Since he and Bryce had nearly gotten blown up, a couple of things were new in Chuck's life. Morgan and Anna had gotten together and gave new definitions to public displays of affection. Chuck had visited Lou and realised that, while she was everything he was looking for, he just wasn't in a place to make a relationship with a civilian work right now. But, maybe one day, he would be.
In view of the positive developments in his life, Chuck had decided to look on the bright side. At least he was still alive to enjoy the dubious pleasures of being the assistant manager of the Buy More and the world's first human intersect. He might not know what the future was going to bring, but he hadn't been turned into radioactive Chuck goo last night, so someone out there had to like him. Even just a little bit.
It was a comforting thought. Or possibly a delusion brought on by another near brush with death, but Chuck was optimistic today. After all, it was Thanksgiving tomorrow. And Chuck had a lot to be thankful for. Almost more than he'd ever have thought.
.
.
Late that afternoon, Chuck stared in bemused horror as Morgan and Anna continued their enthusiastic reacquaintance with the other's tonsils. The pair seemed oblivious to Chuck's presence, Chuck edging slowly away.
"Hey," Morgan called, disengaging from Anna with a muffled pop. "Quick question. It's cool if Anna comes for Thanksgiving dinner, right?"
"Oh yeah," Chuck agreed easily. It was good to finally see Morgan bringing someone for the holiday. "You know how Ellie loves big Thanksgiving dinners. And now it'll be an even eight of us there."
"Is Ellie going to be there?" Anna asked suspiciously.
Morgan frowned a little. "I mean, yeah. Chuck lives at Ellie's apartment."
Anna rolled her eyes. "I know that."
"And she kind of makes all my favourite dishes. You know, like stuffing with apple chips and sweet potatoes and marshmallows."
"And I know that too," Anna gritted out, glaring over her shoulder at Chuck.
Chuck frowned, uncertain why he was earning Anna's ire. "I'm sorry, is there a problem?"
"Not yet," Anna smiled, dropping off the counter and sauntering away.
"She scares the crap out of me," Morgan admitted, watching his girlfriend walk off.
"What is that about?"
Morgan shrugged, playing it cool. "She's got this insane idea that I'm in love with Ellie."
"'Cause you are."
"Why does everybody know that?"
Chuck leaned over the counter towards him. "Because that's what you tell everybody!"
"I don't know what to do man," Morgan sighed, almost defeated. "I'm in love with two women."
Chuck didn't know what to do either. Fortunately, Big Mike saved him from having to form an opinion. "Bartowski! Grimes!" Big Mike stopped in front of them. "What? Does no Larkin mean no work?"
"Hey," Chuck protested, offended at the implication that Bryce was the one with the work ethic among the pair of them.
"Bartowski, round up your team," Big Mike ordered. "Grimes, stay close."
"Where is the Accountant?" Morgan asked, glancing around as if surprised not to see him.
Chuck shrugged, a little disconcerted not to have either of his Buy More employed handlers on site with him. "He's taking a day."
Actually Chuck had no idea what Bryce was really doing. He'd been all but ready to get a lift in with Chuck, when his phone had rung and that had been that. The dimmed light in Bryce's eyes had worried him for a moment, but Bryce had smiled and said that he was needed for another top secret briefing with the Director and General. Briefings that seemed to be happening more and more often lately. So, Chuck had driven in alone.
.
.
Chuck, the Nerd Herders and Morgan lined up in front of the Need Herd centre, Big Mike pacing in front of them like a general preparing for battle. "Tomorrow is Thanksgiving," their manager announced. "Do any of you know what happens after Thanksgiving?"
Jeff waved a hand. "The tryptophan wears off and it's time for the liquor kick in?"
"No," Big Mike disagreed. "I'm talking about Black Friday, people. The biggest shopping day of the year. When regular housewives transform into a crazy mob blinded by door prizes, sales and the urge to get the Christmas shopping done early." Big Mike stared them all down. "On Friday, I'm reassigning you nerds to crowd control. Be here tomorrow for training."
"Tomorrow is Thanksgiving," Chuck felt compelled to remind him. A day they traditionally had off, being that it was a holiday. "So, wouldn't we, as a store, be closed?"
"You got a key," Big Mike reminded him. "Work it out." He turned to Morgan. "Grimes, you know the drill. Get these geeks trained and ready for action."
"Yes, sir," Morgan agreed quickly. Then, his oldest friend smirked, just a little. "What about the Accountant?"
"Can't afford to pay him the overtime," Big Mike sighed, taking a bite out of his pastry.
"We don't get overtime," Lester protested, offended. Yeah, neither did Chuck. Not that he recalled.
"It's not in your contracts," Big Mike called, striding away.
"But, he'll come anyway, right?" Morgan muttered, looking far too gleeful at the prospect of bossing Bryce around.
"No," Chuck shook his head. The idea of Bryce on Black Friday crowd control was honestly a little terrifying. It was bad enough Casey was going to be there. "He's helping Ellie cook. Unless you want to tell Ellie why she's cooking Thanksgiving dinner all by herself."
Morgan shook his head. "No way, man," he said immediately. "I'm not getting myself uninvited."
"Good call," Chuck praised, grinning at his oldest friend. "You remember Bryce's Thanksgiving pies."
"Only good thing about him ever coming for Thanksgiving," Morgan agreed, his smile widening over Chuck's shoulder. "Your former lady is here. Beg for her back, Chuck, then we'll both have girlfriends. It'll be a Thanksgiving miracle."
"Sarah and I are just friends, Morgan," Chuck reminded him, nudging him back to work.
.
.
He crossed the floor to join his original CIA handler, smiling. "Hey, Sarah."
"Hi, Chuck," she smiled back. Things were still a little awkward between them, what with the fake dating thing and the dumping her for Lou thing, but they were getting better.
"So, did you discover why Bryce and I didn't get blown up?" Chuck asked, pitching his voice low so he didn't upset the customers.
Sarah nodded slowly, her expression troubled. "It wasn't a bomb."
Well, Chuck was just going to file that nugget away in the folder marked Information Chuck would have preferred to know before thinking he was going to die. But that didn't explain what that device was or why it had a timer that was counting down.
Chuck let his confusion into his voice. "If it wasn't a bomb, what was so important about it?"
"It was a life support device," Sarah explained, leading him outside for some privacy. "The timer was an oxygen counter."
And that was a whole new level of creepy to explore.
"The person inside?"
"Dead when we got there," Sarah sighed, regretful. "Now we have no idea who he was, why he was so important he needed to be smuggled into the country, or even who wanted to collect him from the docks."
Chuck might only have been in the spy game, albeit peripherally, for a couple of months, but he was getting pretty good at reading when his handlers needed him to flash on something.
"I should warn you," Chuck offered, trying on a smile he wasn't sure he felt. "This thing doesn't always work when I need it to."
"Just look at the body and the inside of the tube," Sarah counselled softly. "If you don't flash, there's nothing more we can do."
Had Chuck mentioned it how much he really hated it when his handlers used sound and logical reasoning? Because, he really did hate that. It made his perfectly rational decisions - like not wanting to look at dead bodies, for example - seem irrational and childish.
"Fine," Chuck sighed, trudging towards Sarah's car. "But if this gives me even more reason for nightmares, the CIA is getting my therapy bill."
.
.
"This is nice and not at all creepy," Chuck muttered, following Sarah through a hidden entrance to an apparently secure CIA facility. It was the kind of nondescript building Chuck passed every day on his drive to work; the kind of building nobody would think twice about. But, on the inside, it was cold and clinical, giving Chuck the kind of unsettled feeling he imagined he would have in an abandoned hospital or a school after nightfall.
Fortunately, Sarah seemed to know where she was going, easily leading Chuck into an elevator and through a maze of corridors. Casey leaned against the wall, his thousand yard stare catching Chuck and Sarah as they turned the corner. He offered an "about time you got here" grunt, pushing off the wall.
"Package is in here," Casey announced, tapping a code into a concealed keypad.
Chuck stared into the room, hesitating to move closer. "I'm really not in the mood to see a dead guy," he said, looking hopefully at Sarah.
Casey rolled his eyes. "This ain't the morgue, genius."
Chuck narrowed his eyes, biting back a sarcastic comment on Casey's sparkling personality and his happiness at seeing Chuck. "The device in there?"
"No," Casey muttered. "We brought you all the way out here just for our own amusement."
"With you, Casey, it's hard to tell."
Sarah stepped in, her eyes narrowed at the pair of them. "Can we get this done, please, before our bosses call to yell at us again?"
That seemed like a fair enough request. So, Chuck followed Casey and Sarah into the sterile, white room. In the middle of the room, the device Chuck had last seen trying to blow him up stood innocently; open like a hospital bed.
Chuck walked up to it, around it, staring as hard as he could. Just like the last time he had seen this device, he rubbed his temples, trying to make the right synapses fire so he could flash on whatever it was the CIA and NSA needed him to.
If Chuck's brain was a magic 8 ball, he imagined the response it would give right now would be my sources say no. Or possibly, given the sarcastic bent of his thoughts lately; concentrate and ask again.
Honestly, if Chuck ever met the designers of the Intersect, he would have to have a word with them about making the interface more user friendly and accessible.
Some time around Chuck's tenth temple rubbing, hard staring circuit of the device, he turned and met Sarah's hopeful gaze.
"Anything?"
"Nothing," Chuck sighed, knowing what that meant.
Casey almost smirked, turning on his heel. "This way to the morgue," he called, exiting the room with a spring in his step.
Chuck glanced at Sarah, finding her watching after Casey with the same mildly exasperated expression. "We have got to find him a hobby."
"I'll leave crocheting catalogues in his apartment," Sarah grinned, her eyes sparkling. "He'll just think Bryce did it."
"That's mean, Sarah," Chuck grinned back. And, the best part was, it was the kind of thing Bryce would do. "What is it with them anyway?"
Sarah just laughed. "I wish I knew," she said, leading the way after Casey. "They already hated each other by the time I was partnered up with Bryce."
Casey glowered over his shoulder at them. "Are we gossiping or are we doing our jobs."
"We can do both, Casey," Sarah smiled, all butter wouldn't melt innocence.
Chuck held up a finger. "And, if I get a vote, I'm going for gossiping."
The furrow on Casey's brow deepened. "You don't."
.
.
At the other end of the corridor, a casually dressed figure stopped, clocked their presence, then turned on his heel and strode back the way he'd come. Maybe it was just wishful thinking, being in a creepy CIA facility and on his way to see a dead body, but Chuck could have sworn that the figure was a familiar one.
"Was that Bryce?" Chuck asked, frowning after the figure that had quickly disappeared. "That looked like Bryce."
"That did look a little like Bryce," Sarah admitted, her frown matching Chuck's. "But he's back in Echo Park, you said."
"He said he had an urgent briefing so he couldn't come into work today," Chuck explained quickly, giving in to the urge to follow the figure of (possibly) his best friend. "Bryce!"
There was a flicker of movement at the other end of the hall, someone moving too fast and too gracefully to be anyone other than his college roommate. "Sorry, Casey," Chuck muttered to his NSA handler. "Why are you holding a gun on me, Casey?!"
Casey blinked once. "I'm not," he protested, but the cry had already achieved it's purpose. And, really, if Casey didn't want Chuck to pick him, he should have been nicer to him.
Bryce reappeared at the end of the corridor, blue eyes burning fire into Casey. He strode down the corridor towards them, expression hard.
"Hey, buddy," Chuck called, waving happily at his friend. "What are you doing here?"
"Classified," Bryce snapped, a muscle in his jaw jumping as he realised he'd been played.
"Classified," Chuck nodded understandingly. Like that excuse could work on him. He pointed at himself, saying cheerfully; "Intersect."
Bryce's eyes widened, almost flinching. "Would you be quiet?" Bryce hissed, his eyes scanning the corridor for anyone not Team Bartowski. "What are you doing here?"
Casey shrugged a shoulder. "Beckman wants to see if he flashes on the body."
"He doesn't need to flash on the body," Bryce said through gritted teeth. "I'm here."
Casey muttered that they could see that, but he couldn't understand why that was important. Neither, for that matter, did Chuck.
Chuck watched Bryce's jaw clench, the muscle jumping painfully. "Buddy," he began softly, reading the danger signs without knowing quite why. "What's going on?"
Bryce glanced around again, his tension getting tension. "You can't be here. It's not safe."
"I'm here with you, Casey and Sarah," Chuck waved helpfully towards his other handlers, in case Bryce had temporarily forgotten what they looked like. "How much safer can I be?"
"You can be a lot safer if you don't get involved in this." Bryce shook his head, eyes wide and imploring. "Not this. Please. Just go back to work and forget you ever got called in."
Really, Chuck had thought they'd gotten past this. "So you've gotta do this alone, huh?"
Bryce looked relieved that Chuck understood. "Yes."
Chuck shook his head stubbornly. "No."
Bryce narrowed his eyes, looking past Chuck to Casey and Sarah. "The body's been identified, the Director and General have been briefed. I'm taking Chuck home."
"Do I get a say in this?" Chuck demanded, grudgingly following Bryce into the nearest elevator.
"None whatsoever," Bryce smirked, his tension lessening as the elevator doors closed.
.
.
"What's so dangerous about me being here?" Chuck pressed, watching the sparkle abruptly vanish from his friend's eyes.
"Everything," Bryce sighed, settling back against the elevator walls. "I told you, I don't trust any other spies with you. Except Casey and Sarah, sometimes."
Bryce had said that once, back when Carina had been trying to get them to help her steal Chewbacca's diamond. But that still didn't explain... "Why?"
"It's complicated."
"Uncomplicate it then," Chuck invited, waving his hand grandly. "I don't see anyone around to stop you."
As if determined to prove him wrong, the elevator began to slow down. Bryce grabbed his wrist, pulling Chuck behind him as the doors dinged open.
A man was waiting for them, cold brown eyes watchful over a scar on his cheek.
"Bryce," the man greeted, and it would have been pleasant if not for the way Bryce had frozen. Those cold brown eyes flickered over Bryce's shoulder to Chuck. "Who's your friend?"
At the sight of him, the sound of his voice, Chuck flashed. He saw a security briefing with the word Fulcrum and a top secret declaration. He saw a lot of dead bodies and the man before him cleaning off a bloodied knife. He saw a list of Fulcrum agents, all photos and numbers redacted save for the man.
Bryce stepped ever so slightly further in front of Chuck, blocking him from view as much as possible. "Stay back," Bryce warned, tone like ice.
"Okay," the man allowed easily, still watching Chuck curiously. "I've been looking for you everywhere. I felt just terrible that we lost touch."
The hand still wrapped around Chuck's wrist tightened minutely, the only sign of tension Bryce gave away. "Tell your people that I'm gone," Bryce said, still in that carefully calm, icy tone. If Chuck didn't know better, he'd say his friend was almost afraid.
The other man took a small step forward, eyes fixed on Bryce. "This is your chance, Bryce," he said, as if they were old friends. "This is me being reasonable. Let's go," he jerked his head down the corridor. "Let's be friends again."
"We were never friends," Bryce gritted out, his grip tightening to the point of near discomfort.
"Ouch," the man deadpanned. "Now my feelings are hurt."
Chuck had no idea what was going on, but by the way the man was talking and Bryce seemed to be fighting back a very real fight or flight response, Chuck knew it was nothing good.
"You're going to run, aren't you?" Scar cheek asked, almost conversational.
Chuck craned his head around Bryce, watching the sarcastic little nod his friend gave.
"Good," Scar cheek smirked, Bryce almost punching the keypad to close the doors and restart the elevator.
Bryce stumbled forward a few steps, leaning heavily against the opposite wall. His wide gaze was fixed on a random spot by Chuck's shoulder, throat bobbing as he swallowed.
"Buddy?" Chuck called softly, moving close enough to put his hand on Bryce's arm. "Are you okay?"
A tiny shake of his head. "They should never have brought you here," he muttered, as if that was the problem right now.
For all Chuck knew, maybe it was.
"Who was that guy?"
Bryce looked away, scanning the elevator as if expecting more uninvited guests. "One of Them."
Oh, one of them. That explained everything.
"What's Fulcrum?"
Bryce's eyes widened impossibly. "You flashed on him?"
Chuck inclined his head in silent agreement. "What is Fulcrum, Bryce?" he pressed, watching his friend's gaze shutter again. "Who are they and how do they know you?"
"It's really, really complicated," Bryce replied, tone light. Far too light for the tension still thrumming through his body, for the flash of fear in his eyes.
Chuck almost thought his head would explode. He'd forgotten how stubborn and prevaricating his friend had been, even before joining the CIA. "Bryce-"
"I need you to trust me about this, Chuck." His friend, still shaken and almost terrible at hiding it, peered at him, worry deepening lines on his face. "You do trust me, right?"
Trust a superspy who had sent Chuck every secret their government had, downloaded directly into his brain and jump-started a life of crippling anxiety and constant danger? Trust his college best friend who disappeared after graduation without so much as a word for nearly five years? Trust Bryce "a CIA trained assassin" Larkin?
"Of course," Chuck said seriously. "There's a lot of reasons I probably shouldn't, but of course I do."
Bryce smiled, a tiny flicker of a thing. "Then I need you to trust me when I tell you that Fulcrum is my responsibility. You are far, far too important to risk where they're concerned."
"Bryce," Chuck began again, not even sure where he was going to go next. There was almost no way to say anything to him that wouldn't seem like he didn't trust Bryce to deal with this as he thought he had to. So, Chuck settled for changing the subject, slightly. "You said you were going to run. Please don't."
Bryce scoffed lightly, leaning a little into Chuck's side. "Like I'd tell him my plans," he said, smile barely even curling his lips. "Ellie will kill me if I stand her up on Thanksgiving."
"And I'll help her," Chuck agreed, narrowing his eyes just enough to ensure Bryce knew he wasn't joking.
"I'm not going anywhere, buddy," Bryce offered quietly. "And you, I'm sorry to say again, are not going to be let out of my sight. Not for a while, at least."
Chuck felt himself grin despite the strange tension still in the air. "We keep this up and I might as well move into your apartment."
He was joking, but Bryce didn't even bat an eyelid. In fact, he almost grinned. "Any time you like, buddy."
