This one refers to the episode Chuck vs. the Marlin. :D

~cosette141


Chuck looked up as Ellie walked inside the apartment. She waved as she walked in, but Chuck paused.

"Is everything okay?" asked Chuck, noticing that Ellie's hand looked very empty. Awesome's great grandmother's ring was quite the statement and hard to miss.

"Yeah, why?" asked Ellie, hanging up her purse on the coatrack, and suddenly going tense. "Why?" she asked, a little more concerned. "Did… some spy thing happen?"

"No, no, no," said Chuck quickly. "The city is safe." Ellie breathed out, and Chuck hated always stressing her out by accident ever since she learned his secret. "I meant," he began, "just… uh… y'know, is everything okay with you and Awesome…?"

Ellie's brows kneaded in confusion, only understanding when Chuck gestured with his own empty left hand.

"Oh!" said Ellie, laughing with what sounded like amused relief. "Yes, we're fine," she laughed. She started sifting through the mail on her way to the kitchen as Chuck breathed out in relief this time. "I dropped off the ring at a jeweler's—there's some damage to it. I noticed it after Devon gave it to me but he said he'd had it for ages and has no idea where it could have gotten—"

Chuck felt his mouth go dry.

"Who's the ring for?" the Fulcrum agent, Lizzie—Schwarma Girl, he coined her—taunted as she flashed the ring on her finger.

That ring had gone through a four-foot-long Marlin, traded hands with Morgan, Lizzie and a dumpster with miscellaneous DNA.

He'd nearly forgotten about the poor ring's trauma.

"—by Tuesday, which is faster than—Chuck?"

Chuck blinked.

Ellie paused when she saw his face. Then— "Not that look," she almost groaned. "Don't tell me…"

Chuck winced. "Okay, I promise it wasn't my fault!" At her deadpanned glare— "Really you should blame Awesome because he entrusted me with it so I entrusted the Buy More with it, but then the store got robbed, but not by real robbers, it was actually the NSA—"

"Wait," she held up a hand. "I remember that—they thought it was some sort of elaborate prank. The NSA robbed the Buy More?! Why?"

"They, uh…" Chuck winced again. "They kinda found out a Fulcrum spy was, well, spying on us and planting bugs around the store. Since we initially used the Buy More's Home Theater Room as a base of operations—"

"The Home Theater Room?" deadpanned Ellie in disbelief. "In the middle of a retail store?"

"Yeah, I never really understood how that lasted as long as it did," muttered Chuck. "But yeah, so… they had definitely heard our conversations and we had reason to believe they knew… well, about me." he finished in a grimace.

"What?" asked Ellie, eyes wide.

"Uh, you know what?" he said instead, backtracking at Ellie's fear. "I actually have no idea what happened to your ring—"

"Chuck." said Ellie firmly.

Chuck always wondered how Ellie scared him more than an armed Sarah or Casey.

He sat down obediently at the dining room table as Ellie stared him down. He sighed. "Look, the good news is: it turned out fine! That Fulcrum agent is in a CIA holding facility somewhere, I am here safe and sound, and your ring made it home… mostly in one piece." He tried for a smile.

"Just in case," mumbled Ellie distantly.

Chuck's brows kneaded. "What?"

"Just in case," she repeated, looking at him, eyes crinkled. "That day you… you and Casey. You were acting weird— well, at that point it was par for the course." Chuck couldn't disagree. "You were looking for a fish, and then…" Her brows shifted in confusion. "You hugged me and told me it was just in case… you couldn't find the fish," she said slowly.

Chuck swallowed, remembering that day all too well.

"What is it? What is it you're not saying?"

"If we don't find the receiver within 24 hours, you'll be stored in an underground bunker for so long you'll forget what fresh air smells like."

Save for the day Ellie found out his secret, Chuck had never been so scared of losing his sister.

"I wracked my head about that for days wondering what had gotten into you… Devon and I even considered if you were on drugs." She shook herself.

Drugs would have explained a lot, thought Chuck.

"What was that hug just in case of?" asked Ellie cautiously.

Chuck sighed. But if he didn't tell her, her imagination would make up something worse.

Bracing himself, he let the truth spill out.

"The bugs that the Fulcrum agent planted in the store needed a receiver to store the data," said Chuck. "That meant that if we could find it before the agent got to it, we could destroy it and I would be safe. If we didn't find it, then Fulcrum would… know." He nearly saw Ellie shiver, and he knew she was remembering the day she found out his secret. "General Beckman gave us twenty-four hours to find the receiver, or they were going to put me underground permanently for my safety." His eyes burning, he looked at Ellie.

"Just in case… you weren't going to see me again?" she whispered.

Chuck swallowed hard, nodding.

Ellie's hand covered her mouth, her eyes crinkling.

"Hey," said Chuck, getting up and pulling her into a hug. "I'm right here."

She hugged him tight. And he suddenly felt something he hasn't often felt.

How much she needed him.

Usually she was the big sister and sometimes motherly figure in his life, whom he couldn't imagine living without.

But here, he was the pillar.

"I'm not going anywhere," he said softly. "Casey and Sarah defied orders to keep me here. You don't have to worry about me, El. I've got the best watching out for me."

Ellie pulled away, wiping a few tears off her cheeks. "What happened?"

"We found the receiver and the Fulcrum agent," said Chuck. "Sarah kicked her ass off a roof and into a dumpster," he laughed a little to himself. "The agent didn't tell Fulcrum about me, and she went straight to a CIA facility. And then Sarah and I spent eight hours looking in that dumpster for where the agent dropped your ring."

Ellie's eyes widened. "You what?"

Chuck winced. "Yeah, I know, I'm sorry—we looked for your ring the whole time we were looking for the receiver too—Morgan apparently found the ring and put it in the fish and the agent found it and wore it and it must have gotten damaged in her fight with Sarah or them falling in the dumpster and I saw things in that garbage I still see in my nightmares sometimes—"

"After all that you went through," said Ellie, "you spent eight hours in a dumpster?"

"Sarah offered to get you a new ring," Chuck relented, "but it was Awesome's great grandmother's ring and you deserved something that special and—"

"I can't believe you did that for me," she said in a small voice.

Chuck shrugged a little. "I'd do anything for you."

Ellie's face crinkled again with emotion and she hugged him again. "I love you," she said.

"I love you, too, El," said Chuck, hugging her back.

But Ellie pulled away, and started back toward the door, reaching for her purse.

"Where are you going?" asked Chuck.

She smiled. "To get my ring back from the jeweler."

"But I thought you said it wouldn't be fixed for a few days?" asked Chuck.

"I don't want it to get fixed anymore," she said. "Any girl can have a perfect ring. But mine is going to always remind me of what my family went through to make sure I got it." She smiled, and Chuck returned it.

She moved to leave, then paused.

And walked back to Chuck for another hug.

"Just in case," she said, so quietly he barely heard her.

He hugged her back. "I'll be right here when you get back," he promised.

She smiled, pulling back and then leaving, her gaze lingering on him a moment before shutting the door.


An hour later, Ellie walked back into the apartment, heart beating a little faster with flashes of fear playing in her head.

But Chuck was right where she left him, sitting next to Awesome who had gotten home from work, and the two were talking about some form of water sports.

Ellie smiled from them to the chipped ring sitting on her hand, back where, and how, it belonged.

Somehow even more beautiful now than it was before.