A/N: All of Dream Job in one chapter. A lot happens, but many scenes happen with Sarah in the background, so one sufficed. I have Chuck tell Sarah the whole story of his life here, because nothing in canon contradicts that. And I never was sure, at the end, when Stephen tells Chuck to trust Sarah and Casey...does he know they are there? How could he...unless he somehow let them know the whole truth. Again, nothing in canon to contradict it. And Day 564...it's pretty damn close to this, so I tossed that little line in there. I can't wait to get to the end of Season 2! Some of my favorite episodes! So close! Until then, enjoy.
I was both physically and mentally exhausted, but somehow that entire quiet drive with Chuck, I never felt my fatigue. I felt charged, awake…alive.
Chuck did most of the talking, of course. Finding the right words and saying them the right way was never easy or comfortable for me. Sometimes Chuck over-talked, back then almost bulldozing anything I could have hoped to say. He never understood that he was doing that, so it bothered me less than it probably should have. This time, he was so upset—his hours and hours of rambling didn't bother me. I wanted him to feel better. I wasn't used to seeing him quite so distraught, and it upset me. So I let him talk.
But, as I mentioned, because of that, what had just happened, or what had almost just happened—was only lightly touched upon.
Instead, Chuck talked to me about his family. Specifically his father. I knew a little—what he had explained on the first October Mother's Day that I witnessed, and again after Ellie had melted down in front of Devon's parents, and one more time when I had been upset over my own father. This time—he told me everything. And it broke my heart.
How many times did my heart break during this time? I wish I knew. Sometimes my heart broke and I didn't even recognize it; it was always so complicated. I was only sure, for real, after Chuck refused to run with me while he was in Prague. That broken heart almost killed me.
This time—it was a strange, mutual, empathetic break. I didn't have to tell him anything more than he knew; he knew enough, and had inferred so much more without me having to tell him—about how my own father had failed me. I hurt for him, understanding in a way no one but his sister ever could.
He explained it in detail. His guilt at nine years old, believing their mother had left them because of something he had done. His father's devastation after that–his frazzled, distracted demeanor interpreted by Chuck's young mind as abandonment. How he clung to his sister, how she became a sort of mother to him even though only three years older. How hard it was on Ellie and how he was too young to know it then.
How unbelievably destroyed he was after his father had left them. How unbelievably difficult their lives became.
Practically, the issues were real. Ellie was 19 and in college, unable to pay a mortgage on a home in Encino. Chuck was still just in high school. He told me he had offered to quit school and work, but Ellie refused.
Instead, Ellie moved out of her college dorm at UCLA. She took the room and board money and rented an apartment with three other girls. Chuck lived with them.
She worked two jobs and went to school full time. Chuck did odd jobs while he went to high school. Somehow they scraped by.
But emotionally, the damage was worse, immeasurable. Hovering between anger and guilt, Chuck took everything too hard. What had he done that both parents had deserted him and his sister? Always at the back of his mind—what was wrong with him, that everyone who was supposed to care just—didn't?
No grandparents, no aunts or uncles—no one. Two teenagers left completely alone in the world. Chuck's parents weren't drug addicts; Chuck and Ellie were smart, successful kids. It never seemed real, seemed possible. No wonder Chuck had foundered so badly.
First his mother, then his father, then Bryce, Jill, Stanford…Chuck was thoroughly beaten down when I met him.
Of course the truth actually made sense—but this life, working for the government like we did—had no room for the truth. That would have been the case without the absolutely devastating facts that had surrounded Mary and then Steven's disappearances.
Or I should say—Frost and Orion. Make no mistake, there are four people involved, not just two. A very important distinction that I've hinted at previously. Everything is upside down once we know all of that.
But we knew nothing of the sort here, as we pulled up the long dirt road that led to Stephen's airstream. I heard the soft intake of breath from Chuck, like he was surprised that we were successful. He must have thought we might fail again. He had been looking for months with no success.
We got out of the car and walked to the camper. The wind whipped around us, messing Chuck's hair and biting my skin even through my jacket. Chuck had only his shirt—fine for LA, but not lost in the mountains where we were, about 100 miles east of Barstow, close to the Nevada border.
Chuck had mentioned something during that ride that the last place he knew where his father lived was Las Vegas. To Chuck at least, that was said like presenting evidence. That moving here reclusively from the city seemed to be a logical progression.
The truth was as always more complicated. Orion hid for 20 years in the mountains, fairly close to this random spot. The camper was a cover, pulled out and put on display for us.
We were clueless of course, but Chuck's plight was known to Orion since Bryce's original theft. I believe Orion watched us all along, and surfaced now because he knew we were looking.
So Stephen Bartowski let me find him. To protect his cover—as crazy and counterintuitive as it seems.
As we stood there, Chuck was hesitant to approach the place. He stressed the point that it appeared his father didn't want to be found. Ironic, because us finding him was a result of the exact opposite.
I tried to encourage Chuck, hoping that whatever he found here would help him, to come to terms with it himself. And to help his sister.
He knocked on the rickety door, then stood waiting with his hands tucked into his back pockets. The lack of initial response discouraged him. He looked crestfallen.
I felt awful, like after all that I'd failed him. I apologized, reaching and placing my hand on the back of his neck. My hand was cold and his neck was warm and the tenderness flowed from him when he turned to look at me. My thumb caressed his jaw.
I felt pulled to him, drawn to him. A few more seconds and I know I would have kissed him. I wanted to kiss him so badly, almost aching for him to pull me into his arms.
But his father opened the door the second before Chuck would have leaned into me.
"Dad?"
I wasn't sure why it was a question. I wondered if the man looked all that different ten years later, or if Chuck just hadn't aged him appropriately in his recollections. Human nature tends to do that, making us think that once someone is outside of our day to day existence that somehow they magically stay the same age while we change and change.
The entire time, starting now, Stephen was acting. I know this now, but we had no clue then. As with most things, as I recollect in retrospect, I can no longer retain that layer of blissful ignorance. So now, as I remember this, I remember it with all the future attached, a future we would not have imagined or even believed at this point.
"Chuck?" Stephen gasped, staggering backward from the doorway. Between the two, I'm sure Chuck was farther from Stephen's memory than Stephen was from Chuck's. After all, Chuck had been only 16 when Stephen left. Apparently, as is common with boys, since I now have two of my own, two boys with taller than average parents, the later the growth spurts, the taller the boy grows. Chuck was only 5'9" when he was 16, and didn't stop growing until he was 18. He grew seven inches in the two years of growing Stephen missed.
I had thought it odd at the time, but Stephen wasn't as shocked as he should have been, if no spy business was involved. How on earth would Chuck have found him hiding in the mountains like that?
Stephen's act, his cover if you will, was the absent-minded professor, the eccentric engineer Chuck had described to me in my hotel room before. Orion was as shrewd as they came, a mastermind, ruthless and cunning. I'd like to think the real Stephen, Chuck's father, was somewhere in between.
But as absent-minded as he appeared to be, I didn't miss the look in his eyes right before he grabbed Chuck in an awkward hug in the doorway. His eyes were clear, focused, full of love and something I couldn't quite discern then, but now know what actually relief. Chuck's return hug was tempered, awkward, but heart-felt. I watched Chuck squeeze his eyes closed over Stephen's shoulder, his eyes misty when he opened them.
Chuck cleared his throat before he spoke. "Dad, this is my girlfriend, Sarah."
Oh, how I wished that was the truth.
Stephen smiled awkwardly at me, not shaking my hand, an added little idiosyncrasy he put on for our benefit. He invited us inside and told us to sit, that he would make us coffee. Chuck sat stiffly behind me on the worn, lumpy cushions of his camper's sofa.
The inside was dated, looking like it had been modeled in the 1980s. Everything inside looked weathered, overused, in need of replacement. The strangest thing, that kept stealing my attention, was how many pictures he had. In frames all over every surface, on the walls and plastered all over his refrigerator. Every last one was either Chuck or Ellie when they were little. So many baby pictures, so many more than Ellie had in her possession. I wondered if her father had taken every other one that wasn't in Ellie's one album. There were no photos of either of his children older than maybe 12. And not a single photo of Chuck's mother. I had no idea what she looked like.
Chuck was nervous, whispering to me while his father putzed around in the kitchenette, making us coffee. Chuck forgot that he took his coffee black, he was so out of sorts. He stressed the fact that the last time he had seen his father he was…crazy. He had a framed set of pictures in his hand as he talked, of both him and Ellie when they were probably 12, playing baseball or softball.
Stephen handed us our coffee and then he just…smiled at Chuck. I had been trying to encourage Chuck, telling him his father had seemed happy to see him, trying to keep him from freaking out. The way Stephen looked at Chuck was so loving, so fatherly, it filled my heart to overflowing. I couldn't begin to understand what possessed the man to leave his children the way he had, but there was no doubt in my mind that Stephen genuinely loved Chuck and missed him.
"So good to see that face again."
Chuck smiled, that wide, beautiful smile that I loved more than anything in the world. He got a little emotional, needing to look down at the floor as he was overcome.
Chuck tried to catch his father up, telling him about high school and Stanford. Stephen bragged to me about how smart Chuck was, how proud of him he was. It was very sweet, even if we were a little awkward.
Then Ellie came up. Chuck caught him up about his sister, finishing off with the fact that Ellie was about to get married. Stephen got this far away look in his eyes, looking out the window, some internal pain that he didn't want us to see.
That gave Chuck the in, to ask the question he had wanted to ask, why he had sought his father out in the first place. He told his father he was there with the hopes that his father would walk Ellie down the aisle.
Stephen got upset, looking away, then walking away, saying he was sure Ellie really didn't want him there.
Chuck was firm, telling him that she did, that they both did. Chuck stood for emphasis, ridiculously tall in the cramped airstream. Stephen continued to decline.
Chuck looked at me, a sharp look of disbelief in his eyes. He started rambling, arguing.
"Charles, I…can't," Stephen stuttered.
"I-I don't want to hear what you can't do. I've seen what you can't do!"
I felt awful, feeling the disappointment and the anger radiating from Chuck. I couldn't remember seeing him that angry, hearing such sharp words from him.
I watched Stephen wilt, his shoulders shrinking in shame. That emotion was real, not part of the cover. That was Stephen reaping what he had sown years before when he was forced to abandon his children to protect them. For all his arrogance, he regretted how badly he had hurt the people he loved.
Chuck saw how his father had cowered under his wrath, and he apologized, sitting back down in defeat.
"That came out wrong," Chuck said softly.
"No, it didn't. No, it didn't," Stephen replied quickly. "You're mad. I left, and-and you're mad."
"Look, Dad, I'm not even here for me really, okay?" Chuck muttered contritely. "Right now, I just…I want you to come home for Ellie, please."
"I like you coming up here and fighting for Ellie," Stephen said solemnly. "Makes me happy you at least had each other." He sounded so sad, I wondered what on earth could have been so important that he would abandon his teenage children, so that they only had each other. If someone had told me the truth here, I wouldn't have believed it.
Stephen decided he would come back with us. I was amazed, and I could see that Chuck was as well.
Once Stephen walked away, I turned to Chuck. "Are you ok?"
His voice was wispy and soft. "Yeah, I think so. I mean, I'm glad we found him for Ellie."
"And for you?" I asked. He turned to look at me, his eyes so soft and overflowing with emotion that I knew he was too overcome to express.
"Yeah," he whispered. He looked at me again, a soft little smirk on his face.
It made me feel so good that I was able to do this for him. It was easier to show him how I felt than to speak about it, and this was something I had chosen to do because of how much he meant to me. How much I loved him, even if I couldn't express it to him.
Stephen jammed himself into my tiny back seat for the entire trip back to Burbank. I dropped them off late this morning at Chuck and Ellie's apartment. Chuck kissed me goodbye, for the cover, I told myself, but it was sweet, perhaps a little longer than was necessary, but I didn't mind.
Stephen knew I was a spy, of course. I bet he wondered what the real deal with us was, if I was manipulating him. It was not outside of the realm of possibility if he was my asset and I was his handler.
I went home to get some sleep. I had been awake for almost 48 hours by the time I got back to the hotel, so I slept straight through until the next morning.
First thing in the morning, I was summoned from the Orange Orange because Chuck had flashed on a flyer from Roark Instruments that his father had with him.
Beckman called a meeting to explain. The CIA believed the flash Chuck had was because there was a potential virus in the new version of Roark's software that could damage the world's computer infrastructure. Beckman wanted to send Chuck inside Roark Instruments for a job interview in the hopes of gathering more information.
Chuck thought we were embellishing, but I told him that in this circumstance, embellishment wasn't necessary. Chuck had a degree from Stanford in computer engineering. He was perfectly qualified for the job we were asking him to interview for. He was shocked, his self-doubt still so in charge of him despite all the strides he had made.
So Chuck donned a suit and went for his job interview. Casey and I were on the com in Chuck's ear, just to monitor. He really did fantastically on his own. The only stumbling block the interviewer tossed his way was about why he had such a gap in his resume. I told him to be honest. He turned that weakness to a strength expertly. I couldn't have been more proud of him at that instant. He got the job.
The rest of the day was uneventful, but he did invite me to Ellie's for dinner with his father that night. He was gushing about how excited he was, even though he knew it was just a cover. I tried to keep him grounded, not let him get carried away.
"If I had gotten this job at Roark right after college, maybe I'd never become the Intersect."
And I would never have met him. The thought went through me like a knife; I hated being thankful in any way for his misery even when it was my joy.
"Then when my dad comes back after ten years, I can show him that I'm not just another loser working at a Buy More."
"Chuck, he knows you're not a loser," I assured him.
"Well, I'm sure he hoped I'd be doing something a little bigger than Nerd Herding."
"You are," I reminded him.
We went inside. Everyone was already at the table, including Morgan. Ellie had made lasagna and it smelled wonderful.
We were talking when Morgan out of the blue decided to congratulate Chuck on his new job. Jeff and Lester had been waiting outside Roark Instruments Headquarters and saw Chuck. One more time where Chuck's real life and his spy life intersected and not in a good way. Everyone knowing about Chuck's cover job became a problem very quickly.
Chuck's father reacted strangely, not the least bit happy for him, even while Ellie and Devon were fawning over him. I took it in stride.
The rest of the evening was subdued, no more weird outbursts or antics, just casual banter. I saw Morgan pull Chuck aside, I know to ask him how he had managed to find his father after so long. I don't know what Chuck told him, but whatever lie he told, Morgan bought it.
The next day, Chuck's fake first day of his new job, Casey and I were posing as Expo attendees. He passed us on the way into work. We were tasked with retrieving the code for the operating system before the potentially tainted software was launched.
We were in the process of trying to bypass the system security when Chuck told us he just flashed on a Fulcrum agent who was with Roark in the auditorium. We couldn't break through, encountering security we had never seen before.
Of course we had no idea, but if Chuck had been with us instead of posing as a Roark employee, I have no doubt Chuck could have broken through Roark's security in no time. That was child's play compared to Chuck's computer hacking skills. He kept it a secret on purpose. But, because it was just us, we failed.
We had to tell him to stall, using whatever means necessary. Being Chuck, looking for the good in everyone, it never occurred to him that Ted Roark was the problem. So Chuck's solution to that problem alerted the head of Fulcrum that the CIA was on to him. Chuck was better than he had been at the beginning, but he was still amateurish in many ways.
So Chuck got escorted out of the building and fired. Roark released the software.
We failed. We weren't used to that.
Defeated, Chuck went home, telling me at least he had never officially quit the Buy More, so it was like he had never left. There was nothing I could say to make him feel better, so I didn't even try.
He called Casey later that night, sure that Roark had an Intersect somewhere inside his facility. I thought he'd flashed, so I left my hotel and drove to Casey's. It seemed so unlikely; Casey and I were both skeptical. Casey questioned his flash, and Chuck admitted that he hadn't flashed at all, but that he had only been thinking, and thought it made sense. None of it made any sense to me. It was too nebulous for him to be so sure without some type of evidence.
He didn't tell us Orion had left schematics in his room the night we thought he was killed.
Instead, he tried to convince me to help him break into RI.
We were less than 48 hours from the 49B. Did he really think I would just defy orders? Go by my gut and my feelings to potentially help him rid himself of the Intersect? We had just dodged a huge bullet and he was asking me to take another risk so soon? I was a little testy, and I shot him down and walked away.
This time, Chuck actually took Cole's advice about never giving up to heart. We refused, so he decided he was going to break into Roark Instruments on his own. He went into Castle alone and geared up. Casey confronted Chuck in Castle and Chuck tranq'd Casey and took off, rogue, on his personal mission.
I went to look for Chuck in his bedroom and couldn't find him. His tracker was offline, which worried me. I tried to call Chuck and I got no answer. Then I called Casey and I got no answer. I panicked and went to Castle.
I found Casey passed out at the bottom of the stairs with a tranq dart sticking out of his neck.
Casey filled me in–that Chuck had come to Castle for gear so that he could break into RI like he'd asked me to. Casey told me about the plans Orion had left for Chuck, and that Chuck had also asked Casey for help and when he'd refused, Chuck shot him with his tranq gun.
I was frantic, worried sick that Chuck had gone into that situation completely alone. Part of me felt guilty for not believing him, for not offering to help him…and, secretly, for contributing to his desperate need to get the Intersect out of his head. And even in that storm of emotion, what bothered me most, what I couldn't stop thinking about, was that Chuck still kept something from me, after I had asked him if he still trusted me. He obviously didn't, since he said nothing about the plans Orion had left.
Casey and I were on our way to stop Chuck when it hit me, just how utterly compromised I was. There was no way I could deny it anymore. Chuck was on a suicide mission and what was driving me to distraction was the fact that I was so hurt because Chuck didn't trust me.
Someone you love not trusting you…hurts. Someone I loved. Chuck.
I loved him. I loved him.
I had always, hadn't I? Only now, finally, I stopped trying to make excuses, convince myself that it was more complicated, more than just that.
Everything I had ever done since the day I saw him talking to that little girl in the Buy More…I had done because I loved him. Everything I would ever hope to do again, I would do because I loved him.
I was still in my cage…but I could see the way out. And soon, I would finally be free.
But I had to save Chuck. Casey argued with me, furious, telling me he was going to kill Chuck with his bare hands when he got a hold of him.
I don't remember what I said to Casey…or even how I sounded when I said it. But something changed in my demeanor, my delivery. I wonder if that inner realization showed on my face or sounded in my voice. But I know I wasn't Agent Walker arguing with Agent Casey. I was Sarah, pleading with my friend to help me save the man that I loved.
He never argued, barely batted an eyelash. He grunted, nodded, and followed me out of Castle.
Casey and I were on our way in his car when I received an encrypted message on my phone. It was a recording.
Chuck's father. Or, I should say, Orion. That was the moment I knew.
Now, I know, after Chuck told me, that his father told him he didn't tell Chuck the truth after he let us find him because the story was so outlandish, Chuck would never have believed him.
Why did I believe him?
Because I had spent my whole life being other people, living other people's lives. Taking on identities and never truly knowing who I was.
The man speaking in the message had Stephen Bartowski's voice, but he was not Stephen Bartowski. He was sharp, to the point, and he had information no one but Orion would know. He explained the helicopter and the fakery of his death, and his plan to help Chuck remove the Intersect from his head. "My greatest fear came true…I tried to protect my family from my spy life, and it ensnared my son anyway."
Bryce, of course, in cahoots with Orion, though acting outside of what Orion wanted. A pain point between the two men. Bryce argued that Chuck was best suited for the Intersect and Orion wanted him as far away from the spy life as possible. Bryce being Bryce, thinking he knew better than one of the greatest spies ever known to the CIA.
My eyes were full of tears by the end of that message. It had tripped, on automatic, because something had gone wrong inside RI. A panic button, if you will. It ended with a plea. "This has gone wrong and Chuck needs your help. If you care for him as much as I believe you do, please help him. He's going to need you."
Casey was dumbfounded, unable to speak, after he heard all of that.
We made our way into RI with little resistance, seeing all of Roark's men were in the Intersect room with Chuck and Orion.
Orion negotiated with Roark for Chuck's release, knowing Casey and I were there to make sure Roark kept his word and didn't harm Chuck if Orion went with them.
We were there to watch Orion saying goodbye to Chuck, for what he believed was the last time. I heard Orion tell Chuck he could trust us.
Chuck was close to hysteria, screaming, terrified of losing his father. It took both Casey and me to hold him back, and still I stumbled, struggling to hold him. His adrenaline had surged and he had almost superhuman strength.
It took superhuman strength on my part to convince Chuck that he needed to leave with us.
In Casey's back seat with Chuck as we drove away, I held him. He was crying, speaking so quickly I couldn't understand what he was saying. I don't think words were necessary–I knew what he was feeling. I could feel it all myself, like his pain was mine, like our nervous systems were connected.
Because I love him. The words wouldn't leave my head.
We went back to Casey's apartment so he could contact Beckman and let her know what had happened. I stayed with Chuck while he explained.
I could tell Chuck was in shock, staring ahead but not really seeing anything. He was speaking slowly, with almost no inflection, rambling random thoughts, disconnected observations about what had just happened.
"Do you know…I can break codes with the Intersect? Like, force a flash and it…works."
In the midst of all that trauma, it stuck out, because it was something new, something no one knew about.
I was already in a state, almost in shock after everything I had learned. But those words struck a chord in me.
Sam. Hadn't Graham mentioned something about his code breaking ability and the Intersect program? It seemed so long ago, from another life almost, but I did recall. The algorithm was built using Sam's technique. And it was inside Chuck's head. It seemed surreal…or like destiny.
Beckman ordered a raid on RI and we stayed the night in Castle. Chuck was too wound up to go home and explain anything to Ellie, too emotional to hide it successfully from her. He got a little sleep, maybe only a few more minutes than I did.
We woke to the bad news that the raid had come up empty–no Intersect, no Stephen Bartowski.
Beckman assured Chuck that no one in the CIA knew that Orion was Chuck's father. For that, I know she was telling the truth, for all the reasons I've mentioned before. Orion's protection was effective, his identity perfectly hidden.
Beckman assured us her best team was "on it." Chuck argued back that we were her best team. Casey agreed. I argued that it was too dangerous, that Fulcrum knew Chuck was Orion's son. It was why Orion had stayed away from his family–to keep that information out of Fulcrum's hands.
Chuck wouldn't have any of my arguments. He made an impassioned plea to Beckman, that if Fulcrum succeeded, that they won, and Chuck himself would become obsolete.
She agreed, and left the mission in Chuck's hands, provided he kept his emotions out of it.
I was terrified, but I knew how upset he was, how awful he felt, so I stopped arguing and instead decided to support him.
"Are you ok?" I asked, once Beckman signed off.
He had tears in his eyes. "I have to go home and…tell Ellie…that…he's…gone again." He swallowed hard. "All this time…she hated him…we hated him…and he was only protecting us…and I can't even tell her that."
He was about to break down again, but he pooled his strength and pulled himself together, as if remembering Beckman's words about personal involvement.
"Just…be with her, Chuck. Try to be understanding. We'll figure this out."
He left to go home, dreading the meeting with his sister. I went home to my hotel and cried, almost the entire night.
Knowing that I was in love with Chuck, but having absolutely no idea what to do about it.