A/N: Feeling the need to do some more of these. I didn't rewrite Season 3. If I did, fanfic style, I would have changed stuff. That was not my goal. That being said, the people who got paid a LOT of money to write some sketchy stuff (at best) wrote it the way they did. So here I am, trying to make rational sense of something that the writer's didn't care enough to make rational sense of. Chuck and Sarah. Sarah fell for him in between the phone fixing and the bomb defusing. Fact. She never fell out, never changed her mind then changed it back. He tells her, on the beach at the end of Goodbye, the same thing, only he fell in love the minute he saw her. Also fact. They "dated other people" as he says, but he also never changed his mind. In order to reconcile Shaw with that, I needed a different angle. And let me just say, anyone reading this who has no idea what it's like to be in love with someone you can't have, you're lucky. People do all sorts of irrational things when they are trying to manage grief and heartbreak. Considering Sarah, who never had a real life, friends, emotional attachments–her heartbreak would be extreme. She had no idea about what he felt until the stake out. None. And he asked about Shaw before he did anything. If she said she was serious with Shaw, Chuck wouldn't have done what he did. They were fluttering around each other. Hannah being gone didn't magically mean everything was ok. They weren't communicating. No mind readers here.

A/N: The earrings. THE WORST SCRIPT ADDITION IN THE ENTIRE 91 EPISODES. HANDS DOWN. Anyone out there championing Fedak/Schwartz and their writing…what sense do you make of that ridiculous premise that she is wearing the diamond earrings that her ex boyfriend gave her…an ex that tried to kill her AND Chuck? She would not have done that. Period. Stupid writing, stupid editing, stupid ignoring the past…whatever it was, it was stupid. So beware, my explanation in Living Dead will be stupid too. Stupid begets stupid. However, in this story, at this point in time, those earrings really are only the second real bit of jewelry she had ever owned (aside from the charm bracelet.) Real as in, a gift. She doesn't still think that after Paris. Trust me. But she thinks it here.

A/N: That whole finish-and-be-a-spy-or-go-home ultimatum? Would they let him go, with the Intersect? Let's use facts. Graham wanted to eliminate him. Once it was up to Beckman, the plan was always bunkering. But…did they want to bunker him after he failed in Prague? No. They just fired him and let him go. Granted, the Intersect wasn't functioning properly, but it was functioning. So here, more of the same. Inconsistent with the past writing, but at least consistent with Season 3.

A/N: There were a total of 5 possible finales for this show, other than the one that was, always teetering on the edge of cancellation. I'm glad I was too young when it was on originally because waiting and wondering would have killed me. Five (Ring, Other Guy, Ring II, Push Mix, Cliffhanger.) Writing within those constraints can't have been easy, especially in a show where each episode builds on the one before. So those little snafus we had to just live with, in order to continually end and then begin again.

A/N: They refer to Anatoli by his first name all but once, so so did I. The whole—not anymore—is significant. He got her to backhandedly admit to feelings for Chuck. Which also implies whatever he did with Sarah he was fully aware that she was in love with someone else while doing it. Why does she say not anymore? Did she really stop loving him? No. I let her explain my interpretation of that reply. Here goes.

When I got back to Castle, Shaw was immediately accusatory. He asked me what the hell happened.

I could see on the monitors that Chuck was already in the steam room at the hotel. I told Shaw it wasn't Chuck's fault. I made sure to point out that in the field, things didn't always go as planned. That was the truth, even if I didn't mention the exact thing that had thrown a wrench into the works.

Anatoli left the steam room, headed to his room upstairs for the meeting. Two of his men stayed behind and questioned why Chuck seemed so interested in them. He flashed, then took out both men with ease, dressed only in a towel.

It was a mission, but I couldn't help but notice Chuck in his relative state of undress. The last time I had seen him bare chested was in the shower in the hotel room when we thought we'd been gassed. Chuck was much leaner now, his muscles more defined but also his overall size was smaller. I found myself getting distracted thinking about it and quickly pushed the thoughts away.

Chuck followed Anatoli to the seventh floor. He snuck into an adjacent room while housekeeping had the door open, then went out on the balcony. I heard him freak out a little at the height, so I encouraged him as best I could. He climbed across to Anatoli's room…in time to witness the mole stab Anatoli to death. The man's back was to Chuck, so there was no record of his face. Chuck made a noise to call him back, and it worked. We got a good view of the mole's face and ran in through our computer system. Hunter Perry.

Shaw congratulated Chuck on a job well done.

Chuck dropped his towel by accident while he was still hanging outside on the balcony. I got flustered, excusing myself from the monitor, with the excuse of running the intel back to Beckman.

Chuck came by to see me at the Orange Orange first thing in the morning. He was all smiles, all proud of himself. I was proud of him too, even if I was upset about all of it. He really had learned so much, come so far, and done so well in such a short time.

Shaw had given me instructions to ask Chuck to dinner at a restaurant at the railroad station. It was to be the final part of the mole mission. He didn't tell me anything else, just that he would explain in the morning.

After Chuck left, Shaw called me to Castle for a meeting, specifically without Chuck. He was acting…strangely…is all I can say. Distant, although he was never close. Harsh maybe, or all business more than usual. It made me uneasy, but I couldn't figure out why.

He said with Anatoli dead, Perry was the only loose end to tie up. Shaw told me he had arranged for Perry to meet Chuck at the restaurant that night. I suggested that was when Chuck was supposed to bring him in.

With his face set like stone, Shaw told me no, that he was ordering Chuck to kill Perry.

My blood turned to ice and my heart almost stopped. That quickly? They were giving him his Red Test? It was almost unheard of to set that up so soon. I started to wonder if that was by very specific design. I had been in DC with him for a week and nothing of the sort was ever discussed.

I asked him why he never told me. He was quick to answer that he didn't tell me because he knew I would have had no part in it. He wasn't wrong. I'd done my best to hide it, but I was stupid if I thought for a second that he didn't know how I really felt about Chuck.

I told him I couldn't do it. That I didn't want Chuck to be able to do something like that. The Chuck I knew, the Chuck I loved, couldn't do that. Chuck had promised me, not that long ago, that he would always be the guy I met, the guy who couldn't do something like that.

The scene of him, holding that man by his throat as the laudanol dulled his conscience…No! That wasn't Chuck. He wanted to be a spy, yes, and this was part of it, the part I had been dreading the most. I could never reconcile the two in my head–Chuck the way he was, and Chuck as a spy.

Shaw was all business, telling me it wasn't about what I wanted. It was about Chuck becoming a spy.

I made my objection known, that if Chuck froze in that situation, that Perry would take advantage. That we could lose him. I said we, but I meant me, only I had just been told it wasn't about me. He manipulated me into going, telling me that if I gave Chuck the order, that he would do it.

How could I do something like that?

What choice did I have? If I refused, Chuck's life was in peril.

I wasn't sure at all about my feelings about Shaw, how to express them. But I know, as he walked away, hatred, like a slow, freezing trickle inside my heart, was stirring.

I was a wreck the rest of the day. I left Castle without another word to Shaw.

I couldn't decide what to wear, how to do my hair, or my makeup. I kept looking at myself and seeing the girl in the hotel mirror, before she had walked out into the Paris night to kill for the first time. I wasn't even thinking about it, and my hair ended up severe, a bun that was so tight it was almost painful. My makeup was plain, my jewelry too much, the purple of my blouse glaring. I didn't like the way I looked, but I didn't care.

Now it was worse. Instead of sitting in front of a mirror, Chuck would be sitting in front of me. I would see him, as he was, and then he would be just as changed as I was. He would lose a part of himself that he would never get back, leaving a festering hole that would continue to consume him from the inside out.

God, what had I done to him?

The temptation to break down was strong. I had to pull myself together, knowing my being calm was the only way. There was a chance, maybe, just a small chance, that he wouldn't go through with it. That he wouldn't let them change him into a monster the way they had changed me. I didn't know, though. It was hard to muster any hope.

I was already seated, in the back, with a good vantage point of the entrance, so I saw him as he entered. He looked so handsome, so dapper as I had said before, as he walked towards me. It took all my strength to hold myself together.

He sat, smiling, complimenting me. I felt as ugly as I had ever felt. I let him talk, until he started to thank me for his being there, at this point in his life.

I felt like I couldn't breathe. I begged him to not say that.

It was my fault he was here, about to do this. It was all my fault. I had transferred my rotting soul into him, poisoned all the goodness in him away, until the man I so admired and loved was almost gone…

I had to stop myself from internally spiraling. I couldn't lose it, or I knew he would.

I handed him the mission packet. Chuck looked wary, concerned, probably because he could see my distress. Chuck opened it and I explained about Perry, whose photograph was in the packet. I slid Chuck his gun, wrapped in the cloth napkin at my place. He narrowed his eyes at me. My lips were parted, because I felt out of breath, like I had just run a mile.

I told him his mission was to kill Perry.

He told me he couldn't do that. I told him that if he didn't, he wouldn't become a spy.

What bothered him most about that, what he vocalized to me, was that, if he didn't become a spy, then we couldn't be together.

I was screaming inside. This was a hopeless circle, a catch 22. I had to tell him no, that we probably couldn't. It would have been like Chuck and Hannah. There was no room for that kind of relationship between a spy and a civilian.

He asked me if he couldn't be a spy, then who would he be?

I told him he would be Chuck, and there was nothing wrong with that. I couldn't say the rest, afraid my voice would betray me. He would continue to be the greatest man I had ever known, the most beautiful soul. Far too pure and good for the likes of someone like me.

I told him that was it, the rest was his decision. I only hoped he made the right one.

He had sacrificed a chance with me before, for the greater good. I was hoping he would do that again. The world was better off with a man like Chuck Bartowski in it, the way he was, not the way he would be when this was done.

I stood, put on my coat, and buttoned it. I forced myself to walk away, feeling the muscles in my legs burning with the effort to hold them still as they wanted to quake in my heels. I passed the entrance and turned back, looking to see him looking back at me too, over the back of his chair.

I didn't know what he would decide, but I knew I was taking a long last look. One way or the other, nothing would ever be the same.

I walked to a bench on the main thoroughfare and waited. After what seemed like forever, I saw Chuck walking by with Perry. Chuck had a gun at Perry's back. I watched as the distance between the two got too wide, then ran into action when Perry grabbed a bystander and used her to distract Chuck so he could run.

I took off after them, but they had a head start. Perry ran out of the station and onto the railroad tracks. It was dark and foggy. It was very hard to get my bearings, to pinpoint direction in the fog and the surroundings that looked like a maze.

I heard a gunshot, one that sounded like it ricocheted off metal. It helped orient me, and I started moving in the direction of the sound. I was still running when I heard the second shot. When I arrived, all I saw was Perry, dead on the ground, while Chuck stood over him with his gun pointed down.

I was already winded from running, and the scene in front of me stole all that was left of my breath. I felt outside my own body, floating above my shoulder. It was like a bomb exploded inside my chest and now nothing was left. I was completely hollowed out, destroyed.

Shaw's voice in my ear pulled me back down to earth.

I told him that Chuck was a spy. It was all I could say. The rest would have been too emotional.

I told Shaw I was going back to my hotel. I didn't want to see Castle or face him. He ignored what I said and came to my hotel to meet me. I needed some time to myself, to let my feelings out, and I didn't feel like I could do that with him there. A few more drips of hatred seeped inside.

Chuck kept calling me. I didn't answer the phone. Shaw was there, but, even if he hadn't been…I had no idea what I would say to him.

Shaw asked me if I was ok, but he knew I wasn't. We didn't have that kind of attachment, talking about feelings like that. I told him I didn't think Chuck would go through with it. It was killing me on the inside, like a thousand needles in my heart, when I thought that he had done that out of some hope that we could be together. That he had done that for me.

I was feeling guilty about all of it, while Shaw tried to give me the-greater-good speech.

He asked me if I was still in love with Chuck.

I was so upset, I missed the significance of that. I had never admitted to being in love with Chuck, not directly. Shaw sort of guessed, inferred, intuited. I denied it, vehemently, but with a "not anymore." I didn't even realize what I'd done until it was out, that I had backhandedly admitted to my feelings for Chuck.

Was that true? No, it wasn't. You can't turn love off like a switch. I loved him, even when I said I didn't. I always loved him. So what did I mean?

That the Chuck I loved was gone. Changed into someone else, just like I was. Only for me, Samantha was far less noble and worthy of love than Chuck had been.

How can you say that you love someone, or something, that you almost single-handedly destroyed? Even if you believe that you do, it must be false. Love creates, it does not destroy. You cannot love that which you intentionally destroy.

And so…everything I ever believed I now questioned. Even the things I had been sure of.

I told Shaw about my Red Test, everything about it, something I hadn't told anyone else about either. Seems he was becoming, by default, the keeper of all my secrets. I didn't know the irony in it, the bizarre facts that had twisted us together when I was telling him the story.

That the woman I had killed on the street in Paris in 2005 was his wife, Evelyn Shaw.

If I had known that, if we had all known that, way ahead of time, things would have been so different.

But instead, I broke down crying and told him to leave. I stood in the shower crying until the water ran cold, until my eyes were almost swollen shut.

I laid awake all night, staring at the ceiling. Every time I closed my eyes I saw either Chuck standing over Perry's body, or me, shooting the woman in Paris.

An endless loop of horror that was going to get worse, before it got better.