A/N: Less readers again, and very few reviews, for the last chapter. I'm sure the problems accessing stories in the last week has played a part in that. For those still with me and leaving reviews, thank you.
As usual, thanks to MicroGirl1225 for pre-reading this.
This chapter continues with Chuck's perspective at the Casey residence, but will have some of Sarah's perspective far away, too.
Far Distant Chuck
Chapter 8
The next day, Chuck stopped reading the Intersect manual having decided to read up on how his parents were involved. That would be in the notes Volkoff kept.
The first thing he found wasn't anything related to the Intersect. It was a series of images from a wedding. His parents' wedding.
He almost dropped his datapad when the image appeared. The two of them were much younger than he remembered them. His dad looked handsome, but it was his mom that took his breath away; she was stunning. Almost as stunning as the woman Chuck had on his mind so much of the time.
As he gazed at the image, he knew the parents that he'd known had suffered a lot since this had been captured. From what he knew, they'd been married for nearly fifteen years before they decided to have kids. Their worn features from when he last saw them were as if they'd aged far more than twenty-five years.
He didn't get to read any notes that day, but spent it looking through the wedding images.
Alexei and Grace Volkoff were in some of the images, also looking much younger, along with many individuals that Chuck had never met. He recognized his mom's parents from the Gunter research he'd done, and possibly her sister, but no one else. That was a sobering thought. Friendships didn't last, or at least not for his family.
The fact that he'd never met any of the Gunters was also telling. He didn't even know what his dad's family looked like, although he believed that some were on the images here. His parents had completely cut off ties with their families.
Maybe the Gunters wouldn't know where Ellie could've gone.
The next day, he decided not to read about his parents' involvement. Thinking about them the previous day had been difficult to say the least.
He decided to just review notes Volkoff captured on the remote base. Some of what he read would've found its way into the manual, but the story of what Volkoff learned may inspire Chuck.
Starting from Volkoff's time on the base, meant that Chuck managed to skip past the descriptions of what was done to use the Intersect before that. Some of the images of implants to accept the connections alone were sickening. He certainly didn't want to know what those felt like.
As he scanned through the notes over the following days, he made his own notes, capturing Volkoff's words on the key events.
xxx
Day 57
Today I made a breakthrough. The first message from the helmet got through to my mind. I couldn't make sense of it, but it was still significant.
.
Day 64
Today's message got through and my brain was able to understand it. I'd never known how to prepare and cook excrax, but now I do. Shame I'll never catch or buy one while I'm here, and therefore will have forgotten how to cook them long before I even return to civilization. Those herds of excrax are safe from me.
.
Day 92
I've been wearing the helmet for thirty-nine days now, only removing it when I sleep. That's because I recharge the device during that time. I'm going to fit it with long-life batteries, and will create some soon. Just another essential item missed when I fled civilization.
.
Day 98
After forty-five days of wearing the helmet and downloading information for forty-one of those, I've had to stop. The headaches have been getting worse each time I download. I need to work out what is going wrong and fix it.
.
Day 133
Pretty miserable today. I finally conceded that proceeding without Stephen and Mary was restricting what I can achieve.
The Intersect is designed to work with Stephen's brain, and Mary was the one who worked out how to make the brain and Intersect work together. I suspect that if they had kids they'd have less trouble than me using it.
Mary would probably be able to enhance it to work with mine and not cause these headaches, but Stephen and Mary have disappeared, just as I told them to.
.
Day 157
Still haven't managed to create a tool to suppress the headaches, but I can't wait. I have to restart my testing.
.
Day 194
The testing I've done has shown that information is less painful than skills. And enhancing existing skills less than totally new ones. Images can be downloaded relatively easily. I've even found a way to route them via my brain to the printer. How amazing is that?
xxx
Chuck stopped capturing his own notes at that point.
He'd found out that he could use the Intersect to enhance his own ability to access hidden information and analyze it to combine what he found into a composite picture. That meant he could access the Republican Guard's data store and find Sarah. It was very tempting.
However, he'd vowed not to use the Intersect again, so he put that thought to one side.
Captain Sarah Walker's achievements in stopping The Force from acquiring the Intersect had been noted. She probably would have been promoted had she and the man with her not had to destroy it.
As it was, she and her squad were sent out to another planet where The Force were trying to take control.
It felt like a demotion because she'd been the most senior on the journey back from what was now known as the Intersect planet. That had put her in charge of the ship as well as her team, whereas now it was just the latter.
The reduction in responsibility wasn't the only loss she felt, though.
Sarah hadn't realized how much her partnership with Chuck Bartowski had meant to her.
She knew that trying to keep in touch with him was futile. They'd never meet again and it would only increase the sense of loss if she tried. She needed to put that episode of her life behind her and focus on being the best of the best.
However, she found herself worrying about him, that Casey wouldn't be able to adequately protect him. Consequently, he remained a background distraction.
Five weeks after seeing Chuck walk out of her life, he crashed back in, or rather his needs and image did. His flier had been impounded by the local police when they found it abandoned at Volkoff's farm. She was asked whether the Guards had any further need for it.
She should've just replied that they didn't, but after asking whether he was present at the pound himself, and being told he was, she couldn't resist seeing him again.
Unfortunately, she wasn't alone and had to put on her professional appearance.
Seeing him was a reminder that he meant more to her than he should. It also reminded of her concerns for him, particularly as he had taken the Intersect helmet. She cautioned him about research without being specific. He seemed to understand what she meant.
After that, she had a mixture of feelings. She was pleased she'd managed to caution him, but looking at his face had brought him to the forefront of her mind again, which was distracting.
Just over two months later, Sarah had just finished another mission. Her team had thwarted an attempt by The Force to intercept a shipment of key parts to a weapons' plant on Xantari. The plant itself was secure but the route that the supplier had chosen was not.
Sarah was with her team and had just finished a debrief with them, when she got a call. She'd been given Casey's caller ID in case of emergencies, and instantly panicked. Was Chuck in danger?
She immediately started to consider ways to get to him, and how long that would take, but realized that may be premature.
She accepted the call and listened to what Chuck had done.
She kept her professional face on, but inwardly cursed the idiot. Surely the impact using the weapon had had on his sleep, Chuck would've known that reading the weapon's manual would bring back those nightmares that she'd helped him through.
She wanted to reach across the void, grab his shoulders and shake some sense into him. She didn't tell Casey but she decided that she would call Chuck later.
The call several hours later, within her quarters with the sound-proofing activated, made Sarah acknowledge that she wanted to stay in touch with Chuck Bartowski, somehow.
It was crazy, but they'd both admitted that they missed each other. Doing it herself had surprised her. it was so unlike her, but now Chuck knew her thoughts on that.
As the call ended, Sarah wondered when she'd next hear from him.
Six months later, Sarah and her team were to join with another team for a raid on a suspected Force base. This was what she'd signed up for. Taking the fight to the enemy.
The three skirmishes she'd been in since leaving Chuck had been unsatisfactory. Exhausting, but hadn't progressed the fight much. However, the intel they acquired on the last one had been encouraging.
So, now they hoped to make a big impact, much like she and Chuck had all those months ago.
Sarah knew that everything she did now was both referenced in time since Chuck and measured against what the two of them had achieved.
She sighed to herself. Her past life had all been about personal achievements or what she'd led her team to achieve. She'd not thought of others, not even her family.
Now, Chuck Bartowski filled her thoughts when she was not focused on planning and missions, even though she'd not heard from him since that call after his nightmare. She hoped that meant no more nightmares. She had told him only to call in emergencies, but wished that he had called.
She told herself that was why this mission was so important, to take her mind off him. She wasn't allowed to be with him, so she should try to forget about him, but that just wasn't happening. Those two calls with him had proved that. The formal one had tugged at her, but her illegal one when she knew he was having problems, did so much more. Their conversation felt almost like when they were together. He made her smile and feel like a woman rather than a guardsman.
She'd had to acknowledge that her feelings for him were much more than friendship, which alone was something she'd not really had before. You thought fondly of friends, didn't you? Like you thought of your family. However, they didn't make you want to be with them, like Chuck did to her.
It was foolish. Her life didn't have room for a relationship, and certainly not with someone like Chuck, the protected one. He was also probably the only person who was capable of understanding the Intersect. And more than that, the only living person who had used it, although no one else knew about that.
She worried about him getting caught by The Force, but it was more than that. She cared about him.
She dropped her head into her hands. She had to put thoughts about that man out of her head and focus on the upcoming mission. Maybe she needed to spend less time in her quarters, and more with her team.
She got up off her bed and headed out.
The other team had gone ahead without them. Sarah was fuming. She knew the other captain. Thrace Praxil thought his team was superior to hers, as well as himself being better than her, even though she had won more credits.
So, he'd obviously decided he wanted all the glory this time and hadn't waited. Consequently, he and his team were not where they should be when Sarah and her team arrived.
Four of his men were soon found, dead in the street leading to the target. Thrace was not one of them.
Sarah led her team cautiously forward. Now it was more than an attack on one of The Force's bases; it was also a rescue mission.
They knew which building was their target, but that was all. Sarah wished that they at least had a plan of the building, but they were going in without.
It was almost as if someone was reading her mind, because a message appeared on her communicator. No one should be calling, so this must be important.
She looked shocked at the message she had received.
* You need this *
It was from Chuck and what followed was a series of floor plans of the building ahead.
She stopped her team and sent the plan to each of them.
"What-" one of them started.
Another said, "Where did you get this from?"
She obviously didn't name Chuck. She was trying not to think what he'd done to get it, or how he knew they were here. "It was just sent through." She looked at them. "From a trusted source."
They accepted her word, as always. They planned their attack with this additional information and Sarah felt better about what was to come.
She deliberately avoided thoughts of wanting to know the positions of The Force's men, or the guardsmen. She seemed to have gotten it in her head that Chuck was reading her mind, and she didn't want him getting caught trying to find out more for her.
The team split into three and they advanced.
Chuck avoided using the Intersect helmet for a few months. He read more and more about the Intersect and the device, though.
The fact that it was designed for his dad and Volkoff believed that his children would inherit that from him, gave him confidence in his ability to use it safely.
The experience of learning a new skill wasn't something he wanted to remember, but enhancing existing skills did appeal.
He finally gave in and he now felt vindicated in doing so.
Chuck sat back and removed the Intersect helmet, and put it back in its hiding place.
His worry about Sarah had driven him to do far more than he should, even before putting the device on this last time.
However, there was no way that he could track Sarah down without accessing the Republican Guard systems. He was good with computers, but didn't even know where to look. He knew how he could achieve that, though.
He'd vacillated for a few days before deciding that Sarah was worth the risk. He knew that really, but putting the helmet back on was something he'd never wanted to do again.
That first usage was just to find a way into the Guard's systems without being detected. It seemed far too easy when the Intersect got him in.
He'd planned to remove the headset at that point, but it advised him not to do that. That it could track her much quicker. His desire to find her overrode his normal concerns.
It was an hour later that he had found both her mission details, but also where she and her team currently were.
Reading her mission brief felt like an invasion of her privacy, so he stopped then.
The helmet was quickly secured away.
He had another bad dream that night. Sarah wasn't killed, by him or anyone else, but she was captured by The Force.
The following morning, when on his own again, the helmet went back on his head.
He knew two teams were to raid a building on the planet she was soon to land on. Knowing they had so little information, he immediately started his search for plans for the building. Again, the Intersect was fast. In less than ten minutes, he had secured the floor plans. He downloaded them onto his communicator and was about to send them to Sarah when the buzz about the other team fired up on the Guard messaging system.
He stopped what he was doing and listened in. The other team hadn't waited for Sarah and had attacked without her and her team. All were captured or killed. Sarah would have received that message, and was closing in on the building.
Chuck wished that she'd abort, but he knew her. She would want to rescue the other team, even if the mission failed.
The nightmare of her dying came back to him. He clenched his fists to fight that back. That awful weapon wasn't in use yet, even by the Republican Guard. He focused on what he had to do. Sarah needed this information, now more than ever.
He had planned to route it via the Guard systems but didn't want to delay things.
After sending it, he got a message back.
* Thanks *
He sat back hoping it would be enough to give her and her team the edge they needed.
Chuck heard nothing more for Captain Walker.
The following day, he had to know what had happened. He didn't need the helmet to gain access. He now knew what to do.
His heart sank as he read the outcome. Sarah and her team had attacked the building. They were outnumbered. Two of her men were killed. They managed to find and release the prisoners, who were of little help due to how they'd been treated. Sarah was wounded and knocked unconscious, but her team managed to get her and the other team out.
They were on their way back.
The mission was regarded as a failure, and although the blame was planted on the other captain's shoulders, Sarah would be reprimanded for focusing on rescue rather than the attack.
Chuck had to console himself with the fact that she was still alive.
Four weeks after the raid, Sarah surfaced from unconsciousness. She didn't know it, but she'd been placed in stasis for the journey back to base, so had slipped from unconsciousness, into frozen stasis and back during those weeks.
Unfortunately, dreams accompanied her final stages, or rather nightmares of Chuck being taken by The Force because they had discovered that he'd used the Intersect.
She couldn't demand to know his status. That would highlight both her continued connection with him, and she'd also be questioned as to why she was concerned. There was no way that she would tell anyone that he'd provided the intel they needed for the raid.
What she did do, once doctors allowed her commander to talk to her, was ask about the results of the mission.
"The mission was a disaster," Commander Page responded. "I mostly had you exonerated from any blame, but being unable to take that base has still darkened your record."
Her heart sank. "And Captain Praxil?"
"Will not be leading a team again," he responded.
"Will- will I?"
He nodded. "The rescue was successful. Two of your men died, but you and the rest got all the living members of the other team out, obviously including you in your unconscious state. Your team told us that before getting out completely, you held off The Force single-handedly for several minutes before being hit. They sang your praises. Your leadership saved them, they claimed." He gave her an odd look. "There was some confusion over where you acquired the plans for the building from, though."
She wasn't going to say it was from Chuck. She remembered her communicator getting smashed part way through the raid, so any evidence was lost. "I received it from somewhere, but don't know the source. It was invaluable."
He sighed. "I can imagine. Your communicator was lost, and there were no traceable signals sent to it. I guess we'll never know."
You clever thing, Chuck.
"So when can I get back to my team?"
"Not until the doctors clear you for duty again, but the team is out, anyway." She raised an eyebrow. "Lieutenant Fraxier is in temporary command."
"So, what do I do?" she asked.
"Recover, obviously. Your main doctor suggested time off." He looked critically at her. "You've never taken any."
She had no idea what she would do with time off. "How much time will I have?"
"It'll be at least five weeks before your team returns."
A trip to Paldane sprang into her head. Could she persuade Casey to let her see Chuck?
A/N: This Intersect is obviously different to the one in the show, and even able to communicate with the user.
If you can leave a review, I'd love to know your thoughts on this chapter.