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"I'm gonna fix this Ellie, I swear. I know that you think I'm, I'm just Chuck, your screwup little brother…but there's a lot about me you don't know. See, I'm, I'm…I'm also Chuck, the guy with all these important government secrets in my brain. I can make this better, I will make this better. God, everything is so different now, Ellie, everything is so different now. I used to be able to come to you and ask your advice about anything. And now my whole life is like, a lie." From episode 1x08, Chuck versus the Truth.
*
Chuck wakes up early in the morning, before his alarm's even gone off. For a second he doesn't understand why he's up so early, why there's this cold ache in the pit of his stomach, and then the memories of last night come back with a rush.
Oh God. Last night's mission that had gone so horribly wrong—Ellie, Ellie's stricken face as she'd worked everything out, as she'd seen Chuck standing there, wearing his mission gear and—oh God.
Chuck stares at the ceiling and wonders if it's too early to call Devon and Ellie, check in on how they're doing, find out if Ellie's any less upset than she was last night, although Chuck seriously doubts that. The look on her face—the sheer disbelief as Chuck had tried to fumble through an explanation. And the more Chuck had tried to explain, the worst it had gotten, until they'd finally had to call a halt on everything thanks to the late hour and the fact that Ellie looked like she was two seconds away from her head exploding.
Chuck's stomach twists at the memory, and he tosses back the sheets and gets out of bed, because there's no way he's going to be able to get back to sleep. After brushing his teeth, Chuck ends up in the kitchen of the apartment that he still can't quite think of as his, not yet anyway. He thinks about getting some breakfast, maybe pouring a bowl of cereal, but his stomach is still in knots, so there's not much of an appetite for sugar today.
After about twenty minutes of brooding—he hopes it's manly brooding, although he has a sneaking suspicion that it looks more like he's moping—Chuck finally can't take it anymore, and he calls.
Devon's the one who picks up the phone. "Hey, Chuck," he says wearily, sounding—well, sounding a lot like Chuck feels right now.
"Devon, hey," Chuck breathes. "Sorry to be calling so early, just…how is she?"
Devon sighs softly on the other end. "Not sure. She's still in bed, but if last night was any indication, it's not—it's not good, bro."
"She's really upset, huh?" Chuck asks weakly. He knew that, of course, but still—
Devon's voice is still weary, and more than a little rueful when he says, "Well, she made me sleep in the guest bedroom last night, so yeah, I'd say so."
Chuck blinks, right before he asks incredulously, "Wait—she's pissed off at you?"
Devon pauses for a long moment before saying, "Chuck, man, I think she's pissed off at just about everybody right now."
Chuck didn't think his stomach could sink any lower, but it's somehow found a way to do just that. "Oh."
"Look, Chuck, it's just a lot to hear, you know? And it's not just you, it's—it's Sarah really being a spy instead of your girlfriend, it's Casey, it's me keeping this huge secret from her—it's your dad, man, and just—it's a lot to hear. She needs some time to process."
"Right, of course, I get that," Chuck says quickly. Of course he gets it. It's been over two years and Chuck can still barely process what his life's turned into. Ellie's had less than twenty-four hours to come to terms with her brother being a spy, her dad being a spy, not to mention the rest of the insanity that comes with having the Intersect as a part of your life.
Chuck gets it. He just wishes he could get that memory of Ellie's expression out of his head, that moment when he saw the truth breaking across her face, and he realized that his relationship with his sister might never be the same again.
"So, uh—are you coming to this briefing with Beckman?" Chuck asks at last. "I know Ellie's mad, but uh, I figure she could use the moral support. I know I could."
"Yeah, man, I'll be there," Devon assures him. "Least I can do."
They say their goodbyes and hang up, and Chuck sets the phone down on the counter, realizing that he was wrong—it is possible to feel worse than he did when he woke up.
Maybe because he's got a briefing with General Beckman and his sister's going to be there and just—God, his worlds are colliding and he has no idea how to deal with it.
"Chuck?" Sarah's coming into the kitchen now, and God, sometimes Chuck thinks that he'll never get used to sharing an apartment with her, being roommates with her. She smiles at him sweetly, running her hand through her tousled hair, but her smile quickly fades at the look on his face.
"What's wrong?"
Chuck lifts up the phone. "I just got off the phone with Devon. Wanted to see how Ellie was this morning. She's still asleep, so I didn't get a chance to talk to her or anything, but…" He lets his voice trail off, and slowly sits down at the kitchen table. "Sarah, last night was a disaster."
"It wasn't exactly one of our more successful missions, no," Sarah admits ruefully. "Chuck—Ellie'll learn to accept this eventually."
Chuck nods rapidly. "Yeah, I know, but—God, Sarah, the way she found out. I never wanted her to find out that way."
Sarah sits next to him at the table. "I know you didn't," she says, her voice filled with sympathy.
Chuck's throat tightens, and he blurts out, "It's just—she saw me carrying a gun, Sarah. I've never…the most dangerous thing she's seen me wield before is the carving knife I used on the turkey that one Thanksgiving dinner." He falls silent, and stares at his own hands for a little bit.
"Last night my sister was looking at me like she didn't know who I was," he says finally. "And I've got to face her in this briefing today, and I—I just don't know how to do it."
Sarah places her hand on top of his and says, "Hey. Chuck, listen to me—it's going to be okay. Your sister loves you, and even if it takes her some time to get used to this…she will. Okay? So just relax."
He tries to do that. He really does.
Having Ellie in the Castle is maybe the strangest thing ever. She's already there by the time Sarah and Chuck arrive, sitting at the conference table next to a very uncomfortable-looking Devon, and a mildly awkward-looking Casey. She's got her arms folded around herself in that way that shows she's really uncomfortable, and Chuck has no idea what to say to her.
He can't remember the last time he couldn't think of a thing to say to his sister.
"Ellie, hi," Chuck says when he walks in, his voice getting that weird, high breathy sound it does when he's really freaked and unsure of himself.
"Hey, Chuck," Ellie says, and even if she seems really subdued and withdrawn, it's still something. Then her gaze shifts over to Sarah, who's right next to Chuck, and wow, he's never seen Ellie's face freeze over like that before.
"Hello, Ellie," Sarah says gently, and Ellie just looks at Sarah, looks through Sarah, before letting her gaze drop to the tabletop.
"Agent Walker," Ellie says in this cool, remote voice, and Chuck's stomach might as well be setting up camp on the floor, because—God. Ellie had always liked Sarah so much, but now—
"So," Ellie's saying now, looking around. "This is what's in the basement of the Orange Orange."
"Uh, yeah," Chuck admits. "Our—hidden lair, you know, base of operations. Pretty sure we could start a land war from here, actually—not that we ever would, you know, because that would be bad, very bad." Thankfully, Chuck's nervous babbling about land wars trickles to a halt, and before the awkward silence can make a full and glorious comeback, Casey of all people tries to help out.
"You want a tour?" he asks, and Chuck blinks in surprise, only to be doubly shocked when Ellie looks at him for a long moment, and then says hesitantly, "Yeah. Okay, that sounds—interesting."
And so here they are, giving Ellie a quick tour of the Castle before their videoconference with Beckman. She's not saying much in response to Chuck's nervous rambling impression of a tour guide, but when they eventually get to the weapons room, she stops and stares at the guns, the knifes, the bulletproof vests. "Oh my God," she murmurs finally, and next to her, Devon makes an abortive gesture like he's going to try and hold her, but stops at the last minute.
"Ellie, it's not that bad," Chuck says desperately, wanting her to understand. "It's not—like, 95% of the time, I'm just staying in the car and letting Casey and Sarah do the heavy lifting—"
"We do tell him to stay in the car a lot," Casey puts in, but thankfully does not see fit to add the fact that Chuck admittedly ignores those orders like, pretty much all the time.
But Ellie's shaking her head. "That doesn't make it—you weren't exactly staying in the car, Chuck, when I saw you last—" She stops talking abruptly, pressing her lips together tightly like she does when she's really upset.
"Ellie," Chuck says. "I swear, it's really not as—as bad as you're thinking—"
"No?" Ellie turns to face him, challenging, with her arms still folded tight against her chest. "Chuck, answer me this, okay? How many times have you been in danger of dying in the last two years? In the last year even? Just—just give me a rough estimate, a ballpark figure, something." And the thing that kills Chuck is that even with the sarcastic edge to her question, she really does want the answer, she's practically begging to know how many times he's almost died without her realizing it.
It's an answer he can't give her. "Ellie, please," he says helplessly, and her face crumples for a moment before she looks away.
Once again, Casey's the one to break the silence. "We should get back. Briefing's about to start."
*
The videoconference with Beckman is pretty much a disaster from the minute the general appears on screen.
Chuck already knows that Beckman's not thrilled about Chuck's cover being blown, not once but twice now—Devon was bad enough, and now there's Ellie to contend with, so Chuck's not surprised to see her looking more sour than ever as she appears on the screen. What is alarming is the way that Ellie's looking right back at the General, like she's every bit as annoyed and pissed off—which is probably true, but alarming nonetheless.
"Dr. Bartowski," the General's saying now, "—you'll be required to sign several non-disclosure agreements promising the government that you will never reveal the details of the Intersect mission—"
As if on cue, Casey slides over the thick stack of non-disclosure agreements that Ellie has to sign. It's smaller than the stack that Chuck had to sign two years ago, when this whole mess started, but not by much. Ellie's gaze drops to the papers in front of her, and then she looks back up at General Beckman, and purses her lips. "Yeah, no," she says, and everyone immediately twists to look at her.
"Excuse me?" General Beckman demands, disbelieving.
Ellie's never been the sort of person to get intimidated by anyone, but if Chuck wasn't currently freaking the hell out, he'd almost be impressed by the way Ellie's matching the General glare for glare right now.
"I'm not signing these papers," Ellie explains, her voice flat. "Not until you give me something in return."
By this point, Devon's mouth has fallen open, and Sarah's eyebrows are about to fly off her forehead, they've gone up so high. Casey's got his arms folded, and he's staring at Ellie like he's never seen her before.
Chuck doesn't have a mirror handy, so he has no idea what his expression looks like right now, but he's pretty sure it's hilarious. You know, if he was in the mood to find things funny right now, which he really isn't.
"Ellie," he whispers urgently, but Ellie doesn't even glance over, she's too busy with her staring contest with General Beckman.
At last, General Beckman asks, her nostrils flaring, looking and sounding totally pissed off, "What is it exactly that you want, Dr. Bartowski?"
"I want access to all of the mission reports and medical records you have on my brother," Ellie says simply. "Brain scans, x-rays, everything."
"That information's classified," Casey volunteers, and Ellie does look at him then.
"And what, knowing that he's the Intersect isn't?" Ellie counters. "I already know the big secret, and everything else is just…details, right? So why not let me see the files?"
Everyone stares at her for a moment, then slowly they all turn to look at General Beckman, who looks more pissed off than ever before, but despite all that—she still isn't saying no.
*
"Maybe we can stick around for a while," Chuck offers warily. "Just, if you have any questions, we could answer—"
"It's okay, Chuck," Ellie reassures him. "I can handle this."
"I'll hang around," Casey says, stepping forward. "Can't leave your sister alone here, and if she does have any questions, I can answer them."
Chuck's not entirely thrilled about that, because if anybody should be answering Ellie's questions, he figures it should be him. But Ellie wants to see this without him hovering over her shoulder, and he gets it.
Well, actually he doesn't, but he can pretend like he does.
He stands there in silence with his sister for a moment, Casey and Devon and Sarah all pretending like they're not listening, and Chuck finally bursts out desperately, "You know I never wanted to lie to you, right? You know that."
Ellie offers him a small, sad smile. "Yeah, I know," she says. "It's just," she takes a breath, and exhales, saying, "Last night I saw…and I don't know how to make any of this fit inside my head, Chuck. I don't—it was two years, Chuck. It was two years, and I didn't even see any of it. Just—just give me a second to adjust, okay? Can you do that?"
"Yeah," Chuck says. "Yeah, Ellie, God, of course. It's two years, and I don't feel like I've adjusted, so—yeah. Yeah, I can give you some time, of course." Chuck can hear the slightly desperate edge in his voice, but he can't help it—he and Ellie have been in sync for his entire life, and now everything's been thrown off-balance, and all he wants to do is fix it—
But he can't. Not right now. All he can do is let Ellie work through this on her own, and wait.
"Are you okay?" Sarah asks him for the fourth time that evening. Chuck looks up from the file he's reviewing for their next mission and gives her a smile that feels about as fake as it must look, judging from Sarah's answering expression.
"Yeah, I'm fine. Ellie knows now, and she's—dealing with it, and I should be happy, right? I mean, I don't have to lie anymore. No more weak cover stories, no more…lame excuses when I disappoint or confuse her with my strange behavior. The truth's out now. So everything's good."
Sarah just keeps looking at him gently, and Chuck feels the veneer crack. "It's just," he says softly, hesitating over the words, "It's just that my entire life, I've been the same person to her. I've been the same guy, my whole life."
The thing is, Chuck doesn't know how to explain how that's always been a comfort, how Ellie's always had more faith in him than anyone else, celebrated his successes and mourned his losses right alongside him. As much as he's always been the screw-up little brother, he's also been the little brother that could do anything in the world, if only he put his mind to it.
And now Ellie finally has proof. Her little brother really can do anything in the world.
His entire life he's been Ellie's screw-up little brother, until now. He had no idea how much he'd miss that old definition of himself until this moment, until he looked into his sister's face and realized she didn't recognize what she was staring at.
Chuck slumps a little more in his seat. "You know, I'm not…really in the mood for mission prep right now," he admits finally. "Mind if I take tonight off?"
"Sure," Sarah says, softly. "Want to watch a movie? We can, uh, put in that new Star Trek," she offers, with a smile. "I haven't seen it yet, and I heard it's really good."
Chuck gives her a bright smile, and if it still feels fake, well, that's all right. "Yeah, that sounds good," he says heartily, closing the folder in front of him.
After she'd read the reports of every mission her brother's been on, seen every brain scan, every medical report, Ellie can only say, "He hasn't gotten injured nearly as much as I thought he might be."
John says quietly, "We try to keep him safe."
"Yeah," Ellie says, her voice a half-whisper. "That's always been my job." She bites her lip for a second, then carefully closes the last folder, the one with Bryce Larkin's unsmiling face on top. "Can you," she starts, and then clears her throat. "Can you give me a ride over to Chuck and Sarah's apartment?"
"Yeah," John says. "I can do that."
*
She and John don't really talk much on the drive. He has the radio on, turned to the news.
"Your brother never asked for this, you know," John says abruptly, breaking the silence.
"I'm aware of that," Ellie responds, still staring out the window, watching the streetlights, the other cars, the trees and the houses. "Believe me, I am well aware that my brother was railroaded into this."
John doesn't say anything for a moment. "He still stepped up though. You're right, he didn't ask for it, and he didn't want it when it all started, but he stepped up anyway."
Ellie's throat is tight, but she manages to choke out, "So what, you're telling me he's happier now as a spy than he was before?" She turns to look at him now, and watches him shrug.
"I don't know. You'll have to ask him," John says, and he sounds so reasonable that it makes some—not all, not even most, but some of the anger that's been building up inside of her drain away.
God, she's been so angry. She's been angry ever since last night, angry with Devon, Sarah, John Casey, that General Beckman, her father, and even Bryce Larkin, who's been dead for three months now, so you'd think that wasting her anger on him would be sort of pointless by now.
But there seems to be plenty of anger to aim at everyone, so Bryce will just have to come in for his fair share too. She's raged, silently and out loud, at everyone that she can blame, everyone that's within her reach. She's been angry with everyone—everyone except for her brother. Except for Chuck. She's pretty sure that Chuck thinks otherwise, that he thinks that she's as angry with him as she is with everyone else.
She's not. Of course she's not. She's upset and she's absolutely terrified for her brother and she's still so bewildered, still unable to understand how everything she's believed to be true could be turned upside down within one night—but she's not angry with him.
"He saved my life twice without me even knowing it," Ellie says after a moment.
John glances at her. "Yeah," he says. "He did."
*
Sarah's the one to answer the door, and her eyes widen for a second before she smiles hesitantly at Ellie. "Hey, Ellie," she says, managing to sound warm and welcoming, even as she's shooting John a questioning look. "Is, uh, is everything all right?"
"Getting there," Ellie tells her. "I, um. I'd really like to talk to Chuck, if he's here."
Sarah immediately steps aside to let her into the apartment. "Sure, come on in."
Ellie steps inside the apartment, slightly amazed at how unreal it all feels. There's the couch she helped Chuck and Sarah pick out, there are the curtains she helped put up. She remembers that day, remembers how thrilled she was that Chuck seemed to be moving forward, remembers idly wondering to herself how long it might take Chuck before he asked Ellie to help him go shopping for an engagement ring.
And now it all looks unreal, because it is, because everything in here is designed for the sole purpose of maintaining a cover.
Ellie takes a breath. She's not going to get angry, she's not going to be hurt. Not right now. So she just turns to Sarah and asks, careful to keep any hint of an edge out of her voice, "Where's Chuck?"
"In his bedroom," Sarah explains. "We were watching a movie when you guys came in, he's still in there."
Ellie nods and walks down the corridor towards Chuck and Sarah's—no, towards Chuck's room, and is relieved when neither John nor Sarah make any sort of motion to follow her.
In no time at all, she's in front of the closed door, her hand resting on the cool metal of the doorknob. She pauses for half a second, and then twists the knob and opens the door, and she walks in.
Chuck's sitting up on the bed, legs folded up in front of him, idly looking at the TV across the bed. His eyes grow comically wide as he sees her, and he shifts the bowl of popcorn off his lap. "Ellie," he breathes, sounding so surprised and hopeful and nervous that it makes something inside of her twist. "Hey, I—I wasn't expecting to see you tonight."
"Yeah, this was—sort of spur-of-the-moment," Ellie explains quickly, wiping her hands on her jeans. "I just—well. I took some time and I thought about everything, and I just…" she trails off, looking away from Chuck's face, glancing around the bedroom—he's still got the Tron poster up, she can't believe it—and without really letting herself think about it, Ellie sits down on the edge of the bed, her hands in her lap.
"I read the files," she says finally, staring at Chris Pine's face, frozen up on the screen. "All of them."
There's a minute where Chuck doesn't say anything at all. "And?" he asks finally, his voice so unsure that Ellie's heart—which hasn't been in the best shape lately—cracks wide open.
So she takes a breath, and lets that hard knot that's been twisted inside of her stomach for the last twenty-four hours loosen, just a little bit. She just looks her brother in the eye, and smiles as best as she can. "And—and I think that it's been a really crazy couple of years for you," she says at last, laughing wetly at the immense understatement. "And that—well. That if you needed to talk about it, I'm—I'd really like to listen, if that's okay?"
She holds her brother's gaze as she's saying this, and oh, Chuck looks—his eyes are wet, and he's blinking really rapidly, before he says, nodding his head at the TV, "The first time I went to go see this movie in theaters, I nearly started crying at the end. And it wasn't because I'm such a huge Trek fan either—" Ellie smiles a little bit at that, remembering how long her brother and father had tried to get her into the original series with Shatner and Nimoy, "—but. The whole time I was watching it, I was thinking about Bryce. He—he would have really loved it. And that was all I could think about and even watching it now, I can't—I'm still thinking about that, you know?"
Without thinking, Ellie reaches out and touches her brother's hand, squeezing it supportively.
"And it's not just Bryce," Chuck's explaining now, his voice rapid-fire. "It's everything, it's—it's been two years of this life, and I swear to God, Ellie, there are days when I don't even feel like I have a reference point for what's normal anymore."
And Ellie finally knows where her place is in all of this. "So you come to me," she says, and gives him a shaky, watery smile. "When you need to remind yourself—when you need a reference point, you can come to me, and I'll remind you."
"I'd like that," Chuck says. "I really would."
"Okay, then," Ellie says, settling herself next to Chuck on the bed. "Okay. So…let's watch this movie, and you can tell me about Bryce, and about Dad, and about…everything."
"Yeah," Chuck says. "Okay."
*
Less than five minutes into the movie, and Chuck's saying, "One of the hardest things about the last two years was keeping this secret from you."
"Yeah," Ellie says softly. "I believe you." And she does.