Chuck vs The Wayward Legionnaire

Book 1: Earth.

Chapter 1: The "Greater Good" isn't good…

13th March 2009 Orange Orange. 10 am.

Chuck frowned, he switched off the monitor in Orange Orange as Sarah and Cole had begun their kiss, his heart shattered again into a fractal pattern of broken pieces. He had never really stood a chance, had he? He'd watched Sarah's face as agent Cole had entered their lives, he saw a longing he'd only ever glimpsed directed at Bryce Larkin on brief occasions, he closed his eyes and wished Sarah Walker would just once look at him like that.

He couldn't find it in himself to complain too much he thought as he exited the store on his way to the Buy More, he had recently 'broken up' with Sarah again to pursue the possibility of a relationship with someone else, anyone that wasn't a spy! Even his futile relationship with his ex-Jill, had crashed and burned again horribly, she, with typical Bartowski luck, had turned out to be a Fulcrum spy who nearly killed Sarah! He bristled at the memory. Then the mission in the suburbs had momentarily filled him with hope, Sarah had seemed so loving and warm, until that last day where she'd stepped on that dream brutally.

Spies, he thought forlornly, who needs them? Me, his aching heart replied, and in particular a certain Sarah Walker, he sighed. Entering the store, he groaned as he saw Casey making a beeline for him with a scowl.

"Bartowski! Finished mooning over Walker and her latest boytoy?" The big man sneered with relish, Casey was delighted, the moron's lady feelings were a source of constant amusement. Chuck's face dropped, but his eyes hardened, and he snapped out "Yeah right Sir Grunts a Lot, and what national emergency has erupted in the time it took for me to get here?" Chuck growled back impatiently and glared at the older man.

Casey was taken aback but quickly barked, "My place tonight after work, the Generalhas a few things to discuss with you, DON'T BE LATE MORON!' Poking Chuck painfully in the chest before he stalked off in search of a new target.

Great, thought Chuck, as if I haven't enough to do, he momentarily brightened, maybe it wouldn't be that bad, I need something to keep my mind off Sarah, unbidden a grim- faced image of Beckman floated across his consciousness, he shivered, perhaps not….

Afternoon, near LAX.

For Sarah Walker it had been a very trying morning, trying not to groan at Cole's chat up lines, trying not to put his face through a computer screen as he kissed her, trying not to damage relations between her agency and an allies' by incapacitating one of their top agents by stabbing him repeatedly in the groin by displaying what she could only describe as having the patience of Job. She groaned inwardly, as if her life needed more complication, her heart was already heavy with the loss of her favourite nerd after he had decided to end their "cover" relationship... well let's face it Walker, she thought, he dumped you. Roan Montgomery would have had a field day hearing his top student had been dumped by a nerd, a nerd with dreamy brown eyes and a head of curly hair she longed to run her fingers through. She found herself daydreaming of just that, when her mobile went off with a text message. REPORT TO GENERAL ASAP CASEY. What now, she wondered, she had just dropped Cole to LAX for departure and was on her way to her apartment for a change to her work clothes before returning to the Orange Orange for her shift.

Quickly she entered her apartment and powered up her laptop, first initiating the security protocols and then opening a connection to General Beckman's office. She didn't have long to wait as the screen came to life with first the NSA logo and then the unsmiling face of Beckman, unconsciously she sat more upright in her chair. The General regarded her, "Agent Walker, good afternoon, I'll get straight to it, my analysts and I have been examining yourself and Major Casey's reports concerning the latest missions involving MI6 Agent Cole and it's our shared opinion that both yourself and Major Casey's performances were decidedly below the standard we expect from our top agents".

Sarah felt herself redding with anger. "That's completely unfair General…" Beckman cut her off, "Agent Walker, if Agent Cole hadn't of acted when he did on the roof when the helicopter attacked, we wouldn't be having this conversation right now and I would have lost my top two agents and the most valuable asset this country has ever had at a time when I need every resource to combat this Fulcrum threat!"

Sarah had enough, "Yes General! A helicopter that he blew up! Damaging buildings and strewing debris across a city block in downtown LA!" She seethed. Beckman was undeterred, "Be that as it may, I've made a decision and as of now, you're on vacation for two weeks, effective immediately. Do not return to Castle, there is a travel order for you waiting at the local CIA substation. Choose your own destination, but as of right now, your leave begins!"

Sarah was more concerned at what this might mean for Chuck, "But what about the asset Ma'am? What happens while I'm away?" Beckman sighed, her voice softened just a bit," Look Sarah, this isn't an attack on you or Major Casey, NEITHER of you have had a vacation since this whole mission started, don't worry about Mr. Bartowski, I have plenty of work for him to attend to during your absence, that will continue when you return and then Major Casey will have some leave."

Sarah straightened at that, no Casey. Just her and Chuck, maybe they could finally get some things sorted out, she brightened at the thoughts of just what she'd like sorted out…

Beckman perhaps sensing her thoughts added. "There will be a strike team put in place during your leave Agent Walker, they'll work on any actionable intelligence the asset provides during this period, and stay until the return of Major Casey, they'll also provide surveillance of the asset, at all times ". Sarah lost her inner smile. Satisfied she had made her point, Beckman disappeared off the screen.

Oh well, thought Sarah, perhaps the General was right, they had been running on empty lately, a vacation could be fun, she wondered what a certain DEA agent was currently up to. She felt satisfied it wasn't a ploy by Beckman to gain more control over Chuck and deep down she wondered if this break from him, might give her time to sort out how she could win him back, she missed him, perhaps absence would make the heart grow fonder and break this impasse they both seemed to have found themselves at. She reached for her suitcase.

Echo Place, Casey's Apartment 7:55pm

Chuck stood nervously outside Casey's apartment, it had already been a long day and he was hoping whatever the General was planning to tell him wouldn't take long, he didn't fancy spending too much time around Sarah after this morning's show on the monitor. As he prepared to knock on the door it was flung open by a glowering Casey, "Get in here moron, the meeting is about ready to start!". Chuck stepped forward and peered inside the apartment, he noticed Casey had a small table in front of the monitor they usually communicated with Beckman on, it had three separate piles of folders placed on it, each one had a different colour, red, blue and white. He felt a little uneasy at the sight, however, he quickly noticed something else before Casey grabbed him and yanked him through the door, closing it behind him. No Sarah Walker!

Startled by the realisation, he turned to Casey, "Where's Sa- ehhh Agent Walker?" Casey smiled, "Not going to be around for the foreseeable future Bartowski." He knew his agreeing with the General to let the CIA skirt have first dibs on vacation time was going to pay dividends with the moron, time to cash in, he thought maliciously.

"Yep, about now she should be on a beach somewhere exotic, probably with that other friend of hers, Miller, God alone knows what they'll be up to, some of their party stories from their team up days still reverberate through the agencies…" He paused to gauge the reaction, he wasn't disappointed, although he shuddered slightly himself at the thoughts of Miller on the prowl! The younger man's shoulders sagged, and he turned his face from Casey, but the pain was evident in his silence.

Thankfully, before Casey could wound him further, the monitor started beeping with an incoming call. Casey stood to attention, motioning Chuck to follow his example, as he acknowledged the call. Chuck nonchalantly folded his arms and leaned against a wall as Beckman's face filled the screen.

"Major Casey, Mr Bartowski". "Ma'am". "General". Greeted her back almost simultaneously, one respectful, one... well one from one of the most brilliant yet emotionally and mentally taxing individuals she had ever encountered. Not for the first time she felt her eyes drift to the drawer in her desk where she had an expensive Scotch with her name all over it.

Later, she promised herself.

"So, by now Major Casey has explained Agent Walkers absence?" She queried. There was a look and a cautious nod from Bartowski, great, she thought, he's taking it well. "Well to keep us busy during her leave I had my analysts report on your efficiency, and we feel we haven't been co-ordinating the intelligence material in the best manner, to that end..." she gestured to the table with the folders "…I've devised a new system.

Red is daily reports I want dealt with as such, review the material and pass your conclusions to Major Casey for review, Blue is weekly, by the end of each week any blue folder is to be reviewed, these contain follow ups from previous cases we feel you may have more insight on that which hasn't been obvious to us. Finally, the White folders, these are special projects I'm personally involved with, at the end of each month any White folders are to be …"

"Reviewed", said Chuck," I think I get the idea General, does this continue when Agent Walker returns, or when do I take a vacation?"

Beckman's eyebrows slowly raised, "Vacation, Mr Bartowski?", she asked icily. Chuck's stomach dropped. "You'll have a vacation the same time I get one!" She snarled and cut the link. "Well done moron!" snickered Casey. "Well, make yourself useful and start in on those Red folders, I'm going to clean Gerda". He pulled his current favourite service revolver and cleaning kit and taking a seat at his counter began to work.

Hour and a half later….

The smell of day-old coffee and stale cigar smoke pervaded the apartment air, Chuck yawned, he had passed the last of the Red folders to Casey five minutes ago and was now eyeing the Blue and White Folders. Thankfully, he hadn't too much flashing off the dailies, but he stood to stretch anyway, as he did so he nudged the side of the small table causing it to tilt, he managed to grab it, but the White folder opened and a small post-it fell from the top one to the floor. Letting out a breath of relief that Casey hadn't noticed his clumsiness, he chided himself as he bend down to retrieve the note. He noticed some writing on the reverse and turned it over… triggering two of the most shocking flashes he'd ever had!

Holy crap! He thought to himself as the aftershocks subsided, this was bad! This was worse than bad! It was four words, but they spelled a horror story for Chuck. CLEAN SWEEP and BITTER HARVEST. These were top secret operations currently awaiting confirmation of Intel from the contents of the White Folder.

He needed to get out of Casey's apartment fast and start checking the information out for himself, there was literally no way he was going to comply with this! First, he needed the contents of the White Folder... He had an idea.

Earlier at the Buy More he'd printed off the previous week's Nerd Herd invoices to check and sign off on, there was no way Big Mike would trust anyone else with the job, usually Chuck did them at his work desk, but Big Mike knew Chuck would occasionally take them home to complete, he didn't mind as long as they were correct and with Chuck, they always were.

He stole a quick glance at Casey, he had his back to him at that moment. Quickly, he grabbed his satchel off the floor and covering the table with his body, he quickly swapped out the contents with some of the invoices in away he'd seen Casey and Sarah do when they suspected they were under surveillance on a mission, sneakily!

He gave another big yawn, really laying it on until Casey took the hint. "Alright Bartowski, let's call it a night, you covered the dailies, we'll get to the rest later. I want to send these reports on. I'll finish up here, see you in the morning" Fat chance of that thought Chuck, as already a plan was forming of how he'd deal with the situation. He was going to have a late night! As he left Casey's he pulled his phone and stepped into a surveillance blind spot he knew about and gave Big Mike a call.

Mike's Apartment...

Big Mike Tucker had been enjoying an evening with his girlfriend at home when his mobile picked the perfect moment to interrupt, annoyed he picked up the phone to see Chuck Bartowski's name as the caller, "What the hell Chuck!" he rumbled, annoyed. Chuck launched into his spiel. "Ah sorry Big Mike, but I just realised you were absolutely right at this morning's meeting and that we do need all the backlog cleared that's currently in the cage for the month end figures if we want to stick it to Beverly Hills, so I'll agree to have the late shift for the next two weeks, I better handle it myself as you thought, so if you can spare Emmett to watch Jeff and Lester…?" He suggested and waited. Big Mike did not disappoint!

"You're damn straight I was right Bartowski! That's why they pay me the Manager salary! About time you got your head out of your ass, and you better believe we 're going to leave Beverly Hills second again! I'll sort Milbarge out and those other two fools, you get the cage sorted! Good night and Bartowski…?" Chuck smiled and braced himself, "Yes Big Mike?". "Don't call at this time of night again!"

He hung up.

He turned to Bolonia again as she slowly undid a button on the top of a rather sheer negligee she was barely wearing, a smile started to form when he froze, WHAT MEETING THIS MORNING? Bolonia gave him her best come hither look. What the hell, he thought, Big Mike suddenly found he had other things on his mind...

Casa Bartowski 10:30pm

As smoothly as he could, heart racing, Chuck made his way across the courtyard to his apartment, he knew Ellie and Devon were working so that was one less thing to distract him, as calmly as he could he went to his room and made like he was preparing for bed. He donned his old college T-shirt and a pair of shorts and lay on his bed, picking up an open book he'd been reading, he settled back as if he was about to read, already his mobile was in his other hand, and he clicked a special app that opened a viewscreen into Casey's apartment.

The watcher became the watched! As Casey went to his kitchenette for a coffee refill, Chuck steadied his body as if posing and hit another little app of his, back in Casey's apartment the monitors fizzled momentarily and then a continuous loop of Chuck reading started playing, unless Casey watched it solidly for an hour, He'd never notice. Jumping up from his bed, he went to his closet and reaching into the vent at the back he found a hidden panel and removed his 'special' laptop.

Hard lessons had been learned after Bryce's email and the Ninja he now suspected had been Sarah stealing his old desktop, over time he'd built a new laptop with the scraps in the cage as well as parts he'd scrounged on missions while Sarah and Casey weren't looking, enemy spies seemed to have an abundance of laptops and computers it was child's play for Chuck to boost the odd part here and there, it was mostly high end stuff too. The operating software he wrote mostly himself, his security protocols alone would have had most IT analysts in the Counter-Cyber Intrusion teams of the CIA and NSA drooling.

He went to his satchel again, this time he took out the contents of the White Folder and started to read, putting the post-it to one side, it was a briefing on the current state of affairs regarding the latest Cyber-attacks on American Intelligence agencies and also European and Worldwide Intelligence/Law Enforcement agencies allied to America. They had become more focussed in their probing, and it was speculated by an NSA analysist that Fulcrum as well as other interested unknown parties were starting to bolster their Cyber abilities by either bribing known Blackhat/Whitehat hackers or in some cases kidnapping them and coercing them into serving their ends.

The main concern of the report seemed to be that so far, the cream of the crop, the truly elite White hats had yet to be found, their abilities in penetrating even the most hardened sites was determined to be of particular concern. To that end, all agencies had complied a list of known hacks and those hackers they believed responsible.

As Chuck glanced the list it was, he realised, a formidable list, some of the names on here even he didn't recognise but quite a few he did, they were like him back in his Piranha days, just seeing what they could do, he'd exchanged code and planned hacks with a bunch of them, then Stanford had expelled him, and he shut himself off from that world.

He started to read the profiles of the Hackers when the flashing started. In less than half an hour the Intersect had joined the dots the various agencies couldn't and now Chuck realised he held the fates of all these people in his hands! He had to warn them, he could hold off a few weeks on the report but eventually Beckman would want her due and he saw no way he could stop this. But, more than that, what really scared him was what he had flashed on earlier, the two Operation code names, that really disturbed him.

CLEAN SWEEP referred to an operation being mounted worldwide to take the hackers into custody or arrest and in some cases – force a Laszlo scenario, where the so-called 'good-guys' would force them under penalty of prison terms for their hacks to work for them, fighting Fulcrum and other terrorist/criminal elements.

That was bad, but BITTER HARVEST, that was worse, that was a CIA thinktank proposal of eliminating the suspected hackers outright, particularly those outside the US to deny anyone the ability to use them and possibly serve as a warning to deter other elite hackers from similar activities.

He thought that one was incredibly stupid, they'd have to assassinate every High school/College computer science student in the world he mused. Not to mention, where did they did think hacking experts came from anyway? Hacking! But it was in essence, an if we can't have them, nobody else will, plan. Who were these anonymous assholes who decided other people's fates like that he thought?

Armed with his new knowledge, Chuck logged on- running a program he'd written to 'borrow' any of his neighbours' wi-fi, he masked his own internet usage as he went deep into the darknet, it had changed considerably from when he regularly dipped in during his college days. He had to start somewhere; it had been over six years.

He had just started to scour some old boards under his Piranha handle when his system pinged with a message from Taranis, a hacker he had helped out with some coding issues for a security program Taranis had been working on, at the time Chuck reckoned he was somebody in the Cyber security industry, he'd asked Chuck his plans back then and when he found out Chuck was still in college he even asked Chuck if he'd consider working with or for him.

Chuck had been flattered and thanked the guy, promising to help again whenever he could, but back then Chuck had been looking to the end of his degree and starting his own company. He wasn't brash or boastful in conversation with his hacking peers, but it was easy to see that Stanford Chuck was full of confidence in his own abilities…then Bryce frigging Larkin and expulsion and Jill dropping him like a hot potato, it had changed Chuck irrevocably, and he hid from his old hacking past, ashamed to show his face, his confidence like his degree, gone like a haze in the morning sun…

He shook his head at the memories, he read the message, Taranis had had a successful product and it had been down in no small part to Chuck and his code! He supplied a link for Piranha to contact him at, he had some good news for Chuck! That surprised the hell out of Chuck. He checked the timestamp, struggling to recall the last conversation he'd had with Taranis, he vaguely remembered Taranis saying if it all worked out, he'd been back in touch, Chuck didn't really believe it, but the timestamps indicated Taranis had tried many times to contact him two months after his expulsion! Chuck clicked the link, what the hell he thought, Taranis's handle was on the list, he had to contact him anyway…

Ireland, Dublin, 8.30 am Head Office Anomaliz Security Products.

For Oisin Murphy, mercurial owner of Anomaliz, it had been a slow return to his office after his latest battle with illness, he'd returned to consider his affairs after his latest round of tests with his consultants, the prognosis wasn't good. He sighed, well he'd met with his daughter Roisin, the company CFO and he had mapped out his personal endgame strategy for his company.

He was happy he was leaving it in her capable hands, she had shown fine instincts in dealing with a multi-million Euro company like Anomaliz, they weren't Microsoft, but they weren't small potatoes either. He was worried. He'd hoped one of his other children would step up and take in interest in software development, but his eldest son was on a different path entirely and his youngest son was currently studying Electronic Engineering.

His thoughts drifted and he gazed unseeingly around his office before he looked fondly at a picture of himself with his late wife, won't be long now Love he thought. Happier times, he thought misty eyed as he kissed his fingers before placing them on her image in the picture.

His reverie was disturbed suddenly by a beeping alarm from his desk laptop, his jaw dropped, and surprise didn't quite cover it as he quickly opened his desktop to see a return message from of all people, Piranha! Jesus, he thought, as he quickly logged into the old IRC chat forums, he'd stationed that message on. There he found the Piranha icon waiting, he smiled. What a turn up for the books!

Piranha! Long-time no hear! So glad you returned!

The message leapt off the screen at Chuck, he been ready and hopeful. He knew he had to grab Taranis's attention fast or he'd waste valuable time.

Hello Taranis or should I say Oisin Murphy, PLEASE DON'T LOG OFF! THIS IS VERY IMPORTANT! YOU AND ALL THE PEOPLE ON THIS LIST ARE IN SERIOUS DANGER!

Chuck quickly uploaded a list of Hacker handles from Beckman's folder; he had also scanned in the file contents with a quick summary of the two operations. He waited…

For Oisin Murphy it had been a real "OH SHIT!" moment, as soon as his real name had scrolled across the screen, his hand dived to cut the link, thinking at long last one of the many European Law Enforcement agencies had finally snared him, but the rest of Piranha's message stayed his hand. What people? What was the danger?

He hadn't risen to run his own company by acting impulsively, he needed more facts and as he thought about it, that message had been sitting online for over six years and only Piranha and himself had access to that private chatroom, he found his hand hovering over the laptop as his rational side won out, files appeared, he opened them and started to read…

For Chuck Bartowski it was even more nerve wracking, by uploading the files, he had broken the law, Beckman would have him thrown in the deepest darkest bunker if she ever found out, Casey would probably sneer and shoot him and as for Sarah…. Well, he didn't want to think of her and the look of disappointment that would cross her face, it would crush him further before Agent Walker would surface and probably join Casey…

Eventually Taranis started responding again...

Piranha, is this real? How can you know about this? Is this some kind of shakedown?

No Taranis, I only wish it was, my name is Charles Bartowski, my friends call me Chuck, as to how I know, it all started on my twenty sixth birthday, September 2007, I opened an email from an old college buddy, who turned out to be a CIA operative and ...

For the next hour Chuck typed, explaining his story, the Intersect, the NSA, CIA, Sarah and Casey his handlers, the rise of Fulcrum and the threat they posed. For Oisin, he felt like that guy in the movie he'd seen some years ago, only it was a whole bottle of red pills he was currently swallowing, it seemed so fantastic, but he had been around a long time and he kept abreast of current technologies, there was people in the world sticking microchips in their bodies to switch on the lights at home why would a supercomputer in somebody's brain be that farfetched?

Chuck's typing eventually slowed down and stopped, Oisin realised there was a lot of work to do and not a lot of time to do it in. They needed to improve the method of communication.

Chuck, can we webcam? Otherwise, this is going to take all night!

He'd been puzzled by this slow approach of Piranha.

No Oisin, I'm under surveillance all the time, even here in my apartment, I've managed to hack the surveillance and loop the feed, but a vocal conversation would be picked up.

Ah! Thought Oisin, he mused. different location perhaps….?

We need to speed this up, is there someplace you can go where they can't monitor you all the time?

I've managed to fix it, so I work the late shift fixing customer hardware at the Buy More for the next two weeks. They don't have as much surveillance there and we can talk.

That was another thing that shocked Oisin, dear God he thought, one of the finest coding minds he'd ever met, and he was working in the American version of PC World... his mind boggled! He thought hard, they were going to need help, it was time to bring in some the others on that list. It was too early in the day in Europe, and a lot of them he recognised as European with a British and a Japanese hacker presence too. This would take some co-ordinating! He looked at his watch. It was nearly 10am that made it nearly two in the morning for Chuck! Guy must be exhausted!

Chuck, nearly all of the list is European based, it's still early morning here now, I know it's nearly 2am for you, you go get some rest, here's an uplink to an old telecommunication satellite, we have 'borrowed' it, it should be safe for a meet and greet, can you get back to me tonight 10 pm your time? I'm going to see how many of these I can contact and persuade to join us. Hopefully everybody, but you know our world, trust is a rare commodity and the fact you know all our identities is going to ruffle a few feathers!

Chuck sat watching the screen, Oisin was right, he was exhausted and in no shape to wait and probably have to explain over and over again his situation one on one, no, if Oisin could gather them all, it would make things a lot faster and with the uplink to a secure site, they could teleconference and get a lot more done.

You're right Oisin, I am exhausted, and your way is certainly better and faster than anything I can do, thanks so much for your help, I really appreciate it.

No problem lad, I have a plan, well a rough one at best, we're going to save you and save ourselves in the process. Signing off now, get rest, you're going to need plenty!

The link closed, Chuck felt a bit better, at least he wasn't as alone as he thought he was, he had made contact with one of his ...people? He smiled at that. He put his laptop back in its hiding place and placed himself back on his bed in the exact position he hoped he was in before he started his loop. Picking up his phone and his book he took a deep breath and with a quick look at Casey's apartment, he switched off his apps and turned over to switch off his bedside lamp. Pulling the covers up around himself, he quickly dropped off to sleep.

For Oisin Murphy it was time to get to work. He quickly contacted the chatrooms he knew the core group of names congregated on and left a message that he knew would get them to come, "WE'RE IN DANGER!" was pretty universal he thought. He included the uplink and meeting time. Others, he had a more direct route to, particularly the Japanese hacker, they'd been working together along with a Swiss and Swedish hacker couple. He added a bit more detail to them.

Unbeknownst to Chuck, a lot of what he had warned Oisin about, had already been noticed, he didn't tell Chuck because he wanted to check a few things out before telling them to him. He wasn't joking when he told Chuck it was going to take a group effort, with what he had in mind, it was going to take some family involvement too. His office phone started ringing, here we go, he thought and answered. "Hello. Akio...?"

14th March 2009 8pm Buy More Cage

It had been an interesting day for Chuck, Casey had chewed his head off for the abrupt change in Chuck's hours, but he could see the NSA agent was secretly happy, Chuck in a cage was probably the next best thing to Chuck in a bunker as far as he was concerned!

On the pretext of a service callout, he got Chuck over to the Castle for a meeting with Lieutenant Schaeffer and his unit from the NSA, Craig Schaeffer was not that far off Chuck's age, and they warmed to each other, laughing over their shared memories of Sci Fi shows, Chuck had to concede not all government drones were carbon copies of one Major John Casey. The meeting was brief and with Chuck on overtime covering the cage a daily workplan was quickly trashed out to John Casey's satisfaction which was signified by grunt # 8, I'm happy, if you're not, tough.

The next test that morning was the return of the white folders contents, luckily Casey and Shaeffer had been busy planning out the duty rota for watching Chuck, as he approached the conference area to work on the red folders for that morning, he'd been able to swop back the Buy More paperwork for the government files. Shielding the folder from the many cameras, he managed a repeat of the previous night's performance in Casey's apartment. He looked around guiltily as he made his way out of the area, but it appeared he'd pulled it off, he just had to pray Casey or Beckman didn't push for a progress on them. He headed for the cage.

Chuck settled into a routine that he figured he could maintain on a daily basis, he shot through a bunch of repairs, enough to write up on his daily log and make it appear that he was working his ass off, while he and hopefully his new friend, could figure out a solution to his pending problems. As he had more or less covered his quota, he figured he'd take a quick scan of the impending meeting location. If Chuck Bartowski had learned one thing during his tenure as the host of the Intersect, caution was a thing that needed to be practised daily and meticulously!

Logging on the satellite uplink he did a quick check of the security, he was somewhat underwhelmed, he knew the NSA could track and eventually break the encryption on the satellite quite easily, he pondered for a moment, he had experience of the latest government software, it was currently watching him! He had of course written his own to counter this.

He hemmed and hawed… what the hell, he uploaded his one of his own special programs and sent the password to Oisin to forward on to the rest. That done, he played around with the open innards of a notebook and waited.

As the time approached, he did a quick cycle through the store cameras to ensure he was alone, a quick inventory of materials he'd gathered earlier that day from trawling a few foreign directories and social media, he was ready as he could be, he pushed a half-finished Lou's away as his screen lit up with an alert to join the meeting. As he opened the display on his laptop, he saw a group of people pop up in individual windows, he smiled, they were all wearing Anonymous V for Vendetta masks that were now more associated with the Cyber world, but their hacker handles showed up underneath their images, that was thoughtful of them he felt.

Oisin, he noted hadn't bothered with a mask, Chuck smiled grimly, it looks like he was in a spot of trouble with Oisin's friends.

There was a long moment where both sets of people eyed each other, eventually Chuck stammered out a nervous greeting. "Hhhi…." That opened the floodgates. "Who are you?" demanded a German sounding voice, "What is the meaning of this nonsense? We are in danger, what do you mean, we are in danger?" Chuck panicked; his breathing sped up as he desperately tried to answer the questions. "Hold on everyone!" Oisin called out, "We all have questions, Chuck gets that, but lets' try and see if we can do so in a civilised manner..."

"That's easy for you to say Taranis, we trust you, not this person," The German accented voice said as a hand gestured towards Chuck, "who claims he knows us and our identities!"

"I don't claim anything," stated Chuck in a calmer voice, having gotten himself under control again, "I know exactly who each of you are, where you live, what you do…" Most of the group erupted at that, shouting at Chuck. He understood, it was a scary thing to have your anonymity stripped away, especially when you thought you had been so careful, he knew he had only moments before things really got out of hand.

He'd started running a search program as soon as everybody logged in to the meeting in anticipation of this and managed to back trace everyone's IP address – right to their individual machines and he swiftly uploaded a series of files to each one, in the background amid the cacophony of strident voices he heard the pinging of arriving emails startling the group into bewildered silence as they opened them.

"Bloodey Hell!" came a shocked British accent, "He's got the lot!" Paul Radcliffe/Warlock, a Systems Analyst for BT, slowly pulled off his mask revealing a stunned face, "No bloodey point in wearing this anymore, is there?", He moaned." He's even got my Facebook profile here!" There were murmurs of agreement as the rest of the masks were taken off, everybody was understandably shellshocked.

Chuck spoke again, "Guys, I don't know everything, I couldn't tell you anything more than what I gleaned in a quick search today, I needed to convince you fast, I don't know what you did today, what you did last week, what you've been doing in your lives. Where you've been…." He trailed off, "Sorry, I hate this, to be the bearer of bad news like this, but in just over three weeks from now, I'm gonna be put on the spot by the NSA boss and believe me, telling her no isn't going to get me very far! We need to get some sort of plan together before she sticks me in a bunker somewhere and pumps me full of enough drugs, so I won't know what day of the month it is much less stop her people from dragging the information out of me!"

"But how can you know these things?", a softly spoken Swiss woman named Meike Becker known online as Kryst asked next. "The Intersect", explained Chuck, "It's the ultimate jigsaw puzzle assembler. Every interaction any of you had hacking with your countries Intelligence apparatus or police is in there, their investigations, reports on suspects, surveillance they may have carried out is in there, the only saving factor is they're all unconnected, but the Intersect takes all the information and ties it all up into a nice, neat bundle. I get occasional updates of new information, my latest must have also contained information from your respective countries for one of the Operations I flashed on. Flashing is how it relays the information to me once the connections are made, I'm the only one that can do it because I'm the only Intersect…" he trailed off sheepishly.

"Unconnected Piranha?" asked a blond-haired Swede Chuck knew was named Baldur online but was named Sven Ohlsen in real life. Chuck nodded. "I've noticed that interagency rivalry is a big thing here in the States, so I'm guessing it's something similar in Europe and the rest of the world too, particularly between law enforcement and the Intelligence Community.", replied Chuck with a shrug. "And please guys," He implored, "call me Chuck, I haven't been Piranha in a long time".

"Ok Chuck, but you understand your existence and your revelations have placed us in a … pickle, I believe the expression is?", came somewhat sardonically from the German voice again of one Dieter Ruffert or Arjun as he was known by, "perhaps right now we should just disappear ….". "NO! You can't do that!" Chuck rushed, more from fear they would suddenly do so than he intended, He paused and took a breath, "No you can't do that, you may as well send up a signal to your watchers, running will confirm their suspicions faster than any report I may be forced to send."

Chuck then gave a masterclass in what he had learned from working with two of the top agents in the US for nearly two years, he had absorbed a lot from helping Sarah and Casey on hunts, having to use traditional methods when the Intersect was of no use, here his computer skills had been put to good use, it had been eye-opening, he understood far better what Sarah had meant that morning when he realised he couldn't run, "Not from us…", she said.

He laid out to them how agencies looked for 'holes' or vacuums left by sudden disappearances of suspected foreign agents or suspects, how agencies maintained covers of agents even if they had been blown and especially if they hadn't, foreign agencies would waste precious resources watching blown covers hoping to catch a returning agent and maintaining the good covers made it easier to re-insert an agent back into their other life if another mission or ongoing mission was in place. He had remarked at the financial cost to Casey at the time, "Why do you think we have such big budgets numbnuts!", had been the snarky reply between grunts of laughter at Chuck's naivety.

Existences had to be maintained, bills paid, letters and emails sent, false histories created on social media, phone calls made, and responses fabricated, jobs were paid, and lifestyles maintained, even in absentia. Failure to do so, was a major red flag, whenever they had found a suspect who had suddenly vanished, Sarah and Casey had immediately fired off prepared dossiers, possible jobs they would go for in their new identities. Once they had armed other agencies and Law Enforcement with these and alerted them to inform on any new people suddenly appearing from nowhere, the hunt was nearly always short. Non spies especially had really no training or ability to maintain an effective cover that would stand up to such intense scrutiny.

There was murmuring amongst the group as they pondered what they had in the way of options, things started to get a bit heated before Oisin Murphy intervened.

"GUYS!" he shouted above the din, "a couple of us have a few ideas that we'd like to share," he began.

"What Chuck has brought to us is confirmation of what we've suspected of a while now, that we have been targeted, look at this group..." He gestured with his hand, "It used to be three times the size it is now, even allowing for some of us going dark, the numbers tell us something untoward has being going on."

That had Chuck sitting up in his seat, he found it hard to believe that that many people could have disappeared, sure groups like this sprang up all the time, Anonymous was one of the largest, even made up of cells as it was, some numbered into the hundreds, but they were full of lower tier hackers, he'd avoided many of them when he'd been online because of possible FBI infiltration. He was more surprised that this group had managed to realise what was happening. "I take it, I've brought a big piece of the missing picture for you to say that Oisin" he ventured.

"Yes lad, you have." He pointed out another man that was known as Altoid, Mike Travers, the only other American in the group. "Mike was probably one of the first that started mentioning hackers going missing, particularly in the US, Mike?".

Travers, Chuck noted was a thoughtful looking man that had an official air about him, he started speaking, "I run a service Chuck, a type you may be familiar with from your current experiences, I deal in identities, providing them and a full service back up".

Chuck knew that meant that these weren't your average fake IDs, these would stand up to even official background checks. It would take an experienced official to spot them and a deep dive on a person's past to turn up any discrepancies that the 'paper-man' might have missed, generally the better the quality the more expensive they were, as the work involved in hacking many official sites to resurrect identities from deceased or young deaths as well as the usual DMV, and financial institutions to fabricate credit histories and college educations was generally very time consuming. A lot of dominos had to line up to fool the average TSA agent or Customs officials, never mind Intelligence agencies.

"I had a couple of friends, they're also on your list, Castor and Pollux, we covered a lot of territory in our work together, about six months ago, they were taken, here in Las Vegas where we ran our business, I nearly joined them, but I got lucky, there was a meeting arranged at a motel, some client stuff we had been working on, we didn't normally meet up, however, it was a big job for me, I needed extra bodies, we had a warning system in place in case we were ever together, a couple of tells to warn us if we had gate crashers, I saw them on the way in, one of the others must have had time to set the blinds to the room in a warning, the motel was one we had done a favour for the manager, Caesar a Mexican friend, Pollux had arranged to get one of his relations in unofficially from the old country.

I called Castor's phone, when he answered, I said I was going to miss the meeting. I then called Caesar and asked him to keep an eye on the room, about 3.30 that morning he called, said a van had pulled up, my friends and the occupants of the two adjoining rooms got in and…", He faltered, upset by the memory. "...that was the last of Castor and Pollux...I didn't even go to the room for their stuff, apparently, they needed to be helped into the van, looked a little worse for the wear, Caesar said …", he trailed off, locked in a moment of self-recrimination.

It was Fenix a young Argentinian called Mateo Lopez, who spoke next in a whispered tone, "...Desaparecidos…" Memories of a time in his country when the secret police had 'disappeared' tens of thousands of his countrymen and women. He worked with Mike on the South American side of things; he had known the missing men too. A wave of anger and sympathy washed over him for his friends. "Nothing you could have done man, or they'd have taken you too". Mike flashed a bitter smile at his younger friend.

"That had to be Fulcrum or somebody else ", Chuck said. "You think so?", asked a puzzled Mike, the others listened intently, curious. Chuck waved his copy of the list of hackers, "They're still on here…" They quickly understood, if it had of been the 'good guys' the names would never have been on the list in the first place and that that information would already have been in the Intersect.

"Well, that settles it," began Oisin, "I think we need to reconsider my proposal again; I still think it's a viable plan, especially now we finally know what and who, we're up against."

Chuck was intrigued, "What sort of proposal are you considering?" "Oh, not this nonsense again!", snapped Paul Radcliffe, "It's complete bollocks Oisin, our own Cabal, Consortium, whatever the hell you want to call it!".

"Paul, we're out numbered, every Intelligence Agency in the book is lined up against us, every Law Enforcement agency from the FBI to the German Federal police, we can't remain independent anymore, now we have to band together and form our own collective, or we'll get picked off one by one until we're either dead, incarcerated or indentured servants to whatever state body we end up serving. BUT! We have the means, I'm wealthy, I can fund us, I'm more than willing to do so, it's US! Plus, we have some of the best computer minds in the world in this group, and most importantly, thanks to Chuck, we have a tremendous advantage here! We know their plans, we know who the players are and for once THEY haven't a clue", he finished with a laugh.

The solo Oriental member of the group of elite hackers, Akio Minoru a Japanese cyber security expert was watching proceedings with a very relaxed state of mind, which was rare considering he was in the company of so many westerners. They tended to be noisy, case in point. He gazed at Chuck Bartowski with some interest, he had been wondering a lot about the Intersect, it had sounded very familiar to him, or at least the underlying principle that formed the basis for the technology, like Oisin Murphy, his closest friend, he was one of the elders of the group, in his early forties and had had a bell going off in his head about this topic since Bartowski explained his situation. He focussed.

Embedded information in imagery wasn't a new science but nobody had managed to make it successfully work as a learning tool it had appeared until now, as a younger man at college in Osaka, he remembered hearing a guest lecturer discuss the idea based on some promising research that had come from the States, however overnight it suddenly seemed to dry up and all reference to the idea suddenly disappeared, he'd been busy with his projects on his Masters and that had delayed his return to what he saw as a great potential learning tool, at least that was the basis for the articles that had formed the lecturer's round table discussion.

At the time he'd thought the research had fizzled out as some do with the practicalities of reality on turning a great idea into being, colliding with the limitations of available technology, although he wondered back then if darker forces had been at play, causing its demise, with the appearance of the human Intersect, he felt he had at least the answer to that question.

The Intersect… so much of their plans hinged on being able to beat it's oracle like powers. The debate between the others he half listened to, he was already onboard with Oisin's idea, indeed he'd been the first to recognise the safety in numbers, the need to belong in a group had always been a Japanese cultural trait, he knew many of the others were also on board, the last two hold outs being the Englishman and his German counterpart mainly because their cultures espoused individualism. He instigated a link to Chuck's laptop.

Chuck had been following the discussion between the group closely, he felt Oisin was making some excellent points and was slowly winning the reticent members to his point of view, Chuck had half opened his mouth on a couple of occasions, but his instincts told him he might be more of a hinderance than a help, besides, Oisin's natural leadership and conviction in his beliefs for the groups safety clearly shone through and the argumentative tone of the conversation had dropped to a more pleasant exchange. So, it was with quite a surprise that he realised that a message had popped up on his screen inviting him to a private chat. Quickly scanning the screen, he noticed the Oriental that had been staring at him intently.

He gulped, he hadn't been introduced but he knew exactly who Akio was, in a group of white hats it was slightly unnerving to garner the attention of possibly the world's foremost Red hat, Soyan. A hacker that took down any hackers that generally made themselves a nuisance or threatened the uneasy status quo that seemed to exist between hackers and the rest of the world. Chuck had often wondered if this would have been a career path, he might have considered for himself before things went bad.

For Akio, the feeling was mutual, Chuck's rep as Piranha and his hacking exploits had caused him to take note of the young hacker when he burst on the scene, he'd resolved himself to taking the young man in hand and taking Piranha down a peg or two before he noticed Piranha was extremely humble, he often fixed the vulnerabilities of systems he cracked, and he was quick to help others, his code was elegant, the product of a brilliant mind and when Taranis eventually beat Soyan to the punch and contacted Piranha first, he had nothing but good things to say about the younger man. However, what was bothering Akio now, was the problem of how to deal with the next Intersect.

"Chuck, you realise that this Beckman will surely seek to replace you with a new Intersect when you go, do you have any thoughts on how we can prevent this?"

As it turns out this was a question that Chuck had given a lot of thought to, he'd carefully monitored the process whenever he received a new update, Beckman had concerns over the Intersect travelling so she had the Castle updated with an Intersect upgrade room.

At first, he'd considered doing what Fulcrum had managed with the Cypher, but he had worried that Sarah or Casey might get injured as he had no idea of how to regulate the damage.

And that posed another problem, how much damage would be sufficient? No, he had decided he needed a more delicate solution, for in this endeavour, the enemy of my enemy was going to be their unwitting friend. They needed a functioning Intersect, they just needed a way to stop it from being able to hunt and find them, and the best way to achieve this aim, was to keep it operational in dealing with Fulcrum, that Chuck realised, would always be Beckman's and the IC's main concern. The bearer just had to be nullified against the group and specifically him!

"You have knowledge of the Intersect Soyan?", asked Chuck wondering where this particular conversation would go. "Hai, I mean yes Chuck and please call me Akio, it's well past the formal stage given our mutual situation", Akio responded with a little smile. He gave Chuck a quick synopsis of what he had learned as a younger man, "…. And even though the information regarding the technology quickly disappeared Chuck, I always hunted for it, just with little or no success, a brief word in a memo here or there in some IC sites I hacked but it just disappeared practically overnight", he finished. There was a sense of disappointment about that, that Chuck noticed.

He smiled back, "That was probably because the original Intersect facility was kept off the books, Akio. Secure from outside penetration, Larkin had to go in to retrieve it before sending it to me. No way you could have known that".

"What is your plan?", asked Akio. Chuck thought for a moment, he was well down the rabbit hole now, it just depended on how far others were willing to go with him. "We better re-join the others, Akio. They deserve to hear this too." Akio nodded and they exited back to the other chatroom. Things had obviously been sorted out, there was a more relaxed air about the others. Oisin Murphy smiled, "Thought you boys might have a head-to-head at some point, seems like you have something to share?".

Chuck rubbed his face with his hands and began, "We face a number of issues, one, we need a way to deal with the Intersect, or rather, the next Intersect, Akio has pointed this as the main stumbling block to any potential plan you guys may have to help me escape, before I get into this, Oisin can you fill me in on your plans please?".

Oisin looked around the virtual room at his friends as if to see if any other wanted to take up the task, the others, perhaps sensing this, merely nodded, or smiled as if to say get on with it. Taking a breath, Oisin gathered his thoughts. "You're right Chuck that is the big one, and you're also right, we haven't exactly told you of the plan, well because…", he paused. "…I'm still working on parts of it, but in a nutshell, we're getting you out."

"The main problem after that was where to put you. The CIA and NSA are going to be looking for you hard everywhere, we have a means to deal with that electronically, to camouflage your presence, physically and digitally, but I found a place that you can go, they will give you a new identity and the best part of this is, if you make it through, you can keep this completely new identity and you'll also have a new nationality to boot! One hundred percent legit and government backed". He paused again, "However..." Chuck has been following with some amazement! A new identity, and a new country, how could this be possible? He felt excitement rise inside him, but as Oisin began again, he realised that the catch was now coming…

"…you're going to have to join … the French Foreign Legion….", he finished.

"WWHHAATTTT!!..."