Fic: Bear In or Out - Chuck, Bryce/Chuck + Bryce Sarah, G
Title: Bear In or Out
Fandom: Chuck
Pairing: Bryce/Chuck/Sarah
Rating: G
Summary: Set during Season 1's Chuck vs. the Nemesis for this prompt.
AO3
He’s rolling a pair of onyx cufflinks in the palm of his hand, tuxedo pants draped over one arm - already out of his t-shirt and standing in the middle of the Burbank BuyMore’s home theater room - and it strikes him.
It’s kind of a shitty moment for an epiphany.
He’s just given General Beckman his answer; out on the sales floor, Sarah is comforting Chuck, an arm draped over his shoulders, eyes wary and sharp on him. Her body language is ridiculously telling, but for once Bryce denies himself the comfort of projection. He doesn’t look at Sarah with the censure he wishes he could take to heart himself. He smiles, a little, at the memory of how it feels to have Chuck pressed up, warm, against his side. Those curls at the nape of Chuck’s neck brushing against his arm.
In any case, he’d have a tough audience if Bryce wanted to play his I’m-such-a-hardass-spy and Let’s-be-more-professional acts. Even Casey is hovering a little too near Chuck to be anything but- Well. Hovering. Bryce shakes his head. John Casey… overprotective handler - who would have thought? If anybody could bring out the mama bear, even in Casey, it had to be Chuck Bartowski.
Bryce’s smile fades.
The tux is just his size - not off the rack, fitted. The onyx cufflinks are his favorite; he never chooses straight gold or silver when he’s given the option. These are the CIA’s little ways of saying ‘Good work there‘ and ‘We’re sorry (we didn’t trust you and let an NSA agent kill you)‘ and ‘You’re so predictable.’
Actually, that last bit is probably open to interpretation, but that’s how Bryce sees it.
They knew he would say yes to the mission in Paris before Beckman even asked him. They knew well enough to have brought in a tailor pretty much the second they found out he was still breathing and on their side.
A part of Bryce wants to aim again at comfort - say that there’s nothing wrong with any of this. ‘This is my job.‘ But that isn’t true, is it?
Chuck’s been doing Bryce’s job - doing it damned well, for months now. And the only thing about Chuck that’s predictable is that he’ll pick the most unexpected moments to be unpredictable.
Like now… If it were Chuck in Bryce’s shoes… Chuck who’d just come back “from the dead” (even thinking the word like this, in the context of Chuck, makes Bryce’s heart constrict - so soon after watching a bullet tear into what would have been Chuck’s chest without the kevlar)… If it were Chuck facing oh-danger-of-all-dangers: conversation, with the partner he’s still in love with and the friend he is still inconveniently in love with (and who may or may not still be in love with him, but is definitely in love with Bryce’s partner) he would just have it. Shy, sometimes socially awkward Chuck would look them both in the eye and be the only one in the room who’s never killed a man or infiltrated an enemy malitia and the only one in the room not ready to run away in terror.
Chuck never runs away, never gives up. He is occasionally run off. Pushed away; shut out.
But he never returns like for like.
Chuck would never accept a split-second departure to Paris and a tailored tux by FedEx. He’d never “resolve” his relationship issues with a half-assed goodbye and a plan to offer Sarah a Get Out of Burbank Free card she isn’t likely to want.
Chuck would stay and talk. Stay and fight. Whatever it takes. He’d do what he did today and face a gunman armed only with his desire to help save Bryce and the foolish misconception that only good guys know how to aim for the head.
Back at Stanford, Bryce’s worst fear was that the CIA would change Chuck. Get their hooks into him and rip until they’d changed him, and maybe that’s still a concern. But dropping the cufflinks back into the envelope they’d come in, it strikes Bryce that he may have put his money on the wrong horse.
Bryce considers the possibility that it’s Chuck who’s changed the CIA. Or, at least, those parts of it lucky enough to get daily exposure to the Chuck Bartowski worldview. Sarah’s obviously changed in the short time she’s known Chuck. Even Casey is different - the reluctant concern and empathy in his eyes as he looks at Chuck a handprint in the shape of Chuck’s hand.
Bryce lays down the tuxedo pants and wonders how to tell a General that he himself has had a change of heart. He’ll probably have to call in some favors to escape her wrath - and, beyond that, to be allowed to stay in Burbank. It will be only the second time in his entire career that Bryce has gone against orders; the first time was when he talked Flemming into eliminating Chuck as a possible CIA recruit.
Bryce tugs his t-shirt back on and recovers his smile. Not all kinds of predictability are bad, Bryce supposes.
It would seem that Bryce, where Chuck Bartowski is concerned, is nothing if not predictable.
[ end. ]
Fandom: Chuck
Pairing: Bryce/Chuck/Sarah
Rating: G
Summary: Set during Season 1's Chuck vs. the Nemesis for this prompt.
AO3
He’s rolling a pair of onyx cufflinks in the palm of his hand, tuxedo pants draped over one arm - already out of his t-shirt and standing in the middle of the Burbank BuyMore’s home theater room - and it strikes him.
It’s kind of a shitty moment for an epiphany.
He’s just given General Beckman his answer; out on the sales floor, Sarah is comforting Chuck, an arm draped over his shoulders, eyes wary and sharp on him. Her body language is ridiculously telling, but for once Bryce denies himself the comfort of projection. He doesn’t look at Sarah with the censure he wishes he could take to heart himself. He smiles, a little, at the memory of how it feels to have Chuck pressed up, warm, against his side. Those curls at the nape of Chuck’s neck brushing against his arm.
In any case, he’d have a tough audience if Bryce wanted to play his I’m-such-a-hardass-spy and Let’s-be-more-professional acts. Even Casey is hovering a little too near Chuck to be anything but- Well. Hovering. Bryce shakes his head. John Casey… overprotective handler - who would have thought? If anybody could bring out the mama bear, even in Casey, it had to be Chuck Bartowski.
Bryce’s smile fades.
The tux is just his size - not off the rack, fitted. The onyx cufflinks are his favorite; he never chooses straight gold or silver when he’s given the option. These are the CIA’s little ways of saying ‘Good work there‘ and ‘We’re sorry (we didn’t trust you and let an NSA agent kill you)‘ and ‘You’re so predictable.’
Actually, that last bit is probably open to interpretation, but that’s how Bryce sees it.
They knew he would say yes to the mission in Paris before Beckman even asked him. They knew well enough to have brought in a tailor pretty much the second they found out he was still breathing and on their side.
A part of Bryce wants to aim again at comfort - say that there’s nothing wrong with any of this. ‘This is my job.‘ But that isn’t true, is it?
Chuck’s been doing Bryce’s job - doing it damned well, for months now. And the only thing about Chuck that’s predictable is that he’ll pick the most unexpected moments to be unpredictable.
Like now… If it were Chuck in Bryce’s shoes… Chuck who’d just come back “from the dead” (even thinking the word like this, in the context of Chuck, makes Bryce’s heart constrict - so soon after watching a bullet tear into what would have been Chuck’s chest without the kevlar)… If it were Chuck facing oh-danger-of-all-dangers: conversation, with the partner he’s still in love with and the friend he is still inconveniently in love with (and who may or may not still be in love with him, but is definitely in love with Bryce’s partner) he would just have it. Shy, sometimes socially awkward Chuck would look them both in the eye and be the only one in the room who’s never killed a man or infiltrated an enemy malitia and the only one in the room not ready to run away in terror.
Chuck never runs away, never gives up. He is occasionally run off. Pushed away; shut out.
But he never returns like for like.
Chuck would never accept a split-second departure to Paris and a tailored tux by FedEx. He’d never “resolve” his relationship issues with a half-assed goodbye and a plan to offer Sarah a Get Out of Burbank Free card she isn’t likely to want.
Chuck would stay and talk. Stay and fight. Whatever it takes. He’d do what he did today and face a gunman armed only with his desire to help save Bryce and the foolish misconception that only good guys know how to aim for the head.
Back at Stanford, Bryce’s worst fear was that the CIA would change Chuck. Get their hooks into him and rip until they’d changed him, and maybe that’s still a concern. But dropping the cufflinks back into the envelope they’d come in, it strikes Bryce that he may have put his money on the wrong horse.
Bryce considers the possibility that it’s Chuck who’s changed the CIA. Or, at least, those parts of it lucky enough to get daily exposure to the Chuck Bartowski worldview. Sarah’s obviously changed in the short time she’s known Chuck. Even Casey is different - the reluctant concern and empathy in his eyes as he looks at Chuck a handprint in the shape of Chuck’s hand.
Bryce lays down the tuxedo pants and wonders how to tell a General that he himself has had a change of heart. He’ll probably have to call in some favors to escape her wrath - and, beyond that, to be allowed to stay in Burbank. It will be only the second time in his entire career that Bryce has gone against orders; the first time was when he talked Flemming into eliminating Chuck as a possible CIA recruit.
Bryce tugs his t-shirt back on and recovers his smile. Not all kinds of predictability are bad, Bryce supposes.
It would seem that Bryce, where Chuck Bartowski is concerned, is nothing if not predictable.
[ end. ]