~~Thanks for sticking with the story guys, a lot of the intro here is them examining their feelings for each other, the next chapters will be quite a bit longer and the humor and dialogue will start to open up more going forward.

~~I do not own Chuck or any of the characters portrayed in this story.

Chapter 3 – The Past Revealed

Echo Park – 7:00 AM

Chuck had gotten in the habit of running with wife every morning and decided that maybe it will help take his mind off of some of the more obvious things that were bothering him. He slipped into an old white t-shirt and sweatpants as he grabbed a pop tart on the way out the door, he hadn't slept well at all the previous night, but a few cups of coffee had given him enough energy to go out for a run, even though he felt empty and so lonely. All he wanted to do was crawl back in bed and go to sleep, but Sarah would have wanted him to stay strong and he wasn't going to go into depressed zombie cheeseball-crazed Chuck this time. He wondered how Sarah slept or where she was, she probably went back her hotel room he thought as it was quite late when they departed Malibu. Who knows where she would be off to today?

As he was running past the fountain he noticed Alex and Morgan doing stretches with what he thought were yoga mats in the front walkway. They were just getting through doing the warrior's pose as they both saw him running across the courtyard.

"Chuck, how is it going, just getting my stretch on," he stated proudly as he motioned to Chuck. Chuck then slowed his pace and approached them, dreading having to talk about his wife in his current state.

"Hey buddy! Wow Alex, I have never seen Morgan out of his dungeon this early and you got him to actually exercise. Keep this up Morgan and you may make adulthood yet." Chuck quipped as he watched them drop their pose.

"Haha Chuck, Alex just wanted some company and I figured my beautiful girlfriend was worth it, I have to admit that she had to flip my mattress this morning to get me up, but a promise is a promise." Morgan chuckled lightly as Chuck could tell he was still half asleep. "Aww Morgan, always so sweet, I hope you didn't your head too hard this morning. Us Casey's don't mess around when we set our mind to something," Alex said as she gave a pouty look with a mischievous twinkle in her eye.

Morgan rolled his eye as he turned towards Chuck, "So how did operation fairytale go yesterday?" Morgan wanted to gauge Chuck's reaction before deciding how to proceed.

Chuck tried to hide the pain he was feeling as he spoke with his best friend, "She left.." after a long pause he looked up brightly, "I mean she needs space, but we did have a fantastic kiss at sunset, so that's something..?" Chuck trailed off as he slowly hung his head. Chuck lightly brushed his fingers over lips as he thought of how special that kiss was to him, for that brief moment he felt he had his wife back. He wanted that moment to linger for eternity if he never got his Sarah back.

Morgan could feel his friend slowly start to break as the emotional walls started to crumble. "Hey buddy; it will be alright that girl loves you more than anything, even something as crazy as memory loss won't keep you guys apart." He let out a slow breath as he continued. "You are also one of the best spies in the world, with a super computer in your head, no less, and nothing can stop you from getting her memories back," Morgan sounding more and more confident as he spoke.

Chuck eyes started watering as that sadness he felt inside turned to hate, he hated how he had to choose the intersect to diffuse the bomb that Quinn had planted to kill everyone in the concert hall including his loved ones. Because of that choice where there was only one real option, he was unable to restore his wife's memories with the key. Sure it held tremendous power and made you feel like you could do anything. It had also led him to his wife and Casey, him becoming a spy, and actually making a difference in the world. They had done a lot of good together, put away a lot of terrible people that would like nothing more than to watch the world burn and General Beckman did say they were best spy team in the world. However, Sarah herself said he didn't need the intersect to be great. He kept spiraling further and further, lost in his own thoughts.

As he snapped out of his fog and look at his best friend, no matter what happened Morgan always had that positivity about him, "I know buddy, it's going to be a long difficult road back, but we will always find each other and no way am I giving up this time." Chuck gave a sly grin as he truly believed this and after his run he needed a plan, he was going to give Sarah the space she requested, but he would never stop searching for answers. He believed he knew just the place to start, this day just got a lot more exciting.

Santa Monica Viceroy – 8:00 AM

Sarah was in tears as she stared at the name that was displayed on her screen, a text from her mother? She kept reading it; she hadn't slept at all since this realization. She lay awake all night, millions of thoughts and scenarios running her head.

How could this be, she had no way to contact her and it was best for the baby if she only used the low frequency transmitter to warn them if her former handler had discovered their whereabouts. However, there it was plain as day on her screen, I enjoyed our visit last week honey, stay safe. Molly and I love you.

She couldn't stop the tears from flowing as she pushed her brain as hard as she could to remember what happened, were they actually safe, what did that mean for Ryker. Why had Chuck not told her sooner, maybe they weren't safe and he was protecting them or he didn't think she was equipped to deal with this information yet? She needed answers and she wasn't going to wait around, she had used Castle before when she needed information on Quinn, but she didn't want to risk running into Chuck right now.

Burbank Buy More

Sarah strided in as the automatic glass doors opened, she saw the store was being remodeled, noticed a large Subway sign overhanging in the back of the store and a bunch of employees in green shirts standing around in a circle gazing in aww at some new sandwich that was proudly displayed on the sign. She didn't have time for this as she took this as an opportunity to go into the home theater room and down through the trap door in the floor. She had found her ID badge in her suitcase along with a few other things, so she wouldn't need to ask Chuck to get her into the ex-CIA facility. After clearing the scanner she went down into the old base with the large Carmichael Industries sign still proudly displayed on the wall.

She lingered over the sign as her fingertips brushed across the brush metal finish, Chuck said they built this company together and she was his inspiration. This man that she hardly knew, he had such a good heart, she didn't deserve him. Then as fast as the thought entered her head it is disappeared, she had a purpose and she needed to focus right now. The lights came on and the computers booted up as she reach the bottom of the stairs.

She went to one of the monitors and began to search for information on Ryker, she was trying to remain calm, but inside she was incredibly scared that he might track them down and do who knows what to one person she still really cared for and that baby that it felt like just yesterday she had taken to her mother to raise as her daughter. She searched open cases on the central database, and then she logged in and checked her CIA login to see if it was still active. "Damn, locked out, now what do I do?" She was trying to remain resolute, but that was quickly breaking.

Every moment she wasn't in control of this situation she was slowly losing it. She had always kept them a secret from everyone, no one knew who or where they were. She thought back to that crying baby and the few days hiding from Ryker that she had to care for that baby. She had felt so many emotions in those few days, but right now this was definitely topping it. She needed to make contact; she didn't even know if General Beckman knew about Ryker, this mission was directly from Graham and off the books. Also, she had gone against an order from her handler. "A good spy always does what she is told," Sarah always repeated this to herself in moments of moral dilemma, it helped her shift the blame when she had to do something horrible that the Agency required of her. She knew whatever she did, she needed to be careful Ryker could be watching her or her family's movements and she might know just the person to help.