Chuck & Sarah vs Themselves 28 Preview

So, I haven't posted anything in about a week, and I feel guilty about it... despite the fact I should have been buckling down to get my thesis finished, and I don't feel guilty about not doing that...

What this means is that for those of you patiently awaiting the next chapter, I have a cliffhanger-resolving early Christmas gift!
Or a late Hanukkah present, depending on your holiday affiliation.

Chapter 28 Preview:

Sarah reacted first. She was already in Chuck's lap, so it wasn't exactly a tackle, but she took him to the grimy floor of the van expertly. Chuck grunted with the impact and the phone skidded out of his hand across the metal floor. For two full seconds, they stared at each other. When gunfire didn't erupt and slice the van apart, and them along with it, Sarah frowned in confusion. “Huh.”

“What's wrong?”

“They didn't shoot...” Sarah explained, pushing herself up. “Stay down,” she admonished, peering carefully out the rear window. “He gets on the phone to taunt us, it should have been followed up with gunfire, or a rocket launcher. That's how I'd do it.”

Chuck took this revelation with a momentary grin, until he realized she wasn't playing her 'master of deadpan comedy' card, but was entirely serious. He swallowed nervously and began to sit up. Sarah hissed and half-turned back, planting a knee in his chest to keep him flat on his back. Gently, but still, she was obviously on edge.

“Stay down,” Sarah whispered fiercely, scanning the parking lot for Shaw and whatever help he'd decided to bring. “Son of a bitch...”

“Can I get up now?” Chuck said, shoving her leg aside. Sarah grumbled but didn't fight him as he levered himself up next to her at the window. “What's going on?”

“A half a dozen men in full tactical gear, maybe more, but...” she grabbed him and jerked him fully upright, so he could sight down her pointing finger. “Look. Tasers instead of assault rifles.”

“Why would they go nonlethal? Shaw wants you dead, doesn't he?”

Sarah pursed her lips, and her forehead creased in worry. “Well,” she said. “He probably wants to torture me or...” Sarah trailed off, and her eyes winced closed for a moment in horrified realization. “He knows you're the intersect. What better way to buy his way into the ring than to hand you over to the Director?”

Chuck felt his stomach turn over and a wash of nausea flood him. “Sarah...”

Her jaw set and her eyes blazed at him. “You remember what I said, that first night, back at the BOQ in DC?”

Chuck frowned, thinking back. It had been before their fake breakup in Prague, and in the whirlwind rush of travel, it wasn't particularly clear. They didn't really have time for him to try and sort through the haze. “I don't... which part?”

She thrust an MP-5 submachinegun into his hands. “Them or you, Chuck. Don't you dare die on me.”

“But I thought you said they wanted me alive?” Chuck said.

Sarah arched an eyebrow and scooped up Reba from where Casey had propped the heavily customized G36. “Don't argue semantics with a woman holding enough firepower to orbit Arnold Schwarzenegger,” she said, kissed him on the cheek, checked her safeties and made sure there was a round in the chamber. “Let's see if this Reba knows how to sing. Get the door, Sweetie.”

Despite the endearment, that was clearly an order, and Chuck lurched into motion slinging the MP-5 around his neck on its strap and grabbing the handle. He threw the sliding door open and Sarah snapped the folding stock into position, shouldering Casey's loaner and thumbing the selector switch to full-auto. Two men in black tactical gear, complete with facemask and heavy body armor froze in horror thirty yards from the van. The rest of their team, Sarah remembered circling around to flank them. She didn't have a good count, but six or more was the most likely. It was an absent thought and didn't really do more than flicker across her consciousness, time had slowed down to a trickle, and her thoughts raced, filling out a tactical plan.

She watched Chuck throw the sliding door open, and from the angle of his shoulders, he had put all his weight into the movement. It could only have taken him a fraction of a second to get the door fully open, and she was squeezing the trigger almost on the instant Chuck was out of the line of fire. But it seemed to take minutes. Reba jumped in her hands, stock thumping into her shoulder in time with the stacatto crack of the projectiles breaking the speed of sound, but the recoil didn't throw her aim off as much as she anticipated. Usually, on full-auto, after the third round, you weren't really aiming anymore, but the weight of the custom under-barrel shotgun acted somewhat to counter the kickback, and she put twenty rounds downrange in a little over a second and a half, two long bursts that walked across both men twice at chest level. A shower of brass casing spun out of Reba's ejector port, making slightly off-tune ping-ing sounds as they bounced around in the van's interior. At less than thirty yards, those vests probably weren't good enough to stop—

Both men's chests burst into flame, screaming and flailing their arms as they collapsed, and Chuck peeked out in horrified wonder. He glanced back at Sarah. She shrugged. “I guess Casey forgot to mention the incendiary rounds.” Sarah looped her foot through the strap of the satchel carrying their spare ammunition, and flung it at Chuck. He caught the bag and slung it over his shoulder. She shot him a toothy grin, turned, kicked the rear doors of the van open, and leaped out, her gun spewing death and fire.

His ears were ringing from the gunfire in the enclosed space of the van, but he heard her quite clearly. “Make for the building, I'll cover you!”

To be continued...