application for ataraxion

[intersection]

PLAYER INFORMATION
Your Name: Zo
OOC Journal: diffraction
Under 18? If yes, what is your age?: Yes; 23.
Email IM: roraroras (at) gmail (dot) com || aim: percolate this
Characters Played at Ataraxion:
Angel ; slipperysoul
Peter Petrelli [AU] ; triedtobe

CHARACTER INFORMATION
Name: Chuck Bartowski
Canon: Chuck
Original or Alternate Universe: Original
Canon Point: 3 x 9 ; Chuck Versus the Beard ; When Chuck's been left behind for a mission because he can't flash and after he and Morgan have been kidnapped.
Number: 082, if possible?

Setting:

The real world (for the most part); California. There's nothing too terribly strange or unusual about it, save for the Intersect, which is a super computer that was created for advanced field agents, so that spy's could go out on missions alone, without any sort of help apart from their mind. The Intersect in its completed form is a room (or a computer) that displays a series of flashing images that have had information encrypted into them, to give spy's intel and even physical 'training' for things such as kung-fu and languages they might not know. The ability to encrypt information into images isn't exactly impossible, but the idea of using this method to implant information, or effectively insert said encrypted information into someone's mind is not exactly realistic in this day and age.

Or, at least that the public at large has been made aware of.

History:

Not much is known about Chuck’s early life apart from the fact that he and Ellie’s mother left when Chuck was in fifth grade, and their father, who was “never really there” left before he graduated high school. From what is known, however, Ellie (his sister) raised Chuck for the most part, considering their father was more than a little bit eccentric, and their mother is hardly ever spoken of, leading one to believe that their mother was equally as preoccupied during their childhood. Once both of their parents were gone, Ellie and Chuck formed their own little two-person family, taking care of each other as closely as possible.

Sometime after this, Chuck was accepted and went to Stanford college, where he was a scholarship student, was happy, had a girlfriend he loved, and was doing incredibly well. Twelve credits away from graduating in the year 2003, his best friend Bryce Larkin ratted him out for stealing test answers and sharing them with other students, getting him expelled from school. However, we later find out that Bryce planted these test answers, specifically to get him kicked out of school and kept away from being recruited for the CIA, believing he wouldn’t survive out in the field. Chuck also believed for a number of years that Bryce stole his girlfriend -- another completely untrue fact, but one that was meant to protect him.

Returning to Burbank, California, Chuck moves in with his sister and begins working at the Buy More. Over the next five years, he earns the position of head Nerd Herder, disliking but willingly falling into this newfound boring, immature lifestyle.

On his birthday, in the year 2007, Chuck receives an odd e-mail from Bryce Larkin. Opening it, he’s suddenly shown a large number of images that flash before his eyes -- in essence, forcing his mind to download the fully combined and complete amount of top secret information from both the CIA and the NSA. Through this medium, his mind becomes the official Intersect computer and is the only source of this information, as the first and true Intersect was destroyed by Bryce Larkin himself. Bryce believed that Chuck was the one person this information would be safe was, and Bryce was correct.

Because of this, the course of his life was altered forever.

Believing that special agent Bryce Larkin has gone completely rogue, the government is anything but pleased by Bryce's actions. Soon enough, the government learns that Chuck was the last person that Bryce sent information to, and they dispatch two agents to find him. The CIA sends Sarah Walker, while the NSA sends Major John Casey to capture him. Through a series of events, they learn that Chuck’s mind is actually the Intersect -- the reason they're there for him in the first place. They also learn that he receives ‘flashes’ of images or intelligence upon contact, sight, or sound with people or objects that trigger these bursts of information from the Intersect database. Deciding that Chuck can actually be of use, the two agencies decide to instead protect him and use him for intel on missions, thus beginning Operation Bartowski.

Soon enough, Chuck begins being brought on missions to help out, though considering the fact that he’s not actually an agent of either the CIA or the NSA, at times he’s less of a help and more of a nuisance that needs to be regularly saved. Regularly told to stay in the van while Casey and Sarah go do their spy thing, Chuck often refuses to follow the guidelines that are given to him, getting himself into trouble, but still managing to provide important information via the Intersect. During one mission, a friend of Sarah’s, Carina, is introduced, and also seems to prefer taking the rules into her own hands, flaunting the fact that she always seems to know better than both Casey and Sarah, though she nearly ruins the mission in the process.

Chuck also occasionally completely ruining missions, such as that of the failed capture of the Chinese spy, Mei-Ling Cho. Sarah and Casey attempt to force Chuck to fix his own mistakes, even if he’s not field trained. Similarly, Chuck seems to be in the habit of running into people that trigger the flashes, even when he's not on duty. At one point, Chuck runs into another government agent that turns out to be much like him -- a man with a mind that’s a government asset, and a man Chuck wants to help until he finds out that this other "government asset" wants to exact revenge on the government. Chuck eventually helps Sarah and Casey track him down, but this is when Chuck’s new spy life begins to take a toll on his real life. Affecting not only his sister but his best friend Morgan, as well as his job, Chuck begins to let down prior real life engagements to do his government work, making the rest of his family wonder what he's involved with

During another mission which forces him to return to Stanford, Chuck discovers the truth about Bruce Larkin and why he had him kicked out of school, further helping him understand the strange things that he’s been through. However, soon after, Chuck meets a girl by the name of Lou, and he begins to struggle with the fact that Sarah is his cover girlfriend (who he's falling for but can’t date) and the fact that there’s a girl who’s interested in him, but will ruin his cover if he begins to see romantically.

Making things simple for everyone involved, after a series of events, Chuck ends up leaving Lou because of some smugglers she’s involved with, hoping to start a real relationship with Sarah. However, this is exactly when Sarah finds out that Bryce Larkin -- her partner in the CIA that she was in a serious relationship with -- is still alive. Despite everyone’s complicated feelings, Bryce needs Chuck’s help to prove to the entirety of the CIA that he’s in fact, not a rogue agent. This isn’t helped by Chuck’s jealousy when it comes to Sarah and Bryce, but he’s still forced to assume the cover of Sarah’s boyfriend to the outside world.

Problematically, on a mission to stop a man that’s been connected with counterfeiting, Chuck flashes about the location of printing-plates. But when Sarah and Casey look where Chuck said they were, they aren’t there. Suspected of acting out of jealousy because of Bryce and Sarah, Chuck later flashes again to reveal the actual location of the plates, as well as the fact that there are plans to blow up the boat they’re located on to destroy the evidence. Chuck manages to stop the missile launch and he’s able to make up with Sarah, however he still has no hope in the possible relationship department.

Soon thereafter, Chuck finds out that Devon is going to propose to his sister, and gives Chuck the ring to hold onto for safe keeping, which he puts into his locker at the Buy More. However, the next day the Buy More is completely robbed, including all of the lockers. Chuck soon discovers that it was CIA/NSA that robbed the store because of one bug that he found hidden inside, forcing the government agencies to believe that they're being spied on by an enemy group called Fulcrum. To see just how badly they've been infiltrated, they’re going through all merchandise. Finding more than just a few short-range listening devices, Sarah tells Chuck that if they can’t find the receiver that he’ll be put into protective custody for his own safety. However, more importantly to Chuck, he does whatever he can to find the ring (which manages to involve his co-workers.) and after the Fulcrum agent is found, Chuck no longer needs to be put away.

Later, Chuck manages to prevent Colt (a mercenary) from stealing something called the Cipher -- part of the CIA's attempt to create a new Intersect. After doing so, he’s informed that as soon as the new Intersect goes online, Chuck will be free of his spy responsibilities. Excited that he’ll get to return to his real life, Chuck begins to plan for the future and fully intends to ask Sarah out on a date. In the mean time, Casey receives his orders to destroy the old Intersect (ie., kill Chuck.) However, the Cipher is revealed to have been infected with a virus by Fulcrum, exploding as soon as it's activated, ruining the Intersect and keeping Chuck in his line of duty. Afterwards, Chuck has to go undercover to retrieve another Cipher, rescuing Sarah and Casey in the process. When Chuck later goes to Sarah’s apartment to try to woo her, he finds that Bryce has returned once again.

In their next mission, Sarah and Bryce have to pose as a couple, only worsening Chuck’s jealousy. Despite this fact, during the mission, Sarah ends up risking her life to save Chuck and ends up in the hospital for her troubles. Bryce, concerned about Sarah, confronts Chuck after they’ve both visited her, telling him that he believes Sarah’s feelings for him will get her killed. As their mission continues, and Sarah is released from the hospital, it seems instead that Sarah’s feelings for Chuck might get Chuck killed when she won’t shoot at someone who grabs Chuck and attempts to use him as a human shield. Casey picks up her slack, seemingly saving the day. Later, Chuck finds a pair of sunglasses that Bryce left for him only to find that they’re an update to the Intersect, forcing more information into his mind.

As their missions continue, life as a spy continues to take its toll on Chuck, and considering the fact that he wears his heart on his sleeve, his friends and family continue to take notice. His missions only serve to complicate things further, forcing him to socialize with co-workers he wouldn’t usually, upsetting his best friend. To make up for the problems the government is creating in Chuck's life, Sarah surprises Chuck with his Stanford degree, using his experience in the field as a spy to earn his last 12 credits. This doesn’t help for too long, because on a Nerd Herd call, Chuck runs into his ex-girlfriend Jill and pretends he’s a big-shot to try to win her back. This would have been more successful had it not blown up in his face, which unsurprisingly occurs when his spy life ends up getting involved. Jill is kidnapped by Fulcrum in exchange for a list of Fulcrum agents that Chuck, Sarah, and Casey recovered. Chuck agrees to the exchange, only after creating his own copy, and after Chuck and Jill leave for a romantic getaway, Sarah and Casey find out that Jill is, in fact, an undercover Fulcrum agent. After informing Chuck, he’s told to use his relationship with Jill to get to a Fulcrum agent called Leader. After a series of events, both Leader and Jill are captured and put away, once again breaking Chuck's heart in the process.

Sometime later, while spying on Sarah after hearing that she has plans, he sees her on a date with an older man that he flashes upon with the Intersect. Telling Sarah that she’s in danger because of the man she's eating with, he finds out that her date is actually her father, and Chuck ends up learning a little bit more about Sarah’s past.

On Christmas Eve, what seems like an amateur criminal on the run from the police takes the entire Buy More (along with Sarah, Devon, and Ellie) hostage so he can buy presents for his children. Sarah and Casey end up sneaking into the Buy more to try to save Chuck so that his cover isn’t compromised, however Ned (the amateur criminal) gets in the way of this. Except not soon after, an LAPD Lieutenant exchanges himself for two of the hostages -- Casey and Sarah, even further pushing them away from Chuck. When said LAPD Lieutenant enters the store, Chuck immediately flashes on him, realizing he’s a Fulcrum agent. The Lueutenant reveals to Chuck that he knows who Sarah and Casey are, that he knows that they’re protecting an asset, and that Ned is a Fulcrum agent as well. In a series of events, Chuck is kidnapped by the fake LAPD Lieutenant while the Buy More employees and Devon are able to take down Ned. Sarah and Casey follow after Chuck, and to protect him, Sarah ends up killing the Fulcrum agent, much to Chuck’s horror.

Over the course of a few more missions, Chuck helps to save an international rock star, goes undercover with Sarah to the suburbs, has Fulcrum upload the entire Intersect into his mind as an experiment, and has to befriend the new boyfriend of Morgan’s ex, because of their involvement with the Triad. All of these things effect Chuck’s relationships with his friends as well as Sarah, and Chuck continues to struggle with the fact that he saw Sarah murder someone. Which affects his next mission where they rescue an undercover MI6 agent who Sarah begins to take a romantic interest in. Chuck, Cole (the MI6 agent), and Sarah are soon captured by Fulcrum and are threatened with torture before being rescued by Casey. However, soon after, Cole is captured again and since he knows all about "the asset" (aka Chuck), he's is placed under 24-hour surveillance by moving in with Sarah.

Cole manages to escape and returns to Castle, the code name for Operation Bartowski’s headquarters underneath the Buy More. After a mission to try to find a scientist code-named Perseus, Chuck finds out that if he can find a man with the code-name of Orion, the designer of the Intersect, he might be able to remove it from his head. Soon thereafter, Chuck is even contacted by Orion and is sent a computer from this mysterious man -- however he sends it to the Buy More. The team goes to retrieve the package and runs into a Fulcrum agent in the process, who manages to unsurprisingly cause problems, but the team ultimately gets their hands on the computer. Through the laptop, Orion tells Chuck to meet him but their rendezvous is ruined by way of the same Fulcrum agent they ran into before. Orion forces Chuck to betray him to this agent, and for all intensive purposes, it seems as of Orion kills himself while trying to make his escape.

After this, General Beckman officially states her concerns that Sarah has become too close to Chuck and it’s ruining her performance. She sends in another agent to assess Sarah’s performance, upsetting Chuck greatly. During a mission that goes awry, a terrorist kidnaps Chuck and even after Sarah is ‘let go’ by General Beckman, she’s the one that finds Chuck and, along with Casey, helps to rescue him. Realizing that their close relationship is more of an asset than a problem, Beckman reinstates Sarah. Shortly after this, Sarah takes Chuck for a car ride, surprising him with the fact that she found his father during her brief time apart from the government. Sarah stays with him while they reunite and Chuck manages to convince his father to return home with him to surprise Ellie.

Chuck’s next mission is to stop the release of a computer virus at the launch of a new Roark Instruments (RI) operating system -- however this is problematic considering that RI his father’s greatest enemy. It’s not up to Chuck however, and he has to infiltrate the company as a graduate looking for a job. Landing what he even calls his dream job, he loses it soon after when he tries to stop the founder from going forward with the launch. Shortly after being fired, Chuck realizes that the layout for Roark’s offices match some of the documents that Orion gave him regarding the Intersect. Trying to convince Sarah and Casey that RI is building their own Intersect, they refuse to help him find it without legitimate proof. Chuck goes alone to gather his evidence, but during his infiltration of RI, he finds his father there, discovering that Stephen Bartowski (Chuck's father), is in fact Orion. While in RI they attempt to use Roark’s Intersect to remove the one in Chuck’s mind, however this doesn’t work and Orion is captured by Fulcrum.

Desperate, Chuck goes to get Jill, his ex-girlfriend, out of jail to try to help find his father. They go, undercover as an engaged couple, to her parents home to meet “Uncle Bernie”, a family friend who recruited Jill to Fulcrum in the first place. Bernie instead tries to kill them but dies of a heart attack before he can do so. Trying a different tactic, the team tracks a call made from Bernie’s phone to the office building where Chuck’s father is being held. Even though the team doesn’t save Orion, in an act of kindness, Chuck allows Jill to escape and soon after Sarah and Chuck go on the run together. General Beckman promotes Casey and then orders him to bring them back. Soon enough, he finds them in Barstow, CA and arrests them even despite some interference from Fulcrum, and brings them home in the back of his car.

Through unknown means, Chuck’s father has been tracking Chuck's every move and leaves a message on the road to their home, telling Chuck where he can find him. Trying to explain to Casey the sign he’s been given, he ignores Chuck, and locks both Chuck and Sarah back in Castle as soon as they get back. After Devon gets suspicious that Casey has something to do with Chuck’s disappearance, he breaks into Casey’s apartment and nearly gets himself killed. However, Sarah and Chuck are able to save him, at the cost of needing to explain to Devon about Chuck’s spy life.

Finally listening to Chuck, the return to the drive-in movie theater that Orion had signaled Chuck to in the first place. On the sly, however, Casey is informed by General Beckman to authorize an air strike to destroy the facility to prevent Fulcrum from gaining the Intersect. The team is just barely able to save Stephen, but they’re captured by an agent anyway. Despite this, they discover that the drive-in theater itself is going to be used to create an army using the Intersect that Roark created, and the Fulcrum agents bring the team, as prisoners, into the projection booth. Everyone closes their eyes, except Orion tells Chuck to keep his open because he programed the Intersect to remove date instead of implanting it. Soon after, the air strike arrives and team Bartowski escapes as well as the Fulcrum agents, taking the Intersect with them. After returning to Castle, Chuck is informed that Operation Bartowski is officially over with the Intersect out of his head, and that he can carry on with his life as he sees fit.

Believing that it’s now time to begin his new life, Chuck quits the Buy More along with Casey. But trouble isn’t far off, with Roark’s appearance at Ellie and Devon’s wedding. After a massive gunfight, Rourk is finally arrested, but sadly, Ellie’s wedding is completely ruined, and Chuck apologizes profusely for it. Realizing how he can make it up to her, Chuck uses his large government pay check to give his sister a small, perfect wedding on the beach, just like she’s always wanted, with their father (and Chuck) to walk her down the aisle. While all of this is happening, however, a member of Casey’s special forces team is revealed to be a member of an Organization called ‘The Ring’ when he kills Roark and three other US Marines, all being kept inside of Castle.

Bryce is later ambushed by operatives of the Ring and Chuck, Casey, and Sarah all rush to save him. Heading to the location where the new Intersect is stored, Chuck goes to find Bryce while Sarah and Casey fight back Ring agents. Finding Bryce in the Intersect room, dying of a gunshot wound, Bryce tells Chuck that the Intersect is too powerful and needs to be destroyed. Chuck however, knows that it’s needed to fight Fulcrum, which is when Bryce informs him that Fulcrum is only one part of a bigger group, called the Ring. After Bryce dies, Chuck downloads the new system into his head (the Intersect 2.0) and then destroys it. The Ring operatives enter with Casey and Sarah as prisoners, preparing to kill both of them. As they take aim, Chuck flashes and instantaneously learns kung-fu, able to take all of the five operatives out without a single hiccup, revealing that this Intersect is even more powerful, just like Bryce said.

Now that Chuck can do even more things, he decides that he wants to be a real spy, and is sent off to spend 6 months in spy training boot-camp. To his great displeasure, Chuck is flunked and sent back home when he can't seem to control when he needs to flash. Making things even worse, the fact that Chuck chose spy training over running away with Sarah, means that when he’s forced to return home, he has no job and no girlfriend to speak of. Because of this, he falls apart and spends days on end in a pair of pajamas, watching tv and eating cheese puffs. Feeling as if his life has been reduced to absolutely nothing, he attempts to follow Casey and Sarah on a mission and ends up ruining it by scaring off the assassin they were attempting to capture, returning directly to the living room couch afterward. However this assassin soon comes back to the Buy More in the evening in search of Chuck, killing one of his co-workers instead. The assassin breaks into the store and captures Chuck and Sarah, and it's only when Sara's life in danger that Chuck finally regains semi-control of the Intersect. With the help of Casey, the assassin is killed and Chuck and Sarah are rescued. After the mission’s completion, General Beckman reinstates Chuck as a member of the team, but Casey and Sarah are ordered to help train him.

Forced to control his emotions so that he can control the Intersect, Sarah and Casey try to encourage him. Sort of At least until Chuck tries to bring up his and Sarah’s relationship problems while they’re on their next mission, putting both of their lives at risk and only furthering to anger Sarah, who’s still upset with Chuck for choosing spy training over running away with her. She’s the one who, upset and overly emotional herself, tries to force Chuck to leave his emotions behind so he can focus on the Intersect, because real spies can separate their emotions from their job, which is exactly what she’s having a hard time doing as well.

On their next mission, team Bartowski is ordered to protect Premier Allejandro Goya, a dictator of a South American nation called Costa Gravas. After an assassination attempt on his life, as well as a heart attack, team Bartowski goes to retrieve his medical journal and pretends to be the Premier’s doctor. While doing so, they find out that Devon is the dictator’s actual doctor. Because of this, a Ring agent kidnaps Devon and tries to recruit him into the Ring, believing that he’s actually Chuck. A CIA Ring expert by the name of Daniel Shaw arrives to try and offer some assistance, but Chuck takes over the operation and does things his own way, resulting in a showdown with a number of Ring Agents.

Encouraged to go on a solo agent by Daniel Shaw, believing that his handlers are holding him back even if Casey and Sarah don’t believe him to be ready, Chuck is sent out on his own, with the belief that his mission lies in Paris. His mission, however, lies on the plane itself, and he’s forced to battle a close-combat expert while hoping that the Intersect does what it’s supposed to. Which it does. Able to retrieve the keycard he was supposed to, Chuck completes his mission and is sent back home as soon as he reaches Paris. Chuck finds that the second good part of his mission is that on the flight he meets a woman by the name of Hannah who has just lost her job, and before they both depart, he gives her his business card.

Soon thereafter, Hannah shows up at the Buy More to begin working for the Nerd Herd, and while she tries to gain Chuck’s attention, he takes on the assignment of handling an asset that’s supposedly connected to the Ring. As more of Chuck’s missions begin to affect his life profoundly, his friends and family become more and more suspicious, especially when it comes to his love life. The strain he’s under becomes even more obvious when Hannah accidentally tags along on one of Chuck’s missions, where they not only end up kissing, but where she’s later kidnapped and Chuck is able to save her life. It seems that their relationship might truly be blossoming after this, despite the fact that Chuck still harbors feelings for Sarah. Chuck promises to cook Hannah, Ellie, and Devon dinner because of his recent disappearances but first he’s forced to assume the alias of a deadly assassin that team Bartowski has in holding, so that he can attend a meeting where he’s to learn the name of the assassin’s target.

Meeting with a group of mobsters to discuss his “job”, Chuck slips even further into the role of the assassin, especially after he’s forced to torture Casey for show. This, however, horrifies Sarah who believes she’s watching Chuck change from the man he used to be, while progressively becoming more interested in Daniel Shaw, causing Chuck no small amount of jealousy and mixed signals. Even so, Shaw and Sarah are able to put together Chuck’s dinner for him to “save the day” while he’s being debriefed after his meeting with the mobsters, trying to help maintain his real life cover.

This doesn’t work for long though, when the mobsters that he met with earlier, call the Buy More and Hannah intercepts the call. They show up soon after and after Chuck quickly switches back into the role of the assassin, he's dragged to go finish the job where he finds out, through the scope of a sniper rifle, that his true target is in fact Shaw, who is seemingly starting to become intimate with Sarah at the same time. Unable to stop himself, Chuck reveals his true feelings for Sarah to his new mobster buddies, but takes advantage of their sympathies towards him as a way to go beat up Shaw in person, instead of shooting him, for “stealing his girl.” Using this opportunity, he warns Shaw that he’s the Ring’s target but still starts a fist fight with Shaw to make it look real. Problematically, however, the real assassin escapes from his holding cell, kills the mobsters, and then takes down Chuck, Sarah, and Shaw, but not before taking Sarah hostage. Before he can kill her, however, Casey is able to shoot down the assassin using the same rifle that was meant for Shaw, from over half a mile away.

Almost as disturbed as Sarah by his own transformation, Chuck finds himself distressed with how easily it’s become to lie to his family about what he’s doing with his life Shortly after this, Chuck confronts Hannah and breaks up with her, claiming that there’s too much about him that she can’t know This only further complicates his emotions, considering he knows he still can’t be with Sarah, which causes him to be unable to flash after the next mission he was meant to go on. Daniel Shaw benches him and says he can’t go, making Chuck feel as if his life is in shambles. However, after a series of events where their underground facility is infiltrated, Morgan is able to discover it and both he and Chuck are held captive. Chuck is forced to give up his secret identity and Morgan discovers that he’s a spy.

Personality:

Chuck is anything but what we would believe to be a spy -- a fact that we're shown over and over again. Chuck isn’t agile, can’t operate weapons, isn’t sneaky, a charming gentleman, or debonaire in any sense of the word. He's not Bond; James Bond In fact he’s everything a spy should never be, except for the part where he has a super computer in his brain that gives him all the information he would need to excel in the art of espionage.

In the grand scheme of things, however, this isn’t truly important when it comes to who Chuck is as a man and as a person, and why the people who care about him, value him so greatly.

Despite the fact that Chuck could be described as a little bit of an underachiever, once he’s been stuck at the Buy More, he’s still well meaning in every single thing he does. He takes all aspects of his Nerd Herd life seriously and does whatever he can, for his every customer, to do his job to the best of his ability. This is shown even in the first episode, where he sets up a fake stage for a young ballerina whose father forgot to put batteries into his digital camera. From the very beginning, we see that Chuck is willing to go to any length to impress upon the fact that he is capable of not only a job well done, but he’s capable of handling himself well, and behaving seriously even in a low class job like a Nerd Herder. In fact, Chuck’s seemingly the only one at the Buy More who takes his job seriously, which is likely why everyone looks up to him without being told that he’s their leader.

Chuck very easily, and even without noticing, assumes leadership roles simply because people like him. He’s incredibly good natured, easy-going, funny, and a huge emotional support system for the people he’s closest to (which has nothing to do with how damn tall he is.) Ellie constantly goes to him when she needs to talk about things important to her or things she's concerned about, as does Morgan, his best friend. Chuck is their shoulder to cry on and he takes it in stride considering he’s a fairly emotional personal himself. He spent five years getting over his old girlfriend Jill, showing that while he may be a little bit of a sap, he’s also a romantic who both cares and loves deeply.

He’s sensitive, giving and always willing to help those he cares for, and even those he doesn’t care as much for, putting his own needs behind everyone else’s. That doesn’t mean that he’s a complete pushover, however. Even when the topic of Bryce Larkin is brought up, Chuck seems more interested in changing the subject than in showing outright anger. Granted, this might have more to do with the fact that it’s five years after the fact, but even in flashbacks, Chuck has a quiet sort of upset about him, showing an offended sort of betrayal more so than he does pure anger.

Chuck is also both incredibly trusting, and incredibly trustworthy. He does his best to never let anyone down, especially his family (Morgan included, considering he views Morgan as family), and he tries just as hard to keep from breaking promises. This is one of the biggest reasons the spy life is so hard on him -- because he has to constantly go behind his family’s back. Spending so much time lying about where he is, what he’s doing, the life he’s leading, and even more importantly, the woman he’s fallen in love with, puts an incredibly large weight onto Chuck’s shoulders, and one that he doesn’t like. The fact that he’s in love with Sarah, while being forced to view their relationship as a cover, is immensely difficult for him when he’d much prefer to be open and truthful about a relationship he so desperately wants to have. Many of the things that are expected of him as a spy go against Chuck’s usual nature and stretch him to his very limits.

Another one of these things is Chuck’s aversion to violence, especially guns. Every time he’s told to use one he refuses, and instead goes for any other weapon. When he’s introduced to the Intersect 2.0 however, he’s able to use things like Kung-Fu and various other weapons that, while they'll induce damage, won’t kill but simply stun. Similarly, Chuck has an incredibly low tolerance for pain, to the point where most spy’s would laugh at his inability to endure torture. However, no one ever said that Chuck was stupid -- he generally finds ways around these uncomfortable situations, even going so far as to encourage torture so that he can pass out from the pain, and therefore not give up any important information. Even if much of who Chuck is goes against the grain of what most spy’s are made of, Chuck shows his talents in other ways. He can still prove his worth by circumventing what he’s told to do (or not to do) and coming up with methods that, while they might be seen as crazy or stupid in hindsight, still manage to save people.

Which at the end of the day, is all Chuck really wants to do: help people. Denied, for so long, the opportunity to make something of himself after his expulsion from Stanford, Chuck viewed himself as a nobody, as someone who would never achieve his opportunity to do something more. By working with the CIA, Chuck is constantly trying to prove himself, even by doing incredibly stupid things, or by refusing to stay in the van even after Casey and Sarah tell him to. All he wants to do is help, and at certain points, the rest of his team is even impressed with his courageousness, no matter how stupid it may be. Chuck regularly risks his life, even before his spy training begins, because he’s so thrilled with the fact that he’s becoming something more than just a Nerd Herder, that he’s willing to do damn near anything to keep this new good thing he’s got going for him.

Even before joining team Bartowski, Chuck is seen as both incredibly loyal and dependable -- Morgan is usually able to go to Chuck for anything, as is Ellie. They both depend on him greatly, and he would do anything to never let either of them down. At one point even Casey states that he’s impressed by Chuck’s loyalty to Morgan -- even when his best friend at times seems to be a weight that Chuck doesn't even see. Except, he knows exactly what Morgan is, but refuses to let him go because he’s family. The fact that Morgan’s been there Chuck’s entire life is as important as the fact that Ellie has as well. Both of Chuck’s parents left him when he was younger and instead of this making Chuck bitter or angry or so upset that he’d force people out of his life, it made him cling even harder to the people that he cared for. Chuck knows how to make a family out of the people that he has, and Chuck would do anything for this family, and they know that they can count on him whenever they need to.

Granted, sometimes his family is a little more protective of Chuck than they want him to realize. Considering the fact that Chuck is on the innocent side of wholesome, it causes many people in his life to want to protect him, especially Ellie and Sarah. They both see Chuck as someone who's incredibly good at getting himself into trouble, and they both don’t want to see him get hurt. Sarah especially, falls in love with Chuck because of the good guy he is -- because he wouldn’t shoot anyone, lie to them, double cross anyone -- and she doesn’t want to see this good guy get tarnished and turned into something else, someone who could murder anyone. Ellie, in a different way, doesn’t want to see him get hurt because he’s her little brother, and her only family. She’s incredibly protective over him because they lost their parents and she, in essence, had to raise him and keep him safe. The only problem with Chuck being such an irritatingly good person is the fact that he’s at risk for so much harm to come to him. Even Chuck realizes this, however, but doesn't try too hard to keep himself safe.

Lastly, in a combination of many of Chuck’s traits, he has a deep seated sense of, not only responsibility, but honor, and of needing to do what’s right and help others when he can. Chuck is incredibly selfless and, as he says himself, will always go back for the people he cares the most about. This can be seen from how he works in the Buy More, to how he works on team Bartowski, doing whatever he can to help others, no matter the risk. Chuck is an incredibly determined man, focused on telling the people that he loves just how much he loves them, and saving as many people as he can when he’s working with team Bartowski. Chuck puts all of himself into something, whether that be the people he loves, the missions he gets sent on, or the computers he installs while on the job. Chuck is very much a man who might seem like an underachiever, like someone who could never be a spy, but Chuck is very much a person who is capable of a lot more than what some see him as, and is unwilling to simply sit back and let others risk their lives, when he wants to be the one saving them.

Abilities, Weaknesses and Power Limitations:

Abilities:

Without the Intersect:

Ignoring the fact that he has the Intersect in his mind, and taking away the spy training and work with the CIA, Chuck actually is a fairly skilled individual, all on his own.

Considering the fact that Stanford is a top-notch school, with very few students admitted each year, it's not an exaggeration to say that Chuck is intelligent. Also, if not for Bryce's interference, Chuck would have been considered for recruitment by the CIA and they don't recruit just anyone in off the street, also proving that he has a variety of potential skillsets. He was able to retain subliminal information gathered from encrypted images, and seemed to impress his teachers. Lastly, he was also a scholarship student, which proves that he did well before college, and likely did well on his SAT's/ACT's.

Being the head Nerd-Herder, however lame and boring the job may be, Chuck seems to be the only guy who works at Buy More who has any idea of what he's doing. He's capable of identification, repair and manipulation of electronics, and does all of these things with incredible ease He has leadership skills whether or not he wants to admit it, and he's especially talented when it comes to fixing computers as well as using ones he's never seen before. It seems to be a given that Chuck understands computers (and therefore, probably understands code), and can probably build or engineer computers to his liking (though, this probably means with incredibly large amounts of storage space and expensive video cards.)

Lastly, Chuck can speak in Klingon, something awfully useful while in space.

With the Intersect

If you take the Intersect into consideration, Chuck has quite a few more abilities. By either seeing, hearing, or coming in contact with certain people, places, or things, Chuck receives 'flashes' from the supercomputer in his head. These flashes contain pertinent information such as locations, blueprints, names, faces and even the intentions behind certain actions. This means that he's not only an incredible asset to the CIA and the NSA, but to any number of people who would love to use this information. While at first, the Intersect doesn't do much but provide him with information, the Intersect 2.0 is what truly gives him even more abilities.

With the Intersect 2.0 comes the ability for his mind to 'flash' intel such as knowing perfect kung-fu, how to use weapons he's never used before, put someone into a chokehold, or how to speak french when its necessary. He can do all of these things seamlessly once he's flashed, with no prior training. This means that instead of simply receiving flashes of intel from the governments data base, he receives flashes of things that go towards helping to make him a much better spy -- which was the true intention of the Intersect project. Though it doesn't make him a perfect spy since he does truly have to learn how to flash for it to be useful, it does go a long way to helping him become a better one, giving him skills he didn't have before, and making him far less helpless when on a solo mission.

Weaknesses:

Without the Intersect:

Without the Intersect in the way, the fact that Chuck can be overly emotional at times might be considered to be a weakness. Especially since it does tend to get in the way of his ability to flash when he needs to, the fact that Chuck can get bogged down with how he feels ends up being detrimental to some of his missions, and sometimes irritates the people around him.

Another weakness is that sometimes, Chuck can be a little bit too trusting. Because there's a lot of good in him, he expects the same amount from the people around him, and this gets him into trouble early on in his spy career when he doesn't know when to not believe people.

Lastly, another weakness is the fact that Chuck can be, at times, immature. This might have to do with the fact that he works with co-workers far more immature than him, but before his spy life, he does spend a large amount of time purely playing video games and reading comic books. The show itself is an evolution of Chuck's maturity and his growing into something greater, so it's something he's still working on. However, sometimes Chuck doesn't know when he should be serious, when he should stop talking, or when he should take the next step and occasionally this sets him up for failure, if only because he ends up flustered and unsure of himself

With the Intersect

Some might say that with the Intersect, Chuck couldn't possibly have any weaknesses. However, one incredibly important one is that the Intersect has the power to change Chuck from the sort of person he's been his entire life. When he flashes, sometimes he doesn't have the greatest control over himself, and he's capable of using weapons to the sort of precision that could probably kill someone. Chuck is capable of having control over some of the actions he flashes on, but that doesn't change the fact that turning Chuck into a spy, changes the very person so many people love him for being.

Also, the Intersect is not always completely precise, leading Chuck to believe that things are being stored where they are no longer (which is probably partially why he requires new information from Bryce or his father, at various different times.) While this isn't exactly a weakness of Chuck's, and more so of the Intersect's, the fact that Chuck relies so heavily on the Intersect could be said to be a weakness unto itself. For Chuck to be a real spy, he needs to have other talents apart from the Intersect, and for a large portion of time, he doesn't. Trusting wholly in the Intersect, is at times, as bad as trusting completely in another person.

Not to mention, the Intersect itself could cause Chuck substantial brain damage. Each "flash" itself is a sudden, overwhelming surge of neurological activity, which has the potential to give Chuck dementia, insanity, or even kill him. While the Intersect is useful, it also has the capability of being incredibly detrimental to his health.

Inventory:

(+1) Nerd Herd uniform; terrible gray tie and all.
(+1) CIA/NSA regulation communicator watch (even if it doesn’t work on the ship)
(+1) Y The Last Man, Volumes 1-5, Ex Machina 5-10
(+1) cellphone
(+1) pair of black Converse high tops

Appearance:

Chuck Bartowski (played by Zachary Levi) stands frighteningly tall at 6'4", is rather gangly, and has a bit of a mop of curly hair (which gets shorter as the series progresses). He's described as your average nerd -- not someone who could win at a fight, doesn't spend much time in the personal grooming section of the store, and really doesn't pay a lot of attention to how he dresses, spending most of his time in his Nerd Herd uniform (which does nothing to make him look any less geeky.)

He's supposed to be seen as the unassuming guy who you would never expect to be a spy, who was never supposed to stray very far out of the computer engineering box, but who might possibly be able to 'get the girl' if only he just cleaned up a little bit. His immaturity comes out in how he dresses, how he looks, and in the comic books he reads (when he's not wearing his work clothes, he's generally in geeky t-shirts and comfortable pants/jeans.) In essence, Chuck is very much the essence of the 'nerd' he so badly doesn't want to personify, but has ended up in because of the Buy More rut he can't get himself out of.

At least until the Intersect.

Age:

An official date of birth is given for Chuck on September 18, 1981. Fast forward to 2007, Season 1 of Chuck begins. Early 2010 is when Shaw joins Operation Bartowski (though the exact date is unknown), which means that Chuck is in his late 20's. The most likely age for Chuck at the canon point given is 28.

SAMPLES
Log Sample:

So, here he was, back in space.

Admittedly, it was kind of nice to no longer be in the clutches of The Ring, but Morgan was back home, undoubtedly still stuck and about to have his eye carved out...

Maybe he should stop trying to think about that so much, might be better for his sanity.

Chuck sighed hard, making his way back to his room. The walk he took was a slow one, a little bit meandering, with his gaze averted to the floor underneath his feet. Sneakers squeaking every so often, Chuck couldn’t help but be once more worried about everyone he’d left behind. Ellie and Morgan and even Awesome, though the guy could supposedly take care of himself even better than Chuck could, and yet-- maybe they were all safer without him. Safer without his secrets and his no-longer-spy life. They wouldn’t be caught up in it without even knowing that he wasn’t involved any more, and maybe that was for the better.

They’d all just be better without him.

Not.. ‘without him,’ without him. But without him being around, lying his way through life and not being able to tell them exactly what he was doing. That wasn’t to say that he didn’t want to tell- god he wanted to be able to tell anyone. Anyone at all. He’d take almost anyone at this point, just to get it all off his chest. Hannah and Sarah and Shaw and all those lies he had to keep about the Intersect and what it was like to be a machine and only a machine in the CIA's eyes.

But they were supposed to be his lies to keep. His fake life. It was fake, wasn’t it. He was practically fired at this point. Couldn’t flash, could barely keep his best friend around. Barely even had a real life.

He’d given up everything, everything, so he could be a spy. And now that he couldn’t flash, what was he?

Just a guy in space.

Practically bumping up against his door, Chuck rolled his eyes, frustrated as he was disappointed in himself. Disappointed in the way his life had turned out because he was supposed to be better than this. He'd wanted so much more out of his life, expected something of himself and he was about to lose it all. Maybe he could find someone here to talk to; it’s not as if it would matter at this point. It wasn’t like the CIA or The Ring could get a hold of him here, but maybe it wouldn’t even matter. He didn’t even know if there was anything to flash on in space, and he’d just go back to being ‘that guy.’ The one that wasn’t much more than the Nerd Herd uniform that he wore.


Comms Sample:
[ video; ]

[ insert big doofy grin here. ]

Guess i’m back here again. Not that i’m anywhere else, obviously, especially since... y’know, here I am. [ have an awkward wave, Tranquility! ] Place doesn’t really look all that different from how I left it. That’s probably not how the rest of you feel-- the rest of you that were stuck here the entire time, I mean. Maybe not all of you, but you guys that are here.

[ he proceeds to look more than a little bit awkward and clears his throat. ]

Getting to the point, gonna be stuck here, so I might as well make myself useful. Useful as I can seeing as intergalactic technology? Kind of new to me. And for a guy that’s never really been on a spaceship before - even if it’s kind of a dream of mine, without the whole jump thing - I don’t really know how to use as much as i’d like to.

I’m just asking if someone could show me around a little. Not on the ship, but the specs of the equipment. Just so I know what i’m getting in to, don’t want to break more things than I have to. [ a beat ] Not that I have to break anything, I just don’t want to go down that road. The road that’s got the whole space ship turning itself off and plummeting everyone down onto nearest planet and starting a galactic sort of--

Y’know i’m just going to stop now. Yeah.

[ he’s done. ]