Prologue

Disclaimer:

They say that "there is nothing new under the sun" and this story is of no exception. This is just my particular sandcastle built with other people's sand in the online sandbox of fanfiction.

The idea has rolled around in my head for a while now (years?) so I don't know where everything came from. General inspiration is obviously Chuck and White Collar with a few recognizable inspirations from fanfiction, MacGyver, Sherlock Holmes (the books), Sue Thomas FBI, and some random google searches to set up information.

Thank you:

A thank you to Quinis for requesting for me to write my idea down in the first place and encouraging me to keep going. Also, for being a person to talk to for questions on the process, bouncing ideas of off to gain direction, providing questions which led me to coming up with answers to fill in the plot, and for sharing and allowing me to use a few irresistible ideas.

Also, thank you to my family, and friend who read this story providing critiques, opinions, and some editing.

Things all started with the антагонист or for simplicities sake the Antagonist. They are a criminal empire who seek to rule the underground as a faceless shadow lurking behind the fear and corruption they spread. Four generations ago a small task force of intelligent law men were put together to find the reasons behind the growing crime rate in the New York area. During their investigations this task force accidentally stumbled into the Antagonist's web discovering their existence behind the veil and the war for justice versus dominion began.

These two groups eventually became known as the families, or the lineage of those law men fighting for justice, and the Antagonists, or the lineage of those who fight for dominion via crime. The battle ground ranges all over the world through any field imaginable. Combatants on the family's side tend to range through military service, consulting, and working for agencies such as the CIA, NSA, FBI, and DEA. Even civilians not directly involved with the work often end up assisting in some form or another. Their personal skills tend to include music, dancing, art, medicine, athletics, academics, and engineering (particularly computers). They excel in their areas of choice being known for keen intelligence, quick reflexes, good decision making, strong leader ship, and experience all starting at a disheartening young age. On the other hand, the Antagonists are willing to do whatever it takes to ensure that their control remains, while endeavoring to expand beyond their current realm. They have been known to have persons involved with such organizations as Fulcrum/Ring, Volkoff Industries, and many other well-known criminal endeavors. Each of the persons involved can be compared to a man known as Matthew Keller, and remembered to be ruthless, determined, and eerily intelligent.

Going head to head, these two would be the makings of a modern version for "Clash of the Titans." Alas, for the better, or for the worse they instead dance around each other in a long and complicated game of chess. A key piece is something the families created when a young man, named Steven Ryder (aka Steven Bartowski/Orion), came up with the idea for the Intersect. For the families, this super computer was the hope for the future. It could be used to store massive amounts of data, compute the information matching details the mind didn't connect, as well as be uploaded into the secure location of a trusted agent's brain for easy field use. The goal was based around the general idea that information and preparedness would out do the devious powers of the Antagonist.

Like all plans tend to go, there were unintended consequences. With the first run Orion accidentally turned his best friend Hartley into the criminal mastermind Alexei Volkoff himself, basically changing the lamb into the lion. Initially, this was intentional as Hartley the docile scientist was needed for a joint operation between the CIA and MI6 where the main role was, Volkoff, the criminal mastermind and the expected duration was only a few months. It didn't take long for it to be realized that somehow the Intersect had changed him and under its influence, he really became Volkoff. Upon this discovery two sectors of the Antagonist began seeking to gain their own versions of the Intersect. They used Fulcrum/Ring to go after the means of information and computing abilities, while those monitoring Volkoff industries sought to better understand how to use the Intersect to alter people by manipulating the mind. As it is known, Operation Bartowski was vital in stopping Fulcrum/Ring from succeeding, but unbeknownst to them, they were too late to stop the efforts within Volkoff.

Years prior, when Chuck was little more than a toddler, he was victim to the sector of the Antagonist who sought to change people. The Детский плечо, or leverage for their tendency to take people away and using them as hostages, succeeded in abducting him and giving him a partial run through of their Intersect. This changed him so that he was afraid of needles and heights, which for a kid who had planned to be a doctor and fly planes, that was a big difference. It was intended to alter the little guy so that he believed he was one of the Antagonists, but his parents managed to rescue him first. In order to prevent another attempt they started a trend in the families by disappearing, moving to California, and creating identities for the normal Bartowski family.

While they were lucky enough to get Chuck back relatively unharmed, Steven's older brother Ryan wasn't so lucky. His son Ryan Peter, or Peter, was abducted and put through the Intersect successfully. The Antagonists set him up with handlers who raised him as their son Peter Burke so that he no longer knew who he really was. Why didn't the families pull another rescue and simply remove the Intersect? Because, the handlers had two strengths. If attempts to rescue were made Peter would fight to avoid abduction (since that is what it would appear to be to him), and if rescue was successful the handlers could simply use an implanted chip to kill him no matter the distance.

Peter was not the only successful alteration effort of this kind. Another was his younger cousin William Cade Ryder, the son of Steven's twin brother Nicholas. While Peter was an only child, Will most definitely was not. He had his eldest brother Joseph Cole, followed by his uniquely identical quadruplet brothers Nicholas Neal, Alexander Bryce, Zachary Levi, himself, and eventually a younger set of twin sisters Moriah Renée and Mary Lynn. Finally, Will's cousin Elizabeth Anne Brennan, Mary Bartowski's older sister Rachel's daughter, was also abducted. Ironically, El grew up to marry her cousin's cousin Peter Burke. With these three held as leverage against them it was impossible for the families to triumph without losses they could not risk.

With the Antagonist targeting their strikes at the children more and more, the families all went their separate ways, changed names, and became new people disappearing into the masses for a while. Creating new identities gave the parents of the children who had been taken, or lost ones, the opportunity to change their appearance and find ways to watch over their children while endeavoring not to endanger them by getting to close. Still, not knowing where the others had gone, or who they had become made for strange coincidences and tragic consequences in later years.

As time does, it passes. Things began to change with the next generation coming of age to officially join the battle as agents and soldiers in combat. These young men and women had watched family being taken away, suffered the consequences of being victims to the Antagonist's cruel techniques, and learned skills of survival and disguise to become whoever they needed to be in order to remain undetected. Being the name sake of the original task force leaders, it only seemed natural, that Nicholas Neal became the leader of this new generation. Despite being at the younger end of the crew he was one of the more experienced, motivated, and determined of the bunch. This is the story of how the families, led by this young man, proved once again that no matter how dire things seem, good triumphs over evil in the end.

Feel free to tell me what you think, be it good, bad, or ugly, I just request that you keep comments clean.

Also, if there are any questions that you would like answered, or additional parts to the story that you would like to see, feel free to let me know and I may be able to get something written down for my growing list of excerpts (additional/alternate scenes ECT). Again, I ask that your requests be kept clean and a heads up that I will not be writing anything with sexual content (please keep them in the family/friendship and PG rated vicinity, thanks).

Thank "You" for reading! :D