Chapter One


I was born Neal George Bennett to a seemingly happy and normal family.

When I was three years old, my father was revealed to be a dirty cop who had been pulled into the local corruption. His decline had started with skimming money off of the top at busts, expanded to mob work when he was caught, and eventually led to murder. After his arrest, our family fell apart with him going into state's evidence while my mom and I went into Wit-sec.

Growing up, I knew myself as Danny Brooks, the son of a hero cop and a bereaved widow. Mom had 'checked out' and become a ghost in my life so Ellen, my father's former partner, stepped up. She was placed with my family at her request and had made it her life goal to watch over me.

Over the years, Ellen made sure I pursued my interests in computers, art, track, and law enforcement. In addition to that, she kept me busy with dance, gymnastics, fencing, and martial arts. Her intent was to make me a law abiding citizen with the hope that I would pursue something other than law enforcement as a career.

There were still a lot of struggles growing up though. Ellen did her best to cover the gaps that mom left, but she couldn't be around all of the time. This left me to find a way to school, make sure I had lunch money, and to bear certain responsibilities on my own. Although I managed, my methods weren't always legal. This meant that I forged bus passes to get to school, pool sharked for money, and made my own fake IDs long before high school. It was inevitable that Ellen learned what I was doing, but she couldn't always help me. Instead, she settled on discouraging me from going beyond the necessary in actions such as following my peers into under aged drinking, but turned a blind eye when I did it to tend banking for paying the bills.

When I turned eighteen, I learned the truth of my past. I couldn't stay in that life, so I left the system officially. The Marshals created Bryce Larkin, warned me that they were aware of my felonies, and told me to take legal paths now or face legal measures. With no need to cover for my mom and being a legal adult, it was easy to keep straight.

Striking out on my own, I went off to college. For the first time, I was free to choose my own path and life was my oyster.

Once I was on campus, it didn't take me long to meet my friend Chuck. He became my best friend, we became roommates, and we created a future. Our plan was to start a computer company after graduation and I was to create the graphics while we would be designing and programming games. I had a friend, freedom, and a future. My life was set.

Then during junior year, one of my professors called me in for a meeting. He offered me a new version of my old dream to work in law enforcement so we talked options, ironed out a contract, and I became an agent for the CIA.


My life changed after that and got even more complicated.

Early on in my working career, Director Graham teamed up with the directors of the FBI and Marshals to put together what was dubbed, Operation Bait. To work the operation, they created the character Neal George Caffrey and used my real Wit-sec history, but when I stepped into character, the college graduate and agent Bryce Larkin didn't exist. Those secrets were to keep me safe as I could protect myself better than expected. The purpose was for me to be bait for my father's organization by being dangled in the relative open as a helpless con to see who bit.

Despite the dangers that entailed, I was game for anything to protect my mom and Ellen.


In order to play a believable con, the bosses assigned a white hat criminal to show me the ropes.

Mozzie grew up on the streets and learned that his parents were spies who abandoned him at a Detroit orphanage before going on a mission. After learning of his heritage, he further discovered that they were killed in action. Determined to learn why, he continued to dig until he learned that they lacked critical street information.

When his snooping was discovered, he made a deal with the agents. In exchange for the full information on his parents, Mozzie would keep his freedom, share how he hacked the government data base, and he became a much needed street informant.

I was a well trained agent in the black ops field so I had the basic skills, but Mozzie went to work trying to teach me how to turn those abilities into a long con.

We started as agent and street legend, but eventually found enough common ground to really become friends. Admittedly, he did have issues trusting a suit while I had issues trusting a con, but despite our rough patches, we were able to embody our roles and have taken Caffrey into criminal history books.


Our first job together was to check out the fishy work of one Vincent Adler. The investigation was important for Mozzie to gather street information and it made for a means of us meshing our working techniques before we took on something like my father's cohorts.

It turned out that we drew the attention of another undercover agent named Kate Moreau. She and I tried to work our way into Adler's inner circle in the hopes of learning his plans. When that didn't work, we teamed up and completed all three of our jobs as a team.

After a while though, Kate and I broke up, she was assigned to go after Adler alone, and I was sent in a different direction

I was still assigned to work with Mozzie from time to time in order to keep my alias alive for later, but my new assignment was for me to be partnered with Sarah and run international missions. Eventually, Sarah and I were working well together professionally, but we were lonely in our personal lives which made it easy to start dating.

Then a lot happened at once.

Fulcrum started messing with my file so I was pulled from Operation Bait and redirected to go after them in Operation Sandwall.

In order to do that, Kate helped me out. She had been allowing the FBI to monitor her location and Peter used that to set a trap. I walked in and had a quick meeting with Kate before the FBI raided.

There had been a breakthrough in the Adler case so Kate was going to pursue it and leave updates on her weekly 'visit.' Mozzie was going to go back to doing his work until contacted, and I was going through the justice system for a while.

As the case progressed, I worked to integrate myself with Fulcrum. Then when the case was finished and my sentence was read, I officially 'went rogue.'

When I stole the Intersect, I knew that I was changing my life… if not ending it. Sarah would be left believing that I was a traitor, Chuck would hate me more for messing with his life again, Orion would be angry that I involved his son, and Casey would shoot to kill. Even if I ultimately survived, I would either be dead, a traitor, or an even worse friend to everyone who knew me as Bryce.

Fortunately, I did survive.

After a year in captivity, Chuck, Sarah, and Casey rescued me on accident. They turned me in to the bosses and I was taken to a base for interrogation. Since I knew that I could trust Chuck, and I wanted to see how he was doing, I refused to speak to anyone but him. He came, and I only made him hate me more by using him for my escape. Still, he cleared my name once I managed to get the message of Sandwall to him.

Returning to the field, I was given multiple tasks. On one hand, I was the decoy for the Intersect and kept Fulcrum busy on an international chase, while on the other hand I did some of my time in prison to keep up appearances and to help Kate.

When Chuck was freed from the Intersect, I was brought back to take his place.

Since I was around, I was able to help protect Chuck's family when his sister's wedding was attacked. Then when we had neutralized the threat, I went back to my assignment while the others went to work getting Ellie married.

It was amusing to watch Casey and his black ops team trying to plan a wedding. Unfortunately, my amusement at their predicament meant that the colonel wrangled me in to help… or take over really. Suddenly I was working with Chuck's information on Ellie and Ellen's training to be a classic gentleman. Compared to playing Caffrey, this was a cake walk. Besides, it was nice to repair some of the damage that I had done to the family.

After my last meeting with Orion, I went on to my assignment of being the next Intersect. When I walked into the Intersect facility though, I could feel my nerves humming. Every instinct screamed that something was terribly wrong. Then the traitor among us signaled his companions and the battle began.

Despite being shot in the back, I was still able to stagger into the room and locked the enemy out. That meant that my protection team was left to do their job in fending the enemy off. I feared they could be overwhelmed, and I couldn't get up to destroy the Intersect.

Then Chuck fell in to the rescue.

I was glad that Orion had warned the team, but I didn't want Chuck involved again. With no other choice available though, I gave him my gear and faded into oblivion, again.


Thank you everyone for reading, commenting, leaving kudos, and choosing to favorite :D

For those who may not have read my previous note on this story, I was stressed when I wrote this at work so I get mean later. However, I do promise to give it a happy ending :D

Since I'm actually remembering this again, I would like to note that I do not own White Collar or Chuck and that as usual, I am simply playing in one of my favorite sandboxes :D