The Explanations


Walking in and causing all conversations to stop, Mozzie made his appearance with a tall fellow dressed in a crazy hair wig. He resembled Einstein right down to his clothes and wrinkled face. Neal was wearing another get up.

Waving his hands for attention before taking a bow, Einstein smiled at his guests. "Every single one of you has been well and truly gotten. Now, so you can sleep, I will be explaining an element of what transpired here this evening."

Giving their full attention, the audience lowered drinks and forgot food as they were too interested to be bothered by anything other than the coming explanations.

Looking to June, Einstein got started. "Mrs. Elington here has asked some good questions. First, you've been observed evading the harmless visitors giving your fear away. Second, those were tiny drones so you were never in any danger. Third, we've refitted them as a present. Now they're gossamer butterflies that will flit about your ceiling before returning to their charging pad at a preprogrammed battery setting. I'm sure your granddaughter will enjoy watching them with you on her next visit." Einstein stepped forward to give her a neatly wrapped little present.

Kissing his cheek, June showed forgiveness and appreciation for the kind gesture to her and her granddaughter.

"Many of the pranks were obvious being Mozzie's pet Percy, one or the other of us in costumes making use of the secret passageways, or things like the double doors." Einstein gave a general description for many of the hoaxes and pranks together to make the process more simplified.

"As for our alien encounter, you shouldn't have left your costume unattended in the office. It was too easy to replace it. How we elevated you though, I will not explain as it was too much fun." After several complaints of curiosity were voiced, he gave in slightly. "Alright, think along the lines of miniaturized hovercraft and electromagnetic technology merged."

Raising his hand, Price asked about his encounter with the little monster in the hallway.

"There are times where Mozzie and I have needed someone small and fast to enter spaces or to distract people while we accomplish our endeavors. Mozzie worked with a friend to create a robot with capabilities to serve our purposes. This time, scaring the FBI was probably the most fun time we've had with it." Einstein shrugged as he vaguely explained the abilities of the robot to remain low to the ground and move fast for the physical aspects while light projections were used for some of the less realistic actions.

Then looking like he was trying to end the discussion, Einstein started to dismiss the general catering staff for the night as the meal had been eaten and the remnants cleared while he talked so their service was no longer needed. As for his guests, he gave them the freedom to explore the property without fear as the scare mechanisms were turned off. Wishing them all a good night, he tried to evade the remaining caterers who had refused to leave along with the Burkes, Jones, and Diana who particularly wanted answers.

"How did you know about my friend?" The curly haired DJ asked as he grabbed Einstein's arm when he passed.

"My birth name is Neal Bennett. My mother is a Caffrey which is how I'm related by blood. However, going into Wit-sec as a child means I've never shown the full picture of who I am to anyone." Neal removed the arm of his costume from the puzzled man's grasp before slipping off to bed with a wish goodnight.

Addressing the only people left seated, Mozzie invited the Burkes, Jones, Diana, and the four mysterious catering staff who remained to retire to their rooms. "Who is Neal Caffrey, really? You are the answers to each other's mysteries and neither of your investigations is complete. Tomorrow, after the other guests have left, you can complete both agendas… if you don't manage on your own before then." Then he was gone in a puff of smoke worthy of the greatest magician.

"Apparently they aren't done with us, just the rest of the guests." The blonde waitress observed.

"I've noticed that they went after each of you, but not any of the other staff. Do you know why?" Peter asked the strangers who were also sitting about the table with them.

Taking the lead, the curly-haired fellow spoke for the others. "No, we don't know anything about Neal Caffrey."

Continuing to question the man, Peter asked, "You seem the most shaken despite what he got the others with. How did they get you?"

Shivering, the man seemed reluctant to go into specifics, but he shared the most basic of details. "I'm pretty sure I saw the ghost of an old friend."

Instinctively, Peter blurted, "You wouldn't happen to be Chuck Bartowski by any chance?"

Startled, the man seemed to be caught completely by surprise while the rest of the group with him got wary expressions.

"I am, but how do you know that?" Chuck leaned closer to Peter in curiosity.

"Mozzie said we were the answers to each other's investigations. That means someone hired you to investigate Neal Caffrey which we know, while we had a name noted to be his legal name cross our records recently so we are curious about him in return. Your name came up in my research." Peter explained while watching Chuck's reaction.

Brightening up, Chuck seemed to be catching up. "What is that legal name?"

"Bryce, Bryce Larkin," Peter answered seeing the knowing happiness light up the other man's face.

"He's not dead again! That explains what happened in the hallway too. I passed him, and he… he just acknowledged me vaguely like we were still in college and none of the other stuff has happened since." Chuck crowed excitedly, he was glad to discover his friend was still alive.

"To confirm they're the same person, do you have a picture of Bryce? I have one of Neal." Peter moved to retrieve his picture while Chuck thought for a moment.

"Ah, yes. After we figured out everything, I uploaded a picture of him from our college days." Chuck started messing with his phone.

Once they were ready, the two exchanged phones showing each other the image they wished to see, the confirmation that Neal Caffrey was also Bryce Larkin, the legendary CIA agent.

With the proof in hand, they passed the images around to anyone from their team who was interested before ultimately passing the phones back to their respective owners.

"What is this about Bryce Larkin? Elizabeth asked her husband. "You haven't mentioned anything about it."

"It's another name for Neal. Apparently, his birth name is Neal Bennett, Caffrey is from his mother's side of the family, but for some reason, he went into Wit-sec and his legal name is Bryce Larkin. He's a CIA agent who appears to be on some kind of loaner assignment. The best we can guess is it has something to do with his family as he's using a name so close to his birth name while being allowed to be here despite the conflicting purposes between our agencies. Since rumors create him to be quite the legend with a lot of secrecy, I didn't want to get you too close to the potential repercussions if we got in trouble for researching." Peter summarized their discoveries and his reasoning for keeping his wife out of the picture in an aside.

"That explains why we were hired to verify the information about Neal. There are those who question whether he's really a Caffrey, while others fear what he may do with the inheritance. Now we can honestly reassure them that he won't be up to funny business, not of the criminal variety anyway." Chuck grinned much more relaxed. Knowing he had seen his friend alive and well eased his fears.

Then after a few moments, Chuck got a devious grin. "You know what, now that we both know Neal is Bryce, I say we try to turn the tables. He probably has the place rigged with surveillance in order to pull all this off and to always know where we were and what we were doing. However, that also means there's a surveillance system just sitting there, waiting for us to make use of it in return. What do you say to figuring out a way to scare him back? It won't be easy, but I think we can manage to surprise him at the very least!"

The devious grins slowly spread around the table as everyone decided they liked the idea of the plan.

"How would we do that?" Peter leaned forward mirroring Chuck as they started sharing ideas and ways to pull it off.


Thank you, everyone, for reading, reviewing, choosing to favorite, following my stories and I, and leaving kudos :D

It was mentioned in a review that Matt's family history has some similarities to Caffrey's here, that's a total coincidence as I haven't researched any of the actors' real lives to intentionally reference anything.