Part 11

Chuck just arrested a guy under the FBI's nose and passed him off to Casey, who would transport him somewhere to be questioned. The more they could find out about the people he was supplying money to, the better.

He was sitting in the back of a taxi when his phone rang.

"Hey," he told the driver once he hung up, "can you take me to this address?" And he rattles off the address Peter gave him a moment ago.

"Sure thing."

Chuck fidgets on the way to the Burkes'. He knows why Peter would call him; it's the only reason Peter would call him. The reason Chuck gave him the card-disguised-as-bookmark.

Bryce.

The Burkes live in a normal place for New York. Their home was surrounded by similar homes and it was difficult to get parking in front of it. Chuck just paid the driver and jumped out.

Chuck knocked on the door and was blasted with how ordinary their lives were. El opened the door and smiled as she let him in, welcoming him to their home. Their dog, Satchmo, a beautiful golden retriever ran up to him and sniffed before pawing at his shoes for pats.

El laughed as Peter came out with beers in his hands.

"Want one?"

"Sure," Chuck responded, taking the bottle and opening it. A smile came to his face as Peter and El guided him to the table. "Now, you said you had something to talk about?"

Peter took a deep breath, turning serious.

"I want to know about Bryce. And Neal. And why Bryce become Neal."

Chuck thought about it. There was information he knew couldn't be revealed and information he didn't want revealed but he had always been good at picking and choosing what to say.

"According to E's report, Bryce did it because of what happened to Agent X."

"Agent X?"

Chuck explained that Agent X had been an agent who was a friend of the Intersect's creator. Unable to go undercover due to his timid personality, he turned to the Intersect to help. Using the Intersect, he was been implanted with a personality which would help him keep cover, a personality which eventually took over and made him one of the most dangerous criminals of Chuck's time.

"It was only supposed to last a few months but something went wrong. A decade had passed before it was removed. I guess Bryce was trying to help them figure out what went wrong so that no one else would lose themselves like that."

"Was Neal only supposed to last a few months as well?" Peter asked. Part of him wondered if that would have saved himself some hassle but another, stronger and more painful part, wondered what his life would be like without Neal and found it lacking.

"Possibly," Chuck said. The project was only supposed to last a few months.

There was silence for a few moments. El rose to put her tea cup in the sink and offered to take Chuck's bottle for the bin. Chuck shook his head. He had only drunk half of it so far.

"Is it," Peter started hesitantly, "is it possible that the Intersect could have gone away on its own?"

"Huh?"

"It's just, Neal and Bryce are similar. I'm having a hard time remembering that the man by my side is an agent when he acts so much like... Neal."

"Well, he is a spy," Chuck responded. But he did wonder. Peter look sceptical with a frown and a wrinkle between the eyebrows. "Bryce doesn't remember what he did as Neal. The CIA had to provide him with files and psychological profiles to help him re-craft the identity."

"He pulled a Neal moves though. A number of them." Peter told Chuck about how Bryce had called in the CIA to handle a case in a round-about way of protecting his friends.

"That sounds like Bryce," Chuck stated. He then explained that Bryce sent him the Intersect, to help Chuck protect himself and his family from the internal CIA war.

"Sounds like something Neal would do," Peter commented.

"Peter, if the Intersect wore off, you would have known it," Chuck tried to explain, "it would have been similar to how how it was when we first met. Bryce would have appeared with no idea what's going on."

"You don't know that." Peter was getting frustrated. He didn't understand this, yes, but there were logical leaps he could make. Why weren't these CIA people making the same leaps?

"My father is the one who designed the original Intersect. I have one in my head."

"So, you're like Neal?" El questioned, taking a seat at the table. She smiled and folded her hands gently before her.

"Uh, not exactly. Mine's information and skills. Neal was a combination of information, skills and fabricated memories, designed to suppress Bryce's own. One could say that it was the platform upon which the Intersect 2.0 which I possess was created. And there have been faulty Intersects which erased users' memories. Sometimes the memories can come back, sometimes they don't."

"We don't know much about the human brain," El commented with a sad sigh.

Peter frowned. His anger had abated a bit as it sounded like Chuck knew what he was talking about. However;

"This sounds like a really dangerous thing. What was the CIA doing with it?"

"Fighting a war, I guess. There were a number of organisations looking to control this technology. In light of that, the CIA was fighting to make sure they had it first. Once those organisations had been dealt with, the CIA wasn't looking to work with this technology any more. Of course, that's what I thought. Then they sent me E's notes about Bryce and the Intersect Neal project.

"There's nothing in E's notes to suggest that Intersect Neal was going away, unless it was removed."

Peter had a selfish moment where he wondered whether they should have removed it. It had only brought problems into his life and locked Bryce into a life he didn't want to lead. He felt guilty for it a moment later. Bryce didn't deserve to live thinking he was someone else.

"Have either of you asked Bryce about this?" El suggested in the heavy silence. "You've been sitting here, talking about things you decided without him. If Bryce really is a trained agent, then shouldn't you talk to him about this?"

Bryce opened his fridge and crinkled his nose.

"You are lactose intolerant," he said to Mozzie, who was sipping wine at the table behind him, "so why are you putting all these cheeses into my fridge?"

"They're for Percy," Mozzie responded. "Although, you are welcome to sample some yourself."

Percy? Bryce didn't want to ask. For once, he was actually enjoying the company of the eccentric bespectacled man. Mozzie was an interesting guy when Bryce could actually be himself instead of keeping up the masquerade.

"I'm not interested in your cheese," Bryce responded, moving back to the table and sitting down. "Now, you were telling me about the time we met the Vulture."

"Ah, yes. Sally."

Bryce felt something buzz when Mozzie said her name.

'Are these your socks?'; 'That one is mine.' Why was Mozzie talking about socks? And who was that?

Sara. Not Sara. Sally.

"..yce? NEAL!"

Bryce jolted back, his neck jarring on the back of the chair.

"Ow," he grumbled, rubbing the sore away. Unfortunately, it did little for his headache.

"Zoned out on me there," Mozzie informed him, "and your phone beeped."

"It's Tempest," Bryce realised when he read the message.

'I have a lead.'

"Oh, can I come?"