Only Once


Fromsteampunkunicorn on AO3:

Okay, you've done werewolves and cats, but I was wondering if you could have them be selkies. They are one of my favorite myths and it would be interesting to know why they are on land. Perhaps the CIA possesses Bryce's and Neal had become a con man to try to get it back? Just a possibility.

Notes: This is a long one and kind of all over the place... enjoy.


The ocean sung. There were times when Neal could hear it, loud and clear in his thoughts. It hummed like a lullaby, like a song heard in childhood.

"Maybe it's time to grow up, Neal," Bryce had said to him once. The words had been hard. They were the words of someone who had lost and couldn't see how to make things right again.

As his madre used to say; 'a selkie only gets their skin stolen once.' Mozzie would have liked her.

She had her skin stolen once. She hunted the thief down, took back her skin and killed him. Because of that, some of Neal's oldest memories were of staying in motels while his mother was out looking for clues.

Because they travelled with their mother on land as children, Bryce and Neal were more attached to the land-dwellers and their culture than most selkies.

Neal and Bryce returned to land years later, making new homes and identities for themselves. They didn't realise the importance of last names and how they showed who you were related to so they spent a lot of time explaining why they had different surnames. Their go to excuse became 'we were separated at birth and didn't find each other until recently'. Really, they had picked whatever last name had suited them; Neal liked the sound of 'Caffrey' while Bryce liked the simplicity of 'Larkin'.

They grew up with land-dwellers and immersed themselves in the land-dwellers culture. They weren't the first selkies to do so and whenever they returned to the sea it was always the same tune; they would return permanently eventually, once they experienced the greed of land-dwellers.

'A selkie only gets their skin stolen once.'

Bryce had his skin stolen during his time at Stanford. Unknown to him, a group of his housemates had ransacked his room as a joke and found his hidden skin. They had crinkled their noses at the seal skin and wondered why he would keep something so dirty and disgusting. One of them, a rich guy who was there on his parent's dime, suggested selling it.

It was sadly ironic. If Bryce hadn't gotten Chuck kicked out, Chuck would certainly have stopped them. But, Chuck was gone so they sold the skin.

Bryce discovered what had happened too late. He tore into his housemates but there was nothing they could do to stop it. Bryce grabbed his things and left, making sure that the money from the sale went into his account and not theirs.

He stayed with Neal in the apartment they acquired.

"It's not over. We can find it!" Neal insisted.

"Maybe it's time to grow up, Neal." They hadn't been to the ocean in weeks. Bryce muttered that they were selkies in name only, he more than Neal now that he lost his skin.


Bryce threw himself into pretending to be human. Neal could see that he was missing something. Without his skin, he was harder and colder than he used to be. He treated everyone with suspicion.

The father of the guy who sold the skin was a banker. Neal wasn't one for revenge but he wanted them to hurt the way his brother was hurting. He moved to New York; told Bryce that he was looking to experience life in the big city, and forged the bonds which he could use to get closer to the guy.

He found Mozzie instead and a new path was opened up to him. Maybe, he could steal it back? It was possible as the path of a conman was one that would teach him how to steal without hurting anyone.

The seal in him certainly liked the idea of taking the shiny things. As much as it loved living it a city on the waterfront.

And Neal met Kate. He forgot for a while that he wasn't human.

'A selkie only gets their skin stolen once.'

Neal kept his skin close to him and hidden in a bag. A bag Kate took when she ran from him. He wondered for years whether she took it with the knowledge of what it was and that it would cause him to chase her forever like the man who took his mother's skin or whether she was ignorant like those who took Bryce's skin.

He never did get his answer. He found her but he couldn't ask with the FBI right outside and Kate refused to tell him at first.

Neal spent four years in prison. Surrounded by grey walks he spent most of his time aching for the sea, for the ocean and for his kind. At times, he would dream of the dark ocean depths, of seal calls, fuzzy whiskers and instinct telling you what was right and wrong and then he would wake up in a cold cell with the cries and whimpers of angry and broken land-dwellers and wonder if this was to be his life. He would feel the overwhelming sense of loss, of a hole in his chest where his seal-self should be and he would have to resist the urge to break down.

He would have been better off at an aquarium, trapped as a seal instead of here, trapped in a form which itched on rainy days.

Kate vanished and Neal made his deal with the FBI. Working with the FBI, he realised something. It wasn't how the land-dwellers' sense of right and wrong worked, like he knew Peter was hoping he would learn.

Instead he realised that there were no Peters in the ocean. No accepting Els or conspiracy Mozzies. There were no kindly and crooked Junes.

The ocean sung and the land hummed in tune. Cars drove past June's with hums and bleeps as people moved across floors with shuffles and thuds. The office bustled with rustles, clicks, scribbles, rings and thumps of feet;

"Sleeping on the job, Caffrey?" Diana questioned. Neal opened one eye and let the hums and the song buzz in the back of his brain.

"Come on, Diana," he smirked, "wouldn't you?" He pointed to the mortgage fraud files Peter had him looking over. He was supposed to be examining the signature to see whether it had been forged.

"Hmm," she pretended to think about it for a moment. "Nope. Not when a warehouse of stolen art has been discovered."

Wait. Neal sat up straight.

"What?" Has she said what he thought she said? Was she joking to get a rise out of him?

She smirked in a 'have I got your attention, now?' kind of way.

"Peter's up there talking with the agents who discovered it," she explained, "they found it while hunting down some terrorists."

"And they probably don't want Neal Caffrey anywhere near that stolen art," Jones pointed out. He was sitting at his desk and typing away, the only one of them actually working during this gossip-fest.

"That's their loss then," Neal shrugged.

"I'd say it's their gain," Diana countered, "they don't have to put up with your childish antics."

"'Childish'?" Neal questioned, raising an eyebrow. He saw the laugh Blake suppressed.

"Well, Childish or not, seems like they want to take their chances," Peter said, causing a few agents to jump. They hadn't noticed him walk down. He added, "everyone, these are agents Carmichael, Walker and Casey. We'll be working together until we can get this mess sorted out." And Peter would take all the help he could get when terrorists were possibly involved.

Neal frowned and tried to figure out why Carmichael looked familiar. He didn't get much of a chance before the man in question walked up to his desk and asked him;

"So, who are you?"

Neal blinked. That was not a question he was used to.

"Neal Caffrey."

Carmichael's dark eyes narrowed, as if examining him for something. Whatever it was, he didn't seem to find it as he straightened up a moment later.

"I'm Chuck," he said, holding out a letter. Confusion raced through the room.

Chuck, Chuck, Chuck; where did Neal know that name from?

"Oh! Chuck out of luck!" Neal realised out loud a moment later, causing more confusion and some embarrassment on his part.

Casey grunted, as if reminding Neal to watch the insults.

Chuck flinched but sighed a moment later.

"Please tell me Bryce doesn't call me that."

"No, just me," Neal responded, opening the letter. It was from Bryce.

"Wait, he's not Bryce?" he heard Walker whisper to Chuck.

"No, he's Neal," Chuck whispered back, "Bryce's twin."

The letter said that Bryce was in New York and that his seal-skin had been found.

Neal stared at it for a moment. 'His seal-skin'? That wasn't possible. For Bryce to be able to find either of their seal-skins... Neal shivered. Why did he think of fleeing to the cold depths of the ocean?

"Neal?" Peter questioned in concern. Neal gave him a smile and then turned to Chuck.

"You're missing an agent, aren't you? I happen to know where he is."


It was a dirty, mean little trick and he knew it. Having land-dwellers around to keep them from fleeing into the ocean bordered cruel. Neal guided Peter and Chuck up the stairs to his apartment at June's and tried to quell the song of the ocean as he walked. He focused on his footsteps and the footsteps of his friend and Bryce's friend.

He opened his door to his apartment to a very angry Bryce. And a very panicked Mozzie, tied to a chair and squeaking through a gag.

"You had it!" he bellowed the moment he saw Neal. Neal nodded and hung his head.

"Bryce?" Chuck questioned softly, a little worried at his friend's anger. Peter moved to cover Neal and glared at Bryce.

Bryce saw his friend and Neal's friend trying to protect his brother from him and forced himself to calm down. It hurt to see others believe he would hurt his twin when he only intended to scare him a little because he was annoyed that Neal kept this from him.

Once he calmed down, he could feel that Neal was upset and apologetic.

"Why?" he asked, one some level unable to believe that they were even having this conversation.

"I found it," Neal explained, "Mozzie helped me to find it." Speaking of Mozzie, "untie him."

Bryce sighed and did so. Mozzie took a huge gasp of air as the gag came off.

"Neal! You never warned me that your crazy copy was in the city!" Mozzie said frantically.

"I didn't know," Neal responded but Mozzie wasn't really listening.

"I'm not crazy," Bryce said around the same time and Mozzie gave him a 'really?' glare.

"He's questioning me about those skins Kate gave me ages ago! What are they?"

"Guess," Neal sighed. There was a fluttering in his chest but, surely that couldn't be?

"Skins?" Peter questioned in a horrified voice. He was imagining a great number of violent crimes which he wouldn't have thought to attribute to Neal, although he wouldn't put it past Mozzie and perhaps even Kate.

To everyone's, except Bryce's, surprise, Chuck was the one to respond;

"Have you ever heard of Selkies?"

Neal missed the explanation through the roaring in his ears. For a moment he thought he was on the beach.

"Neal? Neal!" He blinked and he was back in his apartment, with Peter's hands on his shoulders and a worried Chuck eyeing him.

"Moz, where are they?" he questioned, the gravel in his voice surprising even him.

"Well, I left one in the iron box but I gave the other to the crazy clone," Mozzie admitted in embarrassment.

"Where is it?" Neal questioned, turning to Bryce. He must had convinced Mozzie to bring him one of the skins before realising that Neal actually possessed both. Or he was looking for evidence that Mozzie knew where they were and started questioning him on the location when Mozzie only brought him one skin.

"Neal?" Bryce questioned in concern. He moved closer to him and placed a hand on Neal's cheek. It was cold and damp.

'A selkie only gets their skin stolen once.'

Why?

"You need to get rid of it!" Neal yelled while he could. Hands grabbed him and pushed him onto the floor, trying to keep him calm.

"What?" Bryce questioned. They both knew that destroying the skin would kill Neal. "Why?"

When Bryce lost his skin, Neal had spoken with a few of the ancient selkies.

"'A selkie only gets their skin stolen once,'" Neal recited, shivering as he felt the pull of the waves rush over him. "Do you know why?"

"He's sick, we should get him to a hospital!" Peter raged, pacing back and forth as Chuck and Bryce tended to Neal. He was visibly shivering by now, his body cold and clammy.

"Mozzie!" Neal whimpered as he resisted the call of his skin as much as he could. He couldn't leave; there were no Peters in the ocean and if he gave into the call, he would never see any of the people he cared for again.

He heard Mozzie's pounding feet; a sound which dissolved into the rumble of storm clouds over the ocean.

He came to himself moments later as a hand gripped his wrist and pushed him to the ground.

"Uncle! Uncle!" Neal cried as Chuck held him down.

"What was that?" Bryce gasped.

"That's what I was trying to tell you," Neal gasped out, "the longer a selkie is away from its skin, the stronger the call to find it."

"What?"

Neal made them wait until Mozzie was back. He had a drink of water and tried to push the song of the ocean back to the back of his mind.


When a selkie is separated from its skin, the skin begins to give off a 'call'. There's an urge within the selkie to be whole again. At first, it's weak. But the longer the skin and the selkie are apart, the stronger the call becomes.

If a strong call reaches its selkie, the selkie could go mad trying to get their skin back. It had happened to their mother.

A selkie only gets their skin stolen once and when they are reunited with their skin, they forget about their time on land and hurry to return to the ocean. Their memories return in time but 'time' could mean hundreds of years. Those who the selkie knew during their time on land would be long gone.


"Once, in Italy, I helped another selkie get back her stolen skin. Even though she had a lover she was eager to return to, she forgot the moment she had her skin back. It wasn't that she was cruel, it's just that she couldn't resist her nature. Our nature."

Peter didn't know what to make of this. Mozzie looked interested and slightly overjoyed as everything he suspected was proven true. Chuck was nodding as if this all made sense. Bryce has a growing look of horror as Neal explained what was going on.

Peter wanted to believe that this was nonsense but, he had seen the look in Neal's eyes. Neal had thrown the worried Chuck and Bryce off him and then punched Bryce in the face before Chuck rushed in to stop him. The look in his eyes had been indescribable. The only conclusion he could reach was that it hadn't been Neal, not the Neal he knew, but something more… wild.

"You probably could feel a little from my skin," Neal said to Bryce, "which is why you were so edgy when we arrived."

"Was that was what that was?" Bryce questioned, shivering a little. Then he seemed to realise something. "Uh, did I really threaten to shoot you?" he asked Mozzie.

The little guy nodded with a solemn expression.

"The skin is now in an iron box downstairs," Mozzie explained, "and I will return it to the stash when I leave." He turned to Neal. "I assume the iron does something to dampen the call?"

Peter gave him a look which said 'I can't believe you're acting like this is normal' while Neal nodded.

"I laced the bag Kate took with metals in order to do the same thing," he explained, "it kind of backfired when she ran off with it."

"Hey, at least she returned it," Bryce said. Mozzie and Peter both were silent.

"Mozzie?" Neal prodded.

"I kind of… took it back from her," Mozzie explained. "And since you explained what to do if I found it, I followed your instructions and locked the skins in the box."

Neal sighed while Bryce was silent.

"You okay?" Chuck asked Bryce.

"I could be worse," Bryce said. "I just… never thought that I would have to choose. The land or the sea?"

"You could always hit the pool," Neal suggested with a smirk. If it had been anyone else, Bryce would have hit them. But, since it was Neal, he considered the advice.

"You've already decided, haven't you?"

Neal pointed to the tracker on his ankle.

"I still have years left on my sentence," he explained, "I'm not going anywhere until this is off."

Bryce nodded and thought about it. His skin would be safe, Neal's friend would take care of that. But, never seeing it again? He wanted to swim in the waves like he used to as a child but, that meant never seeing Chuck or Sarah or even Casey again. It meant no spying and he loved the challenges of being a spy.

The ocean still sung to him. He sighed, knowing that he wouldn't respond to that call for a long time.