Title: echoes of another year

Fandom: White Collar/Chuck

Disclaimer: not my characters

Warnings: future!fic

Pairings: Bryce!Neal/Chuck

Rating: PG

Wordcount:420

Point of view: third

Prompt: Chuck, Chuck/Bryce!Neal, He totally had Chuck going until the bad guys showed up; Chuck knows Bryce's fighting style.

Chuck's checked everything the intersect has on Bryce (twice, thrice, a dozen times) and nowhere does it mention he had a twin. Or a clone.

And while Neal Caffrey looks just like Bryce, he doesn't move like him. And he's charming, just like Bryce, but he doesn't know about Star Trek and he gives Chuck a politely confused expression when Chuck speaks Klingon, and even Sarah—who knew Bryce at least as well as Chuck did—says it can't be him.

And then, while Chuck and Neal are a few rooms over from the rest of their joint-team, there's suddenly a dozen guys attacking them. The intersect kicks in and Chuck is totally destroying them, when he glances over and sees Neal doing the same.

Neal. The guy with awesome hats who sketched Chuck so life-like it was a mirror in under a minute. The guy who knows the difference between Monet and Manet, but not Picard and Janeway. The guy who spent four years in jail instead of dying in Chuck's arms. The guy who didn't go to college anywhere, but definitely not Stanford.

Except that is totally Bryce. Chuck's learned his fighting style courtesy the intersect and the Buy-More, and that is Bryce.

And as soon as the fight's over and all the goons are unconscious or dead, Bryce looks at Chuck and—vanishes. And it's Neal standing there, and he says, "Well, that was an adventure, wasn't it?"

Agent Burke and Sarah and Casey run in, guns ready, and Neal says, "Peter, you should have seen Chuck! He was amazing."

Chuck wants to cry. And he tries to talk to Neal a dozen times, but Neal always dodges him, and then it's their last day working with the FBI and Neal pops in out of nowhere, grabs Chuck's hand, and drags him to a conference room. He shuts the door, closes the blinds, and says, "Bryce Larkin died, Chuck. He died and his body was destroyed."

"I know," Chuck responds, watching carefully, but it's still Neal.

Until he gives Chuck a quick, heartbreaking smile. "I'm sorry, Chuck," he murmurs, and leans forward for an entirely too brief kiss. "I'm Neal Caffrey now," he says, and then, in Klingon, "Go home. I can't be who you want anymore."

And Neal pulls away, straightens first his shirt, then Chuck's, and leaves the room.

And when Chuck has to wipe away some tears on the way home, not even Casey gives him a hard time about it.