Title: the ghost of one who came here often
Fandom: White Collar/Chuck
Disclaimer: not my characters
Warnings: AU for Chuck; anytime for White Collar
Pairings: implied Bryce/Chuck
Rating: PG
Wordcount: 320
Point of view: third
Prompt: Chuck/White Collar, Bryce + Neal (no slash), "How is it we're identical twins, you can wear my clothes, you can style your hair right, and you still don't look enough like a spy to pass at the agency?" "I'm just not enough of a dick." "Nice."
The undercover op is successful at first, because Neal is a very good liar and he has years of experience pretending to be his brother.
But it's doomed to failure because while he is good with guns, and proficient at hand-to-hand (his brother insisted), Neal isn't a killer. Not that he can't kill, because he can, and he has, and he will again, to save Peter or El or Moz or (above all) Bryce. But he isn't a killer, not like Bryce. It isn't easy for him.
And he's leading away the spooks after his brother while Bryce escapes, and he slips into a well-dressed crowd, drapes the leather jacket over a model-pretty woman, snags an awesome hat from a guy in a sloppy suit, and sheds Bryce to become Nicholas Calden again.
He gets a text halfway through the party: made it. vanish
He meets up with his brother at the loft, and Bryce smiles at him. "Mind if I lie low here for awhile?"
Neal shrugs and stretches his spine, trying to work out the kinks of carrying the weight of the world on his shoulders. (Or maybe just the weight of one computer geek from Los Angeles. It doesn't matter. Either way, it was a weight he assumed to sell the con, and it failed. How Bryce manages it all the time⦠well, no wonder he needs to get away, and has died multiple times to do it.)
"Thanks, Noah," Bryce says quietly. He stares over the balcony and Neal tugs him gently toward the bed.
"C'mon, Brendan," Neal murmurs. "When's the last time you slept, lil'brother?"
"I'm barely two minutes younger than you," Bryce mutters, but he lets Neal tuck him under the covers and curls in close when Neal slides next to him.
It's the first time they've curled up together since they were boys, and it's the best sleep Bryce has had since Stanford.
