A/N: I know it's been a minute, but if you think this fic has ever been far from my mind, well, you're wrong. I don't know how many "episodes" it will be. (This is the end of the second one). There are things I want to fix, and while getting Orion back is one of them, there is one more key to this whole thing that has always been in the back of my mind. Again, Halfachance and I chatting is what FINALLY got the last barrier removed and let me figure out what to do next. Get ready, cause you didn't see this coming. Chuck Season 6: DC's Loveletter to the Fans, Ep 2 thrilling conclusion of Chuck vs The Past

Disclaimer: I don't own Chuck

In case you forgot this is the fic where the last episode of season 4 and all of season 5 was a dream.

Washington DC

Peter Burke found himself sitting in front of the SAC of the FBI New York White Collar Crime Division, and the Director of the NSA. He closed the folder, and shook his head.

"Not that that he didn't deserve it, but did he suffer?"

"He did not," General Beckman replied. "My agent ended it with a single headshot." Peter nodded. "There's more, Agent Burke, if you are ready for it."

"I'm not sure I am, but I'm guessing me being here isn't just about my twin brother."

"No, it's not," Beckman said. "It's about Neal."

"What did he do?" Peter asked, sitting up straight.

"Peter, what we're about to tell you is so high up the top-secret ladder, I'm not sure I'm cleared," Reese Hughes said, looking over at Beckman. "I was just read in a few days ago, and I will admit that at first I found it preposterous. But I have been assured it is all true."

Beckman handed Peter a thick file. "Get comfortable, this will take you a while," she said. Peter opened the file and began to read.

}o{

Burbank two days later

"I don't know if I can do this," Sarah admitted, looking around the courtyard at all the people coming and going.

"Is this bringing back bad memories?" Chuck asked, glancing at her, worried. "Do we need to go somewhere else to live?"

She snorted as she shook her head at him, and smiled. "No… I mean, wait until we get married." Chuck's anxiety left as quickly as it had appeared, and a slow smile crept across his face. "God, I love it when you react like that," she said in a quiet breathy voice. "Come on," she said, pulling him toward her apartment. She stopped, and then in one move he was behind her, her in front, her gun drawn. "Take one step and I will kill you."

"Agent Walker, please… I am Peter Burke, FBI," the man who looked exactly like Kieran Ryker said. She heard Chuck make a noise, and glanced over her shoulder at him. He shook his head, and she knew what had happened.

"Did he just…" he trailed off and looked around as Sarah and Chuck both turned to him, shock on their faces. "…Flash?" he whispered.

"I think we need to talk inside," Chuck said, holding up a hand to forestall Casey's imminent shooting of Burke. "You too, Casey." Casey nodded, and kept an eye on Burke as they all went inside.

}o{

"Ryker is your twin brother?" Chuck blurted out the second he shut the door behind everyone. Sarah stared at Chuck in shock.

"Yes," Burke replied. "We were separated at birth." He studied Chuck for a minute. "So, it's true about the Intersect."

"How the hell do you know about the Intersect?" Casey asked, only just stopping himself from reaching for his gun.

"Has General Beckman not contacted you?" Burke asked. Chuck and the others glanced at each other. "I'll take that as a no."

"Casey," Chuck said. Casey grunted, pulled out his phone, and moved off to a separate part of the house. "I'm sorry about your brother."

"I'm not," Peter said, shaking his head. "He had a choice, and was dealt the consequence of that choice. I do hate that he's dead, and can't be rehabilitated. But I have no doubt he would have killed all of you to get what he wanted."

"Wow, your file says no nonsense, and it wasn't joking," Chuck replied.

"He's clean, and Beckman apologizes. She's procured our new site," Casey told them.

"Beckman told me to say this, said it might speed things up," Burke told them. "She also said you might want to sit down, Chuck." Sarah grabbed his arm to guide him to the couch.

"Listen, if Beckman says to sit down, it might be a doozy," Sarah told him. Chuck nodded, and followed her to the couch. He sat down, and looked up at Peter.

Peter took a deep breath, nodded and spoke. "Neal George Bennett," Burke said.

Chuck began a flash for which he was wholly unprepared.

}o{

"Are you okay?" Sarah asked. Chuck nodded, but looked at Sarah, worried. "What?" Chuck looked at Peter.

"She said it might be easier if you explain this to everyone," Peter told them. "And trust me, I would love to understand it all," he continued, getting a little heated.

"Agent Burke?" Sarah said, standing up and getting between him and Chuck.

"I'm sorry," he said, holding up his hands. "It's just… I have a partner, that is supposed to be my nemesis, if you will." Chuck and Sarah shared a glance. "But he can't be, that man died in jail. This guy acts like Neal, looks a lot like Neal, but he's not Neal Caffrey.

The people closest to Neal have been gathered up, and told to play along, in exchange for immunity for their crimes. The others he can fool; he's close enough, but there are little things, things that aren't Neal. And then I look at this folder." He held it up and for the first time, Sarah saw it, and her jaw dropped.

"So please tell me: who the hell is Bryce Larkin, and why is he out here pretending to be Neal Caffrey?"

A knock on the door interrupted them. Casey walked over to check, his gun drawn. He gave a curious grunt, and opened the door. General Beckman stood in the open doorway.

"I think you all need to come with me," she said, by way of greeting.

}o{

The group found themselves at the new home of Carmichael Industries. "Nice place," Peter said.

"It will be your headquarters while you are here, Agent Burke," Beckman told him. "Chuck, Sarah, the retrofitting will take some time, but we have the main office here ready to go." She offered everyone a seat as she stood at the head of the table. "I think it's time you know everything that happened to Bryce." She turned to Agent Burke. "And the man you now know as Neal Caffery."

She was silent for a moment. "Agent Larkin sustained what we thought were fatal injuries," Beckman told the group. "As you know, he was killed once and brought back by Fulcrum. This second stab at death also left him brain-dead for a short time. There was one person who thought he could save Bryce Larkin."

"My father," Chuck said softly. Beckman nodded.

"He wanted to try and return Bryce's personality, but…" Beckman trailed off. "He had been killed twice over the Intersect, and we all wondered if he wouldn't for a third time."

"The mission," Sarah said. "It always came first."

"It did," Beckman replied. "What we had to do was find a way to bring him back, but keep an eye on him. And that's when your father discovered the physical similarities between Bryce and Neal."

"To be fair, they are doppelgangers," Peter said. "If I hadn't been told, and knew Neal was dead…" Peter shrugged.

"Your father created another personality Intersect, Chuck," Beckman told him. "I promised him I would train you, take care of you, and I tried. But then… then after the Intersect was put into Bryce, now Neal… you began to malfunction, for lack of a better term."

"That was my fault," Sarah said, raising her hand.

"No, mine," Chuck argued. She gave him a look. "Our?" She relented and nodded. "Our fault, general."

"Either way, you were out of the CIA, or so I thought, and Bryce… Neal,was living in New York where he truly believes he is Neal Caffery," Beckman explained. "The Intersect worked perfectly in him."

"General, that's not right," Chuck insisted.

"I agreed, and we took it out," Beckman told him. "And Bryce immediately began to die."

"What?" Chuck asked, stunned.

"His mind… the trauma from the fight… dying twice… it was too much, and his brain…." Beckman shook her head. "The only way to save his life was to make him Neal again. So, we put the Intersect back in him, and for whatever reason, it's worked."

"So he either has to remain Neal, or die," Chuck said softly.

"Bryce Larkin truly died that day," Sarah added. Beckman nodded. "What would happen if he found out he was Bryce?"

"We don't know," Beckman admitted. "That is why we must make him believe he is Neal Caffery."

"General, stupid question; wouldn't it be safer if we were to never know about this, so we couldn't screw it up?" Chuck asked. "I really appreciate the transparency, but this might be one of those times that me knowing less is better."

"I wholeheartedly agree with you, Mr. Bartowski. But you see, there is a small problem," Beckman began. She glanced at Peter.

"Now I get it," Peter muttered. "There is a man by the name of Dr. Torsten Mueller," he began. Sarah's hand shot to Chuck's. "Uh, is everything okay?"

"That sounds like the man who was torturing me, and my soon-to-be wife beat up a quarter of Thailand so she could save me," Chuck replied.

"That's an exaggeration," Sarah insisted.

"She's right, Chuck," Beckman added. "More like half," she muttered. Sarah gave Beckman a smile. "It is the same doctor, and before you ask, he is still in prison."

"He's got dad," Chuck said softly. "It's the only thing that makes sense. That's why he was working on the Intersect."

"It's possible," Peter admitted. "He has a vault at one of his properties that we believe is housing a stolen work of art. A Caviler by Frans van Mieres the Elder was stolen from The Art Gallery of New South Wales in Sydney. It's worth approximately one million dollars."

"I wonder what the finger paintings of Frans van Mieres the younger are worth?" Chuck muttered. Sarah elbowed him in the side, as Beckman gave him a look. "You have to be a certified badass to steal a painting in Australia." Everyone gave him a look. "Would you be shocked to learn that some of the animals are armed with boomerangs or guns?" Beckman closed her eyes and seemed to be praying. "I mean seriously, they had a military operation called the Emu War to try and curb the population."

"Are you quite done?" Beckman asked. She saw Peter staring at Chuck. "I apologize for him-"

"No," Burke said, shaking his head and grinning. "It's like… it's like talking to Neal."

"Uh, general, you said my dad was in charge of his Intersect?" Chuck asked. Beckman nodded. "Would he have, oh, I don't know… added any of my personality traits to it?" Beckman pressed her lips together. Chuck turned to Peter.

"The two of you are going to help us, aren't you?" Chuck asked. Peter shook his head negatively.

"No, you and Agent Walker are going to work with Neal to break into the facility, find the painting if you can, and try and find your father or any clues to where he is," Peter replied. There was a familiar rapping on the door.

"Bryce," Chuck blurted out in a low whisper.

"Come in," Peter called out. The man they formerly knew as Bryce walked in. He was dressed more formally than Chuck was used to, but the grin, the mannerisms, were all Bryce Larkin. "Neal, let me introduce you to Mr. and Mrs. Charles Carmichael."

"Pleasure," Neal said, reaching out to shake Sarah's hand, then Chuck's. He paused for a moment. "Do I know you two?"

"Why, do we remind you of someone?" Sarah asked.

"No," Neal said with a smile. "It's just you two are giving me a look."

"You resemble someone we both knew, that's all," Chuck told him. "We're looking forward to working with you." Peter handed Chuck a device. "What's this?"

Neal lifted his leg, pulling up his pant leg so that both could see the monitoring device on his leg. "My shock collar," he said with a grin. "It's a joke, it doesn't really shock me."

"Got it," Chuck nodded. "So, any ideas how to get into the facility?" Chuck watched the familiar grin grow across Neal's face.

"Absolutely," he replied.

A/N: I have tried to stay as faithful to White Collar as I can, if you catch a few errors in continuity, well… just squint until they look right. For those that do not know, Matt Bomer left Chuck to become the Co-star of White Collar. I believe with all my heart, much of what Shaw said, and was written to do, was written thinking that it would be Bryce. There are lines that if you imagine Bryce saying them to Sarah it makes all the sense in the world. I have no proof, just what I believe. Anyway, again thanks to Halfachance who had my own personal believe that Bryce was forced to go into hiding and became Neal Caffery. And yes, Neal and Ellie would drink wine together, in fact… they just may.