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“What is this?” Peter demanded.
Neal glanced up at him, his expression pulled into the most innocent shape he could manage. His hands were currently occupied with folding a complicated origami bat. “Origami,” Neal answered.
Peter felt his eye twitch, minutely, and resisted the urge to pinch the bridge of his nose. He knew, from experience, that it wouldn’t stop the building headache in its tracks and, in his mind, it just showed Neal that he was getting under Peter’s skin, which was something Peter didn’t like copping to, even if he was admitting as much inadvertently.
“Not the origami, Neal—” Peter gave Neal a hard look, then turned his gaze pointedly at the small child sitting on the corner of Neal’s desk, eyes fixed on the origami bat.
The child was, as mentioned, small. The child could have been anywhere from six to twelve, for all Peter knew, and had their little shoulders hunched uncomfortably around their ears. They had long black hair that looked mildly unkempt, with a hair tie halfway tugged out of a lazy tail. The child was also strikingly pale, like they had never, in their life, seen the sun.
Peter couldn’t even begin to guess the child’s gender. In general, the longer hair read as feminine to Peter, but he was never sure. Kids all looked pretty much the same to him.
“Why do you have a child here? Where did it come from?” Peter demanded.
The child looked up at Peter sharply, though they moved barely a muscle outside the ones necessary to turning their head.
Peter startled back a step at the bright golden-yellow and unnaturally wide, round pupils of the child’s big eyes.
“Really, Peter? ‘It’? That’s demeaning, and utterly dehumanizing,” Neal gave him a disappointed look.
The child gazed at Peter for a long second longer, then turned their eyes back to the in-progress origami. Slowly – so slowly that Peter didn’t at first register it as movement, at all – the child raised a hand and set their pointer finger on their lower lip.
Neal reached out, absently, and took the child’s hand and pushed it down again. “We don’t chew or suck on our fingers,” he said, gently. “It’s not good for your teeth.”
The child pressed their lips together and looked from Neal’s face to the bat. He made a small motion toward it.
Neal took that as indication that he should continue his folding, but he looked back at Peter while his hands continued their methodical folding and creasing. “His name is RJ,” Neal said. “As far as he’s indicated, he prefers masculine pronouns. It’s a conversation we’ve had. Or, one I’ve tried to have with him.”
“That doesn’t explain—” Peter tried.
“My sitter had an emergency come up,” Neal interrupted. “Don’t worry, this isn’t going to be a regular thing, Peter. And he won’t cause any trouble. He’s a very good child,” here, Neal took the time to turn and meet ‘RJ’s’ eye. “Right, chum? You’re a good kid.”
RJ looked up at Neal, brow creased, then looked back down at the bat.
Neal gave a soft chuckle and raised a hand to push some hair behind RJ’s ear. “He doesn’t do a lot of talking, I’m afraid. We’re working on sign, though. If you see him motion to something, then a motion that looks like he’s pulling something to him, he’s telling you he wants that. It’s one of the few things we’ve managed to get to stick, so far.”
“Who is he, Neal?” Peter asked.
“I just told you, his name is RJ,” Neal said. He finished the last fold on his origami bat, then “flew” it over to RJ.
“That’s not what I meant, Neal—” Peter tried.
The kid looked at it, awed, then cracked the tiniest of smiles. Even Peter found his heart melting at the smile, in spite of all his irritation and the beginnings of a headache. A headache that was beating most persistently behind his left temple. RJ accepted the origami bat from Neal and brought it close to his little nose, staring at it.
Neal waved close to RJ for his attention, then crossed his arms over his chest, fists resting close to either shoulder, then flicked out both pointer fingers a few times. “Bat,” he said. “Can you do that for me, chum?”
RJ, origami bat still clutched delicately in one hand, crossed his arms loosely over each other. He had the bat in hand, but otherwise imitated the two fists, flicking out his pointer fingers.
“You got it,” Neal said. He smiled softly.
“Neal,” Peter cut in. He crossed his arms, though not to mirror the “bat” sign back at Neal and the kid. “Who is he? Whose is he?”
Neal smiled up at him, almost puzzled. “RJ is mine,” he said.
“What?!” Peter snapped. He didn’t mean it to sound angry, but his surprise made his tone short and clipped.
The kid jumped. For a split second, Peter thought he must have startled the kid, but then he was watching Neal grab for and relieve the kid of a knife that the kid had summoned from nowhere. I mean, literally. The kid was in a black sweatshirt and black sweatpants, and it didn’t look like he had any pockets, at all.
“Hey,” Neal said, "No. We don’t stab people.” He opened a drawer on the side of the desk furthest from the kid and shoved the knife inside, then shut the drawer. “Where did you have that? Kid, do you have others?” Neal gave RJ a consternated frown.
“What was that?” Peter demanded.
The kid dropped his chin to his chest and curled up a little. He offered back the origami bat.
“No, no,” Neal pushed the little hand, bat and all, back toward the kid. “That’s yours, kid. You don’t have to give it back.”
“Neal, what just happened?” Peter asked.
Neal took a long, quiet moment to push a lock of hair back behind the kid’s ear, again. Then he looked up at Peter. “RJ has some... quirks,” he said, delicately. “He lashes out if he’s startled, or if he perceives danger.”
“Okay, and the knife?” Peter demanded.
“You startled him,” Neal said, as if that were perfectly reasonable.
“Neal!” Peter hissed.
“Look. You want to know who he is? He’s my son. He’s eleven years old. Yes, he’s quite small for his age, but that’s something we’ve been working on. We’re hoping to have him on a healthier BMI within the next eighteen months or so.”
“We, huh?” Peter asked.
Neal scrutinized Peter for a long moment, then turned back to RJ. “Do you want me to make you another animal?” he asked.
RJ glanced up, briefly, then back down at his lap, and his hands that had landed there, origami bat still in hand. He brought one small hand up to his face, hesitated, then put that hand in front of his mouth and extended his thumb and pointer finger from his fist and pinched them together a few times.
“A bird?” Neal asked.
The kid brought his hand over to about shoulder height and used his fist to nod for him.
“I can make you a bird,” Neal said agreeably. “Do you know what kind of bird you’d like?”
Peter sighed. “Neal,” he interrupted.
Neal glanced back up at him. “Yes?”
RJ’s neutral face turned into a tiny frown. Peter noted that he’d interrupted Neal before the kid could finish his fingerspelling, which he’d been doing very slowly and very carefully.
“Make sure he doesn’t stop you from doing your job,” Peter said.
Neal smiled at Peter. “Thank you.”
“I didn’t say anything,” Peter said.
“For letting him stay with me,” Neal clarified.
Peter shook his head. “I mean it, Neal. Don’t let his presence get in the way of you doing your job.”
Neal nodded, “Of course. I understand.”
--
The elevator dinged and a man, perhaps Neal’s age and perhaps a bit younger, stepped off.
From his office, Peter could just about make out the people who got off the elevator, though the secretary situated out there, in their sort of “lobby” area, was just out of sight. The man that had arrived on the White Collar Division’s floor was no exception.
The young man looked nervous and apologetic as he stepped up to the secretary and murmured his question. Peter raised his eyebrows when he saw the secretary stand and walk the young man into the bullpen. He stood from his seat when he saw their secretary motion toward Neal, though.
Peter made his way out of his office and over towards Neal’s desk, where the young man – dressed in a bright red jacket over blue plaid, for some godawful reason – gave an awkward shrug.
“I know, but I’m still sorry,” he said. Clearly in answer to something Neal must have said to him.
“It’s fine,” Neal said firmly. He turned to RJ, “Are you ready to go?”
RJ looked up at Neal. His expression wasn’t especially sad, but given how few expressions he’d made, in the time that he’d been sitting on the corner of Neal’s desk, the look could almost be read as stricken. He raised his hand to about shoulder height and snapped his first two fingers and thumb together, his brows knit and a pout in place. It was a clear “no,” even to Peter who wasn’t very knowledgeable of ASL, outside of fingerspelling and a small handful of signs.
(Come to think of it, Peter was starting to think that he should make a proper go of learning ASL. It made sense to know how to read and respond in sign, if nothing else. And maybe, just maybe, a small part of Peter wished that he knew how to communicate with Neal’s son in a way that the kid was comfortable with – even if the kid didn’t yet know much sign, according to Neal.)
“More guests, Neal?” Peter asked.
RJ turned to look at Peter again (his eyes weren’t anywhere near as startling a second time, Peter noted – they were a little odd, but that was it). He sized Peter up, almost as if he was going to try and fight Peter – which was ridiculous – and then picked up one of Neal’s origami animals, a bird. He waved in a small motion, as if he wasn’t sure if he really wanted Peter’s attention or not, then offered the origami animal. Peter hesitated, then accepted it. Up closer, it looked like it might actually be an owl.
Sometimes, Neal’s skills astounded Peter.
Sure, it looked like all the origami of the day were birds and bats, but they were all meticulously folded and overtly complex, and recognizable as the different bird species that Neal had apparently been folding, from memory, for RJ.
“Thank you,” Peter said. He brought his free hand to his chin and tapped it with the tips of his fingers, then brought it forward, palm up. “Thank you” was one of the few signs he knew.
RJ’s jaw dropped a little. He hesitated, then looked at Neal.
(Peter noticed that Neal and Neal’s new guest were both watching the exchange.)
Neal gave RJ an encouraging nod.
RJ turned back to Peter, his lips pressed back together. He hesitated, then brought his hand up, fingers all splayed, then tapped his thumb to his sternum.
“He says it’s fine,” Neal offered.
Peter nodded and offered the kid a smile, though it felt just the tiniest bit forced. Peter wasn’t amazing with kids, and they made him a little uncomfortable. This kid, in particular, gave Peter a bit of pause.
Peter turned back to Neal and cleared his throat. ”Who’s this?” he repeated, motioning to Neal’s guest.
“Ah, this is Kal,” Neal motioned to him.
“Uh, hi. Agent Burke. Sir,” Kal gave an awkward little wave. The guy had floppy dark hair that curled around his face, bright blue eyes, and an awkward hunch to his shoulders. Even though he seemed awkward and nervous in his body language, Peter could tell he was ready to jump in if there was need to do so. He was tall and strong, too, which Peter didn’t usually see on people who acted that awkwardly, really.
“Hi,” Peter said. He raised his eyebrows, though, and glanced back at Neal. “He knows who I am?”
“Of course he knows who you are,” Neal stood and lifted RJ onto his hip. It was a ridiculously parental action, though Peter couldn’t help but wonder if RJ – if were eleven years old – weren’t a bit old to be picked up and held that way.
RJ leaned his head on Neal’s shoulder.
“Of course he knows?” Peter echoed.
“Yes,” Neal walked around his desk. “I’m going to take my lunch, okay? I’ll be back in half an hour, and I won’t leave my radius, of course.” Neal stepped up to Kal and Kal, seeming almost habitual in the motion, took RJ from Neal and put RJ on his own hip.
RJ whined briefly, quiet and discontent, then settled with his head against Kal’s shoulder, instead.
“And Kal will take RJ home,” Neal said.
“Is Kal your babysitter?” Peter asked.
Neal glanced at Kal, measuring him up.
“Because you said that RJ was your son, right?” Peter pressed.
“Yes, he is,” Neal agreed. “Kal is...”
Kal didn’t quite pout, but it looked like he knew what Neal was going to say and he didn’t like it very much. He didn’t interrupt, though, he just glanced down at his feet. Peter wondered how much younger than Neal Kal was.
Neal sighed. “We co-parent,” he said.
Kal’s head snapped up, wide eyes fixing on Neal.
Neal didn’t meet his gaze, stubbornly keeping his eyes on Peter.
“Co...parent,” Peter looked between Kal and Neal. The idea that Neal was a parent was weird enough, but imagining him co-parenting with someone who seemed to be a good handful of years younger than him? That was just. Peter wasn’t entirely sure how to wrap his head around it.
“Yes. Co-parenting with one’s significant other is customary,” Neal gave him a vague smile, as if it puzzled him how Peter wasn’t catching on.
Kal’s breath seemed to stutter and catch, briefly. Like he’d never heard Neal call him that, before. RJ lifted his head off Kal’s shoulder to look at Kal, almost in concern.
“Significant other,” Peter breathed. I mean, it made sense. But.
Peter looked at the young man. He couldn’t really tell, off the bat, but he thought maybe the age difference between Kal and Neal might be a bit much, But then again, Peter had never been sure that Neal was giving his real age. He certainly didn’t look like a man in his thirties, anyway.
Kal shifted his weight and glanced away under Peter’s scrutiny.
(Not just Peter’s scrutiny. A good few other agents had turned their attention toward the exchange.)
“Yes, Peter. Kal is my boyfriend,” Neal said.
Peter glanced back at Neal in time to catch Neal scratching behind his ear and averting his eyes awkwardly. Maybe the naming of their relationship wasn’t a usual thing for them. Neal glanced back up and smiled. He shrugged. “Surprised, Peter?”
“Yes,” Peter said. Then shook his head, “I mean. No. Not really.”
Neal chuckled.
RJ waved, another tiny motion. Neal turned to him. RJ pinched his fingers together, against the pad of his thumb, then touched the tips of his fingers beside his mouth, then up onto the apple of his cheek. He glanced up at Neal, then back down, and repeated the sign.
“Don’t you want to go out for lunch, kid?” Kal asked.
RJ glanced up at him, then turned back to Neal and repeated the same sign a third time.
“We can get carryout,” Neal said. He glanced at Peter, “That means ‘home,’” he said with a small smile. “RJ isn’t always comfortable in social situations. It’s a very familiar sign. And one we’re glad he has in his signing vocabulary. I shudder to think about how difficult it would be to know what he’d want if he didn’t have a sign for ‘home.’”
The way he said it made Peter think there was a history there, of before RJ had many signs memorized – or any signs memorized – and spiraled his way into little-kid frustration when his parental figures couldn’t understand what he wanted.
Neal turned back to Kal. “Do you have his elephant with you?” He moved past Kal and RJ, opened the door to the elevator lobby, and hit the call button. Kal turned, eyes following Neal.
RJ gasped and signed an excited “z” into the air with his finger.
“Yeah, Zitka is in the car," Kal said. He smiled at RJ, then used his free hand to mime an elephant trunk. “Elephant,” he told RJ.
RJ nodded and mirrored the sign back at Kal, then signed his excited little “z’s” again.
Peter held the door for Kal and RJ and followed them into the elevator lobby. “Take an hour or so, if you like, Neal,” he said. Typically, lunch breaks were about a half hour (as dictated by New York law), but Peter figured that Neal, Kal, and RJ could use the time to get some bonding in, before Kal and RJ disappeared to wherever it was when they weren’t anywhere on the FBI’s radar.
“Thank you, Peter,” Neal smiled at him as he stepped into the elevator.
--
Peter didn’t expect to see Kal or RJ again, after that first meeting.
Neal had never been open about his past or his relationships, after all. Peter hadn’t had the slightest hint that Neal wasn’t a single man with no responsibilities outside himself; obviously, the existence of a boyfriend and a child meant that that simply wasn’t true.
The universe apparently had other plans, though.
Peter stepped inside June’s foyer, thanking the maid who’d let him in. The first thing he noticed were a set of tiny footsteps and a set of much heavier footsteps, both running and tromping around, upstairs. The maid didn’t seem bothered, which suggested that it were something of a regular occurrence.
Then a tiny figure hurtled over the upstairs rail, against the far wall, and bounced off it like a little rubber ball, over a lower portion of the banister, and rolled into a crouch near Peter. The figure was back to his feet before Peter had finished processing that the figure had gone over the upstairs rail, in the first place. He took off, running past Peter and into the next room. Peter watched, mouth agape, as RJ disappeared around the far corner of the next room.
The larger footsteps tromped over to and down the stairs, then, clearly in a hurry to follow RJ.
“I’m gonna get you!” Kal called.
Peter looked up at him.
Kal stopped, halfway down the steps. He visibly hesitated. ”What time is it?” he asked.
“Uh, seven-fifteen,” Peter said.
“Oh,” Kal nodded slowly. He continued down the stairs. “I must have lost track of—he should be down, soon?” he gave a small, hesitant smile, then walked past Peter and into the next room.
Peter turned to watch him go. RJ’s little face was poked around the far corner. He lifted his hand, fingers splayed and his thumb folded against his palm. He gave almost a salute, his eyes meeting Peter’s.
Kal turned, smiling. “He says hi.”
“Hi, RJ,” Peter waved in return.
RJ’s face darkened a little – it didn’t look quite right somehow, but who was Peter to judge? – and he disappeared back around the corner. The pitter-patter of his little feet (bare feet, Peter absently noted) picked up again.
“Hide and seek?” Peter asked.
“More like tag,” Kal shrugged.
Peter nodded, then started up the stairs. Kal and RJ were none of his business. He kept half an ear out, anyway, particularly since he’d definitely seen RJ fly down the stairs like a tiny ninja and that just wasn’t normal.
Neal opened the door on the second knock. “Peter!” he said, looking mildly surprised, but still about ready for the day.
“Neal,” Peter returned.
“Give me just a second. I just need to grab my shoes,” Neal said. He checked his watch and frowned. “They weren’t supposed to be here past six-forty-five, sorry. We must have lost track of time.”
“Are they... here often?” Peter thought that maybe he should have known if Neal had frequent, not-Mozzie guests. But it wouldn’t be the first time Neal had managed to keep a secret from him.
Neal hesitated.
“You don’t have to—” Peter started.
“We have a schedule. Kal comes into the city with RJ and they stay from Friday night to Monday morning,” Neal said. “From Monday to Thursday, he goes back home. RJ doesn’t attend a school, so their schedule is as flexible as Kal’s job allows. They try to work around me and my schedule with the FBI. The other day, something came up back home – Kal’s home, that is – and we couldn’t find someone to watch RJ. Well. We couldn’t find someone that we felt confident leaving RJ with. That was why I brought him to work with me.”
“Oh,” Peter said. His first thought probably should have been something along the lines of making note of that, somewhere, in case it became useful in the future, but it was actually more along the lines of, El will probably want to have Kal and RJ over for dinner, sometime.
Neal smiled and shrugged, then headed back into his apartment to grab the previously-mentioned shoes. “We’ve made it work,” he said.
“Have you and Kal been together long?” Peter asked. He bit back another iteration of, ‘you don’t have to answer that if you don’t want to,’ though just barely.
“Mm,” Neal hummed thoughtfully. “I don’t know how to answer that.”
Peter waited patiently at the door. Distantly, childlike giggles floated up to Peter. It was obviously RJ, and the sound warmed Peter’s heart, in spite of the fact that – usually – children kind of intimidated him.
“In a manner of speaking, we’ve been together for quite a while,” Neal said. He returned, shoes now in hand, and sat at a dining room chair to put them on. “But, in another manner of speaking, I can’t say I was aware that we were together. I didn’t even realize we were dating.”
“You didn’t?” Peter asked.
“No,” Neal chuckled, self-deprecating.
“And here I thought you were a romantic,” Peter smiled a little.
“Oh, I certainly like to think so. I also like to think I’m an observant type. But my... father. He had to point it out to me,” Neal shook his head and tightened the laces of either shoe, methodically. “And then I felt the need to clarify with Kal, of course. It was rather awkward, for both of us.”
“Well, yes,” Kal said.
Peter jumped and turned. Kal was there, RJ was slung over a shoulder and laughing breathlessly – almost silently. Not for the first time, Peter wondered what the kid’s story is, and what might have happened – if anything had happened, at all – for him to be selectively mute. The question didn’t feel appropriate or necessary, though, so he resisted the urge to ask.
“I got you flowers,” Kal said.
Peter turned back to Neal, eyebrows raised. Out of the corner of his eye, though, he saw RJ pinch his fingertips to his thumb, then tap them on the space to one side of his nose, then arc his hand over to tap his fingertips to the other side of his nose. If he had to guess, Peter thought it must have been the sign for “flower.”
“Yes, I was there,” Neal agreed. He sighed.
“We made out, like, a lot,” Kal tacked on. He was smiling, though. Clearly this was something he liked to bring up, if only for his own amusement. “I slept over, B.”
“Again, I was there,” Neal raised his head to give Kal the most deadpan look he could muster. It was a very effective look. “I’m not saying I was being very bright—”
“I brought you to Thanksgiving,” Kal hid a smile in his hand and let RJ wriggle out of his hold. “Introduced you to my Ma, I don’t know how you missed all of that.”
RJ darted past Peter and into the apartment. He skidded around the corner and Peter let his eyes absently follow. Peter stepped slightly more inside Neal’s apartment to do so.
Around the corner from Neal’s front door was the loveseat and a few chairs. Peter watched the kid throw himself at the couch and roll heels over head. RJ stopped rolling with his legs thrown over the further side of the loveseat and with a stuffed elephant now in his grasp. Peter smiled to himself, then turned back to the conversation at hand.
“I had a socially awkward phase,” Neal stood from the dining room chair, his shoes neatly tied. “It lasted the entirety of my childhood. Social interactions were all about as foreign as they could be. Obviously, I didn’t know what normal was, platonically or romantically—”
“I literally called you my Knight in Shining Armor,” Kal said.
“That one, though, I thought was a joke,” Neal said.
Kal shrugged, as if that were understandable. Clearly, some part of that had gone over Peter’s head. “You know how Lo thinks I’m oblivious, though? Even I thought it was obvious. I mean. I invited you out on dates. We were together two years when you asked if we were together.”
“I know, you told me,” Neal rolled his eyes.
“You two must have been together a long time, then?” Peter asked.
Kal smiled and shrugged. Peter turned to look at Neal, instead, in case Neal were willing to give an actual unit of time.
Neal scoffed. “We’ve broken up and gotten back together more times than I can count.”
“Not least because he wasn’t always aware if we were on or off again,” Kal teased.
Neal made a small, disgusted noise, then turned and walked over to RJ. ”I’m headed to work, chum,” he leaned over the arm of the loveseat and pressed a kiss into RJ’s wild, dark hair. He then straightened and made two fists, crossing them slightly and then tapping one wrist on top of the other, both palms facing the ground. ”Work,” he said.
RJ glanced at him, upside-down, and lifted his hands a bit, so that they were more visible. He folded his middle three fingers in, on either hand, and kept his pinkies and thumbs extended, then shook both hands, turning them at the wrist.
“No, I have to work,” Neal’s smile was obvious in his body language. He signed “work” again, re-tapping his wrist on top of his other wrist. “I don’t have time to play more, right now.”
RJ frowned a bit harder and shook his hands again, indicating “play.”
“He doesn’t do sentences, yet, really,” Kal said.
Peter startled a bit, having just about forgotten about Kal, and turned back to him. “He seems quite bright.”
“He is,” Kal said, but his smile was sad. “He had a rough time of it, for the last few years, though. He’s still in the middle of being deprogrammed from being in the middle of cult stuff. It was a really bad scene... I’m glad B found him, though. I don’t think many people, who have the resources to help someone like him, would do so as readily as B did, uh, I mean. As readily as Neal did.”
Neal ambled back over to them. “I’m ready when you are, Peter,” he said.
Peter watched, with vague amusement, as RJ appeared from around the corner, stuffed elephant in hand, and then attacked one of Neal’s legs. He curled himself around the leg, like a human-shaped leg shackle.
Neal sighed and glanced down at him. “Stay with Kal, chum.”
RJ shook his head.
“You have to. I don’t have leave to bring you with me to work.”
RJ scowled up at him and shook his head again.
Neal sighed, though it was a fond sigh, paired with a soft smile. He looked over at Kal. “A little help?”
“He’ll break another knife on me,” Kal muttered as he moved past Peter and knelt at RJ’s level. The comment was, in Peter’s opinion, a nonsensical one. Or else a disturbing one, depending on how Peter chose to take it. He chose not to take it literally, for his own peace of mind. “C’mon, kiddo. We’ll go get ice cream. But we can’t do that if you don’t let your dad go to work. Okay?”
RJ perked up and looked up at Kal, head tilted to the side.
“You like ice cream, right?” Kal wheedled.
RJ made a visible hesitation, then loosed one hand from Neal’s leg to mime an ice cream cone. Rather, to mime to process of licking a cone.
“That’s right,” Kal repeated the sign back to him. “Ice cream.”
RJ looked at him with wide golden eyes for another long moment, then shook his head and buried his face in Neal’s pantleg, instead.
Neal sighed and gave Peter a look. ”I’m sorry, this might take a bit.”
“We have another five or ten minutes before we need to get going,” Peter shrugged.
Neal lifted RJ and his leg. He attempted, briefly, trying to shake the kid off, but RJ clung tightly to him. “Kid,” Neal tried. RJ didn’t even look up at him. ”RJ.” Still nothing. Neal sighed. “Richard John,” he said, sternly.
RJ’s shoulders stiffened.
“Oh, don’t full-name him,” Kal murmured. “You know how sensitive he is, B.” He frowned up at Neal, almost pouting.
“He’s not listening,” Neal defended.
“Hey, kiddo,” Kal rubbed RJ’s back. “Dickie, come on. Neal has to work. We’ve talked about this, right? He’s not leaving us. We’ll see him again on Friday, like we always do. That’s not too far away, right? Don’t you think you and Zitka would like an ice cream?”
RJ turned his head against Neal’s leg and pillowed his cheek against it instead. He pouted at Kal, then raised a hand, fingers splayed, and tapped his thumb against his temple, at about eye level, then folded his thumb into his palm as he pressed his fingers together.
“B has to go,” Kal soothed.
RJ pouted and snapped his two forefingers against his thumb – no – and repeated the other two signs. The first one Peter thought was “father,” the second one looked like a “B.” RJ then pointed up at Neal.
“I know who B is, kiddo,” Kal smiled.
RJ signed another “B," then pinched the air between his fingers and thumb, on the side of his chest opposite to his hand, and drew a line across to the other side of his chest. After that, RJ cupped his hand to make a “C.”
“I know you want us both,” Kal said. His patience reserves were impressive.
RJ scowled and turned his face against Neal’s leg, again.
“B and C?” Peter asked.
Neal glanced up from Kal and RJ and shrugged. “Me and Kal.”
Somehow, Peter didn’t think that “Cal,” spelled with a C, fit Neal’s boyfriend. He wasn’t one to judge, but he’d figured on Kal’s name being spelled with a K, though for no apparent reason. It was arbitrary, though. What bothered him, more, was that Neal’s letter was, apparently, a “B” for some reason. If it were A and B, Peter felt that he could have let it go a bit easier. But it was B and C, which seemed a strange choice, unless there was a third “A” parent, somewhere.
“Don’t you mean ’Kal and I’?” Kal teased.
Neal rolled his eyes. “B is the stand-in for my name,” he said, almost correctively, “and C is the stand-in for Kal’s name. They’re easy for RJ to sign, and it makes it easier for us if he knows how to indicate who he wants. Though, admittedly, with my work as CI...” Neal sighed. “He used to be able to sign B or C and get his preferred parental figure in moments. Now, he sometimes has to wait days. I dislike that I’ve done that to him.”
“What about when you were in jail?” Peter asked.
Neal tilted his head to the side and smiled. ”I don’t know why you all still think I stayed in my cell like a good little model prisoner. I didn’t.”
Peter blinked slowly at him. “Did you just admit to perpetuating other jailbreaks? To an FBI agent?”
“Hm?” Neal raised his eyebrows. “Did I?”
Peter sighed. Nodded. Then turned to leave. “I’ll be in the car.”
--
Eventually, Neal was able to get loose, though Peter could have sworn he heard a roar of displeasure directly preceding Neal’s appearance at June’s front door.
After that, the day was pretty rote, though with an art smuggling ring rather than the more menial fraud cases they usually dealt with.
It was bad luck when the art smuggling ring turned out to also be a human trafficking ring. It only got worse from there, though, because apparently that ice cream that Kal had taken RJ to get had ended up with Kal and RJ disappearing off the face of a planet.
It was New York City. It shouldn’t have happened like that.
The FBI was alerted by local law enforcement, as a few people had, in fact, been paying attention. But in spite of the almost immediate information (which trickled down to the White Collar division due to the plates having been noted in the aforementioned art smuggling operation), the tips and calls really went nowhere.
They were actually pretty sure that the plates were decoy plates, anyway, used during a crime and then stashed away while a set of uninvolved plates took their place.
It was beyond frustrating. For everyone.
Neal was even more frustrated than the rest of them, though. He was muttering darkly to himself, from the moment the FBI had realized that the CI’s son and boyfriend had both ended up in the hands of art smuggling human traffickers (or were they human trafficking art smugglers?). Some of that dark muttering seemed to be about Kryptonite, though Peter couldn’t tell for sure if it was some kind of personal threat Neal was making or if it had something to do with something else, entirely. It was out-of-place, either way, but different people handled stress differently.
The Criminal Investigations Division wasn’t doing as much sharing as the White Collar Crime Division was doing, but that was probably because they had more experience with the umbrella of crimes that trafficking fell under.
Neal mostly brooded at his desk while the other Division’s agents came and collected what the White Collar Division had on the art smuggling part of the operation. It didn’t escape Peter’s attention that Neal’s brooding was focused in on the knife that he had removed from RJ’s person, just the other day. It also didn’t escape his notice that almost no vestige of the usual “Neal Caffrey” was sitting at his desk, either. The mask was long-abandoned and Neal had sharp, thoughtful eyes on the blade of his son’s knife. And sharper ears on the conversations around him.
Neal got up from his desk after the flurry of back-and-forth with Criminal Investigations calmed down. He walked to the elevator, though completely without leave to go. Peter got up and followed after him. ”Neal!” he called.
Neal glanced over his shoulder, then continued through the door into their elevator lobby. He hit the call button with more force than strictly necessary. ”Peter,” he greeted, as Peter caught the door and followed him. “You’re not going to try and tell me to stay until the end of the work day, are you?”
“No,” Peter frowned. “Though a little notice that you needed time, or planned to leave, would be appreciated.”
Neal stepped into the elevator. “Well, you know now.” He didn’t even pretend to be pleasant about it.
Peter, legitimately worried for his friend (and hie friend’s son, even though Peter had only met RJ twice), stepped into the elevator with him. “Hey, why don’t we go for lunch?” he suggested. “My treat. Anywhere you like.”
The doors were already closing, but Neal looked at Peter like he’d grown a second head. “I’m going to go home,” he said.
“The FBI are doing all they—”
“Where I’m going to take off this anklet, while running facial recognition software on my son and boyfriend,” Neal cut in, “So that I can find their kidnappers, which I will then put through the software, in order to find where they might be or where else they may have been.”
Peter gaped at him. Then forced a laugh. “Neal, you really shouldn’t say stuff like—”
“And then I’m going to visit hell upon the people who dared to lay a hand on my son,” Neal deadpanned. He faced forward. “You’re welcome to try and stop me, but if there’s one thing which I would break cover for, it’s my son. Neal doesn’t mean nearly enough to me to sit idly by, twiddling my thumbs, when I know I am of more use on the streets.”
Peter continued to gape for the rest of the trip down. “Neal,” Peter managed. “What the hell are you talking about?”
Neal waited patiently for the elevator to settle and ding, then was out the doors before they were fully open. So, not very patiently, in fact.
Peter stood in the elevator for a beat, then followed after Neal. It took him a moment to realize that they were in the parking garage, under the building, and not actually the lobby. Which didn’t make sense if Neal – who had no car or driver’s license – planned to go home, like he said. “Neal!” he snapped.
Neal lifted a key fob and unlocked a car.
No. Wait...
Neal lifted Peter’s key fob and unlocked Peter’s car. Peter patted down his pockets, a little stricken, to find that there wasn’t a mistake. Those were his keys. He had no idea when Neal would have taken them, though. “Neal, you don’t—”
“Get in, Agent,” Neal said.
Peter automatically walked to the passenger side, even though Neal didn’t have a driver’s license. He got in and tried to recover from the whiplash that Neal kept giving him. The engine turning over brought Peter back to the present situation. “You can’t drive,” Peter said.
Neal looked him dead in the eye and put the car in drive, then turned his eyes forward again.
“I mean, you obviously can, but you shouldn’t!” Peter tried.
Neal retaliated by taking the corner onto the street too fast, which rattled Peter in his seat and made him grip the handle above his door and his armrest.
“Neal!” Peter screeched.
“You’ll be fine.”
When Peter glanced back at Neal, he found the tiniest hint of a smirk on his face. It was annoying, but Peter was too relieved to see the speedometer drop to legally acceptable speeds to mention the smirk, lest it cause Neal to pull out more of the crazy driving.
--
At Neal’s apartment, Neal did exactly what he said he was going to do. He got out a laptop – unapproved by the FBI, as well as unmonitored – and used it to start running a facial recognition software. Peter found it more disturbing, frankly, that Neal somehow had access to CCTV in and around the area his son was taken, than that he simply had an unapproved laptop.
Neal then set about turning his anklet off, which wasn’t supposed to be something that could be done to the anklet, in the first place. “I could spoof the signal,” Neal said casually, “But that would be a waste of time better-spent on planning my offensive.”
“Of course it would be,” Peter cleared his throat. “And you’ve? Always known how to do that?” He motioned to the anklet, newly abandoned on the dining room table.
“No,” Neal said.
“No? When did you figure it out?”
“Oh,” Neal glanced up at Peter. “I looked up the anklet’s schematics and reliability, as you know. I’ve known since then. While the loopholes aren’t obvious, I have high enough clearance, in my own line of work, that I was able to borrow strings of code that worked about as well as the official channels, in terms of taking the anklet off.”
“I’m sorry, clearance?”
“Yes,” Neal said, patiently. He turned his eyes back to his laptop. “As I told you, Neal isn’t so important to me that I wouldn’t break cover for my son. I’m breaking cover."
“Cover,” the Peter-shaped parrot murmured.
“Mm,” Neal agreed.
Peter rubbed his hands over his face and swore. It made a weird sort of sense, Neal being a cover for something else, but Peter hated how blindsided he was. No wonder Neal Caffrey didn’t have a history with a boyfriend named Kal, or a kid. Neal’s lover and kid belonged to the guy under the Neal Caffrey mask, not to the Neal Caffrey mask, itself.
Neal stood abruptly. “I’m going to put on something more suited to the occasion,” he said.
“Sure.” Peter stood there, in the middle of Neal’s dining room, feeling lost in a sea of muddled emotions, for about ten minutes. Then Neal was back. Peter looked over at him, then startled a little. “Is that body armor?”
“Yes,” Neal said. He wore head-to-toe body armor and held a visored helmet in hand. The getup was vaguely reminiscent of a lighter-weight SWAT uniform, without the lettering and with a motorcycle-type helmet instead of a SWAT-style helmet. ”I’m afraid I only have the one set, though.”
“How do you have that? How do we not know about it?”
Neal scoffed, pressed a hand to his ear for a moment, and put the helmet on, which obscured his face and muffled his voice. “There’s a lot you don’t know about me, Peter. Here.” He walked over and set a comm in Peter’s hand. A comm that was arguably smaller and less noticeable than the units that the FBI used. “Put it in. Otherwise we won’t be able to communicate. I wouldn’t want you getting lost.”
Though Peter could no longer see Neal’s face, he could almost imagine the smirk on his face.
Peter did as he was told. “Who are you?” he murmured.
Neal chuckled darkly. “Never mind that, Peter. It doesn’t matter.” He walked over to his computer and read off the screen for a few moments, then closed the laptop. “Are you ready?”
--
Peter was a professional, yes. But he’d never in his life felt so far out of his depth in his life.
Not only had Neal done – in under an hour – what the FBI had been working on for the better part of a week (if in a manner Peter wasn’t entirely sure was ethical), but Neal had also produced body armor and weaponry, though the latter was thankfully nonlethal.
It was like everything that made Neal Neal was dropping away in the face of a family emergency.
And then they were at the location Neal had managed to pinpoint as being where the smugglers were holing up. Neal disappeared from Peter’s side before Peter could even suggest calling someone – backup or something – or ask what Neal planned to do.
Peter lingered in place, outside the hideout, and debated calling in the FBI himself.
He did, finally, when he heard the muted signs of a struggle. He dropped a line back to the office, then hung up and went inside the hideout, himself, gun raised. His whole body prickled with the kind of nerves he associated with exams and performance reviews. And a new set of nerves that he decided were attributable to the fact that Peter wasn’t following procedure. At all.
Inside, the hideout was dark. But not dark in that “turn on more lights” kind of way. Peter suspected that Neal had taken out their lights, first, on purpose. There was some daylight creeping in, through windows, but it wasn’t enough to discern much by. Peter hung around the door until his eyes adjusted, though he bated his breath and listened for more signs of a struggle.
There were brief thuds, every so often, and the low buzz of nervous conversation, but no all-out fighting. As far as Peter could tell.
That changed with a truly terrifying scream.
Peter moved forward, resisting the urge to rush or skip the sweep he sent each open door and hall. The scream was followed with more screams, as well as some pretty terrifying, echoing crack noises that Peter really hoped weren’t bones. But they were probably bones.
Peter approached the room where the majority of the disturbing noises were coming from and hesitated at the door.
“I’d advise caution if you’re going to enter,” Neal’s voice said. It was the first time he was using the comms to talk to Peter, which caused Peter to jump and have a minor heart attack.
“How does this work?” Peter muttered.
“Voice activation,” Neal said. “Stay away from the kid, if you do go in there, Peter.”
“He should be the first priority—” Peter tried to argue, hand on the doorknob.
“I agree, but it’s for your own safety,” Neal said. Which was a whole new level of ominous.
Peter nodded to himself, gave a mental count to three, then opened the door and leveled his gun at... a room of unconscious men. (Peter hoped they were only unconscious.) In the middle of them all stood RJ, golden eyes wide and zoned-out, posture tight and unnatural, and head tilted to one side. He had blood on him. A lot of blood.
Peter hesitated. Neal had told him not to approach the kid. But. The blood.
Peter cleared his throat.
The kid turned his head, unnervingly bright eyes snapping to Peter. He raised his hands, almost as if he were threatening to box Peter. And then Peter processed that he was holding two darkly dripping knives in his small hands.
“Hey, RJ?” Peter lowered his gun. “That’s a lot of blood—”
“Careful. Keep your posture calm and nonthreatening. Voice low and quiet. Put your safety on. If you’re the only conscious person in there, with him, you need to present yourself as a friendly presence. There are things he will take as aggression which you might not consider aggressive,” Neal was rattling off. “I’ll be there, soon. RJ, you hear me?”
Peter watched, in fascination, as the kid’s eyes flew to the ceiling and tried to find something, going distant as his searching stopped having a visual element. Presumably, he was searching for Neal’s voice, except that Peter had no idea where he was. How could the kid even hear him.
“I’ll be there, soon. Don’t hurt Agent Burke. He’s a friend, I promise,” Neal said.
“You can hear him?” Peter asked.
RJ’s gaze flicked back to him. He brought his hand up, fingers splayed, and tapped his thumb to his temple, at eye-height. Then he brought his hand down, fingers pressed together and palm held outward, with his thumb crossing the palm.
Peter remembered him doing that, earlier. At Neal’s apartment. ”Dad B?” he asked.
RJ hesitated, then nodded.
Peter realized, with a bit of a delay, that the kid had disappeared one of the bloody knives, somehow, somewhere.
“B,” RJ whispered.
Peter slowly put the safety on his gun and moved a step closer, hand still out in a placating gesture. “He’s coming for you,” he said. “I’m Peter. We met. You gave me an origami owl.”
The kid, having managed to disappear the other knife between Peter’s blinks (apparently), brought both hands up to either side of his head, fingers and thumbs made into circles, and brought them down over his eyes, back up, and down again. ”Owl,” he whispered.
“You’re very smart, RJ,” Peter said.
The kid gnawed on his lower lip. “C,” he whispered. He signed the letter, as well – preceding it with the sign for “father,” as he’d done before. Then he pointed his pointer fingers at each other, one hand held with the palm toward him and the other upside down, palm out toward Peter. He twisted both hands, turning the palms to the opposite side.
Peter didn’t know the sign. “I’m sorry,” he said. “I don’t...”
RJ tried either a very similar sign, or a more punctuated motion of the same sign. Peter still didn’t know what he meant. RJ scowled at him, then tried a different sign. This one started with both hands across from each other, pointer fingers pointing inward and at each other, but had both palms facing RJ. RJ used the pointed fingers to draw twin circles in the air, pointers going toward and away from each other.
Peter didn’t know that one, either, though. ”I'm really sorry, kid—”
“Pain,” Neal said.
Peter jumped and turned to find Neal, still fully suited (but for the helmet he held in one hand), suddenly standing next to him. “He probably signed hurt, before that.”
RJ nodded, then did the first sign again.
“Is he hurt?” Neal asked.
RJ sniffed, then ran forward and threw himself at Neal’s middle.
Neal gathered him up and hugged him tight. “I’ll fix it,” he promised.
Neal then let RJ wriggle out of his hold, then followed him as he pitter-pattered in his little bare feet, across the large room and through a side door. Neal turned to motion Peter along with them. “I’ve gotten all the ones RJ missed, it’s safe,” he said. Peter even believed him. “Tell me if you see anything green or glowing.”
“Green?” Peter asked.
Neal nodded and turned away, once more.
RJ lead them to a room with makeshift cells. There weren’t a lot of people in there, but most of the people who were there were kids, and they all looked shellshocked. Except Kal, who was slumped in a far “cell” and seemed unresponsive.
RJ reached his hand out for Neal’s attention, receiving it immediately. The child pinched his fingers close, as if he was indicating that something was small, then shook the sign back and forth. After a moment of hesitation, he then made his hands into fists and gently tapped the knuckles of one hand onto the knuckles of the other.
“Yes, we need to get him away from the green rocks,” Neal confirmed. ”Or the green rocks away from him.”
RJ turned and darted off, disappearing momentarily. He appeared again, this time with a small box. He offered it Neal, cracking the lid open. Neal seemed to recoil slightly from it but, when Peter glanced past Neal, it just looked like jewelry made with emeralds or green glass.
“Yeah, that would do it,” Neal muttered. He picked up the box, opened it up, and dumped the jewelry into his helmet. “Lead-lined,” he explained to Peter. Which seemed nonsensical at best. But as he shoved one of his gloves on top of the jewels, Kal seemed to gain back a healthy complexion and begin rousing.
“B?” Kal croaked.
“Kal,” Neal returned. Then he turned back to Peter. “I’m leaving. I can’t be found here, and my helmet and glove are hardly perfect insulation for the Kryptonite. Kal should be able to help you with the fallout.” He tilted his head a bit, as if listening. “It sounds like the FBI and local authorities, in cooperation, should be here within the minute.”
Peter just nodded, still confused about the helmet and the jewelry.
--
Later, Peter found that everything of Neal’s was gone from his apartment. Except the anklet – which sat alone on the dining room table, on top of a note. Peter picked up the note, unfolded it, and read the six words, scrawled in an elegant hand.
Peter,
I’ll be in touch.
—B.
Peter sighed and put the letter into his pocket, though he knew he should probably book it as evidence, instead.
--
A few months later, after the Neal Caffrey thing had died down—rather—after Neal, all his crimes, all his suspected or alleged crimes, and all other vestiges of Neal himself been deleted from literally every database they had, until it was like Neal Caffrey had been a figment of their imagination, a man showed up.
Literally.
There was a lot of jumping and swearing as the agents realized that Batman has somehow materialized in their midst. After that calmed down, there was a lot of staring, instead. Batman made a beeline for Peter’s office, though, completely ignoring Hughes (even though Hughes popped his head out of his office and called to the Justice Leaguer—perks of being Big Leagues, one could suppose).
Batman entered Peter’s office and closed the door behind himself.
“Agent Burke.”
Peter blinked at Batman. He wondered if he’d somehow managed to fall asleep at his computer. “Is there something I can help you with?” Peter managed.
“I said that I would be in touch,” Batman said.
Peter blinked at him, not quite getting it.
A small motion caught his eye, from about the height of Batman’s hip. Peter looked down and caught the edge of a small face, peeking out from between Batman’s back and his cape. The big, yellow eyes were unmistakable, even through the polarized lenses of the goggles.
RJ hesitated, then signed a small “hello.”
Peter waved back.
And then it hit him.
He looked back up at Batman, sharply. “Neal?”
The answering smirk was enough to turn Peter’s world on its head. Again.
