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Peter and Neal were walking to their next case, some rich guy running another insurance scam on ‘stolen art’ from his office. Neal and Peter were going to check out the scene, Neal was supposed to figure out if all of his art was real or if this was a bigger scam than they think. The traffic was so heavy today that Peter hadn’t been able to park close to the office building, so they had to walk a few blocks.
Neal rocked back on his heels as a small human shaped missile collided with his legs screaming at the top of her little lungs.
“Uncle Dick, Uncle Dick, help me.” She looked up at him with tears in her eyes. She was terrified.
Neal was most definitely not her ‘Uncle Dick’ but he would help her with whatever she was running from.
“Sure honey, what can I do for my favorite niece?”
“That man tried to kidnap me.”
She pointed over her shoulder, there was a man pushing through the crowd homing in on the trio. He was clearly following the little girl and not just another impatient New Yorker. Someone bumped into him making his coat open enough for both Peter and Neal to see a gun holster. This was not good.
“Hey Princess, can I pick you up?” Neal asked.
Even with the extra weight Neal could probably out run the guy especially if Peter tries to slow down the guy. She didn’t answer, just lifted her arms in the universal pick me up move. Neal quickly scooped her up and put her on his hip. He started walking faster trying to put distance between them and her pursuer. Peter kept pace with him for now as they tried to shake her tail.
“Peter, if we get separated, I'll meet you back at the office, okay.” Neal said. “I don’t want him getting anywhere close to her.”
Peter could see how much the little girl was trembling so he didn’t protest, just giving a sharp nod of acknowledgement. The two of them approached one of the crosswalks. Neal makes sure to stand next to another guy in a similar suit as his. As soon as the crowd started to move again Neal flipped his fedora on the other guy and slipped away in the opposite direction from the man. Peter kept walking near the other man hoping to draw the man off the trail.
It worked just like they planned it. The burly guy with a gun crossed the street with the decoys and Neal and the little girl cut up the side street.
“What’s your name, munchkin?” He asked when they had gotten a block away from the guy.
“Quit playing uncle Dick.” She said, swatting at his shoulder.
“Sweety,” Neal paused.
He wasn’t sure if he should tell her the truth or not.
“I'm not your Uncle. I’ve never seen you before in my life. I am more than happy to help you avoid the guy that was chasing you. I will protect you to the best of my abilities.”
The girl looked at his face carefully scrunching up her forehead and really examining him. She put her hands on his face, running them across his checks and then his eyebrows.
“You’re really not Uncle Dick?” She said with confusion.
“No sweety, I’m not but please let me help you,” he said.
For a minute he was sure he’d done the wrong thing, that she was about to either burst out crying or run away screaming from him and not let him help. She sniffed once, and rubbed a hand across her face and then took a deep breath obviously trying to bring herself under control. It made him a little sad that she already knew how to do that at such a young age. She should still be receiving comfort from the adults in her life not trying to do it on her own.
“Okay, you can help for now, but I’m watching you Mister don’t try anything funny, got it.” She crossed her arms and glared at him. It was actually pretty intimidating for the fact that she was like six years old.
"My name is Neal. What's yours? Seeing as we are going to be working together for a little bit."
"You can call me Speedy, " she said with a nod.
"Alright, Speedy." Neal grinned, this kid was smart, "Is there anyone I should call for you, a parent or guardian?"
"No, it's not part of the protocol." She glared at him.
Neal was startled. How many six year olds have a kidnapping protocol? And why wouldn't it include contacting their parents.
"Okay, what is the protocol?"
"Escape; Evade being grabbed, Scream for help, Come up with plan, Ant-a-gon-ize-ing idiots is bad, Picked up by a family member, Eat cookies and get cuddles at home," she recited only stumbling a little on the big words, she had clearly heard this a thousand times.
"I was doing good too, except you messed up my plan and weren't Uncle Dick."
She pouted, honest-to-God pouted, because he had the audacity to not be her uncle. She was the most adorable kid he’d ever seen.
"Ok, well how about this we'll switch a few things around. I could be your temporary Uncle Neal, then we get some cookies from that bakery right there. After that we can head to my office and find a way to contact one of your family to help you finish all the steps, deal?"
She looked at him suspiciously, "you never touch my food and don't tell them that I already got cookies and we got a deal."
Relief flooded through him as she agreed, at least at the FBI building she should be a lot safer. She was street smart enough to know that food could be compromised. Helping her scam extra cookies out of her parents was a small price to pay for her cooperation.
Peter made it back before they did. He had Neal’s tracker pulled up to check on them. Only the fact that they were less than a block away stopped him from heading out after him.
When they finally made it there Lian was pissed that he took her to the FBI building.
“You didn’t tell me you were a copper,” she glared at him.
“I’m not a cop. I’m a criminal informant,” he explained.
“So you’re a snitch that’s even worse.”
Diana had been laughing at him the whole time that Neal was trying to convince her to tell them how to contact her parents. Her parents were definitely not on the straight and narrow, if she was this passionate about this.
Neal groaned into his hands. Little Lian refused to call any of her relatives now that she knew they were FBI. They were about to contact CPS when a man in a police uniform came off the elevator. He looked at his phone and then walked up to the conference room they were in.
“UNCLE DICK.”
Lian threw herself at the guy. He caught her in midair, a relieved smile on his face.
“Princess, are you okay? I got a call from your Dads that I needed to come get you.”
“I did ESCAPE perfect but the guy I found wasn’t you. I did find these guys to helped me get away from the kidnapper.”
“Good job Squirt,” he high fived her. “It will still totally count for cookies and cuddles. You can bet your dads won't let you out of their sight for a week.”
“Alfred's cookies?” she looked at him suspiciously.
“Only the best for our little princess.” Dick promised. “Give me a min for boring grown up stuff?”
“Thanks for watching her for us,” he started.
Dick looked up at the agents.
“No wonder she thought you were her Uncle Dick, Neal.” Jones said. “You two look exactly alike.”
“How in the world are there two of you?” Peter looked between the two men. “I can’t handle two of you.”
Dick looked over at Neal again. Tilting his head back and forth.
“I guess we do look sort of the same.” Dick allowed.
“They say that everyone has seven doppelgangers in the world.” Neal tried to deflect.
“If only it were just seven.” Dick muttered to himself. “How we are all adopted and look just alike I will never know, thank goodness for Duke ruining the streak.”
“Seriously, you could be twins.”
“With everything I've found out, I wouldn’t be surprised.” Neal said bitterly.
All of the others looked at him in surprise.
“What do you mean by that, Neal?” Peter asked, a little hesitantly.
“Peter, you want to know the real reason you can’t find anything on me before I turned eighteen? It’s because I didn’t exist before I turned eighteen.”
“Clone?” Dick asked.
“Witsec.” Neal countered, “I’ve found out everything I knew about myself growing up was a lie. Parents, name, everything. It really wouldn’t surprise me if my ‘parents’ illegally adopted me too.”
“Does that mean he really is my Uncle Neal?” Lian said.
“It means we should probably do a DNA test.” Dick agreed.
“Cool it’s been so long since we got any new Uncles or Aunts.”
“Yes, so very long. Duke was just adopted last year.” Dick laughed.
“Forever ago. I was five.” She rolled her eyes.
She said it so seriously all the Agents started trying to hide their smiles at how cute she was.
“You guys really think it's possible that we’re twins?” Neal said.
“You two look so very alike, it's a little weird looking at him and seeing you in a police uniform.” Diana said.
“What, you don’t think I could be law enforcement?” Neal laughed.
“Only if you're running a con.” Jones said.
“Running a con?” Dick asked.
Neal sobered up at the question. If they were related then he’d just ruined any chance at befriending his new family. Jones looked a little guilty like he had forgotten that Dick wouldn’t have already known that about Neal.
“Neal Caffrey, criminal informant with the FBI, felon convicted of bond forgery.” Neal said with a pale imitation of his normal cocky smile.
“Dick Grayson, detective with BPD, former circus star,” Dick smiled back. “Trust me you wouldn’t even be the weirdest in the family.”
“If you want to bag me a couple samples I can get a DNA test expedited and have an answer by tomorrow.”
“Dang the BPD must have some really good techs if they get it done that fast.”
Dick laughed.
“There is no way I'd trust the department with this. It would be either done by my boyfriend or through Dad’s company. The BPD techs can barely remember how to use their machines, I wouldn’t trust them with anything this important.”
After a few days Jones looked over at Neal during a lull in the case.
“Did you hear back from your ‘brother’ Neal?”
“Yeah.” Neal hesitated. “Yeah it looks like we are related, he really is my twin brother.”
“You don’t sound pleased at that?”
“Well we’re still trying to figure out how we were separated, and I just keep wondering how different everything would be if I knew earlier.” Neal frowned.
“Life always throws you curveballs, Neal. You just got to learn to hit them.” Peter said.
“I’m not even sure what that is supposed to mean, Peter,” Neal shrugged. “It could be worse, he wants to get to know me, despite my past. He’s actually planning on taking me to lunch today and I think he’s trying to get some of his siblings in town to meet me this weekend.”
“That sounds nice. I think a little more family would be good for you, Neal.” Diana smiled at him.
About an hour later Dick was coming off the elevator to collect Neal for lunch.
“Ready to go Brother?” Dick asked.