aragarna | [Fanfiction] Déjà-Vu (2/6)

Title: Déjà-Vu
Author: Aragarna
Characters: Peter, Neal, Elizabeth, Mozzie.
Genre, rating: hurt/comfort, fluff and angst, gen, G.
Word count: 1434 this chapter. 7347 in total.
Spoilers: Set post-series.
Summary: Missing the good old days of their partnership, Peter convinces Neal to help him on a case. But things don't go as smoothly as expected...
Author's Note: Many thanks to

reve_silencieux for the beta. Written for

icecreammilktea's awesome prompt

Chapter One

Chapter Two

Neal stepped out of the subway and strolled to the little diner a block away from the FBI building. Three months after his return, it still felt strange to Neal, vaguely surreal, to be walking again in the city that he had once made his home and was afraid he’d lost forever. Ever since he’d come back to New York, he and Peter had made the habit of having lunch there every once in a while. It wasn’t easy for Neal, walking the once familiar neighborhood again, but those lunches with his friend, here or at his home, were a sweet remembrance of the things they once had, and Neal simply couldn’t convince himself to let it go.

Neal pushed open the door of the diner and caught sight of Peter. His friend looked up and his face immediately lit up.

“Hey, Peter,” Neal greeted him, as he sat down opposite to Peter at their usual table.

Peter put down the sandwich he was already eating and quickly wiped his hands.

“Hi, Neal.”

“How is the family, since… yesterday?”

An expression of infinite tenderness appeared on Peter’s face at the evocation of his family. “Good, it’s all good. Though I am a little worried about Neal.”

Neal frowned. “How so?”

“Now that he’s starting to walk, he keeps escaping any chance he gets.”

Neal chuckled. “No comment.”

“So,” Peter went on. “I was thinking about putting a little anklet on him. What do you think?”

Neal glared down at Peter.

Peter laughed. “I’m kidding. Mostly.”

Neal rolled his eyes and decided it was time to get back to the subject of this lunch. “What did you need my advice on?” he asked, picking up the menu.

“How would you steal a Picasso from the MoMA?”

Neal looked up from the menu, dumbfounded. He sure wasn’t expecting this. He quickly recovered from his initial surprise and narrowed his eyes, sending Peter an amused look.

“Are you considering a change of career, Peter?” he asked, as the waitress took his order.

Peter grinned and shook his head. “It’s about a case,” he said.

Neal’s eyes widened. “A Picasso was stolen, at the MoMA? For real?”

Peter nodded. “Yep.”

“That’s bold,” he said, not hiding the hint of admiration in his tone. “Which one?”

“The Young Ladies of Avignon.”

“Seriously? How come no one is talking about it?”

“We’ve kept all this from the press,” Peter said. “The museum would rather avoid the publicity. So far so good. Though it would help if we could recover it quickly.”

Neal nodded. “How did they do it?”

“Some kid touched it during the day,” Peter explained after she left, “so they had to take it to the renovation room for inspection.”

That was smart, Neal thought appreciatively. “You think the kid could lead you to the thief?”

Peter shook his head. “Nah. He admitted someone gave him twenty dollars to lean on the painting, like so many tourists who want their pictures taken with it. Why people would want their pictures with a painting of weirdly drawn naked ladies is beyond me…”

Neal shot him a shocked look. “Weirdly drawn?! Cubism?”

“And still very much naked ladies,” Peter said, glaring at Neal.

“Did you get a description from the kid?” Better get back to the subject matter than starting a pointless discussion on cubism with Peter…

“Male, Caucasian, dark hair, wearing a goatee and thick glasses,” Peter quoted the report.

Neal shook his head. “A disguise,” he said with disdain.

The waitress brought Neal his salad and he started picking up at the Italian ham.
“And nothing on camera,” Peter said. “The guy was careful.”

Neal paused, thinking this over. Suddenly he looked up at Peter and frowned. “Oh, I see what you’re doing here.”

Peter tried his best to plaster on a look of pure innocence. “What am I doing?”

“A daring theft, likely a smart criminal – though not that smart if he uses disguises…You’re trying to lure me into working with you again.”

“I’m not,” Peter protested. “We’re simply stuck on this case and I could really use your expertise. Just this one case, I promise.”

Neal wasn’t entirely convinced it was that simple.

“Don’t you have a new CI by now?” he asked.

Peter turned serious and paled slightly. “We don’t,” he said flatly.

“Not easy to step in my shoes, huh?” Neal said with a cocky smile.

Peter sighed and looked away. “You were dead, Neal. Our brilliant handler-CI program ended with the death of our CI, under our supervision.”

Neal’s heart missed a beat. He bit his tongue. What an idiot. It should have occurred to him. “I didn’t…” he started.

Peter interrupted him. “Don’t.”

“I’m sorry, Peter,” Neal breathed.

Peter brushed it off. “It’s okay. You’re not dead, which I’m rather glad for, because it wasn’t my fault after all, and because you can buy me lunch.”

Neal gave him a tentative smile.

“But,” Peter went on, “I can’t tell anyone about it, so we can’t resume the program. And since we don’t have any brilliant CI’s now, you can’t refuse me your unofficial help.”

Neal’s smile broadened. “Manipulating my guilt, Peter, that’s…”

“Smart?” Peter grinned.

“I was going for ‘mean’, but that too.”

“Come on, just this one. I’m asking as a friend, not as the FBI,” Peter encouraged.

A soft smile brushed Neal’s lips. “Not that it’s easy to separate you from the FBI. But okay. Just this one.”

Peter nodded. “Just this one.”

Peter excitedly took the blueprint of the renovation room out of the inner pocket of his jacket. He pushed away the plates and glasses to clear the center of the table and unfolded the print.

Neal shook his head and chuckled. “And you have it all ready.”

Looking at the blueprint of the museum, Neal’s mind wandered. He imagined himself at the MoMA, at night, neutralizing security cameras, cutting the alarm wires, putting his hands on the precious masterpiece – very carefully, of course. He could almost feel the tickle in his palms. He missed it, sometimes.

He jumped back to the reality of the café. “Did they take it out of the frame?” he asked, back on track.

“No, they took the whole thing.”

Neal pondered this. “Then the main issue is transportation. You need to get the painting out, and with a painting that size, it has to be through the doors.”

“As opposed to?”

“Ceilings, air shaft, you know…”

Peter rolled his eyes. “Right.”

Neal looked up and shot Peter a cocky smile. “You didn’t ask me if I did it.”

“I know you didn’t.”

“Did you put a tracker on me or something?” Neal asked, looking through his pockets and patting his coat.

Peter chuckled. “Wouldn’t Mozzie’s Russian surplus have caught it?”

Neal laughed. “Probably. So… You just trust menow?”

Peter shrugged. “I guess I do.”

Neal cocked his head. He wasn’t buying it.

“Theft happened on Sunday last week,” Peter admitted finally. “You were with us, enjoying El’s chicken hens. It did occur to me that you might have timed it precisely so that I would be your alibi, which would have been pretty smart…”

Neal smiled. “So it did cross your mind to check on me. For a minute, Peter, I thought you had softened too much.”

Peter smiled back. “A theft like that, I know you wouldn’t let anyone else pull it off.”

Neal grinned. “You know me so well.”

“So, back to transportation,” Peter said. “There was a private event at the museum the night before.”

“Of course,” Neal nodded with approval. “They sneak in their van among the catering vehicles…”

Peter shook his head. “No suspicious van around.”

“Then the caterers are in on it.”

Peter nodded. “To load the painting unnoticed.”

“Or at least one of them.”

“How about the thief himself?”

“He’d have to blend in with the crew.”

“But we checked them,” Peter insisted. “They’re all clean. No criminal record. No one with the profile of a master thief.”

“Are you sure they were all who they claimed to be?”

Peter frowned. “What do you mean?”

“Maybe one of them – or several of them – gave their spot to our thieves.”

“Oh that’s good. I’ll have the team recheck the camera feeds, see if they all look like who they’re supposed to be.”

Peter clapped happily and got up. “Okay, I’ve got to go back to the office now. Thanks for the help, Neal.”

Neal followed him outside. “Let me know how the case goes.”

Peter nodded. “Will do.”

“Just this one.”

“Just this one.”

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Chapter Three
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