Chapter Text
Monday, [10 days remaining]
Things were going great. Well, considering Tim had only been in Burke’s car for about five minutes and they had barely struck up a conversation so far, it would’ve been more than difficult to screw up that soon into the mission. Silver lining. Small victories and all that.
He shifted his position in the front seat, barely refraining from fiddling with his hands in his lap or the buttons on his suit jacket. It was slightly wet from the short walk to the car, but he didn’t mind all that much. He did mind the cut of the pants and the way the fabric rubbed against his ankle.
Through the window, he made eye contact with different people, briefly, and just as quickly as they had interacted with his life, they were gone. Scurrying along to find shelter from the rain. A fleeting glance, his only semblance of what other people felt like when they were in his position.
Unconsciously, he shifted again, drawing attention from the FBI agent next to him.
“So, how was your weekend?”
“Great,” he replied, clearing his throat. “Uneventful.”
Pointedly avoiding eye contact, and to save them both from his own inarticulateness, he tried to focus on the raindrops running down the glass. Feigning disinterest, he couldn’t help but practically feel the raised eyebrow the man was giving him. And at the next red light, he got to see it, as Burke turned to him and he had no choice but to face him.
“I came by yesterday.”
Of course he did.
“And you didn’t knock? I would’ve invited you for dinner.”
Burke mustered him a few seconds, the follow-up question clearly on the tip of his tongue. But then he turned back to the road, the engine coming to life. “After last week’s stint-“
“It won’t happen again, Peter.”
Truth be told, it might happen again. Because Tim had absolutely no idea what they were talking about. He wrecked his brain trying to figure out what had happened, but Jason’s briefing had included nothing dangerous or even remotely stupid the past week, which he should’ve known was suspicious to begin with.
Luckily for him, the agent dropped the subject and he was left to his own thoughts.
Rationally, he was aware that it wasn’t even a full two weeks that he’d have to keep this charade up. Discounting the weekend, it was ten days.
But he couldn’t stop the anxiety of what if churning in his gut that seemed to make the task bigger and more daunting the more time he spent thinking about just what could go wrong and what was on the line. Unconsciously, he dug his fingernails into his palm.
Dick might be convinced that making mistakes and screwing up was part of the experience, but Tim heavily disagreed. In their line of work, it was screw up and die not screw up, cry about it and bond with your family while watching a Disney movie and everything would be fine. How were things supposed to turn out fine if he failed?
With everything going on, he was already on thin ice. One screw-up mission that cost them resources and connections, and he might as well kiss life as he knew it goodbye. One little screw-up, and Dick would understand why messing up was something Tim couldn’t afford. Wouldn’t afford.
And as if on cue, his brooding was interrupted as they arrived at the office building, all shiny and new and all so terribly New York. Burke turned the engine off but neither of them moved. Outside, the rain had picked up and he watched as people desperately struggled with their umbrellas in the wind.
An anxiety-inducing five minutes later, they were in the elevator, after having evaded anyone who came across them in the lobby. Nobody seemed like they were offended that ‘Neal’ had not greeted them and Burke didn’t seem suspicious of him yet.
He turned his head toward the ceiling, exhaling loudly. If it was unusual for Caffrey, Burke didn’t mention it, opting to ignore him. He could work with that.
His heart was racing, the collar of his shirt too scratchy and the layers of clothing weighing him down as he tried to keep his breathing level.
He wasn’t sure for how long he stared up.
When he lowered his head again, his eyes caught the buttons to his right side, their floor illuminated and the display atop of them announcing that they were going to stop one floor before theirs.
Trying to act as nonchalant as possible, and not like he was on the verge of a panic attack, he kept his gaze fixed on the numbers. Dotted reds made up a 20, then a 21. The elevator came to a halt with a soft chime and the doors opened with a mechanical whirr. From the corner of his vision, he saw a young woman enter. Grey suit, lavender shirt.
He missed the nod she passed to Burke as she entered, turning to face the door like them.
“What’s up with you?”
Shit. Fuck. Of course.
There were five female agents on the floor, one Caffrey mainly interacted with. Since she and the woman both had brown long hair and lightly tanned skin, he prayed that this was Diana Berrigan.
“Heyyy,” he said as charming as possible, doing a half turn to face her. “When did you get here?” He prayed to whatever god was listening that he appeared flirty.
The agent in question stared back, but her expression wasn’t displeased. So, he probably was supposed to know her, which was good. She rolled her eyes at him.
Before he could ponder further, though, the elevator came to another stop and his previous anxiety hit him once more, tenfold. Small crisis averted, countless unknown ones to come. If the doors would stay closed forever, that would be great.
Scratch that, if there was a freak accident that left them locked in there for the entire two weeks, he could play off his weirdness as claustrophobia, maybe cabin fever, then when they got out, he’d get away with faking some medical thing, like amnesia- thus evading having to answer questions and potentially messing up and then Jason could-
Regrettably, the doors opened, and his last layer of protection was ripped from him. His best-worst-case planning came to an abrupt halt, now that the actual nightmare was going to set in. As if on cue, he felt his heartbeat pick up and tried his best to breathe calmly.
Straightening up as much as he could, he aimed to display everything he really wasn’t. Confident, head held high, and definitely not unable to recognise and or memorise faces. Perfectly normal. Not panicking at all. Neal Caffrey.
The first thing he noticed was that the entire floor was packed with agents. A gala was bad enough, but this was thirty-something trained federal agents in a confined space, all thinking that he was actually an international conman who could probably talk himself out of getting killed by the reaper, that’s how charming he was supposed to be.
Tim was many things. But right now, the main thing he was was doomed.
Who the fuck had thought that this undercover idea was a good one? No, who had thought asking him was a good idea?
-Well, technically, nobody had asked, since Caffrey was more or less an unofficial JL thing that mostly the Bats were aware of. He was just a better choice than the literal twelve-year-old. Though thinking about it, maybe Damian would’ve dealt with this better. At least he could tell people apart.
They left the elevator, supposed-Berrigan and Burke leaving him to go to his desk. Caffrey’s desk. As he watched Burke mingling into the crowd of agents, he realised with another sinking sensation of doom that he had forgotten to pay attention to the agent’s look. Other than the black suit and the white dress shirt, the man had virtually no practical identifiers. His hands turned cold.
He was fucked.
Sure, sure, he memorised his siblings by outfits and voice, but the first was useless in an office, and the latter impossible to get with how little they had spoken. He hated that not liking small talk ended up actually biting him in the ass and he hated himself even more for being so naïve to think that he could make it work.
Trying not to show his internal panic, Tim moved toward where he knew his desk was supposed to be. Once again, he found himself praying that nobody would approach him. But whoever had designed this circle of hell had clearly made it their job to let whoever passed through had to see as many people as possible, so he found himself nodding at people over and over again in a silent acknowledgment. He could be nodding at the literally most famous person on earth, and he wouldn’t know.
After manoeuvring through the sea of agents, he finally arrived at his desk. Clean enough for Jason, a little bust of Socrates or Aristotle sitting on the right-hand side. Standard computer, flat screen for FBI standards. There was also a stand full of files, all most likely pertaining to fraud he was supposed to be dealing with. Another one was directly on the desk surface, slightly sprawled atop the keyboard of the computer. A small red stamp proclaimed it ‘confidential’.
That must be the loan origination case Jason had mentioned.
Happy to be distracted from his anxieties, he dutifully sat down, not bothering to hide his amusement at the bust, and with another look around, he poked at its forehead. What a nerd.
Jason had told him that he really didn’t need to do much about reports and files, most of his job pertained making sure that everything was in order and entertaining whatever job Burke took him along to.
Soon enough, he was deeply engrossed in the file, even though he could care less about what Frederick Laudner actually got up to. But it was something familiar. It was similar to checking over whatever the lawyers handed over for Wayne and Drake industries, with the slight difference that this time, people knew that he was the one dealing with it. Or rather, they presumed Neal Caffrey was.
Maybe all of this was making his head swim a bit.
Unfortunately for him, at some point, he had worked through the three files that were on his desk, which now left him to do one thing.
He dropped the pen from his left hand and let out a loud sigh. With a quick glance, he confirmed that a) nobody had bothered with the noise, and b) it was not even 11.30am. Just great.
Right as he had gotten accustomed to the task at hand, he’d finished it and was now supposed to go into treacherous waters. Beaten by the invisible forces that dictated what he should do next, also referred to as ‘protocol’, he slowly got up, resigned to go down to Records.
But despite having gathered himself to get up, his hands remained planted on the table. Technically, he was well within his right to take a quick break. With coffee.
Caffrey might be a connoisseur, but Tim was a man of very low standards, so even whatever death concoction they served, he’d take it.
What he had failed to consider, however, was that he might run into people.
So, as he was still struggling to work out the amount of water required for three scoops of coffee powder, and trying not to swear at the over-simplified and unhelpful instruction graphics stuck to the machine, someone of course had to show up.
“Neal?” a man said in surprise.
Tim whirled around, casually sliding the coffee bag behind himself out of habit.
A man, about 1.82m, classic suit and shirt combo. Blue and white striped tie in an offset pattern. He seemed to be in his forties, but then again, he was absolutely shit at guessing people’s ages. The man was probably older than Bruce. Probably.
“Hey,” he replied, drawing out the sound as much as he could. “Did they change the machine? It seems to not be cooperating with me very well.”
Not waiting for the man’s response, he turned back around, trying to wreck his brain for the generic white man. If this mission was going to fail at getting coffee, his siblings would never let him live that down.
“I don’t think I’ve ever seen you drinking office coffee.” The man went to stand next to him, and Tim tried his best not to move to the side too quickly. “But it’s-“ he took part of the machine off and filled it with water. “I don’t know. The trick is to wiggle the tank so it unlatches.”
He watched as the guy put the part back and turned on the machine, before looking at him with a raised eyebrow. It was worse than Alfred’s ‘I know you’re hiding coffee even though we switched you to decaf’ look. This guy had to be Burke.
And apparently, even Jason had higher standards than him, which was just sad.
“It’s pouring outside,” he shrugged. “Besides, what would I do to serve the wonderful citizens of this country, if I fell asleep on my desk because you flood me with mortgage fraud.”
The man who had to be Burke raised his eyebrow even higher, if possible. “Would you prefer the luxury of a prison cell?”
Whoops. “No, thank you.”
It apparently appeased him, as he turned to retrieve cups for the both of them. Tim didn’t want to celebrate too early, but he counted this as another crisis so far averted. And he managed to find today’s identifier: the blue-white patterned tie.
But if this was what Jason meant with ‘annoying’, he got it. One wrong thing out of order, and his handler was suspicious. Honestly, he had thought that his brother was simply messing with him to not fuck up his mission, but apparently, the briefing had been to the best of his abilities and contained valid information. Even though he could’ve included more graphics.
The machine turned off with a click, and before Burke could react, Tim went to retrieve the pot and proceeded to pour the liquid into the cups. As he was doing so, he slightly regretted his decision to risk trying the coffee.
“Thanks,” Burke nodded. “Now get to work, I want the Laudner case gone as fast as possible.”
He shot the man a grin, tipping an invisible hat as he walked backward out of the kitchen with the coffee in hand. Crisis averted.
It was another two hours before anyone came to bother him. He hadn’t brought the files to Records yet, and instead resumed to discovering what Jason had been hiding in the desk drawers. But apart from a little Batman drawing hidden under ruled paper, there was very little blackmail material to be found.
As he was putting away the last supplies how he wanted them (and how he knew would annoy Jason when he came back), a woman approached his desk.
“I need advice.”
She didn’t look like she wanted to ask him particularly, but she seemed desperate enough. Which was why he leant back in his chair, crossed his arms behind his head, and smiled. “Oh?”
There were only so many things he could imagine Diana Berrigan ask Caffrey, and since she didn’t seem too joyful about it, this ought to be good. (He thanked the heavens that she wore the same shirt as earlier, this was the first time today he actually felt confident in his guesswork.)
“Christie’s birthday is coming up. Do you have ideas?”
Did he have ideas? Hell- no. He wasn’t even sure what was going on between him and Conner and she was asking him what to do about her girlfriend’s anniversary. Well, she was asking Caffrey, who in turn was mostly Jason, who would probably suggest something incredibly cliché and so romantic, you’ll want to find a way to kill Cupid yourself.
When in doubt, deflect.
“What are your plans so far?”
She shrugged. “There’s this movie coming out-“
“Nope,” he interrupted her, letting himself fall forward dramatically so he was leaning across the table toward her. There was something so awful, he knew that this would be what Jason would want: “Chocolate making.”
“Chocolate making,” Berrigan repeated dumbly, with a hint of skepticism.
He nodded. “Chocolate making.”
But apparently, she wasn’t entirely sold on the idea. She raised an eyebrow and sighed, before doing a half-turn to where she had come from. “Thanks, Caffrey.”
As she left, he made eye contact with the Aristotle/ Socrates/ potentially Homer bust, shrugging.
By the time 5.30 pm rolled around, Tim had not brought the files down to Records, and had instead resigned himself to checking over the fraud cases he was supposed to start working on during the week. If Caffrey’s productivity increased during his stay, Jason had no right to complain.
He yawned.
Surprisingly, this entire ordeal was going better than expected, which was why he found himself reluctantly relax. Just as he leant back in his chair and closed his eyes, he felt his phone- the one he wasn’t supposed to have kept- vibrate in his pocket. He had kind of forgotten about that one. With a swift glance around the office, he pulled it out and placed it so that it would look like he was reading through the files. For added show, he took a pen into his hand.
‘Do not disturb’ mode had ended about half an hour ago, which was why he found several messages unanswered. One from Barb, asking him about a case file, then five minutes later telling him not to bother. Another was from Bruce, reminding him to at least remember to silence his phone. At this, he felt his cheeks heat up slightly, feeling like a little kid caught with their hand in the cookie jar.
With another glance around, he read the final notifications. A missed call from Jason and new messages in the r/batIdentities subreddit. The first one he figured was unimportant, but he supposed that he could check out the latter.
Tapping the pen on the file, he scrolled through the feed. The most recent top- posts were mainly hopping on ideas that had been around for a while, but there was one that caught his eye.
_TRUTHiSoUTtHERE1
for everyone calling me delusional: there is hard proof that indicates clearly that batman and bruce wayne know each other personally and if you’re still disagreeing, i suggest you read my earlier post about it, because i put links there for you to read up about. /edited
- n8ghtWingsButtocks
nerd.
Clicking on that person’s previous post, he was shocked to discover that they had actually done their research. Between outlandishness, there were enough points that were too close for comfort. Luckily, nobody seemed to pay them any mind, but he needed to make sure that someone ran a check on them.
Engrossed in the profile, he failed to notice that someone had approached his desk and was now hovering there. His head snapped up and he stared up at Burke, who was watching him with a raised eyebrow.
He felt his face flush with embarrassment. “I-“
“Just tell me the Laudner case is done. And Neal-“ the man stared in dismay at the post-it planes he had started to balance on the computer- “Please take this job seriously.”