6Kramer's Folly
If Agent Phillip Kramer was naïve enough to actually think that Neal Caffrey was going to come quietly with him too DC then he was wrong.
It was no secret that Neal was a fantastic escape artist, that if he put him mind to it then he could break out of just about anything, it was a simple fact. It was a lesser known fact that the only reason Neal had stayed in any type of custody was because he let them keep him and at any stage, if he so wanted, he could be gone by morning.
The only reason that Neal stayed in prison was so that after he served his sentence he would be a free man again and go back to his life of crime without fear of being caught again, he would have been smarter this time and knew that he would have never been charged on anything again. But then he broke out because he couldn't be there anymore, so he put him plan into action, the one that he had up his sleeve since the end of his month first month. His escape plan went off without a hitch.
When it came to Peter, it was different. Neal hadn't been lying when he told Peter that he was the only one who could stop him, on that runway the day that Kate was truly lost too him. Neal knew that Peter had taken a chance on him and that if he ran then Peters career could go down the drain with him, so he stayed. He could have run, he knew how to cut his anklet, both versions, and successfully run away within a month of getting them but he wouldn't do that too Peter.
He didn't owe the same curtesy to Phillip Kramer, after all he was the one that was trying to take Neal away from his home for his own selfish reasons. Neal knew that when Kramer came to pick him up for his first day of work for the DC office that he wouldn't be there and would have been long gone. After all, Neal wasn't just going to sit there while Kramer ruined his life and any of his chances of being anything other than a criminal.
First he needs to start setting the wheels in motion, get a plan ready. Mozzie will help him, Moz has always had his back and been the little devil on his shoulder, leading him onto the darker path. They needed money and Neal knew he still had had the U-Boat treasure, but they didn't have the time needed to liquidate. There were always his various bank accounts, which held the profits of his trade, in places around the world from Switzerland to the Cayman Islands, each holding millions of dollars, each holding enough money to start a new life. Neal trusted Sara enough to not spill the beans on Victor Moreau so he didn't need a new alias, although he would miss Sara and decided he would leave a letter for her.
Now there was the question of where to go, he didn't agree with Mozzie about an island paradise, he figured that he would get bored quickly, although it would be a bad idea to stay on a small tropical island without an extradition policy for the first year while the heat cooled down. Maybe a French Chateau, one with a vineyard so they could produce their own wine, after all, Neal loved France.
His first port of call, get a hold of Mozzie, a new burner phone would work the best. He needed Moz to get things rolling so they could be ready to leave out of DC by tomorrow because he knew that Kramer would take him away this afternoon and that they would be in DC before the day was over. He also needed to pack his things, get permission from June to take Byron's suits with him and tell her goodbye.
Five years later, Neal Caffrey had been dead for four of them, killed by an FBI sanctioned bounty hunter by the name of Collins, escaping a small pacific island. Victor Moreau on the other hand was a successful and wealthy entrepreneur who ran a small vineyard in the Bordeaux region with his friend and business partner Bob. Phillip Kramer had had a rather unlucky turn, he had been publicly fired after an investigation into him due to the escape of Neal Caffrey and his subsequent death. He had been labelled a corrupt agent and lost everything he had, mainly due to his own selfishness and a few incriminating documents supplied by one Dante Havisham. Collins was serving life in prison for the murder of Neal Caffrey when dozens of island residents claimed that he shot the, rather peaceful, man they knew as Robert Parker in the back without even trying to bring him in alive, he was also investigated and was revealed to have shot and killed a number of other fugitives without having even tried to bring them back alive. Peter Burke now lived a quieter life with his wife Elizabeth and their son Neal, as ASAC of the New York White Collar Division. And every year on his birthday he received a bottle of Chateau Moreau Bordeaux with a hand drawn card from his old friend Vic.
So I've been watching a lot of White Collar lately, re watched the whole series, and I was thinking about it and I had this theory that Neal is simply too great of an escape artist and only ever stays anywhere is because he wants to and if he wanted, he could walk away at any stage and escape. I also wanted to give an alternate version of how the end of season 3 played out, one where Neal knew that Kramer was going to take him away from New York and put together a real plan before Peter told him to run, and one where Peter wouldn't get any of the blame.
28/11/17