Disclaimer: I don't own White Collar. I just dream in their world, I don't make a profit off it.

Peter stopped as he entered the FBI main office as a colored paper airplane soared passed him. He looked to his right, sharply. Neal sat at his desk and gave him his best innocent 'what?' Look.

"Why are you throwing paper airplanes?"

"What paper airplane?"

"That one." Peter snagged it and found a coffee stained paper from a recent case involving an airline pilot suspected of identity theft.

He looked at Neal, but before their banter continued, he spotted Hughes, pointing at him and motioning him into his office. Peter was more than a little disturbed with the case he dropped on him. "He won't like it. I don't like it. What if he runs into someone who knows him?"

"We've taken all that into account Peter. Now go get him."

Peter sighed, walked out and motioned Neal to come up to the office. He let Hughes fill the young man in.

Neal was, for a moment, speechless. "You want me to what?" He finally sputtered.

"Go inside, find the informant and whoever is on the inside whose leaking the information." Hughes repeated with forced patience.

"In a prison. As an inmate. Do you know what they'll do if they ID me?"

"They won't Caffrey. No one in this facility knows you, at least in that section." Hughes stated firmly.

Neal's brows rose at this. He gave Peter a beseeching look.

"And you won't go in alone. Peter's going in as a guard."

Peter blinked at this. "Do I know any of them?"

"No. Medium security, we've vetted the cell block inmates, who will be there and even the staff."

"But you get to go home at night." Neal said, scowling. "I'm stuck there until..." He looked sharply at Hughes. "How long do I have to pull this off?"

"Long as you need."

Neal looked horrified.

"If something goes wrong, we pull you."

"If something goes wrong it may be too late to pull me!"

"You can do this Caffrey. In fact, you may be the only one who can."

Neal turned to look at Peter as they left Hughes office to prepare. "Now he believes in me? Now of all times?"

Peter shrugged. "What can I say, you've experience in the system. And hey, it's not even supermax. You can probably walk out the door without our help." He gave Neal a pointed look. "He's right you know. You can do it. It probably won't even take long. And you're not going in as Neal Caffrey. We'll even tweak your ID to give you maximum advantage."

"Just don't lose me in the system or solving the case will be the least of my worries."

Peter went in as a guard before Neal did. By the time Neal arrived, Peter was all for pulling out himself. The warden was in the loop as far as knowing an operation was going on in the prison, but didn't have all the details. He only knew an agent was in among his guards. Peter had argued against leaving Neal's cover a secret from the warden, but it was believed, if he behaved different toward him, it might be a giveaway. At the time he'd bought that. Now he felt sick with doubt and wasn't so sure.

Steve Tabernacle AKA Neal Caffrey arrived with a group of inmates and Peter, thanks to the warden, was helping the processing. Neal's eyes glanced sideways but slid passed him. Neal handled the entire degrading situation better than Peter. Outwardly, he hoped, he didn't show his anger at the casual humiliation of the searches, the crude comments. Neal had a complicated mix of confident but wary about him. He didn't mouth off to the guards but neither was he a push over.

When Peter left it was with great reluctance. He managed to catch Neal's eye once when the young man was locked in a cell with another inmate. Neal and the other guy sized each other up. It wasn't until he was sure the other guy was harmless for the moment that he left, shift change or no.

"This is...worse than I imagined, El." Peter stared at his food and wondered at the stuff they'd served Neal. Even the memory of the smells turned him off. It was a wonder Neal had eaten at all.

"I take it you don't mean my cooking."

"No!" Peter looked startled. "I didn't know...I know we're supposed to punish criminals, but we're supposed to rehabilitate too. Everything I witnessed said it was the law of the jungle in there. And the guards...I think some of them enjoy it. Not all, but some..." He sucked in a deep breath. "How can we expect them to learn to live as decent citizens when they have to live trapped in an environment like that for years? When they go out of there way to humiliate? How can they be expected to go out and be respectful when they've live for years in a place that dehumanizes them?"

"I guess the guards get desensitized." El observed with concern. But she was frowning. "But Neal did survive before."

"In supermax, it was just him in a cell. And...I spoke up at the sentencing. Made sure they knew he was non violent and he should get some protection. Here..."

"You couldn't do that?"

Peter just shook his head. "And he's alone at night...in a cell with a stranger."

"Neal makes friends easily."

"These 'friends' may come with price tags. He didn't want to do this, El."

"Can you get Jones or Diana on the inside as guards at night?"

"I can try. But we can't openly act or be treated different from the other guards. We can't follow him around. If we are, it'll just give him away."

Neal for his part, was staring at the ceiling, uselessly trying to sleep. The guy bunked beneath him was snoring. Somewhere someone was crying. A faucet was dripping. On the whole, Neal didn't complain about the snoring guy and he didn't disturb him. Annoying as it was, it was not a voluntary issue and the guy seemed nice. That was no guarantee he wouldn't turn out to be a monster, or a push over either. Neither would be good for his new cellmate. Lack of food and sleep weren't good either. They wouldn't help him solve this case, connect to the behind the scenes mastermind, and get out of here. He sighed. He closed his eyes and pictured the pained, private look Peter had passed him when he left. He knew Peter wouldn't sleep well, knowing he was here. That was an odd, ironic comfort. Someone cared. Someone who would be back, not on visiting day, but tomorrow.