This first chapter is just setting up for the rest of the story, giving you an idea of, like, what happened, why the hell they would be time-travelling. Anyway, I thought it'd be pretty random and awesome if the cast of Castle met the cast of How to Train Your Dragon. Especially Castle and Beckett. Can you imagine what the two of them would do if they saw a dragon? Anyway... I'm not really planning on playing into the romance of Castle and Beckett, so I might even set this earlier in the series, like, before Montgomery's death. Actually, I think I will do that. Have Alexis nosing around. So, just presume this is sometime before the cat comes out of the bag, the two of them are still stuck in that state of constant, delicious, sexual tension.

Disclaimer: I don't own Castle or How to Train Your Dragon or anything affiliated with either.

Prologue

"So get this," Detective Javier Esposito, who almost always seemed to be on the scene before the the rest of his rag-tag team began to debrief the others. Detective Katherine Beckett and novelist Richard Castle were huddled around their coffees as if they were standing before a fire while Detective Kevin Ryan moved to greet his partner. "Neighbors heard three gunshots at 3:32 AM and called the cops. Unis showed up at 3:44 AM and by then, they were gone. One witness went into the hallway with a gun of his own in case the shooter decided to come out, but reported that he saw no one go in or out of the apartment."

"Gone?" Ryan prodded for clarification.

"Both our vic and the shooter are MIA. In a window of twelve minutes they managed to completely disappear." Esposito shared a look with Castle, "Sound like your kind of case, Castle?"

The novelist shrugged, "Well the obvious answer is aliens abducted them-"

"Get real, Castle. Have CSU and Unis canvass the area, they can't have gone far." Beckett rolled her eyes as she made her way up to the crime scene. Sure enough, there were a bunch of markers, investigators swarming the apartment, and no bodies.

Lanie Parish approached them, shaking her head in disbelief, "Well the shooter didn't miss. We're getting the bullets to ballistics, but from what we can see, there were three shots- two in the wall and one into the floor. Suspected brain matter on the carpet suggests that our vic was shot point blank through the head, and with the amount of blood, there's no way he survived. The blood trails into the bedroom where it's puddled, then abruptly ends."

"We'll need to get as much information on him as possible. Do we have a name?" Beckett wondered.

"Neil Sorrels. Single, 75 year old Caucasian male, no listed next of kin. No employment information, but he obviously had some source of income to afford this place." Lanie replied, looking around herself. It wasn't much of an apartment- in fact, it was rather shabby and outdated, but even given its condition, one has to pay rent.

"Ouch," Ryan mumbled, glancing down at his wedding band. To not have a partner at that age and then be shot to death? Nobody would have even known if the guy had used a silencer.

Castle, who had lost interest when they started talking about guns, made his way back to the group with a notebook, "Hey, look at this. Looks like he was big into time travel."

Beckett shot him a glare of disbelief, "Time travel?"

"Listen to this: "Diary, I have finally managed to crack the code of space and time manipulation and tested it. I just got back from a visit with our ancestors, the Neanderthals- they gave me this necklace as a sign of friendship." He lifted up what was undeniably a necklace made of twine and bone.

"Damn bro, where'd you get this?" Esposito snatched the item in question out of the writer's bands to inspect it more closely.

"Careful with that, it's antique!" Castle chided, "I found it in this diary. Here's the most recent entry; "I presented my theory before the board, and they said that I had forged the items I brought back. I suppose this is for the best- if anything alters the course of history, life as we know it could cease to exist. If not for the amount of time and money I've invested in this, I would simply destroy it and pretend it never happened. Or perhaps I could make it so-" it cuts off there, like he was interrupted, but at the bottom of the page it says AD12-12-06-VK603HH..."

Ignoring Castle, Beckett followed the trail of blood into the bedroom, where it stopped abruptly, just as Lanie had said. There was a puddle of blood in front of a wall, then... Nothing. "This just doesn't add up."

"Sure it does, this is where they got into the time machine!" Castle explained, "it was probably right here." He stood in the space between the bed and the wall, "I've got to write this down." With this, he pulled out his note pad and began to jot down his thoughts.

"Castle may be onto something. Not time travel, but space travel.." Detective Beckett examined the chair board near where the blood seemed to end, "This wall moves. There must be a secret passage back there."

"On it." Espositio, always ready to work his muscles, began shoving the wall from all angles until finally, something clicked, and it swung out, blocking him on the opposite side.

Castle's grin spread, "I was wrong. The time machine wasn't out here, it was in here. Very cleverly disguised... Though this seems like something more for Derek Storm than Nikki Heat. What do you think, Detective?" The man challenged, turning to face Beckett.

"I think there must be another secret passage." She decided. Behind the wall was what had likely once been either a walk-in closet or a master bathroom. The detective stepped inside and used a flashlight to help investigate the small, dark space.

"There's an awful lot of petal components in there." Detective Ryan, always the most skeptic of the three professionals, pointed out. It was true. There were nuts, bolts, screws, and other various small and easily lost bits of hardware scattered about.

"That's because he was keeping the time machine in there." Castle explained, as if talking to a small child.

Rolling her eyes, the lead detective said, "Alright, well let's go back to the precinct and get some background on this guy. Maybe if we find our killer, we'll find our body." The troop began to leave, but then Beckett noticed that her little shadow wasn't following. Turning back, she saw Castle taking a picture with his cameraphone of the last entry in the diary. "Castle! What did I tell you about photographing evidence?!" She hissed, snatching the book away from him before grabbing his arm to drag him out of the apartment.

"You don't seem to think it's very evident of anything," The man pointed out with a bit of a pout, but he wasn't as disappointed as he normally would have been when Beckett decided to ruin his fun. This time, he'd already gotten what he wanted.

The moment they got back to the precinct, Castle said, "Well, ladies, it's been fun, but I'm going to go do some investigating of my own."

The female detective narrowed her eyes, "You'd better not be doing anything illegal."

"Me? Illegal deeds?" The man pretended to be shocked at the accusation. "No, Detective, I'd never consider doing something illegal! I just have a... science project to work on."

She smacked a hand to her forehead, "You're going to build a time machine?"

"Am I really that easy to read?"

"Like a picture book," Esposito replied, "Let's go, Beckett, we've got real work to do."

The two began to leave, but Detective Ryan hesitated for a moment. Looking over at Castle, he asked in a hushed tone, "Could you...?"

With a knowing smile and affirmative nod, Castle said, "I'll call you as soon as it's done." With a little victorious hand gesture, the detective turned and went after his colleagues, leaving Castle to talk to himself. "Time to make some phone calls~"

Well, tell me what you think so far. This chapter was really mostly to test the waters, see if there's enough of a fanbase for me to bother continuing or if I'd just be writing it for my own enjoyment. I can think it far more easily. xD So, please review and tell me what you think!