Published June 6, 2021

This story is seventh in the "Averages" crossover series or could be considered the eleventh when also counting the "Their Next Adventures" series of Chuck-only stories. The chronology of the full, combined series is on my author profile page. Before this story, there are 10 other stories and 55 chapters. You can read the others first or just the crossovers, but hopefully this refresher can help.

For crossovers, this story follows:
- "Castle vs the Law of Averages" - after Castle 3x17, "Countdown" and "Chuck vs the Masquerade," 4x16 - Feb 2011.
- "Caskett vs Dr Morgan" - near the ends of Castle 3x22, "To Love and Die in LA," and "Chuck vs Agent X," 4x22 - May 2011.
- "Beckett vs the Linchpin" - during Castle 4x14, "Linchpin," a few weeks after the Chuck finale - Feb 2012.
- "Chuck vs 3XK" - after Castle 5x05, "Probable Cause" - Oct 2012.
- "Chuck vs the Hunt" - starts in the middle of Castle 5x15, "Target" and replaces 5x16, "Hunt" - Feb 2013.
- "Beckett vs Lazarus" - near the end of Castle 6x17, "Belly of the Beast" - Mar 2014.

The first Chuck-only story is set before and after "Beckett vs the Linchpin". The three Chuck-only one-shots are before and after "Chuck vs the Hunt".

This 5-chapter story is a few months later, starting before Castle 7x02, "Montreal". At the end of the Castle season 6 finale, Rick Castle and Kate Beckett were going to get married at his house in the Hamptons, but Castle never arrived. His car was discovered in a ditch and on fire. In the season 7 premiere, Castle was discovered unconscious in Atlantic , with no memory of where he had been for months. They knew he had been hiding out somewhere because they found a campsite, but they had no idea why, and he had no recollection of being there.

Disclaimer: Nobody else owns anything here, so why would I?
Disclaimer 2: No beta. However, if you PM me issues, I'll fix them. There's no expiration date.

Sunday, October 5, 2014
6 PM

This was it. Beckett and Castle would finally get the answers they had been looking for about why he missed the wedding. Like when Beckett rescued Alexis, she was going into the lion's den, with Sarah and Chuck at her side.

This time, instead of Hartley, she had Castle. Hartley used to be at the top of the FBI's most-wanted list when he was Alexei Volkoff, but he had the ruthless part of his brain removed, leaving behind someone who seemed like a congenial professor. She had grown to trust Castle as a partner (when he wasn't being annoying) more than some professor she had never met. She just preferred it when he stayed behind them and came in later. She long ago gave up on him staying in the car. Like Hartley, Castle had part of his brain messed with, but instead of removing a false personality, his memories were removed. They were going to find out why.

As much as she trusted Castle, she'd feel safer with an ESU team backing her up for this "raid". Could it be called a raid when there were only four people—three civilians and one cop far out of her jurisdiction? Then again, after seeing the two ex-spy/civilians in action, she thought maybe Chuck and Sarah alone could be called a raid. After seeing Sarah by herself at that arms dealer's air strip in France, Beckett thought Sarah by herself could probably be called a raid.

Inside, they stood in a wide, ornate hallway with several openings to side rooms. This is where their target was supposed to be, for the meeting of some club. Under more normal circumstances, Castle would probably love the secret society angle. It was like the Illuminati, Knights Templar, or Freemasons. It wasn't going to be all fun and excitement that Castle often wished for, though. They were going to confront the man who had ruined her perfect day.

An older man came out of the side room to greet them. It was Mason Wood. Sarah and Beckett immediately pointed their guns. This was the man who was the reason behind Castle abandoning her for over two months. He worked with Bracken, the man who ordered her mother's murder. She thought she had justice, now she could finally get it.

The man slowly raised his hands, but he smiled. Why was he smiling?

52 hours earlier

Friday, October 3, 2014
2 PM PDT
Los Angeles International Airport

Castle and Beckett's flight was finally over. After a cross-county flight of over six hours, even first class was unpleasant. Beckett would do it twenty times to help Castle, though. Whatever happened with this memory specialist that Castle, this was bound to be a better trip to LA than Castle and Beckett took last time, almost 3 ½ years ago. That time, Beckett was out for justice, and Castle came along as her uninvited tag-along (like he always did). This time, they were coming together. It didn't matter that the marriage didn't happen when it was supposed to. She was keeping him closer from now on.

When Castle said he was going to a specialist in LA, Beckett and Alexis had a debate about who would go with him. Alexis had classes for school; Beckett had no vacation time left. She had even used her sick time as "mental health" days, allowing her to continue to search for Castle while he was missing. Between Beckett and Alexis, they weren't going to let him go alone. Beckett worked out holiday trades with two other detectives to get a couple days. She'd rather work on Thanksgiving and New Year's than be responsible for that girl's grades slipping.

Castle was so convinced this was the right thing to do, Beckett was willing to humor him. They weren't back to the point they were before the aborted wedding, but she wasn't going to stop their progress by getting in the way of him actively trying to get better.

Honestly, Beckett didn't expect much. They were flying out for a weekend. What kind of specialist would work on the weekend, not wanting them there during the week? She had talked to a couple experts in New York who wanted to run a bunch of tests on Castle. She had also gone through the research on memory specialists across the country. They hadn't exhausted all of the NYC options so why would they fly to LA? No one on this side of the country stuck out as an expert more than the doctors in their city. They couldn't even stay in California for long term tests or treatment. While she was willing to fly to LA with Castle twenty times or more, she didn't expect to find hope like that.

Neither of them had a large bag for this trip. They were flying back Monday, so both had packed completely in carry-ons. Walking through the "receiving line" tunnel waiting for people who were on the plane, Beckett looked towards the car rental desks. She hinted to Castle, "Are we getting a Ferrari again? Maybe we should put my name on the rental agreement so I can drive it, too."

"We're not renting," he said. "They're supposed to send a car to pick us up."

Sending a car? What kind of doctor was this? She looked down the line of chauffeurs and got her answer. One sign said "Nikki Heat and Jameson Rook". It was being held by a familiar face: a short beard man with a driver's hat on, Morgan Grimes. In that outfit, he didn't look like Dr Morgan, relationship consultant. That was a stretch anyway, considering his relationship advice was annoying more than anything else and he didn't even have a doctorate. It was hard to believe he was once right about her getting together with Castle over three years ago.

She asked her man, "What does Carmichael Industries have to do with a memory specialist? They're ex-spies, not doctors."

"Morgan assured me that if anyone could help with memory loss, it was them. You know Sarah had problems a couple years ago, but she and Chuck are happily married. That's what I want to be. Happily married to you, despite my missing memory. I know you're not ready, but this will help."

Castle was right that they weren't ready. They'd get there eventually, just not on this trip. Beckett had been skeptical all along, but now she knew why her research hadn't found a memory specialist in LA. They weren't in LA to see a medical specialist. They were here for pseudoscience. At least she got a luxury trip with Castle. They could head back a day early and maybe she'd swap back working on New Year's.

Beckett sighed as she and Castle walked up to Morgan. "Good. You're here." He started to move to take their bags, but realized his hands were full with the cardboard sign. He folded it in half and flipped up the back of his suit coat to put it in his back waistband. After sliding it in place, he tilted to the side and made a face, realizing it was uncomfortable. He reached behind himself and pulled it out. Then he helped up a finger. "Just a sec." He darted to a garbage can, where he threw it out. Then he hurried back and said, "I'll take those."

Beckett wasn't sure about handing over her bag, but she did anyway. Her concern was whether or not he could handle them. With both of their bags he was clearly overloaded. He tried to take her purse and Castle's laptop case, even though he had no more hands. They both kept them and followed him out to the town car waiting for them in an area. Morgan had ignored the sign that said not to leave an abandoned car. Airport security was probably going to show up any second. Fortunately, that didn't happen before they piled in and pulled out.

When they left the airport, he told them it would normally be a half hour, but he wasn't sure with the game going on at Dodgers Stadium. Beckett had forgotten that the Dodgers were hosting the Cardinals for game 1 of the NLDS that afternoon, in about an hour. Traffic around the stadium would be picking up.

At least with a driver, she could lean against Castle and didn't have to worry about finding where they were going. Where were they going? Was Morgan taking them to their hotel? She asked Castle, "Does Morgan know where we're staying?"

"We're at the same place as last time, when it was great luck for us. We're heading in the right direction for that, but I don't think he knows it. It's still early enough here that we're probably going to see the specialist."

Beckett didn't even know this so-called specialist's name, but she doubted it mattered. Sarah didn't have all of her memories back. Why would she expect Castle to get his memories back? Chuck and Sarah were happy together, though. That's what she wanted with her partner. She wanted to be Mrs Castle. She and Castle just had to get back to the special Caskett dynamic that she loved so much. They couldn't remain waiting for the next shoe to drop, like another car blowing up. Ever since she met Castle, he had been "pulling her pigtails," making her life unexpected and fun. If going along with this crazy trip was going to help, she wasn't going to stop it.

Still, she couldn't believe they got in the car without knowing the destination. At least Morgan wasn't a stranger. He was a little odd sometimes, but Carmichael Industries could be trusted not to leave them high and dry. Riding down the 105, she asked their driver, "Are we going to see this specialist today?"

"I'm sure you'll see her tonight. She just has to get off shift at the hospital."

Get off shift? Weren't they going to meet her at the hospital?

Closer to the stadium, traffic slowed a little. Castle looked with fascination out the window, but she couldn't keep her eyes off of him. It was that way on the plane, too. Castle looked out the window or at a game on his phone. In his head, he'd only been missing for maybe a day. He only remembered the accident then waking up in the hospital. At the hospital, he didn't even know he'd been gone for two months. She had been missing him the entire time and didn't know if she'd ever see him again, so her eyes remained fixed on his face.

"I'm sorry," Morgan said. "I should have gone the other way from the airport. Too late now. We're not exiting at the stadium, so we can stay left and drive past most of this. I've already put in a call to get her to leave work early, but I don't know if that will work, so we might have to wait anyway."

Driving by the stadium would be better after 4, when the game was going on and no new cars were arriving. The roads would also be a mess after the game finished. Hopefully they wouldn't have to go through it to get to the hotel. The teams' two aces were pitching today. The Dodgers' had Kershaw pitching. He'd won two Cy Youngs and was certain to win a third this year, when he had been more dominant than ever before. It'd be a low scoring game that would be over quickly. To avoid a post-game logjam, they'd have to check the score before hitting the road.

They got off the expressway at the Echo Park exit. Beckett hadn't seen any signs for a hospital. Castle wasn't sure where they were going either, so he searched on his phone for nearby hospitals. There were a few clinics, but nothing major. Maybe they were going to a clinic where the doctor had an office outside the hospital. Or maybe not. It looked like they entered a residential neighborhood.

Morgan stopped in the parking lot of an apartment complex. "We're here!" he happily said. "We'll leave your bags." Why would they take their bags? They weren't at the hotel. "I don't see her Sienna, so we got here first." Sienna? A Toyota Sienna family van? Nothing made sense to Beckett.

When they got out, she realized something. This must be where this "specialist" lived, an apartment building, not a multi-million dollar mansion in Beverly Hills. However, that shouldn't matter. Sarah used this doctor after her memory loss, and she and Chuck were happy. Since Beckett was humoring Castle more than anything, so she just had to go along and hope for a similar result.

Morgan escorted them through an archway to a beautiful apartment courtyard, with a central fountain and lined with planes. "Welcome to Casa Carmichael. Though… technically none of us are Carmichaels, except when we use aliases, but it's a convenient name since we all live here, except Casey, but he used to, right over there, at my place."

This was where everyone from Carmichael Industries lived? Maybe they weren't seeing this doctor after all. They were meeting Chuck and Sarah, and they all would go to the doctors' together. But who drove the Siena?

They didn't go to the place Morgan had pointed. Instead, they went to a different apartment on the other side of the courtyard fountain. Morgan pulled out keys to unlock the door. He explained, "I used to live here with Chuck, then both Chuck and Sarah, until I moved over there to Casey's. My keys still work. Before I had keys, I'd get in through that window, also known as the 'Morgan Door', but I had to stop when Sarah moved here. She doesn't always wear a lot of clothing in her bedroom, and she likes throwing knives, so this is safer. Also the window is less convenient for guests, like the two of you."

Of course Beckett wouldn't go through the window. Especially someplace she had never been. The only time she'd go through a window was investigating a murder or chasing down a suspect. Morgan unlocked the door and went inside. Beckett and Castle followed.

Inside was a room that Beckett had seen a couple years ago in a video call. The basic decor was the same but there were a few big differences: The large wooden Indian against the wall and the Foosball table were missing. Despite Morgan not bothering to knock, the room was not empty. It wouldn't have done any good because the room's occupant, Chuck, was wearing a large headset, sitting in a video game chair, playing a game on the big screen TV.

Focused on the game, he didn't look their way. "Just a minute, Morgan. I didn't know you were coming. I only have a few minutes until Sarah gets back from picking up Molly at school, so I'm filling the time with a deathmatch." He was playing a multiplayer, first-person shooter. Chuck was in sniper mode and proceeded to take out four other players in less than four seconds. "There. They're all gone, so I can exit before they re-spawn. They're probably all worried I'll spawn-kill them, so they'll be happy I exit."

"Wow," Castle said in amazement. "How did you do that?"

Chuck shot up quickly and looked over in surprise. He looked from Castle, to Beckett, to Morgan, and through each three again. "Hi! I'm sorry. Morgan didn't tell me you were coming. It's good to see you. Please, please, have a seat, make yourselves comfortable. You've been here before, at least virtually. Morgan is dressed as a chauffeur, so I assume he picked you up at the airport. If you showed up on your own, I'd expect something is really wrong, but he knew you were coming. That means this was Morgan's idea. Morgan, why are they here?"

Morgan started his explanation. "You know Mr Castle disappeared before their wedding. It was all over the news."

"Yes. I looked, and there wasn't anything we could do about it. There was no detailed satellite coverage, and there were no leads. The Hamptons don't have a lot of surveillance coverage so I couldn't Piranha-in and see what happened. Widening the search a hundred miles in every direction would have been like finding a needle in a haystack a lot bigger than New York City. That's a lot of hay. It doesn't matter now because they found him."

"He lost his memory," Morgan said. "That's like Sarah and me."

"Yeah, but for you two it was because of a faulty Intersect. That's not the case here. I doubt watching six Star Wars and four, no three, the Indiana Jones movies would help."

Watching movies as a memory treatment? Why would that help? Castle hadn't forgotten a thing about them.

"Maybe Ellie can do her brain thing and help here. There's a reward."

Chuck sighed. He addressed the guests. "I'm sorry for my over-excited friend. You're friends, so we don't need a reward. My sister is a great neurologist, but she's not a memory specialist. Morgan, why would you give them false hope?"

"I'm trying to find ways to help CI more, so I thought I could bring in new business. Ellie helped me remember what I forgot by hypnotizing me."

Maybe that was an option. They talked to one doctor who said it was nonsense without anything to focus on, like a dream, but maybe they needed a second opinion. 'Ellie' was the matron of honor at Sarah's wedding that Carina talked about a few months back. Apparently she was the doctor who had helped Sarah and Morgan with memory loss in the past.

"A lot of doctors specialize in hypnotherapy. I'm sure many in New York do. I'm sorry for wasting your time."

They didn't need to come to LA for a consult. Beckett already had low expectations, but now she knew that Chuck and Sarah didn't even know she and Castle were coming. This entire trip was Morgan's fault—something to be thankful for when she worked on Thanksgiving.

A/N: Castle and Beckett are in California. What now?