a/n- Thanks everyone for the reviews and follows, you have no idea how much they mean to me. This chapter was harder to write than I thought it would be, hence it took longer to go up than planned. I'm happier with it now than I was the first time, but still not sure of it. Let me know what you think.

This story is going to be very difficult to write, as many of you have pointed out. We'll see if I can do it justice. I'll apologize now just in case I can't. Just a note: Text in italics here are Beckett's thoughts. There is going to be a lot of her thinking about her situation, and this is the best way I can express it without making her talk to herself all the time.

Disclaimer: I do not own Castle nor will I ever. Unfortunately.

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Chapter Two

Even before she even opened her eyes the next morning, Kate felt miserable. He was dead. He wasn't lying next to her. He wouldn't bring her a cup of coffee this morning. They weren't married, enjoying the morning after a wonderful night of celebrating their newly formed union. He's dead and that will never happen. Tears spring up underneath her eye lids, and she hurriedly wipes them away. She knows that she needs to get up; that today will consist of painful plans for the immediate future, and a lot of painful conversations. But she can't bring herself to greet this new, terrible day. Not yet.

She lay there, trying to steady her breathing, trying to gather her courage to face this day, to face a future without Castle. She doesn't want to. She wants to keep her eyes closed forever, not wanting to live one more moment without the man she loves. But she knows that it's time, so she opens her eyes.

The moment her eyes open, she knows something is wrong. She's not in his room at the loft. She's…she's somewhere else. The bed is different – less comfortable somehow. The sheets aren't as soft, and the comforter feels all wrong. The light in the room is different too, darker than it normally is in his room at the loft. Where the hell am I, she thinks, trying to make out features of the room that is beginning to look familiar.

It's my old apartment. And it's not the apartment she still rents. It's the place she used to live in before it was blown up by a crazed serial killer. What the hell?

While it feels like a dream, she can sense that she's awake. It's just too real. But even though she knows she's awake, and that this isn't some weird dream, the whole thing feels surreal. She throws the covers off of her, and swings her long legs off the bed and places her feet on the floor. She's wearing a pair of black yoga pants, and a light gray t-shirt. Okay, so that's not what I was wearing last night, she thinks, running her hands over her thighs.

She looks around, trying to gain her bearings, trying to understand what the hell is going on. Her first thought is that she's hallucinating. She quickly discards that idea because she's had hallucinations before and this is just too real, the details of the bedroom she's in too solid for this to not be real. She can feel the panic rising in her chest, and this time it has nothing to do with the loss of her fiancée.

She stands up and walks towards her old living room. Once there she looks around, noticing that it looks lived in, and it has all of her things exactly where they were when she last saw the place before the explosion. She's just about to go back to the bedroom when she hears a knock on the door. She looks at the clock over the fridge and sees that it's just after eight o'clock in the morning. She still can't figure out what the hell is going on, and her nerves are on high alert. Yesterday she was supposed to be getting married to the love of her life, then he died in a fiery car crash, now she's somehow been teleported back to an apartment she hasn't lived in in over four years. What the hell? How can this be real? She walks to the door and looks through the peephole. She doesn't recognize the woman who stands there, but she opens the door anyways, wondering what this could possibly be about.

"Can I help you?" she asks with a scowl on her face and steel in her voice. The woman is blonde, in her mid-30s probably, and strikingly beautiful.

"Actually, Katherine, I'm here to help you."

"Who are you?"

"You can call me Jessica. You are no doubt freaking out a little right now, right?"

"Wait, you know what's going on?"

"I do, and I can answer at least some of your questions. Can I come in?" She asked.

Beckett steps aside and lets the stranger into her apartment, desperate to understand what's happening to her. She guides the woman to the couch where they both sit down facing one another.

"Please, what's going on? How…how is this possible? Is this real?"

"First, take a deep breath Kate, it'll help. I have a lot to discuss with you this morning before you can set about your day, and I need you as calm as possible. It is essential that you listen to me and understand everything that I have to say."

Kate breathes in and out a few times, trying to calm her nerves. "Okay," she says, hoping for some real answers.

"Well first thing I guess I should answer is, yes, this is real. You've not really gone back in time so much as you've just come back. It's hard to explain, so I won't even try. The point is you're here because you need a second chance."

"So what, I just get to relive this part of my life over again?"

Jessica nods, "You in essence get to start over from this point on. You wished yesterday that you could have fewer regrets when it comes to Rick Castle, this is your chance."

"So, what's today?"

"This is the day where you first met Rick Castle; the day you brought him in for questioning."

Oh my God, Kate thinks, completely overwhelmed. This can't be real, right?

"But it is real, Kate," Jessica smirks.

"Wait, you can hear my thoughts, or did I say that out loud?"

"Perks of the job."

"What exactly is your job?"

"I've been sent to help you through this, to answer your questions."

Kate rubs her eyes hard with the palms of her hands and mutters, "I'm so confused."

"I know. I know. But this is a good thing, Kate. There is so much you can change by being here now, knowing what you know. I can't influence what you change, but you can fix so many things if you do it right."

"So how does this work? I've read some science fiction, if I change things aren't other things affected?"

"Think of it like throwing a pebble in a pond. You make a decision that's different this time, and yes other things are going to be affected. But it's more than that. By simply being back in this time stream, there are already things that are different. For example, the case that you'll work today will be slightly different than how it was before. Many of the cases you'll work from here on out will be similar to what you did before, but will have small differences that will affect the outcome. You being brought back here was the first ripple, if you will. That has an effect on everything from here on out, and the more you change things via your decisions, the more other things will change. It's complicated, so just remember this: your decisions and actions have consequences on your future, so make sure you take that into account before you make each decision. Make sense?"

"I think so."

"Okay, good. Another thing. You have all of your memories, which is going to make this first day really hard. You're going to want to jump right into things like you could have back in your previous time. It's going to take some time to realize that things are different here. You have to remember, for example, that Richard Castle doesn't know you, nor does he love you right now. You should take that into account before you make any decision about how to react to him. You have to think about what you did last time and how those decisions affected him and you."

Tears were flowing down Kate's cheeks now, thinking about how she had to start all over again. The thought that Castle wouldn't know her, that he wouldn't love her was breaking her heart.

"Listen Kate," Jessica continued, "I know this sounds daunting, and it is, but it's a good thing. If you do things right, you have the opportunity to live from this point forward without the regrets you had last time. It doesn't mean you won't have new regrets or that your life will be perfect, but you have an opportunity now to live in a world where Richard Castle isn't dead, a world where he and you can be together much soon if you do it right. This is an opportunity that a lot of people would kill for."

Kate nods her head, still overwhelmed with all of this new information. "Who sent you? Why me? How did this happen?" she asks, trying to control her breathing.

"I can't answer those questions. It's not how it works. I'm sorry. My best advice to you is to just go with it, and make the most of this opportunity." Jessica stands up and looks down at the crying detective. "I'm going to go now. My number is in your phone, and you can call and talk about things anytime. Good luck, Kate. Don't screw this up."

Kate watches as Jessica strides towards the door, too overwhelmed to think about stopping her or asking more questions. After the woman leaves, Kate sits there for what must be hours, just thinking about her current situation. She's still not one hundred percent sure that this is real. It seems real, but how can I be sure?

She's on the edge of a full-fledged panic attack, when she hears her phone ringing from inside the bedroom. As she tries to calm her rapid breathing, walks back into the bedroom and then picks up the phone. It's a much older model than what she has (had?) been using. It is yet another sign that she's somewhere else. I still don't understand this, she thinks as she figures out how to answer the phone.

"Beckett," she says with an unsteady voice.

"Detective, there's a body awaiting you," Roy Montgomery says on the other end. Beckett's blood turns to ice. This can't be happening. Roy Montgomery is dead. She knelt beside his dead body. She took a bullet, for Christ's sake, at his funeral. How?

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a/n2 – Reviews are awesome, so leave on and be awesome. Next chapter will be out later this week hopefully.