A/N: I'm sooo sorry for going MIA for a month. I promise I didn't forget about this story. My laptop broke, so I had to get a new one, and then I went forever without MS Word on the new one. The biggest problem is that I meant to have this finished before the premiere, and now the ending might make less sense now that the timeline's a little off. Again, I apologize. I hope everyone continues to enjoy the story.

"It makes an apparently solid image in your mind. But it's all just images in the Mish Mash." – Mostly Harmless, by Douglas Adams

Kate Beckett had been to crime scenes before with Castle. At least, she herself remembered going to crime scenes with him. The actuality of her recollection being accurate, she realized as he reached out to touch a shard of shattered window ungloved, was as nonexistent in this place and time as Detective Beckett was. The self she knew didn't exist, and she was having trouble adapting. It was slightly easier to fall into the step of correcting her partner, though.

"Castle!" hissed Beckett. "Don't touch that." She pulled out a pair of the blue latex gloves that he'd provided her with and slipped them to him before donning a pair herself.

"I wasn't," he said defensively as he stretched the gloves over his hands. He resumed his inspection of the glass. "You know," he said without looking up, "you keep acting like you know me so well, and I don't really know you." She hid her smile- this much had stayed the same: that she knew so much about him while she remained in a chrysalis of mystery. "I mean, we've only met once before."

"Pretty memorable meeting," she said, slowly beginning to walk around the room. She was fishing based on what he'd said before she'd left the previous night, about New Year's. She wanted details, some kind of explanation. All she got was a sort of musing half-chuckle from Castle before he continued in his investigating.

There were obvious signs of a struggle- the cracked window, for one, and the spatter of blood on the Berber carpet. The blood wasn't enough to make bleeding out the cause of death.

She almost felt like rolling her eyes back at herself, and then she frowned. You didn't get cause of death from the crime scene, you got it from the autopsy. Maybe the OCME would've made a better first stop."We'll finish up here and then see if we can get into Basher's autopsy," said Beckett, heading into the kitchen.

"But this is cool," said Castle, kneeling down to get a better look at the blood on the carpet. "My first crime scene." She felt like correcting him, but didn't bother. The "I'm right and everyone else in the whole world is wrong" method was getting kind of old. Maybe, she thought to herself as she examined the pad of paper beside Alan Basher's telephone, it would just be simpler for her to go along with everything. To steer into the skid.

"Detective Nikki Heat," announced Beckett, striding into the OCME and flashing her fake badge, hopefully fast enough so that the guard couldn't tell it wasn't real. Castle glanced at her and mouthed the name "Nikki Heat" confusedly, but she brushed him off. No need to explain something she wished he would already know.

It took a lot of wheedling to actually get down to the morgue. She tried to sneak around, but she was less lucky this time, and people kept catching her. In the end, she found it was easier to threaten to call supervisors than to make up an evasive lie. It was in this manner that she and Castle made it down to the morgue where she'd figured out Alan Basher's body was.

"Wouldn't it have been easier to introduce yourself as Basher's ex who wanted to say goodbye to the body?" Castle pointed out while they stood outside the door. Beckett stared at him- she hadn't even thought of that.

"I'm going to pretend that's not true," she said, and went inside.

"Excuse me?" said the ME as he set his scalpel down. "This is a private autopsy."

"Detective Nikki Heat, I'm assisting on a case," said Kate, stepping forward and approaching the table. She flashed her badge again, still trying to gauge the right amount of time to hold it up, long enough to not look suspicious but short enough so no one could inspect it carefully. "I need the rundown on Alan Basher's homicide."

"I've got his file right here," he said, handing her a manila envelope. She took it carefully, unsure of whether to be ecstatic that they'd gotten the file so easily or disconcerted that just anyone could walk in and get autopsy files.

"Thank you," said Kate, skimming the pages. It had been a stabbing that killed Basher; that made sense. She'd guessed as much from the crime scene. There probably wouldn't have been so many signs of struggle if it had been a simple gunshot.

Multiple stab wounds- one low-angle thrust to the kidney and then additional stab wounds at seemingly random points on the body. The ME had determined that the ones after the kidney were delivered after Basher was immobilized and on the floor.

Low-angle thrust to the kidney… additional stab wounds…

Something was there, something was brushing at the edge of her consciousness and willing her to fit all the pieces together. Low-angle thrust to the kidney. Additional stab wounds, random additional stab wounds.

"Excuse me, was there a cast made of the murder weapon that killed Basher?" she asked the ME.

"Uh, yeah," he said, turning away from the autopsy table to a table behind him. There were several trays covered in what looked like paper towels. He selected one and carefully lifted back the cover to show her. Slipping another latex glove over her right hand, she reached for the mold of the knife.

I've held this knife before.

That thought struck her mind and clung there. She'd held this knife before. The real she, Detective Kate, not the she that was an actress that she had now become through some unexplainable transition. From there it was just a matter of working backward, really, but it wasn't that difficult.

It was an important moment, the one time before that she'd held this particular knife. A very important moment. As impossible as it was- after all, she clearly remembered killing the wielder of this knife- she knew who the killer was. There was no doubt in her mind.

Dick Coonan had killed Alan Basher.