1.

The Case

Science has not yet taught us if madness is or is not the sublimity of the intelligence.

Edgar Allan Poe

It's 4:00 a.m. A call at this time is never a good thing, not for the people who have to drag themselves from the warm confines of their bed, nor for the poor murdered soul it signifies.

Standing in a filthy alley, wedged between two odiferous dumpsters is not a good place to be at 4:00 a.m., but she guesses it's better than laying in a pool of your own blood, cold, frozen eyes staring into nothing as cops surround you, searching for clues. How did she get here, who was involved and what was done to her? It always starts the same way, the same questions. You can only hope it ends with closure as that's the only light in a case where the senseless loss of an innocent life is concerned.

Lanie, shaking her head while bent over the lifeless body of a young girl is not a good sign either. It instantly sends a shiver through her body, knowing Lanie is an experienced ME, if she's shaking her head it must be worse than normal. Things had been going too good lately… at least work wise, not personally. A series of cut and dry cases, wrapped up quickly with a nice neat bow of a confession. She figures it must be time for a hard one. Hopefully just hard to wrap up and not hard in the sense that it tears you apart inside as you're forced to face the lack of humanity in some people, staring into the soul of the devil as he stares back and smiles. The limp, lifeless form in front of her pleads for retribution. The arms are slit from wrist to elbow, the legs from knee to ankle, head turned at an odd angle. No, it's not shaping up to be a good day and since it's so early in the morning that leaves a lot of bad hours ahead.

"What do we have, Lanie?"

"Beckett, this is one of those even I have nightmares about. It appears she has been sexually assaulted and that's only the beginning. The radius bones are missing from both her arms and the tibia bones are missing from both her legs, cut out with precision, and the bleeding in the surrounding tissue indicates she was alive when the removal began. Her neck is broken, the vertebrae snapped, demonstrating strength and training. Some of her contusions are already scabbed over, meaning she was tortured for days before being killed. I'll have to get her back to the lab to determine much else, but taking into consideration the cold temperature, I'd have to say she's been dead about 4 hours, putting her TOD around midnight."

Looking around she sees the area appears to be lacking surveillance cameras. It's a deserted side alley so of course that makes sense. It just doesn't make her job any easier. The killer knew what he was doing, choosing a well secluded area for his dump.

Esposito approaches, stopping just in front of them. "We can check the videos Ryan is gathering from the street up ahead, hoping to catch something, anything suspicious, but it's a long shot."

"Ok, check the area for anyone who might have seen or heard anything. There are clubs only two blocks over and most of those don't shut down until at least 2:00 a.m. so perhaps someone was wondering the streets looking for their car or drugs or whatever around the time of our body dump. Castle and I will take the businesses on the opposite end and work our way back to you and Ryan, but most of the clubs won't be open for several more hours so we might have to conduct a more through sweep for witnesses a little later as well." That is if Castle would stop playing with his phone long enough to get his head in the game. One of his odd theories would be appreciated right now.

Coming up empty handed they all meet back at the precinct about the time they should normally be arriving to start their morning, even more desperate for coffee now than before, considering they've been working for four hours already and Castle arrived at the crime scene with only one cup in hand. What is up with him?

Lanie calls with news two hours later. Their vic is Carrie Walters, 23. She was reported missing 5 days ago, which confirms she was held and tortured for days before being killed and dumped. Her tissue shows no signs of freezing other than the chill of the night air and she has multiple lacerations all over her body as if someone took a sick pleasure in the build-up to her murder.

The surveillance video has turned up nothing of value so far and frustrations are running high with little evidence to add to the murder board other than the victim's name, age and date of kidnapping.

Her friends say she wasn't dating anyone and her mother says she was really happy about a new job opportunity, but she didn't know the details. It's the same old story, she watches the regret wash over for not being more involved in a loved ones life before it's too late.

Hours later a search of her credit card activity and phone records have shown nothing out of the ordinary. She apparently likes to stop at a little bakery around the corner from her apartment each morning and her favorite lunch destination is a café right across from her place of business. She has a gym membership, which indicates she's not out exercising alone in easy target areas for kidnappers. Nothing about her life indicates easy prey, meaning either she was chosen specifically or it's a simple wrong-place-wrong-time scenario and either way it makes for a very difficult trail to follow.

Castle leaves to go hang out with his daughter, having spent more time on his phone than aiding in the case. Her entire being is pulled in his direction as if by some unseen magnetic force as he walks out, but maybe it's good he leaves, the light in his eyes no longer dancing for her. It's tearing her up inside and she just can't fathom what caused his drastic and sudden behavior change, can't stand to look at him any more today with that fake smile plastered across his face. With nothing more to go on, the rest of the team wraps up about 8:00 so they can get an early start tomorrow, hopefully not as early as this morning.

Arriving at work the next morning, Beckett buries her head in the case file, trading between it and the mostly white whiteboard until Castle arrives, single coffee in hand, she's lost track of how many days it's been now. Everything within her deflates a little more.

"How did you sleep, Beckett?" Making small talk, but the sparkle in his eyes is still missing, perhaps chased away by her cowardice. The flicker of hope she was clinging to now crushed, shattered into tiny pieces at her feet as she tries to ignore the voice in her head telling her he's moved on. No, he didn't sleep it off, whatever it is.

"Not great, but exhaustion won out in the end." She can do this; she can put all her focus on the task at hand. "I just can't wrap my head around this case. Either we have a series of complete coincidences or an extremely adept killer. There was no evidence on the body, no hairs or fingerprints, no cameras in the area…nothing."

"Something will come along. Just keep looking at what you have and perhaps something will pop." We…what happened to we?

His daily reassuring comments and their close brushes of shoulders, knees, fingers…always make her feel better, but they are nonexistent now. Their private language of the future offering the promises she had been clinging to as she chatted each week with Dr Burke, repairing herself one broken piece at a time for him... It's all missing now, burned out before it got a chance to consummate, leaving nothing but ash and desolation in it's wake. The thought sends a shooting pain through her system as she instinctually presses a hand to her scar.

The following day Beckett walks into the precinct just as Ryan is holding up a piece of paper containing the address of another crime scene with a similar MO. Immediately she gets a sick feeling in her gut.

The new vic, male, a 27 year old attorney out celebrating his most recent win in court with friends three nights ago then hasn't shown up for work since. Everyone knew something was wrong. His body becoming the subject of their next crime scene with his humerus and femurs missing only confirmed their suspicions.

Same MO, but this time there was a note that said, "Missed me again." Of course, there were no prints on the note, nothing special about the paper… another dead end for now, but why change his MO?

Two days later a third victim is lying atop Lanie's table, cold and battered. A woman missing 2 ribs from each side, 4 total. One body is murder, two could be a coincidence, but three is a serial killer. When Lanie tells the team there's 211 bones in the human body everyone looks a little green around the edges.

A few days later….

"Morning boys, got anything new?"

"Nope, sorry boss," holding up a stack of papers in his hand, "just reexamining all the evidence, or lack thereof for now." Lanie said she was working on some other tests and would let us know if they turned up anything.

Sighing at the apparent boredom she would face and the lack of existing leads, she quietly wonders where Castle is. Some days he still brings coffee, some not. It's been a hard week, but with Castle's coffee in hand at least her morning caffeine fix would make the frustration a little more bearable. She refuses to go to the break room and get her own, deciding she will hold out for his coffee, letting him know she's waiting on him, hopefully giving him a reason to keep showing up. No, the irony of the situation is not lost on her. She has to fix things, but she doesn't know how, she doesn't understand what she did to garner such a reaction from him, but with the case bearing down on her, along with Gates, there has been little time to deal with anything else. Sitting in front of the murder board, file folders in hand for each of the 3 victims, the pounding in her head from lack of caffeine forces her into awareness… an hour has passed with no sign of Castle. Weird she thought, he usually calls or texts if he isn't coming in, although, she can't blame him for skipping this horrendous case with little yield of evidence. She knows how bored he gets when forced to just sit around, but he usually proffers a crazy theory here and there, some proving to be quite helpful.

Finally the boys locate a gray van on the surveillance footage from the first victim, which is also seen in a video collected near the 3rd vic's dump site. They can only make out the first 2 plate numbers, but at least it gives them something to follow.

Beckett stares at the murder board. None of their victims are married and all were successful in their careers, but they appear to have nothing else in common. The teasing note was only found on one of them and it doesn't fit the profile of their killer, considering he hadn't left anything at all on or with his other victims. Every step forward seems to lead to two steps back.

"Yo, Beckett, when we ran the partial plate, attributing the other characteristics, color, make, model…another case file from the 7th precinct popped, same MO. Vic is young, successful and missing all the phalanges from both feet and hands. We started digging and the 6th has a file as well. Vic was missing the Fibulas and Ulnas. The 9th precinct has a vic missing the metacarpals and the 3rd has one missing it's clavicles."

With an indignant tone she huffs, "Why hasn't anyone put these cases together before now?"

"They are all different precincts and involve cases with little to no evidence to go on. The only thing that finally brought our attention to the case with the 7th precinct is they had a witness who saw a van with the same make and model as the one we found on two of our surveillance videos. They had obtained the last 2 plate numbers and flagged it in the system. When we searched for the same make and model with the first two 2 plate numbers it popped. From there we started checking each precinct or we wouldn't have put them all together either. Our perp is smart. By dumping the bodies in different precincts it took time to link them all together. Worse yet, there's also a case with the 2nd that is 10 years old, same MO, meaning this killer has been active for a while, allowing plenty of time to perfect his craft." Espo takes a long breath, knowing the circumstances of their case just infinitely worsened.

Ryan picks up where Espo left off, "The database search of vehicles came up with 5 possibilities. Two are no longer on the road, one went through the police impound lot last year and the other was totaled by their insurance company after a collision. Two others have been cleared, just leaving one possibility. Van is registered to one Ron Carnes. Runs a body shop just outside the SoHo area.

Grabbing her weapon from her desk, along with her Badge and jacket, she is already half way to the elevator as she says, "Let's go."

Falling in behind her, Ryan and Esposito ponder Castle's absence. "Castle's going to be bummed he missed this. Could be a huge takedown of a long time serial killer, one the city didn't even know it was facing." Beckett, ignoring the comment, keeps walking, trying to disregard the pain in her chest at the mention of his name. Espo glares at Ryan.

The body shop is empty, except for a gray van containing blood and a note… 'Nice try detective, Beckett.'

A sarcastic, "Great" escapes one of their mouths, but nothing further is said. Leaving the first note recorded in any of the cases and now this second one, along with multiple bodies suddenly showing up in the same jurisdiction…a taunting serial killer, things are going to get worse before they get better and they all know it, no need to further express what they're all thinking. And why would such a cautious serial killer, one who's been active, but off the radar of law enforcement for years, suddenly draw attention to himself? Is he bored?

To make bad matters worse, they discover Ron Carnes died three years prior so the name is just another dead end, a false identity used by a relentless, now taunting, serial killer. Their circumstances seem only to worsen by the day. They seriously need to catch a break on this one, and soon.

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