Author's Note: Honestly, this came about because of Garcia's hair. Yes, Garcia's hair. Follow me here. There was an episode where she was wearing it in this marvelous retro-40's do, and I started picturing how she'd look in a whole 40's ensemble. And then I started picturing the entire cast in 40's styles. (Boy howdy, would it suit Reid, and Morgan would rock a fedora like nobody's business.) Then I started thinking about how different their lives would have been sixty years ago, and then the social and cultural upheaval of an entire nation coming back from WWII, and . . . well . . . enjoy.

Historical Note: Shell shock was the World War I term, and battle fatigue the WWII term, for what we now call PTSD.

New York City, August 1947

Aaron Hotchner added cream to his coffee and lit a cigarette. "To tell the truth, Dave, my problem with Strauss is that he'd rather have the paperwork done by five then actually figure out what's going on in his precinct."

"I don't disagree," David Rossi said mildly, forking up another bite of the best apple pie on the east side. "But you have to admit that approach gets you home on time, Hotch."

"You never cared much about that."

"I didn't have much to go home to."

"You had plenty to go out to," Hotch said, with only a trace of irony.

Rossi's lip curled. He was in one of his periodic episodes of attempted fidelity to his wife. It wouldn't last. It never did.

"Take the Garner case," Hotch said. "Victim got worked over in a dark alley, every bone in his body broken before he's shot in the head at close range."

"Garner? Would that be 'Ladies' Man' Garner? Mob hit."

"You'd think, but he hadn't done anything to make them mad. His girls said he'd paid up his hush money just like he always did, kept his nose clean. No reason to kill him."

"That you know of," Rossi said, with the cynicism of thirty years' being a cop in New York City.

"Yes, well, that's what I was looking into. Strauss says, 'It's a mob hit, Detective Hotchner. Close the case and go on.'"

Rossi forked up some more pie. "Chances are that's exactly what it was."

"But I want the proof."

"You always do. Sometimes, Hotch, you have to let things go."

"I know that. But not until it's time."

"With you, it's never time."

Hotch started to reply, but another voice cut in.

"You're out of uniform, soldier."

It took a lot to surprise Hotch, but this would do it. He stared up at the face he'd last seen in a hospital in France and exclaimed, "Lieutenant Prentiss!" He rose to his feet and caught the hand she held out.

"Miss Prentiss," she corrected him. "War's over, sir."

"You know, I heard a rumor to that effect," he said.

She laughed. "Right. So what are you doing with yourself these days?"

"NYPD. I'm a detective." He surveyed her outfit, which had doubtless been white and crisp when she started her day. "And I see you're still nursing." He glanced out the window at the looming white bulk of Mercy General Hospital. "You work across the street?"

"Nowhere else. It's funny, what I see there isn't all that different from what used to come through my field hospital. Just less khaki."

"Hotch," Rossi said. "Are you going to introduce me?"

"Excuse me," Hotch said. "Miss Emily Prentiss, formerly of the Army Nurse Corps, meet Captain David Rossi of the NYPD."

She shook Rossi's hand, then frowned. "Am I interrupting official police business, gentlemen?"

"No, no, I'm retired," Rossi said. "Hotch just has trouble remembering it."

"I'm not the only one," Hotch murmured.

Rossi said over him, "We just meet for terrible coffee and excellent pie some days."

"It is amazing, isn't it? I usually eat in the hospital cafeteria, but today I just felt like I couldn't go another second without some rhubarb pie."

Hotch remembered his manners. "Are you on your way back to work, or can you join us?"

She checked her watch. "I can spare ten minutes for an old friend."

Hotch called the waitress over for another chair and an extra cup. Rossi started to light another cigarette, then paused. "I'm sorry, do you mind?"

"Oh, she's fine," Hotch said, tapping the ash off his own cigarette.

"Actually, I do mind. Sorry."

"You, Prentiss?" Peacetime had changed her, if she was bothered by a little smoke.

"Must be something about old age. Can't stand 'em these days." She grinned apologetically, as if she knew what he was thinking. She'd always had that gift of reading faces. "Never fear, I still drink like a fish and swear like a sailor. It's just the smoking like a chimney part I've given up."

He stubbed his cigarette out. "Peace changes us all."

"Wish I believed that," she said. "You know, when Mercy heard I had front-line experience in the Corps, they snapped me right up. Should have been my first clue." She shook herself. "Never mind me. How long have you been in this precinct?"

"Not long," Hotch said. "They transferred me a few weeks ago."

"So we would've run across each other eventually," Emily said. "Detective, hmmm? Promotion?"

"Usually we'd call it that," Hotch said dryly, and made her laugh.

"What does your wife think of being married to a detective?"

Rossi winced.

Hotch said, "I'm not married."

Her brows drew together. "What about the girl you were always writing to over there? The one who wanted the white wedding and the little bungalow?"

Hotch pulled the dish of sugar cubes toward him and started dropping them one by one into his cup. "Things changed, after I got back. We broke it off. She married an insurance salesman last month. I hear they're happy."

"Wow," she said softly. "My big mouth. Sorry, sir."

He shrugged and sipped his coffee. It was gaggingly sweet. He set it down again.

"So. Um. You catch any interesting cases lately, Detective?"

"More than I need," Hotch said, grasping at the mention of work. "You probably see a lot of the same people who land on my desk."

"Probably do. Hey, that reminds me. You know a beat cop named Anderson? I've got a beef with him."

"Anderson? What about him?"

"Two weeks ago, a gunshot victim was brought in on my shift. ID'd as Wally Wilton, local bookie and basically boil on the ass of humanity. Every major bone in his body broken, some of the minor ones, too. Finally shot in the head from close up. He lived just long enough to get to Mercy."

Hotch's eyes narrowed. "Go on."

"Your Officer Anderson gets the ID of the victim, doesn't even open his notebook. 'Mob hit,' he says, and he's out of there before the blood finishes dripping."

Hotch stirred his too-sweet coffee to give his hands something to do. "Bookie," he said. "Mob hit's a logical conclusion."

"Of course it is," she said. "I thought the same until I got a look at the body. But I know mob hits, and this wasn't one."

"Sure sounds like one to me," Rossi said.

She glanced at him. "The mob goons are nasty, but . . . detached, you know? Just business. This was not detached. Frankly, it looked like he made someone mad as hell." She sat back. "Look, I'm not denying he probably could make someone that mad. Guy was filth. But even he didn't deserve to die like that."

Hotch picked up his half-smoked, stubbed-out cigarette and rolled it through his fingers. "What kind of weapon?" he asked, staring at the crumpled end.

"Colt .45," she answered readily.

"Are you sure of that?" Rossi asked skeptically.

She shot him an exasperated look. "I know that wound when I see it." She spread her hands. "I'm not trying to be Nancy Drew here, sir. I just want your boys to work a little harder at getting their answers."

"I'll look into it," Hotch said.

She glanced at her watch again. "Ah, hell. I've got to run." She nudged her untouched coffee away. "Nice meeting you, Captain Rossi."

Hotch and Rossi rose as she did. "Likewise," Rossi said.

"See you around, Captain Hotchner."

He said, "Miss Prentiss, wait."

She paused, half-turned to go.

"If somebody else comes through your hospital with those same injuries, I want you to let me know first thing."

She studied him, the annoyance in her face gradually easing. "First thing, huh?"

He scribbled an address in his notebook, ripped out the paper, and handed it to her. "You can reach me at the precinct, but also my rooms. I rent at a boardinghouse six blocks from here. Any time, day or night. Doesn't matter."

She looked at it for several seconds. "You're serious," she said. "Who else did this happen to?"

"Any time," he repeated.

When she'd left, Rossi finally lit the cigarette he'd been holding. "Interesting coincidence," he said.

"Extremely interesting."

"Pretty girl."

Hotch shot him a dark look.

"You sure you believe her? About this not-mob hit? Her reasoning was pretty flimsy."

"I just think that on top of the Garner case, it's . . . worth looking at."

"Have you thought she might just be trying to catch your attention?"

"Lieutenant Prentiss? No, if she were trying to catch my attention, she'd be more direct about it."

Rossi smirked. "Like that, is she?"

"Look, maybe her behavior's not all it could be. In the Corps, she went up and down the ranks like a yo-yo. But she knows two things extremely well, and that's nursing and people." The older man still looked skeptical, so Hotch elaborated. "Once she came to me and said, 'Captain Hotchner, you need to send Private Stevenson on medical leave. Right now.' I said, 'Thank you for your opinion, but no, I won't.' Two nights later, Stevenson snapped and killed all three of his tentmates."

Rossi let out a low, soundless whistle. "Shell shock?"

"They call it battle fatigue these days. She saw it before anybody else did. From then on, I listened to Lieutenant Prentiss."

"So you'll listen to her now."

"Long enough to have another look at Anderson's report."

"Aren't you busy enough?"

"People are dying for no reason I can figure, Dave. I had enough of that in Europe."