It's early morning, the day after Mickey Scott's execution. Jack McCoy is entering Manhattan General Hospital. He's not entirely sober yet, but the voicemail on his phone was too important to wait until later.

Lennie Briscoe's voice, sounding ragged.

"Jack! Get to Manhattan General! There's been an accident. Claire Kincaid…"

His voice broke then, thick with tears.

"She's hurt, Jack. Bad…"

Jack McCoy runs into the Main Entrance. He knows he reeks of scotch, but right now, he simply doesn't care.

"Claire Kincaid…" he asks the receptionist, and, concern in her eyes, the receptionist tells him.

When he gets there, Jack McCoy hears the sound of retching. That's Lennie in Treatment Room One. He's looking worse than he did last time McCoy saw him earlier in the night, in the bar with Mike.

He's drunk, McCoy realizes.

But Lennie isn't the reason Jack's here. He walks over to the next room, Treatment Two.

Claire Kincaid is there, body covered by a white sheet. Her mother is there, accompanied by Mac Geller.

The On-Call Doctor is there too, talking to Claire's mother and Geller.

Cause of death was a traumatic skull fracture, pieces of Claire Kincaid's skull embedded in her brain…

She's dead. If I hadn't called her to come pick me up, if I hadn't decided to walk out before she arrived…

Jack McCoy can't complete the thought. But he knows…

It may have been a drunk driver who hit her car, but Jack McCoy is the one who is responsible for Claire Kincaid's death…

…..

2008

1 Hogan Place

It all felt just a little unreal to Jack McCoy.

I'm the District DA…

Arthur Branch had left the DA's Office, seeking a bigger arena, and nominated McCoy to be the Interim DA…

"Close your mouth, Jack," Branch had ribbed him at the time. "You don't want to swallow a fly…"

After that had followed all the accolades, the calls from friends.

The call from Adam Schiff, invoking what he called the Parental Curse…

"Just wait," he had said over drinks at their favorite bar. "You'll be saddled with an EADA who will turn your hair gray. Just like you did to me."

"I wasn't that bad," McCoy protested. "Was I?"

"You also gave me cause to be proud, my boy," Schiff assured him. "Remember, you're wearing a different hat now, focus on the big picture, let Cutter focus on putting the perps in prison, and you'll be fine."

Now, a few months later, Jack was sitting in his new office, the one used by Schiff, Nora Lewin, and Arthur Branch.

It still felt unreal, made even more so by the murmuring in his head; like the murmuring of the audience before the concert begins.

It felt odd.

Creepy…

Then...a blinding flash of light, and McCoy was back in his apartment, staring down at his phone, the voicemail light blinking. He pressed the button.

"Jack!" Lennie Briscoe's voice, sounding ragged, on the edge of tears. "There's been an accident. Claire Kincaid…She's hurt, Jack. Bad."

Jack McCoy stares down at the phone on the table.

What…where…when am I?