He didn't know how he got into the hospital.
It felt like only seconds had passed since he watched her fall to the ground but yet it felt like days had passed since he saw her dying in his arms.
He didn't remember anything, not how the ambulance arrived or how they pushed him away from her. The only thing he remembered was her face.
Her face near to his own, her face disappearing in the ambulance, her face behind the people that were sorrounding her. The most terribly memory was the one of her shutting her eyes, as if she was giving up. Giving up her life. Giving up herself. As if she stopped firghting. Kathering Beckett never stopped fighting, she should have been the last one to give up but yet she did and all he could do was to watch her disappear behind doctors.
Somehow he had gotten to the hospital, someone had been able to put him into a chair in the waiting room.
But his mind was empty and only filled with images of her.
As he waited he tried to remember her.
He tried to remember her being herself.
Her being Kate Beckett the NYPD detective, but he couldn't force that immage to life.
It had disappeared into a corner of his mind and the only thing visible was the last glance of her eyes, her beautiful eyes.
He tried to remember the number of times he had looked into these wonderful eyes but again he only watched her closing them, giving up.
Richard Castle had experinced lots of thing in this life. But this was different. He hadn't known what pain actually means before this one moment. He saw her fall to the ground and he could feel her pain. It hurt to see her like this so completely unable to do anything against it.
From far away he heared voices trying to get through to him.
„Richard."
His mind wandered back to the tear she lost momenst before she closed her eyes. Until now he didn't recongized that he was also crying. Silent tears were rolling down his cheeks and he couldn't stop them.
„Castle."
He didn't know which pain hurt more. He was hurt – physically and mentally.
Everything he wanted was to see her again, hear her again, talk to her again and look into those beautiful eyes.
„Dad."
Her eyes. The shot. The pain. The tear.
I love you.
„Dad!"
Alexis was trying to get through to him and finally he looked up.
„You should change" his mother said, „clean your hands."
He looked down at his hands. Red.
The hands that where unable to save her, unable to push her away in time, the hands that belonged to him, the man that should have taken the bullet. She wasn't meant to take it. If only he would have been faster.
„Mr. Beckett!"
He noticed a voice he didn't know. The doctor.
Suddenly his power was back and he nearly jumped to get to the doctor and Jim Beckett.
Two minutes later he knew that nothing would be the same again.
He didn't know what exactly the doctor said.
Everything was just a chaos of words in his head.
Mentally damaged. Physically Damaged.
She wouldn't be the same again.
Katherine Beckett would not remember her life. She wouldn't recognize him, maybe not even her father.
He heard a scream and shouts and heard lots of people call his name as everything went black.
And the last thing he remembered were her words, said so long ago:
„I wish this was one of you books and you could just rewrite the ending."
Then nothing.
Darkness.