Close Encounters 24: Moonraker
Previously on CE 23:
Kate struggled to stand with the help of the railing, and then she took a slow step across the cool marble floor of the lobby, heading for the garden doors. The air was warmer, though the light bulbs were out here too. She could see well enough from the garden lampposts and the lantern lights that shimmered in the rain; they cast a moon-like path towards the door.
She opened it quietly, but it wasn't covert enough.
A hand wrapped around her mouth, an arm around her waist, and she was jerked out into the night.
Castle hustled straight through the lobby and jerked open the back door to the gardens. The text on his phone burned in his hand, and he had his gun poised and ready in the other, but he didn't see her.
Not at first.
And then through the rain he made out the shape of the little bench and its small gazebo, the wet trees and plants nodding their heads against the patter of drops. And there was Kate huddled on the bench, Hunt standing over her.
"What the hell?" he shouted, racing towards them in the rain.
Kate sat up like a shot and held out her hands. "I'm okay, I'm okay. I'm fine, Castle, I'm fine."
That didn't stop him. It was cute how Hunt stepped in front of her as if to shield her from him, but Castle knocked Hunt aside and took up that position of defense himself, breathing hard just from the fear pounding in his blood.
Kate clutched the back of his sweatshirt and stood up.
Hunt was standing in the rain now. Drenched. Castle reached back to grip his wife. "Kate," he hissed. "Get in the house."
"Like fucking hell," she scraped out. "Stand down. Hunt brought the vials."
Hunt was holding a hand to his jaw where Castle's flat-palmed gun had broadsided him, and it was bleeding and swelling up in the rain. He looked like a drowned rat. "Damn it, Castle. This is why I don't meet with you."
Kate tugged on his sweatshirt. "We owe him, Rick. Put your gun down. I have what we need."
Castle gave a fast look back to her and saw the metal case on the bench. She was standing at his back looking regal, and pissed off, but he was pissed too.
"What are you doing down here in the rain?"
"Your damn job," she muttered, slapping his shoulder. "Now ease up, Castle. He's on our side, but he won't be for long if you keep attacking him. Treating him like shit."
The true parts of that statement hit him like ice, your damn job, but she saw the disgust on his face and misinterpreted its focus, narrowing her eyes at him.
Her fingers came around his elbow, nails digging into his skin. "Rick Castle, he is not the one you want to shoot."
He swallowed hard and released the death grip on his weapon, managed to stand down after another rain-spattered moment. "You're soaked to the skin, Kate."
"Not as bad as all that. Hunt carried me under here."
Castle's eye twitched and Kate stroked her fingers at his neck, softening him. Or trying to anyway. He didn't much like the idea of Hunt carrying her anywhere, but she was standing; she looked unhurt.
"My hair's wet, that's all," she murmured. Her mouth glanced against his. "I just want you, Castle. And you know it. So ease up, sweetheart. He did what you asked him to do."
The vials from the courier. Mitchell had been followed when he'd gone to meet up with the man from New York, and so he'd had to bail before contact. Black's spies, or the Collective's - hard to know which. They'd enlisted Hunt's help - reluctantly - but it seemed Colin Hunt had done what he'd promised.
Castle turned back around to study the man. "Did anyone follow you?"
Hunt shook his head. "I had someone on me for half my trip to Cologne, but I managed to ditch them. I made it look like I was heading to Italy and then I doubled-back for you guys. The courier was spooked though; he didn't like meeting me. Code phrase didn't seem to help much. He was expecting Mitchell."
"They're trained to be cautious," Castle said. He was both grateful and concerned at the same time; someone was on their trail, but whether it was Collective or just Black wanting more information, they couldn't be sure.
Kate nudged his shoulder, leaned into him. Her jacket was wet where it touched his skin, but she didn't feel too cold. It was a light spring rain, at least. She nudged him again, not-so-subtly prompting.
"Thank you," he gruffed. "For picking it up for us. Beckett needs it."
"I know," Hunt said, eyes quiet. Usually Hunt was angling for the best deal, best contact, best set-up, but in this moment, Castle could actually trust the honesty of his concern. For Castle's wife. But it was still concern.
"We're done now," Castle told him. "You go your way; we go ours."
"Thank God," he said wryly, smirking at them even in the dark, rainy green.
Castle could see the way the man kept glancing towards Kate. He shifted to step into Hunt's line of sight. "I'm gonna suggest you stay away from Black from here on out, but that's your own deal. If we run across you again in his company, don't think this makes me beholden."
"But it does make me," Kate interrupted, pushing past him and stepping up to Hunt. "Colin, I am beholden. You did this for us, and you didn't have to. But Castle is right. You need to not be in Black's company the next time we meet."
Hunt grimaced. "I go where the contract takes me."
"You should not," Castle said, not liking Kate up close to the man. "If you're with him, it means I can't trust you."
"You wouldn't trust me anyway," Hunt laughed. He stepped back, nearly one with the shadows. "You take your meds, Kate. Until tomorrow."
Kate let out a soft little breath and her shoulders slumped. She was disappointed in Hunt, he knew, but Castle wasn't surprised. Wouldn't be Hunt if he promised to stay safe or stay out of it.
And Castle knew she liked that in her men.
He didn't holster his weapon.
Kate turned around and stepped into him, drew her arms around his waist and pressed her damp cheek to his neck. She was short, in nothing more than flat, muddy shoes, and she was shaking.
"Kate-"
"Grab the case. I'll take an infusion tonight and then tomorrow - we start our plan to get out of here."
"Kate," he sighed. But he shifted out of her arms and reached for the case with those precious vials, the meaning not at all lost on him that the silver case was exactly the same as the ones the serum came in. "You're barely standing up."
"I want to go home," she told him. "With you. Home to our son. Promise me that."
"Anything," he said roughly, drawing her against his side. "I will get you home."
"Soon."
He closed his eyes a moment, but he said it anyway. "Soon, Kate." He knew it was a foolhardy promise, giving her the world when she kept making these untenable decisions - like running downstairs in the dark and the rain to meet Hunt.
But he'd still do it. She was worth it.
"I can walk," she insisted. And as she stepped out from under the shelter of the little wooden gazebo, he saw she was right.
She was walking.
But for how long?
When she swayed on the stairs, Castle immediately had his hands on her shoulders, pushing her to sit down. She sank to the step and leaned over on her knees, breathing hard, while Castle crouched in front of her.
"Kate, honey." His hands stroked her hair from her face and behind her ears.
She let out a shaky breath and lifted her head to him. "I'm okay. Tired. Just really tired."
"You need this stuff," he said. The case was between their knees, knocking into her shins. "Soon as we can."
"Yeah," she confessed. "I really do." She tried to give him a smile; she had felt markedly alive in the dark and the rain, the night air in her lungs and the illicit meeting, Castle storming across the garden for her. It had buoyed her those last few minutes.
But now she was wiped out. An exhaustion that dragged at her.
"We had to take the port out," he murmured. "Otherwise I'd do it right here on the stairs."
She chuckled and leaned in against him, her cheek to his shoulder, catching her breath, slowing her too-frantic heart. Castle cupped the back of her head and stroked his thumb behind her ear, for once not so abjectly worried. Seemingly. He was taking this in stride, she thought.
"Maybe I should," he whispered. "Here on the stairs? Or at least not in the room where Black can see."
"Maybe."
"Kate? Am I making this decision on my own?"
She roused, hand touching the side of his neck, lifting from his shoulder. "No, I'm - I'm here. Let me think. We need someplace solitary to do this."
"Yeah. When we did this before, he was still locked up. So we didn't have to worry about him finding out we had it."
She nodded, tried to clear the exhaustion out of her head. "Okay. The bathroom?"
"It's small. And he'd wonder, right?"
"Wonder..."
"Why we barricaded him out of the bathroom," Castle laughed softly. "But we could still do it there. If you can live with the comments we're sure to get."
"I think so," she murmured. "But don't take my word for it, Castle. Too tired to think it through."
"Yeah, love, I understand." His fingers stroked the back of her neck. "Can you stand up?"
She pushed her tongue against her teeth, closed her eyes. "In a second."
"Or," he said. His voice was so quiet. "I could carry you."
"Okay," she said, drew her arms around his neck. It'd be nice, after the way Hunt had grabbed her around the waist and hoisted her up over his shoulder like a caveman. Be so much better, Castle's gentleness, a place to rest. "Okay, good."
"Okay?" he murmured. "Okay. I'll do that. You ready?"
"Mm-hm."
Castle was right there, the silver case pushed into her lap just like she'd carried the gun that night of the fire alarm. Castle was faster this time, feet barely touching the steps as he moved up to the fifth floor. He stopped on the last landing, caught her lips in a kiss that surprised her.
She pulled back just enough to look at him and he was smiling. "What's that for?"
"Kate Appreciation Day, isn't it?"
"What?"
"Hunt seemed to think so."
She laughed, but there was a tension under his words that she needed to address, tired or not. "Hunt is an ass," she said. "But you, Rick Castle, don't need me to say that."
The corner of his mouth twisted up and he moved down the so-dark hall, heading for the apartment. She was a whole lot more with it suddenly, aware in a way she definitely hadn't been outside, even in the rain with the stars and Hunt lowering her to that bench.
It was dark in here. Dark and close and she could hear Castle breathing, feel him against her side and belly and arm. Her awareness of him was vivid, as if compensating for the darkness in the hall. Castle was a burning, blazing image against her senses.
"Castle," she murmured. "Love."
"Yeah?"
She tightened her arms around him, curling in a little - just enough to set him off balance. "Love. Verb and noun and all." She nipped at his jaw.
Castle grunted and squeezed her ass. "I'm walking here."
"Distracting you?"
"Hmm."
"In a good way, right? A Kate Appreciation way?"
"Honey," he drawled, and even though she couldn't see him at all, she did see his eyes. The spark of trapped light. "Every day you're alive is an appreciation day."
She sighed and nudged her nose against his, softly kissed his mouth and those dry but definitive words.
"Then set me up in the bathroom with the IV. We need to knock this out."
"Yes, ma'am."
"Then we can work on some real appreciation."
He did laugh then, a puff of breath against her cheek, but his arms tightened around her, hard, fierce, and she was going to do everything in her power to live up to that declaration.
Castle had her bedded down in the bathtub, blankets piled around and under her while the infusion from their far-off Echo diffused through the saline and made its way through the IV line and into her blood. Her shirt was rucked up at her stomach, jeans pulled off and dropped to the bathroom floor, and he could see the pale of her skin where that old tattoo was still crisp. But the rest of her was unmarked, unmarred, smooth as milk and without a single blemish.
Scars had gone. Stretch marks gone. Freckles that had dusted her hip on the left - gone.
Just from four days of treatments. Castle slipped his fingers around and around the profile of the Russian bear, the dark stylized grief and anger inherent in its imprint. She'd gotten that tattoo after her mother had died, when the dark hole of that death had scarred everything. The first time he'd seen it, she'd had two black eyes and they'd just defeated a Chinese spy - the bear and its Russian words had seemed only right. Full of strength.
That was Beckett; that was his wife. Even now.
Kate curled her fingers around his wrist but couldn't seem to keep her eyes open. He waited, but she was losing her fight. She was asleep before he even stood up.
He face the bathroom mirror with a dark look, reached down to strip the wet shirt off over his head.
But Kate's body stayed in his mind, a haunting dark relief. The place where her tattoo was, the pale of her skin, the marks of her whole life there on her body. And what marks did he have? Putting himself back on the regimen was already removing his scars, the trail of their years together.
The place at his thumb where he'd burned the webbing trying to heat up baby bottles in the warmer - doing it wrong, of course - had faded to nothing. He'd picked up a shard of ceramic in his foot on the back patio after the dog had gotten frightened by a thunderstorm and crashed through the potted garden plants - but that was gone too.
As he turned his torso in the mirror, he saw that the white meaty scar where the knife had gone into his back was nothing more than a thin, faint silver - that mark of honor, where he had protected her from Coonan, and it was going too.
But he had affected her, she had affected him. The marks they left on each other were more than scars, thank goodness.
He just - he didn't want the regimen to erase them. He wanted something permanent, something to remind him of what this felt like, looking at death in the face. Something that couldn't be so easily written over. He'd given her his own stories, letters in a notebook, but she had torn them out and used them against him, twisted their purpose.
He needed more than a scar that faded. He needed a blatant, blazing reminder of the extremes to which they'd go for each other, the very dark edges of what they did for each other - just how close Death had come, how close they had willed it just to give each other the world.
Because it had made them equal. Death had given him knowledge of her and of himself, too, how limitless his need for her, how stark. The details had burned out until it was only her.
And he couldn't forget it; he was determined not to forget this. How vital. How absolutely vital they were to each other. Nothing else mattered.
What good was being super if it didn't save Kate?
She'd broken her toe when James was six weeks old, and Castle had sworn he'd take care of it, but he'd forgotten somehow. The universe had tried to warn him, but he'd forgotten, and he could never do that again.
Castle knew from experience, from forty years of being the machine, that perfection was cold and lifeless, that leaving no trace behind meant that he mattered to no one. No marks, no scars meant no one else had those corresponding marks and scars. There was no life lived together without them, and now Castle wanted to be fucking marked.
Forever.
"What the hell are you doing?"
Kate jerked awake, thrashing in a bath of blankets and duvet, pillows smothering her, and she heard it again, the hiss of words outside the room.
The bathroom. She was in the bathtub with the IV bag hanging from the showerhead just above her. Black was out there, and so was Castle apparently, and they were yelling at each other.
Black sounded violently angry, more than just Castle sitting outside the bathroom door and blocking his way.
"I don't know," she heard, and that was Castle's voice, sounding thin.
She tried to shift onto her side, get up, out of the tub, but she slid against the blankets, felt her cheek knocking into the porcelain side.
Ouch.
"Are you looking to bleed to death?"
Bleed to death?
"No," Castle growled. "Get the fuck out of my face."
There was a strange silence, and Kate moved to get out of the tub, checking the IV bag where it swayed over her head. She was done, the saline was out; she needed to crawl out of the tub and throw this stuff away. Black couldn't see they'd been dosing her on the side.
"Is Katherine in there?" Black said, suspicion trickling through his voice.
"She's in the bathroom. Fuck, give her a minute," Castle stressed.
That was to her; she had a minute or so to get this shit cleared up. She was shaky, but she wasn't nearly as exhausted as she'd been earlier tonight. What time was it? It could be morning, but it had sounded like Castle had been caught in the act, doing something, so he hadn't been asleep out there.
And he wouldn't have let the IV just run, leave her asleep in here when they were in a time crunch, trying to avoid his father.
"What's going on?" Black said. "What's with the knife and moping outside the door, Richard?"
The knife?
Kate's heart picked up and she fumbled with the IV; it was just a line this time, not the port because she wasn't supposed to be needing it now that the chelation was over. And she hadn't wanted to give Black such ease of access to her veins.
Veins. Looking to bleed to death. And a knife? What had Castle been doing?
She finally got the line out of her vein and the blood welled up, a bubble in the crook of her arm. She had to press a strip of gauze over it even as she dug her elbows into the side of the tub, getting her knees under her.
"Stop looking at me like that. I wasn't opening my veins," Castle grunted. He had to be standing up now; his voice came from a higher place.
"Well, from where I'm standing, you're doing a pretty good job of carving yourself up."
"Just testing," Castle growled.
Testing? Fuck. Fuck, he was testing to see how resilient he was now? How super? God, he couldn't do shit like that, not when one half of his team was already down for the count, a major weakness.
"Testing. What? You know what the program can do for you. It's right in front of your eyes. See? Barely a line."
Castle had been doing what-? Sliding a knife up his arm? Fucking hell, Kate couldn't get to her damn feet with all these blankets. She kicked one free of her leg and tossed it over the side, then another, then the duvet and pillows - at least it would be a softer place to land.
"Barely a line. Nothing ever leaves a mark. I know."
"A mark? You better be damn grateful for that, you idiot. It's the only thing that's kept you alive, the damn foolhardy mistakes you've made. Fatal wounds, all of them, only I was there to bring you back from the dead."
"Regular Frankenstein's monster."
No. Damn it. This wasn't the time to be stuck in a fucking bathtub. She could cry; it was so ridiculous. But she didn't seem to have the strength in her arms to pull herself over the edge.
"I tried to tell you," came Black's insidious voice. "I tried to make you listen to reason. But you keep getting all tangled up in your heart. Like your feelings matter in this job."
"It's more than a job," Castle snapped.
"It's a legacy. And what legacy are you leaving? What does this say - mistake after mistake, death and destruction wherever you go? I'm always having to clean up your mess, Richard, like you're a damn child."
Kate blocked out the snarl of Black's voice and managed to get a knee into the side of the tub. She reached out and grabbed the short chest of drawers between the tub and the sink; it held towels and cotton balls and stuff she was knocking over just to get out. The toilet itself was in a closet just next door, and that was too damn bad - she could have used a solid porcelain object to act as an anchor.
As it was, the bureau was rocking as she tried to help herself out.
"I just want something that stays."
"You're a God damn spy, Richard. Act like it."
Kate fell over the side, slamming her shoulder hard into the floor, and she grunted, rolled to her back on top of pillows and bedding. She caught a long breath, stared up at the ceiling, hating the whole damn world.
"You might want to get in there. Sounds like she's fallen."
There was that moment of indecisive hesitation, and Kate closed her eyes, wondering just how broken her husband was going to be when he came in here and found her on the floor with Black's cold words ringing in his ears.
"She's fine, I'm sure. She'd have called for me."
Kate opened her eyes, felt her lips pulling up into a smile. She had to get up now - she definitely had to get up - but that answer of his was so much better than she'd been afraid it would be.
If Black was standing right there, then Castle couldn't open the door and show him what they were doing. So it was up to her to cover their asses, to do her damn job, just as Castle was doing even if he didn't want to - even if he wanted so very badly to rip open the door and be right at her side.
He was being a spy when it mattered. He was both man and machine, and she was so damn grateful for it.
The spy would move heaven and earth to save her, but it was because the man loved her.
For that alone, that reason alone, she rolled to her feet and stood up, bleeding from the crook of her arm, a little light-headed, and she began to get rid of all traces of the last few hours' IV infusion.
When it was done, she opened the bathroom door, still in only a t-shirt and underwear, and asked Castle to help her pull on her jeans.
Black was standing just past the door; he gave her a long look and then turned for the kitchen. Castle came to her, and Kate surged to her toes and wrapped her arms around him, embracing him fiercely just inside the bathroom door.
"Don't listen to him. Don't let him mess with your head. I love you."
"I love you too, Kate." But he didn't let go; he just pushed her into the bathroom and shut the door on them both, sealing out his father. "That's the whole point. I love you."
A/N: Thank you for coming with me on our next spy adventure! I have *so* loved this crazy AU, and I appreciate all of you for loving it too. May you have a blessed new year, and the best of dreams in 2015.