So, it was Sunday night of the most awesome fandom weekend ever... We'd watched Still and Scared To Death and it was amazing... then over pizza, this idea hit. So I literally sat down in a corner and typed as Laura and Emma watched Once Upon A Time. Em betaed in front of me and this was born.

Most fic I've seen relating to Still has been the aftermath of the case... I haven't seen anything of what might have come before and it was just screaming to be written.

For both my fandom girls... with many thanks to Em for the beta.

Every homicide detective has one kind of case they just blindly hate. For most cops, it was kids. For others, it was assault/murders. For Kate Beckett, it was cases that had anything to do with a bomb. She'd been an on-duty uniform, fresh from the academy when those planes hit the Twin Towers. New York had been changed forever on that day and bombing cases had always left a knot in the pit of her stomach. She'd dealt with few bombing cases since then, forever grateful that they were so much less frequent than pop and drops. The explosive placed in her apartment, the dirty bomb in the back of a van, a device in a backpack to bring more attention to a news story; each and every one haunted her nightmares.

She'd had to turn her nerves to steel when she got the call to the scene, Castle's soothing presence painfully absent as she crossed the crime scene tape. There was no possibility that the case would progress quickly, it had to grind into her bones and wear her down, hanging from her neck like an albatross.

Kate had been dreaming of crisp sheets and downy pillows long before it became obvious that nothing else could be done for the night. When Gates had finally kicked them out of the precinct, telling them that they needed to get some rest, Kate didn't put up even an obligatory argument, desperate to crawl into bed and sleep. The rational side of her mind told her that it was most practical to head to her own apartment. It was much closer and the absence of creative minds meant that she was going to be able to crawl straight into bed and go to sleep, not disrupted by muttered monologues and the clicking of a keyboard. Her emotions screamed at her that it made far more sense to drive the extra ten minutes, if only to have somebody there to talk her down after a nightmare.

There was really no contest. Her emotions won out.

She gave a perfunctory wave to Eduardo, offering him a tight smile when he made a remark about the late hour.

She stepped out of her heels before unlocking the door, the shiny new key hanging on her key ring still sending an affectionate tingle through her chest as she silently slipped it into the lock.

Martha was stacking up a pile of papers she'd been marking when Kate slipped through the door. Martha greeted her with her typically maternal flair, hugging her, cupping her cheek and ordering her to bed before she fell asleep where she was standing. Kate was filled with gentle warmth when Martha pressed a kiss to her cheek as the matriarch made her way up the stairs. It had been a long time since she'd had someone to remark that she needed to eat more red meat and not work so hard and it felt good to have somebody care. Somebody to act like her mother.

Tiptoeing through the bedroom door, Kate was careful not to wake her boyfriend up. She slunk into the bathroom, settling into her nighttime routine. She stripped off the layers of makeup from her face, searching out her hairbrush, finding it in amongst his jars of hair chutney. Face and teeth clean, she padded out to the bedroom, stripping off her clothing, seeking out her pyjamas in the dark.

Castle had fallen asleep in the centre of the bed, spread eagled on his stomach, mouth hanging open in slumber. She rolled her eyes affectionately when she realised his head was lying on her pillow.

She drew back the covers and slipped into bed next to him, nails tracing the bare skin of his ribs to draw him out of sleep, gently nudging him to get him to move over and get over onto his side.

He mumbled something unintelligible, warm and sleep-heavy when he clumsily slung an arm around her waist and tugged her against his chest.

His presence beside her soothed her ragged nerves. Curled against him in bed, the monsters that haunted her subconscious didn't seem so loud and indomitable. She felt safe, knowing that even when he was sleeping he was beside her; he was willing to fight battles at her side. Comforted by this knowledge, Kate cast aside the worries of her day, content to burrow into her lover's side and sleep.

I know it was super short... but any thoughts?

Also! Come and play with me!

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