Rick Castle strolled at a rather sedated pace down 5th avenue, not going anywhere in particular. He let his feet lead him, as his brain was else wise occupied with the shadows hiding in his past. Or was it the future? Mal had never figured just what tense he should be using when referring to the time period he came from. It was one of the reasons he had become a writer, after the explosion that had sent his family and crew back to The Earth That Was his mother had suggested starting a journal, so he could remember his past/future. It had helped him deal with a lot of latent anger and resentment that had built up since Serenity, though he would never truly be who he was before that Gorram war, he could pretend he was carefree. That he was't scarred and messed up on the inside, being turned into a fifteen year old again hadn't helped any either.
It was when Alexis was born that he had truly started to heal a little. He suddenly found himself in charge of this tiny innocent little thing, a person who loved him unconditionally, who didn't care he was a war scarred murder, someone with more blood on his hands than Jack the Ripper, and a rap-sheet twenty li long. She depended on him to keep her safe, to protect her from the horrors of his past, and the dangers of the present.
He remembered when the first Alliance Agent had shown his slimy face, at that time he had felt a cross between elation and sheer terror, he could go back. Back to his own time, but that means that all of his enemies could also come to his new time. His newborn daughter was in danger, they would do untold horrors to her just to hurt him, he couldn't let that happen. So he let his old self out for the first time in three years, he had killed the bastard standing over his daughters crib. It wasn't hard to end a life, he had almost forgotten the rush, the emotions attached, the nightmares of Serenity Valley that would follow, and then the numbness that would take hold when he realized that he felt no guilt, no shame, no sorrow.
In a sort of calm detachment he had sent the agent back, just like he sent the next twelve, and then he started to get creative. He had saved one of the bodies till the next sacrifice had showed up not two weeks later probably investigating to see why the first one had never checked in, after dispensing of him, he had sent them both looking like reaver victims on the same device.
He had spent months analyzing the time travel device, it looked like a bracelet. A pice of shit and ugly as all hell bracelet, but one none the less. He then started to experiment with the strange device, it broke rather easily, so he just lathered, rinsed, and repeated, sometimes two, some times three, it didn't really matter, he did try to mix up the way they died though, because pressure points got old after a while, it was then that he had started to write his murder mysteries, at first he had only jotted down ideas on how to kill them in new and more interesting ways, then he had started out plans on how they died, and who did it, eventually they had become full-fledged books.
His second wife had stumbled onto one of his journals one day, and the rest was history. He had become an overnight sensation in the horror, mystery, and murder circles. Sometimes he had wondered if all of this made him a psychopathic serial killer, but then he would look at Alexis or Mother and remember why he did this, it wasn't out of some sort of sick twisted pleasure, or a need for blood. It was to protect those he held precious to him, to throw the Alliance off their trail, so that no one else in his family or crew would have to dirty their hands with any more blood. And if one thing had been proven over the years it was that for his crew, his family, he was capable of doing anything to protect them.
Sometimes one would slip pass him and go for the others, and then he and Jayne, or even Zoe would have to go after them, but those occurrences were rare. After every one of those rare times however, the crew of Serenity would gather close and plan on how to better protect their new families. Though he had never told anyone of them his new alias, or about Alexis, he knew all of theirs. It was better this way, he often told himself. They wanted him more than any of the others, even the Tams. He wouldn't break under interrogation, as it had been proven multiple times in the past/future. They all knew that, and accepted it, the only way for them to find out was to come accost him on their own. They never looked for him, not on purpose, and they knew not to acknowledge him in any way if they did meet.
Jayne was the first, he had barely kept himself from laughing at Rick when they ran into each other at the morgue, and he had coned his Captain out of his coat, it was great for Mal to work with him again, even if he had to threaten him sometimes. When Mal had seen Zoe on that reality show he had almost died of laughter himself. Though well in the knowledge that she was undercover, hired by the investors to investigate the shows validity and try to tempt the others to lie, he couldn't help but get a kick out of seeing her on screen. Wash didn't see it that way though, he had almost laid the guy out for touching his wife. Simon met him when he needed medical help for his father, his quick thinking to hide in the closet was the only thing that had saved him from Beckett's questions. They had a long talk afterword about keeping his mouth shut even to River about Mal. His mother was the one who met Inara and River again at the Serenity Oasis Retreat. They had said nothing at her appearance though they did ask how she was at the next time the crew of Serenity gathered around. Shepherd Book had hidden in the background at the monastery when he and Beckett had been there investigating the treasure hunt, only offering a head nod in Mal's direction. Kaylee looked at him with wide eyes and had tackled him in a hug when Beckett's car had broken down and they ended up in her garage. They had played her reaction off as an overzealous fan, Wash laughing all the while in the background, happily starting on the car while he singed a book for his mei mei.
When Alexis was kidnapped he wanted so bad to hunt down and destroy the bun tyen-shung duh ee-dway-ro that had dared to touch a single hair of Malcom Reynolds' daughter. When he had found out that this wasn't his mother's first trip to the past, he was shocked, his father was indeed the secret agent she had once jested he was. The yelling match with Martha Reynolds that had followed was not pretty, he would have raged for hours if he had not just gotten Alexis back. After sorting out that his father had worked as a spy for the resistance against the Alliance many years before he was born and had eventually faked his death, going to the past to hide and gather as much resources as possible and sending them to the resistance through his wife and partner in the future. That was what clinched it for him, he had always known that his mother was a tough broad, raising him alone on a Ranch with forty ranch hands to manage was no mean feat, but to do so while separated from your husband and secretly smuggling to an underground resistance force, was incredible. Well at least he now knew where he got it all from, between his mother and father he was practically breed for subterfuge.
Eventually he had worked out how the time bracelets worked, he had even altered a few to work better and blend in. With the help of Kaylee of course. His mechanic was truly a genius, thanks to her the entire crew now had an emergency time band on their persons at all times. He used it more than any of the others however. It helped when he needed to research other times for his books, if he could go back and talk to some of the people who inspired his characters.
He looked up as he entered a store, wandering towards the back he couldn't help but laugh softly to himself as he spotted a couple of teens in heated discussion about what a space-cowboy would wear. One thought that he would have some sort of shiny space suite with a laser gun and a mechanical horse, the other insisted that they would look like a regular cowboy but with out the spurs or horse, after all why would a horse be in space?
Going over to a nearby rack he picked up a brown coat, from a wall display he found a pair of khaki pants and suspenders, finding a collard shirt and a leather belt he walked towards to the still bickering teens and dumped the items into the astonished arms of the second teen.
"This here is sommat like what a space-cowboy would where." He clarified, speaking with his real accent.
"Thanks Mister?" The hesitant voice of the cautious sixteen year old boy reached his ears. He didn't blame the kid any for being weary of him, he was an intimidating man when he allowed his real self out. Standing at almost six six, broad shouldered and trim hipped from years of ranch work and battle. He could hoist a full grown cow on his shoulders and act like it was nothing special, his scars having slowly returned over the years, only lended themselves to his dangerous air.
Offering a small smile he replied, "No problem, my daughter makes fun of me for my old space-cowboy costume all the time, so it's nice to meet a fellow believer, and nicer to help." The two sixteen year olds in front of him dropped their guard a little, relaxing in the knowledge that he was a father, and thus less likely to do anything bad to them. Looking closer he noticed that they appeared to be twins, practically identical besides a few freckles here and there, the red hair, and brown eyes that looked back at him were eire, they looked like they could be related to Alexis, though the strong cockney accents that greeted him defied any possibility, Meredith had no family from England as far as he could remember.
"Where you from?" The abrupt question broke him from his thoughts. They had apparently decided that he wouldn't hurt them.
"Nowhere special really, just a small ranch to the far west. Been in New York for a good twenty years though, never could quite drop the accent." He wasn't really lying, Shadow was far far west of Earth, and he still had trouble correcting his accent for modern day New York. For some reason he didn't want to lie to them, maybe, because he would never see them again, or it could be the fault of all the guilt of keeping his past and their real names from his daughter. He didn't know and didn't particularly care at the moment.
"Really?!" They asked together, eyebrows raised. Mayhap he had let more slip then he thought. He didn't think so though. "Sure you're not a real space-cowboy?"
Chuckling to hide his cough of surprise he simply said, "Now wouldn't that be sometin'?"
"Fred! George! What have I told you about bothering m-strangers!?" The voice of a harried British woman rang out across the store, 'Ah! So that's what their names were.' He turned sideways after observing the twin wide eyed expressions, a plump middle aged woman surrounded by five redheads and the odd black haired boy approached the trio of troublemakers.
"I'm sorry sir, I hope they didn't disturbed you too much." She said as she drew near. Obviously watching him for any sudden moves.
"It's no problem Ma'am, we were just discussing what we figured garb worn by space-cowboys was." He supplied after seeing the look that promised punishment on the woman's face directed to the twins I front of him. "Honest, it was nice to talk about 'em without my daughter's laughter ringin' in my ears." He clarified further, looking directly in the woman's eyes so she could see he meant no harm to her brood. The slight easing of her shoulders told him he had succeeded.
"Still they know better than to talk to strangers, no offense, but anything could have happened." She reprimanded lightly.
"Good thing it was me then, Hi I'm Malcom Reynolds." He didn't know what possessed him to give that name, he just did. Offering his hand to the still hesitant woman, he patiently waited for her to accept, shocking even himself with the small bow over her worn hand. It seems Inara's lessons in etiquette had stuck after all.
"How do you do? I'm Molly Weasley." Came her prim reply as he released her hand, straightening himself in the process.
"Fine thanks! Well I better head out, my daughter Alexis is probably wondering where I got off to." He supplied as he tried to extract himself from the rather awkward situation. "Oh! And before I forget, add some plain brown knee high boots to that costume, and we don't ride metal horses or use laser guns, just regular ones. Bye now, y'all have a mighty fine day!" He exclaimed over his shoulder as he sauntered towards the exit, seeing out of the corner of his eye the identical looks of shock and awe on the twin's faces, as they looked after their new hero.
It felt good to be himself, he needed to remember Malcom Reynolds wasn't one of his imaginary characters, just as Richard Castle while apart of him, wasn't the real deal. He should try to do something like this more often. You had a Ship, you found your Crew, you got a Job, you kept Sailing the Stars.