John Doe
Oh God, oh God.
Beckett jerks the car into reverse and cranes her neck to see behind them, gunning the engine. The Crown Vic lurches away from the SUV where it impacted on Castle's side, screams as metal tears from metal.
"Castle," she calls again. "Castle. Come on, Castle." He doesn't stir.
And then a second SUV barrels through the intersection and smashes into them head on, throwing her body violently. Blood leaks down the side of her face, but she keeps her foot on the gas and maneuvers the broken car in reverse around a fire hydrant, tries to steer them off the sidewalk.
Gunfire. One after another, bullets hitting the smashed hood.
Shit. Shit. Shit.
"Castle!" She takes a precious second to reach for him, shake him awake as single shots splinter their windshield.
All on her side.
None on his.
The car lurches into the side of the corner office building and Castle groans. Another volley of shots comes at them and she realizes that they're not aiming to kill.
Maim, sure. But not kill.
They need the two of them alive.
"Castle. Wake up. Right now. Castle-"
"Beckett," he grunts and stirs in the seat.
"Shit, Castle. Castle, oh God-"
Bullets spray the side of the car even as she tries to wrench the steering wheel around and get them the hell out of there.
"Down on the floor, Castle, get down!"
She can't get the damn car to move, damn it, fuck -
"Beckett!"
The terror in his voice has her turning to look: two guys in black commando gear, weapons in hand, racing towards them across the street, heading for the Crown Vic. One guy gets a grip on the passenger door and Castle pounds the lock into place; the other one raises his weapon, aiming-
"God, no. Castle, get down, get down." She reaches out to shove at him even as she slams the car back into the building, shaking off the two commandos with the lurching movement. She hears the car groan as she puts it back into first; the whole thing shakes like a wounded beast.
Gunfire erupts from the two guys on the ground, aimed at the back passenger side. They're not aiming to kill, no, they want Castle alive. If wounded.
They want Castle.
Beckett grinds it into reverse to knock the guy off the back door again, even as he's hanging on; the car isn't going anywhere, but the back door is at least wretchedly mangled by the first impact and no one's getting in that way. At least there's that - if nothing else - they can't get him-
"Kate." Castle sits back up, but she slams her arm into his chest and shoves him back down.
"Backup." She grabs the mic from her radio and thrusts it at him. "Call. Call Espo. Right now - call for backup."
"I don't know - I don't know how, Kate, Kate-"
She can't think; she doesn't have time to think. She wrenches the car back into first and it lurches forward; she slams it into reverse to angle away from the building, back onto the street, and then she sees why there's no traffic.
They've blocked the street with another black SUV. Blue lights. Like it's a cop car.
"Shit."
Beckett yanks the gear shift back into first, but a blur of black at the corner of her eye has her turning to look-
"Kate!"
She feels the hands jerking at her the moment after she realizes they've gotten her door open. She hooks an arm through the steering wheel, feels Castle already reaching for her, his grip painful on her bicep, arms wrenching from her sockets.
She curses as the guy yanks again, her seatbelt cutting into her abdomen, her thighs. She stomps on the gas and the Crown Vic lurches, comes through for her, shaking the guys off her as the car rockets ahead a couple of feet before stalling out.
Shit. She stalled the car. Beckett wrenches her door shut again; Castle is reaching past her and slamming down the lock even as she turns the key in the ignition, tries to baby the clutch.
Automatics. Every cop car needs to be an automatic. From now on, damn it.
"Kate, here they come. Go now. Go now."
Where? Where the hell can they go? She prays, coaxes the engine to turn over, and then eases it down the street in first, heading back towards the scene of the first crash, veering around the empty SUV.
A flare of the scope in the sun is her only warning. She swerves the car with a hard wrench of the steering wheel and feels the tires squeal. This time it's automatic gunfire - bullets spray the driver's side of the car even as she searches wildly for a place to run.
Side streets.
She feels a burning heat in her head and blinks hard to stay focused.
"Get down, Castle," she growls again, shoving on him as she tastes blood in her mouth. Just a head wound. She's fine. It's fine. She can do this.
Side streets. Where?
Beckett yanks the wheel around and pops in and out of second, up to third, grinds the gears too soon into fourth even as her foot snaps from the clutch to the gas. Another round of automatic weapons fire and the Crown Vic swerves, a tire punctured, but they are through the narrow channel made by the corner pharmacy and the head-on SUV, and she's jerking the wheel to the left across traffic, rocketing down the one way street, going the wrong way, and back out onto the parallel avenue.
Clear. They are clear. She fumbles down for the radio, hand shaking, slick with sweat and-
"Kate."
She risks him a look and he's hunkered down with round, wide eyes, elbows on his knees, breathing hard. "Castle." Alive. He's alive. They are alive.
"You're bleeding."
There's a woman standing with the boys when they double park in front of his building. Kate insisted they head straight to his loft where it was safer, where she could guarantee them some measure of security, and he didn't argue.
He's still having flashbacks. His hands shake; he looks down and sees blood. Her blood, all over his hands. It can't be real.
Ryan's mouth drops open as the car pulls up. Castle has to kick at his door to get out; his knees refuse to hold him and he has to clutch the door frame for a moment.
"Beckett's hurt," he gets out, waving the woman off as she reaches first for him. "Who are you?"
"Damn. They said you didn't remember, but I didn't really believe it."
"Castle," Kate's voice comes to him from a muzzy distance. He turns and she's still standing, even as blood soaks the collar of her shirt. The sight makes him sway. "That's Lanie. Dr. Parish. Our friend. She needs to look at your head. You hit it-"
"You first. You're bleeding." He snatches at the woman's hands - Dr Parish - and nods towards Kate. "She got shot."
Parish spins around. "Kate."
"Just a flesh wound. Grazed me. I'm fine, Lanie."
"No. Everyone inside," Lanie says, and then turns to push him inside his own building. The door man gives him a stunned look, but Castle can't even remember a name to help smooth the way.
At the elevators, all of them in a huddle and waiting inanely, Esposito finally speaks up.
"What the hell happened?"
"They were going for Castle," Beckett says grimly. "They tried to incapacitate the car, and then they went for his door. Shot us up."
"And then they went for you," he says back, shooting her a glare.
So much. It's back - the fights, the words, the push and pull, her obsession. Everything that matters anyway. Some is still gone, but that car smashing into his side knocked some stuff back into place.
"You must have stolen that file, and they know it was you, Castle. They want it back."
He nods. That's still gone. Whatever happened last night, he only knows what the video showed them.
"Catch us up to speed," Ryan says. "What did you find at Hubbard Security?"
Beckett sighs and leans against the back of the elevator, both Lanie and Esposito in between him and Kate. That's okay, actually, because he thinks if she were at his side, he'd wrap his arms around her and never let go.
Never.
Beckett proceeds to fill them in.
It takes some serious convincing to talk Ryan and Esposito into going back to the precinct; Beckett needs them to take the car to Forensics, but they hang around, looking disturbed and helpless. Esposito calls in a couple of uniforms to park out on the street and keep watch, but even then, the boys don't want to leave. In the end it's Lanie who kicks them out, forbids them to come back unless they've learned something useful.
Kate is so grateful she could weep.
Ok, so maybe she's a little shaken up.
Lanie turns back to her, fists on her hips and that don't mess with me look on her face. "Now, you, Kate Beckett, are going to sit down long enough that I can do a better job of patching that up."
She points a deliberate finger to the side of Kate's face, and Beckett mechanically brushes her hand to the makeshift bandage, winces. The lightest touch makes her dizzy.
"But Castle-" she opposes weakly, although she can feel him hovering around. She cannot forget the awful cracking sound of his head against the glass when the other car crashed into theirs.
"Castle is fine," Lanie tells her, voice gentle but definitive. "He's conscious, he can track my finger, he didn't throw up once, and he's behaving normally, as far as I can tell. Whatever's normal for him, anyway. The only thing we can do now is wait for a sign that something is wrong. You, on the other hand, I can help. So sit."
Kate sighs and lets herself be shepherded back to the couch; her knees give out when she bends them, make her crash rather than settle into the leather seat. She closes her eyes, tries to find a breathing pattern, in and out, focus on something other than the nausea.
"I saw that," Lanie says. "Girl, really. You need to start taking better care of yourself."
"Didn't exactly ask those guys to come shooting at me," Beckett replies tiredly, then grits her teeth when Lanie's fingers start working at the gauze. Somewhere to her right, she hears Castle's soft intake of air.
She struggles to get an eyelid open, risks a glance at him. He's standing close, only the coffee table between them, his face too pale, too serious as his eyes intently drink in every one of Lanie's movements.
He's still, uncharacteristically still, except for his hands. He keeps rubbing his hands together, mechanically, his thumb stroking the inside of his palm as if to wipe off-
"Castle," she calls, startling both of them when her voice comes out so sharp. Even Lanie arches an eyebrow at her. "Something wrong with your hands?"
He seems surprised, looks down as if he's just realized what he's been doing. "N-no," he says, and he makes fists of them, puts them both behind his back. A little boy's response that has her heart breaking.
"Come here," she says, holding out her fingers to him.
He gives her a surprised, needing look, and he circles the table, settles on the edge of the couch next to her with infinite care, like he might hurt her by just being near.
She presses her lips together - whatever Lanie is doing, it stings - and trails her fingers over Castle's thigh, laces them with his. He squeezes back, hard, and she wants very badly to be left alone with him.
"Stop moving," Lanie commands. Kate opens her mouth for a rebellious comment, can't help a hiss of pain when something burns at her temple.
"Don't move," Lanie warns again.
Damn it, she is trying, she is, but fuck - it hurts. Beckett has her eyes shut tight, her breath shallow as she struggles to keep herself still. Oh, she's crushing Castle's fingers.
"There you go," her friend says with a final dab of fire against Kate's open wound. The detective lets out a long breath, her muscles quivering with relief. "You'll need to be very careful when you wash your hair, Kate. And graze or not, this is gonna hurt like a bitch."
Eyes still closed, Beckett drags her tongue over her dry lips, gives a tiny nod. "I believe you."
Lanie finishes securing the gauze into place, then moves back, her eyes traveling from Kate to Castle, and back. She sighs. "I'm not exactly thrilled about leaving the two of you here."
"Lanie, you have to go back to work. It's fine. We'll be fine."
The ME doesn't seem entirely convinced.
"You call me if anything feels wrong," she tells Kate with a pointed look. "Not just if Castle is confused or feeling dizzy. You too, you hear me?"
"Yes, Lanie." Of course she won't, but her friend doesn't need to know that. From the look on Lanie's face, she knows anyway.
"Kate Beckett-"
"Look, I will - I will call. If we need you. But I'd rather..." Kate bites on her bottom lip. "I'd rather not have you involved in this."
Lanie arches her eyebrow in a silent, but very expressive version of Too late for that.
"I know," Kate mutters, gritting her teeth. "Not more involved than you already are, anyway."
"Kate, we're your friends. We want to help."
What if you can't? Beckett shuts her mouth before the words make it out, and Castle surprisingly takes over. "Thanks," he tells Lanie with a warm look, a tired smile. "It means a lot."
The ME shoots him a surprised look, before a pleased smile blossoms on her lips. "Well. At least someone is grateful. See?"
Kate rolls her eyes - it hurts - and manages a grimace that can maybe pass as a smile. Castle's fingers are still warm and soft against hers; it helps more than she can say.
"Get out of here, Lanie," she commands. "And thank you."
Her friend smirks, but heeds her words, grabbing her jacket and her bag of supplies before she makes her way out. She's left clean gauze, disinfectant, and some stuff for the pain; Kate hates to admit that she might need it.
The door slams, and Castle shivers against her, a jerk of his whole body.
She bites her lip, resists the urge to close her eyes.
"Come here," she says softly, and it takes entirely too long for him to register that he's the one she's talking to, that she's shifted towards him, opened her arms.
"I'll hurt you," he murmurs back, although want flares at the back of his eyes.
Kate slowly breathes past the sudden tears, shakes her head. "Just - be gentle."
He is, sliding his arms around her waist so very carefully, attentive to every sound she makes as he draws her into his embrace. The air rushes out of her when her head finally rests on his shoulder, the solid warmth of him surrounding her, shielding her - so good.
"I'm here, Castle," she says quietly, letting the words sink in. "I'm alive. I'm safe."
She feels the long, drawn-out breath that he lets out into her hair, and her heart pounds against her ribs, aches for them.
What are they going to do?
