"Way Too Meta"
By December21st
Fandom: Castle
Rating: G
Pairing: Castle/Beckett(ish)
Warnings: Crack!fic. Weird. Mild spoilers for Seaon 3 and "Naked Heat" (the book.)
Summary: There is no such thing as too much meta. Especially when you twist it around on itself. Response to Castleland's "Squared" challenge, for the prompt your choice.
"Once upon a time," the words appeared on the page under her fingers, "There was a talented writer named Richard Castle. And Rick Castle had a muse, a beautiful detective named Kate Beckett, who allowed him to follow her around from one homicide to the next, and eventually they became very good friends, and she even let him take care of her when she was sick. And he wrote stories about a talented reporter named Jameson Rook and a beautiful detective named Nikki Heat, but he was really writing about himself and his detective.
"One time, when she was very sick and he was very worried about her, Rick told Kate a secret. A secret that he had never told anyone before. Richard Castle, he told her, doesn't exist. He's a make-believe writer who writes about Jameson and Nikki, and in these stories, Jameson writes about Nikki ... or sometimes Castle writes about Jameson writing about another couple who are really himself and Nikki, but this Castle just a character in a TV show, who writes stories about himself, although sometimes Jameson and Nikki are characters in a movie on the TV show."
"And then these stories were so powerful that other people started writing stories about Rick about writing stories about Jamie writing stories about Nikki, who would sometimes write stories about Kate when she was feeling left out. And because these things have great power, the stories became true."
There was a long dark pause, and Kate struggled to drag herself out of the dream, blinking in confusion. "Castle?"
"Hey, you're awake. Here, drink some water, that fever really took a lot out of you."
"I had the strangest dream."
"I was reading to you while you were sleeping. A story about a writer."
"I feel like I'm still dreaming."
"Just try really hard to wake up, and then you'll know if you're awake."
So Kate tried really hard to wake up. And she woke up.