Authors Note: Well, hello! No one has sent me any notes of rage, so I suppose the last chapter wasn't so bad. But now, I present you with the alternate ending. As a reminder, there are four more chapters to this story - two for the original ending, and two for this one. I hope you enjoy!

He was going to buy Tori something obscenely extravagant. The Twelfth's resident IT expert had cracked the case open with the final cell phone, the GPS system embedded in all smartphones pinging from towers near the West Side docks in a sequence of times of dates that coincided with Kate's kidnapping.

They'd had other evidence, all gathered by Ryan and a few assigned to assist him, but Tori was the one who was in line for the biggest and best gift of her life. In fact, had he not been engaged and deeply in love with Kate, he'd probably have kissed her.

But he'd restrained himself, piling into the boys temporary cruiser as they followed a tactical unit through the streets of Manhattan, sirens blaring.

Another team had already hit the pavement at the location, setting up a perimeter around the four blocks of warehouses to begin the search. The two teams were splitting up, taking the outside blocks first and working their way in, with four sections raiding buildings simultaneously to both manage time and condense the element of surprise should Tyson have another accomplice.

He was trying to remain calm, sweat gathering against his palms as he continuously fidgeted in the backseat. Castle knew that this was it, the assurance coiling low in his stomach and providing both a sense of calm and a level of anxiety that he hadn't experienced in quiet some time.

But they were coming for Kate, they were going to save her, and maybe Jerry Tyson would be extradited to a state where the death penalty was enforced.

Kate wasn't the sort of person who broke easily. In her 34 years she'd been through hell quite a few times, and she was still standing. But she'd also never actively had to work as hard to keep herself afloat as her time hanging suspended from the pipe.

Even when she had been shot, she'd been unconscious for the worst of it. The pain had been intense, it had spread across her body like an inferno, and the mental scars were the sort she always carried but, on the physical level, her body had gone numb and her mind unconscious before the worst of the process had hit her.

This was a different take entirely. She could feel the ache in her muscles and her bones, the burn in her lungs as it grew ever more difficult to breathe in air. The pull of the drug in her blood making a very strong case to simply close her eyes and rest. Because she was tired, so tired of the back and forth fight to either pull herself up by the chain or stretch her feet for a little relief for her legs.

She was tired of the struggle to breath, of the searing pain in her arms and her torso.

But, she was also angry and the anger was her talisman, burning brightly and sustaining one last quiet note of hope that she'd somehow be able to support herself long enough for help to come. That her life wouldn't end because she had suffocated at the hands of a psychotic serial killer.

So Kate gritted her teeth, a cry slipping from her mouth as she gripped the chain in her hands and used every ounce of remaining strength to pull herself upright, tears pouring down her face at the desperate realization that this was it. That she likely wouldn't manage to pull herself up again and would, slowly, cease to breathe.

"Hurry, Castle," she whispered, feeling the muscles in her shoulders begin to shake in protest, and Kate forced herself to steadily suck in long gasps of air even as her throat tightened from the pressure of her tears and the slight sobs from her open mouth.

It lasted less than a minute, her exhausted muscles losing the war with gravity as her hand slipped from the chain and Kate lost whatever semblance on control she had been holding as she used her last bit of air to cry out - her body swinging wildly as the sudden change in position rattled her skull and zapped the air from her lungs as her vision blurred and her lungs burned for air.

The sound of a scream had them all running - ignoring the building they had been preparing to enter in favor of the one beside it. The tactical team spread out quickly, Esposito and Ryan acting as the point. Several gestures and nods later, Esposito slammed the heel of his boot against the door as the team surged in behind him.

"CASTLE," Ryan's voice cut above the noises, sending him surging forward and shoving aside one of the last men to enter the warehouse, putting Kate's suspended body directly in his line of sight and stopping him cold for just a moment.

It was horrifying, how she had been suspended by her wrists, the stillness of her body and the obvious injuries that she had sustained. It hit him like a brick wall, cutting him into equal parts horror, rage, sadness and sympathy. But he didn't process any of it, instead taking off at a sprint and wrapping his arms around her legs as a tactical member ascended a ladder and went to work cutting the chain to free Kate from the pipe.

"It's okay, Kate, I'm here," he assured her, ignoring how cold her body felt, or how shallow and far apart her breaths were coming. He could hear Ryan ordering for paramedics immediately, the dispatcher's response lost in the sound of separating metal as the chain snapped and Kate's body sank down into his arms.

He curled himself around her, gently lowering her to the floor with soft whispers that both meant nothing and everything. In that moment he was promising her everything short of the moon and the stars, and yet nothing at all, the words almost sounding like nonsense. He just needed to talk, to provide some sense of reality to tether her back to the world as Ryan took her pulse, "It's there, barely," he murmured on Castle's left side while he placed her head in his lap and gently stroked her hair.

"She's alive," Castle responded, feeling the tears that had been threatening him for the past 24 hours finally break free as two paramedics charged through the open door and approached the three of them. "We got to her in time, she's made it through worse than this. She'll get through this as well."

There had been a rotating vigil around Kate's hospital bed, though she had been unaware of it.

Castle had split the time with Jim Beckett, though he had yet to stray very far from the door and the officer that was guarding it. Though he needed a shower, a shave, to change his clothes, he couldn't bring himself to do any of those things - not until she was awake and he could talk to her.

Alexis and his mother had both made appearances, frantic for news on Kate's condition and the full story of what had happened. Lanie had taken the reigns when his voice had given out, emotions overcoming him when he'd attempted to describe the scene in the loft when he'd come back. It felt like it had happened months ago, rather than a couple of days.

Mild hypothermia, pulled muscles and thirty stitches in her arm. Another twenty in her side. All things that would heal with time and physical therapy. She'd been referred back to Doctor Burke for therapy, put on disability pay for three weeks, pending a psych clearance and then desk work until the pt would allow her to work her arms with some ease.

Her shoulders would likely require some sort of surgery down the road, the pressure of hanging for hours causing the sort of damage that, eventually, would catch up to Kate.

But she was alive. She would, in time, be able to go back to work. Tyson hadn't succeeded in taking her from him.

That thought was the one that so often caught him by surprise, not because he wasn't devoutly aware, but because he was so grateful. Without fail, the thought brought tears to his eyes, stole breath from his lungs, and had him chanting a steady stream of thank you to whatever deity that had given Kate such resilience to hold on.

Because she should have died. Her body should have suffocated. The doctors had all expressed what a miracle it was that she'd lived through it. That she'd, yet again, cheated death as it sat whispering on her shoulder.

He had been sitting in a chair just outside the door, her eyes locked on a bare patch of wall as he again went through his silent mantra of gratefulness that Kate was alive, it took Jim Beckett softly clasping his shoulder to remove him from his inner monologue, the older man's smile calm and assuring, "She's waking up, Rick. You go on in, I'll see her when you are finished."

And he again found himself grateful, that the father of the love of his life would be so willing to give him the moment. To be the person sitting beside Kate's bed as she came back to the world.

"Thank you, Jim." he whispered, the look in his eyes providing more than Castle could have ever possibly spoken.

The first realization was that her body had moved. The solid weight of a mattress and the warmth of blankets cradling her body. The pain in her shoulders and arm a dull throb rather than the sharp knives that she'd become accustomed too.

There was also beeping, the soft murmur of a television and a whir of other machines. Enough to give Kate the idea that she was likely in a hospital, though it was going to take more effort and energy than she thought she had to open her eyes and find out.

But then she heard it, the soft call of her name, the sound said with such reverence and love that tears suddenly pricked at her eyes, "Castle," she whispered, her voice croaking on the last syllable as her tongue darted out to moisten her dry lips and she worked to ease the dryness of her throat.

Immediately a straw was at her mouth, Castle's voice urging her to drink, and she responded unconsciously, the coldness of the water providing relief and easing the slight discomfort she'd had. And then his hand was clasped around hers, his thumb tracing soothing circles against the sensitive skin between her thumb and forefinger - a reminder of all the handshakes they'd perfected in the months they'd been unable to acknowledge their relationship in front of Captain Gates.

"We got you, and we got him. He's locked up and has a dozen life sentences to serve," Castle whispered, his breath ghosting over her ear as he gently placed kisses on her forehead, and her cheek. "And you are going to be fine. I'm so glad, Kate. I'm so happy you are safe," he repeated, the soft pressure of his lips against hers making her mouth lift up slightly.

'Castle," she spoke slowly, her eyes fluttering open for a moment, 'Do you think we've hit our quota for near death experiences yet?"

It made him chuckle, his eyes losing some of the seriousness to be replaced with a sparkle as he drew his chair closer to the bed, "I hope so, honey," he murmured, brushing a stray lock of hair behind her ear as she closed her eyes on a sigh, that one sentence all she could manage before she felt the pull of sleep.

"M'sleepy," Kate breathed, "Love you," she whispered after a beat as Castle watched her breathing even out as she moved back into the land of dreams.

"Love you too," he replied, keeping her hand firmly clasped in his own while she slept.