Okay, you guys can relax: Caskett is back. Dr. Doof & Perry will be in this at least one more time but it will largely be Caskett from here on out. I would have put it in the crossover fic section but since I wanted to try this Ficathon thing, I decided to just leave it here.

Sorry, purplangel, I almost forgot: 'Still' and 'The Squab & The Quail' are the inspiration behind this chapter.

I thought I would be able to get this story done this weekend but it's running a bit longer than I expected. So there's going to be at least one more chapter, maybe two. Then, if my muse cooperates, I'll be working on Hollywood Heat. IF my muse cooperates. It's been gravitating towards my Moonlighting Curse story idea lately (don't worry, there might not even be ANYTHING from Moonlighting in that one; it would be more like my crack fic 'The Ultimate Castle Monday'). So I'm just going to have to see how it goes. But I'm really excited about the Hollywood Heat idea, so that story WILL be written at some point.

Disclaimer: Although ABC is owned by Disney, I REALLY don't see there being an episode where Phineas & Ferb will be on Castle. So, yeah, I don't own it.


"You really would do anything for me, wouldn't you?" Kate said to Castle as they pulled up to the precinct for the debriefing on the case. The ride from the crime scene had been made in relative silence and Kate had spent that time mulling over how deeply he loved her and how truly committed to her he was. If any doubt had been lingering in Kate's mind it was obliterated by his instance that if there was even one in 100,000 chance of saving her, he wasn't leaving, even though she was standing directly over a bomb that had been set to go off in mere minutes. She wasn't sure he would have left even if there hadn't been any chance at all.

"Of course," Castle replied, obviously puzzled that she would even need to ask.

Kate would have kissed him again but they were too close to the precinct. And although Gates was willing to maintain 'plausible deniability' she didn't want to push it. Instead she took his hand in hers and gave it a brief squeeze before letting go and getting out of the car.

She had only taken a few steps when she felt it. At first she thought it was a bullet because of the force and speed in which it struck the middle of her back. She stumbled but Castle's quick reflexes kept her from falling. Leaning against him, Castle's hands firmly gripping her arms, Kate waited for the pain to come. Except it never did.

Not a bullet then.

"Did you see it?" Kate asked.

"See what?"

"Whatever hit me."

Castle's eyes widened in surprise. "Something hit you? Where?"

"The middle of my back."

Castle quickly turned her and lifted the back of her shirt. "I don't see anything," he said after a few seconds. His fingers lightly ran over her bare skin in a quick but thorough search. She didn't feel any pain or tenderness, just the usual tingles that she experienced whenever any part of her skin came in direct contact with Castle's hands. "It doesn't feel like you have any bumps or welts. We should take you down to Lanie."

Kate nodded her agreement and turned back to Castle. "But what was it?" She scanned her immediate surroundings but could find nothing out of the ordinary. Castle's frustrated expression told her he hadn't found anything, either.

Kate braced herself for one of Castle's outlandish theories but it never came. All he said was, "I don't know, but we need to find out."


"I don't know what to tell you, girl," Lanie said two hours later after having run various medical tests on her friend. "All of the tests came up negative. I've never heard of anything that feels like a bullet but doesn't penetrate the skin. All I can tell you is to keep an eye out for anything unusual. And you might want to take it easy for a couple days."

"Gates already told me to take a couple days off," Kate said.

"Then the only thing I can say is go home and get some rest. And give me a call if you have any nausea, dizziness, ect; you know the drill."

Kate did; she had learned a lot about medical procedures after getting shot.

"Take care of her, Castle," Lanie said as the couple made their way out the door a minute later.

Kate rolled her eyes but didn't bother to tell them she was a grown woman and could look after herself; neither of them would listen to her.

"Of course," Castle said, taking Kate's hand in his.

"Bye, Lanie," Kate said at the same time.

They were both tense during the drive back to the loft, waiting for something, anything, out of the ordinary. Anything that would let them know what had happened.

By the time Castle opened the door to his bedroom all Kate wanted to do was sleep. But they both knew that could just be the stress of spending hours standing directly over a bomb.

Castle didn't protest when Kate said she just wanted to go to bed, although he warned her that he would wake her up every few hours to check on her. Muttering that she didn't have any signs of a concussion-the object hadn't even struck her on the head-Kate went to put on her favorite sleeping attire-one of Castle's shirts and a pair of her cotton shorts.

As soon as she got into bed, she snuggled up to Castle in their usual position, her head on his chest, his arm around her waist, his hand resting on her hip.

Kate decided against telling him that finally, something didn't feel right. Because instead of feeling relaxed and at peace as she usually did, she felt suffocated and restless.

But it didn't make any sense. They had slept this way countless times over the last year and she'd never felt like this.

Hoping it would just go away, Kate decided to ignore it and force herself to get some desperately needed sleep.


What was she doing?

Kate had been in the middle of getting ready for bed when dropped her toothbrush and shimmed-shimmied, for crying out loud-to the edge of the doorway before she even realized what was happening.

She was completely baffled at her behavior. She had never shimmied a day in her life.

Until now, apparently.

Feeling ridiculous, Kate decided she was going to stop before Castle saw what she was doing.

Except she couldn't. She tried to get her legs to stop moving but they just kept going as if she wanted to be acting like this.

'Cause I got something special for you," Castle said to the TV, completely engrossed in the video game he was playing.

Against her will, Kate's legs took her to the doorway where she involuntarily spun so that she was facing away from Castle. "And I've got something special for you," she looked over at him as she slid down the shirt she was wearing, baring a shoulder, "too."

Kate would cringe if she could. She was acting like some empty-headed bimbo. No, worse. A porn star. An exceptionally bad one.

But she couldn't stop.

Why couldn't she stop?

"Well, that's not looking too good."

Kate was startled out of her performance. And she couldn't be more grateful for it.

Except that the words that came out of her mouth were annoyed. "What? Castle!"

Castle held up a hand before explaining that he wasn't talking to her but a kid from India that he had been trying to defeat on the video game for weeks.

Kate tried opened her mouth to try to tell him that something was seriously wrong. Except she couldn't get her mouth to move. Maybe something hadn't hit her just outside the precinct a few days ago. Maybe it had been something internal, some serious health condition that was only now starting to manifest itself. But if it had been something like that, Lanie would have caught it.

Wouldn't she?

She tried again, with the same results.

"Would you rather play with a kid, in an imaginary world?" Oh no, she could feel it coming on again; the bimbo/porn star was back. "Or in the real world," her voice was breathy and her hands made their way slowly down her sides, emphasizing her figure, before making their way back up, her hands tangling in her hair.

No matter how hard she tried, she couldn't get her arms to move. Until Castle looked back and forth between her and his game repeatedly, being able to say nothing other than, "I…I…I…uh…"

Okay, Kate had to admit she was a little bit hurt that he was struggling to decide between his video game and her. But not nearly as much as her stunned, "You actually have to think about this!" made it seem.

She was actually kind of glad. Because that meant that Castle may not have noticed how much of an idiot she had been making of herself.

Kate tried to let Castle know that something was off. But each time she tried to open her mouth to explain to him, it remained firmly closed. She decided to tell him by writing it down, but she couldn't get her legs to move to take her over to his laptop and her hands refused to move.

In contrast to the previous few nights, Kate wanted to be in Castle's arms. But as hard as she tried to fight it, her body turned away from him. There had to be a foot of space between them.

If she could have gotten her eyes to cooperate, Kate was sure she would have cried.

It was an odd sensation, wanting to cry and not being able to. Usually she had to hold feelings back, not try to force them out.

There was one part of this that was all too familiar, although she hadn't dealt with it for almost a year. She wanted to reach out to Castle, ask for his help, tell him what she was thinking and feeling but something stopped her. Back then, it had been fear, uncertainty, worry that if she acted too soon the whole thing could blow up in their faces. Even a niggling fear that, despite all the evidence, he didn't really want her.

This time, as much as she wanted to reach out to Castle, she literally couldn't.


In case anyone is confused, Kate was hit by the ray that shot out of Dr. Doofenshmirtz's Break-Up-Inator. I'm just guessing what being hit by a ray would feel like. And there are no medical explanations because there usually aren't on Phineas & Ferb. THAT'S why Phineas & Ferb is part of this story. Just to clarify.