A/N: The response to this has been incredible. It's making me feel guilty for every minute I procrastinate doing something other than working on this story. See: Guitar, Trumpet playing, Lesson planning. Btw, I'm from the NYC area so I'm using details that I know about that. I'm not THAT well researched so don't give me credit where it isn't due.

Also, as you can see, I'm not one to hold my chapters hostage. As I finish them you see them, but I really appreciate the reviews. It honestly inspires me, so I thank every single one of you.

A number of you are concerned about Kate's fate. Here's the deal (SPOILER FOR THIS STORY DON'T READ IF YOU DON'T WANT TO), I like putting the characters in mortal peril from time to time, but I love them too much to ever go to that place where they die. I mean, without them there would be no more show and then my Mondays would go back to completely sucking. So, No, Kate isn't going to kick it, bite it, perish, buy the farm, go into the light, die. This story is all about the repercussions of this. I mean, in her head she's going to die right now and Castle knows it. They're going to be pretty messed up after this… and I have the joy of addressing/fixing this.

Without further ado, on with the show…

Don't own 'em.

Richard Castle didn't know where he stood on the whole business of God. If you had asked him twenty years ago, he would have been a complete non-believer, but after looking into the face of his baby girl seventeen years ago, he reassessed. He gazed at the little baby with bright blue eyes in his arms and suddenly he couldn't imagine that there wasn't an all-powerful deity that created the perfection resting in his hands. However, over the years, that faith waned as he researched murderers, thieves, villains, and generally evil people. He knew there was a possibility, but he didn't put much stock in it. Instead, he put all of his faith in his family and the people he allowed himself to get close to. However, at this moment, sitting in the waiting room at the NYU Langone Medical Center, all he could think about were prayers. Please, God, let Beckett be ok; Please God, give me the strength to call her Dad. Please, God, I'll do anything if you let me keep her. Please…

Everything moved so fast after the diner's doors crashed open and New York's finest rushed in. He only took his eyes off of her for a second-A God-damned second!—and when his gaze fixed back down to utter an "I told you so," her eyes were closed.

He told her it wasn't funny. He told her to open them and look at him, but she didn't. She didn't respond at all. This was the point in the movies and his books where he should have professed his undying love and she would open her eyes. She would open those beautiful dark-green eyes and assure him she'd be fine and tell him that she, in fact, loved him, too. None of it happened.

Instead, Richard Castle's throat closed up completely. His hands stilled on her body and the paramedics took her from him before he could regain his voice and composure. Ryan, Esposito and The Captain had grabbed him, hauled him to his feet and demanded to know what the hell had happened. He tried to tell them, he did, but he couldn't focus on anything but the medics working across the room. When Ryan and Esposito stepped into his line of sight he nearly screamed at them. He needed to see her. He needed to see if she was still breathing for himself. Instead, he told the story of the morning. He had gotten to the point in the story where Raglan had passed and Beckett fell, before Ryan shifted and he caught sight of her again between the two detective's shoulders.

They were cutting her sweater open violently and shoving packs of gauze onto her side when he had to turn away. He didn't want to see her like that. He shouldn't have had to. His stomach turned and he fled to the back of the diner where he lost the coffee and Captain Crunch he consumed for breakfast into a trash can.

Esposito's heavy hand landed on his back and Ryan flanked his other side. Castle straightened up and mistakenly looked down at his hands—Red—and he was sick again.

After that, everything was foggy. If he didn't know any better, he would have thought he had completely lost it. All clarity in his mind was gone. He remembers seeing her being wheeled into the waiting FDNY bus outside and it pulling away, sirens blaring. He remembers throwing a fit at his friends at the twelfth; demanding to leave with her; demanding the boys to get their asses in their car and drive him to wherever she was going. To their credit, they did. Ryan and Esposito guided him outside and Montgomery stayed behind to deal with the horrible mess that this day turned out to be.

And so he sat, in the waiting room of the surgical area of Langone Med Center, his iPhone grasped in his palms. He was scrubbed clean with help from Lanie, who was off finding friends to get her information. He was dressed head-to-toe in dark blue scrubs from the nurse's station and his clothes were gone. He told Ryan to get rid of them forever. The boys were on their phones somewhere trying to get info on the sniper who had terrorized the diner and Castle was trying to figure out how to call Beckett's Dad. Esposito had told him that he would take care of it, but Castle insisted. He needed to do this. He made a promise and he intended on keeping it in any way possible.

He balked, though. He told Beckett he was selfish and he was. So he did the thing that all men do when they're lost; he called his Mom.

"Richard, darling, to what do I owe this midday pleasure?"

"Mother… I need you to come down to the NYU Med Center." He squawked into the phone. He was continually amazing how his voice could sound so foreign to his own ears.

"Richard, what happened? Are you okay? Are you hurt?" Martha was panicking and he could hear his daughter in the background beginning to do the same. He had hoped Alexis wouldn't be home; that he could spare her for a little while, but alas, today was not his day.

"I'm okay, Mother… but Beckett… she's not… she's in surgery… and I don't know what to do. I need you to come."

"Okay. We'll be there soon." She gasped and replied. "Richard… Kate's a fighter, remember that."

"I know. I'll see you soon." He hung up and he saw Lanie approaching.

"What did you find, Lanie?"

"Not much, Castle." She replied, sighing. "She's in surgery and it's going how it was expected to be going. That's all I got."

Castle nodded at that medical examiner and looked back down at the phone in his hands.

"Do you know Josh's number? He should know about this."

Lanie looked up at him, surprised. "Castle, you're not going to need that. They broke up weeks ago and he's off in Africa somewhere."

Castle was confused. Beckett had never said anything about them breaking up. It made sense, he guessed. Kate Beckett didn't talk about her personal life unless he brought it up and he just didn't see any outward signs of a change in her mood to call her on it. He would have asked Lanie a million questions had it been any other day, but on this day, he just didn't give a damn.

"I need to call her dad, Lanie," He looked up, "and I don't know how." He stood suddenly and Lanie startled at the sudden movement.

"How am I supposed to tell him that his only daughter might be dying somewhere in this hospital, huh?" He asked in a frenzied whisper. "I don't even know how that bullet got past me! I mean, I was sitting next to her, Lanie, on her left-side! How did it miss me!"

"Castle, sit down…" When he made no attempt to move, she commanded again, "Castle, sit the hell down!" He obliged and Lanie continued, "Now you listen to me, Rick. Kate wouldn't want you to be doing this—this scenario analyzing. She would tell you that it isn't your fault, and it isn't, okay? Now, pick up that damned phone and dial the number. You'll know what to say when you hear his voice."

So he did what he was told. He punched the numbers into his phone and put the device to his ear. With his heart still lodged in his throat, he listened to the ringing on the other end. It rang and it rang and then…

"Hello, you've reached the residence of Jim Beckett. I'm sorry I can't take your call right now… actually I'm not… I'm on an extended fishing trip in Montana. If you need to get in touch with me please contact my daughter, Kate, at…"

"Shit." Castle cursed and hung up. "He's fishing, Lanie… and the one person who knows how to contact him is in surgery."

Lanie nodded solemnly and left her position next to him to go relay the information to Esposito who was hovering in the doorway. Castle took a deep breath and let it out. He would let the boys track Jim Beckett down and talk to him when he could. That was still keeping his promise, right?

Yeah, Castle thought, This day sucks.

Holy Marathon! CLICK ITTTTT :)