Kairos – Chapter 2
DISCLAIMER: Most of these characters are not mine at all, but they are memorable. Thank you, Mr. Marlowe. The others? Yeah, they're mine.
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A/N: Still here? Great! By now, I think you can see where this story is headed. Not my usual Castle story, I admit, but being a long-time comic book fan, and an avid sci-fi enthusiast, I've often considered how to introduce a little science into our fictional tales of Richard Castle. I hope you enjoy where we go with this one.
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Friday Afternoon – April 26, 2013, 1:17 p.m., at the 12th Precinct in New York City
Richard Castle sits in 'his' chair at the 12th Precinct, across from Detective Kate Beckett. Kate is finishing up paperwork for a quick case that was opened – and closed – this morning. Castle is fidgeting, as his left leg bounces up and down rapidly while his fingers drum aimlessly, incessantly atop his knees. Every couple of minutes, Kate looks up, knowing that the little nine-year old boy in him is just bursting with anticipation.
Another minute passes before she closes the file, and backs away from her desk, still seated.
"Okay Castle," she begins, fighting back a smile that threatens to burst into laughter. "What has you so hot and bothered?"
"A certain redhead," he offers jokingly. "And I'm not talking about my daughter."
That draws a raised eyebrow from the detective, much to Castle's delight. She's been toying with him for the past five minutes, elongating her time with the paperwork. He's followed her for years – he knows when she is mentally doodling and when she is really working.
"Okay, I probably deserved that," she smiles warmly, clearly amused. "But seriously, what has you –"
"You will not believe this," he interrupts. "You are so not going to believe this. You're going to love it, trust me. Remember when we . . . Oh you are so not going to –"
"Castle!" she exclaims, raising her voice a bit.
"Okay, okay," he tells her, now standing and pacing around her desk like a large cat on the prowl. But he's not talking. He's thinking. He's mouthing words with his mouth, but no sound is coming out.
"Castle!" she admonishes again, this time louder.
"The book signing," he begins, then stops suddenly. He glances around at the not-so-empty bullpen, filled with officers and detectives who are returning from lunch. Although the precinct has been accepting of him, he knows that in some quarters he is considered something of a nut job.
Competent, yes.
Brave, without question.
But a still nut job.
No, there's no need to give them more water cooler fodder. He motions Kate to the conference room. When Javier Esposito and Kevin Ryan both stand expectantly, Castle hesitates for an instant before waving to both that they should follow them. The two detectives jump up excitedly, eager to do something other than tedious paperwork.
The four enter the conference room, and Ryan closes the door behind them.
"What's up?" Esposito asks, his eyes searching between Castle and Beckett.
"Castle was just getting to that," Kate tells them.
"I think you'd better sit down for this," Castle tells them, as he continues to pace throughout the room, as he was outside in the bullpen, unable to contain his excitement. "All of you."
The trio complies without thinking, knowing that Castle – the author – has a tendency to tell stories. It's how he processes things. There is no telling how long this story will be.
"This morning I had a book signing for Heat in Time down at –"
"Dumb title," Esposito muses aloud. "Not your best work."
An incredulous Castle stares, jaw dropped, at his friend, who quickly backpedals.
"I don't mean the story itself, Castle," Esposito corrects himself. "I mean just the title. Normally you stick with two words, rolls off the tip of your tongue, kind of –"
"I think he gets the message, bro," Kevin interrupts, drawing a grateful yet aggravated look from his partner.
"Go on, Castle," Ryan encourages.
Castle smirks, then turns his attention to the white board on the wall in the conference room, where he draws two large circles, about three feet away from each other on the board.
"At the book signing, I encountered a very, very interesting fan," he begins, but now it is Kate's turn to interrupt.
"Is this the red-head who had you so excited?" she asks.
"Absolutely," he tells her, then immediately sees the error he has made. Esposito and Ryan exchange a chuckle, always amused at how a man so prolific with words can let errant ones get himself into trouble so often, and so easily.
"No, no, not in that way," he quickly corrects himself, which only gets him an eye roll from a less-than-amused Kate.
"Oh come on, Kate, I was willing to blow up with you, for crying out loud," he almost pleads. "That's got to count for something."
"Playing that card already, Castle?" she smirks. "Less than a week old and you give up such a valuable chip so soon."
Ryan and Esposito smile, offering each other a small fist bump, knowing that Kate has – once again – all too easily played their friend.
"Forget it," Castle says suddenly, turning his attention back to the white board, surprising everyone.
"This morning, I met a new fan of mine. A Dr. Sandra Windholm." He waits for any acknowledgement of recognition from the three. Seeing none, he shakes his head, continuing.
"Don't any of you follow science at all?" he mutters just loud enough for them to hear. "She is a world-renown physicist, who specializes in space-time continuum research and discoveries. If you'd watch something other than reality TV and sitcoms, you might have seen her a few times on television," he continues, jabbing them for emphasis.
"Nothing as good as shark week," Esposito mutters, smiling, gaining him a smirk from Castle, who ignores the parry and continues.
"Anyway, she wanted me to sign her copy of Heat in Time, which I happily did. And I got the better end of this exchange. Turns out she told me that the time traveling ideas I postulated in the book weren't all that far off," he tells them, sticking a tongue out at Kate, who wasn't too impressed with his scientific hypothesis as he had laid it out for her months ago. It has been an endless source of debate between the two of them.
"Feel better?" she asks, with a sarcastic smirk.
"Getting there," he smirks in return.
"Back to the important stuff," he continues, ignoring the amused looks on Esposito and Beckett's faces. Kevin Ryan, however, looks at his writer friend quizzically. He senses where Castle might be going with all of this. Castle has always been excited over the supernatural or science fiction possibilities. Even the smallest odds that a zombie, or vampire or alien could be involved in a case is something that brings joy to the novelist.
And superheroes? A joy bath for certain.
But more than that, not only does he take great satisfaction from these concepts, his mind actually allows for the existence of such mythical entities. And because of that allowance, the notion of time travel – apparently his current excitement item for today – is something that Ryan realizes that Castle considers a real possibility. One worth embracing.
And, he fears, one worth experiencing. There is no in between with Richard Castle.
"What are you thinking Castle?" he asks.
"What if she is right, Kevin?" Castle asks in return. "What if it is possible?"
"What? Time travel?" Kate asks, unable to disguise the surprise and disbelief in her voice. Castle glances at her, shaking his head.
"The one person in the room who could benefit the most from time travel is the one who totally disregards the possibility," he says softly. "Yes, time travel," he replies.
"It's not possible," Ryan counters.
"A cop says it's not possible, while a scientist with a Ph. D in the field says it is quite possible," Castle replies. "Guess which one I choose to believe."
Seeing the hurt look on Ryan's face, Castle softens his tone.
"Forgive me, my friend," Castle begins. "Each of us has our own built-in bias as to why time travel is impossible. But I just listened to a fairly impassioned pitch by someone far more qualified than you or I that screams otherwise."
"What do you mean, Castle?" Esposito asks, now a bit more interested. Kate finds a chair at the table, and drops into it. She doesn't want to buy into the myth. She has spent half of her life steeling herself against further heartbreak.
"Dr. Windholm explained to me how time travel is possible," he explains.
"Castle," Kate intones.
"Kate," he replies, allowing her time to process this.
"Castle, it's not possible," she says, shaking her head, now standing and moving towards the door, walking backwards.
"You keep saying that," Castle allows softly. "But what if you're wrong? What if you're wrong and the highly qualified quantum physicist is right?"
A silences descends on the room for the next few seconds, as three sets of eyes eventually fall upon the retreating form backing towards the door.
"Castle," Esposito cautions, now fully engaged in the conversation. "This isn't some hypothetical conversation, is it? This isn't just a 'hey, time travel is real' and then we all just drop the conversation, is it?"
"You know what this would do for her, don't you, Javier," Castle tells him, speaking softly while his eyes never leave those of the woman he loves. It is not a question. It is a statement of fact.
"To give her back her mother," he continues, still glancing at Kate. "To give her back her family."
"No, Rick," Kate tells him, still backing away, but more slowly now.
"Suppose you are right, Castle," Kevin offers, trying to change tactics. "Changing one element of history has repercussions, Castle. You change one thing – and you have no idea what else changes."
"Ripples," Esposito adds, nodding his head.
"If Dr. Windholm is right," Castle replies, ignoring the nay-saying and rationalizations, "and I have no reason to doubt her – then, all of you know what this could mean! If we could save Johanna's life, then yes, you're darn right. Kate's life is different. It's better. She's not Don Quixote flailing at windmills, throwing her life away over William Bracken."
He glances again at a still quiet Kate, wondering if he has finally overstepped. Surprisingly, he hasn't. Even more surprising – it is Kate who finally joins the discussion.
"But William Bracken would still exist – and probably still be evil."
"So what!" Castle admonishes, waving a hand as if dismissing a fly. "There will always be William Brackens in the world. But if we can have a William Bracken who didn't kill Johanna Beckett . . . come on, Kate! You have to see the beauty in this," Castle continues, a new urging in his voice as he draws ones and zeroes between the two circles on the board, duplicating the drawing that the doctor has left with him.
"Look Castle, if it were possible, you know –"
"It is possible," he exclaims, now clearly frustrated with the trio. Somehow he should have expected this, but he really thought they would react differently.
He thought she would react differently.
"It is possible," he repeats. "How often do we get a chance to change history, for crying out loud?! And in a way that benefits us."
He glances at Kate again.
"That benefits you," he tells her. He turns to the white board.
"It's like a cell phone call," he begins. "According to Dr. Windholm, there is no time machine, or time traveling ship or chariot or container . . . dammit," he chuckles to himself before continuing. "Instead, think of how you talk into a cell phone, and your voice is converted into a bunch of ones and zeroes –"
"Data," Kate offers softly. He smiles, sensing she could be warming up to this.
"Exactly, babe," he praises her. "Data. Data that is sent through thin air to another device – another cell phone. The way she explained it, time travel is the same way."
"There is nothing about what you just said that sounds painless, bro," Esposito warns. "If this is true, of course."
"But what else could change?" Kevin asks, still trying to get Castle to consider unforeseen ramifications. He knows enough about his friend to realize that if there is a way to do this, then Castle will find it, consequences be damned. And he will probably drag Beckett down the rabbit hole with him. In this case – literally.
"What about the grandfather paradox?" Kevin asks, but Castle is focused now completely on Kate. He can tell she is considering this. She wants to do this, but she is afraid to even consider the possibilities. She just needs to be talked into this. Her quivering lips and agitated fingers that cannot stop fiddling give her away.
"Ah, so you know a little more about the topic than you care to admit," a smirking Castle replies to Detective Ryan. "It doesn't matter. The paradox doesn't hold up here."
Castle turns away from the group, and draws a stick man inside the circle to the right. He writes a name under the circle.
Rick.
"Suppose Rick here," he starts, pointing at the circle on the right, "suppose he goes back in time to the year 1940. He meets his grandfather there," he tells them, drawing another stick figure, this time inside the left circle. He puts a beard on the left stick man, drawing nervous laughter from the group.
"That's good," he thinks. "Just relax into this."
"Our little time traveling Rick goes back in time and kills his grandfather before his grandfather has a chance to meet his grandmother," Castle continues, drawing a big 'X' through the old man stick figure in the left circle. As a result of his action, his grandmother never gives birth to his father. Now, because of this, our time traveler was never born. But if he was never board, then he is unable to travel through time and kill his grandfather, which means the traveler would be born after all. And so on."
"Exactly!" Ryan exclaims triumphantly.
"None of that matters, though," Castle tells him, bursting the air from his bubble with another dismissive wave of the hand. "We aren't going back to kill anyone."
"We aren't going back at all, Castle," Kate argues. It's too much. It's too promising. But it will turn out like a hundred of Castle's theories before. Funny, exciting.
And pure fancy.
"Stay with me, Kate," he tells her, and then stops in his tracks. "We aren't going back to kill anyone. One letter. That's it," he exults, the plan that has been percolating in his mind finally bubbling over.
"We intercept one simple letter. We make sure it never reaches its destination."
"Castle," Kate says, shaking her head. He's losing her.
"Meet with her, Kate," he suddenly says to the woman he has chased and cherished, and often hurt. "One meeting, one hour," he says, pulling the business card from his inside coat pocket.
"Hear her out, not me, Kate," he finishes. "Let her explain it to you. Let her show you."
"Show her?!" Esposito almost screams out, beating Kate to the punch. "What do you mean let her show –"
"She has a prototype," Castle says softly, placing the writing marker on the ledge attached to the white board.
"This isn't hypothetical. They've done this before."