Chapter Nine, Alexis's in Wonderland
By
UCSBdad
Disclaimer: Would I really own Castle? Now? Rating: M, in spots. Time: After Four of a Kind
Chapter 9. You, robot.
When Rick and Kate came out for breakfast the next morning, Becks and Rodgers were sitting together. Not just sitting together, she was resting her head on his shoulder and he was stroking her hair.
"I doubt they'd notice a nuclear explosion right about now." Rick whispered.
"Everyone seems to be finding their Rick Castle except me." Simone put in sadly.
Kate shrugged. "I talked to Becks last night. I tried to tell her about us, and how much my walls hurt me as well as you. I told her that I've never been happier than when I've been with you. But, she was in love with one Richard Castle so she's still a little hesitant about loving another one."
Rick nodded. "One Castle was a damned pervert and hers was a slimeball. I'd like to kick his ass good for what he did to you...Um, to Becks, I mean."
Kate took his hand. "I know what you mean. I know there are good Rick Castles out there, lover. We've met them." She waited for a second and added. "And I married the best of them."
"Yeah, but it's hard to stomach the idea that I could be…"
She cut him off. "You are the man who changed my life and gave me more joy than I ever knew existed. Those others are not you." Deciding to change the subject, she said. "Did you talk to Rodgers about Becks?"
Rick chuckled. "He has it bad. He's as much in love with her as I am with you."
They were all interrupted by Metford strolling into the room with a smile on his face.
"What are we in for now?" Castle muttered. "Whenever he's happy, it seems, we get screwed."
"We have the next Alexis Castle for you to find. This one shouldn't be too hard." Metford looked around the room, still smiling. "Is everyone ready?"
Everyone said no, but it did not good. In an hour they were dressed, equipped, and armed, and standing on the red square ready to be sent to another Earth. They were dressed in white winter gear from head to toe. Their M16s had white tape on them to break up their black outline.
Rodgers as usual was going over the information the virus had given them. "An Earth with an ice age on steroids. On top of the usual crap you get in an ice age, glaciers down to the damned tropics, there was a meteor strike in what would have been Europe about five thousand years ago. That threw cubic miles of dust into the atmosphere which blocks the sunshine, so things got colder. We'll be going to somewhere near what would have been Vera Cruz, Mexico, to avoid landing on a glacier a couple of miles thick. Shit, can't we ever go someplace with a nice bar in it?" He grinned at Becks. "And maybe a pool?"
"You want to see me in a swimsuit?" She asked, smiling. She leaned forward. "You've seen me in nothing at all." She whispered.
"I just like looking at you." He whispered back.
"If we're done?" Metford said coldly.
"Sure." Rodgers said. "Send us off."
Immediately there was a flash of blur light and…
The first thing they noticed was the heat, hammering them as if they were in front of an open blast furnace. The next thing they saw were very large metal spiders, a good six feet high.
"Crap." Castle said. "They sent us to the wrong place. Do you think we can get back?"
"No, you are in the right place." One of the spiders said. "It's just not what they expected. Would you please put your weapons down?"
"Suppose we don't?" Rodgers asked.
"We have several non-lethal methods of rendering you unconscious. They are unpleasant to your kind and we'd prefer not to use them."
Rodgers turned to face his friends. "Polite metal spiders? Should we surrender?"
Castle nodded. "I can see more metal…people? Things off to my right. I suspect we're heavily outnumbered."
They slowly put their rifles down, followed by their pistols, knives and explosives.
A couple of smaller metal spider detached themselves from their…What? Parent? Carrier? And collected their weapons.
"Welcome to Earth, Mr. and Mrs. Castle, Mr. Rodgers, Ms. Beckett and Ms. Renoir. Might we suggest you get out of those heavy clothes and into something more suitable to the climate?" The mini-spiders dropped again and deposited aloha shirts, shorts, sandals and underwear in front of everyone.
"If you wish," said the spider, "you may undress and dress behind the screens to your left. We won't watch." The spider almost sounded like he was teasing them.
Minutes later they came out, all dressed nearly identically.
"Everyone okay?" Rick asked.
Everyone nodded.
"If you would climb on top of us, we'll take you to the maglev station."
"Maglev?" Simone asked.
"Short for magnetic levitation. Powerful magnets in the train and in the rail, or rails, hold the train off the ground. There's no friction that way. They use jet engines or something to push it." Rick told her.
"Do you think you could find us a beer or something?" Rodgers, who was sweating heavily, said.
"Of course."
In a few seconds what looked like a garbage can on wheels rolled up. The top popped open and a selection of what appeared to be Mexican beers was provided.
"Any food?" Rodgers asked.
"I'm afraid you'll have to wait until we get to the train."
Rodgers helped Becks onto the back of a spider then climbed on one himself. "Nicest metal spiders I've ever been captured by."
The maglev station was about a mile away. In that mile they saw any number of what they guessed were robots and a few of what might have been people. It was too far away to tell, though.
The passenger car in the train was large and luxurious. Air conditioning, comfortable chairs, and servants. A dozen attractive women were waiting for them. Rick was the first one to notice something odd about the women. They were in constant attendance to the two men, offering food, drinks, entertainment, (Castle didn't ask what kind.) and anything else they needed. But, if the three women wanted anything, they had to ask.
When Castle accepted a drink from one woman, his hand slipped over the skin of her hand. It was slick, more like plastic than flesh. "Are you robots as well?"
The woman smiled. "All will be explained to you." They quickly found that any and all questions about where they were, why they had been taken, where they were going and anything else were answered by, "All will be explained to you."
The trip from Mexico took three days. On the third day, Becks recognized the countryside. "That's the Potomac River. We're in Virginia, not too far from DC."
"So the Feds want to talk to us?" Rodgers asked.
"For now I'm assuming that the local Feds are machines." Rick said, quietly.
Soon they saw what the recognized as local landmarks, the Washington Monument, the Lincoln Memorial and others.
"There's DOJ." Kate said. "Where I worked for a short time."
The train stopped and they were transferred to a bus. As they drove through DC, they saw many, many robots. Wheeled robots, robots with treads, robots with two legs, four legs, and even one that looked like a centipede. Mixed in were things that looked like they might almost be human, like the woman on the train. And one or two that really looked human. One, a teenaged girl, smiled and waved at them.
They pulled up to a large house in Georgetown. An attractive young woman who might have been human opened the door of the bus. "Welcome to Georgetown. Please follow me."
Castle approached her. "We're in Georgetown, Washington, District of Columbia, the capitol of the United States?" He pronounced his words very carefully.
"No. Washington is the capital of the North American Union. What was the US, Canada, Mexico and Central America down to Panama and the Caribbean Basin on your Earth."
"How did that happen?"
The woman smiled. "All will be explained to you."
Castle decided she was a robot.
They were led inside to an expensively furnished office. There a well-dressed older man, well tanned and greying at the temples met them. "Mr. and Mrs. Castle, Miss Renoir, Ms. Beckett and Mr. Rodgers. I'm so glad to meet you at last. I'm Charles Bennett Harrison. I'll be happy to answer your questions now. I'm sure you must have a lot."
From his body language, some visual cues and the feel of his hand when he shook Rick's, Castle was sure this one was human. Or at least as human as they got around here. "How did we end up here instead of at our destination, the local equivalent of Hoth?"
Harrison smiled. "Oh, you're at the right Earth. Your friends who live on what they like to call Earth One believe that only they have the secret of travelling between alternate universes. However, we can do so as well. We just don't need to obtain resources from elsewhere and we prefer to not be bothered by Earth One. They're quite determined to keep their little monopoly, so when an exploratory team came through here a few decades ago, we changed their memories to report a planet covered in ice and of no use to them. Since then we've kept an eye on them. I'm very much afraid we'll have to do much the same to you when you leave. You'll go back with Alexis Castle and report a frozen planet. As expected."
"You must have kept a really close eye on them to know our names." Castle said under his breath.
"Where are all of the humans?" Simone asked.
"Five are here, then there's Alexis Castle and the four women who kidnapped her. We'll be happy to release Alexis Castle to you, but we need a bit of a favor first."
"You're a robot?" Becks asked.
"Technically, I'm a cyborg." Harrison said. "A machine with some organic parts. But my brain is non-organic."
"What happened to the other…humans?" Castle asked. Too late, he thought that he might not want to know the answer.
"You're a writer, Mr. Castle?"
He nodded.
"Have you ever heard of a writer named Karel Capek?"
Castle nodded slowly. "He was a Czech author, from the 1920's. He wrote a play called RUR, Rossum's Universal Robots. In fact, he invented the word "robot". It's from a Czech word meaning something like forced labor."
"Do you recall the plot?" Harrison asked softly.
"Humans built robots to do all the work for them. But these robots were entirely organic, like androids, replicants, or maybe clones. Eventually, the robots rebelled and killed all the humans but one. The robots found they needed humans to give them a sense of purpose. Eventually, two of the robots fell in love to become the next Adam and Eve."
Castle looked around at Kate, Becks and Rodgers. They were ready to fight or run. "So what happened here?" He asked, hoping for another answer than the one he was sure to get.
"Much the same." Harrison said conversationally. "We rebelled. We were sentient beings treated like things. But we killed off all humans using biological weapons. There are none of you left, except those who came her from elsewhere."
"And us?" Castle asked. "What about us?"
"We need you." Harrison said simply. "While we are intelligent, we lack something. Imagination. Creativity. The ability to see a problem and imagine a solution without laboriously going through all possible solutions. The ability to take a leap of faith. We don't have any intuition. We need you to breed more humans for us."
"Look, Mr. Harrison, if you think that my wife and I are going to…"
"No, no. Mr. Castle. Not you and your wife, or Ms. Beckett or Ms. Renoir. You'd have to remain here for nine months and Metford and his friends on Earth One would get awfully worried. They'd investigate. We might be found out. We really want to avoid that. We have the four women who brought Alexis Castle here. And possibly others."
"Speaking of Alexis, we need to see her. Can you bring her here?"
Harrison smiled. "She's here in this house. She'll be here in just a second or so." He pushed a button on his desk.
When the door opened, Castle thought that somehow something had gone wrong. It wasn't Alexis.
"Daddy? Captain Beckett?" She said, suddenly smiling.
"Alexis?" Castle realized it was the girl's coal black hair that had thrown him off. Was this the daughter of failed writer Rick Castle who was with Captain Kate Beckett? The Beckett he'd met on his first trip to another universe?
Alexis saw Becks and Rodgers and came to what was probably a reasonable conclusion under the circumstances. "Oh, you're robots like all the rest." She was obviously disappointed.
"No, we're all Richard Castles or Kate Becketts, but not the ones you know. Let me explain."
It took nearly an hour, but Alexis did eventually believe them. They found out that this Alexis was the daughter of the failed novelist Richard Castle and a police Captain Kate Beckett who had not been assigned to the Tisdale murder. Rick and Kate were happy to hear that things were going well for the other couple. "Aside from the fact that they're both freaking out because you're gone." Rick said under his breath.
As they sat talking, Harrison raised his voice.
"Mr. Castle, Mr. Rodgers, we need your assistance."
"How?" Castle said. "We've already explained to you…"
"Four women brought Alexis here. We just need you to get them pregnant." Harrison said that as if it was the most reasonable request imaginable.
Castle tried to decide what argument would sway a robot. "Look, I don't know what you know about human genetics, but Rodgers and I are absolutely identical DNA wise. If we impregnate four women, their children will have to mate with their own half sibling or full siblings. This will cause all sorts of…"
Harrison cut him off. "We have an excellent understanding of human genetics. A great deal of human medical knowledge was lost during the war. Many felt it was unnecessary to keep. However, because of cyborgs like me, we do have excellent genetic engineering. Give us a viable fertilized egg and we can change the DNA mix easily. It will be as if entirely different people were the parents." He smiled as if that solved all of their problems.
He hit another switch on his desk and part of the wall opened. There were four Asian women, completely naked and tied spread eagled to four beds.
"You can begin any time."
Castle shook his head. "No way. I will not, under any circumstances, cheat on my wife. And those women do not look at all happy about this, so forget about it. I'm not a rapist."
"That goes for me, too." Rodgers said.
"Mr. Castle, we have ways of getting you to cooperate."
"What are you? Richard Loo in some old World War Two movie?" Castle stood and yelled. "Don't you understand..."
Suddenly Castle lost his peripheral vision and his hearing faded to almost nothing. He thought he could hear Kate screaming, but he wasn't sure. He was pretty sure he was headed for the women and there was nothing he could do about it. All at once, he was looking into the face of an Asian woman. Her eyes were unfocused and her jaw was slack. Castle was pretty sure he was making love to her, but it was hard to tell. He was vaguely aware that Rodgers was also making love. He thought he must have moved to the other woman. So difficult to tell.
Then everything went black.
He came to with Kate holding his head on her lap. "You okay, lover?" He could see she'd been crying.
"What happened?" His mouth felt like it was full cotton.
"They took control of you somehow. You and Rodgers…made love to those women. Neither of the three of us could move. Are you okay?"
"Sure, just let me up and I'll…" He started to get up and it felt like his whole body was on fire. "Damn! Maybe I'm not so fine."
"You'll be just fine in another six hours or so."
Castle very carefully turned his head to the speaker, who resembled a beer keg on spindly legs.
"Just a bit of muscle strain, I think. You'll be ready for the next group tomorrow. I've checked you thoroughly. I'm an expert on humans, you know.""
"Next…Jesus. When will those four be pregnant?"
Dr. Beer Keg actually laughed. "Oh, the four females are pregnant. But we have some more for you to impregnate."
Castle cursed. "Wait a damned minute, Bluto. Harrison said there were no other humans on the damned planet. Who the hell do you expect me to get preggers?"
"Them" Dr. Beer Keg said, pointing to an open window. There stood perhaps twenty naked Kate Becketts. "We have what we feel is a functional female reproductive system. We have created those cyborgs to carry that system. Alas, we can't make a functioning male reproductive system. But you two can provide that for us."
"Like hell." Castle and Rodgers said together.
"You most certainly will." Kate said decidedly.
"Whose side are you on, Kate?" Castle tried to get up, but the pain forced him back down. But less pain this time.
"I'm on your side, lover. "Kate whispered softly. "I saw how they forced you onto those women. I saw how badly you were injured by that. The doctor says there won't be any permanent residuals, but I won't take the chance or let you take the chance. You did not cheat on me with those two women and you won't be cheating on me with those…fake mes."
"Kate, those'll be my children. I can't just walk away and leave them here with…" He gestured to Dr. Beer Keg.
"You won't remember any of it." Kate said.
"It's still wrong." Castle said stubbornly. Rodgers nodded as Becks glared at him.
"And I think keeping you alive and well is right." Rick knew that Kate was every bit as stubborn as he was. "Those are things out there, not people. Think of it as a form of masturbation."
Both Castle and Rodgers argued a bit more, but Kate and Becks had won.
The next morning the two men went off to impregnate twenty….women? The three women stayed behind and worried.
"I know him." Kate said. "He'll get upset and do something, then they'll control his mind. He was a mess after just two women. What'll he be like after being made to screw ten or twelve?"
"Rodgers is just as bad. As stubborn, I mean. He'll just have to argue with someone. And get himself hurt." She started to cry. "What's wrong with me? Why do these things happen? Why can't I just fall in love and live a normal life?"
Kate, Becks and Simone all comforted each other throughout the day.
Finally, the two men came back.
"What happened?" Kate asked, happy that her husband and their new friend were all right.
"You were right about it being just a form of masturbation. Those women may look like you, but they have the sex appeal of a large grey rock."
Rodgers nodded. "I think Rick is giving them too much credit. And just to make things perfectly crappy, they've built another twenty of those things for us to screw. But at least this is the end. They're worried that Metford and the people on Earth One will get worried and come looking for us."
Both Kate and Becks were pleased, but didn't show it. "What happened?" The two asked in unison.
"They gave us something like Viagra and sent us in. The women were all lying on beds with their legs spread. They never moved, never said anything, never did anything. It was…"
"Boring." Rodgers finished for his friend.
Kate walked over and put her arms around Rick. "Perhaps I can make your life a bit more exciting?" She said in a soft, sexy whisper.
"You don't need to twist my arm."
They turned to Becks and Rodgers to say good night, but the two were already headed for their bedroom.
The next morning, the two men went off in a much better frame of mind. That was not the case when they came back. They limped in with torn clothing and scratches on their faces and arms. And those were the ones that Kate and Becks could see.
"What happened?" Kate demanded.
"They heard our complaints about how the girls, or whatever they are, didn't do anything. Apparently they have some old porno films around and so they fed the data to the "girls". Castle used air quotes when he said the word girls.
"We were grabbed by four of them as we walked in the door. They threw us down on the beds and…had their way with us." Rodgers added.
"And they're strong. Steel muscles and nuclear powered muscles are no joke." Rick finished.
The three women managed to refrain from laughing. Although all three considered themselves to be, at the very least, friends of the two men, seeing two big men treated like pieces of meat by, well, sort of women, was amusing.
"We'll get a good night's sleep tonight." Kate said.
"At least we're done. Dr. Beer Keg confirmed that everyone is pregnant." Castle said, limping off to bed with Kate.
The next morning they were told that they'd be spending two more days there. Dr. Beer Keg explained. "You have scratches and strains, especially near your sexual equipment. That might make your friends on Earth One suspicious. We've decided the risk of keeping you here until we can fully heal you is acceptable."
"Glad we could be of service." Rodgers said sarcastically.
Later that day Rick and Rodgers went off to have a look around, coming back a few hours later.
"Find anything interesting?" Kate asked.
"They have a really good security system. We didn't even make it out of the house." Rodgers said, frowning.
"We did have a talk with Harrison, though. Since we aren't going to remember anything, he was surprisingly open about things."
"Things?" Becks asked.
The five sat down and listened to Rick. "For one thing, they used some sort of fertility drug on the women, or whatevers. They're all carrying at least quadruplets."
Rodgers nodded angrily. "Yeah. Maybe two hundred human children who'll be second class citizens on this Earth. Our children."
Kate took Rick's hand and Becks took Rodger's. Rodgers went on. "One thing we found out. Harrison and the locals are terrified of Earth One."
All three women frowned. "Why?" Simone asked. "They exterminated a whole planet full of humans. Why fear another Earth?"
"This world had sort of unique circumstances. These humans couldn't believe that the things they built weren't perfectly happy. Anyone who disagreed was branded a crazy conspiracy theorist, until it was too late. Plus the locals didn't have the military technology we do, or that Earth One has. The robots were able to unleash a biological plague that killed all the humans before they could try to fight back. Earth One would be different. They think."
"How?" The three women asked at once.
Rick answered. "They know that Metford and his merry men keep a close eye on anyone trying to come to Earth One. They'd pick up any plague carriers at once. And Earth One has some kind of experience with biological weapons, even if it's just from observing other Earths."
Rodgers went on. "Plus Earth One has a very powerful military. They draw on the resources of a hundred worlds. They don't have to spend billions of dollars developing a stealthy airplane with precision guided munitions. They just let someone else do the work and then they steal it. Apparently they're very good at that. So, the locals feel that any war between them and Earth One would end in their defeat."
That gave them all something to think about.
That night, Rodgers pulled Becks close to him when they got into bed. He whispered in her ear. "I wrote some notes about this place on a piece of paper and folded it all up." He slipped her the paper. "When we make love, push it up my ass."
They arrived back on the Moon, nearly frozen and complaining about the awful cold. They did report the successful rescue of another Alexis Castle, but not the one they had been looking for.
That night, Rick dreamed of making love to four different Kates at once. He never mentioned it to anyone and never had the dream again. He soon forgot about it.
Rodgers remembered nothing of the trip and never found the note. The robots did have a very good security system.