My sincerest apologies for the long wait. This one was sitting in the kitty ready to post, in case I got held up writing chapter 8 - and lo and behold, I did. Thank you to everyone who reviewed the last chapter.

I haven't yet decided if the events of 6x17 will happen in this story, but for the time being, assume they don't.

With thanks to:
Sky for continuing to prod me about actually writing things
Vicky for being hilarious
Anna for being constantly optimistic
Alex for being crazy and awesome
Smarts for being Smarts

As promised - fluff!

I don't own anything you recognise


Previously:

He can't. He can see her expression spiralling quickly and he stalls, taking a step back as the door flings open to allow the doctor access. He gestures vaguely towards the exit, nearly tripping over himself in his haste.

"I'll see you tomorrow, Kate," he mumbles, already out of the door and turning away.

But as soon as he steps outside, a blanket of guilt settles over him. He's not strong enough for this. She needs him, and he can't even look her in the eye long enough to tell her the truth. He hates himself for not saying it outright, for not putting her at ease with the fumbling words that she will hear over and over again.

If he can't do it, how will she?


Imagine knowing.

Being full of the world's endless answers.

But you can't share them.

Everything around you is blurred around the edges but the centre is sharp: sharp as it's ever been.

You can think in long, comprehensible sentences that you normally wouldn't think twice about saying - yet you can't make your thoughts meet your tongue, the lump of muscle sitting heavily in your mouth as you switch off involuntarily for one second and miss a day of being watched like a zoo animal, poked and prodded and tested until the figures of your results spin around your head relentlessly.

This was the world she was in.

And no one could get her out.


She's bored. Bored of being stuck in this bed. Bored of being talked at rather than talked to. Bored of being bored.

At first it had been terrifying, not being able to move half her body - despite what they all think, she can hear, and she does know about the paralysis - but now it's tiresome. She wants to be up and moving, hunting for clues, chasing leads, doing what she does best, but her body betrays her with its stiffness and sudden spasms of agony.

The most frustrating thing is that she can only communicate with eye rolls and smiles and grimaces and little squeaks of pain. The odd word escapes her but she prefers to keep quiet. She's still not used to that lag between brain and mouth.

She has never been more grateful for having two arms - one might be out of action but the other she can use to hold Rick's hand, scrawl notes, rub her eyes; and it's the little things that make the big difference. No one having to wipe her nose for her. Being able to scratch that annoying spot on her shoulder blade. Bliss. It almost makes up for all the things they've been running over her skin to see if she can feel - yes, she is still ticklish. Yes, on both feet. It's a bit of a relief.

Soon, it's all too obvious that she has to start from the beginning. She's never been one to take things slow (as Castle so lovingly pointed out to all the medical staff) and the concept of baby steps is somewhat alien.

But her hatred of being patronized is justified. Her speech therapist is a middle-aged blonde and at first, before she opens her mouth, Kate thinks that in another life, the therapist looks like someone she might have befriended.

The thought is quashed the moment she breaks out a box of picture cards from her bag.

"Kate, my name is Tina. Can you hear me?" Instantly, Castle grimaces at the detective, who nods grimly. "I understand you are having trouble with saying words. Is that right?" Again, Kate nods. Tina opens the box and sets out the cards on the tray on Kate's lap. They're colourful, depicting cartoon scenes with short sentences on, as could be found in your average kids' book.

"I'm sorry." Castle steps forward to squint at the cards, his voice incredulous. "Are - are these supposed to help her?"

The therapist turns to him. "And you are?" she asks coldly. Kate can see him bristle and had this been a different situation would have patted his arm gently. As it is, she can only shake her head discreetly.

"I'm her - partner." Oh. Yeah. She hasn't answered his proposal yet.

"And are you a qualified medical professional? No," she steam-rollers on as he opens his mouth. "So yes, this is supposed to help her."

Kate latches onto his hand and squeezes.

"Now, Kate," - and Kate has an urge to snap 'Detective Beckett' at her - "I thought we'd start with something fairly straight-forward. If you could read these aloud - "

Finally, she sees what had Rick so indignant. There is no way she is going to broadcast the resting habits of cats. "No."

Tina blinks. "Kate, this is part of your recovery process. It's very easy to do - and I can assure you, I'm not here to humiliate you." Kate snorts. "Here. I'll say it first. 'The cat sat on the mat'. Now you."

She shakes her head again. They can keep her in bed, hooked up to machines of all kinds, but she will not pretend she has the reading age of a toddler.

"Kate."

"Tina," she mimics. Out of the corner of her eye, she can see Rick suppressing a smirk at the appearance of pre-shooting Kate and she wiggles her fingers in his.

"This is not helping you come to terms with your injuries. It will be a lot easier if you can communicate, won't it?"

"Yes," tries Kate. "Cats - are - stupid. Why - not - book?" A proud gleam shines from her eyes: a stilted yet complete sentence declaring her independence and the fact that she's still mentally intact.

"Because attempting to read something complicated could be more of a hindrance than a help," Tina says. "At least try it, just once."

Kate's stubborn streak is pulsing through her with every breath and she finds that the thrill she gets from defying this figure of authority is very similar to the thrill she got from interrogating suspects. There's no way she's giving in.

They sit in silence for the next half hour, punctuated only by Tina's attempts to get her talking, before she abruptly leaves, her parting message leaving Rick steaming at the ears and Kate quaking.

"I'll be back tomorrow. I hope you realise that unless you learn to cooperate, your chance of returning to the force is even lower than it already is. In my opinion, they're better off without you."


"She has no right!"

"But - true!" Kate argues back just as vehemently. "True. I'll - never - get - back."

"You will! And you can! Come on, Kate. Come on. Where's that iron determination you used to have?"

"Gone. With - my - legs. Gone."

Quiet reclaims the room and she shifts slightly, wriggling until she can get the dead weight of her leg into a comfortable position. A word pings in her head and she blurts it without a second thought.

"Partner." Rick looks at her. He's confused, she can tell. He's probably forgotten his stutter earlier. "You - said - "

"Oh." He does remember. He does.

"Proposal."

"Yeah."

Well. One of them's got to do the talking and she'll be damned if it's her.

"I never - " she finally says, and she doesn't look at him, watching the forlorn twitch of her fingers. Doesn't watch for the inevitable flash of disgust as he looks at her and takes back the question he asked all those weeks ago.

"No."

Infuriating, infuriating man. Give her a proper response, just don't prolong the pain of knowing it's going to be revoked in the face of the New Her.

"So - " she prompts impatiently. He sighs, and she can hear her heart begin to pound in her head. She closes her eyes and takes a deep breath - steeling herself.

"Katherine Houghton Beckett," - and her eyes fly open - "All I said before still stands. Will you marry me?"

"Yes." It's a breathless, hurried reply, attempting to make up for lost time. "Yes. I will - marry - you."


The next day, she's surprised by the glint of excitement in his eyes as he bounds into the room, clutching a handful of books that he dumps triumphantly in her lap.

"Ta-da!"

She's happy to see him acting like his usual self but the reason for his bounciness is hidden until she glances down and -

Oh.

Oh.

Wonderful, caring man. He's brought her her Nikki Heats. Books. With the familiar crisp crackle of fresh pages of Deadly Heat and the more worn, softer pages of Heat Wave. There, with her. A part of him to keep by her side.

"Read with me, Kate," he implores as he picks up the first in the series and perches on the side of the bed. She sits up and leans towards him, smiling at the dedication in front of her.

"To the extraordinary KB and all my friends at the 12th."

They read it slowly, Kate echoing each of his words as he follows the sentence with a finger, giving it time for the words to sink in.

He tilts his head to kiss her cheek. "You're still extraordinary, you know," he whispers. "You'll always be my extraordinary detective."


Robert-the-physiotherapist, on the other hand, is much more like the brother she wishes she had, reminding her of Ryan's boyish nature and Espo's grit. He greets her with a playful slap to her ankles, and before long the semi-polite bickering turns into full-on banter.

The session passes in a blur. At the end of it, she's gifted with a sheet of exercises involving muscles she didn't know she had, to be completed with a large variety of squidgy objects.

"He seems nice," Castle says as he hands her a few toys to try, tossing them from hand to hand in childish glee.

"Yeah." With a stern frown she takes the ginormous elastic band from him as he makes to ping it to the other side of the room. "Behave."

The writer sticks his tongue out and sits back down, picking up the remote that controls her bed and pressing the down button. With a whirr, she flattens out and sighs. "Tired?" he asks sympathetically.

"Tired," she agrees.

"How about a few of these, then you can sleep?" He points to the list and she sighs again.

"Alright."

He can see her concentration waning and watches her carefully. When she sets down a stress ball with a huff, he pokes her gently and mock-frowns at her.

"Do your exercises, Detective." He doesn't miss the flash of sadness.

"Not - detective," she struggles to spit but Rick shakes his head.

"You can take the girl from her badge, but you can't take the badge from the girl." He reaches over and rubs her foot. "You'll always be a detective, Kate. No one can take that from you. Once this is over, you'll still be one." There was silence for a second, but then she yelps.

"Rick!"

"Yes, Detective?" God, that man - but her title isn't her main concern at that moment. He's lightly running his fingertips over the sole of her bad foot and she can't move out of the way of the torturous tickling and it's sore, it hurts, but somehow it hurts in a nice, comforting way - and she laughs. A huge smile breaks out and she laughs her glorious laugh, throwing her head back a little as her body shakes with tiny tremors.

"Rick! Stop!"

"Sorry, stop what?"

"That!"

He pretends to look confused and she narrows her eyes at him, still chuckling. With a squeak, Kate picks up the foam ball lying uselessly in her other hand and launches it at him, and it hits his chest with a satisfying thump.

"That wasn't very nice, Detective," he smirks, scooping it up and booping her on the nose with it.

"Out," she commands, pointing at the door. "Out."

Rick stays exactly where he is. "Nice try, sweetheart. I'm not going anywhere." She clearly feels otherwise and snatches the ball from him, throwing it at his head.

"Out!"


Furious fingers punch the numbers into the cell, jaw clenched, trembling with restrained rage.

"Yes?" the voice on the other end snaps.

He wastes no time on pleasantries. "Bracken," he hisses. "Why?"

A pause.

"Oh, I see." The voice chuckles mirthlessly. "You found the girl."

"My girl," he spits. "You framed my girl, my daughter - who I thought was dead - framed her for shooting Beckett. My daughter, William. Remember Lucy? I could have taken her from you so easily, with one swipe - "

"Oh, you could have. But you never had the strength, the power that I do."

"I had plenty. I just knew how to use it."

"No." The voice is hard, harsh against his ear, grating with hate-concealed fury. "No - you never knew how to use it. And now I can get my own back on those years when you controlled it all."

"Not if I can help it." He's pacing now, nervous energy burning through him. "They're already on your tail. Beckett's alive. They're gonna catch you, Bill."

"Foolish man. Can't you see that I'm in charge now?"

The line goes dead, and he is left with deadly silence, the ghost of the senator's last threat hanging in the air.


Thoughts?

For ramblings that are sometimes related to writing: KermitKettle