InsaneJournal

Since Kate had woken with the new memories in her head, she had sat on a secret. At first, it had been because she thought that it was best to explain everything in bits and pieces and, most of all, because she hadn’t been emotionally ready to tell Castle the final part.

She was sure he knew she was keeping something from him. Even at the worst of times, Rick Castle was the most observant man she had ever met. He knew how to read her like the books he wrote, every single tell and twitch that she had utterly familiar after so many years of working and, later on, living side by side.

But one of the things that Kate appreciated was that Castle understood that sometimes she needed space. He knew when to push her and when to take a backseat and let her come to him with whatever was bothering her. The problem was that she’d spent a few days battling her nerves, worried about how the rest of the story would sound and, then, concerned about what he might say about the conclusion she had slowly drawn about their life together.

Kate had gone to the beach with the intention of reading and doing something about the too pale color of her skin after months on a spaceship, and while the sun had begun to take care of the latter she hadn’t started on the former. Her couple of hours alone in the sand of a secluded beach in Kauai had only given her more time to think.

“Hey Castle?” the sliding door that took up the entire back wall of the small house they had rented for a few days was standing open and a glance to the side of the house was enough to tell her that he wasn’t in the small pool. Placing the book on one of the tables, she stepped further into the house, bypassing the living room with its high-tech video screen and all the other fancy technology that had been invented two hundred years in the future and going down the short hallway to the lone bedroom and bathroom in the house. “Rick?”


“Yeah?” He had actually been reading as well, a contemporary murder mystery on the PADD, where one of the detectives was a robot. It was like Robocop, only the idea of a robot cop was completely normal. Castle put it down on the bed when Kate came into view.

He had been giving her space because he could tell that she needed it. The story would come out in bits and pieces and Castle knew that. Apparently, a lot had happened in the small amount of time that she had recovered. If making her talk about it meant causing her to relive some trauma, then he wasn’t going to do that. The past few days on their vacation had been good for her. Kate was finally relaxing and that made him happy.

Castle sat up on the bed and looked over at her. “Are you hungry?”


For just a moment, Kate didn’t move from her spot by the door, halfway leaning against the frame and just staring at her husband. He was always attractive to her but right then, sitting on the bed with a tiny smile, and ruffled hair flopping over onto his forehead he looked adorable. “Not really,” she answered his question with a shake of her head, pushing herself away from the door and over to a chair where one of Castle’s t-shirts had been left draped on the back.

Picking it up, Kate quickly pulled it on over her bikini, an item that she would otherwise never wear if anyone but Castle would be around to take notice. Even though her scars were years old now, she was very self-conscious about how they looked and, beyond that, Kate had learned that if she put them on display, people would ask what happened.

And, even now, she preferred not to talk about it. Especially with strangers.

“Am I interrupting anything important?” she asked, taking a seat on the bed and stretching out beside Castle, “I wanted to talk to you about something, but it can wait.”



Castle shook his head. “You’re not. I was just reading about actual robocops.”

He turned on his side to face her. While it was obvious that his wife looked amazing in a bikini, he had to say that he really liked it when she wore one of his shirts as well. Kate looked good in anything. Sometimes he had to pinch himself over the fact that this absolutely gorgeous woman was his wife.

“What’s up?”


“You mean like the Terminator?” she asked with a grin. Kate absolutely knew that the Terminator wasn’t a robot, nor was he a cop, but she liked to rile Castle up on occasion and get basic sci-fi facts wrong just to bring out his level of devotion to….well, practically anything.

Once he turned to face her, she lifted her hand to brush it through the thick strands of hair on the side of his head, the edges of her nails lightly dragging and his scalp with the motion. There wasn’t really a reason for the gesture, other than the fact that Kate wanted to touch him, but as she moved her fingers back and forth her face sobered considerably. “I wanted to tell you what’s been bothering me since I had those new dreams,” she said softly, “I should have told you sooner, but I just think I needed some time to wrap my head around it and, well, to decide what I wanted to do.”


“Seriously?” Castle asked. Then he rolled his eyes. He knew she was saying that just to annoy him, so he didn’t bother to launch into a speech of why Terminator and Robocop were completely different.

Whatever she had to talk about seemed serious, so he didn’t want to make light of it. He took her hand after she had run it through his hair, his fingers twining with hers. “Ok,” he said with a nod. “You know I’m always here to listen.”


Kate’s instinct was to curl up against him and keep her face hidden while she explained it all. Rick wasn’t going to mind if she did, but she minded because it seemed a bit cowardly not to face it all head on. So Kate sat up, crossing her legs Indian style, “I do,” she agreed easily, giving him a smile that was genuinely grateful if a little strained at the corners. “And I really need to thank you for not pushing me to talk about this until I was ready. I know it couldn’t have been easy for you to do that.”

Tugging her bottom lip between her teeth, Kate thought about the best place to begin and quickly decided there wasn’t one. The whole conversation was going to be difficult and much like ripping off a band-aid in one go, she opened her mouth and just started talking. “I know we talked about those memories that I had, and I told you about the both of us being shot,” she said, forcing herself not to fidget or to let her eyes roam anywhere other than Castle’s face. “That night when I told you about the new memories, I told you everything but one thing, and I held it back because I wasn’t even certain that it was true and, if it was, I just wasn’t ready to face what it meant.”

There really wasn’t anything left that Kate could say to explain herself or her reasoning for withholding that part of the story, but she did pause to let out a little half-breath as her nerves got the best of her when she paused. “I think I was pregnant when I was shot in the loft,” she said quickly, afraid that if she didn’t get it out that the words would just never come, the fingers of her free hand twisting in the material of Rick’s shirt that she was wearing.


He nodded, ready for her to come out with it, though trying to keep his patience for her sake. Pushing her did nothing, and he knew that. Kate was stubborn and would do things on her terms.

Castle watched her with his brow furrowed while she struggled to say whatever it was. Once it was out, he could understand why that had been so hard. His eyes widened slowly. “What?” Castle asked quietly. “Wait.. are you pregnant now?”

He held his breath, waiting for news that would change both of their lives.


Of all the reactions Kate had been expecting from Castle, the one he had wasn’t on the list. As surprised as she was, she also knew that it was a perfectly logical question and, for a heartbeat or two, she wished that she could give him a different answer.

“No,” she told him with a little shake of her head, “I’m not. It was just at home.”


He breathed, unsure if it was a sigh of relief or not. Castle hoped that she had checked with medical here and wasn’t just running under the assumption that she wasn’t pregnant. “Did you… you didn’t lose it, did you?” His eyes narrowed and he braced himself for the answer, hating to ask such a question, but knowing that he must. Was that where this was ultimately going?


She hadn’t checked with medical, in fact, Kate had been so absorbed with all the rest of it that she had never even given a thought to the possibility of being pregnant in the here and now. To her, there had been no symptoms, no hint of that sort of thing and that had been the end of it in her mind.

She had thought that she would manage to get through the conversation without crying, but at his next question, Kate knew she had been wrong to think that. The thought of losing a child, even if it hadn’t been her fault was painful enough but in this situation, Kate felt that she carried a whole lot of the blame because her mistakes and her vendetta’s had ultimately led them down a path that had ended with bullets in bodies.

Even if Castle had told her time after time that he would go wherever she led him, it didn’t make the consequences any easier to bear.

“I don’t know,” she whispered, the tears that had pricked at her eyes threatening to overflow. “Given where I was shot, it’s very possible.” It was also very possible that she had died, but that was a reality that Kate thought they were both aware of and she didn’t want to bring it up in an already painful situation.


“Kate…” He pulled her in close to him when he saw the tears in her eyes. The whole thing was only speculation, of course. To him, this whole timeline of hers was intangible, since he had never even seen it with his own eyes. Of course, he believed the things that she had seen. Kate was never the type to make things up like that. Castle heaved a slow sigh. Even if her future was hard for him to connect with, her having a baby and potentially losing it was still devastating. He stroked her back gently.

“I’m guessing I didn’t know about it.” He could surmise that much. “Were you happy about it?”

Castle was almost afraid to hear the answer to that question. While he would be open to the idea of having kids with her, he knew that she was a bit more unsure about it. He didn’t think she would get pregnant that early into their marriage either.


“I’m sorry, Castle,” she said it with a quiver in her voice, sliding her arms around his neck and practically crawling into his lap when he pulled her towards him. She wasn’t full on crying, at least not yet, but Kate was shaking from head to toe with the effort to keep from breaking down. “This whole thing didn’t have to happen if I wasn’t so stubborn.”

If she hadn’t gone after Loksat, if they hadn’t trusted Caleb Brown. If, if, if….there were a million of those scenarios in her head and while she knew she just had to let it go and move past it, it was easier realized than accomplished.

“No, you didn’t know,” Kate answered, pulling back enough to get a look at his face. “I wasn’t even convinced myself, I thought maybe it was the stress of the case and everything else. Or maybe I just told myself that because I was scared of the other answer.” She wasn’t really sure of which was the actual truth, beyond feeling that it wasn’t the best time for the two of them to have a baby. Though everyone in their life had spent years telling them that there wasn’t a best time and if they waited for it then it would never come.

Wiping at her wet cheeks she blew out a shaky breath. “I had decided that maybe after we had some sleep that I would tell you and we could decide what to do, but that never happened….” Kate said, pulling her bottom lip between her teeth as she thought about his last question. Had she been happy about the possibility of a baby with him? Underneath the denial and the fear, she had been. “It’s our kid. I was thrilled at the thought,” she added, leaning forward until their foreheads were brushing. “Scared to death of screwing it up, but happy.”


“You have nothing to be sorry about,” he said quietly, fingers moving up through her hair. Again, she was apologizing for things that hadn’t ever happened to him. Castle did wish she had told him about the potential baby sooner, but she had been through quite a lot. It might be better that he was processing this now, separately, instead of along with all of the other things she had to tell him.

With all that was happening to them, it probably wasn’t the best time for a baby. Sometimes Castle wondered if she would actually be able to put aside her pursuit of justice for a child. She would have to. Neither of them would want their child growing up without a mother.

He smiled a little when she said that she was happy about it though. “Good. Of course I want children with you, Kate. When the time is right.” Now they were on a spaceship though. What did that mean as far as timing?


“I might have gotten myself and our child killed. I got you shot and could have gotten you killed,” she replied, the tears sparking up again and, this time, sliding down her cheeks before Kate could stop them. “I have a million things to be sorry for.”

Swiping at her wet cheeks, she sighed, briefly laying her head on his shoulder. “I know you do,” she said, “And I had thought about it before I suspected it.” It felt like a cold comfort to admit that now, considering everything else that had happened. “But in the sense that once we got to Loksat and ended that threat that it might be the right time. I wasn't getting any younger, and being Captain I wasn't in the field in the line of fire so much. So it'd have been safer, you know?”


He sighed, trying to figure out how to express what he wanted to her without sounding insensitive. “Kate…” Castle took one of her hands in his. “I've told you, it's difficult for me to be mad at you about these things when, to me, they've never even happened. I don't want to dismiss that they happened to you, but I find that I can't get really upset about them. I'm trying to live in the now. Right now we're here. I'll always listen and support you when something upsets you, but I don't feel like getting mad about it is going to accomplish anything.”

Maybe it was because the last thing that he had remembered was their wedding that made him come off so optimistically. He had been in a good place that day and had kept it going when he woke up on the Enterprise. He didn't like dwelling on the bad stuff.

“So what about now, then?” He asked. They were free of people trying to kill them finally. The whole tenuousness of this place made him wary though.


“No, I know that,” she said with a little nod of her head. “You don't have to be mad at me, I'm angry enough at myself for the both of us.” And that was true, she was furious at herself for repeating the mistakes over and over that always asked such a high price.

Nothing was worth Castle’s life or destroying their life together. She had taken a long and dramatic route to learn that lesson, but learn it she had.

The question he asked was the one that Kate had been agonizing over since the memories arrived, her desire at home to start trying for a baby at odds with the logistics of their situation. They were refugees with no claim to anything, no identification beyond the Starfleet badges they were issued by the Enterprise. And, even beyond that, what kind of life was it for a child to live on a spaceship? To rarely see the sun, or trees, or grass.

“So much of me wants to say yes,” she said, untangling their fingers to cup his cheeks with her hands. “You and I? We’d have amazing kids, Castle. And I would love to see you with our baby, to really dig in and raise a kid together. I wouldn’t have the slightest idea what I was doing, but I’d be doing it with you and that’s enough incentive for me.”

The little smile she had given him with her explanation dimmed somewhat, a certain sadness leaking into her eyes as Kate shook her head. “I love you and if we were at home? I’d want to start trying today but we aren’t home, we are two hundred years in the future, and we’re living on a spaceship that only docks somewhere for a couple of weeks at a time. We don’t…..there’s nothing permanent for us here, not yet at least, and I just don’t think I could bring a child into this world without knowing for certain that I could provide a good life for them.”

“And I don’t…..” she paused, a little dent forming between her eyebrows while she worked out what she wanted to say exactly. “I can’t see myself raising a child on a spaceship, learning about sunlight and trees and all of that from holodeck simulations. I’d want to have a house somewhere, be able to go to a park or into a yard on sunny days, for them to go to school with other kids their age, not learn in that tiny classroom on B-Deck.”

Frowning at the image, Kate gave him another shake of her head, her voice sad and broken. “I never thought that we wouldn’t have kids.”


Castle understood where she was coming from, of course. Now they were finally out of the way of the people who would try to harm them, but their lives were still tenuous. It was unfortunate.

“I don’t want to completely give up hope yet,” he said in response to the sadness in her voice, “but your points are valid.” Castle sighed. “It makes me sad though, because I really do want kids with you, Kate. You would be a great mother.”

She may have thought that she would screw it up, but Castle knew better. Kate had the passion and dedication that it took to be a good mother.


“I know you do,” she answered, brushing at another round of tears that had spilled over onto her cheeks. “And I always thought it was just a matter of time. At least until these new memories happened and I really started thinking about the situation here and what would be the best thing to do.”

It was a strange thing to believe with your whole self that it the life you were leading wasn’t conducive to having and raising a child but to still want a baby with the same intensity. But Kate’s practicalness, as was usually the case, had won out with her head taking precedent over what her heart wanted.

It left her grieving in a way, mourning all the possibilities that now seemed to be gone, even if Castle was urging her not to give up hope. “Castle, I don’t see how you can still have any….” But that was one of the amazing things about her husband, it didn’t matter the odds, he always found something positive in any situation.


“I never say never,” he said, wiping her tear-stained cheek with a thumb. “Considering that we’re hundreds of years in the future and live on the Enterprise, I’d say anything is possible at this point."

It wasn’t something they had to decide on completely at this moment. They were in a bit of a state of flux anyway, with people coming and going at random. That was another reason to not have a baby, honestly, but it also meant that things were always changing. Who knew what would happen over the next few months and how they would feel about it?


“I’m going to be 37 in November,” Kate said, adding the last fear that she had about trying to have a child later in life. Maybe it was different in this time, who knew what sort of medical advancements had been made, but at home there was a literal ticking clock on how many years she had left to conceive and with each passing year the risks of carrying a healthy child to term grew less likely. “I never really thought I was old or felt like I had to rush until these memories came up.”

But the practicality and logic that wouldn’t allow her to just throw caution to the wind and decide to have a baby also wouldn’t allow Kate to have a baby just because she was getting older.

And still, a small voice deep inside urged another question to the forefront of their talk, sending a shot of apprehension along her spine that was so strong that the idea of holding her tongue never even became an option. “But what if it we never had kids?” she asked, “What if I don’t change my mind or we just can’t have one for some other reason? Are you going to be okay with that? I know before we got married that the few times we talked about it that it was more of a when rather than an if….”

Except for the one time that Kate had told him she didn’t like babies. The disappointment on Castle’s face had been very real, as had his relief been when she had explained that not liking other people’s babies didn’t mean she didn’t want her own and wouldn’t love them when the time came.


Castle felt like there had to be procedures in this time that would help a woman have a baby later in life. There had to be. That was a bridge that they could cross if they ever came to it.

This talk was important, and he didn't begrudge her having it. He took her hand again. “That could have been a possibility even if we had stayed at home,” he said. “Of course, I would love to have a child with you, Kate. But if we don't, I'm not going to love you less. I do at least have one child that I managed to raise without screwing her up, despite being me, so maybe I shouldn't press my luck anyway.” Castle smiled at her.


While Castle’s reassurance didn’t exactly remove the weight from her shoulders, it served to lift the worst of the burden. For the first time in days, Kate felt like she finally could take a full breath, looking past the worry and anxiousness of what he might say or do and just appreciate that she had married one hell of a man.

“So it’s gonna be okay,” she said, less of a question and more of a blanket statement. “No matter what, you and me.” And, really, that was enough for her. She hadn’t been lying when she had told him that he was the thing she wanted most in life and, several years and a lot of life experience later, Kate also knew unequivocally that Castle was also what she needed in life. Not in terms of living day to day, but just in living her life in a way that made her feel complete and happy.

Rick Castle was it. And she didn’t care one bit that it made her sound like one of those overblown damsels in distress in a book or a movie. He made her a better person, and her life was better with him in it.


At his mention of Alexis and his ability as a parent, Kate smiled, giving him a shake of her head in argument to his idea of being a screw-up. “You are an amazing dad, Rick,” she told him, leaning forward to brush her lips against the corner of his mouth. “And I don’t think it was a fluke, either. You love Alexis with everything you have, you’ve supported her and cheered her on and that’s…….she’s as incredible of a young woman as she is in large part because you raised her to be that way and you’d do the same thing with any child we had.”


“Of course it’s going to be ok. I love you.” That would remain true whether there was a child or not. He and Kate were in this for the long haul. He had never fought so hard for a woman in the past, or loved one so intensely.

Castle smiled when Kate complemented Alexis. “She’s pretty amazing. Sometimes I feel like I can’t claim her, but I’m really happy that I get to.” Even if he had a tendency to screw up a lot of things, he’d always taken his role as a father seriously.


“How strange,” Kate told him, giving him her own smile as she slid both of her arms around his neck. “That’s pretty much how I feel about you.” And it was true. It rarely didn’t astound her that Castle had decided she was worth pursuing and, even beyond that, that he hadn’t just walked away when things got difficult and she kept pushing him away.

She was never so thankful that Rick was so very stubborn.

Leaning forward, Kate quickly pressed her lips against his for a brief kiss. “As impossible as this all feels right now, I don’t think I can let go of the idea of raising a baby with you. You just…..” she shrugged her shoulders. “I see how much you love her as a teenager and an adult and I can’t stand the thought of not getting to experience that with our child. And for you to have the chance to raise one with your partner there with you.”

And it turned out those were going to be the thing that kept pushing her towards the possibility of it all. She could give up a lot of things, but never that. “I’m not going to give up,” she added. “I’m just going to…...readjust to this weird new life of ours and see what happens.”


Castle nodded, slightly surprised that she had come around, but glad that she was considering all possibilities. If they were here long term, their attitudes could change. He honestly felt safer here than he did about Kate’s version of the future. The kid might not have natural grass, but they would have two parents that loved them.

He leaned over and kissed her slowly, trying to dry the tears on her face. “Feel like getting in the hot tub?”


Kate didn’t know if they would ever get to the point where the hope that Castle had encouraged her to keep became an actual decision to have a child, but she was more than willing to leave the possibility out there. If not for herself, then for Castle to at least have the possibility of being a father again. No matter what, Kate wasn't about to crush his dreams.

Leaning into the kiss, she couldn’t help but smile once Rick pulled away, brushing her nose against his in what most people at home would call an Eskimo kiss. “I think you could convince me that it’s a good idea,” she told him, slipping her fingers into the hair at the nape of his neck.


“I know,” Castle said with a smile. “I can be really persuasive.” He was glad that if he had to be stuck here, at least he was with her and not alone. Castle would have gone crazy without her.

“Come on,” he said, tugging at her hand.


"Can you really?" she asked, her lips twitching with the effort it took not to smile. Rick could sell sand to a camel if he put his mind to it, but she did like to tease him and pretend she was entirely unaffected by his charm.

Still, she didn't resist the pull of his hand, shifting her body so that it was easier for the both of them to climb off the bed and head into the hallway and, after a short walk, to the hot tub beside the small lap pool outside.