Inspired by a fan art of Beckett dressed as Han Solo and, in part, by 5x06 The Final Frontier. Set in season two between 2x06 'Vampire Weekend' and 2x07 'Famous Last Words'.

As hard as it is to see from between the layers of a Storm Trooper mask, Rick is surprised he notices her at all. Even once his eyes have focused on the slim figure currently walking away from him, he still has to do a double take.

For one, the dress his partner is wearing is ridiculously short and stretches tight across her backside in a way that he hasn't seen material do since Beckett called a cardigan an outfit and adopted a Russian accent to save him from the mob.

It'd been sexy as hell, though he'd saved himself from bodily harm by somehow managing to bite his tongue until she'd gotten properly dressed after kicking the boys out of the surveillance van.

But in any case, the memory lingers, brought back to life with the swing of her hips across the convention hall floor with her legs bare from mid thigh to the black boots that start a couple inches below her knees.

And the hair. He knows its a wig, or extensions. Some kind of girly hair wizardry that has taken the chestnut strands that only recently began to touch her shoulders into some long, complicated configuration that falls almost to her waist.

Even without seeing her face, Rick has decided that long hair is a style Kate Beckett should adopt.

She turns suddenly, and he loses her with the restricted eye sight available with the helmet on his head. There's indecision swimming in his brain, his curiosity about why straight-laced, often hard-ass Detective Beckett is all dressed up (be it in a costume that's rather lame because who actually watched Nebula 9) at a sci-fi convention at war with all the times she'd huffed at him about boundaries and a possible accidental discharge of her service weapon if Rick didn't start respecting them.

It takes all of ten seconds before he's ignoring the warning signs, creeping along the aisle of displays and quickly peering between them until Rick realizes he's wearing a full plastic suit that renders him unrecognizable.

Even if Beckett looked directly at him, there's simply no way she'd make him as, well, himself.

He takes the aisle that runs parallel to the row he suspects Beckett turned onto, grateful for the map of the convention floor that he memorized before arriving. After so many years of being defunct, there's only one booth win a small section of merchandise from Nebula 9, mostly things that collectors are trying to part with to a moderately interested crowd.

By the time he approaches the table, the booth owner is hard at work trying to sell his partner a replica blaster which Beckett takes from the man with a reverence that makes him smile under the mask.

"You gonna buy that?" When Rick speaks, its with a voice that's far more ragged than anything he'd use in every day life. The sound out of his mouth is lower, scratchy and with a much slower cadence that what his usual rapid fire speech pattern would be.

It seems to do the trick because she doesn't give off any flash of recognition, eyes hesitant but polite when she glances his way. "No, I don't think so," Kate replies, placing the toy back onto the display.

If he didn't know her so well, he'd have missed the way her fingers linger at the edges of the purple plastic, the tiny release of breath and split-second of longing that shades her face before she's let go of the toy and focused those hazel eyes on his storm trooper self.

"Is that thing comfortable?"

The answer is no. It's a heavy costume, incredibly cumbersome to move in, and growing hotter by the minute. Already Rick can feel that his under shirt and shorts are soaked through with sweat, and his shoulders are beginning to ache with carrying extra pounds of plastic around for hours without relief. But he goes for sarcasm rather than honesty, taking a moment to allow his brain to switch into the different voice he's adopted, lips shaping the first consonant before he gives it a voice.

"Most comfortable thing I've ever worn," he jokes, grinning when Beckett's lips curve upward and he gets a flash of her teeth as she smiles, "Why Nebula 9?"

Even if Rick isn't strictly a fan, his geek card demands a certain knowledge of practically everything in the genre. The show is seared into his brain for how little enjoyment he found in it with the cheesy effects and over dramatic actors, but he recognizes the insignia pinned to the purple section of the dress.

Kate is cosplaying as Lieutenant Chloe, the debatable heroine on the ship and the uncontested space traveler with super-model level hotness.

"It's not all that popular anymore, I know," she replies with a shrug, two spots of a light pink flush painting her cheeks as Kate bites her lip. It's fascinating to see her relax into the story, shoulders at ease even though she's got one arm draped across her waist. She's still smiling a little, top teeth sinking into her bottom lip at the delight of some memory that Rick isn't privy too.

This is the woman he only sees glimpses of. This is the one who smiles when their fingers brush as he gives her coffee, who will dredge up a joke or some infuriating moment to flirt with him before she's back to business putting killers behind bars. This is the Beckett who opened up to him about her mother's murder, about being a baseball fan.

This is the woman he wants to see more of, but can't always reach.

"It aired at the right time, I think," she says finally, "I was away from home for the first time and this group of people out on their own, trying to figure their lives out when the rest of their home has been destroyed? That spoke to me. Leaving home, finding your identity, working to make a difference; those were all things I could relate to at the time. Still can on most days," Kate adds with a shrug.

Rick wishes he had a pen and his notebook because suddenly he's drowning in inspiration, the war to write down paragraph after paragraph for Nikki going to battle with his need to pull off his helmet and thank Kate for her honesty.

He reigns himself in, clearing his throat with effort, "And Chloe?"

"She didn't care what anyone thought of her, so dressing up like her made me feel invincible. And sometimes, even years later, I need a reminder of what that's like, so I come here, pretend to be someone else for a few hours. Get out of my own head for a while."

Those are words he finds himself relating to, so easily able to recall young Rick Rodgers and how difficult it was to fit in. Sci-fi, writing, comic books, those were the things that got him through stretches of loneliness and bouncing from school to school, borough to borough, neighborhood to neighborhood. Even once Rick found his groove, made some friends and became somewhat of a class clown, he held on to those loves, always painfully aware that not all relationships lasted.

People could hurt you. Books (and movies) would always be there.

"I can understand that," he mutters, shifting from one foot to another in lieu of being able to use his hands to fidget, "I'm the same in a lot of ways, dressing up and coming here to get out of my head, to meet other people."

When her phone rings, Kate's mouth is open to say something that quickly dies on her lips. But there's a moment where he's so sure that his partner is going to flash a bit more leg and retrieve the device from some hidden holster at her thigh that he's vastly disappointed when she squeezes the flip phone from a tiny pocket at her hip and barks out, "Beckett'.

Less than a minute later she's hung up, apology in her eyes as she holds the phone out for him, "I'm sorry, that was work. I have to go, but it was nice meeting you…..?"

"Alexander," Rick supplies quickly, cringing at the way his accent falls slightly short and the complete unoriginality of using his given middle name. It's very likely that super fan Beckett already knows his birth name and, given the fact she's a cop, he's probably on his way to a blown cover when she's halfway out the door.

"Alexander," Kate repeats with a smile, "Maybe I'll see you again sometime."

"Count on it," he whispers, ignoring the giddy thrill that sends his heart beating overtime as Beckett saunters away in those high heeled boots, phone to her ear as she goes.

He's still watching her hips sway back and forth (and he swear she's added an extra pop to them for his benefit) when his phone chirps from the depth of his gym short pockets, impossible to get too without stripping off his costume in the middle of the floor. But it's Beckett's ringtone, paging him to a murder.

Rick still takes the time to purchase the blaster, paying extra for gift wrap and delivery to the 12th Precinct from one R. Alexander.

And he has the added joy of seeing Beckett's face, and her hastily defensive explanation, when it's waiting on her desk after they return to her desk from their latest crime scene.