Crack!Fic: Castle discovers Kate's guilty secret - her version of the Sims, complete with their characters being together. Pre-couple.

It's not his fault the guy from the phone company is running late. It's not her fault either. But she did ask him to come over and sit in her apartment today, and he forgot his laptop, and he doesn't feel like reading any of her books for longer than three minutes.

There are a lot of books.

But there is also her computer, the white sleep light slowing winking at him, goading him into action. Into doing something he may regret. Like watching porn.

Except, the guy from the phone company is coming to fix the internet. So… so why is Beckett's computer on sleep mode?

He reaches to touch the space bar but withdraws his hand. There could be consequences to looking at her computer. He doesn't want to see the business end of her gun.

But still…

He touches the space bar.

The screen awakes, not to a password request but the pause screen of a game. He peers a little closer, eyes locked on the screen as he manoeuvres himself into the desk chair, trying to figure out what it is. What could hold Katherine Beckett's attention so fully that she would press 'pause' and not 'quit'. And then he sees the green jewels and it clicks.

Kate plays The Sims.

His eyes widen as he gasps in disbelief. Not that she'd play a computer game – that she'd have time to play one in the first place is amazing – but that of all of the games she could choose from, she's clearly bingeing on The Sims. No one leaves it paused to go to work. No one.

Except Kate, clearly.

He moves the cursor to the twinkles around the 'resume game' button and clicks without hesitation. His curiosity will be the end of him one day, his mother has always said, but when there's a mystery to solve, and that mystery is part of the greater mythos of Kate Beckett, he's like a bloodhound called Betty with a nose for the faintest of scents.

The tableau on the screen before him is of a picture perfect family, a woman with chocolate skin, sleek black hair and bright clothes, an olive-skinned man with what looks like a five o'clock shadow who wears a polo shirt and jeans, and a cute toddler running around in the garden who looks to be a mixture of them both. Rick smiles and clicks on the woman, looks around the screen to find the status bars that indicate her moods, blinking in surprise when he sees the name 'Lanie Esposito' on there. He clicks on the man and finds he's 'Javier Esposito'. The kid's called Antonio. He shakes his head in amazement before frantically trying to find where the rest of the people in this Sims town live.

He finds Kevin and Jenny next, their four kids all ginger and fair, with two dogs and three cats to look after too. The sight leaves him grinning, knowing this scenario would make Ryan a very happy, if rather tired, man. Those two are going to be great parents one day.

Before he can get caught up in the fairy tale his mind is concocting, he wonders if Kate has made a version of herself. He goes looking around the town but can't find a house with a pixelated version of her face bobbing above it. He does find one that looks a bit like him though, and he clicks on it. When it's loaded, the vision before him takes his breath away because the green jewel has landed by default on Kate.

Kate Castle.

He never knew he wanted that until right this second. He wants to marry her someday. They haven't even got close to thinking about being anything more than co-workers but he knows he wants to marry her. And seeing this version of them, with three cute kids and a dog, in a house with a leafy backyard and a white picket fence? This has set that desire in stone.

He moves the cursor to the Sim version of him and the pop up gives suggestions of actions Sim-Kate could carry out with Sim-Rick. He likes the sound of 'hug' and 'dance', also 'kiss hand' and 'chat'. But there's another one there that he doesn't remember the meaning behind.

"What is 'WooHoo'?" he whispers to the screen.

He hovers the cursor over it, debating whether he wants to know or not. A loud knocking at the front door startles him and the mouse clicks. The Sims twirl around, most of their clothes magically disappearing until their underwear-clad bodies disappear behind a pixelated circle. Rick's eyebrows rise in realisation and he laughs.

He gathers himself together and goes to let the guy from the phone company into the apartment before sitting back down at the computer in time to see a congratulatory pop-up.

Rick and Kate are pregnant!

"Oh, shit."