A/N: Post Headhunters. Part One (Castle's Perspective) and Part Two (Beckett's Perspective) equivalent to a two parter arc (AU of Undead Again and Always). Fic complete with random updates.

"Lights go down,

In the moment

We're lost and found

I just wanna be by your side,

If these wings could fly."

- Birdy

Part One: Collapsed

Consciousness.

It's never been more horrifying.

The pain, the weight pressed upon him, that's bad. The clouded air, too polluted with dust and dirt to breathe, that's also bad.

What gets Castle the most has to be the darkness. No matter how hard he focuses his eyes no light avails the new endless sea of black before him. He's drowning in it with no one around to even know, no attempts to spare his soul. A scream to draw out attention seems the direction to go until the force he exerts going to try exceeds the tolerance for the pain.

Surely by now, however long it's been, someone has to know he's missing.

Memory serves him poorly as far as time though, the pressure and exhaustion consuming the ability to construct any thought. His position permits only one arm to move and obviously desperate, he reaches for his phone to discover, as he had guessed, it is indeed crushed.

He has to try everything…anything. Here, wherever that may be now, there can't possibly be a useless idea to entertain.

Trying to wiggle free he manages the other arm loose and one of his legs with some strain, but pulling upward the bite of concrete over his other leg elicits a yelp from deep within, now aware of how wedged it actually is.

Shitty air supply. Definitive darkness. Pinned. Everything...collapsed.

But it could be worse, right?

Three Days Earlier

It's been days, weeks, but it sure seems longer as the phone refuses to ring. Aside from the occasional call from his mother or Alexis, none come from the precinct.

From Beckett, rather.

Things have been…well. Is there a clean-cut word to describe the last few weeks of tension between them? He's certain any choice will just belittle the wound severing their entire relationship…whatever that relationship may be. Things have been rough, if he'll be kind. He's still silent though. No, he's not planning to tell her why, why his arm is extending out and away from him wielding a cane to keep her at the end of the tip, far from reach. He doesn't need to tell her why. She knows why.

Whether she accepts it or not, she knows exactly why he's pulling away.

So he won't be telling her anytime soon, but the worst part comes with flashing signs pointed right at his heart…because he loves her. Even amidst all this chaos between them, he does, but now seriously entertains his mother's thought before. Love really isn't a switch. How can he continue on like this–unless he allows his feelings to completely settle and dissolve out in the water? It's always a question of time, really. If he can withstand the burden in waiting for change, or if he can bear to work beside her keeping in mind the greater cause, then maybe he'll be okay.

It's a question of time, and then a lot of convincing himself that he can actually do it. A lot of convincing.

Although that hasn't been enough, it seems. They haven't talked since the case with Slaughter, and with the days spent in silence he doesn't know when they will. It's been two weeks at least, nearly three if he's truly counting. In acceptance, he doesn't expect her to get in touch. But, she does.

It's just one missed call she leaves while he's off showering, the single attempt to contact him a clear effort to maintain her own kind of distance. No eagerness, no urgency to beckon him to the scene. She follows up with a short text, reinforcing the plain courtesy of communicating with him.

New case. If you're coming out, call me or Esposito.

Simple. Professional. No hint of something more, or anything personal whatsoever. He reads it over, walking out to the kitchen in search for his caffeine dose already bubbling into the pot, and none of it surprises him. After a minute to turn away he reads it again while taking that first sip of his coffee, the normally pleasant warmth not quite finding its way down his throat as it should – a singeing, overloaded spoonful inching towards his stomach as he ponders the message. Reading it again he nods, knowing he probably would've said the same thing.

Yet for some reason indecision unloads on his chest as the still waking waves of his iris contract to trail carefully over each word. They go over every letter again and again, perhaps searching for something new, some revelation or hidden subtext, but it says what it says. It's plain. It's all there. Somehow it's not enough, and he concludes the next step; they can't go on in this way.

His fingers hover over the keyboard, ready to tell her he can't make it, but heavy feet plopping down the stairs stop him before he can, a flow of sweet-glowing ginger hair flopping on every beat. Another pair of bright blues meets his own when his daughter's face emerges from behind her stack of papers, all of her vibrating in anxiety.

"Even for you this is a little early," he greets Alexis. She orders the papers in her hands in her stride over to the pot for her own mug, sloppy hands dashing in her preference of sugar and cream that hit the rim and bounce onto the counter in dust and droplets. He notes the clothes she's wearing before she can gather a reply…granted, if she could manage one. "You haven't slept."

"Not a blink," she says, shuffling each page. He gestures her over with an open arm, shielding her with it as she sits on his knee for him to assess her face and the scribbles conquering every line of her notes.

"Your speech," he says in clarity, catching some lines of inspiration between the webs of ink. "Words not coming?"

"They are…it's just a mess of them, and none of it is actually...me." Her cheek falls onto her fist, elbow propped on the table in her read-through with thinned eyelids, mentally cleaning it while trying to stay awake. He sympathizes at this near-reflection of him in his own barren writing endeavors.

"A whole night of writing and none of it sounds like you? Are you my daughter?" She passes him a light frown in reading over her words. He amends the thought. "You don't know what to say."

"Sorta," she cuts through the air. "I just don't know what you say for something as big as this. I feel like I've lost a week just trying to write everything…it shouldn't be this hard."

"Well, you do what you can for this one shot. It's hard, but it'll be worth it. The difficult things are the things most…worth doing."

He hears it. It's his own advice calling out to him now.

"Keep working on it, okay," he says standing up while planting a kiss on her head. His feet lead him away while dialing his phone, pacing as his seat squeaks faintly when Alexis sits. It's not loud enough.

The drag of each ring makes sure of that.

"Where you going?" She glances between him and her speech.

"Got a case," he says, slapping his phone up to the opposite ear. The warmth creates an itch. Or he's too impatient. Antsy. He's preoccupied until he notices his daughter's reaction, brows raised with a meek smile holding onto the idea of some normalcy returning, but he grimaces in forcing out another few words. "Last case."

The clarification trashes her hope, and he watches it die with uneasiness as the mask to hide it, she pursing her lips before returning to her speech in clear disappointment.

This is my last case?

There's no apologies. If that's his decision, his child knows he's firm on it, and there's no persuading she can do to alter it. Not for this. The finality strikes him harder once Beckett answers the call.

"Hey…Castle," she says, the uncertainty static through the phone.

It's all they can hear.

"Where are we going?"

They suspend their speech, the implication in the question startling them both. Not his intention, no, but the pause she gives before she can answer confirms both their fears. He'll keep this professional as much as he can. As much as he's able –

without love getting in the way.