Nightfall

ONE

FRIDAY - 9:48 AM

It was a quiet day in the Twelfth Precinct. Detective Kate Beckett and her team had just finished wrapping up a case last night, so most of today was going to be spent doing paperwork. Normally, that would have been enough to convince her unorthodox partner, bestselling novelist Richard Castle, to stay home and work on his other job, which was writing.

However, it appeared that his mother, Martha Rodgers, was having some of her thespian friends over for a "luncheon". Castle had actually used the air quotes when he'd relayed his woeful tale to her earlier that morning. He had then gone on to inform her that the group of aging Broadway actresses would really just be lounging around the loft all day, drinking cocktails and regaling each other with tales from yesteryear. Needless to say, Castle had no wish to be ensnared in the women's trip down memory lane, having spent most of his pre-adolescence backstage during his mother's varying performances.

"Once," he had proclaimed, quite dramatically she thought, "was enough."

Beckett, having been entirely gracious and infinitely patient during his melodramatic complaining, had responded with a roll of her eyes when he had finally finished his rant with a huff, and then calmly asked if he was now finally going to put in his share of the paperwork. She knew very well that the author was just using the whole affair as an excuse to procrastinate, which she had learned over the years was one of his favorite things to do. Castle had, of course, scoffed at such utter nonsense, and promptly plopped down in the chair beside her desk, which had somehow become his chair, even in her own thoughts.

The writer had definitely grown on her over the two plus years they'd worked together. At the end of last summer, Beckett had thought they might have been able to have more—be more—but their timing had been off. She had been unfairly angry with him for most of the summer and fall, when he finally returned into her life. To be fair, it hadn't been entirely his fault. She now recognized that she held some of the blame for the bad timing. She'd been indecisive and had shut him down on numerous occasions. Plus, she had to remind herself, despite their amazing shared-brain ability when it came to theory building, Castle really couldn't read her mind.

But, in the end, things had somehow managed to work out. They were friends now. Good friends. Great friends. And he was single once more, having ended his relationship with ex-wife number two a couple of weeks ago. And there was that undercover kiss they had shared, which—if she was honest—was kind of magical. They hadn't talked about it, probably wouldn't talk about it, but it had been quite something. Beckett was unable to deny, at least to herself, the spark she had felt the moment he'd cupped her cheek. And her motivation for going in for another kiss might not have entirely been about the guard still watching them.

So…

No, she reminded herself. They couldn't go there. They had their shot, and they'd missed it.

Yet…

No, she stubbornly reminded herself. She had a boyfriend. Josh Davidson. He was a cardiac surgeon. He rode a motorcycle. And he wasn't really there. But that was what she'd wanted, right? A relationship where she didn't have to fully invest, where she could keep one foot out the door. However, that wasn't what she really wanted. She told herself it was, but it wasn't. The truth was her relationship with Josh had been over for a while now, she just hadn't actually had the courage to end it. But she would. Soon.

A disturbance from the other end of the bullpen startled Beckett out of her thoughts. She jerked her head up, eyes flicking away from the computer screen as she swiveled around to watch as two uniforms wrestled with a belligerent man who had freed himself from his restraints.

"Yo!" Esposito shouted, jumping up. "Lock it down." He rushed over to assist the overwhelmed officers.

Beckett watched with mild amusement as her colleague bustled past the uniforms, shoving them aside. He easily took control of the situation, pulling the growling man's arm around his back and pinning him to the wall.

"Shut it," he hissed, deftly snapping the cuffs back around the man's wrists. And then, grabbing him by the scruff of his neck, Esposito tossed the man back to the uniforms. "Check that the cuffs are secure next time," he instructed.

The two uniforms, both new to their beats by the look of their youthful faces, nodded, and then took back their charge. Sharing a look, appearing relieved at having the assist and chagrined at getting called out on their negligence, the two quickly escorted the cursing, shouting man towards holding.

Huffing, Esposito returned to his desk with stomping feet, shaking his head and swearing under his breath.

"Hey, didn't you tell me the same thing happened to you with your first collar?" Ryan asked, going for casual as his partner took his seat.

Esposito merely growled and pointedly ignored his friend's questioning gaze.

"Yeah, thought that," Ryan bobbed his head, grinning, before turning back to his paperwork.

Castle shifted in his chair, not bothering to hide his smirk at all as he arched his neck around to glanced at Esposito.

"Nice takedown, Espo," he said. "But you forgot the witty catchphrase."

Esposito scowled and stood up. He glanced around at all of them, eyes narrowing. "I'm going for coffee," he announced, and then stalked towards the breakroom as Ryan and Castle laughed good-naturedly.

Beckett suppressed an amused smile and turned back to her computer, furrowing her brow as she tried to recall where she'd left off before her mind had wandered and been distracted by the commotion. Hunching her shoulders, she glanced down at the form on her desktop, and after finding her place, she then continued punching in the data, transferring the information onto the NYPD intranet network database. Beside her, Castle went back to playing with his phone. He was attempting to beat his high score in Angry Birds. Even though he really wasn't contributing to the paperwork, he was still more than willing to act as a gofer for her, when she required a coffee refill, and when lunchtime came around, she knew he'd happily run out to get her something to eat.

She was close to finishing up copying the written reports over onto the department servers, readying to file it, when all of a sudden the power to computer cut out.

A muffled noise of exacerbation escaped her lips, but before she could fully engage with her anger over losing all her work, Beckett noticed that she wasn't the only one having power issues. Ryan was uselessly hitting the side of his computer monitor, and across the bullpen, other detectives were also groaning and bemoaning the loss of power to their machines.

Castle frowned as he glanced around. "Power outage?"

Beckett glanced back to him and shook her head, gesturing up. "The lights are still on."
"True," he said. "Then why'd all the computers go out?"

"They're on a different system," Ryan answered, standing up with a scowl. "I knew there was a problem with electrical, but maintenance wouldn't listen to me."

Before Castle could reply, with what would no doubt have been a clever remark, the powerful sound of jets screeching across the sky outside penetrated the walls of the precinct, indicating that the aircrafts were flying low, much lower than was normal. Frowning, Beckett stood up just as Captain Montgomery emerged from his office. Following her lead, Castle stood as well, turning on his heels to face her commanding officer.

"Sir?" Beckett questioned, brow furrowing.

"Attention," Montgomery announced, voiced raised so that everyone soon quieted. "I need your attention."

But before he could speak, another set of jets soared past them, flying low again. The building vibrated from the power of their high caliber engines. Releasing a quick breath, Montgomery turned back to address the bullpen. It could have just been Beckett's imagination, but the captain appeared anxious. Montgomery held up a hand to regain everyone's attention.

"The Mayor's just issued a city-wide evacuation," he said. "This is not a drill, people. This is real. Whatever you're doing, drop it now. This is priority. All hands on deck." He paused, casting a gaze over his detectives and uniformed officers. "We've all trained for this, you know your assignments. Now let's get to it." He clapped his hands, and the bullpen erupted in activity.

Montgomery signaled to her. "Beckett, with me."

She quickly stepped up to follow him into his office, Castle on her heels. The captain noticed, but made no comment on the author tagging along.

"Sir, what's going on?" Beckett all but demanded once inside his office.

"The alert just came through, Beckett," Montgomery informed her. "It could be anything."

The ground trembled, and the lights above them flickered for a moment before stabilizing. Beckett glanced up, waiting to see if all the power would go out.

"Whoa! Was that an earthquake?" Castle questioned, eyes wide, head jerking around like an overexcited chicken.

"What? Don't be ridiculous," Beckett said, shaking her head and stifling the desire to roll her eyes.

The cacophony of low flying jets soaring above the building sounded again. Beckett pursed her lips and narrowed her eyes. If she didn't know any better, she would have thought those jets were buzzing Manhattan. She was no military expert, so she couldn't say for sure, but with that speculation in mind, Beckett had to think that something pretty major was going on if the Airforce had jets flying that low through New York.

She glanced over at Castle as he frowned and reached into his pocket, retrieving his cellphone. He must have had it set on vibrate, because Beckett hadn't heard it ring, not that she could have heard much over the din generated by the powerful engines of the aircraft zooming over the city.

Castle caught her eye. "It's Alexis," he informed her, needing to raise his voice just a bit to be heard.

She nodded as he answered the phone and ducked out of the captain's office. Beckett turned back to Montgomery, who was picking up his desk phone and punching the number pad. His normally calm demeanor had fallen away, revealing a very worried and concerned man.

"Sir?" she was utterly confused.

"All I know is that this is big, so big that the National Guard is moving in to assist," Montgomery said, waving a hand, as if indicating that that was all he could say.

"Are we under attack?" she asked, mind running on overdrive to understand the situation. She had just been a rookie the last time New York had been attacked, and that day—and the days that followed—had been etched into her memory forever. They'd come close to another such attack, not that long ago, but an act of pure instinct and luck on the part of one plucky writer had saved them. Beckett could only hope that she and her team had it in them for a repeat performance.

"No, yes… maybe," he shook his head. "Beckett, I don't know. Honest. At this point, you know what I know."

Beckett opened her mouth to ask more, but her captain cut her off with a gesture of his hand. He sighed and shook his head, flashing her an apologetic look.

"This isn't a case, Detective," he reminded her, sternly. Beckett was taken aback by the rebuke. She hadn't seen Montgomery this frustrated in a long while. "We've trained for scenarios like this. You know your duty, Detective." He paused, and then nodded. "You have your orders."

"Yes, sir." Beckett gave a stiff nod, and turned to leave. He was right. She and her fellow NYPD officers had trained for dozens of scenarios, from natural disasters to another terrorist attack. The problem, she thought as she marched back out into the bullpen, was no one seemed to know what exactly was going on.