579. Chapter 579

After The Wrong Stuff

Episode 7.16

By

UCSBdad

Disclaimer: I'm boldly going where I never owned Castle. Rating: K Time: See above

Captain's log. July 19, 2071.

After years of work, Mars 2 will be leaving Earth orbit bound for Mars in less than an hour. I'm so proud and honored to be her captain, especially since my mother died in the first, unsuccessful, attempt to reach Mars on Mars 1. I know that we'll be successful.

I have every confidence in the crew, with one exception. One giant exception. But everyone else is top notch. Dr. Lanie Parish, our doctor, is the best doctor on Earth and has become a good friend of mine as well. Dr. Kevin Ryan, our computer expert is a genius, to say the least, although his taste in clothes is a bit…odd. Dr. Javier Esposito, our engineer is amazing. Every test that IASA threw at him he passed with flying colors. Our science officer is the brilliant Dr. Alexis Castle, an expert in more fields than I can imagine. Which brings me to the one weak link in our crew. For some reason the chair bound idiots at IASA decided to send Alexis' father, the writer Richard Castle along with us to chronicle our voyage. I admit I was once a fan of Mr. Castle's. I found the stories about Derrick Storm, a time travelling secret agent, to be interesting. Meeting Mr. Castle in person, I am appalled at how juvenile and undisciplined he is. He takes absolutely nothing seriously and is interested in nothing but getting me into bed. I will treat him with….

"Eeek!" Captain Kate Beckett screamed as she was goosed. She whirled around, "Castle, I told you…" Looking down, she saw that it wasn't Castle but the mobile part of their ships computer, DUMMING. "DUMMING! What are you doing?"

The garbage can shaped robot looked up at Beckett with its visual sensors, while continuing to move its hand-like graspers.

"I am here in the kitchen making breakfast, Captain." The robot said. With every word it spoke, a puff of what smelled like burning tires was emitted. The technical crew from the manufacturer had said DUMMING was working perfectly, which made Captain Kate doubt their abilities.

"You are on the bridge. Also, we operate on Greenwich Mean Time, which means it's almost 1500 hours, far too late for breakfast."

DUMMING began leaking fluid from its visual sensors and wheeled away moaning.

Precisely at 1800 hours, the engines came on line and the spin habitat where the crew would live came on line. Mars 2 was on its way. All of the crew had gathered in command to watch. Captain Beckett was happy to see that Mr. Castle had failed to make it. She had noticed that punctuality was not one of his strong points.

However, her smile changed to a frown as Castle came into the command module. "Mr. Castle! What are you wearing?" Captain Kate asked.

"My Darth Vader costume. It's from Chapter 28: The Return of the Revenge of the New Empire's Old Hope. George V gave it to me."

"The English king?" Kate asked, confused.

"Duh! George Lucas V." Castle looked around the module and then out the window at the retreating Earth. "This is so cool."

Captain Kate rolled her eyes. "We're doing this to advance mankind's knowledge, Mr. Castle. Not so you can enjoy yourself."

"I know. But this is so cool." He turned to his daughter. "Isn't it, Watermelon?" He turned back to Captain Kate. "So, how much ice cream do we have on the ship?"

Kate knew that Castle's first question would be something extremely stupid. "We don't have any ice cream, Mr. Castle. Our food is nutritious and contains everything we'll need in the way of nutrients and vitamins, but it has been compressed molecularly so we can carry enough to get us through the mission. There was no room for luxuries like ice cream."

"Ice cream is not a luxury. It's a necessity and I was able to talk IASA into adding to our cargo capacity for food and we now have ice cream, wine, steaks, fresh veggies, and cheeseburgers. And some surprises. You'll see it in your cargo manifest on your computer."

Kate checked her computer." You're right! IASA did this without telling me!" Kate was on the radio in seconds complaining to IASA, but as they had left Earth orbit, there was nothing to be done.

Captain's log. August 3, 2071.

Disaster! Earlier today, Dr. Parish complained of feeling very tired. I told her it was probably overwork and suggested a nap. When she didn't appear for lunch, I sent Dr. Esposito to get her. He reported back that she was semiconscious state. Dr. Castle examined her, but reported that all of her vital signs were normal. We've contacted Earth, but they're as puzzled as we are. Mr. Castle was no help at all.

"The solution is obvious. "Castle said. "It's like sleeping beauty. All she needs is a ruggedly handsome prince to kiss her and she'll wake right up."

"That's idiotic and we don't have a prince."

"But I am ruggedly handsome. That should work." He bent down towards Dr. Parish.

Captain Kate grabbed his ear and pulled him away from Dr. Parish. "If you touch her, I will personally eject you out the airlock. Understand?"

Castle nodded. "I had no idea you were the jealous type, Beckett. I'll save myself for you."

Captain Kate glared at Castle, then went to her quarters, shut the door and screamed.

Captain's log. September 21, 2071.

We found Dr. Ryan semi-conscious today. As with Dr. Parish, all efforts to wake him have been to no avail. Actually Mr. Castle has been quite helpful. Since Dr. Parish is semi-conscious, she can eat if someone feeds her and the food is very soft, which our original rations are. He's volunteered to feed Ryan as well. I admit I'm glad Mr. Castle brought the extra food along. That food makes it so much easier to get through the day now that I have so much more work to do.

"I absolutely refuse to kiss Ryan to try to wake him up. He's just not my type." Castle said.

"Perhaps I should try kissing him?" Captain Kate said, tiredly. They had all been working nonstop trying to work the ship and find a cure to whatever was wrong with their fellow crewmembers.

"You're not his type either. And you'd hear his wife, Jenny, screaming at you all the way from Earth if you tried."

"And how do you know I'm not Ryan's type, Castle?"

Castle just smiled at her.

October 3, 2071

It was Esposito today. We're all so tired we can hardly think straight. Castle has been a huge help. He's not only caring for our semi-conscious crewmembers, but he's working with Alexis to try to find a cure for whatever is wrong. I don't think I could carry on without him. He's far more intelligent than I originally gave him credit for.

Kate came awake and looked around her. "What? Where am I?"

"You're in my quarters. You fell asleep at the radio to Earth. At first I thought you had the …whatever, but you were just asleep. You're exhausted, Beckett. You needed the sleep, and you need more."

She tried to push herself up off of the bed, but she was so tired. "I have to go help Alexis. We have to…." She couldn't remember what she and Alexis were going to do.

"I found Alexis semi-conscious a few hours back. I shut down all of the science experiments and put the ship on auto-pilot. I've made some pasta carbonara for us. And when we've eaten, we're going to get a good night's sleep and start over in the morning. We're both too tired to do anything."

Kate shook her head and started to get up, but Castle put a plate of pasta carbonara under her nose and she was too hungry to refuse. She ate quickly and in spite of wanting to stay awake, she fell asleep after eating dinner.

She woke up once in the middle of the sleep period to find herself cuddling with Castle in his narrow bed. She decided she liked it and went back to sleep.

Hours later she woke up feeling better than she had in weeks. She looked around and saw Castle working at the computer station in his quarters. She quickly got off the bed and walked over to him. When he looked up, she leaned down and kissed him.

"I'm not complaining, but what was that about?" He asked when she broke the kiss.

"If we're going to die out here, I wanted to make sure I did that before we both died." That said, she kissed him again.

"Don't worry. We aren't going to die. I just about have this figured out. I know what's wrong and I'm pretty sure I can fix it."

Kate was shocked. "What? How? Tell me?"

He smiled at her and this time, he initiated the kiss. "Trust me." He took her hand and they walked through the ship.

"Oh, DUMMING! Come here, please."

DUMMING scuttled out from the niche he had in the ship. When he stopped in front of Rick and Kate, Rick hit the robot with a hammer as hard as he could and then flipped it on its back. He removed an access plate and looked inside. "Look, Kate. Does that tell you anything?"

Kate was puzzled. "That doesn't make any sense. "

Castle just grinned and took her hand again. "We're going to the computer."

"To M.A.R.T.H.A.? But why?"

When they got to the computer, Castle began to open the main access hatch.

"Rick, you can't do that. The computer is so sensitive that anything could cause it to fail and then we'd have no chance at all."

"Oh?" He said smiling and pulled the access hatch fully open.

Kate looked at what should have been the insides of the computer. "Who are those people?" She said, looking at a very surprised man and two women.

"Disgraced politician William Broken and two of his mistresses. I was checking our supplies when I noticed that the water purification plant was working much harder than it should be. Curious, I investigated further. The only thing that made sense was that we had about three more people with us. I made an EVA and found that someone at IASA had added more food storage space than just mine and it wasn't for the molecularly condensed foods, but real food. And the food was being sent here."

"Why would he do that?" Kate asked.

Broken laughed. "I sabotaged the Mars 1. When Mars 2 failed, Earth would give up trying to send a manned mission to Mars. Once we were there and you were all unconscious, the men would have gone out the airlock and I'd have had my girls here and you and Dr. Parish to begin a new breed of humans on Mars. I would have been the King of Mars!"

Kate turned to Rick. "How did he knock the others out?"

"Our original food is laced with a powerful sedative, put there by Broken's people on Earth. We didn't pass out because we've been eating my food which doesn't have the sedative. A lot of things on this ship were actually made by companies Broken owns, such as DUMMING."

"What happens now?" Kate asked.

"I've rerouted the food dispensary system so that Broken, the redhead and the blonde get only the food with the sedative in it. They can either eat it or starve to death. Once they're semi-conscious, we'll keep them fed and semi-conscious until we get back to Earth. In the meantime. I built a lock for the access panel to M.A.R.T.H.A. They'll be safe in here."

Rick closed up the access panel and locked it. "We should go wake the others by feeding them the non-tainted food."

"I think we should go back to bed." Kate said.

"Are you still tired?"

"Not at all." She turned and smiled at him. "Coming, Castle?"