Kastle AU: Tenacious and hardworking sophomore Karen Page is tasked by her newspaper club to interview the star athlete and the most popular junior in their high school, Frank Castle. Karen isn’t his biggest fan, thinking he’s like any other stereotypical jock. One conversation later though, she starts realizing there’s more to him than meets the eye.
Soon after, sparks fly and romance is born. They become ‘the golden couple’ and everyone thinks they will be one of those high school couples that end up marrying each other and having the perfect life.
Frank is unlike any boy Karen has ever dated. He is attentive and gentle with her, writes her poems and loves to kiss that spot behind her ear. She adores him to bits, even when he is grumpy for no apparent reason and can’t imagine her life without him.
During his senior year, something in Frank shifts, and it results in constant quarrels between him and Karen. They try to make it work, but it seems like their time has come to an end. After he graduates, Frank wastes no time and enlists, leaving Karen brokenhearted.
Years later, Karen is the rising star in New York Bulletin, mentored by none other than Ben Urich. She is content in doing what she’s dreamed of since high school - investigative journalism.
Frank is a distant and somewhat painful memory. She hasn’t heard from him since their break up and avoids thinking of the boy she once loved with all her heart and naively imagined spending her life with.
Not long after, bodies of gang members and mobsters start piling up around the city. No one knows who is committing these atrocities. The police are no help, refusing to release any kind of official statement. Karen is both intrigued and appalled, drawn to the crime scenes. Ben and Ellison warn her to stay out of it lest she gets herself in trouble. Steadfast as she is, there’s no stopping her once she starts investigating.
A month later, the killer the police so aptly named the Punisher is captured. Her heart is in her throat when she sees the photo: it’s Frank Castle.
Feelings she fought to bury for so long resurface stronger than ever.
And while everyone around her is quick to judge and condemn the vile murderer, Karen still remembers that sweet boy who swept her off her feet and made her high school years more bearable. In spite of the protest of the people around her, she knows she can’t let the media paint such a vicious picture of him no matter what he’s done.
Karen digs and digs, abandoning all her other work, until she discovers everything that exists about Frank Castle in the public records. She dares to dig into his past after joining the military too, but not much is available.
Her investigation leads her to a horrific discovery: a massacre at the carousel, several deaths. She gets her hands on DA doctored documents about a family involved in an accident, father being the sole survivor and in coma. She comes across Frank’s skull x-ray and the DNR sanctioned by the DA Reyes. Her soul aches for him and his family and the tragedy that befell them. She abhors all those involved in pushing this under the rug and perpetuating the image of Frank she knows is not true.
Resourceful as ever, Karen manages to visit Frank in prison, helped by her best friends at the Nelson & Murdock law office.
Recognising her immediately, Frank doesn’t hide the surprise on his battered face at seeing her there.
“What are you doing here, Karen?”
“I came to help you uncover the truth.”
