Reborn in Castle (TV show)

[Velmont Grand Theatre]

One of the officers brought the diary to the captain since Espo was at the hospital getting treatment. The captain got the warrant. Kate and Travis went to the theatre where Ade's phone pinged.

Kate parked across from the theatre while Travis checked the latest message Ryan had forwarded to his phone.

"Phone pinged inside ten minutes ago," Travis said as he stepped out of the car. "Either our pink suit guy got careless or he wants us walking in there."

Kate shut her door and adjusted the holster beneath her coat. "People like him usually enjoy hearing themselves talk once they think they've won."

Travis smirked faintly while looking toward the entrance. "Good. Saves interrogation time later."

The moment they entered, something cold pressed firmly against Travis' back.

"Keep moving," a rough voice muttered behind him. "Boss is waiting for you two."

Kate stopped instantly when another guard appeared near her side with his hand under his jacket. She slowly raised her hands slightly, eyes flicking toward Travis for half a second.

Travis gave her the smallest wink.

Kate caught it immediately.

"Today's getting better and better by each minute," Travis said casually while lifting his hands just enough to keep the guard relaxed. "You guys usually greet guests like this, or are we getting the premium package?"

"Walk," the guard snapped.

The two security guards pushed them through the theatre hallways. Their footsteps echoed on the old wooden floors while Travis quietly examined his surroundings. He looked for exit routes, camera locations, and the distance between the guards. One guard acted like tough muscle, while the other kept checking on Kate instead of watching Travis.

'Bunch of amateurs.'

They passed the stage where props had already been arranged for tomorrow night's performance. Tall black curtains hung like shadows across the sides while strange ritual symbols had been painted directly onto sections of the stage floor.

Kate noticed Travis slowing slightly as he looked at the ventilation grates overhead.

'That many ventilation grates? Yeah. He's really doing it,' she thought.

The guards eventually led them back toward Adewale's office. One of them opened the door while the other shoved Travis lightly between the shoulders with the gun barrel.

"Inside."

Travis stepped through first with Kate right behind him.

Adewale sat behind his desk exactly where they had left him earlier. The pink suit was gone now, replaced by a black dress shirt with the sleeves rolled neatly to his elbows. A half-finished glass of whiskey rested beside several open ledgers and financial sheets spread across the desk. A guard was standing beside his chair.

Soft jazz played quietly somewhere in the background.

Adewale smiled warmly the second he saw them.

"Detectives," he said while leaning back comfortably in his chair. "I was wondering how long it would take before you returned."

The two guards closed the door behind them.

"You know, when people start attacking cops retrieving evidence, it usually hurts their innocent act," Travis said.

Adewale sighed softly while swirling the whiskey in his glass. "That situation became unnecessarily messy. Your detective friend arrived quicker than expected." He took a small sip before continuing. "Still alive, I hope?"

"He'll survive," Kate replied coldly. "Which is bad news for you."

Adewale chuckled quietly at that. "You see, this is exactly the problem with people like you two." He rested the glass down carefully. "You keep pushing forward long after wiser people would have stopped digging."

Travis pulled a chair out and sat down casually across from him like they were discussing theater tickets instead of terrorism charges.

"Funny thing about detectives," Travis replied. "Digging is kind of the job description."

Adewale studied him for a second before smiling again. "Adisa gave you quite the story, didn't he?" He spread his hands slightly. "Mad grieving father, dead daughter, poison conspiracies and corrupt officials." His smile widened faintly. "It was perfect for you."

Kate narrowed her eyes. "Except the toxicology report backed him up."

"For Aston, yes," Adewale admitted calmly. "My old friend poisoned himself with obsession long before anyone touched him. Besides, that diary was enough proof to conclude that Aston was the one to kill those three, and Adisa killed Aston." He leaned forward slightly now, voice lowering. "So, you have your killer. You should've closed the file and walked away before this became dangerous."

Travis rested one ankle over his knee. "Dangerous for who?"

Adewale's eyes sharpened slightly for the first time.

"For everyone."

Silence settled briefly inside the office while the jazz music continued softly behind them.

Then Adewale stood up slowly and walked toward the window overlooking the stage below.

"You know what fear really is, Detective Wilson?" he asked quietly while staring down at the empty seats. "People think fear is screaming and panic. They think fear looks dramatic." He shook his head faintly. "Real fear is much smaller than that. Real fear lives in uncertainty. In doubt. In sleepless nights where your own mind turns against you."

Kate folded her arms tightly. "So your solution was chemical warfare?"

Adewale turned back toward them with surprising calm.

"My solution was evolution."

Travis almost laughed at how serious he sounded saying it.

Adewale noticed and smiled faintly. "You mock it because you still think violence controls the world." He walked slowly around the desk while speaking. "Guns create martyrs. Bombs create outrage. But fear…" His eyes darkened slightly. "Fear rewrites people from the inside."

"You poisoned rival gangs to make them paranoid," Travis said.

Adewale nodded immediately. "And it worked beautifully." Pride crept openly into his voice now. "Men who trusted each other for years started killing one another over imagined betrayal. Entire crews collapsed without me firing a single bullet." He spread his arms slightly. "Do you understand how efficient that is? I did your work for you. I took down three gangs within a week."

"You're insane," Kate said flatly.

Adewale smiled again, though this time the warmth disappeared completely.

"No, Detective Beckett. I simply learned what governments learned centuries ago. Fear controls populations far better than brute force ever could."

Travis watched him closely now. 'Delusional narcissist. Smart enough to be dangerous. Arrogant enough to start explaining himself... Perfect.'

"What about you?" Travis said as he positioned himself so that he could see everyone in the room. "Would you feel fear if I kill all your men in this room and then shoot your kneecaps and press the muzzle of my gun on your temple? Do you think fear will rewrite this persona of yours that you worked so hard to create?"

Adewale laughed loudly, the sound filling the office while he spread his hands slightly like Travis had just told him the funniest joke in the city.

"And how exactly are you planning on doing that with three guns pointed at you inside my own office?"

Before the last word fully left his mouth, Travis moved.

The chair beneath him spun violently across the floor. His hand shot backward in the same motion and clamped around the wrist of the guard standing behind him. The man barely had time to tense before Travis ripped the gun free and slammed the muzzle upward under his jaw.

Bang.

The shot exploded through the office. Blood sprayed while his body collapsed backward before his brain even understood he was dead.

That violent death was enough to stun everyone in that room.

At the exact same second, Travis pivoted sideways with terrifying speed and fired twice toward the second guard near Kate.

Bang. Bang.

The first round punched through the guard's throat. The second tore into his chest before he could even pull his weapon free. The man staggered backward into the bookshelf, knocking scripts and framed awards onto the floor before collapsing beside them.

Kate reacted instantly the moment the shooting started. She ducked low and drew her own gun while the third guard near Adewale reached under his jacket too late.

Travis already had the angle.

Bang.

The bullet ripped through the guard's eye. His head snapped sideways violently while his body crashed against the desk and slid lifelessly onto the carpet.

Silence slammed into the room almost immediately after the gunfire stopped.

The jazz music still played softly in the background.

Smoke drifted lazily from the barrel of Travis's gun. The entire exchange had lasted barely five seconds.

Kate slowly straightened from behind the side table she had moved toward during the chaos. Her breathing stayed controlled, though even she looked slightly stunned by how fast everything had happened.

Adewale stood frozen near the window.

The confidence was gone now.

His eyes darted across the room, landing on each dead body one after another like his brain was struggling to catch up with reality. Blood spread slowly across the expensive carpet around his desk while the smell of gunpowder mixed with whiskey and old theatre dust.

"Well?" Travis walked close to the fucker.

Adewale's breathing had changed. The calm rhythm from earlier was gone now, replaced by short uneven breaths he could no longer fully control.

Travis tilted his head slightly while watching him.

"Are you feeling fear now?"

...

[2 hours later] [12th Precinct]

The bullpen carried that exhausted late-night atmosphere that only showed up after ugly cases finally ended. Half-empty coffee cups covered desks. Officers moved slower now, running on habit and caffeine more than actual energy.

Adewale's operation had collapsed fast.

The diary closely matched what Adisa said. It revealed hidden accounts linked to money laundering routes used by the cartel. There were records for distributing drugs and chemical formulas in Aston's research notes. Before the raid team shut everything down, someone had already modified the theatre's ventilation system for releasing aerosols.

The press had not gotten hold of the full story yet. Montgomery planned to keep it that way until Internal Affairs quietly started an investigation.

The captain looked happier than anyone had seen him in weeks.

Mostly because nobody died tonight except armed criminals.

Espo sat at his desk with a bandaged arm while Ryan leaned nearby holding fresh coffee. Castle had finally arrived halfway through the aftermath and spent almost twenty minutes staring at the evidence board like somebody had handed him the script for the strangest crime thriller of his life.

"You're telling me this whole thing started because of haunted theatre drugs?" Castle asked while pointing vaguely at the board.

Ryan looked tired already. "Please don't say haunted theatre drugs out loud where reporters might hear you."

Castle ignored him completely and looked toward Travis. "You shot three guys in under five seconds?"

"Honestly, I think it was faster," Kate said.

Castle blinked once. "That is deeply concerning. Are you secretly a robot who doesn't know he is a robot?"

Travis laughed and looked up after signing the last paper. "You say concerning. I say efficient."

"That," Ryan muttered while sipping his coffee, "is exactly the kind of sentence future documentaries use right before dramatic music starts playing."

A quiet laugh moved through the bullpen, finally breaking some of the tension hanging over everyone.

Espo adjusted the bandage on his arm and looked toward Travis. "By the way, thanks for avenging my arm."

Travis glanced toward him. "Relax. You'll survive. The nurses already said you were being dramatic."

Espo looked offended immediately. "I got attacked by gang members retrieving cursed voodoo evidence."

Montgomery stepped out of his office at that exact moment.

"Internal Affairs already started reviewing the old case files tied to Amara's death," Montgomery said. "Two retired detectives, one coroner, and a medical consultant are getting pulled in for questioning tomorrow morning." He looked at Travis and Kate carefully. "Good work today. Messy as hell, but good work."

Kate nodded once while Travis leaned back slightly in his chair.

"Messy seems to follow us around lately," Travis replied.

Montgomery gave him a tired look. "That's because you treat normal police procedure like polite suggestions."

"Technically," Travis said while closing the file, "today worked out pretty well."

The captain stared at him for two full seconds.

Then he sighed heavily and walked away before the conversation could physically damage his remaining sanity.

Night settled deeper outside the precinct windows while the bullpen slowly emptied one desk at a time.

Ryan headed home first.

Castle left after trying unsuccessfully to convince everyone that Haunted Theatre Drugs was still marketable.

Espo stayed behind a little longer, mostly because everyone kept signing his bandage like a high school yearbook.

Eventually, the noise faded.

Travis gathered the last of his paperwork, put his jacket on, and picked up his keys from the desk. The exhaustion finally started settling into his shoulders now that the adrenaline had nowhere left to go.

He was halfway toward the elevators when Kate's voice stopped him.

"Hey."

Travis turned around.

Kate stood near her desk with her coat already on. The sharp edges from earlier had softened now that the case was over. Her hair rested loose around her shoulders from running her hands through it all night.

"You in a rush to disappear, detective?" she asked.

Travis slipped his keys into his pocket. "Depends. Am I about to get more paperwork?"

A small smile appeared at the corner of her mouth.

"No," she replied. "I was thinking maybe we grab a drink instead."

Travis studied her for a second.

Then he smiled faintly.

"Yeah," he said with a nod. "A drink sounds nice after surviving haunted theatre drugs."

Kate laughed despite herself and shook her head while heading toward the elevators with him.

"You keep saying it like that," she said, "and eventually Castle's actually going to publish it."

"Well," Travis replied as the elevator doors opened in front of them, "then you better make sure he doesn't turn me into the weird side character. I'm pretty sure he'll listen to you."

Kate stepped inside first, still smiling slightly.

"No promises, Detective."

--

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