Reborn in Castle (TV show)

After breakfast, Kate carried the empty coffee mugs toward the kitchen while Travis gathered the plates from the small dining table. The morning had started comfortably enough, but somewhere between finishing his eggs and clearing the dishes, Travis had become unusually quiet.

Kate noticed almost immediately.

He had opened his mouth twice as though he wanted to say something, stopped himself both times, then spent nearly a full minute staring through the glass doors toward the terrace while apparently arguing with himself.

Kate placed both mugs beside the sink and turned around. Travis was standing beside the table with one hand resting against the back of a chair, his expression far more serious than anything breakfast should have caused.

"Okay, out with it," Kate said, folding her arms while watching him carefully. "You've been trying to say something for the last five minutes. What's going on?"

Travis took a deep breath. "Nothing bad. It's just..." He paused, rearranging everything he had planned to say before apparently deciding there was no graceful way to approach the subject. "Okay. Sit down for a second."

Kate's eyebrows lifted, though she pulled out the dining chair and sat across from him. 'He looks serious.'

Travis remained standing for another few seconds before finally looking directly at her. "What I'm about to tell you might sound completely insane, and I understand if your first instinct is to think I've finally lost my mind."

Kate's expression sharpened with curiosity. "Considering the people we deal with for a living, my definition of insane has become pretty flexible."

"That actually helps," Travis replied, rubbing one hand over the back of his neck. He took another breath, then finally forced the words out. "It might be hard to believe, but I have superpowers."

Kate stared at him.

Travis waited for disbelief, laughter, questions, or maybe a recommendation that he avoid the tropical sun for several hours.

Instead, Kate shot out of the chair so quickly that the wooden legs scraped loudly against the floor.

"I knew it."

Travis blinked at her. "That was definitely not the reaction I expected."

Kate placed both hands against the table and stared at him with the expression of a detective finally hearing confirmation of a theory she had been building for years. "You seriously thought I hadn't noticed anything?"

"I was hoping you hadn't noticed enough to reach superpowers."

Kate gave him an incredulous look. "Travis, I'm a detective. Noticing things is literally how I make a living."

He slowly pulled out the chair across from her and sat down. "Alright, Detective Beckett. Apparently you've already opened a case file on me, so tell me what you figured out."

Kate remained standing for another moment before sitting again, though her eyes stayed fixed on him. "It started a long time ago with small things. You never seemed to get tired."

Travis opened his mouth, but Kate lifted one finger before he could interrupt her.

"I mean never," she continued. "We'd work sixteen-hour shifts, chase suspects through half of Manhattan, spend another five hours doing paperwork, and somehow you'd still look like you had enough energy to run ten miles afterward. Then we started training together, and that made everything harder to ignore."

Travis leaned back slightly while listening.

Kate crossed her arms. "One morning, I watched you hit that heavy bag for almost an hour before I joined you. You weren't wearing gloves, and I could hear the chains rattling from the other side of the gym because you were hitting it hard. Your knuckles looked completely fine afterward."

Travis glanced down at his hands. "I probably should've tried harder to look tired."

"That would've helped," Kate replied. "You barely sweat compared to everyone else, your breathing recovers ridiculously fast, and your stamina has always been way beyond anything I've seen from athletes or trained cops."

A faint grin appeared on his face. "You've been studying me pretty closely."

"Don't get smug yet because I'm still building the case against you," Kate replied, though a small smile briefly betrayed her. "Then there's your aim. You hit moving targets under pressure with accuracy that shouldn't be possible consistently. I've watched some of the best shooters in the department, and even they miss occasionally."

Travis nodded slowly. "Fair observation. But that's just me, no super power there. I'm just a pro when it comes to guns and knives and any other weapons."

"And then there was the cut on your thumb," Kate continued. "You were opening one of those ridiculous evidence packages at the precinct and sliced yourself with the little knife."

Travis remembered the incident immediately.

Kate tapped one finger against the table. "I saw the cut. It was deep enough that you swore, grabbed a tissue, and walked away. Twenty minutes later, the cut was completely gone."

Travis looked at her, surprised. "You noticed that too?"

"I notice everything about you," Kate said, then realized how that sounded. She paused for a moment but decided not to take it back. "At the time, I told myself I must have seen it wrong because people don't heal cuts in twenty minutes."

"Well, apparently some people do."

Kate gave him a look. "The tunnel removed whatever doubt I had left."

The humor disappeared from Travis's expression.

Kate's voice softened as memories returned. "I saw you move during that firefight. I know I was injured, and everything happened quickly, but I remember it. You moved faster than those men could react. For a few seconds, you just disappeared, and then when you ran through the explosion... You were like a blur."

Travis stayed silent.

Kate looked toward his chest, where the scars remained hidden beneath his shirt. "Then the explosion happened. I remember that slab coming down on you. I remember the metal rods and how badly you were hurt. You should've been unconscious or... but you stayed above me and kept that weight from crushing me while you talked like you were only having a difficult afternoon."

Her expression became serious.

"The doctors couldn't explain how you survived. They kept calling it a miracle. You lost enough blood that they thought they'd lose you during surgery, and you flatlined three times."

Travis's eyebrows rose. "Three times?"

Kate nodded. "Three separate times during the operation, and somehow they got you back every single time."

"Huh," Travis murmured, processing that information. "I knew things went badly, but nobody said anything about... that."

"You had enough to deal with after waking up," Kate said. "Then your recovery started moving faster than the doctors expected. Every test showed improvement earlier than projected, injuries closed quicker than they should have, and eventually you started recovering so fast that even Dr. Halpern stopped pretending it was normal. Then after you came home and we started doing it... I noticed your stamina. No man can do what you do multiple times in a row. I mean that night..."

"Oh yeah, was it seven or eight? I lost count," He said proudly. "You were so good, I just kept going... I mean, the way you grip and kiss..."

"Which position do you like?" She asked, completely going off topic.

"Cowgirl all day," He replied. "Second is missionary."

"I loved the way you hugged me and just kept going while kissing me..." She could remember that night clearly.

"We can do it later today."

"Aren't we going off-topic?" She raised an eyebrow.

"Yes... Yes, we are."

"We're gonna have sex after we talk about this serious situation."

"Can we try the reverse cowgirl?" Travis asked.

"Sure. But I also want full body nelson," Kate said instantly.

"Done."

There was a moment of silence...

Travis looked toward the terrace, remembering how completely different his body had felt that morning.

Kate's expression shifted despite everything she already suspected. "So, you're really healed, huh?"

"Completely," Travis confirmed. "No pain, weakness, stiffness, or anything else. I tested myself outside while you were sleeping. Push-ups, squats, jumping, stretching, everything I could reasonably do without waking you up. My body feels better than before the explosion."

"Alright. Superpowers. What exactly can you do?" Kate asked, looking really curious.

Travis rested his forearms against the table. "Rapid healing is obviously one of them, but I can't control when it happens or how. I'm stronger than normal, although I still don't know my actual upper limit. My stamina and endurance are much higher than they should be, and my senses are enhanced. Hearing, smell, reaction time, all of that."

"And the speed?"

Travis nodded. "That one appeared during the tunnel fight. I'd had moments before where everything seemed slower during dangerous situations, but that was the first time I consciously moved at that speed. For me, it almost felt like everyone else had slowed down while I stayed normal."

Kate stared at him thoughtfully. "How fast can you move?"

"I honestly don't know yet," Travis admitted. "I haven't exactly found a safe place where I can run around like a budget superhero without somebody filming me."

Kate's eyes narrowed slightly as another thought appeared. "How long have you known?"

"That I wasn't normal? Pretty much since shortly after I woke up after that mission and joined the precinct," Travis replied. "I noticed the enhanced endurance first, then healing, senses, strength, and everything else became more obvious over time."

Kate was quiet for several seconds.

Travis watched her carefully. "You're taking this suspiciously well."

Kate reached across the table and took his hand. "Because I already knew something was different about you. I just didn't know what."

"You never asked."

"I thought about asking plenty of times," Kate admitted. "Especially after the tunnel. But I also knew you were hiding it for a reason, and you never used whatever you could do to hurt innocent people or take advantage of anyone."

Her fingers tightened around his.

"You saved people with it. You saved me with it."

Travis looked down at their joined hands.

Kate continued quietly, "I trusted you enough to believe that when you were ready, you'd tell me yourself."

A small smile slowly appeared on his face. "You have no idea how worried I was about this conversation."

"I think I have a pretty good idea."

"I spent half the morning trying to figure out whether telling my girlfriend I'm basically superhuman would ruin our vacation."

Kate stood from her chair and walked around the table until she reached him. Travis turned slightly, and she rested both hands on his shoulders while looking at him.

"It doesn't ruin anything," she said. "Although you're going to answer a lot of questions."

Travis sighed dramatically. "There's the detective."

Kate smiled. "You fell in love with a homicide detective. What exactly did you expect?"

"Fewer interrogations during vacations would've been nice."

"You're not getting that lucky."

Travis wrapped his arms around her waist and pulled her closer until she stood between his knees. "So we're good?"

Kate rested one hand against the side of his face. "We're good. You're still Travis, even if you apparently came with hidden upgrades."

His smile widened with visible relief. "Hidden upgrades sounds way cooler than superpowers."

Kate leaned down and kissed him before pulling back just enough to meet his eyes again.

"One more thing," she said.

Travis immediately became suspicious. "That sounded dangerous."

"You said you don't know your limits."

"That's correct."

Kate's smile slowly changed into the familiar competitive expression he knew from the gym.

"Then when we get back to New York, we're finding out exactly what you can do."

Travis stared at her for a second before grinning.

"Now that sounds like a vacation souvenir I can actually enjoy."

Then they kissed...

After parting...

"By the way, ever wondered how you got these powers?" Kate asked.

"Yeah, it's either God or the near-death experience that activated my X-Genes."

Kate chuckled, "Like a mutant?"

"Uh-huh." He kissed her again. "Oh, and don't tell anyone. I don't want to end up in a government secret lab or Area 51."

Kate replied, "Your secret is safe with me." She kissed him again, once.

"Since the serious talk is over..." He raised an eyebrow.

"Let's have sex."

Travis took her up in his arms after hearing her reply and carried her to the bed...

--

Find me in the link below for advance chapters: https://unknownmaster.carrd.co/

[20 advance chs] + [Modern Family: 35 chs Early access]