Chapter Twenty Five
Requiem

"A last fire will rise behind those eyes
Black house will rock, blind boys don't lie
Immortal fear, that voice so clear
Through broken walls, that scream I hear"

"Cry Little Sister" Gerard McMann

Previously

Kate twisted and flipped her fingers until she had turned her wedding ring around, slid it past her knuckle and began working the setting across the strap holding her left wrist to the table. The sudden, desperate realization of what the mysterious woman was planning, why she'd kept her alive this long, set her fingers to work to free herself with renewed vigor.

Her captor was going to make Castle watch her die before she killed him.

She could not allow that to happen.

Richard Castle pulled his black SUV into the long driveway and up to the house. He checked his phone, making certain he had ample bars on the indicator and that the panic button dutifully appeared on the screen when he unlocked it. He had to get to Kate before he used it though. He'd been to all of the crime scenes and he took Jack's implied threat to gut her like a fish if things went south seriously.

He only needed to keep Jack occupied for a short time after he hit it until the cavalry came. Until then he would protect Kate as best he could, with his own body if he had to. He had watched Kate bleed in his arms once before. Watched her die a short time later in the back of that ambulance. His worst imaginings took him back to that cemetery four years ago more times than he liked to contemplate in the hours since she was taken.

He would not let that happen again, not while he lived. He would fight for her, fight with everything he had for them, but if saving her life required his in trade, so be it. As long as he got to take that bastard down with him.

He didn't linger on that thought for long, however. He had more pressing concerns.

He'd received a text message from a number he didn't recognize shortly after leaving Manhattan, which he surmised to be a burner phone with instructions to text the number back when he arrived. He went through the motions of doing just that to cover his response to Esposito's voice in his ear.

"Stay cool, Castle, I have eyes on you."

It felt only mildly disconcerting to know that Javier Esposito was looking at him through the telescopic sight of a sniper rifle.

Since he couldn't risk using his own ESU issued sniper rifle he was currently holding the very rifle that had been used to shoot Kate. Technically, her shooting was still unsolved, since Cole Maddox had not been officially connected, so it had still been in evidence. Castle found it almost poetic justice that the weapon that had nearly taken her life was now being employed to rescue her. It felt almost... right, somehow.

The three of them had decided to keep Captain Gates out of the loop, but she was painfully aware of his penchant for going rogue (she'd created new standing orders in the precinct to account for it after all). His text to Ryan had been a ruse in case she had Tory monitoring his cell phone activity. The waivers he'd signed six years ago obviously covered a lot more than liability.

The small number of cops involved were way off the books on this one, out on a limb which they would be merrily sawing off behind them if it went sour. Castle made sure Velasquez and LT knew that before accepting their offer to come along. How LT had come up with all of the nondescript tactical gear (including appropriating the aforementioned sniper rifle) in such a small amount of time boggled his mind.

He would be peppering the man with questions later, if all went well. LT was quiet, but there was obviously a deep well of hidden layers behind his mild-mannered exterior. He needed to write a character like him into the next Nikki Heat.

Rick knew that somewhere in the hills overlooking this house, Javier Esposito was dressed in pattern disruptive clothing, his eye trained through the scope, acting as over-watch. Half a mile up the road, Ryan, LT and Velasquez were armed to the teeth and ready to swoop in upon his signal to breach the house.

Somewhere in that modest two story structure, Kate was alone with their killer, and it was his job to get to her, then send out the signal to breach. He was the tip of the spear and everything was riding on him. He had to get to Kate and keep her safe when the cavalry arrived and all hell broke loose.

I'm parked in the driveway with the motor off.

The response was swift.

Come to the door and knock.
I have a knife to your wife's throat,
so no tricks

Castle got out of his SUV, walked to the door and knocked, trying not to draw attention to the pistol in the zipped pocket of the heavy motorcycle jacket thrown over his left shoulder which Kate had bought for him the first time they went riding on her motorcycle. He schooled his body language to give the impression this was a casual visit as instructed.

'Apparently the neighbors are nosy,' he thought darkly to himself, 'if this goes according to plan, they're gonna get an eyeful today.'

A slender strawberry blonde in her late forties answered the door and beckoned him to come inside without speaking a word. 'Game on,' Castle thought to himself as he turned his attention to the foyer, hoping to get a feel for the layout. It was utilitarian in appearance, almost spartan in decor, a contrast with the outside of the house, which was quite rustic.

It was obvious that Kelly Nieman had not chosen it for the view or the few nosy neighbors, only it's isolated location and he shivered at the thought of what she'd likely had planned to do with Kate here, his penchant for the worst case scenario weaving all sorts of unpleasant variations on a theme, none of them ending well for his wife.

He was shaken from his reverie, when a rail-thin, almost wiry man with short cropped black hair, going prematurely gray at the temples slid open the double doors, the knife in its scabbard on full display at his hip.

"Good afternoon, Mr. Castle," he began, "my name is Sebastian, though I believe you might know me better as "Jack". The woman who met you at the door is my lovely wife, Elizabeth, whom you may recall speaking to on the phone last night."

Castle whipped around to confront the woman who had kidnapped Kate, killed the prostitute who had lured her there and then covered her in Kate's jacket. He felt the pinprick in his arm a fraction of a second too late. His vision swam, he dropped the leather jacket and tottered on his feet as he fought to remain standing.

"This whole thing was not my idea," Sebastian explained as the drug took effect, "I will have some most unpleasant news for you when you wake up in about half an hour, provided I set the dosage correctly."

Castle dropped to his knees, Sebastian's face swam in his vision before he toppled face first onto the floor and saw only shadows.

Ten Hours Earlier

"What the hell have you two done?" Sebastian Keller boomed as he stormed into the house.

He could sense his father's hand in this all too clearly. He had taken all too much of an interest in Sally, almost to the exclusion of David since they were young children. Had his father's convictions not run so deep, he would have almost thought it had been sexual in nature. He always took her on excursions separate from David, leaving him to be doted upon by mother, something he'd always found odd if David was supposed to take up work.

"What you should have done with the other cop, father," Sally replied petulantly.

"That is not your decision to make, Sally," Sebastian replied angrily. Without waiting for an answer from his headstrong daughter, he rounded on his wife and fixed her with a glare.

"What the hell, Lizzie?" he began, "you know damned well that I never wanted Sally mixed up in this, why the hell did you, of all people betray me?"

His wife had the good sense to express at least some guilt for her part in this escapade, though he saw conviction behind her eyes too.

This hadn't been a whim, she believed in what she was doing. She had taken up arms, against his wishes, to kidnap Detective Beckett either with or for their daughter, for reasons he had yet been made aware of. He was playing his part in the family legacy, just like father wanted, and yet his own wife, whom he once thought he could trust implicitly, was following her own agenda and keeping him out of the loop.

"I did tell her no when she first asked," she replied, "I didn't want to do this behind your back, but your father came to me and explained everything. Things he'd kept secret for years - from both of us. Sally was set on this course long ago. I didn't like it... but I'm her mother... I couldn't let her do this alone."

"You should not have let her do this at all," Sebastian hissed, "it wasn't her place, nor was it yours - or father's - I wanted her free of this, I wanted her hands to be clean."

"That was never your decision to make, Father," Sally said coldly.

"The hell it isn't!" Sebastian spat back.

"I'm not a child, Father!" Sally shot back. He'd be proud of her for standing up to him, like he'd never been able to do with his own father, if he wasn't so powerfully angry.

"But you're my child," Sebastian replied, his despair beginning to show through his rage.

"I hear the voices, father," she whispered and it shook him to the core. "The ones great great grandfather spoke of in his journals."

"I never wanted this for you," he replied, which seemed to anger her all over again.

"If not me, then who, Dad?" she spat at him, rage flaring to life in her eyes. "David? We both know he doesn't have it in him. Grandfather has always known. What were you going to do? Force him down the path like grandfather did to you? Make him torture me to death, like grandfather made you do to your whore of a sister, Nancy?"

The words were no sooner out of Sally's mouth, than his right hand shot out and slapped her in the face.

Sebastian Keller had never once so much as raised his hand to his wife nor either of his children. There was almost nothing behind it, not even enough to redden her cheek, but Sally was so stunned, she fell to the floor in shock.

"Don't you dare speak her name!" he roared. Father had beaten him to within an inch of his life the one time he had spoken his sister's name after the two of them had disposed of her body. He had been genuinely shocked his father had told her. Angry for a reason even he could not fathom. Whether it was to enforce his father's decree that she never existed, or to defend her, he had no idea.

A sudden surge of darkness welled up until it nearly poured out of him, a darkness he now knew his father had put there - followed swiftly by the sudden realization that he was not the chosen one, only an abomination of his father's making to keep the cycle of violence going. The path for him had been a lie, forced down his throat by his own father.

Sebastian watched the change come over his daughter and for the first time, saw a knowledge in her eyes that he had never noticed there before, something within her that he had never possessed himself.

A predatory hunger he had only ever seen before in the eyes of his father.

In that second he knew exactly what his daughter was and it filled him with both dread and a terrible sense of purpose. His daughter had been chosen, she heard the voices, where he had only ever heard the screams of his dead sister. He could see only one possible course left open to him now that he knew his entire adult life had been a lie.

"Get out," he hissed through clenched teeth.

"Father?" she asked, and for one brief instant she was the daughter he thought he'd known for twenty years.

"Sally, if you learn one thing from me that you hadn't from your grandfather, it will be this," he said, his voice hollow with resignation. "Never kill a police officer if you can help it, not even a corrupt one. They never forget when you kill one of their own. It galvanizes them in a way you cannot imagine. I didn't hold back out of fear, or out of sentimentality, but because once this is done it cannot be undone."

Sally moved as if to speak, but he silenced her with a glare.

"No, Sally, you've forced my hand. If you hear the voices, if you truly are chosen, then I can't take the chance that Detective Beckett has seen your face. She and her husband must die. I only hope that you learn this one thing from me. Now get out, while your mother and I finish this."

To her retreating back, he whispered the same words his mother had, shortly before his killing spree began, on the day she entered the void.

"May God go with you in all of the dark places you must walk."

The Present

Richard Castle woke up groggily, his senses slowly checking in one by one. He could feel the zip ties digging into his wrists behind his back. He was in the dark, but not blindfolded if the silver of light from under the door was any indication.

He rolled and wiggled on the floor, testing the confines of the space he was in. Supply closet, his mind supplied, and he felt the stirrings of claustrophobia begin to rise. He twisted his wrists painfully in the zip ties, using pain to focus his mind, forced himself to regulate his breathing. Fighting for control of his mind and body as he shook off the effects of whatever drug Sebastian's wife had used on him.

Castle struggled and twisted, using the walls of the confined space to struggle to his knees and then to his feet just before the door opened to reveal Sebastian holding his gun in one hand and an auto syringe in the other.

"Ah, Mr. Castle, you're awake sooner than I expected." Sebastian said calmly, as if resigned to a course of action. Castle knew that could not be a good sign. "If you come quietly I will take you to your wife. I may be a monster, an abomination, but I'm a man of my word, even though you were holding out on me." Sebastian held up the gun, drawing Castle's attention to it. "Very devious of you."

"I gave you no word to keep, Sebastian," Castle replied in a hoarse whisper.

"Indeed," Sebastian noted, "Lizzie will be ready to deal with your wife soon, and you should be together at the end, the same courtesy I extended to Tyson and his whore. However, your shared end will be much kinder. Though my time is short, the two of you have been worthy adversaries and I owe you that much."

Before Sebastian could say another word, or step closer, Castle bent forward and barreled shoulder first into the smaller man, the force of all two hundred pounds of enraged, desperate writer sending Sebastian sprawling across the room, both gun and syringe skittering out of reach in opposite directions.

Castle jumped up and down until he felt the satisfying snap of the zip ties breaking, thankful he'd done his homework after Maddox had tied them up three years ago as Sebastian leaped at him. Castle got a grip on his shirt and flung him into the opposite wall, then set himself as the smaller man came on again.

"Whoever taught him to fight did a pretty good job," Castle thought to himself, but there was a reason Sebastian drugged his victims, the man simply didn't have the mass to take on somebody in Castle's weight class who could defend himself and was fighting for his life. Castle's fist snaked out and hit him solidly in the jaw, sending him sprawling over a desk, both him and the contents driven over the other side with a crash from the power of the blow.

When Sebastian came back up, with a cracked lip and favoring his right ankle, he had a long, straight knife gripped in his right hand like he knew intimately how to use it to his advantage, suddenly swinging the odds back in the killer's favor again.

Castle cast about for a weapon of his own and spied his gun in the corner. Unfortunately he would have to get past Sebastian and his killing weapon of choice to get to it. He knew he only had one shot, if he was going to rescue Kate. There were no points for effort.

"This is gonna hurt," he thought to himself as he steeled his resolve and charged at the man.

Sebastian narrowed his eyes, brought his knife up and attacked.

Kate was busily working the strap holding her left arm to the table, which was loosening with every sharp tug since she'd frayed and separated the bulk of the nylon webbing with her wedding ring. She didn't recall why she'd chosen to wear the rock instead of the simple gold band she usually wore to work, but that choice had since been paying off nicely.

Kate felt the strap partially give way right before she heard the lock turn on the door. She froze, hiding her efforts as best she could when the woman swung open the heavy steel door and stepped inside. She didn't want her attempt at escape to be detected. She had spied her own handcuffs on the table across the room along with her belt and boots. The last thing Kate wanted was for this woman to get it into her head to secure her to the table with those.

Kate still felt a little woozy and disoriented from whatever she'd been drugged with and had no idea how long she'd been held, or even whom her captors really were other than the woman who had examined her rather roughly earlier and the man's voice she'd heard before the door slammed shut and absolute silence descended in her prison.

The woman left the door slightly ajar as she crossed the space to lean over her and Kate did her best not to squirm or struggle too much as the woman smoothed back her hair, slipped the errant curls behind her ear before she pulled the gag from her mouth and gave her some water.

"Sebastian will be in shortly with your husband," Elizabeth Keller whispered in her ear, "provided Mr. Castle doesn't put up too much of a struggle."

Kate did her best to school her features, but her heart sank at the knowledge that they had Rick too, that she had taken too long to free herself. She barely noticed her captor had stepped away to retrieve something from a drawer a few paces away, with her back turned, then the bottom dropped out of her world when she heard the first gunshot, followed by two more.

"I suppose he must have put up a fight, Detective," Elizabeth said, as she turned toward her with a surgical scalpel. "A pity, Sebastian was never fond of guns, they're too noisy."

A single tear flowed down Kate's cheek as Elizabeth brought the knife closer before Kate's left hand shot out, snapped Elizabeth's slender wrist, then shoved the scalpel deep into her neck.

Elizabeth made a soft gurgling sound, her eyes wide with shock as the blade stabbed deep onto her neck and twisted slightly. The surgical instrument came away in Kate's hand as the woman staggered back from the table, her good hand unable to staunch the flow of blood as she wobbled backward then forward on her feet before she toppled face first onto the floor. A growing pool of blood quickly began spread out from her neck while Kate freed herself from the restraints.

"Castle..." Kate whispered, as she stared at the woman slowly bleeding out at her feet. Her back to the door, no longer caring who came through it, her heart empty with the belief that he was dead.

Esposito had waited for nearly half an hour since Castle had gone into the house with no idea what was going on inside. Though Castle should be able to hear him through the ear piece, they couldn't take the chance on a microphone. He didn't dare break silence to distract him either.

He was just about at the end of his rope, just about to say "fuck it" and send their ad-hoc strike team in to breach the house, when the piercing bark of gunfire echoed up to him.

"Ryan! Go! Go! Go!" he shouted into his radio as he dropped the sniper rifle, took up his M-4 and ran headlong down the hill toward the house.

Castle was bleeding from a shallow cut to his left arm from shouldering past Sebastian as he dove for his gun. The two of them had struggled for it, but Castle shrugged the smaller man off, pushing him back with ease. When Sebastian came on again like a man possessed, Castle fired, the first shot went wild, barely grazing him, the second two caught him in the shoulder and high on the chest respectively, slamming Sebastian into the wall.

Moments later, he heard a battering ram make short work of the front door, then Ryan shouted ,

"NYPD! Freeze!"

Castle didn't wait for them before descending on Sebastian, shaking him.

"Kate! Where's Kate, you son of a bitch?!"

Sebastian was only partially conscious, his eyes intent on something only he could see.

"Nancy?" he muttered incoherently, "I'm sorry...I'm so sorry...Nancy!"

"Not Nancy, you bastard, Kate! Where's Kate, goddamn it?!" Castle was about to slam his head into the floor when Ryan pulled him off.

"Castle, no, he can't hear you," Ryan whispered, nodding to Velasquez to take charge of the prisoner while they waited for the ambulance LT had called in.

"We can sweep the place, we'll find her, okay?"

Castle nodded, his face a dull mask, moving by rote, holding the bandage Ryan handed him to his shoulder. They hadn't gotten far when Castle spotted a door slightly ajar, which he was certain had been closed securely when he entered the house. He headed straight for it, pulling the door open wide and stopping dead in the doorway at the tableau inside.

Kate's back was turned, her hand coated in blood and a scalpel clutched in her fingers. She was staring down at Sebastian's dead wife lying in a pool of her own blood. At the sound of his approach, she turned slowly to face him. Her eyes were open, but from their blank, glassy appearance, she did not see him. Her gaze was fixed, as if on a point a thousand miles away.

She didn't struggle or say a word when Castle slipped the weapon from the loose grip of her fingers and handed it to Ryan. She barely responded when he brushed his hand over her face except to turn her cheek into his touch before he pulled her to his chest.

"Shh Kate, I'm here, it's over." He pressed his forehead to hers, and for the first time she seemed to realize it was really him holding her.

"When I heard the shots... she told me you were... dead... " Kate whispered as she crumpled into his embrace, her voice choked with emotion, unable to finish the thought.

"Jack the Ripper shouldn't have brought a knife to a gunfight," Castle replied. His attempt at humor fell flat, the words tumbling out mirthlessly. In spite of herself, the corners of Kate's lips twitched upward for a fraction of a second before she broke down, clutching him like she was drowning.

"I'm so glad you're okay," she whispered between sobs and for once Castle had nothing to say, so he just held her.

The elevator doors opened onto the 12th Precinct Homicide floor and when Rick and Kate stepped through them into view, flanked by Javier Esposito, Kevin Ryan, LT and Officer Velasquez, the whole precinct burst into applause. When the hubbub died down, Captain Gates appeared from out of her office, a scowl painted on her face that didn't quite make it to her eyes.

"That was the stupidest, most reckless, irresponsible stunt you've ever pulled, Mr. Castle," she said with enough fire to silence the entire room. Every eye was turned to Castle as Gates glared at him for a moment longer, before her face softened and she smiled at him. "Thank you."

With that, the room burst into applause once again. Now was the time to celebrate. They had recovered Detective Kate Beckett. She was battered and emotionally scarred, but she was safe. Everything had worked out in the end as far as they knew.

"Sebastian Keller has been transferred to the secure wing of Cedar Sinai Hospital. He's expected to make a full recovery in order to face murder charges," Captain Gates said. "According to the State Trooper who accompanied him, he kept muttering about someone named Nancy."

"I did a full database search," Tory stated, " but I couldn't find any records of a previous victim named Nancy, though a wider database search against his name did turn up a single notation for a Nancy Keller. An arrest for solicitation back in 1989, but nothing else. It's like she never existed before or after her arrest. All other records of her were wiped clean."

"He has a son in law school, upstate, David Keller, and a daughter named Sally in med school, she's interning with OCME this semester, in fact. Officers have been sent to take their statements, but it doesn't appear that they were involved in any of their parents' activities."

Shortly afterward, the precinct returned to normal. Though Kate and Rick had been sent home after giving their statements, there was still work to be done, paperwork to be filled out and other murderers to be caught. New York was the city that never sleeps and the same could be said for its killers.

Sebastian Keller's reign of terror was over, the "Manhattan Ripper" had been caught and was going to face justice.

Or so they thought.

Three days later
Cedar Sinai ICU

Sebastian Keller woke slowly, not knowing where he was. The last thing he could remember were the gunshots, his back hitting the wall before everything faded to black.

He tried to move, only to find that he was secured to the bed, much like Detective Beckett had been, except for his right arm, which was wrapped tight and did not respond to his commands, not even his

fingers. It was heavily bandaged and he dimly remembered being hit there.

"Bullet must have wrecked my shoulder, perhaps even done nerve damage," his mind supplied slowly, recalling some of his medical training. He was breathing with difficulty, finally noticing the nasal canula in his nostrils. He should have a blood pressure monitor on his fingertip, but it was missing and he couldn't figure out why, until a voice he recognized reached his ear.

"You didn't think I could simply walk away and leave you... like this... did you, father?"

The voice belonged to his daughter, but he barely recognized the woman standing in front of him. Sally's features were there, but she was wearing makeup in such a way as she never had before. Her flaming red hair, the same shade as Alexis Castle's (which she had previously taken the greatest care to color the same shade as her mother's) cascaded over her shoulders, making her look just like Nancy used to.

She truly was the spitting image of his twin sister, always had been if he was being honest with himself... a thought he had never truly allowed himself to entertain until now. He had long ago taken to having his own red hair dyed black at father's insistence, so as to not stand out.

"What about your mother, Sally?" he asked, his voice raspy from being intubated.

"Dead," Sally hissed, her voice dull and emotionless, as she watched her father's grief crescendo, the tears form in his eyes and slip down his cheeks to drip onto his hospital gown, "that bitch, Detective killed her, just stood there and watched her bleed out."

She did not allow her angry feelings to fester for long, she had so much to do. The voices were calling her elsewhere... to take the work back to where it had begun. To bring the family crusade full circle. There was only one loose end, however. One last bit of family business to take care of.

She loved her father dearly, but he was an abomination, an anomaly that could not be allowed to fester.

He didn't truly believe, not really, and some well-meaning psychologist looking to make a name for himself might one day crack him open. It had already begun. She'd read all of the reports when Dr. Parish wasn't looking, he had been calling out to that whore sister of his. Begging her to forgive him, as if he had been the one who'd sinned.

"He can no longer be trusted to walk the path." The voices whispered in her mind. From the look that crossed his eyes, she could see that he knew what she was here for. That, he accepted it. The voices demanded a sacrifice from her, equal to the one Grandfather had demanded of him.

It was the only way to save his soul.

She slipped her great great grandfather's blade out from under her lab coat. On her last day at OCME, she had liberated it from evidence storage, along with every sample of his DNA, swapping it with those taken from Jerry Tyson. No one would ever be the wiser.

"End my torment," her father whispered, tears still streaking down his face, she was unsure if they were for her or for her mother, "be on with it, sweetheart and be on your way."

"Go in peace, father, your work is done." she whispered, before slipping the knife into his neck, putting her full weight behind it to make sure she severed the spinal cord cleanly so he would not suffer, then watched carefully as his eyes glazed over, staring up into nothing.

"Go to her," she whispered, before she closed her father's sightless eyes and left.

Sally had drugged the night charge nurse just before she left to make her rounds and slipped her into the bed next to her father's with his pulse monitor on her finger, then took her place. The woman would not be missed until the shift changed in three hours, and perhaps another hour before anyone thought to come looking in her father's room. The police shift change would be two hours after that. She would be halfway to London under an assumed name before anyone knew her father was dead.

As Sally slipped out of the hospital, she knew that one day there would be a reckoning.

Detective Beckett had visited her at OCME the day before, had actually thought her patronizing words would fix the hole she had opened in her soul by stabbing her mother to death and watching her die on the floor like a piece of garbage. She'd smiled and nodded, and pretended to accept the woman's empty platitudes, but inside, Sally Keller raged and hated and plotted. "One day," she thought to herself, "Kate Beckett will die screaming, begging me for mercy." But not before she killed everything that Kate Beckett loved, starting with the pretty redheaded stepchild that she was so fond of.

The very next day, Sally Keller resigned from her internship at OCME and disappeared.

The End?

**Author's note** Uh Oh, now I've done it. *waits for angry mob with torches and pitchforks*

*addendum* Anyone who knows anything about my work knows I won't leave it here. Epilogue to follow.