Chapter 3
The offices for Arbiomedical were very white. Almost aggressively so, playing on people's ideas of cleanliness and hospitals. The required crappy modern art covered the walls. It could have been any corporate offices in the city. Behind the large reception desk, sat two women. One tall, dark skin, and bright red hair. The other was shorter, white with bleached blond hair. The blond woman was currently engaged with another person, helpfully pointing out something on a sheet of paper as they approached.
"Welcome to Arbiomedical! I am Latrelle. How can I help you?"
Beckett pulled her badge from her pocket. "I am Detective Kate Beckett with the NYPD. This is Mr. Castle. I'm looking for the person in charge here."
"Certainly detective. If you take a seat, I'll get the director right down."
Turning around Beckett could see the line of chairs against the wall. They walked over to the chairs, but didn't sit down. She asked, "How's your shoulder doing? Ready for another pain pill?" The trip to the hospital was quick. Castle hadn't popped any stitches like they thought. He had broken open some of the skin around it. All the ER had to do was re-bandage the wound.
"It's ok. After we leave, I'll take one." Castle smiled gently at the concern. He squeezed Beckett's hand. Before he had the chance to say anything else, a man approached them.
"Good afternoon, detectives. I am Dr. Emmanuel Mancebo, the director of Arbiomedical. How can I help out New York's finest today?" The man was as tall as Beckett, Hispanic with brown curly hair. A long white lab coat completed the lab director look.
"We are here to talk to you about Faina Murdo. She was found dead in her apartment this morning," Beckett said.
"That is distressing news. We can talk about this in my office. Right this way."
The office was painted a nice warm yellow, a nice contrast to the stark white elsewhere. Sunlight poured in the windows that dominated the right wall. Behind the director's desk was a number of accolades and newspaper articles. One was titled Working Towards A Cure. Castle wandered over to that wall while Beckett sat down.
"What can you tell me about Faina? Did she have any problems with anyone?"
"I didn't work directly with her. She's been working on our most important project. Let me get you the project lead."
The werewolf lab was an open floor plan office space. One side was lined with cabinets and counters. On the counter sat some equipment that Castle couldn't recognize. Two refrigerators bookended the space. One marked "Lunches Only" and the other "Specimens Only." Desks were set up haphazardly around the space in twos. Each set had a divider in between. A few curious faces peaked out from behind them.
Word had already spread about either the police being here, or the death of their colleague, because a number of men and women were openly eavesdropping. One man leaned on the counter and was just staring, sipping his coffee. Castle could see the corner of a book behind him, and he wondered if the man would come ask him to sign it later.
"Hello. I'm Dr. Alessia Buonaiuto. I am sorry to hear about Faina. She was very good at what she does. It's a shame to lose such a bright star."
"I need to know if she had any problems at work. Was there anyone she didn't get along with? Was she acting differently?"
"No. No real problems I could tell. There was an incident yesterday. A vial of ours that is still in testing has gone missing and Rhonda accused Faina of stealing it. Then Rhonda stormed out and hasn't been back." Alessia walked over to an empty desk, and grabbed a business card out of the small holder there. Quickly she wrote something down on the back of it, before handing it to Beckett. "I wrote her home address on the back of her card. It has her home and mobile phone numbers on it."
"Thank you for this. The vial that was stolen, what does it look like?"
"Like this one." Alessa picked up an empty vial from the desk. "As there was no break in, I'm not convinced that it was stolen. Some times vials go missing. Most likely it was mislabeled and misplaced. That has happened a few times here. Could this be why she was killed?"
"Maybe. We'll know more later. Thank you for your time. Call me if you think of anything else." Beckett hands Alessia her business card.
"So, Rhonda thinks Faina has stolen the vial. Follows her home and kills her for it?" Castle asks as they walk back down the hall.
"But why would she do that over a werewolf cure?"
"Someone she knows has the virus? Someone close to her. She was planing to steal it first, but Faina beat her to it. And that made it harder to steal some for her... significant other." Castle watches as Beckett fishes around in her pocket.
"Here." Beckett handed something to Castle. He opened his hand to see two small white pain pills.
"It's not that bad."
"I don't care. Take the pills." Rather than have an argument with his wife, Castle dry swallowed the pills. Beckett was worried about him, and he just had to accept it.
"I heard Castle wasn't feeling well. So what have you got for us, Lanie?" Esposito said as he entered the morgue, towing Ryan behind him.
"Have you seen him? That was not bad Chinese, no matter what Kate thinks. That man is displaying symptoms," Lanie said as she stood up from her desk. What was left of Faina laying on the metal table.
"Castle? Isn't it early to be displaying symptoms? I thought people don't do that for two to three days. He was just bit this morning," Ryan said.
"That's the norm. But if it was a particularly virulent strain, he could. One of the first symptoms is always being bothered by normal stimulus. Castle has been in here hundreds of times before, but now he can't without puking his guts out?"
"We have a dead woman here. I think that should take priority right now, over whether or not Castle has lycanthropy." Esposito cut off Lanie's speculation.
"She is dead. Tomorrow she is going to be dead. The day after-still dead. Nothing is going to change. But Castle is dangerous right now. If he hurt someone he would never forgive himself. If he hurts Kate... the man might just kill himself.
"Promise me, you'll look out for him. He needs us. Kate needs us," Laine pleaded with the two detectives.
"I promise."
"We will. Castle is one of us."
"Now what about the vic."
"Like I told Kate, it wasn't a werewolf that killed her. Things weren't adding up to werewolf attack. The edges of the wounds are too clean. Only most of the liver is missing. A wolf would've eaten the whole thing. Some of the 'claw marks' aren't parallel. They were made one at a time with a knife." Lanie pointed out some of the claw marks. "You can see them clearly here and here.
"After I realized that I went hunting for more information. I got some scrapings from under her fingernails and I am running the DNA right now. It appears she suffered from a blow to the back of her head. You can see the marks here." Lanie turns the woman's head to the side, exposing a large bruise and gash. "Impossible to tell if that is the one that did her in, but I would put my money on it.
"The blow was delivered from the side. So you're looking for someone who is a similar height and build to our vic. The murder weapon itself shouldn't be too fancy. And the knife used to dismember the body is, most likely, just a simple chef's knife or kitchen knife. And nothing serrated."
"Anything else?" Esposito asked.
"Just keep me informed about Castle's condition."
Faina Murdo, Kenneth Murdo, Rhonda Huang, Shannon Moonlight. The four people's pictures hanged on the murder board. Four smiling faces stared out from their driver license photos with their names helpfully underneath. Details of the people and the crime spelled out, suggesting an answer. But there was none yet.
"So we have our vic, she just got home from work at 6pm. She sits, has dinner. Then her husband comes in. They watch TV, do some stuff. He leaves. Our killer comes in, hits her on the head. Then she stages the crime scene to look like a werewolf did it," Ryan summed up the crime.
"There is a vial missing too. The crime scene doesn't look like the killer was looking for anything. Nothing is out of place or missing. Kenneth has gone over the apartment and said he can't find anything amiss," Beckett added.
"What if our killer just wanted to talk to Faina and killing her was a mistake? Emotions flared up and next thing you know, bam, dead person on the floor," Castle speculated.
"Our killer needed to know Faina's husband had both been there that night and that he is a werewolf," Beckett pointed out. "It points to premeditation."
"That is common knowledge around her work. People gossip," Castle said.
"What if it wasn't connected to the vial? What if it was all about those packages Shannon had Kenneth running? Someone wanted him to go down for his wife's murder?" Esposito said.
"Without footage we can't know exactly who was coming and going from the vic's apartment.
What have we been able to find out talking to the neighbors?" Beckett asked.
"Just that Kenneth was seen going into the apartment. Nothing else was heard or seen," Ryan answered.
"I know you guys got sidetracked, but Ryan, you and Esposito need to go and find out what you can about the packages Kenneth was running. Find Shannon Moonlight. Castle and I will go look at our crime scene again. We might be able to find our missing vial."
Castle got up from where he was perched on the side of Ryan's desk. His head was pounding. Something on the very edge of his hearing was making it worse. He could smell the scent of drugs and B.O. that hung heavily in the air from all the criminals that had come through before. Things were bothering him that had never done so before.
He knew that this could be the first signs of the disease. He was choosing not to face it.
Ba-ba-ba-ba. The sound was merciless as it drove a nail right through his skull. He couldn't even fight it, just curl up on the floor, cover his ears and hope it went away quickly.
"Castle!"
"Something's wrong."
"Quick get him into the break room."
Vaguely Castle registered that he was being helped up. He tried to get his feet under him, but it was useless. Ba-ba-ba-ba vibrated through his skull. Pounding and obliterating any thoughts.
Someone slipped a set of earphones on his head. The pounding sound was still there, but quieter. Castle opened his eyes to see Ryan, Esposito and Beckett's worried faces staring back at him.
"What was that!?" Castle took the pain medication Beckett handed him.
"ARE YOU OK?" Ryan yelled.
"I'm fine. You don't have to yell at me." Castle reached up to feel the headphones. "What are these?"
Ryan looked at Esposito before answering. "Noise canceling headphones."
"Why would..." Castle stopped talking as realization broke through.
He couldn't hide from it anymore. He was infected.