Castle and the three detectives looked up at the high-rise building, squinting as the early morning sun burned its way into the east corner of their sleep-deprived eyes. "Ryan, Esposito, are you guys *sure* that this is the place?" asked Beckett.

"This is the place I had a nightmare about last night," Esposito shrugged.

"It's also the most heavily occupied apartment building in the area," added Ryan. "That can't be a coincidence."

Castle took a cautious step toward the building, feeling the magic energy hum like a curtain in front of him. He put a hand up and reached out to the windows of the building, jumping as the energy sparked and danced under his touch. "Beckett, are you getting this?"

"Getting what?" asked Beckett.

"This place is still being protective by an active shield. I'm almost sure of it," declared Castle.

Beckett turned up her sight and focused all her attention on the building in the hopes of understanding what she was missing. It didn't take much additional focus for her to see the strands of glowing blue energy that crisscrossed the building. "Can you disable it, Castle?"

"I'll give it my best shot," he replied. Castle drew in a deep breath, then let it out slowly to focus the energy he was just learning how to control. Looking up at the building, he spoke quietly and forcefully. "If this place is illusion-sealed, may its fateful truth now be revealed."

Beckett watched as a dense curtain of blue energy rose from the ground in front of Castle to envelop the building. The building's facade shimmered as the two spells warred for control over what was seen by the outside world. Castle's spell overwhelmed the standing shield, which simply disappeared under the assault of Castle's magic.

It was clear to Beckett that something had happened to the power surrounding the building, but other than that, the atmosphere felt eerily quiet and still. The group approached the building tentatively to find...nothing had changed beyond their ability to now go through the point where the shield had once been. Beckett and her team cautiously entered the lobby, Beckett stretching out her hearing as far as she dared. "I hear...growling," she told her team quietly, "but it's not on this floor."

They passed an empty security desk. Ryan crept around to check behind the desk. "I found blood," he told them.

Beckett followed her fellow detective behind the desk. She took note of the small dark puddle of drying blood that Ryan had found, then extended her sight around the area to look for more, frowning when she found no trace. "There isn't blood anywhere else on this floor. Just here."

"That's consistent with the first turn in the other two attacks," Esposito added, "he always seems to want to do the first one himself."

"Is that a control thing," Beckett thought aloud, "or is he still trying to perfect the spell?"

Castle replied, "My money's on perfecting the spell. He probably hasn't figured out yet why the spell doesn't work on everyone he comes across."

"Beckett," asked Ryan, "are you still hearing growling? How far away is it?"

Beckett reached out her hearing. "Some," she replied. "But it's faint, and it's hard to tell distance through the walls."

Esposito found the door to the stairwell. "So are we going to check out this place, or call for backup?"

"We don't know how many of them are up there," Castle warned. "I know I can get us out of there, but if we bring in anyone else..."

Beckett agreed with her partner. "Calling for backup would just put *them* in a level danger that they wouldn't be able to handle. No, we'll go ourselves...at least to the second floor."

Ryan and Esposito nodded in acknowledgement, pulling out their weapons and removing the safeties. Beckett turned down her sense of touch as she felt the magic of Castle's shield spell settle on her skin, and the three cops made their way up the stairs, Castle bringing up the rear behind them.

The group steeled themselves as Esposito opened the door to the second floor...and pitch black darkness. "Anyone got a flashlight?" whispered Ryan.

"Allow me," replied Castle in a matching whisper. He reached up until his fingers just grazed the top of the ceiling and whispered, "Let there be light." The ceiling started to glow with a dim blue light, giving the team just enough light to see by...not that there was much that they *wanted* to see.

The hallway was in far worse shape than the lobby below them had been. Every apartment door was open, many of them swinging slowly back and forth in the eerie silence. The group cleared the floor quickly and methodically, room by room...but found nothing but abandoned apartments. When they reached the end of the hallway, Beckett pointed a finger up to the ceiling in an unspoken question as to whether or not they should continue. Three heads nodded in agreement.

The group returned to their positions, using the combined light from the lobby and Castle's first floor glow-light to make their way up the stairs to the third floor. Castle reached up to the ceiling, and repeated the light spell...

...just in time to see five uncontrolled zombies roaming the halls. The group watched with fascination as the light seemed to hold the zombies transfixed. They were so transfixed by the light that only one thing seemed to break the spell that the spell had over the zombies.

The smell of four fresh living human beings at the other end of the hall.

The zombies let out a terrifying chorus of howls, then, as one, they charged down the hall with the speed of a cheetah, leaving the three detectives with no time to react to the attacking mob.

Castle, though, only needed half a moment to react with the power of a fearful, instinctive though, and in the blink of an eye the group was back in the lobby outside of the building.

The group let out a collective sigh of relief. "Nice timing, Castle. Thanks." Ryan exclaimed with a smile.

Beckett was a little more cautious. "We're not out of the woods yet," she declared. "If any of those things make it to street level...Castle, can you seal the building off with a shield like the one we broke through to get in?"

Castle nodded. "Shouldn't be a problem, but we have to get outside to do it."

"Yeah, no doubt, bro," commented Esposito. "I do *not* want to lock myself in here with those things."

The group left the building, squinting at the contrast in going from the dark hallways out onto 34th Street. Once everyone's eyes were adjusted to the light, though, the space that surrounded them disturbed the group of savvy New Yorkers.

"It's too quiet. I don't like it," declared Esposito.

"I'm inclined to agree with you, Javi," added Ryan. "Normally at this time of day we'd see at least people on the street and cars going by..."

"Sìfāng!"

The voice boomed through the canyon of high-rise buildings. "Anyone blowing that much hot air could only be calling for me," Castle said to no one in particular.

The group turned to the source of the sound and was faced with the lead pack of what looked to be sea of zombies. The front line pushed at a barely visible shield wall, sniffing aggressively in the direction of the four humans in front of them.

"My God," Beckett whispered, "there must be a thousand of them..."

The wizard laughed, a sound that resonated clearly even over the roaring cacophony of snarls and growls of the zombies under his control. "Did you think to escape me, Sìfāng? How foolish. This world will belong to my master soon enough...starting with your beloved city." The wizard leaned on his staff as he turned back toward his slaves, parting the sea of zombies with a wave.

And with a simple declaration of "Kill them," the wizard dropped the containment shield. The zombies took off toward Castle and the detectives at a fully powered sprint.

"Guys," babbled Ryan nervously, "Even though we've gotten to be *really* good at hand-to-hand fighting there's *no* way..."

On that point the group was already in full agreement. Beckett yelled, "RUN!"

They took off, running for their lives. Beckett, Ryan and Esposito fled at their top speed, leaving Castle floundering in their wake. Castle found his own way to keep up, though, popping to Beckett's side whenever the other three got more than a block ahead of him.

Groups of zombies split off north and south at every avenue, attacking anyone who was unlucky enough to be in the vicinity of 34th Street on that day. Still the zombies charged, gaining ground on Beckett and her team with every step.

The surge of adrenaline coursing through his veins kept Ryan running, blindly following his partner, only barely aware of the horde of zombies keeping pace behind him. So it was a jarring shock to the system when Esposito pulled him out of the street and into a store. Gasping for breath, he turned to his partner. "Javi? What gives? Why'd you leave Castle and Beckett out there?"

Esposito looked like he was half listening to his partner and half listening to information he was getting from another source. Castle and Beckett joined the two detectives in a blink, confused as to why Esposito had pulled his partner and *only* his partner into the building. "Espo," Beckett finally spat out, her outrage clear, "What the hell...?"

Between gasps for breath, Esposito declared to the group, "I know how to stop them."

Ryan looked to his partner in shock. "Have you finally lost it? If we had an army-"

"Exactly," Esposito responded matter-of-factly. "We need an army."

"Where do you suppose we *get* an army?" It was then that Beckett realized exactly where they were. "At *Macy's*? You think we're going to get an army at Macy's? Where? Next to the blenders?"

"Uh, bro..."

The senior detective was just getting started. "In sporting goods? Heck, maybe they're in the lingerie department nowadays-"

Finally Esposito snapped Beckett out of her babbling and got the group's attention. "Or maybe we should just ask the *tiger* that is now staring at us."

It took a second for Ryan to process his partner's last statement. He followed his partner's line of sight only to discover that his partner was, indeed, staring at a Bengal tiger in the middle of the Macy's cosmetics counters.

The tiger was fixated on Esposito exclusively. Ryan, Beckett and Castle looked around, noticing that with all of the scared people hiding out in the store, no one seemed to realize that there was a tiger in their midst except for them. A voice echoed through their minds. How may I serve you, my lords?

Esposito looked up to see if that had been his partner in his mind. Ryan shook his head. "That wasn't me. I heard it, too." Castle and Beckett nodded their heads in agreement.

The tiger looked from Ryan to Esposito with an expression on its face that Ryan could have sword to be confusion. You are the Shuāng jiàn, are you not? When Ryan and Esposito started to share the tiger's expression of confusion, the tiger shook its head, exasperated. No matter. You will learn all of who you are soon enough. The tiger turned its full attention to Esposito. Just know that what you need will be given you. Have you any specific instructions?

"Don't get bitten," Esposito replied, "or you will be under the enemy's control." Remembering Beckett's orders, he added, "oh, and don't kill them unless your life depends on it."

As you wish, my lords.

The tiger exploded into a thousand balls of orange light that started to float around the store. When one of the lights found an adult who wasn't caring for someone else, it hit that person square in the chest. They would stagger from the impact, then straighten up as the light filled them with supernatural strength.

The zombies in Herald Square erupted with a terror-inducing roar as they started to rush the doors of Macy's, looking for their four targets. The tiger's army answered the zombies' roar with a roar of their own that echoed throughout every corner of the store, and the newborn super soldiers rushed the doors to destroy the zombie horde.

The group watched the whole army-recruitment process in awe-struck shock. Esposito vaguely remembered a rule that Ryan had suggested when they were in the Hamptons. "Rule #1, bro?"

"Most definitely. Rule #1," Ryan stammered. Gathering his courage, Ryan turned back to his friends. "So you guys wanna go kick some zombie ass?"

Esposito couldn't help but smile as the first lights of hope started to return to his thoughts. "Most definitely, bro. Most definitely."