"Hello?" "Is anybody out here?" "All right." "12-letter word for "transcendent."" "Otherworldly." "Honestly, sometimes it's like they're not even trying." "Doing the crossword in pen?" "Feeling cocky today, are we?" "What is life without challenges?" "8-letter word for "estrange."" "Ah!" "You are just in time, my mini thesaurus." "I need an 8-letter word for "estrange."" "She doesn't hear you, darling." "She's still talking to Ashley." "I should be timing that phone call." "That's gotta be a record." "Please." "I've had relationships that didn't last this long." "True." "Okay." "Bye." "Sorry." "We were talking about the hiking trip next Saturday." "Oh, has Ashley got the all clear from his parents to come with us?" "They say they want to meet you first." "Ah, they want to vet me to make sure if there's some kind of rock slide, that I won't leave their boy stranded on a mountainside, having to gnaw off his own arm to survive." "So you'll do it?" "We'll have them over for dinner." "We'll schmooze and impress them." "Would you like me to cook something?" "No, we want to impress them." "And what is that supposed to mean?" "So it's "meet the parents" time, huh, Castle?" "This is a pretty critical moment for you." "For me?" "Why me?" "Well, I mean, Ashley is Alexis' first love, right?" "Mm-hmm." "Well, what do you think will happen if you don't get on with his parents?" "She'll lose interest in him?" "Oh, no." "The exact opposite." "I mean, it'll make their romance feel forbidden, and they'll be off doing God knows what." "Trust me." "I know." "I never thought of it that way." "My advice is keep the boyfriend close but the parents closer." "Hey, guys." "What do we got?" "Something messed up." "I've never seen anything like it." "Victim's name is Marie Subbarao." "She's 35." "Security guard found her last night." "Still getting over it." "Wow." "She looks like an overstuffed sausage." "Lanie, what the hell happened to her?" "It's called explosive decompression." "From what?" "What would cause this?" "It's a result of exposure to a zero-atmosphere environment." "Zero atmosphere?" "As in..." "Outer space?" "Yep." " Or?" " I don't have an "or" for you right now, sweetie." "I have to get her body back to the morgue, and then I may have some answers." "Okay, well, her body's in a car in the middle of the rail yard, so clearly she wasn't killed in outer space." "There's gotta be another explanation." "Check this out..." "She was reading" ""Taken by the Fourth Kind", a book on alien abductions." "So what's your theory, Castle, that she was abducted and then killed by aliens?" "Mm." "The story that makes more sense is, uh, alien abduction gone wrong..." "One that ends with Marie being accidentally blasted out of the air lock of the alien spaceship." "Well, if it was E.T., he has a nicotine addiction." "We found this cigarette butt by the rear tire." "It was laying in the track, which means it was dropped after the car was parked." "All right." "Well, have C.S.U. check for D.N.A." "Maybe we'll get lucky." "And can you look into explosive decompression, see what else might cause it?" "You got it." "Thank you." "You do have to admit, her condition does seem..." "Otherworldly." "Marie Subbarao..." "The before version." "Born in Chicago, did postgrad work at Johns Hopkins, then two years ago, she takes a job at the Aubrey Science Center in Midtown as an astrophysicist." "Doing what?" "I'm not really sure." "According to the center's web site, she recently landed a grant from the SETI institute." "The search for extraterrestrial intelligence SETI?" "That could explain why..." "No, it couldn't." "So her working for SETI is just a wild coincidence?" "I'm saying, it's an interesting fact that is unrelated to our case." "Aliens were not involved in Marie Subbarao's death." "Uh, I don't know." "Why, Detective Ryan, I never figured you for a believer." "All I know is, my father's cousin Raymond left this party in Jersey one night." "He's driving back to Queens, and bam!" "Blinding bright light comes down from the sky, next thing he knows, it's morning, he's on the side of the Jersey turnpike." "Let me guess." "No memory of what happened." "That is not called an alien abduction." "That is called a hangover." "Maybe." "Raymond always was the lightweight in the family." "Speaking of family, did our victim have any, a husband maybe?" "Neighbors say she was single and lived alone." "They barely saw her." "Apparently, she normally came home from work around 10:00 P.M." "Lanie said that the time of death was around 9:00 P.M., which means work was the last place that she was probably seen alive." "This is unbelievable." "Marie was one of my most gifted researchers." "What did she do here exactly?" "Uh, she analyzed the data fed in from our radio telescope in new Mexico, studying radiation from quasars." "For the SETI institute?" "No." "Most of her work was NASA related." "And when was the last time you saw her?" "Uh, last night." "She was still here at her office at 7:00 when I left." "And what about you, Ms. Holder?" "Oh, we went over the calendar for next week, and then she sent me home at 7:30." "Was she having any problems in life?" "Anything unusual happening lately?" "Not that I'm aware of." "Actually..." "Since Monday, she'd been acting anxious and uptight." "I finally asked her what was wrong, and she said that something life-changing had happened to her." "What was it?" "I don't know." "Then on Wednesday, she left work in the middle of the day." "She didn't come back until Thursday morning." "Dr. Vaughn, Marie's body showed signs of explosive decompression." "Was she doing any kind of research that would account for that?" "Oh, my God." "That's a yes." "It's called an altitude chamber." "We use it to study thermal life support systems under reduced pressure for NASA." "What would happen if a person went inside?" "Without protective gear?" "Mm-hmm." "Your lungs rupture from gas expansion and all the liquid in your body evaporates." "So all the horrible effects of outer space without the view." "Who else had access to this area?" "Mostly our researchers and their assistants." "Maybe 35 people in all." "I'll need a list of all of their names." "Did Marie have problems with any of them?" "Ted Carter..." "Her ex-boyfriend." "After their breakup, things got ugly between them." "Can I ask what this is about?" "Mr. Carter..." "Your key card was swiped at the science center last night at 7:42." "You mind tell us what you were doing there?" "I went to see someone." "Marie Subbarao?" "Why is this any of your business?" "We're investigating her murder." "What?" "Marie's not dead." "How could she be dead?" "Someone put her in an altitude chamber." "Oh, my God." "Who could've done something like that?" "She was killed at around 9:00 P.M., not long after you arrived at the center." "Not me." "It wasn't me." "How could you think I would do something like that?" "You had motive." "You had access to the chamber." "Why else would you even go and see her?" "To ask her to dinner." "After Marie dumped you and had you fired." "I hope..." "It wasn't like that." "I quit." "It was too painful to be around her." "Then on Wednesday, out of nowhere, she called me." "She wanted to go to coffee." "Now why would she do that?" "To mend fences, I-I guess." "She gave me back some old t-shirts, some CDs she had of mine, said she felt bad about the way things ended." "I thought maybe we still had a chance, you know?" "So I went looking for her at the center." "What happened when you found her?" "Nothing." "We talked for a few seconds." "She seemed upset about something." "I-I tried to find out what, but she was in a hurry to get somewhere, so I left." "I went home." "I-I was there by 8:00." "Make yourself at home." "You're gonna be here for a while." "C.S.U. is going through the altitude chamber." "Once they get back with forensics, we should be able to charge Ted Carter." "Tell me this..." "How did Carter get the body to the rail yard?" "Well, the altitude chamber is right next to the parking garage, so he probably dumped her body in the car, took it out to the rail yard, and tried to throw us off the trail." "You know what would be a better story?" "Hmm?" "We have an earthbound solution to this mystery, and you are disappointed." "I get it." "But that, really?" "Come on." "Marie said she had a life-changing event." "What could be more life-changing than being beamed up by this guy?" "Come on, Castle." "We all know that there is no such thing as alien abductions." "And yet, most abductees report the same experiences... the white light, the memory flashes." "That's because they all read the same books, so of course they describe the same event..." "The dark, lonely road, the bright light out of nowhere, memories of being poked and prodded." "I believe the word you're looking for is probed." "And then of course there's the alien implant that's used to track the abductees." "That reminds me of the Lego I got stuck up my nose when I was 6." "You what?" "Uh, guys." "C.S.U. finished going over the altitude chamber." "Nothing turned up." "What?" "I mean, that was the exact machine that we were looking for, right in the building where Marie and her ex-boyfriend work." "That had to have been the murder weapon." "There's no blood, no tissue... it's clean." "That makes no sense whatsoever." "Check other altitude chambers." "It's not like they grow on trees." "Well, that can't be the only one around." "And look for any other devices that cause the same injuries." "I'll do my best." "If it's not an altitude chamber, then what could it be?" "Other than that." "Beckett." "Lanie, what'd you find?" "Not the answers I was looking for." "Instead, just more questions." "How deliciously cryptic." "Because of the unique nature of Marie's injuries," "I wanted to thoroughly document her condition before conducting the autopsy." "While I was taking the x-rays," "I saw this embedded in her sinus cavity." "What is that?" "I have no idea." "Call me crazy..." "That looks just like..." "An alien implant." "What could you possibly be looking for by probing up there?" "Can we talk about dinner?" "Oh, no." "You couldn't convince gram to stay out of the kitchen." "I will stock up on antacids and garbage bags." "No, it isn't that." "It's Ashley's parents." "What about 'em?" "He's an economics professor." "The two of them are serious people, dad." "Y-you may need to be more buttoned up." "I can be buttoned up." "And if I become unbuttoned, you can discreetly let me know with a brutal kick to the shin." "I won't be there." "They thought it would be better if it was just you and gram." "You're gonna leave me alone?" "You'll do great." "I just wanted to make sure that you'll make a good impression." "Trust me..." "So do I." "Where do you come down on deficit spending during an economic downturn?" "Thank you." "I take the theory that's held by most economists..." "That deficit spending is acceptable as long as it focuses on public investments, like infrastructure, defense, education, research." "Wow." "Where did that answer come from?" "Semester of economic theory at N.Y.U." "Where did that question come from?" "I'm trying out conversation starters." "Well, we started a conversation, so I guess it worked... kind of." "It's for a dinner with Ashley's parents." "He's this stuffy economist, you know?" "And I just want to win 'em over, get them on my side." "But what if they don't take to me?" "Oh, come on, Castle." "They'll take to you." "Really?" "Yeah." "Thanks." "So long as you don't act like yourself." "Oh, nice one." "So where do we stand on this mysterious implant?" "It is not an implant." "Lanie says that it's a metal fragment, and she's running tests on it right now." "How'd it get up her nose?" "Well, maybe it was a piece of the altitude chamber that got lodged up there." "The altitude chamber we haven't found?" "Yet." "The altitude chamber that we haven't found yet." "And I'm sure that as soon as we do, it will lead us straight to our killer." "I notice you said "killer" and not Ted Carter." "Yeah, Carter alibied out." "He ordered pizza the night of Marie's murder and signed for it at 8:25." "Alibis in 30 minutes or less." "So at this point, we have no human suspects." "By definition, no suspect means "no human suspect."" "Well, one might be coming your way." "I checked Marie's phone logs at work." "Turns out she made a 30-minute phone call" " before she left the science center on Wednesday." " To whom?" "Benny Stryker." "The Benny Stryker?" "This Benny Stryker, renowned author of "Taken by the Fourth Kind"?" "One and the same." "An astrophysicist and a ufologist, isn't that like oil and water?" "Actually, they used to be colleagues." "Three years ago, he and Marie were members of the same research team, but Marie was worried that all his UFO talk would destroy their credibility, so she had him kicked off the team." "From what I hear, there's been bad blood ever since." "Where can we find Stryker?" "Imprisoned in a cold white room..." "Strange faces staring down at us..." "These are images that will haunt us." "But they'll also unite us and help us remember, we didn't choose this." "We were chosen." "One more time." "We didn't choose this." "We were chosen." "He's like the Tony Robbins of alien abductions." "I see we have some new members." "Maybe you'd like to introduce yourself, tell us your story." "Huh." "Do you actually think" "I had something to do with Marie's death?" "Mr. Stryker, where were you on Thursday at 9:00 P.M.?" "At a book signing in Queens." "But you did have recent contact with Marie." "In fact, she called you on Wednesday." "What was that about?" "You know, I could tell you, but I see, you wouldn't believe it." "Whatever you say will receive a fair hearing." "Well, that hasn't been my experience." "Marie called me last week in crisis." "She had picked up anomalous submicrowave bursts on her radio telescope." "It was not just the background noises of the universe." "It was a signal coming from somewhere nearby with a repetitive pattern." "As in... contact?" "Or so she believed." "So she booked more time on her radio telescope array and studied that section of the sky, which is when the trouble started." "What trouble?" "Lost time." "Four hours on Sunday, just gone." "Then she started having mental flashbacks... a white room, a blurry face questioning her." "Are we saying, Marie was abducted by aliens?" "The classic indicators were there." "I just tried to help her make sense of it." "After Marie called you on Wednesday, she left the center." "Do you know where she went?" "She said she was gonna get proof of..." "What she knew was there." "Proof of aliens?" "And did she?" "I never heard from her again." "I assumed they stopped her before she got too close to the truth." "Who?" "The government." "I warned her, she was probably being followed by men determined..." "To keep the existence of aliens a secret." "It's like that Will Smith movie, only I'm guessing a lot less funny." "These agents are real, Mr. Castle." "They fear the revelation that we are not alone would be too shocking." "Hysteria would break out." "Nations would crumble." "That's why they try to discredit believers like me and eliminate people who threaten to expose the truth... people like Marie." "The bookstore confirms that Stryker was signing his opus between 7:00 and 10:00 P.M." "Looks like we're back to an empty space in the suspect column." "Yeah, but at least our timeline is making more sense." "This whole Sunday-ish area, the life-changing event, that's when she was abducted." "Wednesday, she leaves work, that's when she was looking for proof of alien life." "Thursday, she comes back to work, feeling better, until she leaves and winds up..." "Explosively decompressed." "Overall, a big week." "You know what this timeline shows me?" "A lot of erratic behavior that could be due to drug use or any number of medical conditions." "All right." "Let's say Marie is a drug-addled psychotic with a brain tumor." "She still went looking for proof." "She went looking for what she thought was proof." "Whatever it was, what if she found it?" "Where would it be?" "Come on, Castle." "You don't actually believe that Klingons are behind this, do you?" "Killer aliens is a reach, even for me." "But government agents covering up the truth?" "Not so crazy." "Yes, it is." "I mean, when this is all said and done, it will all come down to where and how she was killed." "And I bet it will have nothing to do with secret agents or massive government conspiracies." "I'll take that bet." "Detective." "Where did everything go?" "Two men came this morning with a-a federal warrant." "They loaded all of Marie's stuff into a truck." "Who were they?" "From which agency?" "They just said the government." "I'd like my payment in small bills, please." "My contact at Justice says no warrant was issued for Marie's office." "Well, then people claiming to be federal agents seized her property." "I mean, there's gotta be an explanation." "Men in black." "Other than that." "I'll put out more feelers." "Meantime, keep me posted." "Okay, thank you." "Marie found proof, and they covered it up." "It's just like Benny Stryker said." "Do you honestly expect me to believe a theory... any theory... that ends with "like Benny Stryker said"?" "What else could it be?" "Who made off with all her stuff?" "Maybe Marie was working on a classified government project, and they confiscated her data." "Was her data in her furniture?" "Because they took that, too." "Well, without knowing who "they" are, we can't find them." "You know..." "The key lies in the murder weapon." "Esposito, tell me that you've located that altitude chamber." "I did..." "At the Physics Center at Hudson University." "It was the only other one in the five boroughs." "See?" "It's clean." "C.S.U. just checked." "Well, there's gotta be another device that does the same thing." "Lanie and I looked into that." "The only thing we found was an industrial vacuum packer." "It's used for food processing." "Check into every single one in town." "We need to locate that crime scene." "Castle." "Just prove that E.T. did this, bro, please." "I hunt people, not machines." "I'm working on it." "Thank you." "Maybe we should focus on Marie's mystery Wednesday trip." "Castle, finding proof of aliens will not help us catch our killer." "It will if she went somewhere with an industrial vacuum packer." "If she did, it was off the Jersey turnpike." "Her e-zpass account shows her getting off at exit 9." "Where'd she go from there?" "Hard to say." "I checked her credit cards." "No activity in the area." "What are you doing?" "I am mapping it." "New Jersey turnpike, exit 9." "Let me share with you the many wonders that await us at exit 9." "Oh, there's an arts center, some state park with scenic hiking trails and canoeing, an astounding amount of day spas, and the Plainsboro Observatory." "Yeah, Marie was here on Wednesday." "She said she needed to use our telescope." "Why would she need this one?" "Marie usually worked with a radio telescope." "This is an optical telescope." "So she came here to get a visual on something up there in space?" "She said she picked up signal anomalies." "She wanted to see where they were coming from." "She took an image capture, then she left." "Could we get a copy of that image?" "I checked the telescope's hard drive." "She erased everything." "Coordinates, the image capture..." "It's all gone." "She erased everything." "What the hell did she see up there?" "Marie Subbarao, a sober-minded scientist believes she was abducted by aliens after intercepting strange radio signals." "Using a telescope, she photographs the source of the signal." "The next day, dies mysteriously." "Then her office is raided by shadowy government agents." "I'm not asking you to dye your hair red and call me Mulder." "I would simply ask that you consider the possibility that Marie had knowledge of or made contact with something up there..." "That somehow led to her death." "We will continue our investigation and solve this case, and it will have nothing to do with little green men." "They're gray, actually." "Castle, the truth...the real truth..." "is out there." "Dead battery?" "Maintenance just replaced it." "My phone isn't working." "Mine isn't either." "Neither is my watch." "You have a logical explanation for this, too, right?" "Marie Subbarao had information..." "Information we need." "Where's Beckett?" "Who are you?" "Where's Castle?" "I am an NYPD detective." "Where is it?" "Where's what?" "We all know what Marie Subbarao was involved with, detective." "That information must not get out." "Yeah, but we don't have it." "Where is it?" "Is this the part where you bring out the old Nazi with the dentist drill?" "If you don't cooperate, we'll find a way to get at the truth." "We'll do whatever it takes to protect our way of life." "From what?" "A woman who thought that she was abducted by aliens?" "You're out of your league, detective." "You have no idea how deep this is." "Now where is it?" "Who are you?" "Identify yourself." "What, CIA, NSA..." "M.I.B?" "Shape-shifting aliens that only look human?" "Who killed Marie Subbarao?" "If you keep asking questions you shouldn't, you may end up like Marie." "Who killed her?" "No one you could ever reach." "What about J.F.K.?" "Was it the second shooter on the grassy knoll?" "Third shooter backed by mafia?" "Castro?" "Mafia and Castro?" "Okay, whatever you guys are looking for, we don't know where it is." "Come on." "No, dude." "Come on." "Don't." "Don't." "Ah!" "No." "Are you okay?" "Castle, did that really happen?" "Do I have a..." "Oh, no." "'Cause you got a..." "This is outrageous." "An illegal detention of an NYPD detective?" "Who says the government is unresponsive?" "They're all over this alien cover-up." "Who are these men?" "Agents of some sort." "They probably are the ones who cleared out Marie's office." "Well, I'm glad you two are all right, but no one snatches up my people and detains 'em." "I'll get into this." "Those men knew who killed Marie, and they refused to tell us." "They also refused to confirm that J. Edgar Hoover liked to wear dresses." "Hmm." "Abducted by government agents, huh?" "Come on." "What were you two really doing?" "It's not a hickey, Esposito." "You both have one." "I wish it was a hickey." "It's from the injectors." "Is that what the kids are calling it these days?" "They were men in black." "Where are you with the vacuum packers?" "So far, I have found over a hundred machines in the five boroughs." "C.S.U.'s checking 'em as fast as they can." "And the cigarettes?" "No D.N.A. match, but they are a Chinese brand only found in Asia or on the black market in Chinatown." "So maybe she was killed by an alien, just an illegal alien." "Hey." "Those hickeys?" "Yes." "No." "I wish." "Okay." "So tech just went through your vehicle." "Turns out you were hit with an E.M.P.... an electromagnetic pulse..." "which knocked out all the electronics." "And here's how they found you in the first place." "Tracers, listening devices..." "They must have been watching the science center." "That's when they put these accessories in my car." "Maybe that's what was up Marie's nose." "Perhaps they were tracking her, too." "No, it wasn't a tracer or an implant." "Lanie identified it as aspergillus." "It's a rare calcification resulting from a sinus infection." "The calcification is so dense, it reads like metal." "There you go." "Logical explanation." "Yeah." "I would disguise my tracking implants as a rare medical you know, the bottom line is that these guys were desperate to get whatever Marie took, so we gotta find it first, because that'll lead us to the killer." "Yeah, but we really don't know what we're looking for." "But we do know that they don't have it." "Which means it wasn't in Marie's office." "She maybe hid it somewhere." "Maybe with someone she trusted, somebody under the radar." "Ted Carter said that Marie gave him some of his stuff back last Wednesday night." "Maybe that's not all she gave him." "I don't understand." "It's just books and T-shirts mostly." "Mr. Carter, did you notice anything different in the things that she gave you, anything that wasn't there before?" "No, it's all my stuff." "It's just T-shirts, Jefferson Starship CD..." "Oh!" "This CD got me through two weeks of "Storm Watch" writer's block." "I don't remember it being a 2-disc set." "This one's unmarked." "Marie's proof perhaps?" "Oh, oh, oh, no, wait." "That's it?" "I mean, no pomp, no circumstance?" "What's on this could shake the very foundations of our existence." "We need to pause and savor..." "Please." "Let's just stick it in and get this over with." "I mean, the fact of the matter is, there's probably nothing of any value on that CD..." "To our investigati..." "You were saying?" "No way." "Behold this image, gentlemen and lady." "We are witness to a stunning event... a turning point in human history... the moment we knew..." "We were not alone." "For who can deny that this..." "Is an alien spacecraft?" "It does kinda look like one." "Yeah, but this image?" "I mean, it's gotta be doctored." "Right, Beckett?" "I don't know." "Whoa." "What are you saying?" "Are you saying, you think that this is real?" "Well..." "It doesn't look doctored." "Okay, just for clarity, so we know later who said what, you are conceding that it is a possibility that this is an alien spaceship?" "What I am saying is that we now know what these agents were after." "That close." "Yeah." "And as far as I'm concerned, let a higher pay grade deal with it." "We now have leverage that we can use with our mystery agents." "How?" "It's not like we can just call 'em up?" "Mm." "W... uh, we do have a box of bugs." "It's the next best thing to a batphone." "We have what you want." "You know where we are." "You really think that's gonna work?" "Please take a seat." "So where is it?" "Not a chance." "I want something in return..." "The name of Marie Subbarao's killer." "Ladies first." "Why are you showing me this?" "It's the photo that Marie took from the observatory of the alien ship." "I'll be on my way now." "Wait a minute." "We had a deal." "You said you had what I want." "As it happens, you don't." "You're not leaving." "Marie Subbarao was murdered in the most awful way imaginable, and her killer is still out there." "You owe it to her." "Give us that name." "Maybe she isn't who you think she is." "What's that supposed to mean?" "I mean, if it's not this, then what?" "Why all of this fuss over an astrophysicist who analyzes radio signals?" "Unless what she analyzed was secret." "That's it, isn't it?" "She intercepted classified information." "Yeah, you did say that she took something that was vital to our security." "And we found Chinese cigarettes at the crime scene." "Was she working with the Chinese?" "Look, either you tell us the truth now, or we take what we know to the media." "What makes you think they'll print it?" "Oh, they probably won't." "But I know more than a dozen bloggers who will." "Not to mention over half a million of my own followers on Twitter." "Nothing I say can leave this room." "You have our word on that." "Last month, we determined that an enemy operative had intercepted classified, coded data streams between the Pacific fleet and the Pentagon." "You think it was Marie." "The intercepted transmissions coincided with Marie's tasking her radio telescope to point at our satellite, which was nowhere near where she was supposed to be doing her research." "So that wasn't a photo of a UFO." "That was your spy satellite." "But the real damage done is the data she downloaded, which I fear is now in the hands of the Chinese." "So then who killed her?" "Her handler, I imagine." "The Chinese must have known we were on to them." "They were smart enough to make it look like the boyfriend did it." "Who's this handler?" "Someone from Chinese intelligence." "We were never able to identify him." "Whoever he is, you'll never catch him." "It's over." "It's never over." "In the book, I take a bold new look at the linear aggregation of markets." "It's about time someone did." "So Ashley tells me you're an author as well." "Tell me about your writing, Mr. Castle." "I don't read popular fiction." "I find most of it crass and tawdry." "Yes." "Right." "Well, I, uh..." "I think of my writing as character studies in human behavior, looking into the heart of what makes people tick." "For instance, what would make an ordinary person, like yourself, commit an act that's unusually heinous or some..." "Out of character..." "Would you excuse me for a-a moment?" "Beckett." "Marie was acting out of character." "What self-respecting espionage agent would act strangely and risk blowing her cover?" "Maybe she wasn't the real spy." "Well, that might explain the test results that Lanie just sent over." "Marie had traces of sodium pentothal in her system." "Somebody gave her truth serum?" "Maybe it was the real spy." "The white room, the questions..." "That's why Stryker thought she was abducted by aliens." "Well, if Marie wasn't the spy..." "Then the real spy is someone with access to that radio telescope at the science center." "I'm heading over there right now." "I'll meet you there as soon as I can." "More wine?" "Got another request here, redirecting the telescope to the satellite coordinates." "Signed by Marie, just like all the others." "Well, out of character or not, it looks like she was the spy after all." "Wait a minute." "These two signatures are different." "The... the A's don't match." "You're right." "And look who else makes an "a" like that?" ""Dr. Charles Vaughn."" "He forged her signatures to make it look as though" "Marie was the one intercepting the satellite transmissions." "So maybe Marie saw a request with her fake signature, and she got curious." "So she put in a request of her own to have the telescope scan that part of the sky." "So that's when she intercepted the weird signals." "After that, she lost time." "And then when she told Benny Stryker about it, he assumed that she had been abducted..." "Which she had been, only not by aliens, by Dr. Vaughn, who drugged her to figure out how much she knew." "When he realized how close she was, he got rid of her." "Yeah, but he's the one who told us about the altitude chamber." "Yeah, because he knew it would lead us to Marie's ex-boyfriend." "Dr. Vaughn is gone." "He's not at his place." "But you know what is?" "Three vials of sodium pentothal." "Any idea where he went?" "No, but it looks like he left in a rush." "Call T.S.A. and have him put on a no-fly list, and keep me posted." "He's on the run." "If he heard we asked for those request forms, he would've been tipped off." "He probably had an escape plan in place, just in case his cover was blown." "And Chinese handlers who can smuggle him out of the country." "Not to be negative, but the odds of catching this guy are not great." "Unless we enlist the help of a certain government agent who wants him just as bad as we do." "I may want to put you guys on my friends and family plan." "We now believe that Dr. Vaughn is the spy." "Marie figured it out, and then he killed her." "I'm inclined to agree, which leaves the agency with some egg on its face." "And which agency did you say that was again?" "I didn't." "We dug deeper on Dr. Vaughn." "Turns out he has a fondness for gambling." "He ran up quite the tab at an Atlantic City casino controlled by the Chinese." "After that, they owned him." "Do you know where Dr. Vaughn is now?" "I know where to start looking." "Using his cell phone number, I can triangulate his position." "Well, he's gotta be worried about being tracked." "He probably turned it off." "Then we'll just turn it back on." "You can do that?" "We turned off your phones, didn't we?" "Yeah, and the car." "He's in the warehouse district in Chinatown." "1400 block of Canal Street." "Could we get a closer look?" "There he is." "Fancy." "That's just a few blocks away from where we found" "Marie's body." "Maybe that's where he killed her." "And who is that guy?" "Oh, wait." "He's the cigarette-smoking man." "Otherwise known as Ung Kyu." "He's a high-level Chinese Intelligence agent." "So our murder suspect is meeting his handler." "Which means Dr. Vaughn may still have the data." "Well, then let's go get him." "Where are the predator drones, the black helicopters, all those S.W.A.T. teams rappelling down on ropes?" "Budget cuts." "It's vital to our national security that we take these men alive." "These guys are trained agents." "They probably have cyanide capsules in their teeth in case they're caught." "We'll worry about their teeth when the time comes." "Patrol cars have closed off all streets in a 5-block radius." "And air support's on the way." "All right." "What's the plan?" "Vaughn's cell phone signal has gone dark, which means he's underground." "According to our intel, this building has an extensive basement with two methods of ingress." "Actually, most of the basements on this side of town are linked through doorways used as escape routes for illegals in case of an I.N.S. raid." "So you're saying that Vaughn and Kyu could be in either of the adjoining buildings as well?" "Welcome to New York." "Let's go." "NYPD." "Stay where you are." "Oh!" "That's a vacuum packer at 1:00." "Looks like we found our murder weapon." "Have you seen this man?" "Go, go." "Semester abroad?" "Nah, a TV show I used to love." "Ah." "Nice job." "Thanks." "Get on your knees." "No." "Wait!" "Please!" "I-I got rid of Marie." "I did everything you asked." "Wait." "Wait, wait, wait, wait." "I can still help you." "Wait." "Wait, wait." "Mnh-mnh." "Please." "No, I can still help you." "Please." "NYPD!" "Drop that gun." "Oh!" "On the ground." "Now." "Cyanide capsule!" "Ew!" "Gum." "False alarm." "Where is the data?" "In a..." "U.S.B. drive in his pocket." "Think we'll get a medal for this?" "This never happened." "Guess that means I can't put this on Twitter." "Vaughn's already spilling his guts." "Yeah, a near execution will shake your loyalties like that." "Between his confession and the espionage charges, he and Ung Kyu will spend the rest of their lives in federal prison, thanks to you." "And to Castle." "Yes, and Mr. Castle." "Might I have a private word with Detective Beckett?" "Of course." "Hey, sweetie." "Look, um, about the parental review." "I failed, and I know, and I'm..." "I'm sorry." "Whoa." "Whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa." "They... they found me fascinating?" "Camping with you..." "They want to go camping with us?" "No." "No, no, it's..." "No, that..." "Yeah, that'd be great." "That'd be so much fun." "Mm-hmm." "I love you, too." "Bye." "So what'd he tell you?" "Uh, he told me something in confidence." "What?" "Well, I wish I could tell you, Castle, but it was classified." "Well, what did he tell you that was classified?" "Was it about aliens?" "The truth about UFOs?" "Are you gonna tell me or you just gonna make me keep guessing?" "I don't know." "This guessing thing is kinda fun." " All right." "Was it about what happened at Roswell?" " No." "Area 51?" "No." "Loch ness monster is real?" "Yeah." "Really?" "!" "No." " Ah." "You had me." "They're controlling the weather?" " No." "Our thoughts?" "No." "Our buying habits?" "Actually, speaking of shopping," "I read this really interesting..."