Castle (TV Series)

Dreamworld (2013)

Lisa Edelstein: Rachel McCord

Photos 

Quotes 

• [Beckett's boss has allowed Castle to consult on the investigation] 

  Kate Beckett : Look, uh, thanks for backing me up with Castle.

  Special Agent Rachel McCord : Is he always such a character?

  Kate Beckett : Yeah. It's one of the things that I love about him, too.

• Richard Castle : [listening to the flight recording of the Zawari air strike]  Valkyrie was the servant. She was one of ours.

  Special Agent Rachel McCord : No wonder the transcript was so heavily redacted.

  Kate Beckett : Secretary Reed killed an American operative.

  Richard Castle : And then ordered Bronson to cover it up.

• Special Agent Rachel McCord : I was following up on Valkyrie to see if there was anything more to the story. This is a family photo we got from Rasheed. He identified this woman as the servant whose body Bronson took after the air strike. And we've identified her as Farrah Usman.

  Matt Hendricks : Yeah, she's listed as a civilian contractor working out of the U.S. Consulate in Kabul.

  Special Agent Rachel McCord : [explaining to Beckett]  It's a typical cover for an intelligence operative.

  Matt Hendricks : Yeah, and she was supposedly killed by a roadside IED the same night as the Zawari attack.

  Chief Carl Villante : Well, that makes sense. The injuries from an IED look a lot like those from an air strike.

  Special Agent Rachel McCord : That's not the story. Look at this. So, Farrah Usman's body was shipped back to Dover two days later. It was claimed by this man. Recognize that name?

  Kate Beckett : Brad Parker? The reporter?

  Special Agent Rachel McCord : One and the same.

  Kate Beckett : I don't get it. How is he connected to Valkyrie?

  Special Agent Rachel McCord : According to the paperwork, he was her fiancé. He's involved in this whole thing.

• Kate Beckett : This has to be about revenge, so it has to be about Reed.

  Richard Castle : Maybe he wants to do to Reed what Reed did to him. Take away the person he loves the most.

  Kate Beckett : His wife.

  [sharing a look with Castle, Beckett turns around and speeds off] 

  Special Agent Rachel McCord : [over the walkie-talkie]  Beckett, why'd you turn around? Is it Castle?

  Kate Beckett : No. We have a hunch.

• Kate Beckett : It's over, Parker! We know everything! Now give us the antidote before it's too late!

  [Parker attacks her from behind and disarms her] 

  Kate Beckett : No, wait!

  Brad Parker : Did Reed wait when he ordered the strike? No. No, now it's his turn to see how it feels. She's gonna die. Just like Farrah.

  Kate Beckett : Please, Parker, she's not the only one that you've poisoned. My fiancé is dying. He needs that antidote.

  Brad Parker : No, you don't understand. You're too late. It's too late.

  Special Agent Rachel McCord : [appearing behind Parker with her gun drawn]  You'd better hope you're wrong.

• [last lines] 

  Kate Beckett : And what about Secretary Reed? What's gonna happen to him?

  Rachel McCord : What do you mean?

  Kate Beckett : He withheld information to save his own ass. People almost died because of it.

  Rachel McCord : Well, we both know it's not that simple.

  Kate Beckett : Well... there's gonna be an investigation at least, right?

  Rachel McCord : You want everything to be black or white, I get it. But... in this town it rarely is. And to do this job, you have to make peace with that. But, hey, that was a hell of a hunch about Mrs. Reed... You should feel really good about this.

  Kate Beckett : Yeah, well, that was Castle.

  Rachel McCord : But you were smart enough to act on it. That was your call.

  Kate Beckett : And you backed me up without even knowing my play.

  Rachel McCord : That's what partners do.

  [as McCord leaves, Beckett turns to look back towards Castle's hospital room] 

  Kate Beckett : [quietly]  Yeah. That's what partners do.

• Chief Carl Villante : I have Homeland tightening security at every likely DC target. Government buildings, tourist attractions, transit hubs.

  Rachel McCord : The bad news is the toxin's versatile. It could be deployed through the ventilation system, it could contaminate a reservoir, it could be detonated with a bomb and release a toxic plume over part of the city. And if that happens, we'd be dealing with a lot more than just a couple of deaths on our hands, and...

  [to Castle] 

  Rachel McCord : ... I am so sorry.

  Richard Castle : No, it's your job. And if we stop the next attack, it might mean saving me.

• Richard Castle : Agent McCord, can I ask you a question?

  Rachel McCord : Yep.

  Richard Castle : How is she doing here?

  Rachel McCord : Beckett? She's good. She has a lot of potential.

  Richard Castle : So, she'll be okay.

  Rachel McCord : Hey... She's gonna be great.

• Chief Carl Villante : So what are we saying here? That Bronson was murdered to cover up the death of an American operative, with the implication that General Reed is behind it? The sitting Secretary of Defense?

  Rachel McCord : A position he got largely because of his success in taking out Zawari.

  Kate Beckett : His political star was on the rise. Maybe he couldn't afford to have damaging details out there.

  Chief Carl Villante : But if he wanted to silence Bronson, why would he go through the trouble of setting him up first? And none of this explains the theft of the toxin.

  Kate Beckett : Sir, he lied to us. About Valkyrie and about Bronson. Either he's involved, or he knows a hell of a lot more than he's telling us.

• Kate Beckett : These are the mission documents?

  Special Agent Rachel McCord : Is there even a *sentence* that doesn't have redactions?

  Agent Richmond : Not a complete one. Somebody is definitely trying to hide whatever went on here.

  Kate Beckett : I-I'm sorry, Castle. This is... pointless.

  Richard Castle : Can you do a word search for "Valkyrie"?

  Agent Richmond : [typing]  It doesn't appear in the document. Probably because it was redacted.

  Richard Castle : Right, but what about a search for blacked-out, eight-letter words the same *length* as "Valkyrie"?

  Special Agent Rachel McCord : Aren't all eight-letter words the same length?

  Richard Castle : Well, not in a proportional font like Times Roman. Um... each character will vary in size from the narrowest, uh, lower case "i," to the widest, upper case "W." So the combination of letters in the word "Valkyrie" will create a very specific length, not unlike a typographical fingerprint.

  Agent Richmond : I may be able to work with that.

• Brad Parker : First time I heard about Dreamworld was in '03. I was serving with the 173rd in Kandahar at the time. The story stuck with me, so, about a year ago I started poking around. Found out it was a forward operating base in northern Afghanistan. Launching pad for covert special ops in the region.

  Kate Beckett : Did Bronson work at that base?

  Brad Parker : Yeah. Yeah, I'd heard his name a couple of times, so I approached him.

  Rachel McCord : And what'd he tell you?

  Brad Parker : Nothing at all. In fact, he seemed pretty freaked out that I knew he was stationed there. Asked me how much I knew. About him, Dreamworld. About what he'd done.

  Kate Beckett : Wait, wait. W-What did he mean by that?

  Brad Parker : He never told me. Whatever it was, he sure as hell didn't want it getting out... Next thing I know, my editor's killing the story. At the personal request of Defense Secretary Reed.

  Kate Beckett : These conversations that you had with Bronson, did he ever mention the word "Valkyrie"?

  Brad Parker : No, why? What's Valkyrie?

  Rachel McCord : Wait... The Secretary of Defense *himself* called to kill the story? That's unusual.

  Brad Parker : Try unheard of. But I'm guessing that the subject matter struck a nerve. Look, prior to his appointment as Secretary of Defense, General Reed... was in charge of Central Command, which ran all missions out of Dreamworld.

  Kate Beckett : Are you suggesting that the Secretary of Defense is hiding something?

  Brad Parker : You have another explanation?

• Agent Richmond : For a strike in Jalalabad, they'd probably use an F-16 out of Bagram Air Base... I did a year as Chief Technical Officer at Bagram. Part of my job was dumping in the fighter jets' flight data onto a central server... If I can access it, I might be able to get that audio.

  Kate Beckett : What are we waiting for, McCord? We played by the rules. And that's...

  [points to redacted document] 

  Kate Beckett : ... what they gave us.

  Rachel McCord : [after a long pause]  Do it.