Happy Halloween. This story is AU. I hope you enjoy it.

I don't own Bones.

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She'd been working for the Jeffersonian for about a year when she had a most unusual event occur in her life. She had started out her morning like most of her mornings by removing bones from a box in Bones Storage and laying them out on a steel table.

The bones were that of a child, a thirteen old boy to be exact. Before she examined them she read the file resting in the box with the bones. The child's body had been found in a forest outside of Philadelphia by deer hunters in Bucks County. When the hunters had found it, the body was mostly decomposed and had been more skeleton than fleshy body. The Bucks County Sheriff's office had tried to find out who the boy was and that included running advertisements in newspapers in the surrounding area including Philadelphia, but no one had ever stepped forward to claim the body. When the Jeffersonian Institute had opened its Medico-Legal Lab, the Sheriff had the bones transferred there in hopes that someday the boy's identity would be found.

Silently, Brennan placed the file down and began her examination of the small bones. While she worked she discovered that the boy had been murdered. The boy had suffered blunt force trauma to his trachea. It was as if someone had punched him in his neck and crushed the trachea. He had numerous signs of abuse including remodeled bones and this made her sad. His short life had been filled with pain.

After she made a few notations in the file, she became aware of movement out of the corner of her eye and looked towards the door. Surprised to see a young boy standing there, she faced the child and admonished him. "You aren't supposed to be here. No visitors are allowed in this part of the Lab."

A cheery smile on his face, the boy moved closer and stopped four feet from the table. "I know. I'm not a visitor." His dark hair was very wavy and stood up in spikes. His brown eyes were warm and filled with laughter. "I was wondering when someone was going to look at these. It's been a long time."

Confused, Brennan shook her head. "I don't understand. Do you know something about this case?"

A cocky smile on his face, the boy placed his thumbs in the belt at his waist. "Well yeah. Those bones belong to me."

Her eyes flicked over the bones and back towards the child. "These bones belong to the Bucks County Sheriff's office. Since you are a child, you are in no way associated with the Sheriff's office therefore these bones do not belong to you."

Inching closer, the boy stood on the opposite side of the table and looked down at the bones. "I made him mad. He was drunk like he always was and he just got so mad at me and he hit me." The boy lost his beautiful smile and became rather grim. "I couldn't breathe. He kept begging me to forgive him, but I couldn't breathe. I didn't want to go, but well you have to breathe you know?"

Her confusion growing, Brennan looked at the crushed trachea and then back at the boy. "If this is a joke, it isn't a very good one. Yes the boy died of a crushed trachea, but . . . well you are clearly fine therefore what you just said makes no sense. I think you should leave now."

The child shrugged his shoulders. "I will . . . when you find out who I am, could you give my bones to my grandfather? I loved him so much. He was the only one who ever loved me, well him and Nana. My father hated me and my mother . . . well, I don't know where she is, but if she'd loved me she would have taken me with her when she ran away. I don't want you to give my bones to my father. He hated me and I don't want him to have my bones."

Brennan prided herself on logic and reasoning and she certainly didn't believe in an afterlife or ghosts. "I think your prank has gone on long enough. You need to leave."

"I can't." The boy's cocky smile was back. "When you give my bones to my grandfather then I'll leave. If you give to me to my Dad, I promise you I'm going to haunt you until you die, so don't even think about it, Okay?"

"This is ludicrous." Brennan's anger was growing. She hated it when anyone tried to make a fool of her. "There are no such things as ghosts or angels. You are not a ghost and therefore you need to leave. This is a restricted area."

"You're pretty smart, but you're kind of being silly right now." The child pointed at the skull and then at his head. "This is me. Those are my bones. I've been waiting for years for someone to figure out who I am, so my grandfather would know what happened to me. I visited him right after I died and he was worried about me. My father said I ran away and my Pops was afraid, but my Dad lied and he knows it. He hit me and I couldn't breathe and then he drove me to some woods and he dumped my body. That wasn't very nice, but I guess he didn't want to get into trouble. He was mean you know. He was always hitting me. I got tired of it and I was going to kill myself, but he hit me too hard and he killed me before I could kill myself. That's called irony. I learned about irony in English class."

She refused to believe that the boy standing before her was a ghost. Moving around the table, she tried to grab his arm only to have her hand move through his arm and part of his chest. Startled she leaped back. "This is impossible."

His cocky grin back, the boy shook his head. "Not really. What's impossible is doing a Rubik's Cube. I got one for Christmas and I never could get all the sides to be one color. I did get two sides once, but I couldn't do all the sides. I'm not stupid like my Dad said I was. Some people are better at stuff than others and that's okay. It doesn't mean someone's stupid just because they can't make all the colors the same on a game."

"You're right." Brennan had played with one in her past and she had worked out the method needed to get all the faces of the cube the same color. "Your father shouldn't have called you stupid because you were unable to solve the riddle."

The boy nodded his head. "Thanks. You're nice. I like you."

Surprised, Brennan shook her head. "You don't know me. How do you know I'm nice?"

He chuckled and cocked his head to the side. "Because you're talking to me like I'm not stupid. A lot of adults think kids are stupid. Also you're going to find out who I am and you're going to give my bones to my grandfather."

She smiled at the child and nodded her head. "Yes, I will find out who you are . . . if these are really your bones then perhaps you can just tell me who you are. It will save time and I can give your bones to your grandfather sooner."

"That would be cheating wouldn't it?" The boy stared the skull on the table. "I don't think you should cheat. You'll never be the greatest forensic anthropologist in the world if you cheat."

His logic was sound and she approved. "Yes, you are correct. I will find out who these bones belong to without your help."

Filled with approval, the boy nodded his head. "Like I said you're nice and I like you . . . I hated it in the woods. I'm a city kid and the animals came and they ate me and that was bad. I'd tell them to leave, but they wouldn't listen to me. I'm glad those guys found me even if one of them did throw up. That was kinda of gross. The Sheriff's office was nice, but everyone was always busy. This place is really quiet. Do you like it this quiet? I like loud music. The louder the better. It makes me want to dance and I'm pretty good. My Mom taught me."

Brennan turned her attention back to the bones. "Yes, I like music. I don't really dance very well though. My parents . . . I lost my parents when I was fifteen so there was no one to teach me how to dance."

Filled with sadness the boy sighed. "Gosh, that's bad. I'm sorry you don't have any parents . . . I had some, but they weren't good ones. I hope your parents were good to you."

"They were." Brennan thought about her father and mother playing Sorry with her and smiled. "They played board games and card games with me. My father never let me win. He said you had to earn it."

The boy nodded his head. "Yeah he's right. You do have to earn it. You don't learn if you cheat or if someone cheats for you."

"Dr. Brennan, who are you talking to?" Dr. Goodman was standing in the doorway and was staring around the room. "I thought I heard you talking to someone."

Embarrassed, Brennan glanced across the table and found the boy to be gone. "I wasn't talking to anyone. I was just thinking out loud."

Goodman smiled. "Yes, I do that sometimes myself. It helps me to organize my thoughts sometime." Turning he left the room, leaving Brennan alone.

"I still don't believe in ghosts." Brennan glanced around the room and shook her head. "I do have a vivid imagination though. I might write a book someday."

A child's laughter rang out in the room. "I wish I hadn't died. I'd like to have been your friend. I understand you. You're cool."

"That would have been nice." Brennan didn't have any friends and sometimes she felt so alone. "That would have been very nice."

Oooooooooooooooooooo

Let me know what you think of my Halloween story. Thank you.