The world around her spun, her head heavy with emotion and exhaustion. She tried to open her eyes, tried to pry open the shutters that were blocking out the light, tried to swim through the darkness that was engulfing her to the muffled voices that seemed to lay so far above her. But she was attempting the inevitable. Her lungs seared with pain although she couldn't tell why and her breathing was coming in short gasps.
In what seemed to be another world high above her, she could hear a voice, a pleading, searching voice, calling out to her, trying to bring her out of the dark and back to reality. But her body was heavy and dull and she seemed to have lost the ability to function and move.
"Come on Bones! Wake up!" she could hear the voice calling desperately. Something clicked dully in her mind, registering that the voice belonged to Booth. She tried even harder to open her eyes but they still remained firmly shut.
"Stay with me babe! Come on Temperance! TEMPERANCE!" He was yelling now, slightly shaking her shivering body in his arms. Something about Booth using her given name dully awoke something inside of her but it wasn't enough to snap her out of her reverie.
"Temp please … please," he begged, lowering his head down to hers and running his fingers through her cold hair. He couldn't help but think that if he just believed her in the first place, that if he had taken that leap of faith and gone where the evidence was leading him like Bones had done, than this whole mess could have been avoided.
"Temperance, I'm begging you here," Seeley whispered into her ear, letting out a little laugh at the desperation he was possessing. "Come on babe, stay with me."
The haze lifted slightly from her head and the throbbing pain that had been dissolved as she slipped into her imagination returned at full force. She coughed slightly, exasperating blood from her lungs up into her mouth and rolling over to cough it out.
"Bones!" Booth cried, holding her head up a little more as she spluttered the blood out. The familiar scent of his cologne rolled over her and allowed her to slip a little back into a state of calm. However the searing pain in her upper ribs was still to painful to ignore.
She opened her eyes, staring into the scared and startled face of Seeley Booth. He was looking back down at her small frame curled up in his arms, her face slightly distorted in pain. A small smile tugged at the corners of his lips, allowing her a little encouraging smile. She blinked heavily, dragging her arm heavily up her side and coming to a rest on her abdomen. She pulled her hand slowly away upon feeling a wetness and put it in front of her face, the crimson red of her own blood staring back at her.
"Welcome back," he said, taking a cloth from beside him and pressing it to her gunshot wound. She winced in pain and he immediately apologized, his heart racing a mile a minute.
In a shuddering breath that nearly stopped Booth's heart, she drew in a staggering breath, the air catching in her chest. She stopped and tried to pull herself into a sitting position, allowing her asofogas to open up and cool air to enter her lungs. But even in the sitting position with Booth's arm under her neck for support, her oxygen supply was cut off and the haze threatened to engulf her again.
"Bones? …" Seeley started, caught off guard by the sudden lack of air she was receiving. "BONES! TEMPERANCE! You just gotta hang on a little longer Temp! TEMPERANCE!" he yelled as her eyes closed and she drew in one last shuddering breath.
Carried by the wind down the long twisting dirt road, Booth could hear sirens from the ambulance rushing down the road to the rescue. But two thoughts ran through Booth's head. Would Temp be ok, and would they make it there on time?
