"Zack? Zack? Dude!" Hodgins punched Zack lightly on the arm. "Dude, you OK? You look like you've seen a ghost or something!"

Zack's eyes flicked up from the computer monitor he'd been so engrossed with, but his expression still remained somewhat shell-shocked. Just as quickly, his eyes darted back down to the screen, his forehead creasing in confusion. Pursing his lips, he let out a forceful sigh and slumped down in his chair.

"Dude?"

"I… Hmmm…" Zack shook his head and sighed, still looking puzzled. "It's nothing. I'll get back to it later. Do we have a case?" Zack stood and made a move for the doorway.

Hodgins raised his eyebrows and reached for the mouse to see what was disconcerting his colleague so. Faster than he'd ever seen Zack move, the younger doctor was back in the room, cuffing him in the shoulder and in less time that he would have thought possible, the screen (email, it seemed) was shut down and the computer screen blank.

"Dude, seriously!" Hodgins rubbed his arm where it'd been hit and looked at Zack in amusement. "Now I want to know WAY more than before!"

Zack simply stared back at him blankly.

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"So… Do we have a case? Or did you just come by to look longingly at Brennan?" Angela asked Booth with a smirk. "Or are you killing two birds with one stone?"

"I…" Booth looked amused as he held up a finger like he was preparing to argue his case when he stopped abruptly. "Hey Bones." His face returned to it's "here on FBI business" look.

"Hi Booth," Brennan acknowledged him with a slight nod and a faint smile. "Got a case for us?"

Angela rolled her eyes and muttered, "So FORMAL!"

"Angela, I know what you're mumbling and please just give it a rest. There will NEVER be anything between—" Brennan was cut off by a slight kerfuffle at the door to her office.

The assembled group looked up to see Drs. Hodgins and Addy at the doorway. The part that caused the commotion was the fact that the younger doctor was prodding the other one along amidst gleeful giggling. Zack, however, wasn't amused in the slightest.

"Cambodian mail order bride? Selling your sperm? C'mon, throw me a BONE, dude!" Hodgins eyes had teared up he was laughing so hard.

All eyes turned to Zack in dazed curiosity.

"No and no," he grumbled, looking mildly frustrated with Hodgins. Then he saw everyone else looking at him questioningly. "And NO!"

"Ok. Ok. I'll lay off. I swear," Hodgins said, wiping the tears from his eyes, the corners of his mouth twitching as he tried to keep a straight face.

Zack narrowed his eyes at his friend and then, seemingly satisfied, and crossed the room where he plopped down Indian style on the floor near the sofa. Keeping his eyes down, he proceeded to nervously pop his knuckles.

Startled, he realized that there was a very unnatural silence in the room. Apart from this thumb popping and a strange snorting sound coming from Hodgins's direction, you could have heard a pin drop. Zack looked up slowly to see everyone staring right at him.

His whole body slumped against the sofa, he gritted his teeth and rolled his eyes heavenward. After a deep breath, Zack started one of his superfast monologues. "I got an email from a friend today we were in college at the same time she is in town and she wanted to find out if we could maybe meet up while she's here because she just interviewed for a job at the Pentagon and doesn't know anyone in D.C. well maybe one person I think a guy she knows works in the French Embassy but, really, I mean, she doesn't know anyone and we were both kids with really high I.Q.s who were in college while we were quite young and… And…"

There was silence for a beat and then Hodgins piped up, "And, dude, you are SO freakin' into her that it's not even funny."

"No… No! I mean, we just could always relate to one another and we've known one another for years, since I was 12 and she was 10—she went to Johns Hopkins for med school when we finished college and then at the CDC in Atlanta and we've kept in touch through email and—"

"Is she pretty?" Angela asked with a huge grin.

Zack had been looking at his hands throughout this whole explanation. Now, he looked up slowly, his eyes wide and scared.

"Yeah."

"Do really squinty squints fall in love?" Booth asked Bones under his breath.

"Really squinty squints? I don't know what that means" she replied, glaring at him with narrowed eyes.

"Look at him, Booth!" Angela said, nodding her head in Zack's direction. He was staring into space chewing on his thumb nail. "It's pretty obvious… They do!"

The youngest man in the room focused on her when she said that, looked even more fearful and mumbled, "Oh shit."

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This is my first aever ttempt at a fanfic. So, please review if you want to see where it goes! Hope you like it, though!