Yes, here it is, that thing that I have been saying that I will be putting up is finally here! First off I'll like to say thanks to all those who'd been reviewing my fics, hugs for all of you! Secondly, do not worry, I'll be trying to update more, as my summer course is ending very soon.
This is a bit of a sequel to The Sexist In The Tree, but you don't really need to read that in order to understand this one, though it might give you a better understanding of the 'big picture" of the main characters.
Disclaimer: I don't own TDI, Bones, or any of the songs that may appear in this fic, all those belong to their rightful owners.
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"She's not afraid, she just likes to use a nightlight, when she gets paid, true religion gets it all, if they fit right…"
The soft lyrics of that song was practically floating around the room during the Checker Box's weekly open mike night, as multitudes of people (mostly young women) crowded near the stage of the bar and grill as the singer continued his crooning. Jet black hair, emerald green eyes and a voice that could lull a beastly giant to sleep, yes siree that was Trent Hannigan in all his talented glory.
"Like everyone else she's in over her head, dreads feds, Grateful Dead and doesn't take meds…"
His voice, even if there wasn't the mic would be heard throughout the whole bar, from the giggling young ladies in the front, to the usual, not so fan girlish patrons sitting farther out, all the way to the back, where the people there were just coming in for a drink to ease their daily troubles away, (unfortunately one or more usually end up at the police station later in the night.) There, in one of the booths, sat a slightly short women, a private detective with brown hair and glasses. As she chugged down a drink just put down by a waitress, she was listening intently while her eyes concentrated on the Solitaire game in front of her.
"Her eyes, that's where hope lies, that's where blue skies, meet the sunrise, her eyes, that's where I go, when I go home…"
The detective's name was Beth, and while she looked like she was all focused on her card game (such a thrilling game, that Solitaire) she noticed a few things out of the corner of her eyes, one of them being a young, blond women blowing a kiss to Trent, while the man that sat beside her was fuming.
The song was done, and Trent stepped off the platform while the people (again, mostly women) applauded. An old, balding man came up, the owner of the Checker Box.
"And that was Trent Hannigan, ladies and gentleman our regular for the Checker Box's open night club. Let's also give a he thanks to Barney, our pianist…"
The owner talked for a while as Trent walked down, passing the women who had given him the air kiss.
"That was great, Trent, I'm sure you impressed that talent scout over there." she commented, flashing her eyelashes at him.
His reply was indifferent, "Gee, thanks." The women got up to go get another drink, leaving Trent enough room to sneak in to a chair at a nearby table, he was stopped for a moment though, by the guy who was fuming earlier.
"You knew that was my song Hannigan, I was saving it for the night the talent scout was here."
"Technically, it's not your song if you didn't write it or sing it originally," he replied smugly as he waved to a man in a suit across the room, the talent scout.
"You know Hannigan one day I'll…"
"Would you guys settle down? I'm trying to concentrate and this isn't helping!" The comment came from a woman, busily tuning her guitar, beside them.
"Now ladies and gentleman, give a warm welcome to another Checker Box regular, the spirited, spiritual, singer, Jacqueline Ryalls!" The woman who was telling the others to be quiet sat up and headed for the stage, a little nervousness in her eyes.
"Thank you Tom," she spoke to the owner and the introducer, "I'll like to perform a little song that I wrote myself, and I hope you enjoy it. It's called "Let It Out'" She started to strum her guitar which stared belting out a beautiful melody.
"Just sleep, It will, be okay in the morning It doesn't matter what you dream, 'Cause it will be okay, in the morning It's okay, Just, sleep."
As Jacqueline continued singing, Beth in the booth was starting to get frustrated with her Solitaire game (she wasn't the best at single player card games) and had been cheating for a while now.
"Just wake up, Let, the sunshine kiss you good morning. It doesn't matter what you drink, Because it will be alright Yeah, it'll be alright"
However, while she stunk at Solitaire, she was great at noticing minute details around her, such as the flirting women who was now striking up a conversation with Trent, the threatening man next to her who was staring daggers at Trent, and Jacqueline, who while had a calm composure,
had a look in her eyes that revealed her slight annoyance at the distraction and small irritation that was Trent's talking during her performance.
"Oh-Ooh-Oh, Oh-Ooh-Oh, Yeah Let it out, Let it out, Let it out 'Cause that's what makes the world go 'round."
Beth decided to call it a night, paid her bill (well she actually told the waitress to put it on her ever expanding tab) and left with a single thought in her mind: The singing's not going to be the main attraction tonight.
--
"God, look at how tall this grass is, I think it's up to my knees!" FBI Special Agent Geoff Murdock said as he trudged along the incredibly grassy field. It was nighttime and he was tailing behind blue, jumpsuit clad forensic anthropologist Dr. Bridgette Dodson, and crime scene investigator Sarah O'Riley, their path lit by a few large flashlights.
"Johnson's Field is pretty barren, not a lot of visitors, so to cut budgets we don't mow it as often as we do with other places, a young government worker said, clad in gloves, orange jumpsuit with reflective tapes and a blue baseball cap covering his thick, messy blond hair, "It was the crunching that got my attention, I stopped immediately after I heard it, and cleared the grass around that area manually with the knife to see what it was. Believe me, I did not expect what I found." The group reached their destination: a police taped area with giant headlights flashing down on a single spot. There, where the grass was roughly uprooted for better visual lay a mangled, bloody corpse, well, maybe corpse wasn't that good a word wince the only flesh left was just the steak thick soft tissue surrounding the skeleton.
"Whoa," was all Geoff could say as the two ladies crotched down near the body.
"By the looks of it, male, early thirties or late twenties, body dumped a good two weeks ago I predict," Bridgette said, flashing a small flashlight on it, "though I can't be too sure, with this much grass and wildlife there may have been more animals and insects than usual to chow down on this guy," that comment was directed at Geoff, and she had emphasized the term chow down to see if it might make him squirm.
It did slightly. "Okay, first off, never use chow down when we're at a crime scene, and second, Sarah, do you have anything?"
Sarah lips curved upward, her long orange hair swaying slightly, "If literally, do I have anything, then yes, I have a lot of things, if you meant did I find anything useful to the investigation, not so much. This grass covers a lot of tracks and the length of time this body's been here does not help either."
"Anyone saw a head?" Bridgette asked suddenly.
Geoff's eyes widened considerably, "wait, you mean a head's missing?"
"Well, I can't find it at the top of the neck, that's for sure."
"Well he had to of had a head before, since there's brain matter over here," Sarah joked morbidly flashing a light on the ground, nobody really bothered to look.
What is with the O'Riley siblings and joking about the weirdest things Geoff thought, internally contemplating who would be better to take to a crime scene: quick-witted, take charge, but short tempered voice of reason Sarah, or her brother: eccentric, plan hatching, but tactless and slightly cowardly walking encyclopedia Peyton. Right now the winning choice was neither. His partner, on the other hand was being much more productive, combing out the area for a head. She stopped at the driving grass mower and, acting on a suspicion craned her neck to see the underside of the mower through the grill.
"Found it," she said triumphantly, as Sarah, Geoff and the worker craned their necks to follow her line of sight. Geoff let out a low whistle while the worker spoke first.
"My girlfriend is totally not gonna believe this!"
"Well, the blade might explain the brain matter," Sarah said as she shined her light on the head, maggots in its eye socket and ants crawling up the fleshy skull.
--
"Now this is a fancy watch," Sarah said, holding up a smashed watch in an evidence bag, "not only does it tell time, it also measures pulse and breathing, Along with the defined muscle structure, this guy was an athlete."
"Ugh, I don't know why anyone would want a watch like that while they're exercising, the last thing I need is a machine to tell me I'm overweight," Peyton commented, "I already have you telling me that!" To avoid getting whacked in the arm he bounded down the platform, "I'll see if they identified this guy yet."
"Bone structure and tissue markers gave me a slight idea as to how this person looked," forensic artist Maurecia Lee stated, swiping her ID into slot and clambering onto to platform of the Jeffersonian, "I'll have to say, by the looks of it," she pulled up her artist rendering on the computer, "he definitely was a pretty boy."
"Well, he definitely isn't now," Sarah remarked, eyeing the remains on the examination table, she grimaced and continued, "stomach contents, or what was left of the stomach, showed trances of cough syrup and medicine, plus I found an old cough drop in the victim's throat."
"Must've been one heck of a cold for him to end up like that," Maurecia commented. Suddenly she noticed something shimmering under the lights, 'hey, look at this," she pointed at the hand of the victim, "it looks like a wedding ring."
"Perfect, now we know our victim was a young, handsome, athletic married man. Lucky wife."
"Not so lucky anymore," Geoff said, following Bridgette up the platform, "we have an identity yet?"
""Well I do have an artist sketch, I think I'm pretty accurate," Maurecia said, showing the two her drawing. Bridgette immediately blanched at the sight of it, Geoff quickly took notice.
"Bridge, you okay?" he asked, concerned, "is it someone you know?"
Bridgette took a moment to compose herself again, "I'm not sure Geoff, but that person look an awful lot like Trent."
"What?" He quickly inspected the picture at a closer perspective. It did, indeed look an awful lot like Trent, granted he had fifteen years to age, but still… "Do you really think it's…"
"Trent?" Peyton answered sadly, "I hate to break it too you but odontology found a match." He typed into the computer, and a picture of thirty-one year old Trent came up beside the sketch which looked eerily the same. "He was reported missing two week s ago."
"My god…" Bridgette said, Geoff gently lowered her into a chair. Ezekiel was one thing, but they knew Trent a whole lot longer and shared a deeper friendship.
"And here's the kicker," Peyton started again.
"You don't think that the fact that Trent's the one on the examination table is already a kicker?" Geoff said slightly offended, Peyton had an annoying knack at being unintentionally insensitive.
Peyton sighed, gently tossing a file on a nearby desk. He pointed to Trent's finger, "Guess who he was married to."
By the way he had asked, Bridgette and Geoff had a slight feeling as to who it was, and it is was indeed her, they would not be looking forward to being the bearer of bad news even more than usual.
"Who?" Bridgette ventured finally.
Out of Peyton's mouth came a single syllable.
"Gwen."
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So now I guess you guys are gonna throw bricks at me aren't you? (ducks quickly) Look at it this way, Trent and Gwen had at the most a happy nine year marriage (okay, even I'm shocked at how small that time is. Ducks again.) Still, I like this fic a bit better than The Sexist In The Tree, and I have the whole thing planned out: more drama, more mystery, more comedy, just a whole lot of more!
Out of curiousity and randomness, how many of you've been to Comic Con 2008? I always want to go but I can't and this year seems extra interesting, a lot of films and shows I'm dying to see are there for panels and interviews.
Oh, and who can guess the song Trent sings in the beginning? It's going to reappear at the end of the story!
Finally I'll like to thank Jacqueline229 (of Deviantart) for guest appearing in this fic and letting me borrow a song. The song, Let It Out was actually written by her, Go check out her work, it's amazing!
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