A/N: Here is number 2 in the series. Hope you like the chapter. :) Please drop a review, they are what I live for. ;)
The Body on the Battlefield
By 18lzytwner
Chapter 1
The Jeffersonian Medico-Legal Lab, Thursday at 10:30 am
Dr. Temperance Brennan stood on the platform examining some bones that had been found by a hiker at the Antietam National Battlefield. From time to time this happened as some bodies had been buried without grave markers. Graves had been erected for both Union and Confederate soldiers (who were buried in separate cemeteries), most of which had names on them, but some only stated that it was "Unknown Solider Number" with up to a three-digit number after the final word. Sometimes bodies could be identified by having Angela recreate a face and sometimes the skull was too damaged or parts were missing which made the identification impossible.
She carefully examined the pieces of the body they had dug up and the artifacts that had been found late yesterday afternoon. The belt buckle would seem to indicate the body was in fact from the Civil War but something was amiss. No other artifacts were recovered. Usually they buried soldiers with everything they were wearing, which would have included their boots, clothes, and any personal items. There was no evidence of any metal objects or even the leather boots, which quite often remained somewhat intact. Of course the disappearance of these items wasn't totally out of the question either. If they had no name for him, nothing would have stopped another soldier from taking his boots, his gun, his bayonet, or anything else that could have been valuable.
Sighing, she examined the bones more closely. More questions were raised as to its authenticity when she examined the bullet hole in the reconstructed sternum, which lie in four pieces, and corresponding gouge in one of the vertebrae. Quickly she headed over to the phone on the platform and called Cam.
"So what's up? I thought this one was going to be pretty routine?" The Head of Forensics asked.
"So did I until I examined the skeleton. Look at this," Brennan pointed out the sternum and Cam leaned in for a closer look.
"It's a bullet hole," she replied.
"Exactly. But look at the size of it," the forensic anthropologist pointed out.
"Its about the size of a nine millimeter," Cam realized.
"In the Civil War, muskets were still in use but with a new type of bullet called the Minié ball. It wasn't actually a ball but more of the shape of bullets today. However in order to be used with a muzzle-loading rifle, they had to be very large caliber and of course still made with lead. This left huge wounds in the victim and easily shattered bones. Most cases it was better to amputate then try to find all of the bone fragments," Brennan explained.
"So no chance the sternum remained this intact," the coroner said.
"No. This man was killed over a hundred years later. No doubt whoever killed him figured no one would go digging on the old battlefield. Only thing was that the ground tends to shift and erode. Our victim wasn't buried very deep and our killer attempted to make it look as though it was a Civil War soldier. Call Booth," Brennan nodded.
"Will do. Can you estimate how long he's been in the ground?" She wanted to know.
"I'll have it by the time Booth gets here," the forensic anthropologist promised. Cam picked up the phone and gave the FBI agent the information they'd collected.
"He'll be right over," Cam said. Brennan nodded and continued to look at the bones more closely.
True to his word, Booth arrived fifteen minutes later. He scanned himself into the platform and now joined the team, which had gathered on the platform.
"Cam said you found a body at Antietam but it isn't a Civil War soldier. Do you want to explain that a little better to me?" The G-man had a puzzled look on his face.
"Upon further investigation, I can say with certainty that this man was between the ages of twenty-five and thirty, and was buried almost thirty years ago," Brennan said.
"So that would definitely rule out Civil War soldier. Ok what else did you find?" Booth asked.
"The belt buckle would indicate that it is of a Union soldier from the state of New York however, I believe it was planted to make us think our victim was almost one hundred and forty five years old. I'm having Hodgins take a closer look for particulates and fingerprints," his partner explained.
"From a cursory glance I'd say the buckle is in fact authentic. That means you could be looking for a Confederate who collects Yankee paraphernalia," Hodgins was really enjoying himself. Booth shook his head and let out a sigh.
"So our victim was buried in the eighties in a National Park with an authentic Union Civil War belt buckle. Do I want to ask what killed him?" The FBI agent wanted to know.
"A nine millimeter bullet to the sternum," Simon spoke up.
"Wow, he's still around? I'm impressed," Booth smiled.
"Simon has proven to be very helpful and eager, but not too eager," Angela smirked.
"Anyway as Dr. Brennan had pointed out to Dr. Saroyan there is no way a Minié ball made this wound. Yes the Minié made the rifles more accurate and they could pierce through a body but the sternum would have been completely obliterated," Simon explained.
"He's been hanging around Hodgins too long," Booth said.
"So what we have is murder," Cam said, ignoring that last comment.
"I'll say and our killer is going to be between the ages of forty-nine and one-hundred. Care to narrow my scope?" Booth wondered.
"Why assume forty-nine?" Angela asked.
"Because that would make him born in nineteen sixty or at least twenty years old at the time of the shooting. I'd prefer not to think that our killer was younger," the G-man explained.
"I'm hoping to narrow things down with a more thorough examination of the bones and any evidence we find," Brennan was confident.
"I certainly hope so otherwise we'll be digging through a decade of missing persons cases," Booth couldn't stomach that idea. No doubt there were hundreds of cases. Brennan saw his point and nodded.
"Well everyone back to work. We have a murderer to catch," Cam steered the group in the right direction. Everyone began to disperse and Brennan had Simon start examining the bones.
"Booth would you come to my office a second? I have something you need to see," the forensic anthropologist said.
"Sure Bones," the tone of her voice made him slightly nervous. Whatever it was it certainly wasn't something he was going to like. The two went into her office and she closed the door.
"This came in this morning's mail," she handed him an envelope that had no return address and the Jeffersonian address was written in all block letters. Noticing the stamp on it, the letter had been routed through a post office in Greenbush, Minnesota. Opening the envelope, he pulled out the piece of paper and immediately recognized the magazine clippings that made up words. Then he read the letter.
"Dr. Brennan, don't forget the surprise inside." It was followed by coordinates, which he assumed meant another body.
"He's taunting you," Booth said.
"Yes, well it's working. I put those coordinates into my computer and they gave me my address," Brennan told him.
To Be Continued…