The Principal in the Play
Chapter 1: The Scarecrow in the Sun
A/N: This is my first Bones story ever and I hope you like it! For the first time, I have also planned the story beyond chapter one, so hopefully I won't get as stalled out as in my Veronica Mars story "Decade" (I'm working on it, I promise, to people from that story-- I hope you'll like this as a stop gap).
Her heart was beating in her ears, her breath was coming out in short bursts, and her feet pounded rhythmically. She couldn't help look at the timer on her treadmill: 35:46. Of course she could make it another ten minutes; she had done it before and there was nothing about this morning that should make her any more or less able to complete her run. She upped the speed on her machine just to show it that it didn't frighten her. A cold drop of perspiration rolled down her back as she gritted her teeth and lengthened her stride.
Temperance Brennan loved going to her gym in the morning. Her gym was clean, chilled and well-lighted, just like her lab. It was full of people fully occupied in their own activities and not interfering with their neighbors'. Here, she was in control and every time she kept going when her muscles were burning and her lungs were bursting and it seemed like she couldn't keep going on, she had told her body that it was she, Temperance Brennan, who had won out, not some silly tired muscles or tendons or bronchi.
In junior high and high school, she had never comprehended the draw of sports or exercise. She hadn't understood the nuances of the games her peers were playing nor did she have the time or inclination to learn them. She couldn't really see why purposefully trying to tire yourself out was a worthwhile activity at all. She performed the required physical education while expending the exact least amount of energy or enthusiasm necessary to successfully complete it.
Nor had she anticipated a change of attitude once arriving at college, a place where she planned to focus primarily on her scientific education. In an effort to get to know some of the people on her floor, however, she had agreed to go to the gym with the girls Maxine and Carol from across the hall once a week. She dragged her feet at first, but having agreed, she kept to the schedule faithfully. She didn't make much headway in her relationship with either Maxine or Carol, but she began going to the gym at times when they weren't there, until she was going daily before class, as her academic schedule permitted. She liked the discipline, the chance to get out of her head for at least an hour a day and she certainly found the endorphins quite satisfying. The habit had formed, and she kept it up in modified form up to the present, needing the chance to get out of her head as much as ever. Besides, now she had to be sure she could keep up with a suspect if one ever tried to elude capture.
Temperance was breathing heavily as she finally slowed the machine down to a walk to get her breath back. 47:01, two minutes and one second over her intended time because she knew she could push herself that far. She gulped down some water when the treadmill came to a halt and headed over to the mats for a few crunches and push-ups. She didn't want to be remiss in the strength portion of her training.
She stood in the locker room, toweling herself off after her hurried shower. Her aisle had no other occupants, and though she didn't feel shame about her body, she did prefer to dress alone. She stood in a bra and underwear, a towel wrapped around her hair, pulling her white shirt out from her locker when another woman can round the corner. Temperance sighed a little at the intrusion, but just pretended the other occupant didn't exist while she pulled the partially buttoned shirt over her head. She was quite surprised to find the woman face to face with her when her head came out from the shirt again. The woman paused, a little startled by Temperance's direct gaze, then asked, "You're Dr. Temperance Brennan, right?"
"Yes, I am," Temperance replied, puzzled by this woman's behavior. People seldom approached each other in locker rooms from her experience. Did she know this woman? Her features did not seem particularly familiar. Perhaps she wanted her to sign a book or something.
The woman looked relieved by Temperance's affirmative response. "Good. There is a man in a suit outside asking for you and I've asked a couple of tall brunettes who weren't you. He said it was urgent, that he has some 'bones'. I wasn't sure what that meant…"
Temperance had managed to get her pants, socks and shoes on while the woman was speaking, but her hair was still damp. "Tell him I'll be out as soon as I can."
"Okay!" The woman left with the message much more speedily than Temperance had expected. She went to the bathroom to hurriedly dry her hair enough to go out.
When she exited the Ladies' Locker Room, she saw Booth there, leaning against the wall, waiting as she expected he would be. She had not expected to still find the woman from the locker room standing there chatting and giggling. Booth immediately smiled at Temperance's appearance and turned to face her. She couldn't help smiling in response, but he quickly said, "Bones! What took you so long? We're urgently needed at a crime scene and you're here dawdling and doing yourself up." Temperance opened her mouth to respond, but he grabbed her elbow and steered her out of the building, waving a quick goodbye to the messenger woman.
Temperance only managed to catch her breath properly in the car that she had been so abruptly deposited in. As Booth drove, she complained, "You know I was supposed to look at a supposedly Aztec skeleton today at the Jeffersonian and I was really looking forward to it. This had better be interesting."
He grinned at her whining. "Oh, it's interesting."
"Well… what is it? I hope you brought my evidence kit with you because I don't know if I can do a proper job without it."
"Don't worry, it's all in the back, Bones. I know you like to be prepared and hands on at the scene."
"I do. So what shall I be expecting when I get there?"
"But I thought you were so excited about your Aztecky man? I wouldn't want to distract from your true passion."
"Aztec, Booth, Aztec man. I am also an adjunct to the FBI. It is also a part of my job to assist the FBI and it is essential that I be given the information I need when I ask for it."
"Oh, but everyone likes a surprise, right?" He looked at her cajolingly.
She just raised her eyebrows. She may not have any particularly good reason to need to know what she was going to see beforehand, as reports from non-scientists rarely contained any useful information for her, but she refused to allow him to know something she didn't.
He sighed dramatically. "Fine. It's a scarecrow, Bones."
As she watched the exterior begin to appear less and less like suburbs and more and more like farmland, Temperance wrinkled her forehead and pursed her lips. "Scarecrows don't have bones, Booth. They are most commonly made of straw and cotton fabric. You should know that from that movie where a scarecrow gets a diploma instead of a brain from a wizard. Of course that doesn't make any sen—"
Booth cut her off with a laugh. "I hope this has nothing to do with The Wizard of Oz, Bones, 'cause those flying monkeys are just plain freaky."
"They were completely physiologically inaccurate," Temperance agreed. "That could disturb anyone."
"I'm sure that was it," Booth said in a way that suggested rather the opposite of his words. He looked over at Temperance as he added, "There was, however, a brain in this scarecrow, Bones. And, more importantly, there're bones. You see if this isn't better than any old Aztecky man."
"Aztec," Temperance muttered, as they pulled over beside the FBI evidence truck on the side of the road beside a field. She looked out to see crows swarming around an apparent scarecrow in the center of a cornfield, with FBI crime scene techs shooing them away, frantically and rather ineffectively. The air was filled with raucous cawing as they both climbed out of the car, slamming their doors shut in unison.
Booth shaded his eyes from the sun as he stood gazing out of the chaotic scene in front of him. Then he turned and grinned at Temperance, saying, "Well, that has got to be the worst scarecrow, ever."
"Given that it is doing the exact opposite of its stated intention, I would say that that is a worthwhile hypothesis," Temperance said as she walked as directly as possible toward her new bones.
Please review! I love feedback and I would like to know whether I should continue from Bones' point of view or switch back and forth with Booth. Thanks.