Disclaimer: Nope they're not mine. I just like to play with them.

A/N: If you've never heard of the catacombs or seen pictures from them, I suggest Googling "Paris Catacombs" and having a look at the results you get. It's really quite fascinating and I hope to visit them one day!


Once they had finally collected all of their luggage, Brennan and Booth headed towards the door only to find a man in a suit holding a placard with their names on it. Booth flashed his badge to the man,

"Ah, Monsieur Booth et Madamoiselle Brennan. Bienvenue à Paris! I am Lieutenant Gerard Dupuis. If you'll just follow me there is a car waiting to take to the hotel." With that their escort turned on his heel and headed for the doors. Booth and Brennan exchanged glances before following hurriedly after the rapidly moving lieutenant. When they reached the car the officer motioned for them to hand their luggage to the driver who put it in the trunk. "Henri will bring you to your hotel so you can check in. You have a meeting with the captain tomorrow morning at nine o'clock. Henri will be at the hotel to pick you up at eight."

"Thank you," Booth said but the lieutenant was already striding away. "Friendly guy."

"I though he was rather brisk," Brennan said as they slid into the back seat of their hired car.

"Sarcasm, Bones."

"Oh…Well anyways, do you have the file for the case? I'd like to read it over before we get to the scene tomorrow."

"Bones you can have it when we get to the hotel."

"But Booth I'm just sitting here doing nothing, I'd appreciate having the file to read. Besides, I'd like to go to bed when we get to the hotel."

"Well unless you're about to crawl into the trunk, you're not getting that file until we get…"

"We're here," their driver informed them, pulling to a stop in front of a palatial hotel.

"Wow…" Tempe looked up at the tall tower.

"Wow is right Bones." Booth and Brennan got out of the car, accepting their luggage from Henri before heading into the lobby.

"Bonjour," Booth attempted the local language at the desk, "J'mapelle Seeley Booth."

"Ah! Mr. Booth and Dr. Brennan! Welcome to L'Hotel Tremoille! I just need a signature here and you'll be all set." Booth was about to sign the paper when he noticed a mistake.

"Uh, there should be two rooms…"

"Ah yes, you see it was such short notice and we only have this room left. It has two beds though, will that be acceptable?" Booth looked to Temperance, who nodded her consent.

"Yeah, that's fine," Booth signed the paper and accepted the envelope containing their room key. As they waited for the elevator, Booth dug a copy of the case file out of his bag and handed it to his partner. Brennan immediately opened it to the first page and began reading. Since so little was known so far, the file was short and Tempe finished reading it before the elevator doors opened on the twenty third floor. They settled into their room for the night, both falling asleep in the respective beds almost immediately, visions of skeletonized remains and case reports infiltrating their dreams.


Brennan and Booth arrived at the police station the following morning and were immediately brought to meet with the captain.

"Bonjour! I'm Captain Emanuel Dione. I hope your flight was good, I apologize that we could only find you one room. I hope it isn't too much of a bother."

"No, it's fine," Temperance assured him, "When can we see the remains?"

"Well you see that is the hard part. Agent Booth told us to leave the remains where they were so you could examine them. However they are located in the catacombs in an area off limits to civilians and are therefore difficult to access. We have gathered the appropriate equipment but it will be cramped quarters and very difficult to work in so if you would reconsider I can have the remains collected and brought to our morgue for you to examine."

"No. I need the context of the remains and associated artifacts. Ninety percent of the information I get about what happened is based on context."

"Alright, if you insist. If you both will follow me I'll have a squad car bring you and your equipment to the site."


Armed with flashlights, batteries, food, water, trowels, brushes, dental picks and a large supply of evidence bags, Booth and Brennan scaled the low stone wall which separated them from a rail bed. Their guide was a young French cop who spoke little English and silently led them along the tracks to their destination. When he stopped, Booth was confused,

"Where are we? Shouldn't there be a door or something?" Tempe turned to the young man,

"Où est la porte?" (Where's the door?) The officer looked down and pointed to a dark and foreboding hole in the wall near the ground, their door.

"Ici," (here) he told them.

"You have got to be kidding me," Booth stared down at the hole.

"Il y a une autre entrée?" (Is there another entrance?) Tempe asked. The cop shook his head, gesturing for them to go down. Booth stared daggers at his partner, "Hey, don't look at me! You're the one who brought me to Paris for a skeleton in the catacombs!" Booth grumbled and pushed his backpack through the hole, following on his hands and knees.

Once through the 'door' they were able to stand. They turned on flashlights to find themselves in a dark tunnel, Lt. Dupuis standing a few feet away, apparently awaiting their arrival.

"Welcome to the catacombs. Few people see the places you are about to visit. Fewer still see them legally. The body was found by a group of cataphiles two days ago..."

"What's a cataphile?" Booth asked.

"An explorer who enters the catacombs illegally, through entryways not yet sealed. Usually it's college kids looking for kicks, some of these people though, they know this place better than anyone."

"How long will it take to get to the remains?" Brennan asked, adjusting her heavy backpack.

"About fifteen minutes or so, watch your step and your head, this is a dangerous place." They began their arduous journey, slogging though knee high water, picking their way gingerly around piles of broken bones and, at some points, crawling through low tunnels until they reached their destination. They came through a final, low tunnel which opened into a cavern, its walls lined with piles of bones, arranged by type. The rear wall was lined with skulls, to the left were femurs, tibia and fibulas and to the right were humerii, radii and ulnas. Behind them were piles of ribs, hands, feet and vertebrae.

"Okay…creepy," Booth said.

"Here is your crime scene," the lieutenant told them, leading them to a body in the centre of the room. The remains that lay before them were almost completely skeletonized, the clothing torn and degraded. Temperance dropped her bag and crouched over the skeleton for a closer look. She examined the skull and pelvic bones first to determine sex and ancestry.

"Female, likely of European descent," she said aloud, digging out a pad and pen to begin her field notes. She lifted clothing away to view the epiphyseal joints of the femurs and humerii and poked her flashlight into the open mouth to see tooth eruption and wear, "Probably in her early twenties."

"How does she do that?" the lieutenant asked Booth.

"She's the Bone Whisperer," Booth replied and the two men chuckled.

"I don't whisper to the bones, Booth. I use specific features to determine age, sex and ancestry based on known models of development and formation."

"It was a joke Bones," Booth told her. Temperance shook her head and went back to her work, pulling out a tape measure. After measuring a series of bones she scribbled rapidly in her notebook,

"Between five foot five and five foot eight, in good shape, she was muscular."

"How did she die?" the lieutenant asked. Brennan shone her flashlight on the skull and poked her pen into a hole through the left temporal,

"Gunshot wound to the head."


A/N: As a forensic anthropology student I know that there's no freakin' way in hell she'd have been able to determine all of this stuff so rapidly but hey, I'm taking a little dramatic license here (they certainly do it enough in the show!)