Thank you so much for the enthusiastic response to Chapter 3! I hope you all continue to enjoy.
RT, thanks for appreciating my mix of humor and tragedy. That's life, as far as I'm concerned, especially when it comes to Zack and Sweets. Sigh. ;) *hugs* D, As I mentioned Dr. Harper's not a quack but a more typical MD, who is eager to medicate. Dr. Brennan explains a little more in this chapter. Thanks for your faithful reviews! A.M. Katy, Your praise means the world to me! I seek to satisfy the Zack fangirls as much as the Sweets' fangirls in this story! Of course, I don't know him as well as you, so feel free to offer suggestions on his characterization, if needed. Thanks again for your delightful review! :D Peanutmeg, You are always so kind. *hugs back* Cassiopeia, Wait and see-you will get the full story of Lance's institutionalization eventually! ;) Mysterious Jedi and Eternal Mist, Thanks for reading and reviewing! It makes my day! Super Ario, Don't worry, things usually work out for the best by the end of my stories. Thanks for the compliment! SFT, Thanks for noticing my work on Zack's character. He does have a heart, doesn't he? I wish we could have more Zack in the institution on the show. Sigh. I have to warn, there's not much Swaisy in this story, but thanks for reading anyway!
As Booth and Brennan entered the room containing Zack, the wooden chairs, and a bare table, Bones whispered to her partner, "Is it just me, or does Dr. Sweets seem mad at us?"
Booth looked at her without signaling agreement; he was focused on the task at hand. They moved to sit across from Zack, who lifted his eyebrows.
"Hello Dr. Brennan, Agent Booth. I haven't seen anyone from the Jeffersonian in quite some time. What are you doing here?"
"I'm sorry it has been so long, Zack," Brennan apologized. "I've been very busy."
"Of course you have. You are the top specialist in your field. I expect that you would be consumed by your endeavors," Zack replied not looking in the least bit hurt. He did appear slightly embarrassed, as he said, "I apologize. They gave me a sedative, and my cognitive responses are impaired."
"That's understandable," Bones agreed. She thought about earlier in the year when she had been stabbed in the arm by a lunatic doctor and had been put on heavy painkillers. She shivered to think of how people of average intelligence functioned on a daily basis.
Booth found the conversation oddly endearing and jumped in, "Zack, what happened today? We want you out of here, not getting yourself into more trouble."
This place gave Booth the creeps. It was his first time visiting Zack, he was sorry to admit. When things had gotten really rough with Booth's alcoholic father in his youth, he had fantasized about ending his own life. Once he had even taken a bottle of pills to bed with him and raged all night with his inner demons. What if he had attempted suicide and ended up in a place like this? What if he had hurt himself or someone else in his short-sighted fury? Booth's grandfather, Pops, had saved him from himself by being his rock and refuge. Booth shivered and wondered how different Zack actually was from himself.
"I don't wish to discuss it," Zack replied. Then, without missing a beat, he continued, "Agent Booth, will you do me a favor?" he asked, his expression unchanging.
"I can try?" Booth said as more of a question, glancing at Bones who was already pleading for his compliance with her puppy-dog eyes.
Brennan was feeling an odd combination of guilt at her negligence of Zack and bewilderment at her own guilt. The logical side of her insisted that she simply hadn't had the time or energy to be visiting her former assistant lately. Her emotional side insisted that she loved Zack. He was like family.
"I do not want Dr. Harper to see me anymore. I only want Dr. Sweets as my therapist. Dr. Sweets understands what it is like to be in a place like this." Zack was adamant.
Booth glanced at Bones again, "You mean because Sweets used to work in an institution?"
Booth vaguely remembered Sweets mentioning something like that in the case involving a schizophrenic with devil-horn implants. Sweets said he had interned in Philadelphia at a mental health facility.
"No, I mean because Dr. Sweets was once in an institution himself. Didn't you know?" Zack asked, then immediately realized that he had done badly by Dr. Sweets. "Revealing that to you was injudicious. I am sorry." He lowered his eyes.
Booth's mouth hung open. "Don't be sorry to us…it's Sweets you should apologize to. Sweets is…was crazy?" He was confused and felt blind sighted by this revelation. Booth considered Sweets a friend; he didn't like to think of the kid as unstable.
"I doubt Dr. Sweets would qualify as crazy," Zack replied, looking confused.
Dr. Brennan said, "We should go, Booth. They told us five minutes." Brennan tried to avoid processing this new information. She itched to leave.
Booth nodded. "We should go."
Brennan reached out and touched Zack's hand. Its flesh felt oddly rotted away. "I promise I'll visit again soon, Zack."
Zack looked at her with tired eyes and nodded.
In the hallway, Dr. Harper was still bellowing at Sweets.
Sweets responded in a very sharp voice that bordered on a yell, "I understand that you think Zack is unstable, but he wasn't hinting about suicide or attacking orderlies until you put him on antidepressants!"
Both doctors swung their heads around when they heard the FBI duo approaching. Lance flushed and deeply regretted that Brennan had heard this last statement.
"We have to go," Lance said to Dr. Harper. "Do NOT give Zack anything else until we discuss this further."
"He's my patient, Dr. Sweets!" Dr. Harper pronounced the word 'doctor' with utter contempt, betraying his disdain for the mere Ph.D.
Sweets rolled his eyes and stalked off huffily.
"You ok there, Sweets?" Booth asked tentatively. He suddenly felt he knew so little about the psychologist that Sweets' presence unsettled him.
"What, that? Yeah, we'll sort it out." I have no idea how, Lance thought. "Booth?"
Booth was surprised by Sweets' familiarity. Too often he referred to him only as Agent Booth. "What Sweets?"
"Do you think you could maybe visit Zack and…and talk to him about Iraq? About being in the service?"
Booth pondered this. He was not at all comfortable with the suggestion. "I dunno. I don't know what I'd say."
"You don't have to, it's just a thought." Lance shrugged and wandered to Booth's SUV. He waited patiently for Booth to unlock the door like a child. Booth realized that as much as he wanted to see Sweets as a kid, Sweets had probably never really been a kid. He'd had a hard life. A brutal one.
As they were heading away from McKinley, Booth couldn't help but ask, "Why would antidepressants make a person violent?"
Brennan answered instead of the morose Sweets in the back seat. "The potential side effects of antidepressants include increased suicidal feelings, anxiety, heightened depression, mood swings, insomnia, aggression, tremors…" her voice trailed off to indicate there was more where that came from.
Booth's mouth hung open. "Why would anyone ever take them?"
"Not everyone experiences side effects, Booth," Brennan explained. "Or at least not the terrible ones. Medication is necessary for many mental disorders."
Sweets grunted agreement and folded his arms, closing himself off from the world.
Later that night, Booth and Brennan were having drinks at the Founding Fathers. Booth rattled the ice in his scotch, while his partner absent-mindedly sipped pinot noir.
Bones turned to Booth. "You've killed perhaps 50 men as a soldier."
Booth set down his drink and stiffened his shoulders. He glanced at the pretty blond bartender to see if she'd heard. He gazed back at Brennan. Her hair shone like spun silk in the dim glow of the bar.
Brennan continued. "Sweets once said that's the kind of thing that would keep a man up at night. Does it?"
Booth looked at her a little longer and thought sadly of her rejection of him a month before. "Um, yeah. It does sometimes. Killing another human changes a person. But I guess you'd know about that, too." Bones' emerald eyes were masked.
She swirled her wine like a tiny red tornado.
"You thinkin' about Zack?" Booth asked wistfully.
"No. Sweets."
"Sweets? He's never killed anyone." Booth was confused. "Not that I know of anyway," he added under his breath. Why was he angry at Sweets for not telling him about the institution? Was it because Sweets had once made that comment that not all shrinks needed therapy? Somehow Booth felt lied to, yet he wouldn't have confessed if he had been in a mental hospital.
"Why was he in an institution? Do you think it had to do with the scars on his back?" Bones asked pensively. Booth wondered vaguely if she was drunk on half a glass of wine.
"Well I don't think it had nothing to do with the scars. Seems like the kind of thing that would shape a person's life." Booth shuddered as he thought of his own old man, coming after him with a worker's boot. "I think we found out what concerned the FBI about hiring Sweets anyway. Having been in a mental hospital couldn't have recommended him for federal service."
Brennan looked deep in thought. "It's strange. I would think that a person like Dr. Sweets, who had endured the kind of life evident in his scars would be the one in Zack's position. The one who had committed homicide." Her eyes were almost watery.
Booth put a hand on her shoulder in condolence. "I still find it very hard to believe that Zack's a murderer." He thought briefly about his coma dream, in which Zack had been wrongfully imprisoned for a crime he hadn't committed. Booth wasn't convinced that Zack was capable of killing, but isn't that what everyone thinks who finds out someone they know is a murderer?
Booth looked back at the blond bartender, who flashed yellow, cigarette burned teeth at him. One of her incisors was nearly rotted away. Things were never as they appeared. Unsettled he added, "Sweets does seem pretty normal now, I mean, considering everything. Right?"
Brennan nodded distantly. She noticed Booth taking one last peak at the bartender and misinterpreted it as flirting.
"Are you seeing Catherine tonight?" she asked with the tiniest hint of harshness.
"No, we've only been out a few times. I keep telling you that. Are you seeing Andrew?" He emphasized the name bitterly.
"No."
"Well maybe you should, so you can talk some sense into him. I think I'd rather check myself into McKinley than see that Karl Jode joker again." Booth downed the last of his drink in disgust. "What would you say to having dinner with our old friend Gordon Gordon in the next few days?"
"Why?" Bones asked studying her partner's strong face.
"Because maybe he can shed some light on the duckling. He has in the past." Booth stretched his arms above his head, ready to call it a night.
"The duckling?" Brennan asked, fumbling her drink. A bit of wine sloshed out onto her paper napkin, sullying it with drops of blood red.
"Sweets, Bones. Sweets."
