The team went to Angela's house next, and Hodgins accompanied her inside. They took equally as long, if not longer, to pack in Angela's place than at Hodgins' mansion. When they returned, they were arguing again.
"Look Hodgins, I just think that you should always have a nice variety of things to wear."
"Yeah, but half of your house is for clothes only! Couldn't you just cut back a little?"
"What concern is it of yours anyway what I wear and don't wear?" Hodgins went silent at that remark, and Angela thumped him on the arm. She had a lot of luggage, which made up for Zack's lack of luggage. Once they had it all piled in, they went to Sweets' place.
Sweets was apprehensive to get out of the car, but once he and Zack went into his house, they took no more than three minutes to get everything packed. Sweets was still petrified at the prospect of being the target of a kidnapper, and therefore was being extra paranoid. He practically launched himself in to the backseat of the car, as though the stalker were right behind him.
They made their way back to Brennan's apartment, and gathered up anything that wasn't shredded to pieces, and loaded Booth's stuff into the car. They arrived back to notice that Zack was standing outside the car, sitting in the gutter a fair few metres away.
"Zack, what are you doing out here?" Booth asked, a little concerned that something may have happened while they were collecting their things. Zack was sitting with his chin in his hands, and he looked up as Booth asked this question.
"Hodgins is fighting with Sweets, Sweets is analysing Angela, and Angela is yelling at Hodgins. I was frightened that things would become physical, due to the state of Hodgins' aggression, and I didn't want to be trapped in the vehicle."
Brennan patted Zack's head, and Booth whistled loudly. The shouting coming from inside the car stopped immediately, and the window was rolled down, and Hodgins, Sweets, and Angela popped their heads out.
"Would you squints calm the hell down, your scaring baby bear!" To that, he received a wave of excuses coming from the car. From Zack and Brennan, he received in unison the response 'I don't know what that means.'
He sighed, and piled Zack and their things into the car and beeped the horn until there was silence. "If you squints don't pipe down, I'm getting out my gun." The rest of the trip was in absolute silence. When Booth threatened the use of his gun, things got serious.
It was while no one was talking that the situation really began to sink in. Cam was gone, she had been almost certainly taken by some sort of kidnapper that was going to go after all of them if given the opportunity, and they had been driven into hiding at the Jeffersonian. There was an air of defeat as they came into the parking lot.
They chose to set up all together, contrary to the time they had spent Christmas together and had grouped off in pairs. They put their things together in the employee lounge, and laid out sleeping bags. They pulled all the lounges together in a circle. When they had finished, Hodgins attempted to lift their spirits.
"So, how about some grub?" he said, clapping his hands together cheerfully. Zack looked a little sad.
"We're expected to eat grubs?" Hodgins tossed his head back.
"Alright Zack, there is such a thing as being too literal, and you have found the boundary. But for your benefit, I will repeat the suggestion free of colloquialisms. How about we eat some food?" Hodgins pronounced the last three letters of the sentence as though he was talking to someone slow. Zack brightened. "Alright."
"I trust everybody remembered to bring food?" Brennan said, and everyone nodded. Everyone except for Sweets.
"I was in such a hurry to get out of there that I forgot that food is necessary for… life." Everyone rolled their eyes at this excuse, even Zack, who found it staggering that someone could forget such an integral part of survival.
"Well, I know for a fact that Angela brought everything she had on the basis of food." Hodgins pointed out. Angela nodded.
"I was planning on cooking something, but I'm not sure if we have the right stuff… I mean, I have vegetables, and spices, and all the staple products, but no meat… or an oven for that matter."
"Well, there's the microwave, but it hasn't got enough voltage to cook anything big." Sweets said, attempting to bring himself back into the conversation.
Then Hodgins and Zack both snapped their heads up at the same time. Hodgins spoke to Zack. "Are you thinking what I'm thinking buddy?" He asked, with a huge smile about to split his face.
"If you are thinking the apparatus we used for the hotel explosion experiment, then yes, I am thinking what you are thinking, Hodgins." Zack said, returning his own, refined version of his friend's awkwardly large smile.
"I'm sorry, what?" Angela asked, confused at this exchange. Apparently, she wasn't the only one – Brennan, Booth and Sweets shared the same expressions.
"Remember when there was that explosion in the hotel, when that Columbian woman killed the girl that was sleeping with her husband and son, and then blew up the place to conceal the evidence?" Asked Hodgins at a fevered pace. When he received nods in reply, he continued, "Well, Zack and I designed an experiment to test the rate of the explosion, stemming from an inferno."
"Oh, that doesn't sound good." Said Angela. But really, she was catching on to their idea. "But if I chop up my veggies into a stew…" Zack piped up again.
"Hodgins and I also have some steak left over from our inferno experiment yesterday." Booth's eyebrows shot up at this mention.
"You guys get steak for your stupid experiments? You squints are funded way too much down here."
After Zack and Hodgins had set up the experiment apparatus, Angela and Brennan had chopped all her vegetables and the meat into a stew, while Sweets found bowls, bread, and etcetera.
They put the pot on the work bench and went behind the porthole. "For safety reasons." Zack explained, but no one was settled by his explanation.
Hodgins turned on the machine, with a little trepidation (recalling the last time they had use this machine), and the machine turned on a low flame. When the stew began to bubble, Hodgins turned off the machine, and Angela and Brennan went to begin piling the stew into bowls. Once everyone had food they gathered in the employee lounge, and ate in silence.
"I wonder what's happened to Cam…" Angela said into her stew. Hodgins put his arm around her, but quickly withdrew it, then patted her on the back.
"I'm sure we'll find her. I mean, the crime tech guys have been doing this sort of thing for years, they'll find Cam soon." Angela nodded, but was not reassured.
"Well, they can find her, but that doesn't mean she'll be ok." Sweets pointed out, still deeply hollowed. Booth attempted to pick up the mood.
"Come on guys, sitting around moping will not change anything, all we can do is sit back and hope for the best. Now how about we turn in – it's pretty late and my ribs still hurt." Everyone nodded in agreement, and got into their sleeping bags.
There was a moment of silence before they heard a high pitched girlish scream. Angela flipped the lights back on to discover that Sweets was leaping out of his sleeping bag, screaming blue murder. "What, what happened?" Asked Hodgins, tensing for a fight.
Zack walked over to the sleeping bag, stuck his hand deep inside, and withdrew a tarantula twice the size of his hand. It's legs scrambled helplessly in the air as Zack examined it, hissing and clicking its fangs. Angela caught sight of it, and everyone thought for a moment that she might faint.
"Hodgins, I believe we have found Angelina." Zack said, toying with the arachnid as it tried to bite him. Hodgins came a little closer, and smiled fondly at the creature.
"Hey Angie, I thought we lost you." He grabbed two bowls from the table. "Come here beautiful." Zack gently placed the huge spider into the bowl, and Hodgins covered it with the second bowl. He handed it to Zack, and as he carried it away, Angela found the voice to ask, "Why did you name your spider after me?"
Hodgins shuffled a little. "Well, I suppose I… Sweets, isn't this where you come in with some analytical reason on why I named my giant spider after Angela?" But Sweets was still lost for words.
"I think I'll sleep in my office…" He stuttered, and he stumbled up the stairs to his office.