Chapter Seven: Could It Be, You're Suffering, When You See Me

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Disclaimer: As always, references made to Bones or its characters do not belong to me and I am not profiting off of this story in any way, except for the joy of writing and sharing my story. I do not own references or lyrics to the Hungry Lucy songs Journey and Could It Be? Some spoilers/ references to Season Two and Season Three. I also do not own Ziploc or Xerox.

Author's Note: Zach is no longer Dr. Brennan's medical assistant/ graduate student but has earned his doctorate degree and has been hired by Cam to stay on as Dr. Brennan's assistant, though he is now a doctor too. The others do not usually refer to him as Dr. Addy because to them, he is just Zach, and that is more familiar to everyone.

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#

"Could it be, you're suffering

When you see me

Again and again?

Could it be, you're suffering

When you see me

Again and again?

#

"I took a drive last night

Went by your place,

You weren't home

You can't hide from me

You'll get yours

Eventually.

#

"Could it be, you're suffering

When you see me?

I know your fears

You'll cry your tears

So helplessly."

#

The free fall into blank space, nothing solid around you. The not knowing of what you were falling into. Only the leap you know, your feet grounded before, Hodgins thought, spacing, as he walked with Angela, her arm locked to his.

The night security at the Jeffersonian offered dull looks to the four as they entered. Brennan had convinced Hodgins and Angela to come back with them; despite both of them having driven separate cars to Genja's. Hodgins was in absolutely no condition to drive, and Angela, though she insisted she could, was too tense, her shoulder blades pushed together like dueling samurai swords, and every few seconds, she trembled down to her fingertips.

Brennan went up to one of the conference rooms down the hall from Cam's office and flicked on all the the lights. The room lit up with pale yellow florescence. For a moment, she hovered in the doorway, steadying her breath. She was relieved to find the room not only empty but free of any nasty pranks or disturbing notes. How could this have happened? Who could be behind it?

Up until this night, Brennan thought very little of the pranks, besides that they were mean. True, both Angela and Zach had been hurt enough to need doctors' attention, but still . . . she hadn't wanted to believe the prankster or pranksters would be malevolent enough to seriously injure anyone. She frowned at her own assumptions.

But tonight . . . what if Hodgins hadn't been able to jump out of the way? What if he had ended up pinned between the row of cars and the one trying to run him down? An unwanted image flashed of Hodgins' body cut in two . . . . Brennan shook her head hard to make it go. There was no sense in this; Hodgins was safe. Terrified, but unharmed.

"Hey, Bones, what are you doing up here?" Booth asked, letting his fingers rest on her shoulder. She backed from the door and faced him. The night was already showing on her face, and Booth's mirrored hers.

"Just thinking. I didn't realize I was taking so long."

Booth smiled grimly. "Don't worry, I think those two won't mind taking things slowly."

"Right," Brennan said distractedly. "I thought we could sit in here, have some privacy. Some of the interns and assistants work late, and sometimes they are in and out of the lab. I didn't really want to share this—"

Booth nodded. "Good thinking, Bones."

Brennan started towards her lab where they had left the files they'd been looking into before Angela's call. "Booth?"

"Yup?"

"Do you think we should call Cam? What about Zach?"

Booth thought about this. He hated to break up separate their nights, though he suspected that both would want to know right away that there had been a new development in the prankster incidents case (it had just, as of this night, become a case, in Booth's eyes), and that it involved Hodgins. "Yeah," he finally said. "This isn't really the thing that waits till morning."

Brennan sighed, as if she could read Booth's thoughts. "No, it's not."

"Okay, I'll call Cam while you get those files."

"And I'll call Zach and get the copies of those notes from my office too." She had been keeping copies in a folder; after this she suspected Booth would have them all fill out statements about what had been going on; ironically, Hodgins had been the first one.

"What?" Cam asked over the phone, adjusting her earring. It was a little loud in the restaurant she was in with her date so she wasn't certain if she'd heard correctly. "Seeley, say that again."

"We need you down here if you can get down here," Booth repeated, rolling his eyes at his own double repetition. "Hodgins was almost run down by a car. Afterwards, he found a note— it's the latest prank, Cam." His tone was grim.

"What?" Cam repeated, but this time she was alarmed. She stood up and leaned across the table towards her date, an incredibly attractive man with short dark hair and twinkling eyes and whispered in his ear she'd need a rain check on their evening due to an emergency at work. She kissed his cheek and hurried out into a light drizzle. "Was he hurt?" she asked, once outside.

"No. Not a scratch. He's just on edge. In fact, we all are."

"Okay, I'll be there soon." She started her car.

"Do you think this means they are done with us?" Angela asked Hodgins quietly in the otherwise empty room while they waited for Booth and Brennan to get all the information together.

He couldn't seem to collect his thoughts enough to answer her.

"I mean, they went through everyone—" Angela stopped, closing her eyes tightly. She seemed to be fighting tears. She brought her knuckles to her lips.

Hodgins took her loose fist and kissed it. "Ang." She squeezed his other hand again, looking in his eyes. "What if it means," he began just as quietly as she had, "that they'll just start over?"

Her brown eyes were huge with question, then dawning fear. "You mean with Dr. Sayoran? And then—?"

"Keep scaring us until we all die." Just as the words were out of his mouth, Brennan and Booth entered the conference room. They stared at him, startled.

Brennan said with reproach, "That's speculation. You don't know that will happen." She sat down in one of the chairs across from Angela and Hodgins and spread out the files, and the Xeroxed copies of the notes, expect for the latest, which had been put into a Ziploc bag for now. Hodgins stared at it with hatred.

"It does feel like it could," Angela defended Hodgins quietly. She had knot in the center of her chest that she wasn't sure how she was going to get rid of. Jack. What if— She hated "what ifs", but if he had been hit? Then what? "It feels like it's become something more than just a sick joke."

"It's a game whose rules we don't know," Hodgins said. "We don't know the short cuts, we don't know how to play, so we're probably going to lose." He dropped his head into his hands.

"Bones is right," Booth said. He remained standing, as if he expected Cam or Zach to walk in any second, though it would take them each at least twenty minutes to get here. Cam, for her part, was very concerned, and Booth suspected she would lead foot it all the way. Zach had been told vaguely that there had been another incident tonight, this time involving Hodgins. "We can't—"

Hodgins' eyes blazed. "We don't know a thing about this person or persons. Not one thing other than they get off on tormenting us with sick pranks and disturbing notes. 'Scared you to death?' Come on, what does that tell you? How do they manage to get by unseen? These people are ghosts."

"They can't be ghosts," Brennan said, being literal. "Because ghosts don't scientifically exist." She glanced up from a file to see that Booth was hovering by the door.

"Sweetie, what he's saying is figurative," Angela clarified. "The pranksters seem to be 'ghosts' because we haven't seen them but they keep getting to us." She shuddered, then patted Hodgins' hand, because he had begun to rise in his chair as Brennan spoke.

"Booth, why don't you sit down? Cam and Zach know where this room is."

"Are they coming here now? Both of them?" Hodgins asked. "Why?"

Booth frowned and repeated, "Because this is not something that waits till morning." He glared at the scientist, whose glare back was diluted with after effects of the attack on his life barely a half an hour ago. "You're right, Hodgins."

"He is? About what?" Brennan interrupted.

"We don't know anything . . . but the stakes just rose. Zach and Angela went to the hospital, true, Cam and Bones ended up with an egged car and a gag gift, but for all we know these jackals may have been trying to kill you."

Hodgins snorted. "Or scare me to my death. Literally. Huh." His brow furrowed.

"What is it?" Brennan looked up from scanning a file.

"What if— what if what they did to me, trying to 'literally scare me to death' was what they hoped would happen with Zach?" They all thought about it. "What Zach's doctor told me while I was at the hospital with him was that Zach was lucky to have lost consciousness. His heart rate was so accelerated by the scare that the incident may have led to a heart attack."

"That's right," Dr. Brennan recalled, "Cam mentioned that."

"That's sick stuff," Booth said with distaste. He sighed, a little ticked off at himself that he hadn't taken Zach's prank more seriously. What if death had been the intention for Zach? Perhaps if he'd looked more at it more objectively, he may have been able to protect Hodgins. But then, he thought, how could he, or any of them, predicted what dangerous trick the prankster would choose? He shook his head. They didn't know anything yet, and the game was already played through its first round.

Booth heard footsteps in the hallway. He went out to look, then came back. "Zach's here," he told them. "I'm going down to the lobby to wait for Cam. I can brief her before she gets up, so it will save some time. You go ahead with Zach. Hey, Zach," Booth told the young doctor as he brushed passed him.

"Hey," Zach mumbled to Booth before entering the conference room. His eyes fell on Jack. "You look completely intact," he stated to the entomologist.

In spite of himself, Hodgins smiled. "I am."

"Dr. Brennan said that you were pranked tonight? A hit and run?"

Hodgins snorted again, getting to his feet. He paced a few steps and then said, "I was almost killed tonight." He glared at Brennan until she looked up, unabashed. "Oh, I just told him we needed him to get down here."

"Dr. Brennan said there would be explanations once I was here." He raised his eyebrows. "Were you hurt?"

Jack sighed, not knowing why he was frustrated with Brennan, because she was just being herself and not trying to purposely upset him. "No. A car tried to smush me in Genja's parking lot, but I jumped out of the way. In time," he added unnecessarily. He pointed to the half crumpled note on the table. "I got that as a souvenir."

"Way to run from a psycho killer, Dr. Hodgins," Zach said, surprising everyone. He peered over one of the black leather office chairs to read the note, mouthing the words.

"Psycho-killer wannabe. We don't know if these idiots have killed anyone yet." His hands shook and he sank back into his chair next to Angela. He managed to stay still for a few moments before jumping up again, just as Angela reached for his hand. While he paced, she drew her hand back and laced her fingers together.

"But he or she can be capable," Zach said. "And definitely willing."

"Definitely," Jack agreed, running a hand through his curls. He blew out a loud breath. "It's just, how did they know?"

"Sorry?" Brennan asked, noticing for the first time that Hodgins was pacing, as if unable to sit still.

"How did they know that I was running late to meet Angela? The car was waiting for me, I know it was."

Brennan held his gaze, which was wild. She opened her mouth to protest that they couldn't know that for a fact, that the car was actually waiting for him. Instead, she blurted out, "Do you think you were followed?"

Everyone turned to her. "What are you saying?" Angela asked, her face suddenly pinched.

"Well, I—" Brennan looked down, then back up. "I'm not certain what I'm inferring." She thought about while everyone continued their stares, each unable to voice their obvious concerns. "What I'm saying is—" She focused on Angela, before turning to Hodgins and Zach, "It's highly possible these prankers are— they know us."

Her words hung in the air until Booth entered with Cam and broke the unease by correcting Dr. Brennan. "The word is pranksters, Bones," he said lightly, before adding that she was likely correct. These pranks were too personal. They were acted out in mostly intimate settings where people were unguarded, at work, or just walking in or leaving work. The only exception to this rule so far had been Hodgins— except with this detail, Hodgins had been on his way to meet Angela in a familiar area. Plus, two days had passed and they had let their guard down. Why had the pranksters waited? Booth wondered. What had they gained by waiting?

"They enjoy violating our personal space— our safe space," Zach observed from Booth's conclusions.

Cam caught Jack's eye and gave a nod, asking the silent question, "Are you all right?" Hodgins nodded back, certainly pale but physically unscathed.

"You really think it's someone we all know?" Angela asked, perturbed. She cast a glance around, not as if she suspected that the prankster was among her but to remind herself how many they were as a team. Who, she wondered, do we all know, who could possibly hold such a grudge and act it out in such a nasty, dangerous, and childish way?

"It makes sense," Cam said, sitting down across from Zach, who had taken the seat on Angela's other side. "There are patterns— a prank occurs, and then a note appears. All of them have those same ransom style letters."

"Right," Booth agreed. "There's a plan at work here, not random acts of some sick Halloween joke."

"But they've gone through all of us," Angela said, glancing at everyone again. She squeezed Hodgins hand; he was standing behind her chair, his hand resting on her shoulder. "Jack said earlier that maybe they will start over but—"

"But the pranks will be meaner. Deadlier." Hodgins speculated, and shivered.

Zach nodded. "What if they really do scare us to death?" The word "death", as it left his lips, was so hushed that if the room hadn't been absolutely silent, it would have passed into the ether, unheard.

Brennan sighed. "It would be better if we could figure out who, and what it is he or she wants. Or they." She glanced at Booth. "There is too much in these files. I feel like we are wasting time looking for a needle in smokestack."

"Haystack," Booth, Cam, and Angela corrected at the same time. They were able to spare each other thin smiles.

Brennan rolled her eyes. "You know what I mean." She sighed, and looked to Angela, Hodgins, and Zach. "Do you guys have any theories?"

"Us?" Zach asked just as Hodgins opened his mouth to interject something irrelevant about a conspiracy theory.

"Yes," Dr. Brennan said. "Are there any intense cases that we are worked on together—um." She stopped, feeling silly for phrasing it that way.

Booth swooped in, getting their attention. "I get where she's going," he told them. "Any cases were you felt your personal safety threatened?"

"Or any where you got that 'oh-so-creeped-out' feeling you couldn't shake?" Cam cut in.

"Gormogon," Angela said. "But that's ongoing. Are you just talking closed cases here? Or cold cases?"

"Howard Epps," Hodgins added. He looked to Booth, then Brennan. "Remember how he tormented all of us, to mess with you?" He frowned, remembering the serial killer's games.

"Ugh, how could you forget?" Tempe said, making a face. "That man was seriously disturbed."

"He did mail me that human heart," Angela reminded them with a shudder.

"But he tried to kill us— every clue lead us to to a more dangerous situation, like when I cut into Carolyn Epps' head," Cam recalled. Booth winced with the memory, knowing that he had nearly been responsible for her death because of his fears about Epps going after Parker.

"Or when I tried to get the vile out of Carolyn's body," Zach said thinly.

"But Epps is dead," Booth said. "I should know."

"I don't know," Brennan began, "this just doesn't add up to a copycat. Does it?" She scanned their faces. "This culprit, I agree he or she is definitely following a pattern, but it's not Howard Epps'."

They were all silent for a few minutes, thinking everything over.

"What about the Gravedigger?" Zach asked softly. "Revenge, for outsmarting him when—?" He looked down, not wanting to say the rest aloud. It was only conjecture, but he felt he needed to offer something.

"No," Cam said. "The Gravedigger doesn't deal in pranks or scares. Of this kind," she added. She blew out a long breath. "The pranks went from petty to deadly so quickly," she stated.

"Right, petty with the eggs," Hodgins said, "then nasty with the motor oil."

"Then gross and chilling with Tempe's roses," Angela weighed in.

"They seemed to be only toying with me," Brennan said. She had a difficult understanding why, if someone was so angry with her, that her "prank" hadn't been worse, frightening or life threatening.

"And then, mean, with the spider," Cam continued.

"And now, deadly. Or attempted fatal. Still not sure about it," Hodgins finished, anger and anxiety in his tone.

Brennan sighed, frustrated."See, there's just too much." She stared hard at Booth, her eyes asking what she couldn't bear to say allowed in front of all her friends. What if we can't figure this out before the next prank?

Booth stared back, his brown eyes warm but flecked with concern. He gave a little head shake, trying to be reassuring. "Okay, let's just think this through. Make some lists, take some notes, compare— and see if we have anything. Maybe it's not a high profile case we worked on. It maybe something minor—" His voice trailed off while his mind tried to work through all the possibilities.

"It is better than just sitting here being afraid," Cam acceded. They all nodded in their own ways.

The team spent a few hours bouncing ideas and theories off of each other while eating semi-cold pizza they'd ordered, since each had been cut from his or her own dinner plans. When everyone seemed restless, as if they were starting to hate being cooped up with frustrating theories and possible criminals who had it out for them, they collectively decided to call it a night. Both Angela and Zach had wondered aloud how the pranksters had known the things they did— echoing Hodgins' earlier talk about the car waiting for him. How had they known Angela would be entering from the front of the building on that particular day, rather than from the parking garage? How had they known about Zach's dormant arachnophobia . . . as well as how did they know Zach was expecting a delivery from Chemerica? It was puzzling . . . but mostly, disturbing.

* * *

The letter was placed in a desk drawer in the Jeffersonian, under paperwork, files, but edged out just enough to be visible due to the color of the paper it was written on. It was counted on that this letter would be found and dissected, but not now. Later, after the fears had petered out and all that was left was rabid anger, disbelief. Shame, that the right decision was not made in the first place. The pranks, the scares, the terror, all of it could have been spared of those closest to her. The desk drawer closed, and its author moved away, assured.

#

Be ready to fly

Above everything

Don't have to know why

Don't have to carry on

#

Dearest Dr. Brennan,

This is a little note from me, for later, when this is all over, when I've been caught. I just want you to know how angry I was . . . well, I suspect you already know this, from all that has been done. All I wanted, Dr. Brennan, was to be at your side, working diligently, solving cases and putting faces to the victims, those skeletons in pieces, as broken in death as in life. I just wanted to please you; but first, I needed to cool my anger. I tried, believe me, but it burned and before I knew it my insides were charcoal and ash. Death. Red hot, I reached out, smoke wafting from my hands. But you still wouldn't see me. I had to make you pay; I had to watch you suffer, and laugh at all your tears and pain. Then, I knew when it was over and you had seen what I had done, all for you, you would respect me. You will admit aloud that you made a mistake when you picked others over me. I enjoyed myself, you should know that. I smiled during your periods of pain. I loved watching each of you burn in your own ways. I loved lurking about, essentially invisible, as you all ran about like children, in terror of some unknown specter with deadly intentions slanting in the shadows in some haunted house.

#

No matter how hard I tried

A thin veil remained between

myself and The Infinite

#

—D.

* * *

Around three o'clock the next day, Booth appeared at the Jeffersonian to collect Bones. "Bones, let's go," he said.

"Go? Where?" Brennan asked, distracted. She had Angela's sketch in front of her of the teenage runaway, along with the girl's recovered bones. The sketch was run through the FBI missing persons database and was a partial match to four different girls, all reported as teenage runaways, some missing since the mid 1970s. The only bone fragments they had of the girl were half of a skull without teeth and the radius and ulna bones of a forearm, carpals and metacarpus, down to the fingers, with the actual fingertips cut off.

Booth drummed his hands on her counter top. "Today's the day we go question Stan Carlson." When she offered a blank face, he reminded her, "You know, giant spider collector guy? Giant spider that was mailed to Zach?"

"Lycosidae," Tempe said, nodding. She tucked an errant strand of hair behind her ear. "Do you have a search warrant too?"

Booth smiled toothily. "I love how you think ahead!" he praised her. He pulled the folded warrant from his pocket. "Judge Caroline was just as happy to grant it when I related the Like-os-day spider story to her. Except I told her its real name, wolf spider."

"Lycosidae is its real name, Booth," Brennan told him, walking down the hall to her office to get her coat. Booth trailed behind her.

"Maybe to you scientist types," he teased her, "but if you say 'wolf' and 'spider' in the same sentence, it really makes people's eyes pop. Like what you just said came straight out of a horror movie or something."

"Did it?" Brennan asked, slipping on her coat.

"Huh?"

"I mean, is that a common plot of horror films you've seen? Giant wolf spiders that cocoon human victims and drink their blood?"

Booth scrunched up his nose at her back, not sure of how to respond. Finally, he offered, "I thought you've never seen any scary movies?"

"I'm just theorizing that that is a probable plot, especially for the 1950s Cold War science fiction era," Brennan said, turning around. "Ready?"

Booth was staring at her curiously. "Have you been talking extensively with Zach about this subject?" His mouth split into a smile when she hesitated.

"Well, I was discussing some of this with him earlier," Brennan admitted.

Booth laughed out loud, leading the way back to the lobby.

"But it was helping him!" Brennan protested, following Booth. "Angela would call it 'talk therapy'."

Booth continued to laugh, but threw a playful glance over his shoulder. "Relax, Bones, I'm not making fun of you. Talk therapy is good. I'm just surprised is all."

"About what?"

Booth heard a slight pout in her tone and smiled wider. He pushed open the glass lobby doors, holding it for Brennan. "Nothing, Bones. It's just, the other day, when I mentioned classics like Psycho, you were completely clueless. And now we're conversing about Cold War era Sci-Fi as you are the big expert."

"What's— what's wrong with that?" Brennan had caught up to him, walking at his side. It was yellow bright for an October afternoon, with a soft blue sky. The air was crisp. Brennan adjusted her autumn jacket and got into Booth's FBI-issued SUV.

Booth pulled open the driver's side door and got in. "Nothing," he said again, with another big grin. "It's cute."

Brennan scrunched her nose, not sure what to say.

* * *

Ten minutes into the drive, Brennan's phone rang. "Brennan," she answered. She listened, and made an annoyed sound. "Can—can you please speak up?" she asked directly. She listened again, pressing the phone hard against her ear.

"Who is it?" Booth asked, keeping his eyes on the road.

"Can this wait?" Brennan asked a little harshly. "I'm on my way to question a suspect with Agent Booth." She listened, and then huffed. "Okay. Okay, all right. I'll come back." She hung up and slid the phone back into her purse.

"You have to go back?" Booth asked, sounding disappointed.

Brennan sighed, incurably annoyed. "Yes. I'm sorry, Booth. That was one of my student-interns, one who works in the pit with all the cold cases and unidentified skeletal remains." She didn't elaborate on that detail, but Booth suspected that that was the reason it had been hard to hear the intern. "He says he's certain one of the skeletons he was working on identifying has the same M.O. as the runaway Angela had been sketching from only half a skull." She sighed with a frown. "He says it's very important and if I can be spared to come back, then I should." She fidgeted. "I'm sorry. I wanted to go with you."

"It's okay," Booth told her. He made a U-Turn and headed back towards the Jeffersonian. "It's just routine anyway." He winked in her direction. "Maybe he'll be our guy and confess everything when a big scary Fed knocks on his door."

Brennan released a small smile in spite of herself. "He'll likely run first. They always run."

Booth returned her smile. "True— but then I bet he'll confess. And then when I get back, I can give you the good news— that's it's all over." Though life didn't usually work out like this, Booth hoped this scenario was true. He enjoyed looking at his partner's face when she was happily engaged with intellectual discussions, rather than all twisted with the anguish of not knowing what was going to happen to her friends— all because, she thought, of her.

He dropped her in front of the Jeffersonian's steps. "Good luck," she told him, waving as he pulled back into traffic. He smiled, and waved back.

Later, she would think of this moment, over and over, wishing she'd taken a longer look, wishing that she hadn't let him go alone, that this smiling face of his was not the last memory she had of him.