Crikey! Rejoice! Do the victory dance! The Conspiracy Bug Girl lives!!!
Yes, I am alive and kicking. Thank you to all the folks who reviewed and PMed me with messages telling me to get my ass into gear and write a new chapter. Okay, not those words but ... :D.
I actually had to go back and read the last couple chapters again cause I completely forgot what had happened. AND I'M WRITING THE DAMN THING. Lucky I did though, cause I totally forgot I introduced Katie /cringe/That could have ended badly if I'd forgotten
This chapter is more light-hearted and serves to recap and explain what is happening.
I can't begin to explain why this is so damn late but (hopefully) it shall all be more easily excepted after the author's note at the end /suspenseful music/.
Taken captive by your stalker?? You have got to be kidding me!
Katie, calm down.
No, don't you dare 'Katie' me. I will not calm down-
Excuse me, Miss Booth?
- no idea how much I worry about Seeley. This only proves how dangerous his work-
We're doing everything in our power to find him.
- if he makes to out of this I'm going to find him a normal job-
Zach Addy and Jack Hodgins were staring down from the platform at the proceedings going on before them.
Zach had a strange urge to hide underneath an autopsy table and did not envy Jared Booth. If looks could kill ... Jared would be happily rotting away by now. If Katie Booth, who looked and acted exactly the same as her brother, was glaring at him in that way now he would have been running for the hills long ago.
Hodgins, on the other hand, was enjoying the spectacle. And the lovely view of Katie Booth. Several times Hodgins had to remind himself that not only he was going out with Angela, but the attractive woman before him with Booth's sister. A fact that could most defiantly get him shot.
"Maybe a baker. Or a florist! I could see Seeley being a florist. Think about it for a moment. No chance to get kidnapped, no death threats from people he arrested and, best of all, he wouldn't be armed. Is anyone else seeing the attractiveness of this?" Silence met the slightly hysterical woman's rant. "What about a ... primary school teacher? Seeley can count to ten and say the alphabet. That's all the requirements needed!"
"Katie, breath. Please, relax," pleaded her brother. Brennan was watching the two siblings fight with open-mouthed interest. Katie stopped her rant for a moment, glaring at Jared, who had his hands raised in the universally-accepted gesture for 'hold your horses,' before snapping her fingers.
"A newsagency! He could buy a newsagency!"
"What is going on here? Who is making that horrible shrieking noise?" Zach and Hodgins both jumped, appearing slightly less manly then they would have liked, when Angela's voice suddenly appeared behind them.
"That, babe, would be Katie Booth. Scary, isn't she?" Angela looked down at the sister of her best friend's kidnapped work partner. The artist couldn't help but agree with her boyfriend. Katie seemed to be a truly formidable woman, especially in her current livid state of mind. Angela supposed that they would get along quite nicely. "Anyone want to bet what her job is?" Hodgins continued, seemingly forgetting the present situation. "I'm going to go out on a limb and say door bitch."
"Door bitch?" Zach asked bewilderedly. (A/N. I am currently laughing my head off. There are several connotations to the word 'bewilderedly' that crack me up.) Angela smiled belittlingly down at the forensic anthropologist and resisted the urge to pinch his cheek.
"It's a woman bouncer," she explained.
"Bouncer?"
"The person who lets people into clubs."
"Oh, right," Zach frowned for a moment as he digested this information.
"Sweetie," Angela asked, "have you ever been to a club?"
"Yes," Zach replied quickly, "remember that time the skeleton was found at one? I was there then."
"Dude. You are deprived. When you grow up we'll have to take you to one," Hodgins said with an eye roll. Angela was back to examining Katie, who was currently poking her brother hard on the chest.
"I disagree, Hodgy. I think she's a lawyer," Angela said.
"Hmm," Hodgins murmured, frowning slightly. "You could be right. But I'm still going to go with door bitch."
"Suit yourself," Angela said calmly. "But don't come whinging to me when you're wrong."
"You! You're the one who got him in this mess," continued Katie's tirade. "Can you please tell me where Seeley is, Dr Brennan?"
"No, I can't," came the quiet replied. "I've tried everything I can think of to find him but ..."
The forensic anthropologist's voice trailed off. Silence engulfed the large room, silence so pliable it was suffocating.
Zach, Angela and Hodgins watched in bewildered (A/N: There's my word again!) silence as Katie suddenly reached out and hugged Brennan, tears appearing in her eyes.
"I disagree with both of you," said Zach quietly. "I'm going to bet that that woman has a hard job, something that constantly forces her to wear a mask to cover up her true self. I'm betting she hides herself behind a strong outer shell, appearing formidable and frightening to those she works with."
Angela and Hodgins turned to look at their young charge, wearing identical puzzled looks. Where had the genius' sudden perceptiveness come from?
"I'm betting," Zach finished, "that Katie Booth is a high school teacher."
-
Brennan patted the back of the woman who was hugging her. Both of them were close to tears. Sniffling, Katie pulled away finally and took her brother's hand.
"Sorry about that, Dr Brennan," she said, looking perplexed at her sudden display of emotion. "I don't know what came over me..."
"Don't apologise," Brennan said with a smile. "I understand. I did the same thing to your brother a little while back. I think Booth's 'guy hug' antics are rubbing off on me."
The three of them laughed then remembered the dire circumstances of both meetings/hugs.
"So I guess you want to know what's going on," Jared asked his sister, then flinched as she hit him in the chest.
"Of course, you dolt," she said. Then she grinned sheepishly. "And I promise not to go all hysterical on you again."
-
The small bathroom Seeley Booth was locked in would live up to any expectations one would have after viewing the rest of the hotel room. Like the rest of the dingy place, the bathroom was probably a bio-hazard or environmentally disaster. Mould covered almost every surface and the toilet had a decidedly concerning odour.
Booth had avoided touching as many surfaces as possible, deciding to forfeit the risk of dying of hepatitis. His head was pounding non-stop and he knew the egg where he was struck was largely to blame for this, despite being a rather impressive bump.
Upon waking, Booth had stumbled to his feet and tried everything he could to break out of the blasted bathroom. Gary had evidently locked him in after the failed escape attempt.
Things weren't looking so good.
-
"So you're saying that some creepy stalker wanted to kidnap and torture you until you admitted you loved him," Katie cocked her head in bafflement. "But Seeley got shot trying to protect you."
"Yes."
"Then the sadistic bastard told you he'd kill Seeley to make you suffer for rejecting him."
"Pretty much."
"So this Gary poisoned him..." Katie frowned, barely restrained anger in her voice.
"That's right."
"...then changed his plan again and decided to kidnap my brother to, you think, force you to admit your love."
"Yep. That's it."
"That's it? That's it? You say that like it isn't enough!" said the Booth sibling. Six figures were seated around the conference room table, two of them participating actively in the conversation, one commenting at intervals and the other three itching to ask Katie what she did for a living.
"So what's being done to find him?" she asked, eyes flittering to all the squints, who began to shift uncomfortably. "What?"
"We've ... we're trying and doing everything we can but..." Angela said to break the awkward moment. There was a stunned silence while Katie processed this information.
"You mean to say that you have no leads as to where Seeley is?" The affirmative nods and actions she received almost caused a coronary. "This is ridiculous! You're the best damn forensic scientists in America! Seeley said so himself. And you can't even-" She was cut off by Camille entering the room.
"Good news and bad news folks," she said, before noticing Katie. "Katie. When did you get here?"
"About an hour ago, Cam," she replied before hugging the coroner.
"You two know each other?" Hodgins asked.
"Yes," Cam said distractedly while placing a DVD into a player. "I finally got the security footage for the car park. The FBI decided they wanted to hog it." Pushing fast forward, the gathered company watch as tiny people and cars zoomed in and out at alarming speed. After about three minutes they approached the time when Booth was taken and, sure enough, a car drove past clearly showing Gary Hill as the driver. "The bad news is that no one has seen that car. Hell, it isn't even registered. By rights, it shouldn't exist."
Everyone stared at the TV fed for several minutes. Angela played it over, and everyone searched for something that might help find their missing FBI agent. Katie suddenly jumped up. "Miss Montenegro, can you zoom on this area here?" she asked, pointing to a point near the left bumper bar. Everyone noticed what she was looking at in an instant. There was a large scrape on the metal. Gesturing wildly, she pointed to were red could be seen underneath the blue of the car's paint. "This car use to be red," she said. "It's been repainted. You can tell it's recent too because it's so shiny."
"Maybe so," said Cam, "but the car which was registered to that number plate wasn't red or that model. Inspiration struck Brennan at that point.
"Ange," she said, jumping out of her chair to stand next to Katie, "can you zoom on the numberplate?" The order was complied to and everyone stared at the blown up numbers and letters. After a moment, Katie started to smile, realising what the doctor had seen.
"Touched up numberplate," she said, earning a nod of confirmation from Brennan.
"Huh?"
Zach stepped up to the plate now, understanding. Pointing to a P, he started to explain. "Can you see how the edges of this letter are jagged and unsmooth?" he asked.
Hodgins groaned in realisation. "He changed the letters on the number plate."
"So all we need to do is find out what the original letters are and we can find out who the car belongs to," Angela finished.
Ooooo sneaky little dude, isn't he? So, what do ya think? Does Hodgins, Angela or Zach have the correct job? Dun dun dun. Andhow ARE they going to find Booth?
Anyway, I said I'd explain why I didn't update. It's because I'd lost interest in writing a story that gets bagged. Most people are completely awesome. Almost all the reviews I get are helpful and friendly. But now and then you get a lovely anonymous review or PM saying something like 'This sucks' or 'you don't know anything about how hospitals work or the FBI.' And I had a lovely review from a person named 'grrr' who told me I don't know what I'm talking about and that I should go back to writing kids stories. Thanks, big guy, you really know how to help a girl's confidence. I my writing style and vocabulary need improving, and that I don't know much about what I'm writing about and that my people aren't always in character. I know that! Thanks for telling me. This is fanfiction! The whole point of it is to write what you want, how you want. I figured that, if you're using this site, you know and respect that. I'm in grade 10, okay? I don't have a wild vocabulary and I don't know how to write up to everyone's standards. That's one of my main reasons for joining this site, so I can improve. Also, I live in Australia where we haven't even got half way through season 2, so I don't know how the characters are acting in the rest ofthe season. If this is AU, then sorry. Lastly, if my knowledge about hospitals or FBI procedure is of then I am truly sorry but I can't really help that. I'm not a nurse or doctor and I don't work at the FBI. My knowledge is from things I've looked up on google and other TV shows.
Also, one more piece of advice. If you want to bag my work, fine. But at least sign your name. LOG IN AND ADMIT TO WHO YOU ARE! Don't get pissed when your anonymous review gets deleted and your PM gets replied with a big FUCK YOU. And it's really dirty to leave anonymous reviews. Have some guts, please.
Finally, don't read it if you don't like it!
Thanks to HugeBonesFan who gave me the inspiration to stay up last night and write this. I thought you might have, like, a heart attack. Lol. And a note to Elsa: you're like my mind twin!!! I thought I was the only teenager who was addicted to Bones. At school, my friends are like WTF oO when I start going on about last night's episode. And Booth is totally my fav too! SO funny. /Cough/ Anyway, when you get an account you have to tell me so I can take a peak at your stories! I was going to reply to your review but I couldn't find a email :(. Thanks!
CBG