H-O-T-H

Continues...

{Scene Ten}

A/N - I hope you all don't mind that I added another character, a female Doctor - but only to add some intrigue since I might write another story where B & B help solve the case of her possibly murdered hubby. I also throught it might add a dynamic of jealousy as the female Doc finds herself envious of Bones, and Bones, realizes her own jealousy over Booth being "taken care of" by the sophisticated Dr. But I WON'T do anything drastic so don't fret!! :-)

Back in the trauma emergency room cubicle...

Before the Navy Rescue chopper had landed, the Trauma Center had been notified of their pending arrival and the staff had been briefed on the kidnapping and as many details about the situation, so they would know for the most part what to expect.

Inside the cubicle that Booth was being treated in, the medical team was finished taking his basic vitals, Booth was still either passed out, or due to the state of exhaustion he was in, wasn't allowing himself to wake up – and the Doctor in charge had begun giving her team their instructions as to what she needed from them as she assessed each of the Special Agent's injuries.

"Becky, I need you to begin an infusion of Ringer's lactate solution, 1000 ml, into his IV pronto. Then get to work on cutting his clothes off as carefully as possible, and let's get him cleaned up so we can see what we are dealing with here. He is so battered, bloody & has so much black grime on him that I can't help but be curious as to what kind of h3ll this man went through during his captivity."

The Lead Trauma Specialist was a Dr. Sierra Nicholas, was an attractive female in her thirties, but despite her young age, she had accomplished a lot in her 10 years as a Trauma Specialist. Having graduated with honors, and grades well above everyone else in her class, she had started as an intern in this very Trauma Ctr and eventually - she was running it.

But when she was promoted to Head TS, she was determined to treat her team like family – not unlike the way Cam managed her Jeffersonian team – because she knew that happy employees made happy patients and that by treating her entire team, including her interns, all with respect. It made them all want to strive that much harder to give 120% of themselves to her & to their job, just as she did.

It was the little things that made all the difference such as the fact that she didn't demand total silence in her operating room or in ER, but she also didn't condone negativity or anger. She knew that in cases of trauma, the victims has already been through enough & even if unconscious - since they say the patient can most likely still hear everything - the last thing they needed to hear, was an unhappy and cold medical staff, bossing each other around.

The Dr., who was widowed 4 years ago after losing her husband in a tragic car accident, couldn't help but notice how attractive this man in her care was, and even in the dirty & bloody condition he was in, he still looked hot. But, then she remembered the woman, the woman who was also very attractive that had come in with him, Oh yeah...his wife... dang... she thought, well - as usual the good ones were always taken, or gay.

The Dr. had her long auburn hair tied back and was wearing a purple surgical type hat/scarf covering the top of her head, keeping all of her hair hidden for the most part. This was due to the fact that she always had to be ready for surgery at a moment's notice, patients that were brought to a Trauma unit, more often than not, required some form of immediate, lifesaving surgery.

She continued calling out her "requests" as she preferred to call them. She avoided using words like "orders" - a word she felt was rather demeaning. The similarities between she and Cam, were evident.

"Okay gang," she begins "we are dealing with a male patient, estimated to be around 37 years old, approximately 190 pounds - and based on my preliminary, visual assessment of his injuries I will begin by the obvious 1st & 2nd degree burns he is suffering from on the upper torso. It appears he has somehow sustained several lacerations, some of which will require extraction of metal debris that appears to be embedded deeply in some of the wounds.

"Based on initial examination of the pupils, Patient appears concussed, possible a level 3 or 4 (moderate to severe), no bleeding from the

ears though which is a good sign – and his eyes show some superficial yet repairable damage to his eyes, that was most likely caused by the smoke & minuscule debris from the subsequent fire or whatever caused his burns.

She continued...

"Patient also obtained approx 3-4 broken ribs on lateral sides of the upper rib cage." and we need to run tests to rule out internal bleeding. I don't see clear signs to indicate lung punctures or signs of an extended stomach with hardening of the abdominal wall as would indicate internal hemorhagging.

"Cal, I need you to finish cleaning & disinfecting his burns. They primarily cover his chest region with some extending onto his arms. They aren't too bad, I've seen worse, but they are still enough to cause problems if we don't take care of them right away. Then go ahead & carefully place the gauze strips on each of the burned areas of his skin - the strips are soaking in the saline solution on the cart behind you."

"Lydia, would you please call up to Imaging and let them know we will be sending up a Male patient very shortly – tell them they'll be doing X-rays of the head and chest, as well as MRI's of the chest, low back & pelvic region, using the Gadolinium contrast so we can see as much detail as possible. We also need them to get set up to run a full Brain scan."

"Then I need to you take the blood samples that Cal took from the patient, get them to the lab, tell them we need the results ASAP! We need to know what kind of drugs were given to the Agent because we were told that administering drugs is part of the kidnapper's typical M.O. These drugs could have a severe and negative impact on his treatment and how he responds to the treatment, especially adding a severe head trauma to the mix.

Tell the Lab I need the usual full blood panel screening including; arterial blood gases, seeing as he was burned, he may have some lung damage from ingesting smoke. I need a CBC (Complete Blood Count), Platelets, Liver Enzymes – the works."

"Thanks everyone, now let's step it up and make it happen!" She smiled trying to keep the mood light since what they did for a living, could easily depress even the happiest individual! "I will take care of flushing his eyes with saline and administer the antibiotic eye drops" she finished.

NOW ~ ~ ~ Back To Our Fallen Hero. . .

Booth was finally, though slowly, starting to wake up again. Now that his blood pressure had stabilized for the most part & the IV was doing it's job in getting him hydrated. They had placed warming blankets underneath him and on top of him to keep as much heat in his body since he was still so cold from the icy water that he had spent hours treading in earlier that day. They removed the top blanket only enough to check out his injuries.

All of his burns had been covered in saline soaked gauze – typically they would use cold compresses as well, on some of the worst of the burns – but due to his almost hypothermic body temperature, they had to abort that part of the treatment as it would only cause more problems.

Booth immediately remembered Bones had been with him, where was she? He had to know, he suddenly felt alone and anxious but wasn't sure why. "Hey," he weakly called out to the entire medical team, "My partner- the one who was with me when I got here..." he stopped as he was overcome by pain from unknowingly moving his upper torso, where a lot of the worst cuts & burns were.

". . .Where is she?" He started to seem a bit agitated and the heart monitor that was being read through the plastic clamp affixed on his index finger, started increasing instantly.

Dr. Nicholas quickly turned back to her patient, lightly placed her hands on his each of his broad shoulders to gently push him back down the few inches he had raised himself up. "Agent Booth, I assume you are referring to your Wife?" With that question, Booth wondered just how hard he had hit his head on the ship, or just what kind of drugs were still in his system? Wife he thought? What?

Booth stared at the Doctor with a blank look on his face for a few seconds before he realized that Bones had probably just said that in order to be with him to oversee his care, "Er. . . uh yeah. . . yeah that's what I meant"

"I'm sorry – she continued, it's against policy for one thing, and this space is already limited & we need to be able to move freely to tend to the patients and quite frankly, anyone else in the room just gets in the way and can hamper our ability to work proficiently. The faster we are allowed to get you taken care of Special Agent Booth, the sooner you can see your Wife again - okay?" The pretty Doctor smiled.

I promise you will get to see her again shortly if you just help me you taken care of sent upstairs so we can just run a few standard tests. She had barely finished speaking before Booth's eyes were threatening to close again. He was still was fighting the urge to sleep after not being able to for over 33 hours, and the IV "Cocktail" that included a light dose of pain medication, was slowly dripping into his veins, making him even more groggy.

The Doctor needed him to stay awake for a little while longer. She lightly shook Booth's shoulders to get him to open his eyes, that had closed in the hopes of sneaking in a long over due nap. "Agent Booth? she said, "I need you to stay awake for a little while longer and I need to make sure you are alert while we explain what we are dealing with here."

Booth opened his eyes at half mass, almost glaring at the Dr. but also knowing she was just doing her job. "Good, thank you Mr Booth, now do you know where you are?" he asked.

"Yeah," answered Booth in a tired voice almost raspy with fatigue, "yeah, I am at the Hospital, but I don't know which one since I was...well...uh, resting when we arrived."

"Okay good, good," the Dr. stated, "You are at the Bethesda Medical Center by the way Agent Bo. . . may I call you Seeley?" to which Booth glared at her again - "No, you may not." he responded. Booth then closed his eyes for a moment to rest them, they still burned slightly - and the insanely bright lights above him was not helping!

The Doc caught this action and instructed one of the nurses to turn off the brightest round florescent lights that were positioned directly above the patient's head & body. "Okay then... Agent Booth it is - are you alert enough to understand everything I am saying to you right now?"

A hushed "Yes" was all Booth had the energy to reply, blinking rapidly to try and command his eyes to focus and refrain from closing – a task proving to be challenging to say the least, he thought.

"Okay good." the Dr. answered, "Now so far we have ascertained that you do indeed have a concussion first & foremost, and we noticed in your medical chart that you were brought in here only 3 weeks ago, with another moderate to severe concussion, is that correct?" "Um...yes." Booth replied, wishing the Doctor would speed this up.

"Okay, well that isn't always life threatening per say, as long as we monitor and wake you periodically over the next 12 hours. However, I will say that two brain injuries like that in such a short amount of time, isn't the healthiest thing for the brain to handle, but it just makes it that much more important that you are monitored closely tonight."

"Are you still with me Agent Booth?" he asked, and after Booth nodded slightly the Dr. continued. "Now this 2nd – more severe - concussion, looks to be substantially worse than the one you had 3 wks ago, although I am going only on what I can see from examining your pupils and symptoms, we still need to get some films of your brain to see just how severe and to check for any Subdural Hematomas, or rather, bleeding on the brain or possible clots." "It is quite possible that you could even have a cracked skull though there is no sign of bleeding from your ears which is good news."

"Can you tell me what you remember as far as how you sustained this new head injury?" To which Booth practically whispered, as his energy was dwindling, "uh...yeah...it wa.. . it was from some C4 that exploded just a few yards away from where I was standing... and...I uh, think it knocked me out for a bit." he replied as he still struggled to stay alert, "I also may have either hit the steel wall behind me, and/or the floor."

"Okay thank you Agent, now do you know how long you were unconscious by any chance?" and after Booth shook his head no, the Dr. continued - "Okay that's fine, but that does tell me why this concussion appears to be worse than your last one, I would venture to say that it's due to the violent force of the explosion that most likely propelled you into the steel wall of the ship, that impact, as opposed to falling a few feet down to the ice- which I understand is how you ended up with the first head injury - is definitely going to have more severe consequences."

"But, let's move on," the Dr. continued, "we have to get started on some of the tests and treatments so let me finish giving you the results of my assessment. Along with the head injury, you appear to have several small pieces of metal debris from the explosion, that have embedded themselves into the muscles your chest wall (a well defined chest that did not escape the attn of the female Dr.), some of them are rather deep.

Before we remove these I need to check the films we will take shortly, and see what we are dealing with, hopefully they will all be easy to remove. And normally I would put you completely under anesthesia to do that – but your head injury unfortunately limits our options a bit, so we will just give you several localized injections to numb all of the surrounding tissue, and though you will be awake, no worries though - we will make sure that you do not feel any more pain."

"You have sustained approximately 3 broken and one cracked rib from what I can tell, but Xrays will be more precise, and we see the burn and marks caused by some sort of Taser, right here on the front of chest right below your sternum. Is that how your kidnapper got the upper hand on you? She asked him. She liked this Agent, even though he was married, though she hadn't noticed a wedding ring among his other belongings. They had removed one lone cuff link and a fancy watch, also his St. Christopher medal which she found endearing – but no ring was found. Perhaps it was missing from the explosion along with his other cuff link.

She went on, "You seem to be in excellent condition so I would imagine the only way anyone could get the upper hand on you, would be through the element of surprise, not to mention all of the weaponry they could find." she smiled hoping to keep him alert by making light conversation, but also trying to keep his attn off of his injuries.

While she had been talking to him and lightly cleansing his eyes and putting the healing, soothing drops in them, her team had quickly completed their assigned tasks and were ready to get him moved to a stretcher for his journey upstairs. The Dr. was running through the list of tests he was about to have when Booth reached up and grabbed her by her wrist. "Wait," he said, startling her, "I'm not going anywhere until you let me see my partn...my Wife" he quickly recovered catching his slip up.

"Where is she? Her Name is Temperance Bren...Temperance Brennan-Booth, uh and she saved my life, I know she's worried about me and I am not going anywhere until you get her in here and tell her everything." then he flashed her his best charm smile and added, "please?"

The compassionate Dr. smiled back at him and said "I'm sorry but if you had let me finish Mr. Booth, I was just about to say that you would be brought up for the tests, after we let you see any family or whomever is here to see you, such as your pretty wife. . . deal?"

"Ok, deal" said Booth with a half grin, looking almost like a small dimpled child whom had just been reprimanded by his Principal.

TBC...

Next scene – B & B reunited once again!!