A/N: Thank you, thank you, thank you to all my amazing reviewers, especially those who sent me long messages. Your feedback is amazing and I love you all for it.
Booth had never felt uncomfortable in his own home. It was his man cave and he was extremely proud that he had saved enough money to fit it out with everything a man could want or need. Sure it would be nice if there was room for a pool table in the corner and a slightly bigger kitchen but all in all he was very happy with his living space.
That was all true until now. Now the walls felt like they were closing in around him and the usually composed FBI agent was pacing around like a caged animal. He had never felt so helpless in his entire life. Here he was stuck in his apartment while somewhere halfway across the globe his partner was being rescued by some other FBI schmuck. He had already called Cam numerous times but the pathologist wasn't answering her phone and that only made him more anxious. Booth just wanted to know if Brennan was okay; that she was out safe and on her way back to DC. If he couldn't be a part of the rescue he thought he was at least worth the courtesy of knowing what was going on.
Swearing he whipped his phone from his pocket, cursing himself for not thinking of it earlier. His fingers racing over the keypad he resumed his pacing as the phone rang in his ear.
"This is Hacker," his boss said sounding harried.
"Sir it's Booth," Booth said resisting the urge to yell at his boss, "I'm just wondering if you have any news about the progress in Maluku?"
"I'm sorry Booth I haven't heard anything," Hacker said sighing tiredly, "I got word that they had landed and again when they reached the location but haven't heard anything since."
"You're the fucking Deputy Director!" Booth exploded, "They report to you! How can you not have heard anything?"
"That's right. I am the boss," Hacker replied just as angrily, "And it would do you some good to remember that. Look Booth," he said lowering his voice, "I know how important Temperance is to you and I know it must be killing you that you're stuck here while someone else is over there playing the hero but I promise you I'm doing the best that I can and as soon as I hear anything I'll let you know."
Booth's whole body deflated as he sunk onto the couch. He scrubbed his hands furiously over his eyes as he took in his boss' words.
"I'm sorry sir," he said eventually, "I know you're doing your best, it's just, its Bones."
"I know Booth, believe it or not she means a lot to both of us," Hacker said, "Look I really have to go but I promise as soon as I hear anything you'll be the first to know."
"Thank you," Booth said resisting the urge to throw his phone across the room as soon as he hung up.
After a moment of sitting in silence he had to get out. He couldn't sit still and just wait. Booth grabbed his cell phone and his keys and headed out the door. If he couldn't be there to rescue her he could at least do something that would help her when she got home.
Daisy listened worriedly as her boss conversed with someone only she could see. After the trauma Dr. Brennan's body had undergone over the last couple of days and the lack of food and water she knew it was only normal for the other woman to experience hallucinations but it still made her stomach sick with dread.
Daisy could recount perfectly the scientific explanations for what was going on inside Dr. Brennan's body but somehow when faced with the reality those weren't quite as comforting as they should have been. She wasn't even sure why they were still alive. She had been positive when the men had come in and found them out of their restraints that they were going to kill them on the spot. Watching them take Jackson and Dr. Andrews had been scary enough, both men had struggled against their kidnappers but Daisy had caught the look in their eyes; they were resigning themselves to death.
She had to stay strong, if only for Dr. Brennan who had suffered much more than she herself had. The darkness was starting to get to her, suffocating and squeezing and if Daisy had been on her own she probably would've started crying a long time ago. She couldn't though. She wouldn't give in to the tears that she knew started to fall probably would never stop. Dr. Saroyan would have someone coming for them.
"I knew you would come back," Dr. Brennan said, her voice echoing off the walls and penetrating the dark room, "I knew you wouldn't just abandon us. Russ told me you weren't coming back but I never stopped believing you would."
When Dr. Brennan had first started rambling into the darkness Daisy had tried to keep the other woman in the present but had long since given up. Instead she had to listen to her boss spill her darkest secrets to people who weren't really there. Daisy had learnt much more about Temperance Brennan in the last hour or so than she had in all the time she had been working for her. She probably knew things that would upset Brennan greatly if she knew anyone had found about.
Strangely it made her feel closer to the woman she had shared this experience with. She had a vague knowledge of Dr. Brennan's past but hearing her cry into the darkness she felt like she had an insight that not many, if anyone shared into what really went on. Not all of Brennan's ramblings had been happy and Daisy had had to bit her tongue when the other woman whimpered as some unseen man from her past threatened her.
"I'm glad you're here Mom," Brennan whispered into the darkness and Daisy bit back the sob that threatened to escape.
She hoped their rescue team was coming soon because she didn't know how much longer her boss could hang on.
Subconsciously Brennan knew something wasn't right. A little part of her brain was telling her that her mother was not alive and yet there she stood in front of her, looking very much alive. Logically she knew this couldn't be real but the abandoned fifteen year old girl inside of her who longed to see her mother again seemed to have dug her claws into the delusion and wasn't letting go. If she was going to die then spending her last few hours with the one person she had longed her entire life to see again certainly seemed the way to go.
"Have I told you how proud your father and I are of you?" Christine Brennan asked smiling kindly at her daughter.
"Yes, when I last saw Dad he told me as such," Brennan replied, "Although I believe at the time he was referring to my purchasing a new television, but I believe the sentiment applies."
"No sweetheart it's not the same," her mother said gently, "We're proud of what you've become. You're beautiful, smart, caring. You have a wonderful job and are surrounded by people who obviously care for you very much. You are everything a mother could hope for her child to become."
"Thank you," Brennan whispered feeling choked up, "I miss you."
"I miss you too sweetheart but you have people in this world you love you so I'm not worried that you'll ever be alone," Christine said.
"But I am alone," Brennan said quietly, "And for so long that was my choice and I was happy about it but now..."
"Now you're wondering if you're missing out on something," her mother nodded knowingly.
"Yes," Brennan nodded, "That is correct."
"Tempe darling you're not going to end up alone," Christine said smiling.
"You can't possibly know that," Brennan interjected.
"I can, call it mother's intuition," Christine said.
"There is no such thing. The myth that mother's have any sort of intuition is in fact an evolutionary process that occurs when a woman's body releases catecholamine as a result of stress for their offspring."
"Call it whatever you want I know that everything is going to work out for the best," her mother said.
"I would refute that but it's becoming apparent to me that the affects of going without food or water are beginning to take their toll on my body," Brennan said, "I'm feeling quite faint."
"If you're feeling unwell then just close your eyes for a little bit," Christine said, the concern on her face making Brennan feel like she was a little girl again, "I'll be here when you wake up."
"Dr. Brennan?" Daisy Wick's concerned voice floated through her subconscious, "You should try to stay awake. I know it's easier to give into unconsciousness but it would be better if you tried not to pass out."
"It's alright Daisy," Brennan said already feeling the world begin to float away, "My mother is going to take care of me."
"Dr. Brennan your mother isn't really here," Daisy said, "You're hallucinating. Its dark remember. If your mother really was in the room you wouldn't be able to see her."
"No-she's here," Brennan said her mind fuzzy with confusion, "She left me but then she came back. Daisy, I-I think I would know if I could see my own mother."
"She's here as a result of a lack of..." Daisy's voice disappeared behind the roaring in her ears and Brennan felt her eye lids droop as her head swam.
Everything came as a series of flashes. Brennan could never tell if she was awake or not. She could hear gunfire and men shouting and Daisy yelling for someone. She could feel pain and other times a blissful nothingness.
"We're in here," she could vaguely hear Daisy call and she forced her eyes open.
"Everything's going to be okay Bones," his familiar brown eyes seemed to warm her from the inside, "I've got you."
She felt someone lifting her into their arms as her limbs burned after being released from their restraints. Her head pounded and ribs screamed in protest with every step the person took but she couldn't find it within herself to yell out for him to stop.
"Is there anyone else inside?" was the last thing she heard before giving into the pain.
The sounds of the jungle may have been soothing at one point in time but for Camille Saroyan every cricket's chirp sounded like nails on a chalkboard. For the agitated pathologist time seemed to be standing still. Her eyes never strayed from the break in the trees where the FBI team had disappeared but her mind wandered as she tried to stop herself from exploding in frustration. Sitting still had never been her strong point.
She had long ago given up on hearing footsteps as every snap of a twig had sent her jumping off the hood of the vehicle she sat upon causing the local policemen to look at her strangely. She blinked as she caught movement in the distance and her whole body tensed in case they weren't the FBI returning. Catching sight of the familiar Kevlar vests she jumped off the vehicle straining to see. Cam wasn't a religious woman but in that moment she prayed that she would see the familiar alabaster skin of Temperance Brennan. She 'd be woe if she had to be the one to explain to Booth that the forensic anthropologist hadn't made it out of Indonesia alive.
"Oh thank God," she exclaimed, feet moving of their own accord as Daisy Wick appeared through the thick trees, flanked on either side by armed FBI agents. Daisy appeared scratched and dirty but no worse for wear. Cam's eyes moved frantically, searching for any sign of Dr. Brennan and nearly cried out in delight when she spotted the next figures moving through the trees.
The last few FBI agents emerged from the undergrowth, a prone form held securely in the arms of the team leader. Even from the distance Cam recognised her colleague and was already moving to the back of the Jeep to grab the medical equipment she had been provided.
"How is she?" she asked as the team approached.
"Unresponsive since we left the scene," the agent replied.
"She's had nothing to eat or drink since we were captured and has multiple lacerations and suspected broken ribs," Daisy supplied standing protectively near the man who held her boss.
"Dr. Saroyan do you think you can treat her if we are on the move?" the team leader asked, "We are under strict orders to retrieve and move out as quick as possible."
"Daisy if you get in the back of this Jeep with me you'll have to assist," Cam said nodding to the agent, "The sooner we're back on a plane to DC the better."
Daisy jumped in the back of the vehicle and helped the agents manoeuvre an unresponsive Dr. Brennan into the middle seat. The agents around them were moving quickly to eradicate their presence from the area. Some were speaking hurriedly to the policemen surrounding their vehicles while others were packing equipment back into the empty SUVs.
"We wrapped her ribs the best we could which a T-Shirt," Daisy told Cam as the pathologist jumped into the car.
"In that case we'll keep that in place until we reach the air strip," Cam replied reaching across the anthropologist to put her seatbelt in place, "I'm going to pass you this gauze and if you wouldn't mind holding it to the laceration on the side of her head."
The SUV roared to life as they were joined by the team leader and another agent.
"Are we alright to move out?" he called back to her.
"Let's get going," Cam called back, already rooting around in her medical supplies to find what she needed, "I'd have liked to get an IV going to start treating her dehydration," she yelled over the roar of the engine to Daisy, "See if you can wake her up while I give her a shot of antibiotics to treat any infection her wounds may have caused."
While Daisy tried to rouse her boss Cam held the woman's arm still in the jostling SUV, delivering the shot the best she could under the circumstances. When Brennan groaned and her eyes fluttered Cam and Daisy worked quickly to get water down the groggy woman's throat. She was only mildly awake for under a minute but Cam was satisfied that they had got some fluids into her and shifted her body as Dr. Brennan's unconscious form flopped against hers. The younger woman's skin felt hot and clammy against her own and Cam laid the back of her hand against her forehead, frowning at the fevered skin she touched.
"She's running a fever," she said to Daisy who was starting to look a little shell shocked, "Probably as a result of the lack of fluids."
"I can't believe we got out," Daisy whispered her face paling.
"Don't pass out on me now Miss Wick," Cam called worriedly shoving a granola bar into the other woman's hands, "I need you here."
With Dr. Brennan's head heavy on her shoulder and the Indonesian jungle racing past outside the window Cam allowed herself a brief sigh of relief. She couldn't really believe it either.
They had got them out.
A/N: I plan on revisiting the rescue a bit later in the story in a bit more detail but I hope that was enough to suffice at the moment.