Chapter 10: Green Green Green Red
"If anyone asks, we're interested in leasing the property. Remember, we don't know what we're walking into."
"I understand." She reassured him before stepping out of the SUV. They walked toward the front door of the building.
"Hello, anyone here?" Booth rapped on the door of the vacated animal hospital, a few seconds went by and he tried the doorknob but it was locked. He was deciding on the best way of gaining entrance, when Brennan held up a key. He gave her a surprised look.
"This wouldn't fool anyone" she whispered, holding a hide-a-key rock in her hand and giving him a sly smile. He took the key and gave her a knowing look as he removed his revolver from it's holster and held it at his side before unlocking and slowly edging the door open. After scanning the lobby and reception area and finding it clear, he motioned for Brennan to follow him in.
"It doesn't look like anyone has been here for a long time." She whispered as they walked around a partition that separated the lobby from the rooms behind it. They carefully entered one room after another, finding nothing but a thick coat of dust in what were once examining rooms or offices. At the end of the hallway was an employee break room, judging from the counter, sink and the built in refrigerator and dishwasher.
"Booth, look." Brennan pointed to the far corner of the room, they walked toward a small alcove where the wall bumped out and found a doorway and a flight of stairs descending into the dark.
"Stay behind me." He took a small flashlight out of his breast pocket and held it under his weapon, the beam of light illuminated the landing and a closed door below them.
While Booth and Brennan were inside, Olivia and Peter were outside, surveying the back of the building. The Police officers had been instructed to cover them and to stay on the perimeter of the parking lot until back up arrived.
They crossed the parking lot quickly and stopped with their backs pressed up against the building. The area was completely deserted, and that in itself gave it an ominous feeling. Olivia bent down to peer into a small window, it was at ground level and covered with bars. She saw shattered glass but no sign of Astrid and Clark.
"Olivia" Peter whispered, he motioned her towards the the small loading dock and waited while she climbed the stairs to the platform before ascending them himself. The man door and the the roll up door next to it were both locked and she silently gave her approval when Peter placed his gun in the waistband of his pants and took his lock pick set out. Olivia covered him and once the door was open, they entered the building cautiously.
The room was dark except for the light behind them and it took a moment for their eyes to adjust to their surroundings. Unlike the empty rooms in the front part of the building, there were several wooden crates pushed up against the wall. They were identical to the ones in the room Astrid and Clark had been kept in.
"What are these?" Olivia asked her voice barely audible.
Peter shook his head and stopped a moment to look at the markings on one of the crates. He frowned, his brow creased and his eyes looked concerned, as he pointed out a Massive Dynamic logo. What was more puzzling on a second look, the image was printed backwards.
They continued to search the storage area, but found nothing of interest, except for a metal door at one end of the room. Working together, Olivia faced the door with her weapon raised, while Peter opened it, and like Booth and Brennan, they found a set of stairs leading into darkness.
"Walter, we need to know the last part of this equation. You need to tell us." Newton walked around the chair where Walter's limp body was restrained. "We would prefer not to hurt anyone, but that is entirely up to you."
"I… I can't remember." He closed his eyes. "I'm very tired." His head nodded from side to side and he struggled to keep it upright.
"Dr. Bishop, you need to open your eyes." Newton stood behind him and with his hands on either side of his head, forced him to hold steady. Walter opened his eyes and saw Astrid being wheeled in on a stainless steel gurney, her arms, wrists and ankles tethered with straps.
A look of sorrow and defeat crossed Walter's face. "Please don't hurt her." He cried out.
"As I said, that is entirely up to you." Newton took a small device off of the surgery tray behind him and showed it to Walter, four tiny lights, green, green, green and red, lit up one after another. He smirked at Walter's confused and alarmed expression. He pointed it at Astrid and when he pressed a button, the device hummed and she was bathed in green light that flashed three times, and when it turned red, she cried out in pain, her body going taut and shaking. Newton looked at Walter. "Shall I continue?"
"Astrid, I'm sorry... I'm so sorry" Walter sobbed when he saw the brave look on her face turn to fear.
The door at the bottom of the stairs opened silently and Booth walked through it, Brennan behind him. The basement was dark except for the beam from his flash light which cast an eerie spotlight on yet another door across the room. They slowly and cautiously approached and opened it, and were surprised to find a brightly lit hallway with industrial looking cement block walls. Booth slipped his flashlight back into his pocket and they crept down the hall and stopped at the first door they came to. They peered through the window in the door and Brennan recognized it was a laboratory, but even though the equipment looked familiar, she thought there was something odd about it.
"It looks like a research lab, I wonder what they do here?" she whispered to him.
"I dunno" he muttered, "but it's giving me the creeps, come on."
They walked to the next door and found it ajar. Inside, large pieces of cardboard were on the floor, packing crates were against one wall, all except for one, it had been pulled under a broken window.
Brennan eyed the crates. "These are used for large pieces of medical equipment." The thought gave her chills and caused her skin to prickle and she and Booth exchanged looks of concern.
"Stay close." He whispered to her and they continued down the hallway to the next door. It was windowless and locked as were the next two doors.
Like the room with the lab equipment the next door had a window, and when they looked in, it caused the adrenaline to course through their bodies. A man with a grotesque shaped head and features hovered over Clark's prone and unconscious body, his mouth was pried open and the man was inserting a metal plate of some kind into his soft palette.
Booth tried opening the door and when he found it locked, he threw his shoulder against it, but it didn't budge. "Stand back!" He commanded and he fired his gun at the lock.
Olivia and Peter had opened the door at the bottom of the stairs and light flooded over them as they walked into the basement. When they heard a gunshot, they ran down the hall with their weapons drawn in front of them, trying different doors and finding them all locked. In the distance they could hear the sound of scuffling and large items being thrown about.
The sound of Booth's voice echoed in the hallway. "Bones! God Damn it!" Another shot was fired, and seconds later they turned a corner and saw a man running out of one of the doorways.
"Peter, I'll go!" Olivia yelled out and she chased after the suspect as he ran down the opposite end of the hallway.
Peter rushed into the room and found Brennan looking dazed and unsteady, her hands pressing down near Booth's collarbone, blood was seeping through her fingers.
"Back up is on its way, Temperance?" He moved toward Clark who lay in a heap next to the gurney.
"They have Astrid, you gotta go!" Clark mumbled. Brennan looked at him "Go!"
Peter spun around and took off in the direction that Olivia had gone and ran even faster when he heard the sound of another gunshot.
Olivia pursued the suspect down the hallway, when he disappeared around a corner, she stopped. She flattened herself against the wall and counted to three before bolting out. She fired first, when she saw the look in the eyes of the disfigured man who held a gun out in front of him. Her aim was accurate, the force of the bullet threw him back and a patch of blood spread on his forehead as he fell to the ground. She kicked his gun away before she continued down the hallway and pushed her way through a set of double doors into the room where Walter and Astrid were being held prisoner. She saw Newton pointing and pressing a device at Astrid, who was writhing in pain.
"Stop, you son of a bitch, give me a reason to shoot you!" Olivia shouted.
Her gaze left Newton and turned toward two armed workers in the lab, one raised his gun at her and Olivia fired at him, and at the identical moment, Peter appeared and shot the other.
Newton looked calm. "Hello Agent Dunham, Mr. Bishop... Well well Olivia, it appears you're not as weak as I might have thought. You've learned a thing or two about strength."
"Take a step backward...Slowly... keep your hands where I can see them." She ordered.
Newton took a step back and raised his hands.
Peter rushed toward Astrid, she was unconscious but still breathing. Then he went to Walter, it was evident he had been drugged.
"Hello son." He said feebly. "I had to tell him things... Astrid... but I didn't tell him everything."
"Newton!" Olivia yelled. "Keep your hands up." She stood with her gun pointed directly at him. He did as he was told, but the device with the three green and one red light, was still in his hand. With his arms up, he pointed it at the ceiling, and pressed the button. A humming noise filled the room and a green light flashed three times before turning red. They all gasped with pain.
Newton pointed the device away from the ceiling and at Olivia, the light flashed over her and all her senses were assaulted as if they were wrapped and squeezed in barbed wire. She fell to the floor and could faintly hear Peter shouting, but through the thick shards of pain she could clearly hear Newton in her head.
"I guess I was right the first time Olivia, you are weak." He laughed, but his mirth was short lived when Peter tackled him and the device flew out of his hand causing the room to go pitch black. Newton struggled and kicked himself loose from Peter grip, he was disoriented from the noise, the pain and the dark.
"Peter" Olivia called out, the sharp pain she felt had changed when it went dark, now she felt as if she were drowning.
"I'm here" he responded, "Where are you?" He searched for her frantically, stumbling over equipment, he could hear her ragged breathing and every second seemed an eternity.
"Olivia, say something, I need to follow your voice." He called out to her.
"Peter, here, I'm here..." She whimpered. "Here..."
He finally found her in the darkness and wrapped his arms around her, holding her close. "Liv, I've got you. You've got to fight it." Peter pleaded.
"I can't breath." She said between gulps of air, clinging to him as if he were a life line.
He sensed she was growing weaker and he was fearful that she would fade in her arms. "Olivia, stay with me, please, stay with me." He could feel her grasp loosen and her body going limp. "Don't leave me" he whispered.
Peter's despair ended with a jolt to his senses, when he heard a crash and the darkness in the room suddenly disappeared and in its place he was blinded by a flash of light. As his pupils adjusted, he felt Olivia's breath against his neck and whatever it was that tormented her, had let go. She took a deep breath and then panted as if trying to slow her heart beat. "Take it easy, you're okay." Peter held her against him, afraid of letting her go.
He looked up and saw Clark, standing next to a toppled piece of equipment, that had the same sequences of three green and one red lights. He had knocked it on the cement floor and was bashing at it with a metal stool.
Broyles appeared, his face hardened with concern. "We have another agent down" he yelled his voice piercing through the commotion of the FBI agents who had followed him in. "The paramedics are here, they're treating Agent Booth." He looked around. "Who else was here, or more importantly, where did they go?"
Peter looked around and saw FBI agents helping Walter and Clark standing over Astrid, but there was no sign of Newton.
"Jesus Bones, you look like you could fix your hair or something..." He murmured, an I.V. had been attached to his arm, the bag hung above him on a hook attached to the gurney he lay on. Brennan stood next to him, she had refused to be treated beyond the ice pack she held on the back of her head.
She smiled at his attempt to make a joke. "Ssshhh, don't talk, just be quiet." She put the ice pack down and held his hand in hers.
"You saved me Booth, you saved me again." She choked out the words as she realized how close they both had been to death.
"It's what partners do." He mumbled. "The Bureau will pay for your dry cleaning."
"I'll remember that." She laughed to herself.
"Bones, what the hell is going on? What is this?" He asked drifting off.
She squeezed his hand "I think Agent Broyles was right. We don't want to know." She walked next to him as the paramedics wheeled him out.
Broyles stood in the middle of the lab, watching and pondering the scene in front of him. Walter was drinking a bottle of orange juice that one of the medics had provided, Clark was sitting next to Astrid who was awake and alert and Olivia leaned back in a chair as the medics checked her pupils and took her blood pressure.
"I think everyone of you is lucky to be alive. Do you know what happened here?" Broyles asked them.
Peter stood with his arms folded in front of him, looking at Broyles. "We all know what went down here. The real question is, what's coming next?"
Broyles shook his head. "He's still out there, this isn't over." He walked towards the FBI agent who had called for him.
"Olivia, are you feeling better? Would you like some of my juice?" Walter asked kindly. He had walked over to her on unsteady feet.
"Sit down Walter." Peter said watching his father teeter and offering him a chair.
"Thank you Walter, but I'm fine." She gave him a reassuring smile as the medic unwrapped her arm from the blood pressure cuff.
"How is she?" She looked at Astrid and Clark and then up at Peter.
"Apparently she doesn't remember much after she and Clark were taken out of the room. Broyles is hoping she'll come up with more information, but..."
"She needs to be hypnotized, let's get the tank ready!" Walter exclaimed interrupting Peter.
Peter smirked and shook his head. "I don't know what's worse, Walter in Wonderland, or Walter in our land."
Epilogue next...