Title: What's Locked Inside

Rating: As a whole this story is M.

Disclaimer: Fox owns them, I'm just showing them a good time. Oh, Naveh's mine. You can borrow her if you like, she's a fun kid.

Summary: "I feel so lost, it's like I've woken up in this totally different life and I don't know how to handle it. I'm scared Booth."

Author's Note: Am I making up for anything here? There's still more coming. :)

Brennan was the first one in the kitchen Thursday morning. The coffee had just finished when Booth came in.

"Morning," He said kissing her on the cheek.

"Morning," Brennan said pouring two mugs of coffee.

"Sleep ok?"

"Yes, thank you." Brennan nodded. Booth sat himself down at his usual place around the breakfast bench and opened the paper. Brennan sat on the opposite side of the bench.

"Morning," Naveh said when she came in a few minutes later. She stopped to check the headline before walking to the cupboard and pulling out her box of cereal. She kissed Brennan on the cheek and poured herself a mug of coffee. She then stood leaning back against the bench while she ate.

"Where are you," Booth started.

"The lab." Naveh cut him off. "You work too hard, it's Thursday." She said swallowing a mouthful of coffee.

"Ok," Booth nodded and turned back to his paper. Naveh checked her watch, rinsed her dishes and set them in the drainer.

"Have a good day at work." She said heading out of the kitchen.

"Bri," Booth said when Naveh got to the kitchen door. She stopped and turned around. Booth looked at her expectantly. Naveh smiled and walked back across to him. They kissed each other on the cheek. "Love you." Booth said.

"Love you too," Naveh smiled. "See you tomorrow."

"Behave and don't stay up too late." Booth said. Naveh sighed and rolled her eyes.

"I won't." She said. "See you this afternoon Mom." She smiled before successfully leaving the kitchen. "Bye," She called and they heard the front door close.

"What are you grinning about?" Booth asked setting his paper down and turning to Brennan.

"Every morning is exactly the same. One of us comes in and makes the coffee, you sit there and read the paper, I sit here and think about what I have to do at work, Naveh comes in, checks the front page, has a bowl of cereal and a cup of coffee, you ask her where she'll be that afternoon and then she leaves for school."

"We like routine, it works for us."

"I see that," Brennan nodded. "Why do you ask her where she'll be? She seems to always come to the lab."

"If I'm not working late and finish at five she comes home. She's almost seventeen but neither of us like her being home alone for too long. She doesn't like it either."

"Man, I hate it when Goodman calls those meetings." Naveh said hanging her coat and scarf on the hooks inside the front door. "I thought it was never going to end. I'm starving."

"No surprise there." Booth said taking his own coat off. Naveh flashed him a grin and headed towards the kitchen.

"Your turn to cook." Naveh called over her shoulder.

"She's right, Seeley." Brennan said pressing a kiss to his lips.

"Pizza it is then." Booth smiled pulling Brennan back in for a more passionate kiss. Brennan rolled her eyes and started to remove her coat.

"Daddy," Naveh screamed. Brennan and Booth dropped their coats and ran into the kitchen. Booth had his gun in his hand by the time they reached the door. Naveh was struggling against the arms of a large man with greasy blond hair. He held a knife to her throat.

"Put the gun down." He said pushing the knife harder against Naveh's throat.

"Steve, don't do this, don't do this, let me go. Please, just let me go." Naveh said trying to pull the strong arms away from her.

"I said put it down," Steve said shaking Naveh violently. She squealed and burst into tears.

"Ok," Booth said. He crouched down and put the gun on the ground.

"Now push it this way." Steve said. Booth did as he was told and slid the gun across the kitchen tiles. Steve crouched down slowly and picked up the weapon. "On the ground, on your stomachs, facing away. Do it, now." He said levelling the gun at Booth's chest.

"Please," Naveh said her cracking with emotion. "Daddy please, save me."

"Shut up." Steve said.

"Mom, don't let him take me." Naveh said. She squealed again and Brennan burst into tears. "Please,"

Brennan felt a pressure on the back of her head and everything went black.

"Tempe?" Booth said.

"That um," Brennan swallowed hard. "That was a scary one." She said wiping away a tear that rolled down her cheek. Booth stood up and walked around to her. He wrapped her up in his arms and held her against his chest.

"Do you want to tell me about it?"

"Who's Steve?" She asked after a minute. Booth drew in a deep breath and sighed.

"He's the brother of one of the people that looked after Naveh."

"Her stalker ex-uncle?" Brennan asked looking up at him. Booth nodded.

"He's the one who knocked you over. We've been tracking him for months, finally we got a break in the case and we found him."

"Did he get away?" Brennan asked stepping back and leaning against the bench. "After he knocked me out?"

"No," Booth shook his head. "No he didn't get away. I," Booth paused and drew another deep breath. "I shot him."

"Dead?" Brennan asked. Booth nodded. "I'm sure you did what you had to do."

"It's not that he's dead, or even that I killed him, it's that he'll never pay for what he did to Bri, he should suffer for what he did and now he won't."

"What did he do?" Brennan asked.

"Why don't you tell me what you remember and I'll fill in the gaps."

"He grabbed Naveh, he had a knife to her throat. Here, in the kitchen. I think he must have knocked me out."

"He kidnapped her. He kept her locked up in his basement for almost two weeks. She was found on the side of the highway naked, beaten unconscious and left to die."

"What did he do to her?"

"I don't know," Booth shook his head. "She won't talk about it. There's a case report but neither of us have read it. Bri will talk about it if and when she's ready."

"We got her back." Brennan said. "He can't hurt her anymore."

"I know," Booth nodded. "We better get a move on otherwise we'll be late for work."

* B & B * B & B * B & B *

"Hi Mom," Naveh said from the bottom of the stairs leading up to the quarantine platform. "Can I come up?"

"Ah, sure." Brennan said walking over and swiping her card. "How was school?" She asked resuming her position bent over the bones she was examining.

"Not bad, thanks. I got ninety-eight percent in my history pop quiz." Naveh said pulling herself up to sit on the edge of an empty examination table.

"That's good Sweetie." Brennan nodded.

"I was pretty impressed. I did that presentation in geography, I'll find out tomorrow how I did."

"How do you think you went?"

"Ok I guess. I don't really know. I remembered everything."

"Were you nervous?" Brennan asked looking over her shoulder. Naveh raised an eyebrow.

"No." She smiled.

"Sweetie." Angela smiled walking onto the platform. "Hi,"

"Hey Ange." Naveh said accepting an enthusiastic hug from Angela.

"Are you ever nervous?" Brennan asked. She'd turned back to the skeleton.

"Sometimes, I suppose." Naveh shrugged.

"I've never seen it happen." Angela said leaning against the table beside Naveh. "Except that time we got stuck in the elevator."

"That was different." Naveh said. "That was fear, not nervousness."

"True," Angela nodded.

"Everyone talks about your experiences as if they mean nothing. As if they've read them out of a book."

"It's not like that, it's not disinterest or insensitivity, it's simply a fact of my life."

"I just thought there would be some hint of hesitation, some form of empathy."

"Empathy and sympathy go hand in hand." Naveh said. "Everyone around here knows that sympathy is pity in my book and they know I don't like pity."

"It's not pity." Brennan said shaking her head and turning around.

"There are people in this world far worse off than me." Naveh said. Angela mouthed the words as Naveh spoke. Naveh glared at her and punched her playfully in the arm. "You and Dad, Angela, Hodgins and Zach, even Doctor Goodman, know, to an extent, what's happened to me in my life. They talk about the events of my childhood the same way I do. Simply as what they are, events in the past."

"Surely you see them as more than that." Brennan asked crossing her arms.

"They aren't any more than that."

"That's not true." Brennan shook her head. "These events, as you call them, in the past or not have obviously deeply traumatised you."

"I'm not traumatised." Naveh said raising an eyebrow.

"Yes you are, of course you are, you must be. You've said to me that you have a fear of enclosed spaces,"

"A lot of people are scared of enclosed spaces." Naveh shrugged. "It's called claustrophobia."

"You said your fear is a result of your being locked in a small dark space. In your case that's a fear borne of a distressing experience. Therefore you've been traumatised. Admitting that doesn't make you weak."

"You wanna talk about admitting weakness?" Naveh said slipping from the examination table. "Temperance, you couldn't admit your weaknesses on threat of death. Asthenophobia is your vice, not mine. Not that you'd ever admit it because a vice, by definition, is a weakness. A senseless chicken and egg situation."

"I don't know what that means."

"It's a catch twenty-two." Naveh said walking to the top of the stairs. "Let me down please." She said turning around.

"You can't just walk out in the middle of a discussion." Brennan said.

"This stopped being a discussion a good few minutes ago. It stopped being a discussion when accusations were raised. Now please let me down, or I'll walk."

"Fine," Brennan said swiping her card. Naveh started down the stairs immediately. "But I hardly feel this is a mature way to handle the situation." Brennan said crossing her arms again.

"I'm more than willing to continue talking with you," Naveh said stopping at the bottom of the stairs and turning around. "When you realise that the reason no one, including myself, makes a big deal about my past is because I don't want them too. We speak about the things that happened as though they were everyday occurrences because, for me, they were."

"That's not how it seems to me, and I am no more than an outsider at this point in time. You talk about them as if they mean nothing, as if they were simply events on your favourite television show, as if they happened to someone else and hold no merit in making you into the person you've become."

"That's my way of dealing. Everyday occurrences or not, I don't like to be reminded that they do, in fact, have a heavy bearing on my life and the way I live it. I'd like to at least try and live as though none of it happened." Naveh said and walked away. Brennan watched her disappear out the automatic doors.

"Sweetie, are you ok?" Angela asked placing a hand gently on Brennan's shoulder.

"Shouldn't you be chasing after her?" Brennan said turning around.

"She needs to be alone." Angela said.

"Shouldn't you be consoling her over the heartless monster that her mother is."

"Oh Bren, you're not a heartless monster. You're an odd pair, you and Jellybean. You're both so strong willed and set in your beliefs, in your outlooks, but you just seem to click."

"I may not be the foremost expert on the subject but I'm fairly certain what just happened here wasn't us 'clicking'."

"Sweetie, have you ever had an argument you didn't realise you were having before?"

"We weren't arguing."

"Oh yes you were," Angela nodded. "You may not have raised your voices or almost come to blows, but you were arguing. That's what the two of you are like all the time. You just, click. She speaks your language."

"Ange, I'm no good at the whole motherhood thing." Brennan sighed. "What do I do? Do I go after her?"

"No," Angela shook her head. "Like I said, she needs to be alone. She'll come back and all you have to do keep a cool head and be honest with her, she won't judge you if you're honest. You'll be fine, you're a natural at this, motherhood becomes you."

Brennan walked into her office an hour later and found Naveh sitting on the couch doing her homework. Brennan paused on the threshold and took a deep breath. Be honest, she thought recalling Angela's advice. "I don't understand you." Brennan said. There was no accusation in her voice. It was a simple statement of how she felt.

"I know," Naveh said not looking up. "I don't think you're supposed to."

"That's hard for me." Brennan said leaning against the doorframe. "In the past whenever I've come across something I didn't understand I worked to figure it out. That's why my most meaningful relationships are with dead people. Even if I don't understand them in the beginning I always work it out."

"I'm not a puzzle for you to decipher, you need to realise that." Naveh said still concentrating on the books in front of her. When Brennan was silent for a few minutes Naveh looked up. "You need to know that you may never figure me out. I don't understand you either."

"How do you deal with that?" Brennan asked walking across and sitting next to Naveh.

"I just remind myself that acceptance doesn't always require understanding. Essentially you and I know each other, we know enough to either accept or move on. Whether you remember it or not you chose to accept me, without fear or favour."

"But that doesn't stop me from wanting to understand you."

"I only said I don't understand you not that I didn't want to. I do, of course I do. It's just that I can acknowledge the fact that it might never happen. I learn new things about you all the time, you learn new things about me too. This is a long haul commitment. You're stuck with me Temperance. The best thing for you to do is use the time we have together to get closer and closer to grasping that understanding you're so desperate for."

"Angela's right, you do speak my language."

"It's taken practice." Naveh smiled.

"I was once told that I need to offer up a little of myself in order to get something in return."

"That's good advice." Naveh nodded.

"I feel as though I have all this deeply secret information about you and that I'm not holding up my end of the bargain."

"It's not like that. I unrestrainedly deal out my own personal life knowing that one day I'll get something back. That advice isn't just for you, I've offered up my share and I know I'll get it back eventually. Despite how it seems, I'm not quite so open about my past with everyone. You and Dad and the people here are the exceptions, not the rule. My friends at school have no idea, for the most part, where I've come from. You, Dad and Angela know more than anyone else. There's things I've told you that Ange and Dad don't know, Ange knows things I don't share with you and Dad knows stuff that you and Ange don't."

"Do I play the game?" Brennan asked.

"I can't believe you just said that." Naveh smiled. "You're learning my language as well."

"Do I?"

"Yes," Naveh nodded. "You play the game, hesitantly in the beginning but you're getting better."

"What do you know? What've I told you that no one else knows?"

"Probably a lot of things actually. Some things you may not even know yourself."

"Like what?" Brennan asked. Naveh sighed and looked away.

"This is hard." Naveh said. "These are things that I swore never to share and it's difficult to overcome that. Even if I'm only sharing things about you with you."

"Just tell me one thing, one story." Brennan said. Naveh chewed on her bottom lip while she thought.

"Do you remember sleeping with Seeley? The first time." Naveh asked looking back to Brennan.

"What?" Brennan asked thrown back by the question.

"You must remember, it was before I found you. It must have been about July of last year. You both had too much to drink at Wong Foo's and ended up,"

"I remember." Brennan nodded cutting Naveh off. "That's not what I meant though, I thought you were going to tell me something I didn't remember. Something that's happened since then."

"I will." Naveh nodded and stood up. "My story starts there." She walked over and closed the door before returning and sitting beside Brennan. "Do you know how you and Dad finally ended up together?"

"He told me." Brennan nodded. "He said he found me on the roof. I was upset and he comforted me. He said he confessed his love." Brennan smiled.

"But you don't actually remember it?"

"No," She shook her head. "I don't remember it. Do you know more? Something that I never told him?"

"Yes," Naveh nodded. "I know everything, right now, I'm the only person who does. I know why you were up there in the first place."

"Was I going to jump?"

"It's something you thought about. People don't stand on high ledges in October for the weather."

"Why?" Brennan asked. "And what does that have to do with my sleeping with Seeley months before?"

"You were pregnant."

"Pregnant? That's not possible. If I'd been pregnant in July I'd be ready to have a baby now, if I hadn't already."

"You miscarried." Naveh said squeezing her eyes shut. "My arrival in September coincided with you finding out about that pregnancy which probably had a lot to do with the way you viewed me. When you miscarried in October, at about fourteen weeks gestation, three weeks after I showed up, you spiralled well and truly downwards. You and I still weren't getting on and we didn't for about another month. The loss of that child compounded the guilt you already felt. You thought you'd failed me as a mother and now you'd failed another child."

"So I thought about killing myself?"

"You were in a bad place. You felt as though your life had no purpose, you felt you weren't worth anything."

"And that all just went away? Suddenly I wasn't in despair anymore."

"It wasn't that simple but the things that Dad whispered to you meant something. They reached you and it helped. You were still in a dark place for a long time and even now you think about it. I have no doubts that if Dad hadn't found you that night, regardless of whether you jumped or not, we would've lost you. You would've slipped further and further into yourself and we would've lost you. You felt like you had nothing, Dad showed you that just wasn't true. His love saved you and it will always be there to save you. You realised that and that's what snapped you out of it."

"Does he know?"

"No," Naveh shook her head. "You've never told anyone but me about the events leading up to that night on the roof. Angela knows the two of you slept together once before you were together, that's all."

"Does Angela know what happened on the roof?"

"You, Dad and I are the only people who even know you were on the roof. Now you and I are the only ones who know why. Angela knows you were upset and that Seeley consoled you. You'll tell her one day, when you understand it better."

"What did I get in return? More stories about your childhood?" Brennan asked.

"No," Naveh shook her head.

"What then?"

"I told you," Naveh cleared her throat and looked away. "I told you about what happened in February."

"I don't know what that means."

"In February I was kidnapped by my stalker ex-uncle." Naveh said meeting Brennan's eyes again, they were a clouded grey colour, almost white.

"Steve?" Brennan said.

"You remember?"

"This morning after you left for school, I remembered something, a part of that. I remember you being taken from the kitchen."

"Please don't ask, I'm, I'm not ready to talk about it again."

"Ok," Brennan nodded.

"Maybe I am traumatised." Naveh sighed. "Maybe I cope by pretending that I'm not. Maybe if I tell myself enough that I'm not, that I wasn't, then it'll become true. I don't think it's a fear of admitting it but an unwillingness to accept it."

"I'm still learning the rules of this game we play." Brennan said.

"You have a steep learning curve." Naveh smiled. "I was offering you an apology."

"I know," Brennan nodded. "So was I."