Between Sleep and Awake
Part X: A Numbers Game
A vehement outcry nearly shook my resolve to remain crouched behind the decaying white oak.
"Nooooo!" The Ford's door snapped shut, rebounding from the rusted metal and screeching slowly open once again. "You cunt! Where are you? You bitch!"
I leaned on an elbow and caught a glance at Agent Prideaux, his face obscured by brush as he stalked through the fallen timber and debris caused by the wreck. His black tie was loosened, his shirt sleeves rolled above the elbows, perspiration moistening his thin blond hair. Rage twisted his features into a raw red glower.
He drew his side arm from his shoulder holster and fired it into the air. Blam! The blast drew a handful of wintering birds from the trees. Their black bodies retreated into the autumn gray sky, their caws muted by the low hanging clouds.
"Come on out, Dr. Brennan. Let's just make this quick." His voice was cold, phlegmatic. As icy as the chilled vaporous air.
He stepped over a large shrub, his black loafers sinking into a patch of snow.
"Comment voulez-vous être enterré?" How do you want to be buried? "My guess? Cremation. You seem like the cremation type." He loaded the weapon and cocked it, then continued toward the treeline. "I tend to lean towards the mass-burials, but for you can make an exception."
The vision from my one good eye was foggy at best from hemorrhagic blood vessels. Getting an accurate shot would be next to impossible under the circumstances and would most likely waste the ammunition.
Two bullets.
Should I wait for a close-range shot?
My hand dropped into the threadbare robe and retrieved the cell phone. I squinted at it.
One bar.
Why couldn't my kidnapper have gotten his cell through a company with less patchy service?
I stretched across the length of the log, my bare legs and stomach making contact with the frigid ground. A chill chased my spine as I extended my arm as far as it would stretch.
Two bars.
Would it be enough to make a call? And to whom? The last phone number I had memorized was in 1995. Pre-cell phone era. At least for me. And there hadn't been a need to memorize a single number since.
911.
My thumb, whose nail was caked in filth and dirt, descended on the 9-key.
It beeped in a loud A-Sharp tone.
The agent's .38 cracked through the air. The oak splintered just inches above my head. Fine saw dust rained down.
My free hand brushed scarlet blood mixed with white snowflakes from my cheek.
"Don't move him!" My voice echoed back to me, sounding much more unnerved than it usually does.
"He'll die out here, Brennan!"
I tripped over my feet, trying desperately to keep my hand on Booth's neck, and stumbled to the back of the ambulance that had just pulled up to the edge of the property.
"Ma'am, you can't ride with us." He was a young paramedic with curly hair and facial features indicative of Jewish ancestry.
"I'm riding with you. This is my partner."
An EMT and another paramedic gathered around the stretcher. A short red-headed woman straddled his chest and began chest compressions while the other team member began to intibate.
"Are you injured?" His voice was gruff. I pulled my eyes from my partner to the paramedic.
"Well, no, bu--"
He pushed my hand out of the way and pressed his gloved one on Booth's throat.
"I'm sorry, it's hospital policy."
The doors closed. Lights, red, white, red, white flashed against trees, flooding the branches in unnatural color.
Another hallucination.
Go back, Brennan! Go back!
First sensation. Cheeks so hot that they caused my vision to obnubilate and swirl like oil paints under an artist's brush. Insects with heads and jowls ridiculously disproportionate to their thoraxes and abdomens.
I breathed deeply, dirt entered my nasal passages with the inhalation. I resisted the urge to cough. It wasn't rational. Prideaux knew I was hiding in the woods. Feverish and infected, it was obvious that I hadn't gone far and he obviously knew my position by then. So, why did I try to keep so silent?
Something snapped to my right. A twig under foot. Before my mind had the chance to process what was occurring, he was on top of me. His hand to my throat, the cold circular barrel of his weapon to my temple.
My lungs were full of live coals. The heat scorched the tissues and wrenched the life from my body. Just as the fire had spread my limbs, he released the grip just enough so I could breathe, which I did gratefully.
The fire was slowly extinguished.
"You really fucking piss me off, Brennan. I can't wait to watch you die. I haven't decided how, yet." Eyes as green as his brother's, teeth much whiter. Every muscle tremored with misdirected hatred and fury. He gave my neck a squeeze, then he holstered his weapon, and fished the gun from the robe's belt and tossed it into the trees. His hand remained on my neck the entire time. "It's like an early Christmas. Fucking presents in November."
"How--s that?" I grunted, pressing his hand away from my neck unsuccessfully.
"Not every day you get to kill two agents in one day." His eyes glinted. He unsheathed the weapon and pressed it against my temple again.
"Wha--?"
"They pulled the plug thirty minutes ago. I saw his little boy. Patrick, right? He was crying his little eyes out. His ex was there. And you know what was going through my mind the entire time?"
My feisty remark never passed through my larynx.
"How she's got a nice rack on her. Firm and supple. Then they snapped that toe tag on Booth and rolled him to the morgue. Merry Fucking Christmas, Ed."
Wrong thing to say, Prideaux. The rage built until I could feel my entire body quaking with impassioned wrath.
My right hand began to search for anything. Within a second, my nails clutched a hard wooden object which I promptly bashed into the side of the man's head.
He fell back, dropping the gun. His blazing green eyes fixated on me, then looked more irate than ever. Jumping forward, he pounced on me once again, his hands clamping onto my neck. He slammed my head against the ground to emphasize his point.
Ice on a forehead.
He smelled like Old Spice and mint.
Back to earth.
"Bad move, Brennan. Now you're going to make you suffer." His breath was a stomach-twisting mixture of cheese and cinnamon, a far cry from the delusion just moments before.
A black dot appeared on Prideaux's bottom lip. The dot grew and leeched until it obscured his face.
Angela 'choked up' on an imaginary baseball bat. "It's a choke-up."
Zack leaned in, "To foreshorten the fulcrum."
The ink receded.
With the last bit of energy I had left, I swung at Prideaux's parietal. Once again, he backed off a bit, then came at me again.
I stumbled to my feet and choked up on the chunk of wood in my hands, my fingers gripping the frosted weapon. It collided with Prideaux's head.
He staggered. Lurched toward me.
Thunk!
I ignored the pain of tensed muscles against fractured ribs.
He stumbled, snatched up the forgotten .38 and aimed at me. His finger squeezed.
Bam!
A bullet whizzed by my head.
I fell to my knees, my lungs heaving, never able to draw in enough oxygen. My body threatened to shut down, go into sleep mode.
It's not a time to back down, Bones.
Bones.
I didn't take the time to process my internal use of the nickname. I pushed a hand on a knee and stood once again. One last burst of adrenaline. I ran forward, bashing the small log into the side of Prideaux's head once again.
His weapon fell to the ground.
My veins pulsed, a response to a raised blood pressure, physical stress, and other factors.
He reached up and touched his head. The flesh on his face was split down the bridge of his nose, across his forehead and behind a mangled ear. Sticky red blood bubbled from the wound and down his neck and cheek.
His knees buckled and he fell face-first to the ground.
Blackness. Flashes of light. Duct tape stars.
The screaming sirens of police cars.
Soil moistened from melting snow cooling a swollen cheek.
The last thing I remembered was the thin figure of an African-American woman standing over me.
"Cam?"
An obvious aberration.
"Told you I used to be a cop."
Other figures appeared around her, then the visions merged together into an amorphous meld of shapes and colors.
I laid my cheek against Booth's hand. Hospital white sheets billowed around his still body like gossamer waves rolling against a rocky shore.
"Sweetie?" Angela stood at the door. She smiled weakly and sat beside me, offering a cup of coffee. "I brought you coffee." Her gaze drifted to Booth. "How's he doing?"
"He's doing fine. He'll open his eyes soon." I was lying to myself, though. I didn't believe it was true. Logically speaking, the chances were against him ever opening his eyes again and in favor of him laying in bed for the rest of his life.
However long that would be.
A week. A month. A decade. Until he took his last breath.
"It's induced, right? The coma?"
I nodded.
She reached for my hand. It was the key to the flood gates. A tear slipped down the bridge of my nose and dropped onto the sheets.
Her arm slipped around my shoulder and she drew me near.
"I'm a mess, Ange. I--I never told--I never let him know..." Wait, that's not right. I did let him know. Making love through the night. Sharing innermost thoughts in the early morning.
"I know, sweetie. I believe you'll get that chance."
Calm in the memory. Tortured in mind.
My eye cracked enough to see a nurse walk in, check the IV drip, pull a thermometer from my parched lips and mutter, "Temp's down."
"Oh, thank goodness!" Russ' voice.
The sterile white hospital room blurred into a cloudy white macrocosm.
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I apologize for the wait. I hope you all had a great holiday weekend! (Thanksgiving, USA). I have enjoyed all of your comments & compliments! Thank you all very much!