.

"This might burn a little."

On the table beside the sofa where he sat, Booth's cell phone chirped merrily. With a grimace and a sigh, he aimed the remote control at the TV, paused the movie he'd just turned on and picked it up. Brennan glanced up curiously from her laptop. He looked at the unfamiliar number and shrugged as he pressed the answer button.

"Booth."

"Sir, my name is Lt. Andrea Potter. I'm with the Johns Hopkins University campus police . . ."

.

.

Just over an hour later, Zach looked up sheepishly as his parents rushed into the room where he was being held.

"Zach, what the hell -"

"Mr. and Mrs. Booth?" The woman behind the desk stood up at their entrance. Every bit as tall as Booth, her brown eyes were steady beneath closely-cropped dark hair. "I'm Lt. Potter."

Booth was still glaring at their red-faced 18-year old son as Brennan spoke. "I am Dr. Temperance Brennan and this is Seeley Booth." Brennan waved a hand toward him. "We're Zach's parents."

"What the hell happened?" Booth's angry gaze went from the police officer to Zach.

"Dad -"

"Your son was involved in an incident in one of the research facilities," Lt. Potter answered.

"Zach?" Brennan's expression showed her confusion. "Do you have an explanation? This sort of behavior is very unlike you."

The teenager stood up and stuck his hands in the pockets of his jeans as he hunched self-consciously and mumbled in the direction of his shoes.

"Excuse me?" Booth crossed his arms over his chest and took a step closer. "I didn't catch that," he said deliberately.

The young man looked up then and, now as tall as his father, met his gaze squarely. "They were mistreating the animals."

"Zach -"
"Son -"

"I can assure you that is not true," Lt. Potter interrupted. "Our facilities meet or exceed all required standards for the care of animals used for the purpose of medical research."

Brennan reached out and rubbed Zach's shoulder sympathetically. "I understand your distaste for the process but without animal research, the scientific advances in medicine we take for granted would have been -"

"Who's the girl?" Booth's words cut her off. Three sets of eyes turned his way. His son flushed hotly. "This wasn't your idea, Zach," he continued, his tone sure. "Who's the girl? Where is she?"

Lt. Potter narrowed her eyes thoughtfully as she, too, looked at Zach. "No one else was in the lab when we arrived."

"Zach?" Brennan's voice was quiet.

He looked from his mother to his father and back. "Whitney," he admitted. "She said the animals were being tortured." He chewed at the inside of his lower lip. "She . . . When we heard the police coming in she ran away."

"Of course she did," Booth snorted. "This is what happens when you try and impress girls, son. They leave you holding the bag. You should have known better."

Brennan frowned at him. "You ran naked across a football field for a girl when you were his age, Booth."

"Hey, wait a minute!" Booth yelped. "She stole my clothes! Besides," he leaned in close and whispered loudly, "he doesn't need to know that! Why did you tell him that, Bones?"

"So he would know that he's not the only 18-year old male who's ever done something foolish for a female," Brennan answered primly.

"Yea, well," Booth muttered, "I was still in high school, I wasn't an 18-year old genius already in medical school." He met his son's eyes and pulled a face. "But your mother's right. You aren't the first guy to make a fool of yourself over a pretty face and you won't be the last." He turned to Lt. Potter. "What happens now?"

"We'd like to keep this as quiet as possible," she admitted, "so word of tonight's events doesn't get out to the more active protest groups. There is some minor damage, he'll have to pay for that and," she continued, "of course the monkey will need to be cleaned up."

In one move, Brennan and Booth swiveled to look at Zach. He tried to smile. "We were trying to set him free but he didn't want to come out of the cage so . . ." He looked down at his feet again. "We went through some of the desks and found some crackers . . ." Another quick glance up and his abashed gaze found his father. ". . . and a jar of peanut butter. I got too close to the cage and . . . he grabbed it from me."

There was a pop as Lt. Potter efficiently stapled a copy of the incident report together and held the pages out to Zach.

"And that's why the monkey was covered in peanut butter."

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Thanks for reading!