A/N Howdy hey readers! I'm aiming to have this story finished in eight weeks time, so for those of you keeping score that's seven more chapters I have to write... I really hope I manage it! I started the next chapter this morning, but I have no ideas for chapters 13 and 15. If you have any ideas you want to throw my way, feel free, if not then review please! Thanks for reading. Oh and italics are flashblack type things, in case that isn't clear, and I'll just remind anyone who needs it that this is a work of FICTION so don't get on my case telling me this hasn't happened - I know! [A/N This chapter was reuploaded on May 23rd 2010 due to page break errors]

They had never thought of three days as being a long time before. Seventy-two hours isn't all that long when you are kept busy – children to look after, work to do, people to see like on a normal day – but the past three days were anything but normal for Temperance, Angela, and Jack. The weather was strangely cool for the middle of August, the Jeffersonian was closed for a week after a pipe in the basement burst, and Booth had taken Bea, Brandon, Astrid and Daisy to the fire house festival. However, most of those things had past the three of them by almost completely unnoticed...

When they thought back to their last conversation with Doctor Zack Addy, what all three remembered the most was how excited he had sounded at the prospect of his latest research project.

"Six months on Mindanao, can you believe it? It will be like my own private island vacation! And what makes it even better is that I'll get to work with the native Philippine tribes!" His voice was raised by at least an octave as he told them about it, and his eyes were lit up like they had never seen before. It was rare that Zack showed such intense emotions, but when he did it was hard to the feel them, too.

They hadn't seen him for a while, purely because they were all so busy, but when he called to say he would be leaving in August, it felt right that they should get together as a group again and give him a proper farewell, the way only those from the Jeffersonian knew how – with imported beer and Chinese food, as they sat around a table and swapped stories from their own travels. Then Zack went off explaining all about the Negrito and Austronesian peoples in his trademark passionate yet distanced way, "The tribes date back to 1500BC, so there should be a lot of artefacts that are still undiscovered." The group said their farewells and 'bon voyages', and they went back to their hectic lives.

That was the last time Temperance, Angela, and Jack had spoken to Zack, and they couldn't help but wish they had spent a little more time with him, or told him just how much they would miss him while he was gone. Yes, they had drifted apart over the last ten years, but they remained close.

He had been missing for three days now, after a typhoon had hit the small village on Mindanao where he was living and doing an excavation project. There had been no contact from him, no word to say he was safe. But the communications from the island were down after power lines were blown down, so maybe he was just having difficulty getting the message to those who were worried about him.

His parents were understandably terrified of losing their son, but were coping together as a family. When they called Jack, who passed the message on to his wife and his wife's best friend, they coped together as a family, too. They held out hope that their friend would be found alive, and every time the phone rang they would try to be positive that it was good news on the other end of the line. But inside, each of them grew less hopeful as every hour ticked by. Scenarios flashed through their minds, tempting them to entertain horrible possibilities. Temperance and Jack had a good idea of how much longer he could survive without food or fresh water, how long he would last with a serious injury. No matter how hard they tried to push those rational thoughts to one side, the scientist in each of them knew they couldn't rely on hope alone.

They had researched the Philippines on the internet, getting a better idea of what he was up against. It was the easternmost island, so would be one of the worst places hit, and the environment was mountainous, scattered with volcanoes. The area was most likely to be engulfed by tidal surges. They had found out that the house in which he had been living had been swept away by a mudslide, which caused Angela to weep for almost the whole day – she was pregnant with her and Jack's second child, and they were trying to keep her calm, but she wanted to know what was going on. They hated not knowing where he was, or if he was hurt.

Seeley came down from upstairs and put his arm around his wife. He had put the twins and Astrid to bed and then gone to get ready for work. "Maybe you should get some sleep."

"I'm not tired. And even if I was, I wouldn't be able to sleep – I can't stop thinking about Zack. What if something terrible has happened to him?"

"He's a smart guy, Temperance. If he was hurt then he's know what to do about it. He's probably so busy helping everybody else out that he hasn't realised we've been worried."

"I hope you're right."

"You just need to try and keep positive, OK? I have to go to work, call me if you hear anything. I love you."

"I love you, too." She went back to staring at the computer screen as she heard the front door shut and his car pull out of the driveway. She was trying to find an current death toll from the typhoon, but each website she looked on said something different. Giving up and going into the living room, she thought about what Seeley had said. Zack was sometimes off in his own world, and if he was helping injured people then he wouldn't remember to let anyone know that he was OK. And he wouldn't be able to let them know anyway, unless he travelled to a different part of the Philippines.

Angela and Jack were sat together on the sofa, half-asleep as they waited for the phone to ring. They all felt so helpless – they knew there was nothing they could do to help Zack or to find out where he was, but until they knew he was safe then they couldn't go about life like it was a normal day.

Two more days passed, and they still hadn't heard from Zack. His parents were beginning to give up hope, especially once they heard the latest estimate of people who had been killed – around twenty-five thousand people had been reported missing, and about a quarter of those were thought to be dead. Mindanao had been completely devastated by the typhoon, people had lost their homes and livelihoods, and the environment had been ravaged by the tidal surges and high winds. Jack and Angela had gone back home (they were in the middle of renovating the downstairs of their house and couldn't afford to not be there to oversee it), so Temperance was alone at home while the children were at school. She would still run to the phone every time it rang, but she couldn't always convince herself that it was good news, especially when almost a week had passed. The chances of him being found alive were dwindling rapidly, and they were all too aware of it. She decided to take a bath – it had always been a way for her to relax and forget about a hard day, and she really hoped it would work this time.

After five minutes soaking in the bathtub, she heard the phone ringing from the hallway. For a split second she thought about not answering it – it wouldn't be good news and she knew it, so right now she didn't want to deal with. She just wanted to stay in the warm water, where she felt safe and protected from the world. But after that split second she realised that this may actually be the call she was waiting for, and she would not be happy if she missed it. Getting out of the tub and wrapping a towel around herself, she rushed out of the bathroom to pick up the phone.

"Hello?"

"Temperance? It's Jack."

"What is it? What's going on?"

"They've found him..."

"Oh my God." She immediately felt all of the emotions she had been holding in while trying to keep a cool exterior come rushing out. The tears rolled down her cheeks, and she had to lean against the wall to stop herself falling over. "They found his body?"

"No, he's alive! He's OK!"