Chapter 28: How Many Type A's Does It Take
So originally, I thought this was the finale. Ha. As always, this wrote itself and did NOT go in the direction I planned at all. Oh well, guess you all will have to put up with more chapters...
Brennan had decided not to mention Taylor to Booth, so was most surprised when they arrived together at the Jeffersonian the morning before her birthday. She had respectfully declined telling everyone how old she was, preferring to jest (or at least attempting), and incidentally confusing everyone. She knew – as it was her lab and she monitored most comings and goings regardless of what Cam thought – that there was a surprise party decorating Bone Storage downstairs complete with presents and streamers, preparing for tomorrow's event. There really was no alternative explanation for the ribbon Angela had strolled breezily by holding, nor the small mountain of gifts that was sure to be accumulating what with the intern's frantic excuses to keep returning to Limbo.
Regardless of what day it was, or would be in less than 24 hours, Brennan had preferred that everyone in the lab continue working normally, as it was to the rest of the world, a normal day. Yet, contrary to Booth's usual detours for a quick office romp (which scandalized her so much that it still felt deliciously naughty the eighth time they had accomplished the feat), or at least a morning coffee and kiss, he had not shown up in her lab. Their antics had not been unnoticed, but thus far everyone was so blissfully happy for them, not even Cam had threatened to douse them with cold water. So it was quite a surprise for Booth to show up late, of all days, with his apparent relative in tow. Brennan schooled her face to show nothing, greeting them both coolly and attempting a show of formality, making introductions to the young woman dressed in jeans and a flattering top.
"I know you two have met Bones, you can cut it out. This is my…" he only paused a beat too long before continuing, "sister Taylor. No, I was unaware I had a sister."
"Half sister," Taylor hastily amended. The poor thing looked like she felt awkward, but was much too personable and polite. Her face brightened.
"Who died?"
"I'm not sure," answered Brennan, following her gaze to the Forensic Platform. "He's been dead for hundreds of years." However, Taylor's smart remark had the desired effect and the tension went out in a rush.
"Have you…" Taylor looked meaningfully at Brennan, a look that wasn't lost on Booth. Brennan, while unskilled at eye conveyances, immediately was seized with a stroke of genius. Here was someone, an objective third party, with whom she could run through her proposal.
"Hello," said someone new, joining their little gathering. Fisher towered awkwardly next to Brennan, creating the effect that the young woman, only approximately 170 centimeters (or, as Booth liked to complain, 5 foot 7 in "American"), was dwarfed by their statures. Their arrival and little gathering had not been lost to the squints on the platform who were murmuring over the body to each other in low voices.
Taylor turned her body openly to face the rather intimidating, if pitiful, newcomer. Booth inwardly approved of her direct approach. Very strong. Very him.
Fisher began in a monotone.
"I saw you come in and when our souls recognized a kindred spirit, I saw then the listless despair that I, too, can relate. I am enchanted and bewitched by your façade of normalcy and beg to know your-" During his long winded introduction that had Booth wincing and Brennan fighting a fit of giggles, not to mention Hodgins about to inhale maggot slime and Cam giving a quick bark of a laugh that quickly became a cough, Taylor's face moved from polite to flat out annoyed.
"Look, Sunshine," she stressed the word, stopping Fisher short with a hand of unpolished yet smooth nails in the space between them, "I'm flattered but forget it. It's never going to happen."
"I know what I saw," persisted Fisher.
"What you saw was two bean burritos from Taco Bell who decided stomach acid wasn't the sauna they signed up for." Booth snorted into his lapels.
"I know your vehemence is code for-"
"Whoa now," said Taylor, taking a step back, a dark eyebrow lifting over an amber eye. "Hold it there Care Bear. You say anything more and I will kick your ass." Now Fisher's little melodrama had drawn most of the eyes on the Forensic Platform, including Angela's from her office, her big teeth flashing in a smile behind the glass. Fisher's face lit with a new ardor and he dropped a big hand on one of her shoulders, leaning into her face fervently.
"I thoroughly give you leave to-"
"Okay, that's it," Booth spit through gritted teeth, starting forward. "Nobody talks to her like that."
"Booth, calm down, she's doing very well," Brennan cautioned, holding his shirtsleeve and already touched that he was so protective.
"I see." Taylor's face had gone from annoyed to vacant; her voice had dropped from boiling to bored. "How's this. If you invade my personal space, or touch me ever again, I will find your favorite pair of black skinny jeans and personally bedazzle them. Into My Little Ponies. And if that doesn't deter you enough, I will duct tape you to a carousel and play 'Walkin' On Sunshine' over and over until you beg for mercy." Fisher's hand immediately dropped and he backed away, as if she had been unbearably rude.
"Once again, my soul is crushed carelessly and anonymously by a stranger." As Fisher shuffled away, Booth sourly slipped ten dollars to Brennan out of his pocket.
"You win," he confessed grumpily.
"Bravo," said a newer, throaty voice. It was Angela, holding a sketch. With an approving glance to Taylor, she immediately turned to Brennan. "Sweetie, I sketched out the exhibit opening design for the pamphlet you're supposed to give to the Jeffersonian for the new museum for the Bronze Age, but it's not coming out quite right…" She lowered the pad for Taylor, as Angela was a good inch taller that Brennan, putting her three inches above Taylor.
"Very good," Taylor mused, staring at the block lettering and the fast but realistic sketches around the words.
"It looks great Ange," Brennan assured her friend. Booth gave her two thumbs up.
"It's off," the artist pouted.
"There's an empty space here," Taylor offered unexpectedly, pointing a slim finger to hover in the air over the sketch. "It's incongruent since you've crowded the picture here."
"But all that stuff goes together," responded Angela.
"If you skewed the letters off kilter and made it asymmetrical, the piece would have that edge you're looking for." Angela quickly rubbed out some of the graphite and with sure lines rearranged the piece. The contrast was immediately different.
"It looks great!" crowed Booth. Angela nodded.
"Yeah – you know, you have a real artistic eye for layout. You should go into advertising."
The four began walking with Brennan, who, having grown bored of the conversation and itching to make sure her remains were intact, swiped all four of them onto the platform.
"I was in AP Graphic Design in high school, and senior editor for the school magazine." Taylor shrugged. "I did a little in college, but I have to confess, subliminal messaging would be too strong a temptation. I would totally overthrow the masses with my awesome ideas." She flashed a brilliant, infectious smile, as if she hadn't just handed Fisher his ass on a platter. Angela laughed.
"Overthrow the masses? You sound like this guy!" She gave a sharp tug to Hodgins' curly hair bent studiously over a microscope. He was so obviously eavesdropping, his intense scrutiny through the lens didn't fool anyone.
"Ouch," he complained, standing up to shake hands.
"Jack Hodgins."
"Taylor Walsh."
"I'm thinking if they're weak then they don't deserve a fair warning," jumped in Hodgins, as if the interruption of the conversation never occurred.
"You mean, you're fed up with stupid people?" Taylor's lips twitched.
"Well…yeah," grunted Hodgins, spreading his arms wide. "Aren't you?"
"That's besides the point," Taylor deflected, but her smile gave it away. Brennan swallowed her own grin and pushed past to work next to Cam on the bones. "We can't all be smart," shrugged Taylor, "or nothing would ever get done."
"That's…not true," said Brennan in a distracted tone. "We accomplish things here. We're all smart. Except maybe Booth…and Angela."
"Don't forget who sells your books sweetie," scowled Angela, with a not quite up to par glare.
"I'm just saying," shrugged Taylor, "if everyone was smart…people couldn't sell things like a Snuggie."
"What's a Snuggie?" frowned Brennan, her nose almost touching an ulna.
"A blanket with arms," Cam interjected absently, her fingers probing the orbital cavities.
"Well, one of the greatest leaders of all time was Hitler," nodded Hodgins.
"Whoa, what? Excuse me, Hodgins," Booth said in his best polite, I'm-about-to-pulverize-you-with-a-meat-tenderizer tone. "Come again? And how did we get from advertising to Nazism?"
"Subliminal messaging...overthrowing the masses..." Hodgins' tone clearly said that he thought Booth was slow.
"No, it's true." Unexpectedly, Taylor came to Hodgins' defense. "He was a terrible person- worst ever, in my book since about half my high school was Jewish – but he did inspire a nation to do the most outrageous things. People on the street believed him. If he had said Swedish Fish were agents of evil…well we might not have such beautiful little gummies."
"Swedish fish?" asked Booth skeptically. Taylor frowned and Brennan found that she almost shattered one of the bones in surprise at the "Boothy" expression on her face when he was about to say something outrageous.
"Yeah…they're pretty good. But after like 10 of those…or those amazing little sugary orange slices – the gummy ones – well I really feel the need to shave my tongue."
"Oh man," Hodgins laughed to himself, "You and I, my friend, need to have a long talk." Angela, on the off chance Jack was hitting on someone besides her, thwapped him upside the head. She knew he wasn't, but she enjoyed hitting him nonetheless.
"I'm in love," murmured Fisher in a corner, before promptly placing his head into his arms and weeping in agony for an unrequited force of will.
"You…" Booth began slowly, trying to wrap his mind around it, "think Hitler was a good leader?" His face crinkled. "And want to shave your what?"
"One of the best," interjected Brennan, tuning in and out of the conversation at will. "Although, as I rarely consume processed sugars, I don't have an opinion on Swedish Fish or other candy."
"What?" Booth was irked that everyone seemed to be turning against him.
"Booth, genocide is hardly a new notion," mused Brennan, still staring enraptured at the examining table but snapping her gloves off her hands by stripping them down her wrists. "Hitler made it extremely effective…almost factory efficient. Exportation when it all boils down to it. It's an old story. One that your religion is founded on, in fact. There is a sect no one likes or fears because of their power. In Christianity it was Jesus, in the Holocaust, the Jews controlled the banks…then, as it always goes, that group is annihilated. Like the Hutu and the Tutsis in Rwanda. The fact that he did it so quickly and silently in a matter of years shows great leadership abilities."
"I…Wha…NO…BONES…My religion is NOT the same principle as HITLER!" Booth bellowed.
Silence followed.
"Don't look at me," Hodgins protested. "I'm basically an atheist."
"Agnostic," smiled Angela. "Love and peace and mother nature."
"Funnily enough Hitler was a vegetarian," interjected Taylor smoothly.
"Yeah, I bet that art school wish they had taken him now," chuckled Hodgins darkly.
"Why would you want to rule the world anyways?" seethed Booth. Taylor looked surprised.
"I would never want to rule the world – it's too much like stepping in an ant pile and then having to form them into little columns."
"Herding cats," interjected Cam, finally stripping off her own gloves. "I know what you mean."
"I'd rather be a deity," continued Taylor with a charismatic smirk, as if imparting a great secret. "It's much less work in dealing with petty problems, and people would just worship me and do whatever I wanted without fear of being overthrown. At least not for a thousand years or so," she added when Brennan opened her mouth.
"Amen to that," Angela laughed. Cam moved forward but Taylor knew what she wanted before Cam would be forced to go through the appropriate motions of small talk...or at the very least, a normal topic of newly met acquaintance conversation.
"Taylor." The girl certainly jumped the gun, Cam thought wryly.
"Cam."
"Nice to meet you."
"Likewise." Hodgins interrupted again.
"No offense – because you're totally ballin' and whatnot…with handing Fisher his ass on a platter – but who are you?"
"Oh…" Taylor, and the brash outgoing young woman who had come in and dominated the lab, making friends in minutes, was gone. She had faded back into the awkward introductory phase. "I'm just a friend."
While Taylor and Hodgins made small talk, Cam sidled up to Booth.
"Whoever she is," she told him in an undertone, "I like her. She's hilarious, competent and smart. But dear God, please don't tell me I have charge of yet another type A personality…"
"She's my sister." Booth said it loud enough for everyone on the platform to hear. "My half sister. We just found each other." Cam almost fainted.
"Seeley?" she breathed, her fist clenching involuntarily around a scalpel. She yelped; she had squeezed the blade end hard enough to draw blood.
"Fascinating," a new voice said, simultaneously as its partner exclaimed:
"Dr. Saroyan!" Sweets and Wendell rounded a corner, both bounding in step up the Forensic Platform, as perfectly in line as synchronized swimmers. Sweets peeled towards Taylor, and Wendell rushed to Cam, staunching the light blood flow with his own shirtsleeve in panic.
"Hi, I'm Dr. Lance Sweets. I'm the Bureau's profiler."
"A shrink." Taylor's voice was amused. Sweets was thrown.
"Well…yeah. In a manner of speaking."
"I don't put much credence in psychology." Sweets looked dumbfounded. Brennan, still perusing lab charts, oblivious to the emotional chaos raging around her, looked up.
"I agree," she said mildly.
"What is it with people and psychology?" Sweets fumed.
"It's nothing personal," Taylor smiled. "I'm sure you're very good at your job. I'm sure you help a lot of people."
"But you don't think that you need help," Sweets guessed shrewdly.
"Everybody needs help," she laughed. "Everybody needs therapy in some form or another. That doesn't make me special. And I choose to find it my own way."
"But what if your way doesn't work?" Taylor shrugged, looking vaguely annoyed for the first time since her set down with Fisher.
"It works for me. I'm sure you're very proficient." Sweets seemed to give up on a losing battle when not on his own turf.
"So you're Agent Booth's sister." It was a question disguised as a statement.
"So it would seem," she said smoothly. Sweets found he was staring at her perfect teeth flashing him a smile, making light of the whole thing. A familial trait, his mind catalogued. She didn't offer anything further, but Sweets made a mental note to get her in the same room as Dr. Wyatt. It was easy to profile her. Beautiful, powerful and intelligent, Taylor was used to being in control. She was obviously successful in domineering most of her relationships and establishing a pecking order from the very beginning. Yet she did it in a funny, enchanting sort of way – like a mix of Booth and Angela. The idea of Taylor being in the room with an ex-psychiatrist (though Sweets was positive he could read minds, Wyatt was so adept at picking up minutiae and reflections), and having her control wrested from her was an entertaining fantasy. In the meantime, Sweets realized within five minutes he was head over heels in a huge crush.
Yet even as he observed, he began noticing the sidelong glances she was receiving not only from dour Fisher across the room, but from Fisher's rotation - who was bandaging Cam's hand – Wendell Bray. Sweets reasoned with himself it was simply because she was in her twenties, like most of the interns. But deep down, Sweets knew it was simply because she was outrageously funny and intelligent, as he listened in genuine amusement to Hodgins' breathless recollection of Fisher's public pride licking by what seemed to be a very ordinary graduate student. Dr. Brennan interrupted his musings with a loud snap of the folder closing, and a meaningful glance towards Taylor. The glance was hardly lost to anyone on the platform save maybe Fisher, as Dr. Brennan's non-verbal cues were rudimentary and overblown at best.
"Miss Walsh…"
"Call me Taylor," the young woman corrected automatically. Her amber eyes intensely focused on Brennan's face, and to Brennan's utter consternation, she did as Booth always had. Her eyes flicked over Brennan's features before she even had time to speak, like reading a lab report.
"Taylor could I talk to you-" Brennan wasn't even sure where she was going with this, but Taylor saved her the social awkwardness with a cleverly executed lie.
"Yes I'd be happy to take our interview upstairs." Although she could tell Booth was bewildered, Taylor's genius cover gave the other Squints a plausible excuse and explanation for her presence. They obviously assumed Brennan was doing a favor for her partner.
As the two walked up the metal stairs, Brennan murmured under her breath: "I need some advice." Taylor's face lit with a devilish grin, so akin to Booth's own.
"I thought you'd never ask."
