A/N: Thank you for your patience as I've made you wait so long for this update! Real life has eaten me alive, so it's been a challenge to find the time to write. Yesterday was my birthday, though, so I asked for some much-needed writing time from my husband, and he obliged. Hooray!
This chapter is for my Twitter peeps – y'all rock. Thanks for keeping me motivated and for encouraging me. And, like I promised you after the last chapter, I'll only be posting the "good parts" of this story to save everyone time and heartache.
/snark
Chapter 29
Brennan was well into the woods before she heard the shouting in the distance. Her shattered shoulder made traversing through the rugged terrain extremely difficult; on uneven ground, she had only the use of one arm with which to steady herself. Still, she had a decent lead, and the fact that the estate was surrounded by woods worked to her advantage. As far as her captors were concerned, she could have taken off in any direction.
She scrambled down an embankment and, much to her surprise, found a wide river at the bottom. It was shallow enough to wade across, and she stepped into its murky waters without hesitation and sloshed through the knee-high water as quickly as she could. Once on the other side, she took a few minutes to catch her breath and to listen.
The shouting in the distance had faded, and she assumed that, for now, they were not searching in her vicinity. She glanced around, wishing that more of Booth's tracking skills had worn off on her over the years. She only knew that she was headed slightly north, but without any sense of where she was to begin with, she was basically walking blind.
She climbed awkwardly up the gently slope of the riverbank, and hope rose within her as, through the trees, she caught a glimpse of a lush, green meadow and a freshly painted red barn nestled into the side of a small hill at the back of the property.
As she approached the edge of the tree line, she took a hard right and followed the natural path along the property line. There was no sign of a road or a house nearby; her only hope was to make it to the barn undetected – tricky, due to the lack of cover since leaving the woods – and to try and find some sort of vehicle or radio to call for help.
She swallowed back the lump in her throat as she thought of how close she finally was to freedom – days had stretched into weeks, and she had lost track of time as she'd been moved, drugged, shot, assaulted, and violated by so many different people. More injury to add to her arsenal of shame that she already carried with her. Sweets would want to dissect her. The thought made her sick as she realized that she would no longer have Booth as a buffer between herself and the eager psychologist.
Her insides formed a sickening knot as she thought of returning to her "normal life." In just a few short hours, she would be free, and after the questions and the concerned looks and the smothering by her associates and students, she'd be left to navigate life without Booth. In the past, she'd be able to compartmentalize and throw herself into her work, and even after the Gravedigger incident, she'd been okay, because Booth had been there, holding her up, a constant who quietly imparted strength just by his presence in her life. He'd been her "normal" for the past six years. Everything was wrong now. She'd have to go home and pick up life without him. She'd have to try and remember "normal" before Booth, which wasn't so easy because of how much he'd changed her.
It might be easier to simply disappear. The thought of living under the constant pity and sympathy of those who knew her best was suffocating to her – she'd never escape their well-meaning but meddlesome "care" – in their clutches, she'd constantly be reminded of how she'd failed Booth; about how she was, in the end, not enough for him, and how that ultimately led to his demise. She would have to live with that guilt the rest of her life, and she certainly didn't need prying friends to help her with that.
And while she loved her career and the status and position it had brought her, she no longer clung to those things. They defined her less and less as she had learned – through Booth's influence – to find meaning in things like connection, relationship, human interaction. She could find that anywhere, with people who had no knowledge of the baggage she carried. She needed to forget. She was strong, and she'd started over many times before. She could do it again.
By the time Brennan reached the barn, she'd nearly made up her mind to call in an anonymous tip regarding the planned attack on D.C., and then to make a second call to her father, who would be thrilled to help her disappear, and who would be more than happy to keep her hidden.
She rounded the corner of the barn and found a side door that was unlocked. She pushed it open cautiously and slipped inside, then stood just inside for a few moments to allow her eyes to adjust to the darkness. Pulling the door open to allow for more light inside the barn, she peered into the vast space to try and get her bearings.
She began groping her way along the perimeter and, after several painstaking minutes, located a light switch. She flipped it, and suddenly, the area where she stood was awash in the blue cast of harsh fluorescent light. She was standing near an old workbench that was littered with screws, empty jars, and old paint cans – nothing helpful to her. She stepped further into the room, the dim light helping her to make out the outlines of old farm implements and, towards the back of the building, an old van.
She had taken her first step towards her newly found escape vehicle when she heard a car door slam outside and an angry voice on one end of a phone conversation as he approached the barn. She quickly switched off the light and dove under a nearby pile of tarps she'd spotted, and then she held her breath as she heard the large barn door slide open.
"…have to take matters into my own hands because of your incompetence," she heard him say. He grunted a few times in response to whatever the other party was saying, then suddenly, he unleashed a loud verbal assault of choice words and slammed something loud and metallic in the barn to punctuate his anger. The sudden cacophony caused Brennan to jump, and she fought to regain her composure as she heard him continue:
"Yeah, well, fuck Arib. He screwed up. Motherfucker was having second thoughts, anyway. He's better off dead. Al-Qadhi wants the job done today…now, actually. We don't know where the scientist ended up. I'm coming to the bus shed now with the remote for the device. It had better be armed and ready when I get there. Two hours."
Her heart sank as she realized that she was still in the clutches of her captors, and then she panicked when she realized that her escape had caused the planned attack to be moved up. There would be no time to call in help – if they were planning something for today, it would happen at the height of the city's activity, when people were in town for work, when children were getting out of school…
And Parker was one of those children.
It would be up to her, then to stop this.
Brennan listened as the man rifled around the barn, and then peered out from under the tarp as soon as she felt it was safe. She could not see much under the tangle of equipment and junk that lay between her hiding place and the area where the van was parked, but she could see his feet. It appeared that he was loading the vehicle.
She waited until he headed outside for another load, and she took advantage of the moment to slip out from under the tarp and make her way toward the van. She waited in the shadows behind an old plow as he placed something inside the back of the van, and then watched as he emerged. She could see his face fully now – she'd noticed that he had an American accent, and now that she could see him, she was struck by the fact that he was wearing fatigues decorated much like Booth's, and his hair was cropped close in military-issue style. Anger rose within her as she thought of the dishonor and betrayal Booth would feel at the sight of this traitorous man before her.
He walked around to the driver's side of the van and started up the engine, then headed back outside the barn. Brennan took advantage of his absence and quickly slipped into the back of the van, keeping one eye on the doorway as she desperately searched for a place to hide. She could hear his boots approaching as she dove behind a large trunk, suppressing a cry at the pain that shot through the right side of her body, and prayed that he would not see her. She held her breath as she listened and waited as she heard him pause at the back of the van, then let out a sigh of relief when she finally heard the doors slam shut.
She heard him climb into the driver's seat and then braced herself against the back of the bench seat as the van lurched out of the barn doors and into the brilliant, late morning sunshine.
############
Booth paced in Doggett's office as Doggett finished a call with the FBI video analyst. It was well past noon, and he could tell that they were no closer to finding al-Qadhi's location than they'd been three hours ago. He was losing his mind. He could not get past the image of Brennan he'd seen on the TV screen, looking like a shell of her former self. He could not imagine what she'd been through – she was a fighter, and for her to have lost her will to fight meant that what she'd faced as a hostage had been unspeakable. The aftermath of her captivity alone would likely take years to undo… and that was if she would even let him back into her life after the way he'd treated her. He was responsible for it all. He didn't deserve to have a place in her life at all after what he'd done… But he had to know that she was okay. He had to try and fix this mess, even if that meant letting her kick him to the curb once she was safe.
Doggett's computer chirped, alerting him to an incoming video call, and he leapt to his screen and pounded the "enter" button to accept the chat. Immediately, Angela's face filled the screen, looking at once triumphant and urgent.
"Angela… tell me you found her…"
"She's here! She's in the area!" she shouted over him. "Outside of Harrisonburg…they used a new camera that has GPS tagging…they must have forgotten to disable it! We found her, Booth!"
Doggett had joined Booth behind the desk and was already on his cell arranging for a tactical team and helicopters as Booth copied down the GPS coordinates. Within minutes they were at the staging area, and after a quick briefing of the team, they were suited up and ready.
Booth had just buckled himself into the jump seat when Hacker appeared in the doorway.
"Booth! Get out!" Hacker shouted over the rotor's cacophony.
"What?"
"I have to pull you off this team! CIA called and needs to bring you in! You need to come to my office…"
Booth felt the fury rising within. "No way in HELL I'm getting off this chopper, Hacker. No way."
Hacker glared back. "Booth, now, or I'll have you arrested for hampering an FBI operation." Two armed agents appeared in the doorway of the helicopter. Booth didn't budge.
"Booth, you're wasting time. We need to get this chopper off the ground now, and we can't do it until you are out of that seat. You are delaying us from saving Temperance. Do you really want that on your conscience?"
At that, Booth ripped off his restraints and dove through the opening, tackling Hacker on his way. He grabbed his former boss by the lapels and yanked him to his feet, seething as he invaded Hacker's personal space.
"Don't go there with me, Hacker. Don't do it."
The two agents were on Booth immediately and wrestled him away from Hacker. Hacker stepped back, brushed himself off, and then sighed. He looked at Booth with a mix of compassion and patience.
"Booth, we can argue about this later. This isn't up to me. We have a hostage to find, and you have a mission. Rescuing Temperance is top priority. Trust Agent Doggett to handle it – he's the best man for the job."
Booth yanked himself free from the two agents and stormed away. Once he reached the rooftop door, he yanked the door open and made his way down the stairs. When he reached the third floor, he found Finley waiting for him in the hall.
"Agent Booth. How's your leg?"
Booth grunted. "Still hurts. Don't have time to think about it. What the hell is going on?"
Finley nodded towards Hacker's office. "In here."
Booth followed, all the while entertaining visions of slamming Finley into the wall. He took a deep breath to calm himself, and then stepped into Hacker's office and shut the door.
"Sorry to pull you off that mission, Booth. I fully understand what it means to you, and I do not take lightly the decision to bring you in. I wouldn't do it if I didn't need you, but based on intel we've received, you're the most capable of handling this situation."
"This better be good," Booth grumbled.
"I'll remind you, Agent, that you do work for the CIA. I'm sorry that your job keeps getting in the way of your personal issues, but I think I've been more than lenient in that area. This is not something I'm willing to bend on. And it sounds like the FBI has the rescue operation covered. I need you to focus."
Booth's jaw ticked in irritation. He knew Finley was right, of course, but his loyalties were still with Brennan, and, if he was honest with himself, with the FBI. He didn't belong with the Agency.
"We know that al-Qadhi is planning something for Friday. We've finally got through to an informant we've been working with for several weeks now. We've confirmed through our source that al-Qadhi and his people have managed to purchase and smuggle an ADM into the country within the last week or so. The timing alone leads us to believe that he's planning on using it Friday."
Finley had Booth's full attention now. "An actual suitcase nuke, or a dirty bomb? Suitcase nukes aren't real."
"This one is very much a real nuke, not an explosive laced with radioactive material. It was modified by the Iranian government a few years ago, and made its way to al-Qadhi through his connections with Hezbollah. According to our source, the original plan was to use a hostage to deliver the device to its mark, but the hostage was injured, and plans were changed."
Bones. Booth sat heavily into one of Hacker's chairs as the pieces of the puzzle came together. They had planned to sacrifice Bones, but she'd been injured. Something had happened that had disabled her. That's why she'd looked so…broken. Part of him was relieved that she'd been spared that end, but his relief was quickly replaced by panic at the notion that she was no longer of value to her captors.
"Our informant didn't know specifics, but said that he thought al-Qadhi had a warehouse space somewhere on the edge of the city. Use whatever means necessary to find it. Use your people at the Jeffersonian. Do what you do. You had the highest solve rate in the FBI thanks to your teamwork with them. I have full confidence that will translate to a case involving national security – especially since one of their own is involved."
Booth stood and headed for the door, wanting to get to the squints on it as soon as possible. After a quick call to Cam to have her assemble the team, he dialed another number and was relieved when the other party answered on the first ring.
He skipped the pleasantries. "Rebecca, I need you to go get Parker right now, and I need you to get as far away from DC as you possibly can…"
A few minutes later, satisfied that his son was safe, he peeled out of the Hoover parking garage and headed back to the lab.
