Chapter 34—Destroy

Booth pulled into his parking space at the Hoover building, letting out a sigh of relief to be out of the Jeffersonian for the first time in almost 24 hours. The case they'd been working on had kept the whole team there around the clock, and the squints were still working hard. The only reason Booth had left was because he had an agent conduct meeting that he couldn't get out of.

Dragging his weary body into the building, Booth estimated he had just enough time to wash up and change his suit before he had to be in the conference room.

Ten minutes later, Booth slipped into the conference room, already packed with field agents. Grabbing a chair in the corner, Booth set in for a long, boring lecture on the proper conduct agents should display when out in the field.

Meanwhile, back in the lab…

"Dr. Brennan! I think I found something," Zack called from the platform, drawing the attention of the rest of the team. They hadn't had a break in the case in almost twenty hours, and if he was correct, it could mean wrapping the case up within a couple hours.

Eager to see what Zack had discovered, Hodgins and Angela abandoned their own work to go up to the platform. Unconsciously, Hodgins checked to be sure he hadn't left anything exposed before pulling the door shut on his way to Zack's station.

Cam and Brennan had both moved toward the platform when they heard the call, leaving their work in the middle of what they were doing. This, in Cam's case, meant leaving the remaining pieces of organs on the table when she rushed out, sliding the door shut behind her.

The team circled around Zack, looking impatiently at the screen, waiting for everyone to assemble.

"What do you have for us, Zack?" Brennan asked, quickly rubbing her eyes to clear the exhaustion away before she turned her attention to the screen in front of her colleague.

"Here," Zack pointed to the screen. "It's almost imperceptible."

"Remember," the speaker said, "we have to work with other departments and offices. Even if your position is superior to the people you're working with, don't act like you're their superior. You're expected to have a professional demeanor and cooperate."

Booth rolled his eyes, wondering for the millionth time why he was being forced to sit through this seminar. He'd heard it all when he was training for his position, and at least once a year since then.

If someone could use this, it's Bones, he grinned to himself, trying to imagine her acting equal to the local police officers and departments they regularly worked with. It made a great picture in his head, especially as it was the only thing keeping him awake through the monotonous speaker's lecture.

Booth's phone vibrated in his pocket, giving him a well-deserved distraction, just as the speaker was starting on the part about inappropriate relationships between agents and partners in the field.

Hiding the movement behind the person sitting to his right, Booth slid the phone out and flipped it open to see the text message he had just received from his partner.

"911," was all she had sent, but it was enough for Booth to know he was done with the meeting. The team had found something, and it was time for him to get back to work.

Slipping quietly from the room, Booth speed-dialed Brennan on his way to the parking garage.

Impatiently waiting for Booth to call her back, Brennan paced the length of the platform, not making eye-contact with any of her colleagues.

Cam had slipped back into her lab to finish going over her findings from the organs, and the other three sat quietly, waiting for Brennan to do something.

As she turned when she reached the end of her pathway, her attention was caught by a young woman with a box under her arm, opening the door to Hodgins' station. Before she could alert her friend to the presumed delivery, her phone was ringing.

"Booth?" she asked, her voice threaded with worry, unhappiness, and uncertainty.

"Ok, Bones, I'm on my way over," Booth told her, opening the door to his vehicle. "I just got in the car. Stay there. All of you. No one leaves until I get there and say otherwise, got it?"

"Yes, Booth, since that's exactly what we were already planning on," Brennan's irritated voice flooded the silence of the car when he switched the phone to speaker.

"Fine, Bones, sorry," he replied, trying to keep his voice at least somewhat sincere. "Now tell me what exactly it was that Zack found, on the leg bone?"

"There's no such thing as a leg bone, Booth," Brennan told him, "One would think you should know that after working with us for so long."

"Sorry I'm not a bone genius like the rest of you, but just tell me what you guys found, alright?" The longer they argued, the harder it was getting to keep the impatience out of his voice.

"Well, Zack found a microscopic puncture on the left femur of the victim," Brennan explained. "It was almost invisible, except…" her voice trailed off.

"Except, what? Bones?" Booth asked, wondering where his partner's attention had gone.

"Except," her voice came back, "that he was going over every millimeter of the bone on a one thousand times magnification. We ran the mark through the system and the only thing we came up with was," her voice was cut off abruptly by an explosion, the sound momentarily filling the vehicle and deafening Booth, before the line went dead.

AN: Mwahahaha… I mean, stay tuned for the next installment of "It Starts with a Promise." What exploded at the lab? Should Booth have stayed to hear the part of the meeting about proper relationships between partners? What was it that Zack found? How does the ink come out of pens? Will I continue the next chapter straight after this one, or skip to something entirely different?