Silly CrayonClown made a faux pas that the TV Bonesverse can get away with because we don't necessarily know how much time has passed between episodes. In Chapter 50, there was a blizzard, but in the last part of the last chapter, it was apparently warm enough for a pregnant Brennan to wear a t-shirt outside and for all of the snow to be melted enough that the bullets were hitting dirt even though in my Jelly Bean Bonesverse it was the very next day and mounds of snow from massive blizzards just don't disappear like that, so that has been fixed and corrected below as well as in the previous chapter.

I usually catch continuity mistakes like that, and I'm wondering why no one pointed it out to me? Maybe you didn't catch it; maybe you would have never known the difference had I not pointed it out. Or maybe you did and you were just conspiring against me… evil.


They had seen five houses already and it was approaching one in the afternoon. They were on their way to see the last one before going to have lunch to discuss what they've seen.

They were standing outside listening to the Realtor relay information about the property before going inside to check it out.

They had not noticed a black nineties model Cadillac drive by slowly. The nice shiny black vehicle fit into the neighborhood well.

A few minutes later, they were still standing outside talking when it came back, this time showering the front yard of the house with gunshots from several guns. Glass could be heard shattering as bullets hit windows. Clouds of white snow dust puffed out of the ground as some rounds hit the mounds and drifts of snow and as some hit bricks in the walls of the house. Some bullets found themselves embedded in the trees.

Booth pushed Brennan down to the ground behind a tree before taking cover himself.

Then all was silent and still.

Brennan sat up and checked herself for wounds. She was okay after being pushed behind the tree, but her world started to spin upon seeing Booth laying next to her unconscious with blood coming from his head. The sight of her husband laying there seemingly lifeless and bleeding made her physically ill. Staying behind the tree, in case the car came back, she vomited as far away as she possibly could have.

Neighbors were already coming out of their houses to check out the noise and call the police.

Brennan looked around for their Realtor, and saw that she was tucked safely behind a tree not too far away with her hands over her ears and her eyes tightly drawn shut.

With rational thought finally coming back to her, she pushed the shock away and she took her jacket off and then her shirt off to press to Booth's wound to stop the blood flow.

All she could think about was a few years back when he'd been shot right in front of her as he took a bullet meant for her, and then being told he had died.

.

"Booth! Booth! Stay with me, please," she begged. "It's me, Bones! I'm here." She broke down in sobs and kissed him, willing him to wake up.

She hoped that just as Prince Charming's kiss woke Sleeping Beauty and Snow White, that her kiss would wake her prince.

She didn't expect it to happen, but she had certainly hoped it would. Dare she even say she prayed that it would work?

She wasn't expecting it, and that is exactly why when he did stir and wake up moaning, it startled her. She felt her heart pound up in her throat.

He brought his hands up to cradle his head where a huge knot was forming from where he had hit his head on the tree and knocked himself unconscious as he dove down to cover Brennan.

He swatted a hysterical Brennan's hand away from where she was holding pressure on his bleeding head.

"Bones? Ugh, what the hell? Are you okay? Did you get hit?"

"No, no I'm fine." She lowered her shaking hands.

Booth sat up and felt blood trickle down the side of his neck.

"What?" He put his hand up to the side of his head. He felt around and felt a flesh wound where the top of his ear met his head. "Oh, ugh. I'm bleeding."

"Are you okay, Booth? Were you hit?" Brennan turned his head with her hands and looked closer now that her shirt was no longer pressed to the wound. "It looks like a graze. I didn't think to look at it this closely before. I just saw blood and… panicked. I needed to stop the blood."

Sirens blared through the neighborhood, getting closer and closer to the scene.

"It's okay, Bones. You did well." Booth looked around to see the Realtor still sitting against the other tree. "Are you okay," he asked her.

She nodded, but didn't say a word in response.

"Bones, I think she's in shock," he whispered. He didn't want to upset her further.

"Booth, I think I'm in shock. I can't stop shaking and my heart is racing still."

"Okay, Bones. Let's sit you back against this tree. We need to calm you down." Booth looked at her bare upper body against the white backdrop of snow and ice around them. Booth picked her shirt up and handed it to her. "Put this back on."

"It's bloody."

"Bones, it's nine degrees outside. Put it back on. The jacket, too"

She put the shirt and jacket back on and closed the jacket tightly. She hadn't noticed how cold she was, until she'd put her clothing back on. Then she started scooting back toward the tree.

"Wait, Bones."

Booth shifted himself over to the tree staying low and behind cover. He sat with his back to the tree and pulled Brennan against him and wrapped his trench coat around as much of both of them as possible and then wrapped his arms around her.

"Just try to relax, Bones. The babies need you to calm down. We're both fine. The Realtor is fine," He whispered into her ear. His low voice and arms around her seemed to calm her down a little.

But she started crying again. Big long hard sobs escaped her throat.

"I—I th-though you were g-gone," she sniffled. "You were so lifeless and I saw the blood on your head. I thought you were d-de…" She couldn't bring herself to say it aloud.

"Oh, baby. Calm down. I'm fine. I'm here. Feel my heartbeat. Feel my warm hands on your face," he brought his palms up to her cheeks. "Focus on their movements and on the comfort they bring. Focus on my voice. Hear me, let my voice calm you. Close your eyes, baby, and just listen. Feel my chest against your back," he kept talking as her crying became harder periodically, "feel my arms around you. Feel my hands soothing you. Feel me breathing next to your ear. Hear my voice, Temperance. How are you doing?"

"I'm… just hold me."

The neighbors were all standing outside. Some meeting at the end of their driveways trying to get a closer look and to talk to each other to see what everyone knew about what happened, none of them having the guts to walk over to the scene to see if everything was alright. They could hear the voices and hysterical sobs and a calming stream of soft words, but no one could make out every word enough to get a real accurate picture as to what had happened or determine if everyone in the front yard of that house was okay. They didn't dare get closer in case someone had been mortally wounded or in case whoever just shot up one of the nicest houses in the neighborhood circled back to finish the job.

The sirens were getting louder, indicating they were approaching the scene and would be there within a matter of seconds.

The first to arrive on the scene was the police. Two officers stepped out of the car after the sirens had been shut off. They surveyed the area to make sure they were not in any danger.

Upon seeing the people huddled behind the tress they approached quickly and gathered information about the incident.

Booth had reached for his badge upon hearing the car pull up. He flashed it to the elder officer as he approached.

"I'm Special Agent Seeley Booth," he started still leaning against the tree with his wife tucked in his arms, "and this is my wife, Temperance. We were viewing this house with our Realtor when we were shot at. None of us have been hit," Brennan started to speak, but Booth squeezed her hand to indicate that she should let him finish talking, "but I think our Realtor is in shock. And my wife is twenty-three weeks pregnant with twins. It's a high risk pregnancy and I'm having troubles calming her down."

The younger officer had his notebook out and was taking notes of what Booth had been saying. The elder officer pointed to Booth, "Agent Booth, your head appears to be bleeding. Are you—"

"It was just a graze. I'll be fine. I'm worried about my wife."

The officer radioed for the ETA on the ambulance.

"It's on its way Agent Booth. Can you tell me what happened? What you saw?"

"We were standing in the driveway talking to the Realtor about this house. It's the sixth one we were looking at today. A dark car drove by and opened fire on us. It sounded like a few fully automatic weapons. The rounds were fired off very quickly. I only saw that it was a dark car, an older luxury model, nice. I was more concerned about protecting my wife. I shoved her behind the tree, and dove on top of her. I think I hit my head and knocked myself unconscious for a few minutes. If I hadn't, I would have tried to get a good look at the car as it drove away. Bones, did you see it?"

"Hmm?" She hadn't really been listening. She had her eyes shut and was still trying to focus on calming down.

"Did you see the car?" The officer repeated for her.

"Yes. Dark, older, shiny, tinted windows, I didn't see the plates. Cadillac, maybe?"

The younger officer continued to write as the information came from the couple, and then he pointed over to the Realtor. "What about her?" He walked over to her, "Ma'am, did you get a good look at the car?"

He didn't receive a response. She only stared straight ahead, visibly shaking. "Ma'am?" She looked at him, but made no response toward him in any other way.

"Sir," he addressed his superior partner, "I believe Agent Booth may be right; she's in shock."

"Okay."

Booth pulled his phone out.

"I need to make a phone call to Sam Cullen, the Deputy Director of the FBI. Yesterday we learned of a plot that was potentially threatening to my life; I feel that this is connected in some way. If someone has made an attempt on my life, that makes this a part of an existing federal investigation. Let me talk to him to see what I can get help with while we wait on the ambulance."

The officer nodded in agreement.

Booth did something that he had hoped he would never have to do. He called Cullen on his home line on the weekend.

"Sir, this is Agent Booth… Yes, sir, I'm aware, but Bones and I were just shot at… A drive by… Ah, no, we were looking at houses. Which means someone's been tailing us in order to know where we are… No, we are both fine. I was grazed by a bullet on the side of my head and Bo—Yes, sir, it was a close call. Bones is having a tough time staying calm. I need to get her away from this as soon as I can… Yes, sir, I'm listening."

Booth listened as Cullen made some decisions and told him what to do. He hung up and motioned the elder officer over. He had been briefing a new pair of officers that had just shown up at the scene while the younger of the two original officers guided the medical team to the young woman behind the other tree who was in shock.

"This has become a part of a federal investigation." Upon seeing the dejected mannerism that displayed disappointment that his case was getting taken away, Booth added, "Cullen wants you guys to finish up here. I have been authorized to offer you to stay on this case and aid in the investigation. I'm going to tell you up front that we think there is someone inside the FBI who wants me dead and they are going to extreme lengths to do so. If you stay on this case, Cullen will brief you on the details later. I do not have time right now, or I would tell you myself. We need to do some things to get you and your partner adequate security clearing first."

"Okay, so what do we do here?" He asked.

"Treat it as you would any crime scene. Cullen has sent for a few agents and crime scene techs to come assist. I need you to keep an eye out for anything suspicious. We do not know who is behind this or who may have a loyalty to this person. We aren't sure who we can trust in the FBI, so watch them. Then after you are done here, meet us at the Medico-Legal Lab at the Jeffersonian Institute. It's safer than the Hoover at the moment."

"Anything else?"

"Yeah, this is just for you and your partner only. The invitation does not extend to those greens that just showed up. Understand? I need experience, here. We do not have time to teach. Cullen is contacting your Sarge right now, and I gave him your names so that this can all be arranged. Now, Bones, come on and stand up with me. We need to get going. We need to go to the Jeffersonian."

"Sir, aren't you going to get your head looked at?"

"No, I'll be fine. I've got a good friend at the Jeffersonian that will patch me up. Stay sharp and keep an eye out."

"Alright, we'll see you later."

Booth and Brennan started toward Booth's SUV only to notice the flat tires and busted out windows and shattered glass littering the icy shale stones of the driveway.

"Great." Booth sighed.

"Now what," Brennan asked.

"Hey, Gomez!" Booth called out to the elder officer. "Mind if we take your cruiser?"

"Go ahead, I'll have the other guys drop us off."

He tossed his keys to Booth, and Booth removed the remote and key to the SUV from his key ring and tossed them to Gomez.

"Not that you'll be able to do anything with that, but I can't use them right now."

The officer looked at the SUV and laughed. "No kidding. I'm not sure you'll ever use these keys again. They'll have to get you a new ride."

B&B

Booth had called Cam and the squints on the way to the Jeffersonian. He made sure Cam knew to bring medical supplies with her to look at his head and she discreetly offered to bring a mild sedative for Brennan if it was needed. Booth told her to bring it just in case, with Brennan none the wiser.

Then he called Rebecca to make sure that she and his son were okay and that no one was after them there. Once he was assured that they were fine, he hung up his phone.

On a whim he turned the police cruiser around and headed to their apartment anyway.

"Bones, we're going to pick them up and take them with us. The security at the lab is one of the best in DC. It puts the Hoover to shame. I just need to make sure that nothing happens to them. Ya know?"

"I know. I agree. If these people have been trailing us to know where we were, they had to have been following us from somewhere. It isn't unreasonable to make an educated intuitive leap that they know where we live and have been following us since leaving this morning."

Booth drove a little faster, with the sirens blaring through the streets and the lights whirling above them.

"Booth?"

"Hmm?"

"What if they are following us now?"

"I don't think they would be. They just caused a commotion, the last thing they are going to want to do is hang around and get caught. They'll lay low for a bit, but we should stay alert."

"We should grab some clothes, too. I don't have any that fits me in my office anymore, and we're both covered in your blood."

"Right, and Parker doesn't need to see my head this way. Could you do a quick dressing on my head while we are at home?"

"Sure."

B&B

The three adults and Parker emerged from the cruiser with bags in hand and ran from the cruiser and got onto the elevator to take them up from the parking garage. Cullen and the squints were already there waiting when they arrived.

"Booth, where have you been? We've been worried that something else had happened," Hodgins said.

"No, I just decided that I needed to bring Rebecca and Parker here because the security is good."

Brennan added, "We thought about it, and if they had been trailing us, it was likely they trailed us from home. So they knew where we lived, and we couldn't leave them there like sitting ducks."

She elbowed Booth slightly, "Did I get that right?"

"Yeah, baby. You did," he whispered.

He turned to Rebecca, and he tossed her Brennan's keys, "Take Parker to Bones' office; it's the big round gold key."

Parker grabbed the keys. "I know which one!" And he took off and headed toward Brennan's office.

"Seeley, has someone looked at your head?" Cam asked, noting the hasty bandage and dried blood on his skin where he had not had time to clean it off.

"Bones did, briefly. It's a flesh wound. Could you patch me up, while we wait on the two officers from the scene to get here?"

Cam led him to her office where they could sit and she could concentrate on his wound. Cullen followed after them and gained the details from Booth.

Angela took Brennan to her office and laid her down in there and covered her up with the soft blanket that was draped over her couch. Brennan was still on edge and knew she needed to calm down. It just wasn't happening. She was stressed and she was starting to develop a headache.

Angela turned off her lights and left the anthropologist to relax while they waited on the officers from the crime scene.

Despite the fact that Brennan was trying to relax and had the light blocked out and the noise to a minimum with the door closed, her mind kept wandering to the events that happened.

Seeing her husband laying there lifeless with a bloody head right after the shooting; her initial knee-jerk reaction had already written him off as dead. The only thing that indicated he was still alive to her was the foggy breaths he had been exhaling. She couldn't actually see his chest moving up and down with his breathing because of the trench coat and winter clothing. He was so still and so limp looking. And the blood. There was blood coming from his head. What other conclusion was she supposed to draw from that scenario? Everything, save for the foggy breathing, pointed to the thing her mind dreaded most.

Cam fixed Booth's head. He'd ended up needed several stitches. She'd also probed the bump on his head (much to Booth's displeasure) to make sure that he didn't actually fracture anything beneath the tissue and checked his pupillary light reflex to make sure he had sustained no brain trauma when he hit the tree with his head. At least with the bullet wound, he had been used to that pain, and was given a topical anesthetic followed by a local injection to dull the pain. The bump on his head was different. A big hematoma had quickly developed under the scraped up skin. It was tender to the touch, and he winced and hissed every time she pushed on it.

As he talked with Cullen, he mentioned that this past week they were supposed to have gone to Los Angeles for their Babymoon, but had changed plans almost at the last minute, and never even bothered to cancel their plane tickets because they were past the deadline to do so. They were already out the money so they just didn't bother with it. Booth mentioned thinking that it was weird that they were supposed to go to LA and then when they didn't he comes back to find out that he was wanted to go undercover, by specific request of someone at the LA FBI office, as a drug dealer looking to get an in with the associates of an LA mob in the DC area. He told Cullen that he felt like this meant that something was supposed to happen in LA, but since they went to North Carolina instead, an arrangement had been made to take care of business there in DC, but was once again foiled when Cullen denied the request from him to go undercover. After that, it seemed that someone decided to take matters into their own hands. Cullen was hard pressed to find out who the special request for Booth to be on the case came from. He still hadn't been able to get a straight answer on that front. No one seemed to know anything about it. Not even Agent Taylor Sullivan knew who the request had come from. She had received orders from someone who had received them from someone else. It seemed to be a giant train of orders being passed from agent to agent with no real origination. Someone in the LA office was lying.

It was two more hours of waiting before the officers had been dropped off at the Jeffersonian. Gomez had reported to Booth and Cullen that they had observed nothing that had raised any suspicions; not from the agents that were sent, nor the FBI techs that were sent to catalogue evidence. Cullen was grateful for their cooperation and recommended that they stay on board since he didn't know who among his own men he could trust. Just because they hadn't noticed anything out of the ordinary at the scene, didn't mean that someone wasn't reporting back to whomever the order for the hit had come from right then.

The techs that had come in with Gomez and his partner brought with them all of the bullet fragments that could be retrieved. Pictures of tire prints were taken. It was the best they could do, given the circumstances of the snow and ice. That also meant that they couldn't take rubber or particulate samples to positively link any tire or car to that drive by. All in all, every piece of the puzzle they had seemed to belong to entirely different puzzles.

The only thing that they had been able to determine that afternoon was that the bullets left at the scene indicated the use of two different guns, likely to be Glock 18s. The rounds they had recovered at the scene were all 9mm and preliminary ballistics showed that there were two barrel patterns indicating the use of two guns. Booth was able to disclose the fact that before he knocked himself unconscious, he had distinctly heard fully automatic weapons being fired based on the number of rapidly fired rounds.

The problem was that Glock 18s were extremely rare and definitely not just readily available to anyone in the market to buy one due to their fully automatic capabilities, and here they had been fired upon by two. This was confusing to all because crime syndicates usually did what they could to obtain commonly used weapons in order to make it hard to trace back to their weapons.

That indicated that this was more than just a hit being put out by the Pirelli Family's DC associates. It was suspected that they were still involved in some way. They seemed to have been the tool of the plot to eliminate Booth from the start of this thing. So they weren't ruling anything out at this point.

Arrangements were made for everyone close to Booth to stay at Hodgins' fortress until further notice. Parker was getting restless and hungry. He didn't understand why the adults were talking in hushed tones around him and running around outside of Brennan's office. And he was getting frustrated that no one would tell him anything, as usual. He knew from the bags they had packed that they were going to be there for a while and that they weren't going back home tonight.

He also knew that something serious had happened.

Why else would his dad be wearing a bandage on one side of his head and have a huge scraped up knot of the other side of his forehead?

Also he knew that Bones was very shaken up and she definitely didn't act like herself the last time he had seen her which was several hours ago now. He knew it had to be bad if someone as strong as a person as she was took a break to just relax and calm down while everyone else ran around like chickens with their heads cut off. It wasn't like her to delegate duties when there was work to be done.

Even though there was no body to examine, Parker knew that body or no, she was always inserting herself in the middle of the situation to help in any way she could be of assistance to his dad. And frankly, the fact that she wasn't, scared him.

Angela was thinking the same thing, unknown to Parker. She had been sitting with Parker and his mother as they sat there playing a few games that she had grabbed from her office. She decided to get up and check on Brennan, and Parker wanted to go with her. Rebecca convinced him to stay in Brennan's office and stay out of the way because they didn't need to worry about him running around the lab while they tried to figure out what was going on.

Angela entered her office; it was still dark and she could hear Brennan's restless breathing and shifting where she lay on the large couch. She turned on one of the lamps over at one of her work stations so that she didn't blind Brennan with the full powered fluorescent over head lighting.

"Bren, sweetie? Are you awake?"

Brennan sighed, heavily, "Yes, I've never been to sleep. I can't stop thinking, and this headache is… killing me."

Warning bells were going off in Angela's mind. She couldn't remember why, but she knew that headaches in pregnant women were not a good sign.

"Sweetie, I'm going to go get Booth. He'll come in here and talk to you a little bit. Parker's hungry and I'm sure everyone could use a dinner break about now. It'll do Booth some good to come in here and get away from all of that out there. I'll be back."

It wasn't a lie; she was going to get Booth.

It just wasn't the whole truth; she was also going to get Cam.

Angela knew that if Brennan was complaining of a headache that it must be bad; her friend didn't complain of anything as mundane as a headache, ever, and she certainly didn't use such terms as killing me, metaphorically or otherwise.

Not too long after that, Booth came through the door followed by Angela and Cam who were conversing and making it look as if Cam was there to continue the conversation rather than being there to check on Brennan. They finished the last of their conversation before any attention was turned to Brennan. Of course, being as oblivious as only Brennan can be, she was none the wiser about Cam's presence.

Even while Cam asked her personal questions about how she was doing, Brennan didn't suspect anything.

"How are you doing? Any abdominal pain, bleeding, nausea, headache, anything?" She asked nonchalantly. "Booth said he pushed you down into the ground pretty hard."

Brennan understood that as a valid reason to ask the questions so the readily answered.

"I had a some nausea right after the shooting and seeing Booth like—like that," she said, begging with her eyes that no one ask what she meant by putting it that way. They all pretty much knew. Booth had told them. "I did vomit before he woke up. I've had a headache ever since, and I just can't stop thinking about how close of a call it really was."

"How bad is the headache? You said you've had it ever since this afternoon, correct?" Cam confirmed as she pulled out an arm cuff and a stethoscope. She took Brennan's blood pressure. Her face grew ashen as the minute passed and she catalogued the numbers in her memory as she schooled her features.

But not quick enough for Booth to miss. He knew that look. He knew Cam. Something was wrong, and she was downplaying it for Brennan's sake.

"I'm going to go get some Pamprin. As a female, you know that it is normally used for relief from menstrual cramps and headaches. It has a tiny bit of caffeine in it that will take care of that headache." It was true Cam did plan to give her that, but she also planned to slip in that sedative pill with the others. "It's in my office. I'll be right back."

She walked out with Booth hot on her heels.

"Alright, Cam, spill. What's wrong with Bones?"

"Her blood pressure is dangerously high. It is what is causing the headaches. I plan to give her that sedative. You're going to call her doctor. Then we are taking her straight to the hospital while she is not in complete control of her actions so that she cannot stop us."

Booth made a face of disapproval.

"I don't like this any more than you do, but you know that with everything going on around here, she will not willingly go on her own. It's the only way to get her to calm down."

"By drugging her?" He threw his hands up in the air and cursed.

"Essentially, yes. But sedating is a much nicer term for it; don't you think? It's the only way we are going to get her to the hospital and you know it. Seeley, she is on the verge of stroke and going into labor. At just twenty-three weeks, there isn't even a fifty percent chance of survival. The lungs…"

"…are just now starting to form air sac thingies. I know. Bones told me this morning." He looked at her for a few long seconds searching for any other way.

He finally nodded. "Alright. Let's do this. She's going to kick my ass for this. You know that, right?"


Oh no! Another cliffy! Jen is being mean isn't she? Once again, feel free to pester.

Oh, come on, you knew I wasn't going to seriously injure Booth. Hell, I couldn't even send him away on a dangerous case. Please don't hate me for scaring you like that. :)

P.S. This was half an hour from having two consecutive days where a chapter was posted. That's awesome right? I imagine, I will work on this one a lot more tomorrow as I do not have to go to work until 2:40!

XOXO,
CrayonClown