A/N: Hello dear reader! It has been quite a while since I posted a new chapter. Unfortunately, I am not feeling that motivated to write for this story anymore, so I might put this story on hiatus soon. I have plenty of notes for this story, but I can't seem to get in the right frame of mind lately. Naturally, the decline in interest in Bones stories, in general, I've seemed to have picked up isn't helping much either. Well, before we have to get to that type of measures, there is at least still this chapter :).

"That was one hell of a game," Booth said as he ripped his leg protectors off.

"Yeah, man. It was a tie for so long I didn't think we could turn it around."

Booth nodded. "And then we didn't."

"So you want to grab a drink after we get changed?" Wendell asked as he tried to get his hockey gear back into his bag.

Booth smiled. "I'd love to, but I only have time for one drink. I promised my girlfriend we'd go out after training."

"Wow, girlfriend? I didn't know you were even dating."

"Yeah, we didn't want to complicate things by telling people in the beginning, but now we slowly are."

"Congrats man!" Wendell said.

"Thanks."

"So, who is the lucky woman? Are you going to bring her to a game sometime?"

Booth grinned. Bones didn't handle watching his hockey games that well. "Probably not. She gets nervous watching me on the ice."

"Ah alright. So, when are you going to introduce her to me?"

"That won't be necessary, because you already know her." Booth looked expectantly at Wendell.

"Please tell me you're not dating Dr. Saroyan again," Wendell said. He wasn't sure he was going to be able to live through that.

Booth chuckled. "I am not, so you can relax."

"Is it Dr. Brennan?" Wendell asked a little comprehensively.

"Hmm", Booth confirmed.

"Well, finally man! That is great. So how long has this been going on?"

"About a month or two." Booth thought. He needed to look up that date. Women found that really important, although, Bones might not care. Well, if that were the case, he would care for both of them. Bones deserved a guy that cared enough to make their anniversaries special.

"Wow, and you managed to keep it a secret for all that time?" Wendell was surprised. It wasn't easy to keep anything a secret at the Hoover or the Jeffersonian. It was amazing that only a handful of people knew about him and Lilly. But then again, he didn't get to work with Lilly as much as Booth and Brennan's work required them to and not many people were interested in the love lives of the interns. The love lives of the best investigative couple of D.C; that was a different story.

"Not exactly. I told Lilly; Cam guessed it. Bones told Angela last week."

"Lilly knew?" Wendell said. "Why didn't she tell me?"

"Because I asked her to not tell anyone." Booth simply stated.

"Why? Didn't you trust me to keep it a secret?"

Booth could hear the hurt in Wendell's voice. "No, I do trust you, but Lilly already knew before the two of you decided to get all lovey-dovey." Booth picked up his towel and hit the showers.

"So, you've been seeing Dr. Brennan for about two months?" Wendell restarted their conversation as he toweled his hair.

Booth nodded. "We took it slow in the beginning until the time we were spending dating exponentially grew. Now we are actually thinking of moving in together. Get a new place."

"Wow, miss a little miss a lot."

Booth chuckled. "I guess. We've been looking at houses but none of those already perfect houses are meeting our needs. Sweets mentioned state auctions because of the case and I've been looking into it and found a potentially perfect home. It has been shot to pieces though so we would have to rebuild it almost from the ground up."

"That sounds like a lot of work, but it will give you the perfect opportunity to mold the place to your wishes," Wendell said, looking on the positive side.

Booth nodded. "Indeed. Bones and I will check it out on Monday. Would you be willing to take a look at it with me if Bones and I like it?"

"Sure", Wendell said. "I know enough about construction to tell you if what survived destruction is sound enough to rebuild."

"Great, I'll let you know. You ready to move this to the sports bar for that drink?" Booth asked, already swinging his bag onto his back.

Wendell nodded as he zipped up his bag.

After ordering their beverages. Booth sized up Wendell. "Do you want to talk about what has got you down?"

Wendell sighed. "Well, since you're dating Dr. Brennan; you probably know that we had a conversation about my Ph.D. candidacy."

Booth remembered his conversation with Bones while in Pittsburg. Bones hadn't filled him in on having had a conversation with Wendell though. "Actually, she hasn't mentioned it. What happened?" With Bones, it could be anything and his girlfriend wasn't actually the most tactful person when giving feedback.

Wendell shared his conversation with Dr. Brennan with Booth. "So ever since I've been trying to figure out what I want to do next."

"Wow, I guess that would be difficult."

Wendell nodded. "Yeah, Lilly took me to New York for three days to try and relax, because I was driving myself crazy. It helped a little, but obviously it doesn't resolve the issue. You changed jobs before. Do you have any advice?"

"I guess it is just a puzzle to find which pieces you find important. Do you want to work indoors or outdoors? Work with people or see as least people as possible? What do you value? Do you want to make money and is that your sole purpose or do you want to serve society? Do you want to spend a lot off your time reading or do you want to do something with your hands?" Booth gave some examples.

Wendell sighed. "I don't know man. I really love working with you and Dr. Brennan and the rest of the team."

Booth nodded. "Okay, and why do you like that?"

"It helps the victim's families, it serves justice, no day is exactly the same. I get to work with awesome people, I get to use a lot of my skills. I don't think I would like a job like Lilly; doing research is fun, but without Hodgins-like experiments that would be completely boring."

Booth nodded. "Sounds familiar. Let me ask you this: when Bones left the country to go to Makolulu you changed jobs, did you enjoy that work?"

Wendell smirked. "It paid the bills, sure, but it wasn't something I hoped to do for the rest of my life no. It's too much of the same thing, changing the oil over and over again." Wendell thought about his conversation with Lilly a while back. Some just were just destined to be temporary.

"Come on, you did more than work for that mechanic. You helped build houses and worked in a bar."

"I did. Living in DC means you have to work hard for the rent. I learned all those skills because there was money in them that would help me get through school." Wendell paused. "I really don't want to leave the Jeffersonian. You're like my family and I love the work we do."

Booth nodded. "Yeah, except what I understood from Bones is that you can't keep working as an intern forever."

"Yeah... There is that."

Booth smiled. "If you could choose whatever job anyone on the team has which would you pick?"

Wendell looked surprised, doubting the sanity of that question. "Well, I can't magically turn into Dr. Brennan."

"Come on, humor me. To become Bones, you would still be left with the issue of having to write that research thing-y. You already nixed Lilly's job."

"Yeah, so that also means I won't become the next prosecutor like miss Julian."

"Hodgins?" Booth proposed.

"No, I would have to back to school and get like 3 PhDs."

"Angela?" Booth continued.

"No, I can't draw more than a stick figure."

"Cam?"

"Well, I have a lot of respect for Dr. Saroyan but I don't think I'd be able to cut into and look at intestines all day. And being the head of the whole lab seems like an incredibly intimidating task."

"Okay, that leaves my job," Booth concluded.

"Becoming an agent?" Wendell asked.

"That is what you would have to do to be in the FBI, yes," Booth said with a smirk. "Look I am not saying you should, but when I listen to your wish list, it kind of makes sense. It gives you the opportunity to help the victims, be around the science, not sit at a desk all day. It also doesn't require you to follow more expensive education for years."

Wendell listened to Booth's explanation. "I never even thought about that but you're right that it would give me the chance to do the same type of job but from a different perspective."

"Still, I am not trying to say you should. Have you looked into studies that you could get exemptions for? I am sure forensic anthropology has some similarities to different studies."

"Not as much as you'd think. Wendell said a bit down."

"Well, you'll figure it out," Booth said, patting Wendell on the shoulder.

Hockey training probably had run a little late, Lilly thought as she checked the time. Or maybe the drinking afterward. Wendell had already told her he wasn't going to be able to get here before noon, so they had decided to meet at the dinner at 1 pm.

"Hey", Wendell said, kissing Lilly before sitting down on the opposite side of the table.

"Hey, you! You seem pretty cheery," Lilly said. "Was that tongue?" She asked, referring to the kiss.

"Yes", Wendell said smiling cockily.

"Did you guys win or something?"

"No, we got killed out there, but Booth and I talked and it was very enlightening," Wendell said with a mysterious smile.

"Oh really?"

"Hmm, definitely. First off: why didn't you tell me Booth and Dr. Brennan are dating?"

Lilly smiled. "Because I promised Booth, I wouldn't tell a soul. But I guess they lifted the confidentiality?"

"Not sure", Wendell said. "But he did tell me, so at least you can gush about it with me now."

Lilly chuckled. "Okay, that is great because I have been dying to fangirl with someone. They are absolutely a cute couple."

"Yeah, they are. It was a development in their relationship I've been waiting for years for. Probably everyone around them." Wendell said.

Lilly nodded. "You didn't tell me they were going to make such a great match though." There was a pinch of reproach in her voice.

Wendell smiled. "I thought someone would have cued you in by then and back then it seemed like they would never get their act together."

"Yeah, that is what everyone keeps saying. I completely missed it. Which would already suck on its own but it could have prevented a lot more drama." Now there definitely was regret in her voice.

Wendell nodded. "True, but hey, in the end, it all worked out. Except for you getting assaulted, of course", he ruefully added.

Lilly took a deep breath. "Yes, there is that. But thankfully we found each other anyway. So, Booth and Brennan getting it together, is what has lifted your veil of doubt?" Lilly changed the subject.

Wendell grinned. "No, but that is not to say that it didn't help. It is great news after all. By the way, did you know they want to get a place together?"

Lilly's mouth dropped open. "Wow, they are not wasting any more time."

"That is what I thought. Apparently, there is a house they think could be perfect for them and it will be auctioned off, it's a police auction."

Lilly laughed. "Of course, they would look at homes from a state auction."

Not following along, Wendell gave her a questioning look.

"It is the circle of life, right? They put a lot of people in jail together and now they are planning to buy the home from a convict. Unless it is a home that was confiscated by the IRS from someone that just couldn't pay the taxes anymore."

"I guess that makes sense." Wendell agreed. "Booth asked me to go and take a look at it with him sometime next week. Apparently, the house was shot to pieces by law enforcement when they came to pick up the guy. So, it is going to need a lot of remodeling.

"Oh, that is great, so that is what got you all happy today?" Lilly tried again.

"No, but again, it helped," Wendell said vaguely.

"Come on, stop messing with me here, I want to share in your happiness," Lilly whined jokingly.

"I thought we were already sharing?" Wendell said with a grin.

Lilly playfully swatted him.

"Okay, okay. I'll tell you. Booth and I went out for a drink after hockey training and we got to talk about what has been weighing me down lately."

Lilly nodded.

"Long story short: I think Booth might have pointed me in the direction of a new career."

"Wow! What?" Surprise and excitement overcame Lilly.

"Yeah, we got to talking about what I find important in a job and that I really love the team. Booth asked me which jobs of the team I liked. I pretty much had to nix most of them. I mean I am not going to be the next Hodgins, Angela or Cam, or you. It would take too much schooling and I am not going to spend another 100k or four years on something new."

Lilly smiled. "So, what was is the right career path then?"

"FBI," Wendell said.

"What?"

"Booth said that left only his role on the team. I was as surprised as you are, and I am not saying I am going to apply to Quantico, but you have to admit it is an interesting possibility. I already have a bachelor's degree, almost got my master's degree so I would be admissible."

"FBI?" Lilly repeated.

"Yes. Are you against it or something?" Wendell asked, doubt settling in for the first time.

"I don't know, I guess I am just surprised."

"You don't think I could fit into the FBI?"

Lilly paused for a second. "I don't know. I guess you could." Lilly said, trying to make up her mind. "I mean, your fit enough. If I can pass the PFT than you can surely do that without having to get up for four weeks and train in the morning. I suppose I am just surprised because you're one of the science people, you know? It would be less surprising if you became - I don't know - an EMT or a science teacher in a high school, or a physical therapist. I am sorry if I am not sounding excited, I am just trying to picture this. You should definitely look into joining the FBI."

Wendell nodded. "That is okay. I understand. I am already happy you're not totally against it."

"Of course, I am not against it. Why would I? We both get to see the amazing work Booth and his team does every day. Hypothetically speaking; though, if you joined the FBI and finish Quantico; could the FBI just ship you off to wherever in the United States?"

Wendell furrowed his brow. "I don't know, I haven't given it that much thought."

Lilly nodded. "I understand. that makes sense if you are just gotten the idea. What I do know for sure is that I am glad you like this as a potential career."

"Yeah, maybe, but maybe I was too enthusiastic..." Wendell said. Relocating was definitely not on his wish list. He liked living in D.C., it was where he had grown up and most of his family lived here.

"Hey, no, don't do that. Don't let my surprise ruin it. I am sorry. Just do your research and then decide if you want to apply to Quantico. It is that simple. Don't already toss out this opportunity without looking into it. I am pretty sure I'll support you regardless of what you end up doing." Lilly said teasingly.

"You're right," Wendell said with a smile that came out a bit forced. Let's just order and enjoy our weekend.

"Alright. If you're FBI you'll be wearing suits all the time." Lilly added with a twinkle in her eyes.

Wendell cackled. "Oh, you would like that, huh?"

"Obviously", Lilly said, her face conveying the word duh. "Didn't you know that is why I went to law school?"

Wendell grinned.

A/N: I hope you enjoyed this chapter. Do you think it would be plausible for Wendell to get into the FBI?