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"Oh my God!" Antonia shouted at the man writhing in pain on the ground his hand over his mouth and nose as blood began to seep between his fingers. "Oh my God. Oh my God." She mumbled again and again, frozen in her spot above him. "What the hell were you doing sneaking up on me like that!" She shouted, her breathing erratic as instead of helping him up, she started to pace over him. "What the hell is wrong with you?" She exclaimed, biting down on her lip as he managed to pull himself into a sitting position and lean against a cupboard.

"Hey?" He grunted, trying to get her attention as she walked back and forth in front of him. He held his hands to his face. "Hey!" He shouted, barely scraping the surface of the attention of the woman above him.

"I mean who breaks into someone's house and startles them?" Antonia lamented wildly, trying to get her breathing under control. "How stupid!" She shouted.

"Hey!" Aiden shouted again, wincing as the pain made him a little dizzy. Her head snapped in his direction. Her eyes were wide with surprise, and her mouth agape. "A little help here?" Aiden exclaimed, tears now rolling down his cheek as he watched her swallow hard, looking at the blood all over his hands, and his white shirt.

"Oh." She whispered, reaching down to grab his wrist, she pulled at one she had twisted, and he let out a yelp of pain.

"Son of a bitch!" He screamed, and she dropped him back on the ground, watching as the back of his head rattled off the cupboard behind him. "Are you trying to kill me?" He asked, letting his head rest against the cupboard, he watched her eyes move from panic to intense irritation. Her dark eyes narrowed at him and she stood over him silent for a moment. "What?"

"Why are you here?" She asked, still not offering help. "Why are you here, and where are my parents? Where is my brother? Did something happen?" She asked angrily, stomping past him into the next room, she left him on the ground.

Aiden watched her leave the room, and groaned as he tried to stand up. His head was throbbing and he felt very dizzy. He stood carefully, wobbling to his feet, he reached across the counter for a roll of paper towels and yanked at them for a moment. When several paper towels were in his hand, he carefully pushed it against his face, trying to turn around without falling. As he turned around, Antonia came whirling into the room, and turned to face him with a stinging ire that would have struck him dead if he could actually focus his eyes on her. "Well?" she exclaimed.

"Your parents are at the hospital." He grunted through the paper towel, and apparently that was the wrong thing to say, as he watched her eyes dart around the room quickly and start her angry pacing all over again. She started mumbling things about her father, and his health, concerned that all of his years of pie eating had finally caught up with him. She seemed inconsolable and completely overwhelmed. He reached out with his good arm and touched her hand, and when she shot him a glare that stopped his heart, he pulled back sharply. "Sorry." He swallowed hard. "Your sister was shot in the line of duty." He said, pausing for a moment for her to start her pacing and ranting again, but she stood completely still, her dark eyes staring directly into his soul. He was taken aback by the intensity of her stare, never wavering, never shifting. "She's in surgery."


(Twenty Minutes Earlier)

The siren on the police car wailed angrily as Officer Shane Dolan drove toward the hospital, the passenger in his front seat silently staring out the front window. The passenger in the back seat was just as silent, a fearful mother still gripping her grandson's hat in her hands, kneading the fabric between her fingers as she stared at her husband's face. She flinched when his jaw clicked, and she closed her eyes for a moment as she took slow, deep breaths.

Suddenly, Booth let out a strangled "Shit!", causing everyone in the car to jump. "Son of a bitch!" He exclaimed, patting his pockets, he slammed his hand on his forehead. "Goddamn it!"

"What, Booth?" Temperance managed to whisper, watching as he struggled in the front seat for a moment to find his composure.

"Phone. He said with a grunt. We forgot our damn phones in the house, and…"

"Toni." Temperance whispered, swallowing hard as she squeezed the winter hat in her hand again.

"Here. Call her." Shane muttered, tossing his phone to Booth without thinking.

Booth fumbled with the phone for a minute, staring at the smart phone in his hand, he pushed random buttons in his search for the telephone part of it, his hands trembling as he tried to remember the phone number he was attempting to call.

"Booth, what are you doing?" Temperance asked, watching him fumble with the phone, he wasn't even in the phone application.

"These stupid smart phones, Bones." He muttered, scrolling through one or two more things, before he found what he was looking for, and dialed a number. His eyes flashed to his wife, and she noted there was a darkness in his eyes that was lurking beneath the surface. He turned his attention away, and waited for an answer.

Special Agent Aiden Fitzgerald was just getting dressed after his shower, pulling on a pair of jeans to attempt to relax a little at his first Christmas away from his family, away from his home. He glanced to his phone, its ringtone screaming at him from across the room, and he walked over to it. He didn't recognize the number, but being in a new city, he wasn't surprised by an unfamiliar number. He lifted the phone to his ear, and accepted the call.

"Fitz." Booth's voice barked over the line.

"Sir?"

"Stop the sir, bullshit, Fitzgerald." Booth barked. "I need you to do something for me, it's an emergency."

Aiden straightened his posture, pulling a t-shirt from the pile of clothes in the basket beside his bed, he started to pull it on with one arm. "What's up?"

"My daughter Grace was shot in the line of duty." He said, not waiting for a response. "She's in surgery. I need you to go to my house and pick up my daughter Antonia and bring her to University Hospital. She doesn't know what happened, and I don't have my phone. I don't want her driving here alone." He said, as his voice became slightly less urgent, and definitely more fatherly.

"Yes Sir." He stammered. "Booth… I mean. I'm leaving now." He didn't even get the words out of his mouth before he heard the line disconnect, and he pulled the rest of his shirt on, and moved quickly toward reaching his destination.

Booth handed the phone back to Shane, sitting back in his seat. He continued his staring contest with the road in front of them.

"Booth, why did you call Fitzgerald, he's not on duty."

"Yeah, well if he's going to work with the Booths, he's going to have to get used to the drama." Booth snapped back, trying desperately to keep his cool.


Suddenly Antonia snapped back into reality, her posture straightening. She looked at Aiden as he pulled the paper towel away from his face for a second. "Oh, for goodness sake give me that." She said, taking the paper towel from his hand, she grabbed his good arm, and pulled him toward the sink.

"Hey, what are you doing? Didn't you hear me? We have to go to the hospital." He said, quieting suddenly at her cold glare. "Antonia." He mumbled.

She ignored his pleading and tossed the bloody paper towels into the trash can. She pulled a clean cloth from a shelf, and began to run it under warm water. "I'm not going to the hospital." She said, matter-of-factly. Squeezing at the cloth, the excess water tumbled over her hand, and she turned to him, surprising him with her closeness.

She carefully began to wipe at the dried and fresh blood on his face, staring at her fingertips as she ignored the wide green eyes that were staring back at her. "Here, you do it." She said, dropping the cloth into his hand.

"What do you mean you're not going to the hospital, your father sent me here to get you." Aiden said, blotting at his nose with the cloth, he winced at the sharp pain in his nose.

"Yeah, well, I can't save her life, so what's the point of me standing vigil over her bed like some kind of emotionless zombie, praying for a miracle." She said coldly. "I'm not my sister's keeper, and I told her that something like this was going to happen." She turned toward the cupboard and reached for another cloth. She swung open a drawer and reached in for a plastic bag.

Aiden stood back and watched her move quickly through the kitchen. He obviously didn't know her very well, but he could tell that she was just running through the motions in her mind, she was cataloguing and compartmentalizing. "You don't even know her condition." He said, watching as she emptied a handful of ice into two bags. She turned around and walked toward him, her dark eyes staring into his for a moment.

She stared at him for a long second, watching as confusion and concern rolled through his expression, with the occasional wince. She set her jaw, running her tongue over her teeth as she thought silently for a second, her eyes narrowing slightly. Then as if a switch was flicked, her eyes blinked. "You should probably have your wrist looked at." She said, dropping the ice pack on his now swollen wrist, she dropped a second one on top of that, and nodded toward his nose. "I also hope you weren't too attached to the straightness of your nose."

She walked away from him, and pulled her keys out of her pocket. "I'll go to the hospital on one condition." She turned, and watched him for a moment. "I'm driving. You have a head injury." She then turned and walked from the kitchen, allowing the door to swing closed in her wake.