Authors Note: This story takes place in the Criminal Minds universe with the occasional crossover into the Bones universe. As such, I only own my own original characters and everything else belongs to the writers and networks, blah, blah, blah.
Hope you enjoy.
P.S.: I am dyslexic. Any grammatical error is caused by such dyslexia, and after so many years of failing grammar, I could give less of a shit about how you feel about it or what I did wrong. If you want to correct my facts or translations, I welcome it. If something I wrote doesn't make sense, I welcome your opinion. Spelling and grammar errors? Not so much. If it bothers you, find something else to read.
REALLY IMPORTANT: This chapter is based off of an episode of Bones, so I'm sorry ahead of time if you haven't watched that show. But I was re-watching the series and the idea of having Spencer spend a Christmas with a bunch of people who for the most part have and equal intelligence was entirely to cool to pass up. Especially when you counter in that they're all trapped at the Jeffersonian solving a fifty year old murder case. If you don't like that, you defiantly don't have to read it but it think having Spencer bond with these people would be a cool idea, especially because it opens it up for him to help them with some of the serial killer cases they encounter throughout the series.
Chapter 3: December 23, 2015
"We're all a little weird. And life is a little weird. And when we find someone whose weirdness is compatible with ours, we join up with them and fall into mutually satisfying weirdness—and call it love—true love."
― Robert Fulghum, True Love
It was the day before Christmas Eve and Spencer had come to the Jeffersonian to pick up Harley and attend the Jeffersonian's Christmas party for maybe an hour. Tomorrow they were driving up to New Jersey to spend Christmas Eve with her wild and crazy Italian/Sicilian family, so they couldn't stay out too late or risk not getting to her grandparent's house in Trenton by the time they'd promised her Nonna. After spending Christmas Eve with the Italian half of Harley's family, they planned on driving up to Boston sometime around midnight to spend time with the Irish half of her family on Christmas Day, meaning whatever amount of sleep they managed tonight was even more vital. Or at least it seems that way in theory. It was crazy and complicated, and in the past three years of making that same plan of going up to Jersey and then Boston, they'd actually only gone to Boston once. The Italian half of her family was much closer and more important (to Harley) than the Irish half. And then a week later they'd been in Las Vegas to spend New Year's with his mom.
For now though, she'd taken him into a lab where two men were playing with a robot one of them had built on one of the tables used to examine bones in a lab she'd told him she and Zack, Dr. Brennan's other assistant, used. She'd wanted to check on Zach's progress with the robot before they left for the company Christmas party. After explaining that Zack was working on PhD's in both Anthropology and engendering, Spencer had agreed, wanting to see the robot for himself. They'd come into the room facing the two men, though neither of the two men had noticed their entrance.
"Stop! Stop!" the younger of the two instructed the robot, which had the opposite effect on the robot. Instead, it began to move faster and even do a somersault. This man was around their age, with shaggy, longish, brown hair, and what Harley called a baby face. He had on a red striped long sleeved button up left open over a red shirt and a pair of jeans where his Jeffersonian ID where clipped to on his right side. Harley had explained him as being socially stunted, mildly autistic, and around their level of intelligence. This all combined to identify him as Zack Addy, the other lab assistant. "Turn!"
Instead, the robot stopped entirely. Zack's shoulders slumped in defeat.
"Your robot reminds me of you," the other man, this one with curly hair and a beard, laughed, looking at his accomplice. He was shorter than Zack and thus had to look up to look at him. His arms where crossed over his chest. He had on a dark blue long sleeve that was pushed up to his elbows, a dark green vest open over that, and a pair of jeans with the Jeffersonian ID clipped to them the same way as Zack's. There was a watch on his left wrist and a rubber band on his right. Spencer identified him as Jack Hodgins. "You tell it to turn it stops. You tell it to stop it turns. You ask it to take out the garbage, it watches reruns of Firefly."
"After I fix the voice recognition protocols, this is going to blow those gomers at MIT away," Zack told him going over and picking up the small toy sized robot. Hodgins went over to some chemistry equipment set up at the other end of the room with only a clear liquid in it, and picked up a large beaker.
"Hey we've got about half a litter of pure alcohol hear. Dump it in the eggnog and we've got the best Christmas party in history," Hodgins told Zack.
"Not after the last fourth of July party," Harley informed them, catching them by surprise and causing the two to turn and look at her. She smiled at the two of them. "Have a merry Christmas you guys."
"You're leaving?" Zack asked, looking up from his robot surprised.
"Yeah, I have a trip up to New Jersey in the morning, and I still want to stop by the party upstairs," Harley explained. "I just wanted to stop by, see how the robot was going and wish you guys a happy holiday in case I didn't see you guys at the party. That alright with you?"
"Who do you have with you?" the other man, Hodgins, asked.
"Zack, Hodgins, meet Dr. Spencer Reid, my boyfriend. He has three PhD's," Harley bragged. "Spencer, meet Dr. Jack Hodgins, who has PhD's in entomology, botany and mineralogy, and Zack Addy who is working on two doctorate right now. Jack is our resident conspiracy theorist, and Zack is Dr. Brennan's other assistant."
The three shook hands before Harley hugged the two men.
"I'll see you two after the holidays," Harley told them with a grin. She'd dressed up for the holiday, wearing a lacy cream blouse under a red cardigan she's rolled half way up her forearm, with a couple of Christmas light necklaces. She had on a pair of black skinny jeans and a pair of red heels, with a Santa hat covering her almost bob length hair. To go with it, she'd donned red lipstick. Her Jeffersonian ID was clipped to one of the belt loops of her pants. Just because it wasn't Halloween, didn't mean she wasn't going to dress up for it. In contrast, Spencer was dressed in a red button up under a cream cardigan with a pair of grey pants he'd tucked his shirt into. Harley had even gotten him to wear a green elf hat with ears. "And I left presents for you both in Hodgins' office, so be sure to grab those before you leave."
"Wait up, I'll go down with you," Hodgins' told them grabbing a pair of antlers.
_._._._._
"Have you seen any of the others?" a woman dressed as an elf(ish) bombarded Harley about a half an hour into the party. Harley had introduced him to Dr. Goodman, an archaeologist turned administrator that ran the Jeffersonian, and a few others from various other departments, and Spencer was borderline in heaven with the amount of PhD's he was surrounded by.
The woman who had brown hair and tanned skin, was dressed in a green long sleeved shirt pushed to the elbows with a v-ed neckline, an open dark green (almost black) vest with red buttons on it, a black skirt, black tights, a green and red hat with a red pom-pom on the end and a square green button where it crossed her forehead. She even had a pair of plush, brown, elf shoes with bells on them. Her lips where red, and she looked mildly irritated.
"Sorry, Angela, but last I saw any of them, Hodgins was running away from Crystal from accounting and I'm pretty sure Dr. B and Zack are still looking at bones," Harley shrugged.
"Who is this cutie?" Angela asked, intrigued, looking at Spencer.
"This is my boyfriend, Dr. Spencer Reid. He works for the FBI in Quantico with the Behavioral Analyst Unit," Harley provided. "I think you might want to get to the lab now. It was looking like Booth brought Dr. Brennan a new set of bones when I left."
Angela Montenegro rolled her eyes and thanked Harley for her help (after complimenting her on her choice of boyfriends) before leaving to retreat to the lab. Seeing a short reprieve from the amount of people they were surrounded by, Spencer suggested they follow her, which lead to the two of them joining Angela, Dr. Brennan, and the FBI agent the Jeffersonian staff worked with, Agent Booth.
"Zack, I need you to find Harley and clean these bones," the woman, easily identified as Dr. Temperance Brennan, called out to the second floor catwalk where Zack and Hodgins's were standing above her. She had light brown hair she wore down. She had on a dark blue lab coat with her ID clipped to the lapel, a chunky necklace, and a pair of latex gloves.
"Now?" Zack asked.
"Ha, burnt," Hodgins smirked, trying to walk away with a cylinder of pure alcohol.
"And I need you to search the cloths for any insect evidence," Dr. Brennan told Hodgins.
"Geese, Bones, merry Christmas!" Agent Booth exclaimed. He had on a black suit with a light blue dress shirt and a thin darker blue tie. He had some stubble on his chin and cheeks, and dark brown hair cut close to his head.
"Okay," Angela interrupted them, taping one of her jingling shoes. Everyone turned to look at her as she stood on the platform with her arms crossed and foot tapping. Harley and Spencer stood just behind her. "You people listen to me. There is a party upstairs, okay? A Christmas party. We're going up there. We're going to talk to some people. We're going to sing some carols, we're going to drink some eggnog. You"—pointing to Booth—"are going to kiss me under the mistletoe. On the lips."—she turned to look at Hodgins and Zack above her—"I might kiss you guys under the mistletoe, too."—then, turning back to Dr. Brennan—"Maybe even you in a festive, non-lesbian manor."—then, turning around to face Spencer and Harley before swiftly turning back around—"I don't know about you two yet. But we are going to that party."
"I'm going to help Zack with the bones, alright?" Harley whispered to Spencer, not wanting Angela to overhear and get angry with her. Spencer nodded, going up to the lab with her, figuring he could grab a book to read on the stairs.
Later, after getting the body to the lab, and getting Spencer situated on the steps with a few books to read a couple of crosswords she kept stored in a drawer with some gloves, Harley pulled on a mask, standing back as Zack prepared the drill.
"Put on a mask," Harley told Hodgins through her mask. She'd left her cardigan and Santa hat with Spencer and traded it for a dark blue lab coat and a pair of latex gloves. Zack and Hodgins had done the same.
"I'm going to take a few core samples," Zack elaborated, holding up the drill for emphasis.
"Okay!"
Harley turned her back, looking at the cloths and other belongings they'd found on the body. She didn't notice Hodgins pick up the glass of eggnog, nor did she see him pull away his mask to drink it. She turned around as they began being covered in bone dust, and her eyes widened, her lips squeezed together, and her forehead scrunched. She was mad. But as the biological contamination alarms went off, all of that subsided as concern overwhelmed her. Hodgins, Zack, and Harley looked one another in the eye, before making a mad dash for the single decontamination shower in the room. The three of them tried squeezing through the door all at once, preventing any of them from getting into the shower until Hodgins finally had enough.
"Zack!" He pushed the younger man in first, followed quickly by Harley and then himself. It was a tight fit as the three stripped of their cloths and tried not to think of the fact she was in a shower with two naked men who were not her boyfriend.
Outside of the lab, on the stairs between the two levels, Spencer ran over to the landing where Dr. Goodman, Dr. Brennan, and Angela where standing as Agent Booth stood near the door.
"What's that?" Booth asked.
"Biological contamination," Dr. Goodman explained, just as they heard Hodgins yell Zack's name.
The doors to the Medico-Legal lab began to shut, and Booth turned around trying to stop them. "Whoa!"
"The doors seal automatically," Angela explained. "Don't worry about it."
Spencer came around the landing to stand between it and the door as the party on the landing began coming off.
"What do you mean don't worry about it?" Booth asked, coming away from the doors with his coat draped over one arm.
"There's no use panicking until we know what it is," Dr. Brennan explained.
"What what is?" Booth asked.
"Um, we might know," Harley stated as she, Hodgins, and Zack exited the doors to the lab directly below the one they'd been in. all three of them where only covered by towels. Hodgin's was wrapped around his hips putting a muscular chest and arms on display, while Zack had two, one wrapped around his waist and the other draped over his shoulders. Harley had a towel rapped around her chest, under her arms, and another wrapped like a turban around her head. She kept one hand gripping the ends of the towel together, and the other laid under her bust, one half of a defensive arm crossing.
"I cut into the fallout-shelter bones and the bio-hazard alarm went off," Zack told them as Hodgins put his hands on his hips, and Harley crossed the group to get her cardigan from Spencer.
"Where you conforming to autopsy protocol?" Dr. Goodman asked.
"Two of us were," Zack informed him snidely, glaring as Hodgins who bowed his head.
"The other was drinking an eggnog," Hodgins explained in mild shames.
Dr. Goodman moaned. Booth looked worried but confused.
"Wait, wait, wait," Booth started, turning to look at Spencer. "Who are you?"
_._._._._
"The pathogen is coccidioidomycosis," a man in a Santa suit on the screen in Angela's office told them. Zack and Hodgins had claimed the couch, Angela was standing over by the screen, Dr. Goodman and Dr. Brennan were over at the desk, to the right of the couch, Booth was at the bookshelves to the left of the couch, and Spencer and Harley were sitting on the ground to the left of it, in the far corner of the room. The three who'd been in towels were still in towels, and Harley had her legs crossed in modesty.
"Valley fever?" Dr. Goodman asked loudly as Spencer whispered it to himself and Harley.
"It was picked up in the scanner in the discharge vent at Mr. Addy and Dr. Isley's station," the Santa impersonator explained for clarification, like they didn't know where the pathogen had been released.
"What's valley fever?" Booth asked.
"It's a fungus that can lead to pneumonia, meningitis," Zack explained.
"Spontaneous abortion," Spencer added to the list.
"Death," Harley shrugged, figuring that should be tacked onto the list as well. She smirked at Zack when he turned around to glower at her for getting the last answer.
"You know, there are two species of coccidioides fungi that cause valley fever. These fungi are commonly found in soil in specific regions. The fungi's spores can be stirred into the air by anything that disrupts the soil, such as farming, construction and wind. Or in our case a dill into a bone," Spencer informed the group before the back of Harley's hand hit him squarely in the chest to silence him with a hissed, "Stop it!". Booth gave him an odd look of questioning.
"The alarm sounded shortly after Mr. Addy cut into human bone. That must have been the source," Dr. Goodman explained.
"Was he following autopsy protocol?" Santa asked.
"Of course," Dr. Brennan informed him from her desk. "However…"
"I was… drinking an eggnog," Hodgins admitted.
"And now he's there with you breathing the same air," the man told them, pulling down his fake beard.
"Hey, I got into the decontamination shower with Zack," Hodgins protested loudly. Then more quietly added, "And Harley. Haven't I been through enough hell?"
Spencer turned to look at Harley in confusion, but she rolled her eyes and mouthed "Later."
"Is he contagious?" Booth asked, earning a glare from Hodgins.
"Dr. Hodgins may have inhaled the spores, yes," the man on the screen admitted.
"Okay," Booth stated. "It must suck to be Hodgins right now, but the rest of us, we didn't inhale. So it's okay that I go, right?"
"Dr. Hodgins may have exhaled the spores all over us," Dr. Goodman explained to Booth softly.
"We have no choice but to impose quarantine," the man on the screen informed them. Harley sighed, knowing what came next. She was going to miss Christmas with her family and all of the jokes that came with it. "Valley fever can be fatal. And we can't risk a pandemic. Just calm down and let us handle things from this side."
"Anyone besides me worry that a guy dressed like Santa is in charge?" Booth asked. No hands raise, no chorus of yes's followed, and the silence of the group was the only answer he got.
"Merry Christmas," the man on the screen told them with a large frown before the screen went blank.
"Okay, you know what, if this is fatal, I will shoot all three of you," Booth told Harley, Zack, and Hodgins. Spence pulled her closer to him and looked at Agent Booth in confusion.
"Maybe you three could go get dressed," Angela suggested. The three left the room at her request, Harley taking a little more time to get off the ground.
_._._._._
"Harley and I zapped the bones with ultra-violet light and arranged them in the isolation table so that we won't have to worry about any spores," Zack explained to Dr. Brennan as the three anthropologists (or one anthropologist and two doctoral candidates) stood around the body on the platform. Zack was to the left of the body with his hands in one pair of gloves going into the isolation table by the head and chest. Dr. Brennan stood across from him, and Harley stood next to her on her left, with her hands in the other pair of gloves near the feet. All three of them had on their dark blue lab coats.
"In addition I found that sown into the lining of his clothing," Harley told Dr. Brennan as Zack pulled out a bag from his pocket, and handed to Dr. Brennan across the body so she could look at the baggy with a ring in it.
"A woman's wedding band," Dr. Brennan observed.
"Two tickets to Paris. A woman's wedding band. A picture begins to form," Zack went on.
"We don't form pictures," Dr. Brennan informed him, staring at the ring. "We accumulate evidence. Dental work?"
"Acrylic resins in the interior fillings from the nineteen forties," Zack answered.
"Childhood tibia break. Bad enough that he walked with a limp," Harley continues.
"Also," Zack added, pulling another bag from his lab coat and handing it to Dr. Brennan, "he wore a toupee."
"Doesn't seem to have degraded."
"It's made of a synthetic called Dinelle. It couldn't have looked good," Zack stated.
_._._._._
"This is a cocktail of four anti-fungal drugs, including amphotericin B," the man in the blue biohazard suit standing in front of them explained as another grabbed syringes of medicine that would be stuck into each of their behinds. All of them were in a line, facing the man in the suit who was talking as they prepared to drop their pants, get their butts pinched, and have a needle pushed into one of their cheeks. "Additionally you will be taking orally ketoconazole, fluconazole, and itraconazole."
"That's great. And then we can leaves?" Booth asked as Hodgins started putting his pants back on. Harley shook her head and Brennan gave him a look as the man in the biohazard suit answered. Spencer wished it was that simple. But he already knew the answer.
"We won't know for a couple of days if the fungus took hold in your system."
"Whoa, whoa, whoa. Wait, are you saying were stuck here over Christmas?" Booth asked with his pants on the ground as he had a needle shoved into his bum. "Look, you know, I have places to go, I have obligations."
"We all have obligations," Dr. Goodman told Booth, pulling back on his own pants.
"And, trust me, we all have plans," Harley sniped, glaring at Agent Booth in frustration. She hatted missing Christmas in Trenton. She wouldn't be able to laugh at whatever hilarious Santa costume her cousins had come up with. And she wouldn't be able to enjoy all of the home cooked Italian food that came together in a pot-luck fashion with different aunts, cousins, and the like supplying different dishes. And she'd miss the look of shere joy on Spencer's face as all of those events occurred.
"I'm supposed to have Quebec!" Hodgins yelled.
"Hey, whose fault is this?" Angela demanded, turning to look at Hodgins.
"Who forced me to go to the party where I drank too much and had to hide from Crystal?" Hodgins threw back.
"We should have just skipped the party and gone home," Harley hissed as the needle went into her butt cheek. Spencer couldn't help but agree as he flinched at the contact. He really enjoyed Christmas with her family.
"Who never should have cut into a bone with a drunken fool in the room?" Angela asked snidely.
"Who brought us human remains just to ditch a little paper work?" Zack threw down.
"Oh, hey, you're saying that this is my fault?" Booth shot back.
"You knew Dr. Brennan couldn't resist," Harley stated with the accusation burning in her eyes. She really wanted to be in Jersey tomorrow.
"Well, I'd have been able to resist if I'd been in Niger (A/N: a landlocked country in western Africa that borders Mali, Algeria, Libya, Chad, and Nigeria) where I'd wanted to be," Dr. Brennan added in, accusingly directed at Dr. Goodman.
"You're blaming me?"
"Ladies and gentlemen," the man in the blue suit interrupted. "We'll have sleeping bags delivered. Please have your loved one call me and we'll set up some sort of safe, quarantine visit on Christmas Eve… Oh, and be prepared for side effects."
"Nausea, fever, insomnia," Spencer listed off, getting looks from the rest of the group, and a nod from the hazmat team. "And in very rare cases, euphoria, dream state, and mild hallucinations."
"I'll take that, please," Angela smiled, raising a hand.
"Early symptoms mimic a common cold," the man in the blue suit explained.
"What if it manifests?" Dr. Goodman asked.
"First treatment protocol involves extremely painful injections into the base of the brain," Zack told the group.
"You know what," Booth started as the bio-hazard smurfs began packing up and leaving, "I never realized how pretty all this shinny stuff is."
"That is not fair," Hodgins and Harley complained at the same time as they all watched Booth stare up at the Christmas lights hung around the lab.
_._._._._
"Tomorrow, I was supposed to leave for Quebec," Hodgins told Spencer and Zack later that night as they all laid on top of autopsy tables in blue sleeping bags. Hodgins was in the middle, with his head near the sink. Zack and Spencer where bundled up in their sleeping bags in the opposite orientation. "You want to know the true meaning of Christmas? It's being inside a 300 year old inn with a French-Canadian misuse with ten feet of snow outside."
"Christmas is heading home to Michigan and heading into the woods with your brothers to cut a twelve foot Christmas tree," Zack corrected him. "And you all decorate it together. Brothers. Sister. Nieces. Nephews. Forty people who all love you and are happy to see you. That my friend is the true meaning of Christmas."
"Nah, I'm going to have to go with the misuse on this one."
Spencer shook his head. "The true meaning of Christmas is going to Nonna Lala's bakery in Trenton along with the fifty plus aunts, uncles, cousins, and friends that all belong to Harley, all pack into one building with a Christmas tree and one long table that wraps around the room with a kids table your still sitting at at 24 because all the grandparents, great-aunts and uncles, parents, and family friends take up all the seats at the adult table. It's the potluck of foods everyone brings and all of Nonna's Christmas cookies. It's having one of Harley's uncles or cousins dress up as some parody of Santa and force everyone to sit on his lap at least once while pulling crazy shenanigans with everyone taking pictures as he does so. And it isn't some normal Santa. Last year, it was Santa and the cross dressing elves. The year before that it was the Santa Bunny. I never experienced Christmas like that until Harley and I started dating. And it's crazy and chaotic, but you'll never be in a room so full of love and laughter anywhere else. The true meaning of Christmas is being with the people who love you and make you happy."
"Is her family going to come down tomorrow?" Hodgins asked.
"She told them not to. To video tape it for her. She told them that it's not Christmas if it's not at Nonna's and that the kids would miss out if they came down. I think her parents might come down for Christmas day though, instead of heading to Boston. She'll celebrate New Year's with them, while I go and visit my mom," Spencer explained.
"Your mom's not coming?" Zack asked.
"My mom lives in Bennington Sanitarium, in Las Vegas. It wouldn't be a good idea to have her come here," Spencer told him. Silence lapsed.
_._._._._
"I know it's against your nature, but," Angela sighed from where she, Brennan, and Harley were laying on the floor, "I need your help"
"For what?" Brennan asked.
"To make Christmas," Angela smiled. The three of them were laying on their backs, looking up at the ceiling in a triangular formation with their heads in the middle, the corners of their pillow bordering each other.
"Why because we're the girls?" Harley asked with a smirk. Angela wouldn't have to bend her arm to get her to comply. She already had plans in motion anyway. Aside from her birth/ween (October 31 just happens to be both Halloween and her birthday, which made her a witch, if anyone asks), Christmas was her favorite holiday. And if she couldn't celebrate it with family, well, she might as well make the most of it. Besides, Spencer deserved to have every Christmas be special after all the years of celebrating it alone or not celebrating it at all.
"Yes," Angela responded, happiness exuding out of her voice. "We have to decorate, and we have to have our own Secret Santa."
"You called it Secret Satan before," Brennan commented, not sounding the least bit excited.
"It's all so tragic," Angela commented, changing the topic. "A cheap wedding ring sown into his suit. Two tickets to Paris. It makes you wonder, who was the girl? Can you imagine what it was like for her, waiting and wondering? Never knowing what happened?"
Harley rolled over, her eyes wide at the enormous no-no Angela had just committed.
"I don't have to imagine," Dr. Brennan said in a tone of voice that squeezed at Harley's barely there heart-strings (yes, she knows those aren't real, but come on…) with the amount of sadness in it.
"What do you mean?"
Harley opened her mouth to answer but Brennan had already turned to look at Angela.
"I'll tell you what I'm going to do for Christmas," Dr. Brennan told her.
"Good, thank you," Angela responded. "At last you decide to take part."
"I'm going to solve a murder," Dr. Brennan announce, before climbing out of her sleeping bag, getting off of the floor, and then leaving her office.
"That wasn't what I meant, Sweetie," Angela said into the void left by Dr. Brennan after the office doors closed.
"Her parents disappeared around Christmas, Ange," Harley whispered, rolling back over onto her side. "But I made a deal with old Hazmat suit that means he's bringing a couple of burners, and a list of ingredients, so we can all have a home cooked, Italian Christmas meal."
"How did you manage that?"
"I promised him a signed copy of a book that no one ever gets a signed copy of."
Harley didn't respond to further questioning, simply smirking until she fell asleep with the Santa hat still on her head, and the smirk dropped into a parted mouth with droll beginning to drop down her cheek the further into sleep she fell.
_._._._._
Spencer woke up, in the middle of the night, and got out of his make shift bed to go down and check on Harley. It wasn't necessary, but Spencer had been spooked about not checking on her at night since they were nineteen. Harley had been on a plane with her parents with her hood all the way over her head and somewhere along the trip she'd fallen asleep. A few hours later, from unknown causes (maybe she wasn't getting enough oxygen with her hood or the way she was sleeping or what) but she'd stopped breathing. It'd later turn out that there were lesions on multiple parts of her brain that caused her to have seizure in her sleep where she'd stop breathing. She'd been on medication to control the seizures, but that didn't stop them all together, until finally at 21, right before joining the Jeffersonian, she had brain surgery to remove the lesions. She didn't have seizures anymore, but she had a dog that borderline sleeps on her as a precaution. But she wasn't home, the dog wasn't here, and Spencer wasn't sure anyone at the Jeffersonian knew about the seizures.
So he went to check on her as a precaution. And that's what he'll continue to tell himself.
He walked past Agent Booth without greeting him. The agent was still riding the effects of the drugs they'd been given and spouting nonsense that Spencer didn't have time for. Dr. Brennan was working on the platform as he passed, and when he entered the office, he noticed that Angela was fast asleep and that Harley was awake and staring at the ceiling.
"Do you want to take your sleeping bag and join me on the lounge upstairs?" Spencer asked quietly. Harley looked at him but rotating her head further back and nodded, quietly kicking her way out of the sleeping bag and collecting her belongings to follow him. They stopped to get Spencer's sleeping bag and pillow and they went to the couches on the landing above the platform. Spencer took one couch and Harley took the other. The glass ceiling above them let them see some stars (whatever stars you could see in DC anyway. It wasn't as magical as the stars in Santa Cruz's mountains or other less populated areas) but they faced towards each other and gave the other one last smile before going to sleep.
When they woke up, men in hazmat suits where bringing in a cart with breakfast on it and several carts that contained most of the things Harley would need to cook a good Christmas Eve feast. The two got dressed in the second outfit that Harley had picked out for them to wear to the party that had ultimately been decided against at the last minute. Harley had on a red velvet Santa dress with a pair of thick, Christmas socks she'd kept stashed in her purse, not bothering to put on heels without having coffee first. She liked to torture herself in those shoes sure, but there was only so much she could bare without having first had coffee. Her Santa hat which had gotten skewed in her sleep got re-adjusted, and the makeup that she hadn't quiet bothered to remove the night before got wiped down to the mascara and the last line of eyeliner circling her eyes. Spencer on the other hand had on had a cream button down under the blue Doctor Who themed Christmas vest that Harley had somehow procured for him. His hair was a mess but he could wait until after getting coffee to deal with that.
They meet Dr. Goodman down at the cart as the hazmat men left. The archaeologist turned administrator had on a yellow button up on. None of them said anything as they began pouring their coffee. There where somethings that just couldn't happen before coffee and polite conversation is at the top of that list.
Spencer watched Agent Booth do pull-ups on one of the exposed metal bars near the stairs as Zack and Hodgins came down the stairs. Booth had on the same pants from yesterday with a tank that had probably been under his shirt. He took his first sip of the warm, caffeinated heaven.
"In some cases of valley fever, separating skin lesions appear," Zack said loudly as he neared the bottom of the stairs behind Hodgins. He had on a dark blue long sleeve
"Can someone in a position of authority please order Zack to shut up?" Hodgins demanded, walking over to the breakfast cart and throwing his jacket over his shoulder. He had on a green t-shirt.
"If you want dinner tonight, shut the hell up, Zack. It's too early in the morning to talk about skin lesions. Why does it have to be so bright?" Harley hissed, taking a sip of coffee before invading Spencer's personal space to bury her face in his vest. He put an arm over her back in turn.
"Coffee. Coffee. Coffee," Angela repeated as she walked up to them in the same plush shoes as the day before with brown pants and a purple wrap on.
"Good morning, Miss Montenegro," Dr. Goodman stated as Hodgins grasped a bagel and Zack took the orange juice.
"Where did this come from?" Angela asked as Booth walked away from the group gathered around the cart after Dr. Goodman passed him a cup of coffee.
"A hazmat team brought it over this morning. Very appetizing," Dr. Goodman sighed. Then turning around to face Booth. "Are you back with us?"
"Yeah, think so," Booth answered with a smile.
"Okay, since we're going to be stuck together for Christmas, we should make the most of it," Angela told the group, garnering an "Oh" from Agent Booth. "We'll decorate this place and exchange handmade gifts."
Angela's smile was so wide it showed almost all of her teeth and produced dimples in her cheeks.
"An excellent idea, Miss Montenegro," Dr. Goodman congratulated her.
"I can get behind that," Zack informed her.
"I'm in," Hodgins stated before shoving another piece of bagel into his mouth.
"As am I," Dr. Goodman agreed. Harley nodded against Spencer's chest, although she had already gotten them all gifts. Spencer nodded because Harley nodded.
"How about Bones?" Booth asked, rejoining the group and getting unanimous negative responses from the group. "Come on, what's the deal between Bones and Christmas?"
"Last night I spun a little story… about two young lovers running away to Paris, but the man never shows up and the woman is left wondering what happened to him. And I say: imagine what that must have been like. And Brennan says: I don't have to," Angela confessed, turning on the sad puppy dog eyes on the group. Harley had rotated in his arm so that her back was towards his chest, and she was mainlining the coffee in her cup.
"Yeah, I… I still don't get it," Booth announces.
"Oh, my god," Dr. Goodman breaths.
"What?' Booth asked.
"Dr. Brennan's parents disappeared just before Christmas when she was 15," Harley informed him. Then, at a much quieter volume she added: "Do your research."
"And she never knew what happened to them," Dr. Goodman added.
"Oh god. That explains a lot," Booth replied. Mumbled acknowledgments and agreements passed through the group.
"Alright, we need a way to choose out Secret Santa's," Angela stated, gearing them to a new topic.
"I can build a random generator," Zack stated.
"Wouldn't it be better to match complimentary people in a premeditated manor?" Dr. Goodman asked.
"I've got seven numbers in my head and seven letters. Tell me the number, I tell you the matching letter," Hodgins decided.
"Are the letters sequential or are the numbers sequential?"
As they began to debate what to do and the lack of an eighth person (and that's why Zack couldn't pick 8), Booth pulled a pad from his pants, wrote the names down. He then ripped them up, put them in a metal jar, and held it out to the group.
"Just pick a name and if you get your own, put it back in," he told them. Everyone told him how good an idea it was as they picked names before heading off their separate ways.
_._._._._
Harley had taken over part of Angela's office to begin cooking Christmas Eve dinner. She was working on a couple of camper burners, with a few pots and a torch. She's made a batch of sugar cookies with the help of Hodgins and a heat lamp. And she was working on homemade pasta sauce for some manicotti. It wouldn't be as good as if the sauce was two or three days old, but she'd added enough wine that it'd still taste good. She was also working on making a batch of her mama's mashed potatoes that where so good you didn't even need gravy. Which she didn't have seeing as they'd be having a small chicken to share that Hodgins was also helping her cook. She also had a special grilled eggplant dish she was working on, and fresh French bread she was working on. And she planned to make her family recipe cream-of-corn soon.
Spencer had gone with Angela, Hodgins, and Zack to try to figure out some decorations they could put up, so Harley was alone when Booth showed up.
"Hey, Booth," Harley greeted him, stirring the pot with her sauce in it.
"Hey," Booth replied slowly. "Look, I got Spencer for the Secret Santa thing, and I was hoping you could give me a few ideas."
"Teach him to shoot?" Harley shrugged. "He likes reading, hard brain puzzles, and geek-dom. And me. And magic. He's been kicked out of most casinos in Vegas because he counted cards to get enough money to pay off his student loans and still pay for his mom's medical bills. And he works at the BAU with a guy like you: fit, experience, and a jock. Thank you for telling me you have a kid by the way."
"I've still got nothing," Booth told her.
"I'll trade you? You take Hodgins and give him the answers to one of his conspiracy theories, and I deal with finding a present for Spencer?"
"Nah, I think I should stick with my own," Booth told her, moving to leave.
"Wait, wait, wait! Come taste!" Harley demanded.
Booth came over and took the small metal spoon full of sauce. He put it in his mouth and moaned. "That's good. That's… wow."
Harley laughed as she watched him walk away.
_._._._._
"So if Lionel was indeed a coin collector that explains the levels of lead and nickel in his bones," Hodgins stated as they all sat around the light table with all of the food Harley had made gathered in front of them They'd all complimented her on her cooking and Harley had smiled. With all her aunts, her mama, and her Nonna, she wasn't all that great in comparison, but it was nice to hear all the same.
Booth sat at one end, Dr. Goodman on the other. Then Hodgins, Angela, Dr. Brennan, and Zack sat along one edge of the table and Spencer and Harley sat in the middle of the other. Seeing as Spencer is right handed and Harley is left, they sat closely next to each other so the others wouldn't notice their hand holding under the table. It wasn't that they didn't want the others to see, it's just private.
"When do they stick the needle into your brain?" Zack asked Dr. Brennan.
"I sneezed because the air is dry. It's not valley fever," she informed him tiredly.
"Any other symptoms?" Dr. Goodman asked. "Headache?"
"Any fowl smelling—"
"Not at the dinner table, Zack," Harley glared from across the table. If she could, she'd have kicked him. Or stabbed him in the hand with her fork like she'd done to her cousins many times in the past when they had tried to take food from her plate.
"Look, she sneezed twice, that's it. Did you find anything else out about the letters?" Booth asked.
"Quite a lot, actually. Yes, they are very, very passionate love letters," Dr. Goodman informed them.
"Careful Lionel had a girlfriend," Booth smirked.
"A girlfriend who was in trouble."
"Pregnant in trouble?" Angela asked.
"Wow, apparently Careful Lionel wasn't so careful," Hodgins stated.
"Unmarried pregnant girl in Oklahoma in the late fifties?" Booth asked, suggest fully.
"You suppose Lionel came up here to procure an abortion?" Harley asked, buttering a slice of bread.
"You know what, this isn't a very Christmas Eve type story," Angela stated.
"Of course it is, the whole Christ myth is based upon the travails of an unwed mother," Dr. Brennan countered. Everyone stared at her.
"Okay, can we just stop bringing up the whole Christ myth thing? Some people believe it's more than just a myth," Booth tried.
"Well, who besides you?"
"That would be me Dr. Brennan," Dr. Goodman stated. "I'm a deacon at my church."
"I do. Christmas and Easter anyway," Angela supplied.
"Although I do believe organized religion is just another political movement designed to control the masses, doesn't mean that God doesn't love me," Hodgins informs her.
She looked at her two assistants who hadn't spoken up. Zack first. "Hey. I'm a rational purist all the way. Unless you talk to my mother. Then, I'm Lutheran."
She then turned to look at Harley who was staring at her food. "And you, Dr. Isley?"
"Everyone in my family is devote Catholic. Accept for my parents and I who are Seventh Day Adventist. Sixth largest international presence, bunch of evangelistic vegetarians? Loma Linda? Some people mistake us for a cult? Two Zodiac victims where Seventh Day Adventists from Pacific Union College, their college in Napa? We don't believe in a hell?" Harley shrugged, trying to see if any of the things she said rang any bells. Hodgins, Booth, and Zack all nodded. "I mean, I question the bible because it's old and it's been translated so many times. But I don't question Gods existence. While there isn't science to prove he exists, it isn't like there's science to prove the counter argument either. And I've seen enough miracles to know that sometimes, there really isn't an explanation."
She looked to Spencer. "I wasn't raise with religious parents. But I go to church with Harley sometimes."
"I can understand why you'd be sensitive, Booth," Brennan starts, changing the topic. "You have a child out of wedlock."
"Sweetie," Angela frowned, disappointed as the rest of the tables occupants stared at her.
"What?" Brennan asked, not understanding what she'd said wrong.
"Uh, um… The letters display a combination of both block and cursive," Dr. Goodman tried, moving the topic of conversation onward. Harley bobbed her head, sort of understanding what he was saying.
"A combination of printing and writing?" Angela asked for clarification.
"It would indicate she may have left school sometime in the second grade," Dr. Goodman explained. "Most white children in those days would have at least obtained an eighth grade education."
"She was African-American?" Harley asked, seeing a new pattern forming in their case. Unwed mother, a woman's wedding ring, two tickets to Paris…
"Well I believe so, yes," Dr. Goodman nodded. Spencer squeezed he hand as a sort of reward for getting the right answer as Harley continued to think.
"Is there any way Lionel wasn't African-American?" Hodgins asked, getting head shakes from Harley and Zack.
"No, no. He was definitely Caucasian," Brennan told him.
"A white man and a pregnant black girl in 1958 Oklahoma," Angela started.
"That was bad?" Zack asked.
"It was illegal," Dr. Goodman clarified.
"In Oklahoma?" Hodgins asked. Spencer nodded.
"Not just in Oklahoma, here in DC as well," he responded. "It was actually prohibited in 24 different states. It wasn't until the Supreme Court case Loving v. Virginia that it was made legal in all states, but that was almost ten years later in 1967. And actually, the last law officially prohibiting interracial marriage wasn't repealed until 2000, but that was in Alabama."
"Then why come here?" Angela asked.
"Three words: tickets to Paris," Harley shrugged. "They couldn't marry here, so they were running away to a place they could get married and live together."
"Visiting hours, folks," a man in a hazmat suit said, coming up behind them. "Who's first?"
"As director of this institution, I claim that right," Dr. Goodman informed them, getting out of this seat and leaving.
"I have a brief announcement. You guys might recognize my dad, but I don't want to talk about it," Angela informed them. "So thanks. Kay. That's all."
"Harley is your family coming?" Booth asked.
"I told them not to," Harley supplied. Then she climbed out of her seat and pulled Spencer along with her. "Come on, there's something I want to do."
Harley dragged Spencer up to the catwalk with her and her trusty sketchbook and they sat with their legs dangling over the edge as the others talked to their families through the glass doors that prevented them from leaving. Harley drew Dr. Goodman and his family in graphite along with Booth and his son. She drew Angela and her father, and Spencer and his mother from memory. While she was watching Zack and his family, she drew her friend as multiple different superheroes. And she drew Dr. Brennan with the people from a picture she remembered that was of Brennan's parents. Spencer watched her draw, finding it amazing how she could get so much details.
"What about you?" Spencer asked. "You're not going to draw yourself with your family?"
"I don't draw myself, Pen. That's a sign of narcissism," she whispered as she began to draw the members of the Medical-Legal lab together with Santa hats on and smiles on their faces. "Plus I really hate the way I make myself look. It's never… right."
"You work with them," Spencer reminded her. "Include yourself."
She glared, but conceded his point. Although when Spencer asked her to draw the two of them, she shoved an elbow in his ribs as he laughed, having anticipated that outcome.
The two left the catwalk and found a lab where they could work on their Secret Santa's. They worked with their backs to each other, seeking comfort in the others presents. Since Spencer was gone so often with the BAU and Harley would go way for months at a time, they almost fused at the hip whenever the other was around. When they finished making their presents, and had wrapped them to the best of what was on hand, they went down to Angela's office and deposited them on the Angelatron. Then, much like the night before, they tucked in on the couches on the landing and fell asleep under the sky.
The next morning when they woke up, Spencer laughed. Her Santa hat that she almost never took off in the weeks leading up to Christmas had fallen off in her sleep and her hair which was about as long as his own was a mess. "Your bed head is insane."
Harley grabbed the compact she used the night before to draw herself among her team, and stared at her refection. "Oh, my god. My bedhead is worse than yours!"
_._._._._
They gathered in Angela's office an hour later, dressed and ready for another day. Harley had managed to fix her hair, they'd all managed to get clean cloths, and now for the fun part.
"Good," Angela stated, watching Dr. Brennan walk into the room, the last of the pack to join. "Okay, everybody. Stand over here."—leading them to the Angelatron—"Close your eyes."—she pressed the buttons to make the hologram Christmas tree she'd been working on appear—"Open you eyes."
"Oh!"
"Merry Christmas!"
"Angela!"
"Well done, Miss Montenegro!"
The Christmas tree in front of them was fantastic, and Spencer pulled Harley close to his, wrapping his arms around her as they looked on, marveling at what they were seeing. Under the tree was all of the presents they had crafted, as well as the presents that Harley had already had for the Jeffersonian staff. And she'd brought her sketch book to distribute the pictures she'd drawn the night before.
Harley stopped Dr. Brennan before she could leave and handed her the picture she'd drawn of the anthropologist and her parents, as well as the one of the Jeffersonian staff. She'd left Dr. Brennan's present on her desk so she didn't worry about that as the anthropologist continued to leave.
They all grabbed their presents off of the table and went to sit down on the couch further into the office. Angela started unwrapping hers first.
"We should be drinking eggnog while doing this," Booth announced.
"I wonder what this is." Angela asked, pulling the red plastic bag off of the framed picture. "Oh, my god. It's beautiful. What is it?"
"It's prettier if you don't know the details," Hodgins told her. Because telling her it was a picture of mold spores would ruin it.
"That is beautiful," Dr. Goodman told her before picking his own up and beginning to open it. "I wonder what it is."
It was a large paper bird.
"This is impressive," Dr. Goodman told Harley. "You made this?"
She nodded, grinning as Zack picked up his present.
"I'm next," he told the group.
"It's from me," Angela told them all as he unfolded it. They all marveled at the picture she'd done in either oil pastels or crayons.
"It's my family!" Zack told them. "And me. Thank you."
Hodgins dug out his present next pulling a carved beetle from the packaging.
"Scarabaeus sacer," Dr. Goodman informed him.
"Sacred scarab," Hodgins breathed. "That is excellently rendered sir. Thank you."
"You're very welcome," Goodman told him as Booth picked up his.
He opened it to find the robot that Zack had been working on. "Wow. Zack, that's a…"
"Self-propelled monotonic unit," Zack nodded.
"Well," Goodman laughed.
"It's a robot," Harley and Hodgins chimed.
"I thought, if we get out of here in time today, you could give it to your son," Zack told Booth.
"Merry Christmas!" Booth told Zack with a smile. "Thanks a lot."
"Aw, Zack," Angela smiled as Spencer picked up his present and began to open it. It looked like one of the FBI's folders for paper work and other things, but when he opened it, it was full of word puzzles and logic puzzles.
"Since you work for the BAU, I know you travel a lot so this way, your team can think you're working while you travel," Booth told him. "I thought it'd be a way for you to relax on the plane."
"Thank you," Spencer told him with a grin. He'd blow through it like no one's business, but he could probably refill it and fill it out while everyone else finished their paperwork. Harley looked on smiling as she grabbed her present. It was from Spencer, and she really wanted to see what he'd come up with. It was a thick blue chunk of silicon like material, but when she pulled it apart it was revealed to be a mold of a skull. "I know how much you like candles, especially of the skull variety. And this way you can make your own anatomically correct ones."
Harley didn't even say anything, she just grinned widely down at it before reaching over and planting one on him. "Thank you." they got a few laughs and cheers from their surrounding people. After wards they opened the presents that Harley had gotten them. They were all made out of wood by her cousin Antonio's wife, who was an artist that like working in wood, glass and ceramics.
Booth got a mini-model wooden Ballista, a piece of Roman artillery that looked like a cross bow on a stand. It had a couple foam slugs to shoot out for his desk.
Dr. Goodman got a few wooden figurines for his daughters to play with.
Zack got a pair of wood framed sunglasses.
Angela got a set of wooden snowflakes with incredicble detail
And Hodgins got a shadow box full of bugs made of wood.
Before they all parted ways, she handed them the pictures she'd drawn for each of them.
"Dr. Isley, you didn't have to do this," Dr. Goodman told her.
"I was raised with a big extended family. In my family, you give gifts to the people your around the most and the people that love you. That's how Christmas works. Sharing the holiday spirt," She told him with a grin as she and Spencer stayed sitting on the ground.
"Well, thank you," Angela smiled. "I didn't know you could draw like this, sweetie."
"Well—"
Before she could stop him, Spencer handed Angela her sketchbook. The artist flipped through it, amazed at what the other girl had drawn. "Wow. Where'd you learn to draw like this?"
"My mom does a lot of work with costuming and make up so she had to learn to draw. And so she taught me, and then we'd go to art classes together to bond. She didn't really know how to raise a genius child so that's how we bonded," Harley explained, accepting the sketchbook back as the others filtered out of the room.
"Did you do the woodwork?" Angela asked, staying behind.
"No, that was Carmen, my cousin Antonio's wife," Harley explained. "Carmen does a lot of 3D art work, and Antonio is a carpenter. They own a shop together in Pleasure Point, New Jersey."
"Well, this is so cool. Thank you. Merry Christmas," Angela told them. "Although I think it's time to get our test results back.
_._._._._
They all gathered on the steps to the platform, watching the two men in blue suits look at the computers scanning their test results. After a while it blinked green.
"Green!" Booth exclaimed. "Is that green as in go or green as in stick a needle in your brain?"
The man in the blue suit pulled the zipper down and took off his helmet. "Merry Christmas."
The buzzer sounded as the doors slid open and they all cheered as they all ran out the door. Spencer and Harley grinned at each other. If they left now, they could make it to Nonna's in time for dinner.
Harley ended up going with his to Las Vegas for New Years, and they had a grand time going to all the attractions that didn't include alcohol or gambling. And they ended up leaving with a few grand more than they'd come with (because while Spencer might not be allowed to play in most of the casinos on the strip, the same rules didn't apply to Harley, even though gambling fudged over some of her Adventist morals).
It wasn't until a few days into the New Year that Spencer asked what had ultimately happened in the case of Lionel Little.
"Brennan got in contact with his girlfriend, Ivy. She and her granddaughter came and talked to her, and she gave Ivy closure and a penny that could pay for her granddaughters med school expenses. He'd been killed for his coin collection," Harley explained. "Ivy had Lionel's daughter in Oklahoma, never married and wound up in a retirement home in Maryland."
Spencer nodded. It was sad, but sitting next to Harley as they ties on ice skates to go skating, he wasn't going to focus too much on that.
"Christmas is not a time nor a season, but a state of mind. To cherish peace and goodwill, to be plenteous in mercy, is to have the real spirit of Christmas."
- Calvin Coolidge
Authors Note: Thank you so much for reading. I'd really appreciate any feedback you can offer. Wither you liked my story or not. If I should continue. Please review. And I hope you all have a nice day/night.
And please tell me if you enjoyed this chapter of if I should never ever do something like this in the story again. Thank you, you wonderful people.
And a special thanks to ahowell1993 for pointing out a fact error I made in the last chapter.