A/N: Sorry this one's a little rushed kiddies but put it down to the clocks going back. Or forward. Or whatever the hell happened to throw my body clock through a loop. What's wrong with a little standardised time for God's sake? All this switching back and forth confuses the hell out of me... Anyways, just a little quick one for you here. There's only two, maybe three, chapters to go so it'll hopefully all be over soon. And I promise there will be more warm and fluffies to come!

PS: Thanks for all the reviews on the last chapter. Sorry if I scared you but it ain't over yet...

"Don't lose your faith in me
And I'll try not to lose my faith in you.
Don't put your trust in walls,
'Cause walls will only crush you when they fall.
Be here now, here now."

'Be Here Now', Ray LaMontagne

oo00oo

LANDSTUHL REGIONAL MEDICAL CENTER, GERMANY

Temperance Brennan paced up and down the sterile corridors, her arms tightly wrapped around her. In her hurry to reach the airport, she had forgotten to bring warmer clothes. She had almost forgotten to bring her passport.

She didn't notice the young nurse watching her. In her starched scrubs, the blonde eyed the dishevelled woman with concern. Her hair was a matted mess, her eyes red and hooded with tiredness, her clothes wrinkled from the ten hour journey.

The nurse was used to seeing distressed relatives worrying about their loved ones, pacing and praying and waiting, just waiting for news. What kind of news it was - good or bad - that didn't matter in the end. Every single person just needed to know, needed that closure and resolution.

Sighing, the nurse looked down at the chart for the worried woman's loved one. A sniper in the Rangers turned FBI agent, a good guy who ended up back in Iraq to try and do the right thing. A man now lying on an operating table, barely clinging on to the world he'd fought so hard to protect.

Laying down the chart, the nurse just hoped the worried woman's answers weren't about to come in yet another flag-draped wooden box.

oo00oo

Temperance didn't know how long she'd been dozing in the uncomfortable plastic chairs. The hours had all seemed to merge in to one long daze, drowning her in her fears and uncertainty.

Sitting up and stretching out the kinks in her muscles, Brennan couldn't get rid of the hollow feeling in her stomach. Dropping her head in to her hands, she stared at the floor, trying to drive the image of her partner in pain out of her mind.

The soft sound of footsteps pulled Brennan back to the sterile corridor. She looked up in to the kindly eyes of a young blonde nurse. She stopped in front of her, a chart clutched to her chest.

"I'm sorry to disturb you. You're Doctor Brennan aren't you?"

She staggered to her feet, trying to shake the sleep from her mind.

"Yes, do you have any news?"

The nurse glanced down at the chart.

"Agent Booth is out of surgery. They're taking him up to ICU now."

Brennan stepped forward, resisting the urge to snatch the chart out of the woman's hands.

"And his prognosis?"

"So far, it's hard to tell. As I said, he's only just come out of surgery so until the swelling goes down…"

"Swelling? Exactly what kind of surgery did he have?"

The nurse frowned.

"You mean, the doctors haven't spoken to you?"

Brennan sighed, running a tired hand across her face as she sat herself back down.

"Well, no. They were a little busy cutting my partner up when I got here."

"Doctor Brennan, I'm sorry but I really should let you speak to the surgeon before -"

The anthropologist practically jumped to her feet, invading the nurse's personal space with eyes that flashed with anger.

"Look, I didn't fly half way round the world for nearly eight hours before being crammed in to a tiny little car for an hour and a half just to get here and be given the run around. So tell me what's going on."

The nurse didn't back away. She just stared at the scared woman in front of her with eyes that had seen it all before and wished they hadn't. Eventually Brennan sunk down in to the uncomfortable seat again, dropping her head in to her hands.

"I'm sorry. I just… I need to know what's going on with him. He's my partner. He's my…"

She seemed to choke on her words and the nurse seated herself beside her, relenting.

"Doctor Brennan, Agent Booth suffered severe injuries during the attack on the base. Although he was wearing a bullet proof vest, it appears that some of the insurgents had Teflon coated bullets, sometimes called 'cop killers'."

She paused, laying a soothing hand on the scared woman's arm.

"I'm afraid that some of those bullets pierced Agent Booth's flak jacket. Two were easily treatable flesh wounds but one hit the ribcage, deflecting off the bone and hitting… Well, an exploratory laparotomy revealed that there was a large amount of damage done to the liver, kidneys and the heart."

Brennan seemed to shrink in to the chair, blinking back tears.

"His… His heart?"

The nurse squeezed her arm reassuringly.

"It's not as bad as it sounds, I promise. The bullet lost some energy as it passed through the Kevlar and flesh, slowing it down and causing it to be pulled in to the cardiovascular system and creating a pulmonary embolism. It's neither rare nor fatal when it is caught in time. And in this case, it was. The doctors operated, removed the bullet and relieved the pressure on his heart. However, there were some minor complications with his burns and the shrapnel from the explosion."

Brennan let out a shuddering breath, staring straight ahead.

"What kind of complications?"

The nurse looked down at the chart, knowing that this was the type of woman who would want facts over empty promises and reassurances.

"It appears that some of the shrapnel from the explosion lodged into his back, and when he was dragged away from the scene it shifted, hitting the spinal column. It caused the inter-vertebrae disk between thoracic vertebrae T5 and T6 to dislocate."

Brennan grimaced, turning away to hide the tears on her cheeks, her voice quiet and weak.

"But that sort of displacement would likely severe the nerves in the spinal column, causing paralysis from the waist down…"

The nurse watched the woman battle her emotions with clinical detachment, attempting to bury her fear in facts and figures. It didn't seem to be helping.

"Doctor Brennan, as I said, we won't know anything until the swelling goes down. But Agent Booth, he seems to be a fighter."

Her encouragement did nothing to sooth the turbulent storm in those sharp blue eyes that stared back at her, slowly turning away to stare down at her hands. She was clutching a small toy pig, absently rotating it in her palm.

"He is a fighter. He always has been. But if he's… I don't know what he'd… He has a son. Parker, he… He has a son…"

The nurse watched a solitary tear creep down the woman's face. She hadn't even seemed to have noticed.

She really loves this guy.

"I'll get a doctor to come and speak to you as soon as they can to explain everything properly. If you need anything in the meantime, just give me a shout. My name is Susan, Susan Escrow."

Walking away down the sterile corridor, the nurse clutched the chart to her chest as a type of barrier from the worry she felt creeping in. She had been here before more times than she cared to count with more families than deserved to be faced with this kind of news. And once again, Susan found herself praying that for once this story would have a happy ending.

A/N: Haven't had time to check this one properly so I hope my anatomical knowledge is holding up. Any glaring mistakes, let me know! Catch you kiddies tomorrow and thanks for reading! It's much appreciated.