Bones was just on today guys...it was freaking AWESOME!! Now...here's the next two chaps.
"You know Bones, it's very rude to hang up on your partner in the middle of a conversation." Booth said as Brennen climbed into his SUV.
"We weren't in the middle of a conversation and I had to grab Norman's intern before she got too far." Brennen got out her cell phone and put it on vibrate.
"Who's Norman?" Booth sped away from the curb in the direction of Raymond Stark's address.
"DNA specialist."
"Why? Whadaya got?" Booth flipped on his sirens and started to blow past the heavy afternoon traffic.
"We got DNA from some of the flesh left on my bones and it matched the name we found registered to the pin in the femeral head. One Maureen Stark, when you told me your suspect's name I…"
"You wanted to run their DNA see if there was any relation." Booth dodged a slow moving Buick and pulled back into his lane. "You're very smart Bones."
"I generally like to think so." She smiled and looked out the window, not at all bothered by Booth's jerky driving as long as the sirens were on.
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The SUV pulled up in front of Raymond Stark's home, where SWAT was loading themselves back up to go to a different assignment.
One of the agent's flagged down Booth. "It's all clear for you guys, Stark's not home. It is his place though."
Brennen started to open her mouth.
"And no Dr. Brennen, my guys didn't touch anything. A few busted doors, that's all the disturbing we did to any of your evidence."
"Thank you." Brennen said and marched off toward the house, Booth in tow.
Booth gagged when he got inside. "You smell that Bones?"
She nodded and said solemnly, "Human remains."
While Brennen began to search the house for the source of the smell, Booth took in the rest of the surroundings. The house was eerily empty. Nothing on the walls, no real furniture. Just a crappy TV with bunny ear antenna, a torn up old recliner and a coffee table. Booth was on his way to the kitchen to find Bones when he heard an agent calling him from the basement.
"Hey Bones! C'mere a sec."
Brennen appeared with a frustrated look on her brow, which told him she still didn't know where the smell was coming from. They went downstairs and found the room Booth hated. The creepy-serial-killer-wall-of-death-room.
Pictures plastered all floor walls lit from a bare light bulb on the ceiling. Hundreds, thousands of pictures of boys and girls ranging from ages 6 to 20. All were twins of other pictures on the walls. Booth's stomach turned. Ten of the pictures had red circles around them. They were the pictures of Stark's actual victims. The rest, Booth guessed, got off lucky because Stark had decided not to go after them. He told the agent next to him to identify the kids and make sure they were okay anyway though. He noticed there were no pictures of Kayla and her brother that Booth could see, affirming his theory that the street kids had been a crime of opportunity.
The only piece of furniture was a trunk in the middle of the room with a saw and knife on top.
"That's pretty convenient." Booth said out loud.
"Well, the door was shut with about four locks. SWAT busted it." The agent who had called him responded.
"And I'd say that with the behavior Stark has presented thus far, he probably wasn't planning on being caught." Brennen made her way to the trunk in the middle of the room where the smell was strongest. She collected the saw and knife in evidence bags and handed them to a nearby CSI. She glanced at Booth who had a pained look on his face and she lifted the top of the trunk.
Booth groaned and turned around, the smell was overwhelming.
"They're bones with traces of human remains, most of which has collected at the bottom of this trunk. I'd guess this is the rest of Maureen Stark. I'm going to need the whole thing sent back to the Jeffersonian."
One of the Agents nodded and a couple of CSI's put on masks and continued to take pictures of the scene.
"C'mon Bones, our work here is done, lets get back to the lab."
She rose and allowed him to guide her upstairs and back to the SUV.
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They returned to the lab and the team had assembled around the trunk, Angela stood a ways off though, not wanting to get any closer to the smell than was necessary.
To Brennen's chagrin as she and Booth joined the others on the platform, Cam was there with the rest of the team waiting.
"Hello Seeley, Dr. Brennen, I see you've brought us a present."
"It's not a present it's human remains." Brennen said matter-of-factly, her hands on her hips. She ignored the steely glance she got from Cam for her comment.
Booth took a seat near Angela, as far from the trunk as they could be without falling off the platform.
Hodgins, Zach, Brennen and Cam began to extract the Bones from the body sludge. When Brennen had sifted through everything she told Hodgins to take the trunk and identify everything he could from what was left.
"Most of the bones are in tact," Zach began, "Except these pieces here which appear to be the missing pieces of our skull."
"Well, Hodgins has enough of a sample of this…"
"Body goop." Booth chimed in from across the room.
Brennen glanced at him out of the corner of her eye. "That's not a scientifically correct term Booth."
"But it is an accurate one." He smiled despite the fact that the burger and fries he'd had earlier that day was now trying to make a comeback.
Brennen ignored him, but Cam proffered a slightly amused smile, which Booth acknowledged, though not with the same warmth he had been teasing Brennen with.
"Go ahead and clean the bones Zach and then get to work on reconstructing the skull. Work carefully, the bones are only a little over two years old but due to the damp condition of the basement they are in a more advanced stage of decay and very fragile. Get the assembled skull to Angela as soon as you can so she can give us a face."
"Yes Dr. Brennen." Zack immidiatly got to work and Cam wandered over to Booth, Angela had gone off to prepare the simulation on the Angelator.
"Hey."
Booth nodded in acknowledgment, but couldn't take his eyes off Bones who was studying the bones they already had from the past victims.
"I hear you stayed the night at Dr.Brennen's."
Booth whipped his head around to her. "Where'd you hear that?"
Cam just shrugged and looked upward. "I have ears everywhere Seeley."
Booth laughed a little, thinking of how Bones would be confused for a moment by that comment and say it was anatomically impossible.
"Whats so funny?"
"Nothing." He shook his head. "I literally slept there ok Camille? She slept, I slept, we were both fully clothed."
Cam stared at him, trying hard to make her decision.
"What? Why are you looking at me like that?"
She sighed and shook her head at the floor. "Booty call is not enough Seeley."
"What?" Booth stood and turned his back to Brennen, looking at Cam. "Did you just say 'booty call'?"
"Yes. Yes I did."
Booth raised his eyebrows waiting for her to elaborate.
"I thought I could deal with just being…physical with you. I know you said we were in a relationship, but it never really got defined did it? I just thought we could be friends with benefits…"
"But Cam…"
She put a finger to his lips. "It's okay Seeley. As much as it pains me to say this as you're your ego is already the size of a small country, you are the kind of guy that a girl just can't help but get swept off her feet by. I can't just do friends with benefits. I'd rather be all or nothing at all and it is clear," She let her eyes slip towards Brennen for a moment causing Booth to stiffen his shoulders, "that your heart is somewhere else. It's time for me to step aside."
Booth started to say something, but Cam turned around and stopped him.
"It would be easier if you just let me go, let me do this with a little grace, huh Seeley?"
After she walked out of ear shot Booth crossed his arms over his chest and whispered, "Bye Camille."
He turned back to Brennen, who was now bent low over a microscope, she hadn't heard a thing. A smile crept across his lips. He had just been dumped, and yet, he felt like he could fly.