"He knows George." Hester stormed into the room as soon as he opened the door.

"You spoke with your son?" He said as he moved back to allow her to enter the room.

"He found me. He was downstairs in the lobby. He told me that he knew who I was."

"You didn't tell him, did you?"

"No. I wanted to, but I didn't. He thought I was dead too, George. My husband must've told my boys the same story that he told me. Why? Why did he do this to us?"

"I don't know Hester," George said as he pulled his friend into his arms. He held her as she cried, yearning for all the years lost, grieving for her boys.

"Please, let me tell him. He already knows. He isn't going to stop looking. What more would it hurt now?"

"What if he wants to go to The Facility? What if he wants to punish The Leader for taking you away from him?"

"But The Leader didn't… he didn't know the truth either." Hester hesitated, "at least I don't think that he did."

"Your son is a FBI agent. He isn't going to stand back and just allow you to return in a few days or a few weeks. What will you do then?"

Hester removed herself from his embrace and sunk down on the bed. "I do want to go back George. But, I want to be here too. Are you sure that there isn't a way that I can have both lives?"

"What if he decides to follow us back there or to investigate your initial disappearance? If your son is able to reveal the secrets of The Facility, they will shut it down and arrest The Leader. The outside world isn't going to understand our way of life. You know how much The Facility means to me. You know how much all of us need to be there. You will be hurting your friends, hurting everyone you've known for the past thirty years. I know it's hard but this is the way that it has to be."

"But he already knows that I'm alive, George. If I just leave now he may try to find me anyway. Wouldn't it be better to talk to him, to tell him the truth? He's my son. If I tell him not to try and find me, he won't."

"Hester, you don't know him, you haven't seen him since he was a child."

"That is where you are wrong George. A mother will always know her child."

"I'm afraid that if you spend time with him that you will never want to leave."

"I promise I'll go back with you George. You've seen how uncertain I am of myself in this world. I want to have a relationship with my son, whatever that means for us, but I know that I am no longer able to live outside of The Facility." Hester wasn't sure that she was telling him the truth but she wasn't deliberately lying to him either. At this point she only knew that she needed to speak with her oldest son. She decided to play on the emotions of her friend. "Besides, where is your trust in me?"

"You need to realize how dangerous it could be for your son if he does choose to find The Facility. The Leader is not afraid to use lethal force to protect what is his. And he knows how much there is to lose if the FBI discovers his location."

"I do realize that and that's why I know that he will trust me if I am able to explain the situation to him. What if he discovers all of this on his own and I'm not able to warn him? Please George just let me talk to my son."

He knelt in front of her and took her hands in his. "This is my fault. When The Leader gave us the pass he had no idea that you were going to look for your son. If he had known that, he never would have allowed us to leave. We lied to him. The passes have always been issued on good faith. They are a way for him to show us that we aren't captives. But no one has ever chosen to stay in the world before."

What George didn't tell her was that people had tried to leave The Facility permanently. It was true that everyone who had ever gotten a pass to leave had returned but they hadn't all returned on their own terms. The Inhabitants were captives and the passes were part of the allusion that they had the choice to leave if they wanted. The Leader had trusted George to return with Hester and he had to be careful now not to let his love for this woman get in the way of his obligation to The Leader.

Hester knew that George was right, everything he had said to her the night before had made sense though her need to talk to her child was outweighing her loyalty to him and The Leader. She convinced George to stay a few more days. She was well aware of his love for her and she intended to use it to her advantage. But she knew that eventually he would return to The Facility with or without her. She planned to spend as much time as possible with her son until that day came.

The following morning she went downstairs for breakfast, hoping that Seeley was still there waiting on her. She looked around the room, disappointed when he wasn't there.

"Looking for someone?"

Walking with her head down because she was afraid to make eye contact with anyone, she hadn't even noticed her son's partner standing next to the fireplace.

"My friend, I thought he'd be here," she lied. Hester looked somewhere over Brennan's left shoulder as she spoke.

"Why didn't you tell Booth the truth last night?"

"I can't talk to you."

"Well then you're going to listen." Brennan looked around the small room, aside from her and Hester only one other guest remained. "Sit down."

They picked a table away from the other patron and Brennan began to tell Hester everything that they knew. "You've been following me and Christine. I know that you said Hank's name when you saw my ring. I didn't mishear you. Genetically you bare several markers that make you his mother. You share the same orbital rims, identical mental protuberances, and similar nasal ridges. You're a first degree relative."

"How can you know all that?"

"It's what I do." When Hester didn't respond Brennan hit her with the most damning piece of evidence. "You dropped your tissue last night. We ran a DNA profile on the contents against Booth's. You can deny that you look alike but you cannot deny DNA."

"DNA? I read about that."

"Excuse me? Don't act like you don't know what I mean."

"But I don't. Temperance, where I've been, we're not allowed access to television or books. They control every piece of information that we are given. They keep our lives very simple." Hester felt as if a weight were being lifted off her shoulders as she began to tell her story. Any notion that she should stop talking went away as Temperance began to ask her more questions.

"How did you find us then? How do you know my name?"

"I made friends with someone who had access to magazines. He let me read. I love to read. I came across an article about you and my son. And my grandchildren," Hester smiled.

"How did you get out?"

"The friend I made, he convinced them to give me a pass. But I wasn't supposed to talk to Seeley. I was only allowed to see him. I thought he was dead."

"You did? Booth thought you were dead."

"Edwin must have lied to all of us. He came home one night, after taking the boys to visit Hank and Clara. He had blood on his face and a black eye. He told me there had been a horrible car accident. He said that my boys were gone. I demanded to see them for myself but he said there wasn't anything left to see, that there had been a fire. I accused him of killing my babies. I was mad at him because he was alive and they were dead."

Brennan listened intently, handing Hester a tissue when she started to cry.

"I went into fits. I hit Edwin, over and over again. I couldn't stop. I remember him saying I was having a breakdown, there was a doctor there. I have no idea where he came from; it was like he just appeared out of thin air. But I was so upset it didn't matter. He gave me an injection. The next thing I knew I woke up in The Facility."

"The Facility?" Brennan scrunched up her nose in confusion.

"That's all they ever call it. I didn't even know what state we were in until George and I flew here last week. I couldn't get back there without his help."

"Do they harm you there?"

"It's isolating, but The Leader, that's what we call him, says it's for our own good. For the first two years I was almost catatonic with grief and the other ladies took care of me. They were all there because of tragedies in their own lives. It was exactly the environment that I need to be in. They essentially healed me. They made it possible for me to function, at least within their world."

"What do you do there?"

"I have my own room, a pad for writing, we play games, have conversations with other inhabitants. I've formed friendships there deeper than would ever be possible in the real world. We grow all of our own food. We sew and mend our own clothing. The men make our furniture and do the upkeep on the building. We are all responsible for our own tasks. My job is in the kitchen, I help to prepare the meals each day."

Brennan's genius brain was having trouble accepting and understanding all the information Hester was giving her but she continued to question her. "Who is the man you're traveling with?"

"George, he's a tier three inhabitant. They're allowed to help with business matters and to leave The Facility at times. But they have to return. I'm only a tier one inhabitant; we are kept to the strictest levels of controls unless we are in the presence of higher level members. George told me that Seeley would be in grave danger if he found out who I was. That's why I lied to him last night."

"Maybe you should let Booth decide what he wants to know. He's been in danger before, he can handle himself."

"This is a different kind of danger Temperance."

"It should still be Booth's decision. Please, come with me and talk to your son. What your husband did to you is unspeakable. You both deserve to get back what you thought you'd lost."

"I want to, Temperance, but George says-"

"Don't worry about that. Booth is very good at protecting the ones he loves. He had a difficult childhood and he deserves to get to know you now."

"Did Edwin mistreat my boys?"

"He beat them."

Hester gasped at her bluntness. "He used to hit me. He never touched the boys though."

"I guess with you gone there was a void that he needed to fill."

"I thought they were dead or I wouldn't have left. You have to believe me when I say that," Hester pleaded.

"I do." Brennan smiled. She was quickly forming a bond with the scared, seemingly broken woman who was sitting in front of her. "Hank ended up raising the boys."

"Hank was a good man."

"Yes, and he raised two good men. And you deserve to get to know them. What happened to the three of you isn't fair."

"Is Jared here in DC as well?"

"No, he lives in Ohio now, with his wife. The boys don't talk to each other often, they don't really get along."

"I guess that some things don't change."

"We can help you contact Jared if you'd like."

Hester studied Brennan's words carefully. She wasn't sure that she wanted to put her other child in danger as well. Not until she knew more about what might happen to them because of their knowledge. "What about Edwin?"

"He passed away while I was pregnant with Christine. It's been almost a year now."

"What happened?"

"Liver failure."

"That makes sense. Did Seeley attend the funeral?"

"He didn't. But he received closure in his own way."

Hester nodded. It seemed Seeley hadn't changed much from the wise beyond his years little boy that she remembered. The little boy who had tried to protect her from her husband. The little boy who always seemed to carry the worries of the world on his small shoulders. Realizing that her absence from his life had only added to his pain she decided that she couldn't keep herself from him any longer.

"Take me to see my son, Temperance?"

"No," George appeared from the shadows. "You can't, you've already said too much Hester."

"I think you need to let Booth decide what he wants to know. What are you so afraid of?" Brennan turned her attention to the man who had appeared in front of them.

"You don't know who you're messing with Dr. Brennan."

Brennan locked gazes with George. He tried to return her stare in an effort to intimidate her but his anxiety got the better of him and he looked away first. George wasn't used to strong women and he didn't know who he was dealing with in Temperance Brennan. He shook his head as he left them alone. If these two women refused to listen to him then he wouldn't stand in their way.

He called The Leader and asked for more time, their two week pass was nearly up. George was fairly confident he could stall for another two weeks but after that he wasn't sure. All he knew for certain is that they had to return before The Leader decided to persuade them to come back.