Sorry about the cliffie guys...but I'm afraid it's only the beginning...
Hodgins and Zack had joined Angela and Brennan on the platform and were quietly discussing Booth's strange reaction to the skeleton on the table.
"Wait, where did you say Booth went a few weeks ago?" Angela asked, looking as if she was trying to figure out some sort of jigsaw puzzle.
"Oregon, why?" Brennan was still studying Angela's drawing, trying to decide if she recognized the face or not, maybe he was from a case she and Booth had worked together.
"Wait, Crater Lake National Park is in Oregon. These remains are from Crater Lake." Zack said quickly, "Maybe…"
The scientists were interrupted when a security guard came barreling through the doors and calling out Brennan's name.
"Dr. Brennen! Dr. Brennan!" He came to a halt at the bottom of the stairs, heaving for breath.
"What is it Charlie?" Brennan gave the man a warning glare for running in the lab and went back to the picture in her hands.
"Please come with me Dr. Brennen," he gasped, "there's been an accident."
Brennan's eyes dilated and she snapped her head back towards the other man.
"An accident?"
Charlie dropped his head slightly. "Yes Dr. Brennen." Was all he could manage to get out.
Brennan stood frozen, unable to speak or move as her mind raced with posibilities.
Booth? No, stop jumping to conclusions. It couldn't be. He was just here…
Angela spoke up, her eyes shifting nervously at Brennan. She knew exactly what thoughts were running through that analytical mind.
"Who Charlie? What happened?"
The security guard finally brought his eyes back to the scientist's.
"A black SUV and another car, Dr. Brennan. It's Agent Booth."
Hodgin's and Angela, who were standing nearest to Brennen, reached out to steady her as her legs turned to jelly and she clung to the examination table for support.
"Booth?" Brennen felt her chest grow tight.
He was just here. It can't be.
"Sweetie…" Angela started, rubbing her hand over her friend's forearm, concerned about the vacant look in her blue eyes.
She was completely underestimating Brennan's ability to receive bad news, quickly recover from it, and decide on a course of action.
"Maybe you should sit down." Hodgns suggested.
Brennan wriggled out of their grip, regaining feeling in her legs, though she could still feel her knees knocking together, and ran towards Charlie.
"Take me to him." She ordered, beating him out the door and into the street.
Outside Brennan could see flashing lights almost two blocks away and she wondered briefly, as she ran alongside Charlie, how the paramedics had gotten there so quickly. Booth had left the lab not ten minutes ago.
Reading her thoughts, Charlie answered her.
"There was an ambulance driving by when the accident occurred. They stopped to help."
Brennan didn't hear him. She was focusing on remembering to breathe as Booth's large black SUV came into view.
It was turned around, facing the wrong direction, since she knew he'd left the Jeffersonian toward the South on the one-way street. His driver's side door was completely smashed in and about thirty feet away a white SUV had smoke rolling out from under it's crumpled hood.
Charlie was still speaking to her, but she only heard every-few words as she searched the sea of activity for her friend.
"…Booth…they didn't see…blindsided…paramedics are sure…critical…no casualties yet…there he is there."
She heard his last few words, turned to where he was pointing and sprinted off for the ambulance.
"Miss!" One of the paramedics reached out to stop a woman who was running past him toward the truck. He grabbed her arm, not knowing what a fatal mistake he was making, "Miss please you need to stand back."
Brennan, so focused on getting to Booth, didn't even hear the paramedic talking to her. All could see was Booth's pale face being lit intermittently with blue and red flashes. His head held in place with a neck brace and blood. So much blood. His crisp white shirt and perfectly gelled hair were soaked in the crimson liquid and it made her stomach flip-flop.
She felt pressure on her arm and instinctively whirled around, planting a knee firmly in the chest of whomever was trying to keep her from getting to Booth.
The paramedic gasped for air as he fell to his knees.
"Oh my god, I'm sorry." Brennan tore her eyes from Booth for a split second and helped the man to his feet. "I didn't see you. I need to get into that van."
She immediately started off toward Booth again, he was completely inside the back of the ambulance now, they would be shutting the doors momentarily.
"Whoa, Scott, you alright? You going to be able to wait here and care for the others?" One of the other medics saw what the crazy lady had done and called out to his coworker, who simply nodded, still clutching his chest.
Brennan got right up to the doors and started to climb in without so much as a glance at the paramedics.
"Lady you need to get out." The man started to put his hand out to stop her, and then remembering what happened to Scott, thought better of it.
"No! Please! He's my partner I have to go with him." Brennan turned her pleading eyes on the man who was trying to hook an IV up to Booth's arm.
"You're his partner?" The medic connected the IV and studied Brennan for a moment. She was half hoisted up into the van and looked desperate, like her whole life depended on what he said. He maybe could have still turned her down though, if it wasn't for the tears rolling down her face. Tears she wasn't even aware she was shedding.
The medic sighed and quickly motioned her into the van. Brennan obliged and moved to sit right up near Booth's head.
"Oh Seeley." She whispered, mostly to herself. The vehicle jumped to life, red lights flashing in front and behind and the sound of a siren announcing their arrival to all who might stand in the way.
Brennan saw his face contort in pain but knew from the stats flashing on a screen over her shoulder that he was unconscious. She grasped his hand with one of hers and began stroking his forehead with the other, carefully avoiding a large gash the medic was trying to tend to.
The paramedic tending to Booth's head injury eyed the woman suspiciously for a few seconds as she whispered assurances to his patient and tears soaked her skirt.
Partners huh? Partners my eye.
-----------------------------------------------
Angela burst through the hospital doors, Hodgins and Zack hot on her heels.
"Where are Agent Booth and Dr. Brennen?" She barked at the nurse, her eyes were still frantically searching the hallway for a sign of her best friend.
"Who ma'am?" The nurse popped her gum and looked at Angela with a slightly bored expression. An expression the artist would have rung her neck for if she hadn't just spotted a familiar looking blue lab coat coming out of a bathroom down the hall.
Angela took off running, ignoring the sound of the nurse calling after her and vaguely aware of Jack's voice explaining her actions to the flustered nurse.
"Sweetie? Bren?" Angela took her by the shoulders, dropping both their purses to the floor. "Brennan are you alright?"
She chose to ignore the blood on her friend's hands and wondered desperately if there was anyone behind those unseeing blue eyes.
"Sweetie…are you okay?" Angela waited quietly for a response, giving Brennan's shoulders a slight shake, hoping to get some sort of response.
After what seemed like an eternity Brennan's eyes shifted and connected with Angela's.
"I threw up." She stated.
Angela furrowed her brows and sat them on a bench lining the hall.
"It's okay Bren. He's going to be fine." She still clutched Brennan's left hand with both hers and was staring hard at her face.
Brennan shook her head.
"They wouldn't let me go with him." Her voice was monotone, as if she were delivering facts about a skeleton on one of her tables. "I begged them to…but they wouldn't. He's in surgery."
"Oh, Sweetie." Angela abandoned Brennan's hand and wrapped her arms around her in a tight hug.
Brennan continued uninterrupted.
"They said mostly he would be okay. A few broken ribs and bruises from the impact…but…but…" Finally her voice dissolved into sobs, and she crumpled into Angela's embrace.
"Angela, I can't lose him. I won't. He has to live. He has too…" She sobbed into her friend's coat softly, trying to get a grip on the pain she felt throbbing in her whole being. Pain she couldn't ever remember feeling so intensely.
She recognized it, yes, knew the pain of loss all too well. But even when her father and brother left her for the second time, Brennan hadn't felt the wounds cut this deeply.
Jack and Zack had been watching the scene from a distance but finally approached the two women. Zack sat on the other side of his mentor while Jack remained standing, his eyes connecting with Angela's in a sympathetic glance of understanding.
Brennan pulled back, wiping her face furiously.
"The doctor said he'd be out as soon as he could."
Just then, as if he heard himself being discussed, the attending Dr. Howard George, shuffled through the doors at the end of the hall.
All the squints rose to meet him.
"Well?" Brennan was the first to speak, the breakdown of moments before all but forgotten except for the puffy red rings around her eyes and a lingering sniffle.
Dr. George shook his head slowly and Brennen almost died right there.
"I'm sorry Dr. Brennen…He's still in surgery."
Brennan grasped Angela's hand as she felt relief wash over her.
He's not gone. He's in surgery. Everything will be fine.
Dr. George was, of course, blissfully unaware at that moment, how much four people wanted to kill him for scaring them like that.
"It will be a few more hours, but we've got the best brain surgeon in the business working on your friend so…"
"Brain surgeon?" Hodgins blurted out, "As in someone is messing around inside his brain?"
"I wouldn't call it messing around mister…" Dr. George began.
"Dr. Hodgins and I don't much care what you call it I…"
This time the doctor was the one doing the interrupting.
"Please, I need you all to be patient." He turned to leave and then stopped, "And if he has any family, parents…children…anything like that, you probably want to give them a call, we've got a long night ahead of us."
He disappeared through the doors and Brennan stared after him for a moment.
Call his family?...That's not good. That means...
She sank to the floor, unable to complete the thought, and put her heavy head in her hands as tears again began to flow freely.
Brennan felt Angela and the others near her, but was thinking too hard to notice. She was racking her brain, trying to remember why she'd allowed herself to open up to Booth when she knew this would happen...just like it always did.
She knew he would be taken from her.
Oh yeah…because you love him. She shook her head, a sad smile on her lips. Damn you Booth, why would you do that to me?
Ah...but how can you not be in love with him? Am I right? R&R, and remember, I'm okay with one-word reviews from you shy types, just so I know I'm not typing to a wall here...