20.

Carter inflicts more pain on Sweets who almost escapes when the harsh movements cause the fragile building to sway. Sweets makes a jump for it but so does Carter smashing vital sections of the stairwell when he does. Booth & Brennan arrive but are soon faced with the only options of saving Sweets or catching Cater. Choosing Sweets they are able to escape the building as it collapses behind them.

As the dust literally settled the commotion was already present in the street below. Onlookers had gathered and Cam and Gillespie assembled teams of people they felt were trustworthy to show up at the scene.

Brennan cleared some dust from her eyes while Booth coughed away some that had infiltrated his lungs. Once oriented they turned to the figure that was placed between them - face down. It was a paradox, in some ways it had seemed forever since they had seen the psychologist and in others it seemed an eternity.

The threatening rain began to fall quite quickly which while it forced the dust out of the air made everything else difficult. Brennan watched as Booth advanced to turn Sweets over but she put out her hand to pause his abrupt movements. Instead she carefully placed a hand over his neck and across his back. Booth was impatient but he knew of no one better than Brennan to look for a broken neck. She nodded but didn't take her eyes off Sweets as they softly rolled him over. No one said anything as the unconscious psychologist lay face up now, all of his bruises and cuts shining in their horrifying glory. Booth turned considerably pale as his guilt deepened while Brennan tried to separate the duty to diagnose from the knowledge that under the frightening acts of violence was a man she considered a friend.

"Oh God." Hodgins said as he looked down. "I don't know what I expected but I didn't expect…maybe I did…I…what can I do?"

"Was Carter upstairs when you guys ran out?" Cam asked approaching them now as well, trying her best not to look at the mangled profiler so she could still be effective on the case for now.

"I don't know, I think so." Booth said though his eyes were glued to taking an inventory of each of the injuries.

"I'm going to secure the area." Cam announced and felt quick to leave before she either threw up or burst into tears, or both.

Hodgins quickly followed. "I'm going to get a team here to start searching for Carter's body."

At the mention of Carter's name Sweets eyes opened though they twitched as he tried to hide the painful sensations he had awakened to. He instantly tried to sit up and Brennan was surprised that he was even mobile based on what she was seeing. Booth followed Brennan's lead of trying to urge him to lie back down until she could examine him.

Sweets shook his head. "Carter. Have to go." He mumbled as his body moved to what his mind failed to comprehend.

"It's okay Sweets, we're here." Booth said trying to calm him down, he could feel Sweets heart racing against the palm of his hand he was gently pushing against his chest to get him to rest.

"NO!" Sweets said not allowing himself to be lowered. "He'll see, can't be here." Sweets eyes though bruised and cut looked everywhere, searching. Booth instantly sensed Sweets' paranoia and having learned only a glimpse from Julie what had gone on, he couldn't fault Sweets actions. He also couldn't promise that Carter was dead, the man had proved to be a slippery fish more than once.

"Bones, how about we get Sweets off the street?" Booth's suggested was two-fold, for one he didn't think the wet and cold street was the best place anyway plus it might calm Sweets' nerves if they were not in plain sight. An ambulance had yet to arrive but Brennan spied a small vet clinic on the corner. It was farther from the other locations but she was sure she could secure some supplies in the small and secluded space.

Booth saw where she was looking and nodded. "Okay Sweets we are heading down the street okay? We're going to move you slowly."

"No, let's hurry." Sweets said trying to stand but the adrenaline gone his body had little ability to act on itself. Brennan still felt strongly against moving Sweets but recognized the rain and street were not the most favorable of conditions.

Once Sweets was vertical though once up couldn't hold his own weight and began to slip. Once she looked down at his feet she began to see why, Booth's eyes followed, having not noticed that Sweets was barefoot in the cold and having walked great distances.

"I've got him." Gillespie said walking up behind Brennan and taking the other half of the man's weight. Brennan nodded, still in a moment of shock as she ran ahead to the vet's office. She had concentrated on Sweets' vitals such as the chest, the face for air and heartbeat. She knew some of what to expect based on Julie's testimony but still to see it in person, on the person she knew well, was no less shocking.

As they began to walk away from the building Sweets looked back at it. "No! The book, I've got to go back." Sweets said but his body flat out said no.

Booth didn't really care about much else than getting Sweets taken care of but he was becoming difficult in his quest to return to the scene.

"I have it." Brennan said and pulled it from a flap inside her jacket. Sweets hand went out to touch it since he could barely see by now but though the book was right in front of him he couldn't grasp it. It was then that Brennan noticed the distorted fingers. She bit her tongue at the sight and placed the book at Sweets' chest and laid his arm across it. It made it harder for Gillespie to help carry him but it calmed Sweets considerably to know it was near.

By the time they reached the vet's office sirens began to wail down the street gaining Booth & Gillespie's attention, Brennan noticed. They went in to the shop where the Veterinarian, Bob, was startled. He had been in the back and hadn't heard the noises going on, he had been working of fixing a dog's broken leg. He quickly moved the dog to another table so they could set Sweets down.

"You're needed at the scene." Brennan said to the two law men.

Gillespie quickly nodded but Booth seemed torn. "I should stay."

Brennan lowered her voice hoping Sweets couldn't hear her. "No, I've got this. You need to make sure that none of Carter's people show up there first. You need to find him, for sure."

Booth nodded and enlisted the Veterinarian's help at the scene leaving Brennan alone with Sweets and the few animals that were there. The air was thick with an old and dank building which also smelled like wet dogs but her senses shut off to that as she concentrated on Sweets.

She made quick work of checking his vitals, off of which checked out within reasonable ranges. She ran her hands along his neck then down to his shoulder when he flinched. She looked at the old and tattered sweatshirt and found scissors to remove it then the threadbare gloves that missed the digits on most of them. Sweets shivering alerted her to locate a blanket though old and torn was still better than the clothes he had been wearing. She covered him as best she could and silently went back to work.

With the sweatshirt gone she could see the deep damage down to the shoulder blade and remembered the baseball bat, most likely the offender to this injry she cateloged to herself. There was nothing to reset in the bone, it was damage to the skin and muscle that caused the most damage. The looked at his arm, peppered with bruises down to his hand with the disfigured digits. She pursed her lips before issuing a warning. "This is going to hurt Sweets." She hated to see how he nodded but the resigned look of 'really? more?' stung at her insides. With as quick of motion as she could she popped the fingers back to a proper position and used an combination of tongue depressors and medical tape to set them in place in a make shift splint.

She moved seamlessly over the rest of his body, from his other arm back to his head where she gently inspected each bruise and cut though most appeared to not be indicative of a head injury that was terribly serious - Carter put most of his force into Sweets chest. His face was still littered with a black eye, cuts on his forehead and a split lip but the chest was by far the area with the most injuries. Brennan noticed that Sweets eyes followed her every moment, each time she touched him he instinctively grabbed the book only to relax a second later.

"Sweets would you feel better if I told you everything I was doing?"

He shook his head no, he didn't want to know how bad he was. His thumb caressed the cover of the book as his mind grasped at thoughts.

"You need to stop." He said earning an arched eyebrow from Brennan. "The book, they need to be found, now, not this."

"We will get to them Sweets, I promise." Brenann said continuing her inspection.

"No, you don't understand." He said trying to sit up again but she quickly pushed him back down. "They could be lost if we don't get them now."

"Okay." Brennan said. "Once Booth gets back we will get to work on this."

"Where is Booth?" Sweets asked lying back down and fighting exhaustion.

"He is investigating."

"Carter?"

"Yes." Brennan answered honestly. "Sweets I know before we failed you, but he's not going to come after you again."

Sweets nodded but he didn't seem convinced. Brennan thought he must have found some solace in the idea because for the first time since she had seen him again he was relaxed enough to rest. She went back to work pulling shrapnel that was embedded in his feet.

Brennan pulled the blanket more closely around Sweets as he still lay sleeping. She had added a makeshift pillow and wished there were something better than the steel table to lay on. She imagined all this was a four star hotel compared to Carter's captivity however. She sat next to him for a moment until Booth and Cam came in the door, the bell over it letting out a sweet ring to alert of a visitor's presence. She hadn't noticed it before - too busy on other things she considered.

"How is he?" Cam asked stepping the closest first. She noticed that he looked better, better than hell anyway as Brennan had removed a layer of dirt from his face along with old and dried blood. His face looked somewhat restful and Cam didn't cringe as much to be this near to him this time.

"He is …. stable." Brennan said picking her words carefully. "He has sustained a high number of injuries but I am confident in time they will all heal completely."

Booth nodded, we didn't lose him thought to himself but something nagged at the back of his mind that he could not define.

"We still need to get him proper medical attention." Brennan explained. "I've used as much of what I can here including some near expiration morphine."

A slight moan made their attention turn but it hadn't come from Sweets, the mutt with the broken leg was stirring from his surgery. Booth went over and patted the dog and rubbed his ears. It was soothing in a way that he finally felt like he could do something.

"How is it at the crime scene?" Brennan asking having noticed on the clock that several hours had gone by. Cam & Booth looked at each other with long faces.

"We didn't find him." Cam said with a heavy breath.

"Hodgins had them combing over every inch." Booth promised her. "Gillespie and I had teams of only people we can trust. He's not there."

"Should we tell Sweets?" Cam asked.

"He knows." The voice from the table said though his eyes were still shut. "He's broken, not deaf."

The others exchanged looks and Cam approached but Sweets shook his head. "I'm fine." She stopped, from doing what she didn't know, offering some sort of comfort.

"Sweets, I…"

"I just need some rest." He turned his head to the side. "Then we need to get to work."

Cam looked back at Booth with a 'what the hell is he talking about' look. The three of them moved to the front of the room.

"He's wanting to track down those people Carter had." Booth explained.

"Well won't Carter move them now that he knows Sweets is onto him." Cam asked.

"He can't remember where every single person is." Brennan suggested. "I flipped thru the book, there's hundreds of entries."

"I haven't examined him but I can tell he is no condition to work." Cam warned.

Booth nodded in agreement.

"I would agree except I think if you don't let Sweets work on this, he… he may never really recover." Brennan advised.

"Again with psychosis Dr. Brennan?" Cam asked.

Brennan shook her head. "I don't know, what I do know is he won't let go of that book."

"He had to fight with his life to get it." Booth reminded them. "I wouldn't give it up either." He sighed. "I know it's not medically advisable but I agree with Bones. I've seen guys in the field be like this. They have to see the whole thing thru."

"He doesn't trust us to do it?" Cam asked.

"It's not about trust." Booth said. "Sometimes it's things you feel you have to atone for."

"Are we talking about Sweets or are we talking about you?" Cam asked but Booth only offered a non-committal stare.

"Are you sure this is a good idea?" Cam asked walking alongside Booth back to the vet clinic. "I mean he even referred to himself as broken."

"Maybe he meant broken bones, which he does have." The statement didn't make himself feel any better.

"Seeley…"

"Cam I know, I agree." Booth said stopping as they neared the door. "But the only person I could really ask about what we should and shouldn't do in this case is also the person I would ask. I'm working this one blind, trying to go with my gut. Besides, if Sweets is on the case then he's not alone and Carter can't find him."

"Do you think he will try, even now?" Cam asked surprised.

"I think Carter has an unhealthy interest in Sweets."

"Sounds like everyone's a psychologist."

"Have to be, ours is out of commission I'm afraid." Booth opened the door and went inside. He was pleased to see that Sweets was up and sitting now though still ensconced in the old blanket. He was by the wall looking to the side and Booth soon noticed what he was doing, petting the dog that was on the floor next to him. The dog vigorously wagged his tale as Sweets rubbed his ears and leaned into his hand. Booth could see that Sweets was getting tired but had no intent on stopping anytime soon.

"Found a new furry friend?" Booth asked.

"Why did you stop shaving?" Sweets said and it took Booth a second to realize Sweets had made a joke. "Yeah he's a good dog, golden retrievers are very smart dogs you know."

"Yeah, I can see that." Booth sat down opposite Sweets who was relaxed and perhaps open to conversation. "He's doing pretty good for a broken leg."

"Funny thing about dogs, they just keep going, they don't let broken bones bother them, always faithful."

Booth waited for Sweets to make the connection with himself but he hadn't before he started talking again.

Sweets cleared his throat. "Dr. Brennan said the vet found him, his caretaker didn't take care of him, he was pretty beat up." Sweets kept rubbing the dog's ears. "Seems common these days."

Booth had a suspicion that was as close to the topic that Sweets was going to actually get, perhaps ever. Booth didn't know what to do, should he ask Sweets to talk about it, should he not bring it up, damn I'm not the shrink here.

"I've got some clothes for you, they're not the best but it's what I could find." Booth smiled. "Better than a blanket anyway right?"

Sweets nodded but with the dog in one hand and the log book in the other Booth just sat the clothes next to him, it was obvious Sweets wasn't going to give up the others at the moment.

The vet came in the door and Booth was glad to see him so that the unfamiliar conversation did not need to continue.

"Hey doc, what's your plans for the dog?"