239Author's Note: First, major spoilers for Secret in the Siege!
Avoid going any further if you don't want to know anything.
~Q~
Second, given a quite recent update to one of my other stories, the first thing that popped into my mind was the way Booth instantly lied to Brennan about who was calling. I was annoyed, I confess. That annoyance lasted just as long as it took me to sit down and write the second paragraph, because suddenly I caught a connection. Maybe Booth did, too. So don't worry, I've fully forgiven him because I think he's actually suffering worse than Brennan.
The rest of this just tumbled out, pretty much exactly as you see it below.
Third, this is rated T for language. Stressed, terrified Booth will think like the ex-military, current cop that he is. The f-bomb makes more than one appearance in his thoughts.
Finally, catching connections is what Brennan does best. She sees connections between events. Most importantly, all the people Brennan cares most about are connected in a way that none of them realize. None but Brennan ... and Pelant.
~Q~
Four Hours
16:11
"You won't marry her, Agent Booth."
He heard the voice, one that had somehow crawled its way up the familiarity chain to instant recognition status. He was sitting next to Brennan and Christine. He was sitting in the sand of a playground, surrounded by dozens of ordinary people, but at the sound of that voice the thoughts that splintered through his mind came like pulsing flashbacks.
Cell phone.
Killer.
The British squintern bleeding to death from a bullet meant for him.
Bones.
Baby.
On pure instinct, Booth slapped out a lie that the call was from his mother so he could jump up and put space between himself and his family. No bullets, God, please, no bullets. He turned a tight circle, searching for threats. His throat tightened, his grip tightened on the slippery plastic of that damned link to death, to Pelant. No, no no no…. Holy Mary, Mother of God, pray for us sinners. He gulped. Glory be to the Father—no time for that, Pelant was speaking, saying he got to decide.
"I always make the decisions, and Doctor Brennan can't know the reason you're turning her down. If you tell her, I'll know."
How does he know…? How does he know?!
He was watching, oh God, he was describing the people surrounding them. All those innocent, oblivious people. The young kid, the old man, the couple on the bench. And he'd better not tell Bones. Pelant had threatened to kill five people, but only mentioned four. Who was the unspoken fifth? He swallowed his own tongue, choking on terror. Bones? Maybe. Maybe not. Maybe Christine or Parker.
"I've read everything Doctor Sweets has written about you and Doctor Brennan."
He couldn't take the risk, God, he just could not risk it. So he acquiesced. Gave in, made that sickly vow to destroy his own happiness—no, not just his; it will destroy her also. Oh God. Oh God, what Sweets wrote.
Pelant read that fucking book.
He'd accessed Sweets's files. He'd read the notes from all their sessions.
"You and I both know that Dr. Brennan's hyper-rationality protects a soft and vulnerable core. So, if you breach those defenses and it turns out you don't really love her…."
And Pelant was watching. And he knew, he fucking KNEW.
Pelant was watching right now. Maybe all the time.
"I'm going to find you and I'm going to kill you," Booth vowed quietly. I won't rest until he's dead. One more stain on his soul was nothing after this, after what Pelant was forcing him to do to her.
"I feel all of us are closer than ever now," Pelant sighed.
Booth drew on the same cover of unconcern that had gotten him through abuse and torture. That stoic face, the casual veneer that proclaimed nothing was wrong. "I will kill you." He closed the phone, quelled the roiling fear and anger and turned back to Bones.
She was watching, too, her eyes softer than he'd ever seen them. Six years he'd waited for her; two years he'd waited for her to propose. Four hours he'd been so happy it felt like flying. Seeing that happiness in her—so beautiful, so long he'd waited to see it—he walked back to her side and dropped into the sand. Christine went to bed at eight pm, which meant Bones could be happy for four hours more. He would give her that much, twice as much happiness because she deserved 40 or 50 years of it.
~Q~
20:13
Temperance Brennan, who swore weddings were archaic rituals and marriage licenses were merely slips of paper, sat in front of him with a bridal magazine in her lap, four hours after proposing a Catholic ceremony because that's what was important to him. Booth swallowed nausea, hearing her compromises as she happily prattled throughout the evening: no white virginal gown but a full wedding Mass and—God—a wedding in itself. An actual ceremony, not a jaunt to the courthouse.
He returned to the living room after putting Christine to bed and Brennan was flipping through that magazine again.
"I don't understand why all these women are wearing white dresses. There's no way they are all virgins..." She finally looked up, saw his bleak expression. "Is something the matter?"
What he had to do felt like Abraham standing over Isaac with the knife in his hand. He was looking down into her shimmering eyes, brimming with trust and innocence, and he was going to plunge it in deep. A sacrifice to save other, innocent people. To save her, maybe.
Years ago, he'd snapped at Brennan that the story of Abraham had never set right with him as a parent. He wouldn't do it, he just would not. But now he understood. God was all powerful, and all knowing. When He gives the command, you obey. Though it was a sickening comparison, at the moment Pelant had used the Cantilever fortune to steal God's shoes, usurping God's omniscience, and he gave the command to sacrifice the most precious person. And when an impostor in God's shoes gives the command, you obey.
"We need to talk." Words are like a knife. The sharper the knife, the less it hurts.
"Okay," she said. Sensing his serious mood, she shut the magazine and gave him her full attention.
This was how he knew Pelant was an usurper: at the last minute, the real God stayed Abraham's hand. He sank onto the chair across from her, sharpening the blade. Raising the knife up high, so high she didn't see it. "About the wedding, about us getting married…."
She wasn't sure where he was going, why he looked so drawn. He could see the sudden flash of doubt, the way she began to backpedal as her logical brain kicked back in—good, she'll need it—and she tried to satisfy whatever she thought he wanted. "Oh the ceremony doesn't matter to me. And I won't be wearing white."
"I don't think we should do it." Fast and deep, sharp and straight into the heart, then pull it out fast and watch her bleed out quickly. A merciful death to her joy. He drew a breath and plunged it in deep, felt his own heart shudder from the blow to hers. "I should have thought this through before."
They were both going to die now, bleeding together.
The stunned confusion took hold. Her blood was starting to flow, her innocent eyes getting wider, the incipient pain growing in her where the knife still rested. "But this is what you want."
He pulled it out. "But you didn't." Used her words against her to flay the other side of her still beating heart.
More confusion, a dawning recognition that he'd just stabbed her. And disbelief: how could he do this? The growing fear that she'd misunderstood something. The pain she was feeling, it couldn't be a betrayal, she didn't want to believe it was a betrayal. "But I do now. I love you. I want to marry you."
Another echoing blow to his heart, and another spurt of answering blood. He didn't know how he had the strength to raise the knife a second time. Give her a reason, give her logic. Let her think this was for her own good. Let her brain save her. "Because we've been under so much pressure. I mean that's what's really going on here.
Another plunge, deeper, harder. "Like you said, it's just a piece of paper. What we have already is enough."
The lie tore through his chest like a cleaver, cleaving him in two.
She was dying, he watched her die. Slowly, the fires of joy extinguished until her eyes had turned ashy grey and lifeless. She nodded silently. "You're right. You're right. It's been a stressful time. I'm impressed that you're finally seeing things from my perspective."
The bloody knife fell to the ground between them. He offered dinner. She stood, said she wasn't hungry and would go read before bed.
He felt himself dying, his eyes burning. "Bones? Umm, we're okay, right?"
Bones froze for a moment, her body stiffened by the rapid onset of rigor mortis. "Of course."
She vanished to the hall, and he heard her lean against the wall at the bottom of the stairs. He heard her tip her head back, heard her breathe an unsteady sob that she quickly tried to cover.
"Right." He collapsed onto the chair, dead as well.
~Q~
Author's Note: That's so ugly, it's like Shakespeare at his worst.
Hubris is the flaw that takes down many a maniacal leader. Hitler invaded Russia (even knowing it was Napoleons' downfall). Has Pelant made the mistake that will lead to his undoing...?
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