-Venus POV-
We are back at the lab as Temp looks at the remains we brought in, "I'm amazed you found a complete skeleton." I nod, "Isn't it amazing everything stayed together." Zack then speaks, "C-14 dating matches at 300 years." I nod and continue, "Subject is male, early 20s, approximately five feet... six inches." Zack adds, "Legs are bowed, result of visible calcium and phosphate deficiency." Temp then speaks, "He had rickets as a child, but his upper body is extraordinarily well-developed." I nod as Zack continued, "Epiphyseal separation in the long bones. Sunken sternum forms scorbutic rosary at costochondral margin." I nod, "He suffered from scurvy as well as tertiary syphilis." Booth then asked, "What's with the 'tertiary'? Isn't plain old syphilis bad enough?" I smiled as Zack pointed out, "Scurvy, syphilis. Pirate." I jump in place as Hodgins speaks, "There is anthropological evidence which supports the claim that Blackbeard executed his burial crews after they were done digging." I look at Temp as she smiles, "Okay. Let's say it's a pirate." We all celebrated as I add, "This would be an extraordinary find." Booth then adds, "And would open up the reality of the treasure."
I chuckle as Temp speaks, "It would be stupid to dismiss anything at this point. But we need to discover why the ossein isn't fully decomposed from being waterlogged for so long." I nod as Hodgins pitches in, "About 50 feet down the shaft is a layer of blue putty consisting of silicon and clay." I then add in, "It can be used to form a watertight seal. Which would explain the condition of the bones." Hodgins cuts in, "I took samples of the same blue clay between 200 and 207 feet. Something is buried down there." Temp adds in, "And these bones were lying on top of it." Booth then speaks, "Macy was killed because of something that he found." Hodgins says, "Silt in his throat and lungs confirms he was killed at the top of the shaft." Zack adds in, "After he swam back up with the treasure." We all start smiling as Boss walks in, "Special Agent Booth. I hate to interrupt your investigation, Agent Booth, but there's an angry billionaire in my office, and he won't go away." I looked at Boss, "If it was like that Boss you should've sent him to my office. I would be glad to handle that situation for you." "Well then shall we all go together." Temp quickly adds, "I will join as well." I nod and Booth, Boss, Temp, and I left towards Bosses office.
We are sitting in Boss office listening to Rose complaints, "It's simple. You have something that belongs to me, and I'm not leaving here without it." Booth then speaks first, "A day ago, you couldn't wait to leave. Pull out of the island cut your losses. You remember that?" "A lot can change in a day." "Yeah. For Ted Macy, a lot changed." "Look, I'm sorry about Ted, but I'll be damned if the federal government swoops in here at the 11th hour and steals what I've been trying to find for two years." I then pipe in, "And I fail to see what this has to do with the Jeffersonian." "Those bones belong to me. They were uncovered at my site. I was granted a permit to dig there and keep what was found. My attorneys assure me, you have no clain to those bones." Booth chuckles, "Sure, I mean, your attorney wants to go to court for the next 20 years and buy himself a nice vacation home in Tuscany, but the fact is, when Ted Macy was murdered, your property became our evidence."
I nod while adding, "And unfortunately it will stay that way until we find the killer." Rose laughs a bit, "I was hoping to settle this amicably." Booth adds, "Really? Because, you know, we haven't seen that yet." Boss sighs, "This is going to be a headache. He has some very important friends." I look over at Boss, "You don't need to worry about that, if he does try to pull those cards, I also have some cards that could easily go against his." Boss nods feeling more relaxed and eased about the situation as Temp then asks, "I don't understand why he's so upset. It's not like he needs the money." It looked like Booth thought of something as he snapped his fingers and turned towards us, "But he has partners that do. Macy and Hardewicke were going to split what they found." I nod as Temp adds, "But Macy is dead." I looked at her, "Exactly sis, leaving Hardewicke with a bigger piece of the money." Booth nods, "That's exactly right Blueberry." I did a small salute to him as he turns around, "Well then lets go." I stand and shake my head. "I can't go with you on this one. I have to make some preparations if Rose does choose to fight against us. Plus, todays the systems check that I do every two weeks, making sure everything is running smoothly." Temp then speaks, "I am going to look over with the bones again." Booth nods and leaves to talk with Hardewicke.
I just finished checking the systems and Temp had walked over to me and we discussed a bit about the bones and see if we could come up with any ideas. I then looked at Temp, "Hey could we go and take another look at the bones again, I think we might've overviewed something about it. " "Yes, I think that's an excellent idea." Temp and I walked into the Bone examination room as we started to put on our gloves. I stop immediately noticing that the bones weren't there. Temp was confused at me stopping as she then also looked and immediately called out Zack, "Zack, the bones- what did you do with the bones?" Zack comes over to us, "Nothing, Dr. Brennan." I immediately grabbed my phone and called a lockdown on the whole facility and get all the security guards to where I was and to inform Boss about the lockdown. While I did this Zack continued to speak, "I left them on the table just like you asked." I then hear Temp yell out, "Where the hell are my bones?!"
I had given every person from security a specific position, while we try and locate where the bones were. Temp, Boss and I were up on the platform as Temp was mad, "Bones don't just disappear. I thought this was a secure facility. You assured me this was a secure facility. I could be working at Stanford, you know. This would never have happened at Stanford." I didn't say anything as I was feeling dejected, but Boss spoke, "We spend three quarters of a million dollars annually on security. We have the best security system any institution could get as it is your sister who developed and created it." "Obviously, that's not enough. I want my bones." I felt even more broken when Temp said that as Booth comes up as Temp turns around, "Did you find my bones?!" "Oh! Maybe you want just want to, you know, chill a little?" "Chill?" "Yeah. You know, take a pill." "Listen, dude, my lab was violated, my bones were stolen, so I think I'll remain warm for a little while longer."
Angie comes up seeing the situation, "Honey, maybe you should focus on your breathing. I think you broke your sister. Count to ten. Have a shot of Jack." Booth then adds, "Look we are doing everything that we can, okay? So, don't go breaking your sister. I promise you, we're going to find your bones, but you have to allow us to do our job." Temp turns her head around and looks at me seeing my dejected face looking at the ground, "I guess I wasn't helping all that much, was I? I.. I'm..." Angie finishes for her, "Sorry. It's cool. Now let's see if we could put a smile back onto Vens face." Booth nods, "Hey, look on the bright side. I mean, this whole theft thing could be good for us, right? I mean, whoever took the bones obviously had something to do with the murder. We're getting closer." Boss then speaks, "Dr. Venus had already ordered all on-duty security personnel to give a minute-by-minute account of their rounds." Booth then speaks, "I want an account of all off-duty personnel, as well." I then decided to speak feeling a bit better, "I already got that done and sent it to your email and your people so they could go through it faster..." Booth looks at me and smiles, "You always make my job so much easier Blueberry, this is why you're the one and only ...." I smile and jump enthusiastically "I'm your berry squint. Just one call away and gets things done faster than normal." "And she's back."
We then hear Zack coming up to us, "They didn't get everything." Booth then asks, "I thought all the bones were on the table." "All the new ones. I was still examining the original finger bone we found for scurvy, so it was in my room." Temp grabs the bone as we both examined it and she say, "There is something they don't want us to find on these bones." I then speak, "Okay then Temp you should take that back to the bone examination room and take a security guard with you." She nods and leaves getting a guard to come with her as I look both at Boss and Angela, "Could you both test and see if my assumptions are correct." Boss and Angela nod, "Alright then I need you both to walk from the bone examination room to the front door, make sure to time it. If I am correct, then someone in this lab is our mole." Angela then asks, "What makes you say that?" "Well, while I was doing the systems checks, I saw that there was no trigger, no one hacking into the system, or anything that looked off. So it would be someone who works here." They nod and start to get to work. I turn and see Zack standing there last, "Zack... you are truely amazing." I grabbed his face with both of my hands and pulled him down as I kissed his forehead, then both of his cheeks, and finally his nose. "You made my day today Zackaroo. Now lets go and help out Temp with the bone. I leave first as Zack was still processing all of the different kisses that I placed on his face. But soon quickly joined me.
Zack, Hodgins, Temp, and I were in the bone examination room looking at the bone that we had left. Hodgins speaks first, "The periosteal surface on the phalanx doesn't have any ingrained particulates that I can recover." I nod, "The solution that ME used probably dissolved anything that was lodged in any surface irregularities." Zack then asks, "Who would clean a bone before extracting all available information from it?" Temp then answers, "Not everyone is as thorough as we are, Zack." "So true, so true." Hodgins then adds, "I wonder if there was gold dust on it." We all look at him as Temp says, "Perhaps you should start working with a parrot on your shoulder." "You're not curious?" "Yes. About the facts." Hodgins nods and leaves as I looked at the bone, "There's a small hole along the distal articular facet of the finger." Temp looks at it as well, "It could be a foramen, but it could be something else, man-made." Zack asks, "A weapon?" "Maybe. See if you can find any possible matches." "I wonder if there are any other similar marks on Macy?" I look at Zack as I walk out with Temp, "We'll find out. And don't let that bone out of your sight. Remember I believe in you and that amazing brain of yours."
Booth came and picked us up and we head over to Harry's workplace. Booth puts up an x-ray of the victim's head, "Both Doctors thought you might have overlooked a weapon of some kind." Harry chuckles, " He wasn't killed by any weapon. He was strangled. The larynx is crushed. It's plain." Temp then adds, "And C2 through C4 are fractured. That wouldn't have occurred if he were merely strangled." "If the victim was shaken while being strangled ..." I shake my head, "No, the fractures are all left to right, approximately 45-degree angles on each bone. That means the head was jerked to the left and up, making sure that the spinal cord would tear. The larynx was crushed when his neck was broken..." I started thinking on why that sounded so familiar as Harry spoke, "I'm always open to being corrected. Why do you think there might have been a weapon?" Temp answers for me as I was thinking, "We saw a small perforation in the finger bone, which you decided to put in the solvent. Did you damage the bone, poke it, stick it in some way?" "Still angry. Okay, no. I handled it according to protocol: rubber gloves right into the solvent." "Something damaged that bone, and it didn't happen 300 years... Wait a minute." Temp started to leave as Booth was about to follow but stops noticing that I haven't moved. "Blueberry we are leaving are you okay?" I break out of my thought and looked at him, "Hmmm, yeah, it was just how the victim died... It sounds so familiar to me, and I can't just put my finger on it yet." You can think about on the way back." I nod, "Okay, let's go then."
We are back at the lab, and I can't stop thinking about how the victim died as we listened to Zack. "I have alternatives that could have caused the hole. This is a disposable acupuncture needle." Booth chuckled, "He was healed to death?" "This is a filament used for an angioplasty." I look at it, "Zack hand the wire to Temp." He gives the wire to Temp as she takes it over to a table and placed it in the bone as she uses a blue light. Booth then asks, "What are you doing?" "Diminished fluorescence. That only happens if the bones have been cleaned and treated." I looked at it with wide eyes, "That means these bones didn't start out in the shaft. They were placed there." I quickly picked up my phone and called Dr, Kendall from the historical department as Booth then asks, "What? Who has got 300-year-old bones?" "We do Ranger."
We are at the platform as Dr. Kendall brought in a case of Bones as he says, "I assure you everything here is authentic, Dr. Venus. I curated this exhibit for the Jeffersonian myself." I nod, "I know that Dr. Kendall, but could you please open the case, right now?" He sighs, "This is a beautiful specimen. Found in Jamaica. We believe he sailed with Henry Morgan." I picked up the bone and examined it a bit, "He's never been on a boat in his life." "Absurd." I looked at him and break the bone in half, "Oh, my God." I shake my head, "These bones are artificial. It's acrylic, not bone. You can see on the real bone the hole where the wire was threaded when the bones were assembled for display." "Then where's the rest of my sailor?" Booth then answers, "He was planted in the shaft in Assateague Island to make the whole treasure business seem real, but somebody found out." "Who?" I sigh, "A murderer. I will make sure we find out who and will personally make sure the people who stole from right under my nose will get what they deserve."
We are at Bosses office with Director Cullen as he spoke, "Okay, let me see if I get this straight. The pirate bones you recovered came from the Jeffersonian to start with." I nod, "Correct. 300-year-old bones stolen from our own pirate exhibit." "And then recovered by one of your own people..." Booth nods, "Dr. Hodgins." "...who brought them back to the Jeffersonian, where they were stolen again?" "Re-stolen, sir." "You have a security problem, Dr. Goodman, Dr. Venus." I had my arms crossed mad about the situation, "Yes, I could see that. I will make sure to develop a better system with Angela, where this won't happen again... But when I find out who did this, you may have another murder problem... Well, if you could ever find them." Boss then adds, "I will happily accompany you with Dr. Venus. Make it two murders." Booth then interjects, "But I'm on top of it, okay? You didn't have to come down here, sir." "That's what I thought, until I got a call from someone at the Department of Defense." "Defense? How do they figure into a murder investigation?" "Branson Rose, he has friends in high places, and they don't like it when the guy who builds their bombers is unhappy."
Temp then adds, "They afraid he'll bomb them?" "What is that, squint humor? Because I'm not laughing. Defense doesn't need a reason to got to war, and I'm not about to be their next target." I shake my head, "You don't need to worry about that, I could handle Mr. Rose with his unhappiness." "Yeah, with what?" Boss then speaks, "You can't forget that she is a highly important person to the government. They trained and experimented on her to become a highly dangerous weapon for the nation. They would do anything to keep her on their side, and she also has a few more friends than Mr. Rose." Director Cullen sighs, "Alright that's one problem handled." Temp the speaks, "We haven't ruled Rose out as a suspect." "Well, of course not. You're too busy looking for your bones." Boss then speaks, "Let's not make this personal." "Rose wants to keep playing in the mud, and his big-shot friends are going to see that that happens, unless we get some answers fast." "At this point, it appears as if the stolen 300-year-old bones are being used to, you know, salt the shaft."
Temp asks, "Salt the shaft?" "Yeah, you know, an investor spends a million bucks, gets antsy when nothing happens, and then, voila, you know, pirate bones appear, and the golden goose keeps, you know... laying those eggs." I chuckle as he makes a spewing noise as Temp speaks, "Okay, that is a convoluted metaphor, Booth." Boss then speaks, "It's a hoax, Dr. Brennan, like Piltdown Man." "Oh, got it. Why can't you be clear like that?" I chuckle when Booth gives her a disbelief look and Director Cullen speaks, "Assuming the bones were stolen..." "Re-stolen?" "...re-stolen so you wouldn't find out they were bogus, how did you?" "How did we what?" I answer, "From the finger. They didn't get the entire skeleton. Would you like Dr. Brennan or I to take you through the process?" "I really, really wouldn't. So who do you like?" Booth speaks, "I like the partner." Temp adds, "Gile Hardewicke." Booth continues, "Acess, motive, ability..." "Dr. Goodman, Venus, the FBI will provide whatever help you need to solve your breach of security at the Jeffersonian. You work the partner angle." Director Cullen then leaves the office.
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DISCLAIMER: I DO NOT OWN "BONES". IT IS OWNED BY JOSEPHSON ENTERTAINMENT, BY HART HANSON. I ONLY CLAIM MY CHARACTER VENUS BRENNAN. I ALSO DON'T OWN ANY OF THE IMAGES. THANK YOU.