#coz of em squints y'know

[wackybuddiemewbs]

The other another snippet to a WIP no one is writing…

AKA, it's me, back on all of the bullshit with this Bones AU. 173k heaps of bullshit (seriously, what the fuckery). Yet, here we are. Again, after this already happened (several times). Because me and impulse control don't vibe well. So here's to vibing! And I will work Schrödinger into conversation, no matter what. For reasons. So stay tuned for Schrödinger's Bones AU no one's ever writing!

The Girl in the Pond IV

Buck still tries to find a way to place his hands that doesn’t look awkward. He feels oddly out of place in this house, well, villa to be perfectly exact.

They are in the living room now, Eddie sitting next to him on the surely expensive sofa. It has to be expensive because it’s uncomfortable as hell. And most pretty sofas are made for the aesthetic, not the comfort.

He does his best to observe. Because that is what you do when you need to learn a new skill. Buck has no clue what it’s like to actually work on a case, so he is bound to follow Eddie’s lead on that one.

Though he finds that increasingly difficult. Because Eddie doesn’t even talk much, doesn’t explain his method. He just knows. And the Major seems to know, too. There are few looks exchanged and that still settles most of it. There is an unspoken understanding, an agreement of sorts – but Buck doesn’t get it.

He is impressed with that, as it surely speaks for Eddie’s skills as a federal agent, but Buck can’t really make sense of it. Which, in turn, makes it all the harder for him to find a starting point, a way to learn. Because he has to get better at this to earn his spot, right?

“You’re positive it’s our Cleo?” Mrs. Eller asks, wiping at her damp eyes. Even without great people reading skills, Buck can tell that she actually already knows the answer to that question, probably knew in a while.

Buck saw that numerous times, when they identified victims of more recent deaths, though most of those were still cold cases. When the remains were returned to their loved ones, oftentimes there was this moment of knowing, of remembering that they’d already known.

It’s accepting it which is the hard part. Because it always feels like giving up.

“We established twenty-two matching points of comparison…,” Buck begins, but Eddie cuts him short, “Yes, we’re certain.”

“Did he do it? The Senator? One military man to another, Agent Diaz,” the Major asks, clenching his fists.

“We can’t discuss the investigation in any way,” Eddie answers mildly. “I’m sorry.”

“Can you at least tell us if our daughter suffered?” Mrs. Eller asks, now tears staining her eyes.

“Given the state of her skull…,” Buck wants to say, but again, Eddie won’t let him, telling her instead, “Cleo never saw it coming.”

She leans back slightly, exhaling. “Thank you.”

“We just wanted to be sure to tell you as soon as we knew,” Eddie continues.

“And we greatly appreciate that,” the Major answers, doing his best to stay stoic. Which is something Buck has seen plenty before, too.

Buck wets his lips. “Mrs. Eller, can you tell us what Cleo wore around her neck?”

He can feel Eddie nudge him lightly in the side, but Buck chooses to ignore that. Those might be the only people who can tell them what this was before the pond and fish nearly tore it apart. They have as much interest in finding out what happened to Cleo as they do, more, in fact. So anything that can get them one step closer to the truth should be an appropriate thing to ask, right?

“Her father’s Bronze Star. Ted won it in the first Gulf War, then he gave it to her for luck,” she says, only to break down in tears.

Buck blinks, suddenly not knowing what to reply, how to follow up on that last statement, to keep alive that conversation. Even though he should be able to say something. How that information is valuable. How that may help figure out part of Cleo’s story, about her last hours. But the words don’t come to him. Buck just stares at the weeping mother and her husband holding on to her, still trying to be stoic, controlled.

And I don’t know what to tell you.

“I think we should be going,” Eddie says in a low voice. “We’re very sorry for your loss.”

“Thank you, Agent Diaz,” the Major says. “This means a lot to us.”

“We’ll do whatever we can to find the person who did this to her,” Eddie says, no, vows.

The Major nods his head tightly, then goes to sit with his wife and hold her as she keeps crying.

Once they are out of sight of the grieving couple, Eddie tugs Buck by the elbow and practically drags him out of the house, villa. His demeanor does not promise anything good, though Buck fails to figure what gets him so angry all of a sudden. Sure, things didn’t end on a high note. They rarely do when you tell someone you found their daughter dead. But he didn’t do anything wrong, right?

“What the hell was that?” Eddie curses through gritted teeth.

Buck blinks, taken aback by that sudden reaction. Normally, Eddie is composed when it comes to these things, but everything tells Buck that he is angry with him, downright furious. And he doesn’t get that one bit.

If there is someone who hasn’t been playing by the book, it was Eddie, right? He made assumptions about Cleo not having seen it coming, when there is nothing to suggest that this is true.

So why am I the bad guy in this all of a sudden?

“The same question I wanted to ask you!” Buck retorts.

Eddie blinks at him, seemingly not having expected that. “What?”

“Those people deserved the truth,” Buck replies.

“Their daughter was murdered,” Eddie hisses. “They deserve the kindness of a lie.”

“What does that even mean?” Buck snaps. “How do you sugarcoat a murder?”

“Not sugarcoat, but simply not bombard them with every damn detail of how their daughter was brutally murdered and her body torn apart by fish in a pond!”

Buck folds his arms over his chest, setting his jaw. “They’re entitled to know the details of her last moments.”

Because that is what he can give them. Maybe they don’t have the whole picture yet, but they will, in time. Buck may not always know what to say to people in certain situations, but he can give them the facts. He can give them back that part of the past of the people they lost.

“Just because they’re entitled to it doesn’t mean they want or need to know – in all its gruesome detail,” Eddie shoots back.

“There’ll be an inquest report,” Buck points out.

“Which they won’t read because they don’t want to,” Eddie retorts, irritated. “Especially because toward the end, Cleo and her parents weren’t even speaking.”

Buck frowns. “They told you that?”

Because that is nothing Buck would be inclined to share with a federal agent. Or any stranger, really. Because they aren’t friends. They only got acquainted because of Cleo, because Eddie was working that case. It was a job. So why would they tell him that much of a personal thing? That doesn’t make sense, does it?

“You know, getting information out of live people is a lot different than getting information out of a pile of bones. You have to offer up something of yourself first,” Eddie replies, clearly all the more frustrated.

“So that’s what you did with the Major?” Buck asks. “Offering up something of yourself?”

Eddie gestures at him. “Learning curve.”

“Okay.”

“Okay what?”

Buck licks his lips. “Then what exactly did you do in the military?”

“You didn’t seriously just ask me that, did you?” Eddie huffs, touching his forehead. He is clearly exasperated, but Buck fails to understand just why. He did what Eddie said you had to do. So what did he do wrong this time?

“I did, but I don’t understand why you’re so pissed because of it.”

“See? See what you did right there, Bones? You asked a personal question without offering anything personal in return. And since I’m not a skeleton, you get zilch. Sorry.”

“You’re not actually sorry,” Buck notes.

“I’m really not, no,” Eddie says, shaking his head.

“Fair enough,” Buck replies. “I still think they deserve the truth. And it’s still Buck.”

“You always have to have the last word, don’t you?”

“I will insist on an argument until I’m presented with better evidence to the contrary. And for the past years, the truth has always won in my book.”

Eddie pinches the bridge of his nose. “Ducks, Buck, think of the ducks.”

“Quack.”

Though Buck starts to think that maybe he can’t be a duck, after all. Because no matter how he tries to stay in line, watching Eddie, following his path, he is not one step closer to figuring out what to say to people like the Ellers.

His steps don’t match Eddie’s, simple as that.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

“Okay, let’s go through the latest findings again, to see if we missed anything,” Buck says, clapping his hands together after he put on some gloves.

Hen noticed that the kid has been somewhat fidgety ever since he got back from his field tripwith the FBI agent. More fidgety than usual, that is. Because Evan Buckley, as they all know, is a lot of energy begging to be released. A whole lot of energy. Buckets of them.

“Well, you said she was depressed but never elaborated,” Chim points out. “That might be a good start.”

“Oh yeah that, sorry. Eddie called, and then I… nevermind,” he answers sheepishly, then looks back at the screen before him. “Pupal casings show that she was on Lorazepam, Chloradiazepoxide, and Meclizine Hydrochloride. Hence my conclusion that she was depressed.”

“That’s what you’d give someone with anxiety and depression, so that checks out,” Hen agrees. While she has worked her fair share next to the forensic boy wonder, it never ceases to amaze her just what he can get out of a bit of bog goo and some bugs he found in that goo.

“And someone who’s nauseous,” Buck adds.

“True, which can be a nasty side-effect of her mental conditions as well as the medication she took for the depression and anxiety,” Hen ponders.

“So does that give us anything?” Chimney asks. “Because I’m drawing a blank, to be honest. Since the necklace belonged to Cleo, as Buck learned from the Ellers, we can rule out that it’s related to the murderer. So that’s a dead end, too. For now at least.”

Buck focuses in on the screen, whispering to himself over and over, “Anxious, depressed, nauseous… Nausea…”

He looks up at them with wide eyes. “Nausea!”

“Oh, hold on, looks like he’s having an idea!” Chim laughs. “That, or a giant sneeze. We’re about to find out.”

Buck jumps up from his seat and rushes up to the table where they laid out Cleo’s bones. He grabs the microscope to take another look. “Those bone fragments aren’t frog bones.”

“What are they, then?” Hen asks.

“Fetal remains.”

Chimney gapes. “What?”

“Malleus, Incus, Stapes,” Buck recounts, pointing to the small bones. “These are fetal ear bones. How could I miss that?”

Hen touches her chest, finding it hard to breathe all of a sudden. “The girl was pregnant by the time she died, oh my God.”

“Not very far along, I’m afraid,” Buck notes with a tight grimace.

Depressed, anxious, nauseous, and pregnant. And now dead. Hen shakes her head. That poor girl has been through so much in her short life, only to have it end when she may just have gotten a prospect at something else. Life really isn’t fair at times. More often than not, sadly.

“Can we do a DNA reading, to see if we can prove paternity?” Chimney questions.

“We can try, but we need enough genetic material to test – both the child and the potential father,” Hen lets him know. And she doubts that they are going to find it. Most of it was lost to the bog and the fish anyway.

“This Senator, he’s smart,” Chimney notes. “He gets an intern pregnant and then murders her when it threatens his career. And he has the connections to get away with it.”

“Eddie says that the Senator may not have done it,” Buck notes. “Though I’m afraid it may be a good hypothesis… even though it leans a bit more to narrative than pure fact. It does create a motive, though.”

Chim shakes his head. “I can say one thing with a certainty: Even if the guy didn’t do it, he is a rat bastard.”

“On that much we agree,” Buck huffs, reaching into his pocket. “I’ll call Eddie, to let him know. I’ll be back in a bit.”

Hen looks back at the bones on the table, the only remains of that young woman’s life that they now have to figure out what else was there, what flesh to add to the bone of the story to make it complete again. Because right now, they only have fragments, so tiny fragments at times, that they might just as well be mistaken for a frog’s.

The supposed “bit” starts to take an awful lot of time, Hen finds, when Buck won’t return to the lab in over fifteen minutes. She sends Chimney off to grab a coffee while she goes venturing. Though Hen doesn’t have to go searching for long. She finds Buck up on the bleachers framing the upper story of the lab – his favorite place to go when he has to think.

“Penny for your thoughts?” she asks, settling down next to him on the ground, letting her legs dangle over the edge. “And since I know how many you got floating around by the second, I know asking for it will make me a poor woman one day.”

Buck smiles at her shyly. “Hi.”

“Hey.”

“The phone call took thatlong?” Hen questions.

Buck shakes his head. “No, that just lasted a minute. Eddie was… busy… Did I miss something important? Something about Cleo?”

“No, no,” she assures him, noticing his distress right off the bat. “Though I feel like wemissed something. Ever since you got back, you seem… not as chirpy as usual.”

Buck looks down. “It’s fine.”

“You tend to say that even when things are definitely not fine, you know?” Hen points out.

“I just needed some alone-time.”

“You need an awful lot of that lately,” Hen huffs.

And that is precisely what she and the others don’t like at all about the latest developments. Buck is doing it again, withdrawing. They somewhat expected it, when they got the news that Abby was gone. They readied themselves to pick up the pieces, make sure their little boy wonder was all set.

But none of them saw it coming when Buck announced he was leaving for two months to work in Peru. He didn’t consult with Bobby until he had to – for the job. He didn’t talk to them. He just followed through with it, in true Buck fashion. And before they knew, they bid him farewell at the airport and watched him go.

But what struck them was that he was back to keeping away from them. Because they all know Buck doesn’t actuallywant that. He wants to be with them. He loves them. But there are those moments when Buck just shuts down, and no one knows why exactly he does it. The way Hen figures, Buck himself doesn’t know either. They can tell the triggers at times, but there are those times Buck just shuts the doors and no one gets to come inside.

And sadly, if shutting the doors and taking flight get you in a mass grave in Peru with people aiming rifles at you, then something is very wrong.

But just as sadly, a certain someone does not recognize that as fact...

“So is this about Cleo Eller?” Hen asks, keeping her voice leveled.

He licks his lips. “Among other things.”

“Any things you wanna share with the class?”

“… I may have messed up with the Ellers. Eddie sounded very pissed on the phone… and before that, too. I don’t see that I’d have to apologize, because I didn’t do anything wrong, really…”

“Then why do you feel like you messed up?”

“I made them upset, but not on purpose,” Buck explains.

“How did you make them upset?”

“I told them information about their daughter’s last moments. Apparently, that was not appropriate for some reason,” Buck says, puckering his lips.

“Alright. And that got you thinking – what?” Hen questions.

“It got me thinking that… that maybe Eddie’s right.”

“Right about what?” Hen narrows her eyes. While she likes the agent well enough, he’s a charming character as far as she can tell, Hen continues to have a bad feeling. And it started the moment she heard said agent snatched Buck right from his strenuous trip to Peru to consult on a case. By having him be taken by Homeland Security, mind you.

“What if I’m actually only good with bones and lousy with people?” Buck asks.

“Is that what he said to you?” Hen narrows her eyes. If that’s the case, she may need to have a word with that federal agent after all.

“No, it’s a conclusion based on… the evidence,” Buck says mutely.

“People like you.”

Because Hen tried. She tried not to like the boy wonder with a fat mouth and a veryodd attitude. But only a few hours into working with him, Hen understood that this guy was the sweetest golden retriever puppy she’d ever met. Since then, Hen has decided that that this pupper is under her protection, even more so when the pupper decides to stray off all the way to Peru and back and now wants to play with the FBI, too.

“I’m not looking for a new hookup after Abby, to release sexual tension, thank you very much,” Buck argues.

“Interesting leap from liking to lovemaking. I’m sure it means nothing,” Hen laughs.

He shudders. “I hate psychology.”

“You may have mentioned that before. Like a million times,” she chuckles, amused. “But back on topic: You got us. And we’re people, you know? At least last time I checked.”

“Of course I know that, but… beside you guys? C’mon. My most meaningful relationships are with dead people.”

Hen shakes her head. “Who said that?”

Who dared?

“No one, but it’s true, think about it!” He gestures wildly to underline a point Hen can’t see, even if she tried to look harder. Though she doesn’t have the intention.

“I’m trying, but I don’t see how that’s factual by any means.”

Yes, Buck has his weird ways, but anyone who bothers to get to know him will see that he is worth putting up with the quirks in turn. The boy has a heart of gold, no one can convince her otherwise. So what’s there not to like about someone who is that dedicated, that hardworking, that kind?

“When we were seeing the Ellers… I couldn’t connect with them in any meaningful way. I just sat there and drank my tea. Eddie could, though. The Major reacted to him, and not just because they know each other. Eddie talked to them, and that helped. They remained calm. He managed to offer comfort at a time we all know there is no comfort… But when I opened my mouth, I just made them upset. I can give the facts, but… but they didn’t seem to help them. I only made it worse.”

“Eddie has been trained for those kinds of situations, you haven’t,” she reasons.

“You can’t train that. It’s either that you have the ability to speak to people, to connect with them emotionally, or you don’t. And I start to think that I don’t. I wanted to help them by telling them all I know about Cleo’s last moments, but… that doesn’t help, does it?”

“It doesn’t help everybody. It would certainly help you. Because that is how your brain works, but… every brain’s different.”

“Precisely. But I don’t know how to talk to people who have… not even similar brains to my own. I couldn’t connect to Cleo’s parents. I drew a complete blank, Hen. I didn’t know what to do when Cleo’s mother broke down crying. But you know who I can connect to?”

She sighs. “Cleo.”

He rubs at his eyes, then looks ahead. “I understand Cleo. And her bones are all I’ve ever seen. I have talked to her parents, I’ve shaken their hands, I’ve had tea with them… And still, I can tell you more about her than I could tell you about them.”

He shakes his head, clearly frustrated with himself. Because Buck will always hold himself to the highest standard. Because Hen knows that boy is deadly afraid of not being enough. And no matter how often they tell him that he is, Buck never seems to learn that lesson.

Sadly, the learning curve on that is not as steep.

“When she was seven, Cleo broke her wrist probably falling off a bike. And two weeks later, before the cast was even removed, she got right back on that bike and broke it all over again.”

He licks his lips.

“And when she was being murdered, she fought back hard, even though she was so depressed she could hardly get up in the morning. She didn’t welcome death. Cleo wanted to live.”

Hen reaches over to give his shoulder a gentle squeeze. It never ceases to amaze her just what Buck can read out of the bones, but she understands that bit. She understands looking at the remains of that person and finding that connection. Even though they all try their best to keep a professional distance, you somehow find yourself in every victim. And you have to be very careful not to leave too much of yourself behind every time you do that.

“It feels like I know her better than I know most people in my life. You know, live people. I can let her close, but… what of her parents? What of me?” Buck asks, sounding defeated. “And how am I supposed to… actually be of help in the field, if… all I do is make people upset by caring more about the bones than the loved ones of the person those bones belonged to?”

“Buckaroo, has it ever occurred to you that you may come off in a certain way to people not because you connect too little but because you connect too much?”

Because Hen can’t say she ever met anyone who cares that deeply about telling the stories of others. Someone who is so dedicated to find out what happened to people who no one bothers looking for anymore. Sure, sometimes Buck seems like a thousand miles away in his head, but she never got the impression that he is emotionally distant or can’t empathize. He can, sometimes too much, sometimes even with just a bunch of bones. Because to Buck, they are essential parts to understanding who those people were.

“Please no more psychology,” he whines, grabbing his head with both hands. “It’s a soft science and I hate it.”

“I know, but people are mostly soft,” she laughs. “Squishy, even.”

“Except for their bones,” Buck sighs, looking ahead pensively.

“Except for their bones, yeah,” Hen agrees with a small smile. “You care about Cleo. You fight for her story to be told. Anyone can see that, even though they may not always get that this is your intention.”

“Not her family, apparently.”

“Maybe not right now, but they will in time. You’d have to be pretty blind to miss that. I’m not going to lie, not everyone will appreciate how you go about it at times, sharing the histories of the victims. But everyone has to recognize that you care. Because that is just the facts.”

“But this isn’t about me. It’s about Cleo. It’s about those victims still sitting in those boxes, waiting to be found. So I don’t want to make this about me, but… I have to ask myself… if I can’t even do that, then… what can I actually do for those people, the families? What’s my purpose being there, telling them that? I don’t wanna make this about me, again.”

And Hen is sure there is so much to unwrap there, but there is a time and place for that, and she is just as sure this isn’t the one.

“You want some advice?” she asks instead.

Buck nods his head, looking so much younger than he actually is.

“Offer up a little bit of yourself every once in a while,” Hen says. “Just… tell somebody something you’re not completely certain you want them to know. That’s a start.”

Buck wrinkles his nose, letting the words sink in for a moment. “That’s the second time I’ve received that advice.”

“Well, you know I give out great advice.”

“But if the same advice comes from one of the feds…” He gestures with his left hand dismissively.

“There’s a saying about broken clocks being right twice a day,” Hen points out, her voice trailing off.

“Right.”

“I know you can do it, Buck. You just need a bit of practice. And we all know you’re stubborn enough to never give up trying.”

He smiles at her. “Never.”

“That’s more like it.” She squeezes his shoulder again. He returns, then looks ahead again. A few moments later, his face scrunches into something pensive again.

“Oh, I got another question, thinking about it,” he ponders. “Not related to the case.”

“Then shoot.”

“Say, I had a stray cat that refuses to be put in a box…”

Hen furrows her eyebrows. “Schrödinger?”

“No.”

“Are we sure this is a hypothetical?”

“No, the stray cat and the box are real. I’m just not sure how to get the two together,” Buck explains. “So I’m coming up with some alternate plans. So far my approaches weren’t… ugh, very successful.”

“If the mountain won’t come to Muhammad, Muhammad must go to the mountain.”

“What does some prophet have to do with a cat refusing to go inside a box?” Buck asks.

“Put the food and the water and a blanket in the box, so the cat has to go in there at some point,” she answers. “And then all you have to do is close the box in time.”

“Ohhhh.”

“So you’re going to adopt a cat?” Hen questions, somewhat liking the idea. Not just because she adores animals, but Buck having someone at the ex’s apartment aside from memories seems like a good first step, right?

“No, no, I just need to take him to the vet, see if he’s got a chip. I found a nice animal shelter in case he doesn’t have one. Five star reviews,” Buck insists.

“But you could adopt him, if he doesn’t have an owner,” Hen ponders.

“I don’t think I’m the most… care-giving person. Especially considering the job I do,” Buck argues, curling his lips into an uncertain frown.

“You know cats are pretty independent, right?” Hen huffs. “And we work crazy hours, too. Some of us even dare to have kids. Imagine that.”

“Sure, that’s not what I mean. But he’s a stray. If he runs off again and gets hurt… or worse… that’d be on me. And I don’t want that,” Buck argues. “It’s a good shelter. You can even sign up for a program to sponsor an animal there, make sure they are provided for. And I already plan to donate to the shelter.”

Hen grimaces. That sounds oh too familiar. And sadly, she continues to have the feeling that this is not at all about Buck not feeling ready to have a pet that mostly takes care of itself. He doesn’t trust people to stick around. And he feels too responsible to let that go. Again.

“But anyway. Putting his things in the box. That actually makes a whole lot of sense. Should’ve come up with that myself,” Buck says, trying to sound way too cheerful over that piece of advice.

“Maybe your brain didn’t want to find ways to take the stray cat out of the apartment?” Hen suggests.

Buck leans his head down with a shout, “Hen, no more psychology, I’m begging you!”

“Fine, fine,” she relents. “Got any pictures?”

“Sure.” He takes out his phone and scrolls through his gallery, leaning in closer to show her. “That’s him eating my cereal.”

“Aww…,” Hen sighs with a smile. That cat sure is adorable. But then a thought crosses her mind. “You didn’t continue to eat that, did you?”

Buck rolls his eyes at her. “I may be slow on the uptake at times, but I’m too smart for that. I know what germs live inside a cat’s mouth.”

“It can never harm to ask, Buckaroo. Sometimes, your smart self is going places.”

He scrolls through the next images, grinning. “Oh, and that’s him dozing. I gave him one of the old blankets to sleep in. He likes to curl up inside it like a burrito, full purrito and all.”

“That is adorable.”

“Isn’t it?” He smiles, looking back at the phone.

And somehow, Hen dares to be a bit more hopeful. Because something tells her the last work is not spoken on the matter. Because as Schrödinger would maybe even agree, as long as the cat is not in the box, he is neither going to the shelter nor is he not.