Paring: Booth/Brennan
Rating: PG-13
Keywords: Hurt/comfort
Timeline: Near future
Disclaimer: Don't own 'em
Warnings: Un-betaed, sorry but I keep coming up with these at late hours when I'm too lazy to edit.
Summary: After running into trouble at a crime scene, Booth is hurt but too stubborn to admit it...much to Brennan's annoyance.
***Notes***
1. If this scene seems familiar. Yes, I based it off a something I saw when I watched Raiders of the Lost Ark yesterday.
2. The fics disagree about whether Booth lives in a house or apartment, and I don't remember which it is in canon so I just picked one.
***********
Damn Seeley Booth and his stubborn, macho, alpha male ways! I grumble to myself as I watch his neck muscles jumping with the effort of suppressing the pain he’s feeling.
I let out a frustrated huff as the traffic light turns green, and he continues along. The man survives a beating by no less than three suspects, and still can’t stand to have a female diving instead of him.
And I actually want to have a relationship this person? I must have completely lost my ability to think rationally.
A thought which, in itself, is irrational, but I’ll worry about that later because right now I’m going to put a stop to this!
“Booth, your neighborhood is at this next exit. Take it.”
“Don’t you need to get home?”
“Just take it!” I snap.
“Alright, fine!” he snaps back, but the fact that he gives in is testament to the fact that he isn’t feeling anywhere near as strong as he’s pretending to.
We ride in silence the rest of the way to his house, and, without any farther argument or comments, he pulls into the driveway and shuts off the engine.
I undo my seatbelt, and, as I’m gathering up my kit I only notice, in my peripheral vision, him sliding out the driver’s side door.
I snap my head up to watch him land on the ground. His legs don’t give out. Not that I’d ever tell him, but I’m impressed.
His injuries are severe even if he’s in denial about the fact. It was only after the hospital was convinced he didn’t have a head injury or any internal bleeding that they reluctantly released him. I still question the wisdom of that decision.
I finish collecting my things, and follow him up to the front door. I note his hands shaking as he fits the key into the lock.
Inside he takes a few stiff steps forward, and leans against the door frame to the kitchen. I breeze past him to deposit my things on the table, and then go back over to his side.
“Alright, let’s go to your bedroom,” I say to him, moving his arm around my shoulders.
“I’m fine, Bones,” he protests, but doesn’t push me away as I try to support some of his weight on the way through to the bedroom.
Once inside I remove his arm from my shoulders.
“I’ll be right back,” I tell him as he drops himself down onto the bed.
I make my way back to the kitchen, rummaging around the cabinets until I find what I need. Plastic bags for ice packs, clean dish towels, Advil.
My hands are quaking a little too as I shovel ice out of the freezer into the bags. I could tell myself it’s just from the cold, but I know it isn’t. It’s been a stressful night.
Booth and I were called to an abandoned warehouse where there was supposed to be a badly mutilated body on the second floor…and there was. However, there were also four of the killers who had returned to move the body.
Apparently the police officers who had secured the crime scene then left it unattended to go get a cup of coffee. In their absence time two parties arrived. The killers, then Booth and me.
When we entered the second floor room, they looked as surprised as we were. Booth and one of the men reached for their fire arms at the same time. I think Booth managed to draw his first, and shot one of them in the chest.
The problem was that the man fired at us even after being hit. I saw flash by my eye just for a second before Booth barreled into my shoulder, pushing both of us toward the outside wall. Actually more specifically me towards the window.
I felt his hands shove hard against my side so that I’d go through the dilapidated shudders, the glass long ago broken. Before I could even register the shock, air rushed by me and I landed hard on my back against a metallic surface, but not hard enough to have fallen two stories.
It was a leanto storage shed that stood about halfway up the building. When I realized what his intent had been I was instantly up so that I could shimmy myself over the side, drop to the concrete below, and sprint over to the SUV to get on the FBI radio.
The local police arrived back quickly, the FBI and an ambulance shortly after. They sent in a team, which lead three men out in handcuffs. The paramedics then went in. I wanted to go in also since the suspects had been apprehended, but the other FBI agents proved just as overprotective as Booth, and refused.
I admit I felt some of the most intense fear in my life when the first stretcher came out covered in a sheet. However, it turned out that Booth was on the next one, and the first one had been the man he’d shot.
I didn’t notice at the time, but that man had been the only one who was armed and had used all of his ammunition firing erratically while he fell dying during our dash to the window. A fact which probably was the only reason Booth is still alive, because instead of picking up their fallen partner’s gun the others, instead, had to use boards, pipes, and various debris from the room as their only weapons.
I was immensely relieved, of course, that Booth wasn’t killed, but I still don’t know how I feel about the fact that he pushed me to safety while he stayed behind to be beaten. Coddling and thus implying, yet again, that I can’t take care of myself.
Though on the other hand, can you really call pushing someone out a window ‘coddling’? And if we’d both stayed behind there would have been no one to call for back up, and we both might have suffered permanent injuries or worse.
But…he could have also jumped out himself along with me.
Stubborn, macho, alpha male, I think to myself again, as I grab a bottle of water from the fridge.
When I get back to the bedroom Booth is sitting on the bed struggling to get out of his shoes.
“I’ll get it,” I interrupt, dumping the supplies down next to him, “Lay down,” I say pushing him gently.
He lowers his shoulders down and stiffly swings his legs up into the bed. I quickly untie and pull off his shoes, dropping them aimlessly onto the floor.
He’s already removed his jacket and dress shirt, so I hand him the Advil and water while I set to work at getting ice on him. His shoulder was dislocated, and there was a lot of ligament tearing in his right hand which is very swollen and bruised already. I’m amazed there are no fractures in it, but I saw the x-rays myself at the hospital.
He uses his other hand to open the Advil, and pour a few out which he drops into his mouth then moves to pick up the water. I quickly snatch it up to twist the cap off before returning it to him. He gives a small grunt of thanks.
The first ice back is balanced on his shoulder with a towel to dampen the cold a little, but his hand needs all the help it can get so I put the other down without anything blocking it. He coughs and sputters, lowering the water bottle and shoving himself into a sitting position.
“God, Bones. Warn a guy before you do that!”
“You need to the cold to constrict the blood vessels and stop the swelling,” I argue, wondering why he always has to complain when I do things which are good for him.
He huffs and mutters, “You could always kiss it better,” before taking another sip of water.
“Booth, that practice has absolutely no basis in scientific fact.”
“I'm just joking,” he says, putting aside the water then giving me an ‘I knew you’d say that’ look.
I don’t like that look. It’s his way of telling me thinks he knows me so well…an unspoken challenge.
“It’s impossible to heal an injury by kissing it,” I continue. He sighs, leaning against the headboard and letting his eyes drift shut. Good, he thinks I’m going to just lecture him for the next few minutes.
He nearly jumps a foot when my lips come into contact with an area of his shoulder that isn’t covered.
“Any improvement felt by the recipient would be purely placebo,” I say against his skin, sit back up, and carefully lift his hand to bring to my lips also.
He gapes until I lift my head again, “Um...I, I thought you just said….placebo?”
I shrug as I lower his hand back down and replace the ice pack, “While it has no effect on recovery rate, the placebo effect can be quite effective at temporarily relieving symptoms. If a person convinces themself effectively enough that they’re going to feel better it can lead to a short term down regulation of the release of the chemicals that pain receptors in the brain respond to.”
He grins lecherously, “Really? Well you know I’ve got other places that hurt too.”
“Oh? Where?”
More grinning, “Well around about in this area,” he gestures to his neck.
I lean over a kiss the hollow just above his trachea.
“And here.” His temple. I place a kiss there too.
“Here,” he touches the tip of his nose, and already has his eyes shut.
“Arrogant son of a….” I flip my index finger against it.
“Ow!” he yelps, “Jeez, Bones what the-”
Before he can get any farther into his rant, I cut him off with my lips. He cups my head, and responds after just a second of surprise.
When we break apart he holds my head for a moment before I swing my leg over him so that I can move myself to his other side. He reaches up with his less injured arm, and pulls me down so that I’m lying next to him.
“Bones about what happened…you did really good,” he tells me.
I nod, “You did too.”
He rolls me a little bit up to kiss me again. Soft but heated. Produces a sensation of feeling like my insides are melting. I slowly slide out of it, and rest my head on the pillow next to him. Enjoying the haze for a moment.
Take it slow. That was our plan, and we’d both agreed it was a good idea but being here with him…in his bed which was probably covered in scent and pheromones…three years of partnership is pretty slow already right?
I fiddle with the button at the bottom of my shirt.
“Booth-” I start to say, lifting my head up to look him in the eye, but find that he isn’t looking at me. No his eyes are closed again, and this time he isn’t just relaxing. He’s drifted off to sleep.
I sit up and regard him. With a sigh I reach to pull the blanket over him. It probably wasn’t a good idea anyway. I know he wouldn’t reject me. He wouldn’t even if he wasn’t feeling well enough. He’d feel to compelled to prove his virility, and would possibly aggravate his injuries farther.
“Goodnight, Booth,” I run my fingers through his hair for a second before picking the keys to his SUV up from where he set them on the nightstand. I need to get home some how, and there’s no reason to spend the money on a taxi. His superiors know that he was injured so they wouldn’t page him during the night.
And since I’ll be picking him up in the morning tomorrow for a change, I’ll be a step in the right direction to improving those stubborn, macho, alpha male tendencies of his.
I smile as I flip the light off on my way out the bedroom door.