Possible spoilers up to Season 3: "Pain in the Heart"

A/N: This was hard. After the season finale, I found it very difficult to reconcile what we learned with the character I had been writing about. It took some time to decide whether to stick with or reject canon. I am now going to say that this story is set four or five months before the events of "The Pain in the Heart".

But it hurts to say that.

Disclaimer: The characters and the show Bones are the intellectual property of their creators and Fox TV.

Chapter 2: Ghost of an Injury

"There is no ghost so difficult to lay as the ghost of an injury"

Alexander Smith

"So, Zack, I hear you have something for me." Booth was rubbing his hands in anticipation as he walked into the young anthropologist's lab.

"No, I don't, Agent Booth," Zack said, looking up nervously.

Booth frowned, "Bones said you had got a hit from one of the databases in the apple crate babies case."

Zack looked in vain over Booth's shoulder, searching for help from a more understanding source. "I did find a match. Several, in fact."

"So you have something for me." Booth stated confidently.

"No, I am afraid I do not, Agent Booth."

"Wait a minute, wait a minute." Booth threw his hands up in the air. "You did get a hit?"

Zack nodded cautiously.

"But you won't tell me about it?"

"Not won't, Booth – he can't."

Zack's face lit with relief when Dr. Brennan spoke from the door. She had seen Booth come in and had run to intercept him. Unfortunately, she had not made it in time.

"Zack can't tell you about the information he found. It would break research protocol." She opened her mouth to explain further, but Booth rode right over her.

"Protocol? What kind of protocol keeps material evidence from an investigator in a federal crime? Any information you found through our databases can be shared with me. You know that, Bones. You're the one who told me Zack had found something."

"And I was wrong," Brennan said firmly. " Not that he found something – he did."

Zack was nodding and backing subtly away from Booth.

"But I was wrong about where he found it," she went on smoothly. "He did not find the information in one of the federal databases. Therefore, he cannot share the information with the FBI without a warrant."

Booth simply stared at her for a moment, his mouth open, anger beginning to stir beneath the surface.

Cam Saroyan stepped into the lab in Brennan's wake, "Seeley," she said warningly.

"Keep out of this, Camille," he retorted evenly.

"You know I can't. Protocols exist for a reason, Booth. Sort of like federal laws."

Brennan stepped in again, tag-teaming seamlessly with Cam. "The information Zack has didn't come from any of your databases, Booth," she repeated, giving him time to control his emotions. "He was doing a side project for the University of Washington …"

"And that's a problem, you see, because of the Ward case; we can't use the information from one case to inform another one, especially if there could be international implications…" Cam's voice once more over-rode Brennan's, trying to get through to Booth with a flood of information to keep him from going over the table and simply shaking the information out of a shrinking Zack, who was now sitting at the table.

Booth stopped staring at the young scientist and transferred the icy glare to the two women, whose babbling stopped for a moment.

"The Ward case?" His voice was a little too calm, a little too quiet.

"Dr. Ward from the University of British Columbia was doing a study…" Brennan began.

"On genetic causes for arthritis," Zack interjected. "There is a community in the Pacific North West which has an extremely high incidence of a rare form …" his voice tailed off when Booth's darkened gaze swung back to him

"The Nuu-chal-nuth people of Vancouver Island," Camille stepped in again. "Their blood was collected in the 1980s – Ward promised to find some way to help them. He did some studies, but mostly …"

"He used the blood samples, the DNA, to prove a theory about whether the First Nations people really are genetically linked with Asians from Siberia – whether they came over the Bering Straits or not. A classic case of bio-colonialism."

The disgust in Brennan's voice was for the duplicity in gathering the sample, Booth registered vaguely, not for the research being done.

"So how did our babies get genetically linked to Indians living in British Columbia?" he asked, following the one thread he thought he could pick up.

"They didn't," Zack stated, his eyes showing his confusion. "They have nothing to do with this study …"

Booth groaned out loud and clutched his aching head. "So you are telling me that some study which has nothing to do with our case gave you evidence that could tell me how to begin identifying 44 dead babies and their families – could give some closure to people who have been lied to for nearly 50 years, Zack – and you won't tell me what that evidence is, and you can't even tell me why you can't tell me?" His voice may have started off calm, but as he spoke it grew in volume and irritation, infecting the room with a kind of menace Brennan had only seen Booth use on criminals and people he was determined to break.

It worked. As Booth advanced on him, Zack put his head down on the examining table, and wrapped his arms protectively over the back of his neck.

"What the hell is going on here?" Angela was by Zack's side before anyone even realized she had come into the room, one arm over the young man's shoulders, glaring at Booth ferociously. "Why are you bullying Zack?"

"Forget it. Just forget the whole thing – babies, families, mothers who were lied to – forget everything. What's really important is that some researcher doesn't get his knickers in a twist because we used some information to help people." He stormed out of the lab, moving so fast down the corridor it took Brennan several moments to catch up to him.

"Booth! Wait! Damn it all, just wait a minute and talk to me." She grabbed his arm, but stepped back when he turned that cold flat look on her – the one that meant he was in full combat-mode.

"We can't agree on this one, Bones." His voice was chilled, cold breath reaching out to touch her cheek. "I want to solve the case. Once and for all. I want those babies to have names. I want the mothers whose children were murdered and tossed away like compost to feed trees to know the truth. I want the people in that neighbourhood who closed their eyes to what was going on there to know what kind of people they were protecting."

Brennan turned from the naked pain on his face, her gaze falling to her feet. "I know you think we are just being unnecessarily obstructionist, Booth. I know that you want to solve the case – not just to solve the case – but to put things right. But if we ignore protocol in this case, we could lose much needed help in other cases. Institutions won't trust us to work with them. Researchers will not share their information with us. It matters, Booth. It does matter."

"I may be able to agree on one level, Bones, but …" His voice faded out helplessly, and with a curiously stunted gesture, he walked out of the Jeffersonian.