A/N: Well, here is yet another story. I know I have several others in the works, but I write what the muse gives me, and this is currently what it is. I'm hoping that you will all be as intrigued as my unofficial betas, Cassie and Lexi, are by this premise. Enjoy.

Disclaimer- I don't own Bones or any of the characters. I just like to torment them and send them into angst-ridden situations for my own enjoyment and yours.

(Don't worry, though, I love happy endings just like everyone else. So don't freak out too much. Also, please take note of the date- it is indeed the year 2018, and that is not a typo.)

In the Worst of Times

Prologue

Her hand reached up and slapped the solid surface above her, the contact sending tendrils of fear straight through her veins, shocking her heart with the cold embrace of ultimate terror. Slowly, memories drifted back into her consciousness, her injuries slowly making themselves known. Her body ached, but she found that she couldn't move, and at that thought, the claustrophobia she'd been expecting started to take control.

For the first time since this ordeal had started, she began to wonder if it was possible that she wasn't getting out of here at all. If this was how she was going to die, finally, after everything she'd already been through.

Who was looking for her? Who would know where to find her?

No one was coming. And if they were... they weren't coming in time.

It was finally over.

Trembling in her grave, she closed her eyes and tried to make it all go away.

Two months earlier

May 24th, 2018

The light was fading, over the small diner where there sat a lonely woman. She had straggly blonde hair that had once been brown and still showed the faintest traces of it, close to the roots. She thought it added character, where her girlfriends thought it only added challenges to her social life. Mainly, dating.

But she didn't have any problems in that department. Hadn't for a while. Which was why she was here, now, sitting where she was… and wondering.

Her choices in the past had never been very significant. She had graduated high school as expected, had gone to the family college as expected, and had earned the grades that had been expected. She had graduated on time, and had found a job at the very office where she had earned an internship during her earlier years in the business field.

Nothing big, just a secretary. Not quite what her father had envisioned for her, or what her mother had been preaching about every Christmas, birthday, and Valentine's Day (the latter being more so because of her failures to bring a date home to meet them than because of anything else).

But her dreams did go farther than this. She didn't plan to sit behind the front desk for the rest of her life, and just usher people in to meet the men in charge. She wanted to be one of those people in suits with a desk that had her name in a shiny gold plaque sitting on the edge. She would rearrange her pencils in their mug as she looked down at her failing employee and asked him if he knew why he was there, not unlike a principal disciplining an unsurprisingly misbehaved child. With slender fingers and gorgeously manicured nails, she would reach out and straiten the name plate just because she could, and she would fire anyone who messed with the settings on her chair. Which would have a massager built in. God, did she ever need a massage.

Life wasn't exactly stress-free. Sure, a job to pay the bills, no family to look after, only a moderate number of bills coming in, and frozen pizza waiting in her freezer for supper that night. But that was just one small fraction.

Sometimes, things were so much more complicated than they looked on the surface. Sitting here, a piece of almost untouched pie sitting in front of her with the vanilla ice cream slowly, rhythmically melting onto the plate in steady droplets, she could see it all falling away.

Why had she gotten herself messed up in this?

Hadn't instinct always told her to avoid trouble? Hadn't her childhood, her upbringing, the firm and occasionally misplaced guidance of her parents, taught her anything about the world? She should have seen this coming. Ages ago. Should have known that it was stupid to think so little of the future and get so caught up in the moment.

Well, not that the moment was well and caught up to her she wasn't sure which way the tables were turning. And she was starting to feel rather dizzy, to be honest. The persistent nausea that had been bothering her for weeks was only increasing every time the waitress came around to offer her a refill on her coffee, eyeing the pie plate as if she would really like her to leave, even though the little diner was by no means busy.

If anything, the waitress probably wanted her gone so she could clean up and be all the more ready to leave. The reddish tint of the sunset over the skyline was yet another reminder of the hour. She shouldn't stay here much longer.

After all, she'd already seen the person she'd came for. Had already chickened out and stayed where she was, watching the interactions of the people around her and looking away whenever the stare she was sending brought up a set of eyes to seek out the source of the rising hair on the back of their neck.

But she was apparently inconspicuous enough that she didn't earn more than a fleeting glance.

The guilt of it was almost overwhelming. To be so close, to have the truth weighing in her heart, but be unable to set it free for fear of bringing down the very gates of heaven and hell upon herself. She had no idea which side she was even fighting for anymore… was this a good choice, or a terrible, ruinous one?

And truly, what was her motivation? None of this could end well, but what right did she, of all people, have to be the one to choose when and how it came about?

You're just a secretary, she reminded herself, taking a few calming breaths. Besides, her target was gone now. There was little she could do about that, and she had no idea where to even look for their place of residence. It had never occurred to her to do any more research once she realized that this was the place to go if she wished to make contact.

At the same time as her doubts had flooded her, so had her memories. She'd been in a position like this once before, when staying silent had ended disastrously. But she knew well enough to know that either way could end the same, having seen enough movies in her time.

But it had been more than one too many visits to the cinema which had prompted her silence. It was fear of judgment, of ridicule, of everything and anything in between. What would the look on their face be, if she simply walked up and spoke the truth? What would they think of her? And what of her parents, her friends, her coworkers?

She shivered at the very idea. She was in too deep. She knew too much for sharing to be a good idea. Sharing could get you killed, couldn't it? Couldn't it?

And who would help her? No one else knew the horrible secret she was keeping locked inside of her. That was why it was just that… a secret. And a well-kept one, at that.

She'd always been good at keeping to herself, after all. The most trustworthy friend you could have, she recalled her college roommate saying once. She had loved the idea, at the time. Found it surprising that some people simply couldn't keep even the smallest of things locked inside when she seemed to have plenty of room to store it all away in to avoid, to refuse to let loose.

What a terrible weapon she could be turned into.

Glancing up as the waitress approached again, she slid the pie away from her and politely asked for the check. A relieved smile washing over the younger woman's face, the waitress nodded eagerly, collected the dish, and shuffled away.

She dug into her wallet, pulling out a twenty. It would cover the pie, the coffee, and a lot more. Glancing around, she made up her mind and tucked the bill under the salt shaker before standing and pulling her purse over her shoulder. The whole time sitting there, and she hadn't even taken off her light coat. It was stiff now, under the arms, and as she stepped out onto the sidewalk and breathed out into the fresh night air, she swung her arms to loosen up the fabric, glancing up at the stars as she absently shoved her hands into her pockets.

There was always tomorrow. Sure, she could truly do this anytime she wished… but sooner was probably for the better, if she truly intended to go through with it at all. She couldn't keep this secret… for the first time in her life, she needed to speak.

No matter what the consequences.

It was just a matter of working up the courage, finding the right words, and diving in headlong before she could talk herself out of it.

She took a cab back to her apartment building, tipping him highly as well because her guilty conscious needed some sort of good-deed-doing outlet for her frustrations. Sighing, she mounted the stairs, and once inside waited for the rickety elevator to find its way back to the lobby. It was always a slow ride, no matter which way you were going. But it had only stuck on her once, and she was, thankfully, not a claustrophobic person. She would think that, with the high-class neighborhood she lived in, the building managers would have gotten it fixed long ago. It didn't even go down to the basement anymore; god knew what was down there after all these years. She had given up sending in complain letters after it became obvious nothing was going to change. She had just gotten used to it.

So, it was without trepidation, but not without the heaviness of her conscience, that she stepped in once the doors rattled open.

By the time they opened again, on the fifth floor, her guilt, her fears... all of it was gone.

And her blood was slowly dripping onto the carpeting as the soft elevator music skipped and hummed overhead.

It's short, I know. But it is necessary, and the next chapter is really quite long to make up for it. Feedback is loved, and let's me know that people are actually interested. In other words, it will make me want to update. Hint, hint. :D