*~* The Failure in the Fairytale *~*

Welcome to my first foray into Bones fanfiction! I began watching the show from the beginning this spring and fell in love with it - especially Booth and Brennan's relationship - and I've been addicted ever since. This, however, is my first story, so I would love some feedback. It's short, but rest assured that the actual chapters will be much longer. And just so you know, this story is rated M for a reason - please read with caution.

Prologue
Parker Booth

At exactly eleven years and one week old, Parker Booth was neither unobservant nor naïve (the latter word had been on his vocab word list the week before the world came crashing down around all their ears). Hushed whispers between the adults, visitors to what had been their house for barely four months, and the barring of his view of the couch all belied tragedy, but as for what exactly had happened, Parker was unsure. He had wanted to ask his dad, but a tight, frightening look had been permanently in place since Friday, and he sensed his father was a few ill-advised words from exploding.

Angela had been waiting for him when he arrived home off the bus on Friday, ready for a weekend of TV, soccer games, and Bones's excellent macaroni and cheese. As his mom was vacationing in the Bahamas with Parker's new stepfather, Brent, Parker was able to spend an entire six weeks with his dad, Bones, and his six-month-old sister, Mallory. Just a week into his stay (and five days after his eleventh birthday), Parker arrived home to a tearful Angela, who said, when he asked, that something bad had happened to Brennan and no one could find her. She drove him, Mikey and Mallory to the Jeffersonian, where the four of them waited in her office for some news as Hodgins frantically analyzed particulates and his dad made phone call after phone call.

Bones had been recovered several hours later and taken immediately to Georgetown University Hospital, where things, to Parker, had begun to get strange. Only his dad and Angela were allowed in the ICU room, but Parker had caught a glimpse of Bones's bruised face through the glass. He felt a little sick to his stomach whenever he thought of her in that bed, hooked up to machines, eyes blank and distant, but as far as he knew, her injuries weren't life-threatening.

Not too long later, Mallory had begun to whimper pitifully, her big crystal blue eyes pleading as she grasped at Parker's vermilion t-shirt. He alerted Cam, who had been standing with Michelle nearby, that Mallory was hungry and that perhaps someone should tell Bones. Cam had told him that Brennan would most likely not be breastfeeding anymore, and the sadness lacing her words had silenced Parker's further inquiries. Even now, the bottle of formula Max had prepared rested on the kitchen counter, cooling rapidly. No one, not even Mallory's father, had been able to persuade the infant to down more than a couple of swallows.

Now the baby, once Bones's very reason for living, lay sleepily across Parker's chest as the boy perched on a barstool, surrounded by somber friends and family and utterly confused. Bones wasn't dead, nor permanently mentally or physically incapacitated, so why was everyone acting as though she was? All these people - Angela, Hodgins, Cam, Max, Caroline, Jared and Padme, Hank, Sweets, Daisy, Wendall, Clark, Russ, Amy, Hayley and Emma, even Zach, who had been released from some sort of facility temporarily and was under Sweets's express supervision - were gathered in their house in support of Bones. He knew she had a broken arm, he had glimpsed the electric blue cast, and he had overheard that she also had broken ribs, a black eye, a split lip, a sprained ankle, and severe bruising. But none of her injuries explained why she hadn't spoken in four days, why she wouldn't hold Mallory, why there were all these people in their home, treading carefully around something Parker wasn't able to comprehend. Both Bones and his father had been injured, occasionally severely, multiple times, and neither had acted as Bones was behaving now. The doctor herself had taught Parker to use logic when a situation puzzled him, and logic left him at the conclusion that something was missing. He simply did not have all the evidence.

Then again ...

He had heard them mention the word, in hushed tones, as if they were discussing death. He didn't know what it meant and was sure, for whatever reason, that they intended to keep him in the dark. But his father caught murderers, Parker reasoned. What could be worse that what he'd already seen, what he already knew about?

This thought in mind, Parker dodged around a toddling Mikey Hodgins and slid into the comfortable computer chair, Mallory held carefully against his chest. Then he proceeded to open a search engine and type in four fateful letters, the letters that had changed all of their lives forever.