It was eleven p.m. as a solitary security guard began his customary rounds through the deserted hallways of the Jeffersonian. He paused briefly as he checked a door, making sure it was locked. He smiled to himself as he read the sign over the door frame. This particular storeroom had been the scene of more than just boxes and crates being moved around. Over the years, the model of Cleopatra's bed from the previous Egyptian exhibit had been a popular lunchtime meeting spot for several pairs of employees to enjoy some time together. The man shrugged, wondering if the installation of the museum's new security cameras had put a crimp in that activity. Surely by now most couples had found another place to indulge in some afternoon delight. He just hoped it wasn't on the wing of the museum under his nightly supervision. He chuckled as he walked on. Maybe somehow he could suggest the storeroom in the Medieval wing as an alternative location for passionate trysts. Jenkins wouldn't care, right? It might even spice up things on that wing of the museum, and Jenkins could use the spice in his life.

The guard strolled through the dimly lit halls, using his flashlight to check dark corners, whistling softly as he worked his way through his appointed wing. He liked the comfortable predictability of his evenings at work. It was rare that anything happened to provide a change in his routine, and to be honest, he liked it that way. He could make his rounds, checking his area for unlocked doors and turning off forgotten lamps as he contemplated a book he'd been reading or a lecture he might've attended earlier in the day. Employees of the Jeffersonian had access to any museum lecture they wished to attend, and the topics ranged from how the brain functioned under stress to the different military strategies employed during the Peloponnesian War. The guard loved going to those lectures. That was part of what had enticed him to apply for the job. He'd learned so much by listening to the presentations, and it felt great to sit in the same room with all those smart people, discussing the various topics with well respected professors and authors, and none of them seemed to care that he was merely one of the museum's security guards.

Being a nocturnal sort, he liked his hours, too. He could work all night and go home to have a bite to eat before going to a lecture somewhere or to the public library to check out some more books, and then he could sleep for a while before going to back to work late in the evening. He always brought 2 or 3 books with him when he came to work. He usually preferred non-fiction books, but he also liked the literary classics. He was reading through the works of Hemingway and Dickens again, devouring pages of their novels as he devoured his evening meal on his break. After he checked the door locks and all the dark nooks and crannies of the old building, he could usually find time to settle down at the front desk for a few minutes so he could read a chapter or two before it was time to make his rounds again.

At midnight, the alarm on his phone sounded, and he nodded as he turned toward the vicinity of the Medical-Legal lab. It would soon be time to check on Dr. Brennan. Earlier in the evening, he'd gotten a text from Dr. Saroyan, the woman in charge of the lab, asking him to look in on the lab's forensic anthropologist if it wasn't too much trouble. The guard laughed to himself. It was no trouble at all. In fact, he was looking forward to it. He enjoyed talking to Dr. Brennan. She was brilliant, but she also had a sort of child-like quality that he found most endearing. Like most geniuses, she wasn't always concerned about little things like time when she was in the middle of a project. In some ways Dr. Brennan reminded him very much of his own daughter, even though his daughter was about ten years younger than Dr. Brennan. He sighed as he thought of his brilliant and beautiful Marie, who was currently living in Japan with her partner. He didn't hear from his daughter very often, and he missed her terribly. Sighing heavily, he slowly continued his rounds. Nothing could be done to fix his issues with Marie right now. He knew everyone had their own sad story, and his estrangement with his daughter wouldn't be of interest to anyone but himself. Shaking off his unhappy thoughts, he checked the video cameras in the hallway to make sure they were working properly before walking across the lab to see if Dr. Brennan was still working.

It was now one a.m., and he was only slightly surprised to see the light still on in the anthropologist's office. When Dr. Brennan had first started working at the Jeffersonian, he'd often scolded her gently about working into the wee hours of the morning, but it usually did no good. He knew her mind probably worked twenty four hours a day, even while she was supposed to be resting. It seemed she also had nocturnal tendencies, and her active mind would sometimes keep her from sleeping at night. She'd often decided that she might as well come to work and do something constructive instead of laying in bed wide awake, doing nothing. He'd understood perfectly, having made similar choices himself many times in the past. It was nice to know that someone else knew what it was like to be an nightowl, enjoying the silence of the night while most people were asleep.

However, over the past few years, since she'd started working in conjunction with the FBI, she'd gradually changed her schedule, spending less time working late at the lab. She'd found other things to do, including spending time with her friend, Agent Booth. The guard had approved, knowing that it wasn't good for her physical or mental health to work so late, spending more time with the dead than the living. He'd hoped that she was learning to take better care of herself. He was glad for the good influence Booth was having on her life. She had seemed so happy for a while…

After gently knocking on the office door, the guard quietly pushed it open, not wanting to startle Dr. Brennan if she was concentrating. Finding no one in her office, he turned off the light and locked the door behind him. If she was still in the building, she'd be able to unlock the door herself, but he figured she'd just left in a hurry earlier in the day, perhaps on a case, and had forgotten the lock and the light. She'd be annoyed with herself if she knew, but he decided not to mention it to her. It was an easy thing to fix, and there was no harm done.

The guard glanced at his watch. Two a.m. He had about an hour until he'd eat his dinner. He walked out to the lab platform and accessed it with his ID card. He stood silently, almost reverently, for a few seconds, noticing how the idling monitors of the computers cast an eerie glow across the tables, softening the sharp edges of the skeletons that were laid out there. No Dr. Brennan here, either. He hoped she'd gone home, but there was one more place he wanted to look before he ate his dinner. Exiting the platform, he decided to check the basement.

Taking the steps down to bone storage, he quietly turned the knob and opened the door, peering around it to see if anyone living was present. The guard knew that this was one of Dr. Brennan's favorite places to come if she wanted peace and quiet for some reason, but the room was empty except for the stacks of large plastic boxes containing skeletal remains that made up the walls. Some people who worked in the Jeffersonian lab called this store room Limbo, and as he recalled the definition...an uncertain period of waiting or resolution...he agreed it was a fitting name, but he knew she didn't like it. To Dr. Brennan, that name sounded like a surrender. She was confident that sooner or later, given enough time, she'd be able to identify every one of those nameless ones...and he had no doubt that she'd be able to do it.

It looked like Dr. Brennan had gone home at a reasonable hour. Good. The guard glanced at his watch as he turned off the light and locked the door leading to bone storage. Three a.m. Time for his meal break. He walked upstairs to the small kitchenette where he'd left his books and his lunchbox. He'd looked forward to diving back into The Sun Also Rises, but he found that his mind kept drifting away from the story in the novel to one of real life stories that had occurred at the Jeffersonian…

Dr. Brennan had been keeping more normal hours at the lab until the Gravedigger trial, when she returned to working long hours, keeping an erratic schedule as she tried to find enough evidence to convict Heather Taffet in kidnapping and murder charges. It soon became clear, even after the successful outcome in court, that the trial had taken a heavy toll on her, physically as well as emotionally, and eventually she decided that she needed a break from all the stress that had been building up in her life. She left her lab and her friends in DC and went to work on an anthropological dig in the Malukus. Even though he was just a security guard, he'd missed seeing her around the museum. Her intellectual energy had burned like a beacon for him. Being a professor as well as a scientist, she rarely hesitated to answer any question he might have for her as he stopped to chat during his evening rounds, and he often answered questions for her pertaining to the vagaries of human behavior. Even with all the differences between them, they'd become good friends over the time they had worked together, and he'd looked forward to seeing her again when the expedition was finished.

After Dr. Brennan's return from the Maluku Islands, she'd soon reverted to her practice of staying at the lab until the early morning hours. The guard, knowing her well by now, realized she was hiding from her pain...pain that was caused by the companion who had joined her friend Agent Booth after his tour of duty in Afghanistan. Blonde and beautiful, the woman was involved in a romantic relationship with Booth. That relationship had caused Dr. Brennan a great deal of heartache, and so she buried herself in her work as a means of retreat. The guard had tried as best he could to help her get past that little bump, but then she worked a case that had pushed her to an emotional brink. She was overidentifying with the victim. Dr. Brennan had worried about becoming a copy of Dr. Lauren Eames.

The guard smiled as he remembered their many discussions over that short period of time when it seemed that Dr. Brennan might be in danger of losing touch with reality. No one had come to her office to tell her to go home, so she had stayed for many hours past closing time, looking over the victim's remains, and having one sided conversations with the dead woman. The guard had known he needed to help her somehow, even though it might not be his place to do so. He felt sure she would listen to him, even if she listened to no one else. She'd often said that he was the one person she could always understand. He wasn't sure what gift he had that made that possible, but he'd used it to convince her to listen to the signals from the Universe. If anyone else had told her that, she'd say they were being ridiculous, but she had listened to him, and something happened, although the guard had never really known exactly what took place. Dr. Brennan said she had listened to the signals from the Universe…and what had happened as a result had made her very sad, but it was better than being dead inside. After three upside down days, things had finally turned right side up again.

Four a.m. Time to make his rounds. The guard walked through the silent halls, thinking about what had happened next in the story. Dr. Brennan and Agent Booth, it seemed, had lost touch with each other for a time, only to find each other again. The signals from the Universe that had gotten crossed or that were becoming faint had begun to come in loud and clear...and finally they were both receiving the same signals. They became a couple and had welcomed a child. For the most part, Dr. Brennan had gone back to keeping regular hours, until the arrival of Christopher Pelant and the Ghost Killer. She would've stayed all night trying to solve those cases, but Agent Booth refused to let her do that any more. He persuaded her to come home with him to get some rest, and to let someone help her, and because she trusted him, she listened. The guard was then satisfied that Agent Booth would take excellent care of Dr. Brennan. Chuckling softly, the guard imagined what Dr. Brennan might say if she knew that he thought someone should be taking care of her…she would most certainly be quite annoyed.

Five a.m. The guard used his flashlight to check the halls, nooks and crannies again, making sure things were all clear before the morning shift took over. He went through the halls switching on the lights for the scientists who normally arrived early in the morning. He checked to make sure the overnight cleaning crew had stocked the restrooms appropriately, making sure the lights were turned on and the water was turned off. The building was slowly awakening after it's quiet overnight slumber. It was like watching a large animal shaking off its sleep and stretching itself to meet the new day.

Sixty thirty a.m. Making one last pass through the halls of his wing, the guard checked the trash cans to make sure they'd been emptied. He booted up the computers at the front desk and turned on the metal detectors in the lobby that led into his wing. Going through the kitchenette, he opened his locker and placed his walkie talkie, flashlight, and baton inside. He checked the safety on his gun before laying it next to the walkie talkie. He closed the locker and spun the lock before walking out to the front desk to greet the security guards on the day shift.

Seven a.m. Time to get ready for the shift change. The digital recorders were reset and the information from the omnipresent security cameras was backed up and stored. The guard laughed as he saved the information, remembering how Dr. Hodgins and Ms. Montenegro had been caught in flagrante because they hadn't realized that security cameras had been installed in various storerooms. They had learned to become much more discreet as the years had gone by…

Seven thirty a.m. The guard decided to stop by Dr. Brennan's office before he left for the day, and was pleased to see that she was already at work. "Good morning, Dr. Brennan."

"Oh, good morning, Micah." Brennan smiled as she looked up from her computer. "Please come in and sit down. How are you today?"

"I'm fine. Getting an early start on the day, I see." He gestured toward her computer.

"Yes, I decided to come to work early so I can leave a bit early today. My daughter has a dance recital this evening, and I'll need to help her get ready." She pointed to a mug on her desk. "Can I get you some tea or coffee?"

"Oh, no, thanks. I just dropped by to see how you are. I haven't spoken to you for several months…" Micah smiled broadly as he pointed to the picture of Brennan's children in a frame on her desk. "I guess your kids keep you very busy. It's good to go home and spend the evening with your family, isn't it?"

"Yes, I find that spending time with my family is very important to me. I miss them tremendously if I have to work late in the lab." Brennan took a sip of her tea. "I assume you're leaving for the day. Are you going to a lecture this afternoon?"

"Two lectures actually. One about warping the space/time continuum to help us travel, like in Star Trek, and then another one about Sequoyah's development of the Cherokee syllabary."

"Both of those topics sound quite interesting." Brennan ran her finger around the rim of her mug. "I know you like the midnight shift, Micah, but I wish you'd consider moving to days. I find that I miss our very entertaining discussions."

Micah shrugged as he stood up to leave. "But if I worked days, I wouldn't be able to go to so many lectures, and I'd be just another boring security guard. Maybe I can stop by your office every few weeks before I go home, just to check in. I can tell you about the lectures I've been to, and you can tell me about what your children have been doing."

Pleased with his suggestion, Brennan nodded in agreement. "I think that would be acceptable. I'll look forward to seeing you soon."

"Give my regards to Agent Booth. Good-bye, Dr. Brennan." Smiling as he waved to her, Micah left Dr. Brennan's office, content with his life, and happily looking forward to another day of learning and another night of work.