Hello, Bones folk! I had started this before I knew if it was official that Brennan was going to Maluku with Daisy; now that it's confirmed, I plan for this to be a small collection of one-shots having to do with their adventures in Indonesia and how two very different people can mutually benefit from each other. Most of it will be a sort of how-can-Daisy-play-a-role-in-Brennan-figuring-things-out deal, so forgive me if most of the time Daisy is more of a vehicle for Brennan exploration than anything else. If my first Bones piece didn't show it, I very much enjoy taking outside characters' perspectives to further explore Brennan. Thanks for checking this out!

Daisy and Daffodil: Postcards

Daisy Wick wondered why palm trees were so iconic. They only grow in warm climates, she knew, so they were indicators of warm weather and people like warm weather… but aesthetically? Not too much there. In fact, they were a little spindly and scraggly and sometimes grew at extremely awkward angles due to the forces of the sea breeze on the coast. And here in Indonesia, palm trees weren't always as full as the postcards at the hotel gift shop depicted them, which is why she did not send Lance a postcard of palm trees but instead of a busy Indonesian city street at sunrise. And unlike the palm tree postcard, the city street one did not say "wish you were here," a thought that Daisy felt could be a little inappropriate given the non-relationship of their relationship. Besides, the shot was rather charming and anthropologically representative of the community. No use sending him an inaccurate representation of the flora, right?

She thought her rationale was scientifically profound and had immediately shared it with Dr. Brennan as she made the purchase, but Dr. Brennan just nodded as she plunked three water bottles on the register counter and nothing else. It was pretty dismissive, actually. Daisy wished she'd just dropped the subject after that… instead of asking Dr. Brennan if Agent Booth would be getting any cheesy Indonesian paraphernalia. Of course, she didn't think that one through and regretted it instantly when she saw her professor's face cloud back over into what Daisy called "professionalism" but what Lance called "her personal stress response state." Damn, and she thought after the long but pleasant plane ride during which Dr. Brennan had reviewed and edited her article on parietal fusion, called it outstanding—but better yet, had called her "Daisy"—that she'd finally got a foot in the door just a teeny bit.

But after that postcard incident, it was right back to Miss Wick… but only for a little while.

That had been weeks ago and that was also the only hotel she and Dr. Brennan had stayed in. Their dig was on the edge of sandy nowhere and they'd been housed in a hut-esque structure that looked something like she'd seen at water parks—but these were actually legit. They weren't small but they definitely weren't anything luxurious… at all. Now Daisy felt the urge to defend Dr. Brennan's honor if anyone back home dared to call her rich and self-pampered ever again—the woman was like a boy scout when it came to these expeditions and had no qualms about camping out by the dig site with nothing but a sleeping bag and the knowledge of how to build natural shelter. Daisy tried to keep her mouth free of complaints for the first week but Dr. Brennan was a great teacher, of course, so now she was like an old pro herself at the monk-life thing. It felt good, empowering, and whenever she was particularly resourceful she could practically feel Dr. Brennan smiling at her. Didn't actually see it, of course, but that didn't matter.

There was still a matter of what was and wasn't fair game of discussion besides anything skeleton-related and after a few early slip-ups that resulted in the infamous Dr. Brennan Professionalism, Daisy hadn't risked much. There were safe things and they sufficed. Weather. Stories from the anthropology journal they'd both read. More weather. She learned quickly that the biggest unsafe topic was anything of or relating to Agent Booth.

But the concept of the significance of palm trees—that was harmless, right? Fair game? Because there certainly were a lot of them around the housing site, which was where Daisy sat on a hand-carved rocking chair, booted feet propped up on the wooden porch railing and crossed at the ankles. Dr. Brennan sat next to her in a companionable silence, writing up a report on the tibia they'd unearthed earlier, because the weather—Daisy and Dr. Brennan's hottest topic—currently prevented them from returning to the dig site.

A gust of wind from the storm down the Maluku coast shook the trees in question and when Dr. Brennan glanced up for a second at the rustling, Daisy took her shot.

"Why do you think people like palm trees so much?"

Yep. Felt stupid, sounded stupid, and as expected, Dr. Brennan looked at her like she was stupid. Time to backpedal.

"I'm sorry I—I interrupted you, Dr. Brennan, really, I didn't mean to, it was really random of me and I know we talked about how I should stop doing that. I'll stop. I'm done," Daisy word-vomited while Dr. Brennan just continued to stare at her as if it might make Daisy disappear entirely. "Back to the uh, the tibia write up."

When the burning that was definitely a blush—that may or may not have been visible beneath the ruddy remnants of week-old sunburn on her cheeks—finally died down, Daisy fully expected the silence to continue. For the past few weeks they'd had a lot of that. For the first time Daisy was thankful for it.

But also for the first time, Dr. Brennan did not look back to her paperwork in dismissal. Instead, she looked up at the palm trees.

"I always think of ribcages."

Startled, Daisy pulled her feet from the porch railing. Should she respond? Or would Dr. Brennan continue with her thoughts? It was such a new experience—this whole budding conversation concept—and Daisy had no idea how to proceed.

"I don't know why, because other than the leaves connecting at the stem like a really narrow sternum, there really are no similarities," Dr. Brennan elaborated passively. "They don't even wrap around."

As if the idle conversation—and yes, Daisy thought to herself, that was most definitely a quantifiable conversation when it came to Dr. Brennan—wasn't shocking enough, Dr. Brennan even pulled her eyes away from the trees to look at Daisy with a gentle… smile? It almost felt like an "I'm glad you're here" but that may have just been wishful thinking.

But that smile, as partial as it was, drew all of Daisy's attention to her professor. The constant sun had initially made them both pink but was now painting Dr. Brennan something golden and freckles spackled her nose and cheeks and her hair was streaked with sun-blonde. She looked so youthful that her commanding presence was almost belied. Almost. Whatever the reason for the phenomenon, it was like looking at Dr. Brennan through x-ray glasses and it only made Daisy realize one thing: there was an impetus for this sudden willingness to chat… and she wondered if it had anything to do with Agent Booth.

"Dr. Brennan? Your scout team has a few questions about tomorrow's directives," a man's voice called from inside the quarters.

"Okay, I'll be right in," Dr. Brennan replied and carefully balanced her paperwork on top of the stool she'd vacated. They balanced precariously and then stilled until a gust of wind ruffled them. Daisy, in a small panic, bounced from her rocking chair to catch them before they blew off into the afternoon. She counted her stars that Dr. Brennan kept things numbered and labeled so hopefully, she'd be able to put this pile back together just as she'd found—

"Oh," escaped her mouth as she knelt from the splintery wooden floor, hands on an oft-opened envelope.

An envelope from a Sergeant Major Booth.

Sergeant Major.

Daisy remembered all too clearly her professor's face in that airport when the camo-donned Booth had stepped into the terminal to say goodbye. Thank God that Dr. Saroyan's "oh my God" had kept Daisy's "let's go, Dr. Brennan" firmly in her mouth's mouth. Dr. Brennan's purposeful stride had hitherto only been seen by Daisy when directed toward work urgency—but it was chilling to see that set jaw, those clenched hands, that exuberating need to get there when the destination was not the lab platform but was Agent Booth.

That's when it hit her… really, really hit her. Daisy should have never said what she had said to Dr. Brennan about the partners holding each other back. She never thought that perhaps "partners" would imply anything but the professional FBI-Jeffersonian link. Stupid, stupid, stupid!

Her professor was in love.

Suddenly, these two inseparable beings that Daisy had put on a pedestal just became two little humans that had become hopelessly entangled… but were now slicing away at the binds and saying goodbye and it broke Daisy's heart.

And Daisy had let out her own, quieter "oh, God," wondering when her concerns had switched from wanting to impress Dr. Brennan for these three hundred and sixty five days to wanting to learn how to comfort Dr. Brennan when she got homesick, lovesick… Boothsick.

Of course, those concerns faded fast when they arrived in Indonesia. Dr. Brennan didn't outwardly show anything and Daisy quickly found out that long periods of silence punctuated by science-y stuff was how Dr. Brennan did Boothsickness; Boothsickness was the ultimate "leave me alone with these remains, please."

But Boothsickness had abated today… and all because of this little envelope.

Daisy glanced inside the hut structure; by the intensity of discussion she could hear from her post on the patio, she could assume that it would be quite a while before Dr. Brennan came outside. Holding the envelope close to her chest, she maneuvered down the steps and slipped behind a palm tree, her heart in her throat.

The parcel was addressed to "Bones," which didn't surprise Daisy. What did surprise her, though, was that it was not a four-page, handwritten letter written by the passion-shaky hand of doting love and dotted with the tried tear stains of a lovesick anthropologist. Based on Dr. Brennan's excellent mood, Daisy had expected something huge, something touching, something monumental.

What was in the envelope was actually a post card of an Osama bin Laden lookalike in nothing but underwear.

Agent Booth's handwriting was scrawled across the back: "The Middle East is doing wonders for my complexion, don't you think?"

She laughed out loud, unable to muffle the sound. It came out way too loudly. She bit her tongue, panicked... until her laugh was echoed by a soft chuckle that she couldn't exactly place but sounded awfully like…

"Oh God, Dr. Brennan!" Daisy shrieked as she turned around and saw her professor standing right behind her. Dr. Brennan was wearing such an unfamiliar and completely endearing smirk. Daisy braced herself against the trunk of the palm tree and sighed, her heart rate resuming normalcy. "He's uh… he's silly. Here. I'm… I'm sorry," she stuttered, handing back the postcard and looking contrite as a kicked puppy. This was a total breech of her professor's privacy; she was going to be given the silent treatment for weeks, she just knew it—

"This one's relatively tame, compared to the last two," Dr. Brennan said, shocking the hell out of Daisy. Her eyes were not even slightly angry and became bright and slightly unfocused as she unconsciously ran a finger over Agent Booth's handwriting. "…Yeah, he's silly," she agreed in a disarmingly soft voice.

"I'm sorry," Daisy repeated in the awkward silence. She had no idea what to say. Dr. Brennan was throwing her for all kinds of loops and she just didn't want to take a misstep.

"It's fine," Dr. Brennan assured her. "Glad it could amuse you. I have to go prep the excavators. See you at dinner, Daisy."

Daisy never heard a more contented-sounding sigh in her entire life as her professor turned, a little piece of Booth in her hand.