Oh my God, it's an update! I'm so sorry that this took so long. I got really distracted along the way and lost interest, but here it is, the final part. Just as I promised (last year). Sorry about that guys, I hope you enjoy and that this was at least kind of worth the wait.
Barney was waking up. He was waking up and Robin was watching to make sure he actually did wake up. It was really early in the morning and she'd just come back from the cafeteria to get coffee. Since the treatments started to work she didn't sleep much anymore, wanting to see when things changed. She was going to be in that room when Barney was awake and they were going to clear up all of this that was between them.
Robin let herself into the room just as Barney's head started moving around on the pillow and he started blinking. His color was back and he definitely looked healthier and the only person she had to thank was one of Brennan's co-workers back in Washington DC.
"Robin?" his voice was quiet and a little distant but all in all it sounded just like Barney. All that she seemed able to do at the sound of it—the sound she didn't think she'd hear again—was smile and nod with wide eyes. She stepped closer to the bed and the confused looking man lying on it.
As soon as she was close enough she lost her self-control. Robin launched herself at Barney, hugging him as hard as she could. The little laugh that left her mouth wasn't intentional and it didn't sound like her, but she didn't care about that right now. All that she could care about was the fact that she was feeling the rise and fall of Barney's chest under her and the feeling of his hands resting hesitantly on her back.
When she pulled away, she was still smiling and Barney looked like he'd caught up. He sat up a little more and moved so he was still resting on the pillows but more on her level. A very tentative and distant smile made its way onto his face.
"You're awake. I can't believe it, you're awake." Robin could almost feel like she was welling up but the tears receded as soon as she felt them. Barney's smile brightened a little bit and his eyes were brightening, too. The blue started looking more like it was supposed to.
"I don't think I can believe it either. This is just what all of my dreams look like. Well…" his face darkened a little at the end but he seemed to shake out of it as soon as Robin was going to ask about it. Barney looked back up at her with a soft look on his face. "It's really nice that this is real, though."
She bent down again and moved his hair away from his forehead, content to just smile back at him. He looked like he was okay with the same thing, but his expression fell again and he sighed. "Robin, I have to tell you something." He looked thoughtful. "Two things, possibly more."
Robin nodded warily. "Okay Barney." She wanted to be ready for whatever this was but she wasn't sure. Still, there wasn't much she could do to but let him go on and tell her whatever he needed to tell her. He nodded and glanced over at the laptop that was sitting on the table by his bed, swallowing.
"Alright, so there are two items of really, really big news and I'm not sure if you'll think of one of them as good or bad, so I'll just tell you both as if they were equal even though they really aren't. Just know that there's a plus side to both so don't get too worked up." Now he was rambling and Robin put a hand on his knee to get him to stop. He blinked a few times, almost nervously and very much not like Barney. "Right, I'll get on with it.
"This one, is that I'm not exactly completely who you think I am, all the way." He winced as he said it and Robin frowned.
"What the hell are you talking about Barney?"
"I should have started with the first one, it would have been much shorter. So you'll just have to listen to this whole story I guess. Uh, so, remember when Ted and I had our falling out and I kind of disappeared for a while?" Robin nodded. "I went out to Los Angeles and kind of ditched the suits for hoodies and got an apartment with a roommate who sweat a lot. I didn't take much money with me and I was living in a dumpy part of town, but it was all kind of nice.
"I went out there to get away and because I heard of this thing called the ELE or the Evil League of Evil." Robin laughed, she couldn't help it, and Barney gave her a look. She just motioned for him to go on, swallowing the laughter. "Here's something you might not know about me. I'm kind of a genius. Don't give me that look, I'm serious. It's part of why I drink so much, to get rid of all of the stuff that just constantly comes into my brain. I've invented a freeze ray, dammit. It works, not for long, but it works. There are other things but that's probably my biggest success.
"The problem, though, came when I met a girl in the Laundromat." Barney's expression grew more pained and Robin could almost guess what was coming. "Her name was Penny and she was beautiful and I fell in love with her. It didn't matter, though, because I was terrified of talking to her for some reason. She was trying to build this homeless shelter and she asked me if I would sign her petition and that's what started our little friendship.
"Every day that we were both at the Laundromat, we would talk and eat frozen yogurt and it was all really amazing. Then Captain Hammer, douchebag that he is, or was, last time I checked he was in the fetal position. Captain Hammer "saved" Penny and they started dating and he got really serious when he knew that I was in love with her. He was a "hero" and he was my, or well, Dr. Horrible's nemesis. You wouldn't believe the number of times that I got beat up by him." Robin was wearing a look of disbelief but she wasn't sure that Barney noticed because he was staring into space like he was watching it all unfold on the clear glass wall.
"I was trying to get into the ELE and they said that to prove myself I had to kill someone. When Hammer started dating Penny, I knew that that was who I was going to go after. Hammer signed Penny's petition, so of course the mayor granted the permission for it to be set up and they built a memorial statue of Hammer. At the big opening ceremony, I stole the statue and hid under there with my death ray and my freeze ray. I froze him, he came unfrozen before I could shoot him and he knocked me down. He tried to use the death ray on me but it exploded and poor Penny was the only one hurt, stabbed by the shrapnel." Barney faltered a little at that point and Robin waited for him to finish his story.
"She died and I got into the ELE but it didn't turn out to be anything like what I thought, so I dropped out and came back to the East coast. I have dreams about the ELE and Penny and all of that in Los Angeles almost every night. It's this one black cloud that hangs over my head." Robin frowned a little and reached out to touch Barney's shoulder.
"I'm sorry Barney. I really, really am." The only reason she was sure that this wasn't a joke was because it genuinely looked like Barney was haunted and tearing up. Otherwise, she would have written it off as another of those strange, somewhat dumb Barney stories that he always told. Robin swallowed again and sat beside him putting one arm around his shoulder. "I'm really glad that you're here, though." For some reason what he'd just told her didn't bother her. Maybe it was because nothing really happened or maybe it was because she knew Barney and trusted him for some inexplicable reason.
He took a minute to compose himself and he smiled up at Robin. "That brings me to the other piece of business that I have to tell you about. I just thought that you should know what you're getting into before I tell you about it."
"Got it, you're an evil genius."
"The other thing that I needed to tell you was that I'm still in love with you. It came up a few months ago when I was with this other girl one night. I just decided now that I've had enough of holding onto it. Also, I almost died and I'm kind of vulnerable now so I can blame it on the fact that I just woke up from a coma if you reject me and I look back on it later." He cut off because Robin was laughing.
"You're an idiot." It was all she could manage before she leaned in and kissed him firmly on the lips. The feeling was one of the most comforting things in the world and she couldn't believe she'd let herself go on so long without doing this.
*House smirked to himself as everything fell silent. He leaned back in his chair and lifted his feet onto his desk, rotating back and forth. So that was what the blonde-haired man had been keeping a secret. It could have been a crazy delusion, but House was privy to all of the man's medical charts and had therefore seen the various IQ tests and the brain scan that had been taken over the years. The man wasn't lying about being a genius. On the various scans recently taken, there was also evidence of many healed bones from breaks and fractures, suffered a few years ago.
The rest of it may have been true as well. House remembered hearing something about that from a patient a while ago. So he'd cracked open the mystery of the blonde man and now his work was complete. Both patients were going to live and would be discharged by the next day and he'd solved all of his personal goals. It was another case completed in his eyes.
*Shawn yawned and blinked, rubbing his eyes as he sat up. It was early morning and there were only two people in their little group that were awake. He looked around and couldn't see Booth anywhere, but he did find Robin. She was in with Barney and it looked like they were engaged in a pretty fierce game of tonsil hockey.
He laughed to himself and got up to get coffee and find Booth. There were questions that he had regarding the murder and he wanted to ask Booth to see if he knew the answers to any of them. Shawn knew that he'd heard something about a suspect and seeing as how Brennan was awake now, he was willing to offer his and Gus's services in finding and evaluating this suspect.
Luckily enough for him, he found Booth in the cafeteria with the same idea that he had. "Booth my good man, a word?" he raised his voice just enough so he could be heard and to slightly annoy the FBI agent. Booth was kind of like Lassie, but much more irritable and likely to punch him.
Apparently, his irritability was curbed this morning because he only sighed as he walked closer to Shawn. He looked happy and Shawn took a not so wild guess that it was because him and Brennan were finally together, or something along those lines.
"What do you want?" The FBI agent asked in a good-natured tone. Shawn thought that he looked interested so he decided to get to the point rather than try to butter him up.
"I overheard you talking about a suspect and I was going to tell you that I was willing to offer my services to you as help."
"Thanks, but I can't have a civilian doing that."
"My friend and I aren't civilians though. We're detectives that work with the Santa Barbara Police Department. Call up Lassie and he'll tell you. Besides, I know that you won't want to be leaving now that you've got your lady love back."
Booth stepped up closer so the space between them was even smaller. His voice dropped and he actually looked threatening, something that Lassie was never able to pull off. "What do you know about that?"
"I just know that you were in a good mood that I haven't seen you in since she was gone. Besides, from the way you were talking about her, I can tell that you're in love with her. So what do you say? Gus and I could go and evaluate the suspect."
It seemed like Booth was thinking about it and he relaxed his grip on the front of Shawn's shirt. "Fine. I'll give you the information and the two of you can go out and talk to him. I don't want you doing anything else, though, understand?"
Shawn snapped a mock salute and Booth looked annoyed by it, but he stepped away nonetheless. Shawn just grinned and followed him.
"No, Shawn, I don't want to go and check out a suspect."
"Dude, it's the only reason we're here in the first place," Shawn pointed out.
"No, we were in New York for a break, then you decided to come to New Jersey and get us roped into another investigation," Gus argued. Shawn could tell that wasn't going to take much more pushing to get his friend to join him, though.
"Well, fine. I'll just go investigate and bring this poor woman's murderer to justice all by myself," Shawn said. He put his hands in his pockets and started walking off, counting in his head the amount of time that it would take Gus to start following him. He barely got to six.
*Barney couldn't believe what was happening. Robin was in the cafeteria to get them some food before the official breakfast came around, and he was sitting up in his bed feeling better and reliving everything.
They were back together, at least that was what he was assuming. She called him an idiot after all, that meant that she returned his feelings. And the making out had been pretty sweet. Barney smiled to himself and realized that he was really glad that he'd broken off with the ELE no matter how scared he'd been doing it or how unsure he was about it.
"Hey Barney." Robin had her own coffee and some type of Jell-O. She handed Barney a bottle of water and a little omelet.
Barney eagerly dug into the omelet, though it wasn't nearly as good as one that could be cooked from home. Robin was sitting in her chair, watching him closely. He slowed enough to pause and ask, "What?"
"I don't know, I'm trying to add everything together and fit it all with the Barney Stinson I already know." Her brown eyes were looking at him sharply and from all the time that he'd already known her, he was torn between being worried and being a little thrilled by the fact that she was taking him seriously.
"Take your time," he told her, smirking a little bit. Robin rolled her eyes, but refrained from commenting and only smiled a little bit.
"Hey! Is that Barney?!" Barney looked over at the glass where the muffled shout came from. Marshall was gaping into the room with wide eyes and he was bending over, shaking Lily and Ted awake. Barney simply waited, resisting the urge to roll his eyes or make a face. It was too nice to see his friends again to get hung up on Marshall's annoying tendency to state the obvious.
Both Ted and Lily looked shocked when they looked into the room and they were all quick to come through the door, their noise increasing in volume as soon as they did. Lily came over immediately to give Barney one of her hyper/hysterical hugs and Ted just rested a hand on Barney's shoulder, looking immensely relieved.
Everyone was talking at once and Barney lightly tuned it out, meeting Robin's eyes. She was smiling and watching everyone, but she turned her eyes to look at him, still smiling. The smile turned warmer on him, though, and Barney couldn't help returning it.
*"I don't know Shawn, this doesn't seem like a good idea, even by your standards." Shawn barely spared a glance at his best friend. "We're not supposed to be on someone's private property."
"Gus, first of all, when has that stopped us before? Second, if the guy is going to leave his gate unlocked anyway, he's just inviting people to his 'private property'," Shawn answered, looking ahead to the white house that he could see right through the line of trees directly in front of him.
One of the shutters was loose, and that window was slightly open. The door was solid and strong, not something that he or Gus would be able to break down. There were windows along the bottom of the house, leading into a basement. The glass looked old and it was dirty. Then there were the black marks on the pavement leading up to the door. Shawn ran over the details of the case and he smiled a little bit. Burn marks.
"Alright Gus, we're going in."
"What? No, Shawn, we're not breaking into this house."
"Who knows, maybe we won't have to. But come on, Gus. Innocent dead woman, the definite killer, all the answers in that building," Shawn said, pointing. Gus was obviously debating, but then he looked down and sighed.
"Fine." Gus got up first from where they were crouched and he looked at the house as Shawn followed him in standing up. "So do you have a plan this time?"
"I always have a plan, Gus." Shawn responded, starting toward the door of the house without a glance backward.
There was no shelter in the front yard and Shawn carried himself with his normal confidence, though he was a little bothered by the fact that they were in the open like this. He'd decided on a course of action, though, and now that he had, he acted it out. Besides, he should have been used to walking up to and talking with murderers. He'd done it many, many times before.
On the porch step, he stopped and waited for Gus to arrange himself, then he reached out and knocked on the door. There was shout from inside, telling them to wait a minute. Shawn glanced over at Gus and raised a little thumbs up. Gus swallowed and nodded, before turning back to look at the door.
It opened and a tall, broad man appeared. There was scruff on his face, approximately two days old by Shawn's estimate, it looked like he'd just gotten dressed—from what, Shawn couldn't guess—as his hair was messed up and the clothes were wrinkly and mismatched, he looked like he was built solidly, not too muscled but incapable of being hurt by either himself or Gus should things get ugly.
"Can I help you?" he asked. There was a slight annoyed sound to his voice, like they were interrupting something.
"Yes, actually. We are a part of the Academy of Urban Development. My partner and I are going around taking surveys and observations of different neighborhoods," Shawn said. "My name is Shawn, my partner, Harrison."
"Uh, I don't want to be part of that," the man said, moving back and closing the door, watching Shawn and Gus with guarded eyes.
"It's not optional, sir. You don't have to agree to the observation of your house, but the survey is mandatory. It won't take long, only five questions regarding your neighborhood and your satisfaction or dissatisfaction with it," Shawn interjected, sticking his foot in the door for some reason.
Something in the man's eyes flashed and Shawn backed away. He could tell that Gus was unnerved, too because he could feel the nervous energy radiating off of his friend. "Never mind, sir, we can leave your house out of the report. I'm sure that our supervisors won't really care anyway," Gus said.
An awful smirk curled on the man's face and he stepped forward. "Too late." He brought something out from behind his back and pointed it at them. Shawn was only able to register that it looked like some kind of laser gun out of a science fiction show before the world went black.
* "Have you heard anything from Gus and Shawn?" Booth asked again, for what must have been the seventh time. Once again—just to humor him, he was sure—everyone looked at their phones and looked back at him with blank expressions.
It had almost been an hour since the two had gone out to check out the lead and there had been no word. Somehow, Booth had known that they weren't going to do what he asked them to and now he had a really bad feeling. Everyone else looked mildly concerned as well.
Booth was pretty sure that the lead was the killer. He'd discussed it with Bones and after checking over all of the details a few times she agreed with him. What he wanted—and needed—to do was go after them, but the doctors were going to do another check of Bones and Barney.
Apparently they were recovering remarkably and the doctors felt like the two could be discharged if everything checked out. That was what was keeping Booth at the hospital.
Dr. Chase came into the room, then and everyone snapped their attention to the doctor. "Okay, we'll check vitals once more, and if everything seems to be working you'll all get to go home within the hour. So let's just get it over with."
The doctors worked efficiently, but thoroughly and it was taking a long time. Then Booth's phone buzzed with a text message.
The screen said that the message was from Shawn and Booth almost sighed in relief, until he actually read the message. It made no sense and Booth guessed that it was in some kind of code, which meant that Shawn and Gus were with the killer, probably not of their own choice.
"What is it?" Ted asked. Everyone was looking at him and he looked back, wondering what he was supposed to tell them.
"It's a message from Shawn, but I can't read it and I'm not sure what good it's supposed to do me," he answered. "I think that it's in some kind of code, meaning that he has to rush the communication because he's hiding the fact that he's doing it."
"Which means that the killer has the two of them," Lily finished for him. She was wide-eyed and everyone looked more worried now.
"Wait a second, you said something about a code?" Barney asked from inside his room where the doctors were working on him. Booth nodded and Barney motioned for him to go into the room. "Show me, I might be able to help."
Booth handed him the phone and waited as Barney studied the screen, frown deepening. "No, this doesn't have any kind of pattern that I can see. It looks like something that Marshall and Ted would have come up with."
Immediately, Booth turned to them. "Would you be able to decipher this?" he asked, holding the phone out to them. Ted took it and looked over it, holding it over for Marshall to see. They seemed to be discussing something, then Marshall looked up.
"He says that he's in the guy's house, tied up to a chair with Gus. Gus is still unconscious and they were both "shot" with some kind of laser gun before he woke up in the chair. Shawn says that the guy is definitely the killer because there are burn marks all over the house and in the basement, where they are, there are a ton more ray gun looking things. Oh, this place sounds cool if you take away the killer part of it." Marshall looked at Ted and the two nodded. Booth got their attention again.
"Could you send something back that he'll be able to read quickly?"
"Sure, the code that we came up with is really similar to this, he'll be able to figure it out," Ted answered. "Do you have anything specific that you want us to tell him?"
Booth nodded and delivered the message.
*Shawn's phone lit up and he quickly turned it into his jeans. The killer was upstairs and he glanced down at his phone. The code that got back was different from what he'd sent, but he was still able to read it. The message told him that the others would be on the way to help as soon as Brennan and Barney were done being checked again. He sighed and tilted his head back, shutting his phone and slipping it back into his pocket.
Again, he elbowed Gus a little bit to see if the other man was awake yet. There was no answer and Shawn dropped his chin to his chest. As soon as Gus was awake, they were going to try to get out. Shawn had been staring around the room since he'd woken up and he'd gathered as much information that might help them that he could.
There was very little within reach to be used for a weapon, one point for the killer. Shawn even had a hard time finding something with which to cut him and Gus away from the chairs that they were fastened to. However, once they were free, the fragile-looking windows that he'd noticed earlier were right overhead. All he had to do was stand up on one of the tables and he would probably be able to break it with one of the wooden blocks that was on the table, looking like it was used for measurement or something.
While he was doing that, though, Gus would have to take one of the ray guns and hopefully not kill himself or the other guy with it until Shawn got the window open. The ray guns were mounted on the walls, only accessible by climbing onto the table in front of them and navigating the mostly sharp-looking tools that covered the table top. Shawn hoped that he would be able to get the window open before any weapon was needed.
A gasp from behind him jolted Shawn out of his thoughts. He glanced over his shoulder to make sure that Gus really was awake then he smiled. "Nice to see you back in the land of the living, buddy."
"Shut up, Shawn. By the looks of it, I'm not going to be here for very long." He sounded nervous and panicky and Shawn immediately braced himself for the upcoming struggle in presenting his idea to his friend.
"Right, well, I have an idea that could help us out of that mess." Shawn continued to talk over the following groan and explained to Gus his whole plan.
"There's a lot left up to chance there, Shawn," he said disapprovingly.
"That's too bad, either we run with the chances or we get tortured and murdered by this guy."
"You say that you found something to use to cut us away from this chair?"
"Yes."
"Fine."
Shawn was confused as to what caused Gus's sudden change of heart, and then he heard what must have inspired Gus's decision. There were heavy footsteps right overhead. He looked down and started cutting at the rope and duct tape binding them to the chair with the piece of jagged metal that he'd picked up while they'd been hiding in the trees.
They were free in a few seconds and the two of them moved immediately to the tables. Gus picked up one of the guns, looking uncomfortable, while Shawn climbed up on the table with one of the blocks in his hand. He navigated the sharp tools while he moved closer to the window that looked like it led to the front yard. "You alright, buddy?" he asked over his shoulder. The footsteps were coming closer.
"Hurry up, Shawn," was the only answer that he got, in a shaky voice.
"No problem." He wrapped his hand in his sweatshirt sleeve and drew his arm back before bringing his fist, clutching the block, back to the window and going through.
At the sound of the glass shattering, the footsteps overhead stopped, then came back faster than before and mere seconds passed before Shawn heard the same heavy footsteps on the wooden stairs. He heard Gus shuffle the ray gun that he'd picked up and Shawn got to work clearing the glass out of the window pane. He wasn't sure now, though, that they would be able to make it through.
"Gus, get up here," Shawn said quietly once the glass was gone from the window. He glanced over his shoulder and looked back at Gus. He turned a little bit and held out a hand to help the other man up. Their captor and murderer was coming through the hallways toward their little room. "Alright, we don't have much time. You go through the window first and call the others, I'll stay here and hopefully stay alive long enough for the others to get here."
"Shawn, you must out of your damn mind." Gus handed off the gun that he held and took another one off of the wall, powering it up.
Shawn smiled and clapped Gus on the shoulder. Then the door to the room blew open.
*"Anything?"
"No, I haven't heard anything else from them."
"Dammit," Booth hit the steering wheel with an open palm and kept driving.
"Calm down and keep driving," Barney replied, fiddling with the device in his hands. "Alright, I think this'll work." He put the box on the dashboard and leaned back in his seat. The little remote would block the processes in the guns that enabled them to fire.
"You know where we're going, right?" Lily asked.
"It was where he sent them, where he was supposed to go," Brennan answered. Barney could see Lily nod out of the corner of his eye and closed his eyes when Robin rested a hand on his shoulder from the seat behind him. After that, everyone was silent.
"We're here," Booth said quietly, stopping the van across the street from a run-down looking white house.
Everyone pressed to the windows to look at the house, Barney included.
"It's funny, that doesn't look like a murderer's evil lair."
"This is the location that we got from the original report," Booth said, grimacing while looking out of the window. Barney turned back to the house and set his jaw.
"Well, let's not just sit here, let's go." He moved to get out of the van, but several hands caught on his shoulders, pulling him back. "What?"
"We need to have some kind of plan, don't we?" Lily asked, looking at Barney as if he were stupid. He rolled his eyes.
"Isn't it obvious? Booth and Brennan, get guns and cover for me. I go for the weak windows in the basement with the frequency disrupter," he picked up the little remote he'd been working on, "as it looks like one of the windows is broken. And you guys," he turned back to his friends, "have the van ready for Shawn and Gus to get in when they come out, since they'll probably be running." Barney looked at all of them, then, as if they were stupid to not see his idea. Only Brennan didn't look surprised by the plan.
"Alright, that's fine," Booth said, pulling out a gun and readying it. "Let's go."
"No, that's not fine," Robin interrupted. "Barney, what happens if you get shot by the ray gun, or if the psycho murderer has a regular gun as well and starts using that?" Barney grinned when a new idea came to mind.
"Okay then, come with me. You know how to shoot and I'm sure Booth has more guns." Robin smiled back at him.
"No, I'm not letting a civilian into this," Booth protested.
"Dude, Barney's a civilian," Ted pointed out.
Booth looked like he was about to answer, but Barney was fed up with the talking. He opened the door and started running for the house, ignoring everyone else yelling after him. It seemed that he wasn't alone, though, as he looked over to see Brennan running with him, a gun in hand. "I've got you covered, do what you have to do." Barney nodded and they split up. Brennan was going for the front door, and he was headed to the broken basement window.
As he got closer, Barney heard Shawn talking rapidly. He wasn't quite able to make out every word but from what he heard it sounded like Shawn was going over the murder and how it had happened based on the evidence. Eventually the story had to end, though, and by then Shawn would be dead.
He got down on his stomach and looked through the window. Both Shawn and Gus were standing on the table, easily in reach of the window, and they were both holding ray guns. Barney hoped that they didn't think they had to use them. There was also a man standing across from them, holding a more dangerous and advanced-looking form of a ray gun. The disrupter would maybe work from the outside, but Barney wasn't so sure about that. In order for everything to really work, the remote would need to be on the inside. He got closer to get a better look inside.
Gus was the closest of the two to the window and the killer looked to be quite focused on Shawn. Still, Barney needed to get Gus's attention as quietly as possible. Looking around himself for something that may work toward that purpose, he saw Robin kneeling beside him. She flashed him a smile, handed him a small rock, and Barney was fully reminded why he loved this intelligent, beautiful, sometimes scary woman.
Barney's aim wasn't the best, but the stone did get Gus's attention when it hit his shoulder and fell soundlessly to the work table. The window was to his left and he had the sense to look subtly. Barney waved a little and held up the remote, mouthing and miming the instructions to the best of his ability. Fortunately, Gus seemed to understand. Barney put the remote on the windowsill and he and Robin backed
away from the window so they were out of sight.
The two of them could still see and they watched Gus discreetly move backwards and slip the remote off of the windowsill. He moved back to his position, holding the remote behind his back. Barney hoped that Gus wasn't trying to be dramatic, but he couldn't think of any other reason why the man would wait. Barney heard Robin suck in a breath and he looked toward her, following her gaze to see that the killer now had his gun leveled at both Shawn and Gus. Barney could tell that it was powerful enough to kill them both in a single shot.
Barney felt Robin's hands on his shoulder as she grabbed him and leaned forward, yelling, "Now, Gus!" Shawn and the killer looked startled, but Gus only jumped a little and drew the remote in front of him, pressing the button.
*White light flashed through the air and Brennan was momentarily blinded. Her disorientation didn't end there, though, because she suddenly found herself knocked to the ground by a solid weight that could only belong to Booth.
They rolled a little bit, following his momentum, and came to rest with him lying mostly on top of her. Once they stopped, Brennan lifted herself onto her elbows and looked around. Everything looked the same, and she glanced toward the basement windows that Barney had headed toward. He and Robin appeared to be talking to someone through the broken window and she frowned before picking herself up and moving toward the space.
She and Booth kneeled down by the other two at the same time and noticed that Shawn and Gus were indeed inside the basement and seemed mostly unharmed. The man behind them on the floor was lying flat on his back, unconscious.
Booth was already looking like he wanted to get into the basement, so Brennan reached her hands through the window, along with Barney, to help lift Shawn out. Robin and Barney got Gus, and Booth hopped into the basement, pulling out handcuffs and his gun and going about taking care of the murderer.
Gus looked a little shaken up and so did Shawn, but the latter simply patted his friend on the shoulder, grinning and saying something about a 'Jules'. Robin looked interested in the two and was quietly asking them questions.
Barney caught her eye, then, and offered her a small smile. Brennan returned it and moved a little closer to him. They were survivors of some terrible, awful disease that they'd contracted from remains found behind a Dumpster in New York City, but Brennan knew somehow that Barney—like her—didn't see it as a bad thing.
Everyone else, upon hearing the story or seeing her back was going to be a symbol of pity, sympathy, and "oh my God, I'm sorry, how terrible". The disease, though, was what finally brought her and Booth together and what finally resolved whatever was going on with Barney and Robin. It may have been awful and painful and nerve-wracking, but it earned Brennan some new friends and an experience that was probably worth just about everything. She didn't regret touching those bones for a minute.
*Barney looked at Brennan sitting beside him. He thought that she was probably thinking exactly what he was thinking about all of this with the disease and the murder and all of the little factors that led to all of them becoming friends-of-sorts. He'd considered it all the while he was working on the remote that finally stopped the killer and subsequently had the unintended effect that all of Barney's inventions had, stopping the killer further.
Gus and Shawn looked okay and Booth looked more than happy when he marched out of the front door with the re-awakening killer held firmly. Brennan looked much happier than she had when Barney had first met her and he knew that the disease had given her as much as it had given him. He looked over at Robin then to see her eyes shining and a small smile—the likes of which he'd only ever seen on her face—making her lips curl.
She moved over to sit by him and laced her arm through his, leaning into his side. "So, you helped stop a bad guy and you got the girl. You kind of suck as an evil genius." They were both looking toward the van and watching Marshall and Ted freak out excitedly over the killer and Lily look on in fond amusement. She glanced over and gave them a huge grin, making Barney smile.
"Yeah, I was never really able to get the evil part down. I don't think that you can argue with the fact that I am a genius, though." He watched Booth push the killer into the back of the van. "I mean, I helped do that," he said, pointing.
Robin laughed a little bit. "You may have a point there. You're kind of evil when you're messing with Ted and Marshall and that guy that works in the building across from yours." Barney decided that he could give her that. "But, I think that you're perfect exactly how you are now. Maybe you aren't Evil League of Evil material-,"
"I did get into the ELE," he protested.
She ignored him. "But, what you are, the little bit of evil that's surrounded by all the good you hide, is perfectly fine for me."
Barney just grinned stupidly and leaned his head on hers. "I love you."
"You're an idiot."
*Booth was calling the local police for assistance in holding their murderer until the FBI could get more people gathered for a secure detail back to DC. Brennan was with him and Barney and Robin were talking quietly. Shawn had just fended off the questions from Ted and Marshall and now he was just breathing, knowing that he should call Juliet and tell her the whole story.
He could tell her about a case with a murderer whose preferred method of death was by barbeque and that he almost befell that same fate. He could tell her about a crazy disease that struck two people and he'd become wrapped up in their lives and friends while trying to solve the case. He could tell his girlfriend about the miraculous recovery of the two patient-friends after finding out just what it was. He could talk about the rescue he and Gus had required, executed by their new friends.
Really, Shawn could talk to her about anything and this most recent adventure gave him plenty of material. With a small smile and a look around the group of them, Shawn pulled out his cell phone and punched in her number so he could do just that.