The Killer in the Crosshairs
Let me just say first off that I absolutely adore the fact that I no longer have begin watching a new episode in fear that the first scene will be a Booth/Hannah cutesy and/or sex scene. I VERY much like that.
And let me continue on with talking about that first scene. And the fact that he appears out of nowhere and is running with her. Now, we can assume that, being the close “partners” they are, he's known for awhile that she runs in this area around this time. And so he just decides to sneak up on his “partner” one day and go running with her. No big deal, right?
They get to the coffee cart, and he's won, so he says. But no, she tries to claims she won using science, and he calls her on it, of course, but he's a humble winner, so he buys the coffee. But only because he's a humble winner, because they're just “partners”.
And then, there's the war lecture. Oh, he'll go with her to that, if she wants some “company”. But... it's a LECTURE, Booth. A fancy-smarty-pants lecture. “But it's war!” he says, as he brushes it off. And so it gets dropped.
But, um. It's a LECTURE.
Do “partners” go to lectures with their partner even though it's the last thing they would normally do in their spare time, only in order to give their partner “company”?
Juuuuuuust saying.
(This'll come up again later.)
Then there's this whole business of her pointing out to him all his similarities to the sniper. And of course, this upsets Booth. So why does Bones do it, then? Well, first, she's Bones, and doesn't always get that she maybe shouldn't say things, no matter how logical, if it is upsetting someone. Second, though, I think she doesn't relent on it because, out of love, she knows she has to keep him honest. Not that there's anything to be kept honest about, but what I mean is that there ARE parallels between Booth and the sniper, and he needs to be confronted with them in order to affirm for himself that he is better than Broadski. In his subconscious, he knows that these parallels exist, but he can't allow himself to think about them, even though he needs to do so. So Brennan makes him.
And then we have a Protective!Booth moment to rid the mind of the complicatedness of all that, though, when he insists she stay in the car, and also a Defiant!Brennan moment when she's like “OH HEY RAVENS!” and jumps out of the car without hesitation.
But, uh-oh, Booth's having some ~serious~ times. He goes to Sweets, he's upset that Bones thinks killing is nothing for him. He cares what she thinks about him.
But when Sweets suggests he talk to Brennan about it?
“I don't go there anymore, it's over.”
Oh, yeah, Booth, you definitely don't go there anymore. Not at all. That's why you're so upset because you think she thinks poorly of your character. That's why you're going with her to a lecture you would never go to otherwise, just because you want to keep her company.
Yeah, sure, it's “over”.
It's ok, though, because his worry is (at least temporarily) put to ease in the ~super-intense~ scene when they're shooting at Broadski. When he asks her just to trust him, and she says “I trust you.”
She doesn't think he's bad, she doesn't think he thinks killing is “nothing”. She trusts him, not just in general, when everything's fine, but in that high-stakes, make-or-break moment. Even in life-or-death situations, she trusts him. And he gets that.
And, as always, we have the aftermath scene. Founding Fathers. And Booth is still upset that she thinks him and Broadski are alike.
(Let me just say first though that although they didn't make it into a moment or anything, when she says “You can't say 'forget it' to your partner, you taught me that”, I melt into a puddle of fandork goo because I love anytime they talk about him teaching her things.)
She breaks it down for him: from where she stands, Broadski is bad and Booth is good.
And he accepts that, because even though he still can't quite deal with the fact that they have any similarities at all, he can see that that is not what matters. What matters is that she thinks he is good and Broadski is bad.
And then, the big one. The Hart Hanson “I'm going to make those fandorks squee like hell” line.
“I'm standing right beside you, Booth, as always. And I always will.”
I, for one, take this as not just a promise from Brennan, but a statement from TPTB (which they have been doing off and on all season, really): even if it seems like shit's going bad for them, they will still have hope, because they will always be there for each other.
She is standing beside him, now, and always.
