Broken Bones

Episode 81 ''The Mastodon in the Room'' Part 2

3rd POV

They were now in the morgue where Cam works at as Angela walks over to them as she sighs, "Wow. These really are the remains of a child, huh?" Cam nods, "Yeah. And that about sums up my total knowledge of the case: it's a male child." Wendell then tries to keep himself distracted as he asks Angela, "You like living in Paris?" Angeal chuckles a bit, "Are you kidding? It's Paris. Yeah, I get to draw the Eiffel Tower... not dead children's faces." Angie then asks, "How are you holding up?" Wendell shrugs, "Shocked, sad, I don't know what I'm going to do... it almost doesn't seem real to me right now." She and the others nod understanding as they felt bad for him and Brennan. Brennan tries to bring everyone back and ignore it as she says, "These remains were found wrapped in a blanket in a shallow grave along the Potomac?" Angela then looks at the blanket, "Yeah. I don't know if that's a blanket. Um... it looks like it might have been cut from something larger." She then points out, "The stitching suggests that maybe it's from some kind of garment, like a jacket or a sleeping bag." Brennan nods as she then asks Wendell over to the X-ray board, "What does this look like to you, Wendell?"

Wendell takes a look at the X-ray then looks back at the remains shocked, "Root completion of the canines." Temp nods, "That plus the fusion of the vertebral elements." Cam then asks shocked, "You're suggesting that this victim is over three years old?" "Yes." "Despite his small size?" Angela then says, "It's hard to be sure in a child this young, but the eye orbits are relatively round." Brennan then goes over to the remains checking as she says, "Yes, Angela is right." Cam asks, "About what?" "The round eye orbits. The skull is brachycephalic." Angela then says, "If I were reconstructing this skull, I'd definitely be going Asian." Cam then says, "So it can't be Logan Bartlett." A few hours later they kept on examining the remains as Brennan was looking at another set of X-ray's as she says, "Yes, I'm seeing Harris lines here in the tibia." She hands it to Wendell as she checks, "These lines of calcified material in the shinbone?" "Signifies childhood malnutrition." Wendell then puts on his gloves sighing a bit, "Well, the skull shows, um... I forget what these lesions are called, but they're caused iron deficiency anemia..."

Brennan nods understanding as she finishes for him, "Porotic hyperostosis." He nods, "Yeah." Cam goes over to them joking a bit, "Comes from working on bus engines, I guess." Brennan then says, "Well, anyone could learn the labels, Mr. Bray. But not everyone would notice the condition. I'm sure Venus would've been very proud of you knowing that." Wendell smiles a bit as Cam says, "Nice. What have you got?" Wendell explains, "Well, we won't know for certain until we get a complete histological profile, but it's looking pretty good that this kid is an Asian immigrant." Brennan adds, "By 'pretty good, 'Mr. Bray means a better than 85% chance." They then hear Angela and Hodgins arrive as she says, "Hey. Hodgins found some bug evidence." Wendell turns seeing Hodgins as the two hug each other as they say, "Hey, Hodgins. What's up?" "Hey, brother. I'm sorry about the news, if anything I think she's still out there fighting." Wendell gives him a small smile, "Thank you." They then hear a bark as they look over at the corner of the room seeing Jupiter as Hodgins says, "You brought him along as well?" Wendell nods, "Yeah... I can't leave without him, you know." He nods as he then says looking around the place, "Wow! What is with this scuzzy hellhole? And where's my office?"

Cam points over to a desk filled with paperwork, "You see that table over there? That's your office. And you have to share." "Huh." He goes putting his stuff down as Cam then says, "If... these remains are Asian, that might help explain his size. And this is adding up to the likely hood that this is not Logan Bartlett." Hodgins then says going over back to them, "It's not logan Bartlett. Cam's bug guy- really not top shelf, by the way- says that insect activity indicates that this kid died between six and twelve weeks ago, but he didn't take into account the fact that the kid was wrapped up." Brennan then says, "But the blanket retarded insect activity." Angela then says, "Again, not a blanket." Hodgins then shows them on a screen of the charts, "Calliphoridae and Sarcophagidae flies are present as adults and larva..." He turns seeing that Cam and the others weren't interested as he says, "You're not interested in details. Okay. Upshot- this child died at least 16 weeks ago. Long before Logan Bartlett went missing." Brennan then says, "I think we're all agreed that this is not the missing child." Angela then says, "Well, maybe not the famous one, but... this is somebody's missing child." They all look at the remains of the child as they have something else entirely.