okay, i fought this for a long time, and i wasn't going to write something about wannabe, but then we were talking on the message boards and i got to thinking about the look in his eyes. so here's the end of that episode from booth's pov. definite oneshot.

It was surreal. He had been taken to some alternate reality where he wasn't in control. And that lack of control seemed like it was going to kill him. Literally.

It only pinched, and only for a second, but it made him jerk violently, a seeming disconnect. Further evidence that this wasn't real.

Evidence. Bones. She was right behind him. She was miles away.

There weren't any sounds, at least none that reached his ears. He couldn't feel it, but he experienced his legs giving way and he was suddenly very aware of his body. Lying on the floor, immediately cradled by another.

There was noise, something else was happening, but then it was done and the other body was over his again.

It called out to him. She called out to him. Bones called out to him. But this couldn't be real, Bones had never called to him with that voice. He had never, in all the time he'd known her, heard her with that level of panic. But it was happening now, so near the end.

So this was the end. It wasn't what he'd imagined.

As he looked up at her, in shock, unable to really respond to her, it occurred to him that this wasn't how he wanted it to end. He'd known her for a long time, for years they'd been growing together. But it only felt like the beginning now that he was looking at it from the end. It felt so short. It wasn't supposed to be like this. He was supposed to be close to her for the rest of his life.

Well, for the rest of both of their lives.

But this woman who craned over him with tears in her eyes, who pleaded with him, was supposed to have been even more in his life. More than his partner and best friend. She was supposed to have been his lover, his wife, the mother of his children. He suddenly saw the life together that they would never have.

You've been cheated. Booth hated being cheated. One final fragment of him fought as sight fled from him.

No.

He wouldn't be cheated.

That was the thought that still clung to him when he opened his eyes to the bright light of his hospital room.

and that's that.