The Memories in the Shallow Grave

The Memories in the Shallow Grave
Season 7
Episode 1
Air date	November 3, 2011
Production code	7AKY01
Written by	Stephen Nathan
Directed by	Ian Toynton
Previous	The Change in the Game (Season 6)
Next	The Hot Dog in the Competition

The Memories in the Shallow Grave is the 1st episode and the season premiere of Season 7 of Bones.

Synopsis

When the Jeffersonian team identifies the remains of a woman found in a paintball field, they discover two missing-persons reports in her file. Booth and Sweets interrogate the victim's husband and learn that she suffered from amnesia. When squint Wendell Bray learns that the victim also survived a bullet wound, inconsistencies in her medical records uncover a surprising crime linked to her murder. Meanwhile, Brennan and Booth adjust to their new life as an expectant couple and deal with the forthcoming changes in their home life.

Summary

A group of very overzealous young men are playing paintball. One gets riddled with paint bullets and falls backward into a pile of human remains. He screams for help only to be ridden with bullets once again. And, again, he falls into the decaying body.

Booth and Bones, who are playing house in Booth's tiny apartment. Bones is quite pregnant -- and aware. "You look great," Booth says before making out with his partner. "It's been five months and we spend most of our time together. What we need is one bed. One place." The pair suddenly gets on the subject of marriage. It sounds like it's certainly a possibility. The conversation is interrupted by a phone call. Time to investigate the dead body on the paintball course. Bones identifies the body as a female. Hodgins puts the time of death, judging by the bugs, at seven days. Bones suddenly begins to cry. She explains it's only due to a hormonal imbalance and has nothing to do with the dead body. "This is definitely murder," Bones sobs.

Back at the Jeffersonian, Wendell and Camille examine the body. The victim was stabbed through the brain. Camille removes the brain -- and discovers it's crawling with beetles. Naturally, this makes Hodgins quite excited as it could identify the murder weapon. Sweets, in the meantime, asks Booth if the pregnancy has put pressure on his relationship with Bones. Booth tells the shrink everything is "fine." Later, Hodgins reports he has found evidence of linseed oil at the "grave" site. The beetles, meanwhile, indicate the residue from anxiety medicine. Interesting.

Bones then pulls aside Angela and admits she is worried that Booth is upset because she is not ready to move in together. "I've always been on my own," Bones says. Angela, a new mother, politely informs her friend she will never be on her own again once the baby is born. "I'm with Booth on this one," Angela says. The team then gets news: the female victim is Claire Serrano who was reported missing twice in the past few months. Booth and Sweets then interview her husband, Joseph, who appears devastated by his wife's death. Joseph explains, he is a pastor and his whole congregation has been praying for Claire's return. Turns out the first time Claire went missing, she returned with memory loss. "Her amnesia caused her to establish a new identity," says Sweets, who explains to Booth it is a common survival mechanism.

Later, Booth and Bones eat breakfast. Bones says the couple should move in together -- at her place because she is more financially sound and generally more responsible. She is very cold in explaining she will be the one making the decision. "We're family; even you should know what that means, Bones," says an angry Booth. Bones is taken aback. Just then, Sweets interrupts with news: the victim was being treated by Dr. David Yazrick, known for unorthodox methods. The good doctor also got "bounced from Vegas" for counting cards. Sweets and Booth visit Yazrick.

Yazrick explains he treated the victim and her memory was just beginning to return. He then mentions a fellow patient had become very, very attached to the victim. "Sounds like a stalker to me," Booth says. Back at the Jeffersonian, Bones is clearly upset, but she continues to work. Camille observes it must have been horrible for the victim to have her life erased from her memory before dying. "Perhaps it was a good thing," Bones tells Camille. "She had the opportunity to start fresh, create a better life." Bones might as well be talking about herself -- and she and Camille know it.

Booth and Sweets then interview the "stalker," Trevor . Trevor plays the violin as he talks about his beloved, claiming the victim was afraid of her husband. Booth then spots linseed oil in Trevor's violin case. Back at the Jeffersonian, Angela has brought in her baby to see daddy Hodgins -- against Camille's rules. Hodgins then explains the linseed oil in the grave does not match the linseed oil in Trevor's case. In fact, fibers at the scene suggest the gravesite previously held a canvas bag that had been waterproofed with the oil. "So someone dug up a bag before burying her," Camille says. She then asks the new parents to keep the baby out of the lab.

At a park, Bones apologizes to Booth but claims she is only being rational. Booth points out having a child together isn't rational, but "here we are." Bones takes his point. Later, Booth discovers from police reports the victim had previously accused Pastor Joseph of assault. Wendell then discovers the victim also had a bullet fragment lodged in her body. The fragment would have been easily removed by a doctor but wasn't. Somebody wanted to remove the bullet and keep it quiet. Booth re-interviews Pastor Joseph. Joseph denies ever having abused his wife. He also denies having an affair with a woman named Karen who was apparently present each time the police were called to investigate calls of domestic abuse.

Later, Angela notes that just because Bones grew up on foster care doesn't mean she needs to be afraid of committing to family life. Bones denies she was even thinking such thoughts, but she doesn't protest too much. Angela then uses the bullet fragment to discover it was shot from particular gun. This gun, Booth explains, was fired during a home invasion months ago. Is it possible the victim, while suffering from amnesia, attempted to rob a home? "She could've adopted the persona of a criminal if she was with one at the time," Yazrick later explains. He says the victim didn't mention any of this during therapy -- or at least he doesn't remember such a strange story.

Back at the Jeffersonian, Hodgins has identified a possible murder weapon, a field spade with a saw blade on its handle. Perfect for killing the victim, then digging her grave. Booth, in the meantime, visits a man at a halfway house arrested for the home invasion in which the victim was shot. He admits to knowing the victim -- not by her given name Claire, but as Brenda. Booth then explains Claire/Brenda was found at a nearby park, and the robber curses softly. He had hidden a canvas bag of his loot from various crimes in that park. "There was almost 80 grand in there," the man admits.

Later, Booth gets a call from Bones, who has become stuck in a storage room after falling over. Booth rushes to save her and then apologizes to Bones for pushing her into sharing a place together. "I want our kid to know I'm not my dad," Booth admits. "I want him to know that I gave him a real home -- our home." Bones agrees. She volunteers to find a new place to live with Booth -- "even though it's a foolish investment." They make out in the store room. The kiss is interrupted when Bones has a eureka moment. Nobody has looked carefully for evidence under the paint splatters. She blames the oversight on her overactive hormones. Booth, a smart guy, doesn't argue.

Sweets then goes through Yazrick's notes on the victim and notices strange notations in the margins. Booth recognizes them as codes for gambling. A check of the doctor's bank accounts reveals nothing. The doctor has a major gambling problem and could've been after money he learned of from his patient. Wendell, Hodgins and Bones, examine the paint splatters. Bones focuses on one splatter and notices chewing gum with a clear impression of a tooth. "That's as good as a fingerprint," Bones says. And, sure enough, that tooth impression matches Yazrick's. Sweets is especially upset. "She trusted her life to you," the young doctor seethes. "You betrayed her."

Yazrick is arrested, and the case is closed. The episode ends with Booth and Bones reclining in bed and looking for houses on the Internet. They banter like an old non-married couple.

Cast

Main Cast

• Temperance Brennan - Emily Deschanel
• Seeley Booth - David Boreanaz
• Jack Hodgins - T.J Thyne
• Angela Montenegro - Michaela Conlin
• Camille Saroyan - Tamara Taylor
• Lance Sweets - John Francis Daley

Intern of the Week

• Wendell Bray - Michael Grant Terry

Guest Cast

• Dr. David Yazrick - Martin Grey
• Joseph Serrano - Brad Greenquist
• Trevor Quan - Jamison Yang
• Ricky Duval - Rodney Eastman
• Buster - Guy Wilson
• Flannigan - Brooklyn McLinn

Featured Music

• TBA

Notes

• This episode stated that Brennan and Booth have been together as couple for five months.
• Emily Deschanel was pregnant in real life along with her character, Temperance Brennan, in the show.
• This episode was dedicated to Emily Maki, whose favorite show was Bones, until her death from undiagnosed heart condition.

Quotes

Booth: Look Bones, I love you, okay? That's not rational. Us having a kid, that's not rational. But... here we are.[Booth's cellphone rings. He answers his cellphone] Booth... It wasn't the um, violin guy. I gotta get back to the office.

Brennan: I-I love you too, Booth.

Booth: I know.

---

Wendell: Still I mean you crying, I would've loved to have seen that.

Brennan: Why?

Angela: Sort of like an eclipse. It doesn't happen that often.

---

Sweets: So creating a simplified timeline will help us construct the coherent narrative, right? The duck sauce is where Claire suffers her initial injury.

Booth: We don't know what the injury is.

Sweets: Doesn't matter. For our purposes it's duck sauce. That's where Claire gets amnesia, loses contact with her husband and her past life. Now, at the egg rolls, Ricky Duval picks her up and in a fugue state she becomes Brenda. The soy sauce packets are their crime spree, ending with the lettuce cups where she gets shot. Now when Ricky is arrested, she starts to have flashes of her previous life and winds up wandering around the fried rice which is D.C. She's brought to Yazrick for treatment at the fortune cookies and begins the slow process of recovering her memories until she is finally murdered and buried at the orange slices.

Booth: That's the simplified version?

Sweets: Well I could add in recovered memories in chronological orders if you're finished with the lo mein.