The Shot in the Dark is the fifteenth episode of the eighth season of Bones.
Summary
The Jeffersonian staff are ID'ing the corpse of a man found underneath a very tall bridge. As Cameron proceeds to de-flesh the body, Bones heads home to put her daughter to bed.
At home, Bones and Booth get into an argument over her lack of spontaneity. Bones angrily storms out, heading back to the lab to finish her work. As she's examining the remains, the Jeffersonian security guard Hal Bennett enters her lab asking and she explains that the victim was pushed from a bridge.
When she is alone, examining the bones with a pair of magnifying headgear, Bones is shot in the chest by a blurry intruder and collapses. Booth and Christine arrive at the lab and find Bones unconscious. He frantically calls an ambulance as Bones drifts into unconsciousness. She dreams of her old family home and is greeted by her mother.
Meanwhile, at the hospitals, Cam and the doctors are operating on Bones and are struggling to save Bones life. They cannot find the bullet inside her with the x-rays and there is no exit wound. Bones' heart stops and she's shocked back to life. Camille, in her scrubs, goes out to the waiting room and explains to Booth that Bones is stable, however, he heard stopped twice. Booth tells Cam that the security guard Hal was also found shot to death in the stairwell of the lab.
Back at the lab, the team, including former-intern Clark Edison, gathers to examine the crime scene. As with Bones, Hal's body has a large entrance wound but no exit would and no bullet.
At the hospital, Bones wakes up and tells Booth that she felt cold at the wound-site where she was shot. Max arrives and tells his daughter that she flatlined. They explain that she was shot but there was no bullet and she attempts to struggle out of bed to help the investigation. Back at the Jeffersonian, Sweets is working with FBI Agent Olivia Sparling. The security guard's card was used to access the lab and the cameras were disabled. He interviews everybody who was inside the Jeffersonian at the time of the attacks, but finds no leads.
Clark and Cam discover that their bridge victim was shot with the same model of taser carried by Hal. Angela's facial reconstruction helps identify the bridge victim as Johannes Groot, a sales rep for a jet leasing company. Sweets and Sparling examine Groot's apartment. They find evidence that the man had very expensive tastes - far too expensive for his salary - and that there is evidence of a struggle. Sparling finds numbered confetti on the floor near the broken coffee table.
At the hospital, Angela tells Bones that the confetti was discharged from Hal's taser. So Hal went to the apartment and tased the man, who had a heart attack and died before he was tossed from the bridge. Just then, Bones flatlines. Once again, she sees her mother. They recall the last time they saw each other. Bones was 15. They'd fought; Bones' mother felt she was changing herself too much for a boy. When Bones woke up the next morning her parents were gone. Her mother had told her not to be so emotional. "You took my advice and never changed yourself for another person ever again, so you'd never be hurt," mom observes.
When Bones' comes to, she's surrounded by her her husband and father. A doctor explains there they'd used the same blood they'd matched to her during surgery, however, she had a bad reaction to the androgens. Bones then explains that she saw her mother but that Booth keeps calling her back.
Back at the lab, Hodgins tests the ice bullet, but it doesn't work. So then he tests a blood bullet - frozen blood that would mix with the victim's own. It works, and leaves no exit wound. It would also explain Bones' bad reaction to the blood administered by the hospital. Camille is so excited she kisses Hodgins.
Clark has found a small cranial fracture on the left side of Hal's head. They shave away the hair and fund a small infected puncture wound, several days old. They find several shiny splinters which Hodgins determines are gold paint and wood flakes from a 12th century gold icon of the archangel Raphael in the Jeffersonians' collection.
Booth and Sparling posit that Hal, the security guard, informed the shooter that Bones was working on Groot's remains and turned off the cameras. Knowing that she was the only person smart enough to put it together, the killer then attempted to murder Bones. The Jeffersonian staff examine the artefact used to bludgeon Hal and find that it has been replaced with a fake.
Booth and Sparling head to the conservation department to interview Dr. Batuhan, the only person on staff capable of restoring artefacts of the icons' calibre. They find the equipment needed to create a blood bullet and to fire it among all the restoration tools.
Dr. Batuhan is interviewed by Booth and Sparling. Batuhan has been stealing original artifacts and paintings for some time and replacing them with carefully crafted fakes. So Hal gave the artifacts to Groot, who packs them in his private jet to avoid customs. Then Dr. Batuhan would fly with Groot to authenticate them before they are sold. That's a good theory, anyway, but they lack proof. Bones volunteers to have surgery to see if they can find evidence of the killer's blood inside of her. Under sedation, Bones sees her mom one final time. Her mother encourages Bones to lower her guard and find that impulsive little girl again. Following her head allowed Bones to survive but following hear heart will allow her to flourish.
Bones awakens to find that the blood matched and Batuhan has been arrested for murder and attempted murder. Booth and Bones kiss.
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
Guest Cast
- Clark Edison - Eugene Byrd
- Max Kennan - Ryan O'Neal
- Christine Brennan - Brooke Langton
- Olivia Sparling - Danielle Panabaker
- David Batuhan - Harry Van Gorkum
- Dr. Art MacGregor - Don Franklin
- Quentin Mayhew - Paul Schackman
- Dr. Jennifer DePaul - Paris Tanaka
- Sam Eagan - David Kagen
- Leonard Foot - Jonathan Runyon
- Hal Bennett - Richard Augustine
Featured Music
- Can you help me - Hannah Peel
Notes
- Clark Edison reveals his middle name is Thomas.
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