It was agreed that Micah would enlist the help of Joseph of Arimathea. The two would claim the body of Yeshua, and remove it ostensibly for burial. Once in the safety of a burial tomb, it would then be the job of the Apostles to administer the counteragent that would wake Yeshua from his death-like sleep. While the Apostles administered the antidote that Micah had prepared, Micah would rush ahead to the hills near Qumran and prepare his secret cave for their arrival. There in the seclusion and safety of the cave, they could all escape detection while Yeshua healed and grew strong once again.
For once there seemed no dissention among the Apostles. With careful and deliberate strokes, Micah drew a detailed map that would direct the Apostles to his cave. Micah then took his leave to join Joseph and to bring to Yeshua his Elixir of Death even as he hung on the cross.
Joseph of Arimathea, deeply grieving the imminent death of Yeshua, willingly agreed to offer his help. He pleaded with Pontius Pilate for the body of Yeshua. He pleaded hard and long and, with his promise of more than a few well-considered favors, in the end Pilate agreed. Pontius Pilate’s consent was all that Joseph needed. He had already enlisted the help of Nicodemus, who allowed Micah to wrap himself in Nicodemus’ clothes and ride his mule and, so, to pass as Joseph’s assistant if any Roman guard should stop them.
Joseph led Micah to the place where Yeshua hung on the cross and, upon their arrival at Golgotha, Joseph presented Pilate’s order for release of Yeshua’s body.
“Not dead yet,” the fat Roman guard informed Joseph disinterestedly. He glanced at Micah, well concealed in rags, who appeared to be staring vacantly off into the distance. The guard turned back to his half-eaten lunch.
“Oh, no!” Joseph exclaimed, in frustration. “They said he was in poor condition, that he wouldn’t last more than a few hours. I cannot come back later. I don’t have all day, you know.”
“What would you like me to do about it? I could put a sword through him if you would like,” the guard said, as he withdrew his sword from its sheath, “but it’ll cost you. Not supposed to give them a quick end, you know.”
The guard glanced over his shoulder to be certain that none of the other guards had yet returned. “I mean your time must be worth a lot to you. It would be a shame if you had to wait here for hours, maybe days.”
It was common knowledge that the Roman guards who had been relegated to crucifixion watching had been demoted to such a duty because they were too old, too stupid, or too incompetent for any other duty. For those same reasons, they could be counted on to be the most corrupt as well. For a few gold coins, they would slit anyone’s throat, including—if one wasn’t careful—the throat of the one who had just offered payment.
With a knowing smile Joseph reached into his robe and withdrew a small pouch, which he offered to the guard. “Well, I do have something here that might help to bring my waiting to a swift conclusion, if you know what I mean,”
The guard returned his sword to its sheath. Micah caught Joseph’s eye, and they shared a moment of great relief. Interested only in the contents of Joseph’s pouch, the guard snatched it from Joseph’s hand, opened it, and poured the contents into the palm of his free hand.
“What’s this?” he asked as his fingers bypassed the coins and picked up the vial that held the precious Elixir of Death.
“The contents of the vial will bring you the remainder of the coins in this hand,” Joseph said, holding up a larger and considerably fuller pouch. “Pour the contents of that vial into a cup of wine and give it to the prisoner, the one who calls himself Yeshua of Nazareth. It will make the wine sour, but he will not be surprised at being given bitter drink.”
“That one? He will refuse it,” the guard countered.
“Tell him that Joseph of Arimathea brought it to ease his pain. He will trust you and he will drink it. But, fear not. Its only virtue is that it will make my wait the shorter and you the richer. Then you and I will both be free to be on our way.”
“Why can’t I just skewer him like the pig he is?”
“Because you were given clear instruction to let him hang and suffer ’til he died. Come now, don’t get us both in trouble.”
The guard shrugged, then took the pouch and positioned himself so that no other guard might see his bribery in action. He quickly counted out the coins. He laughed and placed the money deep within his robes, then turned and walked off without a word.
Joseph retreated to where Micah had allowed the horse to amble. “What’s happening?” Micah asked. “Is he just taking the money or is he going to do it?”
“I don’t know,” Joseph answered. “I’m not sure…”
They waited. As far as Joseph could tell, the guard was just as likely to give Yeshua the drink as he was to keep the money but do nothing. At any moment, he might signal the other guards to come and take Joseph and Micah away. They awaited their fate as much as Yeshua awaited his.
The guard, originally headed in Yeshua’s direction, stopped and conversed with two other men who were not in guards’ uniforms. They laughed and, as the minutes passed, it became clear that Yeshua’s last chance was to be lost at the whim of a stupid arrogant lout.
The guard pounded his thighs in exaggerated laughter at some comment, then moved off into the distance where their Yeshua might yet be clinging to his last measure of life. Joseph and Micah strained to see. It appeared to them that the guard had climbed up and administered the elixir to one who hung upon a cross but at such a distance, they could not be sure. Slowly, after the guard stopped to relieve himself on the bottom of one of the crosses, he returned.
“It is done,” he announced. “Now get him out of here quickly. If you ever speak of this to anyone, I will deny it, then I will make certain you never speak again.”
Joseph and Micah nodded their agreement, then hurried in the direction from which the guard had come.
“Wait,” the guard commanded. They held their breath. The guard raised his hand in the air and shook a nonexistent pouch of money, to communicate what was expected.
Joseph hesitated. If he paid the guard now, the pig might easily take the money and refuse them entry. On the other hand, if he didn’t show good faith, all could be lost. As he silently begged for God’s help, Joseph reached into his sleeve and tossed the heavy pouch into the greedy hand that awaited it. Miraculously, it seemed, the guard stepped aside and allowed them to pass.
The enormity of the number of crosses was beyond their imagination. The faces, frozen in pain, covered in blood, were but one face. There was no way to recognize their beloved Yeshua. Still, they walked in the direction the guard had first taken until they stopped, both at the same cross, for they felt in whose shadow they stood.
Oh, that they might take his wounds as their own. They removed him as gently as they could and carried Yeshua past the small group of guards who believed him dead and demanded a few extra coins to allow them to pass.
The plan worked!
Once they had him secure at the sepulcher that Joseph had prepared for him, the Apostles would administer the antidote and Yeshua would wake. Oh, how he would laugh at the recounting of their deception and the victory they had extracted from the Romans. And Micah would welcome them to his cave where they would celebrate as one.
But all was not to go as smoothly as planned. Perhaps the Roman guard had not been as compliant as they had hoped or the other guards had grown suspicious. Perhaps Pilate had been bothered by rumors or, and this thought greatly worried Micah, perhaps one or more of the Apostles had betrayed their plan. But, in any case, Micah and Joseph were greeted at the burial room by Roman guards who had been stationed at the vault to guard the tomb in which Yeshua was to lay.
“What shall we do?” Micah cried to Joseph in desperation. “He will not wake without the counteragent, and it cannot be administered until the effects of the elixir have had time to subside. If the antidote is given too soon or not soon enough, he will never awaken again.”
“Worry not,” Jos
eph assured him. “The guards will allow me to come and go so that Yeshua may be prepared for burial. At sunset tomorrow, I shall go to the sepulcher and remove his body and bring him to the Apostles. There they will administer the antidote and all will be as you planned.”
“But how will we get him out of the sepulcher when the guards watch all that you do?” Micah asked.
“The guard changes watch at midday. The two who watch him now will not return until midnight,” explained Joseph. “When they return, in thanks for their consideration for allowing me to prepare Yeshua for ritual burial, I will arrange for a gift of wine to be delivered to them. They will be expecting some bribery, so all will seem as it should be. I know well those two who guard him. They will surely drink themselves into a stupor. I will have something added to the wine to help them on their way. After all, you are not the only one with knowledge of elixirs,” Joseph added in good humor, then he continued. “As they sleep, I will bring Yeshua to the Apostles so he may take the antidote, and they will deliver him to you. I will join you all there, later, in the cave near Qumran where you wait.”
His voice grew ever more confident and Joseph continued. “After I deliver Yeshua to the Apostles, I will quickly return to the sepulcher and, as the guards continue in their stupor, I will cover the opening to the sepulcher with a large stone so that they may not see that Yeshua is gone. I will explain that the stone will assure that none may enter or leave to do mischief or desecrate the body. These guards will not dare to tell anyone that they fell asleep from too much drink and did not see me move the stone into place. Since I shall have no complaint, who is there to question their obvious devotion to duty if they themselves make no trouble?”
Micah did not share Joseph’s confidence. There were too many uncertainties for his liking.
I should have anticipated the possibility of the guards. What else might I have overlooked?
Joseph, placing a fatherly arm around Micah’s shoulder, nodded in wordless understanding. Good men blame themselves before they fault any other.
“Now, Micah, you must go!” Joseph announced. “You must finish the preparation of the counteragent. By now, Bartholomew should be back at the stable with the special pungent myrrh you requested.”
Micah hesitated.
“Go,” Joseph commanded. “The Apostles await you. In two days’ time, you and Yeshua shall be together again.”
Chapter 48
Day Ten, late evening
Carlton Bay Hotel, London
Gil turned on the hot stream of water and washed off the dirt of the day. He could hear the sound of Sabbie showering in the room they had rented next door. By the time he was finished, she had returned; apparently with one objective in mind. Warm, welcoming, and completely naked, she waited for him stretched across the cool sheets. It was a dream come true and his body responded without hesitation.
“We both need a little tension release,” Sabbie said simply.
“What?”
“This will make us both sleep a lot better,” she continued soothingly.
A lump fought its way into his throat. Gil slipped under the covers and turned his back to Sabbie. “No, thanks,” he said over his shoulder.
“What? You’re turning me down?” she said in surprise.
He could hardly believe it himself but he was still filled with the jealousy he had been plunged into at Sarkami’s apartment. He was not about to let it go. He had been able to keep a lid on it by telling himself that as long as they were working as professionals, he had no right to feel jealous. But if they were about to get just about as personal as it goes, he had a right to his anger. The rush of pain he had felt when she looked at Sarkami would no longer be contained. Yesterday, Gil would have done anything to have her look at him in the way she had looked at that old eagle. Instead, she was offering to have sex with him as nothing more than a tension release.
Gil turned over and sat up. “Do you realize that I know absolutely nothing about you?” he said accusingly. “Not a goddamned thing.
“You’re all business with me,” he continued. “Then you’re all warm and wonderful with everyone else.”
“Everyone else? Like who?” Sabbie retorted.
“Like Sarkami, like Ludlow.”
“Ludlow! My God, he was like a grandfather to me. He and Sarah took me in when I had no place to go. And Sarkami! You met him. Didn’t you get it? He is simply the wisest and most principled man I have ever met. He would spare nothing, even his own life, to do what he thought was right. I don’t know too many people like that. I doubt that you do either.
“What did you think?” she continued. “That we were lovers? That I had a thing for older men?”
Gil flushed at the absurdity of his jealousy. What could he say? That he ached to hold her so much that he couldn’t think straight, that he was crazy with his need to know her, to touch her mind and her body at the same time.
He shook his head, frustrated at his lack of words and his own asinine actions.
His search for the right words was fruitless. Even as the thoughts left his lips, he knew the tone was all wrong and that she was sure to misunderstand his intention.
“You never really say anything of yourself,” he said, far more accusingly than he felt. “And you run hot and cold. First, you’re all business, cool and professional, then suddenly you want to make love. I’m left hanging out to dry.”
“What do you want, one of those whining women who think that a litany of all the wrongs done to them in their lives is a prelude to sex?”
She was right. The fact that she didn’t spill out her entire personal history was actually pleasant and a welcome change. Still, there had to be some middle ground between spilling one’s guts and playing the role of the ice maiden.
“Look,” he began, “when you talk about the rape, you act as if it was…”
“The rape?” she said incredulously. Her face flushed with anger. “Is that what you want? For me to tell you what it was like to be raped? What? You think that’s sexy? Well, imagine this. A knife to your throat and four men tearing you apart and laughing at your agony. Watching your best friend’s throat cut because she defended herself, then watching her body being mounted even as the last of her blood pours out. Imagine the hot burn of piss on your face as your violators wring one last bit of degradation out of the experience.”
Gil stared, unable to move or to speak. Her images were burned into his mind forever and he was filled with shame at his own former arrogance.
Sabbie looked unblinkingly into his face, apparently struggling to hold onto the aloofness that had served her so well for so long. She nodded, almost imperceptibly, as if agreeing with the voice within that urged her to trust him with her secrets and her shame.
There was more to tell, she explained. A second rape, much more vile than the first. This one perpetrated by those with whom she lived and fought. The politics of the moment, it seemed, made it “prudent” to forgo reporting the rape. Her superior officers at Aleph determined that the subsequent investigation of so sensational a crime might put the entire SWAT unit in jeopardy.
“I was told that, regrettably, the timing of my ‘incident’ was less than ideal. Less than ideal,” she repeated. “Aleph’s budget was up for review and, given the changing public opinion about putting women in harm’s way, the board of military advisors concluded that the less publicity about the incident the better.”
“But what happened to you had nothing to do with combat,” Gil said incredulously.
It made no difference, she said. “They wanted no problems. I was a problem. Alana was less of a problem. She was dead. I demanded justice for both of us and they did what they had to do to shut me up.”
Sabbie had demanded a hearing. Aleph agreed. Her fellow soldiers and superior officers were in attendance. Those she counted on as character witnesses, testified to her sexual promiscuity and lack of good judgment. Women who had fought side by side with her, women for whom she would hav
e laid down her life, painted a picture of her as unstable and licentious. Friends, who had once urged her to date more, testified that she was a troubled young woman who regularly engaged in high-risk sexual behavior with multiple partners.
Her military service record, as well, was called in question. Small infractions, some of which she had never even been informed, were magnified beyond recognition so that they might lend credence to Sabbie’s lack of judgment and responsibility.
“You can make anyone look like anything if you really want to,” she said with a shrug.
“Alana’s death was deemed inadmissible,” she continued. “A separate hearing was slated for the following week. It was later canceled, of course, by request of Alana’s parents. In the end, I did what I had to do.”
Sabbie had refused the honorable discharge Aleph had offered. Without explanation, she left in pursuit of the men responsible for the taking of her life as well as Alana’s. Using skills Gil dared not imagine, Sabbie had extracted from the first of her attackers, the names of the others.
“And, had it not been for Sarkami,” Sabbie concluded, “I would have continued to take lives in hopes of a retribution that could never be realized.”
Gil straightened in surprise. Sarkami, what the hell did he have to do with all of this?
“Everything,” she said. Even as she put the last bullet into her assailant’s brain, Sarkami had happened unexpectedly upon the scene.
“I turned the gun on him,” Sabbie explained, “though I didn’t want to kill him. After all, he had done nothing to me,” she continued.
“To kill someone for what he has done to you or to another innocent soul, that was one thing. To kill someone simply because he has unwittingly witnessed your retaliation, that was another matter entirely.
“So we stood, face to face, I with my gun, the corpse at my feet. I don’t know what I expected from him, horror, I suppose. Fear, at the very least.”
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