“Ground floor,” said a pleasing electronic voice. Ben pushed the number two button and the elevator doors slammed shut and swooshed upwards in an unapologetic manner. “Floor two,” said the elevator and the doors opened.
Mark was met with bright lights and a rush of chilled air in his face. He felt a little off kilter and had to steady himself before they continued on to the nurse's station where someone was waiting for them.
“You must be Detective Stanford,” came a voice, male, low and rumbling baritone. “My name is Dr. Asclepius. I spoke to your chief yesterday, who informed me you might have a positive identification for our John Doe.”
“Uh yes,” Ben said. “This is Father Mark Roman, from Sacred Heart in San Francisco. He believes he might know the patient.”
“Forgive my rudeness, but Father Roman, how do you intend on identifying the patient? He's quite unresponsive so I don't believe an auditory identification will be possible.”
“I have other ways of identifying the world around me.” It was a phrase Mark used often, and it was a lie for him, because he had no intention of doing anything other than removing his contacts and setting his eyes on Yehuda for the first time in a hundred years.
“Forgive me,” the doctor said again.
“Room two-four-five is it?” Ben asked.
The doctor cleared his throat. “Uh yes. If you need anything else, have me paged. Before you leave I'd like to have a word, should you positively ID him, just a brief medical history. We've received some questionable blood work and his chart is incomplete.”
Mark felt his blood run cold. Blood work. He wasn't sure that Yehuda had ever gone through blood work before, and he could only imagine what modern day science might discover should they get their hands on any significant amount of his DNA.
He was pulled from his thoughts by Ben's swift steps, and they walked down the carpeted hallway until Ben came to a stop in front of the room. Absently, Mark reached out and found the number plaque on the wall, his fingers mapping out the Braille tag reading the numbers two-four-five. This was it.
Mark didn't need the Braille, nor did he need to set eyes on the man in the bed, because just standing outside of the door, Mark could feel him. He could feel the connection between them, the immortal soul lying there, trapped in his body, in his madness.
Not waiting for Ben, Mark pushed the door open and walked inside. Turning his head from side to side, he could hear the room was mostly empty, save for a few machines. The window let quite a lot of light filter in, and somewhere above his head a television was playing at an extremely low volume.
The subtle beeping told him Yehuda was strapped to monitors, keeping an eye on his vital signs. He did not say aloud that the monitors would expire long before Yehuda's heartbeat ever would. He stuck his cane out, walking forward until it collided with something large and metal. The hospital bed.
Ben and Abby stayed back near the door as Mark moved forward, hands outstretched as he found the bed, his hand coming to rest on the unconscious man's ankle. At contact, the man in the bed shifted, just slightly, but it was the first time he had moved of his own accord since being taken into the hospital.
Mark knew this because it had happened now more times than his mind cared to remember, and his eyes welled with tears. He swiped at them with the back of his hand, clearing his throat. “This may take me a moment,” he said, his voice thick and rough.
“I'm uh... I'm going to go get coffee,” Abby said. “Ben, want to come?”
“I can't,” Ben said, sounding pained. “I want to, but I can't leave Mark alone here with the John Doe.”
“Right,” Abby said.
“It's fine,” Mark said, his back still to the pair. He waited for a moment, until he knew it was just him and Ben in the room. He reached up, giving a pinch near his eyes and pulled the contacts out.
He blinked a few times, clearing the blur from his vision and letting his eyes adjust to full vision and light. By Ben's silence, Mark knew Ben hadn't noticed the contacts yet, which bought Mark a little time to examine Yehuda and the state he was in.
Mark trailed his hand up from Yehuda's leg to his arm, and looked down at the face of the man he hadn't seen in a century. He was unchanged, his friend, save for the black circles under his eyes. He was thin, sallow but his olive skin was clean shaven and his nails trimmed.
It was when he realized Yehuda's hair was freshly washed that he became nervous. He reached out, touching the side of Yehuda's face, and the man lying in the bed moved again, just slightly, in the direction of Mark's hand.
“Yehuda,” Mark whispered. “Why must I find you like this every time?” His fingers against Yehuda's skin were trembling, just slightly, humming with connection, with power. He could feel it passing between himself and Yehuda and he became frightened again. “When is this going to end?”
“So,” came the rough voice of Ben, shattering the quiet between Mark and his companion, “can you tell who he is?”
Taking a breath, Mark turned to Ben, fixed his clear, brown eyes on Ben's face and said, “Yes I do. Ben, I'd like you to meet the rather unconscious form of Judas Iscariot.”
Thirteen
Ben felt uncomfortable watching Mark approach the bed, his hands trailing on the body of the unconscious man lying there unmoving, attached to heart monitors, his limbs strapped down by restraints on the side of the bed.
The man lying there looked younger than Ben by at least a decade. His face was smooth, his skin olive much like Mark's, and his hair was long, pitch black and formed tight curls. The man's eyes were shut, the skin around them dark and sunken, his lips were cracked and clearly he was dehydrated, despite the slow IV drip in his arm.
Ben knew Mark had a connection to the man lying in the bed. It was apparent from the moment Mark asked Ben to take him here to help with identification. Ben, however, had no idea just how connected Mark was to the man until the blind priest started crying upon touching the bed.
Ben shifted to the side as Mark wiped at his eyes a few times, and stared at the man as best he could from that distance. The man in the bed was emaciated, cleaner than he had been in the church, but still not much of anything. How could this man, this incapacitated thing lying there motionless, be responsible for curing Ben, for saving his life?
No, Ben thought, not possible. It wasn't that, it wasn't that at all, no matter what Mark alluded to. There was no proof, and obviously Ben wasn't going to get any answers from some comatose man Mark was blubbering over like a lost lover.
Ben let it go on for some time. Mark was clearly shaken by the entire thing, his hands trembling as he bent over the man, his face staring down as though he could see the dying figure lying in the bed.
“So, can you tell me who he is?” Ben blurted out. The words seemed to come out of nowhere, and Ben was as surprised to hear himself say it as Mark appeared to be when he turned.
It took a moment for Ben to realize it, and panic seemed to set in before his brain allowed him to process the fact that Mark was staring at him with clear, wide, seeing brown eyes. Ben took several involuntary steps back until he hit the wall, his hand darting out to steady himself on the chair.
His face had gone numb and tingling with panic, his eyes frantic and wide, his breathing hitched. He couldn't believe Mark had been healed. He wouldn't. He wouldn't because if Mark had been healed, so had he, and everything he had known about himself as a functioning adult was based on a lie, and Ben couldn't handle that.
“Ben, please—” Mark said, taking a few steps towards him, his hand outstretched.
“Your eyes,” Ben gasped, throwing out his hand in an attempt to halt Mark's advancing steps. “Can you... Oh God,” he groaned.
Mark blinked in surprise and then turned back to the bed, scooping something up in his palm that had been lying on the blankets. “No,” he said in a voice so firm and so commanding that Ben instantly froze.
“Mark,” Ben whispered.
Mark took slow, deli
berate steps towards Ben, his cupped palm outstretched toward the detective. His face was a mask of passive reason, his brown eyes clear and soft and commanding. “I have not been healed, Ben. Please calm down.”
Ben licked his lips and did everything in his power to force himself to relax. His shoulders which were hunched near his ears fell, and his grip on the chair eased. “You can see. You can fucking see.”
Mark was now within arm's reach of Ben and he was still holding his hand out, but Ben was refusing to look down. “Yes, I can see. I am not blind.”
“So... so...” Ben stuttered.
Mark reached out with his other hand, grabbed Ben's and turned his hand palm up. He tipped something soft, small, and pliant into Ben's hand, and Ben forced himself to look down. He wasn't exactly sure what he was staring at for a moment, but quickly recognized deep tinted costume contacts.
His panic was replaced suddenly with anger. Violent anger. He snatched his hand away from Mark's, his eyes growing narrow and heated. “What is this?”
“They are contacts to make my eyes appear to be white and unseeing,” Mark explained patiently.
Ben reached to the side of his belt, touching his gun with his fingertips, and when he spoke, his voice dripped with threat. “Explain. Now.”
Mark looked at Ben's hand touching the gun and his face fell, though he looked more sad than frightened. With a sigh, Mark looked back at the sleeping man in the bed and then back to Ben. “Two thousand years ago, when this man and I were young, were human, we were cursed. He was given the ability to heal and I was…” Mark shook his head and cleared his throat. “I was given chaos. We’ve been traveling since then, Ben. Traveling and trying to live our lives in peace. I chose to live as a blind man to protect the people I cared about. To protect everyone. I am so sorry I deceived you, but I want to assure you it was for good cause.”
More confused than ever, Ben shoved the contacts back at Mark and stared at the person in the bed. “You said his name, but I didn't hear you.”
Mark gave a small chuckle and shook his head. “Where we came from, he was known as Yehuda, brother of Yeshua, son of Yosef. Here, after legend upon legend was built, and the Romans took his name and turned it into a curse, he's known as Judas Iscariot.”
Ben stared at him, blinking, and then crossed his arms and shook his head. “No. No, no no, absolutely not, no. I'm...” Ben threw up his hands in frustration, “I'm not dealing with this shit, okay? Whoever you are. You're crazy, this man is a homeless person, my sister is a dead woman for dragging me into this, and I'm done.”
With that, Ben turned, only to come face to face with his sister who was carrying two cups of steaming hot coffee. Abby smiled at him, but as she looked over Ben's shoulder at the once-blind man standing there staring at her, her smile fell.
Her hands went limp, and before Ben could begin to explain, she dropped the coffee, splattering Ben's shins with the boiling hot liquid. “Shit!” Ben cried, backing up.
Abby gasped, one hand over her mouth, one pointing at Mark. “Oh my, oh sweet, blessed Virgin,” she said through her fingers. “It's true! It's... it's true!”
“It's not true,” Ben snapped at her, his harsh voice shaking her out of her awe. “He was wearing contacts. He could see the whole time. He's a damn liar, this is just a crazy man in a bed, and I'm leaving, Abby.”
With that, Ben shoved past his sister, stormed down the hall and went straight to the elevator. As the doors opened, Ben heard the doctor with the unpronounceable last name calling after him, but Ben ignored him.
What was he supposed to tell the doctor anyway? That the man in the bed was a two-thousand year old Judas Iscariot? That he was cursed by God to heal brain tumors? That the blind priest claimed to be some sort of ancient cursed being who had to pretend he couldn't see to protect the world? Whatever that meant.
It was ludicrous, and Ben found himself on the verge of hysterical laughter. The elevator hit the ground floor and he had a sudden, insane urge to curse at the electronic voice who wished him to have a good day. He breezed past the reception desk and went straight outside into the small smoking area a few feet away from the doors.
Ben didn't often smoke, and it seemed like a stupid idea since his brush with cancer, but today called for it. He pulled his emergency pack out of his jacket pocket, lit one up and took a long drag from the pungent, white stick.
The smoke filled his lungs and the nicotine coursed through his body, giving him an immediate sense of relaxation. “Kill me now,” he muttered to himself, hanging his head. Part of him felt on the verge of laughing at the entire thing, and another part felt like having Mark arrested for providing false information to a detective. The smaller part, the one of reason, said he should just walk away and never look back.
Finishing his cigarette, Ben crushed the remainder under the heel of his shoe and looked back up to the second floor. There was just absolutely no way Mark was talking sense. He was obviously as crazy as the vagrant lying in the bed had been at the church.
It was entirely possible Mark knew that man, but the idea that the pair of them were two-thousand year old travelers with special powers was ridiculous. Ben had lived his entire life listening to Abby proclaim miracle after miracle and unable to prove anything. In college he traveled with her to see statues that weren't weeping, and paintings of Jesus that weren't really bleeding.
A blessed vial of water from the Sea of Galilee had failed to save his mother from her addiction, despite Abby insisting it would, and eventually Ben had grown tired of it. He just couldn't listen to any more. There was a medical explanation for what had happened with his head, and he wouldn't accept otherwise.
He was done with this nonsense, with Abby dragging him back to this place in his life over and over. He was done trying to believe with her, trying to help her, watching her heart break, and still try and find some sort of religious purpose in her life.
“Detective Stanford,” came a voice from a few feet away.
Ben looked up and saw the doctor from before approaching. He looked young to be a doctor, but outside in the sun Ben could see wisps of grey in his dark hair. His face was smooth, save for the slight crinkles at his eyes, and the shade of icy-blue was unsettling.
“Hello Doctor,” Ben said, “I’m sorry but I feel like I’ll just make a mockery of your last name.”
“Call me Greg,” he said with a laugh. “My parents were Greek, and honestly I probably should have changed it, but it's a little funny watching people trying to work it out.”
Ben tried not to roll his eyes and against better judgment, pulled out a second cigarette. “What can I help you with?”
Greg hesitated a moment, staring at Ben with a frown. “You don’t remember me, do you?”
Squinting at the doctor, Ben tried to recall. Being that it was part of his job, Ben had always been fantastic at recalling names and faces, but he was drawing a blank. Still, there was something familiar about this doctor. “Have we met before?”
Greg smiled a little and waved Ben off. “Not important right now. Was your friend able to make a positive ID on the John Doe?”
Ben let out a long puff of smoke before he answered, hesitant to drop the subject of whether or not he knew the doctor. “I'm going to have to talk with him before making that call.” He tried to keep annoyance from his voice, but failed. “He seems to know him, but I can't be certain. I don't know the man all that well. He's a co-worker of my sister's.”
“So I suppose you don't have any information on that John Doe at all,” the doctor said, sounding somewhat defeated.
Ben looked at him for a long time. Greg’s face was blank, but working as a detective for so many years, Ben could read from the doctor's face he was hiding something. “Why are you interested in John Doe? You mentioned something about blood work earlier, didn’t you?”
The doctor looked around nervously and then lowered his head slightly, and his voice. “There's not a lot I can tell you, regardless of not hav
ing an identity on this man, but let's just say I've found some extremely interesting things which have come back from his cultures. Bacteria that is virtually unknown and genetic material that hasn't been seen in human beings in over two thousand years.”
Ben felt his face grow hot, and he sat back, trying to keep himself calm. “What… what do you mean exactly?”
“I mean exactly what I said. We ran a full panel on him, and we found the strangest things. His genetic make-up is different. You have to think of life as a constantly changing, evolving thing, detective. We're all the same as we were thousands of years ago, yet we weren't. There are constant, tiny shifts in our species, and this man doesn't fit in with the men of today. He's carrying bacteria that we have no record of, bacteria, not harmful, but that shouldn't exist in the form they're in. It's as though the man came from the past, a virtual time capsule, carrying with him makeup from human beings who lived thousands of years ago.”
Ben didn't realize his hands were shaking until the cigarette had burned down so far it began to sear his skin. He glanced down, tossing the cigarette aside, and saw his fingers trembling. Ben clasped his hands together tightly, laying them on the cold, stone table, and he looked the doctor in the eye.
“That's impossible, you realize.”
The doctor's eyebrows went up. “Yes, detective, I do realize that. There's always a chance we have faulty equipment, or got a false reading, but believe me it's not very probable. If I had some idea of family history, some identification... anything, I might be able to tell what's really going on.”
Ben sighed and glanced up to the second floor again, where Mark and his sister likely still stood, Abby trying to sort out everything, and Mark trying his best to explain his absolutely insane story.
Rubbing his face, Ben looked at the doctor and shook his head. “He's here for sixty days. It's not likely he’ll wake up in that time, right?”
The Awakening (The Judas Curse Book 1) Page 8
