If John Knew Isabel
By TravelingThroughTime
Summary: When Isabel returns to Earth, it's up to John and Angela to uncover why. All the while, Isabel begins to have feelings she's never had before. Angela/John/Isabel
Rated T: For violence, language, sexuality, drama and thematic elements
Disclaimer: Nothings mine.
Chapter I: My Dear Sister
A change of mind? Since when did God ever change his mind? How could such a divine purity ever make a mistake - if that was in fact what it was. She knew not. All she knew was where she was going, traveling through space and time. Up ahead she saw a bright light. It was warm and peaceful…inviting. As she flowed through space in a floating sort of motion, she smiled and extended her arms, welcoming the warmth of the rays that greeted her from the bright orb.
"This is it." she thought. "I'm home at last. Thank you, Constantine…." But she was yet to be mistaken.
The orb began to shrink, but how? Was it suddenly moving away from her? No, it was closing.
"Wait!" she cried, but the orb shut and she was thrust into darkness, though the warmth remained.
She heard voices around her, majestic and mighty, but not cold.
"Child of God, your time is not come." said the male presence.
"I do not see you." she whimpered. "Why isn't it my time? What do you mean?"
"You are needed on Earth, Child of God."
"I don't understand. I saw the light, it welcomed me. Am I still not welcome in the house of God?"
"Nay," said he, "You are welcome, but your time is not now."
"But…"
"Do not question my words, Child of God. For in time your answers will come. Be mortal again."
A sudden static wave electrified throughout her body, and she fell numb on her back, feeling the rush of hot blood circulating through her veins. In her confusion, she felt terror seeping back into her mind - an emotion she had forgotten. Then came a softness about her. She could feel that her back was laid out upon a cushion and that her body was covered. For the sheet was cold against her face.
As she sat up, she felt her strength return and as she gasped, the air she once breathed came back to her lungs. The sheet descended from her body, and she tried for her footing, grasping the rim of the bed table as she did.
Looking around, she began to feel the rush of panic.
"A Morgue?" she panted as she stood, taking in all that surrounded her. She stood frozen - forgetting all that made one move about - but it was not the bodies, or even the fact that she was laid here that jolted fear into her now; it was the dark silhouette that stood in the doorway. The shadowed contour was looking upon her, awaking her fears as it's ungrateful eyes grew red. But a voice shrouded the room, the same voice who had spoken to her before. As it reiterated, it sent the demon away, and through the door she ran.
"Run, Child of God. Go and seek who loves you and hear my voice no more."
She burst through the halls in a disarray. The voice seemed to give to her the urge needed to leave. It was all empty and her footing padded in their bareness heavily and desperately.
Into the waiting room she ran, still clad in Hospital appeal.
"Ma'am? Ma'am?" But she ignored the Receptionist. The suspicious woman called for backup. "Someone get down here immediately, a patient is headed out into the parking lot."
She boomed through the doors in her breathless flee, and into the parking lot she did stray. She came to a slow jog, mazing her way through the vehicles. Then heavy, frantic voices came from behind and she knew that the personnels would catch her if she did not quicken her pace again.
"Stop right there! Where are you going?!"
"Ma'am! You cannot leave the Facility without checking out by the Doctor's granted request!"
"Stop! Stop!"
She ignored them and ran ever faster than they. She galloped like a deer - without the grace - and fled foolishly into the street.
The traffic roared at her like the barking of angry dogs. She squealed gutlessly as one car jolted round her and crashed into the hood of a taxi. Traffic began to skid and halt and ram, and she wandered onward.
On the sidewalks, in the backstreets, she was safe at last. Yet she was still afraid. The blunder of her old mortal wounds had returned.
Cursed? She thought so.
~TTT~
The phone blurred the silence and aroused her sleep. Duck began meowing, trampling and pouncing about the bed in an attempt to wake her.
"Duck," she groaned, turning over and rubbing her lids as she fingered for the lamp. The light annoyed her tired eyes. "What's wrong?" she yawned.
Meow! Meow!
Over his excited reply, she heard the rambling of the phone. Stumbling out of the room, she switched on the light of the den and brought the device to her ear.
"Who's calling please?" she asked, and then thought: It's 3:00 am.
"Iz dis Detective Angeela Dosson?" the Spanish woman sounded uneasy and her accent hard to follow.
"Uh," she took a moment to render the words still waking up, "Ye- yes. Who's calling please?" she was suspicious.
"My name iz Romi Ramirez. I waz yer sister's Nurse."
"Yes, I remember."
"Doctor Conner toll me to coll. Izabel Dosson's body haz ben stolen from Ravenscar's Morgue."
"What?!"
"We don't have any answers now, Ma'am. We - "
"I'm coming down there." She hung up and readied herself to leave.
~TTT~
She flung through the doors once they had opened, bringing with her haste.
"Where's Doctor Conner?" she asked the Receptionist. The woman replied not in words but rather tilted her head and shifted her eyes toward the waiting room where a man clad in white stood, a stethoscope about his neck. She closed in on him and he gave a sigh, preparing to speak.
"I hear my sister's body is missing."
"Come, I'll take you to the Morgue."
He escorted her into the corridor striding many steps before shifting into an elevator that took them to another floor. Onward they walked until they met a large double door, and inside they went. She kept behind him, staying close. The place was cold, gritty even and it made her heart sink into sorrow. The essence of death filled the air with loneliness. All of these bodies, sheeted and hidden before her…they were once living things, people… People who had a story to tell and families who loved them. Now they gone from this place. Some of them in Heaven perhaps, some of them wandering the endless halls that were Ravenscar, some of them in Hell maybe, she thought. It chilled her very bones.
"Here is where Isabel's body was." Doctor Conner illustrated with his hands to an empty bed with a sheet draped loosely among it's thin mattress. "One of the Nurses heard a commotion of doors flinging out in the hall and she found this one open. When she looked inside, she discovered that one of the bodies were missing. We uncovered that it was your sister."
Angela shook her head in dismay, fitting her palm over her lips and struggling to hold in the bout of tears that needed to escape.
"Why?" she mumbled to herself. "Why would anyone take her?" Or any thing… "Have you called the cops?"
"Not yet. I told the staff that you should know first, being a Detective and all. I knew you would call them once you got here."
"Uh...okay then." she sniffled. "I need to call headquarters." she stated at length. "We need to investigate this further."
The Doctor nodded and she pulled her cell phone from the boundaries of her pockets.
"This is detective Dodson. I need backup at Ravenscar Mental Institution. A body has been stolen from the Morgue…my sister."
The Doctor watched as she flipped the cover of the phone shut, slipped it back into her pocket and crossed her arms anxiously. She hugged her body tightly as she shivered, her eyes red and tired, but the tears that never flowed had seized from their doorway.
"The Receptionist reported a patient fleeing from the Institution a little before we discovered the missing body."
"A patient?"
"She was dressed as one. But I've come to terms that perhaps she was dressed in Hospital attire to sneak in."
"She?"
"Yes. We suspected that maybe she stole the body, though the men who chased after her saw her empty handed. She dissapeared into the streets...nearly got hit, they say."
"Can you describe her?"
"Hmmm...Lady up front said she was dark haired but nobody saw her face. Probably just some lunatic. She wasn't a patient though, not one that's kept here anyway. I checked throughally."
The Doctor seemed to think lightly of this, more so than Angela liked.
~TTT~
John roused in his bed, restless but given out. For weeks he had been weary and mostly he slept, drank and hid himself from the world. Presumably he was still grieving for all of his friends. For Chas, Father Hennessey and for Beeman. Maybe too, he was longing for Angela but denying her all the while. Brief had she been gone and only now had she just returned home from a few days journey, though he had not seen nor heard from her in person. On the expected date of the arrival she had planned, he simply called the L.A.P.D. and to his relief, she was back at work. She was safe. The Spear was gone.
"Fuck!" Being unaware that his body had been laid against the edge of the bed, he tried to turn back onto his back and suddenly he fell to the floor…the hard, cold floor. He slowly eased up, cursing as he did.
As he dressed into his trousers, he paused, noting that the old nicorette patch from yesterday was attached to his arm still and as he yanked it off he winced slightly before replacing it anew. After finishing the buttoning of his shirt, he wandered like a slob to the kitchen, where, to his rage, he discovered that all the cupboards and the fridge were empty of anything decent to eat.
"Damn." he grumbled. He searched for his wallet, his keys and out the door he went.
In the streets he stood, watching and waiting for the traffic of the morning hours to come. As he fingered into his pocket for the nicoderm gum, he looked back briefly at the Bowl Bowl Bowl sign, only partially glowing now in the dim fog.
"I'm sorry Beeman." he could hear himself say. In his bitterness it seemed that the only thing he had received was a fresh set of lungs, and though he was grateful he wished he had more. Selfish it was, or so he thought, and he sneered at himself for thinking in such a way after all that had happened; not to mention his welcoming from Heaven. But still he wished for something more, a reassurance of another sort, though he didn't quite comprehend what that could be. "I guess there's never a day you're more grateful for life than the day you almost died." he thought.
A taxi peered into the streets, rounding a corner and coming toward him. He hailed it and slipped in. The vehicle disappeared.
In the midst of this morning, he found himself sitting in the quiet Pancake House where only a few truck drivers and shady folk mingled. The only sound that seeped through the air was the running of the TV over the counter. Steadily in his solemn state of bored he glanced it, paying mind to the news. Casually he wouldn't, and had it not been for the title of 'Ravenscar' appearing above the reporters, he would've carried on eating his flapjacks ignoring it.
"Last night near 3:00 am, a body was stolen from Ravenscar Mental Institution. The body is that of Isabel Dodson, a patient who was deemed to have committed suicide days before. Police are now investigating the thievery…In other news, Los Angeles is celebrating the Red Carpet…"
"What the hell?" he pondered. "Something's wrong." He stood from his seat at the bar, pacing out of the place and wandering down the street. He had to know more. Why would anyone have an intention to rob the Morgue of Isabel's body? Foul play was at hand, he knew that much.
To Be Continued.
A/N: So what do you guys think? I dreamed this - something like it - and had to write it. This is actually more of a 'what if' story and is unrelated to my other Constantine fanfics.