Sorry it took me so long to update this... the plot bunny I had for this one sort of hopped away from me... but I think I've re-caught the bunny, thanks to Amelia Bianca Black for giving me the push in the butt to get this going again! And sorry that it's shorter than my usual stuff... I would have continued, but the rest of what was going to be the end of this chapter is almost chapter-sized itself... anyway, here it is:
Chapter 4:
Garret tossed a bag onto the table in Trace, causing Jordan to jump. She put a hand over her heart and glared at him.
"Are you trying to give me a heart attack?" she asked, then shook her head and looked at the bag. "What's this?"
"The live John Doe from the pileup's belongings," stated Garret, moving beside her so he could take a look with her. "You want the good news or the bad news first?"
"Good news, please," she said, leaning in to take a better look at the contents of the bag before opening the top and peeking in.
"Well. Mr. Doe is doing better, and has had very few complications. And he's woken up." Jordan looked at him and smiled.
"So he's not a John Doe anymore! Good, because trying to find out who he is from just this stuff was going to be a pain in the—"
"He's still a John Doe." Jordan stopped and stared at him, looking confused.
"How...?"
"That's the bad news; he has amnesia. The only thing he could figure out was that his name started with an 'm', so the hospital staff has nicknamed him Mark Doe, because John Doe made him uncomfortable." Jordan groaned.
"He doesn't remember anything?"
"Nothing."
"Well, then, we'd better start going through his belo—"
"Jordan! Dr. Macy! Kate! Bug! Lily!" Nigel stormed into Trace wearing an expression of panic and yelling the names of his coworkers at the top of his lungs.
"What's wrong, Nigel?" said a perplexed Garret, walking over to him.
"Therewasatrainthatderailedandwentintoriverandthereweremorethaneightycasualtiesand—"
"Woah, Nige, slow down! Deep breaths," advised Jordan, abandoning the bag and going to her distraught friend's side.
"There was a train that derailed, went into the river. They say there are more than eighty casualties." He looked pretty freaked out. Garret went into full boss-mode, taking control of the situation.
"Nigel, call for all hands on deck— get Peter, Sidney, all the volunteers you can wrangle and send them to the crash site. Jordan, find Kate. You, she and I are going to be on site first." Jordan nodded and ran off in search of Kate, the bag of Mark Doe's personal effects forgotten. "Tell Lily to prepare for mass causalities, and tell Emmy to get the forms ready." Nigel nodded and rushed out. Garret grabbed a kit and ran off after Jordan. This was not going to be a good night.
XXX
Lily was fretting over her missing boyfriend, and panicking over the arriving distraught family members of those who had died or were assumed dead in the train derailment. At the moment the stricken families took top priority, but in the back of her mind the fact that Bug wasn't there was nagging at her. Where was he? Had he just needed some time, like Jordan suspected? Was he kidnapped by Homeland Security again, or perhaps by someone even worse? Was he lying dying or dead in a ditch somewhere because he had gotten carjacked? Was he—?
"Excuse me, but what kind of question is this: 'Are your loved one's earlobes attached or detached'?" Lily sighed.
"Sorry, we just need all the information we can get, so they can be identified if..." The Asian woman burst into tears, and Lily tried to comfort her. And so it went.
XXX
"The Boston Morgue's best people are trying to excavate and identify all the victims in this horrendous accident— though some have speculated that the derailment of train 141E was a planned attack because of some wealthy occupants—" Mark sighed and shook his head. A train derailment just South of where he was? What bad luck! With the morgue— who were supposed to be finding out who he was— so busy with this tragedy, it might take ages for them to discover his identity.
"Dr. Macy, do you have anything you would like to tell the public?" Mark's attention went back to the TV.
"I would like to advice those who might have lost a loved one in this mess to please stay calm, and maybe help us out. If you think your loved one was a victim, please go to the Boston Morgue and bring a photograph and possibly some DNA— a toothbrush or hairbrush will do— to help us identify them to give closure to those who know them. Any and all help would be greatly appreciated at this time. That's all."
Dr. Macy was an older fellow— late forties, early fifties— with grey hair that was receding a little and bright chocolate coloured eyes that Mark swore he had seen before. Not that a specific memory surfaced, but he had the feeling that he knew him from somewhere.
"Thank you, Doctor. Now, back to Kimberly Watson with your hourly weather update." Mark lifted his remote control and turned off the news.
Dr. Macy reminded him of something. He defidently knew him. They mentioned that he was the chief ME at the Boston Morgue. Maybe he had lost a loved one recently and Dr. Macy ad handled the case, or something. Or maybe he was making connections where there was none, and he didn't know this guy.
He hoped he knew him, though, because it might give him a hint to who he was.
"Hello, Mark! How're you feelin', Hun?" Nurse Daisy was standing in his doorway, a happy smile plastered on her face. Mark shrugged.
"Did you hear about the train crash?" he asked her, and she nodded, smile disappearing. One odd thing about Daisy was that she could go from her normal perky self to sullen in a nanosecond. No one changed moods that fast.
"I did. Such a tragedy, it is. As far as I know there weren't any survivors. And I would know, because they'd be here, most likely..." Mark nodded. Made sense.
"How're your stitches?" she asked, her smile back. He rolled his sheet down to his knees and lifted his gown a little to show her the bandage that covered most of his left thigh.
"Feeling better. But I could use some more morphine..." he joked. When they had given him morphine, he had gone a little weird. Apparently (because he couldn't remember) he began to sing out rainbows and unicorns and happy, fluffy puppies. It didn't agree with him.
"Oh, you know I can't authorise that, especially because of how you reacted before." Dasiy put her hands on her hips.
"I was joking." Mark rolled his eyes. No one could ever tell if he was joking or not; it had something to do with his soft, airy voice. And his accent! It made people trust him, and it made people always think he was serious for reasons he hadn't figured out yet.
"Oh, well, why didn't you say so! Here, let me change your bandage..."
Mark sighed and lay back on his pillow, clicked the 'on' button on his remote and once again began to watch the tiny TV in his room as Nurse Daisy changed the bandage that covered his numerous stitches. The news were back on, and again covering the train wreak story, and he watched the background for Dr. Macy, just wanting to see him again. Instead, he saw two female workers— by the looks of it, MEs, because they were standing over a body— arguing about something that he couldn't hear over the female report's voice. He could barely see what they looked like because the camera crew was at a distance; but one was a blonde and one a brunette. They seemed familiar, too.
He closed his eyes and tried to picture them. The three of them, their faces. He could see a fuzzy image, but it was only what he had seen on the TV. And a feeling hardly counted as a memory.
"Daisy, will I ever remember who I am?" Mark turned to look at the nurse, a pleading, desperate look in his eyes.
"I truly believe that you will," she said, and finished his bandage up. "There ya go! I'll come and check on you in an hour, alright?" Mark nodded and went back to his TV watching.
He really wanted to believe her, have some hope that his amnesia would only be temporary. But for some reason, he couldn't look on the Brightside. He couldn't find the Silver Lining. All he could see was a bare hospital room, not filled with friends and family. And no escape from the knowledge that he didn't know who he was.