Mort

by Rod Redux

  Taped to the glass door of the administration building was a 8 1/2 X 11 printed sign that said:

  NJ ADMINISTRATION BLDG

  Registration 1A

  Information and Government 1B

  Adjudication and Law 1C

  Work Assignments 2A

  Housing 2B

  WELCOME TO NEW JERUSALEM!

  Mort pushed through the door and into the building’s warmth and bright artificial light. It still seemed like a minor miracle, the heat and lights. The first couple weeks during the outbreak, he kept flipping light switches when going in and out doors, just out of habit, only to find there was no power. Then, after getting used to having no lights, he was once again blessed with that modern convenience. It would probably be a couple weeks before he stopped forgetting to turn lights on when he entered a dark room or stopped hesitating for a second in surprise when he entered a room that was brightly lit.

  Administration’s interior was clean and modern: tile flooring, neutral-colored gypsum walls and fluorescent lights. There was a water fountain, a coke machine and a few benches in the hallway for people to sit on while they waited for their name to be called. The place smelled just like all government facilities smelled: like the ghost of old gym shoes and mop water.

  Mort limped down the hallway to room 1A and peeked inside.

  A couple spinsters and one plump chick looked up from their desks. Inside, a teenage boy was sitting in a chair with his hands between his knees, frowning anxiously.

  “Can I help you?” the blue-haired lady closest to the door asked. Her voice was appropriately nasal.

  Mort stepped inside and shut the door behind him. “Yeah. I, uh… I guess I need to register and get my work and room assignments.”

  “Name?”

  “Mort Lesser.”

  That seemed to cause a little stir in the room. All four people in Registration stared at him with new interest.

  “Mort Lesser?” the blue-haired lady asked, arching her eyebrows.

  “Yeah. Why?”

  “You’re the guy that almost got killed by a serial killer before the Archons saved you,” the teenage boy said, looking impressed. “I heard the guy shot you in the head with a cattle gun, like in that movie… Uh, what was it called again?”

  “I don’t know,” Mort said, beginning to blush a little.

  “They said your brains were hanging out when the angel got you here,” the teenage boy added, eyeing Mort’s bandage intently.

  Mort laughed and tapped his head. “Well, they’re back inside now.”

  “You must be doing pretty good if they released you from the infirmary,” Blue-hair observed.

  “Yeah, better.”

  Sympathetic, the office ladies brought him a chair to sit on and fired up the paperwork machine. By the time they were finished with him, Mort was registered as an official citizen of New Jerusalem, assigned to Room 4-D in Dorm Eight and was signed up for light duty in one of the compound’s mess halls. He was given chits for personal items he might need like clothes and grooming supplies and a laminated ID badge with codes on it to indicate his immunity status (no immunity, which meant he had to report twice a week to the infirmary for a blood test to make sure he hadn’t become infected) special needs and medical conditions, and also his privilege levels. Apparently, like in the book by George Orwell, some animals were more equal than others here at New Jerusalem.

  But that was okay with Mort. He was just happy to be alive, to be a productive member of a sane and ordered society again.

  Anarchy he could leave to the anarchists. They were welcome to it.

  He wanted to ask them about his friends. He missed Pete and Dao-ming, but he wasn’t sure if these women would tell him what dorms his companions had been assigned to, or even if his old cohorts would welcome him back into their lives now that they were all safe. Had there really been a connection there at all? Mort wondered. If so, why hadn’t Pete or Dao-ming sought him out?

  Before he left for Dorm Eight, Blue-hair suggested he attend the next public orientation. “It’s in three more days. Starts at 7:30 pm at the auditorium. You can find the auditorium on the map we gave you with your new arrival packet. Be sure you read all the other information we put in there for you, too, Mr. Lesser. New Jerusalem has a lot of rules and regulations, but they’re for the safety and security of everyone here.”

  Mort nodded, thanked them all for their help, and tried to hobble his way to his new dorm room without dropping any of his papers.

  It was pretty gloomy out. An early twilight had fallen. Thick snow clouds piled up in the sky like lumpy gray pillows. The snow was beginning to fall more profusely, drifting straight down for a few minutes, then swirling suddenly in eddies of wind. The air was nippier than it had been when he originally crossed the open grounds to the administration building. He huddled deeper into his coat, puffing white clouds of steam. He shivered, his leg and head aching dully.

  Dorm Eight… Dorm Eight… He looked around the complex, suddenly lost. Had to clamp his cane beneath his arm to slip his map from the envelope the registration ladies had given him. He unfolded it. It was a photocopy of a hand-drawn diagram. Mort had to figure out which way north was on the map, using the infirmary as his starting point, because the amateur who’d drawn it hadn’t thought to indicate any compass directions. Not only that, but the neurological damage he’d suffered made visual imagery slippery. Pictures in books and magazines were just blobs of color. Sometimes he looked at things and could not figure out what they were anymore. Shoes. Eating utensils. It was frightening and embarrassing. Okay, there… he thought, putting his finger on the rectangle that denoted his objective. By the time he found Dorm Eight, and walked the stairs to his assigned room on the building’s fourth floor, he was limping severely and in quite a bit of pain.

  Dorm Eight was essentially a prison cell block. There were four stories with walkways overlooking a central common area on the ground floor. Mort was surprised how homey the other tenants of the dormitory had managed to make their stark new residence. He could hear the babble and crash of televisions: DVDs being watched, most likely, as there were no longer any operating broadcast television stations. Music played in the commons and a few people had put up early Christmas decorations. Wreaths and pictures of snowmen and Santas hung on doors and walls. The rails of the fourth floor walkway had been wrapped in sparkling red and green garland. Though it was discouraged in his orientation papers, people were cooking in their rooms on hotplates, and a mishmash of scents floated in the air: stew, vegetables… was that fried bologna?

  He passed a few people as he limped to his room. Nodded. Smiled and said hello. Two men were playing ping pong in the common area.

  He found his room and pushed the door inwards. It was a heavy steel door with a food slot and a small window. His room was small but not claustrophobic. About eight by twelve, with a generous sized set of bunk beds, a toilet and sink and a couple shelves and a closet.

  He forgot to flip the light switch when he entered the room, walked back and turned the lights on, then poked around the shelves and closet for a second, looking for linens. All the cupboards, he found, were bare; not even a mouse turd. It looked like he was the first and only tenant of cell 4-D in Dorm Eight.

  At least he had a window: a narrow rectangle of wire reinforced glass overlooking the yard. Mort leaned toward the window and peered out, watching the snow swirl around the compound, creating swarming gray-white halos around the lights in the yard. His breath steamed the glass and he turned his attention to his own reflection.

  His image in the dark rectangle shocked him. Thin, haggard, eyes set in deep pools of shadow. He didn’t remember ever seeing himself so thin, not even in grade school. He looked… insubstantial. Mort touched the dressing on his head, where DaVinci had shot him with a captive bolt gun. He had almost no hair left, and what hair had grown back had grown in salt-and-pepper.

  I’ve turned into an old man, Mort thought.

&nbs
p; And just in two months.

  “Knock knock,” someone called out behind him.

  Mort turned away from his own sallow image. “Yes?”

  A man and a woman were standing in his doorway, smiling. The man was wiry, short, with pale skin, thick lips and round, bulging eyes. The woman was tan and blonde and very pregnant.

  “We’re the welcome wagon!” the pregnant woman trilled, laughing cheerfully.

  Her companion held out his hands and cried, “Welcome!”

  They laughed together then, leaning toward one another affectionately.

  The couple’s names were Bob Hawthorne and Tina Laramie. They introduced themselves and gave Mort a quick tour of the facility. Mindful of his obvious disability, the tour mainly involved them standing beside him at the rail and pointing out different areas of interest. The drink machines, the galley, the gym and locker rooms, the chapel and laundry facilities. They told him not to worry about the closed circuit camera in his room; the CCTV system had been disabled. No one would be monitoring him. He could get supplies from an attendant there if he needed toilet paper, shaving cream or razors, anything like that. He’d have to use his credit chits, but they kept a good supply of toiletries thanks to the scouting teams.

  “Blankets? Clothes?” Mort asked. “I only have what I’m wearing.”

  “I’ll bring you some sheets and some nice warm blankets,” Tina volunteered. “Those are being provided for free. You won’t have to use any credits. Would you like anything to eat or drink while I’m down there? Snacks?”

  “Could you bring me something to eat? I’m supposed to take my pain medication with food.”

  “I’ll grab you something to eat and a few sodas,” Bob said, eyeing Mort sort of pityingly. “You like chips and bologna sandwiches?”

  “Yeah, anything’s fine.”

  “Good. Good.”

  They waved their hands when he offered them his credit chits, telling him not to worry about that tonight. Mort wasn’t sure how New Jerusalem’s economy worked: what the value of a single credit was, but it didn’t seem to be all that important to the couple, at least for the time being.

  “Oh!” Tina said, pausing a couple steps down the walkway. “I almost forgot. Clothes. You can get some clothes at the Commissary in Orange Yard. I’ll show you were that is in the morning, if you want. You’ll have to spend your credits there, though. They’re real sticklers about it.”

  “I can probably find it on my own. Thanks.”

  After making his bed, eating a cold bologna sandwich and swallowing a couple pain pills, Mort stretched out on his bunk and stared at the ceiling. It was still pretty early in the evening. Only 7 pm. Before the zombie apocalypse, he normally piddled around his apartment until late every night, sometimes retiring at two or three am, but he was exhausted, in pain, and after taking the Lortabs, sleep rushed in and put out the lights.

  He had strange dreams. People hurting. People screaming and dying. Mort dreamed about DaVinci. DaVinci whispering in his ear. Telling him dirty, forbidden secrets. Putting the cattle gun to his head.

  Mort woke with a start.

  He felt like he had just drifted asleep, but he knew hours had passed because the dormitory was silent now. No TV sounds. No radios. No people passing back and forth outside his door or laughing and calling out to friends.

  He pushed his blankets off and swung his feet to the floor—cold!

  Making a mental note to purchase some slippers at the commissary in the morning, Mort rose and walked to the window. It was still pitch dark outside. It was also still snowing, but the precipitation had lightened and now there were just a few sparse flakes wheeling slowly earthward in the open yard outside his window. The ground was white: looked like at least three inches of accumulation, he judged.

  He sat in the shallow niche in the wall that housed his window and watched the snow fall.

  He thought about Dao-ming and Pete. He wondered where they were right then. Were they alone like him, or sleeping with new lovers? Maybe they were sitting awake right that moment, thinking about their ol’ pal Mort. He didn’t think it was likely either of them would waste much time worrying about him. He didn’t want to feel sorry for himself, but he felt abandoned.

  After an hour or so, Mort felt a weird tickle inside his head. He rubbed his temple. Dizzy.

  Out in the yard, three Archons suddenly drifted out of the dark sky onto the snowy yard. The sight of them descending from the snowy heavens like characters from a J.M. Barrie novel jolted him with surprise and a feeling that was something like horror. Being a former comic book shop owner and superhero aficionado, you’d think flying people wouldn’t freak him out like it did, but there was something hideous and unnatural about creatures who seemed so disconnected from the laws of physics. It might be wondrous in the movies to see someone float up into the air in defiance of gravity, but in reality, the sight of it was terrifying.

  Mort leaned close to the cold glass and squinted down at the figures, his heart galloping.

  They were holding people in their arms. Rescued survivors. As Mort watched, the Archons—dressed like leather fetishists— touched down lightly and released their wards. The humans fell to their hands and knees or took off running away from them in fear, making ugly holes and gashes in the pristine snow. The Archons didn’t help them up or give chase, just stood there, wasted humanoid figures in strange black leather clothing, the buckles and snaps glinting in the garish lights overhead.

  Mort could not see their faces, only the bald white knobs of the backs of their heads.

  “No wings,” he whispered under his breath. Everyone said they were like angels with great shining wings. Everyone he had talked to said they were stately, beautiful creatures, but when Mort looked at them, he saw no wings, and they were certainly not stately or beautiful.

  More like mummies with shark teeth.

  The human agents who worked with the Archons came out into the snowy yard. They must have been signaled somehow. Radio, maybe. Or telepathy. People seemed to think the Archons could read minds. The agents scurried out into the snow with flashlights and blankets to collect the newly arrived survivors. The Archons watched for a moment, then turned their bony heads skyward and, one by one, came untethered from the earth.

  Without their human cargo, the strange creatures shot rapidly into the dark, flitting silently into the air like bottle rockets.

  Mort watched them go.

  Why did they look like devils to him? Mort wondered as they vanished from sight. When everyone else called them angels, why did he look at them and behold monsters?

  16

  Reunion

  Mort reported for his first day of work in the blue yard cafeteria on a bitterly cold Monday, November 31st.

  A couple days had passed since his release from the infirmary, but he needed that time to get settled into his new apartment, such as it was, and his new life in New Jerusalem. Bob and Tina, Dorm Eight’s unofficial “den mom and dad” had been a big help to him. They had talked Mickey Hahn into trading rooms with Mort so he wouldn’t have to limp up and down four flights of stairs every day. Mickey had one of the primo cells on the ground floor and had been reluctant to give it up, but Tina had charmed him. She was a sweet southern gal with a syrup-thick drawl. Even nine months pregnant, she could probably charm the Devil out of his red tights if she wanted. Mickey had moved his belongings to Mort’s fourth floor apartment with a goofy grin and a confused look on his face, not really sure how or why he had volunteered to trade his nice digs to the gimpy new guy, and Mort had gratefully taken possession of the room next to the chapel.

  Bob had taken Mort under his wing. The lanky man had accompanied Mort to the commissary and helped Mort purchase clothes and the various sundries Mort would need to get by, haggling with the teen who worked the desk to get Mort a better price.

  “Look at the guy,” Bob had harangued the kid, pointing toward Mort’s shaved and bandaged head, “Don’t you think he’s got it bad
enough without you people trying to rip him off? My homeboy here needs all the credits he can keep so he can buy food and medicine! He’s got a medical condition! He’s practically a cripple!”

  “Listen, dude, we all got it rough around here. It’s the same price we charge everyone else for socks and underwear. We’re still waiting for the scouting crews to bring back more clothes and stuff,” the teenager explained, whining defensively. “I can give you the socks and underwear free, but I gotta charge full price for the retard’s pants and shirts.”

  Walking back with his new clothes, Mort said, “I’m not really retarded, you know.”

  Bob had laughed. “I know that, buddy. But you got some free underwear. You gotta learn how to work the system, man. You look like Cujo’s chew toy. You should take advantage of it while you can.”

  Bob and Tina helped Mort with his bedding, put his clothes away for him. Mort loved his new room. It was a little bigger than the one he was originally assigned. Though it had no window, it was warmer, and his leg didn’t ache as much. Tina hung some homemade Christmas decorations and kept him company until he told her he was tired and hurting and needed to take his pain meds and get some rest.

  Tina had given him a kiss on the cheek and bid him take care. She looked a little tired and achy herself, her tan complexion waxy, her eyes hollow.

  “How are you feeling?” Mort had asked, concerned. “You look a little pale.”

  Tina laughed. Rubbing the impressive mound of her belly, she said, “Just ready for this thing to pop. It’s my first child. I wish it was Bob’s, but we didn’t know each other before the plague. We met after the epidemic started. He looked out for me until the Archons saved us and brought us here to New Jerusalem.”

  Mort had thanked her and told her to thank Bob for him, too, then ate and popped a couple pain pills and stretched out on his new bunk. He slept all evening, despite the noise coming from the commons area, woke up in the early hours of the morning the next day. He puttered around his room, went and sat in the commons and tried to read an outdated magazine, then showered and got dressed for his first day of work. He hobbled out the front doors of Dorm Eight at six am.