Dystopyum (The D-ot Hexalogy Book 1) (8 page)

Well, I might as well test her out — this is why I got her out here.
Griswolt thought.
How should I say it?
He took a breath. “You know Jan
is coming home today?”
Martha’s slow transition into relaxation was immediately aborted by
her reaction to Griswolt’s words. Her relaxing eyes switched into a
squinting, fierce look. Her face became ugly, very quickly. She coldly
said, “When is
it
coming here? I need something I can hurt. This all its
fault! I'll make it pay!”
Griswolt’s stomach tightened.
No!
His posture shot up, in a direction
leaning away from Martha. “Martha, what are you saying?” Griswolt
asked. “You’re talking about our son. You remember Jan, don’t you?”
“This is
its
entire fault,” Martha insisted to the air in front of her. “All
its
fault. All
its
—” and now she was screaming. She bent over on the
bench, almost convulsing with her screams. The older couple was startled,
and hurriedly got up to leave, glancing cautiously back at Martha and
Griswolt.
Griswolt was shocked and crestfallen. “What am I going to do with
you?” he asked, mostly to himself as he looked at Martha. No way could
he touch her now.
Her screams quieted down, and then Martha caught hold of herself.
She looked at Griswolt and said, “This is
its
entire fault.” Then she looked
off into the distance again. “I want to see
it
.”
Griswolt was upset. “Stop calling Jan ‘it’, please! Please.”
Martha continued to look away and said, “I want to see
Jan,
” not in a
nice way.
Griswolt’s visual reflex was drawn to a new group of visiting blogs.
I
think that’s all she can do for now,
he thought to himself
. I guess I have to
be content with this.
He sighed.
I think I’ll drop the subject.
They sat there for another half hour or so. When it appeared that
Martha was starting to relax again, Griswolt figured it was time to head
home. Martha didn’t seem much to care, and so they started walking
back. As they were approaching their home, the delivery of fresh splint
blood had just arrived up ahead.
“Great! I forgot about this, but we’re just in time!” Griswolt exclaimed. “Hey, we’re over here,” he shouted from a distance, “Hold up!”
He did not want them taking off without delivering, which they would
readily do. They would not leave their delivery unless someone was there
to sign for it, and they had other deliveries waiting. It would just spoil too
quickly for them to leave out, even with ice. Griswolt paid them, and then
he and Martha went into the house.
They descended the stairs into the kitchen, and Martha stayed with
Griswolt there. He mixed some salt, nako
,
and carefully added a fresh raw
egg into each big glass of blood. It was nice to make it so cleanly that the
egg yolk stayed intact, and could be swallowed whole. This was a
traditional preparation, and one that Martha loved.
She did finish most of it, and Griswolt had some more for himself.
It’s expensive, but what the heck? She needs to get her strength back.
He
was very pleased to see her eat.
Things are looking all right for now,
he
thought, but then remembered her reaction to Jan’s impending arrival.
Worrisome to say the least,
he thought.
Griswolt asked Martha if she would like to go to the living room to
listen to the radio. She passively agreed, and he went over with her. When
she was settled, he went back to the kitchen to clean up.
The phone rang in the living room, and Griswolt went to answer it. It
was his secretary, Mari. Griswolt couldn’t believe what he was hearing.
The Secretary General of the Central Committee of the NOV had sent his
provincial liaison to Griswolt’s building. All those in administration were
to report for duty. He had one hour to get to work. He slammed the phone
down. “Of all the —”
He had Martha’s attention. Anyone would have noticed.
He looked at her.
What the hell do I do now? Jan’s going to be here
in a few hours and she isn’t close to ready
.
Martha was looking at Griswolt now, curious.
Griswolt started pacing back and forth, and then into the kitchen.
Think, Griswolt, think!
He was greatly disturbed that he had to go in at all.
This was just another surprise inspection, meant to keep the intimidation
fresh. His office was in order. He imagined meeting the pretentious
liaison officer.
That’s it!
Griswolt stopped pacing. He went back to Martha. He came
into the room rather abruptly, which startled her. He realized his mistake,
and stopped. Then he slowly walked in front of her, keeping his distance.
“Martha, dear. Can you do something for me?”
Martha had been perking up since the walk and the blood confection.
She looked at him rather lucidly, and said, “What?” but still with little
emotion and much detachment.
“Can you call me at work after I call you from there later?” Griswolt
asked.
“What?” Martha asked.
Griswolt thought a second, and said. “I have to go to work, but I want
to stay with you instead. I am going to call you from work in about an
hour, OK?”
She sat there a moment, like, well, nothing. Empty. “OK,” Martha
said.
“After I call you from work, I want you to call right back to my secretary Mari, and tell her that you started bleeding, and you need me at
home,” Griswolt explained. He looked at her. “Do you understand? I call
you, then you call me, OK?”
“OK,” Martha replied.
He looked at her, “Do you really promise you will?”
She raised her tone, “I said I would!”
Griswolt thought to himself,
I have no choice. I have to go to work.
Once I meet with the liaison, I really don’t need to stick around anymore.
An emergency will make my exit more valid.
Griswolt gave Martha her pills in the living room, and he went to
change into his uniform. He then said goodbye, gave one more reminder,
and left for work. He had a plan. What he had not planned on was
Martha’s pocketing of her pills today.

n hour passed. Griswolt called, and Martha did indeed answer
the phone.
“Hello?” asked Martha, as she put the phone to her ear.
“Martha! Thanks for picking up the phone. Listen, I can’t
talk long. The liaison hasn’t arrived here yet, so I really have to wait. Has
anyone called about Jan?”
“Jan!” Martha spat, sounding like a different person.
Griswolt’s stomach grinded at the sudden turn of her voice.
Change
the subject!
“Listen, Martha, don’t call me back now, OK?” he said.
“You want me to call you?” Martha asked.
“No, not yet. I’m not done here yet. I’ll call you again, and then you
call me, OK?”
“OK.”
Click.
Martha went back to sitting in the living room. She had turned the
radio on, and was dully listening to the Temple of the NOV’s daily
program. Truth told — she was not really listening. She was still just
sitting and enjoying the peace of having nobody around. “I’m starting to
feel —” she started to say it, but did not know how to finish the sentence.

She took a deep slightly shuddering breath at that last thought. Then
Martha took another yawning breath, less tense. Not a sigh. A good deep,
cleansing breath.
Not so scared.
With the long extended exhalation came
a feeling in her gut of a knot untying. Every time she found the right word
or two to describe her deepest negativity, the knot untied some more. She
took another breath.
This feels good.
She was smiling slightly, still with
hurting eyes.
Do I really feel better now? I guess I do, a little.
Then with
her eyes looking off, resentfully thought,
I swore I’d never feel good
again. I don’t want to feel good.

Martha’s eyes narrowed,
this is all its fault. It shouldn’t have come
here. It ruined me forever. I can’t get even if I allow myself to feel good.
I’ll never forget what it did to me.
Her face fell to a look of misery.
What
they did to me. What animal is that cruel? The NOV is right. The ela is
holy because it kills so quickly.
She stared off in a different direction now.

Who’s here now?
“Griswolt?” she shouted up the stairs.
Knock, knock.
“I’m coming, I’m coming,” Martha said loudly, and went up the

“You!” she spat at Jan. The reality had not sunk in that Jan was truly
coming home that day. Martha was still in a post-traumatic shock, and
was the polar opposite of being ready for this. She could not bear to look
at him, but did notice that he was covered with scabs, like her, from the
repeated SE’s in love-deprogramming school.
Good
, she thought to
herself.

Jan was just staring straight ahead. He now looked as Martha did on
the day she arrived at home. He had a stubborn look to his face. It was
stone cold.

“Isn’t your husband home?” he asked, looking a bit concerned. He
had dropped children off with their “recently graduated” mothers alone
before, and twice so far there had been two murders. It was not uncommon. Usually the mother was the killer. Sometimes she would be the
victim.

Oh well,
the attendant thought,
I have to get back. I’ve got three more
deliveries today, after this one and the ones in the wagon. It’s not my fault
if something happens.
He was not required to refuse deliveries of the
children to their messed up mothers. He
could
refuse, but it involved a lot
of paperwork.
Documents, yes,
he thought to himself. He pulled out the
release documents, and gave them to Martha to sign. As she was signing
them, he asked, “Is there anyone at all home inside?”

“No,” Martha replied.
“What about any neighbors?” He asked.
Salom! What about Salom? Where is she? Isn’t she home?
Martha

He went over to Salom’s house, but nobody answered the door. When
he returned to Martha’s house, all that was there were the signed
documents on the porch at the front door. He sighed, shaking his head.
They should require me refuse to deliver these kids when it’s bad like this,
he thought. It did not matter that it was logical to refuse to leave the child
there, or that he had it in his power to do so. What mattered was that he
could transmit blame to someone else. That did the trick for his reptilian
conscience, and he went back to his wagon. He had two children sitting in
the wagon in restraints as well, plus the three still waiting back at school.

Martha and Jan had gone into the house. Jan resisted at the top of the
stairs, so Martha grabbed him by the back of his straight jacket, and
carried him down the stairs, throwing him down that last few steps, with
Jan spilling onto to the kitchen floor. As soon as he hit the floor, he
yelled, “Don’t touch me!” and in his straight jacket, clumsily got up and
ran into the living room. Martha immediately followed him into the living
room. “You’re a piece of rotten keesh,” she hissed, and then spat on him.

He was standing there, looking angry and removed. He did not flinch.
I can’t stay here with it,
she thought to herself. I’ll go crazy.
I’ve got
to kill it. I can’t live here with it.
Her eyes lit up.
I’ll drown it.
She looked
down at him. She sneered at Jan and squawked, “You stink! You need a
bath!” She went over to him and bent over to untie him. In her confused,
frantic state she was thinking,
I can’t drown it with this straight jacket on.
They will know it was me. They’ll give me DeathBT.

Jan struggled against her, but with the straight jacket on, he could not
do much to resist. He screamed the whole time, but she got the jacket off.
She threw him back down on the floor when he tried to stand up, and
screamed, “Stay there!” Martha ran through the home to run the water in
the bathtub.

Now out of the straight jacket, Jan curled up on the living room floor,
maintaining his unbreakable mental wall.
Once Martha had the water running, she came quickly back to the
living room. Jan was still there, in a ball on the floor. She marched over to
him and said, “Let’s go!” She grabbed him and dragged him towards the
bathroom.
Jan was kicking and screaming, resisting as best he could, but he was
emaciated, just as Martha was when she first arrived home.
Ring…Ring…Ring…
Martha ignored the phone as she was wrestling
Jan to the bathroom.
Ring…Ring…Ring…
She had some strength back,
but not nearly what she had before.
Ring… Ring…Ring…
As she pulled
him toward the tub, Jan was able to get loose enough to make a run for
the door, but she dove for his feet, and caught him, pulling him to the
floor. She quickly punched him, hard, in the back, and he stopped for a
second. Then she just took hold of his feet, and dragged him to the now
full bathtub. She dug her fingers into his arms as she lifted him, and threw
him in the water.
Jan was thrashing, and managed to bite her hand deeply. It started
bleeding profusely, and now that it was mixing with splashing water, she
knew she could not ignore it.
When the police come, they’ll find blood all
over the place. There’s no way they’ll believe he did this on his own.
Ring… Ring… Ring…
Martha gave Jan a hateful sneer, and quickly
retrieved a towel. He was out of the bathtub now, and curled up again on
the floor as she went wrapped her bleeding hand in the towel, and went to
the ringing phone.
Ring… Ring..
Martha switched the phone off.
She stood there thinking a moment, then smiled, and then turned the
phone on again. Martha called the Temple of the NOV, and asked to be
connected with the child-donation department. She smiled again,
why
didn’t I think of this before?
“Hello, yes. I would like to donate my child
for the next child-burning ceremony. Yes, he just attacked me, and my
hand is bleeding. He is very bad, and I think that sacrificing him to God is
the best way now. How soon can you pick him up?”
The Temple was always happy to take these donations. All they
needed was the consent of one parent.
I’ll just tell Griswolt that he ran
away,
she thought. After the arrangements were made, she went back to
the bathroom. “You stay right there,” she ordered.
I don’t care what he
does, now. He’s leaving!
The Temple of the NOV did not waste time in picking up childburning donations. They wanted to get there speedily make the pick-up —
just in case one or both parents changed their minds. If only one parent
donated the child, and the NOV already had that child in its possession, it
was very difficult to get the child back. If both parents donated the child,
it was damn near impossible. The Temple decreed that the children were
holy once donated, and thus Temple property. The Temple had peaks and
valleys in donations. When they had bigger numbers of children
scheduled for child-burning day, they had much larger turnouts. This
meant more donations, and promotion of their important faith. Therefore,
they advertised the upcoming numbers on the local news.
Martha went back into the living room. She had a seat on the sofa,
and picked up a fashion magazine. She was looking at the pages, but
nothing was being read. Her mind was racing with thoughts of the present
situation.
They said they would be here in an hour.
Her pulse was still
very rapid.
What about Griswolt?
Her face turned grim.
Fuck Griswolt.
This is his fault, too.
She continued to pretend to read, even though
nobody was there to watch her.
Ring… Ring… Ring…
Martha got up,
went over to the phone, picked up the receiver.
“Martha!” It was Griswolt, beside himself in worry.
Martha hung up, and then turned the phone off again. She took a look
in the bathroom. Jan was sitting there, still wet, picking at scabs on his
arms. “Don’t move!” Martha commanded. She went back to the living
room to “read”.
An hour passed. Where are they?
Martha looked at the phone that she
had turned off.
Maybe they tried to call.
She went over to the phone, and
switched it back on. Just then, a rapping at the front door startled her. She
went up the stairs, and standing there were two temple prostitutes to pick
up Jan.
Temple prostitution was one of the ways for the uneducated to enter
the employed services of the Temple of the NOV. There were other career
paths for the unskilled — executioners, torturers, maintenance people and
guards were common avenues. Once inside the Temple, anyone could pay
for the many levels of classes required to continue to be promoted. The
faithful were told that anyone could eventually enter the secret inner
circle of the NOV. These ones dictated the laws of the NOV, and they
were above the central committee. Nobody knew exactly who these
people were. When someone was chosen for the inner circle, they simply
disappeared without a trace. Since people disappeared all the time,
nobody could know who went where, although there were always rumors.
Martha observed the prostitutes.
They don’t look like much.
Of
course, Jan was still very weak. “Please come in,” Martha said to them.
I
don’t want to touch him unless I need to. I’ll let them wrestle with him,
she thought as descending the stairs. With each step, she felt lighter and
lighter.
He’s going to be gone!
Martha thought with glee. They came
downstairs, and Martha signed their documents in the kitchen. She led
them into the bathroom.
One of them was smiling, and coquettishly said to Jan, “Come with
us, Jan. We want you to stay with us.” Jan just sat there, on the floor,
looking obstinate. They then went over to him, picked him up by each
arm, and efficiently carried him out of the bathroom. He continued to hold
himself in a tight ball.
“He’s not kicking. Hmmm,” Martha muttered to herself. “He doesn’t
know where they’re taking him.” She watched as they carried him down
the hallway, and up the stairs. She listened for the closing of the door.
“Whew,” she said. “I did it. He’s gone.” Martha smiled, pleased. She
went over to the living room, and turned the radio back on. It was the
news. They were talking about developing new vaccines for new areas in
the wildlands. The problem was that whenever they started a new
expedition, the explorers would fight among themselves, and the
expedition would end in failure. Being removed from the fear of the
central authority of the NOV brought out the alpha in all the participants.
“In the next year, we will be able to send our first mission into the far
southwest territories. This will give our nation more access to rivers and
fish, which are abundant there. In other news, there was small LERN
sting in which four members of a local group were arrested yesterday…”
She got up, and turned the radio off.
LERN,
she thought with disgust.
What a lie!
“Those hypocrites left me here, nobody has even tried to
help,” Martha said with revulsion.
Love is death. Look at Jan —
she
instantly sat up, tilting her head.
Jan —
She could say his name now,
“Jan.” Still detached, the thought of the child was allowed in, because the
threat of what he brought with him was now gone.
She looked at a game that Griswolt had set out earlier in anticipation
of Jan’s return today, sitting in the corner of the room by the radio. She
gave a sigh and said, “I don’t have to face him now. He’ll be burnt, and
he won’t hurt me anymore, and he won’t hurt anym —” She felt a tear
develop.
No hope!
She sniffed it up, and there were no more.
The door slammed upstairs.
What? I should have locked the door!
“Who’s there?” Martha called out as she was walking to the bottom of the
stairs to see what was going on.
“Me!” bellowed Griswolt, carrying Jan in his arms. He had left work
early without waiting for the liaison. He had intercepted the temple
prostitutes as they were leaving with Jan, and forcefully taken him back
from them. Griswolt glared at Martha as he passed her at the bottom of
the stairs, straight into the kitchen. He sat Jan down on one of the chairs.
Griswolt turned and said, “Now what the hell —” but was interrupted by
Martha’s pushing him out of the way to get at Jan.
With a scream, she lunged at Jan, pounding him in the face, and grabbing his crest, trying to twist his head as if trying to break his neck. Jan
was warding off her blows.
Griswolt reacted by punching Martha on the back of the head, shocking her. Then he grabbed hold of the collar of Martha’s robe and pulled
her backwards, hard, away from Jan.
As Martha went flying backwards, she twisted and clawed for Griswolt’s face, trying to scratch him. Once she got her bearings, she
screamed a battle cry and went after Griswolt, punching and scratching at
his eyes.
This went on for less than a second or two when Griswolt said to
himself, “I’ve had enough of this,” and clocked her hard, right on the side
of her head, immediately knocking her unconscious. He caught her as she
was falling and laid her down on the floor. He quickly glanced at Jan. Jan
was focused on the unconscious Martha lying on the floor, and he had the
smile of vengeance on his face and in his eyes.
Creepy,
Griswolt thought, and then he went to the bathroom, and
opened the brown bag of pharmaceuticals that were for Martha. “There’s
one in here, where is it?” he asked himself as he fiddled in the bag of pills
and such. “Here it is!” It was a paralyzing narcotic, in liquid form, and it
came in a dropper bottle. “What’s it say here?” He said, reading the label.
“Given the patient’s weight, give three drops every twelve hours as
needed for sedation. To induce paralysis, give six drops every eight
hours.”
He went back into the kitchen. He found Jan peeing on Martha,
and she was starting to awaken. Griswolt pushed Jan out of the way with
a loud “No!” He quickly cleaned Martha off, and proceeded to give her
the narcotic.
Griswolt then carried her to the bedroom, and he laid her on the bed.
Then he went back to Jan, who was still in the kitchen.
We’ll wash her up
better later.
He was going to give Jan hell for urinating on his mom, but
after getting a good look at the mad expression on Jan’s face, Griswolt
said to himself, “What’s the point?” He simply had Jan sit there while he
wiped up the kitchen floor. Then he sat down with Jan at the table. “I’m
really glad you’re home, son, I know it was tough, but it’s over now,”
Griswolt said, leaning forward to rub Jan’s crest.
Jan ducked from Griswolt’s attempt at comforting him, but was otherwise relatively calm with his father.
They went downstairs into Jan’s bedroom in order to get him into
some dry clothes. “I’m going up to make some early dinner Jan, what
would you like?” Griswolt asked.
Jan found himself more at ease around Griswolt — the NOV had not
poisoned him against his father. Jan asked, “Can I have a splint egg and
toast?”
Griswolt was heartened that Jan had an appetite, and was talking to
him. “Coming right up, son!” he said energetically, and then he asked,
“Do you want to play up in the living room while I make your meal?”
“No, I just want to stay down here for a while.” Jan paused, thinking,
concerned. “Is
she
going to wake up and eat?”
Griswolt looked at Jan with a sad, heavy heart.
It was so nice before
—
“No, Jan, Mama is going to sleep for the whole night.”
Jan’s face squeezed into itself, “Don’t call her ‘Mama’!” he spat, with
the same ugly look that Martha would develop when speaking of Jan.
Griswolt sighed with regret, his mind again returning to the last night
they were all together before love-deprogramming school.
Gone
, he
thought, with great remorse and longing.
Gone
. He went up the stairs to
the main floor, a little slower, a little heavier, than when he came down.
When he got upstairs, he went into the kitchen to start cooking. After
starting up the stove, he received a phone call from Chark, a friend who
had connections in the Temple of the NOV.
“What? Salom failed? Oh, really — oh no! — oh, that’s horrible —
poor Rebecca!” He sighed and said, “OK, thanks for calling.” Griswolt
hung up the phone.
He went back to the kitchen, cracked and put the eggs in the awaiting
hot pan. The steam and spurts of the hot lard crackled immediately. Just
right. He sighed, repeating what he had heard Martha say, time and time
again.
“How do we stay sane in this world?” Griswolt asked the eggs. They
just sizzled their olfactory answer, and that was enough for now. After he
was done cooking, he called Jan to come up and eat.
While dining together on their simple meal, Griswolt had a chance to
observe Jan better. His sores looked bad, but they would heal.
Why did he
get so many wounds?
“I’ll bet you’re hungry!” Griswolt said.
Jan shrugged, and continued to eat.
Griswolt wanted to get him talking. He smelled badly, even though at
first glance the bathroom looked like he had been in the bathtub. The wet
clothes Jan was wearing before were a question mark. “Did you take a
bath?” He would be sorry he asked.
Jan dropped his toast, and looked down. “She tried to kill me. She
tried to drown me.” He stopped everything, and his face fell to a heart
wrenching expression no child should display.
Griswolt slowly put his hand on Jan’s shoulder. “She’s sick, Jan. I’m
sure she will feel terrible about this when she comes to her senses. I’m so
sorry, buddy.”
He’s not pulling away,
Griswolt thought.
Maybe there’s
hope for one of them, anyway.
He sighed and looked in the direction of
the bedroom, then sighed again.
After dinner, Griswolt got Jan started on putting the finishing touches
to the set up of the game in the living room, and then he went back to the
kitchen to clean up. While in the kitchen, his thoughts kept returning to
the way things were before.