Mother of All the Gods

by R. P. Wolff

  “What about the U.N.?” asked Zelda.

  “We closed it down, and we are transporting the foreign diplomats back to their countries.”

  Zelda sensed the concern in the room, so she needed to calm them down and reassure them. “I’m not concern about the summit or even if Canada or Mexico joins them. As long as we have a five million standing army, the largest navy, and seven thousand nuclear warheads, no one is going to attack us. Sure, they’ll threaten and maybe even send ships or fly aircraft nearby, but no one will ever fire the first shot because they know we could wipe every country off the planet ten times over. So let’s not worry about an invasion for one minute. Let’s worry about the containment.” She paused and gazed at her cabinet. “Does everyone understand that?”

  Again, some replied “yes, Mother” while others replied, “yes, Madam President.”

  She needed to clarify what they should call her. “Everyone, please call me Madam President going forward, but the public should continue to refer to me as ‘Mother.’ Understand?”

  “Yes, Madam President,” they said in unison.

  “Is that all, Madam President,” her chief of staff asked.

  Zelda pondered this question. She realized that the upcoming press conference was crucial. Initially, she wasn’t planning to speak and was going to let her cabinet conduct the conference, but after hearing about the chaos, she changed her mind and felt that she needed to be the sole speaker.

  “General Chandler, due to the rough transition, I think it’s best if I’m the sole speaker for this press conference. What do you think?”

  “I think that’s a good idea, Madam President.”

  Of course, you do, Zelda thought. You will agree with everything I say just to avoid the pain that I could inflict on you. You wimp. “Okay, General, why don’t you and the rest of the cabinet prepare my speech and have it ready in thirty minutes.”

  The general sighed. “Yes, Madam President.”

  “Okay, you are all dismissed except for the Vice President.”

  Chapter 7

  Lance sat on his newly issued cot. He gently touched the “C” on his forehead and cringed. It hurt badly. It was a long day. The cops transported him along with thousands of other men to the Dallas Convention Center. They were in a huge room, with concrete floors, the size of three football fields. The massive space had cots, sleeping bags, and benches along the side. There were hundreds of Mater military personnel and police standing with assault rifles just daring anyone to challenge them. The room was loud with many men speaking to each other, some of them were whimpering. Many of the German shepherds, that the guards held, barked at the detainees.

  Some men were sleeping because it was about one in the morning, but Lance couldn’t sleep. He looked down and shook his head. What had happened? This couldn’t be true. There must be some way for him to get out of this place and see his wife and daughter. He held back tears thinking of what they might be doing to his daughter and how scared she might be. How was he going to get out of this?

  “Hey, aren’t you the former Governor Hampton,” a fellow prisoner on the cot next to him asked, dressed in the same orange jumpsuit as Lance but with a letter “B” branded on his forehead.

  Lance put his head down, ashamed, and said, “Yes.” Lance figured that the “B” stood for Baptist.

  “What do you think about this?” the man asked. “They took my two sons and my wife, for Christ’s sake.” The man jerked and panned the area to make sure no one heard him say the word, “Christ.” Maters hated references to “Christ.”

  “I know,” Lance replied. “My wife is in New York right now. I don’t know what they’ve done to her. They won’t let me speak to her. They took my daughter, who’s in high school. We hid in someone’s house, who we trusted, and they turned us in.”

  “Wow, that’s bad. I’ve heard that they’re giving rewards to Maters who turn in people who don’t believe in Materism.”

  “Yeah, I heard that too, and I’ve been a victim of it. How did they catch you?”

  “We tried to pick up our sons at school, one is in middle school. The other is in high school. When we pulled into the middle school’s parking lot, it was chaos. The police arrested adults, handcuffed them, and started putting them on buses. We didn’t know what to do. We couldn’t leave our son there, so we parked and tried to enter the school. That was when the cops arrested my wife and me. They took her to a different bus. I guess they took the women to a different place and are separating them from us.” The man stopped, sniffled, and said, “Governor, what are we going to do?”

  “I don’t know,” Lance said. “I’m sorry to hear about your boys and wife. By the way, what is your name?” Lance held out his hand.

  “I’m Jake Ryan.”

  They shook hands. Jake’s news depressed Lance even more. Lance was desperate but so was everyone else. Jake stared at Lance expecting a response or solution to the crisis. Lance said, “Hey, I’m not in power anymore. The Maters have literally taken over the country.” Lance glanced at Jake’s forehead. “Jake, what’s the ‘B’ stand for?”

  “Baptist.”

  “That’s what I figured.”

  “What’s the ‘C’ for? Catholic?”

  “No, it’s because I’m a non-affiliated Christian. The “C” must be for Christian.” Lance paused. “So they’ve brand everyone with the first initial of their religion, huh?”

  “Yeah, I guess so. It hurts like hell.”

  “I know. It’s so we can never hide from it. We’re labeled for life.” Lance again feared that they branded his daughter and wondered if Jake knew anything. “Jake, I hope they’re not branding our kids.”

  “I hope not, but I don’t know.”

  Both men were silent for a while staring at the ground. Lance thought there had to be a way out of this mess. Escape from this room seemed impossible. Would they shoot him if he tried to escape? Hell, it wasn’t escaping. He didn’t do anything wrong. Lance whispered to Jake, “Hey, has anyone tried to escape?”

  “Yeah, earlier two men tried to walk out. The dogs barked at them, ready to bite them. The guards roughly tackled them and took them to one of those tents.” He pointed to one of the large, white tents that had security guards coming and going. “We heard them screaming. They haven’t come back. No one’s tried since.”

  Lance was glad he asked him because he now ruled out his idea of escaping.

  Jake said, “You don’t want to piss them off. Remember, they have our kids. Who knows what they will do to them if we try to escape?”

  “That’s a good point. They’re holding our kids ransom.”

  Jake nodded and frowned.

  Lance placed his hand over his eyes. He realized that he was stuck as long as they had his daughter. Even if he did escape when there was an opportunity, he couldn’t risk what they would do his daughter. Lance studied the massive hall. He noticed that men were lining up for one of the tents. “What’s that tent over there for?” Lance pointed to the tent in the distance.

  Jake sighed. “That’s the Freedom Chip injection tent. I already got mine earlier. They’ll be calling you eventually.”

  “Great. That’s all I need. A Freedom Chip to take away my freedom.”

  “Governor, this is a nightmare. You got to be able to do something. You have some clout. You’re a leader. Come on, get us out.”

  Before Lance could respond, a guard walked by and glared at them. The guards spread out and held their assault rifles out ready to shoot. Lanced gaped. Were they going to shoot them?

  Then, four large white screens were lowered from the ceilings, two at the far ends and two at the sides. A harsh voice over the sound system spoke, “Quiet! I said quiet!”

  Some men kept speaking. One of the guards took out an old-fashioned whip and started whipping inmates who weren’t quiet. The guard stopped after several blows.

  The room became silent.

  “Good, thank you,” the voice said. “Please
stand by for a press conference from our beloved Mother.”

  ◆◆◆

  The white screens showed an empty presidential podium with reporters waiting in the sitting area. Lance knew that these reporters were, no doubt, state-sponsored reporters. All the respectable reporters quit after the Maters repealed the first amendment.

  Except for some growling dogs, the room was silent. No one else wanted the guards to whip them.

  Zelda Mater walked up to the podium. She was dressed in her usual spotless, white conservative cotton dress with a large silver “Z” necklace dangling between her breasts. A person bowed before her and lit the Evig, the three candles of the Gods of the Sun, Land, and Sea. Whenever she spoke publicly, the spiritual three candles were lit. Each year on the Awakening Day, on July 30, all Maters lit their own Evig and burned the three candles.

  Maters believed that she came from the heavens on the Awakening Day. She had Hispanic features. Although Lance hated Zelda Mater and everything she stood for, he had to admit she was very sexy with the long black hair, olive complexion, hypnotic brown eyes, and the small brown beauty mark below her eye. Maybe that’s how she brainwashed men—she lured them with her beauty.

  Lance jerked and was ashamed of himself for having such thoughts of the person ultimately responsible for kidnapping his wife and daughter.

  More guards carried whips along with their assault rifles. Lance sat up straight, not wanting to provoke them.

  Zelda Mater began her speech.

  “Hello, children. This is your mother.”

  Lance rolled his eyes but then turned his head quickly to make sure the guards didn’t notice him.

  “You have not only asked for me to continue to be your religious leader, but you have asked that I become the formal leader and President of the United States. I am honored to accept your invitation.”

  Lance thought: no one asked; you stole it.

  “My adopted father has resigned as of midnight. I wanted to clarify a few things. Yesterday, was the Conversion Day spelled out in the scriptures in Land, chapter three, verse twelve. I want to go over three aspects of the conversion: the economics, religion, and security.

  “The economics is really quite simple. Everyone needs to get a Freedom Chip inserted into the soft spot at the junction of the thumb and the index finger. It does not hurt. It’s called the Freedom Chip because it gives freedom to you. It’s all you need. You don’t need a wallet or a pocketbook. You don’t need cash; you don’t need credit cards. This gives you everything you need.

  “They are available at registration stations located at most grocery stores and gas stations.”

  Very smart of her for putting it in areas that people need: food and gasoline, Lance realized.

  “Once you have one, and for most of you who already have it, you must scan it at a registration site to see where you’re going to live, where you’re going to work, and how much you’re going to make. For those of you who have money saved up, which is most of you, the government will automatically transfer your money to the chip. If you have cash and you want to transfer it, you can manually transfer it a registration site. The most you can have initially is twenty-five thousand, and this is the beauty of our economic system.”

  Zelda turned toward and briefly glanced at her entourage behind her. She perked up and continued.

  “The days of the filthy rich people that controlled our country for way too long are over. There will be no rich people. Everyone will be equal.”

  “Equal my ass,” Lance whispered to Jake. Jake stared straight ahead and pretended not to hear Lance.

  Zelda continued.

  “What that does for us, economically, is it allows us to better utilize our vast resources that have been dominated by rich people. Now, we’re going to share. All of us will be able to survive comfortably once we share all our resources evenly. My adopted father is a perfect example. He was one of these rich people until he saw the light on the Awakening Day. The Awakening transformed him, and he donated all his assets to the Mater Church. That is what all wealthy people must do openly and agreeably. That is the economic side. You will find out your pay scale which depends on your expertise.

  “On the religious side, Materism is the official religion of the United States, and everyone must convert to Materism; hence, the Conversion Day. Fortunately, most people are already Maters. For the ones that are not, we will educate them. We have had tremendous results. Most individuals are happy to convert. Some of them wanted to but never got around to it. We are extremely optimistic and encouraged that this is working well.”

  Lance and Jake exchanged brief glances and shook their heads in disbelief.

  “The infidel children are being separately educated and will reunite with their parents once they are both truly converted.”

  She shuffled through some papers and spoke.

  “Now, I will briefly go over our nation’s security. We can survive with our own resources. We don’t need anyone else. The rest of the world is literally collapsing because they need our resources, and we’re not sharing our resources anymore. We don’t need them. They need us, so we are shutting off our borders. There’s no one that can come into our country or leave our country. And we will strictly enforce this policy.

  “As far as any countries invading us, we have enough nuclear weapons to destroy the whole world ten times over. Any country who tries to jeopardize or test our security, will feel our full military strength.

  “Now, I would like to open it up for questions.”

  “Oh jeez, like these are going to be real questions,” Lance whispered again.

  Jake shushed him.

  A female reporter stood, and asked, “Mother, how many people will be able to keep their existing jobs?”

  Zelda said, “That is an excellent question. All Maters will, at a minimum, keep their existing jobs and pay. We will be promoting many of them to better jobs and pay. Infidels, on the other hand, will be demoted to lesser jobs.”

  Zelda stopped and called on another reporter.

  “Mother, what about people who own businesses?”

  “Generally, Maters will take over all businesses. There will be some rare exceptions where a Mater can’t replace an infidel’s business because of the infidel’s unique expertise. The way it works for owning a business is that every owner will be on the government GS system, and the government will assign a level and step. Their pay will fluctuate depending on how well the business does. If the business fails, the government will not punish them. They will just be reassigned to a different job.”

  Another reporter asked, “Mother Zelda, you said that the infidels who are rich must forfeit their assets including their mansions. Who will occupy these mansions and who will maintain them?”

  “Maters will occupy these mansions. The more dedicated and loyal the Maters, the better their living accommodations. The beauty of this arrangement is that the rich infidels who previously owned the mansions, will now be doing the maintenance on the property. They will have to get off their lazy asses and work.”

  The reporters in the room clapped.

  Lance thought that was odd. He had never seen reporters clap at something a president said at a press conference.

  “Thank you,” Zelda said. “Enjoy the Conversion Day.” The reporters and her entourage did the sign of the ‘Z’ as Zelda left the room.

  The guards forced the inmates to watch news coverage of how the conversion was going. The reporters interviewed people saying how everything seemed normal and how happy they were with the Conversion Day’s progress. They showed short lines at different registration stations with people joking with the people working the stations. Reporters even interviewed high school students who were saying that they liked the fact that the authorities separated the infidel students and moved them to camps.

  After an agonizing thirty minutes, the main lights went out and the white screens retreated up into the ceiling.

  “Lights out,” a
guard’s voice shouted over the speakers. “No talking.”

  Lance and Jake exchanged sad looks.

  Lance lay on his cot, turned to the side, and started quietly crying. His life was ruined. Hell, the United States, his beloved country, was gone.

  Chapter 8

  Hector Gonzalez sat on the packed bus inspecting his hand and leg cuffs. He tried to discreetly free himself of the cuffs, but they were a little too tight. There was a guard in the front and back of the bus, both with assault rifles. Jose, his cell mate, sat next to him.

  Even with the assault rifles, he wondered if the guards were afraid to be on a bus with a bunch of murderers. Hector, himself, was convicted of murdering a rival gang member. He did it over ten years ago, when he was a young thug at eighteen. He got a life sentence but would be up for parole in two years. He hoped and expected to get it, but that was before the Conversion Day that happened two days ago. He wasn’t sure what the Mother of all the Gods planned for the murderers.

  The guards told the inmates that they were transferring them to a different prison to make room for the new infidel prisoners. When prisoners asked where, the guards told them to shut up.

  “Holmes, I don’t like this,” Jose whispered to Hector.

  “Me too,” replied Hector. He looked out the window and only saw farmland and woods. “Why did they need all these military vehicles and dogs? I mean are they expecting that we would actually try to make a run or fight back?”