Dante dreamt of bright, brilliant colors. They shimmered in his mind’s eye with the twinkling of a thousand diamond stars. Hendrix couldn’t top this. His dreams were a kaleidoscope ; mesmerizing, soothing. There were no troubles here, no worries, no nightmares. All was as it should be. Perfect comfort, perfect warmth, perfect everything.
Dante opened his eyes and gave a yawn. His tongue absent mindedly probed his toothless gums, the saliva running over onto his chin. He couldn’t move, that was normal. He couldn’t see very much. It was dark all around him, and he couldn’t pick up his head. There were no lights anywhere. His vision wasn’t focused anyways. All of that was normal, too. What was wrong then? He had felt like there was something bugging him at the back of his mind.
Then it hit him: He was hungry. He was very hungry. He was very, very, very, hungry. There were no other words. If he didn’t get fed, something bad would happen, he just knew it. He hated being hungry. He wanted Milk, and he wanted his Mommy, and he wanted them right now!
Dante began to whimper and mewl, calling for Mommy. Somewhere deep in the back of his mind he thought he was doing something wrong. There had to be a better way to communicate. Then he remembered. LOUDER! He cried out louder. He cried out louder and louder until he couldn’t even remember why he started crying! HUNGRY! That was it! MILK!
After forever, Dante felt something enter his mouth. Mommy! Milk! Dante bit down, ready for Milk to squirt down his throat. It wasn’t Mommy. It wasn’t her nipple, either. Dante bit down on something hard and cold. Too hard. It didn’t taste anything like milk either. It didn’t have a taste. It tasted like…Dante searched for the word…plastic.
Teeth ripped out of Dante’s gums, and Dante screamed. He reflexively bit into the thing in his mouth. It helped him feel better, but not much. Finally the hurting in his mouth stopped and he spit it out. It was still dark all around Dante. No lights. No nothing. Dante was scared. He wanted Mommy.
Something else forced it’s way into Dante’s gaping mouth. The spoon withdrew and Dante swallowed the stuff. Eugh! Nasty! It tasted like bitter applesauce mixed with overripe pomegranates. Dante thrashed on the ground, unwrapping himself as his arms and legs regained strength and something resembling coordination. His head itched as hair grew back in. Soon he was free of his fleecy confines, but not finished yet.
Memories flooded back. His mom and dad, the party, his death, Limbo, the Judy’s, the survivors, Jamal, anchors, and Lysa. Lysa! Dante looked around, and his eyes adjusted to the dark. He was sitting on a baby blanket in a very large diaper- even for this place. By his left leg, sat the teething ring that he had just bitten down on moments ago. Where was he? Where was Lysa?
“LYSA!”, Dante called out.
“The girl is not here.” A voice quietly answered back from the darkness. “Do not worry. She is well. A bit fussy, perhaps, but well; and very much her worldly self.” The voice was calm, almost friendly but very formal. Old. Definitely old. There was a strength to it, though. More like a quiet confidence.
A light shined down out of the darkness. It wasn’t blinding, or even “Heavenly”, more like someone just turned a low hanging ceiling light on in a warehouse. Even so, Dante winced and squinted as his eyes adjusted to the new stimulus.
Standing in the middle of the light, was an old man wearing white robes. His hair was white, with most of his face covered by a thick beard. Not quite a Santa Claus look, but close. His skin was tan and rough, like he had spent years in the sun. It might have been leather. A golden rope held his robe together, and his feet were adorned in leather sandals.
With a snap of his fingers, his clothes began to move. They twisted and turned around his body, while he remained still. They stretched in places and titled and others. Their texture reshaped and their color darkened and shifted. Before Dante knew it, the robes had reshaped themselves completely. Now the geezer was dressed in a red turtleneck sweater, a pair of slacks, and a black leather belt with a gold buckle. The sandals, for whatever reason, still remained.
The old man reached into the darkness and pulled a wicker chair from it, setting it down. He groaned slightly as he sat down. “I hope you don’t mind if I sit.” the old man said. “I won’t object if you stand.”
Dante sat there, flabbergasted. “Uh, I don’t think I can.” he told the old man.
“Nonsense,” the old man waved his hand, and made a cross, “in nomine Patris, et Filii, et Spiritus Sancti, you may stand for as long as we are having this conversation. Even Midori could stand if I allowed it, now.”
“No, I mean…eh, I don’t think I CAN walk.” Dante pointed down to the scaled up newborn diaper that hugged his hips. His legs were spread so far apart by the bulk that crawling would be a challenge at this point.
“Ah, yes.” The old man observed. “I see what you mean.” The old man stood up, reached into the darkness and had a relatively thinner diaper and tub of baby wipes in his hand when it next came into the light. Not feeling at all in control of the situation, Dante just laid down as the old man went to work.
He wasn’t as skilled as the Judy’s; clearly he hadn’t had the millennia of practice they had, but he knew what he was doing. Dante didn’t take the time to feel embarrassed. For once he was genuinely grateful to be changed. He never thought he’d be happy to be in the regular scale diapers, but he was.
He waited till the old man had retaken his seat, the baby wipes and used diaper being reclaimed by the darkness, and stood up on his two feet. It was still awkward standing and talking to a fully clothed man while wearing nothing but a diaper.
“Can I have some clothes too?” Dante asked.
“It is not yet decided if you’ll need clothes anymore,” the geezer spoke. It didn’t sound like a threat, merely a statement of fact. That unnerved Dante more. Dante waited till it became clear that the old man would not speak.
“Who are you?” Dante asked after a brief silence. The old man looked confused, then offended. Then he leaned forward in his wicker chair; his chin resting in his hand. It was as if he were sizing Dante up. Finally, he exhaled slowly and spoke.
“Forgive my arrogance and impoliteness,” the elderly gentlemen spoke up, his voice raspy with age. “I am Saint Jude, Regent of Limbo until the end of days.
That was a new one. “Do you run this place?” Dante asked.
“Of course, lad.” the priestly man replied. “Why do you think the angels here are all named Judy?” He laughed dryly. “They took the names themselves, without any urging on my part, I assure you.” A guy named Jude running a place just outside of Heaven; every angel named Judy. Worse yet, wasn’t St. Jude the name of that children’s cancer hospital that always advertised in the movie theatres? Dante wouldn’t have believed it if not for all that he had already been through.
“What are you the Saint of?”, Dante asked. It came off as more of a “Oh yeah?! Prove it!” than initially intended. The Milk of Human Kindness must still be in his system, messing with his emotions. The Saint didn’t seem to notice though.
“Lost causes, among other things,” Jude answered. He folded his hands in his laps, waiting for further questions. Dante didn’t not keep him waiting.
“Lost causes?” Dante questioned. “Like…?” Dante let the question hand in the air.
“Fighting the good fight, even though you know you’ll lose.” Saint Jude lectured like an old professor who had given this lecture too many times to count. “Crusades, martyrdom-”
“Treating dead kids like babies so they don’t go to Hell?” Dante interrupted. It was rude to interrupt, especially when this guy clearly held all the cards, but something about him got under Dante’s skin. It figured that a Saint would have a “Holier than Thou” attitude about him.
There was a long pause. Saint Jude didn’t even blink, didn’t even shift his weight. Finally, he said “Precisely.”
“Why?” Dante wanted to know.
Jude nodded his head, as if Dante had asked the correct question. “Because,” he said, “even though everyone deserves to go to Hell for their sins, no one should go there if it can at all be avoided.”
“So you built this place, instead.” Dante concluded. Saint Jude looked genuinely tickled by this.
“Built it?” the Saint laughed more hardily this time. He slapped his knee and tapped his foot as though Dante had said the most amusingly ridiculous statement ever. “No, my dear boy. No. I am Limbo’s Regent, not its architect.” The old man slumped his shoulders slightly. He looked tired. “I don’t even rule this place as much as I”, he let out a weary sigh, “manage it. But yes, I am the one responsible for your current plight.”
Dante said nothing in response to this. He just listened. It was this stranger’s turn to talk for the moment.
“This place was originally nothingness.” Jude went on, his wizened arms spread wide to indicate the vastness of it all. “A between spot that was a barrier between creation and the hereafter. Then it became a haven for infant souls- innocent souls that had not had the original sin of Adam and Eve washed away.” He leaned forward a little bit, “It was intended to stay that way, for the poor innocent babes that fell through the cracks.”
“Sadly,” the old man said as he leaned back in his chair, “mankind has been plagued with a dearth of good judgment ever since the Garden. Slowly, over the millennia, Mankind has sought to increase their childhood, and delay their responsibilities. The descendants of Seth that spread to what you call America are particularly guilty of this. It’s ironic that they still make up a decent majority of the faithful.”
Dante took this all in, but Saint Jude paid no mind. The old man just went on, more talking to himself than to Dante at present.
“There was a time,” the old man continued, “when you were a boy as soon as you could coherently confess your sins, and a man as soon as your second set of hair started growing in.” The old man’s face shriveled up in what might have been disgust. It was hard to read his features. “Now, you’re all practically infants till you’re eighteen- hardly accountability or responsibility at all! Even after that, you’re still children!” He let out something between an exasperated sigh and a growl.
“And that’s why you treat us like babies?” Dante asked, more curious than anything; though that element of resentment still lingered.
The Saint’s features softened. “You are treated like infants,” he said, “because it was the one concession the Creator demanded of me when I proposed providing this service,” he gestured around indicating Limbo itself. “Besides that, it’s appropriate, don’t you think?” Dante tiled his head in question.
“So many of you were ruled by your baser impulses before,” Saint Jude started to list off on his fingers. “Food, drink, sexual pleasure, leisure, sloth, a sense of entitlement, and the personal fable running through your mind that told you your elders didn’t understand you despite your obvious brilliance.” The old man bobbled his head in mock inspiration. “It’s only fair that these things all become the elements of your cage.”