Mortis: The Grieving

By B. Thrall (bathrall@artsci.wustl.edu)

Prologue

Amy felt herself pull away from her dream, the darkness of sleep receding before her to
reveal her bedroom ceiling, dimly lit by moonlight. It looked ominous, but it wasn't just the
shadows, long and grossly misshapen. Amy's stomach twisted sickeningly, and her face
burned.

"I'm sick," she thought. She slipped out from beneath her bed covers and into the hallway
outside her room. She began to turn toward the bathroom, but her gut said otherwise. Slowly,
she turned the other way, shuffling toward Grandpa's room. The door was cracked open, and
within, Amy could hear her grandfather shifting in his sleep. She quietly pushed the door
farther open and saw that Grandpa wasn't asleep, he was laying awake in bed.

After a while, he noticed her standing in the doorway. "Amy, what are you doing up? It's
late," he said quietly, kindly. He beckoned for her to come over and sit on the bed beside him.

"I'm sick, Grandpa," said Amy as she shuffled over to the bed and sat down.

"Ah, well, do you want something to drink then? Or medicine?" He felt her head with his
hand. "You're forehead is very warm, maybe we'd better wake up your parents."

"No, that's okay, Grandpa."

"Are you sure?" She nodded. "All right, then, lie down here and try to go back to sleep. I'll
keep you company. Hopefully in the morning, you'll feel better."

Amy curled up beside Grandpa, and he put his arm around her and sang her the lullaby he
used to sing when she was a little girl. Gradually, he trailed off, thinking she was asleep, but
Amy couldn't sleep, her stomach twisted and complained inside her so. She listened to
Grandpa's wispy voice, though, as it drifted off to silence and after.

Minutes, half an hour later, Amy sat up in bed and looked down at Grandpa. He was silent,
relaxed, with his arm still curled around the impression she had made in his soft mattress. He
looked calm, not happy, not sad, but calm and relaxed like she had never seen him in life.
Amy's fever flared harshly, burning her up inside. Her very skin seemed to crackle under the
heat as her hand reached inevitably down to cradle Grandpa's face. His skin sparked at her
touch, and Amy was lost in a flood.

Grandpa tugged at her, pulled at her mind. He was rushing by her at incredible speeds, his
life, his memories, all like water ripping at her, trying to steal her away. There, she saw
Grandpa stealing bread to feed his mother and sister during the Great Depression, but it was
gone too fast. There, Grandpa married his wife, his love, her grandmother. There, she died.
Amy's eyes stung with the pain of the memory rush. There, Grandpa watched with loving eyes
as he sang her to sleep. There he died. This was Grandpa. This was a man. This was a man no
longer.

The fire died, leaving Amy cool and shivering. Tears fell down her cheeks and splashed onto
the earthly remains of Grandpa.

Introduction

When we die, we leave behind us only memories of who we were. There is not one person
who can say "I knew him, I knew everything that made him him." All we have are little pieces
of life and that only through action and word. How can we know who someone is without
knowing their thoughts, ideas, emotions. Mere words cannot convey an experience, any
experience, because even though "I'm sad," denotes sadness, it says nothing of why nor of the

depth and quality of that sadness. Sadness over the suffering of others has a different quality
than sadness over the death of a loved one.

All that is left is memory, imperfect memory at that.

The Mortis

The Earth shines with six billion souls, and some of these souls shine brighter than others.
One day, for no reason at all, a soul could flash bright and hot. These hot souls burn faster and
more furiously than the others, for they use their fuel faster. These hot souls are the Mortis.

The power of these hot souls is great, so great even that it floods into the physical realm
and draws back into the spirit realm, like the advancing and retreating of the tides. It is the
connection between life and death, the ebb and flow of death and life, and the Mortis are the
pathways.

Becoming

When a soul first flares, the Mortis can feel the heat generated by the new font of energy
passing through her. Generally, this is taken to be a high fever, but it does no injury to the
Mortis. The Mortis will also feel a strange compulsion to be somewhere, and soon. And so she
will find and release her first soul, initiating herself into the ranks of the true Grim Reapers.

The Burden of Death

The greatest consequence of being a hot soul is that the Mortis must act as a conduit for
souls from this life to the next. Just before someone dies, a Mortis feels their imminent
demise and will be compelled to attend that event. Souls cannot leave the body without the
aid of a Mortis. There are, however, side effects to releasing a soul. The soul actually passes
through the Mortis's soul to reach the afterlife and in so doing, shows the Mortis the soul's
hopes, dreams, indeed, their entire life. Literally, the soul's entire life passes before the
Mortis's eyes and is imprinted upon the Mortis's memory. They are made very aware of what
the loss of the dead person means to the world, and they cannot forget. This, they call the
Grieving.

Every Mortis feels every death in the world. This might seem extreme, but the farther away
the death occurs, the less the Mortis feels it; the vast majority of deaths in the world are
barely felt at all, almost on an unconscious level. Only nearby deaths are felt enough to draw
the Mortis to them to release their souls. Usually, only the nearest Mortis to a death feels the
irresistible pull of the death, though others close at hand will feel it, but not as strongly; if for
some reason the first Mortis does not reach the death, others will be pulled in to accomplish
the task.

Mortis Society

Religion

The Mortis have existed since the first Man died. His soul opened the gateway to the
afterlife and the tides of life and death were created to carry the souls of mankind away from
the physical realm and to bring new life to replenish the losses. And upon the Earth, the souls
of a precious few flashed. These First remembered the lives of the dead as their small bands
of people put them to rest, and they spoke of the dead as if they still lived, for within the
memories of the Mortis, they did. The families of the dead thus believed that death was not
the end.

When humans began congregating in cities, the Mortis first saw that their sad duty could be
much more than that. With such a large number of people in a single place, the Mortis were

no longer easily recognized by everyone as the spirit-speakers that they were thought to be.
When a single man is discovered at several deaths, let alone several dozen, the king's soldiers
tend to get suspicious. Many Mortis were persecuted for murders and deaths that they only
had a peripheral relation to before their fellows learned not to be near the bodies of those
souls they released when they were discovered. This was the first Lesson.

Mortis have always been associated to religion with their close proximity to that great
unknown, death. From ancestor-worship to the Greek pantheon to Judaism, many Mortis saw
in their burden a call to the church, seeking positions as shamans or priests of Hades or rabbis,
and with the advent of Christianity, many Mortis either became or were born Christian. As
Christianity grew, more and more Mortis were associated with its church, being either priests
or devout church-goers. They wanted to believe that they were releasing the souls of the dead
to a better place. The Inquisition changed everything.

For the oppressed and the non-Christians, the Inquisition was a truly horrible thing, but to
those whose duty was to release the souls of the dead, even the heathen dead, and to relive
those souls' agony, the Inquisition was a monstrosity unimaginable. The Mortis learned a
second Lesson then, as all but a very few left the Christian church, unable to stand its acts, yet
still forced to bear the scars it left on the souls of the dead.

War

The Inquisition was bad, but war is even worse, though in an entirely different way. With
war must come the release of thousands of souls as their mortal bodies die. These huge
requirements are too much for just the Mortis nearby to handle. Therefore, new Mortis are
created within the battle, but these are not ordinary Mortis. Rather, their souls are great,
incandescent flashes that burn out in minutes or hours instead of years or decades. The
Mortis themselves are generally unaware of what they have become, knowing only that
suddenly they are full of flame and fire, burning to be released. These Mortis may be
responsible for accounts of "berserkers" in battles, men who lose all control and become
fanatical killing machines. They also must carry the cross of the ordinary Mortis, must release
souls to the afterlife, but not just one at a time; in battle, too many die too quickly for that.
Mortis created in battle must release many souls at once, with every soul searing through
their mind at once, tearing, shredding. The Mortis himself is subsumed beneath all the souls
he carries the memories of. If he survives, he will emerge totally insane and incapable of

functioning in normal society. At best. A much more common event, however, is the Mortis's
death and the resultant release of his soul by another Mortis.

Modern Society

Today, Mortis society is fragmented. No longer are do the majority hold positions with their
respective churches. Instead, most Mortis go it alone, desperately trying to reconcile what
they are with their daily lives. Many cannot handle the stress and now subsist in the gutters.
Others, though, have managed to balance their curse with their existence through various
means. Some have withdrawn into themselves. Some of them have taken solace in the
presence of normal people. There are still those who take their Mortis burden to the church.

The Church of Remembrance

The Mortis not only act as conduits for souls to the afterlife, they also remember. They
remember everything about every soul they ever released, though the memories fade as time
passes. The most recent soul, however, haunts them, only gradually receding to the back of
their minds with the release of new souls. This is the basis for the Church of Remembrance.

The Church of Remembrance is a link between the normal world and the patch-work quilt
of Mortis society. Within the human world, it is a poly-denominational church, but it does not
hold weekly masses. Instead, masses are held upon the death of one of the Church members.
These masses are less sermon than eulogies, lasting for hours while the Mortis who released
the soul recounts the life of the deceased, whose family and friends are welcomed to attend.
The public is also welcome, and it is from these people that new members of the Church
come. To Mortis, the Church is a repository of memories. In addition to the masses, the Mortis
priests inscribe the lives of the released souls in books, which are stored carefully in the
Church basement, and though the priests see these biographies as their duty, it is more of a
great emotional release that they find in the writing, as if they achieve some fulfillment in it.
Any Mortis may record a biography for the Church and it will be kept with care, but only
Mortis Priests of Remembrance may speak at the heads of masses, for that is the greater
emotional fulfillment and is reserved to the believers.

The Church of Remembrance itself is located in an old Catholic church in New York, New
York, USA. The church is owned by the Church of Remembrance, but no one knows how it
acquired it, or how the Church began. The Mortis priests either do not know or their story of
the Church "just being there" when they needed it has a grain of truth. There are also small
branches of the Church of Remembrance around the country, but these are merely
missionaries and not true churches. Mostly, they consist of a single Mortis priest who holds
mass relatively often to gather members and establish the Church's presence in the minds of
the public.

Mortis Death

Death is the one certainty in life, and normal humans get only one chance. Once they die,
there is nothing else for them here in the physical world, they pass on to the afterlife with the
help of the Mortis. For the Mortis, however, it is different. They have a duty, a curse, a soul
burning with hot fire. This fire, though, is not the heat of a normal, living soul; it burns hotter
and faster, burns out earlier than normal. Once a person becomes a Mortis, her life becomes
dramatically shortened. The longest living Mortis so far survived for twenty-three years before
his soul burned out. Most Mortis survive only ten to fifteen years.

There are, of course, the usual myths that arise from the desperate wish against dying that
every man has. Some distant Mortis somehow managed to quench the flame and restore the
normal burning of his soul. In some land, almost impossible to reach, there is a spring that
removes the burden of death every Mortis carries, and with it the shortened life. Most of
these myths are spread by the Mortis who have been able to manage their curse rather than
those who have lost control or fled from reality. Whether these rumors are true or not is
anyone's guess.

Another rumor that can be found among any group of Mortis actually has some basis in
fact. Mortis, goes the rumor, cannot die until their soulfire burns out. Indeed, Mortis souls are
not simply released to the afterlife when they die; they carry too much energy to do that. A
dead Mortis can walk, talk, and think as if he were still alive, unlike a normal human, who for
all intents and purposes is dead, with only the removal of her soul to make death complete.
Dead Mortis, are different from live ones, however. Their death calls Mortis to come release it
like any other, though some of the more powerful Mortis have been able to hide their death.

Other Mortis arrive soon after the death of a Mortis, intent on releasing his soul. If he escapes
them, he will not die. Yet. But, he now has a great weakness: if any Mortis ever touches him,
he is instantly dead, his soul released to the afterlife. Until then, or until his soulfire burns out
(it burns much more rapidly in death), he will continue to live.

A kind of side note is the fact that when a Mortis soul is released, it does not pass through
the soul of the releaser -- it would carry with it all the memories of every soul the Mortis ever
released in one instant and that would be too much for the releasing Mortis. Instead, the soul
merely requires the touch of a Mortis to open its own pathway to the afterlife and leaves the
body through that passageway. Another side note is that when a Mortis's soul burns out, its
last action is to release itself to the afterlife; the touch of another Mortis is not required in this
case.

Themes

Mortis: the Grieving is not really designed to be played. Instead, it is intended more to instill
certain themes in a chronicle. For the Storyteller who wishes to make his chronicle more
tragic, the Mortis are a good technique of conveying that theme. In each of the other
Storyteller games, the characters have both curses and benefits. The Garou are cursed with a
losing battle against the Wyrm, but at least they have the spirits and their own determination,
let alone the other Garou abilities, to stand against their foe. The Kindred are created cursed,
but in turn, they have Golconda to counterbalance their unholy existence. Wraiths, Mages,
and Changelings are similar, but the Mortis have nothing to hold up against their curse. This is
what makes them tragic. They were normal people, but now have had the mantle of releasing
the souls of the dead, but not only that, but to be made horribly aware of what the loss of
that soul means to the world. Their only hope of happiness is the rare soul that made the
world better by living in it. A loving grandmother, a charitable man. But even this carries the
heavy weight of the fact that this noble soul is no longer here. It is gone forever.

My god, how depressing, you say, but remember the other major theme of Mortis: that of
remembrance. Even though the soul is gone, it is remembered by the Mortis who released it,
and remembered with perfect clarity. Every person who ever thought they knew that person
actually only knew a small portion of their thoughts and actions and emotions, their hopes
and dreams. But the Mortis knows it all, and from the perspective of the soul. Not only that,
but knowing every moment, the Mortis can understand the soul, if he so wishes. To the family

of the deceased, in addition to their precious memories, another remembers as well, and
knows what they feel, but a thousand times more so. Somewhere out there is someone who
remembers who that person really was. Life goes on, but the past is not forgotten, not ever.

World of Darkness Relationships

The Mortis are awakened beings, but they are not like the other supernaturals. They do not
stand out in a crowd, do not work Magick or speak with the spirits of the Umbra. They are not
undead, or exist in a world of dreams. They are, in fact, more of a natural order, a fact of life
rather than an exception to it, and as such, they are generally unknown to anybody. There
have been, however, certain encounters, generally in the nature of the release of the soul of a
Changeling or a Mage, so the Mortis themselves are aware of the others, but they see no
reason to make themselves known to them. Those who bring death are rarely welcomed.

Garou

Werewolves actually have no need for the Mortis; their souls already have a connection to
the powerful energies of life and death, which they believe to be a single entity called Gaia.
This connection allows the automatic release of a Garou soul to Gaia when he or she dies.
Mortis and Garou have had almost no contact whatsoever, and a Garou will never become a
Mortis or vice versa.

Mages

Mages are probably the supernatural beings that the Mortis have the most contact with,
because they can detect a Mortis if they are using the quintessence usually found in Mage
patterns to search for other Mages. Such a Mage would see a Mortis soul blazing even
brighter than a Mage's but in a slightly different way. Of course, the Mage would assume that
he had found another Mage and take what actions he thought necessary for his purposes. At

least, he will try. Any action that the Mage tries to take that could keep the Mortis from
performing her duty will fill the Mage with nausea and an aversion to that action; even a
Mage knows, though subconsciously, that Mortis are essential to the natural order. The Mage
must succeed in a Willpower roll, difficulty 10, to actually perform the action. Admittedly, the
vast majority of Mages who encounter Mortis are incredibly curious about them, and many
have approached them to ask questions. A few have even struck friendships. The
Technocracy, of course, is still trying to kidnap a Mortis to study this "phenomenon." A Mortis
will never become a Mage, because he is already awakened and his awakened abilities do not
include Magick.

Vampires

The Embrace of a new vampire is a most confusing thing for any Mortis in the vicinity.
Suddenly, they are called to release a nearby soul, but a few seconds later, the call is reduced
to almost nothing, leaving the Mortis to wonder why she no longer needs to release that soul.
Most just assume some other Mortis reached the soul first or someone had a "near death"
experience, and leave the area, grateful that, for once, they do not have to go through the
horror of releasing a soul. A few Mortis, however, have gone to investigate. They generally
come back dead, possibly even drained of blood. Mortis encountering vampires not in the
process of the Embrace will feel uneasy, as their souls push them to release the souls bound
by the blood of Caine to the physical world. These souls are unnaturally kept here, and a
Mortis will feel compelled to release them to the afterlife, but a mere touch cannot break the
bond of Caine; it takes much more than that. A few Mortis have dedicated their lives to
hunting vampires because of this. A Mortis may not become a vampire, because she cannot
die until her soulfire burns out, and then her soul is sent straight to the afterlife; no blood of
any vampire can keep it in this world.

Changelings

Being affected by Banality as the Kithain are, the mere touch of a Mortis could destroy their
soul, shattering it into a million pieces. All Kithain will do almost anything to avoid being in the
presence of a Mortis, let alone being touched by one. Because of this, Mortis who are called
to release the soul of a Changeling merely have to come within a couple of feet of the

Changeling for the soul to flee the body. Touch is not necessary. A person with a Kithain soul
will never become a Mortis.

Wraiths

Mortis and Wraiths generally have no way of interacting except at the moment of the
Wraith's birth into the Deadlands. Very few Wraiths remember the moment of their death,
and therefore the Mortis who released them from their bodies, but those who do are
generally curious as to what this person did that they ended up in the Deadlands instead of
Heaven, or even Hell. They might blame the Mortis for their death or try to use him for one
last reconciliation with life. The Mortis who released a Wraith's soul could easily become a
fetter for the Wraith, understanding her and knowing her as he can, and if the Mortis records
the Wraith's life in a book for the Church of Remembrance, that, too, could easily become a
fetter. It is very rare for a Mortis to become a Wraith when his soulfire dies.

Systems

I have provided these systems for the Storyteller to create NPC's, or for players who really
want to play a Mortis. There is also an optional aspect of the Mortis that should make them
more playable rather than just pawns of death. Hopefully, these mechanics work relatively
well even though they have not been playtested.

Character Creation

Characters are created normally, with the exception of their Life rating. Life is explained in
detail below. Life begins at 5 permanent points, with each additional point costing 4 Freebies.
It may not be increased with experience.

Releasing Souls

When a Mortis releases a soul, it does not go easily. The vast majority of souls grasp and
clamor at the Mortis, desperately trying to keep their connection to this world. People do not
want to die.

The player/Storyteller makes a Willpower roll every time a Mortis releases a soul. If the roll
fails, the character will be haunted by the memories of the soul and might take on some of its
mannerisms or goals. If the roll botches, the soul takes control of the Mortis's body for a short
period of time, determined by the Storyteller or until the player makes a successful resisted
Willpower roll against the soul.

Choosing Deaths

The deaths that surround a Mortis depend heavily on the area that he is currently in; there
are probably more deaths in New York than in the whole state of Nebraska each year. While
there are more Mortis in cities to compensate for the higher death rates, they do affect the
Mortis themselves. Generally, the Storyteller should decide when and where a death occurs
and who, if anybody important, but there may be times when the release of souls are not as
important as other story elements, so the Storyteller may also use the following tables to
randomly choose a death.

Roll a number of dice equal to the character's permanent Life rating:

Location

Difficulty

Large city** 7
Small city

Large town 9

Smaller

10

*In large cities, due to the large number of deaths, characters must spend a temporary Life
point every month instead of every two.

The number of successes should determine approximately how many deaths occur around
the Mortis that he is forced to attend per week. Or day, if the Storyteller really wants to make
the character's life hell.

Mortis Life

The power generated by a Mortis soul is measured by his Life rating, which has both
"temporary" and "permanent" ratings. Characters begin with 5 permanent points and no
temporary points, but they can increase their rating with Freebies (1 permanent point for
every 4 Freebies spent) or take the flaw Short Life (4 point Flaw, character begins with 3
permanent Life points). Every two months (or every month, in large cities), a character loses a
temporary Life point, and when he reaches zero, a permanent point is converted to 10
temporary points. When a Mortis's Life rating reaches zero permanent and zero temporary
points, he dies. Dead Mortis lose Life at a rate of one temporary point per week. Life may also
be used with the optional Mortis ability.

Making

For a player, playing a Mortis character would probably not be very fun without some
Mortis ability to balance out the curse that all Mortis labor under. Therefore, I have provided
rules for an optional Mortis ability called Making.

The Mortis are beings of destruction. They are the conduits of the final unmaking of
humans: death. However, no being created by nature can survive as unbalanced as this for
long. Every unbalanced creature either dies, or finds a way to compensate. In recent years,

some very few Mortis have discovered that they carry within themselves both the seeds of
unmaking and making. The very Life that makes them conduits for souls to the afterlife
magnifies their ability to create and repair.

Creation

The fire of a Mortis's soul has both the energy of creation and the power of death, and,
while the Mortis has no control over the power of death, some Mortis have been able to
harness the energy of creation.

Creation is actually two distinct powers, pure creation, and building. Pure creation actually
creates matter from creation energy. Roll Making against a difficulty 10, and match the
number of successes against the table below to see how much of the material was created.
This costs 1 temporary point of Life per use. Building creation is a very different power.
Building works only with the materials at hand, and creates something new out of those
materials. From wood, a chair. From metal, a ring. Roll Making against a difficulty that varies
dependent on the complexity of the object. The materials used in making the object must be
present, or created using pure creation, and the character should have at least some
knowledge of how to make the object in the first place; creation magnifies ability, it does not
create it. Machined parts, microchips, and other objects that can't be made by hand cannot
be created or built using this power.

Repair

Mortis with the Making are not only good at creating and building things, they are also
remarkably good at repairing broken objects.

Roll the character's Making against a difficulty determined by the Storyteller according to
how complex the object is and how knowledgeable the character is about such objects. Every
success adds a die to the actual roll to fix the object. This ability costs nothing.

The Costs of Making

Characters begin with a Making of zero, but may buy the ability with Freebie points. Each
Making dot costs 5 Freebies. This ability may also be advanced through experience, at a rate
of 8 times the current rating per additional dot.

End

If you have any comments, suggestions, or additions to Mortis: the Grieving, you can email
me at bathrall@artsci.wustl.edu. Thank you, and I hope you enjoyed reading Mortis.