In the rest of the cavern, everyone milled about without a sense of invented purpose, trying to find something to do to avoid thinking about Jawl. And also Delfa, somewhere out there blindly clawing through the abyss. The second they arrived back, Lorenz disappeared into his private office, swearing and kicking at anything that stood in his path. His office door, which Ben had taken quick glances at during Ming’s story, remained closed.
“I . . . I can’t take it anymore, Ben,” said Alison after a few minutes of silence. She watched Ming showing Hannah another book, and Thomas rummaging about under the hood of the half-finished tunnel runner. “Up until today, I thought everything was going to be okay, that somehow we were going to end up back in our apartment with Mom. And then everything just fell apart and . . . and I’m scared, Ben.”
“So am I, Al,” croaked Ben, surprised at the worried whimper in his own voice.
Just then, the steel door opened. The darkness of the tunnel came spilling in and a chunk of it materialized as Basho. With one arm he dragged his machine gun, and he cradled Jawl’s stolen blender under the other. His clothes were smeared black with bloodstains. Everyone looked up, but Basho didn’t return their glances. He walked straight to the workshop at the side of the cavern, about fifty feet away from the House of Proof, dropped the gun against the half-finished tunnel runner that Thomas was working on, and let his body collapse into an old swiveling office chair. Thomas looked up and stared at Basho for a few seconds. As if nothing was out of the ordinary, or as if the situation was beyond him, Thomas resumed his work. Basho simply stared into the plywood wall of the cavern like he was watching TV.
“Ben,” said Alison, “if Mom was telling the truth about everything, why didn’t she show up at the airport?”
“I dunno,” said Ben. “I guess something must have gone wrong.”
“Well, maybe we should tell Lorenz about how Mom might be mixed up with Milagro.” Alison’s eyes were sad and her suggestion was tinged with desperation. “That those guards--or whatever they are--that were shooting at us today are the same ones that took her away.”
“Tell Lorenz? You think we can trust him?” Ben just didn’t think it was a good idea to divulge everything to that spiky headed, cigar smoking dictator.
“Well, what choice do we have? Maybe if we told Lorenz about the silver men and all that then he might be able to help us or figure it out or something.”
“How about we try escaping again,” offered Ben. But he immediately saw how futile it would be.
“And the twig, Ben--maybe Lorenz knows what it means.” Alison was insistent as she remembered this key detail.
“Yeah . . . the twig.” Ben gulped and looked away. He hadn’t told Alison that he had thrown the twig away in a moment of angry self-pity the night before. Whatever it was, he should probably go find it. But if it actually was valuable, there was no way he was ever going to hand it over to Lorenz.
Neither of them said anything further. They listened to Ming and Hannah on the other side of the House of Proof.
“And here are pictures of kids before they take me away to work in factory,” said Ming. “I know I get them back one day.” Ming closed her eyes and clung to the book like it was the mast of a ship in an invisible storm. Through a gap in the wall of books that separated them, Ben could just see Hannah’s face. She wore a sweet smile of understanding.
“I know you will,” said Hannah. “I can tell.”
“Really?” asked Ming. The situation had been reversed: a child was now consoling a parent that her family would be reunited. Before, it had been Ming telling them that they would see their mother again. In Ming’s world of horses, kingdoms, and flying books, happy endings seemed to be divined in the stars. But the way Hannah nodded as she smiled at Ming made it seem like she knew she was lying, but knew that it was the best thing to do.
“Sure, you’ll see them again,” said Hannah. Then she quickly changed the subject by pointing at something across the room. “Hey, what’s that book over there?”
Ming looked up with sorrowful eyes. “That one?”
“Yeah, that one with the big M on it.”
“Oh, you not tell anyone about that one.” Ming’s voice suddenly became a furtive whisper.
“Why?”
“They not understand, Hannah.”
At this, Ben got up and walked over to Ming and Hannah, just in case Alison asked him anything else about the twig. Alison decided to follow him. As they rounded the corner into the adjoining room, Hannah was gingerly picking a big, white book out of a small pile that stood leaning against a slightly bigger pile, which in turn was leaning against an even bigger pile. It looked like the sloping, crumbling wall of an Egyptian pyramid. As Hannah brought the book back over to Ming, Ming’s hands darted up anxiously to receive it, and she took it with the care and delicacy of a jeweler moving a tray of diamonds.
“This,” whispered Ming, “is book about Milagro. It has all pictures and articles about him. Hard to find newspaper and magazine these days, so these things very rare. Nobody understand--you not tell them, okay?”
“Sure,” explained Hannah. “We won’t tell anyone.”
Ming let the book fall open. “Here is picture of him before he become so famous, back when he sell cars. Very rare photo.” Ming sifted through countless pictures of Milagro. She seemed at once scared of revealing her obsession, but also joyous to be able to share it with them. The photos were all arranged chronologically, and Ming hurried through them so quickly that it was as if Milagro was aging as they flipped by. At least some parts of him seemed to age: his eyebrows and his mouth became more and more wrinkled in each picture, while other parts, the parts that were obviously surgically enhanced--his nose and the areas under his eyes--either remained the same or actually became younger. Halfway through the photos, his hair became speckled with bits of gray. And then in the final few photos it reverted to the deep, inky black they had seen on TV. The last magazine clipping in the scrapbook showed Milagro cutting the ribbon on a Children’s Facility, the flashes from the cameras around him shining off his white teeth. The people holding the cameras behind Milagro all looked alike. All had the same too-big, phony smile of people paid to look happy.
“One day,” said Ming very quietly as she closed the book, “Milagro reunite me with my children. When he find out what happen, he make things better. When kids buy that videogamemachine, they not know what’s going on, they not know how much it cost. And they take me away to work in factory to pay for videogamemachine, but Milagro he never let that happen if he know. I need to let him know what happen and he give me back children.”
The three Graham children remained silent at this. Ben was glad that Thomas wasn’t still around to make snotty comments at Ming’s faith. But Thomas probably didn’t fully understand the central illusion of Milagro, how people worshiped his apparent generosity while he was profiting off their suffering.
“I think you’re right,” Alison finally offered.
They were all startled by Basho’s voice growling from behind them.
“Ben,” called Basho. “I need your help.”
Basho was still staring at the wall. His army fatigues, which had been brand new that morning, were now ripped and blotted with maroon stains. On the floor in front of him was a half-full bottle of vodka, a melting bag of ice, and the huge blender Jawl had stolen. He clutched a huge glass mug dripping with condensation.
“I shouldn’t be drinking of course--” But before he could finish his thought, Basho exploded in a thunderous cough. He held his hand to his chest before continuing. “But I figure there’s never been a better time, you see.” He looked up at Ben and smiled weakly. “What are we going to do now, Ben? They know where we are now and we’ll hafta move da base, but damn it, how long can we keep doing this? What’s the point? I don’t care ‘bout Lorenz’s friggin’ justice or . . . redistribution. I jus wanna stop running. And Jawl, godallmighty. Jawl. Why him? Why him, Ben?”
Ben’s throat dried up. It was just like the time before when Basho had cornered Ben to explain how he had deserted the war. Thomas was out of earshot--lost in his own world of the tubes and wires under the tunnel runner--and there was no one else to help Ben in the conversation. He instantly regretted the only thing he could think of saying. “Did he have any family that we should . . . call or something?”
“What? Jawl?” Basho’s face shriveled up. “You picture that guy with a family? Guess he might have a brother or sister or something back home, but damn, he couldn’t take care of a potted plant if you told him his life depended on it.”
“Does . . . did he have anything in the bunk room?” Ben thought this would be a slightly better question. “You know, like, any . . . stuff or anything?”
Basho took a swig from the mug and winced. “Nah. Jawl loved stealing stuff, but not really so that he could have it. Just so the other guy couldn’t, you see. Lotta the cool stuff we got here, Jawl stole, but he never woulda called it his or nothin’. Despite our best efforts, you see, most things are not ours alone. They pass from us, they live longer than us, they go on without us, you see, and maybe the things own us. This blender bought Jawl this morning, and then it threw him out. Some return policy, eh?”
Ben chuckled uneasily.
Basho drained the last of the vodka from the mug and took off his stained jacket. Underneath he wore a white sleeveless shirt that had turned translucent from sweat. He ripped the undershirt off in a casual, effortless movement. The tattoos all over his body were a universe of bruises. “People say that they never get a chance to say good-bye, but they don’t know that we’re saying it every day. Known Jawl for maybe over a year now, met him in a bar in Vegas. Guys on da run can tell if another guy’s running, you see. We was both wanted men. It was only a matter of time ‘fore they caught up with us. Mind you, we was thinking da slammer, not dead, you see.” Basho rummaged around in a box at his feet. After pulling out a few small books, plastic bottles of medication, a baseball hat, and a handgun, he settled on something that looked like a pen with a wire coming out of it. “Been sayin’ goodbye each day, there ain’t no use tryin’ to delay,” he sang under his breath.
“I need you to do something for me, Ben,” said Basho. “Here.” He put the contraption in Ben’s hand. “Should be a tiny spot on my right shoulder between Tim and Munch. Write his name so that it looks like a wave or something. Loved surfing. From Oklahoma, you see. But he loved the waves. Crazy fool.”
The pen shook in Ben’s hand as he tried to find the blank spot Basho was referring to. There were these big names on Basho’s back that could be seen from a few feet away, but as you looked closer, more and more names in smaller and smaller printing emerged. The large ones looked old and faded, but the tiny ones were still dark and vivid. As Ben searched past Mike, Carl, Odessa Mithra, Blaz, Minda, and Tyrus, he found a small spot of bare skin. He pushed the pulsing pen to Basho’s back and watched as the ink fed into the taut, canvas-like skin. The stench coming off Basho poured into Ben’s nostrils. It was the same rank mixture of dirt and sweat that had made Ben think they were being dragged into a monster’s lair that first night in the Strand.
After a few minutes of work, Ben made a shaky J appear. Basho had his eyes closed, as if the process was therapeutic in some way. But Ben felt awkward and nervous being so close to him. He needed to break the silence.
“Who was Tyrus?” asked Ben. Basho immediately straightened his back, as if Ben had pressed a power button on a piece of electronics. There was a minute of silence as Basho either tried to remember, or tried to put the memories into words.
“Tyrus died in a midnight raid in the Swat Valley. We were ambushed by a bunch of guys who appeared outta holes in the ground. We had bad intel, you see. Didn’t tell us about no holes. It was damn slaughter. I was the only one who survived. I had to kill five of them to get away. Blaz and Minda were also killed that night.” Basho sank into silence again.
The word escape--and the stench coming off of Basho--made Ben feel dizzy. They had to try again, Ben decided. There was no other choice, now that Milagro’s guards pretty much knew where the Strand was. They could do it; they could escape. No hesitation this time. Alison couldn’t handle it, but he could. Maybe that was why their mother had given the twig to him and not to Alison. Maybe she knew that deep down Alison was fragile. Ben’s head started to throb. The twig . . . he had thrown it away. Maybe it was important.
On the other side of the garage area, Thomas was now welding the roll cage together on the tunnel runner, but the welding shield was almost half as big as him. Thomas could get them out of the tunnels and back to the culvert, Ben decided, but this time Ben would be in charge.
“How about Odessa?” asked Ben. More silence. Ben was unsure if Basho had heard him.
“Did you say Odessa?”
“Yeah, it says Odessa here. In bigger letters than Mithra, but smaller than Carl.”
Basho made a humming noise as he considered the name. “Damn. Almost forgot about her. Burned into my skin and even that’s not enough to keep da memory alive. When I first enlisted--or when they enlisted me, I guess--Odessa and me we went AWOL together. Dressed up like nomads and ran into da desert. Made it all da way to Karachi, living off the cash we had saved up. She was an intel officer, pretty smart, you see, so we managed for maybe a month ‘fore they found us. Black hair, blue eyes and this smile that would just give you this instant--” Basho’s voice halted and he coughed before continuing. “Jeep they brought us back in hit a roadside bomb. Killed instantly. I come to a hundred feet away and I look up and see da jeep upside down, da whole right side of it missing like someone took a big bite out of an apple.”
“Damn,” said Ben, and then he realized that he had copied Basho’s exclamation. “I’m sorry, that really . . . sucks.”
“It’s alright, Ben. One more voice added to da choir, each name another narrowing of da gyre,” Basho sang in a quiet whisper with his eyes closed.
Jawl had now appeared on Basho’s back, the transfer of a once-living person into a memorial on a still-living person, joining the hundred or so other ghosts piggybacking on Basho. Ben turned the tattoo pen off and put it down on the ground.
Behind Basho, Thomas was nodding in time to an imaginary song in his head, walking around with an exaggerated macho movement as he admired the machine in front of him. He looked around to see if anyone was watching him, caught someone’s eye across the cavern, and gave a slight nod of his head in cool recognition. Then he took a book of matches from his pocket, and reached for the cigarette lodged behind his ear. This should be good, Ben thought.
Within seconds, Thomas was hacking away. Then, forgetting about the lit cigarette smoldering in his fingers, he burned his hand and was then cursing and coughing at the same time.
Even though his eyes remained closed, Basho sensed what was happening, and he called out to Thomas. “Thomas, you fool. What are you doing? C’mon over here.”
Thomas staggered over, his face a mixture of red from coughing, and yellow from nausea. “Think you’re pretty cool, Thomas? Too young to be smoking, you idiot. Here, gimme that cigarette.” Basho reached behind his back, snatched the cigarette out of Thomas’s fingers, and started smoking it himself.
“Oh, so you can smoke, but I can’t?” asked Thomas with an irritated sneer.
“Yeah, that’s right.” Basho himself then started coughing, but the sound was a thousand times louder, deeper, and scarier than the pipsqueak noises Thomas had made.
“What, just because you’re older it gives you the right to smoke? What difference does that make? And besides, I’m the healthy one. You’re the--”
“What difference does it make?” Basho’s eyes narrowed and he looked like he was going to knock Thomas to the ground. “With me, it makes no difference. As you say, I’m already sick. Right?” Ben was starting to think that it would be best if he got Thomas out of there as soon as possible. Drunk and angry Basho seemed even m
ore unpredictable than sober and reflective Basho.
“Pure hypocrisy,” said Thomas. But Ben grabbed him by the arm and led him away. Basho merely stared back at Thomas and shook his head while making a tsk-tsk noise the way Mrs. Brodsky used to scold them back in their apartment.
“Thomas, you’re such an idiot,” said Ben once they were outside the garage area. “Every time I think you might be getting more mature, you go and say something stupid.”
“Stupid?” spat Thomas. “How am I being stupid, Ben? How is saving our asses out there in the tunnels stupid?”
“First you try to poke holes in Ming’s faith, and then you pick a fight with Basho? What’s the matter with you?”
“Ohmygod, Ben. How is having a conversation picking a fight? It’s their fault if they get insulted when I show them the errors in their logic.”
Ben was about to punch Thomas when he remembered that he needed to keep on friendly terms with his little brother if they were going to mount an escape.
“Look, Thomas, in case you haven’t figured it out, these people--Ming, Basho--they’re not like us, okay? They’re not right in the head. They’ve been through too much in their lives. They don’t think clearly, okay?”
But Thomas was looking away and shaking his head in silent disagreement. “Whatever, Ben.”
“Okay, forget about it, Thomas. We’ve got something more important to discuss. We need to get out of here right away, ‘cause the way I figure, the police or Milagro’s guards or whoever, they’re going to be crashing this place down anytime now, and we have to get out of here. And you’re the one who can get us out, okay?”
“Okay,” said Thomas with a mild interest.
“But right now we’ve got to find Hannah and Alison so we can figure everything out.” Ben looked towards the door to the cavern. A guard stood holding a big machine gun, as stolid and immovable as ever. How were they going to get past him?
Back at the House of Proof, Hannah and Ming were deep into what sounded like a very complex conversation about magical horses and winged beasts. Mitty was scurrying in and out of the gaps between the walls of books.
The Fortress of Clouds Page 18