Deserts of Fire

by Douglas Lain

  The guards come, look at the mummy, and look at me. One gasps. Yet, what can they imagine I have done? They have orders not to engage me. They have orders to remove the mummy and notify Jason. Yet they want to speak to me. They think I, this small woman they see before them, has done something.

  One guard goes to the mummy’s feet and crouches. The other, the one wearing a gold watch, remains standing and stares at me. The crouched guard says something in their language to the guard wearing the watch. He says something back, but he says it while looking at me.

  The crouched guard shakes his head, says something that undoubtedly means No!

  The guard with the watch ignores him. He thinks I have done something. He knows it.

  “Up!” he says to me in English. I stand. I anticipate a beating.

  In halting English, he orders me to lift from the mummy’s shoulders. He orders the other guard to drop the feet. He makes me drag the mummy from the cell.

  This small female body finds the mummy of the too-large Saudi heavy to move. Dry, not as heavy as a still-inhabited body, but heavy enough. The guard makes me drag the mummy down the long long hall, then down another, and down to a cellar. There, a great iron furnace blazes. The guard has me force the mummy into it. We wait while the mummy burns. For the first time I witness a mummy’s disposal. The fire reminds me of sunlight.

  After the blaze consumes the mummy, I think we will leave. Instead, the guard with the gold watch motions his fellow out, but gestures that I remain. The guards argue, but the guard with the watch possesses the stronger will. The other leaves.

  When we stand alone, the guard speaks again in English. “I see you in there, monster.”

  I say nothing.

  “Surprised? Monster? Surprised?”

  I say nothing.

  “I hear from rumors. Stories. You are real. I see you.”

  “I exist,” I tell him.

  “Exist. Yes, you exist.”

  He comes closer to my face. “Now you are an old woman, eh monster? Who next? Who knows, eh?” He yanks his mask up. His face appears more narrow than I had expected. He has, perhaps, about the same years Jason has, but possesses the teeth of an older man—brown, and gray gums that expel rot from his mouth. Bloodshot eyes. Blemishes.

  His thick breath chokes me. “Who next monster? Me? You take me? You try?”

  “I don’t know.”

  He jerks his hand, as if to strike. I flinch, yet the blow doesn’t come. He stops his hand short, then laughs. “I touch?” he asks. “No. I no touch. If I touch, then next time I …” and he gestures toward the furnace. “I no touch you. You no touch me, understand?”

  “You have nothing to fea—”

  “Understand! Monster!”

  “I understand.”

  “If you try touch me …” He makes a slitting gesture with his thumb close to my throat. “Understand me now, monster?”

  “Yes.”

  “Say yes sir!”

  “Yes sir.”

  “You smart, eh? Back to your cell, smart monster. Wait for your CIA man.” He laughed. “You’re old woman now!”

  He returns me to my cell.

  I lay on the less-clean mattress. After awhile the guards put in the DVD of Ripley, her friend Newt, and the alien. I delight in listening to the sounds that begin this movie, knowing soon will come the part I like best, where Ripley saves Newt from the alien that threatens their way of life and has killed many Marines.

  This time, as the DVD plays, the guards do not watch in silence. At least one does not. He whoops and hollers at the movie. He jeers at the alien in English. “Kill the monster!” He shouts and laughs. “Die damn you. Die!”

  I do not rise to watch the DVD’s end through the window in the cell door this time. I don’t like this movie anymore.

  In the morning I wake to Jason’s footsteps coming down the hall. My heart leaps. I leap. On my feet I await him.

  The guard’s masked face appears in the window. Behind him Jason looks down, studying the case file most likely. The guard unlocks the door, pushes it open, stands aside. He still wears his gold watch. Jason looks up at me.

  When Jason sees me, he starts. He looks at the guard, then back into the file. He almost steps back into the hall. He looks at the empty cell across the hall. These reflexive actions last but a moment. He tempers his expression.

  “It’s you?” he asks. Then, still in English, to the guard he says, “Step out.” The guard steps out. “Excuse me a minute,” Jason says to me. Then he walks with the guard partway back down the hallway. In quiet tones, Jason questions him about the last detainee, the woman called Muhammad. I hear her name spoken. The guard answers as best he can with his English. He confirms indeed the last detainee “was” female, confirms the removal of the mummy.

  Jason sends the guard away and returns to my cell, closing the door behind him.

  He smiles at me, but the smile does not spread to his eyes.

  He sets the alarm on his wristwatch. “I’m taken aback, Ba’al. Frankly I …” Again, he looks down at the file in his hands. He flips over a page. Then he does something he never has done before. Jason turns the file around and shows me. “Do you recognize him?” Jason asks, referencing a photo of a man’s face.

  I do not.

  “You see the name?”

  I do. This man has the forename Muhammad and also the same family name as the female Muhammad.

  “Tell me about this woman, Ba’al.”

  “She took a man’s name.”

  “Okay. Why?”

  “For her work. She made documentary films. She chose the Islamic prophet’s name to incite, to inspire change. She felt complex about Islam, about Islam and women. She traveled, she wrote, she spoke, she argued. She found many friends, but many others felt she betrayed her culture. She raised money for several Middle Eastern charities; she guesses work with these charities caused her rendition, but has no knowledge of possible terrorist connects to these charities.”

  “She bears no relation to this man? Here. Read the file.” Jason tells me.

  Again I look at the photo, read about the man: a Yemeni driver detained in Basra. The woman who called herself Muhammad hailed from Iran, lived in Switzerland from age eleven, later Montreal, then Toronto. I look hard into her self within me.

  “She does not know this man.”

  “All right. Good work. Good work …”

  Jason appears distressed. He does not act like himself. We do not usually debrief this way. We talk deep and slow about the detainees who come to me.

  “I feel as if you want to leave, Jason. Have I offended you? I have failed again.”

  Jason looks at the ground. “No. This is not … this is … need to get back to Washington. I … this has to be sorted out.”

  “But, your watch alarm has not gone off yet.”

  Jason looks at the walls.

  “I know. It’s unavoidable. This … is a … situation. I’ll be back. Don’t …” He stops. I feel wetness on my face. I can’t help it, and raise my hands to hide.

  “Don’t be upset,” Jason says. “I’m not angry with you. You must understand.” He hits the file with a forefinger. “This man was tasked to us. He’s somewhere in the system. This woman was sent here by mistake, because they have the same name.”

  “Someone has not done his job,” I say.

  Jason looks at the file. “A high-value detainee. I was promised. I was promised.”

  Tears burst from me.

  “What is it?” says Jason, stunned.

  “Why did you name me Ba’al?”

  “Why did I name … what?”

  She held an idea what my name means, it exists in my mind now, I want it out. “Jason, does the name Ba’al mean what she believed it means?”

  “What did she believe?”

  “Men give the name Ba’al to a god. But a false god, the god of a false people, the god of an enemy …”

  “I didn’t know you so well then, it’s
just a name. I’ll give you another. We can talk about it.”

  “You haven’t answered. Does my name mean that?”

  “Yes. That is what it means.”

  “I do not exist as a soldier, not like Ripley, I exist as a monster.”

  “Ripley?”

  I explain the movie. I tell Jason about the furnace, the guard’s words. Jason breathes and listens.

  “All right, here is what I want you to do. Obviously we are going to change sites as soon as I can manage it. Until then, no more movies. No wonder you’re upset.”

  I keep my face hidden behind my hands. Jason clasps my wrists to separate them.

  “You know what you remind me of right now?” Jason asks.

  I shake my head. “The way I first found you. I promised to take care of you didn’t I?”

  “You do take care of me.”

  “It will be okay. I don’t want you to be worried. Will you be okay now?”

  “I don’t know. I will strive for this condition.”

  “Condition?”

  “This condition of okay-ness.”

  “You and your E-prime! You make me smile. It’s called that … the way you speak, never using the verb ‘to be.’ E-Prime. That is the term for it.” He reaches into his back pocket and pulls out some folded pages. “Here, I was thinking of you, and I had this urge to look online before leaving home. I printed out some stuff. I thought we could discuss it today if there was time; or should I say, if time allowed? It makes perfect sense the way you speak, for you. Here.” He tries to press the papers into my hands. “Takes these, read these. When I come back, we’ll talk. Okay?”

  I nod.

  He takes my hand and folds the papers into it. A tear rolls off my nose and falls upon the flesh between Jason’s thumb and index finger.

  “Oh no,” I say.

  Jason jumps back. “No! It’s all right!”

  He takes a small bottle of sanitizer from a pocket and fills his palm with it. He rubs and rubs. “It’s all right, see? All right.”

  I breathe. “Do you still believe in God, Jason?”

  He drops his hands to his sides. “Yes. Absolutely.”

  “God still exists everywhere. We believe, don’t we?”

  “We believe.”

  “She does not believe in God, Jason.”

  “Well …”

  “She does not believe. I thought when she came to me she would find God within me. She has found nothing. God does not exist in me. How can He?”

  “How can’t he? Ba’al, your faith is being tested by this … individual.”

  “I don’t feel God’s presence.”

  “Yes you do! He’s always within. Let’s pray. Now.”

  “I cannot find Him, because I never knew His love at all. I lied. God doesn’t exist in here. I tried to know Him through you. I lied.”

  Jason swallows. “This isn’t you talking. Kneel with me.”

  Jason kneels and holds his hands upward. I hesitate.

  Jason looks up at me. “Listen to me. You are a miracle, you are unique. No one—no other being like you exists. In this dark time you came to us. To us. I refuse to allow that’s an accident. You have a purpose.”

  “I haven’t helped. I have failed. Each time.”

  “No! I haven’t … represented your unique ability well. We haven’t been given the right subjects. We need high-value detainees.” Then he thinks: How can I extract information from prisoners that don’t have it? Ba’al hasn’t failed. I have.

  I hear him think this. I hear it.

  I kneel. Jason prays aloud and when he finishes we sit together in fellowship.

  After a time, eyes still closed, Jason says, “I feel His presence.”

  I rest my hands. “I see Him. I see Him in you. In your kindness and your faith, and your innocence.”

  “I’m not innocent, Ba’al. You’re the innoc—”

  “No. But I know your innocence.”

  “That’s kindness on your part.” He rubs the flesh on the back of his hand.

  “No. I see it.” The tear has only sped a process that began with our first contact.

  He checks his watch. “I have to …”

  “Go. You have shown me God again. I have no fear now. Go, you have shown me the Way.” I tell these lies for his sake.

  He smiles, picks up the dossier, rises to leave. “I’ll sort this out, and I’ll see you soon, Ba’al.”

  “Jason, tell G—” I almost say the name his mind has revealed to me. “Tell your superiors I thank them for the opportunity to serve.”

  “They are the ones who owe you thanks.”

  “Jason. Named for a hero.” Though the verb named leaves a false impression. Jason’s department, led by a man named Mitchell Gay, gave Jason the code name he bears.

  “So they say.” He smiles reflexively. “Jason who sought the golden fleece.”

  I see so much in his mind. “Jason who sowed the dragon’s teeth.”

  “That too.”

  He calls for the guard, who comes and unlocks the cell. Jason turns back to me. “See you soon,” he says. Before he leaves the floor he makes the guards move their DVD from the hallway.

  I lie down under the flickering fluorescents and, like a DVD playing for our mutual eyes, I watch. A link has formed. Jason’s superior, Mitchell Gay, warned him this would happen.

  I have heard about the world, recalled it through the memories of others; but until today I have never walked in it like this.

  Jason returns to Washington on a military flight, experiencing delays and rerouting, then down to Langley by commercial airline. He thinks about Gay humiliating him at their last meeting, and what he will say to Gay about this screw-up with the female.

  At Langley, he does not stop at his own office, but goes straight to Gay’s.

  Gay leans back with his feet cased in snakeskin loafers and propped on his desk. Jason finds this distasteful. Jason wouldn’t deface so fine a wood grain with scuff marks. Nor would Jason wear snakeskin.

  Jason holds the file of the Yemeni driver named Muhammad. He drops the file on Gay’s desk.

  “Hello, MacDonald,” says Gay, using the name given Jason in this outside world. Kyle MacDonald.

  Jason says: “The wrong damn detainee! A woman! What are we doing here?”

  Gay says: “Really? What intelligence did you extract from this woman?”

  Jason stammers. “What? Why … none. She had no relevant intel.”

  “Too bad,” says Gay. “I know how much work you put in this deal. Ya’ gave it your best shot, but it’s time to shut it down.”

  Jason, despite his experience with Gay, has somehow still not expected this. “What!” says he. “No! I was promised the driver from Basra. The guy we know trained in Afghanistan.”

  “Sorry, MacDonald, that captive is high-value.”

  “How can you do this! You expect results and you don’t give me anyone I can get results from.”

  “Your ‘special asset’ has too permanent an effect on detainees.”

  “Ba’al’s intel will be reliable! He becomes them, and tells me everything …”

  “How do you know?”

  I feel Jason’s jaw goes slack. “I … I …”

  Gay says: “Maybe he’s not sharing all he’s getting.”

  “Ba’al is loyal! We have a bond.”

  “Been meaning to talk to you about that.”

  “This isn’t about me!”

  “Make sure it isn’t.”

  “What does that mean?”

  “Means you’re done. I’m boxing that thing. I’m gonna throw it down a volcano or someplace, and I don’t want you anywhere near it again.”

  Jason stammers. He pauses, and clears his throat. “I’ll go over your head.”

  “Listen. With a new administration coming in, I’m having to spend what’s left of this one tidying up on the chance changes are expected. Now you may decide to run down the hall to my boss—or to another department—a
nd sing your creature’s praise. You may decide to do that. I’m sure you can find somebody above my pay grade to drool over your—your whatever-the-heck-you-got-there, and find something to use it for—or somebody who wants to cut it up, at least. I’m aware. I may be half as smart as you, but I’m twice as old, so consider a moment that I might be your bare equal as a man. I understand you were in the seminary before entering public service.”

  “So?”

  “How’d that work out for you?”

  “I’m sure it’s in my file.”

  Gay pulls his feet off the desk, sits up. “You want to talk files. I’m sure it is in your file, MacDonald.” He picks up the file Jason threw down, the driver’s file. “I’m also sure you need to learn what’s in a file might not even be worth lining an animal’s cage with. Even a really big animal’s cage.”

  Without taking his eyes off Jason, Gay drops the driver’s file into a wastebasket.

  “Why’d you quit the seminary, MacDonald?”

  “I didn’t quit. I left.”

  “Why did you quit the seminary, MacDonald?”

  “The church is not … the church is … is not …” Jason faltered.

  “I’ll finish that thought for you. The church is flawed. Not what you thought it’d be. Ineffectual. Hypocritical. Maybe semi-evil at times. So, like many an ex-altar boy you sought a career in government intelligence. Yet, somehow I feel you find us lacking, too.”

  Jason lowers his head.

  “Fun as it is putting the screws to you for its own sake, MacDonald, I’m actually trying to do you a favor. You should get out your date book and circle today. Because you will want to look back twenty years from now—a dozen abandoned careers, a lifetime of disappoints from now—and say, ‘Well lookee here, that’s when that old sonofabitch told me I was full of shit.’ Because you are full of shit, son.”