"How long have you been here?"
He moved his cart out of the bathroom. "Hard to say. Time never much interested me and I don’t own a watch. There are clocks all over the station, but they don’t have numbers on them. I have had to let my own biorhythms set my pace."
Frank relaxed enough with Begay to take a seat. "What did you do before you ended up here? You sound pretty sharp to me."
"They tested me once, back when I could stand school. My IQ is, I don’t know. Two hundred and ten, something like that. I was off their scale. Unfortunately, being crazy I can’t do much with it. Grandfather, now, he was smarter than me. They wanted him to run the Nation. The Navajo Nation, that is. But he would not have any part of it. He was only interested in sheep and corn and watching the weather.
"The schoolteachers kept trying to interest me in different subjects. When I was in high school I got interested in something they call amorphous silicon. I thought you could make high-efficiency solar cells from it. My teachers would not listen to me, so I forgot about it. Then for a while I thought I wanted to be a diesel truck mechanic. There was much talk of a football scholarship, too, until I found out I preferred avoiding people to running over them. That is not the kind of attitude that turns on college recruiters.
"Finally I just picked up and went my own way. Traveling suits me best." He winked. "This is not the only interesting place where I have worked."
"And you don’t find this kind of work, your situation here, degrading?" Frank asked interestedly.
"No hard work is degrading. Ask yourself sometime who you would rather have go on strike: the physicists or the garbage collectors? I have done both kinds of work. I spent much time in a plant in northwest Texas assembling nuclear weapons."
Steven’s eyes got real big. "Atom bombs?"
Burnfingers nodded. "My job was to help with the final assembly and checkout. When no one was looking I made improvements to each warhead I worked on."
Frank tried to envision a self-proclaimed crazy assembling nuclear devices. It made him sweat harder. "What kind of improvements?"
"On the ones that I helped prepare for shipment, I adjusted them so that if they were set off, all the radiation would be confined within a quarter-kilometer radius. The rest of the energy released would take the form of harmless fireworks, like big Fourth of July sparklers." He grinned.
"That’s sabotage!" Frank said angrily. "You’ve weakened our national security."
"Oh, I always even things out, Frank. I did the same work for a time in a Soviet assembly plant near Lake Baikal. The Russian bombs will make red and yellow sparklies, the American ones red, white, and blue." He allowed himself a chuckle. "If they are ever used there are going to be some very surprised generals on both sides."
"I love your bracelet." Alicia gracefully changed the subject. "Is it Navajo?"
Burnfingers raised his left arm. The flannel sleeve slid back from his wrist to expose a mass of worked silver and turquoise. "My father gave it to me. It is old pawn. Myself, I prefer to work in gold. That is why I am collecting so much of it. I have a mind to make something one day."
Abruptly, the hall door opened to admit the three demonic juveniles who had been tormenting Steven earlier. They entered laughing and cackling.
Steven saw them, let out a scream, and fled to the bathroom. One of the demons got an arm and leg between the closing door and the jamb and forced the door open. His companion resumed picking on the hapless ten-year-old.
"Hey, that’s about enough!" Frank moved to aid his son.
One of the juveniles whirled on him. "You keep out of this, blood bag!" He had pupilless red eyes and when he hissed, two narrow streams of flame shot from those inhuman orbs. Frank reeled back from the heat. The creature chortled nastily and turned to join in the fun.
Burnfingers Begay took a step toward the bathroom. "This is a holding area. You do not belong in here."
"You stay out of this, too." Eyeballed flame reached toward the tall Indian.
Begay ducked the fiery blast. One hand reached back to grab the water bucket, brought it around to smack the demonic bully square in the face. A noise like a big boiler letting off steam filled the room together with a ragged shriek. The other two demons stumbled clear of the evaporating puff of steam that had been their companion. All that remained of Steven’s principal tormentor was a small pile of red and black ashes.
Burnfingers tossed the empty bucket aside and picked up the wire broom. "Now you two both get out."
Watching him warily, the survivors edged rapidly around the far side of the room. Though they spoke threateningly, they were obviously frightened of the janitor.
"You’ll hear about this!" one of them squealed. "You’ll be sorry — ouch!" Burnfingers’s broom caught him across the seat of his jeans and lifted him a foot off the floor.
"We’re gonna tell, we’re gonna tell the supervisor!" its companion moaned as he retreated down the hall.
"Go right ahead. I’ll tell him you were operating in a restricted area." Burnfingers closed the door behind them. He put down the broom and entered the bathroom, smiling reassuringly. "It is okay now, little fella. You can come out. They are gone and will not come back soon."
A hesitant Steven peeked out, rubbing at one eye with a fist. "Thank you, Mr. Begay."
"Me, too," said Frank, holding out a hand to his son. "Thanks."
"You are welcome. They did not belong here doing what they were doing and they knew it."
Alicia was staring in amazement at the pile of ashes.
"Now maybe you folks ought to tell me what you are doing here," Burnfingers suggested.
"With pleasure." All suspicions gone, Frank proceeded to explain as best he was able.
7
Afterward, Burnfingers stood thinking for a long time. Then he muttered something angry in Navajo and gave the water bucket a kick that dented the metal.
"Wrong. All wrong. If you were not sent here, then you should not be kept here. They should confess a mistake has been made."
"But will they?" Alicia dared to sound hopeful. "If they don’t, is there anything you could do for us? You say they let you move about freely. Can you help us get away from here? Or maybe you could intercede on our behalf with whoever’s in charge."
Burnfingers shook his head. "He does not concern himself with small matters. In any case, you do not want to bring yourselves to his attention. One time I saw him, riding by in his limo, and even though I had a long hot way to travel I did not consider asking for a ride." He paused, added thoughtfully, "I had not really realized it until this minute, but I think I am tired of mopping floors. Some of the staff is okay, but your average demon or imp is a real slob. They just do not care about keeping things neat.
"I have accumulated enough gold here. With what I have acquired before, I think I have enough to do my work. So I suppose it is time to move on." He regarded them somberly. "Crazy I may be, but I still like my sleep. It is hard to sleep here, what with all the screaming of the Damned. If I agree to help you, then you must agree to trust me."
"Trust a crazy man?" Frank murmured.
"You will get out of here only by trusting someone crazy. But if you would prefer to rely on the kindly nature of the lieutenant and his advisors, I will not interfere."
Alicia clutched at her husband. "Frank, he can help us. Let him."
"I dunno." He stared at Burnfingers, who waited patiently. "We might be getting ourselves in deeper than we already are."
"You will find yourselves in deeper when they send you through the Gates to the First Level. Once past that point, nothing can help you."
"That lieutenant admitted we don’t belong here. Maybe when they finish checking their records they’ll just let us go."
Burnfingers nodded thoughtfully. "They might. But if they let you go, then they are going to have to fill out a big stack of special forms. They all hate paperwork. Just stopping you on the highway and bringing you in will tie up half a dozen
clerks for a week. Letting you go will mean ten times as much work. I do not remember it ever happening before. I admit that the lieutenant is not bad for a demon, but when he figures out how much extra work he is going to have to authorize to process a release, he may find it better to lose you in the shuffle. Hell is an easy place to lose people. After a week or so down on the Third Level or lower you will none of you be in any condition to think of filing a complaint or anything else. Think hard, friend. Do you really expect to receive justice here?"
"Frank, please, let’s do as he says." Alicia was pleading with him now. Her daughter joined in.
"Daddy, if he can get us out of this awful place, let him!" She was looking at the door. "I don’t want to have to see that creature again!"
His daughter’s stark terror convinced him. "Okay. We’ll take a chance on you, Begay."
The big man was pleased. "Good. It has been a while since anyone had to take a chance on me. You really have no other choice. If this is passed on to the higher-ups they will find a way to keep you here. A nice, contented middle-class family like yours would be a coup for the boss here. So if he finds out what’s going on here he’ll have you booted through the Gate and damn any subsequent difficulties."
"Can you do that trick with the water every time?" Alicia asked hesitantly.
"Those were just minor imps, class-four grade-school bullies. What I did was comparable to swatting a fly."
"Fire-breathing flies," Steven whispered to himself.
"A few of your major demonic personages, now, you toss a bucket of water in their direction and they’ll laugh and spit napalm back at you."
"Then how are you going to get us out of here?" Frank challenged him.
"How did you get in?"
"We’ve got a motor home." Alicia gestured indecisively behind her. "It’s parked out in front of the station. At least, it was."
"Don’t worry," Burnfingers told her. "They won’t bother it. They aren’t interested in machines unless they’re built in their own shops. Parked out front, you say? Since they have not figured out what to do with you yet, I am sure they have not figured out what to do with it. It should be as you left it." He placed his damp mop in its slot on the bucket cart. "Now, I want you all to follow me."
Frank put out a hesitant arm, felt it bounce off ribs that felt as if they were sheathed in stainless steel. "How can we do that? Maybe they won’t question your movements, but we’re not staff here. Surely they’ll stop us."
"They must see us first. Then someone must make a decision. The lower echelons shy from doing that because if they make a wrong one it can get them in trouble. Demons and imps have their own punishments." He nodded at the door. "My room is not far. There are a very few things I want to take with me. I do not plan on returning to this place. It may be that I am not breaking any rules by helping you, but I do not think it would be healthy for me to remain to find out."
He cracked the door. The hot air that came pouring in made Frank flinch.
"You folks are lucky," Burnfingers told them. "They turned up the air-conditioning for you."
"Air-conditioning?" Alicia whispered, crowding close to her husband. "It must be a hundred and twenty in here."
"Remember where you are, earth mother. For recreation some of the supervisors here put on winter clothes and go sandskiing in the Danakil Depression." He opened the door wider, peering out into the hall. "Not a busy day. We’re lucky. Keep close behind me, but act unconcerned. If we should pass anyone, appear resigned to your fate. Show any unease and you will be lost."
"Has anyone ever escaped from this place before?" Frank asked him.
"It is not common, but there are stories. Some years ago a minor trusty named Adolph tried to organize a big breakout. Only a few of his people made it and they returned here soon after. As punishment he spends Eternity cleaning bathrooms and waiting on tables in the Jewish section of Level Seven." He continued talking softly and urgently as he opened the door the rest of the way.
"Quickly now, before someone comes to check on you."
They exited into the stifling corridor and trailed Burnfingers closely. A minor female imp wearing the red-orange uniform of Administration appeared in a side corridor. She barely acknowledged Burnfingers’s existence, gave the family clustered close behind him a disinterested glance, and continued on her way.
Only when she’d turned a corner and vanished behind them did Burnfingers take a moment to explain her indifference.
"There is so much paperwork to keep up with, hardly anyone knows what the demon in the next cubicle is doing, let alone the ones in the next department. Act like you belong out here." For the second time his gaze locked on Mouse. "You aren’t part of this family, are you?"
"I was hitchhiking. The Sonderbergs were kind enough to offer me a lift. I am on my way to the Vanishing Point to try and regulate the Spinner before it allows the fabric of existence to unravel completely."
"Something to do with weaving, is it? You’ll have to tell me more. We Navajos make the finest rugs in existence, just the best there is. Especially the medicine rugs. I’ve seen some; a Two Gray Hills, a Seven Yeibichai, and a Teec Noc Pos, with plenty of the fabric of existence woven through them. Miracle Yazzie’s work would astonish you." He turned left up a cross corridor. "One of her medicine rugs had dancing figures in it that shifted whenever you looked away. By the time you looked back the pattern was different.
"But pure fabric of existence, without wool or cotton, that is something I have never seen. If it is coming apart and they find out who you are and what you intend, they will try to stop you. Such unraveling would inspire jubilation in this place."
"That’s what Mouse told us!" said Wendy in surprise.
Burnfingers Begay favored her with a wide smile. "All the more reason for helping you folks away from here."
"It’s nothing to do with us," said Alicia. "We’re just on our vacation."
"Not anymore, you’re not." Abruptly he halted and unlocked a door. "My room," he said helpfully.
Frank didn’t know what to expect. A simple bed, perhaps a table and chair, possibly even a rug of the type he’d described to Mouse. All those were present, and more, but what took everyone’s breath away was the vast and highly detailed work of art that occupied the whole far wall.
Rummaging through a box he extracted from beneath the bed, Burnfingers noticed their rapt stares and commented indifferently.
"Sand painting. My father taught me how to do them."
"It’s beautiful!" Alicia told him.
"Totally awesome," Steven added admiringly.
Burnfingers was filling a small backpack. "It gives me something to do in my spare time. One thing I have no trouble acquiring in this place is plenty of sand." He nodded in the painting’s direction. "But making the sand stay in place on a vertical surface, that is the real art."
Frank was confused. "You mean it’s not glued on?"
"No glue can last long here. It is a matter of placing the grains of sand one at a time and making sure the internal planes of the various crystals are correctly aligned."
That didn’t make sense, but Frank had no reservations about the painting itself.
Four lines radiated from a common center. These served to isolate yeibichais, plants, animals, and highly stylized representations of the forces of nature. Creatures and gods, lightning and stars, combined into an immense whirling shape on the wall. Though the figures were simplistic in design, the overall effect was quite awe-inspiring. It drew you into an alien but warm world.
Burnfingers frowned. "The lower right-hand corner has been giving me a lot of trouble, but it doesn’t matter now." He was watching Mouse as he explained. "That part contains a representation of Chaos. Not easy to paint."
"The Anarchis." Mouse sounded approving. "A most remarkable and revealing portrait. You are quite an artist, Mr. Begay." She stared at the intemperate mass of black and yellow sand that occupied most of the right-hand corner of the painting.<
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Burnfingers shrugged off the compliment. "When I don’t have time for making jewelry I like to play with sand. Keeps the fingers nimble. And the mind."
"What’s this?" Steven had walked around the foot of the bed to examine the painting more closely. Before Frank could stop him, the boy touched the portion of the painting that had piqued his curiosity.
A rush of wind blew through the room, unexpectedly cool in that hottest of regions. It was the kind of wind that caressed beaches and mountain buttes. On contact with Steven’s finger the entire intricate construction collapsed. Where an elaborate work of art had hung an instant earlier there was now only a blank wall with an uneven pile of multicolored sand heaped at its base.
Alicia’s hands went to her cheeks. "Oh my God."
"I’m sorry!" Steven stumbled backward. "I’m sorry, I’m sorry. I didn’t mean it."
"It doesn’t matter." Burnfingers smiled at him as he slung a battered canvas backpack over his shoulders. "We are leaving anyway. Sand paintings are not meant to be permanent. They are intended to instruct and reveal and entertain. The permanent ones you can buy in places like Arizona are for tourists to take home and hang on their walls." He put a comforting arm around the boy and hugged him. "When I have time I will make another, just for you. One you will be able to take to school to show your friends."
"Okay. Just as long as they don’t ask me what I did on my summer vacation." Steven managed a weak smile.
"That’s the spirit. You have quite a little fella here, Mr. Sonderberg. Right now he is a bit too much of a good thing, but I think that will change as he grows older.
"Come now." He led them to the door, checked the hallway beyond, and stepped out into the intense heat. Mouse followed, then the Sonderbergs. They left a small room occupied by simple furnishings and one collapsed painting of the entire universe.
"I hope this doesn’t make things worse."
Frank whispered to his wife, "What could be worse than this?"
She looked up at him out of doe eyes. "Fleeing police custody."
"I think you were right the first time, hon. We’re not gonna find much kindness and sympathy here."
To the Vanishing Point Page 12