On Fire

“Take that right! Yeah, that one. Okay?”

  Rashida is driving her beater van and taking directions from Kina, who is following a map on the van’s barely discernable electronic console.

  “Is that Bear Creek Road?” asks Rashida.

  “No, but it will get us there.” Kina says this with the assurance of someone who is rarely lost, let alone ever at a loss.

  They have just taken the Bayshore Freeway to San Jose and then the Santa Cruz Highway to south of Los Gatos, ascending into the Santa Cruz Mountains and past Lexington Reservoir. It’s late evening and the sallow autumn moon is crisscrossed by light tendrils of cloud. They are on a backwoods road rising and falling over rounded hills covered by second growth forest. A few open meadows border the narrow asphalt lane and a split rail fence runs along one side.

  The van is full of people. Aside from Rashida and Kina, there is Zak, Kim, Artie and Ethan. Ethan has heard about the Northern California Burning Man before and has joined because he wants to see the art that the event is known for. Everyone else is here to help Zak and Kim.

  “What did you say this gal’s name was?” asks Zak.

  “I didn’t,” returns Rashida. “By the way, I’m driving. Don’t distract me.”

  “Why is she going so slow?” asks Artie, annoyed.

  “It’s pretty dark, Artie,” volunteers Kim.

  Just as she says this they round a bend and see lights ahead. An LED lit balloon big enough to carry people beneath it in a basket rises into the sky a ways off. Strings of colored lights have turned the balloon into a huge billboard for Burning Man, one that can be seen miles away. The balloon disappears as the rode dips. They continue for another mile or two, the darkness lit by only a partial moon.

  “Is that an Indian?” asks Kina. “Oh, sorry Artie. A native American?”

  Down the oak lined road is a small wood cabin with a person standing out front near the road in traditional American Indian headdress. This person is wrapped in strings of tiny purple lights and is swinging a bright flashlight around in huge arcs. Behind him, lights are coming through the trees in what appears to be a large field beyond.

  “It’s a parking lot,” Kina announces authoritatively.

  “Is that a man or a woman?” asks Artie, perplexed.

  They close in on the figure, a woman with a set of horns and a headdress of wraithlike hair. She wears a leather bra and lapis lazuli studded jewelry around her neck and upper arms, a small leather skirt and sneakers. She flashes her light at them and points with it down the path between the trees, motioning them on.

  They take the direction and drop from a low hill onto a flat valley floor filled with endless rows of parking, punctuated with temporary street lights scattered here and there. A man in a uniform green shirt comes up to the driver’s window. Rashida rolls it down.

  “Hello Ma’am. Can I have your passes please?”

  Rashida grabs her phone, clicks up an app, and hands it to the man. Having contacted her performing friend, she had obtained last minute authorizations for her van full of people. The man hands back her phone and waves them on.

  “Does she know where we’re meeting her? Do we know where we’re meeting her, for that matter?” asks Kim.

  “She said to call her after we get here,” informs Rashida.

  Rashida follows the flashlight directions of the green shirted men until the line of cars they are following leads them to their pre-designated parking spot. Everybody piles out of the old white van to huddle around Rashida as she calls her friend. They can hear it ring and continue to ring, unanswered.

  “We might as well go on and catch up with her later,” says Zak.

  They fall in line behind others winding their way through the growing crowds toward the center of Burning Man. They pass large campgrounds that have been set up in a radial pattern arranged along the valley floor and gently sloping hillsides. The campgrounds are divided into tiny villages, each with its own signs, streets and utility managers. Kim and Zak’s group can see the many individual fires and lights spread throughout the area, twinkling through the evergreen trees. They smell food cooking and smoke from the fires. They can hear voices in the night, both nearby and far off, their sounds coming back to them on the breeze, echoing in the narrow valley.

  Finally the group hikes a steep rise. Ethan has gone ahead and is now standing transfixed at the top, looking down on the wide expanse of Burning Man. Everyone stops behind him, equally taken by the view. Light installations are scattered everywhere in the crowd, some on moving vehicles. In the center there are fire dancers and a forty foot stick figure of a burning man standing on a wood base. Nearby is a large wood temple.

  Ethan takes out his phone, about to take a picture, when Rashida stops him.

  “No pictures allowed.”

  His face is lit by the valley below and he looks sheepish.

  “Sorry. I forgot.”

  They look on in silence, the group they were a part of moving ahead and down the slope of the hill.

  “Why not?” asks Asobi, who sees this take place.

  “It’s private. Pictures would be too commercial. The Burning Man celebrates free expression and creativity, which they believe would be hampered or even destroyed by commercialization,” replies Rashida.

  “Maybe this would be a good place to try your friend again,” points out Zak.

  “Maybe,” says Rashida, pulling out her phone, clicking it, and holding it to her ear. She waits in silence, then waits some more. “Sorry, she still isn’t answering. I don’t know what she could be doing.”

  This time there is a hint of fear in Rashida’s voice and Kim notices it.

  “Look, she probably turned her phone off and forgot to turn it on,” Kim says supportively, trying not to sound concerned.

  “Yeah,” says Zak, “Let’s check it out. I’m sure we can find her somewhere.”

  Laid out on the downslope of the hillside on either side of the path are colossal carpets of glowing lights in Christmas color hues. They welcome the crowds coming down the hill from the campground and parking areas. Rashida, Zak, Kim, Artie, Ethan, Kina and Asobi wind their way down and are greeted by a carnival of ‘burners’. There are dancers, some in native American dress, others dressed and performing more as gymnasts, some in wild unpredictable outfits more like clowns, and yet others who are dressed in little or nothing. Capes, umbrellas, leather, strings of LEDs, helmets, gas masks, bras, shorts, and sneakers predominate.

  The group reaches the meadow and sees various geodesic structures and large scale sculptures of men and animals that tower over them, some turned into light installations, others made into objects on which performers carry out complicated maneuvers or dance. Wandering everywhere are art cars and ‘mutant’ vehicles, brightly lit traveling pastiches of lighted color made out in the shape of every kind of vehicle blown up to ten times normal size, a bus turned into a light show, a jeep into a Mad Max rover, a dump truck transformed into a spaceship.

  They are greeted by light installations that mimic a waterfall, create a forest of luminescent pillars, wave a field of yellow bobbing flowers, float a building sized aquarium filled with darting, irradiating fish. They stand in a circle of light between the lofty Burning Man construct and this year’s temple building, peering out in every direction without much idea who they are looking for.

  “Rash, this is crazy,” exclaims Kim, “Who are we looking for? Do you really know this person? Will you recognize her?”

  “Of course,” says Rashida, somewhat embarrassed and pulling out her phone, “Her name is Megan. Here.”

  They pass it around with its picture of Rashida’s friend, the one they are supposed to be looking for.

  “I tell you what. Why don’t we split up? We can stay in touch with each other and cover a lot more ground that way,” offers Zak.

  “I’ll head over to the creek,” says Artie, taking off quickly in that direction.

 
“I’m going with him,” says Ethan, sprinting after Artie.

  Kina and Asobi head out on their own, leaving Rashida with Zak and Kim.

  “What do you think your friend might be doing?” asks Kim.

  Kim is warm from the long hike into Burning Man, but just standing here she is quickly getting cold. She pulls her jacket from around her waist and puts it on.

  “I’ve been wondering that too. She is really into the native American thing.”

  “Let’s talk to them at the center of the camp,” Kim points to the area of tents nearby.

  They make their way around a large crowd focused on dozens of dancers performing around a bonfire encircled by vertical banners to the Center Camp tents. Kim stops an attractive young woman there.

  “Can you help us please? We’re looking for a friend. What did you say her name was?” she turns to Rashida.

  “Megan Palmer.” Rashida steps closer to the young woman.

  “Hi, my name is Judith,” the girl says, adjusting the vintage Russian military cap on her head and pointing at a name tag on her blouse. “Let me see.” She rifles through a sheaf of papers.

  “She’s a sweet girl. I don’t want her getting into any trouble on account of this,” Rashida says to Kim with a wince.

  “We understand. It’ll be okay,” Kim assures her.

  Judith suddenly comes up for air.

  “Got it! Your friend is exhibiting a natural kiva. It’s past the center that way,” the girl points. “Take the circle, go around, and there will be a path and a sign. It’s easy. You really can’t miss it.”

  “Thanks so much. You’re great,” Kim says gratefully.

  They set off and immediately run into a man making large soap bubbles.

  “Sorry,” says Zak.

  “No problem,” the man replies before bursting a gigantic bubble that releases a fine spray of soap onto everyone.

  Zak, Kim and Rashida walk cautiously around the outer edge of the esplanade, passing a number of fire dancers, including one man who spins a flaming rope. They give all the fire dancers, and there are many of them, plenty of room as they skirt the crowd. The path takes them away from the noisy crowd and into the darkness, the ground becoming dry as desert, strewn with rocks and boulders, rising up the side of a cliff. They see a few people standing ahead on a bit of a rise and join them. Kim asks a young girl in a black crop top, carrying a striped parasol, about a kiva. The girl points to a square opening in the ground nearby. Approaching it, they see light emanating and detect the faint scent of incense drifting up from below. A primitive wood ladder descends the opening.

  Zak turns to Rashida.

  “Would you like to go first?”

  Rashida laughs.

  “Not really, but I will.”

  She turns and backs her way down the ladder. Kim and Zak follow.

  “Hmmmmm,” goes the dancing dark haired woman in the center of the crowd. The room is lit by a small fire and many candles. The floor is dirt, the low walls are stone, the ceiling is polished roughhewn timber. They stand at the back. Kim engages a couple nearby in conversation and they speak in low voices.

  She nudges Zak and whispers to him, “It’s some kind of traditional dance. A ghost dance I guess.”

  “Must be for us then. We’ll be ghosts soon enough if she can’t help us.”

  Kim strengthens her grip on Zak’s his arm. She’s been pretty much attached to it the whole time they’ve been at Burning Man.

  “It’s a traditional dance. You don’t have to be a ghost to do it. Rather, the idea is to summon ghosts,” she replies. In the confines of the mystic, candlelit kiva she finds it’s not hard to imagine.

  “Whose ghosts?” he asks tongue in cheek.

  “Yeah” she returns, “You would ask that.”

  Rashida has sidled her way to the front of the group in an attempt to catch Megan’s attention. The dancer’s eyes are slits as she moves in various hypnotic ways imposed by the dance, but she is able to recognize Rashida and soon brings the performance to an early end. As she thanks the audience, she approaches Rashida.

  “We couldn’t reach you,” Rashida says accusingly as they embrace.

  Megan is flush from the dance. She is dressed in finely detailed, leather, native American clothes and jewelry. She takes her phone out of her pocket and turns it back on.

  “I’m sorry. I’ve been doing this all night. Obviously, I couldn’t have it on.”

  Megan wants to get into the open air to cool off so she takes Rashida’s hand and walks to the ladder. They meet Zak and Kim there.

  “Let’s get somewhere that we can talk,” Megan says to them.

  Megan climbs the ladder quickly, and the others follow. She takes them away from the crowd to a quiet alcove formed out of the cliff. Wisps of cloud have turned to cotton. The harvest moon and a bevy of stars in the night sky shine through them. A slight breeze turns the air cold.

  Megan looks from Rashida to Zak and Kim.

  “How can I help you?” Her voice catches. She is uncertain what this is about. If it weren’t for Rashida’s involvement there is no way she would entertain this.

  Kim takes the lead and explains something of what has brought them here and why they need to find UNK.

  “Can you help us?” Kim asks Megan as she finishes.

  It was a night two years ago that Rashida and Megan had been at a former roommate’s off campus apartment with a group of older students and significant others.

  “Come on. UNK is nothing more than a transnational outlaw group, nothing more than a disconnected group of worldwide hackers, no different than Anonymous. Heck, they probably are Anonymous,” said a bearded politico, himself a walking talking cliché of a poly sci pre-law student.

  “Anonymous has no leader. On purpose. But UNK does. It has a leader and the fact that UNK has leadership implies that UNK has organization, however mysterious. Whereas Anonymous is essentially anarchic. Organization implies purpose,” replies a tweedy middle-eastern intellectual with dark glasses.

  “Do you have any idea what you’re talking about?” asked Megan provocatively.

  The two debaters had looked at her nonplussed.

  “Like you do?” challenged the politico.

  “I lived in LA for a while,” replies Megan. “UNK does exist. There are people there, especially in entertainment, and these people have more than a passing interest in it.”

  “You mean that they are in UNK?”

  “Not in it. They just know a few things about it.”

  It was that exchange that Rashida had remembered, Megan is sure. Now Megan feels put on the spot.

  “Let’s go to center camp. They should be about to set Burning Man on fire.”

  Not sure if they are being put off or not, Zak and Kim follow Megan and Rashida back down the path and into the boisterous crowd. They call Artie and Ethan, Kina and Asobi, and ask to meet them at the top of the hill that takes them back to their car.

  There are over fifty thousand people near the center when a tremendous explosion occurs, followed by individual fires around the base of the very tall figure of the Burning Man. Soon it too is burning, flames racing up its wooden frame and vaulting into the sky toward the partial moon. It’s heat soon envelops the crowd, dispelling the night’s chill.

  Megan pulls on the sleeve of Zak’s coat, making him bend down to hear her above the noise of the crowd.

  “I was working as an actress in Los Angeles and on a particular film in which I had a small part. I came to know some of the production staff and the director. We were shooting long days. Everyone got to know each other pretty well. This director, he was the outspoken type. He was really opposed to the anti-expressionists. They would talk about UNK. There were some who said they knew people in UNK, but they were probably full of it. I could tell he thought they were stupid and foolish. I became convinced he knew much more than he was willing to talk about, so one d
ay I asked him directly about it.”

  “And what did he say?” asked Zak.

  “He said that it exists. He said to me, ‘that is all you need to know’.”

  “All you need to know? What did he mean by that?”

  “I have no idea. Aren’t all film directors weird and a little hard to understand? But I think he would know who to contact. Adam Sykes. The last I knew he lived in Holmby Hills just outside LA.”

  Zak looks up to see the Burning Man and the huge wooden structure on which it stands become thoroughly engulfed in flame, creating a roaring vortex of fire so white hot it becomes a twisting plasma before it soars away in the night sky. The crowd roars approvingly back at Burning Man their expression of modern angst.

  Chapter 34