Dreamer

by Steven Harper

  “Deal,” she said with a forced smile. “What’d you learn?”

  Fen matched her smile. “Vidya Vajhur was a cattle farmer. She was actually born on Earth, though her parents emigrated to Rust when she was a toddler. She married a man named Prasad Vajhur. You’ll notice ‘Dasa’ is part of ‘Prasad’ spelled backward.”

  Ara nodded.

  “Anyway, the full records of her farming survived Annexation, but they’re pretty boring reading. How about I hit a few high points and you tell me if you want more detail, all right?”

  Ara got the feeling Fen was enjoying stretching this out. “All right.”

  “Vidya Vajhur was under contract to breed Silent children for the Unity.”

  “What?”

  “Well, her contract wasn’t originally with the Unity,” Fen amended. “It was with a company called Silent Acquisitions, Limited. They traffic in Silent slaves.”

  “I’ve heard of them,” Ara said, trying to regain her composure. “Dreamers, Inc. is a paragon of virtue compared to them.”

  “According to their medical records,” Fen said, “any child Vidya and Prasad had would be Silent, and they apparently negotiated a contract with Silent Acquisitions just before the Unity came. After the Annexation, the Unity took over the contract. Vidya and Prasad produced and gave up two healthy babies, fulfilling their contract.”

  “How could she do such a thing?” Ara blurted. “I’ve heard of it, of course, but I can’t sympathize.”

  Fen shrugged. “No idea. Anyway, a year after that, records show she had a third child, a daughter. Silent, of course.”

  “And?” Ara prompted.

  “Here’s where records get spotty. Katsu—the daughter—disappeared when she was barely a year old. A guard report lists her as kidnapped, presumed dead. When she was ten, Katsu would have been taken to be raised in Unity service, of course, and the guard assumed the kidnaping was staged as a way for Vidya and Prasad to keep her hidden somewhere. But the report lists the case as closed, with a link to another report.”

  “Another report?”

  “The next day, Vidya reported Prasad as missing. And that is the last record I could find of Vidya Vajhur anywhere.”

  Ara chewed her lower lip. “It looks to me like Prasad ran away with Katsu.”

  “He got away with it, too.”

  “And then Vidya decided to disappear as well,” Ara said, thinking aloud. “But why? She hadn’t done anything wrong.”

  “Maybe she wanted to escape further scrutiny,” Fen ventured. “The Unity was probably pressuring her to ‘confess’ to the whole thing when actually Prasad took off and left her holding the bag.”

  “Possible,” Ara conceded. “She then moves to another part of the city and changes her name—not too hard with so many records damaged or destroyed in the Annexation. Now she can start over free and clear.”

  “With her son Sejal.”

  Ara thought for a moment. “Fen, when was Sejal born in relation to Prasad’s disappearance?”

  Fen glanced at something in front of him. “Eight months afterward. Ah! There it is.”

  “Yes.” Ara nodded. “Vidya was already pregnant again when Prasad vanished. She made herself disappear because she knew the child would be Silent and that the Unity would take him away. She didn’t want to lose him like she’d lost her husband and first three children.”

  “Except,” Fen said, raising a finger, “I have Sejal’s medical history here. She couldn’t avoid doctors completely, and his gene scans indicate he is not Silent.”

  Ara had to force herself not to jump to her feet. “What? I thought you said any child Vidya and Prasad had would be Silent.” Her mind raced. If Sejal wasn’t Silent, how had he possessed people? Had Kendi been wrong?

  “Obviously Prasad isn’t Sejal’s father.”

  “Or someone changed the records. Or bribed the doctor.”

  Fen shook his head. “Extremely doubtful. Those records are strictly guarded. The best hackers on the planet couldn’t touch them. I also doubt Vidya could come up with a bigger bribe than the bonus doctors get for discovering Silent children.”

  “You have a point,” Ara conceded. “It’s a puzzle, though. Can you netmail me copies of what you found, Fen?”

  “Already did,” Fen answered. He leaned forward again, an anticipatory look on his face. “Now, tell me what you want all this for. You promised to explain later. It’s later.”

  There was a hint of whine in his voice that suddenly annoyed Ara terribly. She wanted to comb Fen’s records herself and set Ben to finding what Fen had missed. She wanted to find Sejal and talk to him face-to-face. But Fen was staring at her from the viewscreen.

  “I’m trading in genetics,” she said. “Viable embryos and such. Vidya and Sejal seem to be prospects.”

  Fen whistled. “The paperwork on that must take you months.”

  “It does,” Ara said shortly. “But it’s high profit, low volume. Can’t ask for more. Look, Fen, I have to—”

  “This wouldn’t also have anything to do with that Silent everyone’s talking about around here, would it?”

  Cold goosebumps rose on Ara’s neck. She went stock-still. “What Silent?” she asked casually.

  Fen folded his arms. “The one they’ve posted a big reward for. Haven’t you been watching the news?”

  “No,” Ara said faintly. “I haven’t had time.”

  “There’s a powerful rogue Silent somewhere on Rust,” Fen said. “And the Unity wants him. Bad. Problem is, they don’t know what he looks like, or even if it’s a he. All they know is that he’s young and he’s somewhere on Rust. And now you’re here sniffing around this boy Sejal Dasa. A connection?”

  Shit shit shit. Ara struggled to remain calm. “Coincidence, Fen. You just told me yourself Sejal isn’t Silent. I’m interested in his genetic potential.”

  “I see.” Fen’s tone made it clear he didn’t believe her. Ara’s heart lurched. Would he turn her in? She couldn’t leave Rust without Sejal. And time was growing short. They had to get Sejal off Rust, and fast.

  “Look, Fen, I have to go,” she told him. “What you told me about Sejal and Vidya changes things, and I have people to contact. I really appreciate your help.”

  “So when do we take our walk?”

  Ara blinked at him. “Walk?”

  “On the seapad. Remember? My price for helping you? How about tomorrow?”

  Ara felt genuinely flustered. Not because Fen was pressing her for a romantic interlude, but because of its timing. So much was happening now and so quickly, the question felt out of place. Once she got Sejal on board, Ara intended to hurl the ship into slipspace as soon as humanly possible.

  So promise him, she told herself. Even assuming you’re around long enough for him to cash in on it and if he lays a hand on you, all you have to do is give him one hard push and he’s sea monster meat.

  “Tomorrow it is,” Ara agreed. “Why don’t we meet at the restaurant at seven?”

  A huge smile spread across Fen’s wizened face. “See you then. Glory to the Unity.” And he signed off.

  Ara was getting immensely tired of that phrase.

  “Peggy-Sue,” she said. “Open intercom to Ben Rymar. Ben, can you raise Kendi?”

  “I’m not on the bridge, Mother,” Ben replied. “Let me get up there first.”

  Ara sat back and thought while she waited. Stress tugged at her gut, but she pushed it firmly aside. They were doing all they could to find Sejal, and the Children still had the best chance of getting to him first.

  Vidya “Dasa” Prasad had voluntarily given up her children. Ara shook her head. How could she do such a thing? Unbidden, Ara’s mind flicked back to Ben’s implantation. Five years after Benjamin Heller’s death, Ara had become aware of a growing desire—need—for a child. She had told herself she was being ridiculous. She was Mother Araceil Rymar of the Children of Irfan, youngest person ever to attain that title, with a clear shot at also being the youngest t
o make Mother Adept. She was powerful in the Dream, had personally taught half a dozen students, was a widely-recognized expert in transcendental morphic Dream theory. Her life was full, she was busy, her friends and students loved her. She didn’t need anything.

  But Mother Araceil Rymar of the Children of Irfan wanted a baby.

  Still, Ara put off the idea another year, until a casual conversation with Mother Adept Salman Reza, Ara’s own mother, changed her mind.

  “I don’t need a baby right now,” Ara complained. “But—oh, Mother—I want one like you wouldn’t believe.”

  “Well that’s the key right there,” Salman said. “Those who need children make poor parents. Those who want them make fine ones.”

  It seemed as if the universe were siding with Ara’s mother. Two days later, Ara and her compatriots were encased in vacuum suits, inspecting a derelict ship they had found while tracking down rumors of an illegal Silent slave ring. The ship orbited the moon of a gas giant and appeared to have taken heavy damage in a firefight. It was Ara’s guess that the ship had been transporting Silent slaves and had run afoul of other pirates. The ship was completely empty. Cargo and crew had either been evacuated, captured, or blown into space. Ara had just been about to leave the cargo hold when she came across a star-shaped metallic object the size of a basketball. It lay forgotten in a corner. She caught her breath, recognizing it as a cryo-module for embryos. The readout said they had been frozen in the same year Benjamin Heller had died.

  Back on her own ship, a medical scan revealed that the module contained eighty-seven embryos, a dozen of which were still viable, and all of which carried the genes for Silence. Grandfather Melthine, Ara’s superior, was uncertain what to do with the embryos once Ara returned with them to Bellerophon. They could not be placed in artificial wombs and grown to maturation—it was well established that Silent fetuses invariably withered and died under such conditions. And were they Silent children waiting to be born, or simple clumps of cells? Hundreds of years of debate hadn’t changed—or solved—the issue. In the end, Melthine ordered the embryos placed in storage until someone could come up with a solution he liked.

  Ara decided to end the debate for at least one embryo.

  “Do you want a daughter or a son?” asked the doctor on the day of implantation.

  “Let the universe decide,” Ara replied, and grinned as the doctor dramatically covered his eyes with one hand and plucked a tube from the module. Nine months later, Benjamin Rymar was born, red hair, blue eyes, and all. Ara held him tight and whispered happy greetings in his tiny ear.

  As time passed, Ara discovered motherhood wasn’t exactly what she had expected. In some ways it was more, and in other ways it was less. She exchanged field work for teaching and was surprised at how little she regretted it. There was laughing and singing, night feedings and toilet training, sleepovers and bullies. Ben’s speech developed late, as was expected of a Silent child, but Ben’s tenth birthday came and went, and Ben showed no awareness of the Dream, no ability to hear the little whispers from the minds that created it. A worried Ara ordered batteries of tests. The monks who conducted them, however, could only shake their heads. Genetically Ben was Silent, but some unknown factor of environment kept him from expressing that trait.

  Guilt had weighed Ara down for months. Had she done something wrong while she was pregnant? Was it something she had done or said to him? In the end, she’d been forced to accept that there was no way to tell. For all she knew, it was a side-effect of being frozen as an embryo for so many years. She supposed that it didn’t really matter. Ara wouldn’t have traded Ben for a truly Silent child, nor would she have given him up. Not after she had fought so hard to have him in the first place.

  So how could Vidya give her babies to the Unity? And would her history make her easier or harder to persuade? The memory of a crackling energy whip played across Ara’s mind, and she had the sinking feeling it would be harder.

  CHAPTER NINE

  PLANET RUST

  The policeman and the terrorist are birthed from the same womb.

  —Anonymous

  Kendi burst into the hotel lobby barely thirty seconds ahead of the guard. The desk clerk, a short man with a horsey face, looked up, startled.

  “What room is the hustler in? The kid with blue eyes,” he snapped.

  “Uh—”

  “There’s a raid right behind me,” Kendi said. “What room?”

  The clerk was already heading for the back door. “Room one-oh-two,” he called over his shoulder. Then he was gone.

  Kendi dashed for the hallway. He had reached the door to the first room when the front door smashed open and armed guard poured into the lobby. “Everybody freeze!” one shouted. Kendi kept on moving.

  Room 102 was only a few steps further up the hall. Without stopping, Kendi rammed his shoulder into the door. The cheap plastic gave with a crack like a gunshot. Kendi stumbled into the room. Inside, Sejal jumped away from the woman he had entered the hotel with. They were standing next to the sagging bed. The woman’s blouse was open, and she yanked it shut with an outraged screech.

  “The guard’s right behind me,” Kendi gasped. “We have to get out!”

  Without a word, Sejal rushed to the grimy window. It wasn’t made to open. Footsteps and shouts rumbled from the hallway.

  “Who the hell are you?” the woman demanded. She was in her thirties, with brown hair and eyes. Kendi ignored her and snatched up a lamp, intending to smash the window with it.

  “Freeze!”

  Two guards framed the shattered doorway, one leveling a pistol, the other pointing a camera. It flashed just as Kendi flung the lamp at them. The guard fired just as the lamp struck his arm. Energy cracked through the air and burned a hole in the wall. The smell of burnt aerogel filled the room. Sejal didn’t move. The guard with the camera abruptly balled up a fist and socked his partner on the jaw. With a startled grunt, the man went down. The woman screamed again.

  Still operating on autopilot, Kendi kicked the window as hard as he could. The tough plastic cracked. One more kick and it shattered. Sejal dove out of the room. Kendi followed. If the woman wanted to follow suit, that was her business. Kendi refused to worry about her.

  The alley behind the hotel was dark and smelly. Kendi wondered if every alley in the Unity was the same as he and Sejal scrambled to their feet and sprinted for all they were worth. They emerged from the alley and threaded their way through the market crowd. After a few meters, Kendi grabbed Sejal’s shirt.

  “Slow down,” he hissed.

  Sejal obeyed, and the crowd obligingly closed around them. Without hurrying or looking back, Kendi strode briskly up the street, towing Sejal with him. After he was sure they weren’t being followed, he hauled Sejal into a restaurant and sat him down in a booth.

  “Hey!” Sejal growled. “Just who the hell do you think—”

  “I think,” Kendi growled back, “that I saved your ass. Twice. And I think that means you owe me some of your precious time. Or do you want to complain to the guard?”

  Sejal said nothing.

  “All right.” Kendi settled back into his chair, trying to get his pounding heart back under control and folding his arms across his chest so his hands wouldn’t shake. He had acted purely on impulse, and only now were the possible consequences catching up with him. If he had been caught, he’d have been thrown back into Unity prison. The memory of a writhing figure and a muffled scream flashed through his mind, and he shoved them away.

  “So what do you want?” Sejal asked warily.

  “A beer,” Kendi muttered, and punched up the table’s menu. He ordered the first alcoholic beverage that appeared under his fingertips, and sweetened kelp juice for Sejal. “Look, Sejal—”

  “How do you know my name?”

  “We talked to your mother.”

  Sejal leaned across the table. “You stay the hell away from my mother,” he hissed. “Lay one finger on her and I’ll cut off your—” />
  “Hey, I’m on your side,” Kendi interrupted. “Look, let’s cut the tough street kid act. If anyone asks, I’ll tell them you flashed a knife at my balls, all right?”

  Sejal grudgingly leaned back again.

  “All I want to do is talk,” Kendi continued. “I have some questions.”

  “Like what?” Sejal asked warily.

  “Did you possess those cops in the alley? And the one in the hotel?”

  Sejal’s blue eyes shifted. He didn’t answer.

  Kendi sighed. The kid was distrustful, but probably with good reason. He glanced around. The booth afforded them a certain amount of privacy, and there weren’t any other patrons within hearing range.

  “Look,” Kendi said, “I’m not a Unity guard or a spy or a slaver. My name is Kendi Weaver. I’m a Child of Irfan.”

  “Who’s Irfan?” Sejal asked.

  “We’re an order of monks.” Kendi met Sejal’s gaze square on, willing himself to look trustworthy and honest. “We find people who are Silent and we train them.”

  A strange looked passed over Sejal’s face. “I’m not Silent. I was tested for it at birth.”

  “Sejal, only the Silent can possess other people like—well, not like you do, but similar to the way you do.”

  “I’m not Silent,” Sejal repeated stubbornly.

  “Listen.” Kendi leaned forward. “Do you sometimes hear voices whispering at you? Voices you can’t quite hear?”

  Sejal’s eyes went wide. “How did you know that?”

  “When you dream at night, is it sometimes so real, you wake up and it feels like you’re still dreaming?”

  “Yes,” Sejal almost whispered.

  “You’re Silent.”

  Sejal bit his lip. The shifty arrogance had left his face and he looked like a frightened twelve-year-old instead of a streetwise teenager. “The Unity ran tests when I was born. If I was Silent, I’d be a slave right now.”

  Kendi held a hand out over the table. “Try this,” he said.

  Looking even more bewildered than ever, Sejal took Kendi’s hand. A jolt banged through Kendi’s arm and crashed down his spine. Sejal gasped and yanked his hand away. Kendi sat stunned. A serving tray scuttled up to the booth and placed their drinks on the table. Both Sejal and Kendi ignored them.