Steven Harper - Dreamer

“Doesn’t she pay access charges for the network?” Ara asked. “What about utility bills?”

Fen shook his head. “Network and utilities are part of her rent. If she logs onto the nets, she does it with a pseudonym that I haven’t been able to track. I’d say she’s going out of her way to make herself as invisible as possible. And there’s more.”

“What?”

“I said there isn’t a record for her that goes back further than sixteen years. This isn’t too unusual. The Unity annexed Rust twenty-odd years ago, and a fair number of records were partially wiped or destroyed during the…transition.”

Nice way to put it, Ara thought sarcastically.

“However, Vidya is an unusual name, so I ran it. Twenty-eight women, counting your Vidya, are or have been registered on Rust with that name. All but five have continual records that go back before the Unity Annexation. One of those five is listed as no longer living on Rust. Two of the five are listed as dying several years after Vidya Dasa’s earliest record, so they aren’t her unless your Vidya kept up a double life. One more of the five Vidyas was sold into slavery and her current owner is still paying taxes on her. The fifth one-Vidya Vajhur-disappears from all records about seven months before Vidya Dasa pops up.” Fen leaned forward. “It looks like Vidya Vajhur decided to disappear and become Vidya Dasa. She kept her original first name, I think, in case she ran into someone who knew her. It’s easy to explain a change of last name, but a change of first name is more awkward.”

Ara flashed back to the time she ran across Chin Fen in the registry office and the relief she felt that Ben hadn’t changed her first name for her forged Unity paperwork. For a dreadful moment she thought Fen was on to her, but she quickly discarded the idea. If Fen knew she was a spy, he would have reported her by now.

“I can see that,” Ara said aloud. “Do you know why she changed her name, if that’s what she did?”

Fen hesitated. “I’m not sure,” he said, reluctant to admit that he had failed on this point. “But I can tell you more about Vidya Vajhur. She’s a lot more interesting than Vidya Dasa.”

He paused, and Ara, restraining her impatience, gestured for him to continue.

“It’s going to cost you,” Fen said slyly.

Alarm bells went off in Ara’s head, but she kept her face calm. “Fen,” she said carefully, “I’m doing all right, but I’m not rich. I can probably come up with-”

“Not money,” Fen interrupted. “Time.”

“Time?”

“On a seapad leaf.” Fen grinned mischievously. “I’ll tell you what I found if you agree to one walk at sunset on a seapad leaf. Deal?”

Ara tapped her feet on the floor. She hadn’t expected this, not from Chin Fen. Did he have a backbone after all? Ara thought a moment. Fen was trying to order her around, and that really rankled. She didn’t really need Fen’s information at this point, now that she had what was probably Vidya’s real name. Ben could probably learn more than Fen had. On the other hand, using Fen to search didn’t carry a prison sentence, and it really wouldn’t do to waste what had turned out to be an excellent contact within Rust’s bureaucracy.

“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.