Dreamfall (9 page)

Workers were still moving around the site doing the setup.
They all wore the same heavy maroon coveralls; they looked up at us as we
entered the camp, with nothing much in their eyes but dull resentment. I
wondered what they had to feel resentful about.

And there were more Tau vips waiting for us. That didn’t
seem to bother anyone except me, until Kissindre’s uncle stepped out of the
cluster of bodies. Sand was with him.

Perrymeade gestured at me. I glanced at Kissindre, saw the
surprise on her face, and then the confusion as he shook his head, signaling
her to stay where she was.

“What now—?” Ezra muttered behind me.

I started across the open ground toward Perrymeade and Sand,
not looking back, not looking ahead, either. I had no idea what they wanted; I
only knew that if they were here in person it had to be something I didn’t want
to know about.

“what?” r said to Perrymeade, barely able to keep my voice
even, with nothing left to make the word civil.

“ft’s about last night. The kidnapping,” he said, looking
like a man with a gun to his head.

I stopped breathing.
Shit.
I met his eyes, saw the
blank incomprehension as he registered what showed in mine. “Let’s get it over
with,” I muttered, feeling a dozen sets of eyes holding me in a crossfire.

“I thought you couldn’t do that,” he said.

“What?” I said again, probably looking as confused as he did
this time.

“Read minds. I thought you were dysfunctional.”

I felt the blood come back to my face in a rush. “I am. What
about it?”

“Then how do you know why we’re here?”

I shrugged. “Because it only makes sense that you’d want to
get rid of me.”

The look on his face got odder. “That’s not it at all,” he
said, and suddenly he looked relieved. “We want your help in dealing with the
kidnapper you encountered last night.”

“Jeezu—” I turned away, not sure whether it was relief or anger
that made my brain sing. I looked back at him. “Why?” I said. “Why me?”

“The Hydran Council is being ... uncooperative,” Sand answered.
‘We think maybe they’d talk to you, as 4n”—[s glanced at my eyes—“outsider.”

“A freak,” I said.

He shrugged.

“They all know that you were willing to help a Hydran woman
you thought was in trouble,” Perrymeade said, looking self-conscious.

“,She set me up. She used me. She thinks I’m stupid.”
She
knows what I am.
I shook my head. “I can’t do that. The Hydrans aren’t
going to trust me.”

“,I don’t have many options here,” Perrymeade said. ‘And unfortunately,
neither do You.”

Kissindre came up beside me. “Is there a problem?” she said,
matching the look on Perrymeade’s face as it turned to annoyance. she folded
her arms, standing on her own ground, the team leader and not the dutiful niece

“No problem,” I said, meeting Perrymeade’s eyes. “I’ve got
work to do.” I started to turn away.

“.Borosage has issued a deportation order on you,” Sand said
behind my back ... If you don’t cooperate, the Tau government will revoke your
work permit. You’ll be off this project and off the planet inside of a day.”

I turned back, slowly, and looked at them: sand with his inhuman
eyes, Perrymeade hanging on invisible puppet strings beside him.

“you miserable bastard,” Kissindre whispered, so far under
her breath that even I barely heard it. I wondered which one she meant; hoped
for her sake it was Sand. “What is this?” she asked. “Uncle Janos—?”

“It’s about the kidnapping.” I jerked my head at Sand. “They
want me to be their cat’s-Paw.”

Kissindre started, the only one of them who got the
reference.

“.Go-between,” Perrymeade said. “Our go-between with the
Hydrans, Kissindre. We’re not getting the cooperation we need from the Hydran
community to ... to rescue the kidnapped child. Under the circumstances, it
seems that Cat is the logical person to help us—the only person who might have
a chance of gaining the Hydrans’ trust or cooperation.” He turned back to me. “We
really need your help, son.”

“Right,” I said.

“Damn it! This is asinine—” Kissindre’s fists settled on her
hips as she looked from Perrymeade to Sand. “You brought us here to do work for
you. I thought that was important for Tau’s ‘rehabilitation.’ How in the nine
billion names of God are we supposed to do this work if you’re already
interfering with it?”

“Kissindre ...” Perrymeade said. He glanced at Sand too, as
if he wasn’t sure about what he was going to say next. “The kidnapped child is
your cousin.”

“What?” she said. “‘Who?”

“My nephew Joby. My wife’s sister’s son.”

“Joby? The baby, the one who was—” She broke off.

He nodded. “He was taken by the Hydran woman who worked as
his therapist. I set up the exchange program that gave her the training and put
her in that position.”

Realization filled her eyes. “My God,” she murmured. “Why
didn’t you tell me last night?”

He glanced at Sand again. “I didn’t even find out myself
until this morning.” His voice was even, but there was resentment in it. “This
whole situation is one that the Tau government wants played down, for ... a
number of reasons.” He glanced away again, not looking at any of us this time.
I followed his line of sight to the spot where the two Feds were standing, out
of earshot, listening to Ezra lecture them about the equipment. “But especially
because they believe the boy was taken by a radical group. His safety depends
on our keeping this quiet. If it becomes public knowledge, there could
be—incidents that would endanger Joby’s safety and hurt people on both sides of
the river.”

“And make the Feds ask questions you don’t want to answer,”
I said.

He frowned. “That is not the point.”

“Yes, it is. It’s keiretsu.”

“Don’t make judgments about situations you don’t understand,”
Sand said irritably. He turned back to Kissindre. “I am extremely sorry for
this intrusion. You will have no further interference from us, I promise you.
But your team will have to function without one of its members for now. Whether
that is a temporary or a permanent situation is up to him.” He bent his head at
me.

I scratched my face, winced. “So if I go, and I talk to the
Hydran Council, that’s it?” I glanced at Perrymeade, back at Sand. “If they won’t
deal with me, then you’ll leave me alone?”

Sand nodded.

I nodded, finally. ‘All right,” I said. I glanced at Kissindre.
“I’m sorr1r.”

She shook her head. “No. I’m sorry.” She looked at her
uncle; he looked down. I wondered what she was thinking as she walked away and
left us standing there.

Wauno raised his eyebrows as Perrymeade ordered him to take
us back to Tau Riverton. But he did it, not asking any questions. Maybe he was
more of a company man than I’d thought, or maybe he just didn’t give a damn.

When we were over Riverton again, Perrymeade gave Wauno an
address and told him to take us down.

“What are we doing?” I said. “I thought we were going to
meet with the Hydrans.”

“We’re making a stop here,” Perrymeade said, acknowledging
my existence for the first time since we’d gotten into the transport. “I want
you to meet the parents of the missing child.”

I stiffened. “You didn’t say anything about that.”

“I want you to meet my sister-in-law,” Perrymeade said. “I
want you to have some sense of who she is and what she’s been through.”

I felt my face flush. “No.” Wauno glanced back at us and
away.

“If you really understand what she’s going through, then it
will be easier for you to make the Hydrans understand it.”

“Or would you rather have us drop you at the Corporate Security
station for your escort off the planet?” Sand murmured. Wauno glanced back over
his shoulder again.

I folded my arms across my chest, my hands clenching on the
heavy folds of my jacket.

“I really hope we don’t have to do that,” Sand said.

I looked out the window and didn’t say anything.

Wauno landed us on a public access, and we got out. He
touched his forehead with his fingers in a kind of salute, nodding at me,
before he sealed the hatch again. I watched the transport rise out of reach and
disappear into the cold morning sky.

Perrymeade led the way across a perfectly landscaped
parkspace to a high-rise plex. Sand stayed a little behind me without seeming
to, ready to step on my heels if I lagged. I didn’t see a single piece of
litter or dog shit anywhere as we walked.

The residence complex reminded me of my hotel and every
other building I’d been inside of since I got here. Maybe it looked more
expensive. Before long we were standing in front of a door on an upper floor.
The security system took Perrymeade’s ID and let us in.

A small, neat, dark-haired woman met us inside. Her upslanting
brown eyes searched our faces, looking for something—a sign, hope. She didn’t
find it. Her own face was colorless where it wasn’t red and swollen, as if she’d
cried for a long time, recently. But she wasn’t crying now, and her face
settled into resignation. “Janos,” she said. “There’s no news.” It could have
been a question, an answer, or just something to say.

Perrymeade shook his head. “I’m sorry/, Ling.”

The woman seemed to recognize Sand. Her glance skittered off
his face, landed on me as Sand gave me an unobtrusive shove forward.

“So far the Hydrans have been ... reluctant to give us
information,” Perrymeade said, “if they actually have any to give. But we’ve
brought someone with us who may be able to help.” He nodded at me as another
man came into our line of sight. The man was tall and dark; he had on a
Corporate Security uniform. I froze, not sure whether he was supposed to be the
father or one of Borosage’s goons. But his uniform had different datapatches—he
was in plant security.
The father.
He put his arms around the woman. The
grief on his face matched hers.

They looked me over silently for some clue about what I was
doing here, until their combined gaze reached my face, registered my eyes. Then
they knew. The man shook his head. The woman’s mouth made a silent
oh.

In the space behind them I noticed five or six other people
watching, waiting—friends, or family, maybe. One of the women came forward,
touched Perrymeade’s arm, spoke to him. He nodded, distracted, and she moved
away again. She was small and dark-haired, with the same upslanting eyes as the
mother. I wondered if she was the woman’s sister, Perrymeade’s wife.

“This is Cat,” Perrymeade said. “He’s with the xenoarchaeology
team. He was the last person to see the kidnappers last night.” I realized that
what he meant was
the last human
“I thought I should bring you together
to ... share what you know about what happened.”

Sand gave me another hidden elbow; I had to move or fall
down. I took one painful step and then another into the home of the people
whose child I’d helped kidnap. I groped through my memories of last night in
Borosage’s interrogation room until I found their names. I seemed to remember
Ling and Burnell Natasa. Their son was Joby. I wondered whether Perrymeade had
forgotten to introduce them to me because he really was as worried about their
child as they were, or whether he was just being an inconsiderate shit. I
supposed it didn’t matter either way.

“Cat—?” the woman said dubiously, the way people usually
did.

I nodded, still not looking directly at either of them.

They led us into a large open room that looked out on sky
and parkland. Their other visitors didn’t follow. Everything in the room was
expensive, spotless, and perfectly matched to everything else. I settled into a
modular seat with its back to the view. The sight of so much open space made me
dizzy.

The parents sat down across from me, under a threedy screen
tuned to the endless drone of the Tau newscast. I wondered whether they
actually believed it would tell them something. The man ordered it off, and
suddenly the wall was a blank slate, white, empty. Sand and Perrymeade were
still standing at the limits of my vision, almost out of sight, but not out of
mind. I hugged my chest and waited.

“You saw Joby and ... and Miya last night?” the father
asked.

I made myself look into his eyes and nod.

“Where?” he asked when that was all I did.

“In Fre—in the Hydran town,” I said, not sure why just
saying that made my face burn.

“You have relatives there?” the mother asked me, as if she
thought that was why I could help them, or maybe because that was the only
reason she could imagine for anyone going to Freaktown.

“No,” I said, glancing away.

“Yes,” Perrymeade said. “In a sense ...” as I looked up at
him, frowning.

I looked down again, knowing that it was already obvious to
everyone here that I had Hydran blood.

“Did you try to stop her?” the father asked. “Did you see
our son? Was he all right—?”

Looking back at my memories, I realized the boy in her arms
could have been dead, for all I knew. But somehow I didn’t think so. “It was
dark. I saw them for less than a minute. It all happened so fast.” My hands
knotted together between my knees.

“He helped them get away from Corporate Security,” Sand
said.

“For God’s sake—” The father half rose from his seat.

I glared at Sand. “She said it was her child! She said they
were trying to take her child.”

“So you ... you believed you were helping her, then?” the
mother asked, her voice thready, her eyes intent.

I nodded, biting the insides of my mouth.

“Is that what Corporate Security thinks?” the father asked,
glancing from Perrymeade to Sand.

“They questioned him thoroughly.” Sand’s unblinking silver
eyes glanced off the scabs and bruises that had made half my face look like
some kind of bizarre cosmo job. Everyone’s eyes were back on me then. Suddenly
my face hurt.