The Vault of Dreamers (17 page)

“There was too little. I told you. Send more next time.”

“You’re impossible. I swear. Do you remember what we said before, about trust?” Dean
Berg said.

The woman laughed. “I do love it when you get righteous. How does the minister’s daughter
like her seed?”

“I don’t seed my patients,” Dean Berg said.

“Don’t you mean your
students
?” she said. “Come on, Sandy. This is me you’re talking to. When are you going to
realize you have a gold mine right there already? Forget clinical medicine. Go for
the entertainment potential. You could rake it in if you let a couple of us dabble
in seeding your students. To watch them live it out! I know a guy or two who would
get a real kick out of playing god. You can’t keep all the fun for yourself.”

“You know the problem with you, Huma?” Dean Berg said. “You think everyone else is
as ruthless as you are. Stick to the dead and leave the living to me.”

“My clients aren’t dead,” she said. “And you’re no one to talk.” Her humor was gone.

The voices were fading, and I didn’t hear Dean Berg’s reply. I tried shifting the
walkie-ham to bring them in clearer.

“I need more of the Lo Eight,” said the woman. “We’ve had some very nice results with
that and I could use a fresh batch.”

“How nice?” Dean Berg asked.

“Nice enough. I’m getting more inquiries than I can possibly keep up with. I’m having
to turn people away. It’s tragic. Please tell me you’re at least reading your students
for potential mining. Give me that much.”

“We do read the students,” Dean Berg said. “I’ll concede that. But only to learn from
their healthy minds. Nothing else. Their dreams, as you can imagine, are exquisite.”

“See? Was that so hard? I could help you so much if you’d just confide in me.”

Then the voices were gone. I tried the channels again, anxious to hear more, but however
the walkie-ham picked up the rogue signal, it wasn’t under my control. It killed me
not to know more about the mining and seeding they’d discussed. Who was Huma? I couldn’t
even be sure I’d heard her name right.

Frustrated, I dialed back to channel four.

I did know that the minister’s daughter had to be Janice. And he was reading us, whatever
that meant. The dean was studying our minds. I found that ridiculously exciting. And
terrifying.

“Are you there?” a voice asked.

I clenched the walkie-ham to my ear. “Linus?” I asked.

“I thought you’d be asleep by now,” he said.

I smiled into the darkness. “I’m not.”

14

WALKIE-HAMS

I CLICKED THE
button to keep our channel open.

“I tried to reach you from home, but I got no signal,” he said. “I’m in the lookout
tower. You should see these stars.”

I rolled to look out my window, seeing just enough sky over the dark tree branches
to tease me.

“Are you still upset about Paige and the face app?” I asked. I curved my hand around
my mouth and pitched my voice barely above a whisper.

“Guys don’t get
upset
,” he said. “Besides, you were right. It wasn’t really your fault. Gorge on Forge
took down the footage of me, for what that’s worth. Are you awake every night?”

“Yes. Since the fifty cuts. I skip my pill.”

“You know that defeats the whole purpose, right?” he said. “I mean, it’s great to
be able to talk to you, but you have to sleep for your creativity to get the full
effect.”

“I know that’s what they say, but I’m not so sure that’s the reason. Why did you say
that thing about how I’m safe as long as I stay in bed?”

“Because students who leave their beds get sent home,” he said. “I don’t want that
happening to you.”

But I’ve been out of bed,
I thought.

Around me, the faint blue glow of my sleep shell had its familiar, surreal shimmer.
I moved my fingers before my face, watching the black tracks that followed in the
air.

“You haven’t been sneaking out, have you?” he asked.

“No,” I lied quickly, shielding my mouth again. “But strange things have been happening
here. I saw them giving Janice an IV in her sleep a few nights ago. Sunday night,
I guess. She was having some kind of seizure. Dr. Ash told me later that they put
in IVs just as a safety precaution, but I don’t believe her. Last night, they took
Paige out of the room in her sleep shell, and I’m pretty sure they took me out, too.”

“You don’t remember?”

“I was asleep again. A man came in and gave me more sleep meds, intravenously. And
my sleep shell wasn’t in the same place this morning.”

“You’re sure?” he asked.

“Positive,” I said. “I’m not imagining these things. And just tonight I overheard
a very, very weird conversation between Dean Berg and some woman through my walkie-ham.”

“Weird how?”

“They were talking about mining and seeding people.”

“Mining people?” Linus’s voice lifted. “Are you sure they said that?”

“Why? Do you know what that means?”

Linus didn’t answer.

I curled my face into my pillow again, keeping the walkie-ham under my quilt. “Seeding
somebody sounds so evil,” I said. “Like they’re planting something inside. Mining
sounds even worse.”

A distant beeping sound came over the walkie-ham, like a truck backing. Linus still
didn’t reply.

“Linus? Are you there?”

“I’m just trying to think,” he said. “It doesn’t make sense. There’s no way Dean Berg
could be mining or seeding people. That isn’t even real.”

“What is it?”

“It’s a scam,” Linus said. “I heard about it back in St. Louis, when I sold my blood.
This quack at the Annex said he could mine people’s dreams and seed them into someone
else, like a drug, for a high. He was always looking for donors.”

“But it wasn’t real?”

“Of course not,” he said. “It was just a way to get guys unconscious. He always picked
young boys. They’d be gone all night and come back the next morning with a wad of
cash.”

I listened uneasily. “You never went, did you?”

“No. I didn’t have anything to do with it.”

“What is this Annex place?” I asked.

“It’s a sort of emporium where you can buy anything you want.”

“Anything like drugs?”

“Drugs. Sex. Guns. Planes. Body parts for surgeries. Private islands. It’s a kind
of exchange. You’ve heard of those places.”

I had, but I’d thought they were all at the Canadian and Mexican borders, not in St.
Louis.

“Did you work there?” I asked.

“No,” he said. “I was a kid. I just sold blood there.”

“Your own?”

He laughed. “Yes. Who else’s?”

I didn’t know, anymore. He knew all about a world I’d only vaguely been aware of.
“Is that where you were photographed?”

“You really want to know?” he said.

“Not if you don’t want to tell me.”

A little clicking noise came from his end, like he was tapping something, and then
he spoke. “It started a couple months after I ran away from my last foster home. A
man came to the park and said he was looking for swimsuit models. He hired me and
a couple of the other guys a few different times.”

“That’s all?”

“It was a little creepy, but he never touched me. He would just tell me politely to
turn my head or lean back or whatever.”

“Weren’t you scared?” I asked.

He laughed. “I was hungry. I didn’t know any better.”

It sounded awful to me. “I can’t believe you went back more than once.”

“No?” Linus was quiet a moment. “I did a lot of dumb things before Otis found me.
I’m probably lucky to be alive.”

That I believed.

“How did you meet Otis?” I asked.

“He came to the Annex to pick up some blood for Parker, his partner, and he tracked
me down. Parker has Alzheimer’s, and Otis likes to give him transfusions of young
blood. He says it stimulates him, and he seems to think Parker responds better to
my blood than the generic pints.”

“I didn’t know there was any difference in blood, beyond the basic types.”

“I didn’t either,” Linus said, and laughed. “My guess is Parker just happened to have
a good day after one of my pints. It makes him happy, though.”

“Otis?”

“Both, I guess.”

“So, wait,” I said. “Did Otis bring you here so you could keep donating blood for
Parker?”

“It’s my rent,” Linus said.

I wasn’t certain I’d heard right. “Your what?”

“I pay my rent with my blood. I know. It sounds strange, but it works.”

I tried to imagine Linus living in a household with old Otis and his partner with
Alzheimer’s. “Are they your family now?” I asked.

Linus was quiet for a moment. “I don’t know what family is anymore.”

A stillness spread through me, a quiet more lonely and sad than I’d let myself feel
in a long, long time. I wished I could reach through the walkie-ham and touch him.
You have me,
I thought, but I couldn’t say it out loud.

“I think family starts small,” I said.

He laughed. “You’re probably right.”

I closed my eyes, trying to picture him in the top of Otis’s tower. “It will be strange
seeing you in the day and not being able to talk openly,” I said.

“We have to remember to act like we haven’t had this conversation,” Linus said. “Technically,
you haven’t heard about Parker, or dream mining, or my fun times in St. Louis.”

“Good point. I’ll try to keep it shallow,” I said. I curled my knees up and shifted
more comfortably. “Can you tell me one more thing?”

“Sure.”

“Why were you in Dean Berg’s rooms last night?”

“How did you know about that?” he asked.

“I saw you through the window,” I said. “I can see Dean Berg’s penthouse from my dorm.”

The tapping came again before he spoke. “I wanted to know if I could become a techie.”

That was the last thing I’d expected. “Really?”

“They’re paid well,” Linus said. “I don’t have the background for it, but he told
me he’ll think about it. I might have to go to university for a few years first.”

“That’s good, right?”

“It’s just complicated. I’ve been saving up, but still I don’t have much. I’d need
my GED.”

“You could get that,” I said.

“Right.” He paused. “This is your fault, you know.”

“Why?”

“You and your dreams,” Linus said. “You asked me about going home to Wales. It started
me thinking about what it would take to actually get there.”

I wanted to jump in and cheer him on. He could totally make it. But something in his
voice warned me not to overdo it. Instead, I said, “Hope is a weird thing.”

“Yes, it is,” he said.

I pictured him in the tower, still gazing out at a sky full of stars. I found the
brightest star in my window and fixed my eyes on it.

“You want to know something?” he asked.

“Sure.”

He spoke quietly, as if divulging a secret. “When I first saw you? I thought you were
too good for this place.”

I couldn’t figure out why he’d think so. “You mean that morning, behind the art building?”
I asked. “You didn’t even like me.”

“No. Before that, when you first came to campus with the other new students,” he said.
“You were different from the others. You kind of kept to yourself, watching everyone,
and you hardly ever smiled. But you were polite, too. You thanked me for carrying
your duffel.”

“I did?”

I hadn’t even noticed Linus then. That first day, I’d been so awed just to be at the
school. I had been so conscious of the cameras, and so nervous about doing the wrong
thing. I wished I had paid attention to him. We might have become friends sooner.

“You’re still too good for this place,” he said.

“Go on,” I said, smiling.

“I mean it. Don’t forget that, Rosie,” he said. “Sweet dreams.”

15

THE NOOSE

A SEA OF
distinct, blueberry-like droplets of water is steadily rising, overlapping the dock
where I stand. Above, the sky is a noxious violet. I’m barefoot on the planks, trying
to retreat, but the strange water droplets lap up to clutch at my ankles, pinning
me, and I can’t escape. The droplets swarm up at a vicious pace and as I inhale, they
crowd into my mouth to drown me. Something pokes my ribs and I surface.

Squarely into the dorm.

“Are you okay?” Janice said. “You didn’t wake up.”

I breathed hard and filled my lungs with precious air.

Janice tipped her head, frowning at me. “Could something be wrong with your sleep
meds?” she said.

“No, I’m good.” The last of the blue droplets trickled away, taking the fear with
them. “I’m good,” I said more certainly.

“If you say so,” she said.

I didn’t believe in trying to interpret dreams. Nightmares, either. Nevertheless,
I got the impression my subconscious was not entirely at ease.

A bit later, when I went over for breakfast, I looked for Linus, but Franny told me
he was out running errands for the chef. Afterward, I collected a few of the cameras
I’d posted around campus so I could check out the footage in Media Convergence. The
morning was clear and cool enough that I half wished I’d worn jeans instead of a skirt.

I was retrieving a camera from the graveyard when Burnham walked out of the IMGD building.
The early sunlight streamed in behind him and highlighted the artful mess of his hair,
making me wonder if he just naturally looked cool all the time, or if he had to work
at it. Our non-friendship was like an itchy scab I couldn’t resist picking at.

“Hi, Burnham,” I said.

He slowed on the other side of the spiky iron fence. “Good morning, Rosie.”

“You heading to the library?” I asked, coming through the gate.

“Yes.”

We fell into synch walking together, but with enough space for an elephant between
us.

“I love these intimate exchanges we have,” I said. “Don’t hold back.”

“I was never mad at you,” Burnham said. “I don’t like being misunderstood.”