Vinyl: Book One of the Vinyl Trilogy

by Sophia Elaine Hanson

  Roark pulled her away from the nucleus of the city to the far end of the atrium. Despite the unusual decor, Ronja knew where he was taking her. Every subtrain stop had an identical control room at its rear. With a fireproof door and sturdy walls, it seemed a likely place for a gathering of “superiors.”

  Her assumption quickly proved correct. They came to a halt before the familiar steel door. A hint of rust licked the base of the metal, but it was still impregnable. Ronja did not find this comforting, despite her steadily growing awe.

  I don’t know these people, she reminded herself. They kidnapped me. Tortured me.

  But it was The Conductor that nearly killed you, a voice countered from the back of her mind.

  Roark rapped on the door three times with a knuckle.

  “Enter,” a sharp voice called.

  Ronja swallowed dryly.

  If Roark sensed her anxiety, he did not address it. He turned the knob and put his shoulder into the door. With a grunt from the boy and a shriek from the metal, it caved. Ronja peered around her guide into the chamber.

  The room was robed in dense shadows. The dark was diluted by a naked electric bulb that dangled precariously from the ceiling. A long oak table consumed most of the limited space, and a projector was mounted on a cart beyond. It spat a grainy, colorless spray at the far wall.

  The table was manned by a dozen men and women ranging in age from their late teens to their late sixties. All eyed Ronja with varying degrees of curiosity and distrust. She attempted to keep her expression neutral, but her mouth was pinched into a taut line and cold sweat was beading on her back.

  Two chairs at the head of the table stood empty. Ronja regarded them grimly. They were situated furthest from the door, making it impossible for her to bolt if things turned sour.

  Movement to her left drew her gaze.

  A woman had risen from her seat at the opposite end of the table. She was tall, considerably taller than Ronja, who stood at five feet eight inches, with a wiry, but not scrawny, frame. Her shockingly orange hair was piled atop her head and held in place by twin wooden rods. Her hooded eyes looked nearly black under sharp brows whose brown color suggested naturally dark hair. A smattering of freckles littered her porcelain nose and high cheekbones.

  She was not beautiful, Ronja decided. She was striking.

  The woman rounded the table at her leisure, her willow-branch finger tracing her path along the table. As she approached, Roark moved out of her way, leaving Ronja to catch the burden of her gaze. As much as she wanted to, the girl refused to drop her stare.

  The fiery woman scuffed to a stop a few inches from Ronja, who had to lift her chin to hold eye contact.

  “You’ve caused quite a disturbance in the Belly, Ronja,” the woman said. Her voice was a stone pillar supporting a broad roof. It did not sway, waver, or question.

  “Maybe you ate something weird,” Ronja replied stiffly.

  A collective laugh pooled behind the pair. Roark snorted loudly.

  “I was referring to our home, not my stomach. We call this place the Belly.”

  “Feels more like a prison to me.”

  The woman arched a brow, which disappeared beneath her ragged bangs.

  “Prison?” she inquired.

  “Well, I can’t leave, can I?”

  “That depends entirely on you,” the woman replied.

  She motioned toward the vacant chairs with a quick jab of her chin, then spun and strode back to her seat.

  Roark grabbed Ronja by the hand and tugged her toward the indicated seats. The door swung shut behind them. Ronja had not seen anyone close it. Was there a guard outside the door?

  The occupants of the table watched the girl silently as she sat. An elderly woman coughed into her gnarled hand, then continued to regard Ronja with curious owl eyes. A man with a paunchy gut stroked his jowls and appraised her with a condescending smirk. Ronja felt a snarky comment rise in her throat, but she swallowed it and lifted her chin.

  The woman with orange hair broke the awkward hush.

  “State your full name,” she commanded from the opposite pole.

  “Why don’t you tell me yours,” Ronja demanded flatly.

  The woman sighed audibly and looked to Roark.

  “Is she always this difficult?”

  Roark was leaning back in his chair, his fingers laced to form a pillow behind his head. He shrugged and flashed his signature grin. The woman returned her focus to Ronja.

  “Ito Lin, second in command of this operation,” she said, placing her hand over her heart.

  “Ronja Fey,” Ronja replied.

  “You’re lying.”

  It was not a question.

  “I’m not.”

  “You’re withholding.”

  “Not as much as you are.”

  Ito bowed her head as if to hide the quirk of her mouth.

  “If you cooperate with us,” Ito began, bringing her head up. “We will answer all of your questions.”

  “And if not?”

  “If not, you’ll be sent back into the world.”

  “What’s the catch?” Ronja asked, narrowing her eyes.

  “That is the catch.”

  Ronja could not resist a smile at that. As anxious as she was to return home to her family, Ito was right. Nothing but pain awaited her on the surface. Her unwitting smile evaporated. “Wait, that doesn’t make sense,” she said. “How do you know I won’t just go to the Offs?”

  Whispers erupted around the table, but Ronja ignored them. Ito silenced the babble with a bored wave of her hand.

  “Roark was right, you’re sharp,” Ito said, more to herself than to Ronja. She crossed her arms on the table and leaned forward. “You wouldn’t last a week up there. As soon as you were caught you’d be administered a new Singer, and would subsequently forget everything that happened here.”

  “What’s to stop me from telling them beforehand?” Ronja asked.

  Ito shook her head slowly, a smirk worming its way across her full lips.

  “You wouldn’t do that,” she said. “It’s written all over your face.”

  Ronja rubbed her nose with her forefinger and looked away, studying the blank wall to her right. Every pair of eyes in the room bored into her, as if trying to see the gears revolving in her head.

  “Let’s try again,” Ito suggested. “Your full name?”

  “Ronja Fey Zipse,” Ronja said, meeting the penetrating gaze flatly.

  “How old are you?”

  “Nineteen.”

  “Circle?”

  “The Ninth.”

  Ito stared at her uncomprehendingly. Roark chuckled to himself.

  “You know,” Ronja said, gesturing helplessly at the intangible. “Like the Ninth Circle of Hell?”

  “Hilarious,” Ito said dryly. “Circle?”

  “Outer.”

  “Family?”

  “Fractured.”

  Roark nudged her in the ribs. Someone further down the table coughed to mask a snort.

  “Fine. My father died when I was an infant, my mother is incapable. No siblings, two cousins.”

  “The names of your parents?”

  “I’m not sure about my father,” Ronja replied honestly. Roark peered at her sidelong, but she ignored him. “My mother’s name is Layla.”

  “How did you find us?” Ito asked.

  “Well—” Ronja looked to Roark, who shook his head, signaling she should talk.

  The radiator in the corner hummed. The projector continued to devour the quivering, gray road. Ronja exhaled her anxiety.

  “I work as a subtrain driver, or at least I did,” Ronja began.

  She recounted the night she caught sight of Roark on the tracks and snatched a glance of his free ear. She described her subsequent tardiness, her cut paycheck, her trip to the Office, and the run she had been saddled with. She left Henry out of the tale for his safety. She went on to detail her shock upon discovering Roark waiting for her at the end of the r
un.

  “Then the bastard knocked me out,” she said, shooting Roark a withering glance.

  “And why was that, exactly?” Ito interjected.

  “Ask him,” Ronja said, jerking her head at the boy and folding her arms.

  “Well,” Roark clapped his hands together and sat forward. “She saw our emblem.”

  Another plume of whispers rose from the bodies crowding the table. Ito and Ronja remained silent, watching each other like dogs preparing to brawl.

  “She understood the significance?” Ito asked, flicking her eyes back to Roark, who shook his head.

  “No. She knew it wasn’t The Conductor’s, and suspected it might be dangerous. The fact that she realized that on her own is more than the rest of Revinia can say.”

  “That’s impossible,” a reedy voice cut in.

  Ronja craned her neck to locate the speaker. He was a wisp a man with abnormally sharp nails, which he was currently using to scratch his rather bulbous head.

  “In two generations no one under The Music has been able to see our record,” he continued, poking a spindly finger at Ronja, who was seized by the urge to reach out and snap it. “For better and for worse The Conductor made sure of that.”

  “Which led me to believe she was an Off. Yes, that was my first reaction, too, which gave Ronja here a massive headache,” Roark gestured at her forehead, which was still bore the shadow of his pistol. “That is, until The Quiet Song nearly killed her an hour later.”

  The silence deepened. The waifish man flapped his lips mutely, then settled back into his chair with arms crossed tight. Ito broke the quiet by blowing a whistle through her teeth.

  “Now there’s something you don’t hear every day,” she said. “How long did it take her to go under?”

  “About three minutes,” Roark said with a slightly manic grin.

  “I see,” Ito’s eyes flashed like steel in sunlight. “Ronja, tell me, were you plagued by migraines before you were freed?”

  “Yeah,” Ronja said, her heart stumbling.

  “At what age did they start?”

  “I don’t know. Four, five?”

  Ito nodded. She did not look surprised.

  “What were they?” Ronja asked, sliding her gaze from Roark to Ito questioningly. Ito opened her mouth to explain, but the boy beat her to the punch.

  “When The Music can’t control you, it resorts to inflicting pain. The pain is intended to, what’s the phrase? ‘Put you back in your place.’”

  Ronja’s mouth quirked darkly.

  “In your case, it didn’t work,” Roark finished.

  “Indeed,” Ito agreed, resting her chin in her hand and staring into space contemplatively. “A nineteen year old from the outer ring resistant to The Music, nearly killed by The Quiet Song in under three minutes. This is intriguing.”

  “The nineteen year old is right here,” Ronja reminded her, waving a hand dramatically.

  Ito’s gaze snapped back to her.

  “Ronja, there is something inherently wrong with this society. You knew that in your gut, but not in your mind. If you want, we will tell you everything. If not, the door is waiting.”

  Ronja studied her hands, which were clenched tightly in her lap. The wound on the side of her head pulsed rhythmically. All that she had ever felt, but could never prove, lay before her just waiting for her to reach out and accept it.

  “Show me,” she said.

  17: A History Lesson

  “Teller,” Ito said, nodding toward the middle aged man to Ronja’s immediate left.

  Teller stood wordlessly and roused the projector. The whirling gray blur stuttered to a halt, and an aerial view of Revinia materialized on the wall.

  It was far from the Revinia Ronja knew. Even from 100 feet above, it was vastly different. There was no distinction between the rings. The entire metropolis was awash with vibrant hues. Red, green, blue, and gray rooftops winked like sea glass. Autos wove through the veins of every ring. The thick cloud of smog that constantly lingered above the city had evaporated, replaced with clear, sharp air Ronja could almost taste. The great wall still encircled the city like a black eye, but it was studded with pinpricks of white.

  Exits.

  The image faltered in the silence of the room, then changed.

  Ronja’s jaw went slack.

  “Revinia, circa 65 PC,” Ito narrated, rising from her high backed chair and moving to stand beside the makeshift screen. She leaned against the wall, slinging one ankle across the other. The edge of the moving picture played across the left half of her body, warping with each angle and curve. “Strange, isn’t it?”

  Ronja nodded mutely, her unhinged jaw bouncing slightly.

  If 65 PC Revinia was different from above, it was unrecognizable at eye level.

  The buildings, though less dilapidated, were fundamentally the same. They were clearly situated in the outer ring. Ronja would recognize the plain, squat structures anywhere. The streets winding between them were paved with the same drab cobblestones, newly damp with rain.

  It was the people who were beyond recognition.

  At first Ronja thought that her ancestors had simply been taller, but she quickly realized that they merely carried themselves higher. Their spines were not bent beneath some unseen burden. Their faces were alive, constantly shifting between shades of emotion. Anger. Excitement. Aggravation. Pleasure. Even boredom.

  Ronja could not imagine what they found so tedious.

  They tossed smiles like seeds, exchanged frowns like small change. They were unabashed in the face of their emotions, and she knew why. She saw it replicated before her now.

  “They,” Ronja began uncertainly, afraid the words would cut her. “They don’t have Singers.”

  She knew she should not have been surprised. Her sixth grade class had spent an entire month studying Pre-Conductor Revinia. Her instructors made it abundantly clear that Revinia had not always been guided by The Conductor and His Music. However, she was led to believe this society was plagued by violence.

  The men and women that filtered through the ghostly avenues did not look particularly vicious. They were certainly more vibrant than anyone Ronja had ever seen above ground.

  “Tell me,” Ito demanded, snapping Ronja’s musings in two. “What do you know of The Conductor. What do you know of Atticus Bullon?”

  Ronja blinked, dragged her eyes away from the moving picture and focused on Ito, who was watching her calculatingly. She itched her nose as she weighed the question. “Well, he was elected mayor in 10 PC, when Revinia was still part of Arutia,” she began, shifting uncomfortably under the collective gaze of the room. “He declared the city independent in 8 PC, took up the title Conductor in year 0 after he and Victor Westervelt I pioneered The Music.”

  “Do you know why he chose to break from Arutia?” Ito inquired, dipping her chin in approval.

  “To avoid the war,” Ronja replied automatically.

  “Indeed.”

  As if on cue the familiar portrait of Atticus Bullon materialized on the wall. Ronja felt her fingers twitch feebly, aching to salute the photograph. She clenched the wayward digits into a fist and regarded the picture grimly.

  “As you said, Bullon did not agree with the war Arutia had chosen to take part in. Not a poor position, truthfully. It was bloody in infancy and destined to be fruitless. Despite its unorthodoxy, most Revinians were initially happy with the secession. No one wants to fight an unjust war. Most of the Arutian army was across the ocean, so there weren’t enough troops to put up a real fight. Eventually, Revinia was left alone.”

  “You sound like my history instructor,” Ronja commented.

  This drew a chuckle from the occupants of the table. Ito did not appear particularly amused.

  “What if I told you that entire story was pitch?”

  Ronja considered, regarding the photograph with her head tilted to the side. Days ago she would have called such a claim treason. “Honestly, there isn’t much that w
ould surprise me anymore,” she said with an exhausted shrug.

  “Smart girl,” Ito praised her, rapping Bullon on his protruding nose with a sharp knuckle. “Bullon didn’t give a skitz about protecting his people from the ravages of war. He was out for power—absolute power. When the war ended, he became paranoid that Arutia would try to reclaim the city, so he tightened security to the point that almost no one could enter or leave. As you might imagine, this did not sit well with the Revinians. They began to rebel. And that”—Ito nodded at Teller, and the image switched—“is when he sought the help of a confidant.”

  “Victor Westervelt I,” Ronja named the man on the screen.

  The industrial giant scowled down at Ronja from the wall, his expression simultaneously condescending and disgruntled. His nose was sharp, his eyes equally potent. Deep canyons carved by stress ran across his large forehead, and frown lines pooled around his mouth. Three aeroplanes wheeled through the sky behind him, leaving trails of pollution in their wake.

  “Yes,” Ito said. “Westervelt was a master inventor at the head of the largest company in Revinia. Bullon went to him seeking a way to control the rebellious population.”

  “Why are you giving me a history lesson?” Ronja demanded, her voice growing brittle with impatience. “Roark told me you were going to answer my questions.”

  “In order for you to understand who we are, you need to learn the true history of this city, and The Music,” Ito replied levelly.

  “Fine, enlighten me.”

  18: Stifled

  “The Music was introduced to the public in 3 PC. Bullon declared himself The Conductor in year 0, and it was made illegal to be found without a Singer a year later.”

  Ronja bobbed her head, indicating she followed.

  “What were you told is the purpose of The Music?” Ito asked.

  “To keep people calm; to counteract violence.”

  “Not precisely.” Ito peeled herself from the wall and slipped her hands into her pockets. She stepped into the eye of the projector, warping Westervelt’s wolfish face with her own. “It isn’t exactly a lie, is the funny thing. The Music is what keeps Revinia from plunging into chaos, but the reasoning is not as noble as it sounds.”