“Why bother now? We should just wait until they take him somewhere else,” Henry suggested.
“We don’t know what they’re going to do to him,” Ronja retorted angrily, rounding on Henry. “They could be torturing him, killing him for all we know.”
Henry threw up his palms in surrender and blew out an exasperated breath through his nose.
“What’s the plan, then?” Ronja asked, her vexation receding.
Terra smiled grimly and pointed at the lights buzzing overhead.
“Electricity,” she said. “We need to take out the power grid, plunge the place into darkness. It should be enough of a distraction for us to get out.”
Henry and Ronja nodded approvingly, and Terra went on. “Three corridors back the way we came and to the right is the main generator,” Terra said. She turned to the boy, who raised his chin slightly. “Henry, I want you to skitz it up until everything goes black. Alarms will go off, everyone will panic. As soon as it goes dark, follow the corridor to the right, turn left once, then right, then go down the flight of steps to the basement. You’ll see the storm drain. Follow it to the bay. Evie and the others should be there.”
Henry bobbed his head.
Terra grabbed him by the wrist and tugged him several paces down the corridor, away from Ronja. She started to follow, but Terra shot her a warning look over her shoulder. Her blood simmering, Ronja leaned back against the wall while Terra pulled the boy down to her level and whispered something in his ear. He nodded, his eyes trained on the floor.
Terra clapped him on the shoulder bracingly, then slipped something small and black into his hand.
“Understood,” he said, straightening and curling his fingers around the object. “Three corridors down, right, dark, right, left, right, down, bay,” he repeated methodically.
Terra inclined her head. She reached to her hip and drew her spare sidearm. She held it out by the barrel for Henry to take. He scowled at the weapon, but took it without complaint.
The boy paused, looking from Terra to Ronja. “How are you getting out?” he asked.
“How are we getting out?” Ronja reiterated.
“Just trust me, please,” Terra begged, sliding an exhausted hand down her face. “I’ve gotten you this far. Go, Henry. Now.”
Henry jogged back to Ronja and roped her into a fierce hug, which she returned enthusiastically. She pressed her nose to his chest, memorizing his smell. Then the boy tore away and sprinted off down the hall, donning his headphones.
“What now?” Ronja asked when he had disappeared around the bend.
“We wait and hope no one finds us,” Terra replied.
“Really, how are we getting out?”
Terra blew a breath through her nose like a bull about to charge, then began to fish around in the pocket of her vest. Ronja craned her neck to see what she was doing, but Terra maneuvered out of her line of sight.
“But—”
Terra stowed whatever she had been fiddling with and put her headphones back on, effectively signaling that the conversation was over.
“How—?”
Terra started. She gestured wildly for Ronja to put on her headphones. Ronja fumbled with the apparatus and slapped it onto her head, wincing when the leather chaffed her wound.
“ . . . is called The Lost Song.”
Ronja froze. The world around her evaporated in a haze of terror as Victor’s voice reverberated through her mind. She wanted to rip the earphones from her skull, but she could not move.
“This Song will be saved only for the most dangerous criminals. It attacks the pain centers of the brain and temporarily incapacitates the receiver. As I explained, it can travel through the air like radio waves. It does not require a Singer, so it may be used on the troublesome rebels. Bayard, if you would.”
Silence reigned, but she knew Roark was screaming.
To her left Terra was gripping her headphones as if she could squeeze the hush from them. Her jaw bulged beneath the drying filth on her cheeks.
“Enough,” Victor said delicately in her ear. “Get up.”
Ronja gripped her automatic and stalked forward, prepared to fly around the corner. Terra caught her by the arm and wrenched her back.
“Again, louder.”
Silence fell again, but Ronja knew that beyond her shield The Lost Song was blaring. She could still feel it burrowed inside her mind like a worm.
“Enough,” Victor said. “As you can see it is highly effective, but only to incapacitate our most dangerous enemies. Our true weapon against emotion is far more refined. This is the Song that will be released to the public within the year. It can travel by air as well as Singer, and will replace all current forms of The Music. It is far from perfect, but it is merely a prototype. Bayard.”
A high-pitched keening built in her remaining ear, but it had nothing to do with The Music.
Time slowed to a crawl as Ronja ripped her arm from Terra’s viselike grip, cocking her automatic as she moved. She felt the girl reach out for her, but she grasped only air.
Her finger was clamped around the trigger before she placed it there. She was sprinting down the corridor before she could think to run. She was screaming beyond the bounds of her hearing, and the storm of bullets joined her chorus. She saw the guards fall like cans off a fencepost, their blood splattering the blank, double doors in great crimson arches. She saw through a sheen of red, as if the blood had splashed in her eyes.
Ronja stalked forward, shoving the knot of limp corpses out of her way with her bare feet. Vomit bulged in her throat. The lives she had extinguished were tugging at her, pulling her down, but she could not heed them. She refused their cries.
Ronja wrenched open the portal and lunged through, straight into the arms of her enemies.
56: Frequencies
Henry
The speech flooded his headphones like a sudden downpour. He heard the words of Victor Westervelt II and finally knew the voice that haunted his friend, his brother.
The day Roark was freed from his tormentor as a child was the day Henry lost his parents. He remembered his brain going quiet when he received the news from Wilcox, remembered walking to the room Roark was being held in, planning to confront him, to put all the pain he was feeling into his fists.
When he arrived, he’d found a boy half his size with his head in his hands, sobbing silently in the corner.
Henry had sat down beside him. He did not remember crying, but when his mind wandered back he found his mouth was fuzzy and his eyes raw. He had looked over at Roark through glassy eyes. The boy was staring at him, his expression a blend of terror and rage.
Henry had risen unsteadily and left without a word. A week later, when Roark was allowed out of his cell, Henry was the first to offer him a meal. From that moment forward they were brothers, and never spoke of the tears they shed together.
As time passed, Roark improved. His wounds healed, both mental and physical, and he reveled in his newfound purpose. He spent six solid months in the Belly after he was taken, and in that time the Anthemites grew to adore him. They both understood the vital role he would come to play in the war and appreciated his antics. Henry introduced him to his companions Iris and Evie, and they became fast friends. Soon, the quartet was inseparable. It might have continued that way forever, if Henry had not begun to walk a different path.
As Roark healed, Henry deteriorated. He pulled away from his fellow Anthemites. His sister, Charlotte, was only a baby then. He was able to blame his increasingly lengthy absences on her. Iris, Roark, and Evie tried to coax him back to life, but he only retreated deeper into himself.
When Henry turned fifteen, he took Charlotte and moved out of the Belly and into the house of his late grandmother.
It was not as if he cut all ties, of course. He became the Anthem’s primary forger . . . it was paramount that those posing as Offs and government employees had the proper documents. Roark, Evie, and Iris visited him as often as they could, but thing
s were never the same.
Now, as he listened to the long gaps between Victor Westervelt II’s words, the ones he knew were in reality filled with the screams of his brother, Henry wished he could rewrite time.
His instinct was to rip the headphones from his ears as he hurtled toward the generator room, but he forced himself to listen, as if his intangible presence might somehow alleviate some of Roark’s pain.
Victor inhaled sharply in his ear, and Henry nearly tripped.
“Bring her to me,” he commanded.
No.
Henry gritted his teeth and plunged forward, her name echoing in the halls of his mind.
Ronja.
The door to the generator room screamed into view on his right, labeled with large, stainless steel letters. Henry came to a halt, his bare feet screeching soundlessly on the tiles. The gun Terra had given him was slick with sweat, as was the radio. She had not told him who would answer if he called, only that it was better not to in case the line was tapped.
“I am rarely surprised, Ronja,” Victor was saying, his voice wavering as a burst of static chewed on the radio waves. “I thank you for an intriguing day.”
Henry felt his ribs tighten around his lungs like the laces of a boot. He reached for the knob but found it locked. He stood back, buried his face in his shoulder, and released two bullets on the lock. The gun kicked silently in his hand. He rammed his bare heel into the portal and it caved. A wave of heat engulfed him and he lunged into it, his weapon raised.
Two Offs, their ears crowned with black Singers, stood before a massive, whirring machine. Henry did not know much about electricity, but he was fairly certain it was not a power generator. It was nearly two stories high and criss crossed with wires and blinking lights. If he did not know better he might say it was a . . .
The Offs lunged at him as one, unnaturally lithe for all their bulk. Henry took aim and fired two consecutive shots. The guards managed one more step each before crumbling to the floor, identical bullet holes like blazing suns on their brows.
Henry had told Ronja he was not a soldier, but that did not mean he was incapable of being one.
Henry stepped over the corpses, trying not to look at the blood he had spilled. He gaped up at the machine, his jaw slack. After a moment, he pulled the headphones down around his neck and held the radio up to his lips, bristling in discomfort as the hum of the world greeted him once again.
“This is Cerberus,” he said, using the name he had not used since Bishop Street.
The meandering of the static; then, a voice.
“Cerberus, this is Harpy.”
Henry smiled.
“I should have known it would be you,” he said into the microphone. “I have a plan. I can incapacitate this entire facility, but first I’m going to need you to make us an exit.”
57: On Three
Evie
Evie panted as she ran, sweating beneath her charge’s dead weight. She hefted his limp form higher in her arms, but he only slipped again, his head bobbing in time with her footsteps.
“You’ve got it,” Iris coaxed from her side.
Evie glanced over at Iris, who now toted the automatic they had stolen from the Offs along with her stinger. The gun was as long as her arm. Iris had never been the best shot, but Evie figured anyone could fire an automatic.
“He—here,” Maxwell panted ahead of them, his mammoth feet flapping to a noisy halt. The unconscious child drooped in his grasp, one of her pale arms swaying hypnotically.
Evie skidded to a halt before a door labeled “maintenance” in bold letters. She dropped to one knee, puffing beneath the strain of the boy’s body.
“If you’re lying about this, you’re stuffed, understand?” Iris said, jabbing Maxwell in the back with her stinger, which was for the moment turned off.
The chemi tensed, but Evie saw the way Iris blanched at her own words.
“Open it, Iris,” Evie said, struggling to her feet.
Iris moved in front of Maxwell and put a frail hand on the doorknob. She stood motionless for a moment, her shoulders rigid beneath her hospital gown. She leaned forward and pressed her ear against the pale face of the door, listening.
“Clear,” Iris told them after a moment. “On three . . . one . . . two . . . ”
Gunfire ripped the air.
Evie dragged Iris to the ground, shielding both her and the boy from the hail of bullets.
The pain never came.
Evie raised her head a fraction of an inch, peering around warily. The corridor was deserted. Maxwell had dropped to the ground and enveloped the unconscious girl in his wiry arms. Catching Evie’s disbelieving gaze, he relaxed his grip on the child and rose to his feet unsteadily.
“It came from that way,” he said, nodding back down the hallway they had come from. “Your friends taking down the Offs, I presume.”
“I thought they were going to sneak in,” Evie murmured. “They were supposed to do it quietly.”
“We can’t go back,” Iris said softly after a tense moment. “They’ll be on high alert. We take these two and we swim for shore. That’s what Roark would want.”
Evie gazed at Iris. She appeared even smaller than usual without her vibrant curls. Her eyes, though, were bottomless. Fierce.
“Okay,” Evie said, trying to convince herself. “Okay.”
Iris shouldered her gun and wrenched open the maintenance door. The hinges shrieked, but the sound and the semidarkness were all that greeted them.
Iris went first, her automatic raised before her awkwardly. Maxwell followed, cradling the girl to his chest carefully. Evie went last. She glanced over her shoulder at the gaping lights of the corridor. There was no more gunfire in the distance.
Evie closed the door with a sharp screech and stepped into the dim room.
Iron shelves stocked with cleaning supplies lined the long, cramped expanse. The floor and walls were concrete, and a single naked bulb dangled from the ceiling.
A manhole labeled “storm” was rooted in the asphalt.
Evie laid the boy on the floor tenderly and gestured for Maxwell to do the same. He placed the mousy haired girl next to her brother.
“Help me open this,” she commanded Maxwell. “Iris, guard the door.”
Evie and the chemi squatted on opposite sides of the exit and dug their fingers into the narrow slits around the rim of the cover.
“On three,” Evie said, holding Maxwell’s feeble gaze in her own. “One . . . two . . . ”
With a grunt the two lifted the grate from its niche. Evie felt one of her nails spilt. She hissed air through her teeth as blood welled at her fingertip.
They tossed the cover aside with a dull clang.
Evie squinted down into the hole. The sickly light from the bulb glanced off the damp floor of the tunnel five feet below. The air filtering up to meet her was thick and humid, but was infinitely better than that of the sewage tunnel.
Evie jerked her thumb at Maxwell without looking up from their escape hatch. She knew Iris was watching her.
“Watch him,” she said absently.
In her peripheral vision, she saw Iris nod and adjust her automatic.
Evie straddled the manhole, then lowered herself into the near total blackness. She hovered for a moment, her muscular arms trembling, then dropped into the tube. The cool air rushed past her for a split second, then she hit the ground. She landed in a crouch, splattering stagnant water across the curved walls.
Evie rose and looked up at Maxwell. His spectacles flashed in the naked light, obscuring his expression.
Evie raised her hands, gesturing for him to hand the children down to her.
Maxwell disappeared for a moment, his white sneakers scuffing against the grimy floor. Half a moment later he reappeared, cradling the unconscious girl in his twig arms.
“Easy,” Evie warned as he lowered the child feet first into the dimness.
She wrapped her arms around the girl’s jutting hips. Maxwell r
eleased her cautiously. The girl weighed almost nothing. Evie lowered her to the damp ground, then reached up for the boy. Maxwell already had him in hand, and dangled him over the gap, his arms quivering with exertion.
Evie grunted as Maxwell relinquished the boy into her hands. Her knees buckled beneath his weight, and she let them sink to the floor. She laid him down quickly, then stepped away from the hole.
“Come on,” she called up to Iris and Maxwell.
The chemi looked over his shoulder wearily. Evie could almost hear The Music roaring in his ear.
“You’ll be killed,” Evie reminded him from below. “By us or Red Bay. Unless you get down here right now.”
Maxwell let his eyelids fall shut for a moment, massaging his temples methodically. Even in the dim light, Evie could see the veins popping in his forehead.
“Forgive me,” he muttered, looking up to the ceiling.
Maxwell took a deep breath and jumped into the gaping manhole. He landed awkwardly in the static water, arms flailing. Evie steadied him roughly.
Iris handed her gun down to Evie and leapt into the mouth of the hole lithely, landing in a deep crouch. She rose, wiping her dainty hands on her white gown and wrinkling her nose at her bare, soggy feet.
“Which way?” Iris asked softly, looking left and right down the dank tube.
Evie spit on her forefinger and raised it to the air. A faint, cool breeze kissed the saliva, and she pointed in its direction.
Maxwell lifted the girl again and Evie slung her brother over her shoulder.
They started down the tunnel away from the nightmarish compound, but Evie and Iris left their thoughts behind.
58: There and Back
The silence deepened when Ronja blew through the doors.
Countless pairs of disbelieving eyes locked onto her, their shock punctuated by their O-shaped mouths.
The lobby had been converted into a makeshift theater with a single wide aisle running down its center. At the terminus of the gap loomed a long, wooden stage.
Vinyl: Book One of the Vinyl Trilogy Page 30