The Boy Who Hated Sound

The Frequency of Vengeance

The roar inside my head is so loud that I think my skull is going to crack open.

Millions of voices scream, laugh, and cry all at once, pressing against my brain like a heavy weight. The silver plugs behind my ears burn like fire, sending hot pain shooting down my neck and spine. Through the haze of white light blinding my eyes, I see the glass pillar in front of me flare up with a harsh purple glow. The magnetic tapes spin faster and faster, pulling the memories right out of my mind.

"Increase the voltage," the man in the gray suit commands, his voice sounding far away through the roaring storm inside my head. "The synchronization process is only at fifty percent."

"Stop it!" Chidi shouts across the room.

I hear the sound of a scuffle, followed by a heavy thud against the floor. I want to look over, but the metal straps lock my neck in place. I cannot move a muscle.

Uncle Emeka stands near the edge of the control console, his hands resting on the edge of the metal desk. He watches me with a dark, heavy look in his eyes. He does not try to stop the guards. He just stands there, letting the Syndicate drain everything out of me to fuel their control grid.

Pain.

It is the only thing left that feels real. Every memory I have, fixing old tape decks in my room, sharing a sandwich with the echo of Adaora, listening to the quiet tick of Baba Tunde's clocks, starts to unravel like loose thread. The Syndicate is taking my past, turning my mind into a weapon to lock down the entire city of Neo-Prague forever.

"Look at the data streams," the silver-haired woman says, pointing a finger at the main computer screen. Her face shows a rare flash of excitement. "The boy's acoustic signature is overriding the master lock. In two minutes, the entire lower sector's memory will be wiped clean."

"Do it," the man in the suit replies with a cold smile.

I close my eyes tight, fighting against the blackness creeping into my vision. I refuse to let them win. I refuse to let them steal the memory of my family, of the home we built, of the truth they tried so hard to bury. If I am going to lose my mind to this machine, I am going to take their entire system down with me.

Deep inside my chest, a sudden, burning heat flares up.

It is not fear. It is a sharp, absolute fury. It is the anger of a boy who was lied to by his own blood, betrayed by his uncle, and robbed of everything he ever cared about.

I stop fighting the noise in my head. Instead, I open the door wide and pull all of it inside—every screeching train, every shattering clock, every angry voice of the city above, and I focus that massive wave of sound directly into the silver plugs attached to my brain.

The master terminal hums violently. The purple light in the glass pillar flickers, turning from a steady glow to a wild, frantic strobe.

"What is happening?" the man in the gray suit asks, taking a sharp step back as his polished shoes slide across the vibrating floor. "Check the power distribution!"

"The energy draw is spiking!" the silver-haired woman says, her calm expression vanishing as she frantically taps at the control panel. "The boy is reversing the feedback loop!"

Uncle Emeka’s eyes widen in sudden horror. He looks from the flickering glass pillar back to me. "Kelechi, stop! You will destroy your own nervous system!"

I cannot hear him anymore. The pain inside my head turns into a ringing white roar that blots out the entire room. I clench my teeth so hard my jaw aches. I push every ounce of my anger, my grief, and my desire for revenge straight through the wires and into the core of the machine.

CRACK.

A loud explosion rattles the control room. One of the massive glass tubes on the pillar shatters, sending thick purple liquid and flying shards of glass crashing onto the floor.

"Get him away from the terminal!" the man in the gray suit yells, his voice full of panic as smoke starts pouring out of the main console.

Before the guards can move toward my chair, Zainab bursts out from behind a heavy storage crate near the back of the room. She does not run away; she sprints directly toward the central power box with a heavy iron wrench she grabbed from the floor.

With a fierce cry, Zainab swings the wrench with all her weight, smashing it straight into the main circuit housing of the Syndicate's control grid.

A torrent of bright blue sparks erupts from the box. The entire room goes pitch black for a single second, save for the blinding flash of an electrical short.

The metal bands locking my wrists and ankles snap open with a sharp hiss of pneumatic pressure.

Released from the chair, my legs give out instantly. I tumble forward, hitting the hard concrete floor hard, gasping for air as the roaring sound in my head finally fades into a ringing silence.

"Kelechi!"

Chidi’s voice cuts through the smoke. He rushes over, dropping to his knees and hauling me up onto my feet before the guards can recover their sight in the dark. Zainab stands right beside us, holding the heavy wrench in her hand with a cold, determined look on her face.

Across the smoky room, the man in the gray suit coughs violently, waving away the thick gray smoke while the silver-haired woman tries to draw her weapon.

Uncle Emeka takes a slow step toward us through the debris, his hand outstretched. "Kelechi, listen to me—"

"Don't touch him," Chidi snaps, stepping between us and our uncle, his fists raised and ready to fight.

Before anyone can move another inch, the floor beneath our feet gives a massive, rolling groan. The ceiling above cracks wide open, and tons of heavy concrete and rubble crash down right between us and the Syndicate, cutting off the room entirely.

Through the thick dust and falling debris, the master terminal explodes in a brilliant flash of blue light, plunging the entire lower Core into absolute darkness.