The Sound Chronicles: Origins

[MotherRussia]

Hullo. I am in the process of making an original (Which I honestly hope that I can improve enough to become a book) and I suddenly got the urge to make a sort of prequel to it. The prequel is set to revolve around the three main characters of the actual book. It's purpose is to shed some light on the backgrounds of these characters. This is sort of a rough draft but I really want some input on this, so, here it is!
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The Sound Chronicles: Origins

BENJAMIN


Sound is all I’ve ever known. It’s put me to sleep at night, it’s helped me stay alive. A woman once told me that no man stays innocent for long. I had never believed her, because for years I was considered innocent, pure. I never disobeyed. The perfect child.

But now I believe. Because now the sound I used to put me to sleep at night is used to kill the ones who hurt me. And my family.
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“Benjamin, honey, do you hear that?”
He did. He knew they couldn’t. The frequency of the sound was too high for them. In fact, even dogs couldn’t hear it.
“Yes, Mother.”
In truth, it wasn’t all. He could feel it. He could see it. The sound waves, making long drops, appeared in silver waves. Sometimes he wondered how his head didn’t explode, because he could see every sound made. His mother’s voice, the sound of his breathing, a rustle of grass outside. He saw it all.

“Excellent! Do you think you can change it’s course of direction?” his mother asked, pointing a thumb at the machine that emitted the sound. It was a small silver pod with speakers.

“I’ll try, Mother.” He singled out the wave, and closed his eyes. Relying on sound alone, he forced the wave to change course by stopping the sound in mid-air and forcing it to bend slightly. “Done,” he said, with a bored tone. “Mother, do we have to stay on such dull courses? I could do this in my sleep.”

“Now Ben, you know we have to take this slow. Your abilities probably haven’t developed enough. Now again, from the-” she was abruptly cut off by a man’s smooth voice. His father.

“No, no, Katherine. The boy is right. Let him have a challenge,” his father told her. “Benjamin, all around you there are speakers. I’m going to emit a different sound and frequency from each. I want you to direct it to me. I’ll be outside. “ He walked out of the room, his dark hair just touching the doorway. Benjamin looked around the room. He counted one, two, three….six speakers.

“Go,” his father yelled. All around, sounds shot toward him. A deep bass, the tingling of bells, a high whistle. A woman’s scream, a dog’s bark, a gunshot. Benjamin’s turquoise eyes lit up. Brushing his dark chocolate hair out of his eyes, he smiled.

This was more like it.


JON

All my life I thought nothing could hurt us. That with my abilities, nothing could ever harm my dear sister. For nearly 18 years, I was right. I protected her like a brother should. It just wasn’t enough. I had stood there, powerless. Weak. Forced to watch. After that day, I made a vow. For as long as I lived, I would never become so weak. Never stand by while the helpless died.

I intend to honor it.
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“A true prodigy.”
Duck, roll, jump, kick.

“I’m surprised we ever found him. The perfect weapon.“
A wrecking ball is swung, punch, shatter.

“In all honesty I think that with him, this war is one-sided.”
The boy breezed through the so called training session. His rich, chocolate skin was absent of injuries. The two men that observed him from above through the one-sided glass were thoroughly impressed. The session had been going on for at least an two hours, yet the boy looked like he could have continued for another two.

“You say his experimental records are unknown?” said the first man. He was old, at least in his late-fifties. He looked at the boy with genuine curiosity

“True. One of the Scouts found him and his twin sister. Out in the desert, near the Nile. It took a tremendous amount of effort to get him here, I tell you-” said the second man, who was very young, around his mid-twenties.

“He has a twin?” the older man asked, interrupting the younger one.

“Yes, but she is useless to us. Nothing special. The only reason we keep her is because the boy refuses to part with her. They’re a joint package,” he answered. The older man’s excitement vanished.

“Back to the boy then. I see he excels in the training, but have you actually tested his abilities against a suitable opponent?”

At this, the young one grinned.

“Actually, I was just getting to that.” He pressed a button on the table in front of him. “Jon,” he said, his voice loud in the intercom, “ we have a visitor.” As if on cue, a teenage girl was pushed into the arena. The doors locked shut behind her.

“Meet Georgia. She’s a Fame from the enemy, caught on our territory. A spy, most likely. She’s here to fight for her life. Make sure she’s disposed of with professionalism. Proceed.”

She lunged.

COLLIN




Human nature.


Love, passion, caring. The feelings society has painted as the basis of our nature. However, it’s all a lie. A filthy, masked lie. Men are wicked, are evil. Everything we do is never for another’s gain but for ourselves. Helping an orphanage? All done to paint yourself as a saint, to get those around you to buy into your masked generosity. The sad thing is, we always buy into it. I bought into it.

Never again.
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“Focus, boy. Your progress is essential.”
The professor looked at the boy, his circular glasses standing out against his shining head. The boy was staring at a small, thick silver cylinder. It rested on a single pedestal, seeming alien to the Roman features of the pedestal. Although he seemed not to be exerting any physical labor at the moment, his white-blonde hair was plastered to his forehead, and the boy’s light gray eyes were rigid with focus.

“Master.”
The professor looked away from the cylinder and acknowledged the boy.

“What is it, child? Stop distracting yourself,” he said with an annoyed tone. The boy hesitated.

“I…I’m not sure I can move it.” At this, the professor’s dark brown eyes widened in surprise.

“You do not give up on me, boy. Two years of experimentation will not be thrown away because you think you cannot move it. You shall. Now continue.”

The boy did not object further. Refocusing, he pushed his mind to the limits. “Attract,” he thought to himself. His magnetic pull on it strengthened, and it did.

“Master ! Master, I moved it!” the boy said with excitement. Perhaps too much excitement, for the cylinder skyrocketed towards him. The boy instantly released his attraction on the cylinder, but it was too late. It’s momentum continued to propel it, but the boy ducked just in time. The professor, however, was not so lucky. The cylinder collided with his nose at a bone-shattering force, breaking his nose on contact. Blood gushed from his now smashed in nose, and the cylinder, half-covered in blood, fell to the ground with an audible clatter. The professor fell to his knees, clutching his face, screaming in pain. He cursed the boy, he called for the guards, he writhed in agony. The boy ran for the nearest corner of the large white room, past instruments he had no idea about. Past computers and screens monitoring his progress, to the corner, where he trembled with fear. Tears welled up in his eyes, threatening to fall. Seconds later, two guards came. They frightened him, in there dark clothing and armor. He was carried to his “room”, a tiny white space that harbored a small bed and a toilet. To him, it felt more like a cell. They threw him into the room, and he scrambled for the bed. All he wanted to do was sleep, to fall into the world of dreams where this would all go away. But the terror kept him awake.

“Boy. Come forward.”

The voice made him nearly fall out of bed; it was the professor. His nose was covered in bandages, and by the strained looked on his face he concluded that he was still very much in pain. The boy stepped forward, reluctantly. Without warning, the professor punched him hard, in the gut. He felt a rib crack, and then he doubled over. He screamed. It fell on deaf ears.

“That will teach you to never harm me again, Collin. Remember it.” With a parting kick to the head that made the boy black out, he departed with a satisfied, devilish grin.

Collin was only eight years old.
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EDIT: As a sidenote, can anyone inform me of how to indent on the forums?

[JX Valentine]

EDIT: As a sidenote, can anyone inform me of how to indent on the forums?

Unfortunately, you can't. Websites don't recognize indentations (unless you use particular codes to do so), so instead, they strip them out. There is an indent code for the forums, but in order to use it, you'll need to know precisely how many words one line will take up, which is impossible because everyone has different monitors. Otherwise, putting the indent code around an entire paragraph sets every line at a certain distance from the margin, putting it around nothing does absolutely nothing, and putting it around only the first word of the paragraph causes the rest of the paragraph to move to the next line.

In any case, a couple of notes:

1. Remember to hit the enter key twice, not once, no matter what you're writing. As in, if you're ever tempted to hit the enter key, do it twice. This is because you're most likely creating a new paragraph when you hit the enter key, and new paragraphs on the internet are indicated with hard returns (read: that line of space between paragraphs), not soft ones. Also note that you still need a blank line of space after lines of dialogue.

2. I'd really highly recommend not using huge, bold character names to separate out bits of POV in the middle of a chapter. This tends to be extremely jarring for a reader because it pulls them out of the flow of the story to smack them upside the head with a character name. I'd suggest putting these bits at the opening of chapters instead as chapter introductions. That way, a reader can go from the quote by that character to the action of the story, but it's less jarring because of the chapter break, if that makes sense.

3. On Benjamin's part, pretty sure sound doesn't work that way. I mean, sure, they're sound waves, but you can't really confine sound unless you soundproof a room or do something to listeners' ears. Sure, if we buy the idea that this kid can telekinetically redirect sound, that won't stop anyone from hearing it. It'll just affect how they hear it. Imagine what would happen if you moved a speaker from one part of a room to another. You'd still hear what was coming from it either way; your brain would just process it differently because it's in a different location.

4. Otherwise, the story seems pretty okay. Average fantasy/sci-fi fare, which isn't to say it's bad. I'd just need more chapters to judge properly. However, I will say I'm rather uncomfortable with Collin's part and not because of the violence. It just doesn't entirely make sense.

It feels more like an attempt to go the generic "evil organization creates a superweapon and is mean to it because they're evil" route. You never do see an organization treat superpowered individuals with kindness or dignity, despite the fact that, you know, treating individuals like people will make them more likely to want to help you (or not want to use their abilities to kill you). I mean, think of it like training a dog. Being kind to the dog will make them love you and want to follow you around. Kicking it and abusing it will either make them vicious and more difficult to control or make them timid and more apprehensive to listen to you. And people have a lot more free will than dogs do, so they're even more difficult to control. Scold a child enough, and they'll either mouth off at you or start crying because of it.

So the main issue here is that we're shown that Collin is being abused, but it's pretty much for no reason that would benefit anyone. It just feels like it's only done to show how the professor is evil and how Collin's backstory is so very angsty. He just moved a cylinder capable of smashing someone in the face. I don't think it's a good idea to abuse a kid who can literally kill you with his brain someday because he'll remember that and try eventually. (Just ask Mewtwo. Or River Tam. Or goodness knows how many other characters fit this trope.)

That and there's some repetition of words (namely "nose") in the paragraph about the accident that could use some working out to avoid awkwardness. But that's just nitpicking.

But yeah, other than that, Benjamin's and Jon's parts look all right (sound oddities aside), and it'd be interesting to see more of them. Especially Jon's part, but that may just be because I'm a sucker for brother-sister tropes.

Good luck!

[MotherRussia]

Thank you. Finally, someone gives it to me straight. I appreciate the feedback and will apply all that you've said. ^_^