Cinder sat in her cell in silence for exactly 28 minutes and 32 seconds before her captors fetched her. One of them held out an envelope addressed to her.
“Can you open it?” Cinder said.
The man ripped the flap open and found a note inside. He held it out to her so she could read it.
Trust them.
- TR
TR—The Researcher? “Who sent this?” Cinder asked.
The guard shrugged. “May I remove your chains?” he asked.
She nodded and he freed her. The two guards led Cinder down a series of several hallways so white and bare that they reminded Cinder of her dream, from right after her upgrades. It had only been a few days earlier, yet it felt like a lifetime ago that she had undergone the surgery. In those few days, she’d become so reliant on the data that flowed through her mind whenever she summoned it. She couldn’t imagine living without it, couldn’t imagine having to ask questions every time she needed information, couldn’t imagine not knowing where she was or what time it was at any given moment.
The guards stopped at a plain, white door and unlocked it. The tall guard looked at Cinder. “Tell him what you were told.”
Cinder made eye contact with Vaughn, who looked both furious and dazed at once. “Come on.” She pointed at the guards. “They’re not here to hurt us.”
Vaughn’s chiseled face relaxed slightly. He gave Cinder a slight nod of acknowledgement. She wondered if The Researcher had visited him too, but she doubted it. Vaughn was from the real world, not hers, and he would never trust or understand The Researcher.
The guards released Vaughn and led them down another series of hallways, until they came to an auditorium. The guards motioned for Cinder and Vaughn to stand at the front of the auditorium, near the podium. Cinder scanned the audience and found Dash and Lia sitting in the stands. She flashed Dash a look, what is going on? Dash lifted his shoulders and shook his head to tell her that he had no idea.
“Welcome.” A skinny man with bright red hair and freckles stood up. “My name is Ren, and I’m leading the coalition that brought you here tonight.” He paced toward the other side of the stage in front of them. “You must be wondering why you’re here.” Ren grabbed a stack of thin books from the podium and held them up. “Have you seen these?”
Cinder zoomed in on the cover to identify them. The top book was a comic book and featured a hero named TR on the cover. Ren flipped through the pages before finding the one he was looking for. “Page 23.” He pointed at some text inside the book and held it out for Cinder.
Cinder stepped forward to take the book from the man. “The Leader’s men used a strong sedative to tame The Savior, until she could trust them,” she read out loud.
Vaughn peered over her shoulder at the book. He pointed to the character on the page, a woman with long, black hair, slanted eyes, and deep purple irises. “This looks like you.”
Cinder scrunched her nose. “It couldn’t be.” She held the book up to Ren. “What is this?”
Ren stepped toward her and took the comic book from her hands. “Instructions. This is how we knew how to take you without a fight. We’ve been expecting you.”
Vaughn looked outraged. “Let me see that,” he said, swiping the book from Ren.
Cinder blinked. “Someone is communicating with you through comic books?”
Ren flipped to the last page of the comic book. “It says here that you will announce an important decision to us.”
Cinder’s face heated up. When she looked out into the crowd, she saw hope plastered across every one of their faces. They believed someone was attacking them and they needed to defend their homes and children. Something about their expressions moved her. She had to at least tell them the truth so they truly knew what they were up against. She stepped forward.
“I’ve never seen these comics before,” she said, “and I doubt I’m the savior you were hoping for. My name is Cinder, formerly Ima, and I used to live here in The Dome, just like you. A week ago during the first attack at the Oriental Theater, I found a way to escape.”
Cinder heard mumbles ripple across the people in the auditorium. “The Dome is a secret underground world. There is another world, the real world, beyond The Dome,” she told them. “I’ve seen it with my own eyes.” She squeezed Vaughn’s wrist. “Vaughn grew up in that world and he can tell you firsthand how different it is from this one. I’m still learning.
“There’s a single man named Alazar Wrightwood who owns a company called FACE. He is trying to destroy both this world and his own, and he is using us as his experiment. The explosions are just the beginning; when Alazar is done with The Dome, he plans to kill us all.”
Murmurs ascended the crowd as people took in Cinder’s words.
Ren stepped forward next to Cinder. “This is what the comic books have told us,” he said.
“The hero in that comic book, called The Researcher, has asked me to help you fight against Alazar Wrightwood and escape from The Dome. Alazar Wrightwood will not be easy to outsmart, but The Researcher wants to help us, even if it’s a long shot. He has asked me to find a way out of The Dome and lead the entire population out before anyone else dies.”
“What did you decide?” Dash’s voice echoed through the room, hurtling toward her like a cargo train on the Blue Line. Cinder felt panic in her hands, her knees; the entire room looked at her expectantly.
She thought back to Dash’s words. That’s who you are now, E? You’re the girl who’ll save her own skin at the expense of others? Did she want to be someone who saved others at her own expense? She didn’t know. She only knew that if she didn’t, these people had no chance.
Cinder took a deep breath. “I’ve decided to accept The Researcher’s proposal. I’ve decided that we are going to fight our way out of this Dome, no matter the cost.”
Dash stood up pounding his fist into the air. “That’s what I’m talking about.” He clapped enthusiastically and his clapping spread from person to person, until everyone in the room had put their hands together at least a few times.
“Before we do this,” Cinder said, “you should know that it is likely impossible to escape. We are weaker than the people in the other world, both mentally and physically. The Dome was designed to keep us contained, and even The Researcher does not know of any weaknesses in infrastructure or design. This is what we face. But we’ll face it head on, as one.”
The auditorium erupted with applause, and Ren joined Cinder in front of the group. “Are you in?” he asked the crowd. “I said, Are You In?!”
“Fight!” Dash chanted. “Fight!”
The crowd started chanting with Dash, louder and louder. “Fight! Fight! Fight! Fight!”
Ren pumped his fist in the air maniacally. “Let’s give ‘em hell!”
The audience rushed toward the stage to talk to Cinder. She stood there like a deer in headlights, answering their questions as best she could. She talked about the world beyond The Dome, the changes to her body since the upgrade, and how she planned to get them out. She spent a lot of time explaining that she had no idea what she was doing, but the group didn’t seem to care. They only seemed thrilled that someone finally knew what was going on and that they would be saved, somehow.
When the group had finally gotten enough of her, Cinder’s eyes found Vaughn’s. He sat in one of the chairs of the auditorium, quietly taking everything in. When he noticed her watching him, he smiled at her like he was seeing her for the first time.
She made her way toward him and sat in the seat next to him. “You surprise me,” he told her.
Cinder nodded, laughing to herself. “I surprise myself more.”
Note from the Author: This book is the first in the Socialpunk Trilogy. It's available for free in ebook format via all major retailers, including Amazon, B&N, iTunes, Kobo, and Smashwords. The second and third books in the trilogy will not be posted on Wattpad, but you can get information about them via http://monicaleonelle.com/free-novels/
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Socialpunk (Socialpunk #1)
Jugendliteratur"This book would be good for those that enjoyed the Hunger Games!” ~ Cover 2 Cover Blog "When I read the first page, I did not anticipate that I would be finishing the book that night, but I did. I had to. I didn’t care that I was up until 3:00AM."...
