Sound of Silence
By Foxgear
Octavia Melody, up incoming cellist and overall talented songwriter and musician hurried through the plain white halls of Ponyville hospital, her high heels clicking against the tiles as she made a beeline for room 107. She stopped short as the nurse stepped out of the room, blocking her path to her target.
“How is she? How’s Vinyl doing?” She asked panicking, grabbing the nurse by the shoulders. She quickly realized what she was doing and backed off. “I’m so sorry. I know you don’t need that given your profession, but I’m a little out of sorts at the moment.”
The nurse gave her a gentle smile, one Octavia didn’t deserve, but the nurse knew this would be hard for anyone.
“She’s out of danger and you are?”
“Oh, I’m so sorry! I’m Octavia Melody, Vinyl Scratch’s sister; I’ve just arrived from Canterlot after hearing about what happened. Is she really going to be ok?”
The nurse nodded, but then frowned as she looked through her notes. “Yes, for the most part, but I’m afraid… well, there’s no other way to say it. The wound on her neck, it’s right on top of her voice box. Until she wakes up we won’t be able to tell how much damage was done, but I’m afraid the chances of slim that she’ll be able to speak.”
A cold feeling a dread washed over her, Vinyl unable to speak? That means she can’t sing and if she can’t sing then her dream of becoming a songstress are…
“Surely she will recover, right? She’ll be able to speak again someday right?” The nurse looked away, clutching her clipboard tightly in her hands. “Nurse?”
“It’s too soon to tell. Our best doctor will come and take a look, but the chances of her recovering are low. If you’ll excuse me I have other patients to attend to, but feel free to go in and sit next to her, but please let her rest.”
Octavia nodded shakily, “Of course, I understand.”
The nurse took her leave allowing Octavia to enter the room. Inside Vinyl lay draped in ugly green scrubs, her electric blue hair matted down and laying loose on her shoulders rather than it’s usual spiky shape. On the table were her shades, purple party glasses that Octavia had given her for her birthday. White medical tape was wrapped around her throat, right where Vinyl had been stabbed.
“Oh Vinyl, I’m so sorry, if only I’d been there to pick you up like I promised.”
Last night Vinyl had gotten her first big gig with her band, Pon3, they have become very popular in the underground and have just started to make it big. The group had been so happy, but some of their fans were not. Octavia had worried over her sister’s selected music genre, metal, she didn’t like the crowd and the concert venues were so scary. None the less she supported her sister and always made sure to pick her up after the concerts, except for last night.
The police report was simple. Vinyl and her friends were exiting the back door when someone jumped out with a knife and stabbed Vinyl in the throat! The attacker ran, but one of the other band members managed to tackle and hold him till police arrived. Seems he didn’t like the fact they were “Selling out” as he stated and wanted to keep the band from doing so by any means, even if it meant hurting them. The man was more deranged than even that, though, in his apartment pictures of Vinyl littered the walls, every inch, the police told her there were traces of… bodily fluids on some of the pictures.
The man was now on his way to prison, but his mission was done. Vinyl wouldn’t be singing anymore. Octavia choked back a sob as she ran her fingers through Vinyl’s hair, she would be devastated, and singing was Vinyl’s life and her livelihood. Sure she could get by, there were probably a lot of jobs a mute could do, but Vinyl was never one to ordinary jobs and her instrumental talents were poor.
She’s tried for years to teach Vinyl how to play an instrument, but she just couldn’t pick it up, no matter what it was. Without her voice her music career was dead.
“Oh, Vinyl…”
Lavish pink eyes as Vinyl awakened, she stretched and yawned soundlessly and she noticed. She noticed right away.
“…! ….!”
“Vinyl please calm down!” Octavia pleaded as the white skinned girl thrashed around violently on her bed. She held Vinyl’s arms above her head trying to keep her still less she opens her wound again. “Nurse! Nurse I need help!”
A buzz went off as the two nurses charged into the room, one was preparing a needle. Vinyl’s heart monitor was going crazy as the mute went into shock. The nurse stabbed the needle into her arm and slowly the fight left her and she lied back down with Octavia holding her hand tightly.
“It’s going to be ok Vinyl; it’s going to be ok.”
She stared at the mirror. She was home now, finally out of that uncomfortable hospital bed and back on her own, it was wonderful. Vinyl touched her throat her image mimicking the action as she touched the faded white scar in the middle of her throat.
“…” Her mouth moved, but there was no sound. Her hands gripped the edge of the bathroom sink tightly as she took a deep breath and screamed! Mouth wide and teeth bared she screamed as loud as she could and still there was nothing.
Vinyl slammed her fist against the counter in frustration accidentally knocking her shades to the floor. In the mirror, tears were rolling down her cheeks as she huffed out of breath. Someone knocked at the door.
“Vinyl,” It was Octavia. “Is everything alright? I thought I heard something fall.”
Taking a calming breath Vinyl kneeled down and gently picked her shades off the floor. Washing the filth from the lens she put them on and opened the door, startling Octavia.
“Oh, Vinyl you startled me!”
Vinyl cracked a smile at Octavia’s flustered face, she always found it hilarious seeing her prim sister flustered. She opened her mouth and spoke her usual morning joke about how Octavia should loosen up and stuff like that, but once again there was only silence and the mood quickly shifted from ok to depressing.
Not liking the silence Octavia dug through her purse and retrieved a pamphlet and handed it to Vinyl, who raised a brow at the title. “They're sign language classes that you could take. I thought they might help with… your new situation.”
Looking from the pamphlet to her sister and back again, Vinyl took the paper and tossed into the nearby trash bin.
(I’m mute not deaf Octy! I don’t need to speak with my hands if I can hear you!)
Octavia cringed as she watched Vinyl go into one of her rants, which looked really funny at the moment like a scene from an old silent movie, but she knew better than to laugh right now.
“You're right, stupid idea, perhaps pen, and paper will be better?” A quick head shake from Vinyl quickly shot that idea down. “How about writing texts with your phone?” Once again Vinyl answered no, leaving Octavia to sigh. “I know you’re going through a hard time Vinyl, but please work with me here!”
This made Vinyl pause. The mute girl looked at her sister with a twinkle in her eye and quickly snatched up a piece of paper and shoved it in Octavia’s face, it read Yes or No only.
“Yes or no… Oh yes or no questions! Simply replies! Brilliant Vinyl! I mean it will only really work between you and me, but that doesn’t matter I guess. What do you want for dinner? Hamburger or hot dogs, nod once for a hamburger and twice for hot dogs.”
Vinyl smiled, Octavia’s joy spilled over to her and she felt cheery enough to pull a prank and nodded three times.
“Ugh Vinyl!”
It’s been a month since the incident and Vinyl has adapted to her new way of life. Everything was shoulder shrugs, nods, or goofy expressions for communication. Vinyl did keep a pen and paper and her phone handy in case she had to deal with someone who didn’t get that she couldn’t talk, but living in a small town just about everyone knew and all did their best to accommodate her.
However as nice as her day to day had been there was still that one thing that escaped her, singing. She’s worked doubly hard to learn an instrument, but with no success. To cope Vinyl has taken to listening to her favorite songs on her headphones almost twenty-four seven, just because she couldn’t make music anymore didn’t mean she couldn’t enjoy it. Unfortunately, her battery just died.
(This sucks. What do I do now? Also where am I?)
Vinyl looked around, the street was unfamiliar to her, she must have really zoned out today listening to her songs. She was kind of surprised she hadn’t been hit by a car.
Slightly depressed and frustrated Vinyl turned around to go back the way she came only to stop short when she heard a sound, the sound of music! A kind of music she hasn’t heard before. Excited about the idea of hearing some new beats she dashed across the street to the building which was in the middle of remodeled; it looked like it was going to be a new dance club.
The door flew open as Vinyl entered, the bright lights that usually were sparkling were off and the floor was empty, but the music still played over the speakers. There up on the stage was the DJ, a slender pink hair girl with pinkish white skin; she expertly tuned the machine bobbing her head to the beat of her own creations. The song came to an end and Vinyl couldn’t help but clap for an encore.
“Ugh?” The girl gasped taking off her headphones. “What are you doing here? You know were closed right? Vinyl nodded and gave two thumbs up, making the girl raise a brow. “Ok… what’s your name? I’m AI Elite, but my stage name is DJ-OCP4, what’s your name?”
Vinyl ran up to the stage and frantically wrote her name on her notepad and thrust it out for OCP to see. The DJ took a step back, clearly weirded out. Not wanting to think her weird, Vinyl moved her mouth and made a slashing gesture over her throat hoping she's got the
message.
OCP gasped, “You can’t talk? Wait… Oh, I’m stupid! You’re that girl… I’m sorry I should have known better. Really I should have, I was at the concert the night you were… well, you know. Loved your music, by the way, it's a shame that asshole had to take it away from everybody.” Vinyl nodded sadly as her hand lazily wondered over the controls for the sound mixer, giving OCP an idea!
“You want to learn how to play this thing?” She said making Vinyl look up in surprise. “I know it’s not singing in the traditional way, but you can remix just about anything with this baby and even create new stuff. What do you say? Oops… sorry, wrong choice of words.”
Vinyl waved her off as a Cheshire grin spread across her lips as she spread her fingers across the sound machine. With this, with this, she could create music again!
Smiling wide Vinyl put the extra set of headphones on her head and gave OCP the thumbs up!
“I’ll take that as a yes then, let’s get rocking!”
And thus DJ-Pon3 was born
Author's Note
OCP= Original character pony
