The aluminum channel of the EdiTall splicing block was cold against Lin Mei’s fingertips.
She adjusted her tortoiseshell glasses with a chalk-dusted thumb, leaning over the wooden workbench in the tape editing corner of Studio B. Before her sat the heavy cast-iron chassis of the Ampex ATR-102 tape recorder. Its dual capstan flywheels hummed with a quiet vibration that traveled straight through the bench legs.
“Line up the leader, Clara,” Lin Mei said, her voice crisp and rapid. “We have zero margin for phase jitter.”
“Leader is threaded,” Clara Vance replied from the mixing console three feet away. Her small hands rested on the silver transport controls of the Nagra IV-S portable recorder.
“The oxide is facing inward. Twelve seconds of Father’s pre-biased carrier tone.”
“Where did Father record this leader?” Clara asked, her fingers tracing the smooth plastic reel flange.
“In the basement broadcast studio of City Hall, thirty minutes before the flood,” Julian answered, looking at the faded label. “He knew the Bureau would try to jam the civil emergency frequencies.”
“He recorded twelve seconds of pure silence with an un-corrupted forty-two hundred hertz carrier tone underneath. It serves as an acoustic key. When a broadcast begins with this tone, every receiver in New Marrow locks onto the signal automatically.”
