All the Devils are Here

The Compound

I wake up starving. The feeling of hunger is so persistent, I barely acknowledge the accumulated sweat on my forehead from the AC going off in the middle of the night.

For a second, I forget where I am. I expect to be in the Compound. Before I turned 16, I had a fairly normal childhood. In the morning, I would get up and prepare myself for school. By the time I got downstairs, my mother would have set the table for breakfast and the four of us would take a few bites of our food before the school bus arrived. At that time, my mother was an interior decorator then, she became a painter then, she became a full-time gardener. As I grew older, I would learn that she was a hobbyist or as some would like to say - a dabbler. My father on the other hand hardly brought work home. Even though I didn't fully grasp what exactly his job was, I knew it was supposed to be our family business. I knew sometimes he came home physically hurt and sometimes he didn't come home at all. The days he didn't come home, I would ask my mother where he was and she would say he was at the Compound.

I wipe the sweat off my face and finally get up from my bed to head to the bathroom. It consists of a shower, a toilet and a small mirror on the wall. That'll do. I shed off my clothes and get into the shower making sure the bathroom door is locked and placing my gun on the toilet seat in case. When I'm sure I've carried out all safety precautions, I relax and let the water wash over my naked body as I try to plan my day in my head.

For the past four years, my days have had a certain routine to them that had become a part and parcel of me. I didn't live in the semi-detached duplex that I grew up in with my family anymore. Although I went home on most weekends, I had moved to the Compound. Three acres of land, over a hundred Hunters and Sentinels in residence, and an unlimited supply of ammunitions - the Compound serves as an unofficial headquarters for Hunters and Sentinels that were actively involved in the protection of the city.

For young Hunters at the Compound, days went in either of the following directions. A hunt, training day or group meetings when the leaders arrived from the council meetings with information relevant to our operations. Hunts were a fancy way to say assassinations and training day was a fancy way to say beating the s**t out of each other. I'm not much of a star student when it comes to physical combat, but, I've shot at the same spot six times in a row every day for the past four years and, at this point, the only people I've shot at that didn't die are the ones I didn't intend to kill.

I turn the water off and all of a sudden remember the one super important thing that I didn't pack - a towel. No surprise that Holiday Motel doesn't lay out towels for their guests. Or maybe they forgot. Or maybe the last guest took it as a souvenir. Whatever the case might have been, I'm forced to stand awkwardly outside the shower and let mother nature dry me off. This brief moment of idleness forces me to look at myself in the mirror and I'm frightened by my own face. When was the last time I looked at myself?

I knew what I looked like of course - straight black hair and hollow cheeks that made me look like a sick child when I was younger. People in my life have regarded me with a certain fear for so long that in my head I had construed this image of a bad-ass woman with a resting b***h face but, what I see in the mirror doesn't match that image. I look harmless. I look like if you push me, I'd fall and break into a thousand little pieces. Like the kind of girl that would be described as sweet. Or delicate. Isn't it funny how sometimes we are unrecognizable even to our own selves? No one had ever called me delicate in my whole life and yet here my reflection was - reminding me that if I wanted to be delicate, I could be.

The realizationa dawns on me that perhaps the only reason I was regarded with such fear was because they knew what I was capable of. It didn't have anything to do with how I look or how I carry myself. It had everything to do with the fact that I was the leader's daughter and I had never missed a hunt since my very first one. I know there are more reasons why people at the compound were wary of me but, ut just never had anything to do with what I physically look like. You can be pretty and harmless on the outside but, very ugly and sinister on the inside. I don;t want to be that way anymore. And it's a good thing that unlike back at home, the people here have no idea what I can do with a gun in my hand or knife at my disposal. Lucky me.

Even though my hair is still damp, my body is dry enough so I head back to the room and put some clothes on. Maybe it's the clothes I wear that suck the delicacy out of me. All black tees, jackets, jeans, and boots didn't exactly scream 'I'm a sweet, harmless girl'. I pack my backpack and head out to my car because for all I know I might not come back here thanks to my next-door neighbor. On my way out, I drop my room keys off with Mina and this time around our brief interaction is free of frowns. Instead, I smile at her. I can be sweet.

My adventure for the day starts at the bakery I spotted yesterday. I eat a full breakfast then head to a mall where I buy two new outfits, a towel and a bigger backpack. I change into one of the outfits in the dressing room at the mall. It's a dark green dress paired with knee-length boots. Fallon always wore black because other colors brought unnecessary attention but, Hera....Hera doesn't mind the attention.

By 6 pm I'm leaving the mall and taking another drive where I psychoanalyze the unsuspecting people on the street. This time I have a bag of chips and some soda so the drive is so much more fun for me. I make mental notes of all the dramatic things I see. Dog humping another dog in the street while dog owners have a chat. Pair of hookers having a very loud exchange with who I assume is their Pimp. Street performers serving as a distraction for pickpockets to grab a few watches here and there. I dip my hands in my bag of chips to take another handful but, it's all gone. I look down in the bag in disappointment and when I look back up my eyes land on the most inviting sign I've ever seen. The Neon lights flash the name high in the sky - WHITE RABBIT. It's absolutely enchanting and I can't help myself. I pull up in front of the building but, the parking lot is filled up so I park opposite the street and walk all the way to the building. At the entrance, there is a security guard positioned. I can see he hasn't let some people in but, when I arrive, he holds the door open for me and ushers me in. I don't know what the basis of getting in is, I'm not even sure what this building is yet, I have a strong urge to be inside it. Once I step in and the security guard shuts the door behind me, it finally occurs to me - I've been here before.