Page 41 of Rising

It was mid-afternoon now and the inside of The Compound was busy as people ended their work days. Picking up their children from school, and made their way to their homes or to dinner. My mouth watered as I remembered my favorite restaurant in the Entertainment Square. The owner made the best vegan chili and smoothies. It was an odd pair to some, but I was never one to allow a weird combination stop me from enjoying the robust flavors.

The food at The Kitchens was free to all and rationed accordingly, but there were a few approved restaurants in the midst of the theaters and taverns that took our local coin. After a year of being established, we figured with the steady flow of resources, some businesses should be allowed to form and some type of currency should start being exchanged. Bring some sorts of civilization back into our lives slowly.

Everyone was paid a fair wage according to their duties. The more strenuous or less sought after roles offered the most pay, but no one was ‘rich’ in the way people could be in The Before. There weren’t anybadhousing options, some just were a bit more elaborately designed, or had more space, but everything was far from uninhabitable. Of course housing was assigned strategically by Prescott.

I didn’t know all the semantics of it but there was a certain amount of housing, that had a certain amount of space, for a certain amount of people, that cost a certain amount of coin every month. Then that money did some cyclical economic shit that Ialsodidn’t understand. Point was, it worked and for the most part everyone was happy.

You couldn’t please everyone, but you could please most when you actively worked to make their life easier, better.

Any clothes outside of the basics we provided from the shops. Some were handmade by people using earth magic to create elaborate designs or fabrics. Others were restored or taken from surrounding neighborhoods in good condition.

It was the same thing for furniture, nothing around here was truly fancy, but I couldn’t deny that it reminded me of a cute, quaint small town overseas somewhere. Where community was abundant and everyone did their own thing without getting a side-eye, where money didn’t matter. Another dimension from the US. Then I remember we’re all trauma bonded and holding ourselves together just barely, one stone away from shattering our little glass house, and I have a good laugh.

A few kids ran in our path as we approached Compound Hall, by their age probably coming back from school. Everyone under sixteen went to school while sixteen was seen as being an adult in this new world. We considered it old enough to put in their fair share of work and support The Compound however they could. Just not as one of my soldiers.

For that, I preferred they waited until they were eighteen, though that didn’t stop some of the young and eager from trying. People like Elie. I couldn’t blame them. Five formative years of their life had been consumed by gore and violence. Ofcourse,they wanted to do something that put them in the midst of danger every day.

The joke was on them. Unless they had some crazy skill that couldn’t be found in someone older, more mature, I never placed anyone near the age of eighteen out near the front lines. If I could preserve even a drop of their innocence, I would.

I wouldn’t let them see the things I had to see or do the things I had to do as a soldier. As a leader. Hellas a fresh out of college kid that had to figure out a lot of shit on her own. My throat bobbed at my loss of innocence, the option I was never given because I never had someone to advocate for me. The truth was, I stopped being me so long ago that I couldn’t even remember who that person was. It’d been years since I felt my true self. Turned into this new person.

The new Amaia.

If I could stop that from happening to any of them, I would.

* * *

Back at the intake room,Alexiares sat on the other end of the desk from me. We stared at each other, saying nothing. Both aware that whoever spoke first lost whatever bullshit game we’d been playing since last night.

I cocked my head and squinted my eyes, trying to will to words out of his mouth. His face remained blank, blinking every few seconds, trying to reflect a face of calmness. Suckerpunch and Harley had decided somewhere along the walk here that they were going to be best friends. Harley licked at the wound on his side, nestled into each other in the corner of the room.

“What’s this?” he asked, finally breaking at the intrigue as I slid a packet of information across the desk.

“A lottery ticket.” I smiled brightly at him.

He looked up, unimpressed. “I’m trying to maintain the peace here, if you would just cooperate, General I’d appreciate it.” Distaste floated off his tongue when he said the wordGeneral.

“If you don’t want a sarcastic answer, then my recommendation to you would be to stop asking stupid questions,Alexi.” I tossed the insult behind a simple word back at him.

His lips parted, but he said nothing as he awaited my honest answer. “It’s a survival guide for The Compound.” I realized how sarcastic that could sound before adding, “It’s just the basic layout of the area. Forcivilianeyes, though honestly, what’s on paper probably doesn’t make much sense until you see it for yourself. Then there’s a list of jobs and their pay. You have a week to decide which one suits whatever sick desires you surely have.”

I remembered the peace we were supposed to be keeping, though admittedly I found it incredibly hard to make it through an entire sentence without insulting him. “There’s also a list of open housing we have in comparison to jobs you qualify for. But you won’t need that,” I said, flipping the packet back closed. “There’s an open room with a friend. You’ll be staying there.”

“Why list out open housing if people don’t get to choose where they wash their ass?” he inquired as he snatched the packet back, flipping through the pages one of the Scholars had typed out, over and over again on our typewriters. Bless their heart, couldn’t be me.

“Well, it’s listed there because most peopledoget to choose where they lay their heads at night. As for washing your ass, there’s communal bathing houses for that. Though there is a drain in your toilet area where you can use your water magic to rinse off.”

He made a face at that before deciding it wasn’t worth the fight and probably nothing he could do about the situation, but a question lingered behind his chestnut eyes. “Uh, and why don’t people have their own bathrooms?”

“Did you have your own bathroom where you came from?” I tossed back at him.

“Uh, no.”

“Then why expect one here?”

He tossed his hands towards the windows as if it were obvious. “Considering the elaborateness of the place, I figured basic plumbing wasn’t considered a luxury.”

Fair point,I thought as I considered my response. Shrugging, I offered him some of our history. “When we built the initial structures of this place, we didn’t have an aqueduct system in place yet. Then our population boomed quickly after lines were drawn. Adding in a full bathing suite in every home didn’t seem realistic when you just wanted to get a roof over people’s heads. I don’t cover city planning, so I don’t really know, but some of the newer houses have them, leadership has them for obvious reasons. Chain of command must be kept insomeaspects. But no one’s ever complained about them. They’re free to add them once they move in, but I think people enjoy the community aspect of it all.”

---