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Chapter 3

     "Atticus... ATTICUS!" I jump out of bed, throwing myself at the air.
     "WHAT?!?!" I open my eyes wide. Art stares over at me. I had only woken up once in the night, to get rid of all the contents in my stomach. I could still smell it coming from the trash bin.
     "Aha, woke you up," she says. I glare at her. "I was lonely. Still didn't get my report done. Want breakfast? I'll show you to Aaron. Then you can unpack."
Still wearing my sweatshirt and jeans from yesterday, I accompany Art up three more sets of stairs. She had already changed into a pair of shorts and a T-shirt.
     The first staircase leads to a strange bath house that split in two for girls and guys, while the second one leads to a room filled with mats, weapons, and punching bags. There were two people fighting with swords in the corner, but other than that, the great room was empty. Art pushes me towards another staircase, which leads to a large kitchen. There is probably thirty people in the room at once, all sitting along the huge tables that ran from one wall to the next. They are eating from strange packages, that are stocked on a counter on the opposite wall.
Art leds me to that counter, and threw one of the containers at me.
"Food."
I give her a strange look as she beckons me to follow her to the corner, where two people sit. One is a large, strong boy, who's Taik is orange. The other is a tall, thin boy, with a blue Taik.
"Hullo, Aaron. Hullo, August," Art says, as she sits in the sit directly across from them. I sit beside her.
"Who's your friend?" the orange Taiked boy asks. "And why does he smell like scum?"
"Scum?" I ask. Why does everyone keep calling me that.
"Scum. Dirt. Trash. Junk. Demon," he hisses.
I sigh, and Art says, "He's a demon. But I'm going to train him to help me fight other demons. Guys, this is Atticus-"
     "I go by Cas," I interupt, referring to my middle name, Castle.
     "This is Atticus, but since he's a demon in exterminator territory, we'll call him Test Four," she finishes.
     "What's Test One, Two, and Three?" I ask.
     "You're looking at one of them. The other two are off who knows where. They belong to Aaron, though," Art replies, gesturing towards the green one. She starts opening her package, and pulls out... what resembles a human hand. She pulls off the finger and tosses it into her mouth.
     "Agh!" I scream, tumbling out of my chair.
     The orange Taiked one looks at me strange. "You sure that's a demon?"
     Art sighs. "Sadly, yes." She turns to me. "I told you demons and exterminators eat humans last night. Try to keep up."
     "Well, Test Two, this is Aaron," she gestures toward the orange one. "But because we are all racist, you are to refer to him as Upperclassman Beadrue." She gestures towards the lanky boy. "This is August," she says, "or Test One. He's Aaron's, though."
     She takes another bite of the hand (I guess you could call it finger food), and looks at August. "Where's Rose and Eric? Not that I particularly care for those two..."
     "I sent Rose and Eric to research something in the library for me. Now that I think about it, it's taking them an abnormally long amount of time..." Aaron stands up. "Test One, stay here. I'll go get Bitch And Friends TM," he says, walking away. "Shoulda asked August to do it..."
      "'Bitch And Friends TM'?" I ask.
     "God you ask a lot of questions," August says. "Rose and Eric. They're twin demons of his," he says. "God, I wish I didn't have to stay here with you," he says. He rolls his eyes and leans against the wall, staring off into space. He was dressed so professionally, in his white button up shirt and khakis, you would think he'd act more professional. Art says nothing about it, and finishes off the rest of the hand.
     I slowly open my package. I look away when I see the hand. It is repulsive: cold, pale, and squishy. The bones had been removed. I pick it up and pull one of the fingers off. It makes one of the worst sounds imaginable. I close my eyes and took a bite.
     I'm expecting one of the worst tastes in the world, but it actually tastes like steak. I quickly finish off the rest of my hand.
     "I know, I thought they'd be under animals!" a voice shouts from behind me.
     "No! They'd be with resources!" I hear a loud smack. I turne around to see Aaron slapping a small girl across the face. Her eyes are closed tight like she was expecting it. Aaron takes a sharp breath and sits down at the table. The girl, who I assume is Rose, follows behind. She has short fluffy pink hair, and looks lighter than most dogs. Unlike August's professional look, she's dressed in a school uniform, with a pink sweater over it. Behind her is boy identical to her, with the same pink Taik, though his seems more red.
     Rose looks at Art with a bright face. "Hiya, Art!" she says, grinning. She looks at me. "Who's that?"
     "That's Test Four, or Cas. He's my demon," Art explains.
     "Ohhh. Hiya, Cas." She sits down next to Aaron like nothing had happened, even though she still had a red mark from where he'd hit her. The boy I guess is Eric sits beside Rose. He's dressed a lot like August, though he's wearing a Batman sweatshirt over his shirt. This is one of the oddest looking bunches you could probably ever see.
     Eric waves feebly at me, and puts his head down. Art looks at me.
     "Let's go," she says. We return back to our room.
     "Why is Aaron so mean to his demons?" I ask after she closes the door.
     "Well... he just thinks that they're less than human. Like they're his pets," she replies.
     "But that's not... fair."
     "He had a hard past. All exterminators are dead, you know," she says, throwing herself onto her bed. "Now stop asking me questions and unpack."
     I do as she asks, and find that I'd been left with a few T-shirts, some cargo shorts, green-colored contacts,  a PDA, a notepad, a sword, and some pens. I find a place for it all in the desk, and shove the sword under my bed.