Domgre

7

"She's our best chance at winning."
"She's a loose cannon!"
"Then we aim her in the right direction."
"She's been through too much. She's going to self destruct."
"Bee,"
"I've worked with kids who've been through things before, it it best to withdraw them from the situation. She needs to heal."

She'd wanted lunch with Hobbs. Instead she found Bee and him arguing. She stayed outside the door, listening in silently, it wasn't hard to make out who they were talking about. she retreated as footsteps came toward the door. She hurried back up the stairs.

She'd been successful in making herself irreplaceable at least. She walked into the training room to find the female recruits with bottles in hand that they quickly tried to hide. She'd been drunk only once at a party. She hated it. She had to have her own back, and she couldn't do that when she could barely walk in a straight line. She left them without a word and instead went down to the gym. She didn't bother wrapping her hands, lunging at the punching bag. It knocked her over on the swing back and she laid, staring at the light above. She would not be pushed aside.

She got back up, going in on the punching bag over and over until her first missed. A mistake. A mistake she would pay for. Pain shot up her hand, knuckles split from where they'd made contact with the wall. She slid down the wall, sucking on her dirty knuckles as she stared at the punching bag swinging miserably. She's going to self destruct. She and her hadn't talked since the fight earlier in the week. Bee smiled at her in the hallway but there weren't many words beyond that. Evie decided she didn't care. She needs to heal. She turned the words over in her mind. From what? There was nothing wrong with her.

She didn't bother bandaging her knuckles. Instead she ran, laps around the gym until her legs were about to give out. She hadn't felt that way in a long time. Weak. She could run for hours. And, it seemed she had. She'd ran all the way through dinner. She went to bed without it.

"And Inaki is here?" Hobbs pointed to the central room on the first floor of the compound. She'd been here a month and he still hadn't memorized the map. She would've by the end of that first week, probably quicker. "We've been over this, yes." He scoffed, "There's no need to be snappy. I was asking for clarification." The others in that room ceased to exist. Rage was all she felt. "And I'm asking you to shut the  fuck up. I'm done with this meeting." She shoved the chair back as she stood, colliding with the ground as she slammed the door behind.

She found Madeline in the hall, she grabbed her by the jacket, "The alcohol." Her eyes went wide and she led her to her room where she slid a six-pack out from beneath her bed. Evie took the whole thing under the guise of confiscating it. Instead she went back to her own room, propping a chair beneath the door before she wrestled the cap off a bottle. It was bitter, the taste unbearable. She pushed through it, finishing off the bottle in the next few minutes before she threw it against the wall where it shattered.

The doorknob rattled as she drank the second bottle. She kicked the rest beneath her bed as Bee forced her way in. She looked to her and then the shattered bottle. Evie grinned, Bee looked horrified, "What have you done?"

Bee took her up to the medical floor where she was given her own room, she refused a hospital gown as she laid down on the cot. Bee was talking to the doctor outside. Evie joyfully busied herself with the machinery that surrounded the bed. The feeling of floating, detachment, had slipped away. She found herself getting sick into a bag. Bee was at her side when she looked up, holding her hair back. "Oh, Evie." Evie looked at her, trying to decipher her tone. She didn't have the look of disappointment that usually came with that phrase, she seemed sad almost. Evie laughed and promptly threw up again.

She woke with a headache as Bee and a woman talked in the room. She had a needle into her arm, tubing pumping something into her. Her initial fear subsided as Bee smiled at her and she almost forgot what she'd done to end up here. She wished she had.

"Hello Evie," she nodded to the woman as she took a seat next to her cot, a clipboard in hand. "I hear you've been through a lot, care to tell me about it?" She looked to Bee, watching her look away. She looked at the tube in her arm and the fluid going inside, she pinched it and looked away as she pulled it out. A tiny dot of blood welled up from where it had entered. She looked at the woman and slid off the bed, "Yeah, I do." She got around the curtain and quickly found she, Bee, and the doctor were not along. Hobbs sat in a chair near the door. He held open the door for her. "Lunch?"

She ended up following Hobbs into the cafeteria. He ordered them both meals and swiped his ID as she looked at the cafeteria. A boy a few feet away was getting yelled at by a woman behind a counter, "I told you not to come back until you have the money!" He held his arms right around his waist, "I don't have any. Please." Hobbs pulled her away before she could see the ending. It made her think of Inaki, making sure every one of his people were fed and cared for. People didn't exactly like you when they were only skin and bones. She couldn't help but look at Hobbs a little different, how often had he seen this happen?

She had a choice to make. She barely listened as Hobbs tried to talk to her. He rambled on as she categorized the differences between here and Domgre. Did she really like it here? All they'd ever done is fight her and tell her how she was supposed to feel and how she was supposed to act. Inaki cared for his people, these people insisted their people hold their own. They would demonize him for allowing people they deemed children into his army but deny half their population entry into theirs. The choice was easy.