The next morning, I got up early. Most of the other girls were still asleep, so I didn’t have to wait long for the bathroom and even had a warm shower. Not a bad way to start the day, after the disaster of yesterday. When I was clean and dressed, I went to the small safe in the back of my closet. Since I hadn’t been able to get a better Items Bag, I could only carry ten things in it at a time. All the rest of my stuff had to be kept here, with only a door between Letcia and it. Luckily, she actually cared about the surveillance cameras in the halls and hadn’t broken into my room yet. I didn’t know what I’d do if she or anyone else stole my safe.

I glanced over my shoulder to make sure the door was shut and locked. It always was, but I couldn’t be too careful. Satisfied, I opened the safe. Inside were ten E-ranked energy crystals, glowing different shades of blue in the dim closet light. I picked one out and fingered the smooth, cool surface. Just holding it, I could feel the energy pulsing from it like a heart. I emptied everything out of my Items Bag and filled all the slots up with the crystals. It wasn’t safe to walk around with these on hand. It was just asking to get mugged, even with crystals as puny as these.

When I finished, I pulled out a brown satchel purse and filled it with my wallet and the other things that I’d just taken out of my Items Bag. With the convenience of Item Bags, purses were more of a fashion statement than a necessity. As for me, I only wore one on the last day of the month. I locked the safe and left the hostel before that she-devil woke up.

I took the tram to the other side of the city, where the South Exit of Eden was. A year ago, I walked through that opening, naively thinking how great my life would be as a Hunter. Well, I’d learned a lot since then. I stood in line with all the Hunters exiting the city and waited for my turn.

When I finally got to the window, I smiled at the guard. “Hi, Jyn Devhro.”

On the other side of the thick glass, he clicked on a computer, checking for my Leave Request. After a moment, he nodded. “Have a good trip.” The energy crystal-infused gate swung open, revealing the city that I grew up in.

I waved at the guard and stepped out into Garden City. It’s funny. This might be my home town, but it didn’t feel like home anymore. As if the seventeen years I spent on these streets were a movie I used to watch. For one simple reason: I didn’t belong here anymore. I was a Hunter, I belonged in Eden. But I couldn’t say anywhere in there felt like home either.

With a sigh, I looked at the soft clouds floating in the pretty blue sky. Someday, maybe I’d find a home. But right now, there were more important things I needed to do. Years of habit directed my feet through the bends and twists of the busy city, past stores and shops, most still closed in the early morning hours. Cars and busses filled the streets as people hurried to their nine-to-five jobs. Runners trekked across the cement with lazy steps, as if they never knew what it was like to run for their lives.

All the while, I watched the safe world around me. I liked these trips to Garden City. It was a reminder that my life sucked for a reason. If Hunters didn’t beat back the monsters continually generated in the Gate, this city would be overrun and killed off like when the Gate appeared twenty years ago. Hunters reclaimed the city and it was because of us that these humans could rebuild and have the relaxed life that they do.

Eventually I stopped on the top floor of a small apartment complex and knocked. Barely a second went by when the door was wrenched open and I was tackled around the waist by a young teen in pink Hello Kitty pajamas.

“Jyn!” Aliya and I went down hard in the hall. My sister sat up, her full weight on my stomach. “Oh my gosh, Jyn, I’m so sorry!” She blinked down at me with the same green hazel eyes that we inherited from our father.

As if my back wasn’t still aching from last night. By the new burning sensation where my shirt had slid up, I’m sure I just added a giant scrape to the sour muscles on my back. But she didn’t need to know that. “Hey, Aliya.” I reached out, smooshed her head to my chest, and kissed her hair like she was a little kid. “I missed you, too.”

She squealed and wiggled, trying to get out of my hold. Laughing, I held her tighter and rubbed her hair with my hand. In seconds, her long, smooth hair was a mess.

“Jyn! I’m not a baby anymore!” She planted her hands on my chest and pushed as hard as she could.

“You will always be my little baby sister,” I cooed and patted her head while she tried to get away. No matter how she wailed, I needed this. After all the shit I’d gone through lately, I needed a reminder of why I was even dragging myself to and from the Gate. I needed to look at her face and remember that I was keeping her safe and fed. I’d break without that.

“Jyn? It’s so early.” Aunt Mina’s sleepy voice drifted out the open door.

“Morning!” I let go of Aliya and straightened.

My sister scowled and shoved me down as she stood up. After brushing herself off, she held out her hand to help me up. I grinned at her. With a prissy snort, she looked away. But her hand was still steady when I grabbed it and her lips curled into a small smile.

We went inside and closed the door. Aliya thumped me on the shoulder and disappeared down the hall.

Aunt Mina finally stepped into the mainroom, wrapped in a purple robe. If it wasn’t for her graying hair and the worry lines on her face, it would have been easy to mistake her for my mom. But that wasn’t possible. Mom was in the same hospital room that she’d been in for the last six years. Still Aunt Mina had done her best to fill the hole that losing a mother left behind and I was grateful. For both me and Aliya.

Aunt Mina hugged me tight. “Welcome home.”

“Thanks.” I glanced around the front room, which was a living room and kitchen combo. It took up half of the eight hundred square foot, two bedroom apartment. If there was anywhere I considered home, it would be this aged but clean place. The very reason why I still breathed were the people in this house. Well, here and the hospital.

Aliya returned, pulling a brush through her hair.

Aunt Mina smiled at her and looked back at me. “How about some breakfast?”

I waved a hand. “Ah, no. I’ve already eaten.” Honestly, I could eat more, but they didn’t have any more excess money than I did. “It’s just a quick trip this time.” Just enough to fill the battered void that was growing in my heart. “I need to drop these off here since I don’t have time to visit mom today.”

I held out my hand over the table. The ten energy crystals in my Item Bag appeared on the table, shining and glittering from their internal energy. These ten crystals would cover my mom’s medical expenses for the month and it was due today.

When the Gate first opened twenty years ago, half of the Earth’s population died before the monsters were contained. Of the remaining humans, a third became Hunters. Then suddenly, another fourth of the population slipped into a coma. Sleepers, is what they’d been dubbed. Unable to handle the magic radiating from the Gates that slowly filled the atmosphere, some humans’ bodies simply shut down. Without medical help, they died. Expensive medical help. Most of the Sleepers had died already, whether their bodies finally gave out or their plugs were pulled. But some of us were still hoping for a cure.

When my dad died inside the Gate, he actually left behind a lot of money. But the six years of medical expenses for my mom had pretty much eaten it all up. The only reason why we could afford it now was because the price had been negotiated down since I was now a Hunter. Without my contract through the Hunter’s Association, we would have had to pull her plug ten months ago.

And I’m wasn’t ready to bury another parent. Even if it meant that I had to forgo a decent dinner ten out of the thirty days in the month, it was worth it to me.

“Is that Jyn?” Uncle Ted stepped out of the hall, wearing a blue robe over his thin frame. “Hey, kid, how are you doing?” He gave me a short side hug.

“Hey, I’m good.” I hugged him back, swallowing the questions on the tip of my tongue. What was he doing here? Why wasn’t he at work?

He patted the back of my head. “That’s good.” He opened his mouth but must have changed his mind because he sighed and stepped back. With that, he turned and shuffled back down the hall.

I blinked after him. What was that about? Where was the energy he normally had? I waited until I heard the click of the bedroom door then glanced at Aunt Mina.

Aliya looked away, frowning, then walked into the kitchen. She pulled a black lunch box from under the kitchen sink, the kind that you would think had a cake inside for someone, and started to carefully stack the crystals in it.

Aunt Mina sighed then nodded her head towards the front door.

I glanced at Aliya then followed my aunt out the door. Even though she was in her bathrobe, she still took me out of the house to talk. There was no such thing as privacy in such a small apartment sometimes.

Aunt Mina checked to make sure the windows were closed before she sighed and leaned on the rail. “Your uncle…”

I knew just by her expression. “He lost his job again, didn’t he?” My voice was just as soft as hers.

She nodded, tears in her eyes.

My aunt and uncle were great people. Despite suffering from infertility, they never once took out their frustration on my family. And when Mom became a Sleeper, they stepped up and became the supportive substitute parents that Aliya and I needed.

But just because they were good people, it didn’t mean good people could keep steady jobs. Neither of them completed college, so the high paying jobs were limited. Things were fine when they both worked. But a work related neck injury put Aunt Mina out of a job permanently. With two to three debilitating migraines a week, who would hire her? As if things weren’t hard enough, the business Uncle Ted worked for went under a couple months later. Since then, he’d bounced around from job to job as he slowly slipped into depression. Most of the time he was good at hiding it. But…

Aunt Mina moaned and covered her face. “I don’t know how I’m going to pay the rent next month.”

My hands fisted at my side, but I didn’t let my frustration show on my face. My sheer hopelessness.

A part of me wanted to demand — Haven’t I done enough? Haven’t I bled enough to keep Mom alive? I’m just an eighteen-year-old girl, how much more do I have to shoulder?

But I couldn’t say that. And I couldn’t let my family end up on the streets.

I would need twelve crystals, on top of the ten that Mom’s hospital bills required, to get enough money for rent. That didn’t include food and energy costs.

How would I ever get enough?

My knees wobbled from the emotional weight that settled on my shoulders. Even so, I smiled. “It’ll be okay. I’ll come up with something.”

My aunt’s lips quivered as tears popped in her eyes. “I’m so sorry, Jyn. I know it’s a lot to ask of you.” She pulled me into a hug. It was like she was trying to squeeze out all her worries into me.

I held her back and let her vent.

After a while, she stood back and wiped the tears from her lashes. “Are you sure you don’t want to stay for breakfast?”

I shook my head. If I stayed any longer, I might miss the groups of Hunters that were safe to trail behind. Now that I absolutely had to get two or three crystals a day — something that I’d never done before — I couldn’t let that happen.

I opened the door and went in to find Aliya eating a bowl of cereal. “I’m going to head out. But I’ll be back soon, okay?”

She dropped her spoon into the bowl and looked up with big eyes. “Really? Already? But you just got here.”

I shrugged. “It was just a quick trip, remember?”

Aunt Mina glanced at me, guilt plucking her eyebrows together. She patted my shoulder then went into the kitchen to make coffee.

Aliya looked at Aunt Mina then at me. It was obvious that she guessed what was going on. Suddenly her face brightened into a smile. She stood up and threw her arms around me. “Just one more year and I’ll graduate. I’m so excited. One more year and we get to be the Devhro Sisters, taking on the world! We’ll be the strongest team ever!”

Her worshipping words were just as sweet as her loving arms around my neck. But I felt like I was just gut-punched by a rock ogre.

No, I didn’t want that. I didn’t want my baby sister within ten miles of the Gate and the hell inside. I didn’t want to see the naive gleam in her eyes dull as she faced the blood and violence everyday.

But most of all, I didn’t want to see the adoration in her gaze change to disdain like all the other Hunters that looked at me. I didn’t want her to find out what a disappointment her older sister was. Right now, my family had no idea. They knew I was an E, but not that I was the weakest Hunter in recorded history. Aliya, my aunt and uncle lived with the romanticized ideals that normal humans had of Hunters. Like we just walked into the Gate and crystals rained down from the sky for the taking. My family was already beaten down enough. They didn’t need to know how I was living in Eden too.

I hugged her tightly, burying my face in her slim shoulders. “You make it sound like you’re going to be a Hunter for sure.” Since she couldn’t see my face, it was easier to bluff the teasing behind my words. Easier to hide the fear that nearly crippled me.

“Of course!” she boasted and patted my head like she was the older sister. “My odds of being a Hunter are high, remember? After you and dad?”

Finally able to control my expression, I leaned back and poked her babyish cheek. “Genetics have nothing to do with it, silly. No matter who your parents are, it’s still only a thirty percent chance.” The smell of coffee filled the room and I used that as a cue to leave. I gave Aliya another quick hug and waved at my aunt. “See you later!” After they called their goodbyes, I shut the door.

For a moment, I stood outside the door. If I took up Jonavon’s suggestion and quit being a Hunter, I would have to leave. I could wake up every morning in the same room as my sister and make breakfast with my aunt. But we wouldn’t be living here, because we wouldn’t be able to afford it. And I’d be visiting my mom in the cemetery, not the hospital.

In the end, it wouldn’t be worth it.

I took a deep breath and pushed off the door. I didn’t have time to mope. There was work to be done.