The Compound

“I worked hard at getting my physique to that level. The outside was a lot easier to perfect than the inside.”

Eli talks about his obsessive exercise regimen, and hints at his inner turmoil. He believes that he is a bad person who was responsible for his brother’s death. He punishes himself through rigorous weight training and running, but knows that he can’t make up for his mistake. His powerful physique is at odds with the fragility of his inner life.

“In the old world, Eddy and I were so close that I never made a point of reaching out to our sisters. The reason was simple: I didn’t need them.” 

Terese accuses Eli of not caring about her, and of not playing with her when they were younger. Eli knows she is telling the truth. His reliance on Eddy robs him of a concrete identity after Eddy is gone. Once he is in the Compound, Eli realizes that his weak relationships with his siblings make him feel alone, even with his family. 

“Most dads had hobbies that they passed down to their sons; hunting, fishing, auto repair. Dad’s hobby was nuclear war, which meant his sons knew everything about it.” 

Rex’s obsessiveness and paranoia compel him to teach his sons about nuclear war. He acts as if it is the most useful subject they could learn about. Later, when Eli is able to figure out the code to the hatch, it is because the dates of nuclear detonations have been so ingrained in him that he can’t forget them. 

“I envied them that, having cyanide as an option. Not that I would have chosen death over life in the Compound. But at least they had a tangible choice. I didn’t.”

Eli thinks about the plot of the novel On the Beach, which Rex once gave to him as a birthday present. He sees the doomed characters in the novel as having better fortune than him. Rex controls everything in the Compound. Eli feels suffocated without the ability to choose anything that happens to him. He envies people who had only the opportunity to choose their own death. 

“You’re obviously the evil twin.” 

At the party where Eli switches the tags on the birthday presents, a clown sees him. He says it casually, but later it reinforces Eli’s shame and guilt over causing Eddy’s absence in the Compound. Eli never sees himself as measuring up to Eddy, but hearing someone express the sentiment out loud lingers with him, convincing him that he is right about himself. If his evil is obvious to a clown at a party, then it can’t all be in his own mind. 

“You don’t have to be loud or forceful to take up a lot of space in the world.” 

Eli watches his mother play the cello. His mother has more depth to her than her obedience to Rex suggests. In the Compound, it is only when she plays music that Eli remembers how talented she is, and how admired she was in the outside world. Her life in the Compound has diminished her influence, because it has taken away her ability to move crowds with her musical abilities. 

“My mind censored out the worst part. The part where I was selfish. The part where I would do anything to get what I wanted. Even if it meant leaving my brother out of our only hope for survival.” 

Eli’s thoughts foreshadow the revelation of how and why he distracted Eddy on the night they came to the Compound. Eli worries that because he—as he sees himself—is someone who will do anything to get what he wants, he is more similar to Rex than he is comfortable with. He will learn that Rex is capable of anything, and fears that he same might be true of him. 

“I would have rather had a dad with change jingling in his pocket; one who would have spent the last forty minutes of the world raking leaves for his kids to jump in, so that they perished in one loud, bright instant, giggles still bubbling up from their bellies, never suspecting a thing.” 

Eli thinks about all of the things his father gave them. But Rex never connected with his children intimately. He was incapable of, or uninterested in, doing small, simple things with his children. Even though Eli has never wanted for anything material, he would trade the wealth for a richer relationship with his father. 

“For six years I’d tried not to dwell on thoughts of her or anyone else too long. It was better to separate the old world from the new. It was better to stay cold and detached.” 

Eli thinks about his dog Cocoa, then stop himself. His memories of life before the Compound are all painful. His detachment in the Compound shows in his avoidance of touch, his lack of contact with his sisters, his distance from the Supplements, and the amount of time he spends alone. Eli believes that detachment is better because he can’t hurt anyone unless he is close with them.

“He lied right to my face. And lying only came that easily when you did it a lot.” 

Eli’s conversation with Rex disturbs him. He understands that lying grows easier with practice, because he has seen it in himself. Now he wonders if Rex is telling the truth about anything in the Compound. The prospect of being held captive by someone he cannot trust—his own father, no less—makes Eli more determined to learn the truth about the Compound. His mission also gives him a purpose that he has not yet had. 

“No way in hell was I going to get to know them. Not if there was the remotest chance they would meet their intended fate.”

Eli remembers his mother telling him that he should meet the Supplements. Before meeting them, Eli does not view them as markedly different than cattle, or nutritional supplements he might have once bought at a store. He knows that he cannot afford to bond emotionally with someone else that he might lose, and Rex created the Supplements specifically because they would be expendable in the service of the family. 

“Poor Eli, now you’re in the same boat as the rest of us. Guess what, you don’t want to hear it, but you’re like me. And me and you? We’re just like Dad. We don’t care about other people and we’re only out for ourselves.” 

Lexie complains to Eli that he ignored her as long as he had Eddy. Now he knows what it’s like to be lonely. She tells Eli what he most fears: that he is like Rex. The coldness, detachment, and lying that Eli engages are smaller version of the traits that allow Rex to use people for his own ends. He knows that his father is brilliant, but he does not know if he is a good man. 

“He won’t brag or use his name to get preferential treatment, but once in a while, he has to test his power to see how far his name and money and reputation will go. Or how far they’ll get someone else to go.” 

Eli overhears Phil talking about Rex. Phil describes Rex’s need to test his willpower and influence almost as if they are pathologies and compulsions. Rex’s resources and reputation allow him to force other people to play games, and take actions, that they don’t want to. Eli now sees that his family and his mother are in the same position as the vegetarians Rex convinced to eat meat at the Christmas Eve party. 

“I couldn’t erase how fresh and soft those little hands had been on my face. I refused to let myself dwell on how exquisite that warm, innocent touch had felt.” 

After one of the Supplements touches Eli, he tries to forget how satisfying the touch was. Despite his proximity to his family, Eli’s insistence on avoiding touch creates an emotional distance between him and the others. The Supplement’s touch reminds him that physical touch prompts emotions that he wants to repress.

“Did we survive simply for the sake of surviving? The rest of our lives, we just exist to survive?” 

Eli’s mother tells him that she wants more than mere, continued existence for her children. She initially believed that Rex had saved their lives. However, an existence in which they cannot thrive is not the same as an enriching life. Seeing her children miss out on life’s opportunities emboldens her to consider rebelling against Rex.

“Was it the right thing, then? To do what was necessary, no matter what?” 

Eli wonders why he is suddenly opposed to using the supplements for their intended purpose. After meeting them he reevaluates his stance that survival is the most important good. His contact with Lukas makes him wonder if survival is a moral imperative, or if there are ethical decision more important than merely continuing to exist. 

“Our life we were living, our oh-so-easy life, didn’t give any of you a chance to be brave or determined.”

After Rex admits to sabotaging the bulbs in the gardens, he says that he built the Compound to give his children a chance to thrive under adverse circumstances. His wealth had afforded them every luxury, but in Rex’s perception, it also robbed them of the need to develop courage. They never had to develop persistence or a hard work ethic, because he could give them anything they asked for. 

“Eventually you run out of things to buy that truly make you happy.” 

Rex explains his rationale for wanting to strengthen his children in the Compound. His wealth does not make him happy. He does not want his children to associate the ability to buy anything with happiness or fulfillment. Rex is always chasing something ambitious, trying to matter to the world in ways that have nothing to do with his fortune.

“None of you kids ever had a friend that wasn’t there for money or your last name.” 

Rex tells his children that the Supplements are no worse off than they were in their previous lives. The Supplements have people who genuinely care for them. He implies that Lexie and Eli are incapable of having friendships based on their worth, only on the status that association with them provides.

“I would be the only birthday boy around in the morning when it was time to ride in Dad’s new plane.” 

Eli reveals that he was the reason Eddy was left behind. His jealousy over Eddy’s popularity led to what Eli believed was Eddy’s death in the nuclear attack. His petty resentment of Eddy resulted in the torment he subjects himself to in the Compound. Now that he knows Eddy is still alive, he wants to believe that he can atone for his mistake by saving his family. 

“This is the way the world ends

This is the way the world ends

This is the way the world ends

Not with a bang but a whimper.” 

As Rex is incapacitated with ergotism, he recites the lines from T.S. Eliot’s poem The Hollow Men. The quote is also introduced in the opening to the novel On the Beach, which Eli receives for one of his birthdays in the Compound. Eliot’s Hollow Men characters failed to achieve grand goals that they had set for themselves. Rex, believing that he may die, feels the same, given that he has not yet achieved the most ambitious parts of his experiment in the Compound.

“‘I’ve had a hard time here without Eddy. I was closer to him than anyone. And you, you’re a lot like him. I hated that you were here and he wasn’t.’ Even though it was my fault he wasn’t there, I had blamed her.” 

Eli apologizes to Terese for punishing her for things that aren’t her fault. Terese knows how much Eli cares about Eddy. By reaffirming that she reminds him of Eddy, Eli’s apology helps her understand why he kept his distance from her. It also serves as a compliment to her, since she knows that if she reminds Eli of Eddy, she must share some of Eddy’s traits. 

“There were so many things I’d taken for granted. So many things I hadn’t appreciated. So many things I’d missed. Too many to even comprehend.” 

Outside the hatch for the first time in six years, Eli looks at the stars and the moon. He realizes that he hadn’t appreciated their beauty when he had been free to look at them in his life prior to the Compound. Now he sees them as Lucas sees them, as if it is his first time. Rex spoke of a world without surprises as a world he did not want for his children. Eli realizes that Lucas, Cara, and Quinn will see the normal world with surprise and awe.