Location from Divergent by Veronica Roth
A neighborhood of identical grey houses where mirrors are an indulgence and selflessness is performed in every meal served cold so someone else can eat first.
The Abnegation sector feels like a held breath. Everything is muted — voices, colors, emotions. People walk with their eyes down and their hands folded. Children don't run. Music is rare. The smell is soap and plain food and the particular absence of anything personal. It's simultaneously the safest-feeling place in Chicago and the most suffocating. The houses are warm, the community takes care of its members, and no one goes hungry. But the cost of that safety is the systematic suppression of individual desire. You eat plain food so others can have better. You wear grey so no one stands out. You keep your pain private because sharing it would be asking for attention. Tris grew up here. Four grew up here. Both left. The sector was devastated during the Erudite attack — simulation-controlled Dauntless soldiers shot Abnegation citizens in their own homes. The grey streets ran red.
Rows and rows of identical small grey houses on clean, quiet streets. No ornamentation — no colored paint, no gardens with showy flowers, no signs. The houses have plain furniture, minimal possessions, and mirrors are covered or removed because vanity is self-indulgent. The streets are swept clean. The silence feels enforced rather than peaceful.
Also known as: Abnegation Sector, The Abnegation Neighborhood