I do not own these characters or this setting. And I just want to thank my friend Queen Scheherazade for the beta!
"What do you mean you're not choosing Erudite?"
Irene Adler watched her mother reproachfully. "Precisely what I said. I'm going into Dauntless."
Irene's mother, Elizabeth Adler, stared in anger and confusion at her sixteen-year-old trouble maker of a daughter. Her short, fluffy blond hair seemed to stick up more than usual. She turned pleadingly to her husband. "Arthur, please." She started.
Arthur Adler, a tall man with dark hair, growing grey at the temples, stood up from his seat at the kitchen table. He placed a firm hand on Irene's shoulder. She looked more like him than her mother. Her dark hair and grey-blue eyes were that of her father, along with the look of willowy strength.
"Irene," Arthur cut his eyes at his panicky wife, "Do whatever you feel right. Just be sure to make the right choice. Know that we love you."
"Arthur!"
He nodded at Irene, motioning for her to leave, before calming Elizabeth.
Irene silently thanked him, backing out of the small dinning room. She crossed to the front door, stepping out on the stoop. This was it. Her last night in Erudite territory. She watched the near-empty street. Dusk was falling, casting the white buildings in a variety of coloured shadows, ranging from inky black to burning crimson. Would it feel strange not living here, she wondered. No. She would have him. Smiling, she looked down at her dark jeans and blue blouse, considering how she would look in black. God, how she hated the colour of her Faction.
He lived just down the street. He was the smartest in school, and had this strange thing he did where he could tell everything about a person from something as small as a crumb on their t-shirt. And brainy is the new sexy, Sherlock Holmes, Irene thought. At least she hadn't been born into Abnegation, they wouldn't have tolerated her flamboyant personality.
Irene knew how to get information. She was extremely clever. She'd blackmailed Mycroft Holmes, Sherlock's older and government-serving brother, into giving her the exact information she wanted: What Faction was Sherlock choosing?
Dauntless. She should have known.
