Tobias and I are in his room, lying on his bed and talking. This is all he wanted to do for his birthday. Coming from Abnegation, I understand he shies away from gifts, but I wanted to get him something. I knew if I got him an actual gift, he would be mad and embarrassed, so I had to do something for him. Last night, inspiration struck, and I talked to Lauren and got the whole thing set up. I look at my watch; it's time to go.
"So, I know that you didn't want anything…" I start
"Exactly. That's why you aren't giving me a gift," he cuts me off, and pulls me against him tighter.
"You're right, I didn't. But I am doing something for you," I tell him. He groans and rolls off so he's sitting on the floor. I sit up and look down at him.
"Tris, come on," he says. His eyes plead with me not to do whatever it is I'm planning.
"You gave me a watch for my birthday. If you won't let me give you anything, the least you can do is let me do something for you. End of discussion," I tell him. I pull him up off the floor and lead him through the Pit.
"So, what exactly are you doing for me?" he says as we climb up the glass wall. His voice is strained from the height.
"You'll see," I tell him as I reach the top. I help him up and take his hand.
"Can you give me a hint?" he asks. I stop and kiss him.
"Nope," I say, smiling. He shakes his head, and we continue down the hallway until we reach our destination: the fear landscape. I stop outside of the door. He raises his eyebrows.
"Remember how you showed me your fear landscape last year? When you did, that was the moment I knew you trusted me fully," I tell him, and he nods his head. I remember that night; it was also the night of our first kiss. I feel the bubble come up to my throat. I clear my throat. "Well, I want to show you how much I trust you, so I want to show you mine."
I find the two syringes I had Christina filled earlier. I had come in earlier and set up the program for my fear landscape, so all we had to do was inject ourselves and go in. Tobias takes the first syringe and I push my hair back for him. He silently places pierces my neck. Even though I am used to it by now, the needle still makes me wince every time. I stand on my toes and inject Tobias.
"Are you sure, Tris?" he says quietly. He seems nervous, but I know it's not for him. He's worried if I am ready for this, I realize, and smile. I take his hand.
"One hundred percent," I say confidently, and open the door. It slams shut behind us, and the simulation begins.
As usual, we are standing in an open field. I hear the familiar caw of the crows somewhere in the distance, and swallow hardly. I sit down as clench my fists as the crows start to claw at me. I run my hands through the damp grass feeling for the gun. I can't find it, and I start to panic.
"Tris, relax," Tobias says.
"Easy for you to say, when you don't have crows digging their talons into you," I snap. I instantly feel bad for being mean when he didn't do anything. He's right, and I know it. I take a deep breath and run my hands through the grass again. This time I find the gun, and quickly load it. I start shooting at the birds. I hear more shots than I should, and I start to look around for the source. I see Tobias shooting into the sky. Where'd he get a gun?
"I told you before Tris, I will always protect you," he calls out, reading my mind. If we weren't facing my deepest fears, I would probably cry. Suddenly, the birds are all gone. I run over and hug him.
"Thank you," I say, my voice muffled by his shirt.
"Like you even need my help," he says, and kisses my forehead. Suddenly, the scene changes. We are trapped in the tank, and the water starts to fill it up. I start banging against the glass. Tobias takes my cue and starts to hit it, too. Small cracks start to form, but the glass doesn't break.
"Why isn't this working?" I cry out in frustration.
"Because you can't control your fear. You need to calm down," he tells me, and leans against the wall.
The water is at my knees now. "While you're drowning, I'm going to try and actually save us," I say, and continue to pound against the walls. He sighs and grabs me, turning me around. He kisses me firmly and I start to argue, but I easily give up and lean into the kiss. Suddenly, the tank breaks and we are free.
"I would say I told you so, but…" he says, and nudges me.
"Whatever," I grumble. I try to move, and then I realize I'm tied to a post, and so is Tobias. I smell smoke, and look down and see the faces of my fellow initiates, all mocking me.
"I smell your burning flesh, Stiff," fake-Peter says, his eyes black pits as always.
"You know what I smell?" I say, "rain." A roll of thunder sounds, and it starts to rain. Tobias closes his eyes, letting the water droplets pour down on his skin. I stare at him in awe. He is so….beautiful. I don't get long to stare at him, because suddenly we are dropping into a raging sea.
I am gasping as I desperately try and cling to the rock. Wave after wave keeps throwing my body against it, and I feel my muscles weakening with every failed attempt. I'm going to die, I think over and over, I'm going to die and there's nothing I can do about it. I feel a strong hand grab my arm and pull me up.
"Grab on to the chink by your ear," Tobias shouts over the waves. He looks deadly with the red moonlight shining down on him. It terrifies me for a moment. I shake this thought and grope the rock until I find what he told me. I grab it and, with Tobias's help, hoist myself up on to the rock. I gasp for air, and choke out the salt water. After a minute, Tobias takes my hand and helps me up. But we are not on the rock anymore; we are in my old bedroom in Abnegation.
"Is this your old room?" Tobias asks, starting to look around.
"Yes," I say, and look out the window for the faceless men. Some have started to appear across the street already. A loud bang startles me, and I see the faceless zombies pounding against my window, and starting to come into the house.
"What do we do, Tris?" Tobias asks.
"Slide one of the mirror panels away, and there should be a gun in there," I shout. He nods, and goes to get the gun. I try and push as many things as I can against the door to form a barricade. I know because it's my fear that it won't work, but it will at least give me some more time.
"Here," Tobias says, handing me a gun and a round. He has one of his own again.
"Thought you didn't like guns," I ask, loading my round in.
"I don't, but I do like you," he says and smiles. I smile back, but our moment is ruined by the window shattering and door splintering as the zombies fill my room. We start to shoot at them, but there are too many.
"Get in the closet," I shout.
His eyes widen with terror. "Tris…" he says weekly. Crap, I forgot he can't do small spaces.
"Tobias, we need to. I will be with you the whole time," I tell him reassuringly. He nods, and we run over to the closet, and lock the door behind us. I start to fumble around for the latch near the back to escape, but I can't find it.
"Tris," he groans, his breathing heavy. I hug him tightly.
"It's okay, I'm right here," I whisper. I fumble with one hand now, my other being squeezed by Tobias tightly. I find it and throw it open, and start to crawl through. When we make it to the other side, I almost don't notice the large four-post bed because I'm so busy comforting Tobias. When I do, I blush, and let him go.
"What's wrong?" he asks, looking up. His eyes fix on the bed and my face that's surely red. "Oh." Even though I told him about this fear, I never mentioned any of the specifics.
"Is this…?" he asks.
"Yeah," I say quietly, dusting imaginary dirt off my jeans. He helps me stand up.
"Well, how do we face it?" he asks.
"I-I don't know," I stutter.
"Well, what did you do last time?" he asks. I flash back to how simulation-Tobias kissed my neck deeply, and how amazing real Tobias looks.
"Umm, well, last time the um, simulation-you, um, tried to, and yeah," I spit out. His eyes look confused for a second, but they put the pieces together.
"Oh," he says again. This time he goes red.
"I have an idea," he says, and smiles a little.
"What is-" before I can finish, his lips are pressed against mine. I feel the electricity in his kiss. I expect him to stop after a second, but he doesn't; instead his kiss only gets hungrier, more intense. I'm terrified by this, but a part of me doesn't want to stop. I allow my eyes to open very little, and see the room fading slowly. I watch until the last thing (the bed, of course) disappears. He pulls back and looks down at me smugly.
"See? That wasn't so bad now was it?" he says.
I smack his arm lightly. "You tried to sleep with me in a simulation," I say half angrily, half giggly still.
"Well, what other way was there?" he asks, and scratches the back of his neck. "I mean, it's not like I actually would have, not here anyways."
I roll my eyes. "Whatever," I laugh. The sound of a bullet being loaded into its chambers clicks next to my ear, replacing my laughter.
"Don't move,' a familiar voice hisses. Jeanine. My body stiffens. I feel the gun in my hand, too aware of what she will tell me to do with it.
"Kill them," she hisses.
"No," I say weakly.
"Do it or die." I look around for Tobias, desperately trying to find them. My eyes glance over my family tied to each post, when I see an extra one at the end, and tied to it is Tobias.
"It's okay, Beatrice, we understand," my mother says calmly. I feel the tears well-up in my eyes.
I look at Tobias, who only nods at me. "It's okay; it's just a simulation," he tells me quietly, and the tears start pouring down my face. I know it's just a simulation, but I can't shoot him, I just can't. It would be like killing a piece of myself.
"You have three seconds. Three, two…" Before Jeanine can carry out her threat I turn around and point my gun at her head and fire. The simulation goes black. When we return to the room, I realize I am in a ball on the floor, still crying. Tobias runs over and wraps his arms around me.
"Shh, it's okay, it was just a simulation, you're okay," he soothes me, stroking my back. "I'm right here."
I look up at him, realizing why he chose after he took my through his landscape to finally kiss me: when someone sees that side of you, you know you can trust that person completely, that they will do whatever it takes to protect you. I lean up and kiss him. He pulls back after a minute.
"What was that for?" he smiles.
"Thank you," I whisper, and hug him again. We sit there hugging for a while. Eventually we stand up and walk back towards our rooms. After tonight, I am sure that I will no longer be scared of being close to him, that my only fear involving him is that I will not be good enough for him. We are bound.
Thanks for reading! Please let me know your thoughts! For those of you who have read my other story, I hope you enjoyed the reference there at the end ;)
-LS