"Human nature is evil, and goodness is caused by intentional activity." –Xun Zi
Song Suggestion: Gods and Monsters by Lana Del Ray
Chapter Four: The Bull's Head
The next morning we are presented with the seemingly kind gift of breakfast, we only get five minutes but I see the others take advantage of the time by stuffing their faces with the time given.
It was nice, until we started running. Eric accompanying us on the run this morning, he stayed at the back, making sure the initiates were to stay in front of him. Four lead us at the front.
Today I find myself near the front again, easily pushing myself, only this time where a few managed to keep up, half way through it was just Four and I in the front. And it wasn't because I was the only one with a good endurance; it was because already three people had to stop to get rid of their breakfasts.
Including Ash. By the time we were done running I think he must of stopped at least twice, the first time came with a passive aggressive comment from Eric to keep up and the second came with more obvious anger. I knew it wasn't him going easy on Ash- it was waiting until we were back to start the real punishment.
Why did I have to befriend Ash? Why did I put myself in the position to have to watch someone I like get tormented? As if worrying about myself wasn't enough. That thought makes me guilty, but when I see him become the subject of Eric's torment, I just wish I didn't know him.
Not out of embarrassment, but because each time it happens a little tear in my heart opens. I yearn to do something, to help him. But I couldn't. I'm not even allowed to be brave. It wasn't that Dauntless didn't meet my expectations, I just expected more freedom to speak up for yourself. I guess standing up for others only goes so far.
When we arrive to the training room, everyone slows down to catch their breaths like we did yesterday morning, but I can see Eric isn't going to let all the people getting sick go easy.
"You aren't done yet, Initiates! Get on the ground and do push-ups until I tell you to stop, I don't care if your arms give in." He commands as we all fall to the ground. A few have more trouble than others, some even struggle to get into the push-up position, Ash being one of them. Please just leave him alone, don't let him be harassed.
My fears come true as Eric approaches Ash in his pitiful attempt at push-ups. I try to focus on myself. Lacking arm strength made the exercise hard and the run made it near impossible, but I couldn't turn away.
"Are you tired? Are you going to puke again?" Eric yells at Ash as he cries out in pain mid-pushup. "Initiate are you crying?" My heart wrenches for Ash as I notice the tears rolling down his cheek. Ash shakes his hand by it is hard to miss the tears. "Get up!" Eric suddenly says and Ash collapses to the ground. "No one else stop!" Eric yells to the rest of us as we pause to look over.
I look to Four, to see if he will do anything. But he stands unwavering, looking at the rest of us, avoiding the side with Ash and Eric on it. My arms burn but the distraction coming from the other side of the pack helps me ignore the pain.
"Up, Initiate!" Eric yells again as Ash's arms shake to lift his body. Once on his legs, his reddened face and quivering legs expose his weakness, and it is obvious that it doesn't rectify well with Eric.
He hung an Initiate over the Chasm once; I remember one of the stories Connie told us. Will he do the same to Ash, or worse- just cut him right now?
"Why can't you keep up?" Eric asks Ash.
Ash's mouth opens for a moment, trembling in obvious fear, but words don't emerge. I root him on mentally and pray he gathers himself. The more he shows fear the more he'll get tormented.
"I asked you a question." Eric repeats again as Ash looks ready to speak before all of the sudden his eyes go blank and his body falls backwards in a heavy thump.
We all pause to look at Ash's sudden collapse, a few take the opportunity to collapse from their push-ups as attention is directed away from us. I stumble to my feet, not thinking as I go forward to Ash's fallen body.
I reach his body, my own burning, not looking up to see if my actions well be getting me in trouble. Memories of the hot summers and what my mother would always do when someone fainted replay as I follow the instructions she would tell me.
"What are you doing?" Eric asks as I begin to play up Ash's shirt.
"Helping him cool down." I say, making sure to not look up or I might stop what I'm doing in fear. Figures loom over me as I check Ash's breathing and pulse, both seem fine. I then elevate his hands by holding them up in my hands.
"Now what are you doing?" I don't look up to see if the comment is matched with a deadly look from Eric.
"Helping get blood back to his brain."
Finally looking up, I realize everyone is surrounding me. I glance at Eric and Four, but neither seems particularly angry with me so I take it as the okay to continue.
"Watch for vomit." I mention as my arms shake with the weight of his legs, they were sore enough before. The people by Ash's head jump away at the mention.
Just as I'm about to look for something cold, Ash's eyes flutter open. A few sighs of relief fill the silence as his eyes begin darting around. "Don't get up fast." I warn Ash. "He should get something cold to cool down." I say, knowing I'm pushing my luck at this point. One wrong move and I could be getting myself in trouble.
I'm relieved when Four nods. "Someone get him water." Thea quickly volunteers.
"The rest of you start warming-up." Eric commands.
"Don't panic, you're fine." I whisper to Ash before standing up, turning around to join the others. A hand stops me before I can. I look up at Four.
"Good job, Initiate." He says before releasing me.
Did I just get complimented? I catch up with the others in a daze from the morning. It isn't even eight in the morning and I'm ready to collapse.
-o-
I stare dumbfounded at the list of fights, our first fights (excluding Connie and Ash), and already I'm fighting one of my friends, Thea. Was this going to be a repeat of yesterday's event but played out with Thea and I? I know I can't win, I don't even think I can bring myself to hurt her.
Thea's eyes find mine and she quickly makes her way over. "It is what it is, just don't hold back and we can go to the Pit afterwards and pretend like we didn't have to just beat each other up." She says.
I nod in agreement. "Deal."
The others approach us as we silently fall into a clump to watch the fights. "First up, Willa and Cleo." I cringe at the pair up. Not only did I not like Cleo, but I knew Willa didn't stand a chance against her as well. I just hope Willa would put up enough of a fight to not have too many points taken away from her.
Cleo passes by Eric on the way up the stage and I catch the look she gives him too. "You got this, Willa." I say as she makes her way to the platform.
They take defensive positions as Four reads out the rules, same as yesterday. No conceding.
Cleo takes the first punch as soon as Four is done speaking, I can tell it catches Willa by surprise too, an excoriating pain is heard as her fist connects with Willa's cheek. That'll leave a bruise, a bad one too. I try not to think too much of how the aftermath on Willa will be as Cleo lands another punch on her.
Willa holds up her fist and manages to land a hit on Cleo's stomach, but it doesn't stop Cleo from delivering another set of throws. The last one hitting Willa in her eyes, making her face turn to the side with the pressure of her fist. I see the small girl stumble back dizzy as she throws out her leg at Cleo. I can tell she is trying to get Cleo off her feet or at least give her time to counterattack, but it isn't enough. Cleo smacks into Willa and sends her into the ground.
My fist begins to feel numb as I realize I've been squeezing my fingers together, clenching them to the point of turning my knuckles a pale white. Watching this go down is even worse than I imagined.
For all the reasons I have to distrust Cleo, from the obvious attempts to flirt with Eric to the general nastiness in her actions and words, I do see her pause for a moment. She looks to the instructors as if wondering if this is enough. But Willa is still squirming on the ground, determined to get to her feet despite the obvious spinning she must be experiencing.
"Continue." Four says with his lips pulled into a thin line.
Cleo clenches her face together as she gets onto the ground, sitting on top of Willa and beginning to punch her. It happens quickly enough that Willa can only get a few kicks in before she is helpless. She tries to throw Cleo off or avoid her fists but quickly I see Willa stop fighting. I don't think she is unconscious, but she definitely cannot continue.
The action pauses for a moment before Cleo gets off and looks for instructions once more. Four nods. "Someone help Willa." He says and Ash quickly helps Willa off the ground, picking her up bridal style and carrying her bloodied body down. The worse of it is her face by far. The rest of her didn't get that badly beaten, but her face definitely took damage.
I don't have time to go over to Willa before I hear Thea's and mine names being called. Glancing at Willa, I see her sitting up again, she doesn't look too great but she'll be fine.
My heart flutters as I find myself standing ready to fight in front of everyone, and with no less one of my friends. I finally manage to befriend people my own age and now I have to beat them up. Dauntless courage I guess.
Thea and I give each other a quick acknowledgement before we get into defensive stances. Circling each other for a few moments, neither of us takes the first action. I know I should but can't bring myself to do it.
"Today, Initiates!" Eric calls from the side. My distraction creating a blind spot, I feel a fist connect to the soft part of my left cheek. Groaning a bit from the pain, I dodge the next punch.
I attempt to kick at her shins but it doesn't do much. Thea goes on attack again, hitting me in my stomach, and I'm dodging again. Giving uneasy punches when I find the opportunity. But most of the time I'm find myself on the receiving end of the hits- and hard ones too. By the near fifth time I begin to feel a strong dizziness overcome me but keep moving.
Kicking at Thea for a second attempt, it is as successful as the first one. I try anything that might make this the least violent possible but know it isn't happening. The greatest accomplishment I find is by twisting Thea's arm behind her, but I'm quickly stopped her turning around to punch me away. This time followed by a kick to the stomach, one that has my falling to my knees.
I look up at Thea but have trouble seeing through my blurred and spinning vision; she doesn't look herself. Her appearance resembles her, but I know that this isn't her.
Maybe it's the real her. I think as my vision begins to blacken and splotch with red. I struggle to my feet only to be punched back down. Falling backwards this time, I try again to get to my feet. Only make it to my knees this time, I hit the ground right on the back of my head.
Unable to move, I await the darkness swirling my vision to overtake me. I can already feel blood dripping down my face, my heart thumping away in my chest as Thea stands before me.
"You aren't done yet." A strange and twisted sounding voice says, accompanied by the sudden ringing in my ears. I feel something solid connect with my body before I'm falling backwards into a black void.
And then voices, "She isn't waking up, usually they are awake by now." The darkness fuzzes as if it is going to focus in but the void reclaims me, my body suspended back into emptiness.
As I come to, I first detect the uneven movement: a sort of rocking or bouncing. I feel myself being carried, my feet and arms suspended into nothingness, blind to the sights around me.
Then I begin to hear, I perceive the sounds of other Dauntless echoing around me. I hear the sound of footsteps. And finally I hear talking.
"Initiate casualty?" A soft woman's voice asks. The bouncing has stopped now, I most be at the end location. Wherever that is. I can't conjure up right now what has gotten me into this darkness or what comes next but I begin to see colors coming back as the grip of strong arms is replacing with a cushion. "What's her name?" I hadn't even heard the person who brought me here respond, did they even respond?
"Cal Horne." My full name, who knows my full name? Recognition of the voice comes just as my eyes finally open. The world starts out blurry but I quickly force movement and twist my body around to look at Eric and a woman with bright green hair standing at the foot of the bed I lay on.
"Where am I?" I ask.
"The infirmary, stupid. This is where you go when you let your ass get kicked. Maybe next time you'll actually try." Eric says before turning around to leave, the woman not too surprised by his words.
Once he's gone, the woman, who I assume is the Doctor, runs a cloth under water before approaching me with it. "It seems like for the most part everything is fine. You must have really been out." She says.
"We had a rough morning." I say as she begins to clean up my injuries. She laughs in response.
"Trust me I understand completely, we all had our moments where we ended up in the infirmary during Initiation." The doctor says as she applies disinfectant to the cuts. It stings but I try to not show any reaction. "That's new."
"What?" I ask.
"A transfer who is use to the disinfectant." She says smiling. "What was your birth Faction?"
"Amity." I say pausing before I continue. "I'd always get cuts and bruises, I'm use to it."
"We don't get a lot of Amity transfers. I had one my year."
"Did they make the final cut?" A silence follows my question that answers it well enough without her speaking.
The woman frowns but finishes up applying bandages before answering. "No, he didn't. But he was a tiny thing, you'll be fine, and so will your face. You can leave as soon as you feel stable again. Give it a few minutes at least, okay?" I nod and she leaves me alone on the white bed.
Unfortunately her saying he failed to pass because of size only reminds me of Willa. Maybe we will both end up Factionless, at least then I'd have a friend.
I end up taking a few minutes to gather my thoughts and center in from the dizziness, but try not to linger in here too long. I just hope they don't bring any of my friends here in a similar state to mine. By the time I'm getting up to leave Kayla is brought in by Guiana. She is conscious but looks like death itself.
"Hey Amity." Guiana says as the Doctor goes to help Kayla onto one of the beds. The tone she uses sounds less than friendly.
I readjust my training clothes so they aren't twisted and pull my hair into a low pony before I turn to look at Guiana, I don't want to stick around here long with the two here. "Hello." I say back, even though I know a simple exchange of hellos wasn't what Guiana wanted. Turning to leave the infirmary, I hear footsteps fall in line behind me. I wait until we are out of the room before turning around.
"What?" I spin around and ask, smirking when I realize I caught her off guard.
She stops and tries to replace her surprise with a sneer but it doesn't have the same affect it use to. "Nothing, just heading back to training because I'm not the one who got knocked out to the point where one of the Instructors had to carry them to the Infirmary- and by a friend." Her sneer turns into one of fake pity.
I can feel my cheeks redden, but in irritation rather than embarrassment. "At least I can run without puking up my entire breakfast." I say, remembering her to be one of those who had to stop to do such act on our morning run.
She rolls her eyes and continues walking past me. "Lets see being able to run get you through Initiation." She says before suddenly stopping to look at me once more. "I mean I'd comment on you trying to screw Eric for points because he carried you, but come on- we all know he wouldn't go for someone like you."
"Someone like me? Please enrich me on what someone like me means." I'm angry now, more than I should let myself get from some bully of a person. What Guiana has to say shouldn't matter to me and I definitely shouldn't be lowering myself to her level.
But that's the Amity in me, and lately I haven't been making decisions based on that side of me. "It means some ugly Amity who isn't going to make it past the first cut."
After a moment of considering insults I could say back to Guiana, I pick none of them. Training should be almost over and I want to go to dinner. I want to be with my friends and not make more of an enemy with Guiana than I already have.
"Not make it past the first cut?" I say with a scoff, leaning into my hip. "We'll see about that." I finish and stride past her, making sure she can't catch up as I take the narrow pathway back to the Training room.
By the time I arrive, people are filing out. I spot my friends and join them. "Hey!" I say inspecting each of them. From the looks of it, they did much better than me. "How did your fights go?"
"Good, Ash and I won." Connie says; I smile at the group. I'm almost surprised Ash won but I remember he was up against Samuel, probably the smallest of the males. Willa looks a little better from the last time I saw her, but her lip is split and swollen on one side. Other than that and a bruise forming on her cheek, she's fine. That's a relief. And almost embarrassing considered how bad I ended up.
Maybe next time you'll actually try. Eric's words to me reply in my mind. He was right; I barely tried, two hands wrapping around my waist interrupt my thoughts.
"I'm so sorry, Cal." Thea's voice plays in my ear. "I didn't mean to hurt you so bad." But you knew you were going to beat me. I know I'm not as strong as Thea, but somehow feeling like she knows she was going to beat me doesn't rectify with me well. It is mostly rooted from paranoia- but still.
"It's fine, you had to. This is part of Initiation." I say smiling at her. She sighs from relief and releases me to join in my step.
"Well I'm going to make it up to you, we are all going shopping tonight after dinner."
"That sounds nice, I've been wearing this for two days now- that's disgusting." Willa comments as we all laugh in agreement. I really do need some extra clothes, and as of yesterday we have our points.
"Okay." I agree and Thea cheers.
After dinner we stick to our plan and head to the store. Standing in a room full of nearly all black clothes is exciting, it is strange to be buying this kind of clothes. The only bad thing is how tight most of the clothes are, but I guess I'll grow accustomed to it.
Ash and Lucas split from the girls to go to the guy's section, but Lucas leaves a clothing request for Connie before he leaves that I don't hear. I can only imagine from the look Connie gets that it is the kind of clothing I will not be getting tonight.
I join beside Willa as we search for some of the less promiscuous clothing. First grabbing a few shorts and leggings I can train in. Then I grab a few shirts and sport bras before going to try them on. Connie immediately stops me before I go in to place something on my stack.
"What is that?" I ask.
"A dress, just try it on!" She yells before I can even open my mouth to complain. I roll my eyes but decide to at least try it on.
After trying everything on I decide on keeping the dress, it wasn't too showy and did fit me well. "I thought Amity would like dresses more." Thea asks as I leave to pay.
I shrug, "Honestly I do like dresses, but I'm trying to separate myself from that image. And it isn't like I can train in a skirt." I tell her.
We pay and leave, with even Willa finding something. She fit in a children's large, and luckily she found less tight and showy clothing there. When we join up with Ash and Lucas they start talking about getting tattoos.
"What about you, Cal? Do you want to get something?" Connie asks. I shake my head.
"No not yet, but later yes." I say. "But I'll go with you." With that we are heading to the tattoo parlor; Ash and Connie insistent on a tattoo. They search through the different designs, Ash finally picking one to bring to the woman working the place. She is a pretty woman, with dark eyes and long straight black hair to match.
I look at Ash's decision, the head of a bull. "Why this one?" I ask.
"I don't really know, I mean it looks cool for one. But I just want to get something to remember how I felt today and how I felt yesterday, you know? Like yesterday all I could think about was how I didn't belong here and this morning I felt even worse. But then I won my fight and now I just want to continue feeling like that, like I belong." Ash says.
I smile at his reflection. "You're stronger than you think. Besides all those time you felt bad was because of Eric being a jerk."
Ash frowns before shaking his head. "I mean in a way, but he didn't make me loss to Connie. He didn't make me unable to handle the morning warm-up. Sure passing out and the fight were caused by actions of his but I choice to not get through them. In a strange way I kind of admire the guy, he's tough."
"Four is tough. Maybe Eric will help us out in the long run but most of the things he does are to make himself feel strong by making others feel weak. I'm all for tough love but he just brings it to another level, he enjoys it." I say, not sure why we are even bothering to discuss it at this point, or why I'm getting so emotional over it.
"He isn't that bad of a guy, hell he carried you to the Infirmary. Sure he did it looking pissed but he did it."
"He's a monster." I finally declare.
We pause for a moment before hearing someone walk up next to us. "Who's a monster?" I look to see Cleo standing beside us, and from the uninterested expression on her face I assume it is a real question and she didn't hear the rest of our conversation.
"No one." I say and leave Ash to get his tattoo.
-o-
This was supposed to be out tomorrow, but it was the last day of school and I ended up not getting home to ten at night. Anyway like always thank you everyone that is reading or has favorite/followed/reviewed, you guys rock! Any suggestions or helpful criticism are strongly appreciated. Thanks!