North's POV
During my three years of training, never once, had I had to face someone shirtless juts for the cause of it. I was never flustered when people removed their shirts for inspection or injuries. So why was I now?
Oh, that's right. Because he's not injured.
I mentally berated myself. I shouldn't be even looking or encountering a situation with nudity, with the exception of my job of course, so I forced myself to look at his face. His intimidating and intense eyes. Without realizing it, we had been awkwardly staring at each other for a few moments before he ignored me completely and shut his door as he left me in the empty and vacant corridor while retreating to his room.
I let out a breath I didn't know I was holding and slapped both my hands on my cheeks awake, and I had not realized how warm my face was.
Eric's POV
He came and woke me up to tell me three words, "It's happening Eric."
And immediately, I understood what he meant. He looked so much like him, that there's no way that I couldn't understand. I looked at him and I coughed a little, "Might wanna cover up your neck…" I suggested. I didn't know him enough, but I knew he and Tori used to have a thing before he cheated and that was the last time I saw him. He had changed so much since then. He turned beet red immediately and I instantly regretted it. He wasn't West, but in my mind, he was and I was just looking out for him. Well, I thought I did and I thought I was. But he was always the one protecting me.
I watched him walk away, ashamed at what I had just done. It's been a few years since I've had any contact at all with him, and surely, the first message I get in 5 years is from someone who looks a hell lot like him. I sure as hell won't be admitting to anyone that I missed him a little.
As he was walking away, I saw a figure approach him and when she was about to ask him if he was okay, she took a step back and apologized profusely for getting the wrong person. I didn't even know his name. I sighed and looked at her. North. We made brief eye contact and I could see her eyes travel down towards my chest and her face was flushed. We made eye contact again, and I remembered meeting her for the first time with West.
Everything was a blur when it came to him and I sighed. When I reopened my eyes, her eyes were glued to my face, her mind probably elsewhere. Her eyes were red as if she had been crying. Had she been crying?
I remember once more what happened in the training room and turned around before smirking and entering my room for a moment. I took a shirt I had worn moments before and I slipped it on before reopening the door. She was still glued to the same spot she was before I closed my door, but her eyes were glued to the ground and her back turned to me.
North's POV
Great. This is probably a sign that I should leave to see Tris and Four and ask for my results. But why did he just leave? It's just like that morning when we were practicing on the punching bags and he suddenly left without a word. But he didn't leave, did he?
I awoke from my daydreaming by a shadow being cast over me. I looked up, expecting to see the clouds but remembered that we were underground and warily I took a step back and jumped when I had stepped on something. I don't recall anything being there since the time I've been here. I turned around to find myself face to face with a hard chest.
Almost like when I had met Eric on the roof and he showed me the new entrance to the Dauntless compound.
I looked up and jumped, alarmingly to see that Eric was looking down at me.
"I… didn't see you there. Eric." I mustered up the words and surprisingly, I sounded more confident than I ever believed I could ever sound when speaking to Eric. I sounded fearless. It sounded casual… right?
To add to my confidence, I smiled.
He smirked before replying, "Well you sound awfully cheery for someone who barely passed from the skin of her teeth."
I faltered a little and jumped of joy on the inside.
I PASSED! All those efforts and struggles, I passed!
I guess the joy showed on my face and I momentarily forgot that I was talking to Eric, talking to a scary Eric who was now wearing a shirt. Because he snorted and made his way to… well… I don't know.
I guess I hadn't calmed down from my high and joy of passing and found myself wandering around the medical area, seeing if there were anything new and when there wasn't, I decided to take a nap. What I didn't realize was that I fell asleep in my room at 4:25 and woke up 8 hours later.
Shit. Now you messed up your schedule. You skipped supper too. Great.
I walked to the mirror and when I couldn't see, because it was dark, I imagined myself and how I would've looked. I would have bed hair, as if I had just rolled out, and my shirt would be crumpled and wrinkly before I had forgotten to remove my bra before sleeping. My arms were more muscular to the training, and although they weren't as toned as the other Dauntless' , I was proud of myself. My core had gotten stronger, and I could feel myself contracting my abdominals whenever I took a deep breath. I had lost some baby fat near my face and stomach during the past month, but I gained some muscle weight. If I would say so, I would say that I looked better. Healthier. More Dauntless than Erudite. Suddenly, I found my thoughts wandering around back to the topic of Divergents.
Whilst I was debating on how to take action, I was taking a small quick shower, afraid of waking anyone up. When I was done, I decided to take a small stroll around, staying up until it was 10PM the next day in order to regulate my sleeping schedule again. When I was done, I undid my bun from my shower so that my hair wouldn't get wet.
Woah. My hair is getting longer. I should cut it. Or get a new style. Hmm… how about a tattoo and new look? They're opening in two hours. Let's go when it's empty.
I wandered and hummed a little tune that my mother sang to me and my siblings when we were asleep. We were never awake long enough to hear the whole song, but the day before the choosing ceremony, I asked my mother to sing it once more and now, I hum it in memory of her. I made my way to the medical bay and took my IPad to send a message to Joel, requesting that we see each other soon. He replied moments later when I was right about to leave and I decided to bring the IPad along with me.
"Sure. After all, it's the least that I can do for you."
I sent him my confirmation to meet me on the roof, but he had told me he already knew the entrance, so I would meet him at the entrance the next morning, which was a bit soon, but I told him it was pretty urgent so he agreed to take the next train to Dauntless.
It's been so long since I've had any contact with anyone else besides Dauntless members, so I was a little excited and looking forward to it.
I walked along the Pit and then toward the Chasm and let my legs hang over the path, while sitting myself down. I closed my eyes and let the sounds of the water hitting the runoff in the never ending bottom and it relaxed me.
Eric's POV
I checked my clock. 8:00. After telling North that she had passed, I went drinking a little to get everything off my mind and brought someone home with me and after that, it's all a blur. I feel something stir beside me and I get off startled. There's a female in my bed.
"Get out. You overstayed your visit here." I said as I removed the blanket in one go. I didn't even know her name. Nameless looked at me shocked and gave me her most seductive look, and tried to approach me. She lifted her left hand to lower my face towards hers and got up on her knees in order to kiss me. I kissed her back slowly before pushing her away. Recently it was becoming a thing for women to become attached after sex. Did they think something was going to happen? Or did they just want a repeat of events? I pushed her away and threw at her clothes from the floor. I went to my newly bought closet to get myself a new pair of boxers and pants and a sweater. And went to the bathroom to shower myself. If Nameless had a bit of a brain left, she would have left before I returned from my shower.
Which, when I returned she did. After she stole one of my shirts, the shirt that I wore when I met her. Geez, now I'm going to have to buy more new shirts.
"They're comfortable." She said as she looked me dead in the eye.
I smirked before leaving my room at 8:45. I went to the parlour to get a new tattoo, one of a compass. It was on my mind since this morning after I had slept with another Dauntless male member. It's been so long since I've done it with the same sex. I shuddered before deciding on a tattoo. A compass except with all the letters, I'd have only W. Finally, I can forget about everything and leave it all behind. It would be a reminder for myself to not forget but to not let it consume me. I checked in to see Tori, but it turned out that she left early because there were hardly any customers and she had to deal with her wedding. I sighed before making up my mind that I would come back as soon as it reopens and finally get some sleep before breakfast.
I walked around, buying two new tees and it was mostly empty, so I wandered around the campus. I thought back to the conversation Jeanine, Max and a few leaders and I had about the Divergents. It's been a few years that we've been onto them and she's finally prepared to take some action.
This will be more trouble than I thought.
I thought to myself, thinking back to our last meeting.
"We're going to take action in presumably, a year, Jeanine clarified. There's one more project I would like to conduct before we take actions." Jeanine clarified.
While I was walking around, my feet led me to the Chasm. I thought back to my first time here, with West.
The first night of our initiation at Dauntless, "Eric. My results were inconclusive." West whispered to me in a narrow hallway, a few minutes before our curfew. We both knew what that had meant, because we were working on Divergents since we had met. It was the project that brought us together. "You know what that means…" he continued.
I shook my head in denial and my eyes widened. We both knew that Jeanine had planned to overthrow and get rid of them, and we were the ones who provoked such a topic. We knew it wouldn't be soon, but in a few years, because she needed more research and evidence.
And now that it was finally happening, I felt as if everything were moving too fast. But I liked it, the rush it gave me, and how I could think with a clear mind. Even during my fear landscapes, I was able to keep my head and a cool mind.
Soon after, West had become factionless and I knew that it wouldn't be the last time I would ever encounter him, but I felt like I was losing a partner along the way. We were supposed to watch each other's back.
But I won't let that happen again. It happened once with my father, and although he never hurt me, he hurt the one most important to me, and he left me. I trusted him. I trusted West. And they had both left me.
While I was getting lost in my thoughts, I almost ran over someone sitting by the chasm. It was too dark to see, but I knew that it had to be near one in the morning. I had been wandering around the whole compound reminiscing, something that I had never done before. Why was it all happening now?
North's POV
What would happen when Jeanine found out? Okay, Focus. Let's start first. What is a Divergent? Someone who is compatible with more than one or two factions. Who was to say that I was divergent? Was I even a pure divergent? This just shows how our environment influences us.
Wait. That's it. Maybe I'm not completely 100% divergent. If I invent some sort of machine to detect it, then maybe it'll show that there would be no need to exterminate the ones below, say, 75%? It was a matter of behavioral influences based on one's environment.
But how would I prove that I'm not fully Divergent? I'm only qualified for Erudite, but things may have changed now, but it doesn't dismiss the fact that I wasn't a pure Divergent, because if I were, than my test would've been inconclusive. I'll talk more about it with Joel, when I see him in a few hours.
I curled myself up in a ball and I whispered to myself, admitting out loud, that I was scared. There was no one wandering around at one in the morning, and I couldn't keep everything bottled in me in case I break down like I did the day before.
"I'm scared." I half-whispered and wept to myself, into my knees with my arms protectively around myself, holding myself together, just like I had always imagined my mother doing, but never did because we were never the affectionate type.
"Great. You already know one of your fears, so you know what to expect for stage two."
I immediately froze upon hearing another voice, and I felt my blood run cold when I realized that the voice belonged to Eric's. And I felt my eyes well up when my mind registered what he had just said.
"Second stage?" I wondered.
A/N: Hello everyone! I'm really glad that some people decided to review, and to clarify, I'm not really sure whether or not I should make Eric bi, gay, or straight. After much thought, and discussion with my sisters, I decided to just play around until i decided. But he won't be gay, because this story was made for him and North, so the only options left are bi and straight. Please keep in mind that North and Eric aren't even friends, or anything. She's just fearful of him, but she's so easily distracted sometimes and lets her emotions get the best of her, she doesn't even like him yet. YET. Thank you for reading, and review, fav, follow (I checked up on authors and this is what they usually say :P)! Oh yeah and I'll be starting school, but i swear i will try to update once a week; at least during the weekend. Hopefully, because this year i made a vow to try harder. But nothing stops my passion of writing! (or so i hope.) Til next time! (:
~ tulip
