Tris wakes me up.
"Tobias, it's time to go to dinner and see the final rankings," Tris whispers into my ear, and kisses my neck.
"Well now I don't want to leave," I tell her, smiling. She smiles back at me, and jumps out of bed.
"Too bad," she says, and puts her jacket back on. I groan and climb out, searching the floor for my shirt. When I put it back on, I see Tris watching me, blushing.
"What?" I say, and walk over to her. I put my hands on her hips and she wraps her arms around my neck.
"Just…I feel better now. Thank you," she says, and kisses me.
"Thought we had dinner," I mumble.
"Dinner, shminner," she says, not breaking apart our lips.
I laugh and open the door for her. We walk down the hallway, not saying anything; we both understand it's too risky, but we still smile. When we reach the dining hall, she goes in first. I wait a second, saying 'hi' to another initiate, and go over to sit with Zeke and Lauren.
"Where were you? We've been waiting for like, ten minutes," Lauren asks.
"Probably hooking up with that little transfer of his," Zeke smirks. I blush and pick some food up from one of the trays.
Lauren's eyes go wide. "No!" she screeches, and covers her mouth.
"No is exactly right," I tell her sternly.
"Sure, sure," Zeke says, and turns his attention back to his giant plate of food. A microphone screeches from the front of the room, and Eric steps up to a podium. Everyone goes quiet.
"We aren't big on speeches here. Eloquence is for Erudite," he sneers, and the crowd laughs. After all this time it amazes me he can so easily put down his place of origin. "So I'm going to keep this short. It's a new year, and we have a new pack of initiates. And a3 slightly smaller pack of new members. We offer them our congratulations." The crowd erupts into a cheer.
"We believe in bravery. We believe in taking action. We believe in freedom from fear and in acquiring the skills to force the bad out of our world so that the good can prosper and thrive. If you also believe in those things, we welcome you," Eric shouts over the crowd. What a load of bull crap. He doesn't believe in any of those things!
"Tomorrow, in their first act as members, our top ten initiates will choose their professions, in the order of how they are ranked. The rankings, I know, are what everyone is really waiting for. They are determined by a combination of three scores-the first, from the combat stage of training; the second, from the simulation stage; and the third, from the final examination, the fear landscape. The rankings will appear on the screen behind me."
Suddenly, the screen behind him flashes to life, and the list of initiates with their pictures appears. I am only looking for one name, and it's in the number one spot. I beam with pride. I knew it. I fight my way through the crowd towards Tris. When I find her, she is letting go of Uriah. I tap her on the shoulder, and she beams at me.
"You think giving you a hug would give away too much?" I ask.
"You know, I really don't care," she says. Suddenly, she leans up and kisses me. I crack my eyes after a second and see her friends gaping at us. Whatever. I brush my hand over her neck, and feel a bandage in the same spot where I was injected earlier. I guess they gave it to her, too. Suddenly, she breaks away from me, and stares at me in fear.
"Tris?" I ask her, confused. I hope she didn't regret kissing me publicly; I sure didn't.
"Not mow," she mutters, and shakes her head. My eyes sink a little. I thought we were passed the whole secrets thing. I guess she can tell I'm upset.
"Later, okay?" she says, and smiles a little. I nod, not wanting to push too much. The rest of the night is spent drinking booze and sitting alone while Lauren and Zeke are making out in a corner. After a couple hours, I get tired and head back to my room. The second I hit my bed I fall asleep.
I am woken by the sound of footprints coming from the hall. I peek outside and see the Dauntless marching in unison. I'm not sure what's going on, so I throw on my shoes and join them. I see Zeke so I jog over to him.
"What's going on?" I whisper. He doesn't respond so I tap his shoulder. Still no response.
"What gives man?' I ask, and grab his shoulder. When I see his eyes, and how his pupils are fully dilated and he is staring into nothing, I understand what Tris was trying to tell me earlier: the formula they injected us with earlier is doing this, this is how the Erudite are getting us to fight. This also means that Tris and I are fully awake, and if we don't play along we will be killed.
I follow the line of Dauntless zombies into an old meeting chamber, where guns are stacked on the tables. We each grab a gun and holster and head out towards the train tracks. We stand in a crowd until I hear the train horn. The front of the crowd breaks in to a sprint into the empty cars I follow the line and make my way in. Copying the person in front of me, I reach out to help the person behind me. The second I grab the skinny arm, I know who it is: Tris. I am relieved to see she is okay for now. We stand in neat rows, silent. I have to let Tris know I'm awake, and that it will be okay. I reach out my hand and lace my fingers through hers. We stand in silence, using each other to remind us that everything will be alright. The train starts to slow down, and I glance outside of the car. We are on the Abnegation border. Oh God, she can't do this; she'll be discovered and killed. When the train is almost stopped, I turn my head slightly towards her.
"Run," I hiss, my eyes forcing the command to her.
"My family," she says. The person in front of me jumps out and I follow. We walk through the streets with the sound of gun shots hanging in the air, and dead, bloody bodies all around us. While other units carry out unspoken orders, Tris and mine stays, guarding the tracks. In the corner of my eye I see Eric and another Dauntless leader, Emily, approach Tris.
"This is insane," Eric says, and pokes Tris's cheek. Get your filthy hands off of her!
"They really can't see or hear us?" Emily asks.
"Oh, they can see and hear," Eric responds. "They just aren't processing what they see and hear the same way. They receive commands from our computers in the transmitters we injected them with…" he explains, and touches the injection site on Tris's neck. I swear to God… "and carry them out seamlessly. Eric walks over to me and places his face inches from my own. Do not flinch, do not react. Protect Tris.
"Now, this is a happy sight," he smirks. "The legendary Four. No one's going to remember that I came in second now, are they? No one's going to ask me 'What was it like to train with the guy who only has four fears?'" He pulls out a gun and places it against my head. "Think anyone would notice if he accidentally got shot?"
"Go ahead," Emily tells him. "He's nothing now."
"Too bad you didn't just take Max up on his offer, Four. Well, too bad for you anyway," Eric says quietly. I hear the bullet click in to place, and I swallow the bulge in my throat. You are saving Tris. It's okay.
In one quick motion, Tris lifts her gun up, puts a bullet into place, and presses it against the back of Eric's head.
"Get your gun away from his head," she says coldly. No, Tris!
"You won't shoot me," Eric says.
"Interesting theory," Tris replies. A gun shot goes off, and Eric screams. He grabs his foot, dropping his gun. I take this opportunity to draw my gun and shoot Emily in the leg. She falls down and Tris grabs my arm. We run through the streets, looking for shelter. I take her hand and start to lead her to an old shed that I used to hide from Marcus in. Suddenly, a shot is fired from behind us, and Tris falls down. I instantly am down beside her, making sure she is still alive.
"Run!" she yells.
"No," I tell her firmly. I help her up, but by the time I do, we are surrounded by Dauntless.
"Divergent rebels,' Eric says, trying to balance on one foot, "surrender your weapons."
We are lead to Abnegation headquarters. Tris is leaning on me heavily. I can tell the bullet wound is really hurting her. A guard opens a door to an office, and we are pushed inside. Jeanine spins around in a chair behind a desk. She hangs up the phone and faces us.
"Divergent rebels," our guard explains.
"Yes, I can see that,' she says, and takes off her hideous glasses.
"You," she says, pointing at Tris, "I expected. All the trouble with your aptitude test results made me suspicious from the beginning. But you," she says, facing me. She shakes her head, almost like she is disappointed. "You, Tobias- or should I call you Four? - managed to elude me. Everything about you checked out: test results, initiation simulations, everything. But here you are, nonetheless. Perhaps you can explain to me how that is?"
"You're the genius," I say coolly. "Why don't you tell me?"
Her mouths curls into a smile. It makes me sick. "My theory is that you really do belong in Abnegation, that your Divergence is weaker." Ha. She has no idea. She smiles even bigger.
"Your powers of deductive reasoning are stunning," I hiss. "Consider me awed." I know that she is only prolonging our sentence. "Now that your intelligence has been verified, you might want to get on with killing us," I tell her, and close my eyes. As much as I'm not ready to die, I can accept it; I would rather die than watch my friends, and Tris, be tortured. "You have a lot of Abnegation leaders left to murder, after all," I spit.
Jeanine doesn't react. She just stands there, smiling. I feel Tris lean a little more on me, so I wrap my arm around her for support.
"Don't be silly," Jeanine finally says. "There is no rush. You are both here for an extremely important purpose. You see, it perplexed me that the Divergent were immune to the serum that I developed, so I have been working to remedy that. I thought I might have, with the last batch, but as you know, I was wrong. Luckily I have another batch to test."
"Why bother?" Tris spits at her. Jeanine smirks back.
"I have had a question since I began the Dauntless project, and it was this," Jeanine says, running her finger over the desk. "Why are most of the Divergent weak-willed, God-fearing nobodies from Abnegation, of all factions?"
"Weak-willed," I laugh. "It requires strong will to manipulate a simulation, last time I checked. Weak-willed is mind-controlling an army because it's too hard for you to train one yourself."
"I am not a fool," she says. "A faction of intellectuals is no army. We are tired of being dominated by a bunch of self-righteous idiots who reject wealth and advancement, but we couldn't do this on our own. And your Dauntless leaders were all too happy to oblige me if I guaranteed them a place in our new, improved government."
"Improved," I snort. For geniuses, these guys sure are stupid.
"Yes, improved," Jeanine snaps. "Improved, and working toward a world in which people will live in wealth, comfort, and prosperity."
"At whose expense?" Tris mumbles. I can tell the blood loss is starting to affect her. "All that wealth…doesn't come from nowhere."
"Currently, the factionless are a drain on our resources," Jeanine tells us. "As is Abnegation. I am sure that once the remains of your old faction are absorbed into the Dauntless army, Candor will cooperate and we will finally be able to get on with things."
Her plan…it's horrid. All those people, just forced into killing innocent people. She has no right to decide who is valuable or not. "Get on with thing," I repeat bitterly. "Make no mistake," I say, my voice raised. "You will be dead before the day is out, you-"
"Perhaps if you could control your temper," Jeanine cuts me off, "you would not be in this situation to begin with, Tobias."
"I'm in this situation because you put me here," I yell at her. "The second you orchestrated an attack against innocent people."
"Innocent people," she says, laughing. "I find that a little finny, coming from you. I would expect Marcus's son to understand that not all those people are innocent. Can you tell me honestly that you wouldn't be happy to discover that your father was killed in the attack?"
"No," I admit. As much as it hurts me to agree with her on this point, I really wouldn't mind it. "But at least his evil didn't involve the widespread manipulation of an entire faction and the systematic murder of every political leader we have."
This point is hard to Jeanine to reply to. We stare at each other for a few seconds before she clears her throat.
"What I was going to say is that soon, dozens of the Abnegation and their young children will be my responsibility to keep in order, and it does not bode well for me that a large number of them may be Divergent like yourselves, incapable of being controlled by the simulations," she says, pacing in front of us. "Therefore, it was necessary that I develop a new form of the simulation to which they are not immune. I have been forced to reassess my own assumptions. That is where you come in. You are correct to say that you are strong-willed. I cannot control your will. But there are a few things I can control." She stops walking and faces Tris, whose head is now leaning against my shoulder, and me.
"I can control what you see and hear," Jeanine says calmly, "so I created a new serum that will adjust your surroundings to manipulate your will. Those who refuse to accept our leadership must be closely monitored." I had almost forgotten how cold and calculating she is. "You will the first subject, Tobias," she says, and my stomach churns at the thought of her controlling my mind. "Beatrice, however…" she turns and smiles down at Tris. "You are too injured to be of much use to me, so your execution will occur at the conclusion of this meeting."
"No," I say firmly and coldly. My voice is trembling, but I still sound deadly. "I would rather die."
"I'm afraid you don't have much of a choice in the matter," Jeanine says lightly.
Something snaps inside of me. She can hold me hostage, but she will never take away my will, let alone Tris's. Never. I swore I would keep Tris safe and happy, no matter what the cost, and I'm not about to break that promise. I kiss Tris roughly, letting it say all the words I can't, and leap across the desk and grab Jeanine's throat. The guards by the door grab me and shove me against the floor. Out of the corner of my eye, I see Tris lunging at me, but she gets slammed against the wall. She lets out a wail, and a little piece of me dies inside, knowing I'm the reason she's in pain. I see Jeanine coming toward me with a large needle, and in a last escape attempt, I elbow the guard to my right in the face. He takes the blow, but just as quickly hits me in the head with his gun. I feel a needle in my neck, and Tris screams, and I fall unconscious for a moment. When I come back, everything is so vivid. The lights are too bright, and I have mixed emotions about everyone in the room. I look for a familiar face, and when I think I find one, a blurry memory runs through my brain of her hitting me. I am confused by this. There's no way she would do that to me.
"Tobias, Tobias!" the girl screams. Every fiber of my body is screaming at me to kill her.
"He doesn't know you," Jeanine says. Suddenly, my body lunges forward, and my hands are wrapped around the girl's throat. One of the guards pulls me off of her, and drags me out of the room. Once we are in the hallway, I feel an elbow hit the back of my head, and I pass out.
When I wake up, I am in a room filled with blinking computers with lines of mixed numbers and letters that mean nothing to me. I close my eyes, trying to remember something, anything of what happened to me. Don't let anyone touch the computers. Kill anyone who comes in here, a voice says in my head. I don't know whom or what it is, but I feel my muscles tense, obeying it. My legs move me towards a chair facing the door, and I sit down. My whole body is tensed, ready to attack any living thing. I'm not sure why I am doing this.
Suddenly, the door opens. A small, blonde girl walks in. "Tobias," she says. Is that my name? Kill her! The voice screams, and I see my arms raise a gun.
"Drop your weapon." The words come out of my mouth, but I don't remember thinking them.
"Tobias," the girl says, 'you're in a simulation." She slowly lowers her gun to her feet.
"Drop your weapon!" I hear myself scream again. Why do I want to hurt her? She is the enemy, my head tells me.
"I did," she says calmly, but she is shaking. Suddenly she runs forward and grabs my wrists. My finger pulls the trigger, but it misses her head by a few inches. She kicks me in the side and twists my wrists, forcing the gun from my hands. She reaches out for it, my the voice controlling me forces my body to grab her and throw her against the wall. I stare at her. Why is she so familiar? I don't want to hurt her. Kill her, the voice hisses again. I feel my arm go back and make contact with her jaw. Her arm blocks some of the force, and she returns my punch with a hard kick to my stomach. I catch her foot and throw her against the wall again. This time she falls, and my arm reaches out and grabs her by the hair, forcing her up against the wall, and she grabs my wrist. "Tobias," she croaks.
When she says that name, an image of me kissing her by the chasm pops into my head. The grip on her hair loosens, and a look of hope flashes into her eyes.
"Tobias, I know you're in there somewhere," she says. Kill her now! the Voice orders again. I start to move towards her.
"Tobias, please. Please see me," she says whimpering, the tears forming in her eyes. "Please see me, Tobias, please!" she begs. She looks at me with pleading eyes, and places something in my hands; it's my gun I dropped. Without thinking, I place it to her head and click the bullet into its chamber. My heart stops for some reason. No, this is second nature to you, the voice commands, and my muscles relax a little, but not all the way. Standing here, with the bullet in place, absolutely terrifies me. A part of my mind knows that the serum will never be able to beat this out, because it is a deep-rooted fear that cannot be fixed. A memory of the girl seeing this fear, along with my others, enters my mind. I trust her completely. No you do not; kill her! the voice screeches, pulsing in my head. The muscles in my arms don't move. I can't shoot her.
"Tobias, it's me," she says quietly, and steps forward, wrapping her arms around me. My body tenses, instinct telling me to rip her throat out, but my head telling me to hug her back. The two sides are at war in my head. I will always choose this girl; I will always choose Tris. Suddenly, the voice controlling my body is gone. My body starts to shake.
"Tris," I confirm. Before she can reply, I press my mouth against hers. I wrap my arms around her and lift her up. Words cannot describe how thankful I am right now. I place her down and trace every crevice on her face just to be sure she's real. I start to cry, something I rarely do. She saved me…again. She leans against my chest and cries with me. We stand there for I don't know how long, just holding each other.
"How did you do it?" she finally ask, my face still in my shirt.
"I don't know," I reply, my lips never leaving her head. "I just heard your voice."
She pulls back and stares at me. I look at her bruised face, and want to hurt myself for doing that to her.
"Was I running the simulation?" I ask.
"I don't know if you were running it so much as monitoring it," she tells me. "It's already complete. I have no idea how but Jeanine made it so it could work on its own.
I shake my head. The power that was so wrong, that could have done so much good…."It's incredible," I mumble. "Terrible, evil…but incredible."
Tris moves her eyes to the side, and her eyes widen. "Tobias, now!" she says. I don't have to ask what she mean; I am working on the computer, typing away the code Jeanine has set up. Damn she's good…but not as good as me. A gun shot goes off somewhere.
"Tobias," Tris says, a tone of urgency in her voice. One last line…I press the last button, and the program is down. I don't bother to look at the results.
"I have to get the data, or they'll just start the program again," I explain as I type away again. I delete what I can find, and it's easily enough to break up the program. I burn it and take out the hard drive. "Got it," I say, and hold up the drive triumphantly.
"We have to leave," Tris says, pointing at a screen.
"Yes, we do," I say, and place my arm around her. "Come on."
Tris and I walk to an elevator. When it opens, a body falls out. Tris lets out a small yelp. I look at the man's face; it's familiar, yet not. Then it hits me: it's Tris's father. I hold her tighter as the elevator carries us upwards toward the ground. When we reach our level, Tris runs out towards a boy who I assume is her brother, judging from their similar appearances. I start to follow her, but then I freeze, and my whole body turns to stone; Marcus is right behind them Memories of beatings and closets and bruises rise in my mind.
"Son," he says, moving towards me. I wince, knowing that any contact with him has always been bad.
"Hey," Tris says sternly, and steps between us and pushes him away. "Get away from him," she says. I want to say something, but I can't; all I can think about is not wanting to be hit. My breaths are coming short and rapidly.
"Stay away," she hisses. I hear the deadliness in her tone.
"Tris," I manage to say.
Marcus just gives her a confused look. "Not all the Erudite articles are full of lies," she says, glaring at him, never allowing him to create less space between us.
"What are you talking about?" he asks. "I don't know what you've been told, Beatrice, but-"
"The only reason I haven't shot you is because he's the one who should get to do it," she says, and steps toward him. I'm scared what she might do to him in the meantime, so I grab her arms to hold her back. "We have to go," I croak, and lead Tris toward the train tracks. "The train should be here any second."
I clench my jaw as we walk, forcing myself not to hit Marcus right now. I have to get us safe first.
"Sorry," Tris mutters.
"You have nothing to be sorry for," I tell her, and intertwine our fingers. I am amazed by how willing she was to stand up to Marcus like that, to protect me.
"If we take the train in the opposite direction, out of the city instead of in, we can get to Amity headquarters," she says. "That's where the others went." Tris's brother says something, but I'm not really paying attention. My focus is only on two things right now: Tris and the approaching train. When it's close enough, I grab Tris and pull her on with me. I know she's not strong enough to do it herself. When we are in the car, she leans her head against my shoulder heavily. We have all been through a lot today, so I don't say anything, just let us rest quietly.
Caleb is sitting across from us, studying me. I don't really care about him; what I care about is protecting from Marcus and Peter, who are a mere ten feet away, which is too close for comfort. I pull Tris in so our foreheads are touching. Ever since I woke up from the simulation, I have had to be in contact with her in some physical way. I need this closeness.
"My parents," she says quietly, "they died today. They died for me."
"They loved you," I tell her. "To them, there was no better way to show you." She nods in response.
"You nearly died today," I point out. "I almost shot you. Why didn't you shoot me, Tris?"
"I couldn't do that," she replies quickly. "It would have been like shooting myself."
Any doubts about what I have to say next all fade away with her last sentence. I lean in close, close enough so only we can hear my next words.
"I have something to tell you," I whisper into her ear. She runs her finders over my arm and looks up at me, waiting for whatever it is I have to say.
"I might be in love with you," I say lightly, and smile a little. "I'm waiting until I'm sure to tell you, though."
"That's sensible of you," she says, and smiles back at me. "We should find you some paper so you can make a list or a chart or something." I laugh a little, and kiss her jaw.
"Maybe I'm already sure and I just don't want to frighten you," I mutter against her neck.
"Then you should know better," she says, laughing.
"Fine," I state. "Then I love you."
She kisses me, and doesn't break apart for a while. She sighs, and closes her eyes. I wrap my arms around her as the train carries us into our unknown future.
Through all that we've been through, I am only certain of two things: that we can trust no one now, and that Tris is my world; if she dies, I will shortly follow her. Everything I do, everything I choose is because of her. I will do anything and everything to make sure she stays safe. I'm not sure what life we will have, but I know it will be together.
Thank you to all my readers! I love hearing your opinions, so please review if you haven't already. Writing this story was such a joy, and I can't wait to write another! Be looking for Tris's fear landscape with Tobias!) When Insurgent comes out, I will work on that from Four's POV as well.
Much love, LS