A/N: Hey there! A couple of things.
One: I will rarely change POV's in the middle of a chapter, but it had to be done for this chapter, so I'm sorry about that.
Two: please let me know if you are ever confused as to what is going on.
Three: At this point, with each chapter I'm trying to balance out the level of conflict with the fourtris stuff that I oh so enjoy. Its hard, so bear with me. I hope I have a good balance of fourtris and conflict.
Four: shout out to Musicmayhem414 for the kindest review last chapter.
Enough jabbering, here is chapter 21:
TOBIAS'S POV
"Four, is this what I think it is?" "It sure is." "Do you know who the girl is?" "That's Malia, Max's daughter." "How do you know?" "I know that face because when I was doing my research on Max, her picture came up and that is how I found out he had a daughter." "How did you not know that he had a daughter." "I think she had moved out already and became a member of Dauntless before I came in. He didn't mention her at all." "I wonder why. Who's the guy?" "I"m not sure. His face is censored, probably to protect himself. He must have made this video." "Do you think this guy sent this tape to Max?" "From the looks of it, since his face is covered, he probably did, just to spite Max, but who would be cruel enough to send Max a tape of his daughter being taken advantage of like that?" Suddenly, the screen changes. "Four, what just happened to the screen?" "It changed to security footage near the chasm. It is marked with the same date as the video." "This must be when she was fighting back." "I still can't see this guy's face. Can you zoom in?" "I would, but it would be too blurry." Then, screen goes black. "It cut out before her death. I wonder why," I ponder. "Beats me. You're the expert with this stuff." "What I want to know at this point is why take advantage of Max's daughter, and why kill her." "The only way to find that out is to find her rapist/killer. Find the rapist/killer, and we can get him to cough up the motive." "It's not that easy Tris. How are we going to find this guy?" "Go back to the first video." "Ok now what?" "Pause it when I tell you." "OK." A few minutes pass by until she screeches,"NOW!" I pause it immediately. "Look here," she breathes as she points at something on the screen,"look at this guy's tattoo on his arm. That is a pretty complex tattoo, so there has to be only one person with it. Find the tattoo and bam. We've found him." "You are one smart cookie, you know that?" "I know." I take a screen shot of the tattoo and print it out.
"Four, I bet you Tori made it, I can tell because of the style." "Then we should head to Tori and ask her about it." "Not so fast hot shot. She's not going to tell us unless we give her a good reason. She won't betray client confidentiality unless it is absolutely necessary." "We can't show her what we found here." "I know. What we should do now is go talk to Max. We have enough information to get him to talk. He may give us more information that could lead us to evidence. If we have the right evidence, Tori will tell us about who got that tattoo." "Off to Max's then." We make our way through the pit and down the corridor that leads to the Dauntless prison. When we get in, I tell the guards recognize Tris, since she is a police officer who has dragged plenty of arrested people down here, so they let us in no problem. She asks them where Max is being held and they lead us to him. When we get there, the leave us be. I look into his cell and I'm surprised to see him on the edge of his bed, sobbing into his hands. "Max," I whisper, but he doesn't hear me. "Max," I say a bit louder. He perks up, looking into my eyes. "What do you want?" he spits. "Look," Tris explains,"We know about Malia and what happened to her. We don't blame you for being upset because we saw the video. Max, does your behavior have something to do with what happened to her." "Yes, unfortunately it does." "Max, what have you been trying to accomplish by getting that file? You made the file yourself, in Erudite. Why didn't you get it yourself?" "Ah, Four, but that is where you are wrong. I didn't make the file. Someone logged in under my name in Erudite and put it together." I pinch my nose and breathe,"how are we supposed to believe that you didn't make it when the password was your daughter's name?" "It was my daughter's name this whole time? I should have known it would have been that simple! For so long I had tried several passwords, but nothing worked! Thats why I needed your help."
"Max," I continue,"did you become a leader after you got that video because you wanted to find the man who killed and raped your daughter." "Yes. I want to find that man and kill him. I thought that it would be easier to find him if I was a leader, but I guess I was wrong." "Max, we can find him. We got some information on him that we think can help locate him, but we need evidence to support our case. Can you tell us anything that we should know." "Four, why should I tell you anything, you threw me in jail." "Max, you attacked us, in our own home, and in Abnegation. Of course we threw you in jail. Please, Max. Tell us what you know. If you give us that information, we can find this man and punish him for what he did." "Would you allow me to be set free?" "Not unless we find him. Until we find him, you're the only person responsible for a crime. After all, one of your guys did shoot me, and almost shot Tris's child. You threatened us, Max, You need to be held accountable." "Fine. Keep me in prison, but promise you'll find this guy." "If you tell us what we need to know, I promise you we will find this man."
"The only thing I know is that, who ever raped and killed Malia, didn't do it just to spite me, but that was part of his plan. 'Corn Starch' contains his plans. Malia was just a part of it. I don't think him rapping her was an important part of the plan, but killing her was. He wanted her out of the way. I know he is planning on more things, but I'm not sure what. 'Corn Starch' details it. I'm afraid I don't have any more information. I found this out all of this information because I talked to one of his accomplices, but I killed him afterward because I was angry. I hope that you guys can figure this out." "Max, Tris and I got this. We won't let this man get away with it. You should have just told us what was going on instead of attacking us. You should have known we could help you." "I know, but I was afraid you guys wouldn't help me." "You should know me better, Max. Other than Tris and Zeke, no one knows me better. You were like a father to me, and you betrayed me." "I know. I'm sorry Four." As we are walking out, Max calls out to me, "Four, now that Eric and I are imprisoned, you're in charge of Dauntless."
"Tris, do you think Tori will tell us anything." "No, not yet. We need to get a look at those plans that Max was talking about. It could be big." We make our way back to the control room and I begin to pull the file back up again. "Uh, Tris." "Yeah?" "The file is gone." "What do you mean it's gone?" "I mean it's gone, vanished. It isn't even in the trash." "We have to find that file." "How?" "I'm not sure on this one." We walk out of the control room, thinking to ourselves where the file could be when Christina walks up to Tris and says,"there you are! I've been looking all over for you! We need to plan your wedding! I want you guys married ASAP, so lets go!" Poor Tris blushes bright red when she realizes that there is no chance at getting out of this, but she tries anyway. "But Chris, I have work to do!" "Oh please, Tris, you always have work to do when it comes to girly stuff!" "Yeah, but this is important!" "So is this, now come on!" "Sorry Four." "Its ok. Maybe it would be good to take our minds off of this for awhile. Maybe we will come up with something." "Ok." As she leaves, I realize what Max said. I'm the leader of Dauntless. This means two things: I need to figure out what it is that needs to be done to keep Dauntless up and running, and two, I have to see my father again, twice a month. Oh great.
TRIS'S POV
Tobias is right. We need a break from this. Plus, I too want to be married ASAP. It will mean that we are one, and that is what we need to be at this point, so I have no choice but to let Christina drag me back to the apartment. "OK. First things first. We need a date. How about next week?" "Next week? Christina, are you crazy? We can't plan a wedding in that short of time!" "Tris, yes, I'm crazy, and so are you, but we can get this done in a week. I've been working on the details for a while." "You have everything ready to go?" "Yep. All that needs to be done is that you pick out your dress, your bridesmaids' dresses, and Four needs to get a tux for him and his groomsmen." "You might as well keep everything else a surprise." "I was planning on it. I figured you wouldn't know what you wanted, so I did it all for you." "You're a great friend, you know that?" "No shit Sherlock."
Before I realize it, Christina has dragged me, Marlene, Shauna, and Lynn to a wedding dress shop. She wants them all there when I find the right dress. "Chris?" "Yeah Tris?" "I want my mother to be one of my bridesmaids. It would mean a lot." "Will do Tris. I'll send Will to get her as soon as he swings by to give me something I need from him. He'll be here soon, so lets get you the right wedding dress." We go through several white ones, but none of them work for me. "Chris, is there any in black?" "We can find out. I mean, there should be some black ones, it is Dauntless after all." She works her magic with the shop keeper, and soon enough, she brings out several black wedding dresses. Some are too short, some are too long, but eventually I find one that I absolutely love. It is black of course, but its simple. It is strapless, withsmall white jewels at the top in the shape of a 'V', its slim fitting to show off my curves, it's a little frilly about the bottom, and it has a few tiny gems sprinkled around the bottom. "Chris, I think this is the one." "I agree," a familiar voice chirps. I turn around to see if my ears are deceiving me. "Mom!" "Beatrice!" I try to run to my mom, but I almost trip over my dress, but I'm able to catch myself. She embraces me for a moment, then she pushes me away at arms length to get a better look at my dress."Well, don't you look stunning!" "Thanks mom!" "Four sure is a lucky man! I'm sure he'll have a hard time with self- control." "Mom!" "What? Its true!" "I'd expect Christina to say something like that not you!" "I told you she'd say that Christina." "You were right Mrs. Prior. I owe you 5 bucks." "Keep the money dear. I just wanted you to know I think I know my own daughter pretty well. Speaking of which, I'm pretty sure you, Beatrice, have not been refraining from having fun with Four like you father and I asked you to." "Dammit mom! How'd you know?" "It is written all over your face. You did it last night!" "Ugh mom!" "Beatrice?" "Ugh, please don't tell dad." "Oh I won't. He's still mad that you're pregnant, and this would just make it worse." "Mom, its just hard with my hormones and stuff." "I know sweetheart. I'm not mad. I get it. I can't stop you, as much as I want to. You're still a little girl to me too sometimes." "Ugh, will I ever out grow that?" "Nope."
After I get some shoes picked out for the dress, and Christina insisted on high heels, I start to search for the right bridesmaids dress. I eventually settle on some one-shoulder knee length dresses. I let the girls pick out what shoes they want. I go to pay for everything. When the price comes up I realize that I don't have enough money for my dress. I'm about to take it back to get another, but my mother steps in. "No Tris, that dress is perfect for you. I'll help you pay for it." "I'll help too!" Christina chirps. "You guys don't have to." "We know, but your mother and I want to. You deserve it." "You guys are so sweet." "Nah, we just love you." Luckily, they didn't have to pay too much more. I decide to keep all the dresses at Christina's place so that Tobias doesn't see them, and I know that Will won't go into Christina's closet because he knows he'd get lost in there. It is friggin huge, and I'm not sure how she ended up with such a large closet.
I get back to my apartment to find Tobias sitting on the couch, just sitting and waiting for me. "Hey, Tobias, how was the rest of your day." "It was ok. I found out that I'm the new Dauntless leader, so we'll have to move to one of the leader apartments, but we can do that after we are married. I also found out what that job entails, but Zeke's actually been taking care of everything for a while because he didn't want to burden me." "That was nice of him." "Yeah, but as soon as we are married, he'll hand the reigns over to me." "Anything else happen today?" "Yeah. Will told me that Christina want us married a week from today, so I was forced to get tuxes for my groomsmen and I, so I'm all set. I was also told that Christina already has the entire wedding planned out." "She sure does, and I got my wedding dress and my bridesmaids dresses." "I can't wait to see that dress on you." "Oh, but you'll have to." "Damn." "Hey, Tobias." "Yeah?" "It feels wrong to be doing this when a killer/ rapist is on the loose." "What do you mean?" "I mean that I feel bad that I was out doing something for me when I should be searching for this criminal, like we promised Max." "Tris, you need to sometimes think of yourself. I know that Abnegation in you makes it hard, but you have to. Plus, you deserve to have time to do stuff like you did with Christina today." "It doesn't feel like it." "Tris, Tris, Tris. My selfless, brave, intelligent Tris. You deserve to be happy, whether you think so or not." "How do you know?" "I just do."