Haven't posted in forever, so sorry. Heres a long one.
Zeke and I drag ourselves out of my apartment the next morning in search for coffee and breakfast in the dining hall. It feels so strange, to actually care about eating. For the longest time, I didn't care about myself. I pushed my health to its limits. And now as I load my tray with an overflowing plate of scrambled eggs, toast, bacon, and potatoes, I can see how it's affected me. I sit down beside Zeke and Shauna.
"Woah. Where's the fire? There's enough food there to feed two grown Dauntless men!" Shauna exclaims with wide eyes. Uriah settles down beside Marlene and Lynn across from us and gives me a glance.
"Four and I have some place to go after this so lets keep the speaking to a minimum and keep eating." Zeke says to the others between bites of egg and slurps of his coffee. Shauna turns her incredulous eye to her boyfriend.
"Where exactly are you guys going?" She asks.
I swallow a bite of my eggs. "Max's office. Gotta clear some stuff."
"Some stuff? What stuff?" Lynn asks. I should have just gone straight to Max's office from my room to avoid this. Questions. And wasting time.
"Just some important stuff. That's what." I mutter as I pick up my tray and make for the trash. But Shauna snags my arm to stop me. I give her a look and she raises her eyebrows expectantly at me.
"Does this 'stuff' have a name?" The ends of her lips quiver as if she is trying to control a smile that wants to break through.
"Yeah. It's called Tris."
Everyone stops eating immediately. Uriah's fork clutters to the table and Lynn's toast is halfway to her mouth. Zeke swallows his last bite of his breakfast and then stands up to throw out his trash. Marlene is the second to move.
"DID YOU FIND HER?!" Marlene and Shauna shriek at us at the same time.
I cringe at the volume of their voices and try to ignore the annoyed looks from other members who are trying to eat their breakfasts in peace as they can get. Zeke raises his fork so it is pointed at the girls accusingly and gives them a strict look.
He drops his voice. "You saw and heard nothing from us."
But Marlene isn't stupid. She is going to put together the pieces and going to realize that Zeke's warning was a way of covering up the truth we discovered last night.
Before anyone can say anything else, Zeke and I bolt from the room.
Max's room is so clean and bright it makes me cringe on the spot. He has a large glass wall window overlooking the upper levels of Dauntless and mysterious sunlight actually makes it into this room. If I weren't in such a hurry or so depressed about Beatrice's disappearance, I would actually stop to acknowledge the beauty. But I won't.
"Four, Zeke. Good morning." Max greets us with a nod when he opens his door and steps aside to let us enter. The last time I was here, I was reporting an initiate's missing eye. Max had to stay in the office late for meetings the next morning. But now instead of covered with papers and pens and empty mugs of cold coffee, his room is impeccably clean. There are two chairs in front of Max's desk, so we sit down.
"Thanks for letting me use the Serum last night. But maybe you could have told me about it before Zeke injected me." I start this off bluntly, not caring for pleasantries or stupid questions about my well being from Max.
"I felt like you needed a little nudge somewhere on your mission that was getting no where. And I hope you managed to control the Serum to a… comfortable level?"
Max clasps his hands over his stomach and leans further back into his chair.
I nod once. "Yes I did."
Max raises his eyebrows in what seems to be amazement, but I don't care for that right now.
"Zeke and I narrowed down our search and we have a strong sense as to where they are keeping Tris. It took us all night, but we narrowed down that search so far Max," I start. He nods for me to continue. "And we came here to ask for help in getting her back." Max takes in a few breaths before sighing deeply in the way that only means he disapproves of this in some way. Zeke sits forward in his seat and rests his elbows on his knees.
"I don't think Four explained the plan out well enough. What we plan to do is use the Serum to navigate through the city to the location where they are holding Tris. And we have deciphered that her captors must have guards and protection, so we need the Dauntless' numbers and support to over run them. We need to put these people to a stop before they kill someone. Like Tris. Our mission depends on the support you give us here Max. We need your help. Please." Zeke's tone is quiet, but straight forward.
Max shakes his head. He avoids our eyes. My stomach drops.
"I'm sorry boys, but I cannot help you with this mission."
"Why not?" Zeke and I ask at the same time.
"I cannot enforce the whole of Dauntless to complete a mission just to bring a girl home. And what if she doesn't even survive this? What if we lose innocent lives along the way? I'm sorry. But I absolutely cannot take that risk."
"He's such a sissy!" I shout as I step into my apartment. Zeke and I just left Max's office. Not two minutes after Zeke slams the door shut, it is shoved open from the other end and in comes Uriah. He shoulders a black bag and Christina shoves him out of the way to come in. I see Lynn's bare head just over Christina's shoulder. Uriah dumps the bag onto my living area floor and turns back around to face us.
"So by the looks on you guys right now, I take the talk with Max didn't go too well." I raise my eyebrows at Uriah's sudden bluntness of the subject. Christina perches herself on the edge of my bed. The blue quilt makes her skin seem colder somehow.
"What are you guys doing here?" Zeke asks for me.
Christina gives me a small apologetic looking smile.
"We're here to help you get Tris back."
For a second all I can hear is silence.
"So you stole weapons from the training room and came here to hatch a plan?" Zeke asks slowly, making sure each word drags out for emphasis. Uriah's face turns serious.
"Well we kind of eavesdropped on most of your conversation with Max… then bartered some of our monthly supplies with Lauren and a few others to get these weapons. Who knew Tori has a mini gun hidden in the base of her tattoo needle?" Lynn says.
Christina turns to Zeke. "We traded clothes, some cake recipe, and a few of our own points. Nothing major man."
I look back and forth, from Christina's group to Zeke. They want to help get Tris back and will risk so much in the process. But I don't want them getting hurt either. I can't risk their lives, no matter how much they want to help get Tris back.
"Four, what do you say?" I hear Zeke ask me through my thoughts.
"I don't like the idea of anyone being hurt on this mission though. This should be my fight. But -," I am cut off from Uriah's yell.
"We're coming and there's nothing you can do about it! Tris is our friend and we will get her back - no matter the cost!" He gives me a hard look of the eye before slamming a hand down on my wall to make a firm point. I stand there silently, fingers rubbing my temple to attempt to think straight.
"Fine."
"Fine what?" Christina asks uncertainly.
"Fine you can help fight." I elaborate, annoyed with the pestering.
"So where is she?" Lynn asks. "Who is holding her? Where is she? Did you guys find anything? You did tell us you were searching all night." Zeke leans against the doorframe and furrows his eyebrows as he gives the group of younger ones a critical or condescending look; I can't tell.
"We narrowed down the area very considerably but it's going to take some more extreme work to get the exact location. For now we know she's being held by the Marsh though. A building lining the river at least." Zeke tells them, focusing his gaze steadily on a gun before looking back at me, then looks away again. "Four and I need to come up with the exact place, then we'll start coming up with some attack and defense ideas." Christina twists her fingers together in her lap.
"Well whoever took her took her with some sort of muscled support and back up. We only have the gang, so chances are slimmer without a few extra hands on this mission. Zeke, do you anyone who would help?" Lynn asks from where she leans against Marlene and Uriah by the door.
"Yes. Alexis is a friend of mine, despises Max and Eric's ideals for the 'new' Dauntless, and has a good shot. I'll talk to her before we go and see if she's up for another adventure." Zeke smirks a little before his expression turns back to serious again. Marlene's eyes land on mine and they turn colder than they were just a moment ago.
"How are you tracking her?"
I nervously pick at my nails.
"A simulation I connected to my thought process right now. It'll only shut down when I tell it to. But for now, the only thing you should know is that this simulation is going to lead us to Tris." Marlene crosses her arms across her chest and she kicks the edge of her black boot against the floor.
"You sure this is going to work?" Christina asks in a small voice. The fear is evident in her eyes and I forget that there are other people that love Tris and want her home just as much as I do, even if they love her in their own different ways. Lynn reaches out a hand and places it comfortingly on Christina's shoulder from where she stands beside Uriah and Marlene. "She'll come home Chris. That's what we're here to do: bring Tris home."
0o0o0
Three hours later Uriah is passed out on my couch with Marlene close at his side, Lynn is out looking for a short list of people Zeke gave her that would most likely be willing to help us on our mission, Christina was asleep at the foot of the couch with a blanket and pillow off my bed, and Zeke was checking each of the weapons the others brought earlier tonight. I silently watch as he empties all the gun chambers, letting the unused bullets fall out onto his open hand before placing them gently in a white cereal bowl from my cupboard. Then he places the empty gun down beside the others on the floor where the bags were emptied and laid out flat for this purpose. There are multiple cereal bowls strewn around the kitchen as Zeke dumps different sized bullets into each category. Some just sit empty.
"During the mission I want you to stay at my side until we get out."
My head tips up to look at Zeke, who had broken the heavy silence between us. I almost didn't catch what he said there.
"Why?"
Zeke flips the safety off on a black Glock 17 before rattling it some to get the bullets out of the chamber. He doesn't look at me as he walks over to the other side of the kitchen to dump the contents in his hand in a white bowl by the fridge. "We need you as the leader during the mission and I think that the real objective here is trying to take down the people running this whole fiasco."
He turns around and walks back to the table for the next gun.
"I don't follow you."
Zeke repeats the earlier process, unlock, shake, and dump.
"I mean let have Lynn and Alexis find Tris, then you, me and the others simultaneously take down the kidnappers. Maybe we can serve as a temporary distraction for someone to sneak around and get Tris out of whereever they're holding her. I just don't want to risk losing you to your swinging moods during the mission or risk getting someone hurt." Somehow, what Zeke says takes me in the wrong way. My brows furrow into a straight line over my brow.
"Are you insisting that I am unstable?"
"In this case, yes."
"So you think that keeping me focused on finding the kidnappers while someone else breaks Tris out is a good idea? Zeke! You know more than anyone else in this compound that I need to get her out myself! Which is why-," Zeke cuts me off as quietly as he can without waking the others.
"-Which is why you are coming with me for mission! Please Four, just consider this because I really don't want you blind firing into a compound and not thinking things through. If you come with me, we can find the people behind this whole mess, take them under, and get the hell out." He slams his hand down on the table, making a bowl's contents shake, staring at me with hard eyes. I know he's right though. When we get there, I know the revengeful, unstoppable, cold blooded side of me will emerge and all coherent thought will be blocked from every discipline needed to function. I could even risk shutting off the Serum during my hot head rage and risk losing a link to finding Tris.
"Alright, I'll stay at your side during the mission."
Zeke unloads another Glock 17.
"Thank you."