Thank you so much for being patient with me. Enjoy the next chapter!


Four is woken up to a loud pounding on his door and he jumps up to see Peter walking past. Four presses his face in the window and watches as Peter opens Tris' door and leads her out. She is stunning as always and he realizes this is the last moment he will see her, he begins to scream and pound on the window.

"I want to….her!" He could barely get the words out, his throat was closing up with emotion. The girl he loved was being marched to her death and he was locked behind a door forced to watch her. "I…see her!" He saw Tris hesitate and turn to Peter, he couldn't hear her but suddenly he sees her approach the window.

"Tris! I want to see her!" He is slamming his fists against the door, wishing he had the strength to break it down. He failed her, hadn't moved fast enough to save her. Just as he felt his whole body breaking, he saw her palm press against the glass. He stares at her in disbelief for a second and then throws his hand up against the glass to line up with hers.

Four visualizes her touch, the electricity that ran across his skin whenever she touched him was in his mind. His eyes connect with hers and he sees the pain and terror in her eyes. Four feels all the fight go out of his body and he allows his head to slump against the glass. He fights to keep his eyes on her, to drink her in for one last moment, but his emotions take over. He slowly raises his head to send her off with his love and promise he would follow and he sees an empty window. That was all Four's heart could take and he falls to the floor, shattered.

She walked away from him, he knows it. Peter didn't drag her or force her or he would have heard it. She slunk away when he wasn't looking and he wasn't sure which hurt worse, her impending execution or her leaving him without a second thought. Somewhere deep inside of him, Four realized she was trying to spare him from saying goodbye but she also took their last moment away from them. The world already felt darker and he felt his body shutting down from the shock of losing the only woman he loved, the only person he let see who he really was. Four felt him slip into the darkness and didn't fight against it, he found peace in the silence, blocking out the thoughts of Tris' life slipping away at the hands of that devil woman.


After what felt like hours, he heard movement outside of his cell but couldn't find the strength to look. He had no desire to see her body and assumed they were moving it past his cell to torture and break him. It was too late, his spirit had snapped the minute he saw that empty window.

He hears someone muttering outside his door but still can't move. Suddenly the door slides open and he sees Peter standing there holding Tris' limp body. How dare he? What sadistic person tortured someone this way?

"What do-" Four flew off the floor, ready to kill Peter but then he saw the one movement that gave his life meaning again. Tris' chest rose, very shallowly, but it moved.

"Oh my God. Oh-" Four's voice waived trying to put together what was happening in front of him.

"Spare me your blubbering. She's no dead, she's just paralyzed. It'll only last for about a minute so get ready to run." Four couldn't process what he was saying. He had spent the last few hours saying goodbye to her, accepting a life without her, plotting how quickly he could follow her into death and here she was alive.

"Let me carry her." Four couldn't stand being this close to her, having just come to terms with losing her, and not hold her close. He never wanted her out of his arms again but unfortunately Peter doesn't allow for that to happen.

"No. You're a better show than I am. Take my gun. I'll carry her." His heart dropped but his brain registered Peter's logic. He knew he could protect her better than him, his whole being was meant to keeping her alive, Peter may not have put as much effort into that goal. He would have her in his arms the second they left the danger behind.

Four and Peter take off running and he puts Tris out of his mind, his only objective was getting them out alive. Peter shouts for Four to turn left and he hears someone shout. Without even thinking, he turns and shoots, hearing silence afterward. They continue running and Peter keeps giving him directions.

For a split second, Four worries that Peter is not leading them outside but he pushes that aside. If Peter betrays them he will deal with him later, right now he has to trust him. They continue to run and Four about punches Peter when he almost slams Tris' head into the door. They finally enter a room and Peter stops running. Four can't control himself anymore, he rushes over to Tris.

"Tris," he breathes and she smiles up at him, "Beatrice," she corrects him. He smirks at her stubbornness and finds himself laughing.

"Beatrice," he concedes and closes the space between them and connects his lips to hers, something he dreamt about last night. As always, they are not alone and Four groans in frustration as Peter breaks them up.

"Where are we?" he hears Tris ask. Peter slaps a square door, "This is the trash incinerator. I turned it off and it will take us to the alley and then your aim better be perfect Four if you want to get out of here alive."

"Don't concern yourself with my aim," Four says. Peter opens the incinerator and gestures Tris to go first. Four's heart drops for a second but doesn't argue, he has to get her out of this building. Four watches Tris drop down and Peter follow her. He jumps through and as he lands feels his legs slam into the ground. None of that pain matters though because her hands encircle his arms and lift him up and his mind doesn't recognize anything but her touch. He leads her away from the incinerator, toward Peter.

"Got the gun?" Peter sneers. Four wants so badly to put him in his place but he recognizes how indebted he is to Peter. He can't stop himself from mouthing off, the stress from the past 24 hours has made him a little irritable.

"No, I thought I would shoot the bullets out of my nostrils, so I left it upstairs." Peter scoffs at him and pulls out his own gun. As he leads them out of the room, Four believes they are actually going to make it. Four jumps in front of them and peaks around the corner. There are two people guarding the entrance of the alley and Four easily disposes of them, not flinching at the loss of life. Peter takes off and Four shoves Tris in front of him.

They continue running he realizes Peter is heading toward the easy route, taking a straight line toward Dauntless. "Take the least logical route!" Four screams at him. He turns back questioning him and Four yells again, "The least logical route, so they won't find us!"

Peter swerves to the left and down a different alley. The group plows through boxes and then heads toward the marsh. Four realizes it at the same time Tris does and she shouts, "Bad Idea!" They were headed again for the front of Erudite. Peter swerves again and Four sees Tris struggle to keep up the pace. Just as he is going to grab her and carry her, she pulls Peter into a building and he follows. The door is locked so Four fires at the window, breaking it, and unlocking the door. Tris solved their problem as she was near death, hide until they stop searching for them.

They find a spot beneath the stairs and Four sits next to Tris, feeling his body pull to her naturally. As Peter sits across from them, Four sizes him up. Why did he save Tris? Why get Four? What was his motive? How did he get Tris out of there?

"How did you do it?" Tris asks. Peter begins to explain, "It was easy, I dyed a paralytic serum purple and switched them out. I replaced the wire that was supposed to read your heartbeat with a dead one. The heart monitor was harder, I had to get some Erudite help with a remote and stuff, you wouldn't understand if I explained it to you."

Tris wasn't satisfied with that answer and neither was Four. "Why did you do it? You want me dead. You were willing to do it yourself, what changed?"

Four watched Peter for any sign of lying as he answered, "I can't be in anyone's debt. The idea that I owed you something made me sick. I would wake up in the middle of the night feeling like I was going to vomit. Indebted to a stiff? It's ridiculous and I couldn't have it. You saved my life at Amity and I had to repay you."

Four couldn't stand it, the idea that Peter only saved Tris because she saved him, it made him sick.

"You're insane. That's not the way the world works, people don't keep score." Peter continued to argue with him about keeping score and Four couldn't fathom living like that. Finally Peter changes the subject, asking when they could leave.

"In a few hours I imagine. We should head to Abnegation to the factionless and Dauntless who weren't wired for simulations. They will be waiting there." Peter just shook his head and settled in for the time being.

Four put his arm around Tris, finally able to take advantage of being close to her. She pressed into him and his body soared at her touch. He felt all the things he wanted to tell her bubble to the surface but he pushed them back down, saving them for a time they were actually alone.


After they felt enough time had passed, they ventured toward the Abnegation sector. Four could see people gawking at Tris and realized Jeanine must not have wasted any time in spreading the word that she was dead. He was not looking forward to her reaction when she found she had been betrayed.

"Tris?" Four turns to the voice and sees Uriah and Christina start toward Tris but he stops them.

"She's been through a lot.. She just needs to sleep. She'll be down the street, number thirty seven, come by tomorrow." Four leads Tris to the house that used to belong to Marcus Eaton, his childhood nightmare. He pushes the fear away, being strong for Tris, and steps through the front door.

As they enter, Four sees Tori, Harrison, and Evelyn standing in the kitchen. He notices the shock cross their face and Four sees Tris lean into the wall and he quickly embraces his mother. She whispers, "Thank God you are alive, I was terrified." Four smiles instantly, hearing that love from one of his parents he had been craving his whole life. He walks back over to Tris and leads her toward the staircase. She follows him upstairs and he leads her into his old bedroom.

Part of him craves for a simpler time when he would have brought her to his home after making her his wife. Their life was so confusing right now, he just wanted one moment of peace and quiet with her. He couldn't take his hands off her, he felt that if he let go of her again she would disappear and this dream would end.

"Marcus didn't go in here after I left, nothing was moved around." Four was rambling, he was so overwhelmed with emotions. He saw Tris' eyes connect with the sculpture on his dresser.

"My mother smuggled that to me when I was young. She told me to hide it and the day of the choosing ceremony I put it there so he would see it. My small act of defiance." Four smiled at the memory of the boy walking toward his freedom. Little did he know he would find the meaning for his life in Dauntless too, the woman standing in front of him.

Four notices Tris' feet are cut up and he leads her over to his tub in the bathroom, "Let's take care of those feet." She follows, clearly tired beyond belief. As he begins to wash her feet, he is overcome with emotion. He almost lost her this morning but now she is in his house, his arms. He feels her grab his hands and begin to scrub the blood from them but he can barely register her touch, his body finally shutting down after the day.

He hears Tris begin to whimper, "I don't…" her voice breaks and Four squeezes her hand willing her to continue. "My family is all dead or traitors, how can I…?" His heart breaks for her, he never realized how alone she must feel right now, especially after Caleb's betrayal.

He pulls her too him and wraps his arms around her. If he could take this pain away from her, he would in a second. She had survived more than any person should.

"I'll be your family now." He meant it, if this stupid war wasn't happening, he would marry her this second. He was all she had left and he was determined to keep her safe.

"I love you." His breathing stopped, unsure of what he just heard. When he had told her that on the train, he saw the hesitation in her eyes and it had left a doubt in his mind ever since. It was one of the reasons they had so many arguments in the past, he was unsure. He doesn't dwell on that now though, she is his and he is hers. His brain slowly catches up and he realizes he hasn't said anything in a while. He looks up as he feels Tris squeeze his hands and meets her eyes.

"Say it again," he whispers to her. He had to know he didn't imagine that.

"Tobias." His heart stops at the sound of his name from her lips. "I love you." He wraps his arms around her and pulls her to him and plants kisses all over her neck and face. Finally he settles on her lips and his heart soars at the contact.

"I love you too."