September 27th Year 499,

Today is Mark's birthday, he's twenty-six today and in the past, when we could, my family had tried to celebrate birthdays together. It's not like it's something that people question, even though 'faction before blood' exists it's not like there aren't other families like mine. This is the first time I haven't been there, and even though there's nothing that I can do about it I still feel bad.

I miss my family so much and a very miniscule part of me just wants to go home and be with them, and my friends, and for things to go back to the way they were. And I know - I know that that can't happen, I can never go back and things will never be the same again but everything here is terrifying and I would give anything to just go home and have some kind of reprieve from it all. But I've made my choice and now my only other one is factionlessness; and it's not that I'm unhappy, I like it here well enough. I just want something familiar. I wonder if this was how the others - Mark, Minerva, Gwendolyn, and Maureen - felt after they first transferred. I know that Dauntless is different, but any kind of change is huge.

I've seen Amity before, spent time up there without my parents and I know all the ways that it's different from Erudite. But it's familiar to me in a way, like another home. My extended family was always more than welcoming to me and my friends. When my great-aunt Sophie was alive she just adored us and when my family would go up to spend time with her and her children she would always ask when I would bring my lovely little friends around again. She was a very happy, very friendly woman but also always kind of lonely. Her husband died long before I was born and so did most of her siblings and their spouses. I only got to know my great-uncle Dexter, but that was almost twelve years ago and I barely remember him. My mother's parents both died long before I was born as well; my grandpa - Leon - when Mark was two and my grandmother - Ruby - when he was eight. My father's parents stuck around a little longer, long enough for them to know me as a very small child, but I can't remember them; all I know of them is from pictures, Minerva looks a lot like my grandma Carmilla with her long hair and broad shoulders.

I've always wondered if Casey's choice was at all influenced by all the time she spent around Amity through me. My mother's Amity-born and raised cousins came to visit her just as much as she went to see them and they've always been the aunts and uncles I never had. It was nice, after my brother transferred I saw even more of them and I think they quietly always expected another one of us to transfer. I wonder if Marilyn, my mom's cousin's daughter who I've always been super close to, talks to Casey at all. On the few occasions I took her and Eliza up with me, or Marilyn came to Erudite, they seemed to get along pretty well. Marilyn is gentle, and kind, and good like Casey is.

I really hope that Casey's doing alright. I miss her just as much as I miss my family and I want to see her again so badly. It's not like I didn't see her leaving coming – I didn't see my leaving coming – and I was prepared to say goodbye. Hell, I did say goodbye when I met up with her in the Commons after the Aptitude Test. We had our last little group moment before everything changed forever and I couldn't ask for anything else. I couldn't have asked for better friends in general and I feel so lucky to have gotten to be a part of their lives, I just wish that we'd had more time together. I'll always miss her I think, all of them, just like I'll always miss my family because those ties are so deep and we're so close. Or at least we were.

And I know that I'm supposed to move on, that I will move on, that we'll all move on because that's just what time does; but I don't want to let go and I certainly don't want to forget. The friends I've made here are great, but I just don't think they'll ever replace what Kira, Casey, and Eliza were to me.

We'll have longer together, time to bond and time to grow even closer. We have our whole lives ahead of us and I have every confidence that we'll always be together; we'll grow up, and learn to be Dauntless, and wonder why we ever worried. Or at least that's the dream, that's the way I've always been told things are supposed to be. Everyone belongs somewhere, everyone finds something in their faction, everyone finds themselves in their faction. But I can't seem to figure out what I've found, where I belong; I know that I should be patient, that things will fall into place all in due time as they always do. But I really don't believe in fate and I hate the idea of just letting life slip through my fingers without a care. That's probably not what people mean when they say things like that everything will eventually fall into place, but that's what it sounds like and it irks me to an almost comical degree. I just feel like I have to take control of my life and be who I want to be; not what I think I am, or what's the easiest thing to be, but the sort of person I want to be and how I want to live my life.

But I don't know. I'd always imagined myself in Erudite, that seemed like where I was bound to choose, and that had made me so happy up until very recently. My test changed everything; I had a vision before, it was vague and it never quite felt as right as people say choosing where you truly belong feels, but now I'm questioning if I belong anywhere at all.

I didn't feel like I could be happy in Erudite, so I left; but now I'm teetering just on the edge of miserable here in Dauntless. My only other option would have been Amity and while I might not have gone through the sort of trials that Dauntless and Erudite use to vet their initiates, I can't imagine it ever being anything close to easy. If my friendship with Will has taught me anything, it's that I really cannot resist being just a little mean to my friends, even though it's all in good fun. And on top of that, I have no patience for people like Four and Peter; I tolerate Eric because his approval may help me further down the line, but I detest him and have never hesitated to talk about it with my friends. I'm not Casey, or Mark, or Marilyn; I'm not especially gentle or kind, I'm polite and I care about other people but I just don't have it in me to just grin and bear the nth degree of complete bullshit like the Amity do. Aside from Abnegation, no other faction has hard rules against telling people to fuck off if they're annoying you and I certainly enjoy that. I just can't deal like they can. Mark – I swear on my life – can and does smile through anything and everything to the point where it actually kind of stops being friendly and circles right back around to unnerving. He's always kind of been like that, diplomatic and patient even when he doesn't have to be. I'll bet that serves him really well as a faction representative, but I could never be like that.

I don't even think I want to. I want to be kind, but I'm no doormat and I wouldn't have it any other way. Divergence aside, I actually like the way that I am. I don't have to be defined by it either; if I don't tell anyone, if I just live my life honestly, I'm bound to do things that will define the sort of person that I am a lot more than a word and a few percentages ever could.

"Hey, Mimi." My train of thought is broken by Christina, who's leaning against my bunk.

I snap my journal shut and look up at her with near fear in my eyes. People aren't usually in the dorms until it's near lights out. I'd been with my friends in the Pit up until a few hours ago. This isn't the first time someone's seen me write in my journal, but it's always been something that I'd been doing when they walked in. Christina is my friend, but I very obviously brought this journal from Erudite and I don't know what she makes of that.

"Yeah?" I fidget sort of nervously with the end of my braid.

"I was just going to ask if you wanted to come with us to get desert. One of the, uh, the Dauntless-born offered to show us one of the better cafés in the compound. They're supposed to serve really good desert.

"Sure thing." I smile, but pause when I realize that I can't put my journal back without her seeing where I hide it.

"I'll catch up with you in just a moment, okay," I say, hoping to god that she agrees.

She gives me a confused look and then shrugs. "Sure. Guess I should have figured you'd want to put your book back wherever you hide it."

"Uh, what?"

She gives me an amused look. "Candor, remember? And it doesn't take a genius to figure out that you brought that book from Erudite. Not that it matters to me very much." She adds on the last part when she notices the alarm on my face. She strolls out of the room and I shove my journal back under the mattress, then catch up with Christina.

"So what do you write about, If you don't mind me asking," she says.

"It's just a diary. Um, it's kind of a habit I've had for a few years now and it feels weird when I don't keep it up."

She nods. "Cool. You know, I never thought of you as the sort of person to keep a diary."

"My mother got my first one for me when I was twelve, she wanted to see if it would help me let out my emotions" I shrug. "I guess it works."

"So what's that like anyways, being a faction leader's daughter?"

"I mean, as amazing as she is, I don't really think of my mom like other people do. I mean yeah, she's this incredible figure with all this power and influence and it's really amazing all that she's managed to amount to, but like she's still my mom. We're close and we care about each other."

She nods. "My mom's a lawyer, so I guess I can kind of relate. I mean she's not really on the level that your mom is, but I know what it's like to look up to your parents." She chuckles half-heartedly. "Though I guess we're not really doing much to live up to their legacies, huh?"

That stings a lot more than she knows, I have to fight a grimace as I say, "Yeah. But I've never really tried to compare myself to my mom. She was always doing a lot more at my age, so it's not like I can expect to compare." I decide to change the subject. "So are you excited for Visiting Day?"

She shrugs. "More nervous than anything. I know they aren't really all that happy with the fact that I left and, you know...they're Candor." She sighs. "I just don't want to deal with her and my dad critiquing every single little thing."

"I know the feeling, believe me." My parents are snobs, I've always known it. They look down on everything that isn't Erudite, but in their eyes there is something inherently less respectable about Abnegation and Dauntless; something that's worthy of scorn and mockery. I'm not going to pretend like my siblings aren't like this, like I'm not the exact same way just with different subjects. I've always thought that people like Eric, Four, Peter, even Dahlia, are just kind of worthless. They don't seem to have any role or purpose other than to antagonize and to hurt, because it brings them some kind of sick enjoyment.

And my family's views have sort of rubbed off on me; I have no love for Abenagtion certainly. I don't like everything they do and I don't really like the faction all that much honestly. As much as I care for Tris, I still can't help but find Abnegation dull and their council to be overreaching and out of touch.

But that's neither here nor there.

My parents don't like Dauntless very much, this I know to be true. They've never liked Dauntless and I know that they never wanted me here. I don't know what Visiting Day will be like; I know that they'll be there, but I have a hard time thinking that they'll be entirely pleasant about it.

"I guess we'll just have to deal with our families and their opinions together." She smiles at me and I return that.

Out in the Pit the light is different; whiter, duller. Up above, storm clouds gather and rain starts to drizzle on the glass. I pause for a moment, my head tilted back and a small smile on my face.

"What?" Christina says.

I glance at her. "It's just…pretty."

It reminds me of Erudite in a way; the natural light that came in through all the windows changed when it would rain. I used to like to sit in the library and just admire the way that the light filtered through the glass dome. Snow too, it was just one of the things that I loved about Erudite. The little things, the things you don't understand if you aren't there.

"Come on." Christina takes my hand and tugs me along, chuckling under her breath. "The others are waiting."

I follow, but trust her to lead me along as I can't stop my gaze from going skyward – or skylight-ward rather. Maybe I feel just a little bit ridiculous admiring it as much as I am, but it's hard to help when it's just so pretty.

We meet up with Tris, Will, and Al, plus Marlene and her Dauntless-born friends by one of the outcroppings and by that time I've managed to stop staring, mostly. Uriah leads the way to this little café on the fourth floor of the Pit; all the lights are dim and colored, and the whole place smells like coffee and smoke. We take up the black sectional couch in the corner of the room. There's barely enough room for all of this; Marlene is in Uriah's lap and I'm squeezed in between Christina and Al with barely enough room to move my arms.

"The cake here is great," Uriah says, "like even better than the dining hall great."

"How did you find this place?" Will asks.

"My brother spends a lot of time in here, he's good friends with some of the baristas and stuff."

"Ay, Uriah!" one of the baristas behind the counter exclaims almost on cue. Uriah grins and gives a friendly little wave.

"'M I gonna be seeing you here when you're done with initiation?"

He shrugs. "Dunno."

"Who're your friends?" says another barista, this one with the thickest black eyeliner I've ever seen.

"Eh, just a couple of transfers who happen to be pretty cool."

"We'll be the judge of that," says the first, grinning.

We go up in small groups to get food, every time someone sits back down it jostles the people around them and when Uriah flops back down after ordering, Al's coffee splashes onto my lap. I grimace and Al gives me an apologetic look.

"Sorry," he says.

"It's fine." I stand up. "I needed an excuse to get up and go order anyways."

I order a coffee, very much like the kind in the dining hall it's not quite as good as the Erudite coffee. But it's plenty good. I return to the couch, wedging myself next to Christina.

For once, we manage to talk about something that isn't initiation. The things that we actually like and used to do with our free time before we were confined to the dull group coffins that are the dorm rooms. It's nice, normal, something that we haven't really had a lot of over the last month between crazy instructors and crazier activities. Our laughter fills the little café and every so often the baristas will lean over the counter to interject with stories of their own, each one seeming crazier than the last. My sides hurt from laughing so hard and I can't seem to catch my breath, though the people around me are no better really.

We must hang around there for an hour at least, long enough for all of us to finish our drinks and the ice left in Christina's blood red iced tea to all melt. Then we leave and the rain outside is coming down even harder. I see a flash of lightning and for just a second I'm enraptured again by the sight and the muffled roar of thunder that follows. Then my hand is in Christina's again and she's pulling me along, grinning and laughing at Lynn's joke that I wasn't quite listening to.

One of their other friends whose name I don't know scales the rough and notched stone, spurred on by the cheers of the Dauntless-born and eventually the rest of us too. Literally he just puts his foot in a little notch in the wall where the circuit's wall becomes slightly flatter and starts to climb. He finds hand and footholds I otherwise would have never noticed and uses just his arms to pull himself up with enough momentum it sends him two feet higher. He reaches the level above us and we let out a rousing cheer, as do a few passersby. He pulls himself up on the guardrail and stands, raising his arms in triumph. Then he tilts forward, his arms spread to either side of him and Christina, Will, Tris, Al, and I gasp but the Dauntless-born don't seem worried and apparently they were right as he grabs the railing at the last second and swings.

"He does this all the time," Uriah says. "Trained in it."

"That's," Will sputters as he looks for the right word. "That's fucking absurd."

Tris – because of course it's Tris – flashes him a wild grin, her eyes wide and bright. "Welcome to Dauntless."

Will raises his eyebrow at her. "You wanna scale that wall?"

"Oh absolutely not," she says with a laugh. "I'd die and so would you." She looks up again as the boy flings himself all the way over the railing onto the floor. "But still, it's incredible."
He disappears for a second and then leans far over the railing, bending at the waist to fold over the bar. He gestures for us to cheer again and we do. Then he curls his fingers like he's beckoning us up.

Marlene seems to think that too because she turns to Uriah and says, "Boost me up."

"Oh hell no." He shakes his head. "I'm not about to be an accessory to your crazy death wish."

She pouts. "You're no fun." She can hardly hold the expression for more than a few seconds before she starts laughing.

"She's right," the boy calls down. "Since when are you the boring responsible one, Uriah?"

He scoffs. "That's low, you two."

"Well," Marlene folds her arms, "prove us wrong then."

He laughs, and shakes his head, and then weaves his fingers together and stoops for Marlene to boost herself up off of him. She wobbles and Lynn reaches out to steady her with a laugh that contradicts the nerves that show on her face.

The other boy hangs off of the railing and offers her his hand. She stretches up to reach him and their fingers just barely manage to grab hold of each other. She uses Uriah's shoulders as a springboard and he stumbles, Lynn having to steady him this time as Marlene's lifted into the open air by the other boy.

"Show off," Lynn calls up to him, rolling her eyes.

He laughs and his grip on Marlene's hands slackens for a second and she shrieks, but it tightens before she can slip completely and he jerks her up to stand on the outside ledge. She laughs and turns around to grin, gripping the railing and leaning forward. The boy keeps his hands over Marlene's and Uriah and Lynn's expressions darken.

"Come on, you two, you've had your thrills," Uriah calls of to them. "Can you come down now."

Marlene laughs and leans forward yelling, "Catch!" She lets go much to the panic of pretty much everyone.

Uriah scrambles forward and manages to catch her sort of, but it's more like cushioning her fall than anything else and Lynn helps them both back to their feet with a kind of amused exasperation.

The other boy climbs down without needing to throw himself over and is descent is just as impressive as his ascent. He wipes the bits of stone from his calloused hands as he reaches the ground accompanied by a well-timed clap of thunder. Then we continue our circuit through the Pit, without any more climbing thankfully. We eventually wind up occupying one of the stone tables on the ground floor. My eyes wander back up to the skylight and Marlene just lays herself across the table to look up at it as well. Our conversation winds like a lazy river; initiation, movies, a new bruise, music, instructors, childhoods. I don't have much in common with any of them, we all barely have anything in common with each other. The Dauntless-born are all friends but they couldn't be more different from my friends and I. But we find jokes in the shreds of common ground that we share to laugh and joke until dinner when we split to our separate tables. I slouch while I eat, and talk, and my shirt still smells like coffee; I feel like a mess.

I love it utterly.

I sleep in for the hell of it, my eyes cracking open the first time when the other early risers are just dragging themselves out of bed and a second time when Will jostles my shoulder. I'm startled by how close he is to me, fully bent at the waist to avoid hitting his head on his bunk and one hand braced on the frame.

"Up and at 'em, Mim."

"Don't call me that," I mutter as I roll over and rub my eyes.

"Aw, are you saying I have to be original and come up with my own nickname for you?" He feigns a pout.

"Yes."

He grabs my hands and helps me pull myself into a sitting position, laughing at the mess of dark curls that hang around my face.

"Yes, yes, I'm a mess." I scrape my hair back. "Laugh it up now, but I know what you're like first thing too, you know."

He tugs on my hands. "Stop stalling. It's almost five forty-five. We're going to miss breakfast if you don't get ready soon."

I sigh and drag myself out of bed, crouching to riffle through the laundry basket for something clean before shuffling to the locker room. I'm not the only one struggling to wake up, Christina is practically falling asleep in front of the mirror. I gently bump my shoulder against hers and her head snaps up again.

"Oh! Mimi, you're up."

"Turns out Will is good for something, he's a human alarm clock."

She chuckles and her head dips again, toothbrush still in her mouth as her eyes dip to half-mast. "Can't wait for this to be over." Her mouth is full of toothpaste.

I drag a comb through my hair and try to sort it into something presentable, though in Dauntless I'm learning that presentable counts as anything you can have on with confidence, no accounting for taste required. "Me too. Any ideas what you'll do?"

She spits into the sink. "My brain physically cannot process career and life plans this early in the morning."

I duck into a stall to change; yesterday's black jeans and a wrinkled shirt. When I walk out to glance in the mirror it works better than I would expect it to. Add a little – okay, a lot – of eyeliner and I could see myself walking down the street as an adult member of Dauntless doing…whatever it is that adult Dauntless members do besides jump on trains, get tattoos, and hang around the compound.

"Hey," Myra comes up to me, startling me and making that cool older Dauntless image crumble, "you look good today."

"So do you," I tousle her purposefully sloppily pulled back hair, causing even more lilac fly-aways. "I'm still loving your hair."

"Are we ready to go?" Christina turns to me. There's something different about her face this morning and I realize after a second that she's filled in her eyebrows using the tips I gave her when we were essentially doing the teenage version of dress-up on Saturday. We'd tried to rope the others into it but Tris and Al were especially opposed and Will was lured away with them at the offer that they go for sodas. They're not half as good as Erudite's, unless you're Will of course and then they're the elixir of life.

"Think so. I like your makeup."

"Christina!" Myra exclaims, her voice thick with delight. "I love your look!"

I can see the faintest hint of a blush in her cheeks as she lets out a nervous laugh. "Thanks guys. Gotta give Mimi credit though, if it weren't for her I'd be totally hopeless."

"We should exchange tips sometime," Myra offers, beaming.

"Ooh!" another turns around, I recognize them as Rumi sans makeup and pulled up hair after a moment. "I got this really cool sparkly eyeshadow palette I'd be totally willing to share." She still wears makeup, I don't know how she manages with everything going on.

"We could have a makeup night," says another, Quin

"Only if you tell me your secret to such flawless wings," says a third.

Tris looks supremely out of her element in this conversation as it turns to palettes, techniques, brands, and looks. I decide to have mercy on her and let Christina lead us both out.

"Well that was unexpected," Tris says.

I shrug, remembering encounters like that from my Erudite days when we were all still young and learning. It was like being in kindergarten again, an instant bond over a tiny commonality. I walk to breakfast with a little grin on my face.

"You look pleased about something," Will sidles up next to me in the line. "Did Four slip on a banana peel or something?"

I chuckle. "Now that you say that, I wish. But no, I just…like it here."

His eyes widen. "I think that's the first time you've ever admitted that out loud."

I scoff. "I'm sure that's not true."

"No," Al chimes in, "it is. To be fair though, I don't think any of us ever really talk about liking it here."

"That's because it's awful hard to like being anywhere when you're constantly getting punched in the face," Christina says.

"So you're not exactly holding up your resolution to not get hit in the face anymore?" Will laughs and Christina does too after she gets the joke.

"You're not exactly a beacon of positivity yourself, Will," I quip.

He pulls a face, like he wants to contradict me but can't. "You know what, fine; I like being here and mostly it's because I really like you guys and hope that we're friends forever. Happy, Mimi?"

"Very." My grin widens when I turn to him. "That has to be the nicest thing I've ever heard you say."

Al scoops the entire group into his arms before the conversation can continue, taking every single one of us by surprise. "Aw, we like you too, Will." As the line shuffles forward, Al attempts to move all of us at once which goes predictably and hilariously badly.

We take up our usual table and Myra waves at me from hers. I grin and wave back.

"So are you actually going to do that thing?" Tris asks.

I shrug. "Sure, why not. Chris, that sounds like fun, right?"

"Oh, definitely." We've spent some time together away from the rest of the group working on her makeup skills, practicing techniques, finding colors and color combinations that work for her. "I'd love to try some of what I've learned on someone not myself or Mimi."

"I still don't understand why you're so into all of that," Tris says. "Doesn't it get, like, I don't know…uncomfortable."
"You get used to it," Will chimes in. "It's a lot of fun once you do." He looks to Christina. "You could test things on me if you want." He grins. "It'd probably be nice to work on someone with a little color in their cheeks."

"Hey!" I exclaim, my mouth half-full of eggs.

"Mimi." Christina gets closer to me. "Mimi." She puts her hands on my cheeks. "I'm sorry, but he's absolutely right." Behind her, Will laughs so hard he snorts, a sound that causes the rest of us to break down into giggles.

"Whatever." I roll my eyes, poorly pretending to be annoyed.

We start to meander toward the training room and I think to myself about how I keep trying to make myself acclimate, to remind myself that I don't really want to go home and I could never really be happy there. I remind myself that this is everything that I'll ever need and all that I could ever ask for. My friends are more than lovely, and I'm free here in a way that I never could be in Erudite. I convince myself that there's nothing for me there, that I've lost nothing by leaving that I wasn't already going to lose.

I haven't decided if I'm succeeding yet, but every day I think I'm getting closer.