The next morning, I try not to let things be awkward between Christina and I. But I can't get the sound of her crying out of my head. It's not the first time, but I think much like me she can't help but find it embarrassing. We try not to let it linger between us around the others, when they could notice, but I catch her glancing at me more than once out of the corner of my eye. Concerned though I am, I really don't want to press her if she doesn't want to tell me what's going on.
"Goddamn I slept like shit," Will groans, his head hanging over his breakfast.
"I cannot believe that this is the next five weeks of our lives," Al groans. "And we thought fighting was bad…"
"Fighting was bad," I point out. "Just because this is worse doesn't mean that what we went through in the last stage wasn't bad." Out of the corner of my eye, I notice Christina shudder.
"Fair enough. But honestly I'd rather be punched in the face repeatedly than drown in acid."
Christina nods as she yawns. We still don't know what she faced yesterday, but if it made her want to go back to stage one then it must have been awful.
"Ah," Will says with fake nostalgia, "the simpler times."
The five of us share a laugh and not too long after that do we head to the training room to do our warmups. I never thought that I would consider running laps and practicing punches to be the better part of my day, but I guess if Dauntless initiation has taught me anything it's that things can always get harder.
I try and keep focused on my hits to the punching bag rather than yesterday. The room is quieter than it's ever been. Usually it's only like this when Eric is stalking around like Four is now that the chatter stops; usually we talk amongst ourselves as we train and usually – providing he's not in one of his Moods – Four doesn't stop us. Today he doesn't have the chance to because don't even start. Even Peter manages to keep his big mouth shut.
Waiting outside of the simulation room after lunch is quiet too. We all sit in the uncomfortable plastic chairs or on the floor against the wall quietly. Marlene seems to be asleep, curled into a ball against the wall perfectly still. But she springs to her feet when the Dauntless-born trainer – Lauren, as I figured out when one of the Dauntless-born addressed her as such – calls her back suddenly enough to make me and a few others start.
"Okay," Uriah announces after a long, long time. "That's it; I can't take it anymore. If it stays this quiet for the next five weeks then I'm going to lose your mind."
"Oh you can't stand quiet," Lynn says, her gravelly voice light with teasing. "How unusual."
He grins and shrugs like he knows she's right. Then the two of them start talking about some sport that's in season, nothing I've ever been interested in but I listen anyways because they're the only ones making sound. For a little while at least; smaller, quieter conversations between other friends start up, seeming encouraged by them.
But I stay quiet, too tired and too nervous to really think of anything to talk about. Christina is the same way, staring blankly at the wall mostly. Our eyes meet once for just a second before she looks away quickly. I wish that there were something that I could say, that I knew what's wrong. She seems different than yesterday before she had to face whatever it is she doesn't want to talk about.
' It's just uncomfortable and not really a conversation I want to have ,' she had said. I'm just not sure what to take that as; did she mean that if she told us then we'd be concerned, then it would become something that we'd have to talk about?
I watch her a little while longer; her blank eyes and slight frown. She picks at the black nail-polish on her right index finger until it's all gone, then she looks down at it and sighs. Even before she was picking at it, it was chipped. Any attempt at beauty beyond basic hygiene doesn't seem to really last long in Dauntless initiation no matter how hard you try. A thousand coats of sealant can't fight the general wear and tear that just seems to come with being Dauntless, but that doesn't mean we can't try. Even the Dauntless-born still try; they've still got that look that I used to admire them for when I watched them at school, the one that Eliza and I whispered over and once tried to replicate in an ill-advised experiment involving lots of shaky eyeliner and dark eyeshadow that made us look more like raccoons than anything. I thought that Melanie was going to have a coronary when she saw us. Her jaw dropped and her eyebrows basically rose into her hairline, next to her Michael doubled over laughing until tears ran from his eyes and he had to sit down – still cackling.
We never told them exactly what we were trying to do no matter how many times they asked. I don't know what they would have said if we had. That little adventure was long before Eliza and I were really aware of how different all the Dauntless looks really were, how they were more than just dark makeup and bright hair. That was three years before we met Kira, who all but swept Eliza off her feet, and four years before we met Gwendolyn, who I can now see never quite let go of the Dauntless style in some senses. She still wears dark clothing and heavy makeup that makes her dark eyes look pitch black against the whites. It's not like the Erudite do it, and I think she knows it too. I think that, a lot like Maureen, she doesn't really care; her Dauntless origins may be embarrassing to her, but I think deep down she'll always be a little bit attached to where she comes from. I know I am.
My eyes grow heavy and I catch them closing for a second before I stop, sitting straighter and shaking my head slightly. I should have had another coffee before leaving the dining hall. I thought I had gotten used to the early mornings, no different from what I had back home, but I hardly got any sleep last night because of talking to Christina and because I was thinking so much about the fear simulation.
I sigh and stare up at the florescent light, the white burning my eyes but I keep staring.
"Do you ever miss your home?" I ask, tilting my head to the side.
Gwendolyn gives me an astonished look, then masks it with her usual stern, flat expression. "I don't know what you mean. My home is here."
"No but like…Dauntless. With your parents."
She frowns more than usual, looking away at the snow coming down just beyond the café awning. At my request, we're sitting outside shivering in the November air, our gloved hands holding tight to our warm drinks.
I only asked because I had noticed her watching as the train streaked by, a half dozen Dauntless leaping out one of the doors into a snowbank where there is usually grass. They paused in their journey to wherever they were off to in City Center to throw snowballs at each other, hooting and laughing. One missed their friend and nailed an Amity in the arm. I think if it were anyone from another faction they would have gotten mad, but the Amity woman just laughed and brushed the snow from her coat. She continued to laugh as she set down the bag she was carrying to scrape some snow off of a tree branch and packing it together to form a huge snowball, which she promptly hurled at the Dauntless who hit her. It hit him in the face and she smiled, picked up her bag, and left. The Dauntless left soon after in the opposite direction, the man who got hit still had little clumps stuck in his hair. Gwendolyn had smiled, and her gaze lingered there until I asked.
She took a while to respond; then said, "No." She chuckled. "I mean have you seen them?"
"So why did you stare?"
She rolled her eyes and chuckled again, at this point I had known her long enough to hear her really laugh and it didn't sound like this. But she smiled at me very genuinely like she smiled at the Dauntless. "Because they certainly make it hard not to notice them. It's in their nature."
"Well I guess you'd know. You too?"
She raised her eyebrow at me and I laughed at my own question, knowing that if she could help it Gwendolyn would like to go unnoticed by everyone but Melanie; 'so that she can finally work in peace' she often said, though never mentioned the exception until someone else brings it up.
I shook my head. "I don't think I'll ever understand how you came from Dauntless."
For as long as I'd known her, she'd never shown a shred of her Dauntless roots – I didn't even know until remembered her mother, and honestly I never would have guessed.
"That's why I'm here, because I'm not," she said very plainly, like it was obvious. I guess it was obvious.
"Is that it? Just because you're not?" I took a sip of my tea, feeling the warmth spread through my chest.
I had always been told that there was more to being part of a faction that just having an aptitude, that it filled in parts of you that you didn't even know were missing and the reasons to be there grew longer all the time, I think it was Maureen who told me that.
She twirled her long black hair around one gloved finger. The straightened lock resisted curl of any kind, little flyways coming off as she twisted.
"Of course not," Gwendolyn said, smiling again. "Like I said, this is my home. Your family may not quite agree, but I do think that nothing else matters as much finding the faction you really belong in. I mean, family's all fine and good, but if they hate who you are then you've got to depend on yourself."
I nodded. Gwendolyn didn't talk to her family much, there was nothing stopping her of course – my family talked to and visited Mark and our cousins in Amity and Minerva in Candor all the time – but she had no interest in it. Melanie said that she didn't like to talk about it, that she'd be much happier if everyone just forgot that she was related to the Dauntless leader at all. This was the first time I'd ever really talked to her about Dauntless, and judging by her initial surprise I think this was the first time in a while that anyone had.
She finished off her coffee and then stood. "Come on. If you want we can go window shopping before we go home."
That was the last time we ever spoke of Dauntless in any depth. I guess she finally got her wish, as the public tragedy of the explosion faded and people spoke of the more well-known Makara less and less people forgot. I don't think anyone ever mentioned Dauntless and her in the same breath that I knew of, I certainly stopped hearing Erudite at the social events she and Melanie attended whisper about it. All of a sudden she was more known for her achievements, for her place close to Jeanine and my mother, for her recent department head title then for her mother. Though from the way that she seemed to shuffle around, listless and sad, I don't think she quite imagined her new image like this. I never saw her cry, but I have no doubt that what I saw was grieving. She and I scarcely went out after that too, there was too much to do; too much work to bury herself in and a sister to take care of that she didn't know how to. My family's help alleviated some of that, but I don't think that anything they could do could ever close that hole that seemed to have opened in her chest. Not for lack of trying, mind you, even Mark and Minerva made a genuine effort to make Gwendolyn feel like family. It changed nothing; not when she herself had already been changed. She didn't like to show it, both because it broke her façade and because Victoria was always more important to her than her own feelings, but something in her broke. And I still don't think it's been fixed after two years; patched, maybe. But all the love, and care, and counseling in the world haven't fixed Victoria two years later; I can't imagine that Gwendolyn, who won't even speak of her parents anymore, has healed.
"Ice Queen," Four's voice snaps me away from my memory with a start.
Christina snickers at my surprise. "Have a good nap?"
I roll my eyes and walk through the door, my heart beating after at the very sight of the chair.
"Try not to do anything weird this time, Ice Queen," Four says as I sit down.
"I'll do my best." I roll my eyes and tilt my head to the side.
He stabs the needle into my neck and I grimace. The pain is the last thing that I'm aware of.
"Mimette." I hear my mother's voice before my eyes are even open. My heart begins to beat faster, excitement building up inside of me.
I open my eyes, smiling. "Mother."
She returns my smile, brushing a stray lock of hair from my face. I can't quite remember how she's here, if I recall correctly Visiting Day has already passed.
"Look at you, my dear girl; you've grown so strong." She runs her hands over my hair and then kisses my forehead. "I love y-" She takes a jerky step back, shock and horror written across her face. Blood trickles from her mouth and she wraps her arms around her stomach.
"Mom." I reach out to her but she steps back again, trembling.
The blood runs faster from her mouth, dripping onto the floor. She drops to her knees and curls in on herself. An impossible amount of blood pours from her mouth, then begins to run from her eyes as well like tears.
I drop down in front of her, unsure of what to do or if I can do anything at all. She lifts her head to look at me and then lurches forward again, letting her head hang down. Blood surrounds us in a huge puddle and I see her grow paler and paler. I try to help but she keeps pushing me away and tears begin to well up in my eyes. Finally, she slumps completely, still bleeding, her entire body drenched in blood. I begin to sob as cracks appear in her form and she begins to crumble apart.
I don't know what to do. My whole body freezes up and it becomes hard to breathe, all I can feel are the tears running down my face and the blood I'm kneeling in soaking through my pants. Somewhere in the back of my mind I remember that this isn't real, that all of this is impossible so I must be in a simulation. But there's nothing I can do with that information, at least nothing that I know of.
I try to close my eyes but they burn and even when I open them again the burning remains. I lift my shaking hands to wipe my tears only for them to drag across my face and come away bloody. I let out a scream that's choked by my sobs as pain consumes every inch of me. Red begins to tint my vision as the tears come faster and my mother's corpse is about halfway turned to dust.
The blood on my cheeks drips into my mouth and my thoughts scatter further. Even if I could fight off my panic I couldn't even begin to figure out how to get out of this.
I close my eyes again despite the pain because I can't stand to look at my mother's crumbling body anymore and curl in on myself, resting my forehead against my knees.
It's not real , I say to myself. This isn't real . Then out loud I whisper again, "This isn't real."
But nothing happens, nothing fades. Blood is still running down my cheeks and I'm still in pain. I curl in tighter on myself, trying hard to steady my breathing and failing. I know this isn't real, I know . But it feels real; I can most definitely taste the blood in my mouth and my mother's groans of pain sounded very real to me.
I wipe my eyes again, trying not to cringe at the warm blood that stains my palms. I close my eyes, trying to force myself to breathe slowly, when I open them again there's very little left of my mother's corpse. I know it wasn't real. I do.
The red tint begins to fade from my vision, and I let my eyes slip closed once more.
When I open them again, I'm back in the room, my cheeks are also still damp but with tears not blood. I let out a shaky breath and tears well up in my eyes again; I try to stop them because I know Four is right next to me, but I can't, not with the image of my mother bleeding to death still fresh in my mind.
"Ice queen," Four says and I ignore him, resting my arms on my knees and letting my head hang down while I try and fail to collect myself.
He sighs in a very put upon way and then says, "Mimi."
"Hey," I say though my crying. "You do know my name."
"Yeah," he says flatly.
"Just…" I take a deep breath, "give me a second."
"Mhm."
"Was that better than the last time?" I ask, trying to get my mind off of watching my mother bleed to death.
"Well...uh...not really." He drops his voice to a mutter. "You took longer, but not long enough."
I look up at him. "Come again?"
"That run took eight minutes your last one took five, the average is fifteen. You see the issue?"
"No? I'm doing great then."
He hisses, "Keep your voice down. Walk me through how you get out, because I don't think I understand how you're getting through so fast."
"You can see my sims, how the hell do you not know?"
He rolls his eyes. "Just answer the question."
"Do I get to know why?" The tremor fades from my voice as annoyance sets in.
"Maybe if you answer the question."
I scowl. "It's not real, not hard to figure out either. I don't typically cry blood."
He scowls right back and then sighs through clenched teeth. "Get up."
"Excuse me?"
"Now. I'll walk you back to the dorms through the back hallway."
"No." I stand anyways. "I'm fine, thanks."
He shakes his head. "Not a request. Come on." He grabs my arm and half drags me out of the chair toward the door at the back. I try and jerk my arm away but he doesn't let go. He slams the door behind us and half shoves me forward.
"What the-?!"
"Quiet," he cuts me off, his voice comes out low and growl like. "Just listen."
"What?" I respond poisonously.
"Whatever it is that you're doing, you need to stop. You say that it's easy to figure out, but it isn't."
"I don't...what?"
"You know, there's a word for people like you, the ones that present situational awareness inside the sims."
"Oh really? Thanks for the fun fact."
"Mimi," he groans. "I am trying to help you."
"I don't want your help." I turn away but he grabs me.
"Trust me, you do."
"Trust you," I repeat incredulously. "You're out of your mind."
His scowl deepens and then he lets me go. "Fine." Under his breath he mutters, "It's your funeral."
I roll my eyes and turn away, continuing down the hallway. I hear him walking the other direction and the heavy door close behind him. I let out an unsteady breath and resist the urge to break down into tears again. My head is pounding and I feel nauseous just like the last time. I take off my jacket and put my hand on the cold stone wall, stopping for a second to catch my breath. I start moving after another minute or so, not feeling at all better but knowing that I should get back to the dorms. At least then I can take a nap.
I shuffle in as quietly as I can and sit on the edge of my bed, leaning my head against the wooden pole. When I close my eyes I can still see my mother, and the blood on my hands. Peter and Molly's talking is the only thing that keeps me from sobbing and/or throwing up on the spot. I try to focus on their voices, unable to talk to Will because he's asleep.
I can't help but wonder what Four was trying to tell me. I mean, I severely doubt that it's anything important; but I'm curious nonetheless. ' It's your funeral ,' he said; was that meant to get my attention? He has such a penchant for theatrics and he doesn't even seem to know it; I don't even think it occurred to him to lead with whatever he wanted to talk to me about rather than vehemently insisting that I needed to trust him even though he's given me no reason to. He's done nothing over the course of these last five weeks being an ass, threatening people, and forcing myself and my fellow initiates to beat each other into unconsciousness. Fucking forgive me if that doesn't endear me to him.
I don't fall asleep this time, not really. I'm just awake enough to be aware of each person entering the room, but in no mood to talk to any of them or even open my eyes. I slip forward for a second and snap alert, jerking back with wide eyes. So I move to sit properly on my bed and rest my head against my bent knees. I try to think about anything, anything but all that blood; instead I just wind up thinking about it more. It isn't until much later when I open my eyes and turn my head to the side to watch the people in the room that my thoughts really change and that's only because Peter gets up with a severely overdramatic swagger once everyone is in the room.
"Ladies and gentlemen, transfers of all ages," he says in a tone that matches his body language perfectly. "I think that I have something that you'll really want to hear."
Will sits up, giving a groggy "Hwuh?"
"Oh great," I mutter to him, lifting my head. "More baseless gossip."
He rolls his sleepy eyes. "I wonder what hot new takes the journalists over at Erudite have come up with this time."
Christina wraps her arm around Tris preemptively. Whatever he's got for us today, she's not going to like it.
Peter reaches under his pillow and produces a small navy blue notebook and I realize after a moment that it's my notebook. His eyes fall on me and his grin becomes almost manic. I'm torn between lunging at him and pretending like what he's done has no effect on me.
"This is exactly what it looks like, Mimi's diary filled with her thoughts and surely everything that she doesn't say. Now I haven't had a chance to read through it all myself yet, only the first few months of entries. I wanted to save all the juicy bits for you all." He snickers.
Joke's on him I guess, I hardly mention any of them at all; it's mostly me talking about initiation and digressing back to my family. What he has read on his own has no bearing on him or me; it's about my family and my old friends, people that no one here will ever really truly know.
"Where shall I start, Mimi? Your first day or the most recent entry?"
I storm toward him but Molly grabs me before I can reach him and shoves me back toward the small crowd.
He shrugs. "Most recent it is then." He starts flipping through the book backward until he comes upon what he's looking for. "Here we go." He clears his throat exaggeratedly. "' October tenth, year 499. Just when I thought it couldn't get any worse, it did. I guess I really should have figured that out by now; what else would Four and Eric do for fun if they weren't making our lives a living hell? '" He snorts. "Good one, Mimi."
"I'm going to kill you." I cross my arms and scowl at him.
He snickers. "Sure you will. Anyways, ' I have never been afraid of heights before I started here in Dauntless; which just doesn't make any sense, I mean aren't we supposed to be getting over fears, not acquiring new ones? Seems kind of counterintuitive to me; but what the hell do I know? I'm just an Erudite transfer even if I am smarter than half the people I've met here and then some. My parents always said that the Dauntless were brutes with the collective IQ of a box of pencils –' wow, pencils; really?" He laughs. "They must really hate you then."
"Isn't Carolina Captor-Malachite a faction rep?" Drew says too gleefully. "That doesn't exactly sound like she respects Dauntless as a faction."
"Leave my parents out of this," I snarl.
Peter laughs again. "Hey, you said it not me."
Molly grabs me before I can get to Peter again but this time I drive my elbow back into her nose. She yelps and her grip slackens enough for me to get away from her. The hand she put over her hurt nose comes away bloody but I can't bring myself to feel bad. Al steps between Drew and I to let me try and snatch the book from Peter.
"Visiting Day not go so well?" he mocks as he keeps the book out of my reach. "I wonder what that entry looks like."
"You'll never find out." I try for the book again but he punches me in the stomach and I take a step back.
"Y'know, I have a theory." He tosses the book straight over my head to Molly, who catches it with ease. "I think that you hate the Dauntless just as much as your parents do and you're only here so you don't have to live in their shadow."
"I'm not even going to dignify that with a response." I throw a punch toward his throat but he catches me by the wrist, his grip painfully tight.
"Do you not remember what happened the last time you tried to fight me?" He shoves me away from him into one of the poles of the bunkbeds.
"Mimi!" Christina helps me to my feet.
"I need my journal back." I pull away from her.
Out of the corner of my eye I see Tris trying to grab the book from Molly, attempting the same method she used yesterday to get the article from Peter. I move toward them but something slams into my head and I stumble.
"You are so easy, you know that right?" Peter blocks my path now. "How did you even make it to number nine fighting like that. If you ask me, you and the Stiff should have gone with Edward and what's-her-face."
"Hmm, well I didn't ask. And you know damn well that you got rid of Edward, not the fucking ranking system."
"I'm still waiting on that proof." He blocks my hits easily and when I try to move around him he grabs me by my hair and yanks me back.
Molly tosses the book back to him and at that moment, Four opens the door. The whole room goes quiet at once and we just stare at him.
"Does someone want to explain what's going on here?"
"He took my journal!"
"She attacked me!" Peter exclaims.
Four rolls his eyes and comes forward to snatch the book out of Peter's hands. I reach for it but he steps back.
"When did you get this?"
"When did I...what?"
This, when did you get this book?"
"She brought it from Erudite," Molly interjects, smirking at me. "You can check the dates in the first entries, they're way before the Choosing Ceremony."
He scowls at me. "Was the firepit you threw your clothes in not clear enough? You're weren't supposed to bring anything from there into Dauntless."
"I…"
"This is grounds for expulsion, you know, breaking a rule this big."
I don't respond, I don't have any defense whatsoever.
"But...we don't have very many transfers as it is and because of your scores I am inclined to be lenient. So I think I'll just get rid of this for you and we can keep this between the people in this room. Cool?"
I continue to keep quiet, and no one else promises not to say anything either.
"Or I can just tell Eric and let him see just how much of a problem student you are."
Even if he doesn't throw me out - which he totally would - that could ruin my chances of ever getting into leadership.
I sigh, trying to hide the tremble in my voice as I say, "Fine. Take it."
"What if we don't keep quiet?" Peter says, his manic grin still present.
"Well than I think you'll be hard pressed to find a way to prove it." And with that, he leaves.
Seething, I wait a minute to make sure that Four is far enough away and them leave, blatantly ignoring my friends calling after me. Tears begin to well up in my eyes again and so does the embarrassed flush that comes with it. That notebook was the last thing I had left of my old life; I wrote in it almost every day. So much happened from the June that I got it to now, really everything changed. I can't believe I lost it, and it's not just about getting a new one because that's not the point. The point is that that was my scrap of home, I had let go of everything else either literally or metaphorical. Even my look, with my tattoos and bright stripes in my hair, I was still a Malachite – I was still a part of my family. And I still am, but it was my mother that bought me the journal and it reminds me of her, of everyone. My memories of my last months in Erudite lived on those pages. A part of me lived on those pages.
I stop, pressing my face into my hands to muffle a sob; tears spill down my cheeks and don't stop no matter how hard I try. All that I can really do is keep myself quiet, but it echoes and I am all too aware of how pathetic I sound.
"Mimi?" Marlene's voice interrupts my quiet sobbing and I wipe my eyes one more time before lifting my face. "Are you okay?" She approaches me and I shrink away. She may say that she doesn't mind my crying – or anyone's crying for that matter – but the Erudite ingrained in me finds the fact that I cry at all let alone this much more than mortifying.
"No, of course you're not." She touches my shoulder and I step back.
"I'm fine." My voice breaks, because of course it does.
Her expression softens without her looking like she pities me. "Want a hug?"
I shrug and then she throws her arms around me, putting her hand on the back of my head and pressing my face into the crook of her neck. I wrap my arms around her waist and my throat closes, another sob threatening to escape. I choke it back and take deep breaths.
When it finally feels like I'm able to speak again, I say, "Is it just me, or do we only run into each other when I'm crying?"
She laughs, letting me go. "Seems like it. Come on, I wanna show you something."
"I really just want to be alone."
She takes my hand in hers. "Come on, you'll like this; scout's honor."
"Fine."
I let her pull me along through the compound, around the Pit and then into a small off-shooting hallway I've never noticed before; another turn brings us to a metal spiral staircase covered in graffiti. She runs up the stairs, skipping steps every so often and I just barely manage to keep up. When we reach the top, we're standing above ground, the room is lit only by a massive skylight and a few standing lights. Only a couple other people are here, most of them distracted with their work. Much of the walls, ceiling, and floor are covered in art; charcoal drawings, traditional paintings, spray paint art. One woman wearing bright blue headphones that stand out against her orange hair, stands in the corner of the room in front of a large white canvas with tarps covering the wall. Balloons hang down in front of her and she shoots it with her handgun, splattering purple paint across the canvas, tarp, and her. Pieces of the balloon stick to the canvas but she doesn't seem to mind.
Another man with fluorescent yellow hear who's also wearing headphones is painting on a canvas leaned against the wall. He sits cross-legged and I can faintly hear him humming along to his music when the woman is in between shots.
Others paint directly on the wall, or laying on their stomachs working on paper or canvases spread across the floor. I look around in wonder until my eyes fall on a woman curled up in the corner, sketching on something balanced on her thighs that I can't see. I freeze like a deer in the headlights, my heart beating fast.
She wears a soft smile on her face as she draws; she hasn't noticed us yet, too focused on her music and can't seem to hear anything through her earbuds. She still has braids like she did when I knew her, only now the ends fade to pale, pale blue.
I walk over and tap her on the shoulder, she looks up and her dark brown eyes widening in surprise as she pulls out her earbuds and gets to her feet.
"Mimette," she says incredulously.
"Mimi," I say.
She hugs me tight and then mutters in my ear, "Like Jeanine's nickname for you?"
I hug her back and respond, "Exactly like that."
She gives a delighted laugh and then leans back to look at me. "Oh look at you. It's been so long. How're your siblings?"
"Just fine. How are you?"
"And, uh, also who are you?" Marlene cuts in.
We turn to face her but she keeps her arm tight around my shoulders.
"This is my brother's old friend, Pandora Steele," I explain. "She's...always been like a sister kind of."
"Not like you don't have enough of those already. "She pokes me in the side and I yelp, trying to squirm away, laughing.
"I think I'll leave you two to catch up," Marlene says. "See you, Mimi."
"Bye." I wave and she waves back as she disappears down the stairs.
"So I heard a rumor that the twins got married."
"Melanie's engaged still, but yeah Michael got married last year."
"How lovely. Anyone I might have known?"
"Michael's married to Maureen Sorabella; you know, the figure skater?"
"You're kidding."
"Not in the slightest."
"And Mel?"
"Gwendolyn, uh...Morgan. Like the old Dauntless leader, you know?."
"Morgan?" She repeats halfway between laughing and gawking.
I nod. "Morgan."
She snickers. "Your mother must hate that."
"Actually she really liked Gwendolyn, they work pretty closely."
"Really?" She raises her eyebrows.
"Really. Oh, and Michael's gonna be a dad soon."
"Wow, little Mikey all grown up." I giggle, knowing he would hate that nickname. "How's Mark?"
"He's well, still basically in love with his work though. Minerva too."
She hums and smiles. "Sounds like them." She sighs wistfully. "It's been so long since we've talked."
"So what have you been doing?" I ask
"Oh...art, art, and, um, hmm let's see; more art. I do mostly traditional art, but I work across all the factions so it's not really a bad field to be in."
"Sounds cool."
"So, Mim, what brings you to Dauntless?"
I shrug. "I, uh, I just wanted to be here. It's kind of hard to explain."
She gives me an odd look. "Really? You have no idea?"
"I don't know, maybe. It's, uh, kind of complicated. I guess this is just where I want to be."
Her eyes continue to bore into me. "You've been here for a month and a half and you really have no clue?"
"No, I really don't. What about you, why did you leave?"
She smiles very gently, like I'm some naive child. "Because there's nothing and nowhere else I'd rather be."
I bite the inside of my lip; shouldn't that be my answer to? If not just because that's what I am than because I really truly want to be here? Because there's nowhere else I'd rather be? And there is nowhere else I'd rather be, right?
"Are you okay?" Her brow furrows in concern.
"Yeah. I just, uh, I had a bad day." Bad does not even begin to cover how exceptionally shitty today was. Maybe Will's right; I think that I'd rather be back in the training room taking punches, frankly.
"Want to talk about it?" She sits down against the wall where she was earlier and I join her.
"Eh, not really, no."
"Stage two always sucks," she says. "Trust me, I know. Pretty much no one's good at it especially not on day two. Just...give it time. I've been where you are, Mimette, I really have."
"I know."
"So I assume stage one went well because you're still here."
"If you can call losing almost as many fights as I win 'well'."
She chuckles. "You know, winning more fights than you lose - by however slim a margin - is still doing better than me. I was dead middle of the pack the whole time. You though, I'd figure you're near the top."
"Number eight," I say. "I was number nineand I only moved up because the guy that was number one got stabbed."
"So I heard. Being all stacked on top of each other literally, news spreads pretty fast in Dauntless." She shrugs. "It's a blessing and a curse."
I snicker. "So the grapevine is universal."
"Y'know, it really is. I once spent a few weeks in Candor working on a mural, I could not go anywhere without hearing about someone doing something illicit. For the faction of honesty, those guys sure do love to gossip. How's Erudite's vine?"
"Abuzz with the Abnegation controversy." I roll my eyes. "It's all anyone ever talks about anymore. Andrew Prior this, and Marcus Eaton that; I know Beatrice Prior, we're friends, and let me tell you I already thought those rumors were bullshit but now I think they're extra bullshit."
She laughs. "I figured. It just...doesn't seem correct. I mean don't get me wrong, the Abnegation Council is a bureaucratic mess and I don't exactly think that leaving them in charge is really the best thing for our city. But going after the leaders' character isn't going to change anything."
"It helps," I point out. "If the pillars of their community aren't morally sound enough to lead us, how can we really trust any of them to?"
"And if the Erudite aren't morally sound enough to not drag innocent people's' names through the mud than how are we supposed to trust them to provide us with the empirical facts that we all take at face value?"
I nod, knowing that she's right. But for all the bad things that they've done recently, I trust Erudite. I trust what they can do, the soundness of their science and the reliability of the technology they create.
"Anyways," she waves her hand as if brushing away the subject, "it doesn't matter really. And you have enough to worry about without dealing with our birth faction's drivel. How do you like Dauntless, Mim?"
"I like it a lot. I have a bunch of new friends and, uh, I don't know; I guess being here is just a lot less...restrained than living in Erudite.
She chuckles. "That it is. That a good thing?"
I shrug, inclining my head slightly. If one could call having a near existential crisis because I've never felt so free a good thing then yeah, I guess this is good. Fate or no fate, it's undeniable that I spent the first sixteen years of my life with my life under the close scrutiny of my faction, my parents' social circle who expected something very specific out of me and all my peers. Something that neither Casey, nor I, nor a few others really delivered on. Of course, none of them were quite like my leaving to Dauntless. The others that I knew vaguely mostly transferred to Candor. Like I've said, there's not very many people in Erudite who think highly of the Dauntless.
Eventually I settle on, "Yes. It is."
The shooting stops eventually and the woman admires her handiwork, the whole canvas has been covered in bright colors.
"Looks great, Bridget!" Pandora calls.
She looks back at us and grins. The yellow haired man looks up from his work as well and looks back, giving Bridget a thumbs up. Pandora gestures for him to take his headphones off and he slides them around his neck.
"What's up?"
"I just wanted to introduce you guys to my little sister, Mimi."
"Sister?" The yellow haired man raises his eyebrow, glancing between us. "'Dora, you never mentioned having a sister."
"We grew up together," she amends. "My parents and hers go way back."
"Aren't you Carolina Malachite's little girl?" Bridget says. "One of 'em, anyways?"
I shrug. "One of them."
"Ay," Jordan says. "I knew her."
"You did?"
"Well of course I did. I was a Dauntless leader, after all."
My eyes widen. He doesn't look like it, not like I've come to imagine what a faction leader looks like. Even Max and Eric fit that mold better than he seems to, more cheerful and good natured than any leader I've ever seen. Even Mark and Johanna don't smile as much as he has in these past few minutes.
"Twenty-three years," he says. "I got out of the game about two years ago."
"Why?" I ask.
He shakes his head. "I won't bore you with the stories of an old man."
"I want to know."
He chuckles. 'Well aren't you just a regular Nose." I shrug and he gives me a bitter smile. "Change in leadership, never liked Max as much as I liked the woman who came before him."
"No one does," Bridget interjects, snickering.
"You guys mean Azalea, right?"
"Yeah," Jordan says. "She hired me and we worked super closely right up until her death. Max though, he was just kinda…eh, old fashioned, I guess."
I nod.
"And what they do now is…mmm, whatever. Also kind old fashioned and I don't really care much for any of it, but I guess I kinda can't complain if I can't fix it."
"Never stopped anyone from complaining before," Bridget quips.
I make a note of that in my head. In all the time I've been here, I've yet to meet anyone who seems to very genuinely be a fan of the leadership. Four makes it pretty clear that he doesn't like Eric, Jordan worked with them – or Max at least and still doesn't seem to care for them. It seems a little strange to me; in Erudite most of the leadership was pretty well liked if not because they were charismatic than because they were just very genuinely good at what they do. I can't really say the same about Max and Eric; I haven't really seen them do anything and Eric makes coming off like a complete asshole a professional sport in which he and Four are locked in an epic rivalry.
"Anyways," Jordan shrugs, "practically ancient history now. Nothing you need to worry about, kid."
"It was only two years ago," I reply, "that's hardly ancient."
"Might as well be here," Pandora interjects. "No one really likes to dwell on the past; especially not the dead."
I pretend like I understand but I can't quite get my head around qualifying two years ago as 'ancient history'. I never knew Azalea but I've known of her for as long as I can remember; she's Gwen and Victoria's mom after all, and a much hated opponent of my parents and Jeanine, and a prominent figure in the city's politics which I've always paid attention to.
But the dead don't matter in Dauntless. Rita's sister who died the first day, she doesn't matter anymore. I didn't even know her name.
"Come on." Pandora throws her arm around my shoulders, making me jolt. "I'll treat you to dinner."
We eat at a small restaurant tucked away in a corner of the second floor of the Pit I would have never noticed otherwise and we catch up. She's a professional artist, she loves her job and our faction, but she misses our family some days. She's still in contact with her dad, but he isn't interested in reconnecting with my parents. If she knows what broke them up in the first place, she won't say. But she thinks it's petty and annoying because, ' they raised us together, we're a family and family learns to forgive no matter what '. I don't tell her that sometimes I have a hard time remembering her father's face.
She asks after my parents and I tell her about Visiting Day, about how disappointed I was that Jeanine couldn't make it. She says we'll have to all get together when I'm done with initiation, do something as a family the way we haven't done in years. She'll even coax out her dad.
I try to imagine that, while running my fingers over my diamond tattoo. My second father, a man who has been out of my life for longer than he was in it. His leaving was sudden, and my parents tried to brush it off. He loves us, they would remind us, and we didn't do anything to make him leave. But that didn't make things better. My older siblings got to see him on their own time, Mark and Minerva both worked in his shop before they left. But I was so young that by the time I could do something like that he was just gone; my parents didn't know what happened to him and don't seem to care.
But sometimes I like to imagine stopping by for the hell of it. ' I'm Mimette, you helped raise me, remember? ' and he would. But I know that's just me being sentimental, trying to recreate a relationship with someone I barely knew.
Pandora and I part ways after we eat, but she gives me a big hug and kiss on the cheek before she goes. She loves me; my eldest sister is back and she loves me still. Before I go back to the dorms, on a whim, I stop off at the tattoo parlor. Only the woman who did Tris' bird tattoo is there, she's sketching something out in a notebook and humming along to the quiet music playing.
I clear my throat and cross the room. "Excuse me, are you still open?"
She glances up at me. "Sure, why not? What'cha need?"
I extend my wrist to her. "Two more of these, please; on either side of the bottom."
"Interesting choice." She leads me back to one of the smaller rooms. This time it feels less alien, less impulsive It's something I have to do. My eight siblings, who would I ever be without them? My family makes me who I am; I can build on top of it, but I can't erase it and I don't want to. I treasure the ways in which we're alike and I know they do to. No faction lines, no time spent apart could ever separate us. I can't wait for us all to be together, as the complete family unity we haven't been in more than a decade.
I smile a little too much through the process of having my tattoo done.
