TRIS POV

The gentle brush of a hand up and down my arm and the pressure of lips in my hair wake me.

I hum, content, and burrow myself deeper into his shoulder. The world beyond my eyelids is bright with the morning sun, but in this safe place of mine—with my face hidden in his neck—I can pretend that it isn't.

"Good morning," he murmurs, his low voice vibrating through his chest, where my hand is placed.

"No," I groan and struggle closer to him, unwilling to get up anytime soon. With a sigh, I dig my fingers into the cotton of his shirt.

His chuckle displaces me because of the movement, but the noise is rare and uplifting enough that I don't mind. The groggy feeling clouding my head keeps me in place while I attempt to drift back to sleep. If I concentrate hard enough, I can block out the red color of my eyelids, the distant sound of a train horn in the city, the stroke of his thumb on my cheek.

"Come on," he whispers. "Time to wake up."

"Tobias," I whine in defiance.

"Wake up, Tris."

Wake up.

I sit up on my cot when I awake and rub my eyes, disoriented, until I can make out the sight of the subject of my dream standing in the entrance of the dormitory.

"Good. Now that your lazy asses are up, I wanted to remind you all that it is Visiting Day," Four barks. "Your families may or may not show up, but if you are lucky enough that they do, I would advise that you keep them at arm's length." With a wry smile, he adds, "We are training you to be soldiers, and not depending on your mother anymore is useful in the matter."

As he stalks out of the room, I am left to deal with the thoughts about my dream, too occupied with it to worry about Visiting Day at the moment. Since the last time we saw each other last year, I hadn't dreamt about him in positive ways. Actually, I hadn't dreamt positively, period. And now I am foolishly hoping that I can somehow transport myself back into my dream, into a time past. I cling to the memory of his hands on me, of being curled up in his bed, of his playful mood, of happiness.

I press a hand to my forehead and fall back onto my cot. What is wrong with me? All thoughts of him should be locked away in my mind—he is my ex, after all—and yet I am desiring the safety and warmth that only he could ever offer. In the real world, I wouldn't have these thoughts, but it is a feat to ignore them now when I have the leftover feeling of peace from my dream, something uncommon since I first transferred to this hectic faction.

Four is not the same person as the one in my dream, and I will have to get over it. My lingering attachment will only hurt me in the end, when I am focused on matters unrelated to initiation. Matters that don't return my childish emotions from forever ago, which were only aroused because of a dumb dream.

"Don't look too happy for a little break," Christina says pointedly from her bunk.

I turn my head and offer a glare. She has no idea why my mood is foul.

"You're allowed to not be stiff anymore, Tris! Hello, you're in Dauntless! You're supposed to live it up on your day off." After a pause, she adds, "Although I guess I would be cynical too if my traitor brother was coming to visit me today."

In response to her teasing, I chuck my pillow at her and lie back down with my arms folded. She deflects it and laughs.

"He's not a traitor anymore," I correct her, and my own words get me to grin too. What odd situations I have had to deal with. Sometimes they seem so strange that I can't help but see the humor in them, like now.

"Right, right." She throws my pillow back at me. "Well, get dressed and come with me to breakfast, and then you can go meet up with your former-traitor brother."

So I do. We prepare for the day with our tight, black clothes and a little makeup—well, much more for her—before heading to the dining hall for breakfast. After cleaning our plates, we split up to find our families with a promise to meet up later.

There are many more families milling around in the Pit this year, maybe because the war put an emphasis on family and now they see an importance in it. Our leaders may tell us that faction comes before blood, but I have never believed it. I wish that more people would be able to see through such nonsense as I have.

I stay close to one of the walls so that I don't get in the path of families who have one chance every year to meet. It is weird to see the variation between them; I watch as an initiate keeps his hands in his pockets and has a cordial conversation with his parents, and then I see Dez squeal with bliss as she runs to an Amity woman, presumably her mother.

My jaw clenches, a telltale sign that my eyes are about to overflow. Last year my mother was able to attend Visiting Day, even when I believed she would never want to see my face of betrayal again. I left her and my father, and yet she still came to Dauntless with open arms.

I glance around to distract myself, searching for someone familiar in the multicolored crowd, and then I realize that I am inadvertently scanning the area for my mom. That just makes everything worse, and I grunt in frustration when a couple tears leak out. My mother would have been here this year if things were different. And maybe my father too, once he overcame his grudge.

I have been too preoccupied with initiation to think about my parents, when it was at the forefront of my mind when I was sent back to Abnegation. When I told Tobias that I almost killed myself because of him, it was partially the truth; he was one of my regrets, but my parents were the reason for the majority of my pain. Living in the house again, with the ghosts of them in every square inch...it was too much.

Now it is easier to deflect that pain, when I have friends to comfort me and training to keep my attention. But their deaths are like a gaping wound in my stomach to this day, and I find myself unspeakably agonized each time something prods at it.

Wiping away the tears, I will myself to be strong. There is no crying in Dauntless.

It takes a few more minutes before I spot Caleb wandering aimlessly through the Pit in his misplaced gray. The sight of him uncomfortably brushing past tattooed and pierced people is comical. I smile when I approach him, and his expression is one of relief.

"This place is insane," he remarks, pulling me into a hug. "The one time I was here, I was too occupied to look around, and we stuck to the hallways. But it's much different filled with people anyway. It is and isn't how I pictured it."

The troubling feeling in my gut is difficult to ignore for a moment, at the reminder of the time when we broke into Dauntless to disable the simulation that forced soldiers to kill innocent people without a choice. "Well, how did you picture it?" I smirk. "With soldiers guarding every inch, doing their duty?"

He shakes his head, looking up at the glass ceiling far above us. "No, I knew the Dauntless were rowdy, but I didn't think their faction would be this wild. It's also unpractical. Why aren't there railings or something along the paths up there?"

I don't bother to follow his gaze because I know the walkways he is referring to. They line the Pit up above, and I have walked them each many times.

"It's Dauntless, Caleb. They don't think logically here. They want everything to be dangerous."

"I suppose you're right." He grins, his green eyes light. "I've missed you. How have you been? How is initiation?"

"Fine."

He tilts his head. "Your face doesn't look fine," he retorts, his eyes narrowing in on the bruises that still reside on my cheeks and around my eyes.

I roll my eyes. "Yeah, that's Peter's fault. I had to fight him a few days ago."

"Did you win?"

I smile slightly. "Yes."

"Congratulations," Caleb says. "I don't think I need to ask you if you're doing good, then."

"I'm in first place for now." I shrug and hope that the conversation will move away from me. Because of Abnegation habits, I still don't like the attention. "Let's talk somewhere else," I suggest. "It's too loud in here."

Grabbing his arm, I drag him alongside me to somewhere more private. Once I decide to take him to the chasm, I head there, but stop dead in my tracks when I see Four leaning against the railing and conversing with Zeke. My dream from this morning thrusts itself forward to the forefront of my mind, meddling with my unresolved emotions.

My breath hitches in my throat. "Let's not go here..."

Caleb follows me along the detour without argument. "How has that situation been?" he asks. "He hasn't been giving you trouble, has he?"

Yes. Every day. "No, of course not," I say vaguely. It doesn't sound convincing, so I amend, "It's just awkward, you know? I mean, once you are close to somebody, it doesn't feel normal to treat them any differently than before. So I try to avoid him since we are estranged, but it is easier said than done when he is my instructor."

We take a shortcut to a remote hallway, and once we arrive, I let him go.

"I can imagine," Caleb concurs seconds later.

I lean against the wall behind me. "Enough about me. How is your initiation? Although, I guess it has to be nice because you can't exactly fail it," I tease.

My brother studies our surroundings, seemingly uneasy. "It is going well."

I nudge his foot with mine. "How is Susan?"

He can't hold back the blush that spreads across his cheeks, indicating that his childhood crush is still at large. "Great—I mean, fine," he stutters. "She has had to deal with Robert leaving for Amity again, so I have been there to comfort her and everything..."

"Are you going to date her? Or just stare across your chores at her for the rest of your life?" I finally ask bluntly.

He sighs. "That's simple for you to say. First I have to ask her mother if she would allow me to court her," I have to stifle a laugh because customs are so different here, "and then I don't know what we would even do on an outing. I can't exactly hold her hand or anything."

My smile betrays my amusement.

"What? It may be easy to be in a relationship in Dauntless, but it is a whole other world in Abnegation."

"No, I get it," I say. "I just have never had to worry about something like that, that's all."

When Four and I were developing feelings for another, our actions would have been completely inappropriate in Abnegation. Holding hands, casually touching, sleeping in his bed (even without him), chaste kisses... Plus our situation was full of anything but common occurrences in the teenage dating realm, even outside of our former faction.

Noting that Caleb is constantly glancing back and forth down the hallway, I call him out on it.

"Is something wrong?" I inquire, confused by the sudden change of mood.

"No. I don't know, maybe." He worries his lip. "You've heard about the suicides, right?"

"Yes, obviously." Then, remembering an important fact, I say, "Wait, back up. How did you find that out in Abnegation?"

With a sly look, he admits, "I may have taken a tablet back to Abnegation with me when I was released from Erudite after my trial." He never mentioned this before, but that was around the time when I loathed to even hear the word Erudite—let alone about his traitorous ties—so that must be why it didn't come up. "But anyway, I don't believe that this is some big coincidence."

"I don't either." Not for a second.

Caleb sighs out his stress and continues, "I don't know what is going to become of this, but I do know that the best thing to do is stay out of it. I'm still researching it, but I don't want to call attention to myself or you if things go sidewards. My point is, I want you to promise me something."

I hesitate. "What is it?" I don't make promises lightly. Or ever, really.

Okay, scratch that. I do make promises, like being careful with my life or not turning myself into Erudite, though they don't hold true. Maybe it isn't even that I break promises rather than I am just a damaging person, and however unintentionally, the people I love always seem to suffer at my hands.

Caleb sets his hands on my shoulders, and I understand the importance in what he is about to say.

"I want you to promise me that you won't try to get involved again," he pleads. "If something radical happens, I need to know that you will try to stay out of harm's way and find your way to me."

I scoff at the last part. "Yeah, because I would be much better off in defenseless Abnegation than I would in Dauntless." In my home.

"You would blend in; you wouldn't have a responsibility to fight because you wouldn't be in the faction of soldiers anymore." He pauses when he sees my unyielding expression. "If not, then at least promise me that you'll stay out of sight and out of mind. You're my sister, Beatrice—the only family I have left."

The words strike something in me. Maybe I can do this for him. I have disappointed enough people, but maybe I can sit back and not be the hero for once if things take a turn for the worst.

"Okay," I agree, staring up at his soft features. "I promise."


TOBIAS POV

Hunter has always struck me as a pertinent man, never wasting time and skipping pleasantries to get straight to the point. But now, as I sit across from him, I can't help but question my observation.

He studies a paper lying on his desk—Max's old desk—silently, twisting the ring in his eyebrow. I don't know why he called me up here to his office in the first place, and so far he hasn't given me an answer, though I don't mind that I have something to keep me occupied on Visiting Day; this day of the year tends to spoil my mood, between watching families reunite in glee and the constant reminder that I don't have a family and that I never will.

Eventually, the lack of conversation is too much, so I say, "You wanted to talk to me about something, sir?"

Hunter clears his throat and slides the paper aside, meeting my eyes with his steely ones that eerily mimic Eric's. "Yes," he replies. "I just wanted to get an idea of how initiation is going."

"Great," I speak without hesitation. "I think the transfers are picking up combat skills quickly, and it has been much easier this time around because of last year's transfers knowing what to do as well."

He nods. "How many do you believe will be cut?"

With a moment's pondering, I tell him, "I am guessing that eight will leave this time around."

He acknowledges me with a hum.

I await his next response, but it doesn't happen. Hunter only stares down at the table and converses with his own thoughts. And that is when I figure out that he doesn't want to make small talk with me about the fundamentals of initiation.

Beginning to feel uneasiness creeping in, I ask, "I don't mean to sound rude, sir, but is there another reason that you called me here?"

"Yes," he sighs. "I'm going to be frank with you, Four. With the loss of so many Dauntless last year, we're practically out of guards, since we have to keep the other half on a rotation and let them have time off. Our priority is the fence, of course. But the factionless have become increasingly rebellious, not just in their sector but in the factions as well."

"I'm well aware," I state slowly. "What does this have to do with me?"

He levels a calculating look at me. "Are you confident with your initiates' skills, then?"

"Yes..." Oh. I get it now.

"Great. Well, I think it would be best if we station the initiates on patrol in the factionless sector after they have completed the first stage of training. Not only will it fill in the spots we need filled, but it will also provide them with the opportunity to get a feel for the job that most of them will end up with, or persuade others that that is an ideal career."

While I am not in a position to refuse orders, I am a bit protective of my initiates. The idea of some of the more vulnerable ones keeping the factionless in check with bulky rifles doesn't sound as if there will be a nice outcome.

"I'll see to it," I reply begrudgingly, though he doesn't seem to pick up on it. Pushing myself up from the chair, I ask, "Will that be all?"

He raises a hand to me. "One more thing: I wanted to quickly discuss your relationship with one of the initiates."

I freeze like I have been caught red-handed, though I am unaware of what for. "What do you mean?"

"I am well aware of your former relationship with...Tris, is it? I wanted to make sure that this isn't causing any bias in the rankings. I mean, it does come as quite a shock to me that a scrawny Stiff is in first place, regardless of the fact that she completed initiation last year."

My face burns at the accusation. I don't like it when people question my judgment, or my integrity. "My former relationship with Tris is just that: former," I clarify, with my hands balling into defensive fists at my sides. "She is only in first because she deserves it, after beating the best male initiate in a fight. Plus, she placed first last year as well, so it seems that she is continuing the trend."

Hunter purses his lips in distrust, making me clench my jaw. I don't know why I'm so bitter inside about this conversation when Tris and I aren't even remotely together.

"All right," he relents. "But I will look out for that, Four. Max may have permitted trainer-initiate relationships, but I will not."

Maybe if you have enough time to stalk my love life, then you're not doing your damn job well enough, I want to spit out. But talking back to Max never got me anything I wanted and even set me backwards, so I keep my mouth shut.

"Of course not, sir." I offer him a tight-lipped smile before exiting his office.

For the next few hours, I sulk in the control room, angered by the tone Hunter used with me and how he dictated everything from the way I run initiation to my private life. At this point in my life, I am past being fed up with everyone trampling me and exercising all control over me. I have had to handle it in Abnegation, with my father; in my initiation, with Eric; in the last few years as a Dauntless member, with Max. And now that Hunter has repeated the cycle all over again, I almost desire to step up to the leadership position again if only to prevent assholes like them from holding that power.

As I sit there and mull over these thoughts, an urge to revolt against the system stirs inside me. Not like the factionless, who wish to gain authority over everything so they can crush anyone associated with factions. Instead I want to have a bloodless revolution, where situations get better, where light is shed on the truth, where I prove these faction higher-ups wrong.

And I realize that I can do all of these. I already have proof—minimal proof, but still proof—that the suicides that are occurring commonly now are not voluntary. I know that somebody out there is behind this, and if I find out who and how, I can save people in advance, like I was unable to when I knew strategical information prior to the war.

But I can't do all of this alone.

While Tris isn't a predictable person, she is easy to locate, though that may have to do with my familiarity with her. She has distanced herself from her friends today, as I expected of her on a day devoted to family—her mother and father won't show up to Visiting Day, and that must hit home for her. She is one of seven initiates holed up in the dormitory, so I wait for her to exit to presumably head to lunch, which is when I grab her arm from behind.

I don't expect the wild and desperate punch she throws when she rounds on me as a flash of blonde hair, but I do manage to block most of the force with my arm.

"Woah, calm down," I say, noting the frantic look in her stormy eyes. "It's me."

Clearly she is not glad that I am not anybody else. "What do you want?" she sighs.

I lower my voice when I see a group of laughing Dauntless members come rushing down the hall. "I need to talk to you about something." It piques her interest. "But not here. Meet me at the chasm."

We split up. As ordered, she shows up to the ledge in the chasm before I even get there. It is strange to approach her in a place where not too long ago we had our first kiss with the mist of the roaring water hitting our shoes.

"What's this about?" She wrings her hands in nervous anticipation.

I am straight and honest with her when she asks. "I don't think that all these suicides are just a coincidence," I blurt out.

Waiting and holding my breath for her to call me insane and leave, I watch her face contort into a skeptical one. "I don't either," she concurs.

The tension in my chest releases. "I found something," I say. "I went through the camera feed in the control room a few days ago. The man that jumped into the chasm was forced to—I don't know how or why, but I have a feeling it has to do something with simulations. I saw someone follow him into a room, and then when they both left separately, he went straight to the chasm and leaped right in without a second thought."

She considers this. "I thought the Abnegation regulated Erudite serums now."

"Yes, but how well did they do that before? And besides, would you ever trust anything the government says again?"

The quick tilt of her head tells me that she agrees with my analysis.

"So I don't exactly know where to go from here," I admit. "But I do know that something has to be done to stop this from happening again."

"Okay, but why ask me for help?" Tris asks with her eyes narrowed in distrust. "What do you want to get out of this?"

I roll my eyes at her stubborn attitude and shift my weight from one foot to another. "I don't want anything, Tris. With or without a partner, I am solving this, and I just don't know who else to trust with this." As much as I like my friends, they don't understand the concept of government corruption, even after the war. If I asked Zeke to disobey a Dauntless leader's orders, it wouldn't go over well. Hell, when Shauna found out about Tris's Divergence—something against the system—she turned on her despite her relationship with me, one of her best friends.

"And I know that you care that people are dying," I say. "You're smart. You don't trust people in power, either." When I see her wavering expression, I try to convince her with a soft, "We were a good team once, weren't we?"

Tris closes her eyes and turns her back on me for a moment. "Tell me about the person that went after the man who jumped," she demands, and I think I have her right where I want her, although why should she help? As she said a couple of days ago, I have done enough damage. When I look at her now, it is difficult to blink away the image of her lying on her bed in Abnegation the night she cut herself, void of any and all humanity. When I blink again, I see the scars that were hidden away by the bandage on her wrist. There were four of them. Four.

Straightening my posture, I answer, "He was wearing mismatched clothes, so he could have been factionless, or he could have easily been anyone else disguised as factionless."

She turns back to me with her arms crossed, and I watch a pebble that her foot kicks fly into the depths of the chasm. "Do you have any idea who could be behind it? Any other hints?"

"No," I huff, frustrated. "But I want to point fingers at Erudite if only because I think serums are involved." And they haven't been trustworthy in the past...

"Well..." She bites her lip. "I want to help, and I have an idea, but I don't know where we would even go from here."

This is precisely why I need her: to point out things I cannot see, to steer me in the right direction. "What is it?" I ask.

"We don't know who is behind it, but we do know the names of the people who are being killed. Maybe to find out who it is, we have to look at their targets, see if they're connected in some way," she explains. Her plan makes sense, but how would we find this information? "There's no way we can get that background we need on them though."

"Why not? Who has..." I trail off.

Oh. The only place where that information would be stored is in Candor, where all files and criminal records and background checks are held.

"Candor is a fortress. I have no idea how we would get in and out unnoticed, let alone if it would even be worth it."

She has a point, but I am reluctant to give up on our only lead right now. "Look, let's worry about the fundamentals later," I tell her. "We'll figure it out. For now though, don't tell anyone about this. And it is best if we aren't seen with each other on the cameras." Not just because of our plot, but also because I have a Dauntless leader evaluating who I spend my time with...

"Okay," she responds and turns to leave.

"Tris, wait," I call after her. She meets my eyes without the usual ferocity that is aimed at me. "I need to be able to trust you with this."

I couldn't even trust her before, when she supposedly loved me. Maybe this was a mistake.

Her face is unreadable when she says, "You've always been able to trust me, Four. With every decision I made, I thought of you first."

There is a flash of the old Tris, an insistency, a blue spark in her charcoal eyes, and then she is gone.

And I am left at the bottom of the chasm to ponder her words, wondering if she really meant them, or if she was trying to somehow make up for the fact that she didn't.


Who was tricked by the first scene hahaha

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