Previously…

Unfortunately, time goes quite quickly leading up to my fight with Chris. There is a giant pit in my stomach, though not as big as when I get insecure about myself. I don't know how to fill it, unlike my insecurity, which I have begun to fill by getting my tattoo. I watch the other fights nervously, Edward beats Peter in their fight and Al beats Will, causing the large ex-Candor to get upset. Molly beats Drew, though she doesn't seem to care that she's knocked out her friend. Now, it's me and Chris.

Four calls us into the ring and we get into position. Just as we get ready, Eric walks into the training room. Oh great, now he'll be watching us too. He smirks as he walks up to the ring and then commands in his usual cold, unrelenting tone: "Fight!"

I'm already sweating buckets and we haven't even moved. Chris also looking hesitative. I don't want to do it and I can tell Chris doesn't want to either. In my entire life, I never thought I'd be in the position that I'd have to hit my friend, let alone render her unable to continue. I look over at Eric, who is standing in my eye line. He looks at me, expecting me to attack like I have when he's been instructing me in the morning. I think back to last night when he told me that I'll lose my friends. At this time, I can kinda see that he is right. Whoever loses this fight will hold something against the other for hurting them, meaning that our relationship will deteriorate a little. So if Eric is right, it means that it doesn't matter. I should just punch her and get it over with. So I try.

Chapter 5

Breaking

Like I've been instructed by Eric, I tense so that I 'might have enough strength to knock someone down,' quoting my leader exactly. As if Eric notices this, he shouts at me like he usually does to start off my training, "Attack, initiate, we haven't got all day!" I close my eyes and send a punch forward. However, Chris is able to duck out of the way. I turn to face her again, both of us with our hands up. I keep tense and put my arms up. Chris swings her arm towards me but I am unable to duck out the way like she did. However, I put my arms forward in a defensive position like Eric showed me. Her punch hits my arms, the smack of flesh echoing around the room. It stings a little but does not hurt majorly. I stay where I am, whereas Chris steps back and rubs her fist. In that pause, I am able to quickly step forward and deliver a solid punch into Chris' arms. They swing back, leaving her torso open for attack. I send another punch with my weaker hand at the side of her stomach. It hits and she winces, sidestepping away. We circle each other again, hands back up. More confident now, I send a kick towards her legs, hoping that I can cause her to fall over and make this a quick fight. But she is able to grab my leg and toss it to the side, making me the person to tumble to the ground. Being one of the smallest people in the group, Chris is quicker than I am and is able to kick me in the back before I can even try to get up. I collapse, the breath taken out of me. In defense, I roll back over and curl up so that my arms and legs are in front of me for protection. Chris tries to send a kick through the small gap between my legs and my arms, but I raise my legs so that her kick rebounds. She stumbles back, giving me the chance to stand up even though I'm still breathless. I put my arms up again so that I have protection whilst I catch my breath. I notice Eric watching me, a slightly proud expression on his face. I guess because he's been helping me with extra training, he's proud that I'm doing well. Chris throws another punch whilst my mind drifts and I am just able to deflect it. She throws another punch and I am able to push it away again. I try to throw a punch at her, but she is able to push my arm to the side and jab my shoulder. I jolt to the side, losing my balance. I stumble and fall onto one knee. Chris is able to punch me in the back of the head, again sending me to the floor. I land on my side and try to push myself up as quickly as I can. Chris sends another kick to my side, causing me to fall onto my back. She tries to send another kick to my chest, but I grab her foot and pull her down. She falls down on top of me, causing both of us to lose our breath. I am able to push her off me and onto the floor next to me. I stand up unsteadily, Chris also starting to sit up. I send a weak kick to the side of her head, causing her to slip back and me to wobble on my unstable legs. I put my feet apart so that I regain balance. But in the time that I regain my balance, Chris is able to stand up too. I look up just as Chris throws a sharp punch to my nose. A loud crack comes from the connection and suddenly my nose starts to throb. I put my hand up to my numb nose and pull my hands away when I feel a warm, sticky liquid leak onto them. I wipe my blood onto my leggings and try to ignore the nose bleed caused by my friend's punch. I throw a punch at Chris, but it's sloppy and she is able to dodge it. The nose bleed is causing me to become lightheaded and I begin to stumble a bit. Chris sends a kick to my waist as I stumble across the mat, causing me to lose my footing and fall to the ground. As I do so, my mind goes black.

Eric watches as Eddi collapses to the floor. He bites the inside of his cheek as she does not try to get up. Her friend Christina stops, breathing heavily. Eddi does not even try to get up, meaning that Christina has won the match. "Christina wins," Four confirms. Christina stumbles off the mat; Eric has to admit that even though Eddi persistently told him that they were friends, they had a really rough fight that you would not expect from childhood friends. Eric knows he's right about what he said yesterday, about Eddi's friendship, and this fight has started the breakdown of their relationship, a bit like a pin the tire of a car, as soon as it falls out the tires will break and the car won't drive anymore.

Eric turns his attention back to Eddi, who still hasn't moved. Eric feels a flash of worry go through him, something he does not feel often. He walks over to her, hoping that she isn't unconscious. He nudges her with his boot to see if he can get any kind of response from her. She doesn't. He kneels down and rolls her onto her back to check her breathing and pulse. It's easy for him to tell that her breathing is fine, and after a minute, he can tell that her heartbeat is steady. He then rolls her over to her side into the recovery position. Eric stands up, calling to her friends, "She's unconscious; she needs to be taken to the infirmary." They turn to him but don't do anything. What the fuck, they're her friends. Eric has to bite his cheek again to prevent himself from giving them all a verbal beating for their actions. But he doesn't for he knows that Eddi told him that there are rumors spreading around about her and him having sex so that she can get higher in the rankings. Eddi's stupid friends are waiting to see what he does, to see if the rumors are true. If he punishes them for this, then it would seem to them that he likes her, which would not help the rumors. He knows that to keep Eddi in his power he must try to keep the rumors at bay so that she likes him for it. However, it's his duty as a leader to keep the initiates relatively safe, so he must take her to the infirmary if no one else will take her.

"Are you just gonna stand there and do nothing?" he yells at them to try to get them to take her, but they stay where they are. He growls as he picks her limp body up. Her friends look at him, judging his actions. They're idiots, they don't realize that it's a leader's responsibility to make sure everyone is safe. He's doing his duty, not purposely He glares at them as he carries her away.

He looks down at her, her nose very bloody and still leaking her fluids. From Eric's childhood at Erudite, he can tell that her nosebleed, combined with the fact that she was getting hit by the Christina, was enough to render her unconscious. So the other initiate didn't have the strength to knock out Eddi, she only had the strength to cause a bad nosebleed. But she still hurt Eddi. They were friends, and Christina was perfectly okay with rendering her unconscious and not actually trying to help her afterward.

He continues to look down at her. He can't do anything at the moment to help ease the bleeding of her nose, as he has to carry her with both arms, except walk faster. Her bluish green eyes are shut and her hair is in her face, making her look as if she's asleep, except for her bloody nose. Eric feels slightly annoyed with himself as he could have stopped the fight. But that's breaking the rules – no one can concede, including him conceding for her – and he cannot do that because breaking the rules is always wrong in his opinion. Eric sighs, pulling the girl closer to his chest to stop her from slipping from his grasp.

As soon as he walks in, the nurse runs over to her and asks him what happened. He tells her that she fell unconscious because of the nose bleed she gained in a fight. The nurse asks him to bring her into a treatment room. He takes her there, putting her down onto the cot. The doctor doesn't arrive in record time, which annoys Eric a little. The nurse holds a cloth to Eddi's nose to stop the bleeding as the doctor checks her over. The check is quick and soon the doctor is done. The nurse tells him that his initiate is okay – "she's fine but she'll be a little lightheaded for a few hours and have a sore nose for a while." – and she'll be awake soon.

Soon turns out to be a couple of hours, but Eric doesn't care. Four can train them without him. He does send a nurse to tell Four that he has to fill out some paperwork, which is true. Though all he has to do is sign his name on a few papers, which doesn't take long. Then he waits. The couple of hours, until she wakes, is slow for Eric, but as soon as she starts to stir, Eric doesn't care how long the wait was. She groans slightly and rubs her head. "What the fuck happened?" is her first words.

Eric's first word to her is, "Christina knocked you out."

She blinks a few times at him and then says "Why the fuck are you here?" in a drowsy tone.

"Your friends are training, so I have to stay with you." He answers, not bothering to get angry at her questioning.

"The highlight of your day, watching my pretty face," she laughs.

Eric feels a small smile twitch on his lips, causing Eddi to grin and loudly state, "You're cute when you smile."

Eric can't help but become a little defensive of his masculinity, "I'm not cute, Eddi, you're not thinking straight."

"You're just getting defensive because you know it's true," she argues back.

"I'm not," he states quickly.

Eddi sighs, "Well, according to me, you are cute when you smile, no matter what you or anybody else thinks."

"Okay," Eric mutters in defeat.

Eddi chuckles a little but then stops. Eric glances up at her to see if she's okay. She looks down at him, concern on her face. "Eric," she asks, "is that clock right?" He nods, knowing that she's cracked the lie he told her. "Training's finished, Eric. Where are my friends?" Eric looks up at her, keeping his stoic look, but feeling a little guilty for lying to her.

"I only lied because you told me that you wanted to keep your friends," he says as an excuse.

"Where are my friends, Eric?" she asks again, growing slightly agitated.

"I don't know. Once you were knocked out, they didn't come to you. I told them to take you to the infirmary but they ignored me. I had to bring you here."

Eric expects Eddi to cry or something. But, no, the opposite happens. "What the fuck?" she hisses angrily. That's all she says, but Eric can tell that inside her head is a lot of angry questions and insults flying about. He knows that feeling, like when his friends in initiation decided to go against him. He doesn't dwell on the thought though, as Eddi speaks again, rapidly changing subject.

"Why did I lose the fight, Eric?"

Eric generally felt relieved at the question. He doesn't like answering the girl's questions about her social life, even though he had a similar experience. This question he can answer with ease, "You were too tense."

Eddi scoffs, "You told me to be tense."

He rolls his eyes, "Obviously I didn't mean that tense."

"Okay. What should I do to help me become less tense?"

Instantly he answers, "In group training, I suggest training with someone else by getting them to try to hit you. But with me, you'll see tomorrow."

Eddi nods and goes to say something, but is interrupted by a knock on the door. Eric sighs, "Enter."

Eddi's friends warily come in through the door, trying to keep their eyes off Eric, who is glaring intensely at them. Knowing that he should leave, Eric gets up and leaves, ignoring the desperate look of the Candor transfer.

I watch Eric leave. For some reason, I want him to stay. But he doesn't. I think with him here, I may have been able to control my feelings, but now I can't. I look at my friends, Christina, Al, and Tris. Will isn't here as Al knocked him out. They all have small smiles on their faces. "How are you feeling?" Tris asks.

"Good."

Chris' smile sinks, noticing my unease. "I'm so sorry, Eddi. I didn't mean to knock you out."

"Apology accepted for knocking me out. Seeing as you haven't apologized for it yet, I can't forgive you for letting Eric bring me here."

All of them suddenly look very guilty. "Sorry, Eddi," Tris says, "It was only me and Al who could have taken you and we wouldn't have been able to lift you between the two of us."

"Really? I don't think so. Even though he's a huge dick, Eric gave me so good insight on what really happened. I know I shouldn't trust him, but I'm pretty sure he was telling the truth."

"What did he tell you?" Chris asks quickly.

"He told me that he tried to get you to bring me here but you ignored him and he had to bring me here because he couldn't leave an initiate unconscious on the floor," I tell them, ice in my words. I made up the last part, but I'm pretty sure that's the reason Eric brought me here.

"He already had you in his arms by then," Al argues.

"But you still could have at least been worried."

"We were!" Chris argues.

"How can I be sure of that? I thought I could trust you guys but now I know that you don't care about me and talk about me behind your back."

"What? We don't talk about you behind your back."

"Oh, there goes the lie. You have been talking about me behind my back. Yesterday I overheard you talking about me in the dormitory. I was on the stairs whilst you talked about how I asked Eric to make Tris fight Molly yesterday."

Chris looks utterly devastated and guilty. "How much did you hear?"

"I started at 'Eddi wouldn't do that' to 'I'm not sure, she might have'."

Chris bites her lip, "I'm so sorry you had to hear that."

I growl, "You cannot be sorry for me hearing it. The only thing you can be sorry for is talking about me behind my back."

"I'm really sorry, Eddi. I'm your best friend, please forgive me and the others, we didn't mean to but the rumors spreading made us talk about you. We weren't sure if it was true."

"I forgive you, Chris. I'm your best friend, please let me apologize for blaming you, I wasn't sure if you were being my true friend so I had to confront you. I mean if you thought the rumors could be true then it really was a good reason to blame you." I say slightly sarcastically, paraphrasing Chris' last sentence.

Chris smiles slightly, not noticing the small bit of sarcasm in my tone, "We're all really sorry. Please, let's just forget this and carry on being friends."

Knowing that this argument could continue for hours, I say, "Okay, I'll forget about it." Hopefully, they will leave me alone now. However, Chris smiles even more and runs over, hugging me tightly. I mentally sigh and wrap my arms around her. And to make it seem better, I beckon for Al and Tris to come over so that they can join the hug. They do and we end in an awkward hug with me on the bed and the others leaning over so that we've all got our arms around each other. Even though we're hugging, I know that our friendship won't last until the end of initiation.

Eric smiles lopsidedly at me from across the ring. "Why are you so happy?" I ask.

"I'm not; you said I look cute when I smile so I thought you might appreciate it."

"I never said that." I defend.

"You did. When you woke up after getting knocked out."

"I don't remember."

"You were really lightheaded."

"Crap. Sorry."

Eric stops smiling at me and turns on his serious mode. "This morning, you will be practicing defense. I will try to hit you and you must be able to dodge. If you can, you must try to hit me as well. First, three laps around the training room."

I nod, "I guess that's why you were happy: you get to hit me." Eric stares blankly at me so I set off. The three laps take around ten minutes to do. They're quite tiring, but as usual, Eric doesn't let me stop for a breath. We're back in the ring now, ready to start. I have myself in the position that I've been taught and Eric is in the same position as he was the one who taught it to me.

Without warning, Eric goes to punch me in the face. I put my arms up to hold back his punch but he's way too strong and I end up punching myself. I cuss in pain. Eric raises his eyebrow and says, "Instead of putting your arms in front you, you should push my fist away." I nod and get into position again. He sends another punch toward my chest and this time I do what he says. I manage to push his throw out of the way. I stop and smile, proud of my little achievement. But I should have known better to stop. Eric punches me in the gut and I keel over. "Don't lose concentration, initiate. In a real fight, it could cost you your life." I nod and straighten up. He punches again and I push him away. However just after the first punch he sends another, meaning that I do not have a chance to block. He hits me in the ribs. This time, I try not to recoil and instead throw my leg up to try to kick him. Somehow I do and somehow I land the kick right on his dick.

"Fuck." Eric breathes, clutching his groin.

I want to laugh but I try to hold it in. However, I end up snorting laughter through my nose. I turn away to avoid the glare that Eric is now giving me. But in my outburst of laughter, Eric is able to recover and come up behind me. He grabs me by the waist and flips me over his shoulder. He lets go and I fly through the air. I hit the mat hard, sprawling with my arms and legs out wide. It hurts a lot but I still laugh. Eric sighs, now standing at my feet. "You're fighting Drew today, you won't be able to learn to beat him if you just lie there laughing." He says 'laughing' likes it's a foreign word that he's never heard before. Though it's very hard to imagine Eric having a giggle like I am now.

I stop giggling when the training room door slams shut. I sit up sharply, staring at the door. Eric, too, seems on high alert, watching the door carefully. No one is there, but it's obvious that someone was, because Eric shut it when we came in, so it couldn't have blown shut. Crap. "Brace yourself," Eric says, still staring at the door, "those rumors about us are going to get a lot worse."

Thanks for reading! Please follow, favourite, and review. I'm sorry that this is really late but I've been through some shit recently so I haven't been able to write. Here's virtual cookies for everyone for being so patient! :D I'm going to say that I'll try to update every two weeks as I'm still going through shit at the moment and I'm starting college this Friday so I'm going to be quite busy.

Last week I saw Suicide Squad and I wanted to ask you guys (if you've seen the movie), what do you think of Captain Boomerang? I love Jai's portrayal of him so much. He's so adorable! Pinky is so adorable! I love Jai so much!

You can visit me on instagram at totallynotdeadyet and totallynotalivenow, unless you came from there already, to see some pretty amazing content and some pictures of Eddi with her new tattoo! I was able to use the Sims 4 (and some custom content) to be able to get a pretty good image of Eddi.

Thank you to everyone who has followed and favourited me, it really helps me to write this. But y'know what inspires me more to write? Reviews!

mmelody6: :D :D :D Lot's of smiley faces for commenting and putting up with the delays! :D :D :D