Chapter 19
Tris
I hurry along the path that leads up from the pit as fast as I can. When I reach the coffee bar, I spot Christina already waiting for me at a secluded table in the far corner, waving happily over to me. I sit down opposite her and am surprised when the waitress follows in my wake and places two glasses of steaming coffee with foamed milk in front of us.
The many ways in which the Dauntless serve coffee are remarkable. Unlike me, Christina isn't surprised at all. She takes her extra-long spoon and stirs her coffee, mixing the dark brown liquid in the middle with the milk above and underneath it. I mirror her movements and have that nagging feeling in my stomach again that comes up recently whenever I realize I've missed something in Abnegation that is completely ordinary for people from other factions. Although I still honor the ideals I've learned there, I wonder why they think it's necessary to renounce all the nice and funny things that enrich life in other factions. It's a vague sensation of lost experiences that I wasn't able to make while growing up, a loss difficult to describe.
"Tris? Tris! Still here with me?"
Christina pulls me out of my thoughts and in the blink of an eye, the melancholy is gone. I chose Dauntless. I'm going to catch up with the others.
"Yes, of course. I'm sorry I didn't spend enough attention to you."
"Let me guess: The coffee?"
She smiles at me with her head tilted to the side. I return her smile, nodding. My reaction to new food and drinks hasn't gone unnoticed, and I know to everybody else it seems peculiar and funny.
"So, how was your simulation?" she asks.
"Good. Today I got one of those I've already practiced a lot in, so nothing new to work on for a change. Yours?"
"Same here. I can't wait for this to be over, so I won't have to face my fears on a daily basis anymore. It's annoying, I know them all-too-well by now."
"Except that you don't have to be afraid that your fears are going to get you into trouble."
"Oh Tris, I'm sorry, I didn't think about what I was saying. So you still think it'll come up?"
"I guess so, although your advice to take at least one little step ahead every time I'm with him really helped me. It's more comfortable for me knowing I don't have to... do it all at once."
I start stirring my coffee again, so my hands have something to do.
"Between all this talking of doubts and fears, you do remember that it's supposed to feel good in the first place, don't you?"
Christina's worried look makes me chuckle, half out of amusement, half out of shyness.
"You don't have to worry about that. I'm not doing anything I'm not comfortable with. And it does feel more than just good. Listen." I lean closer to her. "I'm not afraid because I don't want to have sex. I'm afraid because it's something new and unknown, and because of the importance of that step."
I'm not sure she completely gets what I mean, but at least she seems satisfied with my answer.
We change the topic due to a couple sitting down close to us and speak about the upcoming weekend. Christina tells me about her date with Will tonight after our little meeting. She asks me for my opinion on her outfit and make-up and it's funny that she'd ask me about that. Me, of all people! But it's nice to have something simple like this to talk about, and time slips away rapidly.
When we arrive down at the cafeteria for dinner, the place is already crowded with people. It's always loud here, but on a Friday or Saturday evening, the volume of the voices and laughter is even louder. We serve ourselves fries and hamburgers and join Uriah, Lynn and Marlene for dinner. Not long after that, Will sits down with us, too, greeting Christina with a huge kiss. I instinctively look away until they're done.
We chat about the past week and how time's flying now that we're only a week away from becoming full members. Everyone's excited about it. I join the conversation with a comment now and then to make sure they don't notice the depth of my concerns about that day. At least it keeps me occupied and from constantly looking over to where Tobias sits on the other side of the room.
What I do notice is when he leaves the cafeteria together with Zeke. They're talking to each other as they pass us by, not paying any attention to our group of initiates. Uriah, Christina and I get the message, but keep acting normally. After several minutes, Uriah stands and excuses himself.
"Ladies — and one gentleman — I've got to go now. Shall we meet here again at nine?"
He takes a look around, and I notice his eyes linger on Marlene for longer than on the others. And sure enough, she agrees first. Lynn eyes her from the side before she agrees to come, too.
"Sorry to disappoint you, but I have plans with Will for tonight," Christina says, exchanging a big smile with her boyfriend. I wonder if she meant her words to sound as suggestive as they do.
"What about you, Tris? Wanna join us for some drinks tonight?"
"I don't know yet. I feel tired now, but maybe it'll help if I go home and get some rest now."
I'm not good at telling lies, but good enough to have an excuse to leave the place to go over to Zeke. I even feel a little excited to attend a secret meeting and play along with Uriah and Christina.
Uriah leaves first and I follow him with Christina soon after. She has excused herself to Will for getting dressed and told him he should pick her up at half past nine.
"I thought you wanted to meet at nine," I comment on our way out.
"That was the original plan, but how am I supposed to look as if I've spent an hour in the bathroom when in reality I hardly have time to get ready?" she whispers back to me as we walk across the pit to our meeting point with Uriah.
When he sees us coming, he turns and starts walking ahead, and we follow him in the distance. Lots of people are out tonight. It's good we don't have to go far until Uriah knocks at Zeke's door. Luckily, there's nobody around at the moment, so we get in behind him without being seen.
Tobias smiles welcoming at me as our eyes meet across the room, and I'm relieved that he seems relaxed. This afternoon in the simulation room, there was a slightly uncomfortable tension between us, apparently caused by the memories of my unexpected visit this morning, as if we both didn't know what to say to each other.
Zeke asks us to sit down and hands each of us a bottle of beer. I've never tried one before, and it tastes too bitter for me to like it much. I sit on the sofa between Tobias and Christina, keeping up distance to both of them, while Zeke and Uriah have pulled some chairs over from the kitchen table. A third chair waits empty beside them.
"Shauna is finishing her shift at the infirmary. She'll come here as fast as she can," Zeke explains as he notices me eyeing it.
We don't have to wait long for her, and soon our group is complete.
"Four, do you want to start?" Zeke offers.
"Yes, thanks. Well, first I want to say thank you to all of you for coming here and keeping it secret. It's not forbidden to meet, of course, but we don't want to raise suspicions, especially not in the wrong people. It's important that everything we talk about in here stays strictly secret. Some information we're going to share today could get us into huge trouble, that is to say, could make us factionless. So we have to rely on each other in this matter. Can all of you agree to that?"
He looks around and each of us slowly nods. He's back in his instructor-mode, wearing Four like a shell to protect Tobias. Even Christina resists commenting his question with an ironical remark.
"Okay, then Zeke and I will summarize the events we have observed first. Second, we fill you in on our plan. There's something we've already started. And third, we can discuss our ideas about what it all means."
The tension in the room is perceptible. While I already know some things that are about to come, Christina doesn't know anything yet. And I'm not sure about what Shauna and Uriah picked up so far.
Tobias explains about the email he read in Eric's office and the changes in initiation recommended by Jeanine. When he mentions the different ideas about the meaning of the letter "D" in it, I hear Shauna snort at the word Divergent and wonder what to make of that. Tobias continues with our observations at the Erudite compound, how he secretly followed Max and Eric there and how the lights were still on in the middle of the night. He doesn't mention I was there with him, in order to avoid revealing too much about the two of us. Instead, he repeats the conclusions I have made that night on the train, telling the others that's what I came up with when he talked to me about it the next day.
It all comes down to the conclusion that they're up to something and that our leaders are conspiring against someone, or something. It's a question that we still need to find an answer to.
Zeke takes over and reports about what he's seen one night at our compound. He describes the leader's meeting he witnessed and even shows us a screenshot from one of the security cameras. Tobias immediately scolds him for still carrying it around with him and forces him to promise that he'll either hide it properly or destroy it first thing after this meeting.
I think he's right, in a way, but I'm also thankful for the possibility to see it with my own eyes. I trust them more than anything anyone tells me. Zeke says it's important that we find out what kind of serum the syringes contain, and we all agree with that. It'll give us a clue about whatever plan lies hidden in that odd connection between Dauntless and Erudite.
"If they work on it during the night and keep it such a secret, it's probably a new serum that we don't yet know or use," Uriah concludes. It's a good point.
Next, Tobias and Zeke both present their idea to steal files from Eric's computer, and I'm surprised to hear that they've already started to put it to action. It sounds like a good one, but I wish we had talked about it before. I make a request to discuss such plans next time before starting them, and we decide to do that with future ideas. Also, I'm a little angry at Tobias for putting himself in danger today when he went to infect Eric's computer. And then I get angry that I can't show my anger here, in front of people who don't know about us. Maybe I should, so we'd be even when it comes to making decisions without consulting each other.
But of course I don't, because I don't want to expose our relationship without necessity.
Given that their virus program works, we'll have Eric's files by tomorrow evening. Hopefully they'll contain something helpful for us. Maybe everything will turn out harmless, a voice in the back of my mind suggests, but I know better. We decide to meet again tomorrow to talk about whatever it is we're about to discover. Zeke offers his and Shauna's apartment again.
Now that we have the next meeting scheduled, we continue by exchanging our ideas about the syringes.
Tobias suggests it could be a new and stronger fear serum, able to bring up more fears and make them more realistic. The idea gives me goosebumps all over my body, and I hope he's wrong. In my opinion, my simulations feel real enough and I shudder at the prospect of those horrible images becoming even more graphic. It's hard to envisage that it should be even possible at all with how drastic those simulations already are.
Zeke and Shauna think the serum could be a kind of liquid tracking device, so our leaders could always see where we are and who we hang out with. It's not a pleasant idea, either. Tobias and I wouldn't be able to sneak into each other's apartment anymore if they could follow in our wake, even if it's digitally. The cameras we can try our best to avoid, but if we were to carry trackers underneath our skin...
Uriah throws the Divergent in the discussion, suggesting the serum could be used to distinguish them from the others in order to find and hunt them down more conveniently.
And so it goes on and on, and every new idea is more upsetting and frightening than the one before. My head is humming when Uriah ends the discussion with a hint at the clock on Zeke's wall.
"I think it's best if we wait until tomorrow and probably we'll know more than today. So far, it's all about suspicions when it comes to that serum. — I'm meeting friends to go out for drinks, so if any of you wants to join us at the bar, you're welcome," he says.
I have given it some thought already. "I'd like to go out a bit, not as long as last week though. Maybe just an hour or two."
"Hey, that's cool. We wait for you at the cafeteria," Uriah beams at me.
I hope Tobias won't disapprove of my wish, but he simply agrees to come down, too, only a little later. It's okay for him to bump into his initiates in the bar, whereas meeting with them elsewhere and then go to the bar together with them could be considered inappropriate.
"We'll join you later, too, little brother," Zeke replies with a glance over to Shauna that says he wants to have some time alone with her.
We leave one by one, Christina shortly after Uriah, telling us she needs to hurry up to get ready in time for her date with Will. Shauna doesn't know about our relationship, so I make my way to the cafeteria alone and Tobias leaves after me.
DISCLAIMER: I own neither the Divergent world nor the characters, they belong to Veronica Roth.
I hope you like how they try to work together here!
The next chapter will be mainly Fourtris again. ;-) I just have to say that I'm off visiting family for the next week, and I won't have time to work on this story, so it'll be a little longer than usual until the next update.
Anyway, I've been uploading new chapters faster than I've been writing new ones, mostly because I love to hear what you have to say about them and your feedback keeps me motivated to continue. So I think I have to slow down updates a bit or soon there'll be even longer breaks between new chapters, and I really want to try to continually load up at least one chapter each week, like I originally planned. Usually I need about 10 hours to write and edit and re-edit an average chapter, and once I've finished it, I'm impatient to share it... Unfortunately, I can't do it any faster, or it won't have the quality I want it to have.
Thank you for staying with this story so far, and keep reading/reviewing/favoriting/following! xoxo