So finally, Initiation is here. It won't be the end of this story, there's still about one third to come.

Thanks for your reviews and new favorites!

Chapter 41: Initiation Day

Tris

Saying goodbye to Tobias the next morning seems to be more difficult than the upcoming exam itself. We stand in his hallway, holding each other, and all we wanted to say has been said. We both know there's hardly any time left for us before we have to go and face the day. It's getting harder to ignore the time slipping away, driving us towards the inevitable moment in which we have to let go of each other's hand and leave the shelter of the apartment. What if we won't be able to come back here?

'No, don't think that!' I scold myself. This thought doesn't help, if anything, it makes it even tougher to leave.

My throat is dry and my stomach feels as if it was filled with stones as first our lips and then our bodies part, until our last contact is our hands, my left in his right.

"Good luck, Tris. You'll make it."

"Thank you. I hope I will."

"You will."

I nod, then turn to face the door. My hand slips out of his as I leave, and I fight against the urge to turn around and take him into my arms again. We'd only have to separate for a second time, and I don't think I can do that once more this morning.

I swallow when his door closes behind me and I force my feet to keep walking towards my own apartment.

Once I'm there, I lean back against the closed door, and although I'm trying to tell myself that it's something I do to calm down before I get ready for my exam, I know very well what I'm waiting for. My breathing is shallow to assure the absolute silence I need to be able to hear Tobias' footsteps echoing through the hall outside on his way to meet with Lauren, Max and Eric. For a moment, I imagine hearing them slow down, but then I'm not sure.

It's only after the sound has faded away, and I know that he's gone, that I can pull myself together and away from that door. I change into black training pants and a jersey, use the bathroom and pause only once more before I make my way to the cafeteria for breakfast: I stare at my reflection in the small round mirror on the wall in my hallway, and I gasp when I see my pale face anxiously staring back at me.

No, this is not me! This is not dauntless Tris in the reflection. I stretch my back and straighten my shoulders. That's better. I close my eyes and take a deep breath as I focus on my goal, and when I open them again, fighting spirit and determination sparkle in my gaze.

This attitude suits me much better, and I am stronger and more confident as I stride towards the pit and into the cafeteria where I join my friends for breakfast.

Although everyone is nervous, I'm thankful for the optimism each of them brings up. It's contagious, and it's definitively the right attitude for today, cause it's Dauntless.

Tobias

The initiates have gathered in front of the fear landscape room, and Eric now lets them into the waiting area of the observation office, right next to where we are sitting to watch their simulations.

I glance over Eric's shoulder as he first opens the door, and I have to catch my breath upon seeing the chattering crowd of members outside. So many people will be watching the simulations on the monitors outside. I didn't mind the celebrating crowds last year, but this year, their cheering seems louder and more out of place.

I'm glad when the closing door shuts them out and the quiet returns to our room. The initiates are silent, all waiting for their last challenge to come, some of them pale and worried.

But not Tris. I planned to avoid looking at her too much cause it's so hard not to be able to hug her in this situation, but it doesn't work. And I'm lucky it doesn't, because I see confidence radiating off her. It's not optimism, though. It's pure determination to face whatever is coming, and at the same time, an attitude of indifference, as if she didn't have to care.

She keeps her head high as she takes a seat among all the other initiates, and she glares at Eric while he gives a short speech, twisting the Dauntless values from our manifesto to serve his interpretation yet again.

I'm relieved he keeps it short, although he generally enjoys speaking in front of groups. Maybe the pull of countless fears being displayed for him is stronger. Or maybe it's the alcohol waiting after all this is finished.

Eric and Max decided that the initiates will be sent into their landscapes according to the momentary rankings, starting with the last one. That means Tris is going to be last.

I close my eyes to help my mind concentrate as Drew is sent next door to face his fears. It's going to be a long, long day...

XXX

All too soon, yet not soon enough, it's Tris' turn.

I admire her standing face to face with Eric with her head held high as he picks up the last remaining syringe from the shelf. He places his big hand on the side of her neck and tilts her head.

'Take your dirty fingers off my girlfriend,' I shout at him inside my mind. Condemned to silence, I watch him inject her, longing to punch that smirk out of his face.

"Good luck," he says to send her off, and I repeat his words in my head like a mantra.

Tris glances back at me from the doorstep. I give her a short reassuring smile, and then she's gone for a few seconds until she appears behind the glass in the fear landscape room.

I take my seat again between Lauren and Joss, who is one of this year's two older members that were asked to judge the exams with us. Luckily, that tradition wasn't changed. It's supposed to improve the objectivity to have neutral members in the committee.

I can see the serum's effect in Tris' eyes. It's always the first that changes when a person is confronted with fear: The eyes. The composure is what follows. It all happens so fast, before our instruments can even measure the heart rate speed up.

The transmitters send the images of Tris' simulation directly to the monitor in front of me, as well as the other's monitors, and I recognize the grassy area she's standing in.

A group of crows is flying in circles some twenty yards above Tris. Soon one of them dives down, aims for her and lands on her shoulder. She winces as the bird's talons dig into her skin.

Come on, Tris, we've practiced this one numerous times, and now you're even allowed to influence the simulation.

I watch her crouch and touch the grass at her feet until her fingers come across a gun. She grabs it, clicks the bullet into place and aims it at the malicious creature on her shoulder. Its body tears apart, staining Tris' shirt with blood before it's remnants drop to the ground.

It doesn't stay the only one there. Tris points the gun at the crows that try to attack her from above and shoots bird after bird from the sky until the remaining ones fly off.

Then her surroundings turn black.

One.

Tris' shoes squeak on the floor of the glass tank. She's trapped between invisible walls, her palms reaching out for the panels all around her, trying to find a way out. But there is none.

Water begins to flood the tank, rising quickly. When Tris' first attempts to break the glass with her bare hands don't work, her heart speeds up. So does mine. I don't want to see her drown. I can't.

My fingernails dig into my palms as I watch her kick the panels desperately without causing any damage, the water already reaching her hips.

Only after taking a short break to focus her mind on the task does she manage to shatter one of the glass walls. The water flows out of the tank, and Tris slips and falls.

But she escaped.

Two.

When the darkness fades, there's water everywhere, except for a slippery rock that Tris is clinging to. She's all alone in the endless ocean while merciless waves try to pull her away from the crumbling stone that is her single chance of safety.

She struggles to get a hold on it, but the current keeps pulling her feet away from under her body. At the same time, mighty waves crash her back against the rock. I can see blood, but I can't make out where it's coming from. There's too much water.

Tris is shaking as she fights against the stormy sea, finally pulling herself up onto the rock with a desperate scream, and then she starts running away over the suddenly sandy surface into darkness.

Three.

Now Tris can't run any further. She's tied to a pole, a stack of logs around her feet. She can't move. She's helpless as Peter emerges out of the grayish mist, followed by more identical copies of him, all carrying torches whose flames lick at the darkness.

The first Peter smirks at her, and so do all the other Peters that close in on her from all sides. Their eyes are black and wiped off any human emotion.

Then the figures freeze in their tracks before they begin to laugh. It's a cruel, cold sound, carried by sadism instead of humor.

"Say goodbye, stiff, you started playing with fire, now see what you get," the leading Peter cackles as he lowers his torch to the branches and sets them on fire.

The flames eat their way through the wood towards Tris in seconds, and I flinch as I witness the pain she has to endure as they lick on her hands and feet.

"I can smell your flesh burning," Peter shouts at her in triumph.

God, this has to be over soon.

"All I can smell is the rain," Tris shoots at Peter, and at this moment heaven opens its floodgates, and heavy rain eradicates the flames in its downpour.

Four.

I take a deep, shaky breath. I'm unable to worry about any simulation that could involve the two of us. I just want it to be over. I never had to watch all of her fears one after the other, and it's horrible.

An Abnegation bedroom materializes around her, plain and simple. The only thing that's different is a wall full of mirrors.

I don't know this fear. It's a new one, at least for me. I didn't check the report Lauren typed two days ago. I should have.

Tris looks around, confused. She eyes the bed, and I'm sure I know what she's thinking of. Then she turns to watch herself in the mirrors.

I half expect to see an artificial version of me enter the scene as Tris gasps. But it's not me she's seeing. Instead, a man with a scarred face, dressed in black, is standing motionless outside the window opposite the mirrors, and she stares at him through the reflections.

Then two more figures appear out of nowhere, but, unlike the first, their skin is of a pale grayish color, their cheeks sunken in. In the dim light they look like skulls. Even from outside of the simulation they are scary as hell.

Tris turns around and the three men are suddenly inside the room.

As if that wasn't enough already, bony arms and hands start to slam against the window, belonging to more featureless men, their skin thin like paper.

Tris stands with her back to the wall, terrified. The scarred man and his companions slowly walk towards her, and she stumbles sideways, her hand searching for something. She grabs a knob and opens the door to a small walk-in closet in which she then seeks shelter.

It's dark in there, with only little light entering through the thin slits in the wood down close to her feet. I know this setting all too well, and it's scary enough without the shadows creeping closer.

But Tris is stronger than me, standing up and reaching for a box on the shelf above her to retrieve another gun. She loads it and aims it at the men behind the thin gray door, taking them out.

When there's no movement anymore she steps out into the room again, only to be faced with the outside crowd shattering the window. Tris withdraws back into the closet as the figures stumble towards her with their twig-like arms outstretched.

Shit, there's not enough bullets in her gun to shoot them all!

A second door appears out of nowhere at the back of the closet, and Tris flees through it into the hallway. Her heart rate slows down.

Five.

The Pit is lit by an unnatural beam of light, and standing right in the center of it is Tris' family. They are all clothed in Abnegation gray and clearly are out of place in the Dauntless compound.

Tris is standing a few yards away, aiming a gun at them. Her index finger shakes as she runs it over the trigger. Another gun is pointed directly to her head by Eric.

"Do it!" he hisses at her, pushing the barrel against her temple.

Tris struggles with the order, and I can see the conflict raging through her. Her fear is much like one of mine: She's afraid of being responsible for the death of innocents, only that it's her family she's supposed to shoot, whereas I have to kill a stranger in my landscape.

"Now, initiate!" Eric's voice becomes impatient. He shifts his weight from one foot to the other. "I'm counting to ten now."

And I hold my breath while he's spitting the numbers at Tris, who can't take her eyes off her family. Her parents nod towards her with an understanding smile that is giving me the creeps. They are Abnegation through and through if they can forgive Tris for this. Her brother is looking at the floor all the time, standing a little to the side.

Eric has almost finished his countdown when Tris lowers her arm and her gun slips through her fingers and falls to the floor.

"We train soldiers, not rebels!" And Eric pulls the trigger.

I'm thankful for the immediate darkness, so I don't have to look at Tris' body hitting the ground.

Six.

DISCLAIMER: I own neither the Divergent world nor the characters, they belong to Veronica Roth.