Caleb's POV
"What are you acting so sneaky about, Stiff?" Xander asks.
Chills of the sub-zero kind travel down my spine. What is he, of all people doing in the transfer dorm? He is an Erudite born, isn't he? What twisted motive would his crooked mind come up with?
"I asked you a question, Stiff, or did you lose your tongue?" His tone is even colder than absolute zero, if that is possible.
"I was keeping my clothes in the cabinet. What are you doing in the transfer dorm? Trying to recruit a few rookies into you little group?"
I need to keep up the act and distract him. I am ready to take a punch or two if it means not being factionless. I am hoping frantically that he does not check the cabinet. I need to get that file in Alev's office as soon as possible. I am praying that the door to Alev's office is not fit with the fingerprint mapping technology.
"Oh, a question with a counter-question? Sounds like the job of a guilty party."
"The only guilty party here is you, who came to the transfer dorm." I feign confidence. The knot in my stomach is growing tenser by the second.
"What are you hiding in the cabinet, anyway?"
"It's none of your business. Now go away and leave me alone. No matter whatever I do, I am always on your hit list."
"Don't try to paint a better picture of yourself, Stiff. You are no better than anybody else here. Don't think I didn't notice you glancing into another initiate's answers in the computer exam."
My blood touches absolute zero. How did he know that? I am fervently trying to find a way out when suddenly the stream of thoughts is interrupted.
Xander knees me in the gut swiftly. All the air goes out of my lungs in an 'ufff'. I fall backwards down on the floor, my body unable to support me anymore.
This isn't a simulation. It is the first coherent thought my mind can form. Before my mind gains full coherence, Xander is out of the room.
I won't let him win. I need to save proof of all he did but before I need to return the files and flash drive back to the office and Rhiannon.
It is not possible right now. The broad daylight is an enemy. I need to return the file today itself. I hope Xander doesn't keep any guards posted at night. I think the best time to go inside the office is 1.00 am. The only hurdle is that there shouldn't be fingerprint mapping technology in Alev's office. I don't think there are cameras in Alev's office. Anybody would find it creepy to have a camera right at you all the time of the day.
The door didn't look high tech. It didn't have a lock as well. Maybe it relied too much on the camouflage. I know I shouldn't underestimate the opponent but I think most of my assumptions are right.
I need to go throughout this night normally. The only difference is that enormous boulder settled in my gut threatening to drown me. It is 8.00 pm now. These five hours are the most dangerous of my life.
…
"Brrrrriiinnngggg!"
Another announcement alarm. Couldn't they leave us alone for one day? I dread leaving the file unattended in my cabinet but we need to go to the main building.
We get into a line, most initiates' faces hovering from extremely sleepy, extremely hungry to extremely hyperactive. We go to the main building and wait for Jeanine to come. At last she arrives, her suit ironed to mechanical perfection.
"Initiates, I want to make an important announcement."
Huh, what did we come here for? I guess knowledge is inversely proportional to common sense.
"I have come to announce an opportunity for brilliant initiates who are excelling in our initiation program."
What? What does she want to convey?
"The opportunity is that brilliant initiates will be put in a special programme under my guidance. There will be two initiates from the Transfer pool and two initiates from the Legacy group."
Oh, so the Erudite born are called legacies here. No surprise there. Someone raises her hand. She asks about the field of specialisation in Jeanine's program and when the names of the 'brilliant initiates' will be announced.
"The names of the initiates will be announced the day after tomorrow, after the Visiting Day. The field of specialisation is bio science and applied technology." Jeanine replies.
Visiting day. The phrase stirs up a long forgotten memory in me. It is strange that I didn't even think of my family for so many days.
Now that it has come to me, I think about Mom and Dad. I have been too selfish to choose myself over them. How broken they must be, without their children. It is too late to regret my choice now. The only times I will see my parents are on visiting day, which happens once in every year. They would grow farther and farther apart from me, the only memories left will be my choice and its effects and the general spectrum of doubt and grief which I label 'selfishness'.
I cannot wait for tomorrow. Even if tomorrow lasted for an eternity, it wouldn't be enough for me. I really love my Mom and Dad, even if they don't come to visit. Courtesy of new rules implemented by… you guessed it right, Jeanine Matthews. No member of Abnegation is allowed in the Erudite compound.
We are shovelled out of the main hall and into the dining room. My mind goes blank and I sit on the nearest table. I put my arms on the elbows and put my head down. I close my eyes and think.
This is a pretty frequent occurrence in my case. I usually close my eyes and think. I used to do this as a little kid also.
The initiation, my parents, Rhiannon, Tristan, Anahita, Alev, Xander, Jeanine mix together and make a gigantic whirlpool in my mind. This whirlpool does not allow me to hold onto one thought for longer than a while. Everything mixes up together, Mom and Alev, Rhiannon talking to Beatrice, my dad in place of the lady at the newspaper office. Everything whirlwinds together and leaves me entirely confused.
My arms are a prison, imprisoning my head, my thoughts and my mind. The whirlpool condenses into a smaller and smaller space when finally its power is too much to contain. It takes me along, to its centre.
I sink down, down and down, hoping to find the eye of the storm, somewhere calm to sort this mess out.
It is a strange flashback of my life, as if someone mixed up the order of the frames of the film. It is vague; the pictures appear as if under water.
I remember me as a kid, using an old rusted bike Beatrice and I dug up from the factionless donation pool. It was so old that even the factionless didn't want it.
Fast forward to the first day of Upper Levels, my arms and legs were too big for me. I felt like a clumsy gorilla or something. In the first day itself, Susan had crashed into me and dropped my books onto the ground.
Slow backward to skipping and running in the empty land near the factionless sector. My bike is still there but I was getting too big to use it.
Mom gives me a hug and a kiss on the cheek on the day of the Aptitude test.
Dad gives me a hug and tells me about the government. He told me once about how he ingested mud when he was a kid. I used to do the same thing.
Beatrice asking me about some kind of a math problem, disguised as a riddle. We used to do those sometimes.
The last three memories bring tears to my eyes. I can feel them running down my face and onto the fabric of my sleeves. The tears drag me down further.
There is no calm in the middle of the vortex. It is a myth. There is only pure darkness in the eye of the storm. The memories morph into bloodcurdling retellings of simulations.
An arm shakes my shoulders vehemently. I wake (or sleep?) in this strange half state between awake and asleep. I raise my head and wipe my face fiercely to erase the tear tracks.
"Are you okay, Caleb?" Anahita looks worriedly at me.
"It's all right" I reply.
"You are thinking about the visiting day, right?"
How did she read my mind? My eyes blow wide.
"Now you are wondering about how I read your mind, right?" She says with an unmistakable aura of confidence. I am dumbfounded.
"We were taught to read a person's emotions. Sounds like a Candor job but it isn't. Reading emotions is a very important part and a useful tool while counselling others. Even I think about home, you know?"
"What was your home like?" I ask. I need to seriously hide my emotions. No wonder the eyes are 'windows to the soul'.
"I did tell you about it earlier, didn't I? Well, it was nothing interesting. I was an only child, unlike you two with annoying brothers and sisters. I used to work in the farms…"
"Don't tell me about what you did. What was your family like? Tell me anything else, crazy pranks, weird fetishes, etc. Don't speak about your parents if you don't want to." I interrupt rudely.
"Alright, you asked for it. I used to climb a tree with a basket full of mud in my arms. Not an apple tree, mind you because apple trees are not very tall. There is a huge willow in the farthest corner of the field where I used to prowl. One day, I dropped mud on top of my father, who was standing under the tree with Johanna Reyes."
"What happened after? For the record, I would never have the courage to pull a prank like that on Marcus Eaton." My mouth expands next.
"Nothing, Johanna gave a big smile at me, which looked very weird provided that half of her hair was caked with mud. She just said to my father, "Feisty daughter you have, Joseph." I was a mere ten year old then. Only Johanna and my Mom called my Dad with his first name." She is barely able to conceal a smile.
I laugh out loud, drawing attention of half of the dining hall at me. Everyone looks over at me from their tablets. I go silent. As a result, the dining hall goes awkwardly silent.
"Don't mind them, Caleb. These people do not recognise the benefits of a good laugh. They just go on every day with their serotonin loaded selves." She says this out loud and is careful to make it heard to everyone in the hall. I am mentally applauding her. What courage.
…
Dinner ends. I go back to my room and I am passing through the main hall when Xander stops me.
"Well, lookie here, Stiff. I have a little piece of truth for you." He deliberately draws the attention of many initiates around him.
"And what may that quoted 'piece of truth' be?" I say it with an air of indifference.
"Just listen to this piece carefully." A wicked sneer, characteristic of Xander.
He reads aloud an article about Abnegation. He also talks about Tobias Eaton, an Abnegation transfer to Dauntless, who was a victim of severe verbal and physical assault meted out to him by his father, Marcus Eaton. I decide that I need to dig on Marcus Eaton next. My face goes red with anger at Xander's words.
"What do you want to prove, huh? That you are better than us? Stop it, because it is completely futile." I give him a shove, we are evenly matched and my eyes meet his in a severe glare.
"What if that is what I am trying to prove? You will realise this once you see that your previous faction isn't as shiny-bright as you think it to be. Do you even know who your enemy is?" I would love to flip the bird at him right now. I walk away.
"Scared, Stiff?" The people around me demand for answers. I would not stoop so low as to pick a fight with him. That must be the exact thing he is looking for.
I run away with burning eyes. I go into the library. It is about to close in an hour but I need to get rid of these tears.
I enter the library and slam the door. I grab a book but it fails to grab my attention. I go to the enormous window and look outside. Two apartment complexes frame my view of the enormous marsh and the starry night.
An enormous horde of Dauntless are running through the marsh. They have fluorescent blue lights strapped onto their chests. I search for Beatrice frantically. I do catch a hint of long blonde hair but it could be a trick of the light, or lack of it.
A Dauntless train whooshes by. The same unanswerable question comes to my mind once again. How do the Dauntless even get on these trains?
The crowd of Dauntless run towards the Ferris wheel, probably in pursuit of the next hit of adrenalin. They are running, running, getting farther and farther apart from my vision. 'I crane my neck and look towards the defunct Ferris wheel.
Half of the Dauntless get into one group while the other half is in another. The tiny black figures seem to be engaged in a heated argument while other tiny black figures just loll about. They are careful to maintain group loyalty. This is visible because even when they loll, the wide split between the groups is easily visible.
The game starts right now. I don't know what it is. The groups run away from each other. The first group has a neon green flag and the second one has a neon orange flag.
Two people from the first group climb up the Ferris wheel. My mouth blows wide open once again. Are they crazy? Do they have no regard for their lives? My heart crawls up my throat as I witness this probable suicide attempt. I would love to go and give them a slap to their faces.
The first one slips and the second one catches him/her. What the heck is going on here? Is it a part of Dauntless initiation? I pray for Beatrice frantically.
…
I go into the bathroom and lift my shirt. A dark, sickly blue-purple bruise is visible on my stomach. I check my head for injuries. There is a minuscule bump on my head which hurts a lot. I swear revenge on Xander.
…
I walk into the empty and dark hallway. Wise of me to skip the waking up, getting ready crap, isn't it? I was born ready. I clutch the file underneath my hoodie and go towards my new home, the sim room.
I find the light switch quickly and switch it on. I go into Alev's office quickly and slip out of it in half the time.
I go back into the dorm and lay on my bed with only one thought in my mind. Visiting Day.
…
Only later would I see the figure standing in the other hallway, grinning with glee at finding the perfect blackmail material.
…
Visiting Day is coming! I have many big plans for that one. Expect a meeting with the factionless. The previous reference was from the song 'The Phoenix' by Fall Out Boy. It's from their album Save Rock And Roll. Guess this one, Hint- its a Green Day song from their album 21st Century Breakdown although I am not sure.
Adieu and auf wiedersehen,
TheVibrantNight