Only fitting that Chapter 6 belongs to Tris. I'm enjoying writing this. leave me feedback, I appreciate it. I hope you enjoy the story. This is just the beginning.
Chapter 6
Tris
I almost fall to the floor. But something weighs me down and I am frozen to where I stand. The eyes, I have seen many, many, many times in the short glimpses of the Abnegation mirror as a young girl, in the stolen glimpses in spoons, glossy floors, and other reflective surfaces are looking back at me.
But the face is not exactly my own. The nose yes, but the lips aren't mine. But they are someone's I know all too well. Lips that have brushed my own many, many, many times. The ears too. Ears I have whispered into and breathed into. The hair is dark like same I wake up to every morning.
"What is it?" Tobias' nervous voice comes from behind me. I realize I am blocking his sight. Christina has her hand pressed to her mouth, eyes glossy and blinking rapidly. Zeke isn't sure what exactly to do, but he keeps his heavy pistol tight in his right hand. It is lowered and he looks at Amar who's eyebrows are scrunched together. He still keeps his gun raised.
I feel my now lead filled feet shift backward and to the side where Christina stands. I look at Tobias who also has his gun raised. As the body on the floor comes into his view, he squints his eyes and breathes hard. Then his face widens with shock. If I see them, he sees it too. The features are all too familiar to him as well.
"What…the…" Amar mutters slowly.
"Holy shit. Holy shit. Holy shit." Christina gasps behind her hand covered mouth.
I must be in a simulation. I must still be in a coma. I must have not survived after David shot me. This is the only explanation my mind can conceive.
Tobias' arms are lowered and his mouth is open. I look at his strong chest rises and fall slowly.
"Is this a dream?" I say aloud.
Tobias shakes his head.
"If it's a simulation, then it's not real!" I shout into the empty air. But Christina shakes her head rapidly. "Tris. This is real."
"Who are you?" Tobias' deep and shaky voices comes from behind me.
The girl on the floor shifts on her knees and breathes deeply. "I can't say just yet. But if you have to ask, you already know the answer. Or something of it."
Her body is slender and her legs are long. Her face is strong, yet soft at the same time. Her skin is pale like my own and I wonder how old she is. She cannot be any older than sixteen, if that.
Zeke clears his throat.
"I'm sorry…but you guys….she looks an awful lot like Tris. Except the hair and lips. That's all Four."
Christina says nothing. Her eyes are still wide and watering. Amar is equally silent.
She leans back and sits cross-legged on the floor. Her hands are still bound in front of her and she stares intently at me.
"You can guess if you want." She says to me. I shake my head and feel the room tilt a little. I have to lean back into the wall behind me for support. My knees feel a little tenuous and I want nothing but to sit. My back is now aching and the balls of my feet are tense. Apparently she notices and says "You should take it easy!"
Christina looks to me and then back at her. Then back to me.
"Tris…Four…" she mutters nervously.
Tobias walks over to me and puts his large, warm hand on my cheek. He is chewing the inside of his cheek like he always does when he's thinking or frustrated. It makes the muscles in his jaw clinch and move.
"Who are you, kid?" Amar says sternly.
She looks over at him, her eyes low and stern. "I told you, I'll tell you shortly. I have to wait for Tobias to get here."
"What?" Tobias says to her, confusion laced in his voice.
"He's already here, kid, you blind?" Zeke says scratching his neck with the handle of his pistol.
She shakes her head and giggles a little. "No, not that Tobias. The other one."
She motions with her head toward Tobias who's stiffened near me.
"I'm not sure what you're playing at, but you're obviously a psychopath who hit her head a few good times. C'mon Zeke, get her out of here. I don't have time for this." Tobias almost spits at her.
I look slowly from him back to her. Her head is lowered slightly and there's a look on her face that is almost forlorn. I see his lips, no, her lips tremble slightly at the icy knives that Tobias threw with his words.
Zeke motions again toward her, but I can't help myself. I shout "Don't! Leave her alone!"
He raises a irritable eyebrow at me and then glares at Tobias as if to say "Control your wife."
Tobias rounds on me and places his strong hands on my shoulders.
"Tris…this is some kind of trick. Some kind of sick joke or sim. I don't know what it is, I'm not sure how we got hit with it, but we're gonna get out."
I look into his dark navy eyes and grimace. I can't help but shift my gaze away from him and back toward her sitting on the ground. He releases me. He knows I don't believe him. I don't know what to believe right now.
"Tris." He begins, but I stop and walk back toward her. She looks up at me, her eyes glistening with curiosity and fear. I clear my own throat this time and cough slightly to alleviate the pressure inside of it.
"You called me Six. When you carried me up here. How do you know that name?"
She grins at this and says happily "Four and Six!"
I look toward Tobias and he shakes his head, unable to comprehend any of it.
"How?" I ask her again.
"He gave you that name." She says motioning again towards Tobias with a nod of her head. "During your fear landscape in Dauntless. You were the second ranking member with the least number of fears. Six, well seven to be exact, but I guess you got over that 'fear'".
She grins and I feel myself go red at the reference. Tobias' face flushes a little and I look at him, then back to her.
"I've never told anyone that." I say softly. "Anyone."
Christina looks at me and still says nothing.
"Jeez, you Stiffs are certainly something else. Six fears?" Zeke says.
Usually I would retort and tell him not to call me that, but I am too numb with shock and wonder of whatever is happening right now.
She yawns a little, making us jump in unison. Zeke and Amar both raised their guns quickly. Her eyes dart back and forth from them and then she tilts her head back and laughs. It is light and deep all at once and she slows into a chuckle. "A girl can't yawn? I've been up for nearly eighteen hours."
I bit my lip, tasting the coppery blood now on my tongue. She shifts on her behind and says "Tobias is almost here. In fact I can hear him reaching the elevator."
Amar cackles and snorts. "Please, if you've got a boyfriend coming up here, he won't get past my men. There's a good five of my best officers down there. It's over sweetheart, now why don't you get up and—-
Before he could finish the radio on his shoulder came on. Loud, strained voices were jetting in and out of the static.
"Amar! The—-oh shi—-
"We nee—-d backup!"
"Stop! Stop kid!—
But the radio cut out and there was nothing but the grainy hiss left to fill the air. I looked at Amar who was clicking the small gray button on the side, trying to get any response. His eyes widened and he looked at all of us. His long locked hair swung madly as he ran into the elevator.
"Watch her! She's more dangerous than she looks!" He shouted at Zeke before the doors closed.
Silence grasped the five of us for a few seconds as we watched the elevator disappear, until she opened her mouth and said "He's right."
Zeke turned quickly toward her but she didn't move. I recoiled slightly when I saw the same eyes that reflected my own shift quickly into sunset orange around the irises. Zeke gasped and the muscles in his face relaxed and became blank. His eyes grew dark as if he was transported into a far away land no one could reach him at.
"Take these ties off me." Her voice echoed and reverberated through the air. Zeke moved almost as if he was on strings toward her. Christina gasped and Tobias suddenly raised his pistol at her still seated on the floor. She quickly glanced at Christina, eyes still burning orange and said "Point your gun at Four. Shoot him in the arm if he tries anything."
Christina's eyes emptied and she rounded on Tobias raising her pistol. Tobias eyed her, then me, then her, then Zeke, then back to her.
Zeke cut the plastic ties around her wrist with a small black knife and she raised up off the floor. She rubbed her pale wrists where the ties had left bright red marks. Her eyes looked up at Zeke and she said "Thank you. Throw your gun across the room." He tossed the heavy pistol behind him and it slid against a wall.
"Now wake up." she said looking at him again.
Zeke stood still for three seconds and then his eyes flitted back and forth, regaining their light. He looked wild and dazed then looked at her. His eyes widened and his body trembled. I could see in his eyes he wasn't sure if he wanted to run or fight. So he stood still.
"What the hell are you!?" Tobias scathed, the gun still pointed directly at her chest. She sighed.
"Why do you keep asking the question you know the answer to? I'm you."
Tobias' arm drooped a little and I looked toward the elevator doors. Above them, the electronic meter was rising steadier and steadier.
Five floors away.
Two.
One.
I held my breath as the doors opened with a ding. A figure clad in a dark sleeveless sweatshirt and cowl neck collar emerged. His arms are defined and strong. His pants are fitted to his muscular short legs and his slim dark boots made him appear taller than he was. A hood covered his head and face partially. In his hand was a long sword with a black sheath around the blade. The handle was covered in red leather and looked heavy. The sheath was blunted and dented in small areas, even bearing a long scratch near the steel guard.
The girl sighed and said "Finally! What took you?"
The boy said nothing and Zeke rounded on him, his body now shifting into attack. He rushed him, his elbow nearly connecting with his stomach, but the boy turned almost in a blur and pushed Zeke backward with an almost unnatural strength. Zeke stammered a little and tried to regain his balance. His boots had left deep scraps in the floor from where he was just pushed.
"Stop! Don't fight!" The girl yelled at both of them.
Tobias then shifted his pistol toward the boy and Christina raised hers, her eyes blank and glossy.
I didn't think, I rushed Christina and pushed her down, the pistol firing at a angle near the ceiling. The bang rang inside my head and the shattering glass over head screeched on the floor. Zeke spotted his gun across the room and dove for it. The boy with the sword stood there. I looked up. I felt my eyes narrow in bafflement. in He could've stopped Zeke. Why didn't he?
Tobias now had his gun directly pointed at the boy, his finger flexing against the trigger. Zeke stood up and raised his own.
This was going to end badly.
Suddenly the girl cried out. "Tobias take off your hood! Now!"
Tobias and Zeke both quickly at her but thought nothing of it. Christina shifted under me with a groan. I shouted, my voice coming back to me, "Don't shoot!"
"Tris!" Tobias yelled agitated his face rounding on me. I could see the hot anger in his dark eyes now wide open.
"Let him…let him remove his hood." I say quietly.
Zeke looks at Tobias and then at me. He slowly lowers his gun.
"What are you doing Zeke?" Tobias grits through his teeth.
"Four…c'mon man." He mutters.
I feel Christina rise up next to me on the floor. She clutches her head and her eyes are groggy, but she is herself again.
"What….what happened?" She says dryly. Her lips are slightly chapped and there's a small gleam of sweat under her nose. She looks at me, then at the girl, then at Zeke and Tobias, but then gasps as the boy with the sleeveless hood raises his hands upward.
I feel my heart stop within my chest, then race underneath my palms.
He lowers his hood and a short, cropped dark blonde mop of hair appears. His face is the nearly the exact face of the man I wake up to every morning. It is the face I saw when I first hit the net when I chose Dauntless. It is the face of the man in this room whom I am in love with.
It's Tobias. But shorter. Younger. Clean shaven. His bottom lips protrudes out and his eyes are like mine. Just like the girl near me standing up. The look on his face is the same brooding, handsome one like my Tobias' face.
Tobias drops his gun and it clatters to the floor with a pang. He steps backward, his heels crunching some of the broken glass that Christina's gun blasted apart.
This is not real.
Wake up.
Wake up Tris.
But even as I bite my lip and dig my fingernails into my palms, nothing will wake me. This is real.
Zeke whistles and says "Well I'll be damned. Your boyfriend sure does look a lot like Four."
She whips around to him and glares. The look familiar to me as if I've done it a million times. Because I have.
"Boyfriend? He's my twin brother, Uncle Zeke."
The last part she did not mean to say because she immediately bites the tip of her tongue after speaking it. Her eyes close and she sucks her teeth annoyed.
The boy with Tobias' face looks at her irritably. I see it written all in his face. I've seen the look far too often to not recognize it.
"Wh—Uncle?" Zeke says laughing nervously.
"Nice one." The boy says his tone even. His voice is deep but also is light in it's inflection.
"Shut it, Tobias. It was an accident. They're gonna find out anyway. That's why we're here, right?" She says grinning at him. He rolls his eyes and folds his strong, short arms across his chest. He bites the inside of his cheek, his jaw muscles moving tightly up and down.
I look over at Tobias who hasn't stopped gaping at the boy. I cannot help staring either. Christina shifts on the ground and then raises up. She is shaking and gripping her shoulders.
"You two…are twins?" She asks cautiously.
The girl with the dark hair walked over to the boy and stood next to him. She was slightly taller than him by a few feet. Her slim and lanky body was developing curves and accents. I only noticed that she also was muscular in regions as well.
"Of course we are. Not identical. But almost." She says analyzing the boy's face carefully.
"Who…" Christina begins but her voice catches as if it is snagged on a hook. "Who's your parents?"
The girl grinned and said "You already know the truth, Aunt Christina. You saw it when she took off that visor. So say it. You always do anyway."
Christina jumped at the word 'aunt', I saw her recoil slightly toward the wall. Her eyes shifted to meet my own and then she looked over at Tobias who was still standing statuesque. I got up and walked over to him. He jumped slightly when I placed my hand into his own.
The girl and boy both looked at us. She took his hand like I took Tobias' just now and smiled.
"Mom. She murmured. "Dad."
I felt my heart leap and lump in my throat. Tobias gripped my hand tightly and it felt sweaty.
Mom.
Dad.
Me.
Tobias.
Cause every story needs a good appearance from the future right? Who are these mysterious kids who claim to be Tris and Tobias' children? Is it a simulation? Is it all a dream? Find out on the next Dragonball Z.
Haha no, but more chapters will be up soon. Introducing Natalie and TJ viewpoints next chapter!