Hi hi! Here's the next chapter, enjoy! :) I'm posting this a bit earlier than usual. This is because I can! And it's ready, so why not?

Disclaimer: I do not own the Divergent series. Veronica Roth does.

Chapter 6: The Outside

After dinner, I follow the others round the shops in the Pit for a while before managing to slip away when they're not watching. I head back to the training room, intending to use the knives again. When I get there though, they're not laid out on the counter any more. Six and Four must lock them away for night. Instead, I walk to a punch-bag and spend a while hitting it. I mostly use my left hand, pain flashing through my other hand if I try to punch the bag with it.

"So this is where you've been hiding," A voice says right behind me. I jump and spin around to see Laura watching me. I wander how long she was standing there.

"Just getting in some extra practice," I shrug.

"Good idea. Mind if I join you?" she asks.

"You can do whatever you want." I wince at how harsh it sounds, but she doesn't seem to notice. After a while, we both stop, breathing hard with exertion.

"Do you think you're hand will be better for the fights?" I ask her as we walk over to the benches lining one of the walls.

"I doubt it. I'm hoping I can do really well at the knife throwing and the shooting to get me in. I'm going to lose all my fights," she says, looking down.

I remember how I vowed to get us both through initiation. "I'll help you." I tell her. She looks up, her eyes bright.

"Really? You'd do that?" She asks, hopeful.

"Of course." I reply. "We can come in here in the evenings and practice. You'll beat them all one-handed," I say, trying to cheer her up.

She nods at me. "Okay. By the way, I wanted to talk to you about the other day,"

I look away. My actions repulsed even me. I don't want to know that she is feeling the same way.

"I wanted to say thanks," She says. I look up, confused. "Nobody's ever stood up for me before. Not like that. I know you might think you did the wrong thing, but I'm grateful all the same. I wanted you to know that." She smiles at me.

Her words remind me of my curiosity to know what happened to her in Amity. "Surely people stood up for you in Amity," I say carefully, not wanting to trigger the sorrow I saw in her last time.

"Well, not really." She replies.

"What do you mean?" I press.

"I don't really want to talk about it." She says, looking down. Guilt pierces through me and I sit back and the silence stretches between us.

"Maybe I'll tell you some day," She says, not meeting my eyes. "I'm just not ready yet. Let's just say that I too, know a lot about being alone, without many friends."

I don't understand how that could be; Amity is known for its friendship. But I don't question her any more about it. I try to think of something to say but nothing comes to mind and the silence settles back on us. Laura doesn't seem to mind it.

Suddenly, I hear the door bang open and Four and Six stumble in, grinning at each other. They don't notice us for a moment and Four pins Six against the wall, leaning down to kiss her lips firmly. I feel colour rush to my cheeks, embarrassed to be witnessing their moment of passion and privacy. Yet at the same time, I don't know whether to intrude, wandering if it would be better for them to spot us themselves. I glance at Laura who is trying not to giggle at the look on my face. When I look at her, she stops trying and laughter escapes her lips.

Four whirls around and I see both of their faces turn red at being spotted.

"Um, hi," I say. Laura just laughs harder. Four and Six grin at us.

"Hey," they say.

"So, um..." My voice trails off. "Laura and I are gonna go grab some sleep. See you!" I grab Laura's arm and pull her out into the hall, desperate to escape suddenly.

"That certainly was interesting," Laura says as we walk into the dorm, then stops dead.

"Evening, lovers," Thomas sneers. He is standing in the doorway.

"Get out the way," I say, my voice low. I've stepped in front of Laura protectively.

He looks at Laura who shrinks into herself under his gaze.

"I see you've finally found yourself a friend," He tells her. "Or is he just another way for you to hide away like you did in Amity?"

"Back off," I say, glaring down at him.

He raises his hands and steps out of the way, 'innocently'.

I walk over to my bed and after a bit, notice that Laura is putting her meagre possessions in the closet next to the bed by my bed. "I hop you don't mind," She says. I shake my head.

P/B

The next day, I wake up early again and do some pull-ups in the training room before everyone else arrives. When Four and Six walk in, I see colour rise to Six's cheeks and she looks down.

Four walks up to me, "I hear you've got yourself a new name." He says.

"Kunai," I say. "Simon came up with it."

"Good for you," he replies, and walks back over to Six.

We spend the whole morning with guns again. This time, we are taught how to reload them, dismantle them and clean them. I'm still terrible at shooting, missing the target more often than hitting.

P/B

At lunch, Eric walks over to our table.

"Tomorrow, all the initiates are to meet in the Pit at fifteen minutes past eight. If anyone's late, they will be left behind." He tells us before walking off again.

"Left behind?" Georgina says. "I wander where we're going."

I shrug and say, "Guess we'll find out."

The afternoon is spent with the knives again. Just like yesterday, it seems I am unable to hit anywhere but the centre of the target. By the end of the session, I have managed to decrease the wobble of the knife when I throw it, and throw them faster and faster. The others are able to get their knives to occasionally hit the target with varying levels of accuracy. When we are dismissed, I slip one of the knives into my pocket, glancing at Four and Six to make sure they didn't notice.

On the way to dinner, Laura turns to me, "You still up for going to the training room tonight?"

Four, who is walking behind us, overhears her. "What are you planning on doing? Same thing as last night?" He asks us, slyly

"We weren't doing anything!" I say defensively. He just grins.

"Kunai said he'd help me with fighting," Laura tells him.

"I said, we could help each other," I reply.

Four nods. "Good idea, you'll need all the practice you can get," He glances down at Laura's injured fingers. "If you want, I could spend some time with you guys and help out?"

Laura nods, "That would be awesome, thanks!"

"Okay, I'll come at about nine o'clock." he says and then runs ahead to catch up with Six.

P/B

After dinner, I slip away while the others are still talking about where we might be going tomorrow. I walk into the pit, and into the tattoo parlour. Tori is sitting in the waiting chairs, talking to Bud, the guy she works with.

"Hey there," She greets me. Bud stands and heads to the back of the shop.

"Hi," I reply. I glance around nervously. "I was wandering if you could give me a tattoo."

"Well, you came to the right place," she says grinning. "What do you want?"

I point up at a picture of the Dauntless flames. "That one please,"

"You sure? It's a pretty overused tattoo," Tori replies.

I nod. "Yeah, but I want you to do something over the top."

"Okay, what?"

I glance around again and then pull the knife out of my jacket pocket. "This,"

"Where'd you get that?" She asks suspiciously, though she is smiling.

"Maybe I found it lying around," I reply, grinning.

I sit down in the chair and Tori asks me, "Where do you want it?"

I pull my jacket off and put my finger on the right side of my neck, "Here," I say. "The top needs to come just below my ear, and the bottom at the top of my shoulder."

She nods and starts getting equipment ready. I hear the buzz of the needle and when she presses it to my neck, it stings, but the pain isn't as bad as I was expecting.

P/B

About an hour later, I walk out with a bandage over the tattoo on my neck. I look at my watch which reads 9:15 and walk faster to get to the training room.

When I get there, Four and Six are already by the punch-bags. Laura looks up when I walk in, "Hey, where'd you go?" She asks. Then she sees the bandage on my neck and her eyes widen, "Oh god, what happened?"

"It's nothing," I say. "I got a tattoo is all,"

Both Laura and Four look surprised. We spend a while hitting the bags with Four watching us and giving tips, then he tells us to get on the mats.

"Laura, your hand won't have healed fully by the time we start fights again," he tells her. "You've got to find a way of fighting without it, but remember that your opponent will likely try to use it as a weakness against you. That will make them predictable."

He and Laura fight first. They stop their fists before they can land to begin with, but eventually Laura is dodging where Four would be punching. Then he decides to stop pulling back his fist, but he goes slowly. She is able to dodge most of his hits. Four told her that she'd be better off trying to dodge hits rather than block them because she is so small.

Then it is my turn. Four looks up at me, "Never noticed how tall you were," he says, smiling slightly. I am about three inches taller than him. "Your height means that you will have longer reach than most of your opponents. They will think you are lumbering and slow so you'll have to prove them wrong." We start circling, and he suddenly darts in, punching at my face. I push his arm up with my left arm before he can hit me and try to hit his stomach with my right hand, but he has already dodged and I'm left leaning forward, then suddenly, he has tripped me up.

"You left yourself open. Don't overstretch so much." He tells me.

After a while, I can block most of his attacks, and have landed a couple of my own, constantly learning from his advice. When we finish, we are all exhausted and my eyes close the instant my head hits the pillow.

P/B

"Kunai, you need to wake up or we'll be late," I hear Laura's voice the next morning. I look at my watch, it's eight o'clock. I remember that we need to be in the Pit in fifteen minutes. Laura heads out, satisfied that I'm awake and I rush into my clothes before running to the Pit. When I arrive, everyone is already there, gathered around Six, Four, Uriah and Lynn. I breathe a sigh of relief that Eric isn't coming.

"Right, let's go for a morning run," Four says, grinning when he sees that everyone is here.

We follow them out of the compound and we jog through the streets towards the edge of the city. It's the first real chance I've had to see the Dauntless-born initiates. They are able to keep up easily, joking amongst each other and racing between blocks.

Eventually, we arrive at the city gate, where Four talks briefly to the Dauntless members who are gathered by the gate. Four walks back to us and the Dauntless open the gate. Land stretches out before us for as far as I can see. I've never been to the outside of the city before so this is the first time I've seen it. I wander how far that land can go on for.

"Listen up!" Four shouts over everyone. "This is where most of you will be stationed after you pass initiation. Usually people ranked in the bottom five come here to either guard the fence or to go out there for patrols," He points at the open land below us. Not for the first time, I wander what is out there. As a kid, I used to imagine all kinds of monsters that would invade the city and kill everyone. I imagine going out there, on patrols, and the image makes me smile.

We spend a while by the gate, everyone speculating as to what is in the world outside the city. Most agree that nothing is there. Everyone knows that the war destroyed most of the civilization in the world and we are pretty much all that is left. I think to myself that if one city is still habited, how can there not be others?

We don't run back to the Dauntless compound. Instead, we head up some stairs on the side of one of the roads. At the top, we arrive on a train platform.

"Oh no," Laura mumbles next to me. I grin.

When the train comes round the corner, our instructors start jogging along the platform and we all follow their lead. As the train comes past, I grab the handle and pull myself onto the step. I hit the button to open the door and reach my hand out to Laura. She grabs it and I haul her up into the train car. I stand there helping the others who are near our door get in.

We get back to the compound just before lunch. Four tells us that we have to gather in the training room as usual after lunch.

P/B

When I walk through the training room door, everyone is already there, though I'm not late.

"Today, we're gonna be doing some more gun training," Six announces. I groan quietly. When I head over to the counter with the others, Four pulls me aside.

"We've got something else planned for you," he tells me.

I follow him over to an open area in the corner of the training room where he hands me a few throwing knives. I look at him questioningly. But he just walks over to a bag and pulls out a couple of coloured balls the size of my fist. He holds one out in front of him and says, "Hit it," then suddenly throws it into the air.

I widen my eyes as I realize what I have to do. I raise a knife, preparing to throw. I watch as the ball reaches the top of it's flight and begins to come down again. I don't think; I just throw the knife. It sails out of my hand, and hits the ball in mid-flight, before landing on the ground. I look up at Four who is shaking his head.

"That's really quite something," he says chuckling. I look behind me and see that everyone is watching me, their eyes wide. I feel suddenly embarrassed and turn back to Four.

We spend the rest of the afternoon repeating this. Four changes things, telling me to hit the ball at a certain height. Then he stands behind me and throws the ball over my head, and my knife hits it, launching it further forward until it hits the wall, the knife pinning it in place. It is too high for us to reach so we just leave it there. After a while, Six walks over and they try something else. They take one ball each, of different colours and throw them up into the air at the same time. Four shouts a colour when they both reach the top of their flight and I throw my knife at the ball of that colour. Then they try it with three balls at the same time, followed by four balls.

At the end of the session, Four and Six gather everyone in the corner. He gets everyone to stand in a line in front of me before joining the end of the line with Six. They hand a ball to each person and instruct them to throw their ball into the air after the person next to them has thrown theirs.

I pick up six knives and plant them, blade first, into a table next to me. Laura starts, throwing her ball into the air. As soon as the ball leaves her hand, Georgina, who is standing next to her, throws hers. I throw a knife at Laura's ball, reaching with my other hand for another knife. I don't look to see if my first knife hits; I throw the next knife, my hands working like a machine, passing another knife into my right hand to be thrown at each ball. By the time I reach the end, Six's ball is nearing the ground next to her. I throw the last knife as hard as I can and see it hit the ball just before it hits the ground.

I look and see that all the balls are lying behind them, a knife through the centre of each one. They all applaud me, and I bow, grinning.

"Looks like we have ourselves another prodigy," Four says to me while Six grins before Simon, Georgina and Laura surround me, with comments like "That was amazing!" and "How did you do that?" I see Thomas leave the room, scowling. The truth is, I realize, I have no idea how I did it. My mind was blank as I threw the knives, not even thinking about it. The thought scares me a little.

P/B

After dinner, I head to the training room. I stand in front of a mirror on one of the walls and notice the bandage on my neck. I pull it off, revealing the tattoo underneath. The Dauntless flames burn a bright orange-red, with the knife coloured in black, perfectly resembling the knives I've been throwing all afternoon. Tori told me to keep the bandage on for at least twenty-four hours. My appearance has changed hugely in the past few days. I am still lanky, as if I've been stretched out, but my shoulders are slightly broader and the muscles on my torso are more pronounced. My hair is still long, covering the top of my tattoo; I decide to get it cut the first chance I can.

I hear the door open and turn to see Laura walk in. She stops when she sees the tattoo on my neck and whispers, "That looks really good."

"Thanks," I say, grinning. "I thought it was appropriate," she smiles back and walks round the side of me to get a better look at it. I am suddenly aware of how close she is; I can feel her breath on my neck. A voice inside me says, There's a pretty girl standing right next to you! andI feel my cheeks colouring. I force myself to stand still though, and eventually she pulls back.

We spend about a half hour punching the bags until Four arrives. He glances at my tattoo but says nothing. He helps us fight him again and I go to bed, exhausted, but feeling the best I've felt in several years.

Thank you once again for taking the time to continue reading these chapters and I'll see you in the next one! :)

~Crysics~