AN: This is a newish draft I had started, but never could wrap up in a way that I liked. It's going to be short, likely under 10 chapters, and I'll be able to update at least once per week. Hope you enjoy.
He hated the platinum blonde hair.
Growing up in Erudite, it's all he'd see. It was never natural, just like the fake glasses some would wear if they had no issues with their eyesight, but everything that was done by the women in that faction was in an effort to emulate Jeanine Matthews.
Just like her red lips, overdrawn just like her hair was brittle from being over bleached, and her black rimmed glasses, just as fake as her smile.
He hated her, but she was fucking brilliant.
"Why haven't I gotten anyone new from you?" She asks, causing Max's dark brown eyes to jerk to him.
"Initiation just started, how the fuck am I supposed to know who's divergent the first three weeks?" He grumbles, while cleaning under his fingernails with the tip of his knife.
"Who do you think you're speaking to like that?" Jeanine hisses.
"We're on even ground now, Jeanine, or did you forget I'm a leader just like you?" He sneers.
"You're not the head leader." Max states.
"Neither is she," Eric gestures towards Jeanine, "She may act like it, but I know for a fact that my father is still running shit over there like the Wizard of fucking Oz."
The narrowing of her eyes and brief frown are enough to tell him that he's right.
"Your father and I are the reason you're even here, Eric. Have you forgotten you didn't even finish high enough in your own initiation to have earned the position you're in right now?"
He fucking hated her. She may have been the most brilliant woman to ever rise to power in Erudite, but she was nothing more than a whore in his eyes. He knew his father had been fucking Jeanine for years, and his mother turned the other cheek because she reaped the benefits of their relationship. She had the furs, the money, the place in society as the wife of a head leader, and she didn't ever have to open her legs to get it.
That was all Jeanine.
While Jeanine was certainly intelligent enough for her role, she wasn't deserving, and in order to be noticed by his father she used her own body to get what she wanted. She'd fucked her way into being his second in command, and when she wanted her side project to study divergents funded she simply swallowed his fathers dick.
"I don't need any reminders." He growls and she purses her lips.
"Obviously, you do because I would have expected someone by now. Max, he's been put in charge of the training, correct?" She asks.
"Jeanine, we have a program in place here that works well for the development of our soldiers-"
She slams her hand on the table, "Change it." She hisses at Max.
Eric looks at his head leader, waiting for the explosion he knows is coming, instead he gets a meek response, "Eric, you heard her, get the fear sims started."
"Fine." He says as he stands up. He feels her icy fingers on his forearm and he bristles at the touch.
"You have one week to bring me someone." She says.
"Or what?" He spits back at her.
"I'll no longer have any use for you." She smiles sinisterly at him.
He knows what she's not saying, which is if he doesn't find her more divergents, he's dead. He makes his way down to the initiate gym, slamming the doors open and taking a bit of satisfaction seeing them jump. Four looks over at him with a scowl and he makes his way over to the trainer.
He and Four were in the same training class, and Number Boy was the top finishing initiate while Eric was second. Four was offered leadership, and had accepted, causing Jeanine Matthews and his own father Byron Coulter to force Max's hand in making a second leadership position. Max had balked, saying that his team was full and less than twenty-four hours after he'd told Jeanine and Byron he wouldn't be changing the rules, one of his leaders named Amar Patel was missing, with everything the man owned left behind in his apartment, along with a suicide note.
Based on the note, and no paper or electronic trail left behind, he had no choice but to accept the ruling of a suicide. However, Max Powell knew better, he was being sent a firm message by a faction that was ruthless, and he offered the now open position to Eric Coulter. Max had been working with Erudite for years, so he also followed Jeanine's demand to bring Eric into their plans.
There was something in it for them, because not only did Jeanine want to study divergents, she and Byron also had plans to overthrow the government, usurping the power held by Marcus Eaton and Abnegation. Once she had the power, the leadership team would be Byron, Jeanine, Max and Eric, the twenty year old former Erudite she had hand picked to infiltrate Dauntless.
"Change of plans kids, we're starting stage two today." Eric bellows and Four makes his way over to him.
"What are you doing?" He asks.
"You all heard me, fucking line up and we're getting out of here." Eric commands and he watches as all of the initiates do as he said.
"What's going on?" Lauren Dalton, the Dauntless born initiate trainer asks as her class joins the transfers.
"Are the two of you deaf? I just said there's been a change of plans." Eric says as he moves away from them.
"You can't do this." Four says as he gets in front of Eric, "Why are you even here?"
"I'm here because I can be." Eric replies angrily, "Max sent me. If you have an issue with my orders, take it up with him. I don't have time for your shit." Eric pushes past him and approaches the trainees.
They are a pitiful bunch. There are a couple of familiar faces in the Dauntless born group, but these transfers look like deer in headlights.
"What's your name?" He asks a tall blonde man with ice blue eyes.
"My name is Edward, sir." He replies.
"You're in first place." Eric states and Edward smiles.
"I am, sir."
"You're proud of that, right?" Eric presses.
"Yes sir." Edward replies
"You've been here three weeks, you aren't shit." Eric replies and he hears snickers from the group.
"What the fuck is so funny?" He asks, getting into the face of the youngest Pedrad.
"Nothing, sir."
"Yet, you laughed. You'll go first." Eric hisses.
"First in what, sir?" Uriah asks.
"You'll find out." Eric replies.
He paces back and forth in front of the group, and suddenly he sees a nervous looking woman, trying to disappear behind the large Candor transfer. She's the one he remembers seeing jump first into the unknown.
The Stiff.
"Think you can hide from me, Stiff?" He asks, approaching her slowly.
"No sir." She says evenly.
"Why were you hiding from me?"
"I wasn't." She protests.
"Oh but you were. You'll be going first for the transfers." He spits.
"Yes sir." She nods and he yanks her by her arm and drags her away from the group.
"Eric, you can't do this, leave her alone." Four protests and he turns towards his fellow leader.
"Fuck off. If you have an issue, take it up with Max. You two can divvy up the rest of these babies, I'll be back for an update on him soon." Eric nods towards Uriah Pedrad before dragging Tris from the room.
"Where are we going?" She asks and he looks down at her.
"Why the fuck do you think you can talk to me?" He asks angrily.
She doesn't answer, she just allows herself to be pulled down the dark hallway. He finally unlocks a room, and she looks around once he's turned the light on. The room looks just like the one she took her aptitude test in at The Hub.
"Are we doing the aptitude test?" She asks.
"Shut up." He replies as he powers all of the equipment on and he pushes her into the reclined chair.
He starts attaching leads to her and her hazel eyes flit around, "What is this? What are we doing?"
"Didn't I tell you to shut up? What the fuck is wrong with you?" He asks.
"What is wrong with you? It was you who storms into training, tells us that there's a change of plans but tell me nothing as you yank me down a hall. Can't you at least tell me what you're doing to me?"
Her cheeks are flushed, and her hazel eyes are narrowed at him. She looks furious and he's over this smart mouthed Stiff.
He presses the injection into her neck, and he watches the horror pass over her features right before she falls into her sim.
He watches the screen, and he sees the scene clearly. She's in a desolate area, it almost looks like the desert, and everything is burning around her. She's running, trying to get away from the roaring flames. He can hear the squawk of birds, and she shades her eyes with her hand in an effort to see them.
There are thousands of them.
She starts to run faster, and the birds swoop in. They begin pecking at her skin, swarming her, and her screams fill the room.
"Fucking birds." He shakes his head and starts cleaning his nails again.
She's thrashing on the chair, and he shakes his head at her pitiful reactions. He keeps cleaning his nails, glancing at the screen once in awhile and seeing her do absolutely nothing to help herself.
"This isn't real." She whispers, and his eyes jerk to where she now sits relaxed on the chair.
He watches the screen, and suddenly the birds burst into flames, evaporating to ash that falls over her like a snowdrift.
He watches as she slowly wakes up, and she sits up with a start, wrapping her arms around her legs and resting her chin on her knees.
He remembers his first fear landscape vividly, he forced to stand in a stark white room, with his dark blue suit, staring up at his father. He remembers all of the words, failure, disappointment, useless, an idiot, worthless.
"I'll never be proud of you."
He will never be good enough for Byron.
He shakes his head to try to get his fathers voice out of it, and he watches the woman on the chair as she tries to gather herself.
"How long do you think you were in there?" He asks and she buries her face in her arms.
"Half an hour?" She asks in a barely audible voice.
"Three minutes."
She looks up at him and sees absolutely no reaction from him, just his icy silver blue eyes staring back at her.
"Is that bad?"
"The average time to successfully make it through one fear is fourteen to seventeen minutes." He replies slowly.
"It felt so real." She shivers.
"It's supposed to."
It's the most Eric Coulter has spoken to her since she transferred three weeks ago, so she takes her chances and asks him another question.
"Did I do well?"
He watches her, walking around the chair like he's stalking his prey, and she remembers who is in the room with her. This isn't the kind and gentle Four, this is ruthless and dangerous Eric.
"How'd you know it wasn't real?" He asks.
He's in her personal space, she is uncomfortable and it shows. He smiles at her, his teeth perfectly straight and white, and she notices the smile doesn't reach his eyes.
"It's a sim, just like the aptitude test." She replies nervously.
He removes the leads from her and he feels her hazel eyes trailing him. He knows she's incredibly nervous, but she's also too defiant to just give in. He saves the sim to a portable drive and then deletes any evidence of it from the machine.
"Wait here." He commands before leaving the room.
Even if she wanted to leave, she couldn't. She hears him engage the lock before stomping away. She paces around the room, feeling like a caged animal, and she chews on her fingernails.
Why was Eric changing their training routine?
Why did he single her out, and then seem very interested in how long it took her to get through the sim?
Why did he ask her how she knew it wasn't real?
She remembers the day of her aptitude test, when the Dauntless woman she now knows as Tori Wu had turned to her and told her she was dangerous. She warned Tris that she was something called Divergent, and that people like her weren't safe in the city. She'd advised Tris to stay in Abnegation, since it was one of the three aptitudes she had received as a result of her testing.
Tris could never stay there. She may be selfless at times, but she could never give up her own choices to become a subservient Abnegation wife and mother. She loved her parents, and she knew they were happy together, but their life wasn't something she wanted.
She wanted to be free.
Eighteen years in Abnegation had showed her how little she fit in. She was strong, both physically and mentally, she questioned things and she was protective of who she loved. She wouldn't ever be a woman who's only purpose was to cook, clean and rear children.
She's startled when the door opens and Eric walks in again.
"You're coming with me." He says gruffly.
"Am I going back to training?" She asks and he actually laughs at her.
"You really don't get it, do you? Weren't you warned about coming here, I'm sure whoever gave you the aptitude test told you that having an aptitude for multiple factions was dangerous." He replies.
"What are you talking about?" She asks.
He moves so quickly she doesn't have time to step aside, and he's got her pushed against a wall. His breath fans over her, the smell of cigarettes with the mint gum he's chewing masking most of it.
"What were your aptitudes?" He barks.
"Dauntless." She says, jutting her chin out and not breaking eye contact.
"And?"
"And nothing. I'm Dauntless." She replies.
"You're nothing." He replies, "What was the other aptitude besides Dauntless?"
She doesn't back down, just pursing her lips and staring right at him.
"I saw your results were entered manually by Tori Wu. If you won't tell me, she will." He says lowly.
"She wouldn't." Tris stammers.
Eric presses against her, and leans his mouth towards her ear, "I'll make her." He whispers.
"Please don't hurt her. Please. I'll do whatever you need, no one should be hurt because of what I am." She says.
"Dauntless and Abnegation." Eric whispers and she shivers beneath him, "Anything else?"
"Erudite." She whispers back.
"That wasn't so hard now, was it?" Eric replies.
"Are you going to kill me?" She asks and he just stares at her, "Just do it, get it over with, but please don't hurt anyone else because of me. Please."
He doesn't know if it's the sound of her begging, or the way her body feels against his, but he realizes he's getting hard and he can imagine she feels it too.
"What's in it for me if I don't hurt anyone else little Stiff?" He rubs his nose softly down her cheek.
"What do you want from me?" She asks.
He presses his erection against her core, and he hears the sharp intake of breath she takes, "What do you think?"
She's not naive. She may be a former Abnegation, but she's neither a virgin nor a prude. She also knows Eric is exactly who Tori was warning her about, and she doesn't want Tori or anyone else to be hurt, or even worse killed because of her inability to stay in Abnegation.
"Does it have to be here?" She asks.
"You'll give me enough to preview. I'm not taking you out of here just for you to run or scream." Eric replies and she nods her head.
"What do you want me to do?" She asks.
"Are you a virgin, Stiff?"
She shakes her head, "No."
"Interesting. I always thought the Abnegation thought fucking was indulgent." He teases her.
"I wasn't a very good Abnegation." She replies.
The smile on his face is still sinister, but now she sees his silvery eyes blown out with lust.
"Surprise me, but make it good." He says.
"There's nothing I will give you that isn't good." She replies in a voice much more confident than the butterflies in her stomach should allow.
Her hands travel down to the waist of his jeans, and he's surprised when he feels her unbuttoning them. She slowly lowers his zipper, and then with a practiced hand she cups him through his boxer briefs. She moves her hand up and down, slow and deliberate, and he lets out a slow breath.
"Don't fucking tease me." He barks.
She pushes his pants and boxers down his hips and palms his erection in her hand. When she brings her hand up to her lips, he watches as she generously licks it before bringing it back down to him.
"Fuck..." He drawls when she wraps her hand around him and begins pumping his straining flesh, "That feels too good."
She keeps pumping her hand over him, adding her other hand and looking up at him. He surprises her when he leans in and kisses her, his tongue demanding entrance and twirling with hers.
For the first time since this whole strange situation started, the sick feeling in her stomach is gone, and the twinge between her legs makes her realize she's enjoying this too.
She removes her hands from him and he picks her up and presses her against the wall. Kissing her like she'll disappear and she moans into his mouth when he moves against her.
"You want this too, don't you Stiff?" He purrs and she nods her head.
That's all it took.
He yanks her leggings down and bends her over the chair, rubbing himself through her soaked folds and entering her in one hard stroke. The noise he makes is almost animalistic and he drives into her rapidly.
She feels him pulling her hair and then she's flush against him, sloppily kissing him as he pounds against her, feeling hot all over, her muddled thoughts alternating between how dirty she is for literally fucking someone for her life, and loving the feeling of what he's doing to her.
"Tris..." Her name falls from his lips and it shocks them both.
He pushes her back down and she begins to pulse around him, milking his own release as he slumps over her and breathes into her neck.
"You just bought yourself an extra day." He says breathlessly and she lets out the breath she didn't realize she was holding.