A/N: So I wrote a little Tobias POV one-shot that ties in with this chapter titled We're In This Together. It falls after chapter 16 and before this chapter. If you've read it already you got a big, fat spoiler, but hopefully I've kept this interesting enough to be worth the read.
I have to say I'm pretty bummed out right now. I've only got 4-5 more chapters and then this will be finished. This chapter and all the ones that follow I've been dying to write for months, but now that I'm here it's bittersweet. I've had such a wonderful time writing it and the enthusiasm the fandom has had for it has truly meant a lot to me. I don't want to see it end, but I can't drag it out forever. I can't say it enough, but THANK YOU everyone who has reviewed, followed, and favourited this.
I crawl across our bed and shake Tobias awake. I don't know what time he got to sleep last night, but it was probably a lot later than I did. I let him sleep in as long as possible, but he's still got faint circles under his eyes.
He untangles his arms from the covers and pulls me down to him. "Come on, time to get up," I say against his neck.
"I'd rather stay here."
"You're the one who volunteered us to go check out the fence."
"Well that was a terrible idea," he deadpans.
"It was your idea," I remind him.
He groans, releasing me and sitting up. "Yeah, it was."
I hand him a cup of coffee and go into the closet, collecting a backpack and some clothes. To be honest I'm not thrilled about this either. The prospect of spending a night outside the Pire, in a strange and unfamiliar part of the city is unappealing, but maybe it will do Tobias some good, somehow balance out how unhappy he was hosting the meeting in our apartment last night. Tori said that it was only fair we did after her and Harrison hosted the last two in their apartments. Fair or not it was a terrible idea.
By the time we finish packing a change of clothes and a few toiletries there's a knock at the door. Cara pulls out the contents of a second backpack as Elia, Tobias and I watch, explaining how to use each item inside of it, or how she improved something basic like a sleeping bag. They follow us outside, mingling with the three other teams each going to a different part of the fence. Uriah's there, laughing and joking with Zeke and Shauna, happy that he can at least do something since no one seems to think it's a good idea to send him outside the fence.
When the tracks start humming with the approach of the train we say a hasty goodbye to those grouped with us and then start jogging towards the tracks. The cold, bitter wind that's blowing is only intensified by the train, and once we're inside Tobias pulls me down to the floor with him, tucking me between his legs so we can keep warm with my back against his chest and his arms around me.
Tobias is tense against me, nervous probably about what we will find when we get to our destination. I've never been to the southern part of the city before but Tobias has; last night when he volunteered us he said he 'knew a good spot' in the fence there. "So how did you find this place... whatever it is," I ask, tilting my head back against his shoulder so I don't have to shout the question over the cry of the wind.
"Later, okay?" I scowl at him, but all he does is grin and kiss me lightly.
We watch the other teams jump from the train until we're the last ones remaining. I can't remember the last Tobias and I had a train car to ourselves. Maybe the night when he showed me how the Erudite were keeping their lights on despite the city ordinances. The place where we jump off the train is barren. There are tufts of dead grass peeking up over the thin covering of slushy snow and the fence is clearly in view, and that is pretty much it. "There's tire tracks," I say, stopping dead when we come flush with the fence.
"There's patrols. We shouldn't meet anyone this time of day though," he says.
"Dauntless?" I ask, falling into line behind him as he walks in one of the ruts so as not to leave obvious footprints.
"And Factionless."
I pull my scarf tighter around me. There's a storm moving in, but it's not supposed to get really nasty until tomorrow night. If there was any moisture in the air right now I'm sure it would be snowing; it's cold enough. "You remember in lower levels science class how they used to tell us that before global warming this time of year would be considered Spring?"
"Yeah?"
"It must have been nice to have warm weather so early in the year." Tobias laughs, really laughs, and even though it's cold out I can't help feeling a little warmer at the sound. It's been too rare lately. "This weather sucks."
"Yeah, it does, though we should probably be grateful for it."
"Remind me of that when I'm losing fingers and toes to frostbite," I quip and he laughs again. "How far do we have to go?"
He points up ahead of us to a cluster of trees and I have to suppress a groan at just how far away they are. It's too windy and cold to really hold a conversation so we walk in silence. I stare at my feet, focusing on putting one in front of the other and ignoring how distant our destination seems. And, mercifully, the walk seems shorter for it.
Tobias takes my hand and leads me through a copse of barren trees, the ground thick with dead vegetation. In the Spring after the rains it must be alive with color, but right now it's all the same sickly brown. When we emerge from it my eyes go wide. There's a whole row of houses. No, not houses, mansions. I know the word, but I've never seen any building that fits that description until now.
"People used to live here?" I gasp.
"Apparently."
"But they're so..."
"Big?" Tobias offers, an edge to his voice that tells me his thoughts are in line with my own.
"Yeah." Some of the homes are big enough to fit three or four of the house I grew up in. Unless every family had a dozen kids they would never need all of this. It's almost offensive in it's ostentatiousness.
We walk down the middle of what was once the street. It's eerie. This was obviously the rich part of town, the part of town where people could afford to build out of stone and brick instead of wood. And by virtue of their materials and the fact that the buildings were so far away from the center of the city they're almost perfect, at least from the outside. It feels like there should be people around, watching us from the windows, or just walking down the street like us.
Most of the homes have grand entrances facing the street, proudly proclaiming the owners wealth and status, but the one Tobias leads me towards doesn't. It's just as big as the others, but it looks more like a government building than a home. The windows are narrow and covered with heavy wrought irons grates, and the front door is hidden on the side of the house. The whole thing giving off an air of impenetrability.
We walk past the door. It looks inaccessible anyway since it too is protected by ironwork. "How did you find this place?" I ask as we pick our way around the property, stopping at a heavy iron plate set into the ground.
"When I found out Evelyn was alive I knew I couldn't join the Factionless, but I couldn't stay in Dauntless either. I started looking around for some place in the city that I could go," he says, heaving it up to reveal a staircase that leads down to a wooden door.
Other than this forgotten neighborhood there's nothing here, and certainly no hope of food. The Factionless were centered around the Abnegation sector because they could get handouts, but this far away there would be none of that, which is probably part of the reason the neighborhood is so well preserved. It was simply untenable to live here. "You would have starved to death," I say, following him down the stairs.
We flick our flashlights on and he closes the iron plate over us and leads me through the wooden door. The basement is huge and smells dank and musty. The air is still stale in the kitchen, but at least it doesn't smell like mold. "I would have been fine, for a while anyway" Tobias says, shining his flashlight on a stack of cans on the dust covered counter. "Not that it matters now."
The lower floors of the house are dark. The iron bars on the outside of the windows look decorative compared to the heavy wooden shutters chained across them on the inside. "You do that?" I ask, illuminating them with my flashlight.
"No. The house is just as I found it."
As I look around I can't help feeling unsettled by it all. There's a thick layer of dust over everything, but it looks like whoever lived here just walked out one day and never came back. There's still furniture, books, papers. It makes me wonder why they left. And then it makes me wonder if they left of their own free will or were dragged out to the streets to be executed like the Abnegation were.
It's not until we get to the second floor and I see the sun streaming through the windows that I feel the knot in my chest loosen. Even though there are bars on these windows too it doesn't feel as claustrophobic as the downstairs. We keep going until we reach the third floor. It's one long, open room, windows dotting the sides with seats built into the woodwork under them.
"Now we wait," Tobias says, seating himself on one.
"Hungry?"
"Thirsty, mostly."
I pull a bottle of water out of one of our packs and hand it to him, seating myself on the same bench at the opposite end. Through the bare branches of the trees I can just make out the fence. "What do you think is out there? I mean, I know you think Shauna's being ridiculous with her tales of toxic waste and vicious animals, but you never said what you think is out there."
"I'm more concerned with who is out there," he says nervously. "After Amanda Ritter's video, and what the Farlan's had to say... I don't think it's wild animals that we have to worry about."
"They would have come already," I say quietly. "If there was someone out there, they would have come during the war." And stopped it, I leave unsaid.
"Why?" He scoffs. "They probably wanted to see what happened when their little utopia gets thrown into chaos. We're just their lab rats. Once they figure out where they we went wrong with this version of their experiment we'll have outlived our usefulness."
His tone is hard and callous and I hate it. "Stop it," I snap. One of the first things Tobias told me when we got together was that he tends to think the worst of people, and that he's deeply distrustful. The war only intensified that for him, understandably, but sometimes it's just too much.
He exhales through his nose harshly, a look annoyance on his face before turning to look out the window again. "This isn't really going how I imagined," he mutters eventually.
"What isn't?"
"This," he says with a mirthless chuckle. "There's a lot of things I've been meaning to talk to you about and it seems like every time I try I mess it up, or something gets in the way. Amity was a disaster," he adds.
"Well, there's no one here besides you and me - at least I hope so -, so talk." Normally I would remind him that we live together, but since that first meeting at Tori's about going outside the fence we've had so little time to ourselves it's ridiculous; if I didn't know better I would think the entire faction is conspiring to keep us from doing anything other than working and sleeping.
His hand twitches towards his jacket pocket, but he seems to think better of it and pushes himself off the seat to pace in front of the window. He goes back and forth a few times, pushing his hands through his hair the way he does when he's frustrated before finally speaking. "I don't know what's out there, Tris. I don't think it's good though. We failed at what we were put here to do."
"But would they really just kill us all?"
He cuts me a look that clearly says that's exactly what he thinks.
"So what do we do if that's their plan?"
"I don't know. Fight back, obviously, but I doubt our odds are good. Even if we all banded together..." he trails off, looking back out the window.
I try to look at the problem logically, but I can only come up with one possible weakness for our unseen enemy. "If there really is war out there like that video showed, whoever is out there isn't going to be organized. If we are organized that will give us an advantage."
"Maybe," he says uncertainly.
"But...?"
"But whoever set this up, it was someone with money and power and influence. Some ragtag bunch of people couldn't fence off a city that stretched a hundred square miles. They're at least organized enough to keep us cut off from whatever is out there for decades."
"Then why haven't they shown up here? If they've been watching and waiting why didn't they come to kill us like you think they will once the war broke out and it became clear we were a problem and not a solution?" Even though I know I should be worried, it feels good to talk about this the same way it did to talk out the thoughts in my head after the attack on Candor. Whatever failings Tobias and I have, when we work together we're at our best.
"Right now, the weather," he says simply. "As far as anyone knows there are no roads beyond Amity. They would have to have vehicles that could handle the terrain. During the summer it's probably not too hard, but right now with the snow and constant storms, it's probably impassable. That doesn't explain why they didn't come in the Fall when they had the chance though."
"Or they didn't know what had happened until it was too late," I point out.
"Maybe. The Abnegation haven't been very forthcoming with information. If they're the ones communicating with these people..." Tobias' pacing slows as he mulls the idea over. "They either tried to hide it from them, or they couldn't get in touch with them. I'd guess the former," he scoffs. "Probably hoping we could still fulfill our purpose here, or trying to keep us all alive," he adds like an afterthought.
"When we were in Amity you said 'we're all being watched'," I say slowly. "Is that what you meant?"
"Kind of. I thought they might be monitoring us in some way at least, even if they weren't in contact with the Abnegation leaders."
"Why go outside the fence at all, Tobias? What's there to gain from it?"
"Depends on who you ask."
"I'm asking you."
He sighs heavily, for a moment looking years older than eighteen. "Information. If nothing else we might find some kind of weakness. Best case scenario we find out something we can use to bargain with to keep us alive."
I don't have to ask what the worst case scenario is because worst case, we all die.
We both fall silent for a while, Tobias continuing his pacing and me chewing my lip, my mind filling with static at how many questions I have buzzing in it. "If they don't want to kill us what do you think will happen?" I eventually ask.
Tobias shrugs. "I don't know. Maybe they'll just wipe all our memories and start their experiment all over again."
The more I turn that idea over in my head the more terrifying it is. It's more terrifying than death. Losing all my memories, losing who I am... My throat starts to constrict at the idea that I would forget how beautiful my mother looked with her hair down, and how brave and kind she was; the idea that I would forget how comforting it was when my father ran his hand over my hair; even at the idea that I'd forget what it was like to laugh with Caleb when we were playing games as children.
When my thoughts veer towards what it would be like to forget Tobias I have to bite my cheek hard to keep the tears pooling in my eyes from spilling over onto my cheeks. Christina, Uriah... all of our friends we lost in the war. It would be like Will and Marlene never even existed. "I would rather die," I eek out, each word scraping painfully up my throat and out of my mouth.
"I know," Tobias says, and I'm surprised by the thickness of his voice.
I was wrong. Death isn't the worst case scenario. Being forced to forget who we are is.
"Right on time," Tobias mutters, and it's such a nonsequitur it snaps me away from my painful thoughts. I follow his eyes out the window to see a truck trundling past the fence. Even from this distance I can see that the people standing up in the back are armed.
"How frequently do they come by?"
"Three times a day; sunrise, noon, and sunset. At least that's as many times as they patrol together. The Factionless could be sending people by here more frequently, though I doubt it."
I follow the truck with my eyes until it passes out of view. When I turn back around Tobias is watching me, the look on his face unreadable. "What?"
"There's something else I wanted to talk to you about."
I have to bite back a sarcastic reply. if it's anything like the last topic I'm not sure I'm up for it right now. "Okay," I say slowly, wondering what fresh horror awaits.
"I didn't want to dump all of this on you in one day, but with the way things have been" he starts and then drops his eyes, a little huff off irritation blowing past his lips. "I know we never really talked about what you overheard between Zeke and I, at least not the way I wanted to."
I brace for an argument. It's true we haven't really talked about it, everything that followed after to thoroughly eclipsing it.
"But I've thought about it a lot," he continues. "And he's right. There's no real 'right time' for this." He reaches in his pocket and pulls something small out. I can't see what it is with the way his hand is cradled around it, but a moment later he sets a small box on the empty space between us. The lid is up and there's a delicate ring glittering inside of it, the sunlight reflecting off the stone on top creating a rainbow of colors inside of it.
Before my brain can even form the word 'marriage' my body reacts. It feels like my heart stops, like everything stops, like the world just grinds to a halt. I stare at it until my vision blurs, and it feels like it takes me a small eternity to recognize what I'm feeling as complete, absolute terror. The kind of terror that freezes you in place, the makes you incapable of moving or screaming or anything. Everything just blanks in the face of it.
"...not really good at this." Tobias' voice sounds like it's a millions miles away, and whatever he was saying I must have missed the first part because my brain struggles to catch up, to make sense of his words. It's a lost cause and the best I can do is force myself to focus on what he's saying now. "I know things maybe aren't what you want them to be between us, and they aren't for me either, but I am trying."
he takes a deep breath, and I know I should try to meet his gaze, but all I can do is look at that ring. "But I made my choice when I decided to stay in Dauntless. And when I said I would be your family now, I meant it. Caleb's trial will be next week and I want you to know that whatever happens with that you're not alone. I will always love you, always stand by you. What happened in Jeanine's lab... that will never happen again. There aren't words for how much I regret doing that to you."
I take a gasping breath, finally realizing that I need the air because I haven't been breathing through everything he has said. When I finally look up at Tobias he's eyes are a curious mix of apprehensive and pleading. "I don't expect you to say 'yes' today. I just want you to know that marriage is where this is heading for me." He drops his gaze back to the box, gently picking it up and putting it back in his pocket. "However long it takes, I'll wait."
"It feels like you're always waiting for something from me," I mutter. My hand flies up to my mouth, covering it, and my eyes go wide, but the words are already out there.
"I guess so," Tobias chuckles, but there's no humor in it, only hurt.
I want to apologize, but there's nothing I can say that will take away the sting of that comment.
"C'mon, let's go eat something before the next patrol comes by," he says, extending a hand to me. I let him lead me back down to the second floor, but his hand feels foreign in mine. I sit by in a kind of stupor while he starts a fire in one of the ancient fireplaces, only belatedly realizing we're in a bedroom.
We eat in silence and the food tastes of nothing. I force it down to be polite, so it won't upset him to see me not eating and knowing it's because of what he said. Once it gets dark we take the sleeping bags Cara gave us and lay one flat on the ground, the other on top if it like a blanket. Tobias adds more wood to the fire burning in the grate, and I vaguely recognize the liquid he sprays over it as something Cara told us would make it burn smokelessly.
I almost shrug off Tobias' arm when he wraps it around me. Like his hand it feels foreign. Normally his weight and warmth feel like home. Not tonight though. I wait until he breathing deepens and slip out from under him. I wander between the rooms, thinking over the reason his proposal, such as it was, upset me as much as it did - does, whatever.
I end up in what looks like a childs play room. There's a tiny tricycle sitting in the middle of it, abandoned and ghostly in the moonlight. I lean against the window, chewing on my nails and watching the world below me shift from silver to black as clouds scuttle across the moon. In here, without the benefit of a fire, it's freezing cold and I shiver lightly, but ignore it.
"Are we okay?"
I startle at the sound of Tobias' voice and whip around to find him watching me from the doorway. "It's fine," I say dismissively, though it's not, and turn back around.
"I'm not stupid, Tris."
"Then why ask at all?"
"Because I don't know what else to do," he says, coming to stand next to me.
I sigh, trying to find the courage I need to say the things I need to say and force myself to meet his eyes as I say it. "I don't want you to want to marry me because you're... I don't know... trying to prove something to me. Or because you're scared, or because you feel guilty. I don't want that."
I start to look away, but he makes a small movement with his hand, keeping my eyes focused on him. "I want to marry you because I love you, Tris. No other reason. It's true I don't know how long our forever will be, but regardless it means nothing to me if I don't have you. That's why I want to marry you."
Heat floods my cheeks under the steadiness of his gaze, the certainty of his tone. "Tobias," is all I can get out because I'm not good at this, of expressing or accepting affection even though it's easier with Tobias than anyone else. The prospect of forever is terrifying in its magnitude, but I know, absolutely, that I don't want anyone other than him.
I stare down at our feet as his arms slip around me, as he noses at my cheek, his whispered "marry me", condensing on my skin and sending a shiver through me that has nothing to do with the temperature.
My hands fist against the back of his jacket, and I have to take a deep breath, but when I say "yes," my voice is certain too.
A/N Pt. 2: If you're curious I'm posting a picture of the house I used as inspiration for the one Tris and Tobias visit to my Tumble (bleuwrites dot Tumblr, etc). I'm a huge fan of Frank Lloyd Wright's architecture and most of his early work was in and around the Chicago area and I couldn't let that opportunity pass me by :)