A/N: This was hard to write for some reason and I am not sure I am satisfied with the outcome. Sorry if it doesn't live up to your expectations! The next chapter that I'm writing will have Zeke and Tobias's conversation and….Christina comes back! I wasn't going to tell you guys that but consider it my gift to you for waiting patiently for new chapters. Happy reading!

8-Tobias

All the anger that I've been silently harboring up since Tris got shot floods out of me so suddenly that I don't even have time to think about what I'm saying. "I would hardly call a gunshot wound and a head injury fine, Tris. You don't understand how I felt when I walked into the Bureau and was told you were shot. That you were dying! You don't understand how it feels to know that you deliberately held a gun against Caleb's head and literally walked to your death! You will never know how that feels!" My hands tremble as the words come out.

Tris stutters, trying to form a sentence, caught off guard by my rant. She starts to tell me what I already know: she doesn't know what I'm talking about because she doesn't remember what happened at the Bureau. For some reason, this lights another flame of anger in me. Had she not been reckless, she wouldn't have a head injury that made her forget in the first place. But before I can bring it up, her facial expression changes. She gets a look on her face that I've never seen before.

"I remember." Tris croaks out.

Wait? She remembers? How is that possible? The doctor had said it could take a month or longer for her memories to come back. I can't think of what to say. I'm too shocked to form a coherent sentence. The look on Tris's face dissipates my anger instantly. Her eyes are filled with tears and her face is wearing a look of desperation. I reach out and pull her to me tightly as we both break out into tears.

I'm embarrassed to be showing this side of myself. It's something that I haven't done since I was a child living with Marcus. By the time I turned 9, I made a pact with myself, swearing I would never let Marcus see me cry again. Not a single person has seen me shed a tear since. I cling to Tris. Her hair is wet my tears and sticks slightly to my face. She's sobbing into my shirt that's now damp with her tears. I breathe her in and try to calm myself. Eventually, I lift my head from hers and wipe the tears from my face. Gently, I pull Tris away from me.

"I feel like I failed you, Tris." I say. She still has tears streaming down her face. Her hair is a mess. Her eyes are red and puffy. She's trying hard to stop crying and is hiccupping slightly from the effort. Her hands are in fists at my chest and my t-shirt is balled up in her hands. She shakes her head in disagreement. "No, you could never fail me, Tobias. I failed you the minute I held that gun to Caleb's head."

I move my hands up under her chin and wipe her tears from her cheeks with my thumbs. "Someday, I will make you realize that you are beautiful, kind, generous, and perfect. I don't think you've accepted it no matter how many times I tell you. If you had, you wouldn't have been throwing yourself at death's door again. You would know that your life is worth living. That your life means everything to me, now." Tris doesn't respond, but pulls herself to me putting her head back on my chest. I bring a hand up to the back of her head and hold her there. "Promise me, baby. Promise me that you won't do anything like that again. I can't see you like that again, broken and bleeding, on edge of the death." A shiver rips through my body at memory.

I can feel her tremble beneath me. She lets out a shaky breath. "I won't. Tobias, you have to believe me when I tell you that I never held the gun to Caleb's head and thought I was walking to my death. I knew that the odds were good that I could survive the death serum. And when Caleb and I were making our way through the building to reach the memory serum, I realized that Caleb wasn't doing it because he cared for me. He was doing it because he regretted everything he'd done. Tobias, I couldn't let him walk to his death because he was guilty. I couldn't deal with having to live with his death on my conscious for the rest of my life." Her words come out muffled against my chest.

I let Tris's words sink in. This is the first time I heard her side to anything that had happened at the Bureau. It's not something I had expected to have the chance to hear since it was unknown if her memory would come back. I think about what Tris had told me about Caleb's regret. Had Caleb went into the weapons lab, he would have died without a doubt. There's no telling what that would have done to Tris, having already lost so many people in such a short time. It was stupid of me to ever leave her at the Bureau and expect her to let it happen. I'm still furious for at Caleb for being such a coward and I'm still upset that Tris was so reckless with her life but I know that I need to let it go. The past is the past and there is nothing I can do to prevent Tris from getting shot, as it already happened. I let out a deep breath I hadn't realized I had been holding. I bend down and kiss the top of her head.

"Tris, you always say you left Abnegation because you weren't selfless enough to be in their faction, but you are the most selfless person I know. Taking Caleb's place because he only agreed to do it out of guilt rather than love is one of the most selfless thing you could ever do. The stupidest, too, but one of the most self-sacrificing things you could have done." I say. She could have easily fit into Abnegation, whether she believed it or not. I send a silent prayer up, thanking God that Tris chose Dauntless.

Unsurprisingly, Tris doesn't agree with me. "I was only thinking of myself, Tobias. I didn't want to live with the guilt of another death on my conscious. Especially the death of my brother. I didn't even stop to consider the consequences…that I could die or be injured. I never even thought about what I would be doing to you if either of those things happened. That's not altruistic. It's selfish." She's got a look on her face that tells me I won't win this argument and I decide not to try. "Let's agree to disagree on this, ok? I'll try to let it go if you try not to die anytime soon." I say, playfully nudging her.

"Deal." Tris says as she releases her hold on my shirt which is now damp and wrinkled. She runs her hand over my chest, trying to smooth out the wrinkles. I catch her hand and mine. "Don't worry about it, it's just a shirt." I look at her for a minute. She seems a little more relaxed and a little tired. I'm not sure if I should push my luck, but curiosity about her memory is killing me.

"Tris, do you really remember everything?" I ask her, unable to keep the curiosity out of my voice. Her brow furrows a little as she concentrates. "I think so. But I can't remember anything after the death serum activated. I guess that's when I hit my head?"

I think back over the details. Over the days that Tris was unconscious, I got bits and pieces of what had happened from various people, but since I wasn't there, there isn't any way to fully separate rumor from fact. "I'm honestly not 100% sure. What I was told is that you managed through the death serum with very little affect, but that you were shot by David. You activated the memory serum during that time, but if I had to guess, you probably passed out and hit your head on the way down."

"Well, I never have been a graceful person, have I?" she jokes, laughing halfheartedly. I smile a little. She may not be steady on her feet all the time, but she definitely has a graceful way of carrying herself. She always captivated me when she would walk into the pit during training.

Suddenly, Tris's eyes go wide. "Wait! Tobias, did the memory serum work? Did I activate it? What's been happening with the factions and Bureau?" she asks, the questions flying out before I can answer.

"You did it, Tris" I grin at her, thankful that something good came out the whole situation. "You activated the memory serum, and the Bureau no longer exists. Right now, there is a debate going on about whether or not to continue the factions or if they should be disbanded altogether."