Chapter Three
Tris's Point of View
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One week later. One week left of stage one of initiation. Day before Visiting Day.
"What was with you and Eric that first day?" Christina asked, tugging her combat boot on her left foot.
"What do you mean?" I turned away from the mirror on the wall as I finished tying my hair in a high ponytail.
"I mean, he had his hands all over you during training. What's going on?" I rolled my eyes at her and began lacing up my boots.
"Absolutely nothing. He was helping me with my shooting. His hands weren't 'all over' me, he was telling me to relax my shoulders and hands." I tied the final knot and stood, beginning to walk out of the room. "Believe me, Eric the last person I would have something going on with." She laughed and followed me out and to the cafeteria for breakfast.
When we entered, we were intercepted by Caleb on our way to the line.
"Morning, girls." Christina and I nodded in greeting.
"Caleb. Visiting Day's tomorrow. Do you think...?" I trailed off, but he understood the question. Do you think our parents will visit?
"No. Well, possibly. Father probably won't, he thinks we're hellions now." I felt my face fall, and he wrapped his arm around me comfortingly. "Mother might, though. She never said anything against Dauntless." He tried to cheer me up and I smiled weakly.
"We need to eat, training is in, like, a half hour." Christina said, walking towards the counter. I picked up a chocolate muffin, while Caleb and Christina both had toast. We were sitting down when a deep voice cut through the chatter of the room.
"Initiates!" Eric bellowed, his voice echoing around the cafeteria. We turned our heads toward him, standing in the front of the room with his hands clasped behind his back. The ranking board was hung behind him. "Behind me, are your ranks as they currently stand. Those still below the line by the end of next week will be cut. We will start fighting today. Those with lower ranks can move up the ranking by beating those with higher ranks, and those with higher ranks will lose points for losing to lower ranked initiates." You could hear grumbling around the room. "Quiet. This is how things have always been, no amount of complaining will change that. Finish your breakfasts. We begin in twenty minutes." He turned on his heel and stalked out of the room. I picked a piece of my muffin and popped it into my mouth as I examined the ranking board.
1. Lukas
2. Edward
3. Peter
4. Andrew
5. Uriah
6. Will
7. Sarah
8. Rob
9. Molly
10. Drew
11. Meg
12. Myra
13. Mike
14. Christina
15. Clara
16. Marlene
17. Lynn
18. Mat
19. Caleb
20. Noah
21. Nikki
22. Jack
23. Kimmy
24. Ethan
25. Alison
26. Tris
27. Nick
28. Al
29. Danny
30. Paulina
31. Jimmy
32. Elaine
33. Erin
I huffed and looked away from the board, thinking about how I could improve my rank. Christina and Caleb were ecstatic that they were above the line.
"Don't worry too much, I'm sure you can make it above the line after the fights." A voice behind me said. I turned, ready to throw a skeptical look, and saw Will.
"You don't have to worry about that, do you?" I sighed, getting up to throw away my half-eaten muffin. Will followed me, and continued talking.
"Okay, you don't have much muscle on you, but your small stature means you could be fast, so you can dodge. Sometimes it's more important to just avoid getting knocked down rather than trying to knock the other out. They can tire themselves out and concede. You can easily make your way up, I promise." I rolled my eyes and tossed away my trash, then walked towards the doors.
"Well, I'm going to get some punches in before training starts. I'll see you later."
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I grunted as I threw another punch at the swinging sandbag in front of me. My knuckles split and began bleeding, causing me to curse under my breath.
"You'll want to tape those knuckles, Stiff." I turned to the voice behind me and saw Eric. My eyes narrowed in distrust and I turned away again.
"Why do you care? I am just an initiate, not to mention that I'm under the line." I said quietly, leaning my forehead against the now-still punching bag.
"You won't be able to fight if your fists are bleeding, and I like to watch a Stiff fight." I could hear the smirk in his voice, and it just caused me to grow more annoyed.
"I'll fight with bleeding hands." I grunted. He scoffed and grabbed me gently by the elbow.
"Come on."
He led me over to a bench and pulled tape and bandaging off of a shelf next to it.
"Sit down." He said quietly. I listened and sat, crossing my ankles in front of me. He straddled the bench, facing me, and lightly grabbed my hand. He began wrapping the bandage around the bleeding knuckles and taped it in place. He took my other hand and wrapped the tape around it as well. As he was finishing, he looked up and met my eyes, shooting me a smile. I blushed slightly and looked away to hide the small smile that had made its way onto my face.
"Thank you, Eric." I said softly, standing up. He didn't respond, but I imagined he nodded. I started walking to the center of the room, waiting for people to start flooding in.
"Tris." I turned back towards Eric. He was standing now, looking straight at me, his hands behind his back. His voice and eyes held the cold authority they normally do, and it wasn't until that moment that I noticed they were lacking that aspect while he was bandaging me.
"Yes?" I asked timidly.
"I want you to become my protégé of a sort. I see potential, and I can't let you fail initiation." He walked over to me in three long strides. "You will train with me after the required initiate training each day. I will score you based on how you improved in both required training and personal training. If you show up to each session, you should be able to make it above the line."
"That isn't-" I stopped short as his eyes hardened, "fair..." He let out a short, harsh laugh as I finished.
"What exactly do you think is fair in Dauntless initiation? The part where the person with the biggest muscles gets the highest ranking? How about where we rank the Dauntless-born and the transfers together? It's not fair for anyone except those who have been preparing for this for their whole life, or people who are naturally strong like Peter. Transfers from Abnegation get the worst of it, because anything to make yourself stronger or better would be considered selfish, so you were completely unprepared for this. I'm not giving you an advantage; I'm leveling the playing field."
"What about Caleb?" I asked. "He's from Abnegation as well. Why aren't you taking him under your wing?" I asked, diverting my gaze from his cold eyes.
"Caleb is doing just fine in initiation. There's no point in it, he'll make it by himself." He said, smirking. "Besides, don't you believe in him more than you do yourself? He got a ranking that was above the line from the very start. He picked up shooting faster than you did, I had to help you with that more than I did him. You need my help if you want to stay in Dauntless, Stiff."
The doors to the training room opened and the first few transfers, Al and a few others, walked in slowly.
"I expect to see you after all this." He said quietly before walking away.
"What was that all about?" Al asked, watching Eric walk away.
"He was warning me about the consequences of busting my knuckles before fighting." I lied.
Eric picked up a chalk board and hung it on the wall near the bench I was previously sitting at. It was the ranks as they stood. I was under the line, of course. He picked up a separate chalk board and began erasing things and rewriting. I had been watching him do this and didn't realize the rest of the transfers had flooded into the training room, followed by Four.
"Transfers!" He yelled, causing the chatter that had begun to stop. We all turned our heads towards him. "As mentioned earlier, you will begin the fights for training today. There are two boards over there, one with the ranks, and one with the pairings for the fights." I turned my head back to Eric and saw the board he had been writing on hung up. I scanned the list for my name.
Tris vs. Edward
My eyes widened and I looked at Christina and Will, who had come to my side without my noticing, worriedly.
"Good luck. He's been reading books about fighting and self defense since he could read." Will said, sighing as he spotted his name across from Al's.
"Thanks Will. Really, that was a comfort, it was." I said sarcastically. He nodded, as though I had actually thanked him.
"Will and Al, you're up." I watched as my two newly formed friends got into the ring. Will's stance was good, while Al just looked like he wasn't sure what to do with himself. He threw a clumsy punch at Will's chest, which Will easily blocked. He countered with a blow to the stomach, making Al hunch over and lose his breath. He brought his knee up to Al's face, and you could hear the crunch of his nose. Al slammed his fist up with an angry yell, and it connected with Will's temple. Will was out like a light, and Eric called Al the winner.
"Someone get Will to the infirmary. Stiff, you're next."
I released a nervous breath and stepped up to the ring with Edward. He smirked at me and went into a defensive position. I tried to copy it, putting my right arm in front of my face and my left covering my abdomen. He stepped forward with his right foot and jabbed me in the chest, right between my two arms. I let out an "oomph" and stumbled back as the wind was knocked out of me. He advanced and kept throwing punches, too quickly for me to block. He threw one last punch to my head and everything went black.
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"So remind me again why you're in here? Since when do you care about initiates?" I could hear people speaking, but it sounded as though I was hearing it through water.
"She's been out for more than four hours, I'm supposed to check on her, idiot. Besides, I have something to discuss with her." A voice responded, sounding clearer.
"Like wh-"
"Shh! She's waking up!" My eyelids fluttered and my vision focused on five figures sitting around my bed. Caleb and Will were on the right side of my bed, Christina was on the left. At the foot of my bed were Eric and Four, clearly the two who had been bickering earlier. I groaned as I felt a major pain in my head.
"Hey, how're you feeling Tris?" Will asked, looking worried.
"Just peachy." I growled, causing them to laugh. I winced at the volume.
"Look, I love you all, but I really cannot stand all this noise. Can I talk to one person at a time? Please?" I asked, looking up at all of them.
"I was just here to make sure you weren't dead," Four said. Then, as an afterthought, he added, "Stiff." He got up and walked out quickly.
"We can talk in the dorm, come on guys." Christina said, motioning for Will and Caleb to follow her out. They waved and all three of them left the room.
"So, Stiff." I turned my head towards Eric.
"Let's talk."
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So
I'm back
Please don't hate me for not writing in so long /).(\
I'll be writing regularly from now on, I promise!
XOXO,
E.R.M
P.S. The ranking is from the actual ranking board in the fight scenes in the movie, I just replaced a name with Caleb's. Also, I changed the fights a bit, but oh well x