I own nothing!

Chapter 22

I spend the next few hours searching for Tris throughout the compound. I spent some time in the control room searching the security cameras for a glimpse of her. I even checked the security cameras outside of the compound. I checked every corner of the Pit and the surrounding areas, the train tracks, everywhere I could think of. It was as though she vanished. Now I'm worried about her more than ever. I hope she didn't completely leave the compound that will cause her even more trouble.

I walk through the Pit for about the hundredth time today, hoping I'll see something new. I look up toward the glass ceiling and there she is. A weight lifts from me; at least I know she is alive and safe, for now.

Eric has her by the arm dragging her to his office. She must have left the compound and Eric has caught her. I make my way up to his office; hopefully I can defuse the situation a little and bring some of Eric's rage onto me.

I shove his door open, "What are you doing?" I say in a deep menacing way.

"Leave the room," Eric snaps at me.

"No," I retort. "She is just a foolish girl. There's no need to drag her here and interrogate her."

"Just a foolish girl." Eric replies. "If she was just a foolish girl, she wouldn't be ranked first, now would she?"

I pull my hand to my face and pinch my nose. I look toward Tris and will her to remember what I have told her. How I told her to best convince people that she isn't a threat.

"I… I was just embarrassed and didn't know what to do," she looks at the ground like she is cowering. She places one hand in her pocket and I can see that she is pinching herself to try to bring tears. That's my girl! She really is brilliant!

She looks up at Eric with red teary eyes, "I tried to… and…" She shakes her head like she can't admit to something.

"You tried to what?" asks Eric.

"Kiss me," I say. "And I rejected her, and she went running off like a five-year-old. There's really nothing to blame her for but stupidity."

Eric scoffs and looks from me to her. "Isn't he a little too old for you, Tris?"

She wipes her cheeks with the palms of her hands. "Can I go now?"

"Fine," Eric replies, "but you are not allowed to leave the compound without supervision again, you hear me?" Then he turns to me, I knew I couldn't get out of here without some kind of comment. "And you… had better make sure none of the other transfers leave the compound again. And that none of the others try to kiss you."

I roll my eyes at him, "Fine."

Tris leaves the room and Eric and I left standing there. He has a malicious look on his face.

"Is there anything else?" I demand.

"Yeah, there is," he says. "I want you to keep an eye on her. There is something there that I'm not sure about." If he only knew that I have had my eye on her for very different reasons for weeks.

"Is that it?"

"No," he laughs. "Why would you reject that? Are you stupid or something? If the girl is throwing herself at you, you should take advantage of it!" After he says this he turns laughing and leaves out another door. I would love to snatch him by his scrawny neck and beat him to a bloody pulp, but I restrain myself.

I wait a few more moments until I see him disappear around a corner and walk out the door that Tris exited. Hopefully she didn't go back to the dorms yet.

She is sitting outside of the door curled into a ball. She stands and looks at me with her arms folded in a defensive manner. She looks like she is ready for me to yell at her and a part of me wants to. The instructor part wants to know what she was thinking, and how she could be so stupid, and why she smacked me. But Tobias just wants to make sure she is okay and that no one hurt her.

"What?" she asks expectantly.

"Are you alright?" I ask her touching her cheek gently. She bats my hand away.

"Well, first I got reamed out in front of everyone, and then I had to chat with the woman who's trying to destroy my old faction, and then Eric almost tossed my friends out of Dauntless, so yeah, it's shaping up to be a pretty great day, Four."

I shake my head at her. First off, I hate the way she used my nickname like some kind of weapon against me. But most of all I am frustrated. Why does she never get my intentions? Why does she not know that I am hard on her because I know she can handle it? I look around me at the worn and dilapidated buildings and I wonder how I can make her understand.

"Why do you care, anyway?" she says. "You can be either cruel instructor or concerned boyfriend. You can't play both parts at the same time."

Boyfriend? Did she just call me her boyfriend? My heart flutters a bit when I hear that but then the rest of her statement resonates through my head. She thinks I'm cruel.

"I am not cruel." I scowl at her. "I was protecting you this morning. How do you think Peter and his idiot friends would have reacted if they discovered that you and I were…" I sigh in frustration. She needs to understand my intentions. "You would never win. They would always call you ranking a result of my favoritism rather than your skill."

She looks at me like she wants to argue but stops herself. She thinks for a long time and seems to realize that I am right.

"You didn't have to insult me to prove something to them," she says quietly.

"And you didn't have to run off to your brother just because I hurt you. Besides- it worked, didn't it?"

"At my expense," she is barely audible.

"I didn't think it would affect you this way. Sometimes I forget that I can hurt you. That you are capable of being hurt."

I believe in her strength so much that I think she can handle anything. I forget that she is a sixteen year old girl that isn't always the self-possessed, confident girl that stands before me. Right now I can see both, the confident girl and the vulnerable girl, looking at me through the same eyes. I wonder why I have never noticed that they are both there all of the time.

I watch her face as she contemplates my words. She finally sees that I am so sure of her strength that I rely on that strength to push her. She comes closer to me and stands on her tiptoes to place a kiss on my lips.

"You're brilliant, you know that?" she says softly. "You always know what to do."

"Only because I've been thinking about this for a long time," I kiss her again. "How I would handle it, if you and I…" Then I remember what she said before and I smile. "Did I hear you call me your boyfriend, Tris?"

"Not exactly," she says nervously smiling. "Why? Do you want me to?"

I place my hands on her neck and run them through the back of her neck and hair. I tilt her head up to look at me and place my forehead to hers. I close my eyes and just enjoy her scent and her closeness. My heart is racing.

"Yes," I say. Then I think about Eric, "Do you think we convinced him that you're just a silly girl?"

"I hope so. Sometimes it helps to be small. I'm not sure I convinced the Erudite, though."

This reminds me of what I found just before initiation began. I want to share this information with her, I think it is important that she knows. "There is something that I need to tell you."

"What is it?"

"Not now," I look around. Again this is one of those situations that would be better to show her than tell her. "Meet me here at eleven thirty. Don't tell anyone where you are going."

She nods at me and I release her and walk away.

I turn down the hall back to the control room. I have some information gathering to do before I meet her.

XXX

I stand on the roof and check my watch; she should be here any moment. Behind me the door opens and she walks toward me. I take her hand silently and lead her to the train tracks just as it arrives. I pull myself into a car and lift her in with me. I pull a little too hard, she is much lighter than I realized, and she falls against my chest. My fingers slide down her arms to her elbows and I hold her there as we drift away from Dauntless.

"What do you want to tell me?" she asks.

"Not yet," I say.

I lead her toward the wall and I sink down to the floor, pulling her down with me. I lean against the wall and she sits with her legs to her side facing me. The wind blows her hair across her face and I can't help but look at this beautiful girl in front of me. She is everything that I have ever wanted, and now she is mine. I place my palms on her face and pull her mouth to mine.

I can feel her shiver and I wonder if she is cold or if it is our closeness that makes her tremble. I pull away from her lips and kiss her jaw and neck. I run my finger through her hair as I continue to her ear and cheek. I want to touch every part of her face with my lips.

The train wobbles and she is thrown off balance. She puts her hand out to steady herself and her hand lands on my hip. This sends a jolt of electricity through my body. She makes every part of me tingle with excitement and longing.

All of a sudden she throws her leg over me; she sits on top of me and straddles my legs. She wraps her arms around my neck and she skims the back of my neck with her fingers then she runs them into my hair. She leans in and kisses me. My body is vibrating. I sit up straighter and pull my hands to her shoulders. I slide my fingers gently down her spine to the small of her back. I pull her closer to me. I want her to be as close to me as I can get her. I am kissing her with an insatiable desire, I almost not able to control myself. I pull my hand around her waist, and up the side of her body. I unzip her jacket a few inches and pull away from the kiss. I look from her lips to her neck then her collar bone. I brush my finger lightly across her tattoos. I've always wanted to know what the birds stand for.

I smile at her, "Birds. Are they crows? I keep forgetting to ask."

She smiles back at me. "Ravens," she whispers breathlessly. "One for each member of my family. You like them?"

I don't answer. I pull her closer to me and press my lips to each bird. I feel her shudder at my touch. I pull my hand to her cheek and look at her. Her eyes are closed.

"I hate to say this," I say, "but we have to get up now." I don't want to move. I want to keep the pressure of her body on mine.

She nods and opens her eyes. She stands and I pull myself up next to her. I take her hand in mine and pull her toward the door. We stand in front of the open door of the train car and I point out toward the city. It is after midnight now, so the city is dark. Then I gesture toward a group of buildings in the distance. She follows my gaze to where I'm pointing and she sees what I am point to. In the distance there are a group of buildings that are lit up among the darkness. Erudite headquarters.

"Apparently the city ordinances don't mean anything to them," I tell her, "because their lights will be on all night."

"No one else has noticed?" She asks.

"I'm sure they have, but they haven't done anything to stop it. It may be because they don't want to cause a problem over something so small." I shrug and look out, "But it made me wonder what the Erudite are doing that requires night light."

I move away from the door and lean against the wall facing her. "Two things you should know about me. The first is that I am deeply suspicious of people in general. It is my nature to expect the worst of them. And the second is that I am unexpectedly good with computers."

She nods at me, probably remembering that the first day of initiation I told them that my real job was in the control room.

"A few weeks ago, before training started, I was at work and found a way into the Dauntless secure files. Apparently we are not as skilled as the Erudite are at security, and what I discovered was what looked like war plans. Thinly veiled commands, supply lists, maps. Things like that. And those files were sent from Erudite."

"War?" She ask terrified brushing her hair from her face. "War on Abnegation?"

I take her hand and say, "The faction that controls the government. Yes." I pause for a moment, "All those reports are supposed to stir up dissension against Abnegation. Evidently the Erudite now what to speed up the process. I have no idea what to do about it… or what could be done."

"But," she says, "why would Erudite team up with Dauntless."

I don't answer; she can answer this for herself. She looks up at me wide-eyed as though she has figured out what is going to happen.

"They are going to use us," she says. There is terror on her face.

"I wonder," I say, "how they plan to get us to fight." This is the part that I can't figure out. Some Dauntless will fight without cause, but most won't.

The wind blows her hair across her face and she says, "I don't know."

We stand and look out at the black city for a few more moments. I turn and lead her back over to the wall where we had been sitting. I slide back down to sit on the floor and she comes up and sits on my lap with both of her legs to one side. She leans into me places her head on my shoulder. I can feel the warmth of her breath on my neck. I wrap arms around her and hold her tight to me. She leans in and kisses me gently on the neck, then my jaw, and finally on my lips. I run my fingers back and forth along her cheek and run my fingers through her hair. She lays her head back down on my shoulder and I continue to absently run my fingers along her cheek. We don't talk during the ride home. We stay this way, holding tight to each other until it is time to get off of the train.