We're woken up early the next morning after less than six hours of sleep. It wasn't that I wasn't tired, I just couldn't shut down my brain long enough to sleep. Once I had finally drifted off to sleep, I felt like I was being woken up only a few seconds later. I jump up in bed as the lights flash on a voice echoes through the long room.

"Everybody up!"

It's Four's voice. And the sound of it causes heat to spread through my body. I would be lying if I didn't say that I had been thinking him about while I lay awake on my bed last night. I wasn't prepared to be bombarded with feelings like this. I hadn't expected this. All I had wanted to do was come out here and start my new life. Things were changing…and fast. I didn't mind; compared to my old life this was all a sense of adventure. Everything was new and I was looking forward to experiencing everything. I sit up in bed and I reach under my bed for my duffel and pull out some clothes.

"Meet upstairs in ten minutes," Four says. "We start your training today."

He leaves the room and I wonder if he noticed the color on my cheeks. Hopefully I am too far back in the room that he can't get a good look at me. Especially not so early in the morning. Christina glances up at me and groans. I wonder how much sleep she had gotten, I heard her whispering to Will all night. I'm pretty sure we all did. I know I don't look good at a time like this. I quickly change into a red tank top and black training pants. I pull on my sneakers before heading into the bathroom to brush my teeth. Christina follows me and yawns as she turns on the water.

"God, I need a coffee," she says.

"Never had it," I tell her. Obviously I know what coffee is, I didn't live under a rock or anything, but given the way that I was raised, I was never able to have it. I spit out the toothpaste into the sink and feel Christina's eyes on me. "What?" I ask wiping my mouth.

"You've never had coffee?" she asks.

"I had kind of a quiet lifestyle before this," I admit with a shrug.

"Ah," she says nodding. "You were from that part of town."

"Oh come on now," I say. "It wasn't that bad."

She shakes her head and smiles at me. "Well lucky for you, who we were no longer affects us."

"That's what I'd been hoping for."

We finish up in the bathroom and we run upstairs to where Four is waiting for us. He's leaning against the wall with his arms folding across his chest. He looks tired…bored even. When the last of us come up the steps, granted it's me and Al, Four pushes himself off of the wall and looks at us.

"Now that we're all here," he says. "Follow me, I'm going to be taking you down to the Pit."

"Weren't we just in the Pit?" Christina asks me teasingly.

I stifle a laugh as we follow Four through the halls. "Today I'm going to be teaching you how to fight," he says. "Being a part of Dauntless is making sure that you know who to take care of yourself if you ever get in danger. Some of the jobs available to those who go back for to the city after schooling is either protection, guarding, or military. There are also jobs for intelligence, or as you know sticking around the training to other kids who come out here."

Kids. So that's what he sees us as. Maybe he wasn't looking at me like that. Maybe Christina was wrong. He had to have been looking at me for another reason. Did I look pathetic or something? Weak? Was he looking to trying to figure out how long it'd take me before failing out?

In our city, with our school system being the way that it is, if you don't pass your classes or you fail the final exams, or if your instructors decide that they don't want to waste any additional time on you, you are kicked out. And upon coming back to the city, you must take all the jobs that no one else wants. Transportation, cleaning the city, construction. And it's all for almost no pay, because the city believes that if you didn't have it in you to finish mandatory schooling, you don't deserve to get paid what the rest of the graduates are getting paid. It makes sense, I guess, but the people who have nowhere to belong…they're living in squalor while the rest of us sit in air conditioned homes and have a home-cooked meal every night. It used to scare me that I would end up like that. That I would end up that way because I didn't know who I was outside of my family. I had followed the rules of my parents for so long that part of me figured that I would never find out who I was. That was another partial reason I barely got any sleep last night. I had been worried that I wouldn't fit in…that I wouldn't find out who I am.

At the first mention of the Pit, I had laughed. Because it sounded strange. After spending the night in the basement, that had felt like the Pit. But upon passing the threshold into the giant room, I understood why it held that name. The Pit was a wide room….no room didn't begin to cover the description of the place. It was enormous with stone walls that ran up the entire height of the building. People were rock climbing up, with no bungees or cords. I looked around the room and up on the wall there were separate rooms for certain things. Four explained that they were for supplies, clothes and anything else that would be needed during training. There was also a tattoo parlor that most of the Dauntless visited on a daily basis. I make a mental note to see if Christina wants to go later. Down on the ground of the Pit were several members of Dauntless fight each other. Training. I understand it now. We're going to be fighting. If we're meant to be guards and military, then we must learn how to defend ourselves. As one of the members is whacked in the face, falling to the floor spreading blood everywhere, it's become increasingly clear to me that I'm not sure if I will make it. I am small, smaller than every new member. Pitted against any of them, I would fall to the floor easily. Which means that I have to train hard…every minute of every day. Every day that I have free time. I swallow as I follow Four down onto the floor of the Pit.

"This is where we'll be doing the training. The first thing we're going to be learning is how to fight. I'll be teaching you basic things at first and then we'll be pairing you off so you can utilize those new skills," Four says. "Before all that though, I want you all to know that training takes place between eight and six every day. What you do before eight and what you do after six, that's strictly your business. But you're not to leave the dorm unless you are with another member."

So with that rule in place, I wouldn't be able to find my brother. Not on my own. And not like this. Did that mean I was just never going to see him again? I didn't want to ruin my chances here by asking a question like that, so I keep my mouth shut. I swallow and nod. I pull my hair back into a ponytail waiting for further instructions.

Like predicted, I am not strong. But if I am anything, I am determined and I plan to build up strength so that I do not fall behind. I can't fall behind, not when finding out who I am in so important. Four has up pair up and working on blocking. I have my arms up and hitting Christina's and when I hear Four's low voice, I pause, but only briefly. He had started talking to someone…Eric, by the sound of his voice. I know is it Eric's voice before turning because I recognize the disdain in it. If he hates it here, why does he stay? Why doesn't he just go back to the city and do something else?

"Are they ready to fight?"

"Are you kidding?" Four asks. "We just started."

There is a pause and then Eric speaks again. "Tris and Molly," he shouts out. "In the ring."

I drop my arms and turn to look at the girl coming toward me. She is tall and just by the looks of her, I know she's going to knock me on my ass. I swallow and I walk toward the ring. We stand there, our hands in front of our faces and then she lunges at me. I move out of her way and tank a swing, hitting her in the side. But because I have no muscle, there is barely any driving force behind it. She grabs my arm and begins to punch me in my stomach. I push away from her to strike again, but before I can hit her, her fist swings around to collide with my face. I fall the ground with a groan and when I look up she hits me again and then I see nothing.

I wasn't out for long, and when I do come to, Christina is offering me a towel for my cheek and I press it against it. It stings and I know that I will have a bad bruise in the morning. "Thank you," I tell her. "God that was pathetic." I look up and my eyes find Four standing on the far side of the bit watching the group as they train. I swallow. "If he had been looking at me before, he sure wont' be now." I toss the towel to the side before getting back up and nudge Christina. "Do you want to go again?" She nods and we start again.

After training is over for the day and the clock strikes six, Eric is back and I feel like the smirk on his lips is meant for me. I didn't do my best today. But I have a chance to build up. "Today wasn't great," he says. "It was actually quite a pathetic show." I swallow as his eyes land on me, but I don't look away. "You've heard about students failing out their dorms, right?" He asks. "Well, in Dauntless, if you don't pass training, you're out. You get cut and you go home. Well not home, but back to the city. And that's it." I hear murmurs around the group. Cut? As in kicked out? "You'll have rankings every day. By the end of stage one, if you haven't made it above the red line, you're out. And we won't spend any more time on you. Because you won't be worth it."

A screen flashes behind him and the list of names pops up and far below the red line, second to last, is my name. My stomach falls and I take a breath. What if I don't make it? What if I fail? Eric leaves the room and the group begins to trickle out, heading up to the cafeteria for dinner. I stand there, staring at the screen. Christina nudges me.

"Are you coming?" she asks.

I shake my head. "Not yet," I say. "I'll be up in a few minutes."

I take my hair out of my ponytail and run my fingers through it. It was going to take a miracle to get me above that line. "What am I going to do?" I whisper to myself.

"You're going to come back tomorrow and do better."

I jump because I hadn't realized anyone was still with me in the room. "Shit," I say putting a hand to my chest and turning toward the voice. "Warn a girl, would you?"

Four smiles at me. It's a half smile that leaves me confused and wanting more. I don't know what it is about him, or what it is he wants from me. H's definitely older than I am, and having seen the girls here, he had better options than me. The small, weak, plan girl from the part of town that people avoided. I wasn't anything special. But there he was, standing in front of me, talking to me. "It was just the first day," he says. "You'll get better."

"Why would he make us fight when we barely knew anything?" I ask.

"Eric isn't really the fairest leader here at Dauntless," Four tells me. "Train harder…faster. You might end up surprising yourself at the things that you learn here."

I look at him, narrowing my eyes at him. "What does that mean?"

He looks at me for a moment before taking a step toward me. It takes everything in me not to take a step back. He's intimidating and I know that I can't back away from him. And the worst of it is that I don't want to. "It means you have time. You're going to get it."

"You don't even know me," I say." So how can you know that?"

He shrugs. "I just have a feeling."

I want to ask him what that feeling is, but he's already started to walk out of the room. I swallow and breathe out. The weight lifts off my shoulders as he disappears from view. He's definitely intense. And I can't read him. But I'm definitely looking forward to figuring him out.