A/N: Thank you to everyone who reviewed the last chapter, and to my wonderful beta reader, Rosalie! I really appreciate the support.

Chapter 27: Tris – Girls' Night Out

Like most of the others in my faction, I don't technically need to work. The city provides those of us who went on the mission with a "heroes' pension" that covers our monthly expenses. Apparently, Tori proposed it originally, in order to ensure that Amar could receive the care he needed from George and Tobias and Cara without any of them trying to fit other jobs in around that responsibility. I gather it was one of the few unanimous decisions the city council has ever made.

But I find myself itching to do something, anyway. So, I spend time with the others, going to work with them to get a sense of what I might enjoy doing. The list of options is essentially endless now, since factions no longer have a monopoly on any given type of job, but that makes it more difficult than ever to pick.

Cara is studying to be a doctor, a position that appeals to both the Erudite and the Abnegation parts of me. But it only takes a short time of shadowing her to realize that I've seen too much blood in my lifetime as it is. So, I decide against the medical profession as a whole.

Amar isn't up to an outside job yet, so he mostly works within our building, though he occasionally helps Tobias set up other factions. George sticks close to him, taking care of his medical needs in between his regular appointments and therapy sessions, and helping him deal with the many issues that still arise every week. He's much better than he was, I'm told, but after seeing the full-out melt-down he had a few days ago when a car back-fired outside the window, I can understand why George makes sure not to be far away.

Shauna is running her own tattoo business, serving the many former Dauntless who live all around the city, as well as anyone else who wants a tattoo these days. She competes with the shop that Tori used to run, but it seems she has plenty of customers. That's not surprising, given how many people Dauntless kicked out over the years – most of them would much rather give their money to Shauna than to their former faction.

Christina and Zeke both work in the city's police force, with Zeke in surveillance and Christina doing patrols. They keep trying to get Uriah to join them, but he's apparently been having trouble picking a career. I gather he's tried quite a variety of jobs, but nothing has lasted long. Currently, he's serving as a guard for the city council, since they don't want all of their protection to come from any single faction.

I suppose that's why I find myself following Christina through the building where the next council meeting will be held. They alternate the location, and this one will be in a place that was abandoned until five months ago. It's now a community center for those who choose to remain factionless. As Evelyn says, everyone should have a sense of community, even if they don't want to base their lives around a specific theme.

Christina's job is to start securing the space, to ensure the council will be safe here – along with any members of the public who choose to attend the meeting.

It's not the most interesting work I've ever seen, though there's clearly an art to it, judging by how Christina stops to look at some things while passing by others that don't seem too different to me. I suppose that's a benefit of having grown up Candor – she notices every detail and knows which ones matter.

"We should do something fun tonight," Christina chirps as she runs her hand over the top of a doorframe, presumably checking for wires.

My eyes narrow a bit. "That depends on what you consider 'fun.'" I'm not particularly interested in going clothes shopping for hours.

She evaluates me for a moment – probably reading my mind the way she so often seems to do. And then her face lights up. "Ooh, I know," she squeals excitedly. "We can get Shauna and Cara and have a girls' night out. Just the four of us."

The idea has some appeal. As much as I love spending time with Tobias, he definitely draws my focus when we're all together in a group. And when he's not doing that, Zeke and Uriah usually are with their antics, or Christina is dragging me off for a private conversation. I feel like I barely see Shauna and Cara most days.

Plus, I've never been on a "girls' night out" before….

"Oookaaay," I agree hesitantly. "Where did you have in mind?"

She grins at me. "Well, Uriah says there's a new club less than a mile from home. I've been wanting to check it out."

It's difficult to hide my grimace. Tobias and I haven't been back together for all that long, and it feels wrong to go out to a club without him. Particularly since I've never been to one before and have no idea what to expect.

"That sounds like a great thing for you and Uriah to do," I comment more than a little snidely.

"Ha ha," she says as her fingers continue down the sides of the doorframe. "But I'm really not interested in watching Uri hit on everyone who moves." Her mouth tightens in distaste, though it's hard to say exactly why. As far as I know, she's not interested in Uriah that way.

"Besides, clubs are a lot of fun for a group of women," she insists. "We can dance and drink a little and watch all the single guys try to flirt with us."

"That's not really making a case for it," I say with a chuckle. After a second, she laughs too.

"Okay, fine. But you do realize that Four's been taking you to all the good places, right? There's practically nowhere left."

"It's possible to go back to places, you know," I answer, rolling my eyes. "We only went on some of the rides at the amusement park, for instance."

She thinks about that as she finally decides that the doorframe is safe and moves on to another part of the room.

"I thought it was only open on weekends right now. Until it gets warmer." Oh, yeah….

We're both silent for a moment, trying to come up with other ideas as she inspects a window carefully.

"There's a restaurant on the top floor of the Hub now," she says abruptly. "I've heard it's great. And the view is, too. How about we give that a try?"

A small smile crosses my face at the suggestion. Tobias still avoids heights as much as possible, so he's unlikely to be planning a date to that particular restaurant. And it would be quieter than a club – and presumably won't have single guys trying to flirt with us.

"That sounds like a great choice," I tell her.

"We should so get tattoos while we're here," Christina says as the three of us wait for Shauna to finish her workday before we head out.

"That seems like it would defeat the purpose of getting out of here sooner," Cara says with a small frown.

"Well, Shauna can't leave until her night shift guy shows up, anyway," Christina answers, her eyes already running eagerly over the sheets of artwork on the walls. "So, we have forty minutes."

Cara makes a small noise of dissatisfaction. "How long does a tattoo take?"

Christina keeps her face straight as she says, "About five or six hours, depending on the size." She has definitely been hanging out with Zeke and Uriah too much.

"That makes no sense," Cara begins, but she stops when I smack Christina on the arm.

Turning to Cara, I say, "She's joking. Only something really big would take that kind of time." My mind goes to the ink on Tobias' back. That must have taken days.

Rolling her eyes at Christina, Cara sits in one of the chairs that dot the waiting area and begins flipping through the books on the large coffee table. She's clearly not interested in marking her skin, so I suspect she just wants something to look at while she waits.

I find myself joining Christina, looking at a sheet of faction symbols. There are so many more of them now, and I gaze curiously at the new ones, wondering what beliefs go with each.

"That one is ours," Christina murmurs, pointing, "in case you're interested in getting it."

My gaze follows her finger, and I can't say I'm surprised to hear that this particular one belongs to us. It's a nice match to our manifesto, with each of the original five faction symbols arranged in one large circle, instead of being separated into individual rings. A bird crosses the top of the circle, rising above it to fly free.

The meaning is clear. As our base, we embrace the beliefs that this city was founded on – all of them. But we strive to be more than that. Our goal is to rise above those beliefs as something new, something more powerful than any one of the old factions by itself could make us.

For a long moment, I look at the image, a small smile forming on my lips. It reminds me of seeing Tobias' back for the first time, with the five symbols going down his spine.

It also reminds me of something else, and the more I look at it, the more I'm sure it's intentional. There are six symbols in this image – the same number of fears I have. And the sixth one is a bird that looks suspiciously like the ravens tattooed onto my collarbone.

In at least some manner, Tobias included me in our faction symbol.

My fingers run over it gently before I make my decision. "I want this one on my lower back," I tell Shauna, crossing the room to her without hesitation.

It's not until we're in the back room, away from Christina and Cara that I add the next part. "But first, I want to change something on an existing tattoo."

Christina was right about the view. It's breathtaking to see it, particularly with everything lit up against the dark night air, as we enjoy our dinner.

Shauna and Christina try a variety of cocktails, growing more and more talkative as they become more inebriated. I have one drink out of curiosity – some fruity mix that Christina recommends – but other than that I stick to water the same way Cara does. Maybe it's the Erudite in us saying not to kill off our brain cells with alcohol.

"You know," Shauna says loudly, tapping Christina's arm to get her attention, "one of these days Uriah is going to realize he likes you." She giggles. "The same way Zeke finally noticed me."

Despite the amount of alcohol in her body, Christina looks uncomfortable with the topic. And again, I wonder if she feels more for Uriah than she lets on. Perhaps more than she's admitted to herself.

"It took him two flippin' years," Shauna continues, sloshing a bit of her drink onto her dress as she swings the glass wildly up to her mouth. "But now we've been together for a year and a half." She nods vigorously, causing more liquid to spill before she manages to drink some.

She glances around quickly, as if she's suddenly worried about being overheard, and lowers her voice as she adds, "Don't tell anyone, but I think he's getting ready to propose."

"What?!" Christina exclaims loudly enough to carry through the entire restaurant. She clamps a hand over her mouth as people a few tables away turn to look at us. "Sorry," she mumbles much more quietly. "But really?"

"What makes you think that?" Cara asks in a far more level voice.

"One of my rings went missing," Shauna answers, staring in drunken fascination at her glass for a few seconds before remembering that we're still here. "I was tryin' to find it, and Zeke was all 'oh, are you sure you didn't leave it at work,' but I knew I hadn't. And then the next day, it was just there again." She makes a poofing motion with one hand, as if it magically reappeared.

Chuckling, she adds, "He tried to act like it must have been in my jewelry box the whole time and I missed it. But he was obviously using it to figure out my size."

"Why didn't he just trace the inside dimensions sometime when you weren't there?" Cara asks, her expression puzzled. "Or get a sizing chart from the jeweler and compare it? That way, he wouldn't have had to borrow the ring long enough for you to notice."

Shauna stares at her, clearly having trouble following the train of thought through the haze of alcohol. "We're not all Erudite, you know," she finally says, somewhat defensively.

"Yeah," Christina chimes in. "Some of us are Zeke!"

The statement makes us all laugh. Zeke is certainly not dumb, as I've learned over the time I've known him, but logic isn't his greatest strength. Not that Cara's options would have occurred to me, either. Unlike Shauna, I don't own any rings, and I know nothing about jewelers, so I wouldn't have known that a sizing chart was even available. Or that the inner dimensions were all I needed.

Briefly, I wonder how Tobias will figure out my size if we ever reach that point. If we still had my grandmother's ring, he could have used that, since it actually fit me. But of course we lost that option in Pittsburgh, when we had to sell the ring to finance our mission. There was no way around that, and I don't regret the decision, but that doesn't mean I don't still think about it sometimes….

"Regardless, I'm happy for you, Shauna," Cara says, and her words pull me back to the present. A slight blush rises on my cheeks as my inner Abnegation chastises me for selfishness. This moment isn't about me.

"Yes, congratulations," I say, smiling widely. Shauna has been through so much, between losing her sister and dealing with paralysis and having to change her career because of that. But she's pulled her life together with a strength that I think is truly Dauntless, and I'll always admire her for that. She certainly deserves this joy.

"It's probably better to wait until he actually asks," she tells me, flicking at a spot on her dress as if she's trying to figure out how it got wet. "But thanks anyway."

A big smile suddenly forms on her face as she looks around at us. "You'll all be my bridesmaids, right? I want all of you." She reaches out, grabbing my wrist, to my surprise. "Especially you, Tris." Her expression saddens. "You were Lynn's friend."

The words twist something inside my stomach, as I remember holding Lynn's hand while she died. We didn't know each other well, but Shauna is right. I consider her to be a friend.

"I would be honored," I say quietly, and Shauna squeezes my arm gratefully before letting go and reaching for her drink again.

"I'm so glad you're back, you know," she adds, taking another wild swing with her glass, missing her mouth completely this time but not seeming to notice. "Four was such a mopey bastard without you around."

She chuckles again, apparently thinking about something. "Of course, he was like that most of the time in Dauntless, too. Not quite sure how he ended up friends with Zeke…." She swings her glass up toward me in a toast, sending a few drops through the air and onto my face. "But the point is he's actually happy with you here. So, I'm glad you came back."

"Hey," Christina protests. "You're supposed to like her for other reasons, not just because Four loves her." She leans over the table as if she's planning to hug me from all the way on her side. When she can't reach, she settles for patting my hand. "Like because she's my best friend."

Cara smiles a little. "Well, I for one have other reasons for being glad that she's back." Her gaze passes over our two companions before meeting mine. "It's nice to have someone intelligent to talk to."

Before I can answer, Christina's eyes widen. "Ooooh, ouch!" she says loudly. Looking at Shauna, she adds, "I think she just insulted us."

Shauna slaps her palm onto the table, her expression unreadable. "Finally!" she exclaims, breaking into a grin. "I was starting to think she'd never learn how to do that."

As the two begin howling, patting each other on the back in mock congratulations, Cara joins in, giggling more than I've ever seen from her. A grin works its way onto my face, too, as I watch the dynamic between my three friends. I would never have expected Zeke and Uriah to influence our entire faction so much, but I suppose their style of humor is truly infectious.

Overall, I think that's a good thing. We all need a little more laughter in our lives.

A/N: I've decided to include some of the other stories that I originally planned to write as one-offs in this fic. That means it will be about 45 chapters long in total. Hopefully, that's a good thing. Anyway, please take a moment to review this chapter. It looks like I'm going to be stuck using a temporary computer for a while, so it's difficult to write and edit, and I could really use your ongoing encouragement. Also, if you spot any typos or inconsistencies, please let me know. Thanks!