Chapter Twenty – The One and Only

I know Emily. I imagine my head as an mp3 player and these words are playing on repeat. The only difference between my head and the player is that I can't turn off the repeat option. And I feel each repetition as a sharp knife stabbing me on the back.

I see the woman putting her hand on Is's shoulder and I want to shove it away, but I'm still frozen with confusion. It can't be truth. This woman – whoever she is – has to be wrong. Maybe she's confusing Is's sister with some sort of doppelganger that for some coincidence has the same name has Is's sister once had.

But the body was never found. My mom had told me and Kate these exact words when we were ten years old. She told us not to talk about Emily in front of her family - ever.

"Maybe you two should take a sit." The woman says, and that's when I feel myself unfreeze even though the knife keeps on stabbing me. Who does she think she is to tell us to take a sit on our own place? Especially after coming in without being invited.

"Who are you and why did you come here?" Is is still shocked with her mouth slightly opened as she breathes too fast. The memory of when I told her about her sister for the first time is still fresh in my mind. I remember the panic in her voice. I'm not going to let her go through that all over again.

The woman opens her mouth to answer but she never gets to do it as someone stands on the door, suddenly replacing the sun light coming from outside the car by a shadow on the floor.

Owen walks in with a plastic bag on his right hand but stops once his eyes meet the woman that still has her hand on Is's shoulder. The woman lets her hand fall as she turns to face Owen.

"You did quite a good job on hiding your friends, Mr. Tate. It took me the whole night to find them." Owen looks a little surprised with her words, but he keeps his defensive posture. "Now tell me, did you really fail your initiation?"

Owen thinks carefully about his words before he answers – something I've never seen him doing before except on extreme situations. I hope that this doesn't mean we're in trouble. I take another look at the woman just to make sure I've never seen her in my life before. But again, I have that feeling that she reminds me of someone.

"I never became a Dauntless member, Evelyn." Evelyn presses her lips together, as if feeling the double meaning of Owen's words.

"Evelyn…? You're the factionless leader." Is seems to have finally woken up to reality.

Evelyn turns around to look at her, but doesn't give her an answer.

"You see, Isabelle; yesterday I was informed that two Dauntless members had just become factionless, which I found a little odd, seeing that this year the number of initiates was so low. And so I got in touch with one of my friends on the Dauntless compound and she told me that they weren't just two Dauntless members. They were the two initiates that had the highest classifications."

"Then they lied to you. Neither I nor Emmett had the first place on the Dauntless classifications. Our friend did. Maybe you should find more trustable sources." I look at Is trying to warn to be careful. I'm still afraid that she or Owen can break any time someone mentions Maeve.

"And so I went looking for you two." Evelyn continues as if she hadn't said a word. "Again, I have to say it, your friend did quite a good job, didn't you Owen? But, still, I found you. The moment you opened that door I was confused for a second; I mistaken you for your sister. I almost got angry at you for not being where you should. But Emily isn't the kind to run from her responsibilities and when that boy showed up and matched the description I was given, I realized I wasn't looking at Emily, but at her younger sister. You, Isabelle Moore."

"You have a sister?" Owen asks, but no one pays attention to him. He shakes his head, confused, and drops the plastic bag on a kitchen table.

"My sister is dead." Is says, but her voice trembles as if she's not really sure about it.

It takes me a big effort to make my legs move, but it's time to step between them. The woman evaluates me as I hide Is behind me; as if it was the first time she noticed I was still in the train car. She squints.

"Emily never told me about a brother." She says, calmly. I wonder if this woman has more than one tone of voice.

"I'm not her brother. And if you're here to hurt her you should leave now." I say, instinctively putting my hand on the gun that Is shoved in my belt last night and feeling a little surprise to find that it's still there.

"You can let the gun where it is. I have no intention to hurt you, especially now that I know who she is." She points her chin to my chest, and it takes me a while to realize that she's talking about Is. "On the other hand, I don't think Emily would be very pleased to know that you're dating such a rude boy, Isabelle."

Is suddenly stands by my side and I try to push her back again, but she won't let me.

"That's not my name anymore." She says, calmly and I see that aura of power around her. "You want to call me, you call me Is. And Emmett is not rude."

"I see." Evelyn says, looking at me with curiosity once more. I wish she'd just leave. "Now, Is, what do you think of a choice to work with your sister?"

"Work on what?"

"Work for me. All you'll have to do is infiltrate on a faction and keep me updated on what happens inside."

"She's not going anywhere." I say.

"I want to meet her first." Is says, ignoring me. "I will decide whether I'll accept your offer then."

Against my will, I turn around to face Is.

"You can't be serious! You…" But I stop complaining as I look at her expression. Her voice was calm but her face shows hanger and denial. Her lips are tightened as if she containing herself not to scream. Her eyes are greener than ever, reminding me of a cat and he keeps her look steady on Evelyn.

"Fair enough." Evelyn says. "I will tell her to pass by when I see her." Evelyn looks at the three of us one more time and turns to the door.

"One more thing," Is says. Evelyn has her hand on the door but turns around to face us. "If you're trying to trick us, I'm warning you that we're friends with Tobias Eaton."

I don't know what I was expecting to see when Is called out the name Four had given her. Maybe fear on Evelyn's eyes, or a laugh as she proved no one could scare her. But it sure wasn't what Evelyn let pass for a brief second. Her lips tightened as pain crossed her expression. The name Tobias passed through her mouth but no sound came out. Whoever this guy is, it means a lot to her.

Evelyn's expression turns back to normal and she nods. She leaves and the door is closed, leaving us on a weird darkness. The minutes pass as my eyes get used to the dark. No one says a word.

"I brought food." Owen says, on a low voice. And that's when I feel Is crushing against my chest. But for my own surprise she's not crying. She pulls me closer to her with all her strength and I can feel her hands turned to fists on my back.

"I went through sixteen years of misery because of a lie." She says and neither I nor Owen dare to say a word.

Both Is and Owen left after breakfast, leaving me alone on an empty train car. Owen said he was going to pack his stuff because he and Kate were going to sleep here tonight. Is just said she needed some time alone, shoved out a set of knives from her backpack – which surprised me as first, she doesn't like knives and second, I didn't know she had brought them - and left.

I tried to take a nap, but after lying thirty minutes on the bed I quitted. I'm not very good at cooking but I tried to prepare some sandwiches with the food Owen had brought. After that I changed clothes and left to go look for Is. It wasn't hard to find her. She was near that river Owen told us about. She looked sweaty and had the three knives on her hands. She put herself in position and threw the three knives at three different trees. She didn't miss any, but I wasn't expecting her to. Her aura was stronger than I'd ever seen. I remember when we'd played Capture the Flag and she had what was left of it when I found her. But I had never really seen her on a fight. Not like this.

I found myself a shadow and sit on the grass, my back lying against a tree. I don't remember for how long I stayed there, but at some point I decided to stand up and approach her.

As I walk towards her, Is doesn't seem to notice I'm coming, at least not until I see a knife coming through my direction. All I have time for is to tilt myself to the side so the knife cuts my arm instead of hitting my chest and killing me.

I hear myself cursing as I catch the knife from the grass and feel the warm blood draining through my arm. I hear Is calling out my name and in less than a minute she's standing by my side.

"What the hell did you think you're doing?!" She asks, panicking as she sees the blood. Her skin is paler than usual. She takes her T-shirt off, only keeping a tight sleeveless shirt, and wraps it around my arm, making pressure on the cut so it'll stop bleeding.

"Well, I understand that you feel supernatural when you're throwing knives, but you still need to eat Is." I say. She rolls her eyes to me.

"I have a first aid kit on my backpack. C'mon." She pulls me by the arm and takes me with her. A few minutes later my arm is washed and the cut is covered with a bandage.

I evaluate her as we eat. Her eyes seem to be back to its normal greenish brown colour and she's blushing a little. She actually looks a little more… homely in here.

"Does it hurt?" She asks, as I'm staring at the way her air curls in a cascade around her face. It actually makes me feel a little jealous that now that I'm used to be the only one to see it so messy after she wakes up, we'll have to share our sleeping place again.

"Huh… does what hurt?" She laughs as she looks at my confused expression.

"Your arm."

"Oh! No. It's fine." I say, checking on it. A pinkish stain is starting to appear on the white bandage.

She looks at it too. "Maybe you should rest. You're not used to losing blood."

I feel my lips forming a smile. "Will you rest with me?" I ask. She unconsciously bites her lip and looks at our unmade bed. I offer her my hand, the one which arm is not hurt. She looks into my eyes and I almost say maybe it's better not, but then she nods and takes my hand.

I lie just like I did last night, with my hand supporting my head, as I look at her. She's still only dressed with the black sleeveless shirt, which allows me to see the curves in her body. I move forward to kiss her as I let my hand move to her waist. She pulls me closer to her, and I feel what she's been holding the whole morning.

I feel her pain in the way she hesitates to kiss me, I feel her hanger in the way she pulls me closer to her, and most of all I feel her alive. I let my back fall to the back as she lies over me. She moves up, separating our lips. Her curls tickle my cheeks as she tries to calm down her breathing.

"So that's what my little sister has been up to?"

We both jump out of bed and stand up immediately. And I see a version of Is, a few inches taller and not as pretty. Her eyes aren't as greenish as Is's and the aura of power is missing. No, I could never mistake her for Is.

"We weren't expecting you so soon." Is says, a little in shock. Her lips are pressed together, and she looks at the girl in disbelief. In front of me is standing the one and only Emily Moore – alive.