So, here's the next one! Sorry it took a little long, but here it is! The One: Chapter 4.
She hears a release of air, like a door to an Erudite cell opening.
"Good morning, Jeanine. How are you doing?" It's a familiar voice. She thinks it's Tobias' mother, but she could be wrong. So, she just keeps listening.
"Quite alright, if I must say something." It's Jeanine again. But her voice holds no edge; it's dull, and it comes from somewhere far in the room.
Did Jeanine actually sleep here, in her cell?
There's a short pause and tension in the room. Tris listens a little harder – something she's gotten used to for the past three days – and she thinks that it's probably only Jeanine and the woman who sounds like Tobias' mother in the room. She hears no one else breathing, and she thinks she heard the door close a few seconds ago.
"Why are you even keeping a dead body here, Jeanine?" Is she really dead, and is this torture, or is she paralyzed with no heartbeat or need to breathe, eat, or do what normal people do? Tris isn't sure, and by the sound of the woman who sounds like Tobias' mother's voice, Tris hopes she's just being tortured.
It'd be worse to actually feel things trying to tear her arms apart, cutting up her flesh and yanking her guts out while blades shred everything in her mouth. And know that she's actually just not dead.
Haha, that would be really funny.
Tris guesses the old Jeanine might actually want that.
"Are you grieving?" Either the woman noticed something that would indicate that, or she's smart. Probably came from Erudite.
This Jeanine, though, would never want her dead. Tris is Erudite enough to have at least guessed that.
"Jeanine... Who is she to you? She's a Divergent, I thought you hated Divergents." The impatient steps of the woman who sounds like Tobias' mother move away from Tris, and Tris guesses she's moving toward Jeanine.
They're probably thinking the same thing, she and that woman: this isn't Jeanine Matthews, or at least the Jeanine everyone knows. Jeanine feels nothing, let alone grieves a Divergent, and Beatrice Prior of all people. So what's going on?
But something didn't make sense; if that woman didn't put Jeanine in here, then does that mean Jeanine did this to herself?
No, that made no sense. The Jeanine Tris knew wouldn't do that.
Then again, everything about the Jeanine she knew is definitely gone.
"Jeanine, what happened to you?"
Pause. Tris can hear them breathing, one a little heavy and the other light and silent.
"Nothing. Nothing happened to me."
"Then why are you suddenly..." Tris can hear exasperation, confusion, but Jeanine's voice is still dull, as if whatever flame she used to have was extinguished.
"Why are you even here, Evelyn?"
Evelyn? Isn't that Tobias' mother's name?
"I just wanted to check on my son's girlfriend's body. Like you, he hopes she's okay. And if she really is dead, which we'll be testing, he wants to give her a proper burial. I see nothing wrong with any of that, and I understand his little dilemma. So I'll do that for him. He's my son, after all."
Yep. Definitely Tobias' mother.
"But didn't you leave him when you had enough?"
"That is not up for discussion."
"Didn't you run away after you realized there was nothing you could do to save him?"
"I said stop, Jeanine."
"Didn't you disappear from his life after you lost hope and gave up, not even thinking about what he'd feel if he lost his mother?"
"Jeanine."
Pause.
"You can take Beatrice's body for testing. But I have to be there during the testing."
"What right do you have?"
"I am the leader of Erudite. I command whatever testing you conduct here."
"What makes you think I'm giving you back your title so easily?"
"Because I know that you already know that I'm not, in any way, myself. And we both know that makes me easier to manipulate, especially by you."
Jeanine's voice gained strength. A lot of strength. But it still feels dull, so dull, compared to how she used to be.
Tris listens to them breathing; both a little heavy, both taking in normal breaths. She guesses they're looking at each other, staring each other down.
There's history, probably a lot of history, between Evelyn and Jeanine. And Tris guesses that goes way back, even before Jeanine became a power-hungry machine.
"My son's as closed in as you right now, but him, I understand. You, I don't get why you would even care about the Divergent you killed."
Pause. Tris can hear slow, shaky breaths. The other is steady, a little heavy, but steady.
"And whether or not she's dead, Jeanine, you have no right to decide what we're going to do with her. Tobias is in charge of that."
Pause.
"Why do you even care if she's alive or dead?"
Pause.
"Why do you even care about her?"
Pause.
"Because I do." It's soft, like a whisper, but it feels like a chaste first kiss when you're off guard, like a sip of hot soup that scalds your mouth but warms your throat. It's radiant, it's strong, but it's just a whisper.
A simple, emotionless whisper.
A few seconds pass and Tris hears slightly heavy steps walk even further away from her bed, and soon she hears the opening of her cell door. She imagines Evelyn step out, and on cue, she hears the door close, and she hears Jeanine sigh.
She hears a rustle of clothing, and the clicking of heels against the floor. The door opens, and for a second she thinks Jeanine's going to step out in an instant, then she'll be all alone in her cell, but she hears Jeanine's voice, directed at her instead.
"You're still alive, aren't you, Beatrice?" It sounds pleading, persuasive, as if Jeanine's trying to convince someone of something.
As if she's trying to convince herself of something.
Then the heals click again as the door closes, and Jeanine will never know how confused she leaves Tris, because why would Jeanine want her alive, why would Jeanine even care?
But Jeanine cares, because Jeanine sounds raw, and Tris would never believe that because Jeanine doesn't love, because Jeanine doesn't care. But Jeanine does, and as much as Tris wants to deny it, it's reality, and somewhere deep inside her, she feels the reality of someone caring about her warm her, but it can't be true, it can't be real, she can't actually like this so she denies it and sleeps it off instead.
She doesn't even bother to conceal her emotions. Then again, hasn't she stopped caring about that for the past three days?
She takes a right turn where she knows there would be no Dauntless. No Erudite, no Evelyn, and simply no one, except her in the white Erudite hall. She walks down the hall alone, and her expression is softer than it's supposed to be, but hasn't it been that way for the past three days?
"What happened to you, Jeanine?"
Quite simple actually, what happened to her; she gave up. There's nothing left in her to keep fighting, to keep pretending, to keep feeding lies to herself of things like she feels no emotions or like she only cares about the annihilation of Divergents. She's given up on pretending she doesn't feel lonely, or sad, and she's given up on trying to make herself the complete opposite of who she really is: human. She's tired, she's done, and she's simply giving up.
Technically, nothing happened to her. She just stopped lying to herself. She just let her real self show after all these years, the self inside her that's human, that's lonely, that loves like no other. Yes, Jeanine Matthews loves, though she would have never admitted that before, out loud or otherwise. She had too much pride then, but now, she's seen through it.
Though part of her blames herself because she got attached, because she let her emotions rule her, because she let her human nature get to her, another part of her tells her it would only be time until she gives in to it. Besides, she's human. To make herself believe that she could get rid of her own nature would be a lie, and in other words, ignorance. The exact opposite of what her faction, Erudite, stands for.
Around her, the walls are all white, the floor is white, and at the end of the hall is another corner. She turns it to arrive at the hallway of her living quarters, there where a few Dauntless soldiers stay, two guarding her door and the rest simply passing, and a few Erudite walking by as well, but she doesn't mind any of them. She knows they're all looking at her, be it a passing glance or a stare, but she can feel their eyes on her, but she just doesn't care. She hasn't for three days now.
Finally, she arrives at her door at the middle of the hall, and without even sparing the two Dauntless guards a glance, she enters.
The lock clicks behind her, and now she stands alone, again, in her darkened living room, everything untouched.
It's so lonely here, but it feels better than anyone who isn't Beatrice.
With every click of her heels against the tiles, she inches closer, closer, closer to her bedroom, and she feels the invisible tears return, she feels her heart grow heavier and heavier, clenching harder and harder.
How long has she even been keeping this locked away? This part of her that's hurting in hopeless loneliness? But it hurts right now and it took a girl to make her realize that, a girl that she now knows she would rather have died for. But no, she was foolish, she was blind, she was too encased in her own pride to have ever seen where she was going, what she was doing. And so, it took the death of a girl, the death of Beatrice Prior to shake her awake, to make her see reality.
But reality's too painful, too lonely, too dark and chaotic and hopeless.
She'd rather stay in her little emotionless bubble, but she can't.
She can't, but she wants to, but she wants to feel. She just wants to feel this, but it's so painful, so sad, so lonely, so bittersweet.
And so she feels, and as she curls up at the side of her bed, she wonders to the stars from mother's fairy tales and the gods from father's legends, and asks them why, but she knows she'll never know, she knows she'll never get an explanation or a simple reason, but here, in the darkness of her own room, everything feels like it's closing in on her, like it mocks her and reminds her of how she killed someone she loved – loves – or like it's telling her she's all alone, that no one will ever love her, because no one ever will.
Who would ever love a monster? Who would ever love a woman who blinds herself in goals and lies and things that are just far from the truth? Who could even love someone who doesn't know how to love?
In the solidarity of her room, Jeanine sinks into the darkness, even just for a while, and she feels the tears skidding down her cheeks again, she feels the emotions crash into her all over again. She feels the loneliness devour her, the sadness, the sorrow take over all she's ever known. She feels herself come undone, in the most painful way, and she just cries and cries and cries, because it hurts, it hurts, it hurts and she doesn't know why.
It just does.
He had already asked around, and even with this handful of information, he still didn't understand what was really going on.
He understood that Tris could be dead, and he hoped to God that isn't the case, though until now, he still didn't understand why Jeanine would care. At all.
When he woke up yesterday, he wasn't in his cell anymore. He didn't even feel numb anymore, or felt any kind of pain in his body. It was like he was given a dose of another serum, and it really did annoy him that he's being used like a test subject for serums. Is injecting this many serums in one body even safe? Because obviously, it isn't healthy.
He got up, then walked around the building, then found Peter, then asked about Jeanine. And what happened. And he just needed answers and Peter luckily gave him enough.
But after the whole four hours he spent asking what happened to Jeanine, he still didn't understand why Jeanine Matthews suddenly acted like she did. Jeanine doesn't feel anything. She's more machine than human. So what in hell happened to her?
After being locked in his room (so that's what this is now) by his mother, who apparently is now the leader of Erudite and, oh look, the whole city, he preferred to try to make sense of this whole thing since he's left with nothing to do, but so far, he's getting nowhere.
Though by all the witness accounts he's listened to, everyone is just as confused as he is. Besides, why would Jeanine even care about a Divergent, let alone Beatrice Prior? And why did she actually voluntarily lock herself in Tris' cell? It made no sense.
And he didn't even want to start thinking about why Peter acts like he's grieving or something. Nope, that would give him a headache.
Luckily, the Dauntless traitors (and the loyal Dauntless, apparently) were smart enough to leave him a notepad and a pencil apart from the emptiness of his room save for a bed and other luxuries he didn't really need. So, grabbing it off the desk and plopping it on his bed, he sat down and leaned on the headboard, if only to make sense of something, because 'everything' is going to take a long time to connect.
Beside him, there are trees. Trees, bushes, as if he's in a forest.
But here, where he's standing, it feels like a clearing; grass with no obstructions.
Far away, it looks like the ruins of a civilization, the ruins of the people from the war. It looks so destroyed, so devastated, crumbling down as if it's losing the will to exist.
In his hand he feels softness. A gentle, smooth caress of cloth, like silk or cotton, that he's tugging on for a reason he can't point out. The cloth is pulling away from him, and he's getting the instinct to hold on, to never let it go, so he keeps his grip tight, growing tighter and tighter.
He doesn't know when or how, but in front of him, he sees a girl with long, brown, braided hair. She's wearing a gray dress like the ones required in Abnegation, but on her body it looks more like an angel's robe. On her, it looks more white than gray, brighter and purer and livelier than the dullness it's really supposed to be.
She looks back at him, her lips pursed, and her eyes are a bright blue, brighter and deeper than the sky or even the clothes of Erudite. And her lips; something tells him they're supposed to be curved at the edges, smiling back at him.
The scene feels familiar, an eerie type of familiarity.
Erudite. Erudite.
Blue eyes. Long, brown, braided hair. Gray clothes that look more like white.
Gray clothes that look more like white.
An angel in rags, with a smile so bright.
He grips on tighter, and he knows he's holding on to the hem of her dress, and he just tightens his grip, because he can't let her go. He can't, not now, not again, because he can't let this happen, not again.
But the silk beneath his fingers slip away at the sound of a belt, cracking like a whip beside him.
He watches the scene unfold like it did before, and he nearly thinks she'll be okay after a few steps forward, forward toward the unknown world beyond the fence.
But, just as it happened, his hopes are crushed as a gunshot resounds, and blood bursts out the side of her body. She falls to her side and Mother runs off to her, and he looks at Father, but he doesn't look like he feels anything. He doesn't even look like he cares.
Emerging from the shadows is a lady in blue, with watery gray eyes and a beautiful appearance. But her expression is cold, save for the bit of amusement that sparkled deep in her eyes.
On she walks toward him, and beside him she stops, and whispers into his ears.
"Your sister is dead."
He wishes it would just stop, and it does, but he doubts these nightmares would stop haunting him ever again.
He shoots awake with beads of sweat trailing nearly every inch of his face. His clothes stick to him, and it suddenly feels like the room went up a few hundred degrees.
In front of him is not a girl with long, brown, braided hair, a girl with bright blue eyes, or a girl that looks more like an angel in a white dress than a girl in a dull, gray Abnegation dress, but the notepad and pen he grabbed from the desk, still blank, still empty.
He leans his head back on the headboard and closes his eyes, takes a deep breath, then lets out a sigh.
He seems to have fallen asleep, and instead of dreaming about making sense of why Jeanine Matthews is acting so out of character, he had to dream about her. He thought that was all in the past, but surprise, surprise, it's all coming back.
He leans back down and stares at the empty notepad. He guesses he won't be making sense of Jeanine Matthews' odd behaviour today.
"Trina." He whispers, as a knock resounds from his door.
So, that's it for now! I'm pretty open to constructive criticism, so if any of you guys think I should work on some things in my writing, feel free to tell me. Also, I apologize in advance if my next update will take long, but I'll try my best to bring it to you as soon as possible.
Thank you for reading, and till next time!