Eh, I'm not happy with this chapter but hopefully I'll get better at writing about the fear sims. Avalon is a character from another person's fanfiction on here, her name is LillianPeace and you should definitely go check out her stories. Also, I own nothing except new characters and ideas, all rights go to the rightful owners, and no money is being made from my shitty writing.
We sit in a darkened hall, my brother was no longer back to being himself but for the few days he was he had gained weight and muscle rather fast. I worried for him, I was angry at whoever was doing this to him. I knew Eric had something to do with this. I also knew I didn't stand a chance against him. Not alone anyway.
Initiates were against one wall and dauntless-born were against the other, although I think that was more by choice. We were being evaluated together this time, meaning whatever was going to happen everyone was equally unprepared for. Wonderful.
"So," Lynn looks up from the floor, scuffing it with her shoe. "Which one of you is ranked first, huh?" Her question is met with silence at first, and then Peter clears his throat.
"Me," he says.
"Bet I could take you." She says it casually, turning the ring in her eyebrow with her fingertips. "I'm second, but I bet any of us could take you, transfer."
I don't laugh, if he wasn't the way he was right now maybe I would giggle and join in on the teasing and taunting. But right now I see him as a ticking time bomb and everything in me feared Lynn would be the next Edward.
"I wouldn't be so sure about that, if I were you," My brother says with a cold smile, his once pale green eyes now dark with whatever plagued his system. "Who's first?" he questions.
"Uriah," she says. "And I am sure You know how many years we've spent preparing for this?" She's trying to scare them, intimidate them, get into their heads before they're called back for whatever torture waited for us.
"Lynn." Four walks out and calls her name, and she walks down the hallway, the blue light at the end making her nearly bare head look eerie. She had me shave it all off this morning, leaving it barely there.
"So you're first," Will says to Uriah. Uriah shrugs.
"Yeah. And?"
"And you don't think it's a little unfair that you've spent your entire life getting ready for this, and we're expected to learn it all in a few weeks?" Will says, his eyes narrowing.
"Not really. Stage one was about skill, sure, but no one can prepare for stage two," he says. "At least, so I'm told." No one responds to that. We sit in silence for twenty minutes. I count each minute on my watch. Then the door opens again, and Four calls another name.
"Drew" he says. Each minute wears into me like a scrape of sandpaper. Gradually, our numbers begin to dwindle, and it's just me and Uriah and Tris. My leg bounces, and Uriah's fingers tap against his knee, and Tris sits perfectly still except for her heaving chest. It must be anxiety getting to her. We hear only muttering from the room at the end of the hallway, and I suspect this is another part of the game they like to play with us. I was really starting to hate games.
Four touches my shoulder to guide me into the room and closes the door behind me. When I see what's inside, I recoil immediately, my shoulders hitting his chest. In the room is a reclining metal chair, similar to the one I sat in during the aptitude test. Beside it is a familiar machine. This room has no mirrors and barely any light. There is a computer screen on a desk in the corner.
"Sit," He says, he knows I don't very much like him and he knows I'm scared. He pats my shoulder and gives me an encouraging look, although the smile was absent.
I was divergent. I was going to die. What if with this test he could tell? Would he kill me on the spot? Would my body be found in the chasm one day? I was terrified. Terrified of the life I was leaving behind. Terrified of not saving my brother.
"What's this test?" I question, my voice is steady despite my trembling hands. "I'm guessing it's a simulation, like the aptitude test. You have a bucket ready? My stomach doesn't fare well with these things."
"It is exactly like the aptitude test except you'll be facing your fears. Literally. Most of these fears you won't even know you had." he says. "And yes, Tori informed me of your weak stomach."
"It's not weak, just sensitive." I huffed as I sat in the chair. I was shaking so badly I had to grip the arm rests to steady myself. I wonder how Peter did and if he was okay, I wonder what his fears were. My throat feels tight when I think about him.
"The simulation will teach you to control your emotions in the midst of a frightening situation." He continues.
"That seems reasonable." I take deep breaths, "Peter, my brother, how did he do?"
"He did okay, better than expected but still will be scarred for a lifetime. You were in his fears, if that's what you're worried about. He does love you. Somethings going on, you know that don't you?"
"We should get to the test" the effort I made to calm down was just torn to shreds. Was my brother divergent? "How does it work?"
"I inject you with this serum" I hate needles that plunge into my body, infiltrating me with something made like this. "I have wires, so I can see what's going on. But for you, there's a tiny transmitter in the serum that sends data to the computer."
"Fun." The need is thicker and longer than any other I have seen; it's filled with an orange serum. He tilts my head and slowly dips the needle into tender flesh, a whimper escapes my lips. And then the needle is gone, a deep aching pain spreads from the injection site to my neck and throughout my body. My head is spinning.
"The serum will go into effect in sixty seconds. This simulation is different from the aptitude test," he says. "In addition to containing the transmitter, the serum stimulates the amygdala, which is the part of the brain involved in processing negative emotions —like fear—and then induces a hallucination. The brain's electrical activity is then transmitted to our computer, which then translates your hallucination into a simulated image that I can see and monitor. I will then forward the recording to Dauntless administrators. You stay in the hallucination until you calm down—that is, lower your heart rate and control your breathing."
"Sounds like a daydream" my throat is dry; my words are slurred.
"Be brave." Are the last words I hear that I know are real...
I sit in a pitch black room, the only light shining from the over-hanging lamp that only surrounds where I sit. The ground is as cold as ice, it seeps through my clothes and chills my bones.
"Alessa!" screams a familiar voice, agony weaving through the single word.
"Peter?!" I call out, as I stand ropes spring forward like monstrous arms and wrap around me. Dragging me forward where Peter was tied to a chair, he was nothing but skin and bones. Ghostly pale skin clung to every indent in his bones, every curve. His eyes sunken in and dark, deep, and bruised. Bright red liquid dripping from his mouth, nose, eyes, and ears.
"Alessa! Alessa, please!" he voice was hoarse, ragged, shredding my ears like broken glass.
"Peter!" I screamed, trying my hardest to get out of the ropes. A man with a thickly muscled body walked forward from the black nothingness and as he did a table seemed to appear beside my brother. On the table were freakishly large syringes filled with the sickly red serum.
"Why are you letting him do this to me?! Alessa!" my screams mingled with his as the man turned so I could see him. I expected him to look like Eric but instead his face was distorted, inhuman, a monster.
"Leave him alone!" I shrieked, my throat becoming raw. His broken mouth laughed, something deep and guttural. Something about it was even more wrong than his face, something so fake, so unreal.
Large, disfigured hands picked up the syringes as he turned to Peter who looked so terrified. I never saw my brother scared, I never saw him weak. Not until coming here. To this fucking hell. Another laugh. Another twinge of something in the back of my head, whispered words, my vision swimming.
"No." my voice was soft, I lifted my arms and the ropes crumbled to dust. "I'm in a simulation" I rubbed my eyes, my head throbbed, anger bubbling in me. "Peter is fine" I lied. Not even in real life was he okay.
I tackled the thing, the syringes now in my hands. I plunged them down into its face, again and again and again until he too oozed something foul and crumbled to dust.
I messed up. I shouldn't be able to change this. I shouldn't be able to do this. If Four didn't know I was divergent, he did now. I turned to Peter, blackness oozed from him as he cried in fear until finally crumbling and being taken away by an unfelt wind.
I woke screaming in the cold metal chair. Dry tears streaked my stoney face. I was angry. I was not afraid. I was so, so angry. "You all will die." My voice was steady, eerie. "You will all die for what you've done to my brother!" I lunged at him, not thinking, only feeling.
My fists smacking into Fours face repeatedly, blood streaming from his nose as he used his legs to kick me across the room. Pinning me to the wall as I screamed.
"Enough! Alessa!" I crumbled to the floor, I couldn't breathe. My chest felt so tight, hot tears stung my eyes.
"I'm divergent" I whispered angrily. "Kill me, kill me! I can't even help my own brother from turning into a monster! End this fucking guilt!" my voice was shrill; Fours eyes were wide. He sat beside me, his arms hesitantly came around me.
"I know you are. I am too." He whispered in my ear, "Keep your mouth shut about this. They won't hesitate to kill you, Alessa. Don't do that to your brother, to Lynn, to your friends. Eric is helping him, he's not the bad guy this time. But he has to follow orders or everything is fucked. You understand this?"
His dark blue eyes bore into mine, "I'm so tired." I shook my head, what did I get myself into?
"I imagine-" before he could finish I puked all over his chest. "I should have expected that, let's get you to the dorm and me changed."
I laid in bed, Four came back after changing, simply to check on me. "You lasted three minutes" he whispered to me, "Keep that to yourself, I'll fix the data. You'll be fine. Just, stop the breakdowns. Get some sleep."
It was midnight when I woke, someone was screaming from a nightmare. Chris was in my bed, Peter was rocking back and forth in bed ripping at his hair. Eric kneeled in front of his bed, a syringe in hand. A sympathetic look adorned his usually cold face.
"I understand" his voice was impossible to hear, "Four is fixing it, no one will touch either of you. Play your part, do as told and I can keep you all alive. When the times comes you make sure she knows to play soldier."
"What if-"
"No what ifs." His voice was stern, like a fathers. I'm guessing, I've heard fathers talk to their children that way.
"I don't want to feel this anymore, this anger and then sickness and then anger all over again. Just repeating over and over again, I'm hurting her and she's all I have."
"Believe me, I understand you more than anyone. The love of my life is in danger, her smarts are the only reason she's still breathing and ready to lead the resistant. You have to keep going until then, make it through. The factionless are going to be slaughtered. Don't slip and let yourself be one."
My brother held out his arm and let Eric dig the needle into him, slowly pushing its' contents into his veins. "It'll all be over soon. We'll get through this. And soon you'll meet Avalon, the woman who has saved you and your sister."