A/N: Hello, I only own new characters and ideas and such. I make no money from writing and all rights go to the rightful owners of the divergent series and its publishers. Outfits are on Polyvore.
This past week has been anything but happy, waiting every day, waiting every night for the activation of the simulation. Its day six, I'm in the Pit "I'm sorry Tori, but it's a waiting game. I'm at least glad you don't trust Tobias in this even though you're going with his alliance,"
"I knew your mother, she was manipulative then and I doubt she's changed. I'm only doing this as a way to take down Erudite and Jeanine," I gave her a nod seeing Tobias walking towards us.
"I'll take my leave," I smile at Tori "I can understand your anger, if Georgie did that. I couldn't imagine the pain," she gave me a sad look.
"Ava, please don't leave. You haven't spoken to me in over a week, Tris has barley," but with that I just walked away heading towards Christina who was helping Bud.
I knew we didn't have but a few that had been shot, but without the information of what the simulation did, or what Jeanine was going to have it do.
"So still not talking to Four?" Christina says as I make my way up to her "No," I say with a shrug. "I can understand, you okay you have been really pale?" a look of concern flashed across her face.
"I'm fine, stress is all it is," we helped Bud with loading boxes until Will and Uriah showed up then they took over, Lynn and Marlene are training, I think Lynn has accepted Marlene and Uriah are together and tries to be happy for them.
"Tris," Christina called I looked over seeing her in Fours arms his lips to her head, every touch meant something to them, I just removed my eyes from the sight. "Be right up," I heard her voice, I glanced back seeing Four looking at me as Tris made her way to us it was time for bed anyways.
"You hold a grudge better than anyone," Tris slung her arm over my shoulder, I just scoffed "He deserves it," we headed to bed, I was tired. I lay in a T-shirt looking into the darkness, losing the fight against sleep. My eyes they are heavy and drooping, my heart beating in a calm rhythm.
Something shakes me awake.
"Ava! Wake up," its Tris. I am on my bare feet, she and Christina are too.
We three run to the Pit, and the roar of the river follows me up the paths, we don't care we are running in only T-shirts. We sprint across the glass floor of the Pire. Christina slams her palm into an elevator button and slips inside before the doors are fully open, dragging me behind her. She jabs the DOOR CLOSE button, and then the button for the top floor.
"Simulation," she says. "There's a simulation. It's not everyone, it's just … just a few."
"You were right," Tris is catching her breath "When am I not?" I breath I put hands on my knees and takes deep breaths.
"One of them said something about the Divergent," she says.
"Said that?" I say. "While under a simulation?"
She nods. "Marlene. Didn't sound like her, though. Too … monotone." Tris says.
The doors open, and I follow her down the hallway to the door marked ROOF ACCESS.
"Christina," I say, "why are we going to the roof?" Dauntless graffiti is scrawled on the cement-block walls in black paint. The symbol of Dauntless. Initials paired together with plus signs: RG + NT, BR + FH. Couples who are probably old now, maybe broken up. Couples who didn't have to go through what Eric and I do.
The night air is cool; it gives me goose bumps on my arms. My eyes have adjusted to the darkness by now, and across the roof I see three figures standing on the ledge, facing me. One is Marlene. One is Hector. One is someone I don't recognize—a young Dauntless, barely eight years old, with a green streak in her hair.
"They are going to jump, we have to grab them, three of us three of them," I say my eyes wide. They stand still on the ledge, though the wind is blowing hard, tossing their hair over their foreheads, into their eyes, into their mouths. Their clothes snap in the wind, but still they stand motionless.
"Just come down off the ledge now," Christina says. "Don't do anything stupid. Come on, now …"
"They can't hear you," I say quietly as I walk toward them. "Or see you. They are sleepwalkers right now, they are being controlled," I say.
"I have a message for the Divergent." Her voice sounds flat. The simulation is using her vocal cords, but robs them of the natural fluctuations of human emotion.
I step forward to receive the message, but Tris is right next to me, we move together as one.
"This is not a negotiation. It is a warning," says the simulation through Marlene, moving her lips and vibrating in her throat. "Every two days until one of you delivers yourself to Erudite headquarters, this will happen again."
This?
Marlene steps back but Tris doesn't go for her, she goes for Hector, Lynn can't lose him, as Christina goes for the little girl, I run seeing Marlene vanish over the ledge into nothing. All I was able to grab was a massive fist full of hair, she was dead weight. I can't do anything, can't see if the other manages to save them, I see Marlene hanging there, than she moves as if she is waking up.
"OW," her voice screams "Marlene don't move around all I have is your damn hair, her eyes full of fear and tears look up at me "Please Ava, I don't want to die,"
"Hey, Marlene. You aren't going to die. Can you grab my hand?" she grasped mine with both hers when, I heard a little girl whimpering.
"Ow," a boys voice "What's going on?"
"I could use some help ladies," I snap, Marlene is heavy. I feel Christina and Tris, we manage to get Marlene to the ledge as she pulls herself over, her face red and covered in tears, all we can do is pull her over, hugging her tight as Hector comes over and the little girl who is crying too. But my eyes meet Tris, we give a single nod.
We were lucky this time…
They have a message for the Divergent.
I am Divergent.
This was not some kind of negotiation with the divergents, this was a bribe. You come to us and your loved ones stop dying. I was divergent. These were the people I considered family, this was my faction, my broken faction. I wasn't going to let them die, we were lucky this time. We weren't going to be lucky every time. I had to turn myself in to protect them. Would it work or was it another one of Jeanine's tricks?
This morning Lauren reported that we missed some of the cameras in the initiate dormitories, where Christina, Zeke, Lauren, Marlene, Hector, and Kee, the girl with the green hair, were sleeping. That's how Jeanine figured out who the simulation was controlling. I do not doubt that Jeanine chose young Dauntless because she knew their deaths would affect us more.
I stand with Tori and Tobias "We were very lucky not to have lost any members last night due to Jeanine Matthews. Marlene, Kee, and Hector would have been lost if not for the brave actions of Ava, Christina, and Tris who leapt over the ledge after them, risking their own lives without question for their fellow Dauntless. We have covered the cameras, and will be removing the simulation implants from each Dauntless throughout the next few days and taking every measure. We won't lose another," pounding was heard loud and deafening.
Tris and Christina got hoisted up through the crowed, they smile it is a time for celebration. Lynn comes up to me with Shauna in her wheel chair, they just left Tris and Christina.
"Hey Ava," Lynn says "Hello Ava," Shauna says.
"We just want to say thank you, thank you for all you guys did. For Kee, Marlene and Hec. For our little brother," She said.
"No thanks are necessary. We did what any Dauntless should have done," but they hugged me anyways. I knew this was coming, Marlene and a women I took as her mother found me "Ava," she smiled waving her hand "Marlene, she is our leader show her a little respect," her mother snapped.
"Marlene," I smiled "Mother," she rolled her eyes "I wanted to thank you, I don't know what I would have done if I had lost Marlene. I rather her lose that chunk of hair than her life," her mother said pulling me into a firm embrace.
"You're welcome," was all I muttered "Yeah thanks, I was scared. Wasn't very Dauntless of me," she kicked a rock. "I am a Dauntless leader, I was lucky I didn't pee my pants. I was scared, scared I lost my friend. Scared we let two child fall to their deaths. Being scared isn't weak, learning to overcome it, to mold it is brave,"
"Spoken like a true leader,"
We sit to eat now, I am sitting in the middle of Tris and Christina my stomach churning, and sweat beads my forehead. I eat a few bites "Are you sure you are okay?" Christina asked me "Yeah, all this shit with Jeanine," I mutter but she isn't buying it.
Tobias enters the room a moment later, followed by Tori, I already talked to her, and we got along well. I have been avoiding him. I haven't spoken to him since that fight we had, but I was glad Tris and Tobias are talking.
"Hello, Tris," Tobias says when he is close enough for us hear him. His voice is low, rough.
"Hi," Tris says in a tight little voice that does not belong to her normally.
He sits next to Tris and puts his arm on the back of her chair, leaning close, he stares at her, and her at him.
"Aren't you going to ask me if I'm all right?" I hear Tris say.
"No, I'm pretty sure you're not all right." He shakes his head. "I'm going to ask you two not to make any decisions until we've talked about it."
I smirk bitterly, it's too late for decisions to be talked about. Jeanine was taking lives because she was weak and scared of what she didn't know, she was scared because divergents were stronger than her. Stronger than the factions. We weren't a threat. She was. I knew what I was going to do, did he?
"Until we've all talked about it, you mean, since it involves all of us," says Uriah. "I don't think anyone should turn themselves in."
"No one?" I say.
"No!" Uriah scowls. "I think we should attack back." That means more Dauntless death. Meaningless death, we didn't have the numbers to fight against them. I have no doubts that they've begun to train the erudite how to handle weapons at the least, we'd stand no chance on our own. I wasn't going to let so many people die.
"Right now, Uriah, Jeanine can and will force who ever still has a simulation implant to kill themselves. We have to tread carefully and not provoke her, we can't risk more Dauntless lives. I agree and when the time is right and we have the right forces we take her out, but this isn't that time," he looks at me drinking from a dark bottle.
But no one disagrees with me.
"Tori and Ava and I decided to increase security. Hopefully if everyone is more aware of these attacks, we will be able to stop them," Tobias says. "If it doesn't work, then we will think of another solution. End of discussion. But no one is going to do anything yet. Okay?"
He looks at Tris and I when he asks and raises his eyebrow "Okay," Tris says, not quite meeting his eyes.
After dinner, I try to go back to the dormitory where I've been sleeping, but I can't quite walk through the door. Instead I walk through the corridors, brushing the stone walls with my fingers, listening to the echoes of my footsteps.
I watched Tris go to Four's apartment, I have been back to Eric's making his bed but he never came back, I would just cry before pulling myself together. Tobias is with her so now is the time. I start to leave, this was a small price to pay for them.
I wasn't telling anyone, I dressed and had to wait until everyone fell asleep, except the Dauntless guards. I stay in the shadows making my way out letting the cool night air wash over me. The cool air prickles in my lungs on the way in, and on the way out unfurls in a cloud of vapor. Winter will be here soon. I wonder if Erudite and Dauntless will still be at a standstill then, waiting for one group to obliterate the other. I'm glad I won't have to see it.
Now there are no reassurances, except that where I go, I go because I choose to.
I walk in the shadows of buildings, hoping my footsteps won't attract any attention. None of the city lights are on in this area, but the moon is bright enough that I can walk by it without too much trouble.
I walk beneath the elevated tracks. They shudder with the movement of an oncoming train. I have to walk fast if I want to get there before anyone notices that I'm gone. I sidestep a large crack in the street, and jump over a fallen streetlight. The journey is long, but soon I hear another set of footsteps "Ava, please wait," damn her, damn it Tris.
"Tris, what have you done?" I question her "Same as you Ava," she said, I can't force her to go back. I could knock her out and leave her, but then she will just make her way to Erudite if Tobias doesn't find her.
Now we are standing in front of Erudite headquarters.
Inside, crowds of blue-shirted people sit around tables, typing on computers or bent over books or passing sheets of paper back and forth. Some of them are decent people who do not understand what their faction has done, but if their entire building collapsed in on them before my eyes, I might not find it in myself to care.
I am doing this for Dauntless for my faction, my people we slowly walk toward the building and push open the door like we own the place.
A second after my feet touch the wood floors, and we stand before the giant portrait of Jeanine Matthews hung on the opposite wall, no one notices me, not even the two Dauntless traitor guards milling around near the entry-way. I walk up to the front desk, where a middle-aged man with a bald patch on the crown of his head sits, sorting through a stack of paper.
"I am here to see Jeanine Matthews," I say.
"Give me a moment," he says without looking up.
"No. hey something tells me she wants to us as soon as possible you little bastard," I snap. With that he looks up, his glasses askew, scowling like he's about to chastise me. Whatever words he was about to use seem to stick in his throat. He stares at me with an open mouth, his eyes skipping from my face to the black shirt I wear, to Tris.
He signals to the Dauntless traitors by the door, but there is no need. The guards have finally caught on. Dauntless soldiers from the other parts of the room have also started forward, and they all surround us but don't touch us at all and don't speak to us either. I scan their faces, trying to look as calm as possible.
"Divergent?" one of them finally asks as the man behind the desk picks up the receiver of the building's communication system.
"I am Ava Eaton, Dauntless Leader and Divergent, this is Tris Prior, Divergent," I say they give me a look, knowing we would choose new leaders. My eyes shift to the Dauntless coming out of the elevator on the left side of the room, and the muscles in my face go slack. Peter is coming toward us. "Sissy alert," I mumbled to Tris who smiled.
"We've been instructed to take you upstairs," says Peter his eyes moving between the two of us. We make no noise we just follow, we walk down a series of sleek corridors. Despite the fact that we climb a few flights of stairs, I still feel like I am plunging into the earth, Tris and I exchange looks every so often.
They stop walking in a short hallway with a series of metal doors on each side. Peter types in a code to open one of the doors, and the traitor Dauntless surround me, shoulder to shoulder, forming a narrow tunnel for me to pass through on my way into the room.
The room is small, maybe six feet long by six feet wide. The floor, the walls, and the ceiling are all made of the same light panels, dim now that glowed in the aptitude test room. In each corner is a tiny black camera. I watch as they do the same for Tris, this is what we chose, this is what we signed up for, and I only wish she never came.
I just sit, time is passing but it means nothing, I watched a man took blood from Tris and then myself. Than nothing time is nothing, I don't have my watch, it is on my bunk with a note to Tori, telling her I was still a Dauntless leader if I made it out of here alive. I didn't tell anyone but Christina and Will about Cara and my plan for the factionless, I had to have a backup, someone to finish it in case I wasn't around.
I know Tris and I arrived after midnight so I am sure it is now early morning when my cell door opens, I am on my feet my hands behind my back looking every bit the Dauntless I am when none other than Jeanine Matthews walks in with some Dauntless Traitors behind her.
My enemies, all of them "Hello Avalon," she smiled in her Erudite blue and Erudite spectacles and an Erudite look of superiority that I have come to hate. "I thought you might be the one who came. I wasn't surprised to see Beatrice as well,"
But I don't feel hate when I look at her. I don't feel anything at all, even though I know she's responsible for countless deaths. "It's Ava," I wasn't here to be polite or make conversation with her.
I look from Jeanine's watery gray eyes to the Dauntless who flank her. Peter stands at her right shoulder, I will have time to question this later.
"Tris is being prepped and now so will you, you have always been more calm and ingenuities." Jeanine said "I have made sure my son isn't here, just in case," I raised my brow, as if I didn't know.
"Oh Eric didn't tell you, I'm his mother," her smile was rotten "Well I always knew he was an Erudite in Dauntless clothes. Afraid if he saw me, he might turn against you?" I smile.
"No, not my son," but her voice cracked. She has a way of flattening even those phrases that should have inflection built into them. "Let's go on a little tour, shall we?"
She steps back and gestures toward the doorway. The last thing I want to do is walk out of this room and toward an uncertain destination, but I don't hesitate. I walk out, the severe-looking Dauntless woman in front of me. Peter follows me soon afterward.
The hallway is long and pale. We turn a corner and walk down a second one exactly like the first. I feel sick, but hold it in shaking my head.
Two more hallways follow. I am so disoriented I could never find my way back. But then my surroundings change—the white tunnel opens to a large room where Erudite men and women in long blue jackets stand behind tables, some holding tools, some mixing multicolored liquids, some staring at computer screens. If I had to guess, I would say they are mixing simulation serum, but I hesitate to confine Erudite's work to simulations alone.
Most of them stop to watch us as we walk down the center aisle. Or rather, they watch me. Some of them whisper, but most remain silent. It is so quiet here.
I follow the Dauntless traitor woman through a doorway, and stop so abruptly Peter runs into me, I feel his hand brace on my back.
This room is just as large as the last one, but there is only one thing in it: a large metal table with a machine next to it. A machine I vaguely recognize as a heart monitor. And dangling above it, a camera. I shudder without meaning to. Because I know what this is.
"I am very pleased that you, and Tris in particular, are here," says Jeanine. She walks past me and perches on the table, her fingers curled around the edge.
"I am pleased, of course, because of your aptitude test results." Her blond hair, pulled tight to her skull, reflects the light catches my attention.
"Even among the Divergent, you are somewhat of an oddity, because you have aptitude for all five factions. And Beatrice for three," her watery grey eyes shine.
"I am so glad I amuse you," I say bored when a man walks in handing her a file "Well, this just can't be good, all but Peter leave," she said spiting it out with venom. She doesn't trust the Dauntless still "So Jeanine, where is Caleb I would like a chance to snap his traitor neck" she looks at me, there is something written on her face.
"How would you know it was Caleb?"
"Only Tris knew, in turn she was naïve enough to trust him. So Caleb is a traitor," I smile she does too but it hers is uneasy.
"I won't be able to test on you as much as I like, So Beatrice will get most of it. From your results I have determined that you are one of the strongest Divergent, which I say not to compliment you but to explain my purpose. If I am to develop a simulation that cannot be thwarted by the Divergent mind, I must study the strongest Divergent mind in order to shore up all weaknesses in the technology. Understand?"
"Is there a reason you can't test on me, since as you say I have the strongest Divergent mind other than Tris."
"And then, at the conclusion of my study, you will be executed." She said a little more urgent.
Jeanine moves around "You are stupid for coming here," Peter snaps at me "No, I have done what's right, for Dauntless," I say.
"That execution will take place here." She runs her fingertips over the table beneath her. "On this table. I thought it would be interesting to show it to you." She wants to study my response, as I gaze at it "Well its stunning, so shiny, a good death,' I say a frown pulls at her thin lips.
A large machine stands on the other side, with a man-sized tray coming out of it. I recognize it from my Faction History textbook, the unit on Erudite and medicine. An MRI machine. It will take pictures of my brain.
Something sparks inside me. It's been so long since I felt it that I barely recognize it at first. Curiosity.
A voice—Jeanine's voice—speaks over an intercom.
"Lie down, Ava,"
I do no use in causing a problem this is what I came for "I want to see the scan," I say my voice tense.
"Why do you want to see them so badly?" she says.
"Surely you, of all people, understand. I have equal aptitude for Erudite, and I think I proven more than once how smart I really am." I say looking at her now. I can see my reflection, I am pale, but fit Peter stands behind me.
"All right. You can see them. Lie down."
I walk over to the tray and lie down. The metal feels like ice. The tray slides back, and I am inside the machine. I stare up at whiteness. When I was young, I thought that was what heaven would be like, all white light and nothing else. Now I know that can't be true, because white light is menacing.
I hear thumping, and I close my eyes as I remember one of the obstacles in my fear landscape, the fists pounding against my windows and the sightless men trying to kidnap me. I pretend the pounding is a heartbeat, a drumbeat. The river crashing against the walls of the chasm in the Dauntless compound. Feet stamping at the end-of-initiation ceremony. Feet pounding on the staircase after the Choosing Ceremony.
I don't know how much time has passed when the thumping stops and the tray slides back. I sit up and rub my neck with my fingertips.
The door opens, revealing Peter in the hallway. He beckons to me. "Come on. You can go see the scans now."
I hop down from the tray and walk toward him. When we're in the hallway, he shakes his head at me. "What?"
"I don't know how you manage to always get what you want."
"Well it's fun to mess with Jeanine and I am about to die in a few days," I say but the way he looks at me. He types in a series of numbers on a keypad outside the next door, and it opens. I enter the room on the other side of the mirror. It's full of screens and light, reflecting off the glass in the Erudites' spectacles. Across the room, another door clicks shut.
There is an empty chair behind one of the screens, still turning. Someone just left.
Peter stands too close behind me—ready to grab me if I decide to attack anyone. But I won't attack anyone, plus I could take him down just as fast. How far could I get if I did? Down one hallway, or two? And then I would be lost. I couldn't get out of here even if there weren't guards stopping me from leaving.
"Put them up there," says Jeanine, pointing toward the large screen on the left wall. One of the Erudite scientists taps his own computer screen, and an image appears on the left wall. An image of my brain.
I know what I'm looking at, exactly. I know what a brain looks like, and generally what each region of it does, but I don't know how mine compares to others. Jeanine taps her chin and stares for what feels like a long time.
Finally she says, "Someone instruct Ava as to what the prefrontal cortex does."
"It's the region of the brain behind the forehead, so to speak," one of the scientists says. She doesn't look much older than I am, and wears large round glasses that make her eyes look bigger. "It's responsible for organizing your thoughts and actions to attain your goals." I say they look at me Jeanine a faint smile.
"Correct," Jeanine says. "Now someone tell me what they observe about Ava's lateral prefrontal cortex."
"It's very large," another scientist—this one a man with thinning hair—says.
"Specificity," says Jeanine. Like she's chastising him.
"It's much larger than average," the man with thinning hair corrects himself.
"Better." Jeanine tilts her head. "In fact, it is the largest lateral prefrontal cortexes I've ever seen. Yet the orbitofrontal cortex is remarkably small. What do these two facts indicate?"
"The orbitofrontal cortex is the reward center of the brain. Those who exhibit reward-seeking behavior have a large orbitofrontal cortex," someone says. "That means that Ava engages in very little reward-seeking behavior."
"Not just that." Jeanine smiles a little. Blue light from the screens makes her cheekbones and forehead brighter but casts shadows in her eye sockets. "It does not merely indicate something about her behavior, but about her desires. She is not reward motivated. Yet she is extremely good at directing her thoughts and actions toward her goals. This explains both her tendency toward harmful-but-selfless behavior and, perhaps, her ability to wriggle out of simulations. How does this change our approach to the new simulation serum?"
"It should suppress some, but not all, of the activity in the prefrontal cortex," the scientist with the round glasses says.
"Precisely," says Jeanine. She finally looks at me, her eyes gleaming with delight. "Then that is how we will proceed.
"Did this satisfy my end of our agreement?"
"Yes," I smile.
"Good, I will run other test but in your current condition I can't do much," she gazed at me.
"My current condition?" I said "Oh you didn't know," she came up to me in a whisper "You're pregnant, don't worry your execution will happen before Eric come's back," I stood straight, before anyone blinked Jeanine was lying in a pool of blood she was out cold.
"Now look what you got yourself into," he muttered "Shut up Peter, like I knew. I didn't," I say low.
In silence Peter and I make our way back to my room. We turn left, and a group of people stands at the other end of the hallway. It is the longest of the corridors we will travel through, but that distance shrinks when I see him.
Held at either arm by a Dauntless traitor, a gun aimed at the back of his skull.
Tobias, blood trailing down the side of his face and marking his white shirt with red; Tobias, fellow Divergent, my brother.
"Tobias," I say, god damn him.
The Dauntless traitor with the gun presses Tobias toward me. Peter tries to push me forward too, but my feet remain planted. I came here so that no one else would die. I came here to protect as many people as I could. And I care more about Tobias's safety than anyone else's. That is when another male brings Tris from another hall "Great, a reunion," I hear Peter.
"What did you do?" I mumble. He is just a few feet away from me now, but not close enough to hear me. As he passes me he stretches out his hand. He wraps it around my palm and squeezes. Squeezes, then let's go. His eyes are bloodshot; he is pale.
His eyes move to Tris now "What did you do?" This time the question tears from Tris's throat like a growl.
I throw myself toward him, struggling against Peter's grip. "What did you do?" I scream at him.
"You two die, I die too." He says then his eyes are on Tris "I asked you not to do this. You made your decision. These are the repercussions."
He disappears around the corner. I look at Tris who is crying I mouth words "I am pregnant," her eyes widen as tears come faster, they travel down to my belly before we are shoved to our cells.
"Why did he come here?" Peter says.
"I guess because we are family and he loves Tris, you don't let the people you care about die, or die alone,' I say.
A moment later I hear the door slide shut. Then I let the tears fall, I am going to die and now I am going to let my unborn child die with me.
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