AN: Thank you for the favorites and follows. See you again next week.
She watched Christina work, the other woman carefully using some sort of tool to clean around Tris's nails, and she furrowed her brow at her friend.
"Tris, have you ever given yourself a manicure before?" Christina had asked and Tris shook her head no, "Is it not allowed in Abnegation?"
"It would be considered selfish. Our hands were meant for working, not for show." Tris sighed, "It's bullshit, I know, but it's the bullshit I was taught." She shrugged.
"You sound like you didn't much like it there." Christina replies and Tris snickers.
"I hated it. I love my family, but I hated the stifling life there." Tris admits.
"Did you ever have a boyfriend or anything, or was that not allowed either?" Christina asks as she passes over several bottles of nail polish for Tris to choose from.
"I did, but we kept it hidden. We're not supposed to really court until we've decided on what faction we're going to choose. Had we have had a relationship out in the open, the assumption would have been we'd both stay in Abnegation, and that's not what either of us wanted." Tris replies.
Christina's light brown eyes meet hers, "Do you know where he transferred?"
Tris nods her head, "Here."
Her friend's eyes widen and she stops working completely, "He's here? Have you seen him?" Tris makes a shushing motion and Christina smiles, "Okay I'll be quiet, but please tell me. I'm in desperate need of good gossip to get me through this shit."
Tris laughs lightly, "Promise me you will not tell a soul."
"I promise."
Tris scoots closer to her and looks around, finding no one paying any attention to them. Some of their fellow trainees are sleeping, some hooking up, and others are just talking like she and Christina are. Tris holds up four fingers and Christina's mouth gapes open.
"He's from…" She trails off as Tris nods, "He's with Lauren now, right?" Christina whispers.
"He is. We had no plans to come here together, so there was no expectation that he'd still be available when I came here." She shrugs.
"Did you come here for him?" Christina asks quietly.
Tris closes her eyes briefly, thinking back to the day that she had taken her aptitude test. The beautiful woman with the long, dark dreadlocks, colorful tattoos and captivating almond shaped eyes had been extremely kind to her. Tori had also carefully warned her that leaving Abnegation to go anywhere other than Amity would be incredibly dangerous for her, but Tris had been adamant she was coming to Dauntless.
Was it for Tobias? Maybe a little. Tris had thought she loved him at one time, but she realized she was in love with the idea of a future. It was more of the indoctrinated Abnegation teachings of how a woman needed a man in order to be successful.
Tobias had given her hints as to where he was going, but she distinctly remembered a conversation they'd had just days before his choosing. When she had mentioned that she always found the Dauntless to be the most intriguing when she was in school, he'd scoffed at her, and basically implied that she'd never have what it takes to be Dauntless.
She was determined to prove him wrong.
"Yes, but not really in the way you might think. He was kind to me, but he was also very Abnegation, and he'd once told me I'd never make it here." She replied as she watched Christina carefully apply the dark nail polish to her nails.
"You wanted to prove him wrong." Christina states and Tris nods, "I think you are every day."
"Thank you." Tris smiles.
"No thanks needed, you are absolutely holding your own. You have the best times for the fear simulations by far, and that's with scary ass Eric being the one to give them to you." Christina says and Tris blushes, Thankfully Christina doesn't notice, "How is he when you're stuck in a room with him?"
Tris can feel the heat on her cheeks and she's thankful for Christina's intense concentration on her nails, "An asshole."
Christina laughs again and she begins to carefully clean up any errant polish, "Chris, you're hearing all about my past boyfriends, but I've not heard anything about yours. Spill."
She glances up at Tris and grins, "I've heard we have some of the same taste in men."
Tris feels nervousness in her stomach and she swallows to push the butterflies down, "Oh really?"
Christina nods once and then gestures towards Peter's bunk, "I think we were hooking up with him at the same time in upper levels."
"No way." Tris whispers and Christina nods, "I had no idea he had a girlfriend when he and I had that fling back then."
"Oh girl, he was never my boyfriend, he was just a good time. I started dating Uriah our last year of school, and the thing with Peter ended for good."
This time, it's Tris who is surprised, "No way, did you choose to come here so you could be together?" She asks and Christina nods, "I had no idea you two were even a thing."
"We keep it quiet. You see how there's a strange target on Myra's back since she followed Edward here."
Tris shakes her head, "That's because Myra doesn't belong here. She came here for love, but you," Tris smiles briefly, "You are a true Dauntless."
"Lights out!" Four bellows from the doorway and Christina looks up at Tris with a smile.
"Thank you. They'll dry quickly, just don't let them touch anything for maybe ten more minutes, okay?"
"Okay, thank you again for doing them for me."
Tris watches as Christina crosses the space between Tris's bunk and hers and crawls into it. When the lights completely dim in the dorm, and the only light is filtering in from the hallways, Tris relaxes and reflects on her first several weeks here. She may have come here for Tobias, but she's making it, even if it is Eric who is helping her.
Thinking of him makes all of the lightness of her evening with Christina fade away.
He's just as dangerous as Tobias told her, and he'd all but shown his hand when he gave her a choice to try and save herself. Even if Tobias hadn't warned her that Max was also working with Erudite, Eric's actions would have eventually led her to the same conclusion.
Her relationship with Tobias may not have worked out, but she believed him when he told her that he was going to find a way to keep her safe and off of Eric's radar.
Except he has no idea that Eric already knew exactly what she is.
She's nowhere near a virgin, not with her previous relationship with Tobias, and the people she'd hooked up with while in upper levels once he left, but she's never once resorted to using her body for self-preservation like she is now. Eric is the enemy, he's absolutely vile, but her body reacts to him like no one she's ever been with in her past.
Maybe, just maybe she can keep his attention long enough for Tobias and her to figure out a way to stop whatever it is that Erudite is up to.
She's almost asleep when she feels someone touch her, and she turns over expecting it to be Christina but finds it's Eric instead. He leans close to her ear, his hot breath fanning over her, and he whispers a simple command.
"Come with me."
She does as she's told, and when they make it into a back hallway she didn't even realize existed, he hands her a pile of clothes.
"Put these on, don't ask questions."
Eric watches as she slips his sweats over her own clothes and then he pulls the hood up around her face and then wraps a scarf around her. Only her eyes are visible and she begins to feel a slight bit of panic as he pulls her through the halls. She has absolutely no idea where they are going, and when he finally makes it to a door and pushes it open she's surprised to see the night sky.
"Where are we going?" She asks as he practically drags her along, "Eric, what are you doing?"
"I said no questions." He growls as he continues walking briskly.
She digs her heels into the hard ground and falls, and the look on his face as he towers over is pure anger, "Get the fuck up."
"Please tell me what's happening."
He picks her up, and she begins fighting him, kicking, moving, and just as she's about to scream he puts his hand over her mouth. She feels the cold blade of a knife against her neck and she begins shaking.
"Behave." He commands and she nods, "I'll put the knife away if you promise not to scream. Do you?" She nods again and he puts the knife back into the sheath and takes his hand from her mouth.
"Eric, you don't have to do this. I promise you, I will listen, I will do whatever you need, but please do not take me to her." She begs.
"Her?" He growls as he leans towards her. She realizes she's said too much. Eric has never told her exactly who he was working for, or what his intentions were. He's always just reiterated that Tris shouldn't have picked Dauntless because of what she is. "Fucking talk!" He says angrily and she looks away from him. He once again grips her face in his hand and forces her to look at him, "You have five seconds-"
"I'd rather just die then. Get it over with, do whatever you need to, but I'm tired of this. I don't want you to hurt the people I care about." Tris replies.
"What do you think is happening here?" He growls at her and she feels tears burning at her eyes, "Fucking talk!"
"You're working with Jeanine Matthews, and you're taking me to her tonight." Tris replies.
"Who told you this?" He asks and when she doesn't answer he shakes her, "You love to fucking talk, so do it now!"
"What do you want with me?" She asks as the tears finally fall. She's strong, but this is too much, this is him asking her to give him the actual ammunition he wants to hurt people like Tori and Tobias.
She's selfless.
Eric knows it.
He watches her as she finally breaks, and there's a part of him that wants to drop her from the top of the Hancock building. She's infuriating, but she's also exactly what he needs to get his father's attention away from Jeanine and back on him.
So why is he willing to drag her to Erudite tonight, not knowing if his father is even in the faction to witness him bringing the grand prize in himself?
The train approaches and he glances back at it, knowing if he's to make the jump he'll have to carry the sobbing Stiff onto it himself. He makes a quick decision to bring her back into the faction, but there's no way he can leave her in the dorms with what she knows, and what Jeanine has planned with that scanner tomorrow morning.
"If you're quiet, I'll keep you safe. Is that what you want?" He asks and her watery eyes meet his.
"What do I have to do?" She asks.
"Everything I tell you." He commands and she closes her eyes.
She can do this, she can live long enough to get back to Tobias and save herself. She knows Eric's working with Jeanine, but she also sees he's an absolute mess. He may want her to think he's in total control of this, but she can see him spiraling right before her eyes. She has no idea what his internal conflict is, but maybe if she continues to cooperate she can bring him down too.
"Okay." She whispers and he pulls her back towards Dauntless.
She stopped asking questions as he took her through the lesser known parts of the faction in order to get her to his destination unnoticed. When they'd finally made it, he'd ushered into what she assumed is his home, and she sat down where he indicated.
He'd paced for a while, yanking at his hair, and at times even talking to himself, and she'd said nothing. When he'd finally calmed down, it was in front of his laptop, and with complete silence from her. Looking around the apartment, everything feels cold. The temperature, the sparse furniture, the lack of anything personal.
Cold. Just like him.
He's studying the sims, taking notes of anomalies, and jotting down his personal thoughts about things that seemed just a little too perfect.
"What is going on?" Tris finally asks as she watches him work.
"I told you that you aren't to ask questions." He bites back, not looking away from his laptop.
"You're just planning on keeping me in your apartment? How is any of this this going to actually work? Why can't I just go back to training?" She asks him.
"Because you can't." He replies.
"Eric, I can't be kept inside of an apartment like a pet. I have friends, I need to pass training, I can't just stay here." She argues.
"Do you want to live?" He barks at her, finally looking at her.
"Of course, I do." She replies.
"For you to live, you have to disappear. Don't question me."
"How?" She asks nervously.
He stands abruptly and turns the barstool she's sitting on towards him. He takes her lips in a searing kiss and picks her up, with her wrapping her legs around him. His lips don't leave hers as he makes his way clumsily to the bedroom, and he drops her on the bed.
She watches as he yanks his T-shirt over his head, showing her his chiseled chest for the first time. His defined abs ripple slightly as he unbuttons his pants and kicks them off his legs, his boxers following behind them.
He yanks her to him, pulling the tank top and sports bra she was wearing over her head, and the leggings and panties down her legs. It's the first time she's been completely naked in front of him, and her skin flushes in embarrassment.
He doesn't notice.
He crawls up her body, dragging his teeth, tongue and lips on his way up, and when he gets to her neck he bites her. He's not gentle when he pushes into her, but she doesn't care, he feels too good to argue against what they're doing right now.
He drops his lips to hers again, kissing her slowly and barely moving his hips against hers. His lips travel to her neck, then up to her ear, "You ask too many fucking questions."
"Are you going to tell them I died?" She asks and he bites her earlobe.
"If I have to."
"Eric, how will this work?" She asks and he drops his lips to hers again, twirling their tongues together before he answers her.
"There's no other way."
The conversation ceases, and all you can hear is the sound of their skin slapping together. She's panting his name as she comes apart, and he follows behind her, dropping his sweaty head to her shoulder.
He lays there, catching his breath, his heart racing as fast as his mind. She's not wrong to question him, he has no idea what he's doing. She's right, he can't just keep her hidden in his apartment. It's dangerous, and stupid, but he has no idea what else to do to keep her from facing that scanner.
When he feels her fingers trailing up and down his back, it breaks him from his thoughts and he quickly moves away from her. He walks into his bathroom and starts the shower, stepping under the hot spray, and he rests his forehead against the cold tile wall.
Tris wanders until she finds another bathroom, and she starts the shower there and works on cleaning herself up. She knows that she can't stay here with Eric, this arrangement of her using her body to distract him from turning her into Jeanine isn't going to work forever, and she knows based on his behavior tonight that the target on her back has gotten much bigger and it's put him in some sort of panic.
She's planning her escape when she hears the bathroom door open and sees Eric through the glass wall. He doesn't say anything, he simply drops the towel he had wrapped around him and steps into the shower with her.
"I'll get you what you need, just don't leave." He says as the steam rises around them.
"Why should I stay?" She asks.
It's a fair question, and she watches him carefully as he slowly shakes his head.
"I don't know." He admits.
"Eric, you don't have to force a woman to be with you, I've seen the way they look at you. Why me?" She presses.
"You agreed to this, I didn't force you!" He shouts at her and then he shakes his head again, "If you leave the apartment, there's nothing I can do to help you anymore. I don't know what I'm going to do yet, but I know that I can keep you safe."
"For me to stay here, you have to tell me why you want to protect me." She replies.
"Just give me a week. Let me figure things out. It's safer in here than anywhere else you'd be." He says and she finally nods her head.
"Okay."