Disclaimer: I do not own Divergent of any of the characters.
"Sorry if Christina got the wrong impression about me walking you home," Eric says as they make their way through the Pit doors and into the hall. "I just wanted to make sure Four didn't harass you again."
"Don't be," Tris says with a shrug. "She'll think whatever she wants to think. I don't really care."
The pair start their walk to Tris' apartment in silence.
"Can I unpause our game?" Tris asks tentatively after a few minutes.
"Tell you what, why don't we forget about the game, and you just ask me what you want to know," Eric responds, smiling.
"Okay."
"What do you want to ask me?"
"I'm not sure if this is rude, or nosy, or what," Tris starts, hesitantly, "but earlier you said Marlene humoured you when you asked her a question. I know its probably none of my business, but I'm curious what you asked her."
Eric lets out a nervous chuckle.
"Okay. I probably should have just asked you this directly, but I've been curious about it for a while, and we had just talked about you needing time to process everything, so I didn't know when I'd get the chance to ask you. Marlene happened to start talking to me at the bar, and I figured you guys are friends so maybe she'd know, so I just kind of blurted it out."
Tris shakes her head and lets out a small laugh.
"Wow. I didn't take you for a rambler."
"Hey!" Eric replies playfully.
Tris grins.
"So, what is it about me that you desperately needed to know right away," Tris says dramatically.
Eric rolls his eyes but smiles.
"I wanted to know why you turned down the offer to join leadership."
Tris' face falls.
"Oh."
"I can already tell by that 'oh' that Marlene didn't have the full story."
Tris takes a deep breath.
"What exactly did Marlene tell you?"
"Some crap about how you had just gotten to Dauntless and you wanted to immerse yourself in the way of life here rather than having to deal with other factions all the time. She said you didn't want to have to deal with Abnegation, specifically and…" he trails off.
"And what?" she encourages.
"And after initiation, you needed a break from seeing my face everyday," he finishes, avoiding eye contact.
Tris lets out a loud snort.
"Man, I had completely forgotten that that was the excuse I gave my friends. I can't believe Marlene had the balls to say that to your face."
"So, not the real reason then?"
Tris shakes her head.
"Not even close."
"So, you weren't sick of looking at my beautiful face?" Eric adds, fluttering his eyelashes.
Tris bites her lip but can't help the grin that takes her over.
"No, I wasn't sick of looking at your beautiful face," she parrots back to him. "I actually quite like your face," she adds without thinking, her cheeks immediately turning a dark shade of crimson.
Eric grins.
"Good," he says. "And I quite like your face too."
"You know, you're a lot less serious than you came off during initiation."
"Initiation isn't meant to be fun. I'm there to train you and make sure you understand what it means to be a soldier. I'm not there to be your buddy and I have no interest in getting involved in the drama of a bunch whiny initiates."
Tris stops and turns to face Eric with raised eyebrows.
"That's what you thought of me then? Just another 'whiny initiate'?"
"No," Eric says, shaking his head. "You were different. You caught my attention right away. You're only the second transfer to come from Abnegation and the first thing you did was volunteer to jump down the hole. That impressed me immediately. And I don't remember you ever whining."
Tris starts walking again.
"So, what is the real reason you declined leadership."
"After tonight, I think you probably have a decent idea why I declined."
Eric nods.
"Your boyfriend convinced you we're a bunch of corrupt Divergent hating bastards?"
"Pretty much. It didn't quite sit right with me, but at the time I really didn't want to upset him, and his arguments seemed sound, so it felt like an easy choice."
"Do you regret it?"
Tris takes a moment before responding.
"To be honest, after I turned it down, I didn't really dwell on it. But now that I'm realizing his arguments weren't as sound as I thought, I'm starting to wonder what my life would have been like had I accepted."
"Well, for one, you and I would have probably gotten to know each other a lot sooner," he says with a wink.
Tris smiles. "Maybe, but I still would have been with Four back then so I doubt it would have gone the same way it is right now. I am surprised no one else from my year wanted to join leadership in my place."
"Actually, Peter graciously offered to take your place," Eric says sarcastically. "But he didn't meet all of the criteria."
"What exactly is the criteria?"
"Rankings are part of it, but candidates also have to demonstrate certain qualities and they need to be recommended by at least one of the initiate trainers or the leader overseeing initiation. Even if Peter had ranked first, he wouldn't have been offered a position. None of us would have recommended him after the Edward incident."
Tris stops in her tracks and looks at Eric directly.
"Wait, you knew it was Peter who stabbed Edward? You all knew, and you didn't do anything about it?"
"Let's just say Edward wasn't exactly innocent in the whole thing. We did end up getting Max involved but since Peter was heavily antagonized, he dismissed it. After Edward decided to leave, I figured Peter took it as a win and was no longer a threat," he replies with a shrug.
"Well, you were wrong," Tris states angrily, detangling her hand from Eric's and wrapping her arms around herself.
"What do you mean?" Eric asks, brows furrowed.
"What I mean is, maybe if Peter had been punished properly, he wouldn't have…" she starts, trailing off.
"Wouldn't have what?"
"Just never mind," she says sharply, turning and continuing down the hallway briskly.
She's angry. She knows she's being irrational and that what Peter did wasn't Eric's fault, but she can't help the flood of emotions that thinking about that night stirs up in her.
It doesn't take long for Eric to catch up and match her stride.
"Tris, please stop. Just talk to me," he begs. "Did he do something else?"
Tris lets out a long sigh and slows her pace.
"I didn't mean for this to come up," she says quietly.
"Well, it has, so please just tell me what happened."
Tris lets out another sigh.
"Okay. Do you remember the night you posted the rankings in the dorms after we started doing the fear sims?"
"Yes. You were first and Peter was…second," his says, his eyes growing wide in realization. "What did he do to you?"
Tris swallows hard.
"That night, I couldn't sleep so I went for a walk, and I was about to get some water when I was jumped. Three people in masks dragged me to the chasm and one of them put their hands up my shirt and then pushed me over the railing. Thankfully, Four showed up and two of them ran off. The third guy wasn't so lucky and after Four was done with him, he helped me back over the railing and brought me to his apartment to keep me safe."
Tris watches as Eric face rapidly cycles through an array of emotions before landing on anger. He seethes silently.
"Eric?"
"Who was the third person? Obviously one of them was Peter…I'm going to assume he was the perve who touched you."
Tris nods in confirmation.
"The one Four railed on was Drew, right? I remember him being admitted to the infirmity having obviously gotten into an altercation, but he refused to admit who turned his face into a punching bag. Was the third one Molly?"
Tris shakes her head.
"Al."
"Why didn't you report it? Why didn't you come to me?"
"What good would that have done? We all knew Peter was the one who stabbed Edward and he didn't get in trouble for that so what would have been the point? Besides, Four doesn't trust you remember? He figured it would do more harm than good to tell you."
Eric shakes in head in disbelief.
"He should have told me. Its my job to keep you safe. I would have done something about it. What happened to you wasn't the same as what happened to Edward. Initiation is hard enough; you shouldn't have had to sleep in the same room as the people who assaulted and tried to kill you."
"I didn't actually spend much time in the dorms after that. Four gave me the code to his apartment and told me I could come and go as I pleased. At first, I tried to just go on like nothing had happened, but I could never fall asleep knowing Peter was in the room with me so eventually I gave up and just started sneaking out to sleep at Four's every night."
This time, it's Eric who stops walking.
"How was I so oblivious? All that time. Everything that went on. I had no idea. I mean, Four broke too many rules to count, and if Max was aware of any of it he would have pulled him from his trainer duties for good, but at least he knew what was happening. God, I feel so stupid."
Tris' anger dissipates as she realizes of how genuinely upset Eric is. Impulsively, she threads her fingers through his.
"Do I wish Peter had been punished? Absolutely. But this isn't your fault. We kept it from you on purpose. I wish now that I had trusted you enough to come to you."
"I'm sorry, Tris."
"Don't be."
Eric's eyes flit down to Tris' lips, and she wonders briefly if he's going to kiss her, but instead, he turns to face the end of the hallway and starts to walk again.
Did she want Eric to kiss her? She had never thought about it before now. She sneaks a peak at him. He is very attractive, she wasn't lying about liking his face, and he seems to care about her and not just because he's a leader and has to care about all Dauntless members.
They seem to get along well, and it has been surprisingly easy for her to open up to him. As crazy as it sounds, Tris was starting to like the idea of dating Eric.
They aren't far from Tris' apartment now, and she makes a conscious decision to keep their pace slow, not wanting their evening to come to an end.
"If you had the option, would you join leadership now?" Eric asks breaking the silence.
Tris thinks for a moment.
"I'd definitely want to know more about what joining would entail," she starts. "I was so quick to turn it down, I realized after that I didn't really know what it was I had turned down."
"Do you want to know now?"
"Yeah, actually, I'd love that."
"Well, for the first year you'd be assigned to a specific leader. You'd act as their assistant while learning the ins and outs of leadership. There are six leaders in total and each of us is in charge of one or two specific departments within the Dauntless compound. In addition, all of us, except Max, are assigned as a liaison to one of the other factions."
"What are you in charge of?" Tris asks enthusiastically.
"Member life, which includes initiation, new members, new member employment etc. and housing which includes placement, renovations, coordinating moves as families grow and so on. And unsurprisingly, I'm the liaison to Erudite."
"What happens after that first year?"
"That depends. If there's an open leader position you would be considered for it, keeping in mind there are usually other candidates from previous years also hoping to fill the position. If there aren't any leader positions open, then you can continue being an assistant until one opens up, or you can apply to any of the open positions in the different departments that work under the leaders."
"What other departments are there?"
Eric smiles at her interest.
"Sam manages faction finances. Vivica takes care of employment as well as care and education. Carter handles event planning and, ironically, human resources/employee relations. Khloe does inventory and supplies, and Max deals with military and security as well as overseeing all of us and handling some of the more delicate affairs with the other factions."
Tris looks solemn.
"I wish I hadn't been so quick to dismiss it. You're making it sound really interesting. I guess I never thought about how much goes into running a faction. If I had accepted, who's assistant would I have been?"
"There were three different options at that time. Carter, Khloe and me."
"How did that happen?"
Eric takes a beat before answering.
"I can't really go into too many details, but the year that I went through initiation, there was a major scandal in leadership. The head leader ended up being forced to step down and when Max took his place, he fired everyone who was involved in the scandal. That left three leadership openings and three assistant openings. Max pulled Sam and Khloe in from other departments and brought me on when I finished initiation. As soon as the assistant openings became available, Carter's assistant requested to be transferred to one of us and Max reassigned her to Sam, leaving three openings. The year before you, the top initiate was assigned to Carter since he was the most senior leader who didn't have an assistant, but he quit after a couple of months making that position open again."
Tris nods her head, fascinated by Eric's story.
"If Carter still doesn't have an assistant, why wouldn't I have automatically been assigned to him?"
Eric snorts.
"Carter has a bad case of wandering hands and when Max realized why no one wanted to be his assistant, he changed the rules and decided that if there is more than one position available, he would let the candidate decide who they wanted to learn from."
"You mean to tell me, the man in charge of employee relations…" Tris starts.
"…Likes to try to have relations with the employees," Eric finishes.
Tris scrunches up her nose in disgust.
"But wait, you said 'her' when referring to who is now Sam's assistant and 'him' referring to Carter's last assistant."
"The man doesn't discriminate," Eric says with a shiver.
"He hasn't tried…with you…has he?"
"My first week. Trust me, I shut that down real fast."
Tris' eyes grow wide.
"How does he still have a job?"
Eric shrugs.
"After Max fired everyone involved in the scandal, he had a lot of new people to train, and he couldn't justify getting rid of one of the only members of senior leadership left. Luckily, Carter is set to retire in a year and a half, so we just have to put up with him until then."
"Will his job go to Sam's assistant then? Or I guess Vivica or Max's assistants maybe?"
"I actually think Max is hoping Khloe will take over for him, and Maliah, Sam's assistant, will take over for Khloe. Khloe's job isn't easy, but it is the most straightforward because she only oversees one department, whereas Carter has two departments and Marcus to contend with. I don't know how much time you've spent with Marcus, but he's kind of a misogynistic asshat and Khloe has a much stronger backbone than Maliah. Max's assistant is holding out for Max's retirement and Vivica's assistant has been with her from day one. She never wanted to become a leader but loves working with Vivica. She could have retired a couple of years ago but she's sticking it out until Vivica retires in two years."
"Wow, it sounds like there is going to be a lot of changes coming."
Eric nods.
"What about your job, do you like it?" he asks her.
Tris groans.
"It's okay, nothing as exciting as yours, but I don't mind it."
"If I could convince Max to give you another shot, would you be interested in leadership?" Eric asks cautiously as they turn the corner.
Tris gapes as she looks up at Eric. Is he serious? Could he really get her another chance? She's about to ask when Eric speaks.
"What are you doing here?" he growls, looking straight ahead.
Tris follows Eric's gaze to the door of her apartment and what she sees makes her body go tense.
For the third time in less than three hours, Four is standing in front of them.
A/N: A bit of a shorter chapter than the last one, but there was so much dialogue and info that I felt it best to end it here.
Also yeah, Four is annoying and back for another fun appearance.
Originally, this was meant to be a cute little oneshot that all takes place in one night, but clearly it's turned into a whole thing. It feels a bit rambly to me and I hope it isn't boring for you guys, but there's a lot of info I felt needed to be said in order to set up the second half of the story. Yes, I said half because I've now somehow come up with a bit of a future for these two. The next chapter should be the conclusion of the first half of the story and of this evening that they have spent together and then I'm anticipating around four more chapters after that.
Thanks for reading!