Okay, you may notice the oddity of my nnumbering here as in my other fan fic, I named chapters with Five as the number Chapter 5, but I thought about it. 5 is between Four and Six. What else gets between Four and Six? Veronica Roth. So, yeah, Chapter Roth.
Tris was sick again on the train. I really hoped the theory Caleb had asked me about when we were getting dressed wasn't right. I thought back on the conversation.
I walked into Caleb's room to get dressed after the first completely dreamless sleep I had had in a long time. Caleb was sitting on his bed almost as if he had been waiting for me to walk in.
"What's the matter, Caleb?" I asked. He seemed angry about something. Was it what he had guessed the day before?
Caleb looked me straight in the eye and asked something I hadn't thought of, but made sense with how Tris seemed to be feeling, "Tobias, is Beatrice pregnant?"
"I hope not," I replied shaking my head. "We're transering because of Marcus. I really don't think it would be safe for a Beatrice to go through Dauntless initiation pregnant. No matter what, I would stand by her and protect her, though."
Caleb nodded, "I just figured with how she was sick last night while eating, and what you told me yesterday about, you know.... Um.... I just."
"I understand, Caleb. Now you've got me worrying about it."
Caleb laughed, and we started getting dressed all the while, I wondered, did our actions create a child?
Tris seemed better for the rest of the train ride, but I wasn't paying as much attention as I should have been as I was cowering in a corner after seeing that the train tracks sloped higher and higher. I prayed we didn't have to jump at this hight; I didn't think I could do it.
As I crouched by the wall, a Dauntless girl walked over and started laughing at me, "Wow, a pair of Stiffs are joining us, and look at that one cowering like he's afraid of something."
"Leave him alone," Tris growled at the girl, and the boy Tris was talking to earlier, Zeke, walked over and placed a hand on the girl's shoulder.
"Shauna," he said gently. "They are my friends. Leave them be."
The girl, Shauna, looked back at Zeke with a look very similar to the one Tris gives me when we we're alone, "Only cause you said so."
Shauna walked away, and Tris and Zeke pulled me up, "You might not want to do much cowering. Especially if you ever meet my little brother. He'll never shut up about it."
I nodded still unsure about being on the train as high as it was off the ground. Tris gave me a quick peck on the lips, oh how nice it was to be able to do that any time instead of holding off until I could be alone with her in her bedroom. We stood there on the train for a while awaiting something, but I didn't know what until Zeke yelled that we needed to get ready to jump. Shit, we were still up pretty high, and I really didn't want Tris jumping. What if she got hurt? What if she is pregnant, and something happens to the baby because of this? I wasn't sure what we'd do, but I couldn't help her getting off.
Too soon, I saw where we were supposed to jump off at, a building that had a lot of Dauntless standing on top. Tris looked determined, and I was scared to death. "How about we jump together?" Tris smiled at me. She always knew how to make me feel better.
When it came time for our train car to make the jump, we launched ourselves out holding hands, and surprisingly, we landed on our feet as we caught each other's balance, then I saw a guy stand on the edge of the building. The guy looked younger than Tori, the girl who did my Aptitude Test, and he had dark skin.
"Welcome to Dauntless!" the guy shouts. "Where you either face your fears and try not to die in the process, or you leave as a coward. We've got a record low of faction transfers this year, unsurprisingly."
The Dauntless seem to cheer at the fact that not many want to transfer to their faction. They almost seemed to take it as a form of something to take pride in.
"The only way to get into the Dauntless compound from this rooftop is to jump off this ledge," the crazy guy saai, and my stomach drops. He opened his arms wide to indicate the empty space around im, and he tilted back on his heels as if he was going to fall, but straightened back up a few seconds later grinning.
"As usual, I offer the opportunity to go first to our initiates, Dauntless Born or not."
As the guy hopps down, Tris looks at me pleadingly as if begging for us to go first. I hate being up high, and the idea of jumping scared the shit out of me, but the look she gave me was one that she knew I couldn't resist, so we stepped foreward just before Zeke did. The guy smiled at us. Standing together on the ledge, I started to panic and think again about jumping, but Tris was already crouching ready to jump, so I copied her movements and jumped with her. We fell through the air, Tris twisting around so that she landed on her back, I wondered if she had come to the same conclusion as her brother had, and after what seemed like forever, we landed in a net. Max helps us out.
"It's not often we have two jump at the same time," he smiles at us.
We walk a little way away from the net, and the rest come one by one. When the last of the initiates got to the bottom, the guy who told us we had to jump hit the net seeming almost giddy from the thrill, but before he arrived, a couple Candor started harassing Tris.
"It looks like she's trying not to throw up," a Candor boy remarked.
"Just let it happen," the other boy added. "We'd love to see a show."
My response to how they were treating Tris, my Tris, came out of no where. "Shut up," I snapped, and to my surprise they do, that is until she actually does throw up, all over the second Candor.
"What'd you do that for?" the boy asked as everyone else laughed, including Tris and I.
Tris didn't respond, and the guy who told us to jump arrived. He beckons to all of the initiates, and we form a semicircle around him at the opening to a large tunnel.
"My name is Amar, and I will be your initiation instructor. I grew up here, and three years ago, I passed initiation with flying colors, which means I get to be in charge of the newcomers for as long as I want. Lucky you.
"Dauntless Borns and transfers do most physical training seperately, so that the Dauntless Borns don't break the transfers right away," did I hear him say physical training? Please let there not be fights. Please let Tris not be pregnant because physical training would only cause problems with a pregnancy. "But we're trying something different this year. The Dauntless leaders and I want to see if knowing your fears before training will better prepare you for the rest of initiation. So before we even let you into the dining hall to have dinner, we're going to have some self-discovery. Follow me."
"What if I don't want to discover myself?" Zeke asked.
Amar just looked at him, and Zeke shrunk back into the group of Dauntless Borns he was with, and I could swear I saw that girl, Shauna, smack him on the back of his head. We are then lead down the tunnel to a door that leads into a dark room. Amar busied himself with setting up a machine before begining to explain.
"This is the fear landscape room," he announced without looking up. "A fear landscape is a simulation in which you confront your worst fears."
There was a line of syringes on a table next to the machine. They looked sinister to me, like torture devices, and knowing that they probably sent us into the fear landscape, I figured, they probably were.
"How is that possible?" an Erudite boy asked. "You don't know our worst fears."
"Eric, right?" Amar asked him. "You're correct, I don't know your worst fears, but the serum I am going to inject you with will stimulate the parts of your brain that process fear, and you will come up with the simulation obstacles yourself, so to speak. In this simulation, unlike in the aptitude test simulation, you will be aware that what you are seeing is not real. Meanwhile, I will be in this room, controlling the simulation, and I get to tell the program embedded in the simulation serum to move on to the next obstale once your heart rate reaches a particular level - once you calm down, in other words, or face your fear in a significant way. When you run out of fears, the program will terminate, and you will 'wake up' in that room again with a greater awareness of your own fears."
He picked up one of the syringes and beckoned Eric. "Allow me to satisfy your Erudite curiosity," he said. "You get to go first."
I didn't listen to anything more as I was paying attention to Tris who was trying to determine my fears. She could only come up with three as she was missing the one fear that bothered me most. I was sure I probably had more than the four that I had managed to determine, but you never know.
I kept ducking back every time Amar called for a new initiate until the only two left were Tris and I. Tris offered to go first, and so I watched as she went through her fears. It seemed like she only had six obstacles to face, but I wasn't entirely sure. Amar looked like he was going to congratulate her on something when she rushed to the nearest garbage can, as she didn't know where the bathrooms were in Dauntless yet, to vomit. I went to go rub her back and tell her it was okay, but Amar called me over.
"What's up with that? Is she sick or something?" Amar asked me probably figuring I'd know having been in the same faction as her.
I shook my head, "No, serums don't seem to get along with her system well. How many fears did Tris have?"
"Six, and I'd be careful with her, there's only one other time I've seen a serum make someone sick."
I cocked my head in confusion, but he didn't explain further, just injected me with the serum, and I was in the simulation.
The first thing I noticed was that I was on a cliff very high up, and I immediately began to hyperventilate. I backed up until I hit a wall, but the wall was pushing me, so I had no choice but to jump. Hoping to get it over with as soon as possible so that I could check on Tris and find out what Amar was talking about, I jumped before the wall could push me off.
Just as I was getting used to the feeling of falling, I landed gently, and a wall slammed into my back. As I stood there, walls closed around me, and were slowly inching closer. I huddled into a ball, scared. The walls were made out of the same material as those of the closet my father used to shove me in for punishment. My fear only increased with the thought of Marcus like he could come open the door at any second. I had to get out of there. What could I do, come on, Tobias, think. Wait, the walls are wood, so I just need a tool to break out. I fumbled around until I found a crow bar; well, it would have to do. Taking the crow bar, I pried apart the walls apart and was free until HE showed up.
Multiple versions of Marcus appeared, each holding a more monsterous appearance than the last, and they all began to slide the belt off. He started hitting me until I couldn't take it any longer, and knowing it was all a simulation and that I would exit the fear landscape to find Tris, I turned around and socked one of the many Marcus's right in the nose. Tris always made me feel more powerful.
It turned dark for a minute after Marcus disappeared, then I saw it. I saw the nightmare that had been plaguing my sleep for more than a year. Tris was sitting on her bed, and like always I walked over and kissed her. We were kissing for a while when suddenly, the door opened and Marcus stormed in. A wicked grin was plastered on his face as he grabbed Tris by the collar.
"So, my son has found himself a little whore to hide from me with. How nice?" he smirked.
"Leave her alone!" I yelled even though I knew it wouldn't work; he would still hurt her. He would still kill her right before my eyes.
Marcus slammed Tris against the wall, and I wondered where Natalie, Andrew, and Caleb were. I always wondered it in the dream. He took off his belt and began to whip her speaking directly to me, "This is for your own good, Tobias."
He continued to beat her using the belt, and sometimes his fist, but I couldn't move; I was glued to the spot and forced to watch the love of my life be slowly killed by my father. After a while, he strangled her, and I could finally turn my head so that I didn't have to watch the life leave her eyes. I didn't have to see him pull out the knife he always had in that stupid dream and slit her throat letting blood flow everywhere. Holding my head so that I couldn't see, I remembered, this is just a simulation. Tris was out there waiting for me. Just the thought of her calmed me enough that the simulation went black and then I was back in the fear landscape room.
Amar walked in as if to ask about my number of fears, but I didn't pay attention as I ran outside the room to find Tris sitting on the floor next to the garbage can. I ran over to her and pulled her into a tight hug. I couldn't deal with life if I ever actually lost her.
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