Глава 19. I turn my back to the burning coals on which my blood has just spilt and walk toward the group of Dauntless initiates

I turn my back to the burning coals on which my blood has just spilt and walk toward the group of Dauntless initiates, earning a couple of curious looks from the Dauntless-borns. Behind me, my father's steely glare threatens to burn holes into the back of my head. Cries of outrage surface from the mass of gray bodies – the Abnegation, my faction. No – not my faction anymore. Certainly no one could have predicted this, not even my own father. The son of Marcus Eaton, a traitor to his own faction. That'll give them something to talk about.

As I take a stand behind the rest of the Dauntless initiates, I lock eyes with my father, who stands motionless as a stone on the podium, for a brief second. Although his expression remains composed, as it always does in public, his eyes burn with hatred and anger. Unconsciously, I shrink into my gray clothes, which stand out more than ever amongst this sea of black. My gaze drops to the ground hastily, and it stays there for the remainder of the Choosing Ceremony.

The Dauntless exit first, a stream of black flowing out the doors, dotted here and there with the colourful clothing of the transfer initiates. As we head toward the stairs, a boy with hair as bright as the Dauntless flames bumps into me, nearly knocking me over the stairs. It certainly won't do any good if I injure myself before I even make it out of the building. I put on an irritated face and turn around to scowl at him, but my aggravation fades as soon as I see the forlorn expression on his face.

" Sorry, I wasn't watching my step, " he mumbles while smoothing out his blue t-shirt.

" Don't worry about it, " I say.

" I'm James, " he holds out his hand. " You are…"

I eye his hand hesitantly. Abnegations greet each other by bowing their heads, so naturally, I am not accustom to shaking hands. " Tobias, " I say. " Tobias E – "

" Eaton, " he finishes for me. " Marcus Eaton's son. I wasn't sure if…" He glances around as if he's looking for someone, but his eyes settle on me again and his mouth perks up in an amiable smile. " Well, you're the only Abnegation transfer here, so that was a stupid question."

Before I have a chance to respond, the Dauntless explode in an array of shouts and cheers, drowning out anything I would have said. I exchange a bewildered look with James and follow the crowd out of the building as they rush outside and pour onto the streets, their feet pounding out an uneven rhythm that jolts my heartbeats.

The mass of black clothed bodies come to a stop beside the train tracks and I huddle in a tightly-knit cluster with the rest of the transfers feeling elated, nervous, and anxious all at the same time.

It's how I feel now. I toss and turn, twisting in my bed until my blanket is coiled around me like a snake. Through the gray haze of the room, I can just make out the glowing numbers blinking lazily on my alarm clock. It's only been two hours since Tris and I got back to the compound, but it feels much longer than that. Does time always pass slower when our mind is troubled?

My emotions are wrestling through a restless game of tug-o-war. I bring my shirt to my nose and breathe in – the scent of Tris has weaved itself into the fabric, and every memory of her brings fresh waves of euphoria. However, the good moments don't last long. My mind inevitably wonders to the conversation we had on the train, to the rumblings of war, and uneasiness unavoidably clouds my mind, forcing every other emotion to tumble out of me like water droplets tumbling over the chasm.

At some point during the night, I fall asleep only to be plagued with dreams of Tris being held at gunpoint. An agonizing voice stutters disheartening words into my ear, but the slurred speech cuts off sharply as soon as I open my eyes, as if all sound has been sucked away by a vacuum leaving nothing but hollow silence. Only then do I realize the voice I've been hearing is my own. Twice more, I wake up drenched in cold sweat, my heart hammering madly in my chest like an animal fighting to break out of its encasement before falling back into a fitful sleep.

X X X

As the train rounds the bend, I look to the Dauntless-born initiates for guidance. Beside me, the transfer initiates exchange nervously glances. I guess nobody expected initiation to start as soon as we exited the building.

The Dauntless, clad in black, fitted clothing, all snap their heads up at the same time to the sound of the train whistle. I witness, in that moment, the quality that sets them apart from members of every other faction. Every motion they make reverberates with astounding confidence, as if nothing in the world can strike them down. Their actions have found a way to balance precariously on the edge between fearlessness and idiocy, and never in my sixteen years of life have I ever stood witness to an occasion in which their stunts tumbled over the edge to carelessness. Their eyes carry a sharp, audacious glint that forces you to look away when you catch their eye, as if you have been caught looking at something you shouldn't be looking at. I suppose this is why I am drawn to their faction; they all seem to be teeming with energy and life.

When the train speeds past, they lift themselves effortlessly into the open cars as if they weigh no more than a feather. I try to mimic their smooth movements, letting my feet carry me forward, hooking my hand around a cold metal handle and heaving myself into the car. I, by no means, accomplish this with the flowing gracefulness as the Dauntless-born, but I do fare much better than the rest of the transfers. The muffled thud of bodies crashing clumsily fill the train coupled with stifled groans of those who have hit the floor of the car with too much force after hurtling themselves into the train.

In a few moments, the train will take us past the Dauntless compound. In a few moments my new life will begin.

A new faction, a new place, new friends, a new me.

The apprehension I felt earlier has vaporized like morning mist clearing as the sun climbs higher in the sky. My hands tremble with increasing excitement as I watch, from the corner of my eye, the Dauntless rising one by one, preparing to jump off the train and head back to their compound – their home.

My hands tremble, even now, but more from nervousness than excitement. They tremble as I splash water on my face, they tremble as I pull on clean clothes, and they tremble as I reach for the doorknob.

Today is fear landscape day; the last day of initiation. Although I will not be the one to stand before the panel of judges, I fear it all the same. I don't even know why. I suppose the lingering memory of my own initiation is something I will carry with me for the rest of my life, for better or for worse.

The Dauntless compound is a sea of black motion. The initiation ceremony is a celebration that the Dauntless commemorate spectacularly by forgoing their work for the day and drinking from morning all the way up to the actual ceremony, which takes place during dinner. The Pit, chaotic in nature, has plunged knee deep into insanity by the time I manage to shuffle down the stairs and squeeze my way into the dining hall. Zeke stands by the wall, casually swatting Uriah's hand away while carrying on a light-hearted conversation with Lynn. I swipe a muffin off of one of the tables and shoulder my way through the crowd.

" – didn't even rank first, or second for that matter, " Uriah says, raising an eyebrow at Zeke.

" Keep up the gloating and you'll find yourself plummeting to number ten by the end of tonight, " Zeke shoves him in the shoulder. He turns to me and says, " Lauren's looking for you."

" Well, breakfast is calling my name, " I motion toward my muffin. " Lauren, however, is not."

As if the mention of her name sends out telepathic signals, Lauren appears in the crowd on cue, shoving people this way and that, her dark wavy hair escaping from its hair tie.

" On second thought…"

" Come on, " she grabs my arm, steering me away from the group. " Max will be mad if we're late, and angry Max equals a miserable day. For me, at least."

She halts unexpectedly, jerking me to a stop and almost making me drop my muffin before turning to Lynn with a frown on her face. " Where's Marlene? "

" Sleeping like a baby, " Lynn says. " You know she's impossible to rouse in the morning."

" Okay, anyways, " Lauren waves her hand around as if she's swatting away an invisible fly. " You have thirty minutes before fear landscapes begin so don't be late." She takes half a step forward before turning around again and adding, " Oh, and please don't forget to wake Marlene."

Together, we fight our way through the already intoxicated crowd, which promises to get more and more boisterous as the day goes on. I let my feet guide me up the stairs that lead to the fear landscape, the same stairs that used to frighten me when I first got here because of its lack of railings. Retracing these steps today makes me feel like I'm sixteen years old again, following Amar to the glass building above.

The rocky path before me extends so far up I'm certain the end of it is buried high in the clouds. The stairway to Heaven, I muse, though I always thought it would be more glamorous in appearance. Amar motions for us to follow him as he starts the slow ascend. I swallow nervously; my throat feels like sandpaper. Maybe Dauntless isn't the right place for me after all, but how was I supposed to know my new home would be built like a rickety tower made from crumbling stone? They ought to let us tour each faction before the Choosing Ceremony.

" Fear will only succeed if you allow it to control you, " Amar says quietly in my ear, catching me off guard and making me twitch in surprise. He had slowed down his pace to fall into step with me, and I had been too concentrated on keeping my eyes trained on the path in front of me to notice.

" Pardon me? " I say.

" You're breathing as if you've just run marathon, " he laughs light-heartedly. " I'm guessing heights is not your thing, Stiff."

I give a slight shake of my head. I wonder if all Dauntless are capable of reading people like this – picking out people's weaknesses just from observation. I suppose their lifestyle requires this of them; a lifestyle of soldiers. It is, in its own way, a form of self defence. " No, " I mutter. " It's not my thing."

" Fear will only succeed if you allow it to control you, " he repeats. " If you want to thrive in this faction, don't let your fear of heights control you."

Amar said we would be going through our fear landscapes, but he never did elaborate on what exactly a fear landscape is. We climb higher and higher, all the way up to the glass building that protrudes from the top of the compound. To a passerby, the structure would probably look like any other typical office building that you would find in the city. Never in their wildest dreams would they believe the gaping, cavernous space dug underground right beneath the glass houses an entire faction.

Amar leads us up a flight of metal stairs that take us through a hole in the glass ceiling, which is now a glass floor. I thought the journey upward on the rocky ledge had been bad enough, but this is a thousand times worse. Walking on glass feels a lot of walking on air. The black mouth of the Pit extends far below me into the distance. I'm so high up that the people milling about on the floor of the Pit look like miniature toys. As irrational as it may sound, it feels like the glass floor under my feet is going to disappear any second, and I'd be sent tumbling down into the stone belly of the Dauntless compound, crashing to a great bloody death on the rocks below.

" Hey, " a familiar voice says. " Are you okay? You look kind of green."

" Huh, uh, " I look up to see James with a genuine look of concern on his face. " I'm fine. It's probably just a trick of the light."

" Okay, that's good. I heard Dauntless initiation is kind of brutal, so it probably wouldn't be good if you got sick before it even began, " he says. " I figure the best way to get through this is to stick together, you know? Mutual support and all that stuff."

I smile gently and nod, deciding all the while that if I am going to make friends here, James would be a good person to start with.

Groups of Dauntless are dispersed around the room, socializing with one another in clusters. When they notice Amar leading the lot of us through, almost every one of them either calls out a greeting or pats him on the shoulder. He must be well liked amongst the Dauntless, and I can certainly see why. He walks with a sort of confidence that demands your immediate attention, but he's not cocky at all in the way that he carries himself. It's hard to dislike someone who radiates as much charisma as he does, and I'm sure everyone in the room feels the same way. Hidden in the corner, a couple presses against each other, the boy's hands gently resting on the girl's hips. Every few seconds, they would steal a kiss from each other, and I find myself fighting to repress the urge to scowl at such indecent conduct. But this is Dauntless, I think. Not Abnegation. Two different factions, two different sets of rules. Public displays of affection might be frowned upon in Abnegation, but it certainly isn't here. I guess it's something I will get used to over time.

We come to a stop outside a big empty room with worn down walls that are covered with curling, colourful graffiti.

" This, " Amar gestures toward the room. " Is a kind of simulation, not unlike the ones you experienced during your aptitude test, called the fear landscape, and it is where your initiation will begin. This simulation will teach you to face your fears, literally. The fear landscape will pick out your worst fears and present them to you in a series of virtual obstacles. To move from one obstacle to the next, you must either calm your heartbeat down to a normal, steady rate, or find a way to face the fear."

Our worst fears. I wonder if I will see my father in there. It would be awfully ironic if I do, having left Abnegation mere hours ago only to come face to face with him again just moments after entering the Dauntless compound.

" Your objective is to go through your fear landscape as quickly as possible, " Amar continues. " Any questions? "

Everyone in the crowd shakes their head, a unanimous no.

" Excellent, " he claps his hands together. " Let's begin."

People are plucked at random from our little crowd of transfers. The first person to go is a girl with short brown hair from Candor who breaks down in the midst of the simulation and has to be lead out of the room for fresh air. We can watch everyone from the screens lined up on the wall, but because we're not hooked up to the computers, all we see are their reactions to their fears, not the simulation itself. To be honest, it is quite boring to watch. James and I invent a game to entertain ourselves while waiting for our turn – guess the fear based on the person's actions.

" Drowning. It's obviously drowning, " James says. " Look at the way his arms are flailing."

" Oh, I don't know, " I say. " Maybe he's swatting away a huge swarm of bees."

" That would be terrifying, " James says. " I hope I don't have to go through that."

The next person to go is an Erudite boy with dark, stringy hair parted to the side. " That's Eric, " James says. " I lived down the street from him, but we've never really been friends. Kind of surprised me when he transferred. I always thought he would stay put in Erudite."

" Looks like we'll be spending a lot of time with him, " I say, and even though I don't know Eric, I am dreading having to spend the next few weeks training with him. Something about him – something I can't quite put my fingers on – seems…off. " Plenty of chances for you two to salvage the friendship that never was." I tease.

" Shut it, " James says, elbowing me in the ribs.

Oh the screens, Eric stands, trembling and unmoving, his eyes wild with burning fear. His face contorts as he lets out an animal-like scream. The sound chills me to the very bone. Never once in all of the fifteen minutes that he spends in the fear landscape does he move from the spot where he first stood before the simulation began. Time after time, he would force his heart rate to go down to a steady rhythm, even though you can see terror clearly splashed across his face. I didn't know it was possible to do that – to cheat your body, tell it to do one thing despite feeling the exact opposite. It must take a lot of will power to accomplish such a task. I had been right after all. There is something off about him. I look to the control room where Amar stands with several Dauntless leaders who are all hooked up to computers. His expression is wary, as if he is tending to an injured animal that might suddenly spring up and bite him. I am willing to bet that I am not the only person who will be watchful of Eric from now on.

I'm standing in the exact same spot that Amar had stood two years ago.

The Dauntless-borns go before the transfers. Because I am not plugged in to the simulation, the process is as boring to me as it had been during my initiation. The transfers start to trickle in as Marlene wraps up her simulation. As they do, I find myself measuring time by the number of people who will go before it's Tris's turn. Four more Dauntless-borns and five transfers. Nine altogether, seemingly an eternity.

I step out of the control room briefly to relay a few instructions. " Transfers, the order in which you go through the final test was taken from your rankings as they now stand, " I announce. " So Drew will go first, and Tris will go last."

The jittery feeling in the air drapes over the initiates like a big blanket. Everyone seems twitchier than usual and more alert. Even Uriah, who, much like Zeke, is usually boisterous and confident, jolts slightly when he is pricked with the needle that injects simulation serum. Five more people to go.

When I am not looking at the screen, I am watching Tris from the corner of my eye. When Eric injects simulation serum into Drew's neck, I catch her eye for a brief second, and that brief second is all it takes to reassure me that she will do fine. She is calm, or she looks calm. Her eyes are clear and alert, unlike Molly, whose eyes are glazed over as if she is trying to lose sight of something that is not entirely there. That's good, I tell myself. It's good that she is attentive and prepared. She needs to do well. We both need her to do well.

The lights in the fear landscape room come on; Drew is done. Four more people.

Lights on, three more people.

Two more.

One more.

The lights lift one last time.

Tris marches to the entrance of the fear landscape room where Eric is waiting, twirling a syringe between his fingers. I wonder if she is as nervous as I had been.

Shaking. I am shaking.

The needle pierces my neck, but my mind is too preoccupied to register pain. I walk to the center of the room, slowly, deliberately, as if my feet are slugging through syrup, and memorize the room exactly as it is even though it is only a place built to bridge the gap between reality and the simulation.

The difference, I notice, between Tris and I is the air of confidence that she carries with her as she enters the room. The lights dim, and the simulation begins.

The ground drops away beneath me as if I'm riding in a glass elevator up to the sky. Wind howls in my ears, blocking out the sound of my laboured breathing. I must be hundreds of feet off the ground; I can see the entire city stretched out before me. The clean cut angles of the Erudite headquarters, the gray expanse that makes up the Abnegation sector, the concrete tower that is the Candor headquarter, and even dots of green trees that belong to the Amity farms. Looking down at the crumbling streets nearly makes me vomit, so I close my eyes for a few seconds and try to control my breathing. When I open them again, I survey my surroundings with exasperation; there is no way to get down. I am trapped on this rickety building unless I muster the courage to jump.

Looking at Tris on the screen, she shows none of the uncertainty and panic that was once plastered on my face. Each move she makes is calculated, as if this is a game that has gotten too easy after years of experience.

I try to guess her fears from her reactions. Some, I can identify easily because I have seen her reactions to them during stage two. Others, I am not so sure of, although I am rather curious as to what they are. I wonder if she will ever let me into her fear landscape.

I wonder if James played this guessing game while watching me on the screens. I wonder if he guessed any of my fears correctly. I wonder if he could guess my last fear.

I recognize the man before he even reveals face, before he so much as utters a breath. A creeping chill seeps into the room, and I can't tell if it is merely an extension of my imagination or if the temperature in the room really has dropped due to an unknown reason.

The gray clothed man steps out into the light.

My father.

A brown belt is wrapped around his hands. The leather is worn from age, but leather is leather, and it hurts all the same when the belt makes contact with my skin.

" This is for your own good, " he says coldly, and to my utter disbelief, a dozen replicas of him materialize around the room and trap me in a circle, all echoing the same phrase. They step forward at the same time, pressing into the circle, moving closer to me. I can't run. I can't breathe. The original Marcus draws back his arm and snaps the belt in my direction. I barely have time to cover my face before the leather makes contact with my shoulder, sending a sharp, searing pain through my flesh that makes my eyes water. The pain feels so fresh and so real that for a moment, I almost believe I am back in my house, cowering in the corner as my father draws his arm back again and again, bringing the belt down each time with a snap as it hits my arm, my back, my face.

This isn't real, I tell myself. This is a simulation. You are now a Dauntless, and Dauntless do not cower.

The next time the belt whips toward me, I make a frantic grab for it before it makes contact with my skin. My father glowers at me as we engage in a fierce game of tug-o-war. I grit my teeth and pull as hard as I can, and my father fumbles forward as he loses his footing.

" This, " I force through gritted teeth. " Is for your own good."

I draw my arm back and swing as fast as I can, focusing all of my energy into the swift movement of my arm as if all of my fear and hatred will snap out with the fluid motion of the belt as it sails through the air.

The belt never makes it to its target. The Marcuses around the room disappear the same time the belt vanishes from my hand. Before I can register what is happening, the simulation disappears and I am standing in the dank and hollow room that is the fear landscape.

The lights blink on slowly one by one, and again, the simulation is over before I can register what is happening. Tris sinks to the floor trembling, and I let out a sigh of relief even though I haven't noticed I've been holding my breath.

Stage three is over.

Initiation is over.