Insurgent d-2 Read online

  Finally Johanna walks in with an Erudite woman. Her bright blue shirt seems to glow against her skin, which is dark brown. She searches the room as she speaks to Johanna. I hold my breath as her eyes find me — and then let it out when she moves on without a moment’s hesitation. She did not recognize me.

  At least, not yet.

  Someone bangs on a tabletop, and the room goes quiet. This is it. This is the moment she either hands us over, or doesn’t.

  “Our Erudite and Dauntless friends are looking for some people,” Johanna says. “Several members of Abnegation, three members of Dauntless, and a former Erudite initiate.” She smiles. “In the interest of full cooperation, I told them that the people they were looking for were, in fact, here, but have since moved on. They would like permission to search the premises, which means we have to vote. Does anyone object to a search?”

  The tension in her voice suggests that if anyone does object, they should keep their mouth shut. I don’t know if the Amity pick up on that kind of thing, but no one says anything. Johanna nods to the Erudite woman.

  “Three of you stick around,” the woman says to the Dauntless guards clustered by the entrance. “The rest of you, search all the buildings and report back if you find anything. Go.”

  There is so much they could find. The pieces of the hard drive. Clothes I forgot to throw out. A suspicious lack of trinkets and decorations in our living spaces. I feel my pulse behind my eyes as the three Dauntless soldiers who stayed behind pace up and down the rows of tables.

  The back of my neck tingles as one of them walks behind me, his footsteps loud and heavy. Not for the first time in my life, I’m glad that I’m small and plain. I don’t draw people’s eyes to me.

  But Tobias does. He wears his pride in his posture, in the way his eyes claim everything they land on. That is not an Amity trait. It can only be a Dauntless one.

  The Dauntless woman walking toward him looks at him right away. Her eyes narrow as she walks closer, and then stops directly behind him.

  I wish the collar of his shirt were higher. I wish he didn’t have so many tattoos. I wish …

  “Your hair is pretty short for an Amity,” she says.

  … he did not cut his hair like the Abnegation.

  “It’s hot,” he says.

  The excuse might work if he knew how to deliver it, but he says it with a snap.

  She stretches out her hand and, with her index finger, pulls back the collar of his shirt to see his tattoo.

  And Tobias moves.

  He grabs the woman’s wrist, yanking her forward so she loses her balance. She hits her head against the edge of the table and falls. Across the room, a gun goes off, someone screams, and everyone dives under the tables or crouches next to the benches.

  Everyone except me. I sit where I was before the gunshot sounded, clutching the edge of the table. I know that’s where I am, but I don’t see the cafeteria anymore. I see the alley I escaped down after my mother died. I stare at the gun in my hands, at the smooth skin between Will’s eyebrows.

  A small sound gurgles in my throat. It would have been a scream if my teeth had not been clamped shut. The flash of memory fades, but I still can’t move.

  Tobias grabs the Dauntless woman by the back of her neck and wrenches her to her feet. He has her gun in his hand. He uses her to shield him as he fires over her right shoulder at the Dauntless soldier across the room.

  “Tris!” he shouts. “A little help here?”

  I pull my shirt up just far enough to reach the handle of the gun, and my fingers meet metal. It feels so cold that it hurts my fingertips, but that can’t be; it’s so hot in here. A Dauntless man at the end of the aisle aims his own revolver at me. The black spot at the end of the barrel grows around me, and I can hear my heart but nothing else.

  Caleb lunges forward and grabs my gun. He holds it in both hands and fires at the knees of the Dauntless man who stands just feet away from him.

  The Dauntless man screams and collapses, his hands clutching his leg, which gives Tobias the opportunity to shoot him in the head. His pain is momentary.

  My entire body is trembling and I can’t stop it. Tobias still has the Dauntless woman by the throat, but this time, he aims his gun at the Erudite woman.

  “Say another word,” says Tobias, “and I’ll shoot.”

  The Erudite woman’s mouth is open, but she doesn’t speak.

  “Whoever’s with us should start running,” Tobias says, his voice filling the room.

  All at once, the Abnegation rise from their places under tables and benches, and start toward the door. Caleb pulls me up from the bench. I start toward the door.

  Then I see something. A twitch, a flicker of movement. The Erudite woman lifts a small gun, points it at a man in a yellow shirt in front of me. Instinct, not presence of mind, pushes me into a dive. My hands collide with the man, and the bullet hits the wall instead of him, instead of me.

  “Put the gun down,” says Tobias, pointing his revolver at the Erudite woman. “I have very good aim, and I’m betting that you don’t.”

  I blink a few times to get the blurriness out of my eyes. Peter stares back at me. I just saved his life. He does not thank me, and I don’t acknowledge him.

  The Erudite woman drops her gun. Together Peter and I walk toward the door. Tobias follows us, walking backward so he can keep his gun on the Erudite woman. At the last second before he passes through the threshold, he slams the door between him and her.

  And we all run.

  We sprint down the center aisle of the orchard in a breathless pack. The night air is heavy as a blanket and smells like rain. Shouts follow us. Car doors slam. I run faster than I can possibly run, like I’m breathing adrenaline instead of air. The purr of engines chases me into the trees. Tobias’s hand closes around mine.

  We run through a cornfield in a long line. By then, the cars have caught up to us. The headlights creep through the tall stalks, illuminating a leaf here, an ear of corn there.

  “Split up!” someone yells, and it sounds like Marcus.

  We divide and spread through the field like spilling water. I grab Caleb’s arm. I hear Susan gasping behind Caleb.

  We crash over cornstalks. The heavy leaves cut my cheeks and arms. I stare between Tobias’s shoulder blades as we run. I hear a heavy thump and a scream. There are screams everywhere, to my left, to my right. Gunshots. The Abnegation are dying again, dying like they were when I pretended to be under the simulation. And all I’m doing is running.

  Finally we reach the fence. Tobias runs along it, pushing it until he finds a hole. He holds the chain links back so Caleb, Susan, and I can crawl through. Before we start running again, I stop and look back at the cornfield we just left. I see headlights distantly glowing. But I don’t hear anything.

  “Where are the others?” whispers Susan.

  I say, “Gone.”

  Susan sobs. Tobias pulls me to his side roughly, and starts forward. My face burns with shallow cuts from the corn leaves, but my eyes are dry. The Abnegation deaths are just another weight I am unable to set down.

  We stay away from the dirt road the Erudite and Dauntless took to get to the Amity compound, following the train tracks toward the city. There is nowhere to hide out here, no trees or buildings that can shield us, but it doesn’t matter. The Erudite can’t drive through the fence anyway, and it will take them a while to reach the gate.

  “I have to … stop …” says Susan from somewhere in the darkness behind me.

  We stop. Susan collapses to the ground, crying, and Caleb crouches next to her. Tobias and I look toward the city, which is still illuminated, because it’s not midnight yet. I want to feel something. Fear, anger, grief. But I don’t. All I feel is the need to keep moving.

  Tobias turns toward me.

  “What was that, Tris?” he says.

  “What?” I say, and I am ashamed of how weak my voice sounds. I don’t know whether he’s talking about Peter or what came befor
e or something else.

  “You froze! Someone was about to kill you and you just sat there!” He is yelling now. “I thought I could rely on you at least to save your own life!”

  “Hey!” says Caleb. “Give her a break, all right?”

  “No,” says Tobias, staring at me. “She doesn’t need a break.” His voice softens. “What happened?”

  He still believes that I am strong. Strong enough that I don’t need his sympathy. I used to think he was right, but now I am not sure. I clear my throat.

  “I panicked,” I say. “It won’t happen again.”

  He raises an eyebrow.

  “It won’t,” I say again, louder this time.

  “Okay.” He looks unconvinced. “We have to get somewhere safe. They’ll regroup and start looking for us.”

  “You think they care that much about us?” I say.

  “Us, yes,” he says. “We were probably the only ones they were really after, apart from Marcus, who is most likely dead.”

  I don’t know how I expected him to say it — with relief, maybe, because Marcus, his father and the menace of his life, is finally gone. Or with pain and sadness, because his father might have been killed, and sometimes grief doesn’t make much sense. But he says it like it’s just a fact, like the direction we’re moving or the time of day.

  “Tobias …” I start to say, but then I realize I don’t know what comes after it.

  “Time to go,” Tobias says over his shoulder.

  Caleb coaxes Susan to her feet. She moves only with the help of his arm across her back, pressing her forward.

  I didn’t realize until that moment that Dauntless initiation had taught me an important lesson: how to keep going.

  Chapter 8

  WE DECIDE TO follow the railroad tracks to the city, because none of us is good at navigation. I walk from tie to tie, Tobias balances on the rail, wobbling only occasionally, and Caleb and Susan shuffle behind us. I twitch at every unidentified noise, tensing until I realize it is just the wind, or the squeak of Tobias’s shoes on the rail. I wish we could keep running, but it’s a feat that my legs are even moving at this point.

  Then I hear a low groan from the rails.

  I bend down and press my palms to the rail, closing my eyes to focus on the feeling of the metal beneath my hands. The vibration feels like a sigh going through my body. I stare between Susan’s knees down the tracks and see no train light, but that doesn’t mean anything. The train could be running with no horns and no lamps to announce its arrival.

  I see the gleam of a small train car, far away now but approaching fast.

  “It’s coming,” I say. It is an effort to get to my feet when all I want to do is sit down, but I do, brushing my hands on my jeans. “I think we should get on.”

  “Even if it’s run by the Erudite?” says Caleb.

  “If the Erudite were running the train, they would have taken it to the Amity compound to look for us,” Tobias says. “I think it’s worth the risk. We’ll be able to hide in the city. Here we’re just waiting for them to find us.”

  We all get off the tracks. Caleb gives Susan step-by-step instructions for getting on a moving train, the way only a former Erudite can. I watch the first car approach; listen to the rhythmic bump of the car over the ties, the whisper of metal wheel against metal rail.

  As the first car passes me, I start to run. I ignore the burning in my legs. Caleb helps Susan into a middle car first, then jumps in himself. I take a quick breath and throw my body to the right, slamming into the floor of the car with my legs dangling over the edge. Caleb grabs my left arm and pulls me in the rest of the way. Tobias uses the handle to swing himself in after me.

  I look up, and stop breathing.

  Eyes glitter in the darkness. Dark shapes sit in the car, more numerous than we are.

  The factionless.

  The wind whistles through the car. Everyone is on their feet and armed — except Susan and me, who have no weapons. A factionless man with an eye patch has a gun pointed at Tobias. I wonder how he got it.

  Next to him, an older factionless woman holds a knife — the kind I used to cut bread with. Behind him, someone else holds a large plank of wood with a nail sticking out of it.

  “I’ve never seen the Amity armed before,” the factionless woman with the knife says.

  The factionless man with the gun looks familiar. He wears tattered clothes in different colors — a black T-shirt with a torn Abnegation jacket over it, blue jeans mended with red thread, brown boots. All faction clothing is represented in the group before me: black Candor pants paired with black Dauntless shirts, yellow dresses with blue sweatshirts over them. Most items are torn or smudged in some way, but some are not. Freshly stolen, I imagine.

  “They aren’t Amity,” the man with the gun says. “They’re Dauntless.”

  Then I recognize him: he is Edward, a fellow initiate who left Dauntless after Peter attacked him with a butter knife. That is why he wears an eye patch.

  I remember steadying his head as he lay screaming on the floor, and cleaning the blood he left behind.

  “Hello, Edward,” I say.

  He inclines his head to me, but doesn’t lower his gun. “Tris.”

  “Whatever you are,” the woman says, “you’ll have to get off this train if you want to stay alive.”

  “Please,” says Susan, her lip wobbling. Her eyes fill with tears. “We’ve been running … and the rest of them are dead and I don’t …” She starts to sob again. “I don’t think I can keep going, I …”

  I get the strange urge to hit my head against the wall. Other people’s sobs make me uncomfortable. It’s selfish of me, maybe.

  “We’re running from the Erudite,” says Caleb. “If we get off, it will be easier for them to find us. So we would appreciate it if you let us ride into the city with you.”

  “Yeah?” Edward tilts his head. “What have you ever done for us?”

  “I helped you when no one else would,” I say. “Remember?”

  “You, maybe. But the others?” says Edward. “Not so much.”

  Tobias steps forward, so Edward’s gun is almost against his throat.

  “My name is Tobias Eaton,” Tobias says. “I don’t think you want to push me off this train.”

  The effect of the name on the people in the car is immediate and bewildering: they lower their weapons. They exchange meaningful looks.

  “Eaton? Really?” Edward says, eyebrows raised. “I have to admit, I did not see that coming.” He clears his throat. “Fine, you can come. But when we get to the city, you’ve got to come with us.”

  Then he smiles a little. “We know someone who’s been looking for you, Tobias Eaton.”

  Tobias and I sit on the edge of the car with our legs dangling over the edge.

  “Do you know who it is?”

  Tobias nods.

  “Who, then?”

  “It’s hard to explain,” he says. “I have a lot to tell you.”

  I lean against him.

  “Yeah,” I say. “So do I.”

  I don’t know how much time passes before they tell us to get off. But when they do, we are in the part of the city where the factionless live, about a mile from where I grew up. I recognize each building we pass as one I walked by every time I missed the bus home from school. The one with the broken bricks. The one with a fallen streetlight leaning against it.

  We stand in the doorway of the train car, all four of us in a line. Susan whimpers.

  “What if we get hurt?” she says.

  I grab her hand. “We’ll jump together. You and me. I’ve done this a dozen times and never got hurt.”

  She nods and squeezes my fingers so hard they hurt.

  “On three. One,” I say, “Two. Three.”

  I jump, and pull her with me. My feet slam into the ground and continue forward, but Susan just falls to the pavement and rolls onto her side. Aside from a scraped knee, though, she seems to be all right. The others jump o
ff without difficulty — even Caleb, who has only jumped from a train once before, as far as I know.

  I’m not sure who could know Tobias among the factionless. It could be Drew or Molly, who failed Dauntless initiation — but they didn’t even know Tobias’s real name, and besides, Edward probably would have killed them by now, judging by how ready he was to shoot us. It must be someone from Abnegation, or from school.

  Susan seems to have calmed down. She walks on her own now, next to Caleb, and her cheeks are drying with no new tears to wet them.

  Tobias walks beside me, touching my shoulder lightly.

  “It’s been a while since I checked that shoulder,” he says. “How is it?”

  “Okay. I brought the pain medicine, luckily,” I say. I’m glad to talk about something light — as light as a wound can be, anyway. “I don’t think I’m letting it heal very well. I keep using my arm or landing on it.”

  “There will be plenty of time for healing once all this is over.”

  “Yeah.” Or it won’t matter if I heal, I add silently, because I’ll be dead.

  “Here,” he says, taking a small knife from his back pocket and handing it to me. “Just in case.”

  I put it in my own pocket. I feel even more nervous now.

  The factionless lead us down the street and left into a grimy alleyway that stinks of garbage. Rats scatter in front of us with squeaks of terror, and I see only their tails, slipping between mounds of waste, empty trash cans, soggy cardboard boxes. I breathe through my mouth so I don’t throw up.

  Edward stops next to one of the crumbling brick buildings and forces a steel door open. I wince, half expecting the entire building to fall down if he pulls too hard. The windows are so thick with grime that almost no light penetrates them. We follow Edward into a dank room. In the flickering glow of a lantern, I see … people.

  People sitting next to rolls of bedding. People prying open cans of food. People sipping bottles of water. And children, weaving between the groups of adults, not confined to a particular color of clothing — factionless children.

  We are in a factionless storehouse, and the factionless, who are supposed to be scattered, isolated, and without community … are together inside it. Are together, like a faction.