It's strange how time can make a place shrink, make its strangeness ordinary.

I keep finding myself stifled by the company of others and then crippled by loneliness when I leave them. I am terrified and I don't even know of what, because I have lost everything already.

It's strange to see people you don't know well in the morning, with sleepy eyes and pillow creases in their cheeks

How is it I know this little about the boy who says he loves me -- the boy whose real name is powerful enough to keep us alive in a train car full of enemies?

Out of my peripheral vision, I see Four shove the door open and walk out. Apparently this fight isn't interesting enough for him. Or maybe he's going to figure out why everything's spinning like a top, and I don't blame him; I want to know the answer too.

I take a deep breath. I'm not sure where that swell of desperation came from, but know that I've acknowledge it, it's impossible to ignore, like a living thing has awakened from a long sleep inside me. It writhes in my stomach and throat. I need to leave. I need the truth.

I know I belong in Dauntless because everything I did in that aptitude test told me so. I'm loyal to my faction for that reason -- because there's nowhere else I could possibly be. But her? And you?" She shakes her head. "I have no idea who you're loyal to. And I'm not going to pretend like everything's okay.