I am wearing a gray shirt, blue jeans, black shoes--new clothes, but beneath them, my Dauntless tattoos. It is impossible to erase my choices. Especially these.

Some people believe that I will go nowhere, and maybe they're right, but maybe they're not.

I don't see any elderly people in the crowd. Are there any old Dauntless? Do they not last that long, or are they just sent away when they can't jump off moving trains anymore?

Don't you dare try to apologize." His voice shakes. "This is not something you can bandage with a word or two and some hugging, or something.

That night we push our cots just a little closer together, and look into each other's eyes in the moments before we fall asleep. When he finally drifts off, our fingers are twisted together in the space between the beds. I smile a little, and let myself go.

Thank you for your honesty.

THE SERUM WEARS off five hours later, when the sun is just beginning to set. Tobias shut me in my room for the rest of the day, checking on me every hour. This time when he comes in, I am sitting on the bed, glaring at the wall. “Thank God,” he says, pressing his forehead to the door. “I was beginning to think it would never wear off and I would have to leave you here to … smell flowers, or whatever you wanted to do while you were on that stuff.