I have your back. I didn't mean only when it's easy. All the time.

I am a child. I am two feet tall, and asking if she loves me.

It doesn't take skill to stand in a place were no bullets find you, or to fire into the dark and hit a man you didn't see.

He leans his face close to mine and wraps his fingers around my chin. His hand smells like metal. When was the last time he held a gun, or a knife?

I was still afraid of him, I knew, but in a different way - I was no longer a child, afraid of the threat my terrifying father posed to my safety. I was a man, afraid of the threat he posed to my character, to my future, to my identity.

You're more than Dauntless," he says in a low voice. "But if you want to be just like them, hurling yourself into ridiculous situations for no reason and retaliating against your enemies without any regard for what's ethical, go right ahead. I thought you were better than that, but maybe I was wrong.

Then his eyes focus on something over my shoulder, and he starts walking. I turn to see Uriah jogging from the elevator bank. He is grinning. “Heard a rumor you were a dirty traitor,” Uriah says. “Yeah, whatever,” says Zeke. They collide in an embrace that looks almost painful to me, slapping each other’s backs and laughing with their fists clasped between them.