feel Tobias brushing my hair back before the first simulation. I hear him telling me to be brave. I hear my mother telling me to be brave(...) I am brave.

i like to think that im helping them by hating them

I suppose a fire that burns that bright is not meant to last.

I should probably be afraid. But instead a hysterical laugh bubbles inside me, because I just remembered something: Maybe I can’t hold a gun. But I have a knife in my back pocket.

The gun goes off. I fall.

I hear footsteps and Four's hands wrap around my wrists. I let him pry my hands from my eyes. He encloses one of my hands perfectly between two of his. The warmth of his skin overwhelms the ache in my fingers from holding the bars. "You all right?" he asks, pressing our hands together. "Yeah." He starts to laugh.

There is a reason you don’t know all the things I know. -Marcus Eaton