Cold Hearts | Tobias Eaton

°9°

MY LEGS GO numb, like all the life has gone out of them, and I wonder how I will walk when my name is called.

"Working together, these five factions have lived in peace for many years, each contributing to a different sector of society. Abnegation has fulfilled our need for selfless leaders in government; Candor has provided us with trustworthy and sound leaders in law; Erudite has supplied us with intelligent teachers and researchers; Amity has given us understanding counselors and caretakers; and Dauntless provides us with protection from threats both within and without. But the reach of each faction is not limited to these areas. We give one another far more than can be adequately summarized. In our factions, we find meaning, we find purpose, we find life."

I think of the motto I read in my Faction History textbook: Faction before blood. More than family, our factions are where we belong. Can that possibly be right? That's maybe why my parents left me - their faction was more important than me. - their blood.

Marcus adds, "Apart from them, we would not survive."
The silence that follows his words is heavier than other silences. It is heavy with our worst fear, greater even than the fear of death: to be factionless.

Marcus continues, "Therefore this day marks a happy occasion-the day on which we receive our new initiates, who will work with us toward a better society and a better world."

A round of applause. It sounds muffled. I try to stand completely still, because if my knees are locked and my body is stiff, I don't shake. Marcus reads the first names, but I can't tell one syllable from the other. How will I know when he calls my name?

One by one, each sixteen-year-old steps out of line and walks to the middle of the room. The first girl to choose decides on Amity, the same faction from which she came. I watch her blood droplets fall on soil, and she stands behind their seats alone.

The room is constantly moving, a new name and a new person choosing, a new knife and a new choice. I recognize most of them, but I doubt they know me.

"James Tucker," Marcus says.

James Tucker of the Dauntless is the first person to stumble on his way to the bowls. He throws his arms out and regains his balance before hitting the floor. His face turns red and he walks fast to the middle of the room. When he stands in the center, he looks from the Dauntless bowl to the Candor bowl-the orange flames that rise higher each moment, and the glass reflecting blue light.

Marcus offers him the knife. He breathes deeply-I watch his chest rise-and, as he exhales, accepts the knife. Then he drags it across his palm with a jerk and holds his arm out to the side. His blood falls onto glass, and he is the first of us to switch factions. The first faction transfer. A mutter rises from the Dauntless section, and I stare at the floor.

They will see him as a traitor from now on. His Dauntless family will have the option of visiting him in his new faction, a week and a half from now on Visiting Day, but they won't, because he left them. His absence will haunt their hallways, and he will be a space they can't fill. And then time will pass, and the hole will be gone, like when an organ is removed and the body's fluids flow into the space it leaves. Humans can't tolerate emptiness for long.

"Caleb Prior," says Marcus.

Caleb squeezes Beatrice's hand one last time, and smiles at me for maybe the last time. I watch his feet move to the center of the room, and his hands, steady as they accept the knife from Marcus, are deft as one presses the knife into the other. Then he stands with blood pooling in his palm, and his lip snags on his teeth.

He breathes out. And then in. And then he holds his hand over the Erudite bowl, and his blood drips into the water, turning it a deeper shade of red.

I hear mutters that lift into outraged cries. I can barely think straight. My brother, my selfless brother, a faction transfer? My brother, born for Abnegation, Erudite?

When I close my eyes, I see the stack of books on Caleb's desk, and his shaking hands sliding along his legs after the aptitude test. Why didn't I realize that when he told me to think of myself yesterday, he was also giving that advice to himself?

I scan the crowd of the Erudite-they wear smug smiles and nudge each other. The Abnegation, normally so placid, speak to one another in tense whispers and glare across the room at the faction that has become our enemy.

"Excuse me," says Marcus, but the crowd doesn't hear him. He shouts, "Quiet, please!"

The room goes silent. Except for a ringing sound.
I hear Beatrice's name. I am sure that she'll choose Abnegation. I can see it in her now.

The ringing, I realize, is in my ears.

I look at Caleb, who now stands behind the Erudite. Beatrice is also staring at gim. He stares back at Beatrice and nods a little, like he knows what she's thinking, and agrees.

Marcus offers Beatrice her knife. She looks at him -and take it. He nods, and I turn my eyes toward the bowls, I see Beatrice drag the blade down.

I close and open my eyes and see her blood dropping on the coals. She is brave. She is dauntless. The while room is silent.

"Kazuha Prior"

I may be the last Prior to stay. Or the last Prior to go.

My eyes also find Caleb's. And I'm trying to think what I should do.

Marcus offers me my knife. I look at the bowels. I look at the glass and then back at the soil. Should I follow my future or stay with the Priors.

I cut my hand, not feeling any pain.

My eyes find Beatrice who is looking around the people in her faction. And then they go back at Caleb. He smiles at me.

The blood on my palm falls in to the bowel.

I am honest. I am kind. And I'm unnaturally selfless.