I walked down the hall towards the room where the aptitude test would be administered to me. My loose red pants flapped against my legs. I've always hated these pants.
I was thinking negative thoughts. If Johanna, my guardian and mouthpiece of Amity, could read my thoughts, I knew what she would say.
She would say calmly, "A negative mind creates a hostile environment. It is much easier to live in peace."
My faction trained me to drown out the negative thoughts. First, I must get to the source.
Why was I being so negative? Easy. I was nervous for my test. I was afraid that if my result was Amity, I would be stuck in this life. But I was also scared that my result would be another faction. Amity was all I had ever known. Leaving Amity meant leaving any trace of my parents behind. Not that there was much.
Leaving Amity also meant that I could leave my ruthless "boyfriend" Adam. The thing is that he wasn't exactly a boy and he was not my friend. I was relieved that I didn't have to face him this morning. He was probably facing a hangover.
Adam was the only person that I really spent my days with. I didn't fit in with the other Amity kids. I didn't like the things they were interested in, and I was much more belligerent than them. Not only that, but my parents were gone.
All traces of their life were erased. The only connection I have to them is Johanna Reyes. Apparently Johanna was a good friend of my father, but I had only found that out after my parents' death when she took me in. I was not particularly close with her. As long as I did my required work in the fields (which wasn't much since I was was underage) and kept peace, it didn't matter where I was as long as I checked in once a week. I was always welcome to a bed at her place, but lately that bed was empty more than occupied.
Even the name that my parents wanted for me was gone. When I was born, I was to be named Zara. This caused a petty controversy among Amity citizens, who thought the name was too sharp and coarse for a baby. My parents were usually good with the whole peace and love thing, but they would not back down and change my name. Eventually they were given peace serum and changed my name to Sara while they were on that stuff. I've never been injected with peace serum, and I hope I never will.
I got to the end of the hall and opened the door to the testing room. I saw a Dauntless woman dressed in all black preparing various vials of blue liquid on a counter along one wall. On the opposite wall was a mirror with a large padded chair facing it.
With a bored voice the woman said, "Come in, sit down."
As I walked towards the chair, the woman continued to prepare the vials as she said, "My name is Tori and I will be administering your aptitude test."
"My name is Sara," I said in an effort to be friendly. "How are you?"
"Great," she said dryly. "Drink this." She held out one of the glass vials to me.
I snatched the vial out of her hand. Tori raised her eyebrows. I got that expression a lot. No one expected an Amity to be aggressive.
I took a deep breath and lifted the bottom of the glass to the ceiling. The contents tasted bitter in my mouth. I made a sour face before swallowing it, then took a slow breath as I leaned back in my chair.
Closing my eyes I said to Tori, "So what does the test entail?"
No response. Getting annoyed with her edginess, I opened my eyes and sat up, turning to face her. "You're acting like a-"
Tori wasn't there anymore. The room was now clear except for the chair I was sitting in. All the walls in the room were now mirrors.
Getting out of the chair I called, "Hello? Tori?"
