Allegiant - alternate ending

NEW CHAPTER 54, TOBIAS

It is several hours after Cara told me that Tris was shot. They told me that her skin and lungs are almost completely destroyed and that her heart is very weak. I received these words like they were coming from somewhere far away, like a whisper. But I felt them so real, so painful, like they ripped my chest and transformed everything else inside me into a stone. I feel like these words have killed me and only something like a ghost remained here instead of me.

Tris underwent a long surgery to remove the bullets and to stitch her wounds. They told me that they have little hopes that she will survive it and I was trying to prepare myself to accept what seemed obvious. But something inside me did not want to accept, and this resistance was keeping the pain still more alive. I felt like it took years before the surgery was finished. When the door opened my heart almost exploded. Through the daze and pounding of my heart I saw a doctor coming out and I heart only a world "alive". The friends around me wanted to share their relief with me, but I was too weak and dazed to react. I only felt that a tiny light of hope did appear within all darkness inside me. Doctor told us that her prognosis is still far from being optimistic, but this tinny light of hope survived inside me and I am trying with all my will to keep it alive.

I GO TO see her.

Christina and I walk shoulder to shoulder; we walk in Cara's footsteps. I don't remember the journey from the entrance to the hospital, really, just a few smeared images and whatever sound I can make out through the barrier that has gone up inside my head.

I see her through the small glass window. She is lying in a bed with unusually high edges. Something like inflatable coverings is enclosing her body. The skin on her face is grey and so swollen that I barely recognize that this is Tris. There are a dozen of tubes and wires attached to her body and machines persistently beep. Two nurses are around her and a doctor is busy with one the machines. We cannot go into the room, but my eyes are almost locked to her and I am dying from the wish to touch her...

In all this time I did not muster the will to actually ask what happened in the weapons lab and nobody wanted to disturb me. Now I fell angry and betrayed at the same time and I finally want to know... "What actually happened?" I ask with trembling voice.

Cara thinks a bit and ducks her head before she answers. "When I was trying to shut down the lights somebody noticed the dropper in my pocket and he raised the alarm. I tried to escape but I felt and passed out. As Matthew told me he, Caleb and Tris were running toward the weapons lab and Tris asked him to distract the guards so that she and Caleb could continue towards the weapons lab. From here on it is unclear what happened. Caleb is still not able to talk reasonably. He is just mumbling something like that Tris forced him and then he is just repeating that he should be the one who is dead."

I already realized that Tris would go to the weapons la instead of Caleb. Of course she would. She couldn't stand that she would get her brother to his death. I was angry why she did this instead of this coward and I felt like I will crush him because he let her... Despite something in Cara's voice tells me that he was really willing to do this himself.

"Tris succeeded to blow up the door and she succeeded to activate memory serum. But it seems that David was within the weapons lab and he shot her. Luckily all the guards in front of the weapons lab were immediately affected by a memory serum and Caleb came into the weapons lab only seconds after she was shot. Also his skin is quite injured. Matthew arrived a minute later and he used a first aid kit from the backpack to stop the bleeding. Caleb brought her to the hospital and Matthew got the best doctors. She wouldn't have any chance of survival if it took them only a couple of minutes longer..."

I realize I shouldn't be so angry with Caleb. Obviously he was really trying to save her. But for now I still cannot help myself.

"Can we see Mathew?" I ask. I think I am still not able to meet Caleb.

Mathew should be in the hospital – he got a bruise on his head.

In this moment Matthew comes around the corner. He has a wide gauze on his head and his clothes are soaked with blood. Most probably Tris's blood. His eyes are red and lips squeezed into a thin line. "I am sorry," is all he says, before he drops himself powerlessly to the chair next to me.

"How is your head?" Christina asks.

"I am OK, but Tris..." he closes his eyes and then he looks toward the small window. "I cannot forget her bleeding wounds and burnt skin. How didn't I imagine that David could..." he groans.

"But how did David survive the death serum?" Cara asks.

"He must have been inoculated against it." Matthew replies. "And it seems that our inoculation helped us a bit too. Otherwise Caleb wouldn't survive and I wouldn't dare to think about Tris." When he notices Cara's questioning eyes he continues. "Caleb suggested that we should get inoculated against all four serums because he found out that all of them function in a similar way."

Cara nods.

Suddenly increased activity within the room attracts our attention. I seems that something is wrong and my chest squeezes from fear. I feel like my heart will stop. They need a couple of minutes to stabilize her, but it is like hours for me. I feel like all energy was drained from my cells.

"Do you think they would tell us what is going on?" I hesitantly ask.

"We can try," says Matthew and knocks on the door. The nurse comes to the door and talks to him for a minute. Then he returns to us and he hesitantly says: "She got a shot through her lungs and stomach, and all surfaces that were in contact with death serum are seriously damaged. Including lungs. They are like frozen. The death serum molecules in her tissue seem to be still active. They keep her cooled down, to slow down the spread of the serum and to diminish further damage. He has a lot of experience with serums," he says, pointing at the doctor.

I feel like everything is spinning around me and like I am getting sick. Then I try to focus again on the small light of hope inside me.

"Do they have any experience with death serum?" Christina asks.

Matthew shakes his head: "Nobody knows a lot about it."

"Let's investigate David's office," Cara says. "If he survived he must have known something more about it. And if we find something that could help her ..."

"And there could be quite some other interesting discoveries in his office." Says Mathew with a meaningful glance. "Do you think that Caleb could be useful here?"

Cara gives us a skeptical look, but then she nods "Maybe a new task could bring him back into life."

Then she turns to me and adds "He has enough of pain himself, please don't make it worse."