Divergent FBI

Chapter Seventy-Two

Tris' POV

"Tris," I hear Tobias whisper behind me, his voice low and quiet. "Tris, whatever happens, I love you. You know that, right? Nothing Jeanine can do will make me hate you." I pull away  from his hand when it lays heavy on my shoulder. I can't bring myself to meet his blue orbs.

"How do you know that?" I whimper, tears leaking from my eyes. I feel his strong arms around my waist, holding me flush against his body.  "We have no idea what she's capable of."

"I love you, Tris." But, this voice suddenly sounds foreign, as does this body. It's not Tobias.

"Tobias?" I question, struggling to pull away from him. My heartbeat quickens when his grip only tightens around my stomach. "Tobias, let me go!" 

"Who's Tobias?" I rip the person's arms off me and take a large step forward before glancing back at my attacker. I gasp as Peter stalks towards me, his eyes hooded with the pleasure caused by my fear. "It's me Tris. It's always been me." Then, he lunges for me.

I gasp awake, sitting straight up in the cot of my prison cell. I trace the faint pink lines on my legs, shuddering as I think of the burns that rested there hours ago. I wipe the sweat off my brow and attempt to regain my regular breathing rhythm. Once accomplished, I sit back against the wall and stare at the closed door. Utter hopelessness weighs down on my stomach as I think about the never-ending hallways here. Even if I got out of my cell, finding Tobias would be impossible.

God, I hope Lynn had been telling the truth.

~*~

Hours later my door is opened by none other than Peter. The smirk on his face as he escorts me down numerous hallways indicates that something bad is going to happen, and my blood runs cold when I enter another empty room with a mirror. 

"Stay here." Peter demands, closing the door as he leaves.

"Where else would I go?" I mutter as I cross my arms to cover my cold body. After being injected with The Miracle yesterday, Jeanine had left me in nothing but white, high-waisted underwear and a thin-materialed bra. One of those plastic hospital bands is wrapped around my wrist with my subject number printed on it, and I toy with it as I take my repeating steps back and forth across the small room. 

I hear the door in the other room burst open and look back just in time to see the mirror transform. It reveals a distraught Tobias, who's still in the same clothes as yesterday, looking just as beat-up. At least I know they won't test The Miracle on him.

"Tobias!" I scream, running to the window. I press myself to the cool glass, yearning for the feeling of his arms around me. He extracts himself from the two mens' grasps and sprints to the glass, his eyes frantic as he surveys my body.

"Tris! Tris we'll get out of here I promise!" He yells, his fists pounding against the glass. He swears when the men grab him again and I shriek.

"Don't hurt him! Please don't hurt him!" My voice cracks with my hysteric cries, hoping to convince them to go against orders as they strap Tobias' wrists to leather restraints nailed into the wall. The height of the handcuffs force him to stand up straight, his back facing me. I cringe when they rip his shirt off of him, revealing his recently completed tattoo and his scars. The men walk out of the room and I drive my fists into the glass, knowing I can't get to him. 

After a while of both me and Tobias struggling to get to each other, the door slides open once again. A middle-aged man grins maliciously at Tobias from the doorway, and my heart halts it's beating when I realize who it is. It's not his appearance that gives him away, it's the object in his hand that betrays his identity.

It's the whip in his hand that gives him away.

"Father?" Tobias chokes, making tears come to my eyes. He's afraid. He's terrified by what his father is about to do. 

"Tobias!" I sob, my face crumbling in the slight reflection I can see of myself. "Jeanine, please! Please stop this!" I wait for the sputter of the intercom, so I know she at least acknowledges my request. Instead, I'm met with the whistle of the whip as it flows through the air, somewhat gracefully. It doesn't strike Tobias, it was just to get the both of us revved up, but then his father turns to me, a smirk pulling on his grotesque lips.

"It's your fault." He spits, turning quickly to send the whip into Tobias' back. 

"No!" I screech, hitting the glass again. I can hear his grunt along with the slap of the leather on his back, and when the material slips away from his shoulder blades, I can see blood oozing to the wound, carving a river of red down the dips of his taunt muscles. "Tobias, baby, I'm so sorry! I'm sorry." My tears blur my vision, but I can still hear the whistle and crack produced by the whip. Tobias' grunts slowly turn to groans, yelps, snarls, and eventually to screams. 

I'm hysterical, doing everything I can to stop it. I scream, I kick at the door, punch the glass, but it's evident none of those things will do anything, so I start to sob against the glass, watching as his back becomes a mutilated mess composed of blood and loose strips of broken skin. 

It takes me a while to realize when the whipping finally stops, although, that only leaves me to cry and beg Tobias for forgiveness through the glass. I see him crawl across the floor, meaning his father must have taken his restraints off. He groans as he pushes himself to stand on his knees.

"Tris, it's gonna be okay." He moans, but his voice isn't sure-isn't his. The screaming has made it deeper, throatier. "I love you." He whispers just before he falls to the floor, all the strength left in his body spent.

"Tobias! No! Baby, you have to stay awake!" It's no use though, as I look at his broken body I realize that. Without medical attention, he's going to die.

That's my last thought before I'm dragged away one again by another pair of unfamiliar arms.