Best Divergent Quotes

Maybe It Was Worth It

I somehow find the hallway I sat in the day Edward left. I don't want to be alone, but I don't feel like I have much of a choice. I close my eyes and pay attention to the cold stone beneath me and breathe the musty underground air.
"Tris!" someone calls from the end of the hallway. Uriah jogs toward me. Behind him are Lynn and Marlene. Lynn is holding a muffin.
"Thought I would find you here." He crouches near my feet. "I heard you got ranked first."
"So you just wanted to congratulate me?" I smirk. "Well, thanks."
"Someone should," he says. "And I figured your friends might not be so congratulatory, since their ranks aren't as high. So quit moping and come with us. I'm going to shoot a muffin off Marlene's head."
The idea is so ridiculous I can't stop myself from laughing. I get up and follow Uriah to the end of the hallway, where Marlene and Lynn are waiting. Lynn narrows her eyes at me, but Marlene grins.
"Why aren't you out celebrating?" she asks. "You're practically guaranteed a top ten spot if you keep it up."
"She's too Dauntless for the other transfers," Uriah says.
"And too Abnegation to 'celebrate,'" remarks Lynn.
I ignore her. "Why are you shooting a muffin off Marlene's head?"
"She bet me I couldn't aim well enough to hit a small object from one hundred feet," Uriah explains. "I bet her she didn't have the guts to stand there as I tried. It works out well, really."
The training room where I first fired a gun is not far from my hidden hallway. We get there in under a minute, and Uriah flips on a light switch. It looks the same as the last time I was there: targets on one end of the room, a table with guns on the other.
"They just keep these lying around?" I ask.
"Yeah, but they aren't loaded." Uriah pulls up his shirt. There is a gun stuck under the waistband of his pants, right under a tattoo. I stare at the tattoo, trying to figure out what it is, but then he lets his shirt fall. "Okay," he says. "Go stand in front of a target."
Marlene walks away, a skip in her step.
"You aren't seriously going to shoot at her, are you?" I ask Uriah.
"It's not a real gun," says Lynn quietly. "It's got plastic pellets in it. The worst it'll do is sting her face, maybe give her a welt. What do you think we are, stupid?"
Marlene stands in front of one of the targets and sets the muffin on her head. Uriah squints one eye as he aims the gun.
"Wait!" calls out Marlene. She breaks off a piece of the muffin and pops it into her mouth. "Mmkay!" she shouts, the word garbled by food. She gives Uriah a thumbs-up.
"I take it your ranks were good," I say to Lynn.
She nods. "Uriah's second. I'm first. Marlene's fourth."
"You're only first by a hair," says Uriah as he aims. He squeezes the trigger. The muffin falls out Marlene's head. She didn't even blink.
"We both win!" she shouts.
"You miss your old faction?" Lynn asks me.
"Sometimes," I say. "It was calmer. Not as exhausting."
Marlene picks up the muffin off the ground and bites into it. Uriah shouts, "Gross!"
"Initiation's supposed to wear us down to who we really are. That's what Eric says, anyway," Lynn says. She arches an eyebrow.
"Four said it was to prepare us."
"Well, they don't agree on much."
I nod. Four told me that Eric's vision for Dauntless is not what it's supposed to be, but I wish he would tell me exactly what he thinks the right vision is. I get glimpses of it every so often-the Dauntless cheering when I jumped off the building, the net of arms that caught me after zip lining-but they are not enough. Has he read the Dauntless manifesto? Is that what he believes in-in ordinary acts of bravery?
The door to the training room opens. Shauna, Zeke, and Four walk in just as Uriah fires at another target. The plastic pellet bounces off the center of the target and rolls along the ground.
"I thought I heard something in here," says Four.
"Turns out it was just my idiot brother," says Zeke. "You're not supposed to be here after hours. Careful, or Four will tell Eric, and then you'll be as good as scalped."
Uriah wrinkles his nose at his brother and puts the pellet gun away. Marlene crosses the room, taking bites of her muffin, and Four steps away from the door to let us file out.
"You wouldn't tell Eric," says Lynn, eyeing Four suspiciously.
"No, I wouldn't," he says. As I pass him, he rests his hand on the top of my back to usher me out, his palm pressing  between my shoulder blades. I shiver. I hope he can't tell.
The others walk down the hallway, Zeke and Uriah shoving each other, Marlene splitting her muffin with Shauna, Lynn marching in the front. I start to follow them.
"Wait a second," Four says. I turn toward him, wondering which version of Four I'll see now-the one who scolds me, or the one who climbs Ferris wheels with me. He smiles a little, but the smile doesn't spread to his eyes, which look tense and worried.
"You belong here, you know that?" he says. "You belong with us. It'll be over soon, so just hold on, okay?"
He scratches behind his ear and looks away, like he's embarrassed by what he said.
I stare at him. I feel my heartbeat everywhere, even in my toes. I feel like doing something bold, but I could just as easily walk away. I am not sure which option is smarter, or better. I am not sure that I care.
I reach out and take his hand. His fingers slide between mine. I can't breathe.
I stare up at him, and he stares down at me. For a long moment, we stay that way. Then I pull my hand away and run after Uriah and Lynn and Marlene. Maybe now he thinks I'm stupid, or strange. Maybe it was worth it.

LITERALLY THAT MOMENT AT THE END IS WHAT I PICTURE TO BE AN 'abnegation' kiss. just holding hands for a few seconds. poor little abnegation babes.

-Lanie✌🏼️😘