Daring to be Dauntless (A Divergent Fanfiction)

Chapter 25- Controlled

“Thank you all for coming. Remember to report back with your team leader after lunch please. You are all now dismissed,” Jeanine says smiling to the crowd of rowdy revolutionists.
The two hour long lecture finally ended with a review of every team’s duty. Not only were they required to check in with their team captains but they were also expected to perform a full analysis of their work stations before the ball got rolling.
Jeanine now turns back to all her trusty assistants. Her eyes linger on me for a moment before she nods and announces that we too were dismissed. I glance around at the draining crowd of scientists.
“It’ll all be over soon,” Caine says walking up beside me. If I hadn’t known he drank me out of my liquor cabinet last night I would never have guessed he’d been hung-over. He gelled his hair back so any curl that he had started at the nape of his neck. He was also wearing one of his best suits, a vibrant blue ensemble that lengthened him considerably, all contrast to the white shirt underneath. He even wore his favorite sued shoes, no doubt showing off for his next future girlfriend. All in all, he looked sharp.
“Yep,” I say. He glances at me and nudges my shoulder with his.
“Don’t act all excited,” he says.
“Should I be excited?” I ask looking at him. “We’re killing them.”
“Technically, Dauntless is killing them.”
“We are making them.” I counter turning to him. His face flattens out with a more resonated expression. 
“That’s why we have to bring our A-game,” he says looking at me dead on. I realize what he’s trying to say. We have to be ready to fix the damage.
“Let’s just hope it’s possible,” I say, turning away and walking to my father. Unlike Caine, he looked like he’d been rushing as well. He’d buttoned up his lab coat, trying to hide a creased polo he’d probably just grabbed from the laundry. He hadn’t even straightened out his hair.
“Dad,” I say, tapping his shoulder.
“Hey Kiddo,” he laughs rubbing a hand over my head. I stiffen at the touch and as he looks over his shoulder at a departing Jeanine, I quickly slick back any loose strands he ruffled up. “So, what’s up?” He says still smiling.
“I never really got to talk to you last night,” I say innocently.
He chuckles again and puts his arm around my shoulders. “I know. Jeanine whisked you away so fast I never got to say welcome back.” My father never really was Erudite, you could tell. Everything about him screams Amity, which is what confuses me about his plea bargain with the counsel. Why would such a cheerful man choose such a heartless faction?
That’s when it hits me.
My father didn’t choose Erudite because he loved it or felt liberated saying he was smarter than others. He chose it because it was his job. He did it because in order for peace to ensue, changes would have to be made. Changes could only be made when all the players dealt their cards. Amity would try to stay neutral but in the end they’d show faith in one or the other. Abnegation would stick together, while Dauntless dispersed and Erudite ruled the table. Candor would be right behind Erudite, trying to take the winning title. Only then, when everything was in the open, would Elite deal the winning hand.
My father, an Amity man at heart, in an Abnegation’s skin, living in Erudite’s quarters, was Elite. I can’t believe I hadn’t seen it earlier. The long nights with Caine in the labs. The secrets. The lies.
“You alright Aria?” My father waves a hand in front of my face.
“You never told me,” I whisper.
“Never told you what?” He asks confused.
“I never should have trusted you,” I say slowly. Tears threaten as I look past him to the exit. He said he loved me. Why would you keep this from someone you loved? Tobias and Ash at least told me. My father though looks at me for months, knowing that he is of great importance in the Elites, and that soon I will be too, and he doesn’t tell me. He doesn’t even hint to it. My cheeks redden as he asks again what I meant.
“I’m not ignorant,” I growl. Before he says he doesn’t understand again, I run for the exit. I plow my shoulder into the door and it swings open. I’m left alone in the hallway as it clicks back shut.
I walk the length of the hall many times before losing the force of the anger I’d gathered.
Why would he tell me? He never told me anything anyway. I mean, why start now right?
“Aria?”
Jeanine stands in a doorway further down the hall. Her lab coat is on and stained with chemicals. As she motions for me to come over I notice she’s holding a small vial of clear liquid between her fingers.
“What’s that?” I say treading lightly since our morning’s encounter.
“Well, when it has completed a mixing rotation it should be something greater than the mind control,” she says gleefully, as if the morning never occurred.
“And how’s that possible?” I ask closing the door behind me. “Mind control has probably been the best experiment yet.” Open books clutter a counter on my left. She sets the vial in the rotating machine and hits a button. The vial begins to rotate slowly as she walks back to the counter and picks up a syringe, examining the tip.
“This my darling, works on Divergents.”
I can feel a worm hole open in my stomach. My jaw drops as she places the syringe back on the counter. She looks at me and chuckles.
“Yes, I know, it’s a work in progress my dear.”
“Does it really work?”
She shrugs. “I haven’t tested it yet, but I would like to.” Her glasses slide to the end of her nose as she stares at me. Silence spreads through the room for several minutes.
“Will it hurt?” I finally ask removing my blazer.
“No,” she says shaking her head. I walk to the counter and sit on a stool. She moves the strap of my dress out of the way and wipes over the injection point of my neck with a cool cloth.
“Will this be out of me before the attack?”
“Of course,” Jeanine says tossing the cloth into a nearby trash bin. “I don’t want you to miss the show.”
She carefully distributes the serum into the needle cartridge and reattaches the needle to the top. She presses the needle into my skin and looks at me one more time.
“This will be different than simulation serum. Your enemies have now become friends and your friends are now enemies. You will be confused at first, but I have programmed the serum to recognize me as a friend,” Jeanine says. “This remote here,” she points to a silver disk on the counter, “will take you out of the real life simulation when the experiment has been completed.”
I nod.
“Are you ready?” She asks. I nod once more before she plunges the serum into my veins. Immediately I feel my body slump. Jeanine catches me as I slip out of the stool and onto the tile floor. It’s almost like my actions aren’t mine. My mind explodes with colors. I clutch my head as my eyes open to Jeanine.
She studies me silently before asking how I feel.
My tongue feels obese in my mouth as I try to speak. My body though feels like a taut wire. My bones seem to shatter, replaced with thousands and thousands of wires like a computer. My mind registers a command and I notice Jeanine whispering into the silver disk. Or at least I think she’s whispering. My body functions don’t belong to me anymore. My hearing is like a slinky toy, expanding only to collapse in on itself the next second. Desperately searching for a way out of this dimension, I find myself standing up and walking to the counter. I pick up a book and much to my confusion, put it back on the shelf.
Then, like a snap of a book being close, I can hear clearly, I can see proportionately and my body feels like my own again. And that body I find on the floor again.
Jeanine rushes over to me and shakes my shoulder. “Aria! Aria, can you hear me?”
“Mmhmm,” I murmur and she sighs.
“Thank goodness you’re all right, I thought it failed.”
“It did,” I say. “I couldn’t hear well and my eyes were all blurry.”
She chews at her thumb nail before nodding. “Blurry vision was a failsafe in case it didn’t take effect immediately. Hearing though wasn’t a necessity. I give the commands with the remote.”
I nod holding my head.
“Why did you need a failsafe if you were only using it on me?” I ask.
“That’s because I’m not just using it on you Aria,” she says pulling me off the ground. I feel weak in my knees and a little nauseated. I collapse on the nearest stool and lean on the counter in front of me to keep balanced. “Who else then?” I ask.
She shrugs and takes out another syringe already filled with the exact same serum. I stare at it as she carefully places the syringe into a black box.
“Any divergent that gets in my way,” she says.
 I stare at the box as she tucks it under her arms and straightens her glasses. “Don’t worry Aria, the effects will wear off soon enough.”
She walks towards me, for a second I think she plans on touching me but instead she picks up the small disk and puts it in her pocket.
“Unfortunately,” she says, “the remote does not work with the remaining batch of serum.” The box shifts under her arm. “But it is still very effective.”
I watch as she leaves. My mind feels like a swamp.  Slow and sickly, dragging me down, my eyes begin to close and my mind leaves on the train. My arm slips flat onto the table and my head follows suit.
My body is a bubble, floating along endlessly with nothing sharp to pop it.
I think somewhere in the distance a door opens and my name is being called, but it’s not my name, it’s an old name, a name from long ago.
“Magdalena?”
I can’t make out the face as he comes beside me. Another door opens and another masked face comes up. They weren’t really masked; it was just a grainy picture.
It was all just a glimpse of a picture. “She’s been injected.” A hand tugs down on my dress sleeve.
I slur, trying to tell them not to touch me.
“Serum shouldn’t work on divergents,” a voice comes loud and angry.
“Well what is this then?” Another voice asks.
“How should I know?” The other voice shouts, continuing the altercation.  
My eyes again spark with fireworks. I moan as tendrils of pain strike my head. My brain recedes to the back of the cave. Soon all the colors in my eyes turn to black and I feel the huge hands of the masked men pick me up. Their voices die with my hearing and soon the only words in my head are blinking red.
Controlled.