ALLEGIANT

Chapter: 5

It's only been about two minutes since the fight with Tobias and Peter when Uriah comes walking over to me, cocking his head Peters near unconscious form and laughing at a furious Tobias.

"Damn, I tell you to run ahead for 5 seconds and I miss everything" he looks at Peter when he speaks but his words are for Tobias.

                "Idiot" I hear him say, shaking his head at Peter, "Alright, well, those guns you heard earlier were from somewhere near the dauntless compound. In all honesty we don't know who or what they were for, so in short, we have to go with plan B. Tris you got him?" Uriah asks me now, obviously not caring about Peter's well being. Not that any of us do.

I look up at Tobias to see him looking at me through his dark lashes, his face is stiller than the tracks around me.

"Ya I got him" I answer finally, our eyes still locked.

I struggle to get Peter into a sitting position as Uriah walks ahead. Tobias, brushing his now bruised hands off, follows quickly behind, not so much as glancing back to me.

I lift peter off the ground using the shack as leverage winding his arm around my shoulder to help bear some on the weight.

"Work with me, Peter" I breathe heavily from exertion.

His lifeless body complies and he stumbles to a standing position, my arm around his waist, with his shoulder lifted around mine his shirt lifts exposing a thin strip of skin that my thumb grazes every step. I feel him shudder around me and my eyes roll involuntarily.

                My mind flashes back to all the pain this boy has caused me and vice versa. The training fight, the near homicide, me shooting his arm.

Then I think of the good, saving him in Amity headquarters, saving me from my execution, only to later learn that his motives had to do with his pride and not my wellbeing. But now I have to wonder if there was ever a deeper meaning.

We're only about 5 yards behind the rest of our small little group and I squint to make out their silhouettes dark in the night. Without realizing it, I see the little flecks of gold peeking over to the the east spreading their rays around the buildings signaling a the end of the day, and who knows what else.

                *****

                My shoulder throbs, my eyes are heavy and my arm is unbelievably sore where Peter bares his weight, his head is tilted slightly left and I resist the urge to shrug it off. I hear murmurs of the boys in front of me and I struggle to keep up with their pace. We've bee walking, strangely unnoticed, for hours now.

"I hate- making you struggle, Tris" Peters voice startles me; he's speaking directly in my ear so no one can make out his words but me.

"Ya well, you're not really doing much to help now are you?" I ask him glancing up at his eyes "And what happened to you stupid nickname for me anyways? Have you realized that it's futile yet!?"

"No" I hear his smile against my ear and I jump, not really enjoying the sudden contact, still not knowing his ulterior motives. "I just realized if we're going to be a team then I'll have to be pleasant"

"Not something you're used to I'm sure"

"Oh I can be nice whenever I please." He stops abruptly, his arm falling from my shoulders and I feel cold and exposed.  I look back at Peter and expect him to be joking, but all play has left him and his jaw is clenched tight, he's serious.

"You know, in Dauntless I was an ass. I was jealous of you, yeah, jealous of a Stiff. My families always talked to me about you like you were some 'high and mighty good for nothing officials' they warned me that you'd try to take over the Dauntless like you have the rest of our country. Not you particularly but you know, your-"