Insurgent: Traitor

Chapter 9

"Breathe in, now breathe out."

"Good."

"Open your mouth and say 'ahhh'."

It's comments like these an Erudite nurse has been saying to me, in an annoyingly high voice one would use for small children. She is medium height and plump, with red hair and grey eyes. Her skin is a ghastly pale that makes me look tan.

And, to be honest, it frightens me a bit to have her so close to me.

She hovers over me as I drink the glass of water I am required to have at two hour intervals. I feel ridiculous and claustrophobic when she speaks to me.

It takes maybe thirty minutes for her to check all my vital functions, blood pressure, and even gives me an eye test. By the time I walk out the door I am annoyed and frustrated. If they want to check-up on my heath then that's fine, but at least have Marco do it. The hallways are as bright and sterile as always. Smelling of metal, and chemicals, and books.

It's funny how I never realized that books have such a distinctive smell. Ink, and paper, and dust.

Ink because of what the words are written in. Paper because if what the words are written on. Dust because these books have not been so much as looked at on so long. People are on the computers constantly. It is pretty pathetic, really. Now I see what Jeanine meant by, "a faction of intellectuals is no army". Most of the Erudite are very skinny and have little to no muscle. If they do not have a naturally broad build then they are about my size. The very few Erudite I have seen are physical test subjects. Physical test subjects is my label for the people who pride themselves in being Jeanine's hamsters, and will run on her endless, pointless wheels until they collapse from exhaustion.

Jeanine has her physical test subjects, and her mental ones. Physical test subjects are in the best shape and mental are in the worst. They look like they have not slept in weeks, and maybe they havn't. I imagine that is how I looked while I was being tested.

I worry sometimes that my window of opportunity for escape has closed already. I worry more that it won't open at all. I can feel the strength returning in my body. My very bones feel stronger and I worry Jeanine will pull me back into the lab at any given moment.

I worry because my plan might fail before I have even had the chance to execute it.

And that just won't work. It will not.