Chasing Dauntless (A Divergent OC Fanfic in Dauntless)

Chapter Seven

"Go."

Everybody piled off of the train and ran. I fell into step next to Chase, somehow matching his fast pace. We caught up to our team. Chase pulled out our flag from his pocket and held it up. It was a glowing aqua, about one and a half by two feet. It had nothing on it, it just shined. He stuffed it back into his vest. "Turn off your lights," he commanded. We did. "Is everyone here?" We were. "Okay. Where do we hide the flag? We don't have a lot of time, guys." "

"We can take it somewhere high and hide it."

"No, stay low!"

"An abandoned warehouse or something, definitely."

"Out in the open, with lots of defense."

I looked around, trying to see my surroundings in the dark, "Why not in the tunnel?" I said. Everybody grew quiet. "Easy as hell to guard both sides," I went on. "We can see everybody who goes in and out." Chase looked unsure, but Hannah didn't. "We should do that," she said. I gave her a small smile, but kept my head in the game. We all quickly agreed to do that. "Jess, you and Chase go hide it," somebody called. "Yeah, we'll go find their flag," someone else called. Chase started to shake his head. "We'll need defense-" he started. "We can do that later," I said sharply. "But we need to go now, Chase." He gave a quiet groan and opened his mouth to say something else, but sirens suddenly rang across the dark landscape. The game was on. "Let's go," I hissed. I grabbed Chase's arm and started running. He reluctantly started running, too.

The tunnel didn't really go under anything, it was just a raised tunnel on top of the ground. Chase grew uneasy as we got closer. He finally stopped right at the entrance. I kept walking. "Chase," I said when I noticed he had stopped. I looked over my shoulder. "Chase. Come on." He sighed deeply, and trotted in. He kept whizzing around with his gun. I laughed. "Chill." He let out a flustered breath through his nose, and looked around more as we walked together. I suddenly got it.

"You're afraid of tunnels."

Chase rolled his eyes. "Yeah," he finally said. "Ever since I was a little kid. They always scared the shit out of me." I opened my mouth, about to make fun of him, but stopped: he had just come into a tunnel. It was clearly one of his actual fears, and not something that just mildly creeped him out.

I shrugged. "Everybody's afraid of something," I said casually. Chase nodded, still uneasy. We stopped about three quarters down the length of the tunnel. "We should wait for more people to come be defense" I said. "We should've brought some defense with us," Chase muttered, leaning against the wall, gripping his gun tightly. Even in the darkness, I could see his white knuckles. I cracked a smile. "What, you can't be defense for one minute?" I asked, joking. Chase sighed heavily. "I never like being defense. I like getting stuff done, you know, being the hero. After a good game of anything, who's usually the hero? The person who won the game by getting the points, or the person who just defended the whole time?" I nodded. "I totally agree," I said, leaning against the wall with Chase.

We stayed in silence together for a few minutes, not talking. I knew Chase kept looking over at me out of the corner of his eye.

We heard footsteps in the distance. Chase and I instantly crouched and raised our guns. But a soft blue glow started down the tunnel: teammates. "We're defense," a group of about ten people called. Chase ripped out the flag and threw it on the ground. He jogged the other way out the tunnel. "Thanks," I called, then caught up to Chase.

Once out the other end of the tunnel, Chase shivered. "God, I fucking hate tunnels," he muttered. I smiled sympathetically. "What should we do?" I asked. He shrugged. "I can finally think now that I'm out of that damn tunnel. Well-" I stopped him. "Wait. Chase. Didn't you have to face your fears and stuff in initiation?" He nodded. "Yeah. Actually, you'll have to soon." "Then why are you still so freaked out by tunnels?" I asked. Chase looked at me sideways. "You don't just drop fears like that, Jess," he said.

"Okay. Jess. What should we do?" "Okay. So because you and I are offense, we need their flag. To get their flag, we need to see their flag. To see their flag, we should near it or be-" I looked to my side and smiled. "High up." The water tower was only about a hundred feet away, towering over us. I could see the silhouette of its ladder. Chase stared at me for a moment, then looked where I was. He gave me a curt nod, and we started towards it, jogging low.

I got to the ladder first. The guns fortunately came with straps, so I looped it over my neck and one shoulder. I started quickly climbing. "Shit. Jess, hang on!" Chase's voice came from below me. I stopped, and glanced down. I was already twenty feet up. I held onto the sides of the ladder, leaned back, and smiled, seeing the moonlight through my closed eyes. I felt the ladder move slightly, and knew Chase had started climbing.

About halfway up, around one hundred feet, Chase said, "You afraid of heights?" I laughed lightheartedly. "Of course not-" I started, then realized Chase may be. "Are you?" "No way. I like heights." "Same. I kinda get why people are afraid of heights, but it's not like you're going to trip randomly on nothing and fall to your death." I heard Chase chuckle. "True, true." We kept climbing.

I pulled myself up another bar, and raised my foot. I set it down solidly onto the bar, but as I lifted myself, the bar gave through. I had put all my weight on the foot, and I felt myself fall. I rapidly slid down a few rungs ladder, my hands unable to find a grip. Then, a strong hand wrapped around my waist. I had fallen down and Chase had climbed up. He had wrapped his arm around me and caught me. I was in front of him, my back pressed to his chest. I could feel his pecs, his abs, his strong arm around me, his warm breath going down my neck. I could lightly smell his cologne, too.

"You okay?" he said, still holding me, breathing heavily. After a few seconds, I nodded. "Yeah," I managed. Wordlessly, Chase leaned back and let me climb back up.

Finally, when we reached the top of the water tower, my heart went back to normal.