Pyre

Chapter 6

TRIS POV

Leadership, I have discovered, is overwhelming.

I was elected only a day ago, and I have already acquired a constant migraine from all the work that I am juggling. There are so many things to keep track of: meetings, paperwork, ration plans, housing plans, military plans, hospital needs, weapon distribution. The entire faction has essentially been placed in my lap, and now I have to figure out what to do with it. In any other situation, I would be eased into this with training and time, but we are in a war and, well...

Tori and Mike promised me that although our jobs would overlap, I was mostly in charge of the military. Even then, so much comes with it that I had not even considered before. At first I was glad that I was free of delivering speeches and worrying about the more practical things that make the compound run smoothly, but now the weight of what I am dealing with is intimidating.

When I was celebrating and acting ridiculously hopeful the night I was elected, I was unaware of what the position really meant. I have the burden of strategizing militarily, of potentially sending soldiers to their deaths. In some ways, if I don't make the correct decision, then Dauntless will lose this war.

It was not the same case when Tobias was elected. He had to lead half of the population I am leading, since the other half sided with Erudite. And there were no formalities like paperwork while we were gathered in Candor or Abnegation, and even then he and the other leaders shared leadership with Evelyn. On top of that, they did not face the same problems that we do now, like starving and being low on guns and not having enough gas masks for each and every soldier.

The fact that the faction cast their votes for me—a miserable girl with a mental disorder, who is up to her neck in grief—to lead them in their most important hours is beyond me.

Besides, all I have been able to do successfully so far is argue with Tori. I find myself butting heads with her often because of her ideas that seem to be backtracking us further underground and never on the offensive.

Like now, as we are gathered with representatives from the infirmary, the military, surveillance, and all other branches of Dauntless. We stand around the meeting room table that has maps and lists and all sorts of documents spread out across it haphazardly.

"Food should be our priority right now," I state firmly. "We are not receiving regular shipments anymore, and we are not going to. How long will we even last?"

"We might make it to the end of winter, if we stretch ourselves thin," an advisor says. "We have a decent amount of canned food stored for emergencies."

I raise my eyebrows at Tori, since Mike does not seem to need convincing here. "We have to go on offense, or else we are going to starve to death. It is that simple," I say. "We need to take back Amity and—"

"We just can't risk it," Tori worries with a shake of her head. A gray streak in her hair is highlighted by the light above her. "We don't have the manpower to retake an entire faction, let alone hold them off."

"If we plan it right, that won't matter. Maybe we don't even need to take back the whole faction for some time," I suggest.

But still, she disagrees stubbornly. "There is too much to lose."

And I am tired of this. Mike may have tolerated her policy because he is probably as inexperienced as I am, but I do not believe that I was elected to sit back and let Tori run the show into the ground further.

I snap, "So what are we going to do, hide in here for the rest of our short lives? Almost the entire city is against us now because they take over a new faction every month, and while they cut off our aid from those factions, we cower in a hole. No, Tori, there is not much else to lose at this point. You have been passive for too long—"