Divergent Michael Clifford AU

One Shot

Out of all things that didn't seem right in Michael's life one was clear to him, he didn't belong to Erudite and never would.

Michael's family was well known between the factions thanks to his father. In his younger years, Daryl Clifford, had created a semi-automatic riffle with bullets that simulate pain attacking directly to the nervous system making it seem as real as a gun shot, instead of making real harm to the target. Those guns were first used as a control method against the factionless, whenever there was trouble they would put them down for a couple of minutes until the situation totally calmed down, but soon Amity stood against it. "It's an act of cruelty against the human being" they said, and after a long fight to eradicate them and establish peace and kindness, they won, and the guns were dispatched to Dauntless were they became a crucial item in their training.

So when Daryl Clifford's son started dyeing his hair at age fourteen, the word that there was something wrong with the kid began to spread like a flame in gunpowder. Michael, since a child, knew he was different from the rest of his family and every Erudite member. He couldn't use his brain to solve hard problems, he couldn't sit his ass for hours just reading books and working on a computer, he couldn't use his curiosity to create a gun like his dad, he needed something else to satisfy his restless mind. Because he didn't think like the others, his curiosity, his thoughts, his atention always went beyond, just not in an intellectual way. Michael wanted to feel what was it like to shoot a gun, not make it, he wanted to go outside and run and see the world. He wanted freedom. Fight, run, breathe, protect, face his fears, defend those who couldn't defend themselves, he simply wanted to be Dauntless. As he couldn't leave his faction and had to wait until sixteen, he began to express his feelings through the only way he could, he rebelled to his parents and simply dyed his hair bright blonde. He continued with black, blue and an, almost, heart attack to his mom.

When Michael got his aptitude test at the age of sixteen he wasn't nervous at all. Obviously, and to the shock of, well... anyone, his result was, nothing more, nothing less, than Dauntless. That day he ran home laughing all the way through it and in the moment that he got to the living room with the biggest smile on his face his parents knew, that was the last day of their son under their roof and there was nothing they could do to change his mind. The next day, at the Choosing Ceremony, Michael almost tripped when his named got called out and walked up to the five metal bowls that represented the factions. When his blood drop touched the grey stones he felt that everything that was wrong in his life took it's right place, and with a huge grin thought "Everything will be alright now, I'm coming home." Before he left The Hub he catched his parents looking at him leaving, so with a sad smile he waved at them, even tho his eyes were filled with a light brighter than the fire. And that's what he felt when he run to catch the train, fire. This deep, nice, warm taking over his body with every step he made. Nothing ever felt like that, the wind in his white hair, the concrete beneath his feet, the people by his side, running as fast as him. He was finally running to his freedom and he felt nothing but joy.

Even tho life in Dauntless was nothing but easy Michael found his place. He responded to the initation process like a warrior even when he thought that he couldn't keep going, everytime he fell he would stand up again and throw a punch twice stronger, that's how everyone got to know his name. Not because he was Daryl Clifford's son but because of himself, Michael Clifford at his finest. He left his true self emerge and grow. He changed his hair to pink, lilac, even bright green, colors that would never had been accepted in Erudite. Got his body inked, three tattoos on his arms, two on his hands, and a big bird on his back that represented his new freedom and new life, it was his way of saying "This is who I am."

He learned to fight, to be brave and tough, to be fearless and have courage. He became a well known member of the faction, one of the strongest and soon started to ascend in range until he was named instructor of the transfers at the initiations that followed his. Not only he was eighteen and an amazing instructor but a great person who got along with everyone at Dauntless, and there was not a single one person on the faction that hated him. Great skills, big heart and bright hair, that was Michael Clifford.