Prior Rings

Chapter 40: Christina - Memorial

A/N: Thank you to everyone who reviewed the last chapter, and to everyone who has favorited and/or followed this story! Thank you also to my wonderful beta reader, Rosalie. This is a very short chapter to fill you in a bit on Christina and Uriah and on activities in the city.

Chapter 40: Christina – Memorial

The memorial consists of a gray stone wall, shaped like a broken circle, sitting in the middle of a park. It feels like an appropriate symbol for the war that ripped through the heart of our city, tearing our factions and lives apart.

Names are carved on both sides of it, for all those who died in the war – the Abnegation, Candor, and loyal Dauntless on the outside, and the others on the inside. Only the Dauntless and Erudite leaders, and those who were executed for war crimes, are excluded.

It shows the two sides of the Chicago Civil War.

The city council asked Four and Tris to speak today, at the memorial's opening ceremony. They were the logical choices, given the active roles they served throughout the war, but I don't blame them for declining.

Tris lost too much in that struggle to be willing to discuss it in front of a crowd, and Four has the same demons that the rest of us do – those of us who were under the simulation, anyway. We have to live with the memory of what our bodies did without our permission.

I suppose I was relatively lucky in that regard, not that I'd ever use that word for anything related to that horrible day. The program made me herd a group of scared kids into a building, shutting them into a room and guarding them at gunpoint. Sometimes, their terrified faces still haunt my nightmares, but at least I didn't kill anyone.

On the flip side, that's probably why it was so hard for me to believe that Tris really had to shoot Will. I dearly wanted to believe that the simulation couldn't have made me kill an innocent person, and that I would have woken up if it had ordered me to do that. And that in turn made me assume that Will couldn't have done it, either – that he couldn't have posed a serious threat to Tris.

It wasn't until I watched Marlene step off the roof that I knew I was wrong.

My gaze turns to Uriah, watching where he stands next to her name. He runs his fingers lightly over it as tears course down his face. He loves me, and I know it, but he still mourns her the same way I mourn Will. It's impossible not to wonder, sometimes, what our lives would be like if they had lived.

Cara is by her brother's name now, and I wait, giving her time to grieve before I take my turn at that spot. Tris will undoubtedly want the same chance before we leave, though she's currently by her parents' names. I watch as Four rocks her gently back and forth, her face buried against his chest as his chin rests on her head. His eyes are closed, but there's no hiding the guilt that still torments him. I don't know if he's remembering the way he fought her in the Dauntless control room, or is feeling our collective failure to save the Abnegation, but he's obviously not over that day any more than the rest of us are.

Uriah slowly walks toward me, having apparently finished his silent communication with Marlene for now. He gives me a sad half-smile before wrapping his arms around me and leaning into my warmth. I return the embrace tightly.

"You never told me what you did during the simulation," I say quietly against his shoulder. It's not an easy topic, but I grew up believing that it's important to reveal our secrets, and this feels like the time to discuss his. Besides, I have to admit I'm a bit curious. He's Divergent, so he must have been awake, and I don't know if that made everything harder or easier.

He doesn't answer at first – for long enough that I begin to wonder if I've pushed his boundaries too far. But he finally responds, his voice strained.