Danger is Near

Chapter 11

I found it hard to sleep.

I had really scary dreams. Which was unusual. Most of them were about not fitting in here at Dauntless and some were about being caught as a Divergent.

I lay there in the darkness. I could hear light snores coming from all around me. I was so glad no one was a really big snorer here. I looked around the room, trying to find a clock of some sort. I could see a bright light coming from Al's hand. He's watch! I remembered. I got as close to it as I could and I could just make out what time it was. 4:30.

I fell into slumber, again.

I was then awoken by a loud clanging noise. I looked up towards the grated steel staircase. A little bit of light was peering through the door. Someone was banging a steel pole against the hand rails of the staircase. It was extremely irritating. It was Four. Of course. I thought to myself.

After he banged the pole on the railing about a million times he stopped and spoke up.

"Everyone down in the Training Arena in 15".

Everyone groaned, slowly rising from their beds, like zombies.

I tried to get ready real quick. I also tried to hurry the girls along.

"Seriously! What's the rush Eliza!?" Matisse questioned angrily. She isn't a morning person.

I didn't want to mention what happened between Four and myself last night so I just said that we couldn't be late again after yesterday.

I put on my black skins, black socks over the top and my black runners. Then I put on my black singlet and the Dauntless jacket. I'd be pretty much ready if my hair wasn't being an absolute bitch.

After playing around with it for a while in front of the bathroom mirrors, I ended up just putting it in a high ponytail. "Whatever" I murmured.

As I was looking into the mirror I noticed three girls behind me putting on makeup. Crap that's what I forgot to get.

Amy, Matisse, Jem and Tris walked up to me and joined me in the mirror. We were are all just primping ourselves as much as we could.

"You know what we forgot?" I said to them.

They all looked at me, waiting for an answer.

I looked at each of them through the mirror and flicked my eyes towards the three girls putting on makeup.

"I knew we were forgetting something really important!" Amy said, as if she had finally remembered something that she had forgotten for so long.

Tris was looking at us strangely.

"You wouldn't understand" I said.

"Well, yeah. I may not have worn any makeup back in Abnegation but I also don't see the point of wearing it here..." she remarked.

Jem agreed with Tris. "She's got a point. There's no need to wear makeup here at Dauntless".

Amy and I glanced at each other and shrugged. We always loved wearing our makeup. We mostly just wore mascara though.

Once I was done in front of the mirror I made my way towards the door. I spotted someone with a watch and asked them what the time was.

"It's 6:45" they informed me.

"Ugh. Is he for real? Training at 6:45 in the morning!?" I argued.

The girl agreed with me.

'What's your name?" she asked me.

"Eliza. What about you?" I answered and then questioned her.

"Meg" she replied sweetly. She didn't look like she belonged here. Her hair was blonde and she had it in two pigtails, and her voice seemed too soft and high-pitched. I could imagine her in Erudite or Amity.

A few other people approached us and I quickly realised they were her friends. Meg began to walk off with them. I didn't care though. I was just happy because it looked like I would actually be on time for once.

I followed Megs group to the Training Arena. Just before we got there Amy and Matisse came running into me.

"Hey, hey, hey! Where are you heading off to?" Matisse playfully mucked around.

They were breathing pretty heavily. They must've run pretty far just to catch up with me. I smiled at the thought.

As the three of us entered the Training Arena we noticed we were safely on time. The only people already present was Meg's group, Peter and a few other tough looking people I hadn't met yet. Peter seemed to have though.

Four was just sitting on one of the mats tying up his shoelaces.

He looked up, noticing the three of us. He then finished tying up his shoelaces and stood up, walking towards us.

"Well done, you made it" he said as he walked past us grabbing a few things.

"Yay" I said with a hint of sarcasm. He didn't seem to care, so that was good.

I mean the people here at Dauntless are really criticising and condemning.

We waited around for another two minutes before everyone arrived.

No one was late.

Four waited for us to stop talking before he began. It was almost seven o'clock. In the morning! Usually I would still be in bed.

Only once everything was silent did he begin talking.

"Welcome to your first training session" he paused for a little. "During these training sessions you will be assessed. And then ranked at the end of each day. This will show you where you are ranked." he said as he walked us over to a glass information panel. No one's names were up on it yet. But there were thirty positions marked on it. The top twenty five positions were coloured in grey. The bottom five were coloured in red. There was also a red line that separated these two sections. I guess this was what Eric was talking about yesterday. "... the lowest ranking initiates will be leaving us". I recalled him saying.

"If you are below the red line you are not 'safe'," he paused yet again, "your name is in red... you're not 'safe'".

We all exchanged looks.

"Do you understand?" he then asked firmly.

"Yes" some of us replied.