Determinant: One choice will change everything

Chapter 42: Tobias - Selflessness

Chapter 42: Tobias – Selflessness

There's a period of close to an hour while Peter and Amar are both in surgery. My first instinct is to go looking for Tris, since I'm desperate to make sure she's safe. But Cara convinces me that that will only delay things, and I reluctantly have to admit she's right. If Christina and Uriah have found Tris, she's likely to be on her way here already, and if I leave, she won't know where I am.

Still, that doesn't make it easy to wait, particularly with the images that keep filling my mind. I don't know which ones are worse – the real memories from the last few hours or the snatches that keep appearing from my fear landscape. Between them, they seem to cover all possible variations of how Tris could be injured or dead.

But I keep functioning despite those thoughts. I've spent years ignoring my fears, after all, so I do what I've always done – I build up the walls inside myself and grit my teeth and find a way to deal.

It's somewhat of a relief when they tell us we can visit Peter. Cara declines, choosing to wait for Amar to be ready for the brain scans, but I need a distraction.

"I guess I lived," he says as I enter his room. He lies on the bed, hooked up to almost as many wires and tubes as I needed for the Control Computer. I raise an eyebrow in question. It's an odd thing to say.

"You'd look happier if I died," he explains with a straight face. The words actually cause a smile to quirk at the corner of my mouth.

"No," I answer calmly, "I'm just upset that you're awake. It's harder to steal your cake this way."

He laughs – only slightly, but it still causes him to wince in pain and clutch at his side. "I don't think they've even heard of cake in this country," he wheezes after a moment.

"That's probably true," I admit as I step closer, stopping by the side of the bed and looking at him.

He's young, I realize abruptly. Through all the bizarre interactions we've had since he landed in Dauntless, that somehow never really occurred to me. He's the same age I was as I struggled to fit into my new faction, trying to figure out how to make friends and work a job and be free of my father – all things I had absolutely no idea how to do.

"Don't worry," I add in as kind a tone as I can muster. Maybe it's just a less cruel one. "You'll be able to go home soon, and even with everything my mother may have done to the city, I'm sure there's still cake around somewhere."

One side of his mouth lifts. "I think you're underestimating her," he comments dryly, and this time it's my turn to chuckle.

"It doesn't really matter, anyway," he adds. "I'm going to stick around here." That startles me, and I look at him appraisingly, trying to determine if he's serious.

"Why?" I ask warily.

For a moment, he's silent. When he does answer, his eyes move around, not really focusing. "What is there to go back for?" he asks quietly. "My mom's fine without me, and the factions are destroyed, and my friends are dead. And it's not like I have a job anywhere. I'm going to have to start from scratch, which I might as well do here." He shrugs. "And like I said, the safest place to be is where the Stiff is."

I almost laugh at the idea that we've been safe during any part of this mission, but something in his expression stops me. He looks vulnerable, like a scared kid. It's a sentiment I can certainly relate to, and given everything we've learned about him in the last few days, I find myself actually sympathizing with him – just a little.

"It still seems like you'd have more opportunities in Chicago," I comment evenly. "Or are you expecting Tris to give you a job?"

He shrugs again. "She'd be foolish not to." I raise an incredulous eyebrow, but he continues like this is something he's rehearsed for a while. "Think about it. Everyone else in this country can be brainwashed, and you can bet the people you're overthrowing have some equipment stashed away to do that. They'll try to work their way back into power by 'influencing' key people, and by turning others into assassins."