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"I want to talk about si else--your o after the factionless next Obviously she rong--and I’m not sure why It’s not like the Candor are battle ready or anything--"
"Well, think about it," he says "Think it through, like the Erudite"
I give him a look
"What?" he says "If you can’t, the rest of us have no hope"
"Fine," I say "Umit had to be because Dauntless and Candor were the ets Becausethe factionless are in multiple places, whereas we’re all in the saht," he says "Also, when Jeanine attacked Abnegation, she got all the Abnegation data My ation had docuent populations, which means that after the attack, Jeaninethe factionless is higher than aet"
"All right Then tell ht?"
"Two," he says, nodding "The transmitter and the liquid that induces the simulation The transmitter communicates information to the brain from the computer, and vice versa, and the liquid alters the brain to put it in a simulation state"
I nod "And the transht? What happens to it after that?"
"It dissolves," he says "As far as I know, the Erudite haven’t been able to develop a transh the attack sier than any simulation I’ve seen before"
The words "as far as I know" stick inthe seruent, she’s probably still obsessed with creating y
"What’s this about, Tris?" he says
"Have you seen this yet?" I say, pointing at the bandage covering my shoulder
"Not up close," he says "Uriah and I were hauling wounded Erudite up to the fourth floor all e, revealing the puncture wound--no longer bleeding, thankfully--and the patch of blue dye that doesn’t see Then I reach into my pocket and take out the needle that was buried into kill us They were shooting us with these," I say
His hand touches the dyed skin around the puncture wound I didn’t notice it before because it was happening right in front ofinitiation He’s let his facial hair grow in a little, and his hair is longer than I’ve ever seen it--dense enough to show me that it is brown, not black
He takes the needle from me and taps the metal disc at the end of it "This is probably hollow It must have contained whatever that blue stuff in your arm is What happened after you were shot?"
"They tossed these gas-spewing cylinders into the room, and everyone went unconscious That is, everyone but Uriah and ent"
Tobias doesn’t seem surprised I narrow ent?"
He shrugs "Of course I ran his simulations, too"
"And you never told erous infors is he going to keep from me?--and try to stifle it Of course he couldn’t tellUriah’s privacy It makes sense
I clear my throat "You saved our lives, you know," I say "Eric was trying to hunt us down"
"I think we’re past keeping track of who has saved whose life" He looks atseconds
"Anyway," I say to break the silence "After we figured out that everyone was asleep, Uriah ran upstairs to warn the people ere up there, and I went to the second floor to figure out as going on Eric had all the Divergent by the elevators, and he was trying to figure out which of us he was going to take back with him He said he was allowed to take two I don’t knohy he was going to take any"
"Odd," he says
"Any ideas?"
"My guess is that the needle injected you with a transas was an aerosol version of the liquid that alters the brain But why" A crease appears between his eyebrows "Oh She put everyone to sleep to find out who the Divergent were"
"You think that’s the only reason for shooting us with transmitters?"
He shakes his head, and his eyes lock on mine Their blue is so dark and familiar that I feel like it could shole For a moment I wish it would, so that I could escape this place and all that has happened
"I think you’ve already figured it out," he says, "but you wantto"
"They’ve developed a long-lasting transmitter," I say
He nods
"So noe’re all wired for multiple simulations," I add "As ain
My next breath shakes on the way out of my mouth "This is really bad, Tobias"
In the hallway outside the interrogation rooainst the wall
"So you attacked Eric," he says "Was that during the invasion? Or when you were by the elevators?"
"By the elevators," I say
"One thing I don’t understand," he says "You were downstairs You could have just run away But instead, you decided to dive into a crowd of ar to bet you weren’t carrying a gun"
I press ether
"Is that true?" he deun?" I scowl
"You haven’t been able to touch a gun since the attack," he says "I understand ith the whole Will thing, but--"
"That has nothing to do with it"
"No?" He lifts his eyebrows
"I did what I had to do"
"Yeah But now you should be done," he says, pulling away froh for all the space I want to keep between us "You should have stayed with the Amity You should have stayed far away from all of this"
"No, I shouldn’t have," I say "You think you knohat’s best forcrazy with the Aain"
"Which is odd, considering you are acting like a psychopath," he says "It’s not brave, choosing the position you were in yesterday It’s beyond stupid--it’s suicidal Don’t you have any regard for your own life?"
"Of course I do!" I retort "I was trying to do so useful!"
For a few seconds he just stares at me