Last time on Dauntless, a pretty reasonable game where no one is beaten unconscious.

Today on Dauntless, throwing knives! So we’re back to form.

Apparently the first stage of initiation will be over tomorrow, so either her efforts last night made her rank shoot up or she’s going to do something impressive soon. While I like her like of Dauntless, it does mean there’s not much tension – if she was less HELL YES I COULD DIE AT ANY MOMENT I’M SO ALIVE! then I’d consider it possible the story might be about her getting shunted into the factionless cesspool, but she’s Dauntless to the core.

Antag-Eric is cranky today and she summizes it’s over losing the flag thing, even though it seems like the leader doesn’t actually do anything beyond pick kids. I guess losing by not picking the right team might be a valid thing to compete over, but given there appear to be no standards it seems Antag-Eric could’ve told his team what they should do without issue.

The reason he cares so much is Winning capture the flag is a matter of pride, and pride is important to the Dauntless. More important than reason or sense. when if you think about it, pride should be one of the things they try to smother because it can hide cowardice and isn’t bravery. If the factions are really devoted to their personality trait ideal and not just getting people’s actions to line up with what they want, they should hate feelings that can substitute for their desired one more than anything else.

Amity, for example, should dislike cowardice as well, because if the only reason you aren’t fighting back is you don’t think you’ll win, you’re not true to their ideals, just as Dauntless should hate those provoked easily to violence because fear of embarrassment is just another kind of fear. Abnegation’s hatred of enjoyment is the only one that fits this – if you’re having fun helping people, you’re making it all about you, you terrible, terrible person. Erudite should be suspicious of memorization, because knowing stuff is important but simply regurgitating it verbatum isn’t knowing anything. (Oh, and Abnegation could put emphasis on just repeating stuff without thinking, since that’s a good technique for imparting moral lessons and keeping people the same, which could get into why the two factions get along so badly.)

Everyone watches Four be an awesome knife thrower, and Erudite Tris returns as she realizes that instead of wildly flinging the knifes as fast as she can and hope one hits, she should go slow. Peter, who is evil, makes fun of her.

“I think the Stiff’s taken too many hits to the head!” remarks Peter

You all have.

Everyone gets the hang of it except Al, so Eric orders him to collect his knives while the rest keep throwing. It’d be nice if the rest of the group came together here – they obviously can’t refuse to throw the knives but they could turn so they’re not facing him. But of course they won’t because the author’s decided half of them are evil. This is one of the many reasons deciding a bunch of characters is evil is a bad idea.

She says Al doesn’t complain normally about orders, presumably because he knows there’s no point, but apparently he’s not a fan of being told to commit suicide, so he refuses.

“Why not?” Eric’s beady eyes fix on Al’s face. “Are you afraid?”
“Of getting stabbed by an airborne knife?” says Al. “Yes, I am!”

Tris helpfully points out that saying yes I am totally scared was the mistake rather than just saying no, because that wasn’t totally obvious. I guess you have to be Erudite qualifying to even have half a brain in this world, because I can’t believe Al walked into this one.

So Antag-Eric orders class to pause and for Al to get in front of a target.

“You’re going to stand there as he throws those knives,” Eric says to Al, “until you learn not to flinch.”
“Is this really necessary?” says Four. He sounds bored, but he doesn’t look bored. His face and body are tense, alert. I squeeze my hands into fists. No matter how casual Four sounds, the question is a challenge. And Four doesn’t often challenge Eric directly.

I guess you can fanwank this into everyone in the world is stupid, so to Tris this is a revelation worth explaining because she barely manages it herself. And it’s YA, so fine, no subtlety.

Anyway Antag-Eric starts hissing about how he’s got the authority, and the fact there are multiple faction leaders continues to go unexplored because it seems like we’re supposed to view him as the bad apple but why can’t they go to any other leader to complain?

So Tris speaks up and says to stop.

“Any idiot can stand in front of a target,” I say. “It doesn’t prove anything except that you’re bullying us. Which, as I recall, is a sign of cowardice.”
“Then it should be easy for you,” Eric says. “If you’re willing to take his place.”

That does not actually follow in any sane way, but she tells us that she actually has no choice because I didn’t leave myself the option except for the part where she was saying that being ordered up there makes him a bully and standing there doesn’t mean anything. I mean, she’s still got more agency than usual, but the narration quickly reasserts that now she has no choice in the rest of it.

I mean, I’d have her go with it because she recognizes this is about the best compromise she can reasonably expect, and that trying to debate further might lead to Eric deciding that Al should do it anyway because like she said it’s no big deal, or the bigger concern, he’ll think up something worse. I mean, this is a lot better than dangling over the edge for five minutes.

Anyway, she insists to herself that it’ll be fine because Four knows what he’s doing.

“If you flinch,” Four says, slowly, carefully, “Al takes your place. Understand?”

I don’t see how that’s productive. Eric would probably demand Four reload on knives, so the next total of knife throws to survive increases.

As he throws Four tries to goad her into giving up for no clear reason. Maybe he’s hoping pissing her off is a good distraction. But then he deliberately nicks her ear with the last one for whatever reason. But Eric’s pleased, so maybe it’s because Eric only leaves when there’s blood.

And Eric seems to actually like her now and says he’ll keep an eye on her in a not obviously malicious way, so she freaks out about what if he knows she’s divergent,
because the book needs to keep reminding everyone that supposedly that matters.

When the rest leave, she yells at Four for deliberately hitting her ear and being a jerk, while he’s all goddamn why are you so stupid.

He glares at me, and even when he glares, his eyes look thoughtful. Their shade of blue is peculiar, so dark it is almost black, with a small patch of lighter blue on the left iris, right next to the corner of his eye.
“Catch on? Catch on to what? That you wanted to prove to Eric how tough you are? That you’re sadistic, just like he is?”

Which flips him to creepy cold rage guy who says he could have hurt her if he wanted to, which in fairness is actually a reasonable point here and not just a threat, and then he stabs the table really hard. So definitely rage issues, but so far they’re under control. But that’s very much a damned with faint praise situation, because if he’s stabbing tables to redirect aggression over something this minor, I don’t think it’d take much to push him into actual violence.

But in more positive news Tris doesn’t give a fuck and tries to keep the argument going, but he’s done and leaves.

And with that unlucky thirteen passes by and we’re on the fourteen, which is about Visiting Day!

I think of Visiting Day like I think of the world ending: Nothing after it matters. Everything I do builds up to it.

Except for the part where nothing you do has anything to do with if your parents show up.

As she tries to get dressed she finds out her clothes don’t fit because she’s too muscular. She’s apparently been wearing some very tight pants, despite the fact those would limit mobility and be harder to put on when she’s all bruised.

Also, given the speed of this, I bet they’re spiking the food with steroids.

Tris literally can’t get the pants on so she has to leave the bathroom and covers herself with a towel rather than putting on pajamas or whatever she was wearing just fine before now, because who could have thought that walking around in a towel after you’ve made it clear to the evil kids that this is a big issue you have would work out badly?

“Didn’t realize you were so skinny, Stiff.”
“Get away from me.” My voice is somehow steady.
“This isn’t the Hub, you know. No one has to follow a Stiff’s orders here.” His eyes travel down my body, not in the greedy way that a man looks at a woman, but cruelly, scrutinizing every flaw.

Which I guess is worse, because better rape than being thought ugly?

What I find more interesting here is the bit about having to follow her orders normally. It seems that Abnegation is actually extremely powerful and Tris just didn’t experience it personally. This isn’t part of the Erudite feud, because he’s Candor. Apparently resentment at Abnegation is quite widespread and that makes the bullying different – maybe they aren’t going after her because she’s weak but because her group bullies them and they’re jumping at the chance to bully them in return.

We know there is no don’t-bully faction. The Dauntless don’t give a fuck, Amity just wants whatever causes the least friction and that often boils down to accepting bullying, and Erudite culture is something that led to them bullying Abnegation at random. Meanwhile individual Abnegation kids don’t seem to have any power but their faction can fuck over any other entire faction and they think everyone else wants power and has to be kept from it at all costs. That leaves only Candor to have any issue with it, and as the only faction that prides arguing and being true to yourself, they may be the closest thing to it.

Obviously Peter’s just evil because we’ve been told he is, but if we ignore that, it seems like this would be a natural result of the faction tensions. It’s not fair that Tris be blamed for everything Abnegation does, but no one even knows how other factions work, so it’s unlikely anyone else understands that.

But anyway, the other two come over to continue the threats and she tries to run and loses her towel.

I run as fast as I can toward the door, holding the dress against my body to hide it. I sprint down the hallway and into the bathroom and lean against the door, breathing hard. I close my eyes.
It doesn’t matter. I don’t care.
A sob bursts from my mouth, and I slap my hand over my lips to contain it. It doesn’t matter what they saw. I shake my head like the motion is supposed to make it true.

Here’s where it gets odd – she doesn’t think this is cowardice. She doesn’t think she’s failing to live up to her faction. Instead:

Once I’m dressed and the urge to cry is gone, I feel something hot and violent writhing in my stomach. I want to hurt them.
I stare at my eyes in the mirror. I want to, so I will.

She just decides to do what her new faction has taught her.

Although Tris explains a lot of the obvious, she doesn’t seem too self-reflective.

Anyway, she rushes out to get another set of clothes that she can actually fight in, then heads over to hope that she’ll get to fight Peter.

The name written next to mine is Molly. Not Peter, but good enough.

Is this supposed to be showing there’s no real righteousness behind her rage and she’ll just take anything she can punch? Molly was participating, but all she did was say Tris had a scrawny body, which is nothing compared to how she deliberately brutalized Christina. Peter at least was the ringleader of what happened to Tris.

Edward and Peter take longer. Though they are the two best fighters, the disparity between them is noticeable. Edward’s fist slams into Peter’s jaw, and I remember what Will said about him—that he has been studying combat since he was ten.

I don’t remember this, so I’m not sure if this is the first time it’s been brought up. It’s odd too, it’s the only sign we’ve seen of kids acting out of faction to get ready for their preferred one.

By the time the three matches are done, my nails are bitten to the beds

And shouldn’t this be a sign of cowardice? It’s like all they care about is if you’re punching someone.

Tris says she’s calmed down but deliberately fans her rage again.

Cue another fight where Tris ducks and dodges while Molly makes frustrated animal sounds.

My mother and father would not approve of my kicking someone when she’s down.
I don’t care.
She curls into a ball to protect her side, and I kick again, this time hitting her in the stomach. Like a child. I kick again, this time hitting her in the face. Blood springs from her nose and spreads over her face. Look at her. Another kick hits her in the chest.
I pull my foot back again, but Four’s hands clamp around my arms, and he pulls me away from her with irresistible force. I breathe through gritted teeth, staring at Molly’s blood-covered face, the color deep and rich and beautiful, in a way.
She groans, and I hear a gurgling in her throat, watch blood trickle from her lips.
“You won,” Four mutters. “Stop.”
I wipe the sweat from my forehead. He stares at me. His eyes are too wide; they look alarmed.
“I think you should leave,” he says. “Take a walk.”
“I’m fine,” I say. “I’m fine now,” I say again, this time for myself.
I wish I could say I felt guilty for what I did.
I don’t.

So pretty sure this whole sequence was in fact bad, which in turn is good. This is a far cry from the opening chapters where Tris’ flaws were being clumsy and not paying attention to her surroundings enough to find opportunities to be selfless.

Chapter fifteen is then the visiting day itself. She’s getting dressed and says she no longer cares about being seen as long as it’s not the evil three kids.

Everyone else dresses in silence. Not even Christina smiles. We all know that we might go to the Pit floor and search every face and never find one that belongs to us.

Oh, so it’s not that one of the kids they’d marked as not-evil just went nuts.

Antag-Eric comes in to make fun of the idea their parents would visit them, and explain that if their parents do show up and they look happy it’ll prove they’re not really committed to Dauntless and FACTION BEFORE BLOOD.

“I may have underestimated you, Stiff,” he says. “You did well yesterday.”
I stare up at him. For the first time since I beat Molly, guilt pinches my gut.
If Eric thinks I did something right, I must have done it wrong.

Well, that works.

She fusses with her appearance a minute then decides that it doesn’t matter because it’s how her faction is.

She’s pleased to see Drew and Molly’s families have disowned them, but unfortunately Peter’s hasn’t. That’s actually a lot sadder than she realizes – from how Christina put it, Peter’s the one who decides stuff, so they may not have jumped factions if it wasn’t for him, yet they’re the ones losing their families over it.

Do they know what kind of person their son is?

Almost certainly given they’re the only ones of his group supportive of a Dauntless son. Plus Christina’s story of him lying to blame other kids for a fight sounds like something that would’ve been his family’s responsibility.

But enough about other people, Tris’ mom is there.

“Tell me how you are.”
“You first.” The old habits are back. I should let her speak first. I shouldn’t let the conversation stay focused on me for too long. I should make sure she doesn’t need anything.
“Today is a special occasion,” she says. “I came to see you, so let’s talk mostly about you. It is my gift to you.”

The real gift is the subtle hint that Tris shouldn’t act Abnegation, presumably.

The faction system really doesn’t work right, does it? It’d make a lot more sense to say that people got together, agreed that there were five basic flaws in people, and then had everyone decide which one they wanted to focus on avoiding. Right now, with each faction believing only theirs matters, they should be constantly trying to insinuate their beliefs into other factions and take them over. Of course, going the other way would probably lead to something about one day someone would come who mastered all five flaws and became the messiah, but Tris will probably end up doing something like that no matter what.

Tris asks if her dad is visiting her brother (oddly, the issue of if her parents would spurn one but not the other has never featured in all her thinking about this) and her mom says no, her dad’s just busy, and by busy she means selfish, and Tris is amazed by the idea her mom would accuse her dad of this.

Apparently visiting day is pretty long and her mom could visit the both of them, except that Erudite has fired the first shot in the faction war:

the Erudite have prohibited Abnegation visitors from entering their compound.

So Erudite also presumably has their own laws and police force since they just casually banned their government from coming in. Also, this means that for all anyone knows they just kill any Abnegation transfers. Who would know? There doesn’t appear to be any oversight at all here.

Standing alone at the railing is Four. Though he’s not an initiate anymore, most of the Dauntless use this day to come together with their families. Either his family doesn’t like to come together, or he wasn’t originally Dauntless.

You already knew this because he said he was with Eric the Evil Erudite Transfer.

It would be interesting if he was Marcus’ kid but the real story was that he was the violent one and that’s why Abnegation isn’t responding to the Erudite stuff, they’re trying to protect him. Although Tris said that leaving is considered a huge betrayal, it also appears they’d be willing to take her back and that the community in general still mourn the loss of their kids years later, so in Abnegation, it seems there isn’t much of a division between faction and blood. It’d also be the one positive thing we’ve seen out of people that otherwise hate all other factions.

“There’s one of my instructors.” I lean closer to her and say, “He’s kind of intimidating.”
“He’s handsome,” she says.

He’s got temper issues, Tris’ mom.

Anyway, they meet. We learn that her mom’s name is Natalie and she holds out a hand to shake.

The gesture looks unnatural for both of them. No, Four was not originally Dauntless if he doesn’t shake hands easily.

But Abnegation isn’t supposed to shake hands at all. We know you use your own faction method of greeting when greeting someone because Tris’ one sane friend who ran to Amity hugged her rather than bowing.

And we go on to confirm Four is totally a nuckname and what could his real name and faction be?????? Subtle, book.

It’s a shame we know Eric’s Erudite because it means he’s not an option as Marcus’ kid, and we haven’t met anyone else in the age range.

Four is all business, anyway, telling her mom that she’s been doing well at initiation. Tris bristles because that is what she does with her time and starts agonizing over does he really mean it?

Then her mom says Four looks familiar and he shows he is a proper love interest by bristling up too!

“I don’t make a habit of associating with the Abnegation.”
My mother laughs. She has a light laugh, half air and half sound. “Few people do, these days. I don’t take it personally.”

That’s really, really bad. Not getting along with Abnegation would probably be a worry if they were just one of five equal factions, but when everyone hates their govenrnment to the point they won’t stand near them, you’re minutes from a revolution.

Tris spares a moment to wonder if Four hates them because he’s Erudite or because he believes the stupid Erudite lies, because obviously the fact Abnegation is the most powerful faction and hates everyone else can’t be an issue. Why isn’t Amity an option? I can buy that Amity would hate the Abnegation if they’re about happiness from kindness and Abnegation is about misery from kindness.

But it was kind of him to tell her that I’m doing well when I know he doesn’t believe it.

Can we liven this subplot up a bit, though? Maybe she could think that he means doing well for an Abnegation, who everyone keeps insisting are extra unsuited for Dauntless. Or that wow, the rest of the kids must be doing much worse than she thought for him to not consider her the standout failure. Since I know emoing about this is required, she could wonder if Dauntless might make an exception and take fewer than usual since apparently they all suck this year.

Another Candor family comes over to ask if they’ve seen Al, and it turns out no one knows where he is.

Why aren’t there any railings along those paths? Are you all insane?”
I smile a little. A few weeks ago I might have found that question offensive, but now I spend too much time with Candor transfers to be surprised by tactlessness.
“Insane, no,” I say. “Dauntless, yes.

That’s not insulting in the first place and all evidence is that insane and Dauntless mean the same thing.

She then thinks about how her mom isn’t gaping like the rest at their surroundings because Curiosity is foreign to her. as a good Abnegation. Because there’s no problem with the people ruling you not having any interest in anything.

Tris then goes to meet her friend’s family, and it’s fight time! Will’s sister kicks it off first.

Do you know what she is?” She points at my mother. “She’s a council member’s wife is what she is. She runs the ‘volunteer agency’ that supposedly helps the factionless. You think I don’t know that you’re just hoarding goods to distribute to your own faction while we don’t get fresh food for a month, huh? Food for the factionless, my eye.”

So the Erudite really are just making stuff up, it seems.

Not only do we know Abnegation eats nothing but boring stuff, but it can’t just be Tris’ family because Abnegation’s only form of community behavior or fun is dinner dates over different houses. Interestingly, neither of the Candor kids point out Tris didn’t know what hamburgers were, so her mom certainly wasn’t distributing any to her family.

That said, this sort of disruption would fit with my own guess that Abnegation is really concerned about making sure there’s a stockpile of food because their production capacity is finite.

(There’s also the fact the volunteer agency very obviously didn’t hoard any road supplies for Abnegation, although now that we know Abnegation is the government maybe fixing up the center of town benefits them more than anyone else.)

“Mistaken. Ha,” Cara snaps. “I’m sure you’re exactly what you seem. A faction of happy-go-lucky do-gooders without a selfish bone in their bodies. Right.”

This makes me wonder about Amity. They really seem the afterthought in this story, and their important roles of hospitals and farming could both easily go to Abnegation. Maybe they weren’t in the original draft, which is why it’d make any sense to accuse Abnegation of being happy when there’s Amity right there not being all Puritan.

Tris threatens to smash Cara’s face in for saying things to her mom, instead of pointing out that she handed out that food to the factionless and definitely never ate any before coming here, because facts are for Candors and Erudites and Tris is psycho faction instead!

Will tells her no, she says she totally will, her mom literally drags her away while crushing her arm painfully and then starts the new topic of what ranking does she have.

“Ranked?” I say. “You know that I’ve been fighting? You know that I’m ranked?”
“It isn’t top-secret information, how the Dauntless initiation process works.”
I don’t know how easy it is to find out what another faction does during initiation, but I suspect it’s not that easy.

So this insanity is not, presumably, new, and it not supposed to be well known would actually give some plausibility to the argument you just had where someone was claiming Abnegation abuses their power. But this isn’t Tris’ concern. She says she’s near the bottom.

“Good.” She nods. “No one looks too closely at the bottom.

Since you have to be in the top half just to stay in the faction, maybe the ranking mattering actually is new.

Then her mom asks her test results and we find out her tester said she’d mark Abnegation for Tris, so I guess you’re divergent even if you only qualify for two. Tris agonizes a moment then confesses they were “inconclusive”/

“I thought as much.” She sighs. “Many children who are raised Abnegation receive that kind of result. We don’t know why. But you have to be very careful during the next stage of initiation, Beatrice. Stay in the middle of the pack, no matter what you do. Don’t draw attention to yourself. Do you understand?”

Okay, that’s weird. I wonder if this has any connection to why most Abnegation kids don’t leave, they panic and decide to stay where they are. Also, this suggests most kids do tell their parents, since I don’t see how else they’d know.

Her mom says that she just wants her to be safe, so again, she must not know that the current state of affairs is you’ve the top ten or you’re factionless, because middle of the pack is not safe in that case. Also, never say “divergent” out loud, never mind that “inconclusive” seems to have the exact same meaning given Tris doesn’t even say it but her mom knows.

“There’s something I want you to do,” she says. “I can’t go visit your brother, but you can, when initiation is over. So I want you to go find him and tell him to research the simulation serum. Okay? Can you do that for me?”

Hmmmmmmmm…

A faction can’t test their own people, but only one faction makes the weird drink that magically puts you in a simulation. And we have no comment on if Abnegation kids scoring divergent has always been true or started cropping up more recently. If Erudite made it so the test doesn’t test properly for Abnegation, they might be able to undermine or cripple the other faction.

She has been to the compound before. She remembered this hallway. She knows about the initiation process.
My mother was Dauntless.

Uh. Okay. But faction transfers are totally a thing that happens, so…

The worldbuilding continues to have the problem that there’s no context. We know the first transfer in the ceremony was Dauntless and that they kept as many kids as they got, which suggests Dauntless transfer out all the time. Abnegation kids apparently don’t transfer out, but we have no idea how many transfer in – I’d assume not many, but it’s not like anything else makes sense and they are the ones in power, so they have that going for them. Plus apparently a good number of people think they’re getting the lion’s share of everything.

Is it odd for a Dauntless to go Abnegation, or anyone to go Abnegation? Dauntless/Abnegation aren’t even opposing the way Dauntless/Amity are. What’s shocking about her mom being born to them?