Chapter 65 - Don't Know Anything

— Tobias

"What are you doing now?" I emerge from the bedroom when I see a light on in the kitchen.

It's almost two in the morning.

I take back what I said when I see her shirt pulled awkwardly and One's little legs moving around.

"I have it all wrong," she shakes her head scribbling on the notepad in front of her.

.
"I've heard of that before... the butterfly effect," Caleb takes his nephew in his arms, brushing his little blonde curls. "It's a reference to chaos theory."

"The theory that a flapping of a butterfly's wings in one location can create a disaster halfway around the world." Cars says as if she is reading from a textbook.

But she's not.
Of course two Erudite would know exactly what this theory is.

They were coming over today to visit anyways, because Will and Christina come home tomorrow, but Tris urged them to help her think through this new information she has remembered.

"Oxycodone. Tris, we give that to people at Erudite Medical who are in grave pain— which I mean you were too. Were they trying to help ease your pain maybe, even though I doubt that was the goal...?" Cara's face converts similarly to her husband.

All Erudite are the same in some ways.

"It was manipulated though," Tris goes on to explain the exposure to elements resulting into issues within the body.

"Tris, I get your reference to the butterfly theory with the killing of the New York Ambassador," Caleb's green eyes look deep at her before shifting to mine. "But the Oxycodone doesn't sound like it works with the butterfly effect." He says and Cara nods. "It just sounds like simple cause and effect, geared around a specific manipulated drug."

.

"It's not simple cause and effect," she shows her scratch work to me, pointing with the pencil. "It is the butterfly effect, I just didn't know how, but it is!"

"Show me." I sit and she begins.

"It's not guaranteed, each step of the effect from the drug. I mean, if my heart were to of stopped before I even was exposed to light, I wouldn't have been blind before I "died", obviously."

I nod and yawn.
It's really early in the morning.

"There is no specific way that the drug works. Derrick did tell me this when I was first given it. If I were to of never left the building, I would have just had the wear down of my reflexes from the Oxycodone, and that would have been it most likely."

I think back to how she wasn't able to catch a ball when she was in rehab, or catch herself when she was falling.

The Oxycodone addiction caused that, and yet, none of us knew she was dealing with withdraw.

I set my hand on her knee as she continues.
"It's a theory, but I think I was in the early stages of whatever testing this drug was. I never lost my hearing, Tobias, and this wouldn't have been some kind of decibel that couldn't be reached for me too loose my hearing. The drug I was given was faulty."

"I'm not seeing butterfly effect though."

"It's all psychological," she looks at me and I see the gears turning in her head. "Loosing senses one by one, it was meant for a massive butterfly effect psychologically."

"Which it did do..." I feel a light turn on in my head.

"I wouldn't have been even close to twice as paranoid as I ended up if I could've seen."

"And then if you lost your hearing,"

"Or my sense of touch."

"But your heart did stop, three times, I think," I comment. "You didn't die."

"Because I had gotten lucky. If I had been more crippled from the effect, there would have been more stress on my heart, and there would've been more of a chance that I would've died."

I sigh.

"What?" She hears my sigh and seems upset with me.

"It's so twisted. I'm not sighing at you, I'm sighing at this," I hit her notebook lightly with lines drawing every possible outcome of this drug.

Most of the chances equal death.

"It's so disgusting." I say and I see her nod.

We sit together, Thomas finishing and coming out from under Tris's shirt. She holds him close, as if someone other than me might take him.

"I worry," she starts. "I mean, I was addicted to this drug. I know it was, what, six years ago, but if any of this carried over to him." She presses her lips lightly to his tiny head, and I see her inhale, keeping her lips where they are.

"There's probably tests they could do..."

"But I don't want to put him through that." She says and I nod, agreeing.

"I mean, you were fine when you were pregnant with him," I think back to when her anxiety was off the wall. That's normal though. "I would think that for any of this to effect him, you would have to of been, well, on the drug while carrying him."

"It's a manipulated form though, Tobias."

"But the 'heart stopping after five years' thing was just a hoax for the attack, Tris. We don't know that it was in your system for more than your time in Erudite."

"That's the thing," her eyes look up at mine from where they formally were on our boy. "We don't know anything."

"Is everything alright?" I hear a small voice and jump.
I forgot Rose was still staying here.

"Yeah," Tris smiles at her. "Sorry that we woke you." She apologizes and Rose nods helping herself to a glass of water.

Thank god Caleb and Cara decided to go home and not stay the night. Will and Chris ended up extending their honeymoon, so they're not going to be home for another week and a half— during visiting week at the earliest.

Rose was released from the infirmary yesterday, and she is staying for us as long as she needs, according to Tris.

"Good night," she says, her voice still small.

"Night," Tris and I say at the same time.

I don't know if it was her assault four days ago, or if it is just the disturbing fact that Christina has a sister who isn't as annoying as she is.

+ + +

—Tris

"What happened?" I hear Christina gush when she sees her sister. I turn quickly in a panic and see her holding her checks in both her hands.

"Julia and I were joking around," she refers to someone that Chris seems to know. "Her elbow got me."

Why, Rose?
You promised you would tell her.

"Welcome home!" I hug Will, smiling.

"When was that?" I hear Chris interrogate her sister.
"Three weeks ago, when you left."
I can feel the look that Chris gives her.
I know the look.
The 'Christina interrogative stare.'

I try to save Rose, going over and greeting Chris with a hug. She seems to forget about her sister, to my relief, as she starts telling me how she can't wait to show me pictures and such.

Great.

The next few days I find myself busy tucked in my office.

Visiting week started yesterday, and I'm behind my whole schedule this time.

There's a knock on my door and I look up to see Kaylee standing there.
She's never been fond of me.
And I can say the same about me to her.

"Yeah?" I look up and see her usual snarky face, always looking like she just smelt something bad.

"What are you up to?" She says skeptically, eying me.

"Papers for the ambassador meeting on Wednesday." I hold them up to her line of vision.

I find myself relieved that Tobias is home with Tom today. His travel crib is empty when Kaylee looks in it, and I don't know how I would've reacted if he was in there.

"No shit," she returns her gaze to me. "I don't mean that, I mean you."

"Could you speak English for two seconds?" I exaggerate.
What does this woman want?

"If you're here to get us all killed, just leave me out of it." She spits, dropping a newspaper on the ground before she leaves.

—Male, 34 convinced of the sexual assault of an 18 year-old Dauntless female. Sentenced to death or banishment from the city. Page 3.—

I close my office door, hearing a scoff from I assume Kaylee down the hall, and scramble to find page three.

—Phillip Lee, 34, was walking around telling people that he was mourning the death of his mother for a week before he decided to release his act and assault the eighteen year old that he had been seeing- her name not to be released to the press. The man's mother is not only alive, but refuses to accept that her son did this. She also is looking for revenge on the woman who attacked him at the scene who was not the victim, the woman who saved said victim's life and slashed Lee's throat. No charges have been pressed to the victim or Tris Eaton, the woman who was walking by and stopped Lee, and the Mrs. Lee has also been taken into custody because of threats she's making to Eaton.—

I run my hand through my hair and sigh. I jump when my phone rings, and I see that it is Amar.

"Hey." I try to sound un-phased when I answer the phone.

"Can you come down to the panel at the pit. I know you love telling people off, and there's some assholes tearing apart these new ambassadors."

I smile.
He knows me so well.

"Of course!" I say in my fakest sweet tone which earns me a laugh from him. "I'll be there in five."

I tuck the paper in my desk and lock my office door shut.

Why did I ever release my name to the press?
Did I need the credit for being able to take down an opponent so drastically different from myself that badly?