Summary: Chapter 28

Shaken by her failure, Tris wants to go home but knows she can’t. Instead, ignoring the rule against leaving without supervision, she visits Caleb at the Erudite compound. She finds him in the central library, and they go to a nearby park to talk privately. Caleb reveals that the Erudite seem to be planning something terrible, but he’s conflicted about whom to trust. Tris sees his hesitation as a betrayal of Abnegation and angrily turns to go, but first, she tells Caleb their mother wants him to research the simulation serum.

Before she can leave, two Erudite men approach and tell her to come with them. They take her to headquarters to see Jeanine, the Erudite leader. When Jeanine speaks, Tris realizes her voice is the one from the aptitude test. She was also the woman Tris heard talking with Eric in the hallway before Peter, Drew, and Al attacked her. Jeanine asks Tris probing questions about her missing test results, and Tris tells a series of lies to avoid revealing she’s Divergent.

Back at the Dauntless compound, Eric confronts Tris and threatens to punish her and her friends. Tobias appears, and they pretend Tris ran away out of embarrassment after Tobias rejected her romantically. After Eric departs, Tobias explains he yelled at Tris to avoid showing favoritism. She understands and agrees to meet him later that night. Back at the dorm, Christina reveals she kissed Will. Tris decides not to tell her about kissing Tobias, though she’d like to. Late that night, Tris and Tobias hop a train into the city and kiss passionately along the way. When they arrive, Tobias shows her that the Erudite compound’s lights are on, violating the rules. He says that before training started, he discovered computer files detailing Erudite’s plans for war against Abnegation. Tris realizes Erudite must need the Dauntless as soldiers, but she doesn’t know how they plan to take control.

Summary: Chapter 29

On initiation day, the Dauntless compound is raucous and rowdy, and many people are drunk by noon. After taking her lunch back to the dorm, Tris realizes she’s chosen traditional Abnegation foods and wonders if she picked the wrong faction. She falls asleep and is woken up by Christina. Together, they walk to the Pit for initiation. Each initiate is timed as they go through their fear landscape in front of a judging panel. Meanwhile, the other initiates watch their reactions, including their heart rates, on large screens, and cheer as each person finishes. The transfers are tested in reverse order of their rankings, so Tris must wait until last. When her name is called, she walks to the front of the room, and Eric injects her with an orange liquid.

Summary: Chapter 30

Tris remembers Tobias’s observation that the final initiation stage is about mental preparation. She realizes that her first fear scenario isn’t really about a giant flock of birds: it’s about losing control. As the crows approach, instead of hitting them with her hands, she imagines feeling powerful. She recalls the feeling of holding a gun, and a gun appears in the grass. She shoots the birds and the scene fades. Next, she finds herself enclosed in a glass box. Her attempt to break the glass with her hand fails, so she imagines the glass is made of ice, and it shatters with her next blow. Next she escapes drowning, and avoids being burned at the stake by summoning a rainstorm. She remains calm when threatened with capture by mangled bodies. Then she confronts her fear of sex, telling Tobias she won’t sleep with him in a hallucination. Lastly, an apparition of Jeanine points a gun at Tris and orders her to kill her entire family. Remembering that selflessness can be brave, Tris drops her gun and offers her own life instead.

Analysis: Chapters 28 – 30

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