The fact that Tris had still been walking and talking at all by the time she reached David was impossible, but there it was. She could feel that heaviness, like death tugging at her, but somehow, she fought it off even as she talked to David. Stalling, she was stalling. She was trying to distract him as she backed toward the box that would release the memory serum. Finally, she was close enough and she turned.
David's gun went off. Once, twice, how many times? Tris' body was both numb and filled with so much pain she could barely breathe. There were dark sparkles dancing in her vision and she felt herself start to fall. It was only by chance that she managed to hit the right button on her way down to the floor. As she landed, Tris became vaguely aware of a dampness on her neck. It's dark, warm, sticky. Blood, she thought vaguely.
When she saw her mother appear from behind David, Tris knew she had to be imagining things. "Am I done, yet?" she asked anyway. Even then, she was worrying about her friends, about Tobias and Caleb, but Tris was tired and as her mother nodded and assured her they would be fine, she finally let herself close her eyes. Maybe she would just rest for a minute.
When Tris opened her eyes again, her surroundings had changed. The pain was gone and so was the blood. She was in a nondescript room with no memory of how she'd gotten there. A figure blinked into existence and she stared at it in surprise. Was this a sim? It didn't feel like one to her.
"What- how did I get here?" she asked once she found her voice. The figure in front of her gave her an explanation that she didn't think she believed before depositing her on a beach, in a place called Tortuga.
Jumping onto the network, she'd been even more convinced that this couldn't be real when she saw Uriah - or someone who looked like him. That couldn't be real. He was in a coma, he was never going to wake up. She'd made her way to the room they'd assigned her, anyway, trying the whole way to snap out of what had to be some kind of simulation or dream. It felt real, but it couldn't be.
Then she walked into the room and there he was, standing there and looking just like he had before the explosion. "Uri?" she asked in a small voice, staring, almost starting to give into the idea that this was real because Uriah had been one of her best friends, one of the only ones she'd had left, and she desperately wanted to believe he could really be okay again.