Tris’s interrogation is over, and bunches of people surround her to support her and tell her it wasn’t her fault she killed Will, that it was self-defense, ect. Except Christina, who is understandably too upset to process right now.

Notably missing from this scene: mention of all the other people she shot. At least a few of which should have had friends among the Dauntless who are mourning them. Granted, they would have fallen under the same “self defense” banner, but it really highlights the protagonist centered…not even morality, just the protagonist focus that so many books have. She can kill a bunch of people, but literally everyone in the book only cares about the named character. It’s fine for her to care more about Will, really, human brains are kind of fickle that way, but why is everyone else also laser focused in on the one guy who got speaking lines?

Tobias leads her out so they can get some rest.

He finds us two cots at the end of a hallway somewhere.

That’s…very random?

After Tobias goes to sleep, she climbs 18 stories of stairs and in a very guilt-ridden logic feels that’s very right/just/appropriate/good that doing so hurts. She goes back into that interrogation amphitheater and muses about stuff for a while. I wouldn’t really mind this if only we hadn’t spent the last two chapters completely wasting time. This, here, this is a fine time waster. You have to pick and choose your filler, because some of it is necessary (a bare-bones plot is really grating) but too much of it is even worse.

The Candor sing the praises of the truth, but they never tell you how much it costs.

Okay, but why wouldn’t they? What they hell are they talking about if they keep quiet on, you know, the very obvious thing that literally everyone going through the ‘deepest regret’ test already knows about? It’s a fine and dandy subject to bring up, but why not have some Candor sycophants in here to round out the discussion?

Granted, it would take some restructuring of things, but I’m still in favor of whatever cuts out that ridiculous stall of a ‘trial’ so.

Tris climbs up on the roof and looks out over the city and muses about how there’s so many empty buildings out there. Which just makes me wonder why the factionless couldn’t have moved into a couple of them, since we now have (more) confirmation that there’s plenty available.

Tris stands on the roof and has some pretty rough suicidal thoughts, but decides not to jump. I’m really liking Tris’s grief in this book; it’s one of the few things going right. The last book handled emotionality fairly well, too. It’s just a shame that these good bits don’t have a good home to live in.

The next morning she and Tobias argue about how she didn’t tell him the Will thing, and once again Tobias frames it as a trust issue. This…really makes me uncomfortable. On the one hand, I can see someone saying stuff like this. On the other hand, Tris continues the conversation as if it’s a reasonable argument, instead of extremely self-centered and manipulative. As if ‘trust’ is really what’s at issue, and as if Tobias actually gets to act like the hurt party here, and as if the fact that it happened like a week ago and they’ve been chased the whole time isn’t a factor. As if Tris doesn’t have a right to grieve and come to terms before she tells someone, or as if Tobias just needs to know about it more than, say, Will’s family or any authorities.

Instead, Tris brings up the fact that Tobias keeps things from her as well (which, well, is also a valid point, but kind of missing the bigger emotional manipulation thing!).

“You didn’t tell me,” he says. “Why not?”

“Because I didn’t …” I shake my head. “I didn’t know how to.”

He scowls. “It’s pretty easy, Tris—”

Except Tobias, out of everyone, should know that it’s not easy. He didn’t tell her about the abuse at all (just let his fear landscape sort of heavily imply it), and when it came to his mother’s alive-ness he was pretty tight-lipped and kept putting her off with ‘it’s a long story’ even as they were heading towards meeting her. So it’s pretty fucking hypocritical of him to say “oh, you can just say it.”

The argument continues, with Tobias get more and more asshole as we go, and Tris does a fair job of pointing out most of his hypocrisy. But he still acts like the injured party. Tris…doesn’t entirely agree but sort of implicitly agrees and also just wants the fight over?

“I’m sorry,” I say, all my anger gone. “I should have been honest with you.”

“That’s it? That’s all you have to say?” He frowns.

“What else do you want me to say?”

He just shakes his head. “Nothing, Tris. Nothing.”

Wow, so first he’s an asshole, then he’s a bigger asshole, then he’s a butthurt asshole, and then after she completely capitulates to him because she doesn’t want to fight in the middle of a war, the apology isn’t good enough?

I’ve been kind of blasé on Tobias in this series, but he is really pulling ahead in the Love Interest Dickfest contest.