The second stage of initiation begins with all the initiates sitting in a hallway, even the Dauntless-born. Four calls each initiate one by one into the room. When Tris' turn comes, she notices the room is very similar to the aptitude test room. A reclining metal chair, and a familar machine. She sits as Four explains the simulation, it teahes you to control your emotions in the midst of a frightening situation. A orange tinted liquid is injected into Tris' neck, a more advanced version of the aptitude simulation. Four has wires to witness Tris's simulation which is sent by her brain, to a computer on the other side of the room, pretty fancy stuff. The serum stimulates amygdala, the part of the brain which processes negative emotions like fear and induces them into a hallucination. You stay in the hallucination until you calm down, slow your heart rate and control your breathing. Four tells Tris to be brave, the first time is always the hardest. Is he suppose to be telling her this stuff? is that cheating? He seems to be helping her out a lot lately.
Tris stands in a field of dry grass and a bile-colored sky is above her. A crow lands on her shoulder, digging it's talons into her. She tries to hit the crow but it will not budge. A flock storms toward her, surrounding and pecking at her. She screams and cries, they keep pecking, they come out of her mouth! She starts to think that she's dying, she screams for help. She remembers what Four told her and starts to slow down her breathing, somehow... If I had a crow coming out of my mouth, slow breathing would be the last thing I could do. She relaxes each muscle and opens her eyes in the room again, still hysterical. Four tries to calm Tris down by walking her back to the dormitory. She questions Four as to why she had to overcome the simulation, and he explains that overcoming cowardice is not easy, she needs to learn that. Tris thinks she spent a half hour in the simulation, but she really spent three minutes. The others didn't even come close to that time so I bet they felt like they were in the simulation for days! Four tells her she will get better, she will have to do it again tomorrow. He also confirms her suspicions on the old Dauntless. He says that it wasn't always this way, six years ago Max and the other leaders changed the training methods to make them more competitive and brutal, to test people's strength, Eric is their protege. The training didn't work on Four! Four represents how Dauntless should be, and that's why he refused to take the leadership job in the Dauntless compound, he didn't agree with what Max was going for. The training worked on Eric though, and Eric is going to keep trying to enforce it because that's what he was trained to do! How did Max change the training in the first place, wasn't there someone to tell him that was wrong?
"Becoming fearless isn't the point. That's impossible. It's learning how to control your fear, and how to be from it, that's the point." -Four
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