Chapter 40: Four

Four is jolted awake by Lynn, who reports a body in the chasm and Al’s absence from the dorm. At the Pit’s edge, Dauntless haul up Al’s waterlogged corpse, and Four confronts his failure to protect his initiates, recalling Amar’s death and suspecting this is no suicide.

Seeking distance, Four retreats to the simulation room, where Hana finds him. She urges him to stop hiding behind work, to accept that caring makes him vulnerable, and to grieve with his initiates. After she leaves, Four uses the system to verify who accessed logs: Jeanine viewed Al’s fear sim and, alarmingly, Four’s own fear of heights sequence that ends in a fall—evidence that could mark him as Divergent.

At Al’s raucous Dauntless funeral, Four contrasts the spectacle with Abnegation’s quiet rituals and toasts Al with Hana, Zeke, Uriah, and Shauna before returning to his apartment.

Four finds Tris inside, curious but respectful. She offers comfort when he shares the news of Al’s death. Tris then produces a bullet she secretly recovered from a factionless crate and connects it to Robert’s shooting, fearing widespread weapons circulation.

Realizing the implication—that Evelyn and the factionless are arming—Four admits he understands why and, choosing intimacy over distance, tells Tris he will show her the truth.