#plotideas.

In which Quinn is the youngest son of the Holmes family, who have all been Erudite for as long as anyone can remember. Quinn is intellectual, astute and particularly gifted with technologies and computer sciences, even in comparison to his fellow faction members. But he's is also a number of other things, things that his friends and family are not: prone to impulsive, illogical decision making (when he deems it necessary), an inclination toward self-sacrifice or helpfulness even when there is no logical gain, and a willingness to utilize opaqueness and concealment of information that is at odds with Erudite's creed and teachings. Coming from a family of gifted pretenders, however, is not without its benefits. Quinn learns early to behave as he's expected to, not as he's inclined to—and manages to do just that, very well, for most of his life. Until his testing day, when everything becomes that much more complicated.

In the background of Quinn's life are his brothers: Sherlock, and Mycroft. Sherlock is a Erudite, through and through; astute, logical, casually and unthinkingly arrogant, and confident in his mental prowess above all other things. He is also easily bored. Despite the enjoyment he takes from any number of active experiments he runs in his dedicated lab, Sherlock finds the greatest interest and challenge in deduction and in that vein lends his not inconsiderate observational and investigational skills to the Dauntless division responsible for the handling of crime and law in the city. Widely considered abnormal for his interests, Sherlock is nevertheless an important tool and ally to Dauntless, despite their rather infamous distaste for asking for or accepting help from others. (And it is through this association with the other faction that Sherlock first meets John Watson, a Dauntless man and physician who has been injured in recent combat outside the Wall.) 

Mycroft too, is a prime example of being Erudite to the core: he is objective, analytical, disinclined to do anything without purpose and intellectually incomparable. In light of these things, it came as a shock when, on his Choosing Day, Mycroft made the decision to transfer from Erudite to Abnegation. It shocked everyone who knew him, personally or by reputation—though the latter were far more common. Still, Mycroft spoke privately of his decision to his mother and father on Visiting Day and no more fuss was made over the transfer again, at least not within earshot of the Holmes family. But that's not to say people didn't talk—because they did. Abnegation, they said, was ill-suiting for someone like Mycroft. Abnegation prided itself on self-sacrifice, on giving without expectation of return; they taught a humbleness and unenvious nature that should pervade every aspect of one's life. They were not interested in personal appearances, or creature comforts; they believed truth and peace were found in kindness and self-denial, not in knowledge. Mycroft, people whispered, was not suited for Abnegation at all.

Perhaps it's a measure of how narrow-sighted people can be—even the Erudite who pride themselves on wisdom and observation—that they failed to predict Mycroft's rather quick appointment to a minor position in the Abnegation run-and-led government. Perhaps they never imagined that Mycroft Holmes might pursue an interest in government at all. (But that goes to show then, how many people really know Mycroft at all.) For their parts, Sherlock and Quinn—once he grew bit older—were not at all surprised.

The Holmes children are all made to shock, in their own fashions. Quinn's came on Choosing Day when he too transferred from Erudite—to Dauntless. People thought he might be foolish; might be struggling under the shadow of his two brothers, absentee as they often were. People thought it was a rebellious choice, and that he would fail the unforgiving Dauntless initiation and become factionless. People expected it. They waited to hear about it.

What they couldn't know was: that on his testing day, his results were inconclusive; that he had an aptitude not just for one faction, but for several. They couldn't know that his results—later proclaimed Erudite—were manually manufactured after a computer malfunction his tester had him create ruined the generated results. They couldn't know that the Dauntless woman, who simply called herself M, had whispered a dangerous word to him—Divergent—and told him that his life would be forfeit if anyone discovered; she told him he needed to keep his head down, and that he needed to make a choice.

On Choosing Day, flying in the face of anyone's predictions (even his brothers') and against all odds, Quinn Holmes chose Dauntless. Later, after walking off the edge of a rooftop to plummet freely through the sky and into the darkness below—when he's dragged from the net and a helpful stranger grasps him by the forearm and tells him he needs to pick a name—Quinn thinks of the life he left behind, of his brothers and of M...