Culling

Part I • Chapter VIII

I continued. "The other man is Aakil, they are both from district five. They stood across from me in line and were helpful and nice."

"Yeah, I am sure they were extremely helpful and nice." Nathan said under his breath, sarcastically.

"Did he have his shirt on then?" Silas wanted to know.

Luke whispered to Silas, as his eyes followed Octavius' approach. "You take your shirt off all the time, what's the problem?"

"That's different." North answered for Silas. "Sang Baby doesn't need to defile her eyes with this dude."

Did that mean they were alright with me seeing some naked chested men but not certain ones? How did they differentiate between which chests I could see? Why did it even matter? I didn't think men cared about stuff like that.

"So I can see you guys without your shirts on then?" Not that I had thought about it before, but now that the idea had come up it seemed strangely appealing.

North, Nathan and Silas made choking noises while Luke, Gabriel and Victor laughed.

What was so funny? It was a serious question.

"Girly, I see that you made it out ok." Octavius reached us and he seemed genuinely pleased to see me. "Aakil, Keyne and I joined with a few others in your district. We were looking for you earlier to see if you wanted to join us, but it looks like you've already found a place."

"Oh. Yes. I will be with my friends. Thank you though." I gestured towards the boys around me, who were currently eyeing Octavius and Aakil with different levels of wariness.

I noticed that Silas had undone a few of the top buttons of his own shirt. I hoped he wasn't too hot. It was rather warm in here.

Still, I was curious about the relationships forming around me. "Who did you join with in district six?"

He pointed to a small group of about four men who were gathered in a circle, drinking. Among them I saw the attractive brunette noticed on the train and the scary bald man who had been with him. I only recognized those two, the other two must have been from another district.

"Oh, um. I don't know who they are. We didn't get a chance to be introduced really." I told him.

"Interesting." Aakil mused. "They seemed to know you, or of you at least. Though that's not surprising. The man with the shaved head is Jay and the other is Rocky. Rocky asked about you specifically because he saw us talking in line and assumed that you'd be with us."

"Well she's with us now." Nathan slung his arm over my shoulder and Silas took a half step forward.

"Woah." Octavius put his hands up in a placating gesture. "No harm no foul. I just wanted to make sure that she was being taken care of, that's all. I didn't want her with a bunch of men who had ulterior motives."

Aakil nodded. "Yes, it was quite shocking to see you in line with the tributes earlier. It's not something I would ever have expected."

"Thank you for your concern." Victor nodded to them diplomatically. "We can take it from here though. We appreciate your efforts, it's nice to know that there are allies out there."

"No problem." Aakil didn't seem offended in the least. "I'm not sure how this is all going to play out in the end, but at least we won't be known as the douchebags who harassed the only female tribute."

"That's good to know." Mr Blackbourne returned and stood in front of me, so I was now partially behind his back. "We'll keep that in mind if something comes up."