When I returned that evening, Nat was out cold. I pulled the slices of bread out from under my shirt that I had managed to sneak out. I set them gently by his head. He would be starving when he awoke.

                I figured this would show him how grateful I was.

                Jacob came in after me, noticing my stance before Nat’s bed. His eyes moved from my face down to Nat’s sleeping one to the bread.

                “He could get in serious trouble for that.” Jacob said.

                I shrugged, “I’ll take the blame.”

                “You’ll both be screwed.”

                “He’s going to be starving when he wakes up.” I argued. “He watched over me last night. It’s the least I could do. Literally,”

                Jacob shrugged, “I warned you.”

                I scowled at him and chose not to respond.

                Jacob sat down on the bed that I had seen him occupy with Eddie many times. I was sure that he took the top bunk rather than make the elder man climb up there. Jacob seemed to be attached to Eddie, showing him the utmost respect.

                I took a seat next to him, leaning against the wall.

                “Where do you work?” He asked softly.

                I glanced over my shoulder to where my work partner slept, “With Nat in the fields. We’re Cutters.”

                The slang came natural.

                Jacob cringed, “You picked a tough one. Not many girls that I know willingly went to the fields for their job. And the few that did changed before they were locked in.”

                “I didn’t know anyone else.”

                “So?”

                I shrugged, “It gets a little bit better every day. Some days I can go almost an hour without taking a break.”

                “Must’ve been Hell the first few days.” He grinned jokingly at me.

                “You wouldn’t believe.”

                He chuckled, letting the conversation fall through. I stared off at the door. Out of my peripheral, I could tell that my new friend was watching my work partner intently. I frowned slightly, and glanced over my shoulder.

                “What are you staring at?”

                “He needs to wake up.”

                “Let him sleep; he needs it.”

                Jacob shook his head, “If Red or Cassandra come in and see the bread, there’s no doubt that they will report it.”

                “Why would they do that?” I crossed my arms over my chest. “Who would send a fellow human to the enslavers?”

                Jacob’s face darkened, “People who are more concerned with saving their own ass than with anyone else’s.”

                I had gotten that vibe from Cassandra the first day I met her, yet I continued to follow her like a lost dog because I had no one else.

                The thought crossed my mind that Nat had judged me based on my decision to choose Cassandra as my first friend. It could have given him a look at what he thought my character was. I realized I would have to work to change that impression.

                Jacob stood up, walking toward Nat’s bed.

                “Get rid of the bread or something.” I hissed, “Just let him sleep!”

                It was too late.

                Jacob nudged Nat roughly, pulling him from his unconscious state of mind. Nat grumbled something incoherent before forcing himself upright on the bunk.

                He pried his tired eyes open, glaring at Jacob. “What do you want?”

                Jacob nodded to the bread next to him. “Eat up before someone finds out.”

                Nat’s eyes widened. “Why did you…”

                “I’m not that stupid.”

                Nat’s eyes moved to me. I kept my face ducked down in the shadows as best as I could, avoiding eye contact.

                “Thanks.” He mumbled before shoving half of the loaf of bread into his mouth. He chewed slowly. I watched his Adam’s apple bob as he swallowed. “Don’t do that again.”

                “I know.” I mumbled, my eyes moving to my legs.

                He finished the small amount of food I had given him and stood up. I could hear the joints in his knees cracking with movement.

                “How long was I out?”

                “Only an hour.”

                Nat punched Jacob in the arm.

                “What the hell was that for?” Jacob scowled, caressing his wounded bicep.

                Nat simply scowled, walking toward the door. “I’m going to take a piss. Get rid of the crumbs before anyone else comes back.”

                Jacob and I exchanged glances as Nat walked out.

                “Someone’s cranky.” I mumbled.

                ~*~

                There was no meeting that night. I didn’t question Nat on his actions. He was still exhausted from the previous night’s adventure, and it was too risky to make a move now.

                Work that day was a lot more sluggish than any of the other days I had been doing. Nat seemed to barely have energy to move from one plant to the next. I found myself doing more of the work than he was. I didn’t complain; I hadn’t been putting in an equal effort before. It was only fair for me to take over now.

                After lunch, he seemed that he had regained some of his energy. Or he seemed to realize that I wasn’t as efficient as he was. Nat took more control over the situation, and our work production increased significantly from the morning. Still we were a good ten stalks shorter than our average amount cut.

                As we walked to dinner, Nat seemed to be falling asleep in his step. He carried the cutter loosely in his hands, banging his shin every now and then.

                “Are you ok?” I asked softly.

                When he didn’t respond, I repeated my question with more emotion.

                Nat grunted.

                “Nat, you need sleep.”

                “I’m fine.”

                “No, you’re really not.” I grabbed his cutter, holding it up with him. My arms strained to carry one and a half. His grip on his cutter was weak.

                He ignored me, but accepted my help with the cutter. I had started to really regret taking part of the weight as I realized the stress was almost too much for me. My arms were going to ache so much tomorrow.

                The shed came into view, and I felt my legs pick up their speed. Anything to get rid of these heavy machines quickly.

                “Are you hungry?”

                “Yeah, let’s go.”

                “Do you want to sleep?” I lowered my voice to tag on the second part, “I can sneak you back some food.”

                “No.” He growled. His eyes moved around the area as he surveyed our neighboring humans. When none seemed to be concerned with our conversation, he continued, “It’s too dangerous. I told you already not to do it again.”

                “I don’t care.” I bit my lip, “You need sleep.”

                “I need food.”

                “Nat…”

                “Just stop, please.” He rubbed his eyes furiously. “Let’s get in line for dinner. I’ll go to sleep as soon as we get back, deal?”

                I nodded hesitantly.

                He grabbed a tray as we got into line.

                I grabbed one as well, my fingers playing with the edges of it.

                We got out food in silence. I moved toward my usual spot against the wall when I felt a hand curl around my upper arm.

                I stopped in my tracks turning around to face Nat.

                “Would you…” He struggled for a moment before starting over, “You’re sitting with me today. Not on the grubby floor.”

                “What—?” I shook my head, “No, I’m fine on the floor. Don’t pity me.”

                “I’m not pitying you.” He muttered, directing me toward a new area of the cafeteria. I followed silently.

                It was just as crowded in the new area as it had been where I sat. I passed by a plethora of various colors and faces. It amazed me just how many were fitted into one building at once. All around me it was a tight squeeze.

                We stepped over many people sitting on the floor as I had been. People passing and going in both directions slowed us down. Nat seemed determined to head to the farthest spot away. I followed without complaint.

                Even if he was considerably rude to me, he was still a friend. And one rude friend was better than no friends.

                Nat led us to a group with a variety of different races. It almost seemed as if there was one person representing each race. They clustered around a table in the back corner. A spot in the middle was left open.

                I felt my face heat up as I realized that there wasn’t enough space for the both of us. I stopped in my tracks, turning my body.

                “I appreciate the offer, Nat, but there isn’t enough room—”

                “Stop you’re whining.” He rolled his eyes, “You need to be here for this too.”

                “Why?”

                “You’ll see.”

                “There’s barely enough room for you to sit.”

                He ignored my comment, approaching the table. “Hey guys.”
                “Who is she?” An Asian across the table asked. Despite his race, he had an English accent to him. I hadn’t heard that in a while.

                “She’s sitting with us today. Make room.” Nat dropped his tray onto the table loudly. A few grumbles of complaints rose from the others. My face felt ten degrees hotter. Nat took a seat on the bench, grabbing my wrist and giving me a tug. His eyes turned toward me, “Sit down before I make you.”

                Hesitantly, I climbed onto the bench.

                One leg was pressed tightly against the stranger next to me. I had to tuck my arm in so as to keep some space between us. My other leg ended up half on Nat’s. There wasn’t enough room for me to move it off.

                Nat left it there.

                “What happened the other night?” A Hispanic to Nat’s left asked.

                “When we had our meeting, we were ambushed by Wanders.” He scowled, taking a bite of his food.

                “How many?”

                “I heard there were hundreds.” Someone added.

                “Did you lose twelve men like they say?” asked another.

                “My gathering thinks you faked it.”

                “Did they catch you?”

                The questions flew at him at sixty miles an hour. Nat sat quietly eating his food. My stomach growled, but I chose to ignore it and listen to the questions. Rumors had sprung up from all areas. It seemed that not only had Wanders been there, but other foreign creatures I wasn’t aware of. The names themselves sent chills down my spine.

                Nat waited until they had calmed down enough before swallowing his last bite and looking up from his food.

                “Can I explain?”

                Silent nodded responded.

                He took another bite, taking his time before he continued, “We had a traitor amongst us. We had to abandon our raid on the Mess Hall. I had to tell them as soon as possible so I did last night. For whatever reason, we were attacked by Wanders.”

                At that word, the men around us cringed. It seemed to be a sensitive word.

                “I’m not sure how many didn’t make it. Definitely at least six. There had to have been close to ten Wanders at once.” He took a minute to inhale slowly, “I’ve never seen that many. I’m sure there were more. I got as many people cleared out as possible, but I couldn’t save everyone. I pray to God that no one else died.”

                My eyes widened.

                Six people were dead?

                From those beasts?

                “Why so many?”

                “Hell if I know.” Nat scowled. “It’s really unusual behavior for them.”

                A few others nodded in agreement.

                “You don’t think they’re being trained… do you?” A man with a thick Russian accent asked hesitantly.

                Nat took a moment to ponder that, “I’m not sure. With the sudden change in behavior, it’s possible, but if the freaks actually wanted to harm us or break us up, then they would put everyone in Isolation.”

                “Maybe they want to scare us.”

                Nat snorted, “Isolation’s pretty damn scary.”

                “You know what I mean.”

                “I do, I do.” He nodded in agreement. “I just want you to be careful with your gatherings now. Already they’re suspicious of our activities. I think they know we’re up to something.”

                “Because of the search last night.” Someone finished.

                “Right, exactly that.” Nat said. “Take caution. Don’t risk anyone’s life.”

                That broke out another discussion.

                Nat glanced at me.

                I leaned forward to whisper in his ear, “I can’t understand them.”

                “You shouldn’t.”

                “Why?”

                “We’ve created our own language that we speak in universally. I’m sure they were only speaking English for your sake.”

                I frowned slightly.

                “It’s complicated to explain.” He took a minute to think. All around us the others continued to argue as if we weren’t there, “Verbs are in English, nouns and pronouns and all that are said in German, prepositions are in Russian, that kind of thing.”

                I raised an eyebrow.

                “And we all have our accents which complicated things further.” He chuckled softly to himself, “You should’ve seen it when we first started.”

                “Do you speak the other languages?”

                He waved his hand back and forth, “A little. Enough to speak to the others, but not as fluently as they are.”

                I bit my lip gently, “Will you teach me?”

                He raised an eyebrow, “We’ll see.”

                A loud blaring noise sounded that matched the one at the end of breakfast and lunch. All around us people stood up getting ready to dump away their trays.

                I followed Nat out of the building.

                Our feet crunched on the gravel as we moved with the flow of people heading back to their cabins. This was the first time I had stayed in the cafeteria until the end of the time, aside from lunch time.

                All around us people spoke. I remembered in the back of my mind that they had banned talking for the most part. It seemed that they weren’t as strict at this time of night. It didn’t matter. Nat and I walked in silence down the pathway.

                I knew my way for the most part by now. I had walked it enough times alone to be able to navigate successfully to my new home.

                I couldn’t stand the silence.

                I felt that I had grown close enough to Nat that there should have been no more silent walks between us. There were too many questions I had that he had yet to answer.

                “Thanks for letting me sit with you today.” I smiled, “Sorry I was half on top of you though. It was really tight.”

                He grunted and shrugged. The usual response.

                Another silence passed before I dared to form a conversation.

                “Do you remember Earth?” I asked softly.

                He kicked a stone in front of us as we walked. “Yeah.”

                “Me too.”

                He was silent.

                “What do you miss most?”

                “I’d rather not have this conversation right now.” He grumbled. “You were right before. I need to go to sleep.”

                “I’m sorry.” I mumbled.

                He shrugged.

                Nat walked us up to the cabin, holding the door open for me. I mumbled a thanks.

                A few seconds later, he was out on his bottom bunk.

                I took a seat next to Jacob and Eddie, starting a conversation with my two new friends.

*******

BORING CHAPTER. 

I'm really sorry about the wait guys! But I'm back now. Miss me? Cause I sure missed you guys(: & This story. I didn't realize until I started writing this an hour ago how much I missed it. & If you know me, it usually takes me quite a long time to get a chappie up.

Anyway, Please, I'm asking kindly, could you vote for Superman Stole My Panties in the Fantasy section of the Watty Awards? I think I'd love you to death. If you're interested, it is romance, but it's my weird twist. & It has a plot! Even if you're not, I'd still appreciate the support. Thank you<3