The Protection Program

TPP : Chapter XLVIII

"So your saying that Nina isn't mine anymore?"

"Well technically she never was yours, she was just under your care. But yes, if you want to put it that way. She is no longer yours."

The room filled with silence, Aubrey looked down at the ground, to afraid to look at Nina. Nina didn't know what to think, what to say, what to do, she just sat there staring at the wall in front of her. Why was Oliver doing this? He was so happy when Aubrey told him about the first time Nina even had a conversation with him, he was happy to hear that she wasn't holding herself back from Aubrey anymore and now he was taking that away.

"Why? That's all I want to know."

Aubrey stood up, his sadness was no longer an emotion as it began to bubble up in rage. He was beyond pissed, Nina was being taken from him for no good reason. He protected her, took good care of her, gave her affection, maybe a little to much affection but that wasn't the point. He was following the rules, not really but what people don't see won't hurt hurt them. He was a good mentor and this is what he gets for it.

"Aubrey, I just-"

"No! Don't beat around the bush, why do you want to take her from me? Why do you want us to be separated so badly?"

He stayed silent, he knew the reason but he didn't want to sound like a dick, even though not saying anything made him look even more ignorant. Aubrey scuffed and put his hands up, he didn't know what to say because he didn't have anything to say. Nina was no longer his, the paper work was all switched out and he had no rights of her, so he didn't see any point in fighting.

"Whatever. She can come get her stuff later, I'm going out."

"Going out where?"

"To do whatever I want. I'm not a mentor now so I can do whatever the hell I want."

With that he left the room, slamming the door on his way out. The room filled with awkward silence yet again, Oliver and Nina were now the only ones left.

"And as for you Ms. Nina. I think you know what these are for?"

He held up three red ribbons, she furrowed her eyebrows in confusion, he was wrong because she had no idea what those were for.

"Okay, well there red flags. You know how the red flag system works, correct?"

She nodded her head yes, eyebrows still furrowed. She didn't understand what the red flags had to do with anything, she wanted to ask but she knew he would get to the point. And plus, she hated him right now, speaking to him was not an option.

"Well, for each red flag you get 2 warnings, after 2 warnings if you continue to misbehave you will get a red flag. You have three red flags, so that gives you 6 warnings. After the third flag you have one time to mess up, after that you will be sent back to TPP."

Her eyes widened, she felt like screaming and cussing, throwing a fit and beating the hell out of him, but she couldn't. Legally he was now her mentor, legally he had all rights over her and there was now nothing she could do. She swallowed down at the lump that was continuing to grow larger every second, it was no use, she was slowly suffocating on her thoughts.

There were all kinds of thoughts, thoughts of suicide, thoughts of murder, thoughts of the gang but mainly, thoughts of Aubrey. She was a little sad that he didn't stay and fight for her but she understand that there was no point. She didn't like the fact that he was now free to do whatever, he could do whatever he wanted and Nina didn't like that one bit.

She was afraid that he would forget about her, she was afraid that he wouldn't care about her anymore and he would move on. She was afraid that he would end up with a new number every single night and those were the main thoughts that hurt her.

"Well, tonight the whole crew is going out to dinner. Dress nice, it's very formal because it will be with the mayor of the city."

She sat there, if she was going to be treated like she was at boot camp she might as well act like she was. As much as she hated being here she would only hate boot camp 10x worse.

"What are you waiting for? Go."

She stood up and quickly walked to her room, she shut the door quietly and as soon as she heard the door shut completely tears began to pour from her eyes. She felt like screaming, she felt like breaking stuff, she felt like killing herself. If she didn't have Aubrey, what did she have?

He was all she had so now she had nothing. She tried to put the terrible thoughts to a different part of her mind and focus on the more serious, se had thirty minutes to get ready and at the rate she was moving she would need two hours.

The shower relaxed her, her tightened tense muscles became loose, but as soon as she got out they got tense again. Her head was pounding and she felt like she was gonna throw up, the only dress she had was a short black one. Aubrey was the one to pack her bag because she was to overwhelmed by it, Aubrey must have liked it since he packed it.

It was a beautiful long sleeved, black pencil dress that went about mid thigh, it fit her body nicely, showing off her killer curves that she didn't even realize she had. Her hair was straight still, big lose curls were still placed from the party so she just went with it, for the first time in nearly 8 years she wore heels. She lost her balance the first few steps but afterwards she got the hang of it. She strutted like a pro model

"Wow, you clean up nice."

She didn't speak to him, she didn't have any desire to speak to him. As much as she didn't want to speak she had to admit he cleaned up well, if Oliver looked this nice, she could only imagine Aubrey.

The car ride was long and awkward, the crew would all meet up at city hall where there was a huge dinner with everyone who had passes. The passes were expensive but if you had them you got free access to every event during H.A.W. Only about 200 lucky people got the passes so Nina wasn't to worried about a huge overwhelming crowd. All the other events held up to 1000 and above.

The place was already packed when they got there but luckily they had a bunch of tables in the front set up for the crew and the Mayor. Out of all 200 something people she only wanted to see one, and sadly she couldn't find him.