There were eight naked women standing behind the wall - occasionally, somebody would peek out through the window to see if the mob was still there and her sunken expression would confirm that they indeed were.
The protestors had grown in number since yesterday in spite of Amy dropping out of the event. News of what had happened to her last night had spread and made the remaining holdouts "angry as hell". Sally felt a small sense of pride when she saw another woman come downstairs in the nude that morning, a sense that grew and grew into near excitement as the number of nudists who joined them in the lobby increased until she had counted over half of the female students at Westridge among their participants. Remembering their strength in numbers, she was pleased to see that the protest had doubled in size to eight.
Sally still wished it was nine.
Leah peeked her head around the corner again, saw the men gathered outside their dorm, and sighed. The mob had grown in size since a few minutes ago and they couldn't lounge around in the nude forever. Eventually, they would have to leave the safety of the building and go to class. But when would that be?
"Still there." Leah shook her head, sitting back down at the table. She had clearly washed her long, brown hair this morning - wet tips clung slightly to her back, grabbing at the bare skin whenever she turned her head this way or that.
"What an unfortunate omen." Claire was leaning back, one arm casually over the back of Leah's chair. Her blond hair hung down in a ponytail today. "I knew the administrators would ramp up their attacks on us today, but this is a bit excessive."
"Do you think we could get away with showing up to class a bit late?" Tiffany, one of the most recent recruits added. Her thin arms were still wrapped around her chest with a sense of shame that Sally recognized wasn't present in herself as of some time yesterday.
"I doubt it." Dolly sighed, pressing her thick legs together. "And I also doubt that those men will leave just because classes have started."
"So the question remains..." Leah peeked out the window again. "How do we get past those boys in one piece?"
Sally knew the obvious answer - they would simply put up with whatever molestation the men would levy their way as they walked to class. It was the same situation they had faced time and time again thus far - whenever the number of men was higher than the number of women, they would get harassed endlessly. Sticking together was the only way to get some sort of safety on campus - at least, from physical molestation - but with so many men camped outside their dorm, they knew that numerical advantage would be denied.
And of course, the new girls were a concern as well.
Sally, Leah, and Claire were three of the original protestors who had gone to class naked for the last two days. Dolores and Tiffany joined them yesterday and followed through by starting today naked as well. The last three were Nina, who Sally shared her first class of the day with, and two women she had never had the chance of introducing herself to who went by Jennifer and Felicia. Sally was never good with names, and the fact that she was already struggling to remember who was who felt relaxing in a way; Their protest was getting bigger.
And yet, some of them were already looking as though they were about to falter - to run back up to their dorm rooms to get dressed again. They had remained clothed for the last few days and been written up by the administration for violating dress code - something that would eventually wind up as an expulsion - so going to class naked seemed like the only 'safe' option for getting their right to attend college back.
But if they were sexually harassed so thoroughly so early into the day, the odds that they'd make it through to the end of the protest would surely shrink. They needed a plan to smuggle these girls further from the dorm rooms in safety - to at least build their confidence in the de facto leadership of this movement.
So the question remained of how to get eight naked women across campus without scaring the three of them with the least experience. Sally poked her head around to corner to check on the situation herself and saw at least twenty men sitting around. Some were in the grass outside the dorm, others on ledges, and a few had even brought folding chairs to wait on the Westridge women to leave their dorms. This was not a spontaneous gathering.
One of the men pointed up, shouting something inaudible through the walls and windows that separated the two groups and soon most of the crowd's attention had turned to the naked Sally, who at that point realized her bare chest was slightly exposed through the glass. She leapt back to the safety of the wall the rest of the girls had used as cover, her hands rising to cover herself despite the safety.
And then, the worst case scenario started. One of the girls was sitting on the floor nearby, holding her head in her hands in a near-fetal position as her muttering grew louder.
"I knew this was a bad idea." Jennifer yelled. "I'm getting dressed!" The tall but shapely woman covered her pale body with her hands and stood up.
"I'm going, too." Nina joined in, she was shorter and thinner, with tan lines that made Sally assume she was a swimmer - or at least she was a swimmer during summers.
Leah and Claire gave them pained looks - clearly wanting to keep their unity intact but also unsure how to keep the group from losing their collective nerves.
"Wait!" Sally surprised even herself when she raised her voice, calling out to the two women who had just stood up. "Don't go!"
"You've seen those men." Jennifer replied. "What do you think would happen if any of us were to go outside right now?"
"Maybe you want to get molested by a bunch of guys, but I'm out." Nina said, though not with an angry look in her eyes. Instead, the general feeling was one of failure - a failure to even launch their foray into the protest.
"It will be okay!" Sally tried to reassure them, but her voice cracked a bit while speaking letting her true feelings slip through.
"Unless you have a way to get by those men, I'm leaving, too." Felicia stood up, her dirty blonde hair tied into two pigtails in a failed attempt at covering her chest godiva-style. The whole atmosphere was shifting. Even Sally started to see the logic in surrender.
Which is why her next words seemed to come out of nowhere.
"I have a plan!"
The women stopped, turning to face the short, naked girl standing by the window. Some of the girls who were covering briefly let their hands lower, as if the mere idea of a strategy gave them a bit of additional hope, but Sally knew that this hope was not long if she didn't suggest something. The truth was, she did have a plan. She just didn't want to have to go through with it and failed to come up with anything better. In this state, she wouldn't have the time anyway.
"You can leave through the side exit, then swing around the other dorms and head along the road from there." Sally began. Her voice was only a little bit more confident than before, but she was still able to command the attention of the other women. "Then, you can make it to the main complex after only a few minutes. From there, you should be able to get to class on time."
"No way!" Nina shouted. "Along the roads?"
"But won't the cars on the highway see us?"
"There is a bit of distance between the two areas." Claire raised her voice, drowning out the panic of the crowd. "And I find it unlikely any motorist would come to a halt from full speed just to ogle a few girls - that is, of course, assuming the drivers even notice. Highways are full of distractions."
"Even if that works," The first girl to stand up interrupted. "I don't think we can just slip out of the side exits so easily. There are enough men outside that we're probably gonna be noticed by at least one of them, and then if that happens, the rest will follow!"
"She's correct," Felicia added. "The side exit is not that far out of the way. I doubt we can slip by unnoticed."
"You'll be okay." Sally sighed. She then stood up straight, so that her voice would ring out across the entire common area. "I will distract them."
For a moment, there was silence. A distraction? The others had incredulous looks on their faces - not that they didn't understand what she meant, but that they couldn't believe somebody would attempt such a thing. If Sally was to be understood, she meant to allow nearly thirty men to have their way with her - a similar fate to what happened to Amy just last night.
"Are you sure you can do that?" Nina asked, as she stepped closer, the light of the room making her tan-lines appear almost invisible.
"Y-yes." Sally had hoped her voice would show more confidence. "If it's what needs to be done."
"I do not believe she was asking if you had the courage to do so." Felicia sat back down. "But if you alone could distract all of the men out there at once. There appears to be nearly forty present."
"Maybe she will fail!" Claire stood up suddenly, calling the attention in the room to her. "But so what? This entire protest was a risk from the beginning, a risk that I assume we all understood going into it. Maybe Sally will fail, maybe she will succeed, it's better than doing nothing!"
"It's isn't like the alternative is any better." Dolly spoke up. "We go out through the front door, those men are gonna do stuff to us. But we've already been through a ton; Just yesterday, Sally was forced to-"
