Chapter 2 Dark Premonition Of course, Alexander hadn't grounded Olive until she was sixty-five, but to Olive, being restricted to school and home for a month was an eternity. For four weeks she had absolutely no freedom of wandering out, coming and going as she pleased. But Olive knew that it did no good to argue. For weeks she took her punishment without complaint, spending extra time studying at protocol study conferences and the rest of it helping out at home with Cube. "It isn't that bad, after all," Olive told herself in a barely successful attempt to cheer herself up. "It's a whole darned lot better being with Cube than with the Priss Duo." Also, she learned that housework easily strengthened the grips of her hands, which would be an advantage if she was to be a fighter. Olive noticed that new calluses formed on her palms every single day. As the month progressed, Olive decided to take the punishment as an advantage...even though she hardly considered going to protocol seminars as an advantage. Still, it was torture for Olive, not being able to spend time with her friends and conspiring new ways to ruin Francoise More's dress. If one whole month didn't last for an eternity, how could one whole day last for so long? Olive wondered this as she silently scrubbed the last dish and slipped it onto the pile of clean ones. She gave a weary sigh. "Well, that's the last of them, Cube," she said to Cube, who was sweeping the floor of the kitchen. "I'm off!" She darted towards the door, intending to be well far away from the mansion before Cube could argue. "Hold it right there," Cube exclaimed, just as Olive was reaching for the door knob. He reached out with an extended, black wing. Olive's vision was covered in blackness and her inhale was smothered as she was pulled back by Cube's retracting wing. "You still have to dust the furniture," Cube told her before releasing her. Olive glared balefully at him. "Darn it, Cube!" she snapped. "What were you trying to do? Suffocate me or something?" Cube turned his lofty gaze on her. "Nonsense," he objected calmly. "When I try to kill someone, I don't try to do it. I just do it." (Note from author: Does that last sentence count as an advertisement for Nike? ^_^) He turned back to his broom and dustpan. "If dusting bothers you, Olive, you are more than welcome to scrub the-" "NO! I mean, urm...no thanks. Dusting will be fine. No, honest! I'm okay with that." Olive tried to smile weakly, noting the ever so slightly glint of disappointment in Cube's catlike, yellow eyes. He sighed and said, "Very well then, Mistress. Dusting it shall be. Glad to see you're finally learning manners." Olive glared balefully at him again, and Cube returned with a cocky smile. "Don't I wish I were as well," she muttered under her breath as she took the duster from its tiny rack near the door and began starting on the shelves. She poked at the tiny spaces between the glass vases that were filled with dust. "No, not like that, Mistress," Cube said, exasperated. "Lift them up and then dust under. Yeesh...I don't know how you're ever going to survive if you become a housewife when you grow up." Olive pursed her lips and pouted as she worked. Though Cube was quite the debonair and cheerful friend and servant, he can be too much of the occasional worrywart and a boss-around.. Sullenly, she lifted the vases and sculptures up and carefully dusted the empty space underneath. It was monotonous work...but now, she had more to think about. Hardly paying attention to her work and actually doing it carefully at the same time, Olive wondered if she would ever have a future brimming with honor and fame. She knew she would never succeed as a member of high society...she just wasn't built for it. She was a small, stocky girl, very much unlike the slim, graceful figures of noble blood. She was hopeless at dancing as well as protocol. Her father wanted the very best for her, and all Olive wanted was to impress him...make him proud to have her as a daughter. "Cube," she said. "Yes, Mistress?" Olive bit her lip...trying to scrape the right words off the top of her head, she said, "Cube, what's it to Dad?" "What's what to him, Mistress?" "Well," she murmured. "My future...I mean, what does he want me to be when I grow up?" Cube paused. He stood up and turned to face her with a questioning smile and replied gently, "Mistress, your father wants you to become whatever you want. He wants you to decide what's best for you, he's only guiding you through life, as a parent should. It's not him who determines your future, Mistress. It's you. You decide your future. You choose a desire and you fight for it. Everyone fights for their desires." Olive looked at the floor. "You think that way?" she inquired quietly. "Well, do you, Mistress?" Cube asked her. Olive was taken aback by the question. She paused, thinking hard, struggling to search her mind for the words she'd been hiding for such a long time...a time as long as she could remember. She sighed and said, "Father must think I want to be a dancer...or a lady....or just a place in high society. Like...a princess, or something." Now it was Cube's turn to be taken aback. "Well, isn't that what you'd want?" he asked her. Olive looked at him, but then looked down again, avoiding his catlike, yet warm eyes. "I dunno...I don't suppose that it's....well, maybe it's not..." She stopped, realizing that she'd chose the wrong set of words. If someone was to understand, she'd have to be insistant. "No. It's not what I want. I've seen my father in battle before. I can even imagine him...striving for fame and glory, clearing impossible hurdles, yet knowing that there will be more. Like princes, they're the ones who fight, win, and acheive. They're the ones who save others. Princesses? They only sit helplessly, waiting for the princes to save them. I don't want to be like that." She stopped, and blushed lightly for her babbling. Cube made no reply, but Olive saw with surprise that his eyes were understanding. His eyes gently urged her to go on. "It's not like I don't appreciate Dad's care," she continued. "I know he just wants me to succeed in life. But I had no idea....all this time I thought he'd wanted me to be a perfect lady....not caring for what I want. I never wanted to be like that. You're right, Cube, everyone fights for their desires. Mine is to be what my dad is right now. A legend." An awkward silence stretched out between them, and all that time, Olive felt chastened at herself for acting like such a spoiled brat. With her "I want this," and "I want that," she was too concerned about the small, flickering flame of light inside....the light they call, 'pride'. It was Cube who broke the silence first. "Mistress....we had no idea-" "I know," she replied. "But there's no use to it now, is there? Dad's mind was set ever since the beginning. There's no changing that-" "Yes, there is," Cube replied in a now firm and insistant voice. "Cube?" "Mistress, as I've mentioned before, everyone fights for their desires. Now's the time for you to do it. The best way to do it is-the next time you see your father, talk to him. Tell him your desires. He'll understand, I know he will." * * * The cool, spring breeze of early May lifted her chestnut, wavy locks. Pea green leaves fallen at a premature age scattered, as the wind rustled through the tall grass of the fields. Feeling her dress flow with the wind against her bare legs, she watched the lush, green pattern of the grassy meadow change again with the breeze whispering past, hands tucked cosily in her pockets. The sun was warm against her skin, and its warm radiance surrounded her like a warm blanket. Olive loved Swallow Hill. She loved the soft green grass that gently tickled her cheeks and ankles when she lay on it. She loved the robins, starlings and sparrows that resided there, each and every one of them familier and friendly to her. She learned to love the hill, even in the summer rain, when she'd dance wildly amid the warm droplets landing on her and clinging, giving her the most refreshing sensation of cool wetness against her skin. The hill...felt almost like home...familier and friendly. Even after a month, it had never changed. Swallow Hill always remained the same each spring and summer. Olive watched the cherry blossoms dance and twirl in the breeze, free, joyful, carelessly twirling. She wished with all her heart she could be like that...free to dance in the wind, not caring whether anyone was watching...twirling, spinning gracefully... Swallow's Hill was always a place to contemplate one's troubles. And Olive was just experiencing the very beginning of her troubles.... It happened like a moment when a blinding flash erupted from no where...a moment where one could never know what had hit them before it did. And when it happened to Olive, her mind suddenly snapped...away from the real world. A spark struck a nerve, and she jolted in sheer terror. Something smashed into her mind like a heavy lead weight. What was happening to her?! Her mind screamed with unexplainable energy, and she slipped into unconciousness. Blackness surrounded her.... ~A vision....she was floating....floating above the world, with nothing but frightningly vast emptiness above her. But below her....no...instead of the brownish-green of pure earth, was the upturned, blackened dirt of dead battlefields, reeking with the stench of death. The blueness of the oceans were replaced by glowing, red-hot seas of molten metal and rock. The roar of the fiery ocean below brought pain to her ears, like the angry growl of a lion. The heat...even from miles below.....it was burning her alive. She could feel the burning pain and smelt the smoldering flesh....her flesh. She screamed and screamed in horror and agony as the very essence of fire ate her from the inside out...a deep, unearthly laugh filled her ears, drowning out her screams.~ "NO!" she screamed with all her might as she sat up abruptly, pale and sweating heavily, breathing harsh and strained. She was in her bed, linen sheets dripping with sweat. She stared at her room around her, but she was blinded by the horrible vision. "Calm down, Mistress," Cube's voice told her comfortingly. "It's over...you must've had some dream." A cool wad of linen cloth was pressed against her forehead. Olive reached up with a trembling hand, and held it there gratefully. "Are you alright, Olive?" her father asked her, sounding deeply concerned. "You were out in the fields, lying there." Olive's breathing soon calmed down, but her body was still trembling. "I'm alright," she muttered. "Just had a nightmare, that's all." "You were having convusions, Mistress. Maybe we should contact the doctor." "No thanks, I'm okay now. Dad, Cube, I was just..." "You've never been like this before, Olive...you were out there screaming your lungs out..." "It's okay, Dad, I'm just fine." "You were delirious for hours, Mistress! It took at least seven people to get you back into the house!" "Can't you see? I'm fine now." "Olive, don't keep us worrying about you. There may be something wrong with you." "There's NOTHING wrong with me, okay?" "Mistress, what are you trying to deny? You were unconcious, you were feverish, and you were mumbling in your-" "I'm FINE, okay!" Olive screeched, cherry red with sheer frustration. "I've just had a nightmare, that's ALL! There's absolutely NO REASON at all that you two should be WORRYING ABOUT ME, so, you might as well just LEAVE ME ALONE!! BOTH of you, PLEASE!!" The two of them stared at her, then at eachother. Olive's baleful, pale glare was insistant and defiant, and both knew that it did no good to argue. Silently, they left, closing the door after them. Olive slumped back into bed, mind racing. She turned over, deeply vexed, heart burning. She remembered the vision...she could still feel the heat flaring against her skin...the smell of burning flesh filling her nostrils....that unearthly laugh... Despite herself, Olive felt tears streaming down her cheeks. She tightly shut her eyelids, but the tears welled up mercilessly, stinging her eyes like burning coals. She let them fall onto her pillows, wetting the soft cotten and making it cling to her wet cheek. She knew she was frightened, but she was proud...to proud, to admit it. Even to herself. She knew, deep inside, though she refused to think about it, that the experience wasn't just a nightmare or a vision. It was a premonition. She knew for sure....something horrible was about to happen. Not just to her, but to the entire world. She sobbed for a few minutes, before crying herself to sleep. * * * The next day... "Mistress? Are you alright? What was it with your nightmare?" "Hm? Nightmare? What nightmare?" * * * "Yo, Ollie. You feelin' okay? You look kinda...stressed." "I'm FINE, Anita. And don't call me Ollie." Olive and her five friends, Horst Heimelman, Anita Cassandra, Wendy Lachesis, Patricia Hearn, and Marthia Sheareware were having a drink (no alchohol or anything like that)at Balbon's restaraunt the morning after Olive's supposed nightmare. The five were obviously astonished and perplexed by Olive's sudden lack of energy. "Are you sure, Olive?" the always caring Marthia asked her. "We're all worried around you, you know." "Yeah!" exclaimed the happy-go-lucky Wendy. "You're our best friend, and it's only right that we should try and help you with our troubles, if you'd let us, that is." "You're always so reckless," added Patricia, stern voice filled with deep concern. "You're always worrying about others, and you don't really care for yourself. We care for you." "We know you don't want us to worry," Horst piped in, gulping down his lemonade. "But hey, you just have to know that we're always there for you, like friends are." "It's always good to have someone to talk to," explained Anita. "Someone who understands, someone who's always there to listen...that was what my sister told me. Do you have someone to talk to, Olive? Your Dad? Cube? Significant others?" "Well..." Olive replied, sounding uneasy of herself. "You know, Olive. We're just trying to say that you're not alone," Patricia told her. "You have us," Marthia reminded her. "We're always there for you." "Yeah, and gods have mercy on you if you forget that," Anita told her with a wink. "Hear hear!" exclaimed Wendy, giggling. "And, Olive, you know what they say, 'better the devil you like than the one you don't!'" There was an embarrassed silence. "Um," Wendy murmured, twiddling her fingers awkwardly and timidly. "I'm not...the only one who thinks that...am I?" Patricia frowned and said, "Isn't the quote supposed to be, 'Better the devil you KNOW than the one you don't?'" Wendy blushed lightly with slight embarrassment and replied quietly, "Oh....kay....I suppose that could be another variation..." Olive smiled loftily. That was Wendy, alright, always misquoting. "I dunno about that saying, Wen," Anita said with a smug smile as she rested her arms behind her head. "I'd kinda face the Prince of Darkness himself than Ollie in a temper." "And what do you mean by THAT?!" Olive shouted, cherry red once again. "See? What did I tell you?" Anita said with a knowing, cocky smirk. Then her hard, arrogant eyes softened. "You know Olive, if you need anybody to talk to, talk to us. You know me, I'm only to type who teases when she knows when to. I'd listen to you. We all would listen to you. "Right, people?" "Yeah!" Wendy said. Everyone else nodded eagerly. Olive smiled admiringly. She gazed at her friends with warm pride, distress forgotton. "You guys," she murmured. "You're always looking after me, like...older siblings." "Which would really make sense, 'cause we're all older than you!" Horst told her, giving her a light pinch on the earlobe. "Hey! Stop that!" Olive said, and giggled, glaring with mock indignation. She gave him a playful shove. Dipping his fingers in her glass of freshwater, she splashed ice cold droplets at her. She returned the favor by smearing lemonade onto his face, and they laughed and played like small children until Balbon kicked the six of them out of the restaraunt. * * * "Yes, Olive. What is it you'd like to talk to me about?" her father asked, setting down his book. From in the hallway, Olive gulped nervously. She glanced back at Cube, who gave her an encouraging nod. Feeling her resolve renewed, she stepped into the living room where her father was gazing at her curiously on the armchair. "Um...." she started quietly, trying to find the right words. "Um....I..." Gathering courage, she stepped closer. Her father now seemed a bit worried, which made Olive even more nervous than ever. Stop it, she told herself angrilly. What are you so gods darned nervous about? The fact about the only girl on the face of this world who wished she was born a boy. What's that to be ashamed about? ......Everything..... "Um....Dad," she said nervously. "Yes, Olive?" "...........Did it ever occur to you...that I'm not really like some of the other girls?" Alexander Thornwood seemed extremely taken aback by the question. "Um...well, Olive....I always thought of you as the most extraordinary girl I've ever seen. When I see you next to another girl, like Patricia, I see something about you that's....different." Olive raised a puzzled eyebrow and asked, "Different?" Her father sighed and said, "Well, let's see how I can put it. Hm....well, to me, you're always so carefree, even for a ten year old, near the beginning of the phase we call maturity. It always seems that you have more energy...more enthusiasm....more willpower....let's see....oh yes, you have more determination." "Determination....you always said that all fighters needed a lot of it." "So I have." "Well then, that's what I really want to be," Olive declared bravely. Locking her firm gaze into her father's. "I know I'm not like the other girls, even Anita...because she's proud of being a girl, and is good at dancing as well as fencing...." "Olive....aren't you proud? Of being a girl?" Olive hesitated, biting a trembling lip. "I-I thought.....well, you're right, I'm not like the other girls. Everyone thinks I'm soft, petty, and just plain silly...because I'm a girl. Everyone thinks that boys are always the tougher gender. Me? I hardly even believe it. I can be tough...when I want to be." She paused, and swallowed hard. Stiffening her resolve, she added, "I know I can. Cube taught me, that everyone fights for their desires. Mine, is to become just like you. I can't become a true lady, because I'll always be the blame if it isn't the best I can achieve. I should've told you earlier. I'm sorry, Dad. I'm sorry...for having you waste money on all those classes-" "Don't worry about it," her father cut in gently. "It's not your fault you're different. I'm sorry too...I should've realized...actually, we shouldn't mind that any longer." Olive looked up at him, and saw comfort in his eyes. She let out a huge sigh of relief, nervousness residing. "Well then!" her father said. "Which field of the fighting arts would you like to try out? Archery? Fencing? Kendo? Hand-to-hand combat? Sorcery? Polearmed?" Olive's eyes lit up, and she leaped foreward to throw her arms around her father's neck. "Thank you...Daddy." Her father warmly returned the embrace. Meanwhile, Cube was just answering an impatient hammering at the door. When he opened it, there stood Wendy, bouncing up and down on her toes with excitement. "Lemme guess, she told him, then?" she asked, barely holding back outbursts of excitement. "Huh? Huh? Did she tell him? Did she tell him? Did she? Did she? Hm? Hm? Hm?" Apparently she was too enthusiastic to think about her usual politeness. "And a good afternoon to you, Miss Wendy Lachesis," Cube replied with a smug look. "And yes, the Mistress did have a talk with the Master. Let's see...it's an hour past noon. You betted three hours after, so you owe me five copper pieces. Better luck next time, Miss." "Aw, geez," muttered Wendy in a disappointed tone as she reluctantly surrendered the money. "Why didn't you stall her? I could've earned enough to buy new robes..."