Oliver has never been in a situation where he was the hunted, except now. Ever since, he had been the one inflicting dread in the hearts of others, by just being him, but this time around, something or someone mysterious was really hunting his soul with fear. For fear, they say, is the unknown.
Oliver was a hundred percent sure that he wasn't hallucinating during the hallway incident. He knew what he saw, and now he had evidence that he was truly followed by someone.
Oliver saw little details, regarding the possible physical appearance of his mysterious predator, according to what he observed. It was not that clear for him to detect, but he guessed that the stalker might be small enough to maneuver its way from between the legs of unaware passersby, and from the flash of pale blue he saw, that might be its color or complexion.
Oliver was in the cafeteria. He stood behind the large glass window, watching the men he saw at the principal's office, walking along the long walkway. They were headed towards the parking lot area, where their exotic cars were packed.
"Couple of elites, huh? I wonder why they came here." Jasper's voice sounded from behind.
Oliver turned and saw Jasper standing behind him. He wondered how long Jasper had been standing there.
"Those are HCI agents," Oliver said.
"HCI? I've never he of that before," Jasper said.
"That's because it's a secret government agency," Oliver replied.
"Cool, so what do they do?" asked Jasper.
"I heard that they're higher detectives that concentrate on solving crimes beyond the knowledge of FBI and CIA," explained Oliver.
"Gee, you sure know a lot about these guys, and you call it a secret agency," Jasper said.
"Why won't I know them? They arrested a friend of mine a year ago, then for some reason, they sentenced him to death," Oliver said casually.
Jasper looked shocked.
"Are you serious?" he asked Oliver.
Oliver nodded.
"I guess that friend of yours must've been something," Jasper said thoughtfully.
"He was an outcast, actually, a warlock," replied Oliver.
"Whoa... wicked!" exclaimed Jasper.
They both left the window and headed towards the dishing table.
"I bet it must've been hard for you, losing a friend," Jasper said.
"Yeah, kinda," Oliver replied.
"Mr Damian was the only friend I had. He was like an uncle to me."
They both took their trays and headed toward an empty table. Oliver suspected that the reason why the hostel master sent for Jasper and Shelter, was not about the last night's incident, it was actually about the report from the locals.
"So... Oliver, you were going to tell me something important, about how you messed up big-time, and you desperately needed to fix stuff, maybe?" Jasper asked.
Oliver was not paying attention to what Jasper was saying. As they went, he slightly saw something pale blue, move by the side. His eyes followed it immediately, and at the same moment, he unknowingly bumped into someone.
Oliver looked forward, and to his greatest surprise, it was Drake he had bumped into. Not only that, but he had also emptied the entire contents of his tray on him.
"Oh my god, I am so sorry. It wasn't intentional, I swear," muttered Oliver, in shock.
Drake was visibly red in the face, at this moment, almost the same color as the red sauce on his face. His clothes were also smeared with the sauce and nachos.
Some students had stopped to look, they were all baffled by what had just happened, and curious about Drake's reaction. A bunch of girls on a table close by were laughing already. Jasper was the most astonished. He never thought Oliver would do something like that.
"You stupid idiot!! You've had your revenge, huh?!!" Drake yelled angrily at Oliver.
Oliver stood there quiet, with an undetectable feeling of remorse. Drake was boiling in anger, eager to pounce on him and tear him apart if he could. Just as he was about to land a malicious fist on Oliver's face, an older boy stepped in between them, stopping that from happening.
"Enough!" he declared aloud, "You can't just start a fight anywhere and anytime."
Drake was so annoyed that he lost his chances of retaliation.
"You're so lucky, dude. Just for you to know, this isn't over," he said angrily.
"And you, Drake Parker, I think you got what you deserved. I mean... you can't just go around, bullying people," the boy said to Drake. Drake simply showed him his middle finger and went away.
"I feel sorry for him. I don't know if he realized that it wasn't an intentional act," Oliver muttered.
Oliver looked at Jasper. He was grinning widely at him like he was impressed with him for slatting his food on Drake. He noticed that everyone thought he did it on purpose.
"What?" Oliver muttered.
"Whoa, dude, that was so badass. I heard what Drake and the rest did to you in the hallway, I never realized you were going to do some big payback," Jasper said.
Oliver didn't know how to convince Jasper that it was an accident. The truth was that part of him was starting to like it that way.
"Hay, don't bother yourself. He would only try to threaten you, he won't do shit," Jasper said to him.
Oliver laughed in his mind. He considered the statement so comical, coming from someone like Jasper, who was already a regular victim of Drake and his friends.
Oliver later realized that what he thought to be the thing stalking him, was just a girl's pair of light blue boots. She was standing at the same spot he thought he saw the stalker. He was so annoyed with himself, for throwing his food at somebody, just because of ordinary female footwear.
"Oh, Oliver, how could you be so clumsy and careless?" Oliver muttered under his breath, scolding himself.
Later that day, Oliver had to explain to Jasper what happened last night, but he made sure that the fact that he was in Jasper's room, remained a secret.
When Jasper got so curious about the reason he left his room at night, he said that he went out to check the time on the large clock, because his wristwatch was inaccurate, and his alarm rang at the wrong time. Jasper pretended like he actually believed Oliver's story. However, Oliver knew he would've believed it so easily.
According to Jasper, the hostel master had very intense forgetfulness, which made him unable to remember events he had slept over. This meant that he didn't recall anything from last night.
The dismissal bell rang a few minutes ago. So far, Oliver was starting to regret his stay in the orphanage. Someone was stalking him, and he had made some enemies too. This was not the progress he desired. He wanted to remain on neutral ground in areas of friends and foes and keep a low profile, but things had turned out to be the exact opposite of what he planned. There was a girl who was acting like they were competing against each other, a roommate who was now his enemy, and a group of bullies who had made him their top target. Also, he was at a top rank in aspects of popularity.
The class was almost empty by now. The day's lessons and activities were all dull. He spent most of the time, solving lots of equations. Solving math was the only interesting thing he could do since he wasn't allowed to do any of his other hubbies he found interesting.
When his warlock friend; Mr. Damian, was still alive, he would take him ghost hunting in ancient enchanted castles, teach him how to summon the spirit of the dead in the deep cold winter night, or entertain him with his frightful illusions. Oliver really missed the terribly wonderful times he spent with the warlock.
Oliver had a line of equation problems on his textbook page that he wanted to attend to before leaving for the hostel. When he was finally done, left the class
Along the way, as Oliver headed to the hostel, he came across a small crowd, gathered in front of the school's notice board. Curious about what they were looking at, Oliver came closer.
There were a bunch of end-of-the-year activities coming up. Spelling competitions, science quizzes, and inter-house sporting events.
Something about the first one got Oliver's attention. It was the application poster for the upcoming national spelling bee, but that wasn't the issue. Oliver was in a complete state of puzzlement, at this moment. He cleared his eyes to be sure he wasn't hallucinating.
"What in the... No, no, no, this can't be true," he muttered to himself.
Oliver saw his name written in full, with his own handwriting, as the number one applicant, and also his signature. Oliver knew that he wasn't the one that applied, he wasn't even aware that there was going to be a spelling bee.
The most frightening part of the whole thing was the extraordinarily high resemblance between the handwriting that the name was written in, and his own handwriting, there was no difference. The signature was also the same as his. It was as if a duplicate of himself had written it.
"Oh, look who's on the first line for the spelling bee; Oliver Logan," said Olivia, staring at him, with her arms folded. The other students realized Oliver's presence there.
"Look at you, signing up for competitions already. I just wonder... why would you want to embarrass yourself in front of an audience of a thousand people?" Olivia said to him.
Oliver kept quiet. He knew that no one would ever believe that he wasn't the one who put his signature up there.
Olivia took out her black Sharpie and wrote her name right under Oliver's. She also signed her signature.
"Don't blink, I bet wouldn't qualify for the audition," she said to Oliver, with a proud smile.
Oliver shrugged nonchalantly.
He knew his worry was not about qualifying for the competition. He was being hunted, that was his worry.