[SIZE=21pt]Chapter 5[/SIZE]
[SIZE=14pt]“So.” Chef X said, a grin on her face.[/SIZE]
“So.” Olive echoed.
“Let’s cut the chit-chat and start where we ended.” Butterflies twittered in Olive’s stomach. To her, the words couldn’t come out of Chef X’s mouth fast enough. “Olive, my dear, you are an elementalist.”
A wave of confusion splashed over Olive’s face. “I’m a what?”
“An elementalist! Tell me you’ve heard of them!”
“Yeah, no. What is an elementalist? Is it bad? Contagious? A BRAIN DISEASE?!” Olive panicked.
“No no no! An elementalist is person who can control one of the elements. And you,”—Chef X sighed—“can control water! Now we just have to find the other 4!”
“I-I what? The other 4? What is it? Water, Fire, Sky, Earth and…?”
“…and Moods. This person can show his or her mood in some sort of obvious way. I don’t mean like, crying when you’re sad, or leaping when you’re happy, oh no no. I mean, steam coming from his or her ears when he or her is frustrated, or a storm cloud appears over his head when he is having a rotten day or a light bulb above his head when he gets an idea.”
Olive took a moment to let this all sink in. She was a special girl picked from a handful of 5. Talk about inheritance. “Wow.” Was all she could utter at this point.
“Well, that’s about all I have to say, and you can go back to your dinner now.” Chef X said, standing up. Olive stood up too. She was making her way to the door when Chef X called out, “Oh, and if, for any reason, you have a question, concern or need to talk to somebody about this, you can come to me. And don’t tell anybody. Except maybe Skye; I have known her for a while and although she may be talkative, she sure can keep a secret.” Chef X winked.
“Ok.” Olive said. She walked through the door of the dorm, past the supplies, past the cooks and into the cafeteria.
Meanwhile…
Dustin slowly walked down the stairs. His life wasn't going to well. First, a girl he secretly liked was gone. Now his best friends hated him. Why does my life have to be like this? First, my hair turned red, UNEXPECTEDLY! Then, my albino friend doesn't believe me! His mother was in the kitchen, making dinner.
"Hi, mom." he slumped down into one of the seats.
"Why so sad?" she asked while changing the temperature on the stove to high.
"Luke hates me!"
"Why?"
"He thought I was lying."
"Lying about what?"
"My hair turning red." At this, his mom turned away from the food she was preparing and gave him a stern look.
"Why do you keep using that odd story?
"Because it is TRUE!" at this, he ran to his room, where he stayed until the next morning. One of the reasons he stayed there was because, there was a reunion.
Back at St. Xaviers…
“So what did Chef X say?” Skye asked when Olive sat down.
“Oh uh…” Olive hesitated to answer. “Ok, promise not to tell?”
“Promise.”
“Pinky swear?” Olive held out her pinky.
“Pinky swear.” Skye shook pinkies with Olive.
“Ok this is what happened.” Olive explained the whole story. In the end, Skye looked hardly surprised.
“I knew it.” She murmured. “It was destined to be. I just…wow. So there are… 4 left right? Uh, Earth, Sky, Fire, and Mood?”
“Oh does everybody know about this?”
“No, not many people the world know. I bet it’s like only 10 or something. Chef X told me. She knows everything. We have a strong friendship so she tells me stuff I should know.” Skye smiled. “I see lots of things here because I can fly. Speaking of which,” Skye took Olive’s hand, “close your eyes.” Olive shut her eyes. She heard Skye’s voice say, “Start running until…you feel light.” Still holding hands, Olive and Skye ran. Skye knew they were running towards an open window, where Olive was clueless. Skye jumped out the window, pulling Olive with her. Olive stopped running as she felt she was “light”. “You can open your eyes now.” Skye said after a few minutes. Olive opened her eyes.
She was flying over the town, and saw all the lights from a Birdseye view. It was amazing. The wind was rushing through her hair and into her face. She felt like she was a feather, floating carelessly through the sky. It was like she was an angel, on her way to heaven. It was such a good feeling; no words will ever be invented to describe it.
“Whoa.” Was the only thing that could come out from Olive’s mouth.
“Close your eyes again. I have a surprise for you.” Skye grinned as Olive closed her eyes. Skye flew towards the beach, now she was in the middle of the ocean; she flew close down to it. “Open your eyes again.”
“Skye, this is…my ocean.” Olive said in disbelief.
“I know. I took you here for a reason.” They soared over the ocean and Olive watched its waters thoughtfully.
“Skye, this is great and thank you so much, but, can you take me one last place before we go back?”
“Sure, where to?”
“There, right there.” Olive pointed to a two story cream colored house with a green mini van in the parkway.
“Oh the one with the green mini van?”
“That’s the one.”
“Hold on.” Skye said, accelerating towards the house. “Where at the house?”
“That window. The one on the second floor. The one with the aqua curtains.” Olive gazed at the window as they got closer. When they finally reached it, Olive knocked on the window. Skye and Olive waited a minute and suddenly the curtains flew open.
“Olive!” cried Dustin.
“Dustin!” Olive cried back.
“Skye.” Skye said randomly. Dustin and Olive looked at her.
“Dustin, open the window!” Olive said, a smile so large on her face, it would remind somebody of a half moon. Dustin hurried and opened the window and Skye flew in with Olive, hardly clinging to her hand.
“What the-” Dustin could barely say those two words when he saw them flying.
“It’s a long story. Oh! Dustin, this is Skye, Skye this is Dustin.” Olive said.
“Nice to meet you Skye.” Dustin said, sticking out his hand, in which, Skye would shake.
“You too.” Skye, instead of shaking his hand, high-fived him.
Dustin chuckled and turned to Olive. “What are you doing here? I thought you were in your school. And…and-”
“Shhh.” Olive put her finger over his mouth. “We aren’t supposed to be here. I was in school but,” Olive looked at Skye, “a friend took me over here. I just wanted to say hi while we were here.”
“Wait! Well I have to tell you something. I-”
“Sorry. Bye Dustin.” Olive grabbed Skye’s hand, and Skye began to lift into the air slowly.
“But-” Dustin looked up desperately. But they were already gone. “No.” he murmured.
“I feel bad about that. Maybe we should go back.” Olive said, glancing back at the window, which, she could see the figure of a head very faintly.
“No! We have to get back to school, or else more punishment will come our way.” Skye pulled out a very small far, about the size of a soda can. “I brought this so you can put some of the water from…your ocean. “Who knows? It might be easier to control.” Skye smiled
Olive felt so peaceful, soaring over the beautiful ocean, towards the shadowy, gloomy dark castle looking school. Olive opened the jar, plunged her hand into the ocean, and pulled it out. The jar of water was beautiful in her wet, glistening hand. She closed it up with a small smile. She turned her head forward and closed her eyes. Enjoying the pleasant wind on her face, she thought about the tunnel she had explored earlier with Skye. Why was it there? What was going on with that mysterious gold door? Was it holding any mysterious secrets? Olive was opening her mouth to bring it up, but now they were going through the window into the hall.
“Shhh!” Skye warned.
“Can we come down now?” Olive whispered, looking at the floor from the ceiling which she and Skye were very close to hitting with their backs.
“No.” Skye whispered. “Angie might spot us and this is quieter. Also quicker.”
“Quicker? Back at my ocean, bikers were faster then us.”
“Oh I can control that.”
“Control what?”
“My speed. Check it out.” Skye squinted her eyes and before Olive knew it, the walls and everything were just a blur. It didn’t seem like they were moving until they plummeted out another open window.
“Where are you going? We need to go to the bedroom.”
“First, we call it the B.R. and second, we need to fly through the windows, because everybody will know we snuck out. The door creaks when you open it from the outside. Plus, the girls never close their windows.” Skye explained as they hovered over the roof. They flew towards one of the ridiculously tall, roof-pointed, towers. There were two on each sides of “the castle” as Skye put it. “We call it “the M.C.” because it looks so much like a medieval castle.” She explained. She flew about 2/3 towards the top and stopped at a large (at least for a window, large), round window. She flew in slowly and softly and landed very quietly on the floor.
“’Night.” Olive whispered, quickly putting on pajamas and getting into bed.
“Sweet dreams.” Skye whispered, already in pajamas and climbing into bed.
“I count on it. Dustin…” Olive said softly to herself, drifting off to sleep from the soft breathing of the other girls.
Giggles and Hilary Duff’s hit song; ‘Wake Up’ was what woke Olive up that Wednesday morning.
“Wha-?” Olive yawned, her eyes still a bit groggy. The giggles grew louder. Rubbing her eyes, the forms of all the girls in her B.R. in their pajamas grew clearer and clearer. Skye was one of them.
“Surprise!” she cheered. “Hope you like Hilary Duff! We do this to all the new girls. This is the usual group of girls in this B.R.” All the girls began to high-five each other. Olive hated being woken up rudely, but usually told people who didn’t know very gently. But today, she was grumpy. For no reason, she just woke up and felt grumpy. But it wasn’t the normal grumpy. It was a kind where she feels something bad is about to happen, and to prevent it, she has to be grumpy.
“Shut up.” Olive muttered loudly. The giggles ceased and all the girls stared at her, some with the expression of shock, some with the expression of hurt. Skye, however, had both. “Never wake me up like that again, or you’ll pay the cost.”
“Sorry!” Skye exclaimed sarcastically, but it sound more like ‘Saw-ree!’. “You don’t have to be so rude about it!”
“Well, you’re off the hook…this time.” Olive glared at all the girls and got dressed. She wore her blue shirt with a dolphin on it and her green jeans. She slipped into her red all-stars, brushed her blonde hair and washed her face. Right when she left, frantic talk began to spread around the room.
Meanwhile…
He was walking through a tunnel. It never seemed to end. Steps are behind him! He starts running... the steps are getting faster! The light! It's there! BEEP! BEEP! BEEP! Groaning, Dustin turned off his alarm. “That dream was so odd!” Thought Dustin. He walked to his closet. His mind was with the night before… with Olive and Skye… He looked into his mirror. There was something wrong. It was his hair. It took on another color. Purple.
Dustin screamed at the top of this his lungs as he ran downstairs in his boxers.
"MOM! MY HAIR!"
"Not again! Stop this nonsense!" said his mother.
"I AM SERIOUS!"
"Dustin! Look in the mirror!" slowly, Dustin looked into the mirror. His hair was brown.
"Now go and get dressed!" commanded his mother.
"Fine." he walked up the stairs and put on an Eco United shirt, and some brown shorts.
On the bus, Dustin looked for Luke. It wasn't hard. Around the middle of the bus was white scraggly hair.
"Hey, Luke!" said Dustin. Luke looked at him, and then quickly looked away. Dustin walked to the seat, but Luke's little sister, Donna, was sitting in the same seat as Luke. Donna was a brunette, skinny, and 8 years old.
"Hi, Dustin!" she said.
"Hey, Donna."
"Sorry, but it is two to a seat."
"I know." Dustin said as he walked off. The only open seat was next to Jenna. Groaning, he sat down next to her.
"Hi, Dustin! Are you going to be the guidance counselor today?"
"I don't know."
"Well, I think it would be fun!"
"I guess."
"You ok?"
"No."
"Why not?"
"Luke hates my guts."
"Because.....?"
“He thought I told him a lie when it really-" before he finished, he saw Jenna's eyes grow huge.
"Uh, you ok?" she still just looked at him bug-eyed. “Helloo?" He waved his hand in front of her face.
"B-b-t-t it-s g-r-reen!" she blabbered.
"What?"
“YOUR HAIR IS GREEN!!"
"What!?"
"Wait, now it's brown.... Does that happen often?"
"Well, it once turned red. Another time, purple. Now, apparently, it tuned green. Jenna, can I ask you a favor?"
"Yes..." she was still freaked out.
"Please don't say a WORD about this, ok?"
"S-sure."
"Thanks."
Back at St. Xaviers…
Whispers of worry were crowding the room.
“What’s wrong with her?”
“I’ve been grumpy before, but never like that.”
“What did she mean by ‘or else’?”
“Whaddya’ think she’ll do if she gets the guts.” The whispers grew louder and louder. Finally the clamor was hushed by an even louder and shriller whistle.
“God, like, SHUT UP!” yelled Angie, who stuck her head in the B.R. “Everybody in the other B.R.’s are complaining. Jeez!” Angie slammed the door behind her.
“She’s right!” Skye exclaimed, standing on her bed so all the girls were paying attention to her.
“That we are too loud?” one girl named Calida called out. The name Calida, means ‘Most Beautiful’ which fit Calida entirely. She had beautiful long brown hair that was very lush and full, eyes as brown as hot chocolate, freshly made and smooth, clear skin. She also always had the best wardrobe. She was pretty smart, but she still struggles.
“No! That we need to calm down, and talk this out.” Skye said.
“She never said that!” Another girl named Nadia called out. Nadia means ‘Hope’ in Russian, which fits her too, because she almost always had hope in everything.
“She implied it!” Somebody answered for Skye. The name of this girl means ‘God’s Power’. The name of this girl is Jael, who fits her name, like many others. She has been blessed when she was born, because she had gotten the power of the mind. Meaning, she was telekinetic and she knew just about everything.
“Oh…” Nadia trailed off.
“Anyway,” Skye said impatiently, “We gotta buckle down, and concentrate. Why would Olive be like this? Usually she is kind…and not angry.”
“Maybe she didn’t like what we did.” Calida said.
“Maybe she is possessed!” a girl named Samantha called out.
“Maybe we should talk about this later so we aren’t late for breakfast!” a random girl yelled.
“Right.” Skye said, jumping down and getting dressed into her white shirt with a penguin on it and her purple skirt. All of the girls ran to their classes, some still shoving their shoes on.
During breakfast, Olive was silent, and didn’t even notice Rick watching her from across the table. She shoveled down the French toast and left. Chef X’s French toast is delicious, but Olive was so confused and angry, she couldn’t taste a thing.
Then, during her power class, she couldn’t even make a ripple. That just made her more frustrated.
In English, Mrs. Keller had all the students sit down and listen to her announcement before they continued The Lightning Thief.
“Today is going to be the first day of P.E. class. You will go after your last class to the old willow by the pond. You will also be given 10 minutes to go to your R.R. and put on some comfortable clothes,” Mrs. Keller paused to look specifically at Calida, who was wearing high heels, a jeans skirt and a large, pink, puffy jacket, and continued, “that you can do P.E. in. Questions?” Three hands went up. “Yes Sean?” Mrs. Keller pointed at a boy with messy black hair and a wild look in his gray eyes.
“What should we wear?” Sean asked in his hyper-sounding voice.
“I would say a baggy t-shirt and baggy shorts. Yes Kim?”
A red-haired girl with a tan face smiled her white-toothed smile and asked, “What is the P.E. teacher’s name?” her voice was like a jungle. It sounded mellow, though, full of excitement.
“Mr. Ramzee. Yes Tonya?” Mrs. Keller said, nodding to Tonya. Olive just realized that Tonya was in her class right now. “Now I would like everybody to take out their copy of The Lightn- oh! Homework! Please put your homework in that wire basket over there.” She pointed to a wire basket by the door. Everybody, except for Tom, a telekinetic boy who just moved his homework with his mind, got up, put their homework in the basket, sat down and opened their copy of The Lightning Thief.
Mrs. Keller read until Chapter 13. Olive could barely listen to when Percy Jackson, the main character, is claimed by Poseidon, god of earthquakes, horses and water. She didn’t even notice when Percy Jackson had encountered the Oracle, both scenes, of which, are very exciting. She was too busy contemplating why she was so angry. But, since she couldn’t find out, she just got frustrated and even more upset. Finally when English was over, she began sprinting to Science. Maybe I can run it off she thought. Dodging the students, she was the first one to Mr. Flam’s class.
“Hello Olive.” Mr. Flam said when she arrived. “You’re early. Very early…”
“Yeah.” Olive gasped, out of breath. “Angry…no reason…English…Percy Jackson…thinking…frustration…sprinting…burn it off.”
“Right. Tell me when you have your breath back.” Mr. Flam went over to go greet the students who just arrived. Nadia, as you remember from Olive’s B.R., walked in and her face brightened. She quickly sat next to Olive.
“Hi!” she smiled enthusiastically.
“What?” Olive closed her eyes slowly opened them. While she opened them, she looked at Nadia.
“About this morning…why were you so angry? I mean, I know you probably weren’t that fond about the whole, waking you up thing, but why so harsh. We gotta spread the love, man.”
“Stop talking like a hippie.” Olive turned her face to Nadia, and to Nadia’s surprise, the face was full of panic. “I don’t know!” Olive cried. “I just woke up and was angry! I want it to stop!”
“Olive! Calm down! Let’s go see Chef X at break. She knows, like, everything!” Nadia smiled. “Just, keep cool this class.”
“Hello students! Good to see you today.” Mr. Flam looked at all of them.
“What’s so good about it?” Olive desperately wanted to say, but knew that wouldn’t make her any better.
“Today, we will be testing the germination of these tomato plants,” Mr. Flam motioned to some cups full of soil, “by giving each cup, which have 5 tomato seeds in them, a different type of music. I will call your name and you will pick a partner. Then you and your partner will come up here, take two cups, one per partner, and cross off the music that I have written on the board, that you are going to use. First, Nadia Aarons.”
Nadia smiled and replied happily. “I pick Olive Otelia!” This made Olive feel a little better. They stood up and took one cup each. They looked at the board. The list was:
Rock-If Everyone Cared
Hip Hop-P.I.M.P. (Warning: Explicit Lyrics)
Pop- Potential Breakup Song
Alternative-Misery Business
Country-Before He Cheats
Electronic-Technologic (Radio Edit)
Comedy- White and Nerdy
Soundtrack-Bet on It
Classical- A Daisy in December
Jazz- True Love
Sad Music- Wake Me Up When September Ends
Olive took a moment to study all of them. Nadia however walked right up and checked off ‘Sad Music’ which was the exact opposite of her. Olive stared at Nadia.
“What?” Nadia asked, blushing. “I like the song ‘Wake Me up When September Ends’ by Green Day.”
Olive finally decided on Rock. As they went to their desks, Mr. Flam followed them and handed them each a CD player with headphones.
“These are set on replay, so you just put the CD in,” he handed them each a CD, one with just the song “Wake Me up When September Ends” and one with “If Everyone Cared” by Nickelback, “and the song continues on and on. Don’t worry, the battery won’t run out. Good luck.” The two girls put in the CD, put the headphones around the jars of dirt and began the music.
The rest of the class, Mr. Flam called out people to pick partners, jars of soil and music. Finally everybody had a partner, a jar of soil, and some music. One boy named Jake began listening to his music, which was “Bet on It”. Mr. Flam walked over and pulled off his headphones.
“No.” he said. “Ok class, keep your music off but put the headphones on the jars.” Mr. Flam instructed. “Now turn on your music when I say go. Ready…set…goat!” Everybody stood still. One person even yelled, “C’mon Mr. Flam! That’s the oldest trick in the book!” Mr. Flam sighed and said, “Go.” And everybody turned on their music. The rest of Science was writing down the hypothesis and why they think that they will get that.
Finally the bell rang. Everybody ran, and Olive impatiently waited for Nadia outside of the Science room. When Nadia came out Olive snatched her and they began running down the hall. They didn’t stop until they got to the cafeteria. The two girls burst through the cafeteria doors and ran into the kitchen.
“Where’s Chef X?” Olive asked one of the cooks.
“Dorm.” The cook replied and walked off.
“What’d she mean by-?” Nadia began. Olive pulled her through the busy, hot kitchen into Chef X’s dorm.
“Chef X! Chef X!” Olive ran to the sofa that Chef X was reading on. Nadia followed.
“Hello Olive. Nadia. What can I do for you? Oh and if you’re here to ask me for more tater tot’s tonight, forget it!” Chef X looked up from her book.
“No Chef X.” Nadia said. “This is serious. Olive woke up this morning and was mad and grumpy. For no reason. We thought you might know about this. You know, considering you know just about everything.”
“Oh…oh no. I feared this would happen. Olive, tell me exactly how you felt.” Chef X’s cheery face suddenly darkened.
“Well I felt angry, and it wouldn’t go away. It felt like something bad was going to happen. It was scary.” Olive said.
“Olive, I don’t really know how to tell you this, you have the sense. Because you are an elementalist, there is a legend behind it. It said that one of them had a sense, of something happening. That’s you. You must have a spy on you.” Chef X notified.
Olive’s eyes widened. “Whoa. Major news AND major mood change at the same time.” She said. “Suddenly, I feel like a major load will be taken off my shoulders, like if I’m carrying two chairs, somebody is going to come help me. But it feels twice of that.”
“I see. That means, another 2 elementalist are in, or coming to the school.