The Day That Followed

As much as Captain Smith hoped that Alexander would eat, the fact of the matter was that the Northern Caracal would not. When the next day came, he found that all he wanted to do was sleep, but to his dismay, he found every noise was absolute torture. He could hear Ms. Burnett playing the piano down below while the girl's all practiced ballet and while anyone else would have found the music quite nice, to Alexander that little noise was only one of many. He could hear Captain Smith, Alan and Mr. Cook hammering shelves together down the hall and Emma was scratching at some door that was closed because she was feeling lonely.

Alas, there was no one to close the door, for Nana Smith was having tea in the dinning room with some others of the household and some guests, including Mr. Cook's fiancée Eleanor Armstrong and four students from the first batch, two of were the now married Timothy and Colette Covington and the engaged Herman Petit and Verna Gillespie. Why Emma didn't go into the dinning room was anyone's guess. There were people there so why was she so focused on whoever was in that one room?

Canines were strange.

As Alexander lay on the bed, trying to sleep with only Roxana for company, he found someone new enter the room. It was a canine, one that resembled both Cnut and Emma and it did not take Alexander long to realize this was a pup of theirs now fully grown or close to it and for a canine whose was half-Vancouver Island wolf and half-Alaskan malamute and whose mother was a rough collie, the pup truly was a strange sight. He was quite sable in colouration, very much resembling his mother, but his shape more strongly resembled his father, save for some rough collie-like features such as fur length.

Alexander could only stare at this wolfdog who was more dog than wolf. He had heard his master speak of a wolfdog by appellation of Oliver, named after the great villain Oliver Cromwell, who had been mostly dog and as vicious as can be while his counterpart Charles, a wolfdog who was more wolf than dog, was as gentle as a kitten. Was this pup like Oliver?

The pup approached and proceeded to lick Alexander. Apparently, he was not like Oliver at all. That he was friendly, Alexander was glad, but he wanted to sleep and what the pup was doing was certainly not helping him try to sleep. He would have hissed at the pup, but that simply was not a good way to behave towards a guest.

Soon, someone new entered: Timothy Covington, a young Englishman of nineteen years now living in Canada. He was thin with a narrow face that had a long, thin nose upon it. His hair was black with both mustache and goatee upon it and his eyes were a deep blue. He was five feet and eleven inches in height and wearing a grey suit.

The moment Timothy entered the room, he said: "Now, Harold, what do you think you are doing? Alexander here needs rest." His voice was rich and flawless. The pup, Harold by appellation, looked at his master with tail wagging and then proceeded to lick Alexander once more. The Northern Caracal may have not been growling or hissing, but upon his countenance was an expression of annoyance most restrained. Chuckling, Timothy walked over to the bed and knelt down. "Harold, that's enough." Looking at Roxana, the young man saw an Asiatic caracal that looked less friendly. She was glaring at Harold with her ears flattened against her skull. "You would be Roxana then? You are a beauty. If I didn't know better, I'd say you were Darius' daughter. You kind of look like him, to me at least." Extending a hand to pet Roxana, Timothy found a hiss to be what he got. Retracting his hand, Timothy then said: "It's okay, girl. It's alright. Yeah, need to do this on your own terms. Heard about how Herr von Fell treated you." Then looking to Alexander, he said: "Come on, boy. You can pull through this. Miltiades is out there. He must be defeated and it is not the place for a man to do it. It must be one of the four-footed peoples. I'm sorry, I haven't introduced myself. I'm Timothy." Alexander just stared at the young man. He just wanted to sleep and this person yammering on was not helping. Standing up, Timothy then said: "Anyways, I will leave you to your rest. Come, Harold." And with that Timothy exited the room, Harold too, but not before the pup had given Alexander one last lick.

Watching as the two left Alexander closed his eyes with the most intense expression upon his countenance, as if sleep took a great detail of effort. It was normal for felines to make such an expression sometimes and it could even be said that it sometimes felt as if sleep took a great deal of effort.

Alas, Alexander found no sleep. Harold had suddenly started barking downstairs for some reason or another. Would the Northern Caracal ever find sleep today?

He could only wish.

Soon Alan entered the room and took a seat on the floor next to the bed. The sixteen-year-old boy sighed and looked at Alexander. Unfortunately, Alexander did not look at him. He just stared past Alan, looking out of the room.

"You know, Hippolyta is really torn up about what's happened to you, Alexander." Said Alan. "I saw her last night with her arms wrapped around the statue of Sekhmet downstairs, muttering 'Please let Alexander get well' over and over again. Can you imagine that? Around Sekhmet! If a priest from any church in Oshawa were to have seen that, a fit would have been thrown. Gemma and I had been out by the lake last night when we had found her. We saw that the door to the exhibits was open and we went in to see the reason. You know, make sure that Filcher wasn't back or anything... She doesn't want anything bad to you, Gemma doesn't want anything bad to happen to you, I don't want anything bad to happen to you... Alexander, no one here wants anything bad to happen to you. We all love you and I... I don't... I don't want to lose anyone again this year, but I know I am going too! I've lost my dad, I've lost my mom, I'm going to lose my nana..." Taking a second to breathe, Alan brought a hand to his face. His cheeks were wet. "Good lord, am I starting to cry?" He was. Alexander could tell. Lifting his head, Alexander proceeded to sniff the tears. He had seen Gemma cry, but never before had he seen Alan cry. Was this something that all people could do? Could only adolescents have done this? Alas, he knew not. He only knew that Alan was very distressed, just as Gemma had been.

"Alan?" Alexander looked to the doorway. There, sure enough, stood Gemma, Mr. Cook's sixteen-year-old-daughter. She was a slender damsel of five feet and six inches with light skin, reddish-brown hairs and red hair that was long and straight. Her typical attire, as she was currently dressed, consisted of a blue kimono with shoes of the same colour and a pink turban. She had an honest face and she was fairly attractive. A human would have said her mouth was the cutest, yet Alexander, being a caracal, knew nothing of the cuteness of the human mouth.

Laying his head back down upon the bed, Alexander resigned himself to this being his afternoon. No chance of sleep, just the piano music, Emma scratching at the door and pairs of individuals be they human and beast or just two humans coming in and keeping him from that joy that was slumber. Why was this happening? Wasn't the fact that he was wounded enough? Couldn't he just be allowed to sleep? Was that too much to ask for?

He was becoming tempted to just hiss at Alan and Gemma, to tell them to get out. He was better than that, yet still the temptation was there for the Northern Caracal.

Without even raising his head, Alexander watched as Alan and proceeded to speak to Gemma. The boy was stuttering or stammering, the Northern Caracal was not sure what the difference was, only that Alan was doing it. When the girl took the boy by the hand and led him from the room, Alexander closed his eyes and hoped that no one else would come in, as even all the sounds seemed to stop.