Well, I'd like to dedicate this story to the wonderful Captain Sealant. They're such a gifted artist and made the most adorable OC ever created. Btw, Nat is actually a character from Captain Sealant's animatic of "You'll Be Back", the cute, tall, and smiling soldier boy next to Ollie by the end of the video. Whelp, if you guys don't mind, I'm going to take a nap... I'm tired. This is OCC from Capt.'s world and this is just an unfinished set-up into the actual story, as most first chapters are so enjoy.

"HURRY UP, YOU LAZY ASS! MOVE, MOVE, MOVE!"

Ollie could barely see with his exhausted, bleary vision. Suddenly, he felt a rough kick to his backside and he sprawled onto the muddy, disgusting floor.

A hard, malicious gaze stared unforgivingly at him from above. "You better have this place clean in an hour or I'll extend your contract another seven years!"

The slam of the door was the last thing Ollie could hear of his master as he cowered on the floor. Just five more years. Just five more years…

Dredging himself through the dark, filthy, tiny streets, Ollie could faintly see in the shadows of the broken, ragged houses around him. There was only one house he was searching for, however.

In all this darkness, there was light. He lifted his tired gaze in worn-out joy at the sight of his run-down, cobbled-together "house". Stuffed in with what seemed like a million other houses in shambles, it hardly stood out except for the warm glow of candlelight softy shining within. It was far too late for any other person to be up.

Pulling himself together, Ollie completed the last few meters to the door, cautiously creaking the door open just a crack.

"Ollie!" The joyful cry was quickly followed by – to Ollie's non-surprise – a sweeping hug, pulling him out of the doorway and into the cozy, if not ragged, house. The slender, willowy figure set him down by the fire, careful to make sure he was in the warmest area. Dusting him off, the figure twittered over his scruffy, dirty appearance.

"Ollie," the scolding tone made him almost wince, "you're one dirty little fucker! What happened?"

A pause.

"It was that horrible man, wasn't it?"

She hugged him. "Well, we're just going to have to clean you up." Straightening his frayed shirt, she turned to a little pail of water nearby on the dirt floor. "You're lucky I dropped by a well earlier today. I don't think the flies have gotten into the water yet." Reaching for a rag, she dipped it into the water and ran the dampened cloth over Ollie's pallid face. The dirt and whatever had been in that chamber slipped off slowly as she worked meticulously over all his features.

Once his entire face was clean, she dropped the rag on the floor and kissed his forehead. She knelt down in front of his short, silent figure. "You worry me too much, Ollie. You're too passive – you need to tell your big sister these things! Don't stay silent." After huffing a little bit, she started again. "Honestly, you're just too much like mother. Too quiet."

Her chattering was met with exhausted silence. Her eyes softened mournfully. She cupped his downcast face with both of her hands. "I wish I could do so much for you. A twelve-year-old like you shouldn't have to suffer so much. I wish our father wasn't such a drunken fool. I wish he had died earlier – before he accumulated so much debt and sold you into indentured servitude… I wish…"

She looked away brusquely. "I wish a lot of things. But," she turned back to him, light brown eyes twinkling impishly, as if she was holding a gay secret. "I have good news."

That made him look up. Good news was so scarce.

"You deserve the finest education, not a single day where you need to work – like those gentry boys I always have to serve. But I've got something almost as good."

For the first time in a long time, interest sparked in his dull brown eyes.

"I got you out of that damn contract. You're no longer in debt to that horrible man."

His young mouth opened, speechless. He made a guttural sound in the back of his throat, struggling to express his thoughts.

"H – how?" For the first time that day, he spoke in a soft, stuttered whisper.

Her eyes kept twinkling as she lifted a figure to her mouth. "It's a secret." She stood up again, the reason for his dazed silence capturing all his thoughts.

"Well," she stretched, "I've got to go to work."

That jolted him out of his thoughts. He looked towards his sister, eyebrows scrunched in perplexation. "I thought you were a laundry maid. The wealthy don't need you at night." His soft-spoken manner almost off-set his gentle, hidden question.

She laughed, a twinkling, joyful laugh that filled Ollie with hope for the future. Maybe nothing was as bad as he had thought earlier. "Don't mind that. Go to sleep, Oliver Aedeline, and have good dreams."

His confusion slowly faded as he watched his tall, pretty, and confident older sister leave and close the door behind herself. She must have been an angel sent to help him. He… he couldn't believe…

Lying down in one of the corners of the one room house, he curled up and cried. Tears of happiness washed over his tired, little form as the sun slowly rose in the east, signaling the beginning of a new dawn.

One year later.

"Ollie!"

The short, brown-eyed young man turned towards the call, an adorable smile filling his features.

"Octavia!"

As he called back to his sister, her heart was filled with jubilation with all of the healthy changes within her little brother. One year of kindness had made the boy flourish. Once she had reached him, she pinched his cheek and smiled with a teasing grin.

"Look at you, Mr. Thirteen-Year-Old! I mean," she mockingly picked at his ratty clothes and poked fun at his short stature, "not an inch taller but a whole lot cuter!"

Ollie flushed in embarrassment as he scrambled for a comeback. "Well, uh, you… Uh… Joseph…"

She threw her head back in laughter. "What about Joseph? I see you were about to make a smart comment."

He blushed and ducked his head down. "Never mind."

She smiled at her easily embarrassed little brother and ruffled his light brown hair gently, regretting nothing. "Even after a year, you're still so much like our mother. She looked just like you, you know. You were too young at the time to remember, but she was really quite quiet and tiny. Honestly, I'm a little worried you're a little too much like her. She was, when she was living, a very weak person. She could never say no. Well, then again, it's better than being like our abusive piece shit of a dad."

Head still down, he nodded sheepishly. She was right – he could rarely say no or state his opinion on things – he was very weak.

But she continued talking. "But don't let that get you down, Ollie. You're smart – very smart – I can tell."

And with another, yet sadder, smile, her hand drifted down to her pack. "You're probably wondering why I'm home so early. It's bad news, I'm afraid." The smile dropped completely. "The money's running out again. I hate –" Her eyes squeezed shut, "I hate that I need to tell you this."

"We need you to work again." Opening her eyes again, she met a sight that made her heart squeeze. He wasn't completely healed from his four years of torture, his terrified gaze said that much.

At his stricken look, she comforted him with a softer whisper. "Not as a servant of debt. You need to find work, yes, but only to keep us afloat. You will have full rights and you will never have to face that torture ever again for as long as I live."

His sigh of relief comforted her even more than her news did him.

"Okay."

He looked up, a rosy, reassuring smile accompanying his response. "It's okay. I needed to help you out anyway. It's a wonder you get any sleep at all, always working day and night."

She choked in relief, his gentle response to the news condoling her more than she had anticipated. She hid it behind a strangled laugh and a chiding retort. "Hey, it's my job as your older sister to take care of you."

"Not as much as you do," he said quietly, "Never as much as you sacrifice."

Hiding her horror behind another laugh, she spoke again. "Don't kid yourself."

His warm brown eyes locked onto hers. "Don't think I don't know."

Her heart stopped.

"You could've been married to Joseph by now, if I weren't holding you back."

An inaudible sigh of relief bit into her throat. "No. No, it's not you, Ollie. Don't ever think of yourself as a burden to me. Besides, Joseph… he's a darling but I'm barely fifteen and he's twenty-two."

Ollie scratched his head. "He just turned twenty-two a few months back, when you were still fifteen. You two are only six and a half years apart. A lot of girls get married around your age, and to guys twice their age."

It was her turn for her cheeks to burn. "W – well."

Turning to the door, she called back, embarrassed. "J – just find a job!"

Ollie giggled softly to himself while his sister left. A year really did do him good. While he was still far shorter than other boys his age, he had a healthy glow and nice, tan skin. His previously thin lips filled out and his dull brown eyes sparked a new shine of life. Shaggy, light brown hair cuddled his small, sweet face.

Then it was his turn to face the door, the symbol of his new need for legitimate work. He took a deep breath. And opened the door.

Wandering the busy streets of London, Ollie was smacked with the smells and shouts and shine of upper-class London. Well, a more upper-class version of London than he was used to. Octavia went up here all the time to wash and repair all of her wealthy client's clothes. Suddenly he was a whole lot more appreciative of his sister than he already was. It seemed so easy to get lost within all of the madness.

Yelling from a vendor distracted Ollie for a moment, causing him to literally smack into something.

"Oh, are you alright!?" A concerned voice floated above Ollie, whose eyes were screwed shut. "I'm so sorry! I'm always so clumsy…"

He felt an arm pull him from the ground before he opened his eyes. A tall, lanky young man stood before Ollie, sheepishly scratching his blonde hair. His thin, well-proportioned face matched the rest of his body in its awkward gangly-ness. Pleasant brown eyes were averted and flashing in embarrassment.

"Nat – nice to meet you." He suddenly stuck his arm out, almost hitting Ollie again. "Shoot!" His alarmed expression almost made Ollie giggle. "Sorry! Sorry! I forgot that you need to ask my name first… and I need to present my hand after you say your name, right…? Or was I supposed to…?"

Amidst the young man's confusion, Ollie giggled a little and stuck out his own short arm. "Ollie. My name's Ollie. And it is nice to meet you… Nat, was it?"

Startled out of his puzzlement, he shook Ollie's hand. "Yep, I'm Nathaniel but call me Nat."

Bells suddenly clanged, signaling the end of the hour. "Shoot!" Nathaniel's face scattered in distress. "I was on an errand! Sorry, Mr. Ollie, but I need to go!"

As entertaining as it was that this 'Nat' called Ollie, a child much younger than him, 'Mr.', a thought unexpectedly occurred to Ollie. "Wait!"

The young man stopped and turned around.

"An errand? For who?" Ollie began.

Nat blinked. "The military. I'm in the army. I'm a soldier." He announced proudly, puffing out his chest to show off a rather worn, hardly red suit.

A sneaking thought strayed to Ollie. "How old are you?"

Paling slightly, Nat lifted his head up a little. "Nineteen."

At Ollie's look, he uncertainly tried again. "I am! Look – I'm growing a mustache!"

Now at this, Ollie's head threw back without his permission and a loud laugh escaped him. The young man's face was as smooth as a baby's bottom. Trying to maintain an offended look, but failing miserably, Nat cocked an eyebrow. Ollie continued to laugh – he couldn't help it! "Try again."

Nat's lips pressed together, attempting a serious look but only managing to suppress his own laugh. "Fine. Sixteen."

Laughter finally died off as Ollie wiped his eyes. "Sounds about right."

"Wonder where you got that mouth…" Nat muttered under his breath, trying to disguise his laughter.

Ollie's original reason for asking Nat's age almost lost itself within all of the hilarity of the blonde young man in front of him, but thankfully he remembered.

"Is the… is the army looking for more soldiers?"

"Huh?" The sudden change of topic threw the pleasant young man off.

"I mean," Ollie began to clarify, "if they accept sixteen-year-olds, do you think they'll accept a thirteen-year-old?"

Nat blinked. "You're thirteen?" At Ollie's look, he hurriedly clarified. "Sorry, I thought you were nine." Another blank stare. "Sorry, sorry. That was the wrong thing to say. Well, I think they will. The pay's okay and there's no war happening right now… Yeah, you know what? I think it's okay. I mean, with all the tension happening in the New World colonies, it might… But they almost never deploy guys like us – really young and untrained." He continued babbling while Ollie thought over what he had said.

"Okay." Interrupting Nat, Ollie presented the startled young man a smile. "Thanks. Good luck with your errand!"

Ollie turned, knowing his new destination, hearing a faint but alarmed "My errand!" behind him. Nat seemed nice – Ollie hoped that he would see him when he signed up.

"Boy, who are you kidding?" A gruff, dark-haired middle-aged man huffed on Ollie's trembling face. "No way in any hell would we accept a little stick like you into the army."

Melting into the floor sounded good right about now.

"Joaquin, relax." A smooth, rich voice entered in the scene. Whoever had said that, however, was hidden from Ollie's view due to his closed eyes. Bad Breath backed up a little from Ollie. Feeling a little safer, Ollie cautiously opened one of his eyes. Long, dark locks framed a handsomely masculine face with a faint stubble, featuring the darkest color of eyes Ollie had ever seen.

"Joseph!"

The handsome, strappy man glanced down at Ollie. "Ollie? Octavia's little brother? What are you doing here? Shouldn't you be with the other boys, playing in the river?"

With burning cheeks, Ollie gulped. "We – well, I was looking to… uh… join the army…?" Accidently turning his statement into a question, Ollie winced.

Joseph's broad shoulders, the only thing Ollie could see in his anxiety, shook with laughter. "Why?"

"Um… well… we're a little short money… and I promised Octavia that I would find a job to help out."

"Oh, you sweet lad," Joseph affectionately ruffled Ollie's head, to – what was it – Joaquin's gruff 'humph'. "Maybe we can find you something… we aren't in any major conflict at the moment but I think we can afford some kindness for such a hard worker like you, Ollie. Right, Joaquin?"

The grizzled man snorted. "Do what you like. I can't stop you, captain."

"Oh, come now." Joseph laughed and swung his arm around the shorter if not scarier man's shoulders. "Don't act that way, sir, you know the British Army doesn't have any formal command structure. We're buddies, remember? Now, real opinion. What do you think of letting little Ollie here into the British Army?"

Joaquin snorted again. "I think he'll be crushed on the first day in the barracks. But do what you want. We did accept a bumbling idiot sixteen-year-old the other day, after all. Why not a stick of a thirteen-year-old?"

Ollie's ears perked up at the mention of Nat but he stayed silent as the men debated about his entrance into the army.

"Well, Ollie," Joseph finally turned back to Ollie, "how 'bout you come back tomorrow? I'll have to make the final decision with the other captains and the general, but I'll probably have an answer for you on the morrow, okay?"

Well, that was better than he thought he was going to get. Nodding his head silently, Ollie began to exit the tent.

"And tell Octavia I said hi!" Joseph called as Ollie left. It was pretty cool that two guys Ollie felt he could trust were both in the same battalion. Hopefully, he'll be able to get into it too… Well, time to go home.

Sitting tiredly on the floor, Octavia counted the minutes before she had to leave for her second job. A familiar creaking sound distracted her from it a few seconds later.

"Via…"

"How'd it go?" She didn't mean to interrupt her little brother but she just wanted to settle the sinking feeling in her stomach.

"Via…" That tone of voice never boded well…

"Y…yes…?"

"I'm going to join the army."

That brought her to her feet. "What!? Since when!?" His little head bowed down and he hugged her abdomen, snuggling into her warm clothes like he used to when he was seven. Her stomach continued sinking.

"There's not much a bottom class boy like me can do, Via. You know that as much as I do. The army pays good. And there's nothing major happening right now so… I can stay safe."

"What about the chaos happening in the New World colonies!?" She knelt down and cupped both sides of his face, her lovely features distorted in unmasked distress. "What about training? What about all of those scary men in the armies? What about…" She choked off. "I can't protect you from the Army."

Gently pulling her hands off of his face, Ollie held them in his own small hands. "It'll be okay, Via. I'll stay safe."

She took one of her hands back and used it to roughly wipe at her wet eyes. Ollie continued. "And Joseph's going to be there. He'll also keep me safe. You don't have to –"

"Alright," she cut him off. "Alright. I'm not happy about this, but fine. I'll let you go. You just have to promise me you'll stay safe." Nodding, Ollie calmed his sister down just a tad bit.

"Okay, Ollie. Okay. Go to sleep. Tomorrow's a big day for you then. Go to sleep." Kissing her dear brother's cheek, she reluctantly pulled away from him and left the shabby house. Ollie closed the door behind her and anxiously awaited the next day's big decision.

A young boy stretched in the evening sun. He was fairly short but he'd seemed to be finally growing a little, filling out in all of the right places, on his way to being a healthy young man.

"Yo, Ollie!" The young boy turned to the sound of his name.

"Can't believe it's been a year already, huh? It feels like it was just yesterday when I accidently rammed into you trying to fetch new armaments for the army." The blonde, lanky young man smiled as he roughly ruffled the brunette, younger male's hair. "Well, I'm so glad you managed to get into my division, Ollie. Imagine how lucky you were! You going home this early?"

Ollie nodded silently. "I want to surprise Octavia – it's payday, after all."

Nat grinned. "How thoughtful of you. And Octavia… I've never heard that name before. Do you have a little girlfriend now, my foxy little friend?"

Flushing with embarrassment about the misunderstanding, Ollie shook his head. "No, she's my older sister."

Nat's eyes flashed with interest. "An older sister, huh? Is she married?"

Cocking an eyebrow, Ollie shook his head again. "No, she's not married. But you better not look at her. She's my sister, for god's sake. And that aside, she's the captain's beau."

The interest immediately died as Nat cocked his eyebrow in turn. "I didn't know the captain had a beau, let alone your sister."

"Well, it's not exactly official but they've been making eyes at each other since she was thirteen. It's almost embarrassing that they're not married yet."

Nat shivered. "The captain's twenty-four. That's disgusting."

Rolling his eyes, Ollie corrected him. "When she used to be thirteen. She's sixteen now."

Nat pursed his lips in mock annoyance. "I know that. But it's still a little weird, admit it."

Laughing a little, Ollie playfully pushed him. "What's weird is that we're talking about my sister's romances. Now, I've got to go home!"

"Alright, alright. I'll release you from the dungeon of work. See yah!"

Waving back at his friend, Ollie walked on, shouldering his little pack of pay. On the dirt road, Ollie skipped silently as he watched the chaos around him recede into quiet pockets of shadow. Suddenly, he looked up to see a curious gathering of large, muttering men around a rather short man.

"I can't believe the trouble had gotten so bad…" Little whispers swirled around him, slowly pushing Ollie to the crowd himself. And what he heard almost made him drop his pack.

"…the following regiments will be deployed to the New World colonies to put down the rebelling states," the short man began announcing. "The 23rd regiment, the 24th regiment, the 25th regiment…"

Ollie didn't need to hear anymore to know that his regiment was probably on that list. He turned tail and ran back the way he came. He needed to get back to the barrack, now!

After what seemed like hours, Ollie finally arrived, dusk already beginning to settle. The camp was ominously somber and quiet as Ollie wandered into it. For a place full of rough, lively men, it was too quiet. He continued walking in the dark courtyard until he accidently ran into a big bulk.

"Sorry!" He yelped from the ground, rubbing his head in pain. Looking up, his next apology died in his throat. "Joaquin…?"

The big man couldn't meet the young boy's tender gaze. "I guess you've heard the news then, Ollie?"

Ollie's throat went dry. "Ye – yes."

But Joaquin wasn't listening. "Every Army man twenty and above will be deployed tomorrow. The madness happening in the New World is getting worse, I hear. The trip will take a few months. Bring…" Joaquin's blank stare made Ollie shiver as Joaquin brusquely passed by, emptily reciting a list.

Twe – twenty and above? So that meant… he wasn't going to be deployed? He sank to his knees, clutching his erratic heart. He didn't have to break the news to Octavia… he didn't have to… Wait.

Blindly looking up at a sudden shadow over him, Ollie couldn't make out the man above him. Ollie hadn't realized that he'd been crying…

"Ollie?"

Ollie knew that voice. He knew that smooth, rich voice that always showed up on his doorway accompanied with flowers.

Gently scooped up by the man's steady arms, Ollie felt the constant, dependable thump of the man's heart through the soft, comforting fabric of the man's uniform. Without feeling the time past, Ollie focused on the gleaming, well-worn button on the man's uniform. The news… it was devastating… It didn't matter that he wasn't going to be deployed, it meant that –

"Joseph? What are you doing here? And why is Ollie in your arms!?" Hearing the rush of activity as he transitioned into his sister's arms, Ollie took solace in his sister's soft form, despite feeling like a baby. The soldier within him, who had been conditioned with a whole year of intense training, crumpled.

"Ollie! Ollie! Are you okay!? Joseph, tell me what happened!"