Flicker

Description
Disaster seems to follow Jo where ever he goes, but maybe Carl can help…

Prologue

Jo ran to the basement, locking the door behind him. He could barely see as tears blurred his vision. He stood at the center of the cellar, his sobs the only sound in the soundproofed room. It was almost worse than the screams in the streets.

He quickly ran over to the large computer desk, and yanked open the bottom drawer. He removed the false bottom, and pulled out a thick metallic disc. He held it close, and closed his eyes. Images flashed before his eyes. His friends. The bodies. He opened his eyes, and pressed the object to his forehead.

It wasn't fair. Why was he alive? Why did he, Jo get to live when others didn't? Everywhere he went. It was the same story. Same curse. Same misery over and over and over and over and over. He sighed, and lowered his hands. He looked at the disc, and reluctantly pressed the button on the top.

He looked around, and everything vanished into the familiar white light.

Chapter One

I yawned as I sat up, stretching my arms behind me as I did so. Less than a minute later, the alarm clock on the table next to my bed set off into an irritating screech. I quickly jabbed at the "off" button, and the noise ceased.

I swung my legs over the side of my bed, and stood up. I grabbed the blue jogging outfit that was draped over my chair, stripped down to my boxers, and pulled it on.

I grabbed my iPhone, and sipped it into its special case. I unlocked it, opened up YouTube, and selected my running playlist. I grabbed my wireless headphones, synced them, and secured them over my head. I strapped the velcro phone case around my upper left arm. Before I left my bedroom, I grabbed my sneakers, and slipped them onto my feet.

I flicked off the lights as I left my bedroom. I quietly walked downstairs. My dad was already at work, but I didn't want to wake up my mom. When I arrived in the kitchen, I opened a cabinet, and took an energy bar. As I scarfed it down, I opened the fridge and grabbed my health drink. I emptied the contents into my mouth, then dumped the cup into the sink. The energy bar's wrapper met its fate in the trash can.

I made my way out of the kitchen, and exited the house, closing the door behind me. I slowly headed down the sidewalk. After about a minute, I veered off onto the the path that led to the forest trails. As I jogged down the two-mile-long loop, the sky streaked with the red hues of sunset, and the town slowly woke up.

As I pounded down the snowy, pine-tree-lined path, the calm music swirling in my head gradually switched to louder, faster-paced beats. My short, quick breaths were visible in white swirls that drifted past me as I ran though in the early February air. As I neared the end of the run, the music slowed. As I slowed along with it, I saw something that made me skid to a stop. I pushed my headphones down around my neck - not bothering to stop the playlist.

There was a massive sphere of shifting white light hovering in the middle of the path. I stared at it, shocked at its sudden appearance, and more than perplexed as to how it go there. After a moment, the light dissipated, and a small figure dropped from the space where the strange thing had been.

The figure appeared to be some kind of person. An unconscious person. He was small, and wore what appeared to be a white shirt, and pair of white jeans. The shirt had a series of bloody slashes, as if some unknown creature with a massive paw had taken a nasty swipe at him. His shoulder was crusted with blood, both old and fresh. His left pant leg was stained with red blood - slowly drying. Around his neck was a strip of silky black cloth with what looked to be a tiny little bell attached to it - the kind you'd put on a pet.

The thing that took my attention away from the injuries, was his ears. On top of his head, there was a pair of furry black cat ears. A bit stranger, was the fact that the rest of his hair was as white as the snow in the nearby drifts - inconsistent with the feline anomalies.

I was frozen for a moment, in a clear state of shock. Soon enough, however, feeling returned to my body, and I began to try rationalizing the situation.

Whoever this was, they weren't from Earth. This was a being from another planet! Or a parallel universe! If I left him, and someone else found them, and that person contacted the authorities, then it would be the government's business. No that'd be no good. Who knows what they'd do to the poor guy. He looked like he'd just escaped from a war zone.

Also, who knows what this person could do - I wouldn't want to get on his bad side. I didn't want to anyways. Maybe if I helped, he'd show me some kind of cool futuristic tech. No, better to just help him - right? That was the good thing to do.

I nodded as I made my decision. I would bring the person home, and help him out. After, anything could happen.

I squatted down, and carefully picked him up. In his hand, there was a strange metallic disc. I carefully placed his hand on top of his body so the object didn't fall while I carried him. The person was unsurprisingly light. I was over 6 feet tall, and worked out often. He was barely 5 feet tall, with a small, lean build - maybe that had something to do with him being part cat.

What was mildly surprising, was the long, black tail that dangled from the seat of his pants. Well, he had cat ears - why not a tail?

I carefully headed back to my house, taking a back path. Even though it was early - I didn't want to take the chance that someone would see me, or especially the being. I approached the back door to my house, and opened it using my elbow.

I quickly and quietly made my way up to my room, and gently placed the person onto my bed. I walked out, and quickly determined that my mom was already on her way to work. I texted a few of my classmates to tell the teachers that I was going to be staying home "sick".

I went back to my room, and stared at the being.

Chapter Two

I was sitting at my desk, reading the news online when I heard a noise coming from the bed behind me. I swivled the chair around to face it. The unknown humanoid was sitting up. He had been unconscious for roughly an hour, and was understandably disoriented. When I'd brought him upstairs, I cleaned him up. His shirt was draped over the edge of the bed. The guy's wounds were clean, and securely covered with bandages.

He looked down at the bandages tied around his midsection, then up at me. "Who are you?" He croaked, voice dry from sleep.

I reached to the desk, and grabbed the cup of water I'd poured for him - just in case - and handed it to him. "My name is Carl."

He took the paper cup, and looked at the contents warily.

"Its water." I told him.

He nodded, and lifted the cup to his lips. When the cup was empty, he said. "Nice to meet you Carl. My name is Jo." He appeared to be about to say something else, when he began to look around frantically. "Where did it go?"

"This?" I asked, picking up the odd disc from my desk, and handing it to him.

Jo snatched it out of my hands, and slid it into his back pocket. "Thanks." He looked back down at the bandages, "Thanks for doing this." A tear rolled down his face.

"Hey," I leaned forward. "Are you ok?"

"No," he glared at me. "All my friends are dead, and disaster follows me wherever I go, and its not fair."

I wasn't sure how to respond to that.

We were quiet for a while before he said, "where am I? I mean, what planet?"

"Earth." I told him.

He snorted, then appeared more sad. "It always comes back to Earth, doesn't it?"

"What?" I said.

"Nevermind. I appreciate what you've done for me, but I'm afraid I must be going." He stood up, and started to leave.

"Wait!" I called after him.

He turned around. "What?"

"You can't go around like that." I said.

"Why not?" he asked.

"Well, you're not human, and the humans don't react well to things like that." I muttered.

"You reacted well. You brought me to your home, and patched me up." He pointed out.

"Yeah, but most humans wouldn't do that. They'd call the police, and you'd probably end up at some secret government base or something like that." I explained.

"True, true. Well, no-one can call the police if they don't know I'm here, can they?" He opened the door. As he walked out, his image seemed to flicker, and suddenly he was invisible. The way I know he was invisible, and not simply gone was because I could still hear the faint patter of his footsteps as he left the room, and went down the stairs.

Chapter Three

I just sat there, a bit disappointed. Briefly, I considered going to school, but instead stayed home. I hid the shirt, and cleaned up any and all blood that had been left by the creature.

The rest of the day went by as a normal Saturday, although it was Thursday.

After my morning run on Friday, I returned to find Jo sitting on the windowsill of my room. I removed my headphones, clicked them off, and placed them on my bed.

As I worked the phone case off of my arm, I asked, "so, what are you doing back?"

"I dunno. There's usually some kind of importance to the first person I meet." He shrugged. "I thought I'd come back."