OVER TURNED

        By Christian J Hernandez 

    OVER TURNED

  Chapter 1: First Contact

“Ah!” The sound of my alarm had woke me up from a bad nightmare.  I had never had a nightmare before, only dreams. I looked at the time, “5:11.” Kind of early for my alarm to be going off, and wondered why it had gone off so early. Got up thinking that this day...this day would be like any other school day, not knowing that it would change my life and everybody else's.



I stretched second and turned on the light. Somehow it seemed easier to do than I expected. Or maybe to reach it’s hard to know what could be easier than flipping on a light switch. Once I went to the restroom and looked at the mirror and stared at myself.



My name is Kriss Age Godfree, 17 years-old and a senior in high school.  My name is kind of unique.  My mom changed her name around the time I was born, and combined with my middle name it's supposed to imply that I'm a free soul in both mind and body and a whole bunch of other stuff.  Personally, I think it's catchy and I love seeing the expressions on people’s faces when they hear it.

I'm part Hispanic with some Asian; I don't know what kind of Asian but I hope it's Japanese as I love anime.  I'm 6 feet tall, pretty tall for a Hispanic and even more so for an Asian, with black curly/straight hair almost to my shoulders.  The only other thing that stands out about me is my endurance; most people are stunned when they notice how much stamina I have when they see my do activities.



I brushed my teeth, emptied my bladder and rushed to my room, realizing that the faster I got ready the sooner I can start watching anime on my iPod. Dressing quickly and grabbing my school stuff I headed downstairs. I saw my cousin Martin, a 9th grader who rides the bus with me, on the couch in the living room ready to leave but watching the news on TV. "What's up?" I asked.  He nodded to me and I sat down next to him to see what the weather would be like for the day.



The numbers the weather channel were showing kept changing; the temperatures, they were increasing everywhere in every state including our own. My aunt, standing behind me, said “I told you that the weather channel lies too much, look at those numbers!”

I agreed laughing with her.



After a couple minutes I stood up and I also saw my other cousin and sister who are in middle school, who are sitting at the dining table texting I said my good mornings to them when I passed by them. In the kitchen my mom and her boyfriend were in the kitchen making breakfast. I said “good morning” passing them I told my mom I’m skipping breakfast again. I hate breakfast in mornings I don’t know why; I just don’t like eating in mornings.



My mom stopped me; “Kriss go take the trash out its Tuesday the truck will be here today.” Hate doing this I grunted as I grabbed the garbage bag and headed outside. When I opened the door and a huge gust of warm air hits me. It’s close to winter, so I thought it must have been a warm front headed our way. I walked to the side of the house where the bin is and I dump the bag in the bin and took it in front of the house.



I looked up and can almost see the air gusts flying over me and beyond the fast moving clouds like water currents. Also I saw that it’s a little bit brighter this morning, winter mornings should be darker. But I didn’t see the sun on the clouds and saw that the brightness was on the wrong side where the sun should have been. It was the morning; I didn’t want to think too hard about this stuff.



Finished with the trash I open the door to the house and I went to the dog room on the other side of the house. I sat down on the chair and saw that my dog was staring at me under our X-mas tree. I called out his name while shaking my head and then he waged his tail and just sat there. ‘I laughed inwardly’. The bus comes at 6:21 so I took my iPod out, its 5:31. I put on my headphones and clicked the Netflix app and started watching an episode of bleach.



When I finished watching the episode, I checked the time, ‘6:01’. In the direction of my iPod I saw my dog who was under the tree running in the kitchen too the living room. I also saw my sister, mom and her boyfriend rush to the living room. I saw something in their faces, like a terrified look and head my mom say “oh god”. I quickly got up and speed walked through the kitchen to the living room and saw everybody staring at the TV....



When I looked...it was...some sort of tall metallic pillar. The news reporter was on the helicopter going well above the clouds to meet this pillar...at the top it’s a flat area larger than 3 football fields, like a sort of an arena. I saw another helicopter and another, when I see at least a dozen of them. I see a few big Military helicopters; it seemed like there trying to land somewhere on the flat surface on the pillar. Then it stopped, the news took us back to the women sitting down looking as terrified as us.

 

She began clearing her throat “we are getting word from other countries that other metallic Pillars are rising or already rose in other countries.” They began showing a video of a city, I saw the Eiffel Tower so it’s from Paris and I saw the pillar. Sort of... the pillar isn’t coming from the ground, and it’s not fully there yet. It’s sort of coming from the sky, it’s sort of appearing of out thin air most likely. There's light coming from the bottom then to the top of the pillar, and then it stopped. I was amazed...there in the middle of Paris next to the Eiffel tower was a metallic pillar, as it goes well above the clouds. Then they showed other country's with the pillars.



First the U.S, the pillar is on the Chicago Lake, then another at the bottom of Mexico near a small town, another in Brazil near the ocean, the one in Paris, another in Egypt, and another in South Africa. All of those videos were either morning or afternoon. They showed other pillars in north Russia, another in East Asia, and the last was on north east of Australia (they say either the U.S or Japan was the first to get the pillars)

I toured my head away from the TV, I was mind blown beyond repair, I never knew this could happen, I thought this morning was a normal school day! How...I looked at the time, 6:20! “Martin!” He was drawn away from the TV now looking at me with his mouth still open. I said “BUS!”

Realizing the time he quickly got up and grabbed his book bag and ran to the door, I said my goodbyes to the dumbstruck family, on my way out my mom said “call 911 if anything happens!” I laughed as I was leaving the door.



As I was walked to the bus stop, I couldn't stop thinking about what I just saw, what I just witnessed... I knew from that point on, since the first pillar appeared that the world has changed and my life seemed less important than ever before.



Martin was waiting at the bus stop with Sunny Joy, this Asian girl, he seemed kind of into what just happened and yelled “Kriss! Dude, do you think its aliens or something, or some government thing.” I said “I don’t know but I don’t think it’s from the government.” I didn’t know why I said that, it just felt that it wasn't from our world. The pillars also had some kind of cool or good weird feeling when we watched it, not us rather than just me.

   

Sunny was confused of what we were talking about and said “what are you loonies talking about?” Since martin has a crush on her he jumped on it explaining to her everything we saw on the TV. I started laughing inwardly as I intently stared at her waiting for her reaction. “Ha!” Her jaw dropped to the floor and seemed what he said really struck her. She seemed a little scared too, she took her phone out and started texting and I see she messed up with a few of the letters as she tried quickly to text. Wondering what’s taking so long I looked to where the bus came. The bus was really late I wondered, did they cancel school? Spoke to soon…. The bus came around the corner.



I turned around “Martin, bus.” He was still busy talking to sunny and said “Kay hold on.” As the bus was stopping I wondered if some people already knew, or most people, did kids on the bus know already? Did the bus driver even know? As I walked in the bus my question was answered, the bus driver had some kind of a worried face and he looked impatient. I walked past him and some kids were talking in a hushed voice, others were sleeping and others I assumed didn’t know...yet...



I sat in seat number 9 almost near the back and people in the whole bus were texting out or other people getting texts...well that's the social era for you. By the time we’re almost to the school, everybody knows about it. The whole bus was just roaring with talk about it with my cousin Martin in the middle of it.



I just wanted to laugh because of how they got the information. When we’ve gotten to the school it wasn’t the same usual routine, they used to let all the kids out of the buses at 6:55 but they released us at 6:41. As soon as I got off the bus everybody was saying, “you heard the news!? Are they aliens? Dude, we’re going to kick some ass.” And this one kid I don’t know why screamed and ran back away from the school. I went through the doors into school and it was a frenzy, kids talking loud, some yelling, few crying.



I thought the world ended then and there, but I had thought otherwise when teachers came and moved us along. Since I didn’t know where to go I went to my regular spot in the media center at the back table. As I walked I saw the TVs on the walls showing videos, pictures and the scared faces I’ve been seeing on everyone, then continued to walk to the table.



My friends were already there, Ion Benet he’s skinny like a toothpick and has blond hair and is always the funny and brightest one in the group with his zombie t-shirt, David palicoes, He’s Mexican a little short but lean built and Sian Niño an Asian girl who just sits there and flirts with Ion. I sat down and knew they already know what has happened.  Ion said “you think it could be the zombies Krissssss…..?!?” With an amazingly funny grin. I laughed knowing it was a stupid question “You know as well as I do Ion that we don’t have that kind of tech stuff at our disposal, so yea it could be the dumb freaking zomb…”



Everybody to your classes please! One of the teachers called out to the kids in the media center. “Come on, go to your classes kids.” A teacher behind us said with a phone in her hand and it look liked she was trying to call someone, her eyes were puffy, I knew better not to ask. We stood up and walked out the media center and went our different ways saying cya laters and byes.*bell rung*



I headed to my first class period, Ms. Barnhurst (food and nutrition senior class) and came into the room and people were talking in hushed voices. I sat at my seat looked at the time “7:01”. Nine more minutes till classes start, and the room was already full. The intercom went off “sorry for the interruption, please turn your projectors on channel 2.” Everybody remained quiet when the teacher turned it on and switched to channel 2.



It had went to a guy I saw that’s always where the new news is and now he’s in a helicopter over the pillars. He began saying “they are saying U.S or japan was the first to get the pillars as of this morning and military has them occupied to all allies, or anyone letting the U.S or United Nations occupy them to the west hemisphere and the east hemisphere.” Everybody began saying “U.S? Did our government do this?” I knew they didn’t do it but why would they occupy them? Didn’t make sense. Reporter continued “hold on! We are hearing that the military has found something.” The camera pointed at the middle of the arena, I saw the small figures going to the middle.



The whole class was like volcanoes ready to erupt. “The military isn’t letting us go near the area, they have 20 men armed and ready for something, we are trying to get a closer look, there’s something in the middle of the pillars, what is that?” *gun shots* “there’s gun shots down there!” the class finally erupted, “gun shots?!Who are they shooting at?!?” I was thinking too fast to even understand what I was thinking. Gun shots!?! Who are they firing at?! Reporter continued “we are getting closer and the gun shots are lessening but there is a lot of blood in the middle of the arena, looks like most of the military men backed off only 11 though.”



I thought who killed the other 9!? Maybe the world is coming to an end. At the thought of that, I laid my head down and wondered what life I might have had if all this didn’t happen. Reporter continued “there’s something in the middle of the arena again, were getting too close for the military but they didn’t stop us, there stop! This is good enough, wait what is that? That’s not a something! It’s someone!”

   

When I had heard that I looked up so fast I thought I cracked my neck. “There are 2 of them now! Try getting closer! Wait stop! I can see them now. There moving, let’s land here!” The camera men have gotten off with the reporter and started walking past the blood from the floor, but the blood seemed to disappear to nothing.



End of chapter 1