Courtney's POV

I rubbed my eyes, which didn't seem to want to stay open. Normally, if I was this tired, I would have just gone back to sleep. But, my head hurt insanely, and I couldn't figure out why.

"Ah, you're up?"

I lifted my head toward the somehow familiar voice.

Standing there, looking nearly comical in clothes a bit too big for him, and my necklace around his neck, was a blond-haired, blue-eyed, and familiar entity.

For one second, nothing in the world made sense.

Then the memory of last night flooded back, and the world had logic once more.

Well, some logic. Half the puzzle was still missing.

I remembered someone punching Jake, and kneeling beside me…

Blond hair…

Was it BEN?

Why?

I asked the first thing that came to mind.

"What's going on?"

"Well, you hit your head last night and passed out. I carried you back here and bandaged your head. I just woke up about twenty minutes ago."

He gestured to the clothes he was wearing, which I realized were Danny's.

"Sorry for using these, but my tunic was pretty torn up. Also, I don't think it would go over very well with the general public of your world. Too noticeable."

"General public? What do you mean?"

"Oh, yeah. We need to leave."

"Why?"

"I punched that blond kid out last night, but he's probably waking up right about now. He's not going to be a very happy camper. The first place he's going to come, when he realizes you're gone, is here, and neither of us are strong enough to hold our own in a fight against him right now. I'm thinking the best thing to do would be to leave. I was actually coming in to wake you up."

Wide awake now, I realized he was right. We had to leave now. A confrontation with Jake would not go over well.

"Okay. You get some of Danny's clothes - the ones you're wearing now - and bring them in here."

As he got there, I pulled some of my own clothes from my dresser, pushing them into my empty school backpack.

BEN brought in a few of Danny's. I put them in, too. They all fit in the one backpack – there wasn't a whole lot.

I swung the backpack onto my shoulders, going into the bathroom and getting my toothbrush, as well as a new one for BEN. I had almost grabbed Danny's, out of habit. Me and Danny would often randomly go camping on vacations and weekends. He would put the camping stuff, like the tent and sleeping bags, in the car, while I got the clothes and stuff together. I was assuming that was the only reason I could do this without panicking and messing up despite so much adrenaline flooding my system from fear of a confrontation with Jake – I knew the drill, what to get. It was routine.

BEN observed quietly as I did this. As I pulled out a tube of toothpaste, he took a roll of gauze from the medical cabinet.

"In case we need to re-bandage your head." He said quietly.

I wondered where all the fire had gone from the last of my dreams he had appeared in. Had he already fully recovered from that breakdown?

I didn't have a whole lot of time to dwell on that.

"COURTNEY!"

My heart started thumping as I heard a furious voice scream out my name.

"WHERE THE HELL ARE YOU?"

Jake.

He still sounded a while away. We had about a minute.

"C'mon!" I said to BEN urgently.

We sprinted down the hall, when a thought came to me.

"Hold on." I said to BEN.

"Courtney, we don't have time!" He said.

I hurried into my room, grabbing the box that contained my money. I pulled the bills and the few coins from it, swinging the backpack in front of me and shoving the money in.

I ran toward the hall, swinging the backpack back onto my shoulders as I ran.

"COURTNEY!"

Louder. He was close.

I ran to the door, grabbing and yanking on my shoes. I looked over at BEN, who already had Danny's shoes on. Evidently, he realized his leather boots weren't practical for this world and this weather.

"YOU BITCH!"

He was right outside.

"C'mon!"

I ran to the back door, BEN following me.

I heard thumping against the front door – Jake trying to get in. It was locked, though.

I pulled back on the handle on the back door. As it swung open, I heard shattering glass.

"WHERE ARE YOU?"

The front window.

He was in the house now, I could hear. He must have broken the window and climbed in.

I raced out the door with BEN.

I headed not in the direction of our town, but toward a different town in the opposite direction. I knew I couldn't be in our town right now.

As we ran off, I heard more shattering glass and screams of profanity.

Me and BEN both ran hard. We finally reached a small gas station about a mile from my house. I ran up to the payphone.

Panting, I pulled a couple coins from my pack that I had grabbed earlier. I shoved them into the slot, punching in 911.

"911, what is your emergency?"

Breathless, I explained that someone had broken into a house, telling them my address. I didn't specify that it was my address, though.

"Alright, miss, stay where you are and we'll send an officer to the house."

"Thank you. And hurry, please." I said before hanging up.

I knew the dispatcher had told me to stay where I was, but I wasn't going to. It was for the same reason I hadn't specified that the break-in was MY address, and why I hadn't headed into my town.

I had BEN with me.

If they realized my house had been broken into, they were sure to try to find me, just to make sure I was alright and ask me what had happened. Normally, I wouldn't have had too much of an objection to that, but if I had some kid with me, without parents or files, they were going to get suspicious. The last thing I wanted was for them to do some DNA testing to see if he matched one of those missing children and realize he wasn't a human. He would end up at Area 51 or something for the rest of his life.

I knew they could trace where the call came from, and she had told me to stay put, so I was assuming she was going to send someone here too.

I turned to BEN.

"You okay to keep walking?"

He looked just as winded as me, but he nodded.

"Okay. Let's go."

We started off along the roadside toward the next town, which was, unfortunately, miles away.

It would be a long walk.

Catz: 0_o Jake has some mental problems...

Well, this is a pretty long one for you guys...which is good, since I haven't updated in forever. I'm sorry, my Skittles!

I told you things were going to get crazy. ;) That covered most of the crazy, but the fic is going to go down a new path from here on out, as you could probably tell from this chapter. I don't mean that BEN is going to begin killing people, or BEN and Courtney join the mafia or anything. I just mean Courtney isn't going to be at home anymore with BEN pestering her through video games. The fic will have a different tone, but nothing quite that drastic.

Okay, I'm done rambling. ;p

As always, my lovely skittles, review!