The Hipster Who Leapt Through Time (The Hipster Trilogy Book 2) (28 page)

“What? What about Luna and the cat? The old Thinker with the dog master?” Moomamu got to his feet.
 

“Likely dead. Especially in that part of the world. That’s where it started, you see. But we can change that, possibly, hopefully. It’s kind of why I’m talking to you right now. I want you to save the planet.”
 

“Well …” Thoughts of claws in his skin — Snuckems’ purring. “I …”

“What?” The Light said. “You’re hesitant.”

“You say they’re already dead?” Moomamu felt his hands shake. Not from a lack of food this time. His jaw clenched tight. The tendons in his neck pulled downwards. He stood up, picked up the chair and threw it against the far wall of the cave. “Then what’s the fucking point?”
 

The chair clanged against the rock and the top bar collapsed in on itself, breaking the chair. He felt his hands clench into their fighting configuration. They squeezed until they went numb. He felt like screaming. Instead, he sat down. Closed his eyes. “Fuck it,” he said. “Fuck it. Fuck it. Fuck it.”

For a while, there was silence in the cave until The Light said, “This is not the way the world will end. Oh no, it is not. What if I were to tell you that I could take you home, boy? Oh yes. Think on that. To be free from all this physical nonsense. Pain and emotions and illogical dramas. I could take you back to where you belong. Back to the stars.”

Moomamu kept his eyes closed. He squeezed them tighter as he heard The Light step out of the cave.

***

“What are you going to do? Stay in this cave forever?”
 

Moomamu didn’t answer. He stayed in the darkness of the cave and watched The Light as he threw a plastic carrier bag down by Moomamu’s feet. More tins and bottles of water. A fresh haul.

“You know there’s an alien invasion happening?”
 

Moomamu remained quiet. He scratched his chin. His beard was longer than ever. His hair now down to the top of his cheeks. The cuts from Snuckems were healed now, scarred over in lines of fresh pink. The days in the cave were blurring. He’d stopped counting.

“I know you don’t want to remain here forever. You’ve escaped from one cell and now here you are, locked in a brand new one.”
 

The Light teleported and disappeared. He left Moomamu to fish through the tins. He found the pineapple slices. His new favourite. He liked how the sugary juice felt as it recharged his blood.
 

By the time The Light returned he was by the cave entrance. His legs poking out into the sand. It was dark. The stars were out in full beauty again. The lack of artificial light gave way to them. The Light didn’t say anything. Instead, he stood next to Moomamu and shook his head.

“I pity you, Thinker. I really do. At some point, you’ll wake up and realise you can do something, but by then it will likely be too late. And you’ll ask me to save you, to save this planet, and your friends. To take you home. But by then it will be too late. The soft spot will be gone. The window of opportunity will be closed. Forever.”

Moomamu cleared his throat.
 

“What soft spot?”
 

“Ahh, so he speaks,” The Light said. “Like I said. We can leap through space easy enough, but time is a little different. Time requires a soft spot.”

“Where is it?”

“You know where it is. You’ve been there. You used it. The parasite used it too.”

“The farm?”

The Light smiled and nodded.

“Fuck that,” Moomamu said. Visions of the parasite’s teeth. The smell of his saliva still lingered in Moomamu’s dreams. It was that soft spot that threw him to Othos.
 

“Listen, Thinker, let me be frank. You’re welcome to stay here. It would likely be another ten years or so by the time The Signal works its way to a remote spot like this. But once the soft spot has gone, I will leave you here. No more food. Just you in the cave.”

“Good. I’ll die and that will be the end of it.”

“No,” The Light said. “You won’t die. Not for a long time. You’re a Thinker made flesh. It’s likely that your vessel is already dead. Held together by the space-dust that bore you. You’ll crumble. You’ll feel hunger that would kill a regular human, but you will not die. You’ll simply continue. To feel pain, hunger, and when The Signal does arrive it will eat the flesh from your bones. A lonely and painful demise, one that I would not wish on even the worst of my enemies.”
 

“Just leave me,” Moomamu said. “So I’ll die. As the world will. We’ve no right to life any more than a floating piece of space fauna.”

“If that’s what you believe.” The Light shook his head again. He walked from the cave. “I’ll not be coming back. Please don’t suffer too much and leave this existence with whatever dignity you have left.”
 

Moomamu closed his eyes again.
 

He didn’t open them until the sun was up and he was alone.
 

He climbed to his feet and walked outside. His skin was pale but he felt healthy. His body was full of energy for the first time in as long as he’d been there. The tins of food had nourished him. He looked up at the sunlight and closed his eyes. He pressed his face into it. The warmth of it bathed his body and he yawned and stretched his arms out. Memories of the time he woke as a human came to him. The first time he saw the cat. It pushed its body against him. Gary. The comforting feeling of Gary’s body against his own, vibrating.
 

He felt the hairs on his neck stand up as he shook himself. He walked forward, placing each foot into the warm sand, burying them. He let the sand fill the gaps between his toes. The Light had told him that he could save Gary. And Luna, the tired human with the red hair. The one who saved him from the parasite. The one who saved Gary.
 

He’d heard the humans talk of family before. Even humans who weren’t related by blood were still considered family, occasionally. If Moomamu had a family, it would be those two.
 

He found himself tearing up. The salt dripped down to his mouth and he whispered.

“I’m sorry.”

The words pushed forward and as if caught in the wind before him, flew upwards and away. They left his mouth before his ears could even hear them.

“Whispering through spacetime,” The Light said. Moomamu turned to his right to see the familiar cloaked man. “Took me a while to figure it out.”
 

“You did it to me too. When I was in the cell?”

“Yes. I did.”

Silence lay between them for a good while before Moomamu asked “Is the soft spot still there?”

The Light smiled and placed his hand on Moomamu’s shoulder.
 

“We got a little more time. But first, you have to show me you can leap with intention.”

***

Again with the marks in the sand. Moomamu found himself with his eyes closed. Trying to leap with intention from one mark to the other. It sounded easy. But as he gritted his teeth, clamping them down, he felt his head grow light, his face become numb and warm.
 

“You look like you’re about to shit yourself,” The Light said.

“Well,” Moomamu said as he let go and caught his breath. “It’s not working, is it?”
 

“If you’re going to leap through time, you should be doing this with ease. We only have …” He looked up at the skies as if reading the clouds like the hands of a clock. “Maybe forty hours before the soft spot will close.”
 

“And then what?”

“Don’t think about that. Just worry about getting to that line in the sand.”
 

“I really don’t think it’s going to …” As Moomamu went to say the words he felt a gentle breeze push through his hair. He turned to look at The Light, but he was gone. Disappeared again. Of all the times to leave. What the hell was wrong with him? Fancy leaping off like that—

“What were you saying?” The Light said. Moomamu turned his head to see The Light standing ten feet behind him. He looked back to his feet to see that he was standing on the second mark. He’d just leapt. “Try it again.”

Moomamu closed his eyes. He thought of the direction the wind was blowing. The way the sand felt against his toes. The way it collected in the gaps. He opened his eyes again and he was standing an inch before The Light. His nose almost pressing against his.

“Close,” The Light said. The smell forced Moomamu back a step. “I guess that will have to do.”
 

“Have to do? I thought you said it had to be done with precision.”
 

“Doesn’t matter,” The Light said. “Time’s up.”

“What? But I’m not ready.”

“Doesn’t matter. But just remember this, Thinker … follow my orders, put your faith in me, and I will take you to your home, to your true home, your higher place in the stars, and to do so, you must leap back and kill. If you fail me, if you do not kill, then I will abandon you. I will leave you wherever you end up. Kill or be left to rot. Your choice.”

“Wait …”

The Light stepped forward and placed his hands on Moomamu’s head. As easy as blinking, Moomamu saw the sands disappear. The cave he’d been living in vanished. He opened his eyes and found himself surrounded by concrete architecture. Brick buildings. A bridge. A tower in the distance with a big clock on it. He knew the place. He’d been there before. London.
 

London, December 20th 2015

Moomamu The Thinker

The last time Moomamu was in the city he couldn’t breathe for being surrounded by the noise of the humans and their machines. The rumblings from the underground, the howling of the big red moving transport machines and the smaller ones, like Luna’s. The chatter of the humans and the patter of their feet. Even the wheezing of their collective breathing had found a way to irritate him before, but now, there was nothing.

The place was so quiet he could hear his own heart beating. The distant sound of the wind pushing past the concrete monoliths. Somewhere in the distance, a flame flickered. And the water. He could hear the flowing of water.
 

He took a step forward and placed his bare foot on the cold floor. He instantly missed the heat of the sand. Still in nothing but his pants, exposed and bare to the world, he realised just how cold this part of the Earth was. His nipples firmed and his skin became laden with bumps and grooves. His body shook. He wrapped his arms around himself.
 

“Hello,” he said to the emptiness.
 

A sign. Black writing against a white board was stuck to the side of the building to his right. Southbank. City of Westminster. He took another step forward and saw the giant wheel of the city. Another step and he saw the dark ripples of the river. The wind, riding its waves, blew hard against his skin and through his hair and beard.

To his right, he saw a number of metal food vendors, empty. Words and pictures stuck to the sides of them spoke of frozen yogurt, beef burgers, fish and chips, and Mexican/Indian Fusion. His mouth salivated, but he saw that the places were empty. The cooking fires were still and the electricity had been cut off.

The bank, which would usually be crawling with life was oddly sterile. A square of dirt next to him. Some children’s training equipment— slide, pull-up bars, swing trainers. A park of sorts, but with all the green of life removed. The insect life reduced to nothing. No birds in the sky crying and singing. There were no furry creatures crawling in the leafless trees. No human spawn and no human adults. No shouting at him to try something or buy anything. No humans sitting in circles with their eyes closed and their legs crossed, chanting mantras to their idols. No musical humans with their plinky string instruments and their melancholic singing. Although one of the stringed instruments was on the floor, ownerless, next to an upturned hat full of loose currency.

However, the floors were scattered with pieces of clothing. Loose fabric of all colours blew in the wind and collected in piles as it gathered against the manmade structures.

Moomamu bent over and picked up a white piece of fabric. He held it out, trying to stop it from blowing in the wind. A cloud of dust flew up and into his mouth. He coughed and spat and threw the fabric back down. It wouldn’t work to keep him warm anyway. It was torn and shredded.

It was as The Light had said. The life had been consumed.

Moomamu looked to skies and saw rain clouds. Thick and darkened with moisture. He walked along the bank and towards a bridge, a giant concrete crossing. It was the source of the flames. Human moving machines broken and smashed into each other. Fire dancing on the roof. Moomamu’s teeth chattered as he walked further up the bridge. He passed one of the red moving machines: tall, used for carrying handfuls of humans around the city. It had crashed into the side of the bridge. The front of it hung over the side precariously. Hiding behind it was another moving machine. Smaller and intact. He moved his hands around the side of it, searching for the plastic door handle. Finding it, he pulled it and the door swung open. Inside he saw more tattered clothing and dust. A hat on the front dashboard that read ‘I Heart LDN’. He picked up the clothing and held it out. The t-shirt was black with sacrilegious nonsense sprawled over it. The word ‘Slayer’ along the top in red. He lifted the clothing and let the wind blow the dust away. Only a single hole in the shoulder. He pulled the t-shirt over his head and threaded his arms through it. He did the same with the camouflage trousers inside, dusting and then threading his legs into each hole. No socks, though. He would’ve liked some socks.
 

Once clothed, he climbed into the moving machine and looked around himself. The other seats had their own dusty clothing. Some pink, female’s clothing in the front. And in the back, smaller clothing for their spawn. Nothing but dust and threads. A fabric toy dinosaur lay on the backseat, alone, missing its human spawn, dirtied by the spawn’s remains. Its marbled eyes reflected the dark rain clouds from the sky.