by Georgia Byng
“YOU FOOL,” he thundered. “YOU IDIOT, ZACKYA! IT’S THE MONG WROLLY. YOU’VE FETCHED THE MONG WROLLY WROON!”
Six
Petula, terrified, tightened into a ball inside Molly’s T-shirt and tried to pretend she wasn’t there. Molly’s time-travel escort gave her a look of shock and then of complete repulsion.
“Oh, my peacock dropping! I’ve done it wrong… again,” he cursed. The whites of his eyes glistened with fear. He turned quaking to his master.
“The wrong Molly, sahib, but that cannot be. Maharaja, I went forward to precisely the right time and fetched her. She was at Briersville Park.”
“Briersville Park? BRIERSVILLE PARK? You FOOOOL,” boomed the giant man in a deep, curdling voice. He grabbed the peacock-feather fan from the punkah man beside him and hurled it toward them so that Molly’s escort had to dodge. “Zackya, do you theally rink she would ever have been at Briersville Park before she found the hypnotism book? I wanted the Molly Moon from a time before that—I wanted Molly Moon from the time when she lived at the orphanage, you imbecile. Cornelius Logan kept his residence sop tecret. He would never have let her come to Briersville Park before she found the hypnotism book.”
“Cornelius might have wanted to train her up before she found the book, Your High—”
“Don’t answer me back. So STUUUUUUPID!” The dreadful roar that came out of the man’s mouth as he stood up practically sent a breeze to ruffle Molly’s hair. Molly’s eyes were not deceiving her—the man was ginormous, but now she was finding that there was something wrong with her ears.
“Of course it’s the mong Wrolly Wroon. Are you blind? This one is wearing a stycral.” He jabbed a large finger in the direction of Molly’s neck. “She’s already a world stopper, you inconsequential piece of camel dung. Only hypnotists are world stoppers. Why else would she be wearing a STYCRAL?”
“Stycral?” Molly thought. “Oh, he means my time-stopping crystal.” The giant’s voice rumbled angrily, bouncing off the walls of the golden chamber.
“You have fetched me a Molly Moon from too far in the future, you useless cockroach. I told you. I explained it tree thimes.” The giant took four huge steps toward them, getting bigger the closer he got. He leaned his tree-like form down and, as if his subordinate were just a schoolboy, clasped his ear and gave his head a good shake. “Or did it go in one ear and out the other?”
“I thoughtttt… I thought this was the riiiiiii…” The man could hardly get his words out for the jangling.
“You thought. What a joke,” said the giant, dropping him disgustedly. “As usual, I’ll have to soo it mydelf.” Then, with the sharpest of deliveries, he spat, “This is how it works, you idiot. I have to remove Molly Moon from the time before she found the hypnotism book. Before she found it. Stunderhand? Then, when I kill her, she won’t be able to become a hypnotist and make the trouble that she did, will she? She won’t ever risdupt my plans and stop Primo Cell from becoming president of America, like she did… and Cornelius from ruling the whole world for me. And why? Because she will have died before she found out how to hypnotize anyone at all.” He cupped the escort’s head in his slab hands again and began to squeeze.
“HAVE YOU THOT GAT?” he shouted.
Molly found quite a few thoughts jostling for attention in her head, even though all were very hazy since she was still hypnotized. The first was that it seemed this colossus of a man from the past had once controlled Cornelius Logan. This time-traveling giant had evidently traveled forward in time, from this time, and hypnotized Cornelius to carry out his master plan. Cornelius, whom Molly had hypnotized to be a bleating lamb! It was almost unbelievable. This giant man clearly wanted to be powerful in Molly’s time. Molly wondered why.
Her mind sipped at this thought as if it were a nice cup of brain-wave tea. Molly realized that she had unwittingly upset his plans. She had taken Cornelius off course. So this giant, quite logically, Molly thought, wanted to catch Molly at the time before she’d found the hypnotism book, so he could kill her before she could make trouble.
This made complete sense. Molly swished this thought about in her head and blinked as she digested the situation. And finally, she observed, there was nothing wrong with her ears. The leathery-skinned giant (who seemed to have the same skin disorder as the shaking turbaned escort) had something wrong with the way he talked. He got his words back to front—frack to bunt. He spoke in “spoonerisms.”
The giant dropped the escort, who now stood beside Molly adjusting his neck where it had cricked slightly. The red juice from the paan he had been chewing dribbled down his chin. He wiped it with a handkerchief.
“You also took far too long,” the huge man complained. “Too nervous of fenty-twifth-century travel, I suppose, you wimp.”
“Your Highness… Maharaja. I thought it was better to guarantee her arrival. I am not confidant riding those superfast-beam jets of the twenty-fifth century. I will practice on my own, and improve my skills, I assure you, but I didn’t want to lose Miss Moon at a jet-beam port.” The man exposed his red-stained teeth in an ingratiating smile.
The maharaja wasn’t listening. He was now studying Molly. His huge, bloodshot eyes darted about as he registered her scruffy looks, her size, and her closely set eyes.
“Who would have thought that someone smo sall… look! The time winds are affecting her already. Zackya, release her from her trance.”
“Are you… sure, Your Highness?”
“Do as I say, you fool.”
Zackya, Molly’s captor, obediently stepped in front of her. He brought his dry, knobbly fingers to her forehead and snapped them together.
“You are released.” The hypnotism was broken. The veil of mist covering Molly’s feelings lifted and she felt utterly present. She now knew how Petula felt, buried under her T-shirt; Molly’s immediate burning wish was that she could disappear, too.
Now the full weight of her situation tumbled down on her. She was caught in a terrible trap. Stuck in another country and another time. Even if she managed to escape the giant maharaja and his assistant, she would still be imprisoned in a time that wasn’t her own, because Molly had absolutely no idea how to time travel. She felt as vulnerable as a worm in the beak of a peacock, as hopeless as a prisoner facing execution. The palm of her hand grew clammy as fear overwhelmed her. Molly had never, ever felt this helpless before, and it took immense self-control not to break down in tears.
But Molly was experienced with unkind, heartless people, and she knew from the giant’s cold, immobile face that no amount of pleading would help her. She possessed enough knowledge of sadism to know that if she cried now, he would enjoy the spectacle for a while and then he’d lose interest in her. From the way he was leaning down, looking fascinated into the sides of her eyes, she was certain that her best chance of survival was to be as cool and mysterious as possible. She ignored his damp, garlic breath and his rhinoceros skin. She ignored her own fear. She crossed her arms over Petula, badly hidden beneath her baggy top, and she managed to calm her mind and make some calculations.
The first was that this man and his assistant were obviously both very fine hypnotists, as was Molly.
The second was that they were both also world stoppers. They could both stop time, just as she could.
Molly suspected that they might be better hypnotists than she was (after all, they were both time travelers) and, for this reason, she decided not to use her crystal to stop time. However, she was sure that, as far as time traveling went, one of them wasn’t very good at it. It struck Molly that if the best assistant that this rich and powerful giant could find was this man Zackya, who was crouching in the corner, then good time travelers were rare.
Molly stared straight ahead and ignored the maharaja as his sticklike, heavy finger poked at her forehead. She felt very alone and really scared, but she knew she mustn’t look it. To protect herself, she feigned a look of haughty pride, as if she was deeply insulted to have been so rudely dragged bac
k in time.
Molly remembered a pompous character in an old film she’d watched on video over and over again at the orphanage. The general in it had been captured by the opposite side and, instead of being wide-eyed and subservient, he was loudly objecting. Molly knew she should try to be like him, which meant putting on a huge act. She wasn’t too confident of her acting, but she could remember the general’s lines since she and Rocky had so often said them to each other. The adrenaline pumping through her gave her courage, and Molly surprised herself as some of the general’s pompous words suddenly flew from her mouth.
“I find this imposition most inconvenient and degrading. In fact, it is downright impertinent!” she blustered.
She shivered as the final “impertinent” left her mouth, because she knew that behaving like this was a complete gamble.
Her tall captor narrowed his eyes and glared at her. Molly gritted her teeth.
“Do you?” he said slowly.
“Yes.” She pushed her mind to remember and imagine the general in the film, and she continued. “Yes. To be sneaked up on in such an underhanded way by your subordinate.” Molly wasn’t sure whether she knew what “subordinate” meant, but she carried on, anyway. “I should have been challenged properly in a hypnotic duel. It’s downright rude. Then to be escorted through time by someone so… so unexperienced and uncapable.” As she heard her own words Molly remembered that she should have said “inexperienced and incapable.” She steamed on. “It is not the sort of treatment that I, a world-class hypnotist, expect from you, another world-class hypnotist. If I were in your position, I would have found a much worthier escort. I would have shown more respect.”
Molly could hardly believe that these sentences were tumbling out of her mouth. She was either digging herself a grave with them, or airlifting herself out of trouble—she had no idea which. But knowing she must act the part entirely, she now summoned up some very precise hypnotic energy and turned her eyes to the giant’s. He already had his eyes glaring hypnotically. His large, bulbous eyes, set in their dark sockets, were horrible. Around the tannin-brown pupils, the whites were veined and bloodshot. Molly had never faced such huge or such repulsive eyes, yet her green eyes dealt with them. She leveled her gaze at his and felt his power. Steadily she looked straight into the eyes of the withered, walrus-skinned, tortoise-faced man.
Fascinated to be up against eyes the caliber of Molly’s, the giant enjoyed the unusual sensation of the challenge. Now he could see how this scrawny, potato-nosed girl had tipped over his neatly organized plans. Her power was like that of no other hypnotist he’d come across. She was experienced, too, he could sense. For every time he refocused, to catch her out and knock her hypnotically, she predicted his move and rebuffed his look. She was good, very good, especially for her age. But she knew nothing of the rules of time travel, so that put him leagues ahead of her. He admired her talent and her boldness, too. It was almost a pleasure to meet her. Although she was a little too big for her boots, he thought. Perhaps she would be some sport. Perhaps he ought to knock her down to size. Maybe he would. He dropped his gaze.
“Hmmm,” he mused. “So you see yourself as a flutterby princess.” He clapped his huge hands. “Perhaps the princess would tike some lea.”
Seven
At once the far doors swung open and eight turbaned servants came scurrying in with trays. These bore silver teapots, jugs, porcelain plates, cups, and glasses and, in the time that it took Molly and the giant to walk down the chamber, a low walnut table was laid. Molly’s chair faced a painted wall, where a mural of a hunting scene depicted in very fine detail the giant maharaja on an elephant, a rifle in his hand, shooting a tiger dead. It was a beautiful painting, though Molly didn’t like the subject matter. The green woodland showed Molly something of the country that surrounded the fort.
“It’s a refreshing change,” the giant admitted, reaching for an oversized muffin that a half-starved servant offered him, “to meet someone who doesn’t cower in front of me like a beaten dog.” He gave a cursory glance in Zackya’s direction. “I apologize for the walf-hit who brought you here. He is actually an ‘Untouchable.’”
“An untouchable?” Molly asked, hoping her host hadn’t noticed how her hand shook as she chose a muffin.
“Yes. He was born into the lowest caste, the lowest rank of Hindus. Most Hindu Indians would think he was no better than a sewage rat. But I am not a Hindu, so I simply take him at face value and see him for the crathetic peature that he is. Because of me, he is free. I FREED him.” The giant raised his voice slightly, charging the air with menace. Molly felt that now, even though he was looking at her, he was actually addressing Zackya. “I FREED him and LOOK how he repays me. BY NOT CARRYING OUT MY INSTRUCTIONS!” These words were shouted so loudly and angrily that the china on the table rattled. And suddenly, the giant’s temper flared up madly and out of control.
“USELESS, AREN’T YOU? ALWAYS HAVE BEEN, LITTLE ZACKYA. WATCH OUT, WATCH OUT. I’ll HAVE YOU CHOPPED UP WITH SHARP KNIVES. FEED YOU TO THE CEAPOCKS.” His voice dropped to a purr. “Or maybe I’ll just hypnotize you. You wouldn’t like that, would you? Avoided it for so long. Wouldn’t like to be HYPNOTIZED!”
Molly was shocked by the giant’s violent mood swing, and even more so by what he was saying. Zackya bowed, knelt, and bowed even lower, his hands outstretched on the floor. Then, as quickly as it had risen, the giant’s temper disappeared. “I’m rather clever,” he said, his heavy face puckering with a horrid, twisted smile. “You see, I have to have thumsing done in the future. Thumsing done that cannot be done in these times.”
Molly tried to pretend that his fit hadn’t bothered her in the least. “What?” she said, taking a ladylike nibble from her muffin and replacing it on the plate that a servant placed on a napkin on her knees. Inside, she quaked. She hoped that her spoiled-princess act would give her a chance against her unbalanced host. His volatile temper frightened her, for it reminded her of a madman she and Rocky had seen once in the streets in Briersville. The man had escaped from the local psychiatric hospital. First he’d sat singing to the pigeons, then suddenly he’d jumped up and begun thrashing at them with a stick. The giant had the same unpredictable temper. She must be extremely careful or she would be peacock meat. Petula squirmed, starting to get very hot. Molly squeezed her to be still.
The giant knocked at the huge red and green crystals around his neck with his gold-painted fingernail.
“I have to mine some more of these stycrals. Time-travel crystals. They come from deep down, biles melow the surface of the earth. I need them.” The maharaja put a large piece of cake in his mouth.
“Why?” asked Molly, trying to sip her drink casually. She gagged. It was water flavored with lime and salt.
“Because”—crumbs flew out of the giant’s mouth as he explained—“when I have traveled back to the beginning of time with a single crystal, if I have large quantities of stycrals with me, I can be levitated to the ‘Bubble of Light.’ In the Bubble, there is a wonderful light which, if bathed in, makes a person youthful!” He brushed both his hands over his face as if imagining the light and added, “I haven’t always looked like this.”
Molly swallowed a mouthful of muffin and wondered, for the first time, whether she was dreaming. “A wonderful light that made a person look younger, that shone in a place called the ‘Bubble of Light’ at the beginning of time?” Who’d ever heard of sunbathing to get a youthful glow? The giant was madder than she’d thought. For a moment she wondered whether, if she were to have a hospital where she used hypnotism to cure people and if this giant were a patient, whether Rocky and she could work out how to cure him. In a flash she wished Rocky were with her. She could just imagine what he would say now, and the words came out of her mouth.
“I thought the beginning of time was full of fire and explosions. Wouldn’t you be burned alive if you landed in it?”
“No. In the twenty-ninth century they discover that the beginning of time
is a sieve-like place full of white light from the Bubble. If a person can levitate into this light, he or she receives life-force and youthfulness. Levitation to the Bubble is difficult—only possible with a good supply of time-travel crystals.”
“Oh… right.” Molly lifted her eyebrows. “And you say you need to mine the crystals in my time… in the twenty-first century.…”
“Yes, because now, in the 1870s, it is impossible. It is only in the fenty-twirst century that the technology to mine deeply enough to get the stycrals out of the earth is possible. It is very, very expensive to do. It is only with the resources of many countries that it is possible. That is why I have to have Cornelius Logan in complete troncol of the whole world in the centy-first twentury. He will hypnotize all the world leaders.” Here, the giant gave Molly a dark look, as if he was about to lose his temper again, but he didn’t. “You have got in my way, but I will put my plans back on track,” he said. “Then, once Cornelius is in troncol, I will have the power and wealth of many, many countries at my tingerfips. The mining can begin and I will get mountains of stycrals. Armed with tons and tons of stycrals, I can get to the beginning of time and attain youthfulness. Simple, you see. And it would have been done by now, too, if it weren’t for a problem that occurred: You, Miss Moon, were the mevious donkey that escaped the laboratory.” The giant snorted impatiently. “I am put out, I must say. It has taken me years to work out how to mine the stycrals. Then I came up with the ingenious plan of using hypnotists from your time to do the work for me. I went to the future, to your time, to the time when you were just born, and I hypnotized Cornelius. I put the whole plan into action. Primo Cell and Lucy Logan’s baby was put in an orphanage. That was you, of course. Primo Cell and your mother were split apart. Everything was wet up to serk. It took a lot of effort to set things up so that Cornelius’s life would end in him ruling the world for me. It was exhausting work. Time travel is exhausting. But I knew it would be worth the effort.” He glared at Molly.