Jump City: Apprentice

by MK Alexander

  “You mean a Mykonos fisherman’s cap?”

  “A what?”

  “I know a good place… it’s not to far from here.”

  “Is it open?”

  “Probably, just for the tourists.”

  “Can you give me directions?”

  “Hmm. It’s kind of hard to find.” I looked at the guy, old or not, he seemed nice enough, almost familiar to me. “I could take you there…”

  “Wouldn’t want to trouble you. Mind if I just sit for a while? Shade is hard to find around here.”

  I laughed at that. He was right. All around the park, benches with actual shade were in high demand and competitively sought.

  “See those two guys?” The man asked after a few idle moments.

  I squinted across the bright sunlight. Two guys, in their twenties, both with sandy blonde hair, were feeding the pigeons. “German tourists,” I said.

  “How can you tell?” he asked.

  “The guide book, it says Griechenland on it.” I looked at him. “And they have fancy cameras.”

  “I gotta say, you’re pretty smart for a kid.”

  “Thanks, I guess.”

  “Um— okay, this is going to sound weird, but I think they might be following you.”

  “What?”

  “Have you ever seen them before?”

  I looked again. They did seem familiar and I felt some anxiety. “Maybe I have… Do you know them?”

  “No, no, I don’t know them at all.” My new friend was surprised by the question. “But I think I’ve seen them before.”

  I looked again. “Me too.”

  “Where?”

  “Here in Athens... a couple of days ago. I think they were at the bumper cars.”

  “Bumper cars?”

  “A place I go sometimes...” I tried to remember but couldn’t conjure any details. “And someplace else…”

  “Where?” The stranger’s tone was persistent at least.

  “Um, in the mountains.”

  “The mountains, huh? Which mountains? Nearby?”

  “No… not here... Colorado,” I blurted out. It was such an odd thing to say.

  “When were you in Colorado?”

  I considered his question. “Hard to tell exactly.”

  “Right.” He paused uncomfortably. “Don’t want to freak you out or anything, but look over there by the fountain.”

  “What?”

  “The two sailors there… look familiar?”

  I turned towards them and stared for a long while. Then I looked back to the Germans. My mind reeled. How could there be four people who looked exactly the same?

  “Question for you, Patrick: How come those two sailors look just like those two tourists.”

  “How do you know my name?”

  “Oh sorry…” He smiled awkwardly. “You don’t recognize me, do you?”

  “Not really.”

  “You know what? We should go,” the man said.

  He was right, I knew it instinctively, and decided to put my trust in this total stranger. We left the Palace Gardens in a hurry and made our way into the back alleys off Syntagma Square. Almost comically, the two Germans and the two sailors suddenly had urgent business in our direction. Though they hardly seemed a threat, nor could they be. No one knew their way around this city like I did. After some minutes of zigzagging alleys and narrow streets, we were certainly on our own. I was getting hungry and led the man to my favorite souvlaki place. I told him he could get a soda.

  ***

  “So… you still haven’t figured out who I am?” the man asked.

  I had, but I refused to acknowledge it. I came to suspect that this man was indeed an older version of myself. “How could you be me? It doesn’t make any sense.”

  “Tell me about it.”

  “You couldn’t be me.”

  “Why not?”

  “I could never get so old…” I paused for a long while. “Do you know Inspector Fynn?” I asked.

  He laughed at this. “Of course I do. He’s our friend, maybe our best friend.”

  “Where is he?”

  “Couldn’t make it.”

  “How do I know you’re not Mortimer?”

  “Mortimer? Why, do you remember him?”

  “I’m not sure.”

  “Do I look like him?”

  “Maybe.”

  “Thanks.”

  “Could be, you’re working for him, trying to fool me.”

  “Why would I do that?”

  “How many timelines are there?” I asked, my voice sounded so strange.

  “One, the one you live through.”

  That sounded right. “Why are you here?”

  “I need to talk to you before you forget everything.”

  “Forget everything?”

  “About Colorado, mainly.”

  “What’s in Colorado? Wait… that seems familiar, but like a long time ago…”

  “Do you remember anything?”

  “Like what?”

  “Like anything weird.”

  I stopped to think and tried to dredge up events from a million miles away. I fought to recall. “Fynn was there… Weren’t you there too?”

  “Me? No, not really.”

  “I remember some old guy named Drummond… he killed a lot of people... two of my best friends, I think.”

  “I’m sorry to hear that.”

  “And he knew Mortimer. He was a traveler too… but he didn’t understand anything.”

  “Understand what?”

  “I forget.”

  “How about a guy named Kaiser?”

  “Who?”

  “Probably not important… What do you know about the dustbowl?”

  “The what?”

  “Like a big dust storm.”

  “Like a tornado?”

  “Sort of…”

  I tried to think but felt very confused. Nothing came to mind. “The twins,” I said, and with some excitement, as a memory sparked. “They were in Colorado too. They were him or… they are his kids… I’m not sure which.”

  “Wait, the twins… like the ones we just saw?”

  “That’s right.”

  “Wow.”

  “What’s this all about?” I asked my older self.

  “That’s what I’m trying to figure out. These guys have been following me everywhere.”

  “Following you?”

  “Both of us, I guess.”

  “How can there be two of us?”

  “Kid, you’re asking the wrong guy.”

  ***

  We wandered the streets of Athens for a time, talking about all kinds of things; Fynn, Mortimer and Colorado mostly. He seemed to know more about me than I did, though I also noticed he would not directly talk about the future. Having a conversation with myself proved more difficult than I imagined. Partly, I suppose, because there were three of me. My usual self, the new arrival, and the kid-me, who seemed to be asserting himself more and more as I began to fade.

  At some point I stopped dead on the street and just stood there staring. The ghosts were back, the fleeting shadows just out of view, turning corners at the edge of my vision.

  “You see them too?” my new friend asked.

  I nodded. “What are they?”

  “I don’t know.”

  Eventually we ended up under the Acropolis, sitting on a high wall near the ancient Agora, our legs dangling. Behind us, the Tower of the Winds loomed some forty feet high.

  “What’s this place?” the man asked.

  “The Tower of the Winds… It’s a horologion, like a clock. Some people say there was an ancient mechanism built inside, maybe a water clock, maybe gears.”

  “How do you know so much about it?”

  I had no good answer to that.

  The other Patrick reached into his pocket and pulled out a strange looking device, somewhere between a compass and a pocket watch. It was tantalizingly familiar.

  “What’s that?
” I asked.

  “A compass.”

  “Pretty fancy.”

  “Thanks.”

  “That’s not what I meant. I’ve seen it before.” I tried to get a better look.

  “Really? Hmm… It’s pretty high-tech.”

  “High-tech? Like Hi-Fi?”

  “Yeah, something like that,” the man replied and laughed.

  “Where are we going?”

  “Who says we’re going anywhere?”

  “The compass… it reminds me of something,” I said and smiled. “Aren’t I supposed to jump somewhere, like with you?”

  “Jump? What do you mean?” he asked.

  “Um… library lapses…”

  The man laughed. “No, you’re not supposed to be anywhere else but here…” He patted me on the head. How I hated that. “Listen, I gotta go now. You be good. See ya…”

  “Wait, what do you mean, I’m not jumping?”

  “Of course not. You have your whole life to live. You’ll probably forget everything that happened today.”

  “I don’t think so. I have a very good memory.”

  “That’s true… maybe you will remember some of it. And maybe we’ll meet again eventually, but I’m not supposed to be here… a second time.”

  Next thing I knew, the man was walking along the high marble wall. He stopped, gave me a small salute and leapt into oblivion. In that moment I felt a singularly odd sensation: it seemed like I was him. I was the one staring back at a young boy sitting on the wall. I felt the fiery pain… a hard jump. I sensed something musty and damp, something that had never quite dried out.

  * * *

  chapter sixteen

  convergence

  My feet were wet, or more specifically, my socks… What the hell? I felt cold all over. I was dressed in a black leather jacket, and under that, a pair of pajamas. I knew exactly who I was the moment I opened my eyes, but I had no idea where I could be.

  My last memory was jumping off a wall. It was very hot. I had just been talking to some little kid… a kid who seemed a lot like me— not something I wanted to figure out at the moment. Now I sat on a brown sofa in a small living room. To my right were three grimy bay windows, covered with smudge marks and fingerprints. The only view was a nondescript semi-urban neighborhood. I’ll admit it looked vaguely familiar. It was pouring down rain and pretty dark— that much I could tell; though I wasn’t completely sure if it was dawn or dusk. I seemed to be living in some kind of third floor apartment, maybe a brownstone or something. Directly across from me was the biggest TV screen I had ever seen in my life. It filled an entire wall, just about floor to ceiling. And it was blaring in the darkened room.

  “How do I turn this damn thing off?” I asked aloud.

  “Off,” a voice said and the screen went dead. It was a smooth-talking computer, a female, or at least a good facsimile. I wondered if she was still listening. I tried saying, “On.”

  “On,” the voice repeated. “Television, single viewer mode, parallax engaged.”

  The television came back to life just as suddenly. This was definitely not the past. Soon enough, I had a single thought in my head, a number, and I guessed it to be a telephone number. I looked down at my hands. They were not quite my own, my fingers seemed chubbier than they should be. I looked at the rest of me the best I could manage. It wasn’t me at all. I was pudgy, fat, and slumped on an old sofa. My hand reached across to the coffee table: a remote and a phone. I found the mute button. I picked up the phone and dialed the one number on my mind. A busy signal came to the line. A busy signal? I’m not sure I’d heard one of those in years. I waited for a voicemail but there was none.

  I surveyed the room again, guessing this was my apartment. The place was a mess, piles of laundry, pizza boxes, wrappers, beer bottles and bags of half-eaten snacks… On the side table I found a picture of a couple of school kids smiling up at the camera. Behind them was their mom probably… Wait, I know her. That’s Suzy Chandler. A feeling of distress came over me, anxiety poured through my veins, but absolutely no memories of the present came to mind.

  When I looked more closely at myself, a different kind of shock came to me. How did I get like this? I touched my face, my earlobes, my hair… I need a mirror, I thought so hard I may have said it aloud. I stumbled to the bathroom and stared at my reflection. It was me but it wasn’t. I was a good fifteen years older than I remembered. I was middle-aged, paunchy, my hair was thinning, my face was drooping and my chin was starting to disappear into my neck. I was completely aghast, and forced myself to look away. This is not what I signed up for.

  Primitive denial was my friend now and we walked back to the sofa to console ourselves. I don’t know how long I just sat there. I had trouble fixing on any one train of thought. And no matter how hard I tried, I couldn’t bring any recent memories to mind, memories of this particular present.

  Eventually I succumbed to the giant wall-hogging TV, found the clicker, switched it on, and started flipping channels. It was not quite like any television I had seen before. There seemed to be some sort of weird motion effect. As I moved, so did the picture, at least slightly, as if it were three-dimensional. I tried various angles, turning my head, even walking around the room. It was more like looking through a window than at a screen. I clicked mode. The screen info read: Single-viewer 3-D. I sat back down, feeling heavy and tired.

  Restlessly, I clicked past the news: riots in some far off Asian place… footage of some small scale war, warnings about undrinkable water, a GMO crop blight, and gossip about celebrities I had never heard of. Future or not, all the channels were still filled with crap, some even familiar. I stopped when I saw President Pinkman giving a sound bite. He looked a lot older than I remembered. “You gotta be kidding,” I said aloud.

  “Kidding, Jessica Kidding… calling,” the computer voice replied and started to dial.

  “Wait, no… cancel,” I ordered, and tried to remember anyone by that name. It didn’t take me very long to realize this huge TV was everything: a phone, a browser, a computer. It probably ran the whole apartment and was linked to every other device I could see: a pad on the table, a cellphone, a keyboard, a controller and the remote. I began to wonder if I had any video games to play.

  “Games,” I said to the empty room.

  “Thirty-seven matches,” the smooth computer voice replied.

  Though somewhat tempted, I decided it was not the right thing to do… Eventually, I stumbled across the sports channel and they were offering up Extreme Ultimate. That sounded promising and sooner than I could imagine, I was caught up in the action. It vaguely dawned on me that Ultimate was now called Extreme, and I began to wonder why. After several minutes I realized this game was a full contact sport, more violent than football, I’d have to say. Tackles were encouraged. No fouls, playing a man down. I soon understood the only time contact was forbidden, was during the stall count. After that, any player holding the frisbee was fair game to attack… That’s an open receiver, an unblocked mark. They’re sure to score here… a player was dragged off the field, injured after that terrible missed tackle. Pretty soon I was rooting for the San Diego Red Dogs.

  ***

  A telephone rang but I wasn’t quite sure which device made the sound, certainly more than one: the cell on the coffee table skidded across the glass top, a cordless phone in the corner also glowed, and the giant wall TV blinked with a telephone icon. The screen went black for a moment but was quickly replaced by a giant face. It was Suzy Chandler. I can’t say I was completely surprised by this. She looked a lot older than I remembered, or at least wearier, even bedraggled.

  “You’re still there, Patrick?” she asked, clearly irritated.

  It was extremely odd to see her larger than life, her mouth the size of a dinner plate. I also saw two young boys behind her in the background, peeking their giant heads out. Somehow, I knew their names: Joey and Julian.

  “Still where?” I asked.

  “Your apartme
nt. You were supposed to pick up the kids an hour ago.”

  “I was? Where?”

  “Here, at home…” the gigantic Suzy said, but she was distracted by something, and turned her head from the camera. “Not now, Joey, Julian, I’m speaking to your father,” she said.

  I didn’t like the way she intoned the word father… “Did you get lost again, Daddy?” one of the kids asked, coming forward, peering up into the lens.

  “Yeah, I think I did.” I suddenly knew everything about these boys… Julian liked to draw strange pictures; his favorite cartoon was Samurai Jack. His brother Joey on the other hand loved trains, any kind, old slow steam engines or fast bullet trains…

  “Why are you looking at me like that?” Suzy returned to the screen.

  “Like what?”

  “You have a weird look on your face. Am I on that giant TV of yours?”

  “Sorry, I don’t know how to turn it off.”

  She let go an exasperated sigh. “Well? Are you coming over?” Suzy asked.

  “Soon as I can… Um, what’s the address?”

  “Oh Patrick,” she said, but did manage to laugh a little. The screen went black.

  “Call ended,” the smooth digital voice announced.

  I sat there for a long while. A wave of sadness swept over me and I wasn’t sure why. I tried very hard to recall my present with little result. I had a life here though, that much I did understand. Finally, I spoke to the computer: “Telephone contacts.” A list of unfamiliar names appeared on the screen and I scrolled through. There it was: Fynn, Tractus. I hit dial.

  “Hello?” I asked cautiously when the line clicked open. No giant face on my TV though.

  “Yes?”

  “Who is this?” I asked.

  “Patrick? Is that you?”

  The voice was calmingly familiar. “I think so.”

  He chuckled slightly. “That can’t be good.”

  “What?” I asked.

  “If you only think so…”

  “Well, I am, but I’m not.” I paused. “Who is this?”

  “It’s me, Tractus.”

  I felt relieved hearing that. A flood of memories streamed in. “You sound different.”

  “What do you mean?”