How inconvenient is it when two "I"s come into one place? When two entities who are techincally the same but at the same time not meet? Confusing, certainly, but not impossible to deal with.
Ergo, when my apartment on the fifteenth anniversary of the infamous 9/11 incident became enveloped with a miasmic mist and shuddered; when, after the fog colored with shades I wasn't aware that we as a human species had the ability to see, crawled away and revealed a freezing tundra of seemingly infinite expanse; when, somehow, the house of my parents before I had moved out was right next to my forcibly-extracted-by-God-I-guess aparment in that very same freezing tundra; and when I saw a much more pimply, stick-like, autistically-dressed version of my own self warring against the cartoonish equine creatures I had so dearly loved throughout my high school carreer, armed with crystalline snowballs that seemed to explode and disturb the senses, after reminding myself that I had never done any sort of psychoactive stimulant and that this in no way would have been caused by nicotine or Jack Daniel's and was thus forced to accept what I was seeing, I was not afraid of meeting my past self.
I was afraid of everything else, though. Also rather irate.
"You there! Fucker! What the shit did you do to us!"
He—I, whatever—was just dealing the Coup de grâce, as it were, to the last waking Equestrian guard as I shouted, and startled, throwing the snowball into the poor equine's face much harder than intended.
"Wai-what? Who are you? Where the frik? . . ."
His eyes widened as I approached, casting my shadow over his retarded-hat-wearing-face.
I remained silent, waiting for it to click inside his head.
"Are you . . . holy crap are you? . . ."
"You? Yes. I guess. I suppose. I believe. That is my working hypothesis. And I blame you."
"Wait, why?"
"I sure as hell didn't do anything. I remember the weird-ass shit you—I—we—were into in high school. Mr. Latin and Gothic and summoning-spells-that-are-perfectly-all-right-because-they-only-summon-benevolent-spirits. You must be from a timeline where they would actually work. I reapeat: what did you do?"
"Nothing! I promise! I was just uploading a YouTube vide—."
"Your videos sucked ass. Don't use your parents disabled phone to film. Your music sucked. You piece of shit. I hate you."
He was a little overwhelmed.
After several long moments of stunned silence, he managed to stutter out something along the lines of: "You can't be me."
I raised my eyebrow. "Oh? And whyever not?"
"I . . . I don't swear."
"No. You don't. But guess what? Within the next two years you will, and you'll also—gasp!—have sex before you're married."
"I don't beleive you."
"Yes. And you'll also pick up drinking and smoking. And also you'll go outside, and get a job, and grow up."
"Aren't you . . . I'm religious, I'm a—."
"I'm still religious. I'm just no longer a fucking cultist like you and your entire goddamned family. Come on. I was mistaken. There's no way your competent enough to have brought this about. Come look at your future apartment."
He followed silently, trudging in the snow.
I hadn't thrown anything other than my jacket on and wanted to get inside. Granted, the lack of electricity meant that inside wasn't that helpful, but over the course of being torn from my reailty and deposited into a seperate one with my past self, my brain didn't really function the way it was supposed to.
Even less, that is.
After lighting a few candles and a cigarette, I examined the sad creature before me.
Based off his little war I'd seen the ass end of, he had been having a little bit of fun. Shame. Then I had to come in and ruin everything.
And, him being me and I being he, I knew just the way to cheer him up.
"Here. Let me show you something. A few somethings, that is."
He tried to hide his interest with limited success.
Sliding open the closet I exposed the metal door of a safe. Then, after a four digit code, it swung open to reveal stuff my sophmore self would have got an erection over.
He furrowed his eyebros and gaped, leaning foward.
"Woah. Is that . . . is that an AK-4-?"
"Stop. Stop right there. Fuckwit. That is an Bushmaster AR-15. And that is a quarter of 20,000 rounds of hand-loaded ammuntion."
"You can do that?"
"Uh, yeah. 5.56s aren't shat out of Gadsen unicorn's asses. You always wanted a gas mask, right?"
"Well, yeah, I always thought they were cool. Way too expensive, though. Like, sixty dollars at least."
"If you want a gas mask for cheap, the army surplus store down the highway will sell you one for twenty bucks. It's been there the entire time you've lived here. But if you want a real gas mask, then you're going to spend at least six hundred."
I led him to the shelf of over twenty different respirators.
Again, he gaped. "Which one is the best one?" he asked.
"The best ones are buried, far from any government's eyes."
He wasn't quite sure what I meant by that.
"Hey uh . . . darn. What should I call you?"
"Senpai."
"What?"
"Nevermind. Hm. Call me . . . Longshanks."
"'Longshanks' . . . why? . . ."
"Because that's gonna be your nickname at school within the next six months, and you are going to be infinitely joyful that it's not all that negative."
"Okay then Mr. Longshanks; who's our first girlfriend?"
Of course.
I smirked.
"You don't know her yet. She's in Colorado right now. But dear God Almighty when you meet her, you will know. And you listen here you motherfucker."
He jumped.
"When you meet her, you better fucking get your shit together. Get a job, get a car, take her on dates, and make her feel loved. Don't just fucking message her on Facebook from time to time, because she's worth more than that. You have in your hands the power to stop a great number of scars on her thighs and wrists. And when she comes to Idaho and you two meet, you're gonna develop a crush on her. But let your feelings flow. She can be trusted. Fall in love with her, and when she eventually moves back to Colorado for a bit, don't you dare forget her. Better yet, with all the money you'll receive from the fucking job you're gonna get as soon as we escape from this mess, follow her. She's going to be your first love, and the One for forever." I showed him my ring.
". . . okay. . . ."
I snorted and took a drag from the Marlboro, letting the smoke caress the walls and ceilings.
"Now," I eventually said, "It looked like you were fighting a grand old war when I got here. Need some help?"