That Fucking Rabbit

The trip started as it always did, with his imaginary friend the little white cartoon rabbit. As his heart started to bounce like the drum beat at a funkadelic disco, it hopped with a slow, lolloping gait, appearing right on the edge of both his peripheral vision and the outward spiral of conscious thought, cotton tail bobbing and nose twitching. Ian watched it with detached curiosity, wondering why his neocortex and...thalamus, wasn't it?...had decided on a fucking animated bunny, of all things, to kick-start the journey inside himself. Before he could explore this train of thought more thoroughly, though he found he had instead lifted the bong to his lips and inhaled deeply, holding the metallic-tasting hit in his lungs for a good fifteen to twenty seconds for maximum effect.

The Changa blend packed tightly into this particular bowl was a new mix; an exceptionally high percentage of DMT (or N-Dimethyltriptamine to give it its Sunday name; a naturally occurring and extremely potent hallucinogen found in many plants and animals) and a monoamine oxidase inhibitor in the form of Ayahuasca vine and leaves to extend the intensity and duration of the trip whilst tweaking out some of the nasty side effects of paranoia and anxiety. In the mix was also a raft of other, choice ingredients: cannabis, mullein, passionflower, some peppermint, calendula and blue lotus, plus an extra special ingredient that even One-Lung Roy, his long-time dealer, couldn't pronounce.

As the second hit filled his lungs and opened up his mind, the cartoon rabbit hopped closer to where Ian sat on the sagging, brown velour sofa in Peggy Pete's flat. It regarded Ian with pink-red eyes (pink-red cartoon eyes, his unravelling mind corrected) sitting on its haunches by a half-dead Yukka plant in a crusty pot. Flicking its little front paws once, it proceeded to casually groom one long, pink-lined ear between them, all the while watching him ceaselessly with those unblinking eyes. The light breeze from the open window stirred the yellowing lace curtain and the bunny let its eyelids droop slightly and tucked its feet close together as though enjoying the sensation. As figments of the imagination go, this one was pretty mundane, but what followed was anything but.

As Ian slouched on that flaccid sofa, caught somewhere between the normal, mundane world and the yawning chasm of his awakening mind, he hesitated for a second before taking his third hit. On the armchair opposite him Peggy Pete himself, one hand inside his baggy jeans and already knee-deep in Special K and what Ian referred to as his 'baby food' phase, was giggling uncontrollably. His eyes were barely focussed on the muted TV that sat on a low table littered with crumpled Monster cans and empty plastic baggies. The set played what Ian thought was an episode of The Antiques Roadshow but Pete's glazed eyes were seeing something else though. Knowing both him and the Ketamine, Ian was glad he couldn't see exactly what. The rabbit, which had been sitting peacefully, suddenly sprang forward without warning and, kicking its heels, bolted from his line of sight. Or from his line of imaging, he supposed. Shrugging slightly, Ian took his third and final hit, the breakthrough hit. 
Inhale....exhale...

Everything suddenly slowed down, like the tape in an old-fashioned cassette player as its batteries run down.

Then time just...stopped.

The curtain twitching at the window froze, mid-flutter. Outside, a pair of pigeons were caught mid-air, wings bent in flight. The smoke drifting lazily from his open mouth hung, suspended in a cloud-like layer that almost looked solid. And Peggy Pete, one hand still deep in his jeans, had become as still as a waxwork figure. His glazed eyes showed nothing, and drops of sweat on his sallow flesh hung, suspended, on their journey down his face and into his straggly beard, every hair follicle perfectly rigid. Ian could see individual motes of dust caught in the mellow sunlight, hanging still in the quiet air. They were beautiful, and he stared for a thousand years or maybe just a few seconds. 

Then everything started to whirl like a multi-coloured Fibonacci sequence, and Ian was sure he was dead. 

The walls of the dingy flat around him seemed to recede and even his own hands, still clutching the bong like a talisman, seemed about a mile away. His body felt huge, expanded beyond conception as though his physical self had suddenly exploded outwards along with his consciousness. Then he was floating up off the ground, light as a feather despite his mountainous size, and rushing down a long, high-ceilinged hallway lit by beacons of dancing light. On either side were hundreds of jewel-bright windows. Behind each of them, he knew with absolute certainty, were all the secrets of the Universe, waiting to be discovered, but he had passed each one too quickly to get more than a tantalising glimpse of what lay beyond.

Launching out of the tunnel at light speed, he could see colourful, arching paths of light, that his brain joyfully recognised as Rainbow Road from Mario Kart. Except the track was being held up in places by what his grasping mind could only think of as giant celestial beings, made entirely of stars and galaxies and ancient light. Before his brain had fully comprehended this, though, he was seated behind the controls his own five-wheeled trike as a smiling Super Star circled his head, and feeling the irresistible pull in the region of his navel as he sped along the luminous track. On his left, another Kart vied for position. Steering it, little animated paws stretched across the wheel, and pink-red eyes turned in his direction, was the cartoon rabbit. Ian gave a yell; half-laugh, half-challenge.

Suddenly, a giant being turned millenia-old eyes in his direction and gave the track a sharp tug so his little Kart tumbled off the track and into the vast nothingness of the Universe. Falling freely now, he moved his arms and legs in an ungainly breast-stroke, swimming through Time itself. A long time passed - or maybe no time at all - until, materialising in front of him was a wall of sorts, made of more squares of light. Feeling no fear, he continued on as it doubled then quadrupled in size, expanding infinitely and unfolding further than his eyes could see. 

As he slowed and came to a stop, landing on a shiny black floor that ebbed and flowed like taffy under his feet, he could see that the bright squares were screens. On each one played out a multitude of scenes. Some Ian recognised, most he didn't. The screens moved slowly in rows, and he could see that each column of screens was, in fact, a strip of film. Then it dawned on him. On these strips, he was seeing every single possible timeline in the Multiverse. All of them. All at once. His head swam. Off the back of this thought immediately came another, more alarming, thought: he had no idea from which Timeline he'd come. Looking first one way then the other, he caught a flash of white off to his right. Turning his body, he began to walk briskly for about a million miles, the strips whirring up and down to his left in a never-ending stream as though being passed through some giant, Celestial projector. In front of him, he could begin to see what had caught his eye. The cartoon rabbit was casually washing it face with its front paws. As he approached, it dropped them, raising one long ear slightly, as though in question. 
'I don't know which one is mine' he said in his mind, nodding his head at the quietly whirring strips. 

From both nowhere, and everywhere at once, a commanding voice boomed out.
'Stop the movie!'
Instantly, everything came to a grinding halt, the strips frozen, the undulating floor caught in solid waves.
'Ready to go back?' asked the Voice kindly 'We can send you back whenever you want. All of this will always be here, and you can come back anytime. Just tell us: where do you want to go?'
Ian took a deep breath, sagging slightly in relief, and thought about it.
'I want to go back to Peggy Pete's'
'Okay, Ian, Peggy Pete's it is. You're Ian, you're going back to Peggy Pete's. Now. Think...were you in the bedroom or the living room?'
'The...bedroom' He said with certainty, his eyes still on the rabbit. He could vividly remember sitting on the sagging corner of Pete's brown, velour-covered mattress, the smell of ancient hash ingrained into the very walls of the room.
'If you're sure. The bedroom then. Well, okay then! Let's get to it!' the Voice said cheerfully, and Time resumed. 
The rabbit stood and regarded him for a second, before turning to the moving wall, and with a single, graceful leap that left a multi-coloured trail of iridescent stars in its wake, began to hop up the side of one of the moving columns. Ian watched it go, then followed, stepping up onto the moving wall as easily as ascending an escalator. The white rabbit, satisfied that he was following, began to briskly hop along in front of him, perky little tail twitching, ears held high. 

They moved along the sides of the strips, sometimes leaping over to join another one, in an exhilarating dance that took them lower then higher still. The cells of the film strips allowed glimpses of thousands of different scenes, all playing in unison just below his feet. As he finally began to tire, the rabbit, with a little shake of its head, darted paws first into one of the cells. Without hesitation, Ian followed. 

He awoke some time later, completely in his own head again, face down on the stiff-feeling brown velour blanket on Peggy Pete's bed. The bed felt supremely uncomfortable, as though the covers had been starched, so he stood up, stretched, and made his way to the bathroom. The silence in the flat was absolute. Standing over the shit-stained toilet, he waited for pee to come. His eyes roved the filthy bathroom and then came the exact second when he knew something was wrong.

The bathroom faucet had been faulty forever and didn't fully turn off, meaning a little trickle of water always dribbled from it, staining the aging porcelain. As Ian looked, he could see the little stream of water...but it wasn't flowing. It was frozen in place, looking like a twisting piece of melted glass. Staring, he started to pee without being conscious of it but suddenly yelped as his urine was met by the solid surface of the toilet water and splashed back, wetting him. 
'The fuck?!' Zipping his jeans, he tried to figure out what had just happened. 

Heading for the living room, he lunged at a threadbare peach-coloured towel hanging on the bathroom door to dry his piss-soaked hands on his hurried way out. It fell off its hook stiff and unyielding, like wet clothes left outside on a frosty day and found frozen in place. He stared at it for a good ten seconds before he ran helter-skelter through the door, yelling for Peggy Pete. His voice smacked the still air flatly.

Pete was sitting, still, in the armchair facing the TV, hand still in his pants, glazed eyes staring unseeing at the TV, that was not just paused but frozen. The tatty lace curtain was still caught, mid-flap and outside, the pair of pigeons were still suspended in the air. Frantic now, Ian tried to shake Pete, but he was as unyielding as a shop manikin, his waxy flesh lifeless and cool to the touch. Next he tried to tear open the curtain, his breathing laboured. It may as well have been made of plastic and he struggled with the rigid material before simply ripping it off the curtain rail. The fixtures never budged.

On the street outside, nothing moved. Not animal, nor machine nor flat grey clouds, just perfect stillness. Wide eyes taking in the scene, he saw a woman who could have been a beautifully-made doll standing with a phone in one hand, the other held the lead of a dog that had been caught mid-crap. On a bike was a teenager in a hoodie, the cigarette smoke from between his pursed lips hanging in a perpetual plume around him. Starlings caught on a low wall were stalked by a cat that would never reach them. Traffic lights at the junction glared at him like a baleful red eye. Not a thing, not a single thing, moved.

Lightheaded, the enormity of the situation hit Ian. And he remembered, oh yes, he remembered now! He had been in the living room, not the bedroom! He had come back to the wrong place; he had re-entered the timeline in the moments before he had left it, where time had ground to a halt, before he'd flown out of his mind and into the whirling Cosmos. He tried to draw in a deep breath, but his lungs couldn't get enough oxygen and his chest felt full of rusty nails. The panic began to set in. He was utterly alone, surrounded by food he could never eat, water he could never drink, even the very air seemed difficult to breathe, the molecules of oxygen and nitrogen frozen, like everything, in time.

Except...

On the street below, he caught a pale flash. Ian's heart leapt. Could someone else be alive in this waking nightmare? He pounded on the window, the noise flat in the unmoving air, the pane of glass unable to vibrate at all to carry the sound.
Below, on the silent street, perfectly visible, something moved. Ian stared, utterly incredulous as it slowly hopped along the pavement, stopping to scratch behind one, long, pink-lined ear. Even from this distance, he could see its eyes, its pinkish-red cartoon eyes. With a casual flick of its cotton tail, it turned its back and loped slowly away.
That rabbit. That fucking rabbit.