The Day the World Went Loki

by Robert J. Harris

  Further gruesome signs of her handiwork greeted them downstairs. There was an enormous stuffed bat hanging on the wall. In the bookcase the encyclopedias and Dad’s collection of spy novels had been replaced by rows of ancient volumes with mouldering covers.

  Half the furniture had been replaced by crude tables and chairs carved from gnarled oak, many of which were decorated with vine patterns and gargoyle faces. Family photographs had been displaced by miniature paintings of spiders, wolves and odd half-human creatures Lewis couldn’t even put a name to.

  “This is so random!” he said, shaking his head.

  “I think it’s time we called in professional help,” said Greg.

  “You mean a psychiatrist?”

  “I mean the SAS. Somebody’s got to get rid of her and make the world safe for civilisation.”

  Lewis stopped short, scowling. “You know, she couldn’t have done all this in one night. Not by herself. You don’t suppose she made Mum help her, do you?”

  “I wouldn’t put anything past that woman.”

  They entered the dining room to find the table had been laid for breakfast. They sat down, casting their eyes uneasily over the pictures and ornaments, which had undergone the same sort of transformation as the rest of the house.

  “I feel like I’ve moved into Frankenstein’s castle,” Lewis said.

  Mum’s voice came from the kitchen: “Breakfast will be right out!”

  Greg lifted up his cereal spoon and made a face. All the cutlery had been replaced with crude, heavy items made from a dull, grey metal. “Aunt Vivien better not mess around with my breakfast,” he groused. “Whatever you do, you don’t interfere with a man’s breakfast. It’s the cornerstone of the whole day. If something goes wrong with breakfast, the knock on effect could spread to the whole country. It could devastate the economy. I’ve half a mind to call our MP, whoever he is.”

  At that moment the kitchen door opened and something colossal came stomping out. It was about seven feet tall with green skin and tufts of black fur on the back of its ham-like hands. It had a big, knobbly face and nostrils almost as wide as its round, yellow eyes. A long, thick tail was dragging heavily across the floor behind it. It was wearing Mum’s green summer dress and white apron.

  “Just let me know if you want more,” the monster offered, sounding just like Mum. It set a bowl down in front of each of them, then turned round and started back towards the kitchen.

  The boys looked down, almost white with shock. Sitting in front of each of them was a bowl filled with a noxious yellow goo that looked like it had been scooped off the surface of a swamp. To add insult to injury, there was a fly floating on the top of Lewis’ helping. He hoped for the fly’s sake that it was dead.

  He tried to say something to Greg, but all that came out was a choking noise.

  The sound caused the green creature to halt at the kitchen door and lumber back to the table. It opened its wide gash of a mouth and Mum’s voice came out. “Is everything all right, boys?”

  They both stared at her, unable to speak, until a vexed frown began to form on that monstrous face.

  Lewis’ mouth had gone completely dry, but he gathered the nerve to utter a single word. He pointed an unsteady finger at his bowl and whimpered, “Fly…”

  The creature leaned over him, casting a vast shadow across the table. “Oh, don’t worry about that,” it said in Mum’s sweetest voice.

  The cavernous maw gaped open and a long, forked tongue whipped out to pluck the fly out of the gloop and pop it into the waiting mouth. The creature smacked its lips and lumbered back towards the kitchen.

  “Now get on with your breakfast, boys,” Mum’s voice called. “You don’t want to be late for school.”

  Greg won the race to the top of the stairs, but he had the good grace not to slam the bedroom door shut until Lewis had dived in after him. It only took them about half a minute to get the barricade up, and when they’d finished they slumped on the floor side by side, their backs resting against the heap of furniture and boxes now blocking the door.

  “How long do you think we can stay in here?” Lewis asked once he’d caught his breath.

  Greg’s voice was shaky. “Until we starve.” He drew a hand across the back of his mouth. “You know, this goes way beyond a spot of redecorating.”

  “Come on, you can’t think Aunt Vivien’s to blame for this.”

  “Why not? It’s that muck she fed as last night. Look what it’s done to Mum. It’s only a matter of time before we start to mutate as well. Come to think of it, you already look kind of green.”

  Lewis ignored him and tiptoed over to the window. He gingerly eased aside the curtain and looked out over the back garden.

  “What do you see?” Greg asked, sliding across the floor to his side.

  “That well for one thing,” Lewis answered. “Do you think Aunt Vivien dug that overnight?”

  He pointed to a round well, which now occupied the centre of the garden. A bucket stood to one side of it with a rope tied to its handle.

  Greg rubbed his eyes. “We’re hallucinating,” he said firmly. “She’s drugged us. She put some kind of mushrooms in the food last night.”

  Lewis gave him a sceptical look. “It can’t be a hallucination. We wouldn’t both be seeing the same thing.”

  “Then it’s a mirage,” Greg insisted.

  “You only get mirages in the desert. It’s the sunlight refracting—”

  Greg silenced him with an upraised hand. “Never mind. It’s obvious what’s going on. This is just a dream.”

  “You think we’re both having the same dream?”

  “Of course not, you idiot. You’re not really here at all. You’re just part of my dream.”

  “Then why are you bothering to talk to me if I’m not real?”

  “I’m not talking to you. I’m only dreaming that I’m talking to you.”

  “Then why don’t you go ahead and wake yourself up?”

  “What, and lose my beauty sleep?”

  “Won’t that be better than being stuck in this nightmare?”

  “You can’t just wake yourself up,” Greg objected. “If you could nobody would ever oversleep.”

  “It’s got to be worth a try,” Lewis said.

  He walked over to the bulletin board and pulled a pin out of it, causing a newspaper clipping about a football match to flutter to the floor. “Here, stick this in your backside.”

  “What sort of a nutcase do you take me for?”

  “It won’t really hurt. It’s only a dream, isn’t it?”

  “If it won’t hurt, then stick it in your backside.”

  “How will that wake you up?”

  “It probably won’t,” Greg agreed, “but right now I could use a good laugh.”

  “Take it from me, I’m really here and I’m awake. You’re not dreaming me.”

  “So what’s your theory?” Greg demanded.

  Lewis backed away and sat down on the bed. “All I can think of is that this is Lokiday.”

  “Lucky, right. We have to eat slime for breakfast and Mum’s turned into an orc.”

  “No, Lokiday,” Lewis insisted, picking up The Folklore Of Time.

  “You mean the rhyme?” Greg exclaimed, snatching the book from him. He flipped quickly to the page.

  “I told you it was supposed to call up an extra day, not one that would be lucky for you.” Lewis was too shaken to be smug. “Remember, it says, ‘The day that was lost returns in time’. Suppose this is some sort of a lost day.”

  “You mean like the ones they rioted about back then?”

  “Could be. Maybe even older than that.”

  “But if it’s just another day, why is all this weird stuff going on?”

  “Maybe if you give me the book I can find out.”

  Greg thrust the book at him and Lewis began to study it. He started with the Lokiday rhyme then flicked back and forth through the pages, searching for some further clue to what was happe
ning.

  “This book is a shambles!” he groaned. “There isn’t even an index.”

  “If you hadn’t brought that stupid book here in the first place,” said Greg, “we wouldn’t be in this mess.”

  “I never said, ‘Hey, let’s recite this rhyme at midnight.’”

  “Oh, like you couldn’t tell it was some kind of magic. Don’t you pay any attention to what you’re doing? Would you bring dynamite into the house and stick it in the microwave?”

  “Magic?” Lewis repeated. “I suppose it is magic.”

  Greg stopped to look around him. “Why hasn’t it changed my room?”

  “Because it couldn’t be in any worse shape than it is,” Lewis responded bitterly.

  “No, seriously. The rest of the house has changed, even the back garden.”

  Lewis drummed his fingers on an open page. “Maybe since we were making it happen, the spell couldn’t affect us, or the place we were in, without undoing itself. It’s like, if you’re painting a floor, you can’t paint the part you’re standing on.”

  “How far do you think it goes?” Greg asked.

  “What do you mean?”

  Greg looked meaningfully towards the window. “Do you think it’s just affected our house, or has it changed the whole town?”

  Lewis looked outside. “You can’t see much from here. The trees block the view.”

  “Do the trees look bigger to you?”

  Lewis nodded reluctantly. He was about to speak when a flock of huge, black ravens erupted from the branches of the nearest tree with a raucous cry that sent him staggering backwards. They flapped up into the sky and wheeled away over their roof.

  Before he could say anything, Lewis saw that Greg had put a finger to his mouth, signalling him to silence. Heavy footfalls were crossing the hall outside. Mum’s voice sounded incongruously through the door.

  “You didn’t eat your breakfast,” she called accusingly.

  The boys looked at each other and Greg nudged Lewis to respond.

  “We remembered some work we had to finish before school,” he called back. “We had to come right up here and do it. Sorry… Mum,” he added, trying to keep his voice from becoming a squeak.

  There was a pause and they both eyed the doorknob anxiously.

  “All right,” Mum said. “But don’t be late for school. Remember the fuss your dad made last time.”

  They heard her turn and lumber away, dragging her tail behind her. The boys let out a heartfelt sigh of relief.

  “I’ve got an idea,” Greg said.

  He flicked on his radio, but all he could pick up were waves of static. He switched it off and both of them reached for their phones. The message NO SIGNAL confirmed that they were completely cut off.

  Greg tossed his phone on the bed. “So where does that leave us?”

  “We could go out and explore,” Lewis said. He did not sound keen.

  “If we don’t go to school soon, Mum’s liable to smash the door down,” Greg said.

  “She could do it, too,” Lewis added with a grimace.

  “Look, Mum didn’t seem to think there was anything strange about us. If we keep our cool, we can stroll around outside. Maybe we can find some other normal people.”

  “It would be a good idea to get out of here before Aunt Vivien wakes up,” Lewis added. “If Mum’s turned into a seven-foot tall green monster, what do you think she’s turned into?”

  “I don’t even want to think about it.”

  “Come on, let’s get the barricade down,” Lewis said, taking hold of a chair leg. He saw that a pensive expression had spread over Greg’s face. “What’s the problem?”

  “I was just wondering, how do you paint the piece of floor you’re standing on?”

  Lewis took a deep breath. “Could we worry about that some other time?”

  Once they had dismantled the barricade Greg slowly opened the door. He looked back to see Lewis loading some books into his backpack.

  “Come on!” he said.

  5. TOWN WITHOUT PITY

  Lewis had been nurturing a slim hope that reality would reassert itself while they were hiding, but the leprechaun picture on the wall and the other unspeakable decorations were all still present. He sighed and steeled himself to follow Greg downstairs.

  They were tiptoeing through the front hall when Mum appeared. Greg and Lewis grabbed hold of each other but managed not to scream.

  “Since you didn’t eat any breakfast,” the seven-foot abomination said in Mum’s most patient voice, “I’ve made you each a sandwich.”

  She handed them each something vaguely square shaped that was wrapped in a ragged cloth. Against his better judgement Lewis unwrapped the package and stared at the contents. Two mouldy slices of dry bread with shreds of some unidentifiable leaf drooping from the corners. Something was wriggling in the middle of the sandwich.

  A fat, crimson spider poked its head out from between the slices of bread then began to descend towards the floor on a slender thread. Lewis shook the sandwich rapidly and watched the spider fall.

  Mum gave him a suspicious glare. “You haven’t become a vegetarian have you?”

  Lewis gulped. “I only eat spiders on Tuesday, Mum.”

  Upstairs a door opened and a chillingly familiar voice shouted out, “Do you have any herbal tea, Adele?”

  Mum called back, “Yes, Vivien, I’ll brew some nettles for you.”

  “I’ll be right down!” Aunt Vivien trilled.

  Lewis was rooted to the spot in horror until Greg shook him out of it.

  “We’ve got to go, Mum!” Greg said urgently.

  “Yes, right now!” Lewis blurted out.

  They raced down the hallway, barely pausing to throw open the door before tumbling out into the street.

  “That was close!” Greg gasped.

  “Do you think it’s okay to leave Mum alone with Aunt Vivien?” Lewis asked.

  “In her present condition, I think she can take care of herself,” Greg assured him.

  A snuffling noise drew their attention to their left, where a large green dinosaur was curled up asleep on the driveway. There were no dice hanging over its nose, but there was no doubt that this slumbering beast had been Aunt Vivien’s car.

  All at once Lewis realised he was still holding the sandwich. Reflexively he flung it away.

  Greg looked at his own package, holding it away from him at arm’s length. Before he could decide what to do with it, a voice somewhere above them said, “Greg, you want that?”

  They looked up.

  Then they looked up some more.

  The Chiz had to be at least twelve feet tall. He was covered in thick orange fur and his red beanie was so far off you’d have needed binoculars to see it properly. He’d have made a pretty fair Abominable Snowman.

  Eventually Greg was able to say, “Hi, Chiz,” without his voice breaking.

  “Nice to see you, Chiz,” Lewis added by way of support.

  The Chiz was eyeing Greg’s sandwich. A big red tongue slid out and moistened his thick lips.

  “Oh, sure, Chiz, it’s all yours,” Greg said, offering the package.

  The Chiz lifted it out of his hand with fingers the size of bananas. Without unwrapping it, he popped it straight into his mouth, chewed it three or four times and swallowed.

  “Walk to school with you guys,” Chiz rumbled. It sounded more like an edict than a suggestion.

  “We’ve, uh…” Greg began.

  “We need to go somewhere else first,” Lewis finished for him.

  “That’s right, we’ve got an errand to run for Mum,” Greg said.

  “Can’t miss school today, Greg. It’s Lokiday.”

  “Right, Chiz.”

  Greg was just starting to walk away when one of the Chiz’s immense, furry paws descended and clamped itself onto his shoulder. He squirmed manfully but could not get free. He felt himself being turned around and directed down the street towards school. It was either walk beside th
e Chiz or be dragged along, ruining the toes of his new trainers.

  “Lokiday, eh. So I don’t expect there’ll be a test today, Chiz?”

  The Chiz laughed like he’d made a really funny joke.

  Lewis fidgeted nervously for a few seconds then he hurried after them. He was afraid that if he let Greg out of his sight, he would turn into something abominable as well.

  “He seems even more spaced out than usual,” Lewis observed to Greg in an undertone.

  “The air’s probably a little thin up there,” Greg said.

  Through the slatted fence of the Larkins’ garden they caught an indistinct glimpse of something huge and hairy. It ripped a sapling out of the ground and tossed it high into the air. The animal looked like it wanted to play fetch, but they couldn’t see whether there was anyone around with the strength or the courage to oblige. As they passed, it barked crazily, putting an extra spring in their step.

  For the most part, the buildings along the street were only slightly altered. Some of them now had crooked chimneys giving off streamers of noxious green smoke, and they all looked a little dilapidated, as though they had aged overnight. Here and there a thatched roof or a turret had been added to a building, but the streets themselves appeared to follow the same pattern as before.

  What was most noticeable was the complete lack of cars or bikes. There wasn’t even the sound of an engine. Occasionally somebody would ride by on horseback or stroll past leading a mule. But there were bigger surprises than that in store in the transportation department.

  On the spot where they usually passed Canny Dan’s Snack Van, somebody had parked a wagon load of manure. It didn’t smell any better. While they were pinching their noses, Darren Poole overtook them, not on his racing bike, but on a huge, loping lizard. Even with a mane of wild black hair and a set of fangs, Darren was still recognisable.

  At the corner of Pipeland Road the lizard swerved aside to avoid a head-on crash with a colossal frog. The frog was hauling a carriage with Mr Arbuthnot, the bank manager, and his wife inside.

  The boys spotted other familiar faces along the way, although on this particular day they were a little less familiar than usual. Lewis was relieved to see that not everyone had increased in size. The Brewster twins, for example, had become a pair of identical gnomes, with red beards and long, sharp noses. Susie Spinetti waved hello from across the street and seemed friendly enough, in spite of the fact she was dressed in goat skin and carrying a spear.