Hiro’s first strike clanked off the outer surface of the trash can. He followed this up with a second attempt, hoping to cut the mimic’s tongue away.

The trash can mimic was too fast, the beast able to whip its tongue back and let out an unsettling shriek. “Yeaaahrrh!”

It lunged for him, metal cracking against the stone payment as the monster snapped its jaw.

“Shit, shit, shit.” Hiro went for {Blade Whirlwind}, which did nothing to the mimic’s health bar. Its outer surfaces are like armor. I need a bomb or something to—

The mimic lashed its tongue at Hiro and grabbed legs. It dragged him forward, which somehow triggered {Bounce}.

“Whoa!” Hiro rushed into the air, the mimic’s tongue stretching with him. He landed a good fifteen feet away, the tongue pulling at him. Gripping his katana with both hands, Hiro tried to cut the tongue.

This worked, and what was left of the tongue hurtled backward and struck the mimic.

“Yeaaahrrh! Yeaaahrrh!”

A glance at the monster’s health bar instantly brought a grimace to Hiro’s face, who was expecting a severed tongue to deal more damage than just a small chunk.

“That’s it?”

The trash can mimic wobbled.

It turned to some garbage and used its severed tongue to shove some of the rubbish into its mouth. A green, tingling energy dispersed over the trash can mimic and its health bar filled.

“Yeaaahrrh!”

It healed itself? Fuck you! Hiro struck it again with {Blade Whirlwind} out of spite.

The mimic shot its tongue at a tree, which it used to whip itself around to Hiro, who jumped behind a bench.

Crunch!

The enraged creature bit right through the wooden bench. It ate it fully and its health bar grew in size.

I can’t get in close. It seems to be able to chase me pretty easily. It’s self-healing—

The mimic gnashed its teeth and sent its tongue forward again. Hiro cut at it with his katana, but was unable to sever it this time.

{Bounce} sent him to the other side of the small dog park. The mimic grew louder as it clomped across the stone pavement, Hiro afraid it would attract other attention soon.

He hit the trash can mimic with {Blade Whirlwind} as his mind cycled through other options.

{Refund} won’t work because it’s not really striking me. I don’t want to waste {Lupine Shift}. I just used {Kore Nani Neko}. Shit, shit. I could try my Buster Kunai, but I don’t want it to eat the damn thing. I could poison it with a vape cartridge, but I don’t want to waste it. I—

The mimic jumped for him. “Yeaaahrrh!”

Hiro rolled out of the way, bounced, and landed on the opposite side of his opponent.

Ugh. My mask isn’t making it laugh either. The image of a laughing trash can mimic came to him, followed by an idea he’d yet to consider.

Could this work?

Hiro used {Bounce} to go up and over his opponent. He landed behind it, turned his backpack around, and grabbed the bottle of Xanax as a memory flashed across his mind’s eye.

“It’ll fuck you up right,” a coworker named Gerome had said to Hiro one night at the warehouse. “Xanax.”

Mandatory overtime for the bi-yearly sale had them both working grueling sixteen-hour shifts. Their schedules were exhausting, driven by the relentless demand for packages to be delivered in two days or less.

“What kind of fucked up are we talking about here?” Hiro had asked.

“Take a full bar and you’ll be done, dude. I’m talking done-done. See?” Gerome broke the Xanax into a smaller piece. “This shit divides up into four smaller pieces ‘cause they know. Man, they know. The fuckers that make this shit know that it’ll get you lit as hell. Usually, I take one little piece and I’m good. Tonight? I’m gonna take a little more just because this isn’t my first rodeo.”

“What’s it for again?”

“Xanax?”

“Yeah, what’s the reason for the medication in the first place?”

Gerome shrugged. “Actually, I don’t know what it’s for. But it’ll set you straight. But just a little.”

Hiro popped it in his mouth. It had taken about thirty minutes, but time at the warehouse blazed by after that. And that was just a small piece of the Xanax.

Now, Hiro had a full bottle in his hand as he stood across from an enraged trash can mimic, whose health bar seemed to increase everytime it gobbled something down.

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“Open up, bitch.” Hiro tossed the pill bottle at the monster.

The mimic caught it with its tongue and stuffed it into its waiting maw. “Yeaaahrrh!”

I wonder how long it will take….

The mimic lunged for him again, and when it got too close, Hiro hopped back to the other side of the dog park.

As the mimic chased him, it continued to wolf down anything in its path.

Come on… Hiro thought as he moved behind a small dog fountain. Come on…

The slobbering mimic ripped the metal out of the ground, threw its head back, and started to chomp it down. It made a gesture as if it were choking.

Hiro’s eyes jumped to its health bar, which wavered and began to drop.

The mimic spit the metal fountain out. It moved toward him again, yet did so drunkenly this time, until it finally collapsed.

It’s health bar was now at about ten percent. The mimic still twitched some, but it couldn’t right itself, and its tongue hung out of its mouth.

“Yea…aahrrh….”

Hiro approached the creature just as it gave up the fight. It let out a final death rattles and Soul Essence poured into him.

You have new followers!

A quick check told Hiro that was back to over six hundred followers now. They seemed to be coming in faster.

I’m going to need more Xanax or other pharmaceuticals, he thought as the mimic disappeared. And I still haven’t used my vape cartridges yet. A smirk traced across his face. Bats wielding swords, tigers with poison spitting tails, trash can mimics.

“And Kung Fu Panda. Fuck this place,” Hiro whispered, yet the slight smile remained on his face.

He looked ahead and saw the {Beacon} that he had set for his fallout shelter and bounced toward it.

Boing!

Just a few blocks out from the parking garage and his fallout shelter, Hiro remembered something. He turned onto one of the old streets that ran through the Financial District, near a place he used to get spicy Chinese noodles called Xi’an Famous Foods.

There it is. Just as it had been the last time he’d stayed there, the coffee shop was boarded up, its entrance also protected by some of New York’s ubiquitous scaffolding.

Hiro had spent a week in the place before locating his current home, and it had proven to be both quiet and secluded, even with the world literally coming apart at the seams outside. He’d even discovered some coffee beans there, which he had soaked in water to make a sort of post-apocalyptic cold brew that suppressed his appetite and gave him the caffeine jitters.

Before, Hiro had to scale the scaffolding, enter through a second floor window, and use a hole blasted by a super to jump down to the coffee shop, Some serious parkour shit, he remembered thinking at the time.

Now, he simply bounced his way through the window entrance and even timed it so he shot straight into the hole.

Hiro landed and quickly checked the interior of the coffee shop, which was partially illuminated by the hole in the ceiling. Once he was in the clear, Hiro sat down on one of the couches, got his phone out, and let out a deep breath as he looked at the Blue Lane Coffee sign behind the register.

“Can I buy something in the past?” he asked his Companion. “If I use the bear to go there, can I buy something?”

“I’m asking you.”

“Got it.” Hiro found his wallet, which had his ID and a debit and credit card. It all seemed so useless now. “I have money. Or I did. Or I guess it doesn’t really matter.”

“And bring it here?”

“Got it. Eat quick.” Hiro retrieved the teddy bear. Before squeezing it against his chest, he wondered what the people in the coffee shop would think of him, the man who appeared seemingly out of nowhere clutching a teddy bear.

It’s New York. They’ve seen wilder shit.

Hiro hugged the bear and was transported back in time. He blinked and was now in line behind a woman with a complicated drink order, the coffee shop bustling with activity.

The woman held her cell phone as she spoke. “...Like, yeah, make that a skinny French vanilla with extra foam but not a cappuccino, with half a Stevia in it mixed in with the espresso, and can you make it, like, two pumps of the hazelnut and one of the vanilla? Sugar-free, of course. Oat milk. Yeah. Brad. Brad, Brad, Brad. What did Brad want again? Was it the lavender latte or… ugh. Let me give him a call.” The woman tapped her finger against her phone, which had several jingly accessories attached to it.

Hiro slipped around her.

“Hey—!”

Hiro turned to her, and by the grave look on the face of a man clutching a teddy bear to his chest, she snapped her mouth shut.

The woman’s lips quivered as Hiro turned to the barista. “Look. Hey. I need, um, a cup of coffee with two shots of espresso in it. And, um, this orange juice. And that sandwich. Thanks… Oliver,” Hiro said, reading the barista’s nametag, which was pinned next to a he/him button. “Thank you, Oliver.”

The barista nodded. “A coffee with two shots, orange juice, and a ham sandwich. Would you like your sandwich toa—”

“No.”

The barista raised an eyebrow at Hiro. “Are you sure? It’s meant to be toasted. Way better that way, actually, dude.”

“Doesn’t matter. Sorry. I don’t have a lot of time.” Hiro could see the countdown timer now, the seconds ticking away. Soon, he would be transported back… “Sandwich, coffee, and an orange juice. And that chocolate chip cookie. The big one.”

“Um, okay. Your total will be—”

Hiro didn’t care. After struggling to get his wallet out with one hand, he jammed his credit card into the machine and waited for the beep. By the time his transaction was done, he had chugged the orange juice and wolfed down half of the sandwich while the barista stood there gawking at him.

“Coffee and cookie,” Hiro said with his mouth full. “Hurry!”

The cookie came on a little plate and he stood there at the drop off bar, eating it while the woman behind him continued to gawk: “I don’t know what this guy is doing,” she said into her phone, “but he is totally weirding me out—”

The coffee finally came, Hiro now with one minute left.

“Milk,” he told an indifferent barista.

“Steamed or—”

“Doesn’t. Fucking. Matter. Now,” Hiro said as cookie crumbs flew out of his mouth.

The barista hastily poured cream into his coffee, which Hiro drank in between bites from the cookie.

He let out a deep, satisfying sigh as the past flashed away and he returned to the present day.

Hiro burped. He looked around the abandoned coffee shop as he instantly felt the effects of the sugar, food, and caffeine, the teddy bear still held tightly to his chest. “Wow.” Another thought came to him and started to laugh. I forgot to tip…