Malcolm The “Traveller”

Malcolm was a "traveller", not the type that lived in a caravan or those who had been browbeaten by council after council. Being moved from pitch to green due to the lack of space, and were now housed in council stock, with their pony and cart tethered to the nearest lamppost.

No, he was a green or blue tabletop shandy traveller and as expensive as those drinks were, he enjoyed every minute of his mad adventures. Not that anyone believed any of his tales. 

Instead, they just called him a stupid alcy who loved to tip bottles of green fizzy alcopops into half a pint of Stella and then be found at the end of night full slumber. 

He seemed to love sleeping in the corner of the bars on the sofas "looking after", everyone's jackets, with drool hanging from his lip as he muttered and snored at any attempt to wake him.

He had once spent an hour debating a psychiatrist, who was sure that he was a candidate for sectioning, about his travels. That when he was asleep after drinking enough tabletop shandies that he was travelling the realms of the multiverse. 

He wasn't just KO'd, a dribbling fuckwit that got free lifts home due to a pitty-seeking Carol who felt sorry for what she saw as an alcoholic with some sort of mental issue.

She had spent time and effort arranging the visit to the shrink, hoping for some sort of cure or magic pill to be dispensed. Something that would stop his drunken behaviour, and keep him awake for more than an hour when they went out at night but no.

Instead, she watched dumbfounded as Malcom walked out of her office with a skip hop and lick of pretend lollipop as the psychiatrist could be seen in the office behind him scratching her head in disbelief. Whatever he had said to her had caused a grievance in the poor woman's head and Malcom seemed pretty proud of himself.

He didn't "Travel" (in quotes), all the time, and Carol wondered why if he was truly just a drunk, he didn't feel the need to consume nightly. Malcolm had told her plain face to face that he didn't need to drink but when he felt like traveling, he just had to spend all that money on booze to go dimension hoping. Skipping through invisible portals and diving through black holes only to come out the other side from a white hole, spat like space dust into vacuums of newly created universes.

Malcom could speedily travel through space and time with his mind just thinking about where to go, zipping from an alternate Earth where Hippopotamuses in NAZI uniforms ruled the planet, and humans were just kept in cages and bred like chickens for their consumption as the Hippos planned their next invasion of Russia, which was ruled by Elephants, and just as in Malcom's universe seemed impervious to attacks from the west.

A Rhinosaurus Napolean had failed with his 3 million army and the Hippos were doomed to fail just like a Hitler led, Crocodile Army the same size did with his Operation Barbarossa.

He had to be so careful on this planet not to be detected by Hugo Boss wearing leather-coated Gestapo Hippos, scouting for spies, and always eager for a quick snack. He had almost shat himself dead when on one occasion, he saw a SS Hippo just pick up a naked human, toss him in the air, and then crack n snack him with one bite. 

No this was not a version of reality Malcom liked to visit, but it was interesting he just couldn't help having the odd look in to see which variety of clothed animal was winning their current World War.

Malcolm was always white and shaky when finally awoken by a pull and push in the morning, where he would find himself in strange flats and homes of people he didn't know.

It was almost as bad as the traveling but here he was treated just as a soak, who always fell asleep in bars and clubs. The shakes were not from DT's and the pale face was not from lack of water but more from the stage of discombobulation that a traveller like Malcolm, had to go through, when arriving back in their home dimension.

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