Are You My Mummy?

"Are you my mummy?" A little boy's voice asked. The Doctor had only thought he had saved the day, before running off in his fantastic time machine. The boy aimlessly, or what appeared to be aimlessly, walked around the city of London, 1941. The sky was dark and clouded from soot and ash, both from the war and factories. The boy wore brown shorts, black shoes, a white shirt with a thick brown pea coat. But that wasn't the strangest thing about the boy's appearance. On his face, or more accurately was his face, a gas mask with large eye holes and a breathing apparatus that resembled a plague doctor's mask. His voice was muffled by the mask, but his words were clear, "Are you my mummy?" His voice was slow and deliberate, enunciating each word with purpose. He reaches his hand out, to a passerby. "Are you my mummy?" he asks you again. The passerby looks at him, and wonder why he wears a gas mask...wait is it, fused to his face? The boy takes a slow step towards him, "mummy?!" He calls out. "No, I am not your mum!" The passerby insists. The boy slowly steps closer, and closer still. The passerby steps back and back. They are on a empty street of London, brick buildings surrounded the two, shops and houses, both in devastation from the German bombs. Rubble lines the sidewalks and roads, bits of brick and mortar large and small. The man wears a tan trench coat and brown trousers and a Stetson hat. He clutches a brown rectangular brief case to his chest. An older gentleman he was, so he had never fought in the war.

The man walks backwards still, keeping an eye on the strange boy with the gas mask face. The boy reaches a hand out to the man, keeping pace. The man is physically trembling, as well as a quiet wavering voice. "Whoa...whoa, woo..." he walks back diagonally on the sidewalk, heading towards as shop window. Like a lot of shops on the street, the entryway to the shop was concave in a little outcove, away from the sidewalk. The man's shoe, a nice one at that, hits a larger piece of brick and falls back, his arms spraying outwards to the sides looping in circles trying to steady himself. He lands with his butt on the cold cement, his head nearly missing the corner of the building. The boy comes again, "Are you my mummy?" The man swings his briefcase wildly at the boy, but it doesn't quite reach him yet. The man folds his knees up closer to his chest. He tries to get up, but his old hips creak, and he winces. "Ahhh!"  he curses his old bones. The boy half falls onto him, half reaches for him, touching his face. "Mummy? Is that you, Mummy?" The man hollers in terror as the boy presses his hand onto his face.

Soon, a gas mask is forming inside of him. It will need to come out now, any moment now. The respirator comes first, forcing it's way out of the man's mouth. He shrieks. The mouth piece is followed by the eyes, and then the rest of the dark, black mask. If one were to touch his face, it wouldn't feel like skin, but neither the material of gas masks. It is something in between. The boy backs away, and continues down the sidewalk, in search of his Mummy. The man is silent now, and gets up with ease. He is now empty inside, replaced by a gas mask man. The man goes off in another direction, not a word from him.

"Are you my Mummy?"

[To be continued]