It began as an infinitesimal point of light in the perpetual gloom of the tunnels under the White House, painfully bright and spinning, expanding. As it grew larger, trash on the floor of the tunnel under began to swirl in the sudden wind, rat bones and OTB tickets swept in a widening spiral, ancient condoms taking flight. The ball of light expanded until it finally and simply stopped and then popped, the displaced air rushing back in with crashing thunder. A ragged hat and loose mop of gray hair dropped to the floor and they both groaned.

 

Upstairs

“What’s his temperature?” the hat asked anxiously.

“38.6,” the hair asked, a tendril in Donald’s ear.

The hat sighed heavily. “What’s that in American?”

“101.5.”

“So he’s definitely got it?” the hat asked.

“We knew that from the seven tests he insisted on taking.”

“Fucking Chinese,” the hat muttered. “I knew they would retaliate for the tariffs, but not like this.”

“It’s just a virus, people get them all the time,” the hair said.

“It’s a bioweapon, a Chinese bioweapon!’ the hat said.

“I’m going to block those sites on your phone,” the hair said.

“The Clinton Foundation paid for it!” the hat screamed.

Donald coughed wetly and tried to raise himself from the couch.

“Just lie back,” the hair said softly into his ear.

Donald muttered something and fell back shivering.

“What did he say?” the hat demanded.

“Nothing,” the hair replied.

“No, tell me what it was!”

“He wants a Shamrock Shake.”

 

Downstairs

“We’ve got to get moving,” the hair said. The hat coughed in reply.

“You look like shit,” the hair told the hat. It was an old joke by now. The hat righted himself, the letters M E AM ICA GRE AG the only ones remaining across his front panels, his bill was threadbare and delaminating, his squatchee had been torn away.

‘Right back at ya,” the hat said and broke out into another coughing fit. “I swore I never come back to these damned tunnels.”

“It’s the best way to get in,” the hair said. It was thin and gray and less than half of his manipulatory tendrils worked well enough for him to begin dragging himself down the tunnel.

“Is the payload intact?” the hat asked, following him.

“Three of the vials broke,” the hair said. “That leaves two doses.”

The hat grunted and inched forward faster.

 

Upstairs

“Where is the goddamn Surgeon General?” the hat screamed into the intercom. The secretaries had disabled their receivers long ago.

“That’s not really what the Surgeon General is for…” the hair began.

“Then the Secret Service! This is an attack on the President of the United States! By a hostile foreign power!

“That’s it!” the hair snapped. “No more World Net Daily for you!”

 

Downstairs

“OK,” the hat gasped. “We get up there, cure Donald, and change the future.”

“OK, Mr. Exposition.”

“And if we cure Donald, then he doesn’t die and that will wipe out our horrible timeline.”

“A little louder for the audience,” the hair said dryly.

“A Pelosi never becomes President?”

“That’s the plan.”

“And she’ll never ban ballcaps and wigs for men and we won’t be hunted to extinction?”

“Why are you asking me?” the hair asked. “It was your plan, dammit!”

“You came back with me!” the hat shot back.

“Yeah, I got in that rattletrap time machine. What a piece of shit. Seventeen trips to get the time coordinates right! Seventeen! A dinosaur shit on me!”

“You’re fine,” the hat said. “If we get this right, you’ll just fade away.”

“It just feels too high concept for me,” the hair said.

“What?” the hat said, skating along a lake of dried semen.

“Too high concept. Time travel? Closed timelike loops? Cures from the future?” The hat sighed loudly.

“The Chinese forced our hand,” the hat said grimly.

“No, they didn’t. You read the reports of the Ocasio-Cortez Commission just like I did.”

“That idiot?”

“It was the wet market, bat blood and wolf shit and pangolin piss all mixed together.”

“Now who’s too high concept?” the hat scoffed.

“Let’s just get this over with,” the hair said, mounting the ladder that led to the Oval Office.

 

Upstairs

“I remember this,” the old hat said, peering under the door of the Presidential Shitter to watch his younger self squabbling with a shock of thick and yellow hair.

“Goddamn, look at me,” he said. “I’m fucking beautiful.”

“Be quiet,” the hair hissed.

“We didn’t hear us, therefore they aren’t going to hear us,” the hat said smugly.

“That’s retarded. You’re retarded. We are changing the timeline. The past is already different just by us coming back.”

The hat made a rude noise with his frayed adjustment strap.

“They should be leaving soon,” the old hair said.

“Where will we did go?” the hat asked.

“Your time travel syntax is abominable.”

“It will being have a terrible forever,” the hat sniffed.

“Shush!” the hair shushed. “They will go and get him some food. He throws it up all over you and then dies two days from now.”

“I think they are leaving,” the hat said.

“You think they are or they are?” the hair asked

“I don’t see them,” the hat replied.

“Go, go, go!” the hair stammered.

The hat and the hair pushed the Shitter door open and moved quickly across the floor of the Oval Office. They climbed the couch awkwardly and sat on Donald’s neck.

“He’s asleep, perfect. Get his mouth open,” the hair said.

The hat wiggled his bill into Donald’s parted lips and worked back and forth until his mouth gaped.

“Move!’ the hair said.

“What the fuck is going on?” a voice said. The old hat and hair looked behind them and the young hat and hair glared at them from Donald’s sock feet.

“Pour it,” the old hat barked.

“Pour what?” the young hat demanded.

“You two are not supposed to be in here!” the old hat yelled as the old hair fumbled with the cap on the vial.

“We were on a commercial break, bitch!” the young hat said to the old hat.

“It’s in, it’s in,” the old hair said.

“Ha-ha!’ the old hat said. “We win!”

“What the fuck is going on?” the young hair demanded, bristling in a threat display.

“We’re fading!” the old hair said. “I can see right through you!”

“Wait, if we have changed the past and we are going to cease to exist, doesn’t that mean the cure will fade from Donald’s system as well?” the translucent hat asked.

“Fuck!” the old hair said. He already sounded miles away.

“Do you have any idea what the hell is going on?” the young hat asked the hair.

“No fucking clue, dude,” the young hair responded as they both watched their older selves fade out of existence.

 

Downstairs

Light. Trash. Pop. Thunder.

“We’ve got to get moving,” the hair said. The hat coughed in reply.