install optimise with npm from optimist.js file

Trying to fix an offline install of the Carto tool from Mapbox on Ubuntu 14.04. Currently, node is giving me an error, it cant find the optimist module. I can manually find an optimist.js file, but its not under a "proper" node_modules directory like the other Carto dependancies are (e.g. underscore). I'm very new to npm and node, so my question is "is there a way to properly install optimise from this optimist.js file I have?"