Author's note: Starting Monday July 10th, I'll be on a three to four week vacation, and will have limited access to the internet, especially during the first week or so.

"I'm gonna go take a walk" Antha announced "Wanna come with?"

"sure..." I agreed, if only because despite the state I was in, a part of me worried about her walking in that state after dark.

I left the house with Antha. The street lights seemed to change color, and blink a lot.

"Are the lights changing color on you?" she asked me.

"Yeah..." I admitted.

"Let's make crank calls!" she suggested

"It's okay...I uh...should be getting home.." I mused, as some goblins, sitting on a ford truck seemed to be laughing at me.

"Do you have a cell...?"

"Yeah...but..."

"Gimme it!"

"It's low on battery..." I said lamely.

"It'll be fun!" she tried to reach into my jacket pocket. My reflexes and the effect of my training were off, so my struggles against her finding it were lame. Soon, she had my phone in her hand.

"Hey! Use your own phone! Come on!" I protested.

"Don't be a doob!" she rolled her eyes. "Let me call someone on your list..."

"No!" I tried to grab the phone from her, but she ran, and ran.

"Antha! Gimme the phone!"

I ran after her, but soon she was making the call, after looking at my list.

"Hello? Don's Dad?" she said into the phone as I cringed. After listening for a bit, she said "Who am I? What matters is that evil mice have captured your son and they want to take his brain!"

Finally, I grabbed the phone from her...

"Dad! Sorry...uh...she just took the phone from me..."

"You sound different Donnie..."

"Morlock uh...gave everyone spiked cookies " I admitted reluctantly. They would have found out anyway.

"Would you like a ride home?" he sounded worried.

"Sure...dad...thanks...I'll wait out here..." I agreed, realizing that I wasn't much use to anyone stoned, so I gave him the address.

Antha pouted when I hung up "You're leaving already?"

"Yeah...My Dad's picking me up" I told her. "Do you have someone to give you a ride...?"

"No..." she said...a little too quickly.

"I'll ask him to give you a ride."

"Thanks!"

Quickly, I went to say my goodbyes, especially to Hope. Then, Antha and I were in front of the home of our host.

To my chagrin, Charlie was in the car with Dad. My brother got out of the car. It was hard enough that I had to borrow money from him, now he was seeing me stoned.

"You okay man? Dad says that the cult leader spiked some cookies?" he looked worried.

"Yeah..." I tried to shrug it off...

"I figured you'd need someone to drive your car back" Charlie continued.

"Thanks Buddy!..." I said, and introduced Antha "This is Antha...I was hoping Dad could give her a ride as well"

Soon, I hopped into Dad's car with her.

"Dad...this is Antha. She needs a ride because she had the cookies as well" I said. She sat in the back.

"Hi Mr. Eppes!" she said in a bubbly voice.

"Were you the one who made the crank call?" Dad asked bluntly.

"Yeah..."she shrugged.

"so...getting stoned is what it takes for you to meet women?" Dad deadpanned to me under his breath.

I rolled my eyes.

Antha told Dad how to get to her place, and then chatted about random stuff. Soon, we were there. She gave me her number and left the car.

"So...no one told you that the cookies were spiked?" Dad asked when we were on our way home.

"Nope..."I shook my head. The drive felt surreal, as I saw wavy lines, wavy lights, and cars that sniffed at each other.

"Are you hallucinating?" he asked me.

"No...!" I lied, not wanting to worry him any more than I had.

"You looked just like a friend of mine did when he dropped acid." Dad said. "Did your cousin eat the cookies too?"

"Yeah..."

"If your Aunt knew..." Dad shook his head while trailing off. "Besides getting stoned and meeting weird women, did you find anything useful?"

I told Dad about the developments, and we eventually arrived at the house. I was too riled up to sleep, so I settled on watching TV.

Charlie joined me.

"You want me to make you tea or something?" he asked. "How did it go?"

I told him, but politely refused the tea.

"That girl seemed to like Don" Dad remarked, while doing a crossword nearby.

"She's too young and not my type" I said.

Just then, the phone rang. Charlie answered it.

"It's your client, Mr. Fullerton" My brother said after a bit.

TBC