Otherworldly Botany

“‘Don’t judge a book by its cover’, they say.”

But when I opened the door to my new home, my opinion didn’t change in the slightest. Rubble, dirt, and dust was everywhere. It also seems like the spiders here already made it their new home. Still, this is a big step up from the muddy alley. It is still a bit cold, but at least I have a solid floor to sleep on.

Even better is the fact that I had enough money left to buy myself some equipment for the next step of my plan. First off, a wide variety of glasses that somewhat resemble the flasks and such from back home. Secondly, a bunch of random tools. I actually don’t know what most of them are used for except for the nail hammer and tweezer. The rest could be useful for later I reckon. Last but not least, a huge load of paper and a little something. Now, why paper exactly? Well, for writing down stuff of course. But that is not the actual main reason. I presume that it will take a long time before I find the plant I used for my drug that I got fired for. So until I find it, I have to sell something in the meantime to make a profit and sustain myself. But if one thing is for certain, it’s that I should be able to find that something relatively quickly, since it grows pretty much everywhere and brings in large sums of cash too. Rolling that up in some not overly processed paper gives us a mind soothing drug for the commoners.

After getting everything inside, I make my way towards the forest that is in close proximity. Like I said, my house is very far from the city. A big upside of that is that I’m closer to nature, which is not only good to have some peace and quiet, but to gather nature’s blessings as well.

Since I’m not in a hurry to search for those plants immediately, I take my time to enjoy the outdoors again. It’s much nicer now that it’s warmer and the snow has melted. I wouldn’t say I forgot how beautiful such a green and living scenery can be, but I found somewhat of a new appreciation. Especially since there are no roads, machines or anything here. At least in my country, it was pretty rare to find places untouched by mankind. This is uniquely different in comparison. And once I enter the nearby forest, the smell of spring and freshness underline this feeling of uninterrupted freedom.

Hah…This is a much nicer workplace than the littered city. So much more comfortable and much more suited for my work experience. So let’s see what kind of plants…we…got?

In front of my curious and now crouched self is a plant I have personally never seen before. It resembles a horn, one that a unicorn would have, accented with an orange color. Is it even a plant? It has a stem at least…and leaves.

After trying to pull it out with only little success, I dig around with one of the previously bought tools, still wondering what its use is. However, it works kinda well as a shovel, as I now have revealed the plant’s roots. I mean, the leaves, stem and roots don’t necessarily confirm it to be a plant. I continue digging this particular oddity out of its dirt prison after which I pick it up with the big tool tweezer and put it in my bag.

“How peculiar.”

I continue on, holding my curiosity about this plant at bay as to not interfere with my actual goal. But this wouldn’t be the only time when I got sidetracked by this forest’s strange anomalies. In fact, my search for tobacco turned into an exploration game, finding new things left and right.

An arrangement of lilypads, swimming vertically that formed a circle. On the inner side, each lilypad had a sort of thorny spike on them. I stayed there a bit, wondering how this complex is made up until I noticed a frog jumping around on the more normal lilypads in close proximity to the ring. Once it jumped on a horizontal lilypad inside the circle, the spikes sped into the middle, protruding to the other side and immediately skewing the intruder. There is no other word for it other than ‘fascinating’. Of course I didn’t take any of those with me. I don’t have a death wish after all.

Another plant I encountered had a rough exterior, comparable to stone, though it resembled a carnation. It didn't seem to be moved by even the harshed gusts of wind and only with force was I able to move its solid body. I tried plucking it from the ground, resorting yet again to the trusty shovel to open up the roots. But once I tore the whole plant along with its roots from the dirt beneath, it crumbled to dust just like that. I tried the same with another one of its kind, but this time digging it up with a patch of dirt which it is connected to. That apparently did the trick to prevent it from falling apart.

All of these and more plants I have collected are fascinating and new to me, sure, but there is still no sign of the one I’m actually looking for, even after searching for multiple hours. If I think about it, I have yet to see a plant from my homeland. There were some that resembled them, like dandelions and all kinds of weeds for example, but they weren’t exactly the ones I’m familiar with upon closer inspection…

Since there are only these new, unknown plants, I’ll have to study them to find one with similar effects that tobacco induces. This would go quicker with modern technology. However, since this place doesn't have it, I’ll have to go about it in a more old-fashioned way. But that’s totally doable, for I need only some specifics about the plants, not the whole composition or things like that. So how do I go about this?

For the first step, I will pick one plant to start with, no matter which one. Let’s pick…the crumbling one!

Some of its traits are already known, but I’m specifically interested in its effects, what it does with its surroundings and especially other living beings. To initiate this step, I will choose a spot a bit further away but still in my line of sight, as to not keep animals away from the target. And now I wait.

Wait for a long time.

Yep, sure it is exciting, isn’t it?

Though, in the next few days in which watching plants was my main task, I also prepared the next step. I didn’t just take samples of those plants for my collection. What I actually do with them is make solutions. I put them in the vials I bought, one with water and one with the little something I was talking about: alcohol. It’s comparable to brewing tea, but with the exception of not adding heat and thus having to wait much longer for the process. Making one with water and the other with alcohol is essential too, as they bring forth varying results. Alcohol tends to be much harsher when it comes to extracting chemicals. On the other side, water rather extracts water soluble compounds, making for less concentrated solutions. Those solutions will show a clearer picture of the chemical effects that these plants have, they could even be totally different from what they do to the wildlife they come into contact with.

Speaking of, there has also been progress with that. For example, I witnessed a particular flower being eaten by one of those winged deers. The flower's head was upside down like a snowdrop and the glowing, dark blue blossom was shaped like a star. After consuming said flower, the deer continued on slowly. It took until sunset when a sort of foggy glow in the same color started to encase the deer, after which the deer walked normally again. However, the following dawn, that coat slowly vanished again. Such strange effects are common with these strange plants that grow here, though not every plant applies them.

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Coming home from this week's worth of adventure, I definitely got a lot of research material. It was also exhausting though…

It didn’t always work out as smoothly as it seems. Not only would some animals fully avoid many plants, but I also scared many away just with my presence. I was scared too though. I had no idea what type of animals lurk there besides the ones I encountered months ago and those from this week.

On the bright side, one of those animals were these…mice? They at least look like them. Grey fur, small eyes, weird tail and those same squeaks. The glaring difference is the ears. They are huge, shaped like those of elephants. Where do I keep them? In a makeshift cage made of dreams, hopes and cheap wood. Anyways, it’s obvious I don’t keep them as pets, but rather as test subjects. It sounds worse than it is. Well, to me at least, as I’m more than used to it from my previous job.

The water based solutions are first. As expected, they didn’t do much besides changing the mice's behavior. Not due to some weird, abnormal compounds, but because of vitamins, polyphenols, caffeine, stuff like that. At most they induced a weaker version than what they did in the wild. Remember the crumble flower? When small animals ate them like those weird rabbits, they would crumble to dust just like the flower. As a water solution, it only caused a little hair loss for the rats. Of course I don’t need to test the alcohol based crumble flower solution on them when I already know it’s just going to be a stronger version, maybe even killing the mice in the process.

However, when looking at the alcohol solutions, the documentations were much more interesting. A fiery red, foxtail looking flower produced a neon red concoction. When I gave it to one of the mice, it broke out of the cage and ran loudly through the whole house. Luckily it was exhausted when it came back to its senses, so I could bring it back to its cage easily. Still had to repair it though.

When it came to the self testing, I realised why the mouse reacted that way. With self testing I mean the skin first, not to immediately get it into my body. That solution burned like hell. It wasn’t a chemical burn per se. I’d compare it to the tang of spicy food. However, that didn’t make it any better…

Anyway, after all the testing and putting the mice, as well as myself through this nonsense, I had a plant that was showing signs of what I’m looking for. It wasn't all that special actually. It looked like a normal weed, was eaten by animals and had no special effects. This is also what threw me off at first. But when I saw a hog like thing inhale a whole garden's worth of it, it was calmly tumbling from side to side. It finally rested in the chilly shadow of a tree and fell asleep relatively quickly. If you asked me back home, I would have answered that the hog got his hooves on some melatonin gummies. But here, it may lead me to my goal.

As a water solution, it had a weaker, calming effect on one of the mice, nothing special. The alcohol solution on the other hand made that mouse practically lay back until suddenly they were knocked out cold. The concentration may have been too high for them to handle.

After diluting the alcohol solution with water, I gave it another go with the other mouse. This time, it didn’t fall unconscious, but was still under the plant's calming and almost hazy effects. It didn’t have any effects on my skin, so I took a deep breath and with my heart pounding I drank the diluted mixture. At first, it didn’t do anything, or rather I personally didn’t feel anything. Though, after a while, I did notice I have gotten just a bit more relaxed. Relaxed enough to try the non-diluted version next.

“Here goes nothing.” I drink up everything from the vial.

It doesn’t take long before I start to feel light headed. I can feel as my heartbeat slows down and my shoulders naturally fall back. A soft sigh escapes my mouth before I lay back on the ground. My vision blurs while I blink in and out of consciousness.

After two or three hours, I get back onto my feet, the effect still lingering. That’s a success in my book. It’s totally unlike tobacco from my world. If anything this is probably what cannabis did to you. I wouldn’t know since I never tried it, but I imagine it’s similar to that.

While the lasting effects subside, I prepare the actual first drug test. The solutions weren’t what I would sell. Not only because the vials are expensive, but also because of the absurd price of alcohol. I’d not be making much profit if I had to restock it again and again.

In advance I have prepared dried leaves which have been hanging for a couple of days now while I was busy experimenting. Of course those leaves belong to the plant with the stimulating effect. I crumble up the dried leaves, which gives me the ‘tobacco’. Now I’m gonna take some paper, put on the crumbled leaves, roll it up and…

Tada! There’s my profit maker!

Tediously lighting the blunt with some flint, the top ignites, burning up the leaves. As I inhale the produced smoke, I get the same feeling as before, but just a little less concentrated. The smoke is actually less concentrated than the alcohol solution. But it’s better this way, since you’re not just gonna fall asleep like with the tincture. So all in all, I think this is the best balance of concentration. Though, with heavy coughing, I have to admit that I’m definitely not a smoker.

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“I think I have a deja vu…” I pinch between my eyes.

The sun is already setting. After I made a stack of those blunts I went back to the city to sell them. ‘Surely this time the sales would go smoothly’, I thought. But no, not a single one. Why? Just why wouldn’t they buy them? That’s the one question I tried to answer while heading back home. Logically, it wouldn’t be harder than selling those stupid necklaces. Quite on the contrary actually. The problem with the shells was that people rationally wouldn’t want cheap DIY stuff. I practically had to make them think they want it.

Compared to my drugs, those homeless people should give out their money to me like candy. And no, the ignition wasn’t the problem, as dumpster fires are common in those alleys. Along with that they had money. I even showed them how to use it and described what it did. Some were interested, sure, but they waved me off as soon as they heard the word ‘drug’.

If I didn’t know better, I’d guess people here don’t want anything to do with them, but there are glasses in those alleys. Specifically glasses which always contain strange liquids which are not water, I can guarantee that. And they drink them often, so what’s the problem with my drug? It’s so head scratching.

“Huh?” I already see my house in the distance with the door wide open.

“I’m pretty sure I closed it before heading out.”

As I advance further towards my house, I can hear a sort of rummaging coming from inside. Once I’m close enough, I sneak towards the open door, listening closely. Whatever it is, it doesn’t seem to move from its place. Stepping inside quietly, I can see a blonde something peaking out behind the corner of my ‘lab room’. Moving even more carefully, I stand up, preparing for whatever is inside there.

I step inside the room, the old wood from the floor creaking loudly. It turns around and locks its panicked eyes with mine.

“Uh…Meow??”