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the Secret Race of six-fingered Cannocks. Is that what I should lead with, then? Write it up and tell the world?”
    â€œIt ain’t what you think,” Mac says. “This ain’t what you think at all. This is no scoop, Lono. This is a warning. Stay out of our business, chum, and we won’t have to cork you. The old man likes you; he’s been following your career since the back pages of El Sportivo . He’s a fan.”
    â€œIf he’s a fan, then he should know that I don’t cotton to threats. Not from anyone, least of all some brain-damaged mutant half-wit from the foothills of New England.”
    Mac leans in close. “Well, sir,” he says in a whisper, a whisper of paper sliding against paper, “if it’ll make you feel better, you can put a bullet in my head. Reach into your bag and pull out your gun. I know you must have one in there. You’ve been glancing at it since we started speaking. Go ahead. Kill me. Work your aggressions out and whatnot. It’s all fine and dandy with me. A new world awaits, for thee as well as me. Ia, ia Cthulhu fhtagn , ain’t that what all the kids are saying? Well, who’re you going to believe, me or them?”
    â€œMaybe I’ll just sit over here and wait for the next bus,” I say.
    â€œHere.” He slides a brown paper bag across the table. “Maybe these will keep you company while you wait.”
    I pick up the bag and peek inside. There are three dried mushrooms, milk-white, porous things run through with tiny black spots. I am not adverse to the psychoactive effects of psilocybin and psilocin, but these are the strangest mushrooms I’ve ever seen. They appear unwholesome.
    â€œWhat are these?” I sniff the mouth of the bag.
    â€œCome now, Lono. Your reputation precedes you. Surely, you’ve done shrooms before.”
    â€œI’m being set up, aren’t I? For whom do you really work, you swine?”
    â€œI’ve already told you. Consider this a parting gift. One last gentle kiss before the beating to come. These fungi come all the way from Yuggoth.”
    â€œWhere?” I’ve traveled all around the world, but I’ve never heard of this place. It’s a strange name, Yuggoth. Could be Asian or Slavic or Hebrew, and yet, it sounds like none of them, nor any other language I can think of.
    â€œYuggoth. It’s where the best shrooms come from. I read in your interview with Playboy that you like mushrooms.”
    â€œI do,” I say, seeing no reason to deny it. “Mescaline and mushrooms are a genuine high. They’re clean and interior, as all psychedelics are. Things like speed just give you a motor high. They don’t clean out your brain pipes the way some good psychedelics do.”
    â€œWell, then, enjoy these with our compliments.”
    â€œThey don’t look right. How do I know they aren’t poisonous, you swine?”
    â€œYou don’t. But really, do we ever?”
    He has a point, but I’m not about to admit that to him.
    â€œSo, what’s it going to be, Lono? Are you going to beat me to death? Kill me with your bare hands? Or are you going to take the ride?”
    â€œI already bought the ticket.”
    Somewhere, someone flicks a switch and the lights go off. I presume my coffee and sandwich are now free. Laughing yet again, Mac grabs the sugar silo and clonks himself over his own head with it. A babyish tap, but his left temple opens right up in the brightest NTSC red, just like a Saturday-morning wrestler. Head wounds bleed a lot, but I’ve never seen anything like what pours from his. He smiles at me under his new mask of crimson, flashing teeth that seem just a bit too large, and I decide I’ll find a hotel. I grab the bag of mushrooms almost as an afterthought, and then beat feet right out of there. Mac doesn’t follow me, but his hooting, piping laughter does.
    â€œMoloch!” he shouts after me.