The Doc was right – a couple more lichuors later, and Yrtl didn’t give a damn about Dona, much less his refrigerator.

Slack-jawed, he slumped in the booth and watched the entertainment: an ancient, jumpy holotape of a couple of barely-clad females, slime-wrestling. Quadrimanians, he noted: four-handed and triple-breasted. What a woman like that could do for me, he thought, feeling his plant ring like a cash-register in his head and not caring at all.

“Hey Doc,” he began. Akin was staring at him, a peculiar light in his eyes. “Doc?”

“Remain still,” instructed Akin, “what I am about to do is intensely dangerous. With the amount of alcohol in your system, any feedback could cause you to explode, like a hydrogen dirigible.”

“What!” Yrtl panicked, and found he actually couldn’t move, “What the hell are you doing!”

“Triggering theophany,” Akin replied calmly, “opening your third eye, secundum Swedenborg. Or more prosaically – hacking your plant. Stand by,” he grinned at Yrtl. “This will definitely hurt.”