"Oh, come on, Jesse. It won't hurt you to try it."
      "I don't know. You know me. I never like taking anything that I don't know fully about. I mean every time I go to the doctor and he prescribes me something, I have him show me everything he has on it in the way of literature. And that is the approved stuff. I'm really not into experimentation."
      "Jesse, this is not experimentation. The stuff has been proven time and time again to work. And it really does work. I mean, look at me. I was a dummy. Poor short term memory recall, no concentration, no sense of formulation. And now I'm studying analytical mathematics above the calculus level. Hey, before I started taking these, I would have thought that a Fourier series was something in hockey."
      "Okay, Mark, what is a Fourier series?"
      "It's an infinite series in calculus where there's a set of constants multiplied by the sine or cosine functions of the integer multiple values of the variable. It's used for analysis of periodic functions."
      "Did you memorize that?"
      "No. Look, do you want me to show you how they work?"
      "I know how Fourier series work. Please don't bore me. I'll take your word that you can arrange them. I'll take your word that you finally learned summations and integrations in your spare time."
      "But that's not all. I'm putting my knowledge into the stock market to be able to predict market trends."
      "So you can lose money?"
      "No, so I go into business as a market analyst. People pay good money for forecasts that are dependable."
      "So these drugs let you see into the future?"
      "Jesse, get serious, will you?"
      "Mark, I think these drugs that you've been taking are giving you delusions of grandeur."
      "No, Jesse, you're wrong. They are opening my brain to levels of functioning that I never even knew I possessed. I know that it's easy to be skeptical. I was doubtful at first. But you have to try them to see what they can really do. Take my word, they will make you smarter."
      "I don't want to be smarter. I'm too smart already. I spend most of my time trying to forget things that I've learned."
      "And that is your problem. You are closing off your potential because your brain chemistry makes it hard to correlate the summation of knowledge you have into a whole. These drugs remove the mental blocks that prevent the correlations, so that everything that you've learned fits into a uniform structure of understanding. You see relationships between the things that you know that you never knew existed, and it makes information management a breeze. There is no piling up of unformulated relationships in your mind. It clears everything up for you."
      "I don't know."
      "Look, there have been no bad side effects reported for any of these drugs. You can try them, and if you don't like them, then quit. Look, I'm just trying to do you a favor. You are burned out on learning. You are a smart man, far smarter than I am. You've pretty much dedicated your life to learning while everyone else was out having brainless fun. Look at what it's done for me and think of how much better you could get. You'd be a super-genius."
      "I don't want to be a super-genius. I want to be normal, happy."
      "Jesse, you say that because you're bogging down. Your brain is not managing all that you know because you've filled it beyond its capacity in its current sluggish state. But these drugs remove the blocks and let your knowledge coalesce to where there is none of the exhaustion you are experiencing from that crowded feeling. You are looking for simplicity. These drugs give you the simplicity that you seek. Using them, there is no telling how far you could progress, as smart as you already are."
      "You make them sound like a panacea."
      "Mentally, they are. The effect is wonderful. No distortion, no side effects, just pure clean vision and an ability to comprehend fully without the slightest trace of confusion. They are truly smart drugs."
      "I still don't know. I really don't need to be any smarter, Mark."
      "Look, you aren't making that much money. With these drugs, you will see how to make money easily. With your knowledge, you could become filthy rich. All you need to see is how to apply it. Jesse, trust me on this. These drugs are the best thing that ever came to man. Just try it, and if you don't like them, then stop. They aren't permanent. To maintain the state, you just take them once a day."
      "What happens when you quit?"
      "You revert back to normal. The longer you take them, the slower the reversion. But for the first time, there would be no problem."
      "You are sure about this?"
      "Positive."
      "Well, if they are as harmless as you say, I guess it couldn't hurt to try."

     

      A week later, Jesse lay in his bed reading medical journals at a rate that would have had people scoffing at the fact that he was actually reading and retaining a working knowledge of what passed before his eyes. But he was curious about the effects that the smart drugs had had upon him. So he read, compulsively, hungry for knowledge. He had quit work to spend his time learning. He knew that the effect that the drugs were having on him were not typical, but he saw no danger signs. So he kept on taking them and reading. He thought about taking up residence in the university library so it wouldn't take so much time in traveling for the material he wanted.

     

      After six weeks of study, he changed the formula that he was taking, and he noticed the difference right away. His mind cleared of the jumble and he processed information without delay and retained it. His recall improved, not only of what he took in, but of all that he had experienced in his lifetime. He now had six computer terminals and subscriptions to seventeen data links. He sat before one screen or another all his waking hours. He had lost weight, spending his time learning to the exclusion of all other activities. Only when he felt too weak to continue would he stop and mix himself a shake from the formula that he had derived. He even refused to answer the door in order to avoid interruption.

     

      Three months after starting taking the smart drugs, Jesse fell into a state of exhaustion. Mark had come over and forced his way into the house and found Jesse slumped over one of his computer terminals. He called an ambulance, but Jesse came to long enough to cut Mark off before he could give the address.
      "No, they don't know how to treat me. A number of standard treatments could prove fatal to me. No standard medical treatment, unless you want me dead."
      "Jesse, what has happened to you?"
      "I've made some incredible discoveries. I'm very close to a major breakthrough. Mental imprinting. I've found how knowledge is stored in the brain. I've found ways to streamline the process of learning. I'm very close to finding a way to give a kid a full education in less than a day. I'm talking kindergarten to grad level. Not just that type of learning either. Judgmental wisdom, skill mastery, all sorts of knowledge. Ignorance and stupidity could be a thing of the past. I'm that close to having it all down."
      "What is this?"
      "It's my new formula."
      "New formula?"
      "Yes. I did a study of the effects of the first smart drugs that you gave me, and I found a better more direct means of advancing the mechanism. You see, the drugs that you are taking must go through the body and break down into the usable compounds before they do you any good. But my formulas are the items themselves, bonded to a protective formula that keeps the body from breaking them down further. It works much better."
      "But you are a wreck, Jesse. It's obviously doing you no good."
      "Ah, but that is where you are wrong. Yes, I am overdoing it a bit, I admit. But that is just the enthusiasm like I used to have in college. You remember how I was when I got onto something. No different, except for the rate of my progress. I want you to look at. . . ."
      Jesse slumped again. Mark gently moved him to the couch and started rummaging through the kitchen for something to feed Jesse that would be easy on his digestive system. He found the shake formula and made some for him. He fed him three glasses of the shake in extra strong mixture before Jesse began to come around. He got him to drink a forth, sitting up.
      "This tastes awfully strong. How much did you put in here?"
      "Four tablespoons to the cup."
      "What?"
      "Come on, you need the nourishment."
      "Mark, that shake is my drug. I mixed it in there. You just gave me eight doses of the stuff, enough for a week."
      "What? Jesse, that is the fourth glass I got down you."
      "Oh, no. Same ratio?"
      "Yes."
      "A month's supply at once. A thirty two times overdose."
      "Oh no. Come on, let's get you to the toilet so you can empty your stomach."
      "Too late. The drug absorbs in less than thirty seconds. It goes right into the tissue of any part of the body except the epidermis, straight to the blood stream. I can feel it in my mind, coming in on the blood flow. Well, we'll know what an overdose does."
      "Hey, I'm sorry. I didn't know. I. . . ."
      "I'm not blaming you. I should have labeled it. Wow. Mark, I have it. I figured it out. Get me to my terminal. I've got to get this down. Quit stalling. This is important."
      Mark helped Jesse back to his computers. His fingers hit the keyboards and started blurring across the keys. "Gosh, the power. You wouldn't believe. I've got so much going on in my mind right now that it's hard to concentrate."
      "You don't look like you're having any problems to me. You're not misspelling any words."
      "But it's not easy."
      "Looks very easy, what you're doing. Not that I could type that fast. I sure hope that you know what you are doing."
      "Time will tell. Once this becomes common knowledge, I'll know."
      "May take time to find someone that comprehends what you're writing."
      "Is it gibberish?" Jesse stopped typing and read.
      "No, looks like proper English to me. It's just way over my head."
      "Oh." He continued pounding away at the keyboard in very rapid taps. Mark fell quiet and watched, amazed at what Jesse was doing on sheer nervous energy. What bothered him was the way the tempo of Jesse's actions kept increasing. It didn't take long for Jesse to fill the screen file. He set the processor to store it on hard disc and shifted over to the next idle processor. "Mark, do me the favor of storing away these files on these processors. I'll talk you through, while I'm typing, on what steps come next and where the buttons are."
      "You're doing two things at once these days?"
      "Nothing new. I'm just doing it more readily than I used to."
      "Well, at least you're still dangling you're participles. You haven't left the human race."
      "I'm touched by your humor."
      "It wasn't meant for you. I was saying that to myself."
      Jesse laughed weakly as his fingers flew ever so slightly faster. Mark started following directions from Jesse and hitting the buttons on the different processors to place the on-screen files back in their place, updated or undisturbed as Jesse dictated. He switched to a third processor, leaving the second to file away the process that he was describing. A few minutes later, Jesse was breathing hard and Mark became worried.
      "I may need some oxygen. I keep an emergency bottle in the back room. Could you get it for me?"
      "Will you stop work?"
      "I'll slow down. I have to put in the commands to the compiler to pull and compile the different files I'm writing. I can't go real fast on that. It will take some thought."
      "That is the problem. You are using your brain too efficiently. You will literally burn out your brain if you don't slow down. Eat something."
      "Okay. Bring me something to eat."
      "You're not going to die on me, are you, Jesse?"
      "I don't think so, unless it's from an aneurysm. Get me some air."
      He moved to the fourth console and brought up a file. "Please."
      Mark went for the oxygen and returned. "One puff, and then we see if there is any effect." Nothing unusual happened to Jesse, except that he continued to give the computer routing data. So Mark let him have five breaths. It increased his operating speed, so Mark removed it from his reach. "What's it like?"
      "How do you answer a question like that?" retorted Jesse, as if slipping a dagger in slowly.
      "Sorry. No common grounds for comparison of language. You and your semantics, Jesse."
      "It's a high, Mark. It's awareness like waking is to sleep, if you follow the incomplete comparison. It's knowing. What power. A constant stream of insight on an analytical, a sensory, and an emotional level. Intense. A strength of temper, as in the hardening process, not anger, Mark. It's intelligence."
      "Are there any hallucinations?"
      "None. No delusions, no pretenses. Just the certainty, and it makes you feel happy. Excitedly happy. You just want to giggle. Let me have another shot of O₂." He took a breath and finished compiling instructions and shifted to a clear processor. He was typing quickly again. Mark sat quietly and just watched his pace. When Jesse would start to strain in breathing, Mark would hand him the mask if he weren't typing too fast. Jesse was having problems in slowing himself down, but Mark kept him there.
      The session continued for the next twenty nine hours. He had spent a number of these hours doing graphics on the other processors. It ended with Jesse pulling the bottle away from a haggard Mark, taking a dozen deep breaths, and passing out on the couch. Mark put a blanket over him and found a bed of his own.
      Mark was up the next afternoon, but Jesse still slept. His vital signs showed strong and his pupils were still tight, but he remained lights out. Mark called Lori and had her come over and keep an eye on Jesse while he went out to take care of some business that he had neglected. He left orders that she feed him some real food when he woke.
      When he returned, Lori sat there bored. Jesse hadn't moved a muscle. "What is wrong with Jesse?"
      "Heavy drug trip."
      "He's on drugs?"
      "Smart drugs. He invented a smart pill."
      "Take one and it raises your IQ? Come on. What was it, Demerol?"
      "Look, he's sleeping like that because he's exhausted. He spent nearly thirty hours without a decent break typing on the processors at an unbelievable rate. Stuff way over my head, but it made sense. It wasn't garbage. It was documented thought, as most journal papers use. He had a brainstorm, literally. Mistakenly, he got too much. Most incredible thing I ever saw happen. I just wonder if he'll dream, or has."
      "Is he going to wake up?"
      "Sooner or later."

     

      Jesse wasn't dreaming, he was living, projected from the exhaustion of the body, his mind soared free. It first struck him funny that he didn't fall to the bed when his body did. Then he realized that he had projected, something he had done briefly before on occasions. But this time, there was no panic, only certainty. Without the fear, he let out through the walls to get out of the confinement that he had been imposing upon himself. He wandered about the countryside after leaving the city behind.
      He took in all the scenery, seeing the world and all its processes simultaneously. To know and comprehend, all he needed to do was look. He saw solutions where he had never seen any before. He knew how to use energy better, how to make things healthier, how everything entwined with its environment.
      He then took to the oceans and looked at the cycles and chains. He looked at the big changes and the stresses they caused. Again he saw solutions. He stored these away and took to the air, looking at the levels of vapors and solids in the air. He looked at the patterns from the overall to the sub-microscopic. Again, he saw solutions.
      Then he looked to space, the endlessness that had always intrigued him, and saw the workings of the universe and all its wonders. He got a little lost in himself.
      But eventually, he felt the tuggings of a body tired of sleeping, and he returned home to his body. He knew immediately that it was a mistake when he felt the first tug of ache. His first word was "Food!"
      Lori and Mark jumped skittishly, unready for Jesse, having grown quite relaxed in conversation. Mark turned to him. "Aren't you even going to say hello to Lori who sat here watching you while I took care of things?"
      "Hello, Lori." he said and proceeded to start typing rapidly again.
      "Here we go again. Lori, could you fix something to eat from the groceries that I brought? We're going to need fuel."
      Jesse and Mark went back to the type and oxygen routine and ignored Lori. She sighed audibly to no effect, then went into the kitchen. She returned and said that the table was set. Mark said that they needed it at the processor. She complained about poor digestion habits, and Jesse yelled, "To hell with habits!"
      Mark tried a few consoling gestures. "You can't fight him in this state." Jesse snatched the mask as if to make a point. "See what I mean?"
      "This is bizarre." Lori complained.
      "Amen." echoed Mark.
      Lori brought the meal into the room and started setting up plates.
      "Better wrap it tortillas or bread. Finger food."
      "Next thing, you'll ask me to show my health permit."
      "Do you want to trade places with me?" Mark started wrestling the oxygen mask from Jesse.
      "No." She said no more, but went back to the kitchen for the needed items to make breakfast hand-held. Jesse continued to write at a pace faster than Mark liked.
      The three occupied the house into and through the night. Lori lost her resentment of being forced into a domestic role when she started sitting behind the two and watching. She also became engrossed in what Jesse was doing. She did nothing to contribute at first, except running errands. But as the night wore on, Mark lost his resolve. Lori had seen enough of the process and spelled him for a sleep.
      She woke him late in the morning, too tired to go further. Mark took over and let her sleep until late afternoon, when she woke on her own. Mark took a short nap. Lori kept food coming at intervals while she was awake. Jesse never skipped a beat. He stayed at the processor for thirty seven straight hours.
      Mark was with him when he finished. "Oh, just in time. I feel the effects slipping Mark. I'm in a tail spin. It's unraveling. But I have it all safely packed away. Nice and secure. Where's a bed?"
      Lori and Mark put him to bed and retired to the den. They both sighed in tiredness. "I can't believe that you went through this for two more days more than I did. You must be a wreck."
      "Didn't have the time to call for help until he hit the sack, and then I was too tired."
      "Well, I guess I'll stay here with you. You'll need someone fresher than yourself for when he wakes. He will take some watching."
      "I'll take the couch, you can have the guest room."
      "Why don't we both take the guest room?"
      "Are you suggesting?"
      "I can be more direct, if you're too tired to comprehend." she added.
      "Lori, I didn't know you cared."
      "A first time for everything."
      It didn't take them long to find sleep. They exhausted themselves in a hurry, but they slept very well.

     

      Jesse slept for forty one hours. This gave Mark and Lori time to get to know each other even better. Their loose friendship had blossomed into a healthy romance in the way that shared toil and adversity sometime prompt. Jesse awoke groggy, moaning to himself. Mark and Lori came running.
      "Are you all right?"
      "Hell no. Do you get the number of that truck? Gosh, it's hard to think. Talk about clutter. Get me a shake. No, bring it here and let me mix it this time. Man, I am never again going to drink anything that you mix. Not to hurt your feelings, but you are one lousy bartender."
      "Jesse, haven't you had enough of that stuff?"
      "Oh, come on, Mark. Hair of the dog. Have a little mercy."
      "Hair of the dog and no more?"
      "I said I'm mixing. You try to kill me with an OD, and then you worry about me taking too much? You're too much. I need a little just to cut all the waste products. Not much. Boy do my arms and fingers feel stiff and sore."
      "I'm not in the least surprised. You typed for seventy six hours with only one break. Do you remember what you wrote?"
      "It's all a blur. There was so much. Get me something from bathroom for this soreness. Ah, my shoulders. Make it strong."
      "You don't remember what you wrote?"
      "I remember the general topics and ideas. But there was so much. I remember a little. Enough to find my way through it, I imagine."
      "Now you are sure that you didn't erase it all?"
      "Oh, don't joke about that. No, it's safely stored in a locked file."
      "How is it locked?"
      "Passphrase."
      "Do you remember the pass phrase?"
      "Yeah, it's, uh. . . ."
      "You don't remember it?"
      "Right. How did you know?"
      "Just a sneaky suspicion. Are we going to have to pump you full again to retrieve it?"
      "No. I'm sure that it will come back to me. Shake and pain killers. I've got some ibuprofin in there. Bring three."
      "Three?"
      "You let me worry about my doses. I, unlike you, know what is proper for me in the way dosages."
      "All right, all right." Mark left the room.
      "You really have been a handful, Jesse."
      "Hey, I don't know if he told you, but he was the one that fed me all the formula. I wouldn't do that to myself on purpose. Not that I'm not pleased to have experienced the effect, at least in some ways. Pure raw intelligence. Quite an acquaintance with the human brain. We really do use them for only a fraction of their capacity. It's amazing what the full blown brain is capable of doing. So much you can see, so much you can comprehend intrinsically. To know the full essence of existence."
      "But you can't get to it, right?"
      "I'm sure I shall when the time is right."
      "That would be a shame to go through all that and not be able to retrieve it."
      "I don't think that will happen."
      "What was it like? How did Mark appear to you? How did I appear to you?"
      "I knew the both of you better. It was easy to understand you, but difficult for me to explain what seemed simple to me. I saw you, several steps ahead of your actions, seeing what you were going to do, and doing it, my knowing why you would do it before you did it. Am I making sense?"
      "I think so."
      "There was no question that didn't have an answer, and there was no question that couldn't be easily seen. I want to thank you for putting up with me. I know that I was a pain at times."
      "Not really. Not once I understood what was happening. Mark told me, but he didn't warn me."
      "He didn't warn me, either."
      "How are you?"
      "Weak."
      "Hungry?"
      "You've cooked enough, Lori. Thank you, but I'll manage, as soon as the pain killers take my mind off of my arms."
      "I don't mind cooking. If you feel that bad, you don't need to be trying to cook."
      "But you've done so much already."
      "My contribution to your work. From what I saw on some of the pages, it will be a very valuable work. And I didn't see but a minor fraction of a minor fraction of what was written. You have a lot of answers to problems that we face here on Earth."
      "I seem to remember a few."
      "Will you be able to understand them all?"
      "Well, there is always the smart drugs to help. Now, now, I'll never again do a dose that large. Don't worry. But I'll work through them."
      "If you can remember the password."
      "Passphrase. And don't worry. I'm sure that I'll be able to remember it when the time comes. I'm not worried."
      "I would be."
      "You aren't me."
      Mark returned with the shake and the pain killers. Mark mixed the proper portion and took the pills with it. His head clear considerably from his fog, and within the hour, he was relatively loose and pain free. He got up moving around and demonstrated after breakfast that he was capable of tending for himself and coerced the two out of the house.
      He then took a long soak in the tub. When the warm water cooled, he rinsed and dried and dressed. He returned to the computers. He went to the compiler and set up the recorder for reading. In the process, he felt a bit of the stiffness in his arms and fingers, but it didn't deter him. Then he switched over to one of the units set up for word processing. He punched the file and immediately got the password challenge. He slowly typed, "You don't remember it?" onto the screen.
      Onto the screen came the title "Superbrain Observations #1." He placed the cursor at the end of the title and back spaced off the characters # and 1. "If I didn't get it the first time, it must not be important."
      He flipped to the first page and started reading, editing out what could have military and other detrimental applications for a second edition to be released to the public. The criteria for the editing was the one thing that Jesse didn't forget from his accelerated state. He realized that it would be years before he could fully grasp everything that he had written and get the work released fully.
      He closed and locked the file after a slow dozen pages, reassured that it was legitimate knowledge. He got up and started cleaning house, knowing that it would not suffice once he started publishing. He pondered whether or not he would be able to take living a secure life. He did not look forward to having the government in his life. Maybe he'd mix them a shake, he thought with a smile. "Ah, am I going to be a pain in the rear!" he called to the future.