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The desert sun beat relentlessly on my neck and its radiation cooked my weary brain without remorse. Why should it care, it was doing its thing, we were doing ours.
My comrade and partner for this little misadventure was Nik, it was his chevy that I drove while he sat shotgun fanning himself with his cap and cursing under his breathe.
It was 22 degrees on the dashboard thermo as the sun came up on a new desert morning. By noon we would find out exactly what 43 degrees felt like. I had a pretty good idea and so I kept an umbrella in the boot and wore a Sombrero. I wasn’t about to become another chorizo sausage.
It had been a long morning already. We had been chasing toads across Colorado’s barren desertscape .Those little fuckers move like tiny greyhounds I tell you. After 4 hours and several ingenious trapping devices we had 5 toads, Bufos Alvarius toads to be exact, also known as Colorado River Toads.
These toads have a cunning neurochemical defence mechanism against predators. They excrete a venom from glands on their backs that is orally poisonous to all mammals. If a wild dog or desert fox picks up a Colorado River Toad in its mouth it quickly spits it out before becoming very ill and dying in a slow and agonising fashion, not that theres anything fashionable about a slow death but you get the drift.
My colleague and I are well read on natures psychedelic hallucinogens and it just so happens that the toad venom is amongst the most coveted of natures natural drug alkaloids, DMT. The venom contains 5 Meo-DMT amongst other members of the tryptamine family. When dried, vapourised and smoked this is the worlds most powerful, profound and fast acting psychedelic.
Smoking allows the delivery of the DMT to the lungs in vapour form and cuts out the nasty gasping wheezing foaming death that the venom exhibits when orally consumed.
Now you see our motivation for enduring 4 hours in the dusty colorado heat chasing these reptiles (fuckers) about. By the time we had finished we both had to scrape DMT from our hands. We milked each toad once and returned it to where we ‘d found it, this kept our karma in tact. It can take one of these toads up to two weeks to replenish its venom when milked by these manual methods. A venomless toad is an easy lunch for a coyote so we were careful not to milk them dry.
Toadmilking? Yep, we really were!
With the toad venom drying in the boot we headed East along the long dusty interstate roads through Durango central. Nik popped a tape in the stereo, its amazing how a little music can transform the desert. The ambience of Brian Eno’s music was at complete loggerheads with the harshness of the deserts tough character. Before long the petrol indicator was at red and the 5 litre engine of Niks Chevy was as thirsty as we were.
A crappy gas station appeared on the horizon and we turned into the forecourt when it arrived.
“Howdy boys”, the pump attendant appeared in the uniform oily work gear, “ it’s a hot one today”
“sure is boss, caddies thirsty, fill er up”, I chatted to the pump man as Nik disappeared around the back of the Chevy and rumaged around in the boot.
“where you boys headed then?”, the pump man must’ve noticed our back seat was full of camping gear.
“just a little r&r really, thought we’d head into the desert for some kicks, gonna head into Alamosa and do some camping and we got some friends out here to visit. Who knows where we’ll end up”
“who knows indeed eh, hope you boys is well prepared now, it’s a crazy time of year to be messin about in that heat. Chevy’s in good order I hope. Some kids died out there last year passin through Death Valley when they’re car broke down y’know. Air condition’s life or death out there friend”
“appeciate your concern but were the cars preped and ready, just been serviced. We got water, snake anti-venom, first aid kits, you name it. Chevy’s pretty well weighed down an mobilised for any eventuality, we’ll fill a few cans of gas while where here, we should be right”
“well sounds like ya’ll know what ya doin, Ok that’s $30 dollars for the gas and you want two more jerry cans o gas, thats $70”
“thanks, can you change a $20 for the coke machine?”
“ Sure can son, ya’ll take care now. Watch out for the crazies round here, theres a crew of religious folks set up out West near Monument Valley and they’re a pushy bunch, reckon they’d see the two of you as prime candidates for conversion, godfearin crazies, hehehe”, the pump man fanned himself with his cap and disapeared into his little office to escape the heat.
“Hopefully they’ll stay West and well away from us then, later man” , I bid farewell.
I headed over to the coke machine and spent a few dollars on Dr.Peppers and Sprite to see us through the heat. It was then I turned round I noticed Nik wasn’t there. I scanned the immediate forecourt and there was no sign of him, I figured he must’ve been in the washroom so I waited in the car for a minute. After a good 5 minutes my curiosity got the better of me and I went to investigate, I tell you its just as fucking well I did.
I could hear a commotion as I approached the grimey washroom.
As I swung the door open I saw Nik thrashing wildly on the piss soaked manky floor with an elderly priest.
My mouth hung open in horror as this demented scene played out. My mind stalled for a moment anxious to see who the winner would be before the seriousness of the situation registered with my rational mind.
“what the fuck, Nik, shit”, I launched myself into the flurry of arms and legs and separated them as best I could.
For a priest, the man defended himself admirably but it was clear to see he had in fact recieved an admirals beating. The priest sustained at the very least a broken nose and judging by his rhythmic groaning a few ribs too.
His collar was now a bloody piece of cardboard and it wasn’t long before he composed himself enough to start screaming religious profanities in a loud Irish accent.
“You godless heathen. Hath ye no respect for the crucifix. Blaspheming yank”, the priest managed his sylables through mouthfuls of blood and floating teeth. I noticed a gold crucifix in one of the urinals.
Nik looked ferral with fear at this point and covered his ears at the priests ranting while muttering to himself. It was clear that no amount to diplomacy was going to save us here and the priest started going on about the cops, before I knew it I had delivered my best Joe Frazier impression upon the ranting priest.
I think the whack may have reset his broken nose as he went down. The screaming and holy ranting stopped instantly and there was complete silence in the washroom.
Just me, Nik and the lifeless body of a man of the clothe.
“Oh sweet jesus Nik, what the fuck just happened”, my mind was racing. I had had no option but to silence the priest, the magnitude of the situation was plain to my subconscious and I had acted without conscious intent.
Nik was slumped against a urinal in a sort of daze, as I approached he recoiled as if he didn’t recognise me. He had shit all over his hands and was totally oblivious to the fact that his face too was smeared with doo doo. He had a shitty moustache and I could plainly see his mind had escaped its box!
“ its Ok Nik, its me, what the fuck happened, why...... hey whats that smell in here, no not the shit – { Nik sneared }you’ve smoked some of that bloody toad venom haven you?”
My mind twigged, I could smell DMT in the washroom. Nik, the sneaky fuck had been in the boot while I was talking to ‘pump man’ and had sneaked some DMT into the toilets with him for a dump and a quick hit. The poor bastard didn’t realise the rogue power of DMT and the dose sensitivity factors inherant in its correct use. If he’d been fighting then I would suppose it would be safe to say he hadn’t had enough, but he had been in there for 10 mins which was ample time to smoke it then regain the senses enough to walk back to the car. My mind raced with possible scenarios. I was getting nowhere and needed to hear it straight from the horse’s mouth. For this I Knew I would have to wait, Nik looked like a escapee from...from, well somewhere crazy.
We had to leave quickly before another customer of the pump man came in and found us. Imagine walking into a restroom to find an unconscious priest, a guy in the corner looking scared out of his mind with shit on his hands and face and another standing looking extremely puzzled. This was gun country and most people in these situations shoot first and ask questions later, hell, I know I would.
On immediate inspection the priest was still breathing, just knocked out and a little bloody.
I dragged his limp body into a cubicle and layed his holy head in the classic Armitage Shanks toilet bowl chuckling to myself. I locked the cubicle door from the inside and climbed out over the top, this would buy up a little more time perhaps.
I mopped with washroom floor with some paper towls and my foot before grabbing Nik and helping him out to the Chevy. He was shaking violently. The air was thick with the stench of bad juju and human shit. Nik was a non-violent person and I found it very hard to believe that the priest threw the first punch. Hopefully a chemical-sober Nik would reveal something after a short rest.
After washing him up as best as I could I escorted Nik out of the washroom like a fugitive and bundled in the back seat beside the compressed sleeping bags. I noticed the disposable camera on the dash board and couldn’t resist snapping a quick pic of Nik trancing out with a literal shit eating grin on his face.
I chucked the camera in the back and drove off as quick as possible, trying like a whore in a nunery not to create any attention. I noticed the pump man waving to us as we’d left !. There was a old Ford pick-up in the court that must’ve belonged to the priest. It wouldn’t be long before the priest was found.
I took of East towards Alamosa. I remembered that I’d told the pump man our plans so I thought an about turn was in order. With one road in front of the gas station the pump man would see us changing route so I headed North off-road and went behind the gas station before turning south after a few miles of tumbleweed and axle breaking action back onto the main interstate road.
Our plans had changed, now we were headed West, straight for Monument Valley where the pump man had said the religious folks were based. Truth be told this didn’t concern me much. We’d ride straight through Monument Valley, we’d ride through the night.
On the first day of our trip we’d become fugitives. I wanted answers, Nik was gonna give me some when he woke up like it or shit. He slept like a baby in the back seat oblivious to our predicament while I shuttled us along the interstate highway as fast as the Chevy would allow (115mph steady). The longer I drove the more nervous I got. I couldn’t get the priest out of my mind. I had raised my hand against a man of the clothe. How would the law see this? How would the big man upstairs see this? I was sweating like a scouser in a job centre.
What kind of kooky freaks were these people that the pump man warned me about?
I turned the stereo on and Brian Eno came back on lending his peculiar brand of surrealism to what had already been a crazy enough day.
We wanted an adventure and it seemed we were getting one now. The priest/Washroom incident was the metaphorical starters pistol for our little adventure.
