Just a little poll about your favorite illicit drug…your favorite FICTIONAL illicit drug, that is.
Those are the rules…the drug has to exist only in fiction, and, even then, still be illegal. (Or, at the least, is commonly used for “recreational” purposes, not for valid medical ones.)
•“Kick” from Marvel comics. Temporarily enhances the powers of mutants.
•“Dust” from Babylon 5. Temporarily gives the user telepathic abilities, even if they weren’t a telepath to begin with.
•“Poly-Dichloric-Euthynol” from the movie Outland. Used as a stimulant/stamina booster…but cumulative exposure turns it’s users into uncontrollable psychopaths.
So…any other suggestions?
Ranchoth
(OP’s free, man.)
The ‘milk’ in A Clockwork Orange - the description in the book is brilliant, it lucidly introduces you to a whole new dialect and seductively makes you wish you could try that drink yourself.
I like dreamst** from ‘Perdido Street Station’ by China Mieville (it’s great, read it!). It’s the droppings of creatures known as slake moths (who feed by sucking out people’s thoughts), and when people eat it they essentially live out the dreams of other people around them. It seems horrible at the time and you get a really bad hangover from it, but it’s horribly addictive too.
Hands down, it’s got to be thionite, from Doc Smith’s Lensmen books. When you’re on thionite, you get a full, completely detailed hallucination of whatever it is you most deeply and truely desire. There’s one passage where a Lensman is forced thionite, and he has a hallucination of a completely civilized, lawful galaxy.
The fact that it comes exclusively from a planet so screwey that it can only be successfully navigated by clarivoyants is a nice touch, too.
British comedian Chris Morris introduced ‘Cake’ to unsuspecting celebrities and politicians, asking them to comment on the ficticious drug.
Jeffing brilliant!!
AUM, from Wilson and Shea’s Illuminatus! trilogy, which causes the user to become both wildly imaginative and completely gullible, to the degree that a group of evangelical Christians slipped some spontaneously become sun-worshippers.
Dream Fuel from Chasm City by Alastair Reynolds. Talking about what it does and where it comes from would be too much of a spoiler - and it’s a fairly new book. Oh, and I’ll second what Shill said. Perdido Street Station kicks ass.
While not a drug per se… the total immersion video game “Better Than Life” from Red Dwarf was both illegal and highly addictive. It was so much better than life that players would end up just wasting away.
