Setting: Along side the road at night, Arctor gets picked up by Donna and they go to her place. Mainly in Arctor’s house, later in the apartment containing the holo-scanner stations.

Character:

Barris: He is clearly trying to burn Arctor for some reason and is crazy. It’s not like he’s trying to kill anyone, but at the same time he is.

Arctor: He’s having self-doubts and is spiraling into depression because of Donna and Barris. He feels like he has to keep being Fred in order to help anyone. The situation with the random girl turning into Donna shows that his substance D abuse is effecting his everyday life.

Plot: After Arctor observes the tapes from the holo-scanners, he heads home and runs into Donna. She tells him that she has his tabs of D and they head back to her place. She plans on having Arctor take her to a concert then asks if he wants to go to a drive-in movie. Once back at her place, they do some hash and talk. Arctor asks if he can get close to her and she freaks out and tells him he’s ugly. Arctor gets mad and leaves, but Donna follows. They walk outside and talk for a bit where Donna pretty much shoots Arctor down to be with him. He decides to call a heroin addict to have a one-night fling with and the two have sex. He later wakes up to find that the girl looks like Donna and Arctor freaks out only to discover that the girl looks normal again.

Bob goes back to the holo-scanners and proceeds to watch tapes on Barris’ activities. He discovers that Barris is not only trying to sell toxic mushrooms, but is also trying to burn Arctor. He does this by aggravating a straight and pretending to be Arctor. Arctor decides that he has to diffuse this situation first before trying to stop Barris himself.

Theme: Arctor feels he has to continue doing what he does, even if it has bad repercussions for him. This can be seen as a theme of trying to do what’s right, even if the outcome is terrible, but how to help others, you must hurt youtself.