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vein. groaning, actions. 14 * PROLOGUE The director of the Research Center laboratory was waiting outside the door. I stepped into the hall, out of earshot from the room. He said that the previous blood samples for DMT analyses were collected incorrectly, and that we needed to change how we did this. I told him we would modify our technique accordingly. I let myself back into Philip's room and took the chair by the side of his bed once more. He seemed unaware of the interruption, having begun the inward turning and letting go that we found allows for the smoothest possible entry into the DMT realms. For him, the trip had already begun. I apologized for the interruption and, trying to lighten the mood, said, "Where were we now?" Philip replied with only a grunt; he opened his eyes, nodded for me to proceed, and closed them again. I uncapped the syringe and reinserted the needle into his IV tubing. Cindy nodded that she was ready, too. I said, "Okay, here's the DMT." I slowly and carefully began infusing 0.6 mg/kg DMT into Philip's Halfway through the injection, Philip's breath caught in his throat, sounding like a cough that never quite got out. We quickly learned that whenever this catching in the throat followed a high-dose injection, we were in for a wild ride. Quietly, I let Philip know, "It's all in." Twenty-five seconds after the infusion was complete, he began /love, Ilove... His blood pressure rose moderately, but his heart rate jumped to 140 beats per minute, up from his resting level of 65. This increase in pulse is equivalent to that which might occur after racing up three or four flights of stairs. But in this case, Philip hadn't moved an inch. At | minute, Philip sat up, looking at Cindy and me with saucer-sized eyes. His pupils were hugely dilated. His movements were automatic, jerky, puppetlike. There seemed to be "no one home" behind Philip's He leaned toward Robin and stroked her hair: