The roadkill scuffle down the trail in the moonlight.

They're easy to follow without being seen on account of the decrepit quality of their eyeballs. And olfactory glands. And hearing.

I flit silently among the tree tops nonetheless. Yellow Birch School style.

It's a squad from Ranger Rotten's gang, bringing in their haul for the night. Garbage sacks full of tin cans and eggshells. Coffee grinds and orange peels. A few iPhones.

They're headed to the old abandoned factory east of school. The superfund site. We Weasel Creek kids stay upstream and upwind from that area.

No wonder Ranger Rotten had been able to keep the size of his operation under wraps for this long.

Whew well finally some good news. I got a message from Doctor Greenjeans, and he says everything's chill, and he's real sorry me and my crew didn't get paid on time but we should just come on over to his place and he'll give us a thumbdrive with the psybercoin because it's encrypted. So I guess all that stuff I said about him was just talk and can I delete that out of my journal now? How do I edit posts?

MINUTES FROM THE WEEKLY MEETING OF THE WEASEL CREEK KIDS

"There'a no way we're getting in there."

"There's no way I wanna get in there."

"So do we have to get in there? Can't we solve this in some clever Weasel Creek Kids way without, like, getting poisoned?"

"I've got the clever Weasel Creek Kids plan, don't you worry," @Agatha Anatidae said. "And it involves one of our most powerful forest friends. But it depends on somebody getting on the inside of that abandoned toxic soda pop factory. Just one is all we need."

"Does it have to be a person? The young bucks from the Squirrel Scouts have been bugging me for some kind of action."

"We don't want to have to answer to any angry squirrel moms."

Everyone nodded in agreement.

"I think I know someone," said @Samantha Spruce. "An old friend. Somebody who wants to pay back her debt to society..."

I have been thinking of joining the Weasel Creek Kids, after all, I love the woods and I love creeks, so why not? Seriously, why not; I feel like there's some sort of catch so someone please tell me.

Yeah @Scaramouche one of my oldest friends joined the Weasel Creek Kids. We grew up together under the bridge, but even when we were little kids those Timberjacks rubbed me the wrong way. Guess I thought they figured they were better than everybody else.

So @Samantha Spruce and I took different paths. She was the goody goody and I was the bad girl, but we stayed super close. Till I made one too many bad decisions and now I'm paying for it.

Which is why when she asked if I could help the Weasel Creek Kids get into Ranger Rotten's den, well, I'd still do anything for Sam.

"BWAAAAAP"

My dorm mate burps from across the room. The floor is covered with empty big gulp cups from the cafeteria. The sticky sweet smell of Mountain Dew Moss Madness is attracting yellow jackets from outside.

"BWAAAAAP"

My dorm mate burps again. She hasn't gotten out of bed since her three day long Moss Madness binge.

"Ivy? Are you doing ok?"

I get close enough to see that she's actually growing into her bed. The green fuzzy pallor of her arms has spread to her sheets. Suddenly a slim tendril shoots out of her mouth and just misses my face, sticking to the door frame behind me.

My RA says I need to be tolerant of our mutant hybrid classmates but something about this just doesn't seem right.

Got another frog nailed to my door, but this time it's an invitation! An undead possum came by and delivered it. Scared all the kids in my hall, what with the maggots and the entrails. Part of Ranger Rotten's gang. The invitations ays Doctor Greenjeans is having a party at Ranger's Den, and my and the whole crew should come along and let bygones be bygones and he'll get us that psybercoin WITH interest.

That hardcase @Finley Donna caught wind of it (the possum) and said she's old buddies with the Ranger and can take us right to the den. It's gonna be and awesome party and all the Moss Madness we can drink!

Most of the student body has sprouted tendrils or blossoms, or at least turned a healthy shade of green. The administration claims this is "normal" for the end of spring term, but I sure don't remember everyone being quite this leafy last year.

Arms and legs have become twigs and trunks, with sharp green blades or moss where hair had been on heads. Nobody seems to mind, and the Moss Madness keeps flowing with free refills in the cafeteria.

In order to capture the verdant cafeteria scene, I'm using oil paints on proper canvas. Going for a Hudson River School kind of feel. Psyience Fair is coming up in just a week, and this will be a great addition to my presentation on the phenomenon. Really the "pièce de résistance" of my whole project!

Ranger Rotten's den was a lot more lively than the last time I was in it. Used to be just a big dark abandoned factory, full of roadkill shuffling around and Ranger Rotten sitting on his throne made of bones, cackling away with his rictus grin in the gloom.

But Dr. Greenjeans had gotten all the factory equipment hooked up again and there were cables and generators and consoles with flashing lights and big glass tanks full of bubbling green goo.

Poor @Clade didn't get the reception he was hoping for. I saw that coming but didn't have the heart to tell him. Ranger Rotten doesn't forgive anybody. Or pay them back. Least not in the way you expect. They had Clade set up in a dunk-a-bum chair right over the biggest tank of green goo, and Ranger Rotten's roadkill minions were throwing garbage at the target.

Me, I knew better than to announce myself, and passed myself off as one of Clade's crew of losers with a hoodie up over my head. I wandered around the edges of the big room, discretely dumping out the backpack filled with inoculated wood chips that the Weasel Creek Kids gave me.

"Yooooooo therrrrrrrrrre!" Ranger Rotten hissed from his throne. "In the hooooodie!"

I looked around to see if he meant anybody else.

"Yoooooo sssssssmellllll freshhhhhhhly familarrrrrrr..... let'ssssssseeeee your faccccccce..."

I shook out the rest of the wood chips and bolted for the door.

KERSPLASH!!!!

Down went Clade on my way out.

We thought it was an earthquake. The school shook and we ran out of the dorms into the night. Then the debris started to fall. Pieces of roofing, plastic bottles, bits of roadkill.

It wasn't till the sun came up that we saw the giant mushrooms.

Over the woods to the east, a cluster of giant mushroom heads. We could see them clearly over the trees. Like someone had built a city of skyscrapers over night.

Of course I rushed there, with my pad and pens. Stropharia rugosoannulata -- the Garden Giant. Just like the ones the Weasel Creek Kids provide to the Psyhigh Groundskeeping department in the form of inoculated wood chips. Except no one has ever seen ones quite this giant.

The administration says not to worry, and that the mushrooms merely reacted to some toxic waste in the old factory, and that it was actually really good because mushrooms can process that kind of thing, and maybe it won't be a superfund site for quite so long.

Coincidentally, the flow of Moss Madness in the cafeteria abruptly stopped. Sure, there was a small riot -- as there often is when favorites get discontinued -- but quickly the leafy greenest of the student body lost their energy for it. Most students seem to be losing their new found leaves, and a lot of them are leaving for the summer anyway. Get it? "Leaving?" There were some confused looks from parents though.

My illustrations of the Garden Giants will be included in my Psycience Fair project. I ended up including some photos too, just to capture the scale. I thought I had first prize in the bag already, but now I HAVE to be an absolute shoe-in.