Secret Serum

### Description

The Secret Serum is a rainbow-like substance invented by Squiggles after years of research.

It appears to be a wonder-drug for psychological diseases. It has been known to be a very rapid cure to depression, anxiety, addictions, schizophrenia. The effects reach full strength after 1 week of regularly taking the Secret Serum. The dose required seems to vary massively from person to person. Some people may only need a small dose to have their problems cured, while others may need larger doses. It is also necessary to provide counseling, since the Secret Serum does not work alone.

Care must be taken with dosage, since overdosing on Secret Serum causes the patient to degenerate into a state of complete mind numbness, finding it very difficult have any thoughts of their own. In extreme cases, it becomes very difficult to move. The long-term effect of overdoses has not been studied.

### Mechanics: The Only Drug capable of making Happy actually Happy

Happy is known to be resistant to all known anti-depressants and has spent years trying almost everything.

However, the Secret Serum was actually able to make Happy actually, genuinely happy, despite it needing a massive dose. However, after taking it once, he refused to ever take it again, citing that the drug is too good to be true, and he would rather be depressed than trust a drug created by Squiggles. He also is skeptical about its origins, and doubts that Squiggles created a drug this powerful on her own.

### Mechanics: The Secret Serum requires counseling and will not work alone

Despite being a potent drug, this drug only seems to work when counseling is present. If someone tries to take this drug alone, it does not only not work, but it worsens one's own psychological problems. Ironically, it will worsen the problems that are thought about the most.

There has been one recorded case where Binary began secretly attempting to self-administer this drug without counseling to help cure her addictions, but it did not work. In fact, it had the opposite effect - her alcholism only got more extreme, to the point that she was being hospitalized every day until Katie ordered Squiggles to take control of the situation. When Squiggles administered it, Binary's alcoholism was cured completely. Much like Happy, Binary started refusing to take the Secret Serum because she was unsettled by how effective it was and felt that it was too good to be true.

### Dark Secrets

The Secret Serum is a top-secret formula developed by Squiggles and several other human researchers during her time on the Island of Freaks. Squiggles and her offshore team of human researchers are the only ones who know about this formula, confirming Happy's suspicion that the Secret Serum was not produced solely by Squiggles. Squiggles spent many of her years on the Island of Freaks developing this drug (1991-2019) and while the concept and biochemical discoveries were spearheaded by Squiggles, the actual resources were thanks to the human researchers, most of which are people who are also from the Culture of Harmony, a group of humans who are fanatical about Freaks.

The Secret Serum is an insidious, dangerous drug; because it actually does target any of the pathways known in the psychological diseases it claims to cure. What it actually does, is increase the suggestibility and agreeability of a person for a short amount of time. When someone is injected by this, they will "feel funny" for a few hours, at which point Squiggles will do her "counseling". In this higher state of suggestibility, people are extremely vulnerable to being groomed.

Squiggles will use this state to do a few things:

* Squiggles enjoys using this to get people to like her. She has done this to Grumps, Darlington and Wally, all people who are extremely fond of her after going through this process. They think that they like Squiggles because she has been nice to them and helped them cope with their psychological problems, but it is actually the Secret Serum that cemented their fondness of her. In particular, these three will seem to defend Squiggles' stance on anything no matter what.
* Squiggles enjoys using this to make people more "extreme". She has used this to subtly give Whimpers multiple sexual fetishes, and then groom her into confessing these fetishes.
* Squiggles can potentially use this to harm someone, although she usually does this while solving another problem in order to avoid suspicion. She could potentially introduce phobias or give someone irrational beliefs. She has used this to make Strigid genuinely believe that poor people are sub-human and do not deserve respect. Before the Serum, Strigid never particularly cared about whether someone is rich or poor.
* Squiggles' favourite use, ultimately, is to get people to confess their deepest secrets, and is how she knows so much about everyone. She enjoys using this to establish herself in a position of power; she knows several secrets that can get people arrested, and seeks to establish herself in a position of ultimate power.

Ultimately, Squiggles wants this position of ultimate social power because she feels insecure and wants to do everything in her power to avoid ever going through the situation that led to her Freak Transformation - which was a series of events where she lost favor with several people and had her social network collapse on her due to the manipulative efforts of Dr. Kimberly Slide. Squiggles has effectively become the equivalent of her nemesis, only with one difference - she still has retained her genuinely altruistic intentions. Squiggles' intentions are not purely selfish, because she wants the best for other people as well, but in a way where she cannot possibly be hurt ever again.