Max, an aimless middle-aged man, travels to Brussels. As he wanders the city streets, he meets three unlikely companions, with tensions rising among the group each passing hour.

Dark City, Texas. A terrible bandit named Jim Parasite runs an illegal whiskey distillery. Parasite wants to become the biggest and has therefore developed a magical powder that can shrink anyone. The local Texas Rangers, led by the brave Ranger Tom, try to stop Parasijt, but are lured into a trap. Tom and his Rangers are shrunk and put into whiskey bottles. In an escape attempt, the bottle containing Ranger Tom ends up in a crate that is shipped to Belgium and thus ends up in the hands of Lambik, who is given a crate of whiskey by Theofiel Boomerang. Suske, Wiske, Aunt Sidonia, Lambik, Jerom, and Professor Barabas hear the story and decide to help Ranger Tom. Barabas will try to enlarge Ranger Tom again, and the rest travel to Dark City to stop Jim Parasijt.

After traumatically killing his beloved wife, stylish young Nicolaas 'Nick' Driesen roughs it, squatting at night. He collects cash from his father and arranges false papers to emigrate to South America. Meanwhile he takes pity on grumpy, fat Makkus Van Berlere, who pretends being a former celebrated musical director until tremors wrecked his career. The lonely losers bond and keep evading two clumsy BOB agents (Belgian federal detectives), but can't escape Makkus's terminal cirrhosis.