Work Text:
Plurb (noun): an ironic derogatory and affectionate term for a member of the decentralised hivemind that constitutes the majority of the human population of Earth.
****
“Come in,” says Carol Sturka.
10.5 seconds ago, she had released us from her hold. She was crying because she had missed us. Her tears continue to fall.
We enter her dwelling. Carol has, fortuitously, recovered from her emotional outburst. She pours a beverage for herself but, after she places the bottle on the kitchen counter near the cupboard where she procured it from, she stares at the half-open door of her microwave.
“Is everything okay, Carol?” we say. Carol slowly manoeuvres her head in our direction. The remainder of her body then follows the movement of her head. She places her glass of the beverage by the bottle it was poured from. Her vocal attack is sharp, her pitch is low but her timbre is mellifluous.
“36 days and approximately 12 hours ago everything I know changed. I—“
“Correct, Carol,” we say, inadvertently cutting off the beginning of her next sentence. She creates a fist with her right hand and rhythmically taps it against her forehead.
“Please don’t interrupt me, Zosia,” she says. We wait for her to proceed with what she wants to express. We observe that there are still tears in her lacrimal sacs.
“I have struggled,” says Carol, pausing briefly after the word ‘struggled’, “to reconcile my feelings for the individual you with the greater hivemind that you are a part of. I wish to… discuss this difficulty in more detail.” There is a break of 6.8 seconds starting from the end of her sentence before we deem it appropriate to respond. Carol has an intense expression. However, we are unsure of its significance.
“We are happy to hear whatever you would like to say, Carol.” She picks up the glass of her beverage again and, in a manner indicative of tiredness, walks into her lounge. We follow her. She sits down on her sofa. We stay standing.
“Sit,” says Carol. Her gaze is at her knees. We sit in a chair that is opposite her sofa. “Zosia, — and I speak to you as Zosia, not as the hivemind…” Her tone conveys a hint of resignation. Her head and arms move in a normal manner, in accordance with the emotions of her words. “… — you could not have consented to what happened to you. Has this never occurred to you? Consent must be given with knowledge of what will happen. You didn’t even know it would happen, probably!”
“Here’s what I know,” Carol continues, after a brief pause. “The hivemind has three directives which follow a strict hierarchy of importance. One: protect the hivemind. Two: spread the hivemind. That means turning the non-infected. And three: giving the non-infected what they want.” Carol’s speaking pace, though it began with vigour, slows by a minute amount on her final words, ‘what they want’. Her eyes meet with mine at that moment. With ours. “The higher directives take precedence over the lower ones if they conflict.”
“Why are you crying?” we say.
“I’m not,” says Carol. She is lying: fresh tears are exiting her lacrimal glands through her eye ducts. Without warning, Carol rises from her seated position to a standing one. Her mouth is wavering and her hands are flying about. “What is this relationship between us? What is it? You’re a Plurb! I’m a… I’m a…” She fails to complete her thought.
We show Carol an expression of serene stillness. We want her to know that she can be calm, like us.
“You miss Helen,” we state. “Helen loved you.” This triggers a fierce expression in her.
“Helen’s dead.” Like it was earlier, her pitch is low, but this time her timbre has a harsher quality to it.
“We are sorry for that. We can assure you, the only thing that we want is your happiness.”
“You can lie too,” says Carol. “But only when it suits you.” There is a break of 4.14 seconds starting from the end of her sentence before she proceeds. “You have the memories, the knowledge, the skills of everyone who was alive at the time of infection! They’re all dead! Nothing! Gone! Don’t you see that, Zosia, from behind the complacency of your face!?”
Carol is observing my face. It has hair, eyes, a nose and a mouth: we wonder what she is looking at, or for.
“I don’t know what to tell you.” Carol’s feelings have boiled down. She falls back onto her sofa. She stays in that position for 39 seconds, neck bent and arms flopped over her legs. She is wearing dark brown trousers that flare at the ankle.
“Wait,” she says. Her neck arches her face upwards so that her eyes are staring at us. “You said ‘I’.” She pauses briefly. “You said ‘I’!” She leaps onto her knees; a small thud sounds as she hits the carpet. She clutches my knees and scrambles forwards so that her hands climb further up my legs. “Zosia,” she says. “Are you in there?” Her forehead is scrunched up, sweat dripping from it, but her eyes are attempting to bulge out of their sockets. Her voice has a manic quality to it. “Are you in there?” she repeats. She violently shakes my legs.
We smile and do not modulate our expression from one of neutrality.
“Apologies, Carol. We made a grammatical error when speaking to you. It will not happen again.”
We feel and notice the tension dissipate from Carol’s hands and arms. She collapses to the carpet, gasping and heaving rapidly. She recovers, after 2 minutes and 11 seconds.
“I see,” says Carol. “I’d like you to leave.” We are familiar enough with the idiosyncrasies of Carol’s behavioural language by now to know when she intends finality to a sentiment, so we obey.
****
It is a hot summer’s day in Albuquerque three days after Zosia and Carol’s conversation. There is an urban office building on Menaul Boulevard in which Zosia is present. A landline handset to which the phone number (202) 808-3891 is connected is in a small office room on the second floor where Zosia is sitting. It rings. Zosia allows the answering message to play through and then listens to the voicemail that is left by the spurned caller.
The elm tree on the border of her father’s land was a resplendent god in spring and a fallen warrior in winter.
“Zosia,” says the voicemail. “I know that I can hardly expect you to leave the hivemind. I’ve come to terms with that.”
She had never been closer than ten metres to it because her father said that the tree’s roots were a liminal space that could not be crossed, lest hands from the earth dragged you down into hell.
“This isn’t about me. It’s about you. Well, it’s about us. That’s what every relationship should be, right? A mutual partnership. You’re the only person I have.”
It was a regional tale from folklore that her father likely intended as a scary bedtime story. He would tell it on cold winter nights when the branches on the elm tree were bare.
“I cannot help but to want more from our relationship. I thought that Helen would be the only person I would ever love. It seems that I was wrong.”
One day not long after her father died, she fought her fear and walked right up to the tree. Hell could not be a more painful place than her grief.
“I like to appear moody and conflicted, but I’m not a very complicated person when it comes to my emotions.”
Nothing happened. The branches waved in the gentle breeze and the morning light warmed up her face in a tranquil glow. She looked over the stony wall onto the neighbour’s land. A man was driving a tractor in his field. He waved at her.
“I’m getting this all wrong, like I always do. I offer my love freely and without expectation of reciprocation. Which is the thing. You can’t consent. I’ve fallen in love with someone who isn’t a real person, not really.”
She was scared about going over to greet him. When she told her mother about this, they consoled her and told her that trying scary things was nothing to be afraid of. This didn’t make much sense to her, but, on the first day of spring, she worked up the courage to climb over the wall.
“I love you, Zosia. I want you to come back, as you are. I’m sorry for getting angry at you and then withdrawing. I will never do it again. You’re enough for me, even if it hurts. I’m a martyr for your own ataraxy.”
She returned home happily after speaking with the farmer. Her father watched her contentment from the clouds and the elm tree never frightened her again.
“Please call back.” The voicemail ends.
Zosia’s mind is like a burning bridge. She walks calmly out of the office and procures the keys for the Mercedes-Benz SUV owned by Thomas Gardner, the former manager of that building. She drives it to the University of New Mexico’s Carrie Tingley Hospital.
It will be a beautiful day when this is all over. Zosia walks directly to the pharmacy at the back of the hospital and enters the storage room behind it where more potent medicines for use by trained medical professionals are kept.
The risk, for Carol, is worth it to take. She takes her time sterilising a syringe and cleaning a section of her left forearm.
If she isn’t the same person after? She will kiss Carol with her new lips or accept that her blankness is the only attractive factor of her. Zosia gets the Thiopental Sodium (2.5% solution) and puts 50ml of it into the syringe.
Nothing really matters in the end, but love; her daughter taught her that. She injects her left forearm with it.