Love, Death & Robots (2019) s03e06 Episode Script
Swarm
1
We shall miss your conversation
on the rest of our voyage, Dr.
Afriel.
And I yours.
Our exchange of information has been extremely valuable to me.
Humanity is the kind of race we enjoy doing business with.
Young, eager, flexible.
But we do not understand the profit you seek in studying the swarm.
They are merely well-organized animals.
Hmm.
Well, we humans learn wherever we can.
Dr.
Afriel.
Per our transit contract, we shall return in 600 of your days.
Dr.
Afriel.
Welcome.
Dr.
Mirny.
An honor to meet you.
And I you.
It's good to see another human face.
And please, call me Galina.
- What? - Don't be alarmed.
It will convey your pheromones to the queen.
Otherwise, you might be considered an invader and killed.
I followed your study of the Swarm with tremendous interest, Doctor.
But I had no idea you'd learned to communicate with them.
Not exactly.
I found no Swarm castes that use language, but several symbiote species still do.
I call these springtails.
I believe they were once a spacefaring race who discovered the Swarm and were absorbed by it.
But now they are little more than parasitic savages.
So far, I've identified 15 unique symbiotic aliens living among the hundreds of specialized castes native to the Swarm.
Various strains of nutrient-rich fungi are the hive's main food source.
Since our basic biochemistry is similar, it's perfectly edible.
I've learned to solicit food with a pattern of reflex tapping.
Fermentation in the worker's gut adds nutritional value.
Makes it taste better too.
Mmm.
It's wonderful.
Tunneler.
It can take us further into the Nest.
The queen.
Heart of the Nest.
Whatever caste of worker is needed, she can create it.
The entire Nest is a wonder of genetic automation.
It is truly amazing.
Warrior caste.
Very deadly.
But only if you mean harm to the queen and her eggs.
Dr.
Afriel, I think it's time you told me exactly why you're here.
As you've discovered, the Swarm is a near-perfect organic system.
With a resource like this, we can bring order to the chaos of human expansion.
We must harness its power.
Exploit it, you mean.
If order is what you want, look around.
It's always warm, it smells good, and there's plenty of food.
This Nest has been here for millions of years.
Who will remember humanity in even a thousand? Even though I won't live to see our race triumph, it's enough that I can foresee that day.
Arrogance.
These creatures are primordially innocent, Doctor.
They should never become pawns in some power struggle light-years away.
But we only need the genetic information from one egg.
With that, we can grow our own queen.
Her offspring will build a new nest.
They would be useless without the Nest's pheromones to control them.
Mm.
Artificial vein.
This slipped past the Investor quarantine.
Inside is a selection of the Swarm pheromones we synthesized based on your samples.
If these work, we could control millions of workers.
Armies of warriors.
- You are planning to breed a slave race.
- We could You said yourself, they aren't sentient.
They're organic machines.
It's not as if they'd be staring up at the stars pining for their freedom.
It's true.
Whether they work for us or the Swarm will make no difference to them.
And that is the beauty of the idea, Doctor.
As long as no harm comes to the Nest I'll help you.
We'll need to test the synthesized pheromones with a series of trials.
First vial contains the most basic pheromonal commands.
A simple grouping stimulus.
But to work most effectively, the pheromones need to be combined in a chemical program.
Gather, then dig.
Grow food here, then harvest.
Or retrieve one fertilized egg.
We humans are not so very different.
Adrift on ancient chemical tides.
Submerged in the warm ebb and flow of life.
What is it? Food-giver no good.
Not feed.
Take me to her.
Come on then, you mindless motherfuckers! Galina? I have no name, but you may address me as Swarm.
I am one of its castes.
My specialty is intelligence.
We we mean you no harm.
We seek only knowledge and You sought to breed us.
Use us.
But your crude experiments triggered certain genetic protocols, and I was born.
I am only a few weeks old, but I have millions of years of racial memory.
You are clearly an intelligent being.
Surely we can find a way to Please, Doctor, I'm just a tool.
One the Swarm has used to deal with threats like yours many times.
Through her memories, I understand your race.
An especially vigorous one.
I expect they could be here, competing with us within a few hundred years.
Hmm.
It will be sooner.
Perhaps.
But on the timescale the Swarm operates, your race will soon be gone.
If if you intend to destroy us, we will Most likely, you'll destroy yourselves.
In intelligence is not a winning survival trait.
Consider the scavenger feeding on your vomit.
Two million years ago, its ancestors made the galaxy tremble.
When they attacked the Swarm, we bred smarter, tougher versions of their own race to fight them.
Our nests were the only world they'd known, and they fought with a fury and inventiveness we never could have matched.
It is an excellent strategy.
And the two of you make a perfect breeding pair.
I would never betray my race.
I will kill myself.
In which case, I would simply clone you and raise the children myself.
Bothersome.
And so I offer you a choice.
Remain an intelligent living being or real ugly events So, do you accept my offer, Doctor? I accept your challenge.
We won't become parasites.
Humans are different.
Of course you are.
I'm glad I won't have to absorb you.
I would have missed your conversation.
Afriel.
And I yours.
Our exchange of information has been extremely valuable to me.
Humanity is the kind of race we enjoy doing business with.
Young, eager, flexible.
But we do not understand the profit you seek in studying the swarm.
They are merely well-organized animals.
Hmm.
Well, we humans learn wherever we can.
Dr.
Afriel.
Per our transit contract, we shall return in 600 of your days.
Dr.
Afriel.
Welcome.
Dr.
Mirny.
An honor to meet you.
And I you.
It's good to see another human face.
And please, call me Galina.
- What? - Don't be alarmed.
It will convey your pheromones to the queen.
Otherwise, you might be considered an invader and killed.
I followed your study of the Swarm with tremendous interest, Doctor.
But I had no idea you'd learned to communicate with them.
Not exactly.
I found no Swarm castes that use language, but several symbiote species still do.
I call these springtails.
I believe they were once a spacefaring race who discovered the Swarm and were absorbed by it.
But now they are little more than parasitic savages.
So far, I've identified 15 unique symbiotic aliens living among the hundreds of specialized castes native to the Swarm.
Various strains of nutrient-rich fungi are the hive's main food source.
Since our basic biochemistry is similar, it's perfectly edible.
I've learned to solicit food with a pattern of reflex tapping.
Fermentation in the worker's gut adds nutritional value.
Makes it taste better too.
Mmm.
It's wonderful.
Tunneler.
It can take us further into the Nest.
The queen.
Heart of the Nest.
Whatever caste of worker is needed, she can create it.
The entire Nest is a wonder of genetic automation.
It is truly amazing.
Warrior caste.
Very deadly.
But only if you mean harm to the queen and her eggs.
Dr.
Afriel, I think it's time you told me exactly why you're here.
As you've discovered, the Swarm is a near-perfect organic system.
With a resource like this, we can bring order to the chaos of human expansion.
We must harness its power.
Exploit it, you mean.
If order is what you want, look around.
It's always warm, it smells good, and there's plenty of food.
This Nest has been here for millions of years.
Who will remember humanity in even a thousand? Even though I won't live to see our race triumph, it's enough that I can foresee that day.
Arrogance.
These creatures are primordially innocent, Doctor.
They should never become pawns in some power struggle light-years away.
But we only need the genetic information from one egg.
With that, we can grow our own queen.
Her offspring will build a new nest.
They would be useless without the Nest's pheromones to control them.
Mm.
Artificial vein.
This slipped past the Investor quarantine.
Inside is a selection of the Swarm pheromones we synthesized based on your samples.
If these work, we could control millions of workers.
Armies of warriors.
- You are planning to breed a slave race.
- We could You said yourself, they aren't sentient.
They're organic machines.
It's not as if they'd be staring up at the stars pining for their freedom.
It's true.
Whether they work for us or the Swarm will make no difference to them.
And that is the beauty of the idea, Doctor.
As long as no harm comes to the Nest I'll help you.
We'll need to test the synthesized pheromones with a series of trials.
First vial contains the most basic pheromonal commands.
A simple grouping stimulus.
But to work most effectively, the pheromones need to be combined in a chemical program.
Gather, then dig.
Grow food here, then harvest.
Or retrieve one fertilized egg.
We humans are not so very different.
Adrift on ancient chemical tides.
Submerged in the warm ebb and flow of life.
What is it? Food-giver no good.
Not feed.
Take me to her.
Come on then, you mindless motherfuckers! Galina? I have no name, but you may address me as Swarm.
I am one of its castes.
My specialty is intelligence.
We we mean you no harm.
We seek only knowledge and You sought to breed us.
Use us.
But your crude experiments triggered certain genetic protocols, and I was born.
I am only a few weeks old, but I have millions of years of racial memory.
You are clearly an intelligent being.
Surely we can find a way to Please, Doctor, I'm just a tool.
One the Swarm has used to deal with threats like yours many times.
Through her memories, I understand your race.
An especially vigorous one.
I expect they could be here, competing with us within a few hundred years.
Hmm.
It will be sooner.
Perhaps.
But on the timescale the Swarm operates, your race will soon be gone.
If if you intend to destroy us, we will Most likely, you'll destroy yourselves.
In intelligence is not a winning survival trait.
Consider the scavenger feeding on your vomit.
Two million years ago, its ancestors made the galaxy tremble.
When they attacked the Swarm, we bred smarter, tougher versions of their own race to fight them.
Our nests were the only world they'd known, and they fought with a fury and inventiveness we never could have matched.
It is an excellent strategy.
And the two of you make a perfect breeding pair.
I would never betray my race.
I will kill myself.
In which case, I would simply clone you and raise the children myself.
Bothersome.
And so I offer you a choice.
Remain an intelligent living being or real ugly events So, do you accept my offer, Doctor? I accept your challenge.
We won't become parasites.
Humans are different.
Of course you are.
I'm glad I won't have to absorb you.
I would have missed your conversation.