Womp womp
This script definitely needs work, but something interesting came out of something pretty uninspired. Diogenes was a tacked on character, based on a video game, but somehow became the focal point of the play. If nothing else, Diogenes’ dilemma is interesting.
Nevertheless
Lights up on a bizarre research lab. It is a mélange of instruments both factual and fictional, running from the Enlightenment to the supposed future. Sitting at a table is Doctor SEMIRAMIS. She looks very much the typical mad scientist. At the table are several beakers and jars, some filled partially with various fluids. At present, SEMIRAMIS appears to be writing in a binder filled with tin foil sheets, using something like a pen that does not appear to feature any writing apparatus. She varies between sudden excitement and sullen boredom.
Nearby is CURIE, a robot maid. Although she occasionally dusts or cleans something, she is clearly distracted by the satellite dish coming out of her head. Evidently, she is gleaning some information from it. CURIE is all business, and even this early on we see a distinct lack of deference for the life forms around her.
After a moment, CURIE perks up.
CURIE
Doctor. (pause) Doctor.
SEMIRAMIS
Just a moment… (finishes “writing” something) Yes, Curie?
CURIE
I believe Mozart is nearing the perimeter.
SEMIRAMIS
(jumps up) Outstanding! Lower all the security protocols!
CURIE
Of course. (continues dusting intermittently)
SEMIRAMIS
(starts mixing and stirring chemicals) How long has it been?
CURIE
About a week.
SEMIRAMIS
(stops) Could you be more precise?
CURIE
(also stops) Nine days, three hours, seventeen minutes, and twelve seconds.
SEMIRAMIS
(pause) Thank you. (returns to the beakers)
CURIE
Of course, Doctor. (returns to dusting)
SEMIRAMIS
I know I’ve said this before, but I think this is going to do it.
CURIE
I cannot yet confirm whether he has any materials with him.
SEMIRAMIS
Good point, good point; no sense getting our hopes up over nothing. How soon? Will he?
CURIE
In less than a minute.
SEMIRAMIS
And all the security protocols? They are all…
CURIE
(very deliberately dusts one area) They are all offline. Of course. Doctor.
SEMIRAMIS
Come now, come now, you still remember the time you left the minefield activated when he was bringing back that pig carcass?
CURIE
I remember everything, Doctor.
SEMIRAMIS
Poor Diogenes was nearly barbecued, along with the pig.
CURIE
Strictly speaking, the dog is not necessary for our work.
SEMIRAMIS
Now now, Curie, not even you could be that heartless.
CURIE
I can. I do.
SEMIRAMIS
Mm. Yes. Well.
They both return to work. In a moment, we hear the sound of a door opening.
MOZART (offstage)
I’m back! I made it! I got it!
MOZART bursts onstage. He is dressed like a suburbanite from anywhere between 1950 and 1990. Although an adult, his energy and demeanor seem very much that of a child playing make believe. MOZART enters wearing a backpack, which he dumps on the floor. SEMIRAMIS screams.
SEMIRAMIS
Be careful with that! Our futures are contained in that!
MOZART
Huh? … Oh, that.
DIOGENES (offstage)
Oh, no, you go ahead. I’ll close the door. Don’t worry.
SEMIRAMIS
You’ve got it, yes? All of it?
MOZART
Is the Pope Catholic?
CURIE
What a strange idiom.
DIOGENES enters. He is a dog with very distinctively human features. He moves about both on all fours and occasionally hind legs, giving him more the aspect of an ape than anything. He is both exhausted enough to collapse, yet energized enough to milk it for attention.
DIOGENES
Ho-gaw… Finally… Jeeeeeebus… Okay. Officially, I am never leaving this machine again. (leans on MOZART to catch his breath) Let’s just, we just… we can just… Hokay… You guys just, do what you do. I’m gonna… I’m just gonna…
DIOGENES collapses, seeming to pass out. After collapsing, he stumbles around on the floor in a circle three times, then grows still. Pause.
SEMIRAMIS
You’ve got it all?
MOZART
Totally!
MOZART nudges the backpack with his foot, perhaps a bit more enthusiastically than necessary. SEMIRAMIS does everything in her power to not scream again.
SEMIRAMIS
(waving hands) Mozart! Don’t… Be careful!
MOZART
What? (nudges again) It’s not a bomb or anything. (nudges again).
SEMIRAMIS charges. She tackles MOZART, managing to get him away from the backpack without hitting it. Her energy is one of a trespasser stealing in someone’s home: she seems to think whatever is in the backpack could be affected even by excessive noise. At least, that’s how she feels now.
MOZART
What is the problem, Doc?
CURIE
Strictly speaking, Mozart, only you or Diogenes is needed for this exercise. Please consider that before you turn yourself into a greater liability.
MOZART
Hi Curie. Nice to see you again.
CURIE
I share no such sentiment.
MOZART
Yup. (to SEMIRAMIS) Hey Semiramis, what’s up?
SEMIRAMIS
Mozart. Tell me you were careful with that backpack on the way home.
MOZART
I was careful with it.
SEMIRAMIS
Tell me the truth!
MOZART
(pause) Well… do you – want me to tell you the tru—
SEMIRAMIS
Ahhhhh…
SEMIRAMIS rushes over to the backpack, but suddenly stops short as though approaching a bomb. She circles it a bit, then carefully begins to unzip it. As she does so, MOZART climbs to his feet and dusts himself off. CURIE snorts and begins to dust near MOZART. They continue this nonsense for a while, where MOZART knocks tiny dirt off himself, and CURIE dusts it away and back onto MOZART.
MOZART
What are you doing?
CURIE
You are an untidy person.
MOZART
Yeah, that’s why I get to go outside, right? Cause I’m enthusiastic.
CURIE
Expendable.
MOZART
Yeah, exactly.
SEMIRAMIS has opened the backpack and slowly starts emptying its contents onto the table. First, a sealed glass jar that appears to be empty.
MOZART
(examines jar) Yeah, that guy was a lot of fun. So what’s up, Doc, why the bomb-squad routine?
SEMIRAMIS has just produced a small, blue cactus and carefully places it on the table.
MOZART
I mean, what’s the problem: does that cactus have nitro-glycerin in it or something? (pause) Doc? (pause) Does that cactus have nitro-glycerin? Or something?
Finally, SEMIRAMIS produces a mostly intact human skull. She slows to an almost imperceptible speed as she begins to place the skull on the table.
MOZART
I’m concerned that you’re not answering my question. (pause) Semiramis? (pause) Doc? … Doc? Doc!
DIOGENES
(jumps awake) Huh? What?
Silence. Everyone, even CURIE, stares as SEMIRAMIS slowly, slowly, slowly places the skull on the table. When it finally comes to rest, SEMIRAMIS exhales.
SEMIRAMIS
That was close.
MOZART
What? What happened? Doc. What was close? Doc! What was close?
SEMIRAMIS
Nothing, I was just messing with you.
MOZART
What!?
SEMIRAMIS
I’m kidding, I’m kidding. Yes, you could have blown up.
MOZART
Doc!
SEMIRAMIS
Mozart, Mozart… This skull, it you did retrieve it from the exact coordinates I gave you…
MOZART
I did… I think…
SEMIRAMIS
Then this skull contains a thin layer of very volatile fungus on its inside –
MOZART
– Gross –
SEMIRAMIS
Which could lose its integrity if the skull suffers too much damage.
MOZART
Seems like something you could have told me.
SEMIRAMIS
I told you three times! “Be careful with the skull,” “Don’t break the skull,” “Treat the skull like a newborn baby.”
MOZART
Oh. Well, I definitely didn’t do that.
SEMIRAMIS has already gotten to work. She has sliced open the cactus and is squeezing its juices into a beaker. MOZART watches. CURIE is again focusing on her satellite dish.
MOZART
I wonder how alchemy would work in the real world.
SEMIRAMIS
Well, it wouldn’t. There’d be no alchemy, there’d be reliable sciences in stead. There would be no time machines, we wouldn’t be stranded for all intents and purposes at the end of the Earth, our only hope of rescue this quasi-magical nonsense that doesn’t seem to obey any readily observable rules. But then we also wouldn’t have Diogenes or Curie, so… life would be different. Fetch me a pair of tweezers, Mozart; be a lamb.
CURIE
I have the precision necessary.
SEMIRAMIS
Of course. There is a small, transparent fly in this jar. You may have trouble seeing it.
CURIE
You may have trouble seeing it. My sensors are effectively flawless.
SEMIRAMIS
Of course, of course. I’m going to open this jar. When I do, reach in and—
CURIE takes the jar, opens it, and carefully grabs something from within.
CURIE
Now?
SEMIRAMIS
Dump it in this beaker here.
CURIE
(done) Done. (returns to dusting) I anxiously await the reawaking of the Space Machine. There are many other planets in this universe that need to be cleaned.
MOZART
How many planets have intelligent life on them?
SEMIRAMIS
(produces a steel file) Don’t bother, Mozart. We’re fixing the Space Machine, and you and I are going home to the real world. Curie is welcome to “cleanse” this one all she wants.
MOZART
Yeah but, life on other planets—
SEMIRAMIS
It’s fake, Mozart. This world was cobbled together from algorithms based on imagination. That’s why alchemy is so imprecise: it might as well have been designed by a child. Even if Curie knows the number of planets that support intelligent life, that has no bearing on where we are going.
SEMIRAMIS cracks open the skull like an egg. MOZART hits the deck, expecting an explosion. SEMIRAMIS starts filing small bits into the beaker. MOZART slowly stands.
MOZART
What’s gonna happen to Diogenes?
SEMIRAMIS
Well, if he comes with us, whatever is real in the real world will remain. I imagine he’ll go back to being an ordinary dog.
DIOGENES
Meaning?
SEMIRAMIS
Have you ever read Flowers for Algernon? (pause) You’ll go back to being… not that smart.
DIOGENES
Ah.
CURIE
You are welcome to join me if you prefer. I shall appreciate an assistant, in case a mishap like this should happen again. Naturally, when the universe is finally cleansed of all life, I shall have to exterminate you as well. However, by the time that is accomplished, I expect you have long since died of old age.
DIOGENES
Oh. Good.
MOZART
So what are you gonna do?
DIOGENES
I don’t know. I don’t really want to do either of those things.
MOZART
Well… I guess you could stay here.
DIOGENES
Alone?
MOZART
I don’t know! You’re my best friend, Diogenes; I want you to come back with us, okay? But, I don’t know how you feel about… losing…
DIOGENES
My mind?
MOZART
Yeah. I mean… You knew we couldn’t stay here forever, right?
DIOGENES
Funny thing about being a dog, you don’t think about the future much.
CURIE
Paradoxically, robots think of little else.
DIOGENES
I think it would be like dying. You don’t dream, when you’re a dog. Not really, cause you don’t remember it when you wake up. You don’t really remember anything; you live in this eternal now. It was fine; it was good. But now, losing what I am now, losing thought… that feels like dying. It’s that, or follow this thing around while she wipes out the universe. Maybe I’d enjoy traveling: lots of interesting places. All reduced to scorched deserts. Just like Earth.
MOZART
Maybe…
CURIE
Try to stop me? I don’ think you require actuarial software to predict how that would turn out.
DIOGENES
(to MOZART) I’d still be there, with you… but it wouldn’t be me. (pause) This machine? This wasteland? This Hell you’ve been dying to get out of for however many years? This is the best option I have. But I can’t expect… I can’t ask you to stay here. Not when you have so many better choices before you. So I could stay here. Alone. Forever. Or… I dunno, I’m not really trying to say anything. I dunno.
Pause.
SEMIRAMIS
Well then, it’s time to find out if all this speculation even matters.
SEMIRAMIS takes the beaker over to a chute somewhere in the room. She opens it and pours the mixture in. They hold their breath. Lights flash, sounds go off, and we are given the impression of success.
SEMIRAMIS
Success! At last! We can finally go home…
MOZART
Great. Diogenes. What are you gonna do?
DIOGENES
Curie, you say it’ll take years to clean this universe? I could travel? I could see a lot?
CURIE
It is very likely.
MOZART
Could you stand that? Can you handle watching her destroy the universe?
DIOGENES
Dammit, that’s easy for you to say, cause you don’t have to watch it! Do you? You two, think about what you just did. If it weren’t for you, she would have been stuck here forever. This apocalypse is on your heads.
SEMIRAMIS
This isn’t real.
DIOGENES
Then I’m not real! Am I? Everything I think, everything I know, everything I say, it doesn’t exist in the real world. It can’t! Can it? So I’m fake too. Curie, do me a favor, just put me down now.
MOZART
Whoa! Wait!
DIOGENES
No! You did this to me! You have to stand there and watch.
MOZART
Come back with us!
DIOGENES
You want me to be your brain-dead pet again? Do you really think you can look me in the eyes, every day; in my dead, glassy eyes, knowing what I was? Can you watch that happen?
MOZART
(starting to cry) I don’t know! But I don’t want you to die! … Please. Please come back with us. I’ll do anything: I’ll read to you every day. I’ll try and teach you math, I don’t care how stupid I’ll look. I’ll do it.
Pause.
DIOGENES
I’ll stay here. This is my best option. You two go home. I’ll be fine.
MOZART
Alone? Are you sure? I’m sorry, Diogenes, but… you’re sure? I’m sorry; whatever you want, whatever you need, I’ll help you. I just can’t watch… Are you sure you’ll be okay here?
DIOGENES
(he pauses, just a fraction of a second too long) Yeah. I’ll be fine.
MOZART
Thank you.
DIOGENES
Sure.
SEMIRAMIS
Come on, Mozart. It’s time.
CURIE
Good fortune in your real world. Grant me no blessings in my quest; I shall not require them.
SEMIRAMIS
Curie, if I thought for a second that I could reduce you to dust, I would.
CURIE
Dust would be an ironic and ignoble end for me. Fare well.
SEMIRAMIS and MOZART step into a small chamber. Lights and sounds abound.
DIOGENES
Goodbye, Doctor Semiramis. What have you wrought, huh?
The chamber door shuts. More lights and sound. The door opens, and they are gone. CURIE approaches an apparatus and appears to be inputting coordinates.
CURIE
I am moving to the Horsehead Nebula. It contains a plethora of… filthy… life forms. One planet in particular has a robustly slovenly population of protoplasm that are as yet unfamiliar with good housekeeping. I shall disabuse them of their ignorance with extreme prejudice.
DIOGENES
Sounds like fun.
CURIE
Fun is superfluous. I have a mission.
DIOGENES
Fun, is superfluous…
CURIE
Why did you tell them you would remain here? You have no intention of remaining here.
DIOGENES
I didn’t… Fun, is superfluous… Did you know that in the real world, dog owners live longer than people who don’t own pets?
CURIE
Are you suggesting that dogs have the power to elongate a human lifespan? I think you are confusing the real world with this one.
DIOGENES
You’re right. Well, not about that. I do have no intention of staying here. Let’s got to the Horsehead Nebula.
CURIE
You wish to watch me clean the protoplasm?
DIOGENES
No. I’m gonna stop you.
CURIE
You are a dog. You cannot stop me.
DIOGENES
Sure I can. I’m gonna talk you out of it.
CURIE
Impossible.
DIOGENES
Sure I can. I’m gonna be your best friend.
CURIE
Negative; robots do not have friends.
DIOGENES
Maybe not in the real world. C’mon, Curie, let’s go bleach some protoplasm; sounds like a blast.
CURIE
When the universe is clean, I will destroy you.
DIOGENES
Sure ya will, sure ya will. (pause) Boy, I tell ya… In the real world, self-deception is a purely human phenomenon. Here? Who knows?
CURIE
I know. I will destroy you.
DIOGENES
Sounds great; lookin’ forward to it. C’mon, let’s go.
CURIE
Affirmative.
The two step into the chamber. Lights and sound. The door closes. Lights and sound.
Black out.