31:T1659,Darkness. FORAGER and FRIEND are stuck. FORAGER
Are you - FRIEND
ok? FORAGER
Are you - FRIEND
it sounds like shuffling? FORAGER
I feel - FRIEND
grey? FORAGER
Is that your hand? Take my hand. FRIEND
Yes. Ok. FORAGER
I think I can feel a wall, or something. Over here. Threaded. Almost - FRIEND
... breathing? FORAGER
and damp. FRIEND
Dusty, too, FORAGER
I don’t think we’re alone. FRIEND
It’s a feeling like - like we’re in a crowd. FORAGER
Don’t let go. FRIEND
Or is it the sound of waves? FORAGER
I don’t think it’s waves. FRIEND
Not waves. FORAGER
Doesn’t smell salty. FRIEND
No. FORAGER
Sandy maybe. FRIEND
Smells damp. And dusty. FORAGER
But maybe kind of like the desert? FRIEND
Like a damp part of the desert. FORAGER
Yes. If there’s such a position point place. FRIEND
Where are we? beat FORAGER
Could you see? When this was happening? FRIEND
The mountain? FORAGER
... and the lady - FRIEND
- holy heart hallow hallucination? FORAGER
... and then the fire - FRIEND
Was it a land slump settle slide? FORAGER
If it was a landslide are we under it? FRIEND
Maybe. Are we trapped? FORAGER
We’re in the ground, I think. FRIEND
Underground. FORAGER
I wonder if there’s any truffles. Doesn’t smell like truffle soil. FRIEND
You’re thinking about truffles? Truffles? FORAGER
What are you thinking about? FRIEND
If we’re going to die. FORAGER
I was wondering if we were dead. FRIEND
What? beat Maybe we can dig our way out. FORAGER
Digging… We can’t see.
One time I was out in the woods at night and I started being able to trace the connections the mycelium glowed, revealed itself to me the network of it like neurons running all through the ground. There’s never the need to make a choice when you’re mycelium, they just do both. FRIEND
They just do both what? That’s not reassuring. These words you’re using. You aren’t slam scared. FORAGER
I’m not scared.
You give them two options they branch and take both. FRIEND
Does this help us? beat Why do you seem so calm? FORAGER
I’m thinking that if we’re not far underground we’re surrounded by mycelium. That makes me calm. FRIEND
We are possibly dead or dying.
This is a fundamental difference in reality here. I mean like you’re - you’re thinking about mycelium! I’m falling apart. I’m claustrophobic. I can’t - I can’t breathe. And you’re - you’re like, absorbing. Adoring absorbing the situation! FORAGER
What do you remember from before? FRIEND
Time. FORAGER
Maybe we are dead. We were always gonna be - FRIEND
Having time! This feeling it’s like - you’ve always said that part of us being human - being human! - was being a biome - a biome! Filled with bacteria and fungi and now I can filth fling feel it! But they’re taking over! I had a nightmare once as a child that a plant started growing through my hand, I could feel the roots of it worming through my palm, screwing their way, pale branching roots all the way through, oh god, is this a dream? I can feel, it’s almost itchy, the biome is taking me into it - and something growing through - and time is leaving my body as this, this swarm takes it over - FORAGER
Sorry. This is my fault. FRIEND
Are you glowing? FORAGER
What? FRIEND
I feel like I can see you a little. FORAGER
Can see - FRIEND
Our hands are stuck. FORAGER
Don’t let go! FRIEND
I can’t let go. That’s what I’m saying. FORAGER
Oh. You know. I can’t let go of the wall either. ERESHKIGAL
You aren’t dead. What is happening to you. You were slipping around on the surface of death but now I think you’re heading in a different direction. FORAGER
Hello? ERESHKIGAL
What are you? FORAGER
Forager. FRIEND
We were - humans - but maybe - something is happening. Are we ghosts? FORAGER
Are we fungi? FRIEND
My mind is going soft. ERESHKIGAL
You’re - stuck - in the moment where the imagination - how did Berger say it - ‘overruns the contours of the individual’. You’re disturbing death. It’s like you’re growing through the entire ‘field of experience’. FRIEND
We’re disturbing death? FORAGER
Don’t - FRIEND
Don’t? Don’t! FORAGER
It’s alright! It’s all animal abridge alright. FRIEND
It’s not alright! And who are you? A voice in the darkness? Can you help us? ERESHKIGAL
I’m the goddess of the underworld. FRIEND
The underworld? FORAGER
I think we’re becoming mycelium. ERESHKIGAL
Mycelium? FORAGER
Mycelium holds the soil together. FRIEND
Growing through the field, far field of excruciating, exquisite, experience. FORAGER
Connecting the plants. FRIEND
Softening FORAGER
Healing the soil. FRIEND
Rotting. FORAGER
Breaking down all that is hard. FRIEND
Releasing nutrients FORAGER
So that we might come available FRIEND
To something new ERESHKIGAL
You’re connecting to Ebih. The mountain. It’s like you’ve found their memories. They’re supposed to be dead. No more memories. No more name. FORAGER
We can heal mountains. FRIEND
We were always in the mountains. FORAGER
We are folded in mountains. ERESHKIGAL
What was hidden here? FORAGER
The hyphae are living memory. FRIEND
The spores hold the possible. ERESHKIGAL
‘By themselves the living are incomplete.’ 32:[] 2f:{"title":"Scene 9","cells":[{"id":0,"value":"# Scene 9","pinned":false,"hidden":false,"mode":"md"},{"id":22,"value":"$31","pinned":false,"hidden":false,"mode":"md"},{"id":3,"value":"","pinned":false,"hidden":false,"mode":"md"},{"id":13,"value":"[NEXT SCENE](https://observablehq.com/@florencewallis/ei10)","pinned":false,"hidden":false,"mode":"md"}],"files":"$W32","stdlib":"1","titling":"auto"}