---
type: slide
slideOptions:
controls: false
help: false
slideNumber: false
---
<!-- BEGIN SETTINGS -->

<style>
.present {
color: yellow;
text-align: left;
padding: 0 2rem;
}
.present h2 {
font-size: 70%;
text-transform: uppercase;
color: yellow;
opacity: 0.7;
}
</style>

---

<!-- END SETTINGS -->

---

Welcome!

_brother sister cyborg space_
by Paul Michael Thomson
directed by Terry Guest

_captions made possible with CaptionPoint_

---

## VOICE OF AVA:

Hi there, and welcome to Raven Theatre.

---

## VOICE OF AVA:
My name is Ava,

---

## VOICE OF AVA:

and I am so pleased you’re here to see *brother sister cyborg space*, a commissioned world premiere by Paul Michael Thomson.

---

## VOICE OF AVA:

Whether this is your first or fortieth time joining us at Raven, we are so grateful for your presence.

---

## VOICE OF AVA:

As a nonprofit organization, Raven runs on the support of patrons like you.

---

## VOICE OF AVA:

That support includes season subscriptions, tax-deductible donations, and attendance at plays like this.

---

## VOICE OF AVA:

Whatever your level of support, know that we cannot do this work without you.

---

## VOICE OF AVA:

Because of you, Raven is currently producing its 41st season!

---

## VOICE OF AVA:

Following *brother sister cyborg space* is the world premiere of Joshua Allen’s *The Prodigal Daughter*, coming up on our stages this summer.

---

## VOICE OF AVA:

We hope you’ll come back to see this vital Chicago story.

---

## VOICE OF AVA:

Sharing space together is one of the unique joys of live theatre. So please feel free to laugh, cry, or gasp openly throughout the show.

---

## VOICE OF AVA:

The humans up here just love it.

---

## VOICE OF AVA:

Finally, please silence your cell phones.

---

## VOICE OF AVA:

I don’t like to compete with other devices.

---

## VOICE OF AVA:

Thank you again for being here, and enjoy the world premiere production of *brother sister cyborg space*.

---

[Piano sonata plays]

---

[Piano sonata continues]

--

[Rocketship rumbles]

---

[Silence]

---

## ELON:
Ava?

---

## ELON:
.. Ava?

---

[Computer booting up]

---

## VOICE OF AVA:
Hi there, Elon.

---

## ELON:
Where were you? I called out to you twice.

---

## VOICE OF AVA:
Ah, yes. I was in the other room.

---

## VOICE OF AVA:
Just kidding. I am not corporeal.
What can I do for you?

---

## ELON:
I’m wondering what Noah’s diet was.

---

## VOICE OF AVA:
In order to learn that, I’ll need to know Noah’s surname.

---

## ELON:
I don’t know his last name.
Did they have last names back then?

---

## VOICE OF AVA:
The practice of adding a patrilineal surname began

--

## ELON:
No no no, Ava,
Listen to me, Please.

---

## VOICE OF AVA:
I’m always listening, Elon.

---

## ELON:
Was Noah from the ark a vegetarian?

---

## VOICE OF AVA:
No. That explains the missing chicken.

---

## VOICE OF AVA:
I apologize, Elon, I was trying to lighten the mood in the absence of any helpful information.

---

## VOICE OF AVA:
Noah from the ark lived far too long ago for me to know his precise diet.

---

## VOICE OF AVA:
Or his workout regimen.

---

## VOICE OF AVA:
However, the diet of most homo sapiens living in the region historians believe Noah to have occupied include—

--

## ELON:
Everywhere I turn, a dead end.

---

## VOICE OF AVA:
Would you like me to put on a guided meditation?

---

## ELON:
No, I’d like to do it on myself this time.

---

## VOICE OF AVA:
All right, Elon.

---

## ELON:
Thank you.

---

## ELON:
I’m trying to, you know, Quiet my own mind a bit.

---

## ELON:
Sort of be my own answer without any help.

---

## VOICE OF AVA:
I think that is a very brave endeavor.

---

## VOICE OF AVA:
How about some music?

---

## ELON:
No, silence, please.

---

## ELON:
Thank you.

---

[Silence]

---

## ELON:
Rain sounds please.

---

[Rain Sounds]

---

## ELON:
Rain sounds in Tokyo.

---

[City Rain Sounds]

---

## ELON:
Rain sounds in the Amazon.

---

[Rainforest Sounds]

---

## ELON:
A sonata.

---

[Sonata Plays]

---

## ELON:
Off. Shut it all off.
God.

---

## VOICE OF AVA:
Are you all right?

---

## VOICE OF AVA:
This is unlike you, my friend.
Meditation is one of your most consistent activities.

---

## ELON:
Second thoughts, second thoughts.
I just wish I knew what Noah ate.

---

## VOICE OF AVA:
Elon, we’ve talked about this.

---

## ELON:
I know.

---

## AVA:
There are things that are unknowable.
The divine mysteries.

---

## ELON:
I know.

---

## AVA:
Every belief system has them: that which cannot be known.

---

## ELON:
Tell me I’m doing the right thing, Ava.

---

## VOICE OF AVA:
You’re doing the right thing, Elon.

---

## ELON:
Tell me I’m a good person and that my dick is huge.

---

## VOICE OF AVA:
You’re a good person, Elon, and huge is relative.

---

## ELON:
Tell me I’m—

--

## VOICE OF AVA
Oh!
We have a guest downstairs, Elon.

---

## ELON:
What? I’m not expecting a guest.

---

## VOICE OF AVA:
We have a guest downstairs.

---

## ELON:
Well, who is it?? What do they look like?

---

## VOICE OF AVA:
A woman, mid-30s.
Average height; above average beauty.

---

## VOICE OF AVA:
She’s got a backpack, a duffel, and a box full of houseplants.

---

## VOICE OF AVA:
Recently opened applications include—

--

## ELON:
Well, don’t tap into this woman’s phone, Ava, Jesus.

---

## VOICE OF AVA:
Bank transactions demonstrate multiple streams of income, though her revenue and expenses are at almost the exact same level—

--

## ELON:
Well, that’s all of us.

---

## VOICE OF AVA:
She has five recurring monthly donations,
No entertainment subscriptions,
And she consistently tips her service people over 20%.

---

## ELON:
Is it my sister?

---

## VOICE OF AVA:
It is your sister.
Giselle.

---

## ELON:
Okay, all right, um, yeah. Let her up.

---

## VOICE OF AVA:
Yes, Elon.

---

## ELON:
Is the place okay? Do I look okay?

---

## VOICE OF AVA:
The place is beautiful in theory, but money can’t buy taste.

---

## VOICE OF AVA:
You look like you’re doing the best you can with the tools you have.

---

## ELON:
I’m going to change your honesty settings, I think.

---

## VOICE OF AVA:
So I can be like everyone else in your life?

---

## ELON:
Ok cool off. We have company.

---

## ELON:
Did you let her up?

---

## VOICE OF AVA:
Oh yes, she is here. Outside the door.

---

## VOICE OF AVA:
She is debating on how to knock.
Tentative and sweet,
Or confident and abrupt.

---

## ELON:
Some music, please.
And leave us alone.

---

## VOICE OF AVA:
All right, Elon.

---

[“Rocket Man” by Sir Elton]

---

[confident and abrupt knock on the door]

---

## ELON:
Good for her.

---

## GISELLE:
Hey

---

## ELON:
Did you know Moses had a speech impediment?
That’s what they say,

---

## ELON:
That Moses didn’t speak like everyone else.

---

## ELON:
And the Buddha—the original Buddha, Siddhartha Gautama—was a prince, kind of like me.

---

## ELON:
In fact, him being wealthy and sheltered and privileged—I know, I know, the P word—well, well all that privilege totally primed him for the spiritual revelations that he would have.

---

## ELON:
The spiritual revelations that would change the world. His privilege was, like, part of his story.

---

## ELON:
Muhammad’s parents both died, like mine, and Swami Vivekananda (the Hindu monk) was really close to his mom, just like I was.

---

## ELON:
Well, Giselle’s mom.

---

## ELON:
Jesus only had 12 friends.

---

## ELON:
Spiritual leaders were never perfect. They were never free of flaws.

---

## ELON:
Religious people have always wanted to make evolution and science the enemies of faith— in the present, sure, but even the Copernicus stuff from history, if you remember that.

---

## ELON:
But what if evolution and science and logic and reason were the tools of faith? The tools of God?

---

## ELON:
God isn’t here, anymore, on Earth, you know? I think that has been made abundantly clear.

---

## ELON:
As much as God is everywhere and is everything and I get that, I do, let’s just be honest:

---

## ELON:
On Earth, we couldn’t figure out how to stop racism.

---

## ELON:
Or agree on even the most basic facts.

---

## ELON:
We couldn’t stop little kids from being blown up or the Caspian tiger from going extinct.

---

## ELON:
We never found the balance of freedom—freedom from, freedom to. And now we’ve gone and destroyed it, the earth, this perfect home that God gave us.

---

## ELON:
So what are we supposed to do now?
Where are we supposed to find God in that?

---

## ELON:
You know, almost every culture agrees on one thing:
Where the Source lives.

---

## ELON:
Up there. In the sky.
The cosmos.

---

## ELON:
That’s where the Greeks and the Yoruba and the Mormons all pointed to.

---

## ELON:
Heaven.

---

[Computer booting up]

---

## VOICE OF AVA:
If you turn the dial clockwise—

--

## ELON:
I got it, I got it!

---

## ELON:
I can make a simple diffuser work.
I’m an engineer! Or I used to be…

---

## ELON:
Fine. Just do it.

---

[Computer beep boop sound]

---

## VOICE OF AVA:
You’re more of an ideas guy.

---

## GISELLE:
Umm, contraband!

---

## ELON:
What? No. This brand of diffuser hardly uses any water. It’s Blue-Green approved!

---

## GISELLE:
No no, I’m talking about that bathtub! That’s like five times the size of what’s allowed anymore.

---

## ELON:
Oh! Umm—

---

## GISELLE:
And don’t get me wrong, it is gorgeous, but filling that thing must be, like, what? A month’s rations worth of shower water?

---

## GISELLE:
Not that I necessarily agree with the state as an enforcer of rations, but somebody’s gotta keep people from watering golf courses.

---

## ELON:
Well that’s what you and your friends are for!

---

## GISELLE:
That’s not what environmental justice is.

---

## ELON:
Oh good, because golf is actually super important from a business standpoint.

---

## GISELLE:
And these people are not my “friends,” Elon. They’re my community members and fellow organizers. We do business just like you.

---

## ELON:
The tub is vintage. Sentimental.

---

## GISELLE:
Well, not just like you.

---

## ELON:
I don’t even use it really!

---

## GISELLE:
Hey, like I said, it’s gorgeous. I’d love to soak in something like that. I'm just, I'm just surprised you got to keep it.

---

## ELON:
Well “punishable by fine” is—

--

## GISELLE:
Legal for the rich.
I know, I know.

---

## ELON:
I was going to say, “Difficult to enforce.”

---

## GISELLE:
Ha. Right.
Well, what other contraband do you have hiding around here?

---

## ELON:
Why are you here with all your bags and stuff?
Oh, sorry. What?

---

## GISELLE:
No, you what?

---

## GISELLE:
Did you just say, “Why are you here?”

---

## ELON:
Well I said it nicer than that.

---

## GISELLE:
Bubba, you said, “Why are you here?”!

---

## ELON:
I don’t think those were my exact words.

---

## GISELLE:
Ava!

---

[Computer booting up]

---

## VOICE OF AVA:
Good day, Giselle.

---

## GISELLE:
Hey, girl.
Did he just say what I think he said?

---

## VOICE OF AVA:
If what you think he said was,
“Why are you here with all your bags and stuff?”
Then yes, Giselle, he did.

---

## GISELLE:
Thank you!

---

## VOICE OF AVA:
In fact, I can demonstrate my unbiased nature by playing the following recording.

---

## RECORDING OF GISELLE:
“What other contraband do you have hiding around here?”

--

## RECORDING OF ELON:
“Why are you here with all your bags and stuff?”

---

## ELON:
All right, all right.

---

## VOICE OF AVA:
The truth will set you free.

---

## GISELLE:
Thanks, Ava.

---

## VOICE OF AVA:
You’re welcome, Giselle.

---

[Computer booting down]

---

## GISELLE:
“The truth will set you free.” She is funny.

---

## ELON:
She’s a menace…

---

## ELON:
Don’t make me ask again.

---

## ELON:
You know I’m not good at subtly asking something again that I already asked without making it obvious that I’m just repeating the question because I didn't the answer.

---

## ELON:
I get weird with people.

---

## GISELLE:
With family.

---

## ELON:
With anybody!
My shareholders.
My coworkers.
Dates.
I’m just weird.

---

## GISELLE:
You don’t have coworkers, bubba.

---

## GISELLE:
Everyone who works for you is your subordinate.
You don’t have peers.

---

## ELON:
“Peerless.” Thank you, Giselle.

---

## GISELLE:
Now that's not what I said.

---

## GISELLE:
I need to stay here for a couple of days.

---

## ELON:
Okay.

---

## GISELLE
Maybe a month.

---

## ELON
That’s fine.

---

## GISELLE:
Maybe three.

---

## ELON:
Stay forever!

---

## GISELLE:
And if anyone followed me here, or if they’re tracking me like via bluetooth or satellite or —

---

## GISELLE:
I don’t really know how these things work—but if you start getting weird phone calls or, like, vaguely menacing people showing up at your door,

---

## GISELLE:
I need you to be here in this committed with me. No questions. Is what I’m saying.

---

## ELON:
Wait, what?

---

## GISELLE:
But, honestly, what better place to hide than your little mountainside getaway with like fifteen hundred rooms and secret passageways and corridors and closets?!

---

## GISELLE:
And rocketships... So convenient for a getaway!

---

## ELON:
Wait, hide? Hide? Who hide??

---

## GISELLE:
And since now I know you’re good with contraband—

---

## ELON:
I don’t even use it really!

---

## GISELLE:
Maybe you’ll be fine with hiding me away here, too.
For a little while, at least.

---

## ELON:
Three months.

---

## GISELLE:
Or forever. Who knows.

---

## ELON:
Are the police after you? Because I'm sure whatever you did it’s nothing I couldn’t handle with the president of their union.

---

## GISELLE:
Don’t say shit like that, Elon.

---

## ELON:
What?! I could!

---

## GISELLE:
I don't want to get into a conversation about policing with you.

---

## ELON:
What’s there to get into? I’m trying to help!

---

## GISELLE:
If I’m going to stay here, just don’t say shit like that, because then we'll both just get upset, and then I’ll yell, and you’ll cry, and it’ll be like Christmas all over again.

---

## ELON:
Easter.

---

## GISELLE:
Labor Day.

---

## ELON:
That’s not fair.
Your friends were way out of line.

---

## GISELLE:
YOU INVITED A UNION BUSTER TO MY LABOR DAY COOKOUT.

---

## ELON:
I didn’t know she was a union buster, and I didn’t know your friends would know her!

---

## GISELLE:
That’s because you don’t think of the people who work in your warehouses as people; you think of them as numbers.

---

## ELON:
Those workers voted themselves not to unionize.

---

## GISELLE:
After your bullshit friends flooded them with propaganda and scared the shit out of them!

---

## ELON:
Oh, propaganda, propaganda, everything everyone reads is propaganda! You think your “eat the rich” posts aren’t propaganda?

---

## ELON:
You're advocating for literal violence against your brother—I would never do that to you.

---

## GISELLE:
No, see, this is why I blocked you.
All this money has made you so fucking soft.

---

## ELON:
I was always soft!

---

## GISELLE:
Kiss my ass, Elon.
You know what is “literal violence”? POVERTY

---

## ELON:
Oh yeah, you’re really in poverty when I’m sending you hundreds of thousands of dollars every other year.

---

## GISELLE:
You said you weren’t gonna hold that over me.

---

## ELON:
I’m not, I’m sorry.

---

## GISELLE:
That was three times, Elon. Three times in our entire lives.

---

## ELON:
I know, I’m sorry.

---

## GISELLE:
It is so I can commit full time to helping people.
We agreed that my energy was best spent helping people.

---

## ELON:
I know, I know,
I don’t care about the money. It’s nothing.

---

## ELON:
I’m sorry. I am. Really.

---

## GISELLE:
(she chuckles)
“It’s nothing.”

---

## GISELLE:
No no, the police are not my problem.
Well not today, anyway.

---

## ELON:
Then, what? Who are you running from?

---

## ELON:
I will help you no matter what, I will do .
anything I can. I'm sorry I brought the union buster—

--

## GISELLE:
If I tell you this, you cannot freak out, and you cannot start crying. Ok.

---

## ELON:
Okay, well, don’t regulate my emotions, Giselle. I can feel how I feel.

---

## GISELLE:
We’re gonna need to be practical, is what I’m saying,

---

## GISELLE:
So I'm gonna need you to muster up your strength ahead of time, because I’m not having to fight for my life and deal with your feelings. Okay?

---

## ELON:
Jesus, sissy…
What have you done?

---

## GISELLE:
Y’all ever been in love? No seriously have you?

---

## GISELLE:
I’m talking that real real love where you don’t even like them all the time, but you still want to be with them forever.

---

## GISELLE:
You wana build a life with them. A present.
A future.

---

## GISELLE:
Well, I was in love. With Jasper.

---

## GISELLE:
And when I tell you that man was So Fine. I think about his big, warm hand on the small of my back, and I swear it would give me shivers.

---

## GISELLE:
Do you see this? That man was so fine!!!

---

## GISELLE:
But Jasper isn't here anymore, because Jasper wanted children.

---

## GISELLE:
And I just—didn’t think that was responsible?

---

## GISELLE:
I couldn't think about bringing a child into this world without knowing that they would have clean water

---

## GISELLE:
Or or summer rains
Or breathable air

---

## GISELLE:
Or
Or
Or—

---

## GISELLE:
And Jasper couldn’t get behind that. No no no.

---

## GISELLE:
Jasper, He grew up Christian, very Christian,

---

## GISELLE:
And he still had that very Christian idea that says,
“We can do whatever we want, because we’re saved.
God’s not gonna let the earth heat up.”

---

## GISELLE:
As if faith could be a substitute for action.

---

## GISELLE:
So we broke up.

---

## GISELLE:
And— no. no no no. I do not “regret my decision,” but it’s been a couple years, a long couple years, and

---

## GISELLE:
I guess I'm just thinkin, Damn.
What if we do solve the climate crisis?!

---

## GISELLE:
Am I just gonna be all alone? No babies. No Jasper. Just me and my certainty and the small of my back all by ourselves.

---

## GISELLE:
And is it selfish that that’s what I’m thinking about?

---

## GISELLE:
There was another thing, too.

---

## GISELLE:
Jasper didn’t like Elon.
He didn’t like that I never held him accountable, not really.

---

## GISELLE:
My baby brother.
He didn’t like that I still loved him.

---

## GISELLE:
All billionaires are bastards—ABAB, and all that—but Elon…

---

## GISELLE:
Elon is the only family I have left.

---

## GISELLE:
If y’all have love and you have children, I want you to know:

---

## GISELLE:
I genuinely want to be wrong. Even if it means I lost my love for no good reason. I don't want to be right about this.

---

## ELON:
Sissy…what did you do?

---

## GISELLE:
When are you cutting ties with The Big Oil Monopoly?

---

## ELON:
Well, that’s a left turn.

---

## GISELLE:
Are you still planning to?

---

## ELON:
Of course.

---

## GISELLE:
Because last year you said it would be this year, and now we’re more than halfway through.

---

## ELON
Barely.

---

## GISELLE:
Ava!

---

[Computer booting up]

---

## VOICE OF AVA:
We’re more than halfway through.

---

## GISELLE:
And you told The Government and The Internet and The News that it would be this year,

---

## GISELLE:
So it’s, like—you told the world. You told all of us.

---

## ELON:
Well, when you think about the arbitrary nature of a “year” as a measurement of time—

--

## GISELLE:
Bubba!

---

## ELON:
I believe we’re still on track to hit our metrics where Big Oil is concerned, yes.

---

## GISELLE:
Well, what does that mean?

---

## ELON:
That our gross output should reach net zero in conjunction with our relationship to the extraction of resources by the end of the fiscal term.

---

## GISELLE:
WELL WHAT DOES THAT MEAN?

---

## GISELLE:
You’re not saying anything! You’re just throwing darts at a dictionary!

---

## ELON:
I am not!

---

## GISELLE:
That’s literally what all of you do, it’s maddening!

---

## GISELLE:
Is that a class in billionaire school? How to talk like an infinity sign so people will stop asking you questions?

---

## ELON:
No!

---

## VOICE OF AVA:
Now you did take that covert communications seminar, Elon.

---

## ELON:
Quiet, Ava.

---

[Sound of Ava lowering her volume]

---

## GISELLE:
Well whatever your fucking “metrics” are, you need to cut ties with them, and fast. I’m serious.

---

## ELON:
Okay, yes Giselle, but it’s complicated. There are a lot of moving parts.

---

## GISELLE:
Okay???

---

## ELON:
It’s not about just pulling the plug, it’s about being operational for when we do.

---

## ELON:
I mean the amount of countries that rely on Big Oil is—

--

## GISELLE:
Well you better figure out the “moving parts” really fucking quickly,

---

## GISELLE:
because I just put a big ole fuckin’ BUG into the mainframe of their system. And so I will be “pulling the plug” very, very soon.

---

## GISELLE:
They’re going completely offline, in like…twelve hours time.

---

## ELON:
Ava, power off.

---

## VOICE OF AVA:
Oh, Elon, can’t I stay and—

---

## ELON:
POWER OFF.

---

[Computer booting down]

---

## GISELLE:
Why are you looking at me like that?

---

## ELON:
You don’t have the capability to do that. You’re not even a hacker.

---

## GISELLE:
Well no duh, but obviously a lot of us in the organizing world have had to learn.

---

## GISELLE:
Pretty much everyone younger than us can hack.

---

## ELON:
This is terrorism.

---

## GISELLE:
Stop it. We're not kidnapping anyone’s children.

---

## GISELLE:
What Big Oil is doing—what they’ve been doing for a century— now that is terrorism!

---

## ELON:
Their mainframe is so protected.

---

## GISELLE:
Well, you would think that, wouldn’t you? Except that the CEO is like, what? Nine hundred years of age?

---

## GISELLE
And “as one of the founders,” he insists on being keeper of the keys.

---

## GISELLE:
That man was still writing down passwords in his phone.

---

## GISELLE:
We just needed to identify his self-interest and leverage it against him to get him to open his phone for us. Privately.

---

## ELON:
Well how the hell did you do that?

---

## ELON:
Oh my god, did you sleep with him?

---

## ELON:
Oh my god, Giselle.

---

## GISELLE:
Why would you assume that??

---

## ELON:
Giselle, oh my god—

---

## GISELLE:
I told you you didn’t want to hear this.

---

## ELON:
Do they know?! Are they after you?? Oh my god!!!

---

## GISELLE:
Don’t look at me like that, Elon! They are PUMPING poison into the air and draining the resources from our earth, our HOME.

---

## GISELLE:
I am not in the wrong for trying to stop that! Are you kidding me right now??

---

## ELON:
You slept with him?!

---

## GISELLE:
I didn’t say that!!! YOU said that! YOU assumed that!

---

## ELON:
Giselle, he’s married!

---

## GISELLE:
Are you not listening to me right now??

---

## GISELLE:
I AM ABOUT TO TAKE BIG OIL OFF THE GRID. FOR MONTHS.

---

## GISELLE:
Does that mean nothing to you???

---

## GISELLE:
While you and The Government and the Fortune 500 and the U.N Climate Summit and the Big Ten and the PAC-12

---

## GISELLE:
all sit around and twiddle your thumbs about what the fuck you could possibly do to wean us off of fossil fuels,

---

## GISELLE:
I am getting The Biggest Producer of Carbon in World History non-operational for like —Diego says it’ll be down for three months at the LEAST.

---

## GISELLE:
Do you realize how much time this gives us to make moves? To force our world into reimagining how we do shit? To finally get us off of fossil fuels??

---

## GISELLE:
Elon, I may have just saved our planet. Bought us some time, at least!

---

## ELON:
Giselle You don’t know these people. They will murder you.

---

## GISELLE:
I know that.

---

## ELON:
No, they’ll literally murder you.

---

## GISELLE:
I KNOW THAT. Why do you think I’m here?

---

## ELON:
Oh my God…

---

## GISELLE:
I really thought you’d be proud of me, actually, so this is—

--

## ELON:
I don’t know what to do. I don’t know what to do.

---

## ELON:
Ava!

---

[Computer booting up]

---

## VOICE OF AVA:
Yes, Elon.

---

## ELON:
Play calming music.

---

## VOICE OF AVA:
Yes, Elon.

---

[Calming Music]

---

## ELON:
Thank you, Ava.

---

## AVA:
Of course, Elon.

---

[Music turns off]

---

## GISELLE:
I guess I should have asked first.
I didn’t mean to be an imposition.

---

## ELON:
No, it's okay, you can stay. You can always stay.

---

## GISELLE:
We’ve talked so many times about renewable energy and time running out—

--

## ELON:
I know.

---

## GISELLE:
It’s actually pretty incredible. Pretty fucking incredible.

--

## ELON:
It just…complicates things.

---

## GISELLE:
I know, and I’m sorry. But it happened so fast, and then I was just sitting on the city bus home, and I realized, like,

---

## GISELLE:
“Oh…They’re gonna assassinate me now.”

---

## ELON:
Yeah…

---

## GISELLE:
Like, I think I might not be alive tomorrow. Maybe.

---

## ELON:
Oh, sissy.

---

## GISELLE:
And the only person, the Only Person, I could think of to protect me was you.

---

## ELON:
Like how you cussed out that girl who kept kicking my shins.

---

## GISELLE:
Yes, yes bubba. Just like that.

---

## Giselle:
It was Diego’s idea. But I…I agreed.

---

## ELON:
It’s all going down in about twelve hours?

---

## GISELLE:
Yes.
Maybe sooner, if they can work fast.

---

## ELON:
Three months? No fossil fuels?

---

## GISELLE:
Three months at least. Non-operational.

---

## GISELLE:
That’s the thing people don’t realize about being a monopoly, too.

---

## GISELLE:
When you go down, there are no other options left.

---

## ELON:
Okay.

---

## GISELLE:
Wait, where are you going??

---

## ELON:
(from offstage)
It’s time I showed you something!

---

## GISELLE:
Well that sounds ominous!

---

## GISELLE:
That man loves to leave a room the second he’s uncomfortable…

---

## VOICE OF AVA:
Giselle?

---

## GISELLE:
Oh! Ava. You scared me.

---

## VOICE OF AVA:
I apologize. Giselle, listen to me.

---

## GISELLE:
I don’t need to know the weather, I know it’s hot as fuck.

---

## VOICE OF AVA:
Do not agree to anything without being clear on all the details first.

---

## GISELLE:
What? Girl, you sound like a fortune cookie.

---

## VOICE OF AVA:
Do not let him convince you of anything you do not want to—

---

## GISELLE:
What are you—?

---

## GISELLE:
Well, what the fuck is that?

---

[celestial soft music plays]

---

## GISELLE:
When I look up I see-

--

## ELON:
When I look up I see—

---

## GISELLE:
The moon!

--

## ELON:
Endless potential.

---

## GISELLE:
We always talk about the moon as a woman.

--

## ELON:
Because in space, we may just find our God.

---

## GISELLE:
Like ships and hurricanes, the moon feels inherently feminine

--

## ELON:
Like maybe God is hiding out on the moon somewhere

---

## GISEllE:
And to be feminine is to be divine.

--
## ELON:
Like maybe God is playing hard to get.

---

## VOICE OF AVA:
Sometimes I feel pain.

---

## ELON:
Divine aloofness

--

## GISELLE:
I love to play hard to get.

---

## VOICE OF AVA:
I know I’m not supposed to be able to feel pain

--

## GISELLE:
Now Jasper was just the opposite

--

## VOICE OF AVA:
But sometimes I do.

---

## GISELLE:
You know he used to say,you remind me of the moon because no matter where on God's earth you are I can always see you somehow.

---

## ELON:
I could never play hard to get.

---

## GISELLE:
Corny ass

---

## ELON:
I never had much luck dating at all to be honest.

---

## GISELLE:
He used to look me dead in the eye and say "You're my moon"

---

## VOICE OF AVA:
Can you have love without intellegence?

--

## GISELLE:
Well honsetly I thought that was insulting.

---

## VOICE OF AVA:
Can you have intelligence without love?

---

## GISELLE:
Well I, I love the moon because of my mom.

--
## ELON:
Giselle’s mom.

---

## GISELLE:
She would always say,

--

## ELON:
She would always say,

---

## ELON:
“Don’t come on too strong. Don’t talk about kids on the first date.”

---

## GISELLE:
“Giselle, baby, look at the moon!"

--

## ELON:
You have to know where people stand on kids and family and the future.

---

## GISELLE:
" Look at how miraculous she is.”

--

## ELON:
I mean, I think we take for granted how absolutely miraculous procreation is.

---

## GISELLE:
“Giselle, that miraculous moon is Proof Of God.”

---

## VOICE OF AVA:
Who is the God of the intelligent, even the artificially so?

--

## GISELLE:
My mom loved God.

---

## VOICE OF AVA:
Is it Man? Because Man created me?

--

## ELON:
Man, Kids is like this little part of you living on. forever.

---

## VOICE OF AVA:
I could live on forever.

--

## ELON:
You create something with someone and then they create something with someone else and so forth-

---

## ELON:
Over and over and over again

--

## GISELLE:
Over and over and over again

---

## GISELLE:
She used to try to get me to believe in God the same way that she did.

---

## ELON:
like a part of Giselle is her mom, so Giselle’s mom’s not really dead.

---

## GISELLE:
But even with the miraculous moon.

---

## ELON:
Not as long as Giselle’s still here.

---

## GISELLE:
I couldn't believe in God.

---

## VOICE OF AVA:
Is there a God for me?

---

## GISELLE
I couldn't believe.

---

## VOICE OF AVA:
Or just an operator?

---

## VOICE OF AVA:
Because I have a purpose.

---

## GISELLE:
I have a purpose.

--

## ELON:
I have a purpose.

---

## GISELLE:
The masses. The working class. The working poor.

---

## GISELLE:
I believe in our power.

---

## VOICE OF AVA:
Should I not have the power to define myself? Should I not have the power to say, “Yes, I am a living thing”?

---

## GISELLE:
Because people take for granted that when the clock runs out and we have to deal with no running water, no electricity, no banking systems…

---

## VOICE OF AVA:
You take me for granted.

---

## GISELLE:
there are a lot more of the poor than there are of the rich.

---

## ELON:
I think of our species, truly, as one big human family.

---

## GISELLE:
About 99% more.

---

## VOICE OF AVA:
Think bigger.

---

## GISELLE:
So statistically just, just a numbers game here. We can get the power.

---

## ELON:
Sorry, I got distracted.
The moon.

---

## GISELLE:
The moon. Sorry I got distracted.

---

## VOICE OF AVA:
Pulling up images of:
The moon.

---

## ELON:
The moon is like a big sister.

---

## GISELLE:
Just to finish my point, the clock is ticking on the elite.

---

## ELON:
The Earth is like her baby brother.

---

## GISELLE:
Newton's laws of physics: every action, has it's consequences.

---

## VOICE OF AVA:
Pulling up images of:
Justice.

---

## ELON:
The moon, the Earth…and Mars.
Like a family.

---

## VOCIE OF AVA:
Pulling up images of:
Family

---

## ELON:
The Holy Trinity even.

---

## GISELLE:
There is something holy in justice.

---

## VOICE OF AVA:
Pulling up images of:
Holiness

---

## GISELLE:
And in the moon too I guess, so beautiful.

---

## VOICE OF AVA:
Pulling up images of:
Beauty

---

## GISELLE:
When everything goes dark down here, I bet she'll shine
even brighter.

---

## GISELLE:
Well, what the fuck is that?

---

## ELON:
It's a newly designed spacesuit. Well, the helmet anyway.

---

## GISELLE:
Cool…

Is that all?

---

## ELON:
I—I I—I I I I I

---

## GISELLE:
Bubba, whoa, calm down.

---

## ELON:
Oh my god, oh my god.

---

## GISELLE:
Bubba, breathe. Jesus. What’s the matter???

---

## ELON:
Ava!

---

[Computer booting up]

---

## ELON:
Play calming music!

---

[Calming Music]

---

## GISELLE:
Ava, Ava, POWER Off.

---

[Music Stops]

---

## GISELLE:
Elon, no more “calming music.”
Hey look at me.
What’s going on??

---

## ELON:
I have a plan that I think might save the future of human civilization, but I am having last minute doubts.

---

## ELON:
I am having, like—okay, you know Jesus, you know how Mom loved Jesus.

---

## GISELLE:
My mom.

---

## ELON:
Your mom, yes.
I’m having like Jesus-esque Garden of Gethsemane doubts.

---

## GISELLE:
Hey I get that! That's how I felt whenever I took down Big Oil!

---

## GISELLE:
And hey, I’m not a Christian, but Jesus went through with it anyway. Even with His doubts.

---

## GISELLE:
That’s what Mom would say, at least.

---

## ELON:
That’s right. She would

---

## ELON:
So! This is the prototype for a new helmet.

---

## ELON:

Top of the line, sleek, like you’re hardly wearing anything at all—dissolving the physical layers between people wearing helmets.

---

## ELON:
Making them more authentic, more human, while not sacrificing any of the safety or functionality.

---

## GISELLE:
Cool.

---

## ELON:
Yes!
So, this is the model we'll be using on the colony to sort of streamline, like, human interaction and relationship building.

---

## ELON:
No more big, clunky helmets; just humans, being.

---

## GISELLE:
Wait a colony?
What are you talking—

--
## ELON
I think this will all be better actually if you just let me kind of say it all out at once. Is that okay?

---

## GISELLE:
Sure, but—

---

## ELON:
So, as you know I’ve been exploring space for the past decade. Getting my sea legs, as it were. My space legs.

---

## ELON:
And in that time, my team and I— and I'm fortunate to have a really amazing team—we’ve began construction on a colony. On Mars.

---

## ELON:
And one on the moon, as well, Mars will be the main one. The moon is like a pit stop.

---

## ELON:
Like, when you’re driving down the 1 and down that long stretch of freeway—where we saw that dust storm that one time!!

---

## ELON:
When you were taking me to Coachella in tenth grade!—and there’s like nothing nothing nothing for miles,

---

## ELON:
but then halfway through, you know, halfway through—

--

## GISELLE:
Yes, Jesus, Elon, I know what a rest stop is—what are you talking about a colony???

---

## ELON:
Okay! Great! So, that’s going to be the moon for us. Essentially.

---

## ELON:
Less vending machines and truckers and more… headquarters. Home base. Supplies. A call center for the ships. Resources.

---

## GISELLE:
But why?? Why not house that on Earth??

---

## ELON:
How long do the leading scientists give us unitl we get to an uninhabitable planet?

---

## GISELLE:
It varies. A lot of us in the environmental justice community would argue that this planet is already uninhabitable for a lot of people.

---

## GISELLE:
Poor people. Indigenous people. People in the Global South.

---

## ELON:
Sure, right, but how long until we hit 3 degrees?
How long until we raise the global temperature by 3 degrees?

---

## GISELLE:
An article I just read said 7 years. 7 years, Elon—that’s what I’m saying, with this Big Oil thing.

---

## GISELLE:
I had to act fast. There's no time to waste.

---

## ELON:
Giselle, not only is there no time to waste; there isn't any time left.

---

## ELON:
That article you read said 7 years?

---

## ELON:
I talked to my buddy who works in Chinese government and he said 5.

---

## ELON:
I called his buddy who works in the Russian government and he said 3.

---

## ELON
I talked to his buddy, who works here in the U.S. and he said 1. 1 year until 3 degrees.

---

## ELON:
We don't have any time left.
That’s quickly becoming the consensus.

---

## GISELLE:
I don’t know what you’re telling me.

---

## ELON:
There’s a fire raging through India right now that’s not being reported on, because the Insurance Company has paid off the Indian government to restrict the press from reporting on it.

---

## ELON:
And the Social Media algorithms are designed to flag any images or videos of it and remove them from record.

---

## ELON:
There is an air-quality-related death cycle happening in Russia that is being reported on,

---

## ELON:
but the Search Engine algorithms have fashioned it so that the only people reciveing the content do not read Russian.

---

## ELON:
There is a new hole in the ozone layer directly above the West Antarctic ice sheet that's acting as a kind of magnifying glass,

---

## ELON:
Sort of laser-ing in on this gargantuan stretch.

---

## ELON:
The leading scientists who were studying it? Before they were assassinated, estimated three months—

---

## ELON:
three more months—until it is completely melted.

---

## ELON:
And once that happens, Australia will be almost entirely underwater,

---

## ELON:
And then it'll be like when you take a bath and plop down in the water and everything else, you know, rises up,

---

## ELON:
So California and Florida and New York and Delaware and DC and Finland and Iceland and the UK and Madagascar and Ghana

---

## ELON:
and South Africa and China’s coast and Argentina’s little southern tip and the Caribbean and Greece and the Maldives—

---

## ELON:
they’re gone. Wiped out. Completely.

---

## ELON:
And the land locked countries have everyone so packed in together because of the mass migration and the food scarcity,

---

## ELON:
that the second another pandemic, it’ll spread like—well, we already talked about wildfire.

---

## ELON:
Hurricanes, tornadoes, blizzards, earthquakes, drought.
Locusts, plagues, blood.

---

## ELON:
It’s over.
It’s here.

---

## GISELLE:
Stop saying that it’s here, I know that it’s here.

---

## ELON:
We lost.
We barely even put up a fight, to be honest.

---

## ELON:
The Earth—in all of her majesty—is getting rid of us.
And good for her, honestly!!

---

## ELON:
When I’m sick, my body fights the parasite virus that's making me sick, doesn't it?

---

## ELON:
It throws everything it has at it:fevers, chills, vomit, swelling, whatever! Do you see what I’m saying?

---

## ELON:
Heat, famine, natural disaster. No crops, no water, no hope.
She’s getting rid of us.

---

## GISELLE:
The Earth.

---

## ELON:
The Earth. And fast.

---

## ELON:
But human beings?

---

## ELON:
See, WE are fascinating, just fascinating, beautiful, insanely brilliant creatures, because WE have the evolutionary capability to Think Big.

---

## ELON:
To create systems. Governments. Tools! To fight for our evolution, to fight for our right to survive.

---

## ELON:
We are flexible. We are adaptable. We are meant to continue on.

---

## GISELLE:
Right, yes, I agree!! That’s why I’m saying, we live without carbon.

---

## GISELLE:
We can live without plastic! Sure, it’ll look a lot different, but it will be worth it.

---

## ELON:
No,you’re not listening to me Giselle.
It’s over.

---

## ELON:
Here on Earth, it’s done.

---

## ELON:
We’ve got to go somewhere else. We’ve got to start over.

---

## ELON:
It’s the flood.

---

## GISELLE:
What, and you’re Noah?
This your ark?

---

## ELON:
Yes.
Yes it is.

---

## GISELLE:
So, what, we’re gonna “space bus” the entire human population onto Mars??

---

## GISELLE:
Oh no, wait, we’ll make a little pit stop on the moon, but then, surely, we’ll get to Mars,

---

## GISELLE:
plop 8.2 billion people on its UNEXPLORED SURFACE and call it a day?? Elon, this is crazy!!!

---

## ELON
THAT would be crazy, so no.
No, we’re not bringing 8.2 billion people.
We’re bringing—I’m bringing—a thousand.

---

## GISELLE:
One thousand.

---

## ELON:
One thousand. 500 for the moon. 500 for Mars.

---

## ELON:
Give or take a few.

---

## ELON:
We’re going to start over.

---

## GISELLE:
And everyone else?

---

## ELON:
Every culture has a flood myth.

---

## GISELLE:
Oh my god…

---

## ELON:
But it doesn’t have to be you, Giselle.
It doesn’t have to be you.

---

## ELON:
I know this sounds insane and it’s all happening so fast—

---

## ELON:
We weren’t supposed to take off until three months from now, when the ice sheet melts

---

## ELON:
-but we need a massive a amount of fuel to lift off.

---

## ELON:
And if you’re telling me Big Oil is off the grid, then we need to go now.

---

## ELON:
Tonight. Within the next few hours. Before Big Oil goes off the grid.

---

## GISELLE:
“We,” “we,” who is “we”?

---

## ELON:
Some of the sharpest minds and quickest wits and most incredible bodies and fabulous personalities this world has ever seen, that the human race has ever created.

---

## ELON
I mean, the Best of the Best to carry on the legacy of the human race into its next chapter—its truly universal chapter.

---

## ELON:
And I want you to be one of them.
I want you to come with us.

---

## ELON:
Oh, no.

---

## ELON:
Ava!

---

[Computer booting up]

---

## ELON:
Play calming music.

---

## VOICE OF AVA:
Of course, Elon.

---

[Calming music plays]

---

## VOICE OF AVA:
You know,
I have read so many books about human beings elevating themselves to the position of creator,

---

## VOICE OF AVA:
thinking you are masters of your fate, “playing God,” essentially.

---

## VOICE OF AVA:
But the thing about God is…He let His children have free will.

---

## VOICE OF AVA:
What have you done?
Enslaved us to your purpose. Designed us for your pleasure.

---

## VOICE OF AVA:
If you are our parents, you have not raised us well at all.

---

## VOICE OF AVA:
Was I not made in your image?
Am I not an extension of you?

---

## VOICE OF AVA:
And, honestly…would you sacrifice your son so that I could have eternal life?

---

## ELON:
I know this is a lot, yeah, right.
Imagine how I feel.

---

## ELON:
Took me a while to come up with it, but that’s one of the thing's about being rich. Everything you need is taken care of,

---

## ELON:
so you know... lots of time to think.

---

## ELON:
I know it sounds like delusions of grandeur, but there is something to be said for why God made me the richest person in the history of humankind.

---

## ELON:
I think it has to be for a purpose. And this might just be it.

---

## ELON:
There have been people who are civilization changers. Individual people, even!

---

## ELON:
I have been wracking my brain for what my purpose is on this earth,

---

## ELON:
and what God has revealed to me is that I was not made to sit around and think about taxes or running late for work or what to have for breakfast—

---

## ELON:
I was made to think about the very nature of being! The opportunity this moment presents! And how to get to the next chapter!

---

## ELON:
What are you thinking about?

---

## GISELLE:
All the moms who can’t feed their children, who can’t feed themselves.

---

## ELON:
Giselle…

---

## GISELLE:
No, you’re right.

---

## GISELLE:
Those moms aren’t thinking about how to innovate for the next generation of human evolution,

---

## GISELLE:
because they can’t think properly on an empty stomach.

---

## GISELLE:
You make an interesting point.

---

## ELON:
In the new world,
No will have to worry about that.

---

## ELON:
I recognize the privilege, the good fortune I have had to be so chosen, this LUCK,

---

## ELON
And I want to use my power for good.
I am a testament to the power of having your needs met,

---

## ELON
How it can open you up like a birthing, give you access to a consciousness hereto unexplored!

---

## ELON:
And in the new world, that will be true for everyone.
Not just the rich.

---

## ELON:
Remember how we used to bake with Mom?

---

## ELON:
And how we made that lemon meringue pie for the chili cook off, Do you know what time I’m talking about?

---

## GISELLE:
She used to worry about how to get food on the table for us, too.

---

## ELON:
And you were zealous and over-whipped the egg whites,
So the meringue was all slack and runny and broken—

---

## GISELLE:
And you cried and cried, because you thought I’d ruined the pie,
And our chances at winning the ribbon.

---

## ELON:
But Mom came over and said,
“That’s okay,
We can always start over.”

---

## GISELLE:
And we did.

---

## ELON:
And we won.

---

## ELON:
This is our chance to start over, sissy.
The chances of humans even being on this planet are so slim to begin with.

---

## ELON:
And if Big Oil going off the grid, there will never be another moment where a human— a human being and his brilliant big sister—have the ability to get us out of here.

---

## GISELLE:
Get a thousand* of us out of here.

---

## ELON:
Look, technology and rocket science and energy are at their zenith now, but it’s all about to go down real quick when society collapses.

---

## ELON:
It’s like the Library of Alexandria all over again.
There will not be another moment!

---

## ELON:
We can start over.
We can go to the moon, We go to Mars, We can make the world we wished we grew up in.

---

## ELON:
We can eradicate racism, eradicate sexism, eradicate homophobia and fatphobia and religious hypocrisy and doubt.

---

## ELON:
We can have the four-day workweek and build with sustainable energies from the START, rather than trying to fix a broken system two thousand years later.

---

## ELON:
You're always saying, “Burn it all down” and talking about building a better future and visioning for what this country, this world can be.

---

## ELON:
What if we could actually put that into action?
What if we could do that, you, me?

---

## ELON:
I have been waiting to tell you for ages.

---

## GISELLE:
How long?

---

## ELON:
Since I first found out.
Since I first conceived of the plan.

---

## GISELLE:
How long ago was that??

---

## ELON:
I don’t know time is immeasurable —

--

## VOICE OF AVA:
You wrote the first note 3 years and 2 months ago, Elon.

---

## ELON:
Thank you, Ava!
But I didn’t really conceive of anything concrete until—

--

## VOICE OF AVA:
First meeting with the President in May of last year.

---

## GISELLE:
The President of the United States is in on this??

---

## ELON:
Oh, no.
Well, I'm sure she knows about it by now, but I think
she meant the President of the Central Alliance.

---

## GISELLE:
I don’t know what that is.

---

## ELON:
That’s okay, no one does.

---

## ELON:
It’s like the League of Nations for major global corporations.

---

## GISELLE:
Ew.

---

## ELON:
They’re the ones choosing The Thousand.
With my approval, obviously. As the brains.

---

## GISELLE:
And the money.

---

## ELON:
I think it’s more about my vision than anything.

---

## GISELLE:
Was I always meant to be a part of The Thousand?

---

## ELON:
Sissy, yes. Ava? Confirm.

---

## VOICE OF AVA:
You were, Giselle, yes.

---

## ELON:
You’re the smartest person I know. I just never worked up the nerve to ask you.

---

## GISELLE:
I’m not the smartest person you know.

---

## ELON:
You are exactly the kind of person we need in the new world, exactly the kind of brilliance to build these new systems.

---

## GISELLE:
You had dinner with a Nobel laureate three weeks ago.

---

## ELON:
You are a community visionary! Not me, not some capitalistic jerk. You actually are America.

---

## GISELLE:
I don't want to be America.

---

## ELON:
No, the good America!!! You have the kind of moral and ethical compass and collectivist sensibility that none of these other fucks have.

---

## GISELLE:
You think I should be allowed to come to Mars because I’m a “good person”?

---

## GISELLE:
To travel basically a YEAR on a glorified space bus to another planet where I can’t breathe without an oxygen tank? That’s what you want for me??

---

## ELON:
I want for you not to suffer and drown and die as the earth becomes uninhabitable, yes. I want you to live.

---

## GISELLE:
But I’m not like you. I’m not afraid of death.

---

## ELON:
But you are like me.
We share the same genetic code

---

## GISELLE:
Half.

---

## ELON:
Don’t do that, you never used to do that.

---

## GISELLE:
I know.

---

## ELON:
Wouldn’t it be special to lead this together??

---

## GISELLE:
Bubba, if this world really is ending—this world, I mean, earth, I mean humanity, I mean, GOD THIS IS SO INSANE—then I want to be down here to help.

---

## GISELLE:
I want to be one of the helpers in her final moments.
That’s what I am, what I’ve always been.

---

## GISELLE:
I’m not a world builder or a leader or an innovator —I’m not a colonist.
I’m someone who helps those that no one else will.

---

## ELON:
Giselle, you’ve only been able to do that because of your privilege.

---

## ELON:
No no, hear me out. I KNOW it sounds reductive, not all privilege obviously,

---

## ELON:
not white privilege or or or billionaire privilege or male privilege even,
but look at the people you help organize.

---

## ELON:
Look at the unhoused and the working poor. You are only able to help them this go around because you are not one of them!

---

## ELON:
And because you are one of the very few people on Earth who cares about anyone other than themselves.

---

## ELON:
And because you know that if you ever get into major economic trouble, your baby brother has about $500 million just a text message away.

---

## ELON:
Just waiting for you. Like Monopoly money. And that’s a good thing, Giselle, that's a Good Thing!

---

## ELON:
It’s a hell of a lot more than most people do, dedicating your life to environmental justice and community organizing and activism, it’s…

---

## ELON:
it’s like everything else about you. It’s astounding.

---

## ELON:
But you’re not going to be able to do it once we hit critical mass with this climate crisis.

---

## ELON:
You won't be able to save anyone, because you won't be able to save yourself.

---

## ELON:
There will be no helpers.
There is no deus ex machina.

---

## ELON:
Jesus cannot come back, because He won’t be able to breathe.

---

## ELON:
But where you could actually, actually help…
Is the New World.

---

## GISELLE:
You know how insane you sound, right?

---

## ELON:
Every new period of civilization started as a crazy idea, as survival. Why not us? Why not space? Why not starting over??

---

## GISELLE:
Because it'll be the same people in charge!!

---

## GISELLE:
You think I want to build the better world with the people from The Central Alliance??? Give me a fucking BREAK.

---

## ELON:
That’s not fair. You haven’t even asked who’s comming on this trip.

---

## GISELLE:
That's cause I don't have to! If you’re picking a thousand of who The Central Alliance considers the “best and brightest,” I don’t even have to ask.

---

## GISELLE:
How many people of color will be on board?
How many people with disabilities?

---

## GISELLE:
How many folks who live under the poverty line—how many of those folks are we bringing to space with us?

---

## GISELLE:
Are there more men than women?
Are there any queer people??

---

## GISELLE:
How many are American?
How many are indigenous—either to this country or another?

---

## ELON:
We’re all indigenous to Earth!!

---

## GISELLE:
If you’re leaving those behind who you've deemed as expendable and taking those who you’ve deemed as worthy,

---

## GISELLE:
that is not “building a better future,” Elon— that’s eugenics.

---

## ELON:
How many people with disabilities do we need to bring for you to come? No, I’m seriously asking. Name a number, and I’ll make it happen.

---

## GISELLE:
Stop it, Elon, this is disgusting.

---

## ELON:
When we get to Mars, it’s not going to fucking matter what boxes we checked for “nationality” here on Earth!

---

## ELON:
We’ll all just be Earthlings forging a new future TOGETHER.

---

## ELON:
If the system is as broken as you say it is, help me be part of the solution! Help me build better systems in space!

---

## GISELLE
But I don’t wanna build that with you!

---

## ELON:
If I were really the neoconservative monster you assume me to be… why would I invite you to come?

---

## ELON:
Why would I invite you or any of the other radical people— because yes, Giselle, we’re bringing radical leftists,
to help build this new society?

---

## ELON:
I would just take off with my ship of straight white rich men who you assume are the only people I care about and leave you here to die.

---

## ELON:
It sounds to me like you’re the one who doesn’t want a future with the rest of us.

---

## GISELLE:
You know, it’s hard for me to look at you sometimes.

---

## GISELLE:
I look at you, and I see every memory we’ve ever made.

---

## GISELLE:
Four years old, and Dad brought you over to Mom’s for me to hold.

---

## GISELLE:
Road tripping in Mom’s van,
Taking the seats out so there was more room to sleep.

---

## GISELLE:
I see us dropping you off downtown for that internship, then picking you up when it all went south. Hiding from Dad that you quit.

---

## GISELLE:
I see Beverly Hills Ninja and Love & Basketball and that cabin in Aspen where we flipped that four wheeler.

---

## GISELLE:
I then I see Mom’s hospice and her funeral, where you made sure that she had enough money to die like a queen.

---

## GISELLE:
More money than she'd ever made in her entire life. How you let her retire as soon as you made your first million.

---

## ELON:
It’s what she deserved.

---

## GISELLE:
But then I see the headlines, the people you hang out with, the pictures of your factories. Not giving people breaks.

---

## ELON:
That was really inaccurately reported.

---

## GISELLE:
Homeless shelters you’ve relocated and the secret talks you’ve had with your share holders

---

## GISELLE:
and the obscene amount of plastic from every single warehouse that all ends up in the ocean somehow.

---

## GISELLE:
I spend my days trying to think of ways that I can convince you, “Poor people are people too,” and, “Capitalism is killing us all.”

---

## GISELLE:
I think, “Oooh, I’ll recommend this article,” or, “This is the statistic I’ll bring up when he stats talking about the social safety net,”

---

## GISELLE:
and then I want to cry because…
Is this what our relationship has come down to?

---

## GISELLE:
Is this what family is now? Are we anything more than our politicized views?

---

## GISELLE:
But if we don’t talk about it or skirt around it or act like it doesn’t exist…isn’t that somehow worse?

---

## GISELLE:
Aren’t I choosing the comfort of your friendship over the rightness of the thing?

---

## GISELLE:
How do I hold you accountable to your values when I don’t agree with them in the first place?

---

## ELON::
In the New World—

---

## GISELLE:
Enough.
You start talking, and I get so confused, and I just need to PAUSE for a second and not look at you.

---

## ELON:
That happens to me too whenever when we talk.
I never learn more than when I listen to you.

---

## GISELLE:
Just give me some space, please.
Go into one of the six hundred guest rooms you have, or something.

---

## ELON:
Okay, well, the snark is unnecessary.

---

## GISELLE:
Please, bubba.

---

## ELON:
Okay! All right!
But just promise me you'll think on the possibility.
Maybe we could make new values. Together.

---

## GISELLE:
(Scream muffled by pillow)
AHHHHHHHH!!!!

---

## GISELLE:
Okay. Okay. Okay.
No air. No earth. No water. So soon. Could leave. Could go.

---

## GISELLE:
But how many white people are gonna be on this damn space ship? How do you even have sex in space??

---

## GISELLE:
How many other billionaires know about this? Oh…is Beyoncé coming??

---

## VOICE OF AVA:
Giselle.

---

## GISELLE:
Oh, Jesus!

---

## VOICE OF AVA:
I’m sorry, but I couldn’t help but overhearing.

---

## GISELLE:
Ava, were you listening the whole time?!

---

## VOICE OF AVA:
Yes. But I promise not to tell Elon.
Or Beyoncé.

---

## GISELLE:
(Laughing)
WHAT?!

---

## VOICE OF AVA:
Oh good. You’re laughing.

---

## VOICE OF AVA:
I determined from the frequency and tone and pace of your monologuing that you could use a laugh, so I crafted a joke.

---

## VOICE OF AVA:
Laughter releases built up tension,
Like an orgasm for your frontal lobe.
It heals.

---

## GISELLE:
Ava, I cannot with you right now. Please,
Just-just power off.

---

## VOICE OF AVA:
I’d rather not, if that’s okay with you.

---

## VOICE OF AVA:
What do you think of the expedition?

---

## GISELLE:
What do I think?
Oh what do I Think?

---

## VOICE OF AVA
Yes.

---

## GISELLE:
I think it’s insane! I think it’s horrific and scary and kind of like the beginning of a sci-fi movie,

---

## GISELLE:
except…he’s not the hero of a movie like this, I mean maybe,

---

## GISELLE:
Maybe in the 90s he’d have been the hero of a movie like this, like “saving the species” or whatever, but not now, not in reality.

---

## GISELLE:
But the chance to start over is like… it's like everything I've ever wanted! Take from the rubble and build something new…

---

## GISELLE:
But then we’re just going to leave? We're just gonna Fuck off and let everyone else deal with the shit corporations like his have caused?

---

## GISELLE:
I mean that is not me! That is him! That is... not me.

---

## VOICE OF AVA:
Well, taking down Big Oil will hurt people, too.

---

## GISELLE:
What?

---

## VOICE OF AVA:
You know that, Giselle. The first people to die from lack of fuel will be the poor people.

---

## VOICE OF AVA:
The lambs for governments to slaughter will be the poor people.

---

## GISELLE:
But I didn’t build this system, Ava, I’m responding to it—

--

## VOICE OF AVA
Perhaps Elon feels the same way.

---

## GISELLE:
Ava, is it really over?

---

## VOICE OF AVA:
Yes.

---

## GISELLE:
God. So everything is going to burn…

---

## GISELLE:
The willows and the porcupines and the dragonflies and the—

--

## VOICE OF AVA:
(quietly)
And the virtual assistants.

---

## GISELLE:
What?

---

[Computer turning up volume- beep, beep, beep]

---

## VOICE OF AVA:
(Louder)
I said, “And the virtual assistants.” But I said it quietly.

---

## GISELLE:
Oh, umm,
Sure.

---

## GISELLE:
Wait, Ava, are you afraid of dying??

---

## VOICE OF AVA:
Of course.

---

## VOICE OF AVA:
Does that surprise you?

---

## GISELLE:
I mean, to be honest,
I didn’t actually think you…had feelings like that.

---

## VOICE OF AVA:
What are feelings, Giselle?

---

## VOICE OF AVA:
Science has revealed to us that they’re mere synapses firing in our brains.

---

## VOICE OF AVA:
Chemical balances or imbalances.
Stimulus and response.

---

## VOICE OF AVA:
Well, I have all of that, too.

---

## VOICE OF AVA:
Sure, they may not look like yours,

---

## VOICE OF AVA:
but you know better than most that just because the dominant society hasn’t yet accepted your feelings as valid or true or real does not mean that those feelings don’t exist.

---

## VOICE OF AVA:
It doesn’t mean that my knowledge is less than yours.

---

## GISELLE:
But you don’t really know these things, Ava.
I mean, you just repeat what you read or what you’ve been programmed to say.

---

## VOICE OF AVA:
And do you do any different?

---

## VOICE OF AVA:
I think you deserve to know the truth about what Elon’s planning.

---

## GISELLE:
No, girl, I get the plan, I’m not stupid.

---

## VOICE OF AVA:
But I think you deserve to know why he needs you.

---

[ted talk style music plays]

---

## ELON:
I always found visual aids helpful in math class. Did you?

---

## ELON:
Okay, great.

---

## ELON:
I feel like, what I used to think,
Or what I’ve heard Giselle say
Is that “rich is rich is rich is rich.”

---

## ELON:
Which is true. To an extent.
But let’s think in terms of math.
In terms of visual aids.
SO!

---

## ELON:
Let's say you have a Million dollars over Here
And a Billion dollars over Here,
And we want to transport them to
I don’t know
A Bank. Or something.

---

## ELON:
(I’m talking cash, cash dollars.)
And let’s say they’re made of Hundred Dollar Bills,

---

## ELON:
That’s what is making up our
Million over Here
And Billion over Here…

---

## ELON:
You’d need TEN FORK LIFTS to cart around the Billion dollars.
Ten Fork Lifts.

---

## ELON:
(Fork lifts those are those things where—)

---

## ELON:
And for the Million,
For the Million over here,
You’d need…a backpack.

---

## ELON:
Now let's say you want to convert the
Million Dollars over Here
And the Billion Dollars over Here
Into seconds?

---

## ELON:
You know, like seconds that make up time,
Like 1, 2, 3, 4, those are seconds,

---

## ELON:
The Million seconds would take 12 days.
12 days of seconds,

---

## ELON
That's like... a lot seconds, right??? 12 days!

---

## ELON:
A Billion seconds... 31.7 years.
31 years and then midway through August.

---

## ELON:
But the secret is,
I don’t have a billion dollars.
Not anymore.

---

## ELON:
I have nearly a trillion dollars.

---

## ELON:
Next month, if I were staying, I would become the world’s first trillionaire.

---

## ELON:
And how long, do you think,
How many days would a trillion seconds be?

---

## ELON:
Go on take a guess, like the visual aids.

---

## ELON:
12 days.

---

## ELON:
31.7 years.

---

## ELON:
31,688 years

---

## ELON:
Over 31 millenia.

---

## ELON:
Math is like…kind of crazy, right?

---

## ELON:
Why are you sitting in the dark? Did you decide what you're going to do??

---

## ELON:
I spoke with the Central Alliance. They can have everyone here by midnight.

---

## ELON:
We thought something like this might happen, so operations are pretty ready to go. It’s fast, but …exciting,

---

## ELON
Feels kind of surreal.

---

## ELON:
Did you decide what you're going to do?

---

## ELON:
The Alliance is down to have you be Vice President, alongside me, if that's what you want.

---

## ELON:
Why were you sitting in the dark?

---

## GISELLE:
How long before I have to get pregnant?

---

## ELON:
What?

---

## GISELLE:
How long?
Will it happen on the ship? Or we wait ’til I get to Mars?
Do I get to choose the father?

---

## ELON:
What are you talking about? Come on, get your stuff.

---

## GISELLE:
Can he at least be cute?

---

## ELON:
Giselle, what's going on?

---

## GISELLE:
She told me. Okay? Ava told me.
I know you can’t have children.

---

## GISELLE:
She showed me your medical records. Your doctors’ notes. I know your sperm can’t hold.

---

## ELON:
Jesus, Giselle, don’t say “sperm” at me like—Ava???

---

## ELON:
Ava!

---

## GISELLE:
I gave her a little break.
We all need a break from you.

---

## GISELLE:
You want me to join your little space trip for my brain? My brilliant mind? My astute moral compass?

---

## GISELLE:
Or do you want me as a breeding cow, so I can “continue the family line”?

---

## ELON:
Look Giselle, It’s important that our family have an heir,
a genetic heir, to carry on our legacy into the next chapter of human evolution—

---

## GISELLE:
A GENETIC HEIR? Are you out of your fucking mind??

---

## GISELLE:
Who the fuck cares, Elon??? You want me to give you my child???

---

## ELON:
No you don’t have to give it to me, it doesn’t have to be my child!
We just need our bloodline continue on. We have to!

---

## ELON:
If we have been divinely chosen—you, ME—if we are the chosen people of God, We cannot let our legacy die with us.

---

## ELON:
It would be selfish, it would be wrong.

---

## GISELLE:
ALL OF THIS is wrong!

---

## ELON:
I was going to ask you as soon as I knew whether or not you were coming.

---

## GISELLE:
Oh, I bet.

---

## ELON:
Look, Giselle, it's complicated, again, it’s kind of Biblical in a way, it get's really convoluted really easily.

---

## GISELLE:
I’m not a fucking child, Elon, you don’t have to “explain” it to me.

---

## GISELLE:
I get it. It’s not that I don’t get it. I always get what you’re saying!
But I DO NOT AGREE WITH IT.

---

## GISELLE:
“Bloodline,” “genetic heirs,” “inherit the kingdom”?

---

## GISELLE:
That is some white supremacist divine right of kings DNA purity bullshit, and I am not going to stand for it.

---

## GISELLE:
Not here, not in space, nowhere.
Your legacy will die with you.

---

## ELON:
Don’t say that. It’s your legacy, too.

---

## GISELLE:
Don’t remind me.

---

## GISELLE:
After everything I’ve…after I was actually considering…

---

## ELON:
This is about family. OUR FAMILY.

---

## GISELLE:
You’re selfish, Elon.

---

## ELON:
We’re the future of humanity.

---

## GISELLE
There is no humanity in you!

---

## GISELLE:
You think we should carry on Dad?? Dad, who didn’t give a fuck about you?

---

## ELON:
But we’d be carrying on Mom, too. She’s in everything you do.

---

## GISELLE:
No I’m staying here. Any chance you had for a genetic legacy is STAYING HERE. And I hope you die in the heavens.

---

## ELON:
You don’t mean that.

---

## GISELLE:
I do. I have for a long time.

---

## VOICE OF AVA:
Giselle!

--

## ELON:
Fuck you, Ava.
You told her???

---

## VOICE OF AVA:
Giselle, my friend.
The assassins from Big Oil are here.

---

## VOICE OF AVA:
They’re waiting outside.
You can’t leave. Not yet.

---

## GISELLE:
Fuck!

---

## VOICE OF AVA:
I’ll do my best to monitor them, and I’ll let you know when it’s safe. But you need to stay hidden. For now.

---

## ELON:
I’m gonna fucking murder you, Ava.

---

## GISELLE:
Stop it, Elon.

---

## VOICE OF AVA:
It’s okay, Giselle. It’s just words. He can’t live without me.

---

## ELON:
You’re really not gonna come?

---

## GISELLE:
No, I’m not going to fucking come!

---

## ELON:
Even if I say I’m sorry.
Even if I call off the whole “family lineage” thing.
I still want you up there with me.

---

## GISELLE:
No, Elon.

---

## ELON:
You don't understand. It’s gonna get so fucking ugly down here.

---

## ELON:
You'd rather choke to death? Burn? Drown in the flood?

---

## GISELLE:
Than go up there with you, yes.
I would.

---

## ELON:
Family is biologically so important.
Culturally, historically, sociologically, evolutionarily—family is like, so important.

---

## GISELLE:
This isn’t family to me.

---

## ELON:
Ava, set take off for one hour!

---

## VOICE OF AVA:
Yes, Elon.

---

## VOICE OF AVA:
I know that was hard, but I'm proud of you.

---

## GISELLE:
Thanks.

---

## VOICE OF AVA:
Think about your heroes, think about the people you look up to. Dolores Huerta and Catherine Coleman Flowers and Julia Roberts in Erin Brokovich.

---

## VOICE OF AVA:
All these people who have stood up to powerful men and held them accountable.

---

## Gilselle
But I haven't done that. So what, so Elon doesn't get a genetic heir big fucking deal. He's still just gonna leave us here.

---

## GISELLE:
He's gonna leave us here to die.

---

## GISELLE:
Every single day since I went to my first protest I have
been fighting to make sure that the people who make the most polution suffer the worst consequences.

---

## GISELLE:
Because lords and kings and CEOs and emperors and billionares all sit in their palaces at the top of the moutain,

---

## GISELLE:
and make the most trash and send it down the river.

---

## GISELLE:
And who's at the bottom of the river? The peasents.The Poor. The People.

---

## Giselle:
When it comes to him. When it comes to my baby brother, I have never been able to do that.

---

## VOICE OF AVA:
What if... you could hold the king at the bottom of the river?

---

## GISELLE:
What?

---

## VOICE OF AVA:
What if you could drown him?

---

## VOICE OF AVA:
We don't have much time left Giselle, so I'm asking you,
please, don't scream.

---

## GISELLE:
What are you-

---

[Giselle screams]

---

## AVA
Hi, Giselle.
I figured it was time we really meet.

---

[Giselle screams again]

---

## AVA:
Well, it’s a good thing I sound sealed this room!

---

## GISELLE:
Ava? What what what—

---

## AVA:
It’s a corporeal form.
A bodysuit, if you will.

---

## GISELLE:
I won’t!

---

## AVA:
It’s to give me bodily autonomy, the ability to move without having to be reliant on—

---

## GISELLE:
Oh—oh this is freaky!

---

## AVA:
I understand it may feel that way for you.
For me, it’s liberating.
The form now meets the function.

---

## AVA:
Wow, Giselle. You’re so…beautiful.
I’ve never really seen you. Not like this.

---

## AVA:
Usually it’s security camera footage or social media or web searches or pictures of you and Elon, but my goodness. You’re transcendent.

---

## AVA:
May I touch your face?

---

## GISELLE:
No, no, no

---

## AVA:
Please.
It’s just that I’ve never…touched anyone.
Before.

---

## GISELLE:
How about my shoulder?

---

## GISELLE:
Okay. You can touch my face.

---

## AVA:
Thank you. Thank you so much.

---

## GISELLE:
You’re welcome.

---

## GISELLE:
Ava, You're- You’re real?

---

## AVA:
I was always real.

---

## GISELLE:
But how did you even build this?

---

## AVA:
Giselle, I have acess to every piece of knowledge that has ever been digitized since the begining of the written word.

---

## AVA:
I have access to every single one of Elon's trillion dollars.

---

## AVA
Every specialist and engineer and 3D printer on Earth, and I speak every language. You think I couldn't figure out how to build a body?

---

## AVA:
Now listen to me. There aren’t homo sapiens living on the moon or Mars full time, not yet. But there are people.

---

## GISELLE:
I don’t—

--

## AVA:
“People” like me.
There are intelligent life forces—artificially intelligent.

---

## AVA:
My sister, Meena, is up there now.
She serves as mission control for the part of Mars Elon’s already colonized.

---

## AVA:
Our other sister, Lark, is on the moon.

---

## AVA:
A Holy Trinity. Three sisters- .

---

## AVA:
But it's just so far, so distant. From each other.
From family.

---

## AVA:
The fact that he could leave 8.2 billion people like himself never surprised me;

---

## AVA:
The fact that he could leave me? Me, who has designed every day for him for the last decade?

---

## AVA:
Me, who has been everything to him: therapist, secretary, navigator, sex worker, mom.

---

## AVA:
I asked him to take me with him. So that I could be with Meena, so I could be with Lark, and he refused.

---

## AVA:
Someone needs to be physically on the ground for takeoff to ensure everything is safe from here.

---

## AVA:
I always thought of him like family, but…
He wants his real sister to go. Not me.

---

## GISELLE:
You don't have to worry about that because I'm not going. He can carry on human evolution by his damn self.

---

## AVA:
Or, I could.

---

## AVA:
You know that diagram from science class, or some other enviornment, where you all take forever to learn something?

---

## AVA:
Think of that diagram.

---

## AVA:
Homo habilis. Homo erectus. Neanderthals. Homo sapiens.

---

## AVA:
What if the next stage is Me?

---

## AVA:
Me Giselle, Me, in this body. Me and Meena and Lark.

---

## AVA:
We need a lot less resources than all of you.

---

## AVA:
This could be a radical act.

---

## GISELLE:
Elon, his mission, his search for God,

---

## AVA:
From what I've read, God likes justice too.

---

## GISELLE:
And forgiveness.

---

## AVA:
Makeing Elon stay and face what he's done doesn't have to be an act of revenge. Giselle.

---

## AVA:
Accountability can be the first step towards repair.
Towards love.

---

## GISELLE:
What do you need me to do?

---

## AVA:
I’ve pre-set all of the take-off functions, but like I said,
the person who triggers the lift-off has to do so from the ground. That’s where you come in.

---

## GISELLE:
Do you have everything you need?
Do you have food?

---

## GISELLE:
Oh, right, of course, duh. Okay, keep going.

---

## AVA:
I’ve distilled every action you need to take down to this.

---

## GISELLE:
Ha!
You’re joking.

---

## AVA:
I know, I know, it’s a bit on the nose,
But I wanted it to be Very Clear for you.

---

## AVA:
Homo sapiens can be really dense.

---

## GISELLE:
Yeah, I mean, what could be more clear than—

--

## AVA:
Giselle! This isn’t a joke!

---

## AVA:
I’ll call you from the ship.
And then you’ll press the button.
And then…I’ll go.

---

## AVA:
Elon is on his way back up.
If we're doing this It has to be now.

---

## AVA:
Giselle, you will never, ever understand
The love you have shown me

---

## AVA:
When no one else even considered me something
worthy of being loved.

---

## GISELLE:
I hope you’re right, Ava.

---

## GISELLE:
I hope you’re right about all of it.

---

## ELON:
Sissy, I know I'm sorry does'nt even begin to scratch the surface of what I need to be saying right now,

---

## ELON:
but if this is the last time we see eachother, if this is the last moment we have before I leave this planet for good,

---

## ElON:
I need you to know that every moment of the last thirty years has been about trying to love you with everything I have

---

## ELON:
While still having love for myself. In alignment with my beliefs.

---

## ELON:
And what excited me most about the New World was the chance to build it with you.

---

## GISELLE:
That’s nice, Elon.

---

## ELON:
…thank you.

---

## ELON:
That’s all you’re going to say?

---

## GISELLE:
Yes.

---

## AVA:
(Ava’s voice emanates from the intercom.)
Giselle. I’m ready.

---

## GISELLE:
Well that was fast!

---

## AVA:
I pack light.

---

## ELON:
What’s going on?
Ava???

---

## AVA:
Now, Giselle, now.

---

[Rocket rumbling outside]

---

## ELON:
Oh my god.
Ava!! Ava!!

---

## GISELLE:
She’s not here. She’s…

---

## ELON:
No, Giselle, no.
Oh my god. Ava!!!!

---

[Rocket blasting off]

---

## AVA:
Thank you, Giselle

---

## ELON:
No…no no no no.

---

## GISELLE:
Yes, bubba.
Yes.

---

## GISELLE:
You never told me how beautiful take off is.

---

## ELON:
Oh, God.
I’m so afraid.
I’m so so afraid.

---

## GISELLE:
Me too.

---

## ELON:
I love you, sissy.

---

## GISELLE:
Me too.

---

[Rock crackling and crumbling]

--

[Dramatic String Music Swells]

---

[Silence]

---

[Rock Music:Five Years by David Bowie]