Jibaro awakens to hundreds of flies buzzing. Several black crows peck at the bloodied body of the Woman, who lies in a grotesque position next to Jibaro — lifeless and unrecognizable, on a bed of her own plucked scales.
Jibaro waves the crows away. He is exhausted and walks with difficulty; grabbing the caparison, he fashions a sack in which he compiles the golden treasure. He flips the Woman’s body over, gathering the scales from her underside, until her body inevitably rolls down to the shore, hits the water, and is dragged fiercely away by the current. Her corpse bounces against the rocks, vanishing and reappearing violently, shaken by the waters on her long journey downstream. Meanwhile, Jibaro stacks every single scale into the improvised bag. Once the job is done he follows the path up the river. The bag is heavy and Jibaro loses his balance every so often.
Far away now, the pale body of the Woman finally reaches the serene waters of the lake where she is from. Her body floats peacefully, leaving an oily residue of bright red blood that twirls and spreads in the calm greenish waters. Her lifeless form sinks pitifully beneath the waters edge and all is still for a moment. Then, as if pumped from the water’s depths, blood bubbles up and
out, spreading until the entire lake is tinted red. The red waters of the lake move toward the river but somehow the current seems to change directions. The blood now rises against the current, turning the entire river red.
Jibaro has been walking for hours and the sun is high. The bag is heavy and with difficulty he carries the treasure like Jesus Christ carrying his cross to Calvary. He stops every so often to catch his breath, leaning on the trees and rocks he finds on his way next to the, now bloodied, river. Jibaro is fatigued and dehydrated, he collapses to the ground and drags himself to the water. Blinded by his thirst, he pays no attention to the bloodied water and drinks as much as he can stomach. His chin is now covered by a thick red mud that falls down to his chest.
Satiated, he takes a breath and looks around. A chill runs through him a moment, and his breathing falters. Suddenly, Jibaro shakes his head. He closes his eyes and grips his skull tightly. For the FIRST TIME in his life SOUND is leaking into his deaf ears. At the chirp of a bird, Jibaro turns and panics. He screams and covers his mouth in horror as the SOUND OF HIS OWN VOICE shatters his senses. The thunderous splash of the river is like torture to him.
Jibaro desperately flees into the forest, so frightened that he leaves behind his treasure, now scattered on the ground. Sounds assault him from every side— crows calling in the trees, his own footsteps crunching through the underbrush, the booming rasp of his own terrified breathing. He runs, and runs, covering his ears as best he can, as MADNESS seems to erupt all around him. He falls, stumbles, stands up, bangs into trees and thrashes forward as if all the demons of hell are behind him. He runs until he can no longer sustain it.
Finally, Jibaro staggers out from under the trees and finds himself once again on the shore of the lake. He collapses at the shoreline and presses his face into the mud, crying hysterically. Gradually, he calms down. The lake and its surroundings are tranquil. It is in this beautiful bluish moment just after sunset, where all of nature seems to pause and rest, that Jibaro focuses on the microscopic sounds of his surroundings; the rustling of the leaves, the buzzing of flies. ANY sound for him is a marvelous discovery. He laughs with joy — and then suddenly, pauses surprised by the sound of his own voice. He laughs again hysterically, this time at himself. Jibaro is totally absorbed in his new-found hearing, so much so that he overlooks the figure of The Woman emerging from the red water, splashing blood, staring in his direction. She opens her mouth and sings that strange melody which causes Jibaro to turn towards the lake… and his fun ends. Her song begins to invade his mind like it had the other men — he howls and claws at his face as the madness takes him. He tries to cover his ears, but he cannot resist the mellifluously horrific melody.
The Woman watches him suffer triumphantly and then slowly, sinuously moves back towards the center of the lake… and Jibaro can not help but follow. He screeches like a rabid animal, bites his fingers and tears at himself to stop, but he keeps moving deeper into the lake. Until with a final howl of madness, he sinks below the surface.
As Jibaro’s corpse sinks gently through the red water, the Woman swims to him and, with her now pale scaleless arms, embraces him as they descend deeper together. All around them, we see hundreds of bodies from other times, in different states of decomposition — the totality of her victims, which from their bodies GOLDEN SCALES and jewelry sprout like poisonous coral.
BONUS CONTENT
Three Robots: Two Versions Intro
John Scalzi
When the “Three Robots” story was chosen for inclusion in Love Death + Robots Vol#1, everything about the process was relatively simple: I had already written the story, They bought it, then the Headless team of directors came in expanded the story (terrifically) onto a much broader canvas, revamping the original, static scenario (which I imagined like a “Kids React” video) to a far more cinematic tour of a post-apocalyptic city. The LD+R segment was a hit! And I got the chance to write the follow-up version, directly for the show that time.
And… well, not so simple this time! Which is not to say the process wasn’t super-interesting and fun from my point of view. My first proposal for a sequel was ambitious — which is to say it probably would have cost half the LD+R Vol#2 budget to make — and so I was quickly schooled in the fine art of having to write with production considerations in mind. My second take, which became “Three Robots: Exit Strategies” was no less ambitious in its concepts, but was designed with a more efficient animation pipeline in mind.
But wait, there’s more! Where previously I was only answerable to myself in writing a story, now I had notes, from Tim Miller, from LD+R supervising director Jennifer Yuh Nelson, and from others engaged in putting LD+R together. An initial treatment went through three revisions, with entire segments dropped and replaced and others tweaked. Then came the screenwriting process, with more tweaks and bits added and removed.
And then, when we were putting together this book, I was asked to do the “prose” version! Which meant creating yet another take — a version more like the original lean and mean story, where instead of touring end-of-the-world human habitats, the robots were making a report, commenting on what they saw and felt, with some of the sight gags and dialogue replaced and changed to make everything work better in that original short story format.
And so we thought it might be fun for you to see how the two iterations of this story — the final script, and the short story — differ in scope and intent. So we put them both in here for you to compare and contrast the different writing styles which reflect the different goals of the different mediums.
But the one thing that stays the same is this: I love writing these three robots. I hope I get to do it again sometime, in whatever format I can. In the meantime: Enjoy!