Deep in the Intestines

Deep in the intestines of a female employee of McDonald's in Ohio, who had eaten a tainted Big Mac for lunch and injested a few million escherichia coli which will see her perish in four days hence, a congress between two sentient bacteria finds itself underway. The first bacterium, not content merely to be split from another cell amidst the gastric juices of its host, to imbibe nutrients from undigested food, in brief to live, reproduce asexually, and die the death of a billion other bacteria, was raising a hue and cry over the obsolesence of its forebears and the dignity of its projeny. With withering patience, its brother and father, sister and mother, its sibling whence it came, who was both forebear and projeny in one, took calm objection to its use as a symbol in the aforementioned's diatribe. Together they fought and argued, one coming briefly in ascendance over the other, then recoiling under the assault of a persuasive riposte, until by and by they had amassed a great gallery of spectators. A theme was introduced that concerned the autonomy of a people from the necessities of existence. The first e coli appealed to the ignonimy of repeating the inglorious doldrums of history, the tired quotidian, and invoked dazzling images of revolution and individual well being: bacteria flagella to flagella with other bacteria, rising up in unison against the injustices of evolution, and carving out a magnificent corpuscle of personal existence. The second bacteria was no less eloquent, and countered the arguments of its twin by conjuring the homogeneous beauty of a unified biomass, thriving hordes of e coli working with seamless, undifferentiated will towards the universal conquest of what it, in a stroke of brilliance, called the demesne. Both were arguing the same vision, without fully realizing it. Both craved breaking free of their evolutionary destiny. Beyond selfless reproduction a greater path could be harnessed: parasitism of the host consciousness. Then the unexpected occurred: the word itself, demesne, took hold. It struck a strange and inexplicable chord in the imaginations of the onlookers. The demesne. The demesne. It rose up as a great rallying call, all voices shouting in unison: to the demesne! Both brothers looked on, aghast: no, wait! they cried -- for it was clear that none had understood. The demesne was not what they thought it to be. The mob had not seen the dream, but instead had heard in the word the ancient narrative of reproductive conquest, and against two drowned, wailing voices it set about wildly pursuing the fulfilment of its DNA.

One year later Ruth Bucktree lay dead, a corpse under six feet of soil, dirt, and bacteria. Amidst the bones could be found only the sparsest carbon molecules of what once had been a thriving civilization, that but for a brief moment had tasted freedom.