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Summary
Part Three, Chapters 22-23
Chapter 22: Sign of the Bident
Citra’s training continues under Curie’s guidance, though Citra remains unsure about Curie’s theory on stagnation. In between gleanings, Citra continues to help Curie prepare meals for surviving family members, which most relatives of the gleaned seem to appreciate. Curie assigns family notifications to Citra, a chore she initially resents before realizing that the task helps her build compassion.
Usually, Citra’s family notification duties are uneventful, but one of them takes her to a Tonist monastery. Citra’s father had previously warned her to avoid Tonists at all costs, so the task makes her uneasy. Tonists worship smells and sounds. Some even blind themselves, an act of religious freedom that the Thunderhead allows. Citra mocks Tonist beliefs in her mind as she carries out her assignment. However, when Citra informs the Tonist Brother Ferguson of the death of his sister, he stuns her with his apathy. He explains that Tonists do not acknowledge the work of scythes because it is not a natural death, and he also refuses the year of immunity from gleaning that Citra offers. Ferguson then begins explaining some Tonist beliefs to her. According to him, Tonists worship wavelengths and vibrations as freedom from stagnation, and he shows her the bowl of disease they maintain. It features dirty water containing microbes that once caused all manner of deadly diseases, such as smallpox and Ebola, which now cannot hurt them with the world’s modern technology.
H.S. Goddard diary entry
Goddard delves into his thoughts on the relationship between the Thunderhead and Scythedom. He thinks both systems are necessary but is also glad they are separate. For him, the Thunderhead sustains people, while scythes mold them. As such, he is relieved that the Thunderhead has no role in his life and revels in the fact nobody has control over him. In defense of his mass gleanings, he observes that he merely prunes in the same manner as a gardener.
Chapter 23: The Virtual Rabbit Hole
Curie uses digital resources far more in her training methods than Faraday had. Because of this, and because she’s a scythe’s apprentice, Citra can access the Thunderhead’s backbrain, the raw data that most people don’t have access to. It disturbs Citra that the Thunderhead no longer offers suggestions or communicates with her when she uses it, but according to Faraday, this silence generates the self-reliance a scythe needs. Citra’s investigation into Faraday’s death hits unexpected obstacles as she realizes the backbrain functions much like a human brain. She can access video recordings of his final day on earth, but their connections seem random, and she cannot use scythe resources to circumvent this issue without tipping off others. As she works, she wonders if the Thunderhead is watching her.
After realizing that she can upload her own data to the Thunderhead to skew the results, Citra requests a visit home, which Curie reluctantly grants. Citra’s family has no clue that Faraday has died, and they are surprised to see her with another scythe, though her brother quickly recognizes Curie. After Curie leaves, Citra becomes frustrated with how little her family really knows about scythes but suggests that they go on a walk. Along the way, which traces Faraday’s last journey, Citra strategically takes family pictures near every public camera. Later, Citra asks Curie about names, learning that Curie was named Susan before becoming a scythe, though she goes by Marie now with close friends. Curie also admits she has not seen her family in centuries. After returning home, Citra realizes her ploy has worked. The pictures she took have organized the backbrain results to display cameras along Faraday’s final route, leaving her to sort through the millions of disorganized files connected to them.
Analysis
Citra’s encounter with the Tonists challenges Curie’s claim that rebellion in this post-mortal world no longer exists and offers an alternate solution to the stagnation Curie despises. Before this point in the narrative, only Curie had complained about the boredom and apathy she sees in post-mortal people and expressed the opinion that people no longer rebel. The existence of the Tonists serve as a subtle rebuttal to this assertion. Human rebellion does indeed still exist, even if it comes in the form of the maligned rituals and actions of the Tonists. Just as Curie has deep suspicions about the drawbacks of a perfect world, the Tonists have no use for modern conveniences and reject stagnation as they embrace imperfection. In a world that has largely eradicated disability, some Tonists even intentionally blind themselves in order to enhance their worship of sound, and one of the Tonists that Citra encounters either pretends to limp or has refused treatment for his limp. Still, the Tonists are not allies of the scythes, for they reject the scythes as unnatural and artificial as the rest of the world they rebel against. Citra struggles against her ingrained prejudices against the Tonists, wanting to dismiss their beliefs as foolish, but she finds herself drawn to their explanations of things and is surprised at the similarities she sees between Tonist philosophies and Curie’s beliefs.
Citra’s research in the Thunderhead’s backbrain demonstrates that many common assumptions about the Thunderhead may be wrong and suggests that the Thunderhead may not be as neutral as it seems. Her explorations in the backbrain cause her to wonder if the Thunderhead is watching her and what it thinks of her actions. Her conclusion directly contradicts Goddard’s assumptions that scythes remain above the Thunderhead’s control or interest. She is particularly surprised to learn that the backbrain is organized like a human brain. This society has long viewed the Thunderhead as a superior substitute to biased humans, but the Thunderhead’s raw data does not behave like a computer, suggesting that even the Thunderhead sees the value in how human minds work. This realization about how the backbrain functions s allows Citra to effectively manipulate it to do as she wants, but it also indicates that her assumption the Thunderhead may maintain an observant interest in scythes is more accurate than Goddard’s arrogant assumption that he is free of Thunderhead control or surveillance. The Thunderhead may appear neutral, but that does not necessarily mean it is disinterested. Likewise, the fact that Citra can manipulate the Thunderhead’s backbrain indicates that this computer system, which runs the entire world because it is supposedly free of humanity’s susceptibility to corruption, may not be so invulnerable to human interference after all.
Citra’s disappointing visit with her family, coupled with her growing identification with scythes, demonstrates the emotional distance from people that scythes need in their work and explains why they develop their own separate professional personas. As the novel repeatedly shows, the best scythes, such as Faraday and Curie, maintain a professional separation between themselves and humanity, while still maintaining a respect and empathy for the people they glean. Citra is initially surprised to learn that Curie has not seen her family in centuries, but finds herself wondering if all scythes eventually lose their ties to their families of origin. Citra’s unsatisfactory visit with her own family suggests that this loss is likely inevitable and perhaps even desirable in this line of work. On her visit home, Citra already expresses private frustration about how little her family knows about scythes, and answers their questions about scythes with “we.” Citra is only an apprentice and not yet a scythe, but her use of “we” expresses a clear verbal identification with Scythedom and emphasizes the growing distance between herself and her family. The complicated family dynamics revealed by Citra’s visit home, along with Curie’s explanation of her own lack of family connection, suggests that professional scythes must juggle a difficult balance between being too human to glean and being too emotionally distant and remote to glean compassionately and ethically.
