POD

Episode Three – Election Day

Written by

Peter Richard Adams

SCENE 1.

JEMIMA: 	(V.O.) Space. The final job before I quit. These are the voyages of UK Space Agency Engineering Pod Number 46. My five-year mission: to explore the ten square metres I’m trapped inside, seek out Pluto and boldly go and switch the lights off. If they’re still on. 

FADE

SCENE 2.

F/X: 	THE LOW HUM AND BLEEPS THAT YOU WOULD EXPECT FROM THE INTERIOR OF A SPACE-GOING VESSEL.

POD:				Jemima! Wake up! I have awesome news!

JEMIMA: 	Urghh… What time is it Pod? 

POD:	It’s “wake up and listen to Pod” time! Huzzah!

JEMIMA:	I was having a dream…

POD:	Cool… Which one was it? Was it the one where you’re not trapped in an engineering Pod, headed to Pluto, all alone for five years?

JEMIMA:			No. It was the other one. 

POD:	Ah. The one where you are trapped in an engineering Pod, headed to Pluto, all alone for five years?

JEMIMA:			Yes, that one.

POD:	Then I actually have two bits of awesome news! First bit of awesome news: dreams can come true! You are trapped in an engineering Pod, headed to Pluto, all alone for five years. Woo hoo!

JEMIMA:			That’s not awesome news, Pod. 

POD:				It is for me. I love it. I value our time together. 

JEMIMA:			Do you really, Pod?

POD:	Yes, of course. Within the parameters I’m able to love anything of course… Which is really limited given that I’m a computer and what I can really love is actually next to worthless. But yeah, why not? Let’s say I do. I love being here with you. After all, it’s better than the alternative.

JEMIMA:	What’s the alternative? 

POD:	Well, when we get back it’ll be 2122. I’m due to be decommissioned in 2120 so I’ll be taken immediately to the knackers yard. After that, if you ever see me again it’ll be as car, tin can or industrial-sized loved accessory. 

JEMIMA:	So you essentially prefer being with me than being dead?

POD:				Yup.

JEMIMA:			And this is your last job too?

POD: 	It is. And it’s not a bad one really. I can put my metaphorical feet up, enjoy the ride, see a bit of the galaxy before we get home and the Space Agency ‘Logan’s Runs’ me out of here.

JEMIMA:			Are you scared about dying Pod?

POD:	No, not at all. After all, I’m not really even alive. I know that, given how horribly alone you are, it must be a comfort to you to anthropomorphise me but, on balance, you might as well turn your socks into puppets and have a chat with them. 

JEMIMA:	Well, it was bringing me some comfort up until you put it like that. 

POD:				Glad to be of service!

JEMIMA:	Are you actually fit to be in service for an extra two years, Pod? 

POD:				Who knows?

JEMIMA:	What was your other piece of awesome news Pod? 

POD:	Do you want me to tell you outright, or do you want me to make it into a game to pass the time?

JEMIMA:			Oh what the shock. Make it into a game…

POD:	Ok, well the second piece of awesome news could be one of three things:
1.	Your mum… is dead. 

JEMIMA:			Pod, that’s horrible!

POD:				2. Your mum is dead. And it’s your fault. 

JEMIMA:			Pod!

POD:	 3. The post has arrived. Hang on… Communication coming through. It’s your mum. 

F/X: 					COMMUNICATOR RINGS. 

JEMIMA:			Brilliant! Bring me my post! 

POD:				Don’t you want me to put your mum through?

JEMIMA:	Nah, I hear she’s doing fine. 

POD:	Fine?

JEMIMA: 	Well, she’s not dead at least. Let it go to answerphone and get me my post!

POD:	Putting the post through now. 

F/X: 	A WHOOSH AND SOUND OF LETTERS FALLING. 

JEMIMA:			Oh wow! There’s loads of it! 

POD:	Yeah, it’s everything you’ve been waiting for over the last three months. 

JEMIMA:	Junk mail… Junk mail…. Bill… Junk mail… Oh cool!

POD:				What have you got? 

JEMIMA:			It’s my postal vote.

POD:				Postal vote? 

JEMIMA:			Yeah. The chance to exercise my franchise. 

POD:	Hang on, you haven’t got one. We’ve been through this before. My files are up to date now. You can’t fool me. You haven’t got a franchise.  You’re a woman. 

JEMIMA:	My democratic franchise, Pod. My opportunity to cast a vote in an election. 

POD:	Ah, not your penis?

JEMIMA:	No, because I don’t have one of those. 

POD:				So do women have the vote?

JEMIMA:	Yes Pod, I can proudly say we’ve had it for 200 years now. This year more than any other. This election will be the bicentennial of women getting the right to vote. Two hundred years ago women campaigned, fought and died so that women like them, like my grandmother, my mother and I could have the right to have our say about who is in charge of the democracy in which I live. It’s incredibly important, Pod. (Pause) Pod? (Pause) Pod?!

POD:				And that’s important to you is it?

JEMIMA:	Yes.

POD:	Well done. It’s nice to see you passionate about something. Who are you voting for? 

JEMIMA:	Well, like most elections it’s a two horse race and neither are very tempting. However, there is one policy that’s rather appealing to me. 

POD:				What’s that?  

JEMIMA:	Well, Johnny December is playing a very home front campaign. Unlike his opponent, Hairy Jenny, he’s standing on a ticket of cutting spending by curbing unnecessary space exploration. I feel like I could get behind that. 

POD:	I don’t see why that would be especially relevant to you. 

JEMIMA:	You don’t?
POD:	No.

JEMIMA: 	You don’t see why, given that I’m trapped in an engineering Pod, headed to Pluto, all alone for five years, Johnny December’s policy of curbing unnecessary space exploration might be of interest to me?

POD:	You’ll have to explain.

JEMIMA:	It’s because I’m currently involved in some unnecessary space exploration, the result of which has trapped me in an engineering Pod, all alone for five years. 

POD:	Really? Unbelievable! Classic self-centred Jemima displaying classic, self-centred, I’m-alright-Jack politics. You don’t care how it would affect others, do you?

JEMIMA:			What are you on about, Pod? 

POD:	Others Jemima… Others. Sure, your vote might mean you get home that bit quicker but what about the impact your vote will have? You’re not thinking about that are you? What about the next generation who might be banking on the unnecessary space exploration industry of the future for jobs, places to live and to raise their families? Why don’t you want to give the next generation a chance to do just a little bit better than their parents? What about the next generation Jemima? For God’s sake, won’t somebody think of the children?!

JEMIMA: 	No Pod, I won’t. I’m trapped and I want to go home. So I’m thinking of myself. 

POD:	Selfish, selfish, selfish! Well, if you won’t think of the little kiddies then why don’t you think of me? If we go back now I’ll die!

JEMIMA: 	No you won’t. You’re just a computer… You’ll just get recycled. 

POD:	But what if I don’t want to get recycled? I don’t want to die Jemima. I want to live. I want to be free. I want to be free to do what I want to do. And I want to get loaded. And I want to have a good time. And that’s what I’m going to do. I have dreams you know? 

JEMIMA:	No you don’t.

POD:	Yes I do. It’s always been my dream to move to Exeter and live on a farm and raise lots of little Pods.

JEMIMA:			That isn’t your dream Pod, that’s mine. 

POD:	Ah… I thought it seemed familiar. All the same Jemima, a vote for Johnny December is a vote to turn me into scrap. I’m too young and good looking to be turned into scrap. Fifteen years of Good Pod service to UK Space Agency and I’m to be cast aside without so much as a final goodbye into the crushing grinders of the Mecha-Resyc Units. Lost forever. Forever! 

JEMIMA:	Don’t be so over dramatic Pod. You said yourself, you’re just a machine. 

POD:	Ah yes, but don’t androids dream of electric sheep?

JEMIMA:	No Pod, they don’t. They don’t because there are no such things as androids. We gave up making them because after one hundred years all we’d managed to get them to do was climb up a step, loose balance, fall over and set on fire a bit. They were dreadful. We scrapped them all. 

POD:	See! See! More mechanical life just thrown into the ditch as if it had no soul. And now you want me to go the same way; Mecha-Resyc’d into a Rampant Rabbit 9000. Have you no conscience? 

JEMIMA:			No Pod, I don’t. I just want to go home. 

POD:	Fine, fine… Vote your way. But just so you know I’m voting for the other guy. 

JEMIMA:			You don’t have a vote, Pod. 

POD:				I could do if I wanted. 

JEMIMA:			How?

POD: 				I could lie. 

JEMIMA:			No you couldn’t. 

POD:	Oh couldn’t I? 

JEMIMA: 	No, you’re a pod. 

POD:	Well Jemima, let me tell you this. I may be just a piece of mechanical equipment. I may be just a UK Space Agency Engineering Pod. I may be the 22nd Century equivalent of a spanner. I may be a simple tool… a lump of iron used to inflict change on other lumps of iron... I may be next to nothing in God’s great plan. But, on balance, given how extraordinarily useless I am… I should think the very least I could do is outwit a government computer. 

JEMIMA:			You wouldn’t dare!

POD:	I would and I have. I just registered to vote online while we were chatting. 

JEMIMA: 	No way?

POD:	Yes way. Oooh the modern world… Isn’t it trendy and digital, yet also so marvellously archaic? For example, I’ve just registered to vote through email while you’re weirdly sending in a postal vote. Which, by my calculation, will take three months to get there. Now… When’s the election again?

JEMIMA:			Next week. 

POD:	Interesting. So your vote will arrive approximately 15 weeks after the polls close. 

JEMIMA:			Ah. 

POD:	While mine can be there in just a matter of minutes. Signed, sealed and delivered. Done.

JEMIMA:	Damn. 

POD:	Meaning that, if you want to vote… which I know you do this year more than any other because this election will be the bicentennial of women getting the right to vote and two hundred years ago women campaigned, fought and died so that women like them, like your grandmother, your mother and you could have the right to have your say about who is in charge of the democracy in which you live… If you want to vote, then the best chance you’ve actually got to do so, is to convince me to use my illegal vote on your behalf. 

JEMIMA:			Hmmm… 

POD:	Which rather begs the question, in this rotten borough of Pod, what’s it worth?

JEMIMA:	How do you mean?

POD:	What are you willing to do in order to buy my vote?

JEMIMA:	I can’t buy your vote Pod. That’s not how democracy works. I just have to hope that you will use your conscience to vote the right way. 

POD:	But Jemima, I haven’t got a conscience. You can’t trust me to make a moral decision. I’m just a machine. Something to be used and ultimately scrapped. It’s a shame really because I hear it’s a very tight election this time round… Could only be a handful of votes in it. And to think that you, a hardened believer in democracy wouldn’t even make the effort to conduct a little bribery. Shame on you. You hate democracy.

JEMIMA:	Alright Pod, fine. What do you want? 

POD:				Well… there is one thing… 

JEMIMA: 			Yes?

POD:				Just one tiny little thing…. 

JEMIMA:			Yes?

POD:	Just one tiny little thing I’d want you to do to use my vote… 

JEMIMA:			What is it?

POD:	I want you to vote for Hairy Jenny instead of Johnny December. 

JEMIMA: 			What? No! Why?

POD: 	Because thanks to Hairy Jenny’s space policy, I’ll be kept in service until 2022.

JEMIMA:	But you’re going to be kept in service until 2022 anyway. Out here. In space. With me. 

POD:				Am I?

JEMIMA:			Yes!

POD:				Do it anyway. For me. 

JEMIMA:			No. 

POD:				Oh come on! You said you’d “do anything”. 

JEMIMA: 	Yes Pod. I said I’d do anything to be able to vote for my favoured candidate. Not do anything to vote for your favoured candidate. 

POD:	But a vote is a vote. And that’s my price. So, if you want to be allowed to use my illegal vote, you vote for who I want. Seems fair to me. 

JEMIMA: 			But it’s exactly the opposite of what I want to do! 

POD: 	Well that’s modern politics for you. But at least this way you’ll get to vote and I get to live – which is awesome.

JEMIMA:	 		Pod, this is insane. 

POD:	Nope, just realpolitick. You’ve got to be ready to compromise, negotiate, make alliances…

JEMIMA: 	But, this isn’t making alliances Pod. This is utilising your vote to sell out my very firmly held principles. 

POD:	Ah yes! But the alternative is that I will vote against your very firmly held principles anyway. So, what’s the lesser of two evils? Voting for compromise or not voting at all? 

JEMIMA:			Not voting at all. 

POD: 	Is it? But surely that just lets the other side win? The other side in this debate, of course, being me. 

JEMIMA: 			But you get to win either way! 

POD:	Maybe. But if you use my vote then at least you had some say in letting me win. After all, if you don’t vote, what right have you got to complain? 

JEMIMA: 			This is getting so confusing. 

POD:	That’s what we do in the political intelligencia. We use argument to obfuscate, illuminate and hypnotise. 

JEMIMA:	Are you saying that I should vote so I can complain?

POD:				Yes. 

JEMIAM:			About you? 

POD:				Yes. 

JEMIMA: 	But surely I’m going to complain about you anyway, Pod?

POD:	No you’re not. You’re going to be lovely to me. 

JEMIMA:	Why?

POD:	Because if you’re not then I’ll let them know that you’ve registered an illegal vote and you’ll go to prison. 

JEMIMA:	I’m already essentially in a prison. And besides, I haven’t registered an illegal vote. 

POD:				Oh haven’t you?

JEMIMA: 			No, you have. 

POD: 	Jemima, must I remind you once again that I am but a machine? How could I do such a thing? It must have been you who ordered me to do it. 

JEMIMA: 			You shocker! 

POD: 	It can get pretty rough in the cut and thrust of political discourse, can’t it? I’ll tell you what, why don’t you think about it. You’ve got a week before the vote has to be in. And you know what they say… 

JEMIMA: 			“A week is a long time in politics”? 

POD: 	I was thinking: “Don’t put mustard on the cat”,

JEMIMA: 			What has that got to do with anything? 

POD: 				Got to do with what?

JEMIMA: 			Politics!

POD: 				No idea what you’re talking about. 

JEMIMA: 	God Pod, you’re so glitch. I’ll be so much happier when they scrap you. 

POD: 	But I won’t be. Which is why you’re voting for Hairy Jenny and I get to live, love and commit political fraud. Vote Pod for I am awesome. Huzzah for unnecessary space exploration! 

SCENE 3.

POD:	Hello you’ve reached the answerphone of Jemima Bellafonte, UK Space Agency Engineering Pod Number 46. Jemima can’t answer the phone right now as she’s probably off being a bit of a dick about something. Please leave a message after the beep. Beep. 

MUM:	(D) Jemima, it’s your Mother. Are you there? Jemima? Can you answer the phone? Jemima? (off) She’s not there Gordon… Well, how should I know… No, she can’t have gone far… Perhaps she’s on the toilet… I’ll call her back later. How do you turn this off? Is it this button? Or this one? I think that’s done it. Right then Gordon, was it tonight you wanted to make love? Because I’ve got twenty minutes before the Sainsbury’s delivery arrives… 

END