The Next Bug Thing

Use your delusion

[Something like a conference room, except with a number of smaller desks with chairs rather than a conference table; ugly acoustic tile drop ceiling, ugly grey carpet, fluorescent lights, no windows. A very large TV screen plays NFL highlights with the sound off. A whiteboard is visible with the word DRONES written in marker in large letters, surrounded by sketches of people’s heads and tic-tac-toe games.

Sitting in a little circle drinking sodas are three men in their early 30s: VLAD, chubby and white, wearing a white button-down shirt open to the sternum, revealing a ribbed wifebeater underneath and a gold cross on a thin gold chain, khakis and Clarks; DYLAN, slim and white, dressed the same except with a royal blue shirt buttoned almost all the way up with a loosened pearl-colored necktie; and SAMMI, very thin and of apparent Indian descent, wearing nice but cheap black shoes with buckle straps, charcoal grey slacks, and a pink button-down with a red tie.]

VLAD: I don’t think it’s coming back.

DYLAN: [Looking at his phone] I dunno. People are still, you know — it’s not as many. But —

VLAD: No.

SAMMI: I think it’s a wide cycle. Or maybe medium wide cycle. You know, like the trans stuff.

VLAD: What? You think? Nah.

DYLAN: Trans is —

VLAD: Trans is always there. Like in the back of the fridge. Some company says something like hey, ok my trans employees, there’s always one. [Gets out his phone]. I can get you one now.

DYLAN: Trans is played, Vlad. [Small pause] See, you can’t even find one —

VLAD: [Looking at phone] Ha! Here we go! Disney trans! Oh wait… no, they had a trans in a cartoon but they took it out.

DYLAN: See? That’s what I mean. Everybody’s running from it now. Schools, everybody. They’re scared. Trump, man. It’s over.

VLAD: What about that school shooter? What if she’s trans?

DYLAN: No one cares, that’s how played it is. They go “argh argh ooh trans” for a day and then remember trans people are fucked and move on.

SAMMI: [Nodding] Trans is not sticky.

DYLAN: Anyway in two days there’ll be another shooter.

VLAD: I guess. [Small pause] Kinda fucked though.

DYLAN: [Sighs] Well, yeah.

SAMMI: [Looking at his phone] We still need a hook. When did you last look at the algo? Signal is weak.

VLAD: 5G?

SAMMI: No, drones. Signal is weak on drones. It’s down to Patch and NextDoor.

VLAD: Circle of life!

DYLAN: We can keep an eye on it but Sammi’s right, we gotta give them something else.

SAMMI: Yes. I have an idea.

VLAD: OK.

SAMMI: Well, not an idea, so much, but a thought.

DYLAN: More than I have.

VLAD: [Looking at the TV] OOOOH! SICK-TASTIC!

DYLAN: [Looking at the TV; pause] Valdes-Scantling.

VLAD: Step aside!

DYLAN: Still lost.

SAMMI: Dudes, I want to go home. So, do you want to hear?

VLAD: No, spill.

SAMMI: OK, well, you know when the weather is warm in the wintertime, certain bugs come out? Like gnats?

VLAD: Yeah, fungus gnats.

DYLAN: Yeah, we get them a lot because you get these bizarre hot days.

VLAD: It’s weird, right?

SAMMI: OK, so climate change. But the target, they don’t believe in climate change.

DYLAN: Yeah.

SAMMI: But they sort of do. Just like they don’t — like with drones. They know there is surveillance, right, they think, I don’t know, Pelosi is spying on them.

DYLAN: Soros.

VLAD: Black helicopters.

DYLAN: What?

VLAD: Something my dad told me about, they were like the drones of the Eighties.

DYLAN: Oh word?

SAMMI: But if you told them advertisers are surveilling them, like they are every time they open a website, they don’t get it. But you say look, there’s the drones spying on you, then it’s like, oooh yeah they’re spying on me! Like it could be anybody, like their enemies.

DYLAN: Or Martians.

SAMMI: Exactly. So climate change, same thing. They know there are too many hot days, icecaps melting, but you tell them, cut back carbon, they’re like, what are you talking about. So no climate change. But if it gets warm and there are these little tiny bugs — bugs you can hardly see, just like you can hardly see the drones — just things zip-zipping in the air — you don’t say climate change, you say, hey, you know what, I never saw these things before, don’t you think that’s weird, where did they come from, and in one minute they’re saying it too, yes what are these things? Where did they come from?

DYLAN: But they’re gnats.

VLAD: They’ve always been there.

SAMMI: Exactly! And what are the drones? Planes and stars that have always been there. But you make them think drones and that’s what they say they are. We know they’re gnats, but what if we say maybe they are a bio-weapon? Little little weird bugs, what are they? Where did they come from? Maybe Soros made them in a lab.

VLAD: Like COVID!

SAMMI: Exactly! Sent them to spread a disease.

VLAD: Bro, imagine these people walking down the street and they see a cloud of gnats and they freak out!

[VLAD stands, starts hopping around as if in panic.]

Omigod! Omigod! Soros sent us a foreign disease from Epstein Island!

SAMMI: Exactly.

DYLAN: Well — maybe — I guess.

VLAD: [To DYLAN] Hey, let’s hear your idea, bro.

DYLAN: Got none. OK. Sammi, can you do sixty seconds for Atlanta?

SAMMI: Sure, I’ll do it tonight. Animate some clouds of bugs.

DYLAN: [Stands up] OK, I guess that’s it.

[VLAD stands up, pats SAMMI’s shoulder.]

VLAD: That shit rocks, dude.

SAMMI: Thanks.

[They all grab their things — coats, bags — and head to the door.]

VLAD: I started watching that Substance thing. Totally slaps.

DYLAN: Why didn’t you finish it?

VLAD: [Shrugs] Fell asleep or something.

[SAMMI, the last out, dry-erases DRONES, writes BUG BOMB in its place, leaves.]