The Humans

Isobel tries to drive Andrew to Daniel’s house, but he insists on going alone. He finds the address in their address book and goes to Daniel’s house, which is exceedingly large. His wife, Tabitha, answers the door. She asks Andrew how he’s doing, and Andrew tries to find out if Tabitha knows about the reason for his meeting with Daniel. She says she doesn’t, then gives Andrew a glass of water and discusses Daniel’s health. Daniel had had a heart attack but seems okay now. Tabita sends Andrew upstairs to Daniel’s study.

Daniel is impressed by Andrew’s discovery and tells him that he deserves a slap on the back but advises that he waits$ a week for the news of his nude breakdown to blow over. He tells Andrew that he should take some time off, as it is clear that solving the Riemann hypothesis took everything out of him. The students will surely give him a hard time on the first day back, so Daniel says it’s important to rest for a little bit. He acknowledges that they’ve always been competitors but congratulates him on his discovery. Andrew tells Daniel that he is not in fact Andrew Martin, and that where he comes from, there are no names because individualization is unimportant. Daniel is perturbed, believing that Andrew is having another lapse in his mental health. Daniel tells Andrew he’ll help him home, but Andrew is not going anywhere.

Andrew tells Daniel to give him the slap on the back he offered. Daniel, confused, places his hand on Andrew’s back. Andrew momentarily turns back into his true form, scaring Daniel. Andrew paralyzes Daniel’s jaw and places his hand on Daniel’s left shoulder, instigating a heart attack. Andrew deletes the email and attachment from Daniel’s computer and checks the “Sent” folder for any suspicious activity regarding the Riemann theory. Satisfied, Andrew leaves the studio and calls out for Tabitha to call an ambulance.

Tabitha crouches over Daniel, who is on the ground and struggling to say something, searching for his breath. Tabitha cries out to Daniel, assuring him that he’ll survive this again. She cradles him, reminds him about their dream trip to Egypt, and tells him that she can’t live without him. Andrew is moved by her display of love and is uncomfortable with how sad he feels for her. He knows he is not meant to feel sympathy for the humans, but he can’t help but admire Tabitha and Daniel’s obvious reliance on one another. Daniel dies in front of them, just as the ambulance pulls up to the house.

Where the narrator is from, there are no grand passions or wars. His society is fully functional in its rationality. They have solved all the puzzles about life and death, so there is no reason to fear, love, or try to make some meaning from their lives. He reasons that Daniel’s death was important for the common good because human beings are not psychologically capable of handling the secret Daniel knew. In killing Daniel, Andrew has saved other lives. Still, Andrew has a nightmare in which he is surrounded by dead humans. In the nightmare he becomes ravenous but can’t eat or drink because his mouth won’t open. He awakens to Isobel comforting him in the same way Tabitha held Daniel as he died.

The next day, Andrew is alone in the house with the family dog, Newton. It occurs to Andrew that he can get Newton on his side if he cures his pain. Although it’s confusing to admit it to himself, after causing pain Andrew feels a great desire to ease pain. He heals Newton’s blindness, but it takes a great deal of energy, and Andrew passes out on the floor. He wakes up to Newton gleefully licking his face. At first, Andrew is turned off by Newton’s neediness and almost regrets getting Newton to love him, but he misses Newton the moment Newton leaves him alone. Andrew sits on the couch to contemplate the next steps of his mission: killing Isobel and Gulliver. Andrew decides to listen to music with Newton, who is uncommunicative. Andrew listens to an array of music and is moved by what he hears. When he listens to the Beach Boys, he is surprised to feel the same emotion he felt when Isobel comforted him in bed the night before. When he listens to Debussy’s “Claire de Lune,” he is deeply moved by how well the song captures the depths of the universe.

Andrew is distracted by Newton, who is scratching at the door. Andrew takes the leash and brings Newton on a walk. Though he finds the relationship between human and dog strange, he is pleased by how truly happy Newton is. After running into a couple of neighbors, one of whom asks Andrew about his health and about what happened to Daniel Russell, Andrew relaxes on a bench and watches the cars drive past. He questions whether he is starting to feel a dangerous kindness for the human race and wonders if he is being changed in the same way humans are always changing the world around them. As he begins to question if it is right to stop another planet’s technological advance, Newton’s barking interrupts his thoughts. Andrew looks around for the source of Newton’s barks and sees Gulliver walking along a road. Gulliver is supposed to be in school, so when he sees his father and dog, he turns in the other direction. Andrew follows him, trying to get his attention. Gulliver ignores him and keeps walking. Andrew is concerned about Gulliver because Gulliver possibly knows that his father solved the Riemann theory.

Soon, Andrew sees that Gulliver is close to a train track. A train barrels down the track, and Andrew wonders if Gulliver will step in front of the train. Andrew observes Gulliver; he doesn’t have to be the one to kill Gulliver if he kills himself. Gulliver, however, remains where he’s standing, and Andrew walks Newton away before Gulliver can see that he’s been followed.

Andrew returns home and tells himself that Gulliver will have to be killed because he knows that it’s possible that the Riemann hypothesis can be proven, even if he doesn’t know how to do it. Andrew also reflects that he was right not to kill Gulliver when he had the chance on the walk because he needs to kill Gulliver and Isobel just before he leaves. Killing Gulliver prematurely will arouse too much suspicion and thwart his mission.

Andrew looks up the “Poincaré Conjecture,” a mathematical theory that Isobel brought up. Grigori Perelman, the mathematician who proved the conjecture, refused all the elite awards, prizes, and money that had been awarded to him for his discovery. Here Andrew was believing that humans are driven solely by fame and money, but Perelman proved this theory wrong. Disoriented by this truth, Andrew gets hungry and goes to the kitchen to make himself some food.

Andrew tries to satiate his hunger with tasteless food, then finds crunchy wholenut peanut butter. The peanut butter is delicious, and it occurs to Andrew that he’s never really enjoyed anything before. Newton watches him eat, and Andrew begins to pick up on dog language, which is more melodic than English. Andrew realizes that he’s experiencing many new, human things: pleasure from food, a bond with a dog, and the beauty of music.

He feels the need to confess to Newton that he is a murderer. He finds great relief in speaking the words aloud to an objective listener. He tells Newton about the abilities of his species. Andrew tells Newton that he has many powers, such as telekinesis. The phone rings, but Andrew is enjoying his conversation with Newton and his peanut butter too much to answer. He gives Newton the remainder of the jar, and they continue their conversation.

Newton asks Andrew why he’s here, so Andrew tells him about his dual mission to gather information about humans and eliminate the threat of the Riemann hypothesis’s discovery. Their conversation is interrupted when Gulliver enters the house. He tells Andrew not to tell Isobel about his skipping school. Andrew asks Gulliver why he was standing by the train tracks. Gulliver didn’t know that Andrew had followed him, but instead of answering him, Gulliver grunts and goes to his room. Andrew stays on the couch with Newton and finds calm pleasure in stroking the happy dog.

Isobel comes home from work. She is surprised to find Newton and Andrew cuddling together and even more surprised when Andrew tells her he was eating peanut butter and listening to music. Andrew can tell that Isobel is stressed. She asks him how he’s feeling about Daniel, and he says it hasn’t sunk in yet. Isobel notices that there are many missed calls on the phone. Andrew’s mother, his school, a newspaper, and a woman named Maggie all tried to reach him. Andrew asks Isobel what he should do to help her, and she tells him to call his mother but not to tell her about his hospitalization. When Isobel says that Andrew tells his mother more than he tells her, Andrew gets worried about what his mother might know.

Andrew calls his mother, a bizarre concept for him since on his planet, motherhood doesn’t exist. His mother asks him about Isobel and reveals that Andrew has been telling her for about a year that Isobel is constantly nagging at him and turning Gulliver against him. Andrew tries to figure out if his mother knows about the Riemann hypothesis. She knows he’s been working on it but not that he solved it. She keeps bringing the conversation back to her pain, and Andrew is shocked when she tells him that she needs a hip replacement with titanium. He decides not to warn her about the danger of titanium, figuring that the humans will have to discover it on their own eventually. His mother tells him that his father is in worse decline and that the doctor has told him to stop driving. Although he doesn’t understand why, it makes Andrew sad to think about the ageing process—how humans deteriorate slowly as they get older. He hangs up on his mother but then takes Newton’s advice and calls his mother back to apologize for not saying goodbye. Andrew wonders why he cares so much.

Andrew contacts his home planet. He updates them on the erasure of the Riemann hypothesis evidence and the death of Daniel Russell. When asked if he’s erased Isobel and Gulliver yet, Andrew tries to advocate for mind manipulation instead of eliminating them. His hosts remind him that it’s possible the mind manipulation will wear off when he returns home, and if he cannot complete his mission, someone else will be sent to do it for him. He assures them that this is not necessary.