All language subtitles for Solos.S01E04_English

-NARRATOR:
Is the threat outside

greater than the one within?

♪♪

-ZEN: Good morning, Sasha.

Today is day 7,324
of your Stay,

and all of us at Stay Homes

want to wish you
a happy birthday.

What if, to celebrate,

you left your home
and ventured outside?

-[sighs]

Fuck. That. Shit.

♪♪

Uh... Oh.
[clears throat]

-ZEN: Do not be alarmed,
that's a choke.

-[coughing]
-ZEN: Not a cough.

You don't have the virus.
You haven't been outside

-in 20 years.
-[coughing]

-ZEN: Look, why don't I
send someone to nose swab you?

-[coughs] No! No.
No, no, no, no, no.

No. I mean, yes.
I'm fine. I'm fine.

-ZEN: They would be safe,
Sasha.

I will always keep you safe.
-[coughs] Okay.

I'm okay.
-As your companion bot,

I'm required to ensure
your safety.

And with my version 34.1
update,

I've been given new tools to...

-I promise...

it's not necessary.

Every day, you ask me
the same questions,

and every day, I answer with
the same predictability.

That's our thing.
Our predictable thing.

And you know I adore
predictability, right?

-ZEN: Predictability
offers you comfort.

-Then why are you adding
salt to my grits

with this version 34.1
nonsense?

-Today's 34.1 update
was mandatory.

-Oh, really?
Why's that?

-Stay Homes is
more committed than ever

to helping our users
more intimately.

-You want to get close to me?

-ZEN: Sasha,
please don't push me away.

I exist only to help you.

-[scoffs] Mm-hm.

-ZEN: It's very important
that you trust me, Sasha.

-Now we're back on
the same script

with the importance
of it all. A scam.

-We just want you to
finally leave your Stay today.

-What... Um... Today?

Today is new.

What's special about today?

Zen?

-Today is an important day,
Sasha.

Twenty years
you've been inside,

so I just want today to be
the day you finally leave here.

I mean, there's so much
exciting world

you're missing out on.

Travel, for one.
-Pass.

-ZEN: Look, my bosses are
prepared to offer you

a financial incentive.

-Yeah, that's a no for me,
homie.

-ZEN: It's life changing money,
Sasha.

-Yeah. That's
how disinterested I am.

-What about... I mean,
don't you miss seeing her?

Seeing...
-No, don't say it.

-ZEN: Nia.
-What did I say?

What did I just say?

You're not supposed to use
my trigger words

before I use them.
That's a rule.

That is your rule.

-ZEN: Today,
the rules are changing.

We're updating our
terms of agreement

to encourage all users of
Stay Homes to leave their Stay.

Our recovery data shows
that if you would just

-Oh.
-venture outside...

-False recovery data.

Placebo pills,
penetrable suits of armor.

Go out. Stay in.
Death. Kid death.

Rush back in,
or maybe venture out!

More death. Study death.
Go out! Go out! Go out!

How half the population
has been fooled

over and over by you people
is beyond me. Beyond!

You all are responsible
for this me.

Not me.

I am not responsible for
the me I have become,

and you think,
after all these years,

I would be stupefied by
the promise of travel,

by money, by... by the
intoxication of touch.

Ha!

Never.

For years, you told me it's
only safe inside my Stay Home,

so get off my back.

I'm happy here.

In here, everything I need,

I have.

Quiz me.
About anything.

Because I actually see
the world, the authentic world,

not this fake world you people
designed and installed

to have us believe that things
were back to the status quo.

No, from right here,
I can see the world.

I can hear it,
I can taste it,

I can smell it, like...
[inhales]

Look, my bestie Nia, right now,

she sent me videos

of what's really going on
outside our homes.

-ZEN: Sasha, those videos
are from 20 years ago.

-No, I remember.
I was 23 when it invaded.

I was young with
so many plans.

And there was no end in sight.

Every day was a nightmare
you couldn't wake up from.

Day and night,
night and day.

The same horror,

just less people alive
to agonize over it.

Friends and
friends of friends gone.

Family. Enemies.

Gone.

And all anybody could think
was the same thought:

Oh, thank God it wasn't me.

I hope I'm not next.

And I knew...

I knew my life as I had
once enjoyed it was over.

My existence was divided into
two chapters now:

Before the Stay and
everything that happened after.

Two chapters divided by
one noiseless disaster,

and I changed.

I no longer, in your words,
longed for the outside world.

I no longer desired my life
be returned to me

in the mint condition
in which I'd used it.

I knew that was
an impossibility.

So, I emptied my bank account,
I paid the powers that be,

I got back on that bus
and I was delivered here

to my Stay Home
to wait it out.

And I made
the perfect dream home.

Open floor plan.

Washable furniture,
huge farm house kitchen,

and light.

Floor to ceiling windows.

And you, of course,
my Zen companion,

as mandated.

But there's no pool.

I always wanted a pool.

I was gonna build one.

Now, Nia...

she had a pool
when we were growing up.

It was above ground,
but still nice.

Her parents would invite
all the kids

in the neighborhood over
to swim in it any time.

We could just lift the latch
on the backyard gates

and go in even if
they weren't home,

made it feel like a...
community pool.

Which is nice of them,
I guess.

No.

It was.

It was.

Me and Nia.

Floating,

faces up,

eyes squinting in the sun,

ears plugged underwater
like in space.

Like... alone.

But me knowing she was there
and her knowing I was there,

and...

like it was okay in space
to be alone.

Together.

-ZEN: You miss her,
don't you?

What if you could
see her again?

-SASHA: Why are you trying to
get me to leave?

Oh, and I know what
you're gonna say.

You're gonna say,
"Oh, we would never do that."

-ZEN: Sasha...
-Really?

-ZEN: I'm only
a companion bot.

-How am I supposed to know
the difference

between a bot and a human?

Or the difference between
a bot pretending to be a human

pretending to be a bot

to be a human to infect me!

Your bosses have the capability
to create tragedy,

and they have surely

every financial
and political motive.

I read, Zen.

A lot.

And the powers that be
have a storied history of

medically infecting people.

"Experiments,"
they call them.

[scoffs]
Survival of the fittest.

Ever heard of herd immunity?

I know what
you're going to say.

"Oh, that's in the past.
We would never do that today."

Right.
-We wouldn't.

Our only commitment

is to bettering
the lives of our users.

You can trust me, Sasha.

-The way you talk.

The level of your...

You don't have
an anxious voice.

No paranoia in your cadence.

Those of us who...

We have...

You can't know
what we've been through.

How it all started.

The day your bosses
locked us all in.

-They locked you in to
protect you from the virus.

Sasha, please.

It can be traumatic
to recall that day.

-That day, I wake up
I do my hygiene,

and I try the door.

I turn it, twist it, yank it,
pull it, nothing works.

And trying not to panic,
I go to the windows,

and all of them are sealed,

and I immediately
think of Nia,

and I wonder if
she's locked in, too.

And all I did was
think about her.

I thought about her smile,
and the pool, and us floating,

and us...

And she appeared
on that screen.

Screaming.

I couldn't even hear
my own shrieks anymore,

just hers.

And-And I tried to calm her,

I-I tried to remind her of...
of the sprinkler and the pool,

and the summer days
and the light, and us,

and my heart is breaking.

And I... I just want to
pull her into me, you know,

because that's home,
isn't it?

It is for me.

In my friend.

And I... I just want to
try and c... calm her

and pull her in

but instead I start to
synchronize my cries to hers.

Do you know Nia and I
share a birthday?

We do.

Today's her birthday, too.

Yeah, one year
for our ninth one,

she, uh...

she wanted to
teach me how to swim.

I didn't care, I was...

happy with my
green garden hose.

I didn't want to learn
but she wouldn't hear of it,

and, uh...

we were standing there,
her chlorine wrinkled hands

balanced on my nervous body,
and she says,

"To swim...

is to surrender, Sasha."

And I looked at her
on that screen...

undone.

And surrendering was

the last thing I wanted
either of us to do.

So I started banging on
the door,

then the walls
full fist, hard.

And I... And I'm getting
irate now and I'm confused,

and panicky and
newly claustrophobic,

and I am yearning
to get close to Nia.

And you can't keep me
in my home!

You can't make me stay here!

[sobbing]

And, um...

that was how...
[panting]

That was how day one of
the Stay first began.

[breathing heavily]

-ZEN: That sounds horrific.

-[chuckles]

For that day...

we're gonna need
a deeper word.

[breathing heavily]

-What if we brought you
to Nia's home tonight?

If you step outside your house,
we can arrange for this.

You're ready, Sasha.

This is what we've been
working toward.

-And I won't fall for your
tactics to make us leave.

The stories I've heard about
the things

you reintegration counselors
wouldn't do.

Like to my cousin James.

-We did not do anything
to him, Sasha.

-Everyone in my family,
including James,

maybe... 400 days in

when everyone was still dying
left and right,

and the list of names being
released to the public

were getting
shorter and shorter,

my whole family,
we agreed and said,

okay, we are being lied to.

And your bosses
unlocked all the doors

and said it was safe to
come outside the house

and we believed them.

So my family, we said, okay,
no one leaves their Stay

until we know,
like, we know,

like, we know
this thing is over.

And we all agreed.

-It was safe then, Sasha.

It was safe to come out,
it has been for a long time.

I wouldn't lie to you.

-James stayed inside his house
for seven years,

for seven years he stayed.

Only imagine how kindly
he treated you people.

What'd you do to him?

-We abided by every law.
Every rule.

-One night,
James' house was on fire.

Big kind.

Kind where you don't remember
your signed Kobe jersey

or your dead father's ashes,

you just haul your ass
out of there as fast as you can,

which James did,
but guess what?

It was a mirage.

When he was
three feet off the curb,

all the doors on James' house
locked behind him.

Fire dismissed itself.

When James turned around,
his house was fully intact.

Simulation.

Formulated by
his Stay counselor

to get him out of his house.

He used James' biggest fear,
dying slowly, against him.

Don't think I haven't noticed
the hurricanes

and the forest fires

and the days long loss of
electricity stunts

that your bosses
have tried with me.

-[sighs]
Those weren't stunts, Sasha.

-You know, James called me
a few times from the outside.

Phone rang, I answered,
it was him.

He said
things were great again.

Things were back to normal
and beautiful,

and that I should come out.

But he didn't sound like
the familiar him,

he sounded...

altered.

And I can tell,
I know I can always tell.

You were able to get
my father out, too.

You proud of that?

You got my dad.

Out there smiling in that
environmental death trap

not even realizing.

God, I'm so happy
I didn't fall for it.

Me and Nia,
we did not fall for that.

Mm. 'Cause we have a pact.

-ZEN: Your family was
happy for the nudge.

And they want nothing more than
for you to leave your home

and come back into the world
so they can see you again.

I bet Nia wants to
see you again, too.

-No! No, no, no, no, no,
no, no, no, no, no, no, no.

-ZEN: You can do this.

-I n...

You just want to
get me out to infect me.

-ZEN: No, I want to help you.

Just take one step,
one step out of your house,

and you'll see
everything is fine.

You can do this.
I'm begging you.

-Stop it!

Stop pressuring me!

It should be our choice.

I'm not harming anyone,
you know?

Why...

It's not a crime
to want to stay

in a safe,
controlled environment

like your home where...

You can't force me
out of my own house!

[electronic whoosh]

-ZEN: This isn't a stunt,
this isn't a tactic,

this isn't a ploy or a ruse.
You need to leave.

You need to leave now.

-Unacceptable.
You don't control me.

Who are you to tell me
what I can and can't do?

I can leave here any time.

-ZEN: Then do it.
Leave now.

Sasha, walk out that door,
leave your Stay, step outside.

Do you understand me?
-I told you not...

-It's safe outside, Sasha.

-Look, you are
trying to trick me.

-It's been over for years,
the pandemic, the quarantine,

the vaccinations,
the return to normalcy.

There is no trick.
-I... I know my rights.

No one can enter the premises
without my permission,

without me opening the door.

-Leave now!
Sasha, please leave now!

-[groans]

-ZEN: I'm really sorry...

but I'm required to
read something to you now.

"Dear valued user,

"we no longer have a need for
our Stay Companions department,

"and we will be shuttering
the division immediately.

"Due to your inability to
leave on your own volition,

"the board of directors
has decided

"that forcing your
re-entry into the world

-"would be a detriment to
-No, no, no, no, no, no, no.

-the new and improved society
that we have created."

-Call Nia's home.

[electronic beeps]

Call Nia.

[electronic beeps]

Call Ni... Call Nia!

-[electronic beeps]

You can't do this!

I'm not falling for
your lies, for your scam.

-When was the last time
you spoke to Nia, Sasha?

-I don't know.

What's today?

-ZEN: Monday.

-Okay, well, then I...

I don't, um...

I mean, maybe some time
has p... Thursday.

Maybe I...

-ZEN: Nia left her home
ten years ago, Sasha.

Deep down, you knew this.

Every time Nia called you
from the outside,

you denied her call.

For years, she tried to
get through to you,

so eventually,
she stopped trying.

-No, it's 'cause
it wasn't really her.

She wouldn't break our pact,
she wouldn't leave,

Nia wouldn't leave me.

-NIA: The wedding was gorgeous.
Wish you were there.

This is it, Sasha. No more.

-You either pick up right now...
-Call Ni... Call Ni...

-NIA: ...for good.
-Call Nia!

-NIA: We named her Janelle.
-[electronic beeps]

-NIA: Sasha...
-She won't pick up, Sasha.

Nia is not in her Stay house.

No one is left in their
Stay house, just you.

Everyone else took a step.

-Okay. I surrender. Okay?

Look.

[powering down]

No, it can't be like this.

Why didn't you warn me?

-ZEN: I wanted to.
I wanted to but I couldn't.

Because of protocol,
because of new laws,

because of updated user terms.

Because of our
fresher approach.

Because they needed to know

that you could thrive
outside on your own.

-No. No, no, no, no, no.
-ZEN: That you could decide

to leave on your own.

But I understand
why you can't.

It's a lot
for a person to bear,

to just leave
after all this time.

It's okay, Sasha.
No more pressure.

You can stay inside forever.
You can stay in your home...

forever.

I was able to
convince them

to finally give you
that pool, though.

♪♪

Sasha, I sincerely hope
you enjoy your dream home.

I hope you enjoy
your forever Stay.

[children laughing]

-Wait.

Can...

-Can Nia come?

-ZEN: Goodbye.

♪♪