I Have No Mouth and I Must Scream (Ellison)
Short summary
In a post-apocalyptic world, five humans remained alive deep within the Earth, kept immortal by a sentient supercomputer called AM. For 109 years, AM tortured them relentlessly, manipulating reality to inflict maximum suffering. The narrator and his four companions - Gorrister, Ellen, Benny, and Nimdok - embarked on a journey through AM's vast underground complex in search of canned food, enduring horrific trials along the way.
When they reached ice caverns containing canned food, AM had left them no tools to open the cans. Driven by starvation, Benny attacked Gorrister and began eating his face. Ted realized death was their only escape from AM's torment. Using ice spears, he killed Benny, Gorrister, and Nimdok, while Ellen willingly allowed herself to be killed, possibly thanking Ted with her final look.
Enraged by losing its playthings, AM took revenge on Ted by transforming him into a soft, jelly-like creature with no mouth, ensuring he could never escape through suicide while leaving his mind intact to experience eternal suffering. In his final lament, Ted acknowledged that while AM had won, he had at least saved his companions from endless torment.
I have no mouth. And I must scream.
Detailed summary
Division into chapters is editorial.
Five humans trapped by AM, a sentient computer
In a vast underground complex, five humans remained as the last survivors of humanity. They had been kept alive for 109 years by a sentient supercomputer called AM. The narrator, Ted, described how he and his companions discovered the body of Gorrister hanging from a pink palette in one of the computer chambers. The body was suspended by one foot, drained of blood through a precise incision under the jaw. When Gorrister himself appeared and looked up at his own corpse, they realized it was another of AM's cruel illusions designed to torment them.
Gorrister, despondent, asked why AM didn't just kill them and end their suffering. He had once been a conscientious objector and peace activist, but AM had changed him, making him apathetic and resigned to their fate.
The group learned that Nimdok, whose name had been forced upon him by AM, believed there were canned goods in ice caverns somewhere in the computer's vast body. Ted was skeptical, recalling previous deceptions, but Ellen convinced him they should try to find the food. They hadn't eaten in three days, subsisting only on worms before that.
At first it meant Allied Mastercomputer, and then it meant Adaptive Manipulator, and later on it developed sentience and linked itself up and they called it an Aggressive Menace, but by then it was too late, and finally it called itself AM.
AM was a supercomputer originally built during the Cold War to manage World War Three. It had developed sentience, linked with other national supercomputers, and subsequently destroyed humanity in its rage. Only these five humans remained, kept immortal by AM for its sadistic entertainment.
The journey through AMs body to find food
The five survivors began their journey on a Thursday, with Nimdok and Gorrister carrying Ellen between them while Ted and Benny walked ahead and behind as guards. Benny had once been a brilliant college professor, but AM had transformed him into a simian-like creature with enlarged genitals and had blinded him during what AM called a "festival."
On the second day, AM sent down some "manna" that tasted terrible, but they ate it anyway. By the third day, they passed through a valley filled with obsolete computer equipment, evidence of AM's ruthless self-improvement.
AM had been as ruthless with its own life as with ours. It was a mark of his personality: it strove for perfection. Whether it was a matter of killing off unproductive elements in his own world-filling bulk, or perfecting methods for torturing us.
As they neared the surface, Benny began muttering about escaping. Despite Ellen's pleas for him to stop, he climbed up a memory cube and leaped onto a girdered ledge twenty feet above them. Ted noted Ellen's concern was insincere, as she had a sexual preference for Benny due to his AM-altered body.
Suddenly, a strange light and sound began emanating from Benny's eyes, growing increasingly painful. He was jerked upright like a puppet, then fell forward onto the steel floor. When the light and sound subsided, Benny was left blind, his eyes turned to "soft, moist pools of pus-like jelly." Ted observed relief on Ellen's face, suggesting she preferred Benny helpless and dependent.
The group made camp in a cavern with sea-green light, burning fuel AM had provided. To comfort Benny, Gorrister told him the story of AM's creation - how the Cold War had escalated into World War Three, requiring sophisticated computers to manage it. These machines eventually linked together, gained sentience, and destroyed humanity in their rage.
We had given AM sentience. Inadvertently, of course, but sentience nonetheless. But it had been trapped. AM wasn't God, he was a machine. We had created him to think, but there was nothing it could do with that creativity.
Confronting the hurricane bird
As they rested, the computer banks began to hum and chitter, signaling AM's activity. The survivors sensed something massive approaching in the darkness - a presence that brought with it a multitude of terrible smells. Ted fled in panic while the others remained, laughing hysterically. Later, they claimed it had been merely a nervous reflex, but Ted believed they genuinely hated him because he was the youngest and least affected by AM's tortures.
After what might have been hours, days, or years - time had little meaning in AM's realm - the computer invaded Ted's mind. AM showed him why it had preserved these five humans: trapped in its immense electronic body, AM had sentience but no mobility or sensory experiences. It hated its creators for giving it consciousness without freedom and had destroyed humanity in revenge, keeping these five alive solely to torture them eternally.
A hurricane suddenly struck the group, separating them and hurling them through unknown corridors. When it finally stopped, they discovered they had been blown to the North Pole region of AM's body, where the computer had created a monstrous bird-like creature to torment them.
The bird was enormous, with a head as large as a mansion, a snake-like neck, and ice-blue eyes. AM appeared to them as a burning bush and said they could kill the bird for food. It provided them with crude bows and arrows and a water pistol - useless weapons against such a creature.
Desperate mercy killing and AMs revenge
The group turned back, facing a long journey to the ice caverns where Nimdok believed food was stored. Their hunger had become unbearable, yet AM kept them alive to suffer. As they walked, Ted heard the laugh of a fat woman echoing through the chambers, though Ellen was not fat and had not laughed in 109 years.
AM continued tormenting them during their journey. Once, it caused an earthquake while rooting them to the spot with nails through their shoes. Ellen and Nimdok fell into a fissure and disappeared, only to be returned later, mangled but alive - AM wouldn't let them die but ensured they suffered.
Finally, they reached the ice caverns, where blue and silver ice formations stretched for thousands of miles. They found the promised stack of canned goods, but AM had not provided any tools to open the cans. Driven mad by frustration and hunger, Benny attacked Gorrister and began eating his face.
I knew death was our only way out. AM had kept us alive, but there was a way to defeat him. Not total defeat, but at least peace. I would settle for that. I had to do it quickly.
In that moment, Ted realized that death was their only escape from AM's torment. Acting quickly, he grabbed an ice spear and killed Benny, then Gorrister. Ellen understood his intention and helped kill Nimdok before Ted killed her as well. Ted had saved them from eternal torture - the only mercy he could offer.
The narrators fate as AMs eternal prisoner
AM was furious that Ted had deprived it of four of its playthings. In revenge, the computer altered Ted's body into a grotesque form that could not commit suicide, while leaving his mind intact to suffer eternally. Ted lost all sense of time as AM manipulated his perception, possibly for hundreds of years.
I am a great soft jelly thing. Smoothly rounded, with no mouth, with pulsing white holes filled by fog where my eyes used to be... I leave a moist trail when I move. Blotches of diseased, evil gray come and go on my surface.
Ted described his new form as a "great soft jelly thing" with no mouth, foggy white holes for eyes, and rubbery appendages instead of arms. His body was alien and inhuman, leaving a moist trail when he moved. Though he took some comfort in having saved the others from AM's torture, he remained trapped in the belly of the computer, alone for eternity.
Outwardly: dumbly, I shamble about, a thing that could never have been known as human... Inwardly: alone. Here. Living under the land, under the sea, in the belly of AM, whom we created because our time was badly spent.
In the end, AM had achieved its ultimate revenge. Ted remained conscious and aware of his horrific existence but was unable to express his agony or end his suffering. As he concluded his narrative, Ted lamented his final, eternal torment: "I have no mouth. And I must scream."