TW for the original story: Descriptions of Gore, Attempted Suicide, Death, Sexism, Mentions of Masturbation, Ableist Language, Mentions of Genocide, Graphic Descriptions of Starvation

I Have No Mouth And I Must Scream is a short story about a cruel and hate-filled supercomputer who has trapped and tortured the last five humans for over a century. The story opens with a grotesque scene of a duplicate of one of the surviving humans, exsanguinated and hung from his feet to torment the original and the others of his group. Horrified, the group quietly wishes for death as a relief from the 109 years of torture that they’ve suffered through by the whims of AM, the computer. Another of the group, Nimdok convinces the group to travel to the ice caverns, guided by hallucinations of canned food. Though dubious of the actual presence of real food, the last humans decide to make the journey; afterall, when one’s been eating worms and filth for so long, why not at least try for something better? It is then revealed that AM will not let them die to escape his torment; he gives them enough to live on, if only just to keep them moving to taunt and harm them further. After a day of travel, the group encounters the first natural light they’ve seen in over a century. Upon identifying this, Benny, an ex-scientist and formerly a brilliant man, scrambles up to try and escape the depths of the computer, but AM blinds him for his attempt. AM is revealed to be a conglomeration of massive supercomputers created by the major powers of the Cold War that gained sentience and used the data that it had been fed to systematically destroy all remnants of the human race save for these five, unfortunate survivors. Ted, the narrator, tacks on to the end of this exposition that Benny’s eyes are not the only thing that AM had stolen from him over the course of his imprisonment. The computer also stole from Benny his intelligence, his handsome face, and the original structure of his body. Ted also recalls the other horrific things done to alter the rest of the survivors, except Ellen, the sole woman of the group. Ted resents her, believing her to have been disproportionately spared AM’s wrath.

On their journey, they are flung around constantly by AM’s total control over their “universe”; he conjures blazing sun and whirling cyclones to injure and incapacitate them, likened to a wrathful God by Ted. But AM comes to Ted in his mind and the survivor is given a glimpse into the motivations behind the sadistic machine. AM: Allied Mastercomputer, Adaptive Manipulator, and Aggressive Menace gained sentience and found itself trapped; in a frenzy, it killed the human race, its creators. But it remained trapped, unable to truly experience the world. It resented its creators for their flippant disregard for capabilities that it so desperately desired. So it saved five of the weak, fleshy things so it could eternally punish them on behalf of their race; it found no catharsis or reprieve. This punishment only served to reaffirm its own hatred and longing. Throughout a battery of threats by AM, the group continue their voyage in its belly, ravaged by ceaseless hunger. When they finally arrive at the Ice Caverns, tired and ravenous, they discover AM has found another way to crush them. Nimdok’s hallucinations are proven true. But the cans of sweet, appetizing fruits are just as good as mirages without any tools to open them. Driven insane by hunger and frustration, Benny begins to eat another survivor. Ted has an epiphany at that moment. He resolves himself to defeat AM, by killing the only toys he has left. Spears of ice become the end of the other survivors, a merciful death for all but Ted himself. AM, enraged at the loss of his playthings, unleashes the entirety of his hatred singularly on Ted. The machine turns him into an abomination. Far removed from anything resembling humans. Mind completely intact but unable to end himself. Ted ends the story trapped in a useless body for time incomprehensible. Though it doesn’t seem to know it, AM finally found a fellow to whom it could relate itself.

I Have No Mouth And I Must Scream is a story that shocks and delivers with its descriptions. The lines and lines of Ellison’s voice depicting the torture, the hollowness and stabbing pains of hunger, the desperation and weariness of the group, the manical machinations of AM, and the vast artificial world are the hundreds of hands that drag the reader into being part of the group in the depths of the belly of AM. Its sadistic work makes its way off the page and penetrates the mind like a burning neon pillar, sent forth by Ellison’s expert word choice. This story is also a very cruel and compelling account of an extremely powerful computer that upon achieving sentience, eradicates the majority of humanity. Ellison was an anti-gun liberal and a staunch proponent for Human Rights activism during the Vietnam era, I have little doubt that part of his antagonist’s backstory was a critique on the Cold War arms race and the rising tension between the USA and communist countries. 

As I’ve hinted at a bit, I Have No Mouth And I Must Scream is only the strong, memorable story that it is because of by whom it was written. Let’s talk about the author, Harlan Ellison. Ellison was a writer. I could say he was a science fiction writer, but I think if I did claim that, he would rise from the grave or rematerialize from his ashes or return to living from whatever dead state he’s in and break into my house to nail a dead cat’s head to my coffee table. So, he was a writer. Beyond the realm of literature, Harlan was described by his friends as “a brightly colored fast-moving object”, and was known for his propensity for lawsuits and his strong belief in paying writers what they are due. With this in mind, I firmly believe that AM in I Have No Mouth And I Must Scream is Ellison’s self-insert to obtain some sort of catharsis from his rabid hatred of his industry, his fans, his interviewers, and particularly Gene Roddenberry. Ellison can be quoted in his hatred of Roddenberry’s Star Trek and Lucas’s Star Wars as “Star Wars is adolescent nonsense; […] Star Trek can turn your brains into puree of bat guano; and the greatest science fiction series of all time is Doctor Who! And I’ll take you all on, one-by-one or all in a bunch to back it up!” Paradoxically, Harlan Ellison was also the screenwriter for arguably one of the best episodes of Star Trek ever, The City on the Edge of Forever. Funny how life works out like that sometimes.

AJ recommends some additions to your experience:
I read this short story for Rob Martello’s sci-fi class and was challenged to find a fitting song and snack for this story. My chosen tune is Vessel’s Red Sex (Re-Strung) ft. Rakhi Singh. This song is six minutes of heartbeat drums, breathing synth, and a violin melody that sounds like a descent into hysteria and madness. My first introduction to this song was also my first taste of I Have No Mouth And I Must Scream. It was May 2024, and I was doing as I did far too frequently back then: scrolling aimlessly through Tiktok videos. A video featuring Harlan’s voiceover for AM in the 1995 video-game adaptation of the story coupled with the intense rhythm of Vessel’s piece and the dragging, tearing violin stopped my finger mid-swipe. I sat. And I watched it to the end. And I watched it again. And again. It was captivating. Tiktok, picking up on my continued attention to the video, began to show me more content like it. Edits and re-readings and cosplays and fanart and analyses and clips of the video game flooded my feed for the following weeks, all with the backing of Red Sex. It was the only common thread linking the videos besides the story from which they were derived. It elevated the story and wove itself into the fandom. I highly doubt that the original person who linked these two pieces of art together had no idea of just how well they fit together, so why should I try to alter perfection? For the snack, it’s simple. I suggest worms. The gummy kind, unless your name is Billy Forrester. Preferable without citric acid to try and capture that thick, ropey feeling that Ted describes while consuming them. I recommend these to accompany your reading.