- We found them just outside the city walls,
Looking for a way in.
Hippo's checking them out because they
Were acting kind of screwy.
- [scoffs] raiders.
Why not make something of your own for once,
Instead of raiding your whole life?
You know what, I'm gonna tell them that.
Watch their faces as their entire
Life philosophy crumbles.
- Yeah, raiders are usually pretty philosophical guys.
But these aren't raiders.
These are spies from new scepsia.
- Spies? Why didn't you say so?
That would mean someone wants to see what we're doing.
Such a compliment. - Uh--
- Do you think they have good things to say?
Did they mention me in particular?
No, don't tell me. I want to go in fresh.
What do you wear to meet captured spies?
- It doesn't matter. - I'm so nervous.
Spies come to spy on my city.
I cannot wait to meet these guys.
- What a weenie.
[dramatic lyre music]
♪ ♪
- And that's why democracy is so important.
Here on krapopolis, instead of being ruled by a king,
The people themselves rule through a king.
- Wow, you just so clearly have a passion for this stuff.
- Right?
You can feel it. - Keep talking.
- You know, you might not believe this,
But not everyone is as interested as you are
In what I have to say.
- That's because these people are sick.
- What?
No, it's not. Sick how?
- Still figuring that out.
But whatever it is forces them to pay attention
To other people's feelings.
They're incapable of tuning out a point of view.
- No, that's ridiculous.
I'm sorry about my brother. He's just--
- No, he's right. - What?
- You're both right. - You're both doing great.
- There you go.
They'll see anybody's side of anything
Because there's something wrong with them.
- It's worse than that.
It's called empathy.
I came as soon as I heard.
We have to kill everyone who has it.
- Well, that seems a little extreme.
- It's a biological weapon, tyrannis,
Created by the titan empathis.
It compels you to understand others,
And it almost wiped out the olympians during the war.
- That must have been so hard.
- If it's been passed down to human offspring,
That means it's contagious.
Don't touch their tears.
- Ok, even if this were a disease, which,
To be honest, I'm skeptical, it sounds like one
We could all stand to get.
I mean, taking other people's perspectives into account?
- No, I agree with mom.
It sounds bad.
But also sounds like something I should study.
- Not in my city.
- I understand why you have to do this!
- Hey!
- What is wrong with you?
- Take it up with someone who cares.
Or don't. They could be contagious.
I'm going to my temple and sealing myself in
Until we're sure it's contained.
- My mom.
[coughs] oh, my god.
I can taste them burning.
- ♪ oh, the sunlight's like beer ♪
♪ when you're drunk through the year ♪
♪ and should anyone sneer ♪
♪ I'll say ♪
[armor clanking]
Oh, that's not good.
- Spartans?
- Yes, about a day out, I'd say.
Quite ruined my post-gangtug high.
- Well, stupe ought to be able to handle them, though.
Right? - These guys are 7 feet tall.
Their veins are made of carbon.
They're totally devoted to murder--
To a heroic extent, really.
I mean, if you look at it from their perspective--
- Whoa, whoa, hold on.
Look at it from their perspective?
- Oh, man.
I see what you're getting at.
- When you arrested those spies,
Did you get any of their tears on you?
- Oh. Oh, I have it!
I have empathy.
And I get what a big problem that is.
I'm trying to picture fighting a war right now,
And I can't stop thinking about those imaginary soldiers,
Their imaginary families,
And their imaginary dreams.
If I've got empathy when the spartans get here,
They're gonna literally eat us for lunch.
- All right, just stay away, stupendous.
Try to keep the tears inside your eye hole.
Dad, can you seal her away somewhere or something
Until we figure out what to do?
- I understand.
I understand why you have to do this.
And I respect it. I respect you.
- Fantastic. Very glad to hear it.
But please respect me from over there.
I've got to talk to mom.
Mom, mother, let me in, please.
- Not until you prove to me that you don't have it.
- Well, that's gonna be hard, actually,
Because I'm naturally pretty thoughtful
And take other people into consideration by default.
But I guess I could try--
- No, that does it.
No one with empathy could be so egotistical.
- Well, I'm glad you let me in.
But the reason infuriates me.
Stupendous has contracted empathy.
- She has?
Oh, well, then she's going to die.
- Come on.
How can somebody die from empathy?
- The disease progresses, tyrannis.
You don't just stop with seeing eye to eye with your neighbor.
It ends with you feeling so bad for your salad
That you end up dying of exhaustion,
Trying to find a river you won't pollute
By drowning yourself.
The olympians that contracted it
Turned into things like the north wind
And comfortable silence between old friends.
Humans won't be able to pull off that transition.
They'll just hang themselves or starve!
- Is there a cure?
- Yes, a mushroom said to grow in the feces
Of empathis herself.
Oh, but she's long gone, died in the war.
And all we are left with is this awful disease.
- Titans had feces?
- That's the part you focus on?
- I just hadn't even thought about it.
None of the stories about titans had any reference to that.
- Do you want me to include feces
In every story I tell you?
I'd rather assumed it was an easy cut.
- All right, fine. The mushrooms?
- The mushrooms, yes.
I don't know how likely it is we'll find them.
But I don't want to incinerate my daughter.
And I don't want to stay in this death trap of a city.
So where did the spies come from?
- New scepsia, I think.
- Then we go to new scepsia.
If nothing else, it's a lead.
- All right. Let's save the city.
- Ok, you have to ask before you do that.
Bird!
Ugh, I have to be more specific.
Eagle!
[groans] giant eagle!
Eagle that is big enough!
Stupid-- [screeches]
Time to put an end to empathy.
- Oof, don't love the sound of that.
How about, let's go find some poo mushrooms!
No? Ok.
Well, we'll work on it.
- So we find this cure.
We get stupendous back in shape.
And we have a fighting chance against these spartans.
- Spartans are the least of your troubles.
- Yes, yes, I know you say empathy
Is so incredibly dangerous.
But I still can't see how it could possibly be--
Is this new scepsia?
- I believe it was.
You were saying?
- I don't understand.
How can empathy be so destructive?
Perhaps I've been confusing it with compassion,
The organically occurring version
In human beings like myself.
- Except compassion isn't real.
It's a performance, something that lazy humans made up
So they could get out of the hard work
Of killing each other.
- You would think that, wouldn't you?
Incapable as you are of understanding
The natural human urge to love one's neighbor.
- [screaming] - ah, ah!
Get her off me. Mom, help!
- He's so smart. - Clearly.
- You're so smart.
- Look, no offense, you guys,
That just doesn't mean that much to me,
Given that you both have a mind disease.
- I get it. - Yeah, of course you do.
That's the problem.
- Spot of bad news, I'm afraid,
The spartans will be here by lunch.
So I'd eat early.
- What? You said a day!
- Apparently, they've trained themselves
To March while sleeping.
- Damn it. And stupe's compromised.
Well, at least we've got empathy contained.
- Bad news on that front as well.
It's getting awfully nice out there.
- Mommy, can we get bread today?
- I'm sorry. We can't afford it.
- Ah, on the house. - [gasps]
- Oh, god. Oh, no.
You're definitely not a stone cold killer again now
By any chance, right?
Just got to triple check.
- I understand why you would want me to be.
- [screams]
- It's too bad the spartans don't have empathy.
That would simplify things.
- Say that again. - From the beginning?
All right.
We heard you were starting one of those newfangled cities.
I said this to ty.
- Huh?
No, just the last part.
What if this unstoppable disease were the cure
To the unstoppable spartans?
Dad, hand me a bucket for collecting tears.
Have I ever told either of you guys how hard it was
To grow up with this guy for a father?
[fake sobbing]
- What are we in the mood for, boys?
The usual wanton destruction?
Or do we feel like we want to get ugly?
[all chanting] ugly, ugly, ugly!
- [laughs] that's what I'm talking about.
[clicks, mist hissing]
- Welcome, spartans, to krapopolis.
- It--
It seems like a great city.
- Well, thank you. Do you really mean that?
- Yeah, I mean, to be honest, we came here to rape
And enslave everyone that we didn't just brutally murder,
But you guys would hate that, wouldn't you?
- Oh, yeah. Definitely.
- Doesn't appeal, I'm afraid.
- And that makes perfect sense.
You certainly didn't do anything to deserve it.
We've been here for, like, 10 seconds,
And everybody just seems to be really nice people.
- It's so nice. - Yeah, I can't believe it.
- It's really nice here.
- Well, make yourselves at home.
- Thank you. - Sir.
Permission to speak, sir.
- Go ahead.
- I understand why you had to take me from my parents
At age seven and raise me in a brutal spartan gulag,
Deprive me of food, and ritually flog me every day.
It's a tough world out there.
- Thank you.
- Yeah! - Whoo-hoo!
- Well, what do you know?
It worked.
Crisis averted.
- [grunts] oh.
Mmm.
- Forget the crisis.
I think we may have just turned these highly trained
Killing machines into highly trained helping machines.
This might even be fun.
- Ok, that woman clearly didn't have empathy.
- But yours, on the other hand, inspiring,
The way you begged me to kill her.
- I didn't beg you to--
I mean, I did, but I was panicking.
She was trying to kill me.
You obviously don't have to care about someone
Who's trying to kill you. - I see.
So help me understand the rules.
You don't have to care if they're killing you.
What if they're stealing your food?
- Well, you wouldn't have to care as much, I suppose.
- What if they're tall?
- Screw tall people.
They've already had everything handed to them.
Anyway, it doesn't change the fact
That we humans really do prioritize
Each other's happiness above our own.
And that's one power we have that you lack.
Oh, thank goodness.
I am parched.
- Don't drink that water!
Look, that fish is trying to feed itself
To that starving bear.
And the bear feels bad for not eating it.
- There's empathy in the water?
A river of tears.
- But who could be crying that much?
Unless-- oh, no, empathis.
- That's the titan who tried to kill
You all with empathy during the war
But you killed her instead?
- Or thought we had.
This isn't a mushroom-picking mission, tyrannis.
It's a titan-killing one.
- You guys are so strong.
Look at me.
I can barely get around.
- No. What?
All we're good at is killing people,
Tearing out their esophaguses, you know, that kind of thing.
You've made so much out of nothing.
- Come on.
I can't even pick up crates at the dock
I need brought to my lab.
- Well, we could do that. Which crates?
- Really?
- Well, pretty much, if you see a crate at the dock,
You can bring it up to my lab.
- Excited to help. Spartans, assist!
- I'm not exactly preoccupied with the feelings of others.
But I wonder whether you might be taking it a smidge too far.
- You sure you aren't infected, dad?
[laughs]
- [laughs drily] - whew.
All right, I'm gonna go exploit them some more.
It's fun that there's a risk of consequences.
- Yes.
- You guys have been so gracious.
It's made me rethink my whole life as a spartan.
Everywhere we go, we have such a negative impact
On other people.
- Are you kidding me?
You guys are so cool!
- Really? - Yes.
Can I tell you honestly?
The whole truth is that we're playing you guys.
- Oh, in what sense?
- Well, we've given you empathy.
- Empathy?
- Yep, wait, why did I just tell you that?
Do I have it?
Was that not seawater on those crates?
Oh, man. I'm totally compromised.
You could do whatever you want to me.
Damn it.
I wouldn't have told you that unless I had it.
I totally have it.
Anyway, yeah, we screwed you guys.
Why do I keep doing this?
- Well, thank you so much for being honest.
- You're not mad? - Mad?
[chuckles] no.
I mean, I hope you understand I do have
To tell the other spartans.
- Of course I understand.
I'm infected.
I can't ask you to lie to people.
But what would you say are the odds that you guys are
Gonna, you know, murder me?
Like, if you had to guesstimate.
- Oh, um, I want to say zero,
But I don't want to lie to you.
- It's higher than that. - Oh, yeah, way higher.
All the way, really. I'm sorry.
- And, like, now or-- - yeah.
You understand. - I do, unfortunately.
Quick and painless? - Mmm.
- All right, do what you got to do.
Ah!
You saved me.
I love you, dad.
- Quite meaningless, as always.
[exciting music]
- Now, a titan you said, yes?
- Shaped like a dragon. - A dragon?
- How is that worse, tyrannis?
A dragon isn't more dangerous than a titan.
- Just scarier, I guess.
But you can kill her, right?
I mean, if she comes at us.
- Comes at us?
No twinge of empathy urging you to take the poor dragon's
Feelings into account?
- Fine, enjoy this, mother. You're right.
I'm no better than you after all.
- [laughs] you don't say.
No better than the goddess deliria.
Oh, tyrannis, you do make me laugh.
- I'm saying you win.
You don't have to rub it in my face.
- Oh, what have I won?
Is there a prize that comes with your begrudging
Recognition that you yourself do not possess the holy virtue
You for some reason thought made you better
Than the goddess deliri--
Ah!
- [growling]
- Ah! - Mom!
- Oh, this is the biggest mistake--
Of our lives.
What are we doing?
Oh, you were right, tyrannis.
I see it now.
I was living in darkness to exclude
The viewpoints of others.
Oh, just look at her.
How could I not see?
She's just defending herself.
We took over their world, and now we're invading her home.
Oh, you poor thing.
- Oh, no.
- [roars]
- Tyrannis, watch your step.
Careful on the ice.
Oh, what am I saying? Is this empathy?
Do I have it? Oh, I don't like this one bit.
- [cackling]
- Yes, dear, yes.
Let it all out.
- [growling]
- Tyrannis?
There's no need to hide, tyrannis.
All empathis wants is to share her gift, with perhaps just
A pinch of entirely understandable revenge.
- Mother, she's your ancient enemy
From a war that nearly wiped out the olympians, you said.
- I may have exaggerated.
If we're being honest, it was less a war
Than it was an extermination.
Oh, I'm the only monster in this cave.
- [growls]
- That is audibly untrue.
Look, I know regret is very new for you.
So listen to someone who's rather an expert in it.
What you need to do is focus on what's going on right now
And how to move forward.
- [growls]
- So can you please just go back to helping me find
The cure and very probably slaying this dragon?
- Well, I'm not sure she deserves to die
Just because we don't like
What she's putting out into the world.
- Oh, give me a break, mom.
- Oh, do you want to sit on my lap?
- Yeah, like 30 years ago!
- So this is awkward.
We understand why you did what you did.
But we also understand that it involved
You thinking you're better than us.
I'd ask you to recognize how wrong that was.
But we also know now that you don't care.
So the only way to make you recognize it
Is to hurt you a lot, for a while,
Before eventually killing you.
Badly!
- Badly? Ok, we got to stretch this out.
I'll stop taking advantage of them, obviously.
- I don't think that's going to make
A difference at this point.
- You got any murder back in your heart
Or is that a stupid question?
- It's not a stupid question.
I think it's a great question.
- Agh!
But if I let you out of the cage,
It's not like you'll run off
And join the spartans or anything.
- Mmm. - You have to think about it?
- I don't want to tell you one thing
And then disappoint you
If I wind up doing a different thing.
- [growling]
- Mom, what are you doing?
- I'm so sorry, my darling boy.
I know you don't want this, but it really is for the best.
- No, it really is not because if you do have empathy for me,
If you understand my needs,
Then you know what I need right now is for you to be
Your old, violent self,
The mom I should have accepted in the first place.
- Say every word of that again.
- I'm saying, here you are, the mother
I thought I'd always wanted, but here I am
Needing you to be something else.
And the truly selfless thing for you to do right now
Is to behave selfishly by wanting your son
And not a monster to survive this!
- That isn't even close to what you said before,
But I accept your framing.
[zap]
- [roars]
[zap]
[growling]
[roaring]
[gasping]
- That is an act of moral bravery,
To do something so evidently heartless and cowardly
In the interest of the greater good,
To kill another living being, particularly one
Who can't defend herself.
- Ok, that's not helping, mom.
And we do not have time for it.
- [gasping]
- Oh, you really are a good son.
- I mean, we do have a minute.
- And, look, the cure.
- Ok, I'll take my praise later.
- We can save your sister and the city.
- And you.
- I don't want any.
I want this, you and me, my son.
- Question.
If we just fly away on my dad's back,
What happens then?
- We murder everyone in the city.
- All right, guys, that's not gonna work.
So as we are coming out of our own volition,
You have agreed-- promised, in fact--
Not to hurt us.
- I don't want to contradict you,
But we did not say any of that.
- Wow, kind of inconsiderate.
- Well, if it makes it any better,
None of us feel great about the situation.
- Yeah, it's true! - Not the best situation!
- Does not make it better, nope.
- Spartans--
- Mom!
- Eat this.
- If it'll make you happy.
Mm.
Hey, the fog is clearing.
I see people as valueless objects again.
- You ready to beat up some empathy-hobbled spartans?
- You bet your fishy ass I am.
- If you take another step forward,
You're gonna be a phalanx full of dead guys!
- We totally see where you're coming from.
- [grunts]
- On the other hand, there's more of us than you.
And we don't have to murder nice anymore.
- My mother is a goddess.
And she is currently infected with empathy.
And I don't want to cure her because she is nice to me now
For the first time ever.
But I'm warning you, I will.
Just please don't make me.
- Attack!
- Damn it. Bye, nice mom.
- Time for gratuitous violence.
- [screams]
[all screaming]
- You did it.
- Why did you not give me the cure?
- What?
Well, you said you didn't want the--
- And what kind of an idiot would?
What a dumb move.
You had what you wanted.
Are you really that stupid?
- Right. There she is.
- There she is. You did this.
Why?
You truly are an embarrassment, tyrannis!
Having briefly understood your pathetic feelings
Makes it all the more clear what an ass-face you truly are.
- [sighs] - so what have we learned here?
- Don't try to trick a spartan?
- Well, but it all worked out, didn't it?
- Depends how you define it.
- I'll tell you what we learned.
Together, as a family, we can overcome anything,
Even empathy.
- Yeah! - Yeah!
- Whoo! - Whoo-hoo!
- Yeah! - Well done.
- Whoo! - Very good.
[laughter]
- So although some remained afflicted with empathy,
The effects quickly faded, and the people learned
To manage what was left of it.
But the disease itself stuck around.
It was passed down from generation to generation,
Sometimes stronger, sometimes weaker,
But never quite going away.
Now you might have just enough to bid at a school charity
Auction but not enough to take in an unhoused person
From the underpass.
[laughs]
So if every once in a while
You feel that twinge of feeling what other people feel,
Experiencing their point of view as somehow important,
It might not be because you're a good person.
It might just be because you're sick.
[laughs]
Well, that's all for tonight.
I'm the crazy narrator man.
Any time you don't see me in an episode,
It means I'm in your house.
- Did you get any of that?
- Bento.