The hive exist, or desire to please the survivors. However they want. Koumba has used this more than anyone else to his own advantage to live the life of a decadent, hedonistic and shallow playboy - roleplaying as James Bond and surrounding himself and having sex with women. Now, to me - this is very much - at the minimum - taking advantage of them. The women he’s having sexual relations with are not who they were, and it is unlikely - even if the hive came to him and suggested it (as I suspect they did) - that the women before the joining would be remotely interested in doing this. They are not them. Who they were has been lobotomised, malformed and disappeared into the hive - segmented up into billions of bodies.
I’ve seen some people (not here, but elsewhere) suggest that this behaviour is okay because the hive is consenting. The women he’s picking show enthusiastic and active consent. This to me is disgraceful, not just in the context of that - but also what could be the case if Koumba had different, darker interests.
Now the show will not address this (and rightfully so) - but it still seems true to me regardless of that. If Koumba was a pedophile, they would provide him with children he requested - and the children would provide active consent. Just like the women he picks now, they wouldn’t be who they were. There is no concept of childhood or child innocence anymore. The hive literally can’t say no unless it contradicts their survival or asks them to hurt others.
So to anyone who thinks the hive is a good thing (and some people actually do), or that Koumba is doing no wrong with what he’s doing. This should be a point to consider.
The guy in Paraguay is the wild card in this as well. Couple that with the fact that all of the other survivors except Carol and he are part of an in-group, there’s definitely going to be some antagonism.
They set Laxmi up as a very early foil for Carol, and are definitely keeping her occasionally present so that we don’t forget about her for a reason. I can imagine Carol potentially doing something else that affects the infected in a bad way, and if something were to actually happen to her son, I feel like she’d be out for blood.
I also expect some of the survivor group to dwindle over time, as there were members who were not only happy with the status quo, but actively wanted to join up with their loved ones (Kusimayu, for instance), who would probably acquiesce to the stem cell extraction needed to infect them.
That, and the hivemind is definitely still going to be looking into other, less invasive approaches to infect the remaining few who don’t consent (maybe a spit swab, would definitely place Diabate at greater risk).
Carol froze her eggs so people are theorizing the hive will get her stem cells that way
Apparently that’s not actually possible.
I’m no medical expert, but I believe they could thaw and fertilize the egg to make an embryo and then harvest stem cells that way
A fertilized egg would not be her stem cells as they would only have half of her DNA, unless I am mistaken
I wonder if she would now given she knows they’re going to starve within 10 years.
About that… apples falling from the tree are fine, but eggs from a chicken aren’t?
A crash tree planting program might do the trick. Acorns, other nuts.