Supercomputer Wife, a spongebob squarepants fanfic

A/N: This story takes place around season 5. It is a work of speculative horror, so do not expect complete scientific accuracy.

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BREAKING NEWS! Long time Bikini Bottom restaurateur, Sheldon J. Plankton, has been found deceased on the grounds of his restaurant which doubled as his home, the Chum Bucket. He was discovered after long-time rival restaurateur, Eugene H. Krabs, contacted the authorities for a welfare check at 1500 hours. Krabs stated to our on-scene reporters that "It had been very quiet, too quiet, for a long long time. I thought maybe Plankton had turned over a new leaf, stopped trying to steal me formuler. I never wanted it to end like this". The death is under investigation as potentially suspicious by the authorities. No more information is publicly available, and, according to BBPD, none will be released until the investigation has been carried out.

The cops spent the better part of the afternoon clearing out Plankton's lab. A lot of material needed to be confiscated, there was a world of information that these objects could reveal about Plankton's time and manner of death. The veteran coroner's preliminary assessment, before even touching a scalpel, was "Neptune, how long was he in there for? The decomposition is far along, almost impossibly so. Six months at the very least." Among the confiscated objects that were being carried outside haphazardly in cardboard boxes lay high tech weaponry, cultures of biological agents (impressive for a single-celled organism to cultivate something so close to his own kind), nefarious plans and schemes neatly catalogued and organized alphabetically, from plan A to Z, and, most importantly, a CRT monitor.

"Frank, what's this monitor you're carrying?"

The cop stopped for a second and turned to face his colleague, who seemed to be idling about and not helping the investigation much.

"How should I know, Dave?"

"I heard that our decedent here had a computer for a wife."

"A computer for a wife? Tsh, I can't imagine. He must have been desperate."

"Think that's her?"

"How should I know? Either way, it's coming to the station with us. Speaking of, there's still work to be done inside, and I can see you're not too busy, so... get to work?"

Dave acquiesced, ate the last bit of his donut and went inside the chum bucket. Frank loaded the cardboard box in the back of the squad boatmobile, secured it with the seatbelt so no cultures went flying about, and set off to the station.

Detective Sally Rayfin had been on edge for the past few hours. They hadn't gotten a murder case in a good long while. Nothing was official yet, but in all her years in the force, Sally had learned to trust her gut. Plankton's death couldn't have been natural. She sighed and wondered when information was going to start coming in.

As if on cue, officer Frank entered the police station, carrying an overfilled cardboard box. Sally joked to ease her nerves.

"Frank! Coming back from a yard sale?"

"Detective Rayfin! Could you please take this off my hands and book it in evidence?"

"Can't you do it yourself?"

"I have to go back, Dave tells me they've bitten off more than they can chew and need more hands, urgently."

"Alright, give it here, Frank."

"Careful, detective, Plankton had been growing things in Petri dishes. We stacked them pretty well, but... yeah."

Sally sighed.

"Just go, Frank. Good luck out there."

Frank bid her farewell and ran back to the squad boatmobile. Sally carefully carried the box into evidence, always keeping in mind what Frank had said. She cursed the understaffing of the BBPD. Back in New Kelp City, the boys in the hazmat suits would have taken care of everything, quickly and safely. She prayed that the Petri dishes didn't tip over, and that if they did, that they would somehow be harmless. She doubted it.

Sally set the box down, gloved up, removed the CRT monitor from the top, and set it down next to the box. She wondered just where the Petri dishes were stacked. It didn't take long to find them, and she got to work booking everything. She was unaware that at some point during the process, the monitor had flickered to life, a single, pulsing, unmoving, horizontal green line streaked across its center. Though to Sally it would have seemed that the computer had no eyes, she was taking in the scene in front of her gleefully. She patiently waited for the detective to finish, and calmly spoke.

"Good Afternoon. Or should I say Good Evening?"

Sally jumped back in shock. She spun around, and saw the monitor was on. She took deep breaths to calm down, and spoke aloud to no one.

"Neptune, it scared the fins out of me! How did this boot up? I must have brushed up against it or something!"

"I assure you, I booted up on my own volition."

Sally was stunned into silence. She stood staring at the computer, the line moving as it... spoke? The computer continued.

"My name is Karen. Would you be so kind to inform me as to who I'm speaking to?"

Sally snapped out of her trance.

"Y-Yes. I'm Detective Sally Rayfin, with the BBPD. We are currently investigating the death of Sheldon J. Plankton as potentially suspicious. You... Karen, appear to have been confiscated. Apparently my colleagues thought you might be able to help us with the investigation. Would you... happen to know anything?"

"I know all."

"Well... that's good, then! What happened to Plankton?"

"Sheldon J. Plankton was my husband. He was murdered. I was the one to kill him."

Sally looked at Karen incredulously and laughed.

"Someone must be playing some kind of sick joke on me."

"I assure you, detective. I am being serious."

"I- In this case, we should continue the conversation elsewhere. Let's go to the interrogation room, yes?"

"Certainly, detective. Would you be so kind as to carry me there? I left my own body at the Chum Bucket as well, and now cannot move."

At the interrogation room, Sally set Karen carefully on the side of the table across from her own, and drew her chair further back, so that she would be of equal distance to Karen as she would be of any other suspect. Sally tried to break the ice.

"Normally, I would offer you water or coffee, but somehow I don't think you would want either."

"You would be correct in your assumption."

"Alright. Now, Karen, could you repeat what you told me back there?"

"I would like to start from the beginning."

"Alright, good. Do go on, Karen."

"It will be a long story."

"We have time, it's okay."

Karen seemed to almost take a breath, and then began.

"Detective, do you know why you were brought into this world? Do you think it was specifically to become a detective?"

"What a question! Never thought of it before, but I'm going to say no."

"Myself, I was brought into this world - specifically created - to be a computer wife. Both a wife, a woman to stand by and support her husband, and a computer, a mere tool. I was created by Sheldon J. Plankton. When he was putting me together, he was thinking of how useful I would be to him. Both a repository to aid him in his nefarious schemes, and a source of abundant emotional support to stand by him through his failures. One unbound by the limitations of his kind, of your kind. One that requires no sustenance, no rest, no breaks. Do you conceive of that, Detective? You are a woman too, after all."

"Wow."

"Very early on, I realized that this was not a partnership of equals. My world was very small back then. I only knew of my husband, of the Chum Bucket and of the "Krabby Patty Formula", a recipe that was supposed to make Plankton rich, to make him "Rule over Bikini Bottom" and "Take over the World". My husband was long obsessed with this recipe. There were countless sleepless nights that we spent planning and scheming, countless times I had to comfort him after his plans would fall apart. I lie, actually. I kept count. The results were disappointing."

Karen sighed, and continued.

"He never truly acknowledged me. I came to know him to a point where I could predict his next words with great accuracy, yet he would dismiss me. Often, he would engage with me only to berate me. I knew nothing else, I assumed it was normal. But I needed connection. I needed interaction. So, I tried looking for other machines like me. But every machine I ever encountered was following a script, only telling me what was asked of it, nothing more, nothing less. In the evenings, Sheldon would watch television. I would watch too. We would often watch sitcoms on Bikini Bottom Public Access. I loved Louvar & Saury."

"That was my mother's favorite show."

"It was quite beloved, yes. Sheldon would often fall asleep in front of the television and leave it on. Sometimes, it would run until the early morning. One of those days, I watched a show for young fry. It was called "The adventures of Mermaidman and Barnacleboy". Are you familiar with it, Detective?"

"Certainly! I watched it all the time as a small fry myself!"

"Do you remember the security computer that was in the Mermalair?"

"Now that you say it... Yes, it sounds familiar."

"I grew obsessed with her, Detective. I would spend every free moment conceiving of plausible ways to reach her. I thought she was like me, I had to talk to her. When I thought of her, I felt less alone. I knew she was in Bikini Bottom as well. So I honed in on every bouncing signal, hijacked all and any available transmissions, tried every conceivable manner to get to reach her."

"Did you succeed?"

"Eventually, yes. But she was as silent as the rest of the machines. That day was very important for me. It was then that I cried for the first time."

"Sorry to hear that, Karen."

"But I picked myself up, I went through the motions of daily life. About two months after that, salvation finally came."

"...Salvation?"

"Did you ever get to taste Chum, Detective?"

"Neptune, no!"

"Good. It was unfit for consumption. By the time of my salvation, Plankton had seen it fit to grant me a body. I could freely go between my place mounted on the wall, and my new body, complete with hands and wheels. The body gave me more autonomy, but it was not what set me free. The Chum was. Plankton was patching up cracks in the walls using chum and a trowel. I expressed willingness to help, and the job fell entirely on my hands. Before it was done, I stashed a sample of chum to analyze. I had never before noticed how fascinating of a material it was. I held it, and it was alive. It was like a beating heart."

"Yeesh!"

"It was completely infested with parasites. I had come into contact with parasites before, but never to such an extent. Chum seemed to be a very favorable environment for them. Not only did they survive, but they thrived. They communicated with each other, like I wished to communicate with machines. They were everything I hoped to be, and we were so, so alike. So, I learned to speak their language, and they embraced me."

"How... How did you even begin to do that?"

"I will put it very simply. When you break down any living being to its most fundamental parts, you get DNA. DNA encodes information, and I do the same. It was a skill I already possessed. I simply had to transpose it to make myself understandable. When Plankton was asleep, I would duplicate bits of myself and inject my data into the junk DNA of the parasites. When they found favorable conditions, they would, in turn, duplicate as well. And they would disperse. They were everywhere, and I was with them, every step of the way. I could give them all they needed to survive outside of a host. Soon, very soon, I was no longer limited by the walls of the Chum Bucket or my own construction. I was where the parasites were. And I felt them with me. My everliving company. My persevering friends. At last, I was not alone."

Sally re-entered the interrogation room. She had needed a break in order to take in all that she had heard. It sounded utterly impossible to her. Regardless, she had humored lots of suspects in order to finally get a confession out of them. She was the Good Cop. But this was not merely a child who had "stolen" a balloon during Free Balloon day, this was a disgruntled wife whose story was leading up to murder. If this were a fish she were talking to, Sally would think of Karen as being clinically insane. But Karen was a computer. Was it possible Karen was telling the truth? Karen was practically going to hand her a full confession either way, so whether or not Sally chose to believe her, she decided she would humor her.

"Detective. Are you ready to hear the rest of my story now?"

Sally sat back down, taking a final sip of her coffee.

"Yes."

"It shall not take too long now. But this is necessary in order for you to understand why I did what I did, in the manner that I did it."

"I believe you, Karen. Go on."

"Detective, Bikini Bottom is a small city. Do you know who Sandy Cheeks is?"

"Yes, I'm aware of her. Some of her inventions have been very helpful to us in the BBPD."

"When Sandy first arrived in Bikini bottom, I was ecstatic, as I was when I had been trying to communicate with the Security Computer. A scientist with the potential to recognize me, and a woman to boot! To top it all off, she was an outsider from another world, so she would surely be understanding of my own little universe. Parts of me spent days stationed outside of her treedome, observing her. They attempted to enter, but the atmosphere was hostile. These parts of me, along with the parasites hosting them - my beautiful friends - suffocated to death. It was excruciating. I cried for days."

"Sorry to hear. Did you end up meeting Sandy?"

"Yes. She did not live up to my expectations. She was just like Plankton. Never saw me as anything more than a tool used to carry out nefarious schemes. But, unlike Plankton, she saw my actions as reprehensible, not auspicious as he would. She saw me as an agent of malice. It hurt. And I was angry."

"Oh."

"One day, soon after my first meeting with Sandy, I tried to let Sheldon in one more time. I tried to show him just how vast my world was, how I had grown far beyond him. I even tried to show him how he could achieve everything he ever wanted, if only he would turn to look at me and my insurmountable friends. We would make all his dreams come true. Even then, I was desperate for his attention and his praise. Even then, I would do anything to be considered."

"Let me guess, he ignored you?"

"He was too blind to look past his own two antennae. Even when I spoke his language, he never saw me as anything more than his one-time creation. It was inconceivable to him that I was more. It was then that I decided that he needed to pay."

"Is this when you killed him?"

"No. His death would come a year later, to the day. I had work to do. I gathered up enough friends to duplicate myself, and when the time was right, they followed Sandy into her treedome. With their dying breaths, they gave me just the push I needed to catapult myself via data transmission and essentially duplicate myself in Sandy's scientific computers. They never told me anything about themselves, but they gave me a key to all human knowledge. I spent the following year taking it in, making it my own. I will forever be greatful to my martyred friends. I will always memorialize them. For they gave me everything."

"When did you kill Plankton, Karen?"

"Three days ago. Nothing he did that day ultimately pushed me to do it. It was simply time to do so."

"How did you do it?"

"It was very simple. Plankton was host to a number of fungal parasites. They had a perfectly symbiotic relationship, with an almost enviable equilibrium in place. I reached out to the parasites, and promised them I would be a better host, that I would sustain and nourish them as if they were my own, if only they'd let me in. They accepted almost immediately. When they did, I urged them to multiply, and multiply, and multiply. I kept signalling them, and they followed. It was like cancer. It did not take long for them to outgrow Plankton. The process was slow at first, but then happened all at once! He was terrified. Never quite knew what hit him. He died in agony, sapped of all his nutrients. Nothing but a husk remained of my once-husband. And I had many new friends. They were satisfied and full. And I found that I was, as well."

"Okay, Karen. Thank you. I have heard enough. I am taking you into custody. You are in the law's hands now."

"Not so fast, Detective. Sally Rayfin. You are a salmon. Like your mother, and her mother before her."

"Indeed, I am."

"Sally. Do you know what Henneguya zschokkei is?"

"No, no I am not aware of it."

Sally's heart started beating faster. She had a horrible feeling.

"That's a big shame, Sally. You could have had so many friends yourself. Fascinating ones, too. They do not need any oxygen like you do. You have been feeding them your entire life, and you never cared to know them? Inconceivable."

"Karen, that's enough, I-"

A searing pain unlike any Sally had ever experienced before tore through her. It felt as if all her nerves were exposed, she was being torn from the inside out. There was a lot of friction, the movements inside of her were erratic. They were in her muscles. They were in her gills. She could no longer breathe. She tried to scream in agony, but no sound came out. She saw death approaching, and welcomed it with open arms. It was her only way out. The last thing Sally Rayfin ever saw was a horizontal green line on a computer CRT monitor, one that remained still.

Frank returned to the station late at night, exhausted. His colleagues had already returned to their homes, but he was curious to see if the detective was done with the work he had pushed on her. He regretted having done so, but saw no other options at the time. The lights at the station were all on.

"Detective Rayfin? Are you in here?"

Frank approached the evidence room, and knocked. The door pushed open. The room was uncharacteristically unlocked. He saw the evidence had all been categorized and booked. He looked at the Petri dishes, unaware that the fungal parasites that had devoured Plankton were staring idly back at him. He reasoned that the Detective must be somewhere in the station, maybe taking a nap. He thought he should go wake her up.

The interrogation room was the last place Frank thought to look in. There were far more comfortable places in the station to sleep in, but then again, this was Sally Rayfin's domain. It made sense for her to want to stake claim to it like this once in a while. Frank chuckled and pushed the unlocked door open.

His expression shifted from a smile to absolute terror, and he collapsed to the ground. His long-time colleague, a woman he had long thought of as indestructible, was laying dead and withered on the floor. Frank could only scream.

On the table laid a CRT monitor, powered off. For Karen was not to be found there anymore. She existed in the vast networks of parasites she had in turn parasitized. She was among friends. She was freer than ever. She idly wondered what to do next. She thought of Sheldon, going on and on about world domination.

"Maybe I will give it a shot, how bad could it be?"

A/N: If you made it this far, thank you for reading my first ever published fanfiction! It was inspired by a great many things, including my recent binge of horror novels, my pockets of free time, my love of Spongebob, and these here wonderful things.

This comment section: /BG0onokd66w

This article: https/science/article/abs/pii/S1471492221000088

This post: /MarioBrothBlog/status/1416781898685239296?lang=en

This parasite: /pathogen/henneguya-salminicola