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Snow Crash Chapter 61 Summary

How It All Goes Down

  • Hiro stares at the broken tablet on the deck, and then is tackled by wireheads, who start taking him deeper into the ship.
  • Suddenly a woman's voice speaks nonsense syllables, and the wireheads drop him. Someone comes into view—it's Juanita.
  • But she's got a wire coming out of her skull too. Oh no…
  • She explains that the brainwashing doesn't work on her, because brains have immune systems, too, and hers has gotten a big boost from becoming an atheist and going back to religion.
  • Hiro asks why they didn't harm her the way they did Da5id, and she explains that it's because she came voluntarily, like Inanna descending into the underworld.
  • They gather the shattered tablet, and Hiro uses his computer to take pictures of it; the Librarian digitally assembles the tablet and reads it. His voice is projected by a microphone that reaches the entire Raft.
  • Juanita plugs her ears, and then Hiro sees the blood. She says she used a scalpel to cut the wire that went to her brain, since if she'd heard the nam-shub, she would've lost all the knowledge she came here to gain.
  • Hiro asks her if she'll go out with him again if they get out of this. She says yes.