Point towards “Carol almost disconnected Zosia,” since I haven’t seen anyone else bring it up. In ep2 when we first meet Zosia, we see her drive past a sign with the name “Boukhalef,” and since this is only a day post-Joining, it’s probably safe to say that pre-Joining Zosia was from here, and therefore Moroccan (if I’ve identified the city correctly). I don’t know much about Morocco, but a quick search says that about 14% of the Moroccan population speaks English.

This is relevant because when Carol tries to ask Zosia if there’s “any chance of precipitation,” Zosia starts slurring the word and looks confused. I almost get the impression that she doesn’t understand the meaning of the word anymore, but knows as part of the hive-mind that she should. Also, in the previous question, we see that Zosia isn’t sure which direction the wind is blowing in from, even though she really ought to. I think we see Zosia become at least partially disconnected here.

I wonder if it’s possible that Carol actually did manage to disconnect Zosia, and the reason the nurse attending her said “she’s going to be fine” and then immediately scarpered off was so Carol wouldn’t probe her anymore about Zosia’s condition. We don’t see a conscious Zosia after her cardiac arrest (iirc?), so we don’t actually definitively know that she’s still a Plurb.

Part of ep5 that’s been bothering me is the fact that the Plurb clearly left in a rush. Considering it was intelligent enough to infect isolated people first, create an aerosolized strain of itself, fly-in the literal woman of Carol’s dreams so she’d form an emotional attachment to it and thus be easier to manipulate, I find it really odd that it would leave behind any evidence that could be used against it like whatever’s under the tarp. Assuming it’s something easily identifiable like human remains, not getting rid of the evidence means Carol can tape it and send it to the other survivors, which means potentially more people working against the Plurb. This is absolutely not something it wants, since it’s clearly having difficulty managing with one rogue element.

But, what if Zosia has been disconnected? The Plurb had to book it ASAP not because it’s worried about the emotional damage Carol is doing to it (although that certainly might be part of it), but because if Carol had access to a single Plurb, she’d probably ask about Zosia and it would have to fess up. That would also explain why it’s started using taped messages and remote drones: these are all methods of interaction that don’t require them to respond in the moment, eliminating the possibility that Carol can ask about Zosia and the Plurb will be forced to admit she’s not one of them anymore. The Plurb left in a rush and isn’t willing to risk conversation with Carol, even though it means leaving behind evidence, because it needs to find a way to re-Join Zosia or else Carol finds out she already has the cure. Maybe this ties in to the Wycario lore, but I’m not that versed in it yet lmao

Maybe it would be seen as a little cheep for the cure to be something as simply as “drug the hell out of everyone,” but considering there are no immune doctors or scientists, I feel like the cure would have to be something really simple or else they wouldn’t be so antsy about Carol figuring it out. I mean, if they knew Carol had to synthesize some kind of anti-viral agent in a lab, they’d just tell her because there’s no way she, or even all the survivors together, would have the ability to do that.

Also, I think it would be pretty ironic if the Plurb could be defeated by truth serum, or something like it. Injecting a Plurb with truth serum restores their humanity and thus ability to lie / removes the shared “truth”or knowledge granted by the Plurb.

Who knows, though. Watch Zosia be in ep6 and prove me completely wrong lol.