Clement

My name is Clement, for what it matters to you. I suppose my name is appropriate, I have much forgiving to do, firstly of myself. I am an octopus, if you were curious. I write with eight styluses, each in an interestingly shaped half circle tablet, though I’m supposing that isn’t how this is getting to you: it must have been translated. I have a garden; my mother had a garden as well. It’s in a cave and thankfully, since I live near enough to the surface that Fri the Blind Geometer’s bright and hot finger’s don’t touch it; it’s in the shade. It used to be, in the days I write about, in the days of warring secret societies, of adventures and marvels, a safe place. Indeed, I had the honour of hosting the first octopus-cuttlefish talks, the first shrimp crab meetings, and eventually, by way of constant effort to communicate, predator-prey talks. I have been writing from a time before that, now, gluttony is seldom heard of among predators: why would we waste life like that? My garden somehow stayed undiscovered, the hub of secret activities, then, when it came to the age of adir, or The Great Spill, when secrets were revealed, my garden had the misfortune of being discovered.  Now, sadly, they could be found, whoever came into my garden. And how sad that is! Rules! Oh, we octopuses do love rules, they can be so useful and fun, but when a place has too many denizens, and they have to be enforced! As if they were immutable, incorrectable things? Terrible! I’ll be more specific presently. I grew to loathe rules, but no, rules, I remind myself, are neutral, to be played with and enjoyed, never bound by. Ah, I’m far from that sort of grace now.

It took a long time to grow my garden. The corals and blia and iox [sea horses and sea anemones –trans] were easy enough; I mean the reputation. I set out from the beginning trying to earn respect, someone who knows his things. I wanted every being to talk. Cuttlefish only talked among themselves, as did shrimps, crabs, and octopuses let alone fish; I knew, I’m sure others had thought, we creatures had a lot to offer, and still do. Indeed, we still don’t talk as much as would be good, but the reef is becoming a better place, I hope. The reef is growing, as it would have no matter who did what, but really every creature’s decisions pushes it on in some way. I had to withhold a lot of meals to be in my position, and I had to take excellent care of my garden. Many a rock fish and shark I’ve had to fend off, but some fishes, those big fishes, believe it or not, if you have a garden and can fight, you have their attention. I can fight, not to well, but not bad either. After some time, and  it didn’t seem like long, the IxTaVol, if you know who they are, were meeting with Fa’ng, and the rest happened of its own accord.

It started when I tried to talk to a crab. It was an ordinary day, I wasn’t hungry, I’d had another crab earlier, marking deeper the futility. I was determined, still. Understand, octopuses are subject to oscillations of intelligence. That is, we can be one day brilliant; another, insipid. Take today, when, as we were in front of a gorgeous rock with a single kelp plant and some coral. I made my garden shaped like me, if I were shining on my best day, with my mantle in the cave and my arms in the eight verandas extending from it. The crab was orange, like me, and closer examination revealed the creature to be a female

“Hello,” I shined, as if anyone but an octopus could understand the sublime language.

The crab turned away. She sped, crabwise, as would be expected, away from me.

I went over to her. I wanted to make sure it knew I wouldn’t eat her. She looked at me. I opened my arms, and shined, outward, hoping that would be understood as a welcome. An black round eye searched my garden for a place to hide, just in case. Had others before me attempted this? Was it new? She most likely never saw anything like it. I understood my usual speech of words and movements would be useless here. How could I go about this? How does one communicate an inquiry? Or negation? I’d like to be able to say “I would never hurt you” and imply with an unconscious twitch that as much as I’d like to talk, I’ll need to eat eventually. As it was, I had communicated openness, and she returned the gesture.

The crab must have been thinking along the same lines, for she motioned to me, then to the cave. I suppose this meant she would like to to take leave of me. I never! The only way I could think of to reply was by touching her with my arm, then retreating the appendage, all in my native orange colour. I could eat you, but I won’t. The truth. That was the truth. Why would I eat her? How do I ask a question now, a question like How do you go about life? or Do you have any questions for me? Instead, she motioned towards me, and said to follow her. Where was she taking me? I am and have always been a patient octopus, so I followed. We went somewhat a ways. Then, in front of an unassuming reef, she stopped her sideways gate, and she turned to face me. She held out her claws, fastened shut, and I made a glow in return, hoping she’d understand I’d be silent. She went in, and I heard her claws tapping rhythmically. It took a long time, and a lot of clicking, but sooner than not she went out, held her claws out again, and motioned for me to follow her.

—

Ozymandias, your humble author will name the hermaphrodite, was an i’ra’kot [oyster]. He was an unusual oyster: see, it is a law of nature that everything must move; oysters were content that others could do the moving around while the ocean would move around them. Smart, someone lazy might say. But Ozymandias was ill content with this: she wanted to move himself. She somehow understood, with some sense other oysters didn’t have, that there was a world beyond the blindness and the refreshing tides serving him plankton to be filtered and cleaning out her waste. But Ozymandias desired, craved something else for his life. His shell wasn’t, like for the neighbouring oysters, a home; it was a trap.

To most oysters, such as her friend, Orwell, tradition was of the utmost importance. They spoke by feeling each other’s minds and by the opening and closing of their shells [cephalopods don’t do this as much because the complexity of their minds make it more difficult than shining]. They, like most creatures, could sense each other’s mind but had an inordinate respect for privacy. It was unusual for a creature with so little to keep private, but most oysters had a very good sense of with whom, and when, to tell what little they had to say: when to talk about eating, food, traditions, reproduction and in a shell of some kind, themselves. They shared with neighbors, for example, and whenever a fla [barnacle] or ge’o’a [sea anemone] or even a young coral came about they would first learn about the new neighbor, and decide whether to reveal anything, or stay in its shell.

Ozymandias was alone. Near him were other oysters, and on his shell grew a barnacle. Every day that barnacle, like its myriad siblings, flung its tendrils to the sea. It was a plain part of the reef, or perhaps a dazzling part; none of our heroes could tell.

“I envy you.” Ozymandias once confided to Pete over the course of a feeding cycle. Oysters speak by way of the opening and closing of their shells which makes a subtle impression in the water. It takes a very long time. “You are freer than I am. What is it like?”

“Be careful!” another oyster, Osbourne, said. “An oyster should talk only to another oyster.”

“Indeed!” Confirmed Orwell, “Few have done it, but who will stop you?”

“The gods! The good ocean may stop serving us our plankton!!” Osbourne insisted.

“Be quiet! You fool, I want to listen!” Orwell, too, insisted.

The oysters were frustrated, the traditional ones. Orwell was careful, and wanted to remember so he could talk about it later.

“What’s it like being a barnacle?” Ozymandias said.

“Every day,” Pete replied, “we escape our confines, burst out, and feel the tide against our tendrils. It is a magnificent feeling. I think that is what you want to know.” Most of the shell fish thought the whole ordeal scandalous, but Ozymandias and Orwell listened. “I was even more free once.” Pete relished the attention: “I once could swim around. I had an eye, and could see light.”

“Light!” Ozymandias was excited, “I’ve heard once of that!”

“Yes,” replied Pete, “it was a long time ago, when I was young. It was brilliant,” what else would it be? “Light,” the crustacean continued, “was glorious. I had two impulses then, one was to seek the light, to be nearer to it, to adore it. The other was to eat and grow. And I grew. And I sought. But then a third impulse came, stronger than the others: to find my place in the ocean. There were many things I had to do. I needed a place with good composition, good chances of living. Here there seemed a good chance of eating, a few fellows. So I put my head in your shell and made myself at home there.

“But know, my fellow shelled creature, I don’t envy you. You, I can feel it, have a heart. I do not. My species has, well, some bad members, some creatures I’m ashamed to call family. There are siblings of mine who destroy lives, because they have no heart.”

“Have you seen a fish?”

“I have, when I was young.” Pete was humble enough to know not to give himself the credit of almost having been a fish.

“I want to be a fish. To swim, endlessly, to search the oceans for the great light you spoke of. I have always wanted this. Do you ever wish you hadn’t grown on my shell? That you continued to swim?”

“I have, but brushed these thoughts aside. I needed to. The ocean has a will, my new friend, it I didn’t find a place, I knew that it would be bad.”

“That is silly. How can you know without experience? We’re talking, and the ocean serves us.”

“Perhaps the ocean willed us to speak. Perhaps the Blind Geometer’s desire was that you have your ache for freedom. Who is a mortal to tell you?”

“Tell me more about vision,” Ozymandias’ question was like an earthquake and shook from his little mollusk heart. Shook of frustration, want, pure need to escape blindness and shelledness.

“I see a little. I see…” As he said this, which took half a Blind Geometer’s turning the sea, a whelk crawled to and ate Pete. The little snail unceremoniously left, to eat other barnacles.

After some time, Ozymandias knew what happened, and his heart grew weak. She tried to extend his muscle, as if to eat, but stretched it further, harder, to break his shell. Everything to such a creature as her was slow: after a long time she realized how vain it was, how hopeless. He relaxed and was grateful she didn’t succeed. After cycles of contemplation on a level unknown to most mollusks, he couldn’t accept that the effort was hopeless. No fish would be slow enough to speak to him. Perhaps another snail. Sadly, the snails, too, were too fast. Our oyster was frustrated further. He was near giving up.

“Movement!” Our hero cried. Oysters had no word for adventure.

“Shut up! The good ocean moves! You don’t! That’s how it is.”

The oysters agreed. It was a tradition to stay still.

“Why?”

The others had no response.

Finally, a deox [sea star] was hungry. The creature crawled about, and Ozymandias could feel it in his filters.

“Hello,” he began. The languages among such creatures were mutually intelligible. They were all blind.

“Greetings, my name is Seneca.”

“You are like me, I suppose.”

“How?”

“Blind”

”Indeed.”

The star drew closer.

“What’s it like to move?”

“It’s utterly lovely. I’ve been still, but moving slowly is better.”

“Tell me more.”

Fri turned.

“You are in one place, and you are free. At any moment, I could choose to go in this direction, or in that one. But there is a cost. I will not tell it, you will know soon.”

And our oyster did learn. Seneca wrapped his arms around her. Slowly, the oyster’s desire was fulfilled. Slowly, did the Seneca’s arms crush the  shell, and, over an age, did the star open the shell.

It was, to Ozymandias, sheer joy. It was the closest thing, that moment between having his shell broken and being eaten, her accursed life knew to freedom. And it was lovely. His last words, to the starfish, were “thank you.”

And the starfish accepted his gratitude. Very rarely did she see someone who wanted death. This was the cost of his freedom: the taking of the lives of the enslaved. But today, he worried not, fretted not, for here was a life that welcomed him.

And after Seneca ate what she could, he found something: the result of ages of striving, of a life long search. Ozymandias’ sorrow wasn’t for naught: it made a pearl.