Toples

Pada pagi kedua, Chiara membawa sebuah toples kaca ke tangki Pasta. Toples itu memiliki tutup ulir. Di dalamnya ada seekor kepiting hidup.

On the second morning, Chiara brought a glass jar to Pasta's tank. The jar had a screw lid. Inside was a live crab.

Chiara memegang toples di atas air. Pasta mengamati. Satu lengannya terulur dan menjulur di sepanjang sisi tangki.

Chiara held the jar above the water. Pasta watched. One arm uncurled and stretched along the side of the tank.

Chiara menjatuhkan toples ke dalam air. Toples itu tenggelam perlahan. Pasta tidak menerkam. Gurita, kata Chiara, bukanlah penyerang. Mereka adalah pengamat terlebih dahulu.

Chiara dropped the jar into the water. It sank slowly. Pasta did not lunge. Octopuses, Chiara said, are not lungers. They are observers first.

Polly duduk di tepi tangki. Kepiting itu merayap melawan kaca di dalam toples. Pasta menyentuh toples dengan satu lengan. Pengisapnya memiliki dua ratus sel sensorik masing-masing. "Lengan gurita merasakan semua yang disentuhnya," kata Chiara.

Polly perched on the tank rim. The crab scuttled against the glass inside the jar. Pasta touched the jar with one arm. Her suckers had two hundred sensory cells each. "An octopus arm tastes everything it touches," Chiara said.

Pasta mengumpulkan toples dengan lengan kedua. Kedua lengan itu memutarnya perlahan. Lengan ketiga datang dari belakang untuk menjelajahi tutupnya.

Pasta gathered the jar with a second arm. The two arms turned it slowly. A third arm came around the back to explore the lid.

Gurita telah membuka toples berulir di laboratorium sejak tahun 1950-an. Pertama kali, biasanya memakan waktu sepuluh atau lima belas menit. Mereka tidak berpikir dalam langkah-langkah. Mereka membiarkan pengisap merasakan ulir dan memutar tutup sesuai arah ulir.

Octopuses have been opening screw-top jars in labs since the 1950s. The first time, it usually takes ten or fifteen minutes. They are not thinking in steps. They are letting the suckers feel the threads and turning the lid the way the threads pull.

Pasta memutar tutupnya setengah putaran. Lalu satu lagi. Tutupnya terlepas. Kepiting itu bergegas keluar ke air terbuka.

Pasta turned the lid one half-rotation. Then another. The lid popped free. The crab scrambled out into the open water.

Ia tidak pergi jauh. Lengan keempat Pasta sudah melingkar di mulut toples. Kepiting itu menghilang ke dalam paruh gurita.

It did not get far. Pasta's fourth arm was already curled at the jar's mouth. The crab disappeared into the octopus's beak.

Chiara menulis sesuatu di papan klip. "Tiga menit empat puluh dua detik. Dia semakin cepat. Pertama kali kami memberinya toples, butuh sebelas menit."

Chiara wrote something on a clipboard. "Three minutes forty-two seconds. She is getting fast. The first time we gave her a jar, it took her eleven minutes."

Pasta kembali ke gulungan pipanya. Lengannya melingkar di sekeliling tubuhnya.

Pasta returned to her coil of pipe. Her arms wrapped around herself.

Gurita sangat aneh, kata Chiara kepada Polly. Mereka lebih dekat hubungannya dengan siput daripada dengan makhluk yang memiliki tulang belakang. Mereka memiliki tiga hati. Darah mereka berwarna biru, karena membawa oksigen dengan tembaga, bukan besi. Mereka hanya hidup tiga sampai lima tahun di alam liar. Pasta sudah berusia dua tahun. Dia akan mempelajari semua yang akan dia ketahui dalam waktu yang tersisa.

Octopuses are very strange, Chiara told Polly. They are more closely related to a snail than to anything with a backbone. They have three hearts. Their blood is blue, because it carries oxygen with copper instead of iron. They live only three to five years in the wild. Pasta was already two. She would learn everything she would ever know in the time she had left.