Just Another Day of an Octolynx

Journal Entry #8,725

Ugh. These humans with identical long coats need to just leave me alone. I woke up, per usual, with four pairs of eyes on me through the other side of my thick glass fortress. I’m not sure if they know how rude they are. Maybe their small brains can’t comprehend how rude it is to stare, especially while one is sleeping.

Being that they can not understand me, I lock all eight of my eyes at the same time, pairing two with each individual, hoping they would catch on or even care that they are being so rude, disturbing my slumber. I do know that the spotted, stringy furred one that only had fur on the top of his skull, commented that I appeared to be scowling at them. If they could understand me I would have said would you be annoyed if you woke up every day to four pairs of eyes looking at you? Even though this has been an occurrence for as long as I can remember, don’t think I could ever be used to it.

The day went on like every other day. They would throw in something random to see if I would eat it. The first day that I could recall they had thrown some weird flakes in my tank. I couldn’t identify what it smelled like. I just knew it was unappetizing. The human just watched me stare at it as it dissolved.

Eventually they worked their way to throwing all kinds of things for me to feast on. One of my favorites was alive, single tails, small and aquatic creatures. It gave me a thrill when I chased them around. They were quick but not quick enough. Later, I would find out through human conversations that it was called shrimp. Delicious!

Today, they dropped bits of meat in my tank. It didn’t give me the thrill of the chase as the shrimp did but it was still delicious and tender. Because of its texture, I don’t think it was an aquatic being. It was way less rubbery. For the most part it was tender but every few bits I would get a surprising chewy part - the best part. I think I will log that away as my top five favorite meals.

That meal made me so full I could not move as fast as I normally would as the minacious tool came near me to poke through my soft skin and remove the blue liquid from my innards. I absolutely hate that thing! I wish they would stop! Eventually I just sat still, my stomach expanded, giving up on trying to swim away, suffering through the uncomfortable, torturous, routine.

As the day went by, I could see the humans working on what I now know to be a computer. It was a usual affair. Over the course of the time I have learned to read and write in their language. Swimming at the top of my tank, peering just over their shoulder I could see their notes and test results that they hand wrote about me. Most of these notes were just kishkoshkus which translated to their native tongue means… Bullshit!

Anyways, as I stared at the computer, dropping my eyes down to look at the corner of the screen to look at what time they thought it was… First off, humans have the strangest concept of time. It's completely delusional. It astonishes me how an entire race of beings can live their lives by this delusion. As I was saying, staring at the computer screen a most peculiar creature came gallivanting in, destroying the place.

The beast had fur from the tip of its nose to the end of its tail. It pounced on four legs, slobbering with excitement. I saw a terrified human hide, while one of them yelled in anger and despair, while the other two tried to catch the allusive creature. The sounds of chaos and destruction were happening all around me.

Suddenly, I could hear the sounds of cracking glass all around me. My heart seemed like it would jump out of one of my eight legs as the sound of my glass barrier shared around me. The destruction of my tank left me wounded on a cold, slippery surface. I had several cuts on my body made from shards of glass. I felt as if I could barely move.

The humans had a look of panic stretched across their faces. A petite, curly furred one with magnifiers stretched across its face, knelt down to me. With all my strength, I exposed a hand at the tip of one of my legs and gripped my tiny hand around one of her fingers. I had never attempted to communicate with a human in this way before.

The human gently placed my hand on the ground, observing it retreating back into my leg. Robotically, it stood up and grabbed a large basin. I saw the human begin filling the basin up with water and then my world went black. I awoke submerged in water with the same human punching a note against the outside of the glass asking me if I was okay.

I responded, shaking my head yes.

I could not recall how much I shared with the human but clearly it knew I could read and that throwing me in a basin of water would activate my healing powers. It put its hand up against the outside of the glass. Pausing for a moment, looking around for others, I exposed one of my hands at the ends of my leg and flanked it up against its hand on the inside of the glass. I didn’t need to hold its hands to tell what the puzzled look on its face meant. I swam and did a twirl and exposed all eight of my hands at the tips of my eight legs.

The curious human said, “My name is Elizabeth. Nice to meet you Octolynx.”. Apparently, I told Elizabeth a lot more than I imagined. At first I was worried but I think it could be a good thing. As I sit here, writing in the dark, watching her asleep at her work desk I’m thinking maybe this is a good thing after all. It will certainly make it less lonely around here.

Until tomorrow - Octolynx