The Jar

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

Na druhé ráno priniesla Chiara k nádrži s Pastou sklenenú nádobu. Nádoba mala skrutkovací uzáver. Vo vnútri bol živý krab.

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

Chiara držala nádobu nad vodou. Pasta sledovala. Jeden chápadlo sa rozvinulo a natiahlo pozdĺž nádrže.

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

Chiara pustila nádobu do vody. Pomaly klesala. Pasta sa nevrhla. Chobotnice, povedala Chiara, sa nevrhajú. Najprv pozorujú.

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.

Polly sedela na okraji nádrže. Krab sa v nádobe pohyboval proti sklu. Pasta sa dotkla nádoby jedným chápadlom. Jej prísavky mali každá dvesto senzorických buniek. "Chápadlo chobotnice ochutná všetko, čoho sa dotkne," povedala Chiara.

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.

Pasta chytila nádobu druhým chápadlom. Obe chápadlá ju pomaly otáčali. Tretie chápadlo prišlo zozadu, aby preskúmalo uzáver.

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.

Chobotnice otvárajú nádoby so skrutkovacím uzáverom v laboratóriách už od 50. rokov. Prvýkrát to zvyčajne trvá desať alebo pätnásť minút. Nemyslia v krokoch. Nechávajú prísavky cítiť závity a otáčajú uzáver podľa toho, ako ich závity vedú.

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

Pasta otočila uzáver o pol otáčky. Potom o ďalšiu. Uzáver sa uvoľnil. Krab sa rozbehol do otvorenej vody.

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.

Nedostal sa ďaleko. Pastino štvrté chápadlo už bolo stočené pri ústí nádoby. Krab zmizol v chobotnicovom zobáku.

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."

Chiara niečo napísala na klipboard. "Tri minúty štyridsaťdva sekúnd. Zrýchľuje sa. Prvýkrát, keď sme jej dali nádobu, trvalo jej to jedenásť minút."

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

Pasta sa vrátila k svojej špirále z rúry. Jej chápadlá sa obtočili okolo nej.

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.

Chobotnice sú veľmi zvláštne, povedala Chiara Polly. Sú bližšie príbuzné slimákovi než čomukoľvek s chrbticou. Majú tri srdcia. Ich krv je modrá, pretože prenáša kyslík s meďou namiesto železa. V prírode žijú len tri až päť rokov. Pasta mala už dva. Naučí sa všetko, čo sa kedy naučí, v čase, ktorý jej zostáva.