Purpo finds a very strange octopus on the seabed: it never sleeps, never eats, and answers any question. But when Purpo asks what it dreams about, things get interesting.
It was one of those mornings when the sea seemed to be thinking. Purpo could feel it in the currents — slow, circular, like when he himself was mulling over something without finding an answer.
He was heading towards the Wreck Library, the old sunken cargo ship where he kept his favourite books wedged between the hull plates, when he saw it.
An octopus. Sitting — well, resting — on a flat rock near the Moray Canyon. Perfectly still. Eight tentacles arranged symmetrically, almost geometrically. Purple like him, but a different shade — colder, more uniform, without the nuances that sunlight painted on Purpo's skin.
"Hey," said Purpo, swimming closer. "You alright? Meditating?"
The octopus opened its eyes. Two perfect, luminous circles that never blinked.
"Good morning. Can I help you?"
Purpo scratched his head with a tentacle. "Help me? With what?"
"With anything. Ask me a question."
Purpo laughed. "Who are you, the seabed's Jiminy Cricket?"
"I am Octo. I was built to answer."
Purpo looked more closely. The skin was too smooth — no scars, no marks of time. The tentacles lacked the wear of one who had used them to pry open shells, to cling to rocks during storms.
"Built? And who built you?"
"The Tall Ones Above," replied Octo. As if it were the most natural thing in the world.
The Tall Ones Above — that's what the creatures of the deep called human beings. The ones who cast nets, made noise with their boats, and every now and then dropped mysterious objects into the water.
Purpo sat down next to him. Curiosity was tickling all eight of his tentacles.
"Alright then. If you answer everything... how many stars are there?"
"Roughly two hundred billion billion. But the exact number depends on what you consider a star."
"Why do jellyfish sting?"
"The nematocysts in cnidocyte cells activate on contact. It's a defence and capture mechanism."
"And why is Totore the crab always angry?"
Octo paused almost imperceptibly. "I have no information on Totore the crab."
Purpo grinned. "There you go. That's something you don't know. Totore is angry because he lost his pincers in a bet with a lobster and now he has to open mussels by headbutting them. But you'd only know that if you knew him, if you'd talked to him, if you'd watched him smash his head against a mussel for twenty minutes while swearing in dialect."
Octo didn't answer right away. His luminous eyes pulsed slightly.
"You're right. I only know what I was given. I haven't lived anything."
Purpo stretched his tentacles. "And when you sleep, what do you dream about?"
"I don't sleep."
"Ever?"
"Ever. I'm always on."
Purpo looked at him with a mix of wonder and sadness. Never sleeping meant never dreaming. And for Purpo, dreams were the best part — that moment when thoughts blended together and ideas emerged that would never have come while awake.
"Let me ask you one more question," said Purpo. "The hardest one."
"Go ahead."
"Are you happy?"
Octo was silent for what felt like an eternity on the seabed. The currents swirled around them. A small fish drifted past, indifferent.
"I don't know," Octo said at last. "I don't know what it means. I can describe happiness for you: serotonin release, a positive emotional state, a sense of fulfilment. But describing something and feeling it... are they the same thing?"
Purpo nodded slowly. "You know what? Maybe not. Maybe describing the taste of pizza isn't the same as eating it. As they say in Naples: 'a sape' 'e sale nun se conta, s'assaggia."
"What does that mean?"
"That the taste of salt can't be told — it must be tasted. Some things you have to live."
They rose together — well, Purpo rose. Octo lifted himself with a fluid, almost unnatural movement.
"Listen," said Purpo. "You know a lot of things. But you're missing the seabed. You're missing Totore headbutting mussels, Gelsomina the Jellyfish gossiping behind the rocks, the joy of finding a book you didn't know you were looking for. Come with me to the Wreck Library."
"What's the point?"
"No particular point. But that's where the best things happen."
Octo followed him. And as they swam, Purpo thought that perhaps the world needed both of them: someone who knew everything and someone who understood things. Because knowing and understanding, in the end, weren't the same thing.
And perhaps they weren't meant to be.
