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"The love of complexity without reductionism makes art; the love of complexity with reductionism makes science." ― Edward O. Wilson, Consilience: The Unity of Knowledge
"Bud, you need to sleep," CJ says from the doorway. "Big day tomorrow."
Hunched over his table, an unfinished model of Dinoponera lucida before him, Flick groans and drops his head. "Don't remind me."
"Sleep."
"Soon." If he keeps working, he hopes his focus on the task at hand will continue to push away worries and fears about his meeting at the museum tomorrow. This strategy has worked before, many times, but it is far from infallible.
"You've got to be exhausted." CJ thinks he's helping, but he's just reminding Flick of what he's trying to ignore. "Finervated! Totally washed up and wiped out."
"In a minute," Flick murmurs. With one claw, he slices a long, extremely thin piece off a sheet of undyed rice paper, then rolls it between his palms. Locking his tail around the back of his chair for balance, he lifts himself forward as far as he can go. The paper slots right into the edge of the model and sticks fast. Satisfied, he sits back and exhales.
"Babe. Bro." CJ's next to him now, hand on the back of Flick's neck. When he massages the base of one tubercle, the warmth of his touch courses through Flick and Flick hums a little. "Bedtime for geniuses."
"I'm not..." Flick starts but CJ squeezes harder and pulls him close. First downward, because he only comes up to Flick's scapula, then very close.
"Shush."
Flick can't help smiling, crushed as he against CJ's broad chest. "You shush," he mutters and pushes ineffectually at CJ's arm. "You're not the boss of me."
"Heck no, I'm not," CJ replies, and the laughter in his voice takes over until he's chortling and wiping his eyes. "Not the bass of you, either!"
Joy comes so easily to him: it's beautiful. Flick sits back, head tilted, taking in the sight through one pinhole eye. Nothing ever gets CJ down for very long at all, unless you're talking blast fishing and excessive bycatch. Even then, his sorrow turns quickly to productive anger. It inspires his online petitions and spurs on his special fundraising streams. Hey, there, fishy-onados, CJ coming at you with a REEL-life tale of terror...
"I've just got the rear legs to do," Flick says. "Then I'll go to bed."
"Nope." CJ pulls him up, off the chair and to his feet. Their houseboat is too well-built to rock under this motion, but Flick's balance momentarily swings a bit nonetheless. "You've got a whopper of a day tomorrow, bro."
"Don't remind me." Flick feels lightheaded again, and this time there's no external reason he can blame. "Maybe I'll reschedule. I should reschedule."
CJ just shakes his head and clucks his tongue as he pilots Flick out of the tiny studio toward the sleeping area. Their studio occupies the vast majority of the boat's living quarters, sporting egg-carton foam along the walls for CJ's streams and a wide stern window so Flick can work by natural light whenever possible. By contrast, the kitchenette is merely a counter with a microwave and shallow sink and their bedroom, an expanse of memory foam and tangle of linens.
"You're not rescheduling," CJ tells him as they get into bed. "You don't want to."
"Maybe I do," Flick tries to protest. He doesn't have the energy for it, however. When the lights go off, he sighs and wiggles back onto the pillows. "No, I don't. Well. Maybe?"
CJ noses at Flick's upper arm until he can get underneath and curl up close. His tail thumps happily. "You'll be fine. More than fine. Fintastic!"
Flick giggles at that; he can't help it. He's pretty sure the fish puns started as an ironic thing, but that time has now long since passed. Those puns are here to stay.
*
Flick does not sleep well, so he gets up with the sun and sits on deck to enjoy a cup of tea. The sky brightens around him, and the water glitters. The various islands of the archipelago gradually emerge, hunched like shoulders, around the horizon. He hears CJ get up -- the screech of the blender making his smoothie, the thumps of his bare feet on the floor as he pads around, dictating notes to himself. He seems also to be playing an online game, because every so often, he curses someone out and bemoans the benthic depths of their incompetence.
Flick is ready to leave while CJ's still on the treadmill, chattering away into his headset. He streams his morning workout in the interests of accountability. Flick switches his portfolio box to his other hand, then back again, and calls down the ladder.
"Hey, think I might just hail a coracle and get going --"
CJ appears almost immediately, huffing for breath, eyes shining. His bangs are puffed up like a blowfish. "Wait! I'm coming with you!"
"Don't," Flick tells him. CJ starts to protest, but stops and just tilts his head. Flick wraps his tail around his legs. "It's not personal. I just think I need to do this alone." He's thought about it, and can't imagine managing his nerves at the same time as enjoying CJ's chatty company. He just can't switch his focus like that, rapidly and constantly.
He expects CJ to argue with him. Instead, as he clambers up the ladder, CJ simply asks, "Got your portfolio? Bells? Extra net?"
"Yes, yes, and yes."
Maybe he was even hoping that CJ would argue -- serve as another distraction from his nervousness, perhaps. So when CJ just hugs him hard and wishes him the best, Flick doesn't quite know what to do with himself.
When does he ever, though?
Hardly ever, that's when.
He shares a nook-a-coracle, one of the branded water taxis that plies the inner curve of the archipelago, with a sweet little hamster lady clutching her purse with both paws. She won't look up, due to seasickness, but she does relax a little when Flick offers to teach her to sing "Twinkle Twinkle Lampyridae" and "Rolling Up the Dung" to pass the time. When they reach their destination, she's smiling, if still a little green and unsteady.
Together, they make their way slowly up from the beach. She bids him goodbye when they pass Resident Services and wishes him well for his big meeting. There's nothing left for him but to head to the museum. He loiters a little in the plaza, but no one's around, then lingers longer in the cool, fragrant shadows of the cedars outside Pudge the golden bear cub's little cabin. Pudge loves bugs with all the forthright enthusiasm Flick himself possesses, but absolutely none of Flick's analytical tools or spiritual distractions. He just likes bugs and wants to befriend them. Flick thinks that's pretty cool, all things considered.
But there's no sign of Pudge, so Flick leaves the present he brought, a My First Metamorphosis Kit on the stoop. The kit comes complete with milkweed plant, small net, and instructions for identifying and catching a monarch caterpillar. Flick would have killed for something like this when he was a kid; he likes to think that entomophilia is really coming up in the world.
He has to hurry now to the museum, lest he be late. He's rebuking himself for this -- he never changes, does he? His ever-present instinct is to put off whatever it is that's worrying him until it's too late to avoid and it's bearing down on him like an oncoming swatter -- as he bounds up the steps and into the chill, sepulchral silence of the museum.
At least, that's what he was expecting. The museum is always dark and quiet. Blathers tends to sleep the days away and work all night long; most visits, Flick can arrive, accomplish the tasks left for him, and depart without ever disturbing the snoozing owl.
Today, however, almost all of the residents are milling around the lobby. They wear bright, festive hats and sip juice from paper cups as they mingle. Flick must have crashed one of the island's frequent parties. Maybe they're celebrating a new acquisition or construction of a new wing? He should hope for an expanded butterfly dome, but in his heart of hearts, Flick hopes for a nice cafe with a barista who knows his stuff pulling shots.
Towards the back of the crowd, Blathers is fully awake. Not only that, he has a hat crooked atop his head and he's chatting with another owl. This one looks a bit like Blathers and his sister, especially in terms of the diamond-patterning across his downy chest, but he's leaner and taller and maybe slightly terrifying. Something about the black fix of his gaze, how it finds Flick immediately, and the sleek lines of his gunmetal-gray and ocean-foam-white feathers, impeccably groomed, freezes Flick to the spot. He remembers, in a rush and all at once, that owls hunt lizards. That owl could drop on him out of the dark night; its talons are razor sharp and unerring.
Flick's skin wavers and dulls until he's the color of dusty brick.
"Babe!" CJ shouts from the top of one of the twin staircases. He hurries down, his feet and tail alternately slapping against the marble. He stops short at Blathers' side. "You made it! Hey, nerd bird, check it out! Your boy's here!"
Blathers waves a friendly wing at Flick, gesturing him forward. The residents elbow each other as Flick passes. He spots Pudge; the little guy is holding two cups of juice and trying to eat a frosted cookie in the shape of a ladybug at the same time. He has the cookie balanced on his chest and he's bending awkwardly to nibble at it.
"Yes, yes, the lizard of legend! Chameleon of constant surprise and inspiration!" Blathers has rarely looked so happy, in Flick's experience. He's a very nice owl, highly respected in the admittedly small field of self-appointed polymath curators, but his unease with insects extends, Flick has always felt, to Flick himself.
Flick pauses to help Pudge before he drops the cookie or spills the juice. Then he joins CJ and the two owls, shyness creeping over him like a familiar shroud. The gray-silver owl continues to eye him speculatively, appraisingly, and Flick fights every instinct he has to ripple out of sight. Or take off in a run.
"I brought your dermestids," Flick tells Blathers. "They're really going to help with the specimens--" He stops when Blathers bobs his head impatiently, as if Flick is wasting valuable time. "Sorry."
"My dear boy," Blathers says, one wingtip resting reverently on the other owl's shoulder. "This is Lucien. My brother."
Flick's tail rolls up on itself and he sways a bit before CJ presses a reassuring hand against his arm. "Sir. Monsieur? It's an honor to meet you."
Lucien L'hibou is the gallery owner, not simply everywhere in the archipelago and on the mainland in general, but in the City as well. He's a tastemaker and a career breaker. His eye is, everyone in the art world agrees, nonpareil.
When Blathers said he'd introduce Flick to his brother who likes art, Flick was freaked out by the prospect. And that was when he assumed Blathers's brother was just some nice owl like him! Flick brought stupid little samples in his portfolio like a schmuck! He might as well be offering crappy 3D-printed models with all the seams showing! This guy, this guy is going to laugh Flick all the way back to the jungle he came from.
"Charmed," Lucien drawls. Face to face, his gaze remains every bit as distressing. It rests on Flick like a weight. "Blathy has only the highest accolades for your work."
Flick scratches at the earrings on his rear horn. "I don't know, that's really nice of him, but --"
"Your orchid mantis model," Lucien says as if he's making an announcement, "is both bewitching and haunting, an eerily beautiful tribute to one of nature's cruelest monsters."
"Monsters?" Flick shouts before he can help it, rage overtaking him in a flash. "Monsters?! You're --"
"Chillax," CJ whispers while Blathers' chest feathers ruffle up and he looks anxiously between Flick and Lucien. "Cool like cod, sweetie."
Easy for him to say. CJ fits in better with people like the owls, highly-educated and well-bred. He's a trust-fund kid, after all; he probably went to the same prep school as Blathers and Lucien. His family got rich through various damming projects and hydro-electric installations on the mainland. Now some of those bells support Flick's art as well as CJ's various fish-preneur projects.
"I use the term philosophically, of course," Lucien continues, completely unmoved by Flick's outburst. "Something outside of classificatory logic, a sport, a surprise." He clicks his beak a few times, as someone else might lick their lips. "Your work, for instance. Beguiling and monstrous."
"I --. Huh." Flick's skin shudders into a brilliant carmine, then settles down into cheerful scarlet. "Thanks. I think."
Lucien flicks one wing minutely. "You are most welcome. In all honesty, I ought to be the one thanking you for sharing your vision with us."
Flick has no idea what to say. He still hasn't found his muse -- he will be searching his whole life, he expects, for just the right insect, at the perfect moment of transformation -- so who is he to accept such a compliment? He hasn't earned it. He'll probably never be worthy of such praise.
"Hey, Flick? Flick!" Pudge is behind him, yanking on the hem of his vest. "Flick! I got a bug emergency!"
"What is it?" He turns and drops to one knee, the better to see what Pudge has clutched in his left paw. "Open that up for me, little dude."
Pudge's mouth is a wiggle of consternation. He unbends his claws as he offers his palm to Flick. "Can you fix him?"
There's a scarab beetle lying there, one foreleg aimlessly twitching. Nothing else about it looks remotely good.
"What happened?" Flick asks.
Pudge replies in a breathless rush. "He was telling me a story and then he got tired and fell off the table and maybe someone stepped on him but also I think he broke?"
Flick takes the bug carefully between his fingers and holds it up to the light. "I think he might be going away," he says. "I'm sorry."
Pudge's eyes go shiny, brimming with tears. "But he's my friend!"
"I know. I'm sorry."
"He's going away to change, right? Maybe he'll be a butterfly now?"
"No," Flick says, "I don't think so."
"But maybe," CJ puts in, leaning over to join the conversation, "he will. We don't know, do we, Flick?"
They exchange a look while Pudge sniffles. Behind them, one of the owls' beaks clicks. Flick doesn't know if he should lie, and therefore betray both Pudge's confidence in him and the natural order of things (beetles don't metamorphose! That's just basic Bugs 101!), or not. If he lies, Pudge will feel better. That matters, he realizes, almost as much as intellectual honesty does.
"We don't know," Flick says at last and squeezes Pudge's shoulder. "I can make you a sculpture of your friend. I do know how to do that. Would that help?"
Pudge brightens up. "Like a robot? He'd talk to me and we could go on walks? Could I ride him?"
CJ laughs. "Flick's not making you a mecha. He's an artist, not an engineer, right, Flick?"
Everyone's looking at Flick now: the owls, Pudge, CJ, even the pretty yellow dog who used to be a civil servant. This should feel like it's straight out of one of Flick's anxiety nightmares, being the center of attention.
Instead, he thinks, tubercles twitching and skin nearly glowing, it's kind of nice.
"Right," he says, and he's speaking to Lucien as well as Pudge and CJ. "That's right."
There's no single moment of perfection, he thinks. It's all a process.