Octopope!

by John Smallberries

  From above, Octopope bellowed, “DISPERSE,” and we watched him slowly float down though the ceiling (which repaired itself after he flicked a tentacle at it) and onto that seriously nice bed where he lay down and fell fast asleep.

  It’s funny how just that little remnant of tradition can set you at ease despite how massively fucked the rest of your day has been.

  * * *

  Later we would find that what caused the screams when Octopope whipped forward his tentacle was a line of explosions that shot through a section of the crowd, spraying bits of followers all over other followers. I feel I should say that that also never happened with any previous Octopope.

  Part X:

  The Time of Confusion

  Well damn if the followers didn’t try like shit to be more Holy. Granted, nobody knew what the fuck it meant to be more Holy, but shit. They were trying their dumb little hearts out. Of course, we were exempt, being Holy Cardinals and things, so while they were out there losing their minds trying to follow Octopope’s Commandment, we were provided with some quality entertainment. It was like reality TV, only better because this shit was real. Seriously. We could look out different windows and it was like changing channels:

  * * *

  Channel 1: Pretty boring, routine stuff. Sitting around, reading the Book, praying like a sonofabitch…see what else is on…

  * * *

  Channel 2: Proselytizing. Fuckers up on soapboxes yelling something-or-other. We couldn’t hear too clearly, but it sounded like bullshit. Next.

  * * *

  Channel 3: Oooh, child sacrifice!

  * * *

  Channel 4: One big fat guy in a suit (where the fuck did he get that?) keeps slapping followers on the head and snatching their wallets. Amusing, but sort of sad. The lighting was good though. He knew how to put on a show.

  * * *

  Channel 5: I don’t care what anybody says, there’s nothing funnier than watching idiots try to crucify themselves. Andy made a crack about them definitely being more ‘hole-y’. We took turns hitting him with a stick.

  * * *

  Channel 6: Things started to take a more violent turn. Folks started thinking that Octopope’s will included them being blown to smithereens, so they strapped bombs and shit to themselves and blew up in crowded areas. We didn’t laugh so much. It was a rather poignant and telling demonstration of how an extreme belief may skew an otherwise rational person’s judgment and make them do terrible things in the name of their leader.

  We paused to reflect on this.

  And we laughed our asses off.

  * * *

  Channel 7: A group of followers who believed they had found the key to Holiness had decided to go around and kill other followers who didn’t fit into their definition of Holiness. Again, I tend to think that that defeats the purpose of Holiness, but what do I know? I’m just a Holy Cardinal or something.

  * * *

  Channel 8: These guys had the right idea. Sitting around drinking Holy Booze like there was no tomorrow. Holy Booze is Holy. Therefore, drinking more Holy Booze would result in being more Holy. Logic is fucking sweet.

  * * *

  Channel 9: Hippies strumming guitars and singing about love and shit. Next.

  * * *

  Channel 10: And more assholes standing around with signs like ‘Octopope Hates You’ and ‘We’re Better than You’. That sorta pissed me off, until one of the guys from Channel 6 came over, pissed on them, and blew up. Then I cracked-fuckin’-up.

  Things tend to sort themselves out.

  * * *

  And during all this carnage and shit, Octopope just kept on napping. We found that particularly hard to believe, since all the noise from outside tended to culminate in the center of the room, right where the seriously nice bed was. When you stood next to the bed, you could hear bits and pieces from every window. It was a sort of symphony of stupidity and explosions. It went something like this:

  * * *

  “You there! Be more Holy! *BOOM* AAARGH…Octopope loves you, yes he do…*KABLAM*…be saved and feel His presence *KERPLOOEY* AAAAGH…we’re Holy, you’re not!…ACK, I’VE BEEN STABBED…pass the Booze…don’t worry son, you’ll be dying for Octopope, so it’s all good…*THOOM*…look at me, I’m a martyr…Octopope hates *KABOOM*…”

  * * *

  And so on and shit. Octopope just kept on dozing. Maybe the sounds of death and shit were soothing to his crazy-ass Octopope brain. Maybe he was just a heavy sleeper. We didn’t question it, we just thought it was fuckin’ weird. But we shook it off and went back to watching dumbasses blow up, or nail themselves to wood, and occasionally pondering where one could get a suit like that guy on Channel 4 had.

  But while Octopope slept and Dick, Andy and I watched the mayhem, Jeff took it upon himself to mark these events in a new chapter in the Book. After all, maintaining a record of important things was part of our job. That’s what Jeff said, and Jeff was pretty fucking smart. So he began work on the new chapter, listing Octopope’s wholly unspecific Commandment and the horde of atrocities (his words, not mine) that followed.

  He called this new chapter ‘The Time of Confusion’.

  Andy suggested ‘Land of Confusion’, but Dick insisted that Genesis died when Peter Gabriel left and beat him with a stick.

  Part XI:

  Octopope Wakes

  The Time of Confusion lasted for eight days and eight nights. On the morning of the ninth day, Octopope awoke. We decided early on that there was nothing we could do in the current situation, so with the exception of Jeff, who had been busy writing the Book’s newest chapter, we spent the past week eating popcorn and watching the chaos outside build to a head and gradually subside as more and more followers bit the dust. By the time Octopope raised his head and smacked his lips, the streets outside were stained with blood and ash, littered with corpses and studded with eight-pronged crucifixes. The survivors maintained their fanatical ideas of individual righteousness, but the new-found shortages of explosives, wood, nails and assorted weaponry caused them to seal themselves off into their respective factions and resort to glaring angrily at each other.

  Admittedly, the last few hours were pretty boring.

  When we heard Octopope yawn, we all ceased our activities (popcorn eating for most of us, writing for Jeff) and circled the bed, staring in silent frustration at the freshly woken Octopontiff.

  “Good morning,” Octopope said, the distinct stentorian bellow seeming to have vanished from his voice.

  “Have a nice rest?” asked Dick, barely managing to control the rage in his voice.

  “Oh yes, very much thank you,” said Octopope. “How has the Holiness been coming along?”

  “Pretty dead, mostly,” said Andy.

  “Dead?” Octopope asked, rubbing sleep from his eyes. “How so?”

  “Killed each other,” I said.

  “Themselves, too,” muttered Jeff, “I kept a log.”

  Octopope took a moment to let this news sink in. “Now why would they do that?”

  “They didn’t know what else to do,” Jeff said, “they were confused.”

  Octopope shook his head. “Confused by what? I believe I was pretty clear in my Commandment.”

  “Apparently not,” said Dick.

  “Well, blah blah blah,” said Octopope, “it was fairly self-spoken. Not my fault if they didn’t get it.”

  I shook my head. “Do you mind telling us just what ‘it’ was again? Just for clarification?”

  “Oh, y’know,” said Octopope, waving a tentacle, “something about Holiness and shit. And a boat too, I think.”

  Now, looking back it’s fairly easy to see that Jeff was pretty shaken by the whole ‘Time of Confusion’ thing. I mean, can you blame him? Me and Dick and Andy were just watching it, but Jeff was keeping record of that shit. That’s gotta have some effect on a guy. And when Octopope woke up eight days later and couldn’t even remember what the fuck he had told the followers…well, I believe Jeff
sort of snapped right about then.

  “Fuck you!” he screamed. “Fuck you and your fucking bed and your fucking curtains and your stupid fucking hat! People fucking died out there!”

  Octopope looked hurt. “My hat is…stupid?

  “IT WAS A BLOODBATH, YOU ASSHOLE!”

  “Oh,” said Octopope, taking off his hat and looking it over, “it couldn’t have been that bad…”

  “Yes. It. WAS.” Jeff held up the pages he had written. “I kept a fucking log!”

  “Damn, you’re good,” said Octopope.

  “Go fuck yourself.”

  “Be that as it may,” ventured Octopope, “how many are left?”

  Andy went to the windows and took a quick headcount. “About eighty, maybe ninety.”

  “And they’re alive?” asked Octopope.

  “Oh.” Andy went back to the windows. “Forty, on a good day.”

  “Wow,” said Octopope, “I guess I should say something, huh?”

  “An apology would be nice,” grumbled Jeff.

  “I am Octopope!” said Octopope. “I make no apologies!”

  “But you’re why they died,” Jeff said.

  “OCTOPOPE!” cried Octopope, and he launched up through the ceiling once again.

  * * *

  “MY PEOPLE!”

  The remaining followers stared up at Octopope, floating high above the Palace, and merged into one group. Inside the Palace, Andy got a piece of paper and tallied up the survivors. Thirty-eight. Thirty-eight idiots survived from that massive group, and they still stuck around.

  Fucking sheep.

  “O mighty Octopope,” they called, “what is thy Word?”

  Octopope was silent in contemplation. His next words would have to be pretty fucking spectacular, otherwise there could be a revolt. Not from the followers, though. They’d do whatever Octopope said, we already saw that. No, Jeff just might kill his ass. I’d never seen him that pissed off, and he wasn’t even hung-over. So I don’t think murder was too far from his mind. I figured I’d probably help in that case, and Dick and Andy probably would too. There wasn’t much else to do but drink at this point, so it’d be entertaining if nothing else.

  The small crowd of survivors below held their breath. Octopope’s Word, no matter how fucking nonspecific, was their law. Octopope speaks it, dumbasses do it. As it always has been, it blah blah blah.

  I was kind of sick of tradition by then. I just wanted to drink and go home.

  But Octopope just hung up there in the air, gazing around at the destruction that had passed in his sleep.

  “Say something,” called someone from below.

  Octopope absentmindedly flicked a tentacle and we heard a wet pop. Andy erased a check on his tally sheet. Octopope then raised two tentacles and spoke.

  “A latte.”

  Part XII:

  Well, Shit.

  I mean, how do you react to that? The guy gives his followers some obscure instructions that throw them into a massively confused panic, causing them to nearly wipe themselves out while he sleeps through the whole fucking thing, then he wakes up, and having forgotten what his fucking Commandment was in the first place proceeds to kill one of his remaining devotees and announce to the rest that he’d like a fucking latte?

  Now, we’re generally pretty relaxed (as are most professionals), but what in the name of mighty FUCK?

  And guess what.

  They gave him one.

  Part XIII:

  Latte Time with Octopope

  Un-fucking-believable.

  Octopope floated back down with his latte, provided by his dumb fucking followers (who, might I add, deserved to be blown up by this point), and sat on his bed before us.

  It’s surely no surprise that we had to restrain Jeff from finding a very inventive way of using a latte to murder an asshole. And don’t think we weren’t tempted to let him.

  “I think that went well,” said Octopope between sips.

  “RATFUCKER!” Jeff screamed.

  I looked at Jeff. “Ratfucker?”

  “RATFUCKER!” he screamed again.

  I turned to Octopope. “Ratfucker?”

  Octopope shrugged and sipped his latte.

  * * *

  We came to the conclusion that Jeff needed some alone-time. More specifically, alone-time with some Holy Booze. Even more specifically, alone-time in a really big (and pretty damn ornate) mason jar of Holy Booze, which we liked to call the Divine Alone-Time Receptacle of a Shit-Load of Holy Booze.

  We basically threw Jeff in and locked it.

  He struggled some at first, but soon enough he started smiling and went real quiet.

  * * *

  So it was up to Dick, Andy and myself to talk to Octopope.

  “So,” I began, “Octopope…”

  “Yeah,” said Octopope, clearly enjoying his latte.

  “Octopope,” I said again, “you…you, uh…”

  “What the fuck’re you doing?” Dick cut in.

  Octopope looked up. “Enjoying a latte.”

  “Ah,” Dick said, “care to tear yourself away and tell us just what the fuck your game is?”

  Octopope mulled it over. “Mmm, not really. This is a seriously nice latte.”

  Dick threw his tentacles in the air. “Fuck.”

  “Octopope,” I said, trying once more to form a sentence, “you said something about rebuilding an ark…”

  “Did I?” he chuckled, “Oh boy…”

  “You did,” I pressed on, “you talked about dark times and times of light, and you said that everybody should be more Holy so you could rebuild the ark.”

  “It’s true,” said Andy, “it was pretty crazy.”

  “Wow,” said Octopope, taking another sip, “cool.”

  “Oh, for fuck’s sake,” said Dick, “we should just let Jeff out and be done with it.”

  “Nah,” said Octopope.

  “What?” Dick asked.

  “Jeff apparently wants to kill me, and I can’t have that,” said Octopope, “at least not until I’ve finished this latte.” Another sip. “Damn, that’s a seriously nice latte.”

  We were, quite frankly, astonished.

  Octopope took another sip. “Ahh…” He held out the cup.

  “Care for a sip?”

  We did.

  He was not wrong.

  Part XIV:

  The Divine Frustration of Milo

  or,

  How I Learned to Fly

  Octopope took his sweet time finishing his latte. Sure, it was a seriously nice latte, but when you’re the fucking Octopope whose followers have been blowing themselves and each other to pieces in your name because of a decidedly nonspecific bullshit Commandment you issued before going to sleep for eight fucking days and your Holy Cardinals or whatever are freaking out trying to figure out what the fuck to do and what the fuck’s going on and one of them’s pretty much lost it and has to be locked up in a big-ass mason jar full of Holy Booze to stop him from killing you, I believe there are more pressing matters at hand than a fucking latte.

  And I said as much to Octopope. Verbatim, give or take a swear.

  * * *

  It didn’t go over too well.

  I barely had time to bask in the glory of my words when I found myself flying about the room at an amazing speed. I imagine that from the outside it must have looked pretty damn spectacular. However, from the point of the recipient, it was thoroughly terrifying and pretty damn painful. The spectacle, I fear, was lost on me.

  By the end of my flight, I had become well acquainted with the wall.

  * * *

  I came to rest at the foot of Octopope’s bed. Let me assure you that I wasn’t dead, I wasn’t seriously injured, but I was reeeeal fuckin’ sore. Andy started toward me, but Octopope threw a pretty vicious glare his way and he went back to standing with Dick. I managed to get myself upright and squeaked out a small, “Fuck”.

  “Have you anything else to say, Milo?” asked Octop
ope.

  I shook my head and let it rest back on the floor.

  “Outstanding,” said Octopope, clapping two tentacles together, “I’m very sorry I had to do that, but I don’t appreciate sass.”

  “But he’s right, you know,” said Dick.

  Octopope slowly turned to face him. He rose up so that his tentacles were about a foot off of the floor and floated over to Dick, getting uncomfortably close to his face.

  “Say that again,” Octopope whispered.

  Dick stood his ground. “I said Milo’s right.”

  Octopope set himself back on the floor and looked at me. Then he turned back to Dick. Then to me. Then to Dick again.

  “Is he?”

  Dick glanced from me to Octopope and carefully said, “Yep.”

  Octopope hung his head slightly. “Oh.”

  My mouth fell open a bit.

  Octopope turned and approached me.

  “Uh…sorry about that, Milo,” he said.

  I blinked.

  “Ow.”

  Part XV:

  The Ark

  We agreed to take a break to let me regain a little consciousness and mobility before the serious discussion began. To get the blood flowing back in my tentacles, I went to check on Jeff. The Divine Alone-Time Receptacle of a Shit-Load of Holy Booze was nearly three quarters empty, and Jeff was floating in the remaining Booze with a look of sheer drunken bliss. Bless him, I thought. After all the shit that’s been going on, he deserves it. Occasionally he would roll over, immersing his face in the Booze, and take a huge gulp before facing up again. We should all be so lucky.