Cerulean Planet (Blue Dust Trilogy #1)

Chapter 9

"You consider your own human form beautiful and so deem all others ugly. Is it not absurd to refer to such narrow-mindedness as possessing aesthetics?" the monster asked.

"A random pile of flesh with a bunch of tentacles waving about. Any species would deem it ugly."

"Your perspective is indeed myopic. Even among only those who have recently joined the United Planetary Federation, there are many species that possess these forms. The winner of the last Federal Beauty Pageant was Mr. Tentacle. He had 34 of them."

Jiayun smiled, "Then you should compete in a beauty pageant with 68 tentacles."

"Do you finally realize how ridiculous it is to judge something through your human lens now?"

"But you looked beautiful underwater."

For a moment, Jiayun's words seemed to have rendered the monster speechless.

"You looked so carefree the way you spread yourself out in the blue sea. The way light flickered across your body was very, very beautiful," Jiayun continued before the monster could respond. "The form you took underwater must be your true form."

"What makes you think so?"

"Because your other forms all looked like they were haphazardly put together. There was something natural about how you looked in the water. A kind of order among chaos. It looked rather delicate. Besides, the way you moved underwater made it feel like you've lived there your whole life."

"Your analysis is quite right."

Jiayun followed up with another blow, "It's a pity I'm not accustomed to aquatic life, or I'd spend everyday with you in the waters, looking at your natural form."

The monster seemed stumped again for a moment. They weren't sure how to deal with the sudden change, going from being at each other's throats to this. Should they continue to humiliate and antagonize him, or follow in his footsteps and compliment one another?

Except he was a lowly creature with nothing worthy of praise.

Jiayun lay on a patch of shallow sands near the waters. He turned his head towards the monster and asked, "Is there lots of water on your home planet? Earth is a planet with a tonne of water, too. As you know, we call them oceans. There's a lot of ocean water on Earth, so it looks deep blue from afar. What about yours?"

The monster padded over to Jiayun as a human would and sat down. They began describing it to him, "My home planet only has a landmass of 1.37%. The rest of it is covered in ocean. It has a uniformly azure hue when observed from afar."

"Are you the only intelligent species on your home planet?"

"No. There are 17 different kinds of intelligent species with civilizations that live in the ocean, and two that live on land."

"That's a lot...."

"Because the planet is large and fairly ancient."

"What's your civilization like?"

The monster extended their human-shaped hands, staring at the patterns on their palms and fingers. "We do not have a culture of our own. Since our species is capable of recording and analyzing everything we come across, the other species refer to us as the Observers. The oldest of our kind have been in existence since the dawn of our planet and are still alive today."

Jiayun stared at them, wide-eyed. "I can't imagine."

"A simple brain like yours...."

"Cannot possibly comprehend such profundity," Jiayun cut in and finished the monster's sentence for them. "What I can't imagine is, how should I explain, as a human, I can live for about 150 years with a bit of modification, even up to 200 years in theory. But there are barely any humans who live for that long. A life ends for lots of different reasons."

"The ultimate form of my kind is immortality."

"Yeah, that. Isn't that frightening? With the exception of accidents, those who don't live 'til the end almost always end their own lives. They would pick a time and commit suicide. Earth's humans only lived for less than a hundred years before. Maybe the human consciousness could only last that long. Their body could sustain life, but their mind grows old. It gets damaged, gets weathered. When you've gained something only to lose it; when you feel helpless and alone; when the people and things you love slowly fade away, your mind loses a part of itself too. And one day, your mind will crumble and it will become unbearable. I knew someone. He discarded his human flesh and transplanted his brain onto a bionic machine. Supposedly, he's been alive for hundreds of years. He's very rich and has bought many laboratory planets, which makes him more money so he could do even more research. When I met him last, his mind was already a complete jumble. Desire drives our survival. But when your desires are always being fulfilled, then you'll lose sight of what you desired too. That man will be dead soon."

"A petty, pitiful human," the monster said.

Jiayun smiled wryly. "Which is why I have to wonder, do immortal beings like you really possess life? Can your kind truly be called living beings? Does your kind have consciousness? Don't you think that compared to a living organism, you're more like a constant flow of data?"

"When primitive organisms make conjectures about things beyond their understanding, the conclusion becomes more than absurd."

"After all, living comes with death."

"Your earlier analysis was based somewhat on evidence. The rest seemed entirely delusional."

It had been a few hours since sunrise and the ice should have all melted by now. The planet was quiet. Warm vapors began enveloping the two of them.

Jiayun got up. He took out the seaweed that the monster carried inside their body and laid them flat on the sand to dry. He even took a bite of a piece. It was bitter and astringent and tasted nasty beyond words. He spat it out.

He returned to sit by the monster's side. "You said your kind had an ultimate form. You also mentioned something about a Second Form? Are you still in your original form? What do they all look like?" he asked.

"The newborns of our kind are considered to be in their Primary Forms. They can choose whether or not to advance to Second Form. Our Second Form allows our bodily tissues to completely transform so that we can adapt to various kinds of environments, including the vacuum of outer space. Regular weapons would also not be able to deal damage to this form. At some point, after evolving into our Second Form, we automatically advance to our Third Form at some point. In our Third Form, that is when we truly become immortal. Our consciousness will no longer be bound to physical matter."

"But you joined the fleet. Why didn't you decide to advance to your Second Form then? Wouldn't it be a huge advantage during combat?"

"Because I have not yet decided."

"Decide what?"

"Whether to become immortal."

Jiayun fell silent.

"Entering into our Second Form means that it would be extremely difficult for us to be killed. There is also no way to know when we will advance to our Third Form, at which point we become completely immortal. The kin who I copulated with, the one who knows about humans, he left our planet in his Second Form and returned as an immortal."

"That's ironic. Other species fear death. Your kind fears the lack of it."

"It is not fear."

"If it's not fear, then what is it? You aren't ready to face it yet, right? You're like a kid." Jiayun turned his body over and pressed it on top of the monster's. "I've noticed that even though you find it difficult to accept a human's aesthetics, you haven't transformed yourself back either! How about you use this form and do it with me?"

"Do what?"

"Make love. Mating. Sexual intercourse. Procreation. Spread your legs and let me see if you've formed a proper anus. Or better yet, why don't you make a female vagina...." Jiayun reached between the monster's legs as he spoke.