Elibeth Cabrera

The Unknown Waves

How many plastics do you think there are in the ocean? Don’t look at me, I don’t fucking know. I know it’s more than 100 that’s for sure. Now if you ask me specifically how many plastics are on the beach, then I would say enough for me and my so-called friends to pick up and toss them in the recycling bag. Don’t get me wrong, I’m all for saving the ocean. I wouldn’t normally pick up trash on a Saturday morning in my free time but that’s what happens when you are hanging around with the people.

“Eric! Wait up!” I turned to see my best friend running towards me with his almost empty bag. I scoffed at the sight of him grinning like a child, leaving the rest of the gang behind.

“Shit man, you walk too fast.” He complained as he panted.

“Or maybe you are just out of shape.” I snicker as I picked up another empty water bottle. I swear New York beaches are not pretty at all. You would be lucky to find even the slightest clean sand here.

“I work out three times a week thank you very much.”

“Congratulations. Was that supposed to impress me or..?”

“No, unless…” Ryan wiggled his eyebrows at me. I threw one of the empty plastic bottles at him. He laughed it off like he normally does. We are just that close. Then again he has been my best friend for years now.

“Why were you calling me again?” I asked as I slowly walked barefooted on the sand. It was summer vacation when all this happen. It’s funny how we still got in trouble with our principal who has to happen to go to the same beach at the same time as us. I thought Ryan and the others picked up while I was getting the car. But it doesn’t matter what I was doing. I was part of the group so therefore I too had to suffer with them. Yuppie.

“Oh! We saw a dead jellyfish.” He announced almost like he was the one that discovered a sea monster.

“And? There are hundreds of sea creatures dying as we speak. Both naturally and unnaturally. You know, because of us.”

“Yeah but this one is strange. It’s like its guts are out.”

“Ryan, you do know jellyfishes don’t have guts like us right? Just their digestive system.”

“Of course, I know that, but dude this one is super weird. It’s like someone did it.”

“Maybe someone was bored and gutted a jellyfish for fun.”

“Maybe. But you should still check it out.” At this point, Ryan was being a pest about me seeing this gutted jellyfish that the others gathered around in amusement.

“I’m good. I rather get this over with.” I told him coldly which I’m sure he felt once I walked away. That’s when he started to catch up with me.

“Oh c’mon Eric. Don’t tell me you’re still mad.” The sound of waves crashing was the only thing that was keeping me calm.

“No Ryan. I’m very happy that I have to spend my Saturday morning on the beach picking up trash when it wasn’t even my fault you littered the beach yesterday. As a matter of fact, thank you! Thank you for allowing me to share this punishment with you!”

“Oh...You are mad.”

“No shit Sherlock!”

“Hey hey, no need to yell. I get it, and I did say I was sorry didn’t I? Who knew the principal will be there. I even tried to tell Mr. Parker that you weren’t involved. I’m sorry Eric.” At this point, I’ll admit I was causing a scene. Did I regret it? Not really. I was annoyed by how things went down and to be fair, this isn’t the first time.

The rest of the gang behind us called out to us to see if we were okay. Ryan waved at them, telling them everything was okay while I walked away. Ryan eventually left me alone with my chore. The chore I didn’t want to do at all. I picked up loads of trash which never shocks me sadly. Humans are disgusting.

The smell of the sea and the sound of the waves eventually distracted me. I’m not an ocean kinda guy but I was enjoying this more than I should have. The ocean can be a scary place to be in. The fact that we have yet to discover the rest of the darkest depths of the ocean and the creatures that live there. To others it’s scary but to me is fascinating.

“Shit!” I stepped on something wet and slimy. I guess that’s my fault for not looking where I was going. I took a few steps back as I try to process what the hell I stepped on. It was a dead fish. I stared at it confused to see that I stepped on and squished a small portion of its corps. It was a lot easier than how you would normally do such a thing. Not even that but the smell was unbelievably strong and unnatural. To me at least. I’m no scientist but a fish corps shouldn’t look or smell like that. What’s even odder was how far from the sea it was. There is no way the waves were that big, right? There wasn’t even a sign that the waves reached this level. I squat down to get a closer look at the dead fish. Now that I got a closer look, I noticed the fish was sliced open from its belly. Is this how the jellyfish that Ryan and the others found look?

“Listen eric how about I make it up to you later when we are don-“ I didn’t have to look over to know that Ryan saw what I discovered.

“What the fuck?” He said.

“It looks rotten. Like it’s been here for hours maybe days.” I shared.

“All of them?” I looked up at him confused.

“What?” Ryan then points straight ahead. Once my eyes moved from what lays ahead left me in utter shock. I slowly stood up, analyzing the scatter dead fish on the beach. All are either freshly gutted or left to rot like my fish.

“What…the hell..” is all we could say. This was creepy and random. What sicko would do this?!

“Should we call the cops?” Ryan asked.

“I think it’s best if you do it before someone comes and thinks we did it.”

“Right on it.” Ryan took out his phone and called the cops or whoever would take care of this. Instead of staying behind the crime scene, I started to investigate. I walked to each random fish one by one. Some were close to the water while others weren’t. Looks like we have a serial killer on the loss or this is climate change, which sounded less believable to me. From how these fish were, it looks like a human did it. It has to be. I started to take photos so I could research this later on but something was off. I moved back, away from the water, and noticed how three fishes created what look like the letter L. That’s..odd. I moved back more and took a better photo at a better angle.

I might have taken too many photos of my liking. I looked through each photo one by one. Most of them looked normal. Maybe I’m going mad. I kept looking through the rest of the photos till I saw it. I saw the letter K then I saw the latter I, then another L then an E, and last but not least the letter R.

“Killer.” Maybe some ocean hipster did this out of protest? If this was some sort of message, believe me, we got the message.

“Hey, some folks are coming. They said to stay away from…whatever that is.” Ryan explained as he approached me.

“Check this out.” I bluntly said before passing him my phone with the picture.

“Killer? No fucking way. How did you-“

“I have no idea. I just took photos from this angle and boom a message.”

“What do you think it means?”

“Well besides the fact that the dead fishes were the ones the created the letters, I think it’s a love letter.”

“Eric.”

“It’s a threat. Whoever did this obviously wanted a clear message that someone is killing the ocean? Or should I say ‘we’ are killing it? We are the killers.”

“Yeah but still. What sicko would do this?”

“Someone desperate I assume.” As Ryan analyzes the photos I took, I watched over the waves. The way it pushed and pull more aggressively than before. The ocean is very powerful. It could easily kill thousands of people with a single tsunami. My eyes were glued to the sea. It was almost hypnotizing to me. That’s when I saw a figure dive down into the waves. I wasn’t unsure if I saw someone or something. I even looked around to see if any of the gang decided to be more stupid and get in the water but no one did.

“Hey, I think I just saw something,” I said as I tapped Ryan. Ryan looked up and watched the sea with me.

“I don’t see anything.”

“Hold on.” As you can see I was more patient than him. I could watch for hours if I needed to but I doubt it. It was not needed. People were coming and-

“HOLY-Did you saw that!? Please tell me you saw that!” Ryan exclaimed. I blinked in pure shock. I indeed saw it. I saw the grayish-green fin and long tail splashing among the waves like it was trying to stay hidden from the large waves. The tail looked long but not at all big. Perhaps close to a dolphin or shark size but it wasn’t at all any of those creatures. It was..completely different.

“W-what do you think was that? Do you think it’s the cause of this?” Ryan asked.

“It would have to be very intelligent for it to spell out killer with dead fishes…but…maybe..it was.”

The Art Form of Science Fiction

Science fiction is not only a genre but a different aspect of art. It’s more than just a ‘complicated’ art form with its ‘complicated’ science explanations and its alien languages. It is a different form of language that many people may or may not like. Like any genre, its community is large and by far very creative in the fictional side of it. Stories such as “Parable of the Sower” By Octavia E. Butler are labeled as science fiction even though it’s nothing like the typical science fiction genres. That being said, what makes something science fiction? What characteristics of writing justify what is science fiction and how does the media come into play with that justification? Is it the plot, the setting, the characters or is it the hint of reality that creates the stories more scientific than fictional?

It is no mystery what is science fiction but the real question is if there were no aliens, space ships, time machines, smart robots taking over the world, or amazing predictions of the future, is it still considered science fiction? Genres come in all shapes and sizes. It can branch out with other genres creating a bigger and newer genre. It’s obvious that science fiction had changed over the years and Octavia E Butler was able to prove that otherwise with her books. She was able to not only point out climate change and economic crises that cause distraction in society but was able to create a new definition of science fiction which is to see the future in the present. Only the present, is what shapes the future. Many can also agree such as Nik Brown, Brian Rappert, and Andrew Webster who stated that “we have moved from looking into the future to looking at the future, focusing less on correct understandings of what will happen and more on how we are talking about emergent realities” (Sheryl, 271). Science fiction doesn’t have to be anything future realistic when in reality we are already living in the future that many books, stories, and films had predicted or tried to. We may not have flying cars but let’s face it, “[r]eading science fiction used to be the only way to get to the future... Now the pace of technological change is so continuous and so fast there's no longer any kind of clear barrier separating us from the future. We're living in the future. We're living in science fiction.” (Sheryl, 271) Science fiction can simply make you fear the many possibilities of how the world can change or it can make you be curious about it or even hopeful. Which Butler was able to achieve in her book, showing the readers the most realistic science fiction.

Even though we have unlimited choices on what science fiction can be and what it can be based on, we have yet to understand the elements of making this genre come to life? Like any genre, science fiction takes more than just predicting the future and coming up with a scientific theory. Most of the time, these ideas are based on today's world and how we see the world or how we wish, believe, and fear what the future holds. Even these “alien” languages we heard or read in these science fiction novels or films “nonetheless evaluate SF's created languages in terms of real-world linguistics-terms under which fictional texts are going to be found wanting.” (Cheyne, 390). The borderlines of science and fiction come to play in many ways. Things like creating a new “language” can be beneficial by “making the reader "learn" a new language, authors "force us to rethink the challenge of language acquisition, and by extension they empower us to reconsider other tasks that we may find daunting? such as avoiding Armageddon and building a more livable society" (Cheyne, 390). As I said, Science fiction can be a fearful thing or a hopeful thing. It can be as complicated as making a new language or predicting some type of outcome from today's problems.

Understanding that Butler's story not only gives a sense of awareness of everything about the world but opens up our unconscious surroundings. It becomes even more relatable since her character goes through life issues as a young black woman in this big world full of corruption and natural disasters such as climate change in one book. Science fiction can be as simple as that or complicated as Star Trek. Science fiction as a genre is not limited nor should it be limited by the amazing possibilities can hold, both for the future and present.

Works Cited

Butler, Octavia E. Parable of the sower, Headline Book Publishing, 2019.

Cheyne, Ria. “Created Languages in Science Fiction.” Science Fiction Studies, vol. 35, no. 3,

2008, pp. 386–403, http://www.jstor.org/stable/25475175. Accessed 12 May 2022.

Sheryl N. Hamilton. “Traces of the Future: Biotechnology, Science Fiction, and the Media.”

Science Fiction Studies, vol. 30, no. 2, 2003, pp. 267–82,

http://www.jstor.org/stable/4241173. Accessed 12 May 2022.