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Show ONE TURTLE Flourescent light from the ceiling tubes descended on him as the young girl removed her thumb. Then he was Eskimo kissed by an acne infested nose. REBELLS By Ann Kraft ‘Oh, ‘‘Oh,'' Homer poker his head from his protective painted shell and blinked sleepily at the other turtles, flowered purple and orange, who swam drowsily through the floridated, chloridated water that environ- ed the artificial rock ‘on which he lay. Craning his neck to clear the miniature palm tree from his line of vision, he squinted bitterly at the 100 watt sun a foot above his prone position. Someday, Homer thought with his underestimated turtle brain, | will find a way to destroy that false sun, and all dents will perish. satisfaction, we of its artificial Then, will depen- he reflected with all live in a real, un- tinted world, A toothless smile flashed briefly across his ancient face before his eyes rolled up to the darkness of sleep. The sea-horse moved swiftly, gracefully through the dark sea, mounted by an armour clad turtle called Homer. Up through the darkness. toward the sun, past the loudly cheering crowd they fearlessly galloped. Fragments of broken plastic lay strewn across the ocean floor from which they ascended. Higher, higher, nearer and nearer the orbitless sun's scorching body. Straight toward the sun, the stallion carried the hero turtle, pivoting an instant before impact, but not before the sun was shattered by Homer's sword, Hope. His life mission completed, the liberator reined his steed back to the tank to free his captive rejoicing fellows. An elevator feeling. brought Homer back to the wakeful, closed-eyed world from which he had been momentarily parted. Cautiously, he opened his left eye, only to find that something obstructed the light from the opening of his flower bordered neck. The covering was warm, soft, and damp on his prodding nose. i ‘Oh, he tickles!’ squealed human voice. | : a soprano he's so cute,’ she turned her head and voice toward the impatient proprietor. she seemed to like the word, ‘| love his bright painted shell. Pam,’’ she addressed her heavily mascaraed companion, ‘Isn't this shell pretty?’ ~The other girl grunted her agreement grudgingly, mirroring Homer's sentiments exactly, then whined that it was closing time and that they should go. “Yeah, | guess we'd better let him close up,'’ she said, refering to the foot tapping fat brown man at her side. ‘‘But | still like his shell,’ his elevator engine persisted before lowering Homer to the luke warm, eye burning water. Clumsily, Homer climbed onto the base of a palm tree. Yeah, he thought, she likes my shell. | wonder how she'd like to have flowers painted all over her body? He wished sadly that he could trade her places. The overhead lights sputtered for a second or two then disappeared, leaving the room in the dim glow of aquarium tank lights. Cheerful parrots mocked the night. The turtles merely accepted it. Around Homer, turtles engaged in loveless intercourse, stacked like crooked piles of pancakes and just as oblivious to the predicament they were in. Some sunbathed in the white light of the false sun while still others slept, seemingly unconscious of the stereotype mold they had been pushed into. Homer's anxiety and anger increased to the breaking point. Narrowing his eyes, he pushed himself to an upright position and with his block hands waving, he addressed the public. ) | ‘Open your eyes,'’’ he screamed in the turtle voice whose existence humans deny. Every veiled eye in the tank turned quisically to focus on this noisy cell mate. ‘Can't you see what he is doing to us?’ Homer asked, pointing to the counter behind which the Mexican slept. We aren't real to him or to ourselves. We're just little toys. You and you and you,’ Homer raged, pointing accusingly into the three startled faces nearest him. ‘‘We're painted with artificial colors to make us _ look more handsome than we really are. We live surrounded by artificially colored! water on artificial rocks below the plastic veying with set face the mocking sun, ‘destroy that demon up there and each dependent of it.'' Yes, he thought shrewdly, but how? The night in the pet shop was quiet except for the gurgling sound of the fish leaf aquariums’ domes of artificial trees,’ he cried. The other turtles looked curiously-and disapprovingly at his bitter crying mouth and remained silent until one old timer swam to Homer and spoke. ‘What can we do?" he said in the sarcastic and defeated voice of the weary. He repeated ‘‘What can we do?" Then, he answered his own question. ‘Nothing, absolutely nothing!"' With this, he spat on the ground at Homer's feet and swam grumbling away. ‘Wait,’ Homer reasoned with him. ‘‘We can fight!'’ Astonished faces mocked him. “We will fight," Homer said stoutly. “We'll tear down the plastic trees and take the false color from our shells. We'll be free individuals, each being judged for his true characteristics. We can start now.” The crowd of turtles stood silently, many of them mocking and a few wishing for the courage to stand beside Homer. Their courage failed them. “Homer Turtle,"’ a pink daisy with a green head said reproachfully, ‘there is nothing we can do. You can't beat the system,’ he used the old lowered ted backs heads, Homer yelled. ‘‘! Homer sank, defeated, to “| will,’ he mumbled to It's time now, thought Homer, and he slid from the synthetic rock into the chemically treated water. After swimming to a palm tree, he closed his toothless mouth around his trunk, pulling and shaking it in an effort to make it fall. The weight of his body pressing against the base finally snapped it loose, and it fell noisily into the shallow water. The plastic dome of leaves floated, an across the pool, Homer felled the in the same manner, Indian five then round boat, remaining swam trees to the corner to rest on the only granite rock in the tank. There, he fell into the heavy, peaceful sleep of the innocent, waiting to accept their praise when the others saw ioned a bitter turtle. ‘‘No, Homer,’ said, shaking her head slowly from do it alone. | will be a real turtle or | will die. Do you hear me? You can live in an undisguised world in which each member maintains and reveals its natural self."’ They were virtually deaf to his voice. prone position, working his bring saliva to the dry cavity. occasional will ‘‘and on him. ‘Alright,’ an their pain- cliche, turned and what he had accomplished. The cracking sound of the window shades snapping up woke Homer at eight thirty in the morning. His eyes opened to the wreckage he had made during the night and on the many baffled turtles who wandered through it. ‘Good morning,’’ Homer said jubilantly to the group in general. ‘‘What do you think? | told you 1! would destroy the plastic world by myself, and | did.'’ He grinned toothlessly, waiting for the forecoming words of approval. None came. “Destroyed the plastic world?’ quest- he's the system,’’ he said, indicating the sleeping counterman., ‘‘Don't cause trouble for yourself and the rest of us.”’ ‘Yes, we can beat the system,’ Homer argued. ‘Who's with me?" he asked, surveying the crowd with glistening eyes. Turtles waved their hands in dismissal or, with air systems squeal by a rotating hamster wheel. Slumbering turtles, like decorated flying saucers, lay immobile, blending perfectly into their world of unreality. his natural mouth himself, to sur- she side to side, ‘‘you've only made it worse. Our tank still contains the remains of our plastic world, even if they are strewn about.'' She looked into Homer's anguished face and said sadly, ‘‘We told you there was nothing you could do to escape the artificial life you were born into, but you just wouldn't listen, would you? Now look what you have given us, Homer."’ |