Inky the Octopus and the 50-Metre Drain
Welcome back to Learn English with Podcasts. Mike, imagine you are a small animal in a glass tank. One night, the lid is left open just a little. What would you do?欢迎回到 Learn English with Podcasts。Mike，想象你是一只被关在玻璃缸里的小动物。有天夜里，盖子没有完全盖好。你会怎么做？
Most animals stay. Inside there is food, and water, and someone who feeds them every day. Outside it is dark, cold, and you have no idea where to go.大多数动物会留下来。里面有食物，有水，每天有人喂它们。外面又黑又冷，你也不知道该往哪儿去。
But an octopus at a small aquarium in New Zealand looked at that little opening and thought: maybe tonight.但新西兰一家小水族馆里的一只章鱼，看着那道小小的缝隙，心想：也许就是今晚。
Wait. It actually got out? Through the top?等等。它真的跑出去了？从顶上？
Yes. And this is the part I love. The next morning, the staff came to work, and the tank was empty.是的。我最喜欢的就是这一段。第二天早上，工作人员来上班，缸是空的。
Empty. No octopus.空的。没有章鱼。
No octopus. But there was something on the floor. A wet line, like someone had pulled a wet cloth across the tiles, from the tank all the way to a drain.没有章鱼。但地上有东西：一道湿痕，像有人拿湿布从缸边一路拖到排水口。
So it did not just get out of the tank. It went somewhere.所以它不只是跑出缸，它还去了某个地方。
It went down. The wet line ended at a drain pipe. That pipe was fifteen centimetres wide.它往下走了。湿痕终点是一根排水管。那根管子只有 15 厘米宽。
And it was fifty metres long. At the other end of it was the Pacific Ocean.它长 50 米。另一头是太平洋。
Fifty metres. In the dark, with no map.50 米。还是在一片漆黑、没有任何地图的情况下。
The tank wall was about two metres high. So it climbed down two metres. It crossed the floor. Then it pushed itself into that narrow pipe and crawled fifty metres to the sea.缸壁大约两米高。它先爬下两米，穿过地面，然后把自己挤进那根细管子，爬了 50 米，到了海里。
But how? An octopus is not small. This one was about the size of a rugby ball, right? A rugby ball would never fit in a pipe like that.可它怎么做到的？章鱼并不小。这只大概有橄榄球那么大吧？橄榄球绝对塞不进那样的管子。
Because an octopus is almost all soft. It has no bones at all. The only hard part is its beak, the little mouth part. It looks a bit like a parrot's beak.因为章鱼几乎全身都是软的，它完全没有骨头。唯一硬的地方是它的喙，也就是嘴那部分，有点像鹦鹉的喙。
So if the beak fits, the rest fits.所以只要喙能过去，剩下全都能过去。
That is exactly what the aquarium manager said. If the beak can get through, the whole animal can get through.水族馆经理说的就是这个意思：只要喙能过，整只章鱼就能过。
Okay, I need to know who this octopus was. Did he have a name?好，我得知道这只章鱼是谁。它有名字吗？
He did. Inky. He arrived in 2014. A fisherman found him in a crayfish pot near the reef, and he was in bad shape. Some of his arms were hurt, and a few were shorter than they should be.有的，它叫 Inky。它是 2014 年来到这里的。一个渔民在礁石附近的龙虾笼里发现了它，当时它的状况很糟：有几条腕足受了伤，还有几条比正常的短。
The city even held a competition to name him. Inky won, because octopuses squirt ink.市里还办了一场给它起名字的比赛。Inky 赢了，因为章鱼会喷墨。
So he was a rescue. They fixed him up, and then he left.所以它算是被救助的。他们把它养好，然后它走了。
He stayed about two years. The staff liked him. He was friendly and very curious. If you put your hand against the glass, he would often come up and put an arm on the glass, like a high five.它待了大约两年。工作人员很喜欢它。它很友好，也非常好奇。你把手贴在玻璃上，它常常会游过来，把一条腕足贴在玻璃上，像击掌一样。
That makes it worse. He was not a wild animal who hated the tank. He was the friendly one.这更让人难受。它不是一只讨厌水缸的野生动物，它是那只最友好的。
The manager said something interesting about that. He did not think Inky was unhappy. Octopuses live alone, so he was not lonely either. He was just curious. He wanted to know what was outside.经理对此说过一句很有意思的话。他不觉得 Inky 不开心。章鱼本来就独居，所以它也不孤单。它只是好奇。它想知道外面是什么样。
So it was not an escape from a prison. It was more like a walk out of the front door.所以这不是越狱，更像是从前门走出去散个步。
On a night when the door happened to be open.只不过那一晚，门刚好是开着的。
And they never found him?然后他们再也没找到它？
Never. They checked the pipes. They did not think anyone took him. He was just gone.再没找到。他们检查了管子，也不认为有人把它带走了。它就是不见了。
And here is the strange part. This happened in January 2016. The aquarium told nobody for three months.奇怪的地方在这里：这事发生在 2016 年 1 月，水族馆整整三个月没有告诉任何人。
When the story finally came out, it went everywhere. Newspapers in New York and London. Television in many countries.等消息终于公开，它传遍了全世界。纽约和伦敦的报纸，很多国家的电视。
For one octopus?就为了一只章鱼？
For one octopus. Five people at the city office were answering phone calls about him, full time.就为了一只章鱼。市政府有五个人全职接关于它的电话。
That is a lot of phone calls about a soft animal in a pipe.为了一只钻进管子的软体动物，这电话也太多了。
Then people started asking the question nobody at the aquarium wanted to answer. What happened to him after that?后来大家开始问一个水族馆不想回答的问题：它后来怎么样了？
Well. He is an octopus. He belongs in the sea. That is where he came from.嗯，它是章鱼，本来就属于大海。它就是从那儿来的。
That is true. But an octopus does not live very long. Most of them live only one or two years.没错。但章鱼活不长，大多数只活一到两年。
Oh.哦。
A scientist at Otago University said in early 2017 that Inky was probably already gone. He was already an adult when he escaped. If he found the reef and mated, he would have died a few months later. That is what octopuses do.奥塔哥大学的一位科学家在 2017 年初说，Inky 那时大概已经不在了。它逃出去的时候就已经成年。如果它找到了礁石并交配，几个月后就会死。章鱼就是这样。
So his great escape might have been the last thing he ever did.所以它那场伟大的越狱，可能是它做的最后一件事。
Or the first. Nobody knows. His arms were short from old fights, so someone might still recognise him out there. But nobody has.也可能是第一件。没人知道。它的腕足因为早年打架而偏短，所以也许还有人在海里认得出它。但至今没有人。
And there is one more thing. Do you know what lives in his old tank now?还有一件事。你知道它那个旧缸现在住着谁吗？
Please do not say another octopus.请别说是另一只章鱼。
A moray eel. His name is Psycho.一条海鳝。它叫 Psycho。
Of course it is.那当然了。
The manager said it best, I think. He said Inky went off, and did not even leave them a message.我觉得经理说得最好。他说 Inky 就这么走了，连张字条都没留下。