Black and grey line drawing of an octopus wrapped around a sailing ship within a spade shape of rope, with a ship's wheel, anchor and an Ace of Spades banner.

Enlarged with AI from a smaller original

Octopus and sailing ship ace of spades design

Black and grey · Flash

A black and grey drawing of an octopus with its tentacles wrapped around a three-masted sailing ship, set inside a spade shape formed from coiled rope. A ship's wheel, an anchor and a ribbon banner reading ACE OF SPADES sit around the central motif, with a large A and spade symbol in the corners as on a playing card. The work uses fine hatching, cross-hatching and stippled shading, with a symmetrical, closely detailed composition.

Octopus Tentacle Sailing ship Rope Ship's wheel Anchor Playing card Banner Spade

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A story inspired by this tattoo · fiction

Thursday, becalmed off the Azores, the wind gone soft as wet paper. Pinch has been at the card table since the morning watch, losing his wages one hand at a time to the purser's clerk. Tonight he staked the last of them on the ace of spades, the only card he swears has never once let him down.

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At four bells the thing came up under the stern. Its mantle was as broad as a cask, and its arms lifted over the rail and wound around the hull the way a man might hug a dog he doesn't trust. Nobody moved. The rigging creaked, the wheel spun loose in its lashings, and somewhere below the galley cat began to yowl. Cook swore it was after the scraps. Old Hosea swore it was after the ship's bell, which had been rope-bound and silent since Lisbon, and which nobody had thought to ring for luck.

The captain ordered the anchor cable cut, then countermanded himself, because the octopus had one arm wrapped round the cable already and seemed to be waiting for us to try. Pinch stood at the rail with his cards held out like a penitent. When he finally let the ace of spades drop, the creature took it. I watched the card curl down through the black water, and the arm withdrew as slowly as it had come.

We drifted for an hour before the wind came back. This morning the clerk paid Pinch his wages in full, and Pinch will not look at the sea. I have kept a loop of rope the thing left coiled on the rail. It still smells of deep water, and I am certain it was never the ace that won that night.