- Portent -

A STORM WITHOUT cloud brought the rain, sudden and hard. Its drops pockmarked the smooth rise of swells bringing the new tide, drops that tinted the ocean a deeper green.

Thrice daily, the tide brought life to life. Its return woke those who bided their time within airtight casings or hidden in moist crevices, so they might feast on the flood of organics. It drew to the shallows those from the depths who would, in turn, feed on the feasters. Yet they would leave their eggs behind in the protected pools, to begin a new cycle of life that would wash out with another tide.

Until this tide came in, storm-wracked and bringing only death.

First to succumb were those who opened their casings and extended fragile arms in anticipation, those arms dissolving with the ocean’s tainted kiss.

Next were those who had risen in their multitudes to feed and breed in the shallows. Even as they tasted the layer of death above and would have fled, their flesh rotted from their bones, their bones washing into the tide.

The tide paused at its zenith, having filled the pools with quiet green.

Only those waiting onshore for the tide’s departure were spared. They peered, bright-eyed and bold, from their holes in the rock face above. Some leaned farther out, into the daylight, tiny feet holding firm to the edge of the stone.

Shadows cut the sun.

In reflex, those leaning winked inside their shelters. Those who felt safe kept watch, chittering among themselves, then grew utterly quiet as the shadows surrounded what had been a tidal pool.

And began to drink.