“Wha…?”
He spun and looked down.
“Shit!”
A jolt of fear rocketed through him — there was a tentacle, thick as his wrist, coming up out of the water beside the rock, and in the few seconds, he was frozen watching it as it inched a little more up his calf to grip on.
Ben leaped to the side, but the thing held on tight, and looking down into the water, he finally realized where his fish had gone, and horrifyingly, what was lurking there.
Its camouflage was so effective that even so close, Ben had to concentrate to make it out. The massive creature was spread out like an enormous rug beneath the water, and the bulbous bag of a head had two plate-sized eyes staring dispassionately up at him. It was easily 30 feet across and as he watched, it changed color, flaring red and becoming brilliantly visible from its camouflage in amongst the weed beds.
As part of his Special Forces training, Ben had dived in deep water where the giant Pacific octopus dwelled and knew they could get to 150 pounds with an arm span of 12 feet. They were smart, curious, and strong as hell. But this thing was three times that size and might have been one of its ancestors.
Maybe it was just curious, and maybe it was hungry. But Ben had no intention of letting the thing drag him into the water, as he knew underneath the massive cephalopod’s body would be a horned beak, probably a foot across on this monster, that would sever limbs and crack his skull open like an egg.
Ben also realized that this must have been the thing that had been gifting him the shells. It scared the shit out of him knowing that it had been watching him probably since he arrived. And it was baiting him, trying to lure him to deeper and deeper water. And when that failed, it had decided to come get him itself.
“Fuck you.”
Ben brought his spear around and jabbed at it, and then began to hack with all his might as the head began to breach the surface. It ignored him and started to bring more arms to bear on its task.
“Shit, shit, shit.”
Ben continued to stab, but it was like trying to put holes in a soft and super tough rubber blanket, as the limbs or boneless bag refused to be penetrated. There were tentacles around both his legs now, and his feet began to skid on the rocks… toward the water.
“No. Fucking. Way.” Ben lunged with the spear, this time catching the edge of one eye, and blue blood spurted from its side. The tentacles curled back up for a few moments, a little like a boxer protecting its head in the ring.
Ben backed away. Would it stay in the lagoon? he wondered, or rather, he hoped. He remembered seeing a nature program once that showed an octopus leaving a rock pool to chase down a crab. It was fast and ruthless, and once it had caught its prey, it hauled it back into the water to dine at its leisure. Ben didn’t want to find out if the bigger variety could do the same.
Ben used the moment to clamber higher on the rock and scale down onto the ocean side. He peered back between the boulders, spear held ready, and saw the bulbous thing start to heave itself from the water. The large disc-like eyes caught sight of him, and the body flared a fire engine red—if ever there was the color of anger, this was it, he thought.
Perhaps the lagoon belonged to it, and the monstrous octopus was about to show the soft two-legged creature that it was boss around here. He bet he knew who’d win that fight.
Ben looked up and down the breakwater. The rocks on the ocean side looked slippery and also covered in oysters closer to the deep, dark water — he didn’t like his chances of moving quickly. At worst, he’d slip and hurt himself, but at least he’d end up in the ocean. Though he desperately wanted to avoid those bottomless-looking depths, if need be, he’d damn well swim for it.
He considered his options; he could go south and try and swim around the octopus, and all the way back to the beach. Or swim to his north, where the breakwater met the cliff face? Though he doubted he’d be able to scale the sheer edifice, he might have been able to at least get up and out of the water, and perhaps higher than the heavy creature could climb.
He grimaced with indecision. How long would he have? How long would it take him to climb with that big bastard in the water, throwing sticky tentacles at him while he slipped and slid on the rock face?
Ben glanced between the rocks again and saw the huge muscular body launching more tentacles from below to latch onto the rocks and haul itself out. Its body now undulated in stripes of red, green, and brown, and he knew it wasn’t going to give up and just go away. His time was up — the beach or the cliff? He chose — the beach it was — and he ran for it.
Skipping across jagged rocks in bare feet meant he’d be crippled for days, but he had no choice. Back between the huge stones, he saw the octopus now fully out of the water and pulling itself up to the top of the border rocks. Thick tentacles were thrown like climbing ropes over the jagged stones and the bag-like head began to appear.
Ben knew he’d never get past now, and worse, the thing had the high ground. He had one chance left. He gripped his spear and dove into the ocean.
He swam hard and fast, knowing he had seconds to get around the huge beast before it was fully over. If it decided to launch itself into the water, it’d have him in seconds. Ben knew his one chance was to get around it, clamber back onto the rocks and then, damn his feet, just freaking run like a mountain goat over the rocks and back to the beach.
Ben swam, almost right beside the huge cephalopod and past it, and then flicked over onto his back for a quick glance back. It was moving fast, but maybe it had decided to stay out of the ocean. The huge body was all writhing tentacles like a coiling bag of snakes and flaring redness as it perched high on the rocks.
He was almost past it, and a glimmer of hope started to flicker in his chest. But the huge eyes continued to stare at his flailing arms and must have found them irresistible, as a warm rippling effect ran over its skin color — satisfaction, delight, or hunger? Ben might never live to find out.
To Ben’s horror, it started to descend, and he was going to be trapped in its element. He wasn’t far enough along, and he glanced at the rocks and knew it’d be hard to pull himself out of the water quickly here. So, instead, he wedged himself in amongst the boulders, feeling oysters and barnacles slice into his back. He ignored them, gritted his teeth, and pointed his spear outwards.
“Come on!” he yelled in defiance.
The massive octopus began to clamber down and at the water line, stopped, and spread itself out like a parachute on the rocks. Colors flashed and rippled on its body, and the lead tentacles touched the ocean water, coiling back as though being scalded.
To Ben, it looked like it couldn’t decide what to do. Then, instead of coming in, it lifted itself and began to slide across the rocks at the water line. Horrifyingly, the boneless creature flowed like some sort of glutinous liquid — straight toward him.
Jesus Christ, it’s going to drop down right on top of me. Ben eased out of his shelter and was about to start swimming again when the ocean exploded around him.
Something like a submarine launched itself from the depths beside him. Ben’s eyes were so wide with panic, they nearly bulged out of his head, and his sudden, sharp intake of breath was mostly seawater.
He spluttered and thrashed as the biggest thing he’d ever seen in his life surged up on the rocks to grab at the bulbous head of the octopus. It was shining gray-black with a triangular head as big as a truck that split open to be nearly all mouth and full of tusk-like teeth.