Do Not Feed the Wildlife

“Hey, Sparkles.” The muffled voice came from across the room.

“I told you not to call me that,” Jenna said with a grimace. She didn’t move, or even look up from her ancient, beige computer.

“Whatever. I need your help.”

Grumbling under her breath, Jenna pushed back a chair with an earsplitting squeal as the metal leg scraped over worn floor. Locating khakis and sturdy shoes sprouting from underneath a desk across the room, she saw a plethora of wires where a torso should be.

“What did you do, Glen?” I am so not fixing that disaster, she added mentally.

“I wanted Dr Hort’s desk now that he’s retired. And I screwed it up,” the legs-and-wire bundle responded. His knee rose and the wires shifted. “I unplugged stuff that shouldn’t be unplugged.”

Jenna tapped a booted foot on the linoleum, happy to see Glen get some comeuppance after months of refusing to call her by her real name. Interning at Fish and Game hadn’t been what she’d expected. In retrospect, being surprised by the amount of bureaucracy at a government organization shouldn’t have been shocking.

She pursed her lips, reluctant to ask. “So what do you need me for?”

The wires parted and thick glass lenses appeared, brown eyes behind them pleading. “Turns out one of his computers ran the automated fish counter software.”

“I didn’t see the software failure alerts.” She frowned again, holding in an unprofessional laugh. If Glen had bothered to ask her – but he never did, did he?

“Yeah, well, I changed it so they came to me. But you’re gonna have to go to the ladder and get a manual estimate for the day. I’ve got to fix this and it’ll be a while.”

“Only if you promise to use my real name for the rest of the summer.”

The eyes grew sad before disappearing behind tangled wire again. “Fine. Jen.”

Jenna snarled on her way out the door.

“Don’t get eaten!” Glen yelled. She slammed the door on the rest of his words.

Her mood lightened as she went to her truck and grabbed her backpack. Stepping onto the path beside the fish ladder, she took a moment to relish being outside, in the sunlight. Her face broke into a grin. “This is more like it.”

She hiked for about fifteen minutes before settling into the shade. The rock ramp had been built from natural materials local to the area, with an eye to making it blend with the surrounding environment. Water overflowed the weirs as the pools overflowed, white streams against crystal-clear pools.

Pausing about halfway up the fish ladder, she perched on a comfortable, speckled boulder. She was unsure of the best observation spot, since Glen rarely let her go into the field. Jenna pulled a notebook from her backpack and dangled her feet over the edge of the fish ladder.

She glanced at a nearby curious squirrel with bulging cheeks. “Hope I remember all the fish types from training.” His tail fluttered at the sound of her voice.

The next half an hour was fairly uneventful. The squirrel continued to keep her company as she ticked off species and numbers transiting the fish ladder. “Steelhead…I think that’s a smallmouth bass…salmon, probably sockeye…ooo, a couple walleye there. Wonder if they’re a mated pair.”

The squirrel chittered his boredom at her. Jenna stuck her tongue out. “Hey, this is my job. Calm down. I’m still not giving you any food.”

“Trout…steelhead again…octopus…” Jenna’s pen scratched against her notebook. “Octopus?”

She closed her eyes and reopened them. The octopus was not only still there, limbs showing steady movement against the churning water, it had a passenger. Six tentacles climbed the rocks carefully from the lower pool, adhering suckers against a slippery path. The remaining two tentacles formed a backpack of sorts, where a squid nestled, its own tentacles dangling and shining against the octopus’ flickering camouflage.

“What’s a cephalopod pair like that doing all the way out here?” The squirrel squeaked and lifted his bushy tail, then ran up a tree, finally abandoning her. “No one’s going to believe this,” Jenna called after the tiny rodent.

She pulled out her cell phone and snapped a few pictures of the octopus climbing into the pool, settling the squid down carefully, and stretching out some limbs before settling into the pool for a rest. A bulbous eye caught her gaze, and Jenna lowered her phone, transfixed.

“Excuse me,” a voice said from the pool below her. “I know it’s a public place, but I’d rather you deleted those photos.”

Jenna choked on absolutely nothing and began coughing. Her phone slipped out of nerveless fingers and landed with a splash below.

A curling limb covered in suction cups rose above the edge of her boulder handed the slab of smooth metal and glass to her., water droplets dripping from the edges “Well, that solves that problem, doesn’t it?” The octopus’ beak moved in what might have been a smile as he tucked his tentacles underneath himself.

“Ah. Thank you for returning my phone,” Jenna said, feeling faint. “I didn’t know octopi could talk.”

“Oh, well.” A lazy wave of an arm gestured to the pool. The squid swirled around the pool, splashing. “They can’t. Not really. Super smart, but not that smart. You know how it goes.”

Jenna struggled for words. “Oh, of course.” Perhaps she was dehydrated.

“No, I mean, I’m a kraken,” the cephalopod continued. “That’s why I can talk. I’m James.”

A tentacle reached out to her hand, suckers tasting her arm briefly and releasing her after a brief and unnerving silent handshake. She coughed again. “I’m Jenna.”

“My parents don’t know how far George and I decided to go hiking today. They’re really active on social media, so if those pictures got out, I’d be in a ton of trouble. Grounded and restricted to the ocean for the next five years, probably.”

Her voice sounded eerily like a strangled cat. “Wouldn’t want that, obviously.”

The cephalopod bobbed his head, bouncing on tentacles. “So thanks. I’m sorry if your phone doesn’t work anymore.”

She nodded, wondering if Glen had set her up somehow.

James uncurled himself. “We’re just gonna chill here for a little bit, okay? Then go home.”

He scampered down the speckled boulder, camouflage rippling through dappled greys and blacks. “It was nice to meet you!”

“Bye.” Jenna’s voice was indistinct against the sounds of splashing water between the ladder’s pools.

A head popped back up briefly, a tentacle on each side just below protuberant eyes, beak twitching as if he was sniffing the air. “Hey – you got any snacks?”

This week, Becky Jones challenged me with “The fish counter spotted the baby kraken as it made its way up the fish ladder.” My prompt went to nother Mike: “The moon looked like it had another crater, which grew as the moon waxed larger. And then…” I can’t wait to see what he does with it.

Want to join the Odd Prompts crew? Send in a prompt to oddprompts@gmail.com by Tuesday, and receive one of your own. Don’t like commitment? Check out the spares to see if any pique your interest!