Genus: Evolving
Day Zero

Michael’s phone started ringing at two-thirty in the morning.

He stumbled out of bed, over clothes and food wrappers to get to the phone. He started to yawn as he answered the phone.

“There’s a weird creature on the beach,” his boss said before he could even greet his caller.

“It’s just a drunk college student,” Michael sighed. “They do this every Spring Break. They do it in Cancun and Florida too. The substance is usually alcohol, but sometimes illicit drug activity is to blame as well.”

“Funny,” the boss replied flatly. “I always love making these emergency calls in the wee hours of the morning for your dry, humor-less sarcasm.”

“Point made,” Michael relinquished, “Who calls the military first when they replace something on the beach?”

“The big boss’ daughter and her boyfriend were partying on the beach and they stumbled on this thing. Since she’s still on the beach, hysterical, the boss wants our attention on this ASAP. She said she thinks it’s a genetically engineered organism of some sort,” the boss replied flatly.

“That’s one hell of an assumption,” Michael replied, genuinely surprised by his boss’ answer. He started to dress, already knowing he was going to have to investigate before day break.

“Obviously, we hope she’s wrong. Hopefully it’s just a deep sea creature washed up on shore from the last earthquake,” his boss replied. “But regardless, the creature is alive.”

“Alive?” Michael stopped mid motion, trying to understand the words that were just used. “Like on the beach, from the water, still alive?”

“Alive, alive,” his boss assured. “Be on the road in five minutes. I’ve already sent the location to your phone.”

* * *

Michael drove fifteen miles over the speed limit, ran red lights, and parked sideways. But, he had a really good time getting to the beach.

He walked along the dunes, armed with his flashlight, watching the little clams digging their holes, sandpipers running in the surf, the moon reflecting off the water. The tide was beginning to get higher, so time was of the essence.

His boss’ daughter was waiting with a police officer near the boardwalk, wrapped in a towel.

Great, Michael grumbled to himself. I’m here for a wasted college student…

“You’re the one who spotted the creature?” Michael asked, trying to sound professional instead of annoyed.

“Yeah,” the boss’ daughter replied, clinging to the towel with one hand. “Sorry to get you involved, my dad’s kind of…”

“This is what I do,” Michael interjected, “Where did you see this creature?”

“It… uh… traveled… up the coast,” Ashley said, with her voice wavering. “I wasn’t going to follow it after it growled.”

“Traveled?” Michael asked, also in disbelief. “And growled?”

She nodded, “It lunged at us, too.”

“All right, thank you for your help,” Michael said. He clicked on his flashlight and started down the beach as the police officer escorted his boss’ daughter home.

He was starting to get tired, finally. But here he is, a soldier with a minor in Marine Biology on the beach at three in the morning investigating an inebriated woman’s hallucination because his big boss told him to.

He found the spot where he figured the sighting occurred, and there definitely was something at some point.

The sand was disturbed in a circle six inches in diameter. From the small disturbance, drag marks lead down the beach.

The trail continued for over a quarter of a mile before Michael came upon the thing. The body was larger than the trail it left; it was the size of a horseshoe crab. The body was red, and it had tentacles that it used to drag itself along the shore. It pulsated in the light of the flashlight. Instead of flat, it stood up like it was inflated. The body was covered in a thin exoskeleton, similar to that of a shrimp.

“What are you?” Michael asked. He took his phone and took a picture of the tracks and then another of the creature.

“You’re an unusual thing. But you look like some kind of jellyfish,” Michael explained to the weird creature. “Are you deep sea? How would you get all the way up here?”

He wondered if the species was a different genus of jellyfish, with the hardened exoskeleton enabling its body to survive if beached. It seemed like an unlikely evolutionary characteristic, but the thing was in front of him.

“I’m going to swab you really quick, ok?” Michael said, getting out a swab from his pocket and opening the sterile container.

He moved toward it to swab it, and the creature responded to his advance by growling and lunging toward him.

He stepped back, dropped the swab, withdrew his firearm and fired into the soft skin of the creature with a wet slosh noise.

The thing stilled, flattening.

Michael put his firearm away. He sighed heavily, hating himself for killing another living thing. He realized it probably couldn’t have done any significant damage; his clothes protected him from any sting could have given and it did not have teeth.

He picked up the swab and resumed swabbing the creature. He took advantage of the bullet hole to swab deeper. He closed the swab and looked at the creature again. He was pissed at himself for overreacting. All he needed was to lose his cool again with a seagull and he could look like the worst person to ever join the military.

“I’m sorry,” he told the creature.

The creature suddenly inflated again, and the wound began to bubble. The mangled lead bullet came out the injury, landing in the sand, and the wound sealed. The creature was suddenly larger, and lunged again, this time faster and accompanied by a loud hiss.

Michael backed away, “What the hell are you?”

He ran back to his car to call his boss while he checked over his shoulder again and again to make sure the creature wasn’t following him.

His boss answered the phone promptly, “False alarm?”

“No,” Michael said, out of breath, “It’s aggressive and resistant to bullets.”

“Another one of your humorless jokes?”

Michael checked his phone, lucky enough to have filmed his encounter with the thing, at least the sound was recording. He sent the file digitally to his boss.

“Does it look like a joke now?” Michael asked when he could hear his boss listening to the video.

“I’ll file an official report now,” Michael’s boss confirmed.