The Scientist and the Sea
|| @maxwellxcarter ||
Wilson P. Higgsbury lived in a two-story house on a cliff overlooking the sea. It looked, at first sight, to be a rickety structure, barely holding its post on the top of the cliff, but when one got up to see it more closely, they found that it was indeed a rickety structure barely holding its post on the top of the cliff.
Still, it suited his needs. It housed a decent laboratory, simple living quarters, and numerous tanks filled with live aquatic animals. It was high enough up to be safe from flooding (if not heavy winds), yet close enough to the water that he could drive down from time to time to collect samples, take readings, and check on the equipment he’d left down there on his cold and pebbly private beach.
On this particular day, he was doing just that. A great storm had just blown through (he’d needed to effect some repairs to the house afterward, but nothing too severe), and it was time now to check on his equipment and see what sorts of creatures and things might have been washed up from the thrashing waves and raging winds.
To this end, as soon as he was done with the housework, he loaded up some nets and tools and drove down to the beach as was his custom, parking at the line where pebbles and sand met thin yellow grass, taking his box of tools, and walking down the rest of the way to see what was what.