Submission (#2422) Approved

Siren sighed as she stared gloomily into the little mountain lake. It was a beautiful place to be fishing, undoubtedly, but she just wasn’t that interested in fishing. Her paws tightly gripped the decorated fishing pole in her hands, and she couldn’t help but fidget impatiently. Fishing wasn’t her strong suit. Siren was good at other things--singing, fighting, baking (she had been improving rapidly), even swimming...but fishing was (in her opinion) simply luck. If the fish chose to bite, great! If not, one would just have to try another day and pray to the goddess of fortune. Whose bright idea was this anyways? Ena, of course. Siren couldn’t help but smile wryly. Ena was too cute and convincing. A simple flutter of her eyelashes, and Siren would have to think twice before rejecting any of Ena’s advances. Unfortunately, Ena had decided that it was the perfect time to go fishing in Bellmoril. She planned out a little hike, and bought matching fishing rods, matching fishing hats (Ena’s was white, and Siren’s was black of course). She even bought a tiny fish-shaped basket for the anticipated great catches of the day. Ena was certain they would catch their food, and thus, stubbornly, did not pack any food to eat during this expedition. Siren was a bit more skeptical, and secretly brought some snacks in her bag. Just in case they were quite unlucky, at least they would have a bit of cookies and manaberries to munch on.

The skies were blue and the clouds were floating by lazily. The bright red and orange leaved trees waved their branches in the light breeze. Occasionally, an orange leaf would drift down from a bough and land gently on the surface of that little mountain lake, sending tiny ripples of water across the calm of the waters. The water itself was crystal clear, and one could see the beautiful pebbles in the water, of various colors and shapes.

“You should make me a necklace out of those pebbles,” giggled Ena, as she tugged at her rod. Her fishing hat (basically a cute bucket hat) originally sat quite properly on her head, but now, after a few hours of adventuring and now fishing, hung slightly lopsided on her mana horns. Siren looked at Ena fondly, and reached over with one paw to tug the hat back into place.

“Maybe I should,” she replied with a smile. Siren’s ears perked up. This was something she could do. Fishing, she could not. But this! She definitely had the skillset for making jewelry. She stared down at the clear waters. Technically, if they didn’t catch any fish, getting a small memento to bring back wasn’t a bad idea at all. They could look back on the objects with fond memories associated with the pebbles. Siren put her fishing rod down to the side, and began to slowly wade into the water. The water was bitingly cold, and her paws began to feel numb almost instantly. The water probably flowed directly from the melted glaciers and snow from the mountains even higher up.

“What are you doing?” Ena glanced over, a bit puzzled. She had been lost in thought, the previous statement long forgotten.

“Making your necklace!” Siren answered back lazily. She found a few small cute pebbles already and carefully put a few in her pocket. She was careful not to take too many from any one spot, as she didn’t want to bother the ecosystem too much. Out of the corner of her eye, she spotted a carnelian in the water. From a certain angle (especially in the water), it looked like an ordinary smooth orange colored rock. But the light managed to hit it at a certain angle, and Siren excitedly dove into the water. The water was a bit deeper than she expected--the clear depths, deceiving. She finally grabbed hold of the carnelian and swam back up to the surface of the mountain lake with it in tow. Siren held it up triumphantly as she got back to the shore. On the shore, Ena clapped her paws diligently, with a suitably impressed expression on her face.

“What is it?” Ena asked, proud of her friend but also very confused.

“I think it’s a carnelian,” Siren chirped back. She brought her loot onto shore and showed it to Ena. It was not a small carnelian at all. In fact, it was about the size of an adult mana horn. The surface was completely smooth, and the bright orange and tan stripes of the gemstone made one feel intrigued. Not quite warm or cozy, but it was magical, and alluring.

“I’m going to see if I can find some more cute rocks!” Siren left her loot by Ena and dove back into the water. Ena smiled and watched her friend swim away excitedly. She calmly put a small bit of bait (a shriveled up manaberry/raisin) onto her fishing hook and launched it back out on the lake. The fish weren’t really biting today, but she didn’t mind. She liked hanging out with Siren even if they didn’t accomplish anything. Besides, the beautiful trees and birch trees with their yellow, gold, orange leaves were splendid to behold. It was like living inside a fantastical painting. She was quite at peace in this moment.

At this time, the carnelian on the grass next to Ena moved a little bit. The initially smooth surface slowly had parts of it open up, like pocket doors in the surface. As it did so, pincers, flippers, two tails, and eyes poked out. It was a lake crab! There were many lake crabs all across Eyre, but this one had not been seen before. And especially not in Bellmoril of all places. The crab was orange and white, its eyes were black, and quite cute to look at. The pincers at the front didn’t look too scary, and its back legs were flippers (much like sea turtles). Iit had two tails (seemingly with separate tail bones, as they moved on their own) on the back. It blinked its crab eyes a few times after emerging, and, once it collected its bearings, began to attempt to inch its way back into the cold mountain lake. At this time, Ena noticed Siren’s spoils of war moving on the ground, and was astonished to see a cute tiny crab.

In the meantime, Siren had dived a few meters deeper and was surprised to find quite a few of these mysterious carnelian! They were very similar in size, and in bewilderment, she took a few more of these to show Ena the strangeness of it all. She swam up to the surface just in time to hear Ena yell, “Siren! Come here! Quickly!”

“I’m coming over!” Siren swam over as fast as she could, a bit concerned at the urgency in Ena’s voice. Had something happened? Siren arrived in front of Ena, dripping water all over the place.”What’s wrong?”

Ena’s eyes were full of excitement rather than fear, and Siren’s worries quickly dissipated. “IT’S A CRAB!” She pointed at the crab with one paw, and her other paw clutched at Siren frantically. Siren’s eyes widened in surprise. This made… a lot of sense. Especially considering how the other carnelians she found in the lake were so uniform in size. The two kittoms stared at the crab in surprise and excitement. It truly was a very cute crab, with its big black bright eyes. The crab seemed to understand it was being heavily scrutinized and paused its original retreat back to the lake, staring back up at them. How interesting of a little crab!

The little crab made a few bubbles at the two kittoms, almost as if it was blowing a raspberry at them for staring for so long. Siren startled a bit, remembering the other unfortunate carnelian crabs in her bag, and quickly reached for her bag. She rummaged through the other cute pebbles she had found until she found the couple of carnelian she had found just a few moments prior. They were still completely smooth and looked, and felt, like normal rocks (albeit with that carnelian sheen to it). She placed them on the ground next to the fully emerged crab, who, by the way, had an indignant look to it. The look on its crab face almost seemed to say, “How dare you put us on land?” There were five carnellians total, with the crab right in the center. Ena and Siren watched silently to see what the crab would do next.

To their surprise, the crab scuffled over to each carnelian and knocked on the orange outer shell twice. Then it just stood in the center, seemingly waiting. A few brief moments later, the carnelian crabs all began to emerge. Some of them had more streaks of orange than the first crab, but they all had a primarily white body. The six crabs stared up at the two kittoms, and all of them blew some bubbles. And, in unison, they began their short journey back to the lake. Within a few moments, they reached the crystal clear waters, and swam away quickly into the depths. They were rather slow on land, but quite fast in the water.

Siren looked at Ena. “That was my catch of the day,” she smirked a little. Ena looked at her empty fishing hook, and let out a dramatic sigh. She then looked back at Siren’s smug expression, “I hope you brought food.”

“I always do.”

Siren still had a few other colored pebbles, and hopefully in a few days, she could wire wrap them into a bracelet or something as a present for Ena. Quite a few of them were orange and yellowed colored, with flecks of red. Maybe she could make a crab sculpture for Ena out of these pebbles, as a fond memory of this day.