Tentacles

Seeking solace after a hectic day, I left my house on the waterfront and descended down a well-known trail to the foot of a steep coastal cliff. A gray narrow strip stretched out into a stony beach, so dismal and uninviting that the likelihood of encountering anyone in this forgotten place seemed negligible. Especially since it was late and a piercing cold wind blew in from the sea.

Standing on the bleak sand, with hungry mosquitoes swarming around me, motionless jellyfish gasped for air behind. The sea lapped at the shallows, as if in feeble attempts to reach my feet. Across its iridescent dark-lilac surface, ebbing weak evening waves rolled.

A large amber moon hung low over the hazy horizon, a few minutes ago it had appeared there above the dense mist, and in that time the sea had retreated almost another meter, leaving behind foam and clusters of dark-green algae. And among the mounds of large multicolored shells, some tiny shelf creatures with long bristles and black globular eyes helplessly writhed. They floundered in small sandy depressions, where there was still a little stagnant water. Vital organs peeked through their translucent chitin, and their thin bristly legs convulsed and desperately churned bubbles around them. What an abomination nature has created, I thought disgustedly.

I gave them no more than a minute of my attention, and then continued on, watching as the sea reluctantly receded, and for some reason, in the rustle of the waves, I heard... a threat?

Where the bottom was exposed, only clumps of yellowish frothy foam remained, swaying in the wind.

And then I stopped, leaning over the jellyfish. It was a very large representative of its ugly kind. And although it looked completely dead, I thought that life could still linger in its soft gelatinous body, which had already weathered and softened. Long and thin as hair, stingers were visible on its dangerous white and blue appendages. The jellyfish lay belly up and...
A vague fear stirred within me. I leaned in closer, to make sure I wasn't imagining it: the undulating tentacles barely trembled.

It must be the wind doing its job, my reason suggested. However, an unpleasant chill ran down my spine to the very crown, and I shivered involuntarily.

Straightening up abruptly, I recoiled from the jellyfish, as if it could be dangerous. And I walked on, stepping along the crest of the washed-up sand ridge that stretched along the entire beach. On its outer side, almost a solid strip, slippery seaweed darkened, sharp as mollusk shells in their tangled knots. And here and there, like sea castaways, lay gray, dull-white, pale-blue, and greenish jellyfish corpses, small, large, and monstrously huge.

Everywhere...
There were hundreds of them!
My vague fear turned into unfathomable horror. I felt feverish, although the wind had subsided completely by now. And I could no longer blame it for all these disgusting tentacles suddenly stirring ominously, like slippery physalia, swaying on the seabed.