A Walk On The Beach (Patreon)

Woman's Image with permission of Swift Creek Photos
Crab: Creative Commons

Heddi was a bit greedy. For crab legs that is. None of that synthetic stuff made from fish for her. No sir! It was the real thing or nothing. Whenever she let a guy take her out, it had to be seafood, real seafood, real crab legs. Of course, it had to be lots, too. It wouldn't do to just get a taste of crab. You really couldn't enjoy them unless you had a kilo or more. Those all you could eat places were best, of course, for quantity...but expensive recipes stuffed full of crab meat were nice, too.

Of course, even on the coast crab meat isn't cheap. So when Heddi's greed started to outstrip her finances, she decided she had to do something. Of the many possibilities that presented, some were totally unthinkable. She couldn't give up crab legs. Nor would she switch to synthetic crab meat. That, too, was an impossibility. The possibility of a better job was a possibility but that meant searching and searching took time. Time away from crab legs. Heddi wasn't so biased about real crab though that she'd not try alternatives not even once. In her mind, they had a metal or plastic taste that wrecked the whole experience.

When one of her friends told her of lab grown crab meat that was cheaper by half than the real thing, she decided to head on down to the local grocery store and try it. It was, her friend had assured her, real crab meat just not grown inside a living crab.  Deciding that she'd best not go overboard at first, she only bought one tin. But after trying it in her favourite casserole recipe, she was so pleased that she bought a whole box of the meat. She used it for everything and soon the box of 24 tins was gone. No matter, she could get more at the store.

Unfortunately, there was none. After fruitlessly searching for hours (or so it seemed), she finally asked the clerk. It seemed that there was something wrong with the meat. Some people had had bad reactions. Others became ill and were still in hospital. Heddi was annoyed at first. It was as good as the real thing and cheaper. Now she'd have to go back to the real meat again and that was expensive. Still, she'd suffered no ill effects and felt lucky.

About five days later, she was invited by a friend to the beach. Deciding she had nothing else that she would rather do, she accepted and helped make the picnic basket (of crab salad sandwiches, what else?) The trip to the beach was uneventful and she quickly retired to the change tents to take a quick dip in the ocean. No sooner had she donned her swimsuit and entered the surf then she doubled over. She'd never felt anything this painful and strange. Fortunately, help was nearby and pulled her from the water. They quickly stepped back from her once she'd been pulled to safety though. Her swimsuit lay in tatters as her body broadened and hardened. Her lower body quickly flattened and grew legs and claws -- crab legs and claws!<

Now Heddi would always have crab legs with her. Unfortunately they were now her legs and there was no way she could eat those ...