Prompt: Mass sea level fluctuation event of 2004

The grey diffuse light casts a uniform half shadow and sucks the colour from the vibrant beach. Not even the gulls circled overhead through the thick sea fog hugging the pebbled expanses, as if the air itself had solidified into a damp mass preventing their joyful soaring. The lack of jubilant cries forming an auditory void in the soundscape, broken only by the sea. Waves lapping and clawing at the steep slope throwing yet more salt into the air as they tirelessly reclaim the land. The wet rolling of each throthy hand slapping against the shore and providing the only sense that time still passes, moments marked by the gentle sigh of wet stone on more wet stone. Storm battered bungalows break the uniform grey atmosphere, miniature bastions of civilization in the stony waste. Salt stained and faded wood that once boasted once bright colours now leached into the fog, constitutes up the dim grey intrusions against the oppressive atmosphere.

A lone figure wanders parallel to the banks of scree, disturbing slow swirls of lazy white tendrils in their wake as the footsteps add their own rhythmic crunch to the sigh of the sea. With a resolute sigh the wanderer drops to sit among the cold pebbles, venting their frustrations to the shrouded sea. A single flat stone draws attention for no other reason than it is there. The slick pebble flying easily from the palm and vanishing. The gloom quickly obscuring the path and the soft, satisfying plop of the surface being broken momentarily breaking the monotony. A second stone soon follows its sibling into the gloom, along with a solid thunk of stone on stone moments later.

The continuous static of the waves becomes absent from the world, robbing the only stimulus for an entire sense. From behind the wanderer a breeze begins to move the fog, at first a gentle caress but quickly intensifying into a howling gale pulling at the wander’s hair and clothing, snatching and grabbing to pull untethered flotsam away from the land and out to the expanse. Streamers of fog rip and curl along with the wind, torn off the land by the ferocious force. As quickly as it had come the wind vanishes leaving the unobscured sun to beat down on on the sparse land.

The wanderer stood as the land became revealed, where once the rolling waves dominated an entire cardinal now only the exposed sea bed is visible, the newly exposed land extending out beyond the new horizon. Damp seaweed shines in the sunlight as surprised sea life struggles around it. The occasional small pool provides temporary refuge to a lucky few creatures. Their home now the domain of land dwellers.