Octopuses and a New Friend
Molly opened her eyes and stretched properly. She already knew it was morning because through the tiny hole in her little house she could see a beam of light. With one tentacle she lifted her little home and swam outside. Her home — or rather a coconut shell — gently settled back onto the sand.
Outside it was so beautiful. Around her swam all her little fish friends — tiny red platys, bigger neon tetras and the biggest guppies. But most of all she was excited to see her very best friend — another little octopus — Annie.
Just to be sure, she knocked on the wall of her shell. Annie slept inside a real sea shell and sometimes she simply did not want to wake up in the morning at all.
Finally she came outside! They grabbed each other’s little tentacles and started dancing. After some dancing and swaying around the aquarium, they became hungry.
“When will breakfast be?” they wondered.
Every day, a little brown-eyed girl took care of their food and the cleanliness of the water. But today she was surely late! The octopuses pressed themselves against the glass and waited impatiently.
At last the door opened and the brown-eyed girl entered the room. It was just a shame they did not know her name. They often asked her, but the little girl could not speak at all! She only made strange noises, but no bubbles ever came from her mouth, so they could never understand her.
The little girl approached the aquarium holding something in her hand. Well, it was definitely not the food box! It was some kind of bag and something inside it was swimming. But the octopuses could not see what it was.
All the little fish gathered near the girl, expecting breakfast. The girl said something to them, but no matter how hard they tried, they could not see a single bubble leave her mouth. So once again, they could not understand her.
Suddenly the little girl opened the lid and poured the bag into the aquarium. Then she half-closed the lid, made another strange sound and left the room.
The octopuses searched for their new fish friend. But they could not see anybody new. They looked above themselves, in front of themselves, behind themselves, left and right — but no new fish was swimming anywhere!
Then they looked beneath themselves — and there she was!
A small strange fish sat on the sand at the bottom. She was not swimming at all. Not even a little! Maybe she did not know how? wondered Annie.
The new fish looked strange. She had odd fins, almost as if they had been cut in half. Even her tail fin looked unusual. Her eyes bulged outward and it looked as though instead of scales she wore some kind of armor!
Molly decided she would introduce herself to the new fish.
She swam closer and began politely:
“Hello! I am Molly—”
But before she could even finish her name, the new fish suddenly snapped at her!
Snapped? With a fin? But fins do not snap!
The strange fish only bulged her little eyes on stalks and snapped once more. Then she quickly scuttled away into the opposite corner of the aquarium.
Molly and Annie quickly hid behind the tree trunk on the other side of the aquarium. They decided they would rather not approach the strange fish again and instead watch her from afar.
More fish swam over to the newcomer. But she terrifyingly snapped at them with both her front fins! One little platy named Donna even got lightly pinched on the tail.
Donna squeaked in surprise and quickly swam away.
But Molly noticed something.
The strange fish did not look angry.
She looked terrified.
Molly and Annie quickly hugged Donna and brought her somewhere safe.
Then they decided they had to act! They grabbed a little stick in their tentacles and decided they would confront the strange fish and make her apologize to Donna.
As they approached her armed like this, the strange fish suddenly cried out:
“Wait, please! I do not want to hurt you!”
“Then why do you keep snapping at us with your fins?” asked Molly.
“No! I am just very scared of you,” the strange fish answered.
Annie tilted her head. “And why are you scared of us? We never hurt you.”
The strange fish stayed silent for a moment and then quietly squeaked:
“Because all of you look like monsters.”
Suddenly the whole aquarium became completely silent.
“And what exactly are you?” Donna finally asked.
“I am Rudolf the crayfish. And I do not have fins. I have claws.”
“Crayfish? Claws?” Nobody in the aquarium had ever heard of such things before.
“This morning I was still with my friends in my own aquarium and now suddenly I am here. And all of you look strange. None of you have claws and you two have far too many legs, but you do not even walk on them. You only swim like everybody else.”
“We are octopuses! We do not have fins, we have tentacles,” replied Molly. “And these are fish — Donna the platy, Betty the guppy and Sandra the neon tetra.”
“Nice to meet you,” Rudolf answered shyly. “I ended up here and I was very scared of all of you. I do not know anybody here and I did not know whether I could trust you not to hurt me.”
Annie thought for a moment. “Rudolf, what games did you play with your friends in your old aquarium?”
For the first time Rudolf’s eyes lit up. “Tag!”
Donna immediately shouted: “Then catch me! You are it! But no snapping, promise?”
Rudolf smiled. “I promise!”
And from that moment on, Rudolf, our little octopuses and all the fish in the aquarium played together and laughed together.
They discovered that when somebody is new, they only seem strange until we get to know them.
And that even someone with claws can be afraid of a new place.
Yours, - 9i7wo2 -
January 2026