Troy is an average fish; to be precise he is a Rainbow Trout. He loves his colors, shows them off around mates. Swimming around, shining the lights’ reflection off of his rainbow colors at potential mates. He spends his leisure time swimming up and down a stream that leads to Lake Peigneur, only a few miles away. Today was going to be no different from any other day or, so he thought.

“I’m hungry,” he thought to himself. Hunger had rumbled his stomach once already so the pain was starting to get to him. “I haven’t eaten in an hour. That feels like forever ago.” His dramatic thoughts weigh on his mind as he scans the rocks for any sign of movement. Whipping his tail under crevices, sucking up water on the back sides expecting something to be hiding, each turn he came up empty. “Where is everything?”

After a few hundred yards of swimming, he comes up to a dirt cloud floating around. “What is that?” He questions as he slowly swims closer. The closer he gets the more he can hear a sound, like struggling, individuals struggling. Slowly inching closer the sounds of struggle end, the dirt cloud settles and there set still were two fish.

“Whew, that was good,” said one of the fish.

“I agree” said the mate. That’s when the mate noticed Troy being still and watching them. “Hey you, yeah you.”

Troy just gives a blank expression.

“Yeah I’m talking to you. You better just swim the other way buddy. These here are my eggs. I just got done fertilizing them, and I am not about to let some free floater just come around and eat them.”

Troy becomes confused.

“You better just get. Go on now. Get,” the mate swims towards Troy. Finally, he took the hint and swam the other direction.

“This is crazy, I’ve got to find something soon,” he complained. Then finally, just after a few dozen yards, there it is a crayfish. “Alright, found something!” The crayfish was distracted, struggling to keep its grip on a tiny little fish. Troy slowly swam his way towards it; kick back as very little water as possible to avoid unnecessary back waves. Getting closer and closer, the crayfish finally sinks his grasp and beings the fish to its mouth. Troy makes for the take, he kicks hard and jet streams at the crayfish, upon getting in range he sucks up a tremendous amount of water into his mouth. The crayfish is sucked up into his mouth and into his stomach it goes.

“Mmmm,” he thought to himself. “That will last me for a while. Now what should I do?” Being still for a while he could feel the crayfish struggle in his belly. “I’m just gonna go for a swim,” he decides. Off he went heading downstream.

Just after a few dozen yards he comes across Barry. Barry had lots of company today.

“What’cha got there Barry?” Troy asked while looking at the collecting group huddled around Barry.

“A school of my kids, apparently.” Barry has a school of about fourteen baby fish huddled around his backside.

“Your kids huh?”

“That’s what they tell me.”

“Hasn’t it been a while since you’ve mated?”

“It has, that I recall.”

“Since the…”

“Since the last batch got eaten, yes. Some fish around here just have no boundaries when it comes to food.“

“Yes this is true.”

“Anyway, these guys say a crayfish near here got one of their siblings, and they need to get him back.”

“Uh-huh,” the school says in unison.

“Oh a crayfish just a few dozen yards back?”

“Un-huh,” they say again. Troy looks one of the babies over and gets a look at their side patterns.

“Yea don’t worry about that crayfish.”

“Oh, you know it?” Barry asked.

“Yes I ate it on the way here.”

“So it’s gone?” One of babies ask.

“Yes its gone.”

“YAY!” They exclaim in unison and swim away.

“Well that was easy.”

“Right?”

“So you saw the baby fish I take it?”

“Yes I did.”

“Eat that too?”

“Yes I did.”

“Well not like I don’t have a few more, they’ll need me again when something else eats one of their siblings again.”

“That’s one way to stay positive.”

“Yeah, this whole parenting thing has gotten me wanting more, I think I am going to go hunt for a mate.”

“Awesome, I’m happy for you. Have fun.”

“Thanks Troy.” Barry swims away heading up stream.

“It’s been a very productive day so far.”