Il Pescatore (The Fisherman) is a sci-fi story by Massimo Rotundo and Ricardo Barreiro, serialized in the magazine Orient Express in 1983 and set in a future 1997.
The setting of the story is a New York degraded by pollution, which has produced irreversible damage to the environment and genetic mutations in animals.
The ecosystem has gone mad; the alligators thrown in the sewers of New York, as in the most classic of urban legends, have become huge because of the uncontrolled emissions of major industries and have infested the pestilential waters of Long Island, not bathable because of pollution.
Marine species have evolved to acclimate and dangerous mutant species, algae and deadly carnivorous, resistant to corrosive substances dissolved in water, poisonous jellyfish and many other varieties.
To protect the citizens and vacationers that hung out to take the 'falsified sun' on the beach of Long Island, the same was fenced with electrified barbed wire, especially useful to hold off the giant albino alligators.
The natural foods are scarce and are paid for their weight in gold. Those who can not afford it are forced to resort to substitutes. Just as those who can not afford the real sun far from New York are forced to settle for the artificial sun of Long Island.
Meanwhile, the big food price speculators buy the flesh of mutant crocodiles, selling it for its weight in gold as tuna meat.
Alex, like most people, struggling to maintain the family and get some extra money, dedicates to smuggling. The best way to make money quickly, but in an extremely dangerous and illegal way, is to go in search of albino alligators.
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