Jeff stared out of the porthole and watched as the glittering blue ocean rolled by outside.
Skyscrapers rose across the bay, while nearby a group of gray destroyers was anchored together. Jeff wasn’t sure where their house had been teleported to, but it certainly looked like it was on a naval base.
He pulled himself away from the porthole and just took in the house.
It was much more sterile and stark than the cluttered mess his old home had been. The floor was made out of textured plastic, almost like a shower might have – which made sense given that it covered ankle deep in water.
Speaking of which, other than the layer of water on top of it, the floor was absolutely barren. Meanwhile, all of their old furniture – tables, chairs, everything – had been converted into cold aluminum that was welded into the floor.
As Jeff took a quick walk around the house, he did find a single dry spot towards the front. Connecting to the front door was a raised entry room, with a small, adjoining bedroom. From the look of it, this was a guest bedroom designed for human visitors.
Walking towards the back of the house, Jeff found a diving room for direct access to the sea outside. Next to the diving room was a set of stairs, which led to a dry upper level. At first, Jeff wondered why there would be another dry section of the house, then quickly got his answer when he looked into his dad’s room.
Mike’s room was mostly just a tank full of softly swirling sea water, the currents necessary for a shark to survive. Looking around at the high-tech and sterile white walls, Jeff guessed that they contained the filtering equipment. His father’s various trophies and honors were on the far wall, along with a computer desk.
He wandered down the relatively short hallway and glanced into the nearby bathroom.
The toilet was odd, just a single bidet sitting in the middle of the room, probably to accommodate his dad’s huge tail. To the left and right were two separate sinks. The toothbrushes were different. His dad’s was a heavy-duty brush and a thing of tooth floss. Next to that was what appeared to be a pair of dental pliers and a jar filled with teeth, which he couldn’t help but stare at.
That’s right! He’d forgotten that sharks went through teeth left and right. Without prey to lose them in, his dad must have to pull them out on his own every once and awhile. Weirded out, he left the bathroom and continued to his room.
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Downstairs, Mike started watching the football game.
He wished he could be out there in the field. Mike had an amazing, nigh-superhuman physique. Of course, he’d been made that way. But unfortunately, football was impossible for him. His fins made fitting the brawny shark with the safety pads difficult and his head shape made helmet designs useless.
Mike heard his son bumping around upstairs and smiled, showing off his sharp teeth.
He’d hoped Jeff would join him in watching the game, show some interest. Maybe… maybe he should have spent more time with him.
All those missions he’d done, disarming sea mines, taking out pirates off the Ivory Coast - they’d taken him away from his son’s life. When he came back to his house, it felt like Jeff was more like a stranger than his own son every day.
The kid didn’t even like sports!
Mike had been an amazing athlete even before the experimental process that had turned him into a super-soldier. He’d joined the Navy straight out of high school and done his stint, was recruited into the Navy SEALS, and then proved himself again there. Major Mike Davis then went on missions under the arctic ice, discovered the Hollow Earth.
He’d fought a Cave Kraken and led three survivors to safety.
All his missions had gotten weirder and more top-secret from there. Alien hive-minds trapped in the oil reserves from meteors a million years ago, destroying a black hole generator in Iraq and fighting the Chupacabra. His life was the X-Files.
And then he was going to retire.
His driver’s license said he was getting old. But despite the fifty years he’d spent on this planet so far, his shark genes had rejuvenated him back to a young adult. It had been an unexpected, but welcome, occurrence.
With his success, other anthros started appearing in the super soldier program. The vast majority were carnivores, of course, although the military did make one or two exceptions. Mike was no longer the only anthro in the world, and gene editing became a big trend.
Mike hadn’t been able to leave, you see. Top Secret super-soldier mutants generally didn’t have the ability to leave their labs. But now that the technology had been released (in limited form), he could finally get out and start hanging out again.
He’d spent, what had it been? Thirty years in the super soldier program? He’d been trapped in this house for most of that time, with only his son to keep him company. And now that had changed. He could go to football games, get drunk at a bar.
Recently, he’d even checked out the dating scene and found a girlfriend – Delilah Shreveport – and they’d really hit it off.
Of course, he had no idea her son, Finn, was Jeff’s best friend. That made things a little awkward, but they’d made do. He’d invited her over to watch the game, but she was about as interested in football as Jeff had been.
It was so strange how much he was reminiscing today!
Man, it brought back memories of when he’d first held his son, Jeff…
The Cowboys scored a touchdown and Mike’s attention was drawn back to the tv.
As Mike cheered, new memories began to trickle in.
When he sat back down, his mind turned back to his son – though son perhaps wasn’t the most accurate term. Jeff was Mike’s son in the sense that Mike had raised him. But unlike a normal son, Jeff’s mom was a tank in a Navy research lab.
Given Mike’s success, the Navy had decided to clone him, and had offered to let Mike raise that clone. Now, close to twenty years later, and Jeff was a strong, handsome shark who was following in his father’s footsteps.
Mike shook his head, toothy mouth spreading into a smile.