Safety is for Suckers - Chapter 3

“You all ready to depart?”

Calvin started a bit at Dr Reed’s question, asked before Calvin even realized he wasn’t alone, and almost spat out his breakfast of cold cereal when he did. This led to some choking, coughing, and a few hard slaps on the back from Dr Reed.

“Shhh…. Sure. Dr,” Calvin finally managed to choke out after getting his breath back.

“Calvin, you really need to pay more attention to your surroundings.” Dr Reed said sternly.

“I do!” Calvin insisted, “but you know how it is down here. The random booms and noses of things hitting the hull, the echoes and creaking and groans…”

Dr Reed nodded absently as he scrounged for his own breakfast, “You’ve got movies on the brain again, don’t you?”

“Oh god yes,” Calvin leaned forward, eyes gleaming, “this place would be an amazing setting for a horror film, it already feels a bit haunted. I could swear sometimes I hear something creeping around at night when you aren’t looking.”

Dr Reed just rolled his eyes, “Finish up, we need to get moving. We’ve got lots to do today when we get topside.”

Calvin hastily slurped down the rest of his cereal, which earned a critical raised eyebrow from Dr Reed, and hastily began to clean up.

Calvin’s mind drifted to the night before as he put his dishes in the sink, and he frowned slightly, “Maybe you should take Silvia with you today.”

Dr Reed’s face darkened, “What have you noticed?”

Calvin's features twisted up thoughtfully, “Well, she was spending a lot of time in her quarters yesterday…”

Dr Reed looked incredulous. 

“... and she seemed pretty off last night. She was saying something about staying and studying sea life? I think she was trying to get me to stay so she could go the surface today.” Calvin finished, scratching his chin.

Dr Reed sighed with all the pain of a man who had seen far too many intelligent people acting completely ignorant, “Calvin. I’d suggest you think about what a young lady might need privacy for at some times, and a partner for others. Let’s get going.”

In his foggy memories, Calvin suddenly recalled Silvia using the word ‘together’, but at the time he assumed she had used it in a more general sense.

Calvin did a mental recap of his relationship with Silvia, “I don’t know Dr. Reed, Silvia may not always be the picture of professionalism, but I always got the idea she was pretty married to her work, you know?”

Dr. Reed snorted, “Everyone’s got needs Calvin. And you spend enough time down here, and your co-workers start looking more and more capable of meeting them.”

No kidding, Calvin agreed mentally. When he first met Silvia, he thought she was cute, but hadn’t really pursued her as she didn’t seem too interested, and Calvin usually felt it was a good idea to avoid ‘dipping his pen in the company ink’ as some people phrased it.

But lately? Calvin swore he was noticing little things about Silvia more. How her wetsuit hugged the curves of her hips like a second skin, accentuating the firm roundness of her ass as she bent over while studying specimens. Or just how much that zipper of her suit strained to contain the prominent bounty of her chest.

Calvin carefully adjusted himself, feeling his own swelling manhood starting to strain against its seemingly tightening confines. Suddenly quite happy that Dr Reed was facing the other way, Calvin awkwardly tried to be… well, less conspicuous.  He tried to focus his thoughts elsewhere.

“I guess work-hot is a real thing,” Calvin conceded to the professor.

Dr Reed laughed, “Really makes you understand how sailors might suddenly mistake a manatee for a mermaid, doesn’t it? A bit of alone time with whatever… relationship aides Silvia brought may be good for her.”

Now there was a thought that caused Calvin’s imagination to go into overdrive. Suddenly the idea of going back to the surface in a bathysphere with zero privacy or personal space seemed extremely uncomfortable.

BEEEP BEEEP BEEEEP!

Silivia’s alarm started off. Waking from her sleep, she rolled over in her bunk. the sheets clinging to her skin, slick with the brine of her own sweat. The last day had been such a whirlwind all she wanted to do was just lay in bed. 

She struggled to sit up, her body still heavy with fatigue. Rubbing her eyes, Silivia swung her legs over the edge of the bed. She felt a strange sensation creeping through them. The suckers on the insides of her legs seemed as groggy as she was. Their color shifted from a more white color to a rich fleshly tone. She smiled at them, part of her was worried that everything from yesterday was just a dream. That she would just wake up the same old silly girl; and everything that’d happened had just been a fever dream after injecting herself with the gene sequence.

She forced herself to rise. Her legs wobbled slightly as she got up. Looking down Silivia saw that her suckers had continued developing down her legs, now to her ankles. But surprisingly her knees had also lost some of their distinct shape; she could still feel them holding her up but it was clear that the serum was working slowly on her legs making them more tubular. With another dose they might not be legs anymore at all, but proper strong tentacles she mused. Further down her toes seemed to have fused together, as if they were merging into a single, rounded mass. 

“Just a little longer,” she whispered to her feet, her voice trembling. She took a deep breath and cautiously pulled on a pair of wool socks. “They won’t notice, right?.” 

“Silvia? Are you awake in there?” came a voice and a knock from the other side of the door. It was Calvin, “We’ve finished final prep for the ascent, ready for you on station support.”

“Yeah! Just getting ready!” she called back putting on a fresh suit and her trusty sweatpants. Again she could feel the suckers shifting slightly beneath the fabric. Today though the feeling was more calm… more part of her. She felt a rush of courage well within her.

"Hey, Calvin," she called out, trying to keep her voice steady despite the rising tide of emotions swirling within her. "You're not going to be gone too long up there, are you?

Calvin turned to Silvia coming out of her bunk, then glanced back down the hall at Dr. Reed inspecting the ascent vehicle’s controls. “We won't be gone that long. Besides, we might be back early. That storm has not budged, it could change direction still.

Calvin paused, looking back at Silvia with a hint of regret. “Take care of things down here, alright? I’ll see you soon.”

“Yeah, see you soon,” she echoed, heat flushing her cheeks and her suckers. Then with a swift motion she took a new risk, she leaned in and planted a tentative kiss on his cheek, feeling a warmth spread through her chest.

“Silvia…Um..I.” But before he could finish, Dr. Reed called for him, his impatient voice echoing through the lab. The two exchanged a look.

“Next time,” Silvia said softly, biting her lip with a smile as he turned to follow Dr. Reed. “Next time, I’ll be in the pod with you”. As she watched him head down the hallway her eyes stung. “Gah!” She rubbed at them trying to clean off the sleep clinging to her eyelid. 

“Yawnnnn… guess i need to get over to the monitor. I probably have time for some toast though,” Silvia said to herself heading towards the galley. 

As Calvin entered the ascent vehicle, a part of him felt uneasy. He couldn't place it but there was something off about the way Silvia looked at him. Something with her eyes. But he looked out the port hole at her as she walked down the hall. Nothing seemed amiss as he watched her hips swaying with her steps.  

“Start the computer nav system Calvin, Let's get this show on the road.” Dr. Reed chided him. 

Hunched over her workstation, the glow from the monitor burned Silvia’s eyes. With a sigh, she pushed back her hair, the dull ache in her eyes momentarily dissipating. Protocol was for the station to track the departing vehicles progress until the topside ship took over communications.

“0830 radio check, All systems nominal” the radio crackled.  A few taps on the console and Silvia watched the vehicle data pour in as it began to climb slowly towards the surface. As she sat she took a bite of her toast, the texture of it broke her concentration. 

With each chew, she became increasingly aware of sensations she had never noticed before. The bark-like ridges of the crust, the soft fluffiness of the center, and the warmth that spread through her mouth from multiple areas at once. She felt a tingling at each sensation.

“Okay, that’s different,” Silvia thought, her brow furrowing.

She set the toast down and decided to investigate. Entering the restroom she looked into the small mirror hanging above the sink. To her surprise, her reflection was unfamiliar. What she saw looking back at her were not just her usual wide, blue eyes—but horizontal pupils. Panic surged within her as she leaned closer. She opened her mouth in shock, and in that moment, she caught a glimpse of her tongue. Gone was the human form she had always known; instead, her tongue was alive, writhing softly in a way that sent a shiver down her spine. It was no longer just a muscle; it resembled a tentacle, adorned with tiny suckers.

“What the hell?” Silvia gasped, her voice shaky. 

Her reflection stared back at her, and in horror, she touched her tentacle tongue with a hand. The sensation was overwhelming. “OH SHIT! SHit shit…. Shit, Oh shit!”

“Think, Silvia, think!” she muttered to herself, shaking off the rising tide of dread. Rushing to her laptop, she took a seat at the small desk. With shaking fingers, she logged onto Reddit and typed r/bodymodhorrors into the search bar. Silvia had seen mistakes like this before and scrolled past several posts. Accidental hoof hands, a failed mermaid attempt, even a spinnerette butt.  somewhere she remembered seeing a post about a successful centaur mod. But she couldn't find it. 

Silivia looked at her eye’s again in the screen’s reflection. She hadn’t been very careful. Deep down she knew each injection was a roll of the dice. Even though she wanted to be a scylla she still wanted to be herself. Her concentric irises stared back at her, she was lucky that the last dose had been small. It was entirely possible that she could’ve ended up with a whole octopus head. 

Post after post she kept looking. Past one about a girl who didn't get any of the physical changes of a dog serum she wanted, but now struggles with being in heat every month. Then another repost of an infamous dryad attempt that just left the person comatose, a known problem with incompatible mods. 

“There you are!” Finally, after so much scrolling she found the post. u/horsegirl had shown how she managed a full centaur modification, with minimal adverse changes. Silvia’s resolve was returning and she wasn't going to make the same mistake again… 

“Crackle crack…. 0930 hours 2000 meter check in” 

“Oh hell!” Silvia grabbed her laptop and rushed back to the monitor station. Oddly, it was getting harder to move her legs quickly. Her knees bent outward in odd ways when her weight shifted on her legs. Flopping back to the monitor station chair. “Station copy!” she radioed back. Noting the time and other nav data into the station log. Silvia entered the coordinates into the computer. At their current ascent speed they still had at least 2 hours before she could hand over monitor control to the support ship. 

Silvia spent the entire time studying how u/horsegirl managed it. 

“Avoid major arteries and veins” a reply to the OP post stated. “Putting a large dose within the venous system spreads it too fast and throughout the entire body” Silivia’s heart skipped… had it gone into her lungs she might’ve really had problems. She looked at her reflection again, staring at her new pupils. Her irises blue color still remained. They were distinctly octopus but retained a bit of her. The more she looked the more they grew on her. “Kinda cute in a weird way” She thought as she started making a list of what she’d need to do for her next dose.