Shapeshifter City: Jobs of Ferals and the Biology of Shapeshifters
Shapeshifter City: Jobs of Ferals and the Biology of Shapeshifters
By Crola_the_Snake
Okay, maybe cutting off the dinner part was a bad idea. Welp, too late now. I told you that I invited Sarah for a dinner, right? Well, we will talk about that real quick, then to the main idea of this story.
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"Man, today was exhausting," Sarah said as she stretched her wolf body a few minutes after we met up at the lobby. Sarah already told her caretaker Aaron to go home, so only the two of us will be heading to a restaurant.
"That's what you get for working that hard," I said, referring to earlier, "What's the fuss?" All afternoon, Sarah just sat behind her desk and worked really hard. She didn't even came out to drink water. That bitch (pun intended) was exhausting herself.
"If I didn't distract myself with work, I could get arrested for biting you hard. Which would be satisfying because deer meat tastes good." She started walking to the entrance of the building. Yeah, I'm a deer. She's a wolf, I'm a deer, that could totally work. What? We're both shapeshifters. Our forms wouldn't matter.
I followed her, "Oh, come on. You're that mad about me using your tickets?" We exited the building.
She looked back at me, "Yeah, they costed me two weeks of food, you know?" she looked up ahead, "That's why you'll treat me to dinner for five nights." We sat side-by-side in front of the building.
"Five nights? You know we'll visit our parents by weekend. Make it six nights, do one tonight, then call off the other five for next week." I pressed a button at the side of a post. A circular, yellow light lit up at the top of the post, signalling a request for a taxi. Many ferals can't raise their forelegs (at least not high enough for the driver to notice), so posts were installed to signal taxi drivers if any passengers would need a ride.
The wolf looked at me smirking, "Hmm, look who's being nice."
"These are our families we are talking about. We only visit them once a month. Better delay the other nights." A taxi, which was a carriage drawn by a white three-meter-tall husky taur, stopped before us.
Like most taxis, the carriage was covered in yellow paint. Its bulk size allowed for both anthros and ferals to sit in. There was no place for a driver to sit on the front, since the taur was the driver.
Let me explain for a second. Make it a minute, actually. This might get long.
One of the limits of shapeshifting is that you cannot gain nor lose mass via shifting. No one thought that it could be bypassed until 1965. One thing about shifting is that you could control what kind of flesh your flesh will be. Which means that if you shifted with fat, you could actually change the fat to something non-fat. Then you could use your fat to permanently add mass to your body.
This method boomed alongside the fashion revolution. People deliberately eat fatty food to get more mass to use for their wings or tail. Some people even used it for oversized boobs or really long tails for snakes and snake-like creatures, although this trend declined immediately because of the inconvenience of carrying two mounds that comprised one third of your weight on your chest, or having a tail six times your height. Seriously, a number of accidents were caused by oversized parts of the body.
Anyways, ferals and taurs (centaur-like anthros) used this method as an opportunity to have jobs. A lot of these jobs required strength, like farm worker or taxi driver. This actually helped the economy of several countries boom. No one truly knew who discovered the method, but whoever they are, they changed the world.
"Where do we go?" the taur asked through a speaker at the ceiling of the car as Sarah and I stepped in the huge cab.
The cab had space for four ferals to sit down. To avoid getting to heavy the taxis don't have seats for anthros, leaving the anthris to sit on the floor of the taxi.
Sarah pressed a button below the window that shows the driver, then spoke through a microphone between the button and the window.
"Can I tell you outside? I want to keep it as a surprise." She looked back at me.
"What?" I said retracting to the corner.
"Hmph," the wolf said as she pulled down the lever of the door and went outside. From the window, I could see the taur nodding as Sarah said something to him.
"Ah, keeping that from your boyfriend, eh?" the taur asked. I could faintly hear the wolf growl and scream. I smirked at the thought about Sarah and I being a couple. That could never happen. Despite the fact that we have been best friends since highschool, we fight a lot, mostly because of our contrasting personalities. I'm calm, yet sarcastic. Sarah is arrogant, yet caring. Although I think she just shows her arrogant side to me.
"Got it, alright?" The driver said as the wolf returned to the cab blushing. I was still smirking.
"Fuck you, Sam," Sarah said as she closed the door. I stopped holding back and started laughing, "Hey, stop that!"
"Ah, love," the husky mumbled to himself, although audible to the two of us, "My wife insists me to stop doing this and shift back to anthro and get a decent job, but I can't shift back this heavy. I nearly stopped halfway the first time. I can't afford to risk that again." The taxi started moving as the odometer started to measure movement.
Like pretty much anything, the weight-gaining method has downsides.
One of these is that shifting with a larger mass is hard. Shifting with an average weight is already hard, taking fifteen seconds to do so and can only be performed once a day for a person shifting every 3 days. There were even incidents of shifts stopping halfway because the victim was too weak to shift.
"One friend of mine once stopped halfway. They operated her for 6 hours."
Halted shifts are always nasty. The subject would experience pain and might pass out, if they hadn't already. In a medical operation, the subject has to be injected with polyrium. Polyrium is a substance produced by the body that breaks down and rearranges the DNA of a person. Basically, polyrium enables the shapeshifters to shift. Polyrium, at the right amount, could force the subject to shift or continue shifting. The smallest excess of polyrium could kill you, though. That's why it takes long to fix halted shifts. Tests have to be taken to ensure that the doctors would give the subject the right amount.
"My wife just rants about how I eat too much. I can't help it, I need more food!"
Another downside of the method is that, the heavier you are, the more you need to eat. A larger body would require more nutrients to keep it running. Which means that the amount of food you need to eat at the next stage of weight gaining would be larger, too. More food means less money.
"Oh, was I ranting too much? Sorry for wasting your intimate time together."
"We are not a couple," both of us said as Sarah pressed the button.
"Are you sure about that?"
"Yeah, we are. I hate that deer with all my heart." Then she looked at me.
"Uh, what she said," I said. There was a hint of a growl coming out of the wolf's mouth.
"Why do you continue hanging out with him, then?"
"Well, we work at the same place, and he owes me six dinners." The taur remained silent for a while.
"Okay," he finally said. He never returned to his rant earlier.
Fifteen minutes was spent in silence, me looking through the left window and Sarah through the right window. The taxi stopped by a diner.
I looked at Sarah as she opened the door, "Hold on, is that...?"
The wolf looked back and smiled, "Yep." She got off the taxi. I paid for the fee with my cash account, a sample of ny blood used for verification, and got off. We bade the husky taur goodbye as he drove off to find another passenger.
"This where you want to have your dinner?" I asked Sarah.
"Yeah," she replied.
I grinned, "Look who's being nice."
"Shut up. It's just that, this is the first place we ate food in when we first moved to the city. Maybe we could spend the dinner here." We moved from the north a few years ago, right after we graduated college. We were pretty much stranded, since lightweight ferals were not in demand.
"But we go here most nights."
"Yeah, that means we had more memories here."
"What's with you tonight?"
"Remember, I get to say where."
I sighed, "Alright. Whatever you want." We entered the diner and sat by a table.
The diner's small, having only eight tables. But the food tasted good here, anyway. It's also near to the apartment and always had an empty table. An anthro skunk was the cook. His waitress, a taur skunk, cheerfully served customers. It's a mystery where the waitress learned how to wait without knocking things over.
"So, anything I could get you two?" The waitress asked as she approached us with her notebook.
The waitress had a curvy figure, making her a sight for men. She was wearing a brown dress on her torso, while she had her breasts on the lower body covered.
Sarah looked at me, then I looked at her.
"Well?" I asked, "This is your dinner, what do you want?"
"Hmm... ground beef will do."
"You are even ordering the same meal as the one you ordered from the other day. Seriously, what's with you?"
The wolf ignored me and asked what I wanted to order.
I looked at the waitress, "Maybe a salad will do." The skunk wrote down the orders.
"Now you're the one ordering the usual," the wolf said.
I sighed, "If we are gonna eat at the diner, we might as well order the usual."
The skunk looked from her notepad, "Any drinks before I get you two your dinner?"
"Um, water," I said.
The wolf looked at me smiling and raising an eyebrow, "Same."
"Alright then," the skunk said as she finished writing down the drinks, "I'll see you guys in a mo." Then the skunk headed to the kitchen and handed the slip of paper to the cook.
"Ah, I love those two," I said as the waitress took a tray of fries.
Sarah looked at the female skunk, "Stu and Chloe? Yeah they're lovely."
I looked at the wolf, "We never got to know them, actually. The closest we got to them was the Halloween party last year." Don't ask. Halloweens could actually get scary here. When I was a child, I got scared during Halloween by a kid in a bogeyman form. I never went out the house at night for two months.
Sarah looked back at me, "Yeah, we got stranded here because a storm brewed up and we never got out."
"Yeah. Fun times. Remember that time when Ruth got really drunk and tried to hit on Chloe?"
Sarah laughed, "Yeah. Flat out rejected. I feel bad for her, though."
Later, Chloe returned with a tray on one hand and one at the other.
"Here we go," she said as she placed the tray on her left hand on the table, "One salad, one ground beef, two bowls of water. Enjoy." She then walked away to give the other tray.
Both of our orders were in dog bowls, including the water. We ferals can't really use utensils, so we have to eat the food directly from the bowl. Same with the water.
"Well, then," Sarah said, "Let's eat."
After we were done eating, I paid for the food and then we headed home to pack for tomorrow.
Just to make things complicated, we live across each other. That means Ruth and I get to hang out everyday with Aaron and Sarah. Yeah, we're that close.
I pressed the doorbell at the door of my apartment while Sarah pressed hers. An redheaded elf answered the door.
"Hey, Ruth," I greeted.
"Oh, hey," Ruth greeted back, "Come in." I did. When Ruth closed the door, Aaron was just opening the door for Sarah's.
"Big day tomorrow?" the elf asked.
"Yeah, we're going north to our parents. It's not that big, but we only get to visit them once a month."
"Aaron's gonna carry your stuff?*
I looked at the door, "Nah, your brother deserves a break from work." Yeah, our caretakers were siblings. Really complicated life.
I looked at Ruth, "You'll do it."
She placed her hands on her chest, "Really? Thanks, I never got to meet your parents before."
"I don't really know if you'll love them. They are... weird."
"I've seen Aaron. I'm sure I'll be fine." I laughed.
"Get packing already."
"Okay." I then went to my room and slept.
The next day, Ruth, Sarah, and I rode the train heading north. The north was pretty much farmland and woods. Further north, snow. After a 3-hour train ride, we took a 1-hour bus ride, followed by thirty minutes of walking. Then we reached Sarah's and my home.
They were two houses standing next to each other at one side of the road. At the other side of the road, a huge farm plot was being tilled by three horses.
"Which one is yours?" Ruth asked.
"Right one," I said.
"Who do I get to stay with?"
"Your choice. Depends on whose parents do you like the most."
We approached the right house and I pressed the doorbell. A female anthro cow answered the door.
The anthro has white fur with brown patches. She was wearing brown overalls, which bulged by her midriff because of her udder. She was wearing a polo shirt beneath the overalls and wearinh leather shoes. A tuff of golden was on her head, which had blue eyes.
"Oh, hey, Sam," the female cow greeted with a smile on her face.
"Hey, Mom," I greeted back, "Where's Dad?"
She pointed to the farm plot with her hoofed finger, "Over there, tending the field with his boys."
"Boys?" Ruth asked, "Do you have siblings, Sam?"
"No, I'm the only child," I responded, "Those are non-shifter animals."
"Wow, that's the first time I've seen those."
"No wonder. Meat is already butchered here before distributing it to the city and other regions."
"Why does he have to work as a feral? That must be exhausting."
This time, Sarah spoke, "It's easier for him to just stick around as a feral, given how heavy he already got. Also, ferals get along non-shifter animals better than anthros." While shifter and non-shifter animals are unable to normally communicate with one another, it helps both parties understand what one party is feeling and what the other is trying to tell.
"Come in," Mom said, "It's nearly noon, anyway. Let me get my husband then let's get eating." She then exited the house and went to the plot.
The house was simple, having a living area with a LED TV in front of two chairs and a couch. Behind the TV, a dining table for six was placed. Behind a curtain, the kitchen was found. Opposite the kitchen, a door led to a bedroom. A few steps from the door, a staircase led to two more bedrooms upstairs. The floor was wood, and the walls were painted with peach.
"Woah," Ruth said as she placed her luggage down.
"Yeah, my parents worked hard for this."
Aaron and I were living in apartments our entire life, so this is the first time I ever went to a house." The elf sat on the couch.
"Aaron had the same reaction when he came here."
"Too bad someone has to take care of the apartments," Sarah said as she sat next to Ruth.
A door by the kitchen opened and entering through it was the brown horse from the farm plot.
"Hey, Dad," I said.
"Hey," he greeted back, "Visiting for the weekend?"
"Yeah. Have you met Ruth?" The elf approached the horse, but she remained silent.
The horse chuckled, "It's okay, I don't bite."
"Sorry. Had a bad experience with horses."
"She fell off a horse as a kid," I said.
"Ah," Dad looked at Ruth, "Sorry if I make you uncomfortable."
Mom clapped her hands, "Alright, let's eat now."
Some of the chairs have to be removed because of the incompatibility of Dad and I and chairs.
The meal? Stir-fried vegetables.
"Sorry about this," Mom said as she placed the pan on the center if the table, "We never expected you three to come today. Let me see if I still have those bacon strips." She then returned to the refrigerator to look for bacon strips.
"Mmm, it's okay," Ruth said as she took a bite, "I liked it."
"Aw, thanks," the cow said looking from the fridge.
"Herbivore-based anthros can eat foods that humans can eat, but we can eat more vegetables that would harm a human. We also prefer to eat vegetables over meat."
"Same goes for carnivores," Sarah said, "But I won't eat it, my canines are not designed for those."
"Ah, found it," Mom raised a half-empty pack of bacon strips from the fridge, "I hope these will be enough."
"Thanks, Aunt."
"Aunt?" the elf asked, "I thought you two are just best friends?"
"We are," the wolf said, "We hang out with each other's parents a lot, so we just call the other parents 'Aunt' and 'Uncle'."
"Oh." A sizzle was heard, as the smell of bacon wafted through the air.
"Oh, yeah," Sarah said with her tongue out, "Bacon."
"Mom, can you get the rifle?" I asked, "There's a wild wolf in the house."
The wolf looked at me, "Hey!"
"I think the wolf won't bite, sweetie," Mom said.
"Oh, it will," I replied.
The wolf growled, "Stop that!"
"Alright alright," Mom said, "Just don't stain the table." She approached the tablr holding a pan with bacon on it. She then placed the eight strips on Sarah's plate. The wolf then grabbed a strip with her mouth.
"Mmm," she said as she chewed on it.
"Hey Sarah, where are your parents?" the elf asked.
"Don't ask me," she said with two strips of bacon in her mouth.
"Sarah's parents are out of town," Dad said.
"What are your parents like?" Ruth asked.
"In a lot of ways, they are just like Uncle and Aunt," the wolf replied.
Later, Mom brought Ruth to the stables.
The stables housed cows, pigs, chickens, sheep, horses, and goats. It's really huge. You could get if you try to run all over the place.
"So, how do you work out here?" Ruth asked.
"Oh, it's simple, actually," the anthro cow said as we walked, "Non-shifter animals have simpler minds and no rational thoughts, but somehow we're still unable to fully understand them. We could, however, tell what they're feeling. Too bad some cows see me as a potential mate." She then eyed a red cow with disgust, "At least the girls were nice to me. They let me milk them. They get moody when I near their calves, though.
"It's just that," Mom neared one of the cows and placed her hand on its cheek, "You could actually love them. It gets hard to ship some of them as meat." She looked back at her, "Tending farm animals is simple, but tedious, boring, and hard, especially with the knowledge that some of them will be butchered."
"Oh," Ruth managed to say, "I'm sorry. I never knew."
"It's okay."
"What happens if a shapeshifter had a baby with a non-shifter animal?" Ruth asked a few minutes later.
"First of all, that's bestiality. It's forbidden to do it with non-shifter animal, let alone have a baby with it. If a shapeshifter ever had a baby with a non-shifter, the baby would have defects."
"Defects?"
"There's a definite line between shifters and non-shifters. A shifter and a non-shifter could never have normal babies. The resulting defects are random. At one time, the baby came out fine at first, but as it grew up, it was discovered that it's brain was underdeveloped and it acts like a wild aninal. At one time, the baby produced too much polyrium at birth and shifted to 3 forms before its body gave out. There are other defects, but I don't think you'll want to hear about them." They continued their thing while Sarah and I were walking in the middle of the woods.
The last signs of winter just disappeared, replaced by sprouting leaves and blooming flowers. The grass was cook under my hooves. Chirps and the sound of the wind filled the air along the rustles of the bushes.
We came to a cave by a cliff. The opening was large enough for both of us to enter side-by-side.
"You remember this place, right?" Sarah asked as we entered the cave.
"Yeah, we hang out here a lot as children."
"We found this place when we played tag then got lost."
"When we were found, we tried to find the cave again. Then we knew how to get here and back."
"You know that one time when I ran away because I got to a fight and didn't want Mom and Dad to find out?"
"Yeah. What about it?"
"I--" A huge tremor interrupted Sarah as the ground vibrated ans the ceiling shook. I quicklt threw myself over Sarah to receive the stones that fell off. A rumble from the outside grew louder, then all of a sudden, darkness enveloped the cave.
"Sam? Sam, wake up," a voice called.
"Wh-what?" I asked as I stood up groggily. I felt something crawl out beneath me.
"Dear Lord, you're heavy, Sam." I opened my eyes. There's only darkness.
"What happened?" I heard scuffling from a direction.
"An earthquake. It caused those rocks to block our only way out." The scuffling stopped.
"Ow. Why does my back hurt much?"
"You covered me from falling stones. Thanks for that."
"It's nothing. A man got to do what he has to. Any hopes of getting out?"
"No, the rubble is too heavy. And I don't think we should feel our way through the cave."
"Oh right, there's that cliff deeper inside. Looks like the best we could do is wait."
"Yeah, I agree." We sat there in silence.
"Sam, you still there?" the wolf asked a few minutes later.
"Yeah," I said, "Why?"
"If we ever got out of here, I--Let's start dating."
I chuckled, "Making a joke is appreciated, but it will not get us out of here." I expected the wolf to shout at me or at least growl. She didn't. She just sat there looking where she thinks I am located.
"You're serious," I said after I stopped chuckling.
"You know those dinners? I just want to get closer to you. Beyond best friends."
"But we fight a lot."
"Yet we still live close to each other."
"Are you thinking about what that driver said?"
"Yeah. If people started to see us as a couple, maybe take it there now."
"I just think it was funny. You and I as a couple. I hang around with you since high school and you're the person I least expected to want this."
"So what do you say?"
"I'm afraid that if we fail, I might lose you. But okay, let's date." We remained silent for another few minutes.
"Sam?" Sarah called.
"Yeah?" I replied.
"Can I sit next to you? It's getting a bit chilly, so..."
"Sure. I'm getting cold over here right now."
"Alright, I'll walk towards you." I heard scuffling from a direction and it got closer until the source was next to me. Then I felt warm fur touch mine by the right side.
"We are doing this, huh?" I asked.
"Yeah," the wolf said as she rested next to me, "We are."
"Could we ever get there? The only way I imagine us getting together is when both of us are single by 40."
"That thing, huh?"
"Man, Ruth and Aaron will be surprised to hear about this."
"Yeah, they are."
"How do you picture us, Sarah?"
"Cuddling in the dark?"
"No, I meant in the future. Do you see us getting married, or...?"
"I imagine us having four children. One girl, three boys."
"Wow, you are serious about this." The wolf remained silent, "Sarah?" Then a soft snore sounded loud in the silence of the cave. I smiled, or at least I think I did as I sat there next to Sarah and fell asleep.
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A few hours later, a rescue team reached us and got us out. I was still asleep then. According to the doctor, I lost a lot of blood in a severe wound across the back. I was asleep for three days. Sarah was the first person I saw when I woke up. I swear she cried then. My parents and Sarah's parents all met me at once, giving me a lecture for going to that cave again.
Oh, and after I got out, I declared that Sarah and I will start dating. Both of our parents were in shock, but mostly, they're happy. Hey, we are not getting married yet. Don't expect anything.
Ruth was surprised about the news and wondered what will Aaron's reaction will be.
I wrote this down a few days after getting out of the hospital and a few hours before our first official dinner as a couple. Life's good, so far. Nothing else to write about yet.