Charon's story at the URL

While I never really liked the water when I was a young cub, it grew on me or well, I was thrown in the deep end literally.  That's what I get when most of your friend's were otters.  I was even scared in taking a bath and well, showers were a bit better at least you can't drown in a centimeter of water.  I just don't know how I became so terrified of water to not getting enough of the wet stuff.   

When I began my journey into the Navy, I was on the swim team, made up of mostly of other Neos and even then it was mostly the aquatic kind; otters with the occasional seal.  I could never dream of matching their total enthusiasm of the water and their speed.  I was just the neo that could swim better than most humans.  If they allowed me to use fins during our practices, I could catch up to the slower otters but that was only at the end.  Had to admit that the females were very pretty to look at in their fur tight swimming suits and leotards and well, I bet they had an eyeful when we paraded in our swimming briefs.  Then the Navy recruiter came to our high school swim team meeting; encouraging the otters and seals to join the Navy.  I had to make the otter recruiter raise an eyebrow when I was one of the first ones to join on the spot as a JROTC for the Navy.  He even pulled me aside and question me about my swimming skills.  I had to admit that while not as fast as the other aquatics; I assured them I was one of the few members of the swim team they never really wanted to wrestle in or under the water.  They usually floated with their fins up and swimming briefs off their body.  He merely laughed and went about his way.

Well, Navy training was a bitch, let me tell you.  The only feline in a otter squad and well, they still hated to wrestle me but the drill instructor wanted me to become better.  I almost outmaneuvered him a couple of times and every battle thereafter, he and I were sucking so much air, our tanks were spent in fifteen minutes instead of the hour that was the norm.  Then the unthinkable happened; a small island in the Caribbean was having an uprising and a dictator's forces were mostly comprised of underwater forces and guess who was called in to take care of it before the entire island chain of the Caribbean Sea was pulled in.

From the kiddie pool to the boiling pot of water was a common otter saying for getting into trouble and one couldn't get into more trouble than fighting an enemy that was so ill equipped to fight a highly trained and efficient Navy diver unit.  They even had teenagers swimming about; thankfully they were only using them as messengers but still had to be detained for the possible messages they might have been carrying.  The Caribbean Sea ran red with the blood of the dictator's forces.  Sure we lost a few divers along the way but still it turned about everyone in my squad off of battle.  If we were going against maybe the North Koreans or Chinese we would have felt pride in defeating a trained corps of divers, but these were just islanders that were tired of being impoverished and looked down upon by governments themselves being poor.  The dictator easily preyed upon these neos' and humans' fear and led them in an ill-prepared assault.

Came back from the failed uprising a bit wiser and a whole lot older than what a person, neo or fur, should be.  With no wars or battles to fight, most of us took up positions that kept us busy.  I found out that I had a knack with pipes and knowing where they were clogged or a dent in the pipes.  Everyone else's guess was all that time in the water and knowing where a fish was or electrical current in the open water; a talent that was inherited by playing blind underwater tag in my days of a cub with the other otters.

Then it came a time where while the Navy was a great learning experience, the real world beckoned.  I found a few odd jobs with cleaning pools and being a plumber filled my days, I missed the camaraderie that I had in the Navy; where one knew his mates and the kinship of the squad was paramount.  That was the day I saw an ad for the URL wanting qualified divers for underwater welding and the occasional plumbing job.  This was an opportunity that I certainly couldn't pass up.  I went to the local library and sent my resume and credentials as a former Navy diver honorably discharged.