Catscratch Fever at the Beach

A hyena girl comes down with contagious brutification that turns her into a big mean rubber shark. Based on BimboPhi's SkinSplit concept. Mature.

Sitting on her bathroom towel with her foot propped up on top of a backpack wasn’t how Thorn had wanted to spend her day at the beach. If she’d gotten her way she wouldn’t even be at the beach, but Sam liked swimming despite being a cat, and Cora was impervious to heat, so the two of them had talked her into coming along. It had taken less than an hour to get hurt again. It was just like she’d tried to tell them: hyenas weren’t made for beaches.

“You probably just stepped on a rock,” Sam said, standing up and brushing the sand from her knees. “No biggie. Me and Cora can go grab some first aid stuff from the lifeguard stand.”

Thorn shot Sam an annoyed glare. “I didn’t step on a fucking rock, there was something in the water and it scratched me. What if it’s that...SkinScratch thing?”

Cora had been hanging back and letting Sam do her thing, but now she piped up. “Catscratch Fever? I dunno, I didn’t see any eight-foot-tall monsters swimming around. I bet it was a poisonous fish and your foot’s going to fall off and die.”

Thorn said, “I’m serious.”

“So am I,” said Cora. “Like fifty people die of their foot falling off every year.”

Trying to win an argument when Cora was being this sarcastic was like trying to win an argument on the internet, so Sam cut them both off and told Thorn, “Well, whatever it was, just keep it clean till we get back.”

Business Kawaii

A business catgirl turns into an embarrassingly anime catgirl. In the middle of the office, no less! Explicit.

Tara’s big presentation for the board of directors had gone well, until her hair turned candy-apple red.

For instance, she’d gotten to the conference room with half an hour to spare, so that her laptop would be hooked up and ready to go. She’d even had enough time to duck into the bathroom for a couple minutes, to make sure that both her chin-length black hair and the feline ears poking out of it were brushed and tidy. And once she got started, she didn’t even have to check her notes. She was only a few slides away from the end when things went wrong.

One of the board members raised their hand and leaned forward. They didn’t even look up from the phone in their hand. Tara couldn’t remember their name but was immediately sure they had always been on the board and she shouldn’t question whether they had. Unable to guess whether she ought to call them sir or ma’am, she had to settle for asking, “Yes?”

They kept their eyes on their phone. “Question. Have you considered kawaii?”

Tara breathed in sharply and a small chill ran down her spine, all the way to the tip of her black tail. One of the board member’s jackal-ears twitched, as if they’d heard her gasp. Did they know? She’d worked hard to keep her whole thing a secret. Her laser pointer rolled anxiously between her sweating fingers. “I’m...not familiar, so no.”

“Really? I thought you’d be familiar with, y’know, nyan.” They curled their hand in a paw-like gesture.

As if a gust of wind struck her in the face her hair blew back from her face, then swung back down again, its color warmed to a bright, glossy red. With a flick of her ears and a swish of her tail, both of them had turned pastel pink.

For a moment she stood still, with the hair on the back of her neck prickling and her heart beating faster and faster. She didn’t know what to do or say. Everyone was staring at her, except for the one board member who had asked the question—they had settled back into their chair, once again occupied with their phone.

She gulped and then said, “S-sorry, Tara has to excuse herself.”

Past Present

Blackshirtboy's birthday present is a free trip to Egypt Times, complete with a new catgirl princess persona. Mature.

Just as you settle down at your desk with some tea, your computer chimes with a new message:

Uh oh.

You pause and double-check to make sure you’re not a panther, or a dragon, or a dog. You’re not. As far as you can tell, all your parts are still in their usual configuration. So you tell Kotep no, and wait for a minute or two to see if they’re going to send you something. When nothing comes right away, you shrug and grab your tablet pen so you can get to work.

A couple minutes into drawing, a warm draft ruffles the back of your shirt. You glance up at the window, which is wide open to the outside, with only a pair of linen curtains to soften the breeze. It’s not getting hot and sticky again, is it? Summer should be over by now. But the fresh air is light enough to soothe rather than stifle, and it carries the dry green smell of date palm blossoms into your room.

You narrow your eyes suspiciously at the window. It’s off, but you’re not sure how. You’re definitely not getting up to stick your head through, that’s for sure.

You turn back to your tablet and keep drawing.

The window stretches taller and taller and its panes disappear completely. Columns rise quietly from the receding walls, growing white and tapering until they blossom into wide lotus-petal capitals, painted red and green and gold. They meet the ceiling, then slowly and steadily push it higher and higher. Your small room isn’t so small any more.

You’re not paying attention to that, though. Your fingertips have turned black.

Black fur, smooth and short, sweeps over your hands. It ripples beneath your skin as it moves and reshapes your fingers, leaving them light and nimble. You barely have time to sit up in surprise before it moves up along your arms, like a pair of velvet gloves being tugged up past your elbows. The sleeves of your shirt cleave away from the rest, fall down your arms, and grip your arms as they re-form into gold armbands inlaid with blue lapis.

The Island

Part wish fulfillment and part Weird Tales, a party led by a ship's captain explores the strange island they landed on, only to find one of their number turning into a sheep-maid. General.

Today, the island took the first of our crew. I would say it is the fifteenth of September, in the year eighteen hundred and fifty-six, but I am no longer sure. Since we put in to land five days ago, not once has the fog which shrouds the shores lifted.

In that time, no two parties sent into the interior of the island could agree on what they had found or where. One claimed it was a ring of land around a wide lagoon, another an impassable jungle thick with vines. Irritated by this, Captain Clarke this morning formed a party of the 'most sensible and scientifically-minded' men among the crew, the least given to flights of fancy or tall tales. They were the captain himself, the ship's cook and navigator Sloan, myself as naturalist and unofficial doctor, and a sailor named Simon who was the oldest and most seasoned of the ships's men. We would determine at last the nature of this strange place.

We set out from our encampment in the shadow of our ship, climbing up the seaward slopes of the hills. The fog descended over us until the tents along the sand had vanished and we could hear nothing but our own footsteps and breathing. Sloan and the captain walked ahead together, leaving me to keep my company with the sailor.

Simon did not speak much. The lines dug into the corners of his eyes made it seem as though he was always peering at some far-off memory, and the flecks of white in his black beard could almost have been sea-salt. I knew little about him save that he was from Connaught and that the captain regarded him highly.

The Dragon and the Elf-Blade

What if the fey were just fantasy cartoons? A dragon and an adventurer get turned into "fey" versions of themselves. Mature.

With each great footstep beat the heart of the mountain. With each fiery breath its treasures glimmered like stars. Scarce light filtered through the slits cut into the vaulted stone roof while the vast cavern turned every sound into an echoing chorus. Aluin huddled behind a gilded longship half-sunk beneath the dragon's hoard. One hand lay over her mouth and the other across her chest, as if to still her breath and stop her heart.

The dragon's voice cracked the dry air. "Trespasser! My flame has killed noble warriors—you should be honored to join their kind. Now show yourself, and I will be merciful."

The floor shuddered. The goblets and diadems beneath her began to slip away and rob Aluin of her footing. Clinging to the hull of the boat, she fought to stay above the tide of riches. The thundering footsteps were terribly close now. A gasp died in her throat as a claw as big as her head came to rest on the boat just above her. Silver and gold spilled across her shoulders like sand.

The shower of coins woke the elf-blade bound to her belt. It began to quiver and clatter, as if sensing danger and eager to be used. Scowling, she clutched it tightly by its hilt. She knew not what magic was worked into its blade; she had not yet needed to unsheathe it.

"My treasure is mine by right," the dragon said. He lifted his claw and beat his wings, rising into the air. "None can lay claim to a single coin of it. I am the King Beneath the Mountain. I am black smoke and the coming night. I am death and the ruin of cities." With a mighty crash, he landed in front of Aluin wings outstretched, fire brewing between his fangs. "I am Glaud!"

Gilt timbers groaned. The longboat listed to the side and spilled over. Aluin scrambled out from underneath it to keep from being drowned beneath a sea of silver. Now she stood face-to-face with the dragon. His scales were the color of porphyry, or dried blood, stretched taut across the sinewy frame of some great beast or tyger. Fangs filled his narrow snout and goat-like horns curled back from his head. His eyes gleamed yellow-green like tarnished gold.

She said, "I am Aluin." Where the courage to speak came from she could not guess. The elf-blade bucked and jostled at her side like an over-eager hound. "I come in search of a stone which belonged to my family generations ago, a sign—"

"You are a thief," Glaud snarled.

Aluin wrested the sword from its sheath. Its hilt was red and its blade blue, both blazing so bright it seemed as if they shone with their own light. From the hilt toward the tip, it thickened so much that she could not say how it had fit in its sheath. A shiver ran down her back and the sword wobbled along its length.

"I will not leave this mountain without that stone," she said.

Glaud's lips peeled in a beastly grin. "Then you will never leave."

Twisted Wish-ters

Kotep poofs two of their friends into a couple of useless stoner genies. Mature.

Above a sea of lotus columns, an impossible number of stars swirled in the purple of the night sky. Below the columns, Rush and Tama followed close at Kotep’s heels. They both guessed that getting lost in the jackal-god’s home was an invitation to get hit by some ironic curse or another.

"This is the hypostyle hall," Kotep said with a sweep of their hand, looking back over their shoulder. "It's where I do festivals, parties, strip clubs—that kind of thing."

Tama was only sort-of listening, but she nodded along. "Sick."

"So how do you fit all this into one pyramid?" asked Rush.

Kotep did their best not to sigh out loud. "This is a temple, not a pyramid. Pyramids are for dead people."

"Wait," Tama said, "You're not dead? I thought you were a mummy or something."

"I'm a god."

Rush asked, "Aren't mummies kinda gods though?"

Kotep didn't bother answering that. Instead, they led their two guests onward, past braziers filled with golden flame spilling light across the open hall, and into a smaller, cozier room, lit by oil lamps that filled the air with fragrance. Several couches surrounded a table spread with grapes and candied dates, roast vegetables and morsels of meat stuck through with ankh-shaped skewers, and sitting in the middle of it all, a tall silver hookah.