The Bar at the Center of the Universe: Entertainment
Tobias Fox 2/21/12
Merging- Foxtaur- Shrinking
General Audiences
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Mary chuckled and swishing her nine bushy tails hopped from the couch to my back magically shifting from anthro to feral in mid leap, landing softly on Leaf—and my—our backside. “Yay! Free ride!”
“Get Out! Out, Out, OUT! Leaf screamed with our voice, “This is my body!” I ignored him and glanced back at the nine-tail with a grin. “Welcome aboard!”
It seemed the war between me and Leaf would go on, each of us fighting for that tiny portion of the same form. He really did not know how to share I thought to myself with a sigh. “Get off of me you old hag!” I heard, felt and then gasped as the words left my muzzle. I also felt Mary stiffen on our back, inwardly I cursed Leaf for that and knew we were both in a world of trouble.
“Aww, what’s wrong? Not having fun?” My strained voice chuckled, trying to recover from my counterpart’s horrific blunder. It was unlikely that anything would actually fix the situation. “What do you think?” Came the reply.
The nine-tailed fox simply curled up on our back and giggled, “Such a potty mouth you two.” We were boned, I could feel it. Leaf however, seemed either intentionally ignoring the danger or otherwise totally oblivious to it.
“Um, yeah Leaf is acting dangerously, talking that way to one of your status,” I tried to put an emphasis that it was Leaf talking and not me. Glancing by at Mary nervously I saw her shaking her head and I knew as long as I was in the same body as Leaf. I was as going to catch it hot same as Leaf.
“To what?” Leaf asked.
“A Nine-tail you fool, You’re gonna get us both killed,” I began to prepare my spells to separate from this human. It was clear that he wanted to test the full powers of the older fox spirit, something that I had absolutely no interest in doing.
“Indeed,” Mary replied, “He is talking quite dangerously and should watch what he is doing, no? But, I fear that for you both it is far too late.” Mary grinned and stood up on all fours in the middle of our back. It was clear that she had found her ‘perfect opening’ to use on both of us. “Now what should I do to someone who doesn’t show the proper respect.” Mary tapped her paw thoughtfully on our fur causing our skin to ripple with the magic.
“Um—” My final attempt to get away; pulsing my own power through our merged bodies, muscles rippling and our separate essences starting to separate I thought for a moment that I just might slip out before the jolt of static shock repelled me out of my magic. “Come on, I-I’m still bound with... wait for me to get out...”
“Stuck much,” Leaf asked with a snicker. His laughter hiding the nervousness that I could feel lurking just under the surface.
“You are enjoying this aren’t you?”
“Of course not, how could you even think that,” Leaf replied with our muzzle.
“So, Mary how about letting me out?” I turned my head slightly to look into the grinning fox face.
“Oh, no, no, no; I’m not done dearie.” The nine-tail stomped once with her small paw, the impact sent a jolt of magic through my body. Leaf groaned and swayed unsteadily on our feet.
“I think I’m gonna be sick… what—what are you doing to us,” Leaf could barely form his words and I gulped choking off her next statement.
The ancient Kitsune vixen stomped again and again on our collective back, each impact sending another wave of power through our body. All of our insides being compressed downward with Mary rapidly growing heavier on our back; it didn’t take us very long to realize that she was shrinking us down to a more... manageable size.
“Mary,” Leaf began, his—our voice tight with panic, “Let me—let us, begin our three part apology by saying; You are an amazing and forgiving soul and we love you—gahh—” We stumble, falling to our knees.
With our body no longer able to support her weight we slowly collapsed to the floor just as Mary leapt to the beanbag. Towering over us from her position she resembled a queen gazing down in judgment upon her unworthy subjects.
“Get a grip Tobias!” Leaf yelled at me whipping her head around.
“I don’t think that’s going to work,” I replied, rising back to all fours, and tilting back in the opposite direction.
“If you shut up it might!” Leaf growled back at me turning his head again.
Mary just stood back, content for the moment to watch our heads whip from side to side as if we were both turning it to face a speaker who wasn’t there.
“Oh hush you; I’m in this as much as you are.”
“This is all your fault; if you don’t shut up I’m going to trip you!”
Mary grinned and stepped forward raising a paw she thumped our muzzle once, twice, three times each time our body shuddered and shrank another few inches until we were no bigger than her forepaw.
“Shit! Toby, what do we do? What do we do?” Leaf’s voice cracked in panic. I couldn’t think either her raging emotions flooded through my mind making it harder for me to think and nearly impossible to use any kind of magic. Mary smashed her paw again onto our head and we shrank a final time now only an inch and a half tall. Teetering, we fell, collapsing in a heap on one side.
“We don’t, more accurately we can’t. You’re an ordinary mage, I’m five-tail.” Still flipping our head back and forth as if watching a crazed tennis match Leaf tried to glare at me with our shared body.
“Some help you are!” He growled at me, “Mary, err, Part Two, I am so very sorry for what I did and said it was wrong and I was disrespectful and being ever so childish.” His words came out in a huge rush, all in a single breath of air.
Mary brought her paw within a hair’s breadth of us and sighed, the wind of her exhalation passed over us like a hot wind. Lowering her forepaw she nudged us back to our feet. Even standing up we could barely touch the top of her paw. “You should learn to be more respectful of someone like me dearie.”
“I have learned! I promise,” Leaf gasped as Mary brought her enormous muzzle down to our level and licked her chops. I had a very bad feeling about what was coming next.
The ground around us began to bounce and vibrate, a soft rhythmic thud coming every few seconds. It didn’t take long for us to realize the cause. Flipping our head around we jumped nearly out of our skin as a midsized—enormous to us—anthro feline pads over to examine the spectacle.
“This one does not understand,” She said in her thick accent and unusual speech pattern, “Why must you shrink them, the hunt will not be a challenge.”
Mary nods a polite greeting at the newcomer, an obvious friend of hers, “Greetings Murgie, a moment please.” She turns her attention back on us, still tiny still standing there next to the giant fox paw. “Oh, no dearie, I don’t think you have. It is far more fun my dear feline if the prey is genuinely scared; size is the best tools to truly unhinge your prey.”
“TOBY STEP ON IT!” Leaf took complete control of our body, I didn’t stop him, running was exactly the thing I wanted to do now as well. And it was just as well, for the giant kitsune was looming over our shoulder, a wicked grin on her face.
Mary didn’t even need to move, her paw darted out, sliding across the smooth white floor, it easily kept up with our tiny feet. The back side of her paw keeping just behind our tail; holding back, just a fraction to keep us running straight into a mouse hole carved neatly as you please right in the base of the table.
Both of us, Leaf and I inside the same body huddled there, panting softly sweat dripping off of our fur. The darkness complete all around us and no sound except our pounding heartbeat and a soft scratching at the mouse hole.
“Dude, we are so boned,” Leaf gasped between deep breaths, “I blame you for this; you know that?” If I could have I would have glared at him.
“She’s a kitsune, she’ll get bored soon enough and the spell binding us to this form will evaporate. I’ll be able to change us both back then.” I gasped and gargled a little as Leaf tried to talk over me. Leaf was getting a lot better at controlling this body I realized the sooner we split the better.
Two hours later the spell did wear off and we snuck out of the tiny hole we were hiding in and shape shifted back to our normal forms. The room still huge around us I concentrated on our size and chanted something softly under my breath. Nothing happened, the room didn’t get any smaller we didn’t get any bigger, and now finally—Leaf in the form of an ordinary human—was able to glare at me properly.
“I blame you for this you dumb fox,” he said into the silence that followed my failed spell, “I really do blame you.” The humor of the situation was too much, practically falling into his arms I began to laugh and so did he.
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