Suddenly, the mana laser cut off and Joe blinked in surprise before he realized he’d run out of mana. Huffing a small laugh, he dropped his head back before deciding to continue his efforts on the mana points he had. He once again shot out mana in various configurations of sprays, half spheres, and laser like streams. All acted the same as what came from out of his… heart? Or… what should I call it… the mana… organ? Joe sighed and left that idea for later before turning his attention to manipulating the points themselves, spending time zipping them around his body in various formations before he finally began working at their form as well, stretching them, squeezing them, and forcing mana in and out in various ways. After squeezing the mana out of them, he felt a bit of an ache forming from them, and put some effort into pulling mana back into the points. With that, he considered his own core point. Ha! That’s a good name, I guess. The mana point at my core would be the ‘core’ organ, I guess?

He focused on the sensation of re-aquiring mana, trying to understand what was happening and identifying the biofeedback mechanism, if any, from his body as his mana points returned an aching emptiness. I can tell if I’m hurt, full, hungry, tired… there’s gotta be something for this, right? Gotta hope it hasn’t atrophied… well, my control of releasing and holding hasn’t atrophied… so I can only hope. I wonder if…

Joe suddenly grunted in surprise when he felt soft curves slide down his belly and into his lap. He opened his eyes to see Kilniara leaning back into his chest, head turned with a smile as she looked at him. Joe returned the smile and then accepted the light kiss Kilniara placed on his lips.

“Morning.”

“Morning to you. How do you open the door without making any noise? And you’re a bit later today,” Joe replied.

“I’m pretty dexterous. Acokzau are known for this,” then she grew a bit annoyed, “And I don’t know how you have the crazy sleeping late waking early thing. I don’t see how you get enough sleep at all!” Kilniara grumped back.

Joe smiled and shrugged his shoulders, “I don’t sleep late. I sleep very early, compared to all of you. Done it all my life, so… not surprising.” Joe brought his hands up to her shoulders before lightly rubbing them, “Why the backwards seat. You hinting you want a backrub?”

Kilniara smiled, “I won’t say no, but you are way too distracting when I’m pressed into you.”

“Distracting? Only when you face me?” Joe asked as his hands slid from her shoulders to her arms before sliding to her side to slip his arms softly around and settling them lightly on her belly, lightly brushing her stomach.

Kilniara groaned, her eyes closing as she shifted slightly, reacting to his hug from the rear. She shifted and struggled to keep herself still before finally relaxing once more and leaning back against his chest, her head falling back on to his shoulder. She glanced up at him with a shy smile.

“This… feels nice.”

Joe grinned, “I’m… glad.”

They said nothing for a time, simply glancing up at each other until she looked away and leaned back into him.

Joe glanced down at her and felt his own sense of satisfaction, enjoying. They remained that way for a time until Joe’s hands shifted back to her back, unwilling to stay still. He massaged her back, starting with her shoulders once more, now more serious about his efforts and slowly worked his way down from her shoulders to her back.

As he did so, she began groaning in satisfaction, and leaning further and further forward to give him more access to her lower back. As she did so, however, Joe grew more uncomfortable, a sharp poking in his lower abdomen growing ever more insistent until Joe finally frowned and slid a hand down to shift what was poking him out of the way. Belt buckle? Something?

He didn’t think much of it, but another couple pokes had him sliding a hand around to remove the offending sharp piece of clothing. As his hand drifted around her side, following the line where her belly met her pants, his hand came to her back and found that the object poking him was a bit lower than her pants line. He hesitated for a moment before slipping a hand down, pressing it against this own body instead.

When his hand pressed against what was poking him, Kilniara moaned a bit more insistently. His hand pressed at it firmly, attempting to push it to the side, but Kilniara’s reaction described a quiet pleasure. Joe didn’t connect the two as he tried to brush the sharp nub away from his belly. He did so two or three times before he finally grunted and pushed her away.

“Sorry… just… one second,” Joe said as he pushed her away from him and began to try to brush away the hard object more firmly. Kilniara shuddered as he did so and finally he trickled his fingers up the nub trying to place what it was.

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“Don’t… it’s… stop…” Kilniara breathed.

Joe blinked to awareness a bit more with Kilniara’s cry, pushing Kilniara further forward with more confusion and looked down. There, he found a small nub about an inch long and about as thick at its base before it tapered to a rounded nub. It took a moment before Joe suddenly realized what he was looking at, pushing Kilniara away sharply.

“Your tail! What happened? Are you OK?”

Kilniara, still lost in a haze of pleasure, took a moment to recover before she finally realized what Joe was speaking about, “Yes. It’s fine? What do you mean? You’ve been playing with it this whole time!”

Joe slid his hand down the small nub again, “This is your tail?”

Kilniara’s hips jerked again before she nodded breathily, “Yeah.”

Joe pulled his hand back when he noticed Kilniara’s reaction, “Ah… then… what happened?”

Joe pressed Kilniara to stand before looking closely, his hands holding her waist. He did not notice Kilniara’s face blushing bright red. Kilniara’s tail was now nothing more than a small inch long nub pressing out of her very low spine. Her pants were still cut in a way where the waist of the pants held tight to her torso at a height about half way between the traditional location of pants for men and the traditional location for women on Earth. However, a triangular cut away below the waistband dipped down low enough that Joe was able to see the top of her rear, easily exposing the tops of her cheeks. When Joe realized he was looking at the top of Kilniara’s rather beautiful rear end, Joe stood and stepped back quickly with a soft clearing of his throat.

When Joe stood and stepped back, Kilniara turned to face him while blushing rather intensely, “It’s… that’s my tail.”

Joe shook his head, “It was much larger. How is this your…” Joe trailed off when Kilniara looked at him in some confusion before cocking her head and nodding to herself, coming to some kind of decision. With that decision, her tail rapidly expanded to its former size before she lifted it to brush across Joe’s cheek and nose delicately.

“It didn’t go anywhere.”

“How did… what… How did you do that?” Joe asked excitedly, his embarrassment from before now long gone as he quickly slipped around behind her and began tracing her tail and looking at it carefully.

“You did not seem… do you prefer… you did not like my smaller tail? I could remove it completely if you wish.”

“What? No… it didn’t bother… wait… you can remove it completely?” Joe quickly stood and faced Kilniara again, looking into her eyes with surprise, shock and excitement, “What do you mean?”

Kilniara took a moment to reply before speaking with some confusion, “Have you not seen kin take on their base form before?”

“What… I… what’s… wait… never mind. There’s too much to unpack there. What’s kin? What’s base form? And the answer to your question would be no.”

“You… how…” Kilniara stepped away and pulled herself and her tail away from Joe, “You do not know base form or kin?”

“I’m going to have to guess no? I made a guess that I was base form?”

“Yes. You are… um… humans are… have the norm of the forms.”

“So I’m the base form?”

“Yes.”

“And the base form is male?”

“No… no… the… your race is base… ah… sorry. I should not have said such.”

Joe stopped at Kilniara’s apology, sidetracked, “Is the word base considered rude?”

“It’s… a very impolite belittling of humans.”

“Huh… well, I don’t care. Just use base for now. It doesn’t bother me. So… base forms basically means humans as a whole, male and female.”

“Yes.”

“Huh. OK. I think I got that. What is kin… a kin? What are kin?”

“I am kin.”

“So Acokzau are kin?”

“Yes. But not only Acokzau. Any who has their original form in addition to the base form are kin.”

Joe’s eyebrows flickered, crunching into valley’s over his nose, “That… so … kin can transform?” Their… werewolves? Were… uh… Werewhatever? Were of some kind?

Kilniara looked at him in some shock before shaking her head, “You’ve never seen it?”

“No. All… people on my plane are base human, I guess.”

Kilniara took a deep breath and looked at Joe with some surprise which was quickly replaced with some concern, worry overshadowing her face. Joe caught this and cocked his head in some surprise.

“What’s wrong?”

“You… Acokzau are… kin…” Kilniara trailed off in worry.

Joe stepped forward and wrapped her in his arms, “Talk to me. What are you worried about?”

Kilniara stared at Joe carefully, her eye’s penetrating into his deeply, searching him in some way before she took a deep breath and stepped back, “Just…watch.”

Joe nodded but there was only confusion across his face and Kilniara considered him once move carefully before she somehow… changed. Her face became slightly rounder and more… full, as did her breasts. Her chest and hips also expanded slightly in size, both broadening into more human width in contrast to the incredible Acokzau slimness. Her legs stayed relatively the same. It took Joe a moment to realize before he gasped.

“You’re… more… your… this is your base form!”

Kilniara nodded, seeming a bit shy but said nothing and Joe quickly realized her worry before he stepped forward and wrapped his arms around her, “And quite a beautiful form it is!”

Kilniara blushed brightly at that before smiling brilliantly. She didn’t say anything and simply basked in his embrace before he stepped back from her and looked at her seriously.

“That’s not to say your other form is not beautiful either. Honestly, I find both… incredibly attractive in their own ways. You may choose either as you will. Please don’t change or whatever for me.”

Kilniara’s bright smile only exploded in brilliance after that and she smiled before grimacing and swiping a hand down her backside, “I hate that.”

“What?” Joe asked as he placed his own hand on her back and slid it down her back to where her hand played just above her quite delicious rear end. He met only smooth skin and quickly glanced around behind her to find the smooth unbroken skin of her lower back flow lusciously into the rising mounds of her rear end.

“Your tail!”

“Yeah. I don’t like… It feels weird to have no tail. I don’t mind shrinking it a bit like I did before, but it does make it incredibly sensitive. All the feeling is compressed into the little nub of a tail and it… feels overwhelming. But without a tail, it just feels really… really weird. I can’t sense the wind or air anymore and I don’t feel… anything. No brushing against the wall or floor or … yeah. It just feels weird.”

“Huh… I never really thought of that before. Although, it would probably be a really good idea for you and your brother to learn to fight with and without a tail. It will completely change your balance and actions.”