Chapter Four: My Cat-Girl Assassin Waifu Goes Into Heat!

Pouring rain stung Chuck's eyes as he lifted his sword. Opposite him was one of the most deadly foes he had ever faced.

Ruthless, cunning, and deadly - the Crimson Claw had never failed to kill her target when she took on a contract, and tonight, Chuck was her mark. He had left his companions sleeping at the inn - having made sure to exhaust them first - because he didn't want to risk their lives.

This could only end one way: In death.

Lighting broke across the sky, illuminating the profile of his enemy. She was slight, yes, but Chuck's experiences so far had taught him that on Aeternia, appearances could be deceiving.

"I came alone!" Chuck called out. "It's me you want. Leave the others out of this!"

Thunder crashed around them, the inevitable companion to the earlier flash of light. The assassin drew her blade and held it confidently at her side. Only when the thunder faded did she raise her head to speak.

"Nyaaa~aaan, Chad-saaa~maa... Kitty wants to pla~yy~!"

Chad froze, sitting bolt upright in his office chair, and slowly pivoted to see the perky catgirl standing in the frame of his doorway, completely naked.

"NekoNeko," Chad said sternly. "We stayed up until 3am last night 'playing.' How in the Nine Worlds do you still have the energy?"

She stalked towards him, her hips swaying like the deck of an ocean liner with every sensuous step. Her tail whipped from the base of her spine around her ankles, and her tongue licked her lucious lips.

"Oh, that's because unlike the other skanks you keep around for some mysterious reason, NekoNeko is all woman," she purred in his ear, climbing onto his lap. She straddled his thigh and pressed her body against him, her breasts pushed flat against his chest. "Besides, isn't it time you finally settled down with the obvious Best Girl and breed a litter of kittens into me?"

"Oh fuck," Chad said, coming to an immediate realization. "You're going into heat again aren't you."

"So what if I am?" she said, licking his cheek. "Remember that time at the hot springs? Just you and me, alone for a week-"

"The same week the others were trapped in an inter-dimensional vortex labrynth? Filled with Void Spiders? That you put them in?"

"They got over it!"

"Listen," Chad said firmly, taking her by the waist and lifting her off his lap. NekoNeko made a small mewl of disappointment and started crawling around his legs, rubbing her face on his shins. "It's not that I don't appreciate the attention-"

"You showed me your appreciation all night long last night, lover-"

"-but I really, really have to get some work done. Can't Dahlia help you out?"

The succubus required a certain amount of lust energy from mortals to sustain her - a process that left most human men drained for months afterwards. Chad had been the first man Dahlia had met who had been able to withstand her voracious appetites, but even so, Dahlia had been able to help channel NekoNeko's excess energies in the past.

NekoNeko, like most Aeternian catgirls, was more cat-like than she appeared. Her most prominent feline features were her ears, two tabby-furred little tufts that perked up from the top of her head, along with the long, swishing orange and tan tail. Her eyes were mis-matched - pink and blue irises with vertical black pupils. Apart from the fur on her ears and tail, and a small orange patch on her pubic mount with a vertical white stripe - she was naturally hairless. Her fingertips hid small retractable claws that were surprisingly sturdy and sharp - delectably so, in the right circumstances.

No, the cat-like characteristics were more... behavioural. The possessiveness, the manic hot-and-cold energy she brought to the group, these things reminded Chad of Earth cats in a way that was equally endearing and irritating.

Fortunately, the other girls in the group were mostly amused by her constant belligerance. Mostly. Through their soul-deep SexBond, the five of them were connected on a deeper level than mere friendship. For all her, well, cattiness, NekoNeko loved all of Chad's harem just as much as she loved him - in her own way.

Not to mention, she was absolute dynamitie in the sack.

That said, her three-month week-long heat cycles were a little bit much, even for Chad.

"Nyaaa~rrrn," NekoNeko said in a plaintive voice. "She's not as much fun as you. Besides, she says she is getting her lust fix from teasing all the girls at the all-woman soccer team she signed up for."

That did sound like Dahlia, Chad thought.

"OK. Fine. I think I have a solution to your problem."

NekoNeko sat up on her haunches and hung her hands under her chin, looking up at him with sparkling eyes. "Is it Super-Power-Drilling-NekoNeko-Nookie-Time?"

"Um, no. What? When did you start calling it that?" he said, puzzled. "Grab your coat, we're going on a shopping trip."

"Yay, shopping!" NekoNeko said, her momentary disappointment banished by the mention of her second favorite activity.

"And after shopping, Super-Power-Drilling-NekoNeko-Nookie-Time!" she continued, racing out the door before Chad could correct her.

*****

The bus ride to Uptown was beyond embarassing. He had thought about taking the Dodge, but Yuri had the Ravenous Devourer up on blocks and he wasn't sure introducing the mechanically-minded elf to the world of motorised sex toys would be a good idea quite yet.

So instead they'd taken the bus, which in practice meant that the elderly retirees and tired shift workers who usually used Detroit public transport were given a front row seat to what could only be described as a public lap dance. NekoNeko, try as she might, could not stop writhing and gyrating on Chad's lap the entire trip and it was only the determined apathy the driver showed to his work that stopped them getting kicked off.

NekoNeko was under the effects of a hastily cast illusion spell - Chad's InkMage powers allowed him to cast any spells his SexBonded lovers knew, but as he was a generalist rather than a specialist, he'd had to focus on the more combat-

Their destination was an unassuming square brick building with a tacky neon generic "Open" sign in the high window and a plain white "Entrance at Rear" sign tacked onto the front door. Chad led the way through the car park as NekoNeko clung to his arm.

"What kind of place are you taking NekoNeko to, Chad-Sama?" she asked, her heterochromatic eyes wide. "This doesn't exactly look like a secluded love nest where we can spend my heat cycle locked in firey-"

"No, it's not," Chad said, interjecting before she got too carried away. "But it's definitely the kind of place you'd want to go to, to stock up on supplies first..."

He pushed open the plain white door and ushered her in to a pervert's paradise.

The Uptown Adult Toy Emporium was something of a local institution. In an era of chain stores and Amazon's dominance of the online adult novelties market, somehow the Toy Emporium kept its discreet doors open to serve the city's discerning clientele.

The store's white walls were host to racks and racks of dildoes, vibrators, pocket pussies, paddles, wrist cuffs - both cheap novelty plastic handcuffs intended for hen's nights and serious leather buckled straps that even Euridice's angelic strength wouldn't be able to break. Shelves of DVDs containing films depicting all manner of depravity and debauchery were on display, mostly a relic from an earlier time when instant access to pornography sat in everyone's pocket at all times.

NekoNeko's jaw dropped.

"What... what is..."

"Hi! Welcome to the Emporium," a young brunette woman said, stepping out from behind the counter. She was about five and a half feet tall, dressed in a black A-line skirt and a red polka-dot ruffled top that left her cleavage and shoulders bare - kind of a goth-inspired rockabilly look, Chad decided, seeing that she'd taken the time to apply tasteful smoky-eye makeup and bright red lipstick. She was what some might call a shortstack - busty and blessed with a bountiful butt leading to full, soft thighs wrapped in black tights paired with a pair of red pumps.

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"Its always nice to see young couples coming in to shop together," the woman continued with a genuine smile. "My name is Stacy, can I ask what you're interested in today?"

NekoNeko stopped staring at the wares and started glaring at the shop assistant, clamping herself to Chad's right arm. "That's right! We are a nice young couple with more than enough extraneous women hanging around my beloved Chad-sama and we don't need any more women for the harem, thank you very much!"

"Ignore her," Chad said, rolling his eyes.

"Oh! You're polyamorous? That's cool," Stacey said. "That's something I've always wanted to try, but, you know, lots of people are just in it for the sex and not the relationship stuff."

"It's, uh, complicated," Chad said, rubbing the back of his head with his free hand. "But really we're here to find some toys for Neko-" he stopped, suddenly realising that they'd never agreed on a more normal sounding name for her to use around civilians.

"Polyamorous and a cat girl? Wow! You guys are my kind of people," Stacey said clapping her hands together. "OK. I think I know just the thing. Follow me..."

NekoNeko glared at her back as Stacey led them to a display of silicon dongs.

"So, if you're just starting out with toys," she said, reaching for a neon purple toy about six inches long and an inch in diameter, "I'd recommend something like this, not too ambitious but also not too expensive, just so you can get a feel for what you might like-"

"That's meant to go inside NekoNeko?" the catgirl asked. "Pssh. That's pathetic. Nowhere near as big as my beloved Chad-sama."

"That so," Stacey said, not missing a beat. "In that case we could start a little bit more ambitious-"

The catgirl cut her off by scurrying up to the racks of toys, grabbing ever escalating sizes of dong from the display stand, examining them briefly, then tossing them over her shoulder.

"Smaller than Chad-sama," she said to herself, "not as thick as Chad-sama, nowhere near as good as Chad-sama-"

Stacey looked up at Chad with one raised eyebrow. Chad just returned her look with a casual shrug.

"Pah! Are the women of this world all weaklings and lesser wimps?" NekoNeko proclaimed, having come to the end of the display stand and not finding a single dildo that measured up to her standards. "Is there nothing here that could compare to the mighty phallus of my beloved?"

"Bit of a size queen huh?" Stacey said with a smirk. "Hang on a sec. I've got something out the back that should meet your expectations."

"NekoNeko doubts it, but you are welcome to try," she said, with her hands on her hips. Stacey stepped behind the sales counter and ducked behind a red velvet curtain to a back room.

Chad let out a heavy sigh and picked his way through the discarded sex toy packets to stand at her side. "Don't you think you're exaggerating a little?" he said, pulling her in for a side-hug by the waist. She nuzzled his chest and purred.

"NekoNeko is intimately familiar with the size, contours and shape of Chad-sama's Thundercock," she said smugly.

"My what-?"

"Here," Stacey said triumphantly, carrying a very large satin-sheened black box in two hands. She laid it on the counter, the brand name DECIMATOR printed in glossy letters on the side. The shop assistant paused for effect, then opened the lid to reveal a black sillicon phallus roughly the size of Chad's entire arm nestled in a red velvet bed. The monster of a toy was tapered, about as thick as his wrist at the tip and half again the size of his bicep at the base.

NekoNeko's eyes widened, then twinkled greedily.

"Yes..." she said, her voice low. "Yes, that might be acceptable."

"Now I do have to warn you," Stacey said. "If you do buy this, there's a liability waiver I'll need you to sign-"

"How much for this... thing?" Chad said, well aware that high end sex toys don't come cheap.

She told him.

"...fuck me," Chad said, stunned.

"No silly, is for fucking me," NekoNeko said, turning to him with her hands on her hips. "This is the only toy you have shown me so far that comes even close to being a challenge for me. So either you are fucking NekoNeko, of this thing is."

"Fine, fine," Chad said, already doing mental arithmetic to try and make room in the household budget for this month. "Just remember you said that when we're eating ramen for dinner five nights in a row."

"Yay!" she said, clapping her hands and wrapping Chad in a tight hug. "Thank you! NekoNeko promises to give Chad-sama a great show when NekoNeko uses this fabulous new artifact Chad-sama got for me! Yay!"

"Aww you guys are so sweet," Stacey said. "Now was there anything else you needed or should I ring this up?"

"Uh, you might want to throw in that big bottle of lube there," Chad said, pointing at a bottle behind the counter. "I had wanted to see what you had in the way of Magic Wands, but this thing is a little bit more than I'd wanted to spend..."

"That's not a problem," Stacey said. "We have a couple of decent mid-price models I can show you and if you're already spending this much, I can wrangle a discount for you. If you'll follow me..."

NekoNeko was already bored with this conversation, so she let Chad and this Stacey person wander off to one end of the store while she went to go browse in what looked like the costume section. She nodded in approval at the range of pleather bustiers and corsets - she found human clothing to be utterly stifling compared to what she used to wear on Aeternia. Humans were such prudes, really. As an assassin, any clothing more constrictive than a basque and hot pants was going to get in the way of her acrobatic fighting style, and even then, why hide the perfect body she worked so hard for?

She made a mental note to come back here when she'd found the time to rob a bank or two and stock up on more suitable clothing, then stopped in her tracks when she moved to the next aisle over.

Stacey and Chad's conversation on the merits of wall-powered versus battery-powered wands was interrupted by NekoNeko's blood-curdling shriek.

"YOU GODS-DAMNED MONSTER!"

NekoNeko came running towards them on all fours, her illusion dispelled and claws outstretched. Her eyes were flat back against her head and her tail bristled in anger as she leapt at Stacey, bringing her crashing to the ground.

"YOU BEAST! YOU CREEP!" she shrieked,keeping the shocked saleswoman pinned to the ground with her knees and flailing at her head with her fists. Stacey did the best she could to ward off her blows, covering her head with her forearms.

"NekoNeko!" Chad snapped, reaching down to grab her arms. The catgirl merely snarled and pushed him away, her anger lending her inhuman strength.

"You-- you-- you're selling catgirl tails!" NekoNeko said. "How many of my people have you killed just to harvest their-"

Stacey caught NekoNeko's wrists in her hands and hauled her up towards her head, unbalancing the catgirl and giving her the opportunity to roll on top of her. NekoNeko brought her leg up between them and kicked her off, sending her flying into one of the shelves which toppled to the ground.

"NekoNeko, what the fuck-" Chad yelled. He spread the fingers of both hands, reaching inside himself to summon his magic. On Aeternia, he could instantly summon a field of black liquid ink-like magic that he could telekinetically control to form weapons and tools, but since coming to Earth, summoning it had been like squeezing fondant through a thin straw. Thick and sluggish.

NekoNeko pounced on Stacey again. Stacey responded by wrapping her legs around the catgirl's torso and hooking her arms up underneath her attacker's, locking her arms in place. NekoNeko snarled and slipped her right arm free of her grasp and reared back to throw a punch at Stacey's face, only for her to move her head to the side and grab NekoNeko's wrist.

The catgirl yelped in surprise as Stacey wrapped her legs around NekoNeko's shoulders, wreching her into an arm lock.

"What the hell are you talking about?" Stacey snapped as NekoNeko growled.

"The cat tails in the clothing aisle!" NekoNeko snarled. "Don't try to deny it! You're docking poor defenceless Nekojin and selling their tails!"

"Wait, you mean the catgirl butt plugs?" Stacey said, shocked. "I thought - I thought you were wearing one! How do you not know-"

"Y- You-" NekoNeko stammered. "Are you telling me humans are putting Nekojin tails up their BUTTS!"

Stacey was unable to keep her grip on the catgirl's arm when she unsheathed her claws to rake at Stacey's hands. NekoNeko scrambled backwards, putting space between them; Stacey quickly got to her feet, just in time to meet NekoNeko's charge.

Chad had only managed to conjure a glob of energy about the size of his fist. It would have to do - this situation was rapidly spinning out of control. As Stacey and NekoNeko exchanged punches, he spun the ink into a lasso and sent it hurtling across to bind his lover's right wrist and jerk her towards him.

She yelped in surprise as he grabbed her wrists from behind, holding her arms above her head. She writhed in his grip, her tail flicking in his face and her ass writing against his chest, spitting at Stacey in rage.

"They're not real cat tails!" he shouted in her ear. "They're made from fabric, just like the cat ears are-"

"YOU MEAN THEY'RE ALSO SELLING NEKOJIN EARS-"

She got her feet braced against Chad's thighs and launched herself at Stacey again, her powerful legs sending her flying through the air and connecting with the hapless girl about her waist. The crashed into another set of shelves, sending a rack of pornographic magazines tumbling to the floor.

"Of course that's what she takes from that sentence," Chad said bitterly. Thinking quickly, he sprinted over to the clothing section of the store.

Meanwhile, Stacey did her best to defend herself from the assassin's flailing arms. Her makeup was beyond ruined, her skirt riding up her legs and her top torn into polka-dotted shreds. NekoNeko wasn't faring much better, her skin starting to form bruises wherever Stacey was able to land a punch.

Five seconds into this latest exchange of blows, Chad arrived back to the melee clutching one of the offending cat-tail butt plugs and a headband with sequinned plush cat ears. He dropped the cat-accessories to the ground and wrapped his girlfriend in a bear-hug, bodily hauling her off of Stacey and throwing her to the ground, landing on top of her to pin her in place.

"NekoNeko!" he snapped. "Bad kitty! No! Stop! Look at the damn things!"

The slender catgirl squirmed in his grasp making frustrated mewling sounds, but Chad was too strong and she wasn't able to wriggle free. With a huff she stopped moving, but her body was still rigid and tense.

"Look!" Chad snapped again. "They're obviously fake! What catgirl do you know with bright purple and neon green fur, huh? And those sequins? Think!"

NekoNeko's tail stopped thrashing, and she narrowed her eyes, Chad's words slowly percolating through her adrenaline-soaked brain.

"...huh," she finally said. "Well. Why didn't you say so?"

Chad just closed his eyes and rolled off of her with a sigh.

Stacey had gotten to her feet and was trying to adjust her clothing as best she could. "Jesus fuck you guys. What the hell was that about? Wait-"

She paused, taking in NekoNeko's true appearance now that the illusion was gone and the catgirl wasn't actively trying to bash her brains in.

"You're... an actual... literal catgirl," Stacey continued, eyes wide and jaw hanging open.

"That's right!" NekoNeko said, pointing to the sky and cocking her hip with her left hand at her side. "You have had the honor of having your ass kicked by me, the notorious, beautiful pretty assassin, Crimson Claw! And now that you have been defeated, the powerful Chad-sama shall take you as his concubine, by right of conquest!"

"Jesus Christ Nekoneko," Chad said, gripping the bridge of his nose. "How many times have I told you that the harem doesn't work that way?"

"Uh..." Stacey said, blushing, "actually I think I'd be kinda into that."

Chad sighed. "How the fuck is this my life."