Hero or no hero, feline or no feline, I wasn't going to be able to go able anywhere without some sort of clothes. Yes, the fur did a reasonable job of keeping myself covered. It was even warm, once I got used to it. People however, were not used to seeing certain things exposed.

It could have been worse, I suppose. Cats usually had litters, and female cats could feed the entire litter. At the same time.

Eeew.

OK, so I didn't have that problem, Still needed something to cover up, and nothing I had was able to fit that bill. After the change, I was simply bigger.

Proportionally.

I've seen artist renditions of people like Wonder Woman and Supergirl. They don't look anything like that. Trust me. I've seen them in real life.

Creeps.

Granted, I was all thumbs when sewing, even before my change. However, not being a hermit, I knew a friend that may be able to help.

I also did not want to become a hermit, someone was going to have to see the new me eventually. So I made a call to a friend of mine named Sheri. While my hobbies were everything involving computers and stories, she was into costuming. She even took part in some of those reenactor festivals they had, where people dressed up in period clothing.

She, however, was not at home; nor was she answering her cell phone. Unfortunate. I left a message and tried to think. I did not yet have a plan B. Going out in public wasn't an option, and I was uncomfortable with the idea of trying to get a professional seamstress to do a house call.

Instead, I doodled at the computer a bit, hoping inspiration would strike. A score of about 1.2 million in Bejeweled 3's Lightning round struck, a score I was pleased with; but no real ideas. It was when I was contemplating another round that I instinctively froze, turned, and stared at the phone.

I had no idea why.

About two full seconds later, it rang. I about tipped the chair I was sitting on all the way over. I approached the phone cautiously. I had known it was going to ring.

How had I known that?

This whole cat thing was going to take a lot of getting used to.

"Rachel," I answered.

"Its Sheri," came the voice on the other line. "I got your message. What's up?"

How the hell do I explain this to her?

"Have you seen the news today?" I asked.

"About all the new supers?" she responded, "of course I have."

I swallowed, audibly, as it turned out. " I need uh, a costume." I put unnecessary emphasis on the last word.

There was a pause. An unreasonably long pause. "You... it happened to you too? Are you planning on doing something crazy?"

"No. Trust me. But..." I cast around for the proper verb. "I've changed, and I've literally nothing to wear. I need something, just to go out in." That was lame.

There was another pause. "All right, I can come over early tomorrow, bring my tools with me," Sheri said.

"And fabric, trust me. Bring some kind of fabric. Ten-ish?"

"Ten-ish," she agreed, her voice unnecessarily sweet. "I'll see you then."

Awesome. My best friend thinks I've gone crazy.

There wasn't much else I could do that night. After messing around on the computer a bit longer, I went to sleep. At least, I tried to. I wasn't restless, so to speak, but I had a hard time getting comfortable. Damnable fur.

When I did eventually drop off, I had dreams. Nightmares, really. I awoke twice, trying to hold onto the images around me. I wasn't sure what I saw, though I don't believe it looked like Earth, at least, no part of Earth I was familiar with.

When day finally broke, I was tense, both from the nightmares and that someone was coming over. I made some breakfast, and set to cleaning up the apartment. I eschewed the shower, as I wasn't ready to go through that again just yet.

A little before ten, I picked up the phone, realized it hadn't actually rung yet, and put it down again. I swallowed, put it down. About five minutes later, I resisted the urge to pick it up again. Again, about two seconds later it rang, then I picked it up.

"Hey, Rachel," came Sheri's voice. I greeted her. "Who were you talking to?" she asked, "I got a busy signal."

"Uhm," I stammered, "No one, I'll buzz you in."

I made sure the door was unlocked, then sat on my couch, covering myself with a blanket.

After a few minutes, I could hear someone at the door, then the knock came. This always kind of irritated me. I know you're there. I just buzzed you in. "It's open!" I called.

"I could use a hand!" Sheri called.

Oh.

I stood, wincing a bit as the blanket hit the ground, and moved over to the door. I opened, carefully, to stay out of the line of sight arc of the hall way.

Sheri entered the room, making for the kitchen area. She dumping a bag and sent a box down gently on my dining table. She must have realized she hadn't seen me, and turned around. Then her jaw dropped.

"Hi Sheri," I said.

Sheri could only stammer something incomprehensible.

"It's the hair, isn't it?" I waited. I could feel it coming.

"You look like... like," she started.

Here it comes!

"a Thundercat!" she said, and her tension gave way to a nervous giggle.

I merely sighed and sat down at the table. "Anyone else you want to compare me to?"

"Felicia!"

Great. Now I'm a Darkstalker. "Done?" I asked. Sourly.

"For the moment," she said, relaxed now.

"I appreciate it." I gave her the brief run down on what happened twelve hours ago, and that I needed some sort of clothing to go out in. I had to replace a wardrobe, and I wasn't going to eat take out for the rest of my life.

With what Sheri had on hand, a sports top was easy enough to make. The bottom part was a little more interesting, due to the tail. It was under conscious control. When I focused on it, I could directed as needed. It seemed to behave more or less autonomously otherwise, but it did make wearing pants a problem.

In the end, it was worked around by creating, ahem, a "sports bottom" that went just under it. It was mildly uncomfortable, and not exactly form fitting, but it did the job. I kept it on with a belt.

The entire ensemble was covered by a large cloak, bright sunshine yellow. It was the only thing Sheri had enough of. It'd make people stare, I supposed. The "Look at the weirdo in the weird clothes" stare seemed to be an improvement over the "My god what is that?" stare.

It was about half past one when we finished. This was important, as I was supposed to work at the Noodle Bar at five. This left plenty of time to get to the local mall and try to find some real clothes.

Sheri drove. I tried to look inconspicuous in the passenger seat. As much as a six foot woman covered with a yellow cloak could be inconspicuous. At least the person at the drive thru waited until we were past before doing anything audible.

The department store was reasonably crowded – the weather had held off mostly, and the mall was full of people getting the necessities they needed. As expected, whenever I walked by, people giggled and pointed, until they caught side of my head. Then they gasped.

We made a bee line for the dressing room before we could I could be cited for disturbing the peace. Or another child could look at me and yell "Kitty". One was enough, thanks.

Trying to find anything that would cover fur and muscular arms was a bit of an adventure, but one that was eventually solved. Tank tops could work around the problem, of course, but Sheri was able to find a few puffy sleeved blouses and loose fitting shirts.

Pants were less of a problem, until it came to the damnable tail. It became apparent that nothing would cover both tail and legs with any ease. The tail wanted to stick outward, so covering it with a dress wasn't an option. In the end, I was left with some low cut skirts and pants. Rachel said she'd work on the problem, maybe she could come up with a solution.

"After all," she joked, "Now I have a real life Superhero to design for. I feel like Edna Mode. No capes!"

I sighed.

The lady who rung me up was a professional, at least. She raised her eyebrows when she saw me, but didn't ask any questions, didn't make any jokes. She just took my credit card, advised about their own card (as I'm sure they're required to do), took off the security tags, and put my myriad purchases into a bag.

After another ego suffering trip back to the parking lot, we returned to my apartment. Rachel dropped me off. I thanked her, profusely. Forget moving bodies, this is what real friends were for.

She laughed when I told her this. "Just remember that you owe me," she said. Trust me, I wasn't about to forget. You don't forget people helping you out of a crisis or two.

I admit, I still had hope of finding some way of reversing the process. Faint hope. I suppose I should have contacted the Justice League, but I was afraid they'd try to talk me out of it. I'd heard Superman's speech, and I was afraid I'd be drafted for the war on Brainiac. Strength? Agility? Intuition? I'd gotten those. I can't say I had the mental shift needed to be a hero. Still, maybe there was hope for me in my new situation. Maybe I could live a normal life.

Then came my shift at the noodle bar. I won't say it was a complete catastrophe, but it was very unpleasant. To see the manager, a normally well tempered man by the name of Charlie, go pale was not a good start. It could have been worse though. He could have sent me home, and with what I spent on clothes, I now needed the money.

The other server, Mike, had a reaction completely on the other side. He thought it was completely cool, and was borderline envious. Before I could stop him, he snapped a picture of me. He at least promised not to put up my real name, or anything.

On the other hand, there was more then one family that refused to be served by a freak. I was polite about it, and traded Mike for his next table. Eventually, it got me a family with a kid (age: six or so) who noticed I had a tail, and I'm going to guess, wondered if it was real.

I could feel the phone about to ring, and I couldn't see this coming? There's no justice in my world.

I'm just lucky I wasn't carrying at the time. Having my tail pulled HURT! I let out a wail and turned, sharply. The kid, who didn't have the sense to let go, crashed his face into the side of table, then lost his seat completely.

The whole place went almost completely silent. The only noise was the kid crying. He may have taken a nasty tumble, but the only injury appeared to be a bruise on his face. I closed my eyes, counted to five. When I opened them, the father looked angry and the mother mortified. I departed to the kitchen to fill their order.

I never did get an apology from the kid, who appeared to be sulking the rest of the meal, but there was a healthy tip at the end of it.

Another man at the bar, with a saki glass in front of him, wanted to arm wrestle me. He was ignored at first. As the night went on, he became more insistent, and slightly more slurred. He finally made a grab at my upper arm that I saw coming. I let him, probably because he'd have fallen off the bar stool otherwise.

"C'mon," he pleaded with me.

The match had begun and was over so fast I didn't think anyone else had noticed. There was quite a lot of power in these arms, and yet I could control my strength so easily. I hadn't broken his bones. At least, I don't think I did.

Didn't matter, I got chewed out by Charlie anyway. Never mind the guy had borderline assaulted me. Granted, he wasn't going to be much of a threat, and he was drunk. I still maintain the easiest way to get the guy to leave me alone was to give him what he wanted. It worked. Next time I came out he was gone.

When I finally returned to my apartment, it was not quite midnight. I climbed the stairs to the second floor, put my hand on the building and froze. I couldn't put my finger on it, but there was something wrong.

The door was locked. I checked. Trust me, if the door was unlocked, I'd have run like I was in a bad horror movie.

I unlocked the door, pushed it open slowly, looking behind me. I could feel my fur standing on end. I couldn't even see anything off. I had no idea why I was feeling so nervous. I was on the verge of running like a mad woman.

I stood at the door frame, wondering if I'd left the lights on. I hadn't. My eyesight had become that good, I could see through the darkness almost as if it had been daytime. I stood there, frozen. About a minute or two, I did see movement. There was someone in the apartment. It wasn't Rachel. It was someone with a gun.

I did turn and run at that point. To the stairs, I will point out, not the elevator. There was a second thug, wearing combat fatigues, and holding a big scary pistol. Probably a Magnum.

"Bad kitty."