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Tigress Transformation

Written by Arian Mabe (Amethyst Mare)

Commissioned by Thebodyswapeur

Late at night, in his apartment, John pulled up a movie to watch, something to get him through the rest of the night with something akin to lifted spirits. It was not that he had had a bad day, not really, just “one of those days", the kind of day that ticked by, pop by pop, without anything of significant note happening, nothing really at all. He looked the same as he always did at work, his first boring office job after finishing his studies, with a shirt and tie, dressing to impress but never getting there. It was all rigged against him, really, but he had even shaved off his beard to fit in, his hair trimmed short and neat, glasses clean.

But it didn't matter. It was what everyone else was doing, so did that mean anything bad? No, of course not, he was just him, just John…but why did things feel so bland and boring?

“Hmph."

He didn't have an answer for that, the lights turned off so that the brown of his plain, short hair was only illuminated by the light of the TV while his selected movie started up. He didn't feel like he had much of an answer for anything those days.

John sighed, leaning back onto his old, creaky sofa while watching the first film in the Kung Fu Panda series. They were up to a trilogy now? Man, they really went all out on movies like that, but he didn't mind. It was one of his favourite movies, to be fair, though there was one huge problem in the franchise.

Tigress. Ugh. Why was she even in it? She never even did anything useful, they didn't even have to have her there at all. It didn't matter whether she was there or not, it wasn't as if she had anything more to do after she had not been chosen to be the Dragon Warrior. Really, she should have slunk off in shame and she was always so rude and so bossy. He did not get at all why people seemed to like her so much.

“Ugh, why are you here?"

He talked to the TV, even pulling his lips into a sneer at one point, Tigress on screen, though he didn't want her to be. Po was much better than her.

“Did you think you were good enough to be the Dragon Warrior?" John scoffed, mocking her in jest. “Hah! Girls aren't strong enough for that. You think punching…ironwood trees is going to change anything?"

The tiger anthro on the screen could not hear him, of course, and he might have felt more foolish than he did in shouting at the TV if it had not made him feel as good as it did. In fact, it was exactly the stress relief he needed after the day he'd had.

“Too thick," he scorned her. “Muscular… Who'd want a woman like that anyway? Not me!"

Not that he had a partner himself, but, well…that wasn't something that John was going to linger on, not while he was trying to make himself feel better.

“Hope you're not in the next movie," he laughed with a shake of his head. “Have Po sit on you – like you'd ever get up after that! You'd fall to even a fat panda, even if he is the best."

“I don't think you should speak to me like that."

John started, gripping his phone, his lower jaw falling slack. He'd seen the first movie a hundred times over, he was sure, but he'd never heard that line in it. Yet the worst was yet to come as the tiger anthro on the screen, Tigress herself, turned to him with her lips turned down in a frown that promised trouble, her look sullen, series. Of course, she still wore her usual red shirt with no sleeves, buttoned at the front, her black trousers flexible enough to move with her, allowing her a full range of motion.

If he had not been so struck dumb, John might have said that she only wore something like that because she needed the extra help in battle, but the tigress' eyes bored into him through the TV screen. It was almost as if she could actually see him…

“You are a disgrace to your kind," Tigress said, still staring directly at him, the other characters still and quiet around her, as if they didn't know what she was focusing on outside their field of vision. “I have had enough of your kind, of not being treated with respect. Now, it is your turn to take my place."

“What the…"

But John never managed to finish the sentence as his head slumped forward, chin rolling to his chest, his phone falling from his grasp. Unconscious, the blackness closed in on him, drawing him deeper, away from reality, though he had never truly had much of a place there anyway.

Tigress had plans for him, after all…

*

“Urgh…"

John woke slowly, his head pounding. Damn, had he had something too much to drink the night before? He didn't even remember drinking anything, which was probably worse than anything else. That probably meant that he had had a lot more to drink than he had even intended to, which was nothing at all.

But…things did not feel quite right around him. He rolled to his side, eyes fluttering open. That wasn't his room. That didn't actually look anything like his room – what on earth was going on there? He tried to sit up, but his body didn't feel right anymore, as if he was bigger, taking up more space than even he was used to.

He groaned. Was that his voice? How much had he really had to drink that night? It sounded thicker, raspier. He must have knocked his head on something, surely, to be feeling that rough. Maybe he even needed to see a doctor, because there was no way that he was going to be able to continue with his day with it all pounding like that.

But his room… Wait, that was not his room! It looked like a light room made from fabric screens and thin, light wood – was that bamboo? No… No, it could not be bamboo, he'd never had anything like that in his house, wouldn't have been able to both afford it and even know where to put it, what to do with something like that. And what was with those screens? Where the hell had those suddenly appeared from?

John could not be blamed for being rather slow on the uptake, shaking his head, pushing up off the floor with his hands. He didn't have anything else in the room with him, which was very odd indeed, just a sleeping mat and a light blanket. It must have been comfortable enough, considering that he was not sore from sleeping awkwardly at all, but it didn't make sense, nothing at all made any sense.

“H-hello?"

His voice startled him, grunting, swallowing, trying to clear his throat. Maybe his friends were playing a prank on him, that would make the most sense out of everything that had happened to him there.

“Hello? Sam? This isn't funny anymore, seriously, you've had your laughs now…"

Yet he recognised that voice, even if he could not quite put his fingers on it. He'd heard it somewhere before, not his voice, but someone else's. Yet where had it come from?

They had to be pranking him, he was sure, yet his hands were not his own when he finally looked down at them, dressed with a bandeau top around his chest. But that was most certainly not John's chest as he gasped and clutched at himself, heart pounding, orange and black striped fur covering his body, not skin!

“What the hell?"

He snarled, feeling his lips pull back, though even that shocked him, gasping, whirling in a circle, though that only flummoxed him further as a stripey tail chased him, following the line of his motion. John growled, tongue flickering harshly against the inside of his teeth, teeth that were suddenly a lot sharper and more pointed than they had been before, his heart pounding, big and strong, at the inside of his ribcage.

Focusing on that beat, he grabbed at his body, his chest…a chest that was not male anymore. He had not had that much muscle there to begin with, though there was more than that there in that moment, a pair of breasts softly rising under the strapless top that covered his new breasts and only then. It was as if the clothing there was purely in place for modesty and decency, leaving the creamier expanse of his belly exposed, his stomach doing a sick flip as he stood there, staring, unable to even come to his senses.

It was not him. He grabbed his face, fingers smoothing over the features that would have been more in place with a character on the TV screen, a character that he loathed, one that he hated. For he could not have been anyone else, not with a tiger's muzzle, whiskers, a rough face and rounded ears poised on top of his head.

It was not him, it was not him! He grabbed at his thighs, finding more stripes down by his calves, clothed but that was hardly a good thing under such circumstances! He heaved for breath, trying to turn quickly, but finding that his body whipped to the side too much so, dizzying and tipping, revealing a lashing, striped tail. A tail!

It couldn't be real, it couldn't be real!

Letting out a strangled cry, he staggered back, tottering onto one leg as if he could flee from his new form, the body of Tigress that he loathed so much. He couldn't really be a tiger, couldn't be her, could he? No – no! It had to be a dream, a horrible dream! He was going to startle awake right there and then and he'd laugh his head off over how he'd thought that he was actually Tigress in the worst nightmare ever.

And yet he did not wake, not as he stood there, sweating, heaving, panting, his heart hammering to a beat only it knew on the inside of his ribcage.

“This cannot be," he muttered, head hanging, speaking with evidently Tigress' inflexion in his voice. “No… This truly cannot be…"

Yet he wasn't waking up as he shuddered and looked himself over, trying to ignore the twisting pull in the pit of his stomach while he did so. He wasn't John anymore: he was really Tigress, turning his hands over – but they were paws, they were paws. What the hell was going on with his world, his crazy life? He flicked his tail, looking at the black tip, running his paws over his breasts, though he could not stop the heat of a blush, the light rise of his nipples pushing against the fabric over his breasts, as if they were trying to push through, to make themselves known.

That wasn't right, though he couldn't stop his heart from hammering, trying to breathe slowly and evenly, not that that was going to help him much.

Calm down…

_ _

Yeah, like that was going to help him, though he tried with all his might, holding his head, his legs covered by form-fitting black trousers that seemed a lot tighter than anything he had seen Tigress wear in the movies. That was, of course, if he wasn't losing his mind. That was still up for debate, but he tried to take a moment, a deep breath, inspecting his new tiger body, hands running down his legs.

They were so muscled… More so than even he would have expected them to be, the muscle easily showing through the near sheer fabric, John gulping. Everything was on show, his tail snaking back and forth behind him as if lazily, though he didn't feel like he was controlling it. Did it have a mind of its own? Could tails do that? It felt like that, but also like it was part of him.

No… No, it was just moving in time with what he was thinking, following the emotions of his body. Like a house cat, he supposed, though that didn't make John feel any better. He groaned, turning and trying to look down his back where the black stripes were more prominent, though he could barely stay upright. It was like trying to learn to walk all over again, instinct doing better when he had been startled than his active mind trying to control his walk.

He took a breath, his centre of balance off, not what it had once been, though he knew he had to do it. He had to walk, as much as that felt like an astronomical task, something that he could not achieve, no matter how hard he tried. With his hands out on either side of him, tail swinging behind, he tried to take a step, reluctant to pull his foot – or was that a paw too? – from the ground. His breasts too could have thrown him off, though he ground his teeth together, making sure that he did not grab them again. God, that was so embarrassing…

“Whoa!"

He loathed how it sounded exactly like Tigress' voice rolling from his lips, those startled tones, able to see, in his mind's eye, the widening of her eyes, the snarl on her lips. But those were his lips, not her lips, even as he tried to stagger, one babyish, heaving, grunting step after the other.

Could he even call himself a “he" anymore? Or was “he" a “she"?

John groaned, rubbing her head. John… Tigress… One way or the other, she had to find her way out of there, some way to get back home and back into her normal body. Then she would know, for sure, that she was John, the boring guy in the office with a predictable life that suddenly seemed a lot more enticing than it had before, without any shadow of a doubt.

She had a tiger's body, that of a tigress, so that was what she had to be, a weird hybrid of something and someone that was both John and Tigress, even if she didn't know how the hell he'd gotten there. Dimly, in the back of her mind, she recalled Tigress on the TV screen, back when she had been John but in their house, saying something about being her. It didn't make any sense then and it didn't make any sense now, so she cast it aside with a low groan.

“This is wrong," she muttered, rubbing the back of her head, fingers raking down through the fur between her ears. “Ugh… Maybe it is a dream and if I just go through it I will wake up again?"

That seemed to be the best chance she had, straightening her back. Now, she had to actually pass for Tigress, stepping further and further away from John, standing tall and pushing her shoulder blades back. How was it that Tigress walked?

She had to really think about that, because she had been so caught up in scorning and shunning the character before that she had not paid all that much attention to Tigress before. She'd been far more interested in the action scenes with Po and Monkey and Mantis and Crane – they were, at least, interesting to watch together. Tigress was just another big cat and a bitchy one too that thought she was better than she was.

But that was her now, she thought with a grimace, trying to practice walking, even if it was like walking and staggering through the thickest of mud, every scrap of it holding onto her and trying to cling to her, dragging her down. She had to be Tigress and maybe if she embodied that arrogant attitude, that sense of being better than everyone else, she would get through it and wake up.

At least, that was what John, as Tigress, had to think, though her hands could not help but slip down her chest again, feeling her breasts through the fabric, though it was light and flexible, not the kind of material that hid all that much. She shivered. Since when had skin been that soft and pliable, so sensitive? She swore that she hadn't felt like that in the body of a guy, but there was so much to make sense of already that her spinning mind hardly knew where to pause or where to begin.

She could only move forward, however, step by step, trying her best. Or at least get through whatever the strange, strange dream was so that she could get back to her regular life. If the whole thing ended up being some kind of crazy dream from working too hard, she was sure she could live with that.

Tigress relearned how to walk, step by wobbly step, though found herself pushing her back straighter, her walk more elegant, but not in a way that was becoming of a lady. It was more as if she was putting so little effort into every step that the tiger didn't even have to think about it. She didn't realise that, in her mind, she had already shifted to using female pronouns for herself as if it was the most natural thing in the world.

Maybe it was. Maybe it was not. Who was to say?

Still, the shift and heft of her new body forced her to find a new centre of balance, testing out a jump. She could jump both from the flats of her feet and her toes, though the toe jump was springier.

“Whoa!"

It was still weird to hear Tigress' voice coming from her lips, though there was little she could do about that, wobbling, having landed the jump strangely. Yet the more she moved the more she became used to her body, walking back and forth, trying a quick lunge, a stab, a strike with a foot. The worst one was always the first, but she flowed more and more easily from one movement to the next as if it was coming back to her in the form of muscle memory, something that she had spent an awfully long time doing before and was only then returning to. Her mind only had to be quiet and allow her body, her instinctive reactions, to take over.

She was relieved about one thing, however, and that was that every movement felt increasingly like it was Tigress performing them, as if it was really her. Yet where did the line between Tigress and John even belong anymore?

I don't have to worry about that, she told herself, performing a palm thrust in perfect balance, tail striking out behind her to keep her precisely poised. I just have to…go about my day. That's it. Piece of cake.

_ _

She stood tall and brushed herself off, taking a deep breath. It felt a more natural thing for Tigress to do in going out and on with her day than to hide away all holed up there wondering what was going on, so that was what she would do. The door to the rest of the accommodation slid back smoothly, allowing her out into the wooden-floored hallway, pacing down without making a sound. It was not a big abode, suited for the Kung-Fu warriors to sleep and eat and rest, but little more than that. It was a simple life that they had to lead.

She didn't know what she thought about that, mixed feelings swirling in the pit of her stomach, one not knowing quite what to do about the other. But the outdoors offered her a breath of fresh air, cherry blossoms pink and waving faintly in the breeze. Dimly, she registered that it must have been spring if they were all in bloom.

“Hm… Interesting."

She could more or less follow the path down from the accommodation on the hillside to the temple a little lower down, though the whole training facility, the temple of Kung-Fu was still set higher than the village below, almost growing into a town. It looked different to how it had been in the movies, bustling with more activity and as if it had spread further, almost to the foothills of the mountains to the east, which seemed closer too. Tigress shook her head. Her mind simply had to be filling in the blanks there, making more of the world than it was. Even then, she had to find a reason for her situation.

The temple rang with activity, a voice that was evidently Po's squawking and shouting as he performed his favourite thing: Kung-Fu. Even though Tigress smiled inwardly, her body would not allow the smile to reach her lips and show that, at least in some small way, she was amused by Po's antics, how full of life he was and how much he seemed to want to enjoy everything that was going on around him in the world.

She pushed open the door, feeling the smooth wood under her palm, the far side of the temple training area open too, allowing more light to spill in, the training pits offering all manner of wicked devices, such as the spinning logs and spiked beams, tongues of fire… They had all been things that very much foiled Po when he had first come to the temple, but that had, at least, been something that the panda had been able to traverse.

Something pulled at Tigress' heart, though it took her a moment to identify it. Sorrow? Was she sad that she had not, in the end, been chosen to be the Dragon Warrior? But she was not really Tigress, she reminded herself, even if she felt increasingly as if she was. She had no reason to feel sad at all about that tiger getting what she deserved and Po ascending to his rightful place. It could have been cool, kind of, if Crane was the Dragon Warrior though, he was her favourite otherwise…

“Hey, pussycat!" Monkey greeted her with a cackle, swinging upside down from a beam, his tail lazily wrapped around it with his hands free. “Got your beauty sleep then, hm? We thought you were never going to make your way down here!"

“Yeah, did training yesterday knock you out or something?" Crane queried, his hat tipping to the side as he peered at her, as if checking her over for injuries. “Nothing, ah, happened in the night?"

Tigress' lips turned down in the tiniest of frowns while, inside, she yearned to show him her claws. How dare he mock her like that? And Crane – what did he mean, what happened in the night? Did he know something?

Unconsciously, she drew herself up a little taller, an impenetrable wall, expression bland and plain, as if she had become as still as her stripes.

“I daresay it was better than yours," she said flatly, ears twitching back but, otherwise, her expression giving nothing away as she addressed Monkey first. “If you slept as well as I, you would not bear such bags beneath your eyes."

“Ohhhh, strike one!" Mantis hopped up, punching the air, a grin stretched across his tiny, green face. “She got you there, bud!"

Monkey grumbled and rolled his eyes, while Crane shuffled back, tipping the wide brim of his woven hat down over his eyes, wings fluttering, already appearing sheepish.

“Ah, yes, sorry…Tigress, I didn't mean to pry."

Tigress surveyed him quietly for a moment, one eyebrow, very slowly, raising. It was as if her body suddenly had all the time in the world and all the patience too, her chest slowly rising and falling, feeling the detail of every breath.

“You, at least, did not intend offence," she said, her voice dry, as if bored. “But I trust that none of you shall be keeping track of my sleeping habits going forward."

She strode past them, even as Po laughed behind his hands. It was not how she would usually have been, at least as John, but it felt as if she had to be more serious. If she tried to turn and make a joke, even as she set herself up in front of one of the highest-grade punching bags that they had there, it was as if an invisible wall blocked her.

Was she being forced to act like Tigress? She growled and shook her head, focusing on the target, a flurry of motion surrounding her that, abruptly, the tiger realised was her. She had done nothing more than think about hitting the big punching back, hanging from a strong beam with a stronger chain, though hitting it was like slamming into a bag of rocks – worse, even.

Something in her mind made acting like John difficult and acting like Tigress easy. She couldn't see much point in fighting it when it was so easy to act like Tigress. It even made her ever so slightly more empathetic to Tigress, aware too of Viper watching her from the background. They should have banded together as the two women there, but, truly, there was little between them that they had in common. As always, Tigress was left on her own.

At least, however, she could train. That soothed her, slamming into the punching back with fists and feet, even twisting, spinning in mid-air, all so she could push her limits. It was easier and easier to use her body the more she did, growling, grunting, not caring for the noises she made as she pushed her body to its limit and more.

The slam of her feet and fists into the bag steeled her heart, but soothed her too, in a way. She was aware, vaguely, of the rest of the group closing in around her, though she stiffened a little, striking harder. How hard would Tigress strike? She had to make sure that not even one of them realised that she was not Tigress, focusing on her task with the driven seriousness that the powerful character had always seemed to embody on the screen. At least it did not turn her stomach as much when it was her that was doing it, not the character she had been watching, back then, on the TV screen.

Pausing, her chest heaved, fur lightly dampening with sweat, even though her muscles did not feel as if she had physically exerted herself. Words from John leapt to her lips and died there. They did not belong on the lips of Tigress, not with how she was, quietly calm, quietly controlled, always so very sure of herself.

It was comforting, in a way. But she didn't know what to do about that, so she merely stood, letting her breath return to normal. It was surprisingly swift, shoulders pushing back, standing as tall and as proud as ever.

“Damn, you've got the strikes of a cheetah there, like, ka-pow! Wa-ha-haaaaa!"

Po, of course, had to be there, her eyes sliding to him as she paused, the panda once again acting the fool. However, Tigress had to admit, even in a small way, that it was amusing to see him strike and kick like that. He really had come a long way in Kung-Fu since the panda who had been thrust into being the Dragon Warrior.

Again, her stomach twisted and she half-turned away. It still should have been her. She should have been the Dragon Warrior.

“That is where daily training will bring you," she said, instead of pursuing the thought that did not seem like it was her own. “If you put as great an effort into the force of your strikes, you could hit as hard as me."

“Ohhhh, cool!"

It was hard for her not to smile at Po's unbridled enthusiasm: it was as if the panda really could not contain himself. He was so full of life and energy and she wondered why she couldn't embody that in herself, even if how she stood and the set of her face felt perfectly natural too. Did she always have to be so serious?

“Tigress!" Po waved, catching her attention. “Watch me – like this?"

He wanted her to coach him and Tigress gulped subtly, wondering if she was enough in her new head and body to be able to say something, anything, that would sound like Tigress. The other Kung-Fu Warriors were there, watching her: Monkey, Crane, Mantis and Viper. With them, she should have been the Furious Five. And with Po… Well, Po was always making up new names for their group, so that changed weekly.

She started. There it was again: another thought that, strangely enough, did not feel as if it belonged in her head, as if it had been placed there by someone or something else. She didn't shake herself off or shudder physically, however, every part of her held tightly under control. Even her muscles felt contracted where they might otherwise have been loose and subtle, always on guard and always on alert.

Was that how Tigress always felt? Even then, her shoulders wanted to sag and round. That felt exhausting. Mentally, at least, for it did not seem as if there was all that much that could physically exhaust her, interestingly enough.

Po struck wildly, a palm thrust followed by a side kick, leaping in the air to bring his fist down on the top. They were uncouth moves, some unconventional, and there was not as much flow to it as there was to a string of her moves, but they did the trick, she had to admit, standing tall. She was the teacher in that moment, standing with her hands laced behind her back. Goodness, she hoped she didn't look like Shifu or else Monkey was going to have a fit. They always seemed to take every opportunity to tease her – and what was with all the jokes about her being a feline? That didn't make sense at all, even though she was a tiger. Her hand balled into a fist. She was so much more than that.

“Ah… Oof…" Po bent over, his hands on his knees, his wobbly stomach doing what it did best. “Unff… Tigress… How…was…that?"

She stepped forward, suddenly cool and confident in her own ability.

“Good. But take your weight back on your heel a little more, like this," she explained, showing him the position. “Your centre of gravity remains different to mine. You need to work with your body, not against it."

That was something that she understood all too well after her shift from human to tiger anthro, as much as it was not something that she could say aloud to any of them. If it was a dream though, surely she would have woken up by that point?

Smiling faintly with the hint of a purr that she barely even noticed, she watched Po take her critique seriously. It was good to see at least one of them take her seriously. It didn't look like Viper really needed advice from her and the fighting styles of all of them were so different that they all had their unique way of doing things. Even Monkey, being the most similar to her physically, could not emulate her strength and neither could she, no matter how hard she tried, match up to his sheer agility, how he flipped through the air as if the bounds of gravity simply did not apply to him.

It was jealousy that curled there, deep in the pit of her stomach, but it could not be helped, not truly, not in that way, pressing on, helping Po, advising him, helping him get into position. The panda was amenable to her help, which made things easier, allowing her to move his elbow, to shift his weight a little, all small adjustments that would improve his strikes. Whereas the panda had his own style of fighting too, he strangely blended all of them, perhaps from how obsessed he had been with the Furious Five before joining them, he also had his greater weight and shape to use.

“That's correct," she said, watching carefully. “And a little more…higher… Yes, yes. Like that."

Po smiled, breathless but please, and she purred, ears twitching to catch the sound. The others, however, were less impressed, even though they could have just gotten on with their training in the interim.

“Why so serious, kitty cat?" Monkey laughed, doing a flip, balancing on one hand with every other limb in the air. “Maybe you should be our next master? Or would that role go straight to the Dragon Warrior when…well…you know…"

Viper sighed and pressed her tail to the space between her eyes, shaking her head.

“Honestly, Monkey, why do you aggravate her so?" She hissed, though it was difficult for Viper to be at all threatening in any situation other than the heat of battle – and, by then, her opponent was most usually disabled anyway. “You know she doesn't like to be called, uh…that."

Tigress growled, lips flickering, though it was the only outward expression she gave of her composure slipping.

“A slip of the tongue is one thing, Monkey, but if I hear that from your lips one more time you'll be dangling from these rafters with your tail in a knot."

Monkey grinned, dancing out of reach, perhaps knowing, even then, that she could not catch him.

“Ah, you don't have to be like that, pussycat," he teased, always the light-hearted one. “Lighten up a little! You don't have to be so serious, there's no threat here. We're just keeping our hand in, improving, you know that."

She did know that, but showing her teeth was instinctive, before turning her back. There was no sense in letting him rile her up, not as she focused on the task of the morning.

Training. That was what took up so much of their time, though she felt their eyes on her. She didn't know her usual routine even if her body knew what moves to make, relying entirely on muscle memory and what her body simply had in the memory of it.

A punch to a block, a flip through the air. The weight of gravity bore her down, but understanding her new body with increasing confidence, Tigress fought back against it. She darted through the pillars of a thousand knives, which jutted out in all directions, testing her speed, her flexibility, her agility. Even though they were blunted, she most certainly did not want to hit one.

Pausing at the end of it, her fur ruffled where some of the obstacles had caught her, she smoothed down her fur, some part of her hoping that no one had noticed. Tigress grimaced, even as she tried to push her own thoughts from her head. It didn't make sense that she thought with words, in Tigress' voice – as John, she had not even thought with words, not one of the kinds of people whose mind worked that way. She saw more with images and pictures, abstract thoughts without the concrete nature of words. To have a different way of thinking suddenly thrust upon her was disconcerting, setting her on the back foot.

And it was annoying to have that tiger's voice in her head, even if she was that tiger too… Tigress sighed. It was not easy, not easy in the slightest. Would the dream end when she went to sleep, at least? If there was a lesson to be learned, she didn't think there was one there for her to find.

“Wow, Tigress – you've really toned up!" Mantis said, hopping up on a box as he complimented her, though the large bug was already sizing up his next training routine, more focused than, sometimes, the others gave him credit for. “Your shoulders will be as big as Tai-Lung soon!"

Tigress baulked, whiskers twitching, visibly taking a step back. Ugh! Why did that bother her so much? To have them looking at her, commenting on her body, as if it was something that needed any kind of discussion…

She tried to ignore it, but Monkey and Crane were there too, the former of which probably wanted to make amends for the way he had behaved earlier, though she didn't have to accept it.

“Yeah, and your abs!" Monkey did a pose, giving her what Tigress could only read as an encouraging smile. “You're super muscly now – nice going!"

It was meant to be a compliment, but it didn't feel like a compliment to her, even though a part of her did like her body, did like how she'd changed. Yet the comment about Tai Lung… Ugh. She shuddered visibly and threw them a disgusted look.

“It is strange that you have the boldness in you to speak his name," she said, chin tilted defiantly high. “Do you not remember how easily we were defeated before? Muscles to not render victory."

And neither did training, even if that was what she threw herself into. Scoffing, Monkey rolled his eyes, Crane fluttering up out of the way.

“We're only trying to say something nice to you, Tigress, sheesh," Monkey chattered, rolling his eyes. “Come on, Crane – don't you think she looks good? I mean, you'll never get, like, super thick legs but Tigress' are on a whole other level!"

Looking at his skinny legs, Crane rolled his eyes and sighed.

“You're making trouble for yourself now. Tigress, you look good, but I'm going to get these idiots out of your hair now."

He shuffled the troublemakers away, even though Mantis truly did not mean any harm. Tigress knew that and, still, the flicker of a growl rumbled behind her teeth, her throat vibrating. A purr would have been softer, more pleasing to her ear, but she was no more in control of that part of herself as she honestly could have been. It came naturally, showing pleasure, a small slip in her serious façade that was not entirely true.

“Is there anything else you can comment on?" She hissed after them, though her voice was too long for the guys to catch, Po wrapped up in his training, not noticing what had gone on. “There is more to me than being a cat or looking good!"

“Are you okay, Tigress?" Viper said gently, resting the tip of her tail on the tiger's shoulder, as a hand might soothe. “They don't mean ill, you know. But I know they can be…" Viper winced. “…A bit much. That might be a good way to put it."

Tigress sighed, though felt a little more comfortable with Viper than she did the others. Maybe it was because she was the only one, bar Po who had been concerned with Kung-Fu, who hadn't said anything about her figure or about her being a feline.

“That's one way to put it," she practically snarled. “They don't know what they are saying…"

She didn't know what she was saying either, wanting to stalk and pace back and forth. Still, there was that voice in her head, not Tigress' head, John's head – she still couldn't forget who she was!

“You're simply not…" Viper cast about for the right words once again, taking her time, ever the diplomat. “Quite yourself today. You don't usually mind their jokes. You don't usually act like you heard them either, to be fair, but…is everything quite okay?"

Tigress shook her head. She couldn't be John, not right then. She had to be Tigress. For at least one of them had realised that she was different that day, that there was something there. So, it was in her own mind that Tigress' voice would have to live, guiding her in the right thing to do and to say.

“Everything is fine, Viper," she said shortly. “But I would appreciate it if the…loons took a break from rendering my life a difficulty rather than a pleasure."

There… That sounded natural. Like Tigress. Kind of. She still did not know how far into “being Tigress" she had managed to push into, but she knew that she had to keep pressing on, had to keep trying, had to keep doing, one way or the other. She growled, ears twisting to catch words more clearly, tail lashing back and forth like the cat they called her.

“Cats are meant to be feisty, I dunno," Mantis shrugged, though Tigress would not have heard him from such a distance if Monkey had not been darting about, his short, quick movements drawing her attention. “She should take it as a compliment. Isn't that all the new hit words of the day and all? What's new pussycat?"

Crane sighed, Tigress' frown deepening where the guys could not see. Viper groaned and shook her head.

“Yes," Crane said, evidently losing his patience. “But she doesn't want you to talk like that to her. If she wanted it, she wouldn't have ignored it for so long. You know that's what she's like. You don't like people saying how small you are, do you, Mantis?"

Mantis scowled and Tigress suppressed a smirk. It was good to have someone on her side to at least put one of the others in their place. But it was not easy, not even as Monkey muttered something and Viper drew her attention back, light and delicate, betraying the power of the serpent behind her soft features.

“Let us eat," she suggested, eyes bright. “I'm sure they will follow in their own time."

Nodding, Tigress knew it was all she could do, going along with it, the normal day of “Tigress". Leaning into “Tigress", all that came naturally in her new form, even that accursed voice, was the best way forward for her, the tiger's mind made up, at least for the moment. With an encouraging smile from Viper, they headed off to break their fast, Tigress trying to not remember the man, to play up the ruse, to be the Tigress that she hated so much.

It was all she could rely on to get her through the day.

*

Back in her room, Tigress finally sagged, the façade dropping. She'd never thought it would be that hard to mask, to pretend to be someone else, even if some things had come to her as if instinctually, the way to walk growing easier and easier while words slipped from her lips as if someone else had planted them there.

She didn't know what was happening, though she'd managed to keep up the ruse that she was Tigress, the normal Tigress, even if she very much was not. She reeled from the day, the training, the dinner, though…it had been good, in a way, to work out. She'd never been able to do that as John, though everything that was said was so not her, all scrappy conversation, things that sounded right coming from Tigress' lips but did not endear the man trapped inside her body, John, to the tiger one little bit. She wasn't so sure that anything, ultimately, would ever make her feel kindlier towards Tigress, not even when that was who she was.

She shook her head, setting herself down, though she had not asked anyone where they were to go to shower and wash their clothes. They'd had a shower after training, but, well, she could have done with another. She wasn't used to a female body and the hygiene required, though it felt as if she should remove her clothes for the evening.

Laying back on her sleeping mat, which was rather comfortable, despite being a little on the thin side, she lifted her hips to slide down her light undergarments and the trousers, peeling them away from the muscle where they were drawn taut around the base of the leg, cut off high enough so that they did not flap around her feet. It was a nice design, though she tried not to look too much at herself, at her new, female body, not as she took off her top too, wriggling out of it awkwardly to get it off over her head. That had been hard to get back on after showering too, though she had, at least, been glad of the privacy. Viper, thankfully, had not joined her, as she had wondered if there would be another ruse of pretence to keep up while she wanted to make sure her body was hidden.

Tigress sighed, shaking her head. How was she supposed to get out of anything?

“I can't just tell them who I am…"

She spoke quietly, so that only she heard her own conversation, though there was no one that Tigress could talk to either. There was too much going on, everything at once, the weight of it pressing down on her shoulders.

Lying back, nude, she had no choice but to pay attention to her body – and not only in the way that it moved and flexed in exercise and kung fu. She arched her back, wiggling her tail as she worked out a kink at the base of her spine, her thick thighs spreading, though there was not an ounce of spare fat on her.

“Not even all that feminine…"

She muttered to herself, even as she spread her thighs with her own hands, sliding them down and brushing the edges of her sex, though she tried to tell herself that she was massaging away the soreness from the day. It didn't even feel like she had trained that hard, as if she had exerted herself all that much, and she caught herself promising, even if only to herself, that she would train harder the coming day.

Her female sex was too much, so her hands wandered higher, for the first time sweeping over her chest, what she had done her best to avoid during that swift shower earlier. She had, to be fair, been more concerned with ensuring she had privacy in that strange little outdoor cubicle, the shower fed with a series of chutes and limited water stored in a wooden tank. It was fresh and clean, however, and had done the trick, though she had noticed how her nipples perked through her fur in the cool, fresh air.

They were perky again then, even as she twisted her lips, not wanting to pay too much attention to herself, but she couldn't drag her mind away. Her body was there and maybe, just maybe, she could do something about her crazy situation if she explored herself more…maybe. Of course, that was rather a stretch, but a worried mind would cling to anything it could in a situation like that, so she allowed it.

It was not as if it was all that bad to rub and caress her breasts, after all, gently and soothingly manipulating the soft flesh, digging her fingers in, testing what felt good. Some pressure was too much, bringing discomfort rather than a lighter pleasure, but it was best when she accidentally brushed against a nipple.

Oh.

_ _

That was interesting, very interesting, an electric tingle zapping through her as if she had been shocked by lightning made safe, her fur standing on end around the back of her neck and shoulders. She wriggled in place, trying to ignore the heat in her cheeks, though it was wrong that it was on her body. Having a pair of lovely breasts in her hands was not a bad thing, but she would have wanted them to be on the body of a partner, a girlfriend or whatever, not on herself.

She was a guy…wasn't she?

Yes, definitely. Definitely a guy, but she could not deny the female form she had then, fingers playing with her nipples, curious about the sensations. Yet she did not linger too long, some sordid part of her wondering how the space “between her legs" would feel if just those light touches felt good. She grunted as her fingers brushed her folds, torn between repulsion and arousal, for even that soft, tentative brush had her trying to whimper and push her own pussy into her hand.

“So weird…"

Her body had never responded like that even when she'd been a guy, yet that male body seemed further and further from her as she shuddered. It was so weird, so freaky, even though she had been with women before, there was something horrifically and grossly different about her own body being female. That was not her, not for her, and yet it was what her life had turned out to as her fingers, cautiously, stroked the folds of her sex.

Instinct led her on as she explored her body, clamping her jaws against a strange little mewl, her tail lashing back and forth as she rolled onto her side, knees spread so that one knee pointed towards the ceiling. It was an easy position to maintain with her flexibility and musculature, though she admired more the fact that she was able to do it rather than the fact that it was her body. Maybe Tigress wasn't that bad if she could look as sexy as that, but what she was doing at that time was hardly something that could ever have been included in the movies…

She swallowed hard, licking her lips, heart racing. Her pulse was so high, more so than even when she'd been training and lying her way through the day, but she couldn't stop. There was too much curiosity there, though maybe a part of it was her mind refusing to accept what had happened, pushing through at all costs.

She didn't know, couldn't know, but it didn't matter, in a way, either. Not really, not for her, not as she grunted and panted, breath hitching in her chest, her lungs tight. It was there, yes, arousal, but not the same as she had had as a man. Her fingers traced the line of her sex, folds softly parting under the pressure of her finger, hardly even feeling as if she was present in her own body.

Yet it was a part of her that she had not explored yet, making a face as her finger pushed into her, though that was partly to cover up a moan of arousal. Oh god, that felt good, even more so with how firm her body was, hips rising as she rolled back over onto her back, arching up from the sleeping mat as if it was the most natural thing in the world for her to do.

If she didn't think about what she was doing and only considered the muscle of her body, how she flexed and rolled her hips so easily, maybe that would be better for her. Maybe she didn't have to think too deeply about everything, only how fit she was, the excellent level of strength in her body, how she could flip back and forth without a second thought. She'd never had the luxury of so much muscle, as she'd never tried to gain it as a man, and she growled as her fingers pushed deeper, exploring her passage.

Yes… Maybe that was something that she could focus on. For Tigress clearly had put in an awful lot of work on her physical fitness and her body, something that she, as John, had not thought about before. But that had been back when she had thought that Tigress was nothing more than a character on a screen and someone that she would have much rather have seen the back of, at the very least.

Yet she could not linger on her shape and her form for too long, not as arousal took over. She clamped her jaws shut to hold it in the best she could, trembling in place, panting through her nostrils, though the heaving of her chest worried her a little. She couldn't remember a time when she had been at all close to being that turned on, her entire body prickling and tingling as if she was being licked by tiny tongues of fear.

It was surreal… It was a female body, but not hers. And it was hers? Best not to think about that. If she didn't think about what she was doing too deeply, she could work her fingers back and forth, exploring, trying to feel, if only in a small way, what felt good to her. There was almost no sense at all, to her, in being stuck in another body if she couldn't find something in it to make herself feel good, whimpering, holding back her moans. The walls there, after all, were thin.

She wondered if the real Tigress had ever explored herself like that, or if she was too prudish. Without facing the real Tigress, wherever she was, if she was even still in that world, there was no way for her to tell.

She grunted, twisting and lightly curling her fingers within her sex, though she didn't want to be too crude. Yet what she wanted and what she did in reality did not quite line up, not as heat flooded her body, the slickness around her fingers growing in time with her arousal. She had to have more, greedy for it, the growing buzz of pleasure. Just stroking her inner walls had her wanting to grunt and buck and thrust her hips wildly, yet Tigress managed to claim some semblance of control for herself. She wasn't sure how long that would last though, especially as her thumb brushed her clit.

And that was the turning point. From there, she could not go back, one hand up on her chest, squeezing and massaging a breast, tweaking a nipple, the other delving a finger deep into her pussy. As she worked her hand back and forth, however, Tigress made quite sure to rub over her clit, the nub of flesh that she had never paid much attention to, not with partners. Truthfully, she had not known what to do, even if she knew it was pleasurable, but everything was so much clearer when she could feel it all for herself, getting instant feedback from the stimulation as she ground her teeth, tail lashing.

Oh, god…

_ _

She wanted to moan, wanted to cry out, yet she had to keep every last little sound locked away within her. What if she alerted one of the Furious Five to her predicament? Though it was not much of a predicament, self-exploration had, far too easily, turned into ardent masturbation, even if it was not something that she could easily explain away if someone walked in on her.

But she would have to deal with it, because she was too much into it to turn back, moaning lightly, faintly, holding everything inside her quaking body that she could. A second finger joined the first inside her, not really knowing what she was doing but going along with what felt good at any given time. That was what it was all about, after all, the pleasure of experimentation, how flowing from one thing to the next could feel good, so very good.

And it took her mind away from everything else too, the predicament of how she had come to be trapped in another's body, swallowing her urges, hating everything and yet finding pleasure in it too. It felt like all that could be done, though she had never been one to make well-thought-out, calculated decisions, fingers working deeper as she rubbed against her clit with every thrust.

“Unff… Oh…no…yes…"

She didn't want to push too far, but it felt like she didn't have a choice in the matter, something that she could not put a name too building to a throbbing, driving crescendo in the pit of her stomach. She didn't even feel like she was in control of her own body anymore, fingers pushing and twisting, curling up deep inside her as her stomach leapt and her lips parted in the breathiest of moans. Tigress clenched her jaw, tail lashing, hips pushing, grinding, her body, somehow, knowing exactly what it needed to do.

Maybe it would be okay if she didn't think about the fact that her body, at that time, was female. But Tigress couldn't stop, not when all her energy was taken up by masturbating, fingers grinding deep, seeking out something inside her, although she was not entirely sure what that was. Sometimes she hit a spot inside her pussy that made her legs quake, but there was only so much she could know and do with a body that was entirely new for her, sweating lightly, the pads of her paws damp with perspiration. Heat, after all, had to escape her body one way or the other.

But she had to be quiet, regardless of what she was doing. Biting her lower lip, she sealed away a groan as she explored between her thighs, fingers pointing out, where they were not delving into her sex, stroking her inner thighs, the soft fur there covering hard muscle. She was so fit, deliciously so, and she tried to imagine that she was doing everything in the moment to another – maybe to a nicer tigress than Tigress was. For she still didn't like the tiger that she had become, even if it had to be a form of revenge or retribution.

She didn't have time to think about that, not as the cords of tension strung taut inside her, hips pumping and working up against her hand even more fervently. She needed it, something, even though she could not yet put a name to it, slick juices moistening her fingers, the fur there damp and slick down to her flesh. Her claws were kept carefully retracted, though she would barely have halted even if she had accidentally caught herself, not even as her body brimmed over with heat, curling and twisting in the pit of her belly.

Finally, her body could hold on for not a single second longer, moaning behind the bite of her teeth, drawing a bead of blood from her lip that trickled back into her mouth. Grunting thickly, she squeezed her breast, losing herself, coming apart at the seams as what could only be described as an orgasm took her. and yet it was not like any climax that Tigress had experienced as John, pulsing and pushing, feeling as if she had been tipped over an edge of pleasure that seemed to have no end at all in sight.

Yet that was not something, for once, that she at all had to worry about, riding out the waves of pleasure, clumsily fumbling, for she was not in tune with her new body yet. But that would come to Tigress, all in good time, all as John lived out their real life as Tigress, facing the ways of kung-fu and becoming so much more than he or she ever could have been as a human being. There was no thought about the transformation, however it had happened, being against his will as she mewled faintly, plaintively, rubbing over her clit through the pulses and waves, trying, unconsciously, to draw out the warm thrums of heat more and more, as much as she possibly could.

It was all she could do, even as the waves of climax softened, allowing her to, finally, ease back down to the sleeping mat, her legs trembling worse than they had after training, grunting, whimpering, though satisfied. At least for the time being – and that would have to be enough for Tigress. She had already pushed the limits of her new body and her privacy more than enough already, tough had a better understanding of the form she was in.

Perhaps, this is not so bad… She thought faintly, tail lashing back and forth under her as, to her surprise, a throaty purr built and rumbled. This life is different, but it is mine.

_ _

She didn't notice, not that time, that she even thought in Tigress' voice, losing more and more of John by the moment, as if he had been the fictional character and not her. But who was to say, anymore, exactly where the lines between fact and fiction or even fantasy lay? They were all arbitrary, dependent on an individual's understanding of the world, Tigress purring and purring and purring as she laid there, her tail slowly still.

Sleep was to come, slowly teasing her down and down and down, hands gently sliding from her bare breasts, though they hung on there for as long as possible, as if they didn't want to leave the touch of her own body. But that was okay, as it would still be there in the morning and Tigress had no reason at all to believe that it was going to end, not thinking, only resting. It was something that neither Tigress nor John had ever done all that much of, always busy in mind or body, though that was something that could change for both.

She sighed, her tail stilling at long last, relaxing where she was. Sleep drew her under, blissful, sweet. But only time would tell what the morning itself was to bring, her chest rising and falling gently, a hand stretched out to the side of her, having fallen there quite naturally.

In a tiger's transformation, the world was open for her to make it her own…