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Shared Experience

by Old Pines

	A little shiver runs up your spine, triggered by the murmur of voices in the lobby. There’s not a big crowd, but the dark granite of the floor and walls picks up the voices and multiplies them into a pervasive drone. Thea and Craig, with whom you’ve been friends for years, stand at the reception counter opposite the entrance. The cheetah and greyhound kept details of tonight’s event quiet from all of you, and most of the invitees are abuzz with six months worth of accumulated speculation. The clamor is nearly overwhelming; it doesn’t help that you’ve only met about half of the crowd face-to-face. You take a deep breath and remind yourself, as you have with a few of the couple’s previous group activities, the couple only invite folks they trust. 
	The tingle over your skin fades as your fur lays flat once more, but you can still hear your pulse in your ears. Anxiety or no, you know better than to expect something tame from the couple. Your eyes return to them at the counter. Whatever they’ve got planned, it’s bound to be good. Thea’s tail tip is twitching, like a house cat watching birds through a window, and Craig is wagging at a tempo you haven’t seen since he returned to the bar after getting his now-fiancée’s phone number a few years ago. He keeps turning to glance over his shoulder at the group and flashing little grins at the cheetah.
	Collective Immersion’s logo dominates a backlit frosted glass panel suspended behind the receptionist. The tagline under the logo boasts of “Authentic shared experiences”; whatever that’s supposed to mean. Thea and Craig have been known to bring their friends to some colorful places for what they termed “sexcursions”, but this is more than a step up from the barn carpeted with beanbag chairs at a hippie commune. The bright lights and the sterile shine of the lobby’s polished stone surfaces give this place the atmosphere of a moderately successful bank. Did they bring us here to fuck, you wonder, or cosign on a loan? A bit more of the anxiety ebbs with the giggles that follow that thought. You scan the group while the cheetah and greyhound continue the check-in process. Some of the attendees are old friends, the others you only recognize from the group chats that led up to this night. 
	Nearest is a slender, golden-coated cocker spaniel, anxiously biting her lip. She’s an old work friend of Thea’s, but this is the first time you’ve been at the same event together. The longer you look at her, the less anxious her expression seems. Her eyes certainly aren’t nervous when they make contact with yours. Her nose twitches in your direction, flaring to catch your scent, and you notice her left eyebrow rise slightly. Her gaze is almost a physical thing as it slides down your body and lingers for a moment on the fabric of your skirt. The spaniel’s lips part and she starts to pant a little, eyes half-lidded.
	Blood rushes to your ears and your gaze shifts over to two stocky snow leopards—sisters who went to high school with the cheetah. It’s been about two years since the last time you were at one of these things with them. Denise gives you a double-pawed wave and a huge grin. Seeing this, Molly glances over and repeats her sister’s gesture, but she stops half-way through the wave with her ears perked and eyes locked on your chest instead of your face. When she glances back up, her paws switch from the aborted wave to a quick grasping motion in front of her breasts and she mouths “Nice!” to you with an approving nod. You mouth back a thank-you through a muzzle-wrinkling grin. She was the one who recommended the surgeon, after all. The photos you sent her after the procedure hadn’t done the final results justice; but, she seems almost as happy with them as you are. 
	The short, thickset, piebald rabbit next to the sisters is Loren. She’s Thea’s maid-of-honor and at a previous event proved that “doe wild” is far more fitting than “buck wild”. You were preoccupied with Thea at the time, but the sound of the couple’s couch breaking under Loren and Craig still echoes in your mind whenever you see her. Catching your eye, she offers her usual deceptively meek wave. You indicate the lobby and shrug your shoulders, a question in your eyes. She shakes her head—ears drooping—and shrugs back; they haven’t given her any details either.
	Past the rabbit is a wiry coyote, who arrived with a tall Australian Shepherd. The unfamiliar coyote pats the Aussie’s belly with the back of one of her paws and nods in your direction with a toothy grin. Cocking his head, the Aussie glances at you with curiosity in his mismatched eyes and his tail alternately wagging and falling still. His chocolate brown and ice blue irises consider the ceiling for a moment before you see him reply and nod with a matching grin. He’s another one that you haven’t met in person before. In the group chats, his user name is a string of emojis sandwiched between two ♂ symbols that are the colors of the trans pride flag. He’s someone Craig befriended at the gym, if memory serves. The well-toned physique beneath his blue merle coat supports that recollection. He and the coyote went to a few of the couple’s biannual “In-and-Outings”, which rarely fall on an available weekend for you.
	A few feet from the Aussie and coyote is Sam, a grey fox you and Craig have played with since kindergarten and “played with” since high school. He’s chatting with a husky, whose name starts with “M” but escapes you. The way the husky’s tail is wagging, you half expect it to fly off. He’s been to some of the tamer get-togethers—clothing-optional but no hard stuff. You can’t help but grin. If the secrecy is any indication, today will be one hell of an initiation for him.
	Two pudgy hyenas, also from Craig’s gym, bustle into the lobby from outside. They trot over to Craig and exchange hugs and apologies for running late. They’ve been in the group chat for about six months, but you’ve not been to a gathering with them either. When they step away from Craig, they make a bee-line to the coyote and the Aussie and exchange more hugs. The taller hyena kisses the coyote on the cheek and receives a playful pat on the ass from the Aussie.
	A flash of yellow in the corner of your eye draws your attention as you fidget in place. Turning, you catch your own gaze in the smooth surface of a granite-clad pillar. The jaguar girl in the reflection nervously fingers the seam on the side of her black tank top. You give your paw a little shake and take a deep breath. Exhaling slowly, you let your eyes wander down the reflection. She’s median height in the group of reflected individuals and her build is on the heavy side for her species; but, the contours of your outfit emphasize the femininity of those soft curves, which you’ve put years of work into cultivating. The effort, the injections, the humanoid breast augmentation have all been a part of the journey to the you standing in the dim reflection and toward the jaguar who waits further down the line. You meet your reflection’s eyes for a moment, dark gold with a faint ring of green around the pupil, and briefly poke the tip of your tongue out at yourself. Retracting it with a snicker, you watch some of the nervousness melt from your features.
	Standing a little taller, you straighten your shirt and smooth the blue-grey fabric of your skirt, wrinkled from the train ride. Hell, as long as they’re on they might as well be tidy. The invitation said to dress casual and expect your clothes to come off; most of the couple’s invitations do. They also include some description of the planned activities for everyone, though. Despite your nagging curiosity, you’re not particularly concerned; the cheetah and greyhound know their friends’ boundaries. Whatever the couple have planned, you’ve no doubt it’ll be a good time.
	The receptionist finishes checking the group in and waves you all through the door into the facility. The corridor that leads to the dressing cubicles foregoes the ambiance of the lobby for pale green walls and low carpet that would have been more at home in a dentist’s office. Thea jogs ahead as Craig hands back everyone’s IDs, which he collected to facilitate check-in. You find the door whose digital tag bears your name and pause as the sight lock matches your face to the check-in details. The door slides open with a soft hum, revealing a large dressing room. A shelf on one side holds a headset made to fully cover the top of one’s head and a folded jumpsuit; below are empty shelves for your belongings. There’s an interactive placard on the wall which cycles through the instructions for dressing in both text and speech, including a pointed note to remove undergarments as well. Suited and helmeted, you tap the “Finished” button on the display. The screen flashes a new message and the soft, feminine voice speaks the words aloud.
	“Please face the screen and clearly speak or sign your relief phrase.”
	“What the fuck is a relief phrase?” you wonder aloud. The chime that follows startles you.
	Your words appear next to a checkmark inside a green-bordered box as the voice responds, “You have provided—” the voice briefly switches to your own “—‘What the fuck is a relief phrase?’ as your relief phrase. Use this phrase to disconnect from the Experience if you become overwhelmed or uncomfortable.”
	It’s an unorthodox safe word, but at least it’ll be easy to remember. The door hums open and you just barely suppress a laugh as you step out to join the others in the corridor. The brushed metal of your headset is cool where it touches the bases of your ears, but the padding of the inner surface holds your body heat. Loose, grey jumpsuits swish as they flap around your bodies with every movement. The soft fabric stands your fur on end each time it brushes your nipples or crotch. The contact and the anticipation of what awaits farther down the corridor begin to stand something else on end, too.
	The party proceeds barefoot down the corridor and you fall in near the rear, positioning your paws in the pockets of the jumpsuit to hold the fabric away from your bits in the least conspicuous manner possible. You wonder aloud what the couple has in store and the husky bloke—Mike? Martin?—offers “some sort of virtual reality thing” as a guess. Thea snickers as a pair of attendants escort the group into an elliptical chamber with twelve seats arranged in a circle. 
	The slate grey, featureless walls rise to what could be a dome overhead; it’s hard to tell from the acoustics of the space. A luminous band follows the perimeter of the chamber at about a meter above eye level, saturating the room with light and doing nothing to clarify the exact dimensions of the walls and ceiling. You have to focus on the chairs to dispel a brief wave of disorientation. They each rise as an elliptical pillar of the same grey as the walls and floor. A gentle S-curve of soft, black upholstery surmounts each plinth, providing a reclined surface. The attendants wave everyone to their seats in turn. When one directs you to your seat, she asks in a low voice that you stand to the right of it and wait for everyone else to be ready. There’s a taste of metal, plastic, and disinfectant to the air in the room; though, these gradually fade into the background as the group’s scents begin to fill the enclosed space.
	Standing beside the seat in the chamber, you feel sweat collecting in the furred spaces between your toes. The scents blend together into a mélange of warmth and nervous expectation. Those who must pant to regulate temperature do so, filling the echoing room with a rhythmic huffing like the muted rush of blood through an artery. The attendants give whispered instructions to the couple and exit the room. With a hum and a soft click, the door shuts and locks. To your relief, the lights dim to half intensity and shift from the nearly migrainous blue-white to a warm amber.
	“All right, y’all,” the greyhound says. “Thanks for putting up with us keeping this a secret. We came here by ourselves a year ago and decided that we had to surprise you all with a session. I promise it’ll be worth it.” His voice is high, betraying his excitement, and it echoes in the spartan room. “Ready, Tee?”
	All eyes turn from the groom-to-be to Thea, whose inner ears are flushed crimson in the warm light. Her answering “Hell, yeah!” is distorted through the purr that has been at the edge of your consciousness since you stepped out of the dressing room. The cheetah and greyhound raise their right paws to their headsets. A tap on the smooth surface between their ears prompts pairs of lights to shine through what had seemed to be solid metal. On Craig’s headset the lights are green; Thea’s are yellow. The faint points blink asynchronously as the couple lower their arms. The panting of the canines goes quiet, as everyone’s breath halts for a moment. A ripple of low chimes sound from each of the group’s headsets, followed by a brightening of the couple’s lights. The flashing speeds up for a second, then the lights remain solid. 
	There’s a static tingle through your fur from head to tail, eliciting an involuntary squeak from your throat. Each person’s headset glows with lights matching one of the couple, mostly in line with sex. Something different about the Aussie’s headset catches your attention. Both lights are steady, but the one on his right side is yellow and the one on his left is green. Your curiosity piques and you want to know what color or colors your headset bears. The long hairs above your eyes are glowing in your peripheral vision, but you can’t quite tell the color; it could be either or both. Figuring that it should be fine to pop the device off and have a look, you try to reach for it but find that your arms won’t respond beyond a slight wiggle. A quick glance around the room reveals that everyone’s arms are in much the same position. Hell, everyone’s bodies are eerily similar positions.
	A high pitched mrrp escapes the bride-to-be and she raises her right arm over her head. Surprised murmurs fill the chamber as the right arms of everyone with yellow lights, including the Aussie, lift almost simultaneously with hers. You could swear her motion controlled that of the others. Your arm hasn’t budged: so, you guess that this rules out yellow lights on your headset. You’re standing on the greyhound’s side in the wedding anyway, so Team Green it must be. Maybe the Aussie’s lights are two-tone because he’s an usher or something? Craig lifts his left arm and the blokes’ left arms follow suit. The Aussie now has both arms up and looks thoroughly confused. 
	He’s not the only one. The hard edge of the headset presses against your ears, where they fold back against it. In a moment of frustration, you wonder whether your headset is defective. You catch Thea’s eyes and cock an eyebrow. She winks as she and Craig both raise their other arms.
	All remaining arms, including both of yours swing upward. The sensation of your limbs moving without a thought or command on your part is bizarre to say the least. The cuffs on the sleeves and legs of the jumpsuit ride up a little, ruffling the fur of your wrists and ankles backward in a way that sends a new shiver up your back. You search the chamber with wide eyes, scanning the group of comically-posed, baffled people. Your headset appears to work fine after all; but…what the hell is going on? This goes a bit beyond virtual re— 
	Startled yelps and grunts fill the room when everyone’s arms move at once, mimicking the couple as they grasp the collars and zippers of their jumpsuits. The spaniel, standing to your left, whispers a giddy “Holy shit!” that could have just as easily been from your own mouth. A soft bong from her headset draws everyone’s attention. Her lights flicker and turn blue. The spaniel’s eyes go wide and her arms droop as control is relinquished back to her. Wrinkles rise on her muzzle and she curses under her breath. 
	“You ok, Cher?” Thea asks, brow knitted with concern. 
	“Yeah,” the spaniel sighs. “Fucking—”
	She’s interrupted by the gentle, feminine voice that spoke from the panel in the changing room. “Relief phrase acknowledged. You have been disconnected from the Experience.”
	“Goddamnit,” the spaniel growls to herself. “Use ‘holy’, Cheryl; you never say that. Fuck!” She looks all around the room and says, “Never mind! It was an accident. Cancel! Rescind? Shit…resume?”
	“Are you sure you wish to resume the experience?” the voice asks.
	“Yes!”
	“Please, speak or sign your name to confirm reconnection.”
	“Cheryl Winslow.”
	“Thank you, Cheryl. Please match your posture to the other participants to facilitate reconnection.”
	The spaniel grumbles an apology to the group and reaches up to hold the collar of her jumpsuit with one paw and the zipper with her other. Her headset chimes with the connection tone from a few moments ago. Its lights flicker rapidly and switch from blue back to yellow. Thea and Craig both check in on everyone on their respective sides, making eye contact with each in turn and getting a verbal or non-verbal response. Everyone’s good. The couple face each other and grin.
	The air in the room hums with the sound of plastic zips easing down from the bases of everyone’s throats to just below their waists. Not an ear in the group is a shade lighter than burgundy at this point. Some shudder, others lick their lips, almost everyone pants lightly. There’s a burst of stronger scents as the jumpsuits flap open. The couple releases their zippers and shrug to slide the jumpsuits off of their shoulders, to the staggered accompaniment of every other member of the party. Everyone’s movements are tied to either the cheetah or the greyhound, but some move slightly faster or slower than others. Fur is laid bare all around the room as the soft cloth falls in a chorus of ruffles.
	All together, the group moves to step out of the loose ankles of their jumpsuits, some with more difficulty than others. The snow leopards, husky, fox, coyote, and Aussie all have bushier tails and the suits refuse to fall by gravity alone. Thea and Craig are forced to mime sliding the suits off of their own tails before stepping out of imaginary cuffs in an odd dance that brings laughter to the group and calms some of the remaining nerves. Freed from the jumpsuits, the group stands nude at the sides of their seats. You all mirror their motions when the couple move to sit in their places. There is a yelp followed quickly by a loud thud. When you look toward the sound and the blur that preceded it, you discover that the husky has fallen onto his ass because he had started on the left side of the seat. The outburst draws cackles from everyone including himself.
	“Participant disconnected,” announces the familiar disembodied voice.
	“Mark, goddamnit,” groans Craig, simultaneously running every guy’s right paw over their face and muzzle, except for the husky and the Aussie. Your paw follows along with the gesture, too.
	The husky laughs and apologizes. He picks up the headset that fell off in his tumble and positions himself on the seat before putting it back on. His lights are blue for a moment but return to green once he is settled. Your attention briefly wavers from his headset to the flash of bright red that protrudes just outside Mark’s sheath. Your eyes dart around the room, seeing similar reactions from all the other guy’s bodies, except the Aussie. The white fur that covers his belly and groin thins out around the swollen, glistening folds of a bright pink spade and prominent clitoris. Your ears heat up as your gaze lowers to peer at your own crotch through the cream-furred valley between your breasts. There, with its band of pale bristles pointing back toward your body, throbs your own blushing dick.
	The other girls’ bodies are no less active than yours. Pussies, tucked away or on display, add heady scents and an imagined viscosity to the already humid air. The scents mingle with the more masculine ones into a dizzying potpourri. Noses flare and tongues loll out between slack jaws. Soft growls and huffs murmur around the chamber. The others’ eyes are also roaming and a tingle of rising fur runs over your body when their gazes fall on you. The spaniel to your left and the shorter hyena both have eyes locked on your crotch. Hers are even narrower than before and the pink of her tongue traces the black curve of her lips; no stranger to barbs, her. You meet her sidelong glance and a smile plays at the corners of her panting mouth. The hyena’s gaze wanders around the hips that have softened and widened throughout the hormone therapy. Returning to the organ that strains forth from your sheath, his unblinking eyes threaten to fall to either side of his parted muzzle. You feel an involuntary tingle at the base of your shaft that runs up its length. The bristles twitch in a wave that ripples through the band from bottom to top, straining outward briefly before relaxing again. The hyena’s pupils contract within his caramel irises and his jaws clack shut as he swallows hard. A staccato laugh from the other hyena snaps him out of his trance and his stubby ears fold back, burning red even through the fur. Seeing that you’ve also noticed his stare, he looks away with a poorly suppressed a grin.
	The next phase begins with paws rising to faces around the chamber. Your eyes close and in the darkness you feel your own fingers touch your cheeks in the most alien way imaginable. They move without any conscious effort, brushing the pads of your fingers from the outside corners of your eyes down the soft fur of your jaw. The sensation is weirdly amplified. It takes a moment to realize that although you feel your fur against your pads and your pads running over your face, you also feel everyone’s pads, everyone’s fur; there’s even a ghostly tracing of the claws of those who can’t retract them. As seconds pass, the variance between everyone’s motions reduces. The soft touches separate, left paw running backward through the fur until your fingers meet your ear. Thumb and fingers slip around it and slowly roll it between them. Every head leans into the caress.
	The gasp that slips between your teeth rumbles with the purring in your throat. The breath tickles your right paw as it rustles the fur around the pads of your fingers and palm. The paw has slipped around to the front of your muzzle, bending your whiskers forward. Your eyelids flutter at the touch. Finger pads trace your lips and the crease that divides your muzzle between your mouth and nose. Your tongue and mouth are still under your own control and you can’t resist the urge to lick and nibble at the pads. The nibbling elicits squirms from a couple of the blokes. The rough barbs of your tongue on the sensitive pads drive squeals and arched backs from those who aren’t used to the feeling. Your reverie is briefly interrupted by the system’s voice softly announcing, “synchronized”.
	Separate winding courses take your paws down over your jawline and along the tense length of your neck. Out of the corner of your eye, you notice that your left paw isn’t following along with Craig’s. A look to the left confirms that it’s mimicking Thea’s, instead. It's the other way around for the Aussie, and you realize what the headset lights indicated all along. The fingers of the right paw are accompanied by the sensation of phantom claws, but the fingers of the left flex under Thea’s control. Your claws extend to carve furrows through the soft fur of your throat, following the valley between the thick muscle at the side of your neck and the ridge of your windpipe. You and the Aussie are the only ones getting both treatments. His back arches and his deep voice rolls out in a moan that mingles with a half-dozen similar sounds from around the chamber.
	Your right paw leaves the base of your neck and slowly rakes nonexistent claws down your sternum. Halfway down your chest, Craig, the bastard, deviates from the midline—which had begun to tickle in a way you hadn’t expected but had been enjoying—and both of his paws drift apart to seize the highest of his nipples. On the blokes, including the Aussie, this motion ruffles the fur over their pecs and manages to catch a couple of the canines off guard. Mark growls out a curse at the greyhound and a breathy whine escapes from the Aussie. The gesture misses your uppermost nipple, as the augmentation repositioned the top two sensitive nubs. The pinching and rolling motions of your fingers are wasted on the slope of your right breast. There is, however, a ghostly feeling of pads, fur, and claws on bare skin around contracted points that aren’t yours. It isn’t enough stimulation to coax a sound from your muzzle, but your jaws tighten and a slow whisper of breath hisses through your flared nostrils. 
	Another awkward side effect to your anatomy is that something is in the way of your arm when it resumes its downward trek. The motion of your right arm carries it over the breast, flattening it briefly. You grunt at the pressure and couple of guys notice the feeling on their arms and chests through the connection, eliciting wriggles and squeaks from them. Past the obstacle, your fingers spread and the pads run through the soft, pale fur of your torso. The touch is light as it passes over the next nipple down on that side, but another sensation draws your attention away from it.
	While the lads’ paws all follow the movements of the groom-to-be, your left paw and extended claws have plowed four parallel tracks in the thick fur of your neck and chest. The middle two furrows take turns dipping back and forth between the cream-colored fur that runs from your chin to your balls and the dusty yellow of your main coat. The tip of one finger softly traces a dark rosette on the side of your breast. Through the ensuing shiver, you remember that it isn’t you or the greyhound doing the tickling. Your eyes flick to Thea in time to catch warm, golden irises and dilated pupils between the dark lashes of her heavy eyelids. Her ears flip forward from the tense backward angle they had held and her lips pull back into a grin, bending the dark lines that run from her eyes down through her whiskers and flashing pink gums and white teeth, shot with amber sparks from the lighting in the chamber. She winks at you again and her ears return to their pitched-back angle, as she resumes her play.
	You see her movement before you notice your own. She cups her breasts in both paws. The sensation reaches your pad a moment before they make contact with your own chest. That’s Molly, the biggest of the group. The remaining contacts are a shudder of touch-echoes before and after your paw lands. The pads of your fingers are hot where they push through the fur and reach the flushed skin beneath. Your nipple finds itself between the pads of your fingers and the broader pad of your palm. The others have reached a similar position and you each quiver when Thea moves your paws such that the soft, warm fur between the pads tickles the firm nub of bare skin. Between the mixed sensations from both sides, you struggle to contain the mewls that race up your throat, but they start to escape anyway. A deep whine cuts through the general bustle of heated vocalizations. You glance cross the room and see the odd spectacle of the Aussie bloke squirming along with you and the girls, with his cupped right paw separated from his chest by a couple of inches. He is not completely without stimulus, however, as his left paw continues down his torso, pausing to tease each nipple along the way.
	With your fingers still kneading your left breast you catch sight of the Aussie’s right paw, slipping away down through the snow white fur of his belly. The right paws of the ladies are doing the same, moving faster than those of the guys but still following a similar course. Their fingers spread as they reach the dip where their legs meet their bodies, pads slowing in the valley as they trace it downward. The Aussie’s hips twist as his claws plow forward through the fine fur of his crotch. The motion stops just as the tips of his middle and third fingers graze the side of his spade. Soft panting is barely audible under the murmurs of the others. Another whine interrupts his panting and raises to a yelp. His fingers flex in concert with those under full control of the cheetah, whose claws have extended. His paw can’t replicate the motion, but he must feel the curved claws unrolling from their sheaths through the sync. Cheryl is whimpering to your left. Her blunt claws, too, draw narrow trenches through her golden brown coat, exposing the flushed pink skin beneath. You feel a bit envious as you watch the sky blue enamel on her claws rake through the auburn fur between her thigh and belly, moving slowly up toward her hip. That area is one that you always love for a partner to tease. You imagine the feeling of claw points raking the skin there and moan.
	The imagined sensation is usurped by a real one. Your body jumps slightly as your right paw reaches that area on your right side, then farther to caress the inside of your thigh. It eases back upward with claws tensed and extended—how the greyhound son of a bitch learned that trick, you can’t imagine—leaving narrow wakes in the fur where leg and pelvis meet. It’s exactly the sensation that you missed from Thea’s gesture. The muscles of your pelvis contract hard with the reflexive twisting of your hips and the tightness just behind your scrotum rolls up trough the length of your cock, coaxing a transparent drop out to roll down the shaft and drip from the short barbs that circle the organ halfway up its length. The drop falls into the fur of your belly to be joined soon by others. 
	Your left paw seizes your nipple between the pad of your thumb and the knuckle of your index finger and you suck air through your teeth. The inhalation barely pauses in your lungs before it rushes out as a low mewl to welcome the touch of your strangely unfamiliar right fingers circling the base of your scrotum. The canine guys stutter out moans though their heavy panting. Every penis in the room shines with dripping arousal and the air thickens with the scent of it. Blending with the heavy scent of the secretions flowing from the girls, it’s almost overwhelming. 
	Soft grunts and whispered oaths rustle among the men, as the index fingers of their left paws tease the openings of their sheaths, intentionally avoiding the striving organs that twitch in the air to the beating of their hearts. It feels bizarre to you, whose left paw is nowhere near the area, that you should detect the heat of a finger pad on the damp skin at the end of your own sheath and the faint tickle of fur on the prickled shaft of your dick. The way the headset is crossing sensations becomes disorienting. Where before you had a sense of inhabiting a body not yet fully yours, you now have the weird sense that you are inhabiting many bodies at once or that they are inhabiting you. As the fingers of your right paw cup and massage your balls, the sensations tangle further and you catch the echoes of swollen lips being probed and caressed by phantom fingers. 
	The feelings filter in from of a variety of vulvas; first, the puffy spades of the Aussie and the other canines, then the shallower folds of the felines and the odd arrangement of the rabbit. Her pussy is all but invisible to you, with the exception of the slick of wet, matted fur around her paw. Her mound feels bare of the soft fur that creeps nearly to the entrance of every other girl you’ve seen or felt. The sensations from her sodden fingers, hazy through the touch noise from the others, give you the impression of a vaguely Y-shaped cleft set within incredibly hot skin. The impression fades back into the general cacophony of the moment.
	You wonder, squirming madly under the assault of so many touches at once, whether the Aussie is getting all of these sensations, too. A glance down your muzzle shows him on his seat at the other side of the chamber, tongue lolling from the side of his panting mouth and wide eyes staring through the ceiling. Yeah, he must be. His right paw kneads the folds of his pussy, rolling the puffy lips under and between the pads of his fingers and spreading the glistening patina of arousal that trickles from deeper in. The dog’s left paw still teases at the air just above his chest and you see him strain against the control to close the distance. You wonder idly if that even works; but, of course it must—people must occasionally have to piss in the middle of a session and need to leave the group to visit the restroom without having to fully exit the experience. Unless…
	Heat rushes through your ears and they fold backward against the rim of the headset. The room disappears behind your eyelids, as you close them on the off chance someone looks your way and somehow guesses what you’re thinking. It’s not something you’ve ever been interested in, but the thought of losing control to that extent suddenly sends a fluttering thrill through your stomach and chest. You thank yourself internally for remembering to hit the toilet before leaving the apartment. To get the image out of your head, you open your eyes again and watch the group.
	Craig has his left paw cradling the base of his sheath and his scrotum. His fingers massage his crotch in a slow, gentle rhythm. This works on the Aussie as well as it does the other blokes, kneading the area around his spade while the right paw under Thea’s control continues teasing the puffy lips. The husky is whining with each panting exhalation. His hips reflexively buck at odd intervals and he’s dribbling like a leaky tap. Sam’s ear-tips fold where they press against the back of the reclined seat. His voice comes in broken squeals and yips and the tiny paws at the ends of his legs alternately spread and relax. The thick brush of his tail swishes over the soft material of the seat beneath and between his legs, loud among the other sounds. The hyenas’ heavily muscled chests shudder with the movements of their arms. The one that focused on you before is doing so again. His eyebrows are gathered beneath the furrows of his forehead and pitched at a sharp, pleading angle over the eyes that strain to the left and down as he watches your right paw approach the base of your dick in synchrony with the trembling fingers nearing the novel organ between his own legs.
	You feel hot skin against your pads before your paw or the hyena’s reaches their goal. The canines’ fingers have reached the knots swelling just outside their sheaths and close softly around them. As with the Aussie’s paw hovering over his chest moments ago, your fingers and those of the hyenas grasp only air. The others’ sense of touch carries through the network, causing your front teeth to press down upon the tip of your tongue. The phantom grip slides upward, following the narrowing contour of the canids’ smooth shafts until your real fingers close around your real flesh. Pads and fur of right index finger and thumb pause just above the dogs’ bulbs and just below your bristles. The other fingers knead the air around the base, to the ghostly sensation of knots being massaged and the pulse of arteries thundering beneath their collective touch. Your left paw releases your nipple and again cups your breast, its thumb circling the areola with the tip of its extended claw. You feel the right paw start to slide upward and suppress an expectant giggle.
	A few of the guys gasp at the first touch of the barbs through the connection. The grip vanishes as Craig’s paw recoils in surprise. All the partners he’s had, all the times you’ve fooled around together and he hasn’t once touched a cock with bristles. You laugh, startling the other girls. Thea and the snow leopards catch the looks on the blokes and join in on the mirth. A mischievous flash in the cheetah’s eye precedes the sudden movement of your left paw. Her eyes are on you, watching the progress of your arm as she guides all of the left paws on her side of the circle downward. Your whiskers shift with the curve of your lips: you can already guess what she’s planning. The cocker spaniel gets it, too, and her pink tongue traces her lips again. Thea, Molly, and Denise are purring loudly; the coyote and the Aussie are unaware. Your paw almost reaches your dick, but Thea stops millimeters away. The tips of the fur between your pads faintly tickle the bare, flushed skin. Her muzzle wrinkles and she snickers breathlessly. She must tease the hell out of Craig when they’re on their own and, knowing him, he probably loves it.
	You don’t. Grinning, you figure it’s as good a time as any to find out if a participant can override control without fully breaking the connection. It takes about three times the mental effort that it would in other circumstances to move your paw the rest of the way; but, it gets easier once you start. Your fingers grasp your shaft and you are rewarded by a chorus of reactions from everyone. The girls, without moving further or closing their fingers, feel the hot, slick skin and striving barbs materialize and swell within their grasp. The spaniel and the three cats let out soft, chuckling moans. Loren gasps, her wide eyes staring at your paw and what it encircles. A yip and a yelp come from the coyote and Aussie, respectively. All of the guys feel non-existent fingers on their cocks, along with the unfamiliar sensation of phantom bristles twitching, flexing and shifting in the grasp. A fresh pulse of fluid rolls from you and some of the blokes.
	Thea mutters, “Good girl,” over both a low chuckle and her steady purr. The soft rumble of her voice stokes the vibrations in your own throat, and the phrase sends a giddy thrill through your chest.
	Seizing an opportunity for some unanticipated fun, she closes her grasp around where a penis would have been on her and the other girls. Your grip tightens slightly when her position catches up with yours and she resumes control over your motions. The Aussie is panting and squirming across from you. He’s still getting all of the sensations; so, it must feel to him like someone is rubbing his own—albeit prickly—cock right now. For a split second, you’re jealous. You wish you could feel someone touching your pussy, even if it is a phantom sensation. The thought whisks away on the breeze as Thea moves everyone’s thumb upward, grazing the tips of the barbs with your pad and catching the dribble of fluid that slides down the already slippery shaft. Her thumb continues up, rubbing the slick of arousal around your tip. The guys are all squirming along with you. 
	Craig is wagging and grinning ear-to-ear. Not to be outdone, he navigates the left paws of his side of the circle, watching the unsuspecting Aussie out of one eye. You follow his gaze as best you can through the waves of touch rolling up from your crotch. The Aussie’s left paw eases beside the kneading fingers of his right paw and the pad of his index finger dips into the folds of his pussy. The girls’ breaths catch in their throats and the guys groan with the gentle pressure between their balls. Your eyebrows lower as your eyes drift upward. There is the strong, immediate feeling of a paw around your dick and a thumb rolling back and forth over the weeping tip; but, there is also the welcome sense of a warm, soft pad slowly tracing the inner folds of your pussy. A rush of buzzing static seems to wash over your head for a moment, filling your ears and tingling under the headset. As you lose track of which signals are real and which ones are mirage. You think to yourself that you might just become addicted to this.
	The cheetah and greyhound share a look and Thea nods. Something in their expressions suggests that this wasn’t quite how they had expected the event to go. Perhaps it was just supposed to be a really intense circle jerk, but it has evolved into something else entirely. Thea guides her group’s right paws to spread their lips and Craig responds by reaching down to trace two of the Aussie’s dull claws from the base of his tail, skirting the twitching skin of his ass and along the border between the dark pink inner flesh and the blushing outer skin around the rim of his spade. Every millimeter of claw path translates to your skin as an echo. It’s a practiced motion that draws a shuddering whine from the dog, whose buttons Craig is clearly familiar with pushing. Writhing in their seats, the other guys are clearly benefitting from the treatment as well. The track the Aussie’s left claws follow runs from bottom to top, barely skirting his clitoris. As they near one another at the point of his spread lips, Craig pushes them forward and straddles the swollen organ with two fingers. The fingers squeeze it and softly roll it between them. This motion also isn’t wasted on the folks with penises; their fingertips gently massage the bases of their cocks, where the throbbing roots of the organs can be felt before they vanish behind scrotums. You can see the Aussie’s small, dark entrance open and close in small spasms beyond his claws; but, the sight is slow to reach your mind through the feeling of fingers on your phantom clit and your own left paw moving in time with Thea’s, slowly rising and falling along the length of your dick.
	As the muscles of your pelvis tighten, more clear fluid rolls up and out of your shaft to further soak the already damp fur of your paw. The cheetah’s speed increases, pulling the bristles up and folding them back down with each stroke. Each new pulse of seminal fluid is caught as it escapes and spread around the tip before the next downstroke. The faint rasping sound of pads and fur passing over the bristles is muted further by the froth that begins to form between them. The Aussie’s left paw is a blur—or maybe that’s just your head—and you can’t entirely tell if it’s all the greyhound’s doing or if he’s lost control to the other dog. You don’t care. The ghostly fingers of the other girls hold themselves and you open. Wet sounds echo in the chamber as you feel the pads fluttering back and forth over your…his?…clit, now left to right, now sliding forward and back on either side and dipping furtively inside to tease the rosy flesh with claw tips, now returning to roll the firm nub between them, now squeezing.
	No, that’s not right; the squeezing is you. Thea’s fingers tighten and loosen in waves as she pumps the air, varying the pressure on the barbs and bringing together your thumb and index finger as they move over your tip. A hyena is yelping to your right; you don’t know which. Sam’s shoulders keep leaving the seat a little and falling back with soft thuds. His tail strains between his legs as if he were frightened. You see it start to twitch forward and back and you feel the hints of pressure rising at the base of someone’s cock. There is a similar sensation deep in your belly, below and behind your navel. Whose is that? Whose isn’t it? Your ears are burning, roaring with your pulse.
	Loren goes first. Her ears flip forward as she doubles up, nearly sitting upright with her chin buried in her ample dewlap. The pressure in your abdomen continues to grow at the same time that a small part of it breaks in a flood of warmth outward into your limbs. No sooner is the rabbit up, her long ears fold back, her mouth stretches in a silent cry, and she falls back against the cushion with eyes clenched and back arching. Her toes splay at the ends of her long, trembling feet and her hips writhe and thrust against her spread fingers. There isn’t time to process the sight or the sensation; the coyote follows, seconds on Loren’s heels. She rolls over, curling into a ball. Her bushy tail pulls to the side, wrapping over her hip and exposing the paw that is trapped between her quivering thighs. Her yip and cries find an echo on the other side of the circle. Mark almost bites his tongue as his chin hits his chest and thin jets of semen arc out of him. They fall on the floor over his shoulder, on his face, on his chest and belly. You feel their ghosts, hot through your fur.
	The cascade continues with the hyenas coming one right after the other. The husky’s scent is already heavy in the air and the combination with the smell of the thick stuff rolling down the hyenas’ shafts to puddle on their crotches is so strong you can taste them all now. A whine that builds to a quavering yelp beside you announces Cheryl’s climax. Her body shakes in your peripheral vision. The convulsions cause her to slip down in her seat, with her curled feet shuddering in the open air off the end. Denise is going now, too. Her squeals and snarls ring in your left ear and it involuntarily flicks against your headset with a whap. Molly pitches over her cliff in silence—as she always does—her jaw set and the tip of her heavy tail flicking between her straining ankles. You feel each of them within you: reverberating waves of heat received from the other women radiate from your center to burn through your torso and limbs alongside striving bursts from the guys and the ensuing numbness in their extremities. It’s as if you’re exploding and imploding at the same time.
	Your body tingles with fur standing on end. A squeal and another series of tense pulses and tail twitches come from the fox. It’s down to you, the Aussie, Craig, and Thea—four opposing points on the circle. You feel them building higher along with you and wonder who will be next. Biting your lip, you struggle to hold out longer than the others. It’s no use. The dam breaks in your pelvis and that familiar rush courses down through your crotch and up your shaft. Your tail tugs between your legs, curling around your left knee as rolling pulses send streaks of liquid heat onto your belly. The bristles strain outward, catching on the pads and fur of your fingers. Thea’s motion continues on your shaft, coaxing oversensitive squeaks and curses out of you as your body struggles to fire from an empty magazine. Her pace is unsteady now and through the buzzing haze that closes in around your vision you can see the gold of her irises rolling up under her eyelids. Her paw squeezes into a fist around the base of your cock and you feel the greyhound spurting. The rushing pulses of his issue clash with the fluttering ripples of the cheetah.
	Craig’s fingers lose cadence and twitch in spasms. There’s a choking sound from the Aussie and his mismatched eyes cross before they, too, disappear behind their lids. His muzzle waggles in a vague nod and the final waves break gently. Rather than the crashing, bursting, vibrant chaos of the others, his orgasm unfurls through you like sunlight breaking through clouds. The warmth of it spreads slowly out into your limbs, before reaching your head with a tingling rush that reminds you of the first sip of heated sake in winter.
	For a full fifteen minutes, you all lie panting on your seats until the canids finally finish pumping seed onto their fur. Knots shrink, erections fade, and breathing slowly steadies. Laying with your eyes closed, you hear Thea whisper, “I love y’all so much!” After a few more moments a low chime echoes in the chamber and the lights come up little by little. Opening your eyes, you see the cheetah and greyhound lowering their paws from their headsets. One last tingle passes over your skin in time with the simultaneous pings of the group’s headsets. The lights on the devices blink off and a soft voice announces the end of the session. There’s a hum on the side of the room opposite from the way you entered, as a door slides open. Craig and Thea slip unsteadily off of their seats and stoop to gather up their jumpsuits. You and the others stand on shaky legs and retrieve your suits as well. As a group you shuffle toward the door, giddy and flushed, at a loss for words beyond a few whispered interjections. On the other side of the door is a shelf for the helmets and a bin for the jumpsuits.
	Down the corridor are individual shower rooms, not terribly unlike the layout of the changing rooms before. The hyena that watched you during the session grins at you as he ducks into a stall and closes the door. You walk a little further and feel someone brush by. The cocker spaniel turns on her toes after she passes and looks up at you with an intent expression. The top of her head comes up to about the height of your muzzle and her raised eyes glint in the light of the corridor. Startling you, she runs the index and middle fingers of one paw through the soaked fur of your belly without breaking eye contact. The claws tickle a little as they graze your skin. She reaches behind her to open an empty shower stall and backs in, withdrawing from your fur. She winks at you and raises her fingers to her nose, sniffing the pads before giving them a couple of licks and disappearing behind the frosted glass door. 
	You find an empty stall and flinch when your paw pads meet the cool tile. There’s a bottle of complimentary shampoo in an alcove on the wall, nothing special but enough to do the job. The water is warm and soothing on muscles you didn’t realize were sore until they start to loosen. As you hold your head under the spray, letting rivulets wend their way between your eyes and down your muzzle to drip from your whiskers, you catch the sounds and scents of the others in their stalls. You can hear Thea and Craig together in a stall two or three doors along. Snickering to yourself, you lean back to rinse the mess out of your belly fur. The couple’s sounds grow faster and louder; Thea’s chirps echo on the tiles. 
	Bare pawsteps sound wetly along the corridor, accompanied by the soft clicking of claws. There’s a knock on the glass behind you and you turn to find two shapes. One is just shy of your height, broad and dark; the other is shorter, auburn, and sways with the wagging of their tail. You feel your ears flush, but you don’t bother to fold them back as you open the door and step aside to allow the dripping spaniel and hyena to join you.

*  *  *