The Stench of Suicide

Very slowly, he uncurled his tails. He made himself face the back of the couch so he would not be tempted to mate her anyways. He read. Then he rested. Anything to distract him from the pheromones she was putting off.

He woke to the slamming of cupboard doors. Lottatna wasn't on the beanbag anymore. Nor was she in the kitchen. Resetarits crawled off the couch and stepped towards the bathroom. Lottatna sat on the floor in front of the cupboard doors. He sat just outside the bathroom. His head tipped to the side.

"Is there something you need that I don't have?" Resetarits asked.

She shook her head.

"Are you hungry?"

Again she shook her head.

"Will you speak to me?"

Lottatna turned her head away.

"There are clean robes on the back of the door, if you'd like to get cleaned up."

Lottotna lay on the floor, her tails twisting on themselves behind her. The bathroom wasn't very warm, but if he tried to get any closer to her, she shifted further from him. Resetarits frowned. He may have very well just lost the only person he could call his friend, despite them now being the same.

Her pheromones increased despite her depression. Resetarits shifted where he sat. He was aroused by the smell and found it difficult to keep his distance. He had not smelled a woman so strongly in all the years he could mate. He counted her tails. He had counted over 30 tails when his mating tail started to warm with the smell of her and he forced himself to go back to his book.

Lottatna came out of the bathroom after he read a page. She curled up under the beanbag. He understood she was struggling with the change, but not once had she moved to leave his apartment either. He made food. He brought it over to her. He set the plate down beside the beanbag. The beanbag shifted and Lottatna's face poked out. Her hand followed and she pulled the plate underneath. He found food for himself. Then he sat by the beanbag. He ate.

He was almost done when Lottatna's plate was pushed out from under the beanbag. She had eaten it all. Resetarits hoped that was a good sign. He finished his food, aware of the slight rise and fall of the beanbag as Lottatna continued to breath. He washed the dishes and read a chapter of his book. A different smell reached his nose. Climbing off his couch once more, Resetarits approached the beanbag. He uncovered Lottatna. She hadn't made a mess, but she needed a washing.

She stirred only slightly as he carried her to the bathroom. He lay her in the tub and ran the water warm. He left it shallow as he washed her. He dried her off. He slid her arms into the sleeves of one of the robes. Then he carried her back to the beanbag. He was about to tie the robe closed when her mating tail twisted around his. He tried pulling away, but their tails had already started to sweat. The sweat stuck them together and would keep them together until the shifts Lottatna needed to experience for offspring to start growing was complete.

"What are you doing?" he asked.

Lottatna didn't respond, but pulled him into a kiss.

He kissed her deeply in response to the overwhelm he felt mating with one so strong. He straddled her legs and his fingers pressed into her abdomen. He broke away. "The first mating isn't very…."

"Shut up," she said, pulling him back into a kiss.

Their kisses continued until Lottotna broke away with a groan. Resetarits continued to kiss her. His hands slid beneath her as he shifted his kisses to her shoulders. He rested on her hips and was very conscious not to touch her abdomen. She gasped and cried as the skin in her abdomen thickened and separated to create the pouch that would house their young for the next year.

Lottatna closed her eyes and Resetarits' whiskers and lips feathered her skin hoping to distract her from her pain. She turned her head and kissed him a few times before the next layer of skin separated from her abdomen. She cried out then moaned. Her tail sweated more, enhancing the connection between them with gratitude. Resetarits never stopped caressing and kissing her despite her discomfort making it hard for her to reciprocate.

"Would you like me to explain what's…?" he asked, teasing her cheek with his nose and lips.

"No," she groaned.

She shifted beneath him. Heat started to rise in her lower abdomen. Lottatna twisted several more of her tails in Resetarits' for support. Her nipples and accompanying milk ducts were coming out of her deep abdomen and pushing into her pouch. Instead of just the two from her once Human form, Lottatna would have six nipples. Their tails pulled slightly as Resetarits got up on his hands and feet. Lottatna closed her eyes and just tried to breath. He lightly kissed along her sweaty forehead and kissed the tears that fell from her eyes. He licked her ear, the little teeth massaging the tissue and getting her to smile despite the pain she was still experiencing. He licked both of her ears then kissed her lightly a few times.

She was able to kiss him back a couple times before the last of the pain came. The layers at the top of the pouch were thinning slightly and the outer layers were being pushed away from her nipples with a little bit of fluid. The fertile liquid from their sweating tails readied the nipples for their offspring to grow from and eventually feed from. Resetarits settled back on Lottatna's hips again. She cried as he softly nuzzled his head against her shoulder with a purr.

She relaxed her tails as they kissed again.

Resetarits moved off of Lottatna's hips and grabbed the blankets. He covered them and held her. Very lightly he ran a cool hand over her feverish abdomen, making sure the layers had fully separated from her nipples. There were some places it hadn't yet. She tensed slightly as the layers separated under the movement of his hand. Then she rested her head against his shoulder and closed her eyes in sleep. Resetarits kept Lottatna in his arms while she slept. She had taken the pain of first mating in stride. But why had she mated him? Why, when she was struggling to accept she had been changed, did she complicate it with a pregnancy?

He continued to stroke her feverish abdomen. The skin cooled as he lightly caressed where the babes would grow. He was just beginning to think this her way of showing him she was coming to accept the change when a stench filled the air. His eyes filled with tears. She was…. She wanted to…. He couldn't let her…. He…. Resetarits pulled her securely against him. He would not let her commit suicide. He would do anything he had to in order to keep her alive. He could not bury another wonderful, beautiful, creature.

When she woke again, Resetarits had his head resting on her back between her shoulder blades. His hand ran up and down her arm. Lottatna took a deeper breath and shifted beneath him a little. She got up long enough to use the bathroom. When she came out she sat a few feet from the bathroom door. The smell of death came off her stronger.

"I'm sorry, Resetarits," she said.

Resetarits padded over to her and held her tightly. "Please don't kill yourself. Please don't kill our children."

"It wasn't a dream?" Her body trembled.

"No. You mated me."

Her head lowered to Resetarits' shoulder. Her arms held him tighter as she cried. She mourned. Mourned the loss of the being she once was. "I wondered why my belly hurts. Why I could no longer smell the arousing scent you put off."

Resetarits nodded.

"How many children am I carrying?" she squeaked.

"Because you've conceived in the spring, it can be anywhere from two to six."

"How soon before we know?"

"Four months. How evenly your pouch expands will tell us how many children we'll have next spring."

"A year long pregnancy?" she checked, surprised.

"Yes."

She felt a little nauseated.

"Let's get you some food," Resetarits said, pulling away slightly.

Lottatna's head hung further, but she nodded. She followed him into the kitchen where he put together some quick grits. They ate together before Lottatna returned to the beanbag. She lay on her side. Her hand ran over her abdomen. She cried. She slept. Did she remember that she had clients tomorrow? She had told him she could do her work off the body, but how was she to keep working with those she needed to touch? Resetarits opened her bag again. He pulled out her schedule and her phone.

He called her clients telling them she was going to be away from the office for a while, but she would call them back as soon as she was back. He did this for all the clients she had for the next three days. Then he checked to see if she had an emergency contact. Someone he could talk to that might know more about Lottatna. Someone who could help him know how to help her. There was a Jason listed. Resetarits called him.

"I was wondering when you were going to call me, Lottatna," Jason answered.

"This is about Lottatna," Resetarits said.

There was a pause on the other side. "Can I ask who this is?"

"My name is Resetarits. I'm…."

"Lottatna's neighbor. She speaks often of you. What's going on with Lottatna?"

"She's not what she once was. She…." Resetarits tried to blink back his tears. "She wants to commit suicide."

"I'll be right there. You're in her apartment, right?"

"Mine."

"Be there in five."

"O…."

Jason hung up before he could finish.

Resetarits hung up the phone and frowned. Who was Jason? What kind of relationship did Lottatna have with him? She had talked about work associates, but no one of significance.