Open customization options? Yes | No

Mika hit yes, and was pulled into a void with a screen. She chose “Race” on the options, scrolled, and hit “Human”.

The 3D image on the screen morphed, showing what she used to be. Almost. Her eyes shimmered with color, and her waist-length hair was a bright rainbow.

As a teenager she’d looked into getting her hair dyed like that. Since her hair had originally been thick, long, and pitch black, the price had been close to a thousand dollars. She’d given it up as a hopeless dream. But with the magic of, well, magic, this dream was about to be a reality.

She couldn’t wait.

Open customization options? Yes | No

Kimi chose yes, and closed her eyes as she was pulled into the void.

They’d agreed to all be human. Just for one cycle. She’d agreed, too.

She hit race and chose human. The 3D picture on the screen lost its cat ears and tail. The red became more auburn. Her eyes turned hazel green.

Kimi looked at… herself. What she had been.

A stereotype. The short redhead with a big personality. The flirt. The firecracker.

No.

She changed her hair to be bright red with orange and blue streaks. Her eyes became crimson-tinged brown.

She liked being a catgirl. She liked having ears that could turn in any direction and a tail that helped with balance. Humans were inferior.

She had been a “wild little thing” on a leash. As a human, people had always held her back. They’d put her in a respectable college that led to a respectable job, with a respectable boyfriend who made sure she never did anything too crazy.

Kimi was never going back to that. If needed, she could look human for a cycle. But nothing could make her act like one.

Not again.

Aya opened the race option and chose human.

She frowned as her hair became shorter. The program must have realized she’d had extensions when she died. Annoying.

She switched to hair options and scrolled through the pictures. And paused. She’d had knee-length straight hair for a while now. It was time for a change.

There weren’t any good braid options, because there rarely were in programs made by white people, but there was a decent dreadlock look. She chose it, lengthened them down to her armpits, and added gold beads.

There. Something different.

Her dad would have liked this look. Her mom would naturally have preferred braids, but the gold beads would have gained approval.

Aya noticed her eyes were back to being black and changed them to gold. Not quite the yellow she’d had as a catgirl, but close.

Actually, no, they looked brown. She hit the yellow closer to green.

Well, now they looked green, not gold.

Finding the perfect color was going to take a while.

Lily frowned at her 3D image, debating.

Would anyone notice? No one would notice. A small change wouldn’t be detectable. Right?

Besides, her height and weight had been different when she was an elf than a neko, so why would it be surprising if she looked a tiny bit different as a human?

She increased her height an inch, hesitated, and increased her breast size. Just a little change. Nothing noticeable.

To distract herself from that, she went to hair options and changed the color from flat black to black with just a shade of purple. Would only be noticeable in sunlight.

She hit “Apply” before she could panic and revert any of the changes.

Nikki barely recognized the 3D image. It was of someone… lost. Someone who had been left behind long ago.

It wasn’t someone she disliked, it was just… someone else.

It wasn’t her any more. The image showed what Rachel had looked like, but Nikki was Nikki. Nikki hadn’t been Rachel since the day Mika came running into the diner on that first cycle and knocked the door off its hinges.

Not because of any fault on Rachel’s part. Rachel had been a happy, well-liked girl with hopes and dreams that were going nowhere fast, but that was ok. Life didn’t have to be exciting for Rachel.

Nikki was just… different. It would feel weird to go back to light brown hair and blue eyes. It would feel off to have freckles instead of whiskers.

Well, the group was going to be human for a cycle. But no one said they all had to look like normal humans.

Nikki changed the hair to forest green and the eyes to lime green. Freckles could stay, but they became rainbow colored. Instead of looking like freckles, it looked like a bag of sprinkles had exploded onto her face.

Perfect.

Nikki grinned and hit “Apply”.

Via hadn’t paid much attention to the customization options before. She’d just agreed to whatever it told her, trying to get to her friends faster.

But she could change everything.

She swiped her finger across the color panel, watching her hair go from red-orange through the rainbow to red-pink. Up to black and down to white.

For some reason she couldn’t explain, she liked white hair. It was… dignified. Or something. She brought it up to be grey, then pushed it back down. She’d have white hair.

Deciding what color eyes to have was harder. In life she’d had solid dark brown eyes, but she didn’t want that. Silver eyes were cool, but with white hair she wanted brightly-colored eyes.

Green or blue? After debating for a while, she remembered Y. He had one blue eye and one black eye. It made him look kinda insane though, and she didn’t want that. But if she went with blue and green, that wouldn’t look too odd.

She tried it. It looked great.

Next she made her skin a shade darker. That made her eyes and hair stand out more. Very elegant.

She fiddled with the height and weight numbers, but ended up bringing them back to what they’d been originally. The breast cup size toggle alarmed her, so she left it alone.

That just left the last option. It also alarmed her, but curiosity overrode that. She switched the image from “Female” to “Male”.

The 3D image changed slightly, but not as much as she’d thought it would. The face structure was slightly different, but it was still recognizably her.

Other things… were also different. But a lot was the same.

Interesting.

Via reached for the toggle, stopped, and drew her hand back.

She liked being a catgirl. She liked being a girl. She’d never really thought about not being a girl, because wishing to be something she wasn’t was a waste of time. …She’d tried.

But if she could be anything, and the point of being human was that this was a starting point to finding out which race was the “best”, then why not try being a guy? She knew what being a human female was like; she’d been one for two decades. But she didn’t know what being a human male was like.

If the point of being human was to begin experimentation, then she should experiment.

Her hand went to the “Apply” button, and again she paused.

What would the others think? She was a part of the group because she was a catgirl. Would they kick her out if she… wasn’t?

Via shook her head. She probably wasn’t the only one to think of this, honestly. After all, why would everyone be what they’d been before? That wasn’t very experiment-y. And it was just for one cycle. Next cycle, she’d be a female… otterkin? Or had they decided on elf for next cycle?

Didn’t matter.

Shrugging, she hit “Apply”.