At long last, it was finally done.

     Standing in front you lies a three-meter tall metallic ring. You head to the panel to its side and press the big red button right in the middle of it, which causes the ring to start humming and crackling. The lights in the garage dim, but soon after the inside of the ring fills with a pulsating pink-and-purple light. You wipe the sweat from your forehead before taking a blue stress ball. You throw it in and the light waves as it absorbs the foreign object. You rush to the panel and take a look at the screen, and you smile. It took longer than expected, what with you only being able to work on it during your free time, but at long last, the multiverse portal was done!

     If only passion projects were not so frowned upon nowadays, that way you could have worked on it at the lab (instead of stealing equipment every once in a while), though to be honest, maybe it was better this way. You shuddered at the thought of what would have happened if someone from the government or the defense industry had found out about your little pet project, but now, only you and you alone knew about it. Which meant…

     You type in the coordinates, and the portal starts humming again. While it recalibrates, you head all the way around back home (whatever made you think that it was a good idea to build the damned thing just in front of the kitchen door?) and grab a drone and a few sensors. Temperature. Humidity. Radioactivity…

     You head back to the garage. It appears that the portal is done, so you fly the drone in and take a look at the readings. So far, everything seems… normal. You try looking at the camera, but the quality is too bad to be able to distinguish anything, though at least your drone seems to be able to land, so that’s one less worry. Still, there’s a nagging feeling at the back of your head. What if you got the coordinates wrong? What if…

     No, it can’t be. You take a deep breath. There’s no way you could be wrong. You then head of to the wall of the garage and grab an hermetic suit. You put it on and approach the imposing ring before putting in an arm, soon followed by the rest of you.

     Finally, a new world.

     A world where a different species might have risen to be dominant.

     A world where, maybe, at long last, you’d finally...


     White. Except for a huge gray wall to your left, everything else seems to be white. However, as you tilt your head, you start to notice some kind of folds and shapes in all this whiteness. Guess it was not an issue with your camera after all?

     You move closer to the grey wall and notice that it seems to be levitating on what you assume to be a sort of dark void. Curious indeed. More importantly though, as you approached the wall, you started to notice more “walls” to your right, but this time they were all of different colors and shapes. You take a second look at the readings.

     It seems that you might be able to survive in this place. So, against your better judgement, you decide to take off your helmet as maybe the foggy visor might be the issue, and it was. Well, kinda. Everything starts to become clearer and take another look. You then step back.

     No, it couldn’t be—

     You crash into something and turn around to see a big spheroid object roll around for a few meters. You gulp and approach the object, poking at it this time. This all too familiar, squishy feeling… There’s no denying it. You didn’t go to a different universe, you just shrunk!

     You step away from the now twice-your-size stress ball and towards the refrigerator, taking a few deep breaths.

     In.

     Out.

     In…

     How could you have gotten the coordinates so wrong!?

     You start to walk towards the living the room. The couches. The TV. That cheap coffee table. To the right, just as usual, you can see a pair old, raggedy sandals right next to the door to the back yard. Were you still at your house?

     You take another breath.

     Okay, it might not be that bad. A lot of people dreamt with this kind of scenarios (you included), so it was not a total loss. Still, you were hoping to finally meet—

     A loud clicking sound echoes through the room and you instantly run under the coffee table. You peek from behind one of the legs towards the garage door and your eyes go wide as a massive anthropomorphic lion in a business suit steps through.

     “Ugh, day’s finally over…” the lion says to the small company of one he didn’t know he had around. You watch as the lion quickly takes off his shoes and carelessly ditches them at the entrance before he moves to the fridge.

     You can barely contain yourself. Your plan did work after all! You finally reached a world where furries were real, though you did not expect it to happen like this. Were they always this big or had the portal malfunctioned? Maybe you should have tested it a few more times before using it yourself…

     A loud beep snaps you out of your thoughts and you look back at the lion, who puts down the stress ball on the kitchen counter before taking out his meal from the microwave. You hide again as the lion slowly approaches your position, soon hearing the creak of the couch supporting his weight. Not that you get much chance to see it as your vision is soon obstructed by a pair of huge socked paws. So tempting and inviting. You then turn your gaze up and see the lion put the tray down… wait, see?

     That’s when it dawns on you. You didn’t have a coffee table with a glass top, the lion did! Which meant—

     “I swear, whoever thought that standing desks…” the lion looked down and met your own gaze. “What the…”

     The lion leans down, catching you with one paw before you could run away, and with one swift move, he puts you under a transparent lid, likely the one he used for his meal. He then runs over to the garage. You think of escaping, but quickly abandon the idea. The lid is just too heavy to budge for someone your size. You’re at the complete mercy of the lion, and with nothing else to do, you sit down and wait until the constant rustling coming from the garage finally stops. The lion comes back with what seemed to be a hamster cage, were there even hamsters in this world? Regular hamsters, that is.

     He grabs you again and brings you closer to his face. “Well, I don’t know what you are, but I don’t care. I might be able to sell you for some quick cash, or if not, I guess I could release you somewhere…” He starts to lower you towards the cage, and you shout. You don’t want to go. The giant stops and bring you back to his face, looking at you with mild amusement. “You can talk?”

     Not looking a gift lion in the mouth, you start to explain your situation. When you mention the portal, the lion walks with you in hand to the kitchen. He puts you on the floor and you scramble to look for the portal, but it’s all in vain. It was gone.

     You try opening a new one remotely using the interface on your watch, but all you get is a fatal error. Maybe it was the door when it opened, or maybe the impact from the steel-toed shoes when they landed on top of it, or maybe just a blackout back in your own world, but in the end, it didn’t matter.

     You were stuck in here. Alone. The only human in a macro furry world. However, the big question was, was the lion stuck with you as well?

     The giant crouches down, not that it’d make much of a difference when you’re barely as tall as his ankles. “Look, man, I’m sorry. Get in the cage. I’m sure we can find someone that could help you get back home.”

     You don’t know if you trust him. What if he handed you to the government and they experimented on you? Or what if he sold you online? If this was your world, you know that there would always be some rich person somewhere looking to get the only human in existence. Be it to make you part of their personal collection, an exotic pet, or even a once-in-a-lifetime meal… wait, that’s it! You ask the lion if maybe he could be that someone, and he quickly backs out until you say that you might be able to make it worth to him.

     “Oh?” He grinned. “Okay, tell me, why should I keep you?”

     Shoot, you didn’t think that far. You had to think fast, as this place, his place, was likely the only one where you might be able to return home. You take a quick glance to where the portal was, now just a steel-toed shoe in its place, and something crosses your mind.

     Maybe you could worship his feet?

     The lion looks at you nonplussed for a few moments before grabbing you and taking you back to the living room. He sits down and puts you back on the floor. You stare wide-eyed as he then removes one sock and props the giant paw in front of you.

     “Let’s see what you can do.” He crosses his arms and waits for you to make your move. “One chance. Don’t waste it.”

     Panicking, you rush to the giant footpaw and hug it, or at least that’s what you intended to do. Even with your arms stretched as much as you can, you can barely cover the length of the pad, let alone apply any sort of pressure. You decide instead to put all your strength in your shoulder and tackle the pad, sinking in the warm and leathery surface. Then, with your one free arm, you try to do long and firm strokes in whatever area you have available. The lion must really spend a lot of time on his feet, as those pads feel more like bricks than cushions.

     You look up to try to see if your technique is having any effect, but your vision is blocked by the lion’s plump toes, each easily wider than your head. Then, you start hearing voices coming from behind you, followed shortly after by the metallic clatter of cutlery as the lion prepares to have his TV dinner, now with free paw treatment.

     You continue like this for a while, each tackle being weaker than the previous one, when suddenly, you start feeling some resistance coming from the paw. You try to stand up to it, but in the end, the paw just crashes down, pinning you to the floor. With what little strength you have, you try to crawl your way out, but drop exhausted shortly after reaching the toes. You turn around and, from what little space you have in between the titan’s toes, you can see the lion just relaxing while watching the TV, seemingly having forgotten about you altogether.

     Still, just because he forgot, that doesn’t mean that you did, especially with everything that was at stake. You try moving your arms, but they’re held too tight underneath the paw. Squirming like would not help your situation at all. There had to be something else that you could for the giant, and you unfortunately knew what.

     You open your mouth and start lapping at the digit right next to your head, your hope being that he would be able to feel it just like you did all those dead-skin-eating fish at the zoo. You continue to lap, giving the digit the occasional kiss here and there, and then look through the toe gap again. The lion seems to have a small grin on his face, which you hope was because of you and not from whatever he was watching. You continue like this for a while until you suddenly feel the pressure keeping you down lessen, shortly before the lion applies it again but with a different paw this time.

     Guess it was time to start all over again…

     You don’t know how long you remain there, but it doesn’t matter anymore. You’re way past the point when you’re licking just to please the lion, all this exercise and the heat make you feel more and more thirsty, and all this constant licking is the only thing keeping you somewhat hydrated. In fact, you’re so parched up that you barely register when the lion finally lifts his paw or when he goes to load the dishwasher, nor do you notice when he picks you up and puts you inside the cage.

     The lion then walks to his bedroom and puts the cage on top of his dresser. He then takes the water bottle and heads to the bathroom. One flush later, he comes back and puts the bottle back in your cage, and you rush to drink as much of that sweet, sweet tap water as you can.

     “Oh, I almost forgot.”

     You turn around and see that the lion is naked except for his underwear. He then takes off his jockstrap off, and you get a small glimpse of his package before he puts it inside your cage.

     “Rest well. You’ll need all your energy for tomorrow.” The lion closes the gate and then heads off to his bed before turning off the lights.

     You take a few more sips from the bottle and head towards the jockstrap. Did he really expect you to sleep in there? Because if so… never mind, you were tired. Too tired. You make your way in and nest in the cotton cup. Everything’s damp, yet your head instinctively finds the only still-wet spot in the middle of the cup.

     A normal person would find another place. Hell, a normal person would not denigrate themselves to sleep inside a jockstrap in the first place, but you were not a normal person. You just lay there and quickly fall asleep. Completely surrounded by the lion’s scent.

     A fitting end to your first day as the lion’s pet…