Empathy

Empathy

"Hello, and Welcome to the Cat Girl Maids Fellowship or The Sisterhood as some of the sensationalists like to call us. My name is Éponine and it's wonderful to finally meet you.

Okay, I guess Cat GIRL Maid Fellowship and 'Sisterhood' ARE just catchy names. We do have cat boys in our group too dear Aliza. We didn't at first, but then they started popping up when our social group hit the three digit mark last year.

Why did cat-boys show up then? Anna, and Julie supposed it was due to if accidents happen, and they do, we'd need to reproduce somehow and the 'curse' of Xanadu had to accommodate that.

Nope, those -aren't- the names of any anime character cat girls and they aren't Japanese, that's one of the stereotypes that the media stapled us with after the Fem-Trooper was finally contained and controlled and they needed a new 'evil cult' born from Xanadu to fill the niche in the sensationalist reports... you think after Xanadu sensationalizing anything would be pointless.

Yes yes! I know! The 'maid' thing can be considered just a name too! We were trying to be cool! Merle thought I'd be best to do the PR with possible members Aliza because I'm not all that threatening, can be taken seriously, and am I look the part of our name. Yes Merle is the name of an anime cat girl and that's her, ever seen Escaflowne? No? Too bad, good show!

Yes, some of us are nudists, and not just the ones who have fur covering their entire bodies. There are also 'Felicia' types who wear clothes, and 'Kemonomimi' type who go around naked. And there are 'full-anthros' who go around in just a thinly disguised bikini just because they can. ... Yes, those cat boys I mentioned? Some do it too Eliza...

Why do I keep calling you by your first name? If you read our website before coming here instead of coming here on a dare from your friends or looking for the latest hottest scoop... yes we did have a nice interview by the Newshound Brothers from TOONTV... don't ask me why toons aren't considered a threat to the continued existence of humanity while we are... okay, maybe the all powerful Disney and Warner Brothers has something to do with it...

Oh right! Sorry! As for why I'm so personal Eliza, like it says on our website's front page, the fact is: I already think of you as family. You can stop looking, you don't have ears or a tail yet. Yes, we -could- do it that way but look at what that got zombies, vampires, and werewolves. We'd rather NOT be marked as some infectious plague.

Yes, that's the -big- question. -Why- do I think of you as family Eliza? Like a sister? Someone I've loved from the day you were born? Yes, it IS scary, but please let say my case on behalf of the rest of my family. No, the door isn't locked, but I do hope you'll have an open mind and let me have my say.

You will? Thank you. Anna and Julie themselves, they're our resident science nerds by the way, did some theories and research, and it all came back to our founding member Neko, no, heheheh, she didn't have much imagination in that department! Her original's costume was a stereotypical Japanese School Girl outfit, pink hair, pink ears and tail, widdle fangs, and yes, even colored bright blue contacts. Neko put a fair amount of effort into herself actually, okay, maybe not, but the costume was decent, and she really knew how to play her part! She was supposed to be a Mary Sue like magical princess but she hadn't gotten that far in the design when the Event happened.

I was about to get to that. What does this have to do with me thinking of you like family Eliza? I'll give it to you straight. It's not just you. It's your parents, your classmates, your co-workers, people you hit bumper to bumper with on the way to work? I love them too.

You see, Neko, being more than a little on the idealistic side and not being what many would call 'realistic' had one detail of her character down pat, and played it fully. That detail was taken by the change at Xanadu and run to it's logical conclusion. Yes I'm building dramatic tension, sorry Eliza. That detail was that, 'Neko loves everybody!'

You see... there is a limit to how many people a human being can empathize with before they break them down into bite sized categories for their brains to process. Supposedly it's around a hundred a fifty, but I don't know weather to believe that or not. Neko? And all of us? We don't HAVE that limit! And it goes beyond that too! I could tell you the name and description every member of my family here, and the family I was born into into perfect detail. I don't mean just my parents, I mean my aunts, uncles, grand-parents, great-grandparents, cousins, second cousins, third cousins, nieces, nephews, and on and on.

You remember the Tsunami that struck India? The one the super heroes were all on in seconds? The people who died? I could tell you names of each and every one of them! And the names of all their families too! I-I'm sorry it's...just I... sorry. I don't like thinking about their deaths. It doesn't matter if they were cat girls or not, they were family too.

Huh? Oh right. Neko. After the change hit, she suffered the hardest deconstruction of a fantasy motif ever... She took one look at all the panicking people around her, and with no ESP, she was thunderstruck when she realized she could comprehend the point of view, and the position, and the the starring role: their -lives- of every single one of them as they panicked. Some born to the world that very instant and confused and scared, others now in bodies not their own and panicking and terrified, others now slaves to base instincts like Davis Daleson. Whose that? He was a zombie that was had to be put down during the event... Did you just think about his family? His little brother who was supposed to go with them as Dracula but was grounded for putting glue on his teacher's glasses? I did.

Overwhelming? For Neko? That's putting it mildly. No, that's downplaying it to absurd levels. And that comprehension was growing as she stared. She fell to her knees, held her head and -screamed-. Anne and Julie aren't sure if Neko's immortal or weather Magical Girl protagonists just don't die in situations like that. But she somehow avoided being trampled by the on coming stampede.

Yes, we have very good relationships with the Crystal Tokyo Party, and ... as the media dubbed them the 'Magical Girl Squad' ... really they're just a support group for girls who suddenly find themselves able to change into cute costumes and do magic along with a base desire to help and protect others...

Neko however as I said hadn't gotten that far in her costume's character yet. So she was an open ended book. And the variables she had inserted into herself like I said ran to their logical conclusion.

She wandered off in a daze, very confused, very scared, and without even being near a person she felt them. Finally when she reached the paramedics and the police, she fell into a coma. Anna and Julie have concluded now that her brain was still rewiring itself, fixing itself so that it could take Neko's description of herself and make it reality as ALL at Xanadu have become.

She was in that coma for months. No, we don't go through the same thing, Anna and Julie think it's due to some magical balancing force, I think it's due to us just having those willing to support all of us now.

When Neko came out of her coma, of course her family was overjoyed to have her back. While she remembered each and every one of them, again due to not having all the details of herself down when the change happened, she was calmer, peaceful, benign, kind hearted without being intrusive. I suppose you could say if her falling into a coma was a deconstruction of a Mary Sue's 'loves everybody' trait then we coming out was a reconstruction.

They did CAT scans on her, yes I heard the joke before moving on. And they saw her brain structure had completely rewired itself. They weren't sure how to even categorize it!

Even Neko isn't sure how she was able to do what came next when she finally went home with her family. Personally? I think it's due to the simple logic that 'loves is meant to be shared' and of course 'if love is forced, it isn't love.' Once at home, her family changed... her little brother become a little sister anime orange-red style cat girl in a ballerina outfit. Her parents became a pair of 'in the fur' cat girl twins with complimenting colors. And they weren't scared, they were surprised, and decidedly confused, but they weren't angry or terrified.

They almost fell into the same coma as Neko had, but I guess there being more than one of us at that point kept that from happening.

Of course they all had to get new ID. But after Xanadu that had become less of a problem. And of course they had to convince neighbors worried about very real and very dangerous werewolves and vampires that they weren't out to turn people into identical, identity-less zombie slaves.

Things went surprisingly relatively smoothly after that. There weren't any lynch mobs, and we had only about two people wanting to 'contain' Neko and her family for being 'perky versions of zombies.'

Yes we keep our individual tastes and preferences thank you very much.

And Neko and the rest of her family basically took in new members from there. How does the whole 'new membership' thing even work? You really didn't read the website or our brochure.

We're all pretty sure that the person makes the choice themselves, subconsciously. On weather or not they want to open themselves up to the rest of the world and not to be afraid to care about everyone else too. And to take 'everyone else' to it's actual conclusion and not just where it's convenient.

Yeah... it can get tiring... but that's what you have a family for, to support you when you tumble or fall, or that's what I and my family believes.

Okay, I'll admit, the whole 'turn into a new species and zap my gender' thing WOULD turn a lot of people off, and I'm guessing it likely does, but it's how Xanadu had things go, and so we have to sail the ship given us.

So Eliza let me ask: do you have to accept that the seven billion people in the world are all as much an individual person as you are? And that there is no person named 'People'? And there is no 'Them' or 'Us?' "