When Jackie found Hannah, she was sitting on an outcropping, talking with Sam. Jackie had seen the way Hannah was looking at Sam, and then Hannah had gone off for a short talk with Laurie, a born-female vixen who provided advice and emotional support to male-to-female guests, so Jackie figured this might be a bad time to intrude and kept her distance.
I can't believe I'm doing this, she thought. This morning I was an average guy setting out on vacation, and now I'm an anthropomorphic panthergirl who's giving serious thought to having sex with a male panthermorph! She shook her head in wonder. Is this something from my new instincts? Probably not, she decided. If that were the case, she'd probably be a lot less concerned about getting pregnant. ...I guess that means I actually do like him, then. As to the pregnancy question, I guess I wouldn't be so concerned if it wouldn't screw up my life so much. I could see myself as a mother, I think...holy cow, did I just think that? But I could, I guess, except that I have no idea how we could make that economically feasible. She paused. "We?" She felt a nagging doubt. Keith didn't seem like the sort of guy looking for a one-night stand, but if she should somehow get pregnant, would he really want to stay and be a father to their children?
Seeing that Hannah and Sam had reached a lull in their conversation, she stepped forward. "Oh, hi, Jackie," Hannah greeted her. "What's up?"
"Well," she said, blushing under her fur, "it's kind of embarrassing..."
Hannah laughed. "You're among friends," she said. "Spit it out!"
"Well," Jackkie said, staring at her feet, "I'm wondering about contraception."
Sam stared, not knowing what to say. Hannah just giggled. "Is that so?" she asked. "Got your eye on anyone?"
"Kind of," Jackie said. "But I just thought it's something I ought to know, and besides, there are those male ferals, and if they were to..." She trailed off. She had been trying to steer the conversation away from her attraction to Keith, but if anything she was making things worse.
Hannah sensed she was touching on a boundary line and decided to just answer the question. "First things first," she said, "you don't need to worry about the ferals. They won't do anything if you don't want 'em to, and they're not sexually compatible with the guests, so you couldn't get pregnant anyway. Now as to guest-on-guest, there's this berry." She held one up, along with a sample of the plant it came from. "Eat a few of this each morning. They're fast-acting, too - you could eat some right now and get only a little less than the full effect." She winked. " It'll reduce your chances fairly significantly, but it's not perfect - there's still a not-insignificant chance you'll wind up with kids."
"So if it's imperative that I don't get pregnant, I'll just have to abstain completely."
Hannah nodded. "Precisely. But hey, you may want to consider whether motherhood is really all that bad." She gave a sly grin, and Jackie thanked her and left.