Limyaael

That's the kind of body-centered writing I was talking about. If you're thinking yourself into a new body, then I think you're likely to write better stories.

I've bitched at cartoons and comics that have a character with a nine foot wing span, walking around with a trench-coat but no obvious hunchback or lumps.

Ugh, yes. And then the clothes always tear so easily when they need to bust out their wings to fly away from a threat. Wouldn't they at least get tangled a bit and slowed down? There, I think stories that show transforming werewolves and the like tangled in their clothes have the advantage; I can't remember many stories of winged characters that did the same.

I'm unfamiliar with X-men, so I didn't know the Phoenix's wings were supposed to be immaterial. Now you've got me wondering how they work, too...

I can see why you have a wing fetish. This is fascinating.

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Jean Grey's 'wings' don't do anything except look pretty. The fire and stuff you see is just the, for lack of a better word, aura of the Phoenix Force (I read too many comic books...). Her flight is propelled purely by telekinesis. A better example for a winged humanoid from X-Men is Archangel, whose body is completely modified for flight. (Peak metabolism, zero-body fat, hollow bones, ect. Even his lungs are altered so they can extract oxygen from higher altitudes.)

Question about clothing, though. What would the point of having the back of a shirt or something? It'd be more economical to have a back-less shirt, especially if when you get cold you can just pull your wings in around you. It would completely bypass the hassle of getting special clothing that fit around the wings.

Anyways...

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It would depend on what the skin between and around the wings was like, I think, and how big the wings were. If it had pinfeathers, or if the wings could cover the entire span of the back, then a backless shirt that, say, tied to the hips or breasts would work. But if the wings were relatively small compared to the height of the human, or if the culture had a nudity taboo- because then the argument becomes, if you leave the back bare, why not the ass?- then the clothing would have to be more complicated.

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