oneortheother
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A belated happy new year and all that, and hope you all enjoy my latest story - it's set in the same 'verse as the my other 'Battle of' stories, though this story will probably make sense even without reading them. Sci-fi/fantasy tickle battles, feet, armpits, etc, you know the drill.
There will be a part two at some point in the near future too.
Without further ado, enjoy.
---
Battle of Lomond I - Faen
O-O-O
The war started over something small. They always started over some sort of minor triviality that ended up growing into some great conflict, as if they were unknown forces that seemed insistent on escalating things till some bloody big mess came out of it. This particularly bloody big mess takes place on the planet of Lomond, a planet that was essentially one giant forest separated by pure blue seas, and littered with precious mineral resources.
An inquisitive race like the Faen saw a planet like this like a bee saw honey, like a Boudo saw a bound pair of soles, or like a Paxim pansy saw make-up. The Faen were known as the vain, though Head Scientist Corel felt such a title failed to describe her people accurately well at all. They liked to learn, and how else do you learn but take things apart, and try to put them back together again? Was it their fault their technology was so advanced because they had put so much effort into advancing it? Hardly.
Frankly, it would be bloody nice if the Faen could just be left alone to their own research, and investigations of the planet’s mineral suppositories, but fate seemed to have other ideas, the same way in this world the invisible hands of fate always seemed to nudge in the direction of tickle-warfare.
Head Scientist Corel paced the floor of her laboratory, her hands tucked behind her back as she murmured to herself. Their planet-side sweeps of Lomond has turned up zero military installations, so they had make the mistake of assuming the planet was unclaimed, and sent a detachment of scientists and soldiers to probe the planet for useful resources. And now they were in this mess, Corel thought, as she brushed her fingers through her neatly-cut short silver hair. She adjusted her thick-rimmed spectacles as they threatened to fall off her nose like they always did.
Corel had been placed in charge of this expedition because of her technical knowledge, and she was much more scientist than military leader, yet she was expected to hold her position till reinforcements could arrive.
Hold her position? She could barely hold her hands steady. Corel lifted up her hands and looked at them – her light-purple hands with their silver nails shook like an old crone’s. Damn them, damn those plants for their meddling. Corel pulled off her white labocoat and slipped into the mecha exo-skeleton that Fae soldiers wore – their wings had long atrophied, so now they sought to augment their bodies with technology. The suit fit like a second skin, metal plates hardening around the body till it fit like a glove yet was as tough as plate armour – especially around the soles of the feet and any other ‘vulnerabilities’. Yet the armour nor the energy cannons equipped in her palms did not reassure her. So Corel did what she always did when she was nervous. She opened up her head scientist’s log at her desk, and prepared to recount all that had happened since their landing at Lemond.
“It all started a week ago…”
O-O-O
“The planet seemed an untouched paradise then… almost too good to be true, but we should have known when our advance party went missing.”
---
“I wish you would stop that,” Captain Oracle said, as she glared down at the grinning face of a younger Faen woman who had been whistling.
“Come on, Capt, where’s your sense of excitement? We’re on a new world, full of such godly creatures! Oh, brave new world, look what creatures are here!” Private Byte said, as she launched an energy blast which shook a tree violently and sent a colourful bird toppling from its branches. Byte immediately scurried over and deposited the bird into a sample collector. It had been Corel’s orders to obtain DNA samples from every new species them came across – they had been encouraged to do so without weapons, but alas, soldiers loved to shoot things, regardless of race.
Captain Oracle sighed, of the dozen that walked with her, it seemed only she cared at all about the risks that might await them in this strange, woodland planet. Half of her party were scientists, and although they wore the mecha exoskeletons that made the Faen so dangerous in combat, they still needed constant babysitting just to make sure they didn’t shoot anyone by accident.
They had been walking for half a day in this oppressive heat, and Oracle could feel her short silver-hair sticking to her neck inside her helmet. The reports had said it would be humid, but you really never knew till you were down there in the dirt just what that entailed. She had been nagging them to stay ready and keep their armour at full defensive capacity, but the mecha suits made walking cumbersome, and activating the jump jets here would just be a waste of fuel. Everyone but her had either retracted their helmets, sleeves, or even unzipped their suit along the chest to let some of the heat out.
“Can we take a break?” one of the scientists, a tall woman named Debian asked. “My feet are killing me – we’ve been walking all day.”
They had only walked for six hours, but Captain Oracle saw the wisdom in the complaint, and they sent up a quick camp by a clear running stream. Oracle watched as Debian unzipped her boots (the suit was designed so it could be detached at any main joint in order to make each individual component easier to replace) and dipped her sweaty and reddened purple feet into the running water, cooing contently as she did so. Oracle wanted to go and slap the scientist for such disregard for battle policy, but she knew scolding the scientist would likely invite a reprisal when night fell, and although she the defacto leader, she knew her comrades considered her a hard-ass and would happily enjoying tickling torturing every inch of this hard-ass till she was mewling like a kitten. Oracle’s toes curled in her boots. Well, she definitely wouldn’t be exposing her bare feet out like that in the open, she decided. But then again, she wouldn’t be walking around with bare arms or an unzipped suit, either, Oracle thought as she looked around the campsite in dismay. Were they trying to tempt fate?
And how right Oracle would be.
They didn’t notice at first, as a soft scene wafted through the area. Oracle didn’t smell anything through her helmet, but she heard the others commenting on a sweet aroma, and assumed they were talking about some flowers or perhaps bees were making honey nearby.
“It smells so nice…” Byte said dreamily, swaying a bit on her feet like she was about to faint, and Oracle suddenly spotted movement coming from the trees. Something flashed by green on green, camouflaged, but there was no mistaking the humanoid shape.
“We have company!” Oracle bellowed, as she primed her blasters, and suddenly there was a flurry of movement. As if they were sprouting from the ground themselves, green, elvin creatures popped out of the soil and grabbed surprised Faen by the wrists or ankles– shapes that Oracle had assumed were part of the landscape but were now distinctly… Dryad.
“What brings you to our little planet?” giggled the nearest green-haired, green-skinned girl as she effortlessly lifted Debian by her bare ankles (the fool should have kept her shoes on!) as she spluttered indignantly as her back was dragged across the grubby forest floor. Tendrils slithered from the Dryad’s lithe body and began sliding across the bare purple soles, teasing the sensitive flesh dexterously. Oracle could only watch in horror as Debian’s plump silver toes (all Faen had silver nails as a symbol of their embrace of technology) were engulfed by a growing mass of vines.
“Not often we get guests,” a voice giggled behind Oracle, and she spun around, as a Dryad nimbly leapt on her back. Oracle spun around, trying to throw the Dryad girl off as she could fell the tendrils sprouting her skin began to push against her armour… the Dryad girl was getting heavier like an overripe tomato, and Oracle knew only had moments before she was trapped. A desperate, blind blast from her palm was what saved her, as the Dryad girl was blown off. All around the campsite, there was ticklish pandemonium. Byte and the others had recovered their senses to start blasting at the Dryad girls, but the Dryads just giggled and more and more seemed to be melting out of the forest or out of the ground by the minute.
There were too many. Scientist Zip’s armour had been well, zipped off, and it looked like she had been absorbed by the tree, there were so many vines covering her. Only her face, breast, stomach and womanhood were visible, and all of those spots had Dryads hovering over them. A Dryad girl was kissing her neck, while two more used feeler-like fingers to tease all over her breasts. More feelers were teasing Zip’s stomach, and Oracle didn’t even want to think about what must be happened down between her legs.
Debian had fallen into the pond, her suit short-circuited by the way, but she was laughing too hard to care, as a pair of Dryads had their first taste of Faen feet, using fingers and tongues all over Debian’s ticklish soles.
Oracle ran to Private Byte, and then stood next to each other back-to-back as they blasted and blasted at the army that advanced as steadily and certainly as nature. Nature won out, as the energy blasters overheated, and the two Faen found themselves unarmed against an army of Dryads.
A lone dryad walked out, seeing that the Faen weaponry were out of ammo. She looked much the same as her sisters – frizzy green hair like a branchy thicket and green skin, with leaves for clothes that covered her private areas, but the way she carried herself gave her an air of authority over her giggling sisters. The dryad wasn't much taller than her sisters, but she still towered over the short Faen women. She was in charge here, Oracle thought, a pit of dread in her stomach.
“My name is Raffia, I lead my people. Why are the Faen here?” the dryad woman said, with an easy air of confidence.
“You attack us and then ask us questions? What the hell do you take us for?” Byte growled. Oracle could have slapped her.
“You trampled across our garden, and you hurt our friends,” Raffia said, spreading her arms wide. “We sought only to inquire as to why you are doing so.”
“Oh? Want to ask Zip?” Oracle asked, gesturing to the giggling form of the scientist who was still being gang tickled by several dryads at once.
“You invaded our territory.”
“We didn’t know.”
“And that justifies things?”
“It’s not our fault!”
“I see this conversation goes nowhere – so be it,” Raffia shook her head, and blew a breath of pollen at Byte. Thinking quickly, or perhaps not thinking at all, Oracle charged at the Dryad leader, forgetting her exoskeleton gave her no assistance with its system overheated and drained. A woozy Byte dropped to the floor like a sack of potatoes, and was quickly snapped up by a swarm of giggling Dryad girls as Oracle continued her lunges.
“You have spirit,” Raffia commented casually, as Oracle punched and kicked at her. “Commendable,” she said, ducking underneath a punch. “But misguided”, she whispered, as she summoned a vine unseen on the ground that Oracle promptly tripped over. Oracle felt her armour be stripped away by vines and hands, and found herself strung up on a tree, her arms above her head as her wrists and ankles were bound to the hard bark.
Naked as the day she was born and separated from all her weapons and armour, Captain Oracle had never felt so exposed. It didn’t help when Raffia suddenly leaned in and kissed her on the lips, tasting of sunshine. “For your noble efforts,” she said, blowing at her with breath that smelled like roses. Within moments, Oracle’s head was spinning as if she had been drugged. She found herself giggling softly as Raffia lightly drug her long fingernails across her chest. Another kiss that tasted of honey, before a series of smaller kisses along her purple neck that made Oracle’s stomach churn. She was a Faen soldier… Oracle struggled to remember, what was this Dryad and her pheromones doing to her?
Oracle got another answer after another thick puff of pollen; only this time is wafted along her chest and sides, and tingling the skin. The Faen captain gasped, arching her back as the pollen seemed to intensify every little sensation – even the air seemed to tickle now. Raffia blew some more pollen into her hands, and this time rubbed it into Oracle’s breasts instead, which were already stiff and at attention. Immediately, a moan, and then a laugh, as sharp fingernails lightly flicked across Oracle’s exposed nipples. Her entire body jerked with every little pinch and wiggle as Raffia giggled as she played with the stiff buds of those stimulated nipples. Right when orgasm is an inch away, Raffia leaned down to blow pollen on Oracle’s stomach instead, and then suddenly her finger ploughed straight into those now super-sensitized sides, which needless to say, tore her away from such tantalizingly enjoyable sensations.
“How’s about you tell me everything you know about what the Faen are doing here… and I’ll be understanding on you on your friends. You didn’t even realize what you were doing, did you?” Raffia said, as her fingers continued tracing their lethal path across Oracle’s toned purple torso. She only strayed up to tease the breasts, but only for a few moments till Oracle’s legs dripped with moisture like the leaves of a tree after a storm.
O-O-O
“And then the scouts we sent to find the investigation party went missing too. We were such fools...”
Captain Ether walked slowly through the clearing, a dozen other Faen at her heels. They were all fully armed with all their armour in place – they were taking no chances after the garbled messages they had received at main camp that seemed to indicate the advance party had been hit by some kind of attack. Soft grass crumpled under her metal boots as she could feel her short silver hair clumping together with perspiration. It was tempting to tear her helmet off and let her breath in this humidity, but the hard-nosed Captain was not about to risk it.
There was a cacophony of bird-calls that echoed across that forest that was driving Ether mad – she much preferred the orderly solitude of a laboratory. The birds’ cries even sounded like cackling laughter… wait, it was laughter! The Faen Captain lifted up a mailed hand and the group stopped.
“Eyes open, people. Where’s that laughter coming from?” she said, as she armed her weapons and began walking to and fro, looking for the source of the laughter.
Through the combined effort of the group, they quickly tracked the laughter to a clearing in the forest, where a stripped and bound Faen soldier was laughing helplessly, with thick vines at the ankles and wrists that pulled her body taut. Ether approached cautiously, as she watched the snake-line vines tickle the poor Faen girl as if by their own accord; based on the sheen of sweat that covered the Faen’s purple skin, she had been here a while. A vine had slipped around her eyes to serve as a blindfold, though Captain Ether felt it looked like Private Byte based on the prominent jawline, as the booming laughter definitely sounded familiar. The vines seemed to have sprouted leaves that looked like feathers, and were brushing them all over the Private Byte’s trapped body. The feathers dusted all over Byte like the cleaning droids the Faen used on their ships, and Ether shuddered as her eyes went from Byte’s red face, to her silver wiggling toes, and her sopping wet womanhood. The cruel plant wouldn’t just tickle, of course, they would tease their trapped victim. The green plumes fluttered all over Byte’s body, a wave of constant motion that ensured every spot would be tantalized – feathers danced everywhere from the neck down. Feathers licked up and down her flesh, stroking along her sides and abdominal muscles. They took care not to neglect her bouncing breasts, as the feathers twirled on erect nipples, and the helpless Private moaned and giggled in frustrated ecstasy. She kicked her feet and twisted as best she could, anything to avoid the torturous plumes sliding up and down her sensitive arches and lapping along her inner thighs, but never, never her throbbing womanhood as fluid trickled down her legs and onto the forest floor.
Captain Ether had seen enough. She pushed to the front of the clearing and blasted the vines that bound poor Private Byte to the tree. The vines whipped at her like green snakes, but blasts from the other soldiers put a swift end to it.
Byte spluttered for breath for a moment, then kicked her bare soles at the dirt and a wisp of a vine was trying to worm its way through her toes. “Trap… run!”
Ether’s grey eyes grew wide as she tried to issue a command to her squad, but before she knew what was happening, roots exploded from the ground, and vines wrapped around her body, tying her arms behind her back and twisting around her waist. The Captain grunted and tried to twist herself loose, but the strong vines pulled her to her knees. Out of the corner of her eye, she could see her soldiers in a similar bind as green-skinned Dryads melted out of the forest.
“My name is Raffia, and I assure you that our captives will be treated honourably if you yield,” a dryad with an easy air of confidence said, as she stepped in front of the clearing with all its kneeling soldiers. Byte was grunting as fresh vines appeared to ensnare her again – she was mumbling “no, no, no!” as her purple body was stretched out again and the feathers began to trace their teasing paths once more.
“She refused to cooperate with us,” the dryad named Raffia said, gesturing with her head. “We can at least promise… release, if you share some information with us,” Raffia said, as naughty vines began sensuously stroking across Private Byte’s skin, lightly flicking across skin as if caressing a lover. Byte bit her lip and choked back a giggly moan as a vine lightly brushed across a stiff areola.
“If you choose not to cooperate…” Raffia said, in a voice like a whisper. “You have only yourselves to blame,” the green-skinned Dryad waved her hand as her girls came forward to disrobe Ether and her soldiers.
Ether wondered why they were taking their skin-tight armour away, as the weaponry could only be used by Faen with their implants to control them, but rational thought became difficult as a giggling Dryad girl with long oak-brown hair kissed her on the neck as she pulled off her clothes.
O-O-O
“We thought we were one step ahead when we caught the saboteur…”
“How did this happen? How?” Head Scientist Corel shouted, waving her hands in the area. Her spectacles had fallen to the floor in her gesticulation. “Captain, please explain to me what the bloody hell is going on here?” Corel said, as she slumped into her commander’s chair on the ship, using a pair of dainty finger to massage her temples.
Captain Micro was no stranger to their leader’s outbursts – she had actually covertly recommended to her superiors against giving Corel this position. She had nothing against the woman, well, nothing aside from the fact Corel had once nominated her to test a new tickle-device. Micro’s soft toes curled in her boots at the thought; the device had been a successful one, and the Endurance tickle device Micro had tested was now a mainstay on many vessels, as it was especially powerful on the bold and headstrong (“like our dear Captain Micro”, Corel has said snidely) but that was all besides the point. Corel did not have a cool head under fire. Her ranting and raving was doing little to change the fact that their defences had been compromised. Half a dozen Dryads had slipped in past their sentries using stolen Faen armour - how they had obtained them was a dark and worrying thought. They had done some damage to the computer mainframes and their defences, but thankfully they had been apprehended before long. Corel was a brilliant inventor and scientist, but a poor leader. Then again, they had never expected such resistance on such a backwater planet in the middle of nowhere…
“Initial interrogation is still undergoing. The dryads didn’t figure out how to work our suits, so we were able to neutralize most of them fairly easily,” Micro said stiffly.
“How am I going to report this?” Corel groaned, as she pounded her slender purple hands on the desktop like a petulant child. “We need results. Put the one who looks like the leader in the Endurance. Warm her up for me. I’ll be there in ten minutes… where did I keep my stims…”
Micro saluted, but her Corel has already turned her back and was rooting through her drawers in search for her stash of stimulants. Micro grit her teeth, swept her silver hair from her eyes and departed. She issued the orders on her inter-com and by the time she made her way to the interrogation chambers on the small research vessel, her captive was already there waiting for her.
“There you are,” the green-skinned, green-haired Dryad said with a coy smile. Her hair was a shade darker than her light green skin. “About time you showed up. I was getting rather lonely,” she said, tilting her head to the side as she gave a Cheshire grin. Captain Micro felt unnerved by the mischievous smile – this was not how a captive should act when they were about to receive a heavy dose of tickle torment. The textbooks all Faen soldiers had to read said captives would be begging or swearing, but not this…
And the entirely naked Dryad surely had no reason to be grinning at all, as she was placed into Head Scientist Corel’s own pet project – the Endurance device. Just the sight of it made Micro’s skin crawl. The version that appeared here on this ship was a lot more refined than the prototype that had tickled her so many moons ago, but Micro still recognized the complex bondage apparatus which consisted of a set of mechanical stocks with little claws that held the toes in place (oh, Micro remembered those horrible things well), a collection of electric brushes akin to toothbrushes that hovered over the feet, and metallic manacles that extended from the ceiling. There were little worm-like devices with feathers on the end that hung lifeless along the stockade too. The Dryad was placed in a kneeling position with her green feet (a lighter shade than her body, Micro noticed) in the stocks facing upward, not that the position seemed to be making the cheeky Dryad any less recalcitrant.
“Listen, you-” Micro began, before to her shock the Dryad interrupted her.
“Rose. My name is Rose. I don’t like all this you-ing,” the young Dryad added, with a smile.
“I’m in charge here, don’t interrupt me!” Micro said, pointing a finger right at Rose’s face, only pulling her finger away when Rose pretended to try to bite it.
“So what’s your name? No need to be rude, I gave you mine,” Rose smiled, as if Micro had just made an uninteresting remark about the weather.
Micro growled and resisted the urge to slap the Dryad across the face, but instead, she went over to the device and began calibrating the feathers. As she activated the machine, the feathers suddenly sprang to life, and with Rose’s arms stretched taut above her head by the manacles, the feathers had free reign all over her slender green body.
The feathers were at a low setting at first, so there were only four in motion. One feather gently brushes back and forth across her taut stomach, a second feather slowly traced along her thighs. A third lightly dusted a rapidly-stiffening nipple, and the fourth dipped along the Dryad’s little ear.
Rose ground her hips and send a smouldering look Micro’s way. “Now we’re talking… keep it coming, soldier girl…”
Micro crossed her arms. The dryad would change her tone soon enough. “Oh, you’ll have more than enough before long.”
And soon enough, the Endurance began living up to its name.
The first peal of laughter escaped the Dryad’s light green lips as a feather dipped into her belly, and in immediate response to the laughter, the mass of brushes that hovered menacingly above her green feet, which until then had been inactive, suddenly hummed to life and the small buzzing brushes descended upon the trapped upturned soles. At first it was just one or two, but as the brushes made devastating ticklish contact with their new targets, fresh giggles came bursting forth from that mouthy Dryad girl, and so more brushes were activated, and so on. It was a vicious cycle – the more Rose laughed, the more they tickled, and the more it tickled, the more she laughed. She let loose her first proper squeal when the little brushes began teasing under the pads of her green toes all in unison. The Endurance was a cruel device, and more and more feather sprouted to assail Rose’s mid-section to ensure that her upperbody did not feel like she was missing out on the fun. It was a harsh juxtaposition, the brutal brushing of her soles compared to the light feathery touch that tantalized her skin. Micro couldn’t even count how many feathers were teasing all over her uppderbody now, but there were definitely around a dozen just teasing around the Dryad’s dripping womanhood, licking along the slick petals and even along her butt. Of course, the inner thighs and the breasts would not be left out of all this feathery fun too.
As Rose’s tinkling laughter echoed across the room, Micro sat back and enjoyed the show, with her finger on the button to deactivate the machine. The machine’s manual had suggested toying with the captive by placing your finger on the off-switch and then making eye contact with said captive to see the desperation in their eyes, but Rose seemed content to ignore Micro as the machine made her moan and howl with laughter. After a few minutes more, knowing that Corel would arrive soon, Micro turned it off.
“That’s just a small taste of what that machine can do,” Micro said, crossing her arms again. “You ready to cooperate now?”
“You Faen and your machines… woooh!” Rose said with a giggle. “That was great! My feet are still tingly, hehe.”
“Are you even listening to me?” Micro said, as her hand hovered over the on-switch it what was intended to be a fearsome motion. “One wrong word from you and you’re screaming again.”
Rose rolled her hazel eyes. “You still haven’t worked it out, have you?” Rose flashed Micro a predatory-grin. “I welcome more of your ‘torture’. I volunteered for this mission, and that’s because your fancy tickle-torture techniques won’t work on me. You can give me just the brushes, soldier girl, I don’t mind.”
“You…” Captain Micro said, suddenly lost for words. There were those in every army – true tickle gluttons, who could take whatever tickle torment they could get… but was this Dryad really so insatiable? Was it something to do with their Dryad biology? It couldn't be...
“Oh, but I’ll talk – I do have things to say to your commander.”
As if on cue, Head Scientist Corel walked in, sniffing slightly. The scientist had her usually-immaculate purple hair somewhat ruffled and looked to be swaying slightly. “You’re dismissed, Captain. I’ll see to this hippie myself,” she said, her voice a bit shaky. Micro wondered exactly what stims she had taken to ‘steady her nerves’.
“This is all I have to say: Nature is coming for you, and she’s going to give you a good spanking,” Rose grinned, and Micro had never seen a smile from such a sweet-looking female look quite so fearsome.
O-O-O
“Head Scientist Corel!”
The coarse voice of a Faen soldier shook Corel from her recollections, and Corel tucked her purple hair behind her ear before looking up and replying. She adjusted her thick-rimmed spectacles. Her tidy hairstyle had somehow become matted during her trip down memory lane and all her mistakes.
“Do you have a, um, status report? Have we driven them back?” Corel croaked, more in hope than in expectation.
Captain Micro looked up at her disbelievingly. “Haven’t you been reading my status reports?” she asked, and Corel turned away at the pile of reports that had appeared on her desk as if out of nowhere – perhaps she had been more lost in her thoughts than she realized. “Our perimeter has been breached. They’ve made their way to the ship. We’ll be overrun soon. We have to leave,” Micro said, speaking rapidly while she reloaded her wrist blasters.
A part of Head Scientist Corel wanted to play the part of the defiant warrior, the captain who decides to go down with her ship, but she knew she didn’t have the heart for it, and the thought of being captured by these rustic creatures sent a shiver of fear down her spine. A quick skim of the reports with their graphic visual imagery of the tribulations of tickle-war did not change her mind – Purple-skinned Faen overwhelmed by vines and fingers, bound in every angle, stomach, soles, and womanhood all tormented, technology and knowledge worthless…
“We must flee,” Corel said with a sigh. “The ship’s defences will defend us, right?”
There was a pause as Micro’s eyes would not meet hers, and Corel noticed she was staring at the security monitor. A pair of Dryad girls had burst through an open ventilation port and were wrestling with a pair of Faen scientists. The scientists had a pair of modified cattle-prods which pulsed with ticklish-inducing power, and one of the scientists – a taller, bulkier woman Corel recognized as Ram who was terrific at developing memory-retention software, had thrust the prod into the green-skinned Dryad’s stomach till the smaller green-haired girl was writhing on the floor. Ram’s colleague was having no such luck, as the nimble Dryad fighting her had uprooted and tripped the Faen, whose name Corel did not recall as she had been an unremarkable worker, and was sitting contently on the backs of her legs, while her mossy fingers tickled her buttocks through the thin lab coat where evidently she was very sensitive. Looks like we have another scientist who is more ticklish than smart, Corel thought dimly, as they watched the display monitor for a moment, so enraptured by the sight of their possible impending fates. Corel’s toes curled up within her boots as she watched, daring to imagine what it would be like to have her own ticklish body manipulated like that; like all Faen she harboured many a sensitive spot, though at least she could say her gluteus maximus was not one of them.
“Captain, Faen progress is in your hands,” Corel tried, shaking a frozen Micro by the shoulder. “What do we do?”
Micro looked at her with grey eyes as cold as the chill of outer space. “We fight to live another day. To the escape pods!”
As they ran down the corridors towards their destination, Corel’s naturally inquisitive mind couldn’t help but go towards their mysterious foe in all this – why were the Dryads doing this? Perhaps that had been her biggest mistake in this whole savage affair. She knew nothing really about her opposition. Corel gulped at the realization that if nothing more, soon she might get many a private audience with their leaders if she was captured, tickle-tortured and interrogated. She just hoped they would go easy on her – tickling did the most devilish things to her Faen biology...
There will be a part two at some point in the near future too.
Without further ado, enjoy.
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Battle of Lomond I - Faen
O-O-O
The war started over something small. They always started over some sort of minor triviality that ended up growing into some great conflict, as if they were unknown forces that seemed insistent on escalating things till some bloody big mess came out of it. This particularly bloody big mess takes place on the planet of Lomond, a planet that was essentially one giant forest separated by pure blue seas, and littered with precious mineral resources.
An inquisitive race like the Faen saw a planet like this like a bee saw honey, like a Boudo saw a bound pair of soles, or like a Paxim pansy saw make-up. The Faen were known as the vain, though Head Scientist Corel felt such a title failed to describe her people accurately well at all. They liked to learn, and how else do you learn but take things apart, and try to put them back together again? Was it their fault their technology was so advanced because they had put so much effort into advancing it? Hardly.
Frankly, it would be bloody nice if the Faen could just be left alone to their own research, and investigations of the planet’s mineral suppositories, but fate seemed to have other ideas, the same way in this world the invisible hands of fate always seemed to nudge in the direction of tickle-warfare.
Head Scientist Corel paced the floor of her laboratory, her hands tucked behind her back as she murmured to herself. Their planet-side sweeps of Lomond has turned up zero military installations, so they had make the mistake of assuming the planet was unclaimed, and sent a detachment of scientists and soldiers to probe the planet for useful resources. And now they were in this mess, Corel thought, as she brushed her fingers through her neatly-cut short silver hair. She adjusted her thick-rimmed spectacles as they threatened to fall off her nose like they always did.
Corel had been placed in charge of this expedition because of her technical knowledge, and she was much more scientist than military leader, yet she was expected to hold her position till reinforcements could arrive.
Hold her position? She could barely hold her hands steady. Corel lifted up her hands and looked at them – her light-purple hands with their silver nails shook like an old crone’s. Damn them, damn those plants for their meddling. Corel pulled off her white labocoat and slipped into the mecha exo-skeleton that Fae soldiers wore – their wings had long atrophied, so now they sought to augment their bodies with technology. The suit fit like a second skin, metal plates hardening around the body till it fit like a glove yet was as tough as plate armour – especially around the soles of the feet and any other ‘vulnerabilities’. Yet the armour nor the energy cannons equipped in her palms did not reassure her. So Corel did what she always did when she was nervous. She opened up her head scientist’s log at her desk, and prepared to recount all that had happened since their landing at Lemond.
“It all started a week ago…”
O-O-O
“The planet seemed an untouched paradise then… almost too good to be true, but we should have known when our advance party went missing.”
---
“I wish you would stop that,” Captain Oracle said, as she glared down at the grinning face of a younger Faen woman who had been whistling.
“Come on, Capt, where’s your sense of excitement? We’re on a new world, full of such godly creatures! Oh, brave new world, look what creatures are here!” Private Byte said, as she launched an energy blast which shook a tree violently and sent a colourful bird toppling from its branches. Byte immediately scurried over and deposited the bird into a sample collector. It had been Corel’s orders to obtain DNA samples from every new species them came across – they had been encouraged to do so without weapons, but alas, soldiers loved to shoot things, regardless of race.
Captain Oracle sighed, of the dozen that walked with her, it seemed only she cared at all about the risks that might await them in this strange, woodland planet. Half of her party were scientists, and although they wore the mecha exoskeletons that made the Faen so dangerous in combat, they still needed constant babysitting just to make sure they didn’t shoot anyone by accident.
They had been walking for half a day in this oppressive heat, and Oracle could feel her short silver-hair sticking to her neck inside her helmet. The reports had said it would be humid, but you really never knew till you were down there in the dirt just what that entailed. She had been nagging them to stay ready and keep their armour at full defensive capacity, but the mecha suits made walking cumbersome, and activating the jump jets here would just be a waste of fuel. Everyone but her had either retracted their helmets, sleeves, or even unzipped their suit along the chest to let some of the heat out.
“Can we take a break?” one of the scientists, a tall woman named Debian asked. “My feet are killing me – we’ve been walking all day.”
They had only walked for six hours, but Captain Oracle saw the wisdom in the complaint, and they sent up a quick camp by a clear running stream. Oracle watched as Debian unzipped her boots (the suit was designed so it could be detached at any main joint in order to make each individual component easier to replace) and dipped her sweaty and reddened purple feet into the running water, cooing contently as she did so. Oracle wanted to go and slap the scientist for such disregard for battle policy, but she knew scolding the scientist would likely invite a reprisal when night fell, and although she the defacto leader, she knew her comrades considered her a hard-ass and would happily enjoying tickling torturing every inch of this hard-ass till she was mewling like a kitten. Oracle’s toes curled in her boots. Well, she definitely wouldn’t be exposing her bare feet out like that in the open, she decided. But then again, she wouldn’t be walking around with bare arms or an unzipped suit, either, Oracle thought as she looked around the campsite in dismay. Were they trying to tempt fate?
And how right Oracle would be.
They didn’t notice at first, as a soft scene wafted through the area. Oracle didn’t smell anything through her helmet, but she heard the others commenting on a sweet aroma, and assumed they were talking about some flowers or perhaps bees were making honey nearby.
“It smells so nice…” Byte said dreamily, swaying a bit on her feet like she was about to faint, and Oracle suddenly spotted movement coming from the trees. Something flashed by green on green, camouflaged, but there was no mistaking the humanoid shape.
“We have company!” Oracle bellowed, as she primed her blasters, and suddenly there was a flurry of movement. As if they were sprouting from the ground themselves, green, elvin creatures popped out of the soil and grabbed surprised Faen by the wrists or ankles– shapes that Oracle had assumed were part of the landscape but were now distinctly… Dryad.
“What brings you to our little planet?” giggled the nearest green-haired, green-skinned girl as she effortlessly lifted Debian by her bare ankles (the fool should have kept her shoes on!) as she spluttered indignantly as her back was dragged across the grubby forest floor. Tendrils slithered from the Dryad’s lithe body and began sliding across the bare purple soles, teasing the sensitive flesh dexterously. Oracle could only watch in horror as Debian’s plump silver toes (all Faen had silver nails as a symbol of their embrace of technology) were engulfed by a growing mass of vines.
“Not often we get guests,” a voice giggled behind Oracle, and she spun around, as a Dryad nimbly leapt on her back. Oracle spun around, trying to throw the Dryad girl off as she could fell the tendrils sprouting her skin began to push against her armour… the Dryad girl was getting heavier like an overripe tomato, and Oracle knew only had moments before she was trapped. A desperate, blind blast from her palm was what saved her, as the Dryad girl was blown off. All around the campsite, there was ticklish pandemonium. Byte and the others had recovered their senses to start blasting at the Dryad girls, but the Dryads just giggled and more and more seemed to be melting out of the forest or out of the ground by the minute.
There were too many. Scientist Zip’s armour had been well, zipped off, and it looked like she had been absorbed by the tree, there were so many vines covering her. Only her face, breast, stomach and womanhood were visible, and all of those spots had Dryads hovering over them. A Dryad girl was kissing her neck, while two more used feeler-like fingers to tease all over her breasts. More feelers were teasing Zip’s stomach, and Oracle didn’t even want to think about what must be happened down between her legs.
Debian had fallen into the pond, her suit short-circuited by the way, but she was laughing too hard to care, as a pair of Dryads had their first taste of Faen feet, using fingers and tongues all over Debian’s ticklish soles.
Oracle ran to Private Byte, and then stood next to each other back-to-back as they blasted and blasted at the army that advanced as steadily and certainly as nature. Nature won out, as the energy blasters overheated, and the two Faen found themselves unarmed against an army of Dryads.
A lone dryad walked out, seeing that the Faen weaponry were out of ammo. She looked much the same as her sisters – frizzy green hair like a branchy thicket and green skin, with leaves for clothes that covered her private areas, but the way she carried herself gave her an air of authority over her giggling sisters. The dryad wasn't much taller than her sisters, but she still towered over the short Faen women. She was in charge here, Oracle thought, a pit of dread in her stomach.
“My name is Raffia, I lead my people. Why are the Faen here?” the dryad woman said, with an easy air of confidence.
“You attack us and then ask us questions? What the hell do you take us for?” Byte growled. Oracle could have slapped her.
“You trampled across our garden, and you hurt our friends,” Raffia said, spreading her arms wide. “We sought only to inquire as to why you are doing so.”
“Oh? Want to ask Zip?” Oracle asked, gesturing to the giggling form of the scientist who was still being gang tickled by several dryads at once.
“You invaded our territory.”
“We didn’t know.”
“And that justifies things?”
“It’s not our fault!”
“I see this conversation goes nowhere – so be it,” Raffia shook her head, and blew a breath of pollen at Byte. Thinking quickly, or perhaps not thinking at all, Oracle charged at the Dryad leader, forgetting her exoskeleton gave her no assistance with its system overheated and drained. A woozy Byte dropped to the floor like a sack of potatoes, and was quickly snapped up by a swarm of giggling Dryad girls as Oracle continued her lunges.
“You have spirit,” Raffia commented casually, as Oracle punched and kicked at her. “Commendable,” she said, ducking underneath a punch. “But misguided”, she whispered, as she summoned a vine unseen on the ground that Oracle promptly tripped over. Oracle felt her armour be stripped away by vines and hands, and found herself strung up on a tree, her arms above her head as her wrists and ankles were bound to the hard bark.
Naked as the day she was born and separated from all her weapons and armour, Captain Oracle had never felt so exposed. It didn’t help when Raffia suddenly leaned in and kissed her on the lips, tasting of sunshine. “For your noble efforts,” she said, blowing at her with breath that smelled like roses. Within moments, Oracle’s head was spinning as if she had been drugged. She found herself giggling softly as Raffia lightly drug her long fingernails across her chest. Another kiss that tasted of honey, before a series of smaller kisses along her purple neck that made Oracle’s stomach churn. She was a Faen soldier… Oracle struggled to remember, what was this Dryad and her pheromones doing to her?
Oracle got another answer after another thick puff of pollen; only this time is wafted along her chest and sides, and tingling the skin. The Faen captain gasped, arching her back as the pollen seemed to intensify every little sensation – even the air seemed to tickle now. Raffia blew some more pollen into her hands, and this time rubbed it into Oracle’s breasts instead, which were already stiff and at attention. Immediately, a moan, and then a laugh, as sharp fingernails lightly flicked across Oracle’s exposed nipples. Her entire body jerked with every little pinch and wiggle as Raffia giggled as she played with the stiff buds of those stimulated nipples. Right when orgasm is an inch away, Raffia leaned down to blow pollen on Oracle’s stomach instead, and then suddenly her finger ploughed straight into those now super-sensitized sides, which needless to say, tore her away from such tantalizingly enjoyable sensations.
“How’s about you tell me everything you know about what the Faen are doing here… and I’ll be understanding on you on your friends. You didn’t even realize what you were doing, did you?” Raffia said, as her fingers continued tracing their lethal path across Oracle’s toned purple torso. She only strayed up to tease the breasts, but only for a few moments till Oracle’s legs dripped with moisture like the leaves of a tree after a storm.
O-O-O
“And then the scouts we sent to find the investigation party went missing too. We were such fools...”
Captain Ether walked slowly through the clearing, a dozen other Faen at her heels. They were all fully armed with all their armour in place – they were taking no chances after the garbled messages they had received at main camp that seemed to indicate the advance party had been hit by some kind of attack. Soft grass crumpled under her metal boots as she could feel her short silver hair clumping together with perspiration. It was tempting to tear her helmet off and let her breath in this humidity, but the hard-nosed Captain was not about to risk it.
There was a cacophony of bird-calls that echoed across that forest that was driving Ether mad – she much preferred the orderly solitude of a laboratory. The birds’ cries even sounded like cackling laughter… wait, it was laughter! The Faen Captain lifted up a mailed hand and the group stopped.
“Eyes open, people. Where’s that laughter coming from?” she said, as she armed her weapons and began walking to and fro, looking for the source of the laughter.
Through the combined effort of the group, they quickly tracked the laughter to a clearing in the forest, where a stripped and bound Faen soldier was laughing helplessly, with thick vines at the ankles and wrists that pulled her body taut. Ether approached cautiously, as she watched the snake-line vines tickle the poor Faen girl as if by their own accord; based on the sheen of sweat that covered the Faen’s purple skin, she had been here a while. A vine had slipped around her eyes to serve as a blindfold, though Captain Ether felt it looked like Private Byte based on the prominent jawline, as the booming laughter definitely sounded familiar. The vines seemed to have sprouted leaves that looked like feathers, and were brushing them all over the Private Byte’s trapped body. The feathers dusted all over Byte like the cleaning droids the Faen used on their ships, and Ether shuddered as her eyes went from Byte’s red face, to her silver wiggling toes, and her sopping wet womanhood. The cruel plant wouldn’t just tickle, of course, they would tease their trapped victim. The green plumes fluttered all over Byte’s body, a wave of constant motion that ensured every spot would be tantalized – feathers danced everywhere from the neck down. Feathers licked up and down her flesh, stroking along her sides and abdominal muscles. They took care not to neglect her bouncing breasts, as the feathers twirled on erect nipples, and the helpless Private moaned and giggled in frustrated ecstasy. She kicked her feet and twisted as best she could, anything to avoid the torturous plumes sliding up and down her sensitive arches and lapping along her inner thighs, but never, never her throbbing womanhood as fluid trickled down her legs and onto the forest floor.
Captain Ether had seen enough. She pushed to the front of the clearing and blasted the vines that bound poor Private Byte to the tree. The vines whipped at her like green snakes, but blasts from the other soldiers put a swift end to it.
Byte spluttered for breath for a moment, then kicked her bare soles at the dirt and a wisp of a vine was trying to worm its way through her toes. “Trap… run!”
Ether’s grey eyes grew wide as she tried to issue a command to her squad, but before she knew what was happening, roots exploded from the ground, and vines wrapped around her body, tying her arms behind her back and twisting around her waist. The Captain grunted and tried to twist herself loose, but the strong vines pulled her to her knees. Out of the corner of her eye, she could see her soldiers in a similar bind as green-skinned Dryads melted out of the forest.
“My name is Raffia, and I assure you that our captives will be treated honourably if you yield,” a dryad with an easy air of confidence said, as she stepped in front of the clearing with all its kneeling soldiers. Byte was grunting as fresh vines appeared to ensnare her again – she was mumbling “no, no, no!” as her purple body was stretched out again and the feathers began to trace their teasing paths once more.
“She refused to cooperate with us,” the dryad named Raffia said, gesturing with her head. “We can at least promise… release, if you share some information with us,” Raffia said, as naughty vines began sensuously stroking across Private Byte’s skin, lightly flicking across skin as if caressing a lover. Byte bit her lip and choked back a giggly moan as a vine lightly brushed across a stiff areola.
“If you choose not to cooperate…” Raffia said, in a voice like a whisper. “You have only yourselves to blame,” the green-skinned Dryad waved her hand as her girls came forward to disrobe Ether and her soldiers.
Ether wondered why they were taking their skin-tight armour away, as the weaponry could only be used by Faen with their implants to control them, but rational thought became difficult as a giggling Dryad girl with long oak-brown hair kissed her on the neck as she pulled off her clothes.
O-O-O
“We thought we were one step ahead when we caught the saboteur…”
“How did this happen? How?” Head Scientist Corel shouted, waving her hands in the area. Her spectacles had fallen to the floor in her gesticulation. “Captain, please explain to me what the bloody hell is going on here?” Corel said, as she slumped into her commander’s chair on the ship, using a pair of dainty finger to massage her temples.
Captain Micro was no stranger to their leader’s outbursts – she had actually covertly recommended to her superiors against giving Corel this position. She had nothing against the woman, well, nothing aside from the fact Corel had once nominated her to test a new tickle-device. Micro’s soft toes curled in her boots at the thought; the device had been a successful one, and the Endurance tickle device Micro had tested was now a mainstay on many vessels, as it was especially powerful on the bold and headstrong (“like our dear Captain Micro”, Corel has said snidely) but that was all besides the point. Corel did not have a cool head under fire. Her ranting and raving was doing little to change the fact that their defences had been compromised. Half a dozen Dryads had slipped in past their sentries using stolen Faen armour - how they had obtained them was a dark and worrying thought. They had done some damage to the computer mainframes and their defences, but thankfully they had been apprehended before long. Corel was a brilliant inventor and scientist, but a poor leader. Then again, they had never expected such resistance on such a backwater planet in the middle of nowhere…
“Initial interrogation is still undergoing. The dryads didn’t figure out how to work our suits, so we were able to neutralize most of them fairly easily,” Micro said stiffly.
“How am I going to report this?” Corel groaned, as she pounded her slender purple hands on the desktop like a petulant child. “We need results. Put the one who looks like the leader in the Endurance. Warm her up for me. I’ll be there in ten minutes… where did I keep my stims…”
Micro saluted, but her Corel has already turned her back and was rooting through her drawers in search for her stash of stimulants. Micro grit her teeth, swept her silver hair from her eyes and departed. She issued the orders on her inter-com and by the time she made her way to the interrogation chambers on the small research vessel, her captive was already there waiting for her.
“There you are,” the green-skinned, green-haired Dryad said with a coy smile. Her hair was a shade darker than her light green skin. “About time you showed up. I was getting rather lonely,” she said, tilting her head to the side as she gave a Cheshire grin. Captain Micro felt unnerved by the mischievous smile – this was not how a captive should act when they were about to receive a heavy dose of tickle torment. The textbooks all Faen soldiers had to read said captives would be begging or swearing, but not this…
And the entirely naked Dryad surely had no reason to be grinning at all, as she was placed into Head Scientist Corel’s own pet project – the Endurance device. Just the sight of it made Micro’s skin crawl. The version that appeared here on this ship was a lot more refined than the prototype that had tickled her so many moons ago, but Micro still recognized the complex bondage apparatus which consisted of a set of mechanical stocks with little claws that held the toes in place (oh, Micro remembered those horrible things well), a collection of electric brushes akin to toothbrushes that hovered over the feet, and metallic manacles that extended from the ceiling. There were little worm-like devices with feathers on the end that hung lifeless along the stockade too. The Dryad was placed in a kneeling position with her green feet (a lighter shade than her body, Micro noticed) in the stocks facing upward, not that the position seemed to be making the cheeky Dryad any less recalcitrant.
“Listen, you-” Micro began, before to her shock the Dryad interrupted her.
“Rose. My name is Rose. I don’t like all this you-ing,” the young Dryad added, with a smile.
“I’m in charge here, don’t interrupt me!” Micro said, pointing a finger right at Rose’s face, only pulling her finger away when Rose pretended to try to bite it.
“So what’s your name? No need to be rude, I gave you mine,” Rose smiled, as if Micro had just made an uninteresting remark about the weather.
Micro growled and resisted the urge to slap the Dryad across the face, but instead, she went over to the device and began calibrating the feathers. As she activated the machine, the feathers suddenly sprang to life, and with Rose’s arms stretched taut above her head by the manacles, the feathers had free reign all over her slender green body.
The feathers were at a low setting at first, so there were only four in motion. One feather gently brushes back and forth across her taut stomach, a second feather slowly traced along her thighs. A third lightly dusted a rapidly-stiffening nipple, and the fourth dipped along the Dryad’s little ear.
Rose ground her hips and send a smouldering look Micro’s way. “Now we’re talking… keep it coming, soldier girl…”
Micro crossed her arms. The dryad would change her tone soon enough. “Oh, you’ll have more than enough before long.”
And soon enough, the Endurance began living up to its name.
The first peal of laughter escaped the Dryad’s light green lips as a feather dipped into her belly, and in immediate response to the laughter, the mass of brushes that hovered menacingly above her green feet, which until then had been inactive, suddenly hummed to life and the small buzzing brushes descended upon the trapped upturned soles. At first it was just one or two, but as the brushes made devastating ticklish contact with their new targets, fresh giggles came bursting forth from that mouthy Dryad girl, and so more brushes were activated, and so on. It was a vicious cycle – the more Rose laughed, the more they tickled, and the more it tickled, the more she laughed. She let loose her first proper squeal when the little brushes began teasing under the pads of her green toes all in unison. The Endurance was a cruel device, and more and more feather sprouted to assail Rose’s mid-section to ensure that her upperbody did not feel like she was missing out on the fun. It was a harsh juxtaposition, the brutal brushing of her soles compared to the light feathery touch that tantalized her skin. Micro couldn’t even count how many feathers were teasing all over her uppderbody now, but there were definitely around a dozen just teasing around the Dryad’s dripping womanhood, licking along the slick petals and even along her butt. Of course, the inner thighs and the breasts would not be left out of all this feathery fun too.
As Rose’s tinkling laughter echoed across the room, Micro sat back and enjoyed the show, with her finger on the button to deactivate the machine. The machine’s manual had suggested toying with the captive by placing your finger on the off-switch and then making eye contact with said captive to see the desperation in their eyes, but Rose seemed content to ignore Micro as the machine made her moan and howl with laughter. After a few minutes more, knowing that Corel would arrive soon, Micro turned it off.
“That’s just a small taste of what that machine can do,” Micro said, crossing her arms again. “You ready to cooperate now?”
“You Faen and your machines… woooh!” Rose said with a giggle. “That was great! My feet are still tingly, hehe.”
“Are you even listening to me?” Micro said, as her hand hovered over the on-switch it what was intended to be a fearsome motion. “One wrong word from you and you’re screaming again.”
Rose rolled her hazel eyes. “You still haven’t worked it out, have you?” Rose flashed Micro a predatory-grin. “I welcome more of your ‘torture’. I volunteered for this mission, and that’s because your fancy tickle-torture techniques won’t work on me. You can give me just the brushes, soldier girl, I don’t mind.”
“You…” Captain Micro said, suddenly lost for words. There were those in every army – true tickle gluttons, who could take whatever tickle torment they could get… but was this Dryad really so insatiable? Was it something to do with their Dryad biology? It couldn't be...
“Oh, but I’ll talk – I do have things to say to your commander.”
As if on cue, Head Scientist Corel walked in, sniffing slightly. The scientist had her usually-immaculate purple hair somewhat ruffled and looked to be swaying slightly. “You’re dismissed, Captain. I’ll see to this hippie myself,” she said, her voice a bit shaky. Micro wondered exactly what stims she had taken to ‘steady her nerves’.
“This is all I have to say: Nature is coming for you, and she’s going to give you a good spanking,” Rose grinned, and Micro had never seen a smile from such a sweet-looking female look quite so fearsome.
O-O-O
“Head Scientist Corel!”
The coarse voice of a Faen soldier shook Corel from her recollections, and Corel tucked her purple hair behind her ear before looking up and replying. She adjusted her thick-rimmed spectacles. Her tidy hairstyle had somehow become matted during her trip down memory lane and all her mistakes.
“Do you have a, um, status report? Have we driven them back?” Corel croaked, more in hope than in expectation.
Captain Micro looked up at her disbelievingly. “Haven’t you been reading my status reports?” she asked, and Corel turned away at the pile of reports that had appeared on her desk as if out of nowhere – perhaps she had been more lost in her thoughts than she realized. “Our perimeter has been breached. They’ve made their way to the ship. We’ll be overrun soon. We have to leave,” Micro said, speaking rapidly while she reloaded her wrist blasters.
A part of Head Scientist Corel wanted to play the part of the defiant warrior, the captain who decides to go down with her ship, but she knew she didn’t have the heart for it, and the thought of being captured by these rustic creatures sent a shiver of fear down her spine. A quick skim of the reports with their graphic visual imagery of the tribulations of tickle-war did not change her mind – Purple-skinned Faen overwhelmed by vines and fingers, bound in every angle, stomach, soles, and womanhood all tormented, technology and knowledge worthless…
“We must flee,” Corel said with a sigh. “The ship’s defences will defend us, right?”
There was a pause as Micro’s eyes would not meet hers, and Corel noticed she was staring at the security monitor. A pair of Dryad girls had burst through an open ventilation port and were wrestling with a pair of Faen scientists. The scientists had a pair of modified cattle-prods which pulsed with ticklish-inducing power, and one of the scientists – a taller, bulkier woman Corel recognized as Ram who was terrific at developing memory-retention software, had thrust the prod into the green-skinned Dryad’s stomach till the smaller green-haired girl was writhing on the floor. Ram’s colleague was having no such luck, as the nimble Dryad fighting her had uprooted and tripped the Faen, whose name Corel did not recall as she had been an unremarkable worker, and was sitting contently on the backs of her legs, while her mossy fingers tickled her buttocks through the thin lab coat where evidently she was very sensitive. Looks like we have another scientist who is more ticklish than smart, Corel thought dimly, as they watched the display monitor for a moment, so enraptured by the sight of their possible impending fates. Corel’s toes curled up within her boots as she watched, daring to imagine what it would be like to have her own ticklish body manipulated like that; like all Faen she harboured many a sensitive spot, though at least she could say her gluteus maximus was not one of them.
“Captain, Faen progress is in your hands,” Corel tried, shaking a frozen Micro by the shoulder. “What do we do?”
Micro looked at her with grey eyes as cold as the chill of outer space. “We fight to live another day. To the escape pods!”
As they ran down the corridors towards their destination, Corel’s naturally inquisitive mind couldn’t help but go towards their mysterious foe in all this – why were the Dryads doing this? Perhaps that had been her biggest mistake in this whole savage affair. She knew nothing really about her opposition. Corel gulped at the realization that if nothing more, soon she might get many a private audience with their leaders if she was captured, tickle-tortured and interrogated. She just hoped they would go easy on her – tickling did the most devilish things to her Faen biology...
