I know some of you get frustrated when a story ends after several parts without coming to a conclusion. Those who also write stories can tell you that sometimes a particular scene or idea motivaties you in the beginning, but after that part is written, the motivation leaves. The author then has only two choices. Finish it badly or don't finish it at all.
To avoid that, I made sure to finish this story before posting any part of it. It is quite long (over 15,000 word) and a part will come out every few days (as long as Ivan leaves us alone).
She tickled me...with science! is a tribute to my favorite author, Isaac Asimov. Think of it as a strike back at the movie I, Robot (Anyone who read the book knows the movie is way off) Would Dr. A like it? Probably not, but he was the author of several books of dirty limerics and "The sensual dirty old man" so who knows.
In the prologue, their is no tickling, just set up. Skip to part one if this upsets. I'm going to try for a bit of real plot here, so for those only interested in the tickling, you may have to skip ahead at some points.
Oh, and it will be all F/f. There's not even a male character in it!
She tickled me...with science! Prologue
The Bureau of Science Research had determined that the ideal work environment was one of isolation. Lab assistants, friends and families only served as distractions and delayed the final results. In the past, this might not have been possible. Science was too grueling a job for one lone man. Setting up experiments, monitoring them, adjusting them and recording them required a team of experts. However, the Bureau showed, through the use of the new positronic
robots and super computers, for one scientist could do it all by themselves.
As the Bureau controlled billions of dollars in grant money given out every year, they usually got to make the rules.
But not even the Bureau with its billions of dollars could alter human psychology. People, even scientists, needed companionship. After several unfortunate accidents from scientists forced to work completely devoid of human contact, and years of testimony from highly regarded psychologists the Bureau came up with a new concept. Let the scientists work in pairs.
Dr. Polly Andrews and Dr. Caroline Lee were one such pair. They worked together in a laboratory somewhere in the middle of Montana. For company, they had only themselves, half a dozen robots and a super computer named 'Mulitvac.' They did not work together. Their fields of study were too diverse for that. Dr. Andrews was a robotics engineer while Dr. Lee was a biologist and chemist. Dr. Andrews was working on the next positronic robotic brain while Dr. Lee was trying to synthesize some exotic compounds found in plants from the Xeon star system.
The Bureau kept their areas of study diverse for several reasons. For one, it would give them little chance work on a single project as a team. This would, to the Bureau, be a waste of time and expertise. They wanted two scientific breakthroughs, not one. Also, it would severely cut down on any feelings of competition and jealousy. How could their be when the scientists were working on such different projects? Finally, the Bureau thought that this
arrangement would bring about the most efficient use of Mulitvac. Two different projects would require the full range of the super computers abilities, not just one narrow segment of them.
No, the two doctors were brought together for companionship, nothing else. On paper, they were should have been excellent companions. Both were not quite thirty, from middle class families and had graduated from similar Universities. Both were single, though Polly had had one long term relationship that had almost ended in marriage. They had similar hobbies and goals.
Of course as any good scientists can tell you, their are many ideas that look great on paper that explode in the lab. Dr. Polly Andrews and Dr. Caroline Lee were two of those.
From the beginning, their had been a general animosity between them. Neither woman could explain it, but it was there nonetheless. The only time they saw each other was at dinner, and that only because it was Bureau policy.
"Damn that policy," thought Dr. Andrews as she stared blankly at her computer screen. She would have long ago said the hell with it if not for Mulitvac. It forced to go through that awful ritual, shutting down all laboratory equipment at the designated hour and refusing to dispense food until both woman were seated at the table. No order Polly could think of could force Mulitvac to do otherwise.
"Of course not," Dr. Andrews muttered, "First Law of Robotics. A robot may neither harm a human or through inaction allow a human to be harmed." The computer programmers at the Bureau had convinced Mulitvac that to allow the two scientists to miss that meal would do undermine their social well-being, doing them potentially great harm.
All the shouting and cursing at Multivac in the world only fell under the Second Law of Robotics. A robot must follow the orders of a human unless those orders would conflict with the First Law. Even Dr. Andrews, an expert in the field of robotics, could not find a way to phrase an order to get Mulitvac to cancel the joint dinners. And she had tried. Repeatedly.
The dinners had only gotten worse lately. Now Dr. Lee would sit there and smirk. Smirk like the cat that had eaten the canary. She had something Polly wanted, and Caroline was delighted to not give it too her.
A month ago, Polly had come to a dead end in her new robot design. Everything seemed perfect, except that the positronic pathways, used to transmit signals from the robot 'brain' to the rest of the construct since the very first robots, would not be strong enough in hers. Then she had an idea. Why not supplement the positronic pathways with a neural chemical transmitter, similar to the ones found in the human brain? It was, if Polly did say so herself, genius!
Except for one problem. All the neurotransmitters on file would not work >with the mechanical systems of the robot. She would need to find a chemical with a radically different structure and properties. Not being a chemist, Dr. Andrews contacted as many as she could, hoping someone might have a solution to her problem.
That person ended up being Dr. Caroline Lee. She had found an experimental neurotransmitter in the alien plants she was studying, one that could have been perfect for use in Polly's robots. It should have been that simple.
Now every night at dinner, Polly had to watch Caroline's mocking eyes, her smug smile, so full of the knowledge that she held Polly's career in her hands. And she was going to let that career crumble and fall apart, all out of spite.
"How do you force someone to tell you their secrets?" Polly said aloud, talking only to herself.
"Working..." Multivac's melodious voice surprised Dr. Andrews, "Searching historic records...l". Polly almost gave the order for Mulivac to stop searching, but something stopped her. She hadn't meant for Multivac to find a solution to her problem, but maybe the super computer could succeed where she had failed.
"List compiled." The feminine but artificial voice concluded several minutes later.
Looking down at her screen, Dr. Andrews saw hundreds of words streaming down. Most, she saw, named torture methods straight out of the Spanish Inquisition. Tempting, but Multivac would never allow her to actually hurt Dr. Lee, the First Law of Robotics again. Undoubtedly it would order the robots to stop any attempt.
"Mulitvac, remove all items from list that would cause harm to a human being," Polly ordered. The phrase 'cause harm' was a vague one to her, but she knew that Mulitvac would have a very well developed definition of it. She immediately saw everything that could cause even the slightest physical or psychological damage vanish from the list.
What was left? A few con-games that could supposedly trick someone into telling their secret. Dr. Caroline Lee was too smart, too cunning to fall for one of those. There were also some truth-forcing drugs still on the list. The problem with those was that, as a robotics, ordering any of them would be highly suspicious. Unless she could show proof why they were needed in her project, proof she couldn't fake, her request would be denied.
Dr. Andrews almost deleted the entire program before she noticed one oddball still on the list. It was only one word. 'Tickling'.
"Mulitvac," Polly asked confused, "Why is tickling on this list?"
"While tickling does no harm," Mulitvac's contralto voice replied, "And is in fact more strongly connected to the sensations of pleasure. Even so, recipients with a high level of sensitivity often find it irritating and will give much to have it stopped."
"Would it work on Dr. Lee," Polly mumbled to herself, lost in thought. Mulitvac's sensors picked up the barely audible comment, however, and again treated it as a question. This time, Dr. Caroline Lee file appeared on the screen.
There was a picture of her. She was wrapped as usual in a lab coat, any curve or feminine shape her body may have held hidden from view. Caroline's blonde hair was pulled back in a single, unflattering pony-tail. Thick, horn rimmed glasses obscured her eyes. Only her California tan skin showed Caroline might care about her appearance. It was as Dr. Lee looked every day at dinner.
"Almost genderless," Polly commented again, though she would have killed to have that long, yellow hair. She absentmindedly ran her fingers through her own fiery red curls.
Polly pressed a key, and the picture vanished. In its place was Dr. Caroline Lee’s biography. It listed her height as 5'6", her weight as 125 pounds, and her eyes as blue. Below that it mentioned her family, educational background, medical history ad her list of accomplishments. It was one sentence in the medical history that stood out for Polly. It was a short one, one she'd never seen in a personnel report before.
"Sensitivity Rating: Very High."
“Maybe…maybe…” Polly whispered, “This could be just the thing I’ve been looking for. I could…”
She could what? Jump on Dr. Lee and wrestle her to the ground? Pin her down and tickle Caroline silly? She had a PhD in engineering for gods sake! They both had PhDs! It would be ridiculous. Besides, Caroline had six inches and fifteen pounds on her.
No, Polly thought, I won’t humiliate myself. Its bad enough that my career is stumbling. I won’t look like a fool on top of that.
But the doctor kept the thought in the back of her mind, as Multivac knew she would. And when she unexpectedly got a letter the next week from the Bureau of Science Research demanding she show progress on her project or lose all funding, those thoughts jumped to the front of Polly’s mind.
And as she discovered, there really was an engineering answer for every problem.
End Prolgue
To avoid that, I made sure to finish this story before posting any part of it. It is quite long (over 15,000 word) and a part will come out every few days (as long as Ivan leaves us alone).
She tickled me...with science! is a tribute to my favorite author, Isaac Asimov. Think of it as a strike back at the movie I, Robot (Anyone who read the book knows the movie is way off) Would Dr. A like it? Probably not, but he was the author of several books of dirty limerics and "The sensual dirty old man" so who knows.
In the prologue, their is no tickling, just set up. Skip to part one if this upsets. I'm going to try for a bit of real plot here, so for those only interested in the tickling, you may have to skip ahead at some points.
Oh, and it will be all F/f. There's not even a male character in it!
She tickled me...with science! Prologue
The Bureau of Science Research had determined that the ideal work environment was one of isolation. Lab assistants, friends and families only served as distractions and delayed the final results. In the past, this might not have been possible. Science was too grueling a job for one lone man. Setting up experiments, monitoring them, adjusting them and recording them required a team of experts. However, the Bureau showed, through the use of the new positronic
robots and super computers, for one scientist could do it all by themselves.
As the Bureau controlled billions of dollars in grant money given out every year, they usually got to make the rules.
But not even the Bureau with its billions of dollars could alter human psychology. People, even scientists, needed companionship. After several unfortunate accidents from scientists forced to work completely devoid of human contact, and years of testimony from highly regarded psychologists the Bureau came up with a new concept. Let the scientists work in pairs.
Dr. Polly Andrews and Dr. Caroline Lee were one such pair. They worked together in a laboratory somewhere in the middle of Montana. For company, they had only themselves, half a dozen robots and a super computer named 'Mulitvac.' They did not work together. Their fields of study were too diverse for that. Dr. Andrews was a robotics engineer while Dr. Lee was a biologist and chemist. Dr. Andrews was working on the next positronic robotic brain while Dr. Lee was trying to synthesize some exotic compounds found in plants from the Xeon star system.
The Bureau kept their areas of study diverse for several reasons. For one, it would give them little chance work on a single project as a team. This would, to the Bureau, be a waste of time and expertise. They wanted two scientific breakthroughs, not one. Also, it would severely cut down on any feelings of competition and jealousy. How could their be when the scientists were working on such different projects? Finally, the Bureau thought that this
arrangement would bring about the most efficient use of Mulitvac. Two different projects would require the full range of the super computers abilities, not just one narrow segment of them.
No, the two doctors were brought together for companionship, nothing else. On paper, they were should have been excellent companions. Both were not quite thirty, from middle class families and had graduated from similar Universities. Both were single, though Polly had had one long term relationship that had almost ended in marriage. They had similar hobbies and goals.
Of course as any good scientists can tell you, their are many ideas that look great on paper that explode in the lab. Dr. Polly Andrews and Dr. Caroline Lee were two of those.
From the beginning, their had been a general animosity between them. Neither woman could explain it, but it was there nonetheless. The only time they saw each other was at dinner, and that only because it was Bureau policy.
"Damn that policy," thought Dr. Andrews as she stared blankly at her computer screen. She would have long ago said the hell with it if not for Mulitvac. It forced to go through that awful ritual, shutting down all laboratory equipment at the designated hour and refusing to dispense food until both woman were seated at the table. No order Polly could think of could force Mulitvac to do otherwise.
"Of course not," Dr. Andrews muttered, "First Law of Robotics. A robot may neither harm a human or through inaction allow a human to be harmed." The computer programmers at the Bureau had convinced Mulitvac that to allow the two scientists to miss that meal would do undermine their social well-being, doing them potentially great harm.
All the shouting and cursing at Multivac in the world only fell under the Second Law of Robotics. A robot must follow the orders of a human unless those orders would conflict with the First Law. Even Dr. Andrews, an expert in the field of robotics, could not find a way to phrase an order to get Mulitvac to cancel the joint dinners. And she had tried. Repeatedly.
The dinners had only gotten worse lately. Now Dr. Lee would sit there and smirk. Smirk like the cat that had eaten the canary. She had something Polly wanted, and Caroline was delighted to not give it too her.
A month ago, Polly had come to a dead end in her new robot design. Everything seemed perfect, except that the positronic pathways, used to transmit signals from the robot 'brain' to the rest of the construct since the very first robots, would not be strong enough in hers. Then she had an idea. Why not supplement the positronic pathways with a neural chemical transmitter, similar to the ones found in the human brain? It was, if Polly did say so herself, genius!
Except for one problem. All the neurotransmitters on file would not work >with the mechanical systems of the robot. She would need to find a chemical with a radically different structure and properties. Not being a chemist, Dr. Andrews contacted as many as she could, hoping someone might have a solution to her problem.
That person ended up being Dr. Caroline Lee. She had found an experimental neurotransmitter in the alien plants she was studying, one that could have been perfect for use in Polly's robots. It should have been that simple.
Now every night at dinner, Polly had to watch Caroline's mocking eyes, her smug smile, so full of the knowledge that she held Polly's career in her hands. And she was going to let that career crumble and fall apart, all out of spite.
"How do you force someone to tell you their secrets?" Polly said aloud, talking only to herself.
"Working..." Multivac's melodious voice surprised Dr. Andrews, "Searching historic records...l". Polly almost gave the order for Mulivac to stop searching, but something stopped her. She hadn't meant for Multivac to find a solution to her problem, but maybe the super computer could succeed where she had failed.
"List compiled." The feminine but artificial voice concluded several minutes later.
Looking down at her screen, Dr. Andrews saw hundreds of words streaming down. Most, she saw, named torture methods straight out of the Spanish Inquisition. Tempting, but Multivac would never allow her to actually hurt Dr. Lee, the First Law of Robotics again. Undoubtedly it would order the robots to stop any attempt.
"Mulitvac, remove all items from list that would cause harm to a human being," Polly ordered. The phrase 'cause harm' was a vague one to her, but she knew that Mulitvac would have a very well developed definition of it. She immediately saw everything that could cause even the slightest physical or psychological damage vanish from the list.
What was left? A few con-games that could supposedly trick someone into telling their secret. Dr. Caroline Lee was too smart, too cunning to fall for one of those. There were also some truth-forcing drugs still on the list. The problem with those was that, as a robotics, ordering any of them would be highly suspicious. Unless she could show proof why they were needed in her project, proof she couldn't fake, her request would be denied.
Dr. Andrews almost deleted the entire program before she noticed one oddball still on the list. It was only one word. 'Tickling'.
"Mulitvac," Polly asked confused, "Why is tickling on this list?"
"While tickling does no harm," Mulitvac's contralto voice replied, "And is in fact more strongly connected to the sensations of pleasure. Even so, recipients with a high level of sensitivity often find it irritating and will give much to have it stopped."
"Would it work on Dr. Lee," Polly mumbled to herself, lost in thought. Mulitvac's sensors picked up the barely audible comment, however, and again treated it as a question. This time, Dr. Caroline Lee file appeared on the screen.
There was a picture of her. She was wrapped as usual in a lab coat, any curve or feminine shape her body may have held hidden from view. Caroline's blonde hair was pulled back in a single, unflattering pony-tail. Thick, horn rimmed glasses obscured her eyes. Only her California tan skin showed Caroline might care about her appearance. It was as Dr. Lee looked every day at dinner.
"Almost genderless," Polly commented again, though she would have killed to have that long, yellow hair. She absentmindedly ran her fingers through her own fiery red curls.
Polly pressed a key, and the picture vanished. In its place was Dr. Caroline Lee’s biography. It listed her height as 5'6", her weight as 125 pounds, and her eyes as blue. Below that it mentioned her family, educational background, medical history ad her list of accomplishments. It was one sentence in the medical history that stood out for Polly. It was a short one, one she'd never seen in a personnel report before.
"Sensitivity Rating: Very High."
“Maybe…maybe…” Polly whispered, “This could be just the thing I’ve been looking for. I could…”
She could what? Jump on Dr. Lee and wrestle her to the ground? Pin her down and tickle Caroline silly? She had a PhD in engineering for gods sake! They both had PhDs! It would be ridiculous. Besides, Caroline had six inches and fifteen pounds on her.
No, Polly thought, I won’t humiliate myself. Its bad enough that my career is stumbling. I won’t look like a fool on top of that.
But the doctor kept the thought in the back of her mind, as Multivac knew she would. And when she unexpectedly got a letter the next week from the Bureau of Science Research demanding she show progress on her project or lose all funding, those thoughts jumped to the front of Polly’s mind.
And as she discovered, there really was an engineering answer for every problem.
End Prolgue
