The Warlord Out Of Time M/F-M/F

This is in a Scifi scenario.

The Warlord Out Of Time
A tickling/scifi novel by Mastertank1

He appeared out of nowhere on a foggy day in late 1918. The First World War, called the Great War because the second had not yet been dreamt of, had ended only weeks ago. The docks of the port of Shanghai, recently taken from the former German owners by the Empire of Japan, were being quietly but very completely bought up by a consortium of four wealthy families of Iraqi Jews, fleeing the rising tide of anti-jewish violence there.

None of the world’s people could feel it, but at the moment when that man was first sighted their universe split into two. One was the universe in which that man had not appeared, and it followed the course of history that all the history books in the time he had come from related. The other was brand new, and would be forever different.

Uptime, in 2118 C.E., a screaming tabloid headlines announced;

TERRAFORMING PLANT VANISHES!

The front page story of theft was bizarre; a massive terraforming nanofactory had been taken. This was a mass of submicroscopic machines which could be programmed to assemble anything known to humanity. The work would take place at the level of individual atoms, but with uncountable billions of the little machines manipulating atoms and molecules, assembly could be accomplished with incredible speed.

It took hundreds of thousands of these tiny machines to weigh a single gram, and the stolen factory consisted of 6 tons of coordinated nanites. Intended to convert an entire environmentally hostile planet into a place where the ecology of Earth could be reproduced, it could be reprogrammed to make anything out of anything, but it did have limitations. It could not transmute atoms of one element into those of another.

If you told it to make a sword out of a pile of dirt, it would be very slow going as it sifted the dirt for random iron atoms, and there might not be enough to do the job. If it was dumped on a pile containing all the required elements, in the required amounts, it could create a computer, a statue or an Abrams tank in minutes.

In other places, odd amounts of assorted raw elements were also taken. No one in that time and timeline put it all together, but all the thefts were related. The nanites built a full strength brigade of fully humaniform androids. These androids were distinguishable from real humans only by electronic scanners and by their unshakeable, unreasoning loyalty and obedience to their creator, the man who had stolen all these items and taken them into the past to create an alternate timeline.
Shanghai in 1918 was a city in a state of chaos. It vied with Macao, about a thousand miles away down the Chinese coast, for the dubious title of most corrupt, wide-open major city on earth. From his 22nd century perspective, Matthew Gault, the man who had stolen the artifacts and created a new timeline, Shanghai won, with no real contest.

Macao was a Portuguese colony, and its lawlessness was due to neglect by the government at home. The colonial ministry in Lisbon was concerned only that the fat commercial license fees and trans-shipment taxes keep flowing. As long as that happened, and public order was maintained at least on the surface, any other activities could proceed with no interference from the authorities.

Shanghai was lawless because there was actually no one in charge. It had been a German Imperial colony before the Great War. During that was, the forces of the Japanese Empire had taken the city from the Germans, but now that the fighting was over and peace negotiations in progress, none of the (white) great powers had any intention of letting Japan keep it.

Oh, the funny little yellow men with the odd rising sun flags could have such insignificant places as German Samoa. They could have the odd islands in the Bonins, Gilberts, Marshalls and Marianas which the Kaiser’s sailors had staked out. None of those island chains were really worth very much.

But Shanghai? That was a different story. Shanghai was a major port of import for European and American manufactures being sold to China. It was a major export depot for Chinese products being shipped to Europe and America. It was a lively center of manufacturing and handicrafts. It was worth serious money to anyone who controlled it, and right now the entity which came closest to doing that was the Triad society, a criminal gang among the native Chinese.

By the end of the Great War, there were a number of zones in Shanghai city and it’s hinterland where different nations exerted de facto control, but there was no de jure control at all.

There was a French zone. There was a zone run by German merchants with a private army of deserters from the defunct Imperial army. There was a British zone, and there were Italian and American zones. There was a Japanese zone where, due to the smoldering anger at Japan’s cavalier treatment at the hands of the western nations, no white person was safe alone, even in daylight. There was a Spanish zone, and a Portuguese zone.

There was a Chinese zone where the remnants of the old Imperial beurocracy contended for control with the officials of the new Chinese Nationalist Government. There was a Russian zone where adherents of the Czars fought bloodily with the revolutionary zealots of the Soviet Union for authority. Their fortunes often reflected the ups and downs of the war between the Red and White armies which raged across Siberia.

Underneath the surface of all this violence and turmoil, the triad societies operated in every zone, and collected taxes to spare the residents from most of the random crime and destruction. They were tolerated by the nominal regimes of the various zones, because they often were the only organization acceptable to all parties to act as a go-between in negotiations among multiple hostile groups.

Into the midst of this semi-organized, institutional anarchy came the man who would become known as The Warlord Gault. He showed up out of the fog one night, just after sundown, and took over a rundown, largely depopulated area on the outskirts of the city. The few who lived there were paid well to go elsewhere.

Those who tried to ask for more than the generous amount they were first offered were offered progressively less and less. If they remained obstinate, their meager property was destroyed and they were thrown out with nothing.
That object lesson only had to be taught a few times before the word spread.

By morning, a 100 yard wide swathe around the new warlord’s domain had been flattened by demolishing all the buildings. All of the streets leading into the newly named Gault Quarter were now gated. All the gates were protected by blockhouses, which were manned at all times.

A large area of the city’s agricultural hinterland was being fenced off, the residents paid generously for their land and buildings, and new farmers (androids) taking over. The crop yields would rise by an incredible amount.

Within the urban Gault Quarter, the sounds of ongoing major demolition and construction could be heard beyond the gates. At midmorning, the previous nominal rulers of the section of city, the Soviet revolutionaries, sent a group of armed Russians, supported by local Chinese communists, to threaten dire consequences unless they were compensated for the theft of ‘the people’s’ property. A single carefully targeted shell from a 6 inch mortar wiped out the entire group. Hoses sprayed high pressure water, washing away the remains.

That afternoon, a battalion of several hundred armed communists attacked the new perimeter. They were knocked out with sleeping gas. This seemingly humane response was because Gault, watching on closed circuit TV, had noticed several attractive women among the fighters. Androids in Gault’s uniform ( a dark reddish brown with copper trim) came out, took the good looking women into the fortifications, and cut the throats of the rest.

Within minutes the corpses were being looted. When the looting was done, bulldozers came out and pushed all the bodies out to the farmlands beyond the city, where they were buried.

The following day, the Czarists sent a delegation to parley with the new proprietors of the section. They were hoping that the old adage, ‘the enemy of my enemy is my friend’ meant that they had a new ally. Their delegation, which included a couple of exceptionally lovely women, was admitted on Gault’s orders. They never came out. They never communicated. The Czarist’s hopes had been misplaced.

By June of 1919, the forces of The Warlord Gault had forcibly made it clear that they were the toughest kids on the block. Every single one of the other power blocs in Shanghai, except one, had lost people, territory and valuable property to Gault. His domain now included one fourth of the city, and almost one third of the surrounding farmlands. The losses in people always included at least one beautiful woman taken prisoner. Some of these had been taken by kidnapping expeditions sent specifically after them. The one exception was the Triads; they had not run afoul of Gault’s expansion plans, and so had lost no people. They had no territory they openly claimed as theirs, and so had lost no territory, except that they no longer realized any profits from running gambling, prostitution or opium in The Gault Quarter.

Gault’s people offered a wide variety of gambling in casinos he owned, where the games were said to be more honest and more people won. They had new narcotics that felt better than opium while doing no harm to the user’s health, costing less and lasting longer.

They operated brothels where the girls were kept free of disease by the Warlord’s medical corps. The loveliest, sexiest, most sought after prostitutes in the city competed for places in those brothels, because they were also allowed to keep more of the money they made than any of the other houses permitted.
They were healthy, affluent and happy. These factors brought in the best paying clients.

Petty crime and racketeering simply did not happen in The Gault Quarter. The criminal underworld of Shanghai stood in awe of the vigilance of the Warlord’s police. No sooner did a pickpocket turn to run with a stolen wallet, purse or watch than a policeman’s hand fell on his or her shoulder. The same thing happened to shoplifters and burglars. They were taken in, sentenced by judges who always somehow knew if they had any prior arrests by the Warlord’s police, and put to work on various onerous projects. If they tried to escape, they were always apprehended in minutes. In those cases, the sentence was doubled and started over again, any time already served being lost.

For violent criminals, justice was equally swift and far more drastic. Muggers or robbers were either interrupted in the act or stopped as they tried to leave the scene. Shakedown artists trying to operate the venerable Chinese version of the protection racket were met at the door of the first business they tried to extort money from by police. For them, it was not a hand on the shoulder but a fist in the face which told them they were caught.

These criminals who thought they could make their living by violence or intimidation were never brought to trial. The Warlord’s police publicly, messily and very painfully beat them to death.

The criminals were not in any way restrained or hampered during this process. They were free to defend themselves if they could. They all discovered that they could not.

The Warlord’s police were too strong, too fast, too agile and too skilled for any normal person to stand a chance against them. Those facts were a part of the object lesson, the reason why the beatings took place in public. The word spread very fast.

Effectively, the crime rate in the Gault Quarter was zero. The drug parlors, the gambling clubs, the brothels were all owned by the warlord, and all operated quite openly. They were legal here. Unlike the districts run by the various Chinese factions and foreign nations, there was no pretence at Christian morality, no lip services to the laws of any home country or any creed, no pious pretence that the laws of China were in force.

When the Chinese Imperialist, Nationalist or Communist police tried to enter the Gault Quarter to collect the customary graft from the purveyors of vice, they were denied entry if in uniform. If they entered in plain clothes and then tried to demand graft, they were treated like any other protection racketeer, and beaten to death in public, in a fair fight. If they were armed and tried to use weapons, they were shot down like vermin, and the headquarters of the police force they came from was razed in retaliation. Challenges ended very quickly, and no more came.

Everyone in the city was amazed at the seemingly ubiquitous eyes and ears of Gault’s police. They assumed that he must have a vast network of spies. They were, of course, quite unaware of 23rd century surveillance technology. Gault’s police did have eyes and ears everywhere; however, they were electronic rather than flesh and blood.

The Triads (the native Chinese crime syndicate) were very angry; they no longer drew any profit at all from the part of Shanghai that the Warlord controlled, and that part seemed to grow to include more of the city every day. The Triads were also cautious; they seen the fate of everyone else who challenged the Warlord. No one, not even major powers, had enjoyed any success against Gault at all. Reluctantly, they decided not to fight Gault until and unless he gave them no choice. That time was coming, and it would happen because of a woman.

Gault had gone into the past and created a new timeline for a reason; to create conditions which allowed him to indulge his unusual sexual proclivities. Desires which society in his own time and place regarded as bizarre and a bit repugnant.

Gault moved around the city freely, accompanied and protected at all times by a crew of 16 android bodyguards. Only he knew they were androids. Four of them were built as large, imposing European males. They were obviously with Gault, and very obviously bodyguards.

The rest were a mixture. They were formed and dressed as a variety of eastern races; Chinese, Japanese, Malay, Lascar, Khmer, Thai, Hindi, Phillipino. They were physically smaller than the four blatant bodyguards, and four of them were apparently women. They had been required to foil assassination attempts three times, and each time all had been reshaped into new characters by the nanofactory, so that no attacker could ever no exactly who in the ever shifting crowds was there to defend Gault.

Gault was a large, imposing figure himself. He stood 6’3” and weighed 325 pounds, yet he moved with an animal grace that told the keen observer that a great mass of well toned muscle was concealed under the fat. He had an arresting, intimidating presence. His shoulders were broad, his chest deep, and his limbs thick.

His leonine head of hair was a deep chestnut brown, matching his eyes, brows, moustache and full, silky beard. All except the eyes were lightly frosted with iron grey. His complexion was ruddy, his demeanor vigorous and healthy. He seemed to have a tangible aura of vitality and masculinity.

He wore impeccably tailored 3 piece suits when ever he went out, with a matching hat and a fire-hardened hickory walking stick with a large head of solid bronze. He wore eight large, heavy, deeply carved silver rings, one for each finger save the thumbs. On one occasion, when the would be assassins were very numerous, he had demonstrated most convincingly that he was amply capable of defending himself when required.

For recreation, he was working his way through the upper class gambling halls and brothels of Shanghai. His implanted electronics told him at once if a gambling device was dishonest in any way, and gave him the ability to counteract the cheating at will. At gambling he won steadily, but not in excessive amounts. The story had gotten about that he liked to restrain the courtesans he hired and tickle them to the brink of insanity, or perhaps a little beyond that point, before taking his pleasure. After, he was said to bestow immense gratuities in compensation for the girl’s ordeal.

On this particular evening, Gault chose to sample the delights of an establishment which titled itself; Ruby Foo’s Den Of Iniquity. It combined an exceptionally elegant gambling casino, a palatial brothel inhabited by women of surpassing loveliness, and a luxurious parlor dedicated to the consumption of the purest opium to be had anywhere.

Gault had no interest in the opium, but intended to enjoy the casino and brothel to the full. He entered, accompanied by his normal entourage. As soon as the doorman reported that the Warlord Gault had entered, Ruby Foo herself came down from her observational eyrie above the gambling floor to greet so important a guest.

At his first sight of her, Gault caught his breath. She was quite simply the most beautiful woman he had ever seen. Ruby was tiny, standing only 5 feet tall. She weighed about 80 pounds, and it was distributed perfectly. Her womanly curves were remarkable in such a diminutive person.

The beauty of her face was simply breathtaking. Her hair was that deep, deep blue/black found in certain Chinese, her complexion the color of the finest white bisque porcelain, but naturally so, with no paint or makeup. Her very slightly tilted almond shaped eyes were a similar jet black.

Her long, pointed nails were lacquered a deep red, which matched her doubly hip-split, tightly form fitting cheongsam style dress. When she walked, the rippling of the fabric alternately exposed and concealed two perfect legs, and the fact that her exquisite, tiny feet were shod only in deep crimson sandals, high heeled, held on by only a single thin strap across the foot just below the ankle. Her arches were almost impossibly high, her feet short and wide for their size. Her toenails were painted to match the fingernails.

She approached Gault just inside the lobby; “Hello, Warlord Gault. I am Ruby Foo. Allow me to welcome you to my humble establishment. It will be our pleasure to serve yours.”

“Madame Foo, I consider myself an expert on precious stones. In all my days, I have never set eyes upon a ruby, or any other stone, of such heart stopping beauty as yours! I hope I’m not being too forward in stating that I find you exquisite.”

To her own surprise, the highly experienced female Triad commander found herself blushing at praise which, while extravagant, also seemed to be quite sincere. The one thing she had little experience with was sincerity!

“What may we do for you this evening, kind sir?”

“At the risk of indelicacy, is there any possibly of spending the evening with you? Any fee you care to name, I will cheerfully meet.”

“Truly, Warlord? I don’t believe that. What if I were to name a fee of 100,000 sterling? Would you cheerfully meet that?”

“Will you accept it in diamonds, or must I send for gold?”

Now she was truly flustered. The sum she had named was the income of a small kingdom for a year! She almost stuttered as she said; “I’m sorry sir. I was only joking.”

“I was not. I can have such a sum here, in Gold or jewels, within two hours. Of course, I would expect more than just one night for that fee.”

“I had no intention of misleading you. I am not available in that way. For any price, to any man. I have never given myself to any man, for any reason. I never intend to. Once a man has had a woman carnally, he always thinks she is his. I shall never give any man the excuse to think that of me!”

“Madame, I must and will have you, one way or another. But that may take time. For tonight, I shall patronize your gaming tables.”

“Do not underestimate my powers to resist, sir. I am not just a woman alone. Behind me stands all the power of the Triad Society!”

“So I understand. The Triad Society, the only power in Shanghai that has never openly challenged me. I know you are biding your time. You still think that the clandestine nature of your organization, the hidden aspect of your power, will give you the means to defeat me where all others have failed. You are quite wrong, but I know you will never believe that until you have tried and failed. So be it.”

Gault wandered in among the tables, keenly observing. He left in his wake an angry and unaccustomedly flustered Ruby Foo. She retired to her observation nest near the domed ceiling to steam in private.

Gault, meanwhile, was carefully noting the fact that the only games in the place which were not discreetly rigged were those in which the patrons played against each other while the house took a small percentage. He also came up with ways to defeat the rigging with remote electronic methods. Then, he returned to his own quarters.

When Gault returned the next evening, he went straight to the cashier’s cages and purchased 10,000 pounds sterling worth of chips. He noticed that Ruby did not greet him this time. Then he went to the high limit roulette wheel.

Gault took a seat, and placed a maximum bet of 1000. Using his electronics, he made that number win. He was far too clever to win every bet, but with a payoff of 36 to 1 he didn’t have to. He varied it. Betting the same amount every time, he won once in each seven to ten spins. By the end of the evening, he was ahead by nearly a million. When he left, the cashier, with great embarrassment, whispered that they did not have that much cash on hand. Gault told the man to establish an account for him, and said he would be back the next day.

And so he was. Day after day, Gault ran up the amount in his account. He knew that he had vastly exceeded Madame Foo’s ability to pay. She would have to go to the Triad Society, hat in hand, and offer them a larger portion of her profits in perpetuity in return for their payment of her debt.

Ruby would not like doing that. Matthew intended to negotiate with the central council of the Triad Society before she did. If his negotiations had the result he expected, Ruby would find the results of her appeal to her council superiors even more of an ordeal than she expected. In the meanwhile, until he demanded payment, she would continue to hope that his incredible winning streak would end, and that he would lose back what he had won.

Matthew arranged a meeting with the central council of the Ghost Wind Triad. He brought with him the written accounting of the monies owed to him by the casino of Ruby Foo’s Den, validated with Ruby’s seal and chop. Earlier that day, he had sent a message to Ruby to inform her that he wished to cash out his account.

As soon as she received the cash out demand, Ruby also asked for a meeting with the council. She planned on offering 50% of her share of the profits of all the operations of the Den until the 32,500,000 pounds sterling debt owed to Gault was paid off. She realized that would take close to five years, and she was prepared to negotiate up to 75% to shorten the time.

When she was told to sit in the waiting room instead of being ushered right in, she became nervous. When Gault passed her in the entryway, going out as she was entering the council chamber, her heart sank. She suspected Gault had made a deal with the council that she wouldn’t like.

Ruby calculated that despite the esteem in which the council held her, they would sell her to Gault if he offered to take her instead of 5 million of the monies owed her. She figured the council would initially ask for an exchange rate of 1 million per year, but might negotiate down to as long as seven years that she would have to serve the Warlord. After that, she would have to assert herself ruthlessly to regain the respect she had enjoyed until now.

When Ruby entered the chamber, she expected a calligrapher to be present who would inscribe the date of completion of her indenture on the back of her right hand. When she saw a tattoo artist instead of the expected calligrapher her heart sank. She was shocked, dismayed and horrified. She knew what it meant. Numb inside, she sank bonelessly into the seat on her side of the table.

The leader of the council spoke; ‘The warlord began the negotiations with an offer so attractive, so generous, that we were stunned, and almost accepted it as stated.”

In a tiny voice, Ruby asked; “Wh---what did he offer?”

“His first offer was to forgive 22 million of the debt in return for possession of your person for 25 years.”

“You of course asked more for less, just for form’s sake?”

“We did. Of course. It would have dishonored us, and him, to do less. Our counteroffer was 18 years for 27 million pounds.”

“And his counter offer?”

“The Warlord Gault’s counteroffer was so generous, we could do nothing else but accept it.”

“What was this generous offer?”

“The honored Warlord offered to forgive the entire debt, all 32 and a half million sterling, and also never to let anyone know that he had been forced to counter dishonest games in the casino of your den in order to win. This was desirable for two reasons, of course.

First. It saved us the loss of face involved in having it publicly known that we ran dishonest games of chance. Second, it saved us the even greater loss of face that would have come with having it known that someone had defeated the rigging of our dishonest games.

Then he offered the final sweetener; the thing that made it impossible for us to even pretend to negotiate any longer. He said that if his borders expanded farther in the future, he would allow any operations of ours in his newly acquired territories to continue to do business unmolested, instead of shutting them down the way he has in all the territory he has taken to date.”

“That was.....exceedingly generous. You had to accept, of course. And what exactly did he ask in return?”

“I’m sure you have realized what that was. You knew as soon as you saw the tattooist. He asked for your permanent, lifelong enslavement to his personal service, and that of his heirs. The ideograms for slave and forever will be tattooed on the back of your left hand. The artist knows that for a woman of such immense value, he must make the mark as elegant and beautiful as he possibly can. The work will be performed now.”

Ruby exerted all her willpower to ignore the pain and hold perfectly still. It took a lot. The traditional tattooing method was extremely painful. The needle was split bamboo. It was dipped in the ink and then tapped into her skin with a small hammer for each dot of color. Every few dots, the needle had to be resharpened by cutting off a diagonal slice of the bamboo. When the remainder got too small, they discarded it and sliced a new one.

It took nearly two hours to inscribe the two small characters. She remained expressionless throughout, honoring herself, her clan, her teachers and her mentor. The council members were impressed, and sorry to be losing her, but business was business.

When the tattoo was done, Gault was called back into the council chamber. Ruby showed him her hand. He brushed a thumb across the inscription, and the residual pain vanished. He had sent a small part of his resident nanodoctor into her hand to heal the damage and eliminate the cause of the pain, then recovered it. That startled her.

A large, armored luxury car was waiting for him outside. It was convoyed by a half dozen military armored cars. Even though she was now his property, he handed Ruby into the back of the car like an honored guest. By his demeanor, he was not mocking her either. She was bemused by his behavior. In a way, the impossibly huge sum and consideration he had paid to own her did her honor. She could not decide on the proper attitude to take. Hostility did not seem to be called for, under the extremely odd circumstances.

The convoy drove on through the huge, ancient city. The contrasts of wealth and elegance cheek by jowl with poverty and squalor always shocked newcomers, but Ruby had grown up with it and accepted it as normal. Gault gazed out the window, now and then ruefully shaking his head at what he saw.

It was obvious when they crossed into the part of the city that Gault controlled. As they crossed an invisible line, there was a sea change in the nature of the city. Everything was cleaner, in better repair, more cared for.

As they penetrated deeper, reaching areas that been Gault’s for a longer time, the streets were actually wider. The sidewalks were wider, with room for the vendor’s stalls without forcing pedestrians into the gutter. Buildings of architectural or artistic value had actually been moved to widen the thoroughfares. Those that were not of value had been demolished and rebuilt.

There was even a visible difference in the people. The poor were less desperately poverty stricken. The rich were less blatant in their displays of wealth. All, rich and poor, appeared stronger and healthier. Ruby had never visited the Warlord’s domain since he had taken it over. She kept sneaking sidelong glances at him. She began to respect him in spite of herself.

Western barbarian though he clearly was, this was a ruler who took good care of those who passed under his rule. His motives might be no more altruistic than those of a swineherd who took good care of his hogs, but the recipients of that care benefited from it none the less.

They approached the wall around the square mile he had occupied by raw force the night he arrived. The original buildings had all been taken down. The wall that stood in their place towered 160 feet high, easily overtopping every building in the district. It was made out of heavily steel-reinforced concrete. The wall bristled with casemated machine guns, light and medium cannon. The top of the wall was capped with turrets such as one might see on a Dreadnought class battleship, and were armed with guns of similar caliber.

The convoy slowed not at all as it approached the huge gate, called the Gate Of The Bear for the painted high relief sculpture that occupied the wall above it. The two mighty valves of the gate opened between the hind legs of the rearing bear, which had bared its teeth and claws in a threat display. It was a magnificent work of art in it’s own right, amazingly lifelike.

Rather than swinging inward or outward, the gates slid straight back into the wall to either side of the opening. The convoy went though with no need to slow, or to change formation in any way. Staring in open wonder, Ruby realized that the walls were incredibly thick.

Roughly 100 feet in, the convoy made a wide turn 90 degrees to the right. They proceeded in this direction for another 100 feet before turning 90 degrees to the left. At regular 100 foot intervals, the tunnel made another 90 degree turn to the left and then one to the right again. Ruby realized that the turns were a defense measure. The tunnel was now proceeding along the same route it would have followed if there had been no turns.

At the inner end of the tunnel, 400 feet from the outer end, there was a second set of gates, just as large as the outer ones. Looking to the sides, Ruby saw that the gate tunnel was contained within a tower 320 feet high, 400 feet deep and 600 feet wide. The main wall was only 200 feet thick.

Then they drew away from the gate tower, and Ruby noticed something that surprised her into a highly uncharacteristic, girlish giggle. The inner wall of the gate tower bore a high relief sculpture that was the mate of the one on the outer wall; the inner gates stood between the hind legs of the same standing bear, only seen from behind!

Glancing at Gault, she saw him grin with pleasure that she had seen and gotten the joke. For the first time, Ruby allowed herself a hope, a very tiny one but still a hope, that life as this man’s slave might not be an entirely horrible experience after all.

Looking out the front windshield again, Ruby was once again surprised. The entire mile square of city within the wall had been razed, the foundations filled in and the ground landscaped! There were gardens, and meadows, and flowerbeds. There were groves and orchards. There were ponds, and streams, and lakes. There were foot bridges and road bridges.

At the center of all was a man made hill, occupying a half mile square, one quarter of the enclosed area. On top of that hill sat a squat, imposing, intimidating fortress of steel and concrete and granite. The guns it was armed with were larger and more densely sited than those of the outer wall. A further height of hill rose from the top of this fortress, and on top of that hill stood a palace of breathtaking, ethereal beauty.

The distance from the outer wall to the fortress was divided into three equal segments by two circumferential roads. Where the road from the Bear Gate crossed these, the circumferential roads dove under the gate road in tunnels.

There were three other gates with three similar roads, one for each cardinal point of the compass. The Bear gate was the southern access. To the north was the Tiger Gate, to the west the Dragon Gate, to the east the Wolf Gate. Each was decorated with painted high relief sculptures of the appropriate beasts.

Gault had decreed these arrangements. His thinking was to have the northern Bear face the south, the southern Tiger face the north. In similar fashion the eastern Dragon faced the west while the western Wolf faced the east.

As the convoy drew near the central hill, Ruby saw that the road did not enter the wall of the fortress, bur rather plunged into a massive block of concrete and steel which protruded from the hill just below the fortress wall. The front of this blockhouse was sculpted into the gape-mouthed head of a monstrous bear.

When the convoy approached the huge head, the jaws opened wide, revealing a pair of steel doors. These parted sideways, just like the gates in the outer wall. Now at last slowing, the convoy plunged into the maw of the bear.

The tunnel behind the bear’s head gave onto a vast, echoing space with a 40 foot high ceiling. The military cars dispersed to the left and right, while the limousine kept on straight toward a central pillar 400 feet wide. The space was illuminated by electric lights, as bright as summer daylight.

The car slowed as it neared the pillar, and another set of doors opened. Large enough to admit the car, or for that matter a much larger truck, or a railroad car if required, they were still far smaller than the other sets they had passed.

The car rolled to a stop in the center of a room about 100 feet wide by 120 feet deep, by about 30 feet high. The doors closed behind them, and the room began to move upward. Ruby was stunned. She had ridden in elevators in upscale buildings in Shanghai. She had even owned one, in the residential rear area of the Den. But never had she heard of one this immense!

When the elevator stopped rising, Ruby judged they were in the lower levels of the palace atop the fortress. A door opened opposite the one they had entered by. They drove through into a large but normal looking garage. Gault got out of the car and walked around to Ruby’s side. He opened the door and handed her out, and then took her into a normally sized but very luxuriously and tastefully decorated passenger elevator.

Gault pressed a button marked ‘Penthouse Top’. The doors closed, the car rose smoothly. There seemed to be a very long distance to the next level up, but after that they came at normal intervals. Ruby lost count of the number of floors they passed.

When the elevator slowed and stopped, the inner and outer doors opened on a magnificent entry parlor. The carpet, the furniture, the lighting, the decor, all were amazingly lovely.

To the left was a plain door of richly grained wood marked ‘Servant’s Wing’. Right ahead was a beautifully carved double door marked ‘Warlord’s Chambers’. To the right was a more ornate door marked ‘Concubine’s Wing’.

Taking Ruby by the hand, Matthew conducted her to that third door, the one on the right. Opening it wide, he ushered her into a wide, luxurious hallway, and thence through an open door to a huge bedroom, furnished with an evident feminine sensibility. It resembled, in fact, the bedroom Ruby had slept in, in her own quarters at the Den. Only everything was made from finer materials, and with immensely superior craftsmanship. With a broad smile, Gault told her; “Welcome indeed, most ardently desired of slaves. Welcome to your new home!”

Matthew continued to surprise Ruby, again and again. She had assumed that he would begin to use her for his own sexual pleasure as soon as he got her home. Instead, he had dinner with her and then sent her to her room to get a night’s rest.

The following morning, Gault breakfasted with Ruby, then took her to his medical staff. After ascertaining that they remembered and fully understood the instructions he had given them regarding Ruby, Gault left her with them. She had no way of knowing that these highly competent women were all androids.

They weighed and measured her in a hundred ways, or so it seemed to Ruby. Then they administered a number of drugs , orally and by injection. They informed Ruby that she was now immune to a number of deadly diseases that were quite common in that place and time. They prescribed a diet, and informed the house nutritionist what that was.

For the rest of that day, Ruby was conducted on a tour of the Warlord’s quarters. She was amazed again and again, sometimes by the beauty he surrounded himself with, sometimes by the technological marvels he employed. For the first time, she began to understand how the Warlord’s police accomplished seeming to be both omnipresent and omniscient.

She dined with Gault at dinner time, and he behaved politely enough while making it clear, by little touches here and there, that yes, she was his property and he had an absolute right to caress and tease her if he so chose. After dinner they sat on a divan in front of a fireplace, watching the fire, conversing, and listening to recorded music of such quality she found it hard to believe that there was not a hidden room with a live orchestra hidden behind a tapestry.

Gault took her slim ankles in one big hand, removed her slippers with the other, and placed her bare feet in his lap. As they continued to talk, he began to caress her tiny feet and toes. Ruby strove with all her will power to control her reactions, but started to giggle at once. Once she had started to giggle, Matthew began to deliberately tickle her. Soon she was laughing uncontrollably, futile trying to squirm her little ankles out of his powerful hand. That hand never squeezed or bore down, it was simply as immovable as if made of iron.

After forcing Ruby to laugh helplessly for nearly 15 minutes, Gault took his hands off of her feet. He seized her by the hips, lifted her as though she weighed nothing at all and set her on her feet on the carpet between his tree trunk like legs. He kissed her on the lips in a very sensual manner, and to her amazement, sent her off to bed alone.

As she lay in the comfortable bed, Ruby reflected on the fact that The Warlord’s gentle tickling, teasing touches and his goodnight kiss had aroused her deeply. She was very surprised to realize that she had actually been disappointed that he sent her to bed alone. What had happened to her rejection of heterosexual sex because of the aspects of male dominance and female submission that seemed to with it?

Well, to be honest, in Gault’s case her principle objection no longer applied. She had avoided sex with men because once they had sex with a woman they seemed to think and act as if they owned her. But Gault DID own her! She was his property. She had allowed herself sexual pleasure with other women, and was surprised to find that she was actually eager to discover what it felt like with a man. She was fascinated by the fact that his deliberate tickling of her feet had not only excited her sexually, it had also filled her with the strangest feelings of submissiveness. She was still trying to analyze her reactions to his tickling when she fell asleep.

On her second morning in Gault’s possession, Ruby was taken back to the medical wing. There, she was given a large intravenous infusion which took more than two hours to complete. They told her that this would improve her overall health immensely, prolong her life, make her stronger and increase the acuity of her senses. It would also make changes in her system which they did not tell her about.

The diet she was now required to eat, for only the next two weeks she was told, was rich in certain types of proteins. In particular, the kind needed to build nerve tissue, although that information was not shared with Ruby. They did tell her that the transfusion of medications would take about two weeks to complete its work, and during that time she would avoid any physical stress. For this reason, Gault would not touch her during that time.

For the next two weeks, Gault summoned Ruby to have lunch or dinner with him every day. He seemed to enjoy her company even though he did not touch her. She was again oddly disappointed, but thought she knew the reason. Actually, he did not want her to become aware of some of the changes that were taking place in her tactile nerves. These changes would not become evident unless there was direct skin to skin contact between them, because they were activated by contact with Gault’s DNA.

The truth was that the medical androids had created a nanodoctor specifically for Ruby, based on the tissue samples they had taken the first day. In addition to all the genuine health benefits Ruby had been informed of, the nanodoctor would grow large numbers of brand new tactile nerve endings and connectors, concentrated in certain key areas.

These new nerve endings would normally lie dormant, having no effect. They would only become active when her skin was touched by that of Matthew Gault. As soon as that happened, all the new nerve endings would come to life within two or three minutes. The effects, when she finally experienced them, would be extreme.

In the first place, her entire body, every square millimeter of skin, would respond to Matthew’s touch with twice the intensity that she would feel from an identical touch by any other person or thing. Whatever he chose to make her feel, pain, pleasure, arousal, sensuality, comfort or tickling, would be twice as vivid because he was doing it.

That was only the start of the matter, however. The key alteration consisted of four new primary erogenous zones which had been created on and in Ruby’s person, and which would always be dormant unless activated by contact of Matthew’s skin with hers. The first one was the entire inner surface of her vagina. Normally one of the parts of the body most sparsely supplied with nerve endings, when the new nerves were activated by Matthew’s DNA this area would have as many active nerve endings PER SQUARE CENTIMETER as Ruby’s clitoris did. The point is, the number of square centimeters on the inner surface of the vagina was much, much larger than the number of square centimeters on the surface of the clit!

All these new nerve endings had the same direct connections leading to the pleasure center and the center of sexual arousal in the brain as the natural clitoral nerves did. The same was true of the other new primary erogenous zones.

One of these included Ruby’s lips, her tongue and the entire inside of her mouth. The other two were located to cater to Matthew’s favorite fetish; they encompassed the tips, pads, stems and sides of all ten of Ruby’s delectable little toes. They also included the entire bottoms of both tiny feet, including the heels, the greater and lesser balls of the feet, the creases between them, the flats of both soles, and the amazingly high arches.

In the case of these last two areas, the ticklishness would also be specifically increased by a factor of three, and not evenly. Gault’s favorite areas to tickle would be made both progressively more ticklish and more erotically responsive in direct relation to how ticklish each spot was made.

Ruby knew none of these arcane details. She did notice that as the two weeks passed, the shape of her body remained unchanged, but the flesh became firmer, the muscles stronger and healthier, the skin tone and color even finer, the skin smoother and softer to the touch. Her hair felt stronger, thicker, smoother and had a higher gloss and shine, and more and brighter blue highlights in the now deeper black. The black color in her eyes seemed more vivid and rich than before. Her lips and tongue were a more intense natural pink. She felt sexier, more feminine, and more generally attractive than she ever had in her life. In fact, she was.

Ruby found herself with seemingly boundless energy and vitality. She began to wander about the concubine’s wing at night, just exploring. She met the other women who had been chosen to serve Gault’s pleasure. She got to know them, and began to have long conversations with them.

Ruby seemed to get along best with five of them. The first was Liel, a tall and statuesque blonde girl from the eastern counties of southern England, the second Joan, a small and slim brunette from Wales. Both had been visiting the British commercial legations in Shanghai, and Gault’s men had taken them captive as part of his retaliation after a British attempt to take back territory he had claimed failed.

The third girl was Alexis, a tall and voluptuous brunette beauty who had been part of the White Russian delegation that had futilely tried to negotiate an alliance with Gault after he had dealt so harshly with the Reds. Alexis came of the aristocratic stock that had ruled in Russia for a thousand years, and represented one of Gault’s favorite physical types. None of the men in her delegation had lived

The fourth girl was Myoko, a lovely Japanese girl of middle height with dark brown hair. Myoko came of sturdy peasant stock. Her family were hereditary pearl divers. She was trim and athletic. She had been in Shanghai with her mother, several Aunts, sisters and cousins in order to sell a large collection of fine pearls in the most profitable market. They were present at the time when Gault chose to take over part of the Japanese zone of influence. The Japanese had been warned not resist, but they tried anyway. As punishment, several young women had been taken captive. Some had been ransomed, some assigned to various duties in Gault’s organization. Myoko he had chosen to keep for himself.

The fifth of these girls was Nina, a classic Jewish beauty. She was tall, statuesque, and incredibly lovely of face. She was the final ‘sweetener’ that allowed the four Iraqi Jewish families who had bought up the Shanghai waterfront to obtain the protection and noninterference of the Warlord Gault at a cost so nominal they were stunned when he named it.

Then, when he named Nina as part of the bargain., they inquired what the price would be if she was not included. It was so steep it terrified them. They went to Nina and asked her if she would agree.

Because the protection of so mighty a power was so vital to her people, and because the price if she were not a part of the bargain would have made them all essentially Gault’s employees, she agreed. There was also the fact that they all, including Nina, were very aware that the Warlord could simply have taken her if he chose to.

Due to this bargain, Nina alone was present in the women’s quarters as a free concubine rather than a slave. At any time, she could choose to walk out and return to her people, but if she did they would have to begin paying a huge percentage of their income for the protection they now enjoyed almost for free.
Nina, by her own admission, ceased even to think about leaving after her first few nights with Gault. She no longer wanted to be in any place where he was not present.

In her wandering, Ruby found that the door connecting the Concubine’s Wing with the parlor was never locked. The door from the parlor to the Warlord’s Chambers was never locked either. She had circumspectly explored, but always taken care not to be seen. She didn’t know how Gault might react to her wanderings, and wasn’t sure she wanted to find out.

Ruby knew that every evening one of the women in the Concubine’s Wing was summoned to spend the night with the Warlord. They had never been willing to go into detail about what Gault did with them.

On one point they all agreed; whatever it was that he did to and with them, they really enjoyed it. They all complained that the Warlord had too many girls, so that no one girl got to be with him as often as they wanted to. Ruby had asked if any of them liked Gault’s attentions so much that they would like to be his only girl, and be with him every night. Every one of them said yes, they would. They said it enthusiastically too. Ruby was pleased to learn this.

One night, late, five days before her two week adjustment period was slated to end, Ruby got restless again. This night Myoko had been chosen to be with Gault. Ruby decided to go for another nocturnal wander in Gault’s chambers.

She peered in wonder at his personal workshop, his art studio, his office, his library. She saw his music room, his smoking room, his card room, his game room. She saw a fully equipped gymnasium, and something she recognized as a martial arts dojo. She saw an extensive armory, filled with both modern and antique weapons.

Hesitantly, she opened the unlocked door of his bedchamber and looked inside. It was immense, and furnished in a massive, totally masculine manner that surely fit his personality. There were three doors in the wall to the right. The one nearest the door she had entered by led to a dressing room, with an impressive selection of casually elegant clothing for all occasions. There was clothing for all seasons, conditions and activities.

Back in the bedroom, she tried the farthest door, but found it locked. It bore the legend; ‘Fungeon’. Sounded like a blending of fun and dungeon. She remembered that there had been a door in the dressing room which seemed to lead into the same place as the middle door. Approaching the middle door she found it open, and found an elaborate bathroom behind it.

She saw a large spa tub, a sitz bath, a large shower stall with seats, a pair of crappers with privacy curtains, a bidet and two sinks. She also saw two other doors. One led into the dressing room she had looked at before, as she had expected. The other was positioned to open into the room with the locked door. The ‘Fungeon’. She tried it, and it opened. There were hanging light and sound baffles inside. She hastily turned of the lights in the bathroom and turned back to the open door. Then she heard it; the muffled sound of Myoko’s voice. Ruby couldn’t quite make out words, but the tone of Myoko’s voice sounded happy and excited. The cadence and spacing of the words sounded like begging. What an odd combination!

Then Ruby heard the unmistakable sound of Myoko loudly giggling. Ruby thrust her head through the baffles, and the sound became louder.

Myoko stood 5’6” and weighed about 120. She had a classically lovely, typically Japanese face, and shoulder length medium brown hair that was straight until the last inch curled under and in. Her eyes were slightly almond shaped, slightly tilted, and a deep, rich brown. Her complexion was the color of old ivory, when it’s gotten old enough to pick up that slight, almost yellow patina but had not really turned yellow. It was smooth and unblemished as fine silk. Her feet were a size 5 wide, with short, rounded little toes and high arches.

The room was remarkable. It was a very exact simulation of a middle ages dungeon somewhere in Europe, with one exception; the entire place was clean. Meticulously, white glove kind of clean. A white glove inspection would not find a speck of dust anywhere. This was known, because the chief housekeeper had given it just such an inspection less then 30 minutes before Gault brought Myoko in to play.

Ruby slowly crept all the way inside the dungeon, to where she could hear more clearly. The floor and walls were of gray stone, the ceiling of stout planks reinforced by massive timber rafters. The lighting came from a fire in a vast stone fireplace along one wall and a dozen torches of carefully wrapped rags soaked in bitumen oil blazing merrily on the walls.

Unlike the original it was copied from, this dungeon was comfortably warm, heated by steam pipes just under the stone of the floor and walls. Also unlike the original, this room was dry, not dripping with moisture like the European dungeons it was made to resemble, and this one was well ventilated with clean, fresh air.

As she slowly drew near, Ruby heard Matthew speaking; “Now let’s see. Hmmm. Which of these fearsome implements shall I bind you with today, little slave.”

Myoko said; “Master, I have tried to be a good girl since the last time. I’ve tried very hard.”

“Yes, you have my sweet slave. You have been a very good girl.”

“Then, Master, may I ask you to please use the web this time? I really enjoy being bound in the web!”

“Do you now? Do you then imagine me as a big, hairy spider creeping up to devour you?”

Myoko squealed happily; “Yes, Master! Yes, that is it exactly! You are the spider and I am the fly who will find herself consumed by your teasing touch! Oh, Master, Yes! Please?”

Smiling indulgently, Matthew said; “Alright Myoko. This time, I will indulge you. But don’t get accustomed to that! If you even ask next time, I will choose something I know you don’t like to remind you just who is in charge here!”

“Oh, my dear Master, never could I forget! You are in charge! Nor would I have it any other way, even if I could!”

Gault smiled again, then he kissed Myoko. Ruby was close enough now that she could see clearly the Myoko’s body responded with, deep, hard arousal. Ruby was surprised. She thought that Myoko must really have lost her heart to her owner if she reacted that strongly to simple kiss.

Matt conducted Myoko to a rear corner of the dungeon, away from the fireplace. He took a torch from its sconce and lit two more, one on the wall to either side of this dark corner. As Matt put the first torch back where he took it from, the new light revealed that corner was cut off from the main area of the room by a symmetrical spiderweblike structure. It was made out of heavy, shaggy, soft surfaced hemp ropes. There were 8 straight strands, each anchored at both ends to heavy ringbolts sunken into the wall. These formed a sixteen pointed asterisk. These strands were each almost 3 inches thick.

The weblike appearance came from 8 concentric circles of lighter, thinner 1 inch ropes. These to were soft surfaced and shaggy, and they had been threaded right through the middles of the heavier ropes, apparently using a marlinspike to separate the individual strands of the heavier ropes without cutting the fibers. All the intersections of ropes had broad leather straps dangling, while a profusion of strings of varying thicknesses hung from all parts of the ropes.

At a wave of Matt’s hand, Myoko hastily doffed her kimono and stood proudly naked before her owner’s gaze. Brazenly, she did a slow full turn, giving him a good look from every angle. She returned his broad grin. Matt mock growled; “Brazen wench! Come here, you!”

Matt seized Myoko by her shapely hips. Lifting her as easily as if she were weightless , he turned and placed her in the web, her lovely buttocks resting on one of the horizontal strands of rope while the vertical heavy rope ran right up the crack between them. She gasped and looked startled at first, then slyly grinned at her master.

Matt grasped Myoko’s wrists and extended them up and out. He wrapped the fingers of each of her hands around a heavy diagonal rope and fastened them there by wrapping a strap around each hand of fingers, wrists and ropes. He also wrapped straps around each upper arm, closer to the shoulder than the elbow.

Then Matt grasped Myoko’s exquisite thighs and spread them. He did not press them into a full 180 degree split, which he felt would be uncomfortable, but he did make an angle of 165 degrees between them, leaving her very exposed. As he did this, Matt bent Myoko’s legs at the knees, fitting her feet and lower legs through the openings of the web. The inner side of each knee rested firmly on a light rope just before it bent to angle upward. They were fastened by wrapping straps around each leg just above the knee.

Reaching through the web, Matt bent Myoko’s knees farther, but not uncomfortably. He threaded her shapely little feet back through the web to the front, then attached them to the web by wrapping straps around her lower calves and shins.

When Myoko saucily wiggled her pretty feet around, Matt grinned at her wickedly. He grasped them and fastened each toe separately to the ropes with ten of the dangling strings. He wrapped the strings around the stem of each toe starting just at the base and continuing around toe and rope till just below the pads. This method would prevent Myoko from hurting herself when she inevitably, and quite involuntarily, began trying to move her feet around.

In her final position, Myoko’s feet were alongside her womanly hips. Her soles were facing forward and upward. The strings around her toe stems kept her feet in a position of having the balls of the feet pointed. This maximized the depth of her arches. Her toes, each fastened in place on it’s own, were both flexed back, which stretched the skin of her foot bottoms tight, and splayed apart. This exposed the tender skin between them very nicely.

Myoko’s eyes were now closely following Matt’s every move. When he reached out with both hands and firmly caressed every inch of her, head to toe, Myoko’s delicious body arched in delight, and she cried out in obvious pleasure.

Matt kissed Myoko; a long, deep, warm, sensual kiss. When he broke it and stepped back, Myoko was visibly quivering with the intensity of her aroused desire. Grinning that wicked grin, which Ruby found devastatingly excited even when it was not directed at her, Matthew reached out to Myoko again.

This time, to Ruby’s utter shock, Matt began to tickle Myoko’s ribs! Myoko sucked in a deep breath, which emerged as a loud peal of wild, helpless laughter. Then she did it again, and again, and again. Her visible arousal kept growing.

Judging by the tone of her laughter and the reactions of her body, Myoko was clearly enjoying this. Ruby was puzzled. In China, tickling was traditionally used as a form of torture, either for interrogation or punishment. But Myoko was reveling in it!

Ruby was fascinated, and incautiously kept edging closer to see better. Matt saw her from the corner of his eye, and grinned to himself. He ignored Ruby’s presence, thinking that she would be dealt with at the appropriate time for her disobedience.

Meanwhile, there was another lovely woman to enjoy, and she deserved his undivided attention! Putting Ruby and her unauthorized presence out of his mind, he concentrated on increasing Myoko’s happy agony.

Matt went from tickling Myoko’s ribs to teasing the soft curves of her flanks. He loved the way this made her undulate from side to side while she helplessly laughed. Her face was so lovely, lit up with the forced mirth of tickling!

Matt was fascinated by the undulations Myoko’s body went through as his fingertips glided up and down her sides. Almost rhythmically, she swayed from side to side. It was as if her body refused to admit that there was simply nothing it could do to escape from the delicious tickling touches. An arc to the left. A twist to the right. Curving her supple form back and forth. Oh, what a beauty she was!

Matt began kissing Myoko while he continued to tickle her. He began by kissing her mouth, then his lips nibbled their way all over Myoko’s neck and throat. He let his lips linger in the tender hollow at the base of her throat. Matt nibbled and kissed back and forth along Myoko’s collarbones, all the while tickling her wonderfully responsive sides.

Matt moved the site of his ticklish assault on Myoko’s senses to her armpits, which were defenselessly exposed by her bound position. This drove Myoko wild, her laughter become higher pitched, almost shrill as the ticklish sensation became more intense.

At the same time, Matt shifted the site of his kisses down to cover the upper part of Myoko’s chest, then descended to the upper surfaces of her lovely, small, delightfully rounded breasts. After several minutes of this, Matt stepped back to let Myoko catch her breath.

Myoko’s pretty chest heaved as she drew in great, shuddering breaths. She was sweaty, disheveled, and happy. The looks she bestowed upon Matt were not angry or fearful. Ruby had seen women look at men that way before. Those looks were filled with desire, and ... love?

Ruby was puzzled. To Ruby, it appeared that Matt was torturing Myoko for his own enjoyment, and yet Myoko appeared to be loving every moment of it. Ruby had seen women gaze at men they loved before. That was exactly the way she now saw Myoko staring at Matt. The conclusion was inescapable; Myoko was deeply in love with her owner, Matthew Gault!

Matthew was caring for Myoko with tender regard. He had picked up a large fluffy towel, and he dried her sweat and folded the towel around her, seeing to it that the moisture did not chill Myoko as it dried on her skin.

After a rest break of about 5 minutes, Matt put the towel down. He smiled at Myoko in way that Ruby could only describe as tenderly, and looked a question at her. Myoko smiled and nodded yes, and Matt resumed tickling her helpless underarms.

In just seconds, Myoko was once again writhing and laughing, swaying and twisting and growing visibly aroused. Matt resumed kissing Myoko a few minutes later. This time his lips wandered over the fronts, sides and undersides of Myoko’s lovely breasts. Myoko’s enjoyment of all this was quite evident.

Then Matt was kissing Myoko’s sweet face while his fingertips tickled the sides and undercurves of her breasts. Ruby was growing aroused just by watching this scene. She could barely imagine what it must feel like to Myoko! Ruby found herself starting to envy the victim in the torture show she was watching.

“Envy?” Ruby thought; “Am I going crazy? He’s torturing the poor girl!”

But inside her own mind, Ruby had to admit that as she watched Matt gently torment Myoko, she was imagining herself in Myoko’s place. Those imaginings were causing Ruby to become aroused, even as she watched Myoko grow more and more aroused. It was clear that Myoko was enjoying her torture, and despite herself Ruby was consumed with curiosity. Ruby wanted to know what Myoko was feeling!

Matt pulled up a chair, sat, and opened a long shallow box. It held an assortment of feathers. He selected a matched pair. They were long, slightly curved, soft and silky-smooth. He grinned up at Myoko and hitched the chair closer to her. Myoko was licking her lips with a mixture of fear and anticipation clear on her face.

To Ruby it seemed that Myoko knew what was coming, had felt it before. It also seemed that whatever it was would prove so intense that Myoko was not sure she could take it, and yet knew she was going to love it. Again, Ruby found herself envious! She wondered if she were losing her mind.

Slowly, slowly, ever so slowly, Matt stroked Myoko’s exposed inner thighs with the edges of the feathers. The edges of the feathers, inner curve turned to touch her flesh, covered the entire width of Myoko’s shapely thighs. Matt began just at the insides of her knees, and went up three inches, then back down two, up three and back two, again and again, slowly advancing closer and closer to Myoko’s engorged and ever wetter womanhood.

The very first touch made Myoko giggle. She sounded so happy! Her giggles grew louder and wilder. Soon she was out of control. By the time the feathers got halfway up her thighs, Myoko’s giggles had grown into laughter again. She was squirming and writhing in every appearance of desperation, trying to escape the intense stimulation, and yet she still both looked and sounded happy. Ruby shook her head in confusion.

As the feathers neared her groin, Myoko’s hips began to buck in an obviously sexual way. Between bursts of laughter, she managed to gasp out; “Oh! Hahaha! Please mahahaster! Hahaha! Take meheehee! Pleheeheese! Ihihi neeheeheed youhoohoo sohoho bahahahad!”

Matt began using the tips of the feathers now. He was tracing the softly rounded ends along the creases where Myoko’s muscles slid over and under each other. He was exploring the hollows formed where the tendons that joined her thigh muscles to her body trunk made flexible ridges under the smooth, tender skin. These teasing touches kept Myoko helplessly laughing, and were clearly driving her wild sexually! The pleading looks she was sending Matt’s way were unmistakable!

Matt stood and dropped his robe. He was fully erect. He was not huge, but to a woman who had only seen Chinese or Japanese men, he seemed quite impressive. Letting the tips of the feathers graze Myoko’s labia again and again, Matt slowly stepped ever closer. She was fully blossomed and ready, and wanted him desperately.

Matt moved the feathers up to play around the sides and undersides of Myoko’s breasts as his member made contact with her labia. Slowly, gently, patiently. Matt maneuvered until he slid into her snugly, wetly welcoming heat with no pain, only pleasure. Even as she kept softly, uncontrollably giggling, then resumed laughing out loud again, Myoko’s face showed only joy!

As Matt became fully inside of Myoko, he stuck the feathers into knots in the ropes of the web. His hands gently tickled her spine and her buttocks, making her giggle and squirm, giving both of them great pleasure.

Then Matthew picked up the feathers again, and he touched the rounded tips to the heels of Myoko’s utterly defenseless bare feet. The look on her face was so comical, Ruby almost laughed out loud. It could only be described as eager dismay.

Myoko knew what was about to happen to her. Matt had done it before. She anticipated the extreme pleasure it would give her, and yet dreaded the wicked torment she would feel. Eager dismay. Then, it started!

Matt drew the tips of the feathers down the length of Myoko’s feet, and her entire body simply exploded into a frenzy of agonized delight. She threw her head back and screamed out the loudest peal of laughter yet. Her thighs, hips and belly bucked forward to engulf Matt more deeply.

Matt made the feathers play with Myoko’s heels, wander all over the flats of her soles, graze the balls of her feet. Then they played with Myoko’s extremely ticklish toes. He teased the pads, stems, and spaces between, then lingered agonizingly right on the tips.

It was while Matt was teasing the tips of Myoko’s toes that she came for the first time that night. With each toe held in place, she felt more helpless than ever. Matt let the feather tips dwell on the flats of Myoko’s soles while she had two more laughing orgasms.

Then it was Matt’s turn; he started to use the feathers on Myoko’s lovely arches. This drove poor Myoko absolutely wild she howled out her wild laughter, desperately bucking and thrusting, coming for a fourth time, and then for a fifth just as Matthew reached climax and growled like a bear!

Matt stopped the maddening tickling, and both lovers (for it was clear to Ruby that despite their status as owner and slave there was genuine feeling on both sides) gave deep sighs of completion. Matt untied Myoko and carried her out to the bedroom. Myoko’s arms were around Matt’s neck, her head cradled against his chest. She wore a dreamy look of deep contentment.

As Matt approached with Myoko in his arms, Ruby quickly retreated, stepped aside behind the sound muffling drapes and let them go past. Then Ruby explored the edges of the dungeon until she found the door to the master bath. From there she returned to the hallway and back to her own bed. That night her dreams were filled with feminine laughter and the sensation of fingertips and feathers on her skin. The laughter was her own.

The next day, Myoko did not return to the concubine’s quarters until well after breakfast. The expression on her face could only be described as smug satisfaction. The others were clearly envious of the night she had spent with Matthew. Ruby was amazed, and bemused by the whole concept.

As far as Ruby could tell, Myoko had spent the night undergoing ruthless tickling torture while having sex. Ruby expected Myoko to be subdued, humiliated and angry the next day. Instead, Myoko was exuberant, proud, and happy in a very smug sort of way. Ruby didn’t understand.

Still more perplexing to Ruby, the other girls in the little clique she had joined all seemed to agree with Myoko’s attitude toward her experience. They all clearly agreed that Myoko had reason to be energized, happy and proud. Especially proud that, as Myoko had stated in a manner that made it clear she was boasting; “Our dear Matthew took me back to the playroom as soon as we awakened, even before breakfast, and then again after breakfast!”

The other members of their clique openly congratulated Myoko. They were envious that the Warlord Gault found Myoko so attractive and exciting that he chose to play with her three times before returning her to the quarters. This was treated as a notable accomplishment on her part! Ruby was bewildered.

The others had been told not to discuss any specifics of their nights with Matthew in Ruby’s hearing. At least not until she had spent her first night with Matthew herself.

Ruby couldn’t ask for specifics without revealing the fact that she had illicitly observed the beginning of Myoko’s night with the Warlord. They all obviously knew about the tickling, but from the oblique references they made to ‘the Warlord’s proclivities’ they regarded that as a good thing, not a bad thing. Ruby simply didn’t understand.

A few nights later, it was Liel’s turn to spend the night with Gault. She was conducted to his quarters early enough to be taken into the nightclub district for dinner and a show together. Gault enjoyed being seen in public with his favorite beauties like Liel.

Liel stood 5’11” and weighed a toned, athletic 130 pounds. Her was natural spun gold color, her eyes a deep cobalt blue. Her flawless, smooth and soft skin was a light golden color as well, from her carefully measured time on the sunbathing deck of the concubine’s quarters in Gault’s castle. Because the deck had complete privacy, Liel showed no tan lines anywhere.

The classic loveliness of Liel’s face showed clearly the heritage of Viking blood in the stock of the eastern counties of southern England. She had the high cheekboned, clear skinned beauty of the Scandinavian heritage she shared in. Her lips were a natural deep pink due to the nanodoctor Gault had given her when he acquired her.

Liel’s body was stunning, with naturally high breasts and long, clean limbs. Her torso also was cleanly shaped, sleek and sexy. She was a natural athlete, but also worked out to keep her shape as she liked it.

Her wide size 9 feet might have seemed a bit big on a shorter woman, but with Liel’s height they were perfectly in proportion. In addition to being wide for their length, Liel’s feet were also high, with extremely deep arches and a somewhat greater than average thickness of flesh from top to bottom of the foot.

Liel’s toes were a row of size-graded perfect little spheres on the ends of stems that were relatively short and thick, just the way Matthew preferred them. Her nails, both finger and toe, were painted a bright metallic gold which matched the shade of her hair exactly.

Ruby was bothered by something. Watching Matt tickle torturing Myoko had aroused Ruby. Now, the thought of the tall, commanding, nearly Amazonian Liel reduced to a helplessly laughing and begging bundle of uncontrollably responsive nerves, the way Myoko had been, was strangely exciting to the tiny Chinese doll. She could not repress her eagerness to witness Matthew dominating Liel with his tickling!

All evening, Ruby was listening for the sounds that would mean Matthew and Liel had returned from their evening out. When she heard those sounds Ruby at once made her way through the corridors to the hallway entry to the master bath, then through that room to the dungeon.

Staying behind the wall hangings, Ruby made her way halfway around the large room and found a vantage point which allowed her a good view of the various apparatus positioned around the floor. There she sat crosslegged, in a position she had long ago taught herself to hold for hours on end, and awaited the beginning of what she had begun to think of as her evening entertainment.

Matt conducted Liel to an apparatus which stood near the fireplace. The base of this device was a steep, four-sided pyramid, truncated 30 inches above the ground. At the flat top, it measured 4 feet on each side. Six inches in from one side there stood two vertical 6” by 6” timbers, the centers 40 inches apart. The sides of the beams that faced each other had facing slots two inches wide, each with a row of holes for pegs.
Wooden bars with assorted attachments were stored in the base. These fit into the vertical slots in the beams, and could be fixed at desired heights above the base by placing pegs in the holes. In between the two uprights were a pair of padded depressions in the top surface of the base. Each was fitted with a padded rope that stretched across the center.

Matthew helped Liel climb onto the base and kneel with her knees in the padded depressions. She fairly purred; “Thank you, my warlord. You know I love the vertical pleasure rack.”

“You like all the various apparatti I have here, my Amazonian sweet.”

“Yes, lord. But this is my favorite!”

As they were speaking, Matt had taken a crossbar from the base and installed it at the proper height above the base. The lowest went across just above Liel’s knees. It had a downward extension from which a hinged arm extended back to Liel’s trim ankles. The hinge was directly between the hinges of her knees.

The hinged arm ended in a padded wooden restraint block which Matt locked around those lovely legs, just above the ankles. This block had an extended portion, which reached down to Liel’s toes. The metallic polish Liel wore included substantial amounts of magnetic metallic elements; these were held tight by a powerful electromagnet in the end of the toe extension of the restraint block.

Liel’s gorgeous feet were held in a most alluring and vulnerable position; the ball of each foot was pointed, maximizing the depth of arches which were deliciously high to begin with, and the toes were both flexed back and splayed. This stretched the skin on the bottoms of her feet tight and also exposed the extremely sensitive skin between her toes. Liel gulped, apprehensively; “You’re gonna drive me insane, Master.”

“Yes I will, and you will love me for it, won’t you?”

“Yes. Yes, I will.....and I do.”

Matt paused to kiss her. It was a long, deep, sexy and sensual kiss. Liel sighed; “Oh, lord. You do that soooooo well.”

Matthew smiled, and put the next bar into place. This one had a well padded forward arch, which fitted into the small of Liel’s back just above the golden globes of her buttocks. This forced her lithe body into a forward arch, a very inviting position.

Next, Matthew placed the third bar in the frame. This one positioned a thick, comfortable pad behind Liel’s neck, head and shoulders. A padded strap around her high, clear forehead held her head immobile, and arched her neck slightly backward. This exposed her elegant throat and the tender flesh under her chin. Matthew kissed her again.

Then Matthew put a fourth bar into place. This one held two broad, padded leather cuffs for Liel’s biceps. As a final touch, Matt fastened Liel’s long, narrow hands into stiffened, palmless gloves that were attached to the uprights near the top.

Now Liel’s bondage was complete. Matt stepped back and took a moment to contemplate the sight he had created. He quietly said to her; “Good God, but you are beautiful.”

Liel, smiling happily, replied; “I love you, my master. I want you to torture me, for your pleasure and my own.”

Matthew pulled up a high stool, and seated himself. He decided to begin with one of Liel’s hot spots, and reached out with both hands to tickle her vulnerable, prominently displayed ribs.

Liel was one of the most ticklish women Matt had ever encountered. She could be forced to laugh out loud by the stroke of a medium firm feather through thick nylons; few women are that ticklishly sensitive. There were some spots where Liel had a bit of ability to resist and hold her composure, but her shapely rib cage was not one of them. It was, rather, one of the spots where she had no resistance at all.

As Matt lovingly, tenderly caressed her ribs with a light squeezing pressure, Liel’s lovely face contorted in a rictus of forced mirth and she instantly emitted loud peals of wonderful, feminine laughter. Ever careful not to bruise or abrade the sensitive skin, Matt kept on tickling her, drinking in the sound of her laughter as if it were fine wine.

Within the first five minutes, it was clear even from Ruby’s somewhat distant vantage point that Liel was already in a state of full arousal. In addition to the involuntary attempts to pull away, there was also an unmistakable, eagerly sexy undulation of Liel’s hips.

Ruby would reserve judgement on the veracity of Liel’s protestations of love for Matt; they might be perfectly true, or they might be what those Black American Jazz musicians called ‘shuckin’ and jivin’’. One thing Ruby had no doubt about; Liel WANTED Matt. Wanted him deeply, sincerely, and eagerly. Hmmmm. Interesting.

Ruby’s wandering attention was called back to the tableau unfolding before her by a change in the timbre of Liel’s laughter. Matt had switched from tickling Liel's ribs to pouncing the fingertips of both hands all over her tight six-pack belly. The sound of Liel’s laughs now was less wildly out of control, short bursts instead of long peals, but with a strong undertone of genuine happiness and enjoyment. Clearly, Liel was enjoying this playful pouncing belly tickling.

Then Matt changed tactics; his hands now were in constant contact with Liel’s sexy belly, making long, endless looping swirls all over the area. Liel’s response now was continuous happy giggling and wiggling.

Matt never broke his eye contact with Liel. He was intensely interested in her response to his tickling touches. He wanted to see her enjoyment and pleasure, he wanted to revel in it.

Now, Matt began stroking Liel’s curvy sides with just the very tips of his fingers, the touch constant but light as a feather. He started at the widest part of her hips, glided up to just below her armpits and then back again. Never a pause, never a break.

At first this made Liel giggle, but as the relentless stroking went on, the giggles became louder, longer, wilder, and then the first laugh emerged. Five minutes in, she was almost hysterical. Liel’s luscious body was twisting and writhing from side to side, futilely trying to break the ever more maddening contact between those moving, teasing finger pads and her extremely responsive flanks.

Matt paused and backed off a step. Watching as Liel regained control of her breathing. His eyes were fixed on her. Her attention was riveted on him. He seemed to be the most important thing in her world. The more self control she regained, the more helplessly, submissively loving her facial expression became as she gazed raptly at her (quite literally) lord and master.

Now, for a while, Matt amused himself with Liel’s less ticklish places. He tickled the palms of her hands, exposed in the stiff-fingered palmless gloves. He tickled her forearms, her elbows, and her chest above the breasts. He tickled the back of her neck. He tickled her back, and he let his hands linger teasingly on her perfect, rounded asscheeks. He tickled across her hips and groin.

Throughout all this teasing, Liel kept on giggling and wiggling and occasionally chuckling or chortling. Her nipples were visibly throbbing with the intensity of her arousal. Her labia were fully engorged and swelled to their maximum size.

When Matt began to tease Liel’s long, exquisite legs she began laughing again. Especially when he played with the hollows behind her knees. Then he bent down, stuck the tip of his tongue into her navel and wiggled it back and forth. Liel SCREAMED laughter at that, so he did it again, several more times.

Liel looked at him in mock reproach, so he moved in to tongue tickle her ears, one by one. This made Liel scream and twist in helpless, out of control delight.

Now, Matt briefly kissed Liel’s eagerly waiting lips and then stepped back a half step. He reached up and started to tickle her underarms. Liel just exploded into wild, helpless, full-on hysteria.

Loud roars of laughter exploded from Liel’s helplessly wide open mouth. Her hips began urgently thrusting, so Matt bent at the knees and hips, bringing his mouth to her crotch.

While Matt’s hands kept unmercifully tickling Liel’s defenselessly displayed armpits, his lips gently sought out her clitoris, tenderly exposing it by pressing the flesh hood that normally covered it out of the way with soft pressure. He began by kissing Liel’s clit, then, when it was fully erected, engulfed it in his warm, wet lips and tongue. He kept the touches of his lips and tongue light, soft, well moistened and gentle so as not to abrade that delicate flesh while he brought her to crashing multiple orgasms while never slackening the relentless pace of the fingertips doing the spiderdance in the ticklish hollows of Liel’s armpits. Liel came laughing time after time, then Matt stepped back and let her breathe.

Ruby imagined that to be put through such things would make her feel angry, humiliated, perhaps violated. Yet the look on Liel’s face as she again gazed raptly at Matt was happy, submissive, loving and grateful!?!? Ruby didn’t understand. Liel seemed to be such a strong, independent woman! It didn’t add up! Or did it? Ruby, feeling her own excitement grow with each session she spied on, was very afraid she would find out for herself all too soon.

Once again, Ruby was recalled from her woolgathering by the sound of Liel’s laughter. Matt was tickling her inner thighs again, then started tickling her firm, high, round breasts. All of Matt’s fingertips were gliding like feathertips over those gorgeous, now sweat-sheened golden tanned globes.

Liel laughed loud and long, sweet and hot. Matt asked; “Ready, Liel?”

Liel, between peals of laughter, gasped; “Yes, master! Please!”

Then, Matt entered Liel. The gasp she gave was clearly one of pleasure. His proximity mashed her sweet breasts flat against his massive, muscular chest. Ruby could see that Liel was deliberately rubbing her erect nipples against that masculine chest.

Then Matt reached up and he started to tickle the sides of Liel’s neck. In just seconds, Liel was all-out hysterical, howling with laughter. Then, by the sudden convulsive movements of her body, Liel climaxed again.

Without any pause in the neck tickling, Matt covered Liel’s wide open mouth with a long, deep kiss. In less than two minutes, Liel climaxed again.

Matt pulled his face back to look Liel in the eyes, and then began tickling her under her chin and up and down the front of her lovely throat. Liel chortled and burbled in laughter, and very soon came again, then did it again when Matt kissed her while tickling her throat.

Now, Matt said; “My turn, my sweet little tickle toy. My turn.”

Liel felt his hands moving down her body and toward her back. She knew what was next. Looking him right in the eyes , she said, throatily from all the loud laughing; “YES master! OH, YES!!!”

Without any further delay, Matt let his fingers began scrabbling and dancing all over the balls, soles and heels of Liel’s beautifully shaped, utterly defenseless, helplessly immobilized bare feet. Instantly, Liel was way beyond hysterical. Liel’s lovely feet were her most ticklish place. She could simply not endure tickling on her feet, and yet somehow when Matt did it while making love to her, she absolutely loved it.

Her entire lithe body shook and quivered with the force of the roars of laughter that were forced from her by the merciless tickling of her tender feet. It wasn’t long at all before she came again, then again when Matt stifled her laughter with a kiss.

When Matt began tickling Liel’s toes, which were completely unable to so much as twitch, that was what finally broke her. She desperately, uselessly fought to escape. She shrieked out her despairing laughter. Tears filled her beautiful eyes and spilled over to run down her face, as those highly skilled fingers tickled and tickled and tickled her unbearably sensitive toes.

Matt kissed away the tears, and ground his hips lightly but firmly against hers, and she came again and again and again. Then he moved those wildly dancing fingertips right into Liel’s deep, tender arches.

Liel’s whole body convulsed with unbearable and yet joyful ticklish agony. She pressed herself against him with a wild desperation, as though trying to merge her body with his. She seemed to be locked in a single, continuous orgasm.

To Liel, it felt like the tickling and climax went on for hours. Ruby knew it was only a couple of minutes. Then Matt began to convulse and shudder in his own massive orgasm. When that communicated itself to Liel, feeling her beloved owner cumming inside of her, while he tickle tortured her beyond her endurance, triggered her nervous system into a sudden explosion of pleasure that seemed to include every nerve ending in her entire body!

Liel Screamed and Matt bellowed in pleasure and joy. It seemed to go on for a very long time, even to the watching Ruby. When it finally ended, Matt at once released Liel from her bonds. She was eagerly awaiting her freedom, apparently in order to wrap her limbs and body around Matt’s as tightly as humanly possible.

Liel eagerly kissed any part of Matt that came near her mouth, while Matt grabbed a large, fluffy clean towel and dried them both off. Still eagerly, happily touching each other, the (temporarily) sated lovers walked to the bed, sat on the edge, stretched out on it, pulled the sheet up and happily cuddled.

The last words that Ruby clearly heard from them, as she made her stealthy exit, were when Liel said; “Oh Matt, my master. I love you so much. I’m so glad you own me. It gives me such joy just to know I belong to you.”

It was a bemused and puzzled Ruby who made her surreptitious way back to her own bed. She would lie awake long into the night, pondering over what she had just seen and heard.

END OF PART I

Part II will be forthcoming. In it Joan, Alexis and Nina will be put through their ticklish paces by the Warlord Gault, and Ruby herself will finally be initiated into the joys and torments of ticklesex.

As always, comments are welcome.

Very nice story with wonderful decriptions of the tickling.

Great story to read...look forward to part 2 !!

Thank you

icetickler said:

Great story to read...look forward to part 2 !!

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for those kind words; I've actually just decided that there will be a part 1 and a half, introducing a new 'lee character who hasn't been in the story so far.

A beautifully written, intensely sensual story set in a wonderfully complex half-real, half imaginary setting. It has the superb tickling of such stories as I write, the physical and psychological female slavery of John Norman's 'Gor', the intense and complex reality of James Clavell's 'Shogun' and 'Noble House' combined into a story that is truly fantastic. You are a talented and highly imaginative writer who has my total respect and admiration. Thankyou, sir, for sharing this wonderful story with us.

Thank you so very much

tkl-pen said:

A beautifully written, intensely sensual story set in a wonderfully complex half-real, half imaginary setting. It has the superb tickling of such stories as I write, the physical and psychological female slavery of John Norman's 'Gor', the intense and complex reality of James Clavell's 'Shogun' and 'Noble House' combined into a story that is truly fantastic. You are a talented and highly imaginative writer who has my total respect and admiration. Thankyou, sir, for sharing this wonderful story with us.

Click to expand...

for such a kind assessment of my efforts.
I have planned at least three more installments of Matthew Gault's adventures in time.
In the next one, he will visit our timeline and abduct one of our TMF ladies for his harem, because he loves her singing voice.
Mitch
aka