"Lemme... guh," I laughed.
The gloves were trying to get under my shirt. Pushy fingers. That would be very bad.
I wanted to trip out on what was happening - gloves that were alive, and all that - but the tickling was frying my brain. Four or six gloves were busy...
And I couldn't pull it together enough to fight 'em. Or yell. I was really stunned at how quickly they had me just about paralyzed... and where the whole deal seemed to be going.
I mean, within about fifteen seconds they attacked me - right in the doorway of the bathroom - and carted me off. Tickling hard for a few seconds, apparently they liked what they found. Before I could even get a good look at 'em, one clamped over my mouth. Others grabbed my arms and legs.
So many gloves, with nobody else around that I could see.
They carried me like I was a log.
Third or fourth door down, they turned to the right...
Dusty room. Concrete walls, no windows, nothing inside except a couple old boxes. And me.
And they never stopped tickling. I was yelling into white shiny cloth, and laughing pretty hard. The palm had all the pressure I'd expect from a guy who works out.
The glove crawling over my belly was full too, as if a hand was inside, but there was nothing that I can see. Just air.
They had a death-grip on my limbs. No matter how I tried to move, they were ready...
The metal door clicked shut behind me. Doomed, I thought. That sound was as final as the gavel coming down in a courtroom. Gotta get back on the right side of that door -
I think that was about the time they started creeping up the sleeves of my t-shirt. Fingertips were in my armpits, with no shirt in their way. Much worse, now, the contact. I seemed to fall, but they must've been holding me close to the floor anyway.
The current racing up to my brain insisted that I laugh a lot harder. My whole body got very serious about pulling away from the mysterious hands and beating 'em until they stopped.
My lower ribs were next. That cloth, sliding and squeezing, made me snap out of the frenzy. I squirmed good and hard, gulping air. My arms had stopped flailing all around - it was too much work. Screaming was just out of the question, I was so undone. There was only this chuckle that wouldn't stop... as if someone said okay, now, let's hear your hardest, most desperate chuckle, slow and irregular 'cause you just can't pull it together anymore to scream the laughter out.
These waves of crazy warmth just rammed through my sides. It might've felt so good if the fingers hadn't been moving like they knew exactly how to make it crippling. Breathtaking.
All of the fingers were deliberately, skillfully destroying my concentration.
And I was looking the door, not two meters away... afraid that the gloves would never let me get over to it.
I could picture the process in my head. Crawl, reach up, get the knob. Success. No more tickling. Somehow I'd move fast enough so the frickin' hands couldn't just clamp on and drag me back inside.
If it was locked, though, I was gonna just pitch a fit. Laughing fit. Yeah. They won.
No. Not yet, they didn't. Gritting my teeth, I snickered and flopped over. Okay. Facing the right direction, so I tried to start pulling myself -
Fingers started messing with my neck.
Just so overwhelming...
After a little break to whoop a few times, I kept moving. A piss-poor excuse for crawling, and nothing like the speed I could've been making if the damn gloves would just lay off for a couple seconds. My whole nervous system was shorting out. Tickling, of all things, was getting to me too much and my brain was all scrambed, it got to be almost too hard to move at all, and I just -
My knee? Oh, no, no! Both. Real trouble. Even through my jeans, the grips were lighting me up. Squealing, screeching laughter insisted on pouring out of me, for a few seconds. Kicking around didn't shake any of the hands, digging and sliding, getting to me worse than ever.
Damn. I was just hysterical.
At some level, though, I had one chance to get away from the gloves. So I made myself laugh less, and groan more, so I could keep crawling for the exit.
A little further back from the chaos - the lightning that was flashing around inside me - I could still think. That rational part of my mind wasn't distracted by all the tickling. Instead it seemed kinda disgusted with my body...
We're not getting out of this, it warned the rest of me. Hold on.
That was so ridiculous that I started to giggle. Of course we were. We had to -
The door's locked. They're just getting started on us. Face the facts, here, and look for some other way to handle what's going on.
I laughed a little harder at the thought. The best way to end this was getting closer, inch by inch. I'd get the door open, jump into the hallway - and some other guy on his way to the bathroom would be coming down the hall, and he'd see me. The gloves would have to give up and let go of me. I'd be okay.
Timing was everything, though. The fighting and laughing had taken a toll. I was getting weak.
We might not be able to get away before the fatigue sets in. Just trying to get prepared for the truth. This is going to get a lot more intense -
No. Frickin' pessimist. I was not gonna hang around this place another second.
Scooting forward a little more, I reached for the knob -
Oh, shit! No. High gear...
They're digging in. I can't take this. Aw, hell...
I'm snickering. Twitching. All sweaty now.
That door is not going to help us -
Screw that negative bullshit. Time to get out of here! I grunted and tried to sit up. All I had to do was reach the knob. No matter what the frickin' gloves did to me, just turn the knob and pull...
The cool hands were in there, squeezing my armpits, playing with my ribs. No regular pattern. My neck, my poor knees - and I was just wailing laughter, with tears running down my cheeks. Almost there.
They're not going to let us go.
Reaching for the damn knob again - and yeah, oh shit they immediately kicked it into gear. In no time I was rolling on the floor, trying to pull the damn gloves off, grunting... but just so blown away I couldn't even laugh hard.
See?
It was impossible. What I was feeling. How much I was feeling. Magic gloves, on the hunt, and I just happen to show up. They definitely knew what they were doing. No hesitation in those fingers...
They laid down deeper tickling than I'd ever imagined was possible.
Now can we work on some kind of mental defense?
But that would be... giving up.
I opened my eyes.
The door was so close I could touch it. The ticklers would try to throw me off-track every time I reached...
They were playing with me.
Well - duh.
I got mad.
Lurching over, I slammed a shoulder into the door.
The gloves turned me - so my back was flat - and they just let me have it. Pinning my arms up.
My fingers, on my right hand, were trying so hard to close the gap. The damn knob was just a few inches away!
Yeah, my mind said unhappily, this is gonna be grim.
No, it wasn't. I couldn't let that happen. Not this close - I was going to go down fighting.
Somehow I bucked, breaking contact.
And a glove found a whole new spot to tickle. Low on my belly - half-inside my jeans.
The whole world went away for a bit.
Oh, shit, just so overwhelming.
Ready to believe it now?
I was looking at my legs. There were gloves underneath, gloves over my kneecaps...
Why was I curled up in a ball? There was no way to tell how long I'd been laying there. My shirt was just soaked with sweat. I needed to piss something fierce...
Get out. Move, run, don't look back.
With a deep, long groan I rolled toward the door. Smooth metal, nothing to hang onto - just the knob, there. My ticket out.
Something tugged at my leg.
"Nooooooh," I whined, intending to sound a lot tougher than that. The laughter demanded to take over instead. Even though my eyes were all blurry I saw a dark shape. My shoe.
Then the other one came off.
Was I kicking my feet, just then? I didn't even realize it. Man, I was whacked out -
Idiot, my brain yelled, they're not falling off. The gloves just pulled our shoes off. Wanna guess why?
The mental image of these fingers getting at my bare feet was way too scary. Before I even knew what I was doing, I sprang up and got that doorknob.
Turn, turn turn pull pull. Well, huh. I just wasn't pulling hard enough -
No. It's not going to open... and you know why.
Uh-huh. It was locked.
The gloves seemed to be actually holding back while I pulled at it. Left, right, toward me. Nothing. Oh, well.
They'd already locked me in.
Always the last one to find out, my mind taunted. Okay, let's figure out some way to deal with what they're gonna do. It's way too much to handle, but maybe there's something we can try.
My hands were much more interested in pulling at the doorknob. Hey. Now, look - we're not getting out of here! Not until the bastards let us go. Give it up. Save our energy for... something else, I don't know. But they won. Gotta be smart, now.
My socks were being peeled off. It was just too much to handle...
I was sliding... away from the door.
Something snagged my shirt. Pulled at it. When it came up past my face, I saw more of those shiny fingers had a good grip on it, and they wanted the shirt off, so away it went. Trying to cover up my sides or my belly was useless, but my arms wouldn't stop trying.
Next time I could pull myself together enough to look, the door was at least ten feet away.
I couldn't understand how my inner voice, ol' rational-boy, could have been right about all this. Absolutely impossible...
But the gloves had me. Pinning my legs down as they were mauling my knees, digging in my armpits... and I just roared. Good grief, the ticklers were enthusiastic about this shit.
Maybe, just maybe, the door had been about to open. It could be that they pulled me away at the last second, before I would've found out that the damn thing had just unlatched and all I had to do was pull and shove my ass through the gap. That wonderful, ordinary hallway where this insane tickling wouldn't happen any more -
Listen to yourself, rational boy sneered. We have to concentrate on finding a way to adapt. Dial it down, inside. It's our only chance. They want us freakin' out of our mind, feverish...
Delirious. That was the word. I'd still be ticklish - probably more so, with my luck - and there would be no more chance to think up a plan and use it. Yeah, that was exactly what these gloves could go for...
It was increasing, though. The impact. Hitting harder.
So ticklish, so screwed now...
This was not the kind of experience I'd ever been through, and I had no idea where to start "dealing" with it. Too many fingers, and they were so serious about making me crazy...
What I really needed to do was get away.
Escaping? No, no. That would spoil the fun.
You're losing it, my mind informed me.
"Oh no no nooooo," I cackled... just like I was six years old or something. Ridiculous. Except I was a big boy now, all this skin to tickle, with spots all up and down me that made me freakin' come unglued.
Making the gloves lay off - no, that just ain't gonna happen, and even my thoughts sounded annoyed with the whole deal. Coping mechanism. Now. C'mon!
Easy to say. I was whooping - drunken, slow-motion noises, not anywhere near loud enough to be heard through that door. No one had come knocking when I was hollering laughs right next to the dawn hallway. They weren't gonna hear me - and I wasn't going to fight the gloves off. Not a chance.
My arms still slapped at the ticklers, though -
And some new texture was under my right palm. Maybe it something I could use to fight 'em off. I grabbed it and brought it up, enough so I could squint over at it.
Was that... rope?
I squawked. Big laughs. Hell no, they've got rope. Bring the curtain down, right now - I was in for a nightmare that would top every other intense memory I ever had. Uh-huh.
"Nooooooooooooooo," I managed to whine. Just like a freakin' third-grader...
A glove took hold of my hand, and others started pulling the rope around my wrist.
Well, this sucks, rational boy snapped.
They worked real well together, these gloves. It was amazing. I couldn't flail hard enough to keep 'em from tying the knots. There had to be ten circuits of rope. I wasn't going to break that -
Giggling desperately, I watched 'em take charge of my left arm.
So they won, rational-boy said. They're good. I mean, they must've done this a lot -
Not helping, I thought back at him. My stomach already ached from laughing so much.
Nothing's going to help. This is bad. We've got to find a way to deal with the intensity of this tickling. Pretend it's happening to somebody else, and we're just watching. Convince yourself it ain't really that urgent. Laugh harder, wear it out. The ticklishness. Do something!
But they were tying my ankles together. I wasn't scared, so much as I was... scattered. Too many fingers, no way to stop 'em, and I didn't have a clue about how to knuckle down and take it.
Plus, there was the worst thing of all. That's what I thought, anyway. They checked the tension on the rope - gloves, floating wherever they wanted, making sure I was not gonna be able to get loose. My wrists had been tied together, way up there past my head. All that rope...
And there were gloves moving down, through the air, to the places I definitely didn't want 'em to tickle - already tied good and tight.
Good luck, my mind said - and it seemed like a goodbye, probably one of the the last coherent thoughts for awhile.
The stroking fingertips were breathtaking. I had no idea my soles were that bad...
Whooping and slinging myself around didn't make the gloves stop. Not even one.
Immediately it got worse - inside. My brain and my whole body had a very serious purpose.
The current was racing in and I couldn't possibly keep up, but there was no way to stop trying to feel all of it either. I couldn't do it, and I couldn't stop trying. Laughter was a whole separate thing from the real work I was doing. Sometimes I roared like a fool, and other times I chuckled like a horndog...
They'd definitely stepped up their game. A couple of gloves roaming around, finding weak spots... and experimenting until they knew just how to make 'em scream. Fingers would settle in, and one more time I was stunned with an even higher level of current just blazing all the way through me.
I couldn't move anywhere near enough. That was exactly where they wanted me. Sneaky gloves. Stronger than me - and I couldn't even roll around 'cause they were always tickling my sides... and my feet, my neck. No direction is left open. Anywhere I tried to lunge, there's tickling. It was just everywhere.
The ropes weren't going to snap. No cops would bust through the door and save me.
I even quit hoping for an earthquake.
The gloves wouldn't want that. They ruled everything. Moving from place to place, tickling energetically, tickling gently. I couldn't take it, but they weren't about to stop.
So I just laughed and laughed, from a long way off...
My thighs were ridiculously sensitive. Didn't I have jeans on? Once, maybe five years ago...
It hadn't been all that long. Talk about intimidating. I was a wreck, and my arms weren't even done fidgeting yet. Fifteen minutes, I guessed. Completely freakin' unbearable.
Touching... became a set of fingers. Curling around me. Cool, slippery material.
Not there, I wanted to scream. Immediately I was furious -
Why are you surprised? a familiar voice said. My rational mind. Such a long way off... Really. Only one thing left.
"Nnnn-nuh," I panted. Crazy - that was it. I'd gone over the edge. This had to be my last few seconds of conscious thought. So many fingers -
Roll with it. That's right. You must. There's nothing else...
My body just sagged. No more fight. I wanted to show that it was not okay with me, dammit, where that last glove was petting. There was no way I'd be any less ticklish, after it was through.
But I couldn't get my limbs to pull anymore. It was like I forgot how.
The current peaked, slowly - inviting me.
Further in.
I went down. Lower, somehow. My spinal cord was right there - glowing strong, a beautiful intensity, almost searing, as it carried all the reports of tickling up to my brain. All traffic was one-way now. Still too much to comprehend, to experience. Such a beautiful system, filled with tickling. The volume of it all was more important than trying to squirm around. High-priority.
Speed of current, immeasurable density, creeping slowly higher and higher.
Fingers moving. Gloves squeezing... slower. Huh? Thorough, but they'd eased off.
My chest was panting. Deep, regular breaths. Maybe I'd started to pass out. The gloves were never gonna let that happen. They were smarter than that. Knew their business, alright. Feisty gloves, hard-working ticklers...
So much. Everywhere.
There were gloves doing this to to me. Incredible. No stopping them.
Rope held tight.
Hands all over me...
Too much. Again. More, and more, always more. Inside - it's deeper, bigger.
Oooooh, it tickles.
Far away, outside... tickling hands. Hardcore. Busy hands, expert hands, everywhere. So incredible. Nonstop hands.
Tickling me. More. Always more. Bigger now, hotter. Never stopping. That's all there is.
On and on and on and on and more...
05mar08