Castle
Saga - Missing Manga 6
Xei
rushed up
the stairs after having consulted with Felin.
“Jelex, Kiri, it’s all right now, there’s no more need to torture
anyone, Felin
found her manga somewhere else!” Xei almost laughed except for the fact
that
laughing unnecessarily was the number-one way to draw attention to
oneself,
attention that might not be desired under the current circumstances.
After all,
she did need to deliver this information to Jelex and Kiri and
therefore was
unable to stop and indulge herself. This restriction, however, seemed
to create
a contradiction, Xei’s logic programming vying against her
self-gratification
programming. At times, it irritated Xei how she did not have as much
control
over which programming had more say in the eventual action, but she
realized it
made her act more human, which was the essential point of her
functioning.
This internal argument, which had caused Xei to commence her characteristic soft whirring, was a sufficient distraction to guide her past Syia’s room and other temptations, where she might otherwise have stopped outside of the door to giggle softly and pretend she was at work cleaning when she was really trying to induce an attack upon herself. Yet, to her combined relief and chagrin, Xei made it to Jelex’s room, and was about to fling open the door when she noticed something odd. There was darkness coming from underneath Jelex’s door. Had they gone somewhere else? No, Xei realized immediately as she dialed up her aural receptors a bit to catch the noise from within the room…
“Kiri, come on, stop, stahahha --- aahhahahhahahaahahahahahah not th-there…!!!”
“I’m only tickling with one hand… I still have five fingers in reserve, Jelex…” Kiri’s trademark chuckle followed that statement. Xei made an effort to breathe quieter and forcibly halted the deep musings she had been contemplating, going totally silent as she leaned against the door with her ear pressed to it in order to hear everything more clearly…
[i]I know you’re there, Xei…[/i] The message, not delivered through sound waves in the air but a digital transmission, slid across Xei’s brain quietly, swift yet gentle like the disabling stroke of a fingernail along her sole… The very message seemed to send an involuntary shiver through Xei’s nervous receptors. Indeed, Kiri seemed to somehow be able to irritate her sensory receptors slightly to produce a reaction which the humans aptly described as “tingling”. [i]Come inside and watch, I know you’re dying to see what’s happening, aren’t you?[/i] Xei resolved to ask Felin if Kiri had some sort of upgraded data transmission capability, it definitely seemed as if Kiri possessed the ability to make Xei think certain vague thoughts, images flashing in her mind almost, or to feel fleeting touches upon her body…
Xei quietly opened the door the barest crack that would allow her to slip inside and shut it silently. Jelex’s eyes would normally have been drawn to the light as a natural reaction, yet Kiri had her hand over Jelex’s eyes for just this brief instant… once the door was closed it was pitch-black in the room again, a rug stuffed under the door to block the light seeping in through the hallway. Xei could see to an acceptable degree, as could Kiri, as they were both equipped with low-light enhancements to their vision. Jelex’s eyes strained to catch any hint of movement, but Kiri was cleverly allowing her eyes to glow faintly, causing Jelex’s natural reflexes to keep her eyes locked on Kiri’s. Kiri was obviously exploiting this situation by not moving her head at all as her arms caressed the elven girl’s body…
Xei couldn’t help an intake of breath at what she saw. Jelex’s limbs were bound with rope, yet the material was not hemp or the usual polymers that make up artificial ropes. Rather… Xei analyzed it quickly and was startled to see that it was silk rope. Where had Kiri gotten such a thing? More to the point, where had Jelex found it, since Kiri had probably pirated it from Jelex’s stash…
“You hate it that you can’t see what I’m doing,” Kiri teased softly. Her hands were hovering just above Jelex’s sides as she straddled the girl’s waist. “Your eyes are right on mine… keep them there, Jelex… keep looking at me, that’s right… don’t take your eyes from mine…” Kiri repeated this slowly, almost hypnotically. The effect was that Jelex began to giggle as Kiri’s fingers stroked her ribs, yet it took her a few moments to realize she was being touched and begin squirming…
Kiri’s knots were none too magnificent, Xei saw at once. Jelex was steadily degrading the ropes’ binding performance by a cumulative 3.7% with every struggle. Did Kiri know, or was she spending too much processor time with teasing Jelex? Xei was barely able to keep her eyes on anything but Jelex’s body herself… Jelex was giggling, Xei realized suddenly. Kiri’s finger was tracing a long, lazy S-shape from Jelex’s left hipbone across her stomach to her ribs, curling lazily and sensually around her breast and looping atop her shoulder to dive gracefully into the smooth hollow of her underarm.
Jelex had been fighting giggles out of sheer pride, yet the hum of her soft laughter rose and fell depending on where Kiri’s finger touched, her body producing laughter almost as if it were a record on an old-fashioned player, the grooves of her figure producing a soft, slow crescendo to the needle of Kiri’s finger… when Jelex felt the nail tease her shoulder, she giggled, body tensing… and immediately, that tension was relieved when Kiri’s finger found her underarm. “Hwaahahahaahahah ahahhahaa!! Ohoho heheheh Kiriirirhrihihiiiii!!” Jelex wriggled again. Was it her imagination, or were the ropes getting loose?
Kiri smirked in the darkness. “I’ve thought it might be fun to turn off my vision enhancement, so that I see nothing, like you. I’d be able to think only of your body beneath me, I could feel every wriggle, concentrate on every muscle tensing as I tease you slowly to madness in the dark…” Her hands, both of them, scratched gently at the sides of Jelex’s ribs. It wasn’t enough to make the elven girl howl with laughter, yet her giggling picked up a few more decibels and another octave or so in pitch.
Xei blinked suddenly. That was it! Kiri’s speech patterns, her teasing, almost everything about this encounter… it was reminding her a great deal of Felin. Had Kiri studied Felin’s technique and had sought to copy it? Or had she fallen victim to Felin’s hypnotic, sensual purr and been stalked as a victim of the feline scientist? The thought of Kiri under Felin’s nails was enough to make Xei shiver again… these subroutines made logical thought very difficult, but Xei found it harder and harder to care…
Abruptly Xei realized she had removed Jelex’s shoes and was stroking her feet gently, using her short fingernails to tease the sensitive areas of Jelex’s bare feet… she wasn’t teasing as Kiri had been, tickling more to make Jelex laugh, which Jelex did. Unfortunately Xei had forgotten her own analysis of the rope’s ability to hold Jelex, and along with more laughter came increased struggling, struggling which compromised the final bit of the knots’ integrity… The silk rope came loose around Jelex’s ankles, sending Xei into an instant panic reaction.
Xei saw a disembodied hand materialize and flip the light switch on the wall, giving her enough warning to dim the light-enhancement to her vision. Kiri took a bit longer to do so and suffered a slight optical overload, being “dazzled” as a human might say, and was just scrambling off the bed as Xei threw the rug blocking the door’s movement aside and flung the door open.
“XEIEHEHEHEHEHEHEHEHEH HELP!” Kiri cried, and Xei turned back to see that one of Kiri’s sensitive feet was caught within Jelex’s grip and her deft fingers glided upon the bare, exquisitely sculpted foot of her sister. Xei gloated for .0001 seconds upon the fact that Kiri was absolutely terrible at taking what she dished out, then she formulated an idea to save Kiri. Xei turned and blurted out her message, the message she had come here to deliver originally.
“Felin found her manga! You don’t need to do anything else for her! Thank you very much for your help!” Jelex looked up, pausing briefly as she processed the news. At the same time, Xei darted forward and tickled Jelex’s ribs to make her release Kiri with a squeal. Helping her sister, the two android maids scampered from Jelex’s room, bare feet pattering upon the stone floor as they fled.
“You stopped to help me,” Kiri said to Xei once they had stopped fleeing and determined that Jelex would not pursue. Xei wondered if, for all her quiet condemnation of Kiri’s overly forward advances towards whoever happened to be within her sight, that she was the one misinterpreting things to have a different meaning. Why should she feel… flushed? Her sister was thanking her for assistance, there was nothing to be drawn from that. “Thank you so very much, Xei…” Never mind, Xei admonished herself a half-second later, she had every right to feel flushed. Kiri just giggled and pushed her back into an empty room.
“Let me thank you… by helping you lighten up a little, Sister.”
Jelex blinked her eyes several times and squinted. Geez, those two were a double handful, maybe more. The only reason she hadn’t chased their sorry tin rears all over the castle was because she’d been kinda dazzled by suddenly flicking the lights on, too. Ah, well. If Felin had found her moldy old manga, there was no reason that she needed to be waiting for Felin’s orders anymore, right? Right. Jelex decided, after her stomach’s proposal, that she was hungry and would go find something to eat.
It was actually almost dinner time, so that meant there’d be something good cooking in the kitchen… if Makoto wasn’t around, hawkishly guarding her food as she normally did, it would be great to pick at whatever was cooking. Jelex decided to head for the kitchen after putting some short pink socks on and leaving her boots in her room. The smells of cooking food reached her nose as soon as she made it to the top of the stairs, but the sound of sweet giggling was feeding her ears from a room nearby…
Jelex hastily pushed the urge aside. If she went on without eating for too much longer, then she’d be unable to fight back if she needed to. It didn’t bear thinking about, and besides, the food smelled good enough to compete with and eventually win out over the giggling reaching her ears. It was decided! Jelex took the stairs two at a time and bounded into the common room energetically.
That was odd… Jelex saw a tassel of blonde flash by, somewhere in the labyrinth of couches and chairs that made up most of the common room. Maybe Usagi, maybe Minako. Both dizty enough to try hiding down there, but Usagi probably also wanted food too… well, no reason to suspect Usagi would snitch anyone out. A little session with those feet would convince her of that if need be. Syia was down there too, although she was busy watching some TV show, and more importantly, facing away from Jelex. But never mind that, the food smelled better than ever…
Score! The kitchen was empty and okonomiyaki was frying on the griddle, its intoxicating smell probably coming from the sauce… Makoto’s sauce was to die for, a mere taste of it seemed to cure hunger pangs for at least a day. It was enough to make Jelex salivate as she stood over the defenseless okonomiyaki, debating which one to nip at… They all looked good, so Jelex decided to sneak some sauce instead, and get right to the root of the delicious flavor. The sauce jar was open and the ladle was still inside, so Jelex helped herself to a ladleful, sipping the thick brown sauce and squealing with delight as she replaced the ladle. Best not to get caught by Makoto –
“What have
I told you about stealing food before it gets eaten?” Makoto planted
her fists
on her hips, somehow managing to look very intimidating even with an
apron on.
Maybe the fact that she was taller had something do with it, Jelex
thought
nervously as she grinned, scratching the back of her head. “Well? I saw
you
pilfering the sauce,
“I didn’t touch the okonomiyaki! I swear!” Jelex blurted out. “I only sipped at the sauce, honest! I saw Usagi hiding in the couches when I came downstairs. She probably stole the okonomiyaki. I’ll help you find and punish her!” Jelex offered, speaking quickly. Although Makoto was terrible at fighting her ticklish reactions and usually very easy prey for Jelex, there was an unwritten rule that made such an attack ill-advised: anyone who tickle tortured Makoto while she was cooking didn’t eat.
“That’s all right, I can handle it just fine by myself,” Makoto said, wiping her hands on her apron and grinning, very close to Jelex’s face. “Didn’t you know that sipping my special okonomiyaki sauce before it’s cooked makes your stomach ticklish and sensitive?”
Jelex’s eyes went wide and her hands flew to her belly, feeling at it reflexively. “It does -- !” It was too late; Jelex had fallen for the trap, diverting her attention for a crucial moment. Now, Makoto’s fingers wormed their way in through the porous defenses of Jelex’s arms, tickling at her stomach, which wasn’t really made any more sensitive, although some people, like Usagi, were seemingly extra vulnerable to teasing when they had eaten a lot and were full…
Makoto smirked. “Maybe it doesn’t, but you’ll never find out!” Jelex twisted and bent her body in spasms of laughter, trying helplessly to evade Makoto’s fingers. Her strength let her worm her fingers into even the smallest vulnerable crack, allowing her to exploit it mischievously. Makoto turned several times, getting to Jelex’s side or behind her, always tickling and prodding, always trying to herd her towards the door. Jelex couldn’t fight back, and defending herself was problematic, so she decided to surrender herself and hope for leniency.
Makoto did stop tickling when Jelex put her arms behind her head. “Oho? Feeling repentant, are we? That’s a start, Jelex… now what are you never going to do again?” Slowly, teasingly, Makoto’s fingers stroked Jelex’s stomach, scraping back and forth ever so slowly.
“N-n-neheheheh never gonna pick at dinner while it’s cookin’,” Jelex managed to say, belly shaking with laughter.
“And who’s the undisputed queen of the kitchen?”
“Mahahah hahahaaha ah Makoto is!” Jelex squealed, feeling the tickling become rather more insistent. Still the questions continued;
“Who’s the best cook in the whole wide world?”
“YeheheEHehEHEHheehEHEHEhehe you are! And the most ticklish too!” Jelex couldn’t resist adding on to the end, much to her own detriment as it caused Makoto’s fingers to begin tickling madly. “EHHEEHEHE EHHE HEEHEH HAHAHAH AHAH KYAHAHHA AHAHHA HAAAAA HAHAAA – OOF!” Jelex hadn’t seen that she was being marched out into the common room, where she fell over the back of a couch and landed face-first into the cushion.
“Maybe that’ll teach you not to pick at dinner before it’s ready…” Makoto teased, playing with Jelex’s socked soles, which were kicking about in the air as the blonde elf tried to regain her balance. “Now, where did the piggy Senshi go…? She’s not getting out of this one without a reminder, either…” Syia chuckled, watching Makoto begin her stalking and turning around to see Jelex contorting herself back into a sitting position. She seemed unaffected by the incredible smells coming from the kitchen… why?
Jelex finally managed to tumble over and get her rear end on the couch cushion where it belonged. Makoto was hunting, it was plain to see from the expression on her face; yet as she walked the clusters of couches and chairs, Jelex was also hunting… planning her own hunt, more accurately, planning, musing, devising schemes to get at the powerful ponytailed brunette who had so deftly chased her from the kitchen… Not now. Now was not the time to get revenge, but… after dinner, she was fair game. Yes, Jelex chuckled, thinking to herself…
And what about Syia? There was something suspicious about her, the way she seemed to be taking all of this in stride, as if she knew it was coming, or somehow had an inside track… Was she working with Makoto? To spot, capture and torment those who dared steal food? A deadly combination… Jelex giggled. Makoto and Syia would be fun to get, especially both at once, and yet… They represented an extreme of one end of strength apiece, Makoto’s physical strength and Syia’s mental strength. Getting both at once was hard, but it would be fun… Yes, this game was going to be very fun…
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