Makoto actually didn’t mind doing the cleaning and cooking in the kitchen. It was her forte anyway, and it had the added bonus of giving her large chunks of time immune to tickling, which was good. By now, word had gotten around that the tall girl’s remarkable strength rapidly dwindled to nothing if she was tickled in the right way… that was to say, on her ribs, her second-worst spot and only fractionally behind her underarms and the rest of her upper body close behind.
In any case, Makoto was an expert at dragging things out for quite a long time, so on a good day she could technically remain immune to tickling for the entire day, and good thing too, since the mood was definitely skewed towards tickling tonight. Makoto wiped her hands on her apron, humming and in good cheer as she made her way back into the kitchen – only to find that, to her astonishment, the kitchen was already sparkling clean.
Makoto blinked and took a few more steps into the kitchen to make sure that she wasn’t being tricked, and opened the cabinets to double-check. No, it wasn’t a trick, everything had been washed, put away, sealed and refrigerated, leaving her with… actually nothing to do, since even the floor had been swept. Why would anyone want to do the work for her, unless… Makoto shrugged, taking off her apron and hanging it on the hook next to the doorway. Well, she’d have some extra free time then tonight. It wasn’t until Makoto was three steps into the common room that her brain returned the answer to the question she’d been mulling.
No cleaning, no immunity.
That had to be it. Whoever had cleaned up specifically wanted to deny her the de facto protection that doing housework provided her, and they wouldn’t have done it unless… Suddenly Makoto felt that her clothing was extremely thin, especially around the ribcage. Trying not to giggle, she hurried upstairs.
“Mako-chan!” Minako called out, waving from her open doorway. “Mako-chan, can you come here for a minute?” Instantly Makoto was suspicious. Had Minako been waiting for her? Or was she just being too paranoid? No, there was no such thing as “too” paranoid at times like these.
“What is it that you want?” Makoto asked, her arms crossed beneath her chest, or at least that’s how she wanted it to appear; Makoto was actually trying to keep her ribs and underarms covered as best she could, and stopped a few feet outside of Minako’s room, still in the hall and examining the room’s interior for anything suspicious.
“Huh? What’s got your panties in a twist –“
“Hey! There she is, you let her sneak away!” Jelex shouted from the top of the stairs, some distance down the hall. “C’mon, hurry up before she – gah!” Jelex groaned as Makoto weighed her options and fled into Minako’s room, slamming the door behind her.
“Well, I guess I see what the problem was, eheh,” Minako chuckled nervously, scratching the back of her head. “Too protective of dinner again?”
“Oh, shush. Now what did you want to show me?” Makoto asked, relaxing a bit and letting her hands fall back into a more or less normal position. “Oh… geez, wow. You two again?”
Kiri and Xei both sat on the edge of Minako’s bed; the empty room they had dived into upon escaping Jelex was actually Minako’s. “We were escaping Jelex and… hid in here,” Xei said, inwardly cursing the slight pause her lie had caused in her speech. “Is Jelex after you as well? She seems to have been more assertive lately.”
Makoto nodded. “Yeah, she got all uppity since I tickled her away from dinner.” She giggled at the thought. “But thanks for letting me stay in here, Minako. I owe you one.”
“It’s no big deal. Say, we were just discussing something you might want to be in on.” Minako winked and gestured towards the two androids. “Jelex would be easier to deal with if we had some help, right? So we were talking about having a temporary alliance.”
Kiri nodded. “Allowing us to join you will definitely prove to be a smart move. Xei and I are experts at logics and logistical thinking and we’ll easily outsmart that brash elven girl.” Kiri giggled and went on: “We’ll show her who gets the last laugh… and it sure won’t be us.” Xei glanced at her sister, shaking her head and sighing. “All right, fine, no puns, but you always complain that I don’t bother to study humans enough.”
“You ought to study what’s acceptable and what isn’t,” Xei retorted. “Puns are definitely one area of study that should be avoided…”
“Enough, who cares,” Minako said, heading off a stupid argument. “So what do you say, Mako-chan? Are you in?”
Makoto nodded thoughtfully. “I’m in. We gonna have a strategy meeting or something?”
“Yes, we will need to ascertain how best to apply your individual skills while compensating for your weaknesses. To do that, however, we’ll need to run a risk analysis on everyone.” Xei nodded and she and Kiri stood up from the bed. “Makoto, if you would please, lie down on the bed.”
Makoto started to back up, holding up her hands as if in defense. “Hey, whoa, I agreed to this so I could avoid being tickled, not to --!” Minako gave her a shove from behind, giggling, that sent Makoto sprawling onto the bed, where the two androids eagerly clambered on top of her before she could properly recover. “Hey! Oh, geez, can’t you just ASK or something?”
“The ribs!” Minako squealed, nearly hopping up and down with giggles and excitement. “Test the ribs!” Xei turned to Kiri and nodded; Xei sat on Makoto’s wrists, while Kiri straddled Makoto’s waist and let her short fingernails scritch on Makoto’s ribs.
“Minako I’m gonna ki-hihihiHIIIIIIL yoUhuoUhouhouhhuuuu!!!” Makoto squealed, her arms trying to force Xei off so she could cover herself. Normally, given that Xei was fairly lightweight, Makoto might have been able to manage even with the leverage problem, but with Kiri teasing her ribs she might have had muscles made of water. It felt like the tickling sensation skittered out from her ribs and swirled on her pectorals and biceps, teasing the strength out of them and leaving her as a large tickle dummy.
“Such a nice big area to get,” Kiri said happily, half an eye on the bobbing chest of the girl she straddled. “Hmm, this will be trouble.” Kiri scratched at various locations on the ribs, letting Xei analyze the result.
“A very broad, very ticklish, and very debilitating area,” Xei mused. “Her applicable strength is falling rather rapidly. In short, she suffers a rather extreme loss of resistance ability upon being tickled at her ribs. Continue tickling, I want to see how low her strength is compared to the baseline after a minute.”
“KyAHAHhAHAhHAHahaHAHahahAHAHAHh khahaha hahaah knock it off withhahaah that technical stuff!!” Makoto squealed, blushing as the androids dissected her embarrassing weakness, knowing nothing they said was wrong and already almost too weak to even struggle that much. Kiri had slid her shirt up to her neck, making her blush rather more as they exposed her chest, but all were female in the room, so it could have been worse…
“One minute,” Kiri announced as she moved upwards to tickle Makoto’s underarms. “How’s she looking?”
“Almost a seventy-eight percent strength loss,” Xei called out over Makoto’s rather hysterical laughter. “I’m seeing a potential pattern for an enemy to follow, tickle the ribs until strength loss is critical and go for the underarms afterwards, I’m currently flagging underarms as the most ticklish area. Continue for a minute and then proceed.”
“YHAAAHAHAH AHAHAHAAHA AHAHAH HAHAH OH GHAHAHAHAAD NO MORE AHAHAH I CAN’T TAKE IT!” Makoto cried breathily, her face flushed red from laughter powered by her significant lung capacity. Kiri was fascinated with how despite her constant laughter Makoto still seemed able to draw in full breaths, giving her laughter a fuller tone than the high-pitched, half-breathless squeals most made. It also allowed her to endure greater amounts of tickling, despite her apparent sensitivity and weakness.
“Lung capacity is high, endurance is shaping up to be a strong point,” Xei announced. “Go on to the midriff.”
“Wow, you guys are really thorough,” Minako said breathlessly, covering her own body a bit and wondering if she’d have to go through this testing as well. “I mean… wow, Makoto’s really ticklish, but…”
“HahahAHAHHAHAahahahah some hehEHEhehEHEeh help you are!” Makoto retorted while still laughing, albeit less now, she was slightly less ticklish on her stomach and sides. However…
“Reaction suppression poor,” Xei called out. “I don’t think she’ll be good at a free-standing tickle fight, too easy to tickle and pin once she’s been cracked by the first blow. She’ll be much better at resisting long torture sessions.”
“I chAHahahahah coulda told you thahHAHAHAhahahahahat!” Makoto squealed, breathing a bit easier as Kiri stopped for the moment and turned around, taking off her socks and raking her short fingernails upon the soles. “Nhahahahahahah ahahaha heeehe hhehehehehe hehehee!!” Makoto flexed her feet a bit and breathed a little easier. Her feet were definitely her least ticklish spot, and in truth she could be tickled on her feet for a very long time without breaking, as some foot-centric ticklers had learned to their dismay.
“No, no, not there,” Minako chided Kiri, stepping up to the foot of the bed, where Kiri was diligently tickling the long arch of Makoto’s foot. “Right… here!” Minako drilled her fingers along the undersides of Makoto’s toes and was rewarded with a whoop and a squeal.
“Shock value on that area,” Xei proclaimed. “Initial very strong reaction, but it rapidly levels off to normal levels around that area. It is probably useful for breaking open the initial laughter if she resists. And I think that should conclude the preliminary analysis, we’ll do another later if time permits.” She and Kiri clambered off of Makoto, leaving the big girl breathing hard and flushed red, still giggling residually.
“I think we have enough data to figure out how to use Makoto strategically,” Xei announced.
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