From: simon333@aol.com (Simon333)
Newsgroups: alt.sex.fetish.tickling
Subject: About "A Pirate Story"
Date: 23 Mar 1996 13:41:52 -0500

Between _Oliver Twist_ and _Bleak House_, Charles Dickens wrote a number
of short stories that dealt with a favorite but little-known obsession of
his - tickling.  These stories were never published, and are very rare. 
Posted here is the only known manuscript of one of them entitled "A Pirate
Story".
     Okay, okay, *that* little Dickens didn't write this - *this* little
Dickens did (Simon) - in the spirit of Charlie D. himself. 
      In two versions, yet.  See, I originally wrote it for a friend who
dreamed of being tickled by another guy.  So it was done first of all as a
m/m story.  But then, I remembered I had promised to write another story
for the woman in "The Termite Inspector".  Being essentially lazy, I just
went in and changed the genders, and then wrote a third part just for her.
 So!  You have a choice!  If you want to read about guys tickling guys,
get the m/m one, in two parts.  If you want to read about guys tickling a
gal, get the second one, in three parts.  Or if you're not picky, then get
both!  Collect all five parts!  I've posted the m/f one before, it's
marked as such, but I've never posted the m/m one. 
      Ahem.  "A Pirate Story" is the tale of a (man)(woman) who was
kidnapped by pirates and tickled - well, a whole lot.   It *does* contain
details of both sensual and sexual acts, so if you're offended by blah
blah blah.
     I turn up in this one, too - look for the tall guy with the curly
hair.                   Simon---->>>>>>>>>>>>>>


LONDON, 1867

     Steve walked along the parched streets of London.  The drought had
taken hold during May, and hadn't abated halfway through July.  London was
a rainy town; it's buildings and people were not prepared for such a long
stretch of dry weather.  The searing heat which began at dawn each day
didn't help, either.  There had been numerous fires; there would be more.
     Steve worked, for twenty pounds a year, in a barrister's office hard
by Old Bailey.  Twenty pounds was not much to live on, but it was enough
to keep his small flat and have enough food sent from the cookshop.
     Steve spent his days scribbling in ledgers, keeping the accounts and
greeting customers in the basement front office of Mr. Tarkington.  He had
held the job for three years, and was constantly being promised that he
would "advance" in the world in due time.  It had not happened yet.  Steve
was beginning to wonder if it ever would.
     Steve enjoyed the job, anyway.  He was gay - before such a thing had
been heard of - and although he did not have much chance to act on his
urges for other men, he still came into contact with quite a few during
the course of his days in the office.  
     Steve also had a very unusual taste for tickling.  As the clients of
Tarkington came to visit the office, Steve always found himself closely,
but discreetly, examining their hands.  He would notice the shape and size
of the fingers, and wonder how those fingers would feel running up and
down his rib cage, stroking him under the arms, or digging into the sides
of his stomach.
     He had only acted on his desire to be tickled once, with his good
friend Jommy.  It was clear to Steve from the start that Jommy liked men;
he couldn't keep his hands off of Steve.
     They had met at a play; one of Steve's few delights in life was to
take in an evening at the theatre with some friends.  It was expensive,
though, so he didn't indulge himself often.
     Jommy was in the seat next to his.  They conversed between acts, and
finally, enjoying each other's company, retired to a public house where a
number of pints of ale loosened them up considerably.
     Steve invited Jommy back to his flat, where they ended up making
furious love.
     They became constant companions after that.  Jommy, a short fellow a
few years younger than Steve, had curly red hair, lots of freckles, and
blue eyes.  Originally a Scotsman, he had come to London looking for work.
 Except for occasional day jobs, though, he hadn't found any.
     One night, Jommy had poked him in the ribs, to emphasize a
particularly vociferous point about modern life.  Steve jumped, which made
Jommy smile.
     "Tickly, are ye?" he said, and poked Steve again.
     Steve laughed, and tried to wriggle away.  
     "Oh, no, ye don't," said Jommy, and jumped on him, tickling all up
and down his sensitive sides, reaching under his coat and shirt to torture
his bare skin.
     Steve screamed with laughter.  Jommy held Steve's arm up over his
head, while trapping the other underneath his body.  He began tickling him
under the arm unmercifully with his free hand.  
     After a few moments, he stopped and looked into Steve's eyes.
    "Ye're likin' this, aren't ye?" he said, smiling.
     "I'm . . . I always wanted you to do this, Jommy!"  said Steve.  "I
just knew you'd think me daft if I asked!"
     "Nae, ye're not daft," said Jommy.  "Me bruther was the same - he'd
do anythin' for a tickle, he would!"
     "Would you . . . do it some more?" asked Steve.
     "Aye," said Jommy.  "I'll tickle ye 'alf crazed, like I used to do to
lil Robbie when we was wee ones."
     Jommy launched another tickling attack on Steve's ribs and underarms,
running his strong fingers down Steve's sides until Steve squealed in
ticklish delight.  He tickled his neck, his ribs, his stomach while Steve
wriggled and screamed with hilarity.  
     The two men spent the night alternating between making love and
sending Steve into paroxysms of ticklish laughter.  At one point during
the night, Jommy tied Steve to the bed and tickled his bare ribs until
tears came to his eyes and he screamed for mercy.
     The next morning, when Steve awoke, Jommy was gone.  He found a note
on the mantel of his fireplace. It said :

                       "My dear Steve,
                             Since you so obviously enjoyed last night, I 
                              didn't have the heart to tell you that it 
                               would be our last.  I cannot find work here
                                in town, so I've shipped out.  The
merchant
                                ship Bonnie Brae leaves this morning at
                                 six o'clock; I've signed on for this 
                                  journey, and perhaps for many more.
                                  I may not see you again, but you will 
                                  always be in my heart and mind.
                                                    Affectionately yours,
                                                             Jommy
     Steve's life had been empty ever since a year ago when this had
happened.

*************************************************
     On this already sultry July morning, he rounded the familiar corner
on which the office lay, sweating in his suit and wiping his forehead with
his handkerchief.  As he approached the building, he sensed something
wrong.  There was a smell of something burning in the air, but he saw no
fire.
     As he came closer, what had happened became clear to him.  The
building where he worked had burned to the ground during the previous
night.
     As he stood there in shock, seeing the blackened timbers that were
all that remained, he felt a hand on his shoulder.
     Startled, he turned and looked into the eyes of a man a few years
younger than himself.  He recognized him; he was a fairly wealthy ship
owner who had had considerable business with Mr. Tarkington. 
      "It's all gone, Stevie," Mr. Trill - for that was the name Steve
knew him by - said, and patted his shoulder.
     " What . . . happened . . .?" Steve said, still not believing his
eyes.
     "The building burned during the night," said Trill. "They say the
fire was started by a lit pipe."
     Steven let the significance of this sink in.  Tarkington smoked a
pipe constantly.
     "Mr. Tarkington's gone, Stevie," Trill said, sadness showing in his
demeanour.  "The business is gone, too, without him."
     "My . . . work," Steve said, his eyes filling with tears.  "What am I
going to do?"
     "It's not so bad as that, boy," said Trill.  "You could come and work
on one of my ships.  There's always need for a fine strong fellow like you
as a crewman."
     That was the beginning of Steve's new life.

*************END OF PART ONE*********************** 

    Steven had been on board the good merchant ship King George for a
month now.  He had become adept at climbing the rigging, setting the sails
in their proper places, and was no longer constantly seasick as he had
been during his first days on board.
     The ship was sailing for India, and had made fairly good time . . .
within the next few days the boat would round the Cape of Good Hope and
enter the Indian Ocean.
     The ship had a cargo of Chinese silk and porcelain, loaded aboard
from a merchant ship also owned by Mr. Trill, which had just arrived from
the Orient.  This was common; the English were among the greatest traders
in the world, and London was the largest port.  Nearly all goods were
shipped through the docks of London, no matter where they had come from or
where they were bound.
     The King George had been built cleverly; the lowest deck had a false
bottom.  Underneath this bottom was where the most valuable cargo was
stored.  Access to the cargo was limited to one well-concealed trap door. 
One had to know its location, and then perform a series of manoeuvres to
open it.  The block of planking surrounding it was somewhat like a Chinese
puzzle box; the pieces needed to be removed in a certain way and order for
the trap to open.
     The particular way in which this was done was known only to the
captain and his first mate.
     The ship was arranged this way to protect it from pirates, which
roamed the southern seas of the Atlantic at this time like predatory
sharks.  If the ship was boarded by these criminals, it would be very
difficult for them to lay their hands on the riches.
     Steve had become well-liked by the crew.  He was a hard worker, and
new facets of his personality had opened like the petals of a flower in
the last few weeks.  He joked with the other men, told stories, and
generally kept the morale of the sailors high as their journey lengthened.
     Some of this had come to the attention of the captain, but like many
men who had spent nearly their whole lives on the sea, he was unemotional
and businesslike around crew members.
*************************************************

    In the middle of the night of their thirty-second day at sea, Steve
was awakened by his cabin-mate.
     "Steve," the man said. "You must come up on deck.  Night watch has
spotted a ship, and the captain wants all hands awake and ready."
     Steve sat up, and slipped on his boots and blouse.  He was instantly
wide awake.  "Pirates?" he said, stepping to the door.
     "Not sure," his mate said.  "Best hurry."
     Steve stepped out on the upper deck of the boat.  Sailors were
running about in confusion.
     "Pirate ship off stabboard!" he heard someone cry.  "Prepare for
boarding!"
     Squinting his eyes off to the distance off the side of the ship. 
Steven could just make out the outline of another ship bearing down on
them.  As he watched, it grew closer rapidly, and he could indeed see the
Jolly Roger flying from its mast.
     It took an eternity for the ship to close in on them.  By then, the
crew was prepared.
      The ships were yards apart, and small boarding boats were being
dispatched by the pirates, full of terrifying men intent on robbery and
slaughter.
     The first ship reached the King George, and the pirates showed their
heads over the side.  They were met by a hail of rifle fire from the crew.
     Suddenly, on the other side of the ship, screams rang out.  The
pirates had outsmarted them; they had sent the bulk of their boarding
boats to the opposite side of the ship, which had  not been
well-protected.  
     The pirates swarmed the deck, and the crew of the King George was
quickly overwhelmed.  Some crew members were thrown overboard, others shot
or stabbed.
     Steve, unarmed, could only watch helplessly.  Finally, fear overcame
him, and he hid behind some of the large storage barrels on deck.
     He hid for about half an hour, and then heard footsteps approaching
his hiding place.  A bearded head peered around the corner of the barrel,
and immediately saw him.
     "Cap'n! 'Ere's one still!" the man said.
     He was seized by two men, who brought him roughly to the center of
the deck.  His hands were raised and tied in the rigging of the mainsail. 
His feet were bound together.
     The pirates surrounding him cleared to make way for the captain.  As
he approached, Steve could see a short, muscular fellow wearing a black
hat.  The face looked . . . familiar somehow.
     "Jommy!"  he cried.  "It's you!  You're the captain!" 
     Jommy - if indeed it was him - frowned and took a closer look at the
helplessly bound man in front of him.
     "My name's nae Jommy," the captain said.  "Soonds like ye might know
me bruther, though - he looks a bit like me."
     Steve peered at his face through the gloom.  The hair color and
freckles were the same, but the features did appear slightly different. 
The nose was turned up more, the eyes slightly smaller and more cruel.
     "You . . . must be Robbie?" he said.
     "Nae more," the captain said.  "I goes by the name of Cap'n Red now."
 He approached Steve even closer, until his face was inches from Steve's
own.
     "And that's what ye'll call me," he said.  "Now, doon to business,
mate.  We've nae been able to find the cargo this ship carries.  Ye're the
only one who could tell us, I think.  The captain's dead along with half
the crew.  We just finished . . . discussin' this with one o' the others,
and he told us ye were trusted by all.  I figure ye know how to get to the
riches."
     "I . . . I know nothing . . ." said Steve, knowing he would probably
pay for it.
     Red poked his ribs hard. "Ye'll tell us soon enough . . ."
     Steve jumped when he was poked.  A shudder went through his limbs.
     "An' I think I know just how . . ." Red said.  He had noticed the
jump.
     "Matty!" he called. "Come over here . . . and bring ye're tools."
     A huge black man approached Steve's helpless body.  Steven was amazed
to see two seagull feathers dwarfed in his enormous hands.
     "Ye know what to do," said Red, smiling wickedly.
     The man smiled, and held up the feathers for Steve to see.
"Ya see dese feathers?" he said.  "Da cap'n wants me ta torture ya a while
widdem."
      Matty reached for the shoulder of Steve's blouse, and tore it off
with one motion.  Steve's chest, his ticklish underarms and ribs, and his
sensitive stomach were exposed.
     He began running the feathers gently up Steve's sides, and into his
ticklish armpits.  Steve shivered.  It didn't tickle him very much, but he
knew that soon he would be squirming and screaming for mercy.  
     Matty continued to run the feathers over Steve's bare, helpless
torso.  After a while, the tickling had a cumulative effect.  Steve
shivered uncontrollably now, and squirmed against his bonds.  It was like
water torture; all those feathery little touches were beginning to take
their toll on his body and mind.
     Just when Steven thought he would go insane from the soft touches,
Red said to him "Are ye ready to tell us anything?"
     "I . . .I don't know anything," said Steve.
     "Then I think we'll stop going easy on ye," said Red.  He looked at
Matty and nodded.
     Matty smiled, dropped the feathers, and flexed his huge hands over
Steve's chest.  Steve looked closely at them.  They were monstrously
large, with nails as big as shillings.  They appeared very strong.  Steve
knew that if those hands started to tickle him, he would be lost.
     Matty began to tickle, hard, using all fingers and thumbs, right in
the middle of Steve's ribs.  Steve immediately went into hysterics,
squirming and screaming with laughter.  Matty's hands were roughly
textured; it was obvious that he was someone who had been working with his
hands all his life.  He was also an expert at tickling; it was clear that
he had done it before to others.  Those enormous hands could tickle all
the way from the top of Steve's rib cage to nearly the bottom.  Matty
seemed to know the right amount of pressure to use to send Steve crazy
with ticklish laughter, but not hard enough to cause pain. Steve squealed
and screamed with hilarity.  Matty tickled without a stop for ten minutes.
 
     By the end of that time, Steve was weak with ticklishness.  Tears
were running down his face, and his helpless body  tingled all over.  He
hung in the ropes, without the strength to stay on his feet.
      The pirates had all been standing around watching his torture,
laughing at his plight.  Red finally approached him again.  "Are ye ready
to talk to us, ticklish one?" he said, poking his index fingers into
Steve's ribs.
      "I . . .I'll tell you . . ." Steve said hoarsely, his voice nearly
gone from forced laughter.  "I'll tell you that the ship's cargo is below
. . . but I don't know how . . . to get to it."
     Red's face darkened with anger.  "I think ye DO know," he said.  "And
I think yer torture is just beginning."
     He snapped his fingers.  Matty approached again, as well as a small
Asiatic sailor.
     "Matty, Chan," the captain grinned evilly. "Do yer work."
     Matty began tickling Steve's ribs as before, while Chan put his small
hands into Steve's armpits and began tickling in such a way that drove
Steve wild.  He didn't tickle very hard, but he was extremely accurate in
finding the most ticklish spots in Steve's sensitive armpits.  He kept
changing, by inches, the place where he was tickling, so that as soon as
Steve became used to his touch in one location under his arms, Chan would
move to find a new spot that was as ticklish as could be.
      Red stayed close by and watched the proceedings.  He would yell,
over Steve's screaming, "Now, ticklish little boy? Now ye'll talk?" 
     Steve couldn't have answered if he wanted to. He was being tickled
half to death!  His body squirmed back and forth, but he couldn't defend
himself in any way from the ticklish fingers all over his torso.  His
laughter had tightened in his throat; he screamed and squealed and
wriggled.  
     Red snapped his fingers again.  Steve saw, through teary eyes, two
more sailors approach his bound body.  One began tickling his neck; this
was a tall, curly-headed fellow with a devilish smile and long fingers. 
The other, a short, stocky, Spanish man, began to tickle the sides of his
stomach, just below where Matty's enormous hands reached. 
      Red and the other sailors watched Steve's increasing torture and
smiled.  They would occasionally call suggestions.  "Tickle him 'arder,
Matt!" one called.  "He's turned bright red!" said another.
      Red was apparently enjoying himself so much that he forgot the
purpose for the tickle-torture.  He asked no more questions, but after a
moment or two sent two more sailors over.  These men lifted up Steve's
legs, and peeled off his boots.  They began tickling his bare soles,
bending his legs up and holding his feet in their laps while they sat
behind him.
     After what seemed like an eternity of tickling, Steve didn't even
know where he was anymore.  He was just a toy of these men; his only
purpose for existence was to be the tickled slave of these merciless
sailors.  He couldn't remember his life ever being any other way.
     Through a haze of tickled torment, Steve saw another sailor approach
the captain and confer.  Red listened, nodded, and held up his hand for
Steve's torturers to stop.  
     "We've found the cargo," he said.  "This ship is ours now . . . I'll
put on a crew of my men to sail it."
      Red approached Steve's body, reddened all over from the tickling. 
Steve was catching his breath, and could see the captain grinning at him
through the veil of tears that had been tickled out of him.
     "As for ye . . ." he said.  "I think my men enjoyed playing with ye .
. . so much so that I think I'll leave ye there so that all the others can
take their turn . . ."

                                    THE END?