A Ticklish Viral Trend

“There’s no way that this works,” Cassie said. She stared back at her computer screen with an incredulous look of mild disinterest. Slight unease washed over her composure as she looked back at the picture she had just uploaded.

“It’s just bait for pervs,” Jessica chimed in. Her voice was slightly grainy through the dated computer speakers. The whole chat murmured with ambient noise in the back of each of her connected friend’s homes. Cassie switched to her browser, displaying the Discord call that she and her friends shared.

“Yeah, maybe,” said Anaya. The window that displayed her face caught mostly the entire room, riddled with a disorganized array of clothes and loose papers scattered all over nearly every available surface. She sipped from a can of Cherry Pepsi, a mix-matched pajama set hanging limply off of her figure. “But, like, what if though?”

“Yeah, what if you’re just giving some weirdo something to ‘use’ later?” Jessica added. Her hair was pulled back, a tight undershirt hugging her torso like a tank-top. Without makeup, her eyes gave a slightly more tired look than usual, yet not significantly less pretty. Cassie sighed and grumbled a bit. Her lips pursed as she switched between the Discord and email tabs.

“I mean… so long as they don’t actually bother you, who cares?” Harriet added. Harriet’s window had her popping in and out of frame. She looked onward to the side, her fingers tapping a PS5 controller rapidly and quite audibly. From her end, the murmuring sounds of game action and dogs barking kept the chat fairly routinely lively. 

“Then why don’t you do it,” Cassie asked.

“Yeah!” Jessica exclaimed.

“Because I don’t want to risk it being real,” Harriet said. “But if you don’t think it is, then just try. See what happens.” Jessica and Anaya continued to bicker over the logistics of the legend while Cassie grumbled and switched back to her email. She looked upon the picture that she was supposed to take, according to the myth being spread. 

The latest viral trend being spread around school had taken off like wildfire. Many claimed to have tried it and nearly just as many had said that it actually worked, adding more tinder to the flames. It was said that, should anyone email a picture of the bottoms of their feet to a specific address with the phrase ‘please tickle me’ written three times in the subject line at exactly midnight, a demon of sorts would come to them in their sleep and tickle them all night long. Many expressed disbelief that the myth was real, calling it a hoax or some kind of predatory campaign, though the word of it spread quickly on the lips of those that swore by its authenticity.

“There’s no way, though,” Jessica repeated, with a mix of irritation and amusement in her voice. “And it’s kinda dumb you guys still believe stuff like this.” 

“Cass can try it and see and let us know, though,” Harriet said.

“Why do I have to try it though?” Cassie asked.

“Because you already took the picture,” said Harriet, full of energy and conviction for it being as late as it was. “Plus you’re, like, the most ticklish out of all of us, so do it.” Ignoring the pressure as just Harriet’s antics, Cassie looked down to the corner of her screen, catching the numbers 11:59. She whimpered a bit before switching back to her email tab. There, a picture of her feet, with her looking bashfully away, stared back at her. The email had been already set to the address she was told with the correct subject line, according to the legend. Her teeth sank into her lip while her friends continued to argue. 

“And if anything bad does happen, we’ll do what we can for you,” said Ayana.

“Well, don’t make her think like that,” said Harriet. “I really want to know. You ready?”

“Shut it, Harry,” Cassie said. 

“You got it all written out?” Harriet asked.

“Yeah,” Cassie said with a beleaguered sigh.

“Good, let us know what happens,” Harriet said. Rolling her eyes, Cassie waited the last remaining seconds before the clock rolled around to reading 12:00. Reluctantly, she hovered the mouse over the send button. She groaned slightly, closed her eyes, and clicked. She sat and watched the notification pop up on her inbox reading the word ‘sent’. Cassie double checked her sent folder to see that it all had gone through. Harriet’s ruthless tapping grew even louder into the microphone. “Anything happen yet?”

“Not yet,” said Cassie.

“It just happened, give it some time, at least,” said Jessica. 

“Christ, die already…” Harriet mumbled, clearly more engaged with her game than the conversation. 

“I might call it,” Cassie said. “I’m pretty beat.”

“Can’t wait for your demon to show up and tickle those tootsies?” Harriet jested.

“Heh, no, I’m just not usually up this late and I’m really tired,” said Cassie, rubbing one eye. “So goodnight everyone.”

“Yeah, but you’re going to tell us what happens though, right?” Harriet asked.

“Yes, I’ll let you all know if I’m ‘tickled in the night’ or whatever,” Cassie said.

“You don’t want to stay up and wait for it?” Harriet asked.

“Isn’t it supposed to come in your sleep or something?” Ayana asked.

“Guys, it’s not real,” Jessica groaned. 

“I’m with Jess on this,” Cassie said. “Mostly because I’m tired and just really don’t care anymore, so I’m hanging up now. Goodnight!”

“Night!” Jessica said.

“Let us know in the morning if–” Harriet began until Cassie ended the call with another sigh. She sat back in her chair, breathing in a refreshing gulp of solitary air. With her friends off the call, she felt as if they were out of her room entirely, giving her the freedom to simply do what she wished once again. Giving herself another few moments of recollection, Cassie pushed herself to her feet and stretched out her back.

In an apathetic rush, Cassie engaged in her pre-bed ritual with minimum effort. She washed her face, brushed her teeth, and set her ceiling fan to the perfect intensity for a cool night’s sleep. Her pajama set was a long sleeve top and bottom of matching flannel, one of the softer and more favored articles in which she tended to sleep. Turning her lights off, she slipped into her bed. She lifted the covers to cloaked all but her head, which laid elegantly against her pastel pink pillow. Her bare toes rushed against the coolness of her sheets, coupling so enticingly with the warmth cloaking her arms and legs. She was not as familiar with twilight hours as her friends typically were, leaving her little time to contemplate when she would fall asleep and a swift retreat into that nocturn cradle of intimate slumber.

“Heh… heh… heh…” 

When Cassie finally woke, the window by her bed showed no evidence of morning. Not even a sliver of alerting sunlight. It was a comforting welcome, a way to wake up to know that she still had plenty of hours left before she had to get up for school. Cassie reached up to her face to rub her eyes once more, or tried to. Upon attempting, she realized that she was staring up at her own ceiling, having been sleeping on her back. Cassie rarely slept on her back, or at least she never started that way and hardly ever woke up sleeping on her back. Once again, she tried to reach up to touch her eye, only to find herself stuck in place. 

“Wh… whah…” Cassie muttered. She tried again to move her arm. Her body fell under a strange phenomenon, feeling as if she were physically strapped down to the bed, unable to move anywhere. The more eyes adjusted to the room and the darkness within it, the more she could see that the room seemed to be spinning to a faint degree. Nothing around her seemed as static as it should have been. Sounds seemed distant and hollow. Shapes began to form in the darkness that she knew were not there when she laid her head down. For a moment, she questioned if the room was even hers. She almost failed to recognize where she was. Objects and shapes around her began to change at will, leaving her fully aware of the dream in which she had found herself. Even so, a lucidity veiling Cassie’s body and mind projected a realness over the circumstance potent enough to leave Cassie almost disoriented. It was all just a dream, but one that felt more real than any dream she had ever had before.

Cassie huffed and pinched her eyes shut. Unable to move about, she attempted to force herself back into a dreamless sleep where she would wake up like any other morning. Unwilling to acknowledge the potential horrors that her mind could conjure, she laid with her eyes shut until the moment when she felt a strange chill brush against both of her feet at once. She tried to look down, able to see the rustling of her sheets as they lifted up to her calves seemingly on their own. Her bare feet poked out from the other end, her toes cresting slightly above the bunched edge of the bedding. Cassie swallowed anxiously. She watched with complete assurance that she was still dreaming as a shadow rose from the end of the bed, cutting ever so slightly through the darkness of the room.

“Well, well, what do we have here?” a breathy voice wafted through the room like a soft breeze. Cassie’s eyes remained fixed on the spot at the end of her bed. From the edge, a long, spindly arm raised beyond the sheets. A wide hand pressed down into the comforter, fingers spidering out tipped with thin nails. Another gripped at the bottom edge. From the bottom of the bed, the nightmare began to rise. Round yellow eyes glimmered back in the darkness. A drape of straight hair fell across its face like a shade. The thing seemed to grin, though Cassie could hardly make out a mouth in the black. It loomed over the bottom edge, rising steadily. Its fingers sank into the sheets, clutching the bed in deep talons. Cassie’s heart raced, watching the thing through a trembling, frozen expression.

“Wha-wha… w-who…?” Cassie muttered. The beast leered over her bed. Long, spindly arms stretched from end to end. Its face lowered to examine the girl’s feet, having been revealed and exposed by the raising of the sheet like a pair of small, supple performers atop a stage. Its breath puffed warm and eager against her bare, blushing soles, each sparking slight but noticeable irritations of the delicate nerves throughout. Deep, queasy instincts stirring within Cassie’s gut made the girl feel as if the creature were neither real nor dangerous, though enough of both to validate her petrified terror.

“Mmmmm, you called the pact, little ones, “ the creature said, its voice still as soft as the air swirling through the room. “Now… you must satisfy…” It spoke not to Cassie but to her feet, each syllable puffing little blasts of air against her soles. She could move neither but feel everything, likely more so in such an ethereal chamber so void of reality. The creature’s eyes fixed on the petite, innocent pair, admiring the soft pinkish hue of her soles, the milky streams of her arches, and the peony bubbles of her toes. Its hands slid closer to them. It raised one finger, commanding Cassie’s feet to sit perfectly upright. Cassie could feel her feet moving yet could make no effort of her own to push back. Her lith ran dry as her breathing increased. She clenched her eyes again, hoping to wake upon opening them once more. Through pinched eyes, she could still feel the creature’s taunting breath brushing against them, making her tremble and whimper as she contemplated the dare that had brought her to such a nightmare.

“This isn’t real, this isn’t real, this isn’t real, just wake up already,” Cassie repeated to herself. She braced herself as much as she could for the monster’s intentions, dreading harm as much as she found herself dreading the implied consequence of her actions. All she seemed to remember in that foggy haze was the picture she had taken, the email she had written, and her finger clicking on ‘send’ at exactly midnight. Nothing else in the frightened stupor seemed to matter. Yet as much as she tried to force into her mind that the images before her were just that, a sharp, gliding scrape soon erupted through her nerves, igniting the bleak understanding that it was all quite real enough.

“Tickle, tickle, tickle…” the thing muttered through the darkness. Bearing a lengthy smirk behind a dim veil of hair, the creature swiped a single finger from Cassie’s heel to the base of her toes. The drag happened with a feathery swipe, slow and deliberate, but with a single flick, it awakened the trapped girl’s senses with a sudden burst of ticklish stimulation. 

“Neeeaaaaahhhhhhhhhhahaha!! Ohhhhgahahahahahaad!!” Cassie bellowed, eyes shooting open once more. The finger traced across her warm, plush sole with ease. The simple swipe, a teasing introduction to anyone’s efforts in tickling, cast a rousing explosion of nervous flurry through the girl’s body and a burst of laughter spewing from her mouth. Her body clenched, yet she could consciously move none of it on her own. Her feet as well remain perfectly still, standing upright as if beckoning more of the creature’s ticklish antics. With such a slight motion, Cassie reflected on all the times that she had been tickled in the past, none of which seemed to resonate as potent as the beast’s cursed touch. Not the time she had been pinned down and tickled at Jessica’s slumber party, not the camp where Kyle had been dared to tickle her in front of everyone, not even the time her cousins wrapped her up in a blanket and took turns tickling her feet. It all paled to the delicate rush of its single, sharpened finger against her one sole, followed swiftly by another.

“You asked, little ones,” the creature muttered against the tips of Casse’s toes. “You begged. You begged the words so many others had before. Now… you feel…” Another scratch rushed up Cassie’s foot, followed by another and another. Sharp surges of tickles shot through the girl’s heightened nerves, instilling tickles more real than any she had ever felt before. More laughter followed from her open mouth, no matter how hard she tried and failed to fight against the impulse. All the while, Cassie’s body remained nearly completely motionless, save for a few impulsive twitches in her arms and legs. Her feet gave no response to the tickles. She watched to move them away, to cover them up and hide them from the beast as best as she could, yet they remained perfectly still, standing upright even for the creature’s easy access. The beast snickered as it faintly clawed more of its fingers across Cassie’s tender sole.

“Ohhhgahahahahahahahahahaaaa!! Staaahahahahahahahahahahaaaaap!!” Cassie could only laugh. Her voice broke with sharp squeaks and whimpers cut through the consistent flow of laughter, her face quickly turning a light blush. The creature’s fingers lapped and scraped slowly up and down her soles, alternating from one to the other at will. It took its time, snickering to itself, as its long, spidering appendages toyed and teased over Cassie’s highly sensitive soles. It examined the minute twitches, the pitch of her laughter, and the unseen elation of the nerves being so activated with every touch. Cassie’s laughter grew with the panic of knowing that the beats, whatever it was, had no intention of stopping what she herself could not prevent.

“Geeeaaaahhhhhahahahahahahahahaha!! Pleeehhahahahahssee!! Naahahahahhat there!! Ahahahahanything but my feeeheheheheheeheet!!” Cassie pleaded. Her laughter poured freely through the room, alerting no one in her dreamscape. Rationality proposed comfort and protection in expecting her mom or dad to rush into the room at any second by her manic, squealing cries and chase the thing away. Though as the night continued, time crawling in distorted intervals, the hope steadily faded. She squeaked and wailed and bellowed with ticklish hysteria, the creature’s fingertips still just lazily scraping up and down the extremely responsive flesh.

“Such mirth in every little touch…” the creature commented. “We shall have so much fun together…” The nightmare continued dancing its fingertips along the creamy arch of one foot. It clawed and tapped up from the plush, peach heel to the humid indent of her toes and back down again. Over and over, it made this pass, painfully familiar yet reveling in each as if it were the first. Its other hand slid closer to the unoccupied foot. As Cassie cackled and bellowed with ticklish laughter, she had become far too distracted to see the creature raise more of its fingers to keep her hysteria thoroughly charged. More tickles began their scattered flurry across her other foot, casting devilish stimulation across both feet at once and further plunging Cassie into a ticklish trap unlike anything she had ever felt before.

“NOOO PLEEEHHAHAHAHAHAHHAHAHHAHAHAHAAASE!!!” Cassie begged through her laughter. She wanted to twist around, to thrash and buck and scramble for protection, but could do very little else but laugh. She felt every scribbling swipe of the beast’s feasting claws, each gliding across the soft blush of her soles. The creature tickled faster and faster, though steadily so, still taking its time in getting to know Cassie’s feet and the laughter that each touch elicited. It wore a wide grin. Its glee came through its impish efforts and a resonance that spoke through every itching claw. It watched Cassie’s feet remain firmly upright and still, embracing the ticklish flourish tearing through them. 

“You are mine for the twilight, little ones,” the creature whispered. “I shall tend to your eager needs all night long…” The swirling scribbling enveloped both of Cassie’s feet at once. The girl wailed and screamed with laughter. Tears formed in the corners of her eyes. Her chest pounded as the surging tickles pulsed through her body and out of her mouth in reactionary cries. She desperately tried to move her feet, yet found them perfectly still for the creature’s manic desires, as if held still by a thick casting of cement and plaster. Despite the night and the visit harboring a product of her mind’s own delusions within her slumbering state, the sensation of being held down and forced to endure every little tickle passed by with a framing more real than the waking world. 

“OOOHHHH GAAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAAAAAD!!!” Cassie cried. The girl squealed with every laugh. She knew she would be bucking and thrashing in place, trying so violently to kick the creature away and run out of the room. But there she laid, unable to make any motion to defend herself, let alone fight back. Her face burned as she endured a tickling more harsh than any she had ever imagined. The creature’s fingers scurried faster and faster. They tickled with a freedom unbothered by the girl’s terrorized efforts, confined only to her mind’s hopeful wishing. The beast’s fingers swallowed Cassie’s petite, pristine feet in a tempest of skittering tickles. Up and down, over and over again, every slow second passed with a sensory challenge that Cassie never imagined she would have been able to endure.

“So exquisite… so precious…” the beast muttered as if looming over a priceless treasure. It savored every nerve left erupted by its touch. Every lick of its fingers against Cassie’s soles came with the single-minded embrace of a predator enjoying a hunted meal. It snickered and laughed along with her. It seemed to taunt the girl with its words, taking additional pleasure in doing so. Cassie, however, could hear little beyond her own laughter and felt even less outside of the tickles that pulsed through her. The girl shrieked, wide-eyed and terrorized by the idea that the night would never end. She wondered how much time had passed or when the creature would finally relieve her of the ticklish torment. A dense, gnawing horror remained as each inquiry painted the grim picture of an eternity where she laid, her feet forced to endure endless tickling at the hands of the beast that she had beckoned herself.

“PLEEAAAHHAHAHAHHAHAHAHAHASSS!!! STAHAHAHAHAHAHAAAAP!!!” Cassie wailed, screaming like a little girl for her daddy. She could hardly remember a time in which she felt so helpless or so at the whim of fear caused by nightmarish terrors. And yet, there she continued to lay, frozen by a harsh new reality of both bearing down on her. Memory of the events leading up to her plight also began to seem so distant. What remained was the guilt of her own actions leading her to such a void, though the picture and the e-mail and the subject line all began to fade into a foggy veil of her own brazen ignorance. She knew not what she was playing with and, in the throes of consequence, it mattered little. She was not expected to reflect but to endure what steadily became more and more challenging as the clock ticked by in lazy inches.

“All mine… so supple, so ready, and… all mine…” the creature snickered, its fingers gleefully tormenting the soft soles of the frightened girl. Cassie found herself slowly letting go of fear itself. As the tickles continued, her mind chipped away at more and more of conscious thought to help her better endure the sensory distortion raging through her. ‘Fight or flight’ was a slow process with the former option having been removed entirely. Every second came with a vicious scurry of nails across both of her soles at once, hands splaying impossibly wide to cover the entire area of both feet easily. Every passing moment, she wished that she would be gifted the powers to finally break from the beast’s binding effects and fight back, only to find herself still in place, all of her focus and energy spent on outlasting the tickles as much as she could, to whatever effect that would mean in the end.

“PLEEAAHAHAHHAHAHAHAASSEEEE!!!! NAHAHAHAHHAAAAATH MY FEEEEHHEEHEHEHEET!!!” Cassie screamed. The girl knew well that she was ticklish all over, but that her feet had always been the ‘fun spot’ for her friends and family to hit for a quick jolt. Any touch came with a jump, a sharp yelp, and most likely a swift kick away. Anytime she had been held down and tickled before, it had only been for a short while and lasted as long as her screams could reach the ears of adults that would quickly run in and end her torment. Under the touch of the monster, her soles screamed as lively as she did with peaking irritation, a ticklish flood washed through her senses as the scribbles eagerly lasted. 

“Coochie coochie coo,” the monster teased. Its demeanor was less ‘uncaring’ toward the girl’s explosive reactions and more completely blind to them, enraptured far more with its own agenda. It was a beast that seemed to feed off of ticklish feet, willing to answer the call of anyone who reached out to it, and existed only to serve that purpose. What it was or where it came from was far from the minds of anyone under its spell, yet the reality in which it kept its prey was more potent than anyone would be able to ignore. Despite Cassie knowing how ticklish her feet were, they seemed to be far more so where she had woken in such a frozen state, caught in the web of the monster’s domain.

“NAAAAAAHHAHAHHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAAAA!!” Cassie screamed and screamed, the tickles amplified greatly by how little she could do to stop them. The creature at the end of the bed giggled. Its fingers, alternately, began to slip upward. They had thoroughly scratched over her fraile, plush soles until both blushed with a hot pink hue. The ticklish touch migrated, however, northward to her toes. As frozen as the rest of her feet, Cassie’s toes remained held back by the same force that kept her still. They sat in a nice, neat little row, pinkish bubbles inviting ticklish touch with a natural softness. The creature's fingers hovered over each row, delicately brushing over the pads with  scratches.

“Such precious giggles, such a gift for the ears…” Further encouraged by the girl’s manic display, the creature’s fingers continued toying with the two rows of still, blushing toes held back for its amusement. It snickered in the darkness like a demon come to life in a large doll, playing with Cassie’s senses as easily as Cassie used to play with toys herself. Its fingers brushed deviously over each quivering toe. While Cassie became overcome with the innate desire to flail and thrash and buck against the tickles storming through her, she could only still lay back, such impulses manifesting in even louder laughter.

“EEEEKKKHHEEHEHHEHHAHAHA!!! NAHAHAHAHAHT MY TOEESSSSAAHAHAHAH!!!” The girl shrieked. Tears streamed from her eyes. Her body shook in place, still being held down by a force that she could only conclude came from inside her own mind. The nightmare around her played out minute by minute as real as any other memory, quickly becoming the only memory or thought resonating through her consciousness. The tickles stormed like sadistic little bugs scurrying around her toes. As much as she wished, at the very least, to be able to move her feet away, feeling them held in place and upright, fully exposed for the beast’s tickling fingers, only served to accentuate her helplessness and seemed to make her nerves that much more receptive to the tickles pulsing through her. 

“Delightful toys, all for me…” The state of timelessness passed by in unknowing ticks, lost behind the fever of stimulation tormenting the girl in her bed. Its fingers, tipped with hardened nails, danced ever-so meticulously across her burning toes. They scribbled freely, working across each delicate pad before weaseling underneath and in between. The apparition focused brief attention on tickling each digit individually, taking its time as Cassie’s screaming laughter continued to fill the room. The girl had never felt being so densely tickled like that before. She never knew ticklishness like that before, as if the air itself were nipping at the places where the beast’s fingers gave mercy. 

“PLEEAAAHHAHHAHAHAHAHAHAHAASSSEE!!!” Cassie could only beg. She had all but forgotten the wager that had brought the creature to the foot of her bed in the first place. Her mind blocked out any responsibility, memory, or indication that its visit could have possibly been from her own actions, her own skepticism. Nonetheless, the why mattered little in the feverish throes of ticklish torment. All she could do was laugh and squeal into the echoes of her own nightmare chamber. The beast grinned as its fingers plucked away at the ticklish nerves of the girl’s petite soles and toes. As it tickled, Cassie’s eyes remained pinched tightly while she endured, unable to see the other two arms that circled around the beast’s body.

“Tickle, tickle, tickle…” With Cassie’s feet still standing upright and firmly pulled back, unable to move more than a responsive twitch, the creature scattered ten boney fingers up and down the pale, blushing arches, feasting contently on her laughter. It brought two more hands up to the innocent pair, its new fingers wiggling eagerly in the air above her toes. They descended with their own hunger, their own enthusiasm, adding more skittering nails to the plight of Cassie’s ticklish feet. As Cassie felt them lay upon her toes, scribbling with ruthless intent, her laughter peaked. Her eyes shot open, her voice almost going silent, before she succumbed to deep, boisterous laughter, cackling harder than even she imagined she could. 

“NEEEAAAAHHAHHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!!!! STAAHAHAHAHHAHAHA!!!!” Cassie bellowed. Even still in such harder fits of ticklish agony, her body was still not allowed to move. She could feel everything, every flick and scribble against her feet. What little conscious power remained in her thoughts wished, at the very least, for the tickles to be concentrated elsewhere, compromising in her mind where her mouth remained too busy to plead. Tickles enveloped Cassie’s feet, devouring them like acid slowly picking away at their very material. But Cassie’s feet remained perfectly intact, healthy enough to feel everything while her chest ached and her mind cracked more and more simply trying to comprehend the stimulation pouring through her.

“Beautiful treasures, such wonderful music… all for me…” the creature taunted. Cassie had given up hope that the beast would simply get bored and let her go, yet failed to comprehend any other end to the nightmare. She screamed more than loudly enough to wake up a whole neighborhood, let alone herself, yet the nightmare persisted. She knew she had no choice but to endure, yet not knowing for how much longer was a torture in of itself. In panic, it felt as if the tickles could last forever, a maddening thought that became harder and harder to ignore. There was nothing else to do, no other conclusion at which to arrive. She could only withhold hope that the tickling would, in fact, end eventually.

“NAAHAHAAAAHHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAT THEHEHEHHAHHAHAHAHAARE!!!” Cassie squealed. She laughed with bellowing fits in between sharp gasps and silent defeat. Her feet trembled while they remained upright for the tickles of forty devilish fingers, each determined to taste more and more of the ticklish nerves that remained ablaze. The monster smiled. Its single-minded efforts seemed impossible to overcome or reason with. Very clearly, it only wanted to tickle, birthed from the rumor that could not have possibly been true. Yet there it stood, at the end of Cassie’s bed, riddling her senses with a flurry of never-ending tickles against the offering of her bare, ticklish feet.

“Love the screams… so pretty… all for me…” The creature snickered and teased with little phrases on a whisk of break. From Cassie’s perspective, the beast was just hands. Hand and arms, charged with the sole purpose of tickling and nothing else. She fed into its needs by laughing and howling, the thing still feeding off of the ticklish senses that resided within her soles and toes. Tears streaked down the sides of her face. Her cheeks burned while her chest felt flayed with fire and her jaw clenched with a sharp ache. The laughter poured through her throat like water breaking from a dam. She knew nothing more than the tickles tearing through her senses, each passing moment losing more and more of what made her a person.

“YYEEEAAAAHHHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAA!!!!” Cassie’s mind had been reduced to simply processing the natural reactions of the tickles themselves. Conscious thoughts, memories, even the concept of time slowly faded until the tickles raging through her made her body little more than a vessel for them and them alone. The world shifted like a nightmare, only Cassie was left more sure that what she felt was real than she ever had in a nightmare before. She would have recalled being chased by monsters in sand and with heavy footsteps. She would have recalled standing up on a stage for a play in which she had forgotten all of her lines. She would have even remembered several times in which she held her own teeth in her hands. Cassie would have given everything to live one of those nightmares in full than spend another moment being tormented by the beast’s ticklish touch.

“All mine… coochie coo… all mine…” the beast taunted like it were the only words it knew. It cackled in the night, its laughter melding into an uproarious song along with Cassie’s. Neither of which stopped. The creature’s many fingers scribbled and scraped all over Cassie’s soles and toes. Each swipe sent explosive jolts of ticklishness through the girl, compounding gravely onto one another again and again. Its hands devoured the blushing pair of feet with vicious scribbles, drinking in the ceaseless fits of laughter. Minutes faded into hours and hours became a meaningless measure of timeless agony. Far beyond the point when Cassie was certain that the tickles would never end, morning came and gifted relief.

Cassie’s eyes squinted as she stirred in bed. She opened her eyes to sunlight shaded by her curtains, far more bright than she was used to waking up to. The first greeting was a pounding of her head, a sudden and swift headache. She groaned upon seeing the light, her mind slowly reflecting on the evening she had spent and the nightmare from which she awoke. After a few moments of recollection and considering whether or not she would try going back to sleep, Cassie sat up. She reached up and touched her jaw, feeling it just as sore as the pounding in her temples. Likewise was an ache that permeated through her chest and stomach. Steadily, she began recalling the nightmare, one from which she could not escape.

“No way…” Cassie muttered, finding her voice somewhat scratchy. She paused and looked down, seeing her bare feet peeking out from the bottom of the sheets, cut in several places by strange claw marks.