Aylin’s light footsteps echoed throughout the empty library. The place was never a hot spot but never completely devoid of patrons either. Students, researchers or otherwise curious bookworms like herself.
She walked gingerly past the front desk, unsettled by the absence of the grumpy librarian that was normally planted behind it. The pleasant musty aroma of old books and lacquered wood now carried with it an unusual note of dust that tickled her sensitive vixen nose and nearly brought her to sneeze. She clutched her left arm, not because it hurt but because it helped calm her nerves.
“Hello?”
No answer.
She dared to venture deeper into the old building in search of any signs of life. She posited it might be maintenance or cleaning day but quickly found that that was impossible. Not only because the front door was wide open but also because a quick scan of the place through her reading glasses was enough to know neither cleaning nor maintenance were being conducted – or had been conducted in a while. Motes of dust danced under warm rays of afternoon sunlight and unorganized piles of books littered the floor, seemingly pulled from their shelves and unceremoniously discarded by hurried hands. She climbed the imposing central staircase and found the second floor as unkempt and deserted as the first. On her way down, something caught her eye. The unassuming door that led to the library’s archives, which was always locked shut when she visited, was now ajar and markedly unsupervised. Under normal circumstances, she avoided entering the area knowing it was strictly off-limits to visitors, but surely whoever – if anyone – was inside would understand and pardon her transgression.
At least that’s what she hoped for.
“Oh… my… Arceus…”
The inside of the archives was not at all what she expected. It was even better. Rows upon rows of of fine leather-bound volumes that even the most unlearned of readers would recognize as being of great value. The central chandelier – which was oddly showy for a room not intended for the general public – cast a warm glow upon the gold and silver labels on the spine of each book, making them twinkle like gemstones. Aylin’s eyes darted from title to title, awestruck. Advanced Fire-Type Moves, first edition. The original manuscript for The Thorn of Sinnoh. A Complete Study of The Berry Fairies, all twenty-six volumes with accompanying author’s notes.
It was bookworm paradise and it brought a tear to her eye.
Then she saw it. Atop a wooden pedestal and encased in luxurious mahogany leather lay a tome like no other. It’s cover sported the outline of a four-leafed clover embossed with silver and precisely nothing else. No title, no author, and no publisher. But none of those things were needed for a work as mythical as Fortuna.
She stumbled towards the pedestal feeling her heart in her throat. Could it be? The tome of legend that was said to contain the secrets to lifelong good fortune? In her town library, of all places?! Aylin was never one to believe in fairy-tales but no one is immune to the allure of eternal luck.
There was no mistaking it, it really was Fortuna, the one and only copy in existence. Her hands instinctively moved towards the book when she stopped herself. This wasn’t right. Fortuna, if it even existed, would never be kept unguarded in some small town library… but if it was, she didn’t want to miss a chance to peer through it’s pages. No harm in it… right?
“Only one way to find out.”
She took a deep breath and opened the book on a random page, only for it to be…
“…Blank. There’s nothing written!”
She flipped through the pages to find the same marked absence of mythical secrets to eternal fortune on each and every one of them.
A fake. Of course it was a fake.
“But why anyone put up a fake Fortuna on a pedestal,” she thought out loud. “Unless… Oh no!”
When she put two and two together, it was already too late. Her legs were ensnared by something near the bottom of the pedestal and violently jerked upwards, utterly discombobulating her train of thought. The pedestal extended vertically with a series of wooden thuds and clunks, like it had been spring loaded. It fully extended to twice it’s original height, more than tall enough to leave Aylin suspended upside down in the air.
“Hey! W-What is this?!”
She curled up and tried to loosen the rope around her ankles but soon realized it was no rope at all, but rather a thick belt with thicker padding. It was surprisingly comfortable for holding her entire body weight, not that Aylin weighed a lot. She quickly gave up and resigned to doing the only thing that could realistically be of some use in the current situation.
“Help! I’m stuck! Please, help!”
While she screamed for help, her mind steeled itself for the inevitably embarrassing encounter she would have with the first person that came to her aid. No excuse she could come up with on the spot sounded better than the truth, so she decided to stick to that, even if it meant admitting to trespassing.
She didn’t have to wait very long until someone stepped through the front door.
“Well, well, well. Looks like I’ve caught my little thief.” The voice was gruff, rumbling and imposing, as was the man it belonged to. Rough red scales, scruffy white beard, spiked tail and a scary frown behind a pair of rectangular reading glasses. A dinosaur. More specifically, a Tyrantrum. Even more specifically, the librarian. He sauntered towards the suspended Aylin nonchalantly. “Having a second go at my library? Did you really think I wouldn’t be expecting you?”
Aylin quickly caught on.
“Excuse me, sir, but you must be mistaken. My name is Aylin, I come here often and I was just wondering why the place is empty. Did something happen?”
“Not the worst story I’ve ever heard, miss thief, but you’ll have to do better than that.”
He took a length of rope and began tying her wrists. The panic started to set in, but she managed to keep her nerves under control.
“I assure you that I’m no thief, sir. Surely you must remember me? Like I said, I come buy quite often.”
“I only remember one Braixen, miss. The one who robbed this library two days ago and looked exactly like you.” He picked up the fake tome from the floor. “You foxy sorts can’t resist a good prize, can ya? Even when it’s an obvious fake.”
This wasn’t working, and Aylin’s nerves were starting to get the best of her. “Please, sir! I—If you just untie me w—we can talk this over! I’ll show you my ID and—”
“Don’t wanna hear it, miss! You’re not talking your way out of this,” he sternly said. “I’m gonna hand you over to the authorities but before that I’m going to administer my own special punishment.”
Alarm bells were going off in her head. The police?! There was no way she was going to get her squeaky clean criminal record stained over a misunderstanding. She had to do something, say something. Anything to deescalate the situation. She had to—
“Ah! Haha! Hahahahaha!!”
Something squeezed her tummy. Claws. The librarian’s.
“Ticklish, are ya? Good.” The man’s stony visage crumbled into a sadistic grin that sent chills down Aylin’s spine (or rather up her spine, owing to the fact that that she was hanging upside down). “Let’s see if we can’t tickle you out of a life of crime.”
“I’m nohot a thiehehef~!”
“That’s okay, miss,” he poked both of her armpits, making her squeal. “We’ve got plenty of time to make you confess.”
The Tyrantrum’s claws were the length of bananas with tips dulled to a harmless rounded point that had no chance of accidentally tearing through a book’s pages on accident. His commitment to his profession was nothing short of flawless. Coincidentally, this also gave them the perfect shape and texture to deliver the most intense tickling that Aylin ever had the displeasure of experiencing.
As those blunt knives danced over the bare skin of her underarms and made her twist and wriggle in mid-air, repressed childhood memories stirred within her mind. As the youngest of four siblings, she had no shortage of experiences being tickled by her older brothers and sister, though their tiny claws were nothing compared to the librarian’s incorporated finger blades. Even still, all those playful tickle fights taught her something about herself.
She could not handle being tickled.
For the past few years, she had managed to avoid being so much as poked by one of her friends and confined the notion that she was ever ticklish to begin with to a deep, forgotten recess of her mind, hoping that the passing years might slowly cleanse her of the lingering curse that was her unbearable sensitivity. Wishful thinking, she now concluded as the librarian traced his claws over her ribs.
“Do you know how much that book you stole was worth? Signed first editions aren’t easy to come by, little thief. Especially when the author’s been dead for a century!” He pinched the supple skin of her belly, making her scream and wiggle from side to side. “I’d ask you to return it but you’ve probably sold it off by now. Right?”
“Ayieugheugheugheugh! Cough! Cough!”
I am not a thief. That’s what the garbled mess of noises that spilled from Aylin’s mouth was supposed to mean. Of course the Tyrantrum wouldn’t have bought it. Still, the old dinosaur finally relented and allowed her a moment’s rest if only to prevent her overstimulated brain from oozing out of her ears.
“Th— Thank you…”
Why am I thanking him? She thought, appalled by her own exaggerated politeness.
“You could thank me by promising to never steal from my library again.”
“I didn’t steal from your freaking library!” Her frustration welled up and spilled out in an almost swear word. Once again, she was flabbergasted by her own attitude.
The librarian cocked an eyebrow. “What’s the matter? Is your goody-two-shoes facade finally falling apart?”
“It’s not a facade! And I’m not a goody-two-shoes!”
That sentence was half true.
“Speaking of shoes, you should’ve brought some to cover up these feet of yours…”
Oh no.
“…because now I’m about to find out if they’re as ticklish as your torso.”
OH NO.
She curled her toes. Her bare, ticklish, defenseless toes. More unwanted childhood memories came rushing back into the forefront of her thoughts. Recollections of having her brothers arm lock her legs while her sister drew from a seemingly bottomless well of sadistic creativity to torment her bare feet in ways she would’ve never dreamed of. She had no time to brace herself – not that it would’ve made any difference – before feeling the rough touch of those dreaded claws against the sole of her foot, right where her pad ended and her toe stems began. She screeched loud enough to make the librarian wince.
“Found your sweet spot?”
Aylin scream-laughed.
“I’ll take that as a yes.”
What followed was a near-medical exploration of the Braixen’s bare soles. The rounded tips of the librarian’s claws traversed the spaces underneath the vixen’s toes before traveling down to her heels to swipe back up along her arches and scrape against her soft paw pads.
“No wonder you’re a thief. With pads as soft as these you can walk without making a sound.” He drummed his claws on her pads, dimpling the pillow-like surfaces and sending the poor Braixen into a frenzy of laughter.
This wasn’t fair. Being dangled from her legs and tickled to tears by a grumpy old Tyrantrum wasn’t what Aylin had in mind when she left home that day to spend the afternoon snuggled up in her favorite corner of the town library getting lost in the pages of a good book. From the boiling stew of panic and frustration that stirred inside her tortured mind bubbled another feeling. Resentment. Not towards the misguided librarian but rather the thief who had apparently robbed the old dinosaur’s library and apparently looked exactly like her.
She had to wonder if this was somehow part of the thief’s plan.
“I’ve prepared something for your punishment.” The librarian said as he fetched a flask filled with a cloudy turquoise liquid and poured it over her feet. She winced as the cold fluid rolled along her soles. She felt the claws again, massaging her feet instead of tickling them. “Two crushed Oran berries, one crushed Lum berry, one cup of Moomoo milk…”
Aylin recognized the recipe. “…one tablespoon of honey and one cup of water,” she completed.
The stoic lines of the librarian’s lips broke into an uncharacteristically giddy grin. “Well, well, well! So you’ve read A Guide to Oils and Ointments! Then I suppose you know what this recipe is for?”
She almost didn’t dare to say it. “It’s massage oil.”
“And?”
Her throat felt dry. “And it makes the skin more… sensitive.”
“Right you are, little thief!”
“I told you, I’m not a thiEEEEHEHEHE—!”
The claws were back on her newly moisturized and sensitized soles. The oil’s efficacy was undeniable. It enabled the claws to slide around the spasming soles like an ice skater on a rink, spiraling and zigzagging in seemingly random directions with no discernible pattern that she could get used to and mentally filter out.
Aylin had mostly given up squirming and simply hung limp, accepting the unjust punishment for a crime she didn’t commit as it was delivered by an unreasonable man who took it upon himself to be judge, jury and executioner.
Her squeals became an octave shriller when the librarian held what appeared to be a drill-like rotating brush to her stomach. It had a wide head made from coarse yellow filaments that she quickly recognized as being Jolteon fur. The static electricity generated from the brush against her own stomach fur would occasionally arch back into the device, powering it’s small electric motor. Aylin recognized this building technique. Either through physical strength or sheer force of will, she powered through the deluge of laughter that begged to spill out of her throat for just long enough to blurt out the title of a book.
“D—DIY Self Powered Machines! Bwahahaha!!”
“I’m impressed! That is indeed what I’ve referenced to build this handy little brush. You’re a well-read thief, I’ll give you that much.”
The librarian’s brief admiration was quickly shattered by the unbearable feeling of being tickled on both her oiled feet and vulnerable belly simultaneously. Whenever she wasn’t laughing, she was coughing, snorting or wheezing. The brush was wide enough to cover her entire midriff but that didn’t stop the librarian from targeting specific panic spots with the self-powered tool. She squealed when he pressed it against her side, then screamed when it was slowly dragged over to her armpit. He did it all over again on the opposing side and armpit only to return to the first one afterwards and repeat the pattern.
Her feet didn’t fare any better. A movement as effortless as curling her toes to shield the tender spaces in-between and underneath was now a monumental feat for the critically exhausted Braixen. The result was an effective resistance of zero to the Tyrantrum’s evil claws, and free reign for them to exploit the most reactive crevices of the vixen’s soles.
Aylin sobbed. She lost track of time at some point after the brush started attacking her soles and the claws returned to her torso. Her cheeks hurt. Her sides hurt. Her legs hurt. Everything hurt. She thought she heard the librarian ask something but couldn’t hear him over the sound of her own crying laughter.
Reality itself started to warp and distort in the poor woman’s perception. Was this right? Did she really steal something and simply forgot about it? There had to be a reason for this beyond a simple misunderstanding… right? Maybe it was fate’s way of reminding her that, no matter how much she tried to hide it, she was still a ticklish little crybaby. That’s what her siblings used to call her after tickling her to tears. She felt woozy. Being suspended upside down for that long could not be good for her.
It took her a full minute to realize that the librarian had stopped tickling her.
“Hey! Don’t pass out on me, you hear?”
“…Huh?”
“I think that’s enough… for now, anyway.”
Gently, the librarian lowered her to the floor and untied her arms and legs, helping her stand up and take a sip of water, if only to ensure that he didn’t mortally dehydrate her.
“You okay?”
There was s hint of genuine worry in his voice which only served to further unsettle Aylin considering the whole ordeal he had just forced upon her. She might’ve said something about it if she wasn’t too tired for a confrontation.
“Y—Yeah.”
“Good. So here’s the deal: See that, there?” He pointed to a bookshelf on the right of the pedestal where Aylin had been suspended from. Nestled between two thick volumes was a small, palm-sized camera pointing straight at the pedestal. She felt a pit in her stomach. “I recorded the whole thing. Check the library’s website later tonight. Any would-be thief who thinks they can outsmart this old dino will see what they get for trying, in high-definition.”
This wasn’t happening.
“Now,” he continued. “I won’t turn you over to the cops, but I want you out of my library. And if you ever step foot in here again you’re gonna get much worse than just a measly afternoon of tickling. Understood?”
No. Not understood. Not at all. But Aylin was well and truly defeated. Hungry, exhausted, and on the verge of tears, she nodded and limped out of the library. She wanted to go home, curl up in a warm blanket with her teddy bear and scream into a pillow while pondering which town was best to move to. Such was the weight of the shame she felt for an act she didn’t do.
The thief sauntered along the deserted street, playfully avoiding the lights cast on the floor by the streetlamps while humming a cheerful tune. She had a good feeling about tonight. The heist on the library two days ago had gone well enough. But she was an ambitious Braixen and rumors of a copy of the fabled Fortuna had reached her ears. Normally she would not hit the same place twice but, with a prize like that, who could afford to miss it?
She saw someone in the distance. A dark silhouette that grew steadily as it approached. She steadied herself and stopped humming, trying to look as inconspicuous as she could. As the figure drew closer to her, she could make out the details of fellow Braixen, one bearing a striking resemblance to herself. They crossed paths and kept walking, each their own way.
The thief couldn’t help but notice an air of sad dejection about the other Braixen. She didn’t know why, but the thought of tickling this stranger popped into her head. Maybe it bothered her to see another of her species so sad? Surely a bit of tickling would make her laugh, at least.
She smiled and kept humming her joyful tune.
Tonight is the night. Fortuna. Lifelong luck. It will be mine.