Commander Alara returned to the fields the next morning. The village people were already hard at work, scattered around the fields and around the giant man, setting up ladders and hauling tools. She was not surprised to see the giant was right where they’d left him. She climbed the ladder onto his chest, walking back to the spot on his chest where he could see her.
“Good morning!” She called out.
He looked down at her. He grunted through his nose gruffly. The sound was obviously supposed to be intimidating, but the commander kept her head held high, stone-faced. “It is your choice.” She warned.
The man watched as her boots pad back across his chest and she disappeared back down the ladder. She strolled back down his body, waving to the villagers who set up around the man, readying themselves for their work so casually, like they would if they were building a new mill or preparing a field. She made her way up the stairs to the observation nest, where Aldric already sat, sipping from his mug.
“Good morning.” He rasped.
She sat at the table next to him. “Thank you for taking first nightwatch.”
“Not a problem.” His voice was gruff from lack of sleep. He slid her a mug, before picking up his own.“We got had plenty to do over night… The men secured him tighter. We are confident no one will be squished.” He took a sip, the corner of his mouth quirking into an amused smile.
“Well done, as always.”
“Some of the villagers have been… brainstorming. Coming up with… creative solutions. Ideas for tools. They almost seem... excited? You said… you would award gold?”
“I will award gold,” She took a sip from the mug – a lukewarm and oversteeped tea she had come to both expect and appreciate from Aldric – and looked out at the man again. “To whoever can get him to break. To speak. To… tell us who he is, where he came from.”
“Well, all you need to do to get the people excited is mention a little gold.” He laughs lightly. “There is much talk… They want to make a competition of it. Have everyone come out and… see who takes home the gold.”
“A competition…” Her brow furrows.
“The town could use a little entertainment. It’s been a minute since they’ve really had anything to entertain them. Could be good for moral. And…” He gestured to behemoth man before them. “Maybe the way to break your guy.”
“Well … we will see what today brings.” She leaned over the table, eyes back on the man. “Did we… give him anything today? Food? Water?”
“We did give him some water, yes… I figured he would need it if you… wanted to hear his screams today.” Aldric teased, giving her a knowing smirk. She scoffed, but her lips quirked up, just for a second.
“That is fine… I do not want to see him dead before we can even find out his name. Are we all set up for today’s trials?”
“Just about. I told everyone they can start whenever they feel ready.”
Alara gave a nod of approval and turns at thte sound of Maren joining them. Under her arm is a bag of notes and scrolls. “Good morning.”
“Morning, Mare.” Aldric leaned back to greet her. She sat beside them, throwing her bag on the table. “You’ve been at it, too, I see.”
“Yes. Updated my notes from last night. Trying to note all the… intelligence we learned.” She rolled out the largest diagram, the one with the crudely drawn picture of his body. Old notes had been written over with new, big circles added around the places they’d found yesterday. X’s drawn on his toes and armpits. “Showed these to some of the villagers. Tried to point them in the right direction.”
“Smart.” Alara looked over the diagram. “Thank you for keeping everyone informed.”
As if on cue, they heard the huge man below them groan. They looked down, pulling their chairs closer so they could see everything. The first villagers had begun.
“I think we could break him today.” Alara murmured. “If we do all of them at once.”
“He was barely handling them one at a time last night.” Maren agreed.
Two villagers had begun working the tillers, almost exactly in sync with each other, over the expanse of his belly. His body had already tensed, his jaw setting tight, as the points – so small to him-- pricked his skin. They went up the outline of his sprawling muscles, turned, then covered the next strip, closing in on his gaping navel. From their observation nest, they could truly see how the small tillers made his belly quiver under them.
One of them passed over the spot below his navel, following the trail of hair that led to it, and his breath held in his chest. They seemed to notice, stopping a second, then running it over that spot, back and forth. He let out a strangled sound, his body trying to push up to no avail.
Maren circled the spot on the diagram.
The giant man tried to twist in the chains again, the iron groaning as it pulled, and Alara noticed something new. Two villagers had brought pitchforks – a smart tool to use, she thought – and were standing at his side, poking them into the soft rolls of his side. He turned directions, trying to twist away, but he had been secured well.
“Good job, Aldric.” She noted.
“I had a lot of help.” He smiled modestly.
A few well-placed pokes to his side, right above his hip, pulled a growl out of the man loud enough to momentarily quiet the grounds. Villagers looked to each other, eyes wide and scared, before realizing this man was… no longer a danger. In fact, they were not a danger to him. They could hear some of the villagers laugh at the man as they picked their tools back up, pitchforks poking back into the soft and pliant spots on his sides.
Between the tills and the pitchforks, maybe a stroke of luck that they hit the right spots at the right time, earned a deep guffaw from the man. The villagers on the ground cheered, laughing. The giant growled again, the chains yanking against his biceps.
“Do you think it pisses him off more that they aren’t afraid of him?” Meran asked.
“Yes.” Aldric took another sip of his tea, watching intently.
“We will have to have them play that up going forward.” Alara watched as more villagers approach – a man approaching one armpit and two women approaching the other.
“Humiliate him.” Aldric added.
“He may not be small, but we can make him feel that way.” Alara watches as the man begins to run his rake back through the underarm hair of the man. She cannot tell for sure, but she believes it was the villager who had done this last night – he seems to be working the prior knowledge.
The armpits had already been noted as one of his worst spots yet, circled in red on diagram. His sharp catches of breath came quicker and faster, his face becoming strained and red, until sounds began to squeeze from his throat. He shut his eyes tight, fighting the sounds that clawed their way out. His skin began to shine in the sun, a layer of perspiration slicking over all the sensitive parts he could not protect. One of the men on his stomach almost slips.
The two women found their way to his other armpit. Alara couldn’t hear them, but they seemed to be laughing, joking to one another, possibly at the giant’s expense. One of them tugged on some of the hair, testing, and the other copied her – and they laughed some more. One of them pushed into his armpit, running their arms under the hairs, scrabbling about and laughed again-- the other followed suit.
The man, already brimming with bitten back laughter, finally broke when both women slid their arms up under the protection of his coarse, stinking hair, tiny hands clawing at the unprotected, rarely touched skin underneath. The women, the rake, the tillers and the pitchforks put him drew a loud shout from him, shaking the ground.
His body shook, the chains wretching as he tries to throw back his head, only to find the hardness of the ground, his mouth opening wide and a booming laugh flooding the village.
“HAH-AHHHAHHA—HOOOHOO--HEEHOOOHOO--”
Cheers erupted from the villagers. Alara looks to her companions, eyes raised.
“Broken enough for you?” Aldric smirked.
“Not nearly.” Alara almost let a grin slip. “Let’s see if he can take a whole day of this.”
They watched him as he struggled, trying to roll from side to side, to get any part of him lose, but he can only shake, movements tight and minimal. Sweat poured from his forehead into his eyes.
“You’re in luck. There’s Boris.” Aldric pointed to the man wheeling his cart towards the man’s towering foot, a few men following him. Boris was a local craftsman ran a shop with a few other men in town, selling wares he built. He was known to be a man who always loved a challenge.
The men pulled their wagon up and immediately set to work. Each man began to poke and prod the foot, trying to find the softer spaces. The foot shook, trying to shake them away from it, but they didn’t even seem to notice. Alric’s men had bound the giant’s toes in the night while he was knocked out from sleeping powder. They now were separated carefully with wood and chains so they spread apart, no way for them to curl forward or scrunch up to crush an arm. One of the men had thrown a rope up through his toes, tying it securely, and tested the waters by climbing up the back of his foot. His boots slipped against the giant’s sweat-slick skin, kicking and trying to find footing, which got a reaction in itself.
“OOH—HAHH—HEEHEHEE—” The man pulled himself up finally, clinging onto his toes as he situated. He pulled himself, grasping the wood that held his second and third toes apart and slid body through them, planting his ass between the toes. Just the feeling of the man sliding between them was enough to earn another sharp bark from the giant. “HAHHAH--”
Maren circled his toes in red. “Toes and armpits seem to be the worst.”
“This is going to break him, he’s going to talk.” Aldric shook his head. “Look at him.”
“He’s weak.” Alara agreed. “But he’s also very stubborn.”
Boris had pulled stable brushes, their coarse fibers meant for brushing horses, and tossed them up to his men. He took his own and began to scrub the giant sole all over, trying to find the right spot. The man in his toes made sure he was secure, sitting in the toe crevice, his arms over the restraints holding his toes apart like it was a seat made just for him. He leaned down to take the stable brush, holding tightly to the man’s second biggest toe with one arm as he began to scrub the tip of it with the other.
The man’s eyes snapped open, his body straining upward, the veins on his neck visibly pulsing. Suddenly all he could feel was the touch of those punishing bristles, designed to work through tangled manes and caked on mud, being used instead on one of the softest parts of his body. He couldn’t differentiate between whether it felt scratchy or soft – just that it felt so, so much.
“AHHH-- HAAHAAHAA--” He howled, his feet trembling so much they felt like they were vibrating. Below, Boris scrubbed another stable brush over his instep-- forced taunt, so this time, no wrinkles. His other companion began to climb up with his friend, struggling to get a grip as the foot shook violently.
“That brush-- that’s intense. We need to find… every brush like that in the village.”
“He might explode if we used every brush in the village.” Maren commented.
“Hey, at least we wouldn’t have to figure out what to do with him.”
The man held on tight, scrubbing relentlessly, letting the brush work from the top of the toe down to the softer skin under it.
“NAAA---HAHAHAHA!” His giant eyes snap shut again, tears prickling in the corners. The second man leaned against the top of his foot, reaching up, his small fingers scratching the space between his big toe and second toe. The giant man’s hips buck forward unwittingly, but the chains stop him from bucking off the people still tending to his stomach.
The man’s toes trembled and his mind begged for them to close, to squish the men like the insects they were to him, but instead stayed pried open, giving way for their their tiny hands and their rough brushes to continue torment him.
The other villagers had stopped momentarily, the booming shrieks of the man and the way his whole body shook beneath them putting doubts in their mind that he wouldn’t break free any instant, smashing them beneath his behemoth body, but as he went on, they realized they were once again safe. They began again, scratching his reddening armpits, tilling over his soft belly, poking and prodding at his trembling love handles. Many villagers shouted and whooped as tears fell from the man’s eyes, sweat dripping off every part of him, matting further the hairs on his chest and down his body.
“Who would have thought…” Aldric shakes his head, the three of them watching the scene.
“How long will you let them go on?” Meran leans into Alara.
“Until they’re tired.” Alara watches the scene, her eyes fixed darkly on the man.
It took hours for the villagers to tire. The man screamed until his voice was hoarse. They descended their post as the sun descended the sky.
“I see you have survived your first day.” Alara stood back on his chest, staring the man down. He still trembled, was still panting. His eyes were still angry, but the fires have died down – his body and mind had clearly given in to exhaustion. “I will ask you again… Would you like to tell me your name?”
The man let out a grunt, clearly meant to sound scarier than how weakly it came out. “I see.” She stepped closer to his face, sweat starting to dry against his skin, the dirt from the field now caking his face. “You know… the town is quite interested in you. They’re apparently… all excited to see if they could be the one to get you to talk. Get you to break.” She raised her eyebrows. “What do you think about that?”
He tried to turn his head away from her, too tired to remember he cannot. His face was red, his lips still parted and dry, thirsty for the air that had been stolen from his lungs.
“Very well. We will see you tomorrow, beast.”
Author's Note: Hello! This is my first story after years of writer's block and I'm very excited to have already written a few chapters! Starting this blog to hopefully continue to write more so if you're into this sort of thing, keep an eye out!! Thank you!
“Commander.” The bearded man met the commander at the the edge of the grounds. “The overlook is has been finished and tested.”
“Excellent. Walk with me, Aldric.” He turned to follow her back the way he came, back to the grounds. “Have they found any weaknesses yet?”
“They are still testing. With little luck.” He murmured as they approach the man. He was as long as the entire field, nearly fifty feet, laid out across what used to be a beautiful, now barren field of wheat. The man had been coming to their meager village for the better part of the last year, his huge hands coming down to scoop their grain reserves for his own, plucking their livestock from the fields and popping them between his yellowed teeth. He’d eaten food in days that would have lasted the whole village months. When their reserves became low, the village hungry, they waited for the man to come back. They put their anger into their work, building artillery and walls to defend against him. When he came, the battle was short. Where they’d tried to keep him out, it only slowed him down. When they’d tried to attack him, it only annoyed him, and he batted projectiles and villagers away like insects. Little came out of their offense besides broken limbs and destroyed homes.
It had been Lieutenant Aldric’s idea to try not to attack the monster, but trap it. The walls and ropes they set up around the village had not protected their town, but it did stop him, if only for minutes. If they could get him on the ground, on their level, the village healer had a barrel of a special powder that would knock him out cold.
The plan had its hiccups, tricking the monster into the field where the trap lay, but they’d gotten him there. A series of ropes and chains caught the monster’s ankles and dropped him into the field and the townspeople came to hold his head down as the commander broke the barrel of powder into his nostrils. His eyes had rolled back and he laid still. Aldric, before joining the command, had worked in rigging and his experience with chains and ropes had given him the knowledge of how to keep such a massive creature from escaping. The chains and ropes worked together, both driven deep into the ground and bound to each other to keep the man in place.
Commander Alara eyed the chains holding the man’s thighs, taller than two of her, watching them strain against the bonds. They walked down to the end of the man, Alara taking in the scene on the way. The villagers surrounded the creature, poking it and slicing it with their poles and swords. “None of this has been working?”
“It is trying to get free, we’re sure of that. But its skin is thick, strong. The pain does not seem to affect it the way it should.” They arrived at their destination, a tall, wooden structure at the end of the man, a set of steps on either side leading to an overhanging deck. An observation nest.
They climbed the stairs and Alara stepped to the railing, taking in the sight. They could see the entirety of the man from here. He was wide, broad, even for his size. Carrying the weight of a man that size has made him incredibly muscular, but fat still pooled around his midsection and thighs, put on from their stolen food supplies, no doubt. He had a mess of dark brown hair that tangled down to his shoulders, some parts dyed lighter by so much time in the sun, too tall to be hidden from it by trees or shade. A thick, wild beard covered his face, muddy and matted from years of lack of care. He wore something like a loincloth – torn fabric secured with leather around his waist, covering up what was important to cover. When laid out like this, it covered him, but just barely.
As they approached the deck of the observation nest, they saw Meran waiting for them, the commander’s second lieutenant. The woman got up from the small table on the deck to join Aldric and Alara at the railing, overlooking the man. “He’s giving us trouble, I guess. Even now.”
“Can’t be surprised.” Aldric shakes his head. “At least, we can be assured the town is safe as long as it is here… We will have to decide what to do with it.”
They watched as a few villagers move cautiously around his head, checking the chains at his shoulders and neck. Another poked the monster in the neck, trying to force it to test the chains. It grunted, but barely moved. “The blacksmith did a good job on the chains.” Aldric added. “If it could have broken free, I think it would have by now.”
It seemed the villagers had decided the same. They watched a few setting up ladders against the muscles of the giant’s sides and thighs, trusting the chains enough that they began to climb on top of it, exploring the body of the beast.
The giant man’s eyes focused forward on the three of them, casually resting against the railing, watching him. “It’s looking at us.”
“He knows we’re discussing his fate… He may be a terror, but I do not think he’s stupid.” Meran murmured, the three of them staring out at the man, the weight of a glare of such scope and such intensity making all the hairs on their neck stand up.
“I think Meran’s right. We are dealing with an… intelligent terror. The question is how intelligent.”
“You believe he could be… holding back? Waiting?” Aldric asked.
“That is exactly what we will have to make sure of. Make sure he does not hold back, and that we still have control over him.”
“So… we poke the bear. What happens if he is holding back? And gets free?”
“We have more of Healer Hana’s sleeping powder. We will keep some nearby. I think the restraints are strong enough that at least… would not break at once.”
Aldric and Meran gave each other quiet looks as the Commander continues to stare out at the man. “We will keep testing.” She ordered.
--
Commander Alara returned to the observation nest in the early evening. The sun had just begun to lower in the sky. Torches had been set up around the perimeter of the field so they could continue to keep watch on the giant after nightfall.
“You’ve found something?”
“Something.” Meran said dryly. She sat at the table on the observation deck. On the table laid a large scroll, a basic drawing of the man, the body circled and marked at certain spots, notes scribbled next to them. Alara’s eyes scanned the crude diagram and the spots circled. “His skin is tough. Too tough for blades, poles, to penetrate to really hurt him. But some areas are more vulnerable.” She takes her quill and circles the spots, already marked: the crease under his arms, the rolls of his sides that cover his giant muscles, the thin skin over his hipbones, his knees, the bottoms of his feet. “We’ve found something interesting here.”
“Interesting how?”
“I think it may be easier just to show you, Commander.” Meran nodded to Aldric, who whispered to the messenger on standby. He disappears down the stairs. Alara watches as the messenger spreads word among the villagers below. Alara’s brow furrows, curious.
She watched as the villagers begin to scatter around the man. One, armed with a pole, began to poke it into the mass of matted hair under the giant’s arm. The giant’s body seized, his bicep rippling under the chains. Another took a spear and began to drag it down the arch of the gigantic foot. The man tried to kick, but the chains held tight, his giant toes curling in as if trying to grab the villager themselves.
“He—” Aldric started, watching, still in disbelief. The giant man pushed against the ground, against the chains, making the ground shake. A stifled grunt rung out of the crowd.
“We believe he’s ticklish.” Meran finished, her voice flat with disbelief. From their vantage point, they could see how the giant’s chest heaved with rapid breaths. Another man began to poke along the his broad ribcage. The chains holding his massive arm in place bit into his skin as he strained against them harder.
“Ticklish?” The commander asked, eyebrows raising in surprise. “That is… certainly… unanticipated.” The commander watched the giant struggle below, fascinated. “…But could be used to our advantage.”
“He hasn’t spoken a word since he’s been here.” Meran looked down at the drawing, at the notes.
“Well… now we have a way to change that.”
--
Commander Alara climbed up the ladder that led up the man’s side. She was a tall, broad woman with piercing eyes and lips often pursed in disapproval. She commanded more authority than most women her age, mid 30s, and dressed to make sure she kept it. She wore a long, dark blue commander’s jacket with gold trim and tight pants in the same shade that hugged the thickness of her thighs, disappearing down into heavy black boots that came to her knee. Her clothes were well-fitting and flattering, but showed signs of wear, signs of work done. She kept her hair pinned back tight, but soft brown curls always escaped around her neck and shoulders.
Meran and Aldric followed her across the plan of the man’s chest. She could tell they were nervous to be on top of the behemoth of a man, the ground under their feet rising with each breath he took, but she was confident he wouldn’t be able to buck them off of him.
They walked up to the man’s chest, boots kicking through the mess of dark body hair. “Hello.” The commander called loudly. “I am Commander Alara, these are my Lieutenants, Aldric and Meran. You may remember us from when you destroyed our village.”
The man looked down at them over his nose, unable to lift his head. His eyes were a deep, earthen brown and they narrowed at her words.
“And you? What is your name? Where are you from?” The giant huffed through his nose, the breath rolling over Alana like a gust of wind, her fluffy, brown curls blown back. The commander pursed her lips. “I see. If you refused to cooperate, please know, there will be consequences.” She called out. Despite their size difference, she stood tall and defiantly on the man’s chest. Her piercing eyes narrowed to meet his. “Many small consequences.”
“Commander?” Meran asked.
“Bring up the tiller.”
The villagers had been ready at the ladder and began to lift the tool upon command – a long pole ending in five rotating tines, like a mop with rotating spikes, used by the village to prepare the fields to break up tough soil.
“Let’s start simple. Tell us your name.” When the giant does not speak, she turned back to the villager with the tiller. “Very well.” She walked over to his ribs, waving her hand over the area. “Let’s start here, please.”
A low sound came from the man, but no words. The villager ran the roll of spikes over the man’s topmost ribs. Alara watched for a moment, then turned to stare back at the man. “Where did you come from?”
Another soft roll over his ribs, further toward his side. They could feel the giant’s kept breath under their feet. “Get the second tiller.”
Another villager came up with a second tiller. She directed them to the other side of his ribs, mirroring the first. The behemoth stared down at her in anger.
The villagers began to work on both sides, pushing the tiller up a few feet, then back, up and back, working slowly down the ribs of the giant man. They felt as he tried to hold his breath, only for it to escape out of his nose in short, soft bursts. They were getting somewhere.
“Seems odd to me that such a… big, powerful creature would be affected by such a small tool. By such small people.” Alara taunted, looking back to him. The tillers work his sides, moving gently to his lower ribs, pulling a strangled grunt out of him – the first real sound they’ve heard from him that day. “Hmm.”
She watches the villagers repeat that movement, tracing his lower ribs with those maddening spikes. His arms tug the chains again, his massive fingers clenching into fists.
“Downward.” She called. The tillers moved down, starting to edge along the curves of his belly. The sharp inhale he took moves his entire stomach under their feet. They stop a moment, looking to the commander. She looks back at the giant man. His eyes still blaze down on her in anger, but there is something else in them now. Something nervous. “There.”
The villagers drag the tillers up the sides of his belly. In comparison to the skin on his arms and legs, the skin on his belly is softer. Though his frame is muscular and wide from carrying around his own huge weight, his stomach has a soft layer of fat that covers his broad, rippling muscles, softly pooling downward when he’s laid flat, making the skin even thinner, and apparently amply sensitive.
Tracing the sides where his muscles show and his fat hangs to the sides pulls a deep grunt from him, his body arching and shaking the entire ground. They all brace as he shifts, one of the villagers almost losing his footing.
Everyone looked to each other. Alara looked to her lieutenants. “Again.”
The tillers again traced the crease where soft belly met the rigid edges of his muscles. His skin rippled and quivered at every touch, muscles clenching and releasing involuntarily beneath the yielding layer of fat.
Deep, guttural grunts slipped between his teeth as he tried to turn and twist in the restraints, punctuated by each stroke of the tillers. One of the tillers changed tactics, moving the tiller up over the center of his belly, over the skin above his bellybutton, he felt his chest begin to crack open.
The sounds began to pour out of him unwillingly, a booming bark of laughter that shook his whole belly. When he tried to contain the sound again, it only came out differently, more high pitched, more breathy, and somehow even more humiliating.
“Seems we’ve found a good spot, haven’t we? …a shame I don’t have a name to address you with.” She called to him.
The man’s groan ripped through the air, trying to buck up, but to no avail. “Hah…hah hah…ahh—” He twisted again as both tiller began to slide horizontally over his belly, one right above his navel, one below, the tillers working over the coarse, dark hairs that trailed down his belly and beyond.
“Things will go better for you, beast, if you play nice.” Alara called.
He grunts again, his chest rising and falling rapidly with heaving breaths.
“Stop.” She called, turning to the villagers. They stilled their tillers. “Let’s try something else.” She walks back the expanse of his ribs -- each step of her boots now registering higher against his over-sensitized skin. “Get the rakes.” She called down the ladder.
The giant registered her words, eyes glancing down towards the ladder and the people gathered there he cannot see, then back at her, that hint of nervousness now grown much more noticeable.
“Would you like to tell me your name? It’s just as well I call you beast and continue this on. I’ve got no where to be.” She stared him down, standing back on his chest, stand wide and confident. His eyes darted from her back to the side, waiting to see the implements brought up the ladder.
But they didn’t come. Instead, he felt, on either side, the soft touch of the rakes’ fingers combing through the mass of hair under his arms. He bucked upward, thwarted by the chains, only able to shake softly under the feet of the villagers.
When the rakes catch onto the knots of his underarm hair, pulling the hair, it amplified the sensations. His eyes squeezed shut, his jaw setting, his biceps pushing hard to clamp down and protect their sensitive underside, so hard that the chains bite into his skin, leaving red marks in his already scarred and weathered skin. His teeth grit hard, but the rakes didn’t let up, stroking the twin patches of hair softly.
The rakes worked in tandem, but they both used their own strategies, one stroking the ends of his hairs, just enough to send ripples of sensation deep into his nerves, the other scraping more roughly, getting deep under the hair, tormenting the thin skin beneath. They watched his whole body contract, trying his best to rip the chains from the ground, trying to swallow the laughs bubbling up, until he couldn’t.
The laughter poured out of him. “Ahhah—ah—AH--” He growled in between laughter, still trying to sound tough. Alara was unsure if it occurred to him what a silly thing that was to try right now.
“Wouldn’t it have just been easier to tell me your name?” Alara called out. He grunts again before devolving back into laughter, trying desperately to move his head.
“Ha—ha--” The man panted, trying to open his eyes, but every new stroke, maddeningly soft, made his eyes clench again.
Maren leaned into Aldric. “This is… much more effective than I’d thought it would be. Are you sure he won’t be able to break free?”
He looked over at the worry in her eyes. “…if he hasn’t by now… I think we are okay. I think… we will break him before he breaks these chains.”
The man let out a sharp howl when the rakes find a particularly sensitive spot under the hairs, scraping that spot until his laughter goes up in pitch, a tear squeezing out of his eye.
“We can do this all night.” Alara called out to him. “We can do it all week, if you like!”
The only response she got was booming laughter.
“Have it your way.” She called out to the man. Then she turned, walking back across his ribs and disappearing down the ladder. Her lieutenants followed her hesitantly.
The raking stopped. The man’s chest heaved. His skin quivered, arms still pulling at the restraints with leftover shocks of sensitivity firing in his nerves.
Alara led them – Maren, Aldric and the villagers, cart of implements in tow – down the body of the giant man. “I want our best people on this.” She turned to Aldric as they walked. “Constructing tools, coming up with ideas, finding ways to… break him down.”
“You want to… outsource this to the townspeople?”
“Anyone who can help. He destroyed parts of their lives as well, took from them. If they can help us bring him down, I’d like to allow them that courtesy.”
“I will call a town meeting.” He agreed.
They reach the foot of the man, towered nearly twice the size of them. His giant toes still twitched from the feeling of the rakes.
“Unfortunate we cannot run the tillers here.” She mentioned casually, looking up and down at the giant sole. The skin was toughest here, thick skin calloused over the parts of his foot that touched ground, leaving few places soft – but those places did exist.
His foot had been quite responsive to the poking and scratching from the villagers’ spears, but she had high hopes they could do better. She reached out her hand to the villager. “Give me the rake.”
They watched as she walked up to the foot. She set the rake against the bottom of his heel, the thick skin there, and scratched.
The foot immediately tensed, toes jumping, clearly surprised. “I think the skin is too thick here.” She brought it up the stretch of skin across his arch – thinner, softer skin – and scraped the rake back and forth.
A low, angry sound came from deep inside the giant’s throat. His giant foot tried to kick, but only moved a few inches. His toes scrunched. She noted that may have to be dealt with later. “Another rake.” Another villager came up next to her and began to scratch along the soft expanse of his arch.
They felt it in the ground as the muscles in his giant legs began to tense and let go. His giant toes curled towards them. She brought the rake to the side, scratching the inside of his arch on the side of his foot. They heard the breath sputter from his lungs.
“He likes it right there.” Maren noted quietly.
“What else do we have?” Alara asks. The villager pulls his cart up into her view.
“Brooms, mops, gardening tools…” The villager picked up a broad fork, a gardening tool shaped like a giant four-pronged fork. She handed him back the rake and takes the giant fork. “You get to work on the other side.”
She held the heavy fork above her head, pressing it under the ball of his foot and scraping it down the center of massive sole. The foot shuddered, trying hard to curl inward, fold away from the sensations, deep wrinkles forming across his sole. She moved the fork horizontal, sliding it between the deep divot of the wrinkles in his instep.
“NGHH—”
The other villager began running the rake along the thin skin at the outside of the foot, scraping from as high up as he can reach down to the bottom of his heel. His leg spasmed again and again, trying to fight off the shocks running through his nerves, the sounds that began once again to fight from his throat.
“Ah—HAH--”
She dug the fork into the pad below his toes and they tightened violently, foot kicking as much as the chains allowed, but not enough to kick any of the dueling sensations away. Each pass of the fork drew a fresh sound – a yelp, a grunt, a sharp laugh, even what sounded like a whimper. Maren appeared next to them, holding the mop.
“I have an idea.”
She held the mop over her head, sliding it up between his toes. The ground shook, the man letting out a booming yell, his toes crushing the mop instantly. Maren let him, still tugging on it, creating rippling sensations between his toes. Alara continued to scrape along his instep with those sharp prongs, while the two rakes teased the thin, sensitive skin up the sides of his foot.
“AGH—HAHA--” They felt the ground shake as his other foot, secured quite a distance from them, drummed against the earth, toes twitching sympathetically.
They continued to explore every wrinkle, every curve of his foot, poking, prodding, scraping, until a thin layer of sweat had formed across the man, until their arms tired. Alara is the first to put down her fork, dropping her arms to her sides, taking a step back and watching the huge sole quiver violently under such a small touches.
“I want his ankles secured so he cannot move at all. Fingers and toes, too-- we can’t have what happened to that mop happen to one of us.”
“We can have it done tonight.” Aldric nodded
“Very good.” The others place their tools back on the cart. She turns to them. “Everyone rest up. We will reconvene tomorrow.”
They walked back to the path to gate to the village, sun almost completely down. Alara looks back at the giant, the sides of him just barely lit by small torches around the perimeter. She could tell he was looking for them in the darkness, wondering what would come next. She wondered, too. She let her lips curl into a smile, just for herself, and turned back, heading home.
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