Tickled By a Tumbuka Tribesman
The cell was carved into the stone like a wound that refused to heal.
Damp air clung to the walls, thick with mildew and the scent of old blood. A single bulb flickered overhead, casting shadows that danced like specters across the floor. In the corner, slumped against the wall, sat a handsome young American named Andrew Mason.
Age Twenty. Blonde. Blue eyed. An aspiring photojournalist from Ohio. A lover of prog rock and late-night drives. None of that mattered here in this subsaharan African nation.
He culdn't tell which country on the dark continent he was in anymore. It was most-likely Zambia. The last thing he remembered clearly was the checkpoint, the shouting, the hands dragging him from the van. Since then, everything had blurred into interrogations, blindfolds, and the metallic taste of fear.
Now, silence.
Andrew had stopped trying to guess what would happen next. Torture? Execution? Some twisted spectacle for a black-skinned Zambian crowd he’d never see? All possibilities felt equally real, equally close. The guards didn’t speak to him. They didn’t need to. Their silence was a language of its own—one that said, you are forgotten.
He pressed his forehead to his knees and tried to summon the faces he feared he’d never see again.
His mother, who used to hum while folding laundry. His father, who taught him how to throw a curveball. His younger sister, who cried when he left for college. And Skye—her name alone made his chest ache. Skye with the crooked smile and the habit of tracing circles on his palm when she was nervous. He wondered if she still wore the necklace he gave her, the one with the tiny compass charm. So you’ll always find your way back to me, he had said.
He had no compass now. No map. No way back.
The sound of boots echoed down the corridor. Andrew’s breath caught. He didn’t lift his head. He didn’t want to see who was coming. The door creaked open, and for a moment, the light from the hallway spilled in like a cruel reminder of the world outside.
But no one entered.
The door closed again.
It was worse than footsteps. Worse than shouting. It was the reminder that they could come at any time—and that they hadn’t yet. That the waiting was part of the punishment.
Andrew lay back against the cold stone, eyes open, staring at the ceiling. He tried to imagine the sky. Blue, endless, forgiving. He tried to remember the sound of laughter. The warmth of a hug. The feeling of being safe.
But the cell swallowed memories like it swallowed light.
And so he waited. Not for rescue. Not for mercy.
Just for whatever came next.
On the third day after five o'clock, Mr. Nkandu, a native African Zambian Tumbuka tribesman, came and escorted Andrew to the shower room ... and immmediately started punishing him. The aspiring young photojournalist knew he’d never fare well in any kind of prison. He was just too good-looking, and that was a curse in any prison. Twenty-year-old Andrew had neatly trimmed blond hair, enormous, green-rimmed blue eyes. He was a very handsome young man, with flashing striaight white teeth and who used to have an easy laugh before he was incarcerated. Nkandu brought a box of food to Andy, and he made him stand on it with no clothing, except his underwear and a blanket. Eventually three tall African soldiers came ... they escorted Andrew into cell #66 and forced the twenty-year-old to lie spread-eagle on the cell's bed. Nkandu joined them, carrying the blond youth's discarded socks and a mysterious leather bag.
"Huh ...?" Was all Andy could say as the ebony-skinned officer gently massaged his soles--Pressing firmly against his insteps, his thumbs systematically rubbing them in slow clockwise circles. Then the Tumbuka tribesman, who was apparently the warder, proceeded to dance his fingertips all over the bottoms of Andy's big pale feet. The blond prisoner's body began to shake, giggles immediately emanating from him.
"Much too tense. I know what is needed to loosen you up." Said Nkandu. The Tumbuka prison warder took one hand and gently pried Andy's toes back away from the ball of his foot, causing the skin to stretch tight. This, of course, exposed the twenty-year-old's soles and made them ultra-sensitive at the same-time. The ebony-skinned officer then probe-massaged his soles until Andrew Francis Mason's feet started to jerk and his sweet toes wriggle.
He tugged off Andy's trousers. After that he tied the youth's own socks to each wrist ... then fastened those socks to each corner of the bed. He used the youth's own belt to tie one ankle to the bottom corner of the mattress, leaving one leg free ... until he removed his own shirt, wound it into a makeshift rope and used it to tie down that extremity as well. Andy was so stunned that the Tumbuka prison warder was actually doing this, he couldn't call up the strength to resist.
The ebony-skinned officer saw the look on his face and half frowned.
"I've been doing this all of my life, in prisons and out." The ebony-skinned officer stated nonchalantly. "I enjoy it, I praise it and I celebrate it openly when I can. My late wife and I enjoyed tickling each other even more ... and LONG before we were even married! We performed all kinds of tie-up and tickle games back when we were just friends ... young curious neighbors. Tickling implies a certain level of intimacy, you see. Back in the day we were a lot less uptight about intimacy because, unlike you westerners, it wasn't always confused with sex for us."
As Nkandu said this, he blindfolded Andy. Taking his sight away and forcing the young man to surrender to total darkness, which purposefully intensified his apprehension and his ticklishness.
Meanwhile the ebony-skinned officer resisted the urge to tickle the now shirtless Andy's bellybutton. Still, he surprised even himself by jumping up onto the bed and straddling the pale prisoner's crotch before spider-crawling his hands up the sides of his tummy. Nkandu tightened his legs against Andy's body. His Zambian body reacted to the prisoner's American one--tickling the twenty-year-old before he could even utter a sound. Andy rolled uncontrollably back and forth in his attempt to escape the tickling sensations the ebony-skinned officer was already producing. His mind whirled and he fantasized about floating in deep space or through rainbows.
"HAAHAHAHAAHAHAHAHAHA!!!" Andy shouted, as he began coming back to reality. The first thing that hit him was the tickling sensations attacking his tummy as Nkandu laid into him. The blonde youth really had no idea what he was in for.
"OH STOP! PLEASE PLEAAAAAAAAAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAH!!!"
He screamed almost like a little girl with laughter, wriggling his body back and forth and realizing that he couldn't really move much at all thanks to the way he'd been tied. He was bound tight and blindfolded ... effectively paralyzed and blinded!
"Too much for you, American?" Nkandu cooed as he dug his fingertips into the prisoner's tummy and wiggled them as if they were individual vibrators. Andy immediately screamed with laughter and fought hard against the sock bonds. His belly flexed wildly as the ebony-skinned officer continued.
"HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHEA EAHEHAEHAEHA WAIT!! PLEASE!!! HAHA HEE HEE HAHAHAHAHEHAE AEHAHEA AHAE PLEASE STOP FOR JUST A SECOND!!! HAHAHAHAA HEE HEE HEHAE HAHAHA WAIT!! PLEASE!!!!"
The ebony-skinned officer lightly went up and down his sides causing the blond American prisoner to shriek. He lightly tickled the twenty-year-old's ribs and armpits. Andy intensely begs the Tumbuka tribesman to stop. Zambian Nkandu responds by moving down to his feet. The prisoner had size 12's with long toes, trim nails, round heels, soft soles and a medium arch. Like all good tickle torturers Nkandu just happened to have a bottle of lotion in his black leather bag and used that to coat and massage the boy's feet. What a reaction the American youth displayed! He furiously jerked all over the place.
That's when Nkandu ordered the other soldiers to leave.
Then the ebony-skinned officer's fingers explored every inch of both the twenty-year-old's bare feet one at a time. As he did this Andrew Francis Mason squirmed and burst out with even louder explosions of laughter. The ebony-skinned officer kept massaging the twenty-year-old's feet and toes. Then he lightly went over the tops of his feet and Andy lost it. His green-blue eyes rolled in his head and he seemed to convulse like a man being electrocuted in response to the ticklish torment!
Nkandu's fingers slowly curled over and tickled under and in-between the lad's well-shapped wiggly toes. Then up and down his soles. The prisoner screamed like a female slasher movie victim! Nothing was going to deter Nkandu now. He retrieved an ostrich feather from his black leather bag and immediately used it on Andrew Mason's toes and soles and his laughing grew even louder! When the ebony-skinned officer used the feather in-between his toes the blonde boy seemed to fade in and out of consciousness while still howling his brains out. The Tumbuka prison warder's huge penis stiffened.
And he wasn't the only one feeling the intensity of the situation. Andy was clad in only his briefs at this point, and the ebony-skinned officer had long since discovered that tickling this boy's feet got the American blond as aroused as he himself was. The lad was currently and shamelessly "pitching a tent" in his briefs.
But instead of fooling about with his tumescent genitalia, Nkandu's fingers tickled Andrew Mason's extremely sensitive neck ... and the boy shook his blond head so violently when he did this, Nkandu thought he might snap it right off. The African tribesman moved to his armpits and the lad nearly broke free from his bonds! The ebony-skinned officer's fingers slid down to his ribs, bellybutton and waistline.
Andrew Francis Mason was moaning and howling and shrieking like crazy. He screamed when the Tumbuka prison warder got to the twenty-year-old's inner thighs. He tickled that area for about ten minutes. Then he returned to his favorite part of the youth--his size 12 feet. He ran his fingertips softly up and down on the prisoner's soles, sending the twenty-year-old instantly into shrieking hysterics. When his fingers touched the ultra-sensitive area just beneath his toes, Andrew Francis Mason was laughing and shaking so hard that he looked like an epileptic.
"Oh please PLEASE! ... hahahahahaha ... please stop this HAHAHAHAH! ... Have a little mercy ... PLEASE!!! hahahahahaha ... PLEASE OFFICER! NOOOOOOOOOOOAAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHHAHAHAHAHAHAHAAHA!!!!OFFICER PLEEEEEEAAAAAAAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!!"
Nkandu then quickly returned his hands to Andy's tummy and purposely tickled his bellybutton--never allowing him to get used to being tickled on one spot for too long. Andy shrieked and howled and tried to kick out. As he did this, the ebony-skinned officer admired the twenty-year-old's clear manicured nails on his well-shaped toes. They looked so comely that Nkandu did something he never had before; He bent his head down tenderly kissed each toe and drew each in turn into his mouth. He tongue-washed and suckled upon the American youth’s perfect toes for a bit. It was around this time that the Zambian Tumbuka tribesman all but forgot just why the young blonde American had been detained and imprisoned in the first place!
As his toes were tenderly sucked, Andrew Francis Mason's entire body vibrated.
Once the Tumbuka prison warder finished sucking and swirling his tongue around each of Andy Mason's digits, he gave the prisoner a rest period. Then he came to his senses and made the American youth stand up on the stairs outside the cell and forced him to carry a box of food.
Andrew Mason was so exhausted from the tickling that he dropped it. The ebony-skinned officer started screaming at him in his native Zambian togue. He made the twenty-year-old lift a chair high in the air. Then the chair came down and Nkandu took the blindfold off the youth's face and took him back to his cell.
There Andy slept for about an hour and then woke up at the headcount time. He couldn't go to sleep after that because he was very worried that the ebony-skinned officer would return to his cell, armed with ostrich feathers or some other type of tickling tool!