TFAM - The Magic Touch Ch. 01

Special thanks to my editor KenjiSato for all of the help!

This story depicts at one point or another mind control, incest, and (story-relevant)non-consent. These themes are for the purposes of this story and are not condoned or encouraged by this author or editor. All characters in this story that are engaged in sexual conduct are 18 years of age or older. This author encourages the practice of safe and satisfying sex only! Any resemblance to any actual person is either done with permission or is entirely coincidental. This work of fiction is the sole property of the author. No reproduction or redistribution is allowed without the written consent of the author.

CHAPTER 1

Old sayings tend to be misleading. They are always so simplistic and easy sounding. As though, it is such a simple thing to handle great power. And great responsibility is just a choice you make one time and you have fulfilled your obligation... Bullshit! Not a single old adage can prepare you for the constant weight and daily suffering that having to bear superhuman abilities inflicts on a person. Not one of those old sayings instructs you on how to maintain your sanity when something as simple as touching another human being can bring death.

None of those old wise words can adequately explain how having an extended lifespan can break the human psyche. Nor do any of them warn or instruct a person on how to retain your humanity, even though most of them tell you to do so.

Maybe I am just a little bitter. Yeah. I guess I am bitter. You wouldn't think that someone in my position should ever be bitter. But then, no one else has ever been in my position. At least not to my knowledge...

I am getting off topic. Sorry. You tend to ramble when you have been alive for over eighty years (sixty of which have seen you stuck in a perpetually horny, twenty-something body). There is the first 'great power' right there.

You are probably thinking, "Hang on! Immortality?!? Isn't that like the first thing most people would wish for? Why is this dumbass so depressed? I would be thrilled if I knew I couldn't die..."

Or possibly, "Why is this guy crying? He can get everything he wants if he just waits long enough! I wouldn't be such a baby if I was immortal!" That all sounds great when you are looking at this from the outside. But everything has a price.

Now, some of the more astute among you, may have jumped ahead of me here. But for those of you who haven't, don't worry. The ones that are trying to jump ahead are probably not anywhere closer than the rest of you to the real cost of my immortality. Most of the time, when you read fantasies about immortals, you see that they either lose those that they love to old age, or they are constantly on the run from bad people in nondescript uniforms that want to dissect them and unlock the secret to immortality themselves. Others still might be thinking about the process by which one maintains their immortality being directly costly. I am looking at you, vampires... Funny thing is, all of those are correct in a way. But probably not the way any of you are thinking.

See, having powers does not come with any kind of instruction manual. I was not 'given' these powers by any alien entity or a divine being. I received my powers via genetics... I think. I first experienced my powers when I was in my twenties. I may have had them before that, but due to the fact that I was a hermit for the most part, I really don't know. By the way, I say 'experienced' because I didn't have any better idea about what was happening at the time than my coworker did. I am probably being a little unclear here.

See, immortality is not my only power. It is, again, I think... not even really a power I have. Immortality comes as a by-product of my actual power. My current understanding of my powers comes from what little testing I have dared to try and a few observations made after reflecting on my MANY mistakes.

Let me start again. I have an ability that I call Tacto-hypnotic Feedback Absorption and Manipulation, that is, TFAM for short. That is a lot of technobabble to most people, so let me break it down. Human beings have several facets to how we express or experience interpersonal communication. If you break it down into broad categories, based on our senses, we mainly use sight, touch, and sound to understand each other. Now, I put them in that specific order because approximately seventy percent of our communication is based on body language (thank you Dr. Hitch!).

Now, most people believe that body language is perceived via sight alone. That is not entirely correct. While what we see does have the greatest effect on interpersonal communication, touch is still an integral part of body language. Let me explain. When two human beings touch, there is an immediate upsurge in brain activity that happens. This is unique to humans for reasons that I don't fully understand, but I do know that this upsurge is nowhere near as significant if we are touched by inanimate objects or materials. You have felt this difference yourself. Think about it— there is a definite difference between what you feel when a friend touches your sleeve versus touching your arm; same location on your body, but a different feeling by a significant degree!

And it is not tied to just the sensation of skin-on-skin versus skin-on-fabric. If that were the case, we would feel the same connection if we were touched by a fake hand on a stick. But even when tested blindly, some people can tell the difference with even the lightest contact. Why...? I don't have a clue. I am not a scientist and I don't have the temperament to try to unravel that. I just accept it as fact and have moved on.

Anyways, TFAM utilizes this particular facet of touch-based communication to do more than just tell my brain that what is touching me is a human. The first time I experienced it, I was being assaulted by a coworker that took exception to me reading a book during lunch. He was a douche, but he didn't deserve what happened.

Let me clarify, I had obviously been touched by other people before. My parents had a fondness for beating me anytime they felt the mood, and they were not too picky about whether that beating was delivered with fists or the two-by-four that my mother would sometimes use. I can confirm that nothing like this ever happened during those events.

And, of course, not all of the times I had been touched were bad. I had a favorite aunt and cousin that I would try to escape to as often as I could. They had never had any kind of unusual sensation associated with touch. They were able to comfort and care for me, sure. But nothing supernatural. Even when I lost my virginity, it was an exceptional sensation, but not supernatural. Although, that might have had more to do with the fumbling nature of the event, than anything else.

Let me set the scene, I was a Union Ironworker at the time. That meant that I was a construction worker that worked on building large, steel structures and buildings. Our union hall covered several theme parks and I usually worked as a welder on these job sites. I have always been sort of a loner (thanks mom and dad...) and I didn't see any reason to change that. Welders on these jobs usually get to have their own work area that they are responsible for, and as such, they are usually left alone with their work partner or even by themselves.

I had finished my apprenticeship a couple of years before and I was a full journeyman. I bring this up to put into context the dynamics of the situation. Jake and I were both journeymen. He was a connector, I was a welder. Most connectors are very proud of their work and like to look down their nose at detail guys like me. Most welders are very proud of their work, but see themselves as small cogs in the larger machine.

Jake was a model connector. I was a decent welder. He thought that a REAL man (and more specifically an REAL ironworker) couldn't be nerdy or quiet. It apparently became insulting to him that I wanted to read a fantasy novel during my lunch, instead of talk about all the 'hot bitches I had fucked', or 'how big my truck or gun was'. I didn't agree with his assessment of manliness and I had politely expressed this on previous occasions. I am not sure what drove him to make the conflict physical, but the moment he touched my arm, while trying to force me to drop the book and stand up, everything snapped.

I am going to take a moment to describe how it felt to me first, and then explain what I believe actually happened (I am still not one-hundred percent sure how this works. I have done a fair amount of testing and research to figure it out, but I can't really quantify or explain a lot of it.). When Jake touched my bare forearm with his bare hand, I could feel his anger. I could feel it in such a visceral way that it almost made me throw up immediately.

As I was fighting down my instant nausea, Jake began to act strange. He had reached down to grab my arm and forcefully pull me up to my feet. As soon as his hand closed around the underside of my arm, his face contorted into confusion and then revulsion. This might have been explainable due to my immediate change from normal skin texture to absolute clamminess in a matter of moments. But then his expression changed to immense pain and deep loathing that just escalated. I could feel these changes more clearly than I could even classify my own feelings at the time.

I, sadly, focused on the feeling of loathing that was coursing through me. I was confused as to what I should feel loathing towards, except this oaf trying to assault me. I looked into his eyes and we just kind of froze for a few moments. I could only feel the loathing swell as we stared each other down, until I was absolutely convinced that Jake was doing something to me that was causing me to feel this way. I was so focused on this feeling that I completely missed any of the other emotions that were running through his mind at the time.

To be fair to myself though, I had no idea that these emotions were not my own. Up until this point in my life, I had never had someone else's thoughts or emotions in my head. I could tell that these thoughts and feelings were somehow different, but I had no frame of reference as to what that meant. So when I focused on the loathing, it just started to grow exponentially. And for me, the focus of that loathing was solely on the person that I thought was doing something unexplainable and definitely unwanted. Jake.

It must have looked weird from the perspective of our coworkers. Jake holding my arm, frozen in place as I stared him down. Me staring down my would-be assaulter and seeming to dare him to take things further. Finally, I yanked my arm from Jake's hand and got up to leave the break trailer. As I did, I heard Jake take a sharp breath in, and then, in what could have been taken as a broken-voiced whisper of remorse, I heard him say, "I am so sorry, Ronin."

Those were the last words I ever heard Jake say. They may have been the last words he ever actually said. I don't know. What I do know, is that he walked out of the break trailer immediately after I did. Nobody else went with us. Probably thinking that we were either going to talk privately, or separate and cool off before we had to go back to work because lunch was almost over at the time. Afterwards, everyone claimed that they had not seen Jake until he was found in the rebar pit. He had apparently climbed up to an upper level on the steel and jumped into the pit from a considerable height.

It was never revealed if he had ever been suicidal previously. But it was unmistakable that he had done this to himself. I had gone straight to the foreman when I left the break trailer. So everyone knew that there was no way that I had done anything. When the guys that found Jake came running up, I was still with the foreman. When they finally were able to communicate coherently that they had found what was left of Jake, I took that opportunity to throw up.

Still think superpowers are great? Well, I don't. I had very little to go on, but I was sure that whatever had happened to Jake was tied to what I had felt when he touched me. I even began to think that he may have been the one with the powers and that he had just had enough of dealing with the world or something. It wasn't until several months later, that I had another experience. It may seem odd that I didn't touch any other human being, but it really wasn't. I was single and lived alone. I was a hermit, as I said before, and I really didn't want to be around people.

The other ironworkers on the job site had given me a wide berth since the incident. Probably not because they thought that I had anything to do with it. More because I was just associated with a brother ironworker, who had died on a job site. Ironwork is a very difficult and dangerous career. Ironworkers consist of about forty percent of all fall-related construction accidents. We work at extreme heights and do dangerous work. Usually, we work in pairs to mitigate some of the risks, but no one wanted to pair up with me. Ironworkers can be a superstitious lot. Bottom line, I didn't make physical contact with anyone else for a while.

Anyways, everyone had given me a wide berth since the accident. But, as is the nature of ironwork, and construction in general, jobs change and when one job ends another quickly takes its place. I was laid off from that job, (not a reflection on me or the circumstances of the accident, just the job was finishing up and they didn't need so many workers.) and I got dispatched to another job site. This job was indoors and was a night-shift job.

Unfortunately, night shift was excessively loud most of the time due to the constant moving of heavy equipment and trucks through and around an enclosed structure. The noise meant that we usually had either hearing protection or earbuds with music to deaden the racket. That also meant that when anyone needed to speak to you, they usually had to either wave their arms like a lunatic and hope that you saw it, or tap you on the shoulder to get your attention. You can see where this is going...

It was about two weeks into the job when it happened. I was working with a sister ironworker and we had been joking around with the crew. She had told a particularly raunchy joke (What? Women in construction are a different breed! Most of the ones who are worth their salt, are just as bad as the guys around them. Some are lesbians, and they are usually worse than us guys!). Anyways, the joke had been one of those cliffhanger type of punch lines.

So, when she came up to me, I figured that she just wanted to deliver the finisher to her previous joke. She was smiling when she came up to me, so I could easily tell that she was in a good mood. But she had a bad habit of pinching guys' ears like some kind of old-fashioned motherly type. I noticed her walking up, but I didn't act like I had noticed her because I kind of had the hots for her. Sue me. I have always been horny and she was hot. If I could manipulate the situation to increase my chances of physically interacting with a hot woman that also just happened to be single and a colleague, I was going to do so.

Anyways, I saw her put her hands on her hips behind me and I figured she must have been shouting at me to get my attention, but I honestly couldn't hear a thing. Between the cement truck and the pumping truck right outside the door I was working next to, there was way too much ambient noise to hear anything below a nuclear blast. I could see her between my legs as I worked on the platform and watched her hips shift their weight as she waited for a response. I was kneeling down on the platform putting epoxy into the anchor-bolt holes I had just drilled and cleaned. I was expecting the awaited pinch on the ear and had a whole indignant response worked out in my head. Of course, it was going to lead to a brief exchange in which, hopefully, I would gain some desirability in her eyes. I was lonely and horny, not stupid.

Either way, I got more than I expected from that ear pinch. First of all, she decided that I needed BOTH ears pinched for one. Second, the result of the physical contact between her fingers and my ears was light-years away from either of our expectations. Obviously, since she had decided to grab both of my ears, she had positioned herself sort of hovering above my back as I knelt on the platform. She had climbed up to better access both ears and that meant that she was bent over my back and had her head near mine.

So when both of our worlds got simultaneously rocked, she kind of lost the ability to stay upright and slumped onto my back. I was not expecting either the sensation of the TFAM kicking in, nor her sudden adding of weight to my back so I kind of fell forward onto my arms and knees. That was significantly less dignified than I would have liked, but the sensations kind of dictated what happened, rather than anything as insignificant as my grand imaginings of some witty exchange.

The sensations though... How do you describe something as subtle as unacknowledged lust that originates from another person, but is something you feel through them and you? How can I explain the feeling of my own horniness rebounding on a veritable river of nymphomania barely contained? Three things were immediately clear to both of us at that exact moment. One: we were definitely not expecting this. Two: she felt like we were both wearing far too many clothes. And three: we both liked the sensation and didn't want it to stop. But after that initial connection, there was the unusual issue of getting up off of the floor to address the new situation. As soon as she let go of my ears, the sensation faded. I could still feel something, kind of like a ghostly memory of her fingers on my ears, but there was a definite sensation that lingered.

She began to scramble to get off of me, blushing and stammering. (At least, I think that she was stammering. Remember, it was loud as hell in there.) I had managed to flip over and saw her hovering over me trying to get up. I could see the sweat on her neck gathering to roll down her chest to her very generous cleavage (it was near the end of our shift). Her denim shirt always seemed to have the first two buttons open. So I had a pretty decent view down the front of her shirt as she had managed to get back onto her hands and knees over top of me. She saw where my eyes had strayed and gave me a knowing smirk as she seemed to brush off the weird sensation that had just occurred between us.

I will never know what prompted me to do this, I blame the fact that I was low on available blood in my brain (having had most of the blood rush to fill another purpose at the time), but I reached up and cupped her cheek in my hand. I think that I was intending to tell her that it was okay or something. I am not really sure that my thoughts were even remotely coherent enough to actually have formulated even that much of a plan. And even if they were, I am not sure why I would have thought that touching her face would have been appropriate. I had never been a touchy-feely kind of person. And even if I had been, this was a workplace and this kind of unasked or unprompted gesture would have been something I would have been terrified of trying.

Let me be clear, I do not condone being a pig towards anyone, regardless of any circumstance or category that could possibly apply to that person. I saw, and continue to view people as being worth respect and deserving of their dignity. So, it surprised me as much as it did her, to see my hand reaching towards her face. I was gentle as I touched her cheek and the sensation returned. I could feel her flush of excitement and heat as she perceived my advance as an indication of desire mixed with either reverence or benign dominance.