Zero

I interact with and write for several different fandoms which I have listed a little further down! I’m currently fixated on Project Hail Mary in light of the movie release (heavily suggest the book for those of you who haven’t read it), so expect quite a lot of content about Ryland Grace.

Some of my content can occasionally be suggestive. This is an 18+ blog. I will tag all content accordingly, and any explicit content will have a label.

Just to give you a little bit of info about me, I’m 20, I use all pronouns but I’m partial to he/they, and I love diet cherry coke hence the theme of the blog! You guys call me Zero. It was between that or Cherry and unfortunately Zero is much cooler.

Here are some fandoms I write for!

Just to preface this real quick, I write reader inserts and ships.

Project Hail Mary

I mentioned this one earlier. I’m a huge fan of the book, and I thought the movie did a phenomenal job of bringing it to life. I’m a switch! Grace truther. So there’s something for everyone here.

Resident Evil

I have played all 9 of the mainline games, ogs and remakes, and I’m working on the secondary storylines right now. I’m a multi shipper to my core. I know how y’all like to tussle over Aeon vs Cleon. Again, maybe everyone can be happy here!

The Pitt

Not much tickle content for this yet! I’m caught up and I watch every week. Again, multishipper.

Uncharted

Guys, I know fanfiction for Uncharted is not in high demand, please just let me have this one.

Criminal Minds

Ler! Reid truther. Sorry y’all.

The Walking Dead

Fun story. I stopped watching TWD a while ago, well before any of the spin-offs came about, and I decided recently to start from the beginning. One thing didn’t change and that’s Daryl Dixon. #needthat.

Dispatch

There’s already a good amount of tickle content out there for Dispatch! My writing style is a little different from what I’ve seen in the fanfiction out there for this. Please don’t hate me when I inevitably end up writing a bunch of ler!robert/lee!reader.

Call of Duty: MW

Most of the content I write for this will likely be a little suggestive in nature, mostly reader inserts. Sometimes SoapGhost.

For the sake of clarity, I think it’s important that I mention that I will not write for any underage characters. Tickling is not inherently sexual for me, and I can enjoy it in a non-sexual manner, but it is still a kink.

These are just a few I write for! I’m not limited specifically to these fandoms, so if you’re curious about one, my inbox and dms are always open! I also encourage you guys to send in your own thoughts that you might like to see turned into a little drabble, or maybe even an idea you just wanna talk about.

——————

If anyone were to ask on any regular occasion, you’d consider yourself a pretty lucky hunter.

Sure, the life of a hunter can get dangerous- and even more than that, it can get boring. You see so much of the same exact thing every day. Vampires, shapeshifters, vengeful spirits, maybe a Tulpa if things shake up enough, rinse, repeat. But you, well, you never seem to be bored.

How could you be? What, living in a house with the world’s two most interesting people and all. At least on the days that you can consider them people, which are few and far between given that you usually land on something more akin to wild, yet non-aggressive stray dogs.

Er- they’re non-aggressive to you. And even that’s debatable.

See, you’re not the only one that knows how to keep entertained, and you’re made painfully, brutally aware of that fact every day.

You’re a very competent hunter, in almost every aspect of the job. Your expertise is not so much the field work as it is the book work, but you can still handle yourself well in a fight, and you’re incredibly intelligent. You can recite lore and history off-rip that it would take Sam hours of research to accurately source.

They know it too. You’re not just a work partner. You’re their best friend, and they each hold such deep rooted admiration for you. They have never once questioned if you were capable enough for a job. You’re smart, you’re strong, you’re independent…

They respect you.

…but really.

What do you expect them to do?

On top of all of those wonderful things that you are, you’re cute.

And oh so devastatingly ticklish.

So, yes. You’re their work partner, their best friend, an absolute genius, and also their personal plaything. And you have learned that they each have very different ideas of “playing”.

Anyone that’s ever met Dean knows what kind of man he is. He’s rambunctious, loud, sometimes a little reckless, and he’s rough. He is, at his core, an adrenaline junkie. He loves the sound of his heart thudding loud in his ears, the rush he feels course down his spine, and in a way, he craves control.

Everyone knows it, but you know it better than anyone. So, when his focus turns from whatever menu he’s studying or weapon he’s cleaning to you…

And his eyes darken just enough to be noticeable and you watch that charming, pearly white smile turn into a silly, crooked smirk, your heart sinks to your stomach.

It’s unpredictable, but the shift is immediate. He doesn’t have to tell you to run, you do it anyway, and he chases. He’ll chase you around the entire bunker as many times as he has to, or in circles around whatever shitty motel you’re staying in for as long as your legs will allow it. Once he’s got his sights set on you, that attention is unbreakable, and running only prolongs the inevitable.

“Come on, sweetheart”, he’ll call from behind you, “The more you make me chase you, the worse it gets when I catch you”.

And he will catch you.

He’ll corner you first, run you somewhere with your back against a wall and nowhere else to go. It’s quite honestly a little deranged. He likes to watch the way panic flares in your eyes when you realize you have nowhere to go, and you can always see something hungry and a little feral burn behind baby blues.

He just stands in front of you, maybe a few feet back, but still a hard barrier between you and mercy. Sometimes you try to reason with him, not that you ever expect it to work, but you can’t do anything else, and every instinct in your body tells you to get away. He’ll take a jolting step forward, hands coming up as if he’s lunging at you, just to watch you jump and hear you squeal.

When he finally decides to stop jump-scaring you out of your poor little mind, he has no qualms about manhandling. He’d never in a million years hurt you, but he knows you’re tough. He’ll throw you over his shoulder, carry you to the bedroom squirming and writhing and all. And if he has to wrestle you down after he throws you on the mattress, then he’ll wrangle wild desperate limbs and pin them down as he needs to.

God forbid you start giggling before he gets started. It rushes straight to his head.

“Oh, c’mon, sweetheart… what’re you so nervous for, huh? You can’t be that scared of me, can ya?”

And when you nod, because ‘yes asshole, I’m scared of you’, he’ll just grin something bright and brimming with pride.

“Yeahhh, I know”.

You know he won’t keep you in wait long. He doesn’t like it. He loves those nervous little giggles, but that’s not what he’s after. He wants to pull squeals and cackles and desperate pleas from your lips as quickly as possible.

You never know where he’s going to start, and his hands are sporadic, digging into your ribs and drilling into your hipbones and pinching up and down your sides. He doesn’t like to linger in one spot too long unless it’s noticeably driving you much crazier than the other spots, and even then he’ll constantly switch methods.

He just loves to put you through whatever rips the loudest noises out of you, and he is so very responsive. It seems like he never stops talking in fact, especially if you have a tendency to beg.

“Did you say stop? You want me to stop?”, a pause “Can you say please?”

….

“Mmm, nah, I think I’ll keep going.” He definitely has spots he's partial to, like your hips and tummy, but his favorite spot is whichever one makes you the most frantic. Sam scolds him for being sadistic, which you think is ironic coming from him, but you know better than to say so much as a word about that. To hear Sam call anyone sadistic in regards to tickling you- well, quite honestly, it's laughable. He and Dean are a lot more alike than he would like to admit. Everyone looks at Sam and sees a big ol teddy bear. A gentle giant, and one that looks at you like you hung the moon and the stars at that. You can't disagree. It's undeniable that Sam is much more gentle than his older brother, but that doesn't mean he's nicer. He's just slower. Methodical. See, Dean is impatient, but Sam likes to take his time, and it always seems like he has nothing but when it comes to you.

It’s not hard to tell when Sam is in a mood. It’s written all over him. His demeanor changes almost entirely. He gets less chatty, and you never really realize it until you look at him, sitting across the room from you, and you see him looking right back at you like… like he’s already caught you.

You’ll look away of course, red from your neck to the tips of your ears and suddenly much more aware of your own heartbeat. He may not say anything about it at first- he also very well might- but it certainly doesn’t go unnoticed either way.

You become acutely aware of every little thing he does, and he knows it. Even when you pretend to be engrossed in some book in your lap or a video on your laptop, he’s completely aware that he’s got your undivided attention, and he takes advantage of it as much as he possibly can.

Maybe a slow tap tap tap, just one finger tapping idly against a hardwood table. And he’ll go on and on like that for minutes before it turns to a rhythmic drumming, 4 fingers, now a much quicker, and significantly less ignorable sound. You’ll huff in frustration, glaring at him before turning back to whatever you’re pretending to focus on, but soon that tap-tap-tapping will stop, and the silence is heavy. You can feel his eyes on you, and when you look up, his head is tilted down just a bit, looking at you through his eyebrows. You’re first drawn to that sly, tongue-in-cheek smirk on his face before your eyes flit downwards to his hands that are tracing slow, mindless, swirly patterns into the dark oak.

When he finally decides he’s spent long enough etching anticipation into your little brain, it’s a daunting process. You know better than to run from Sam, and he doesn’t let you anyway. If you even so much as think to try it, you’ll find yourself lifted off your feet before you get the chance to strike out. So, when you watch him stalk over to you, or feel him creep up behind you, towering over you, you just shrink.

He’ll always take you to the couch or to the bed, your comfort being his number one priority, and he’ll pin you down, or hold you against him. You often times think Chuck was personally setting you up by making Sam Winchester so goddamn big. He knows exactly how affected you are by every little thing he does, and he loves it. He’ll drop his voice just a bit to something a little softer, right above a whisper, a nearly patronizing tone soaking every last word, and he’ll coo in your ear about how nervous you seem, or how sensitive you are.

“Tickle” is apparently just his favorite word in the entire Webster, and on top of him muttering it as many times in your ear as he can possibly manage, he’ll do everything in his power to coax you into saying it. And you have to deal with all of that before he even actually starts tickling you.

It’s not fair, and you tell him that so very often. He doesn’t care, but he’ll tell you how brave you are for speaking up about it, and then he’ll show you exactly why you should have kept your mouth shut.

He’ll make you watch his hands, slowly trailing just one or two fingertips around your belly, barely enough to tickle, but the anticipation makes it maddening, and if you close your eyes or look away, he’ll stop completely just to make you watch him do it all over again. He teases. A lot. Verbally, physically, mentally, any way he can think of, and he’ll trail his nails so gently over every part of your body just to watch you get more and more desperate for him to just get it over with.

“Get it over with? What do you mean…? Oh! Are you asking me to tickle you? You want me to tickle you? No? Then I’m gonna need you to be a little more specific.”

And when he does “just get it over with”, even that takes forever. He’s going to explore and poke and prod at every little spot. He doesn’t like to be jumpy or sporadic, he focuses on one spot until you’re pleading with him to just go somewhere else.

“Not there? But I love this spot. Okay okay, fine.. How about here? Not there either? Well, then what do you expect me to do?… Stop? Cute, but no.”

He is so obsessed with your tummy, and on the rare occasion that he grows out the beard or gets a little too scruffy, you are so very screwed, because he’s rubbing his face anywhere he can get it.

He’s a little cruel, but he’s not a monster- at least not most of the time. That persona of his tends to stay tucked away.

Unless his brother gets involved.

The two of them have this way of drawing out sides of each other nobody else can really tap into. Dean can almost always rile up the playfulness in Sam, but Sam’s also scarily good at convincing Dean to do things his way. The two of them together is a lot. Even when they’re frustrated with each other or not exactly seeing eye to eye, they can always agree on one thing.

Tickling you to pieces.

You never get used to, and you can never adjust, because it’s unpredictable. Not to mention that everything between them is a competition. Everything. Who can make you laugh the loudest, who can get you to break the quickest, who can get you to make that one little embarrassing noise they like, and they don’t stop until someone has been deemed a “winner”.

You’re pretty sure you’re the only one in this little arrangement that can be considered a loser.

It’s such a conflicting feeling. Sam on one side fluttering gentle fingertips against your sides and hips while Dean is on the other side, scratching and digging into your ribs and armpit. You never know what to focus on. Not that you could focus on anything if you tried.

You had learned fairly early that one thing you never ever do is ask one for help if the other is on you, because they will in fact help. Just not you. Dean had once ran you around the entirety of Bobby’s place, including the junkyard, and when you ran back through the house, you turned one corner and you ran face first into Sam’s chest.

You hit him hard enough that it knocked you back a little bit. He of course caught you, wrapping his arms around your shoulders and making sure you were okay. You could see worry shining in his eyes as he kept glancing behind you, but when you finally managed to mutter out something about Dean and needing to get away, worry shifted to something else entirely.

Before you could even read his reaction to know how fucked you were, you watched his eyes lock on the hallway directly behind you, and when you turned, Dean was just a few feet away from the two of you, and not nearly out of breath as you.

You pleaded with Sam to help you, but you inevitably found yourself situated on the couch, your back to his chest and arms pinned up while Dean took advantage of every spot he could get his hands on.

They’re so mean to you, poor thing, and they know it. Their absolute favorite thing to do is straddle your arms and hips and take advantage of allllll that wide open space from your hips to your armpits. You do everything in your power not to end up in that situation, but they’re the biggest men you’ve ever laid your eyes on, so everything in your power really only includes pouting and asking very nicely.

Sometimes they let you get away, but it’s a short lived freedom once long slender fingers take a grip around your ankle, or a strong arm wraps firmly around your waist and drags you right back to where you were.

The worst part about it is listening to them bicker over you. Where they should start, how they should start, and they completely ignore your input on how they could just… not start. They've never crossed the line, but they know how to get awfully close. They usually don't decide you've had enough until coherency is long lost to babbled pleas and pitiful squeals and giggles. They don't usually push much further- not unless you provoke them, anyway- and they're great about taking care of you. Anything you could want or need is immediately within arms reach. Your wish is their command. Need a nap? Need to cuddle? Want a warm bath? A snack? Some water? There's absolutely nothing you could ask for that they wouldn't go to the ends of the earth to get for you. Nothing is ever off the table. Which means you can always ask one for help if you really want revenge on the other.

__________

You make the brothers dress up every single year for Halloween so they don’t “lose their whimsy”, as you so love to put it.

Dean was first firmly against the idea. Said they see enough monsters without looking in a mirror. There was a Bloody Mary joke in there somewhere, but you didn’t push it.

After days and days of you giving him the biggest, saddest puppy dog eyes he’s ever seen, he just couldn’t stand to keep telling you no. He agreed, on the condition that he had to be something “badass”.

Sam, on the other hand, he’s so smitten for you that all you had to do was ask the one time. Dean still to this day says that he doesn’t think Sammy even knows how to fix his mouth to say no to you.

That first Halloween, Dean was a vampire- but not the kind you three fight, no. A full on gothic Dracula style vamp. White face paint, red contacts, two glued on fangs, a little “blood” dripping down his lip, and a three piece suit. The cape was apparently too tacky.

Sam had opted for a zombie. He let you paint him a pale green and tear up some old clothes of his. You drew some red bite marks on him and he too had to go through the torture of contact lenses- ghostly and completely dead.

You hadn’t considered how complex or time consuming it would be to paint yourself as a skeleton until you were nearly down with the jawbone, but you were a damn good skeleton. Your outfit was easier, since the look relied on your body paint. Just black pants and a white t-shirt.

So, with Nosferatu and Frankenstein in tow, you set out. Of course, the three of you were noticeably a little old for trick-or-treating, but nothing’s better than bar hopping on Halloween just to come home and watch classic horror movies on the couch until someone (i.e. you) falls asleep on the couch and has to be carried to bed.

That’s been Halloween tradition for years now. The three of you have been ghouls, ghosts, monsters, critters, night crawlers, fairytales, creatures of the night, and any other name you can think of to describe all things spooky.

And that’s exactly what seems to be the problem this time around.

You’ve been everything you can think to be, and you’ve spent days grueling over it. You’d figured out a costume for Dean, you’d already scrounged up parts for Sam’s, but you just could not land on your own.

With the golden crown and red coat you’d planned for Dean to sport, and the chainmail and sword you’d managed to find for Sam’s get-up, the choice seemed obvious. What could possibly complete the king and the knight’s trio better than a pretty princess or a dashing young prince? But that was “too on the nose”, you had said.

It’s Dean that eventually gives you the perfect idea for a costume. Something that fits the little theme you’ve established, something that’s easy enough to identify, and something you’ll feel cute in. You’re absolutely thrilled, so much so that you almost immediately run to tell Sam, but Dean stops you.

That should be a massive red flag for you, especially when he tells you that you should surprise Sam with it on Halloween day, but you agree immediately. He talks you into it without ringing a single one of your alarm bells.

So, on Halloween day, you wake up thrilled.

The jester.

It’s so genius that you’re aggravated that Dean thought about it before you did, but you can’t think about that, especially not when you’ve found the perfect outfit for it. It’s your absolute favorite color with some black checkered print, and white ruffles at the collar, wrists, and ankles. Textbook jester, and you do your makeup to match perfectly.

You jump up once you’re done getting ready, More than excited to show Dean, who is quick to urge you to show Sam. Again, you should find it odd, but when he tells you to hide behind the door and pop out once he calls Sam in the room, he justifies it with getting in the Halloween spirit, and who would you be if you disagreed?

If anything, this isn’t fair for you. You expect Sam to startle a little bit, but you don’t expect him to jump nearly out of his skin, and you don’t think you’ve ever heard a scream quite that high-pitched come out of him. You don’t mean to scare him that bad, and you’re even more confused when Dean nearly folds to the floor in hysterics at his brother’s reaction.

Sam is looking between you and Dean with that tight-lipped stare he gives when he’s fed up, and Dean is collapsed nearly in half laughing. As confused as you are, you find it hard to bite back an entertained giggle, and if you weren’t in trouble before, you certainly are now.

“Oh, you think you’re funny, huh?”

Those are the last words you hear before you find yourself staring at the ceiling, pinned firmly against the mattress by hands squeezing and scribbling maddeningly against your sides and ribs.

It happens so fast you don’t quite register what’s happening, and you still don’t know why it’s happening, until Sam drags one of your arms up, slender fingers wiggling into the flesh underneath. The thin layer of silky fabric seems to only be making things worse.

“This was my big surprise, huh? A clown? Yeah, okay, laugh it up. You’re just soooo clever, aren’t you?.”

That’s when it sinks in. All of it. The reason Dean had suggested it in the first place, why he was so adamant about keeping it a secret, his absolute delight when he first saw you in your little costume. He used you to scare Sam. You hadn’t even considered that your costume might be a little clown-like. And now you have to pay for it? How is that fair?

You try so very hard to plead your case, but Sam is seemingly only dealing in absolutes, and someone has to face the consequences of this little prank. You poor thing, you didn’t even mean to scare him, and Dean- who is seemingly somewhat recovered from his own laughing fit- is much too content to just watch you take a punishment that rightfully belongs to him.

You don’t know how long you stay that way, but you do everything you can. You try to tell him that it was all Dean’s idea— hell, you try to tell him that you aren’t even a clown, but neither of those points get through to him, and every attempt to explain yourself turns to frantic, babbling apologies when fingertips keep clawing and pinching at your belly and hips.

It’s not that he doesn’t believe your excuse. In fact, he’s positive you’re telling the truth. He’s met Dean before, he knows perfectly well not to put it past his brother to put you up to something like this. He just doesn’t care.

As unfair as it is, you can’t deny that you learn two very important lessons before it’s over with.

Never take advice from Dean about.. well, anything. And never, never tease Sam about his fear of clowns unless you, in his words, “need something to laugh about”.

————————

That’s what got you in this predicament in the first place. The whining.

That’s not your fault though. How could it be?

You’d been in a mood all day, eyeing his hands, watching the way they worked so efficiently with such delicate precision. You of course couldn’t help but think about his hands on you, that was only natural, and you knew he’d love to get his hands on you just as much, so why were you still here, frustrated and un-tickled?

You’ve done literally everything you know to do when it comes to getting what you want from him. Whining and pouting and batting your pretty eyes at him and… that’s.. well, that’s about it.

But that usually works!

Oh how very well it usually works. Just looking up at him with big puppy dog eyes and tilting your head so slightly to the side. It makes him weak. His knees buckle just slightly and his stomach twists, and how can anyone say no to a face like that?

So, when you found him on the beach tinkering with some Eridian device, and you looked up at him, your eyes wide and glazed over, bottom lip poked out just a bit, you had expected him to give in to you nearly immediately. Drag you into the little house, pull you into his lap, find all of your favorite sensitive spots, coo over how sweet your laugh is. You certainly don’t expect him to tilt his head and furrow his eyebrows just a bit, confusion evident in his expression.

But, of course, that’s exactly what he did. He even went as far as to ask you if everything was okay.

You had just huffed out of your nose, eyes narrowing slightly for just a moment. You first thought he maybe just wasn’t picking it up. Yeah, that must be it. He’s just too engrossed in his work to properly comprehend the pressing matters at hand. But, when you batted your eyelashes at him, leaning in just a little closer to him, he just gave you a quizzical look before turning back to whatever he was working on.

You were taken aback to say the least. He’d never had any problem putting two and two together before, so it didn’t take a genius to figure out that he was doing it on purpose. Though you couldn’t quite land on a reason when you wracked your brain.

You pouted, an honest to god pout. Your eyebrows knit together, lips pursed, and your arms crossed over your chest, as you stared right at him. He didn’t notice- or at least he pretended not to for the moment. You didn’t notice the way he bit his lip or turned his head so that his face was just out of your view. Though, after several seconds of you burning holes into the back of his skull, he turned back to you, eyebrows raised a bit.

“Can I help you with something?”

His expression was unreadable, along with his tone. You huffed through your nose, glaring as you turned away from him and stomped through the sand back inside.

You missed the way he watched you when you turned your back to him, and the breath he let out when you got out of ear shot.

‘This is going to be much more difficult than I thought’, he thought to himself as he shook his head.

————————

It’s about an hour later when he makes his way into the house. You’ve had time to wallow in self pity, which included curling up in bed, and pouting, and thinking more and more about what you want. You just don’t get it. He’s usually jumping at the opportunity to tickle you out of your mind. Why would this be any different.

You sigh, chewing on the inside of your lip as so many different things run through your mind. The way he’d looked at you outside, especially compared to how he’d usually look at you. He usually looks at you like he wants to eat you alive— you’re not always unconvinced that he actually does.

You think about how he’d watch you, the way you’d watch his eyes narrow and his lips curl into a smirk. The way he’d approach, slow and stalking just to tower over you and look down at you with that grin. Your mind races as you think about how he'd hold you, how he’d wrap you in his arms, keep you in his lap, his hands exploring every ticklish spot they can reach— god, his hands.

You don’t realize how lost you are in your own pitiful yearning until the sound of the door opening and closing startles you out of your daze, your face and neck hot.

You perk up almost immediately, and you start to unwrap yourself from the blanket to find your way to his heels again, but your mind jumps back to what he’d done to you on the beach, and you make a snap decision.

If he’s got a point to prove, you’ll prove one of your own.

He walks into the small kitchen, whistling as he pours himself a glass a water. The house is only so big, you can hear him shuffling around, the clinking of the glass against the counter, and if you were to peer around the doorway, you could watch him. You stay right where you are, back to the doorway of the little bedroom as you lay in bed. You say nothing, but you sigh loud enough for him to hear it. He stops, and you can hear the sudden halt of the water trickling. Everything is still, including him, aside from the way his lip twitches upward at the corner. He waits for a moment, listening out for anything from you, but when you don't say anything, he starts meandering around the kitchen again. You furrow your eyebrows, huffing out of your nose before letting out another exaggeratedly loud sigh.

When he stops this time, he laughs, and you light up as he makes his way into the bedroom.

“Alright”, he sighs, sitting on the edge of the bed next to you. Your back is to him as you lay completely cocooned in the soft blanket. His hand snakes around your waist and you tense, inhaling sharply. You’re sure this is it- he’s had enough of watching you sulk, and he intends to do something about it.

At least, that’s what you tell yourself.

He pulls you closer, and you shift just a bit to look at him. He can see it all over your face, in the way your eyes shine with something hopeful, and how you chew anxiously on in the inside of your lip, even as you try to glare at him. He stares for just a moment, considering his options.

He’d planned to keep this up much longer. He has a point to prove after all. What kind of lesson is he teaching by giving in to you every time you so much as look at him a certain way? He has to hold his ground, put his foot down.

It’s just… that spark behind your eyes, and you had been asking for it all day, and would it even be fair to deny you something that you want so badly? Something he needs just as much? And… yeah, okay. Whatever. Maybe he had overestimated his own willpower, but that doesn’t mean you need to know that.

He just huffs. He’s not ready to give in to you yet, at least not completely.

“I know what you want”, he says simply as he pulls the blanket down, his hands trailing and resting on your hips. He holds you firm, and you can’t help but squirm beneath him, your face flushed red as your heart flutters in your chest. It’s almost embarrassing, how quickly he broke your little grumpy facade.

To him, it’s an absolutely breathtaking sight, the way you get so visibly needy. His jaw drops just slightly and his chest heaves as he takes a deep breath to ground himself. His skin is absolutely crawling as he watches you writhe underneath him, his fingers twitching instinctively at your sides.

He takes you in entirely, just watching, and he has to bite back a smile of his own.

“You’ve been just beggin’ for it all day, huh?”.

You deny it of course, shaking your head, but this is what you’ve wanted all day. You feel a nervous smile playing at your lips, and you bring your hands up to cover your face.

“No?”, he repeats, quirking an eyebrow as he reaches up and pulls your hands away from your face, gently pinning them to the mattress beside your head.

You turn your head, trying to hide your face as much as you possibly can- something he corrects almost instantly. “Hey, eyes up here. On me please”.

His tone is low and steady, and certainly not unkind, but still stern. Your stomach twists just a bit and you find yourself turning your head, your eyes meeting his.

“Good. Thank you.” Your lips part just slightly as your breath catches in your throat. You just nod, any argument you could have posed faltering on the tip of your tongue.

“Now”, he starts, brushing a loose strand of hair out of your face. His tone is low, just above a whisper. “Just because I know what you want doesn’t mean I’m gonna give it to you.”

You start to whine, but he cuts you off with a chuckle, rolling his eyes.

“What, you think just because you whine and give me those big puppy dog eyes, I’ll give you whatever you want?”

You’re quiet for a moment, chewing on your lip.

“Umm… yes?”

In your defense, it usually does.

He’s quiet for a second, lips pursed. “Okay, you know what? That’s fair, but, this time,” his thumb rubs soothing circles against your wrist, “that’s not gonna work.”

You whine again, and again he cuts you off.

“Ah-ah, what did I just say, hm?”

He tilts his head down, eyebrows raised as he gives you a pointed look.

“Use your words.”

Your eyes widen. Those words in that tone out of his mouth… it’s the last thing you expect to hear from him. He’s never done this to you, denied you like this. Honestly, you didn’t even know he had the self restraint to tell you no. About anything.

Truth be told, he doesn’t. With every passing moment, he’s starting to regret this little game more and more.

He had done this as a means of toying with you. He wanted to watch you squirm, to see that desire build inside of you until you were too desperate for it to think about anything else. He hadnt considered his own need hindering that, and he tries to push it down, but instinct is gnawing at him. Everything in him is telling him to just give you what you want, draw out all those pretty giggles and squeals.

Still, he just waits, watching you, but you feel his grip on your wrists get just slightly firmer. You don't know what to do. He's never put you in a position like this before- at least not that you can remember. You open your mouth, trying to find the right words before closing it again almost immediately. You've never... asked for it before. You're honestly not sure that you can even fix your mouth to form the proper sentence to do so. You think and think, taking a breath every now and then as if you've thought of something before going quiet again. He watches the way your eyes shift. You keep looking at him, like you're hoping he'll help you out, but you don't look at him long enough to meet his eyes or hold his gaze. He can see the frustration build, your eyebrows furrowing and your face burning as you realize you can't force it out.

He’s silent for the entirety of the battle you’re having with your own brain, and that only makes it worse. He’s just waiting. Waiting for you to do as he’s told you, no exceptions, no easy way out. His fingers tap idly at your pinned wrist, which isn't helping you at all. You think he's teasing you, just the lightest tapping of his fingertips against your skin as if he's giving you just the slightest bit of what you want, making you want more, and god it's working, but that's not his intention. He's getting just as restless as you are, eager to touch and to tickle, but who would he be if he didn't uphold his own rules? It feels like the words are stuck in your chest, like you know what you need to say, but you can't make yourself. 'Please tickle me'. It's just three little words. A simple request. Something you know you both want. And still, your tongue feels like cement. You take a deep shaky breath, your face contorting into a small wince as you start to force something out. "I-", you clear your throat, rolling your eyes with a huff, "Ryland- just, please-" Before you can even get out the rest of it- or at least try to- he's got both of your hands in one wrist, moving shockingly quickly to pin them above your head and straddle your hips. "Yeah, okay, that's good enough for me". It comes out rushed, so much so that you almost don't fully comprehend what he's saying, but it certainly doesn't take you long to register the feeling of his free hand squeezing rapidly up and down your side. It all happens so fast, it feels like a jolt of electricity trailing down your spine, and suddenly, what was a plea for him to get on with it turns into a desperate for him to just wait. He shakes his head, his hand suddenly jumping from your side to your ribs, clawing against the sensitive skin and worming his fingers into the spaces between the bones. "I’ve done enough waiting. I will literally never do that again. Don't ever make me wait that long again." You squeal when his hand jumps again, this time under your arm before he scribbles back down to your ribs. You don’t believe what you’re hearing.

After all of that, he has the audacity to blame you for the delay, and for what? Because he got impatient? How can that possibly be fair? "ME?", you ask through loud cackles, in utter disbelief. "I dihihidn't! I-", He cuts you off, clicking his tongue at you before he brings his hand to your belly, clawing around your navel before scribbling across your lower belly from one hip to the other. It's so sporadic, fingertips jumping from one spot to the other and swapping between clawing and spidering and scratching. "Excuses, excuses...", he sighs, but you don’t miss the small smirk on his face. You know arguing with him about it will only dig you into a deeper hole, but you just can't help it. You're already so worked up. I mean, he was the one that demanded you ask for it anyway. He had intentionally denied you earlier just to prove a point, and then he got too impatient to even enforce it properly. And now he blames you? You just can't believe it. You start to tell him that you're not making excuses, that the whole ordeal is his fault, but his thumb finds that sensitive spot in the dip of your hip, and any rebuttal you might have had is immediately lost. Your head falls back against the pillow, eyes squeezed shut us as you twist your hips as much as possible.

You’re so focused on trying to get away from the unbearable sensation of his relentless squeezing that the argument falls further and further into the back of your mind, but you just can’t seem to worm free even in the slightest.

You whine, a mess of flustered, frustrated giggles as his unpredictable movements finally turn into a steady kneading in one spot.

You’re honestly not sure at this point which is worse.

“There ya go”, he draws out, his tone softer, higher, almost patronizing. “Isn’t this so much better than laying around and pouting all day? And all you had to do was say please! I didn’t even make you say tickle.”

He watches the way your nose scrunches at the sound of the word, and the way you shake your head in response to his question. You try to say no, but you’re not sure it comes out too coherently through squeals and giggles.

He laughs. “Ohhh, that’s right! You can’t say tickle.”

He already knew that.

“We’ll work on that. I’m sure I could help you.”

A whimper slips out through frantic giggles as he reaches up to hold your wrist in his other hand before pushing the soft fabric of your tshirt up just enough to slip his hand underneath it.

You arch your back when his fingertips swirl in a smooth motion around your navel, but they don’t linger. He traces all the way up your side, just to wiggle his fingers into the soft skin under your arm.

You shake your head, trying to pull your arm down. You feel like you’re putting up such a hard fight, but he doesn’t budge.

“Where do you think you’re going?”

He barely manages the question out before you’re squealing for him to let you go, but he just shakes his head.

“No,” he says, drawing out the ‘o’, “You wanted me to tickle you, didn’t you?”

You whine again, squirming and twisting as much as you can, but not only are you stuck beneath him, you can feel your muscles giving out on you.

You’re so incredibly conflicted, just as you usually are, and he knows it, and loves taking advantage of it. This is exactly what you wanted, but you- you poor thing, you’re just so ticklish, and he’s so very mean.

It’s his favorite thing, to watch that little bit of panic flare behind your eyes when you realize that you’ve gotten exactly what you want, and ,despite the fact that you craved it all day, it’s still just as unbearable as it always in.

You nod, but then you shake your head, and it turns into some weird combination of both.

“I-I don’t knohohow!”

He laughs again, this time genuine. He almost feels bad hearing how frantic your responses are.

Almost.

Not nearly enough to stop.

His fingers stay in motion as they crawl upwards, over your bicep and to your elbow before trailing back down, spidering and scratching lightly in your armpit and down to your ribs. It’s such a repetitive motion, up and down, up and down, but you can’t adjust to the sensation at all.

“Okay, okay, fine. I’ll stop teasing.”

Liar.

Though, his hand does slow. It doesn’t stop, but it slows at your ribs.

Desperate cackles turn to something lighter, but his fingertips are still trailing gently over the spots he’d already assaulted. You can’t fight it anymore, aside from twitching and squirming out of pure instinct.

“Why are you still giggling?”, he asks, feigning confusion as his nails keep tracing against your ribs in a slow circular motion. You can feel his hand traveling higher and higher, inch by inch, devastatingly close to that oh so sensitive spot under your arm again.

“Becahahuse! It-“, you cut yourself off, biting your tongue with a frustrated whine as you throw your head back against the pillow in defeat.

“Because it what?”, he asks, eyebrows raised. “Because it tickles?”

He annunciates the word by kneading, rougher and quicker, into the soft flesh of your ribs, but only for a second before he’s back to slow teasing.

“Yehehes!”, you squeak, planting your feet against the mattress and trying to buck him off.

You don’t knock him off, but you definitely throw him off of his balance as he falls forward. He almost loses his grip on your wrists, but he holds tight using his other hand to steady himself against the headboard.

Everything’s quiet for just a moment, aside from the quick, shallow huffs you let out as you try to settle down.

He doesn’t say anything, not for a minute anyway. He’s just looking down at you, his jaw slack, and eyes narrowed, almost offended.

When you finally do look up to meet his gaze, your heart sinks.

You’re fucked.

You are so completely and utterly and extremely fucked.

“W-Wait— Ryland, hold on-“

He just shakes his head, cutting you off before you can even get started.

“You…”, he chuckles, a grin that can only be described as shit-eating playing at his lips.

“You are so screwed.”

——————

What’s this? More Ler Ryland? Who could have thunk. This isn’t my absolute favorite of my ler Ryland concepts but fret not because I already have another one bubbling and brewing in my drafts.

When he was a rookie, Leon was an open book. He wore his heart on his sleeve, cried at sad movies, kept sentimental photo albums— he really was as sappy as they come. He’d always been that way. He was a sensitive kid, then a sensitive teenager, and an even more sensitive adult.

Though, of course over the years, in his line of work, those emotions got dangerous. They never went away, but he taught himself to hide them. Show no weakness, no vulnerability. Keep your enemies close and your friends far far away.

On top of grueling physical training, Leon spent hours upon hours making sure his mind was nearly impenetrable, or at least to make sure he seemed that way. It didn’t matter what emotion it was, he made sure he didn’t express it too outwardly. Anger, sadness, joy, fear, love…

Most importantly, Leon S. Kennedy does not cry.

Usually.

Now, he’s older. He’s stronger. He can handle himself and he’s secure in that, and trust he can protect those around him. He’s got a tight circle of people he trusts and keeps close. People that he loves more than anything, and they love him.

To be loved is to be known, and they know him. They know his heart, his mind, and they certainly know the walls he keeps around them.

Sure, he’s a little more expressive with them, but certainly not by much. Fortunately, they also know how to knock those walls down.

He says it’s not fair, and maybe it isn’t- or, well, it definitely isn’t, but that doesn’t really change anything. Sometimes that argument works on Claire if he looks at her the right way and whines pretty enough. Chris says she’s much too soft for him. Leon would call that ironic if he didn’t have any better sense.

Though, most of the time, ‘Fair’ doesn’t matter. Why would it? They wouldn’t tie him up if they were concerned with fair. He wouldn’t enjoy it as much either.

It isn’t really their fault that he’s so much fun to play with. He’s always so stoic, and when he’s not, he’s being a smartass. You’d think someone so excruciatingly ticklish would know better. He’s always so firm. His gaze is strong and confident, he never breaks, never falters. Occasionally, you can see a smirk tug at his lips, or hear a low, rumbling chuckle, but almost nothing more than that.

It’s makes it so much more satisfying to have him in such a vulnerable state- to feel and watch every little jolt and reaction, break down that tough exterior. They feel the way his muscles twitch and tense under a soft, teasing touch. They watch the way his lips curl into a smile he can’t bite back. They hear the way his breath hitches in his throat, how he tries so very hard to suppress bubbly laughter.

And maybe he’ll tough it out for a minute or so, masking nervous giggles with low grumbles, empty threats, little growls, but he can’t hide the way his eyes shift nervously side to side, or the way his body reacts to long sharp nails dragging across ticklish ribs.

He can’t stand it. The way they watch him, the way they coo over him and taunt him, the way his skin crawls, and the way he’s so completely helpless to stop it. He can’t control himself, or his reactions, and it feels like his nerve endings are on fire.

He’s strong, he knows he is. He can endure anything. He’s been interrogated and tormented and otherwise put through the wringer in every way imaginable, and Leon Kennedy does not beg.

But when fingertips slip under the thin fabric of his shirt and worm their way into outstretched hollows… well, he tries. He tries so hard to fight it, to work his way free or at least pull his arms down just a bit, but they won’t budge and he can’t make it stop and he just can’t take it anymore. His only option is to ask so nicely for it to stop, and his mouth is forming the word “please” before his brain can remind him who he is.

It almost never stops there, and it only gets more intense, and with every passing moment, the pit in his stomach grows heavier and heavier.

He’s so completely and utterly helpless. He can’t do anything to protect himself, his ego is bruised, and dignity went out the window the moment he resorted to pleading. It’s not even dignified with a proper response, just someone cooing in his ear in a horribly patronizing tone about how bad it must be, and suddenly he’s babbling nonsense- trying to find a coherent sentence through all of the brain fog but it tickles so bad.

He can’t focus on anything else, but he can’t do anything about it, and he doesn’t even feel the first few drops bead at the corners of his pretty blue eyes.

And would you look at that?

It turns out Leon Kennedy does cry.

——————

It had happened while he was watching some cheesy romcom, a couple play fighting on the couch. The tickling itself lasted all of a few seconds before one thing lead to another and he was suddenly watching a very different scene unfold. That didn’t matter, not to his brain at least. He was absolutely fixated on the tickling, his breath caught in his throat and his heart fluttering in his chest.

He pushed it down, wayyyy down. If it came up in conversation, he tuned it out. If it showed up on TV, he turned it off. He just decided to never unpack it and never explore it.

Until the early 2000s, well after the events of Raccoon City, when he discovered the online world of tickling. Forums and chat rooms and videos and people planning meet-ups and events. He’d found a rather large community of people with this same interest, and he tried to pry himself away from that too, but he was so infatuated with it.

He spent most of his time browsing text posts, much too embarrassed to watch any videos, and he certainly never posted or tried to reach out to anyone. When a video would catch his eye, he watched it with absolutely no volume.

It was- and honestly still is- his biggest and most embarrassing secret. He never told anybody, no girlfriends or boyfriends, no friends. Nobody was allowed to know about it. He didn’t know at first why he was so embarrassed about it. Why it made him flush so very hot, or made his skin crawl. He couldn’t stand to witness it naturally or even hear the word.

He had learned all about it. The dynamics of it, the terminology, even the psychology behind it. He had gotten familiar with what it meant to be a lee and what it meant to be a ler, and then he learned that there were people who fell somewhere between the two. He had considered himself none of those. It was mostly a coping strategy, separating himself from it all by telling himself that he didn’t want to actively participate. It was just… an interest of his.

It wasn’t until a particularly… interesting dream he had that he was forced to face the reality of that being an absolute load of bullshit, as he realized that, not only does he very much want to be an active participant, but that he’s also very drawn to being on the receiving end.

He woke up in a cold sweat, flushed from his chest to his ears, and with one achingly obvious problem that kept him from going back to sleep. He spiraled almost immediately, now in even more denial about it than he’d been before.

That night, it shifted entirely. It went from a slight agitation in the back of his mind to a gnawing, incessant, insatiable need. He couldn’t stop thinking about it, and that made him a mess.

It was Claire that would eventually draw it out of him, or more so figure it out herself. It wasn’t entirely an accident either. She could tell something was up with him, everyone could. He was constantly fidgeting, unable to focus, zoned out, and seemingly completely unable to hold eye contact with anyone.

Of course she asked, but he wouldn’t tell, and one thing lead to another, and she did what she had to do. It was that night that he learned for the very first time in his life exactly where he’s ticklish, and oh how very very ticklish he is. Poor guy. It almost wasn’t fair, and she just was not getting anything out of him, but right as she started to feel bad enough to pull away, it clicked. Watching the way his face fell so slightly when she stopped, thinking of how jittery he’d been, stuck in his own head, staring at her hands, it all fell into place.

From that point on, nearly everyone he got close to learned about his little secret. Hunnigan, Ada, Chris, Ashley, even Luis had figured it out after overhearing a particularly teasing remark from Ada.

It only gets worse as time goes on, as each and every one of them find their own little ways to push his buttons, watch his brain short circuit, and he gets more comfortable being defiant. Chris says he’s like an old dog, snapping for attention.

He’s like an experiment for them, finding out which spots drive him up the wall, what methods and tools make him the most desperate, how to break him down and make him roll over. They test his limits, finding that boundary and toeing the line oh so dangerously.

You’d think it’d get a little less intense as they all get older, that he’d be able to handle it a little better, but they’re constantly finding new ways to ruin him. New tools, new methods, bondage, teasing, all of it.

Even now, with salt and pepper in his hair and stubble, after living through the zombie apocalypse, and basically saving the world, he’s still just as embarrassed about it.

In his defense, he’s probably the biggest and baddest motherfucker in any room at any given time. Right up until one of his oh so loving friends cocks that grin at him- the one that tells him everything he needs to know about the situation he’ll be in once they get their hands on him.

———————

It's negligible to begin with. One little conversation that you just so happen to overhear. They're working together on something in the lab. You're too busy with Armando's maintenance to be concerned with it, but you can't help but notice Ryland consistently coughing and clearing his throat. When Rocky asks if he's okay and Ryland brushes it off by saying he's just got a tickle in his throat, it definitely gives you pause- as it always does to hear that word, especially out of his mouth. But the two of them keep working, so you do the same. The second time, it's just a few hours later. You had asked Rocky about customs on Erid. Holidays, traditional meals, different dialects. It's when the three of you are discussing music that Ryland explains to Rocky what a piano is and says he "always wanted to learn to tickle the ivories". You furrow your eyebrows, your face slightly flushed as you throw him a quizzical glance, but he doesn't even seem to notice, despite the fact that that sentence could definitely be found somewhere on a list titled "Top Ten Things Dr. Ryland Grace Would Literally Never Say". So, again, you brush it off, chalking it up to his usual awkwardness. The third time, you start to get that gut feeling. Like someone's fucking with you. The three of you are recording. Nothing too interesting, really just a situation report. You let Ryland do most of the talking, which proves almost immediately to be a mistake. He talks about a minor change you had made to Armando's programming, Rocky's weird sleeping habits, and he heavily suggests they equip the next ship with at least ONE shield. He asks if either of you have anything to add, and then he signs off by saying he's going to "keep tickling Rocky's brain" about life on Erid, but this time you swear you catch a little sideways glance and smirk. You huff, glaring at him as soon as he turns the camera off, but he just furrows his eyebrows a bit. "Something wrong?" If looks could kill, Ryland would already be cold Unfortunately, he plays it off just well enough that you just can't let go of that little bit of doubt, the little voice in the back of your head that tells you you're thinking too hard about it and getting worked up over nothing, and oh how very worked up you are. You can't stop thinking about it, and you hadn't realized up to this point that just so much as hearing him say the word could put you in a lee mood, and yet, here you are. You're sure he was doing it on purpose, and your constant mental replay of the three separate instances certainly isn't helping your current predicament. You don't realize that you're too absorbed in your own thoughts to pay attention to whatever Rocky's been rambling about. In fact, you had tuned out of the conversation several minutes ago when the two of them had started going back and forth. It isn't until they both stop talking entirely that you notice you've been staring off into nothing, bouncing your knee and fidgeting mindlessly. They, on the other hand, are staring expectantly right at you.

Suddenly, your face feels much hotter. "Friend okay, question?", Rocky asks with a light chirp, and you nod, but then your gaze tilts to Ryland, and you know exactly why he's got that sly ass smirk on his face.

You don’t know why you’d even doubted it in the first place. Nobody talks like that, he certainly doesn’t, and it’s his fault that you’ve been an absolute flustered wreck for the past hour or so.

You’re definitely the first person to seriously ponder the legal implications of committing murder on a suicide mission, and Rylan would be petrified of the glare on your face if he didn’t already plan to wipe it off.

“You sure? It definitely seems like you’ve got something on your mind.”

You barely let him finish before you snap back at him just to tell him he knows exactly what he did.

He bites his lip and looks down for just a moment, but you don’t miss the barely concealed grin on his face, or the way his shoulders shake just a bit before he looks back up at you.

Rocky lets out an inquisitive trill. “Grace did something, question?”

You take in a quick sharp breath, still glaring daggers at Ryland as you start to tear his head about it, but the words die in your throat almost immediately.

What are you supposed to say? Really? You get flustered just saying the word in any context, there’s no way you can explain out loud that Ryland was saying it just to get you all flustered and needy. And then you certainly can’t admit to the room that it worked.

Ryland eyes you up and down with a cocky, triumphant grin when you fall quiet.

“Yeah, that’s what I thought.”

——————

You can’t help but roll your eyes at that, glaring at Ryland from across the rolling table he’s pulled between the two of you in a desperate attempt to create more distance. He watches you wearily, his eyes wide and flitting all around in search of an escape. His heart is pounding so hard his ears are starting to ring, and in the moment of stillness, he takes deep breaths, trying to steady himself.

You watch for just a moment, entertaining the illusion of peace only briefly before taking a hurried step forward. He lets out a yelp when you push the table out of your way and continue after him, and he darts to the right of you, out of the lab and back onto the beach.

It goes without saying that you have no interest in talking, especially given that he’s managed to run you around the entire beach twice now, and is seemingly working towards a third. You're hot, and you're tired, and it's his fault.

“Come on, Ryland~”, you sing, slightly out of breath as you jog behind him “It’s much easier when you just let it happen”. His face flushes red as he recognizes his own words from just hours earlier thrown back at him.

See, the day hadn’t started like this at all. In fact, it had been quite the opposite. He had woken up with a want- no- a need. Something loud and hungry and in desperate need of attention. Something he had to satiate. So, he had sought out to do just that.

It felt exactly the same as all the times he’d gotten the gnawing urge to draw squeals and giggles and pretty little desperate noises from your lips. So naturally, he assumed that's what would cure his deficiency. What else was he meant to do?

You, you poor thing, had no idea what waited for you when you rolled out of bed, stretched, and sleepily made your way after him.

He was on you as soon as you stumbled out of the house and into the lab, before you even got the chance to wake up good. Honestly, you weren’t entirely sure what had happened, just that an arm had wrapped tight around your waist before he hoisted you up and carried you right back inside. By the time he was done, you were so worn out you went back to sleep.

He got what he wanted. Then again, he always does. But, that need had just kept buzzing at him. Even as he lay beside you, petting your hair, tracing your skin while you slept it off, it ached in the back of his mind. All day. No matter what he was doing, he couldn’t shake the thought of fluttering fingertips and bubbly giggles. The problem was that this time, the feeling is just slightly different.

Usually, he’s mean, but now, now just the thought of it is making his face flush red as he gets what he could only describe as butterflies. He can’t focus on anything else. Not Adrian’s rambling about the water temperature, or Rocky’s mention of fixing up Mary. Not even Armando’s new voice box that sounds strikingly similar to Meryl Streep.

You had noticed his behavior was a little odd. It was hard not to. He was fidgety, stumbling over his words, tripping over himself, lost in thought. He couldn’t stand still for the life of him, and every few minutes you’d catch the faintest hint of a blush creeping up his neck. Of course he's naturally a little awkward, but this was something different. You really didn’t know what to think at first, but you just couldn’t shake the thought that you should be able to identify his behavior and-

“Oh my god.”

You looked up, eyes wide as Ryland’s voice interrupted your thoughts, just as you pieced it together. From the wide-eyed look on his face, he had too.

That was all it took. One look between the two of you, a mutual understanding, and he had turned on his heels before you even got the chance to tell him to run.

He doesn’t realize as he strides across the sand that running into the small beach house almost certainly isn’t the best idea, until he finds himself standing in the walkway with limited options for running or hiding. His heart drops as he hears your footsteps behind him before you stop in the doorway, taking a breath.

“You”, you point at him, hunched over slightly as you steady your breathing, “yooouuu are so fucked.”

He’s seemingly frozen for a moment before he turns slowly to face you. You’ve never seen a man so red. It’s almost concerning, and the awkward smile he cracks certainly doesn’t help.

“Wh— me?”, he asks, forcing out a small chuckle, “Pfff, I’m just- we’re— you know, we’re just messin’ around! Right?”

You raise an eyebrow, propping one hand on your hip as you watch with great amusement as he tries to talk his way back into your good graces. You also certainly don’t miss the slow step he starts to take backwards.

His hands are raised in front of him just enough for the gesture to be defensive, and he moves ever so slowly. Almost like he thinks you wont notice if he moves slow enough.

“I-I think we should take a break! Just relax for the rest of the day, have a nice bath, a-and I’ll even invite Rocky and Adrian over!”.

You huff out a laugh of your own, crossing your arms over your chest as you just watch him back his way into the small bedroom. You’d be lying to say you arent thrilled at the opportunity to get him back, and you so badly want to rub in his face just how screwed he is, but you know his brain. So, instead, you say nothing. You just watch with a pointed look.

Sure enough, after a few seconds with no response or reaction, you can see him falter just a bit. His breathing quickens, and his face falls just slightly to one of panic, or maybe something more like anticipation.

“I— c’mon— why aren’t you saying anything?”. You’re sure he doesn’t mean for it to come out quite so whiny, but that doesn’t change the fact that it does anyway, and as overjoyed as you are to watch him writhe and whine about nothing more than a look, you’re eager to get your hands on him.

You roll your eyes with an exaggerated sigh as you take just two steps towards him. You can see his chest heaving. He's sweating, a mixture of nerves and the exhaustion of running around the beach, and you certainly don't miss the way he's trembling as he continues to slowly edge backwards. You're only so far from him as you cross the threshold from the living room into the bedroom, you could reach out, just grab him and get it over with. You, however, are much more attentive to your current surroundings than he is, and you spot almost immediately how his current course of action is going to get him in trouble. "Please, I am begging you. My light, my life, my best friend in the whole wide world. This is not necess-", he cuts himself off with a loud yelp as the back of his knees hit the bed and he falls backwards on the mattress. It takes him all of one second to realize how absolutely fucked he is, but you had watched, and you had planned, and you're straddling his hips before he can start to try to get himself up again. "NO! Nononono! This is not fair, we are not doing this!", he grumbles through gritted teeth, trying to make himself sound angry and intimidating, but he doesn't account for the giggles that he's not doing a very good job of holding in. They certainly aren’t deterring you in any way. He tries oh so hard to free himself, but you make quick work of grabbing his arms. Well, as quick work as you can. It is a slight bit of a struggle, he's much stronger than he looks, but you have the higher ground, and you can feel the will to fight slipping from him when you pin his wrists under your knees. He struggles for just a moment longer, face red and heart pounding as he looks anywhere but at you, and for the very first time ever, you have left Dr. Ryland Grace speechless. You give him a moment, just to settle, but even as he takes deep, steadying breaths, he can feel the anticipation crawling all over his nerves. He doesn't know what to do with himself, poor thing. Closing his eyes makes him paranoid about when you'll attack. Looking at you drives him up a wall. It's tingling up his spine and through his arms and down to his fingertips, and he doesn't notice how sweaty his palms are. It hangs heavy between the two of you, the knowledge of what's to come. It's peaceful for the moment- much more so for you than for him- but both of you know how this ends. He’s never been on the receiving end of such an inevitable fate, and you had greatly underestimated how incredible it feels to hold this much control over someone. So much so that every little move you make makes them squirm. "Nothing to say now, hm?" He squeezes his eyes shut as you card your fingers through his hair. It's damp with sweat, but you don't mind. Everything inside of him is telling him to do whatever he can to get away, and when the idea strikes him to bite, he almost acts on impulse, but he stops himself just as he bares his teeth. He shakes his head, and you can feel him twisting his hips in one last small effort to get some freedom, but it’s impossible for him to get any leverage in this position. You giggle and the sound sends a shiver down his spine. He narrows his eyes, the corner of his lip downturned as he glares at you, but when you bring one hand up, ever so gently holding him by the chin, he quickly corrects himself.

“Okay! Okay okay, ohhhh my god, I’m so, so sorry-NO!”

You don’t expect the first noise you draw from him to be so loud and high pitched, but you had gotten tired of listening to him ramble, and you’re so very content to prod experimentally at his ribs.

You’re taken aback yourself by the reaction, and you stop for just a moment before the slight smirk on your face turns into a shit-eating grin.

“Ohhh right here, huh?”, you enunciate the words by worming your fingers into the spaces between his ribs, wiggling against the soft flesh. He shakes his head, letting out little huffs as he tries so very hard not to laugh, but when your other hand finds the very same spot on his other side, he just cant seem to stop the steady stream of high-pitched, hiccupy giggles that spills from his lips.

“Nohoho! No— plehehease! Please- just—“, he whines through his laughter, squeezing his eyes shut as he turns his face to the side. You watch the way his eyes crinkle at the outer corner with his smile. You can’t help but giggle yourself.

“Just what?”, you ask, fingers trailing down to squeeze and prod at his sides. “Just stop? What if I don’t want to?”

He manages a couple quick breaths as your assault moves to a slightly less sensitive spot, but it’s still nearly unbearable.

“Plehehease!”, he whines out again, this time sounding particularly desperate. You can feel him tugging at his wrists. “I’ll never— I’ll never tihihickle you again!”

It’s such an absurd statement- especially coming out of his mouth- that you can’t help but laugh. “You are such a liar, Ryland”, you say, just as he manages to get one of his hands free.

He doesn’t manage much with his new found freedom before you grab his wrist, leaning forward to pin it above his head. He groans, his face burning red. This position just feels so much worse, so much more compromising.

You giggle, slipping your hand under his shirt just to trace your nails ever so slowly up and down his stretched side. “What’s wrong? You liked it better the other way?”

His breath hitches in his throat at the first touch of your fingertips against his bare skin, and he doesn’t know whether to shake his head or nod, which results in an odd combination of both.

“No- yes— I, ohhhh my god, I don’t know! I don’t know!”, his voice is strained, like he’s trying to hold his breath, and you can’t help but notice that he only gets more and more nervous the higher your fingers trace.

Just two fingers crawl slowly up his sides, then over his very sensitive ribs, and when you reach the spot riiiight under his armpit, you stop, just swirling around the sensitive patch of skin there.

You watch him close, your eyes never leaving his face. He’s trembling, shaking his head ever so slightly as giggles threaten to spill already. His eyes are still closed tight as he chews on his bottom lip. You can feel his legs shaking just slightly behind you- like he’s trying to calm himself down. He seems so worked up, so desperate to get away, but… you can’t help but notice that he’s not pulling quite so hard at his wrist. He’s not fighting like absolute hell anymore against your grip. Only instinctively jerking when your nails graze a little too close under his arm.

You don’t say anything about it. Not yet at least.

Slowly, ever so slowly, gentle tracing turns to soft, quick fluttering. Five fingertips right there, so very close to such a ticklish spot. Hushed, anticipatory giggles become something more frantic as his eyes widen. He turns to look at you, to watch, but he can’t. The nails so very close to tormenting him are hidden under his shirt. All he can do is feel it, and take it.

The thoughts sends a shiver down his spine as he arches his back just slightly, squeezing his eyes shut again.

“Are you nervous?”

It’s a simple question. It shouldn’t have his heart racing or his adrenaline skyrocketing, and it shouldn’t be as flustering or nerve-wracking as it is, but if he wasn’t already bright red from his current predicament, you’d be able to see the deep red flush on his cheeks. He huffs out through his nose. If you were meaner- like someone you know- you'd remark on the silly grin on his face or the little hiccups that slip out through laughter. His only response is a quick nod. "Why?", your voice is soft, but there's another underlying tone. Something a little too high pitched, too patronizing for the question to be innocent. He hears it. "You shouldn't be. You went through all that trouble this morning just for this. Isn't this what you wanted?", he twists just a bit underneath you as you trail tickling fingertips down just to his top rib, and then right back up just below his armpit. A man in a less vulnerable state would deny it. Ryland is many things, but an idiot isn't one of them. Most of the time. He opens his mouth, starting to answer, but he freezes, breath caught in his throat when you inch your fingers up just slightly and still them completely. You'd never heard him whimper before but you very quickly make a vow to yourself to draw the noise out of him again and again before you let him go. You feel him tense, like he's bracing himself, but you don't give him much time to be nervous about it before finding the sensitive skin under his arm, fluttering and scratching wildly. The reaction is immediate. Frenzies squeals and desperate laughter and several apologies. "Sorry? Why are you sorry? I'm having a great time! Aren't you?" His head is thrown back against the mattress, and he's twisting from side to side as much as he can in this position. He manages to get his other hand free but it does absolutely nothing to help him. Something something being tickled stupid turns him into an uncoordinated, blubbering mess apparently. He tries to respond coherently, but he can't seem to articulate exactly what he wants to say. Nor does he really know what he wants to say. He just keeps babbling out "please", especially when you wiggle your fingers in the very center of the stretched hollow, but he doesn't follow it up with "stop" or "quit". Part of you feels at least some semblance of empathy. You've been in his very predicament, torn between craving it and finding it absolutely unbearable. And then you remember that he's the very reason you've experienced such a torment. You just shake your head with a chuckle as you finally move from that spot, squeezing all the way down his ribs and sides just to dig your thumb into his hipbone. You start to linger there, but you're taken aback to find that that spot is the worst so far. His laughter falls silent for just a moment and his face gets impossibly redder as he arches his back, desperately trying to twist his hips left and right to get away from it. What had been somewhat intelligible pleas become absolutely senseless, and you finally pull away. You keep him pinned as he settles, but your hand quickly finds his face and hair, fixing his glasses before carding your fingers through soft blond locks, "Okay, shhh, it's fine. You're fine.", you soothe, though, you aren't sure how much of it he actually comprehends over the sound of his own residual giggles. "Breathe, bud. Real deep breaths", you take a deep breath in yourself, holding it for just a moment before letting it out, nodding and encouraging him to do the same. It takes a moment, but he does, goofy grin still on his face and all. He's still on edge, tensed up and flinching at every little move you make. You try not to laugh but you can't help it. It's cute. He's a mess. His hair is sticking up in every direction, and he's still twitching, but it doesn't take too long for him to calm down. You watch him, still combing through his hair as he lets his head fall back.

Eventually, the steady spill of giggles dies down and you shift positions, laying beside him and pulling him against you. He clings to you immediately, burying his face in your chest and wrapping his arms around you, one of his legs thrown over yours.

You rub up and down his back soothingly as his breath evens out.

“Sooo”, you start, your voice low, but he can hear the grin on your face, “you ready to figure out what other spots make you sound like that?”

Just the mention of it is enough to draw that pretty whimper out of him again.

——————

This one feels a little weak to me but I tried not to wreck him too hard for this particular concept.

Somehow, he’s managed to pin you flat on your spine, and his back is turned as he sits beside you, partially leaned across your chest. All you can do is push at his back and shoulders while he kneads all around your belly and sides, occasionally trailing down just a bit to slot his thumbs into the dips of your hips and squeeze.

He had made a big show of ever so slowly pulling your shirt up just below your ribs, and then reaching down to pull the waistband of your pajama bottoms down just far enough to expose your hips and lower belly before he got started- which seems like forever ago to you right now.

Not that you’ve really been able to keep track of the time, but you’ve taken several minutes of this already, with a couple of small “breaks” that consisted of him lightly trailing his fingertips over your flushed skin.

What had been threats and swears have since turned into nearly incoherent pleading and pitiful giggles. He’s talking. You know he is, he has been this entire time— teasing you when you let out a particularly cute noise, or commenting on how adorable it is that you’re kicking and squirming like it’s actually going to help somehow— but you can’t hear him over yourself. What little you can hear doesn’t register.

The only thing you’re absolutely sure of right now is that he doesn’t plan on stopping anytime soon.

It wouldn’t be the first time he’s done this to you— just held you down and played with you until he decides he’s done. He has, on several occasions, told you that he’s pretty sure they just sent you up here as his stress toy- only jokingly of course, though it being a joke doesn’t stop it from flustering you beyond belief.

This time around though, he doesn’t account for visitors, and when he brings his hands to the center of your belly, one clawing at the plush spot below your navel while the other spiders above it, the shrill squeal it draws out evidently catches the attention of a concerned bystander.

You don’t hear the rumbling noise of Rocky’s ball rolling towards the two of you, and you don’t register his voice when he starts squawking at Ryland about your predicament. Everything is fuzzy, and you shudder as you try to blink through the brain fog.

It takes you several seconds to realize that you can breathe, and you seemingly have a moment of reprieve as Ryland tries to calm Rocky down.

When you do manage to get your bearings, you see Rocky shifting from leg to leg and waving his arms wildly at Ryland before he notices that you’re alert, and he very quickly rolls his way beside your head.

“Friend okay, question?”, he asks, his voice high pitched as he taps on his ball, “Breathing okay, question?”. He rattles off several other questions but all you can manage out is a weak “uh huh” and a thumbs up as your chest heaves.

“See, Rock?”, Ryland starts, “They’re perfectly fine. I told you they’re not dying.”

You would have objected to that if you weren’t still in such a compromising position.

“Everything’s okay. It’s just tickling.”

You huff, bringing your hands up to cover your red face as Rocky lets out an inquisitive chirp and rolls back over to Grace.

“Tickling, question?”, he murmurs. You groan, "Rocky please-"

Ryland sighs, waving you and nodding at the alien. He should have known Rocky wouldn’t really know what it is. Even if they have something similar on Erid, it almost definitely would look much different for them.

“Yes, tickling. Think of it like… like- uh, playing, I guess. Most humans are ticklish, which means parts of their body are sensitive to touch— particularly areas that cover vital organs, or spots that aren’t typically exposed to touch.”

“Hmmm…”, Rocky hums, “Why?”

There’s a pause, save for the muffled sound of you grumbling at Ryland to "please stop talking".

“Well, um, I guess it’s like a defense mechanism. To protect those spots. When you touch them in certain ways- like squeezing or poking, that’s what we call tickling, and it makes humans laugh”, he glances back at you, the corner of his lip tilting upwards ever so slightly before he looks back at Rocky, “Or in some cases, squeal. Or beg.”

You turn your head, refusing to look at Ryland out of pettiness and also the sake of your own dignity. Actually, it’s primarily for the sake of your own dignity.! Rocky seems to understand, as well as he can at least, and the brief silence that hangs in the air makes your stomach twist before the both of them speak at the same time. "Show Rocky." "Would you like a demonstration?" You knew it was coming, and still your breath hitches as you twist in Ryland's grip, but you're just as stuck as you were before. The noise you let out can only be described as a whimper, but it's immediately interrupted by a loud squeal when you feel his fingertips trail gently up and down the sides of your belly. "Nononono, Ryland, please-!", you babble out, trying to pull your knees to your chest in a desperate attempt to protect yourself, but you're ignored as Grace pushes them right back down and starts to explain your reaction to Rocky. "Usually, they wouldn't react like that right away, but the longer you tickle someone, the more sensitive those spots get. You can't see this, but this skin right here is already really red." Rocky bounces up and down a bit, paying close attention to Grace's hands, "Red. Why red, question?" You tremble when his hands trail further up, closer to your ribs, just to trail all the way down to your hips. You're in a constant fit of giggles. You know it’s only going to get worse, and the anticipation is driving you mad, but you can tolerate this much better than what he was putting you through just a few minutes ago. "Two reasons, actually. Humans turn red when they're flustered but the tickling itself stimulates blood flow, especially if I were to be just a little bit meaner," your eyes widen, and you shake your head, "like this". You try to arch your back when light tracing turns to quick clawing, but he has a firm hold on you. "You hear that?", he asks when bubbly giggles turn to desperate laughter. "That's because there are different ways to tickle people. Different spots and methods get different reactions." He brings his hands down, squeezing rapidly at your hipbones before he squeezes all the way up your sides to your ribs, and then back down again. You kick uselessly, shaking your head and pleading through cackles, which only encourages him. Rocky can't help but feel just a little bad for you as he rolls over to watch you a little more closely, "Why telling Grace to stop if it's just play, question?" "Because I don't like it!", you whine. You can see Ryland's shoulders shake a bit as he laughs at that. Rocky perks up, slightly concerned as he rolls back over to look at your captor, who speaks before Rocky has a chance to voice his worries. "They're a liar." The way he says it so matter-of-factly would be insulting if it wasn't true. "Most people don't like being tickled. It doesn't really feel... good", he circles his nails around your navel while the other claws at your lower belly. "Think about if you had a really bad itch, and you can't scratch it, and the longer you go without scratching it, the more intense it gets. And maybe it starts in one spot, but it can spread all over your body, and you can't do anything to stop it. That's what tickling feels like." Rocky shifts left to right at the description of it, and it only makes him feel a little worse for you in that moment. "Your friend over here, though...", Ryland starts, and you're so glad you can't see his face because you can hear the shit-eating grin in his voice. "Well, they love it. They will absolutely never, ever admit that for two reasons. One, they're all embarrassed about it because they think it's weird, blah blah blah", he rolls his eyes. "Two, I would literally never let them live that down, like ever." "Hmm," Rocky hums before letting out a soft trill, "Why ask Grace to stop if they like it, question?" You so desperately want to tell Rocky to please stop asking questions, but you're certain that's much too long of a sentence to get out coherently, and you’re far past the point of intelligible speech.

Grace is thrilled. He gets to do his two very favorite things: bestow knowledge upon an eager to learn mind, and tickle you out of yours.

“Well, it’s an instinct, and human instincts can be weird. Tickling is a really overwhelming sensation, even for someone who likes it. So, they’ll try to make it stop— or, beg for it to stop if they’re otherwise incapacitated.”

As if on queue, you let out a weak, pitiful “please” when he vibrates five fingers in the very center of your belly.

“See, I’m being very, very nice. No matter how much they beg, or squirm, or ask me so very nicely to stop, I know they don’t really wanna get away. Isn’t that right?”.

You can tell from the tone switch the last bit was meant for you— probably the first bit too— but you’re confident that he’s very aware you were not listening. You take a deep, greedy breath when tickling fingertips turn to a firm palm, rubbing soothingly against your skin.

At first, you don’t respond, but, you nod at him when he shifts to face you, still leaned over you with his head propped on your sternum. You have no idea what he was asking you. You don’t really care either. All you can focus on is catching your breath and behaving as well as you possibly can, even as you eye Ryland wearily.

Not that your “behavior” has ever swayed him to be nice.

Rocky rolls around to the two of you, idling at your head. You glance up at him for just a moment, a small smile still on playing at your lips as your breath finally evens out. You hadn’t noticed you were still giggling, and fortunately, neither of them comment on it.

“You got any other questions, bud?”, Grace asks Rocky, but his eyes are on you, and his tone is notably softer.

You’re so relieved it’s over. You can finally let your guard down, relax, and just let Grace take care of you.

And then, Rocky lets out a small chirp, just as you close your eyes and let your head lull to the side.

“Grace said other spots are ticklish too, question?”

Your eyes widen instantly, only for you to be met with the devious grin growing on Ryland’s face.

You should have known Rocky would have more questions, and Ryland definitely wouldn’t pass up the opportunity to torment you in the name of education.

You whimper, giving him an absolutely pitiful little look, but before you can protest, he’s already positioned above your head, pulling your arms up and pinning them under his legs.

“Rocky, bud, I know I’ve already said this but I think you and I are going to get along perfectly.”

————

Until he gets that certain itch.

The one that buzzes ever so slightly at the base of his skull.

You've been around long enough that you should be able to spot it, but somehow you never do. That buzz crawls down his shoulders, through his arms, and his fingers twitch unnoticeably at his sides.

When it trails down his spine, he gets ever so slightly calmer, seeming to stare off into space at random, lost in thought as his foot taps or his knee bounces.

He sits with it, but it only gets more incessant as hours pass, and before he knows it, it's starving. It buzzes from the base of his skull to the top and worms its way into his brain, and if his gaze lingers a little too long when your shirt rides up mid-stretch, you don't notice.

By that point, it's too late anyway. He has to feed it, and once you realize how close he is to you— the way he's looming over you, eyeing you like some sort of prey animal— well, he's really already caught you.

You can try to run. He might even let you, depending on the mood he's in, but he will catch you, and he is much stronger than he looks. It doesn't matter how much you squirm or writhe or fight. If he doesn't want you to go anywhere, you won't. Sometimes he'll let you "escape", get your bearings, maybe even start to crawl away, but it doesn't last long before a hand wraps around your ankle, or maybe a strong arm around your waist, and you're right back where he wants you.

He'll mutter out something along the lines of "Did I say you could go somewhere?", and you don't know what to do with yourself when he finds that spot that just drives you up that wall, especially when he rubs his stubble against it, all the while biting at you like he's trying to eat you whole.

Begging does nothing for you, and everything for him. It goes directly to his head. It doesn't garner sympathy, it feeds his ego. It's just encouragement to him. What sympathy you do get is all fake, and you don't miss the patronizing tone in his voice when he says "Oh I know, baby, it just tickles so bad, huh? You poor thing."

Before its over with, you're a babbling mess, and the only thing you can manage out coherently is something he already knows about himself, and seemingly takes great pride in.

Dr. Ryland Grace is mean.