#ler!janus

~~~

The MindScape nuisance was on a pranking spree as usual. Every now and then, one of the others would be caught in a trap that would put them in awkward positions that left a certain area of theirs vulnerable to sensitive attacks and some that would involve moving a couple of items every few seconds to see if the person would notice. The pranks were mostly harmless for Remus pranking standards but they were still getting slowly out of hand and since repression wasn't an option, they had to confront him sooner or later. Two weeks of this ordeal and the others were finally sick of it.

Maybe it was molasses and feathers that made Janus banshee scream, or putting the sleeves of Logan’s books on his own self-binded smut stories. Or... maybe... the time he put some of Patton's collectible Squishmellows in a small guillotine. Or dyed all of Virgil's clothes red and Princey's clothes black. Or replacing Roman's Disney collection with CDs of the original Grimm's version of the fairytales.

The Sides set up a different kind of trap for the intrusive figment. They got Janus to summon Remus, who was immediately ecstatic at the idea of having more fun. But what Remus didn't realize was that it was a trap for himself. Soon Remus’ ankles were locked into stocks, wrists bonded to the floor of the living room. He stammered, asking what this was all about.

"Oh, Remus~ You know all too well why this is happening~" "No, I don’t, Janny! Was it the last prank?! In all fairness, I think Roman is just a poor sport. I could have actually dyed your hair white." "That baby powder made my foundation cakey." "Consider it an improvement, bro."

The others gathered around the stocks, with one of them snapping off Remus’ boots. Remus chuckled nervously as Roman wrote the punishment on the board that read:

Tickle Jail!

Name: Remus

Crime: He’s a little shit. Show no mercy 💚

Said aspect held back the toes on Remus’ right foot, allowing the Janus to skitter under them. Remus immediately began cackling, his body shaking and thrashing. With all of them putting their own personal spin on the torment, Remus was barely able to make a comeback or rebuttal to any of this.

Between Patton’s soft teases of "You’re in for oodles of fun, little Octo!" and "Aww~ You’re snorting! Can you count how many times you’ve done it?", up to Logan “counting” his toes, code for counting then writing it down only to then not “properly” write whatever number due to Remus’ thrashing and having to clean it to write it again, all the way down to Roman singing Nursery Rhymes.

"Guhuhuhuhuys! Wait! Sorehehehehery!" "You have been up to your pranks for weeks now. No apologies here."

Janus sighed for what felt like the hundredth time in as many minutes. He’d been a having a moral conundrum, and he’d only recently figured out how to go about solving it. Or, well, hopefully solving it. Maybe the solution he’d come up with would make everything worse instead. That’s always a possibility.

As if he could read Janus’ mind, Janus’ phone buzzed with another text from Patton. He stole a quick glance at the kitchen doorway before tapping the screen.

Patton: Have U told him yet???

Janus: u know he doesn’t wake up before noon

Patton: LOL!

Patton: Well, Jan The Man, whatever happens, I got UR back!

Patton: high_five.gif

Patton: fist_bump.gif

Patton: puppy_saying_yeah.gif

Janus: ,,,,, thank u patton

Janus sighed yet again-- but this time his sigh was followed by a matching yawn from behind him.

He slammed his phone down on the table and whirled around. “Good morning!” Fuck, he was never that positive. He had to dial it back. “You look like shit.” Well. That’s one way of doing it.

Luckily, Virgil either didn’t notice or didn’t care to comment on Janus’ jumpy behavior-- he yawned again and made a beeline for the coffee pot, where Janus had graciously prepared another pot just in time for Virgil’s late rise.

“You’re thinking too loud,” he muttered as he poured his coffee. “Talk or shut your brain up.”

Janus snorted. Well, if Virgil didn’t care about being indelicate, then Janus sure wouldn’t.

“I found your blog.”

Virgil sighed, not looking up as his scooped a copious amount of sugar into the mug. “Yes, I remember, I got drunk enough to show my 2013 era Tumblr to Roman, and he got drunk enough to send it to the group chat. Cool reminder.”

“Not that one-- although your Superwholock fic was surprisingly well written,” Janus said. “I found... another blog. Of yours.”

“My anime blog?” Virgil asked. “Don’t you already follow that one?”

“Another blog,” Janus hissed. “A blog you haven’t told us about.”

With his mug only an inch away from his mouth, Virgil froze.

It was enough to tell Janus everything he needed to know.

“I don’t have any other blogs,” Virgil said, quickly bringing the mug up to his face and taking a sip.

“Virgil. Please don’t insult me by lying so boldly in my face.”

“Who’s lying?” he replied. “Not me. I’m standing up, not lying... down, that is-- oh, dad joke, ha! Speaking of which I think I’m supposed to be meeting Patton for, uh, brunch, right now--”

He darted out of the room, nearly sloshing his coffee in his haste. Janus heard his bedroom door slam shut, and he sighed.

Well, he wasn’t going to sit around and let Virgil stew in his own nerves. He got up from the table and moved to the hallway, coming to a stop right in front of Virgil’s bedroom door. He heard no movement coming from inside, so he figured Virgil was probably frozen in panic as he thought about what Janus had said.

“I’m not going to make fun of you,” Janus said bluntly through the door. “Or tell anyone. Patton knows I had something important to tell you, but I made absolutely no references to having found a secret of yours at all. It’s just me.”

He knew that still probably wasn’t overly comforting-- Janus was, admittedly, crafty and manipulative, and he often used information as leverage to get what he wanted. But given how genuinely upset Virgil seemed to be at the mere idea that his secret blog had been found out, Janus wanted to prove that he really wasn’t going to tell anyone. And unfortunately, he knew exactly what he had to do to prove it.

“A secret for a secret, an eye for an eye,” he continued, steeling his nerves. “Because, honestly, you... aren’t the only person in this household with... that specific kind of... interest.”

Again, he heard no noise, but Janus could picture the way Virgil’s face probably shifted from blind panic to slight confusion. Janus sighed.

“How do you think I found your tickle blog in the first place?” he asked drily.

Janus ignored the urge to cringe as he said the word aloud-- this conversation was not about his embarrassing secret interests, thank you, it was about Virgil’s. He didn’t have the chance to ponder on that further, because suddenly the door clicked open in front of him, as if Virgil had opened it and hurried away.

He stepped in, and there was Virgil on his bed, lying on his stomach with his face buried in his pillow.

“You can block me if you want,” Janus said, moving to perch on the edge of the mattress. “Just let me type in my URL so you don’t see it.”

“How much did you see?” Virgil asked instead, voice muffled and defeated.

“About ten posts,” Janus said. “And no, you didn’t accidentally doxx yourself in any way. I’m just extremely clever.”

Virgil didn’t respond. At least he didn’t seem to be actively panicking, just humiliated. Janus himself was starting to feel a bit warm; he’d seen some... rather interesting posts before he’d realized whose blog he was looking at. Apparently he and Virgil had more in common than he’d realized.

“Virgil, I’m not going to bullshit you,” he said quickly, before his nerve was lost. “This sucks, and if it’d happened to me I’d break your computer in half, so I can imagine how you are feeling right now. But the fact of the matter is that we are both switches and we are home alone, and if you consent I would very much like to tickle you right now.”

Finally Virgil whipped around, eyes catching Janus’ with a wild look.

“What?” he squawked, voice cracking.

“Or you tickle me,” Janus said. “I’m really not picky.”

“This-- this is-- Janus.”

“Virgil,” Janus said firmly. “Take your pick, lee or ler?”

“I’m gonna have a fucking heart attack,” Virgil hissed. Janus could practically feel the heat radiating off his cheeks.

“I’m trying to avoid an outcome like that,” Janus said through gritted teeth. “By being disgustingly open about what I want, in the hopes that we can bypass the anxiety and awkwardness and humiiation by treating this all as if it’s perfectly normal.”

Silence hung over the room for a moment as Virgil took in the words. He looked down at his hands, fiddling with the blanket.

“I don’t know...”

Janus leaned in to catch Virgil’s mumble. Okay, that’s not a complete no. He could work with that.

“What don’t you know?” he asked with as much patience as he could muster.

Virgil continued to fiddle for a few seconds before he spoke. “Like, right now...?”

“No time like the present,” Janus replied. “Of course, we can wait if you’re not comfortable right now. Then again, I wonder how it would feel to wait in this room knowing that I’m right across the hall, ready to tickle you.”

He smirked when Virgil’s eyes snapped up towards him, a blazing blush crowning his face. “Janus!”

“What? You know I’m right. I could leave this room right now, but all your little fantasies in your head about what I could do to you would feel so delightfully real-- it’d be like I was still here.”

Nothing came out of Virgil’s mouth but a strain of choked noises. Belatedly, he covered his face with his hands. “Come on--”

“I mean, I really didn’t look very far through your blog before. I still have so many questions about this little sensitivity of yours.”

Now Virgil shoved his face back into his pillow, probably with the goal of hiding the soft whines that were now coming out of his mouth. It didn’t work.

“But, of course,” Janus continued, “I can’t touch you until you agree. You won’t get one little tickle from me until I hear you say so out loud.”

Virgil went silent for so long Janus considered checking that he hadn’t suffocated, but finally a muffled mutter came from his pillow that sounded suspiciously like the word please.

“Hm?” Janus said, because despite everything he wasn’t going to be too nice to Virgil. “I couldn’t quite catch that. You’ll have to speak up.”

More muttering, this time sounding closer to cursing, came from the pillow. Janus enjoyed drawing things out as much as the next ler, but he was getting pretty antsy. How to draw Virgil out?

Suddenly his mind flashed with a post he’d remembered seeing; a post that had also been reblogged by Virgil, with a few choice tags that made him think this could be a good idea.

“Virgil,” he asked softly. “How about you show me where you want to be tickled?”

And there it was; there was Virgil’s desperate squealing whine, his back arching just slightly, legs suddenly fidgeting behind him, and the tips of his ears burning red through his dark hair. Janus hit the nail on the head.

It only took a few more seconds for Virgil to roll over; his hands twitched, and he refused to look Janus in the face, but finally he managed to pull his t-shirt up over his stomach before shoving his face into his hands again.

Janus smirked. “I thought so.” He let one hand, gentle and wiggly, hover right above Virgil’s tummy. “When you want me to switch, I’ll just need you to pick another lovely little spot for me to tickle instead. One that’s just as ticklish, just so I know I’m getting a fair deal. You can do that, right?”

Virgil’s whine only last half a second this time, before it was replaced with a startled burst of frantic giggles as Janus began scratching all ten fingers around his sensitive tummy and sides. He curled up, and wiggled back and forth, and kicked his legs like there was no tomorrow, but his hands stayed over his eyes, his shirt stayed halfway up his torso, and he stayed right on the mattress under Janus’ lovely fingers.