My first submission for this year's TickeTober! Hope you all enjoy!
“Ah, what a peculiar, perfect, pumpkin!” Jack Skellington exclaimed, holding the gourd in his boney hands with fascination and care. This would be the first Halloween the Valley would experience since Jack Skellington’s return, and you both were determined to make it the best it could possibly be. Which meant that planting, cultivating, and care-taking of pumpkins would be one of your priorities in the foreseeable future.
Fortunately for you, the Pumpkin King made himself available, and rather enthusiastically, to help whenever you needed.
The pumpkin in question did in fact look like a cookie-cutter image of a classic pumpkin; one you might see in a film or picture book, with no bruises or soft spots. Its vine even had a small curl and a leaf on it.
“It is a good-looking pumpkin, Jack!” you encouraged, carefully plucking another pumpkin from the row of vines and adding it to a cart. Most of them had turned out what most would call suitable for carving, which did not surprise you. With Jack’s help and dreamlight magic at your disposal, perfect Halloween pumpkins were all but assured, and with little wait time. However, it didn’t matter how many you harvested: Jack glowed in awe the entire time, and gave each individual pumpkin its own praise.
“It’s not merely good-looking, my dear friend. It’s perfect. I’ll carve this one and make it a truly terrifying masterpiece.” You were listening idly as you were working, but a case of deja vu crept up. You looked and watched as Jack rose from the ground to move the pumpkin over to his own pile. It seemed as though the pile he was keeping for himself was outgrowing the number of pumpkins moved to the cart.
“Jack,” you started, also standing with your hands on your hips, “you have to let the other residents carve these too, you know. We can always grow more.” Jack’s eye sockets wandered to his pile, then to the cart. And with the time closing in on the most important day of the year, he conceded.
“Oh, I suppose you’re right. It wouldn’t be in good spirit to have all the fun. But how will I ever choose which ones to give up?” you snickered, not realizing this would be such a dilemma. Jack noticed you were amused by his situation and narrowed his hollow gaze.
“This is no laughing matter, it's an important decision! We said this would be the best Halloween the Valley has had yet!”
“I’m sorry, Jack, I’m not laughing because of that,” your grin grew a bit, “you’re just the absolute icon of Halloween and all things terrifying, but you care so much about the Valley and its residents having a good time. I think it’s endearing.”
“Endearing?”
“Adorable, even.”
“Adorable?!”
Jack considered himself to be many things. The Pumpkin King, most obviously. The Czar of Halloween. Experimenter extraordinaire. He even briefly held the title of “Sandy Claws”... albeit that one was a little chaotic. But, endearing? Or adorable?? Absurd.
“What’s wrong with that?” you asked, looking at your friend as he contemplated your words.
“That can’t be! I’m the very antithesis of adorable! I am the bump in the night, the chill down your spine, the whisper in the wind!” You smiled, hiding yet another chuckle.
“And I don’t scare you?”
“I mean, you can. But most of the time? Not really, no. You’re my friend, and it’s hard to be afraid of you when you have such a good heart, Jack. I hope that makes sense.” Jack processed this briefly. He did suppose he would rather not scare you all the time if it meant his frightening features were all still light-hearted. That was a value of his, and one that even Halloween Town lived by: scaring for thrill and fun, never to be malicious.
“It does, my friend, I’m glad you feel that way,” he started. His features changed ever-so-slightly from touched to intimidating. “However…”
Suddenly, as if proving his point, you did feel a chill run down your spine as he stood to his full height and loomed over you. His arms were outstretched, and he shaped his boney fingers into claws, fingers twitching as if waiting for their owner’s command.
“Maybe I should remind you how scary I can actually be!”
He stepped forward, and you instinctively took a step back, and as luck would have it, you tripped on a pumpkin vine, falling on your backside. Your already towering skeletal friend seemed impossibly tall from your viewpoint, and he was closing in. You attempted to scramble away.
“Not… so… fast!” Jack bellowed, latching onto your ankle and dragging you closer. You shrieked, realizing you weren’t escaping.
“J-Jack, wait, what are you- JAHAHACK!” Without warning, his lanky skeletal fingers danced up and down your sides, not too unlike how a spider would crawl. You toppled over onto your back and continued to cackle wildly. You weren’t sure what his plan was, but if you had the capacity for hindsight at this moment it should have been clear. Jack would never hurt a fly, let alone his friends, and seemingly everyone in this Valley knew you were ticklish and even enjoyed it by the way you and certain other villagers played.
“Do I scare you noooow?” Jack drew out the question, focusing more now on playful skittering over your belly. Your cackles continued in a bubbly stream as you futilely tried to push his hands away.
“Nohohohot hahahardly!” you spat defiantly. He seemed amused, and laughed rather evilly as he dexterously avoided your attempt at stopping him.
“Eeehehehe! That’s fine, I’m only just beginning! But if you don’t think I’m scary now…” he swiftly took both your wrists in one hand and pulled them up over your head. His tone darkened but his wicked grin remained.
“... you will.” Instinct forced you to try to pull your arms down, but logically, you knew you were trapped with some of your most vulnerable places at his mercy.
“Silly human, thinking you could escape my clutches!” he teased, wiggling his boney fingers just above your ribs, very purposefully in plain view. You shuddered in anticipation, the phantom feeling of what was to come causing your breath to hitch.
“Jahahack, wahait!”
“Yeeeesss?” he asked, his grin widening as you struggled for composure.
“W-we can talk about this, right? You are the scariest person in the Valley, there’s no question!” You bardered.
“Hmmm… That is true,” Jack replied, using the same hand previously threatening to descend on your ribs to stroke his chin. You sighed, relishing in the reprieve of his teasing. Too early.
“That’s not the question, though! The question is if you think I’m scary.”
“I do!” You blurted, a little too eagerly. The Pumpkin King chuckled.
“You wouldn’t happen to be lying to get yourself out of this, would you, friend?” Ah, those wiggling, lanky fingers came twitching back, hovering over your underarm. You lost any sense of coherence you had gained in your short break.
“I-well, uhm, no, I do think you’re scary right now!”
“I’m sure you do. Let’s make sure you don’t forget anytime soon!” You babbled in protest, but it fell on deaf ears as those menacing fingers finally found the hollow of your underarm. They teetered and teased all around the tender area, eliciting at first an explosive shriek, then unhindered giggles.
“Jahahahack! Dohohon’t doho thahahat!” You squealed, trying again to free yourself from the skeletal monster’s grasp. He cackled evilly again at your futile attempts.
“Try all you might, little human, you can’t escape the Pumpkin King’s wrath!” He raked the tips of his fingers from your elbow to the bottom of your underarm, almost where your ribs started, and back up, repeating this process over and over again. It was such a light gesture, yet you had no control over the relentless giggling that continued to pour from you as your legs kicked out in vain. Jack melted a bit at the sight and sound of your unhindered self, knowing what he was witnessing was genuine, even if it took some persuasion on his part to draw this out.
“And you had the nerve to call me adorable. You could easily be one of my cutest victims, my dear friend,” Jack commented, deepening your already brilliant blush.
“Knohohhock it oohohohff, Jack! JAHAHACK!” Your bubbling cackles adopted a certain panic as Jack’s spider-like fingers crawled onto your ribs. Jack seemed pleased by the reaction, recognizing he’d stumbled upon an especially sensitive area.
“My, my, what have we here?” he asked, his more sinister expression and tone returning. “Such a different sound, yet I only ventured slightly downward. How curious. It would be a shame if a monster, one that could be regarded as truly frightening, would come across this. Wouldn’t that be dreadful?”
“Cohohohomplehehetly drehehadful!” It was getting harder for you to form words as Jack incessantly poked at your ribs. He was playing with you, keeping you guessing.
“Good thing you aren’t afraid of such a monster,” he grinned, releasing your wrists only for the sake of having both his hands free to pinch each rib bone and flutter over the spaces in between them. You threw your head back against the grass beneath you in a belly laugh, kicking your legs out and holding onto Jack’s wrists for dear life.
“JAHAHAHACK!” you shrieked in ticklish agony.
“Eeehehehe, goodness! That squeal doesn’t sound like a fearless ruler to meee~”
“IHAHAHA’M NOHOHOT!” You and Jack both felt your resolve breaking. You still weren’t afraid of Jack, but you were afraid of how long he would be willing to keep this up.
“You know, there are some legends of monsters that eat people. Now usually that just wouldn’t do, then I would have no one to scare!” Jack pondered, continuing to spider his fingers on and in between ribs, with random pinches to your sides.
“JAHAHAHACK, I CAHAHAN’T!”
“Well no, you aren’t a monster. And I certainly wouldn’t be eating you, the Valley and I would miss you greatly! Hmmm…though I do wonder…maybe just a nibble…” He hummed, putting on a show of contemplation. But he wasn’t so lost in thought as to relent, his spidering fingers finding your hip bones now. You yelped at the sudden change and tried to curl in on yourself.
“DOHOHON’T THINK ABHOHOHOUT IT!”
“Well, how can I not, now that you’ve practically made yourself bite-sized?” Jack asked. The question started as a coo of admiration toward your reactions, but ended impishly, telling of his intentions. Jack continued to squeeze and scurry on and around your hips as he slowly and ominously bent forward, baring his teeth. You immediately shrugged your shoulders in defense; your giggling, scrunched up face was almost enough to break the Pumpkin King’s facade.
Almost, but not quite.
Jack managed to worm his way into the space you were trying so hard to protect, peppering your neck with playful bites and nibbles, not sparing you of the dramatic noises included when a monster devours its prey.
“JA-EEHEHEHCK!”
“Om nom nom! Eehehehe, your giggles are quite delicious, my friend.” He continued tracing haphazard lines onto your hip bones while nibbling up and down your neck, occasionally nuzzling around your ear. Both sensations at once were driving you mad, a boisterous belly laugh still erupting from you. It might be getting a little hoarse right now.
“Om nom nom! I see why tickle monsters enjoy this so much. Maybe that makes me one, too! But that wouldn’t be scary at all…”
“YEHEHES IT IHEHEEHES! YESITIS! BWAHAHAHA!” shortly after your plea your laugher fell silent. Jack chuckled to himself before finally showing mercy on his poor pumpkin harvesting companion.
“My, my! I think that’s enough for the time being. We do have a task at hand, don’t we, friend?” you didn’t respond immediately, allowing yourself to catch your breath and wipe away mirthful tears. Jack tittered as he stood, offering a hand to help you stand as well. You looked at him skeptically.
“No more tricks for now, my friend, I promise! But only for now. I do think you’ll need to be reminded from time to time as to why I am the most feared monster in Halloween Town.”
omg i finished reading your disney dreamlight valley series and my heart is bursting with cuteness <3 i especially loved the one with scar since he’s one of my favorite disney characters.
do you have any random tickle headcanons or thoughts for him at all? i’d love to see some content for that grumpy lion
I'm glad you enjoyed, especially since I've been so slow with updates 😬 I'm getting ready to play again, haven't really touched it since the update where we got Jack, and I know there have been a few characters added since, so I'm excited!
Anyway, back to our resident grumpy cat.
Scar is my favorite villain in the game so far, so I had to make something for him ☺️
I think no matter what he would have turned out a villain/without the best moral compass, but he may not have always been that way if he wasn't always booted from the spotlight by his brother. Hence why I think some of his attitude and the need to be threatening is at least somewhat a barrier he puts up. So, after getting past that, if you can get him to trust you, you'll see a softer part of him (not too unlike the fic with him).
Lee!Scar:
I can't really see it, tbh. But:
He's very prideful and private, even if he was ticklish, he's going to die before openly admitting it.
I imagine scratches behind the ears or under the chin might work (if you can keep your fingers), but might also be something softer, more comforting than causing full-blown belly laughter
If you do attempt to tickle him, he'll probably jerk away, looking at you with a growl: "What on earth do you think you're doing?"
BUT if you play your cards right and your on his good side, he maayyy let a little giggle slip before glaring in your direction: "Oh, it looks like you're feeling rather brave today. This is your only warning to stop that."
Ler!Scar
He's not one to give out punishments himself. Like if it were up to him, he'd have his hyenas do it or something, any way not to exert his own effort or get his paws dirty. So if he's taking matters into his own paws, he means business.
He comes off as lazy, but truly is not the case. He's still a fully grown lion capable of hunting.
In true feline fashion, he'll play with his prey before going in for the kill. And honestly it's one of his favorite parts, especially if you happen to be in his cave. That's his territory and he knows all the possible escape routes. You aren't going anywhere.
"And just where do you think you're running off to? After being such a thorn in my side?"
Master teaser. Shakes his head and tuts at you "Aww, you really thought you were getting away with that, didn't you?" Cue evil grin: "How foolish."
Anywhere with skin showing, like with a tank top or shorts, is fair game for drawing lazy lines and scribbles with a claw or two. Slowly and without any rhyme or reason.
If he's in a particularly vengeful mood, you know how cats "make biscuits"? It's that, but quickly, up sides, across ribs, haphazardly. No predictions, no getting used to one spot for too long.
No mercy til he genuinely thinks you've had enough. "Oh, looks like we aren't as strong as we thought we were, hm? Better think again before challenging me."
Let me know if you have anything to add! I really need to get back on the game 😅
