Author's Note: Heyyyy. Do you guys remember that other prompt I had you all vote on with the logicality first century Roman AU? It was the prinxiety mer AU? Well. This is the outcome of me wanting to write that prompt and this is 11 pages of straight up tickle fic. It's mostly prinxiety, but technically it's analogince, but you can take it as just prinxiety if you want. Either or, neither nor, ya know. Anyway. I had this in bullet points, but I finally put it into a full length fic and this is long. Also spawn means child or youngster because ya know...fishes spawn. It's just mer speak. This fic is gonna take you about a good 20 minutes to read, but I think I did it justice. So I hope you enjoy! Love you all!

Not So Different

AU: Mer! AU

Ships: (Prinxiety/Analogince)

Words ~ 3,850 ~

Warnings: Mention of injury, threat of injury, food mention, (Please let me know if there's anything else.) 

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Off the coast of northern Florida, lived a pod of mer around 30 members strong. Unlike other groups of mer, this pod did not have multiples of only one species, but was an eclectic bunch of all different types. Even from an outsider's point of view, one could tell it was a band of misfits all living together because it was evident they were each thrown out of their own pod for the same reason. They were all too curious of humans.

In this mer world, it was forbidden to talk to humans because of their widely known greedy and deceptive nature. Even so, some mer find humans fascinating and can't help themselves but be ever so slightly curious. And that is the reason these thirty some mer exist together: to try to understand humans in a more accepting environment.

Now none of these mer would ever try to encounter a human directly. They are still wary of all the tales and stories they have been handed down from their elders, but no one in this pod sees the harm in learning or trying to understand them. It's a known fact that they are all more technologically advanced than any mer clan, and that they have connections all across the surface world. So, the main goal of the pod is to learn without interacting. For now, at least until humans are deemed worthy of a mer's trust.

One of the ways they examine them is with scouting parties stationed along the water's edge where humans spend their days playing in the overlap of receding tides. This particular scouting party consisted of a dolphin and shark mer named Roman and Virgil respectively. They were along the coast, observing a particular past time that humans seemed to partake in when the waves were high. They would take these 'boards' with a fin on the bottom, swim out into the deeper waters, and wait for a decently large wave to head their way. Then right at the last moment, they get up on the board with almost perfect balance and ride the wave back to shore.

Roman and Virgil were currently watching these humans do crazy tricks on the waves in awe. They heard the word 'surfing' multiple times from these humans and Roman had told Virgil that's what Logan calls the particular past time too.

"Why do they keep doing it though? They aren't going anywhere and...is it just a matter of showing off?" Virgil watched one pro surfer shouting to his friends on the water's edge do a couple switch backs to keep them entertained.

"Maybe but who cares?! I bet they hold competitions! Who can surf the best? Who can do the most tricks? And who can ride the waves the longest?" Roman watched them excitedly, his sharp eyesight switching between the different surfers along the beach.

Virgil chuckled. "If I didn't know any better, I would say you wanted to try it."

Roman looked a little sad. "I do..." The shark mer rolled his eyes and nudged the dolphin mer back towards their patrol route.

"Well, keep dreaming. We don't have those...things...that the human's use to stand on."

Roman followed Virgil and they slowly left their observing spot. "What did Logan call them again?"

"Uhm...leegs...yeah leegs." As Virgil rounded a bend, he swam lower to better avoid the proximity between them and the nearing humans who played on the beach.

"Well...what if I got leegs?"

Virgil blew an amused stream of bubbles at Roman's remark. "You can't just get leegs Roman. They are part of a human, just as our bottom of halves are part of us."

It was evident the dolphin mer was getting a little upset. "But our top halves are the same! We can't be that much different from them!"

"Yes. We can. Just...don't do anything stupid. Let's just take our round trip, then report our findings back to Logan."

"Fine." Roman sulked as they passed by the chattering humans at a safe distance. He took this time to observe those not surfing. There were many other activities a human could do at the beach, he quickly found out. There were human spawn playing in the tide pools, older spawn making structures from the sand, and there were even some elder humans using rods to catch fish. As he and Virgil swam, he quickly grabbed his clay tablet and scratched a few symbols describing what it was he was seeing.

Virgil glanced back a little confused until he observed the beach with his own eyes.

"Woah..."

Roman nodded. "Yeah."

"Right. Well, write down whatever you need to I guess. I want to be home before sun down though."

"Alright." As Roman finished writing down his observations, a small spawn began to run away from it's mother towards the water's edge.

The mother quickly chased after it and scooped them up before the youngling could get any farther. The child quickly began to squeal, with at first Roman thought was pain. But as it's face turned his direction again, he noticed it was laughter instead. Roman peered his eyes to the human mother and watched as she wiggled her fingers along the spawn's underarms and stomach. With a quick epiphany, Roman quickly realized this was the top half of the human, not the bottom half. His eyes grew wide with confusion and wonder as he looked at his own hands, and mimicked the same movements he saw the mother doing in the water. Maybe they truly weren't so different after all.

Roman's gaze switched between his hands and the place where the mother touched the child on his own body. Eventually, he decided to try the hand movements on himself. Unfortunately, nothing.

"What are you doing?" Virgil had been eyeing him the whole time. Roman felt a foreign flush redden his cheeks.

"Uhm...well I saw this human doing this touching thing to a small human-no no it wasn't a bad touching thing. It made the spawn laugh and giggle, so it must have been good."

"Where?" Virgil swam closer to Roman and looked to where the Dolphin mer was pointing too. All he saw was a mother, holding a young spawn's hand. "They are just holding hands, Roman."

"No no. It was different! I saw it!" Roman tried, but Virgil just seemed in a rush to get home.

"Well, I don't. C'mon Roman. We've done so much observing today, I think you're beginning to see things." Roman sulked but obeyed, trailing behind Virgil in the deeper parts of the shallow water. His mood was lifted, however, when he saw a similar situation just a little further up the shore. It was two older spawn, wrestling in the sand. Once he heard the laughter, he knew it was the same action.

"Virgil! Virgil! There it is!" He quickly gestured to the two laughing humans who were doing the action back and forth to each other.

"Huh?" Virgil looked to where Roman was pointing and sure enough. There was laughter coming from the human on the ground as one human wiggled their fingers on the other

"They...aren't in pain?"

"No! Isn't that crazy?! I wonder how they do that. Wait...one is doing it to the other...can it only be done by another being? Because I tried it myself and it didn't work."

"Oh. Is that what you were doing back there?" Virgil lightly teased.

"Maybe..." Roman rubbed his chin, an idea popping into his head. "But maybe..." Roman turned to Virgil and the shark mer instantly saw what Roman was planning to do. He rolled his eyes.

"It won't work, Ro. We aren't human." Roman ignored him, and quickly grabbed his wrist. "Woah hey!" Roman's other hand dove straight for his outstretched armpit and gently wiggled in the crevice.

Virgil instantly cried out to both of their surprise and swam away from Roman's grasp. "What? Was that!?"

"It worked?" Roman grinned widely and went after Virgil again, who tried to fight him off.

"No no no! No! Don't! Don't do that again!" Roman was much stronger than Virgil and quickly caught him around the waist. This time he squeezed his sides, like he saw the mother do to the child. Virgil began to twitch and wiggle until finally laughter bubbled out of his mouth.

"WAahahahahah!! Whahahaht ihihis thihihihiss feeeheheeling!??"

"I don't know! Isn't it good though? You're laughing!" Virgil finally wriggled out of Roman's hold and knocked him away gently with his tail.

"No! It's not! There's nothing funny about it! I don't even know why I'm laughing! I hate that feeling! It's like I have no control over anything." Roman quickly felt bad as the shark mer curled in on himself.

"I'm sorry. It...it looked like the humans were having fun."

"Yeah well. Do I look human to you?!" Virgil snapped.

Roman flinched back and held his wrist in shame. "No..."

Virgil took a breath and let his irritation subside slightly. "Look. I'm sorry. But, that's not fun."

"Well..." Roman thought. "Maybe not to you...Could you try it on me?" Roman looked hopeful.

Virgil's shoulders visibly dropped in astonishment. "You want me...to subject you...to that?!"

"Well I just want to try it! Maybe this thing is like how some mers like salmon, but others prefer trout." Virgil shook his head.

"I don't see at all how you would like it. But if it will get you to leave me alone about it, then sure." Virgil retored with a deadpan expression.

"Yes! Okay. Do the thing!" He let his tail float in the water and spread his arms out wide. Virgil pursed his lips and eyed him up and down. Finally he settled on the armpits as they were the first spot Roman tried on him. He set his hand in and wiggled his fingers in the arch.

Roman instantly puffed out his cheeks and doubled over, still somehow managing to keep his armpit stable while the rest of his body was slightly flailing. Virgil raised an eyebrow, now surprisingly amused. At first, it was a jolt at the foreign touch and that jolt subsided itself into a feeling that was so weird it was fun. Roman cackled and Virgil was right! There was nothing funny about it except for the feeling. He wanted so badly for it to end and to continue at the same time. The dolphin mer had never been so conflicted over something.

Eventually Roman's flight or fight response won out and he escaped from Virgil's hand, giggles still pouring from his mouth.

"Aahahahahah!! Oh wow!" Roman felt his cheeks, and he wore the brightest smile on his face. Virgil couldn't help but blush just a little from that adorable expression.

"That. That was amazing! Do it again!" Virgil swam backwards in surprise.

"You...actually liked that?!"

"Yes! Do it again! Except this time, squeeze my sides like I did to you!" Virgil blinked in bewilderment but obliged, tweaking his sides lightly in different places. This time Roman gave off shrill squeaks of laughter and curled in on himself, doing his best not to protect his sides from Virgil's onslaught.

Virgil only continued for only a little bit longer, before giving Roman a break. Roman's cackles dwindled into giggles and quickly rushed at Virgil, crushing him into a giant hug.

"Thank you Virgil!!! Oh that was absolutely delightful!! I love it! I can't believe we have never figured this out before! I'll bet Logan doesn't even know what it is!"

Virgil awkwardly placed his arms around Roman's back returning the hug shaking his head fondly. "You're crazy. I can't believe you liked that."

"Yes!!! And I want more!" Roman grabbed at Virgil's wrists gently and set them back on his sides with the biggest toothy grin Virgil had seen the mer Dolphin wear.

Virgil was about to squeeze again, when a devious idea crossed his mind. If Roman wanted this done to him so much, would he actually do stuff for it?

"Well...if you like it so much...maybe I'll use it as a reward you if you stop stealing my food, and maybe do your half of the chores for once." Virgil's hands retreated back to his sides, a smug smirk on his face.

Roman's smile quickly faded and he began to whine. "Noooo...I want it now."

Roman was always cute when he didn't get his way, Virgil decided.

"Well..." Roman thought, forming a devious idea of his own. "I could do it to you, until you did it to me." He grinned and wiggled his fingers in the mer shark's direction. Roman had never seen Virgil put up his defenses so quickly. The hiss was just so perfect that the mer dolphin couldn't help but double over in laughter at his reaction.

"If you even try, so help me I will rip off all of your fingers." The mer shark seethed.

"You're cute when you're mad." Roman innocently intertwined his fingers with Virgil's as they once again began their journey back to their pod.

"Shut it. I'm trying to be mad at you."

"Ahahah. Well if that's not an option, then I'll just tell the rest of the pod about this new found information."

Virgil froze. He could imagine it now. The mer in their pod would absolutely take to this new information and use it in many different ways. He shuddered at the thought. Virgil's eyes widened. No. He couldn't have that.

"No. Don't you dare."

"What why?"

Virgil was quick to come up with an excuse. "Its a human thing! Not a mer thing. We don't do human things. We watch human things! Just like we can't surf!"

"But this is something we can do! See?" He tweaked Virgil's side which caused him to gasp. He was quick to hit his hand away.

"What did I just say? No. And that's final." Roman pouted.

"Can I at least tell Logan?" Virgil bubbled an exaggerated sigh. "C'mon. Logan would be level-headed. And don't you want to know what it is? And why our bodies react the way humans do?" In truth, Virgil was curious, but the experience Roman put him through earlier screamed that it wasn't worth it. But, they had promised Logan to give him a full report and this new thing unfortunately had to be included in the full report.

"Alright. Fine. We'll take it to Logan. But only Logan. Okay? Leave Patton out of this."

Roman pouted, swimming faster as they neared the pod's current hiding place. "Why? I think Patton would really like it."

"Just...hear what Logan has to say, before we do anything else. Okay?"

"Okay. Fine." The two mers entered the cove from a different way than usual. Virgil was feeling on guard from Roman's attack and the last thing he wanted were a bunch of questions. He just wanted to go straight to Logan so maybe he could stop being bothered by Roman and his obsession with his...thing.

They wriggled their way into Logan's secluded study of the cove. They found the octomer conveniently flipping through a soaked copy of a human anatomy textbook. He had found it around a week ago and had already read it through twice, much to the entire pod's surprise.

"Hello Logan."

"Ah! You two are back." He gave a soft smile and propelled himself through the water towards them. "Find anything interesting?"

Roman broke into a grin. "Well, actually..."

Virgil saw it coming from a mile away and quickly tried to divert the conversation.

"Surf! Surfing! Yes. There was a lot of interesting surf- I mean surf interesting - I mean-" Logan raised an eyebrow. "-there was lots of humans surfing. And that was interesting. Yes." Virgil nodded trying to act like he knew what he was saying. Roman just blinked at him, obviously peeved. Logan hid a smile and turned to Roman.

"What were you saying?"

"I was just talking about this thing I discovered before I was rudely interrupted about-"

"SURFING!" Logan chuckled into his hands.

"It's ok Virgil. You're obviously embarrassed. I promise I am still interested to hear what you found out about surfing. However, Roman's 'thing' that he has discovered has me intruiged." Virgil scoffed in offense.

"You're...you're actually taking his side! I thought you would take my side!"

Roman chuckled. "Speaking of sides, I saw humans wiggle their fingers or squeeze another human's sides and they laughed!" The mer dolphin, grinned at the shark mer, who was beginning to swim away. Logan watched the exchange fondly.

"Really?"

"And. And and and. Guess what? It happens to us mers too!"

Virgil saw it coming from a mile away. "Dont you dare..."

"Well I think Logan here needs a demonstration."

"No. I Will not volunteer as tribute. I will fight you." Roman just laughed and began to swim gently towards him.

Virgil blew a large stream of bubbles at Roman's face temporarily startling him, but Roman quickly grabbed at Virgil's waist and pulled him close. The dolphin mer then began to wiggle his fingers into his hips this time and Virgil burst into giggles again. "Roohohohohomannn!!! I hahahahtte youuu!!"

"No you don't!" Roman teased over Virgil's cackles.

Logan at first found the situation endearing, then as he recalled a few pages he read in the anatomy textbook, an epiphany struck him. As Roman continued his phalangeal assault on Virgil, he swam back to it and flipped through the pages until he found the bolded page titled "Nervous System". After turning yet another couple pages, he found the information he was looking for.

"Ah! I found it! Alright Roman. That's enough." Roman reluctantly stopped wiggling his fingers on Virgil's sides, who promptly elbowed him in the ribs right after. "Ow!"

"I actually read about this two days ago. Come over here." He beckoned them over to the page he was looking at. Roman strode over with a panting Virgil, reluctantly following suit. They looked at the page he was pointing at and a picture depicted a human elder gently tickling a young spawn on her lap. "Allow me to translate."

Logan cleared his throat.

"When a certain amount of pressure is applied to a part of the human body that is considered not harmful, the brain will start to misfire the action and use laughter as a mechanism for the panic response. This panic response can be obtained using many different tools, but the most common are feathers and fingers. The action itself is called tickling."

Virgil's reaction to the tickling finally made sense. "So...it's a panic response...but it's not...dangerous?" The shark mer asked.

"...It couldnt be dangerous, because why would an elder be doing it to spawn if that were the case?"

"You are right Roman, although we are not humans, so this information leads me to think that we may not be that different from humans after all. If we can feel like they do, then we must have a similar nervous system. I wonder what else we have in common?" While Logan stroked his chin thoughtfully, Roman whooped for joy and spun an extremely done Virgil around Logan's study creating a tiny current.

"I knew it! I knew it! We aren't so different after all! I was right!"

"Yes you were..." Virgil deadpanned.

Roman settled down, looking back at the foreign words of the textbook. "Tickling hmm...?" Roman thought. "Are all mer ticklish?" He glanced back up at Logan for an answer.

"I would assume so. The book stated that all humans have a similar nervous system, and if we do as well, then yes." Logan stated.

"Are you ticklish Logan?" Roman began to grin. It was rare to see Logan giggle, and if tickling can make Mr. Grumpy Gills Virgil giggle, then it was sure to get Logan too.

Logan thought carefully. "I don't see why I wouldn't be. You may try if you like, seeing as you have more expertise in it." Logan thought carefully before giving a small smile afterwards.

Virgil ran his hands through his hair in frustration. "Oh no...not you too..."

"I see no reason not to. Plus, I'm curious myself. We are different species of mer afterall. It's a good test to see how different our top halves are."

Roman took it as an invite to swim towards him. He found himself face to face with the octomer and felt his cheeks redden. "Hey..."

"Salutations." Logan said, watching the dolphin mer's movements carefully.

He began by gently wiggling his fingers along the octomer's side. Logan's eyes instantly flew wide. Oh...so this is how tickling felt. He could feel the butterflies and urge to get away. It was hard to stay in one place.

"O-oh...I...this...this is it...hm?"

"Oh, so with him your gentle. I see how it is." Virgil was beginning to get jealous. Logan felt the laughter rise out of his chest. He saw the many ways in which this particular action could be used, but there was definitely a limit.

He gave a couple more chuckles then gently patted Roman's arm. "Ohohohokay. Okay, that's enough."

Roman retreated his fingers, a giant grin still plastered across his face as Logan regained what breath he had lost. "That was pleasant," Logan began. "Although enduring that for longer would have taken the fun out of such an action. I do see the bonding capabilities it has and I do not mind it one bit. But, perhaps the tickling should be kept to quick and light spurts." He eyed Roman and Virgil knowingly. "Long strenuous bouts would allow the so called victim to harbor negative feelings towards the action in the future."

Roman looked down guiltily. That's what happened with Virgil.

"Hear that Ro? Quick and light. And what did you do?" Roman nodded, remembering he was quite rough and demanding when he tickled Virgil the first couple of times. The dolphin mer hung his head.

"I'm sorry Virgil." Virgil nodded in approval.

"It's okay. I'm just...not ready to give it a try again. Alright? I'll let you know when I am. Just don't...pester me. Got it?"

Roman smiled at the bit of hope Virgil gave him. "Alright Virgil."

"Good. Okay I got chores to do and questions to avoid. Later." Virgil flipped his fin and left the room. He was quite aware that he had not given the full report yet, but the shark mer wasn't in the mood to continue talking about the subject matter.

Roman just smiled back at Logan. "Even if he doesn't enjoy it, I like it!" Logan raised his eyebrows.

"You do? For how long?" Roman pursed his lips.

"I don't know. Haven't tested that yet."

Logan smirked and Roman responded with a sheepish grin. "Perhaps at a later date. For now though, I think Patton would enjoy tickling. Would you like to help me introduce it to him?"

"Yes!" Roman exclaimed excitedly and he pumped his fist. "Say do you think your tentacles would be great for tickling?" Logan eyed Roman with a dangerous smile.

"Would you like to find out?" As they swam out to Patton's part of the cove, Roman definitely found out.

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Author's Note Part 2: This is one of the few fics that I'm actually extremely proud of! I love this fic and how it turned out so much! Please tell me what you think below. I might do a part 2 with more Patton and Virgil but that's only if I feel the motivation. If you guys are wondering what tickle fics I'm planning on writing next, I have another LAMP and Royality one planned. I also have three pre-written in case I don't feel like writing one day. I may also do a certain twin tickle fight idea that I had, and I may do a Remile fic that's been tapping at the back of my mind. Regardless though, you will all see soon enough. See ya later. Ceffy out! <3