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It was a late December night, abnormally cold for Florida. Thomas had gone to bed hours ago, having been too exhausted to even bother with any of the distractions that normally kept him awake well past midnight. It had been a long week, filled with deadlines and expectations and lots of ‘What if’s’ that had kept the man on edge up until the very second he fell into a blissful slumber.
Which is why waking up with a panicked gasp, clutching his chest and thoughts of his friends abandoning him and never being accepted plaguing his frazzled mind, was not an ideal way to start his morning.
Well, barely morning, Thomas realized as he looked towards his alarm clock, gulping in oxygen. He had had a nightmare, one that he couldn’t even remember really, but the after effects were still very detailed. He blinked, and finally managed to school his breathing. Just a nightmare.
“That was...something.” Thomas said to no one. He couldn’t remember having a nightmare that had affected him like that. His stomach still felt like a pit, and his heart raced in his chest, even though he couldn’t recall the details of whatever it was he had been dreaming about, his body surely did. And there was the gnawing feeling of hopelessness that the nightmare seemed to have dredged up.
“You could say that again.” A voice from the darkest part of the room spoke, causing Thomas to scream and sit up, instinctively tossing his pillow at the demon that was definitely in his room. Said demon gasped out a ‘Hey!’ before revealing himself.
“Remus?!” Thomas yelled, higher pitched than he would have liked, but could anyone really blame him? His body hadn’t even had time to calm down from his nightmare, and immediately it had to go back into danger mode when a voice from an empty room suddenly started speaking to him. Remus looked annoyed, throwing the pillow back at Thomas.
“What was that for?” Remus asked with a pout. Thomas blinked, wildly confused.
“What are you doing here?” He asked, voice a bit more normal as he began to calm back down, realizing he wasn’t in immediate danger. Danger could still be afoot, of course, since this was the Duke after all, but he was no longer worried that his soul was going to be sucked into the void, which is leagues better from where he was just a few seconds prior.
“What d’ya mean ‘What are you doing here?’ you summoned me!” Remus explained, crossing his arms. Thomas shook his head.
“I definitely did not, I was asleep!” Thomas argued back. Plus, if he had wanted to see a side after a nightmare, Remus was probably dead last on the list. In fact, he wouldn’t be surprised if Remus had caused the nightmare in the first place.
“Well, I hope the bed bugs gobble your toes.” Remus said with a strong pout, before sinking out. It was...probably the easiest conversation he had ever had with his Intrusive Thoughts. He hadn’t made a lewd comment or appealed to any type of violence, unless he was supposed to consider bed bugs gobbling his toes a viable threat...Thomas lifted up his covers and looked at his sheets, just to make sure there were no bugs to be found.
“Yeah well, I hope you...sleep...bad.” Thomas fought back, even though Remus was no longer there, since that was about the levels of confrontation he could handle. He then laid back down. It was far too early to come up with decent comebacks anyways, and he still had a lot of stuff he had to do tomorrow, he didn’t need any more interruptions. So he closed his eyes, and attempted to go back to sleep.
Keyword: Attempted.
Because even though he knew he was safe once more, and his breathing had calmed down, and he couldn’t even recall a single thing about the nightmare he had had, he still felt a deep-seated sense of...well, Thomas could only really identify it as scared. He had no idea of what though, and he didn’t really have the energy to call upon his fear sensors and demand to know what it was that was keeping him on edge. So, he merely rolled back over with a huff, closing his eyes tighter and demanding in his head that his body let him sleep.
It took a while for him to completely feel calm again, which made actually falling asleep that much harder. He tossed and turned, and soon found a just comfortable enough position to finally begin to relax fully. But right as he swore he was about to drift back off to sleep, a swooshing from somewhere in the room disturbed what was probably going to be a very peaceful slumber. Thomas’s eyes were once again wide open, and when he sat back up and looked around his room, he very quickly spotted the culprit as to why he was awake. Again.
“God, Remus, I don’t have time for these games tonight.” Thomas groaned, falling back onto his back, his words barely having any bite to them. He was frustrated, but mostly he was tired. He rubbed his temples as a headache began to form. He had so much to do tomorrow, he really needed his rest, and here he was, not even being tortured by Intrusive Thoughts, but by the entity who created them instead.
“I’m not playin’ games! You summoned me again!” Remus argued, walking over and kicking the bed, though there wasn’t much force behind it. “You’re the one playin’ games, Thomathen.”
“Remus, PLEASE. Go to sleep.” Thomas begged. He wasn’t sure why Remus was trying to convince Thomas he was summoning him, he was pretty sure he’d be aware if he was summoning someone.
“I’m tryin, and then I keep endin’ up here! YOU go to sleep.” Remus argued, and Thomas just did not have the energy to keep up the back and forth. He threw one of his pillows over his face.
“Goodnight, Remus.” Thomas said without actually looking to see if Remus would leave or not. At this point, all he could do was try and ignore him. Thomas knew that Logan said one couldn’t really force intrusive thoughts away, but he wasn’t even having intrusive thoughts, just a very intrusive side. Maybe if he just didn’t give any sort of credence to Remus’s actions, he would eventually just give up.
Thomas heard a quiet whooshing noise, and he assumed that Remus had once again returned to wherever it was he went when he wasn’t needed. Thomas relaxed minutely, and started counting sheep in his mind. Sleep usually didn’t come easy to him, but with how tired he felt, and how much he had to do tomorrow, he was determined to make it happen, and nothing was going to stand in his way. Not even intruding Dukes.
He slowly moved the pillow from his face, since he wouldn’t actually be able to sleep otherwise. He rolled over onto his stomach, and took a final deep breath. This was it. This was going to be the sleep that carried him through the night. He was certain of it.
And then, five minutes later, a pillow was being chucked at his head.
“What the f-” Thomas didn’t have a chance to finish before another pillow was being thrown at him. Thomas grabbed the pillow in a tight grip as he sat up, immediately glaring in the direction they were being thrown from.
“Remus!” Thomas yelled. Thomas didn’t yell, ever. Well, maybe when he was scared, or if there was a really good reason to yell. But in frustration? Rarely. Anger was something he didn’t like feeling, and he tried to avoid it at all if possible.
But man, was Remus ticking him off.
And not just because it was Remus, if anyone was doing this, he’d be pretty irked too, but it didn’t help that it was his Intrusive Side, the one that had a tendency to keep him up all hours of the night with Intrusive Thoughts and weird ideas. But this felt too far. This was way too direct for Thomas. He just wanted to go to sleep, and there were no grounding techniques or words of affirmations that could deal with a literal person in his room. He closed his eyes and took a deep, calming breath, trying to get his anger under control so that he could deal with this like an adult, by summoning Janus and making him deal with Remus, but stopped before he had a chance when he was interrupted by a soft sob.
Thomas opened his eyes and looked up at the Duke. The Dark Creativity himself, and saw that he was…crying. He was crying?!
Remus was standing in his room, all 6’7 feet of him, and was crying. Black, inky tears were running down his face and mixing in with his makeup. Thomas was stunned into silence. Remus was crying. REMUS WAS CRYING? What was he supposed to do!? He couldn’t think of a single time he’d seen one of his sides cry before. Not even after big emotional blow ups, not even after Logan had gotten his own jam. Not even after years of anticipation when ROMAN had gotten his own jam. This was full-fledged, eye burning, snot inducing, throat aching crying. And Thomas had absolutely zero ideas on how to begin to address it.
“Why d’ya keep summonin’ me, n’den tellin’ me t’go way? I a’ready can’ s’eep, n’yer makin’ it harder!” Remus cried, wiping at his eyes aggressively. Thomas still felt at a loss for words. He wasn’t summoning Remus…was he? He knew that Remus wasn’t exactly a beacon of truth, but Thomas imagined it would be quite difficult to fake a reaction like that, even for someone as skilled as the Duke. He looked positively miserable, and Thomas began to wonder if he had looked that way every time he’d shown up, and he just hadn’t noticed out of frustration.
“I’m…I’m sorry.” Thomas managed to mumble out, since apologies were practically coded into his vocabulary. And Remus seemed surprised by that response, like he hadn’t expected Thomas to feel bad about what he’d been doing.
“Are you…Are you okay?” Thomas asked, sitting up fully in the bed and leaning over to turn a light on, since the only light that was giving him any idea about what was going on was coming from the moon through the window. When the light flickered on, Remus hissed and covered his eyes.
“Can’t sleep.” Was the grumbled response Remus gave. He had managed to get his crying under control, and Thomas could have sworn he saw Remus’s cheeks darken, as if he was embarrassed. Thomas nodded in understanding. He was longing for sleep too, but now he had Remus to deal with. He tried not to feel frustrated by that, seeing that this whole not sleeping thing was clearly bothering his Intrusive Side, but how was Thomas supposed to help?
“Have you tried summoning Janus? I bet he could help with that.” Thomas suggested. He was Deceit, but he was also Self Preservation, right? And he was always talking about baths and naps and self cares, he probably had lots of remedies for helping someone sleep. However, as soon as the suggestion rolled off of Thomas’s tongue, Remus was quick to shake his head in a frantic ‘no!’. He bounded over to the bed, jumping on it and covering Thomas’s mouth, much to Thomas’s displeasure.
“No! He busy, don’t call him!” Remus begged, before looking around, perhaps looking to see if just saying his name had managed to summon him. Thomas shook his head to free himself from Remus’s hold.
“Wha’? But it’s so late?” Thomas asked, looking up at Remus. Now that he was merely inches away from his face, Thomas could tell that that had NOT been Remus’s first crying session of the night. His eyes were puffy from crying, and the inky tears had left stains that ran all the way down Remus’s neck. “Remus, are you--”
“He’s with Pat and Lo.” Remus interrupted, finally scooting a bit away from Thomas, though still staying on the bed. “They’ve been together all night…” He trailed off, and he looked dangerously close to crying again. Thomas felt the sudden need to try and stop that from happening.
“He’ll be back with you tomorrow though, right?” Thomas said, and watched as Remus just shrugged.
“Maybe…” He whispered, and then quietly whimpered. In an effort to quell further tears, Thomas watched as Remus bit his fist, and noticed that this wasn’t the first time he’d done that either.
As Thomas took in Remus’s state, things began to click together for him. Remus was clearly in distress, and that distress seemed to be coming from the fact that Janus was hanging out with Patton and Logan. Thomas thought back to what had woken him up in the first place, and everything began to come together.
“You’re worried about being abandoned.” Thomas said aloud, though with very little confidence. Maybe he was wrong, jumping to conclusions, and assuming things about Remus that he really shouldn’t be. After all, he was only concluding this based on a dream he barely remembered. But he did remember the isolating feeling of being left alone, and the fear that everyone was going to leave him behind, and he’d never find a place with them.
Remus whimpered and bit down harder on his fist, which just felt like a confirmation for Thomas.
Thomas leaned forward and pulled Remus’s hand out of his mouth. He didn’t like watching Remus hurt himself, even if severe bodily harm was kind of Remus’s thing. But it didn’t feel like his thing right then. Something about Remus’s state pulled at Thomas’s sympathy, which wasn’t very hard, but still. Remus let his hand be guided away, and looked over at Thomas with wide, scared eyes.
“I um, I know I don’t know you or Janus super well, but if you guys are really a part of me…” Thomas searched Remus’s eyes for a second, to see if he would somehow indicate that they weren’t a part of him. That they were the Big Bad Dark Sides that Thomas needed to cast away in order to finally be his true and best self. But when he looked at Remus, all Thomas could see was himself. An overtired, anxiety-ridden, 6’7, and mustached version of himself. And only two of those things weren’t just his everyday experience anyways.
“If you guys really are a part of me, then I know Janus isn’t going to leave you behind.” Thomas said, and watched as more tears began to drip from Remus’s face, though this time, they were clear watery ones that Thomas was much more familiar with. Also, snot was now dripping from his nose, ew…
“Y’mean it?” Remus asked, sniffling. Thomas nodded, and tried to hide the disgust he felt at seeing the snot dribbling down his face and into his mouth.
“Yeah. I mean it.” Thomas said with a forced smile, before he turned to the side, grabbing some tissues from the box beside his bed. He held one out for Remus to take, but he just stared at it blankly. After a few seconds, it became clear that Remus had no idea what to do with the tissue. Thomas resisted the urge to roll his eyes, and began to clean up Remus’s face for him.
“I’m sorry that I kept summoning you.” Thomas said as he dabbed the ink, tears, and snot off of Remus’s face. He now believed that he HAD been summoning Remus, but completely by accident. Maybe his brain just knew Remus needed a friend tonight, and Thomas was the only one available? Or his dreams had summoned him, or something. He didn’t exactly know how his brain worked, and he was pretty sure the Sides rarely did either, so he sort of just learned he needed to go with the flow. His brain subconsciously thought that Remus needed to be here and not alone, and his conscious was beginning to agree.
“S’okay, sorry for throwin’ pillows at you.” Remus said. Thomas pointedly ignored the fact that he was pretty sure he had been the one to throw a pillow first, before holding the tissue up to Remus’s nose and forcing him to blow. He did, with a force that was inhuman. Thomas grimaced as he moved the tissues away from his intrusive sides face and quickly tossed it into the garbage.
They both sat in an awkward silence for about a minute. Thomas had no idea what Remus might have been contemplating, but he knew what was on his own mind. He’d never seen this side of Remus before. He’d never really considered Remus having complex emotions, or issues with attachment. Which was probably wrong of him. Everyone had depth, even Remus apparently. And this side of him seemed scared and lonely, things that Thomas could empathize with.
“Do you…want to stay here for the night?” Thomas offered. He consciously didn’t want to leave Remus alone. And he also kind of got the feeling that even if he tried to, he would just end up subconsciously summoning him again. Tonight, Remus needed company. And even if it meant that Thomas didn’t get the good night’s sleep he needed, at least he would wake up knowing he had taken care of a part of himself that really needed it.
Remus looked genuinely surprised by the offer, another emotion that was rare for the Duke. Then he looked nervous, nibbling on his lip.
“I dunno.” Remus mumbled. Thomas could understand the hesitancy. He hadn’t exactly been very kind to his Side in the past. Especially given not even an hour ago he’d yelled at him for disturbing him, when it hadn’t even actually been Remus’s fault. But Thomas wasn’t going to rescind the offer, or back pedal at all. Remus deserved to know that the offer was genuine.
Remus seemed to think about it a bit more, rubbing his arms up and down his pants as he rocked a bit. Thomas was patient, something he owed Remus, and waited for his response.
“What if Jan needs me? Or can’t find me?” He asked suddenly. Thomas felt that heartstring pull once more. Remus really valued Janus a lot, didn’t he? Thomas had always viewed Remus as one dimensional. He was just a stinky trash rat who liked to freak people out. But he was clearly so much more. He was shy and reserved, at least sometimes, and cared a whole stinking lot about Janus. It made Thomas feel a lot better about his “Dark” sides, but also himself. If the “worst” parts of himself were still so very genuinely sweet and kind, then how could Thomas be all that bad?
“You could leave a note for him, telling him where you are?” He suggested, and Remus lit up at the idea. He immediately summoned in his hand a phallic-shaped pen, gross, and a notepad.
“Yeah yeah yeah! Write him a note!” Remus said a bit too loudly, eagerly thrusting the pen and pad into Thomas’s chest. Thomas took the items, making sure to hold the pen very very loosely. His trust in Remus might have been slowly building, but not fast enough to trust anything phallic-shaped coming from him.
“You want me to write it?” Thomas asked, and watched as Remus nodded his head so vigorously that he began to worry that it might fall off. It wouldn’t have been the first time it happened. Thomas wasn’t sure why Remus was asking him to write it, but he didn’t feel like arguing. At this point, whatever got Remus to bed the fastest was the route that Thomas wanted to take.
“Okay.” Thomas said, and wrote a short note on the pad. All he wrote was ‘If needed, I am with Thomas.’, before very quickly handing the items back to Remus. Remus looked over the bad, squinting his eyes as he read it, before taking the pen and began scribbling on the paper.
“What are you adding?” Thomas asked out of curiosity. Remus happily showed the pad once he was finished, shaking it in front of Thomas’s face.
“Drew lots of butts and me sleepin’ next to you.” He explained, pointing out the stick figure drawing of Thomas and Remus in bed. It was almost kind of cute.
“That’s…great.” Thomas said, since he wasn’t about to say out loud that he thought it was cute, that would be insulting to a part of his creativity, wouldn't it? Plus, Remus beamed under the minor praise Thomas offered, hugging the note to his chest, before scrambling out of the bed.
“Okay be back so fast!” Remus said, before sinking out. Thomas couldn’t help himself as he smiled and chuckled. This night was so weird, and he was going to be so tired in the morning. Maybe he could push back some of his responsibilities back by like an hour or two. Logan would lecture him about it tomorrow, but that was something for morning Thomas to deal with. Or maybe early afternoon Thomas…
Remus suddenly sprung back up from the ground, giggling as he moved into the bed. Thomas had heard his Creativity giggle before, but nothing like that. It was almost childlike and bubbly.
“I left the note on m’door so he sees it first thing!” Remus said as he crawled to the front of the bed. That’s when Thomas noticed an adorable green octopus tucked in Remus’s arms, something he must have brought back with him.
“Good, now we can get some sleep.” Thomas said, helping Remus as he maneuvered to get under the covers. It wasn’t the first time he’d shared a bed with someone, but it was the first time he’d shared it with one of his sides. If someone had told him that morning that he was going to end the night with a bubbly Remus in his bed after a small reconciliation, Thomas would have asked them how they knew about his Sides. But THEN he would have told them how ridiculous of a scenario that was. And yet, here he was.
Thomas helped to tuck the blanket around Remus, who seemed to need it. He had brushed against Thomas while he was getting into the bed, and the Duke was freezing cold. He wasn’t sure if that was just a feature of Remus though, like how Patton always felt warm and Roman always smelled like roses. Still, he made sure to tuck Remus in snuggly on his side of the bed, before scooting back over to his own.
“All ready then?” Thomas asked, leaning over to turn the lamp off when Remus gave him a nod. Thomas nodded back, before thrusting the room back into darkness. A weight began to lift off of Thomas’s shoulders as he settled back into bed. His body seemed to know that he was finally going to be able to rest, because all of his sides were now safe and sound.
“Night Thomas.” Remus mumbled, the words barely escaping the plush of his toy that was pressed up right against his mouth. Thomas smiled and reached over to Remus, ruffling his hair, which felt greasy, but nowhere near as offensively as Thomas might have always assumed. It seemed like someone at least tried to get Remus to take a bath on occasion.
“Night Dukey.” Thomas said, before laying back down, and finally getting the peaceful sleep he had been waiting for.
+++
Janus brushed his fingers through his host’s hair, smiling down at Thomas fondly. He wasn’t aware of all that had happened while he had been gone, but something had shifted for Thomas. Not enough to completely diminish the divide between the ‘Dark’ side and the ‘Light’ side, but enough that the passage between the two wasn’t so difficult.
And enough to have Thomas curled up around his Remus, cuddling him close.
What a weird night to have missed.
Janus looked over at Thomas’s phone. His alarm was set for 8 am, but Janus got the feeling that that wasn’t going to be enough for his host. So he picked up Thomas’s phone and turned off the alarm, before setting it back down. Now he wouldn’t have to lie to anyone about having accidentally slept through his alarm clock. And Janus was okay with not lying, just this once.
He turned his attention away from Thomas and to his little one. Or, at least he had gone to sleep as Janus’s little one. He had Sucker, his plushie, squished in between him and Thomas, one hand clutching Thomas’s shirt and the one in his mouth. It made Janus feel a little bit guilty about not being home that night, and he would have to sit Remus down and remind him that he can summon him no matter where he is or who he is with. However, he was just relieved that he had ended up somewhere safe and sound, and had apparently made the type of progress Janus had been trying to gain for years.
Janus ran his gloved fingers through Remus’s hair, which was tousled. He did that a few times, enjoying the serenity of the scene, before bending down to Remus’s ear.
“Good morning, your highness. Why don’t we get in our own bed, hm?” He whispered, doing his best to make sure he didn’t wake Thomas as well. Remus whined as he was woken, letting go of Thomas’s shirt in order to attempt to bat Janus away. But he remained persistent, slipping an arm under Remus’s back in order to start to sit him up in the bed.
“Jan?” Remus mumbled as he sat up. He pulled his fingers out of his mouth and rubbed the sleep out of his eyes. Janus answered the question by planting a kiss onto Remus’s temple.
“Let's go home and let Thomas get some sleep without you kicking him.” Janus whispered. That seemed to remind Remus where he was. He looked down over at Thomas, before back to Janus, face beaming with a bright smile.
“He letted me sleep here!” Remus whispered with excitement. Janus nodded along, taking Remus’s hand and guiding him out of the bed, which he followed without a fight.
“He did, how kind of him. You will have to thank him later.” Janus said.
“Yeah yeah yeah!” Remus chanted, still quietly, though Janus knew his capacity for whispering was about at its limit, so they would have to leave.
“Are you still sleepy?” Janus asked, rubbing Remus’s arms up and down, since he knew Remus liked that sensory feeling of it. Remus took a second to think, before nodding a bit, which was quite big of him to admit. Remus almost always fought sleep. Maybe last night before Remus had come to Thomas had been rough…
“Okay, go to your room and I’ll come to cuddle with you a bit, alright?” Janus offered. Remus nodded happily, before sinking out into the floor. Janus watched him go, and would follow him in just a second. But first, he needed to make sure his host was all taken care of.
He tucked the blanket back around Thomas’s shoulders, walked over to the side of the room and shut the curtains so the sun wouldn’t wake him, then walked back over to the bed.
“Thank you.” He whispered to his host. Whatever had happened last night, he had taken the initiative to take care of Janus’s little one despite having no expectation to. It filled Janus with lots of hope that maybe, things were going to work out between Thomas and them.