Animaniacs A Big Brother's Duty

**Hello again! Sooo the context behind THIS A! oneshot is... well... roleplay... the Warners are grown up and married and things. Adult Verse...? This just happened one night, I stayed up an extra half hour to churn out the most cheesy thing ever because I was in that mood... so Yakko and Dot fluff man, I can't get enough of it. Sorry if the romantic pairings in this aren't your cup of tea, they're not even the main focus, just side notes. Just listen to the soothing sounds of the fluff. This is p short so I doubt it will take long for you to read it. Enjoy!**

**Everything belongs to Warner Brothers! **

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_Gasp! _She was startled awake, her breathing quick and her heart racing. She'd never been so frightened in her whole life. Never before had she had such a dream filled with nightmarish images, such horrifying gore. What was that about unconscious thoughts she had heard once? Dot knew she was pretty kooky, but was she insane, deep down? Eh, probably not.

Her eyes blinked the darkness away as they adjusted, and she shivered, still freshly terrified from watching people's faces melt off. Ew… don't think about it. She didn't even have the strength to muster a 'Deeeegusting!'

Dot gained the willpower to turn her head to the side. No monsters here, just her bedside lamp. The other way? Just her husband Skippy, sleeping silently next to her. She smiled a little, reaching over and tapping him awake, telling him in a whisper that she'd had a horrible nightmare, and he gathered her close to him. Dot tried to nuzzle into his warm chest and fall back asleep, but the images were still burned under her eyelids. The squirrel's breathing was even and relaxing, but her heart was still beating a mile a minute. Dot whispered to him that she was going to take a short walk to get her mind off of it, and he agreed in a sleepy voice, turning over. She tip-toed out of the room, closing the door behind her, and down the stairs.

_Water. I just need water is all… _she tried to convince herself. Normally, she could be soothed by Skippy on a rare occasion she had a nightmare. She was an adult, for Acme's sake! Adults don't have nightmares! But this one was too personal, it wasn't about Skippy. The only people who she could seek for comfort were the three in the dream, her older brothers. Dot sat down in the kitchen with a glass, sighing and trying to get herself not to drive down to one of their places. Wakko would be lovely to visit, he gave good hugs and made her laugh and smile, but he wasn't very good at explaining dreams to her, which is probably what she needed. She laughed and almost gagged at the thought of Smakky explaining it, he would grumble, first of all, that she woke him, and give her some bogus human cultural reason for the dream, or scare her even further with something violent. She really wished she could have all three of them there with her, but it wasn't life or death and she didn't want to cause a ruckus. Dot found herself almost gagging again. Ruckus was such an old fashioned word. Such a Yakko word.

Hmm. Yakko was the only brother she hadn't thought about, yet. He was always the first she went to with nightmares when she was younger, so she figured she'd give Wakko and Smakky a shot… but wasn't it inevitable? All of them were equally so wonderful to her, most of the time, but certain aspects were unique to each, and Yakko was the shoo-er of things that go bump in the night. Not with sheer force, but with sheer logic.

Dot stood and tip-toed up the stairs again to grab a sweater and her keys. She headed out the front door, walking past her car. He was close enough and she didn't want to make noise. There was a key for each of her brother's front doors on the key ring, of course. Who didn't do that? With one last round of a corner, his house was in the distance. She was halfway up the driveway when a light in the front window turned on. _No way, he can't be up because I'm coming. There's no way his sixth sense still works so well. _Dot backed up a few steps, her face flushed with anger, embarrassment, whatever it was, she couldn't tell. But, there was no way she was ever sleeping again until she did this, so… she stomped up the steps and as she was about to put the key in the lock, he opened the door.

"May I help you?"

His eyes were open. For no reason in particular, really. It was completely silent, he didn't even realize he'd been sleeping, he was in that deep sleep where you never remember any of your dreams. So… why was he awake? He seemed to recall waking up randomly from time to time when he was younger, but that was when Dot would sneak into his bedroom to wake him up, he'd always be awake already. Yakko rubbed his eyes, sitting up and squinting at the clock. Hmm. He weighed the possibilities that Dot was coming to the house in the middle of the night. Eh… unlikely, but not impossible. Yakko turned his head when his wife touched his arm groggily, and he smoothed her hair back and whispered for her to go back to sleep.

Yakko walked down the stairs, stretching and groaning. He flicked the kitchen lights on a few minutes later after preparing for Dot's arrival. He figured, if she was coming, she might as well know he was awake. Save her the trouble of sneaking in and fumbling in the dark into his bedroom for no reason, waking Fifi up. He saw someone angrily stomping up the front steps through the window, and it took all he had to not start laughing out loud. In the end of it all, nothing ever changed, not really.

Dot glared at her towering oldest brother, a whole foot taller than her, who was looking at her with a blank expression, until he raised both eyebrows.

"Well? You here to sell me something?"

"Shut up, you know why I'm here."

"Oooh, that sounds like a threat. Do I owe you money, or something?"

"Yakko…"

"Just come in already."

Dot pushed past him with a glare, knowing that he was smirking at her like the child that he was. This was a bad idea.

"Nightmares? You don't have a husband to take care of those?" He asked, closing the door.

"I DO! It's just…" Dot's face fell, and she was holding back tears at this point as the dream screaming in her ears rushed back to her. "It was… different, Skippy's perfect, but I need... a brother right now." She gulped down her pride, feeling thoroughly embarrassed.

Dot didn't even notice that while she was speaking, he had handed her a cup of hot cocoa, and stepped behind her to start running his fingers through her thick hair in an attempt to calm her down.

"Mmmm. I see. Like to share the nightmare with me? Or is it not real like all those others? Or…" Yakko held her face up and forced her to look at him. "Do you not wanna tell me, at all?"

Dot shook her head, not speaking for fear of tears. She knew it would be enough for him to understand. She tried to sip the sweet drink, but she started to feel sick from recalling the nightmare, and put her cup down and buried her face in her brother's shirt, still not saying a word. She could feel his hands rubbing her back, trying to console her, and it helped enough for her to force some speech from her vocal cords.

"It… it was bad. I don't wanna talk about it. It was gross and scary and all I know is that you and Wakko and Smakky were there and…" she hiccuped, tears brimming over. "I'm sorry."

"Don't be." He replied in a whisper, taking her shoulders and guiding her to his couch. "Just sit down." He had a blanket ready. How long had he been awake? Ever since she was? How strong was his sixth sense, anyway?

Dot sat on the couch, wrapping the blanket around herself, and sniffed. "I'm a wimp, aren't I," she said with a sad laugh.

"Please." Yakko replied with a little grin, plopping down next to her and tucking his legs underneath him. "The opposite. You're the scariest girl I've ever met." She hit his chest with the back of her hand, giggling.

"Like I haven't heard you say that before."

"Doesn't make it untrue. Nor does it make it less flattering, no?"

"It's always nice to know that it still stands, yeah."

She leaned into and wrapped her arm around him, her cheek resting against his collarbone, his warmth and the rising and falling of his chest starting to lull her back to sleep, until the visions and sounds of the nightmare returned and she would snap awake. He showed no sign of sleeping until she did, and after the third time she jerked awake, he sighed.

"We might need to take it a step further, huh." He said in a low voice. She nodded, lifting her head to stare wearily at him.

So next step was instead of just sitting up, Yakko stretched himself across the whole couch on his side (yes, he took up ALL of it), and Dot inserted herself in front of him, face buried in his shirt again, hands strung around his neck.

"Tell me the story," She said in a muffled voice.

"What?" He asked in a breathy tone, one that reminded her of how he had read it during the filming of Wakko's Wish. Dot lifted her head, knowing he had understood her, but just wasn't sure.

"You heard me. Story. Now."

"You're not the boss of me."

"When it comes to story time, I am!" She said with a pout. He rolled his eyes, and pulled her over so their faces were on the same plane with one another, knocking their noses together.

"You're a monster."

"I'm your monster."

No response, just a smile. And a deep breath, with eyes closing, complete concentration on his face, it was almost serene to see.

"Once upon a time…"


End file.

Animaniacs, Family, Hurt-Comfort