YEAH SO CHAPTER 5 OF IUTMTM IS OUT AND IT'S GOT Q POLE DANCING IN IT AND I HAVE DECIDED THAT THE BEST WAY TO DEAL WITH THAT IS TO GIVE YOU SOME SUPPLEMENTARY CONTENT IN THE FORM OF A FUCKING ANIMATION BECAUSE WHY THE FUCK NOT
HAVE I EVER ANIMATED ANYTHING IN MY ENTIRE LIFE EVER? NO.
DID I STAY UP UNTIL 5:30 AM (not a hyperbole) TRYING TO FINISH IT TODAY? YES.
BUT IT'S DONE (more or less). IT IS DONE AND I AM DONE WITH IT SO HOLY SHIT ENJOY BECAUSE JESUS CHRIST WHAT IS WRONG WITH ME.
An Archive of Our Own, a project of the Organization for Transformative Works
anyway hope you enjoy both the animation as well as chapter 5 of IUTMTM please i put so much effort into both
Since It's us that made this mess chapter 3 is finally out
Here's my little comic of it
it doesn't spoil anything, it's just a really funny moment I really needed to have visualised, and it's not even realistic (that's not how panic buttons work guys fyi)
I hope you enjoy cuz as much as it's a mess, I find it utterly hilarious, and that was the point
It's done, guys. I did it. I fucking posted chapter 5 of IUTMTM. It is 12,5k words long and literally separated into 7 sub-chaters because i am a madman but it is done.
An Archive of Our Own, a project of the Organization for Transformative Works
this hc has been brewing in my mind since 2021, butt yeahhh enjoyy
wil loves smoking but hates the taste of alcohol. q loves drinking but hates smoking.
now some people might disagree, ive seen many fanart and such drawing them sharing a cig or doing shotguns but hear me out.
q hates the taste of alcohol, but he loves that it makes him blanks out from reality for a moment. wil hates the taste and how it burns in his throat, even if it does makw him forget his problems for a while he ddint find it worth it. hed always gag and spew it back out whenevr q offers him some, sometimes over dramatically to piss q off.
smoking brings memories to wil, thats how he relives them in his head. its more or less addiction than love, but it calms him down. q hates how the smoke would linger on his clothes and reeks his breath, he does smoke sometimes to remind himself of how much he hates it, but is never able to finish an entire stick and ended up giving the rest to wil if he was around.
theyd hooked up a couple of times, both in pogtopia and in las nevadas. most of the times theyd kiss, never soft and loving but out of desperation (pogtopia) or wanting to dominate the other (las nevadas). either way, wil had always tasted the same to q. smoke, and sometimws a little sweet, the taste of smoke is always there.
a few days before wil left for utah, they hooked up one last time (unknown to q that it was their last time). that was thwir last interaction before wil left without a goodbye. the last memory that q had of wil was the bitter taste of cigarettes.
and so, after wil left, he started smokimg again. and although it left him coughing and hacking for fresh air, he wants to relive the memory.
it was never the same, but he tried and tried again. each and everytime, it left his lungs burning and eyes prickling with tears from the smoke.
he hates smoking, but he loves wilbur.
this was supposed to be a funny hc, but then in took a turn lol :33
(may 2024)
I absofuckinglutely agree oh my god yes exactly
chapter 2 od IUTMTM actually deals with that topic and describes my feelings on it, but yeah no Quackity's drug of choice is alcohol, and it provides such a perfect angsty parallel to Schlatt too. He slips into alcoholism without realising in Las Nevadas. He's still functioning "normally", but uses alcohol in private to be able to quiet the storm inside his head, usually when he's trying to sleep. He doesn't like smoking, but starts to smoke because of Wilbur and after Wilbur's death he is properly addicted to it but more so to how it reminds him of Wilbur, rather than to the substance. The thing is, they were each other's unhealthy coping mechanism, and they still are. Quackity loves Wilbur, is basically the only one who sees him as a person etc, but he still has that subconscious idealised version of how Wilbur used to be able to help him just go on despite the horrors of his life.
(this also ties in with the fact that Q for sure has ADHD and alcohol does initially raise dopamine levels and while then it decreases the dopamine levels even more, it is still something that makes alcohol dangerously addictive to people with ADHD)
Meanwhile Wilbur doesn't like alcohol. Not the taste, not the effect all too much... He doesn't particularly mind it, though usually he just doesn't really go for it. Nicotine relax his muscles, which must be particularly appreciated post revival with his body being fucked up, but also generally as he becomes unstable
Also, an alcohol dependency is technically easier to hide, unless you're drinking right then and there. Yeah, it does affect your body odour a bit, but it's much easier to mask than cigarette smoke. Cigarettes leave a smell, and that fits Wilbur a lot—he doesn't hide the fact that he has issues. Narratively speaking, as he starts smoking he starts using his instability as an intimidation tool, basically. He wears it on his sleeve, he starts portraying himself as the bad guy, and smoking certainly adds to that aura, both with how it's viewed, as well as with how it "announces" itself
actually have the specific fragment under the cut, if someone here doesn't feel like reading the whole thing (though of course i very much encourage you read it):
“Do you have a light?”
Wilbur took a lighter out of his pocket.
Click.
Quackity leaned towards the outstretched flame, which trembled slightly. Last they’d met he assumed emotions were the source of the hands’ unsteadiness, but maybe there was an actual issue there after all, unrelated to their argument. He felt an odd, vague sting around his stomach. Regardless, soon enough smoke was spilling out of his mouth, drowning the tingle in his chest in thoughts of pointless irony.
He never even enjoyed smoking. The stench turned foul if not aired out or washed, the smoke made his mouth feel covered in hair, and it didn’t even have much of an effect other than some light-headedness—and even that disappeared quickly. He only engaged in it at parties, if at all…
But then his lonely nights became not so lonely anymore, instead suddenly veiled in a thin curtain of smoke.
And then he realised that a shared cigarette let him indirectly taste the lips which would then rant to him whenever it’d be his turn for a drag.
And then Schlatt’s inquisitive, increasingly agitated comments about the lingering smell made him start smoking where others would see, for an easy explanation.
And then Schlatt was finally gone.
But so was the initial source of the smell.
Convincing himself it was nicotine he was addicted to came easy.
His lighter continued clicking, as he gradually learnt not to mind the tang which begrimed his throat. He scrubbed, washed, rinsed, brushed and cleaned in secrecy, having quickly memorised the disappointed looks on his lovers’ faces. He carried chewing gum, bathed in cologne, and covered his hair with a beanie, despite the change in his style.
But he didn’t stop. He kept searching.
Searching for an ember that’d feel half as warm as the ones in the ravine. For a scratch in his throat that’d itch half as much, as the one he felt when for the first time in forever the hands which held him didn’t make him want to rip his skin off. For a smell half as pungent as the one that used to paint a smile on his face in mere seconds.
But there he was now, right next to the lure which pulled him into the habit in the first place. And the smoke still didn’t feel as vivid as the memories, which he’d already taught himself to disregard. He’d gotten over what happened between them.
Letting go of his reverie he inhaled greedily, stepping closer to Wilbur and leaning against the pole next to him.
Heads touching the cold metal, they stewed in shared smoke.
“Well-” Quackity took a drag, “-wanna tell me to what I owe your visit?”
