in which obsession overcomes irony

ventricle cauterized

Quackity remembered the days of L'manburg.

Of course he did. Who could forget? A country, shiny and new, fighting for their total independence from the greater DreamSMP. Of course, it wasn't like Wilbur let him actually stay in L'manburg.

Quackity was younger then. Young enough to be stupid, stupid enough to think that his late night rendezvous with Wilbur actually meant something to either of them. Stupid enough to want more, to think it could eventually mean anything. Because later he had Schlatt, who was even okay, at first, but he never stopped thinking about Wilbur.

And then came along Sapnap, and with him, Karl, and for once in Quackity's life he let himself be in love. He didn't think about Wilbur anymore. Why would he, when he was so happy with his boyfriends, and later, fiancés? They made a country together, and Quackity thought that was it.

But then he got bold. He thought, but what if I could make it better, and set off to create something new. He wouldn't even remember where he got the idea. Maybe from some whisper from an acquaintance of a friend, or maybe his need for more wasn't just limited to foolish flings.

Turns out that when you disappear for a while to work on something big, your fiancés will run off with someone else and make their own thing. That's fine. It's not like Quackity needs them or anything. (He hopes they're happier without him now.)

Anyways, the point is, Quackity had gone a long time without thinking about Wilbur. He had gone a very long time without thinking about how Wilbur made him feel, and how Wilbur's bare skin felt against his own. And then he had the absolute gall to show up to his country, his Las Nevadas, and start some sad little van selling burgers in a vehicle that violated every health regulation ever, and call it Paradise. If there was any kind of paradise on the entirety of that godforsaken server it would be Las Nevadas.

But then, Wilbur fucked everything up. At first, he just said some things that he shouldn't have. Fine, that was fine. They argued all the time. Wilbur wanted to goad Quackity? Quackity wouldn't let him get under his skin. He had spent years building up a hardened exterior; pathetic squabbles and feeble attempts to get to him would do nothing but slowly crack at him.

And then Wilbur blew some things up that he shouldn't have, and suddenly Quackity was bitterly beating Wilbur to a pulp, shock and horror on his tongue at seeing his friend and citizen nearly blown to smithereens, and further still an actual death. And then Quackity was feeding Wilbur a golden apple when he wouldn't wake up, because he didn't have the heart to let him die.

All the while Quackity desperately tried to ignore him so that his own feelings would fizzle out and die. Every emotion towards him. Anger, passion, guilt, whatever. Truly, it would have been better if Wilbur had never showed up in the first place. Wilbur, however, clearly had other plans. He kept breaking in, finding Quackity like he had some kind of internal tracking GPS. At this point it wasn't hard to see the man was obsessed with him, and Quackity, Prime help him, could not stop thinking about it.

Then Wilbur said one thing too many, had dug a little too deep, a little too personal. Quackity's resolve finally broke under everything. He found it helped, when he hit Wilbur halfway to death for the second time. Like some kind of catharsis. Even if it left him feeling worse than before when he had to drag Wilbur away from the scene of the crime. He didn't even have it in him to carry him back to his pathetic little van, just left him out there in the sand and the dark by Las Nevadas.

Then he didn't see Wilbur for a week. It ate at him, to know that the last time he had seen him was when he was unconscious and practically dead, and to not know whether he survived. Part of him thought it would be better that way; the murder of his friend finally caught up to Wilbur. Guilt came from that thought and smothered everything else, except for the tiny pinprick of hope—or something disguised as it—that screamed, Now you'll be alone, you greedy, unforgivable man. It's better this way. Isn't this what you wanted?