T/W: Alcohol use and getting drunk
Also, please keep in mind that I have never been drunk. And I just have never drunk alcohol at all. This is not based on experience. I don't know what it's like to be drunk and have simply based this on what I found online. Apologies in advance if it's a flawed representation of being drunk.
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Schlatt explains to you the wonders of the best invention ever made by the DeMeter company. How you can decide exactly what goes into your drink, how much alcohol it'll contain, how much it'll pour into a glass... And well, you've never seen someone as excited about being an alcoholic as him. When you mention this to him, he simply laughs. Sure, he seems to be drunk, but he's not that drunk yet. "Well, when you have nothing else to be excited about, you'll start holding onto those small things that give you at least a little bit of an escape, you know?" he answers. "It's the one thing that hasn't let me down yet."
"You have nothing else to be excited about?" you chuckle incredulously, tilting your head at him. "You have a fountain of gold and are the most powerful man in the city, yet you have nothing to be excited about?"
"If I had, would I be here?" You're not sure how to react to that, but the man takes a sip of his drink and you stare at the glass you just filled yourself as well. Are you going to do it? Get drunk with J. Schlatt, the most influential alcoholic? This is such a dumb idea, how did you even get to this?
Easy. The pure power that distraction can give you. The mere thought of not having to think about all your issues for a moment, is so much more tempting than swimming through the impossible river that you call your mind. As long as you don't light the candle, you won't have to be afraid of the house burning down, right?
So, you put the glass against your lips and drink. Drink. Drink. Drink as if there's no bottom to hit. Two people in one room, drinking as if there's nothing else in the world that matters. Drinking while there's nothing else in the world that matters. Drinking because there's nothing else in the world that matters.
Yes, you know that Tommy hates this man and that he's hurt many people in the past. Yet, you can't help yourself. Is it self-sabotaging? Or is this just one of your other self-destructive behaviours? You don't know. But who cares, anyway?
"So, why exactly do people like Tommy and Wilbur want you around here so much? From what I've seen, you're just a big nuisance."
"Everybody needs a big nuisance in their lives and you're not going to do it if you're constantly drunk."
Schlatt lets out another chuckle, shaking his head as he takes another sip of his drink. "What can I say? Sobriety is overrated."
"And alcohol is not?"
"You're drinking alcohol right now, sweetheart. Maybe don't call it overrated when it's the only thing making you feel alive right now."
"Is it making me feel alive? I don't feel anything. I don't even understand why people describe it as 'an angel pissing over your tongue'."
"Oh right, people call it that, don't they? Just so you know, that's fucking bullshit. Angel's piss is just as nasty as my own piss."
"The fuck? You've drunk your own piss before?"
"I'm surprised that's what you're questioning and not how I know what angel's piss tastes like."
The both of you prepare another glass after you've already finished your first. Schlatt and you talk complete bullshit. There's no real subject you're constantly returning to, but you do feel better than usual after a couple of drinks. And Schlatt also seems to have more energy than usual. You jump from subject to subject. Whether it's about what piss tastes like, or the nonsense that Schlatt calls religion. "If God existed, I wouldn't have been here," is his main argument. Even if it is all so chaotic, you can't help but feel comfort in the philosophical conversations with the satyr-like man. "Besides, what the fuck did the Christian God think when he created Heaven? I mean, living a 'perfect afterlife' if some bitches follow some stupid-ass rules is so fucking selfish, is it not?! I mean, if Heaven exists, I'm going to kill myself right here and right now!"
"Silly old Schlatt," you chuckle, "thinks that he can go to Heaven." Before Schlatt can even answer, you come up with the worst and yet best idea ever. "Oh my God, you know what we should do?"
"Don't use the Lord's name in vein," Schlatt speaks with a mocking voice and you roll your eyes with a grin.
"I'm the Lord, fucker, but let me fucking finish my sentence!" When Schlatt remains silent, you continue. "We should do karaoke!" You jump up from your chair, almost falling over as you point at Schlatt. For a moment, the world turns blurry, but this quickly changes after you stand up right for a moment and closing your eyes. "Fuck, this is not healthy."
"Well, we're not here to get healthy, bitch. But why the fuck is karaoke a good idea?" Before you can even answer, he laughs. "Let's fucking do it!" He stands up from his chair as well, falling on the ground right away, and you simply laugh at him, reaching out your hand. He takes it, but instead of lifting himself up, he pulls you to the ground as well. You fall on the ground too, using your other arm to break the fall and prevent yourself from falling on your beautiful face.
"Fucking asshole, I wanted to help you!" you complain, but Schlatt simply laughs.
"So did I. Kiss the ground that I stand on!"
"You're not even standing, dickhead," you snarl and you get up again. Your hands are trembling a bit, but you manage to get up after a few times failing miserably. Schlatt does the same, but you're the one standing first anyway. "Ha! I beat you, now kiss my feet and call me Wilford!" As soon as he gets down to your feet to do this, you almost kick him in the face, causing him to fall over from the sudden movement right away. You also have to find your balance again, but you do so successfully earlier than him. You laugh at him again, before Schlatt presses a single button and a microphone comes out of the floor. You look at it with a confused expression on your face, barely processing what is happening, until Schlatt opens his arms with a wide grin on his face.
"Look at this! Our own personal karaoke machine!"
"What? Are you a karaoke addict or something?" you joke and he blinks a few times confusedly.
"Of course not! But I want some weird shit when I'm drunk, and this was on that list!" He walks over to the microphone, almost falling over his own feet, as he grabs the microphone stand with such an aggression, that he almost drops it right afterwards. You simply laugh at him when that happens, which he doesn't seem to appreciate. "Shut the fuck up, asshole!" he shouts immediately, startling you a little with this, "don't laugh at me, J. Schlatt the Second!" Again, you burst out laughing, ignoring his furious shouts.
"So, what song do you want to sing first, huh?" you chuckle and you come to stand next to him. The music starts and you start loudly singing with him to whatever song gets on. You have no idea what the fuck they're singing, so you just sing gibberish mostly. And damn, the amount of energy that you and Schlatt put into the singing, even if it's not good.
"If you wake up in a house that's full of smoke, don't panic: call me and I'll tell you a joke!" the two of you basically scream into the microphone, "if you see white men dressed in white cloaks, don't panic: call me and I'll tell you a joke! Oh shit. Should I be joking at a time like this?" Schlatt and you throw your arms over each other's shoulder, as if you're really going to be able to support each other properly. "If you start to smell burning toast, you're having a stroke or overcooking your toast." While Schlatt continues singing, you put a bottle of some of the drink to your lips and drink the half of the liquid inside. This is so unhealthy, but as Schlatt had already said...
We're not here to get healthy.
As you almost choke on the drink, you cough out some of the shit and fall to the ground again, Schlatt falling on you. He rolls off and lies down next to you now on the comfortable floor, coughing a bit as well as the music keeps playing.
"I'm sorry! I'm so sorry, darling! I never meant any of it!" The fuck? As your mind tries to recollect its thoughts, you look around confusedly, smelling the scent of feet. You're still on the ground, but judging by the darker tint of blue in the sky, it's gotten later.
"What the fuck just happened?" you ask Schlatt, who's sitting in front of you on the floor as well with two different colours socks on his hands and his shoes next to him. As you look at your own hands, you come to realize that you also have two different coloured socks on your hands. One is yours, you see right away, and the other one is a sock with Sonic on it. Schlatt has the same on his one hand, while his other has a black one. "Why the fuck are we wearing socks?" The world around you is a little blurry, but you can manage. After Schlatt burps suddenly, he looks at you angrily.
"Come on, Y/N, are you kidding me!? You can't break character without saying you're going to break characters. That was the rule that you gave me, so you should at least follow them yourself, you hypocrite!"
"Answer the fucking question, Jared."
"The fuck? I don't understand, are we still playing or not?" You simply scream at him. No words, just the letter 'A' very loudly in his face. "Okay, fine! I think that after we fell on the floor, you came up with this stupid ass idea. Or I did? I'm not sure anymore, I'm fucking drunk. But yeah, Connor came in during our play and we needed two other socks for characters, so he gave them to us."
"Is that what I'm smelling?''
"No, you're smelling my socks. Unless you're talking about the scent of BOOMune Perfume, because that's the scent of Connor's socks." You put the sock without a second thought against your nose, before realizing that it wasn't Connor's sock that you smelled, but your own. "Oh god, you must have gotten a blackout," Schlatt then says, chuckling a little. "Maybe it's for the better. The story I came up with wasn't good anyway."
"I feel like a child," you mumble and he bursts out laughing.
"You are a child!" As he puts the bottle against his lips again, he drinks and you look over at your own bottle. You want to drink and at the same time you don't. The music is still playing and you try standing up, barely managing to even stand a little. Once you stand up right, you carefully stumble over to one of the nice-looking couches in the corner of the room.
"I'm just as you, dickhead."
"You're just as me?"
"I mean, just as old as you."
"Yeah, sure, you are."
You fall on the couch with your face in one of the cushions, groaning into it as you hear some footsteps before hearing a loud bang accompanied with the sound of glass shattering. You turn your head towards the sound, finding Schlatt lying there, fallen on the ground with shards of glass in front of him. And there's blood as well. Coming from his hand. Right away, the two of you get into a panic and start screaming, while Schlatt simply holds his bleeding hand, of which he quickly pulls off the sock. The two of you continue screaming until the door to the bar opens and your eyes fly to it. A fox-hybrid thing walks in and looks around the room, and it takes a while for you to recognize him. However, Schlatt does so before you do. As he stands up, his hand still bleeding and almost stepping into some shards and close to tripping again, he approaches the confused fox and puts his non-injured hand against the boy's chest.
"Hello there, Furry!" he shouts a little too loud to Fundy's likely, you assume after seeing his ears flattening against his head. Either that or he's frustrated. You have no idea, your mind is extremely fucking gone right now.
"What the fuck is happening here? Y/N, you do realize that Tommy thinks you've left, right?"
You sit up right, looking at your bare feet and pointing at your shoes, which are lying behind the shards. "Give me my fucking shoes, Fundy," you tell him. "I'm not going to bleed to death tonight yet!"
"You got them drunk?!" Fundy shouts at Schlatt, who simply laughs at him. Meanwhile, you're too busy trying to not fall over while standing on your two unstable legs. The loud voices of the two arguing takes over your mind and you take off the socks, grabbing the bottle in your hands. You look up, seeing that Schlatt is about to throw fists with Schlatt, before looking back at your bottle.
"...why I've never eaten out of a Pringle can anymore." You're now sitting at the bar, a lot of papers in front of you with all kinds of words on it. You're not sure what the fuck you or Schlatt have been writing, but it seems like a mix of poetry and movie scripts. Out loud, you read the last words that you've written down, even if it's so incredibly hard to read it.
"Skiddy skiddy skiddy skiddy."
Schlatt looks at you with a raised eyebrow, leaning over a little and almost falling off his chair. "What the fuck? I thought you were making a script for a movie based on some bitch in Greek mythology?"
"I was? How the fuck did we get on these chair properly?" When you look at your hands, you find them to be covered with blood and red and white fur. Fuck. Another blackout. Is this normal? Of course, it's not normal, but considering the circumstances? "Did we kill Fundy!?" you squeak, and Schlatt laughs, grabbing his pen and writing something on his paper which you can't read because of how messily his handwriting has gotten. And because you're still seeing blurry and maybe even double.
"No, we didn't kill him."
"Then why do I have his blood on my hands!?" Tears start getting out of your eyes and honestly, you feel terrible. Why? Who the fuck knows!? You're a mess and don't have any control over your body anymore, let alone your feelings!
"Mine! You pulled that glass shared out of my hand, remember!?" he shouts.
"And what about his fur, huh?! Did I just skin a fox alive!?"
"What, no! You petted him. Or pet him. Whatever the right word is."
"Why?"
"I can't remember." You look around the bar, seeing that there are more drops of blood on the floor and quite some fur on the couch. On the wall near the door, is a splatter of your drink, with more glass shards on the floor underneath it. You must have thrown the bottle there, for whatever reason. Or maybe Schlatt had. It kind of freaks you out that you can't properly remember and right away, you feel your heart beating in your chest faster and your breathing getting out of control as well. That's when you remember your cat.
"Is that all of Fundy's?" you ask Schlatt, still stressed out that you can't remember what the fuck happened in that time, but Schlatt simply shrugs.
"Yeah."
"My cat always moults a lot more when he's stressed," you then manage to let out, hoping that something – anything – comes up when trying to recall those memories, but Schlatt shrugs.
"So?" he asks and you hit him angrily, causing him to fall off the chair with another bang. You're still thinking too much about what happened – or what you did – to Fundy, but something else that catches your eye, causes you to forget all about it.
"What the fuck is this?" It's a small notebook. Many of the pages are written on. Sometimes it's just rambling. Other times, it seems to actually have meaning. On some pages, many penises have just been drawn amongst other things. But that's not even what really catches your eyes. Oh no. The first pages are the ones that you're the most curious about. It's obviously Schlatt's handwriting, but a lot more controlled and pretty. Schlatt looks up, still lying on the ground, and immediately shouts.
"No! Give that back!" He tries standing up and reaching out to grab it back from you, but you only have to push him a little and he stumbles over already. Meanwhile, you read it. A mix of a venting and poetry.
The two lights shine at the end of the tunnel
The tunnel that only I could describe as guilt and agony
I have lost myself
And the few things in life that mattered
The glass that cut our skin and the knives with which I cut out my eyes
I only wish that the loss of my eyes would erase those images in my head
It's haunting me
I can't get it out of my head, it's just there
Always there
I thought that I would put myself back together perfectly and that everything would be the same again, but I should've known that every single stone carries a scar of its past with it and that it is impossible to erase what has already happened
And now I'm simply putting myself through this immense suffering
I just wish that I could turn back
Go to a universe in which it never happened
It was an accident, I swear
Please forgive me
Schlatt hasn't even tried to stop you after you pushed him over. You look at him confusedly, putting the notebook on the table and feeling tears enter your eyes for no reason. Why? Why are you feeling like this? "Don't tell anyone, especially not-"
Schlatt and you are sitting at the bar. Again, you must have had a blackout, but you very easily feel where the tears have fallen. You're crying and you don't know why. As you glance over at Schlatt, he simply looks at you with eyes that you can't recognize. Maybe it's a sense of familiarity? You don't know. But he chuckles. "How easy it is to kill a partner, huh? Welcome to the club, Y/N. The club of terrible people." You're not sure what to think of it and for some reason, you feel like you and Schlatt are the only sober people in the world. You're both extremely drunk and just absolutely fucking wasted. Yet, it seems for a moment like he's the only reasonable person in the world. It's hard to remember he has the status he has, huh?
"What happened? I can't remember anything after you telling me not to tell anybody."
"You started talking about Sally," he answers right away and that's when you feel your heart break in two. Fuck. Fuck. Fuck. "Don't worry, I won't tell anyone. I wanted to use it as blackmail material first, but I'm not that bad of a person."
"I find that hard to believe."
A silence falls between you two for a moment and you want to laugh and cry and scream and punch and do everything all at once. Fuck. What have you done? You thought that maybe this would help you relax and calm down, but instead, you're just feeling more miserable than ever. More tears fall down and Schlatt simply remains silent. You can feel him growing impatient, but you feel his eyes burn into your skin. Yet, you don't care. Why would you care, anyway? "You know, everybody is a terrible person in the end," he eventually speaks up, his voice sounding so distant yet so close. "Wilbur, Tommy, Dream, they're all horrible people, you know? You know what the difference is between them and us? We can admit that we've done wrong. While we do bad shit, we at least have the balls to admit that we're absolutely evil, which a majority of the people don't. They'll always make up excuses for themselves. 'I do it for the good' or 'it was just a joke' or 'I didn't do it, you're judging me' or 'you're making it seem bigger than it is', but in the end, those are nothing but excuses. But we don't excuse our actions, you know? We just do them and then face the consequences afterwards." He stutters a lot throughout it, but you're not sure whether it's because of nervousness or because of the alcohol.
"Consequences? What consequences have either of us faced? It's not like we went to jail or anything," you snarl and he simply chuckles, although it's filled with mere emptiness.
"We. We are the consequences of our own actions. The guilt of our actions is slowly eating us up inside, otherwise neither of us would be sitting here right now talking about it. I mean, nobody other than you has seen that page, Y/N. And I don't think you're going around telling everybody about what you did. Neither of us have been caught. We're not facing shame or anything, since nobody thinks differently of us yet, or at all."
"Quackity knows, so how the fuck do you know that I haven't been dealing with shame, huh?"
"Has Quackity been treating you any different?"
You fall quiet. "No," you eventually sigh and he nods.
"Exactly. As much as we're assholes, we still have regrets. I mean, look at me! It's not like I'm not responsible for multiple deaths, but I can't save everyone. I mean, I'm the only reason this city isn't crumbling yet, because it's not like the leaders are doing anything about it. When I die, this city will die with me. I'm killing myself while trying to keep this place together, knowing fully well that it's going to fall down like the Roman Empire. I'm an asshole. I have very little morals. But at least I can look myself in the eyes and admit that every single bad thing happening to me is a simple consequence of an action I committed in the past. Even if I try to chase it away with alcohol or drugs or cigarettes or whatever, I know that that's extremely fucking useless. I'm a terrible person, Y/N. And I don't even know what I'm rambling about right now, but I'm a fucking wreck and I'm doing what needs to be done to at least do something not extremely terrible."
"I have not listened to a single word you just said," you admit, knowing fully well you zoned out only at the last part and Schlatt grumbles.
"Fucking Hell, you're terrible company." You look over at him and he mumbles. "You remind me of myself and I don't know if that's a good thing."
"Schlatt? Tubbo is your son, right?" As soon as you ask it, his eyes fly towards you quickly and furiously.
"Don't fucking remind me of him. I'm not here to talk about him and I'm not going to."
"Come on, Schlattie Pattie. No one else is in this room, you can tell me everything. Tubbo is too old to be your child, yet he has too many similarities to you not to be family. So, what is he? Is he like your little brother?"
"Does it fucking matter?!" he screams and you let out a disappointed sigh, standing up from the chair. Your legs feel like jelly and you almost fall down, yet manage to regain your balance anyway.
"Am I not allowed to be curious?" you taunt and Schlatt also stands up, but he doesn't seem to be as balanced as you are, and next thing you know, Schlatt falls right on you on the floor.
Yet, when you open your eyes, you find yourself walking through the halls of the building at DeMeter, not being able to walk in a straight line at all, but a hand on your back guiding you a little. Another blackout? "The fuck just happened?" you mumble, when you hear an all too familiar voice speaking next to you. Instead of J. Schlatt, you realize it's Dream's.
"It already got late and I realized you had neither gone home or gone to a guest room, so I decided to check up on you, when I found you in the bar, with Schlatt lying on top of you." Dream doesn't look at you and you find it hard to focus on him, the world going in circles around you. "When I saw that, I decided to go to you and help you out. I had to get you out of there, Y/N. It was for your own safety. Schlatt is not a good man and he has not good intentions." You're too confused to process any of his words, your head being too much of a mess for you to really think of anything. You want to argue with Dream, but simply can't find the willpower too. As you groan, you wonder if this is going to worsen your symptoms even more. Is it going to mess with your medication? You don't think it will, but you have no idea. Dream seems to notice your odd behaviour though, independently of you being under the influence of alcohol. "It's going to be okay, Y/N. You're healthy. Any more drinks and it would have been more likely for you to suffer from symptoms of alcohol poisoning."
"I hate myself," you blurt out and Dream stops walking, causing you to almost fall over as you just continue walking when you see the familiar door of your guest room. Dream just stays in his place and you open the door, feeling an oddly familiar feeling overflow you once you see your bed. Sure, it's all looking weird and shit, but at least you're back.
"Y/N," you then hear Dream behind you starting, after he's taken a few steps closer, but you interrupt him right away.
"It's okay, Dream. Really, it is. I hate myself and that's just how it is, how it'll probably always be."
"But," he starts again, but you look up at him and smile at him, but you're not sure what emotion is hiding behind it.
"I don't care how much you love me and how amazing you think I am. Because I don't agree. I don't think the same and that's just the way it is. Your opinion about me doesn't change the way I feel. So, please, don't try to convince me otherwise. I've learnt how to live with it by now, so I guess I'll just live with it a bit longer, you know?" When Dream doesn't answer, you laugh again. "Good night, Dream." With that, you close the door and walk to the bed, finally feeling good enough to sleep in the building of the company, and who knew that all you needed for that was so much alcohol that you could almost get alcohol poisoning?
You lie down and crawl under the blankets, barely having any of the energy to do anything else. So many thoughts pop up in your head. So many impulses. But you're too tired. You just want to sleep, nothing else.