Late night horrors

I'll explain what this piece is a bit later... first, I'll tell a story >:]

//-//-//

Way before Carl finally accepted taking up his proof-reading shift, Nathan was the tall n' twisted figure roaming the halls of the news department... a local cryptid feeding his tired self with cups of coffee and some irritated sarcasm. It wasn't the first time he had pulled all-nighters because of his long shift, and little by little, those habits had eaten away a good chunk of his own sanity.

And like having his own fair share of illusions in his daily life wasn't enough, the coffee needed to make him see things too... long and boiling tentacles and sharp claws began to spill out of his cup, while screeching noises were coming out of it. Nathan could even believe the coffee was calling his name...

But reality snapped upon him. "That isn't real, is it...? I've never seen a creature like this one before, my head must be messing things up- OUCH?!! WHAT THE- ACTUAL COFFEE!!?"

Everything was still really confusing, but it didn't take long for N to realize he had to run. A LOT. The caffeinated beast was full of energy, and tirelessly chased him all over the place, from the press to the actual studio setup. He couldn't run as much... his vision was getting hazy and blurry, and his legs were turning into jelly because of how tired he was. He pretty much gave up on escaping once he reached the office storage room, where all he could do was grab a broom and try to kick that monster's butt with it.

"Just admit you wanted me to hold a broom in the most awkward manner possible, you-" FINE NATHAN, FINE! You won :'7 Now, can we please go back to the story?

"... sigh, fine, go ahead. It can't just end with the broom part, after all."

So, Nathan hit the creature's chest, but the coffee's heat melted the broom's head, leaving him with a distorted broomstick... now what? What could he use against it?

That's when he remembered the whole pile of teas a certain someone (and a bunch of other people) had given to him, and an evil idea popped in his head: "If this is all in my head, what if I knock myself down... to sleep?"

In a final sprint, he made his way to the coffee break room and boiled some water and tea in a kettle as fast as he could. In a matter of minutes, he was surrounded by the tentacles, who were drawing nearer and nearer every second. He chuckled, and turning his back to face the monster, he said with a maniacal face:

"Goodnight, you caffeinated freak!" He took a great sip from the tea and tossed the rest inside the kettle on the coffee itself, which died down in a mix of sad screeches and screams of pain.

"That's it... I... actually did it... goodn i g h t" - Nathan said, closing his eyes and slowly tumbling to the ground. And the next day, he managed to successfully freak out Ellie when she saw the whole coffee n' tea mess and him on the floor.

//-//-//

Alrighty, guys! NOW I'm going to explain why the heck I made this piece xD

I've been meaning to make a fanart for TubesAnn for a while already (I just wanted to say thanks to all the drawings, fun doodles n' stuff she did of my charas ^^), and had this one halfway through some time ago, but never got enough time to finish it. My main inspiration for it was a drawing of Nathan in sleep-deprived mode, which even got my brain boiling with a story around him xP

The funniest thing to me was the fact JustPippy (a fellow DA pal and Tubes’ friend) had grabbed inspiration from the same drawing and painted Nathan like that too! I was already working on the drawing when I noticed, and thought it was a really neat coincidence xD

Now, speaking of the technical side of it, I painted Nathan and the monster arms inside Aggie, and the whole rest, such as the background and atmosphere, were done in IbisPaint! I had some crazy fun painting him and experimenting with my style, and can say I'm flipping proud of his pose and body language there lol