Comic #7 is here! Yay! Probably my favourite comic of the whole series, is this penultimate one – it gets into the dilemma of the parent/child thing, and is a big enough comic to do the feels some justice. Building up to a crisis and then atonement of self that I hadn’t expected when I began to write the thing.
Reading it back, in many ways I wish I’d done more full-page renders of some of the ‘juicier’ moments – there’s some great sex scenes sort of rushed past. If I still had those 3D files I would re-render them, but alas once I’d finished OHB I deleted that spaceship setup (it took sooo long to create), because I couldn’t think where I’d need it again considering where the plot goes. Ah well, we’ll make do, won’t we? Nice to revisit this story though, and make some tweaks.
Main tweak was the flashback image of Little Steph being returned to her mum’s apartment – it looked too similar to Anna Smit’s place from Rather Magnificent Family Bubble! Main reason for that, was it was the same source 3D scene from Renderosity; a nice industrial apartment scene you can buy basically setup exactly like that. So to make it slightly less like Anna’s apartment, I’ve now photoshopped the windows a bit and removed the hanging fire … not that anyone probably noticed but for those who did, yeah I wanted it clear Steph’s mum isn’t some sidequest plot involving Anna Smit hehe!
Anyway here it is:
Also, there’s an Easter Egg in here I’d forgotten about; when Mike and the henchman exchange security phrases (‘Nasty Butler’ etc), these are references to some of the things Victor blurts out in STFW! Random Easter Egg but there we go, everything’s connected on a zillion random levels lol.
It’s a shame I deleted this 3D setup spaceship though:
…. it’s take far too long rebuilding that to bother. But heck, it’s nice to look at.
This hits the spot—deliciously well, and I love the cover art!
It’s definitely a very horny issue (or pair of issues from the different perspectives I guess). With all the casual-but-inappropriate nudity, and accidentally-on-purpose touching, the not-really-having-sex-having-sex, and the so-shouldn’t-be-doing-this-but-too-horny-not-to, like you’ve bottled up all the tension and steps-toward-things of Lithium and put it in one issue but maybe more so? And Steph being just super horny in a sort of weirdly innocent way, and Mike trying to be the sensible one but finding himself just unable due to his own out-of-control horniness…and maybe not even knowing what sensible even is…
And then obviously there’s the sweetness and the sadness of it, and that idea of navigating both being horny for someone and really caring about them, and to what extent those things are really coalescing and to what extent you might be being selfish, whether that feeling might potentially be hurting that person you care about with that lust or acting on it at a particular time or whatever, and the guilt that can come with that (whether or not it’s in an incest-ish type situation like this), and then potentially also hurting someone by acting on that guilt…it’s all very messy and human.
So yeah… Agree it’s a standout. Thanks for your magnificent work.