#This is another case where I looked up the quote in English and then decided to forcibly translate my Chinese version back into English
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On Class in Britain and why the same kind of actor ends up getting our panties in a twist (see Hiddleston, Cumberbatch, Goode, etc...)
Isn't it peculiar that all this adoration and fandoms tend to be about white-cis mostly het (thought admittedly that's the more laxed of attributes) able thin, tall, pale but most importantly coming from riches guys?
You look at a Tom Hiddleston and his first headshots and roles and the wonder has got to be there: "how much time and means were available to him to get his degree from Oxbridge and then decide to do another entire BA on top of it at RADA?"
Admittedly he gets off easy going back historically("just" baronets in his line) when in his league we have Benedict Cumberbatch, whose existence is literally dependant on the slavery his direct ancestors built their empire on in Barbados, and were paid compensation when the end of slavery came to England. Finally his Wikipedia has a full description of this even though when I worked on the essay that took the Downton Abbey series and films as examples of the inhumane social divide the UK depends upon, it was all incredibly well swept under virtual rugs with a vague quote from Mother Cumberbatch advising her son to change his surname in case "they come after you for money" where money stands for "reparations" and considering the luxury of an arts career like the last few Cumberbatches have had is something intrinsically entrenched in wealth and privilege makes perfect sense if you ask me. A councillor in New York carries the same surname and she is Black. Slaves carried the surname of those who owned them.
Let that sink in: there is currently a commissiomer (and Professor at Columbia) in New York who carries the Cumberbatch surname because they are a direct descendant of the Slaves the Cumberbatches owned and owe their fortune to. Stacey Cumberbatch.
So yeah, when people think the UK is not the US, they Invented class and the divide that come with it. It is so crucial to come from a family that can afford you connections and the luxury to work for nothing while never risking bills or rent going unpaid.
And I guess what I'm trying to say is: it's ok for all the fandoms to salivate over anyone, I just think it's important we know why the media propels in front of our eyes the same prototype of Englishman over and over, and perpetrates the production of new pieces of media that casually seem naturally meant for white, rich, het passing people.
The system works like a bottleneck for privilege and I think the SAG-AFTRA strikes also show that: everyone that had some privilege and didn't do anything to average out the system will see their own reduced over time until only the tip of the top remains. And "eat the rich" is going to be another post but you get the gist.
That is to say, next time I go to Insole Court (the Victorian house where a Lot of A Discovery of Witches was filmed, including Matthew's "rooms at Oxford") will I touch every single book of the reading room because likely I will have touched something Matthew Goode touched when he was there filming? Sure.
I also do know that house was paid for by coal miners who actually died in a tragedy in the mines owned by the Insole family and that admittedly I find the only decent way to keep real estate built with the blood of people can just be that: give that back to the people.
It's about educated choices, that's what I'm trying to say.
Fun fact: I started watching a discovery of witches because after filming the essay at Insole Court, wanting to bring down the bourgeoisie, I learned the show was also filmed there. So i went and found it and now I have another white, pale, lanky, English twink to lose sleep over just because he's been given a character created by the mind of a woman who dreams enough, possibly because unfulfilled in some part of her life -because when we're happy we go out, we don't vomit pages over pages let's be honest -.
If none of those elegant white British men who embody the characters we love come from a program that allowed them to raise from the working class... or are anything but white or adhering to a white-er standard (Rege- Jean Page is the quintessential example of this, better than nothing but still, my point)...Maybe we should ask ourselves why, and how is that ok.
Just a random though on a day I wanted to go back to Insole Court for the aforesaid reason.
#adow#a discovery of witches#matthew goode#tom hiddleston#benedict cumberbatch#slavery#classism#class issues#downton abbey#white cis het#sag aftra#sag strike#rege jean page#fanfic#fanfiction#fandom#fanfiction writer
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Day 0
I don't like airports. I don't like traveling. And yet, I find myself, once again, in the airport to go to another country.
I'm always really stressed about the trip until I'm past security and the plane is in the air. Then it's a magical void unbothered by time and space where I dive into the world of games, or in this case, draw a million things and then some.
Despite being a mostly empty flight, somehow I scored a window seat with another passenger next to me. He asked to be moved to the row in front so we could each have a whole row to ourselves, though.
I took Japan Airlines for the first time, and their food is okay. Apparently you can get miso soup as well, but I declined each time in anxiety. I'd like to try it when I fly back. I've always wondered if airplane food being bland in general is due to the altitude. Something about higher altitude requiring more salt? Don't quote me on that, though. It's pure conjecture on my part.
I've decided I prefer window seats now. I used to grab middle seats because I didn't really need to leave my seat, and I wanted to avoid getting up to let people out. Then a couple flights ago, two people of larger stature sandwiched me into half of my seat. Thankfully it was a domestic flight, so it was only 6 hours, but ever since I've tried to get window seats instead. If the person next to me decides to spread and take my space again, there's a bit more space at the window. The view is also very pretty.
At baggage claim, the security dog beelined to my backpack. They asked me if I had any fruit or meat products, and I told them there was only a breakfast blueberry muffin from the airport... When I took off my mask later at the hotel, I got hit by a wall of blueberry. The blueberry muffin must have had some really strong stuff, since my backpack still smells like it.
On the plane I was using English, but I told myself to talk to people in Japanese starting from customs. The customs people all spoke very clearly, as did the airport train clerk. I managed to get to my station without too much trouble, although as always I was very scared that I might've gotten on the wrong train.
When I reached the hotel, the doors were closed. I called front desk over the intercom, and a man picked up and said... something.
My mind blanked.
I defaulted to English, "Hi, I have a reservation..."
There was a pause, before the man said, "check in?" in a heavy Japanese accent.
And I was in. He went to find an employee who spoke English, and that person was very polite while walking me through everything. He also answered all of my strange foreigner questions as I looked around the apartment with wide eyes. The appliances still look a bit like black magic to me, but I'm sure I'll get familiar with them eventually.
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11/08/2022 DAB Transcript
Ezekiel 18:1-19:14, Hebrews 9:1-10, Psalms 106:32-48, Proverbs 27:10
Today is the 8th day of November welcome to the Daily Audio Bible I’m Brian it's wonderful to be here with you today as we gather around the Global Campfire and move forward together a step at a time. And we’re here for the next step and that next step leads us back into the book of Ezekiel. We’re reading from the New English Translation this week. And today Ezekiel chapters 18 and 19.
Commentary:
Okay. So, we have been working through some prophetic books for a while now. And, so, with book after book chapter after chapter page after page of what seems like impending doom it's really easy for a subtle shift to start taking place in our hearts about what we think God is like, how our perception of his heart is. And yet we came upon a passage in the book of Ezekiel today where God is speaking about how his heart is on his own behalf. Like I said, it's easy for us to go book after book chapter after chapter page after page that of words feel like vengeance and impending doom and no mercy. And, so, we get this sort of like other side of God. We have Jesus and that shows us what God is like but there's this other side of God that we’re not so sure about and we don't know how to demystify. He’s an angry God and He absolutely hates disobedient people. It's important for us to remember that the prophets are prophesying. They’re talking about an outcome that hadn't happened yet but was going to happen if things didn't change. In other words, the path the people were following was going to lead them to destruction. The prophets come along and flesh out what that destruction is going to actually look like. But it hadn't happened yet. Now, we’re read plenty of things in the Scriptures where the people just continued on their way, ignored the prophecies of people like Jeremiah who prophesied for two decades before the fall of Jerusalem, but he was ignored and then it happened. The sad thing is, in so many of the cases of the prophets these things didn't have to happen. They happen because they were ignored. And, so, indeed we have read of some really catastrophic stuff that happened the Hebrew people. But what does this have to say about God? Well God speaks to that in the book of Ezekiel today and I quote. “do I”, and this is God speaking, “do I actually delight in the death of the wicked, declares the Sovereign Lord? Do I not prefer that he turned from his wicked conduct and live?” Well there’s God speaking into this on his own behalf, which lets us know that the books of prophecy that we find in the Bible are like memorialization's of a time when God could not keep His act together and was so angry and had woken up on the wrong side of the bed and decided that lightning and thunder and smiting the people of the earth was what He was going to do today and this is just all written down by the prophets so that we can understand what a vengeful God, an erratic, unpredictable God we serve. Typically what we find is a very thorough explanation of where things are going and why. And usually, this boils down to a breaking of covenant or a turning to a false lover in idolatry, which is a breaking of covenant. And words like that, words that are mostly found in biblical discourse like covenant, our eyes can kind of glaze over. Covenant. Like whose…whose obeying covenants. Ironically, we all are. It's still part of our story. It's not foreign. It's not a foreign concept even for us in the modern era. We enter into covenants all the time. Mostly now we call them contracts. I mean if you go to a restaurant and you use a credit card to pay for your meal and they bring a receipt back that you have to sign, you’re signing a covenant that you’re gonna pay. All the way up to the covenant of marriage. You're going to enter into an agreement with another person that you will be loyal and faithful to them until death do you part, in sickness and in health. This is a covenant. And using the idea of marriage covenant here or marriage contract here, anyone who's ever been through the breaking of that covenant or has observed friends breaking that covenant for various reasons, bad things usually happen. It can be devastating on families, it can be devastating on lives. It takes years to recover from this kind of stuff. So, if the Lord sent a prophet when the marital problems began, and said if you keep going in this direction, utter doom and destruction are coming upon you. Your family will be broken apart. Your life will never be the same again. Stop what you're doing. Return to God. Repent. Come home. And they don't. And then it does happen, and their lives get blown apart and their family gets ruined. Is it God's fault? Did He wake up on the wrong side of the bed for sending someone to say this is not going to work out. Ironically, the story of the Hebrew people found in the Bible is one of covenant breaking on a repetitive regular interval. The people broke the covenant and served other gods and were disloyal to each other. For God to send a prophetic voice to say this is going in the wrong direction and if you keep going in this direction it's going to blow up on you and here is what that will look like. Is that God waking up on the wrong side of the bed or is that God being long-suffering and continually trying to send warnings of where things are headed. Did God need to send warning messengers at all? Was He obligated to do that? Couldn't the people have just broken covenant and gone on to their own destruction? Because they knew it going into the covenant what would happen if they broke the covenant. So basically, what we find when we’re moving through prophetic voices is God sending a messenger to say hey, we had an agreement and I have been faithful to my end of the agreement. You entered into a covenant with Me. You are eating, you are breaking the covenant. And, so, all of the things, the curses of the covenant, the repercussions of breaking the covenant are headed your way. Destruction is upon you. Turn back. But even if you don't, even if you are absolutely determined to be destroyed, I can't forget you. I love you. I'll be waiting on the other side of this. In the end I will restore you and make all things new again. Come home to me. Trust me. Or how about we take it out of my own paraphrase or my own ill equipped words and just simply read from the word of God quoting the Lord as he spoke to the prophet Ezekiel. “I will judge each person according to his conduct house of Israel, declares the Sovereign Lord. Repent and turn from all your wickedness, then it will not be an obstacle leading to iniquity. Throw away all your sins you have committed and fashion yourselves a new heart and a new spirit. Why should you die, O house of Israel? For I take no delight in the death of anyone, declares the Sovereign Lord. Repent and live.” So, that’s what’s going on here when we read through the prophets. God doesn't want to destroy people because He woke up on the wrong side of the bed. He wanted and wants to destroy the things that destroy people and anything that will seduce people away from God is ultimately going to lead to their destruction and the breaking of a covenant, a pledge. We pledge our hearts and our loyalty to the King of Kings and Lord of lords. Anything that will cause us to walk away from that is not good for us. It will lead to our destruction. And like the children of Israel we'll either listen or we won’t. The choice is ours. It is a life-and-death choice as we've seen several times in the Scripture. Choose life is what we are always encouraged to do in this situation. And, so, if we’ve been afraid that God woke up on the wrong side of the bed and is smiting us maybe we really need to realize that He is trying to rescue us and we are smiting ourselves. We woke up on the wrong side of the bed. We are smiting ourselves by walking away from the only true thing we have in life and that is our covenantal relationship with God. Some things to think about today.
Prayer:
Holy Spirit, we ask that you help us to think about these things today, to re-examine our lives and look at the ways that we've created havoc and then blamed you for it. We are sorry. We don't want to walk the path that walks away from you. That is walking the path of destruction. Forgive us. We stop in our tracks here and now. As you suggested through the prophets, we stop here and now and turn around and come home. Forgive us for what we've blamed you for. Forgive us for what we've done to ourselves. Forgive us for what we've done to each other. Forgive us for walking away. We pray this in the name of Jesus. Amen.
Announcements:
dailyaudiobible.com is homebase, that is where you can find out what's going on around here. You can do that with the Daily Audio Bible app as well. Just look for Daily Audio Bible in your app store and you should be able to find it, no problem.
We have this new resource called Sleep, a contemplative journey and I’ve share the whole story and talked about it and just been surprised at…watch it remain at the number one Christian release still. Like, I’m surprised that it's having such a reach and connecting and…and I'm so grateful. But more than anything I am grateful just to hear people going to sleep and resting well. And I know that that is true in my life as well. So, Sleep, a contemplative journey is our latest resource. It is available wherever you get your digital downloaded music, whatever store, whatever outlet, whatever site that might be where you stream your music you should be able to find it. And, so, check it out.
If you want to partner with the Daily Audio Bible, if the mission of all of us around the Global Campfire to bring the spoken word of God to anyone who will listen anywhere on the planet any time of day or night, and to build community around that rhythm, what we call the Global Campfire so that we know were in this together, if that is life giving to you then thank you humbly for your partnership. There is a link on the homepage at dailyaudiobible.com. If you are using the app, you can press the Give button in the upper right-hand corner, or the mailing address is PO Box 1996 Spring Hill Tennessee 37174.
And, as always, if you have a prayer request or encouragement you can hit the Hotline button in the app. That's the little red button up at the top or you can dial 877-942-4253.
And that's it for today. I’m Brian I love you and I will be waiting for you here tomorrow.
Community Prayer and Praise:
Good morning Early Riser first time caller it's very nice to meet you and I'm so glad that you called in. You called in on November 4th and you were saying that you work at a minimum-security prison and I'm so glad you shared your prayer practice. Such a visual of the influence that we have in our workplace. I remember you sharing about that your work being filled with water. The water symbolizing the cleansing influence, proximity, power of the Spirit flowing through there. And then when you come to work you visualize yourself flowing in there and throughout the place and I really appreciate that. I too understand my presence because I carry the presence of God, the presence of the Holy Spirit within me and everything that Jesus is dwells within me because of the Holy Spirit. And, so, when I everywhere I go that presence, His light radiates every step that I take. And…and as we work and interact with other people as we are sensitive to the Holy Spirit, He allows us to minister to other people. So, thank you so much for calling in. You really blessed me.
Hi, this is prodigal Princess from Massachusetts although I'm more relating with Paul when he says that he’s the worst of sinners. I'm just calling to express gratitude for this program and for the wisdom of God daily, for direction and insight. And I'm calling for prayer. I’m in individual in recovery and learning how to…I don't know…I just struggle with substance use disorder and mental health and I could just use prayer. I'm learning how to work in the field to…to help other individuals and I can really relate with Brian when he read, you know, by this time you ought to be teachers, but I need someone to teach me the basic principles of God's revelation again. I need milk, not solid food. I'm inexperienced with the message about righteousness. I'm an infant. Those whose senses have been trained to distinguish between good and evil, those are the mature and I'm just learning these things. And I've lived wrong for a long of my life and I just could use some prayer as I figure this stuff out and try and live right and according to God's word. Thank you.
Hey guys my name's John and I just need some prayer. I came home on Friday and my wife and daughter had left me. It's been about a week now. And God has really shown me things in my own life and my own mindset and my own worldview that probably been the biggest…biggest factor in all this and then leaving. I haven't really had much contact with her. I'll be talking with her tomorrow morning with, you know, our pastor and a few other people. Please just pray that I would be willing to do whatever it takes to save my family, trust God through this, and that she would be willing to at least try to save our family. Thanks guys.
Good evening, everybody, I'm Timothy from North Yorkshire and England. I wanna pray for the lady who…who ran who called in, called herself Luke 1:47 with fertility issues. Do you know what, my birthday too is on the 11th of November. I was going at 11:00 o'clock but that’s beside…beside the thing. I can...I can understand. We…we…we could not have children. We tried for 13 years and then God gave us our wish. I've been married 25 years now and we have a 10-year-old son. So, Father in the name of Jesus I pray for this family. I pray for the hurt. I pray that You give them strength Lord. And Father God may…may You…may You meet this lady at the very core of her need. Where there is lack You give plenty. So, Father, I pray that there would be healing in her body, that…that…that You will create the most wonderful children for her. Father, I pray that You…that You heal the heart, that You meet her where she is right now in the beautiful, fantastic name of Jesus Christ. Amen.
Good morning DAB family this is Preserve Hope. I am calling it for the man who called on October 27th from Louisiana. I'm sorry I could not understand your name, but you were talking about struggling with sexual desires and you're tired of your battle and you want to start your own ministry. Lord, we pray for this. We thank You that he called in for to ask for prayer. We ask You to deliver him from this and to please give him a mind that is set upon You that is pure and good and that You would eradicate these thoughts from him Lord. Help him to do what is most honoring to You. Help him to be able to do that so he can minister to others and so that he can start this ministry and start a family of his own. We ask for Your blessings to just rain upon him. I wanna pray for June in Maryland who is being attacked…demonic attacks are constant. I pray Lord You would please just…just keep Satan at bay and that she would be able to feel her mind with worship and with Your word and even with Brian’s new Sleep, a contemplative journey. I pray that whatever it takes You would be able to just put things on her mind so that Satan would not penetrate her mind in any way shape or form. And I also want to pray for her co-worker who lost his brother through gang initiation. Please be a comfort to this family. Please use this situation to bring about Your glory and…and Your…and that You would be honored through this. I also want to pray for Joe who you kind of implied that maybe you had HIV and you're feeling exhausted and afraid and you don't wanna die. We just ask for Your healing and Your mercy Lord and that You would be able to help him to be the godly man that he desires to be. And we thank You for…for him calling in. Lord I also just pray for my own husband Kurt. Please bring him and call him and draw him into Your Kingdom as one of Your own. Thank you DAB family. I love you all. Bye.
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day 8 : travel
Today I started a countdown for how many days until I am home. It is too many.
We got up today at 5am so that we could get to the bus station with plenty of time just in case something went wrong. This meant lugging my stuff for quite a while until we reached the train station then on the train then quite a while to the bus.
Getting up was hard but it was a relief to leave that hell hole of a place. Maybe I am just in a poor mood or maybe my American standards of what a home (even a temporary one should be) so I will list my observations and you can decide for yourself.
The first red flag for this place was it’s attempt to be relevant and welcoming to a younger generation. There were posters from Star Wars, quotes about seizing the day and snippy bitchy comments that people thought were interesting for the longest time as well.
However, some redemption could be allocated to the hostel for the South Park poster.
The second red flag was breakfast. Bread and eggs is apparently the European way. Which is fine except I like a variety.
Another observation is how stained all the fabric is. The sofas, the rug, everything.
The biggest issue that I had was the rats. Someone said they had found some in the basement and I thought “well that’s gross at least I’m up two levels” but apparently that did not matter. They managed to crawl into my suitcase and eat some of my snacks. They ate grandma’s trail mix and three granola bars. They had the audacity to not even finish too. That bugged me a lot. Not only was it was a waste but they left a mess. The audacity of some creatures. I at least didn’t come across any poop. Then I might have had a problem.
The wait for the bus was not that bad. I got some groceries at a market and premade pb sandwiches. they were dry but I also got a yummy juice to go with it. this entire time I have been avoiding reading labels but it was definitely more than one serving. But do I care? No. I have earned it.
The bus ride was fine and all. I had to keep moving so I didn’t fall asleep and my legs kept going numb but that is what happens during a 10 hour bus ride. sometimes when you travel in America, things can look the same but staring out the window, I realize that this is not the case here. The lush green was certainly beautiful but it was not familiar. Everything felt different and new and exciting.
We got through passport security for France and that was fine. I got a stamp and they were nice. The worst part of the trip was when we had to go underground. It turns out that the idea of being in a bus in a train under ground under water is a lot to take in when you’re tired and worn out. I was sitting alone so I had to talk myself off the edge and try to just take a nap and it mostly worked. It may not be the best way to approach it but I try to separate myself from the equation and think about how I would take care of someone else and then I do it for myself.
After the underground we stopped at a place in France to refuel and I wasn’t sure where to go or what to do to get to a bathroom so I just followed a woman on the bus and copied what she was doing. I think she caught on but she was very nice. Someday I hope to be that for someone else. I think that would be nice. Then we got back on the bus and headed to Paris. Something that I noticed along the way was that they have a ton of windmills. I couldn’t even count them all and they went on for as long as the eye can see. It was wonderful to see. The landscape was slightly different from England as well. Not as many trees which I thought was interesting.
Something else that I noticed was how much graffiti there is. It’s all over wherever people could reach and they don’t attempt to clean it up. I appreciate it.
When we got to the bus station, we had to wait a while for the other bus to come. Dr. Mack gave us a quick overview of what to expect and how to act. Making sure to start in French to show respect before swapping to English if we can. Also they don’t like big loud crowds which is very difficult for our group already. He also said that we have been so good that they would like to reward us with a boat tour of France which is fun and nice. That will be Wednesday afternoon. The photo below isn’t the river, it’s just pretty.
After we hiked 30+ minutes through the streets of Paris to our hostel. It was very painful. My shoulders were hurting before but they were screaming after. Then we unpacked and my room was just too much so I ended up leaving and finding other people to be by. I like quiet time or being allowed to be quiet in my space but that was not happening in my room.
We ended up getting pizza and it was okay. I’ve had better in America. Then we got yelled at for asking where we should throw away our pizza boxes. She was like “you see that garbage outside? Use it. It’s not going to fit in that one (the one in the store).” I get it. You’ve had a long day. You’re tired of it. You’re tired of us. But honestly, some kindness please? I have learned that they do not care about pedestrians, everyone here dresses nice and I feel so out of place and unwelcome.
Then I ended the night writing and editing but went to bed before I finished all that I had wanted to complete. I am still trying to balance it all.
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For the true story is too heartrending
#the witcher#a little sacrifice#dandelion#essi daven#my art#This is another case where I looked up the quote in English and then decided to forcibly translate my Chinese version back into English#because they had almost opposite meanings?!?#the English quote is 'for the true story would not have moved anyone' what the f#Also this is @herbalina-of-yesteryear 's fault bc they asked for Essi and I was like oh yeah#A Little Sacrifice what a fun story in my memory with pretty mermaid and funny Dandelion#so I reread it#And Jesse Pinkman.jpg#So you're welcome#I do want to draw sth else for the story that's not this tho aklsjdhaskdj#But this idea has been hurting me so I have to share it. I can't be the only one seeing this in my head all the time#book witcher#the witcher books
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Bungou Stray Dogs Dead Apple: “You used corruption, believing in me? How Beautiful.” A “DISSECTION” OF THE SCENE
I mentioned before in one of the posts by @nataliaphantomhivesblog, where we were discussing about the corruption scenes in BSD, that the scene in Dead Apple is my favorite. So, I decided (like any SKK trash) to make an “analysis” of that scene, just to make a point why I like it the most compared to the other corruption scenes (as if this post is the definition of being productive like I’ll just wasting my time rambling here LOL)
I divided this post into two parts. Part 1 is the more difficult one where I am attempting to write some “character analysis”. While Part 2 is more about how the scene is composed (it’s pretty boring. I’m sorry)
I will NOT include the infamous Lap scene (I know. I know. We all love that moment. But I would rather focus on the scenes before that).
Side note: I do not specialize in film or literary critique, so really this whole post is just for fun. Thus, why I put quotes on the analysis. Take this is as my personal opinion where I’m attempting to make sense by making it sound “fancy”.
But anyway. Here it goes:
In every Corruption scene, the thematic notion is always Trust—as in Chuuya trusts Dazai well enough to use his ability so long as he is present to nullify it. It is a very life-threatening process, especially for Chuuya since Corruption, despite being one of the most powerful abilities, can cause self-destruction the longer he uses it. So, Dazai should keep a close watch on him at all times, and then even giving him a sense of comfort to compensate to Chuuya’s worn-out body and for his efforts. This is the same trajectory in all 5 episodes of Corruption, but out of all of them, what stood out the most (for me) is the scene from Dead Apple.
This scene has amazed me ever since I first watched the movie. And while it just shows their infinite trust, the whole execution of this scene evokes more than just that thematic concept. What I see in this scene is something that all of us have already witnessed, but there is something unique in the way Dazai nullifies Chuuya’s corruption, and their dialogue may be just them bantering and yet, their tonality is different. It is as if, we just touched a moment that is reserved only for these two and we just happened to have the privilege to witness it. In other words, there is a sort of familiarity (or intimacy) and gentleness going on at this very moment—it is cathartic. This is what I want to look into—like how did we come to this?
PART 1: His Proper Partner.
In the Japanese version, ever since the episode where Chuuya made his first debut, they call themselves “aibou” (相棒), referring to a one-on-one partnership. While “nakama” (仲間)can also refer to a partner, it has a different connotation in which the closest English equivalent of that term would be “comrade” or “acquaintance”. The closest English equivalent of “aibou” is, to no one’s surprise, “partner” (or “pal”). And it makes sense, considering that the first kanji (相) can mean “mutual”, “together”, or “each other”. So, to have Dazai and Chuuya referring to themselves as that, it just manifests their familiarity on each other.
And in their case, their “familiarity” is both their advantage and disadvantage. It is a “disadvantage” because they use it to get on each other’s nerves (both in comedic and serious situations).
However, it also serves to their advantage, especially when they have to cooperate in the battlefield. This comes into light in the Lovecraft Episode where they executed Operation Shame and Toad—Chuuya acknowledges Dazai’s tactical mentality, whereas Dazai (as he referenced Chuuya’s mastery in martial arts) let’s his partner do the grunt work. Interesting enough, this is the same episode we first see Chuuya’s Corruption (but not the first time he uses it).
Using Corruption stipulates that “familiarity”, especially in Dazai’s part who has to be present to monitor Chuuya’s physical state, therefore he is aware, not just the consequence in using Corruption, but also of Chuuya’s limit. This explains why Dazai declares that he is aware of Chuuya’s moves and “breathing pattern”, otherwise, as what he himself says, he “won’t be a proper partner”.
What is witnessed in the Lovecraft Episode is the standard protocol that Soukoku uses when they are at their last resort. So, it is not a surprise that we get to witness Chuuya using Corruption, again, when he saves Dazai in Dead Apple, except it is done differently.
Even though Dazai is ten steps ahead of the enemy, the situation is still risky and even more complicated in Chuuya’s part since he is using his ability WITHOUT Dazai present. And that he has to save Dazai first before he can get it nullified. With that being said, it requires a careful approach, one in which they know the other’s moves—Dazai knows too well how Chuuya would react. For instance, the manga version of Dead Apple demonstrates how Soukoku communicates in their operation using “codes”. As such when Dazai got himself kidnapped, no one knew about his whereabouts until Hirotsu mentions about Dazai buying a microscope (to which it leads them to a dead end). However, Chuuya—upon remembering that Dazai teases that he needs a microscope in order to see him—demands to see that microscope, breaks it, and finds the transmitter. It is a well-planned strategy in Dazai’s part where all it takes is to leave helpful clues for Chuuya to pick up and catalyze the operation. In the Dead Apple movie, he does it again:
Indeed, for the audience, it is not new to see Dazai planning ahead and having ulterior motives behind his actions. It is not new to see Chuuya executing his plans and understands his motives either. But seeing these two working together despite those four years of absence, and without physically communicating is beyond human comprehension. Almost like the microscope scene, Dazai is not there to directly tell him about his plan. Chuuya doesn’t know about the antidote until that punch as his only “clue” is that Dazai is working alone, so he sees that something is amiss.
Seeing the critical state of Yokohama, Chuuya knows that he will use Corruption, but seeing Dazai’s corpse, it gives this uncertainty on whether they can make it out alive or not. And yet, what did Chuuya do? He jumped off the plane and activates his ability, knowing that there is “no time to chicken out” or else Dazai’s plan won’t work, and they’ll end up dead. Even if it means doing the job to protect the city, it still takes guts for Chuuya to work and place his life on someone he “hates”. Despite those 4 years of absence, the scene in Dead Apple just manifests that they never doubt each other’s capabilities. And to further validate this, let’s check out their dialogue:
Dazai: You used Corruption, believing in me? How beautiful.
Chuuya: Yeah I did. I believe in your disgusting vitality and craftiness.
Dazai: That was a somewhat violent way to wake up Snow White.
Chuuya: Tch. You’re the one who hid an antidote your mouth knowing I would punch you.
Not only does this scene perfectly parallels to the Lovecraft episode where we see Soukoku bantering while still in a critical situation, it also emphasizes the degree of their trust and how that trust has taken root from their familiarity.
Dazai: You used Corruption, believing in me? How beautiful.
Chuuya: Yeah I did. I believe in your disgusting vitality and craftiness.
Dazai’s first line is the main idea of their partnership, echoing Chuuya’s quote from the Lovecraft episode: “I used Corruption because I trust you”. This is a vital aspect in their relationship since it has been stated before in Fifteen and Stormbringer that “no one has trusted Dazai”… until Chuuya comes into the picture. Ever since their first teamwork against Rimbaud, Dazai finally has someone he can rely on both in strength and assurance, even smiling at the fact that Chuuya doesn’t even deny his proposal but merely asks for his reason.
With that being said, then it is appropriate for Dazai to say that line, touched by the idea that Chuuya still constantly trusts him. It just reminisced so much from what they have as children that it seems to this day, they never forgotten about it.
On the other hand, in Chuuya’s end, he confirms that trust and provides a reason, which is appropriate since Chuuya is Dazai’s “reason-living” like in Fifteen:
Chuuya’s line—“I believe in your disgusting vitality and craftiness”—is very similar in the excerpt from Fifteen, and this just shows how that line from the movie indicates his familiarity to Dazai. By “familiarity”, I mean that he knows his partner’s mental process and motives (as I have mentioned above). In this case, it seems like Chuuya has seen something that he and Dazai have in common: the desire to live. Of course, the latter always craves for death, but with his new viewpoint on Death, his mission in fulfilling Oda’s wish, and the fact that he is tethered to someone who wished to live, Dazai just couldn’t die. And Chuuya, being his constant companion, knows this. This is why Chuuya “believes” that whatever plan Dazai has on mind, it will always work, and in the scenario in Dead Apple it starts by taking a leap into Corruption—which is ironically, the very thing that could kill Chuuya, and by extent, would cause Dazai’s death if the plan is not well-thought or if they don’t work together. By referring to his “vitality and craftiness”, Chuuya is acknowledging his familiarity on Dazai, admitting their “rotten relationship”, and justifying his trust on him.
Dazai: That was a somewhat violent way to wake up Snow White.
Chuuya: Tch. You’re the one who hid an antidote your mouth knowing I would punch you.
Another interesting thing I find in the dialogue is Dazai’s line: “That was a somewhat violent way to wake up Snow White”. Fans think that this is Dazai flirting, where he is implying that he wants to be kissed by Chuuya the same way the prince does to Snow White. For me, I think this little dialogue is more than just fanservice since it makes sense, not only in the context of the movie containing motifs of a “poisoned” apple. I think the reference of the fairytale in this dialogue not only foreshadows his “death”, but it also highlights their dynamic whenever they work together with Dazai acting childish and Chuuya knowing that he is actually being serious (or the fact that he cracks some jokes in most Post-Corruption scenes). This is still related to the whole “familiarity” theme that I have been rambling about; as mentioned before, Dazai and Chuuya would use whatever they know about each other just to rile each other up. These moments are generally meant for comedic effect, but these teasing and bickering can serve as their advantage.
Similar to the microscope scene I have mentioned, Dazai makes that microscope comment seem like a childish joke on the surface, however, Chuuya picks this up as a clue and sees his real motive. This kind of synergy is seen again in the prologue of the movie where Dazai jokes about Chuuya getting hit by bullets when he is in close range of the enemy, and yet, the latter takes it as a warning that an ability-user is nearby. We really don’t know if Dazai leaves a Snow White-related clue for Chuuya before the events in Dead Apple (it would have been pretty cool tho), but that dynamic in the microscope incident and prologue is very similar to that dialogue we see in the movie: Dazai is being playful, but Chuuya sees and calls out his ulterior motives. This is how Soukoku works!
PART 2: The Art of Catharsis
The relationship of Soukoku in the battlefield is one of the best teamwork we have seen in the anime. Both parties are synchronized in the way that Dazai’s brains and No Longer Human, and Chuuya’s fighting skills and Corruption perfectly compliment each other. Moreover, we also see the basis of that partnership, and this is something that the creators want to highlight in this scene (in other words, how did the animators deliver this dynamic?)
In my opinion, I think the words “gentleness” and “cathartic” fit in this scene. To start off, before this moment takes place, we have witnessed Chuuya fighting the Dragon.
That scene was intense! Chuuya activates Corruption, generates into pure destruction with him yelling Dazai’s name (despite the fact that he is not supposed to be in a proper mindset). The way this scene plays out is interesting; in the shot, we see the two main figures (the Dragon and Chuuya) mostly in red—which is a very vibrant color—in contrast to the blue and green background. By using the color that pops out, the attention is on them, and it is topped with the amount of action in that moment. Not to mention, the background music, containing a rock music and a rap, elevates that energy. It is a scene that heightens the adrenaline, so the audience can empathize with Chuuya—understanding him as a character that is full of life, and also his hastiness to kill it before he runs out of time.
When that fight is over, we notice that the music alters into a string orchestra. This is a very good change because the tempo is slower—a direct contrast to the rap music—as if it is slowly bringing the audience down from the hype in the fighting scene the same way Chuuya slowly goes down and hovers Dazai’s body. The music immediately stops right on cue when the punch happens, then the audience is left in silence. Usually in films, silence is used for the purpose of anticipation. In this case, the anticipation is placed on whether Chuuya’s punch and/or the pill worked and saved Dazai.
The transition from the white background into a blue background should indicate that Dazai is alive. And yet, the animators did this subtly rather than showing Dazai’s face (like in Season 1 episode 1), just so the audience is still in the state of anticipation (add that with the white noise in the background). Furthermore, there is a fairytale quality in that shot, like this is similar to when Sleeping Beauty (in this case “Snow White”) wakes up, that’s when the colors in the castle come back.
Getting close to that iconic shot, I love how the animators keep the “camera” in the same place (Chuuya’s face), that way we can further empathize with Chuuya by seeing a close shot of his state: he was at his limit! But as soon as the blood starts moving away from the screen, we can see a bandaged hand moving to his face. And then, finally!
Words cannot describe how much I appreciate the details of that scene, especially on Dazai’s gesture. He moves his hand slowly but quick enough to nullify him right on time. Not to mention, he does not just touch his cheek but rather cups it (look at the shape of his hand!). One can say that the gentleness in Dazai’s gesture is the exact opposite to Chuuya’s punch, and this sort of contrast further highlights the catharsis in this scene. In other words, after all of that intensity with the fight and seeing Chuuya’s bloody state, it is relieving to see that familiar hand touching him, indicating that Chuuya can rest. And seeing that we witnessed and empathize with him, we know what it feels like.
With that being said, that’s why the third shot above where the hand is fully placed on his cheek and he made a short gasp is my personal favorite. It is the contrast in Chuuya’s face where we can still see “Corruption”, and Dazai’s hand to which he activates “No Longer Human”. I have seen some people complaining about how they want to see Dazai’s face in this scene; personally, I think this scene is animated brilliantly as it is. It is only fair to see a close up of Dazai’s hand to indicate that he is nullifying “Corruption”, after all, “No Longer Human” is works through touch. To top it off, the beauty in “not seeing the face” is more powerful because it leaves more to the imagination—we don’t know specifically what kind of face Dazai is making, but the way that hand moves alone is enough to tell us what he is thinking at that moment. And finally, upon contact, we see Chuuya making a slight twitch—this is when Corruption recognizes No Longer Human and deactivates. This is when Chuuya recognizes that familiar touch and knows that his partner is finally awake, so he can finally rest.
Then we have that iconic shot! Like the one I mentioned above, the camera stays in one place, only this time, it is a long shot, so the focus is on them (thus they are on the middle). Interesting enough, there is no background music in this scene, and we can’t see their expressions. Usually, in this anime, when a character is seen faceless, in order to determine what they are thinking are feeling, the animators would usually make them do a gesture or a dialogue.
In this scene, where everything is silent and their faces “unseen”, our focus goes to their exchanges. Both Mamoru and Taniyama use their “bedroom voices”, and I think it is appropriate considering that their dialogue contains a deeper meaning in regards of their relationship. In other words, as mentioned before, it may seem like another day of bantering, but with their tone, there is something sincere and intimate in what they are saying. Also, the playfulness in Dazai’s comment and Chuuya’s response hits different compared to their other moments of constant yelling. You really don’t need the close up of their faces in order to see that they are at peace in each other’s company.
In addition, the color scheme of the scene is predominantly blue, which makes sense, not just because of Dazai’s ability, but also because it highlights the serenity in the scene. The blue color, the orb, and the bandages that glide silently are animated in a way that they buffer out the red that we have seen back with Corruption, and also indicates a sense of “protection” (which is later seen in the lap scene when Dazai has to protect Chuuya from the fog). In short, the ambiance perfectly fits with how Dazai is there to give Chuuya a sense of comfort in Post-Corruption, letting him rest so that he can compensate for all that he did.
**********
The scene in Dead Apple is something that lies in between of the familiar and the new—we have seen Dazai and Chuuya in this situation before, we know how they function as a team, and we know the level of risk they are taking. But this is something that we have never seen before; like subtleness in his gestures, the softness in their tones, and the fact that these two are in a position where they are saving each other, which becomes part of their instincts. They show how much they trust each other by knowing how much they knew of each other. They acknowledge the fact that their fates are tethered regardless of the years of absence. And finally, it is not just the Prince saving Snow White, but rather: the Prince saves Snow White and Snow White saving him in return.
OK, I just literally fried my brain. If you’ve read this far, I thank you so much for your time! I am so sorry if this is too long. I welcome for any critiques or discussions. So yeah, that’s my ted-talk
#soukoku#bsd#bsd analysis#dazai x chuuya#skk#Dazai Osamu#Nakahara Chuuya#chuuya nakahara#bsd manga#bsd dead apple#dead apple#bsd fifteen#bungou stray dogs#I dont even know if this makes sense#That moment when I said that I can make a five-paged essay of this and realized it's no longer a joke (*ﾉωﾉ)
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The Bad Batch - Quart d’Heure Américain
Summary: In French, we use the expression “quart d’heure Américain” (lit. “American quarter”; I think it’s “Lady’s choice” in English) to talk about that moment during an evening out/ a party where they play slows and couples dance together (very sweet and romantic, yes)
So here is the Quart d’Heure Américain, Bad Batch Edition™
Pairing: Crosshair x reader; Echo x reader; Hunter x reader; Tech x reader; Wrecker x reader; the Bad Batch x reader
Reader description: f!reader [she/her], no real physical description
Word Count: 5463 words
CW/ TW: Nothing, just pure fluff and cute relationships (some established, one not quite yet) also there’s a LIL BIT of someone being sad/ a LIL BIT in pain BUT promise it doesn’t last and it gets all soft
Tags: @loth-wolffe @m-o-o-n-s-g-o-o-n-s @allamarisss
@imalovernotahater @murdertoothpick (if you want to be added to the tag list for future stories/ if you want to be removed and not tagged again, please let me know! )
Notes: This is for you all, because you deserve it and I hope it’ll sooth whatever you need soothed; and here is a quote that quite grasp the concept of this small fic
“Quand je danse, je danse” –Montaigne (“when I dance, I dance”; enjoy the moment and don’t think about anything else)
Crosshair: Something Stupid – Nancy Sinatra, Frank Sinatra (1177 words)
Had someone asked you beforehand, you never would have been able to tell that Crosshair was an amazing dancer. You didn’t expected him to invite you out that night, especially not when everyone in town was speaking about this Dancing Night. But he did, and now he was next to you, moving like he had done it all his life.
“You’re doing great, mesh’la,” he complimented as you tripped on your feet.
“I already told you,” you nodded a thank you when he helped you get back up, “I don’t understand Mando’a.”
Well, you did, but only a few words. You grew used to them, because Crosshair would use them all the time when speaking to you, but never once did he told you what they meant. So you did what every logical person would have done, and asked Tech.
“Well, mesh’la could be translated to ‘beautiful’, and cyare to something like ‘love’ or ‘my heart’. Why you asking?”
“I heard that on the radio, in a song once and I just wanted to know what it meant. Thanks Tech!”
And you had left him as soon as he was done explaining their meaning to you, because the more you stayed here, the more he could guess why you really asked. But you didn’t want Crosshair to stop calling you mesh’la or cyare. It sounded so peculiar when he would whisper it close to your ear as he would walk behind you; “out of my way mesh’la”, “you truly are a lost cause, cyare”. It wasn’t really a lie not to tell him you knew; more of a covered truth.
The song changed and went from a catchy tone to a slower, more sensual one. Crosshair waited for you to come to him before gently grasping your waist, a hand holding your own, fingers folded around yours. He pulled you closer, so close you could feel his chest moving according to his breath. You looked straight at him, trying to decipher his expression, to find any feeling uncovered behind those bewitching whisky eyes.
“Are you scanning me?” he softly asked.
“Maybe.” you confessed. “I want to know what’s going on behind this pretty face.”
It slipped out. You didn’t mean to say that; yes, he had a pretty face, yes you meant it, but-
“I think, about you mostly.”
Ho.
“You’re…pretty.” He sharply nodded, as a way to keep up his facade. You almost tripped over again, so taken aback by his little confession.
“Sorry,” you muttered, “sorry, I- that’s very… very kind of you to say.”
He didn’t say anything, but the grip on your waist tightened. You decided to try it, and slowly came to rest your head on his chest. You could hear his heart beating, muffled by the layers of skin and cloth. You felt a cold spot on your waist, and a hand brushing your hair off of your face, tucking them behind your ear before resting on your shoulder.
You couldn’t yet guess it, but he was craving for more, he wanted you closer to him, wanted to bury his face in your neck, hum your scent and kiss you all the way to your jawline, your cheek, the tip of your nose; and your lips.
But never once did he flinch, or let out any sign of his heart bleeding to feel you so close, yet so out of reach. Instead he held you there, slowly leading the dance, almost silently telling you to “move left, come back to me, and left again; great job mesh’la”.
He couldn’t yet guess it, but you were craving for more. More Mando’a’s nicknames, more gentle touch on your face and body, maybe a bit of appreciation in his eyes, a bit of love on his mouth.
And you thought you could hold on, spend the night glued to his body, feeling the warmth of his embrace, the delicacy of his moves; and still be able to pull out a straight face, to pretend mesh’la and cyare were unknown words to you, that your heart wasn’t racing at the sole thought of getting more.
But you didn’t.
“Ni kar’tayl gar darasuum”.
It slipped out tenderly, purposefully. And this time, he almost tripped on his feet.
“What did you say?”
You raised your head, taking a small step back to look at him in the eyes.
“I said I love you, but I guess my accent sucks a bit. I- I asked Tech about it last time.” You confessed in a small voice.
Crosshair couldn’t even speak anymore. He completely stopped moving, staring at you like you were the only one here, with him.
“Look, we can just…forget about it if yo-”
“Shut up.”
Your eyes widened at the command, and nothing could have prepared you to the devastatingly exquisite sensation of his lips brushing against yours before completely diving in. Nothing could compare to the fire in your belly, to the sweet bite on your lower lip, his teeth briefly pulling on it before letting go; and the overwhelming sensation filling your mouth as his tongue caressed yours in a heated, terribly slow kiss.
None of you could pull away; if he tried to release your lips, you would dive right back in, and if you gasped for air he would barely give you time to breathe before coming back to you. He couldn’t resist the urge to hold you tight in his arms, and you were too afraid of letting go so you firmly held his face against yours.
You felt his weight shifting to the left, then to the right, and once again you followed his lead. You felt it, the uncontrollable grin against your mouth, and the way he spin round with you, making sure no one else but you existed in that moment.
When you finally let go of each other, you were both heavily breathing, and a mutual stare was enough to get you both chuckling like kids.
Yes, you loved him, with all of your heart and soul, and you would gladly learn more Mando’a if it got you that type of enthusiastic reaction every time you did so.
“Your accent is actually quite cute,” he managed to tell you, and your smile only grew wider, and his eyes only got lovelier. “But maybe you should say it again, just in case it was luck.”
“I sure will, but I think I need you to tell me; how do you say it, again?”
He shook his head, both defeated and amused.
“Ni kar’tayl gar darasuum.”
“Ni kar’tayl gar darasuum”, you repeated, and he nodded in approval. “I think I won this round.”
“You did.”
He grabbed your arms and pulled you closer, leaving small misses on your forehead, your cheeks, your nose, and your lips. The song was over; it had been for a few minutes now; but you didn’t care. Crosshair was still dancing with you, his hands on your back, a smile on his face; and maker he was even more handsome when he smiled. You had him, and he had you, and you were glad you said something as stupid and childish, and sincere and deep as this.
I love you.
.
.
.
.
.
Echo: Everybody Loves Somebody – Dean Martin (1168 words)
“Alright, open your eyes.”
Echo’s voice tickled your ear, making you smile. Your eyes had no trouble getting used to the light outside; it was dusk already, and a small campfire was gently crackling a few meters away from the Havoc Marauder. Earlier that day, you made a stop on an isolated planet to get some supplies and land foot for the night. It was a quiet place, mostly villages and beautiful landscapes, covered in grass, moss, and flowers like you’d never seen before.
Echo asked you to wait inside, and it had been almost an hour, but now that you were standing here…
“Is it…Did you do that for me?”
“I’d dare say for us,” Echo smiled, “today is a special day for us, remember?”
Ho.
“You forgot, right?”
“Echo, I’m so sorry, I-”
“Don’t be! I kinda hoped you would, this way it could be a real surprise for you.”
You couldn’t quite tell what about him always got you flustered. Maybe the way he was fondly looking at you, or the softness in his voice when he whispered “Surprise!”, or how he left your side for a moment, bending over the blanket to grab a small package before giving it to you.
“I don’t have anything for you,” you quietly confessed.
“Take it.”
You accepted the gift, giving him another look of apology, but all you saw in his eyes was…something soft – soft and loving.
You carefully unwrapped the paper, exposing a Tooka plush, proudly wearing the colours of the Bad Batch.
“I thought it was more than time for you to have your own.” he said as he got closer to you, a smile glued to his face. “Do you like it?”
You barely nodded, too occupied trying to decipher your gift. The limbs were gracefully mixing a red and black pattern, and the symbol of the Republic’s paramedic had been carefully stitched in white, where the heart should be. You softly stroke it, the tip of your finger following the edges of the seam.
“I.. I love it,” you couldn’t help but smile at the attention. “I’ll call him Handsome Jr.”
“Whatever pleases you, love.”
You shifted you attention to Echo, the lovely grin on his face making your heart melt even more. You closed the gap between the two of you, wrapping your arms around his waist, just above his prosthetics. He held you against his chest, resting his chin on your head.
“I’ll get you something tomorrow, I’ll be up before the sun.”
“I already have everything I need, cyare.”
“Echo…,” you chuckled, “I don’t want you to get nothing. It’s an important date for us.”
“Well, if you insist…There is something you could do for me.”
“Anything, Handsome.”
He waited an instant, savouring your embrace.
“Would you dance with me? The way we did that night?”
You remembered that night. It was quite some time ago, before the Citadel. Echo invited you to the base you were both settled in for the night, on Corusant. His general gave his troopers a night off, and his first thought was to take you out on a date. You remembered the way Fives came up your office, panting, still fully armoured, and asked you to follow him. You didn’t know it at the time, but Echo and some of his brothers were taking care of decorating and preparing dinner.
You remembered the cantina being empty, except for a table with two plates and beautiful flowers in a glass way too small for them; and how every clone you had crossed path with in the hallway innocently smiled at you. They knew, obviously, but none of them made any comment, only wishing you a good night.
You remembered Echo, blacks on and slightly stylised for the occasion, offering his hand to you for a dance. And you repeated the answer you gave him that night.
“Of course, Handsome. I’d love that.”
He took a step back, looking at you intensely, falling in love all over again with the shape of your face, the light in your eyes, and the delicacy of your lips. He wanted to kiss them, so badly, but there was still something to do before that.
A static sound resonated behind you, and a voice emerged from it.
“Not that- The other one, Tech.” Echo threw a look at his brother, who was already changing the station, until he got the right one. He then barely let slip a “Pretend I don’t exist.” before disappearing inside the ship.
“Sounds familiar,” you joked, thinking about the way Fives did the same things all those years ago.
“Some things never change, right?”
You didn’t need to hear the end of the sentence; his eyes were speaking for him. He brought you closer, his prosthetic arm gently pressing your waist as his left hand held yours. The Citadel changed him, but deep down he was; and would always be, your Echo.
“You’re so beautiful, my pretty boy,” you said, stroking his cheek with your thumb. “Some things indeed never change.”
He chuckled and started moving his legs, inviting you to follow his lead. He never really had a chance to dance since he joined the Bad Batch, but tonight; tonight was all he needed. Holding you close, smelling your hair, delicately balancing you on your left, a step back, on your left, a step back…
“Your love made it worth waiting.”
You slowly raised your head until you could look at him. His eyes were shining, wet from the emotion, filled with adoration and fond memories of you both. You smiled, trying to swallow the knot forming in your throat. His hold on you was so gentle, his smile so sincere. You knew he was falling in love with you all over again. You knew, because you were too.
You let your hand slide to his neck, pushed yourself on your tiptoes until you could feel his warm breath tickling your face. He tightened his grip, pressing his lips against yours, abandoning himself in your arms, making you feel like nothing but you mattered.
His kiss was gentle, he took the time to taste you, for the first time, the hundredth, the thousandth; it didn’t matter. Even after all these years, he couldn’t get used to the softness of your lips, the warmth of your tongue, the dizziness in his head and the knots in his stomach when you were confessing, wordlessly, your love for him.
Nothing broke you apart. The sun could go down, the song could stop, but none of it mattered, because all you truly needed was each other.
“Waiting for someone like you.” you finally replied.
“Waiting for you, and only you.”
You kissed him again, taking great delight in the sensation of your pounding heart, of his tongue against yours, of his hand letting go of yours to slim on your waist, down to you hip, finding his way to the back of your pant.
He was all you ever needed.
.
.
.
.
.
Hunter: Ain’t No Mountain High Enough – Marvin Gaye (989 words)
“Everyone, out, let’s go.”
Hunter waved his hand toward the door, a tired, maybe a bit painful expression glued to his face. Hi brothers obeyed, knowing what it meant, and left the room in silence. You tried to copy them, because you knew Hunter was getting overwhelmed by his senses; it happened sometimes, and you knew you couldn’t sooth his pain by remaining with him. But he firmly pressed his hand against your chest.
“Not you.”
Echo closed the door behind the two of you, giving you a sympathetic look before disappearing behind the grey metal sliding. Hunter tilted his head back until it touched the cold wall behind him, letting a long sigh slip from between his lips.
“Could you turn off the light, please?” he barely whispered to you, eyes closed.
You nodded, even though he couldn’t say, and switched the light off. All that remained was the small, dim blue light above your head. Tech had it installed after a bad power cut that lasted three days. Hunted asked for the blue shade, because it was the one which was the less aggressive to his eyes. You liked it, because it nicely highlighted his features, blending his tattoo a bit more with his skin, making the marking look almost natural.
You could hear him, deeply inhaling, slowly exhaling; probably trying to sooth the pain away. After a moment, he opened his hand to you, and you gently took it, slightly stroking the skin on his palm with the tip of your thumb.
“Love you.”
You softly kissed his knuckles.
“Missed you, too.”
His voice was barely breaking the silence of the room, but you still heard him relaxing a bit more.
“Can you hug me, sweetheart?”
He couldn’t bring himself to open his eyes, even if he truly wanted to. He managed to cut off sound and light, because he wanted to focus on your touch, and your touch only. And it felt great when your arms delicately wrapped him, when your body pressed against his, holding still as you listened to his heartbeat.
“Is it okay like this?” you asked, and he nodded, a light smile on his face. “I love you too.”
He straightened up his head, blindly stroking your back, his hand getting lower and lower…
“I see what this was all about.” And the smile in your voice betrayed you, and the chuckle he let out showed you he felt a bit better.
“I just wanted some time with you, sweet thing” Hunter stated, innocent.
“Well, here I am now, pretty boy.”
He finally opened his eyes, taking a few seconds to get used to the lighting, but immediately shifting his attention to you, your face. You were another kind of beautiful; the kind he could hold against him at night when he had troubles sleeping; the kind that could sit on his lap, telling him all about your day while he stroked your hair; the kind of beautiful that he never knew he could have.
He gave you a soft kiss, humming your scent as his lips brushed yours, and you tried as hard as you could not to make it too much for him. But how could you, when he tightened his embrace, humming to you that song you liked so much, when you could feel his warm breath against the crook of your neck, and his low, slightly raspy whispering in your ear.
“From that day on, I made a vow…” a kiss on your skin, “I’ll be there when you want me…” another kiss, gentle, loving.
He pushed himself away from the wall, his head buried against you, singing to you the way you liked it, and it came naturally to you both. He balanced you one side, you came back and led him to the other side, and you kept going like this, following the low rhythm of his voice, barely giggling when he would – more or less in a dramatic and theatrical movement – bend you over like in those holomovies, pressing kisses against your neck, your jawline, crawling his way back to your mouth.
That mouth. Hunter missed it so much, the way you moved it, the softness of your lips, the warmth of your tongue, and the tight embrace as you tried to remember each curve, each spot; barely biting his lip to let you know you were here, you missed him too.
And you couldn’t help but fall in love again when he kept humming against you, when he led your hands to his lower back, a grin painting itself as they slid down the back of his pants.
“I love your heart,” he told you, lips on your skin, “the way it beats. I hear it pumping faster when I hold you, and- maker, I love it.”
He abandoned your neck for a moment, diving into your eyes like it was the first time ever, hypnotised by the blue reflection on your iris.
“I love you, the way you feel under my fingers,” he touched your face with the tip of his thumb, “the way your brush your hair over your shoulder, how you always come back to me when the lights are out and the night is still; I love you and your smile,” you granted him one, tender and oh so caring, “and your eyes, and your mouth. I love how you move your hips when you dance with me, how you crave for closeness, and how I can’t do anything but offer it to you every time, all the time.”
And you knew words couldn’t possibly offer a good answer, so you simply hummed back.
“Nothing could keep me from getting to you, baby.”
He let out a sweet laugh, kissing your nose and the top of your head, seeking for your embrace once again as you led him dancing.
“I know, sweetheart.”
And I love you for that, too.
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Tech: My Guy (Single Version) Mary Wells (1078 words)
You didn’t expected Tech to ask you out tonight. He was usually quite content living around the Marauder, but when you walked next to that clothing shop, something ticked in him. He dragged you in, told you all about the different tissues, how the colours were applied, how the stitches on this dress were obviously done by Twi’leks because you see that little knot? This is a signature from the crafters, more precisely from the members of a tribe that moved around…
You loved hearing him talking. Sometimes you would ask him a question, fully aware of the answer, simply because you were eager to hear it coming from him. And every time, without any hesitation, he would answer with as much precision as possible. He probably didn’t know it, but it was one of the reason you fell for him.
“What about this one, cyar’ika?”
“This one would fit you perfectly.” he had held the dress against your body, bending his back to get a better look at it. “The colour matches your skin tone and the shape would really highlight the curves of your hips.”
“Then I’ll take this one.” You had nodded with a smile.
And now, a few hours later, you were wearing said dress while walking to the counter of the restaurant to order another drink. As the bartender was pouring a blue liquid in a fancy glass, a man smoothly accosted you.
“Were you sculpted out of Kyber crystal? Because you sure bring some light in here.”
“Thanks, but it’s mostly because my cyare chose that dress for me,” you confessed.
“Well, he sure have good tastes,” he took a step back and pursued, “may I ask which one of these…?”
He threw a look at the tables around, and you pointed to the one where Tech was visibly waiting for you, waving when he noticed you looking at him.
“Is it…Is it him?”
“It is indeed,” you fondly smiled.
“Well, at least he got some taste in dresses and women,” he conceded, visibly surprised by his “intellectual” look. But you couldn’t care less, because he didn’t had Wrecker’s body, or Hunter’s features; but he had soft shapes and sweet lips, he knew everything there was to know, and even more, because he loved learning almost as much as he loved you.
You grabbed your drinks and started walking away, only turning around to slide a little “Glad you recognise it” before returning to your table. When you pushed his glass in front of him, Tech gently grasped your hand.
“Thank you for the drink,” he glanced at your body, a little something lightening his eyes, “and for buying that dress. You really are the prettiest.”
“I couldn’t be that pretty if I didn’t have you to tell me all about cloths, you know.”
“Love, you could wear sheets and you’d still be the most beautiful person I’d ever seen.”
You slightly bent over, bringing his hand close to your lips, kissing his knuckles as a thank you. There was a brief silence, Tech analysing every inch of your face, so focused on the curves of your lips and the shape of your eyes that he stopped talking.
And you heard it. The soft music playing in a corner of the room. When you looked behind Tech, you noticed a jukebox, and a few people dancing. You got up, pulling on Tech’s arm to drag him with you to that part of the room. He tried to protest, but the way you moved in that dress, how it fell oh so delicately on your knees… He couldn’t resist.
He grabbed your waist, offering you a soft kiss on the cheek as you started swinging in rhythm, left, right, left, right, and a turn. In a second, you were barely touching his hand, and then you were pulled against him, spinning round until you crushed in his arms.
He chuckled, bewitched by your smile, your movements, and you could tell he only had eyes for you. Truth be told, he was all you could focus on too. Nothing could take your attention off your guy, because nothing could equal his lovely smile or the soft kisses he landed on your lips every time he pulled you against him before letting you spin away in rhythm.
“Cyar’ika, tell me all about dance.” You asked, panting a bit.
“Well, you have to be more precise, because there are a lot of dances out there,” he laughed, and you felt your heart melting at the warmth of his voice.
“Then tell me about all of them. Tell me about this one,” and you wrapped your arms around his neck, breathing slowly to calm your racing heart.
“This one would be a form of slow dancing, quite far from the twists and swings you did earlier,” he confessed in your ear, making you shiver. “but initially it was a- well, it depends of the planet actually, but it was originally a ritual to make official a relationship between different people.”
“So if you danced with someone, it meant you had a certain relationship with them?”
He firmly grabbed your waist, lifting you for a few seconds as he turned round.
“Exactly, it meant you shared a profound bond with them, that you were able to get comfortable with them being very close to you…”, he let you spin away from him, “or very far.”
You proudly smiled at him, letting go of his hand and taking a step back. He understood what you intended to do and grounded himself, catching you up without any problem as you run into his arms.
“Well,” you muttered in the crook of his neck, “I don’t want to be far from you, smart boy.”
“And I don’t want you away from me, pretty girl.”
You lifted your head to look at his eyes, filled with love and appreciation. The music stopped as you filled the gap between the two of you, kissing him with the same energy you had dancing. You could feel him smiling against your lips, carrying you like you weighted nothing until you let go, sliding back onto your feet.
You kissed him once again, a gentler contact, taking your time to memorize the shape of his mouth, the soft touch of his hands on your hips, the smooth tone he used to tell you how fitting this dress was.
Yeah, nothing could compare to your guy, your Tech.
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Wrecker: You Aksed Me To Be Yours – The Tymes (972 words)
You knew the mission was rough when Wrecker struggled to give you a full smile as you entered the cockpit. He was sitting there, all alone, and your heart got tight when you heard his low “hi, mesh’la”.
“You want to talk about it?”
He refused with a shake of his head, visibly upset.
“Do you want me to leave you alone?”
“No, I want you to stay. I- I need company.”
You quietly nodded, offering your hand to him, which he held close to his heart. You kissed the top of his head, softly rubbing his check with your free hand. He closed his eyes for a moment, letting himself rest on the embrace, taking a long, deep breath.
“I’ve missed you,” he whispered, “t’was a long day without you.”
“I’m here now.”
The remark made him smile a bit, as he realised that you were indeed here with him. He pulled you closer to him to hug you, straightening in his seat so you wouldn’t have to bend too much to snuggle in his arms.
“You smell good. You always smell good, it’s amazing.”
You slightly blushed, letting out an amused sigh. Even when things went wrong, he always found something positive to comment on. People usually looked at him as the “big dummy”, but you knew how sensitive and emotionally invested he really was, under all the muscles and loud exclamations.
“Do you think we could, like…get up for a bit?” he asked, hesitant.
“Sure, everything’s fine?” You let go of his grip and helped him get up. He wrapped his arms around you, resting his forehead on your shoulder.
“Yeah, t’s’all fine,” he murmured, “I just wanted us to stand.”
You rubbed his back, slow movements tracing imaginary lines and shapes against his blacks. He let out a sigh, tired yet satisfied. You felt the upper part of his body move; slightly at first, rocking from one side to the other. When he felt you following his lead, and with the absence of any question or remarks, he marked a more regular pace in his balancing.
You started humming, lips barely touching the skin on his neck, your warm breath tickling him until a light shiver shook his back. You left kisses, here and there, still humming the song you heard on the radio earlier that day. It was a beautiful ballad, something sweet about love and closeness. You found parts of Wrecker in the lyrics, and knew you’d have to sing it to him.
It wasn’t the first time Wrecker did something like that. Usually he would do it before going to bed, or after a long time away from you. He would grip you tight, whispering soft words to your ear, telling you how much he missed you, how pretty you were, how lucky he felt to have you in his life. But this time, you wanted to make that first move.
“I see that love is there, so real and so true…”
You felt his fingers tighten, then relax. The rocking slowly turned into a dance, moving step by step, never following a precise direction. Your voice was a balm to him, healing the wounds no one could see, covering his heart with warmth and love.
He slightly let go of you, just enough to dive into your eyes, scrutinizing the details in your iris, the way light reflected on them, adding to the sparkle they usually carried. You could see how his attention shifted from your eyes to your lips, then your eyes again, and the delicacy in his silent ask. You gave him your most heartfelt smile, and he leaned toward you, kissing you in a tender, desperate way, as if something or someone would come in at any moment and rip you both away from each other.
You let his tongue meet yours, dancing the way your bodies were. His hands left your waist, raising to cup your face and pulls you even closer to him. You held his wrists, preventing him from pulling away, savouring the taste of love coming out of his mouth.
He only broke the kiss when he truly needed to breathe, deeply inhaling and exhaling. You couldn’t stop a chuckle, to which he grinned.
“I know, I know…”
“How do you expect to kiss me if you faint?”
“I don’t know!” he laughed, his nose wrinkling in such a lovely way. You could read through him like an open book, and now you just knew he was contemplating how beautiful, and soft, and delicate you were. “I don’t know, I just want you. I want to hold you, and kiss you, and dance with you all night.”
You pecked his scarred cheek, nodded in approval.
“Then let’s dance all night, and hold onto each other, and kiss you breathless.”
He relaxed the tension in his shoulders, visibly happier than when you arrived.
“Can you sing that song again? I really liked it.”
His eyes gleamed with happiness when you took back where you stopped. You couldn’t tell if you got all the lyrics right, but it didn’t matter to Wrecker. You were here, ready to spend the whole night on your feet just to make him feel better, and it was already working so well. But he never told you so, too content to hug you and kiss you and feel you.
And you, of course you knew. But you played along, because you loved him so dearly, so profoundly that you could spend every night in this cockpit, humming and swinging with him, as long as you could feel his breath on your neck, his hands stroking your hair and your back, his lips pressing against your skin, where he knew he could get a shiver from you.
“Thank you, cyar’ika.”
“Anything for you, ner Wrecker.”
Anything for you.
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I hope you guys enjoyed it; it's really not the angsty stuff I was supposed to work on (that I will do now) but I guess I just had a soft spot for the boys tonight and the songs I listened to didn't help getting over this idea!
#the bad batch fic#tbb fic#crosshair x reader#echo x reader#hunter x reader#tech x reader#wrecker x reader#the bad batch x reader#the bad batch#soft batch#soft tbb#sw writing#mesa writes#the bad batch writing#Soft Hour for the Boys
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Tony Stark and Arthuriana
Coming to you by special request, a very long post about 616 Tony's interest in Arthuriana, with a focus on all of Tony's run-ins with Morgan le Fay!
I feel like I should disclaim the extent of my knowledge here, which is that I still haven't managed to read anywhere near every issue of Iron Man -- at least, not yet, anyway -- so I'm just going by the things I know I've read, and Morgan le Fay's Marvel wiki entry is frustratingly under-cited, so it's very possible I've missed something relevant, but I'm pretty sure I've got the big stuff down. My other disclaimer here is that I'm not as big an Arthurian nerd as Tony is, which is to say that most of my familiarity comes from modern retellings -- T. H. White's The Once and Future King, Marion Zimmer Bradley's The Mists of Avalon, Mary Stewart's The Crystal Cave, Rosemary Sutcliff's Sword at Sunset -- and not so much the usual classic sources on the Matter of Britain, though I've read bits and pieces of them.
(This is because I wanted to read versions of them that were as close to the original as possible but so far have not ended up finishing any of them because, well, that's hard. So I've never read the Mabinogion because I do not know Welsh. I've got the Norton Critical Edition of Malory's Le Morte d'Arthur, which is probably the best student edition if you're looking for something without modernized spellings, as I was. I've also got -- well, okay, it's my wife's but I'm borrowing it -- a relatively recent Boydell & Brewer edition (ed. Reeve, tr. Wright) of Geoffrey of Monmouth's Historia Regum Britanniae (History of the Kings of Britain), which is, you guessed it, in Latin with a facing English translation. I haven't gotten very far in it because, in case you didn't know this about Latin texts, the beginning is pretty much always the hardest, so I gave up and read some Plautus adaptations instead. Anyway, if for some reason you too want to read Geoffrey of Monmouth in the original Latin I'd recommend that one, but I can't recommend any particular English translations because I've never read one by itself. I bet you didn't think you'd be getting Latin prose recommendations in this post. I mean, maybe you did; it is me, after all.)
Okay. Right. King Arthur. Here we go.
We've got:
Flashbacks to Tony's childhood in late Iron Man volume 1
A brief discussion of Morgan's origin story and Avengers #187
Iron Man vol 1 #149-150: Doomquest
What If vol 1 #33: What if Iron Man was trapped in the time of King Arthur?
Iron Man vol 1 #249-250: Recurring Knightmare
Iron Man: Legacy of Doom #1-4
Avengers vol 3 #1-4: The Morgan Conquest
Civil War: The Confession
Mighty Avengers vol 1 #9-11: Time Is On No One's Side
In terms of universe-internal chronology, we know from Iron Man #287, from 1992, that Tony has been a fan of King Arthur since childhood. This is an issue of a fandom-favorite arc which features Tony having a lot of childhood flashbacks, including the famous "Stark men are made of iron" line (in #286) that for some reason MCU fandom decided it loved; I mean, seriously, I've seen that quoted in way more MCU fic than 616 fic. But slightly later, in #287, we get an entire page devoted to Tony's love of King Arthur.
The narration reads: "Over the next few years, I learned as my father intended. Discipline of body. Strength of character. But in what free time I was allowed, I worked my way through the school's library. At thirteen, I discovered Mallory [sic], who showed me a whole new world. A world of dedication to a cause greater than oneself. Of chivalry and honor. And the fantastic deeds -- of armored heroes."
The art shows Tony as a child sitting under a tree, reading a book labeled Mort D'Arthur by Mallory [sic] -- no, don't ask me why nobody at Marvel checked how to spell either the name of the book or its author -- and daydreaming of King Arthur, the Sword in the Stone, knights, et cetera. Just in case you somehow missed the extremely blatant hint that we are meant to understand that Tony's knight obsession heavily influenced him becoming Iron Man as an adult, we see one of his armors mixed in with all the drawings of knights. So, yes, canonically Tony is Iron Man at least partly because he's a giant King Arthur nerd, which I think is so very sweet. I love him. He's such a dork!
(This issue is currently in print in the Iron Man Epic Collection War Machine, should you need your own copy.)
This isn't actually the only reference to Tony as a King Arthur fanboy in this era of canon, either; a little later, in IM #298, we see that one of Tony's passwords is actually "Mallory." (Yeah, no, they still couldn't spell. But it's cute.)
But in terms of actual publication order, this is definitely not the first time we have seen in canon that Tony is into Arthuriana, as I'm sure you all know. I would assume, in fact, that giving Tony a childhood interest in Arthuriana is because Doomquest is one of the most beloved Iron Man story arcs of all time, and that all started at least a decade before IM #287 here was published.
The villain of Doomquest -- the one who isn't Doctor Doom, at least -- is Morgan le Fay. Yes, that Morgan le Fay. Yes, Arthur's evil half-sister Morgan le Fay. Yes, all of this King Arthur stuff is canonically real history on Earth-616. Morgan's first appearance in Marvel, per the wiki, was in Black Knight #1 (1955), which I have not read, and judging by the summary I feel like this is probably just supposed to be a straight-up comic retelling of Arthurian legends for kids; I don't think Marvel really had the whole Marvel Universe in mind as a concept in 1955, so I'm not sure this was meant to connect to anything else. I feel like this is another one of those instances of Marvel discovering that they can write comics about characters in the public domain for free -- like, I'm pretty sure that's how we also ended up with, like, Norse, Greek, and Roman mythology wedged into 616.
As far as I can tell from the wiki, the first time Morgan tangled with the Avengers (or indeed the larger 616 universe) in any way actually predated Doomquest -- it was in an early arc in Spider-Woman (#2-6) and then Avengers #187, which came out in 1979, actually right when Demon in a Bottle was happening over in Iron Man comics. If you read #187, Iron Man is not in it because he's off the team due to his drinking problem and also his accidentally murdering the Carnelian ambassador problem. So Wonder Man's filling in instead. This issue is part of Michelinie's rather sporadic Avengers run, which makes sense, I guess, considering where we see Morgan next.
Anyway, Avengers #187 is the classic issue where Wanda is possessed by Chthon, but what you may not remember from Chthon's backstory (I sure didn't!) is that he was summoned by Morgan le Fay because she was the first person who tried to wield the Darkhold to summon him. As you can imagine, this did not work out especially well for her and her followers and they had to seal Chthon away in Wundagore Mountain, which was where Wanda found him. (The Spider-Woman stuff is only slightly earlier and also appears to be about Morgan and the Darkhold; the Darkhold is not one of the areas of 616 canon I am especially conversant with, alas. It's on my to-read list.)
Doomquest, as you probably know, was a classic Iron Man two-parter in Layton & Michelinie's first Iron Man run that set up Tony and Doom as rivals; Doomquest itself was IM #149-150, in 1981, and then in their second IM run they came back and did a sequel in 1989, Recurring Knightmare (IM #249-250), and then the much later four-part sequel to that was the 2008 miniseries Iron Man: Legacy of Doom, which was also by Layton & Michelinie but generally does not seem to be as popular as the first two parts. They've all been reprinted, if you're looking for copies; I have a Doomquest hardcover that collects the first four issues and then a separate Legacy of Doom hardcover. Currently in the Iron Man Epic Collection line there's a volume called Doom, which confusingly only collects the 249-250 part of the storyline (as well as surrounding issues), because for some reason the first Layton & Michelinie run isn't in Epics yet but the second one is. So the beginning of Doomquest isn't currently in print, as far as I can tell. I'm sure you can find it anyway.
So what's Doomquest about? Okay, so you remember how Doctor Doom's mother's soul is stuck in hell for all eternity? Well, Doom's obviously interested in getting her back, and the strategy he has embarked on is to try to team up with other powerful magicians who can help him out, and he thinks Morgan le Fay would be a good choice, for, uh, his quest. Doom's quest. A Doomquest, if you will. (If you've ever read Doctor Strange & Doctor Doom: Triumph & Torment, you're familiar with the part where he later ends up waylaying Strange for this and they go to hell together. And if you haven't read Triumph & Torment, you really should, because it's amazing.)
So Doom is off to his time machine to go team up with Morgan le Fay and Tony thinks Doom is up to something -- Doom has been stealing components for his time machine from a lot of people, including Tony -- and he follows him and it turns out one of Doom's lackeys has a grudge and wants to trap Doom in the past forever, and Tony gets caught up in it. Now they're both in Camelot. Surprise! #149 is actually all setup; they don't get to Camelot until #150.
IM #150 begins with Doom and Tony thrown back into the past; there's a fandom-famous splash page of them locked in combat, only to realize that they have found themselves in Camelot.
They are then discovered by knights; Doom would very much like to attack them, but Tony, who naturally would be happy to LARP Camelot forever, persuades him to play nice. Also Doom thinks Iron Man is only Tony's bodyguard so he keeps referring to him as "lackey," much to Tony's annoyance. Somehow everyone thinks they're sorcerers. Can't imagine why. The knights take them to meet King Arthur himself, and Tony has clearly had his introduction all ready to go, as he introduces himself in a timeline-appropriate manner, says he's here to apprehend Doom, and demonstrates his "magic" by levitating Arthur's throne. Doom's response is essentially "I'm the king of Latveria," which is, y'know, also valid. So they're guests at Camelot for the night while Arthur figures out what to do with them.
We then have a page devoted to Tony alone in his room, musing sadly about how alien he feels, how he doesn't know if he'll ever get home, how he could never fit in here without his beloved technology. Then a Sexy Lady shows up to keep him company for the night, and he decides maybe it's not all bad. Thanks, Marvel. I guess they can't all be winners.
Doom is using his evening much more productively; he compels one of the servants to tell him where Morgan's castle is, because he's still interested in having that team-up. Then he jets off. Literally. He has a jetpack.
The next morning Arthur's like "one of you is still here and one of you has punched a hole through the castle wall and flown off to join Morgan so I guess I know which of you is more trustworthy." He then explains to Tony who Morgan is, because Tony professes ignorance, because clearly we had not yet retconned in Tony's love of Arthuriana. Tony offers to go fight Doom and Morgan with Arthur; meanwhile, Morgan and Doom have teamed up and Morgan has offered to help get Doom's mother out of hell if he commands her undead armies against Arthur because for Reasons she can't command them herself anymore. So that's a thing that happens.
So, yes, it's Tony and Arthur versus Doom and Morgan. Fight fight fight!
Tony tries Doom first but then decides to hunt Morgan down, and in the ensuing fight we get what I think is Tony's first ever "I hate magic," a complaint that we all know he still makes even to this day.
Anyway, Tony freezes a dragon with Freon (mmm, technology) and Morgan gets upset and disappears, so the battle comes to an end, and of course Doom is extremely mad at Tony because he blames Tony for Morgan not sticking around to save Doom's mom, because I guess Doom trusted her to keep her word? Weird. (Like I said, for the next chapter of Doom saving his mother, go read Triumph & Torment.)
Doom says if he and Tony work together, the components in both of their armors can send them both home. So Tony has to trust Doom. Which he does, because he really has no other choice. They build a time machine and Tony makes Doom agree to a 24-hour truce when they get back, so they can both get home. So it all works out okay, and they end up in the present, and Doom tells him, ominously, that they will meet again. Okay, then. That concludes the original Doomquest. It's fun! You can see why fandom likes it.
So that's all well and good, but you might have noticed that Tony's ability to get home hinged on Doom actually being trustworthy. And Doom was. But what if Doom hadn't been? What if he'd just stranded Tony in Camelot forever As you may have surmised from the form of that question, that is in fact a question Marvel asked themselves, because, yes, there's a What If about this! What If v1 #33 is "What if Iron Man was trapped in the time of King Arthur?"
The divergence point from canon, as you can probably guess, is the very end of Doomquest. Instead of Doom bringing Tony home, he deceives him and leaves him in Camelot. And since Tony cannibalized a lot of the tech from his armor to make the time machine, he doesn't have a way to go home.
This is not a story where Tony comes up with a way to go home after all. He really doesn't get to go home. But instead of drowning his sorrows in mead -- because, remember, Demon in a Bottle has already happened and Tony is sober now -- he decides he might as well just play the hand he's dealt. So with what's left of his armor, he defeats some enemies that Morgan rounds up to send against Camelot. And for his services, he's knighted. He is now Sir Anthony.
Tony acknowledges that he is both living the dream and would also like very, very much to go home.
He does end up having some fun in Camelot; it's not all miserable. But he obviously doesn't want to be there.
So if you're at all familiar with King Arthur, you know how this goes, right? Arthur fights Mordred and Mordred kills him. And that does happen in this version. Except Tony is right there, and with his dying words, Arthur asks Tony to rule Camelot... and Tony agrees.
So, yes, Tony Stark becomes king of the Britons after Arthur's death and he never goes home again. The end. Man, I love What Ifs.
Heading back to main 616 continuity, there is still more of this arc to go. The original Doomquest was only two issues, yes, but it was popular enough that Layton & Michelinie did a sequel a hundred issues later, in their second run of Iron Man, and that's Iron Man #249-250, Recurring Knightmare. (In the intervening issues were Denny O'Neil's IM run, specifically the second drinking arc (#160-200), and then Layton & Michelinie came back and most famously gave us Armor Wars (#225-232). I would have to say that Armor Wars is definitely the standout fandom-favorite arc of their second IM run; for their first one, I think a lot of people would have a hard time choosing between Doomquest and Demon.) But anyway, yes. Recurring Knightmare.
Recurring Knightmare is... well, the best way I can describe it is "a trip." It is definitely a sequel to Doomquest, and it is also definitely not a sequel you would ever have expected to see for Doomquest.
Much like #149, #249 is pretty much just setup. Fun setup, but the big action is in the next issue. We open with Doom in Latveria, on his throne, pondering which of his servants he should have disintegrated. Anyway, he's just hanging out there when a mysterious object appears. In California, Tony is suited up and entertaining the crowd at a mall opening when the same object also appears! He takes it to his lab. Please note that this is after the Kathy Dare incident, so Tony is still recovering and is walking with a cane. Doom sees on the news that Iron Man has found the same object, which cannot be carbon-dated, and he shows up at Tony's house. He criticizes Tony's taste in art.
Anyway, Doom basically orders Tony to work with him. Tony refuses, and then Doom sends some robots to attempt to steal Tony's version of the object because he thinks if he has them both he will be powerful. Doom manages to steal it, and when he puts the pieces together, both he and Tony disappear.
So where do they go, you might ask? Camelot?
Not exactly. The future! There is a great callback to the Doomquest splash page.
It turns out they are in London in 2093. Merlin brought them there. Tony still hates magic. And in the future, King Arthur is still there, except he is now a child, because he has been reborn. But he does remember Tony from Doomquest, at which point Tony kneels. Doom, of course, is not impressed. He asks why they have been brought to the future.
The answer is that things are going wrong in the future. If you do not personally remember United States politics in the 1980s, I need you to google the words "Strategic Defense Initiative" right now. I'll wait.
Back with me? Okay, so this is a future where Reagan's Star Wars program actually happened the way he wanted it to, and the satellites are still hanging around the Earth in the future and messing everything up, and Arthur and Merlin need Tony and Doom's help to stop them. Doom once again flies away with his jetpack, of course.
Tony is game to help, but he's not in an armor that can stay in space for long. This is when Merlin takes him and Arthur to the mall and Tony manages to get everything to upgrade his armor at Radio Shack. You see what I meant about this issue being weird.
Tony is out in space trying to disarm the SDI platform, which is where he runs into his future descendant, Andros Stark, who is in armor you will probably recognize from Iron Man 2020. He is referred to as "the resurrected spawn of Iron Man 2020" so I assume he's actually directly related to Arno rather than a direct descendant of Tony; Wiki confirms that Arno is his grandfather. This is all from way before Arno was contemporaneous with Tony in canon. Anyway, he's fighting Tony.
Oh, by the way, Future Doom exists. Future Doom would like to rule this future Earth and for some reason Andros would like to help him. Meanwhile, Present Doom finds out from Merlin that he can't leave except by magic and he can't leave without Tony, so he is reluctantly on Tony's side.
They need help from the Lady of the Lake, except the lake has been paved over and is now a parking lot. Merlin makes the lake come back and then of course they get Excalibur. Arthur is a kid, so he can't wield a longsword; Doom assumes he's going to take it because he is basically a king, and he's pretty grumpy when the sword picks Tony. Tony then uses Excalibur to destroy the space lasers, and I bet that is a sentence you never thought you would read. It's pretty cool. Tony concludes that magic has its good points. Tony stops Andros and Doom stops, uh, himself, and the world is saved and they get to go home. Also, Doom finds out Tony is Iron Man, but when Merlin sends them back he conveniently erases their memories, so neither of them remember anything about this and Tony's secret is still safe. And that's the sequel to Doomquest.
And if you think that's weird, wait until you see Legacy of Doom.
Iron Man: Legacy of Doom is a four-issue miniseries from 2008, also by Layton and Michelinie. Even though it's from 2008, it's set during a much more classic time in Iron Man, continuing on from where we left off in this Doomquest saga. We start with a framing story in 2008. Tony, who has Extremis now, is busy scrapping some of his older armors and reviewing his logs when he suddenly remembers that there was a whole thing with Doom that happened that he seems to have forgotten about until right now. So the whole thing is narrated by Tony in flashback.
Tony's in space fixing a satellite when a hologram of Doom shows up and summons him to Latveria. It's not really clear why Doom needs Tony's help in particular here, but Doom tells Tony that he's discovered that Mephisto would like to bring about the end of the world, which Doom finds, and I quote, "presumptive." So Doom has his Time Cube, and with it he takes Tony to hell.
(Yes, I promise this is relevant to Doomquest. There will be some Arthuriana shortly.)
Doom brings Tony to Mephisto, and it turns out it's a setup! Doom trades Tony for an item he wants from Mephisto, leaves, and Tony's going to be trapped in hell forever! Oh no! (I mean, he's not. But it's quite a cliffhanger.)
At the beginning of issue #2, we find out what the Arthurian connection is, which is that we learned that after the events of Doomquest, Morgan had been granted sanctuary by Mephisto in exchange for a shard of Excalibur that she had somehow stolen. Doom still wants Morgan's help with some magic -- he doesn't mention what it is here, but he says he needs someone of Pendragon blood, and that'd be her -- so he traded Tony to Mephisto in exchange for, I'm guessing, Morgan and the Excalibur shard.
I have probably mentioned this elsewhere, but Legacy of Doom #2 is one of my favorite issues of Iron Man ever, solely because of the next scene. We return to Tony in hell. Howard Stark is also in hell, and he is now a demon, and Tony has to fight him. Mephisto brings popcorn and watches. This is the one time in canon when Tony actually confronts his father, and okay, yes, it's a fistfight in hell and Howard is a demon, but that's comics for you. Howard spends several pages insulting Tony -- specifically insulting his masculinity, but that's a whole other essay -- until he finally insults Maria too, and that's when Tony fights back, because his mother taught him to be good. Honestly if you're a Tony fan I'd recommend this issue just for that scene.
Anyway, we go back to the Doom and Morgan plot, and Morgan casts the spell Doom wanted, which was fusing the Excalibur shard with Doom's armor. Then Doom sends her back to Camelot rather than hell, because he's still mad that she never helped him get his mom out of hell like she said she would.
Tony freezes Howard with Freon -- yes, the same trick he pulled on the dragon back in Doomquest -- and tells him, "You're no father of mine." It is immensely satisfying.
(I had been going to mention that I thought it was a shame that neither canon nor fandom seems to have really engaged with this confrontation, and I know canon never believes in narrative closure but fandom sure does -- and then, anyway, it occurred to me that since the framing story of Tony remembering this is set when Tony has Extremis, there's a very good chance that he no longer remembers remembering it. Goddammit, Marvel.)
(If I got to retcon one canon thing about Tony, I think "the entirety of World's Most Wanted" is up there. I mean, okay, a lot of things are up there, but WMW is definitely on the shortlist.)
Okay. Tony has now engineered his way out of hell, and he's back with Doom in Latveria. Doom has Excalibur. Doom would very much like to fight him. While wielding Excalibur. You get the sense that this is going to be bad. Another cliffhanger!
Legacy of Doom #3 opens with Tony destroying Doom's lab to buy time and running away from Doom and Excalibur. I should probably mention that Doom still doesn't know Tony is Iron Man (anymore), so he thinks he is dealing only with Iron Man, Tony Stark's lackey. Meanwhile, some scientists at SI think there's something weird going on with space. Meanwhile meanwhile, Tony is in a forest taking a breather when a mysterious old man walks up to him.
It's Merlin! Surprise! Merlin wants Tony's help to stop Doom from doing whatever he's doing with Excalibur. The sword makes you invincible and the scabbard makes you invulnerable, so Merlin sends Tony to Scotland on a fetch quest for the scabbard. Doom has now magically sent the sword in search of the scabbard, so the sword flies away to meet it and Doom follows. Turns out the thing that's wrong with space is a thing that's going to hit Earth at the exact place Tony and Doom are. What a coincidence! So Tony and Doom get trapped in a stone circle and fight some stone warriors and then Tony ends up with the scabbard. And by "ends up with," I mean it fuses to his armor. Next issue!
Legacy of Doom #4 is when things really, really get weird. A giant demon made of eyes (???) appears, and this demon is apparently what Doom had been preparing to fight (because it's mad that Doom stole one of its spellbooks), and now he can't, because the sword and the scabbard aren't together. Thanks, Shellhead.
That's when Merlin shows up and says all is not lost. They can defeat the demon... if they put the sword into the scabbard.
"But I'm the scabbard now!" Tony says, uncomprehending.
"Yes," Merlin says. "You are."
Then Tony gets it.
So, yes, Doom has to, um, penetrate Tony. With Excalibur. I love comics. I love comics so much.
So that's a thing that happens.
And then Tony flies off and, I guess, resolves to never, ever think about any of this again.
We head back to the framing story, in which Tony, now having remembered all of this, flies to Britain, buys the land the lake is on, and paves it over, presumably so it will be there for Merlin to bring back in Iron Man #250. The end.
Whew.
Okay, yeah, I know I didn't have to summarize the whole thing, but Legacy of Doom here really is one of my favorite Iron Man miniseries. And I just want to share the love. Please read it. It's great.
But the Arthuriana fun doesn't end there! In fact, now we get an Arthurian-themed arc that actually isn't in Iron Man comics. It's in Avengers! Iron Man is involved, though.
(There is also apparently a Morgan arc in Avengers #240. I actually haven't read it. It seems to be yet another Spider-Woman arc. I get the impression that this isn't really Arthuriana other than having Morgan in it fighting Jess, though, so it doesn't seem quite as relevant. Morgan also apparently has some appearances in FF, Journey into Mystery, and Marvel Team-Up, but those seem like more of just basic villainy. Also, probably not involving Tony.)
Kurt Busiek's 1998 Avengers run, volume 3, is in large part the kind of Avengers run that is a nostalgic love letter to older comics. Heroes are heroes and villains are villains and good triumphs over evil. The Avengers all live in the mansion and are BFFs. I love it. It does assume that you are already a fan of the Avengers, because it starts out by summoning pretty much everyone who has ever been an Avenger and is available to the mansion, and that is... a lot of people. Thirty-nine, by my count. Also, when the entire team is magically whisked away, we are treated to the following narration, as Steve disappears: "And Captain America's last thought, as the world goes white around him, and he with it -- is that Iron Man would hate this."
The narration doesn't tell you why Iron Man would hate this, or how Captain America would know that Iron Man hates this. This is not explained later on. But if you have read comics -- or if you have read the above summary of Doomquest -- you know that Tony is absolutely, one hundred percent, thinking, "I hate magic." And Steve knows it.
The reference is not relevant to the plot; if you don't get it, you'll be fine. But that's what I mean when I say this is a nostalgia run. There are definitely Easter eggs for people who have read a bunch of comics. Busiek does this a whole lot in his work -- there's a reason you can buy an annotated edition of Marvels -- and, yeah, it happens here too. Just know that there will be references you're not getting, if you're new to comics.
Anyway. So Busiek's run actually starts out with an Arthurian arc, #1-4, "The Morgan Conquest." The name is a dead giveaway. Yes, Morgan le Fay is back. Again. For once, Doom is not involved.
The Avengers are all back from their sojourn on Counter-Earth after fighting Onslaught -- don't worry about it -- and mysterious things are happening. There are a lot of monster attacks. So pretty much everyone who has ever been an Avenger is summoned to the mansion, at which point we learn from Thor about some mystical artifacts that are being stolen. (They are the Norn Stones and also the Twilight Sword. That sounds like something from a Zelda game, doesn't it?) The Avengers go to try to stop this, end up in Tintagel, and then they run into Mordred. He wants to capture Wanda, presumably for Magic Reasons. Morgan le Fay casts a spell on all of them, reshaping reality. Yes, all of them. Surprise!
So now all the Avengers are living in a medieval castle and/or town; Morgan is their queen, and thanks to the power of mind-control they are all basically living in Ye Olden Times. The Avengers are all some variety of knight, except for Wanda, who is chained up in the dungeon so Morgan can steal her magic and use it to fuel all this reality-warping.
Wanda calls for help, and that snaps Steve (Yeoman America!) out of the mind control (or altered reality or whatever you want to call it) pretty fast, because Steve's always been very good at resisting mind control, and then Steve promptly goes and snaps Clint out of it, because I guess Steve is also good at inspiring people to snap out of mind control. "Oh, man!" Clint says. "Not another alternate reality! Not again!" (I assume he's referring to Counter-Earth? Maybe?)
So Steve and Clint go around reassembling the Avengers and orienting them as to reality. They get Jan and Monica easily, but then Steve insists on trying to get Tony because, I guess, he likes Tony and would really like to hang around Tony, who is half-naked and asleep in his bedroom, and certainly I am reading nothing whatsoever into this. Clint tells Steve it's not going to work. Tony has historically been fairly susceptible to mind control; it was only pretty recently at this point that he'd been doing Kang's bidding in The Crossing. But the more serious impediment is that this is Tony Stark and he would obviously like to LARP being a knight forever and ever. Tony, therefore, does not believe Steve, and throws him and Clint out of his bedroom and into the barracks.
"Iron Man's a good guy, normally," Clint says. "But he's waaay too into his whole nobleman/lord of the manor trip. That spell musta hit him right where he lives!"
Clint speaks the truth, clearly.
Anyway, they go around and manage to make pretty much every Avenger in the room other than Tony snap out, and attempt to rebel against Morgan while Tony is stil fighting them because he is Still A Knight. There's a lot of punching, because some of the Avengers still aren't free; they weren't ones Steve found.
The day is saved when Wanda manages to channel Wonder Man and break free. This gives the Avengers a fighting chance against Morgan and the Avengers are all lending Wanda their power when Tony finally snaps out of it and is on the side of good.
Then they take Morgan down, go home, and attempt to figure out which of these thirty-nine people should be on the active Avengers team. Hooray.
But that's not the end of Morgan le Fay showing up to screw around with Tony's life! There's more to come! Not much, but there is one that I know of, and at least one more memorable reference.
(I haven't read all her appearances or anything, but one of them definitely involves Tony; I can't swear that he doesn't appear in any of the other books Morgan shows up in, but it'd be a cameo for him, because I only know of one more arc that she's in in a book that Tony stars in.)
In a few more years, we have now entered the part of Marvel Comics history where Brian Michael Bendis writes all the Avengers books at the same time for, like, seven years running. It was sure A Time. There were a lot of word bubbles.
And the thing about Bendis is, Bendis looooooves Doomquest. If you're familiar with the very end of his tenure at Marvel where he made Doom be Iron Man after Tony got knocked into a coma in Civil War II, you have probably figured out already that he likes Doom. But he also likes Doomquest, specifically.
I mean, if nothing else, the giant splash page in The Confession where Maleev redrew the climactic Doomquest fight while Bendis had Tony talk about how deeply meaningful to his understanding of the world this all was -- and how it allowed him to predict Civil War -- was probably a big clue, right?
As far as I am aware, Morgan le Fay makes exactly one more appearance in Tony's life. And that's in Mighty Avengers vol 1 #9-11. Only one of those issues is named, so I'm going to assume the arc is named after it: Time Is On No One's Side.
You remember Mighty Avengers, right? The deal with the Avengers books at the time was that after Bendis exploded the mansion and made the team disband in Avengers Disassembled, the main Avengers book was no longer called just Avengers. Instead, the main Avengers book was New Avengers, and that was the only Avengers book. Then Civil War happened, Steve got killed, and New Avengers became the book about what was left of the SHRA resistance (i.e., Steve's side) after the war. So about halfway through New Avengers, Mighty Avengers starts up, and Mighty Avengers is about an extremely fucked-up and grief-stricken Tony Stark trying to run the official government-sanctioned Avengers team, with Carol's help. This is the comic with the arc where Tony turned into naked girl Ultron. You remember.
So, anyway, there's this Mighty Avengers arc where Doom is Up To Something (there are symbiotes and a satellite involved) and somehow Tony and the Avengers end up in Latveria, punching Doom. Also, by the way, Doom is visiting Morgan in the past because he likes her. The Avengers attacking his castle made him have to come back to the present, so he's kind of cranky. And he fights Tony, and in the course of the fight, his time platform explodes and sends Doom and Tony and also the Sentry to... the past.
This is one of those times where you should definitely look up the comics if possible because the way the past is visually indicated here is that it's colored with halftone dots the way you would expect old comics to be colored, although they have modern shading and color palettes. It's very charmingly retro.
So the three of them are stuck in New York in the past, and naturally they would like to leave. There's one person in this time who has a time machine and it is, of course, Reed Richards. Doom and Tony have a lot of banter in this arc; I think it's entertaining.
Sentry has to be the one to break them all into the Baxter Building because of that power he has where no one will remember him. So they do that, travel forward in time, and end up in Latveria in the present again except Doom is gone and also things are currently exploding where they are.
Doom, of course, has made a side trip to visit Morgan again and he asks her to help him build an army, because I guess this is what their relationship is like. So the rest of the Avengers are captured by what look to me like Mindless Ones and are in a cave in magic bondage, because comics. Jess comments that at least they aren't naked, because she too is remembering that memorable New Avengers trip to the Savage Land. Doom threatens Carol in some creepy sexist ways and eventually it turns out that Tony and the Sentry are fine and everyone kicks Doom's ass. Business as usual.
And the last page of the arc is Morgan alone, wondering where Doom is. So technically Morgan and Tony don't come face to face here, but I think she counts as being at least partially responsible for ruining Tony's day here. And then Secret Invasion happens and Tony has a very, very bad day.
There are a few more Morgan appearances after this, but, as I said, I don't think any of them involve Tony. She shows up in Dark Avengers, apparently, which was one of the post-Civil War Avengers titles I didn't read, and I know that recently, on the X-Men side of things, she's been in Tini Howard's Excalibur one, which I have only read a little of. No Tony there. Just a lot of Morgan and Betsy Braddock and Brian Braddock and the Otherworld.
If you are interested in Morgan's other appearances, you might like this Marvel listicle that is Morgan le Fay's six most malicious acts. I pulled some of the Darkhold backstory from their discussion, but it's not really focused on Morgan and Tony.
So there you have it! That's everything I know about Tony's love for King Arthur and every run-in I know about that he's had with Morgan le Fay! One of two terrible people in Tony's life named Morgan! Actually, I don't think we've seen Morgan Stark in a while. I wonder if he's alive. There should be a Morgan & Morgan team-up. I should probably stop typing and post this.
The tl;dr point is that you should all read Doomquest and its sequels, especially Legacy of Doom. They're great!
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🐰🎩NEW TRICKS🎩🐰
Prompt: Y/N decides to show Mr. Moxley some new tricks in order to certify him that he is still her number one
Word Count: Long
Pairings: Jon Moxley x Reader
Warnings: +18, oral sex (male receiving), angst, jealousy, cursing, praise kink
Tag: @jibbles26 , @bellalutionn
Notes: I’m a sucker for the power that blowjobs hold upon guys. Y’all know the drill loves,sorry for misspellings,english isn’t my first language (bla bla bla),check out my other stories if you’d like to(it would make your girl here very happy 😊) and if you’re comfortable with it,please let me know what you think? Some feedback is always welcomed and appreciated ❤️You can check out my other stories on my Masterlist and my newest story as a fixed post. Okay,now let’s get to the fun part,shall we? Hope you’ll enjoy 😉
“Hi doll, what you’re up to?” He smirks as he nibs my neck
“Just working. Why? Do you need something?” I ask as I remove my reading glasses
“I do, actually”
“What do you need babe?” I look up to his blue eyes that were filled with mischief
“You” He grinned
“Jon, I thought you needed something urgent” I chuckle
“I do!” He pulls me off my desk chair “I missed you so much” He cradled his face on the crook of my neck
“Jon, we’ve had sex six times yesterday and two times this morning, how can you physically still miss me?” I laugh “That’s like, 8 rounds in less than 24 hours babe! And you only got home yesterday”
“I can’t help it that you’re so fucking hot and looks so sexy all the time” He licks a trail from my neck to my lips
I look down to my current outfit that consisted in a comfortable pair of grey leggings, an oversized Korn t-shirt, Wilson’s crew socks, glasses, messy hair and no makeup
“I don’t think I look very sexy right now” I cackled
“Yes you do! You always do!” He pulls me closer to his crotch by my ass “C’mon Y/N, let’s do some fun nasty business, kitten” He slaps my ass quite vigorously
“Tempting, but I’ll have to decline it! Sorry big guy” I patted his chest
“Why?” He whined and stomped his feet like a little kid
“Because some of us got some serious work to do” I smiled fondly as I sit back in my desk chair
“But I wanna be with you! I need you and I want you now!” He pouted
“Jon, I promise you that once I finish this I’ll be all yours ok love?”
“No” He whines “Not later, right now!” He stomps his feet again
Yes, Jon Moxley can be quite the bad boy, but what a lot of people don’t know is that he’s also a fucking whining little baby! He gets an attitude over the dumbest reasons and sometimes this little scenario happens, where he thinks he can whine and pouts his way until he get what he wants. Sometimes it’s cute and charming to see such a big bearded man like him cause such a scene, but another times like right now it’s annoyingly frustrating, uncalled for and the last thing I need to get me even more stressed out.
“Jonathan, don’t start it! You’re not 4 years old! You’re a grown ass man in your 30’s, so behave as such” I turn to my computer and start to type my notes. After 10 minutes I can still feel his presence behind me, making me grow more nervous
“Jon, you’re not helping, my love” I said calmly
“I’m waiting. You said I would have you once you’re done so I’m waiting!” He bitterly said
“Won’t you rather wait in the couch instead? Meanwhile you can pick a movie for us to watch it later” I try to negotiate
“Meh, I’m perfect where I am right now, thanks for the concern” He huffed
*Oh great, what a fucking joy!* I thought
“This might take a while” I defeatedly said
“Don’t worry, I got time” Was his short answer
Fifteen minutes (and a stubborn Jon Moxley sitting on the floor) later I get a call from Peter, my coworker.
“Hey Peter what’s up?” I say holding my phone to my ear with my shoulder “What? Wait Peter, hold on I can’t hear you properly and I can’t stop typing”
“Well, put it on speaker then” Jon mumbled behind me and in my workaholic haze I did it as he told me, forgetting about one little small detail: Peter’s innocent (but also kind of annoying) flirting.
“Pete, can you repeat that again please?” I rapidly say while I type
“I asked when do you think you can send me the paperwork?” He chuckled
“Oh! Can you give me like....30 minutes?”
“I can give you whatever you want” He charmingly said
“Peter, shut up”
“What?” He cackled “It’s true you know, ask and you shall receive, my dear”
“I didn’t knew you were a Jesus fan” I mocked
“I’m your fan” I can hear the smile on his voice
“Whatever weirdo” I brush it off as I continue to type on the dashboard “Is that all you needed?”
“No, there’s one more thing that I forgot to ask you”
“Ok, shoot” I said
“When are you finally going to accept any of my nightcaps invitations?” Pure amusement filling up his voice
“Oh God send me to hell, fuck off Peter!” I jokingly said and hung up
I totally forgot the fact that Jon had heard that until his voice broke the silence
“So how long have you been seeing each other?” He rudely spats
“What? Seeing who?” I ask confused
He stood up from the floor, yanked me off the chair and trapped my body between his and the table.
“Your sweet boy Pete” he coldly smiles
I roll my eyes “Jon, are you really gonna take a guy like Peter seriously? He quotes Jesus to flirt! That’s nothing but pathetic and also slight disrespectful towards Jesus” I joke
“You think this is funny? What if you caught me flirting with a girl from work, how would that make you feel?”
“It depends if you’re gonna quote Jesus or not” I tease
“Y/N I’m fucking serious! Is this a joke to you? Our relationship is a joke to you? Am I a fucking joke to you?”
“My answer is no to all the above. Now if you ask me if I think that you’re overreacting then yes, I do”
“Overreacting? Really? What about all of the nightcaps invitations? Are you gonna tell me I’m overreacting about that too?” His voice starts to rise
“I don’t like your tone Jonathan” I angrily said
“And I don’t like you having an affair with your coworker!” He yelled
“Oh, so I’m having an affair now? Wow, I better accept those invitations then, if I’m going to hold the cheating girlfriend of the year award” I spat
“Are you having an affair with him?”
“How can you even ask that? You know me better than that Jonathan!” Now I’m yelling too, peachy just peachy!
“Well you didn’t answered my question though. Are you?”
“Of course not! What makes you think that?”
“You don’t wanna have sex with me, so where are you getting some? ‘Cause we both know you have quite the appetite for sex, I mean fuck, is hard even for me to keep up with you! You’re like a fucking machine!” He says
My eyes widened in disbelief “So just because I declined to have sex with you 30 minutes ago, because I have to work, I am suddenly a cheater? Or is it because I like to have sex more than the average women do that makes me a cheater? Wow Jonathan, I’ve never heard you say that when one of your male friends cheated. That says a lot”
“Says a lot about what?”
“Your sexist side. Or I don’t know, maybe it’s something else, maybe you are the one who’s cheating on me! So you’re mirroring your infidelity on me”
“Me? A sexist? Now that’s a joke” He laughs “We both know the things you’ve already done to me in the bedroom and trust me pumpkin, if I was a sexist I would never had let you go down that road, if you know what I mean” He measured me up and down “And even if I wanted to cheat on you, which is not the case, I’m pretty sure I wouldn’t physically be able to since you knock my ass down every single time we fuck”
“I don’t hear you complain! In fact if I remember correctly you were the one who got in here wanting to have sex in the first place” I huff annoyed
“And I still do kitten” He gets closer
“Don’t touch me, jerk”
“You know how much it turns me on when you get all mad like that, right?” He tried to grab my breasts but I slapped his hands away
“Stop, Jonathan”
“What?” He leans closer, pressing his hardening bulge against my lower belly “Am I not good enough for you anymore? Do you prefer your boy Pete instead?”
“Bullshit” I spat
“Then show me, kitten” He whispers “Show me I’m still good enough for you” He makes me grab a handful of his erection “Show me that you still want me, that I still turn you on”
I pulled him down towards me by his neck, kissing him roughly, biting his lower lip quite harshly
“Hmm” He growls “My kitten is feisty, I like that” He smirks “I love when you’re a bitch to me” He laughs devilishly “Whatcha gonna do, huh?”
I forcefully open the button of his jeans, pulling the fly down and yanking the pants along with his boxer briefs down.
Jon put his hands up, in a surrender position. I lick my palm and close my fist around his cock, pumping it up and down.
“Yes baby” He moaned “Take it! Take what’s yours”
I kneel down and without thinking twice, I swallow his length until it reaches the back of my throat
“Fuuuuck! Y/N, baby...so good, you suck my dick so fucking good kitten! I love it, I fucking love it!” He moans and I push him further down my throat, swallowing around him
“Oh my fuck” He bucks his hips forward in surprise “How can you be so good at this?” He whispers, holding my hair back, so he can watch me sucking him off
“You look so fucking gorgeous sucking my cock baby. Fuck, look at that! Look at how well you take everything in”
I look up at him, hearing him continuing to praise me
“I love when you look at me...so beautiful with your mouth full of cock, so greedy for more aren’t you, baby?”
I nod, lifting his member up so I can lick the bottom half of his shaft, making him moan loudly
“You’re so insanely good at giving head! A fucking pro” He panted “The best head I’ve ever gotten”
I lock my lips around the head, sucking it hard to make him feel the pressure I know he loves, while my hands pump his length with a tight grip
“Oh yes, baby” Jon screamed in pleasure “Oh my fucking- Stop, stop” He moans with his eyes hazy in ecstasy, mouth in an ‘O’ shape as he bites his knuckles to prevent any screaming.
“We both know you don’t want me to stop” I smile, licking from the bottom of the head to his slit
“You’re gonna pay for this” His voice shakily says
“I wouldn’t threaten me if I were you baby” I smirked “I have other tricks that I’ve never showed you before” I whisper, feeling his length throbbing on my hand
“Other tricks?” He faintly whispered
I let go of his member and lay down on the floor beckoning to him.
“Come here Jon, let me show it to you baby”
Please let me know your thoughts on this? Feedback is always appreciated 🥰😘
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Break The Rules (Kazutora x Reader)
(Kazutora Hanemiya x Reader)
Kazutora Hanemiya doesn’t like school. Like, no offense but sometimes he just needs a break from all the studies and the teachers who pile up an assignment after an assignment. He sighed, walking through the familiar stairs. After an hour-long lecture from their English teacher, he will never be ready for the Science period next. He walked up the familiar staircase. Sometimes, it was his happy place: the place where he will be when things get rough. Sometimes, when he just needed a break, he would go up the stairs and open the door to the cozy rooftop. The wind brushing through his hair. He just enjoyed the silence, the peace. He readjusted his bag and slung it over one of his shoulders reaching to the cold, metal doorknob. He was about to twist it to the side and escape to the warm summer breeze when his ears caught the sound of a guitar. Hanemiya stopped, tilting his head to the side, wondering.
To begin with, he ignored the sound, thinking it was all in his head. That’s when a tune started to catch his years. A soothing tune: slow and deep. It was somewhat confusing not knowing what he would meet from the other side of the door. Hanemiya wrapped one of his hands around the black stripe of his backpack and opened the door. It was all the same, just as he left yesterday evening. The summer breeze kissed his skin as he walked out. The bench in front of him was occupied. He had seen her before. A glimpse or two when they passed the hall. That was it. He didn’t know her name and he didn’t mind that either. It was a big school, you are not bound to learn anyone’s names after all. The girl didn’t look up when he stepped to the rooftop. Her eyes were focused on the guitar. Her finger smoothly plucked each string with ease producing the same lyrical, melodic music he heard before.
“Nice tune,” He said, unable to handle the silence only broken by the sound of the melody. She looked up, her dark eyes surprised by his sudden words. That’s when Hanemiya realized she had not even heard him enter. Quite the prey for a serial killer.
She narrowed her eyes, placing the guitar on her lap, “You’re skipping classes.”
No Hi. No, Who are you? Just stating facts. Hanemiya shrugged, “I can say the same for you.”
She rolled her eyes, readjusting the guitar, “I have music now. The teacher is absent. I’m practicing on my own.”
“Such a nerd” The male muttered under his breath, taking a seat beside her.
She didn’t react, instead, she ran her smooth fingers across the guitar strings. It was like she was creating her own magic with music. Hanemiya watches for few long seconds: “You know, your music is pretty good.”
She looked surprised, “Uh, thanks?”
He shrugged, leaning back. “It’s not that surprising to hear. I bet you get that all the time.”
She gave him a sideways glance, “Not really, you sure you aren’t going to get in trouble because of skipping class?”
She was trying to change the subject, Hanemiya realized. But he didn’t say anything. He, out of all people, knew that sometimes people needed a break. “I am trouble, girl.” He smirked.
She rolled her eyes, “Well, I guess I have heard about your troubles a lot” She said, making air quotes.
Hanemiya grinned, “Glad to know I’m pretty popular, Uhm…” He grimaced, she knows his name but he doesn’t.
“Y/n” She simply replied. Just as if someone who’s used to be forgotten. Like someone who didn’t care about being forgotten.
“Right,” Hanemiya said, rubbing his hands together.
“I don’t make trouble, so people don’t know me,” She said, standing up. Hanemiya raised an eyebrow as she opened her black guitar case and carefully placed the instrument inside. He watched her moves, carefully. From her care for the guitar, it was evident how much she loved music.
“Once in a while, everyone needs to be in trouble.” He said. He didn’t know why he felt that but today he didn’t feel like going back to classes at all. “Without that, life gets boring”
She slung the strap over her shoulder, “I’m the kind who lives a boring life. Excuse me.”
“Wanna break the rules with me? For today?”
She turned in surprise. Her eyes widen, her fingers tightly wrapped around the black strap. “Huh?”
He gave her a sheepish grin, pushing back one of his stray bangs from his face. “You don’t look like you want to go back at all. You can use a little excitement.”
She looked as if she’d reject and Hanemiya wouldn’t have been surprised. They barely knew each other and never have talked before. But something about her made him feel different. It was almost sad that she didn’t have any excitement, hope in those beautiful eyes. She is missing out on the best things in life. “I don’t trust you” She boldly stated, “But yeah, I don’t want to go back.”
A smile crept upon his lips, “Wanna go?”
She nodded hesitantly, “I hope we don’t end up in jail” She murmured. Hanemiya grinned, walking out of the rooftop with her.
“Honestly, I hope so too”
He looked over his shoulder to see whether his statement has shaken her. But her face betrayed no emotion except for the same plain look. He was going to put light into those eyes today. Sneaking out of school was not the hard part. Hanemiya had done it countless times. You just need to know the right hallways and turn from the right corners. Soon, both of them were standing outside of the school, facing the clear view of the road and Hanemiya started leading her to the alley beside.
Each step was conscious. You were ready to flee at any given moment as you followed him towards the alley. In the school, Hansemiya didn't have the best reputation, but there were worse guys, and all you wanted to do today was escape. On other days, you might’ve even rejected if he asked to snitch school and go out during school hours. But lately, you haven’t felt anything. Your only friend was your guitar and your music. You could use something else to drown your thoughts. Hanemiya told you to wait by as he walked deeper into the street. His figure losing in the shadows of the dark alley. You waited, looking around. The main street was nearly empty. All the people were working, all the students studying inside schools. You stared at a nearby stray puppy limping through the road when you heard the sound.
It was a surprise that caught your heart in a storm. There he was, in front of you with a black motorbike, designed thoroughly with dragon stickers. Honestly, you didn’t know much about them but the motorbike looked pretty cool. Hanemiya had changed his school uniform with a black jacket. He tossed you a helmet and grinned, “Let’s escape”
You looked at it unsurely, “You ain’t gonna wear one? Do you have the license for that thing? Are you going to kidnap me?”
He rolled his eyes, “I don’t kidnap girls in broad daylight. C’mon, who do you think I am?”
“A stranger” You replied putting on the helmet and tightening the strap making sure you won’t bust your head if you get into an accident. Looking at his balance and the familiarity he had, like the motorbike was his second personality, you didn’t doubt his skill to ride it.
“Don’t worry, get on. This buddy is my best friend” He said, giving you a sheepish look, patting the seat of the bike.
Something clicked inside your heart. You didn’t remember how many times you have called your guitar your best friend. For the first time, you looked at him a bit more closely. He doesn’t seem to be a person with many friends and behind the excitement of his eyes, there was a hint of sadness. It was barely there, but it existed. You got on behind him and held onto his jacket as he raced through the streets of Shibuya. The trees, cars, people passed you by a blur. Like a watercolor painting ruined by water. Still, there was a beauty in it. Ruined and broken things always had this beauty to them. You just had to look a little bit harder, you just have to be more careful and vigilant. Hanemiya took a sharp turn, breaking your thoughts. You yelped in surprise, holding onto him tightly as you closed your eyes. You could hear his chuckle at your surprise. “You know what is the best feeling in Biking?”
“What is it?” You raised your voice a little because you had to cut through the wind to speak to him.
“It’s escape, Y/n. When I bike, I feel free. No one can touch me. Everyone just passes by me so fast. Sometimes, I feel like I’m escaping to another universe. Just me, the wind and the sound of my friend. It’s a different feeling” Hanemiya tilted his head slightly, taking another turn. “And today, there’s another person sharing my universe, that’s you”
You could feel your cheeks heat up. It should be the rush of wind, you thought as he spoke again, “Quick advice, don’t close your eyes. Open them wide and see. This is freedom!” He yelled the last part, breaking into a peal of soft laughter.
You decided to give it a try. You sat up a little straighter still holding on tight for him. You tipped your chin back slightly, feeling the wind cutting through your face, the harsh wind was comfortable in a unique way. You stared at the blue sky, painted with white tufts of clouds. Everything seems to pass you by, just as he said. It felt like escape, freedom. “This is awesome” You blurted out, leaning against his back, talking against his ear that he might actually hear.
He nodded, “Told you so!”
When he finally stopped beside the grassy plain of the river, you felt a little at loss. You were almost at a zone while you were on that bike. It was like suddenly, all the thoughts inside your mind disappeared leaving you floating in your own dream world. A place where you felt belong. He parked his motorbike and told you to wait. Surely, a lot of waiting, you thought. You sat down by the grass, placing your guitar beside you, waiting for this boy who appeared into your life out of nowhere. “I’m back!” He chirped, jumping behind you.
You turned to see him, holding on two popsicles and the ever-growing grin on his face. “Summer is the time for ice cream,” He said, handing you one.
You unwrapped it and tasted the chocolate and the minty flavour. He was not eating it smoothly, or correctly, you noticed as you looked at him in surprise. He was practically chewing down the popsicle. You cringed, “How are you even-”
He turned with a quizzical look, “Oh, I like the ice cream cold?”
You blinked, “What are your grades? Honestly? Ice cream is supposed to be cold. That’s why you call it ice cream.”
He juts out his bottom lip, “I was just trying to give you a reason.”
You hummed, “Do you often do this? Skip school I mean.”
Hanemiya put away the wrapped and laid down on the river bank, shielding his eyes from the direct sunlight on his face. “When I think it’s too much to handle, I do”
You looked at him. His sandy eyes looked distant. Pale skin shadowed with the silhouette of his own hand. You saw it again, the lingering sadness like chains he could not escape. You wondered the reason behind that. Just maybe, there was no reason at all. It’s just the way it is. We’re all a little sad and broken. Even though others expect us to be perfect, we just can’t and that’s the truth for everyone. “Don’t you ever feel lonely? You’re alone when you’re riding, no one in your little universe. It’s just you.”
He turned to look at you, “Sometimes, but I liked loneliness. When I’m with myself, no one can hurt me. I like it.”
“And you hate it too” Your reply was instant. He blinked in surprise, then a small smile drew out of his lips. You understood it: the nature of loneliness.
“Yeah, I hate it too” His voice was open than before. It was like the boy beside you was starting to open up slowly. He knew she understood and she knew he did too. “I’ve shown you my freedom” He propped himself on elbows, “Can you show me yours?”
It took you a second to realize he was looking at the guitar case resting beside you. You ran your hand through the smooth black fabric before deciding, it was only fair you show your freedom too. You put down the wrapper and carefully took out the guitar. Your finger idly running through the strings, embracing the melodies and the beauty of the sound. Almost magical to your ears. It had always been like this. When you held your guitar, you’re in your own little world. A parallel universe you made for yourself just as Hanemiya said. Your fingers ran through the strings with great familiarity. The melody was soothing for your ears. Your music spoke the words you couldn’t say. It was your outlet. Your way of telling the world that you’re lonely. There’s no beauty in sadness. That’s why your melodies always spoke the plain truth. The truth to your heart, to your soul. “Miya,” You said, turning to him after you finish one song. “This is my freedom. My way of escape.”
He nodded, “I like the nickname”
You flushed, “I’m sorry! I didn’t realize-”
He shook his head hushing you, “You were in the zone. Your music, it’s so beautiful Y/n. I love how it speaks raw and plain truth.” He turned to the river flowing in front of you, “And your eyes shine when you play. Like you have found the excitement” He smiled, “Your happy place”
The smile on your face was effortless, “Like you with your bike.”
“You know it!”
You two shared your ideas and talked with each other. You found comfort in his words as you had never found before. You had never known what it felt like to meet a person who understands. Understand the chaos in your soul. The deepness in your mind. You started to play another song. This time, the melody was a bit hype, because you’re happy. He dropped his head into your shoulder, relaxing. You stopped playing for a minute, unsure of your next move when he sleepily murmured, “Keep playing.”
So, you did. You didn’t know what this was. A boy sleeping beside you, soothed by your music. A boy who understood you’re not perfect and not supposed to be. A boy who showed you his world while you showed him yours. You didn’t know what to call this feeling, so you played it on the guitar. The feeling of butterflies. The feeling of belonging.
After few hours, you two finally decided it was time to leave. There was something you were holding back, the reason for you to be so down the whole day. “Y/n?” He asked, seeing you spacing out. “Are you okay?”
“It’s my birthday, you know” You weren’t looking at his face. You were staring at the river. There was a reason you loved rivers, no matter the challenges they never stop. “No one remembered. I didn’t expect them to. It would be nice if someone did” You scratched the back of your head, “Sorry, that was dumb”
You heard his footsteps before you saw his face right in front of you. “Why didn’t you tell me sooner!?”
You shrugged, “You used to be a stranger a few seconds ago”
He took a step back and pulled out his wallet, surprising you. He frowned, his face drawing into a deeply thinking expression. “Oi,” You said, “What’s that look for?”
He pouted, “It’s just I don’t have enough money to buy you anything.” He looks as if the gods have decided to send him to hell.
“I don’t need anything” You flushed, “I just told you because-”
He cut you off, wrapping one of his arms around you pulling you into a tight hug. You stiffened for a moment, before finally hugging back, pressing your face onto his leather jacket. “There’s something I can still give you” His voice was muffled. The two of you pulled away and stared at each other for a second. You didn’t guess his next action. Didn’t see it coming either. He brushed his lips against your own. The tiniest speck. The softest intimacy. “Happy Birthday, Y/n. Next year, I’m gonna make it special, I promise”
You closed your eyes for a second, “So, you’re going to kidnap me next year too?”
Hanemiya ruffled your hair, “Yeah, I’m gonna kidnap you from the rooftop next year too.”
You didn’t know why, but you trusted him when he said he’ll remember. “I’ll be waiting.”
“For a hot biker to kidnap you? Geez, Y/n, your imagination is sure wild” He teased, laughing.
“Not just any biker, the dork named Miya is the only one” You shot back, it was his time to flush.
“I didn’t know you had it in you,” He said, exaggerating his surprise as he clutched his heart dramatically.
“I always had it in me, the other people were not keen enough to draw out this side.” You flipped your hair, imitating his dramatic actions.
“What is this? A teen drama?” He huffed, slipping his hand to yours. His long slender fingers fitting right in yours. You both stared at the river for one last time before getting on the bike.
You never held someone so close in your life. It was like no one understood you, and never accepted you for who you are. You were insecure about your flaws, about those imperfections. But he made you feel right. He made you realize it’s okay to be imperfect. He found the meaning behind your music and saw right through you. Kazutora Hanemiya: a boy who knew about the art of loneliness. Who went behind the things he loved to make himself feel something. The only person who understood you. Walking with him, your hands intertwined. You realized how lucky you stumbled into him. How lucky you agreed to break the rules with him. Every second, every minute was worth it.
Happy Birthday to one of the loveliest people in the whole world! I love you Oya! Have a great birthday sweetheart! ❤❤❤❤❤❤
#tokyo revengers#x reader#kazutora hanemiya#kazutora x reader#happy birthday oya#i love you#fluff#birthday fic#you are amazing#x female reader
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DA4 Lead Producer Scylla Costa’s BIG Festival talk, “Challenges of Dragon Age production during the pandemic”, can currently be rewatched on YouTube here starting roughly at timestamp 8:57:02 after a lil presenter blurb/intro. It’s 1 hour long. When it was streamed live, there was an English translation ‘voiceover’. There isn’t in this vid, however I want to post the link for Portuguese speakers, and also it’s neat for everyone to be able to see all the slides he presented with for themselves in context.
I don’t know if an English-language version will get put up so I’m sharing the notes I took during the talk below, in case anyone’s interested and because I might as well since I wrote them. The rest of this post is under a cut due to length.
Edit: Found a place to re-watch the English version of the talk
(Quick note: I didn’t note down everything, mostly things that caught my interest, so this isn’t exhaustive, and when I was watching I was real tired, so pls bear that in mind and don’t take these notes as bullet-proof 100% accurate gospel or direct quotes. If you watched it and think I’ve written down something wrong/misunderstood, let me know and I’ll fix. Also if you’re a Portuguese speaker and I’ve gotten something incorrect or missed something important etc, again just let me know.) **
** Edit: I’ve now gone through my notes while watching the talk again. I’ve filled in some of the gaps (although they still don’t cover everything said) and so forth, and now I’m no longer worried about there being possible errors in this post.
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For some context, this slide contained the breakdown of the talk’s structure. Bear in mind there are other slides present in the talk than the ones I’ve posted here, I didn’t include caps of all of them, just ones which were of note to me.
In the talk, chief Producer Scylla goes over challenges of DA4 production during the pandemic. He discusses the adaptations - necessary skills and learning from remote work - and he ponders on the future of teamwork.
After the launch of ME3 he became a producer, all his MMO and other experience helped a lot. He was on DAI for 3 years and MEA for 9 months, then Anthem. Today, on DA4, Scylla and another Lead Producer were the heads of the whole project, and there is his boss is the Executive Producer Christian Dailey.
^ the usual AAA game development cycle (brief introduction)
AAA games are games that are launched for several platforms simultaneously.
In BioWare’s case, the pre-production phase of the game development cycle can have from 5 - 30 people, and up to almost 60 people when they’re just about to go through the gate to production.
In the pre-production phase, they go through the game’s concepts and prototypes and start developing systems. They seek the game’s concept and focus, and its key features. They do lots of market research. In the case of BioWare, all their games are strong in narrative, so they have lots of tools related to game narratives and supporting the development of a narrative (cinematic design, dialogue system etc) that get focused on in this phase. Other parts of the team such as writers and cinematic design need these systems to do their own roles.
In BioWare’s case, the pre-production phase through to launch can take 4 - 6 years, but it does depend on the size of the team during development.
With regards to Dragon Age 4, they were coming close to the time when they would shift from pre-production to the production stage when the pandemic hit.
During the production phase is when the development of content and features takes place, with the systems mostly already existing from the pre-production phase. A few new systems may be developed in this phase. In the production phase is when things start escalating, and the team really starts growing, to like 2- or 3-fold the prior pre-production phase size.
(DA4 is currently in the production phase.)
In the alpha phase, features have to be fully implemented and systems all have to be running / working. All the game features should already be in the game by now. They test from pre-production onwards, but this phase is when they run heavy technical tests with lots of players trying to play at the same time. In the beta phase, the idea is that you should now have full content and that now you’re balancing it and running more and lots of different tests with players before launch. There are final tweaks and then the final launch, when in the weeks prior to launch, all the different business units and areas e.g. marketing team, technology team, publishing team, get together once a day and all of the game’s issues are reported and brought to the table to be prioritized. Then they decide the next steps re: these issues (this is known as ‘the war room’).
After the launch there are usually patches like day zero patches and other patches, this being standard industry practise. The last stage is the new content stage where there are DLCs and a game with more content.
On March 12th 2020, the team gathered to review the DA4 story in the new office. Everyone was very excited. (They had spent over 10 years in their last building and had noticed that with the team growing they needed more space. In August 2019 they found the new studio in the city center.)
Anyway that evening, they got an email from the CEO which contained instructions and said that due to the pandemic, they should from now all start working remotely. They had known that this happening was a possibility so they had been planning on how to have all the devs working from home, but initially less than 50% of the devs were able to work from home successfully/efficiently due to various issues e.g. you need a VPN to be able to log in remotely to do your job normally, varying home office setups. The day after this, the office was basically deserted, except for Scylla, the IT infrastructure people and one or two odd devs.
Scylla was part of the team that was working on allowing the devs to work from home. They first started looking at the short-term changes they needed to make to allow this.
“First, take care of our developers”.
When the pandemic first hit, their and Scylla’s [as Lead Producer] first priority was to look after the devs. Many of them are parents (schools and day-cares were shut, children were studying from home), others have relatives living with them, others have other personal circumstances which of course need to be taken into account when it comes to assessing what needs to be taken into consideration for this new scenario. So, they looked at each dev on a case-by-case basis in order to evaluate, speaking to each one and asking them what they could do to support them.
One of the first changes/adaptations they could implement was flexible working hours and flexibility around deadlines. Generally speaking the devs got a lot of support, EA was really good and really supported the devs especially in the first months of the pandemic (and they are still supporting them). Initially not all devs had suitable office spaces at home, some were working from the living room from laptops or at the kitchen table. The whole covid situation basically just happened over night and nobody was really ready to deal with that change. So their first step was to enable their devs to work remotely. As a producer, Scylla’s main task is to communicate with the team such as via a number of daily meetings. He doesn’t depend so much on powerful hardware.
“Enable developers to work remotely”.
This slide shows some of a BioWare audio team. Different teams have varying and specific needs in order to do their jobs and therefore in order to do them remotely. For example, the audio team need good-quality speakers and amplifiers, while the lighting and art teams need other specific equipment such as tablets and large screens. So there was a lot of work they had to do to go through each dev to understand their individual needs and what needed to be done for them. ‘Could they download the builds? Did they have the right performance [tech-wise]? Could they submit their changelists, their codes to the server?’
Some devs needed a more powerful internet connection as it would take 6-8 hours to download a build (some devs live rurally). Some needed a lot of cable, as they were working far away from their routers (sometimes up to 50m). As time went by things got better and better.
The chair devs work from is also important; a kitchen able chair etc is not suitable to sit in for long-term desk work, possibly leading to health issues like back ache and blood circulation problems in the legs.
Every 3 months they had money given to help devs buy new mice, keyboards, monitors - anything they needed really in order for their office setting at home to be improved. For a while, because lots of people [generally, in society] were needing and buying them, it was quite hard to buy things like webcams and microphones.
On mid- and long-term changes:
In terms of DA, we have to look at this from 2 perspectives, the change in the personal and the professional environments.
As a consequence of working from home, people tend to be less active during the day (even in an office, you go between meeting rooms, up and down stairs etc). Physical activity supports life quality and therefore work quality. Scylla noticed that he began to feel listless and such, and found that he needed to change his routine that he had initially developed when he started working from home, for example; having a normal start time (as in, have a semblance of structure in your day as if you were still working in the office site), get dressed at the normal time, not having meetings over lunch etc. This wasn’t just him, lots of other devs encountered this and had this experience too. Devs which adapted faster had better productivity and became more productive faster.
Scylla bought a stand-up desk which he can raise up and down, and at meetings he would be delivering a talk while standing or even while walking on a treadmill. Other devs also got stand-up desks. He tracked his body’s data on a Fitbit. These sorts of things helped improve physical and mental wellbeing. Other devs did similar things, like starting going out for jogs or began practising yoga. Essentially, everyone needed to make changes to their daily routine in comparison to what they had been doing prior to the pandemic.
The pandemic has been a thing for over a year now. In their location, every couple of weeks a new restriction is put into place or a rule is changed, and every two weeks there’s a new thing that you can and can’t do. Scylla also started moving around his property. He worked on his desk, fixed it up and painted - taking up a new hobby. Other devs picked up new hobbies too. These are good ways to be active and also to be somewhere else, i.e. to break up the working day and not be spending it all in one home office-type location. Scylla found that when he made these sorts of changes to his routine to improve his lifestyle, the data output by his Fitbit as indicators of his health/wellbeing etc improved, e.g. number of steps taken in a day, heartbeats per minute while at rest. As stated many of the other devs went through a similar process.
On the professional side of things:
They had to improve remote delivery of builds. Accessing things from home as a dev requires a VPN. They need to download a build every day and then upload it to the server after making their changes to the game. They had to work with infrastructure and research other tech, such as streaming tech to allow remote console access, in order to better facilitate this process. For remote access, they also had to work on adapting communications channels.
“Adapting channels of communication.”
In this slide, the team are working on the storyboards. Before you can implement motion capture & performance capture, you have to ‘run the storyboards’ like this. These are small illustrating drawings which reflect the drafts and are meant to quickly reflect the intention of the scenes that are to be built. Before the pandemic, the team would go to meeting rooms like this, sit down, talk and interact in person. After the pandemic, the question became ‘How do you do this over Zoom?’ You can, but it’s not quite the same; it’s harder to see peoples’ expressions, some people are embarrassed speaking over Zoom etc. Therefore they had to adapt their communications systems, and unlearn the ways in which they developed before in order to relearn and learn new ways of communicating.
Slack was a tool that they adopted on this front. Communications channels can be confusing on Slack, so there was a need to develop structure. For example, how quickly should someone reply (as a recommended convention for the purposes of work)? They had to define the process/procedures for the channels so it was clear for the team as a whole how it would all flow (this is important especially if you have a team with say 30 people or as a whole hundreds of people). Before the pandemic, they had stand-up meetings where they’d go around in a circle every morning and talk about their activities - what they’re going to be working on, any roadblocks they had encountered etc. The question arose ‘How do you replace these?’ They ended up doing Slack messages at a certain time of day and updating their statuses with some details on what they’re working on and color-coding (green - fine, yellow - need help, red - busy/blocked out).
Another issue that they faced was unforeseen - the number of meetings that devs were having really shot through the roof. When there wasn’t a good structure of communications channels, any conversation would become a meeting. Everybody began scheduling meetings left and right, and at the end of the day they would have little time left in which to actually work on their to-do lists. Hence, they had to work with the team to really analyze and be very pragmatic. ‘Which meetings needed to happen? Which didn’t? Is a specific meeting really necessary? Which meetings should be recurring? What can be done over Slack?’ This guideline had to be given to the team to help, and it improved things a lot. The number of meetings decreased a lot and they got more effective. For example, by making sure to set an agenda for meetings beforehand, and by having meeting notes (then a dev who didn’t really need to be at a meeting could skip attending and just quickly review the notes output after instead). They also decreased the standard length of meeting times from the default Outlook blocks of 1 hour and 30 mins to 55 mins and 25 mins respectively. This 5 minute change gave devs time for things like bio breaks (also 4 hours in a row at a computer in a home office with one meeting after another just isn’t good for a person).
“Adapting p-cap and mocap”.
On content:
From a content point of view, the most difficult thing in terms of the pandemic was adapting p-cap and mocap (performance capture and motion capture). They hire actors and it’s a large studio. The pandemic meant big limits to what they could and couldn’t do. The actors had to be masked and 5 meters apart in distance (although it doesn’t look like it in some of these shots due to angles). Also there could be no other person around in the studio - only the actors. The directors instead would ‘patch’ in remotely on big screens (you can see this in the second photo in the top right).
Before the pandemic, they felt that they wouldn’t be able to do p-cap or mocap properly remotely, as the directors would usually stand right next to actors giving guidance on their performance. The techs would also usually be near. But they adapted! The keyword is adapting, changing process. It’s harder and it’s different, but it is possible, and people start rethinking what is possible. What was said to be impossible before now is possible.
P-cap differs to mocap in that it also captures voice and facial expressions.
On the future of work after covid:
There will probably be more working from home and more flexibility for workers e.g. being able to work say 3 out of 5 days from home. It does depend on what a dev’s specific job is however. For example, the audio engineers require lots of specialist equipment and said equipment is of higher quality and quantity in the office. So, depending on role, devs might be working more often or less often from home.
Another development is that lots of devs are moving house. In lockdown etc people started reassessing what’s most important in life. Some are moving further away from the studio to get a cheaper rent or for example couples who both needed an office space to work from home from but their current place only had one area. Others are moving closer to nature for a better quality of life, and still others have other different reasons for doing so. Over 10 devs that he knows in fact have recently moved, including Scylla himself.
The pandemic changed certain skills being used by people on a daily basis. Scylla used as an example of this one of his soft skills, being able to tell from looking/interacting in-person with someone if they are stressed out. Obviously it’s less easy to tell if someone is stressed out when you’re remote, so you adapt different ways of checking in with people in the new situation. To continue carrying out his role as Lead Producer, he began checking in with his team pro-actively on the new comms channels and asking how they were doing.
Also, now that companies are more open to working remotely, there is going to be increased competition for hiring devs. They saw both sides of this coin at BioWare. They were able to hire devs from many places that they couldn’t hire from before e.g. Montreal, Vancouver, the US, as there’s less need for devs to relocate to Edmonton or Austin. This opens up opportunities to hire really intelligent and skilled people that they would not have had access to before.
Question and answer segment:
The pre-production phase has been concluded. They’re in the production phase.
They are not giving out a lot of details yet but Scylla is really excited as a big fan of the whole series. He thinks that with DA4, they will have the opportunity/possibility to launch the best story out of all DA games. He feels that the characters they’re making are amazing. He’s dying to say more but can’t.
When you work from home you need to keep your team as productive as possible. During the pandemic, when people started working from home, they noticed that some people became more productive and some people became less productive. They were analyzing it on a case-by-case basis so as not to make assumptions. They were interested in seeing what they could do to help. At the beginning of the pandemic, they were looking at the devs as people and seeing what they needed.
Production of DA4 still needed to continue during the pandemic because they want to be able to launch the game.
This slide shows a writer. Writing is an example of a role which is more able to work from home easily.
Their productivity did go down in the first month of the pandemic. After adaptations, some people then became more productive than they were before (this was role and personal situation-dependent, examples of this being artists and coders who were able to art and code at home without being interrupted, thereby being able to produce more). Covid has affected productivity in general, but this is part of our new reality. They have adapted and adjusted some deadlines. They have enough data (Scylla LOVES data) now to understand how long it will take them/how long they’ll need to launch the game. They have always had historical data for this purpose, but they’re doing more of this sort of thing now to ensure that they are doing things at the right time.
Remote hiring opens up the door to more talent joining, so if someone has talent geography will hold them back less. Some companies though may choose not to hire people from other countries due to labor issues, cumbersome legal aspects, time zones. But even in such cases there are activities for example that can be carried out while the rest of the team is asleep such as testing or working on the build, or there are cases where those companies still will want to hire a specifically/highly talented person even in spite of the potential legal aspects and so on.
On mental health: People were affected. There is the mental, physical and social impacts of the pandemic situation on people. EA supported them during the pandemic in terms of their mental wellbeing, there are specific companies (services offered, speaking to a therapist) that they can contact if they need something or help. EA had always been good at supporting them with this sort of thing but this has improved further during the pandemic. Another change was that they could/can take a couple of days off if they needed/need to because of the pandemic e.g. to take care of children, who were obviously not at school at the time. As a producer he had to be very mindful of all of this. How much they were monitoring peoples’ wellbeing really went up during the pandemic.
A question that was asked - in terms of DA4′s storybeats, is there anything in there that they decided to change due to the pandemic as it wouldn’t be sensitive or appropriate to include anymore, for example a plague plotline or something? Scylla’s answer is that DA and ME are games in which they try to have narratives that are relatable, which include things which people will identify with, so that players understand what characters are going through etc. Nothing in DA4′s plotline/storybeats has been changed (in the frame of this question, relating to the pandemic), as it didn’t have anything in it that could be specifically or a directly connected to a pandemic-type situation or anything. Of course the DA story has Blights and the Taint, but these are different & fantastical things and existed long before the pandemic situation. So this wasn’t the case with DA4 and there was no need to change anything, but this has happened to other games where they decided to change a storyline due to a strong correlation with something in the real world.
There were then concluding/closing remarks. The message he wants to send is that a crisis will always spark opportunities. Look at a crisis and try to see how you can grow.
-----
[☕ found this post interesting or useful? my ko-fi is here if you feel inclined. thank you 🙏]
#dragon age 4#the dread wolf rises#da4#dragon age#bioware#video games#covid mention#long post#longpost#wanted to write these up properly and post them yesterday but wasn't able to#mass effect#anthem
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Rereading The Chapter 14 (The End)
I believed that in ASOUE's universe, chapter 14 was apparently written some time after the rest of the book. But I abandoned that idea. Lemony wrote to the editor that chapter 14 could be found at the end of the same manuscript.
We then have the epigraph of Le Voyage. It's an excerpt that portrays the moment of death, and perhaps the acceptance of death. But I don't think this means that Lemony is completely certain of the Baudelaires' death. I think it means he's pretty sure he won't write about the Baudelaires anymore. I think the right question is "why did Lemony decide to stop writing at this point in the story?" "Why did he plan to write more and then stop writing?" I think Lemony didn't promise to write the entire story of the Baudelaires. He promised to write the story of the conflict between the Baudelaires and Olaf. So when he was sure of Olaf's death, and that was only with the additional information he had probably had access to through Beatrice Jr, Lemony realized that the research might be over. The certainty of Olaf's death was the event he determined when the narrative came to an end. So, it makes us wonder what kind of promise Lemony made. Apparently he promised that he would clarify the facts surrounding the charges the Baudelaires went through, as well as the contexts in which these events took place. That's why it was so important to get this information out to the general public. Because it involved the honor of the Baudelaire family. Furthermore, this explains why he could not rely solely on the account given by the Baudelaires themselves: after all, they were being accused of being lying criminals. Lemony needed to clear their name, proving, so to speak, that the facts reported by the Baudelaires were real, and it was not enough just to record what he read in the island book.
I think this is the most sensible explanation, and as a theorist I will defend it. But as a fan willing to come up with slightly bizarre ideas, I feel like imagining Lemony realizing that his own death was close to happening. It would be interesting to imagine that Lemony's research took so long that he was an elderly man when he was publishing The End. And the reason Lemony finished his work at this point would be his physical limitations. That would explain shocking secret #13: "he's finished." And more than that: it would even explain the title of the book: "The End of Lemony Snicket". And furthermore, this would explain Lemony's dedication to Beatrice in chapter 14. After quoting the words of Charles B., in which the poet compares the hour of death with the setting off of a ship, Lemony claims that both he and Beatrice are like boats sailing at night, but especially her. Both were on a dark and lonely journey, but she was already dead. "
Beatrice's last words recorded in the book were really emotional to me when I first read them, and they still are today. Especially after I watched the Netflix series, it's now possible to imagine a very specific face when I picture Beatrice. And it's possible to think of a specific soundtrack when I read this.
About the baby's name, on my Headcanon Violet is the name of Mrs. W, who was presumed dead around the same time as Lemony. And in my Headcanon, just as Lemony didn't really die, she didn't either. I still like to think that she was the mystery woman on TGG, and that's the real reason Quigley used the name Violet in the message he sent to submarine Q.
I think this is the first time I stop to think that the Baudelaires ate crab. This is unclean food for those who practice Judaism as a religion, isn't it? I even thought the roast lamb was a reference to the Passover celebration, but they wouldn't do that by eating crab. Or is it that in a book in which Daniel Handler implicitly criticizes religion, he did so on purpose? I think it's unlikely, but still possible. But, albeit unintentionally, the Baudelaires rejected the religious customs of their ancestors in a book in which religious customs are questioned and this is significant.
"The baby had heard about danger, too, mostly from the register of crimes, follies, and misfortunes of mankind from which the Baudelaires read out loud each evening, although they had not told the infant the whole story. She did not know all of the Baudelaires' secrets, and indeed there were some she would never know."
The above excerpt is important as it reveals that Lemony has information about Beatrice Jr's future as he was writing this chapter. This explains how Lemony knows what happened in this chapter: Beatrice Jr told him. Lemony did meet her, and he realized that the Baudelaires hadn't told her the whole story.
A detail that has always pleased me in this book is to notice that after 1 year, Sunny stopped babbling words and has a more conventional and extensive vocabulary. I find this compatible with the fact that 1 year has passed and it's also compatible with her character development arc. One of asoue's themes is "how some children are forced to mature too quickly because of tragedy". Sunny, for example, needed to learn how to cook and convince herself that she loved doing it and that she was good at it in a few days. And all this before she learned to speak English properly. She needed to help with a birth long before she fully understood issues related to human procreation. But in chapter 14, she finally had the opportunity to develop without tragedies forcing her to skip important steps in life.
"Do we take this?" Violet asked, holding up the book from which she had read out loud.
"I don't think so," Klaus said. "Perhaps another castaway will arrive, and continue the history."
"In any case," Sunny said, "they'll have something to read."
Please realize how important this dialogue is. Daniel Handler placed this dialogue here to make sure the reader understood the source of information Lemony had access to: the island book. The children wrote about their own story in that book, including their thoughts, feelings, and private conversations. The children shared some details about ancient events, about when Sunny wasn't even born. In the book, Lemony found details about some events that took place on the island before the arrival of the three Baudelaires.
"I want to make sure these life jackets I've designed will fit properly."
Well... It's good to know that, even though the boat sank, the Baudelaires had lifeboats. Their chances of survival really increased a lot. And knowing that Beatrice Jr managed to survive a shipwreck, it's quite possible that they did too.
The Baudelaires watched her approach, wondering what the next chapter in this infant's life would be, and indeed that is difficult to say. There are some who say that the Baudelaires rejoined V.F.D. and are engaged in brave errands to this day, perhaps under different names to avoid being captured. There are others who say that they perished at sea, although rumors of one's death crop up are often revealed to be untrue. But in any case, as my investigation is over, we have indeed reached the last chapter of the Baudelaires' story, even if the Baudelaires had not.
Lemony just reports here what he heard. Although Daniel Handler intentionally wishes the ending to be left open, and I will respect his decision, I will speak my opinion. They didn't die at sea, though. Note that Lemony directly relates the baby's future to the future of the three Baudelaires. The way Lemony wrote here suggests that the baby's future is as uncertain as the future of her adoptive parents. But we TBL readers know the truth about Beatrice Jr.'s future. Beatrice is alive! So the most likely situation is that her parents are also alive. ( And who knows other characters that we thought had died there on TBB... could it be that at least one of them could also have survived?)
But the question is: if Lemony knows the baby survived, why did he hide this information from the reader? Certainly to protect his niece. Lemony didn't lie, just omitted some details.
The baby paused, and looked at the back of the boat, where the nameplate had been affixed. She had no way of knowing this, of course, but the nameplate had been nailed to the back of the boat by a person standing on the very spot she was standing—at least as far as my research has shown.
Lemony once again dismantled specific knowledge through research, which could only have been done through information provided by others. Beatrice Jr needed to tell Lemony exactly where she was at that moment and Lemony needed to compare that with the information Beatrice Sr and Bertrand wrote in the island book. And then, on visiting the site, Lemony was able to ascertain the most likely position for those descriptions. While Lemony is a bit mistaken, the research process must have been like that.
Finally, she uttered a word. The Baudelaire orphans gasped when they heard it, but they could not say for sure whether she was reading the word out loud or merely stating her own name, and indeed they never learned this. Perhaps this last word was the baby's first secret, joining the secrets the Baudelaires were keeping from the baby, and all the other secrets immersed in the world. Perhaps it is better not to know what was meant by this word, as some things are better left in the great unknown. There are some words, of course, that are better left unsaid—but not, I believe, the word uttered by my niece, a word which here means that the story is over. Beatrice.
Oh... How I love this ending. That's when I felt my head explode for the first time in my life, and I'm still picking up the pieces.
#asoue#asoue theory#lemony snicket#a series of unfortunate events#asoue theories#beatrice baudelaire#snicketverse#beatrice snicket#beatrice jr#violet baudelaire#sunny baudelaire
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Long, Slow Kisses - Inspector Cavill 5
Guess who's back again? It's Inspector Cavill and his girlfriend! I thought you might enjoy another smutty chapter of their lovestory. (You can find the Inspector Cavill series, parts 1 - 4 on my masterlist.)
I got inspired by the song "Long, Slow Kisses" by Jeff Bates (see end of post for spotify link). I used quotes from the lyrics in the fic, they are written in italics.
Pairing: Henry Cavill x female reader, y/n
Warnings: RPF but AU (Henry Cavill is an inspector at Scotland Yard), song fic (kinda), fluff, smut, sex, oral sex (m and f receiving), deep throat, unprotected sex, 18+, NSFW
Unbeta'ed! English is not my mother tongue!
Credits: I know nothing about Henry Cavill, this is pure fiction. Pics for the moodboard are from Pinterest.
Taglist: (let me know if you want to be added or removed) @hell1129-blog @lunedelorient @inlovewithhisblueeyes @mis-lil-red @willkatfanfromasia @omgkatinka @summersong69 @agniavateira @legendarywizarddetective @taebfada @xxxkatxo @kebabgirl67 @artandotherdelights
Summary:
Imagine...You and Inspector Cavill are a couple. It's been two years now and somehow everyday life has pushed romance and passion back a little. The same old treadmill day after day has damped down the fire of being newly in love. The spark is still there but in the last months it had been buried under a lot of work and all kinds of duties.
~~~~
It was Saturday morning and Henry had to go to the office again for paperwork though he had promised he would spend the day with his girlfriend y/n.
"Really, Henry? Again? You promised it. You're not working on a case, why do you have to go?"
"Darling, I'm really sorry but I have to do my paperwork. You saw the pile on my desk yesterday. It's growing taller than me, I will never be able to work through it without some extra hours." He gave her an apologetic smile.
"You promised it, Hen." She repeated with sad eyes. The disappointment in her voice was killing him.
"We'll just take a rain check on this. We can go to the park and have the picnic tomorrow, okay?"
Henry kissed her on the cheek before asking her again. "Okay, princess?"
She rolled her eyes and shrugged. "Do I have a choice?"
Henry smiled and grabbed his jacket before opening the door. "Thanks, y/n. Love you." He was already on the steps in front of the house when he heard her.
"You know, Henry. Sometimes I feel like I'm not the most important thing in your life anymore." Her soft words were followed by a deep sigh and she closed the door before Henry was able to give her an answer.
All the way to work Henry just couldn't stop thinking about her words. It broke his heart to hear her say them because she definitely was the most important thing in his life. She was now and she was always going to be. He loved her more than words could express but obviously she doubted that. He was almost at the headquarter when he made a u-turn and headed back home.
She was in the kitchen, doing the dishes, when she heard the key turn in the lock of the front door.
"Henry? Is that you?" Y/n dried her hands with a towel and went to the hall where Henry stood with a lopsided smile on his pretty lips. "What's wrong, Darling? Are you sick?" She asked him.
"Naw, I ain't sick, it's just this morning, when you told me, you didn't feel like you were the most important thing in my life anymore, well that broke my heart. So, I had to turn around and come back and tell you what I'm gonna do about it."
She looked at him with a frown, confusion written all over her face. When Henry gave her a wink she stepped closer and placed her hands on his chest. She looked him in the eyes with a smile.
"That's so sweet, honey. And so surprising, but I'm curious now...what are you gonna do about it?" She returned the wink.
He cupped her face with his big hands and gave her a quick, tender kiss.
"I'm gonna light the bedroom candles, take the phone out of the wall. We can lay around and talk for hours or maybe we won't talk at all. I'm gonna resurrect the love that slipped away from us and the man you've been missin', startin' with some long, slow kisses."
She took a deep breath and smirked, biting her lip.
"Well, that sounds promising. So what are you waiting for."
Henry chuckled and pulled her close. Long, slow kisses followed, just like he'd promised. Y/n almost melted in his arms, it just felt so good, so hot, so sensual. Henry deepened the kiss and she got all wet just by the way he let his tongue roam around in her mouth. Henry's hands were all over her body, stroking her ass and her breasts which made her moan.
Hearing her desire turned him on so much he shortly considered taking her right there in the hall but he remembered his promise. He pulled away, out of breath, his eyes dark with lust.
"You like that, baby?" He looked at her with a lewd smile.
"You know I do."
"Then let's continue upstairs."
And before y/n knew what was happening he had swept her off her feet and thrown her over his shoulder.
"Henry?" she shrieked. "Put me down, I'm too heavy!"
"Don't be silly, hon." He laughed and took the stairs to the first floor so easily as if she was light as a feather. His strength never ceased to amaze her.
He put her down in front of their bedroom and placed his hands on her shoulders. "Just gimme a second, okay? Oh, and throw this away." He gave her his mobile. "Not literally of course."
"Sure." She grinned and Henry went to the bedroom, closing the door behind him. Y/N looked around and decided to hide the phone inside the laundry closet between the towels.
Just when she was done the door flew open and Henry made an inviting gesture. "Come in."
The room was bathed in dimness, only lit by her bedside lamp. Henry had thrown one of her light summer shawls over it, a crimson red one, and so the illumination created an illusion of sundown. Some candles were flickering on the window ledge making the romantic atmosphere perfect. Henry was standing beside the bed smiling at her with a hint of shyness. He usually wasn't a man of great gestures and he seemed to be unsure if y/n liked the scenario he'd created.
"Darling." She whispered amazed. "This is wonderful."
"So you like it?"
"Of course." She wrapped her arms around his neck and kissed him. "It's so romantic."
"I was hoping you'd say that. I think we've neglected this part of our relationship a little in the last months."
"That's true." She sighed, sounding a little sad.
"I'm gonna make it up to you today, my love."
She gave him an encouraging nod and Henry continued with telling her what he had on his mind.
"I just want to let you know how ashamed I am for making you feel that way Darlin', I'm so sorry. I guess I've just been spendin' too much on making a living and way too little on making love. But if you can just find it in your heart to forgive me, girl, I swear from this moment on you'll always know where you stand with me. 'Cause what really matters most is you and me this close, feeling no distance, sharing some long, slow kisses"
Y/n looked at him with wide eyes and it was obvious that she was touched by his words.
"Oh my god, Henry. This is the sweetest I've ever heard. But it's not all your fault, we've both been so busy lately…"
"I know, but today it's my turn to show you how much I still care about you. How much you mean to me. And I don't just want to fuck you, I'm going to make love to you, alright? Will you let me love you, princess?"
"I'm all yours, Buzz." He smirked when he heard the nickname and pulled her close. They kissed again and it was the most sensual foreplay - slow, erotic, sexy.
"Let me undress you." Henry's voice was smooth and soft. He took a step away and started to unbutton her shirt. She wanted to help him but he grabbed her wrists gently.
"No, babe. Let me take care of you. All you have to do is to relax and to enjoy this."
She looked him in the eyes and nodded.
Henry slowly stripped off every single piece of clothing from her body until she was completely naked. He admired her body, smiling at her. "Sometimes I forget how very beautiful you are, darling." She returned his smile and batted her eye lashes suddenly a little self-conscious.
"Lay down." He patted on the mattress and y/n stretched out her body on the bed. She enjoyed watching Henry stripping off his clothes too and when he was naked he laid down beside her. A shiver ran through her body and Henry looked at her with a worried frown. "Are you cold, love?"
"No, darling, just shaking with anticipation."
"Good." He grinned and placed a sweet little kiss on her shoulder. "Why don't you close your eyes."
"Okay."
From this moment on all she could do was feel. She felt Henry's mouth on her lips and after a while he started to kiss every part of her body. Her neck, where he concentrated on the sensitive spot behind her ear which made her moan, her collarbone and her shoulders. He stroked her tits tenderly, kissing the tender flesh, licking and sucking her hard nipples.
"Oohhh…." She let out a deep sigh, her breath was going fast already. Henry continued to take care of her breasts, kneading them with his strong hands, just like he knew y/n liked it best.
She whimpered when his mouth left her nipple but when she felt his soft lips showering her belly with hot kisses she uttered a sexy groan, showing him how much she enjoyed his actions.
Henry climbed between her legs, spreading them wide enough to fit in with his body. He was kissing her lower abdomen now, his hands reaching out for her tits, giving them a quick little squeeze before he placed his hands on her thighs. He stroked her legs slowly, kissing her right above her pubic area.
"God...Henry…this is torture…" She was a panting mess already and Henry was so hard it almost hurt. "Do you want me to stop?" He whispered against her pussy, blowing softly against her clit.
"No. Please...don't stop."
Henry kissed her sweet spot before he licked through her folds a few times. "I love your juices. You taste so sweet, so pure, like dew, like nectar...and you are so damn wet, my love."
He straightened up to take a look at her and to give his dick a few strokes. A moan escaped his lips and y/n opened her eyes. She stared at his massive manhood with hungry eyes, licking her lips. "Stuff my mouth with this big cock, baby. I need to taste you."
Henry let out a growl full of arousal. "You want it down your throat?"
"Yes." Y/n moved her body and let her head hang down from the edge of the bed. It was her favorite position for deep throat, perfect for taking his length all the way down. Henry climbed off the bed and stood in front of her. His heavy cock was hovering over her head. He took it in his hands, giving it another few strokes and then he penetrated her mouth slowly, carefully.
They had done this before many times and he knew exactly what he was doing. Y/n loved having him balls deep in her mouth but she liked it slow, not rough. He never mouth fucked her, there was no need to. The way her throat closed tightly around the his dick, the feeling of her tongue pressing against his shaft, licking him, was enough to make him so incredibly horny, sometimes it even was enough to push him over the edge. But he didn't want to come in her throat today. He looked at her, how she sucked on him, playing with her own nipples and he started to move slowly, thrusting his hips carefully with tiny motions a few times. Y/n groaned, grabbing him by his thighs, obviously enjoying this.
He wanted to take her so badly, wanted to drag her down from the bed, take her in his arms, shove her against the wall and rail her into oblivion, her legs wrapped around his waist, her back pressed against the rough surface but he wanted to stand by his promise. Today he wouldn't simply fuck her, he would love her, show his affection. He pulled his cock out of her mouth slowly and climbed back on the bed.
"I need you inside of me, Henry. I need to feel you close." Y/n begged in a dark, needy voice.
He was back between her legs in an instant and kissed her before he let his dick glide into her wet, hot pussy. He took his time, letting her feel every inch. When he was completely inside of her they moaned and moved in unison for a pretty long time, their motions slow and intense, giving them the feeling of intimacy and total closeness. This was love making, this was passion, this was devotion. They looked each other in the eyes for the entire time, whispering sweet words, exchanging soft moans and little smiles. After a while Henry grabbed her ass and pulled her on his thighs to penetrate her even deeper. She lifted her hips eagerly and while he started to thrust, shoving his cock deep inside of her, she started to stimulate her clit simultaneously. It was such a turn on for Henry to watch her pleasure herself, he picked up speed, desperately wanting to fill her tight cunt with his cum.
Her moans turned into shrieks, his groans into animalistic grunts. They were rocking their hips, panting breathlessly, their bodies glistening with sweat.
"I'm close baby." Her voice was hoarse.
"Then come for me princess...come...."
"Fuck." Her pussy clenched around him and she cried out loud, enjoying her orgasm, rocking her hips, her legs shivering.
"Y/n…." Henry grabbed her hips and now he allowed himself to fuck her. He went fast, took her deep and hard before he came too. As usual he let out a long husky sigh, throwing back his head, thrusting his hips till his climax was over.
He pulled out slowly, plopped down beside her and took her in his strong arms.
"I love you." She whispered.
"I love you too, princess. More than anything in the world."
"I know, Henry." She turned to him and kissed him tenderly. "And if I ever doubt it again, just show me...like you did today."
#Spotify#henry cavill#cavillry#henry cavill fandom#henry cavill fanfic#henry cavill smut#henry cavill x reader#inspector cavill
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Kingdom - Reborn (pt.2)
Minyoung’s Outfit
Note:
Texts placed inside brackets are Kingdom’s show subtitles
Italicized texts are in English
Texts that are block quoted are interview cuts
────────── ♔ ──────────
During the shoot before Round 2, the time when they got the experts’ evaluation for Round 1, ATEEZ revealed the reason behind why the chose iKON as the group they wanted to exchange songs with.
"Everyone wanted to do iKON sunbaenims' songs. San did his monthly evaluation with Rhythm Ta and Minyoung's video for her highschool admission was Bling Bling. It's like we're fated to do this." Hongjoong explained moving his hands to point towards the two metioned people.
Seonghwa nodded adding in his own experience "I really like iKON sunbaenim that I even performed it at my school event."
"That's true! There's even videos of it." Hongjoong chuckled while Seonghwa shifted uncomfortably knowing the editors would probably add in the said video
"Minyoung too. She was formerly a YG trainee, so she must have had to dance to at least one song?" Jongho turned to the girl who was uncharacteristically quiet
"Me? I was a trainee there when they competed in Mix and Match. Ah but we don’t really practice Korean songs a lot there. Although, it’s like a mentality of trainees? You want to learn all the seniors’ songs in the company in case you have to perform it suddenly." Minyoung looked as if she was hiding herself cringing at her trainee days, feeling a bit embarrassed.
"So what? You literally are a member of their fanclub! I’m sure you know their songs by heart." Wooyoung pointed out making the rest of the members laugh. This information prompted the production staff behind the camera to ask if she really was a member of the iKON’s fanclub.
"I am, I also attended their concert in Sydney before. I also have membership for SF9 sunbaenim and BTOB sunbaenim. Oh but I like everyone!" Minyoung quickly added afraid she'll get misunderstood
[Photo evidences that Minyoung loves K-pop!] Photos of Minyoung’s merchandise and being in concerts or fan meetings were shown after edit.
"Ah right! But your class performed with Killing Me during the festival." Yunho exclaimed, clapping as he remembered the performance
"Oppa! Don't!" Minyoung tried to shush him but she knew it was too late. She turned to the staff worried "You're probably going to dig up videos right?"
[Of course! Here it is!]
As if teasing the girl, the editors played a clip of said performance. At this point, Minyoung knows there's no escaping what she calls her dark past.
(Group Interview)
The staff asked the group if they have tried contacting someone other groups with Hongjoong answering that he will try to do that after the show ends.
“When we started filming for Kingdom, I decided to be close with Kim Jinhwan-sunbaenim.” Wooyoung confessed making the other members laugh as he did declare that he will do whatever it takes to become close with him.
“Why do you sound so excited?” San asked laughing
“I feel like I don’t want people to know that I know you when you act like this oppa.” Minyoung mumbled evoking laughter from everyone including Wooyoung.
“What do you mean by that? You’re also like this with the other seniors!” Wooyoung grinned teasing the girl, Minyoung stuck out her tongue playfully at him.
“Even before filming Kingdom, the only groups that I don’t have anyone I personally know is iKON-sunbaenim and BTOB-sunbaenim. I’ll work hard to change that and be a successful fan.” Minyoung answered smiling shyly
“You do know Chanwoo-sunbaenim though? Through Chani-sunbaenim right?” Yunho poked the girl chuckling
“Ah right. We haven’t really talked but when it’s possible, he said he’ll schedule for our group to have a meal together with iKON-sunbaenim.” Minyoung nodded making the members smile in excitement
“Are you thinking of making it a win-win scenario with iKON?” the staff asked and with no hesitation the whole of ATEEZ answered yes.
“I think it’ll be great if we could place 1st and 2nd with iKON-sunbaenim. That’s my wish.” Hongjoong answered as the rest of the members nodded.
“People complimented our narrative in round one and that’s because they could tell that we were pirates. When performing Rhythm Ta, we need an arrangement and choreography from which people could tell exactly what we’re going for.” Hongjoong explained his ideas to the group as they conceptualize the stage for the round.
“Let’s our heads together and come up with it.” Wooyoung stated as he looked towards the other members.
“Let’s really put our heads together” Jongho joked as Hongjoong asked them to say their cheer. “Say, 9 makes 1 king.”
“9 makes 1 king! Fighting!”
(Preparation for the Stage)
“In the original song, ‘What’s up? Hurry up and nod your head.’ this is the part that I liked. It’s catchy.” Hongjoong said to the camera as he worked on the song. “I left that part in verse 1 and verse 2 but I changed the second part a bit to incorporate a Latin vibe.”
“Another thing we agreed upon is to have another movie reference for this performance. We borrowed ideas from ‘Pirates of the Carribean’ for our Round 1 performance and for this stage, we will borrow the theme from the drama called ‘Money Heist’.”
“So we’re becoming 8 pirates. It’ll be a prequel to <Wonderland>.”
(Phone call with Minyoung)
Hongjoong called Minyoung while he was arranging Rhythm Ta into their own color and was on the phone with her as the cameras were recording.
Hongjoong: Minyoung-ah, so I was thinking..
Minyoung: Oh no. What is it? *nervous tone* More high notes? Oppa stop thinking. That’s bad for my heart. *laughs*
Hongjoong: Instead of high notes, I'd like you to rap.
Hongjoong laughed hearing Minyoung groan over the line and there was a pause before Minyoung spoke again.
Minyoung: Oppa. Don’t do this to me. Save me. Please. I'll do the high notes or stunts
Hongjoong: We have to showcase everything Minyoung-ah. You're a rapper. You already showed Atiny that you can do it.
Minyoung: I knew it. Giving in to Atiny’s request for that cover was bad *sighs before letting out a laugh in resignation* Understood. I'll do it. I have to do it. I did say I'll follow your decisions all throughout and I don’t go back on my words.
Hongjoong: Also, you know that we’ll be adding narration right?
Minyoung: Ah no. I’ll go along with your rap request but I won’t do the narration.
Hongjoong: Why? It’s in English and you’re our native English speaker.
Minyoung: It’s because I’ll most likely laugh if I do it besides don’t you think having the leader do it would paint a better picture? Like you’re leading ATEEZ into a revolution.
Hongjoong: *convinced* Oh you have a point there. Alright. Thanks bun. Come record your parts tomorrow and bring Seonghwa with you.
Minyoung: Mhm. I'll come with Seonghwa-oppa. Fighting Joong-oppa! I’m hanging up. Bye bye~
“Let’s do it from the start.” The choregrapher called out as he counted out loud while the members dance. San laughing after they finished a part.
[Main dancer losing his mind]
Nodding, the choreographer clapped and called out “Okay let’s try the second part”
"Let me catch my breath first." San asked the choreographer
“We’re not going to jump. We’re not using our steps.” as they run through their dance routine only to find out the choreographer is doing the footwork while all the members laughed
"It's what we've been doing anyway. It's just the base footwork." the choreographer commented laughing when he saw the members' faces "Just roll your feet"
"I feel like I'm getting conned." Wooyoung laughed as he too was trying to catch a breath
Minyoung laughed as if she is losing her mind. "Why is this so difficult? This rolling is insane." before singing the song Rollin’ as she attempted the move again.
[Another one who is losing her mind.]
“I feel like we’ll all be sore after this stage.” Wooyoung remarked as the others laughed knowing that it’s going to happen.
“Where are we?” San asked as they walked into an establishment
“We’re here to practice for Kingdom.” Hongjoong answered as he explained what they need to do. They all agreed that it is important to try the action with one’s own body and Wooyoung pointed them to a place where they could practice those movements. The group went to a BB gun shooting place and played around.
“Ah. But won’t Minyoung have an advantage?” San grinned ready to tease the girl
“Why? What about me?” Minyoung asked tilting her head a bit.
“You’re small. You can hide behind almost everything here.” San got ready to block the girl’s slap laughing
“That would also mean Yunho-oppa is a great target though. Besides I can’t win if I stay cooped up in one place.” Minyoung shook her head slapping San’s arm “But rest assured. I’ll make sure to hunt for you oppa.”
“Everyone, aim for Yeosang.” Hongjoong reminded everyone of their goal today
“Okay.” “So it’s a 7 v 1 then.”
[It looks like they came here to have fun]
“But why are we aiming at Yeosang-oppa?” Minyoung asked as they shoot Yeosang who tried expressing how being shot by bullets felt like.
“<Rhythm Ta> is the title of the song right? We need to get the rhythm and enjoy the stage to the fullest. I think people will like it if we could perform while laughing and having fun like we did today” Hongjoong explained to everyone after the day of playing
The group went for their rehearsals with the props for a final time, everyone taking their places. San and Minyoung were together as they have to lead the last group dance together.
"What are you doing?" Minyoung could be heard asking San in the background as he was talking to the camera, then feeling embarrassed with his actions.
As Minyoung was practicing the dance for her solo part, she limped slightly when trying to change positions, the staff asked her if she's doing okay. "I am! I don't think it'll affect my performance during the show, I just have my knee wrapped as extra protection."
"She hurt herself during one of our rehearsals. It's nothing serious but to be safe, she was told not to strain too much." San explained for Minyoung who returned back to practicing her routine
[The choreography as expected is intense for all the members but she continues to practice despite the injury]
Noticing the camera focusing on her, she shared what was on her mind "More than this, I'm more nervous rapping in front of the seniors live. I’m worried that people wouldn’t take to well to me rapping and I'm especially scared that iKON sunbaenim might not like it. But I have to do it, I just need to do my part well since everyone else would surely kill theirs."
[The pressure must be heavy for the 22-year old girl to face but she continues on with a smile]
As the staff asked if they could win, San confidently answered “Win? If we do what we have to do properly, if we show what we got, I think it’s possible.”
“There was some pressure but I think we could prepare it with energy solely because we ranked high.” Jongho confessed during the group interviews.
“Right. I feel like we could prepare for the stage and just purely enjoy the process because the pressure isn’t as bad as before.” Minyoung said chiming in
“We were preparing for the next round energetically because we want to achieve another good result this round.” Jongho concluded
“I’m most curious about iKON-sunbaenim’s reactions” Hongjoong piped in making Yunho nod adding in “If we’re acknowledged by them, we already succeded a bit.”
“As we won first place in the previous round, we should show a performance fit for that title. That’s what we kept on thinking.” Hongjoong smiled as the other members nodded in agreement.
“A performance fit for the winners?” San asked
“We should meet their expectations.” Hongjoong nodded
“Shouldn’t we go above their expectations?” Minyoung asked making the whole group laugh as they end the interview.
"There were a lot of new things we tried for this performance. San doing b-boying and Minyoung would have more active parts in the choreography. You also have to look forward to her rap too." Hongjoong answered confidently smiling during the interview for Round 2.
When the music played ATEEZ’s version of Rhythm Ta, Minyoung felt adrenaline pump through her body as she felt herself suddenly no longer nervous, just excited.
Everyone was surprised to hear her voice whispering their opening and even more when she rapped the pre-verse after Seonghwa's lines.
BTOB Eunkwang: She also raps? She’s insane! Didn’t she do the high note last round?
BTOB Minhyuk: Right. Isn’t she a vocal?
SF9 Chani: She’s going all out, huh. *chuckle*
Minyoung took center position for the first chorus as she sang “igeon gunyang noraeniggan rhythm ta” the cameras closing in, focused on her facial expressions before panning out to their group dance.
Stray Kids Han: *excited shout* Minyoung-ah!
iKON Yunhyeong: She’s an all-rounder.
SF9 Dawon: What’s scary is her facial expressions. How is she this good? It’s completely different from her usual aura
SF9 Inseong: She’s an actress. But I agree, her facial expressions are fascinating. All of them do but she’s standing out in this performance.
As Hongjoong finished the Money Heist speech, Minyoung and Jongho sang together for the bridge with Minyoung supporting his high note before the dance booster where San lead the dance. For the ending, Minyoung once again took center position before doing a high kick in time for the last beat and smirking at the camera as the music fades to the intro of their Round 1 performance.
THE BOYZ Hyunjae: Minyoung is crazy. Pick one thing to be good at! Goodness.
SF9 Chani: *claps, standing up*
SF9 Inseong: Minyoung-ie looked impressive during that last bit
Stray Kids Han: That's my friend right there! *laughs*
Stray Kids Changbin: *laughs* You sound like you’re a proud parents
iKON DK: They killed the stage. Like how we made our own from their song, they also created their own Rhythm Ta.
BTOB Eunkwang: They really made it their song. It was totally ATEEZ’ song.
ATEEZ bowed and thanked the backup dancers and the staff after their performance, all smiling as they all thought they did perfectly.
Minyoung now feeling the high from their performance settle down a bit, finally felt the pain in her knee. Yunho noticing that’s she is having a hard time walking, crouched down in front of her. "Let's go and no, it's either you get on my back or I carry you over my shoulder Young-ah." knowing she'd refuse.
Sighing, she went on his back getting carried to the backstage to get their microphones taken out and treat Minyoung.
"Did you hurt it again?" San asked approaching the two with Jongho beside him, still trying to catch his breath.
"Same old. I just feel a numb pain but nothing too serious." Minyoung smiled trying to reassure the members that managed to gather around her and their manager who gave her a cold pack for her knee.
"If it's too much, sit out the rest of the filming-" Hongjoong started to say but the girl quickly rejected the idea
"No! I want to watch the rest of the stages too." Minyoung pouted trying to win over their leader with aegyo
Laughing, Wooyoung patted Minyoung's back lightly. "Okay case closed. Minyoung is staying for the performances. Hongjoong-hyung can never resist Minyoung when she does that."
"Fine. But you have to get that checked after the shoot and you have to tell us immediately if it gets too painful." Hongjoong sighed knowing how stubborn Minyoung could get when she wants something.
(BTOB’s stage)
“Okay. Another stage that I’m looking forward to. When Stray Kids picked BTOB-sunbaenim, I was already thinking of what songs could match well with them.” Minyoung stated as she made herself comfortable in her seat, playing with the wheeled chair a bit.
“Since <God’s Menu> was already performed last round, they probably won’t pick that.” Seonghwa laughed as he watched as the girl roll around her chair using her good leg
“What if it was <Hellevator> or <Double Knot>? That would be really cool!” Minyoung exclaimed clapping her hands “They could go for a complete 180 of the song. Imagine that.”
Hongjoong laughed at her excitement as Wooyoung grinned “Yeosang-ah, you and Jongho should probably get your ears ready if she squeals.”
“A bit too late for that warning.” Jongho laughed as Minyoung lightly punched his arm in protest
As BTOB started their stage, the camera was focused on the floor label ‘Stage 1’. Minyoung pointed at the screen. “It looks like a backstage..Omo! Are they going to perform <Back Door>?”
“Oh! <Back Door> <Back Door> <Back Door> <Back Door>” Yunho exclaimed excitedly with Wooyoung when Eunkwang pretended to warm up his vocals for their performance
“This is totally rock. The style actually suits Changsub-sunbaenim a bit.” Minyoung noted as Changsub opened the song with his verse “How does he go high that easily?”
Yeosang looked at the girl chuckling “You also go up that high. You and Jongho do that easily.” to which Minyoung deadpanned “Maybe Jongho but for me, I die whenever there’s a high note in my part.” at this answer all members of ATEEZ shook their heads, disagreeing with her but decided not to say anything and just focus on the performance.
“Wow! Crazy!” Wooyoung had his mouth open during the high note while Seonghwa could be visibly scene having the time of his life at the side
“Omo!” Minyoung let out a light squeal when Minhyuk came into the screen in his robe. Seonghwa suddenly switching from a fanboy mode to a protective mode and trying to block Minyoung’s view.
“What’s with everyone showing off their physique? We cannot win that!” Wooyoung laughed
“Peniel-sunbaenim’s rap is a bit…provocative?” Minyoung mumbled as she nod along to the music. “I guess they changed the theme quite a bit.”
“Oh! They’re finally going up the stage.” Jongho pointed out as the group walked out to what looks like a concert stage
“I want to go there too! I’ll be a backup dancer for them and just vibe up the stage.” Minyoung pointed at the screen copying the movements of the backup dancers
“Omo. Here it goes. Here it goes. BTOB-sunbaenim’s harmonies” Minyoung clapped excitedly as both Changsub and Eunkwang harmonize.
The rest of the stage was spent by the whole of ATEEZ just being the fans that they are, raising their hands up and down just like the dancers on stage. Most of them had their mouths wide-open as they’re amazed by the whole performance brought by BTOB until Minhyuk ripped his shirt off prompting Minyoung’s surprised gasp and Seonghwa’s frantic hand going to cover Minyoung’s eyes.
Wooyoung laughed at the two of them. “They’re at it again.” Seonghwa trying to cover Minyoung’s view while Minyoung trying to remove Seonghwa’s hand while laughing.
(Stray Kids’ stage)
“<I’ll be your Man>? This is song is so high though! I wonder how they changed it up. Also, Stray Kids’ openings for both of these rounds sounds so..” Minyoung paused trying to think of the word “you know the feeling you get during horror movies when they suddenly turn down the music?”
“Eerie? Mysterious? Creepy?” Hongjoong listed words that the girl could be thinking of.
“Eerie. That one. It feels so eerie but like you’re anticipating something but the general tone is just so solemn or something.” Minyoung commented as she watched Seungmin’s part in the opening.
“Han Jisung aye~” Minyoung smiled as Jisung did vocal parts right after Seungmin.
“So is this the part of Kingdom where the rapper sings and vocals rap?” Hongjoong chuckled glancing at Minyoung “You rapped today when you’re usually vocals then Han sings when he usually raps.”
“Minhyuk-sunbaenim did it first on this show though and Jisung has been doing vocals parts in their songs too.” Minyoung shook her head as she pointed it out to her leader
“You should give her more parts is what I’m hearing right now.” Jongho laughed, shaking his head before returning back his focus on the performance.
“it’s a difficult song. This one.” Yunho pointed out looking forward to the stage
When the screen changed, Minyoung got startled and jumped a bit in her seat as Changbin’s rap section started. “Changbin-sunbaenim’s parts always sounds so heavy. Oh but I meant it in a good way.”
Minyoung gasped with her eyes wide when Changbin fell from the platform. “Omo!” Wooyoung who was sat at the end grinned, proud of his friend. “My friend.” making Yunho laugh at him as Hongjoong praises Changbin for his rap.
“The kid disappeared!” Minyoung exclaimed making Yeosang chuckle at her. “Are they like dead? Is that why the dancers are wearing white? What is happening?”
“He’s gone!” “Where did he go?” both Wooyoung and Yunho gasped and spoke at the same time
As soon as Han took center and sang the chorus, Minyoung clapped excitedly in her seat. “Go get it! Let’s go!” then during Felix’s parts Minyoung couldn’t help but point at the screen shouting his name “Felix! Yes, go make use of your deep voice and dig deep underground.” as all of ATEEZ let out a sound in awe.
“Wait why are there axes and spears? Omo! They’re dragging him..I did say to dig deep but..” Minyoung gasped in realization “Omo! Is he like a devil?”
Noticing the backup dancers, Minyoung mumbled under her breath “So are all backup dancers in JYP this fit? It’s like they all have toned bodies.” Yeosang who was seating next to her let out a laugh, getting the attention of the rest of the members as he waved them off indicating he’ll tell them later.
“Is that blood? Are they going to summon Felix?!” Minyoung incredibly invested at the performance would have scooted closer to the screen if not for Jongho who was holding her chair back. “What is this? Did they sacrifice the kid? Or are they trying to save the kid?”
If Minyoung was excited during the first part of the performance, imagine that being doubled when both Seungmin and Han did the high notes. She was practically beaming, proud of her friends her attention on them before noticing the heavy rapping of Changbin in the background when Wooyoung pointed it out.
“I got goosebumps” Seonghwa confessed as Wooyoung exclaimed “Changbin, he’s super cool!”
“Our I.N-ie!” Minyoung raised her hands up high when Jeongin did the last bit of the chorus. “Oh! I’ve got goosebumps.” Jongho noted as the performance ended.
“So did they like sacrifice their blood to summon Felix and then save the baby?” Minyoung asked still a bit lost
“I think so. The statue seems to represent the kid in the beginning then they gave it a heart to save him.” Hongjoong nodded clapping for the last performance of the day.
“So did they save the kid? Or was the kid a ghost? I need answers!” Minyoung pouted as Yeosang chuckled and patted her back. “I believe it’ll be up to the interpretation of the audience.”
Outtake:
After everyone has performed, Minyoung laughed to herself gaining the attention of the rest of the members. “What’s funny?” Hongjoong asked her
"Should I just take it off too? Everyone ripped their shirts off and stuff." Minyoung asked patting her jacket, shocking the other members making them jump from their seat and yell out "No!" in unison. Minyoung laughed surprised at how loud they got.
"Why would you want to do that?" Seonghwa asked frowning a bit, trying to think up a reason to discourage whatever idea is on her mind.
"I don't want to hear that from you and San-oppa. You exhibitionists." Minyoung countered jokingly making Jongho and Wooyoung laugh. "It's not like I'll actually go topless that’ll be real bad. Maybe wear something sexy. I've already tried it during <HALA HALA> and <THANXX>...kind of? anyway, so it's not like it's anything new."
"After all this time? Why?" Yeosang asked curiously as there were lots of time when fan would question her stage outfits. She would always get something that doesn’t show that much skin, take her stage outfit for today. She has layers of clothing which worked in favor for the group since they won’t need to be on the look-out too much for ill-intentioned people. After that incident during their <Wave> promotions, everyone took turns on sticking by Minyoung’s side to avoid another incident.
"I mean everyone's been ripping their shirts off or showing of their physique and by everyone I mean including the backup dancers. They look good by the way.” Minyoung reasoned, taking her phone out already looking at potential outfits.
Jongho laughed as he patted Minyoung's back "Your image. Try to protect your image, you fangirl." making Minyoung laugh shrugging
"A bit too late for that Jongho. I'm pretty sure Atiny already knows that I have my fangirl moments. Besides, when could I ever enjoy myself like this other than off stage? I’ve had my fun with hair colors so maybe I could have fun with outfits as well."
"Why not her do what she wants? Better to agree and decide with her rather than her surprising us about it." Yeosang shrugged, chuckling when Minyoung raised her thumbs up exclaiming "You know me too well oppa"
"If you're comfortable with it...it’s not like we can completely stop you from doing what you want " Hongjoong sighed in resignation, patting Minyoung's head. He would have ruffled her hair if not for the thousand pins on your hair.
"Young lady, I am going to make sure it isn't scandalous. You better let me see the outfit first." Seonghwa wagged a finger trying to look threatening but only making Minyoung laugh and agree. "Like I said, you and San-oppa are the last ones I'll want to hear those words from. Well especially San-oppa. His clothes keep getting lesser and lesser." cracking up everyone
────────── ♔ ──────────
ATEEZ Minyoung Masterlist
Disclaimer: This is just a work of fiction. Any portrayal of real people is a combination based on what we could see on cameras and imagination of the author. This is purely fan fiction written for entertainment. Thank you for understanding.
━━━━━━ʕ ˵• ₒ •˵ ʔ━━━━━━
Writing Beary Corner
That’s it for the Reborn Round! I’m not sure if it showed but I had a lot of fun writing this round as everyone did a great job and this was the stage I looked forward to the most.
I’m a bit busy this week so I cannot finish my drafted posts but I’ll post as soon as they’re ready. ♡♡♡
Thank you for reading!
-Mimi
20
#kpop scenarios#kpop reactions#ateez scenarios#ateez 9th member#ateez au#ateez oc#ateez#kpop oc#kpop au#kpop imagines#ateez minyoung#park minyoung#minyoung masterlist#writing beary
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Six of Crows re-read
(i also did this for the shadow and bone trilogy so read that if you want to)
spoiler alert obiously
i'm SO EXCITED FOR THIS this is my comfort book (with crooked kingdom of course)
JOOST HI
oo fun fact this was my first grishaverse book and i read it with no context whatsoever except that the mc is an emo boy and morally grey
so IMAGINE my pure confusion when JOOST appeared
i was like ?????? weird take on morally grey character but ok
joost trying to figure out how to flirt with a girl is a mood
anyone wanna teach us how to???
i kinda wanna skip this part so i can see the crows..
but i won't don't worry
(won't I?
"I think Yuri may be quarantined"
aaaand?
so are we you are not special
i feel like it's very important for me to mention that i read this book in spanish first
and then i got into the fandom and i was like who the fuck is the wraith? i only know El Espectro
Heartender who??? ooo you mean Cardio
Tidemakers? nope, i only know Maremotores
for real i was so confused i had to re-read it in english (not that i mind tho)
say whatever you want about the spanish version but we have to agree that this design is pretty af
another one yay: "Retvenko was a Squaller" vs. "Retvenk era un Impulsor"
(should i also say that in my pfd english version the book is 294 pages long and in my pdf spanish version its 532????) (i think it's because in the english one the speces are way less like the lines are so close together wtf
i've decided that i'm bored so i'll be skiping this chapter
anya is super badass tho
skdgfalsdgfliaysvfascvhjl yesssssss inej
Kaz Brekker didn't need a reason.
AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA
KAZ
INEJ
I MISSED THEM
omg now i can picture amita and freddy SDJGKASKGLASG THIS IS AMAZING
we interrupt our regularly scheduled program to watch the shadow and bone trailer once again to hear freddy's beautiful voice
ok moving on!
now hear me out i'm giving you all permission to make fun of kaz for this one: Dirtyhands = Manos Sucias
hello i am Kaz Manos Sucias. nice to meet you!
AAAAA
AAAAAAAAAA
JESPER FAHEY
JESPER LOVE HI
SJDGHFKAHSGDLAJSDFSJ,AHFLHDSGF
I MISSED HIM OMG
OMG NOW I CAN PICTURE HIM AS KIT
can you tell jesper is one of my favourite characters?
i really love the fact that kaz is pissed about the murder of that ambassador ONLY because he can´t figure out how it happen
he´s such a nerd
i can't believe one of the firts things we hear jesper say is threathen to kill someone by writing "forgive me" with bullets
AND HE CALLS HIS GUNS "BABIES" OMG
picture saying hi baby and wylan thinkin he's talking to him but actually jesper's talking to one of his guns
Jesper rolled his eyes. "It's about sending a message. What's the point of a dead guy with forg written on his chest?."
"Compromise," Kaz said. "I'm sorry does the trick and uses fewer bullets."
ooo thank god we have kaz to come up with creative solutions /j /s
honestly i love how they talk about kaz's cane like it's the scariest weapon ever (which it kind of is)
nothing will ever disappoint me more than finding out that in english their gang name is "the Dregs". like i don't even know for sure what that means
in spanish is "Los Indeseables" (the undesirables?) which sounds a lot more badass
no hate tho i like the dregs
but i was confused af bc i expected it to be sometihng like "the undesirables" or"the unwanted" or whatever
and it said "the dregs"
which in the translator means something like shit or something
anways moving on:
If he'd (kaz) ever been a little boy
i love how lowkey all the crows think he was just born exactly like he is now
imagine a baby kaz all dressed in black and threatening people
cute
"No mourners," Jesper said as he tossed his rifle to Rotty
"No funerals," the rest of the Dregs murmured in reply. Among them, it passed for "good luck".
YES
YESSS
i wonder what wylan's doing right now :))
i can't wait for the next book where he has a pov
the first time i read this book i literally looked at the title of every chapter to see if he ever got one (i was disappointed to say the least :((((
Besides, she was the Wraith - the only law that applied to her was gravity, and some days she defied that, too.
ma'am
marry me please
i'm gonna cry so hard once the show is out and we get to see inej omg
me simp
That Kaz had chosen Jesper to be one of his seconds was no surprise. Twitchy as Jepser was, with or without his revolvers, he was at his best in a fight, and she knew he'd do anything for Kaz.
idk why but i just love it every time kaz implies or shows that he cares or trusts jesper
it makes me soft
But every one of Inej's senses told her that was not how this was going to play out. Her father would have said the shadows were about their business tonight. Something bad was going to happen here.
underrated saying from Inej's father right there
"I'm a business man," he told her."No more, no less"
"You're a thief, Kaz."
"Isn't that what I just said?"
i-
i see no lies here
not to be annoying but i hc jesper as adhd (i mean is pretty much as canon as wylan's dyslexia) so i'm gonna write here every time i see evidence :)
jesper with adhd part 1: impulsivity
Jesper snorted. "Stomach, spine. What's next, spleen?"
"Shut it" Oomen snarled. The rules of parley dictated that only the lieutenants could speak once negotiations had begun. Jesper mouthed "sorry" and elaboratedly pantomimed locking his lips shut.
he know he couldn't speak but couldn't stop himself from making a comment (i relate way too much to that lmao)
hoestly poor jesper he had to watch hid friend get shot and kaz do nothing about it
i would've been mad too
"I like it when men beg," she said. "But this isn't the time for it"
KAHGFAHLGSFGASFLGSAFS
this is one of the best quotes in the book by far
YASSS KAZ POV
Kaz could have tol Jesper that he knew he wasn't dirty, reminded him that he'd trusted him eough to make him his only real second in a fight that could have gone badly wrong tonight.
cute
but kaz is petty af
he didn't even have a reason not to tell jesper that!
i love that kaz knows inej is following him but doesn't say anything because he wants to wait until she's ready
i LOVE the scene where kaz in in the van eck mantion /srs
idk why but it's so good
And, of course, there was the mystery of Van Eck's son.
wonder what that could be!!! /s
He grinned at her (...)
"Hmm." she said noncommittally, pretending to examine one of her knives, determined to ignore that grin.
KANEJ YESS
HE'S BASICALLY SHOWERING IN FRONT OF HER OMG
this is so funny poor inej is getting flustered
"And I'll need Wylan waiting at the Crow Club tomorrow night."
YES WYLAN OMG
One minute he made her blush and the next he made her want to commit murder
happens to the best of us :/
"Please, my darling Inej. treasure of my heart won't you do me the honor of acquiring me a new hat?"
if kaz doesn't say this on the show we riot
agreed?
it's so amazing how nina found a way to use her powers to get money instead of having to like steal and murder like the rest in the gang
NINA'S POV YESSS HIII
nina and inej omg
their friendship is just perfect
POOR MATTHIAS HE HAS TO FIGHT THE WOLVES
i would straight up cry
Matthias was dreaming again. Dreaming of her
i'm gonna cry damn it
this is the enemies-to-lovers we all needed
jesper has adhd part 2:
"Jesper was supposed to wait until three bells." said the pale boy
"It is three bells, Kaz." replied a small girl (...)
"Since when is Jesper punctual?" the boy complained with a glance at his watch
the time blindness come one
(btw i love the fact that kaz plans around jesper's time blindness instead of like threatening him to be on time)
i really love how every one feels the need to take the time to say/think that the masks are ugly
its so unnecessary lmao
yessss inej is a badass that kills monster we stan
and matthias is lowkey impressed lmao
as he should
"Thank you, Jesper," said Nina
"You're very welcome, gorgeous. See, Kaz? That's how the civilised folk do"
THESE TWO OMG
JESPER IS THE LOML
INEJ OMG LOOK:
She stepped aside as if she's known he was coming, languidly hooking her heel behind his ankle. Matthias let out a loud grunt as he landed on the stones
(...) "Clumsy, this one," the bronze girl said impassively.
i-
that's what happen when you underestimate her bitch
AAAAAAA
PEOPLE
PEOPLE
TIME TO FREAK OUT
WYLAN IS HERE
AND HE'S DOODLING STOP IT'S SO CUTE
ok jesper has adhd part 3 i think:
"Just how crazy is he?" asked Jesper, fingers drumming on the pearl handles of his revolvers.
ok first of all: stimming
second of all: hyperactivity
i rest my case
ok 2 or 3 things here
"I believe you know Nina," Brekker continued. "The lovely girl freeing you is Inej. (...) and this is Wylan, the best demolitions expert in the Barrel"
"Raske is better," Inej said
The boy looked up, ruddy gold hair flopping in his eyes, and spoke for the first time. "He's not better. He's reckless"
"He knows his trade"
"So do I"
ok 1: kaz calling inej lovely omg kanej
2: YES WYLAN STANDING UP FOR HIMSELF
2.5: kaz calling him the best cute af
3: honestly why do people think wylan is like an innocent soft boy or whatever. he's in a room full of murderers and thieves and the first thing he does is correct them and stand up for himself
like i wish i could do that
i would be crying like a bitch
AAAAAAAA
"Meet Wylan Van Eck"
KHDSGFALSGFIASGFAL
HI WYLAN BABY
YESSS JESPER'S POV NOW
I'M SO HAPPY also look at this it's the first thing in his pov
Jesper stared at Wylan
do i sense some wesper?????
ok everyone is being so mean to him right now
they are aclling him useless and an idiot and other shit
poor boy honestly he had to deal with this + taking part of a heist he is definetly not ready for + he has to hide the fact that he can't write or read
it so distrubing that kaz is literally the nicest one to wylan right now
"See that? Hidden depths." (...)"He's good enough at demo, and he's got a fine hand for sketching, thanks to all those pricey tutors."
(...)
"There you have it," Kaz said to Jesper. "Marketable skills. Wylan is watching you, Helvar"
GET READY
ARE Y'ALL READY?
OK THEN:
"Scheming face," Jesper whispered to Inej.
She nodded. "Definetly."
THEIR FRIENDSHIP OMG
AND THIS QUOTE
I NEED IT ON THE SHOW THEY BETTER GIVE IT TO US
"Who's Mark" damn wylan (but pretty good comeback to jesper tho)
"What's the easiest way to steal a man's wallet?
"Knife to the throat?" asked Inej.
"Gun to the back?" said Jesper.
"Poison in his cup?" suggested Nina.
"You're all horrible," said Matthias.
tag yourself i'm jesper
KJSFGAL kaz just told wylan to tell him everything he know about his dad's company
and he said he doesn't know and kaz was like "and you never looked trough his documents????
AND THEN HE GOT SAD AND SAID HE HADN'T (and kaz believed him this is sad)
AND NOW JESPER CALLED HIIM USELESS
ok you know i love you jes but if you keep this up
idk i can't do anything you're a sharpshooter
but stiiiiiil
LMAO MATTHIAS ACTUALLY THOUGHT HE COULD BEAT KAZ
nice try
demjin
*insert spongebob voice* demjin
WE'RE GONNA TAKE A MOMENT NOW TO APPRECIATE INEJ GAHFA
BECAUSE KAZ DOESN'T
The heart is an arrow. It demands aim to land true.
*ugly crying*
Many boys will bring you flowers. But some day you'll meet a boy who will learn your favourite flower, your favourite song, your favourite sweet. And even if he is too poor to give you any of them, it won't matter because he will have taken the time to know you as no one else does. Only that boy earns your heart.
*uglier crying*
TANTE HELLEN IF YOU DON'T GET THE FUCK OUT OF HERE
SOMEONE PLEASE STAB HER FOR ME
jesper has adhd part ?? (i have dyscalculia you can't expect me to remember the number):
That sound - the swift, shocking report of gunfire - called the scattered, irascible, permanently seeking part of his mind into focus like nothing else.
do i really need to explain this?
ok just in case.. an adhd brain doesn't actually have a deficit of attention(the name just sucks) it's problem with controling that attention. the brain is always looking for new sources of dopamine which is why it shifts its focus so much
i love that jes thinks of matthias as "tha giant"
like sir
have you seen yourself?
you're tall af
HE GOT SHOT
WHY DID I FORGET JESPER GETS SHOT IN THE LEG HERE
"Close your eyes!"
"You can't kiss me from down there, Wylan"
"Just do it!"
i love the energy BUT NOW IT'S NOT THE TIME JES
YESS WYLAN SHOW THEM THEY WERE WRONG CALLING YOU USELESS
inej just stabed some guy int the d
good for her!
KAZ YESSSS HI
AWWW SHE'S WORRIED HE DOESN'T HAVE HIS CANE
KANEJ FOR LIFE
oh no wylan got shot too???? (just barely but stilllll por baby)
my Wraith omggg
ok 3 things about this:
Without another word, he tipped Oomen into the sea.
"No!" Wylan shouted, leaning over the railing, his face pale, stunned eyes tracking Oomen in the waves. (...)
Jesper set his hand on Wylan's shoulder. "Let it go."
"It's not right-"
"Wylan," Jesper said, giving him a little shake."Maybe your tutors didn't cover this lesson, but you do not argue with a man covered in blook and a knife up his sleeve"
1. wesper yasssss
2. wylan just argued with a mant hat had just tacken the eye out of someone. he literally called him out for being an asshole. like damn wylan is brave af i love him
3. do you think seeing kaz trow the guy out of the boat reminded wylan of when the same thing happened to him???? this makes me sad
he's brave and a good person and i just-
"Man with a knife, remember?" he said over his shoulder.
"Man with a gun!" Jesper called after him
this had no right being so funny
AND THEN KAZ GAVE HIM THE MIDDLE FINGER STOP I CAN'T
nina is the biggest kanej shiper no one can tell me i'm wrong
unrelated but if jesper had gone to the Little Palace and had studied there with nina they 100% would've had a crush on Zoya and bonded over it
like you can't tell me those two bisexual disaster wouldn't be absolutely in love with Zoya
jesper has adhd part ??:
Jesper scrubbed the back of his neck, touched his hands to his gunds, returned to his neck. He always seemed to be in motions
hyperactivity right there
and restlessness
"Do you know the best way to find Grisha who don't want to be found?" (...)
"Seems to be if they don't want to be found, you should just let them be" (jesper says this)
this conversation must be so stressful to him omg
LMAO JESPER CUT MATTHIAS HAIR THIS IS SO FUNNY
AND HE SHAVED HIM
ok you all know i love all of them but they can be sooo stupid
like wylan wrote no names on the drawing and he's excuse is that he doesn't know fjerdan?
AND THAT'S NOT EVEN TRUE he literally said he learned school fjerdan which means he should know how to write it too (we know why he can't but the tohers don't)
and even then like the excuse doesn't make any sense. why would having the original name be usefull if no one can fucking read it????
the worst part tho? NO ONE QUESTIONED HIM
THEY WERE LIKE "yup makes sense" AND WENT ON WITH THEIR DAY
i wondered how they didn't figure wylan's secret sooner but now i now
it's because theya re idiots
"I'm just doing my job. Stop glaring at me"
wylan baby let's not make the gigant mad
Jesper knocked his head against the hull and cast his eyes heavenward. "Fine. But if Pekka Rollins kills us all, I'm going to get Wylan's ghost to teach my ghost how to play the flute just so that I can annoy the hell out of your ghost."
Brekker's lips quirked. "I'll just hire Matthias ghost to kick your ghost's ass."
"My ghost won't associate with your ghost," Matthias said primply, and then wondered if the sea air was rotting his brain.
i had to put this here i don't want to get murdered by the fandom
jesper, inej and nina have the BEST friendship
I CAN'T WAIT TO SEE JES AND INEJ TOGETHER ON NETFLIX
"I know some people don't understand, but Kaz told me ... he said it was my choice, that he wouldn't be the one to mark me again."
i love this because it happen when they had just met
he did it because he understands her trauma and he respects her not because he loves her (i doubt he did at the time)
Kaz had been impressed with the sketches. (...)
"Just learn to take a compliment. Kaz doesn't hand them out often."
I'M SO PROUD OF WYLAN
and yess kaz only compliments wylan (and inej but that's sarcastic so it doesn't count) because he's a proud dad
"And you don't belong here, either."
"I beg your pardon, merchiling?"
"We don't need a sharpshooter for Kaz's plan, so what's your job - other than stalking around making everyone angsty?"
He shrugged. "Kaz trusts me."
Wylan snorted and picked up his pen. "Sure about that?"
DAMN WYLAN DESTROYED HIM
also
"If you aren't born with every advantage, you learn to take your chances."
"I wasn't-" Wylan left off and set down his pen. (...)
aww cute neurodivergent boyfriends bonding
Wylan had turned back to his work, his disappointment obvious. For some reason, Jesper felt disappointed, too.
ajgflasjgfjagslfiuusgflgdfsgdflasdgfsd
wesper
aww jes checks on inej every morning and every night i love him
"Thank you for keeping me in this world when fate seemed determined to drag me to the next. I owe you a life debt."
Nina blushed deeply. "I was teasing, Inej"
LJFGALKGFALGA another cute friendship right there
(and i can see why people ship them romantically)
STOP INEJ AND JES ARE BONDING SO MUCH (page 127 so i can go back and read it lmao)
Van Eck writes to Wylan every week, and Wylan doesn't even open the letters
"They just said the same thing again and again: If you're reading this, the you know how much I wish to have you home. Or I pray that you read these words and think of all you've left behind."
should i kill him? anyone want to join me?
Inej bumped her shoulder against his."Then at least we're both the same kind of stupid." (...)
"You're too good for him, you know?"
"I know. So are you"
jes and her bonding over their stupid crush on a white boy
Because I've been looking for an excuse to talk to you for two days.
jfsfdajdhmgkfutdjrgsg ok i can't blame them for having a crush on him anymore
this chapter is full of kanej i love it
"What do you want, then"
You, Inej. You forever.
jksdgfoagsdfgsdgfklasgdflaghsldfgksdgfkahgsdfghjlkf
kaz's backstory makes me sad
"When we get our money, you can burn kruge to keep you warm," said Kaz. (...)
"I´m gonna pay someone to burn my kruge for me."
Kaz fell into step beside him. "Why don't you pay someone else to pay someone to burn your kruge for you? That's what big players do."
"You know what the really big bosses do? They pay someone to pay someone ...". Their voices trailed off as they tomped ahead, and Matthias and the others followed.
JES AND KAZ HAVE THE BEST CONVERSATIONS
i can't believe we get to see nina and matthias meet and their whole backstory in less than a month omg
"It's not natural for women to fight."
"It's not natural for someone to be as stupid as he is tall, and yet there you stand."
QUEEN
YOU TELL HIM
oh no the dead grisha
this part breaks my heart every time
"Do you have a different name for killing when you wear a uniform to do it?"
.....i'm just gonna leave this quote right here
anyways acab
stop nina tried to kill the survivor so they wouldn't suffer but she couldn't do it
and jesper did it for her without hesitation i wanna cry
and inej didn't want to do it either i want to hug them
"Because our crime is existing. Our crime is what we are"
..........
i'm gonna leave this here again
do with it what you will
"Don't mock what you don't understand."
"My mockery offends you? My people would welcome you laughter in place of this barbarity"
i- this conversation is so important
AAAAA JES AND WY ARE A GREAT TEAM I LOVE THEM
WYLAN TROWS BOMBS TOGIVE JESPER TIME TO GET READY TO SHOOT
INEJ AND KAZ ARE A GREAT TEAM TOO
THEY LITERALLY DID THE SCENE LIKE IN THE AVENGERS (but without the shield WHICH MAKES IT BETTER)
Jesper shouldered his rifle. "Wylan earned his keep."
Wylan gave a little jump at the sound of his name. "I did?"
YES BABY YOU DID GREAT
kaz getting self-conscious for his hair is pure comedy
but nina how can you say that have you see his hair on the show???? it's perfect
"Remeber our friend Mark?"
HELP I CAN'T
"Any other impossible feats you'd like us to accomplish?"
The bearest smile flikered over Kaz's lips. "I'll make you a list."
once again jesper and kaz being besties
unrelated but nikolai and jesper would love each other
the amount of sass they have between them it's unparalleled
"Mmm," Inej murmured, taking a sip from her mug. "Maybe you're just not enough."
DAMN
ma'am marry me please
kaz fainted damn poor boy
unrelated unce again but this is so much betetr than shadow and bone
like you can tell leigh improved so much
her characters are better and their arcs are better developed
the writing itself it's better
or maybe i'm just biased because i love soc so much but i think she definetly improved
INEJ IS TRYING TO GIVE HIM SPACE EVEN WHEN SHE'S TRAPPED AND LOCKED ON THE WAGON
I JUST - THEY KNOW EACH OTHER SO MUCH
Though he'd trusted her with his life countless times, it felt much more frightening to trust her with his shame.
Inej had once offered to teach him how to fall. "The trick is not getting knocked down," he'd told her with a laugh. "No, Kaz," she's said, "the trick is in getting back up"
inej is smart af
Kaz was usually unshakeable during a job, but now he was on edge, and Jesper didn't know why. Part of him wanted to ask, though he knew that was the stupid part, the hopeful farmboy who picked the worst possible person to care about, who searched for signs in things that he knew deep down meant nothing - when kaz chose him for a job, when Kaz played along with one of his jokes. He could have kicked himself. He's finally seen the infamous Kaz Brekker without a stich of clothing, and he'd been too worried about ending up on a pike to pay proper attention.
ok i got a couple of things to say about this part
first of all it makes me so sad that jes cares so much for someone who dosn't deserve him. because no hate to kaz but they would never work as a couple and kaz already treats him like shit most of the time
i think this part shows who a lot about who jesper really is. a boy that grew up having to hide parts of himself, who thinks he's worth nothing but it's smart and capable, who's loyal and brave and caring but doesn't even know it himself. he's someone who feels he doesn't deserve good things and thinks he's not good enough, and that's why he unds up in all the wrong places with the wrong people. he left uni bc he fell in with the gangs, because he didn't think he was smart enough or even prepared to be in studying in the university. jesper is constantly hiding behind a mask or running from things because he's scared of not being enough
an kaz is everything jes in a way wishes he could be. kaz is secure in himself (at least on the outside), he's stable, he's smart, he's "unshakeable". and most of all, he doesn't care about others (we know that's not true but that's how he presents himself)
and that's the thing that causes jesper all his problems. because he's insecure because he thinks he's not good enough for the poeple or things he cares about. and he's always trying to do what's best for his loved ones: he went to the ice court to pay his debt for his father, he follows kaz everywhere beacause he cares about him, he offered to read to wylan (knowing it wouldn't be easy for him to be still that long).
and yeah it often doesn't work out becuase he's messy and he has problems but he tries. and he hates that. he hates that he cares so much about people because at the end of the day, that's what makes him feel like he's not good enough
one more thing and i'm done i promise
unpopular opinion but i love that leigh made jesper have a crush on kaz. 1 beacuse it's refreshing to see someone not get otgether with his first crush. and 2 because i love that it shows that we sometimes get attached to people that are not good for us, but that we can learn to move on. jesper ended with wylan who respects him and values him, unlike kaz
ok i'm sorry that was probably all bs
oo one more thing, jesper definetly has rsd (rejection sensitive disphoria), which is something most poeple with adhd have
"My father used to take me everywhere with him"
this is so sad. bc they probably had a good relationship when he was little. and then they figured he coudln't read and now his father treats him like shit
it's even worse than if he haf been horrible from the beginning because wylan knows he can be a good father. and so he thinks it's his fault and he deserves to be treated like that. i hate van eck
"You're cuter when you're smart"
(...)
"Definitely cuter when you're smart"
wesper yesssss
i love them so much
ok but why do people think jesper is stupid. like the boy just made a bunch of criminals pass out by mixing some chemicals
and he was going to the university at like 15
AAAAND NOW THEY KNOW HE'S A FABRIKATOR
amazing plot twist
also:
Wylan coughed. Flirting with him might actually be more fun that annoying him, but it was a close call.
oooo come on jesper we all know you just love getitng him to blush
and you love him
who said that? definitely not me, nope
awwww jesper misses being around animals that's cute
imagine him coming home to wylan one day with a puppy because he just couldn't resist
cute
Better terrible truths than kind lies
just leaving here more of inej's wisdom
ok this may be a reach but jesper has adhd part ???
Yellow Protocol? Red Protocol? He couldn't remember which was which. (...)
"The alarm was Yellow Protocol, a sector disturbance."
Jesper pushed at his temples. "I don't remember what that means"
a bad working memory? sounds familiar
kaz loves puzzles
it's canon
"I love puzzles. Trickery is just my native tongue."
this part where wylan and jesper see the banner made with grisha's kefta kills me every time
I would have worn purple, Jesper thought, if I'd joined the Second Army. (...) He'd beenwilling, even eager to risk capture and execution as a thief and hired gun. Why was it worse to think about being hunted as a Grisha?
this makes me want to cry so much
another thing super sad: the fact that since his father is Kaelish and had some supersititons towards grisha, jesper grew up wondering if his own father was scared of him. he had to hide his powers and he was almost taught to be afraid of them
"Is it safe to leave them, you know-"
"Alive? I'm not big on killing unconscious men."
"We could wake them up"
WYLAN
NO
damn the boy needs therapy
it's amazing how nothing went like they planned
not a single thing
PEOPLE GET READY
ARE YOU READY?
NEITHER AM I BUT WHO CARES
"What do you like?"
"Music. Numbers. Equations. They are not like words. They...they don't get mixed up."
ok dude the clues are right there he's basically saying it
"If only you could talk to girls in equations."
There was a long silence, and then, eyes trained on the notch they'd created in the link, Wylan said, "Just girls?"
Jesper restrained a grin. "No. Not just girls." It really was a shame they were all probably going to die tonight.
wylan really said a straight man?? couldn't be me
this is the definition of bi panic "jesper restrained a grin" bitch we saw that
btw i love the slow burn
like they hint something here but they don't actually start liking each other until much later and they don't get together until almost the end of ck
i also love that the fact that they both like guys is like out in the open now. bc i'm not a fan of when queer characters have a crush and there's the whole thing of "are they queer too or not?"
like they both know htey are queer. but they don't get together right away bc they have to start liking each other before. they don't get together bc they are the only queer mlm characters
matthias fake betrayal killed me
i tought it was real
I have been made to protect you. Only in death will I be kept fom this oath.
this is just-
also foreshadowing?
YAYY KUWEI HI
There was no part of him that was not broken, that had not healed wrong, and there was no part of him that was not stronger for having been broken.
She's laughed, and if he could have bottled the sound and got drunk on it every night, he would have. It terrified him.
if i ever have a s/o and they don't tell me this at least once i don't want it
He needed to tell her... what? That she was lovely and brave and better than anything he deserved. That he was twisted, crooked, wrong, but not so broken that he couldn't pull himslef together into some smeblance of a man for her
THIS
THIS IS LOVE RIGHT THERE
they are the only straight couple that matters
everyone else go home
Wylan had scratches all over his cheeks and neck. He was beaming. Inej grabbed his hands and sqeezed.
so cute omg
"You can explain why our illustrious Shu scientist looks like one of Wylan's school pals along the way"
KAZ
i mean it's true but you didn't have to say it
KAZ IS SMILING OMG
EVERYONE FREAK OUT WITH ME
HE'S "grinning like and idiot" STOP I LOVE HIM
"We are all someone's mosnter, Nina"
"I will have you without armour, Kaz Brekker. Or I will not have you at all"
this part breaks my heart and i love it
"Stay," she oanted. Tears leaked from her eyes. "Stay till the end"
"And after," he said. "And always."
i just- helnik is perfect
AWWW JESPER MISSES WYLAN
my daily dosis of wesper :)
ok but in like 2 pages jesper tought of wylan like 10 times bc he's sad wy isn't with him
Jesper scanned the empty deck. He's assumed Wylan would come up to see them off. (...)
Jesper knew he was being selfish and stupid, but some petty part of him wondered if Wylan had deliberately kept away from him on the journey back. Maybe now that the job was complete and he was on his way to his share of the haul, Wylan was done slumming with criminals.
*charles boyle's insinuating voice* and why do you care so much???
btw YOU ARE WRONG. HE'S LITERALLY GOING OUT OF HIS WAY TO BE WITH YOU EVEN THOUGH HE CAN'T SPEAK
this scene where we find out the truth about wylan hurts so much but it's one of my favourites idk why
I LOVE THAT EVERYONE IS AS MAD AS I AM ABOUT THE LETTERS NOW
"Your're a fool," Jesper snarled. "He smarter than most of us put together, and he deserves a better father than you."
YES TELL HIM
the fact that wylan just heard him say that omg
"Deserved" amended Van Eck. He blew the whislte twice.
SOMEONE BETTER GRAB ME BEFORE I KILL HIM MYSLEF
THAT IDIOT
I HATE HIM SO MUCH
I'M GONNA CRY CAN SOMEONE KILL HIM FOR ME
Jesper screamed in rage and raised his guns.
YES EXACLTY WHAT I MEANT
JUST KILL HIM RIGHT NOW
"I'm not big on bludding, am I Inej?"
"Not as a rule"
Van Eck's lip curled. "And why is that?"
"Because he'd rather cheat," said the boy who was not Kuwei Yul-Bo in perfect, unaccented Kerch.
THIS WAS PERFECT
THE BEST WAY TO REVEAL THAT
(...), and Jesper flinched
baby he recognized wylan's voice
The Shu boy held out a hand. "Pay up, Kaz"
BITCH THIS IS AMAZING
THIS BOY MADE A BET WITH A CRIMINAL THAT HIS OWN FATHER WAS GOING TO TRY TO KILL HIM
AND HE WON THE BET
A nearly perfect replica of Kuwei Yul-Bo stood before them, but he had Wylan's voice, his mannerisms, and - though Kaz could see the fear and hurt in his golden eyes - Wylan's surprising courage, too.
i love it when they compliment him
my boy deserves all the compliments ever
AND KAZ IS PROUD OF HIS SON WE ALL KNOW THIS
Wylan cuold draw a perfectt elevation. He's made a drill that could cut throu Grisha glass from parts of a gate and scavenged bits of jewellery. So what if he couldn't read
this is taking me to some real places
i may cry you've been warned
WYLAN DIDN'T CARE THAT HE MAY BE STUCKED LOOKING LIKE KUWEI
this is making me cry
"A fool would have been waiting to be smashed to bits on that ship. And as for "traitor", you've called me worse in the last few minutes alone."
EXACTLY
YOU TELL HIM WYLAN
Instead, in that moment of threat, when he should have thought only of the fight, he looked at Inej.
BABY
i would've done the same tho she's pretty
amita is sooo pretty i'm gonna die when the show comes out
Jesper was staring at Wylan, his eyes roving over the black hair, the golden eyes. "Why?" he said at last. "Why would you do this?"
nothing to say here except: wesper
You... how many times was it you standing beside me on the deck at night when I tought it was Kuwei?"
"Every time."
i want to cry so bad
"Why does it matter?"
"I don't know!" Jesper said angrily. "Maybe I liked your stupid face."
a very staright and platonic thing to say of course
i know jes we all liked his stupid face
"Jesper made a mistake," said Wylan. "A stupid mistake, but he didn't set out to betray anyone."
YES WYLAN DEFEND YOUR BOYFRIEND
And maybe he'd kept him in the dark about Wyllan because he wanted to punish him a little
even kaz know they like each other come on
Jesper sat with elbows on knees, head in hands. Wylan deside him wearing th face of a stranger.
wylan give him a hug fro me please
he needs it
"Scheming face," murmured Jesper.
"Definitely," agreed Wylan.
i miss inej already
And I'm going to get my girl. Inej could never be his, not really, but he would find a way to give her the freedom he´d promised her so long ago.
i'm ugly crying and so what?
and now we're done....
i want to read this book again omg this is unhealthy
#shadow and bone#s&b#six of crows#jesper fahey#wylan van eck#kaz brekker#grishaverse#inej gahfa#matthias helvar#nina zenik#freddy carter#kit young#amita suman#soc#helnik#kanej#wesper
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Too Young Too Burn
Mobius x Female Reader
A/N: so my account was deleted lmao and this is a re-upload. this post was originally getting some likes so I decided to repost it, and hopefully this time my stuff doesn’t wack out. But for first time readers, this is my first ever fic lol! I was cracked out on nicotine and red bull when I wrote it, so it might be all over the place. alsooooo if any of u like this, I turned on my asks so feel free to request something! I’ll do any Marvel character, male/female/gender neutral, so feel free to ask lol turns out I enjoy writing
Word Count: 2.5k
Triggers: bad language, kinda sort angst, a tragedy ending in suicide, death
It started off as a simple school boy crush.
She was a new member to the office, a new analyst that would train alongside Mobius, nothing was supposed to come of it but a friendly coworker relationship. (The only kind of relationship allowed in the office, the Time Lizards have sticks up their asses.) The first day he met her, she was in a standard TVA uniform, beige slacks and a button up shirt of another drab color. Though when she entered the room, an air of confidence came with her, sweeping him off his feet like something out of a Midgard fairytale. She was introduced to him as [y/n] [y/l], newest to the TVA’s section of analysts, preferring to study dangerous variants, much like himself. He was immediately taken by her attention to detail, he felt her eyes studying him the entire time his bosses boss introduced them to each other.
Her attention to detail, as mentioned before, was brought to his attention when she mentioned his hands fiddling with the hem of his blazer. She noted that he didn’t give off a nervous energy, but with the way his hands were going you would have thought that the boss had caught him doing something he wasn’t supposed to. As they continued their conversation, more and more was pointed out that he didn’t even notice himself; she seemed to be a perfect fit for his team.
Their first day consisted of standard paperwork and the general office tour, Mobius introduced her to his boss, Ravonna Renslayer, as well as a strew of other office members they pasted in the hall that Mobius could remember a name for. Let’s be real, he just rambled on so that he could try to forget how kindly she smiled at him and how her eyes twinkled when talking about the job at hand. He thought if he could get past the first day and the excitement of gaining a new coworker, the odd feeling creeping into his heart would go away.
As the day went on and he got to know his new coworker better, he believed the relationship would grow into an unstoppable workforce bond. As the nice coworker he is and to start this unstoppable force off right, he offered to buy her dinner at a restaurant not far from the office (totally not to hang out with her for a little while longer). The time they spent both at the office and eating dinner, Mobius couldn’t quite help but find this new girl fascinating and for lack of a better term, lovely.
But it was just a school boy crush, right?
Time went on, sooner rather than later, Mobius and [y/n] found themselves working together quite often on cases. New cases left and right, most of them being Loki variants, surprise surprise. The more difficult they grew, the more time Mobius spent with the (not so) new girl. Between late nights in the office and many almost death situations, the two found themselves becoming close friends amongst the sea of the neverending bureaucracy. Though still as before, he felt that odd feeling in his heart growing stronger each time she brought him his coffee just the way he liked it or added fuel to his jetski fantasies.
What solidified that feeling in his chest was the night he and [y/n] went on a smaller mission by themselves, July 29th, 1890.
It was a clear night, though somber, both knowing what was supposed to happen. The air was warm and the moon was shining bright over the quiet fields of Auvers-sur-Oise. No, they weren’t looking for a variant of Vincent, he did indeed die tragically in this nexus event. No, no, they were looking for the person who burned all of his paintings in a rage, hence throwing off the timeline. Without the paintings, no memory of Van Gogh would be left for the future, and that’s not how the Time Lizards wanted it to be. So they were there, under the melancholy skies of France.
It was taking longer than planned, they ended up having to spend the night in an old cabin near the edge of the old town. A slow fire burned in the den of the cabin where [y/n] was reading, while Mobius was trying to find some sort of food to keep the two of them from going to bed with their stomachs rumbling. To no avail, there was nothing in the abandoned cabin so he gave in and entered the den of the cabin. There, he was met with the serene and abnormally domestic [y/n] in front of him. Usually the new girl was like a chicken with it’s head cut off; running around the office to put her wild theories to the test or just the general hectic vibe that went along with their job that made her hair stick out on all sides of her head from her running her hands through it in frustration. But this scene sitting quietly in front of him was something he didn’t know he wanted in his life. She was sitting on the ancient furniture with a book in her hands, hair down and surrounding her face in a way that made his heart palpitate. She was relaxed for once, not an ounce of stress weighing on her shoulders as she immersed herself in the world of whatever book she found on the old shelves. He could even see that her work shirt was untucked and her shoes were off, showing off her mix matched socks. He didn’t even know mix matched socks were a thing, but she pulled them off perfectly.
She looked up when he hadn’t said anything for a solid 4 and a half minutes, he was too busy taking in the scene in front of him to notice he was just open mouth staring at her. It didn’t bother her really, though silence with Mobius around was quite unheard of, so she filled it.
“Suis-je trop vieux pour alimenter cette passion et la laisser me consumer - ou suis-je encore trop jeune pour savoir quels dommages cela fera?”
“I’m sorry, w-what?”
“Am I too old to throw fuel onto this passion and let it consume me — or am I still too young to know what damage that will do?” She said again, in english this time. She knew he could understand her, everyone in the TVA could speak and understand a multitude of languages. She just wanted to see what his reaction would be when she said it to him. “It’s a quote from this diary. The person who wrote it was in their mid 20s when they did this entry, they’re writing of their partner. They were in love, but poor and couldn’t afford to be married. The writer got an offer to marry into a wealthy family, but they turned it down, hoping for everything to work out in the end.”
The explanation of the words she spoke before hit Mobius a little harder than they should have, the author of the diary was caught between a rock and hard place. Much like he found himself in right now, even if he refused to believe it before tonight. Seeing the domestic life he could have right in front of him made his head spin, his heart hurt, and his love for his job lessen a bit. He was grateful to the Time Lizards for creating him, for giving him the life he has in the TVA, but seeing what life could be like on Earth startled him. He didn’t know he wanted it until it was right in front of him, taunting him like a cat chasing a laser light. A life on Earth, with the girl sitting right in front of him; that was all he wanted. Jetski be damned (not really, he would love to have a jetski alongside this lifestyle). Even if he couldn’t live a normal life on the Sacred Timeline, he wanted to be with her. After all this time getting to know her and the little details of her soul between official meetings and paperwork piles, he finally realized what that feeling was in this moment.
But he knew it could never happen. Not here, not in the TVA. It simply wasn’t allowed. So he swallowed his feelings, but he never forgot that sweet, peaceful night. They talked, laughed, and even cried together that night, both of them tucking that memory in their hearts and reliving it in times when they most missed the feeling they didn’t know they could miss.
Again, time passed from that night in France, they did eventually catch the variant and reset the timeline. After, they only grew closer as the late nighter grew later and newer, tougher missions appeared on their radar. Their biggest being the Loki variant killing more and more Minute Men, and the case was beginning to take a turn. They brought in a new Loki variant, one front 2012 just after the attack on New York. He was cunning and a very good liar, but he grew on both Mobius and [y/n]. It wasn’t long before they actually found the dangerous Loki variant with 2012 Loki on their side, but he betrayed them and followed the other Loki into the portal, losing both a friend and a lead.
This devastated Mobius, it was his last chance to prove to the Time Lizards that their Loki could be trusted, that he was changing and doing good for the TVA. But he’s a Loki, and they all should have guessed something was going to happen. But they guessed what would happen next.
They found the two variants, out of sheer luck in the Lamentis apocalypse. When both were brought in, it wasn't long before all hell let loose. Mobius found out the TVA was actually just made up of variants, they were all variants, and none of this was what it had been told to them. It was all lies. At first it gutted him, he didn’t believe Loki, but after some snooping, he found out they weren’t lying. Then, hope sparked in his chest. Life without the TVA meant, eventually, he could live out his domestic dream. With the girl of his dreams, [y/n].
With the (fragile) trust in Loki and hope in his heart for a new life with [y/n], he flew into action. He busted Loki out of the loop he had originally put him in, and swapping his Tempad with Renslayer, he now had the proof that Loki was telling the truth. With this renewed faith in his friend, he was going to expose the truth to everyone. They had a right to know, they had a right to their former memories. They had a right to free will.
Only, he didn’t get that far. Suddenly, he and Loki were being escorted to Renslayers office. If there’s one thing about Mobius, he had good intuition, and the feeling he had in his gut was telling him something was very wrong. Of course Renslayer knew he switched their Tempads, he knew he wouldn’t have much time, but it felt like only a matter of minutes before he was caught. He didn’t even have time to go find [y/n] and explain to her what was going on, he didn’t have time to tell her his feelings, and he knew he was going to get pruned if Renslayer found out before he could spread the truth.
But once he stepped into Renslayer’s office, the feeling in his gut froze, sending goosebumps all over his body.
Not only were he and Loki standing in the middle of her office, but so was [y/n]. She was thrashing against G-17, who had her in a chokehold. The scene made his blood boil, [y/n] had no idea what was going on, she was innocent. The thought of anything happening to her gutted him, he wasn’t going to let that happen.
“I uh, I think I grabbed yours by mistake,” he starts out, trying to get out of this smoothly, but he knew Renslayer was going to take that obvious lie, he was no god of mischief. She gave him a cold look that only the devil himself could forge, and ordered D-90 to take the Tempad from him, shaking her head at Mobius in disappointment.
“Mobius, what’s going on?” [y/n] asked, her voice wasn’t faltering, but her usually confident demeanor was gone. She was worried, she knew something bad was going to happen, she knew something was going on with the two variants, it just hadn’t been disclosed how fucked the situation was. All Mobius wanted to do was take her away from this place and tell her what she meant to him. Before anything could happen to him.
“Tell her, Mobius. Tell her how you’ve betrayed the TVA and joined forces with the two Loki Variants. Tell her how you betrayed her trust,” Renslayer says with a silver tongue, looking coldly at not only Loki (the usual) but also Mobius, a look he’s never received from her before on any other occasion than a joke. He could feel his time ticking away, he could only stall so much and there was nothing left to stall. All he had was the truth.
“Look, [y/n], they’re all lying to us. We’re all variants, all of us, they took us from the Timeline. This place- this place isn’t what we think it is.” He says, begging her with his voice to believe him. In all the time they’ve known each other, this is the first time he’s begged her. Though he didn’t need to, [y/n] trusted Mobius with her whole being. Time and time again, she’s saved his ass and he hers. They were bonded in a way she didn’t know was humanly possible, she knew he wouldn’t lie to her. She felt it in her soul he was telling the truth.
“I believe you.” Her voice was soft, even in this terrifying moment, she still found a way to calm him with a gentle smile even as she was being held by the throat.
But that was all taken away when he saw the pointed end of the pruning stick going through her. A guttural roar that escaped him was animalistic, loud enough that surely the entirety of the TVA heard it. Her body was thrown to the ground by D-90, and it took every Minute Men in the room to hold Mobius back from Renslayer. That was it, his whole future ripped away from him right before his eyes, and he didn’t even get to tell her every secret feeling he held for her. No promises of the future they could have together without the TVA. There was nothing left.
He didn’t even hear Renslayer telling one of the Minute Men to prune him through his weeping, and before he knew it, a searing pain took over him.
#mobius#mobius x reader#loki#loki Ła#mobius marvel#mobius m mobius#marvel#mcu fanfiction#mcu x reader
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