#borrowed Egyptian history and mythology

[diejager]

Bittersweet Devotion pt.2

Pairing: Miguel O’Hara x fem!reader

Cw: angst, heartbreak, mention of cheating, mention of death, no happy ending, apology, tell me if I missed any. wc: 9.3k

Previous

Your universe, Earth-XXX, was a parallel one to Earth-616 in some sense. You had a Peter Parker, a Gwen Stacy and a Mary Jane Watson, it had everything down to the death of Ben Parker and the devastation it brought to your friend. It was the same year as Spider-Man 616’s world, it had the same political standing and same history. Your world, like many others, was a near carbon copy of 616, down to the smallest things; but like others in the spiderverse, you had differences. Some were minor changes in the course of its canon story, others were major changes in the characters and the era.

You - like Miguel, Miles, Jess, Hobart (he liked going by Hobie), Patrick and Patriv - were one of those major deviations in the original canon. You didn’t exist - or so you thought - in Peter B. or Peter’s universe even though you lived in the same year. The reason might be that in the reality, the sum of all potential universes that paralleled each other, created the multiverse - the Spiderverse. 

The concept of it seemed strangely unlimited, the infinite possibilities to a different ending or a different start for its world. The multiverse was, in some sense, as old as time, a culmination of everything made imaginable by man. Found in ancient texts - the Puranas, ancient Hindu mythology - that expressed the infinite number of universes with their gods and principles. Whereas Persian literature - tales - touched the idea of learning about alternate universes that were similar, yet distinctly different from theirs. 

Misconstrued by many, the strangeness of it was deemed a danger, the unknown possibilities were feared by people of older age, but venerated in the past as it was in the present for the unfathomable possibilities. It exists in fiction, where they borrowed the idea of many worlds within a reality from myths, legends and religion. Heaven, Hell, Olympus and Valhalla were all reflections of a familiar world, a material realm for the blessed, the sinful, the gods, and the worthy. The similarities sometimes frightened you, how close the people were to knowing of the reality you all lived in. The tangibility of crossing worlds and bringing about chaos to every string, every realm, every material form of the multiverse. 

They, after all, were real, Hell as much as Heaven in your universe. Gods from every religion, either monotheistic or polytheistic, some you’d personally seen are Thor and Loki, brother and sons of Odin the Allfather, and the God of Thunder and Mischief respectively. Another was a big crocodile lady, Ammit, from what you’d heard from the all-knowing Dr. Strange. From God to Norse and Egyptian gods, from angels and demons, and from humans to mutants, your plane of existence was as wide as it could go without drifting off the edge and causing a mass domino effect within the multiverse.

You were curious, naturally so for a scientist, exploring the worlds that felt familiar to you but you hadn’t truly grasped -  different, yet similar. You hadn’t given a second thought to exploring yours. After all, why explore yours when your horizon was as broad as you imagined it, unperturbed by any limits when it came to the multiverse? The eternal and unlimited growing number of realms in your expanding reality.

Perhaps that was the reason why you hadn’t known your universe had its own Miguel O’Hara. You rarely came back for anything, you had everything you’ve ever wanted in Nueva York, Earth-928. You have friends who could truly understand you, people who stood beside you when you fought, youngsters who looked up to you for mentoring and a dream- or it was a dream. Dreams, not dissimilar to wishes, were hopeful, naive in a way, they came and went. Some dreams would come true, while others fell, like the fallen stars that crossed the night sky.

Yours simply happened to be a fallen one, one not meant to happen and become greater. You let it go after he dropped you, after he turned his back and let his mouth run unperturbed. He brought her up, someone he swore he would remember but left in the past. A new chance to become something, to become whole again, and Miguel took it. He wanted to start anew, fresh with someone he never met, you wanted the same; you both had what you wished for, until he put his foot down, cutting the thin web that connected both your lives.

It broke your heart. Months of patience and anxiously stepping around each other, nervous about breaking the trust freshly built between you both, lost in a few weeks. You were brittle, heart fractured and threatening to fall further apart if someone was any crueller to you. The smallest glare, the tiniest scoff or the weakest remark would send you reeling into the abyss of heartbreak and the throes of anguish. Yet somehow, you found yourself being led away by a copy of the Miguel you loved. 

He mumbled apologies as he held you tightly, his arm over your shoulder as he cradled you under his umbrella, hastily urging you to follow his guidance. If it were any other person, you would’ve been wary, cautious of any strangers that touched you so closely and chaperoned you so quickly; but this was Miguel, a man you trusted and that you still trusted wherever he came from. Earth-XXX’s Miguel O’Hara was still similar to the one you knew, someone you could trust. You did.

He led you to his flat, someplace near Alchemax’s building in Manhattan, a safe neighbourhood for the richer citizens of Manhattan. A cozy place of neutral tones and muted colours, yet warm as he welcomed you - a stranger as of yet - into his home. He had machinery strewn around, reports stacked on his coffee table and smaller things he had been tinkering about decorating his home. As a geneticist, he liked to play with machinery, having drawn his designs and models, built his creations from scratch and worked from the base programming to make something better. At least Miguel from Earth-928 did, and it seemed this one did as well. 

You stood in his shower, where he left you in a frenzy to bring you dry clothes, drying out your hair with the towel he motioned you to use. You doubted that he had anything your size, his broad shoulders and his towering height, nothing he had in his draws - and the boxes he stowed away in his closet - would fit you. They would drag down your ankle and sit low on your collar. Granted, you were soaked down to your socks and had no temporary clothes to cover yourself with during your stay. 

You had stripped from your soaked clothes and patted down your wet skin, shivering from the cold that clung to your bones even after Miguel had increased the heater in the small confines of the bathroom. It was small but big enough to move around and stretch your arms comfortably. You hadn’t felt the cold until he brought you to his bathroom, the numbness of the past months weighing heavily on your shoulders and the bleeding of your heart made everything seem so meaningless. The colours draining from the world around you, a once bright New York turned grey, the monochrome tones of black and white mixing and interlacing to form even more boring shades. 

The vibrancy and life you once saw around you dulled and died suddenly, like the winters brought by Demeter’s devastation and sadness when her daughter was taken from her, stolen from the berth of flowers she liked frolicking about. How Demeter doomed the world to see her pain, to feel how she felt in the moments her daughter had to return to her husband than stay with Demeter. You felt laden by your faults and his actions. Doubtful of your relationship, of what led you both to such an ending. Had you been clearer or more forthcoming about your emotions, or had you confronted him for his behaviour, would you still be in his arms? 

Were you at fault for missing something you had relied on as comfort and safety? Could you be blamed for his reaction to your meddling in his affairs in the Society? Could you blame him for dropping those words on you? After all, being reminded or compared to a past lover was anything but gentle, the gut-wrenching envy and betrayal you felt flash through you was nearly drowning. It made you feel lacking, to be reminded of his old flame, the one he was about to marry and the person he seemed to love before all. Could you even compare to what she was; what she did? (Dina had cheated on him, you knew that, but he was truly happy in their moments of pleasure and domesticity. They were a family until she died.)

You were drowning in your self-made sorrow when his voice called you, grounding you to the room. Standing before a door, naked and shivering, arms wrapping the damp towel around your shoulders. He called again, cracking the door open to pass you the - his - clothes he thought would fit you. He coughed as you took your temporary wear, your cool fingers brushing his warm ones. It was a sudden and jerking contact, you pulled back jerkingly, a shamble of an apology and a thank you flew from your tongue. His chuckle was a reassurance in the complete quietness of the flat, his low voice reminding you of better times. 

The sweater hung loosely around you, dipping down your collar to expose your shoulder. It was warm, the cotton used to make it still soft after being stored away and the soothing scent of spice and pine deeply integrated into the fibres. The pants were stretched around your hips, the tight fabric thin and flexible under stress, hidden under the long shirt. The legs, however, swayed loosely around your limbs, too big for your calves, but tight enough to hug your thighs. He had certainly made sure to bring you clothes that would fit your frame. You hadn’t attempted to smell his pants, you thought it would’ve been too intrusive and disgusting to do so if only to smell a remnant of Miguel on his as you did on the sweater. 

Miguel was waiting for you in the kitchen, his back turned to you as you ambled towards him. His shoulders loose and back relaxed in the presence of a stranger made you appreciate how good-natured he was in most universes you’d been to. He turned his head, gesturing you to sit on the chair facing him on the island as he returned to something he was making while you changed. 

“I hope you don’t mind hot chocolate,” he started, voice light and hopeful as he turned to you, cup in each hand as he moved to stare at you. “I’m not one for tea.” He slid the warm mug into your hand, eyes watching your expression as he slowly sipped on the hot beverage. 

His eyes squinted slightly when your lips curled upwards, a smile hidden by the steaming mug. You cupped the mug, feeling the warmth of the freshly brewed drink, the steam rising in soft curls and melting in the cooler atmosphere. Tentatively, you brought the rim to your lips, slowly tilting the cup. The powerful taste of chocolate hit you strongly, the sweet and dark liquid melting the tension in your muscles until you could curl over the table with an appreciative sigh. 

“Thank you…” you knew his name, wanting to call him, but his reaction would be unwanted, the shock, fear and suspicion that would fill his beautiful, brown eyes. So you slurred your words, dragging out your voice until he could tell you his name himself.

“Miguel. Miguel O’Hara, ” he nodded, cocking his head upwards, pointing at you with his chin. “What’s your name? I can’t keep calling you Hey every time I want to call you.” His lips broke into a cheeky smile, teasing you when he saw that you’d comfortably melted into the drink and his island chair. He wanted to ease the tense atmosphere from before into something much calmer, to help the accumulated tension in your shoulders to fall like the rain that clouded the streets of New York.

You let out a hoarse chuckle, your throat still fresh from crying, and told him your name, trying to stabilise your shaking tone. His cheeky smirk tugged at your heartstrings, you hadn’t seen Miguel laugh or smile this freely in months. You missed it. The casual banter you shared and the on-and-off insults you’d hurl at one another, all good-natured insults meant to rile him. 

“Thank you, Miguel,” you nearly choked when you uttered his name, the wound still so fresh and bleeding it slip from your tongue easily. It brought up so many memories, both painful and joyful. Your eyes glazed over, tears threatening to fall once again, to paint your cheeks with agony that you - him, or perhaps both of you - had brought on yourself. “Thank you…”

Miguel hummed sympathetically, eyes staring down at his drink, deep in thought. Perhaps he was thinking of a way to invite you to share your problems, to tell him why you broke down on the street in stormy weather. Or maybe he was thinking of the fastest way to kick you out, to get rid of the mess you became. The silence, however, was reassuring, calming the nerves that followed the eerie calmness of Miguel’s den or the loud, hectic atmosphere of the Society. His warm, worrying gaze grounded you, the softness behind his concerned stare was heartwarmingly nostalgic.

“Difficult breakup?” His words seemed hesitant, unsure of his conclusion to the cause of your appearance. Unknowingly, he had struck gold, pinning down the right problem in your life with a few observations. Of course, he was observant and aware of his surroundings, why else was he so willing to bring you into his home? 

“How’d ya know?”

His sigh was telling, the deep, concerned and tired breath was only used when he knew that you wouldn’t tell him what ailed you, like the groan of a disappointed, yet worried father. 

“Because I know how it feels,” he says slowly, pensive over his words, picking them carefully to not damage you further than your ex had. He knew the pain of a harsh breakup, the pain and sorrow that followed, like a dark cloud that hovered over you whenever you were awake. 

“Why?” You croaked.

“Why?” he parroted, frowning at your question.

“Why did you invite me in? I’m a- a stranger to you, you don’t even know me. What if I’d been acting to mug you or potentially kill and steal from you? What’d you do then, Miguel?”

“I know the risks, but you didn’t, didn’t you? And wouldn’t, you don’t look like the person to harm another.”

You scoffed at his words. Didn’t and wouldn’t didn’t mean you would not do it later after gaining his trust, to stab him in the back after he helped you and nursed you. The simple, naïve idea that you didn’t look like a violent person was mind-blowing, it was stupid. How could he know if you didn’t mean harm later on? Like how Miguel never meant to harm you - he loved you - and yet in the end, he had. 

“That’s naïve,” you muttered, eyes closed as you drank the cooling beverage, the sugary drink trickling down your throat. 

“I’m confident in my ability to read people.”

He did seem confident in his ability, the straight back and the strong gaze in his eyes showed; and, maybe because you knew from experience that Miguel was observant and careful, he hadn’t gotten where he was by simply trusting people and following the herd. He tested and made mistakes, he learned from them each time and found a way to use it to his advantage. The Miguel you saw in every universe was similar in some ways, their good nature, their cunningness, their bravery and their intelligence. All aspects known to characterize Miguel O’Hara in all universes he existed in. 

You conceded to his will, head bowed and shoulders slack. You breathed shallowly, swallowing the lump in your throat:

“Yeah, what gave it away?”

You thought it would be the last of him you’d see in your life, you wished it wouldn’t, that you’d see him over and over, to feel what the Miguel from your universe had to give, but you knew it was wishful thinking, a wish thrown to the stars. Logically, he had no reason to call or text you after exchanging numbers days prior. He promised to call you, and he made you promise to call him if anything ever resurfaced, be it pain, anger, heartbreak or hate. You, instinctively, believed his word. 

You hated yourself for falling so easily to another Miguel, how you bent to his words and the sweet promises he uttered that night. There was no sign that he would keep his word, that he would see you again after your breakdown, except for his words and your belief in him. Then it wasn’t misplaced, all the trust and belief you had, since he called you, asking to meet up at a cafe. Miguel had set up a place and time for you when you replied with a croak, still feeling down. He had whispered reassuring words to you, urging you to meet him - he explicitly told you he’d feel offended to be stood up - and spend some time outside. The air was fresh and cool for an autumnal month, it wasn’t too cold that you were forced to wear a thick jacket, but it wasn’t warm enough for you to go out in a simple shirt. 

You were hesitant to take him up on his offer, knowing how easily you could rebound. You’d crash into Miguel’s open arms, searching for the love and affection he fed you like a lovesick puppy, but, then again, Earth-XXX’s Miguel was similar, yet different from his variant. It would be a lie if you told yourself you didn’t miss him, the soft smiles, the gentle touches and the affectionate words. You had spent so much time as his right-hand Spider that it felt odd not seeing him the following morning. It was a routine you’d formed: waking up in his bed, kissing him good morning, getting to work together and eating together. Everything you’d done in the past years was with Miguel from Earth-928 the routine, the rigidity, it was grounding, it was the only semblance of normalcy in the world you lived in.

Now, you had to face the possibility that you were too broken to see another Miguel, to hold a casual conversation and form coherent and normal sentences. The purposefully slow steps you took to the cafe picked after having a moment outside the glass front were telling in itself. You swallowed the little amount of saliva in your throat to soothe its dryness and walked through the doors of the quaint establishment. It was painted in calm, brown tones, rustic in design with a warmth that rivalled the comfort of your bed. It lifted a bit of the tension you had, shoulders slumping slightly as your eyes searched for a familiar mop of brown hair.

Laying against the brown sofa, he stared out of the wide window from his booth. The warm, morning lights caressed his cheeks, lighting up the sharp edges of his jaw and nose. He was sculpted in perfection, like the youthful beauty of Adonis, crafted with the meticulous and attention-catching hands of an artist that created what was thought to be a god’s beauty. You could spend your days watching him, catching every little detail of Miguel’s face under the changing lighting, but you were standing near the entrance and he was waiting for you. His words echoed in your mind: “Don’t forget about next week, I miss seeing you.”

His eyes flickered to you, blinking as he turned to you, flashing a smile. You returned the sentiment, a shaky smile lifting the corners of your lips. You sat across from him, eyes wandering the cafe to stare at anything but him, lest you wouldn’t be able to stop the rush of emotions that would light your face in a flush. He uttered your name, greeting you in a friendly manner. You nodded back, muttering his name, pushing down the wince whenever you said it. 

“Chocolate.”

The still-warm cup stared at you, light steam wafting over the reflective liquid. It was full, unlike Miguel’s cup, and drank down to the middle of the container. 

“Thank you.”

He probably wouldn’t let you repay him for the hot chocolate he bought you, the smile he gave you told you as much when your eyes flickered between his and your cup. The hot chocolate was a reminder of your night in his flat, where he lent you his shoulder to cry and his ears to listen. Embarrassment seemed to flash whenever you recalled the memory, how vulnerable you were to him, your walls broken down and your heart open. Though, Miguel didn’t seem to mind your fragility, giving you as much time as you needed. 

“How are you? I wanted to give you a few days to think before meeting again, I thought you might’ve needed the time alone.”

You nodded lamely, fingers curling around the warm porcelain, back slumped into the booth to hide from his knowing eyes. He was right, you had needed the time alone to clean yourself up, scour through your memories and tend to whatever mess you made of yourself. You were thankful. The last few days had brought revelations, how - both of - you had ignored the signs of a rupture in the relationship and continued to push on, like crossing a crumbling bridge. 

“‘M doing better. How- and how are you?”

He smiled at your attempt, you were trying on your own after a few - forced - encouraging words from Miguel. Maybe you’d learn to live with the pain, coexisting with the numbness that filled you until it dulled to a point where it would be barely acknowledged by you or anyone in your vicinity - where it wasn’t painted on your face with bright colours. Or the pursuit to forget it, pushing it into the farthest corner of your mind and heart, painting over the crack with glue. As long as you wouldn’t drown in your sorrows, ending up playing with dangerous substances to stay afloat while your mind sunk deeper into addiction and denial. 

He wouldn’t let you get that far, Miguel understood you and he lived through it as you did. Although his was a more violent breakup - she had cheated on him, his explosive reaction was natural - than yours, he hadn’t relied on anything but self-meditation and a lot of thinking. Like a friend - you were one by his standards, he’d invited you to his flat, you’d seen his organized chaos and ranted about your life while he comforted you with his shoulder and a cup of hot chocolate - he would stay by your side, hoping his support would be enough to help you.

“Great so far.”

His grin - somehow - grew even larger, enthusiasm gleaming in his eyes. 

Oftentimes, Miguel would be the one to call you, your phone ringing in the afternoon of the day prior with his soothing voice on the other end of the line. He spoke easily, finding the time to invite you out for the simplest reason, to talk, to make a drink, to have fun, and - your favourite by far - to see you. His initiative had you trying to double your efforts to heal, reaching outside of your boundaries and texting Miguel whenever you had a moment to yourself. You felt guilty that he was always the one to plan these outings, so you promised yourself that you’d become a better friend than you currently were. You even remembered his teasing tone when you called him for the first time:

”Aye, finally. I thought you’d never call me, chica. I felt neglected, thought you had forgotten about me for a second there.”

It started with the first coffee date, bickering about who would pay, pushing your card before the other while still seated at your table, frowning stubbornly and throwing promises about letting the other pay next time. Either way, Miguel rarely let you pay, coming atop as the winner of your little fight with his strength and height (you couldn’t exactly put all your force into your push, it could break bone and bruise the skin.).

Then it would be random meetings on the streets that would lead you to a random bench at the park, basking in the other’s presence, retelling your day and him nitpicking anything he could with a ridiculously criticising frown. He was playing, you knew he was. You did the same after you’d gotten more comfortable talking to him, it became easier to see him as a different - as his own - person. A few hits on the shoulder left and right, but it was mostly laughter at ridiculous expressions made to emphasize your disdain for a certain event.

The months that followed were a blur to you. Rather than going to a cafe or the park, you went to restaurants and crashed at one of your flats, yours if he wanted to play games and lounge about with food and drinks, and his if you wanted to watch movies (he had the best television you’d ever seen, such high definition and speed.) and tinker away at his inventions and theories. He was certainly happy that his new friend was another scholar in the field of genes and engineering (you were mostly into engineering than genes, but you knew a few things that you’d found interesting.). You could both gush - scientifically - about the possibility of gene splicing and lab-generated mutations in humans, like the mutant superheroes. 

You’d taken some liberties and went drinking, meeting at the same bar biweekly to relax after a few hard days at work. It served to loosen your nerves until either of you felt comfortable to chat up a storm about the most random subject. It’d been about the odd dent on the rim of his glass; then it’d be about how the sky was grey this week, there weren’t any warm, yellow rays blaring down on you when you went out; or it’d be about the distasteful cut of a man’s moustache. Drinking loosened your tongues, some words were said and some sentiments were shared, but none were truly taken seriously knowing you were tipsy - nearing drunk - those nights.

Every time you saw Miguel, you felt like you were rediscovering a part of yourself as well as him, the thing that made him so distinct and loveable. Miguel was expressive and honest, he slowly and gently let you down from whatever high you were, the pillar you needed to stand again after falling. He was so much different. It used to pain you how much they looked alike, but character-wise, they were like the two sides of a coin. It made you appreciate the delicate intricacies that made the multiverse.

You won’t - can’t - deny that you’ve grown fond of this Miguel as you did with the other one, but you couldn’t let yourself love him. He didn’t deserve someone broken and hashed into many lives: the masks you wore, the things you did, the secrets you hid, and the things you could do. He didn’t deserve someone who could bring him to his death; dying simply because he was connected to Spider-Woman; beaten simply because he knew Spider-Woman; kidnapped simply because they deemed him useful as leverage. All things that could go wrong haunt you. Miguel was human, he wasn’t a Spider, he wasn’t a superhero, and he wasn’t a vigilante. He was Miguel O’Hara, the geneticist working at Alchemax, with a brilliant mind and a kind heart. 

You cherished every part of him. That’s why you can’t let your heart lead, dedicate how you’d react to Miguel after the months you spent together. He was so close, yet so far; he was touchable, you could hold him, kiss him and hug him, but he was unattainable, you couldn’t tell him how much you loved him. You watched him with hidden love, showing your affection as platonic, a friend watching another. You had hardened yourself to your heart’s cries, for loving Miguel was a dangerous game-

“I- what?” you gawked at Miguel, wide eyes and mouth agape. You were shocked at the words that left his mouth, his soft, wet lips moving as he repeated the words.

“I love you.”

His cheeks were flushed, burning a soft red, it trailed to his ears and nape. His open collar - his jacket hung on the back of his chair and his shirt clung below his collar, a skin-tight shirt that hugged his sculpted chest sinfully, it hid little to the seeing eyes of the crowd and your drunk self. His sudden words had all but sobered you, shaking you into clear lucidity of his confession.

“You… love me?”

He blinked dumbly at you for a second, as if taking the time to absorb what he told you and what you repeated. Miguel was tipsy, not drunk. He smiled and nodded, a bashfully affectionate grin on his beautiful lips.

“Yes, is it so hard to believe, chica?”

He often called you chica, you thought it was a friendly term of endearment between friends (truthfully and regretfully, you knew little of Spanish, even with being in a committed relationship with an Irish-Mexican.). You just realised it was his pet name for you. All this time, he had given you his heart, and yet, you had denied him of yours. He was more playful and less burdened by life, it made him more teasing and smiling. The term chica somewhat made sense, a cuter and more playful way of calling someone you loved than the deep-meaning ones like mi cielo and mi vida, a play of words like a small secret between you. This secret hid behind names given between friends, a well-kept one, close to his chest but gifted to you. 

It might’ve once been - started - as friends, but it grew and festered in his heart until he found the time to express himself, to tell you how he truly felt for you - how he grew to care for you. He deemed this moment fine, bordering tipsy and nearing drunk, he’d be open, brutally honest but still aware of the words that left him. He wasn’t a lightweight anyway. 

You wanted to tell him you also loved him, but you couldn’t do it, mouth slightly open and eyes glazed with heartbreak, you simply stared at him in hesitancy. You opened your mouth once to reply and closed it, open and close, again and again until all you could do was stare at him. How were you supposed to answer him after the bomb he dropped? 

”Yes! I love you too!”

”Oh, Miguel, I love you too.”

”I- I love you as well.”

There were so many ways to express your feelings to the man who confessed, but none seemed to convey the true emotions that lay in your heart. You wanted to tell him you learned to love again thanks to him, that the time spent with him had made you open your eyes to the beauty that you were blinded by the pain and you slowly grew to care for - love - him as much as you did with Spider-Man 2099. He had the same smile, the same mind, the same heart, but he was more innocent, less burdened by disaster and happier. 

So you simply nodded. It made his smirk grow.

“Aye- would it be better if I called you ‘mi tesoro’ instead? It’s more straightforward, no?”

Even now, his words were light and playful, his tone affectionate as he leaned closer to you. You could see the mischievous glint in his warm, chocolate eyes (you thought that was why he liked serving you hot chocolate, it reminded you of his eyes.) and the curve of his lips as they moved to form words. You were transfixed by his beauty, mesmerised by the comforting hues and the sharpness of his cheeks, missing how close he was to you. 

“Or maybe-”

Softness caressed your lips, a plush, warm feeling that made you flush. He was kissing you, those pretty lips on yours. Your breath stuttered and you froze, but it didn’t stop Miguel’s initiative, a hand cradled your nape, holding you in place as he pushed himself closer to you. He moved against you, tongue slipping from his mouth and tentatively laving over your bottom lip, asking for something. 

He was so warm, so caring. You could just close your eyes and follow his lead - you did. He pushed harder, yet the kiss stayed soft and passionate, he lightly nipped your lip and soothed the stinging with his warm tongue, beckoning you to open your mouth for him. Your lips parted, opening up for Miguel to dive in, muscle meeting yours halfway and curling over yours. He still cradled your head, fingers running through your loose hair and tilting your head backwards, giving him more space to show you how much he loved you. Your arms, somehow, found themselves wrapped around his neck, pulling him as close to you as he was pushing himself against you. 

His kiss was loving, his hold was careful and his touch heartwarming. You almost regretted having to pull away, but you had to breathe, your lungs starving for air after having been devoured by Miguel’s adoring kiss. The moment you opened your eyes (you didn’t know you had closed them while you kissed), his smile greeted you, a lovesick one bubbling with unending joy. You almost choked from how it fit so well on him. 

“That’s- that’s one way…” you spoke between breaths, chest swelling with every erratic pant, matching his similarly worn-out breathing.

That was all he needed from you. Your kiss was enough for him to know you loved him the same, a patient and gentle love he was willing to give you. Your heart pulsed strongly, lips curving and eyes squinting, you pushed yourself closer to his heat, his all-encompassing warmth that wrapped around you when you wanted to feel safe and loved. Your world couldn’t be any brighter, like the vibrant colours of blooming flowers when Persephone was given to her mother, where the snow melted and colours washed over the lands once more, painting the blank white and dead grey in joyous tones. It glowed brightly and warmed you like the summers that followed the melting ice, the clear, blue skies of Olympus and as freeing as the soaring hawks and skipping elks.

Letting go was far harder than loving. To let the person who you let in leave felt emptying, it left a gaping hole in his heart. Where it was once calm, struck a raging storm of rejection and regret, crashing waves the size of Poseidon’s rage and violent storms the strength of Zeus’ retribution. It hurt watching you walk beside a variant of himself, a happier and lighter version of him without his mutations or duty. You were the Spider-Woman of your universe so there wouldn’t be a second one unless there was a catastrophic canon divergence. 

He hadn’t followed you at first, respecting your wishes of being left alone. He had to give you that much, at least, after those months spent beside his ignorant ass. He hadn’t seen it until it was too late, lost under the weight of his duty and fears that he’d forgotten he had people who cared, who felt, who loved. It was too late, it was always too late with him. If he couldn’t fix his first mistake, who’s to say he could fix this? He couldn’t save his first daughter or his second’s universe because it was falling apart. He couldn’t save anyone because he hadn’t realised his mistake in interfering in canon events, and he lost you because he couldn’t stop his vitriol, his violent temperament that had pushed you away. He always took things for granted until they were lost to him. 

Was it two or three weeks before he decided to check up on you? He didn’t know anymore, the weeks blurred until he finally amassed the courage to go against everyone’s words. Through the flat hologram of his orange screen, he watched you lament on your own, body curled into itself and shoulders shaking. Your sobs were heart-wrenching to watch while he had no means of contacting you; you would’ve reacted more strongly and aggressively if he’d contacted you after leaving. 

So he watched.

You stared vacantly from your window and left only for the bare necessities or to act as Spider-Woman. Crime never slept so you couldn’t stop even in your time of need. You swung from building to building so gracefully that Miguel was hypnotised by your grace. He watched these moments as a reminder of the missions he took by your side, webbing and catching anomalies all across the multiverse with fearsome speed and accuracy. You both had made a fearsome team, but that time was over, it was a memory long forgotten. 

So he watched.

Your flat was cold and empty, the space filled with spectres of memories, the cool rooms vacant of life that used to fill them with warmth and happiness. It was saddening from his perspective - the observer, the watcher and the reader of your story - of your time spent alone. He wanted to tell you that you weren’t alone, that he was watching you from afar, a silent protector that would only act if you were in imminent danger - as long as it wasn’t part of the canon. 

So he watched-

Besides you was Miguel - not him, another one - and he looked much too comfortable by your side for his liking. His variant seemed much too close for a friend, moving from sitting before you to beside you, arm slung over your shoulders and leaning back and, sometimes, towards you at a breath’s distance. He turned green with envy, a vicious monster brewing inside his body with the threat of bursting out, clawing at his chest. The other was too close to you for his liking. 

He watched as his variant bought you drinks - always, however long and loud you’d complained and fought, he never let you pay in the end - and paid for your dates. He abhorred it. How happy you looked with the other him. How calm and satisfied your smile was. How close his variant was to you. He wished he was at the other’s place, taking his rightful place beside you. He would kiss you, smother you in love and give you whatever you wanted, whether it be a hug, a kiss or his time, he would’ve given them to you. He wouldn’t dance around the edge of your affection and his love like he was doing, like a man unsure of his feelings and anxious to act on it. 

He thought the other Miguel was a coward - though he knew he wasn’t. He wanted to blame his variant and find fault for anything he did, but they were still the same person. He was Miguel O’Hara as much as he was. He wanted, but couldn’t, especially after seeing how both loved you the same, having a similar type. They were so much alike that he could’ve replaced his variant, yet so vastly different in other manners that he would’ve stood out. His history, his trauma, his curse, the other had none of them. He was normal while he was Spider-Man, a stronger, more brutal version of Spider-Man. 

Granted, he loved you with every fibre of his being, but he had never showered you with as much love and affection as the other, having his character muddled through long hours of work and long-lasting tragedy. You were another of his tragedies, where he found love again and lost it by his own making. He would have left too if the Society didn’t depend on him, leaning towards him for support and help in protecting the multiverse. It was something he couldn’t sacrifice for his whims.

So he kept watching and let his heart crack and envy fester.

He watched you grow even closer to him, shoulders and hands occasionally touching, making you jump and blush. He watched you move from simple coffee dates to full-blown restaurants and bar dates, drinking and eating at your leisure - something he could’ve never provided you. He watched you wobble around when you were drunk, your arm over his shoulder and his around your waist, supporting your drunk weight. He watched you kiss, the other pressing your bodies together and you reciprocating the loving embrace you had once given to him. 

He felt like crying. He was crying, silent tears rolling down his sharp cheeks in slow, thundering waves of his heartbreak. He clung to the desk, claws unintentionally popping out and bending the metal under his fist. The sound ripped through the silent room like the image that ripped through his heart. He was alone in his grief, shoulders slumping and arms shaking with the intensity of his emotions. He had locked the door, barricading it with a busy, do not disturb sign, warning the others that he was occupied and wouldn’t be reached unless there was an emergency. 

“Miguel…”

He’d forgotten Lyla was here - she was everywhere and nowhere at the same time, with your help he had given Lyla an upgrade in her system that gave her access to every Spider that had the watch. She had access to every file in the database and his secrets. Lyla was loyal to him as much as she was to you, respecting your words with a promise of her own to leave you alone. That, however, didn’t mean that she wasn’t privy to his pains, watching him while his eyes were stuck to your universe’s screen, giving him some comforting words that were meant to lift his spirit. It never worked but the intention was there. 

He couldn’t look at her, still facing the hologram of you kissing. He felt the surge of too many emotions to be able to think clearly, his self-control tethering on a thin line of fragile web. If he turned, he would explode on Lyla, giving her the brunt of his suffering even though she didn’t deserve it, she felt and laughed as much as any other human. He remembered programming in emotion with you, laughing about how much she would be as teasing and annoying as you. Lyla was another gift to him by you, so it would hurt him more. 

“Miguel-”

“Don’t- Do not say another word.”

For a man in tears and pain, his voice was curt and stoic, playing the leading figure he’d taken for so long. It betrayed his shaky figure, fingers crushing the metal loudly and shoulders jerking with ever-wrenching choked sob. His world was crumbling around him, rippling and cracking from the seams and folding into itself. The control of his state was failing miserably as he kept staring at your mirthful smile after the kiss. It tore him apart knowing he pushed you further away and into the arms of another. It hurt him deeply. 

Through everything, he heard Lyla whisper a small sorry before she popped out of existence, her small holographic body vanishing along with her orange light. Gone was her familiar light, gone was the nostalgic memory of programming her, and along her, was the support of another person. He was truly alone in this moment, to fall on his knees and let himself drown under the weight of everything. 

If your love was a tangible thing, he would’ve cradled it between his warm palms, holding it tightly to his chest to feel the soothing effects you had on him. Like a balm to burns, you cooled the searing pains that the world inflicted upon him, the warm blanket that covered him when he needed rest and the pillar that held him when he fell. He’d lost something he couldn’t gain a second time, clutching his head in his misery, drowning and howling.

It felt surreal until it wasn’t until it all sunk in. He truly couldn’t grasp the utter loss and betrayal he felt. The realisation that he truly lost you to none other than himself. The irony of it all slashed deeper, how he drove you closer to another him by his own doing, making you love a Miguel with more gentleness, more kindness and time than him, Miguel O’Hara, the Spider-Man from Nueva York, Earth-928. Everything he had was lost in time, his spiralling thoughts of loss and misery clouded his vision, bringing tears forward in bigger waves. 

Was he doomed to lose everything he cared about? Was he bound to love and lose? Why couldn’t he have a happy ending like everyone else? Was it because he was different? Perhaps it was, there were other O’Hara Spider-Man, but none were mutated like him, a product of self-infliction and sabotage - none had their DNA spliced and mixed with a spider’s. He was simply too different from the others, they were lean but still had a strong musculature, muscles tightened to create more strength and defence; none were big and broad as he was, with rough edges and mean streaks. They were nice and happy, faced losses of their own, but always came out on top (there were some minor - sometimes major - variants of Spider-Man here and there, but they all had some similarities in their stories of becoming.). He saw the devastation and grasped onto the thinnest silver lining he could find, holding onto it to stay afloat while others thrived where they were. 

Maybe it was truly because of him. He was realistic - near cynic -  he couldn’t see things optimistically, life had made him that way. The silver lining he saw in things was small, nearly extinguished by his near-pessimistic way of life. Did that have an impact as well? It most likely did, at least partly. Fate had given him a bad hand in things, he couldn’t be completely blamed for how things turned - or so he thought, hoped. A man wasn’t only the result of what he’d done, but also of what he was given. When push comes to shove, Miguel acted in a way he thought meant well for him and the others even if it didn’t seem like the right decision at first. He rarely doubted his actions while he did them, only after, could he let himself face the consequences of what he’d done. Miguel simply didn’t have the pleasure of waiting. He needed to act when it was called.

If he had waited, if he had been patient and sought out others for support, if he had spent time thinking before acting, would he still have his little girl beside him? Would he still have you in his arms? If he had shown you more affection, would you have still loved him?

Did you still love him?

Miguel didn’t know what he was doing. Standing before your apartment door in civilian clothing and a bouquet of twelve, beautiful white tulips - the meaning not lost to him. It was an attempt at apologizing for his mistakes, a desperate one led by heartache. He brushed his hair back, trying to look as kept as he could in his situation: dark bags and sickly skin, tense muscles and sore back. This was a daring move from him, it would end up catastrophic if the Miguel from your universe saw him at your front door; but he checked, making sure his variant was elsewhere before opening a portal to your place. 

He hadn’t moved in a while, listening to you move around your flat, the sound of your soft steps shuffling from behind the door, a wall between you and him, reminding him that he wouldn’t be able to cross it unless you welcomed him. He held the bouquet in one hand and knocked with the other, his knuckles hitting the wood softly and hesitantly. There was a pause between every knock, drawn by his nerves and the anxiety that gripped him. 

You moved and closed in on the sound at the door. He saw your shadow dance under the small gap on the floor and pause. You knew. You knew it was him even without peeking through the peephole, your spider-sense aiding you in recognizing the unknown. Although your hand rested reluctantly at the knob - perhaps still too raw from your break as he was - you opened the door for him, figure small and apprehensive. 

“Miguel,” you muttered his name, greeting him with a slow nod. You stepped back and opened the door wider for him, he took it as a good sign that you let him in rather than shut the door in his face.

He nodded back, saying your name. He took a step forward, foot breaking the barrier to your flat. The second one ensured he was fully invited, both feet strongly rooted on your side of the door. He wanted to make himself smaller, to appease you, but he knew you wouldn’t have liked that. He squirmed under your stare, a mix of curiosity and concern. 

He nearly sighed audibly when you gestured at him to sit and he moved to the sofa he remembered sleeping on with you, cuddling under a warm blanket while you watched a movie. He knew your home by heart like you knew his, the memory washed over him with melancholy. You sat on the armchair to his left, your back to the kitchen. He swallowed thickly and handed you the bouquet, freshly cut tulips glistening with pearly drops under your lights. 

Your shoulders shook as you leaned in to take the bouquet, jolting back when your fingers grazed him. Feeling your skin felt invigorating, it breathed back life into him, even slightly. You thanked him with a slow nod, seemingly unsure of what to make of it. Was it a gift? Was it an apology? Was it a farewell sign? He figured your mind was running in circles trying to understand the meaning of the pretty bouquet he handed you. You were always an overthinker, but your mind worked brutally well. That’s something he always appreciated about you. 

“I-” Miguel started, seemingly stopped by something that he couldn’t get out of his throat. Maybe a ball of dread or needles of anxiety, but it held him from giving you the words he spent nights thinking over, to give you the message he built from the deepest crevice of his heart. “I’m sorry, (Name).”

You stared at him, understanding that he needed a moment of silence to truly convey his feelings. You hadn’t uttered a word since he first started, expression neutral, not betraying whatever brewing storm you locked inside of you. He was grateful, truly. 

“I know- I know it doesn’t mean much now, but I’m really, really sorry, mi vida.”

He sensed you tense, the muscles of your back contracting and rippling under your shirt. Every unseen fibre moving was bare to him, he could see and feel better than most, if not, everyone else. 

“I acted out of anger and lack of sleep, but that doesn’t mean you deserved that- never. I just, my mutation makes me more animalistic, more… aggressive than the other, and I hurt you. You didn’t deserve any of that and I can’t always blame it on my mutations. I should’ve been able to control myself. I shouldn’t have lashed out at you in those ways.”

He lowered his gaze to his hands, the calloused pads of his fingers rubbing his palm, trying to coax himself into relaxation. Although your breathing softened, a calm breeze in an atmosphere thick with tension, he didn’t dare look up and see the face you were making. 

“I was a bad boyfriend and a horrible friend. I’m- I’m not asking you to forgive me, I don’t want you to forgive me, but- I just needed to tell you how much I regret hurting you. I want to apologise, I don’t know what else to do, I don’t know how to fix this.” He breathed deeply, collecting every ounce of confidence and honesty to brave your reaction. “I’m sorry, mi cielo.” 

He shuddered, body rippling with his pained breath. He hadn’t realised how painful it would be to face you with his fears and confession, with the threat of abandonment and rejection fresh in his mind. He was a man of pride and strength, rarely facing anything with trepidation and hesitance. 

“I’m really sorry, mi cielo. I’m so, so sorry.”

He sat in silence, letting it hang over him like the blade of a guillotine, silent and brunt. Perceiving the flash of the sharp blade before it fell on his neck, sentencing him to a quick downfall with a long, lasting agony that would sting his neck as long as it would hurt his heart. The French used it for executions, the thing that spelled people’s end. At its height, it was used as an apparatus to behead traitors or people who were deemed dangerous to the people of the new republic. Down the blame went and off the head popped, like it would happen to Miguel if he wasn’t prepared for it. He truly didn’t know whether he had prepared for his rejection, for the death of his heart, to watch the flickering sparks of his flame wither out.

“I’m sorry too, Miguel-”

The rope strained, knots twisting and rippling in the tightness of the pull. It shook, whipping in the air as it straightened completely, held closely by the hand of the executioner. The wind blew but it was sturdy, withstanding the violent gales that slammed against the body of it.

“-it means a lot that you came here to apologise- ”

The crowd was filled with silence, the emptiness of the area a mock of a ghost town. Abandoned to be sentenced to death without anyone to witness. They deemed him not fit for their acknowledgment before his death, before the sparks of his life extinguished. His fate wasn’t worth their time, unlike the poorest criminals who stole for money, unlike the richest pigs who fed from the poor with their silver spoons and golden crowns, unlike the cruellest killers who gutted and left men, women and children to bleed out, and unlike the guiltless innocents cursed for something they hadn’t committed. 

“-but, I can’t.”

The rope was let loose, its tail flying and whipping in the air as the blade descended with its weight. The wood chafed against its support beams, yet it flew gracefully and rapidly, singing the doom of its prisoner. The blade gleamed under the moon’s bright light, the silver whispers of peace and sleep deaf to his ears.

“I can’t love you anymore.”

It cracked down on him, his life flashing before him as it cut into him. Severing his control over his body, putting out the dying embers of hope. He clung to desperation in his last moments, wishing to relive the moments of happiness, bright oblivion and cherished love. 

He wished that he could’ve seen your shadowed figure hidden in the darkness, tears lining your cheeks as you watched him take his last breath. The only person who came to see him leave, the one who he would’ve burned the world for. In the end, after everything he’d done, you still gave him a small moment of your time to witness his fall, you deemed him worthy of such an act. You offered him your kindness. 

My extensive tag list of extremely patient people pt1.:

@iseizeyourmom @raynerainyday @etherealton @sciencethot @coffee-obsessed-freak @thesecretwriter @beepboopcowboy@bontensh0e @aikoiya @allysunny @fandoms-run-my-life @brittney69 @aranachan @maladaptivedaydreamingbum @konniebon @starlightaura @redwolfxx @aniya7 @alicefallsintotherabbithole @bvbdudette @wwwelilovesyou @wwwellacom @akiras-key @bobafettbutifhewasgay @opiplover @rinieloliver @uniquecroissant @yas-v @xrusitax @blkmystery @darherwings @ariparri @notivie @vr00m-vr00m @battinsonwhore05 @irishbl0ss0mz @mivanda @saint-chlorine @livelaughluvmen @battinsonwhore05 @notivie @lililouvre @giasjourneyblog @ykyouluvme @skullywullypully

[givemearmstopraywith]

i just watched someone saying "christianity is and always will be the cultural appropriation of religions" and they mentioned the resurrection, which surprises me a little. do you know what they could be referring to? they also called it a very common trope and i'm no theologian, don't know that much about other religions or mythology, so maybe you could help?

resurrection narratives are absolutely not unique to christianity. there are resurrection narratives in the religion of ancient egypt (osiris), greece (adonis, zagreus, dionysus, and attus), and sumer (dumuzid and inanna). all of these predate christianity by centuries. to consider resurrection myths appropriation is, however, rather ignorant: the mythologies of the ancient near east are absolutely woven together, to the point where they are almost indistinguishable from each other, especially in the early history of the hebrews. the roman empire was heavily influenced by hellenic culture, religion, and philosophy. consider dionysus, the god of wine: plutarch stated that the stories of osiris and dionysus were identical and that the secret rituals asociated with them were obviously paralleled: the second century AD saw the emergence of greco-egyptian pantheons where the god serapis was synonymous with osiris, hades, and dionysus. this is also similar to the interrelationship between inanna, ishtar, asherah, astarte, and multiple other near eastern female deities (and she likely played an influence in the development of lilith as well). how much did the cult of dionysus influence later rites of the wine and the eucharist in early christianity, especially given that within fifty years of christ's death most christians were greeks? romulus and remus were said to have been born to a virgin, and so was the founder of zoroastrianism, zoroaster, a religion that influenced platonic philosophy and all abrahamic faiths.

christianity is more guilty of appropriation that most other faith practices of appropriation because of the crudeness and hatefulness with which it borrowed judaism and then turned on the jews. but attempting to divide western and near eastern religious traditions into pure (original) and impure (appropriated) is next to impossible. otherwise we can start trying to particularize everything as either pure or impure and discard what we deem as "impure" or unoriginal because we think it is valueless, hackneyed, or unethical. religion does not work like that. christianity does require critical consumption and practice because it has both appropriated judaism and because the way in which it exerted itself as a dominant religion over other faith practices. and the appropriation of judaism must be especially viewed as troubling, because judaism cannot be compared, historically, to religions like those of ancient egypt and greece because until the state of israel it was never a dominant or state religion, and the fact that it survived some odd thousand years without being recognized as a state religion is part of why it's particularly interesting. of course, that has changed now, but this ask isn't about israel/palestine and i won't dwell on it this issue much except to reaffirm that christianity appropriating an oppressed minority religion that emerged out of colonial contexts is very different than christianity utilizing aspects of ancient greek religion or zoroastrianism, and also different from jesus being included in islam, for instance.

interestingly, quetzalcoatl, from the ancient aztec religion, was the patron of priests and a symbol of resurrection. this gestures to the hidden sacred, eliade's hierophany: the hidden holiness, the sacrality and beingness of something beyond ourselves, that underlies all existence, with its own explicit truths that emerge consistently in faith practices that, unlike those of the near east, never interacted. maybe we all carried the same stories out of the cradle of civilization; maybe there is a perpetual and accessible truth that transcends boundaries. i don't know. but everything is borrowed. everything is copy. humanity is not capable of true originality: and isn't that beautiful? everything is taken in communion. everyone is interconnected. everyone wants to believe something, and we seem to be universally compelled by the same truths, motifs, meanings, and stories.

[practically-an-x-man]

I'm having a scatterbrained day, so for talk shop Tue, can I get a commentary reel/directors cut style talk about how WWFA came about? How you got the idea, how Kat was developed and how you decided to insert your plot into the movie canon?

Oooh man, great question!! Thank you!!

So first things first... there were absolutely elements of Katherine and her story that were logically chosen for a specific position, and as with all of my stories, I did have the plot in place before I started writing, but there was a lot of this story in particular that evolved as I wrote it.

So WWFA? first came about after I went through a huge NATM hyperfixation in late 2021. The movies have always been really comforting and close to my heart, especially as a history and mythology buff, but there was something about that time rewatching it that just sent me headfirst into it. I don't remember how specifically I came up with Katherine as a character, but the first little inkling of plot came from the idea of an artist leaving sketches for the night guards and janitors to discover, not knowing that it was the exhibits themselves who ended up appreciating them.

So that's where I started the story: Katherine, leaving her drawings, simple and sweet. I had my point A (her leaving the drawings), my point B (following the third movie, the tablet dying and being restored), and my point C (hush now, we haven't gotten to that yet), but hadn't quite gotten all the details of how I was going to work Katherine into the story. I always had her coming along for the ride, but it's safe to say that the original concept did not have her nearly as deeply woven into the story as her final version does. She brought her drawings to life, building off the idea of the tablet bringing museum artworks and exhibits to life, but at that point I didn't have much of an explanation as to why her.

And then I started college. I'd always been a history nerd and had a good base of knowledge to start the story, but then I was a history nerd taking various college-level anthropology, history, and archaeology classes, and it took my knowledge to a whole new level. I've said this before, but I nearly wrote a paper on how I believed the Egyptian god Tutu was borrowed from the Babylonian god of the same name (though that fizzled when the Egyptologist I tried to contact never emailed me back, and he was the only expert in that particular god I could find). I love that sort of thing, and if college had been a better fit for me it might've ended up being my lasting career. My knowledge skyrocketed, so did my inspiration, and that's what springboarded the fic into its present mythology-heavy form.

As for how Kat was developed... it was a lot of those more spur-of-the-moment decisions. She became descended from Bastet on a whim, and that ended up being a driving force that worked so well for the rest of the story. Her name, Katherine Johnson, is a reference to the NASA scientist who contributed to the moon landing, but that reference itself was just sparked from the fact that I couldn't decide on a name at first. Her physical appearance, her backstory, whatever else? I just wanted to create a fun, dynamic character, someone who really felt like a real person rather than a plot device - and part of how I do that is just to stop thinking too hard about it and let things just flow.

Idk, it's kind of hard to describe. I don't want to say I was flying blind at any point, but there were a lot of areas in which the story just fell together as I wrote it. Most of my work came from creating Katherine and establishing her within the first few chapters - after that, she just seemed to fall into the story.

[godsofhumanity]

MUMMIES (2023) | REVIEW

OVERVIEW: An Ancient Egyptian charioteer, Thut, now a mummy in the afterlife, is unwillingly engaged to fellow mummy, Princess Nefer, after Ra's phoenix bird chooses him. On pain of losing his eyes and tongue, Thut must protect the engagement ring until the wedding, until British archeologists find the ring in a burial site and put it up in a museum. Desparate to not face punishment, Thut, his little brother Sekhem and his pet crocodile Croc, and Princess Nefer venture out into the world of the living, now in the 21st Century to get the ring back.

RATING: 6/10. i thought it was funny personally, but i wish there was more egyptian mythology references... -2 points for bad music, and a further -2 points for not providing better explanatory scenes that would have helped an unfamiliar audience become more familiar with the beauty that is Ancient Egyptian mythology.

AVAILABLE: netflix

THINGS I LIKED:

YAY MORE EGYPTIAN MYTHOLOGY IN MEDIAAAAAAAAAAAAAA CAN'T HAVE ENOUGH OF IT

loved the whole concept of "21st centuries guys open up the tomb and unleash mummies" except they're not monsters, they're literally just people.. i loved the idea of the underworld being connected to the world of the living; i think it was in line with egyptian mythology the idea of the next life..

the mummies looking liking skeletons when caught on camera or in the light lmfao... cute idea i think!!

i might be reading to much into it, but i think the film did a good job of exploring the morality of archeology; like, for the 21st century people in the film, they were all very excited to find an item from Ancient Egypt intact, which of course, is essential for learning from history, but when they removed the item and sent it all the way to England, it was like-- for these people who believed in life after death and the importance of being buried with their possessions, their afterlife kind of just got shattered because you took their possession... so idk, it was a simple plot but a good conversation to have.

mythology references; Nefer's wedding ring was Hathor's sun disk with the cow horns which we all know is Hathor's symbol.. and it made perfect sense for Hathor to be the symbol on the ring since she's the goddess of love.

there was a phoenix that was meant to choose Nefer's husband... there are phoenixes in Egyptian mythology, and they were associated with Ra.. i THINK the movie called it the Phoenix of Ra, which i think is awesome (yay Ra reference!!!), and since Ra is associated with Hathor, i think he was the right reference to use.

Sekhem is also depicted in the beginning of the film with a boomerang-- boomerangs were found in ancient tombs, so there's that idea of the possessions moving with the deceased into the next life again!

the mummies trying to start a car by sitting on the roof and kicking it like a horse lmfaooo-- they had no idea what the hell a car was or how it ran, and i think that was perfect.

THINGS I DIDN'T LIKE / MADE NO SENSE:

a lot of the plot concerned Nefer finding "freedom" in the 21st century that she didn't have in the after life, particularly, in the after life, she wasn't allowed to sing... but music, as it is for many cultures, was very important in Ancient Egypt as demonstrated by wall engravings... and both men and women could play music/sing.. the highest musical status you could have was to be a temple musician.. so, i'm not an expert, but i find it very hard to believe that an Egyptian princess would be told "stop singing, it's not ladylike"...

i wish there had been MORE myth references T-T so much of the film was set in the modern world, and i guess it had to be, but it felt like the film only borrowed a few minor Ancient Egyptian elements and then made up the rest to suit their agenda :((

also, i couldn't find much about what actually happened in the Duat, but i would assume that you might be reunited with loved ones or something like that... but the fact that Nefer had to get married confused me because they're already dead... it's not as though one day her father would die and she'd become Pharaoh or something.. i think? idk. the film didn't really explain the Duat at all which i think sucks especially if you're not familiar with Ancient Egypt.

i feel like there were probably more things but i watched this film sometime ago and i can't remember anymore T-T

[mevbotcrypto]

Exploring The Christ: Myths, Facts, and Everything in Between

The figure of The Christ has long been central to religious, cultural, and philosophical discussions. Over the centuries, the story of Christ has been interpreted, reinterpreted, and often misunderstood. From ancient myths to modern facts, exploring the life and teachings of Christ is both a fascinating and complex journey. In this article, we’ll delve into the myths, facts, and everything in between, shedding light on some of the most debated aspects of this revered figure.

1. The Origins: Myth or History?

The story of Christ is rooted in the New Testament, where the Gospels narrate his life, ministry, death, and resurrection. However, beyond the Biblical texts, there are ongoing debates about the historical accuracy of these accounts. Is Christ purely a religious myth, or does historical evidence back the existence of Jesus of Nazareth?

Mythical Interpretations:

Many people argue that the story of The Christ borrows elements from pre-Christian myths, including resurrection themes, virgin births, and miracles. Figures such as the Egyptian god Horus or the Greek hero Dionysus have been cited as precursors to the Christ narrative. These parallels have led some scholars to suggest that Christ’s story may be a synthesis of ancient myths adapted by early Christians.

Historical Evidence:

Despite the mythic comparisons, the majority of historians agree that Jesus of Nazareth was a real historical figure. Ancient texts, including the works of Roman historians like Tacitus and Jewish historian Josephus, make mention of Jesus. While these accounts may not confirm the miraculous aspects of his life, they support the existence of a Jewish teacher whose following influenced the development of early Christianity.

2. Miracles: Myths or Divine Acts?

One of the defining features of Christ’s ministry, as recounted in the Gospels, is his performance of miracles—from healing the sick to walking on water and raising the dead. These stories have fascinated believers and skeptics alike. Are these miracles factual events, or are they symbolic myths created to emphasize Christ’s spiritual power?

The Mythical View:

Critics of the miracle stories often view them as allegorical or symbolic narratives. Some argue that these miracles were exaggerated or created after Christ’s death to elevate his status among followers. For example, turning water into wine at the wedding at Cana could be seen as a metaphor for spiritual transformation rather than a literal event.

Faith and Belief:

For believers, Christ’s miracles are divine acts that demonstrate his role as the Son of God. These miraculous deeds are central to the Christian faith, serving as proof of Christ’s divine nature and his authority over life and death. While they may not be empirically proven, they hold deep meaning for those who view the world through a lens of faith.

3. The Virgin Birth: Symbolism or Fact?

The story of Christ’s virgin birth is one of the most famous narratives associated with his life. According to Christian tradition, Jesus was conceived by the Holy Spirit and born to the Virgin Mary, a concept that is both miraculous and central to Christian doctrine. But is this story purely symbolic, or did it really happen?

Mythological Parallels:

Many ancient cultures have stories of virgin births, which often symbolize purity, divine intervention, or the birth of a savior figure. The connection between Christ’s birth and earlier mythological accounts raises questions about whether this element of the story was influenced by existing narratives in the ancient world.

Theological Significance:

For Christians, the virgin birth is a cornerstone of Christ’s divine nature. It is seen not just as a miraculous event, but as a fulfillment of prophecy from the Old Testament. The virgin birth is central to the belief that Christ was both fully human and fully divine, free from original sin. Whether viewed as fact or symbolism, this narrative carries profound theological weight.

4. Crucifixion and Resurrection: The Core of the Christian Faith

The crucifixion and resurrection of Christ are the central events of Christian theology. His death on the cross and subsequent resurrection are seen as the ultimate sacrifice for humanity’s sins and the promise of eternal life. But how much of this narrative is rooted in fact, and how much is religious myth?

Historical Crucifixion:

There is widespread historical agreement that Jesus was crucified under Roman rule, likely during the governance of Pontius Pilate. Crucifixion was a common method of execution for political dissidents and criminals, so Christ’s death fits within the historical practices of the time. Ancient sources outside the Bible confirm that Jesus’ crucifixion was a real event, marking a turning point in early Christian history.

Resurrection: Faith or Fact?

The resurrection of Christ is the most debated aspect of his story. For believers, it is the defining miracle that confirms Christ’s divine nature and the cornerstone of Christian faith. However, skeptics view it as a mythical element used to elevate Christ’s status among his followers after his death. While historical evidence of the resurrection is lacking, it remains a profound article of faith for Christians, symbolizing victory over death and the promise of eternal life.

5. Christ in Popular Culture: Myth Reimagined

Throughout history, the image of The Christ has permeated art, literature, music, and film. From Renaissance paintings to modern movies, Christ’s influence on culture is undeniable. But how has this figure been reimagined, and how do these portrayals reflect both myth and fact?

Artistic Interpretations:

Christ has been depicted in countless ways, from Savior to Rebel, each reflecting the cultural and societal values of the time. Artists like Michelangelo and Leonardo da Vinci portrayed him as the divine, compassionate figure central to Renaissance religious art. In contrast, more contemporary depictions, such as those in film, explore the humanity of Christ, his suffering, and his revolutionary message of love and forgiveness.

The Evolution of Christ in Film:

Modern films, such as The Passion of the Christ and Jesus Christ Superstar, have brought Christ’s story to new audiences. These portrayals often walk the line between fact and myth, blending historical elements with artistic license to explore both his divine mission and his very human emotions. These cultural interpretations continue to shape how Christ is perceived in the modern world.

6. Myth, Faith, and Modern Relevance

Whether viewed through the lens of myth, historical fact, or faith, The Christ remains one of the most influential figures in human history. His teachings of love, forgiveness, and humility resonate with people across different cultures and belief systems. But why is Christ still relevant today?

Personal Transformation:

For many, Christ’s teachings offer a path to personal transformation. His message of unconditional love and forgiveness provides a roadmap for overcoming fear, hatred, and division. By following his example, individuals can find inner peace, purpose, and a deeper connection to humanity.

Social Justice and Compassion:

In a world marked by inequality, injustice, and suffering, Christ’s message of compassion for the marginalized continues to inspire movements for social justice. His call to love one’s neighbor and care for the least fortunate speaks directly to the challenges we face today. For many, living out Christ’s teachings means advocating for the poor, the oppressed, and the voiceless in society.

Conclusion: Myth, Fact, or Faith?

Exploring the life of The Christ reveals a fascinating interplay between myth, historical fact, and faith. While some aspects of his story align with ancient myths, others are firmly grounded in history. For believers, the deeper truth lies not in the literal details but in the transformative power of Christ’s message. Whether you see him as a historical figure, a mythological archetype, or a divine savior, Christ’s influence on culture, art, and the human spirit is undeniable, offering hope and guidance for navigating the complexities of life.

[king-of-wrath]

On the topic of cultural property, there are cases where the origin of something in popular culture and/or media is difficult (or even impossible) to pinpoint to a specific people's mythology or folklore. While civilizations have borrowed various elements from their neighbors throughout history, there are still instances where two peoples come up with the same idea---despite having never come into contact with one another

For example, the concepts of "the risen dead" or "undead", evil and benign "spirits" and "malevolent beings" or "demons" appear in many different cultures around the world. Oral and written sources that long predate Western colonization and the development of the internet mention creatures such as zombies and vampires, humans capable of transforming into powerful beasts and mysterious beings well known for their trickery (whether obnoxious or malicious in intention)

We can also see this happening in the architecture of different civilizations: both the ancient Egyptians and the Mesoamericans (Aztec, Maya, Inca, etc.) eventually learned that they could build very high structures that were both physically stable and long-lasting---constructing buildings with a wide base, adding incrementally smaller layers atop it until the desired height was achieved (aka "steppe pyramids" or "ziggurats"). Similarly, the Pueblo nations and ancient Anatolians both carved homes out of the rock formations present in their territory rather than build from scratch

Human ingenuity and imagination do not require an upbringing by a More Civilized PeopleTM or the guidance of an Enlightened SpeciesTM. Go fuck yourselves, colonization apologists and ancient aliens theorists

[satashiiwrites]

Death, Rebirth and the Jackal, V: A Deal is Struck

Title: Death, Rebirth and the Jackal V: A Deal is Struck

Fandom: Mass Effect Andromeda, The Mummy 1999 with influences from American Gods and Moon Child

Pairing: Eventual MReyder. 

Fic Summary: The Jackal wakes when his master returns. 

Chapter Summary:  The Krogan has seen much in his time but few things are as puzzling as Reyes Vidal or his visitors. 

Other tags/warnings: borrowed Egyptian mythology, set roughly ~1905, not a fusion with the mummy movies, no librarians were harmed during the writing of this, i am my own editor (this is a warning).  TW this chapter for hanging. No knowledge of source material needed for enjoyment. 

Read it here on AO3

[midnightmargheritas]

Some of my witchy resources! I also use a lot of online sources. Always cross-reference your information, especially regarding plants and herbs.

The Encyclopaedia of Mythology - Arthur Cotterell

Lots in this one, shallow information though. Good for reference.

Buckland’s Complete Book of Witchcraft and Buckland’s Book of Spirit Communications - Raymond Buckland

I really liked the Witchcraft one, but it was very heavy on Wicca and some sexist practices; if you sift through it you’ll find good stuff (there is a link to a free copy of this book on this blog under reference). The Spirit Communication book was a little disappointing if I’m honest, but that was because it talks a lot about using trances, which I personally find very difficult.

Llewelyn’s Complete Book of Correspondences - Sandra Kynes

A TikTok recommendation. This book is brilliant. Absolutely full of correspondences and information.

Tarot for Love and Life - Jane Struthers

This book taught me tarot, it’s got a special place in my heart. Bought it on eBay as part of a kit with a rose quartz and cards... the cards were shown to be Raider Waite style... they are not... they don’t match the book either... they’re still my most accurate deck and the deck I have used the longest.

Palmistry - Sasha Fenton

Amazing book. Too much to remember in here, it’s full of info. Spent so many hours reading it cover to cover in secondary school.

The Penguin Book of Witches - Penguin Classics

A lovely book on history, but it is a bit dry.

Magical Creatures - Witches Almanac LTD

I might as well have reread my comic relief copy of Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them from my childhood.

A Treasury of British Folklore - Dee Dee Chainey

This was a gift from a friend, such a sweet book. It’s full of fun myths and legends.

The Hedgerow Apothecary - Christine Iverson

Bought this looking for a book for identifying plants out and about, it has some lovely information on the plants it has (with recipes for salves and pouches and drinks using them), however it has limited information.

The Green Witch and The Witches’ Book of Self Care - Arin Murphy Hiscock

Wanted these for so long, I was so excited when I found them reduced in the Works during a time I was questioning my craft. Some good beginner friendly information inside. Still working through the self care one. Includes information and spells.

Runes for Beginners - Lisa Chamberlain

Haven’t read this yet, wanted to learn more about reading runes. My runes are mean.

Witchery - Juliet Diaz

Another TikTok recommendation. Lovely book, includes spells. I had hoped it had included more advanced stuff. For a beginner, it’s great. Includes information and spells.

The Witches Way - Robbins and Greenaway

0/10. Shallow and baseline information with a heavy focus on Wicca being the only way to practice. Regret buying.

The Grand Grimoire Or The Red Dragon - Lamba and Overman

Another TikTok recommendation. Worth it. Delves in deeper. Still working my way through.

The Egyptian Book of the Dead

Lovely to have the historical knowledge. Also totally appeals to my archaeology degree. Working my way through.

The Mabinogion

Haven’t started this one, but thoroughly looking forward to reading the myths.

The Art of Divination - Deb Robinson

This came with my witch casket this month. An overview of different divination methods, it’s really sweet.

Tea Cup Tales - McWhorter

This is actually my mum’s book that I borrow. She treated the author in hospital when she was a nurse and the lady insisted on giving her a signed copy. It’s a really great book.

Useless Magic - Florence Welch

An honourable mention. I know it’s not technically a witchcraft book, but who doesn’t hear the raw power in her lyrics?

@the-hermit-witch

[zoe-oneesama]

You know I saw a post about how that guy will do the myths on ML and was wondering what your opinion on the mythology and if you have a problem how would you fix it

I’ve never been particularly interested in the background lore of fictional worlds. I’ve always been infinitely more invested in the characters that inhabit them and their relationships and backgrounds, which can be used to develop the lore in conjunction with it. I prefer character driven stories over world driven stories.

That doesn’t mean that a character driven story can’t have really rich world building and mythos. Star Wars comes to mind as a storyline that fills out a cast of characters and completes their stories but through them and their motivations and interactions enough of the world is fleshed out that lots of people could (and have) expand upon it in interesting ways. But a lot of times when series try to focus more on the world building than their characters, the overall story suffers imo. 

Because of this, my feelings on That Guy taking on all the mythos and lore from now on gives me feelings ranging from boredom to intense unease. There are too many things in the foreground that aren’t complete or fleshed out enough - the many mysteries surrounding the Agreste family (even though I don’t care about it, they’ve introduced it and so should finish it), the power ups and zodiac miraculous, the Villain At Home, the rOmAnCe, but they were already hopping from one new discovery to the next without closing the book on anything they’ve introduced and are determined to just get bigger and bigger. 

There’s enough going on already. Maybe if they were going to expand the world by introducing bigger villains after defeating the last, this progression from Paris to the Rest of the World would feel more natural. Instead, it feels like they’re tacking on more and more stuff to an already bloated story without finishing up anything they started.

The part that gives me unease, and where I understand most people’s frustration comes from, is that That Guy makes claims of borrowing from real world examples, like Wu Xing and that whole…Egyptian Mythology/History thing in The Pharaoh, but then makes a mockery of it or basically borrows the bare minimum like names without digging into and researching the mythology. Instead they’re reinvented to fit the narrative, which to me feels disrespectful. 

I don’t care about lore, especially in this weird mix of From The Real World But Not The Real World setting that Miraculous Ladybug is. Maybe I’d be interested if the show was inventing their own mythology or it was set in another world, but even still I’m more concerned with the character development and what’s going to happen to the people that inhabit the world rather than the world itself. That Guy announcing he’s taking over doesn’t make me feel any more excited for it. 

[dutch-and-flemish-painters]

Pieter Thijs - Time and the Three Fates - ca. 1665

In ancient Greek religion and mythology, the Moirai (Ancient Greek: Μοῖραι, "lots, destinies, apportioners"), often known in English as the Fates (Latin: Fata), Moirae or Mœræ (obsolete), were the white-robed incarnations of destiny; their Roman equivalent was the Parcae (euphemistically the "sparing ones"), and there are other equivalents in cultures that descend from the Proto-Indo-European culture. Their number became fixed at three: Clotho ("spinner"), Lachesis ("allotter") and Atropos ("the unturnable", a metaphor for death).

They controlled the mother thread of life of every mortal from birth to death. They were independent, at the helm of necessity, directed fate, and watched that the fate assigned to every being by eternal laws might take its course without obstruction. Both gods and men had to submit to them, although Zeus's relationship with them is a matter of debate: some sources say he can command them (as Zeus Moiragetes "leader of the Fates"), while others suggest he was also bound to the Moirai's dictates.

In the Homeric poems Moira or Aisa are related to the limit and end of life, and Zeus appears as the guider of destiny. In the Theogony of Hesiod, the three Moirai are personified, daughters of Nyx and are acting over the gods. Later they are daughters of Zeus and Themis, who was the embodiment of divine order and law. In Plato's Republic the Three Fates are daughters of Ananke (necessity).

It seems that Moira is related with Tekmor ("proof, ordinance") and with Ananke ("destiny, necessity"), who were primeval goddesses in mythical cosmogonies. The ancient Greek writers might call this power Moira or Ananke, and even the gods could not alter what was ordained:

To the Moirai (Moirae, Fates) the might of Zeus must bow; and by the Immortals' purpose all these things had come to pass, or by the Moirai's ordinance.

The concept of a universal principle of natural order and balance has been compared to similar concepts in other cultures like the Vedic Ṛta, the Avestan Asha (Arta) and the Egyptian Maat.

In earliest Greek philosophy, the cosmogony of Anaximander is based on these mythical beliefs. The goddess Dike ("justice, divine retribution"), keeps the order and sets a limit to any actions.

Pieter Thijs, Peter Thijs or Pieter Thys (Antwerp, 1624 – Antwerp, 1677) was a Flemish painter of portraits as well as religious and history paintings. He was a very successful artist who worked for the courts in Brussels and The Hague as well as for many religious institutions. His work was close to the courtly and elegant style of Anthony van Dyck and his followers.

Pieter Thijs produced allegorical and mythological compositions for the courts of the Southern Netherlands and the Dutch Republic as well as the local churches and monasteries. He was also in demand as a portrait painter by the court and the local bourgeoisie.

In the past his reputation suffered because of misattributions of his work. As his style was close to that of van Dyck and the followers of van Dyck, Thijs works have often been attributed to van Dyck and artists working in the van Dyckian idiom such as Thomas Willeboirts Bosschaert, Jan Boeckhorst and Erasmus Quellinus the Younger. With the rediscovery of the artist, works have been re-attributed to Pieter Thijs. As the styles of Thomas Willeboirts Bosschaert and Thijs are very close, there are still disagreements about the attributions of some works to either artist. The main distinguishing features between the styles of the two artists is that Willeboirts Bosschaerts' work uses a looser brushwork and displays a distinctive humanity and sensuality in the figures, especially the female figures. Thijs, on the other hand, applied the paint more tightly and thickly, and his figures express their emotions with more decorum and contained theatricality.

The influence of van Dyck on Thijs' style is due to his direct working relationship with van Dyck. Other possible influences are the works of slightly senior painters such as Thomas Willeboirts Bosschaert and Gonzales Coques who were both early followers of van Dyck as well as Thijs' predecessors at the courts of Brussels and The Hague. The patrons at these courts showed a preference for van Dyck’s refined courtly style.

He showed himself to be an eclectic painter who did not strive for originality but adapted and borrowed from the styles of other artists where he felt the commission demanded it.

[wkakadrac]

Re:Warhammer The Old World

Since some people might recall my older posts on Tumblr being on Warhammer-related matters, and having poured easily $1000-$2000 USD between when I entered in 2001 and left in 2013, I feel like I’d be a bit negligent if I did not offer my opinions on the announcement for Games-Workshop bringing back the Warhammer Fantasy line.

Are you ready?

I’m tentative. Not tentatively optimistic, not tentatively excited, just tentative.

On the one hand, Warhammer Fantasy had something... unique, if you will, to a bit of its fantastical flair. It was a rather decently fleshed out fantastical world fit for mainstream production but also took efforts to differentiate itself from a lot of its competition. Its mainstay human Empire was notably - predominantly - Germanic in inspiration, for example, and the technology generally hovered somewhere between “On the cusp of Pike and Shot” to “Solidly Pike and Shot” depending on which books you read. The Elves were not the oldest race, but instead the Lizardmen were (who, for that matter, had both the traditional “Simple cold blooded warrior-beast” thing going for them with the Saurus and Kroxigors but also “Functional society with sophisticated artisans and philosophy” with the Skinks, too). 

It featured Bretonnians who went all in on some of the more superhuman aspects of Arturian Legend. It featured the start of the “Big, green, musclebound Orcs” trend (much of the portrayals before tending to be more blatantly porcine and / or ‘broken’ Elf in nature). It had Not!Ancient Egyptian who were explicitly polytheistic and made use of chariots who at times even lead mortal kingdoms instead of doing nothing but brooding in ancient pyramids planning the death of Lion-Oh. It had... I think you get the point. There was a lot of interesting lore aspects to it.

Not only that, the setting was generally rich in lore (surprisingly so for a mere war-game). Supplements like the Liber Chaotica / Necris, the complex history of Dwarves and Elvish mythology, how a lot of army books originally spent literally dozens of times as much length providing narrative hooks as they did rules (and sometimes even having as much pages of alternate rules / army lists as base rules, so as to give armies more unique flair).

This was stuff that caught my interest when I picked up the hobby ages ago, both in a way that 40K just couldn’t satisfy as well as missing some of the aspects I came to eventually recognize as... rather concerning / problematic. Not missing it outright by any means, but being less obvious / prolific.

But that brings me to exactly where I feel like the Warhammer Fantasy revival could be... less than inspiring. Horrifying, even.

Warhammer Fantasy is a setting that makes no effort to hide that its map is - barring a few subtle and not-so-subtle changes - a rather blatant mimic of our own. You have Not!Europe, situated above Not!Africa and connected to Not!Asia. Across the ocean you have the Not!Americas, broken up into familiar Not!North and Not!South American versions. There are nations such as “Ind”(ia) and “Arabay”, and the aforementioned Not!Egyptians. The faction settled in Not!South America blatantly cribs off various Mesoamerican aesthetics, the one on the Not!Steppes from pop culture Mongols, the Not!Russians going so far as to borrow terms like Cossack, etcetera.

This in and of itself is not horrifying. Warhammer Fantasy wears this openly on its sleeve, and it provides some ease in identifying / characterizing things without having to flesh them out too explicitly in text. 

Where it does become problematic is how... shall we say, regressive a lot of the major Wargaming communities are, as well as how some of the lore has been handled. And how this might interact with things such as... say, a once powerful faction re-awakening and deciding to forcibly expel the outsiders, reclaim their stolen wealth, and make their nation powerful again. Or how a certain landmass is presented as being populated predominantly by Green-skinned savages who almost universally throw spears (let alone the formal name for their Bolt Thrower war machines), wear war paints, and operate in tribal structures. How one of the major four Chaos gods is heavily coded to represent - in an unfavorable light - the LGBTQ+ spectrum. How another of the major Chaos gods is blatantly - explicitly - referred to in older lore in a manner synonymous with signs of abuse... and has increasingly been whitewashed as being “The good one” or “The only one who truly loves you” or “Hurting his followers because he loves them” in an unironic light. 

Basically, there is an ungodly amount of room for things to - if handled either less than tactfully or even just mindlessly carried back over without any revision - go terribly wrong, and that’s without assuming purposefully hostile intent!

From a business standpoint, it’s relatively easy for WHFB’s revival to become a sort of money printing exercise for GW. Outside on-demand square bases and publishing some additional books, there’s relatively minimal work that needs to be done for such an endeavor due to the cross-compatibility between lines (Daemons are by default meant for 40K and AoS / Fantasy, for example, and a lot of the AoS line remains old WHFB ones repurposed for AoS). 

But from a community / Lore standpoint, I cannot help but see so many potential areas this revival could enable some of the worst aspects of modern Wargaming communities. Warhammer 40K was never exactly spotless, but it at least had a degree of separation due to the Sci-Fi veneer. Warhammer Fantasy has the real-world expies baked in.

[practically-an-x-man]

I just finished Who Waits Forever Anyway? and I just wanted to drop in and say that I ADORED EVERY MINUTE I SPENT READING IT. I'm not in the NATM fandom (I haven't even thought about it for like 10 years lol) but wow the mythology the characters the THEMES. I love how you fleshed out The Magic and made everything cohesive, especially all the small hints (I think I saw something about Katherine's drawings turning blue being a reference to Osiris which made me lose my mind). There were just so many things that made me go "Yes! Nobody ever gets that right!!" It was clearly so well-crafted, both in the writing and the research. I'm not super articulate when I try to talk about fics I like but I'm just so overwhelmed with love for this one. (Also, I was wondering, is the "vitiligo meaning Ra has looked upon you" connected to a real association from back then?)

AHHHH THANK YOU SO MUCH!! I'm so glad you liked it!! This fic has been a love letter to history and mythology in every single way, and it means so much to me that another mythology nerd enjoyed it!

I was this 🤏 close to being an Egyptologist myself (I was an anthropology major for a bit, but college wasn't the right place for me) and I still have so much love for that branch of history, and just history as a whole. I even gathered sources and intended to write a paper suggesting the god Tutu was borrowed from the Babylonian god of the same name after the Neo-Babylonians entered Egypt... but the Egyptologist I was trying to contact for more information never emailed me back, so that was a bust. Either way, I'm a HUGE nerd for this stuff and I've really enjoyed implementing it into the fic!!

(fun fact: the professor Katherine talks to about the tactile worker's scroll is modeled after my Development of Western Civilizations professor in college, since he was a really cool guy and I wanted to give him a shoutout. His focus was Roman history rather than Egyptian, but the mannerisms and speech patterns are the same)

As for the vitiligo thing... yes and no. The premise of it is just something I came up with, there's nothing (currently found at least) that suggests they saw vitiligo as linked to Ra or the other gods in any way, but I did try to keep it rooted in the evidence I did find. Vitiligo was indeed present and known in Ancient Egypt, as treatments for it were mentioned in the Ebers Papyrus of medicine (in case you were curious, the treatments involved rubbing the skin with certain plant oils, then having the person sit in the sun. It reads to me like a method to tan the afflicted skin to make the vitiligo marks less visible). As for the connection to the sun god, I borrowed that from a Vedic myth about Bhagavatam (the sun god) being looked on by his illegitimate son and developing vitiligo as a result. It's sort of an... educated guess, let's say, since the condition was present and we see similar myths in other parts of the world.

I feel like there's a fair amount of these connections throughout the fic - it's a combination of just pure facts from my research into the various cultures and historical timeline, and a bit of educated speculation on my part (mostly just for fun, sometimes to tie story elements together in a satisfying way). The NATM movies are part of what initially sparked my love of museums and history, and as an adult I love how much work went into the sets and costuming, so I wanted this fic to reflect the same level of education mixed with entertainment.

Oh, and don't worry - there's more I have planned for this fic, I've just been damn busy these past few months and am still working on writing the next chapter. I'll get there soon, I promise!! This isn't the end just yet!

Thank you again for reading and giving me your thoughts!! You have no idea how much this made my day!! I'm smiling so much at this!!! <3

[mattkenzie]

So I was pretty much busy during the Christmas period that I almost broke my New years resolution of 2019 which was to read a book a month. So I know that there is this infamous quote/meme amongst book bloggers everywhere whenever it comes to books, that goes in the lines of “I don’t know what the title of the book is called but I know that the cover is red.” So I thought that I’d make this my book of the month (December 2019) because not only that the cover of the book is red (“I want to be in on the joke.” —Matt) but there was something in the States known as Free Comic Book Day and Vox Machina Origins was also going to feature Norse Mythology by Neil Gaiman.

As a kid when I was in primary school age... (So I was about aged 5-7) History has been one of my favourite subjects that I’ve learnt in school I was pretty much a fidget bum (I found it hard to sit still), I wasn’t the smartest kid in school but I loved listening to stories... other then listening to bible stories as I’ve heard them all in Sunday School... in fact... the R.E. (Religous Education) teacher was so annoyed that I was doing her job so I got History instead (jokes on them because “History is my jam!”), where I’ve learnt about Cavemen, Egyptians, Romans, Henry the VIII (Tudors), Saxons, Greeks, Boudicca (Celts), Medieval/Middle ages... etc). When school was finished I go to my local library and borrow the Asterix books and my big sister would mostly borrow books about mythology (Greek mythology) and she reads them to me, so I am glad to have that kind of leg up when I moved into secondary school.

So recently this year, I was reading Mythos by Stephen Fry, I’ve been watching a lot of Egyptian mythology on YouTube since November and now I’m in December I was world building my own D&D and then I was thinking... I want (Egyptian) Palor and (Greek) Kord be in a same sex relationship. Then I wanted to see the world with fresh new eyes (in the northern continent) as I never knew much about Norse mythology so I’ve been reading up Norse mythology. (Haha... maybe I want to be an anthropologist when I start New Game +)

[uncurieuxrenard]

Football is more French than you might think.

France has been part of my life since my birth, probably, but, through the years, this feeling grew stronger and stronger. There is actually a year where it started, and that's 2015, but it peaked in the summer of 2016, thanks to the European championship which took place in France. That tournament ended with France losing the final against Portugal, but that inspired me to research for the story of this sport I had just begun following (end of 2015). So I did. I am a perfectionist, so I wanted to dig as deep as possible into this mystery, the first of a long series of origin stories of inventions, sports and more, which, to be honest, were the main reason why I created this blog in the first place. So, I thought that the first one of these stories to share with you had to be the first I researched.

So, we will start from the very beginning and with the premise that, since the dawn of times, every civilisation having roamed Planet Earth has played games, and many of them involved a ball. There are evidences of ball games everywhere in the world, from Pre-Columbian America, where Mayans played the Tlachtli, the probable precursor of basketball, to Asia, and this is where our tale begins.

The civilisation is the Chinese one. The dynasty reigning is the Han. The century is the third B.C. The name of the game is Cuju. Born as a military training, this game, officially recognised by FIFA as the earliest form of the game, initially saw players trying to kick a feather-stuff ball into a goal made of two wood sticks planted on the ground. This game spread from the army to the royal courts and upper classes, always during the Han Dynasty, which lasted from 206 BC to 220 AD. Cuju evolved into something more complex where its popularity during the Tang Dynasty, and it started to resemble football even more. It became a team-oriented game and clubs started to be established, but its popularity exploded during the Song Dinasty (960-1279) and in the X century the first Cuju league was created, 800 years earlier than the British Football Association. Not bad. Eventually, cuju began to fade around the XVII century and soon disappeared.

In the same period cuju was being invented in China, in Europe the spiritual father of European football and rugby was being developed by the Greeks. Despite the image of the lone Greek athlete trying to reach for glory by himself, like a mythological hero, Greeks also played team-oriented games, and Episkyros was one of these. The teams of this violent game, especially in Sparta (where else?), were usually made up of 12-14 players. The field and the teams were divided into two by a line, and another line was behind them. The goal of the game was to push the ball to the other end of the field. This game incorporated, therefore, elements of both football and rugby, which actually were two sports of the same root at the time of their "inception" in XIX century England. But, according to some sources, even the atmosphere was similar back in Ancient Greece. One of these comes from the Egyptian writer Athenaeus of Naucratis' Deipnosophistae, which contains an excerpt dating from the IV century by Antiphanes, the famous comedy writer who describes a moment during an Episkyros game and the consequent reactions from the supporters, all written in a modern television commentary style:

"Once he took and passed the ball, he was enjoying that, while he was dodging an opponent and making another one of them fall on the ground. Then, he helped one of his team mates lift off the ground. All around were strong yells saying "out!", "long ball!", "high!", "low!", "short ball!", "shoot it back to the fray!"

Episkyros never was an Olympic sport in Ancient Greece, but, as you can read above, the agonism was all there, both from the athletes and the audience, unlike cuju, which was merely an exercise, a game. Sports and games always were a serious thing for the Greeks.

Once the Romans conquered Greece in 146 BC, one of the many things they "borrowed" from the Greeks was this game. Romans renamed it Harpastum and it is said that they introduced the rule which forbade to touch the ball with the hands. Plus, when Rome built the empire we all know, this game got immensely popular among the centurions defending the limes of the Roman Empire. This means that, while Greeks invented this game, Romans spread all over Europe (which means the British Isles, naturally).

Actually, the first mention of an unidentified ball game in Britain comes from the IX century AD. We cannot know whether it had anything to do with football, but probably this game was the Harpastum of some game deriving from it. What we know, though, is that the game which officially started it all came from... France.

In fact, if we want to find the actual origins of modern football we have to move to Northern France where, around the same time above mentioned, a new game developed and spread in Normandy and Picardy named Soule (or choule). This game was usually played after a religious function or during the holidays between two teams composed of people coming from two villages, usually close and rivals, but also between two different social statuses or situation (for instance, married men against bachelors et cetera). The game ended when one of the teams, composed of a potentially unlimited number, managed to push the ball with any means (besides the feet, sticks and hands were also allowed) towards the opponents' village, and then shot the ball into the portal of the local church, scoring de facto one gol. The ball disputed in a Soule game was made either of leather or animal bladders, filled with bran, hay, moss or horsehair. The field was of variable dimensions and could include ditches, streams, woods and wetlands, but the game started in the "midfield", which could be the border between the two churches (or "goals", in this case), the square of the village, a graveyard or even the castle of the local landlord.

As my description of this game may suggest, la Soule was a manly, violent game. While this was true, it was unexpectedly regulated and accompanied by an actual code of rules. Surely, it was much less violent than believed, since any type of violence towards the opponents was allowed. If today this sport is remembered as a barbaric, medieval game is surely thanks to the infamous, so called "remission letters", in which real court cases involving injuries and, some times, deaths, were evoked and told. When we actually think about the amount of players involved in a single game of this ancient sport, though, these sad cases were possible, as they are in every sport up to this day. Despite this, these letters helped give this game a bad, and equally unjustified, fame.

The first mention of the Soule in France dates back the year 1147, but it's almost sure that it was played in Northern France way before that date, since scholars are nowadays sure that this game was introduced in England by the Normans after William the Conqueror invaded the island in 1066. Moreover, this theory sounds incredibly plausible because the so-called "mob football", medieval English ball game from which modern football as we know it today descends, has no anterior mentions than 1174 on British soil, and, also, this mob football was characterized by almost identical features and rules than the French soule. However, I think it is right to specify that from the moment the soule was introduced in Britain, every development of the game that eventually led to the codification of modern football, the establishment of the Football Association in 1863 and the birth of the first football clubs (the first of which is Sheffield F.C.), all occured in the British Isles, even though soule kept being played, with discontinuity, on French soil at least until the XIX century.

A special mention goes to all the other subsequent ball games which were played throughout the history of Europe, from the Icelandic Knattleikr, first mentioned in XII century (but probably older) to the Italian Calcio Fiorentino from the Renaissance.

Finally, we can say that this long story tells us that we should never write or talk about history with the verb to be. Football, as in many other inventions and other things in history, is not English. This verb sounds like something definitive, an ended argument, as sure as death. As we can learn from this story, instead, history can surprise us with a lot of beautiful "maybes", "ifs", "actuallys", by showing us Ancient Chinese people kicking a ball, an Ancient Greek young man freestyling and medieval French people scoring goals by shooting balls inside churches, by playing a primitive form of the sport which eventually became the most popular one in our world.

[scripted-dalliances]

Rest In Peace: Chapter Seven

Title: Rest In Peace

Chapter: 7

Summary: A part of Faithless Fairy Tale, a more in depth look at how they brought Laura back to life. Appearance of old faces, creation of new ones and if you’re looking for canon, it left a long, long time ago. If you squint you might be able to see some pieces from the book.

“Have you ever been in love? Horrible isn't it? It makes you so vulnerable. It opens your chest and it opens up your heart and it means that someone can get inside you and mess you up." -Neil Gaiman

+

He hates her, he hates her, he fucking doesn't hate her at all and that’s a major fucking problem.

This repeats over and over again, driving him from her in attempt to soothe the beast in his chest. The furious feeling of his heart beating wildly and every inch of him vibrating with unwanted energy. Like he had been shot up with pure adrenaline, like he could start a fucking war and win it.

Like liquid golden luck has been poured into his veins.

Everything in him roars and heats, his cock is hard enough to cut fucking steel at this rate, and the pounding of his blood threatens to make him go deaf. He hasn't felt this rush in years. Possibly decades, and it burns him inside and out knowing that some how Laura Fucking Moon is the cause.

-because this shit is addictive.

“Fuck, fuck, FUCK!” He roars, slamming into the first empty bedroom he finds. Tearing off his clothes as he heads to the connected bathroom. Not even waiting to lose his boxers to jump in under the running shower head. Its cold as hell, but he doesn’t budge. Forces himself to stay under, intent on driving out all the warmth in his bones.

He can not get addicted to her. It's just not a fucking option.

It's one thing to fancy her, to make a deal with her and help bring her back to life.

He owes her that much.

Even the idea of her sticking to her end and giving him a bit of her hard earned faith is just a fancy. A bit of leftover desire from the old days, of Essie and her clan. A selfish, ego centered day dream. One where she goes off to live the life she wants and he can maybe get an ounce of who he was at the end of all this hell.

That's the reason he can't get addicted.

Laura needs him for now, and maybe she even believes in him enough for that to mean something but if there is one thing he knows all too well is that eventually belief will fade.

All it takes is time.

+

Laura allows Mad Sweeney his space. Despite the clawing need to recapture the odd feeling from before, or the deep unsettled tension developing in her the longer he is gone.

Death has made her clingy.

When she was alive, she enjoyed her space. Loved the days off when no one wanted anything from her and she was allowed to simply be. It would just be her, her cat and a good book, perhaps Shadow out to work or minding the backyard. Back then, she even enjoyed the silence.

Now, it grates on her nerves. Just as darkness reminds her of the grave, now being left alone in silence sends her back. Trapped and scared in a box, confused as hell.

She screamed at first, before realizing quickly that this far down under the earth no one could hear her.

It wasn't until she became enraged, and struck her fist upwards through the wood paneling that she discovered how strong she was. Even then it wasn't an easy climb, the soil was thick and wet, and six feet turns out to be a long way up when you can't fucking see or hear.

More than once, she choked on grave dirt.

After breaking free, it was a blur of rain and violence. Of tracking Shadow and quickly realizing, oh yeah, she was a walking fucking corpse with a missing arm.

She had lied, back when she told Sweeney she didn't have any shame. She did have shame, at least in that moment and that’s what made her turn away from Shadow. She hadn't wanted him to see what death had done to her.

Even now. In retrospect of everything, she finds herself ridiculous, the earlier shame replaced by indifference. Shadow was going to eventually see her, and her shitty sewing job wasn't going to change what he saw.

Fuck, not even the polished, professional look changed that fact.

Just remembering that night, when she had gone to him and posed on his dirty motel bed like a gift makes her insides curl with disgust for herself. She had gone all out. Nice dress, nice hair and gone the extra mile afterwards to warm herself up. Did she really think that would last?

Did she really think Shadow would touch her cold skin and want more?

She decides that at least some of her disgust belongs to the brothers of death, it was their words that had given her false hope. Small as it might have been, it fueled her enough to be brave and confront Shadow.

Any man will be grateful, they had said.

Only Shadow hadn't. He had been horrified.

Scared. Shocked. Hurt.

All well within his right, because she was the corpse of his cheating wife. Who died with his best friend’s dick in her mouth. Who had smelled like rot and lies, trying desperately to pretend she wasn't.

Maybe if she hadn't kissed him, things could have been different. She will at point blank refuse to admit Sweeney might have been right about that too. As far as she is concerned he is at max, allowed to be right once a day.

Any more than that and he would just be an insufferable prick.

+

The morning shifts to afternoon and Laura goes stir crazy trying to keep herself busy. First she cleans the kitchen (Sweeney had made a mess) and then she goes through the library, this time with a fine eye. Picking out all that she can find on Egyptian mythology. 

Truthfully, she just skims. The names are complicated in different tongues, none of which she can get her dead one around. Each entry is miles longs with histories that extend not just to Egypt but to Greek and Rome. Of the resurgences and connections to more modern ideals, basically making her unable to read more than a handful of paragraphs.

She was a shit student, okay?

Afterwards does her best to find something to wear, just because she's dead doesn't mean she likes wearing week old pants.

It was only by luck that Ostara's height and body shape was similar enough to her own that she could borrow an outfit or two. The goddess had offered earlier to help pick things out for her, but Laura worried that it would be extra frilly pink monsters. Like the kind her mother used to set out for her on Sunday mornings for church. All pastel colors with seas of lace and flowers, that only succeeded to wash her out. The kind she’d never be caught dead in. 

Which is why it’s worth a laugh at, since it’s exactly the kind she was buried in.

In the end, she doesn't find a lot that suits her tasted, just a pair of dark fitted jeans and a few plain colored t-shirts, that still have the tags on them. She slips on a deep blue one and looks down, it manages to just cover her open chest stitches.

Another thing she attempts to fix on her own.

This time goes a little better than the first, the angle not as awkward as her shoulder. It helps that Ostara's needles are thinner than Aubrey's, and the thread finer but Laura has never been gifted with sewing.

She was good with her hands in other ways, with the smooth flex of cards and coins. Needle work had always been beyond her, those were the skills of her mother and grandmother. She remembers watching them stitch flowers, cute little sayings and mermaids with shiny tails. They recreated famous art pieces, of medieval maidens begging for love and Greek heroes slaying monsters, every fairy tale she had ever heard had been stitched into neat little pillows. Every delicate detail perfectly etched by hand, needle and thread.

The stitches she makes now, don’t even come close. They are uneven and crooked, the dead skin she punctures the needle through bunches up and makes it look like the work of a child compared to the beautiful thick straight lines of the god of death's skilled work. Anubis would probably laugh at her attempt to copy his work at all.

Laura traces them both, and looks at herself in the mirror.

Shit, she is starting to look like a fucked up Raggedy Ann doll.

+

By six in the afternoon, Laura is done waiting.

Any longer and she is going to start foaming at the mouth. She has given him enough space to get over his weirdness, a lot more than she normally would.

Her search doesn't take long, her feet leading her to him in record time. She is only mildly surprised to find him passed out on a grand king sized bed with several empty bottles of booze. Only surprised in that he still has pants on and there is no sign of vomit on him.

For a second she almost decides to shove him off the bed or perhaps pull the sheets out from under him…but then she looks again and stops.

He is shining.

Not blinding like Shadow, who seemed to vanish under the furious glory and fire of a sun being born. This is altogether softer, his skin seems to shimmer and move. Soaking up the natural light of the setting sun peaking through the blinds. Making every inch of him glitter like gold.

She is touching him before she even realizes she has moved. Climbing into the bed carefully as she can, so not to wake him, she crawls forward on hands and knees. Until she is poised above him, staring down at his sleeping face.

The second her finger comes in contact with the skin of his cheek, she loses any grace to back out of this easily. Just one touch has her gasping, the same spark of lightning hits her again, just as strong as the last time. Maybe even harder because now she can chase it.

Laura's thumb strokes the surprisingly soft hair of his beard, followed by the rest of her fingers drifting down and giving into that long ignored urge of tracing his jaw line.

The longer she touches, the warmer she feels and it makes her nearly sick, the slow push of something white hot and slick being poured into her dry veins.

Like a balloon being filled to the brim, it hurts to feel the pressure building but the heat of it all only makes her ache for more.

Under her touch Sweeney sighs softly, still asleep but seeking her out until his head is resting against her palm and his whole body is radiating delicious warmth into her own.

An insane thought crosses her mind to curl herself around him, to just give in completely and hug him. Or kiss him, Sleeping Beauty style. And just like that, the slow push ache turns into a flood of actual desire. She would melt, wouldn't she?

But in a way that would feel amazing, a little voice inside her says.

The only thing stopping her is the fact she knows if she dares, and he wakes up, she will never hear the end of it. And then she might accidently-on-purpose murder him, and then what she will she do?

So she pulls back the touch, despite her bones screaming at her to not and not so gently shoves him -right off the bed.

“FUCK!”

“Wake up Sleeping Beauty. We have a road trip to start.”

>

[satashiiwrites]

Bradley the Damned, Ch 3

@quietborderline​ Brad finally enters our story…. 

 Title: Bradley the Damned

Fandom: Generation Kill

Pairings: Bradnate, RayWalt

Other tags: AU. Borrowed Egyptian myth and history. 

Fic Summary: 

Returning to England upon the death of the only father he’s ever known, Lord Nathaniel Fick has braced himself for a return to a society that he never really has felt a member of. He’d much rather be off on one of his Uncle’s archeological adventures than running the family business. 

Luckily, it seems that adventure has followed his Uncle to England.

Chapter Summary: 

Schwetje comes to breakfast. Both he and Nate are surprised by the outcome.

Read Chapter 3 here on AO3