#it gave us something so cinematic

[happycattail]

Orym had such an epic takedown of the Juggernaut. Three attacks, three superior dice to make it a pushing one. Action Surge and repeat. I was so invested when I watched.

But I want to take a look at it from a role play standpoint.

Orym is usually the protector, the one who will make himself the target with his goading attacks. Or to do bait and switch and put himself in between the enemy and his friends. He does attack too quite often actually but when he does it’s usually to try and be fast.

In this case, it was fast but it was also angry. He used all his superior dice just to keep trying to push the Juggernaut into the lava despite it already taking 6d8 damage.

Fearne was right there. Held captive, across the lava from him. But he was angry and he chose to fight instead of to protect like he usually did. You see that realization on his next turn when all he could do was run and yell out Fearne’s name.

He used everything to kill that Juggernaut. But it left him with nothing to save his best friend.

[ladysophiebeckett]

.

[hannieehaee]

18+ / mdi

content: loser!seungcheol, afab reader, smut, continuation of my previous two loser!cheol fics, mentions of fwb relationship, confession, penetrative sex, etc.

part 1, part 2, part 3

wc: 2017

a/n: im creating the loser cinematic universe

masterlist

"so, are you guys dating now?", jeonghan asked one day as a few of the other frat members hung around the kitchen after a rowdy night partying.

"oh, uh, i'm not sure," was seungcheol's response.

it was the truth.

after only a few weeks of knowing each other, – and you jumping his bones every time you saw him – seungcheol still had no idea what label he was supposed to use when referring to you.

you were quite sweet to him any time the two of you got down to unseemly activities, but you were yet to mention anything about being exclusive, much less about officially being his girlfriend.

still, when jeonghan asked, seungcheol felt slightly embarrassed answering.

he wanted to proudly claim you as his; to have his fellow frat brothers look at him in envy when he brought you around, knowing you had picked him out of everyone else; that despite having the reputation of being a loser and a smartass, he had scored the prettiest and sweetest girl on campus.

sadly, he could only daydream about such a thing. he fid not have the balls to actually ask you out, something that jeonghan apparently caught sight of when seungcheol gave him his answer.

"dude, just ask her out," he practically scolded, "she clearly likes you. just make the first move and tell her you wanna be official."

"it's not that easy," he grumbled.

except it was.

what seungcheol didn't seem to realize was that you and jeonghan weren't just mere acquaintances. you were actually friends, which meant that he was pretty well informed on the current status of your relationship. while seungcheol remained unaware of what you sought out of the relationship, jeonghan had been made privy of that information by you directly.

your current hope was for seungcheol to ask you out himself. you knew he was shy and introverted, – and entirely inexperienced when it came to relationships – but you wanted him to want you so bad that his want for you bypassed all those barriers. being asked to be official by the pretty nerd from your friend's frat house was something you simply felt was a must. refusing to make the first move, you waited for him to grow frustrated enough to snap and beg you to be his.

meanwhile, seungcheol was disheartened at the thought of you being so nonchalant about it all, believing that if you were really interested, you wouldve already asked him to be yours.

"girls like to feel wanted. all you have to do is ask her out to a movie or something. easy," shrugged jeonghan.

"easy for you to say. i've never done it before," complained seungcheol, deflated.

"when's the next time you're seeing each other?"

"she asked to come over tonight, why?"

"great," smirked jeonghan, "i have a plan."

~

even as socially inept and inexperienced as seungcheol was, he knew this was the cheesiest thing he could've possibly done.

however, jeonghan had been right about setting him up with you in the first place, even having orchestrated the perfect plan to do so in such a seamless way that it landed seungcheol the prettiest fuck buddy, so he decided to blindly trust jeonghan's expertise yet again.

and now he stood in his room, staring down at the bed covered in red rose petals as what jeonghan described to be 'baby-making music' played. the lights were dimmed and the entire aura was nothing short of suggestive.

after having confirmed for you to come over, – all while jeonghan dictated the text seungcheol was meant to send you – he prepared his room for 'a night of romance,' as jeonghan had called it. the plan was to welcome you in, somehow work his way into a confession, and then 'make love' to you (jeonghan's words, not seungcheol's). as much as cheol wanted to actually make love to you and make you officially his, his anxiety was through the roof. he had never had a girlfriend before. you were his first everything, and he was terrified of scaring you away by being too forward. maybe all you wanted was something casual – which would break his heart, but he'd respect it.

it was, however, too late to back down, as you were supposed to arrive within minutes. in fact, he could already hear the door being opened, accompanied by muffled speech, coming from the entrance of the frat.

upon hearing a quiet knock on his door, he went to open it, offering you a sheepish smile as you walked in and took in the sight.

you giggled in disbelief, "cheol, what's all this?"

"uh, i, uhm, i wanted to make tonight a little extra special, that's all."

— 'tell her you coward!', he could hear jeonghan's voice playing in the back of his head.

"yeah? that's all?", you asked, nearing him with a purpose.

"well, no, i- i actually wanted to ask you something."

"mhm?," you smiled, placing your hands on his shoulders.

he was visibly sweating by now, gulping after every sentence and his eyes fleeting from your own down to his shoes.

"just, uh, i wanted to, f-fuck- it's kinda difficult when you- when you do that," he stammered when your hands made their way to the back of his neck, playing softly with the hair there, drawing goosebumps in the process.

"it's okay, cheollie, just tell me. i can get a lot more distracting," you practically warned, not halting your soft touches and now invading all his personal space.

without even thinking of it, his hands had wrapped around your waist, a place that was now natural for him to hold, albeit always in a shy manner.

"y-yeah, okay, uh, i just- just wanted to know if you ... if you'd like to- to, uh, maybe go out sometime," he gulped and cringed at how not-smoothly it had gone over. he hadn't even asked you out how he meant to, how he had rehearsed with han.

"go out? but, cheollie, we already hang out so much. what do you mean by 'go out'?", you tilted your head in fake confusion, clearly acting obtuse on purpose to further mess with an already nervous seungcheol.

nevertheless, cheol was not planning on backing down. not even when you leaned in and began pressing hot kisses to the skin of his neck. not even when your tongue came out to lick at the splotches you'd begun leaving behind. and specially not when your teeth went up to softly nibble at his earlobe.

"b-be my girlfriend, fuck, please? i ...", he whined all at once, hands tightening into your hips.

seungcheol could not be blamed for being such a weak man, falling to your seduction so easily. you were always in control whenever it came to the bedroom. this was something seungcheol absolutely adored. maybe it made him feel weak and a little bit pathetic at times, but it sure made his dick insanely hard, just like at this same moment.

"yes, cheollie," you sighed with a smile as your lips remained attached to his skin, "i'll be your girlfriend, angel."

"y-you will?", he managed to let out a gasp when your hands joined in on the fun, reaching under his shirt and feeling up his chest and abdomen.

"of course, baby. like you so much ... just wanted you to ask me out first," you revealed between kisses on his neck, reaching to his cheek and then finally landing on his lips.

"mmm," he hummed against your lips, hands tightening around your waist as he instinctively pulled you into himself, "god, wanted to ask you out since the day we met."

"i know, cheollie," you giggled, "you're just a little shy, huh?"

"you just make me so nervous," he groaned, letting himself fall limp to your touches, molding to your body and letting you guide him to bed with zero complaints.

"me? but i like you so much," you stress the words as you undress him, with him numbly following along to all your wordless commands.

"like you more ..." he breathed out once he was completely undressed and your hands reached down to toy with his cock through his boxers, "l-like you so much, you have no idea ..."

"can't believe such a pretty boy likes me so much," you went back to his lips, pulling his head back by his hair in order to force his mouth open for your tongue to make an entrance. you breathed in his gasps, making love to his tongue with your own.

"y-you're pretty. so pretty, you- fuck, can't believe you even looked my way," he kept mirroring your compliments, feeling an innate need to let you know how much more into you he was than you could ever understand.

"yeah? let me show you how much i like you, then?" you smiled against his lips, whining at how he seemed unable to disconnect your lips, chasing after your own with a huff.

nodding feverishly, he helped you out of your clothes, groaning any time your hand would go back down to make contact with his cock, eventually pulling it out of his boxers.

"m gonna fuck you now, okay, baby? gonna fuck you just how you like," you promised once undressed, sitting on his lap as his breath accelerated.

he felt a cold sweat rush through his body at the thought of you sitting on him. he'd gotten the privilege of fucking you many times in the pas, but he was always unprepared for the feeling of your cunt wrapped around him. the sight of your nude body in front of him was already enough to make him lose the ability to think coherently.

"f-fuck, oh, fuck, thank you," he groaned when you finally sat down on him, eyes rolling back and fingers digging into your hips.

"cheollie ... fuck, always feel so good for me," you breathed, arching your back and wrapping your arms around his shoulders for support, "such a good boy ..."

the praise made his hips cant upwards, beginning to fuck into you with a complete lack of rhythm, yet still making you let out those high-pitched moans that always made him lose his mind.

"it's so fucking tight ... fuck, love it so much. l-like you so fucking much. so perfect for me ..."

"can't believe you're mine ... please tell me you're mine. please ..."

"need you every day. can't live without your cunt. fuck, you ruined me ..."

uncharacteristically, his words were endless, wanting to let you know how much he liked you and how badly he needed to have you day after day. he needed to make you feel as wanted as you always did him. after every single one of his confessions, you'd respond with a reciprocation, making him even more desperate for you.

"'m gonna cum for you, cheollie," you eventually whined, "cum with me , angel. please? show me how m-much you like me?"

how could he deny you when you played that card? when all he wanted was to give you anything your heart desired? he had no ability to resist you, always following your every request without question.

there was no need for him to hold back his orgasm, as he could practically cum on command if you so much as looked at him a certain way. he just liked you so fucking much, having no control of himself any time you touched him.

his hips accelerated when your orgasm hit you, pistoning into you at punishing speed due to the way your cunt wrapped around him all of the sudden. despite already being used to your cunt, he could not resist its warm embrace any time your orgasm would rob you of your senses. predictably, his own orgasm followed yours almost immediately.

"t-thank you. fuck, thank you. like you so much, fuck. baby, l-like you so fucking much," there was a mantra of thank you's and confessions through the entirety of his orgasm, sounding entirely too pathetic but not caring for it as he expressed his truth for you.

"such a good boy, cheollie," you whispered into his ear once both your orgasms subsided. your hands played softly with his hair, pressing him against your skin in a comforting manner.

seungcheol could die happily in this moment. how could things be better than now? he had the prettiest girl holding him in her arms after the best orgasm of his life, having found out that his feelings were mutual. no more words were needed as the two of you softly loved on one another, eventually laying in bed and napping together, only to wake back up again and express the same sentiments over and over again.

[therealdisneyfan2319]

Early Morning Rain | Wanda Maximoff

A Stripper MILF Wanda Cinematic Universe Story

Summary: An early rainy morning with Wanda

Pairing: Wanda Maximoff x Male Reader

Warnings: Smut (18+, MINORS DNI), language

Word Count: 2.5K

Masterlist

Rainy weekend mornings have always held a special place in your heart.  You weren’t sure if it was the allure of spending all day snuggled under the covers or the way the world seemed to stand still under a blanket of grey, but these kinds of days were some of your favorites to wake up to.  This gloomy Sunday was no different except for one minor difference: Wanda Maximoff was in bed next to you.

Wanda was still asleep, the blankest covering her rising and falling as she breathed deeply in the early morning hours.  Her fiery red hair spread over the pillow and cascaded down toward you.

You leaned forward as you brushed Wanda’s hair away from your neck, softly planting a kiss on the porcelain skin that was left exposed.  She remained motionless as your lips lingered above the spot you only just kissed.  Smiling, you gently kissed the same spot again and again.  Wanda sighed deeply as your kisses intensified.  You felt her body stiffen as she stretched her limbs, ever so slowly waking from her slumber.

“Watimeizit?” Wanda mumbled, rubbing her eyes.

“What was that?” you mumbled against the crook of her neck.

“What time is it?” she yawned.

“Early.”

“The boys up?”

“It’s too early for that.”  You wrapped your arm around her waist, pulling yourself into her.  “Far too early.”

“Is it?” 

Her hand teased up your arm.  Slowly.  Gently.  Her fingers brushed over yours, sending a shiver up your spine.  A rush of heat began to wash over you.  You remembered the countless other times you found yourself in this exact situation with Wanda.  You remembered the way your head nestled in the crook of her neck as you relished the afterglow, the quiet gasps as the two of you struggled to stay quiet, the feeling of her hand resting against your stomach as she begged for your release.

“They won’t hear us,” you whispered.  The heat flowed downward, reaching your core.  Wanda’s backside grinded into your pelvis.  Each breath you took felt like it could be your last with the way anticipation bubbled up inside of you.  It was almost painful.  Excruciating.  The wait was killing you.  The thought of being with Wanda nearly drove you to the point of madness no matter how many times you two were together.

As Wanda leaned back to look at you, her eyes ever so enchanting, you finally gave into temptation and kissed her.  A feeling of ecstasy blossomed inside you as your lips touched.  The scent of her vanilla shampoo instantly overwhelmed your senses.  Wanda’s lips were soft and warm, their silky essence captured between your own.  You were tentative at first.  Not wanting to overwhelm yourself with all of Wanda first thing in the morning was a task in and of itself.  She was intoxicating, and the slower and gentler you kissed her the more you found yourself wanting to drown in her.  

Gently, you rolled yourself on top of Wanda, your hand sliding from her midsection up to lightly grasp her cheek as you locked her top lip between yours.  You felt her swallow a soft moan as you bit down on her lip.  Wanda’s arms wrapped around your back as you nestled your legs between hers.  The distance between the two of you lessened, only made completely impossible by the tent of your pajama pants between her legs.  

An involuntary gasp left your lips at the familiar feeling of Wanda’s fingertips tracing down your spine. It filled you with an excruciating desire that only she could quell.

“I like it when you’re like this,” Wanda giggled between kisses.

“Like what?” you teased.  “On top of you?”

“That’s just a bonus.”

“So what do you like then?”

“When you can’t hide how badly you need me.”

Bright red heat flushed over your cheeks.  Wanda embarrassed you and yet simultaneously filled you with even more desire.  There was something about the way she admitted to finding your desire attractive that made her even more desirable.

“What gave it away?”  An not-too-unfamiliar feeling of anxiety caught in your throat as you gazed down into her eyes.  She was so beautiful, something you reminded her of every single day while she felt the years wear on her.  “Is it that obvious?” you asked, rolling your hips ever so slightly into hers.  Wanda groaned at the feeling of your erection grinding into her pelvis.

“I’d say so,” she whispered, kissing you softly as she brought one hand up to cup your cheek and the other down to rest on your hip as you laid atop her.  You stared at one another as your breaths grew erratic, tinged with want and desire.  

“I love you,” you breathed against her lips. “I love you so much.”  You crashed your lips into hers.  There was nothing holding you back from craving each and every inch of her.  

Your kisses became frantic and hungry as your hands explored every inch of each other’s bodies.  You couldn’t help but grin into the kiss as Wanda’s hands tangled in your hair, tugging your soft locks in a way that sent bursts of electricity through each and every nerve in your body.  Wanda gasped at the sensation of your smile against her lips.  Her eyes fluttered open, gazing at you adoringly as she toyed with your hair.  

“Take your shirt off.”

“Are you asking or are you telling?”

“Take your shirt.  Off.”  

You sat up, reaching behind you to pull your shirt up as Wanda helped lift the hem.  She rested her hands on your stomach as you threw the shirt on to the floor behind you, rubbing them ever so slightly up and down.  The closer she got to the waistband of your pants, the more intensely you felt your erection throb against the confines of the fabric.  

“Wanda-”

“Take my shirt off.”

“Are you asking or are you telling?”

“I want you to take my shirt off.”

“Yes ma’am,” you gulped.

Wanda sat up ever so slightly, giving you access to the bottom of her shirt as you pulled it up, exposing her toned midsection and her breasts as she raised her arms up.  You threw the shirt behind you with yours.  Sitting there, on top of her, you gently grabbed her waist and rested your head against hers.

“Why am I so nervous right now?” you whispered.  

“I don’t know.”  You felt Wanda’s laugh against your face.  “First time?” 

“I don’t think so.”

“Been a while?”

“Only if you count two days ago as a while.”

“You love me so much that even the thought of me still makes you nervous?”

“Most likely.”

“Don’t be nervous,” Wanda whispered.  Her hands found their way to your pants, her fingers slinking inside the waistband.  “This is the fun part.”

“Take them off.  Please.”

“Are you asking or are you telling?” “Wanda…”  She snickered as she tugged on the waistband.  You sat up on your knees, allowing her tug pull them down your thighs before you awkwardly kicked them off and on to the floor.  Not wanting to waste much more time, Wanda kicked off her shorts, too.

“Thought I’d save you the effort.”

“How considerate,” you joked.  Wanda had already laid back down on the bed.  Anticipation thrummed in your chest as you laid back down on top of her.  Her hands found your hair again, one of her favorite places, as she looked back up at you adoringly.

“I only do it because I love you.”

You smiled, placing a chaste kiss on her lips as you reached for your cock.  You rubbed your tip between Wanda’s lips.  Her slickness coated you as you teased her most sensitive spot.  Her wetness was audible.  It echoed off the walls.  Quiet.  Loud.  Too much.  Not enough.  God you needed her.  She moaned as you grinded against her clit, stimulating the both of you.  It felt so good, you couldn’t help but keep going.  You wanted to watch her writhe in ecstasy as you touched her in all the right ways over and over and over.  Wanda’s arousal mixed with your own as you held yourself back from making a mess of yourself too soon.

“I love how good that feels,” Wanda moaned, her words chopped as she gasped for air.  “I need you inside me, baby.”

It took the slightest touch to lower yourself down from her clit into Wanda herself.  You groaned loudly, the feeling of fire setting your entire body ablaze.  The pounding in your chest made it hard to breathe, hard to see, hard to think straight, and your forearms burned as you feebly attempted to hold yourself up.

“Oh god,” you whispered, eyes screwed shut in sheer pleasure.  Wanda tugged gently on your hair.  It was her way of reminding you that she was still there.  This was real, this was now, this was happening.

“You’re okay.  You’re okay, sweetheart.”  Her thumb found your cheek, caressing it gently.  “Take your time.  We’ve got all the time in the world.”

Slowly, you rolled your hips into hers, thrusting your length deeper inside her.  In and out, in and out, in and out.  Breaths mixed with moans and gasps, the soft slap of sweat-gleaned skin against skin, the gentle creak of the bed as your weight shifted back and forth all engulfed the two of you as the rain gently splattered against the windows.  

“You don’t seem nervous anymore,” Wanda joked as you continued to fill her entirely.

“I’m not.”

“Then pick up the pace.”

“I thought you said we had all the time in the world.”

“We do,” she replied, half-gasping for breath as she brushed a damp strand of hair out of her face.  “I just want you to go faster.”

“Do you now?” You questioned, rolling your hips only slightly faster.

“Mmhmm.”

“How’s that?”

“Faster.”

“You want me to go faster?”

“God yes.  Please.  Please.  I need you so bad.”  You obliged, not wanting to disappoint as you quickened your pace further.  “Just like that.”

“Is that good?”   

“Fuck,” Wanda moaned.  She squeezed around you, her walls stimulating your entire length.   The bed creaked louder, shaking as you filled Wanda again and again, pulling out halfway before slamming back into her.

The intensity of your movement exhausted you, causing your arms to absolutely give out after a few minutes.  Wanda pulled you close as you collapsed on top of her.  The crook of her neck became your pillow as you nestled your head there.  In and out, in and out.  The familiar coil of release started burning deep in your core.  It was all you could do to kiss and lick and suck her neck as her whines and whimpers got progressively louder the closer she drew to her own release.  

“Wanda,” you murmured against her neck.

“I need you.  I need all of you right now.”

Whatever entity controlled the universe took pity on you in that moment as you found the strength to push yourself up.  Your forehead met hers as every ounce of energy left in your body focused on the release that was dangerously close.

“I’m right here,” you panted.  

“I need you so bad.”

“I’m close,” you groaned.

“Please,” she whined.  “Please, I want you to-”

The coil inside you finally snapped.  You exploded inside her, filling her with burst after burst of your cum.  Waves of pleasure washed over your body.  Involuntary moans erupted from your mouth as your arms gave out from a combination of pleasure and exhaustion.  You crashed on top of Wanda as your hips abruptly snapped into her one, two, three more times.  On your final sharp thrust, Wanda came undone.  

“Oh god!” Wanda’s breathless high pitched scream brought a smile to your lips.  Her walls squeezed you in a jarring rhythmic pattern milking every last drop from you.  She gasped and groaned again and again as wave after wave of pleasure coursed through her body.

The damp scent of sweat and sex hung in the air as you both gasped for air, sweaty limbs entwined while you remained joined as one.  While you weren’t one for such mushy, romantic thoughts, the idea of being inside Wanda, of being so intimately and vulnerably connected, filled you with a surge of love for the woman who brought so much joy and meaning into your life.

“Hey,” you whispered, your nose lightly brushing hers.  Wanda’s eyes were still screwed shut.  Her hair was plastered to her forehead with beads of sweat, her cheeks flushed with the afterglow of her orgasm.

“Hi,” she whispered back as her eyes unscrewed, though they remained shut.

“You okay?”

“Mmhmm.”

“Can I pull out?”

“Mm-mm.  I like the way you feel.”

“Okay,” you chuckled before kissing the corner of her lip.  “We’ve got all the time in the world.”

“You don’t hear the boys, do you?  They’re still asleep?”

“It’s 7 am, Wanda.  We’ve still got a few hours if you want to go for round two.”

“I don’t think I can.  I’m not as young as you, remember?  You forget that sometimes.”

“Doesn’t bother me,” you shrugged, trailing your fingers up and down her side as you laid on her.

“I know,” she replied in a small voice.  Wanda gazed up at you with those adoring emerald eyes that made you fall more madly in love with every time you looked at them.  

The two of you stayed in the silence for a while, staring into the depths of each other’s soul.  There was something incredibly comforting about the familiarity of each other and the love that needed no words to fill the space.   

“Do you want some coffee?” you asked after a long while.  Wanda nodded sleepily.  “Okay.”  Groaning, you pushed yourself up off her still-flushed body and pulled your now-soft cock out from inside her.  A thick strand of white gushed out of her and dribbled onto the damp sheets.

“Fuck,” she groaned.  “I love feeling your cum inside me.”

“Watching it come out of you like that was pretty hot,” you sheepishly admitted.

“Yeah?”

“Yeah.”

“You know what I think?” “What?”

“I think.” Wanda teased, reaching toward your soft cock that was once again beginning to twitch with desire.  “I think I want you to cum inside me again.”

“What happened to being too old for another go?” you joked.

“You have a bad habit of making me feel young again.  Besides,” she added breathlessly, “I desperately need you to fill me up again, and I need you to tell me how good I feel as it happens.”

You groaned at the feeling of Wanda’s hand closing around your cock.  It would be a long while until that coffee, and it was the most sincere hope that what you were about to do to Wanda wouldn’t wake the boys. 

[livelaughlovesubs]

Hii can I request teaching Bram how to ride you after he just got his body back after so many centuries?

Heyyy, Ofc you can! I love riding sm- also sorry for taking so long (also I kinda made it romantic for no reason sorry)😭

Dom!reader x sub!bram

Warning: the beginning is fluff only - aka romance (kinda meh I’m sorry), nsfw under the cut, pegging (I use dick), riding, fingering, praise kink, soulmates (?)

It was like a miracle that you found him, as if destiny desperately wanted to play a prank.

You were going on a walk, aimlessly wandering around with no special purpose. Life has been treating you well, though you have been feeling an unexplainable yearning for a long time now. As if a part of you was missing, something very dear and important to you, enough to leave you with a sense of emptiness. Every single day you’ve been doing this, walking along the shore of Yokohama. It was almost laughable how much you trusted your guts, on some days you’d feel pretty pathetic because of it but you’d still do it anyway.

Not even you could explain why, you only followed instincts.

That was until today, until this moment where you finally understood what your purpose in life was. There he was, standing amidst the sand in front of the setting sun. The vibrant colours of the dusk blending into a skilfully created masterpiece. The horizon was hanging low, making it possible to see far into the distance. A black shadow stood out, all alone, quietly, gazing into the far ocean while the waves splashed against the beach.

It wasn’t rare for people to take a stroll around here, especially during such a cinematic time and period. Though never have you ever been so mesmerised by such encounters. Something about that person was different, once again your guts told you so. When you got closer to the figure, you noticed his long silver hair fluttering in the breeze, along with his coat. You were still contemplating on how to approach him, when to your dismay the person turned around and looked you straight into the eyes. For a moment, it was as if your soul escaped your body.

As if your heart stopped beating, your lungs failed to function, the shock and uniqueness of this meeting causing you to hold your breath. He was just so beautiful.

With newfound determination, you walked up to him and introduced yourself, apologising for being sudden. His eyes were a wine red, a bright yet most elegant shade of crimson you’ve ever seen. The expression he wore was nothing special, even so it still touched your heart like nothing words alone could describe. It was weird, you didn’t believe in love at first sight, but maybe he was worth believing in. When he heard your name, his eyes widened and his pupils shook, lips slightly parted as if to showcase his sharp fangs. “You..” That person began, then stopped themselves. He bawled his hands into fists while his cheeks reddened. You noticed how his breathing became ragged, and you were almost worried about him before he continued with, “I’m glad to see you are back.”

“I see you really don’t remember.. well, my name is Bram, Bram Stoker.” It would be an understatement to say you weren’t surprised by his words. On one hand his name seemed so familiar, it gave you Deja vu, yet on the other hand you couldn’t remember. Apparently this man was a vampire, who only recently reclaimed his human body. A vampire who lived hundreds of years, who was your fated lover in a previous century. This was hard to believe, even for someone like him who was mystical in every way possible. To think his mortal lover would get reincarnated and meet him in another life time, waiting for him to return like this.

As soon as you met him, learned his name, the hole inside your heart vanished. Dissipating like the fog on a dreamy morning. Destiny was truly unpredictable, it brought forth surprises no one could be prepared for. This made you curious, also a little awkward. He was your lover in another life, would it be appropriate to repeat the same process in this one as well? And, you wanted to know how your previous self was like. The two of you sat down on a bench in a park near the strand, facing the warm blanket that covered the sky while it slowly sank into cold tones. He told you storied from the good ol’ times, answered your every question with patience as he looked at you with the same yearning he described to have had decades ago.

What was there not to love about him? It seems like the previous you adored him for the exact same reasons. When the question of intimacy popped up, it appeared to make the male to falter. He took a moment to remember the times you two would do the deed, and his face immediately flushed red. That only made you even more curious, what did you do to make him all flustered like this? At first he was reluctant to tell you, due to his own embarrassment, then he remembered how you and his other love are basically the same person. In the end, he succumbed to your stubbornness to know.

“You’d do… well, this and that.. and make me, er, do that and what not..” Great. You understood everything. “Moving on, if we went that far, did we kiss?” Once again his face heat up, but this question didn’t embarrass him to the point he couldn’t answer. “Yea, you.. kissed me a lot. Awfully often.” Hah, sounds just like you. “Is that so? Then, please pardon me.” You said in a quiet tone, gently tugging his hair behind his long ears before kissing his lips. Despite him getting caught off guard, he didn’t pull away, instead he returned the kiss. Closing his eyes as he reminded himself of how much he missed this feeling.

It seems the partner fate decided for you wasn’t talented in explaining, or at least not in these matters. Since he didn’t expose many details except the fact that you made him do this and that, you had to take a guess yourself. In the end, you invited him over to your home near the beach, deciding to find out whether or not you two were compatible in bed. You lied down on the soft mattress, ordering him to come closer and climb on top of you. Then you asked, “did the other me also made you do this?” He nodded, looking away in shame. How cute.

You grabbed the bottle of lube and squeezed its content onto your length, noticing how he was staring at you with shrinking pupils. “You can take this, right?” He didn’t reply, he only bit his own bottom lip. Since he haven’t answered you yet, you didn’t continue, staring up at him and waiting for him to respond. “I was never… actively on top. I-… what should I do?” Bram eventually admit, his eyes were half lidded, to the point only a thin line could be seen. “It’s alright, I’ll teach you.” You chuckled, before holding his slim waist and making him hover above your pelvis. “Ah..” he gasped as electricity coursed through his body, his breathing was becoming more shallow with each passing second.

“First, you have to prepare yourself.. may I be so bold as to claim you have never done this with anyone but me?” It wasn’t a bold claim, it was the truth. The vampire nodded, still lingering over you with a slightly arched back. “Then use your hand and stick a finger inside yourself, but don’t rush it, alright?” You whispered into his ear, then you grabbed his wrist to squeeze some lubricant onto his fingers. “Use this, it will the easier that way.” Bram tried to follow your orders, clumsily inserting his middle finger inside his hole. His rim tensed first, then loosened up, permitting him entrance. “Hnng- hah, is this.. right?” He asked you, looking for guidance. “Yea, just like that. Once you feel ready, do the same with a second finger before scissoring them.”

My.. how humiliating. Now the prince of the dead was spreading himself open in front of some mortal, putting on a degenerate display only for your amusement. The worst was it felt good. He bit down some more onto his lips, to the point blood was running down his chin. You leaned closer to him and clasped your hand over his, then sticked one of your fingers inside him along with his. “Ah- you..! What are yo-you, hmNn.!!” Damn it, you were still a tease just like before. Out of nowhere you also licked the trail of blood away, savouring every drop and licking your lips afterwards. Who was the vampire now, huh?

“HgNn…ah, haah.. is this enough?” Bram was already panting like crazy, feeling his body shudder uncontrollably. You pulled your hand away, feeling the sticky liquid stick to your fingers like gum. He had a dazzled look on his face, almost as if he was melting due to the pleasure. The way you handled him was just like your previous incarnation, even the way you tackled all of his weak spots as if you still knew them. “Hmm, you tell me, do you feel ready enough to take me?” Once again he couldn’t answer you, only glaring at you as he slowly sank down onto your dick. He took his precious time doing so, gently going down at you. Everything was going smoothly until he took half of you in.

You couldn’t even ask him before he complained, “it.. it’s too big.. hahh, I can’t ta-take more….” Ah, he was so adorable. “It’s alright, take your time dear, I won’t rush you, I’ve been waiting for you all this time after all.” He nodded while clenching his eyes shut, focusing sorely on the feeling of you stretching his insides. Fuuuuuck…. It was too overwhelming, too good. After not being active for so long, he was like a virgin again. “I.. I really can’t, it’s so de-deep..! Uh-unghh.” All you did in response to his whines was draw circles on his sides with your thumbs, as well as whispering sweet praises into his ears. Sweet words of encouragement reached him, as in, “Don’t worry you are doing so well, it’s alright, I’m here.”

Eventually he managed to take all of you in, at the expense of his rationality. Not a single logical thought plagued his mind, all he could think about was the bliss spreading to every fever of his nerves. When he sat down on top of you completely, he couldn’t fathom it at first. By that time tears were dripping down his face while inaudible sobs left his mouth. “Good job, Bram, so good for me. Now, grind your hips this way.. right, just like that.. and slowly move up and down. Heh, that’s my good boy.” While you gave him instructions on how to move his body your hands also gently showed him the way. They were still around his waist, nudging him into the right directions.

He shook his hips so erotically, it send a shiver down your spine. Before long he was jumping up and down your cock while your hands forced him to move rougher, your own body snapping against his to trust into him harder. “UghNnnhh.!! Ha-hahhhh! Oh, it’s.. go-good, so UhmM!” Bram gasped and groaned, losing himself to the ecstasy as he exposed more and more of his hidden desires to you. And you were enjoying yourself room of course. You were feeding on his pleasure, loving every single moment. He really was your destined partner, your fated other half.

It seems destiny wasn’t playing a prank on you, rather, it was using you to write an unforgettable love story.

[welcome-to-green-hills]

The Cinematic World of Sonic the Hedgehog!

Recently, Paste hosted an interview with Knuckles producer Toby Ascher about the mini series premiering in April and Sonic 3. Down below are some of the highlights from the interview with the online magazine:

The Knuckles series will focus on our favorite echidna warrior finding a new purpose in the world. He embarks on a personal self-growth journey with “hot mess” Wade Whipple to teach him some discipline/Echidna warrior training.

The mini-series is treated more as a character study. It focuses more on the growth of the characters and who they are.

Toby Ascher explains that there are some “bigger things” that the crew wants to do with SCU.

The “fish-out-of-water comedy” that came from Knuckles at the end of Sonic 2 is what inspired the series.

The series is meant to follow the same tone and direction of the movies in order to tie in with events for Sonic 3.

Character models have been refined and tweaked along the way in order to match the pace of storytelling. As time passes through the films (whether it’s months or years), we see the models of Sonic, Tails, Knuckles and more “grow up.”

Extensive character references have been made of Sonic, Tails, and Knuckles in determining how each one emotes depending on situations. Character study is key here.

There are roughly 1,600 model shots compared to Sonic 1, which had a little over 300.

Toby Ascher explains that if the Knuckles series is successful, then there is potential for more stories/mini-series with other characters. He also explains that the story will be carefully crafted with a purpose to serve the character(s) rather than to make something for the sake of making something.

If the series and the third film are successful in general, then expansion will continue in SCU.

To quote Toby Ascher, “We knew that, with Shadow coming into Sonic 3 and some of the bigger things that we want to do, the Sonic franchise on the movie side is going to be these Avengers-level events. They’re going to be these big, exciting stories that have a lot of different characters. And so what television did for us is it gave us time to go into some of the more supporting characters in depth and really build them out in cool ways.”

[vashtijoy]

So the conversation you can have with Futaba in the attic after the interrogation room has always bothered me, she says something along the lines of "You weren't the only one risking your life, y'know? Everyone else was in danger too."

Which... Is a weird thing to say to your best friend/brother figure after he risked getting shot in the head and beaten to a pulp underneath the police station. It just comes off as creating a problem that didn't exist...

Nobody thought the other thieves weren't in danger, No one said that they didn't have it rough.

Just seems like an out of pocket thing to say in that situation. Which makes me wonder if it was yet another translation boo-boo. I don't know for sure, I'm going to keep looking into how I could translate it.

Does this stick out as weird to you? Or is it just me?

Hi, anon, thanks for your question! The immediate answer is that Futaba qualifies that statement a little in Japanese:

Futaba わたしも、みんなも、こう見えて 、わりと体張ってたんだぜ。 watashi mo, minna mo, kou miete, wari to karada hatteta n da ze It may not have looked like it, but everyone else was risking their lives too. [lit. I and the others, despite how it looks, were risking our lives a bit too.]

(Incidentally, note her ze there—a very masculine particle which Futaba is fond of, which goes well with her rather rough and ad hoc speech.)

That wari to means "relatively"; "kind of", or "sort of". "We were all in a bit of a pickle too." As she goes on to emphasise, while Ren was in the most danger, everyone else was in some danger:

Futaba ま、命賭けでホントの逮捕までされた{F1 82}が一番がんばったのは、間違いないけどさ。 ma, inochi kake de honto no taiho made sareta <Ren> ga ichiban ganbatta no wa, machigai nai kedo sa Though there's no doubt you were the most at risk. I mean, you actually got arrested. [lit. but you, Ren, who bet your life and went so far as to get arrested for real, did the most, there's no doubt about that.]

Somewhere along the line Futaba's "you gambled with your life and even got arrested in real life!" has turned into the rather understated "you actually got arrested"—which again contributes to her seeming to understate what Ren endured. Her "you did the most" is 頑張る ganbaru, a word most anime types know very well—it means to give it your all, to keep at it, to persist, to be tenacious; to fight against all odds. "You gave it everything, you bet your life, you got arrested!"

Don't forget that, while Futaba is ICly speaking to Ren, she's also performing exposition here. We, the audience, are the ones who should not forget that all the PTs were in danger. It's a bit clumsy, but what can you do.

I do think this exchange of Futaba's has to be taken together with the immediate followup section, which is all about what the PTs had to do—the events of the 11/20 cinematic, after Ren's arrest:

Futaba: Well, since the rest of us didn't get captured, we had to act. Futaba: We had to pretend we never wanted you to get arrested… Pretend the suicide news was a real shock… Futaba: Basically, we had to act like we didn't know anything, 24/7.

acting vs acting

I'm going to highlight the first line of this one, since it contains an error:

(Doesn't she look pleased, all of a sudden? It doesn't quite match the tone of the English—but goes very well with her pride over their little one-act play.)

Futaba 捕まらなかったわたしらの、一番のシゴトは『芝居』だ。 tsukamaranakatta watashira no, ichiban no shigoto wa "shibai" da Well, since the rest of us didn't get captured, we had to act. [lit. the main task of the rest of us, who were not arrested, was "acting".]

Do you see the confusion? The localisation has Futaba say, "we had to act"—that is, in English, "we had to do something". But the intention of the line is "we had to act our parts"—that is, they had to put on a play or a drama! They had to engage in the craft of acting!

This exact error crops up in at least one other place, with Akechi in Shido's Palace:

Akechi 学業に励み、優等生を演じ、正義の名探偵として、名を上げた。 gakugyou ni hagemi, yuutousei o enji, seigi no meitantei toshite, na o ageta I devoted myself to my studies, acted as an honor student, and made my name as an ace detective. [lit. I devoted myself to my studies, played the part of an honor student, and made my name as an ace detective of justice.]

See the error? The Japanese words are different, but the translator, again, didn't know how the verb "to act" works in speech. So Akechi just sounds like he's saying "I acted like an honor student"—his emphasis that this was a performance is lost.

Lastly, there's no doubt the other PTs were in genuine danger. Witness Shido's order to take the rest of them out next, earlier on 11/21—which Akechi evades:

revision history

Click here for the latest version.

v1.0 (2024/11/03)—first posted.

[fadyelj]

All Summers End In Beirut

That summer in Beirut was never meant to be a journey inward; it was a time to shed the tension that had been building for years, a silent rage caged behind words, waiting for release. If I hadn’t confined it to words alone, that rage might have carved valleys out of stone. Instead, Beirut had to become the channel, blurring into nights spent chain-smoking in dimly lit pubs, romances that ended at dawn, and goodbyes that lived only on social media — Adieu, my dearest Beirut, though Beirut would know better.

I didn’t come here to romanticize the city or to make sense of my past. Beirut was simply the stage for a deliberate escape, a place to lose myself, not to find myself. Depth? I didn’t want it. Self-discovery? Even less. 

You go to Paris to find yourself, not Beirut.

They say romantics run from reality, but I think the opposite can be true. Sometimes, it’s the realists who are drawn to it, clinging to the poetry of a place like Beirut, knowing full well the inevitable heartbreak. Still, they chase it, how can they live knowing that the greatest art has always been born from the agony of others.

They say romantics run from reality, but I think the opposite can be true. Sometimes, it’s the realists who are drawn to it, clinging to the poetry of a place like Beirut, knowing full well the inevitable heartbreak. Still, they chase it, how can they live knowing that the greatest art has always been born from the agony of others.

Most who know me now might think I loved Lebanon from the very start, that my attachment was unshakeable, rooted in my childhood. And yes, I loved it — loved the version my father painted in late-night stories, those poetic tales he’d spin after slipping me a few bills for my Arabic lessons. My American-born Lebanese mother would look on, quiet but approving, as if to remind me that the language, the culture, was theirs, and that I was the inheritor of this beautiful burden. I memorized Ana esme Fady, w ana mn el Lebnan before anything else, words embedded as deeply in my identity as my own name.

My childhood was grown around Lebanon , a world away, yet vivid, woven from stories passed down like folklore. For years, my father’s tales could hold a magic of their own, sketching a distant land in colors bright and cinematic . But as soon as I began to think critically, that magic wore thin. I dug deeper, searching for something beyond his poetic recollections — and, yes, I found it. I just didn’t like what I saw. The stories, once so full of promise, started to feel threadbare, unable to hold up to the truth I’d uncovered. Resentment crept in. I felt the weight of belonging to a place I’d barely touched, a version of Lebanon that felt faded, passed down like an old newspaper, each retelling dulling its colors.

My father never wanted us to inherit his hate for the ugly parts of Lebanon. But the more I learned, the more I felt its grip on me. My God, as I fell down the rabbit hole of history and politics, the anger took root. I hated it. I hated my people. How could they turn heaven into hell? What gave them the right? I was only a child, but even as an adult, I still can’t find the answers. The unfairness of it all punctured me — the idea of a “home” drilled into my mind, yet always out of reach. Baba’s explanations never quite satisfied me. How could they do what they did? This new idea of Lebanon felt like a burden I hadn’t asked for, a heritage as heavy as it was distant. My anger grew as fierce as my love once was, aimed at my parents for planting this identity inside me, one that felt both too far away to reach and yet too close to escape.

When you’re a child born to the diaspora, there’s a harsh awakening. The stories you once loved take on shadows, and you begin to see yourself as part of a fractured history. A life in the diaspora is unforgiving, forcing you to carry a culture defined by survival and loss, a homeland that calls to you just as it keeps you at arm’s length. And yet, you’re expected to honor it, to love it. But where the hell was it for me all these years?

In those years of resentment, I lost myself in what you might call the most “American” ways possible — masking everything behind a polished exterior, where emotions were kept in check, and vulnerability was a distant concept. I crafted a composed, respectful façade, presenting a calm demeanor to the world while slipping in and out of identities like costumes, each one leaving its mark until the reflection in the mirror became unrecognizable. Certain truths I’ve kept buried, tucked away, left unspoken for the sake of the moshtamaa and a culture that expects us to live in quiet service to its ideals. Those years were a season of cold, each step pulling me further from warmth, further from a true self I could barely reach. Even today, I find myself still living in service to the moshtamaa. If I weren’t, wouldn’t I be writing freely?

But the moshtamaa wins, as it always does, leaving two choices: pretend and save face, or die by its sword. So, I’ve learned to play the game we all know too well, the one practiced behind closed doors. I walk the line between what’s true and what’s accepted, balancing carefully, learning to give just enough to satisfy but not enough to betray what lies beneath.

Today, though, I’m grateful to have found warmth again, in places I least expected, maybe even in Beirut itself. If this story is about anything, it’s about laying the bricks for a return that would come later — a return built on facing myself under a different sun, through eyes altered by time and distance, in a city that doesn’t promise forgiveness but offers, perhaps, the faint hope of reconciliation.

I’ve always considered myself a pessimist — or at least I was. Now, I’m less certain. Do you believe in naseeb? In the idea that everything is maktoub? Most days, I do. When the world throws me down, leaving me to stare at the pieces of something I thought I’d built, it’s almost comforting to believe this was fate, set out by some higher power. It’s a rational way to face my failures, a way to soften the edges of my shortcomings — and my friends, there have been many.

But then, there are other days, those rare days when my focus sharpens or when I’m medicated enough to believe fully in my own power. On those days, I don’t believe in naseeb. In those moments, it’s up to me to seize the world, to mold it, to make it my own. I’ve tasted the highest highs and endured the lowest lows, and somewhere between them, naseeb lingers in the background, watching, almost amused. Funny thing, this naseeb — it’s there when you’re at your worst, a crutch to lean on. But at your best, you realize it’s only ever been a story you’ve told yourself to make sense of things.

That’s why, sometimes, I hated this culture — or is it society pretending to be culture? I haven’t spent hours dissecting the difference. But I still wonder why this culture sometimes feels like a weight. Kindness can be a strength, yet sometimes it feels like a burden, a weakness we carry with pride. We’re so polite, even in revolution, so restrained, so respectful. We humanize everything. As Lebanese, we’re raised to be hospitable, welcoming, open-handed, even to those who come to tear us down.

It’s birthed into our history, in the very fabric of who we are. We’ve been the greatest lovers, poets, philosophers, building legacies out of words, hospitality, and resilience — but at what cost? We’ve shown grace to invaders, generosity to those who left scars, keeping that welcoming face, even as our eyes are gouged out . This hospitality, is it a survival instinct or our own self-inflicted wound?

We offer kindness to those who have broken us, a habit we can’t seem to shake. And that, more than anything, reminds me I’m Lebanese. Not through resilience, but in this weakness, this tendency to submit to fate and rationalize everything through comforts like naseeb. We’ll rationalize until it destroys us, convincing ourselves it’s out of our hands, that we’re powerless in the grand scheme. Maybe that’s the true Lebanese trait: cloaking our wounds in politeness, surrendering to the story we’ve been told is maktoub.

That summer in Lebanon was meant to last just two weeks — enough time to keep my mother from losing her wits and for me to avoid getting too attached. Lebanon was on the brink of a full-blown economic collapse, but somehow it was still the kind of crisis you could strangely enjoy. We Lebanese have a talent for squeezing joy out of hell itself. But the food poisoning was relentless; I swear I had more bouts of it than actual meals. Gas was scarce, leaving me stranded in the Chouf for two weeks alone. The electricity cuts, ones I’d later learn to base my schedule around, were already routine.

In 2021, Lebanon was cheap if you had U.S. dollars. “You could live like a king,” they’d say. A king, perhaps, but in a crumbling kingdom, a decomposing throne on shifting ground. That short, two-week escape stretched into five long months, a summer that took on a life of its own.

What do you do for five months in Lebanon? You put Baba’s folklore to the test. He’d told me he’d lived ahla eyam — the best days of his life — there, so I set out to see if his glory days held up, with my own modern twist, of course. The summer had to commence with the usual formalities: endless relatives streaming in daily (we were foolish to think two weeks would ever be enough), a parade of faces remarking on how much I’d grown, offering life advice I’d never follow, cursing the country I was born in, and reminding me, insistently, that I was Lebanese. Looking back, I wish I could’ve handed them that reminder with the same smug tone they’d given me. They needed to hear it, not me — after all, they weren’t the ones constantly reminded of where they came from. And it showed.

Then, finally, the real summer began: the clubbing, the drinking until I felt out of body, the strange sensuality of Beirut’s nights washing over me. Chain-smoking until my lungs felt scorched, wild kisses with strangers whose names I’d forget, tasting the city on every tongue. By dawn, I’d come home smelling like a chimney, my mother half-wrinkling her nose, half-smiling.My mother, first experienced Lebanon in the aftermath of the civil war, under Syrian occupation. Her homecoming was to a Lebanon in ruins, where she endured nasty, sexual remarks from Syrian soldiers on the streets — a Lebanon that had barely survived yet clung to the hope of reconstruction. For her, the country had weathered war, and through its scars, she could still see its beauty.

I am as doe-eyed as she was, hopeful for Lebanon’s rebirth. Yet, it saddens me to think of her early hopes — built on resilience but weighed down by reality. My mother loved the Lebanon I experienced that summer, perhaps even envied it. Watching me live it seemed to offer her a glimpse of the dream she’d never fully held. But her Lebanon never stood a chance, whether from the war or the expectations placed on her as a Lebanese woman raised in the diaspora.

It’s impossible to put into words how much my mother sacrificed to raise her children as Lebanese. She learned Arabic alongside us, prepared the traditional foods that connected us to our roots, and carried the weight of social expectations with grace, kindness, and love. If my father gave us Lebanon, my mother, in countless ways, taught us what it meant to be Lebanese, especially within the diaspora. For this, she’s rarely received the credit she deserves.

The summer grew lonely fast, and with time on my hands that I barely knew how to use, where better to spend it — or rather, who better to spend it on — than the faces on dating apps? I downloaded them all, swiping through profiles like browsing a gallery. I skipped anyone listing philosophy or psychology as interests — the very subjects I read into alone but had no desire to mix with summer flings. A philosopher would kill my buzz, and a psych enthusiast? Probably too eager to “read” me and fail.

I’ve never bought into zodiac signs, thinking we mold ourselves into those traits if we let them define us. As a Cancer, I’d rather avoid that “complicated” stereotype. And yet, you, my Beiruti lover, slipped through the cracks. There were plenty before you, and to be clear, I am no sex symbol — quite the opposite, really. But I have a certain charm, a mask I wear well, though, it unravels fast when the right string is pulled. I have a bad habit of being too deep for those who don’t care, and maybe too blunt for those who do.

This wasn’t supposed to be a journey of depth, I remind you, but I made an exception. After all, I was the ajnabi, the foreigner with broken Arabic, overly polite, saying please and thank you into every sentence, careful not to get too personal. The one who always leaves.

In a world where everything is instantly accessible, connections too often die before they’ve had the chance to truly live. A few minutes on an app, both revolutionary and tragic, now seem enough to define intimacy. But then again, everyone before you faded into irrelevance; after you, they simply ceased to matter.

You appeared unexpectedly in my swipes. Looking back, it almost disappoints me that it began there, as if it’s an insult to everything that came after. Whatever this was, it broke every boundary of digital connection, beyond anything an algorithm could contain. You shattered every rule, challenged each line I’d carefully drawn to keep people out. I may never write like the legends, but I would later love you with the urgency of those who inspired them.

Have I sold you the groundwork for a coming-of-age love story? God, I hope not. Those stories aren’t written for people like us, and they’re certainly not meant for places like Beirut. I won’t say if we broke that rule, but if we did, it was a story lived in the soul, never meant to be captured for the eyes- certainly not yours.

The dating app was our first encounter, our first in-person meeting the second — both unfolding in a single, impulsive night. It was the only time I allowed myself to be that spontaneous, that open. For once, I let go of who I thought I should be; I just let myself be.

I wish I could reach back, shake that past self, urge them to stay present, to see things as they truly were. Over the past two years, I’ve rewritten this story more times than I’d like to admit, asking myself: What was it about you that’s so hard to release? What keeps me searching for traces of you in others, only to come up emptier than you left me? The answer should enrage me, but instead, it humbles me. I could have cast you as the villain, and in many ways, you were. You shaped so much of who I would become: how I’d love, the person I’d grow into. And yet, here I am, sparing you, as if you were a debt I owed for sins from a forgotten life.

You were never the villain; we were just kids, and all summers start and end in Beirut.

That night replays in my mind like a vinyl on loop, the needle pressing down, cutting through the haze of a post-pandemic fog. I wasn’t nervous, and neither were you. In Beirut, no one knew me yet. Does that sound pretentious? Maybe so, but that probably means you don’t know Beirut. I didn’t — not then, not until a year after that summer. But I learned quickly: in Beirut, everyone knows everyone. It’s a city stitched together by connections, faces you know by name, names you know by rumor. That’s what makes it beautiful and, just as often, unforgiving.

Did we have dinner? I can’t remember. But I remember the abandoned home we tried to climb — somewhere in Gemmayze, or Mar Mikhael, maybe Sodeco. I was hesitant, still too green to embrace the thrill of Lebanese lawlessness. But you, with that maddening confidence, climbed as if you belonged there, as if the city, its people, and even its emptiness were yours to claim. You wore that boldness well, like armor, until, like all armor, it eventually cracked.

We ended up on a bench in Mar Mikhael, talking into the night. I let years of pent-up anger spill out, pouring words over you like gasoline, almost hoping you’d catch fire. Was I that fragile, that quick to unload it all? You, though, you kept your calm, saying so much with so few words, holding back just enough to keep yourself safe. I’d learn to play that game eventually, but never as well as you.

That night, we seemed to live a hundred lives in a few hours, time expanding until it felt like it might never end. But, of course, it did. Something shifted in me as it drew to a close, like a new wire connecting deep in my mind, a change I’ve carried ever since. It ended with a kiss, messy and unapologetic, pressed against the walls of Mar Mikhael under a blue streetlight, your confidence outbidding mine, as if we were two revolutionaries daring the world. A soldier watched us, but we didn’t care.

Beirut was a different time then. The soldier couldn’t even feed his kids, let alone care if two strangers kissed in the street. Beirut today, the soldier beats you just so he can feed his kids — and somehow, you understand.

I’ve written about this too many times, penned it as if it were my will and the country its witness.

I‘ve only given you the beginning, and though the story doesn’t end here, for you, it must. Perhaps I haven’t left you fulfilled; Beirut has that way about it — a love in extremes, a city defined by the unfinished, and inhabited by those merely passing through. That summer felt endless, with stories I’ll never put to paper. I’ve come up with countless reasons why all summers must end in Beirut, but in the end, they’re only theories. You’ve seen my contradictions laid bare. Whitman was allowed his contradictions, so why not me? Am I Whitman? No, not in this life, and not in the next. But I’ll contradict, freely.

In the end, there will always be three sides to this story — yours, mine, and the truth.

What I know to be true is this: you shook me in ways I never expected, and here I am, writing about a time that perhaps should have been left unwritten, simply lived. Maybe it was my American politeness, or my Lebanese hospitality, that softened each retelling, but no matter who you are now, you will always be my Beirut.

The summer of 2021 has never returned, yet it left me with more than I bargained for — lessons about life, about myself, about the person I longed to be and what I must never become.

You offered me revolution but gave me meghli ice cream, and I forgive you.

A year later, I moved to Lebanon, learning to love Beirut as you once taught me to , holding it like a secret, forgiving its sins, and embracing it as if I were your sacrifice to the city. If that’s what I was, then I’ll honor it. Beirut always knows better.

I promised myself not to search for you when I returned, not to wish for you in the eyes of strangers. But when I broke that promise, every face fell short — not because of them, but because of us…

My dear, this city without you is like nurturing a lone flower in one hand while severing its roots with the other.

[fae-renjun]

OPPOSITE SIDES OF THE CAMERA — h.sh

ep. 11 — take a chance with me [𖦹 wc: 830+]

previous | masterlist | next — (listen to take a chance with me by niki for the ideal experience)

“that’s it for today guys! all of you did a great job, i can’t wait for us to start shooting tomorrow!!” the rest of the cast said their goodbyes and shuffled out of the room. wonbin shot seunghan a knowing look just as taesan wiggled his eyebrows at you before both musicians left for uni band practice for the upcoming end of year concert, followed by yizhuo who said something about having to style the band. sungchan, shotaro and eunseok said their goodbyes and filed out as well, patting seunghan on the back as they did. sohee and anton walked up to seunghan, holding back laughs as they gave him a hushed pep talk. 

you were too distracted by your conversation with karina and leehan about scenes that might need to be changed to notice seunghan’s nervous glances towards you as his two younger friends left the room. as you finished your discussion with your friends and closed your binder with notes on the film, leehan looked over your head and at seunghan, giggling before leaving the room and dragging karina with him before she could say more than “have fun!”

you spun on your heel to face seunghan, “so.”

“so?”

“where are we going?”

“oh! yeah sorry. um. we’re going to kwangya cafe first, and then, would you want to see a movie?” he said, rubbing the back of his neck in nervousness as he finished his question. you looked at him, holding back a smile, “seunghan i am literally directing a movie right now. do you think i don’t like watching them?”

“oh, yeah,” he laughed in embarrassment. “the local theatre is playing pride and prejudice for its anniversary i think. i remembered you talking about it and i’ve never seen it so i got us tickets.”

your whole face lit up and seunghan was relieved. 

you started talking about how much you loved the movie and how excited you were for him to see it as you packed up. he kept listening, asking questions and nodding his head. when you got to the cafe you cut off a short rant about cinematic techniques in romance so you could order, after which you said, “oh my god i’ve just been yapping about movies again. i’m so sorry.”

seunghan laughed and brushed it off, “don’t worry. it’s cute. i like listening to you.”

“oh. well. i wanna know more about you too though.”

so, the two of you delved into a conversation about his dance background, his love for pokémon, and any mutual interests the two of you shared. before you knew it the food and drinks were over and it was time for the film.

in the darkness of the small movie theatre, your elbows bumped against one another on your shared armrest every time one of you reached for the popcorn bucket in between. you kept subtly glancing over, trying to gauge the boy’s reaction to all your favourite scenes, observing as much of his expression as possible with the light from the large screen in front of you. every time you reacted to a scene—giggling when lizzie rejected mr. collins or sighing as you watched darcy’s hand flex for the 127th time in your life—seunghan would look over and wonder why he’d never tried harder to talk to you before now. 

seunghan was anything but dry and boring. he launched into a mini-monologue about the movie as soon as the two of you exited the movie theatre, and you were grateful for it. You’d always felt like you were too much for people, you’d been told you talked too much and too fast about the things you loved and were too passionate about movies and making them to pay attention to real life. but you never felt like you were too much around seunghan. more and more each day you were hoping his presence in your life would become permanent, and that it wouldn’t end as soon as the short film was done. 

the sky darkened as the sun set while he walked you back to your apartment. when the conversation you had been having came to a lull, you said to him, “you don’t have to do this you know? walking me back to my apartment and all.”

“oh it’s no problem, it’s on the way to my apartment anyway.”

“oh.”

“and i just wanted to,” he finished. you hummed in response, not knowing how to reply. soon, you arrived and said your goodbyes to each other. but as you turned around to open your door and he turned to leave, you spun back towards him, “seunghan?”

“yeah?”

“was this a date?” “only if you want it to be. see you tomorrow, future oscar winner,” he said with a grin, not giving you a chance to process his words and reply before leaving. The final part of his sentence only registered in your head as you walked into your apartment, the thought of it gracing your lips with a smile. 

a/n: not that anyone cares but this takes place the same day as the tpwbib prologue :))

taglist (strikethrough = can’t tag): @billiondollarworth @nujeskz @secretiny @soobs-things @talk022 @renjuneoo @flaminghotyourmom @academiq @luffysgfforevaa1 @yujinxue @starwonb1n @icewons @calumsfringe @seunghancore @snowyseungs @yoursyuno @taroddori @miyawwn @https-yeonjun @shoberi @milktea-academia @sseastar-main @p-d1ddy @woonagi-lemon @lilriswife4life @kyusqult @chuutaroo @parkwonbinie @soheendo

© 2024 FAE-RENJUN. All Rights Reserved. Do not copy or steal any of my posts.

[lexsssu]

Good Little Girl (Marshall Lee)

TAGS: Mashall/F!Reader, Original child character, parenthood, fluff Ao3 ver.

“Mishael Linus Abadeer, get your sorry butt down here already before your dinner gets cold!”

“Jeez, I’m coming down already, Ma”

“If you don’t hurry up I’ll eat your portion of fresh strawberries, kid~”

“Dad, don’t be so unfair when you already have your own portion!”

“Not my fault if you’re a slowpoke”

A handsome dark-haired youth flew into the humble dining room hurriedly, seating himself at his designated chair and clutching the small bowl of strawberries to his chest as if they were a priceless treasure. His skin had a grayish hue to them, pointed ears peaked from his ebony tufts of luscious hair while a pair of sharp fangs poked from his lips. The scowl he wore didn’t make him look menacing, but rather even more attractive than he already was in the first place.

“Now, now, now. Stop teasing our son already, Marsh. You know how he gets when it comes to his strawberries and besides, aren’t you already too old to be competing with him over food?” You stifled a laugh as you raised an eyebrow at your husband who merely grinned, shrugging in response.

“It’s survival of the fittest, babe. If our own kid doesn’t understand that then he doesn’t deserve the plump and juicy fresh strawberries you’ve painstakingly grown, picked, and washed straight from our garden”

The vampire king wrapped his arm around your waist and pulled you closer, landing a quick kiss to your hair as your preteen son gagged at the public display of affection. “No spawn of mine will grow up ungrateful to their beautiful, amazing, spectacular, wonderful mama~”

Dinner passed by without much fanfare aside from the playful teasing your family generally engaged one another with. Though mainly it was just Marshall being the big bully that he was, something Mishael had already grown used to ever since he was young.

While you washed the dishes, you spotted your son fumbling with his phone as he floated back up to his room. A bright smile lit up his face as a tinge of red gave his cheeks some much needed color and contrast from the grayish hue he’d inherited from his father.

“Lemme guess, he’s probably hung up on Fiona & Evan’s kid...Evie, right?”

Years of being with Marshall had trained you to anticipate his sudden appearance at all possible times that you didn’t even flinch anymore when you hear his voice and feel the warmth of his breath on the back of your neck.

“Mhmm, he’s got it quite bad from the looks of it. Kinda reminds me of another lovesick vampire I knew back in the day…” The corners of your lips quirked upwards in a smile as memories of a time not so long ago flashed in your mind like a cinematic movie.

“Whaddya mean you ‘knew’ back in the day? I’m still very much YOUR lovesick vampire until the universe itself collapses and time ceases to exist, thank you very much”

Placing the last plate upon the dish rack, you wipe your hands dry on the dry dish cloth before gingerly taking the raven-haired male’s face into your hands and pecking his nose. “And I wouldn’t have it any other way, my bad little boy~”

A tender looked slithered its way onto the hybrid’s face, snaking his arms around you until your front was pressed flush against his own. You both floated a few feet off the ground, arms around your waist and your own around his neck as you stared into each other’s eyes.

Marshall Lee had his fair share of relationships over the course of his immortal life, but none had ever enamored him the way you do. None had ever made him want to come home so desperately, even if you were the one who gave him all the freedom he wanted to go off on adventures while waiting patiently for him. His once cold, unbeating heart felt the warmest, the liveliest as long as he was with you.

“Forever’s a long time, ‘ya know? But I’ll be more than happy to let you feel why being MY good little girl is worth it~”

[crowleywowley]

BACK ON IT WIT DA HEADCANONS 🗣️🗣️🗣️🗣️

Y’all already know what tf is going on. Modern AU, silly headcanons, everyone is alive and well, blah blah blah.

Previous sillies: 1 2 3 4 5

Aight see u unda da cut 😼

-John definitely cried at the dinner table trying to do his math homework with Dutch

Dutch is absolutely like ‘WHY WOULD THEY CHANGE THE WAY THEY DO MATH!!!!!’ While John is like “I😭don’t😭know😭😭”

-John joined the middle school track team but ate shit on the hurdles so he quit

-John was absolutely the kid who always leaned back in his chair

He fell once and hit his head and to this day that teacher uses him as an example

-John was a pain in Arthur’s ass but when Arthur was a senior and John was a freshman Arthur beat up some kids for being mean to his baby brother :((((

-Jack is a Roblox kid for SUREEEE

John used to play it with him but the obbys pissed him off so much he had to take a walk

-Jack was also a Percy Jackson kid. Argue with the wall!!!!

-during Jack’s wannabe emo phase he got a fake earring and it gave him an allergic reaction

He cried :(

John and Abi, being reformed emo kids, held in their laughter until that night after Jack went to sleep

-speaking of emo. John definitely had shaggy long hair that he parted so it was across his forehead, and Abigail had cool bangs with like blue tips or something

She definitely put eyeliner on him at some point

They both had MySpace usernames like Xx._Fallen.Angel._xX

-Abigail has more than one stupid stick and poke tattoo that John gave her when they were like 19

They are CORNY and POORLY DONE but she secretly loves them :’)

-Despite being the younger of the two Dutch is much less tech-literate than Hosea

He understands Facebook. It’s one of like… 3 apps on his phone

His camera roll is filled with accidental photos

-these two have SO MANY DECORATIVE PILLOWS

-Hosea is such a Frank Sinatra lover!!!!!!!

They danced to Strangers in the Night at their wedding :’)

-Hosea was absolutely the parent that’s sitting in the dark when their kid tries to sneak out and they’re like “going somewhere?”

-shoutout to this person because YEAH

-a crazy night in the Morgan-Smith household means staying up until 10:00 PM watching a documentary about whales

-both of these men are the biggest babies when they’re sick. Common cold = death

-if Jack was a Percy Jackson kid then Isaac was probably into Ancient Egypt or dinosaurs

Charles and Arthur are good dads so they listen to him spew facts and they’re like “wow! Cool, buddy!!!!!”

Even now that he’s a teenager they still remember random facts :)

-Arthur LIVES for unbuckling his belt and settling into a recliner after a big meal

-These fools are so in love and constantly bring each other trinkets :’)

“Saw this and thought of you” and it’s like a mystery Lego pack

I think we’ll stop there for tonight but hehehehe I love these soooo much. Does anyone want me to start bringing OTHER characters into this universe😲??? or do we wanna just keep it to the VanDerMatthews/Marston family/Charthur cinematic universe. Y’all know I can get silly and funky with anyone.

ALSO!!!!!! If anyone has an idea for a name of this universe plzzzzz let me know bc I think that would be fun :D okay bye!!!!!!

[squemkerz]

Alright, so this would technically be my first ever post other than reblogging. Technically it is a rant, because I was certainly surprised by the end of the cinematic. Something had came across my mind though when I watched the new PS4 Cinematic Trailer for Mauga.

If you haven't watched it, I'd highly recommend it even if you aren't looking for Mauga in particular. Reaper, Sombra, and Doomfist also make a cameo in it. If you haven't watched it, go ahead because I will be spoiling it. Mostly the end though- While I was watching it, I was discussing it with my friend about how goddamn SCARY Mauga is. Not only is he an extremely capable and strong fighter, but the ending just gives us a real look into how tactical he is. We've heard the devs describe him as being 'cunning' and 'two-steps ahead' at all times. This trailer really goes into that side of Mauga we didn't see from the short gameplay experience. He single-handedly one upped both Sombra and Reaper by getting that core, while also taking down that ship and having as much fun as he possibly could. Truly a terrifying add to the roster, but one thing really caught my attention near the end of the trailer. He not only knew that Reaper and Sombra were calling Doomfist, but he intentionally kept the core at his side until Sombra came in to check on him. He didn't barge in and make himself known to Doomfist of what he'd done. Surely telling the boss himself would've given him a lot of favor within Talon for such an accomplishment. Yet he intentionally held out, and even gave it to Sombra. She could take credit for grabbing the core, though she'd have to explain to Doomfist how they got it in the first place. This just shows how he's really two steps ahead of everyone. He knows who Sombra is, and knows just how easily she can get information on basically everyone. Being in her good graces would certainly give him more of an edge then he would with some promotion from Talon. He most definitely is clever, and fakes at being the big dumb brute well. Reaper was even willing to kill him because of how badly he supposedly screwed up the mission. He has Reaper completely fooled, and probably the rest of Talon. Everyone except for Sombra. That was my first ever rant on Tumblr! Woopee, now time to scroll through Tumblr art for the next hour. Thanks for coming to my Ted Talk-

[loganslowdown4]

Did you guys see the Yours music video yet??

well I got a little emotional to say the least lol 🥲🥲🥲 I adored it

I actually was thinking about it today and realized something… so here is my theory on colours used in the video—

(please note this is just my interpretation and you can decide for yourself the meanings within the video!)

💚🤍💙

Second thing I wanted to bring up was the CINEMATIC PARALLELS 😍😍😍

Almost everything you see c!Thomas do in this is mirrored by c!Terrence or vice versa. Showing they both have the same mindset without knowing the other feels the same way. 😭

💙🤍💚

Oh and lastly I just wanted to point out Calypso gave this dress to this dancer and it was the same dress from 13 Going On 30 which made me so happy lolol

💙🤍💚

(Also the pinky touch KILLED ME DEAD 😭😭😭)👆👆👆

What did you think of the video/song?

[ive-gotta-gay-go-go-ive-gotta-go]

For all of you complaining about the ending of the show…

We know Agatha and how she works. Do you really think they’re going to give you an episode with the past and how Rio and Agatha started their romance? No. They gave you a conversation with Jen and Billy about “how they met”.

The show is not about Agatha falling in love with Rio. The show is about what happened after Wanda left Agatha trapped in Westview. The show is about how Death tries to come for Agatha since episode one. Their bargain in easy, get your power, I’ll get my bodies.

We learn that Billy made up the road. Still it had its purposes, Rio after all, continued to get bodies. On the way in the road Agatha selfish self, becomes a friend, a mother, a motivator, empathetic witch. But when she’s not getting what she wants, Agatha becomes ruthless, disheartened, egocentric, cunning. This is when she hurts Rio, telling she only took. When Rio was supposed to get her baby right before he was born. Which eventually breaks their previous bargain.

So yes, Agatha decides to kiss Death instead of explaining what really happened with Nick. Because she knew she could never had her son, still her selfish ways ask Rio for mercy. Rio let him live and create memories that will haunt Agatha forever. But this is Agatha’s choice. Yet again Rio complies.

We also know when dead people have unfinished business they stay around as ghosts. It could really be because of Nicky and her fear of facing him, or it could be the love that she has for Billy. It could be interpreted either way.

But people could focus on the wrong things. In my opinion, we got a MARVEL TV SHOW, with an intricate, woven wonderful cast. With extraordinary cinematic storylines. With remarkable and moving soundtracks. A show that the characters had substantial chemistry. We got all of this on DISNEY+. LGBT on Disney!!!

I think we could focus on the magnificence of the show. The heartbreak and how every week we looked forward to something magical. The show is over but their stories and characters are not. We know how Marvel uses their characters. Let's be appreciative for the tears, for the laughter, sing-alongs, the cast, the plot twists, the scenery, the emotions, the growth and the storyline.

We’re all sad that the show is over. But what a gift they left us behind. Happy Halloween 🎃

[insanityclause]

When Tom Hiddleston landed his career-changing role in Marvel’s Thor back in April 2009, he never dreamed he would be playing the character for nearly 15 years. To be fair, no one did—except maybe Marvel’s mastermind Kevin Feige, who had begun laying the cinematic groundwork for a multi-billion dollar franchise. At the time, Hiddleston happily threw himself into extensive research and prep to play the duplicitous brother of Thor (Chris Hemsworth).  “I was cast in April 2009, and I had about eight months to build the character from the ground up,” Hiddleston says on this week’s Little Gold Men. “So that was a deep dive into everything Loki from any comic book, any Norse myth, any saga, everything—from the whole run of Marvel comics to the ancient Scandinavian stories, and how he pops up in The Ring cycle for Wagner, and Jim Carrey is wearing the mask of Loki in The Mask.” Hiddleston was trying to discover “this sense of, what's Loki's impact on human imagination and culture? And then synthesizing all of that into the story we’re telling. That was such a delightful period of discovery and curiosity.”

Hiddleston’s scene-stealing portrayal made him an instant fan favorite, laying a formidable foundation for a character who went on to appear in six more films and the stand-alone series Loki. The two-season series threw the character into a new dimension and timeline, stripped him of all his creature comforts, and gave the actor new challenges to tackle.

“In successive iterations, [my approach] has been, how do I keep it interesting?” he says. “I genuinely say this to myself and to others: ‘We're not reheating yesterday's meal in the microwave. We're cooking up something new.’ It's trying to find new ingredients or new challenges for the character, for us as actors, so that it feels like the same person is growing. Because that's what human beings do. They don't stay the same, they grow. Sometimes they regress, but there's always movement.”

Hiddleston has gone on to star in a wide array of projects outside the Marvel universe, of course, from his Emmy-nominated, Golden Globe-winning work in The Night Manager to Jim Jarmusch’s acclaimed romantic vampire drama Only Lovers Left Alive and Steven Spielberg’s epic War Horse. But he’s definitely spent the most time with the God of Mischief. And though no official announcement has been made, the final episode of Loki season two strongly indicates the closing of a formative chapter.

The actor and executive producer stopped by Little Gold Men for a thoughtful discussion about the gift of developing and playing a single character for so long, the surreal fun of working with drama school classmates turned costars Gugu Mbatha-Raw and Wunmi Mosaku, and getting to come up with the character's last line (for now). Listen below, where you can also read excerpts from the conversation.

Vanity Fair: Did the series version of Loki feel a little more stripped down, or did you have the same kind of mindset playing him as you did in the films? Tom Hiddleston: Yes. I think it was stripped down literally in the sense of taking away the costume, but stripped down spiritually and in his soul. I thought [the concept] was such a brilliant idea, and it wasn't mine. It was [executive producers] Michael Waldron and Kevin Wright, and the great and the good at Marvel Studios. I thought for any character, if you were presented with your life and watching a kind of highlight reel of it, what would it add up to? Would it be satisfying? Would it be meaningful? Would it be amusing? Would it be disappointing? And I thought to do that with Loki especially, as it's the journey of a life that the audience is familiar with, but he hasn't seen it. I just thought it was a brilliant conceit. And then I leaned into this idea of the leopard being challenged to change his spots. Because you'd have to if your life ended up in murder by Thanos and humiliation. You'd want to try something new.

And that was really fun, developing a story which was actually very philosophical. It asks the question of Loki, as I hope it asks the question of all of us: Are we in control of the course of our lives? Do we have any free will, and can we break free from any kind of predetermination? It seemed like a great question, and a fun way to ask it.

You’re also an executive producer on the series. How did you take on that role? What did you get to do?

Honestly, it was such an honor and I loved it. I loved the extra imagining and problem solving. I was invited into the writer's room really early, season one, even earlier on season two. And to borrow the words from Lin Manuel Miranda, to be in the room where it happens, and to sit around the table and break story and crunch through the great creative ‘what if’ questions—what if Loki did this? What if Mobius [Owen Wilson] did that? What if they couldn't find Sylvie? What if the TVA ran on an energy source, and it wasn't energy, it was time?

Can you take any credit for bringing Ke Huy Kwan or your RADA buddies Gugu Mbatha-Raw and Wunmi Mosaku on board? I love that that was a little bit of a through-line, that you all got to work together.

Well, when their names came up, Gugu and Wunmi particularly, I was able to say, those guys are great. And Ke was just an amazing idea because actually, [his character] Ouroboros was coming to life on the page. Somebody suggested Ke, and Everything Everywhere All At Once had just come out. And I was like, genius: somebody call him now before we lose him. He was so joyful and optimistic and happy to be there, so honored to be there. He'd wanted to be in a Marvel project his whole life, I think, and, and he brought everything and more to that character.

The day he landed, he came from the airport straight to the studio, probably thinking, ‘I'll just say hello and go back to my digs.’ And Owen and I were actually rehearsing the scene before Mobius and Loki meet OB for the first time. And he came in and he listened. And then we got to the bit where we were like, ‘You're in the next bit. Do you want to do it?’ He said ‘Okay!’ And he stayed and rehearsed for three hours. I think he felt completely crazy having just [traveled] across the continents, but it was so brilliant. And the chemistry was so immediate between the three of us, and so funny. We all love Ke.

Thinking about your journey with this character and all the places he has taken you, has there been a surreal aspect to it? I think about you being in drama school with Gugu and Wunmi—now you're getting paid to play.

It's a wonderful question, and I'm never unaware of the great gift that this job is. Especially because it happens all the time,: I go out into the world and I meet young people or children, and they're so amazed that they’re meeting Loki. I'm obviously not Loki, but the response is so immediate and so emotional and so joyful. What a gift. It's the best job in the world. And I never dreamed back then that I would be part of something with such reach and for so long. It just is the most unlikely, surprising, delightful thing. And we—Wunmi and Gugu I've known for a long time. It is amazing to look and go, ‘Can you believe we're here, we're doing this?’ It is exciting too, because it feels right in some way and they're great actors. They are brilliant.

Do you get recognized as the character, or are people starting to recognize you for your other work?

Oh, it's always different. I went to a friend's birthday party the other day—a friend and his wife, both turning the same age. They got a taco stand. I went to get my taco and the guys were like, ‘Only Lovers Left Alive, man. Love that film.’ And I said, ‘Thank you very much. That's very kind.’ Some people say The Night Manager. Some people stop me in the street and go, ‘It's you! You're the dancer.’ And they're referring to some talk show, some bit of dancing I did on a talk show from like a thousand years ago, which really tickles me.

Speaking of dancing, I wanted to bring up your physicality. With the most recent season of Loki in particular and that time slip, did you have to have massages and stretch after? Because it seems like such a jarring movement.

It's jerky, yes. I had to put my body under a kind of relentless physical stress. But I think it pays off in the way it's presented. In terms of movement and physicality, it comes from my own admiration for other performers when I sense that there is a really, alive and visceral physicality in the performance. Some of people are great actors, very cerebral, very intelligent, but sometimes not always fully embodied. And I love the actors who are giving me a sense that the whole body is occupying whichever space that is. They could be on a horse, they could be driving a car, they could have just run in through the jungle. I don't know, it could be anything, but a real sense of physicality is always something I admire in other actors.

One of my favorite things in doing a little research about your work on this season was that you got to craft Loki’s last lin,e and it also maybe came from going on a run. Can you talk about that? Well, first on running, I love it and it is a big part of my life. And a big part of my creative life. Running outside, in space, in the world with only your own legs to carry you and your own breath to fuel you, I find incredibly freeing. And it's where I do some of my best thinking and dreaming and imagining. Things bubble up from inside you. So I often run at the beginning of a day, very early and with an awareness of what's coming, what the scenes of the day are. Sometimes things will bubble up. And maybe that's just extra oxygen in the brain, who knows? 

But to the point about that last line: one of the things I kept trying to guide our team back to was that the whole series, both seasons, was really about finding purpose, or re-finding, re-defining, re-discovering a sense of purpose. And I think a primal need in all of us, is that we need our lives to mean something. So I kept coming back to this line from The Avengers, ‘I am Loki of Asgard and I am burdened with glorious purpose.’ And we kept thinking, well, if Loki has a second chance, he gets to redefine his purpose or re-imagine it. I went for a run and was listening to some film scores, and it was a beautiful day. I was thinking about the journey of playing this character and where it started, and all the people that I have had the great good fortune to work with and become friends with—that completely unique kind of soul-sharing relationship where you make something together. And I remembered the end of the first Thor film, and how emotional that felt and. I just suddenly thought, that's what he should say—but it should mean something completely different. Loki's last line in Thor, directed by Kenneth Branagh, is, ‘I could have done it, Father. I could have done it for you, for all of us.’ And of course his effort to gain his father's pride has been misguided and ill thought-out. And then at the end of Loki season 2, 14 years later, he turns to Mobius and Sylvie and says, ‘I know what I want I know what kind of god I need to be. For you. For all of us.’ It felt very resonant somehow. I hope the audience picked up on that.

Are you able to just say goodbye when it's wrap time, or do you have any sort of meditative, formal way of saying goodbye to a project or a character?

That's such a good question. I think it's a very honest, immediate feeling of relief, which they say is the most intense human emotion. You'd think it was anger or grief or something, but actually relief is—the way relief kind of washes through you, and a sense of finality that some finish line has been crossed and there are no more miles to run. And for me anyway, huge amounts of energy have been stored inside myself which had been poured out over time—over maybe 20 weeks or however many months. 

I love that feeling of completeness. The great joy of what I do for a living is that it involves very intense, very close working with a team. And the pride that you can feel with your teammates, with your crew, with your cast—you just hang around and say goodbye, but it never really is goodbye. And there's just a sense of, like, “that'll do, pig,” you know? Yeah: that'll do, pig.

[sekaithemystic]

Neve Gallus Analysis and Theory series [Part 3]

Minrathous is broken,” Aelia spat at me. “I know,” I said. “But you aren’t the one to fix it.”

The section under this contains spoilers from the game.

[part 1] [part 2]

Circle and square diamond - Solas, Neve and the future

Shapes, right. Very interesting. Let’s start with Solas and circle first.

Solas and/or circle seem to appear everywhere in the last few teasers: the 2018 teaser, the 2020 teaser, the 2022 cinematic trailer (which is later shown to be part of the cinematic prologue of Veilguard). The circle has been seen to be the sun, the moon, the symbol of the Evanuris (especially when it’s a circle with borders), even the Veil itself.

After finishing the character creation, Solas is shown with a circle in the background again, only this time, there is also a square diamond outside the circle. Quite the noticeable change from his usual circle.

The scene shifts to Minrathous, and there you see another circle, which seems to be the moon behind the Archon’s Palace.

Here, the circle and the square diamond appear, along with Neve Gallus, with the moon being inside the square diamond.

So what’s with Neve and square diamond?

Frankly, her design has a lot of square diamonds: her fascinator (especially in this shot, is purposefully angled parallel to the outer square diamond), her earring, the back of her outfit. Even the top of her fascinator also has a circle inside a square diamond. And it’s not just Neve, Tevinter seems to have square diamonds everywhere, especially in its architecture. Just look at the Archon’s Palace.

So what does this tell us (aside from the fact that I might be crazy)?

We know that the Evanuris can call upon Archdemon aka the Old Gods and for now there are two Old Gods left of seven: Razikale and Lusacan. We suspect that there are connections between these two factions somehow. This post is just to provide further proof that there is something here between the Evanuris and Tevinter (or the Old Gods) and maybe, maybe Solas and Neve will be involved in it, or at least take a crucial part in this.  

Random tidbits from me to conclude this fever dream

Neve is going to be possessed by Razikale or Lusacan. I’m a bit on Razikale, because the High Priestess of Razikale gave birth to the First Archon of Tevinter Darinius, so if Neve being Radonis’ bastard is true, we are really going full circle Tevinter here. 

The first quest is “The End of the Beginning” and the objective is “Find Neve Gallus” in Minrathous. How cool would it be if our final quest is “The Beginning of the End” and the objective is still “Find Neve Gallus” in Minrathous? From the release date trailer, we know that a battle (most likely the final one) will happen in Minrathous based on the fact that the Archon’s Palace is in the background here.  

The loading icon for Veilguard, if you don’t know, is made of circles, square and four-armed star

And that is the end of the series. I hope you enjoy these crazy posts!