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The lights flick on and the stage is illuminated. The words 'The Nex Issue' is displayed behind the large, black leather armchair currently occupied by a brown-haired, black furred wolf and the empty, three-seater sofa. The audience applauds but it is strangely subdued. As to be expected from a somewhat sombre conclusion to the most recent series. The wolf takes a few moments to compose himself, keeping a smile on his muzzle as he turns his brown eyes towards the audience.

"Welcome everyone," he greets with a gentle nod. "This is The Nex Issue where we take a short dive behind the scenes of the most recent series. Today, we will be discussing My Life is Super Issue 5 subtitled as 'The Legion of Pain'."

He waves towards the couch beside him. "As always, this show will take a format of three sections. The first is, myself interviewing a select number of cast members. Afterwards, the cast will have an opportunity to ask me questions and gives me an opportunity to provide my insights on the series. Lastly, I will be opening up the floor to the audience to answer any questions they may have. Fair warning, this session does contain significant spoilers to those who haven't read or haven't caught on yet so make sure you know what you're getting into."

The lupine host claps his paws together. "So, without further ado, let me introduce our guests for today's show." He gestures off stage. "Please Salazar Shin or Tibia on the show."

A fit, compact young man with Asian features comes charging onto the stage. The audience applauds his entrance and some people even leap up to their feet holding up signs 'I want you to BONE me'. Tyson plays along, doing a little dance and even getting on the floor to perform a quick break dance before approaching the host. He shakes Nex's paw before taking up position on the left hand side of the couch.

"Next, we have Peter and Noah Alberich Pins and Needles respectively on the show." The wolf winked at the crowd. "Yes, they were not brothers in real life but happily married.

Two otters who looks stunningly alike come onto the stage, waving with their paws intertwined. Crowd members leap up to their feet with several guards having to hold back audience members who were screaming for either of the men to be 'one with them'. Remus took up his place next to Tyson while Liam stood behind him, wrapping his arms around his husband's shoulders.

"And lastly, please welcome Natalia Charbonneau who plays Spider Queen on the show."

The elegant form of the lightly tanned human woman emerged from back stage, gliding across the stage with the strength and posture of a woman radiating confidence. Dressed in a bright blue pants suit, she waved at the audience with both women and men cheering for her appearance. Missing her trademark dark green lipstick and porcelain-coloured skin, she took up positioned right beside Remus, giving her co-star a little peck on the cheek. Liam shot her a playful look and she gently slapped his cheek as if to say, 'you had your turn'.

"So let us begin!" Nex says, clapping his paws together. "Let's start with you, Sal. As you know, production of Issue 5 ramped up very quickly. Originally designed as a sort of 'side-story' simply titled 'My Life is Super: The Legion of Pain', Issue 5 sort of snowballed quickly and your casting was done in haste. How did it feel?"

Sal laughed softly and slapped his knees. "Honestly, when my agent first told me that I'd be starring in a My Life is Super spin-off, I was ecstatic. I heard about Caleb's notorious partying ways but that wasn't why I wanted to sign on. My Life is Super is an amazing series and I was proud to be part of it." He beamed brightly and absently scratched his cheek. "Though I never really expected Tibia to have such a big role. When I first read the role, I thought he was just going to be a throwaway character as this issue had a lot of villains and Gene Stealers instead of just the focus on the one."

Nex smiles gently. "I'm glad you were up to the task. It certainly wouldn't have been easy transforming into not just one form but two throughout the course of the Issue."

"Yeah, that really did throw me for a loop!" laughed Sal, absently rubbing the back of his head. "Honestly, the wolf-elephant hybrid was fun but I kind of wanted to see what Tibia would look like as a full-on wolf."

"Sadly not in the cards. At least not in this Issue."

Nex turns to the two men holding each other tightly. "Peter, Noah. As husbands, how did you feel playing twins having an incestuous relationship on screen?"

"Honestly not that bad, Nex," Peter chuckled, his voice considerably deeper than it was on the show. "It's kind of one of the little role-plays we get up to in be -"

Noah nudges him lightly. "Pete, come on." He grins sheepishly towards Nex. "Let's just say that it's a fantasy and that's all that it ever is."

"Audiences will note that Peter's voice is very different from what was shown on the Issue. Care elaborate?"

Noah giggled, the same childish giggle that Pins and Needles were notorious for. "Well, I actually voiced both characters. To maintain the illusion of us being twins, we needed to have similar voices. So I read the lines as a voice over and my husband just mouthed everything. It was honestly amazing how smooth the editing was."

"Why didn't you just use CGI and copy one of us in?" Peter asked.

Nex shrugged. "That would've taken out the authenticity of the role. Let's also remember that as the Legion of Pain evolved, it was Pins and Needles that wasn't there initially. You were originally hired to play the role of another villain known as 'Numbskull' whose entire power was meant to be just making people feel numb." The wolf grins brightly. "But then I noticed how your husband looked pretty much like you and I couldn't help but cast you both! Was that how you two met?"

Noah rolled his eyes. "Pretty much. We were competing for a different role in a different role but Bradley Aston was going for the same gig. We couldn't compete against him. So, as a prank because we both knew we'd never get it, we decided to swap identities at least for that moment. And that's how we met!"

"Did you get the role?"

Peter let out a gruff laugh. "Hell no. Then again..." He reached over his shoulder, grabbing Noah's paw lightly with one paw. The other rested on Seraph's knee. "... We would never have been able meet and get this role. Not to mention we would never have met Seraph here who gave us a bouncy baby girl."

Nex nods and turns next towards the notorious Spider Queen. "Which brings us neatly to you, Seraph. Care to elaborate on that last comment?"

Smiling brightly and warmly, Seraph patted Peter's paw lightly. "Well, I've been on this show for a while and it took at least two years to finish production on this issue. It was a huge twenty chapters, after all. I had the pleasure of working with Peter and Noah from day one and we got quite close. I learned that they were hoping to have a kid but, of course, being two gay men it wasn't really in the books."

Nex opens his muzzle to say something but Seraph shoots him a look.

"At least naturally," she quickly interjects and that shuts up the black-furred wolf. "So we got to talking and I agreed to be a surrogate to them. It kind of fit well with Spider Queen's persona as she is a very motherly creature who does view many of her creations as her children. Though she can be a bit careless about them, she sees them as her kid nonetheless. It was fun exploring that during the Issue."

The brown-furred wolf nods with a smile that quickly faded. "How was it working with a certain No One?"

Seraph grimaced and rubbed her temples a little. "Honestly, he's a little bit of a headache. Sometimes his off-the-wall comments actually breaks the immersion, you know?" She lifted her hands, holding them parallel to one another. "You're in the scene and you're trying to stay in character but then he ad-libs some line that just leaves you scrambling to think of something to say. In retrospect and when you look at the scenes afterwards, it's great but at the time, you're freaking out!"

The rest of the guests nod in agreement.

"That'd be my fault," Nex admits. "I gave Jacob free reign because that's how he works best. Of course, he had the most pressure. The various cooking scenes that I had him do were completely ad-libbed. He's a talented cook but when you should've been there when I told him that he needed to treat the scenes like he was on a cooking show. The look of total horror was priceless!" Nex chuckles mildly. "He did a great job with it, though. He had no preparation for any of those dishes. We just stocked his kitchen with a lot of ingredients and just told him to go nuts."

"I love his Sunday Brunches," Sal commented. "Every Sunday, just after the morning shoot and just as we're breaking for lunch, he caters for the entire cast and production crew. It's always something delicious. Don't know how he does it even if he's in on the scene."

"Perks of standing outside Time and Space, I guess," Peter laughed softly. "He even catered for our wedding. You modelled Abigail's wedding scene after that idea, right?"

Nex nods. "Yes. Your wedding in the middle of production really sparked my inspiration for that one. I had originally planned Abby's wedding to be very vanilla. A sort of 'normal' reprieve in the midst of chaos. But then you two got hitched and had a No One catering and it just struck me."

The wolf waves a paw through the air. "But that neatly brings us to our next segment: the moment when the cast asks me any questions they may have." He nods towards Salazar Shin. "So let's once again start with you, Sal. Any questions?"

The Asian actor nods. "Yeah. What made you take the Legion of Pain from a side-story to a full-blown issue? Was it the size?"

Nex grins in embarrassment. "Actually, it's more about a compulsive need for me to put some substance into a story. I'm finding it harder and harder these days to write something just for the sake of 'smut'. There has to be some underlying plot or development especially if it's for an established series. That's the failing I had with My Life is Super:Profiles. The Profiles Universe was just meant for Caleb to have sex with different stereotypes of men but I just couldn't leave it at that so I began making ties with it and putting more meaning into it. Same thing with the Legion of Pain. Originally, this was meant to be a series of stories that explores different kinds of species transformations that is outside of the planned Gene Stealers. Elephants, rhinoceroses, crocodiles, caribous, otters and goats were not on the original list of transformations but I wanted to explore them nonetheless. But as the story developed, I couldn't just leave it as a 'villain of the week' sort of series and just had to tie it to the main story. Eventually, those ties became so strong that it evolved into Issue 5."

"What made you choose those particular species?" Sal asked.

"I hadn't actually picked the species when I first began. The Gimp, actually, was conceived as a bull but then I remembered that I had already done that with Minos. Eventually, after conceiving of your role, Sal, I found a sort of connection in the 'horns' or 'teeth' of the species. Elephants have their tusks, rhinos have their horns, crocodiles regenerate their teeth, caribous have their horns and so do goats. The only odd one was the otters but that's why Scalpel, Pins and Needles appeared at the same time."

Sal nodded thoughtfully as he leaned back on the couch. "What about the whole travelling the world thing? Was that always planned?"

"Actually, no. In the initial draft, the Legion of Pain was predominantly meant to focus on West California Island. The idea was to get people more comfortable on the entirety of the Island and get a bigger picture of the Island as a whole instead of the few places that we've already seen. However, as I expanded the Issue to become the sort of penultimate Issue to My Life is Super, I decided to bring a wider view. One of the world as a whole. That's why we went to places like Madagascar, Mount Everest and Canada. Each of those places offered different views and showed that there was a bigger world out there than just West California Island."

Noah lifts a paw and Nex nods in his direction. "Yes, Noah?"

"You mentioned that this was the penultimate Issue for My Life is Super. I think you've mentioned that many times before. Is Issue 6 really going to be the end? Seems like there will be a lot of things to cover."

"Oh yeah?" Nex asks with a smirk. "Do tell."

Noah exchanges glances with his husband and lifts a finger to begin listing off the plot points. "Well, I guess there's the elephant in the room - sorry Sal - and that's Caleb's return. That's going to be a big one. Of course that's tied with Jacob being an 'antagonist'. Then there's Washington's revolution, what I can only assume is a Gene Stealer Civil War, there's Chimera's whole thing and then there's the Ring."

"Let's not forget David's werewolf thing," Peter chimed in. "Whatever is happening with Leon, Ben's defection from the Alpha Pack, Madman's beef with Gnoll, Mary's lineage and of course, Elliot."

Nex lifts a finger. "There is, of course, Lance's relationship with Corey, Lars' place in the world and his recovery, Gabe's return and how he will fit into the picture and all the people that were left behind in the previous Gene Stealer attacks as well. All of them will come to play in the endgame in some way shape or form. Your concern, however, is valid." Nex straightens in his seat. "Issue 6 will indeed be the last Issue of My Life is Super and it will deal with the threat of the Gene Stealers. At the same time, it acts as a prologue to the threat of the Ring. There is a very high level plan of a much shorter series that occurs after a significant time skip after the end of My Life is Super to will finally answer several questions and includes the ending of Caleb's story. These questions are many but they will include things like who the Ring truly is and Caleb's true origins."

Peter blew out his cheeks and let out a held breath slowly. "Whoa... Big reveal there, Nex. Still, that's a lot of ground to cover in one issue. Will it be as big as this one?"

"Possibly. Possibly bigger. I am still planning the progression of the story and needless to say that it may still be a while before I am comfortable writing let alone publishing Issue 6."

Peter nods. "I guess to ask another question everyone's been thinking. Were you always going to kill of Caleb?"

"Yes. I most definitely was. All the way back from Issue 1, my goal was to make this series all about superhero tropes and one of those tropes is indeed that the hero 'dies' and comes back stronger or better than ever. I knew Caleb had to die to make that happen but at the time, I wasn't sure how I wanted it to happen. It actually wasn't until Issue 3 that I started to really come up with a solid plan and that involved Leon, the sort of forgotten twin brother. The idea of Caleb coming in between David and Leon during a critical juncture was formed quickly after that but it was always difficult trying to figure out exactly how Caleb would die or who would really carry the blame. That's why in the scene, you don't actually see Caleb getting killed only that it was mentioned he died before the building crashed around him. How dealt the fatal blow is left to interpretation."

"I think you threw a few red herrings at people during the story," Noah accused. "You hinted many times that Jacob would try to fill the role of the prophecy and then you blatantly told us that Mary would be the one that's destined to die. Were these intended?"

"Totally but not for the reason you're thinking. It all comes down to what Jacob says in his confrontation with Arcturus and indeed in his little side chapter. Foreknowledge and trust. Jacob knew he couldn't avoid certain things because to achieve the best outcome, he has to make those tough choices. It hurt him and left him conflicted but he made those choices nonetheless. He couldn't alter key factors like someone dying but he could alter who died. It was rather insidious of him to blatantly point out as well that Caleb getting in between two people is a surefire way to get killed. You could interpret that as him trying to keep Caleb from dying or further emphasising his fate because, as we know, at that stage in his life, Caleb was trying to go against what people were telling him to do. The key takeaway is that while someone was meant to die, it was very much up in the air on who it would be. While the gods had their plans, Jacob was moving his own pieces into position. There's a reason why he didn't end the Gimp's assault sooner or even rush to aid Caleb right after he defeated the Gimp. He knew what would happen and purposefully chose not to act because this was the ending he wanted."

"I guess that brings me neatly to my question," Seraph begins. "Arcturus clearly had his plans as well. If things had gone his way, would it really have ended the Gene Stealer threat?"

Nex bobs his head from side to side. "Yes and no. In the original draft - and this is the original original - Arcturus was meant to sacrifice his divinity to bring Caleb back. Caleb would have been in Paradise at that point and bringing him back would have left him a sort of semi-catatonic state as he laments over being brought back into a terrible world plagued by conflict when he was basically in Heaven. Many members of the family would try to bring him out of it but it would only be when Leon returns after hearing of his brother's resurrection that he'd snap out of it and promise to save his brother. Remember, this was the original draft when Leon wasn't a triple agent and was just a pure Gene Stealer whose actions would lead to Caleb's demise. However, when I brought in Jacob and the No Ones, that plot didn't make sense anymore. When Jacob mentions that Arcturus' original plan would have ended the Gene Stealer threat, it was in reference to that original plot. A little in-universe fourth-wall breaking if you want."

"Damn," Spider Queen laughs. "Don't think anyone who didn't know would've gotten that but thanks for sharing. Next question." She coughs softly. "Arcturus as Ryan. Was that always the plan? And what the hell is with the picture that Chimera was holding?"

Nex laughs. "Yet another twist. Some readers have already deduced the truth behind who Chimera really is and how he has come into possession of that picture. I did this on purpose so that the eventual reveal isn't so shocking but makes sense. But to answer your original question, Arcturus was always meant to be Ryan. It was something I had planned for a long time since Arcturus' introduction. The thing is, Arcturus was actually meant to have a complicated relationship not only with David but Lance as well. He was meant to still hold feelings for David from his previous life but as the Hound of Death, have developed feelings for Lance. However, that just became extremely convoluted so I scrapped the whole 'loving your son but also loving you' thing and just had Arcturus' actions revolve solely around David. The funny thing is, Arcturus rarely made a showing in this Issue and yet his actions had such a big impact."

"That's true," laughs the elegant woman. "Last question from me and I guess one that's pretty standard at this point: what's next?"

Nex lifts a paw. "First let me say this: Issue 6 will come when it comes. This Issue was so big I had to take a break about halfway through to make sure that everything lined up well enough and that I could recharge. I'm going to need to take a break from My Life is Super before I get back to it again. So please be patient. I'll get to it when I can. I write to inspire and to entertain. I don't do it for money or popularity. In short, Issue 6 will come when it comes.

"Now to answer your question, I have two projects already in the works. The first is the second 'part' of The Perfect Pair which deals with swim wear. Look out for that in the future. The next is the second 'season' of the Overworld Series which started with Independent. I've finally decided on the title of the season which will be 'Relevant'. Stay tuned for both of these this year. I might touch on Changing Times again which spawned the Woodfather Series and after that, we shall see!"

Nex claps his paws together and turns towards the audience.

"We now reach the last segment of our show today and that's the portion where I welcome the audience to ask any questions they may have and myself or the cast will be happy to answer. So I open the floor to you, my readers and watchers.

"But before we go, I hope you enjoyed My Life is Super Issue 5. It was a pleasure to write it and certainly a pleasure to hear your comments."