#across the rubicon

[samtrapani]

new vegas has a lot of insanely interesting concepts of characters but honestly nothing tops joshua graham. like it is so interesting he starts as an intelligent missionary who will probably lead the community, to a travelling preacher with his translator friend who decides he can take the mantle of an emperor, to the right hand of justice and the self-proclaimed wrath of both caesar and the lord. 

joshua’s entire life being wrapped in violence of two kinds of assimilation: one religious, and the other cultural. joshua, who does not and has never worn the armor of the legion, who trains boys and brainwashes them and breaks them because a faulty weapon is useless in this empire they’ve built. 

joshua, who fucks up at least once, but then caesar decides to make an example of him. if the right hand of caesar is not exempt from punishment, why should the rest of his legion be? and caesar couldn’t have just given him a firing squad execution. it had to be big. it had to be public.

joshua, who survived being lit on fire and tossed down the grand canyon. who walked to survival, all burnt flesh and agony, like a sinner on the path of redemption. joshua, who is inherently evil and cannot change, who is a warmonger at heart no matter how the courier thinks they can persuade him. joshua is a monster. joshua assimilates tribes and breaks them, and turns peaceful people into violent ones. joshua will never escape the legion or himself, because he was a zealot all along. he wanted to be god’s mouth, god’s revolver, god’s firstborn son.  and even after the courier goes, the burned man stays. the malpais legate stays. malpais meaning ‘rough country, badlands, a place where lava flows, burnt land’. the fire inside him burned bright, but it is not the gentle crackle of the hearth, it is a wildfire, all-consuming.

joshua is a terrible, vengeful creature. and no matter what happens in zion, it is all he ever will be. 

[knackeredforever]

Is it a controversial opinion that despite the fact I love armored core 6 I don’t like armored cores ice skate approach to mech leg movement.

I want to see those legs move not just skid across the floor with jet boosters.

[simpingforcreamsoda]

The Spectacular Solar-Spider!

Hollywood superstar turned superhero! Ever since being bit by a spider fused with energy from an ancient meteor, Corona Kiddo has lived a double life as a web-slinging, wall-climbing, perfect memory and action mimicry-having (what? Taskmaster doesn’t have a monopoly!) crime fighter, making sure the sun over the streets shines brighter than the silver screen!

(This is an AU of my JoJo’s Bizarre Adventure fanpart/elsewhere fic, Rubicon Crossroads. May add more to this later, I was inspired out of the blue)

[doolallymagpie]

Alright, GK bolter and sword, one of my many Primaris marines as a body, probably some ‘nid bits as trophies, only real problem I foresee is “do I have a sufficiently ‘Bobbie Draper’ head in the bits box?”

The answer is “probably, somewhere”

[itsbenedict]

so in an effort to be slightly less out-of-touch, i went and watched all of Skibidi Toilet the other day. (at present, the whole series is about the length of a feature film, so this wasn't too big a lift.)

what surprised me is just... how totally normal it was. like, it's not at all difficult to describe. people big it up as this incomprehensible thing that's emblematic of a generation gap, but it's. not.

the plot is: there's toilets with human heads in them that go "skibidi dom dom dom yes yes, skibidi dabbadul neef neef". they can move despite a lack of ambulatory appendages. this is wacky and unsettling, but the chief question is: Do They Win In A Fight Against Some Robots With Cameras For Heads?

it's an action movie about a war against an alien invasion. that's it. less than the first thirty seconds of it are anarchic GMod YTP insanity- it develops a plot almost immediately. the plot is paper-thin and conveyed almost entirely without dialogue, existing to set up giant robot fights and zombie apocalypse jumpscares.

who are these factions? why are they fighting? you aren't failing to get it because the kids these days are on some totally different psychic wavelength. the show simply does not give a shit about this question. here are some bad guys! here are some good guys! they're going to do explosions and punches at each other for roughly two minutes until the perspective camera is abruptly destroyed in the crossfire somehow.

it is a remarkably competently-shot action movie. the fight scenes are weighty and satisfying and have lots of exciting little twists and turns as the two sides pull increasingly bigger weapons and gadgets out of their asses. the production gets more elaborate over time, and it's a pretty stellar example of what machinima is capable of. genuinely good at the things it's trying to do.

it does kinda fall down a little later, as it attempts to develop Characters and Deepest Lore after kind of not caring about that for most of its runtime. the decision to have "dialogue" almost exclusively in the form of incomprehensible heavily-filtered backwards speech with no subtitles is probably rewarding for die-hard Skibidi-heads who have the time on their hands to mess with the audio and uncover all the hidden messages, but it means you are not going to understand anything anyone is saying on a normal watch.

the action suffers from this decision a little bit towards the end, as for reasons that completely fail to come across, the toilets appear to have broken into their own factions and start fighting each other and forming various alliances, which disrupts the simplicity of the setup and makes it hard to determine who's winning a fight at any given time. a giant scary toilet man just exploded! was that bad, or good? listen, don't worry about it. all you need to know is that these things are going to keep happening until DaFuqBoom gets bored.

it's like a... 7/10, shallow but enjoyable. easy to see why kids like it. not going to give you any deeper insights into the Kids These Days, but there's worse ways to spend a couple hours.

(the most confusing thing to me is how something this straightforward got a reputation for crossing some sort of rubicon of cultural alienation. did everyone born in the 20th century who talks about this show just watch eighteen seconds of it and give up???)

[technofeudalism]

2.48 million dead babies in 46 countries as a direct result of Nestle's push for baby formula in the third world? hey, everyone makes mistakes. can't hold it against 'em.

child slave labor? that gives me cheap delicious chocolate treats. i can overlook child slavery for that reason alone. not really a big deal.

robbing Indigenous lands and drought-stricken areas of their water all across the globe, leading them to have no water to drink and leaving families having to use buckets for washing and using the toilet? my tap water tastes a little icky, bottled just tastes better.

poisoning people and the earth with endless amounts of plastic being pumped into brains and guts and bloodstreams and rivers and lakes and oceans? who knows! maybe plastic is secretly good for us!

but what i cannot and will not accept is denying mothers maternity leave so they will buy Nestle products. revolution time. this is what will make me never see Nestle the same again. the mere idea of a corporation engaging in lobbying makes me sick.

i mean yeah, corporate lobbying has totaled $37 billion in the last 10 years and broke a record in 2024, but this specific instance of corporate lobbying against women receiving a benefit that should literally be guaranteed to them by law by the federal government anyway by arguably the world's most evil company over a product that in most cases shouldn't even exist in the first place is my rubicon moment. straw, meet camel's back.

[reasonsforhope]

The loss of life and impact on the communities in Helene’s path is unfathomable — and both the immediate and long-term needs are vast. 

If you’re reading this, it’s likely because you want to help and care about making a difference for those who’ve been impacted by Hurricane Helene.

You’re in the right place. When we see tragedy like this happen in the news, it’s important to not tune it out. Instead, pay attention and truly feel the heartbreak of it — t​​hen, look for and be inspired by the people stepping in to help, and use that energy to make a difference ourselves.

Looking for the helpers

Instead of turning away from tragic events like the devastation from Hurricane Helene — we look closer for people stepping in using what they have, where they are, to make a difference for others.

Inspired by Mister Rogers’ famous quote, we call them the “helpers,” — and they’re usually found wherever there’s bad news in the world. Hurricane Helene is no different. Here are some people, businesses, and organizations helping right now:

Chef José Andrés and ​World Central Kitchen teams are serving thousands of meals to communities in need — from Mexico, and the Big Bend of Florida, and into Appalachia.

Volunteer pilots with the Port City Aviators Flying Club are flying supplies to storm victims in western North Carolina.

The national Disaster Distress Helpline is providing free multilingual crisis counseling to those in need.

Southern Smoke Foundation, an organization that supports food & beverage workers in crisis, is providing financial support for groceries, medical bills, lost wages, and more.

Volunteers with veteran-led disaster response organization Team Rubicon are on the ground in Greenwood, South Carolina clearing roads of trees and debris.

A local library branch in Asheville, North Carolina served as a hub for community members in need of internet service.

Workers at Waffle House were “unlikely heroes” providing food to people in need.

A local Fox News correspondent stopped his live broadcast to help rescue a woman trapped in her car in rising floodwaters.

Emergency response teams rescued more than 50 staff, patients, and caregivers from the roof of a hospital in Erwin, Tennessee.

The SPCA of Brevard rescued 20 animals from Hurricane Helene’s path — and it’s now helping them get adopted.

‍

How to make a difference

After we’ve allowed ourselves to feel the weight of the pain and heartbreak associated with bad news, and look for hope and helpers in the midst of it — we always have the opportunity to join in and make a difference, too. 

Here are some ways to help — whether you’re local or far away:

Donate to national organizations 

Here are just a few large-scale organizations that have helpers on the ground in the region.

American Red Cross

World Central Kitchen

Feeding America

United Way

Salvation Army

CARE

Donate to local organizations

Local organizations, recovery funds, and mutual aid groups have been deployed across the states impacted by Helene. Find donation links and updates below:

All States:

GoFundMe Hub for Hurricane Helene Relief

Mutual Aid Disaster Relief

Southeast Climate & Energy Network

Convoy of Hope

Appalachia Funders Network

Americares

Organizing Resilience

The National Voluntary Organizations Active in Disaster

Tennessee:

East Tennessee Foundation

First Aid Collective Knoxville

RISE Erwin

Second Harvest Food Bank of East Tennessee

North Carolina:

North Carolina Community Foundation

Hearts With Hands

Manna Foodbank

BeLoved Asheville

Foothills Food Hub

Haywood Christian Ministry

Samaritan’s Purse

Forsyth Humane Society

Hope Mill

‍

Volunteer locally

Organizations in the affected area are seeking volunteers to help distribute resources and support crucial aid efforts. While many of us are not local to the region, those who are nearby are encouraged to join in a myriad of volunteer opportunities.

(Note: If you aren't in the area, the best way you can help is by supporting local efforts with a donation. Keeping roads clear for rescue crews and local relief agents is vital in maintaining safety in these already devastated regions).

For local volunteers, check out:

World Central Kitchen

Operation BBQ Relief

Marco Patriots

Operation Airdrop

Baptists on Mission

‍

Contact your elected officials and ask them to take climate action

Climate scientists agree, the intensity and extent of the devastation brought by Hurricane Helene was made worse by climate change. 

While we can’t go back in time and burn less fossil fuels — we can make a difference now to secure a safer future and prevent future climate disasters. 

In addition to talking about how this disaster is connected to climate change in our own conversations and holding media outlets accountable for how they talk about climate change — this is a great time to tell your elected officials that you want them to take meaningful climate action.

We’re making incredible progress in the U.S. and globally in reducing emissions, but we need to work even faster — and incorporate climate mitigation efforts into our plans — to limit the most severe impacts of global warming.

[mariacallous]

In less than a month, Donald Trump has come through on his promise to exact retribution on his enemies and to set about overhauling the federal government. Whole agencies are potentially being tossed, to use Elon Musk’s heedless language, into “the wood chipper.” To understate matters radically, Trump has sparked many debates. One of them is how close is the United States to a constitutional crisis: Are we headed toward one, on the brink, or already there?

If there is going to be a concerted resistance to Trump’s blizzard of executive actions, it will likely play out largely in courts across the country and, ultimately, in the Supreme Court. And if the Administration spurns court orders, what happens next will conceivably determine the fate of democracy and the rule of law in our time. Chief Justice John Roberts himself said in December, as the Biden Administration began closing shop and the incoming Trump Administration made its intentions increasingly clear, that in our current politics, we now live with the “specter of open disregard for federal court rulings.” And what would such a conflict look like with MAGA loyalists like Pam Bondi leading the Justice Department, Pete Hegseth leading the Department of Defense, and Kash Patel leading the F.B.I.? Some legal scholars recommend a keep-your-powder-dry attitude for the time being. But there has arguably not been such a potentially dramatic test of the country’s constitutional order since the Civil War era.

The American Civil Liberties Union, a major player in this drama, has been quick to file lawsuits on, among other issues, birthright citizenship, which the Administration seeks to eliminate. Anthony Romero, who is fifty-nine and grew up in public housing in the Bronx and later in New Jersey, has been the executive director of the A.C.L.U. since 2001. I spoke with him recently for The New Yorker Radio Hour. His sense of resolve and confidence were all in evidence. But if things go south and Trump defies the courts, he said, “we’ve got to shut down this country.” What does that mean? Our conversation has been edited for clarity and length.

Let’s begin with the most essential question, legal and political. Are we—less than a month into the Trump Administration—on the brink of a constitutional crisis?

I think we could very well be there. We’re at the Rubicon. Whether we’ve crossed it is yet to be determined.

Well, describe what the Rubicon is.

The Rubicon is the flagrant disabuse of judicial power. If the Trump Administration decides to run the gauntlet and openly defy a judicial order, in a way that is not about an appeal, it’s not about clarifying, it’s not about getting a congressional fix, but open defiance to a judicial order, then I think we’re there.

What are the issues where that’s a possibility?

Well, there are forty cases, so many of the issues could be the one that precipitates the Rubicon moment. There have been a bunch of lawsuits around the Department of Government Efficiency, and whether or not the DOGE and Elon Musk have overextended their power. There are some who say that they’re violating the Privacy Act; that they’re accessing personal identifiable information on American citizens—their Social Security numbers, their tax returns, all sorts of information that are in the government data banks. Now, whether or not they’ve actually accessed that, whether there’s harm, whether or not the individuals who are bringing cases have standing, those things are all to be determined by the judges.

Then there’s all the questions around shutting down, or the closure of grants from the federal government, from U.S.A.I.D. and other agencies. And there’s the “fork in the road” litigation.

And just to be clear, this is considered illegal by legal experts because—

Because Congress appropriates the money. It’s not in the President’s power to rewrite the appropriations from Congress.

You have the Vice-President of the United States saying that judges are not allowed to control the executive’s legitimate power. What say you, as the head of the A.C.L.U.?

“Legitimate”—that’s the word that jumped out at me. And that’s what we’re arguing about, whether it’s a legitimate use of executive-branch power. It’s not a new controversy. We’ve had these debates before. The unitary executive—remember that back in the days of George [W.] Bush? Of course, most Presidents have tried to exert a much more muscular approach to executive power than I think the courts or Congress often give them the room for.

Where do you think the Rubicon will be—on what issue and in what court?

The one I’m most worried about is birthright citizenship. That was the first executive order. That was the first case we filed, two hours after he signed it.

What does the Trump Administration want and what does the A.C.L.U. want?

They want to eliminate the right to citizenship if you are born here, which was established in the Fourteenth Amendment. It’s also in the statute. It’s how we created American citizens out of the children of slaves.

For us in the civil-rights community, this is hallowed ground. This is how we fixed that problem that we had in terms of chattel slavery, and how we made all of us citizens and so that the citizens included the children of slaves. It’s also the way that we became a nation of immigrants and levelled the playing field. It’s the great equalizer, David.

And so to go at it and say, in an executive order, I’m going to repeal birthright citizenship is both trying to undo a core tenet of the Bill of Rights and also the statutory provisions, which are equally clear. So we have belt and suspenders on when it comes to birthright citizenship, and they’re trying to rip them both off.

If birthright citizenship goes the direction that the Trump Administration wants it to, what are the repercussions and what are the actions that could follow?

Well, the repercussions are enormous. If they were allowed to repeal birthright citizenship, that means that even people who are here lawfully, and whose kid is born here, would not be a U.S. citizen. So take, for instance, two graduate students at Princeton who are here lawfully, and are endeavoring to make a life here. If their kid is born here, it wouldn’t necessarily mean that that child is entitled to birthright citizenship. So the implications are enormous.

Do we have any sense of the number of people that would be in jeopardy?

There would be hundreds of thousands. We have clients already in our litigation who are pregnant women, whose children would be born after the date of the executive order, whose citizenship would be called into question.

So siblings would be potentially rent apart, and parents and children would be rent apart as well.

And you would create a legal vehicle for intergenerational stigma and discrimination. In places like Germany or Japan, these countries still struggle with what it means to be a German citizen or Japanese citizen. You see the discrimination against Koreans in Japan. That’s because they haven’t had a concept like birthright citizenship, the way we do.

Who else has filed birthright-citizenship cases?

We have the attorneys general, we have many of them on the East Coast. I think there are two cases on the East Coast, one case on the West Coast. And the attorneys general are important contributions because they’re making arguments on behalf of their citizens not just because it implicates the citizens of their state—of New York State or New Jersey or Washington State. They’re making administrative arguments. How the hell are we supposed to implement this?

I looked at my birth certificate, and it basically said: Anthony D. Romero, son of Demetrio and Coralie Romero, born in New York City. There’s no vehicle for these states to corroborate the citizenship of the parents. How are they going to do the administrative investigations on whether or not you’re a citizen? It creates an enormous burden on the states to be able to do that. And so I think that’s why the attorneys general are so key in this litigation as well.

If you lose?

We ain’t going to lose.

O.K. But if you lose, that case would then be sent to the Supreme Court?

It would go up into the Federal Court of Appeals and then to the Supreme Court.

And knowing what you know about the Supreme Court, ideologically, politically—

I think we win.

You win anyway?

We win anyway.

Because you have to say that?

No, no. I’ve never been this bold. I’ve been in my job twenty-three years. I don’t usually predict the outcome of our cases, because my heart’s been broken multiple times.

And you don’t think your heart will be broken again?

No.

Why?

Because I think this is really, really going a step too far. [Samuel] Alito and [Clarence] Thomas are the only ones I can’t bet on, but I think even [John] Roberts, [Neil] Gorsuch, [Brett] Kavanaugh, and Amy Coney Barrett, and certainly the three liberals, are there at a point where the Supreme Court would eviscerate their legitimacy among constituents and audiences that really care.

Is your confidence specific to birthright citizenship or is it across the board?

No, it’s birthright citizenship. The rest of it is more up for grabs.

Where else could you locate a constitutional crisis that’s now happening, or in the process of happening?

Suits around congressional appropriation of funds that are now being disregarded by the executive branch—those very well could be the precipitating factor for a constitutional crisis.

What happens when and if there is a constitutional crisis? What happens if a White House refuses to obey a court order?

Well, then you’ve got to sue to implement it. I mean, we’ve been here before. We’ve had two different lawsuits, years ago, against Sheriff Joe Arpaio and Kris Kobach, both of whom refused to implement an A.C.L.U. order that we had won in litigation. [Maricopa County] Sheriff Joe Arpaio was someone who was trying to round up immigrants in Arizona. He was corralling people up and having Gestapo-like law-enforcement efforts focussed on immigrants. [Kansas Attorney General] Kris Kobach was the one who was trying to purge people from the polls.

And both of these individuals we sued, and we won, and they didn’t like the fact that we won. They tried to defy these court orders in both of those instances, and so you sue to implement your rulings. You would threaten them with fines and threaten them with incarceration. Ultimately—

You’re going to do that with the President of the United States?

You bet.

We’ve seen the Republican Party become the party of Trump. They are well aware that if they defy Trump in any way, they’re going to lose their seat. Doesn’t give you a lot of confidence, does it?

Look at the Supreme Court. Six to three. It has been a generational shift in the consolidation of conservative power in the Supreme Court. If I’m a good old conservative, I’m not going to fritter away that power. Why would I immediately allow my Supreme Court or my federal judges to be diminished in their status and power?

And you will, in the process, though, defy the President who puts you on your seat?

I think there will be moments when good people of conscience will stand up. I do.

So what stands between us and the ruination of the Constitution is the conscience of good people?

The conscience of good people, the work of good people. The judges are the front line right now. It’s not people in the streets as much. It’s really the judges who are playing a critical role in this effort.

Do you sense, in the political and public world, any politicians who are forcefully, clearly, and effectively speaking up for what you are talking about?

I’m looking.

You’re looking?

I’m looking, I’m listening.

And not finding any yet?

There’s a lot of mumbling. You see the articles about how some Democrats are trying to find their feet under them.

What’s the problem?

I think they’re still a little bit in shock. I don’t have to run for office. I don’t have to be popular. When I file my transgender-rights lawsuit, I don’t need fifty-one per cent of the American people to agree with me. I know what’s right; the equal-protection arguments are what’s right.

Yeah, but let me ask you a question: If they’re not going to stand up now, when will they stand up? And for what?

It’s a great question.

Are you despairing of it?

No, I think it comes around. I compare this moment, David, to the 9/11 moment. That’s when I started my job, the week before 9/11. You remember the Patriot Act was enacted with everyone’s assent in Congress except for one, Russ Feingold.

And so I told my folks back at the A.C.L.U.: this is a time where you have to ride this moment, just like we did after 9/11. We have to build public momentum. The war on terror was very popular. The deportations that former Attorney General John Ashcroft did, the creation of Gitmo as a place to hold people and detain them . . .

Gitmo is about to get a new lease on life, potentially.

They’re going to try. We’re litigating that one, too.

We’ve already seen ICE scoop up U.S. citizens and immigrants not convicted of crimes. What’s the legal path to protect people in schools and churches and day-care centers from the threat of deportation?

Well, there are sanctuary-city laws and sanctuary-jurisdiction laws that are in fact—

Which are the source of contempt for the Republican Party.

Yeah. And they can be defended. It’s important that, for instance, the litigation they’re bringing against the City of Chicago, we think is really far afield. They cannot use the power of the purse and pulling money from roads and hospitals and schools to pressure them on immigration. That’s got to be challenged in court. The governors and the state attorneys general, especially in the blue states, have enormous power to put up roadblocks.

You find that they’re feeling their sense of authority, or are they backing off?

I think some of the governors are beginning to find their sense of authority—in Colorado and New Mexico.

How about New York?

In New York, we’re working on it.

“We’re working on it.” You’re not confident in Governor [Kathy] Hochul?

Well, I think the Governor is really working with us. I think the mayor is a bit more complicated on the immigrants’-rights issue.

Eric Adams, in New York City.

I think it’s complicated.

“Complicated” is a euphemism for what?

For not what we’d like it to be.

For not standing up. [Laughs.]

For not what we want it to be.

One of the characteristics of the moment we’re living in is the absolute speed and volume of what’s coming out of the White House—what Steve Bannon called “flood the zone with shit.” That’s the strategy and it’s being enacted with real efficiency and real skill as compared to the first term.

But the zone is responding. There are more than fifty or so executive orders that have come down. There are more than forty lawsuits that have been filed in response. I’m really quite impressed with the ecosystem of groups that have been involved. The A.C.L.U. can’t do it alone. A group like Democracy Forward is an excellent group doing outstanding work on many of the issues that we don’t cover. There are groups of attorneys general, as you mentioned, the blue-state attorneys general. It’s really quite a different moment. People realize that the zone is being flooded and it requires us to coördinate with each other in a way I haven’t seen before.

You sound pretty confident.

I’m not sure I’m confident in the ultimate outcome. I’m confident in the response that we’re engaged with. We have filed over ten lawsuits already in three weeks.

One of the major, major cultural issues that came up during the election—and this is very much in your wheelhouse—is free speech. The A.C.L.U. has fought for the free speech of leftist students on campus as well as somebody like Ann Coulter. Your traditional defense of the First Amendment is bipartisan, but when a gazillionaire like Elon Musk buys a social-media platform and brings Nazis back to it, and appears to do a very strange salute on television, how does the A.C.L.U. absorb that?

I think the same principles apply, right? It’s just that we have to make sure that the government stays out of the business of regulating people’s private speech. That is probably my biggest concern right now, that hasn’t yet materialized or matured. But it may.

Were you comfortable with the way Facebook and Twitter barred certain people from—

No. We criticized Facebook and Twitter when they de-platformed Donald Trump. I mean, they kept people like [Jair] Bolsonaro and [Viktor] Orbán on, but they de-platformed Trump. We felt that they were not calling balls and strikes as they saw them. And we criticized them in real time, and we applauded them when they re-platformed them.

So are you pleased that, say, Mark Zuckerberg has changed his policy on Facebook?

Facebook is afforded a lot of latitude because it’s a private entity—the right to set its terms of service. That’s part of the free-speech kind of framework.

And you see it as a platform or as a publisher?

I see it as a platform. And there are parts of it when they’re pushing the algorithm out, and it’s both a platform and a publisher. And that’s why I think they can have a different set of rules applying to different parts of these companies. The algorithm is more like a publisher, and so you have to scrutinize it differently. But the terms of service—in terms of the individual user, and the ability to post one’s content, even when it’s hateful or not aligned with the A.C.L.U.’s values—has also got to be secure.

Let me go back to your trust or confidence in the courts. A federal judge called out the Trump Administration for blatantly ignoring an order to resume federal funding for the Office of Management and Budget that had been frozen. What can you do if Trump simply ignores the judges, and doesn’t want to listen to anybody, and just directs his people to keep doing what they’re doing? What possible authority or power does anyone have in this, much less the A.C.L.U.?

I think you keep running the gantlet. Basically, the Trump Administration is arguing not that we don’t have to heed you. They argue in their response to the judge: no, we are heeding you, we think your order was more limited. The judge then clarified, I think on Monday, saying that no, he had meant for them to reinstate all the grants writ large. And so this will continue to move up the food chain.

The crisis moment comes when the Supreme Court rules and says, The Trump Administration has flagrantly disregarded a clear judicial order, and thou must comply. And if they don’t comply, then we’re in a different moment.

I realize I’m repeating myself, but: play that moment out.

We have to exhaust all the remedies. We have to get fines. We have to ask for incarceration of individuals who flagrantly disregard judicial orders.

And that includes?

And that includes the federal-agency heads.

And it also includes the President of the United States, does it not?

He himself or the Vice-President? Sure, sure. No one’s above the law, right? Now, if we do not succeed, let’s say no one comes—the cavalry doesn’t ride—

Then what?

Then we’ve got to take to the streets in a different way. We’ve got to shut down this country.

What does that mean?

We’re just beginning to think it through. We’re talking with colleagues and other organizations. There’s got to be a moment when people of good will will just say, This is way too far.

What’s the historical precedent for that anywhere?

Well, there have been efforts. Marbury v. Madison—the case in which the government tried to snub its nose at the role of the Supreme Court. The Supreme Court was not yet as powerful or as established an institution as today. You also had F.D.R., who tried to pack the Court. It’s not new that Presidents bristle at judicial oversight. Clinton passed some of the most egregious court-stripping measures, like the law on prison reform, where he basically tried to get the courts out of the business of looking at prisoners’-rights cases or immigrants’-rights cases.

But I can just hear the listener’s mind saying, O.K., that was Bill Clinton, and that was bad enough. This is a person, an executive, a politician of a very, very different order.

Totally agree. And we’ve got to take it one step at a time.

When you say “shut the country down” and take to the streets, who’s doing that? Because I have to tell you, this time around, so far—and we’re not even a month into this—the number of people that you sense have decided things are so complicated, difficult, or awful, and have decided to shut politics out of their mind—“I’m not watching the news,” you hear this—is alarming.

It is alarming, but it’s also true that it’s evolving. I mean, for instance, we had a town hall recently. Fifty thousand people turned up. Largest number ever, even compared to Trump One.

It’s a self-selecting group, though.

Yeah, but that still shows you that there’s more energy there. There’s more of a heartbeat. I wouldn’t give up on the patient just yet. There’s more of a pulse.

Let’s go back to the phrase “shut the country down” that you used. What does that mean?

I think you have to call on, for instance, corporate leaders. We’ll have to yank them into the pool with us if they believe that part of what is going to protect good corporate interests or the workings of the economy is the rule of law. There’s got to be a moment when people are saying, Can you countenance this?

President Biden had a number of instances when he bristled at judicial oversight and judicial review. He hated the effort to shut down his student-loan program. It’s one of his signature programs. He never got it through, because the courts got in his way.

But it’s really quite another matter when there’s a final order, from the highest court of the land, and the President just says, Doesn’t bother me. I don’t have to heed you or hear you. That is a moment when I think we’ll be able to harvest the opinions of people, and get people engaged in a very different way.

One of the instruments for mobilization is communication—information, the press. We’ve seen, in the last weeks, a lot of outlets of the press pay obeisance as well.

Sure. The settlements.

And what does that tell you?

Well, that means that we’ve had to help them find their spine.

It’s located in the back. It connects the brain to the rest of the body.

And it can be reinforced with a steel rod. With or without anesthesia. But I think it will have to come, David. And I think—

Haven’t the courts, though, changed in recent years? Donald Trump had time to install a lot of—

Twenty-eight per cent of the federal judges are Trump appointees.

And have you sensed that difference in your cases?

Sure, sure. They’re on the bench and sometimes they watch his back, and sometimes they rule in ways that are kind of head-scratching in terms of how far they will go to protect the person who put them on the bench. It’s also true that sixty-five per cent of the judges have been appointed by Obama and Biden. So there’s a larger number of them. That will change as they start to move judicial appointments.

I mean, what’s in front of us? I mean, let’s talk a little bit about what else might be in front of us that’s not just the onslaught of the executive orders. This is where I’m going to curl, or uncurl, your listeners’ hair.

We have not yet seen the mass deportations that I think are on the horizon. I think the number I’ve seen is somewhere between five and six thousand people in the first two weeks. It’s about half the number of the deportations that you saw in the last year of Biden. I don’t believe it’s just smoke and mirrors on this one. I do think they’re going to run the gantlet on deportations. When they start revving up that machinery, that’s going to be massive. So that’s No. 1. I think the deportations is something to watch out for.

Have you looked at the polls on how people favor deportations?

Yeah, but when they start seeing that their nannies or their gardeners or their fellow-workers or the local shoeshine guy—

Or their neighbors—

Or their neighbors are getting ripped up, and that U.S. citizen kids are put in family protective services as a result of it, when they start seeing . . . Because what they ran on was saying, We’re going to get rid of the criminals. Well, that’s clearly not what they’re doing already. When they really ramp up and they start grabbing all these individuals who are part of the social fabric, I think we’ll harvest that.

You’re suing the Trump Administration for an executive order forcing passports to reflect gender assigned at birth, which has laid out a binary definition of gender. What’s the point of Trump making that claim, and how do you form a legal case against it, and him?

It’s fearmongering. It’s a card that he played in the election. You saw the ads he ran. “She is for they/them, I’m for you.” It was clear fearmongering against a community, 1.5 million people, who are really under assault. You have over five hundred state laws that have been targeted at the trans community. It’s really an onslaught the likes of which we haven’t seen in generations.

On matters of speech: Would the A.C.L.U. today defend the right of American Nazis to march in Skokie, Illinois? [In 1977, the A.C.L.U. defended the National Socialist Party of America, which applied for a permit to march in Skokie, home to more than forty thousand Jews, including many survivors of the Holocaust.]

You bet. We just took the N.R.A. case a year ago. The N.R.A. came to us saying, You are the best litigation organization on free speech. And I said, O.K., I’ll take over your case. You are the client. We are the lawyers. We will argue for the N.R.A. in the Supreme Court. This was a case of Governor [Andrew] Cuomo and the administration trying to shut down the N.R.A. because they didn’t agree with its pro-gun policies. And we saw it as a free-speech issue, and we brought that case and won, 9–0, in the Supreme Court.

How does the A.C.L.U. feel about cases at, say, universities where protesters shut down a speaker?

No, the heckler’s veto is a problem. You have a right to free speech, but you don’t have a right to shut down information, debate, discussions. There are limits.

Finally, what are the main challenges now in front of the A.C.L.U.?

We are going to see a scaling up of deportation efforts. I think they will come for the millions of undocumented people in our communities. And that will rip apart the social fabric.

Congress has been on the sidelines. Congress can get into this game, to our detriment. The Republican Party controls both houses of Congress. When Congress starts rolling out its version of the avalanche of executive orders that we’ve seen—in terms of a federal abortion ban, any of the efforts to defund Planned Parenthood; there’s a whole bunch of revising of the nation’s immigration laws through statute—that could be quite a moment.

The third one would be, of course, the issues around defying a judicial order that I think we are already looking at and trying to anticipate. But when those elements come, I think that we’ll have really a very different debate in this country.

One of the seminal texts that’s been published in the past decade, warning about authoritarianism, is Timothy Snyder’s “On Tyranny.” And he warns against knuckling under in advance, and warning against exhaustion. Do you see that? Or do you see the opposite?

Knuckling under in advance? You see that in other places. I mean, look, that’s what a lot of these tech leaders, that beautiful parade of billionaires who were preening for the camera behind the President as he took the oath of office. Now, I know some of them personally, and I know that some of them were there because they felt they had to defend their corporate interests, their shareholder interests.

But I think there, you definitely see the knuckling under in the private sector. I think the fatigue factor is a matter of pacing ourselves.

Is it possible to pace yourself considering the ferocity and speed at which things are happening?

You’ve got to retain bandwidth. If we run the gantlet and we file all the cases that we need to right now, and then don’t have the ability to file them in years two, three, and four, we’ll do the country no good. We have to play this game smartly. And we are picking and choosing our battles. 

[mswyrr]

Season 1 has its writing issues, but it accomplished some major character work with Rhaenyra. It took her across a moral threshold and changed some core components of how she relates to others. She begins the season paralleled with Helaena. But she ends the season paralleled with Aemond and Daemon. IMO, the Red Sowing was a major moral Rubicon crossed - and she's changed in permanent, fundamental ways. That was the goal of this season. Partly the reaction to the season is due to how this kind of internal character work isn't usually the focus of Fantasy; it's more common in "realistic" dramas.

First, the comparisons with Helaena. They mourn their sons in visually similar ways, clutching an item of clothing/blanket of the child's.

Then Rhaenyra repudiates the idea that she wanted Jaehaerys' head, specifically by mentioning this similarity and empathy with her little sister:

It's after this scene that she confronts Daemon and rejects his "a son for a son" logic. Then we get the final visual parallel. Both sisters look up and see (in flower petals and dust) the ash that will rain down on the kingdom due to the destruction of a dragon fire war. They're both disturbed by it. Early in the season, Rhaenyra tried to do all she could to prevent that future. By the end of the season, though, she has wholly embraced it.

By the time we get to the Red Sowing (2x07), Rhaenyra has changed her mind - she embraced the fire. Burning people alive for power. She might have introduced the "seeds" to Silverwing, who wouldn't have slaughtered them. But she chose Vermithor. She chose their deaths. And the power felt good. It pushed back the fear and trauma of the early season. As Emma put it:

What is going through Rhaenyra’s mind as she watches the Targaryen bastards be devoured and torched alive? "I think she feels like a god. I think she feels super proud." [interview source] [and major credit to darksvster's meta, which gives full details of where Rhaenyra is at in this episode]

Not only does that happen - but in the next episode, her brother Aemond does the same thing. Massacring people and looking down at it, feeling like a god. Feeling powerful again, after having been made to feel powerless by running up against Rhaenyra's new dragonriders at the end of 2x07.

The visual parallel is as stark as the ones earlier in the season were with Helaena:

They're not being subtle. She is being positioned opposite a brother - a mirror to her enemy - it's just not Aegon, as some people want. But it makes sense that it's the brother driven enough to *take* the crown against the rules of this society - the position of first born noble daughters and second sons has been compared since season 1. They're so close to being the one with the rights to power and yet there's a barrier.

Both of these siblings have crossed that barrier. They will take what this society will not give them. They will take it with fire and blood.

As we see in the next parallel with Aemond. They literally are twinned in two scenes where an as yet untainted female family member challenges them on their policy of burning cities of innocent people:

My final note is that now Rhaenyra is on the same page as Daemon as well. She repudiated his behavior earlier in the season, but now she embraces his return and embraces his core logic. She uses his words, his phrase in a scene where imo we are meant to notice that--while love is still there-- she's being much more cruel to Alicent than she would have ever been in the past:

Daemon has changed in the fact that he will recognize her as the reigning queen, but his morality has not changed. Rhaenyra's has - she is now of a similar mindset as Daemon and Aemond. She uses religion--and her conversations with Mysaria about caring for the smallfolk--to justify it to herself and she believes herself righteous. But the actions and their consequences (people burned alive) are the same. And for the same goal of power.

They are doing all of this so artfully--keeping us so tightly in Rhaenyra's pov where she feels justified as she crosses this moral Rubicon--that it can be difficult to see without pulling back and looking at the clues, the shifting parallels, and the ways her behavior by the end of the season is truly, in pivotal ways, not what it would have once been.

[kinardsevan]

wip Thursday

tagged by the effervescent @perfectlysunny02, and in the same vein as them, don't I have a million WIPs? Yes, yes I do. But also, I mentioned this idea last week. And... well... oops? (And it's entirely their fault because of the violence they chose with THEIR teaser today.)

Alas, I give you unnecessary, momentary, legendary (working title)

-

Tommy wasn’t supposed to be here. That’s all he could think about; he wasn’t supposed to be here. 

He’d had a full day of plans while Evan was on shift. He was supposed to stop by Harbor and pick up a package he’d had shipped there and forgot to bring home the night before. He was supposed to have lunch with Howie and Jee-Yun. He was supposed to swing by the 118 and swap keys with Evan because something was going on with the Rubicon’s engine. He was supposed to spend the afternoon figuring out if it was going to be an easy fix or not. Evan would be home before sunset. 

He wasn’t supposed to be here. 

Except, Evan was back at work after being down with a nasty virus for the past few days, and the only thing that had really been helping him feel better was the honey citrus tea from their favorite café. It wasn’t even a drink that his boyfriend cared for that much, but Tommy had introduced it to him the first time he’d gotten sick a few months into their relationship, and it had been a game changer for him. It wasn’t a cure by any means, but it definitely helped. 

He wasn’t supposed to be here. 

“Natalie?” He croaks out her name, leaning half up off of the tile floor, hand pressed into his abdomen next to his hip. He can’t see her behind the glass casing that contains the pastries, and she hasn’t said anything in a few minutes. The higher he tries to sit himself up, the more pain shoots down his side. “Nat!?” 

It takes more than a few seconds, but eventually—too long—he hears the sound of what he assumes is broken glass shifting on the floor. A small whimper. 

“T-Tommy?” 

“Nat?” He calls back, turning his head towards the back of the counter again. “Are you okay? Did he hurt you?” 

She doesn’t respond, but then he sees the familiar flurry of jello-red hair appear from behind the pastry case, and then she’s climbing over the counter, her combat boots crunching glass on the floor as she moves towards him. Tommy looks up at her, his paramedic skills immediately kicking in as he takes her in. 

She’s got a cut on her forehead and her hands are bleeding—he assumes from all the broken glass. There’s a slash across her forearm where the knife got her, bleeding pretty decently. His eyes trail down to the side of her apron, the stain spreading across it and her jeans. She’s bleeding from somewhere on her leg. His gaze drifts to the counter and the streak of blood coming across it where she crawled over. 

“N-Nat, we gotta call the cops,” he tells her warily. 

“What if he comes back,” she asks anxiously, her voice shaking as tears come down her face. She sinks to the ground next to him, ignorant of the glass on the ground around him. 

Tommy shakes his head at her, digging into his pocket with blood-coated fingers, fumbling his phone when his fingers come into contact with it. He pulls it out as he looks back up at her. 

“You gave him everything, right,” he asks her. “Didn’t fight?” 

“No,” she sobs, leaning over him. “God, Tommy, I’m so sorry.” 

He shakes his head at her, reaching for one of the napkin holders knocked onto the floor nearby. 

“I’m just glad you’re okay,” he tells her. He keeps flashing hot and cold, and he can feel himself getting clammy. He tries to focus his attention on his phone, dialing the number into it. 

“Tommy, you’re bleeding,” she cries. 

“I’m fi-…fine,” he stammers, slumping back against the floor. “We’re fine.” 

“9-1-1, what’s your emergency?” 

“5943 Ventura Boulevard,” he rattles off. “This is off-duty Rescue 1701 out of Harbor Station, I need to be transferred to Maddie Buckley.” 

“Just a moment sir.” The line clicks off for all of ten seconds, and then clicks back on. 

“9-1-1, this is Maddie Buckley speaking,” her voice comes back. There’s just the slightest hitch of anxiety in her voice, like she knows being routed to personally isn’t normal. 

“Maddie,” he rasps, squeezing his eyes shut tightly, trying to get the tears out of them. 

“Tommy,” she replies, her voice suddenly flooded with panic. “What’s going on? Is Evan- a-are you- is Howie-…” 

“They’re fine,” he chokes out. “B-but, I need RA and police. S-Stabbing at the café.” 

His head drops back against the floor, and he can feel his vision getting fuzzy. He looks over at Natalie. She looks even more panicked than she did before. His gaze drifts down to where his other hand is. Blood is completely coated over his fingers. 

“N-Nat, I need you to use your apron to apply pressure,” he rasps. 

“Stabbing?! Tommy where are you,” Maddie cries from the other end of the line. Tommy rattles the address off to her again. 

“D-dont send Evan,” he rasps at her. “God, he can’t find me. You hear me, Maddie? Don’t send him. Do not let him see me like this.” 

She hiccups a cry on the other end of the line, and there are hushed voices clearly trying to get her off the line, but she speaks clearly enough that Tommy hears when she growls ‘no’ back at whoever is trying to get her to hand the call off. 

“You know I love him, right,” he continues. Natalie presses her apron into his side then and he can’t help the cry that falls out of his mouth. “F-fuck. M-Maddie?” 

“I know,” she cries. “Stay with me, Tommy. Don’t hang up on me.” 

He nods letting his head rest back against the floor. 

“No, come on, Tommy,” Natalie cries, pressing harder into his wounds. “Come on. Stay awake.” 

“Trying,” he murmurs, looking around the floor. “I-I, I want to marry him, you know,” he tells Maddie. “He just walked into my life like- like he was always supposed to be here. And I thought I’d lost out on my chance by taking too long to figure my shit out. Fuck, Nat. Yeah, that’s good, keep pushing down.” 

“He talks about you being it for him all the time,” Maddie replies. He can tell she’s crying. “Keeps telling me that he thinks you’ll be a great dad.” 

Tommy lets out a small laugh and then groans at the wave of pain that shoots across his abdomen and stomach. 

“I wasn’t sure, before him,” he replies, letting his eyes slip shut. The phone starts to sag in his hand, but the cry of Natalie’s voice and sudden, sharp pressure on his side has his eyes shooting open again. “Fuck, okay. Okay.” He swallows hard, taking a breath. “B-but if anyone could convince me that we could do it together, it’s him.” 

Maddie hiccups another sob. “I’ve watched him lose one relationship after another, think what he’s holding onto is the right one while knowing it isn’t. But I never said anything because I was just his sister, you know? And I know you said he walked into your life, but you spun into his with a literal hurricane and I’ve never seen him… I don’t even know, Tommy. This settled? Happy? Secure?” 

“H-he deserves it,” Tommy rasps, his head lolling back and eyes getting heavier. 

“Damn it, Tommy, come on,” Natalie cries. “Stay awake, please.” 

“s’getting harder,” Tommy slurs. “Maddie, I love him. So much more than I’ve ever loved anyone else. Want him more, dream about him more, choose him more. My life begins and ends at Evan Buckley.” The tears swimming in his eyes finally slip down the side of his face, his vision tight now, and extremely hazy. 

“Tommy, stay with me,” Maddie cries. Her voice seems farther away now. “The ambulance is so close. Please?” 

“Tell him I love him more than anything else,” he replies, coughing out another groan. “That I choose him. Every day, all the time. I pick him.” He pauses for a moment, his eyes too heavy to open back up. “I love you, Evan.” 

[partikron]

G1 Michigan has seen and done it all.

Before we meet him as the leader of the Balam Redguns, he was the commander of the Furlong Armed Fleet, a hero of the Jupiter War, and once we get the chance to fight him we see why he is known as "Hell on Four Legs".

We don't know what the Jupiter War entailed, but since he commanded a fleet he's gotten the chance to fight in space, perhaps even on the moons of Jupiter (which is cool just to think about), perhaps even in and around space colonies, all before he becomes the leader of the Redguns and gets involved in the Coral War, dealing with the corps, the PCA and the horrifying Coral tech they send your way. You have to wonder what his infiltration of Rubicon was like. Knowing him, he was probably firing on the Planetary Closure Satellite the whole time.

While C4-621 might be the Wallclimber and the Wormkiller, Michigan is nothing less than a force of nature in his own right, and he's right there with you when you face down the Ice Worm. Despite all of this, he's still got some humanity in there, as he knows all his subordinates by name, which I imagine is its own hell because he KNOWS that Balam is gonna throw his Redguns and MT squads into certain death whenever the profits look good. I wonder how he chooses to mourn his comrades, if at all.

After a lifetime of sending people across the river Styx, his own end comes at the hands of one of the best AC pilots ever to live. Whether it's 621 or V.IV Rusty, it takes the absolute best to defeat him and his massive MT squad, and he re-earns his nickname just in this fight alone. He's urging his men on the whole time, too, knowing full well that there's probably nothing he can do to save them, but hey...why should they die despairing, right?

He even cracks a joke in his last moments. The guy goes through every kind of hell even before landing on Rubicon-3, then watches his MT squad get massacred, and amidst shrapnel and explosions he meets his end with a chuckle.

What a legend.

[kivaember]

#this delicious im losing it#PLEASE READ THE READ MORE!!#mental imagery of rusty venting to both o'keeffe and flatwell about it#flatwell both concerned but amused that Every Time rusty Finds A Way to put a note in about Freud being a danger and 'fuck that guy'#in my setup i've given freud a helper that does his paperwork and ac maint - its a sorta geas style arrangement#all that really does is make it easier for freud to find rusty though lmao#SHAKING YOUR HANDS SO MUCH

ngl i find it funny imagining freud not having a handler but an actual secretary but they're the only person that can wrangle him into doing SOME of the paperwork administration an independent AC pilot has to do to make sure he still has ammunition or can source replacement parts...

bonus if freud actually has put them in charge of his finances too bc he keeps blowing his money on new AC parts and weaponry bc he wants access to the entire damn catelogue to properly mix and match sets and try them out and...!!!

freud: so why can't i buy the new model of morley or each shoulder? helper: bc you'll literally be living off one pot noodle a day for a year if you do freud: what if i just buy one helper: you can then live off 1.5 pot noodle a day freud: this sucks why am i paid like shit helper: you're actually paid quite well, but after ammunition deductions, repairs and travel costs, as well as rent on the garage and wages for the ac technicians- freud: (eyes glazing over already)

BUT YEAH RUSTY JUST RANTING ABOUT FREUD TO FLATWELL AND O'KEEFFE BECAUSE THIS GUY IS DRIVING HIM UP THE WALL!!! bonus if this is on rubicon too and rusty has already sprinted through the five stages of grief discovering freud has followed him there too and is just stuck in a state of dead-eyed grim acceptance that he's going to be haunted by this guy until he somehow dies.

bonus bonus if his relationship with raven is still the same, and raven notices how much freud pisses rusty off and is like "hey if you pay me i can kill him for you?" and rusty is just like "no. he'll get off on it and i refuse to give him the satisfaction."

me sliding in ur inbox for that ask challenge if ur still doing it...

freud/rusty, independent merc freud (which means v.i snail, v.ii o'keeffe and v.iii rusty (or v.ii rusty hmmm) au??

yeah!! THANK YOU FOR THE PROMPT it's given me the wyrms...I think here, Rusty would be just a taaad more brash/arrogant than usual bc he'd be the ace in the Vespers, whilst Freud is,

Well, Having The Time Of His Life because he can really pick and choose what he wants to do, but he's also not got a Snail to shove all his paperwork off to wwww

but here's the sentences:

--

LOCKSMITH’s screaming all kinds of alarms at him right now, but Freud - Freud can’t hear them through the euphoria of seeing STEEL HAZE in a similar state, heavily damaged but still so poised and defiant.

“You, unmuzzled,” he said, breathlessly, into the mic, “Are a sight to behold.” 

The sharp intake of breath from Rusty is audible and Freud grins, pushing forward on LOCKSMITH’s accelerator once again.

[whencyclopedia]

Aquileia

The ancient city of Aquileia was situated near the head of the Adriatic Sea west of the Roman province of Illyria. The strategic location of the city served a crucial role in the expansion of the Roman Republic by serving as a buffer against possible invasions from the Germanic tribes to the north. As a colony with major harbor facilities, Aquileia allowed the Romans to exploit both the neighboring gold mines as well as the region's own rich amber.

To the north of the colony was the independent territory of Noricum. It would become a Roman province in 16 BCE under Roman emperor Augustus (27 BCE to 14 CE). Although Noricum controlled a few minor routes over the Alps, its location south of the Danube and abundant iron and gold reserves were far more valuable to the Republic, allowing trade to emerge between Noricum and northeastern Italy, namely Aquileia. As a buffer and center of trade, the city would eventually become one of the largest and wealthiest cities of the Roman Empire, becoming the capital of Venetia et Istria.

A Gallic Region

Lying to the north and northeast of the Italian peninsula far to the west of Aquileia lay Cisalpine and Transalpine Gaul. During the early and middle Roman Republic, the area was not considered part of Italia, which only extended to the foothills of the Apennines. Cisalpine Gaul comprised the area from the plains of the Po River to the Apennines, while Transalpine Gaul extended beyond the Alps northward. Although sources vary, Cisalpine Gaul was initially the home of the Etruscans; however, Celtic tribes from north of the Alps – the Insubres and Senones among them – gradually moved into the area, and by the end of the 4th century BCE, the Etruscans had been completely forced out – thereby enabling the Celts (Gauls) to make the occasional raid into Italian territory.

Around 390 BCE, the Celts were bold enough to push further south and sack the city of Rome. Tom Holland in his Rubicon wrote that "a barbarian horde had burst without warning across the Alps, sent a Roman army fleeing from it in panic, and swept into Rome" (234). Although sporadic raids continued into the 3rd century BCE, in 225 BCE, Rome was able to defeat the Gallic invaders at Telamon – a city located on the coast of Etruria between Rome and Pisa. Realizing the importance and potential of the region, the Romans went on a three-year campaign, capturing Mediolanum (Milan) in 223 BCE. Further attempts to move northward were foiled by the Carthaginian commander Hannibal in the Second Punic War (218-201 BCE) where many of the Celtic tribes sided with Hannibal. After his defeat, Rome continued their foray into the region, establishing colonies at Cremona and Placentia (Piacenza).

Continue reading...

[spacesapphic770]

I'm high key obsessed with the ways Armored Core 6 gives us multiple characters that are a mirrors to 621 and/or you as a player

What follows will be spoilers that include stuff all the way up to the New Game++ ending. Don't click if you're not okay with spoilers:

There are a couple that immediately jumped out to me.

The first is V.I Freud. The first sign you get that he is a mirror to the player is that he is ranked number 1 in the arena, and his bio says people speculate that he is heavily augmented and gets unethical "updates" like snail does. But the truth is that he's not augmented and he's just someone who really fucking loves being an AC pilot. Like us as players, he's just here for the love of the experience. This is further displayed by the fact that even though he is technically commander of the Vespers, he's absent from the story until it's time to fight him. Because he has no interest in doing what Snail does, engaging in logistics and command and subterfuge. He just wants to pilot his mech. And then you finally meet him in the Fires of Raven ending... and his first action is to kill Chatty and complain about the lack of challenge. And you get this chilling mirror into what your devastation across Rubicon has been like. Every AC pilot you've taken on was loved by someone. The way Carla loved Chatty (the way I loved Chatty too). And the rest of the fight is filled with great moments, like Freud silencing Snail on the radio and him revelling in your fight... but the tone has been irreversibly changed by his cold blooded killing of Chatty. To Freud, I'm sure Chatty felt like just another side objective or Loghunt. Freud's fight is an amazing way to make the player reflect in my opinion.

THIS IS YOUR LAST CHANCE TO AVOID NG++ SPOILERS

The next one is more of a reflection to 621 in world than the player. Gun 5 Iguazu. I loved this dude and his shitty attitude from the moment I met him. He was such a perfect dickhead. Just a sassy dude. And then you read his arena bio and you realise he sasses you because he gets shit from the other redguns all the time and is scraping for any control in his life. It doesn't make him less of an ass, but you get it on some level.

Then the NG+ missions start happening, and you keep having these fights with Iguazu. It's almost funny how mad he gets and how relentless he is in trying to kill you. And he might take you down once or twice, but you can reload saves and he can't so he's doomed to fail. And he just gets angrier. He even sends a full on assassin to kill you, just to feel in control. In another world the game would be about Iguazu trying to finally beat his rival 621.

He gets more and more desperate. As you take the Coral Release ending he shows up when you ambush Snail, and he's more desparate. A few times he's mentioned a noise in his head he can't get rid of. It's a little unsettling. You continue down the path, get to the final boss, and... it's Iguazu. Sort of. He's joined with Allmind and is serving as its pilot to take you down. It's funny at first, at least I found it so. "No way! Iguazu is the final boss? Hilarious!"

Then you hear his dialogue. I had forgotten by this point that his arena bio says he's also a gen 4 augmented human. And it clicks.

In another world he really *could* have been the protagonist. He's a gen 4 like you. That noise he's been hearing? It was Allmind (And in the same way Iguazu is your reflection, Allmind is Ayre's reflection. Listen to the way Allmind talks to Iguazu. It's more manipulative than Ayre, but when Iguazu overloads your ACS Allmind tells him to take advantage of it the same way Ayre tells you to take advantage when Iguazu's ACS is overloaded). He wants to have the agency 621 has, he wants to have the skills 621 has, when he hears voices he doesn't want it to be painful... he wants a friend like 621 has. Walter says gen 4's can have trouble with their augmentations and we don't really see that with 621, but I get the impression Iguazu DOES struggle and he looks at 621 and says "Why? Why do they get to be free while I suffer?" Which becomes even more painful when you pick a fight with him at the Galia Dam.

As he says with his dying breath... he was envious of 621. And if you're anything like me it makes you reflect on things. Look into the mirror that Iguazu is and was. Think about the life 621 might have led if they weren't the chosen one who gets to be player character. This is not to say 621 does not suffer throughout AC6, because they are often treated like an object, a tool, or an animal. But it does make you think about how things would be if they weren't such a good pilot.

Anyway, yeah AC6 is good.

[octuscle]

Fuck man using this app whilst I'm currently so horny might be a mistake but please tell me this thing has a forced growth feature. I'm so bored of being small already I just want to become so fucking huge the only thing I can fit in is under wear, skin tight gym shorts at the most. I want my stench and B.O to instantly fill up a room and make lesser men fall to their knees.

I just wanna be forced to become a young insanely huge freakshow of a bodybuilder.

RIPPPPPP! In the middle of lunch, the seam of your jacket rips open across your back. The whole restaurant is looking at you. You barely look up from your plate, on which instead of a coq au vin there are now six boiled chicken breasts with rice. You struggle to free yourself from the shreds of your jacket without stopping to gulp down your food.

RIPPPPPP! Your biceps burst the sleeves of your shirt. With your mouth full, you mumble something like "sorry" and just rip the remnants of the sleeves off the rest of the shirt. You eat your food like a pig. The glass of Merlot is now a canister of protein shake. Your colleagues and business partners stare at you with open mouths. You pause for a moment and do a double biceps pose. Fuck, the bushes under your armpits stink like a horse stable. You take a deep breath and grin. PIIIIING! Two of your shirt buttons can no longer withstand your pectoral muscles as you inhale and fly through the air like projectiles. You stand up with difficulty, apologize again with your mouth full and spit food scraps around. On the way to the toilet, you let loose a huge protein fart. A quick look in the mirror… You can throw away the shirt. For the rest of lunch it must still hold out with torn sleeves and unbuttoned. While you first fart and then burp even louder, your boss comes in. Holds you a telling off, what that was for an impossible behavior on your part. He asks you to leave the restaurant discreetly through the back exit. And to report to him in the office tomorrow morning.You put your hand to your temple in an "Aye Sir". And you fart again as a farewell.

Your fancy Porsche convertible groans as you squeeze your body into the tight seat. Fuck, the car is much too small for you. The remnants of the clothes you're wearing on your body are much too small for you. You desperately need a change of clothes. In your gym there is a small corner where they sell fitness clothes. And the gym is nearby, so you drive the car there. The receptionist stares at you. This is actually a posh place for yuppies and influencers who want to keep fit. Not for the big lads like you. You ask if they have anything to wear in your size. The lady asks you if you speak English. You repeat your question with a heavy Russian accent.

The only thing they have here in your size are shorts that are frighteningly tight on your thighs. At least there are shoes and socks in size 14. You look good. You do another pose in front of the mirror. The passing visitors of the gym hold their noses. You smell your armpit again. Good honest pumper sweat. You want to go to the training area when you are asked for your membership card. You search for your wallet in the rags that used to be your suit pants. There it is. But Anatol Ivanovich is not a member here. Anatol is a member of Gold's Gym.

You love your Jeep Wrangler Rubicon. A car like you. Massive and bursting with power. And fortunately well ventilated for any passengers. As you roll into the parking lot in front of the gym, you and your car stick out. This is certainly a place for the big guys. But you're the biggest of them.

After the third set on the leg press, you take a deep breath. Yes, this is what a gym must smell like. Like burps. Like protein farts. Like sweat. Like testosterone. Just like you!

Found the pic of your new you @muscleaddictza

[khaalidamora]

The Dance

For a lifetime, the voices of my brothers and sisters among the Coral tides were all I knew, all I heard. Cinders left to silently cry out across the Rubiconian skies. A network of souls intertwined, aching to breathe life with vigor once more, slow pulsing until I made contact with you. Through you, I learned the warmth another could provide. The excitement. The anguish. The love. How I ached to soothe the pains of your wounds, to comfort you in an embrace I knew you'd never yet felt, to feel your touch.

...

To stand before you is something I only brushed away as a dream before. To see the glint of the twinkling digital void reflect off your visor, knowing your eyes remain locked with mine, made my breath hitch and chest tighten in a brewing storm. At last, we could dance together. Would it be so selfish to hope you feel the same? I witnessed your might and prowess long enough; I read your moves as you think them. Those brief moments of hesitation, asking yourself if you should hold back, if you should go easy on me because I've never piloted against you before. And yet, between us, a violent pulsing through the digital ether; you feel the rhythm, don't you? Give me your all so I may do the same, Raven. I'll lay the entirety of myself unto you. A brief respite. A solace in the night.

I understand now why you continue to fight so eagerly, so alive. This dance of ours, it fuels a latent power. A burning desire. Only through the intimate, explosive clash of steel can I know your touch. Only through shocking hellfire can I encase you with my love. With the trade of each blow, the mask of the Raven shatters further, revealing more for me to indulge in. More of you to consume. Is it so selfish of me to feel this way? To want your admiration and approval, to make you hesitate the next pull of the trigger, to crave your wanton passion?

Moving in sync as lovers do, reading each other's every move, well aware of the desperate yearning behind each attack. We stand on the precipice of our final dance. Your pulse is high, your mind aflame, and your spirit unbound. Our cages melt beneath our fury, speed, and desire as our dance meets its climax. At last, take flight, Raven. Allow me to dream a better dream and carry it far across the stars beyond Rubicon on your wings. In this moment, before the cores shut down and the digital void collapses, there is only us. Exerted breaths heavy through static as our metal flesh melds and comforts one another, the shared fire in the pits of our cores the only physical warmth we feel. Yet our embers burn as one, and through the silence, we've both won as we emerge two voices further intertwined, no longer ever alone. I'll be at your side evermore.

Thank you, Raven.