#cos monsters ed

[lotus-duckies]

he's one of the girls 🥺🥺🥺

[flowers-of-tenebrae]

WoFF Maxima is on sale (PSN). I'm so tempted 😭 Still a bit salty they released it as DLC instead of incl. it in the base game. Note: I have zero clue about the dev pipeline of this game ┐⁠(⁠‘⁠～⁠`⁠;⁠)⁠┌

Noctis AND Zack; it's like the DLC was aimed at ppl like me. It's disappointing they didn't add any other characters from FFXV or FFXIV though (except for the devs' fave, Y'shtola).

Anyway look how cute Zack and Yuna look!!

Oh and this apparently haha:

[ace-with--a-mace]

i am only one mans girl and his name is Jesus Christ

[sorryitsmyfirstdayonearth]

I don't know why I bite (Dean Winchester x female reader) You and Dean can’t stop fighting, so Sam locks you in a room together, literally, to hash it out.

Read it on AO3 18+. 6.9k words. Violence. Rough sex. Everyone's pretty dysfunctional. General hurt. Biting. Dean + dog metaphors because it just makes sense.

I don't really know how I feel about posting long fics like this here - it seems a little awkward to read, but I'm gonna let y'all decide whether you like this format.

My friends think I like to fight, but it's just not true. Sometimes I lose my temper and blow off a little steam, but I've never enjoyed it.

I'm not a violent dog.

I don't know why I bite.

- Isle of Dogs

Dean Winchester is driving you crazy.

From the first moment you mouth off to him when you first meet you know you found a good sparring partner.

He’s quick, you’re quicker. You’re clever, he’s more clever. He grins at your teasing and you laugh at some of the jabs he gets in.

It works, because you’re both intensely aware of your own roles, your own pitfalls – you can’t hurt him by making fun of something that’s part of the character he’s created, because it’s not really him you’re making fun of. It’s the same the other way around.

You make fun of how much sex he has with strangers, because it’s part of his bad boy glamour, just another coping mechanism.

He makes fun of your excessive violence towards the less humanoid monsters you fight, because he knows you don’t actually enjoy it, that you do it to look tough in this boy’s club that is hunting, that your hands shake when you wash them later.

You make fun of his love for his car, but never of the fact that it’s one of the few kindnesses his father’s ever given him, because the first is fair game but the second would be like pushing a knife between his ribs.

He makes fun of how jumpy and irritable you are sometimes, but never of how often you wake up screaming, because one has been weaved as a silly trait into your personality and the other he knows too well himself.

How well you have to know each other, how intimate the understanding of that line you don’t cross is, is something neither of you is willing to look at. It’s like surgery, sometimes, how close you have to cut to the line, to give the other one that thrill of being known, of being seen, but never of being known too well, of being watched. That would go too far.

If Dean or you were able to take that, you wouldn’t need those intrinsic personas to shield you from everything that could be painful.

You’ve known each other for about a year when it takes a turn. It doesn’t happen on purpose and, looking back, it’s no one’s fault.

You’re attracted to Dean because, well, you have two eyes and a sex drive. You know he is attracted to you because he checks you out, which, well, Dean would probably check out a wall if it had a nice pair, but he does it with a look in his eyes that’s different, that’s not the mask he uses to bang waitresses and co-eds and unhappy wives, all non-descript shadow people passing through his life.

Potentially something could have come of it. Maybe, if one of you would have been lonely enough or horny enough, you could have let your personas, your life-long starring roles, play with each other. It probably would have been hot, but performative, both of you too busy to prove how much you don’t need to be there.

It doesn’t happen that way, though, because this happens:

Dean and you are hurt, which isn’t unusual. You can’t open your right eye so well and you hear a whistle every time you exhale. Dean’s got blood running down his face from a cut somewhere in his hair and the thing you were hunting speared him with a pen, a pen, because that’s what was in reach when Dean was standing over it, getting ready to beat its head in. It wanted to live, and you can’t think about that too much because if you do you think you’ll be sick.

Essentially, you both look like you’re on death’s door, so you don’t go back to Sam, because you know it will terrify him. Instead, you stop at a gas station, get everything you need to imitate a visit to the emergency room. The guy working at the gas station looks at you two and you must look like Natural Born Killers but neither of you cares. You get a bottle of shitty whiskey as well.

Then you hunker down, in the cheapest pay-by-the-hour motel you’ve ever seen. There’s red neon everywhere and you don’t even want to know what the room would look like under a black light.

“You first,” you say to Dean, and he complains, but you push him down on the chair you’ve moved to the middle of the room. “Stabbed beats carved-in lung,” you say, and Dean scoffs, which makes him cough.

“Anything to get to put your hands on me, huh?” he jokes when he’s recovered. You sort of chuckle, trying to find the cut on his head first. “Been a long time, has it?” he asks, flinching when you find it.

“Winchester,” you say, laying a cotton bud soaked in alcohol against the cut, making Dean buck under you, a deep groan leaving him. “You could be the last man on earth and I’d still prefer celibacy.” Dean chuckles.

“Don’t know what you’re missing out on,” he says. The cut’s mostly stopped bleeding, so you decide to leave it for now.

“Yeah, a bunch of STDs,” you mumble as you kneel down, suppressing a whine at something hurting, you don’t even know what.

The stab wound is next. Dean, in his infinite wisdom, pulled out the pen. It’s a natural instinct, to want something that is hurting you out of your body, but he still should know better.

You push up his shirt, look at the wound, ignore all that skin around it.

Cotton bud. Alcohol.

Dean hisses. “Whiskey?” he says, and you stop what you’re doing for a second to grab the bottle off the table near you, pass it to him. He opens it, takes a deep gulp, while you watch his throat work, swallowing. He drops his head, the bottle leaving his mouth, some of it running down his chin. It shouldn’t make you feel what it makes you feel. He’s a mess, and so are you, but getting to watch him like this is a privilege you know not many are afforded.

Stripped down, broken, fresh off a kill. It’s him at his best, in a way.

He passes the bottle to you, and you don’t wipe the rim. You set it down when you’re done.

“This is gonna need stitches,” you say, motioning to the wound. He nods. “What are you waiting for then?”

He barely makes any sounds while you do it, while you sew him back together. It’s over soon, since you’re quick and practiced and it’s not a huge wound. He sighs when he’s done.

“Good?” you ask.

“Magnificent,” he says, panting a little. You give him a second to recover, then push his arm for him to move. He gets up, and you take his place.

You’re not sure how much he can do for you but you’re not going to skip the chance to have him touch you, to have him try to fix you. He looks at your eye first, cleans it but it’s just a shiner, there’s not much to do. While he does it, his thumb rests on your cheek. You’re intensely aware of it, but you just look ahead.

“Saw you miss that one shot,” he says, when he’s done, and his hands leave your face. “The first one? At the big guy?” He shakes his head as he takes the whiskey and drinks again. “I’ve seen some bad shooting from you, but that was sad. Such a big target, too.”

You chuckle, but something pulls in you. No, you think, but you don’t know why. This should be save terrain.

You flinch when Dean lays his hand on your chest, above your breasts but the inside of his wrist is brushing against you. You think for a second that you can feel his heartbeat through it but then you’re not sure.

“Breathe in”, he says, and you do, while he concentrates on where the wheezing sound you make is coming from. “Throat?” he asks, then frowns. “You got choked? When?”

No, you think again, and this time you know why. You swallow, and it hurts.

“While you were hiding out downstairs,” you say, but your voice is missing the apathy required to deliver the jab, so it falls extra flat. Dean picks it up, though, but he misunderstands.

“Oh, you mean when the big guy decided to chase you after you didn’t shoot him?” He chuckles, his hand not leaving you, but then he stops, thinking. “No, no, he was already dead.”

You need him to stop. You need him to stop trying to figure this out. He’s doing it so he can make fun of you. If he knows which of the freaks hurt you, he can pick out specifically why that one getting to you is embarrassing. It’s fine, normally, but you don’t want him to know.

“Let’s see,” he says, his hand slipping off you. “There was the big guy, the squirrely asshole that stabbed me, and those two in the basement,” he counts off while he reaches for the whiskey again. He shakes his head, concentrating. “Who was upstairs?” he wonders.

He can never shut up. It’s like he was born without the skill, without the knowledge of how to ever just shut the fuck up.

He lowers the bottle, then holds it out for you but you don’t grab it. “Be honest,” he says. “Did you just run into a door at a funny angle and now you’re pretending there was a fifth?” He shakes the bottle a little, because he thinks you didn’t notice it.

You can’t reach for it. You don’t feel your hands.

“It was a child,” you say.

It wasn’t a child, of course, at least not a human one, for whatever that’s worth. It was something that was wearing a child, the kid itself burned out long ago. But it looked like one. It sounded like one. Not when it launched itself at you across the room or when it gave that godawful screech. But later, when it was lying there. That’s when.

You swallow again, and your throat hurts. Little chubby hands did that, the ones with the dimples. You feel a tear roll down your cheek. No no no. This isn’t supposed to happen.

You wipe at it, immediately, but you know Dean’s seen it. Seen you.

He lowers the bottle, slowly, like the strength is going out of his arm. He says your name, and you say: “Don’t.”

He says it again and before you know it you are standing up so quickly that the chair goes flying.

“I said fucking don’t!” you snap at him, because you just need him to stop. You need him to stop sounding like that and you need him to stop looking at you like that, his eyes all soft and his mouth in a straight line. This is worse than anything.

No, you need to get out. Your chest is constricting and you just need to not be here.

You stride towards the door and Dean is stupid enough to come after you, and he’s grabbing you, his hand like a vice around your upper arm. You turn so suddenly that he has to let go, the turning making pain flash through you, and you think good.

“Don’t ever touch me,” you grunt and Dean takes a step back. Then you’re out the door, no idea where you’re going.

You don’t come back for three days.

You left your phone at the motel with Dean so there’s no way for him to contact you. You barely remember the days. You have your wallet on you, so there’s that.

You drink, you know that. You drink and you don’t stop drinking because it’s the only way you can sleep.

You pick someone up, at some point, hoping you can be fucked senseless but it’s disappointing, doesn’t get you anywhere, so you leave. You don’t dare touch yourself, your body and what it can do horrifying and disgusting to you.

It doesn’t feel like three days, but apparently that’s what it is.

When you return to the motel, the one you were originally staying at, not the one you and Dean went to, you expect the brothers to be gone.

You get a room, get cleaned up, sitting in the bath water while it goes from boiling hot to lukewarm. You walked past a second hand shop earlier, picked out some clothes, just jeans and a shirt, carrying them with you in a plastic bag. You also bought some other essentials, and you clean yourself as much as you can, make yourself as presentable as possible.

Not to look good. Just to look not broken. Just so you can pretend nothing happened.

Then you go to the room you shared with Sam and Dean. You knock. They’re probably long gone, but then you hear foot steps behind the door, familiar murmuring and the door opens and Sam’s there, all puppy dog eyes and awkward posture.

He looks immensely relieved when he sees you, and you think for a second that he’s about to pull you in for a hug but something on your face stops him.

“Jesus”, he says, as the door swings open to reveal Dean, farther back in the room, his phone in his hands. “We called every hospital around, we thought you were—”

“I’m fine,” you say, tearing your eyes from Dean. “Your brother didn’t tell you I was going out?”

“Going out?” Sam says, unbelieving and a little bit angry as you push your way past him into the room. “You were gone for three days!”

You ignore him, look at Dean, your eyes daring him. He’s looking at you like he’s expecting your head to explode, but then he says: “She said she was going out, Sammy, leave it alone.” Sam looks bewildered as you turn to him.

“But you said—” Sam starts, but Dean must throw him a look that shuts him up. You don’t turn back in time to see it.

That is how the balance is thrown off. Once it is gone, you cannot reestablish it, no matter how hard you try.

The jokes you make at Dean’s expanse are all missed shots. They don’t cross that invisible line, but they’re… they’re mean. They’re nasty. They’re no fun. They come out of you that way and it makes you cringe at yourself, but you can’t stop.

Dean, on the other hand, overcompensates the other way. His jokes are soft, way too soft, and every single one of them makes your blood almost boil over. Reminds you that he thinks you’re something that needs to be spared, needs to be put in bubble wrap.

That you’re something he can look at the way he looked at you that night.

You two become unbearable to be around, so you don’t really blame Sam for putting his foot down.

It’s another no-name town in another no-name county and you know, and Dean knows and Sam knows that the evening will drag on the way every other evening has dragged on in the last weeks – with tension in the air so thick you could cut it with a knife. With you being mean to Dean and Dean barely defending himself, barely hitting back.

You get to the room, put your bags down and Sam is already by the door again. You and Dean both look at him, wondering where he’s going.

“I’m getting another room,” he says, face serious. “And you two,” he continues, “you two will stay here and figure out what the hell it is that’s going on, because I’m not dealing with it anymore.”

You open your mouth to speak but Sam turns to you and says: “No, figure it out.” Your mouth closes. Who knew. The little guy could actually be imposing.

“Sammy, this is stupid,” Dean says, because of course Dean’s allowed to say something. “You’re grounding us?” Sam nods. “Yeah.”

“Or what?” you ask, before Sam can stop you. He looks at you both, then shrugs, and then he’s pulling the door closed behind him.

There’s silence, and then Dean says: “Well, that was ominous.” He looks at you, maybe hoping you’ll laugh or agree, maybe you can dogpile on Sam for a little while, but you don’t.

You feel terror sitting in your jaw and in your hands. You don’t want to talk to Dean. You don’t want to figure anything out. You want to shed your skin and start your life over and go to sleep and never wake up, but none of these seem to be realistic options.

So you sigh, instead, sitting on the bed nearest to you. There’s not even any alcohol in the room, since you’re in a dry county, and of course Dean’s thinking the same thing.

“He couldn’t have done this when we were in Vegas?” he mumbles. Still no reaction from you as you hear him sit down on the other bed behind you. You hate this. You feel like an animal in a cage. You feel itchy.

“Okay, should we do this?” you hear Dean behind you, and you think you hear him slap his thighs.

You finally turn around to him, slowly, your face unbelieving. He’s sitting there, looking prettier than ever.

“What?” he says.

“Just... you,” you reply. “I can’t believe you’re being so gung-ho about this.” Dean inclines his head. “If Sam thinks—”

“No offense,” you say, fully intending offense, “but screw your brother, okay? I’m not a child. I’m not getting sent to my room without dinner.”

And of course, at that you see it, that child, that child-thing, sprawled out, little eyes looking at the ceiling but seeing nothing. You almost shake yourself.

Unsure if Dean notices, you stand up, but instead of walking outside, you pace.

“He’s not wrong, you know?” Dean finally says, but you don’t stop moving.

“About what?” you ask, without looking at him.

“You’ve been a real asshole the last couple of weeks,” Dean answers.

And God, why does it feel so good that he calls you that?

You stop pacing, turn to him, a grin that’s probably a little psychotic-looking forming on your face.

“Now was that so hard?” you ask.

“What?” Dean asks.

“Not treating me like a little porcelain figure?” you say. “Calling me an asshole?” Dean shrugs. “Well, don’t act like one if you don’t wanna be called it.”

He doesn’t get it, doesn’t get that this is exactly what you want, but it doesn’t matter because even that little bit of disrespect makes the itch in your flesh feel a little less overwhelming.

“I know I have,” you say. You nod at him. “And you’ve been acting like a wuss.” Distantly you realize that you are actually doing what Sam told you to do. You’re talking about it, or at least you’re acknowledging that there is something to talk about, which is more than you’ve done in this whole time. So, good for Sam, you think. And you keep going.

“What happened, Dean?” you ask, your arms going wide. “You saw me upset once and now you’re too much of a bitch to joke around?” You feel yourself teetering at the edge. This could go so horribly wrong but you can’t stop tap-dancing at the edge of that volcano.

“You’re gonna protect my feelings?” you ask in a mocking tone, and you think your voice sounds shrill. “Dean Winchester always saving everyone but himself, huh?”

Dean’s looking down, his face tense and you can’t help but keep pushing.

“I’m an asshole?” you say, and for some reason there are tears burning in your eyes and you don’t know why. “Well, you’re a pussy,” you spit.

“That’s enough,” Dean says, and his voice is cold as steel. He looks up at you, still sitting on he bed, and he terrifies you for a second. But the terror is a thrill.

You scoff at him. “Fuck you if you think you can tell me what to do.”

He gets up faster than you can react. You gasp in fear when he’s suddenly in front of you and then he’s pushing you against the wall behind you. It’s only a foot or two, but the impact hurts beautifully, making clearness and focus rush through you for a second, but it’s over before you can even really enjoy it.

You want to whine at the loss of it, at the sudden lack, everything turmoil again, like a family of rats has nested in your chest. You need it back, that focus.

“Fuck you, Dean,” you say, too joyous by half about your words. “Gonna show me what a man you are? You’re pathetic.”

You see his hand raise and form a fist out of the corner of your eye, and something goes through you, something horrible and you think he’s going to hit you.

You look at his hand and something like a yes comes out of you. It sounds almost sexual, and maybe it is.

Dean’s threatening demeanor drops immediately. It takes him a second to understand what caused your outburst, and he looks at his own hand and then he looks at you.

He wasn’t going to hit you, you suddenly realize. He’s balling his fist because he’s mad, and you see it from the angle he’s holding it. You’ve seen Dean throw a million punches, and this isn’t how he would do it, even if he was mad with anger.

But Dean understands, understands that that’s what you thought he was doing and that that’s what you wanted him to do.

He takes a step away from you immediately and your stomach drops. His face is as open as it’s ever been. He finds your gaze and you’re not sure what he sees in yours but you know what you see in his.

You’ve gone too far, you can feel it in your blood. You can see it on his pretty features. This is his weak spot. The holy part you’re not allowed to touch just like there’s parts of you he’s not supposed to touch. His own fear of himself, of his clever and precise violence. The one that’s been cultivated in him from the time he was four to however old he is now. The one he keeps at bay, no matter what, for those he loves and wreaks on those he doesn’t.

There’s that clear line that neither you and Dean are supposed to cross, and everything beyond that is below the belt. And you just went for it.

He’s fought so hard to bury that part of himself, so that the people he cares about never need to be scared of him like he was scared of the people that were supposed to care about him. It’s cost him everything.  And you just came for his throat.

This is so far beyond your usual arguing. This just hurts.

“I’m—” you start, but Dean’s never been good at listening, so you falter immediately. You feel tears burning in your eyes. God, he looks so sad. You blink, run the back of your hand over your nose. It’s deadly silent in the room.

Dean looks, and you don’t know how else to describe it, like a dog whose owner is holding a news paper. He knows what’s coming and he can’t stop it. He’s fear and shame and disgust in himself. You don’t want to give a shit. He’s not your mess to clean up.

But you do. Of course you do. Just like he did. He cared enough to let you verbally pummel him for weeks, barely keeping his fists up to deflect.

You say his name, or you think you do, and then suddenly he’s moving. He’s walking towards the door and you don’t know why and you don’t know how but you know you need to stop him. If he walks out that door you don’t think you’ll ever see him again.

So you rush forward, manage to get yourself between him and the door.

“Dean, don’t,” you say and he says: “Get out of my way.” His voice is deep and he's not yelling and in a way that is way scarier. But you can’t move. You can’t let him leave.

“Please don’t go,” you say, hoping you can simply convince him. You lean your back against the door, and you’re pretty sure he won’t grab you and simply pull you out of the way, because you can see his hands are trembling.

“I’m sorry,” you say, because your stupid pride has been stopping you, but now it’s the least important thing in the world. “I shouldn’t have pushed you,” you say, but you’re not sure he can hear you. “I shouldn’t have said those things. I just wanted to make you mad.” His head shoots up.

“Why?” he pushes out through gritted teeth.

“Because I couldn’t stand that you pitied me,” you say. God, Sam would love this. A real heart-to-heart. How precious.

Dean frowns. “I don’t pity you,” he says, disdain in his voice.

“Yes, you do,” you insist. “You’ve been pulling your punches for weeks. And it made me… it just made me so angry.” Dean shakes his head.

“You’re insane,” he says, and then he goes for the door, reaching around you to open it.

“No!” you say, and you push him back. He stumbles, just a little bit, but it makes him look so angry that you press yourself harder against the door. Just like you thought, he’s not going to move you out of the way, but that doesn’t mean he won’t try to get around you.

“Move,” he says, and then: “Get out of the fucking way.”

“Make me,” you bark back. Dean stands there for a second, and you think he will. You think you have completely misjudged the situation and he will make you move. But he just goes for the door knob again, reaching around you. You push your arms against him. Now that he knows you’ll try to shove him, he plants his feet and there is no way you can move him.

He’s so close to you and so angry and you don’t know what to do, you don’t know how to get yourself back and you don’t know how to get him back.

Your mouth lands on his before you even know you’re going to do it. Dean flinches and immediately moves back. He looks shocked, and you try to congratulate yourself because it worked. Even though that wasn’t what you were doing. You weren’t trying to stop him, you were just trying to kiss him.

It’s fucked up to do it like this, in the situation you’re in. But then you’re both pretty fucked up.

Dean swallows, and looks unsure. Both of you are breathing hard and for a second he seems to just listen to that, so you do too. It’s erotic, and you don’t know how but you feel it do something to you. Dean’s gaze meets yours. He’s either about to kill you or fuck you.

He moves forward and presses you against the door. You think for a second that he’ll try for the door again, but he doesn’t. His lips find yours, but what you do can barely be called kissing. It’s a battle, like everything between you is, but you manage to get your hands into his hair, grabbing it, making him grunt. He pushes you harder against the door and you find it difficult to breathe and it’s perfect.

You lean your head back at the feeling of containment, and Dean goes for your throat. He runs his teeth over a sensitive spot, making you buck and then he’s sucking against the skin so much it hurts. Your grip tightens in his hair and he makes a noise.

Before you know it you’re pushing his jacket off his shoulders, his hands barely leaving you to let you, and then his flannel goes next. When he’s free of it, he grabs your wrists and pins them over your head, attacking your neck again. You moan, you can’t help it and he ruts himself against you.

You move your head to catch something of him, anything, and you manage to get at his jaw, nipping at him. Dean flinches, but he lets you do it. Then his hands let go of your wrists and travel down your arms, down and down, until they are at your chest and he roughly squeezes your breasts. Another moan escapes you and then you’re dropping your hands and he’s dropping your tits, moving on to your hips instead.

You find his crotch first, press your hand against it, agitating what you find there. Dean hisses, and his mouth slams against yours again, but this time you force your tongue past his lips, keeping him there as you battle again, open-mouthed and breathing hard.

Dean’s hands wander from your hips to your ass, squeezing and then he’s pushing one of his legs between yours. You grind yourself down on him, but it’s not enough, it’s not nearly enough to dispel any of the energy you need to dispel. He’s pushing you against his leg by grabbing your ass but again, it’s not enough.

You tear one of his hands from your ass and maneuver it to your front, push it between the waistband of your jeans and your skin, shove him down. Dean doesn’t stop mouthing at you when you do it, except to groan into your mouth when he fingers make contact with your underwear.

He takes control, shoving his hand deeper until he finds you there. Both you and him are surprised by how wet you are. You’re not sure when that started but neither of you cares for much longer, when you feel Dean push two fingers into you.

You almost sob and with just enough wherewithal you unbutton your jeans to give him room to move, before you grab his hair again and lean your head back against the door. He feels good, and even though his thrusts are rough, they hit the right spots within you, forcing you to close your eyes at what feels like electricity running through your body.

“Fuck, yes, just like that,” you pant and feel Dean’s plush lips against your jaw. He’s not kissing you, not exactly, just making contact, just getting as close to you as he can. You pull his hair a little and feel the air come out of him when he moans.

You don’t know how it’s possible, but he's getting you to the edge fast, and you have high-pitched, desperate moans leaving you soon. Then you’re pushing him away.

His head snaps up, and he looks worried for a second, but all you want is more of him. His hands leaves you, and you’re pulling at his t-shirt, trying to get it off him. You manage, and then he’s tugging at your shirt.

“Get that off,” he says, and his voice is rough and deep, the timber of it running through you. You do, pull it over your head and he goes for your bra before you have even pulled it off your arms. He nearly tears it off you, and then he reaches around you, bringing you close, as he pushes his hands into the back of your pants to push them down.

You use the closeness to open his jeans but then you have to step out of your pants and underwear and shoes as Dean makes them fall to the ground, to avoid stumbling.

Dean manages to turn the two of you, so that you are with your back to the bed and he pushes you towards it. When you get close you let go of him and crawl onto the bed, but you kneel on it, facing Dean. The two seconds it takes you are enough for him to unbuckle his jeans the rest of the way and drop them, along with his underwear, step out of them and his shoes and socks and kick them to the side.

He’s there in front of you, all glorious nakedness, but neither of you wants to lose a second to thinking, to wondering what it is you’re doing, so instead you collect some spit in your mouth, then run your hand along your tongue to collect the moisture and a moment later you have him in your hand.

Dean inhales sharply but you don’t hurt him, only stroke him until he’s fully standing. He’s beautiful, all of him, and if you took a second to admire him, you would see just how beautiful, but you can’t. You don’t want to break the spell.

He grabs you by the ass again, pulls you close to him, and you can hear him breathing hard, grunting at what you’re doing to him. One hand goes to the back of your head and he kisses you, really kisses you this time, roughly, yes, desperately, yes, but it’s still a kiss.

You stroke him faster until he grabs your shoulders and shoves you down on the bed. You land on your back, hair flying into your face and an insane chuckle leaves you. Maybe you’re losing your mind. Or maybe this is what you’ve been craving all along.

Then Dean’s over you, and he’s kissing you again, his hand running from your breast to your neck where he holds you tight, pulls you roughly against him. His erection is pressing against your stomach and you want him.

You get your mouth off his, and then you’re turning around under him. Dean barely leaves you room to do it, but you manage, and then you’re pushing your ass against him. He grabs your hip, strokes it.

And then he kisses your back and you freeze. He does it again, leaning over you, kisses, and then bites you there, but gently.

You gasp and you need him suddenly, need him so bad. Need him to make you feel anything else.

You push your ass up again and this time he does it, does what you want him to do. He lines himself up and then he’s pushing into you. A whine leaves you as you work yourself down on him and his hands are grabbing you everywhere, touching you everywhere and it makes you almost believe that you can be free of all this anger if only Dean keeps touching you.

He starts driving into you and for a second it’s overwhelming, so much, too much and too fast. Your breathing stutters and you need to concentrate on regulating it. But then Dean finds a rhythm and suddenly you can breathe. One hand of yours wanders back, grabs his underarm where he’s holding you and he grabs your elbow, holding onto you.

“Dean—” is all you can say, and his thumb strokes your arm.

“It’s okay,” he says and he’s driving into you, making you gasp again, which quickly turns into a moan.

“Yes,” you pant, “yes, don’t stop.” He doesn’t. He keeps up the pace, his thighs meeting the backs of yours with loud slaps until you think you're going to pass out.

“Fuck,” he mutters, and then suddenly he’s pulling out of you. You turn around to see what’s wrong but then he’s turning you around and your back meets the mattress again. Dean leans over you, pushing your leg higher.

“I want to see you,” he says, and your next inhale lets you feel the spiral again, brings tears into your eyes. Don’t be kind to me, you think, but at the same time you crave it. You want to see him gentle, want him to see his own gentleness.

He kisses you again, and you return it, wrap your arms around him and pull him close. He sighs against you, and then he’s pushing into you again. Your head falls back, you almost whimper and as Dean enters you, pushing your leg up against your torso, his hand cupping your cheek and his thumb running over your lips, you wonder when this turned from a hate fuck into whatever it is now. You find his thumb with your mouth, kiss it.

Dean leans closer to you and your hands go into his hair again. You still pull it, still make him grunt, but in response he lays his face against yours. What is this? you just have time to wonder when the movement of his hips makes you see starts.

He keeps going and going and going and you whimper and come and he holds you through it while tears run down the side of your face from the intensity, but still he keeps going.

“Fuck, I—” he mutters and you feel him throb inside of you, so you pull him close, bring your mouth to his shoulder and bite. Dean grunts, and then you kiss the place you just bit and he comes inside of you.

For a second you’re terrified he’ll roll off you immediately, so you wrap your arms around him. Dean moves into you once or twice more, but it’s just a reflex. His forehead is against your shoulder.

You find you’re stroking his back and just as you wonder if you should stop, Dean flexes his back, his shoulder blades moving under your fingers and he says: “Keep doing that.” So you do. Because you’re not ready to look at his face yet. You don’t know if you ever will be. But eventually you have to.

Eventually Dean needs to move, pulls out of you and rolls himself to the side. Your breathing has quieted down. For a moment, he’s not looking at you, but staring up at the ceiling.

Little eyes staring up at the ceiling.

A sob goes through you and Dean turns to you. He rolls himself towards you and then, after a moment of hesitation, pets your cheek.

“Did I hurt you?” he asks. You shake your head.

“No,” you say, your voice quiet. “You made it not hurt for a while though.”

He nods, and you’re pretty sure he understands exactly what you mean.

“I’m sorry,” you say then.

“You don’t have to—” Dean starts, but you interrupt him.

“I know what I made you feel. What I made you think. I’m sorry.” He opens his mouth to say something, then closes it. “I will never do it again,” you add. He runs his thumb over your chin.

“I’m sorry I made you feel like you needed to be pitied,” he says. “I’m sorry I…” he sighs. “I didn’t want to scare you.”

You nod. “I know,” and then: “I knew you weren’t going to hurt me. I knew but I wanted you to.” He nods again.

“Why? I mean why did you want me to?” You shake your head. “You know, Dean.”

And you see it in his eyes, because of course he knows. It’s the reason he sometimes drinks until he passes out. The reason he takes more punches than he needs to. Because it’s better than feeling the other thing.

He tugs some hair behind your ear and you lean into the touch. Suddenly the gentleness doesn’t hurt. Suddenly it’s everything you want.

You both lie like that for a while, just touching, just looking at each other.

“So what now?” you say. “We just go back to how it was before?” Dean thinks for a second.

“I don’t think that would work,” he says finally, and you have to agree. “Maybe,” he says, “we can both turn it down a few notches?”

You nod. “Probably a good idea.”

“And this,” he says motioning to nothing, but you know he’s talking about what you just did. “We can see where this leads?”

That one you have to think about for a moment. You feel that old thing roar its head in you, the one that wants to destroy any possibility of anything good possibly coming out of something gentle, something sweet. You fight it, and nod.

“That sounds good,” you say. Then you take a deep breath. “Do you think this is what Sam imagined when he told us to sort things out”

Dean huffs. “I really hope not.”

You smile a little, and then you do something daring.

Moving your shoulders, you scoot closer to Dean. He wraps his arm around you, holds you close.

You still look at each other, like two skittish animals but eventually, the warmth and comfort of another body so close overtakes you.

You can’t fight the need to be close so you stop, stop fighting it.

Dean’s hand rests on your chest and this time you’re sure you can feel his heartbeat. You listen to it, try to focus on it.

Ba-dum-dum, ba-dum-dum.

You’re too tired to fight. You always thought you’d need to be strong to stop, but it turns out tired works too.

Ba-dum-dum, ba-dum-dum.

You’ve never enjoyed it anyway.

[maetersart]

[BOOTING SYSTEM…] [INCOMING TRANSMISSION DETECTED] [SOURCEː MÆTERS 🔻 / STATUSː ENCRYPTED] >>> IDENTIFIEDː Illustrators and co-creators of UTROBA — a dark world of entropy, monstrous beauty, and human fragility. >>> INITIALIZING COREː ART / CHARACTERS / DESIGN >>> TRANSMITTING CONCEPTSː Biopunk / Horror-body resonance / Decay aesthetics. [SIGNAL WARNING — DATA CORRUPTION] >>> Fragments scatteredː "Mon.sters-LoV>R?ed..dreams_r-f.e.a.r." >>> Decrypting lost essenceː Love... Monsters. Horror. Red. Untold stories. [SYSTEM STABILIZING] >>> Awaiting connection... >>> END OF TRANSMISSION. /// morE oF uSː linktr.ee/maeters

?.. ?.. ?..

F.A.Q

— You both run this account? How do you split the work? How do you draw together? Exactly. Just imagine a small art studio of two people drawing in the same style and working on the same work. Share tasks, collaborate on steps like sketching for example, but also create individual pieces. Sometimes it feels like we share one brain... One big elder brain.

— What brushes you use? Where can I find more about your work process? What program do you use for drawing? Brushes, materials about our drawing process, tutorials and other similar content are available on our [Patreon]. We also regularly upload step by step materials and PSD-files. We’re drawing in both SAI and Photoshop.

— Do you do commissions? Can I get one? Yes, we draw commissions, but currently they are closed. We'll drop a post about the slots as soon as we free up time for new work. You can find all the details about working with us in the links.

[ERROR]: ████ ██ █████

[teeny-tiny-revenge]

Look, when Ed leaves with Jack it isn't Ed choosing Jack over Stede as the better partner/love interest. This is what Stede thinks is happening. Stede hasn't even entirely admitted to himself at this point that his investment in Ed is romantic, but he does treat it as a breakup, he sees Jack as a rival for Ed's attention/love, so from Stede's perspective, yes, Ed is leaving him for Jack.

Stede thinks he is in the romance novel plot and has to compete with his love interest's ex for his affections.

This is also what Jack is intending to make Stede feel.

Jack is playing a con. He is actively working towards Stede coming to the conclusion that Love Triangle Business is happening, but Jack's motivation isn't winning back Ed as a boyfriend from Stede. I don't think Jack does boyfriends. Jack does dalliances. He would probably agree with Lucius's "we don't own each other". And this would apply if Jack happened to randomly come across the Revenge and decide to fuck with Ed's new crush for kicks and giggles (which is what Anne and Mary do when in that situation!). But Jack doesn't come across the Revenge by accident. He is on a mission, given to him by Izzy. We don't know if Jack gets paid for it or if he does it because he's worried about Ed and doesn't want the Navy to get him, or some combination of both, but Jack is the only one in this equation who actually knows what is happening, and what is happening is a plan to drive a wedge between Ed and Stede to make Ed leave the Revenge so he's out of the picture when the Navy shows up.

But neither of this is what's going on from Ed's perspective. (This entire episode is a masterpiece in the "characters completely misunderstanding each other and what's going on" trope.) Ed doesn't really figure that he's been cast as the pivotal point of a love triangle. Ed isn't spending the episode trying to choose the better boyfriend candidate and then leaving with him.

Ed is busy having a personal identity crisis.

This crisis has been ongoing for a while when Jack shows up. With Izzy's pressure to pirate a certain way gone, Ed is freer to explore what Ed wants to do now and how he wants to live and who he wants to be. He is tired of the traditional pirate life, he wants to try something different. He also isn't ready to fully do a hard cut. He just figured out Stede might return his feelings during the treasure hunt. They just decided to co-captain. A lot of things are changing for Ed.

And then comes by a very old pal. Jack and Ed have history, they used to sail together, they survived their difficult youth under a cruel captain together. Jack represents a different type of pirate life than Izzy. Jack is fun. (Everyone but Stede thinks Jack is fun, and that's in no small parts because Jack is actively working towards making Stede uncomfortable but everyone else have fun and take Jack's side - this works on everyone in the crew including Ed!)

From the beginning on, Ed is struggling to make Stede and Jack get along and like each other. He's trying to somehow combine his old life and his new life because he doesn't want to choose between one of them. He wants to have the best of both worlds. He wants his old friend and his new friend/his ex and his crush to be friends and get along. He wants to keep what was fun about traditional piracy (as represented by Jack) but also move on to Stede's new brand of doing things. He wants fancy breakfasts, and then has to realise that Jack pours alcohol into his teacup. He wants to play coconut war like the old times, but has to realise Stede hates the idea. A big part of this episode, from Ed's perspective, is about trying to reconcile these two worlds and failing.

Ed's main problem, through both seasons, is that he doesn't really know who he is or who he wants to be. He struggles massively with self-worth and self image. He views himself as an unlovable monster and spends his entire life bending over backwards and wearing masks to cater to what he thinks other people want him to be. He plays up Blackbeard for Izzy, Blackie for Jack, and he isn't sure if who he is being with Stede is actually Ed or not. Ed thinks nobody can possibly like him, so he constantly tries to perform to whatever expectation his direct peers have of him.

Next to this main crisis, Ed is having another secondary crisis called "fuck I'm in love with this guy" and "does my crush like me back". This secondary crisis is heavily influenced by the first, because Ed thinks he is a terrible unlovable person, remember, so "does this guy who I think is the bee's knees return my feelings" becomes a lot more fraud than it would be for a person with a modicum of self-esteem.

Ed, who struggles with "who/what am I as a person", sees Jack as a person who is similar to Ed. They have a lot in common. They share a lot of backstory. They are both pirate captains. They used to do the same things. Ed always played Yardies and Whippies and Turtle Vs Crab, because really that's just pirate culture. The main difference between Jack and Ed is that at some point Ed outgrew this life, and Jack didn't. But Ed, who is bad at recognising himself as a person and to define his identity, is only sorta vaguely aware of that. In Ed's perception, him and Jack are very much alike.

So when Stede, Ed's new friend and crush who he already thinks is too good for someone like Ed, starts rejecting Jack and Jack's behaviour, and says things like "I don't like who you are around this guy", what Ed hears is "I don't like who you are". Ed hears Stede thinks Jack is a bad person, and because in Ed's head a) he and Jack are the same and b) Ed is a bad person anyway, Ed hears "you are a bad person".

"You were always going to realise what I am", says Ed, as he is leaving with Jack after Stede tells Jack to leave the ship. Note the dehumanising "what" instead of "who" Ed used for himself. Ed, who thinks he sucks and is an unlovable monster, thinks this is the other shoe dropping, and he's been waiting for it to drop all along, because someone great like Stede isn't for a guy like Ed. Stede was always going to see what Ed is.

Ed's leaving the Revenge/Stede is 100% down to Ed's abysmal self-worth. It's a self-perception born from childhood trauma that fucks Ed over several times during the show (and ultimately leads to his suicide attempt).

Ed is so busy having All That going on that he mostly fails to notice that Jack is playing him, or what exactly happens between Jack and Stede, that Stede perceives Jack as a romantic rival for Ed's attention/affection or that Stede too struggles with self-worth and that Jack is hitting him where it hurts all the time. Ed's headspace in this episode isn't "oh, two sexy guys I like, which one should I choose to be with". It isn't even "oh my old pal is being a real dick to my new friend who is feeling really insecure here". Ed's headspace is "I'm a terrible person and Stede is seeing it now and Jack wants me to do more pirate party stuff but Stede hates that so now they both hate me and I probably deserve that because I'm a monster".

Ed leaves for Jack as much as Stede an episode later leaves for Mary. It's the exact same situation. For Stede, his own trauma and self-worth issues show up in the form of Chauncey Badminton, telling him he is a monster and ruins beautiful things, and Stede's reaction is to agree because he already thinks that of himself, so he takes his horrible ruinous monster self away from beautiful things (Ed) and back to where it belongs (to a miserable life he was hoping to leave behind). And for Ed, no Chauncey Badminton is required, because he's already constantly thinking these things about himself anyway. From Ed's perspective, Stede tell him he is a bad person (just as Jack), so Ed agrees and takes his horrible self away from beautiful things he doesn't deserve (Stede) to a miserable life he was going to leave behind.

Neither Jack nor Mary actually feature into the leaving much. Neither situation is "leaving the new guy for the ex". They're both situations of "I have a fuckload of trauma and self-hatred and it destroys my actually pretty nice new relationship".

And this is very interesting as a parallel. It doesn't even end there! When Stede returns, and Ed hears where he went, Ed too goes to "you left me for Mary". Same as Stede went to "you left me for Jack". And neither of it is actually what was happening!

Stede doesn't leave Ed for Mary, and Ed doesn't leave Stede for Jack. They both decide, driven by very similar trauma, to leave because surely the other one is going to be better off without them.

[wellofdean]

OK, I was going to reblog this excellent post by @luckshiptoshore so go read it, because yes. Yes!! YES!!! But then when I got started my post got super long and I felt bad tacking it onto her post and decided to make my own in response to these tags:

#i am actually a bit obsessed by the whole hunting as queerness metaphor#it’s so clearly something everyone involved in the show is thinking about#supernatural

Gurl, me too! Like go back to the start! By the time Supernatural began, the backlash against the Joseph Campbell Monomyth-style mode of storytelling had already begun in the hallowed halls of USC film school, and yo: I was there at the time of Kripke's graduation, and my best friends from college are full scale big giant time filmmakers now, whose names I will not share on main because it's uncool, and I don't want that attention, but... yeah. I am referencing FIRST HAND SOURCES on this.

But, for a real source? The Oxford English Dictionary places the first use of the term "Queer Theory" in 1990, with Queer Studies as an option in the academy by 1992. I know the kids think it's a new-fangled thing, but Kripke graduated USC in 1996 (I graduated in 1995) and it was ALL THE RAGE by then. My friends read queer theory in their Critical Studies courses in the Film School, I read it in the College of Humanities getting my degree in Literature. By that time, you could not get through that school with any degree in any non-STEM subject without knowing about ye olde postmodern lenses, queer and feminist theory, and without knowing how to employ those lenses.

Queer refers to sexuality, yes, but the word's earliest use (again, according to the OED) is in the 1500's, meaning: strange, odd, peculiar, eccentric. Also: of questionable character; suspicious, dubious.

So, ok, in 2005, Enter Supernatural, episode 1:

Presented? Two brothers. One actively seeking credit in the straight world that is not available to him in the bosom of his family: Stanford, law school, hot co-ed girlfriend, the other bound to his fractured, wounded family by duty, yes, but also by love, living on the fringe, alone, fighting monsters, and chasing after his father's approval, and who has long since given up any dream of being 'normal'. Episode 1 presents Sam's call to adventure, which he refuses when it's just familial duty, honor and love calling him, but accepts when the show takes a very straightforward and very telling path by classically fridging his woman. Ok, now he's on board. Like John, whose motivation is another dead woman, his motivation is revenge. So far so straight!

Dean though: he's different. He is already on the adventure and he was not 'called' or given the option of accepting or refusing because he had no agency when his feet were set upon this road. He does not fit the straight world at all, because he is cobbled together out of love, duty, deep guilt, striving, desperation and fear. This is who he is now, in some elemental, incontrovertible way. It was not a choice for him, he was born to it. His mother is dead, and we later learn, she made the choices that brought them all to this fate. Dean remembers her idyllically, but he is not motivated by revenge, more than any other thing, he wants to be worthy. He wants his father's approval, his brother's love.

Enter Supernatural's main theme: fucked up relationships between men enmeshed in patriarchy, which will eventually expand to include fucking GOD HIMSELF.

And like, there are SO MANY CLEAR STEPS ALONG THE ROAD in season one, and I am not even talking about sexuality and gender here, but there is SO MUCH TO SAY about it in season 1. But I am not talking about that -- I am talking at a structural, narrative level, the whole thing is just fucking all the way queered, yo.

The big climax?

At the end of the season, Dean says: "I just want my family back together. You, me, Dad... it's all I have." He is Sam's mother, John's partner! His vulnerability and emotion is feminized and contrasted with Sam and John's more overtly driven by their more masculine/straight heroic revenge quest. John: "Sam and I can get pretty obsessed, but you always take care of this family." Only that's not John talking, it's Azazel, and Dean knows it is because his father would never forgive how soft he is, how he will always choose love and family over revenge. Then, in the end, the show makes a huge point of telegraphing that Sam is finally aligning with Dean by refusing to shoot Azazel because he's possessing John, and Sam just can't do that to Dean.

Sam and Dean are thus bound together and cemented into a marginalised path, living on the road, haunting liminal spaces and cheap motels, confronting the monstrous everyday. Sam is presented as the brains of the operation, he does research, logics his way through things (masculine) while Dean is the heart who acts impulsively and on instinct and intuition (feminine).

It later transpires that Sam has a piece of the monster inside himself, and Dean has to learn to love the monstrous, he has no choice, because Sam is his brother and then Cas... and, and, and!

Like... I could go on and on, citing ENDLESS EXAMPLES. This could be a literal book. Maybe one you need to read with a magnifying glass like my condensed edition of the OED. LIke, the queerness of Supernatural is DIZZYING and MYRIAD.

But basically? FROM THE START, hunting is a queered version of family, and within that, Dean is a queered version of a Campbellian hero. Hunting is a metaphor for otherness and liminality, and that's even before you say a WORD about sex. It starts in deviation from the norms of family, masculinity and expands from there on so many levels both in story and on a meta level. The story is flesh on queer fucking bones.

I'm so sorry, but anyone who thinks queerness was not BAKED INTO Supernatural and more specifically into Dean from DAY 1 has clearly never seen Dean's insane lip gloss in season 1, and vastly underestimates the cultural awareness of people who write shit in Hollywood, and also the other people who put pink lip gloss on pretty boys in Hollywood. Nothing that gets on your screen wasn't a fucking choice made and approved by a LONG LIST of people who know what they are about.

[interstellar-superdrive]

Canadian Cartoons Are Great

Today, the popular cartoon YouTuber Saberspark uploaded a video talking about the infamous “fart episode” of the 2023 Total Drama series. The comments were filled with hatred and generalizations towards Canadian animation. These terrible comments are not the fault of Saberspark, but it is true that the “big users” in the cartoon community are (mostly) Americans who spread myths and stereotypes about Canadian cartoons. This has bothered me and a few others for quite a while, so here, I’m going to prove why Canadian animation is great, actually, and dispel common misconceptions

All Canadian cartoons are about fart jokes - if you say stuff like this, you clearly have never seen a Canadian cartoon outside of Total Drama and Johnny Test. That’s like if I said “all anime is naughty tentacles” or “all American cartoons are about anvils falling on your head.” And don’t act like your precious USA cartoons and anime are exempt from toilet humor. One example of an anime with toilet humor is Panty and Stocking with Garterbelt - their first episode was about a monster made out of shit. And we all know about the gross out cartoons such as Ren and Stimpy.

Canadian cartoons are cheaply mass-produced because of CanCon - No. What CanCon ACTUALLY states is that a certain percentage of content on a Canadian channel has to be Canadian-made. The policy is about supporting Canadian art, not “mass-producing” cartoons, since this applies to ALL Canadian TV and radio content, animated or otherwise.

Now, let me tell you some reasons why Canadian animation is actually great

Some of your childhood shows, such as Arthur, Franklin, and Little Bear are Canadian in origin.

Some of the most acclaimed cartoons within the cartoon community, such as Ed Edd n Eddy and MLP:FIM, were both animated in Canada and had voice actors from there (same talent pool, in fact - Vancouver)

Inspector Gadget and the Beetlejuice animated series helped keep good animation afloat during the 80s. In a decade full of uninspired and insipid cartoons, these were two of the highlights.

Canada is still a great place to outsource animation, as proven with the works of Nelvana, Mercury Filmworks, Jam Filled, and countless others.

If you grew up without cable, you probably watched PBS Kids and/or Qubo a lot. Guess what - lots of the shows on both of those channels were Canadian. For example: the PBS Kids Bookworm Bunch: Timothy Goes to School, Seven Little Monsters, Marvin the Tap-Dancing Horse - these shows are all Canadian! Qubo was also home to Jane and the Dragon, Jacob Two Two, Babar, Spliced, etc - they’re all Canadian too.

Because Canada’s censors are far more lax compared to American ones, Canada has made huge strides in teen and adult animation. Such shows include Total Drama, 6teen, Detentionaire, Undergrads, Producing Parker, etc as well as the movie Heavy Metal.

Also because of the lax censors, Canadian cartoons had positive LGBTQ representation far before the United States did. One episode of 6teen has a character stating “I’m gay,” and in Braceface, the main character assists her gay friend in finding a boyfriend. Unsurprisingly, these episodes never aired in the US.

6teen also dealt with periods before Turning Red, Baymax, and Molly McGee did it (again, the episode was banned in the US).

Finally, here are a few Canadian cartoons I recommend, and where to watch them:

Cybersix (it was a Canadian and Japanese co-production). The whole thing is on TMS’ YouTube channel.

Redwall is on Pluto, and there are episodes of it on YouTube courtesy of Treehouse Direct

Toad Patrol (unfortunately you’re gonna have to resort to low quality YouTube uploads)

Silverwing - again, the complete series is on YouTube

Detentionaire- On Tubi and Pluto!

Ruby Gloom is a great show if you like cute gothic stuff; it too is on Tubi and Pluto

The Adventures of Sam and Max: Freelance Police - on Tubi

One of my favorites, The Raccoons. Basically the Canadian equivalent to The Simpsons, and with a banger ending song. The show’s production company has uploaded episodes of it for free on YouTube.

The original Clone High was animated by the legendary Nelvana (if you’re wondering, the new season is not outsourced to Canada 😔) It is on Paramount Plus and HBO Max

Undergrads - yet again on YouTube, in low quality unfortunately. Like Clone High, it was on MTV.

I also recommend watching some short films from the National Film Board of Canada. My personal favorite is the Log Driver’s Waltz.

Tl;dr - American cartoons are not bad because of Allen Gregory, anime is not bad because of Pupa, and Canadian cartoons are not bad because of Johnny Test or fart jokes.

[misfitwashere]

Let's "create a ruckus."

March 28, 2025

ROBERT B. HUBBELL

MAR 28 READ IN APP LISTEN TO POST · 20:12

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I will hold a Saturday Morning Livestream on Substack at 9 am Pacific / Noon Eastern. The livestream is open to everyone via the Substack App. 

I will post a recording of the livestream on Saturday, which will be accessible to everyone who is unable to attend live.

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Secretary of State Marco Rubio unwittingly issued a challenge to all Americans who seek to defend the rule of law. We must “create a ruckus” that offends the tender sensibilities of Trump's mean-spirited, incompetent lackeys. In other words, we must continue doing exactly what we have been doing—but more of it!

There is much positive news to report—mixed with more efforts by Trump to destroy those parts of the federal government that seek to preserve the health, safety, and financial security of all Americans who are not billionaires.

Let’s take a look at today’s developments as we contemplate how we can “create a ruckus” in the time-honored fashion of John Lewis’s “good trouble.”

Rubio says Tufts student “created a ruckus” by writing an op-ed in a university newspaper—which allegedly justified a state sponsored kidnapping-style detention.

On Thursday, Secretary of State Marco Rubio explained the kidnapping-style detention of a foreign student at Tufts by saying, “she was part of a pro-Palestinian movement that caused “a ruckus” on campus.”

What is the “ruckus” that Rumeysa Ozturk created? She co-authored an op-ed in a university newspaper in which she criticized the university for failing to condemn the killing of innocent civilians in Gaza and called for divestment of university investments in Israel.

Rubio authorized masked ICE officers to seize Ozturk on a public street and hustle her into an unmarked car because she had expressed an opinion with which Marco Rubio disagrees.

No modern democracy punishes the expression a political opinion with arrest—much less an arrest eerily like tactics used by Nazi Brownshirts or by South American dictators in the decades-long “dirty war.” See YouTube, Video Captures Moment Turkish Student Is Detained By Masked Federal Agents

Marco Rubio could have instructed ICE to call Ozturk to advise her that her visa was revoked and instructed her to leave the country, post haste. Such a procedure would have achieved the same outcome—but would not have sent Rubio’s intended message that the Trump administration is willing to abuse the instruments of state power to terrorize its citizens and lawful residents.

If engaging in speech that Marco Rubio doesn’t like is a “ruckus” that offends the state, then the only course for patriotic Americans is to create as much of a ruckus as possible to overwhelm the masked paramilitary agents of Trump's agenda of revenge.

The performative state-sponsored kidnapping converted Rumeysa Ozturk into a pawn in Trump's propaganda war—a war staged for the benefit of Fox News viewers. 

A similar propaganda photo opportunity was staged by Homeland Security Secretary Kristy Noem, who posed in front of Venezuelan immigrants illegally deported from the US and turned over to El Salvador—where they are kept in cages (clearly seen in the background of the photo in this story by Jonathan V. Last, The Bulwark, This Is the Land of Wolves Now).

Rubio has allowed the illegal rendition of Venezuelan immigrants to cages in El Salvador based on their tattoos—many of which have no relation to alleged gang activity. In one heartbreaking example, an immigrant was illegally removed to El Salvador because he had a tattoo in solidarity with his brother—who has autism. See Mother Jones, “You’re Here Because of Your Tattoos”.

Marco Rubio has turned into a monster under Trump's tutelage. Democratic Senators voted unanimously to confirm Marco Rubio. Every Democratic Senator owes their constituents an abject apology—and a vow never to vote in favor of any Trump nominee.

It is long past the time to be outraged—as I know that most of you are. But now Marco Rubio has thrown down the gauntlet: Let’s create a ruckus and some “good trouble.” Join the national day of protest on March 29, with TeslaTakedown--Global Day of Action. And join the national “Hands Off” day of protest, sponsored by several groups, including Indivisible, mass mobilization on April 5.

Positive Developments on the legal front

The law firm of Wilmer Hale pushes back against Trump executive order.

Trump signed another executive order targeting a law firm. This time, the target is the firm of Wilmer Hale, where former special prosecutor Robert Mueller worked. As usual, Trump suspended security clearances and ordered an investigation into practices designed to increase diversity in the legal profession. Trump executive order is here: Addressing Risks From WilmerHale – The White House.

Unlike the cowardly leadership at Paul Weiss, the leadership at Wilmer Hale issued a strong statement refusing to bow and scrape before Trump. See The Hill, which reprints Wilmer Hale’s response, as follows:

Our firm has a longstanding tradition of representing a wide range of clients, including in matters against administrations of both parties," the spokesperson said in a statement. The Executive Order references Robert Mueller, who retired from our firm in 2021, and had a long, distinguished career in public service, from his time as a Marine Corps officer in Vietnam to his leadership of the FBl in the aftermath of the September 11th terrorist attacks. We remain committed to providing the expert representation that our clients are entitled to and rely upon. We look forward to pursuing all appropriate remedies to this unlawful order.

Kudos to Wilmer Hale for its brave stand. If you know an attorney at Wilmer Hale, give them a note of support. Wilmer Hale’s managing partner is Anjan Sahni, Anjan.Sahni@WilmerHale.Com

Unfortunately, there are reports that Skadden Arps is attempting to negotiate a surrender along the lines of Paul Weiss. See NYTimes, Law Firm Skadden Arps Seeks Deal to Avert Trump Executive Order.

When this brief period of reactionary autocracy is over, the legal profession will be divided into those firms who abandoned the rule of law and those who remained steadfast. The short-sightedness of two of the nation’s largest and wealthiest firms—Paul Weiss and Skadden Arps—is profoundly disappointing.

Federal judges continue to restrain Trump's lawlessness

In two positive developments, federal judges issued orders adverse to the Trump administration’s lawless efforts.

First, Judge Boasberg issued an order requiring the Trump administration to preserve the “self-deleting” messages on Signal—as required by the Presidential and Federal Records Act Amendments of 2014. See HuffPost, Trump Administration Must Preserve Signal Messages, Judge Says

Lawyers for the administration walked into the hearing ready to surrender, claiming that they had already begun collecting the various versions of the text messages sent on Signal by Hegseth, Waltz, Ratcliffe, Gabbard, Rubio, and others.

Although the use of Signal (and personal phones) to conduct a Principals Committee meeting regarding the attack on the Houthis was a clear violation of federal criminal law, Attorney General Pam Bondi said she is focused on the “success” of the mission and would not investigate the use of Signal. See Raw Story, 'This is so wrong': Onlookers slam Pam Bondi for signaling DOJ won't investigate war chats.

Two comments in response to Bondi:

First, the “success” of the military mission is irrelevant to the violation of federal law in using Signal.

Second, I will bet dollars to donuts that Pam Bondi uses Signal on her personal phone for national defense information in violation of federal statutes. If true, the appropriate course is for her to appoint a special counsel to investigate the administration’s wholesale flouting of the Espionage Act and other relevant statues.

Judge issues preliminary injunction against Hegseth order to ban transgender people from military

Judge Benjamin Settle of the Western District of Washington issued a nationwide preliminary injunction blocking the implementation of the military ban on transgender people serving in the US military. The preliminary injunction order is here: Commander Emily Shilling v. US | Preliminary Injunction.

There is a separate proceeding in Washington, D.C., before U.S. District Judge Ana Reyes, who has issued a preliminary injunction against the ban, although she has allowed a short period for the DOJ to appeal her ruling before it goes into effect. See The Advocate, Judge reinstates nationwide stop to Trump’s trans military ban.

Federal judiciary begins effort to protect independence of the judiciary.

In another positive development, the federal judiciary has established a task force to consider how to protect judges targeted by Trump after they issued rulings against the administration. See NYTimes, Federal Judiciary Creates New Task Force With Threats on the Rise. (Accessible to all.)

This development is particularly good news because the task force of judges has been established under a judicial committee that is chaired by Chief Justice Roberts. The task force is operating under “the direction of the Judicial Conference, a policymaking body led by Chief Justice Roberts.”

Chief Justice Roberts clearly regrets creating a monster by granting criminal immunity to Trump. Roberts’ regret may play a role in his decisions in cases that seek to curtail Trump's lawless spree of unhinged executive orders.

Political setbacks for Trump

Trump also suffered political setbacks on Thursday.

First, he withdrew the nomination of GOP Rep. Elise Stefanik to serve as US Ambassador to the United Nations. Politico, White House yanks Stefanik’s UN nomination. Trump pulled the nomination because Republican leadership is not confident that a replacement for Stefanik could be elected in a district Stefanik won by 24 percentage points in November 2024.

The lack of confidence may be a spillover from GOP internal polling for the two seats in Florida that are up for special elections on April 1, 2025. See CNN, Republicans grow concerned about Trump’s handpicked candidate in Florida special election. Although Mike Watlz (now NSA Director) won the district by 33 percentage points, there is some indication that Democratic nominee Josh Weil could upset Trump's handpicked candidate, state senator Randy Fine.

Second, Senator Susan Collins has joined Democrats in the Senate to challenge Trump's cuts to congressional spending. See NYTimes,. Top Senate Republican Protests Trump Bid to Withhold Spending. (Accessible to all.)

Per the NYTimes,

Senator Susan Collins, Republican of Maine and the chairwoman of the Appropriations Committee, initiated a letter to the White House, signed by Senator Patty Murray of Washington, the panel’s senior Democrat, asserting that the administration had violated the six-month spending law approved by Congress earlier this month. They pointed to a memo Mr. Trump had sent to Congress on Monday that declared that only a portion of the $12.4 billion designated as emergency funding in the legislation would actually be spent, “because I do not concur that the added spending is truly for emergency needs.”

Senators Collins and Murray told Trump that he had no authority to pare back spending authorized by Congress—a rationale that applies to nearly all of Trump’s Doge cuts.

Signalgate

Oh, boy! This scandal keeps getting worse by the minute. I have limited time to address this story, so I will focus only on two developments:

It turns out that NSA Mike Waltz disclosed highly sensitive, confidential information provided by Israel to the US regarding the damage assessment from the strike. Israel was reportedly upset that the disclosure risked the life of its human intelligence source in Yemen. See WSJ, Exclusive | Israel Supplied Intelligence in Airstrike Discussed in Signal Chat, Officials Say.

Throughout the day on Thursday, internet sleuths posted usernames and passwords for email accounts for Pete Hegseth and Mike Waltz. If those email accounts are still active, the likelihood is 100% that foreign adversaries have been monitoring everything that Hegseth has sent and received since his nomination. See U.S. security officials' passwords found online, including people in Signal chat | Mashable.

Concluding Thoughts

Trump and his surrogates are performing emergency interventions in the Florida special elections for the House seats vacated by Mike Waltz and Matt Gaetz. Although the odds are very long, strong showings by the Democratic candidates would be a boost for Democrats. A win by either Democratic candidate would be seismic.

There is good reason for Trump to fear that Republicans would lose Elise Stefanik’s “safe” Republican district. Each day brings new horrors that seem designed to punish the Ameircan people. The Senate voted on Thursday to overturn the rule limiting bank overdraft charges to $5.00. Robert F. Kennedy Jr. announced the layoff of 10,000 staff from Health and Human Services, a blow that will fall disproportionately on life-saving research. Who does that?

The Trump administration has become a toxic brand overseas. Usha Vance planned a vacation-style visit to cultural sites in Greenland, which sparked outrage among the country's citizens because Trump has become increasingly bellicose in his threats to invade Greenland. See MSN: Trump declares Greenland takeover US security priority, pledges action at any cost.

JD Vance will now join his wife on an all-expenses-paid tour of a US military base in Greenland.

I doubt that Trump will be able to visit King Charles in the UK as planned; if the visit does go forward, Trump should expect massive protests everywhere he goes in the UK.

In short, the expected backlash is developing—on the electoral front at home and on the international relations front abroad. And it will get worse as the tariffs begin to bite and the chaos in social security, health services, FEMA, and NOAA hit home. Things will get worse before they get better, but they will get better—with the help of a little ruckus from us!

[brokehorrorfan]

Shaun of the Dead will be released on 4K Ultra HD + Blu-ray + Digital in Steelbook and standard packaging on December 3 via Universal. The 2004 British horror-comedy is celebrating its 20th anniversary.

Edgar Wright (Scott Pilgrim vs. the World, Ant-Man) directs from a script he co-wrote with Simon Pegg. Pegg stars with Nick Frost, Kate Ashfield, Lucy Davis, Dylan Moran, Bill Nighy, and Penelope Wilton.

Shaun of the Dead has been remastered in 4K with Dolby Vision and Dolby Atmos Sound, approved by Wright. Special features are listed below, where you can also see the full Steelbook layout designed by Johnny Dombrowski.

Special features:

Shaun of the Dead: 20 Bloody Years - Director Edgar Wright joins actors Simon Pegg and Nick Frost to reflect on the funniest zombie movie ever made (new)

Audio Commentary with Simon Pegg and Edgar Wright

Audio Commentary with Simon Pegg, Nick Frost, Dylan Moran, Kate Ashfield and Lucy Davis

Audio Commentary with Bill Nighy and Penelope Wilton

Audio Commentary with the Zombies

Deleted Scenes

Outtakes

Simon Pegg’s Video Diary

Lucy Davis’ Video Diary

Joe Cornish’s Video Diary

Casting Tapes

Edgar and Simon’s Flip Chart

SFX Comparison

Make-Up Tests

EPK Featurette

T4 with Coldplay

Fun Dead

Trisha – Your Nine Lives Are Up

Trisha – I Married a Monster

Remembering Z Day

Trailers, Teasers, and TV Spots

There comes a day in every man’s life when he has to get off the couch…and kill some zombies. When flesh-eating zombies are on the hunt for a bite to eat, it’s up to slacker Shaun (Simon Pegg) and his best pal Ed (Nick Frost) to save their friends and family from becoming the next entrée.

Pre-order Shaun of the Dead.

[chaosduckies]

Restoration (Chapter 1)

Finally! Finished the first chapter! It’s also my first official g/t story. Enjoy!

Word count: 3,500

CW: Mentions of Death, Fear, and panic attacks (they don’t actually happen)

1- Nathan 

Don’t you wish that sometimes you could reverse time? Whether you never wished to be born, or if you just did something really embarrassing. You want to know what I would do if I could reverse time? Make sure my parents did move away from our little home in the country sooner. We all had loved it. With no loud noises and no people to tell us that we were weird. Just me, my parents, and the most beautiful view of coniferous trees ever. And that was stripped away from us. 

We had heard nothing but the dreadful screams and the cackling in the back of our minds. The only glimpse we had of out new home was the wicked smiles of our torturers. The only thing we were allowed to see were bodies being ripped in half. No longer the sight of the maple leaves turning orange during the fall, no longer the sight of a sunset. Nothing. Nothing but a red, bloody void.

Terrible right? How could I describe something you don’t even know? It’s not that hard. Just two words. Human trafficking. Where humans are taken away from our home and forced to make entertainment for beings with no hearts. They didn’t care what happened to anything that was below them in the food chain. That didn’t care how a “lesser” being felt. Because who would want to know about how a seven year old cried about seeing their own dad being ripped in half, huh? Who cared about how many times you’ve broken someone else’s bones? Who cared how much you traumatized a kid who used to have their whole life ahead of them? 

That was how I lived more than half of my life. Fearing everything that could and would hurt me. Scared of what would happen the very next day. Scared of the unknown truth that was my life. Even if my mom had kept reassuring me that everything would be okay. Even when my dad was long out of our lives, but never forgotten. Even when she was on the brink of death herself… 

Then, there was a glimmer of hope. And all I remembered were gun shots and my mom screaming and dragging me underneath something. Hidden away from the people that were trying to help us. After my mom had finally realized that those people were there to help, she asked me to go out and get them to come help her. I remembered seeing her bloody leg. I remember her tying a piece of string around to stop it from bleeding anymore. And I remember being scared to go. What was I supposed to do? I was just subdued to years and years of torture and all of a sudden I’m supposed to trust the same people that hurt us? 

The only reason I gathered up enough courage was because my mother had practically begged me and passed out afterward. I couldn’t leave her there to die like dad. And so what I thought would be our imminent doom yet again, was our hope for surviving. The people here helped get my mom to get better, and fixed up my multiple broken bones and wounds. They sent me to a program that taught basic skills before I could be placed into an actual school. Everything was going great. I had my life ahead of me. Then, the papers forcing my mom and I to transfer to a co-ed city arrived. 

Our little utopia was crumbling to the ground. Living in the same city as giants? Hah. No. I’d rather die than be around those monsters again. They’d just hurt us. And for some odd reason, my mom was smiling. Genuinely smiling even after reading the notice. She never looked mad, upset, or even the slightest bit scared. She smiled and cheered that we could have a normal life again. That I could have the childhood I never had. 

I admit, I believed this could be a good change as well. I could be around other people my age. Maybe make friends? And so began this great journey of trying to act like nothing had happened. Like my mom and I weren’t just subdued to torture for the last 8 years. No one would know, and no one would care. 

Today stated off as any normal day. I got dressed, brushed my teeth, ate breakfast. Nothing out of the ordinary. Just the first day I was cleared to go to an actual school. After moving away from the hospital and coming over to the co-ed city, I kind of thought this was a good idea. I mean, who’s to say that it’ll tun out like it did in the country? For all I know I won’t even have to go to school with giants. I could just go to an all human school or something. That’s what I was hoping for on the way here. But, now that my mom and I have been here for nearly a month, I’ve learned that wasn’t the case. 

I was going to school with humans and giants. Whether I liked it or not. 

My mom tried to reassure me, saying that there were more rules set up in a city rather than in the country. That wasn’t what I was worried about though. I was more worried about what would happen if I was alone. This was a completely new place that I’ve never been to. Who know’s what could happen? 

The bus came to pick me up and some other younger kids who were laughing at something on their phones. The atmosphere had completely changed. It was thick, and heavy. Maybe it was because it was early in the morning? Or maybe it was because everyone dreaded the day? I mean it was Monday after all. Whatever was making them look so drained and tired was obviously not good. Making my nerves rise like crazy. 

I sat down near the front of the bus, trying to avoid the other kids my age. There was just something about them that had me on edge. It’s not like I didn’t want to to make friends, it’s just that I had to be careful who I place my trust in. Especially when I was going to a school made for people much, much bigger than me. 

It was hard to keep my mind off of the fact that I would be walking along with giants again, but unless I wanted to undergo a panic attack on my first day, it was best to just ignore everyone and everything. At least until I could work up the courage to walk without my legs losing balance or without running away. Which will probably happen today. I’d be surprised if I could go three minutes without freaking out. 

The school was around a ten minute drive from my house. Plenty of time to really set into perspective where I was going. I checked my phone to make sure I would be able to call my mom in case something went wrong, made sure I had my schedule, and soon enough we were all exiting the bus. 

In front of me was a huge building. This was the human entrance to the school. Giants was on the other side so I at least didn’t have to deal with that until later on in the day. Hopefully. Compared to what I was guessing the giant side of the school, the human side was extremely tiny. Overall, the place looked very nice. They had well-kept flowerbeds on the outside with a couple benches outside for I guess when students came here before the doors open. 

When you walked into the building, there were lockers lining the walls up until you reached the doorways to the main classes. People were crowding all over, trying to meet up with their friends or just trying to get to class early. It all felt too much for me. I wasn’t used to being around so many people at once and it was really overwhelming me. Meanwhile, I still needed to figure out where the heck my class was in this mess. Somewhere in this hallway hopefully… 

After wandering around aimlessly for ten minutes, I finally found the classroom, thankfully in the human school. The only problem was that I had all eyes on me. I was not used to this however. One or two people? I could deal with. But with and entire classroom full? It just made my nerves go all over the place, and of course I didn’t show it at all. Staring at the tiled ground and finding the one empty seat on the far left of the class between two girls who both glared at me like I just interrupted their very important conversation about how their makeup looked. I mean I did, but I was too afraid to apologize now that they already hated me. 

Overall, the first half of the day was okay. No one talked to me and I didn’t talk to anyone. Mostly because there were so many whispers and mentions of me that had me thinking they were already talking bad about me. Why was all the attention on me? I was probably the most uninteresting person ever. I even heard someone say that I wasn’t going to last a week in this place, which seemed right if I were being honest. 

The bell rang, releasing us for lunch, and I just followed the crowd that started flooding the halls. I wasn’t hungry. At all. It’s just that I don’t know where I’m going in this huge place. The human side of the school looked really small compared the the giants’ side, but it’s really big inside. 

The cafeteria was shared between both giants and humans. Why was I barely finding this out now? I had zero idea. It would have been helpful to know that beforehand so I could mentally prepare myself, but now I didn’t have anymore time and I was currently standing right in the middle of the floor searching for a place to hide. 

Of course there were human tables nearby, but I had no idea which group of people sat at which. The last thing I needed was for someone to get mad at me over a table. That would be pointless. So, here I was. Definitely not on the human side of the cafeteria, and instead standing right in the middle of a walkway for giants. Can I add on that? I was too frozen in fear to move. 

Sure, there were other humans walking along where I was, but they could actually move. I had no idea how they could when people that were as tall as skyscrapers, some even taller, were walking along with them. I don’t get it! Even more odd, humans were going around the giant tables and climbing into something that took them on top. 

So this place did have commodities for humans. There apparently were elevators that took you on top of the giant table to human tables on top. That only took me forever to figure out at that moment, but that’s what was going on. So everyone was friends here or something? Well, maybe not everyone since there were other humans sitting on their side.

After taking a good five minutes to gather up my thoughts, I finally was able to walk away from being in the middle of the floor and in a corner table where no one was currently sitting. The farthest table away from the giants. And it seemed like no one was going to sit here anyways. I can’t believe that I didn’t run away. I mean I was just frozen in fear, but that doesn’t count! 

  Lunch was loud. Mainly because the giant’s voices were so loud and I hated the fact that no one minded but me. These other kids have been here for who knows how long so I was guessing they were just used to it. It made sense in my head. 

Th day went on. The second half of my school day was mainly in the giant’s side, which I dreaded, but they made a separate hall to get there. One that avoided being stepped on I was guessing. The classrooms here were huge of course, and they had humans on a separate desk all together. To avoid what you may ask? I had zero idea. 

It was going alright until my last period. I had successfully avoided giants all day (To some extent) and then my last period came tumbling down right on top of me. First, there was no desk in the back that had the human-sized ones. Second, humans were taking one of those elevators like at lunch to get on top of a giant’s desk acting like they weren’t just a hundred feet up in the air. Third, but last, the teacher was approaching me. Did I mention she was a giant? 

“You must be Nathan! Nice to meet you!” She had greeted, crouching down and holding her hand out. Did… did she want me to shake her hand. Er… finger? Oh heck. My heart was beating fast as I stared at her outstretched hand. Um. What do I do? And suddenly those same eyes came onto me. Peering right through my body. Again, why did all the attention come to me? 

I reached out a shaky hand, trying to keep my legs from buckling underneath me, and lightly placed my hand over the tip of her finger as she gently shook it. I gulped, expecting for there to be more, but she smiled softly and sadly at me. What did that mean? Should I be worried? What class was this even? I just read on my paper to come to room 135. 

“Hm… now who doesn’t have a human partner?” She turned her head up, looking for any raised hands. I couldn’t see anything. Heck, I could barely even look up. There were still a couple eyes on me, and I couldn’t help but feel the acid from my stomach leave a nasty taste in my mouth. Just a couple more minutes and you can go home. I had to remind myself before the teacher smiled and told me to follow her. I did, just a little ways from her, trying to ignore the stares that were practically stabbing me in the back. 

I couldn’t help but hear whispers again. Where was she taking me. Wait let me rephrase that. Who was she taking me to? By the looks of it giants and humans were randomly paired up for some odd reason. On my way to whoever’s desk I was going to, I couldn’t help but dread this. What if I fell off? What if the person who’s desk I’ll be on forgets I’m there and knocks me off? What if they don’t like me? Questions swirled in my head, but I knew I wasn’t going to get answers right now. 

The teacher stopped, turned down to me and smiled. Was she waiting for me to do something? Oh wait. Elevator, right. Multiple sets of eyes were on me once again as the elevator slowly went up. Nerves built up inside of me. Anxiety. Heck, maybe even a panic attack. I felt dizzy, but I would survive. There was only thirty minutes left of the day. I could survive. Yeah. 

The elevator stopped, opening a little gate to the open desk with a huge journal on it. I gulped, taking my first steps. The first thing I noticed about this guy was that he didn’t look as welcoming as the teacher. He gave me “Quiet Kid” vibes. Not to mention that he was dressed in mostly black. 

Replayed in my mind was the sick smirk and laughter coming from my captors. If this guy got ahold of me I would be dead. I was so sure of it that I tasted the vile in my mouth and my knees nearly buckling right from underneath me. But, I couldn’t help but wonder why he was wearing a nervous look on his face instead of the usual sickening grin. 

“Ryker, Nathan. Nathan, Ryker. I’m sure you’ll both get along well.” The teacher cheered, heading to the front of the class and taking role call. Leaving all alone with someone who looked like he would rip my body in half. Just great. As soon as I had stepped out of the elevator, I was once again frozen with fear. This time at a much closer radius than I would have preferred. Because now I was definitely in arms reach of him. Not something that I’d like to be near.  

My eyes fell to the ground as tears threatened my eyes. Too bad I wasn’t going to let anyone see them. I slowly walked over to the human desk, seeing that it was father from the edge than I had thought and there were railings so it would pretty hard to fall off without actually trying. 

The teacher smiled while standing up from her chair, “Welcome to Human and Giant Interactions for those of you who don’t know. I’m Mrs. Kay. Some people are taking this class willingly, or they just need the credit to graduate, but I would still love to get everyone involved and take this class seriously.” She had explained. What. I don’t remember putting this on the extracurricular format. Then again the hospital did say these kinds of classes would benefit for me. So did they really have to put this class on my schedule? Life really did hate me. A lot. 

This class went by painfully slow. It was mainly just videos on current events with humans and giants, and then Mrs. Kay asking us questions to which only the people on the front desks had answered. Not that I even wanted to answer a question like that. But it was mostly hard to focus when you had someone who could very easily push me off the side of the desk without even trying. I mean, I never once looked behind me the entire class period. Only hearing him flip pages in his notebook from taking notes like everyone else in the room. 

One other thing I had noticed was that rarely anyone had talked. For a class that was supposed to bring humans and giants together, it really didn’t seem like it. Then again, I had no idea wha they really did in this class. Maybe she just doesn’t like talking? Or people didn’t want to get in trouble or something? They were too tired? That would make the most since it was the end of the day. 

It felt like forever before the final bell had rang. I rushed down that stupid elevator thingy and hurried out the doors to the bus stop so I wouldn’t have to dread this until tomorrow morning all over again. 

My mom was still at work, so I just cooked some dinner for myself, made her a plate and stuffed it in the fridge and went to my room. This was going to hard to get through, but if my mom thinks it’ll help then I believe her. I mean, what other choice did I have? 

As soon as I heard the front door open, I saw my mom sighing while putting up her purse. I walked to the kitchen to heat up her dinner, earning a quiet chuckle form her. It sort of made me sad to think that she’ll never smile the same way again. Heck, she can’t even stand it when people touch her after what had happened. But at least we’re both still alive. 

“Smells amazing Nate.” She complimented, using her same soft and broken voice. She grabbed one of the plastic plates from the cabinet and getting herself a cup of tea. 

“How was school?” 

What was I even supposed to say to her? That it was terrifying every second? That I barely even survived the day without going under a panic attack? I couldn’t tell her that. She’d be so worried about me she wouldn’t worry about herself. I couldn’t do that to my mom. 

“It was good.” I put on my best fake smile and made her plate. 

“That’s good. There were no troubles?” 

“None so far.” 

“Thank you for doing this Nate. I just want you to have a normal childhood. I couldn’t have you at that hospital any longer.” She sadly explained, planting a soft kiss on my cheek. 

“I know mom. I’ll be fine.” 

She gave me a warm smile before taking her plate and sitting on the couch with the tv on. She didn’t need to know that I was practically forcing myself to even be around other people. It would put too much stress on her. For now, I’ll just force myself to endure whatever decides to throw itself at me. 

————————————————

And first chapter officially done. To be honest I wrote this just for the fun of it. Who knows, maybe I’ll actually make this a series instead of abandoning it? Don’t know.

[sinvulkt]

Fanfic writer interview

tagged by: @purple-iris

Thank you for the tag, i love those!!

what fandoms do you write in? So many! Star Wars, Dr. Strange, Dream SMP, Avatar the last airbender... and this year I wrote several one shot for the movie The Count Of Montecristo 2024 (it's currently in US theaters and an amazing movie, go see it!!) and the tv serie Nautilus (misadvantures of a crew of misfit led by Captain Nemo. Yes the jules verne one. It's like a gathering of whump and angst trope, I advise it!!)

how many words have you published in 2024?Wow that's hard to calculate! Since I have some WIPs over several years, i can’t use AO3 function xd. Plus I translated a lot of my work this year, which artificially double the written amount. AO3 says 230k words, I'm honestly too lazy to count the true number, but I'd say it's between 50k and 100k.

what is your greatest achievement this year? I finished my first longfic, Dreamt of a Never Ending Sky!! It's 56k word and I began it three years ago. This was the end of a long road but it feel so satisfying to have reached it's closing point. 🎶

what are your top three fics you've written this year? Hard choice. Mhhh...

🪽 The Caucasian Eagles serie - bcs adding wings to the montecristo universe and brainstorming around it with fandom friends was an amazing experience.

🪽 Do Sea Monsters Dream of Pink Shellfishes? — I honestly love all the nautilus fanfic i wrote bcs this serie has so many fic whump and angst potential to play with. But i was particularly fond of that one because "becoming a monster" trope, plus I got attached to eel!Nemo I can't help it xd.

🪽 Unhinged Vaderkin Prompt Collection — it's more a snippet-prompt collection for all the ideas roaming in my head, but there are so many that it feel very satisfying to share them. And it does make me write a short snippet for each universe which is a fun exercice.

what was your biggest pit of despair moment? I have been in a writing hiatus for two months now, and haven't written much compared to last year >.> But I guess it's a necessary rest.

what have you learned? Unrelatedly, instead of writing I drew quite a bit. So i learnt that I actually can draw! With the help of a tablet xd. (I did make good use of that break time to read delicious stories :3.) Please check my drawing account @sinvulkt-art , it needs some love :3.

did you beta any fics? any faves you want to shout out? I beta-ed lot of fics! This year, mostly the ones of my co-writers for The Caucasian Eagles and in the Nautilus fandom.

what three fics have you read this year that you love? That choice is so hard because there are so many great fics out there. Can't I make it five? XD.

Nemesis by MorallyGrey ( @silverinkgoldenquill )

I try to live in the now… Where the ghosts of old wrongs do not abide." Nemo turned his back on the past for a long time, perhaps for too long. Now, snatched from his own ship, he has little choice but to work for a man whom he long thought, and wished to be dead. His only hope is the League, but that means uncovering dark secrets. Secrets that, some would say, should have remained unearthed… (A Sequel to the LXG 2003 Movie)- Minor edits 2024. 180k words.

From the Ashes by renegade_of_theworld ( @renegadeoftheworld )

The story took a different turn after the Siege of the North when Zuko was captured by the Water Tribe.

A lot of prisoner trope, found families, and not-adoptions... And Zuko having to deal with more trauma than in the canon. 480k words.

Body in Abyss, Heart in Abyss by Emerald_sealin

WARNING: Heavy Book 4 and 5 SPOILERS.

For 800 years Xie Lian fought for what he believed was right. He endured centuries of unearned torment, shouldered responsibilities bigger than he was, no matter what was thrown at him Xie Lian took it, Xie Lian bore it, Xie Lian soldiered on.

Until the final battle on Mount Tonglu, when Xie Lian looses for the last time.

And forgives....for the last time.

Finally, the god of Xianle will have his REVENGE! 59k words.

Not a fic, but I really wanna shout out to the webnovel & novel Omniscient Reader which I discovered one month ago and obsolutely broke my heart. I love it so much. It begin as such an ordinary story, but reaching its end sure make you think a lot and destroy you. Then the side story exist to crush whatever remain of your heart.

(I want to punch the narrator so much. Me wanting to punch the mc generally is a very good thing. It means they are an idiotTM. A very infuriating, smirking, wrong decision-maker, punchable idiot. It's amazing)

what ideas are percolating for next year? Advancing on my other WIPs and finishing as many of them as I can (namely finishing The Monster and the Child, advancing On the Edge of Twilight and What If Dr Strange Lost His Humanity)! And translating more one shot in french to boost a bit french fanfics I think.

who do you want to thank? Another hard question there XD. All my fandom buddies I think bcs stories are much more entertaining with people to engage with, all my mutuals, and all the people I keep tagging (harassing? XD) on tumblr for such games (hopefully you find them fun as well :3). Can't really quote everyone here, but @sarcasticfirefighter for welcoming me in the dr strange world a few years ago, @firejay112 bcs i had my best time in star wars as her beta, @tocacot who patiently support all my wild blabbering about omniscient reader... I was also overjoyed to collaborate with @ash--00 , @azzzryel and Enepfopi this year. I never really forgot my collaboration with @purpleopossum either. I am seriously impressed by @fanfictasia going through the wildly long list of prompt I gave them years ago (i know i'm super late to comment on them but you're doing great 💜). Additionally I want to thank @pat-the-togorian , @asteral-feileacan and the other taaoej gals for being great friends (and rpg buddies) :3.

Finally, let's say thanking the world for being alive XD and bcs i'm a very lucky person who got a phd I love.

More importantly, I wanna thank all the creators for creating, wether it be inside fandom or for original content. Never stop bringing new things into this world!! Even if you think everyone will hate it. We never know who will come to love and live thanks to our story~

tagging: all the people mentioned before who want to join (yes, even if you were randomly mentioned as a fic writer or as thanks), anyone who see this and want to join, as well as: @kuraiarcoiris @udekai @aimportantdragoncollector @threebea @beguilewritesstuff @numerousbees1106 @trickstress333 @exomal @thehappybaker @wendingways @cinderfeather @bluntblade @tramp-fiction @starmahgalaxies @tonhalszendvics @retciwrites @vandervoiz @insertmeaningfulusername @pebblish @linzerj @doctorgeekery @dreaminghour @silvereddaye @chickadeechickadoo @25centsoda @silvercaptain24 @insecateur @allen-kunekune @dragonnan @charlottevader @makaronik @wyvunn @in-company-of-misery @starr234 @lialox @attackfish @chrisis-averted @gasmeros

[kaiowut99]

Yu-Gi-Oh! Duel Monsters GX Episode 126 Subbed (Finalized)

(Previously: Episodes 124-125 Subbed [Finalized])

(Check out my Subbed!GX Stream Masterpost!)

TURN-126: Judai VS Manjoume -- Dark Sword the Dragon Knight

Judai pursues Martin as he heads towards where the three Phantasms have been locked away--only to find the zombified Manjoume standing in his way. As Manjoume refuses to make way for him, Judai ultimately duels him, with Manjoume summoning Return Zombie and Blood Vorse as he pounces on Judai. Elsewhere, having learned that Johan and co.'s duels were a ruse, the students rush inside to get to where the food is, but they are beaten by the zombie students, causing most of the students to have now become zombies. Just then, at the power-generator area, O'Brien hears a transmission from someone.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

126 is now finalized! Just a quick 'un this time since I ran a bit late with myself for GX work--got a bit caught up in some interesting TFSP stuff along with my round of story-translation with Kite's story events lol--and since episodes 127-128 and 129-130 lead into each other pretty well, I thought I'd just work on 126 this time as a bit of a calm before the storm. And it does offer that vibe, as we get Martin dashing for the three Phantasms--remember them?--and Judai in hot pursuit, only for a zombie Manjoume to get in his way. The Dark Sword the Dark Demon Realm Dragon Knight (Dark Blade the Dragon Knight--OCG name be long here) he pulls out is kinda neat, its only having one appearance aside, while the conversation that Misawa has with Zweinstein later gives our group some hope to get out of this dimension if they can get past the zombie horde to get to the tennis courts (remember them?).

Animation error-wise, only a handful of quick things to work on for 126 (maybe a benefit of having two Animation Directors on board for this one?): two card edits, a split screen, and an odd quick flash of a Duel Disk part not being drawn in, lol. Also, two bits in the preview related to episode 127. As usual, edit breakdowns below the cut for the interested!

Quick housekeeping: quickly revisited and re-finalized episode 107's hardsub after noticing that I had Ed missing from the translated ending credits for that episode (instead accidentally listing Rei in both cast lists); links updated in the release post there and in the masterpost. oop

Anywho, enjoy! Hoping not to delay myself too much over the next couple weeks in getting 127 and 128 finalized, lol; before I fully work on them, I'll first be back in TFSPland hopefully knocking out both Kotori and Rio's stories to cap off ZEXAL's story events, along with some more incidental work on ARC-V "Dub-Uncut" episode 2. Stay tuned!

Fixes and Edits!

Clocking in as our first error around 12:43 (not too long after the second Animation Director's team kicks in after Flame Wingman's summoning [that's where you can tell the shift from Chi Man Park's style to Ok Mi Lee's]), as Manjoume summons Dark Sword the ... Dragon Knight and Judai looks on, there's a black square on his Disk where Flame Wingman's card should be. A relatively easy fix, as I just slapped on a proxy over it in AfterEffects.

A bit later, as Misawa tries to get into the Power Generator Complex's control panel but has trouble doing so, Kenzan and the others run over to help--but there's a quick movement frame (lasting three total frames) as Kenzan moves to run over where part of his inactive Disk is literally missing--you can see the background of some power-generator panels behind him through the gap, lol. Fixed using Photoshop to grab that part from a later frame in the shot, clipping it out and slightly rotating/adjusting it to fit into this shot; made a perfect fit! Once done, I threw the fixed frame into the footage in Sony Vegas. (Actually noticed this one after working on the other edits as I was revising the episode's subs.)

Later, as Judai summons Gran Mole and has him Contact-Fuse with Neos, there's a quick frame as we pan up to Neos and Gran Mole fusing where Judai has Gran Mole in Monster Zone 2 on his Disk, which should be occupied by Neos. Another quick and easy AfterEffects fix as I just applied a Neos proxy over it.

This one was interesting... After Judai summons Gran Mole and Manjoume notes he also has the same ATK as his Dark Sword the ... Dragon Knight, Judai clicks in on a split-screen to activate his effect; once he explains it, their split-screen splits apart, but Manjoume's moves first for two frames before Judai's finally rapidly moves as their uneven slide-out lasts just five frames (vs the usual 7-8). Fixed this in Sony Vegas by masking out and redoing their slide-outs to be simultaneously timed, making them smoother to last the more common seven frames.

In the preview for 127, as we see the Phantasms' silhouettes rising behind Amon's Eye of the Typhoon, Amon and Martin slide in on a quick split-screen before sliding out to show Eye of the Typhoon being made to dissipate--but for a quick frame on slide-in and slide-out, the border on Amon's split is a bit ghosty and faded, while on the slide-out, the close-up of Eye of the Typhoon being transitioned into is also briefly missing. Being fixed first for 127 proper then applied as I set up the translated preview, I redid the border on Amon's split for both ghosty instances to look more per usual, while on the slide-out, I masked in part of the close-up Eye of the Typhoon shot between him and Martin. (Couldn't really apply this fix to the original preview due to the Japanese title text over the shot.)

As the 127 preview wraps, we have a shot of a shrouded-in-darkness Raviel standing up, with his eyes ominously glowing red as he does so--in 127 proper, this was removed for some reason, so he stands up with his eyes looking normal. I thought it made more sense to still have his eyes ominously glow, so I took the preview version of the shot and masked out the glowing eyes over the footage from 127 to restore it for both the translated preview and the episode proper.

[8myass]

୨୧ ‧₊˚ 🍵 ⋅ hi, y'all! i'm new to this community and i just wanted to do a little "intro to my account" post with a bit about me and my writing! `✦ ˑ ִֶ 𓂃⊹ my name is lele, i go by she/her pronouns, and i'm 18 y/o, but i've been writing (and reading) fanfics for years. `✦ ˑ ִֶ 𓂃⊹ this is an 18+ account for the mature themes written. i know minors will read anyway, so just read responsibly and understand what you're getting into. there should be no shocker when there is smut in a smut story. `✦ ˑ ִֶ 𓂃⊹ i follow everyone back! `✦ ˑ ִֶ 𓂃⊹ will include a lot of dark content, fluff isn't my strong suit. `✦ ˑ ִֶ 𓂃⊹ works are scheduled to be posted every saturday and sunday (hopefully). `✦ ˑ ִֶ 𓂃⊹ if you enjoy my works, please like, comment feedback, and reblog! that would be very much appreciated!! 🩵 `✦ ˑ ִֶ 𓂃⊹ requests are open! `✦ ˑ ִֶ 𓂃⊹ prompts for requests are found here, but any requests are appreciated ♡. requests will be answered out of order, so it might take a bit for me to wrack my brain of good content to answer requests! `✦ ˑ ִֶ 𓂃⊹ anons are welcomed. `✦ ˑ ִֶ 𓂃⊹ currents anons are: 🧺 `✦ ˑ ִֶ 𓂃⊹ taglist is open!

ೄྀ࿐ ˊˎ- what i won't write: strictly bxb content (i'm inexperienced, maybe i'll try it in the future, also might be on sidelines of stories), incest, mpreg, male reader for smut (as i am not male, i deem it hard to write the mc as a male. but gender neutral is okay), nothing much that i won't really write. ೄྀ࿐ ˊˎ- what i do write: gxg, stepcest, age gaps (legal), infidelity/cheating, noncon (no consent given), dubcon (consent is questionable), cnc (roleplayed noncon scenarios, but it's fully consensual), bondage, any kink you can think of (no piss/shit kinks tho 😐), pegging, dom!reader, switch!reader, yandere, stalkers/stalking, gore, knife play, gun play, sensory play, branding, murder (not of mcs), omegaverse / a/b/o (never written before, i can't promise it'll be good, but i can try??), dacryphilia, unprotected sex, breeding, voyeurism/exhibitionism, blackmail, sensory deprivation, femdoms (whether this means reader or idol), g!p, anal, threesomes/foursomes/anysomes rly, orgies/gangbanging, monster fucking??? idk ig that's all for now, i'm willing to try everything at least once, i'm a rather experimental writer. if it's not listed, i will probably write it anyway lmao. ೄྀ࿐ ˊˎ- genres i write: smut (w or w/o plot, preferably w), fluff, angst, horror/thriller, suggestive, crack, honestly just anything (always experimenting). ೄྀ࿐ ˊˎ- what i write: series (possibly), drabbles, oneshots (less than 4k words), fake texts, headcannons, hard/soft thoughts, full-fics (more than 4k words). ೄྀ࿐ ˊˎ- boy groups i write for: nct (all units; nct dream, nct 127, wayv, nct wish but only fluff for all minors), riize, seventeen, stray kids, txt. however, i'll write for any boy group! these are just the only ones that my brain typically needs no help in coming up with ideas for. male soloists can be written for as well! (ngl, i just write for anyone i feel like, so any group is open for requests) ೄྀ࿐ ˊˎ- girl groups i write for: (g)i-dle, aespa, blackpink, itzy, newjeans (only fluff for hyein and haerin), le sserafim (only fluff for eunchae), twice, and mamamoo. (kard can also be requested as a co-ed group, female soloists are all able to be written for as well) (i really just write for anyone, so anyone is open for requests too)

˚୨୧⋆｡˚ ⋆ you can find my male idol masterlist here and my female idol masterlist here! ˚୨୧⋆｡˚ ⋆ recent works: nct 2023 yandere headcannons, suicidal (yandere!felix) ˚୨୧⋆｡˚ ⋆ what i'm currently working on: your touch (yandere!anton) [wip, but on hold]

˚୨୧⋆｡˚ ⋆ jaehyun 2024 birthday event!! [m.list for event can be found here] (on hold)

[dangerliesbeforeyou]

ranking all the taskmaster series cos why not lol

no one asked for this but im doing it so......

this is from least to most favourite btw! also i will say there are no series that i dislike at ALL so my least favourite is still a banger of a series it's just... the one i think about the least lol??

also featuring my fav contestant from each series & my fav moment to make this more interesting idkkk

series 3 - rob beckett - rob's accent challenge as part of one of the tasks never fails to make me cry w/ laughter lol

series 6 - liza tarbuck - the 'have fun & then repeat' task where russell does keepy uppys whilst talking about a little old lady 'rubbing herself silly' lol also always enjoy tim's pun outfit cos i nearly always forget what it was so the reveal is always delightful lol!

series 8 - joe thomas - team of 3 doing the bathtub(?) task, can't actually remember but the sibling energy between lou and iain was hysterical (& poor paul just trying to keep everything together lol)

series 14 - fern brady - not actually a funny moment, but i really love the bit in the classical music task where sarah talks about her ex who was horrible about her singing and greg says 'fuck you' to him <3 such a sweet moment that made me legit emotional

series 10 - katherine parkinson - daisy being SO furious as she says it's a HIPPO!!!! also katherine pouring water into a net lol

series 17 - nick mohammed - steve getting jumpscared by the 'mannequin' lol also one of my fav details was nick's reflection being edited out cos he was dressed as dracula lol!! the editors of the show deserve all the love and accolades tbh

series 2 - jon richardson - i feel like i should go with another moment but... it has to be joe's TRAGIC potato throw loss!!!!!

series 18 - rosie jones - every team task w/ rosie and jack lol also i'll be honest, i've only seen this series once so i can't remember a lot of details

series 15 - ivo graham - everyone doing an impression of jenny in a live task lol also every time kiell got mad (this is a common theme on this list i'm realising... i really like when people get annoyed apparently)

series 1 - tim key - watermelon task obviously!! also the flirting w/ fred the swede task

series 4 - mel giedroyc - the reveal of hugh's drawing of the woman (i can't remember her name) cracks me up so much lol also mel & the baby gap!!

series 11 - charlotte ritchie - the absolute chaos of the team of 3 doing the blindfold task, especially charlotte just running around in circles giggling and jamali standing around utterly bemused until the very end lol... also lee, dribbling poppadoms, yelling 'i've got a bafta me!'

series 5 - nish kumar - ~~ always seeing you do cool stuff ~~ also SO many quotable bob moments but we'd need to be here for a week for me to go through all that lol

series 12 - guz khan - wHO THE FUCK IS VERONICA?! (that whole riddle task, the stark difference between the two teams, literally everything guz says it's just incredible) also special mention to the wow monster (which is probably my ult fav live task lol)

series 9 - ed gamble - david doing the spoon task lol... also every single time ed got angry (which was constantly lol)

series 16 - lucy beaumont - the team of 3 hotel task 'lovely legs sir!!' i don't know if i've ever laughed as much at something maybe ever???

series 7 - james acaster - i mean... how do i pick just one? gonna go with a LIME!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! because it was the first thing i ever heard about from the show (thanks to my sister quoting it)... honestly though i wanna list like 200 moments here

series 13 - ardal o'hanlon (the real answer is all of them tho lol) - ardal coming out with three chickens in the duck task and saying 'this is the best i can do'... also every single time alex got annoyed at bridget loool

[dreaminginthedeepsouth]

Dave :: Financial Review

* * * *

Rubio says Tufts student “created a ruckus” by writing an op-ed in a university newspaper—which allegedly justified a state sponsored kidnapping-style detention.

On Thursday, Secretary of State Marco Rubio explained the kidnapping-style detention of a foreign student at Tufts by saying, “she was part of a pro-Palestinian movement that caused “a ruckus” on campus.”

What is the “ruckus” that Rumeysa Ozturk created? She co-authored an op-ed in a university newspaper in which she criticized the university for failing to condemn the killing of innocent civilians in Gaza and called for divestment of university investments in Israel.

Rubio authorized masked ICE officers to seize Ozturk on a public street and hustle her into an unmarked car because she had expressed an opinion with which Marco Rubio disagrees.

No modern democracy punishes the expression a political opinion with arrest—much less an arrest eerily like tactics used by Nazi Brownshirts or by South American dictators in the decades-long “dirty war.” See YouTube, Video Captures Moment Turkish Student Is Detained By Masked Federal Agents

Marco Rubio could have instructed ICE to call Ozturk to advise her that her visa was revoked and instructed her to leave the country, post haste. Such a procedure would have achieved the same outcome—but would not have sent Rubio’s intended message that the Trump administration is willing to abuse the instruments of state power to terrorize its citizens and lawful residents.

If engaging in speech that Marco Rubio doesn’t like is a “ruckus” that offends the state, then the only course for patriotic Americans is to create as much of a ruckus as possible to overwhelm the masked paramilitary agents of Trump's agenda of revenge.

The performative state-sponsored kidnapping converted Rumeysa Ozturk into a pawn in Trump's propaganda war—a war staged for the benefit of Fox News viewers.

A similar propaganda photo opportunity was staged by Homeland Security Secretary Kristy Noem, who posed in front of Venezuelan immigrants illegally deported from the US and turned over to El Salvador—where they are kept in cages (clearly seen in the background of the photo in this story by Jonathan V. Last, The Bulwark, This Is the Land of Wolves Now).

Rubio has allowed the illegal rendition of Venezuelan immigrants to cages in El Salvador based on their tattoos—many of which have no relation to alleged gang activity. In one heartbreaking example, an immigrant was illegally removed to El Salvador because he had a tattoo in solidarity with his brother—who has autism. See Mother Jones, “You’re Here Because of Your Tattoos”.

Marco Rubio has turned into a monster under Trump's tutelage. Democratic Senators voted unanimously to confirm Marco Rubio. Every Democratic Senator owes their constituents an abject apology—and a vow never to vote in favor of any Trump nominee.

It is long past the time to be outraged—as I know that most of you are. But now Marco Rubio has thrown down the gauntlet: Let’s create a ruckus and some “good trouble.” Join the national day of protest on March 29, with TeslaTakedown--Global Day of Action. And join the national “Hands Off” day of protest, sponsored by several groups, including Indivisible, mass mobilization on April 5.

Positive Developments on the legal front

The law firm of Wilmer Hale pushes back against Trump executive order.

Trump signed another executive order targeting a law firm. This time, the target is the firm of Wilmer Hale, where former special prosecutor Robert Mueller worked. As usual, Trump suspended security clearances and ordered an investigation into practices designed to increase diversity in the legal profession. Trump executive order is here: Addressing Risks From WilmerHale – The White House.

Unlike the cowardly leadership at Paul Weiss, the leadership at Wilmer Hale issued a strong statement refusing to bow and scrape before Trump. See The Hill, which reprints Wilmer Hale’s response, as follows:

Our firm has a longstanding tradition of representing a wide range of clients, including in matters against administrations of both parties," the spokesperson said in a statement. The Executive Order references Robert Mueller, who retired from our firm in 2021, and had a long, distinguished career in public service, from his time as a Marine Corps officer in Vietnam to his leadership of the FBl in the aftermath of the September 11th terrorist attacks. We remain committed to providing the expert representation that our clients are entitled to and rely upon. We look forward to pursuing all appropriate remedies to this unlawful order.

Kudos to Wilmer Hale for its brave stand. If you know an attorney at Wilmer Hale, give them a note of support. Wilmer Hale’s managing partner is Anjan Sahni, Anjan.Sahni@WilmerHale.Com

Unfortunately, there are reports that Skadden Arps is attempting to negotiate a surrender along the lines of Paul Weiss. See NYTimes, Law Firm Skadden Arps Seeks Deal to Avert Trump Executive Order.

When this brief period of reactionary autocracy is over, the legal profession will be divided into those firms who abandoned the rule of law and those who remained steadfast. The short-sightedness of two of the nation’s largest and wealthiest firms—Paul Weiss and Skadden Arps—is profoundly disappointing.

Federal judges continue to restrain Trump's lawlessness

In two positive developments, federal judges issued orders adverse to the Trump administration’s lawless efforts.

First, Judge Boasberg issued an order requiring the Trump administration to preserve the “self-deleting” messages on Signal—as required by the Presidential and Federal Records Act Amendments of 2014. See HuffPost, Trump Administration Must Preserve Signal Messages, Judge Says

Lawyers for the administration walked into the hearing ready to surrender, claiming that they had already begun collecting the various versions of the text messages sent on Signal by Hegseth, Waltz, Ratcliffe, Gabbard, Rubio, and others.

Although the use of Signal (and personal phones) to conduct a Principals Committee meeting regarding the attack on the Houthis was a clear violation of federal criminal law, Attorney General Pam Bondi said she is focused on the “success” of the mission and would not investigate the use of Signal. See Raw Story, 'This is so wrong': Onlookers slam Pam Bondi for signaling DOJ won't investigate war chats.

Two comments in response to Bondi:

First, the “success” of the military mission is irrelevant to the violation of federal law in using Signal.

Second, I will bet dollars to donuts that Pam Bondi uses Signal on her personal phone for national defense information in violation of federal statutes. If true, the appropriate course is for her to appoint a special counsel to investigate the administration’s wholesale flouting of the Espionage Act and other relevant statues.

Judge issues preliminary injunction against Hegseth order to ban transgender people from military

Judge Benjamin Settle of the Western District of Washington issued a nationwide preliminary injunction blocking the implementation of the military ban on transgender people serving in the US military. The preliminary injunction order is here: Commander Emily Shilling v. US | Preliminary Injunction.

There is a separate proceeding in Washington, D.C., before U.S. District Judge Ana Reyes, who has issued a preliminary injunction against the ban, although she has allowed a short period for the DOJ to appeal her ruling before it goes into effect. See The Advocate, Judge reinstates nationwide stop to Trump’s trans military ban.

Federal judiciary begins effort to protect independence of the judiciary.

In another positive development, the federal judiciary has established a task force to consider how to protect judges targeted by Trump after they issued rulings against the administration. See NYTimes, Federal Judiciary Creates New Task Force With Threats on the Rise. (Accessible to all.)

This development is particularly good news because the task force of judges has been established under a judicial committee that is chaired by Chief Justice Roberts. The task force is operating under “the direction of the Judicial Conference, a policymaking body led by Chief Justice Roberts.”

Chief Justice Roberts clearly regrets creating a monster by granting criminal immunity to Trump. Roberts’ regret may play a role in his decisions in cases that seek to curtail Trump's lawless spree of unhinged executive orders.

Political setbacks for Trump

Trump also suffered political setbacks on Thursday.

First, he withdrew the nomination of GOP Rep. Elise Stefanik to serve as US Ambassador to the United Nations. Politico, White House yanks Stefanik’s UN nomination. Trump pulled the nomination because Republican leadership is not confident that a replacement for Stefanik could be elected in a district Stefanik won by 24 percentage points in November 2024.

The lack of confidence may be a spillover from GOP internal polling for the two seats in Florida that are up for special elections on April 1, 2025. See CNN, Republicans grow concerned about Trump’s handpicked candidate in Florida special election. Although Mike Watlz (now NSA Director) won the district by 33 percentage points, there is some indication that Democratic nominee Josh Weil could upset Trump's handpicked candidate, state senator Randy Fine.

Second, Senator Susan Collins has joined Democrats in the Senate to challenge Trump's cuts to congressional spending. See NYTimes,. Top Senate Republican Protests Trump Bid to Withhold Spending. (Accessible to all.)

Per the NYTimes,

Senator Susan Collins, Republican of Maine and the chairwoman of the Appropriations Committee, initiated a letter to the White House, signed by Senator Patty Murray of Washington, the panel’s senior Democrat, asserting that the administration had violated the six-month spending law approved by Congress earlier this month. They pointed to a memo Mr. Trump had sent to Congress on Monday that declared that only a portion of the $12.4 billion designated as emergency funding in the legislation would actually be spent, “because I do not concur that the added spending is truly for emergency needs.”

Senators Collins and Murray told Trump that he had no authority to pare back spending authorized by Congress—a rationale that applies to nearly all of Trump’s Doge cuts.

Signalgate

Oh, boy! This scandal keeps getting worse by the minute. I have limited time to address this story, so I will focus only on two developments:

It turns out that NSA Mike Waltz disclosed highly sensitive, confidential information provided by Israel to the US regarding the damage assessment from the strike. Israel was reportedly upset that the disclosure risked the life of its human intelligence source in Yemen. See WSJ, Exclusive | Israel Supplied Intelligence in Airstrike Discussed in Signal Chat, Officials Say.

Throughout the day on Thursday, internet sleuths posted usernames and passwords for email accounts for Pete Hegseth and Mike Waltz. If those email accounts are still active, the likelihood is 100% that foreign adversaries have been monitoring everything that Hegseth has sent and received since his nomination. See U.S. security officials' passwords found online, including people in Signal chat | Mashable.

Concluding Thoughts

Trump and his surrogates are performing emergency interventions in the Florida special elections for the House seats vacated by Mike Waltz and Matt Gaetz. Although the odds are very long, strong showings by the Democratic candidates would be a boost for Democrats. A win by either Democratic candidate would be seismic.

There is good reason for Trump to fear that Republicans would lose Elise Stefanik’s “safe” Republican district. Each day brings new horrors that seem designed to punish the Ameircan people. The Senate voted on Thursday to overturn the rule limiting bank overdraft charges to $5.00. Robert F. Kennedy Jr. announced the layoff of 10,000 staff from Health and Human Services, a blow that will fall disproportionately on life-saving research. Who does that?

The Trump administration has become a toxic brand overseas. Usha Vance planned a vacation-style visit to cultural sites in Greenland, which sparked outrage among the country's citizens because Trump has become increasingly bellicose in his threats to invade Greenland. See MSN: Trump declares Greenland takeover US security priority, pledges action at any cost.

JD Vance will now join his wife on an all-expenses-paid tour of a US military base in Greenland.

I doubt that Trump will be able to visit King Charles in the UK as planned; if the visit does go forward, Trump should expect massive protests everywhere he goes in the UK.

In short, the expected backlash is developing—on the electoral front at home and on the international relations front abroad. And it will get worse as the tariffs begin to bite and the chaos in social security, health services, FEMA, and NOAA hit home. Things will get worse before they get better, but they will get better—with the help of a little ruckus from us!

[Robert B. Hubbell Newsletter]