#i think odo would have face book

[marxistgnome]

On the one hand i think star trek not really having an internet equivalent is cool cos it shiws we developed an entire new and possibly better system, similar to how holosuites replaced film and tv, and it slso lets me speculate about whether internet connection as we know it works in deep space or 9ver long interstellar distances (idk how the internet works so i get to just imagine). But on the other hand it would be funny if data was a twitch streamer.

[walkingstackofbooks]

DS9 2x22 The Wire thoughts (I'm re-watching, so there may be future spoilers)

I'm so excited to watch this again!

I guess we don't know that Julian had the choice to "entertain one of his lady friends" the night before, but I certainly choose to believe he did, he wanted to finish Garak's book more :p

Garak's stammering in "Doctor, what do you think you're doing?" :3

"In my expert medical opinion, I'd say it's sick." XD

"Keiko would be proud of you." Hah - the thing is I can imagine the overly-excited Julian telling her about this at some point and her just sweetly saying "well done, I'm impressed" but in her teacher voice she uses for seven year olds

"It's not like you two are really friends." Julian is NOT being subtle here that at the very least he WANTS to be real friends 😅 this man and lying...

Okay and now he's stabbing the plant with the hypospray because he's so frustrated with not being able to help Garak

VERY dramatic entrance, doctor.

😬😂That looked suspiciously like Quark was miming giving Julian oomax while saying "maybe a late night session in a holosuite".

"Try not to yell at any more admirals for a while." "I wasn't yelling. I was just expressing my feelings. Loudly." Gotta love Sisko

Oh, his poor dejected face at the information recurring taking weeks :3

Love how Julian is called to take care of Garak - this isn't Dr Bashir being called, it's not a medical emergency. It's Julian being Garak's only known friend who's requested.

Is it just me or did Julian check Garak or when he said "We'll go to my quarters"?

That drink exchange was VERY smooth of Quark and Julian

"I routinely monitor all of Quark's subspace communications." "Is that legal?" XD

"I see your point"... That's actually the exact same phrase as altered!Julian uses in Dramatis Personae - only this time it's ihm agreeing to do something questionable with Odo, last time it was to do something reasonable with him.

" I hope you don't have one of those little bugs hidden in my quarters." "Should I?" What's the betting Julian's going to be paranoid about this for a few weeks?

Julian's "What?! *sigh*" after being told Garak had left the infirmary. Idk it gave me feels.

I'm here for his Angry Pacing

"Doctor, did anyone ever tell you that you are an infuriating pest" "Chief O'Brien all the time, and I don't pay any attention to him either." That answer came SO quickly, he didn't even have to think about it

"I'm a doctor. You're my patient. That's all I need to know" JULIAN I CANNOT WITH YOU

Ohh, his sad looking downness <3 <3

Endless endless compassion, I love you so much

"Right now I'm not concerned with what you did in the past. I'm simply not going to walk out of here and let you die. We need to turn that implant off and whatever withdrawal symptoms or side effects you may experience, I promise I'll help you through them." Is he really not in love with Garak?! Because this is some gay shit Julian Subatoi Bashir. GAY I tell you

"In that case I want to talk to him now. Wake him up." "I'll do no such thing." "Doctor, these are murder cases and Garak may be a suspect." "That may be so, but he's still my patient and I won't have him disturbed." I am WILD about calmly resolute Doctor Bashir

I love a sleepy Julian :3

Garak's manic speech is incredible. WHAT a performance. My word. I couldn't look away.

" I can't believe that I actually enjoyed ... staring into your smug, sanctimonious face." Staring into Julian's face sounds pretty gay to me, Garak. (Who wouldn't enjoy staring at it though?)

Ah yes, wrestling on the floor with your alien crush while he is out of his mind. Definitely never happened before in Trek. No parallels here to be drawn.........

"I don't want to hurt you." And presumably he actually could.

Julian whizzing through all the samples, brining one back having seen it for all of 2 seconds and immediately knowing which one to overlay it with. THAT SEEMS PRETTY GENETICALLY ENGINEERED TO ME. I swear I don't know how that crackpot retcon worked so well, but it DOES

"More than I deserve." Oooh, callback to earlier int he episode when he said "Has it ever occurred to you that I might be getting exactly what I deserve?" .... My HEART

"I've about given up on learning the truth from you, Garak."I The FONDNESS with which he SAYS this!

"We were closer than brothers...."Sons of Train" welp, that's the 'true' bit

Holding handsssss!!!

There's no way Sisko sanctioned this, right? Did Julian just steal the shuttle craft?!

Okay then, just beam into the house of someone you know to be extremely dangerous and start poking around?! Your curiosity, Julian, I swear...

*wide smile* "I always drink Tarkalian! ..." -suddenly realises that this is VERY personal information Tain has on him- "...Tea."

Did he just GIGGLE? *rewatches* Yep, it's definitely there - "Are all the Starfleet Lieutenants as brash as you are?" "I couldn't say - hehe - though I doubt it."

"I thought you were his friend." "I suppose I am." YES HE SAID IT that's the first step

"Information is your business." Julian you are bold as BRASS

"he'll never come home again" oof, knowing the double meaning of home as Cardassia and to Tain

The disappointment in Julian's face at the answer to his "Who was Elim?" question

Ohhh, that last conversation. Julian's so damn fond of him. That smile at the end. They ARE in love.

Well this was delightful. What a good episode. I had forgotten, and wasn't sure if it had just been hyped up. But no. Truly phenomenal. Thanks, DS9!

[slippery-domjot-balls]

I am grateful that Odo and the changelings were limited in their powers on screen, even if it primarily was due to budget limits. If they had full access to the amazing range of their abilities it could have made some other characters redundant or even irrelevant.

In some of the books their powers are ridiculous. Odo fights another changeling in the vacuum of space in Peter David's The Siege. In the same book a murderous changeling flows his form into all points of entry in a Cardassian's face and then rapidly expands his form to kill him.

We know that when a Founder changes form into an object they basically assume some of the properties of the object. Odo states in an episode that if he took the form of a rock a tricorder reading would only find a rock.

However, in that form would that mean on a chemical or molecular level he is a rock? To be clear, he now holds all the exact properties of a rock and is not merely disguised as a rock? He would be a literal rock?

These powers make me think of Metamorpho from DC.

[loisfreakinglane]

has anyone asked disco yet? also ds9 also idk whatever the movies are called i can’t keep track of these things

OOOOOOOOOOH SO MANY TREKS!

disco!

The first character I first fell in love with: 

MICHAEL!!!!!!!!!!! THAT FACE. FOREVER.

The character I never expected to love as much as I do now: 

emperor georgiou is so evil and i adore her she is my EVERYTHING

The character everyone else loves that I don’t: 

no one springs to mind?

The character I love that everyone else hates: 

lorca was just suuuuuch a good character including all the villainy. ALSO I LOVED AIRIAM AND HER DEATH EP HIT ME HARD

The character I used to love but don’t any longer:

mmmmmmmm i've just....... gotten really ambivalent about gabrielle

The character I would totally smooch: 

ash, michael, book

The character I’d want to be like: 

JETT RENO, ICON

The character I’d slap: 

lorca?????? LELAND

A pairing that I love:

ASH/MICHAEL. also ash/pike i am what i am

A pairing that I despise: 

hmmmm the fact lorca/michael exists in some universe makes me shudder

DS9!

The first character I first fell in love with: 

it was either benjamin or julian

The character I never expected to love as much as I do now: 

GOD SO MANY PPL THO???? a huuuuuuuuge one is rom. i found him so obnoxiously weak willed at the beginning lol. ALSO O'BRIEN. oh and nog!!!!!!!!!!

The character everyone else loves that I don’t: 

nobody comes to mind!

The character I love that everyone else hates: 

DO PPL HATE QUARK BC HE'S AN ASSHOLE BUT I FIND HIM SOOOOOOOO ENTERTAINING. also ezri! we never should have lost jadzia but ezri was adorable

The character I used to love but don’t any longer:

i used to be way more into odo at the beginning of the show. still love him but i just got less and less interested

The character I would totally smooch: 

bashir is top of the list

The character I’d want to be like: 

can i say lwaxana troi or will u judge me

The character I’d slap: 

dukat obvsly. also quark! bc i love him but he deserves it!

A pairing that I love:

BASHIR/GARAK OTP 5EVERRRRRRRR

A pairing that I despise: 

why did they try to make ezri/bashir happen out of nowhere

star trek chris pine movies i think you're saying??

The first character I first fell in love with: 

KIRK! MY LOVE!

The character I never expected to love as much as I do now: 

i was so mad about sofia's character being a fully painted alien that i didn't expect how much i would ADOOOOOOORE jaylah. BUT I DO. MY BABY.

The character everyone else loves that I don’t: 

nobody??? i can't think of anyone lol

The character I love that everyone else hates: 

I LOVE CAROL MARCUS SHE IS MY SPACE MOM

The character I used to love but don’t any longer:

n/a

The character I would totally smooch: 

spock tops the list. then uhura, kirk, sulu, carol, etc lol

The character I’d want to be like: 

SPACE MOMMMMMMM

The character I’d slap: 

fake khan that piece of shit

A pairing that I love:

kirk/spock/uhura are an ot3 of dreams. also i fucking love both spock/uhura and kirk/carol leave me alooooooooone

A pairing that I despise: 

n/a! SO MUCH N/A

[sapphosewrites]

Also you know what it's short enough that I'm just going to put it here as well:

“Frankly, I’m surprised you agreed to this.”

“I did not agree. I was… overruled.”

“You and Constable Odo. He told me this morning he would much rather keep me in the holding cell.”

“You should not have lied.”

“Everything I said was the absolute truth.”

“You do not regret your actions.”

“Of course I do. I regret getting caught before I finished accessing the torpedoes, and I rather regret you hitting me.”

“That is not what I meant.”

“It isn’t my fault that the Federation has such ridiculous notions about 'restorative justice' and 'repairing harm'. Really, I find the whole thing deeply foolish.”

“I am not interested in having you repair anything.”

“It was either make things right with the officer I assaulted, or spend more time as Constable Odo’s guest in Security. Not much of a choice.”

“You talk too much.”

“There’s no reason to be rude. I think you’ll find me a very enjoyable conversation partner if we find the right topic. The doctor and I have some wonderful discussions about literature.”

“I do not want to talk with you about books.”

“There’s some Cardassian novels I think you might appreciate. Have you ever heard of The Chain Unmade ?”

“No, and I do not want to.”

“Oh, but I’d love a Klingon opinion on whether the main character’s actions are honorable. You see, he’s trying to exonerate his disgraced father, who was accused of colluding with the enemy and causing the deaths of innocent civilians. The protagonist discovers that his father was in fact taking the blame for someone else, in order to prevent a civil war, and agrees to go into exile rather than reveal what he knows, because it would undermine the stability of the state if anyone else were to find out.”

“That is not amusing.”

“You're right, it isn't. Sacrifice for the greater good of the state is a pillar of Cardassian society. Of course, the fact that there was a conspiracy at all made the novel rather unpopular in some corners, but I always admired the protagonist. Exile is a terrible thing, and he faced it without fear, for the good of his state.”

“In the Klingon Empire, it is called discommendation, not exile.”

“Call it whatever you like, I don’t imagine the name makes it any less lonely.”

"You have been reading classified files."

"It's only a story."

“And you are wrong about the ending.”

“What do you mean?”

“The civil war was only delayed, not prevented. But when it broke out, he returned from exile to protect his people again, and his honor was restored.”

“That’s the difference between Klingon and Cardassian stories, I’m afraid. In Cardassia, the sentence is always final.”

“Discommendation was… lonely. But even in exile, he was never alone.”

“I suppose that’s another difference between Klingons and Cardassians.”

“I do not read novels. Perhaps we could discuss opera instead.”

“My dear commander, I would be delighted.”

Chapters: 1/1 Fandom: Star Trek: Deep Space Nine, Star Trek: The Next Generation Rating: General Audiences Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply Relationships: Elim Garak & Worf Characters: Elim Garak, Worf (Star Trek:TNG/DS9) Additional Tags: Post-Episode: s04e26 Broken Link, Dialogue-Only Summary:

As part of his sentence for assaulting an officer, Garak is supposed to work to repair the relationship. Neither he nor the officer in question are thrilled about the idea, but they find an unexpected common ground.

—

I’ve been wanting to write something post Broken Link poking at how baffled Garak would be if the Federation tried restorative justice rather than carceral punishment, but couldn’t figure out what to do with that idea. Then today it hit me like a bolt of lightning (I literally stopped walking in the middle of the sidewalk, which was a bad idea, do not recommend) that Worf had also been exiled during TNG, and this conversation was born.

[cowboyworf]

i think we should have just had a lwaxana bonding episode for every character in ds9.

sisko: a little confused, but very amused. would show her old videos of baseball, she would talk about how great their butts look in uniform.

kira: horrified at first, but then they would find solidarity over being strong women who have faced adversity. episode has very strong gay energy.

jadzia: best friends immediately. gossips constantly. makes worf uncomfortable over how much lwaxana knows how his sex life. tricks julian and garak into a "one bed" situation. wins dabo repeatedly, much to quark's disdain. also gay.

julian: victim of the "one bed" situation, but is definitely also a gossip buddy. is pleasantly surprised at how intelligent lwaxana is and they have lunch often. lwaxana asks about cardassian anatomy with dubious motives, which julian doesn't notice.

garak: he is shocked by her vulgarity. secretly loves it. he treats her with utmost respect and surprises her with handmade gowns. only participates in gossip if he thinks it will be beneficial. also a victim of the "one bed" situation.

quark: he hates how much she wins at the dabo table, but is drawn to her because he loves strong women. she loves his wardrobe and they go shopping together. he falls in love over how she haggles prices on his behalf. discuss goo dick, naturally. she doesn't tell anyone he smuggled tribbles on board for some convoluted money making scheme and that's why ds9 is now infested.

worf: he is extremely uncomfortable around her, but she earns his respect once he realizes what a strong "warrior" she is for overcoming her trauma. she visits him in his quarters when he is definitely not hiding from the tribbles. he will only use her entire title to address her and though he acts indifferent toward her, he brings her a klingon artifact as a gift for when she departs.

rom & leeta: she takes on leeta as another daughter and buys rom a new wardrobe. rom thinks she is wonderful and is completely unphased by how extravagant she is. "moogi would love you." she gets into contact with moogi and they have a life long friendship. also kind of gay.

jake & nog: participates in pranks with them. comes up with most of the prank ideas and they all are directed at odo. secretly funds a book deal for jake and writes letters praising nog to the academy every six months. gives them good life advice. gives them very bad life advice.

ezri: she also takes on ezri as another daughter. is very gentle with her and protective. teaches her that crying is not indicative of weakness and checks in with her every single day. tries to dress her up in extravagant clothing, but gives up.

dukat: spits in his fucking face

[pollyna]

Garak arrival at Tarak Nor doesn't go unnoticed but, even if he's in exile, he's still Tain's protege and everyone and their mothers are afraid of him. So he has more free time than ever, his new job is relatively easily once he learns how to do it and trying to kill Gul Dukat is fulfilling for just a couple of hours the first week he's on the station. The man is quiet boring and not important enough to really attempt to his life.

Garak's day is spent sewing, reading, eating food that doesn't taste of much and hoarding secrets, one after another. But, even if he speaks most of the Kardasi's dialect and a good number of other languages, bajoran is almost alien for him. It takes him weeks to really understood a full sentence, during a lunch between two workers, and his life would be a little less miserable if he had, like everybody else, a UT but it doesn't work well with Tain's implant and the implant is more important than is own life.

By the time Tarak Nor becomes Deep Space 9 and Bajor is free, Garak knows how to speak Bajoran and three of it's dialect, Standard, a decent amount of Trill, Japanese and Arabic. For them, for the Federation just as for his fellow cardassians, there's no reason to think he doesn't have the UT and that he actually speaks all that languages.

After all the mess with the implant, doctor Bashir little trip to find Tain and a solution to save him, some adjustment to his quarters, is captain Sisko who asks him about the lack of UT and Garak laughs in his face with the little grace he has left. They don't dispense them for plain, simple tailors captain. Nobody tried to talk about him about it or to talk to him in general.

It's routine goes back to the one he had with the Cardassian's around, sewing, eating food that doesn't taste like much, reading to many books and trying to exercise a little, in the middle of the night when sleep doesn't come and the pain makes him almost blind(*). Odo still checks on him and Quark tries to sell him replicated liquor, that he swears, come directly from the capital of Cardassia Prime. The first smirk is almost disappointed when he doesn't do much else than his work and the second persists until Garak doesn't spend almost an hour straying at him, directly in his eyes, without telling a word. Apparently he hasn't lost his touch when it come to intimidation practice.

Garak is in the middle of a discussion with a Bolian man about the cut of his pants when doctor Bashir enters his store. Garak smiles at him, always polite and compose because he's a client, before turning his attention to the other man. After forty five minutes of discussion they finally find an idea that please both of them, Garak takes a break before his next costumer and he can almost forget about doctor Bashir still being there.

The number of language you can speak is astonishing Garak and oh boy, he really wants to have a conversation, doesn't he? More than enough, doctor he smiles, now, what can I do for you today? New suit or do you need another extravagant costume for your holosuit games?

No, I'm here because I wanted to ask you if you want to have lunch with me? Maybe today? ha asks and he almost seems to stand taller while he speaks.

I have to much work to do, doctor. But thank you the same for the invitation. Why his clients are always late? He has another three and then a bride before closing for the night and doesn't want to take other work to his quarters.

I- Garak, please. I know the last month I've been cancelling our lunches but- believe me when I say it was for a good cause.

I'm sure of it, doctor. That doesn't change I have a half dozen of pants to adjust, two betazoid clients coming in for two new dresses each and a Vulcan bride who's particular picky about the shade of her dress. Maybe next week. And gods be blessed because one the betazoid woman decides to arrive just in that moment and cut off their conversation. He barley notice doctor Bashir leaving the establishment. Or, at least, it what he likes to think.

The Vulcan bride leaves the shop but she doesn't take with her the headache she caused him. Cardassians may speak in circle but Vulcans are no better with their "truth". At the end Garak has to take some work to do in his quarters anyway.

The next morning, waiting for him in front of his shop, is Odo and what it follows is the most strange and peculiar breakfast he has ever had. And he had sat at the same table with the heads of, almost, every secret agency in the Alpha Quadrant.

To that it follows a lunch with commander Dax and a reluctant major Kira, who spends the entire hour alternating between looking at him waiting for a mistake and asking him about a particular fabric for a dress she would like to order from him. And then a breakfast with Quark and Odo, a lunch with Keiko and Molly, filled with pretty drawings, long talks about plants and the promise to help her to create a space for Cardssian's flower and, maybe, to look after Molly a couple of times.

In the next two weeks Garak eats with everyone, even captain Sisko and his son, a boy too tall for his own age. But not with doctor Bashir. After the Vulcan bride problem is solved he decides to go to find the Doctor, maybe to say sorry, think about how much he missed him, and maybe the could grab a bite together if he isn't busy?

What he isn't expecting, when he chimes to Julian's door, is to find the man listening to a recorded lesson of Kardasi, while repeating some of the sentences.

Doctor Bashir? Are you going to leave Deep Space 9 to live on Cardassia?

Garak! Oh god, I was hoping to have a little more time... he answers, looking almost embarrassed.

For what exactly doctor?

When we took care of the implant I realized you didn't have an UT and I asked captain Sisko if we could procure one for you because it could have been simpler for you? Just after I realized you didn't need help because you were speaking everyone's language without problems, but no one was talking yours. And I, sorta?, decided to learn Kardasi but it took me more time that I would ever imagined and a month went by and the others decided to help? I didn't even have to ask, they did all themselves and gave me a little more time to study but I still don't grasp it enough to have a serious conversation...

Oh dear doctor, you didn't have to go and learn kardasi for me! I would have continued to talk your language without any problem!

But I wanted to. And I learned about a little about your culture and about the meaning behind all that arguing at lunch. And I would like to invite you to another one, maybe tomorrow? If you have resolved your Vulcan bridezilla problem, obviously.

Garak doesn't remember the last time his cheeks felt so hot all at once. I would be delighted, my dear. And, perhaps, I could tell you some about my Vulcan bridezilla problem.

I would be perfect, Garak. he answers before kissing him on his forehead.

—

Garak's routine doesn't change much after their first date, he still sewing, eating food that doesn't taste of much, read books but now they're from all over the galaxy and in every language he speaks. He's still learning new languages and existing without a UT. But now he rarely spends a lunch alone sometimes he gets invited to dinner by Keiko or Capitan Sisko. When he doesn't sleep and everything hurts to much there always are a couple of hands shooting his ache and talking him down most of his nightmares.

Deep Space 9 it still to damn cold and distant from what he defines has home but it's something he could learn to live, because now is not alone anymore.

(*) I don't honestly know if there's some equivalent of the Italian sentence "non vederci più dal dolore" but it seemed the most appropriate translation.

[mylittleredgirl]

trekathon: disco 1x8

in this week’s episode of star trek discovery:

saru gets zapped by a sentient version of the winamp player visualizer and proceeds to terrify the fuck out of me

intrigue! on the ship of the dead

with only a passing knowledge of latin, i assume “si vis pacem, para bellum” means “if you want peace, square the fuck up”

remember that time odo said “the klingons felt menaced by fog?” 

i feel like that’s about to become relevant

we’ve avoided this topic long enough:

so

t’kuvma shining a bright light to draw klingon ships in from around the quadrant

that whole business with the red lights appearing all over the galaxy in season two

detecting klingon ships by sonar

it’s just going to be easier on all of us if we accept that for mysterious space reasons, for a brief period of time about 10 years before captain kirk’s five-year mission, light and sound traveled at infinite speed and then we don’t worry about it anymore

yikes™️:

is there anything creepier than when a character get possessed by aliens and starts attacking their friends

with a calm smile

and it turns out they weren’t possessed after all

i mean i too would go to some lengths to get rid of anxiety but i wouldn’t donkey-kick my colleagues and destroy the federation’s last hope of ending the war!! SARU!!!!

this episode is very stressful

i posted this and then immediately realized i need like three more hours of thought before i can get into it properly, but it feels actually inevitable that saru and michael would get into a physical fight and the “you won’t stop taking!” line just. the way they’re both grieving for georgiou and he’s taking it out on her HURTS.

meanwhile, klingons:

that “scream” scene with l’rell and cornwell? a+++

i don’t remember what l’rell is after and that makes this Very Good TV

but seriously... mary chieffo creating a layered character using none of her actual face or eyes or teeth and in a language she doesn’t speak

i know things are going to go to hell before redbubble would have time to deliver, but i want lorca and cornwell and tyler to have matching “i got tortured by the klingons and lived to tell about it” jackets because that seems to happen a lot

STOP STOP I ALREADY LOVE THEM:

they really really got me with the michael and ash tyler thing, like there’s a deep wailing in my soul when i think about the ship they make me think they are setting up here

“our futures look different” 😭😫😭

i was going to keep these recaps text-only because i love mediocre memes too much to stop once i start, but there’s really no other way to express my love for ash tyler’s pickup line:

AND IT WORKS

i just want them to get on a boat together in peacetime and eat fresh trout!!! discovery!!!!! why are you doing this to me!?!!???

while i’m making vaguely relevant memes:

it’s like gersha phillips looked gene roddenberry’s ghost dead in the eye and designed these field jackets as a personal attack

other characters:

tyler and lorca have now both played the Reveal Trauma card as a diversion technique and people wonder why 100 years later it became standard to put a trained mental health professional on the bridge

in the meantime, we have tilly in the mess hall!

stamets’s mushroom hangover periodically yeets him out of this dimension oops

that definitely seems like a thing you should not keep to yourselves when stamets is the key operating component of your starship engine but ok

i REALLY thought that when saru gave tyler the pahvan harmony crystal it was going to knock loose the klingon brainwashing

i have spent way too much time on this:

i feel like we should talk about captain t’shen kovil of the uss gagarin, human man with a traditionally female vulcan name

i mean obviously?? the first thought is trans human-vulcan hybrid, BUT we know from tng that vulcan/romulan ears remain dominant for at least two generations, and it hasn’t been long enough since enterprise-era for more vulcan generations to pass

so instead, consider: “10,000 names for your baby from 65 Federation worlds!” books

linus! jennifer! t’shen! imagine the federation version of the babynames.com message boards

“i want to give my baby an andorian name but that’s sooo popular right now ugh so i’m thinking i should spell it in rigellian or klingon??”

very sad though that we didn’t get a replay of that “i was told to expect a vulcan” scene with stamets, except it’s t’shen and michael meeting each other

“i assumed you’d be a woman.” “i assumed you’d be a man.” “i also thought you’d be a vulcan.” “i get that a lot.” “....... actually so do i.”

rip dude i thought about you for 75 times longer than you were actually on screen

other moments of delight:

michael’s explanation of starfleet protocol brings peace to my soul

i was going to come at voyager specifically for their tendency to toss everything under the prime directive banner but then it occurred to me that voyager is well over 100 years later, so they probably added some sub-paragraphs

so more specifically, michael’s explanation of starfleet protocol at a simpler time in star trek history brings peace to my soul

“mr. rhys, can i trouble you to FIRE at something!” i.... still really like lorca

“the needs of the one” most romantic line in star trek confirmed

[thoughts-i-have-had-in-passing]

“Who’s Kukalaka?” Quark asked. He assumed a nurse or someone that worked closely with Doctor Bashir, because no one else was commiserating with him, and besides, if this Kukalaka fellow was important to the senior staff then Quark was sure he would have heard of him by now.

Bashir looked up at Quark and set his jaw the way humans did when they were about to be defiant about something.

“Kukalaka,” he said defensively, “is a soft toy in the shape of an earth animal known as a bear. I have had him since my first birthday, and he has a great deal of sentimental value to me.”

Quark nodded. “When I was a young Ferengi I had Marauder Mo action figures. The sentimental – ugh – value on them was so high I actually ruined their resale value. Thankfully I’ve since grown up”–he caught the look on Bashir’s face and hurriedly continued– “but I understand how strong these connections can be. Any suspects?”

Bashir’s face darkened. “Elliot Mitoth,” he said bitterly, and drank the rest of his drink.

Another name Quark didn’t know. “Who’s that?”

“He was at the Academy with me. Science track. In the early years the science and medical classes are the same. Elliot was best friends with my assigned roommate, and he used to tease me about pretty much anything he could find.”

“And he found out about Kukalaka?” Quark asked, pouring Bashir another glass.

“Every time he saw me he asked about him, questions like ‘And how’s your other roommate?’ And ‘When’s his birthday, do you think he’d like a little suit?’ He was insufferable.”

Quark watched as Bashir threw back the second drink and immediately pulled the face of someone who should have known to sip. “Insufferable? You thought he was insufferable?”

Bashir gave him a pointed look.

“But why do you think he took Kukalaka?” Quark continued.

“Every year the student union would organise a scavenger hunt,” Bashir said. “Anything could be on it, physical books from the library, an Admiral’s pips, the contents of the ‘students’ bodily extraction box’ at the medical centre.”

“The what?”

“And in our second year Elliot made sure that Kukalaka was the final item on the list.”

“Oh,” Quark said. “But that was years ago.”

“No one won that year. I hid Kukalaka too well, but that wasn’t the point. The entire student body now knew I had a teddy bear, that was the point,” Bashir said. “Although Elliot did vow to win the scavenger hunt if it took him the rest of our careers, I assume so that he could rub it in extra hard.”

“And he’s on the station?” Quark asked. “He must be or you wouldn’t be assuming it was him.”

“He’s here. Got in two days ago on the Argos.”

“So report him? Breaking into private quarters is a class 3 misdemeanor. Then there’s taking property of low financial value, class 6, overriding an encoded lock, class 4, unless he used a transporter, that’s a class 2–”

“Quark. I don’t want to walk into Odo’s office and report a stolen teddy bear,” Bashir said.

Quark leaned in conspiratorially. “You know… breaking into a Starfleet ship is only a class 7 if you don’t cause any damage.”

Round Robin!

Rules: Below will be a section of writing beginning a story. Anyone can reblog and continue the story, and anyone can reblog and continue on from them. Please try to keep your part between one hundred and five hundred words, and (for this go at least) try to keep it rated no higher than T/light M. Any characters or ships may be added, and please no ship or character bashing. No out of universe crossovers (ie non-Star Trek). Please be aware that the story will likely branch into different versions depending on when others see new additions and start writing their own. Respect the other writers in the chain. Most importantly, go into this with a mindset of fun!

~

Bashir sighed and slumped into a stool. His form hunched over the bar in obvious misery, a dark cloud looming overhead.

Quark eyed him and mentally calculated the pros and cons of having such a dreary bar patron seated right smack dab in the middle his establishment. On one hand, it would be easy to keep the drinks flowing from here and to pump Bashir for gossip on whatever had gotten him so down. But on the other hand… well, no one liked drinking next to a Debbie Downer. He might need to shoo him off to go drink in a dark corner instead.

Quark assessed the room. Morn was in his usual spot, chatting up some poor Starfleet ensign who evidently hadn’t realized what they were signing up for when they’d taken the seat next to him. There was a private birthday party on the upper level which would be moving into the holosuites within the next hour. Leeta was explaining the dabo tables to a Vulcan. Odo was not visibly present, but when did that really mean anything? (At least he wasn’t skulking around scaring away the customers for the moment.)

Overall, it wasn’t a bad night. But it really wasn’t so busy that Bashir’s dark cloud would choke out (too many of) the other bar goers. Besides, Quark was in the mood for some conversation.

He picked up a fresh glass from under the bar.

[autisticburnham]

Accession

Julian said Damn, bitch, you live like this?

Molly!

Keiko, sweetie, I love you

Hate that Star Trek is making me think about Miles O'Brien's virility. I do not need to know how many tries it took to get Kirayoshi

Benjamin holding his baseball behind his back while giving a blessing as the Emissary... comfort item

Love seeing the return of lightships

Fake Emissay said what the fuck is the Federation?

Julian looks so fucking bored

Oh wait, I just remembered this guy brings back the caste system

I mean, I love Kira's birds, but maybe reconsider that decision, sir

Kira likes poetry ❤

I would argue they did give you back your life, Ben

"Chief O'Brien is having a baby!" "I thought your females carried your young"

Why does Ferenginar have children's books if it was considered normal for Nog to not be literate at the start of the show?

"Did you hear? Keiko's having another baby!" "Right now?!"

I hate Kira's "sexy" outfit. Bring back her real uniform and her boots

Fake!Emissary: The Prophets want Bajorns to return to the caste system

Bemjamin *John Cena voice*: Are you sure about that?

Deportation? From a planet??

Benjamin, is that a regular coffee cup???

Is this a vision from the Prophets? Doesn't that normally include blurriness?

Nerys... I love you

Oh, I like this little instrument

Molly I love you

Miles, your whole "Being with my family makes me miss Julian" thing is a little homoerotic

I love that Benjamin still has his clock in his office. I wish you could buy replicas of it

Benjamin's so disappointed by Nerys leaving 🥺

Benjamin I love you...

I don't think Miles' b plot is inherently bad, although I don't love the gender politics of it, but fuck, is it tonally dissonant from the a plot

Miles and Julian are acting like exes

Quark's face. He said "Is this what I'm like with Odo?"

Damn, Vedek. What the fuck?

Love that everytime the Prophets interact with linear beings they're just like "Jesus Christ, not this time bullshit again"

Oh, I forgot they send him back. I hate temporal mechanics

Local Woman Desperately Trying to Open Up Her Marriage

Nerys, I love you so much

I love Benjamin's smile

A plot? Fantastic. B plot? Fine. Together? Oh, jeez... 7/10

[uglysockperson]

“quark!” someone shouted behind him, it wasnt hard to figure out who it was as there was a very few who didnt say his name with a drink order following it, or an accusation. and very few who sounded so fond, and if it wasnt rom it had to be him. Theyd been introduced almost a year ago. cardassians loved introducing people, maybe it was showing off how many people they know or their connections but it was almost a nightly occurance one gul or another would introduce quark to visitor of the station, constantly smiling faces and cold hand touches. but he was diffent, his hands snaked up and held ferengi fingers without a sour face. a refreshing change.

“oh glin, how may I be of service this evning” leaning against the bar may be a smooth move in anyone elses book but having to look all the way up to see the person your talking to makes presentation a little rougher. but shuffling to get his little step stool under his feet he feels a cold claw on his chin pulling his face up to meet cold eyes. “I will be needing a holodeck..with company” clearing his throat knowing the cardassian could feel his throat move under his finger “may I assume the same comapany as last night?” “the very same” “well I’m afraid our holodecks are booked for the night but I can arrange private meetings for 2 bars all the same” “its a deal, what time?” “I get out a 0100, but make yourself at home” quark moved off the perch of the grey hand and placed a code card in the hand.

there was hardly a close for quarks, it was more like leaving rom in charge of the few quite hours of the morning, which he excitedly took. quark left him in charge of the count as well as he had an appointment to keep. speed walking to his hall and fixing his collar before entering his own pass code. But down the hall he could feel that all familiar feeling... hed being watched. And if he cant here them it must be odo. but this was hardley anything gto sweat about the constible could hardly arrest him for this. so he presses in his code and enters to see his quarters as they always are but with the addition of a tall lizard lazily sat on his couch reading a padd. “good morning quark” “good morning to you nalin”quark took off his heels and outer coat trying to up his sex appeal before walking over to his guest who had since turned the padd over on the his coffee table. uncrossing his legs as an invitation. theyd been doing somthing like this almost as long as theyve known eachother now there was a familiarity about walking till their knees brushed, a normal event to have a tail tull his thigh until he was sat straddeling a scaled leg. almost a comfort in long claws undoing his shirt before slipping into his waist ban. and equily it was now normal to nibble down a ridged neck and to count scales with his teeth. it was nice to get picked up and tossed on to his own bed. nalin was probrably as kind as they come by cardassian standards but thats hardly saying anything, just because he wasnt outwardly cruel didnt mean he was gentle. he found that out just as quick as they’d started this sort of relationship. But it was better than any holodeck program he money could buy and he was being compensated hansomly for his time.

Now here he was flopped over on this cold blooded lover, who was kindly rubbing his ears. If he could purr he would. “When does your next shift start?” He asks from under quark. “Oh in a while, I need to sleep” “I should leave you to it then” but he doesn’t make a move to remove himself. If quark hard any more energy he’d tease the glib but before he could get to it he had drifted off.

When he woke up he was alone, it surprised him to have not woken up when nalin had left with his sensitive ears he could hear the mans pulse from the bathroom. But either was he saw the hand written note he’d received a handful of times “thank you for the company I will be returning in a few weeks” it was almost a sweet gesture to give him a time estimate. Quark would never be so romantic as to think of it like a promise... but any other goof just might have.

[montagnarde1793]

Ribbons of Scarlet: A predictably terrible novel on the French Revolution (part 1)

Parts 2, 3, 4 and 5.

Q: Why is this post in English? Isn’t this blog usually in French?

 A: Yes, but I can’t bypass the chance, however small, that someone in the book’s target audience might see and benefit from what I’m about to say.

 Q: Why did you even read this book? Don’t you usually avoid bad French Revolution media?

 A: My aunt left the book with me when she came for my defense last November. I could already tell it would be pretty awful and might not have read it except that I needed something that didn’t require too much concentration at the height of the Covid haze and I — like most people who insisted on finishing their doctorate despite the abysmal academic job market — have a problem with the sunk cost fallacy, so once I got started I figured I might as well find out just how bad it got.

 Q: Don’t you have papers to grade?

 A: … Next question.

 Q: Aren’t you stepping out of your lane as an historian by reviewing historical fiction? You understand that it wasn’t intended for you, right?

 A: First of all, this is my blog, such as it is, and I do what I want. Even to the point of self-indulgence. Why else have a blog? Also, I did receive encouragement. XD;

 Second, while a lot of historians I respect consider that anything goes as long as it’s fiction and some even seem to think it’s beneath their dignity to acknowledge its existence, given the influence fiction has on people’s worldview I think they’re mistaken. Besides, this is the internet and no one here has any dignity to lose.

 Finally, this is not so much a review in the classic sense as a case study and a critical analysis of what went wrong here that a specialist is uniquely qualified to make, not because historians are the target audience, but because the target audience might get the impression that it’s not very good without being able to articulate why. To quote an old Lindsay Ellis video, “It’s not bad because it’s wrong, it’s bad because it sucks. But it sucks because it’s wrong.” Or, if you prefer, relying on lazy clichés and adopting or embellishing every lurid anecdote you come across is bound to come across as artificial, amateurish and unconvincing.

 This is especially offensive when you make grandiose claims about your novel’s feminist message and the “time and care” you supposedly put into your research.

 I also admit to having something of a morbid fascination with liberals creating reactionary media without realizing it, which this is also a textbook example of (if someone were to write a textbook on the subject, which they probably should).

 With that out of the way, what even is this book?

 The Basics

 It’s a collaboration between six historical novelists attempting to recount the French Revolution from the point of view of seven of its female participants. One of these novelists is in fact an historian herself, which is a little bit distressing, given that like her co-authors, she seems to consider people like G. Lenotre reliable sources. But then, she’s an Americanist and I’ve seen Americanists publish all kinds of laughable things about the French Revolution in actual serious works of non-fiction without getting called out because their work is only ever reviewed by other Americanists. So.

 Anyway, if you’re familiar with Marge Piercy’s (far superior, though not without its flaws) City of Darkness, City of Light, you might think, “ok, so it’s that with more women.” And you might think that that’s not so bad of an idea; Marge Piercy maybe didn’t go all the way with her feminist concept by making half the point of view characters men (though I’d argue that the way she frames how they view women was part of the point). It’s even conceivable that if Piercy had wanted to make all the protagonists women her publisher would have said no on the grounds of there not being a general audience for that. It was the 1990s, after all.

 Except the conceit this time is they’re all by different authors, we have some counterrevolutionaries in the mix, and instead of the POV chapters interweaving, each character gets her own chunk of the novel, generally about 70-80 pages worth, although there are a couple of notable exceptions. We’ll get to those.

 It’s accordingly divided as follows:

·      Part I. The Philosopher, by Stephanie Dray, from the point of view of salonnière, translator, miniaturist and wife of Condorcet, Sophie de Grouchy, “Spring 1786” to “Spring 1789”; Sophie de Grouchy also gets an epilogue, set in 1804

·      Part II. The Revolutionary, by Heather Webb, from the point of view of Reine Audu, Parisian fruit seller who participated in the march on Versailles and the storming of the Tuileries, 27 June-5 October 1789

·      Part III. The Princess, by Sophie Perinot, from the point of view of Louis XVI’s sister Élisabeth, May 1791-20 June 1792

·      Part IV. The Politician, by Kate Quinn, from the point of view of Manon Roland, wife of the Brissotin Minister of the Interior known for writing her husband’s speeches and for her own memoirs, August 1792-(Fall 1793 — no date is given, but it ends with her still in prison)

·      Part V. The Assassin, by E. Knight, which is split between the POV of Charlotte Corday, the eponymous assassin of Marat, and that of Pauline Léon, chocolate seller and leader of the Société des Républicaines révolutionnaires, 7 July-8 November 1793

·      Part VI. The Beauty, by Laura Kamoie, from the point of view of Émilie de Sainte-Amaranthe, a young aristocrat who ran a gambling den and who got mixed up in the “red shirt” affair and was executed in Prarial Year II, “March 1794”-“17 June 1794”

An *Interesting* Choice of Characters…

 Now, there are some obvious red flags in the line-up. I’m not sure, if you were to ask me to come up with a list of women of the French Revolution I would come up with one where 4/7 of the characters are nobles/royals — a highly underrepresented POV, as I’m sure you’re all aware — but fine. Sophie de Grouchy is an interesting perspective to include and Mme Élisabeth at least makes a change from Antoinette? And though the execution is among the worst (no pun intended) Charlotte Corday’s inclusion makes sense as she is famous for doing one of the only things a lay audience has unfortunately heard of in association with the Revolution.

 Reine Audu is actually an excellent choice, both pertinent and original. Credit where credit is due. Manon Roland and Pauline Léon are not bad choices either in theory, but given the overlap with Marge Piercy’s book, if you’re going to do a worse job, why bother? The inclusion of Sophie de Grouchy, while, again, not a bad choice, also kind of makes this comparison inevitable, as another of Piercy’s POV characters was Condorcet.

 But Émilie de Sainte-Amaranthe? I’m not saying you couldn’t write an historically grounded and plausible text from her point of view, but her inclusion was an early tip-off that this was going to be a book that makes lurid and probably apocryphal anecdotes its bread and butter.

 The absolute worst choice was to make Pauline Léon only exist — at best — as a foil to Charlotte Corday. (It turns out to be worse than that, actually. She’s less of a foil than a faire-valoir.)

Still, why does no one write a novel about Simone and Catherine Évrard (poor Simone is reduced to “Marat’s mistress” here, not just by Charlotte Corday, which is understandable, but also by Pauline Léon) or Louise Kéralio or the Fernig sisters or Nanine Vallain or Rosalie Jullien or Jeanne Odo or hell, why not one of the dozens of less famous women who voted on the constitution of 1793 or joined the army or petitioned the Convention or taught in the new public schools. Many of them aren’t as well-documented, but isn’t that what fiction is for?

Let’s try to be nice for a minute

There are things that work about this book and while the result is pretty bad, I think the authors’ intentions were good. Like, who could object to the dedication, in the abstract?

This novel is dedicated to the women who fight, to the women who stand on principle. It is an homage to the women who refuse to back down even in the face of repression, slander, and death. History is replete with you, even if we are not taught that, and the present moment is full of you—brave, determined, and laudable.

It’s how they go about trying to illustrate it that’s the problem, and we’ll get to that.

For now, let me reiterate that while I’m not a fan of the “all perspectives are equally valid” school of history or fiction — or its variant, “all *women*’s perspectives are equally valid” — and there are other characters I would have chosen first, it absolutely would have been possible to write something good with this cast of characters (minus making Charlotte Corday and Pauline Léon share a section).

The parts where the characters deal with their interpersonal relationships and grapple with misogyny are mostly fine — I say mostly, because as we’ll see, the political slant given to that misogyny is not without its problems. These are the parts that are obviously based on the authors’ personal experience and as such they ring true, if not always to an 18th century mentality, at least to that lived experience.

Finally, there are occasionally notes that are hit just fine from an historical perspective as well. The author of the section on Mme Élisabeth doesn’t shy away from making her a persistent advocate of violently repressing the Revolution. Manon Roland corresponds pretty well to the picture that emerges from her memoirs even if the author of her section does seem to agree with her that she was the voice of reason to the point of giving her “reasonable” opinions she didn’t actually hold.

I should also note that while the literary quality is not great, it’s not trying to be great literature and in any case, on that point at least, I’m not sure I could do better.

Ok, that’s enough being nice. Tune in next time for all the things that don’t work.

[obviouslyelementary]

Confessions over Ice Cream

Am I going to supply the Nog/Jake fandom with all teh fanfics I can muster? Absolutely. 

I hope my old followers don’t mind.

(MIght make a dirty follow up if it comes up)

Tags: first kiss; confessions; the ds9 crew being annoying; mentions of oo-mox

-------------------------

Another dangerous mission. Another set of nights without sleep, drifting off one or two hours before waking up on a rush with any sound that made its way to his ears. More and more he felt sympathy over misses O'Brien, having to stay aware of her husband through subspace communications or his father's own words. It was quite difficult, he understood it now. And Nog wasn't even his husband!

He was his friend.

Only his friend.

Jake caught himself thinking about that way more often than he would like to admit. They had been friends for years now, way too long, and it didn't seem to get any simpler. In fact, everything was turning out to be more and more complicated. He realized his feelings for Nog when he was what, fourteen? Fifteen maybe? Now he was past his twenties and that god damn feeling never left, in fact, it became stronger. One look at him and his heart jumped, his lungs squeezed and his stomach turned. Well, not anymore, but it used to do that. Now seeing Nog meant he was safe, and sound, and it brought a nice warmth to Jake's chest.

Julian and Dax knew about it, and wondered time and time again when he would open up the game. He insisted to them he would, eventually, when the time was right, but it never seemed quite right. In fact, he hadn't even summoned up courage to ask Rom or Quark about Ferengis and, well, same gender relationships. He did his research, and nothing he looked through seemed to point out any resistance against it, but who knew? And besides, every time he believed the timing was right, either he or Nog were in a relationship with someone else, and that always stopped him in his tracks.

But now, oh, he was regretting his cowardness. Nog had been away in a dangerous mission into the Gama quadrant for weeks, and hadn't returned yet. It was a mission supposed to last two weeks total, but they were coming around to the fourth with barely no contact between him and his team and the station. Last time they had contact had been two days prior, and everything seemed fine, but Jake couldn't shake away the feeling that something wasn't right.

It could be his anxiety talking, but still.

He was so nervous in fact that even his books weren't being touched. He hadn't written a single word since Nog didn't return on schedule, so there were seven days and counting without any progress. He didn't like it, he didn't like standing still and waiting, but he had to. He couldn't grab a vessel and run after him.

But he could pray, and hope, that Nog would be back soon. And indeed, someone in the vast universe heard him, because on the next day his father said that Nog and his ship would be back in three days. Apparently the delay was caused by a phenomenon they wanted to investigate before returning, not that Jake understood or cared about that space crap. Nog was coming back, and that was all that mattered.

On the day they were scheduled to arrive, Jake didn't sleep a single second, and he was right at the doors together with the senior officers to greet the ship's personal. As the officers left the ship and got into the station, Jake did his best to greet them without seeming too disinterested, but there was only one pair of ears he was waiting for.

Nog was one of the last ones to leave, luckily for the rest, because Jake grinned at him and hugged the Ferengi without caring about leaving the passageway open for the rest. Nog was quick to hug him back, finally having learned that some human affection didn't hurt, and even though Odo tried to tell them to leave, he had a heart not to bother them too much.

And after Nog finally greeted Kira, Dax, Julian and his father, they were finally free to leave and have a more private talk.

 "really Jake it was incredible! The formation of a nebula right in front of our eyes?! I have never seen anything so beautiful!" Nog said, ranting on and on about the trip, something Jake didn't care at all, specially over some delicious betazoid ice cream. "I-I'm sorry, I'm making this all about myself again... how were your days here at the station?"

"You have all the right to make this about yourself, my days here were as boring as ever" Jake chuckled, getting a spoonful of ice cream into his mouth. The bar was quiet, empty. It early still for movement, and Quark and Rom were looking over the profits of the morning while preparing for the night shift. The station had an air of calmness around it, and they were pretty much alone, and Jake felt it. Like he felt the other times.

Maybe it was time to just... spill it out.

"Jake-"

"Nog-"

They stopped and looked at each other, before Nog snorted and Jake chuckled, shaking his head.

"Go ahead" Nog said, but Jake shook his head and nodded to him.

"No please, be my guest. What is it?"

"Alright alright" Nog grinned. "Jake, something amazing happened. I have to tell you. I'm so excited."

"Oh now I'm curious. What is it?" he asked, eyes widening as he leaned closer. Nog did it too, their noses almost touch.

"Jake... I got promoted" he said, giggling loudly, and Jake's eyes widened before he laughed and reached out for his friend, holding his shoulder.

"Oh my god Nog that's amazing! Congratulations!" he said, smiling at his friend's excitement. "Should I call you captain now?"

"Come on" he groaned, pushing Jake despite having a smile on his face. "You know I'm not even close to captain. But now I am a junior officer. Isn't that cool?!"

"It's cooler than cool! Ice cold" Jake exclaimed, and Nog grinned widely, tapping his shoulder. "I bet you are going to be captain in record time!"

"I wish" he chuckled, shaking his head and returning his attention to the ice cream. "So, what did you want to tell me?"

"Oh... yeah that, it's not half as exciting as a promotion" Jake chuckled, weakly, feeling as if the moment was already gone. Nog frowned and shook his head.

"Jake, no! I bet whatever it is will be very exciting! Let me guess... you finished your book?" he asked, and Jake shook his head. "No, I see I see... you started a new one? No? Okay you... you got a girlfriend?!"

"No Nog! Oh my, not even close!" Jake laughed because what else would he do. "No no no, none of that... it's just... it's nothing really."

"Nothing? Jake you never hid anything from me. Spill it out" Nog insisted, frowning at Jake, who felt bad for both of them. He sighed, nervously, and then nodded.

"Alright. Alright I will tell you. I love you" Jake said, like a band aid. Ripping it off. He looked down at his ice cream for a moment and then at Nog, who seemed to be waiting, and then became confused.

"Okay? I love you too. Now tell me what's up" he said, looking honestly concerned now, but Jake felt his cheeks warming up and shook his head.

"No Nog. That's it. I love you. I'm in love with you" he said, slowly, and Nog narrowed his eyes before they widened, his mouth opening slightly. "I told you, way less cool than being promoted."

"I..." Nog started, while Jake played with his ice cream, not really knowing how to make this easier. "Jake... What..."

"Yeah, I know it's a bit out of the blue, but it's the truth" he said, shrugging and looking at Nog with an awkward smile. "No hard feelings, I hope?"

"Jake... this... is this serious?" he asked, as if he didn't believe him, and Jake nodded as patiently as ever. "I... I don't know what to say..."

"Then don't say anything" Jake said, shaking his head. "You don't have to say anything. If you don't want to. Or you can say what's in your mind. Whatever that may be."

"In... my mind" Nog said, softly, and looked down at his dessert. "I mean... Ferengis don't really... have relationships with other species' males..." he tried, but jake shook his head.

"Okay don't... say what's in your head, say what's in your heart... unless your heart wants to punch me. Please don't punch me" he said, making Nog chuckle weakly despite his utterly confused face.

"I am not... going to punch you" he assured, in a way that didn't make Jake too confidant of the promise. "I just... don't... know."

"It's... it's fine if you don't know, I just don't want it to ruin our friendship. I just can't keep it to myself anymore. I was so worried about you during this mission and I was tired of being a coward that never... told you the truth" Jake admitted, sighing to himself. "At least this way, if something happens to you... you will know-"

"That you love me?" Nog finished, and Jake swallowed thickly before nodding. "Okay... I think... I think I have an answer for you."

"Oh really?"

"Yeah but it's not... verbal."

"It's not punching me, is it?"

Nog chuckled again, and despite that, Jake was still nervous, not really knowing what Nog was going to do. Then he shook his head, seeming a little calmer.

"No, I'm not going to punch you" he said, and leaned closer to Jake. "Do you trust me?"

Oh, Jake did. He trusted him with his life.

With a nod, he watched as Nog sighed, leaning over the table and getting closer and closer to Jake, tilting his head and gently, very delicately pressing their lips together. Jake's eyes fluttered closed, and he held the spoon tightly in his hand, never expecting but also wishing he could kiss Nog like this every day. Their first kiss after a childhood of hidden and repressed feelings, it sure felt much better than any girl or guy he had kissed before.

However, it didn't last long, because both of them heard a quite loud 'YES' coming from behind a set of flowers, and they pulled away to see no one other than Dax there, looking over at them, somewhat embarrassed.

"Yes, I just won... on tabo... yes" she tried, and then sighed. "They are not gonna fall for it, are they?"

"Absolutely not" Jake heard his father say, his head popping from behind the flowers next to Dax.

"Dad?!" Jake squealed, feeling even more embarrassed, but he wasn't alone. Julian appeared from Dax's other side, looking over.

"Well, at least we were able to capture this unique moment" he said, and Benjamin looked at him unamused, before Kira looked over with O'Brien.

"Can we please leave? This was such a waste of time" she complained, and Dax showed her the tongue just before the flower stand transformed into goo and then into Odo, who was shaking his head.

"Odo? Even you?!" Nog asked, clearly embarrassed out of his mind, but the shapeshifter just grunted.

"I was the only one supposed to be here. I don't trust you two together" he said, and then looked at the others. "They just decided to come with me, for a change."

"Alright alright could you all just leave or ask for something to drink? The boys are having a moment here, shoo" Quark complained from the bar, waving his hands at them while Jake let his head fall over the table and Nog shook his head, blushing up to his ears.

"This is the worst" Jake mumbled, and looked up at Nog as the others continued their discussion, accusing Quark of also being there to spy on his nephew. "We should probably get out of here."

"Could we go... somewhere we can continue what we stopped?" Nog suggested, seeming to blush even brighter, and Jake smiled at him before nodding, reaching for his hand and standing up.

"I know a place" he said, and pulled Nog out of the bar, heading to the lift so they could be alone while the... adults kept talking. "So... you like me back?"

"I did say I love you too, didn't I?" Nog smiled, more relaxed and almost softer than Jake had ever seen him. "Although... I never expected you to like me back."

"I never expected you to like me" Jake said, and then leaned closer, smiling down at his... friend? Partner? Lover? Boyfriend? He didn’t know yet. "But now that I know you do... I've always been curious to try out some of that oo-mox your uncle talks so much about."

"Oh my merchants Jake!" Nog squealed, pushing him away and getting a laugh out of him. "That is so inappropriate!"

"Not for a Ferengi is not. They do it all the time!"

"It's a business strategy and yes, my uncles does it too much. It is very intimate, no matter what he says."

"Has anyone ever-"

"NO! And I'm not like other Ferengi, I'm a star fleet officer!"

"Oh come on, just lemme touch it?"

"No!"

"Please?"

"M-maybe but when we are alone!"

"Like in our quarters?"

"... p-perhaps."

"Nice."

[irene-sadler]

Sir Reynard and the Red Knight

aka ‘The Tournament’

so it turns out medieval tax law is insanely complicated and even a small amount of side reading on it takes forever. if someone else is for some weird reason interested in knights' fees and some of the problems they caused my source material is this chapter in a very lectury 1895 book which goes into detail about English feudal government income in general. this is probably not the most recent scholarship on the subject and i would not try to use it as a source in a paper but I did not feel like battling with JSTOR's shitty search engine just to research a short color plot in my goofy thronebreaker fanfic. anyway welcome to part 2 of our non-adventure, enjoy (or don't, i am not a beggar.)

---

4. 

   A week later, Meve had nearly forgotten about the looming duel. She alighted from her horse in the castle courtyard and was instantly handed a report: in Dravograd there was a disagreement between the human and dwarf smithing guilds, which might soon lead to violence. The Queen turned out her favorite knight to solve the distant problem and settled into days of debate over an ongoing issue at home. The trouble, she learned, was that some of her barons had too many knights, overfilling the quota on which the crown drew an annual tax, and paid more than they preferred or could afford. Meanwhile, others had too few, with the result that the realm burdened them less. The latter outnumbered the former by a mathematically considerable amount, so that the crown’s entitlement had fallen short of the expected amount for the year; a new law was required, and had been drafted. However, the batch of them were incapable of finalizing the text of the proposed rule, especially where it concerned the amounts to be payable, and had come to a hopeless standstill in her absence. In the resulting confusion of numbers and obstruction, she only had reason to recall the tournament and its aftermath because a servant brought an unexpected letter to her office.

    She eyed the scrawled writing on the front, was informed that it had been delivered to the kitchen by a sullen-looking speechless brigand, shrugged, and left it, unopened, for Reynard. He found it some days later, when he returned from his mission.

    “Gascon doesn’t ever write,” he remarked, frowning suspiciously at the Duke’s name on the envelope, and cut it open it cautiously. He tipped it out over Meve’s desk, but it contained nothing dangerous, only a short note on dirty old paper, written in what appeared to be charcoal.

    “I presumed it was about your duel,” Meve explained, “Is it?”

    “Not - not as such,” he replied, after reading it over a second time; a baffled frown was on his face. “Says he’s departed on a quest, of all things, not to worry about him, will return when he’s finished, or else when Sir Holt gets around to fighting, whichever happens first.”

    Meve took the note out of his hand and stared at the offending word in disbelief.

    “A quest? Has he lost his mind? This isn’t a bard’s tale; he has a fief to manage, and -”

    “It’s getting on to winter, luckily,” Reynard interrupted in his most reasonable tone, “So, there’s not much managing for him to do, just now.”

    “Unless there’s a fire, or a war, or bandits,” Meve snapped, gripping the flimsy paper hard.

    “Well, you’ve made two of those possibilities rather unlikely, at the moment,” the Count said; he took the letter away and added as Meve instantly crossed her arms, “I agree; this is a ridiculous notion. However, he does appear to have had the foresight to choose a sensible time of year to have it, which is more responsible than usual. For him, I mean.”

    “He might’ve said something, instead of simply vanishing,” she complained, feeling that she was losing ground in the argument by remaining silent.

    “-and,” Reynard continued, as if she hadn’t, “He can’t have gone very far, else he’d have no way of knowing when this duel is to take place. If, indeed, it ever will.”

    Meve brightened slightly and said, “In that case, you should find it simple enough to hunt him down again.”

    “I’ll do it if you wish, of course, but will you hear my advice, first?”

    “I usually do, I suppose.”

    “I think you should just leave it be, for the time being; he’ll return in due time and patience will answer far better than action, to speed the process.”        

    “Were he anyone else, I’d have him arrested,” Meve said, the glare staying put on her face but her shoulders relaxing slightly in defeat.

    “I know that, but in truth, I believe we’ll have our stray dog back soon enough,” Reynard said gently, “All we have to do is wait.”

      Patience, instead of action, was not how Meve preferred to operate, but she did her best to do as Reynard suggested, aided considerably by the ongoing distraction of the tax problem. Intelligence crossed her desk, in relation to the knights’ fees and otherwise; no report contained information on the missing Duke, but one included a rumor that briefly distracted even her from her main priority: an informant ended his confidential message on the exact details of her northern vassals’ taxable estates on a strange note.

    “Says here an unknown knight’s rumored to be in th’ area of Hawkesburn,” she said to Reynard, after a glance around to ensure they were alone in the room. “Apparently he wears black armor and jousted with all comers who crossed his path, for two days, defeated three knights, and then, on losing to a fourth, vanished again and hasn’t been seen since.”      

    “How tiresome,” Reynard replied; she laughed at his stuffily disapproving tone and, as it was difficult to collect fees on the armored head of an unverified rumor, forgot about it. She was, after all, quite busy, cooking up a scheme to end the fee stalemate before it brought the court to a complete halt or, worse, came to blows. She set her accountants and clerks to work and soon delivered a new proposal to the court, a plan that settled the matter in a way that heavily profited the crown at the barons’ considerable expense; the document was of course rejected out of hand. She then threatened a royal command, and was pleased to find that all but the most belligerent of her vassals suddenly favored the original, far more equitable proposal that had been drawn up in the first place.

    Meanwhile, the end of autumn passed by; the last of the dull brown leaves on the trees blew away in a windstorm and the branches stood bare against the sky. Reliable reports of a werewolf near the northern border were followed, as Reynard was preparing a force to investigate, by further news that the beast had been dealt with by a black knight. The last holdout against the final version of the new tax law suddenly became perfectly amenable to the proposal, after a personal visit from Count Odo, armed with a sword and a bluntly phrased reminder of the baron’s failure to support the Queen during the war. A somewhat embarrassed young knight of Meve’s court turned up, with a believable, unembellished tale in which a stranger in black armor jousted against him on a bridge and knocked him off into the icy creek below. That same day, the new tax law was finally signed by unanimous consent of the court. The weather settled into its usual, predictable early winter pattern - two days of rain, two of sun, one of icy grayness, followed again by rain.

    Then, during the afternoon on one of the rainy days, a traveler arrived in court - a familiar man, dressed in mismatched chainmail and leather armor, and bearing a message from Sir Holt of the Fen. Meve happened to be in the armory, considering a new crossbow that could fire two bolts on a single load; he was shown in, followed immediately by Reynard. The sergeant broke off his explanation of the crossbow’s double trigger system, raised an alarmed eyebrow at the Count’s dark expression, and promptly invited himself out; the messenger seemed to feel similarly about the situation and wasted no time making his speech:

    “My master asks for your assistance, Your Grace; he was - “ the messenger paused, frowning uncertainly, produced a paper with writing on both sides, and read from it, squinting nearsightedly, “ - he was, I quote, assailed at night at an isolated crossroads, by a knight errant well armed in black armor who spake not; there they did fight a mighty battle for hours -”

    “Skip to th’ end, sir,” the Queen said, casually picking a sword from a rack; the messenger glanced at it, quickly flipped the paper over, and summarized the rest:

    “ - anyway, he was struck down by the stranger, following which the black knight disappeared into the darkness, as if by an enchantment, and - well, in short, he requests that you send an appropriate force to apprehend the villain. Also, he wishes to inform my lord the Count that he is prepared to do battle with the same, at the Count’s convenience.”

    “About damn time,” the Count growled under his breath.

    “To clarify,” the Queen said, a slightly malicious gleam in her eye, “Sir Holt, after challenging the best out of all my knights to a personal combat, wants me to send him along to fight off a brigand that he is unable to defeat, himself.”

    “That’s about the size of it, my lady,” the messenger said, absently folding his paper into a square and looking carefully blank. She eyed him thoughtfully, wondering what role, exactly, he filled in Sir Holt’s retinue; the question was irrelevant, and so she set it aside for later consideration.

    “I see. Well, Count Odo, what say you?”

    “I am at your command, as always, Your Grace,” he said stiffly.

    “Very well; we’ll depart for Sir Holt’s lands tomorrow morning,” she decided, idly studying the sword she held. “I believe I’d like to meet this mysterious knight for myself; my court sorceress will solve any enchantments, and there will be nowhere for him to hide.”

      The messenger bowed his way out; Meve waited a good half minute for him to be well out of earshot and then stepped across to a large map tacked to the armory wall. She considered the north of the country and noted, casually, “Gascon’s estates and Sir Holt’s aren’t so far apart; they’re neighbors, in fact.”

    “Oh?”

    “Well,” she said, turning back with the sword pointed toward Reynard, “I know of only one anonymous knight errant in black armor in my kingdom, and I certainly have not been riding about the country in the middle of the night, fighting with passing strangers and killing occasional monsters. At least, not recently.”

    “No, I daresay I would have noticed, if you were,” Reynard allowed with a fond smile. “So, then, who do you suspect?”

    “I don’t know, yet,” Meve said, looking down the length of the blade at him. “It just seems odd that the place where I fought incognito is so near to where a similarly attired knight is now causing trouble. I take issue, sir, with some stranger stealing my disguise and ruining the reputation I forged in it.”

    “Or,” he suggested, eyes narrowing, “Perhaps what’s happened is that Sir Holt, not making any connection between the black knight of the tournament and the similar knight at Hawkesburn, heard the same story we did about the latter and invented this tale of his defeat, to draw me out to the countryside and thereby avoid fighting me on home ground.”

    “Ah,” she said, lowering the sword. “Yes, I suppose that’s a plausible theory. I can send someone else out, if you’d prefer.”

    Her heart lurched suddenly as a slight, dangerous smile crossed his face. She set the sword down absently, said, “No, I didn’t think you would,” and abandoned consideration of far-away knights, black or red, in favor of the much more interesting example she had immediately to hand.

      The next morning dawned clear and the weather remained dry; Reynard’s picked company needed little encouragement to take full advantage. The General was in an uncommon hurry, it was plain to see, and so they traveled until late each night with only short breaks. During their third, bitterly cold, evening, a scout came down the column toward his commander and reported, “Seen an armed horseman not far up the way.”

    “A highwayman,” the Count suggested; the Queen, overhearing them, said, “Or the black knight.”

    The scout shook his head.

    “Not likely a knight, my lady, nor no bandit neither, sir, I figure, but I’ll wager he waits for passerby, whatever.”

    “It’s just th’ one man,” the Count said, shrugging; nevertheless the column continued somewhat more slowly, with eyes kept to the dark trees around and arrows on their bowstrings. They reached the turn in the road that the scout indicated and paused; the stranger was still there, sitting his horse in the moonlight under a dark hood, apparently waiting. The Queen and Count both leaned forward to squint suspiciously at the oddly familiar figure, and several of the warband as well; the Count then pulled an exasperated frown and sat up suddenly in his saddle.

    “Oh, for the love of -”

    “Stand down,” Meve ordered, cutting Reynard off, “We know this fellow.”

    The stranger laughed, pulled his hood down, and bowed grandly toward his audience. Meve kicked her horse into motion as Reynard said, irritably, “Nice of you to rejoin society, Brossard.”

    “Couldn’t miss your duel, could I?” the Duke replied, brightly; the knight had no time to reply as Meve approached, turned her horse, grabbed the Duke’s stirrup, and yanked upwards, tipping him off the opposite side of his alarmed mount. He hit the road with a grunt and immediately sprang upright, surprised and angry, caught sight of the grim expression on the Queen’s face, and mastered himself with an attempt at a nonchalant shrug. She said nothing and rode away; the column followed, leaving Reynard behind.

    “Well,” the Duke said, after the last of the warband passed on, “I suppose my unhorsing was long overdue.”

    The Count shook his head disapprovingly, recaptured Gascon’s mare, and waited for the other man to clamber, wincing, back into the saddle.

    “Nice to see you, too,” Gascon added, settling himself and picking dead leaves off his jacket. “Ouch.”

    “Hmm,” Reynard replied doubtfully, releasing the horse.

    “Yes, quite, and no more need be said on the subject. Anyway, I rode out t’ invite you and your company to stay at my place. My other place, I mean; the lodge, not the fort, which is inconveniently located for our, um, purposes. It’s about an hour’s ride from here,” he added, in response to the knight’s unspoken question. “I stationed a man partway, to direct you; I myself ought t’ ride on ahead and ensure all’s prepared. Under the circumstances, if you’d kindly relay th’ invitation to your lady love for me, I’d be much obliged.”

    “Yes,” Reynard agreed, “That’s probably th’ only good idea you’ve had all month.”

    “Well, you know what they say about clocks,” Gascon said, cheerfully enough. “Or is it th’ one about blind squirrels? Anyway, I’ll see you later.”

    He galloped off; Reynard sighed and hurried to catch up with the column.

      Half an hour later, at a fork in the road, they found Ethan waiting; the squire awkwardly led the warband through the dark woods, attempting to look anywhere except at its silent leader. They arrived just before midnight at a building which resembled a typical hunting lodge in the same way that Rivia Castle resembled the Brossard fort. Meve displayed no particular interest in the vast exterior, built out of the crumbling remains of an elven fortress, or the several hundred hunting trophies mixed with long since out of fashion furnishings that filled the drafty rooms within it. As they entered, Reynard said quietly to her, “Reminds me of my grandfather, this place,” which dragged a slight smile through her tense displeasure; nevertheless she stayed stubbornly silent until they were out of sight and hearing of anyone else but the uncharacteristically courteous Gascon.

    “This house is like that menagerie Foltest keeps in Vizima,” she finally remarked, studying a white bearskin rug with the snarling head still attached, “Except that th’ animals are mostly still alive there, of course.”

    “I haven’t had the time to redecorate,” Gascon ventured with the air of a man testing the waters. “In truth, this is only the second time I’ve ever been here, myself. My mother never wanted t’ come here when I was young; said it was creepy.”

    “She wasn’t entirely wrong,” Meve said, glancing around at the strange shadows the animal heads threw on the walls in the firelight. Reynard shrugged unconcernedly and put an arm around her. A slightly awkward silence fell.

    “Would you like to see a camelopard’s head?” Gascon asked, breaking it; Meve looked interested, instead of icily distant, and he pointed the rare trophy out, just over the fireplace in company with a few other preserved monsters. They sat and regarded it for a moment.

    “That,” Reynard stated flatly, “Is a horse’s head with spots painted on it.”

    “It was quite a fine horse, however,” Meve said with an amused smile, her bad mood forgotten.

    “And they’re well-painted spots,” Gascon replied, grinning.

    By morning, the incident on the road the night before had been forgotten, by unspoken mutual consent. Meve and Reynard passed an hour of the morning in an argument over their next move; Gascon, meanwhile, conveniently vanished to negotiate with the enemy camp. Eventually the disagreement was resolved by some cunning diplomacy on Meve’s part; she and Isbel then departed to investigate the mystery of the black knight, leaving Reynard behind to await his second’s return.

    Rain had set in; they rode through cold drizzle, accompanied by a miserable escort. Isbel considered the dripping soldiers and the sparse, leafless scrub trees that dominated the roadside and finally said, “If the black knight, so-called, can vanish, perhaps by enchantment, as you suggested when you dragged me along on this excursion, it isn’t by light of day, and certainly not into these woods.”

    “I know that,” Meve said.

    “Then what, may I ask, is the point of this?”

    “Why, the fresh air and exercise,” she replied. Silence returned after, for a time, and then the sorceress, in a tone of deep disgust, said, “You’re hoping to find this person before Sir Reynard does, aren’t you?”

    “Well - all right; we’ve something of a wager going, on that ring I won in the tourney, and the next of us to win a fight will also win the prize. He, of course, is expecting this duel any day now, so the sooner I find the black knight, the better, as there’s not much chance he’ll lose it.”

    The sorceress sighed, cast a despairing look skyward, and noted, “The black knight perhaps does not exist, or may not be found in these parts.”

    “Yes, that’s Reynard’s theory,” Meve said, casually, “But I disagree.”

      They returned that evening empty-handed and damp, to find Reynard in a state of abject boredom. His gloom was only slightly lessened by Meve’s return and her lack of success; noticing the depressed atmosphere, she attempted to engage him in a chat about the weather, and then, when the conversation failed, talked aimlessly at him about the latest advancements in crossbow design. Gascon returned as night was falling, long after she’d stopped trying to shift his mood and had resigned herself to examining the hunting trophies in the melancholy silence.

    “We’ve chosen the field,” he said, “I just went to have a look, as it’s not all that far away. It looks decent; not too many holes in it, and I don’t think it’ll be flooded from all this rain.”

    “When?” Reynard asked, testily.

    “Tomorrow evening,” said Gascon, “And I should warn you that th’ opposition’s clearly intending to use the sunset to his advantage, should the weather clear, but then, perhaps it won’t.”

    Meve glanced out the nearest window; the rain had turned spotty after dark, and she could see stars through patches in the clouds at the western horizon. She frowned and left the men to an involved discussion of the field’s layout; neither of them appeared to notice her departure. She found Isbel studying the camelopard head with a dubious frown. The sorceress kept up the expression as she explained the latest development and only said, wearily, “These men,” in response.

    “I thought,” Meve said, idly, “That, perhaps, you’re right about the black knight.”

    “Oh?”

    “Yes; he certainly shouldn’t vanish very well, by day, at least; we really ought to be hunting for him at night, instead.”

    “In this weather?”

    “Well, it’s inconvenient, to be sure, and would make fighting him much more difficult, and I suppose that any advantage is worth th’ effort,” Meve said significantly, eying the older woman. Isbel considered the statement a moment.

    “Is Sir Reynard in any significant danger?” she asked, pointedly.

    “Doubtful,” Meve replied, waving the idea off as it if was impossible; hadn’t even crossed her mind; “This isn’t that serious of a matter. He may be injured, I suppose, but not killed - not on purpose, at least, and he’s been a knight too long for an accident to be likely.”

    “Well then, perhaps I might leave early,” Isbel suggested, looking unconvinced.

    “The fight’s tomorrow evening,” Meve noted, apparently ignoring the request, “Do you think that the weather will hold, or clear?”

    “I don’t know,” Isbel answered, reluctantly. “It’s hard to tell, so far in advance, at this time of year; I suppose it may not.”

    “As you say,” Meve said, flashed her victorious smile, and added, “Travel safely; we’ll see you at home.”

[ezrisdax-archive]

Thoughts on a fun way to make a Star Trek/Mass Effect crossover? Or characters interactions cross-series?

like a full crossover? hmmm, certainly it’d be a parallel worlds type situation where I feel in Trek world the Leviathans didn’t evolve and create the Reapers and thus life wasn’t constantly wiped out and that’s why there’s more of an alien populace in the galaxy to explain the stark differences. And then time travel would get involved too since ME takes place before Trek.

So depending on which Trek you’re gonna go with (which for me I can pick any) there’s some wormhole shenanigans going on only what they call wormholes are the dark energy spots that Reapers use in ME time. The crew is investigating them when they go through it and end up in ME time (or if you want the ship accidentally goes through a la Voyager crossing over quadrants).

At first the crew is clearly trying to not get involved but can’t resist the chance to explore and learn the differences and when they realize this isn’t their actual past and can interact with the place more, which brings them into contact with the Normandy which has been sent to investigate the strange readings so we get to crew interactions of (which I’ll put under a cut cause it got long):

Spock and/or Tuvok, and Liara discussing the Vulcan Mind Meld versus the Asari meld and coming to the conclusion that they might have a genetic link back

Tali and B’Elanna having a field day comparing notes (and complaining) on what it’s like keeping a ship together when you don’t have all the parts you really need since Tali used to do that with the Quarian ships and B’Elanna does that now

Kirk and Shepard discussing choices made that shape worlds for better or worse despite the best of intentions and geeking out over model ships. You can’t tell me that doesn’t happen.

Bashir and Mordin are the only people able to understand each other in their speed talking and excitedly sharing notes about different aliens.

Worf and Wrex and Grunt immediately start a fight (bonus points for Wrex insulting Worf for sounding like Uvenk whom Dorn voices)

Seven and Legion (in a world where he lives, what do you mean he dies) discussing what it’s like going from a hive mind to being individuals and coming to find yourself and who you are as a person, like Legion clearly was more involved in finding this aspect for his people as opposed to Seven who had it forced on her but they share the desire now to learn and become an individual and protect those they care about

Janeway and Shepard blow something up by accident while trying to investigate something because of course they do

Samara and Deanna sitting down and just discussing life because I feel like these two would be friends and smirking at their friends antics and secretly betting on who’s gonna get into what danger

I actually have a lot of thoughts about paragon!Shepard and Michael being similar characters in the sense of having this burden of the galaxy placed on them and speaking out against things that people refuse to see except for the crew they’re apart of and trying to warn people of a war and do their best to prevent it and bring people together

Tilly and Tali and Gabby together would be a delight I feel, just talking excitedly about everything under the sun. including the sun.

Sulu and Joker arguing who's a better pilot and Sulu being fascinated how Mass Effect fields work when it comes to piloting and Joker proudly explaining it

Sisko tries to adopt Grunt from Shepard (no I’m mostly kidding, I think that Sisko and Shep have a great deal of respect for each other in caring for the crew and having in placed in an almost god like reverence in certain situations and the struggles with that. and then also Sisko brings back baseball to the Mass Effect world. Shepard absolutely hates that)

I figure the EMH would actually be most interested in biotics and the science of that and writing down to make a paper to publish as the first hologram to do so.

Likewise EDI is fascinated with hologram technology that Trek’s have and if the ships have ever developed sentience in any way and if she can incorporate some of that technology into the Normandy to further her own development

I think Kira gets along with Wrex and is angry at Salarians on his behalf once she hears what was done to the Krogan because the genocide of a species hits hard with her

Tilly and Samantha are even worse than Bashir and Mordin at talking so fast no one gets it but them and they very much do enjoy talking to each other

Tom and Steve have shuttle races until they’re ordered back by their bosses because really guys

Geordi has a lot of talks with EDI, some about his friendship with Data and the human side of interacting with a being that’s trying to learn about humanity themselves but most about the ship and the benefits of integration with it that allow you to be aware of everything that’s happening on it

also Data and EDI tell the worst jokes and everyone regrets this

Picard and Thane drink tea together and discuss philosophies and Thane talks about his species old artifacts and how they were lost to his culture and Picard just listens with interest and some ideas on how you could maybe get those back

Jadzia and Jack get along surprisingly well, they have a holodeck fight at one point and Jadzia takes tricorder readings of biotics and then they go out drinking together

on the flip side Ezri and Miranda get along in terms of being forced to live up to unreasonable family expectations (all though far less harsh in Ezri’s case) and having to carve out your own identity and also like...weirdly everyone hating you for no other reason than your character exists

Bev gets into playing poker with Kaidan and Steve and now they’re all trying to beat each other constantly at it

Saru and Liara get along the easiest at first and discuss the wild things their crews get up to and how they eventually just started to go along with the madness

Kasumi keeps trying to steal from Tuvok but can’t manage it and thinks it’s the best challenge she’s had in years. Tuvok just wants to talk to Thane and get back to the Delta Quadrant already captain.

Harry and Jacob get to talking about having to prove themselves and always being looked over and the troubles of trying to get your own command

Bones hates all of this, Kirk what the hell have you done now. That said he and Zaeed get to drinking and talking about the bullshit that comes from space travel. All though Zaeed’s is more about how annoying it is to try to kill someone in it. Bones thinks he’s just over exaggerating and not a mercenary at first.

James keeps showing off for literally everyone and turning things into a competition with whoever he can when it comes to physical activities, he’s still sulking that Data beat him until he finds out that Data is an android and then calls foul on it.

Odo and Zaeed grumble about everything together

B’Elanna and Ashley have a book club that they don’t tell anyone about and share romance novels and poetry while complaining about how everyone doesn’t expect it from them and that’s part of why they don’t tell people those parts of themselves

Uhura gets the translators turned off on the Normandy to listen to everyone’s dialect and language and is quick to pick up on it, she’s especially good with Drell and enjoys conversing with Thane in it

Liara is absolutely freaked out that Deanna sounds like her mother and Deanna is absolutely using this to troll her whenever she can because it amuses her

Grunt and Chekov get into arguments about history of all things despite that people keep pointing out that they’re from alternate worlds and therefore it’s different anyway

Chakwas and Chakotay sit down to talk about what it’s like sorta taking care of the crew and just ridiculous stories of things they’ve put with

Riker at one point talks to Miranda about clones and dealing with someone who is the same genetically as you but isn’t you and do you have a relationship with them or leave them be (they don’t come up with an answer really)

Mordin gets banned from taking samples of other aliens

Nog and Gabby talk one point about being sorta new to the experiences of war and frontline suddenly and the horrors that come with it and share their experiences of being trapped by the Reapers vs being in a Jem’Hadar fight and coming back from that

Guinan doesn’t care much for Javik but they do have one good discussion about what it’s like being one of the last of your species and seeing so many of them die due to a machine race (and worse, converted to serve that race) that you just can’t fight back against no matter how much you try (or that’s what they thought at the time)

Samantha and Spock and Kirk and/or Airiam have strategy game nights and really get into it and Spock will typically leave while Sam and Kirk are still geeking out over it until the morning

Quark is banned from the Normandy point blank

Worf tries to get everyone to appreciate Klingon opera, the only one he manages to get into it are Grunt and Legion

Scotty is especially fascinated with the drive core of the Normandy and talks to Adams about it constantly

Chakotay and James having a boxing match at one point

Jake interviews like everyone and is thinking about turning this experience into a novel and enjoys listening to everyone’s stories

O’Brien and Garrus get caught up in calibrations, can you come back later

okay this literally is getting too long already but I could keep going. I think then there’s a group discussion about the Borgs vs the Reapers and the troubles everyone faces in those fights and a lot of back and forth about things that have worked for one crew that may help someone else out (like the Changeling cure to maybe help the Genophage cure or vice versa)

[frankendykes-monster]

"Godzilla [1954] was made at a time of rising anti-American sentiment. A flood of popular novels and magazines critical of American policy, as well as radio programs and newsreels, had appeared after the Occupation. There were 210,000 US troops stationed in Japan, and accounts of GIs and ex-servicemen committing rape, murder, and other crimes with impunity fanned the flames of resentment; anti-US views were espoused by college students and conservative politicians alike. Several Japanese movies exposed the ugly American and his arrogance; even [Ishiro] Honda's Young Tree and Inao would make brief asides on the subject a few years later. Simultaneously, the Americanization of Japanese populat culture that began in the 1920s continued, as youths embraced American fashion, jazz music, and movies. And the surging economic recovery was dependent on America, which was Japan's primary trade and also using its influence to help Japan enter European markets.

Yet, despite the tremendous shadow it cast, America is conspicuously absent from Godzilla. International advisers arrive in Tokyo; but except for several Caucasian faces in the back of the room, the West is invisible throughout the film. The American military's complete uninvolvement in the crisis might be interpreted as a reflection of national anxiety over the Treaty of Mutual Cooperation and Security, which was signed by Japan and Washington in September 1951. Known by the acronym AMPO in Japanese, the lopsided pact allowed the United States to keep military bases in Japan as an Asian bulwark against Soviet communism and required Japan to defray part of the cost. America was permitted to defend Japan against external threats and to suppress internal ones, yet the treaty did not explicitly guarantee protection by the US military, an omission that would make AMPO a political lightning rod for years. The treaty also remilitarized Japan by authorizing the Japan Self-Defense Forces (JSDF), a contingent of 150,000 ground, sea, and air troops established in March 1954. Yet under Article 9 of Japan's US-written 1947 constitution, Japan had renounced "war as a sovereign right of the nation." There were concerns that the constitution prohibited Japan from defending itself, worries that the JSDF was too small and underequipped, and fears that America would not honor its role as Japan's primary defender. Notably, in the film Japan battles Godzilla without American help.

"The story proceeds as a purely domestic affair", notes historian Yoshikuni Igarashi. "Godzilla...is subsequently killed by Japanese without external assistance...In 1954, the concerted attack that the film portrays would have been possible only with the help of American forces. Nevertheless, the [Self-Defense Forces]...are solely responsible for the attacks against Godzilla. If the [monster] indeed embodied American nuclear threats, it is only logical that the Japanese forces alone should attack. The American forces by definition could not." Anxieties about national security are mirrored: Japan's fledgling military cannot halt the monster's massive onslaught, though fighter planes eventually succeed in driving it back to the sea, to the cheers of civilians. The EIRIN ratings board, in approving the screenplay on July 8, 1954, included a requirement that the film portray Japan's new military "with the upmost care and respect."

As Igarashi points out, "There is not even a hint of [American] responsibility in the...destruction of Tokyo by the monster." Godzilla's ties to the atomic bomb have nevertheless led some Western critics to mischaracterize Honda's film as anti-American. Several contemporary Japanese scholars, meanwhile, have interpreted Japan's military self-reliance and the monster's reenactment of wartime destruction as "ambivalent notions of nationalism and anti-nuclear ideology," writes critic Inuhiko Yomota. In recent decades, influential film scholars have interpreted Godzilla as evoking a powerful national trauma, with the monster symbolizing the restless ghosts of Japanese soldiers lost in the Pacific War, a concept inspired by the postwar essays of folklorist Kunio Yanagita. Among those popularizing this view is prominent critic Saburo Kawamoto, whose 1994 book Revisiting Postwar Japanese Film theorized that these souls had taken the form of Godzilla and returned; as evidence, Kawamoto offers the monster's deference to the prewar order. "Those who died in the war are still under the spell of Japan's emperor," Kawamoto writes, therefore "Godzilla cannot destroy the Imperial Palace."

However, Honda's own attitudes toward Godzilla, the bomb, America, and his own country are more nuanced and complex; the film is not an anti-US polemic but an even-handed treatment of the tenuous and asymmetrical Japan-US relationship, casting light on both the invisible hand of American hegemony and the spineless politicians who are more concerned about safeguarding Japan's client-state relationship with Washington than about the welfare of the nation. Just as some real-life leaders tried to downplay the Lucky Dragon incident, legislators move to suppress information about Godzilla's ties to the H-bomb, wary of antagonizing Uncle Sam. As Godzilla approaches Tokyo, one politician frets not about the threat to public safety, but to international shipping. Godzilla doesn't think much of national leadership. It demolishes the Diet building, Japan's equivalent of Capitol Hill.

Honda does not depict all Western influence, Occupation reforms, and new attitudes negatively. Women's suffrage was enacted in 1945, and the first female member of the Imperial Diet was elected in 1946, changes mirrored by the fiery women's caucus that insists Godzilla's radioactivity be revealed. Emiko's decisive role in the drama and her rejection of arranged marriage also point to the changing times. Emiko is openly dating Ogata, with no fear that her father will forbid their relationship. Issues of class status, and clashes between old and new values, create less conflict than in Honda's other works. Yamane is respected and well off, evidenced by his large home and television set (broadcasting began in 1953, and only the affluent could afford a TV as yet); but he allows his daughter to date a working-class sailor, and he adopts the poor island orphan Shinkichi (Toyoaki Suzuki) into his family. The Odo people are backwater folk - there is a funny moment when their mayor awkwardly tells the senate about cows and pigs eaten by Godzilla - yet the Tokyoites don't ridicule their superstitions, as Ryo Ikebe did in The Blue Pearl. Yamane names the monster after an Odo Island legend, simultaneously linking Godzilla to modern science and old mythology, and to America's atomic bomb and indigenous Japanese folklore and culture. In this way, Honda shrouds the monster's origin in mystery. It's not perfectly clear whether Yamane's theory is correct, or if the creature is a god, or both.

An early draft of Kayama's story began with the Lucky Dragon No. 5 returning to Japan, directly linking Godzilla's birth to America's hydrogen bomb. Honda saw his monster not as an indictment of America but of a symbol of a global threat, so he rewrote the scene. The vessel destroyed in the opening scene is a fictional one, though a lifebuoy on deck is labeled "No. 5."

"I did not want to [reference] the Lucky Dragon," Honda said. "If I did, I would have to [show how the] creature was born from that explosion. The screenplay is written with the 'speculation' that this creature was a result of a nuclear test, you see. I think that if I visually showed that [the bomb created the monster], that would have gone too far and I would not be surprised if people came out to protest such a film."

"Putting a real-life incident into a fictional story with a monster would not be appropriate. Instead, it became a matter of...the feeling that I was trying to create as a director. Namely, an invisible fear...the creation of the atomic bomb had become a universal problem. I felt this atomic fear would hang around our necks for eternity."

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- Ishiro Honda: A Life in Film, From Godzilla to Kurosawa, by Steve Ryfle and Ed Godziszewski