#nebulouscoffee

[trillscienceofficer]

-Do you have any thoughts on B'Elanna's grandmother (the one who made the banana pancakes) because I swear I think about this woman a disproportionate amount lol, and- -What are some things (broadly speaking) that you'd like to see more of in Trek fandom?

Feel free to choose a question if you don't wanna do both! And I hope your cold gets better soon :)

Thank you so much!! (I also hope that this cold gets better soon, my head feels like a balloon)

I do have some thoughts on B'Elanna's paternal grandmother, but I'd like to stress that these are very partial impressions and I probably should think about her in more depth. There's very little we know about her from canon; the banana pancakes (and the fact that she cared for B'Elanna and made her meals often enough that it's one of B'Elanna's favorite treats from childhood, which I personally interpret as her living on Kessik IV as well, canon doesn't contradict this), that she had two sons, the fact that she liked Miral but knew her John well enough to know that he wouldn't treat her right, and was against their marriage. The last part always stood out to me!! It can be taken in many different ways, and while it could be easily just a stereotype of the protective-mother-of-the-favorite-son, I'd like to put forward the idea that she was simply a woman unafraid to speak the truth as she saw it. I like to think that when John and Miral got married regardless, she did her best to make Miral a part of the family, and I think of B'Elanna's grandma as someone who was very conscious of the ways in which Miral was at a disadvantage in this situation (alone with basically no support network of her own, the only Klingon around). In one fic I wrote her quoting Gloria Anzaldúa because I can't stop imagining her as a feminist who tried her best trying to raise two conscientious sons and... it did not exactly work out the way she intended, but it doesn't mean she's going to leave her daughter-in-law and her granddaughter to fend for themselves. (iirc Miral also never says that John's family was a problem, which can be interpreted as her not feeling particularly left out, beside the obvious fact that nobody else was Klingon.) If we follow my headcanon that she lived on Kessik IV as well, I also like to think that she (and her husband?) moved there because of her job—it would be fun if B'Elanna had taken a liking to engineering because one of her favorite people had a nice workshop where she could hang out even when things between John and Miral got rocky. In general imagine B'Elanna's grandma as a no-nonsense, quick small woman, with curly black (graying) hair and a big smile but that could turn very stern in the span of a second. I imagine she eventually returned to Earth as well, once John separated from Miral, and if B'Elanna was to reunite with her it would be there.

By the way I'd love to hear your thoughts on B'Elanna's grandmother very much, if you feel like it and haven't already written about her!

As for what I'd like to see more of in Trek fandom... I don't know, obviously the fandom can do much better re: appreciating and be respectful of characters of color and women, always something I can improve on as well. I think what I like to see/read the best (women dealing with very gnarly problems! Romance between women that is anything but fluffy!) already exists and there are so many fantastic artists (you absolutely included!!) that develop the themes I like to see with the complexity I think they deserve, it feels like asking for more of that is almost... entitled? But I wouldn't say no on seeing more of these themes both in fanworks and fandom analyses, definitely.

[nebulouscoffee]

Sorry to correct you but. Samosa is an indian dish not Kenyan

Hello anon! LOL okay I never expected to get into Samosa Discourse on my Star Trek blog but I happen to love food and history and the history of food so here we go😂

You are correct that samosas are not native to Kenya- and yes, India is by far the country most associated with samosas in the popular imagination (for good reason, samosas are pretty much omnipresent throughout India!) But while samosas are not originally from Kenya, that doesn't mean (imo at least) that they cannot be counted as part of Kenyan cuisine. (Which I didn't even necessarily do in that post, but I understand your position so I'll elaborate on those terms!)

Kenya is a multi-ethic country made up of several African peoples and migrant communities, including Kenyan Asians. Now, the history of South Asians living in/trading with East Africa goes back centuries, but there was also this huge (and deeply colonial) boom in the Asian population during the late 1800s-early 1900s when the British sent tens of thousands of indentured Indian labourers to Kenya to build the Uganda railway. (There is a LOT more history I could get into re the British East Africa Protectorate and the complicated social dynamics between African & Asian communities at the time, but that's not really relevant to samosas so I'll spare you.)

Anyway, modern day Kenya still has a considerable South Asian population, and as such (again not getting into the more complicated social dynamics here), Kenyan cuisine has a lot of Indian (and Arab) influences. But beyond that- Swahili culture(s) and cuisine(s) evolved over centuries of interaction between the various (predominantly Bantu) peoples of East Africa and traders from West, Central & South Asia (who brought in- among other things- their own spices), so cultural intermingling has always been a staple of the East African coast (which is geographically SO close to Asia!) If you were to walk around some of the bigger, more Asian diaspora-heavy cities of Kenya, like Mombasa or Nairobi, you'd find plenty of chicken/fish-based coconut curries & stews that strongly resemble Indian ones- as well as rice-based dishes like pilau & biriyani, rotis, chapatis, bhajias (called 'bajjis' in certain parts of India), kheemas, kebabs- and yes, samosas. Or sambusas, as they're often called in Kenya.

And what's more- the samosa (originally 'samsa' iirc) likely originated in Central Asia in the first place! It still goes by other names in West Asia and North Africa too; as do several other dishes-in-common. In fact, kuku paka (a dish I mentioned in the post that prompted this ask) is a Kenyan chicken curry with distinct Indian & Arabic influences. So if samosas can qualify as Indian cuisine (which, they undoubtedly do), imo they can qualify as a part of Kenyan cuisine too! Anyway I'm truly sorry I let this ask get SO far away from me lmao, I guess I've always felt a bit alienated by this growing tendency in Asian & African communities to sort of rigidly and unquestioningly (even proudly) uphold colonial divides when our cultures are actually so sprawling and ancient? Like sure, we are not monoliths, and it is important that people learn that- but also, so many political borders across both continents didn't even exist as they are today even a hundred years ago. It's so cool how much there is in common! Food, like so many other aspects of culture, is often migratory and full of varied influences, and that's just so deeply human and beautiful and fascinating to me

[candycurlsofmaddness]

Tags by NebulousCoffee

wish more people found leeta and julian cute I feel on my own here. like I don't think they'd last long term at all but they're sweet, I like them.

[bijoumikhawal]

Also, since I mentioned it but haven't talked about it, let's examine "with sentiments like those you wouldn't last 5 seconds on Cardassia" through the Garak as mixed race reading we get from A Stitch In Time- and, because Julian's there, and I can't really talk about this interaction without it, reading Julian through a Jewish lens. (CCing: @nebulouscoffee as they asked the inital question)

Background contextualization once more: in the play The Nexus, there is an interaction which frankly, reveals itself as deeply cruel and mean-spirited. And, heads up, I will be discussing antisemitism and my criticism of the Federation.

BASHIR: When you were truly free. We so often only ruminate on the sad memories. When, if ever, have you felt like Elim Garak? GARAK (warms as he remembers): I used to perch on the edge of a dirt cart, drinking cool Ribexa, watching my “father” - Tolan - gently knead the soil around newly transplanted orchid bulbs. He used to talk to his patients, softly reassuring them that they weren’t lost or in danger. He was completely oblivious of me - but it didn’t matter. I lived through him, Doctor, and I lived through those orchids, imagining that I myself was being carefully tucked into my own bed. When all the talk was of war and mayhem, I would wait till all was quiet in the house and go sit beside the planted bulbs, digging my toes into the moist earth, looking up at the stars… BASHIR: Like your regnar. GARAK: Mmm? BASHIR: Transforming yourself, becoming at one with your environment. Isn’t that what happened to you in your early training at Bamarren? When you leaned to be somewhere without being noticed. GARAK: I was sent to Bamarren to learn how to kill...cleanly, dispassionately. To be part of a team that kills without question. But that tiny creature was my lifeline. Literally, my line to life. Through Mila, this regnar, I could still remember what it was like to be alive for life’s sake. BASHIR: L’chaim! To life! An old earthen sect called Jews used to say l’chaim to salute each other in celebration. No one says it anymore. GARAK: No, I’m sure they don’t. The Federation don’t approve, do they, Doctor? Sectarianism is divisive, is it not? How ironic. How Cardassian! Everyone surrenders their individual culture for the greater good of the whole. BASHIR: It evolved out of our choice, Garak. We have freedom of choice, and choice has kept us free. GARAK: Of course you call it choice. Coercion would have been too Borgian, certainly not the Federation style. Assimilation by consent is much better. Keep the grass green on my side of the fence and simply wait for everyone to come on over. Sometimes, Doctor, choice is the last thing we need. Ask any child to make a choice, and he or she will invariably make a regrettable one. We’re all such children. BASHIR: Considering your support for democratic principles on Cardassia, I’m rather surprised to hear you say this. GARAK: You wouldn’t be, my friend, if you saw how some people are using these democratic principles. But perhaps they’re simply following the Federation example. Perhaps Federation democracy is the most subtle, the most devious tyranny yet conceived.

This is a very long section, but I feel the whole of it is relevant. Let's break down the major takeaways I have:

Garak is at a point in his life where he very openly is criticizing Cardassia's policy of cultural assimilation and supremacy. He could not do this before without facing extreme legal and social reprocussions, and even though he's still doing this to Julian- someone who wouldn't care- the kind of person he is during the show would not do this.

The Nexus is presenting the Federation as a logical conclusion of a specific permutation of anti-theism popular with certain "progressives", and in my opinion the Federation has expressed characteristics of European Secularism (see: Bajorans being made to remove their earrings while serving in Starfleet while others in Starfleet are allowed to wear other items of cultural significance).

Julian is putting forth the company line on that front, which is suprising given he and Jadzia are the more respectful members of the senior staff towards Bajoran religion.

This whole scene must be contextualized in that gardening/connection to "soft, green" things and Tolan, are connected to Garak’s sense of Hebitian identity, and that Garak is criticizing Cardassia and the Federation from the perspective of someone coming to terms with his Hebitian identity, and that that is an oppressed identity.

On my first reading, I'll be blunt: I completely despised this line from Julian and was willing to pretend I never read it. It does, on some level, make sense for him without adding any extra dimension of cultural context beyond what we're explicitly told, but it is a very nasty belief to espouse. However, upon receiving the trivia that the actor who plays Julian's father is Jewish, I found myself turning it over in my head again, and a question that I think is very relevant to Julian: what does it mean to assimilate and how does it fuck with you? Regardless of what you believe, what is it safe to do (Orthodoxy vs Orthopraxy)? Both are also, relevant to talking about Garak and what it means to be Hebitian.

and let's return to the scene in the show that we're examining.

GARAK: It all comes down to a question of loyalty. My dear Doctor, Yiri had to choose between protecting his brother and protecting the state. He chose the state, as would I, every time. BASHIR: I suppose that's one way of looking at it. But then again, before you can be loyal to another, you must be loyal to yourself. GARAK: And who can we thank for those misguided words of wisdom? Sarek of Vulcan? BASHIR: Actually, it was Bashir of Earth. GARAK: With sentiments like those, you wouldn't last for five seconds on Cardassia. BASHIR: Would you? GARAK: Fishing again, Doctor?

The script adds a direction before Garaks last line here: "Garak is a little taken aback. Bashir's question cuts right to the heart of the cat-and-mouse game that the two of them have been playing for months."

Obviously with the biracial reading from ASIT the joke is: no, Garak wouldn't. He didn't. Once he stepped too far out of the line, that was betrayal, and you can draw a straight line from his betrayal to his exile (though we never actually get an explanation for why he was exiled, and are left to draw our own conclusions). And the precise reason he didn't last is arguably BECAUSE he was crossing the line of self loyalty, bringing him out of step with loyalty to the state. He didn't chose the state. You can even directly point to him contemplating turning in the Oralian Way meeting in ASIT and not doing it as a parallel to the situation the two are discussing. He had the choice to protect the group or the state, and through inaction, ultimately chose the group.

And the joke with the Jewish reading brought on by the Nexus: Julian isn't loyal to himself, and his disloyalty makes him more loyal to the Federation. Julian is of course, a walking disloyalty, he's an Augment. And because this is a reading based on very little information, we can't say why he's disloyal to himself. Are his parents assimilationists? It wouldn't be suprising: he talks with a much more posh, distinctly British accent than them both (Amsha doesn't have a British accent, to my ear, and Richard's sounds more working class), which potentially indicates they put effort into him not talking like them. Was assimilation a choice to avoid already being seen as odd and disloyal in an attempt to avoid examination of background and discovery of his Augmentation? How does the Federation talk about Jews, educate about them, how is Jewish history viewed?

No one says it anymore- but you, Julian Bashir, just said it. Where did you learn it? Did your grandmother still say it? Did you read it in class? Did you seek out reading it yourself? Was it in a play, a movie, a novel? Did you ever say it before now? Did you say it to your father?

Were you told the lie that the second exodus of SSWANA Jews during the mid 20th century was gleefully undertaken? Were told to be relieved, as Garak implies, that yet another vector of sectarianism was gone? Were you told to be relieved people could not be made to suffer through that avenue anymore? Were you told to think of it as a mercy killing? You were certainly told it was a choice, freely made.

We end up with a scene where a man who chose loyalty to himself and was punished (would have always risked punishment because the requirement of loyalty is against something he was born as) denies he ever made such a choice, and a man who is not loyal to himself calling self loyalty a pre-requisite for loyalty to a state he inherently cannot be loyal to, while questioning the first man what called his state loyalty into question. Men in intersecting lines.

[fancy-a-dance-brigadier]

List 5 topics you can talk on for an hour without preparing any material

@anatahia tagged me in this wee game - thank you friend!! This was fun 😁

Doctor Who (both classic and new - I could manage any era pretty decently, but 60s/early 70s would definitely be my area of expertise)

Late Victorian feminist novels (hellooo masters thesis)

Deep Space Nine

Final Fantasy XII

Star Wars (could probably fill up the hour just talking about Padmé honestly)

I’ll tag: @nebulouscoffee @nerdy-flower @observethewalrus @xomby and @nostalgia-tblr (no pressure of course!)

[wanderingwriter87]

@nebulouscoffee tagged me to share the latest line I wrote. from a wip tentatively titled "my neck, my back (my anxiety attack)"

But then Julian tossed his head back, flicking the hair out of his face, and looked over his shoulder. 

Garak became keenly aware he did not know how to stand, what to do with his hands.

Tagging @ectogeo-rebubbles @lorenzobane @thethirdromana @sapphosewrites @xenobotanist

[lorenzobane]

(A/N: I’m in the airport again! So here is another 20 minute Drabble. As always, apologies for any spelling and grammar mistakes. Also a special thank you to @nebulouscoffee for the prompt!)

To Deserve Each Other

“Oh, come off it; that’s not how it happened,” Julian says, laughing slightly while topping off his glass of wine.

“So sad to have one’s partner decay into senility,” Garak replies.

“No, what happened was that I was calmly and peacefully minding my own business in my personal holosuite time, and then you–”

“Goodness! Human memory really does get quite fuzzy after all these years. I assure you, my dearest Doctor, you invited me–”

“This is absurd,” Julian says, laughing again despite himself. “I most certainly did not!”

“Yes! That is exactly what happened. I was invited to play with my dear friend, a man I so admired and adored–”

“You’re so full of shi–”

“And then he shot me! Can you even imagine?”

“Stop giving Parmak a bad impression of me!” Julian exclaims before turning to Parmak. “He broke into my holoprogram, which is illegal by the way, and due to a series of unfortunate events, I was forced to shoot him to save my colleagues.”

“Wait,” Parmak says, his eyes wide. “You really did shoot him, then?”

“It was only a flesh wound,” Julian says flippantly.

“A flesh wound!” Garak’s pout was reaching epic proportions. “You shot me in the neck.”

“He deserved it,” Julian says, looking beseechingly at their dinner companion.

Parmak looks wryly between them and then says, “well, at the very least, you certainly deserve each other.’

[cyberspacenine]

Tag game! I was tagged by @nebulouscoffee thank you so much 😌😌😌

3 ships: I don't really have 'favorite' ships, so these are just the ones I'm currently rotating the most in my mind: Louis/Armand from IWTV, Grilka/Natima Lang from DS9 (idc if they never met! in my heart they're together!), and finally Marvin/Whizzer from Falsettos.

first ever ship: ohhh good question. If my memory serves me right? The first pairing I really got into was Usagi and Seiya from Sailor Moon at the age of like... 11 😭 what can i say, im a sucker for bickering/rivalries (and this is still true.)

last song: I listen to stuff on Youtube while I'm at work, which led me to discover this arrangement of songs from the Little Shop of Horrors musical revival! I love this cast and i've been replaying it like a few times over and over. ("Feed me" and "Dentist" especially. I haven't even seen the show yet but these songs are stuck in my head lmao. Very sad that Conrad Ricamora's and Aaron Arnell Harrington's rendition of these songs is not up on Spotify).

last movie: Roommate & I watched The Devil Wears Prada to see if it holds up!

currently reading: Two books that I've been meaning to start with, one is A Psalm for the Wild-Built by Becky Chambers, for a book club I'm in, the other is On Sundays, She Picked Flowers by Yah Yah Scholfield

currently watching: I'm slowly getting through the second act of Angels in America, Perestroika (im watching a recording). Still not sure how i feel about the play overall!

currently consuming: made a mimosa for myself so now im drinking the leftover orange juice!

currently craving: fries, tbh

people to tag: @hateandashbury @the-game-is-up @uncommonbisisst @clonedking @podcastlesbian

ofc no pressure as always!

[girlonthelasttrain]

tagged by @firstroseofspring to shuffle my Spotify 'on repeat' playlist and list the first ten songs that come up (there are going to be repetitions of bands because I generally listen to albums)

The Widow - The Mars Volta

The Problem of Other Minds - Animals As Leaders

Out of Sight - The Beths

Bones - Editors

Not Unlike The Waves - Agalloch

Stagioni - Massimo Volume

L'Via L'Viaquez - The Mars Volta

Little Death - The Beths

Something I Learned Today - Hüsker Dü

Dreams Burn Down - Ride

tagging @asimplecreature @pulptrash @nanaqui @amarocit @nebulouscoffee and @deannastrois but no pressure whatsoever to do this! (feel free to use whatever playlist you're listening to right now, it doesn't need to be from spotify)

[the-oracle-of-the-lost]

🖖 🫂 📚

from this ask game

🖖 First Trek media you encountered?

answered here!

🫂 Character you'd like to be friends with.

answered here!

but also let's be real there are very few ST lead characters i wouldn't want to be friends with

📚 Favourite ST fic you've read.

Who We Are by @nebulouscoffee is hands down the best Dax fic i've ever read (an AU where Jadzia survives the end of s6 but still loses her symbiont to Ezri). the descriptions of what it's like to be joined is so wonderfully and vividly written.

Gazing Seaward from the Heather by Squirrels_All_The_Way_Down is also a wonderful post-Voyager Seven & Neelix fic that broke my heart a little bit.

[trillscienceofficer]

🌈🌿🎀💞💌 - pick and choose if you don't wanna do all!

Thank you so much!!

🌈is there a fic that you worked really fucking hard on that no one would ever know? maybe a scene/theme you struggled with?

Answered here :)

🌿how does creating make you feel?

Ouf, complex question. I've tried not writing at various points in my life, thinking that it was childish, what's the point anyway and it's not as if anything I make is particularly good or relevant... but despite these rationalizations not writing always made life tangibly worse for me. I used to fill notebooks with stories as a teenager, I left word documents full of half-written fic in all the computers I've ever put my hands on, it's just something I do. That said though... putting something on paper is usually a distressing emotional roller-coaster for me. I know this sounds fucking overdramatic for someone who writes silly Star Trek romance fic but it's just the way it is! I oscillate between almost 'manic' episodes of elation to depths of despair previously not known to man, and the difference between them can simply be 'reading an opinion that disagrees on the approach I've taken in the story I'm currently writing'. I love talking to other writers (it's what made me start posting fic publicly in the first place, I want to talk to people with whom I share interests and sensibilities) but if I have the wrong conversation at the wrong time it can make me stop writing for literal months. I probably should work on that and make writing less of a sensitive topic because this is definitely a me problem lol, but I'm also not exactly sure how to put more emotional distance between me and the act of making up a story with characters I love. Something I'm definitely thinking about, nonetheless!

🎀give yourself a compliment about your own writing

I care about these characters so much and the amount of thought I put into them and the relationships between them shows in what I write.

💞what's the most important part of a story for you? the plot, the characters, the worldbuilding, the technical stuff (grammar etc), the figurative language

Characters for sure, they always come first for me. I care about grammar as well, though this is a complicated subject (how exactly I am proficient in English is a question I'm very afraid to ask, even to my beta readers when I have them). I'm not a big plot person, but I always try to have a central 'conflict' in every story I write, something that helps bring out the differences and similarities between the characters involved. Figurative language is admittedly not among my main concerns, and lately I feel like I should concentrate more on prose, I realize my writing can be too dry sometimes. Worldbuilding is complicated for me... I feel like anything I make up ends up sounding silly, so in general I try to keep things close to canon, or at least close to interpretations of canon that can be recognized.

💌share something with us about an up-and-coming work (WIP) that has you excited!

This question kills me because I'm writing the assignment for an exchange right now and I can't really share anything that would make the fic recognizable! But I definitely AM excited about it, as well as a little apprehensive because it's for a fandom and characters I haven't written about before. Stay tuned ;)

fic writer asks

[nebulouscoffee]

Wow... It has officially been one whole year since I posted my first ds9 fic on ao3 (which was also my first time sharing my writing on the internet!) Feeling soft feelings rn about all the lovely friends I ended up making through this enterprise (pun intended)

[sapphosewrites]

@wanderingwriter87 and @nebulouscoffee tagged me to share the latest line I wrote, which is great because I love tag games! Thank you! This is from the "fake marriage for fed citizenship" fic that has been languishing in the wip graveyard forever but was recently resurrected courtesy of ecto's wedding registry collection.

If Garak was on one of the beds when he returned, would it give the wrong impression? It wouldn’t do to appear presumptuous, or make Julian uncomfortable, as if Garak planned to pressure him into something. As if Garak wanted anything from him that was not freely given.

I don't know who else has already been tagged, so with apologies for any repetition I'm going to bother @ectogeo-rebubbles, @copperplatebeech, @hellostuffedtiger, @hingabee. If I didn't tag you but you want to do this, consider yourself tagged by me!

[bijoumikhawal]

tagged by @nebulouscoffee and @thegreatbajoranschismof2369

3 ships: for ds9- garashir, siskarakshir, goranashir, kai winn/a nice quiet Monastery where she can be her frankly horrible self without being tormented. For that MXTX shit I've been on- Hualian, Moshang, Xiyao

First ship ever: hmmmm I don't know if I remember. Back that far lol. It mightve been Percy and Annabeth from PJO.

Last song: Good Ones by Charlie XCX

Last movie: Pom Poko. Absolutely heart wrenching Ghibli movie about eco terrorism in the face of modern (colonial) development projects. Also there were a lot of testicles

Currently reading: (guiltily looks at all the partially read stuff I have open) Masashi Fukaya - The Festivals of Opet, the Valley, and the New Year: Their Socio-Religious Functions; Mina Ibrahim - Identity, Marginalisation, Activism, and Victimhood in Egypt: Misfits in the Coptic Christian Community; The Manichean Church in Kellis; John Cliff Holt - Buddha in the Crown; Howard Schwartz - Tree of Souls; also a bunch of papers about Irish lace bc I was planning to write a post about it and it's sociopolitical history

Currently watching: I'm technically working through the Thousand Autumns donghua but it honestly hasn't grabbed my attention throughly

Currently consuming: asparagus and barbecue chips

Currently craving: a nap and relaxation ngl I had to run ragged with errands last week and drive to the same interview twice and get really frustrated with my mom's bad time management and inconsideration/idiocy

9 people to tag: @ofhouseadama @spocks-kaathyra @personalmoshiakh @deepspaceclawstation @cardasssians

[fancy-a-dance-brigadier]

���️ hello all about a voyager/far beyond the stars au???

Your wish is my command!! (The Voyager FBTS AU is a fic I'm writing as a collab with @nebulouscoffee !!)

🏝️ - The Ever-Changing Horizon (Star Trek: Voyager, Far Beyond the Stars AU)

The stranger narrows her eyes a little, but she is not suspicious - merely concerned, for she is beginning to realise that the woman who threatened her did not do so out of malice, but out of fear. Slowly, she began to approach, treading carefully lest she step on any of the plants beneath her. "My name is Bianca. It's alright, you can trust me." As if to prove her point, she tosses the shard aside, and it goes sailing into the endless night, never to be seen again.

[wanderingwriter87]

First lines game

Rules: share the first lines of ten of your most recent fanfics and tag ten people. If you have written less than ten, don’t be shy and share anyway. I was tagged by@bijoumikhawal and @nebulouscoffee

1. "Kelas, I need you to be honest with me." (The Never Ending Valentine)

2. "This is Dr. Julian Bashir on the USS Volga. Requesting permission to land." (emotional motion sickness)

3. "Hmm. I don't know, Garak." Dr. Julian Bashir stepped out of the dressing room in Garak's Clothiers, while the titular tailor fussed with a mannequin in the corner. "The length is perfect, but I don't think they're meant to hang like this." (take me closer, take my clothes off)

4. "Dr. Bashir! It's been too long." (Spark)

5. Just one more resequencing of the biopolymers, and he'd call it a night. (Wired)

6. "Well, it could be a lot worse." (Sex Pollen Not Included)

7. "No! Absolutely not, Vic." Julian Bashir shook his head vigorously. "It's aged very poorly." (at least there will be plenty implied)

8. "Forgive me, Doctor, if I don't…precisely understand what is meant to be so enjoyable about this particular program." (join us for a bite)

9. " Garak…" Dr. Julian Bashir let out a long sigh, pushing the sticky, crumpled towel to the floor. "Elim. Look at me, please?" (Quite Full)

10. "Have you seen the news today?" (this photo of us, it don’t have a price)

I can’t get tags to work so if you want to do it, consider yourself tagged.