#enigma space

[attleboy]

can you draw Pomni in a liminal space?

kept thinking about this ask so... pomni on the bus for tonight

original image here! it should link to the source now :D

[mistershoestied]

what the FUCK is paul robalino talking about

[thererisesaredstar]

Cover of Endgame Enigma by James P. Hogan (1987)

[churchofthemimic]

where are you?

[horrorfilmlesbian]

continuing with Enigma Tales again and once again absolutely kneecapped any time the novel mentions Garak thinking about Bashir.

Literally there's a big political shit storm going on and Garak is thinking about how he will probably have to apologise to Parmak again for being so obsessed (in love) with Bashir & despite being a certified Yapper, has absolutely NO idea how to explain how much the man means to him

[royalarchivist]

Etoiles: Let's go! I've got the codex! It's so fun to do, can I do more?

[Dapper hits him]

Etoiles: [Laughs] I want to do more, what the hell! Cellbit POV! Cellbit point of view!

[stimlanders-collection]

Enigma stimboard!

❔-❔-❔|❔-❔-❔|❔-❔-❔

[nie-narzekam]

All the girls know his fame, men curse his name

And they talk about him like he’s magic

He’s stolen hearts like they’re horses

And horses* when hearts can’t be found

*Or uranium and space rocks

He knows he’s a fool to get caught up with you

He can’t let go of love once he’s had it

He knows that his story is tragic

But he can’t rest ‘til he’s next to you

(Josh Ritter, “Next to the Last Romantic”)

[lady-lazarus-13]

I finished Enigma Tales by Una McCormack and I have thoughts. Spoilers below:

Since this book is technically an enigma tale I was trying to figure out who was guilty of what. One joke I sent earlier to Tinyfaust (he's not tagged cause he hasn't finished) was "What is Kelas guilty of, huh? Loving a married man so much?"

Genuinely every bit we got of Garak yearning was so so so good. Seeing the relationships he'd built on Cardassia was also so fascinating. I really appreciated all of these new characters and the layers added to Lang.

But I did not like Pulaski or Alden. They grew on me by the end but kinda like a mold on soft cheese. Couldn't even cut it off and hope for the best.

Cause Pulaski was running her mouth about racing hounds and got Lang worried about why the castellan doesn't like her. Then miss kitty cat got rude about Julian. Why are you bringing that up around all these randoms? She assumes Garak is secretive and nefarious because he's ex-Order and not because he's the HEAD OF STATE.

It makes more sense for Garak to be private. Like for once he was not being sketchy and yet everybody was up in his business.

It was sad seeing Garak mourning for Ziyal, but him wanting to keep her memory alive was so beautiful. I also realized probably would have been easier for Garak to mourn Julian if he was dead and not just upstairs catatonic. How awful. The guilt must have started to gnaw at him so I could understand his unwillingness to see Julian empty like that.

"My poor Julian." And Garak cryiiiing because he got shook up by Telek's story. That killed me. Garak heard "genetic experiments on children??? Just like my main man Bashir."

Also, Kelas getting a small note with "Baby, I'm coming home - G xoxo" was shocking enough but the [sent] personally sent me to another planet. Like just send Julian his letters omg. (I hope Kelas pulls a "To all the boys I loved before" and sends them for Garak.)

I have to say though I'm slightly disappointed in the ending. It was just kind of lame for the whole thing to be caused by a rogue Starfleet agent deep undercover. Maybe if he'd lost it AND had reason to do all this it would have made sense. But instead it was to...help Lang gain power? Maybe I need to reread that part so feel free to correct me. It just didn't carry enough weight. But I suppose that's an enigma tale for ya.

I love how Garak was like hahaha why be the president of a school when you can be the next Castellan. The description of him in black walking away into the darkness when Lang stepped into the light? Iconique.

Anyway, the last chapter with Julian as Garak read to him? The twitch of his fingers over Kukalaka? So worth the ride.

Now time for me to be delusional and pretend Julian wakes up and he's like oh hey boo and they live happily ever after. And have freak nasty sex ten plus years in the making.

[tinyfaust]

I decided, in light of making sure I can take detailed notes of my thoughts and questions in my notebook, to start enigma tales over. I wasn’t even 20 pages in so it’s fine, but I was utterly unprepared to re-face that wicked first letter to Julian from Garak. The last line? Fuck OFF I’m already crying dude this is unfair!

[bashirsjammies]

I like to imagine that there's something similar to the windows vistas games on the devices on ds9. Imagining Keiko talking to Sisko because she caught Jake playing Meteorsweeper in class, or Odo playing digitalized Tongo when he's not pestering Quark. I might draw this!

[obrienmustsuffer]

We talked a lot about Enigma Tales and Natima Lang tonight!

@unamccormack

[katsdynam1ght]

oh i will also prob post a server invite link soon so for all of my mutuals that are not yet in the server 🤲 i want to collect u in my server jar

[horrorfilmlesbian]

a few (non spoilerly) highlights of Enigma Tales:

Cardassians loving news programs so much they have like a billion 'casts going all the time

Mhevet being incredibly competent at her job of running the Constabulary & stopping Garak from committing more war crimes (secodary objective but no less important)

Something something Garak is self aware enough to know he can be quite easily corrupted even if his heart is in the right place so he's surrounding himself with Good People instead of people pleasers

The uh. Letters to Julian. Powerful concentrations of Yearning.

[unsent] gets me every time

Garak acting like a bitchy guard dog the moment someone tries to get to Julian. Goodwill GONE

Elima Antok!!!!!! Woman of all time. Yet another reason to cry about

Parmak canonically texting Garak commentary on the news as it happens. Imagine how cunty those texts would get.

Dr Pulaski meeting Garak and immediately having beef. #haters both of them.

Garak, the entire time, just wants to sit down and read his new book but things do NOT stop happening. Except for when he has to remind himself he's not in his war crimes era again.

[3knight333]

Andromedian starseeds rise up!!!

[gay-meowmeow]

nobody:

Pete looking at Way: