#* in character ┊ mezoti.

[best-star-trek-character]

[sshbpodcast]

Character Spotlight: Jake Sisko

By Ames

We’ve talked a bunch of times on A Star to Steer Her By about how Jake Sisko is the best. He’s one of the best child characters in the whole Star Trek franchise, in both writing and acting (second to maybe Mezoti and/or Rok-Tahk). His relationship with his father is depicted so beautifully in so many episodes, as we’ll surely discuss below. And that kid’s personal style bypasses Wesley Crusher’s in every single way.

So this week, we’re picking up a Jake Sisko holonovel to read as your SSHB hosts declare our favorite Jake-O moments and scrape up some bad moments to consider. Our definition of what a Worst Moment is – which was shaky at best to begin with – gets really stretched this week. So enjoy them all below, listen to our chatter this week on the podcast (jump over to 1:01:52), and prepare for Jake Sisko to make a deal for you to have great damn day.

[Images © CBS/Paramount]

Best moments

“A” is for Apple, “B” is for Best friend ever Jake is just a straight-up good kid. So good that we happily forgive everything on our bad list, and this early moment really established what a pure heart he has. When Rom pulls Nog out of Keiko’s school in “The Nagus” and Sisko is about to get all racist at the Ferengi for corrupting his son, we learn that Jake has been sneaking off to teach Nog to read, squashing all the jumped-to conclusions and being the example that everyone on the station needs right now.

Who wears the lobes in this relationship? Speaking of teaching things to Nog, when the two form the Noh-Jay Consortium in “Progress,” which is adorable enough on its own, Jake somehow schools Nog on the value of owning land when they start trading assets around. How a Ferengi doesn’t understand real estate is beyond me, but Jake knows a good deal when he sees one. Turns out Jake’s got the lobes!

My friend’s real sorry for what he did In our Nog coverage on the podcast, I mistakenly sullied Jake’s name, claiming he started a fight with the Skrrean kids in “Sanctuary.” Well I was dead wrong! Jake, the ever goody-two-shoes, actually tries to prevent the fight and then does one better by patching things up with Tumak in line for the replimat later. How I could think Jake would have a vicious bone in his body was my error.

I need to find what’s me While we gave Nog lots of props for pursuing his dream of being the first Ferengi to join Starfleet, Jake goes the opposite path, and we love him even more for it! You’d think with a father commanding a whole station, Jake would go the Starfleet route too, but in “Shadowplay,” he reveals he’d rather pursue something he’s more passionate about.

First let me get the hang of flying at impulse When the away team gets captured during “The Jem’Hadar,” Jake and Nog sneak aboard the runabout to escape. Despite not knowing how to pilot the thing, Jake is able to elude disaster and invaders long enough to be rescued. Add to that the fact that they were there to ensure Nog got a passing grade, and Jake comes out as the hero of this episode! (Sorry, Quark.)

If I go, you’ll be all alone Even though he wants to spend time with Leanne, Jake decides to accompany his father on the lightship in “Explorers.” This episode gives us some more of those patented lovely father-son moments of the two being honest and supportive of each other, as Jake expresses his interest in writing and also that he’s concerned about Ben coping without him if he went away to school.

Something called “Sliding into Second” An episode later in “Family Business,” Sisko relents to Jake’s insistence that he get a girlfriend by going on a date with Kasidy Yates based on his son’s matchmaking skills. And it turns out Kasidy is perfect for Ben! Now whether Ben is perfect for Kasidy is another matter altogether that we hinted at a little in our Ben Sisko post, but let’s just say Jake has solid taste.

To my father, who’s coming home I cannot overstate how beautiful “The Visitor” is, and at the center of it is Jake’s relationship with Ben, undoubtedly the strongest asset of all of Deep Space Nine. Jake’s love for his missing father is so strong and pure that he dedicates his life to getting him back from the white void. Is it what Ben would have wanted? Absolutely not. But is it perfect for Jake Sisko? Tremendously.

You may be a little rusty, but you’re still the Chief When O’Brien has gone through literal decades of torture after his brain adventure in “Hard Time,” who better than Jake Sisko to help reacclimate him to all his tools? Jake, who apprenticed briefly under the Chief earlier in the series, shows characteristic patience and empathy for the man who is clearly in need of much rehabilitation and therapy.

The line between courage and cowardice Cirroc Lofton gets his time to shine in “...Nor the Battle to the Strong,” providing an understandably terrified face to the front lines. Not only does he scrub up to help Julian and the other combat medics as injured soldiers start pouring in, AND thwart a Klingon siege by blasting out the ceiling, but he also reminds us that war is absolutely horrifying, in case we’ve forgotten.

You can always find something that’ll make you smile Yet another feel-good moment comes from Jake in the entire lovetrip that is “In the Cards.” While trying to cheer up his dad by getting him a baseball card, Jake and Nog find themselves running a series of fetch quests that add up to one thing: finding ways to make everyone have a nice day, even in the middle of the Dominion War. It was a breath of fresh air in a very serious season.

Let people read it and decide for themselves While Nog and the rest of Red Squad were entirely taken in by the opportunity to play war, Jake saw through Watters’s bullshit immediately in “Valiant.” He’s able to scrape Nog and Dorian Collins together and save them from destruction. And I’ve got to give him credit for endeavoring to write both sides of the story, without bias or condemnation, even if Watters deserves it.

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Worst moments

Watch the wheel, not the girl Boy, that Jake Sisko has a type, and that type is older Bajorans. We first meet Mardah in the flesh in “The Abandoned,” and not only is she a Dabo Girl (whom we know have sex acts with Quark written into their contracts), but she’s also too old for him. I don’t know what age of consent laws are in the future, but when she’s 20 and he’s 16, it just feels on the wrong side of legal.

Stop calling her Nerys When things with Mardah don’t work out, Jake sets his sights on another Bajoran who’s definitely too old for him in “Fascination”: Major Kira. And sure, you could justify this one by saying that everyone on the station is affected by Lwaxana Troi’s Zanthi Fever, but out of all the uncomfortable pairings, it was this one that just felt kinda gross about it.

I guess I just forgot you’re a Ferengi While we blame Nog for his terrible behavior during their double date in “Life Support,” Jake isn’t innocent either. First, how he let Nog weasel in is just a goofy plot device to make the episode happen. But also, Jake shows naivete on his part for not understanding that this is perfectly normal for a Ferengi, and blaming his friend for his upbringing isn’t a good look.

So you’re Jennifer Sisko, but you’re just not my mom Okay, this one’s a little on Ben too for trusting mirror Jennifer to be alone with Jake, like a fool, but Jake’s whole attitude toward his mirror mom in “Shattered Mirror” plays right into her trap. He is so blindsided by her presence that he doesn’t think rationally, even if he’s heard the stories about how nefarious everyone is in the alternate universe. Jake, don’t trust this imposter!

I can spot a creative soul a galaxy away Jake’s weird thing for older women shows up again in “The Muse” when Onaya easily manipulates the poor boy. This is just an episode after “Shattered Mirror,” when his mirror mom took advantage of his trusting nature and eagerness to believe people have good intentions. And this soul-sucker preys on him so easily because he lets himself get taken in.

How much laundry is too much laundry? One last one that’s on both Nog’s and Jake’s list somewhere, since the two are so intertwined: While Nog has become a complete square in “The Ascent,” Jake has turned into a slob so comically disorganized that it stretches credulity. Nog is literally gone for several hours and when he’s returned, Jake’s laundry coats their quarters. How is that even possible?

These visions, they’re not worth dying for This is one of those instances that’s more bad for Jake than bad for us at home. When Ben is catatonic from prophet visions in “Rapture,” it’s Jake’s responsibility as next of kin to decide his fate. He chooses for his father to live, partly selfishly, even though it’s not what Ben would have wanted. But really, I say they should have put this decision on Joe and not a teenage boy.

Just remember, Bashir is spelled with an I Consistently, it’s a running joke on the show that Jake’s spelling is poor. It comes up a couple of times! Nog has to correct all his spelling in “The Ascent.” Sisko points it out when he reads Anslem in “The Muse.” And clearly he spelled Dr. Bashir’s name wrong in his article from “...Nor the Battle to the Strong” because Julian reminds him of the spelling in “Call to Arms.”

This is where I belong After all the Starfleet personnel have abandoned the station in “Call to Arms,” Jake opts to stay behind to do some journalism work, hoping that his status as the Emissary’s son will keep him safe because the Bajorans will revolt if some harm comes to him. So he effectively makes himself a hostage of the Dominion just for a writing gig. Weird flex, Jake-O.

What about freedom of the press? And then the stories Jake writes about the Dominion occupation don’t even go anywhere because Weyoun keeps intercepting them in “A Time to Stand”! Jake, my dude, you can’t go writing clearly biased stories and thinking they’ll make it to your audience. You think Weyoun’s going to let you interview him when he knows your angle? Oh you sweet summer child.

Anything for a story I’ll admit that Jake’s actions and uncharacteristic ability to see through bullshit in “Valiant” were commendable, but his reasons for being there in the first place were thin at best. He weasels into Nog’s trip to Ferenginar to try to get an exclusive interview with the Nagus. Presumptuous much, kid? This after promising to Nog that he wouldn’t be acting as a reporter on his mission.

Please, no more Vic Fontaine! When Nog returns to the station in “It’s Only a Paper Moon” after his leg replacement and clearly suffering from PTSD, the support he gets from friends, family, and professional therapists alike is laughable. Even Jake. It strikes me as out of character that Jake fails at being tolerant of Nog’s wishes during a painful time. Maybe get the guy some comically large headphones instead of kicking him out next time.

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Send this one off to the presses because we’re done! We’ve still got some more Deep Space Nine characters to spotlight coming up, so keep following along for those. We also hope you’re watching Enterprise along with us over on SoundCloud or wherever you get your podcasts. You can play some dot-jot with us over on Facebook and Twitter, and check your spelling before submitting because evidently there’s no Clippy on DS9!

[los-ninos-tortugas]

It’s been a hot minute since I watched a lot of the episodes they were in but truth be told Voyager really went and established four whole child characters to add to the cast and then barely did anything with three of them when it came to the borg children. However I am not restricted by a tv budget and can be as chaotic as I like and I know for a fact that Donnie, Naomi, and the Borg kids would get up to some major hijinks.

Voyager is in orbit of a friendly planet for some trade and refueling, and the kids are allowed down planet side, and Sam and Seven (and idk Tuvok maybe) think to themselves, “alright Donatello and Icheb, you’re both old enough and presumably responsible enough where you can both be in charge of the little ones on your own for the afternoon. Feel free to wander around but meet back at a specific place by 1500 okay?” And at the end of the day the group shows up at the rendezvous point 15 minutes late, covered in mud, two of them are wearing different clothes than they were that morning and Icheb is missing his shoes. No they will not elaborate on what happened.

There’s definitely probably a few instances of the kids attempting to sneak various live animals/creatures from different planets back onto the ship but they’re all really bad at lying about it so they always get caught (though Donatello will attest that he had nothing to do with Mezoti’s plan to bring an entire storage container with a hive of alien bees back onto the ship, she was a rogue agent on that one)

Then of course as kids will do they do also mess around with each other quite a bit. I just imagine Mezoti coming up to Donnie like, “here I got something for you!” And when he puts out his hand she drops a spider in his palm and runs (later she finds that somehow all her stuff has been turned purple. Even her regeneration chamber and she has no idea how the heck he did that it’s literally JUST hers)

Donnie calls out to one of the twins, “Hey Azan!” “I’m Rebi.” “Apologies” *later* “Hey Rebi!” “I’m Azan.” *Donnie squints* “… No you aren’t” and it goes on like that throughout the day until the twins get tired of the bit

Then there’s the fact that all of these kids have grown up in relative isolation for most of their lives (or in the case of the borg kids, they don’t remember enough of their childhood so they’re basically starting with a clean slate) and their only other reference point for how kids socialize and interact with each other is this small group of kids who all also have no idea what that looks like so they collectively develop a very weird/unique sense of humor and way of addressing each other that just….. sounds like a foreign language to all the adults on the ship. It does not help that Donnie keeps teaching them gen Z slang. Tom Paris is the only one on the crew who kinda (just barely) understands what the hell it is these kids are saying and the rest of the crew is just left scratching their heads.

I just think they could have a lot of fun being very silly together :)

[counselor-durango]

Species 8472 (3161 words) by voltairescat Chapters: 1/1 Fandom: Star Trek: Voyager Rating: Teen And Up Audiences Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply Characters: Seven of Nine, Kathryn Janeway, Tom Paris, Icheb (Star Trek), Mezoti (Star Trek), The Doctor (Star Trek), Chakotay (Star Trek), B'Elanna Torres, Tuvok (Star Trek), Azan (Star Trek), Rebi (Star Trek) Additional Tags: Episode: s02e15 Threshold (Star Trek: Voyager), Episode: s06e16 Collective (Star Trek: Voyager), Crack-ish, this has to have been done before right, the lizard babies got assimilated, happy threshold day, Threshold Day 2024 Summary:

On her mission to the Borg Cube in “Collective,” Seven encounters three non-humanoid juvenile drones. Species 8472, a small reptilian species discovered by their proximity to a transwarp signature and assimilated for their unique genetic structure. Their presence is hardly noteworthy. Tom Paris reacts differently. As does the Captain.

And she follows the girl away. The lizard-drone follows after a moment, waddling slowly and often looking back. With her Borg-enhanced hearing, Seven catches snippets of her crewmates’ conversation. “Those are definitely your kids.”

Happy Threshold Day!

[phantom-le6]

Episode Reviews - Star Trek: Voyager Season 7 (1 of 7)

Episode 1: Unimatrix Zero (Part II)

Plot (as given by me):

Following the events of part 1, Captain Janeway, B’Elanna Torres and Tuvok have been assimilated by the Borg.  This is actually part of the plan they’ve devised to release the nanovirus that will enable the occupants of Unimatrix Zero to retain their individuality in the waking world.  A neural suppressant has been given to all three to keep them out of the hive mind, but Tuvok’s begins to wear off.  Ultimately he succumbs and reveals their location to the Borg Queen, but Janeway and B’Elanna manage to release the nanovirus before this.  Meanwhile, Seven returns to Unimatrix Zero to monitor the situation despite her relationship with Axum being strained, while Tom Paris expresses his concerns about continuing to allow the mission to proceed to Chakotay.

The Borg Queen communicates with Janeway, ordering her to enter Unimatrix Zero and ask the drones there to surrender.  Janeway refuses, so the Queen begins destroying the borg vessels containing liberated drones.  The captain still won’t comply, pointing out that the queen would have to destroy the whole collective.  As such, the queen enters the unimatrix herself and comes up with a new plan; release a nanovirus inside Unimatrix Zero to kill the drones that go there.  Janeway sends a message to Voyager indicating that “Unimatrix Zero can no longer exist”, but Chakotay releases there is a hidden meaning in the instruction.

Rather than ask the Unimatrix Zero inhabitants to surrender, Voyager and a Borg vessel in the hands of liberated drones attack the vessel where Janeway, B’Elanna and Tuvok are held.  They send a signal that disrupts the interlink frequency for Unimatrix Zero.  With nowhere to release the modified nanovirus, the Borg Queen cannot kill the liberated drones.  Seven returns to the Unimatrix briefly to bid farewell to Axum, with whom she’d reconciled earlier in the episode.  The pair are unlikely to meet in reality as Axum’s ship is in fluidic space in a remote area of the Beta quadrant.  The away team are retrieved, and the Doctor is able to extract most of their Borg implants.

Review:

As is always the case when dealing with season-bridging two-part storylines, the start of the new season requires a resolution to the previous season’s cliffhanger.  Frankly, given that part 1 of this two-part story wasn’t firing on all cylinders in the way Trek storytelling should, that means you’re not getting the best start possible.  The same absence of plot exploration and over-abundance of action eating into character development airtime is just as much of an issue here as in part 1.  We get maybe slightly more time spent on the Annika-Axum relationship, but not by much, and it ends somewhat too predictably for Trek.  Having Axum appear in real life might have been a nice development against Trek’s episodic tendencies of this time period, but then Borg-on-Borg romance seems a bit too formulaic and cliché as well.  Really, this episode is more like set-up for better stories later on in this area.

The episode also fails to address key plot elements.  There’s no prior mention or subsequent exposition on the neural suppressant, and no one goes into why Tuvok’s wears off where Janeway’s and (presumably) B’Elanna’s does not.  My guess would be Tuvok would be more susceptible because of the telepathic nature of Vulcans reacting poorly with anything designed to block anything telepathic.  However, the episode never says anything about this, so we have a lack of exposition on a key plot point compounding the other issues.  I give this episode 6 out of 10 and look forward to better as we move on.

Episode 2: Imperfection

Plot (as given by me):

Voyager bids farewell to the Borg twins Rebi and Azan, having made contact with their original species, as well as the Borg girl Mezoti who Rebi and Azan’s people have chosen to adopt.  This leaves only Icheb on board out of the children Voyager liberated from the collective.  During a discussion on the departure of the other children, Icheb notes Seven is crying, which Seven attributes to a possible malfunction of her Borg implants.  The Doctor initially suggests it was a natural emotional response, but then finds Seven was right about a malfunction.  It also turns out Seven has been experiencing other symptoms but hasn’t voiced them, though she agrees to be more forthcoming in future.

As Icheb expresses an interest in applying to Star Fleet Academy and taking preliminary classes remotely, Seven’s condition worsens.  However, she doesn’t report these, and it isn’t until she collapses in the Mess Hall in front of Neelix that she goes to sick bay.  It turns out Seven’s cortical node is failing, and without it Seven will die.  Seven claims the technology is too complex to replicate or repair, meaning a transplant of a node from another drone is the only remaining option.  Taking the newly rebuilt Delta Flyer to a Borg debris field with Tuvok and Tom Paris, Janeway obtains a node from a dead drone, though a clash with an alien salvage crew almost prevents this.  Meanwhile, Icheb learns of Seven’s condition and begins his own research into a solution, while Neelix tries to help keep her spirits up.

Simulations on the holodeck reveal that the node from a dead drone won’t work, and while Janeway is willing to abduct a live drone to save Seven, the Doctor talks her down.  After Seven absconds from sick bay and has heart-to-heart conversations with B’Elanna and Janeway, Icheb hits upon a solution.  Due to his age and not being fully assimilated by the Borg, Icheb can survive without his own node if the Doctor compensates with genetic resequencing.  Reviewing Icheb’s research, the Doctor concludes the procedure has a high chance of success, but there are significant risks.  Unwilling to compromise Icheb’s health for her own, Seven refuses the idea, and the Doctor and Janeway are forced to honour her wishes.

However, Icheb refuses to be stopped; he summons the Doctor and the captain to the cargo bay, then rigs his Borg alcove to disconnect his cortical node.  When Seven still refuses, claiming Icheb is over-dependent on her and must look to others, Icheb retorts that Seven has constantly refused to depend on anyone, even though depending on each other is the core ethos of a Star Fleet crew.  Ultimately, Seven is brow-beaten into agreeing to the transplant.  Both patients ultimately recover, and when Seven cries again over Icheb’s recovery, it’s an emotional response rather than an implant malfunction.

Review:

This episode is one of the best of this series overall, maybe even the best.  The sick bay scene near the end where Icheb pleads with Seven to let the crew help her has always stuck with me as one of the best acting moments I’ve seen in the franchise.  However, the key reasons are that not only is the episode well-acted, but it delivers character and issue exploration in equal measure without really putting a foot wrong.  Well, except for a few details indicating this should be episode 4 rather than 2, but honestly, this episode is so good in other ways that I’m not even sweating the continuity errors in that point.

In terms of character development, that comes mainly from Seven and Icheb, as Seven’s apparent illness and how they each deal with it allows us to see aspects of who they are.  Both are selfless, but each of them shows that selflessness differently; Seven tries to avoid being a burden to the crew, albeit in part because she is also proud and maybe is perhaps over-trying to be self-sufficient, whereas Icheb takes a more traditionally self-sacrificing approach out of concern for his surrogate mother.  These aspects of the episode also give us insight, if not exploration, of the issues surrounding major illness, organ donation and how families react to the idea of a family member potentially facing the end of their life from a degenerative ailment.

Now the episode also gives us some issue exploration in terms of the autistic mind-set, something I’ve previously mentioned Seven of Nine embodying at times.  In addition to her social skill issues, Seven’s Borg-inspired quest for perfection is another trait she shares with autistic people.  Why autistic people seek perfection is not always easy to understand; I’m autistic myself and I’m not entirely sure I understand it.  A lot of it relates to trying to function in a world that has never been designed with us in mind, for which we need a lot of predictability.  I think that for an autistic person, the more perfect something is, the less likely it is to do something unpredictable like break down.  This can sometimes lead to us not speaking up when things are wrong, much like Seven in the early parts of this episode.  If we speak up, our routine is disrupted and our predictability goes out the window.

There’s also the matter of self-reliance.  For me, this is something I really want to achieve because if I ever manage to live independently, I don’t to be in a position where something happening to someone else suddenly undermines my ability to keep a roof over my head.  As such, I can understand Seven not wanting to rely on others, in-so-far-as people are fallible, so the more you depend on them, the more potential there is for something to go wrong.  However, Seven takes this to excess and, instead of encouraging self-reliance in Icheb, she suggests he simply depend on someone different.  This is why Icheb’s argument ultimately wins through; it’s Seven’s own advice that she’s refusing to live by.

Moreover, the others Seven should depend on include the Doctor, who actually has a skill set she needs and that no level of self-reliance can replace.  In essence, the true solution is to find balance, to be self-reliant where you can and ask for help when you know you need help.  The episode even has a moment of situational morality when we look at Janeway being prepared to sacrifice a random drone to save Seven and the Doctor talks her down, which is always interesting.  That’s not just down to the fact that questions of when is it right to put one life above another are inherently fascinating; the Doctor himself has faced ethical conundrums before and will again later in this season, so it’s interesting to see this come up knowing what’s on the horizon.

Anyway, to summarise, I give this episode the first top score in ages; 10 out of 10.

Episode 3: Drive

Plot (as given by me):

During a test flight of the newly rebuilt Delta Flyer, Tom Paris and Harry Kim end up competing in an impromptu race with another ship, which sustains damage.  Escorting the other ship back to Voyager to help repair it, Tom and Harry are informed by the ship’s pilot, Irina, that she’s due to compete with the ship in a major race; the Antarian Trans-Stellar Rally.  Apparently, the region of space Voyager is passing through has been in a state of war for many years, and the rally has been formed in celebration of the recent peace that has come to the region.  Given the race’s symbolic importance and the opportunity for some R&R for the crew, Janeway agrees to their participation.

Unfortunately, in his excitement, Tom has forgotten about a romantic weekend he was supposed to have with B’Elanna, which she has been planning for and making trades all over the ship to enable.  While she acts understanding, B’Elanna is disappointed, and when she confides in Neelix, it appears she is ready to end the relationship as Tom is not showing any serious interest in the relationship from her perspective.  As the ship engages more and more in the race proceedings, a suggestion of Seven’s gives B’Elanna renewed hope.  Seven finds that engaging in Tom’s interests helps them work better together as shipmates, so B’Elanna takes Harry’s place aboard the Delta Flyer to be closer to Tom.

However, the race isn’t all smooth sailing; beyond the general competition, Irina’s ship suffers sabotage from groups opposed to the race, while Tom and B’Elanna struggle to work together at times.  When the act of sabotage takes out Irina’s team-mate, Harry volunteers to replace him.  This results in the discovery that Irina is the saboteur, as she is part of a race or group who aren’t comfortable co-existing with other races.  Part-way through the final leg, Tom ends up stopping the Delta Flyer to finally confront the issues he and B’Elanna are having.  It turns out Tom has a serious interest in their relationship, but didn’t want to progress as he thought B’Elanna was averse to more serious romantic interaction.

The discussion leads to the suggestion of a proposal, which is interrupted when Harry alerts Tom and B’Elanna that Irina also rigged the fuel converter she leant them so the Flyer would conform to the race guidelines.  Tom and B’Elanna fly away from the race course and manage to eject the warp core before it breaches, saving everyone, and Tom pops the question during and after the incident.  A short time later, Tom and B’Elanna celebrate their newly-wed status aboard the Delta Flyer, which is decorated accordingly with a “just married” sign on the aft hull and cargo containers dragging behind.

Review:

With this episode, we’re getting into character exploration territory with Tom and B’Elanna, but also some issue exploration in terms of relationships and communicating with your partner.  While the episode does well show-casing a dramatic example of how couples can interact, it’s very much also a case study in how they shouldn’t interact.  Now I’m not just saying this because my autism inclines me to see all neurotypical social interaction as pointlessly over-complicated and in serious need of simplifying.  Through various discussions in social media groups, I’ve learned about more modern approaches to relationships and communication that work better across the board.

In this instance, we have a couple who clearly love each other as many, many prior episodes have demonstrated.  However, they are also a highly combative couple at times, in large part because they seem to struggle to communicate well with each other.  Case-in-point, Tom gets swept up in the excitement of a chance to fly in a big space race and forgets a major relationship event coming up with B’Elanna.  Communication red flag number 1 is that Tom already knows this is coming up, but as is subsequently revealed, a lot of effort has been put in by B’Elanna to secure the holodeck for the whole weekend that Tom isn’t aware of.  If B’Elanna had perhaps included Tom more in her plans for the two of them, he might have been more likely to remember it, and maybe could have avoided a clash of plans.

Communication red flag number 2 is the reason why B’Elanna wasn’t so open about her effort; Tom’s lack of any expression that he wants to get more serious in their relationship.  It might make dramatic sense to tease this out until the fifth act and then propose on the fly, but from a relationship point-of-view, this is a big mistake.  Yes, fair enough, B’Elanna does have a tough exterior at times and I can understand Tom wanting to avoid accidentally triggering an argument, but sometimes relationships require you to run risks to function.  Moreover, women often expect men to be the leaders in relationships, so stepping up and taking the lead by initiating a conversation can work wonders.  It’s what ultimately works in this episode, but it shouldn’t be ultimately in real life.  As soon as you feel a conversation is needed, figure out what you want to say and have one, though be sure you’re both nice and calm to start off with if you can.

Now Seven’s idea of sharing your partner’s interest certainly has merit, and I dare say it was also key to the happily ever after, but here’s communication red flag 3.  Tom and B’Elanna have been romantically involved for three seasons of the show by now, and there was a previous episode that ended with Tom sharing a holodeck program he’d previously kept to himself, namely restoring a vintage muscle car.  We’ve also seen B’Elanna replicate a TV set for Tom, so there’s evidence of chances offered and taken for her to share Tom’s interests.  This episode’s plot suggests, however, that this is a new idea, so why is this?  Does B’Elanna only share Tom’s interests momentarily without realising it, does Tom never reciprocate?  In fact, the idea that B’Elanna has to be the one to bridge the divide when Tom has fouled up is a further communication red flag, bringing us to 4.  I think Tom should have committed to doing a few things B’Elanna wanted to make up for his behaviour.

Lastly, there’s the “hints” B’Elanna drops aboard the Delta Flyer, which for me is communication red flag number 5.  This is a major peeve of mine in relationships; one person, most likely but not always the woman, has an issue but won’t tell you directly, or they want to “test” you.  As such, they will use certain words or actions to suggest something may be wrong, but will never be overt or explicit on the matter.  Instead, you’re expected to deduce something is wrong, what that something is and take appropriate actions.  Now that’s difficult for anyone, but luckily for this episode, Tom is written just smart enough to deal with it.  There will be some good partners who lack the ability to parse such riddles, especially autistics and other people of a neurodiverse nature.

This is why this part of the episode, and of relationships in general, really annoys me, because if you had me or any other neurodiverse person in Tom Paris’ shoes, we would fail.  Not because we couldn’t make amends, but because we weren’t ever told we had to.  Autistics like me, and most likely people of other neurodiverse mind-sets, struggle with implicit communication.  Ask someone like me to “read between the lines”, we’ll probably take you literally and tell you there’s nothing there, or we’ll get a piece of lined paper with something written on it and read the writing because it’s between one line and another.  Don’t do hint, don’t be cryptic, tell us what’s up straight out.  Say what you mean and mean what you say; that’s the only way we understand things with absolute certainty, and if autistic people are ever to be treated as equals, this is how all communication should be, especially in romantic relationships.

Overall, I find this episode to be somewhat disappointing, because it puts dramatic contrivance ahead of consistent progression of the Tom-B’Elanna relationship to get a story.  However, I like the race aspect, as that’s not something we see much of in Trek.  Nonetheless, I’m only dolling out 5 out of 10 here.

Episode 4: Repression

Plot (as adapted from Wikipedia):

At the opening of the episode, a Bajoran is shown recording a message for Voyager’s Maquis crew members.

Aboard Voyager, former Maquis member Ensign Tabor is found comatose. The Doctor finds evidence Tabor was attacked; Captain Janeway assigns Tuvok to investigate.

Soon there are five comatose crewmen in Sickbay, with the same injuries, all former Maquis. Tuvok notes that the assailant must have access to security protocols to avoid detection. Tuvok, Tom Paris and Kim capture a negative image of Tabor's assailant.

While investigating, Chakotay is suddenly attacked and rendered unconscious by Tuvok. Tuvok has no memory of this and continues his investigation. All the victims recover but have no memory of being attacked. Tuvok meditates and has flashbacks of attacking the former Maquis members, and has a vision of the Bajoran. Tuvok realizes the negative image matches his own description and asks to be confined to the brig.

Janeway discovers a message to Tuvok from the Bajoran, a former Maquis named Teero Anaydis who experimented with mind control; his message triggered Tuvok to 'attack' other Maquis members with mind-melds. Tuvok sends a message to his 'victims,' who then take control of Voyager. However, Tuvok manages to regain control of his mind, and Tuvok performs more mind-melds to restore his victims and retake the ship. The recovered crew attend a movie on the holodeck.

Review:

This episode is the very definition of filler.  No issue exploration, no character development, bad misapplication of whodunnit and mind control story-telling as well as the ship’s long-resolved Star Fleet-Maquis divide.  Honestly, just once, I’d like to see fiction use concepts like hypnosis and brainwashing from a positive, consenting perspective instead of constantly lumping it all together under villain fodder.  The constant alien “trigger phrase” doesn’t help matters either.  Going way down to a 2 out of 10 on this one.

[storiescrafted-a]

007  |  muses ; star trek: voyager to zoey’s extraordinary playlist.

* in character ┊ b’elanna torres. * in character ┊ kathryn janeway. * in character ┊ mezoti. * in character ┊ tom paris. * in character ┊ freya moss. * in character ┊ jack pearson. * in character ┊ kevin pearson. * in character ┊ rebecca pearson. * in character ┊ lucy preston. * in character ┊ jenna hunterson. * in character ┊ abbey bartlet. * in character ┊ cj cregg. * in character ┊ ellie bartlet. * in character ┊ jed bartlet. * in character ┊ toby ziegler. * in character ┊ zoey bartlet. * in character ┊ will chase. * in character ┊ joan bennett. * in character ┊ max richman.

[galaxyraised]

MUSES ADDED,  CARRD + INTEREST TRACKER UPDATED   ⇾  

VOYAGER.

freya moss,   original character,  fc: emily blunt. mezoti,   fc: marley mcclean. miral paris,   fc: probably faceless. naomi wildman,   fc: scarlett pomers. tuvok,   fc: tim russ.

↳     samantha wildman,   fc added: emily vancamp.

PICARD.

kore soong,   fc: isa briones.

[startrekladies]

Star Trek Ladies best female character poll: results! #40 - 2 votes

- Alynna Nechayev (TNG/DS9)

- B’Etor (TNG/DS9/Generations)

- Grilka (DS9)

- Mezoti (VOY)

- Oh (PIC)

[best-star-trek-character]

Official VOY Character Bracket

And here’s the final bracket! Round One will go live tomorrow, 4/17 at 10 am EST!

Full List:

Round One:

Left Side:

Seven of Nine vs. Lon Suder: poll here

Tom Paris vs. Annorax: poll here

Neelix vs. Mezoti, Azan & Rebi: poll here

Braxton vs. Tuvok: poll here

Q Junior vs. Chakotay: poll here

Quinn (Q) vs. Kes: poll here

Naomi Wildman vs. Dexa & Brax: poll here

Vorik vs. Tuvix: poll here

Right Side:

Barclay vs. Icheb: poll here

T’Pel vs. B’Elanna Torres: poll here

The EMH vs. Doctor Chaotica: poll here

Samantha Wildman vs. The Lizard Babies: poll here

Captain Kathryn Janeway vs. Dr. Crell Moset: poll here

Seska vs. Lewis Zimmerman: poll here

Harry Kim vs. Kashyk: poll here

The Borg Queen vs. Q: poll here

Round Two:

Left Side:

Seven of Nine vs. Tom Paris: poll here

Neelix vs. Tuvok: poll here

Chakotay vs. Kes: poll here

Naomi Wildman vs. Vorik: poll here

Right Side:

Barclay vs. B’Elanna Torres: poll here

The EMH vs. The Lizard Babies: poll here

Captain Kathryn Janeway vs. Seska: poll here

Harry Kim vs. Q: poll here

Quarter-Finals:

Left Side:

Seven of Nine vs. Tuvok: poll here

Chakotay vs. Naomi Wildman: poll here

Right Side:

B’Elanna Torres vs. The EMH: poll here

Captain Kathryn Janeway vs. Harry Kim: poll here

Semi-Finals:

Seven of Nine vs. Naomi Wildman: poll here

B’Elanna Torres vs. Captain Kathryn Janeway: poll here

Finals:

Seven of Nine vs. Captain Kathryn Janeway: poll here

[sshbpodcast]

Won’t someone think of the children?! A Rok-Tahk Appreciation Post

By Ames

Last week, we covered just why your hosts here at A Star to Steer Her By largely dislike the children characters in classic Star Trek (tl;dr: it’s mostly because they’re written as props instead of people, or so I make my claim). There is one show in the franchise, however, that’s a huge outlier in how its children characters are written, acted, and treated overall as individuals who grow and develop. Obviously, it’s Star Trek: Prodigy. Since basically all of the main characters are children, the show would have failed if it couldn’t make them compelling and relatable to both a young audience and the preestablished fanbase. 

And against the odds, it succeeded like whoa. There’s a reason why the fanbase is in such an uproar right now about Paramount’s avaricious cancellation of the Emmy Award–winning animated underdog (go sign the petition if you haven’t yet!), and that’s that the show is just so surprisingly good. We’re the last group of people who would laud a kid’s show so much, and we absolutely adore it.

Read on below for what Prodigy gets so right when establishing its children characters. Rok-Tahk is the prime example here because a) she’s voiced by Rylee Alazraqui, a legit child voice actress, who NAILS IT, b) she ticks all the boxes for what makes a good child character, and c) she’s just the best. Period. But let me explain anyway…

[images © CBS/Paramount… I guess? For now? Yikes.]

Rok is more than you expect

I think all the kids who made our favorites list in last week’s blogpost have one thing in common: they had some kind of hidden depth to explore. A character having some kind of twist or secret or hidden identity is just a staple of science fiction. We see it in Barash and Taya, who turn out not to be the children they appear to be. We see it in Mezoti, whose dual nature as both a young innocent girl and a Borg drone with the collective experiences of a whole hivemind makes her endlessly fascinating. 

So when this massive rock creature whom we start off being intimidated by turns out to be the sweetest little girl, we’re immediately interested because it subverts our expectations. We’re forced to remind ourselves not to judge someone by how they look on the outside, something Star Trek has been doing since its very conception. And then when we learn even more about her and realize that her jailors put a child in a prison camp, we can’t help but root for her.

Rok is allowed to just be a kid

Sure, Rok is still smarter than your average kid, but she’s smart without being obnoxious like other naturally brainy kid characters I could name. *cough cough Wesley Crusher* As the obvious example, Wes is exhausting as a character because he’s a boy genius who is acutely aware of it and his supernatural smarts force him into situations another kid wouldn’t be in. He isn’t allowed to be a kid because he is first and foremost a child prodigy. 

Rok, on the other hand, is first and foremost a child in the show Prodigy! Her excitement about new encounters is because most encounters to her are just that: new! She plays “Delta Heart Magical Veterinarian” in the holodeck, she loves ice cream, she plays with the cute little creatures on “Dream Catcher” planet, she naturally cares for Murf as though he were her puppy. Rok’s youth informs how she reacts to circumstances in the show and she acts accordingly in ways that aren’t forced, better suited for other characters, or just downright unnecessary. And seeing the universe through the eyes of someone with such a clean slate allows the audience to make their own judgements about the Protostar crew’s circumstances episode by episode.

Rok is a freakin’ alien monster

Prodigy also introduces us to the Brikar, a new alien race of rock monsters. And everyone accepts her without a single word! Now that’s the Star Trek way! From the moment we meet Rok-Tahk, she’s not physically cutified or even feminized, which is frankly refreshing. She’s less humanoid than most creatures we meet, outside of say, the Horta or Murf. It’s also a great use of the CGI-animated medium because live-action shows can’t pull stuff like this off. 

I’m honestly impressed to see any female character, let alone a little girl, portrayed in a way that isn’t that cookie-cutter kind of attractive that we see everywhere. Rok is BIG. Rok is HARD. She’s not feminine or pretty or soft. Her cuteness comes from how she acts, talks, and treats people. And the crew of the Protostar and the Starfleet officers we meet later treat her like they treat everyone else: like a person. The people who run the slave show in “Preludes” pin her as a monster because they don’t/can’t know her. But our other main characters do get to know her and barely even bring up her size! And when they do, Rok subverts it by proclaiming that she doesn't want to be the muscle on the ship, and they go with it. I love that.

Rok has character flaws

Like any person, especially a well-written character in a television program, Rok isn’t perfect. Perfect people make for obscenely boring television (unless it’s a satire or something), and perfect children are just plain not believable and take you out of the story. But Prodigy writers went a few extra steps in developing someone like Rok to have credible flaws for her situation that also informs how she acts, changes, and grows. Rok overthinks and doubts herself constantly because she has anxiety. She’s suffered through traumas, like some of the orphaned boys mentioned in last week’s blog have, and that gives her something to overcome over the course of the season and [hopefully] beyond. 

And, as mentioned above, she’s also really young! She doesn’t have the experience and knowledge yet to save the day every week. She knows she has limitations and when she remembers this, she panics, freezes, and languishes in self doubt. I’m thinking specifically about the turmoil she goes through in the supremely excellent “Time Amok,” in which she is forced to be alone (already terrifying) and also with so much pressure put on her (downright immobilizing!). Audiences can relate to anxiety and stress like this. It doesn’t matter that she’s a kid: we all get what she’s going through and connect with her immediately.

Rok grows throughout the season

You’d think it would be easy to create story arcs that help child characters grow since they’re going to grow up just by virtue of natural development anyway, but it’s harder than you think. Both Jake Sisko and Wesley Crusher get things to do as they get older that build on the foundations for their characters, but they also had several seasons to work with. Rok, in just one season, has her entire world opened up for her because of the nature of the story, and she runs with it!

This is a science fiction show, so of course the characters are going to love science, and watching Rok learn, try new things, occasionally fail, and try again is an excellent entry point into STEM. Just like how a lot of today’s doctors credit watching Dr. McCoy and today’s engineers got their start because they wanted to be like Scotty, and just like how many women and people of color joined the space program specifically because of Nichelle Nichols, I really hope that kids today watching Rok-Tahk and crew are captivated by science in that same way. I would be.

We love you, Rok! We love the other crew members of the Protostar too! We love Star Trek: Prodigy! Check out the other character appreciation posts for Dal R’El, Gwyndala, Jankom Pog, and Zero while you’re here. I know I can speak for not only the other hosts here at A Star to Steer Hey By but for myriad other fans when I seriously hope someone picks up this wonder of a show. We’re really looking forward to seeing more from these amazing child characters, and we’re seriously wishing we get that opportunity. #SaveStarTrekProdigy

[riteaidofpassage]

Chapters: 17/? Fandom: Star Trek: Voyager Rating: Mature Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings Relationships: Seven of Nine/B'Elanna Torres Characters: Seven of Nine, B'Elanna Torres, Tom Paris, Harry Kim, Kathryn Janeway, Joe Carey, Icheb, Mezoti (Star Trek), Tuvok (Star Trek) Additional Tags: Romance, some fluff and humor, Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Tom and Seven brotp, Carey and Seven brotp, no bashing in this fic Summary:

Tensions between B'Elanna and Seven shift under changing pressures. Not one to miss out on a chance to cause drama, Janeway emerges from her ready room and Tom, ever the joker, comes along for hijinks. Expect varying levels of fluff, smut, and debauchery between the two women, but hopefully stay for the friendfluff.

Note: Am currently reworking some parts to create in-canon scenes.

[wildishmazz]

Who's that body?

I've seen a few people guess Chakotay, and that could be his uniform, but if it's a named character we've previously met I reckon it's Icheb.

Most superficially, he's too skinny to be Chakotay. Seven's arms wouldn't reach so far around his shoulders. His hair doesn't quite look right either, and though his face is mostly obscured, enough of his forehead is visible beyond his hairline that I think his tattoo would be visible.

Considering the known and popularly speculated elements of the franchise at the focus of this series, Seven sobbing over a dead Chakotay would be too irrelevant to include in the trailer.

This clip immediately follows a voiceover of Picard saying "The past is written", and shows her for the only time in any of the trailers so far with her hair looking one of the ways it did on Voyager. The implication would seem to be that it's a flashback. The next time we hear from her, she says in voiceover that she helps people who have no-one else to help them, and the next we see her, she's Ripleying her way through what looks like the Borg-to-Android processing facility with guns blazing. The further implication would seem to be that the two incidents are both subsequent and consequent. She's become a badass vigilante liberator because of the dead body from the past.

If it was Chakotay, why would his death spur her to fight for the ex-Borg?

More broadly, we are not yet so gender equal as a society that a woman being spurred to action by the death of a lover is viewed the same way, and will have the same impact, as a man being spurred to action by the death of a lover. It will still be more impactful and resonant to a massive chunk of the audience for a woman to be spurred to action by the death of a child.

It's easier to refer to maternal instinct than try to convince everybody that she felt as protective of her man as the stereotypical man does of his woman.

Seven did not have children, biologically. But she did pretty much adopt the four Borg children Voyager found that one time, including a teenaged boy, Icheb. He remained on Voyager when the other three were rehomed on the planet one of them(Mezoti) had originally come from. He came to earth.

They seem to remember that he existed, as evidenced by the shot of her shooting up the android factory, in which her cortical node(on the end of her eyebrow implant) is particularly prominent. That's a component Icheb donated to her, to save her life, risking his own in the process(though it turned out he didn't really need it because he hadn't been fully assimilated yet when they found him). She very nearly didn't let him do it.

Icheb looked almost completely deassimilated, the last time we saw him. From behind he looked completely humanoid. He looked like the body she's cradling in that clip. And if he, a young man she felt responsible for and protective of, had been murdered for his Borg tech like all the other drones seem to be being, that would work to put her on the warpath to save others like him.

Now the thorny thing is that Manu Intiraymi, who played Icheb, has turned out to be a really nasty piece of work in real life. I don't like the thought of him being included in the show, or any Star Trek iteration.

However. If Icheb's only appearance is in a flashback where he's a teenager, Intiraymi is too old to play him. And if he's dead, he can't come back for any further appearances. He's been fridged. So... yay?

Of course, it's entirely possible that they just won't mention the body's name at all.

[ignisgalaxia]

Voyager Sketch Month

So I’ve decided to do something really stupid because I apparently don’t hate myself enough already. For the entire month of October, I will be attempting to draw a Voyager-themed picture every day (what is wrong with me?). However, this isn’t just about filling up my blog with my own posts for once (or getting the extra drawing practice). It’s about showcasing my love for Voyager in the best medium I can.

As you’ll see from the list, the first half of the month will be devoted to character portraits (excluding the first two days), while the last half of the month will be about favorites (excluding the last three days which will be just for drawing fun).

~

Day 1 - U.S.S. Voyager

Day 2 - Delta Flyer

Day 3 - Kathryn Janeway

Day 4 - Chakotay

Day 5 - Tuvok

Day 6 - B’Elanna Torres

Day 7 - Tom Paris

Day 8 - Harry Kim

Day 9 - The Doctor

Day 10 - Seven of Nine

Day 11 - Neelix

Day 12 - Kes

Day 13 - Naomi Wildman

Day 14 - Icheb

Day 15 - Borg Children (Mezoti, Azan & Rebi)

Day 16 - Mike Ayala

Day 17 - Borg Queen

Day 18 - Favorite Female Character

Day 19 - Favorite Male Character

Day 20 - Favorite Minor Character

Day 21 - Favorite One-Time Character

Day 22 - Favorite OTP

Day 23 - Favorite BroTP

Day 24 - A Pair I Didn’t Know I Needed

Day 25 - Favorite Villain

Day 26 - Favorite Species

Day 27 - Favorite Episode

Day 28 - An Episode I Wanted to See

Day 29 - Alternate Universe

Day 30 - Chibi Style

Day 31 - TOS Era

~

I made this list as free-reigning as possible so others could do it. However, if I’m the only one who participates, then I might make this a yearly tradition for my blog (dear god why). I highly encourage other artists to try the challenge. Spread this post to all corners of the Voyager fandom! We must show our love for this wonderful little show!

Good luck to me and all other artists! :)

(I’m asking for death at this point)

[warp6]

Journey to the Center of the Moon

Gen | 11,781 words | No Archive Warnings Apply | Read on AO3

An away mission gone wrong lands Janeway, Chakotay, Tom and Harry in a vast cavern at the heart of an alien moon. With only forty-eight hours before magma heats the chamber to deadly temperatures, the away team will have to muster all their daring and ingenuity as they confront the obstacles to their escape--along with some surprising truths about each other.

Characters: Kathryn Janeway, Chakotay, Harry Kim, Tom Paris, Mezoti (minor appearance) Relationships: Kathryn Janeway & Harry Kim, Chakotay & Tom Paris

Tags: Journey to the Center of the Earth AU, (based not on the Jules Verne novel‚ but on the 2008 movie based on the Jules Verne novel feat. Brendan Fraser and dinosaurs), (disclaimer: Brendan Fraser does not appear in this fic), (dinosaurs do), Away Mission, Action/Adventure, Humor, Danger, Minor Injuries, Ridiculous science, Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder - PTSD, Hurt/Comfort, Friendship, Boats and Ships, Piranhas, Magma, Dinosaurs

This is my thank you gift for @weary-hearted-queen...thanks so much for the study help & editing. Having your support, academic and otherwise, meant a lot to me as I wrapped up my semester ♥

[startrekroleplay]

Directory Updated - February 4, 2018

View the full directory here. To be added to the directory, reblog this post.

This directory is large and likely to contain errors. Please notify me of any mistakes, either in this update post or in the directory itself, and I will do my best to correct them.

*denotes a multimuse blog

ADDITIONS - CANON MUSES

Original Series:

Spock - @boldlylogical, @tuppencetrinkets*

Original Series & Reboot:

Spock - @boldlyprospering

Reboot:

James Kirk - @spaceworn

Spock - @logicworn

Nyota Uhura - @uhcra

Joanna McCoy - @jojomccoy

George Kirk - @kirkworn*

Winona Kirk - @kirkworn*

Sam Kirk - @kirkworn*

Next Generation:

Jean-Luc Picard - @ofstarrynights*

Will Riker - @firstofficerslog, @ofstarrynights*

Beverly Crusher - @ofstarrynights*

Data - @secondofficerslog

Geordi La Forge - @visorworn

Deanna Troi - @ofstarrynights*

Tasha Yar - @ofstarrynights*

Deep Space Nine:

Kira Nerys - @ofstarrynights*

Jadzia Dax - @ofstarrynights*, @tuppencetrinkets*

Next Generation & Deep Space Nine:

Worf - @ofstarrynights*

Voyager:

Kathryn Janeway - @ofstarrynights*

B’Elanna Torres - @ofstarrynights*

Tuvok - @ofstarrynights*

Tom Paris - @ofstarrynights*

Harry Kim - @ofstarrynights*

The Doctor - @ofstarrynights*

Naomi Wildman - @ofstarrynights*

Icheb - @ofstarrynights*

Mezoti - @ofstarrynights*

Samantha Wildman - @ofstarrynights*

Enterprise:

Charles “Trip” Tucker - @treaclyoptimist

Discovery:

Michael Burnham - @ofstarrynights*

Gabriel Lorca - @ofstarrynights*

Paul Stamets - @ofstarrynights*

Katrina Cornwell - @ofstarrynights*

ADDITIONS - ORIGINAL CHARACTERS

Beziar Duraize Tye - @bastardswxrd*

Tanaka Matheson - @therunawcy

CHANGES

first-officer-saru is now @captainxsaru

@honoredsouls‘s Jonathan Archer is now at @exploriism

soongtypecosplay is now @natimalang

REMOVALS

If this is a mistake, message me to be re-added.

@captaingabelorca - 3 months of inactivity

cosmoswandered - blog no longer exists

@emergency-medical-hologram - 3 months of inactivity

flcraliisms - blog is private

@inorganicc - 3 months of inactivity

@kirkarus - 3 months of inactivity

@redshrt - 3 months of inactivity

thesexarexthexvoyagers - blog no longer exists

@twoandroidbrothers - 3 months of inactivity

[cassiopeiasara]

Fanfiction Writer Appreciation Day

Hi everyone! Here is my annual post inspired by this. I know the point is to go comment on stories but I also love to share some favorites so maybe the writers get some new readers and comments from more than one person. you can catch up on older recs here: 2015 and here: 2016 There’s a new fandom in this one but also familiar faces (or pennames) because my faves are always awesomely creating new content. Under a cut bc there’s A LOT

Battlestar Galactica-Adama/Roslin:

A Quiet Place to Read by @lolcat76 This was written for me literally but also she delivered on so much I love about reading these two in any universe. It’s a No Attacks Library AU and I just promise you’ll adore it. 

so much life by @okaynextcrisis This is a collection of minifics and I always squeal when there’s a new one bc I just love every single one of these universes and situations. They’re so varied and interesting.

Grace and Frankie-Grace/Frankie: I’m so glad there’s been an influx of fic for this pairing because I’ve been jonesing since season 2. 

Let Your Arms Become Propellors by @chainofclovers This is a great interlude between season two and three and has Grace’s voice so exact, it’s incredible. It could so very easily fit in canon and features one of the best kisses I’ve ever read. 

I Think I Just Blacked Out by @telanu The voices, the dynamic and highly featuring my fave Brianna Hanson. This fic is funny sweet and so in character, I wish it was an actual episode. 

The Closer: Brenda/Sharon: 

Your Heart Like A Dam When It Breaks by @missparker I’m not usually one for a Teacher/Student dynamic but thankfully not only are both people adults in this situation but it’s also got intrigue with Brenda being recruited by the CIA and baby Rusty. It’s a great 90s AU with a good look at Brenda and Sharon during a time in their life we’ve only had hints at in canon. 

there’s a road that’s long and winding, it hollers home also by @missparker Besides the way my heart melts at the song referenced in the title, I love the way this one builds and the significant role Julio plays.  

Star Trek: Voyager: B’Elanna/Seven: 

Queen of Hearts by @dinovia-grant I’ll be honest, half of the reason I bothered with Voyager at all was to read DiNovia’s fic in this pairing. She did not in any way disappoint. The best thing about this fic is that it holds such a great understanding of Seven and her isolation as well as B’Elanna and her insecurities. This story is such a great exploration of family, friendship and love. Also my love Mezoti rips a door off its hinges and it;s glorious. 

She Who Hesitates is Lost by lisa countryman. This fic is epic and contains a story that’s full of interesting plot turns and a slow burn and sustained romance that’s satisfying throughout the entire story. Also the OCs in here are lovely and I love them so much. 

Of Christmas Alone by Cirroco DeSade I’m always a sucker for Christmas fic but this one is quite special. It’s post series end and features B’Elanna going to spend Christmas with Seven and a sort of gentle, quiet coming together that I really enjoy. 

Swan Queen:

as imperfect as love is, we could coexist by wordsasweapons. Not only does this feature tons of domescity which I always love but it’s also every bit of the season 6 we deserved. 

grape-dark clouds and brittle frost by @coalitiongirl An imaginative and well constructed season 1 AU. 

Keep Me Without Chains by swansaloft A lovely story in which Emma and Regina end up struck together with magical handcuffs and lovely tropes like sharing a bed and quality family time abound. 

once upon a time, there was by strangesmallbard. The style of this story is hella interesting and I found it magical and lyrical in such a gorgeous way.

Safe by @sgtmac7 This is a post “The Miller’s Daughter” fic. I don’t know why it took me so long to read this one but I adore the slow respect Emma and Regina come to and the wonderful journey Regina and Henry take as they rebuild their relationship.  

Toltzmann:

and possibly I like the thrill by @thepratandtheidiot This story isn’t done yet but it’s worth it to invest your heart and time into a glorious epic with lovely characterizations and a slow burn that truly delivers on the SLOOOW burn. 

The Bold Type Kat/Adena:

Brazen by bazinga01 A great fic written from Adena’s POV that’s layered and beautiful, fits canon in a breathtaking way. 

I also found this old rizzles AU fic that I fell in love with years ago where Maura and Jane meet while Maura owns a bakery in France and Jane meets her on vacation. It’s sweet and lovely and you should read it. It’s Sugar and Spice by molly2012.