#lindsaybob

[mylittleredgirl]

For the ‘don’t’ prompt thing:

Doggett/Reyes and “You don’t care what they think.”

In my head, John is the one saying it to Monica, but I’m not married to that idea.

Thank you for the prompt!!

--

One of the things Monica has always appreciated about John Doggett is that she never has to guess his mood.

The emotional weather patterns of her family of origin can be generously described as tempestuous—ultimately loving, usually kind, but varied, rapidly shifting, and loud. Monica herself was always the even-keeled one, happily going about her life amid the rising and falling dramas of the people around her (and las telenovelas on TV), but growing up in a house without a single emotional filter means that she is most comfortable when the people around her say what they mean.

She makes exceptions for friends she cares about, of course, but it’s always like reading a foreign language. Nine times out of ten she gets it right when she guesses if Dana is actually fine or if she’s hanging on by the very last thread of her rope, but John’s complete inability to disguise his feelings is always a relief.

She’s also usually good at guessing why he’s in a mood, but as he tears down US 70 like the devil himself is chasing them across Pennsylvania, she’s coming up empty. It’s a nice spring day, there’s next to no traffic, and the coffee-and-muffin situation at the Pittsburgh field office was surprisingly good. The case they’re on is pretty grisly, as they often are when the X-Files office and violent crimes get summoned at the same time, but John has seen far worse.

And while he never likes her more metaphysical theories, it’s rare that one of them will set him off like this unless the case itself is somehow personal.

“We should stop by the game lands again,” she says, continuing the essentially one-way conversation she has been holding for the past half-hour. “I want to take a wider perimeter around the second crime scene to see if there are more burned-out trees with those markings.”

John grunts something that sounds affirmative.

“I know it’s not your first instinct to believe in forces like this, but you have to admit it’s an unusual pattern of—”

“It’s fine. I said we’re stopping.”

Well, given that those are the first six words he has strung together since leaving the city limits: “Not out loud, you didn’t.”

She says it teasingly, but she gets no reaction, positive or otherwise.

After another minute of watching him silently glare down the asphalt ahead of them, Monica goes for the direct route, “Well if it’s not about fire spirits, will you tell me why you’re so angry all of a sudden?”

“I’m not—” He cuts himself off, then looks at her like she’s being irrational.

She’s pretty immune to that look, so she just stares back, eyebrows up, waiting.

He says, “I don’t get that about you. Why aren’t you angry?”

The question seems to come out of the blue. It’s only ten-thirty a.m. and they spent the morning in the same task force stand-up, with no disturbing developments in the case—beyond the ones that were already there. She can’t think of what information he could have that she doesn’t. “Should I be?”

He shakes his head. He eases up on the gas, letting their rented Camry slow from reckless to just garden-variety illegal. “You really don’t care what anyone thinks of you, do you?”

Ohhhh. That.

It’s kind of sweet to learn that he was bothered by the collective snickering of the violent crimes agents when she laid out the reasoning for her elemental-spirit theory—and no, she doesn’t care what they think, because at the end of the day she will be right or she will be wrong, and only one agent in that room is coming home with her.

So to speak.

She offers, “I care what you think.”

For some reason that makes John’s frown deepen as he turns on the blinker and exits the interstate. She pulls out the map in case he asks for copilot guidance to the hunting reserve, but he seems to remember where he’s going without her directions.

A mile down the road, he says, “You know… I mean, you do know that when I tell you one of your theories is…” He trails off.

“… nuts?” she supplies the word the ASAC used this morning.

He grumbles in response, then says, “I don’t ever think you’re nuts.”

Oh, John. “Yes, you do.”

He glares at her, but most of his anger has burned off. “I’m trying to make a point here, okay?”

“Sorry.” She politely folds her hands on top of the map, and can’t help but grin. “Make your point.”

“I don’t always understand how you get from point A to point B, but you get there. The whole… fire spirits, and whatever, it’s a lot to take in, but I don’t like when they brush you off.”

It is sweet, and her heart squeezes a little in her chest, accompanied by that familiar feeling of gratitude that she not only gets to go on such an exciting journey with this X-Files assignment, but that she gets to do it with him.

Monica really doesn’t care what a random Pittsburgh ASAC thinks about her, as long as he lets her do her job, but still, “It’s good to know you’re on my side.”

“Always.” This time when John looks over at the passenger seat, his frown has been replaced with a warm little smile, the one that he has been giving her a lot more lately, the one that makes her feel like they’re heading toward something important. “We’re partners, right?”

They have been for almost a year. At a certain point, her heart should probably stop skipping when he says it out loud. “Even when you think I’m nuts?”

He rolls his eyes and turns back to the road, but he’s still smiling, and she’s willing to take that as his final answer.

[curator-on-ao3]

May I greedily request another dialogue prompt ficlet, please?

Janeway/Paris (or Janeway&Paris would also be good; it doesn’t have to be romantic) - “What are you doing out here by yourself?”

Not greedy at all — request away, @lindsaybob! 💕 These are fun. 🥰

I’m going to go AU on this one for a post-Endgame established relationship. Fingers crossed you like it, and please keep the prompts coming, y’all.

———

In This Place of Dreams, We Find Ourselves

McKinley Station is as bustling as ever, computer chirps overlapping low-toned conversations, clipped orders, and seemingly far away reverberations of metallic clangs.

But it was silence that brought Tom out from their temporary quarters, doors parting so he could squint in the bright light of night shift, try to saunter as if he doesn’t have a care in the world, as if the grey-shouldered uniform he was issued doesn’t somehow feel like a betrayal of the red shoulders he wore for those seven years out there.

Kathryn had said she was going to take a walk. And Tom is used to that, used to her insomnia and her fears that would grow too big for their quarters on Voyager and her need to go away and come back because coming back to something — to someone — would remind her that it’s possible to come home again.

But now they are home, technically, and she’s doing it again.

Maybe she’ll always be like this. Maybe those seven years have changed her, etched a new personality over the old one.

Maybe not.

There’s a narrow corridor not far from the port docking clamps, an out of service section of the station overlooked by most adults. But children, bored admirals’ children brought to McKinley Station and told to entertain themselves with a padd while their flag officer parent sat in meetings, those children can find the narrow corridor, follow it until they reach the open-air turbolift, then tap in the access code that’s easy to guess because who sets Federation Day as an access code if they don’t want children to be able to guess it?

Tom retraces his childhood steps, keys in the old access code, and the turbolift rises. And it’s funny because people say visiting a place from childhood should feel strange, proportions out of place and objects seeming too small, but everything is just as he remembers, just as he and Kathryn talked about so many times once they both realized that, separately, they had found this place and stood on small tiptoes to try to get to the top faster, stolen lift ride ascending until it reached the top.

He’s at the top now, the lift settling with the same seeming sigh of accomplishment.

And awe.

The old, floor-to-ceiling transparent dome gives a clear view: Earth, Mars, the asteroid belt and beyond, every star gleaming, ships gliding past, motion as observed from stillness. This is the station’s original docking control room, a function long-since moved to deck six for closer proximity to other station operations, old computers left behind for reasons lost to time.

But nothing could beat this view.

Kathryn is sitting cross-legged on the floor, her back resting against an out-of-date console. She doesn’t turn from the stars — her stars, her North Star that became his North Star to get the crew home — but she must know it’s him because her voice is a gruff imitation of his father: “What are you doing out here by yourself?”

That’s what Owen Paris had said when he caught Tom in this room, small arms out pretending to be nacelles, flying, flying, flying.

So Tom pitches his voice to the timbre of Edward Janeway: “Young lady, you had better explain yourself.”

Because of course Kathryn got caught, too, her padd clattering as it hit the floor, her childhood equations an attempt to determine quantum efficiencies for every type of luminescence of matter she saw through the dome.

She chuckles now, pats the floor next to her, and he sits, her head finding its place on his shoulder, familiar weight in this room they’ve never been to together but both visited alone.

“They say we all become our parents.” He speaks in his own voice, words he feared until he could see the divergence of his life’s path from the Parises who came before him.

Kathryn speaks as herself, too. “I don’t think they meant it literally.”

“Nah.”

And they should talk — as themselves — about what it means to be home and about all the things they said they would do once they got back to Federation space. They should talk about … everything … from tomorrow’s briefings to the future beyond winding down Voyager’s first mission.

But, instead, he sits in a room where he was a child and she was a child, and he stares at Earth, Mars, the asteroid belt and beyond, gleaming stars and gliding ships.

He pretended to fly here.

She tried to make scientific discoveries here.

Now he’s flown farther than anyone else ever has and she has a stack of scientific discoveries that will keep headquarters busy for years.

And, yet, here they are in this place where they separately, silently, stole off to dream.

Together.

———

Send me an ask with character(s) and a prompt and I’ll do my best to dream up something you’ll like. ❤️

[regalpotato]

For the weirdly specific ask meme: "rank the methods of death: freezing, burning, drowning," please!

freezing, drowning, burning in that order

at some point, when freezing, you just sort of sleep (or get naked and weird but...)

and i hate being warm, let alone on fire so...burning comes last.

weird ask meme

[fiadorable]

For the three word prompt thing, Una and Chris, #6 or #23 please!

#6 for Pikeuna: Be gentle, please. Number One checks on Pike after the events of "All Those Who Wander".

As captain, Chris' quarters had the most and best viewports on the ship, and he kept them open as much as possible. "It's why we're up here, isn't it," he'd said one night, fingers trailing shivery patterns up her spine as they lay tangled in his sheets. "To be among the stars."

Tonight, every viewport was shuttered.

Number One stepped far enough into Chris' quarters for the doors to close behind her, and then stopped. The lights were off, the main section of the room lit only by an aging fire crackling in the fireplace. A glint of light reflecting off a squat glass bottle on the coffee table caught her eye, drawing her gaze to the couch. As her eyes adjusted, the lumpy form occupying it gradually took shape as a supine Chris.

"Captain?" she asked, squinting.

"What do you need, Number One?" Chris' voice was rough and papery, and punctuated with the sharp clink of a glass being set on the floor.

Number One clasped her hands behind her back. "Permission to enter?"

His silence siphoned the air from the room, her lungs, had her pulse pounding in her ears and her palms sweating. Her thoughts spun back to the dizzying, tense moment on the bridge earlier when his shuttle wasn't at their rendezvous point. She'd sent a scout shuttle down to the surface to report in, the minutes without contact ticking by like a cord winding tighter and tighter around her chest.

"Granted," Chris finally rasped.

Number One unclenched her jaw and let her arms fall to her sides. She approached the couch with soft, deliberate steps. There was a little space on the cushion near his feet. She sat, resting a hand on his blanket-covered knee.

"Do you want to talk about it?" she asked.

"No," he said. "Do you?"

Number One shook her head. "No, I would very much like to not talk for a while."

Chris shifted from his back to his side, pushing her toward the edge of the cushion with his foot. "C'mere."

She rose and resettled in the curve created by his upper body. Her palm skimmed his arm, followed the arc of his shoulder down to the warm dampness on his cheek.

Lifting his hand, he traced the full curve of her lower lip with the pad of his thumb. His palm cradled her cheek.

Number One covered his hand with hers. She kissed his wrist, and then helped him stand, leading him toward the sleeping alcove. Here, the viewports above his bed were open, blanketing the room in a dim silver. Stars crawled past as the ship towed its precious, broken cargo.

When her shins knocked the foot of his bed frame, she turned, hands rising to press against his chest.

Chris' arms encircled her waist, tugged her body close to his until their foreheads were touching and their breath mingled between them like a fog.

He was here. He was alive. His heart beat a furtive tattoo beneath her palms.

Here. Alive. Heart beating.

Gasping, her, when his hands rucked up her uniform and undershirt in one move, trailing fire across her skin.

Groaning, him, when she dragged her fingernails through the thicket of silver hair at the nape of his neck.

"Please," she whispered, nosing his face upward. Pressing her lips to his, hard. No, that felt wrong. He tensed. Number One softened the kiss. Gentle, her feathery kiss to his upper lip said. I'll be gentle.

Chris melted into her embrace. She guided him down to the bed, then removed her boots. The viewport controls were on his side of the bed. She walked over, touched her fingertips to the prompt that would lower the shades.

From the bed, Chris looked up at her with glassy, questioning eyes before darkness reclaimed the room. Number One crawled into the bed, cradled his body with her own. "It's why we're up here together, isn't it? To be among each other when the stars are too bright."

One hundred thousand apologies for the late response to your prompt, @lindsaybob. This one needed to steep in my WIP pile for a few months. 😅

just like lindsay, you, too, can try your luck and send me a prompt and a pairing

[lindsaybob]

Chapters: 1/1

Fandom: Star Trek: Strange New Worlds (TV)

Rating: General

Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply

Relationships: Number One | Una Chin-Riley/Christopher Pike, Number One | Una Chin-Riley & Christopher Pike

Characters: Number One | Una Chin-Riley (Star Trek), Christopher Pike

Additional Tags: the briefest of brief appearances by most of the rest of the crew, Court Martial, una needs a hug, and she gets one (more than one!), Emotional Hurt/Comfort. i’ve marked this as a pikeuna fic but you could just as easily read it as friendship i think

Summary: This is it. This is the moment of truth. In around fifteen minutes a panel of judges will take their seats at the bench in front of her, enumerate her crimes and ask her how she pleads. She knows what her lawyer wants her to say. She knows what Chris wants her to say (and oh, she wants that too, more than she can say, but she finds it so hard to believe that it isn’t simply far too late for any kind of happy ending).

But what does Una want to do? She has fifteen minutes to figure it out.

[grissomesque]

From the Birdcage prompt list, Janeway/Paris and “there’s one place in the world I call home, and that’s because you’re there.”

Okay, listen, I can explain.

This was supposed to be like 500 words. And that's about what I wrote on the plane, where and when I said I was going to write it. And then I got home and typed it all up and it just sort of gnawed at me, and then I became very ill, and it continued to gnaw at me only I could do little about it, and then my fever broke and it turns out this thing is 2300 words. Whoops!

At any rate, thank you so much for the prompt, and I hope you enjoy it! I seem to have a lot of Feelings about Scorpion. 🙈

G / 2,294 words Summary: The truth is that she’d hand her very soul over to the Borg and be damned for it, if it would get her people out of harm’s way.

The Birdcage x Trek prompts

[beautifulhigh]

Tagged by @wtfuckevenknows​ and @firstprince-history-huh​

1. Are you named after anyone?

No, and deliberately so.

2. When was the last time you cried?

Yesterday

3. Do you have kids?

Hahahahahahhahahahahahahahahahahhahahahahaha no

4. Do you use sarcasm a lot?

Absolutely not

5. What sports do you play/have you played?

I used to play netball when I was younger and do Irish dancing. The latter fucked up my ankles and I had to give up everything.

6. What’s the first thing you notice about people?

Their body language. How they are presenting themselves will determine how I react to them. I’m a hugger but if they are holding themselves in then I won’t go for the hug unless I know I can.

7. What’s your eye colour?

Blue

8. Scary movies or happy endings?

Happy endings from this choice because I don’t do scary movies. At all.. But I also don’t need a happy ending so...

9. Any special talents?

I think @goodways would say my ability to create a plot and storyline out of thin air.

10. Where were you born?

In a maternity hospital that has since been knocked down and turned into a housing estate

11. What are your hobbies?

Procrastination mostly

12. Do you have pets?

I am indentured to serve a cat for the rest of her life

13. How tall are you?

5' 8" ish

14. Favourite subject in school?

English

15. Dream job?

One that pays the bills AND leaves stuff over at the end of the month

Am so late to this party so tagging a bunch of people who have probably already done this... @capseycartwright @first-kanaphan @danrdarrenc @lindsaybob @paperstorm @wild-aloof-rebel @reyescarlos @kiras-sunshine @slayerkitty

[the-lady-general]

Thank you for the tag @lindsaybob! 🌟✨

1. Are you named after anyone?

The opposite! My parents wanted to buck the trend of Annas and Marias in the family. So my name is neither of those.

2. When was the last time you cried?

A few weeks ago when coming down from the scary yet harmless dog encounter.

3. Do you have kids?

No. I move around too often to inflict that on a small person.

4. Do you use sarcasm a lot?

Who uses sarcasm? I don't think anybody uses sarcasm.

5. What sports do you play/have you played?

lol no abso fucking lutely not uh uh i'm the master of my own destiny now and i will not touch anything p.e. related with ten foot pole nobody can make me and if they try i will burn it all to the ground and spit on the ashes my body is sacred and it has one job and it is Nerd. pushups.

6. What’s the first thing you notice about people?

Depends on the person? Normally if they colour coordinate any part of their outfit.

7. What’s your eye colour?

brown

8. Scary movies or happy endings?

Yes, please!

9. Any special talents?

Plenty! The one I'm most grateful for is that I can sleep anywhere, through anything.

10. Where were you born?

The interesting question is *when* was I born, because I made dad miss out on a leave day and mum on an episode of Dallas.

11. What are your hobbies?

dog, starting projects, reading sometimes, writing, wargaming and rpgs

12. Do you have pets?

The one and only Doorstop. She's an ancient rescue puppy and she's a grumpy old cow and utterly mercenary when it comes to scritches and pizza. In cahoots with my mother. The candy bowl for my brother and me is now a dog treat bowl.

13. How tall are you?

5' 2"

14. Favourite subject in school?

It wasn't about subjects so much as which teachers I got on with. My favourite was the P.E. guy who didn't show up for class either. Art and English never bothered me and were usually the only ones with enough of a spine to stop bullying when they noticed it.

15. Dream job?

I don't dream of working. It used to be white blood cell from Once upon A Time... Life because they had little spaceships and they were badass!

After one bout of tag anxiety today, please tag yourselves! Thank you!

[icepixie]

Tagged by @lindsaybob

1. Are you named after anyone?

First name = paternal grandmother, middle name = maternal grandmother.

2. When was the last time you cried?

Probably during recovery from my sinus/septum surgery a few months ago.

(Hey, guess what, a bunch of the tissue grew back and scarred over and trapped the MRSA infection in my sinuses AGAIN! So I have to get surgery AGAIN! 😫 Supposedly it won't be as bad because at least the septum stayed put, but I shall believe that when I experience it.)

3. Do you have kids?

No. Don't have the parts anymore, either.

4. Do you use sarcasm a lot?

NoOOOOOooooo.

5. What sports do you play/have you played?

I figure skate. Started at 29 when I began a job near an ice rink. Got hooked in the first round of group classes when they taught me how to spin.

I did ballroom dance in college, competitively (at a low/college level) for a couple years.

6. What’s the first thing you notice about people?

Onscreen, which seems most relevant here: Their way with words. If they're funny. If I want to read more from them.

In person, hair. If you change your hairstyle too dramatically, it's even odds whether I'll recognize you.

7. What’s your eye colour?

Green.

8. Scary movies or happy endings?

Both are fine. I guess happy endings.

9. Any special talents?

People generally find the skating and dancing unusual. My spine and various joints can also feel like they're on fire and trying to disintegrate if the temperature makes a big swing and sets off a flare of my autoimmune arthritis--that's certainly special.

10. Where were you born?

Southern US.

11. What are your hobbies?

Skating, fandom, reading, gardening.

12. Do you have pets?

I'm still honorary owner of my parents' dog, a 12-year-old terrier mutt. I see her every other week when I come for dinner.

13. How tall are you?

5' 5"

14. Favourite subject in school?

English and history.

15. Dream job?

Independent wealth.

Ummmm, I'll tag @sarnakhwritesthings, @castalianspring, @rivendellrose, @gaslightgallows, and @havocthecat. If you want to.

[sun-lit-roses]

Emancipation

I’ve been duly warned about this episode (thank you @lindsaybob and @tabbyofwisdom!), so I’m approaching it with some trepidation. But here we go, Season 1, Episode 4!

YESSSS New planet!! Right out of the gate. So to speak.

It’s very green.

Run kid!

Being chased by dogs is one of my greatest fears. 😨

‘We’re from - very far away.’ Well, they aren’t lying.

OKay... I’m guessing they keep women and men separated in their culture? Or maybe they’ll get more creative and all their women are secretly evil? Split off long ago and formed their own nation? Are secretly gorgons who can turn men to stone with a look?

Oh look, Jack brought a gun to the arrow fight.

Hey, maybe his father will be reasonable! They did just save the kid.

...oh look, it’s death threat time again.

Not completely ungrateful, and at least he’s willing to give them a chance to learn about their culture rather than stumbling around blindly.

Yeah, I’m thinking maybe Sam should just bow out of this one gracefully. They’re a little trigger happy and not too clear on the details.

‘We’ll be fine if we learn about the culture.’ Easy for the one who isn’t being singled out to say. Why can’t Daniel just go and have a good time without her!

Well there’s clearly at least one other woman here. Many women! And they’re fine with them?

Okay, the women have to go veiled and quiet in public. Pretty standard and boring. I was kind of hoping for the gorgon theory.

The leader seems pretty blase about the ‘old laws,’ though.

I mean, dressing like the locals to not upset anyone seems fairly standard? Like not refusing food and making sure to copy their manners.

It is annoying that the men don’t have to change. I’m surprised their clothing isn’t deemed inappropriate as well. But I suppose a different style of trousers and shirt might be easier to accept.

I wonder what would have happened if they had said, ‘no, Carter’s not a woman, some men just look like that in Very Far Away.’ 😂

The women’s clothes are very pretty, I wouldn’t mind a set!

I’m not sure why they wouldn’t be comfortable? From what the other outfits looked like, it was soft, loose trousers under a flowing tunic-type dress?

I genuinely can’t tell if the guys are trying to make her feel better about it, or being creeps. The ‘works for me’ comment crossed the line there.

At least Teal’c is his stoic self about it.

I wonder if Jaffa treat men and women differently?

Wait, I thought the point of her changing clothes was that she could go out and see the medicines and such?

If she’s just stuck in the yurt (and by the way maybe don’t insult the hospitality of the women we CAN SEE IN THE BACKGROUND. Clearly she is not the diplomatic one), why didn’t they let her just go back through the gate?

‘We should bring an all-male team.’ I’m confused as to why this time around isn’t an all-male team either. You weren’t that far from the gate to begin with, you could have waved her back through, and kept on trucking.

Yeah, leaning more towards sexist from Jack. Between this and the whole ‘I like women’ thing from the pilot, he’s running out my goodwill.

Why isn’t she planning to talk with the women about the medicines or whatever? She’s surely allowed to talk to them.

Party Time!

Oh no, apparently Kidnapping Time! Where are the other women? Are they just like, ‘well, serves her right for complaining about our yurt.’

Was she in a yurt by herself? Why wasn’t she with the other women? I’m so confused about the set up here.

They gagged her underneath the veil? That’s a commitment to veiling.

It’s THE KID??

 I would pay SO MUCH money if the kid was actually a girl and wanted to know how Sam got to be seen as an equal.

Of course it’s not that.

They trade women - they could have maybe mentioned that in their cultural brief. Or if Sam got TO TALK TO ANY OF THE OTHER WOMEN. Still bewildered that this wasn’t a thing.

‘How do you always jump to the worst conclusion.’ ‘I practice.’ 😂

Hang on, I thought Sam was kidnapped by several people. If it’s just the kid, why didn’t she just overpower him when they stopped to rest? She’s trained military, and he was eating - I’m pretty sure she could have at least tried to turn the tables.

This episode is just chock full o’ creeps, huh?

The kid’s in love with the other leader’s daughter - how Romeo and Juliet! It’d be a lot more sympathetic if the kid hadn’t just shown that he doesn’t value women in general, just the one that he happens to be attracted to.

His daughter spoke up, which is surprising if her father is so terrible.

They’re protecting their women from demons. I’m assuming the Goa’uld? I don’t get the sense that making them cover up and not speak would prevent the Goa’uld from taking anyone they pleased, to be honest.

Oh what stupid thing is the kid going to do now.

That daughter goes around a lot without her veil for this society.

Sam gets another creepy talk with the leader. Great.

Sam has a good point - why does he want an allegiance with that 23rd clan so badly? What does the political landscape look like here?

I’m not sure about cooking, but she’s not great at chopping.

ARMED AND DANGEROUS!

And escaping!

Yeah, taking the horse was probably a bad idea. Sneaking off into the woods on foot would have been a better plan. Although dressed in bright blue and avoiding sentries would still have been a stretch. Stealing darker clothes and waiting until night might have higher odds?

Back to Creepy Leader (tm).

She’s in different clothes now - did he beat her?!

FINALLY SHE GETS TO TALK TO ANOTHER WOMAN.

Yeah, I’m pretty sure it’s not quite that simple for the daughter, Sam. I mean, she very clearly said no earlier and it didn’t make much of a difference. I’m willing to see where you’re going with this, though.

Wait, how did the team get so close to the camp with those sentries?

See, Jack had the same night plan as me!

I don’t think Sam would be happy with a trade - wow, nope, never mind, even if the trade plan would work, that ain’t happening. Glad Jack and I are on the same track there: “There is not a chance in hell.”

He’s making up a little for being Creepy McLeering earlier.

Escape Part Two! With bonus fire this time!

Okay, escape for the daughter. Carter must have a lot of faith in her team. I’d have been booking it for the woods too.

They are not great at bartering. You’ve driven the price too high, too early - now he’s suspicious.

Um, Daniel, if she’s so amazing, wouldn’t the guy be tempted to keep her more?

See?

Heck of a Plan B, Jack. I get that there’s no Prime Directive in this universe, but surely there’s some sort of rule about not giving away your weapons? I’m pretty sure the military frowns on that.

Ah, giving them the gun with no instructions. I guess that’s slightly better, but I don’t think guns are that complicated. Pretty sure they can figure it out with an actual gun and bullets as a blue print? Maybe I’m underestimating the complicatedness of guns, though.

I guess they made it! And Carter got her clothes back. That’s nice.

Really, the episode just had to throw in one more lewd reference to a mission where Carter accidentally got drunk and took off - her top, I’m guessing? You’re losing all the points you gained back, Jack.

That’s very generous, Sam. *I* certainly blame the kid for what he did. Pretty sure he’s old enough to know what he did was wrong, otherwise he wouldn’t have kidnapped her in the dead of night. Also, he thought it was perfectly fine to trade women - not exactly a beacon of progressive thinking there.

Yeah, kid’s got hormones raging with ‘the madness.’ Still not an excuse.

And the daughter’s escape didn’t work out. Predictable, but death by stoning is a surprise. When Sam escaped they just hauled her back (and maybe beat her? she seems fine so maybe not?), I wonder why this escape merits death? Because she made it farther or was out longer?

I mean, with the gun thing and the kid trying to escape with the leader’s daughter, there’s probably already going to be a war. I doubt going back at this point will make things any worse.

Or we’re going to get legal. Sure, why not.

And legal turns out to be a fight between Creepy Leader and Sam.

Jack’s not great at the pep talks, huh?

Oh. Well that ups the stakes a little there, doesn’t it? I feel like the ‘death’ part should have come up a little sooner. They had the whole ride back to mention that bit?!

I feel like hand to hand training is a little different than a knife fight?

Maybe not, she got first blood. Not bad!

Go Sam!

Suddenly everyone’s okay with Sam wandering around in men’s clothes without a veil. Sure. Guess all she had to do was win a knife fight.

...and now women don’t need a veil or to be separate. Everyone’s okay with this too, suddenly. Did they all have to win a knife fight as well?

Well this ending is very - something.

But we’re going out with a joke about Oprah. Can we have an episode where we watch them introduce Teal’c to talk shows? An entire episode of that would probably have been more enjoyable.

Rating: 🔘

1/5 Gates I’m unsure about this rating. Maybe I should keep the one gate reviews in reserve for something truly unwatchable? But most of the decisions here didn’t make sense, the ending was dubious, and seriously WHY WERE THERE SO FEW WOMEN? Maybe show that women are more than one-dimensional by - actually developing some of the women to be more than one-dimensional? We did get a new planet and there were some good one-liners, but this one was a mess.

[curator-on-ao3]

get to know me

Tagged by: the delightful @lindsaybob — thank you @lindsaybob! 💕

rules: tag nine people you want to get to know better

three ships: Christopher Pike/Una Chin-Riley (Star Trek: Strange New Worlds), Kathryn Janeway/Just About Anyone (Star Trek: Voyager), and Captain Shaw/His Psych Profile (Star Trek: Picard, which I am optimistically counting on to somehow redeem Shaw and not only have him issue a heartfelt apology for deadnaming Seven, but also have him purposefully address her by her proper name of Seven — commander or otherwise)

first ship: Imzadi (Will Riker/Deanna Troi, Star Trek: The Next Generation and a bunch more Treks since)

fave color: purple and green (both amazing)

last song: “Marry the Night,” by Lady Gaga

last movie in the theatre: ummmmm … I don’t know. Maybe “Saving Mr. Banks”?

last show: in the theater? I don’t remember. At home? Star Trek: Picard season 3, episode 2 (Baby Got Back)

currently watching: Star Trek: Picard season 3, Night Court reboot

currently reading: lovely AO3 comments that came in while I had a very busy last few days irl

currently working on: in terms of fic, a Chapel/Pike story that I am looking forward to having more time for

current obsession: I don’t think I really have obsessions anymore. Just sparkling affinities.

Also, y’all know I have tag anxiety, so if you’re reading this and want to play, please consider yourself tagged. ❤️

[fiadorable]

revelation in the light of gray - a snw fic

📖 Ensign Uhura stumbles into sickbay late one night and discovers something new about Captain Pike and Number One 🎬 Rated S for sickbay, P for pajamas, and A for alien fruit drinks ⚠️ Descriptions (not graphic) of persons in sickbay being ill 💙 Thanks very much to @lindsaybob for the prompt of a third party observing an intimate moment between the command team 💜 Thanks also to @curator-on-ao3 for her patience and kindness as beta once I realized this fic was not going to be just a few hundred words but a few thousand.

✨Read it on AO3 ✨

[grissomesque]

Oooh, for the “I can’t…” prompts, J/P and #13, please!

So! This is, based on a very wonderful comment/suggestion once upon a time, a bit of Play It Again, Sam backstory (though it can also stand alone). I hope it doesn't disappoint.

I have to bounce it over to AO3 because, turns out, this thing is eventually going to be three parts.

Thank you so much for this prompt, @lindsaybob 🤍

• words: 1.1k (part 1/3)

• rating: T

• warnings: Non-gratuitous descriptions of injury/violence (per Mosaic)

• relationships: Kathryn Janeway/Tom Paris

• summary: They are friends, she tells herself.

[Send me a prompt and I'll write you a thing!]

[beautifulhigh]

Tagged by @wtfuckevenknows who provided me with a break in my massive jobs list of a day!

do this uquiz

do this picrew

tag people

(well fuck...)

(why can't you have other jewelry on? Imagine a Rennie Mackintosh deseign on a silver chain neckace)

Tagging @goodways @leximitchells @lindsaybob @first-kanaphan @capseycartwright @makesomehistory @moon-canyon @guardian-angle22

[the-lady-general]

For the Star Trek asks, number 6 please! “What Star Trek food or drink do you wish you could try?”

Nice one, @lindsaybob!

I'd like to start with a slider of blue or green uncarbonated ale from around the galaxy, together with a sample of the corresponding bar table snack. Romulans, Andorians and Orions all serve ale (always ale!) in Kölsch sized shot glasses and I want to know what the fuss is about.

With that, I'd like to get a meal featuring Cardassian yamok sauce, and really hope that I end up with their version of bbq ribs.

Of course you need potatoes with your meat (that's what she said!), and I want Earth potatoes. Waxy, not mushy. All those colourful Andean varieties you can't get in Europe. Or maybe just some boring European ones, either is fine. Potatoes.

For a side salad, Vulcan would be the logical choice. Since fanon likes making Vulcan food either unbearably spicy or unbearably bland, I'm going with an unauthentic Earth-fusion cuisine version, but with ~weird alien textures.~

For dessert I'll have a jumja stick from that one stall on DS9. It was the first Bajoran business back on the station after the occupation and that stall stayed there throughout the series, so I can only assume it was an absolute hit with Bajorans, Cardassians, Humans, and whoever else came through.

After dinner it's time for a coffee, and I'm curious to see what the Italians are doing with Raktajino.

[icepixie]

I finally got around to watching Strange New Worlds this week. (I started it when it first aired, but grew so terminally bored with Pike's existential angst that I quit halfway through the first episode. Apparently I stopped just before it got watchable.)

In general, I like the characters but the plots are dull and/or annoying. Ortegas and Chapel are my favorites. (So sad there wasn't an Ortegas-centric episode. Next season? And maybe she could not have a tragic backstory involving dead parents like everyone else we've gotten to know?) Also, I know they're pushing the Chapel/Spock thing, and Jess Bush is giving it her all, but there's no chemistry whatsoever there. Meanwhile, Chapel and Ortegas lit up the screen in their scenes together on shore leave. Even if we don't get a ship, which I expect we won't, I want more scenes between them.

Loving the Captain Dad and Commander Mom vibe from Pike and Una. (@lindsaybob posting about them here may have enticed me to try the series again, and I was not disappointed.) The family dinners are fun, even if the fireplace in Pike's MASSIVE quarters beggars belief. Didn't T'Pol have to get special dispensation for her candles? Even if that was 100 years ago, fire + spaceship still presumably = bad.

I like(d) Uhura and Hemmer too. Sad Hemmer died. :( M'Benga is lovely as well, especially the subplot with his daughter.

The actual stories, though...um. "Elysian Kingdom" was great fun and the actors all looked like they were having a blast, so that was the high point of the season. Less so for the rest. I mean, 20% of their output from this season was practically plagiarized. Could we not have a secret for Una that wasn't done 30 years ago on DS9 with Julian Bashir? And if they didn't pay royalties to the estate of Ursula Le Guin for that bastardized "Omelas" episode, someone got robbed. If everyone had suspected it earlier, that might have been one thing, but when I figure out what's going on basically in the teaser and it takes the characters the full episode, that is Not Good.

My other annoyance with their storytelling is mostly my fault, because I HATE time travel (or time travel-related) stories in something that's not primarily about time travel. I dunno, it's a quirk, they just piss me off. Anyway, like the angst in the first episode, Pike's fated future in general is utterly dull and a drag on everything else.

I'll watch the next season, but I think this is a show where I'm going to be more interested in the fic than the actual canon.