Do you understand that I now have to compose my responses in Word because of this damned quote system and how much we TALK??
Re: adorable - hee hee, mutual restrained delight, my favourite, and then the oven goes “ding” and lunch is ready and they’re both just a bit disappointed, and Julian says, well, I AM due for my break - and he takes an hour instead of fifteen minutes, with Kira’s eyes boring into his head the whole time. Poor Julian, written up again. Does that carry any real consequences, I wonder? Or is it just being in Kira’s shit book? Which might be worse, granted. Heh, I kind of like that - there’s really no such thing as being written up, Kira just writes down everything you did wrong and makes you sign it, and then she gives it to Sisko when he comes in, and he kind of looks at her.
I like Leeta. She’s fluffy and sweet and takes no prisoners and doesn’t apologize for it, ever. I’m quite curious to see how she exists in your DD9. I haven’t quite found her in mine yet. She might be at the club. I love the idea of her working at Quark’s because she likes his dorky brother (oh, DD9 Rom, he would be so freaking adorable, huge ears and crooked teeth and this soul that just shines - and Leeta would love that, because she knows about pretty and exactly how deep it goes - look, I’m freaking out in parentheses!).
And envious of your Gallifrey One experiences - the pics look so fun - I haven’t been to a con in far too long; may have to go this year. How cool to see Chase Masterson. Was she as fun as she seems?
And Leeta will be INTO Julian? Ooh, that’s even better than rejection! Complicated choices and easy physical attraction vs. well, Garak’s mind is amazing, but the rest isn’t quite as instinctive, and isn’t it easier to just slide a hand around Leeta like this, and… Hmm, complicated! My brain runs away with me with this stuff.
Oh, no brands! Our worlds differ a bit, I guess, because I’m kind of enjoying juxtaposing my IRL experience and Julian/Garak’s worlds. I’ve got DOBs pegged for them both, and what kind of music they’d therefore listen to (because it’s mostly what you hear in your teens that you carry around, even if you hated your teens), and what they like to drink… I know it’s Canada-centric, but I figure I read fic set all around the world, so I guess this’ll work for me… Although I agree, no Starbucks, and fast food will stay pretty generic. But band names, though. And I like the idea of races-as-countries. And I adoooore the idea of Cardassian graphic novels, and Julian teaching Garak about them!? is delightful and would set him right back on his heels, yes yes yes.
“I JUST WANT EVERYONE TO FALL IN LOVE AND LEARN THINGS.” /puts it on a shirt
Platonic sleepover is appealing, and I kind of figured it’d be the natural fallout of a movie marathon. Come over and watch the first three not-James-Bond flicks with me, hmm, okay, we’ll start early, except they forget to allow for the fact that it takes two hours in between movies for them to discuss it properly, and also Julian talks over half the movie, so Garak keeps having to rewind, and between one thing and another it’s four in the morning and Garak’s still there, wrapped up in a quilt, sitting on Julian’s floor. It’s lovely and intimate being the only two people in the world who are awake, and being together; you make food, and talk, and it’s strange and special, even if nobody kisses anybody. Hell, it feels like that when you’re with friends who you DON’T want to rip your clothes off; it’s a special intensity when you’re kind of hoping they do.
If this Garak understands that this Julian is not to be protected, he’s smarter than my Garak. Well, my Garak is in early days, and Julian may teach him that he can do fine on his own before my Garak makes any really stupid mistakes. Tell me about Miles and his stupid mistakes: what really stood out to you? I always see him as kind of level-headed and pragmatic, which means he does what he thinks needs to be done. What did he really mess up?
And threats over teeeeeea~
Oh, I hope this doesn’t affect his friendship with Julian too badly… That’s a hell of a thing to trade. /suddenly sad
Also composing repsonses elsewhere! I have to do this on dA too for the Orphan Time discussion because it’s just enormous.
Ahahaha, getting written up there HAS to be something that means nothing, because Julian would be out of a job so fast if it were otherwise. Kira is clearly just trying to shame people into doing things The Right Way. Though I think half the things this universe has spawned are all very joke-y? And probably wouldn’t fit within the context of the stuff I’ve written by now. So, you know, probably not sneaking Garak into a supply closet or going on breaks four times their allowed length, but it is hilarious.
Leeta being described as ‘fluffy’ is cracking me the fuck up. I really love the idea of her as someone who sees people for what they are. We never see her just dismiss someone, and she marries a Ferengi for fuck’s sake.
(Chase definitely seemed like she was having a good time. She’s been doing a character for the Doctor Who audios, so that’s what she was there to talk about. Even with a big sign behind her saying she was on DS9, I still didn’t recognize her, but she looked happy and cheerful the entire weekend and just hearing her voice was so fucking surreal. )
Into him enough to be open to suggestions, sure! I’m going with that they were canonically involved enough for her to make off with The Bear, so she at least deserves some kind of mention/involvement here. And I also liked the idea of there being some complicated stuff going on with Julian, because, sort of like you said, Leeta is much easier for him to process than Garak is, because she’s more like what he’s used to. I do want to be able to show that one date does not exlusivity make, and not do anything skeevy with the women Julian knows, because fuck knows that happens to female characters in these sorts of stories all the time. (This sort of harkens back to the occasional resurfacing guilt I have that all my favorite fandom pairing things are men, actually.) Leeta is not going to be some sort of ‘EUREKA, I LIKE A MAN’ catalyst.
I like having birthdays, that’s pretty rad. I may actually need to randomly generate one for Garak at some point because fancy reasons. But yeah, not so much with me and the ‘Things In Real Life’. It does bad things to the structure of an alternate universe for me that they’d have the same media that we do, but I’m glad you’re having fun doing it!
Gotta do Cardassian graphic novels now, pretty much. Though it’ll be interesting to tweak them enough to make them recnogizable but still human. It sometimes seems there are a lot of differences in alien cultures that they only get away with because they’re alien and if you found a bunch of humans acting like that, you’d think something had gone horribly wrong. Also they’d have trouble adapting to society or whatever. The palm to palm thing I think is lovely, and I’d like to keep that, so that’s something than can be in one of the books that julian just doesn’t see the siginificance of.
Awwwww, Garak in quilt, you will kill me. I had planned on Garak actually being in Julian’s apartment at a certain point, but now I wonder if it shouldn’t be earlier and more than once, because this is murdering me.
I definitely think Miles does what he thinks needs to be done and that he does said things with the best of intentions, but I often found that the interactions he had with Keiko made me go “WHY WHY ARE YOU DOING THIS, HAVE THE WRITERS GIVEN YOU THE IDIOT BALL, THIS IS CLEARLY THE WORST POSSIBLE THING TO DO, THEY ARE DOING THIS JUST TO MAKE THE PLOTLINE DRAMATIC’, so he’s usually super on that shit with electronic anything, but I sometimes feel his closer relationships are not so great, and those are what I was talking about. Which is actually sort of a thing people do with technologically saavy characters - good at metal bits and parts and not stellar at people all the time.
I’d have to go rewatch everything to find exact moments, but I know there was a red dress conversation with her that was just ‘what?’ and them talking about her going to Bajor because plants, and I think at one point he said something sort of douchey to Julian (after they were friends, not before, when he said sublte douche things to him all the time) that was just like, ‘Wow, what made you think that was going to help?’. And, you know, he also makes the decisions that you don’t want people to have to make, like the Jem’Hadar thing when Julian wanted to help them and be a prisoner or whatever, and Miles was just all ‘fuck no.’ So it’s not that he makes giant epic mistakes in my eyes, and probably not in his own either, just that the things he does do are often so opposite what I would think the proper thing to do would be and that I always sort of wince when he does anything with Keiko. I saw all that and thought, ‘He would think that talking to weird older guy interested in Julian was the best course of action, rather than just letting Julian handle his own bullshit.’ Because he cares, but maybe does not consider other people’s perceptions to the fullest? Admittedly, I do not watch Miles like a hawk when I watch the show, but I definitely regard him as the guy who does a lot of well-intended things with his gut, and his gut is aimed in a slightly different direction than my own.
The order of things thus far is ‘Miles talks to Garak. Garak casually reports that MIles has been there to Julian. Miles gets screamed at by Julian who has had enough of this, thank you.’ But I don’t think either of them are going to be willing to just say, “WELL FINE” and not talk to each other ever again. Maybe for like, a week. And they agree to play WoW together “Because we’re paying for it, we might as well. BUT I’M NOT GOING TO LIKE IT.”
“NEITHER AM I.”
”GOOD.”
”FINE.”
”SEE YOU IN AN HOUR.”
“I’LL BRING POPCORN.”
“WHICH WE WILL ALSO NOT LIKE.”
“RIGHT.” etc etc etc etc
Re: DD9 splitting into dark vs. silly – sad but true. Part of me wants to keep the silly stuff, and part of me is very intently writing dark pasts for Julian and misunderstandings for Garak, because that’s what I doooo. I couldn’t find a way into this universe until I saw Julian dancing, and imagined how that might come to be, and as happy as that sounds, apparently I have to make things snaky for it to work…? /sigh
I wish there was more silly in my head.
I wish there was more silly DD9. I’m going to submit more asks to the deep dish nine tumblr, because it does my heart good when I see those wonderful little answers.
Ah, this fic keeps going past the date? I am well pleased! Excellent, I do like that one date does not exclusivity make, because I myself am hard-wired for monogamy and pick out towels and curtains on the second date, so it’s nice to see somebody write something different. I’m curious to see how that plays out with Garak. Might be hard to see somebody you’re opening up to, investing in, spending sexy/romantic time with somebody else, even if they plan to spend more time with you later. Hmm hmm. I guess he can sublimate that. But it’s not good for you to do that. And he might want to pull back instead. Eurgh, I don’t want this to turn into some kind of weepy “if I can’t have you I don’t want to know you” bullshit – but once Garak actually sees a flicker of interest in Julian, how will he handle Julian continuing on with his typical romantic life? Well, like a grown-up, I guess, a grown-up other than me, who would howl and eat chocolate. Projection is a bitch. (what am I even talking about?)
Well, Julian’s got a birthday because he got carded. Garak has a birth year, day to follow if required. I don’t want to do the birthday-by-the-horoscope thing because I’m not much for horoscopes. If you come up with one that works for me, excellent; I’ll yoink it. :D
I think that may be the definition of alien culture, for me: they only get away with it because they’re aliens, and if you found a bunch of humans acting like that, you’d think something had gone horribly wrong: YES. Doesn’t have to be malevolent or malicious or even particularly sick. Just has to be different. Ever read Elizer Yudkowsky’s (sp?) “Three Worlds Collide”? A fascinating breakdown of ethics and morality as viewed by three sentient species, who all appear to be very nice people, but whose physiology informs their ethics in ways that are hard to reconcile. Go read it, it’s on google. It’s v good and will make you think. But don’t read it right before bed or you’ll have weird dreams.
I love the palm-to-palm thing too. Curious to see what it means to your Cardassians.
Garak-in-a-quilt works with the always-cold thing you have going for him, which was immediately headcanoned by me (is there any other kind of canon for this canon?). And it also gives them a little artificial barrier between them, which is something else that works for me. I liked the bit in the movie theatre when Julian thinks to himself that this is the first time they’ve ever sat together without something between them, be it a table or a counter or what have you. They’re looking at a movie screen instead of at each other, but it’s still a strange moment. Garak wrapped up in a quilt is a fascinating little mix of vulnerability and self-protectiveness, even if he doesn’t mean it that way; it might be quite enrapturing.
Oh, Miles and Keiko, of course. I figure they must just have incredible make-up sex, because my God, they do like to piss each other off as much as possible. “Just keeping you on your toes, O’Brien,” indeed. He’s clumsy with people, but honest to a fault, and you know what? That does fit with his character. So not so much doing stupid things, but perhaps not thinking through where the conversation is going to take him. Yerk, which will really get him in trouble with Garak, who’s usually five steps ahead. Hmm.
Oh, and I read further, and yes you said that – he cares, but does not consider other people’s perceptions to the fullest. Yep, I agree, not that he doesn’t think it through, but that he can’t – he’s not good at people – some people just aren’t – but he’s a nice guy, and he’s there for his friends, so they back him up even when he steps on their feet, because sometimes you come to him with the revelation that you were genetically engineered and his only reaction is, “Oh, yeah? Well, you have to stand further back from the dartboard, then,” and it turns out your world wasn’t destroyed after all. (I love Miles O’Brien.)
Re: I’LL BRING POPCORN WHICH WE ALSO WILL NOT LIKE – first, I die, that’s totes adorbs, she said. Second, yep, that’s how these two seem to work, on DS9 or DD9 – you did a shit-tacular thing! Yes, I did, and here’s why. It was still really shitty! Yes, it was, and I’m not sorry. Fine, you bastard, I can see your side of it, see you for darts tomorrow! It didn’t always ring quite true on the show, but I think it’s only because it was a bit rushed sometimes with the episodic format. I can’t see anything breaking these two up, because underneath all the Miles being direct and Julian being dramatic, they’re both really just very good people who crack each other up and dork out to the same things… you don’t stop seeing a person like that. (Remember when Keiko came back from Bajor and Miles felt he had to spend all his time at home and they were both super lonely and Keiko finally did an end-run around them both to make them hang out because Miles was driving her nuts? You do? Squee, right?)
Oh – Orphan time discussion is still going on? Back to dA I go to fangirl~~
cucumber-s
