My contribution to DS9 Week, day seven prompt: Station Family
Feast of Stars
A Deep Space Nine poem
Link to it on AO3
It was warmth.
It was a filling, consuming fire that kept stomachs calm and heads pleasantly full.
The chatter, absent, carried around the table as bowls were passed back and forth with a story lilting through the air, a memory being made to be stored and kept.
The film would develop under the shine of the stars, written on and signed in languages familiarly foreign, shapes curling together to make their dining.
While the foundation was carved, the setting itself was woven from their own blood and heartache.
From late nights where tears should’ve been given and sudden bouts of absence when it hit.
From a laugh chiming through Quark’s and a smile rivaling Prophet Tears.
From righteous fury birthed out of necessity, forged into a blade that tore and left scars on their psyches.
It was hell. It was beauty.
It was friendship.
It was the reason they got up and kept moving, citrus to a cut, motivation toxic and needed.
It was a biting chill, locked together with the realization of doorways shadowed by wings.
It was the relief, that their meeting the dark wouldn’t be alone, and the guilt after at their solace.
And yet they continued, out of desperation or autopilot or determination or grief, they continued.
They crept, footsteps out of rhythm but worth the discord because it meant they were alive.
The breaking arm over their shoulder, the bloody handprint on their waist, it meant movement.
So they continued.
And they would, until shot through the skull, for each other.
That’s what made their tapestries.
Not just their sheddings, but the new underneath.
The squealing, writhing mass of unknown cosmos inside their chests shouting to save everyone.
Not just for themselves, but for one another.
The blossoming sparks lighting up their spines, sending kindness to all in their net.
It intertwined their neurons into a lace that draped over them, placemats and tablecloths.
The meal provided might have been mud and worms, yet with the company of each other, it just as well could have been for kings. It did not matter.
They were a brand new system, with a station as a home, and an ecosystem making for discoveries envied by most. That was all the food needed.
