So I come on tumblr for the first time in Many Moons, this piece is at the top of my dash, and a bolt of inspiration hits like a freight train so here! Have a fic!
~
It is a warm rain, not unlike the first of the rainy season, however brief, of the meadowed regions of Vulcan; much less ferocious than the few but frightening desert storms much the rest of Vulcan faces. Earth has such storms; flashflooding, torrential rains that sweep the whole of the seeming endless sands, the taste of ozone cloying at tongue and thick in throat.
I'm so glad you enjoyed reading it!! I had a lot of fun writing it! I'm going to crawl through all your other work; the whole thing just about wrote itself with your work to set the scene, I could practically taste the rain as I wrote it xD
I have yet to get around to making an ao3; I should though! I've got a whole laundry list of wips I ought to finish and post xD maybe a place to post them will actually get me to finish em (one can hope)
So I come on tumblr for the first time in Many Moons, this piece is at the top of my dash, and a bolt of inspiration hits like a freight train so here! Have a fic!
~
It is a warm rain, not unlike the first of the rainy season, however brief, of the meadowed regions of Vulcan; much less ferocious than the few but frightening desert storms much the rest of Vulcan faces. Earth has such storms; flashflooding, torrential rains that sweep the whole of the seeming endless sands, the taste of ozone cloying at tongue and thick in throat.
It is a warm rain, soft and smattering and...comforting.
The first rains across all Vulcan are always celebrated - water in the desert is precious and all Vulcans know the danger of the dunes. To not mark the arrival of life-sustaining gift would be to not celebrate life itself and there is nothing - not even Sarek's own precepts - held in higher regard than life.
Spock is returning to his quarters after assisting the Academy's greenhouses with newly acquired Derizian River Vines - a sentient but not quite sapient species of flora with a marked preference for skin contact with handlers and a psi-positive touch.
Given the xenobotanical department's immense generosity in allowing him near-complete access to their diverse gardens since his cadet days and their subtle, though largely unnecessary, safeguarding of his person and privacy even beyond the walls of their greenhouses - he felt it only prudent to lend his aid in transitioning the vines from transport carriers to their more permanent places in the greenhouses.
His forearms still prickled from where the vines had gently wound around him and brushed against his mind - an entirely psychosomatic response but even so, to pull his sleeves down to their proper place would feel as abrasive and uncomfortable as if the vines had been covered with scratching bristles.
It is a response that will pass by the time he has returned to quarters and he finds the press of his PADD and the wash of the rain...soothing.
He gives half a thought to telling himself it is unnecessary to rationalize his actions to himself when they affect no one but - and do no harm to - himself. Self-reflection and introspection can wait; can have their time during meditation, not...now, when he has found a moment of near complete ease with himself.
He is waiting for traffic to stop to cross the road when he hears a quiet scuff, the rain ceasing to land on him though continuing its steady fall all around. He turns to the scuff and finds a widely smiling cadet holding an umbrella over his head.
"You shouldn't go out in the rain without something to shield you."
It was not advice given in condescension or even in ire, rather, a gentle reminder out of sincere concern for another person.
It does not escape Spock's notice that in shielding him from the rain the cadet has left himself without any cover of his own - and that the cadet is entirely unconcerned with it.
It is something Spock has seen in many Terrans during his time at Starfleet and on Earth, this simple selfless regard for others. Inconvenience and discomfort borne for the sake of another for nothing more than knowing they helped.
Spock has seen it in his mother - considers it one of her defining characteristics, in fact - and now he sees it in this cadet and Spock...wonders.
Briefly, because the cadet has offered his umbrella and will expect a response in that way Terrans do, but wonders nevertheless.
"No, cadet, that will not be necessary. My destination is a short distance away and the rain of negligible concern."
The cadet looks at him a moment, head tilting in a brief expression of keen contemplation, and then his smile returns, a softer expression than the bright grin he greeted Spock with.
"If you're sure, sir." Again in that sincere way, and the cadet nods towards the crosswalk.
In his peripherals, traffic has stopped. Spock nods in return and crosses the street.
The cadet had not pulled his umbrella back - had waited for Spock to leave its shelter himself.
The prickling the vines left had completely faded in the brief interaction with the cadet, but Spock does not draw his sleeves down to his wrists, no thought to even crossing his mind.
Spock has never encountered that cadet before and wonders if he will enroll in any of his courses. Spock's thoughts continue on such relaxed paths for the rest of his night.
Long home and long dried, he finds himself entering his nightly meditation with a before-unfound ease, finding nothing but memory of a kind smile and the phantom sensation of warm rain cooling on his skin.
Hello Everyone! To all my star trek fans out there: I need your help. My senior capstone paper is focusing on gender hegemony in Abrams star trek. While I think I've got a fairly comprehensive paper going on I wanted to ask for some help. If you could comment or send me a messages saying ways that you find the movies to be sexist that would be great. I'm looking a lot at male gaze and how the female crew is clothed as well as the women's character arcs in contrast to the men's. I'm also looking at how each of the men fits hegemonic masculinity, which is highly related to toxic masculinity. So if you have any thoughts or examples on how Abrams changed characterization to make each guy more masculine that would be lovely. This is just a way for me to grab ideas from others where I may have missed some things in the movies. Thank you all!!
I imagine you’ll cover Gaila, Carol Marcus, and Uhura extensively because they are the most blatant victims of sexism and the male gaze under Abrams, but Winona and Amanda are really done dirty. Winona is front-and-center in childbirth and trauma and then the time skips and she’s just gone; a brief mention of “being off-planet” and nothing else. No explanation, no interactions with her children young or old, nothing but the terrible implication that she is an absent and neglectful mother. Amanda is treated horribly within the story and by it; shunned and insulted and then soullessly killed for Man Pain™. Then there’s Nero’s nameless, pregnant wife who was also killed for the Motivational Man Pain™. There’s a deeper statement to be made about the treatment of motherhood and mothers themselves in the film but I don’t have the vocabulary or a complete enough analysis to make it xP
Beyond the treatment of women that are on screen, it’s telling in the treatment of the women that aren’t: namely Janice Rand, Christine Chapel, and Number One. Rand and Chapel who were both present in TOS with full arcs and personalities are completely missing excluding a throwaway line that establishes “Chapel is on the Enterprise, she’s just not important.” Number One, I could understand not being in the AOS given that she’s only briefly in TOS and doesn’t even have a name beyond “Number One,” but if the AOS can give Christopher Pike such narrative importance and character beyond what was present in TOS, then they could certainly give his First Officer something! Anything! But she is as absent as Rand!
As for the characterization of the men themselves, there’s good stuff on the Triumvirate in the replies already; Spock and his vulnerability being reduced to anger and violence, Bones and his more pointed anger with little care, Kirk Drift. The other that stands out to me is Admiral Marcus. Marcus, who in TOS was only a name and not much beyond that, becomes an intense, aggressive, war-monger with major screen time, plenty of monologing, and gross disrespect for all life and his daughter’s choices.
The AOS is sharper, harder, and more violent overall. Cornerstones of TOS, the hope and morality, pacifism and diplomacy are almost entirely absent. More ““”masculine””” and I cannot put that in enough sarcastic, eye-rolling, frustrated quotation marks.
I don’t know this was any help, but they were the things I thought of immediately.
my list, in no particular order, of when a soundtrack has absolutely went off it’s tits to give some of the best moments in any media.
infamous quicksilver scene from x-men apocalypse (”sweet dreams are made of this” playing as he saves everyone from the manor)
the inexplicable use of supermassive black hole by muse in twilight during the baseball scene
the scene in umbrella academy where five fucks up all those agents in the diner while “istanbul (not constantinople)” plays in the background
what’s up danger playing from into the spiderverse when miles takes the leap of faith
the start of spiderman homecoming when they played the orchestral version of the spiderman theme for the first time
sweet victory
“sitting there useless as two shits hey, turn around bend over i’ll show you where my shoe fits”
the part in rwby where they slingshot ruby at the nevermore while the final part of red like roses pt.2 plays, the guitars blaring as she goes up the cliff and ending with the beheading
“I AM MOANA”
busted from phineas and ferb
the end of guardians of the galaxy volume 2 where they start playing father and son
the part in thor ragnarok when hela asks thor “what were you the god of again?” before thor attacks her and starts going batshit crazy on the undead army while led zeppelin’s immigrant song plays
as this is by no means a comprehensive list, please add any soundtrack moments that were so Fucking Good they made you have a physical reaction.
This post revived me from the dead because I have Thoughts on Soundtracks and Feelings. My non-comprehensive additions to Moments that went Off Their Tits:
13. Kingsmen; wasting bigots to Freebird
13.5. Kingsmen 2; Take Me Home Country Roads sung and then the follow-up full orchestral version? For Merlin?? Tears.
14. Shrek 2; unparalleled castle siege to “I Need A Hero”
15. No Man’s Land
16. Man of Steel theme in piano (aka ‘What are you going to do when you’re not saving the world?’)
17. Labor of Love aka the two minutes of the first five of Star Trek: 2009 that had everyone weeping
17.5. ‘Sabotage’ in Beyond
18. ‘Binary Sunset’
18.5 ‘Duel of Two Fates’ in it’s entirety basically
19. Pirates of the Caribbean 3: ‘Hoist the Colors’
20. ‘Mulan’s Decision’ (the synth version from the movie, not the orchestral piece on the soundtrack)
21. First notes of ‘Go the Distance’ from Hercules
22. Sam Carrying Frodo Up Mount Doom
23. ‘Leaving Hogwarts’
23.5 Guitar riffs as the twins bust out in Order of the Phoenix
24. “Welcome to Jurassic Park.” DANANA NANA DANANA NANA
24.5. the soft piano version playing as the apatosaurus dies in Jurassic World
25. ‘Forbidden Friendship’; Hiccup and Toothless drawing in the dirt and the peak of the piece where the strings stop and the vocals hold and Hiccup reaches! and Toothless meets!
25.5 ‘Test Drive’! Flying! On! A! Dragon!!!!
26. All of Spirit: Stallion of the Cimarron score frankly, but none more than those sweet sweet ‘Homeland’ and ‘Running Free’ horns
27. “Let. My. Peo-ple. GOOOOO!”
#ITS TRUE AND YOU SHOULD SAY IT #(ALSO THORIN AND KILI BEING ‘UGLY’ BY DWARF STANDARDS IS AMUSING CONTENT)
further take: Kili is straight-up ugly by dwarf standards. Thorin is like, the dwarf equivalent of Benedict Cumberbatch. Some dwarves think he’s an absolutely dreamboat, others think he is super weird looking, there’s very little middle ground.
