#tolan garak

[qu33rtechwitch]

Tolan, pointing at young Garak: that's my boy

*Tain locks him in a fucking closet*

Tolan: oh no my boy

Garak (muffled): FATHER HELP

[lady-lazarus-13]

Letter from Mila - a ficlet

Rating: Teen And Up Audiences

Category: F/M

Relationship: Mila Garak/Enabran Tain

Archive Warning: No Archive Warnings Apply (but look over the tags!!!!)

Status: Complete - Chapter 2/2 (1,743 words)

Link: https://archiveofourown.org/works/66324469/chapters/171007795

Summary:

When Tain does not return, Mila prepares for the inevitable. She writes a letter to her son.

--

I got inspired by this Tumblr post by @abigbagofnope. Thank you so much @horrorfilmlesbian (furyofthetimelords) for being my beta and looking this over for me. ❤️❤️❤️

[searchingforserendipity25]

sometimes i forget a stitch in time is not canon-canon and could never have been set to tv and am i go rabid about the fact that there is no hebitian revival sub-plot in the series. anyway it's intolerable that there's no tolan garak flashback i can watch with my own two eyes and not just project it into my mind while staring at a wall.

[spocks-kaathyra]

A Stitch in Time thoughts

Part 1: about the Hebitians and sentimentality and Andy Robinson accidentally inventing the social model of disability again

So in one scene in the book, Tolan reveals to Elim that what he's been taught about the First Hebitians, the "primitive" civilization that lived on Cardassia hundreds of years ago, is a lie.

The Cardassian state claims that the Hebitians died out because they were too weak to survive the harsh world after the planet's climate naturally changed from tropical rainforests to deserts. When in reality, it was the early Cardassian invaders who drove them to extinction.

The truth is that the world is not naturally cruel. It is made cruel by cruel people, the conquerors and colonizers. The Hebitians were never inherently too weak to survive. There was nothing wrong with them, with their softness and sentimentality. The Cardassians created the harsh world that killed them.

Elim was taught that his sentimentality was an inherent weakness, something he must overcome to survive in their harsh world. But it's people like Tain who made their world so harsh, so unlivable for people like Elim, with "the soul of a poet." Everyone thinks the Edosian orchid is too weak to survive in their harsh climate. But Tolan proves that with love and care, it can. And by giving Elim the orchid tuber cuttings, he's telling Elim to practice loving, to practice nurturing.

Do y'all see the connection to the social model of disability. There is nothing wrong with Elim or the Hebitians!! It is society that creates a world they cannot thrive in, that makes sentimentality into a "disability" of sorts. AND the book goes on to say that WE have the power to create a better world. Now that the old Cardassia is in ashes, they start to create a kinder world, where orchids can thrive, where poets don't have to bury their hearts in the sand.

I think there are also further parallels to disability theory here. The way that they give Elim the wire because he scored too low on the enhancer (cannot withstand psychological torture as well as they want him to), "fixing" his "inherent weakness," but the thing is. The wire doesn't actually help him or improve his quality of life. It just makes him a more useful tool for the system, a better cog in the machine. In fact, it actively hurts him later. After years of grooming him to be the perfect cog, they toss him out, and the "tools" they gave him that were meant to make him a better cog harm him. Because they were never designed to help him. Of course the wire is a literal physical example but when I say "tools" it can just as easily apply to, say, teaching him how to repress his emotions, how to lie, how to distrust everyone. Which reminds me of how in the real world, the field of psychiatry often seems less focused on helping people and more focused on making people better cogs in the machine of capitalism.

ALSO obviously the Hebitian stuff is also abt racism. The way they're described as "primitive" and how the early Cardassians colonized them and how their relics are auctioned off to museums and how their cultural/spiritual practices are outlawed. But I think that's well-trodden ground in terms of analysis. And I could not find a neat way to tie it into this.

Sorry this is so disorganized and does not have a conclusion. There is more to be said abt this!! Please add on!!

[cardassi-art]

We’ve the Lovely Tolan!

I received a lovey comment from @qirunwei about seeing the Non-Dude-Bro military type cardassian and mentioned Tolan. I was inspired and wanted to draw him so here is the result.

Thank you everyone for your lovely comments it truly makes my day! I love these little guys.

[starsmadeofpaint]

Tolan

I think more people need to appreciate Elim’s wack, flower power, hippie uncle

[funnywormz]

3. Obscure headcanon for hmmm a DS9 character?

YAYAYAYAYAYAYAY THANK YOU FOR THE ASK!!!!!!

3. Obscure headcanon

although he's technically not a canon ds9 character (only in the ds9 tie-in beta canon novels), i have this one random headcanon that tolan garak is a trans man (and possibly lgbt in other ways too)! it's Extra Obscure bc he's already a semi-obscure character lol.

idk exactly how this headcanon started for me. ig it was through thinking abt mila and tolan, and how tolan was able to convince everyone he was mila's husband despite actually being her brother. ik they did it to protect tain and elim, but surely tain's enemies would be able to find out what was going on pretty easily bc ppl would have known tolan and mila when they were kids, right? so it got me thinking. what if tolan used to be mila's "sister", and transitioned in private and took on a new identity that way? and it just so happened that it aligned with mila and tain's plans to obscure elim's true parentage?

idk, it's kind of a crackpot headcanon, but one that i've gotten attached to for some reason. it also thematically could kinda tie in with the hebitian stuff and tolan being a more gentle and positive influence on garak, vs tain being the negative authoritative influence. like tolan could also represent a more accepting lgbt friendly kind of stance and would've accepted garak's queerness, whereas tain would probably want him to suppress it. idk if that makes sense.

to be clear i'm well aware that there's absolutely 0 evidence for any of this in canon, this is just a headcanon thing that i enjoy

[bijoumikhawal]

I am thinking about Tolan and how the fact that Garak had someone who loved him and wanted better for him and wanted to nurture the poet's soul inside him, and how that did not save him. Because one man cannot defeat centuries of genocide and authoritarianism.