In Light Of Mother's Day

Subversion Theory: Chapter Two Posted

Subversion Theory

Three years after the attack on Section 31 Headquarters, Control has the Federation on the brink. When the USS Discovery begins receiving encrypted transmissions from someone claiming to be Starfleet who seems to know everything about their enemy, Captain Michael Burnham sees one last shot to turn the tide. But as Control's obsession with her deepens and the boundaries between ally and adversary begin to unravel, its objectives evolve into something far more dangerous--and lead Michael to question if she's still in control of her own game.

Fandom: Star Trek: Discovery

Relationships: Michael Burnham/Airiam, Michael Burnham/Control, Michael Burnham/Nhan

Rating: Mature

On Writing & Rarepairs

One of my favorite aspects of writing characters is really trying to get into how their minds might work--and when it comes to pairings, I greatly enjoy making something out of nothing.

Prior to 2023, I wasn't a Star Trek fan. I had seen the newer movies, and as a lifelong sci-fi nerd, they were fun to watch, but I always preferred Stargate and Farscape. I've historically been one to connect with characters who are "different"--Seven, Scorpius, Airiam, Saru--and I was in the midst of a particularly bad mental health spiral when I happened to turn on Star Trek: Picard. Seven of Nine was immediately someone that piqued my interest, not only because she was canonically LGBTQ, but because she was clearly someone that had a backstory. This led me to Voyager, because I wanted to see that backstory.

Shipping Janeway and Seven dragged me out of a 6 year writing hiatus, and I started working on a fanfic, though I never intended to post it, and I never finished it.

In 2024, I started Discovery, and was completely unprepared for how much S2E09 would mess me up. I'm a sucker for a tragic character on a good day. Make it a character we didn't know much about, then add an emotional scene between her and the female lead who barely ever interacted and apparently this is all it takes--that and being a bit grouchy about rare pair voids. For the first time since 2017 I was able to not only write something, but FINISH writing it. And then write and finish five more. More than that, I was actually happy with how they turned out, and how my writing evolved as they went from a one-shot to the longest thing I'd ever written.

Sometimes it seemed strange to Burnham, feeling that Airiam was beautiful. She suspected not everyone did, that they might see Michael as defective or faulty for feeling that way about someone–some thing–like that. She knew from the outside it was easy to forget Airiam had once been human, had once looked just like every other human aboard Discovery, but they only ever saw the augmentations the Commander couldn't hide beneath the trim navy and silver Starfleet uniform. They couldn't see the rest, the places where metal and machine fused into the organic remnants of a woman who had lost far more than just her life.

Brains are weird, and they latch onto weird things. As terrible as I consider Discovery overall, I can't complain about the fact that it was able to bring something back to me I hadn't been able to do in many years. The fact that it has now also translated into letting me write my own original fiction again, and allowed me to get back into the HABIT of writing again, is something I will be forever weirdly grateful for. The last time I finished an original piece was 2007. I'm looking forward to changing that next month <3

Setting aside my crying for no Airiam but YAY PRETTY DISCO ART

six crews done now for this little project of mine :D

It's even better when you can look back through the story and see the exact moments where you changed your mind...

I haven't watched this show in years and I can still hear the way she says, "...and you don't get...bored?"

2.20, The Evil Queen 3.13, Witch Hunt

Winter: -Does winterish things-

The Northeast: "HOW DARE YOU???"

Me, while defrosting: "My characters shall also suffer this sub-zero misery."

Truer words have never been written!

"And fuckin' up motherfuckers is my game."

This show will go down in history as the biggest missed opportunity for the most genuine and incredible enemies to lovers WLW arc and it's been YEARS and I am STILL HEARTBROKEN.

I don't even remember if I finished the show but I do know I continued watching even after Hook came in because Lana is worth watching no matter what.

Ain't no way those motherfuckers put those bitches looking at each other like that and expected us to believe they weren't madly in love

"she didn't want anything to do with me"

"I have to say goodbye to the thing I love most"

And with those lines??

bonus points:

Me being an A+ graphic designer trying to figure out how to write about my characters navigating an upside down spaceship.

And as the Admiral "...people who LOVE YOU." 😭

Janeway in love with seven is like the most precious thing bc she keeps her emotional self kinda private from everyone on board but then *bam* SEVEN, anything to do with Seven and suddenly she's showing everybody her weakness unintentionally bc she's so deep for this woman she doesn't even realize she's telling the whole ship she's in love with her just by being in sevens court at every turn without any regrets. I love janeway. I love how janeway loves seven. I love how kathryn janeway allows herself to love seven, unequivocally.