Icon from a picrew by grgikau. Call me Tir or Julian. 37. He/They. Queer. Twitter: @tirlaeyn. ao3: tirlaeyn. 18+ Only. Star Trek. Sandman. IwtV. OMFD. Definitionless in this Strict Atmosphere.
Past Tense (both parts) has got to be one of the most important star trek episodes, to me anyways, and is among my favorites. I was wondering how you all came up with that near-future setting seen in that episode? It is very evocative and believable. Im also curious, now that we are almost in 2024, if yall wrote that story as a "worst case scenario" or a "most likely scenario"-- and how close the 2022 we are in now matches the 2024 you all were writing about in the 90s?
A1) Umm, we just made it up. We looked around at where we were at the time (early days of the internet, 90s homeless crisis, rise of media tycoons like Ted Turner, etc) and tried to project some things forward. No real magic to it, just work.
A2) A mix of both, I think. The police now are even more militarized than we predicted, but the polarization is much worse. Sadly, I’m not sure the Bell Riots, if they actually happened in 2024, would move the needle for most people. Half the country would claim that the riots were faked or that the SD residents deserved what they got.
are any three little words more romantically devastating than “Not like this”
the bone deep agony of someone wanting something so, so, so badly and finally having it within reach but knowing that they’d never forgive themselves if they got it in This way, if they took it or were given it when it couldn’t last or wasn’t real or the other person is only giving for the wrong reasons, maybe doesn’t actually want Them, just Someone…
and having to say that they want this but…. but not like this.
You get it!!
Saying it desperately, brokenly, practically begging, knowing they have to stop this, have to get those three words out before they give in and accept this, even knowing they’d hate themselves if they did… Or worse, knowing the other person would hate them if they did… Ugghh
So many torturous ways. Is it said just before that first kiss they’ve been longing for for centuries and they have to pull away or make an excuse or just run lest they give in.
Or is it after that moment, it coming as a shock and they want so badly to given in and open up and just take but they couldn’t, they’d never be able to stop and it would kill them, like giving a dying man a sip of water before snatching it away.
How terrible and cruel the world must be to be so close and yet how very wrong it is, like this.
