Icon by @ThatSpookyAgent. Call me Tir or Julian. 37. He/They. Queer. Twitter: @tirlaeyn. ao3: tirlaeyn. 18+ Only. Star Trek. The X-Files. Sandman. IwtV. OMFD. Definitionless in this Strict Atmosphere.
Garak knows about the kind of kill for you, defy everything for you love. The one choice in his life he seems to fully own as his and his alone (in large part because it was made of defiance and not service) is to have that kind of love, and to kill for it. To be exiled for it.
Julian on the other hand, has such a gentle love. Not a foolish love, but one that I think knows the absence of certain elements, certain kindnesses. The kind of love that says you’re tired, I’ll get the dishes just as much as it holds the dying hand. It’s a love that takes your outbursts and still expects you to make recompense for them. It is not unconditional, but it is something.
And I really don’t think either of them really have experienced either and both find the other’s way of loving strange and a little frightening and a little intoxicating
Caption: [Oh boy, they are really going to town on them now! Fortunately, I have patience. Oh would you look at that, two in one day! Someone’s unhappy that I exist. Now you may be asking yourself, is there a plan to make everything as gay as possible? This is my welding hemet. This is my welding cap… do-rag… thing. That I wear when its not cold. This is my twenty two and a half pound homemade sledgehammer, that I call the genderizer. This is my tool stand. This is my collection of hammers that I have dubbed, my poly-hammery. So, yes! That is my plan to be as obnoxious and agressively out as I can be to balance out the agressive heterosexuality of my profession. Plus like I weld MIG and thats gay as fuc-.]
heres the ziyal family situation imo. kira is her mother her mom her mama bear. julian is her cringe uncle and garak is her fail uncle. jadzia is her fun step mom. jake and nog are her absolute bff besties. sisko and kasidy are like when you are friends with your best friend’s parents. molly is her little friend who she babysits with jake sometimes. d*kat is dead
I’m a drunk bitch rn babey so you get some thoughts on autistic Bashir because it’s me favourite headcanon and guess what? It’s my party and I’ll write if I want to
ANYWAY god you know what? I started thinking about this when I was watching the fucking electric hopscotch Allamarine count to fucking whatever episode and Julian shows up like “sorry I have uhhh misplaced my dress uniform” and honestly I’ve done that before too with clothing that I was supposed to wear but was a Bad Texture
So I like imagine a Julian who struggles with bad textures and clothing that is too restricting - the jumpsuit is fine, he can deal with that because it’s loose and comfortable and lined, but oh GOD does the dress uniform itch like a bitch. Plus the trousers that they have to wear with it now? Double Nope, why can’t they just wear tights like the old style?
After the whole shenanigans with the Wadi(?????), Sisko offhandedly orders Bashir to make sure he’s got a new dress uniform, and soon. He’s counted as a senior officer, and it’s an expectation. The thing is, wearing clothing that grates on your nerves with every movement is doable if you have enough time to prepare, but it’s exhausting. Couple that with the sorts of occasions where you’d be wearing one (important Starfleet ambassadorial social shit) and it turns into a complete nightmare of a situation.
Garak notices. Well, he notices something, because Julian is jittery as hell, he keeps squeezing his thumb into his fist, and tugging at his sleeves. So he’s not particularly surprised when Julian shows up one day, looking around his shop as casually as he can manage (not very, by the way)
It takes the better part of half an hour of dancing around the issue before he admits it, but it’s really the easiest thing in the world for Garak to design a new dress uniform for him, one that’s made out of something a little softer and thinner, something that breathes a little better, something that’s lined in a texture he can tolerate, with sleeves that edge just over his wrists. It’s barely noticeable until Sisko, fake-smiling at another idiotic function, reaches for Julian’s elbow to tell him something.
“That’s soft,” he says instead, and his eyes are slightly suspicious, then confused, then understanding, and he leaves it at that.
A couple of weeks later, Julian wakes up to his alarm, and three new duty uniforms. Jadzia feels like hugging him is suddenly nicer than before, although she can’t quite figure out why. Odo is fixated on the change for a while, convinced something fundamental has changed about Doctor Bashir, although he can’t put his finger on exactly what. Sisko refuses to acknowledge anything, having put all of the pieces together from start to finish on his own and wanting absolutely nothing to do with the situation. Julian, for what it’s worth, rehearses his thank-you for ages - the exact way he’s going to berate Garak for the blatant disregard for his personal privacy and security. Garak is flattered beyond words by this, and as they stand nose to nose, radiating irritation as their argument reaches its peak, he leans in.
