Date: 22 May 2013 00:45 Title: The Battle of Bajor
Oh man. Worf goes down. Kira goes down. Sisko keels over (great word choice there, really enjoyed that). The scene was set wonderfully and Ezri's thoughts about Worf, about how Jadzia would have handled it, were quite humbling. I never got the sense in DS9 she ever felt guilty about things but here that feeling is quite genuine.
It was nice to see Nog, too, and the loss of the Defiant is, as always, a sad affair. Now ... where does Ezri go from here? What happens next?
Can't wait for more.
Date: 22 May 2013 00:40 Title: The Battle of Bajor
Damn. So much in so short a space. It really makes it all very stark. Such a huge thing to try and assimilate and understand. For Ezri and for the reader to take in so many upheavels. Real punch to the gut type stuff. Would love to see an expansionof this beyond the ficlet of course to get the real grit and gore and sense of palpable loss through.
Date: 22 May 2013 00:13 Title: The Battle of Bajor
I got chills with this one; not to mention the heartache. Her struggle pulls in all directions, and I love what you've done with it.
Date: 22 May 2013 00:11 Title: The Battle of Bajor
Frying pan, meet fire.
Oh, I can feel her confusion and her feeling like maybe she can't do this.
Well done.
Date: 22 May 2013 00:10 Title: The Battle of Bajor
This is so very well handled. I could feel Ezri's shock; it was like that feeling where you're underwater, and everything's muffled and distorted. Then it's like it snaps back into place when she has to give the order.
Talk about a gut wrenching piece. Everything about it was paced perfectly; each word landed exactly where it should, and how it should. Truly brilliant work, no kidding.
Date: 21 May 2013 08:34 Title: Ezri
This feels... so horrible and wrong. That he can order upon her a violation of her body and force a joining, it's just... awful. But it rings very possible. Probable. And on the other side, everyone's familiarity with Dax makes it even more painful.
Date: 21 May 2013 08:31 Title: The Battle of Kaskora
Oh, Jadzia.
She will ever and always break my heart, and so does this piece. Beautiful.
Date: 21 May 2013 07:09 Title: Ezri
Ouch! To be pushed into this, and not even so much for the good of Dax, but for the good of the war effort. Tough position to be in, but war is Hell, and one is expected to do one's duty, no matter the personal cost, so long as the greater good is served.
Date: 21 May 2013 06:52 Title: The Battle of Kaskora
Very vivid description of the battle, and painful and heartwrenching description of her need to protect Worf at all costs, despite her own injuries. Awesome writing.
Date: 20 May 2013 23:41 Title: Ezri
God. Tough call and really it feels like a scene we should have had in some sense somewhere on DS9. The lurch in Ezri's stomach that ahd to have been there when she realised what she had been called for. Damn. Worse still is that as much as it is dressed up in the importance of the symbiont it amounts in a large part to the need for the information Dax holds. That somehow makes it even colder, more clinical and all the more harrowing. It only actually strikes me how in many ways, this is forced on Ezri and one has to wonder at the parallels that can be drawn to that without getting too ugly - but from a forced situation it is easy to think of rape or think of it as some sort insemination or some kind reversal of an abortion. Quite chilling in its own way and one has to wonder how a host can withstand that.
Author's Response: I agree totally that I wish we could have gotten to see this on DS9. I hadn't necessarily thought of that when writing it, but you are totally right. In fact, I think that insight may change some of what is to come in these over ficlets! Thanks! And again, thanks for the comment.
Date: 20 May 2013 23:40 Title: Ezri
Wow, poor Ezri! I really feel for her here; the idea of being possibly forced into this is enough to give one a serious case of the heebies. (And losing Jadzia just sucks all around, let me tell you.) Very well written.
Author's Response: Thanks! I think they made it clear in the show that Ezri didn't get to choose her joining with Dax, and she struggled with it for a while. In my Restoration timeline, this happens much more viscerally and her struggles may have to take a back seat to what is to come... Thanks for the commment!
Date: 20 May 2013 23:35 Title: The Battle of Kaskora
And exhale.
Man worth the wait getting back into reading your stuff Sarine. Always it is a visereal experience, with either ground shaking events or some great plotical maelstrom or alien set piece. But always at the core are the characters.
A blindingly brilliant piece here and I just have to say I love the concept of the ficlets for the various lives of Dax. Awesome idea and here is the amazing execution of said idea.
Author's Response: Hey Miranda! Hope this means I will see you get back to Volume III now that I only have one chapter left to go! I'm hard at work on Volume IV by the way... :) Wow, your review is so kind! Some really touching words. For the challenge I only plan on writing for Jadzia and Ezri but I may continue beyond the challenge with the other hosts up to and including Haebron and Jasto from Restoration. Watch this space!
Date: 20 May 2013 20:56 Title: The Battle of Kaskora
Whoosh, quite intense and an interesting take on it all. If anything, good to see Martok went a warrior's death. It's always good to see the Jadzia/Worf pairing and here it read brilliantly.
Author's Response: Yeah, Martok had to go out with a bang! As I have said in some of the other comment replies, I loved Jadzia and Worf as a couple, so I was glad to be able to include them here.
Date: 20 May 2013 19:15 Title: Ezri
Oh, wow. You painted the battle scarred scene very well here, and Ezri-sweet little Ezri-didn't quite put it all together and until she was told about Jadzia. I like this slant you have here ... instead of Ezri volunteering for this, even grudgingly, it seems that she's gonna be forced to accept Dax as part of a war effort. That's a different take and one I actually find more believable than the canon version of these events.
Well done and looked forward to more.
Author's Response: Yeah, it seemed obvious to me that there was no way they would keep Dax out of the war with the pivotal role Jadzia had played on DS9 and the pivotal place DS9 held in the Dominion War. Thanks for the comment, hope you'll enjoy tomorrow's "serving". :)
Date: 20 May 2013 18:05 Title: Ezri
Big choice for Ezri (but ... no pressure!).
Author's Response: :) Love your comment! Thanks!
Date: 20 May 2013 17:50 Title: Ezri
Oh, Ezri. Such a difficult, life-defining moment. No one should be forced to make it so quickly. But war is hell, and sometimes a single awful moment alters your destiny completely.
Author's Response: I always regretted the fact that we didn't get to see this happen in the show, especially as they made it clear that she struggled with the joining. In doing research for this ficlet, I discovered there is a short story dealing with it I may have to look up... Anyway, thanks for the review, glad you liked it and I managed to get across the idea I wanted.
Date: 20 May 2013 01:27 Title: The Battle of Kaskora
:( So crazy. A very, very hopeless and dark feeling to this piece. Enough explanation of what happened, that it's easy to fill in the blanks with your imagination and get a very vivid picture of what is happening. Can't wait to see what else you do for the challenge, whether it's related to this or not.
Author's Response: Thanks Templar! What you say about the filling in of the blanks is the main challenge of these ficlets and so far all of the ones I have read have done so well at doing that, so it means a lot that you would say that! All of the ficlets for the challenge will be related, following the events of the Fall of the Federation (touched upon at quite some temporal distance in my Restoration stories) through the Jadzia and Ezri hosts. Hope you enjoy them!
Date: 19 May 2013 23:43 Title: The Battle of Kaskora
A sad and scary beginning indeed ....
Author's Response: Thanks. Not sure if you have read any of my Restoration stuff, but if you have you may know that it isn't really going to get any better as time goes by...
Date: 19 May 2013 22:32 Title: The Battle of Kaskora
NOOOOOOO, not Worf.
*sadface*
I like the way you stick us right in the middle of the battle scene, and right in the middle of Jadzia hanging onto Worf for dear life. Their romance was one of the highlights of DS9 IMO, and when she died it sucked big time. Seeing the reverse here, seeing Worf dying ... it still sucks. The pain is well described and brings me right there with her.
Well done. Look forward to more.
Author's Response: No spoilers, but Worf's fate may not be as clear cut as you think. So glad to see that I'm not the only one who loved the Worf/Jadzia relationship. It was difficult getting everything I wanted in to these short paragraphs, but from what you said I think I managed it. Just. :) Hope you enjoy the contiuing ficlets!
Date: 19 May 2013 22:21 Title: The Battle of Kaskora
Aw, this is heart-breaking! I love Jadzia, always have, and her thoughts and feelings as she's trying to keep them both alive are excellent here. War is hell. You did well conveying that.
Author's Response: Ditto, SL, Jadzia is and was one of my all time favourite ST characters. And IMHO the most attractive and sexiest as well (just throwing that out there... :) ) Glad that what I wanted to get across in this ficlet got across. Thanks for the comment!
Date: 19 May 2013 21:24 Title: The Battle of Kaskora
Yikes. Tremendously well-written. You really painted the scene here. You can feel Jadzia's strength even in physical weakness, and her love for Worf. Worf losing Alexander in battle is heartbreaking, although it no doubt assures his son's place in Sto'vo'kor.
Also, you can really get a sense of the damage and death around them through the little details you added.
I wonder if they survive this. Can't wait to find out.
Author's Response: Thanks kes! I always loved the Jadzia-Worf relationship, it is the one relationship he had that made sense for his character after K'Ehleyr (had to look up that spelling on Memory Beta three or four times to type it out right!) and so I find writing that part of the scene relatively easy. I'm glad the little details did what I wanted - wow, writing to a 500 word limit is HARD! :) Thanks for the comment.