I don't think I ever told you, but the entire Pi'maat series might not even exist except for this story. This was the first time that I read a fic about all OCs that wasn't a about a Starfleet crew on an adventure and it made me seriously think about writing up my own OCs that had been floating around in my head for years.
Re-reading it now, I still love it. Both of your main characters are really well drawn. I like how they're different, but complementary in their personalities. The worldbuilding is great, especially around Bajorian textiles and the recovery in general. Little details like the pollinators needing different plants that they don't have because the Cardassians poisoned the land really add to the texture of the story and drive home how devastated Bajor was by the occupation. But despite that (and the kidnapping, heh) overall its a very soothing story to read. I very much enjoyed re-visiting it.
Thank you so much, and no, you never told me that! I am so honored, because the Pi'maat series is incredible and, imo, a lot better done than this one. I reread it, and I love it, and I'm glad I wrote it, but I was definitely noticing a few places where it was. a bit clunky. I could tell that I had first started it a long time ago, and that my writing skills have improved over time. But of course (like most people) I'm more critical of my own writing than other peoples', and overall I still really love this one.
My original idea ... probably over two decades ago! ... was because I'd noticed that all interspecies pairings were human/alien, and so instead of pairing a Vulcan OC with a human, why not pair them with a Bajoran! And I had a whole other swathe of OCs who were going to interact with this--in my head, Spock's daughter is a priestess married to a Human Starfleet captain. There was a whole bit with that, like my Vulcan OC needed family permission, and since there was no history of marrying Bajorans she needed to be vetted and stuff, and so they took leave to go to Vulcan, and traveled on the starship captained by Spock's son-in-law.
Except by the time I got around to writing this, I had developed the Bajoran OC to be more than just a placeholder "why should the Vulcan marry a Human, surely there's interesting stuff to be done if the alien wife is a Bajoran instead!" and also learned about asexuality (and discovered that I was asexual and aromantic), and so there's almost nothing left of the original idea in this, just that the two main characters are a Bajoran and a Vulcan.
And you know me, I write stories partly as an excuse to show off my worldbuilding, so I had a lot of fun thinking through all the details.
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sixbeforelunch on Chapter 5 Wed 21 Jun 2023 01:13AM UTC
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Beatrice_Otter on Chapter 5 Wed 21 Jun 2023 02:41AM UTC
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