thisandthisandthis:
gods the first ds9 episode is so fucking raw. the dialogue between sisko & the wormhole aliens, the way his emotions just rise and fall and rise again with every memory that they push him into. you can see him understanding more through his own explanations. they ask, time, what is this? and he isn’t sure how to respond at first, because how do you explain a concept so basic yet complex? how do you explain the most vital, integral part of the nature of your existence to someone who has no frame of reference?
but as he speaks, his face lights up and he changes, because he’s understanding, now. not until this moment did he even have to think about how the nature of linear time so affects the human spirit! but as he speaks, he gets it! we are explorers, he says! the game isn’t worth playing if you already know what shape it will take in the end! and he only realizes the weight & beauty of what he’s saying as the words leave his mouth! linear time, the cycle of life and death, all of this, it’s so wonderful and sacred and intricate. but we don’t realize it, because to us, it’s just the default.
and with this realization he’s almost giddy, this is first contact and he’s learning more about his own species, and himself, just through this one dialogue! how incredible is that! but. but they keep bringing him back to the day that jennifer died. you exist here, they’re saying. and he doesn’t get it. until he does.
the sheer fucking power of no, it’s not linear. it’s not. that’s only how we perceive it. the realization of how trauma interacts with time, the way our own brains manage to subvert the laws of this linear existence and bring us back, back, back, to one moment, one searing moment, so that we just exist there, and we’re moving through this life getting physically older and older but in every other sense we are still living and breathing in that moment. it’s terrifying and still somehow unmistakable human.
and all of this in the first episode …whew.
yesimgaythanks:
dantooiine:
when the first episode of deep space nine has sisko explaining linear time to aliens and then it turns into an examination of how trauma manifests as a disturbance of linear temporality you know youre gonna be in for some Good Shit with this show
“Trauma manifests as a disturbance of linear temporality” is maybe the most validating sentence I’ve ever read
first-iotian-in-starfleet:
Star Trek: Deep Space 9 | Emissary | Hopeless Cause
