dark_sinestra

Garak

Quark's Bar

 

Garak didn't know exactly what possessed him to go to Quark's. The place was all but deserted, with most of the civilian population of the station evacuated to Bajor. The mood was positively sepulchral. He approached the bar for a glass of kanar, only to find Quark in a particularly annoying and unsympathetic mood. He sometimes wondered how Rom stood his brother at all and found himself oddly grateful in that moment to be an only child, even if it was of a dysfunctional tyrant like Tain had been.

 

He listened to him whine and moan about how he should have gone into the arms trade. He honestly couldn't have cared less. Worry had made itself home in every inch of his body, he had the beginnings of one of his accursed migraines, and he had no idea if anything of his government yet survived. He had no idea if Julian would make it back in one piece. It rankled him to think of the doctor going off to battle when he was forced to stay behind, useless and fretting like an old woman.

 

“Take a sip of this,” Quark said, pushing a brown, foamy drink closer to him.

 

“What is it?” he asked, suspicious. The foam reminded him of salt scum on the sea, and the smell coming from the glass was revolting. The name, “root beer”, didn't exactly inspire confidence, either. Against his better judgment, he gave it a try, finding it foul beyond belief. It was bad enough that he was as tormented as he was, but now Quark wanted to torture him? He briefly regretted that he hadn't simply shot the Ferengi and Natima Lang when he had the chance long ago. Rom could've gotten the bar, and maybe, just maybe, the civilian dissident movement wouldn't have survived her death.

 

No, he realized that in his own way, Quark was trying to be sympathetic. They had something in common, after all, a mistrust of and yet a reluctant respect for the Federation. It was such a slender thread to place all of his hopes upon, and yet it was all he had left. He watched Quark take a sip of the root beer and grimace. At least the bartender was an equal opportunity offender.

 

He was just about to have another kanar, because the first hadn't managed to kill the cloying taste of the root beer, when a red alert alarm sounded. Knowing what it had to be, he took his leave and hurried to his shop to arm himself. If the Klingons were here, it meant that the Defiant must be here with passengers. He checked the charge on his disruptor and tucked it into his belt at the small of his back.

He waited to see what would happen next, and his patience was rewarded. He saw more Cardassians than he had seen in a very long time being herded from the docking ring and led down a side corridor toward the nearest H-ring. He didn't let the sight of Dukat deter him. As he headed off after them, he managed to find Julian in the throng of officers taking up positions and inclined his head to him, putting as much of his gratitude as he could in his gaze. He hoped that he would have time to thank him more properly later. As it was, he was relieved to see him not only in one piece but handling himself like a consummate professional.

 

Dukat greeted his approach with derision and skepticism, but he changed his tune when Garak drew his disruptor. As tempting as it was to give the man a reason for his mistrust, Dukat was simply too skilled and valuable to waste over a grudge. He took up position beside him and two Starfleet security officers, prepared for the onslaught he knew in his bones was coming.

 

Klingon warriors materialized directly into the corridor. The four standing guard outside the door leading to the room housing the Detapa Council immediately began firing. It was no good. The numbers were overwhelming, and the Starfleeters were the first to drop. The Klingons closed to melee range, but they couldn't use their bat'leths to full advantage, running the risk of hitting one another instead of Garak and Dukat if too many advanced at once, nor could they shoot for risk of hitting their own men. Idiots, Garak thought with scorn. No sense of tactics. If these were Cardassians, we'd be in real trouble.

 

Dukat wrenched a bat'leth from his closest opponent and hacked through his armor, dropping him messily. Garak used his disruptor as a blunt weapon, striking his foe across the face and backing him up far enough to get a shot off to his gut. He never had enjoyed hand to hand combat, and he couldn't resist expressing his distaste, any more than Dukat could resist the opening to bait him. Is this it? He thought with grim humor. I'm going to go down with that annoying voice in my ears? I don't think so! He redoubled his efforts and saw a satisfying flash further down the corridor. “They've raised internal shields,” he told Dukat, “which means they probably have the external ones back online, too.”

 

“Let's finish them,” Dukat said, a predatory gleam in his blue-gray eyes.

 

He needed no prompting, the two of them proving together exactly why and how the Cardassian Union became such a power in the quadrant in such a relatively short amount of time. When his disruptor was knocked from his hand, Garak swooped down and seized a family dagger from the belt of one of the fallen, thrusting up through the diaphragm and into the heart of his attacker. His lips peeled back from his teeth in a silent snarl. Soon only he and Dukat stood in a corridor lined with the bloody dead and dying, both of them cut and bruised, but fully intact. Breathing heavily, they eyed one another with grudging respect. They made quick work of those still breathing, giving no quarter to those who expected none, and dropped back into defensive positions without another word, waiting for the next wave that never came.

 

Shielding in the corridor shimmered and dropped just as a contingency of security and medical personnel rounded the curve with Doctor Bashir and Nurse Decla just behind the Bajoran officers. Garak discarded the dagger as though it were trash and fished his disruptor out of a tangle of bodies. He straightened as Dukat said, “Better late than never, I suppose. Sorry to disappoint you if you expected Cardassian casualties.”

 

Garak exchanged a look with the doctor and suppressed a smile. He was glad to see that Julian was long past being intimidated by the pompous windbag. Not to say that Dukat couldn't be dangerous, but there was no reason to fear him in situations like this.

 

“Don't be ridiculous,” Julian snapped. “We're glad you made it, all of you. Please, tell the council members to let us inside to check on their welfare. We've managed to repel the Klingons. They've withdrawn from Bajoran space and called off their attack on Cardassia Prime.”

 

Garak noticed that Dukat sagged slightly with relief. He felt exactly the same way. Dukat tapped his wrist comm and passed on the news to those waiting inside. The door slid open, and the medical personnel filed in. Despite Dukat's accusations that he was there to curry favor, Garak had no desire to linger long in the presence of most of the council members. Many of them were enemies of Tain and wouldn't hesitate to pass that enmity on to him. He slipped away unnoticed and made his way through the deserted H-ring toward his own quarters. He wanted to wash the Klingon blood from himself. He knew he could have his own minor wounds tended later. Cardassia was safe for now. That was all that really mattered.

 

Decla Lisane

Temporary Shelter

 

Lisane fanned out with her co-workers to take readings of the elderly civilians. She walled herself behind her professional demeanor, staying focused on her task rather than thinking of how it felt to be surrounded by that many Cardassians. Some were grateful. Most regarded her with the haughty demeanor she remembered all too well from the occupation. She wondered how many of them had taken part in it in their pasts, how many of the people she tended had Bajoran blood on their hands. She saw a heavy set man with iron gray hair standing off to the side and seemingly following her movements without trying to be obvious about it. Feeling impatient, she straightened to confront him, only to feel her heart leap into her throat. Feylan! “Come on,” she said to him, her voice thankfully not betraying her. “Let me have a look at you.”

 

They stepped off to the side in the crowded room, and he stiffly sank to a seat against the wall. “You may have to help me back up again,” he told her, his gray eyes fond.

 

“What are you doing here?” she hissed under her breath, going over him with her tricorder, her hand shaking.

 

“I see you still have a temper,” he said, rumbling a low chuckle.

 

She glared at him, feeling as though her eyes would bulge from their sockets. “And you still don't take things nearly as seriously as you should. Did you not get my message? Do you realize that Garak was right outside with a disruptor? He could've killed you.”

 

He smiled faintly, almost touching her but seeming to think better of it at the last minute. “I've missed you,” he murmured.

 

“Don't. You're going to make me cry. We can't talk about this here,” she whispered fiercely. “You're fine,” she said more loudly and stood from her squat. She clasped his cool hand, so large it completely engulfed hers, and helped to tug him to his feet. More than anything, she wanted to pull him into her arms and never let him go again. She stepped back. “I'll find you later,” she promised and hurried away to finish her job.

 

She kept a sharp ear out for Dukat's conversation with some of the senior council members. It sounded as though they intended to get back underway for Cardassia as soon as possible. She couldn't blame them. The longer they were away, the more frightened their people would become. They had enough unrest and instability on their hands without this. She didn't care about Cardassia at all, but anything that threatened Feylan's safety worried her tremendously.

 

She lingered and finally found the opportunity she was looking for. “Doctor?” she caught Bashir's attention and took him aside discreetly. “I'd like to take that patient back to the infirmary briefly. He's on medication that he wasn't able to bring with him.” She subtly indicated Feylan.

 

“Of course,” he said, distracted.

 

She took Feylan by the elbow and led him from the room, waving away the security officer who tried to accompany them. “I've got him,” she snapped and shot the younger man such a glare that he didn't question her.

 

When they were out of earshot and alone in the corridor, the elder Cardassian spoke quietly. “I never wanted to leave you, Lisane,” he said. “But I had a duty, and...as I'm sure you've guessed by now, I had a family.”

 

“You don't have to explain yourself to me,” she said tightly, looking straight ahead. “It was war.”

 

He stopped her with a hand to her arm and turned her to face him. Even so much older, she still found him unbearably beautiful. “I want to. I want you to understand that my marriage has always been one of convenience. There is little love lost between me and my wife, although I love my children. I loved you. I still do, and I owe you my life.”

 

She inhaled, intending to negate the debt, but he put a finger to her lips. It stilled her more surely than if he had gagged her. She felt tears sting her eyes and once more fought the impulse to embrace him.

 

“You were never one for listening to sense,” he said, his voice gruff with emotion, “but you're going to listen to me now. You're not going to argue. You're not going to fight me. You're going to let me do something for you, and you're never to speak of it to anyone, or you'll make it all for naught.”

 

Fingers of panic coiled about her ribcage. She had no idea what he was talking about, but she could tell it wasn't good. “Feylan,” she breathed.

 

“No,” he said more sharply then eased his tone. “Listen to me. This Garak of yours isn't after me, Lisane. He's after you. He has hard evidence that you helped me to escape. You know what the sentence is for collaborators. You'll be exiled from Bajor.”

 

“No,” she said, shaking her head, wide eyed. “I saw the file. I'm telling you, he intends to ruin you. You'll lose your family, your title; you'll be in disgrace. Your people don't bat an eye at liars, but they're not kind to those who get themselves caught.”

 

“This is my choice,” he said with the full authority of his long experience and position, his gaze laser focused upon her. “I'm going to tell my people what I've hidden from them for decades, about my captivity. I'm going to tell them how I feigned my own death with an overloaded phaser and how I only recently discovered that the resistance fighter I thought I killed in the blast survived. I'd rather admit my duplicity myself than be exposed by a Bajoran. I failed to relocate and destroy the cell that captured me. I am unworthy of my title of Legate, unworthy to lead Cardassia. I can only hope that my family one day forgives me for the shame I've brought upon our name.”

 

She choked back a sob, bringing a hand to her mouth. This can't be happening, she thought. How can this be happening? “You can't do this,” she said, her voice wavering. “Not for me.”

 

“There's no one else I would do this for,” he said, cupping her cheek gently. “You've suffered enough at the hands of my people. I won't have you stripped of your very home when you just got it back.” He slipped his hand to the back of her head and drew her close, resting his forehead to hers. “No crying, now. You don't want me to cry, do you?”

 

It was the only thing he could have said to stem the tide trying to break free. She clamped down her control and stepped back, quickly swiping at her eyes. She knew that there was no way to talk him out of his decision. The least she could do was to support him honorably. “No,” she said. “I never want to see you cry. I love you too much for that.”

 

“One other thing,” he said, turning and tucking her arm in his as they walked. “I want you to promise me that you'll stay away from Garak. What little I do know of him makes me afraid for you. I don't want to know what you did to incur his enmity, but if it's true, that he's ex-Obsidian Order, you've gotten off lightly.”

 

Lightly? She thought bitterly, I'd rather that he had killed me a hundred times over than this, a thousand. “I promise,” she said woodenly, the words tasting like ash in her mouth. When they reached the infirmary, she took him into the back and fetched a pill bottle from the shelf, counting out a few pills and tucking them into a packet. “They're pain killers,” she said, “in case your knee acts up later.”

 

He smiled warmly and took them. “You remembered,” he said.

 

“I remember everything about you, you idiot,” she retorted. A moment later, she gave in to her desire to hold him tightly. His girth was much greater than she recalled, and he no longer smelled of dust, unwashed clothing, and an unwashed body. How had she ever managed in imagination to substitute Garak for this reality? For the first time in close to two decades, probably for the last time ever, she reflected, she felt truly safe, wrapped in a strong, loving embrace. Her husband had never managed to give her this. Was that how the occupation had marked her deepest, ruined her for anyone other than a Cardassian? Before she could stop herself, she felt tears spill down her cheeks. She forced herself to let him go. “What will they do to you?” she asked.

 

“Disgrace, but not death,” he said. “I know you won't understand this, but in a way, I've always felt this was coming. I'm...relieved. My lies never sat well with me. I should have brought troops back and killed all of you.” He held up a hand quickly. “I'm not saying that I'm sorry I didn't. I could never harm you. But I shouldn't have lied. I shouldn't have spun a tale of heroism that wasn't mine to tell, and I should never have accepted the promotion to Legate. I should have retired long before I did.”

 

“That's rubbish,” she said harshly. “Your people need men like you. Good men! Not people like Garak and Dukat, two snakes in the grass if ever I've seen any.”

 

“Even snakes have their uses,” he said gently. “Those snakes saved our government and our lives. I'm not quick to discount that, despite my personal feelings. Kiss me once, and then let me go. They'll come looking for me soon. I need to get back home.”

 

She kissed him tenderly, pouring every bit of love into it that she possibly could. She knew that she would never see him again and that he was about to face isolation and scorn similar to that which Garak faced on the station, only it would be from his own people, his own wife and grown children. She wanted him to have something recent to help warm his nights, however small and insignificant in the bigger scheme of things it might be.

 

“You're still magnificent,” he said against her lips, sighing contentedly. “I'm glad I had the chance to see you again. I'm glad you survived us, and I'm...”

 

This time she stilled his lips with her finger. “Don't say you're sorry. It's not your apology to make. No matter what happened to me or how horrible things were, I've never been sorry I met you, so don't you dare.”

 

She walked him back to his people, setting her features to the cool dispassion that had served her so well in her life. No one who saw them together seemed to think twice of it. Most of them were too distracted with the events of the day to pay close attention to a Bajoran nurse, and none of them had reason to suspect she had any connection whatsoever to Feylan. Thanks to his sacrifice, they never would.

 

Garak

Private Quarters

 

Garak re-watched the anonymous subspace transmission from Cardassia, a planet-wide feed broadcast about the disgraceful lies of formerly respected, former Legate Feylan Pa'Ren. He saw his elderly wife denounce him and discard her marriage bracelet with a dramatic gesture in front of the main court house of Cardassia City, the gathered adult children turning their backs. He heard Dukat himself comment on how shocked and disappointed he was to see that such a well known servant of the people had stooped so low as to self-aggrandize his service during the occupation, but he praised his courage in coming clean without force or coercion. Garak snorted softly at that part.

 

Civil unrest had followed for the rest of the day and well into the night, demonstrations, vandalism, fires. Fury thrummed his veins. It had never occurred to him that Pa'Ren would sacrifice everything for a woman he could never be with. He had thought for certain that the man would contact Decla and plead his case. Everything in his file showed him to be conservative, a traditionalist. Then the Klingons had come along and put pressure on an already volatile situation, like throwing gasoline onto a fire. He made a recording of the transmission onto a data rod, boxed it, wrapped it in pretty paper with a bow, and marched himself straight down to the infirmary.

 

Julian smiled when he saw him. Decla glared daggers from behind the doctor. “Have you come to let me fix your face?” the doctor asked. “You know, Dukat insisted on getting patched up before they left. Why did you just disappear like that afterward? Some people were looking for you. They wanted to thank you.”

 

“I need no thanks for serving Cardassia,” he said smoothly. “It's a privilege I cherish. I couldn't dream of bothering you this morning, Doctor, not for anything so minor. I'm sure that Lisane can do it, if she's so inclined.”

 

The venom in her eyes turned the green to an apple shade. “Is that for me?” she asked, indicating the box.

 

“As a matter of fact, it is,” he said, if anything even more pleasant than with the doctor.

 

“You shouldn't have,” she said, taking it and seizing his elbow in a vise-like grip.

 

“I trust I'll see you at lunch?” he asked Julian over his shoulder.

 

“I wouldn't miss it,” the doctor said, shaking his head at the two.

 

As soon as they got into an exam room, she had the computer shut and lock the door. “You have a lot of nerve,” she growled, slamming the box down on the counter top.

 

“Be careful with that,” he said sharply. “It's the fruit of your labor. You should be very, very proud of yourself. You've helped to destabilize Cardassia further, quite the feat for a nobody former resistance fighter from the Lonar Province.”

 

“My labor? You're the one...”

 

He launched at her and banged her head against the door, a hand at her throat. “No, you're the one,” he snarled, so furious it was all he could do not to kill her. “You're the one who couldn't leave well enough alone. You saw something you wanted, a Cardassian to satisfy your sick needs, and with no thought to who you hurt or how you did it, you went about trying to ensure that you attained it. When that didn't work, you weren't satisfied. You decided to try to take from me the one thing left to me that matters to me, and if the doctor were even slightly weaker, you would have succeeded. You would have shredded a person who had done nothing to you but reject you because of your hurtful manipulations.

 

“You knew what I was. You knew what I would do. Despite knowing it, you bedded me anyway. You had to know it wouldn't work, that I would never give up my rightful claim of vengeance for a worthless piece of Bajoran tail. For you!” He slammed her head against the door again, harder. “A truly good man gave up his life, everything he has and is on Cardassia, for you, for a pathetic, sick, waste of flesh who can't even feel anything if it isn't rammed down her throat or up her ass hard enough to hurt.”

 

She swallowed thickly against his hand, every word excoriating her to the core. She didn't want to see what was in that box of his, but she knew she'd open it. That is, she would if she survived his rage. She wasn't entirely sure there was any guarantee of that in that moment. Part of her didn't want to.

 

“I've been very good about shedding old habits since coming here,” he dropped his voice dangerously. “You'd never know it now, but I was once extremely easily offended and so vicious even my superiors felt the need to curb my...enthusiasms. Pa'Ren has been demoted and disgraced for his complete and utter stupidity at letting his sentiment override his common sense and his sense of duty to the state. At a time when he was needed most, he decided to turn from a pragmatist to a bleeding heart romantic. Having sampled your questionable charms, I can't for the life of me fathom why, but there it is. What do you think will happen to him if it comes out that in coming clean with one lie, he told a far worse one, just to save garbage like you?”

 

Although she hadn't been able to step past her own self-loathing to fear what he might do to her, she deeply feared the further threat to Feylan. “You can't do that! You can't make everything he did for nothing,” she said, hating the plea in her own voice.

 

“That is precisely my point. Everything he did was for nothing. For you, and not just he but my people have suffered for it. You offend me. Your presence on this station offends me. I feel a relapse coming on to some very bad, very nasty habits. I fear Feylan Pa'Ren won't survive them.”

 

“What do you want?” she asked, trembling violently. “I'll do anything. Anything for him.”

 

“Leave this station. Don't ever come back. Don't ever let me so much as hear your name or see your shadow. I promise you, if you try to avenge yourself or him over this, he will be executed within forty-eight hours. I don't need influence to make that happen. All I need is information, information I already have.”

 

He released her so suddenly that she sank to her knees without the support. She could hardly breathe; she had never seen such deep rooted malice, such naked hatred. She didn't doubt for an instant that he would do everything he said. She realized that Feylan had been right. This was the most dangerous man she had ever known, and she was lucky—they both were—to escape his wrath alive.

 

He watched her, quivering with suppressed violence, and stalked over to take a seat on the edge of the bed. “Do your job. Breathe a word of your real reason for leaving to anyone, and Feylan is not the only one who will pay the price for your stupidity. I'll leave you alive long enough to watch the aftermath. You'd be surprised who I managed to dig up while conducting my little investigation.”

 

Her hands were shaking so badly it took both of them to hold the dermal regenerator steady. He studied her for any signs of resistance or deceit. All he read was naked terror. Good. He had broken her. He had seen some manage to rally themselves from the depths of such emotion to cause trouble later. He didn't believe she'd be one of them. She genuinely loved Pa'Ren, probably more than she genuinely hated herself. As long as Pa'Ren lived, she'd be neutralized, and if he died, well, it was as he said. He had contingency plans.

 

His satisfaction didn't touch his regret at having inadvertently harmed Cardassia. He'd be a long time smarting from that, his miscalculation and mistakes. When she finished with him, he said, “You have two weeks,” and let himself out without a backward glance.

 

Julian

Replimat Café

 

Julian watched Garak eating, finding himself staring overly long at the hands that always held such fascination for him. He had several things that he wished to say, unsure of how to go about saying them without provoking the Cardassian's testiness or sarcasm. It doesn't matter if you do, does it? It's not about how he reacts. It's about what you want to express, he thought. Bolstered by that thought, he cleared his throat. The man's blue eyes lifted immediately, his attention focused. “I think...it's very unfair that you're still here,” he said carefully.

 

Garak wiped his mouth with his napkin and set it aside. “Eager to see me go?” he asked coyly.

 

“You know better,” Julian snorted. “What I mean is that I don't believe that Gul Dukat killed all those Klingons alone, and he wouldn't have even known Klingons were coming for him if it weren't for you. Surely he doesn't have so much influence that he can make the others keep you away?”

 

The tailor smiled slightly. “Your knowledge of Cardassians may be considerable for a Starfleeter,” he said, “but there's much yet to learn.”

 

“Then I suppose I should be grateful you're still here to teach me,” he said, forcing a smile. He knew that Garak wouldn't appreciate pity, but he truly felt bad for him and angry that his people had such little gratitude toward someone who had risked everything to save them.

 

“I'm grateful,” Garak said carefully, “to all of you who risked so much for my government. Cardassia may never formally thank you or acknowledge it, but I'm aware of what you risked. I plan to speak to Captain Sisko about this as well, but I wished to tell you first.”

 

His smile turned from forced to genuine in an instant. “I was glad to be able to do it. I'm lucky to have a commanding officer like the Captain. I'm lucky to be here, period. Speaking of being here, Nurse Decla just turned in her resignation and said she's going back to Bajor. You wouldn't happen to know anything about that, would you?” He lifted a brow.

 

Garak looked surprised. “No,” he said. “Did she say why? She seemed fine when I spoke to her earlier today.”

 

He shook his head and rolled his eyes. He should have known better than to expect anything forthcoming. If he were the betting sort, he'd lay a wager that Garak and whatever had been in that pretty little box of his had everything to do with it. Honestly, he was simply so glad to see her go that he had no intention of looking into the matter if Garak wasn't willing to speak of it. “There's one other thing,” he said. “I meant to approach you about this before the two of you broke things off, but one thing after another conspired to distract me from it. She used her medical override code in your quarters. You may want to be certain she didn't access anything sensitive.”

 

The tailor laughed lightly. “My dear Doctor, the only thing she would have found on my computer are business records, inventory sheets, and tax forms. Of course, there's also a wide selection of excellent Cardassian literature, but she wouldn't have needed an override code to access it. I'm not concerned, but it's very kind of you to tell me.”

 

“In other words, you already knew about it, and you've taken care of it. I should have known.” He chuckled and took a bite of his food. “Why do I have the feeling I ought to thank you?”

 

“Thank me? For what?” the tailor asked, blinking.

 

“For removing a thorn from my side,” he replied after swallowing.

 

“I'm sure I don't know what you're talking about,” Garak said, his eyes wide, “but if I did, I'd tell you that you're most welcome. It's always a pleasure to be of service to you.”

 

“What am I to do with you?” he asked, feeling a warm surge of affection. It was refreshing to see that no matter how much things around the station had changed, Garak was much the same as he ever was, slippery, wily, and unwilling to take credit even when it was due.

 

The Cardassian fixed him with a look that made his palms slightly damp and set him to tingling places he didn't need to be tingling for a friend. Garak leaned closer, his voice pitched for Julian's ears alone. “When you figure that out, Doctor,” he said, “I trust you'll tell me?” He leaned back and beamed at him, a knowing gleam in blue eyes.

 

Julian nodded slowly, toying with his fork and unable to look away. “I promise you,” he said, “you'll be the first to know.”

 

The End

Julian

Quark's Bar

 

Julian knew that he ought to head to Garak's. His third ale into his bar sitting, he still hadn't made the move. Leeta wasn't anywhere to be seen, either already off shift or perhaps occupied at some private party Quark occasionally hosted in one of the back rooms. Dax saw him and approached, taking a seat on the stool beside him. “So,” she said, leaning in to bump her shoulder against his, “spill.”

 

“Spill what?” he asked, taking a swig of the ale.

 

“Why were you so eager to get rid of me last night?” she asked.

 

He knew he'd have to face that question sooner or later. He tried his best to be casual. “I don't know. I suppose I was just enjoying her company, and I wouldn't have been as able to get to know her with somebody else at the table.”

 

“You were flirting,” she said.

 

“There's nothing wrong with flirting,” he said defensively.

 

“You're right. There's not,” she said entirely too agreeably for him to trust it. Her next words confirmed his suspicion. “At least if your relationship is secure, and you both have an understanding that it's no big deal. What do you think Garak would say if he saw you flirting with a dabo girl?”

 

“Quark seems to think he'd break my neck,” he said glumly.

 

Dax's eyes flashed. He could tell she was still angry about what he had told her. “He had better not even think about it,” she said. “Still, if it made him angry, don't you think that would be reasonable under the circumstances?”

 

“Probably,” he said, polishing off his ale. “As much as I appreciate what you're trying to do, I'd just as soon not talk about it. This is something I need to work out for myself.”

 

“Fine,” she said, signaling Quark and ordering a colorful drink Julian wasn't even sure he could pronounce properly. “Why don't we talk about something else, like Doctor Lense? You must be excited about seeing your old school mate.”

 

“Just thrilled,” he said flatly. “I just recalled that I promised Garak we'd talk about something important tonight. I had best get to it.” As he slid from his barstool, he thought he caught a flash of a knowing smile from her and wondered if driving him back to Garak's hadn't been her intention from the start.

 

He chimed the Cardassian's door three times. He was about to ask the computer for Garak's whereabouts when a very distracted sounding, “Enter,” had the door sliding open to admit him.

 

He felt bad when he saw dinner sitting out, some of the sauce congealed in a very unappetizing way. Garak barely acknowledged him, tapping away at his comm with an intensity he hadn't seen in him since before the raid. Curious but unwilling to interrupt his concentration, instead he cleaned up the cold food and replicated himself some hot. “I'm sorry I'm late,” he said. “I had a late patient.”

 

The tapping stopped, and Garak twisted to eye him reproachfully. “If you're going to lie, it ought to be something I can't easily verify. I already checked with the infirmary over an hour ago.” To Julian's surprise, he turned back to his comm and began the typing again instead of pressing the point.

 

“You're not angry with me for lying?” he asked.

 

“I'm irritated that you didn't even put any effort in it to be creative,” he said airily. “If it matters that little to you, you may as well have told the truth.”

 

“I was at Quark's, having a few drinks,” he said, suddenly not very hungry anymore. “What are you doing?”

 

“Just a little research into the latest fashions on Risa,” the tailor replied. “They do set summer trends for a large portion of the quadrant.”

 

“I don't believe you,” he said, pushing his plate away and standing to approach him.

 

“Mm,” Garak said, hitting a couple of display buttons and shutting the entire screen down. “That's a pity. There was a particularly daring shirt that would suit your frame perfectly.”

 

“I think we should take a break,” he said, surprised at the words coming out of his own mouth.

 

Garak stood and turned to face him. “I thought we already tried that,” he said. “It lasted four days. We had three amazing days after that, and then things got awkward and stayed that way. Admittedly, lunch was pleasurable today, but only for as long as we weren't talking.”

 

Feeling a little light headed, he said, “I mean a break from the relationship entirely.”

 

“For how long?” the tailor asked, his eyes hooding.

 

Julian sighed. It was so hard to talk to him when he shut down like that. “I don't know,” he said honestly. “I just need some time to think about things. You'll be glad to know that the document I filed isn't official without your signature. You're not bound to me in some uncomfortable way.”

 

“I'll be happy to know that, will I?” Garak asked. “Funny, Doctor, I'm not the one proposing a break. You are, so why would I be happy?”

 

“You didn't seem happy with the idea of doing it in the first place; career suicide you called it, if I recall correctly,” he said, folding his arms.

 

“Yet I agreed, to make you happy. So, you don't know how long you want this supposed break. Can you at least tell me to what end? Do I cloud your thinking so terribly that you simply can't do it if we're together?”

 

“Truthfully? Yes, you do. There are times you start talking, and I no longer know up from down or left from right. I know you've been trying to protect me since that night. It's not making things any better. It's making them worse. I don't want some bland, safe yes man to cater to my every whim and desire, agree with my every statement, and back off at my first sign of discomfort. I didn't fall in love with that man. I fell in love with you,” he said.

 

Garak made a soft sound that may have been frustration or something more complicated and closed his eyes briefly. “I don't know what you fell in love with, Julian, but it most surely wasn't me,” he said heavily. “I think we've established that beyond any doubt.”

 

“You expect me to believe that the violence is more real than anything else you've shown me?” he asked, incredulous.

 

“No,” he said. “But there's no pleasing you. I'm too rough or not rough enough. I keep too many secrets, but when I tell you the truth, it's not the truth you want to hear. I'm too accommodating or annoyingly contrary. I've tried my best to find the middle ground, but there is none with you. We're not just speaking different languages. Our very thoughts and emotions travel in completely different channels. We couldn't be less compatible if one of us were Vulcan and the other Andorian.”

 

“You really believe that, that I'm the one never satisfied?” he asked.

 

Garak nodded. “So why don't we be truthful this once? Calling this a 'break' is insulting to my intelligence. You want to leave. After everything I've put you through, I can hardly blame you. Actually, I'm relieved.”

 

“Relieved?” Julian asked, frowning deeply.

 

“Yes, relieved,” the tailor answered. “When I decided to give us another chance, I told myself that come what may, I wouldn't do that to you again. I wouldn't be the one to break it off, no matter how bad it might get. I let myself believe that if I allowed myself to love you, we'd bridge the large divide put between us by our respective cultures. It was naïve of me, which goes to show, I suppose, that one is never too old to be naïve.”

 

“You're such a liar,” he said to him, feeling his throat constrict, “and you're breaking my heart. Stop it. You don't want this. Say you don't want it.”

 

“Why? So you can throw it back in my face and walk out that door anyway? I think not,” he scoffed. “If you want revenge, you'll have to be more subtle than that.”

 

“This isn't about revenge! God, you're doing it again, and I'm walking right into it,” he said, feeling disgusted with himself. He stepped closer to him. “Do you get that I'm telling you I'm about to walk out that door, and when I do, we're done?”

 

“Yes, dear, you made that quite clear,” Garak said, his eyes glittering.

 

“And you expect me to believe that's what you really want?” he asked.

 

Garak drew in a deep breath and let it out. He finished closing the distance between them, and to the doctor's surprise, he wrapped his arms loosely about his waist. “So I beg you to stay,” he said softly, his expression almost as gentle as when he was making love to him, “and I know you will, for a while at least. You never could bear to see me in pain. We'll continue this deteriorating cycle, fuck each other senseless, and sooner or later wake up to realize we hate each other, except when we're fucking, perhaps even then, and we'll lie to ourselves and call it passion.”

 

He wanted to deny it, but the words froze before ever reaching his lips. Those eyes had never looked so blue, or so sad. He couldn't look away if he tried. Lifting his hands, he rested them against the deep chest and felt the slow, steady heartbeat strong beneath the tunic. He couldn't recall his lover ever using such crude language, even in the heat of passion. The tailor was more often than not elegant and refined. He didn't know what to say.

 

“I'd sooner have it end this way, while we still love each other, than when it gets to that point, and I believe that you would, too. Lie to me all you like, my darling, but please don't lie to yourself. That road leads to ruin. This isn't a break. This is the break,” Garak said.

 

“I didn't want this,” Julian said, his breath hitching.

 

Garak tilted his head forward, resting his forehead against the doctor's. His breath came warm against his lips. “I'll be here as much or as little as you need me to be,” he whispered. “I could no more turn my back on you than you could a patient of yours. We're just not compatible lovers. I don't want to lose you altogether. Stop being stubborn, dearest; I'm agreeing with you for once, honestly and openly.”

 

He wrapped both arms around the man and squeezed, burying his face against the cool, scaled neck. How was it possible that both of them could try so hard and fail so spectacularly? He wanted to weep, except that all of it wound itself tightly in a ball in his chest to the point that it physically hurt. He felt lips in his hair, and then a cheek resting against the curve of his skull. Garak held him until he was ready to pull away. “I don't know what I'm going to do,” Julian said miserably.

 

The tailor lifted a hand and cupped his cheek, stroking downward with his thumb. “I have every confidence that you'll figure it out,” he said. “You should go. We're only prolonging the inevitable, and I need some time alone. I wasn't expecting this quite so soon.”

 

“But you were expecting it?” he asked, his nose tickling and his eyes stinging. The threatening tears were getting closer. Garak hesitated and nodded. “Don't you ever get tired of being right?” Julian asked, chuffing a laugh that very nearly turned into a sob. Yes, it was time to go.

 

“More than I can say,” he said, giving him a final squeeze and then pushing lightly against his chest with both palms flat. “Go. We'll see one another. We'll talk. We'll be the friends we should have stayed all along. You'll see.”

 

Julian nodded and turned, actually managing to make it out into the corridor before tears blurred his vision. Garak may have wanted to be alone, but he didn't. He desperately didn't. This time it wasn't Dax's company he wanted. He didn't think he could take being held tenderly and stroked. He needed colder comfort, preferably something in a bottle and someone who wouldn't let him curl into a ball of abject misery and pain. Even though it was getting late, he headed in the direction of Miles' quarters and reached up to scrub at his eyes. The crying could come later.

 

Garak

Private Quarters

 

When the door closed, Garak let himself go. Feeling for the chair behind him, he sank into it and lowered his head into his hands. No matter how much of a brave front he put up for Julian just now, this was the one thing he had hoped wouldn't happen. It felt as though everything that had meaning to him was falling away, leaving him to stand alone, a cold pillar of stone in a raging sandstorm. There was no solid ground, no shelter. His tenuous thread of hope that the Warbird might not have been destroyed could snap at any moment. His past had caught up to him and cost him his present and his future. That old Elim was the worst enemy he had ever had and now too distant to be called back for his strength.

 

Instead of burying himself back in his new research or retreating to the safety of the demands of the shop, he forced himself to sit exactly where he was and feel everything running through him. If he flinched or turned his back on it, it would consume him. That break in his control that Julian had so hoped to see finally arrived, long overdue. He wept until he felt he had nothing left inside and then climbed into his bed fully dressed, so exhausted that when he slept, he didn't dream.

 

Julian

Miles' Private Quarters

 

“Come in,” Miles answered the hail through the comm.

 

Julian stepped into the quarters that had increasingly taken on the appearance of a bachelor pad the longer Keiko and Molly remained on Bajor for Keiko's botany survey. Spare parts littered the top of the dining table and a mate-less sock draped over the back of the sofa. “Where are you?” Julian asked.

 

The engineer emerged from the back, wiping his hands on a greasy looking rag. “I was in the workshop,” he said, the “workshop” in question the bedroom he had shared with Keiko. “Bloody hell,” he exclaimed as he drew closer, “what's wrong wit' you? You look like you just lost your best friend.”

 

“No talking,” Julian said tightly. “Drinking.”

 

Eying him a moment more, Miles nodded and crossed to his sideboard, uncapping a whiskey bottle and pouring into two lowball glasses. Julian sat heavily on the sofa and accepted his glass. Miles sat beside him and set the bottle on the coffee table in easy reach. “So, what're we drinkin' to?” he asked.

 

“Nothing,” the doctor said, starting to raise his glass to his lips.

 

Miles stopped him with a hand to his wrist. “You can't just drink to nothin', Julian,” he said. “'S bad form.”

 

“Then you pick,” he said morosely.

 

“All right,” the Irishman said, looking thoughtful. “I have it. T' whiskey, women, an' darts.” He cocked a side glance at Julian. “Good enough for you?”

 

“Perfect,” he said, not caring one way or the other as long as it meant he got to down the drink. He did so in one gulp and leaned to pour himself another. The strong liquor burned him all the way down and started a small fire in his belly. “I hope you're not going to insist we come up with something for every glass,” he said.

 

Miles grunted. “No, just every bottle.” He grinned and tossed back his drink, letting Julian pour him a second. The two of them made fairly quick work of the first bottle and started on a second before the engineer let his curiosity get the better of him. Slurring a bit, he asked, “So's this about that dabo girl, or th' doctor comin' here on the Lexington?”

 

Julian blinked several times. “Who told you about all of that?” he asked, then held up a hand. “Don't tell me. Dax,” he said, irritated.

 

“You're half right,” Miles said. He decided to forgo his glass since he was having a hard time aligning the bottle neck over the top of it and swigged directly from the source. “Dax told me about th' doctor. Quark told me about th' dabo girl.” He slid off the couch onto the floor, looking more comfortable there. Julian joined him.

 

“Quark!” Julian snatched the bottle from Miles' grasp. “That disgusting little toad! What'd he say?” he demanded.

 

“I don' remember specifically,” he said, waving a hand dismissively. “Tell you th' truth, I didn' take it all that seriously.”

 

He tried to focus through his drunken fog, setting the bottle aside and almost tipping it over as he pulled his hand away. “Miles,” he said very seriously, leaning closer to the man and fixing him with huge eyes, “this is very important. What...specifically...did Quark say about me and Leeta?” If word got back to Garak, the man would almost certainly assume that Julian broke it off with him in order to pursue a new relationship, and that would destroy any chance they had of remaining friends. When Miles reached for the bottle, he snatched it out of his reach. “You can have this after you remember,” he said tartly.

 

“You don' have to be such a scab,” the engineer said with a scowl. “It was his usual malarkey. He was takin' bets on how fast Garak would find out th' two o' you had been flirtin' and whether he'd kill you for it or not.” He snorted a laugh and reached for the bottle again.

 

Julian crabbed backward out of reach, sloshing a bit onto his uniform and coming to an abrupt halt as his back hit the soft chair behind him. “And you didn't...” A belch came up, interrupting his ire. “Didn't see fit to tell me about this?” he demanded.

 

“O' course not,” the man shrugged and rolled to his knees to crawl forward, intent on the bottle. “Quark does these sorts o' things all the time. It doesn't mean anything.”

 

“I left Garak tonight,” he said. “If he hears that...”

 

Miles stopped advancing and sat back on his heels, whistling low. “Julian,” he said, clearly shocked. “It's not true, is it?”

 

“No!” he said impatiently. “She...we flirted a little, but I had no intention of doing anything. But if this gets back to Garak, how's it going to sound to him?”

 

“I think you know the answer t' that,” he said, leaning forward suddenly to swipe for the bottle, over balancing, and falling onto his face over Julian's legs.

 

“Shit,” the doctor said, more out of concern over Garak than the clumsy entanglement. He helped right him and thrust the bottle into his hand. “I've got...I've got to go. Got to tell him...”

 

“No! Are you a bloody idiot?” Shifting to his side, Miles propped himself on an elbow and leaned his back against the base of the sofa. He swigged with his free hand, some whiskey dribbling down his chin and onto his vibrant blue shirt. “Y' do that, then he's goin' t' believe it for sure!”

 

“I don't understand,” he blinked at him blearily.

 

“Th' worst thing you can do wit' gossip like that is t' give it weight. The harder you deny, the more guilty you look. Trust me. I've been there before. If he comes t' you about it, then you say it's ridiculous, an' you leave it at that.” He rested the bottle against his chest, nodding sagely.

 

“So you're telling me,” Julian said, bending forward to reach for the whiskey, only to have Miles play keep away, “that if this was happening to you, and Keiko were the one in danger of hearing such a rumor, that you'd completely ignore it until she said something to you?”

 

An odd look came into the hazel eyes. “That's exactly what I'm tellin' you,” he said.

 

Frowning and scratching at his chest, he sat back and tried to puzzle out that look. “What?” he finally asked.

 

“What what?” Miles retorted, lifting a brow.

 

He gestured in a circular manner, largely because he couldn't hold his arm steady. “That...look you got when I asked you about Keiko. Has somebody been spreading rumors about you?”

 

“Pff, it's nothin',” he said, shrugging it off and lifting the bottle for another swig.

 

Taking advantage of the opportunity, the doctor leaned forward and snagged the neck. They struggled for a few minutes, grunting and cursing at each other, only to spill the remains over the carpet. “Now look what you did,” Julian said.

 

“What I did? Y' bloody bastard, you're th' one who got all grabby!”

 

“I can't seem to do anything right lately,” he said, his mood turning maudlin. He sat back against the chair base again and drew his knees up in a loose hold, resting his chin on a forearm.

 

Rolling his eyes, the Irishman struggled to his feet and staggered toward his sideboard. “Look, I'm gettin' another bottle, so don't start that. If I've learned anythin' in my life, it's that when it comes to relationships goin' wrong, nothin' is ever entirely one person's fault. You're far from perfect...”

 

“Thanks ever so much,” he interrupted him dryly.

 

“You gotta keep perspective,” he said with a humorous twist of his mouth, staggering back toward Julian and sitting beside him. “Move over,” he said, nudging until they could share the chair base as a resting spot. He placed the bottle with exaggerated care into his hand. “As I was sayin' before I was so rudely interrupted, bein' with you is no bed of roses...”

 

“Miles O'Brien, how would you know that?” he asked crossly. “You've never been with me.”

 

“You keep interruptin' me, I'm going to take that bottle back and kick your skinny arse to the curb,” he said gruffly. “I'm...” he struggled to find the word, then shrugged. “It's easy to tell that just from bein' your friend. You're no picnic on the Shannon, but neither is Garak,” he said, seeming satisfied with himself for making his point.

 

“You wax so poetic when you're drunk,” he said, amused in spite of himself. “You're no cruise down the Thames, yourself.” He uncapped the bottle and took a long drink. His nose and lips were long past the point of numb, and he could no longer really taste the whiskey. His whole body felt too warm, so he reached up and unzipped the top part of his uniform.

 

“I'm not, am I?” Miles asked, his lips twitching as he snatched the bottle back for a swig. “Then why're you here?”

 

He mustered as much dignity as he could in his state and said, “I suppose the Thames is overrated sometimes.”

 

Miles grinned and pawed him over the back of his head, ruffling his hair. “Nicest thing you've ever said to me, I think,” he said, offering the bottle back.

 

“I'd better not,” he said, holding up his hand flat. “As it is, I don't think I'll be able to find my quarters, much less walk there.”

 

“Then stay here,” he said, shrugging. “Y' can sleep in Molly's bed or on th' couch.”

 

Those tears that he had done such a good job of keeping at bay caught him by surprise and slid from the corners of his eyes. “That's too kind of you. I don't deserve such kindness.”

 

“Hey now,” the Irishman shook his head and wrapped an arm around his shoulders, pulling him in with a rough squeeze. “None o' that. That's th' booze talkin', you hear? Whiskey never said anythin' smart. Why don't we go ahead an' get you settled while you can still move?”

 

“In a bit,” he said, taking more comfort from the warmth of his friend at his side than he cared to admit. It was what he needed, gruff affection that didn't make him feel fragile, only supported. Tentatively, he rested his head on Miles' shoulder, pleased that the man didn't shove him away; instead he just settled a little lower so that he could lean his head back comfortably against the chair seat. Neither of them moved again until morning, an unpleasant awakening of hangovers, sore necks, and in Julian's case, a uniform stained with more than just whiskey since he had never changed from the day before.

 

“God help me,” Miles groaned as he sat up, reaching both hands up to the back of his neck.

 

“I can't do much for your neck, but I can give you a hangover cure,” Julian said, leaning away from him and rubbing at his own neck.

 

“You're answering t' 'God' now?” the engineer asked wryly. “Always said that ego of yours was out of control.”

 

“Very funny,” he snorted. His mouth tasted about like he imagined that lone sock on the couch might. He replicated both of them something for their hangovers, zipped his uniform up, and left in pretty short order, turning down the offer of using the shower. It wouldn't do him much good to shower and then don a dirty uniform. He'd still smell like sex and booze. With that thought, he felt a small eruption of panic. What if someone with a sharp sense of smell saw him leaving Miles' quarters? That was the stuff of the worst sorts of rumors.

 

He couldn't relax until he made it back to his quarters with no one seeming the wiser. The place looked and felt empty. “Better get used to it, Jules,” he said quietly. “It's what you asked for, after all.”

When morning arrived, he checked himself out very early. He knew he was out of danger now, and he didn't want to run the risk of encountering Nurse Decla. The less she knew of the situation, the better for both of them. He thought of going to Garak's quarters, but he couldn't bring himself to face him, not quite yet. He also rejected his own quarters. It was possible the man could be there waiting for him. Was he still afraid? He had to admit to himself that he was. He needed to talk to someone, see a friendly face. He desperately needed outside perspective. As he ran through the list of everyone he knew, the choice was a simple one. He made his way to Dax's quarters and hesitantly rang the chime. It took a second ring before her sleepy voice came through the comm. “Who's there?”

 

“It...it's Julian. I...shouldn't have come so early. I'm sorry,” he said, feeling completely idiotic. He should be able to handle his own problems, not go running to someone like a frightened child when something went wrong.

 

“No, it's OK,” she said, sounding a little more awake. “Come in.” The door opened and he stepped into the darkened quarters. The lights came up suddenly, and Dax padded barefoot from her bedroom in a plain white nightgown that came down to her knees. She covered a yawn. “What's going on?” she asked.

 

He opened his mouth only to feel his face contort. No, he thought fiercely, don't you dare cry!

 

She hurried the rest of the way to him. “Julian?” she said, her brows dipped downward in concern. She cupped his face lightly in both hands. “Tell me.”

 

“I can't,” he said, shying away from the touch. His eyes stung, and tears dropped heavily over his lower lashes.

 

“Oh, sweetie,” she said, pulling him into an embrace that he didn't fight. He felt mortified, but her uncomplicated kindness wrung the pain of the past twelve hours from him effortlessly. She held him tightly and gently stroked the back of his head. He felt safer than he had in days, and it hurt all the worse because he knew he shouldn't feel safer with a friend than with the man he loved. Everything was upside down. “You need to tell me,” she said, quietly insistent and pulling back so that she could look at him.

 

The concerned blue gaze burned him, his shame almost overwhelming. He tried a few times before he could get out, “I had a fight with Garak.”

 

“I'm sorry,” she said gently, stroking his cheek. “You know, he just went through something really terrible. Maybe he just needs some space. I don't think he'd leave you for good.”

 

“He didn't leave me,” he said. The understanding dawning in her eyes made him wish that he could crawl into a hole. He had never felt so humiliated in his life. What had possessed him to come to her? “I shouldn't have come here, you know. I really am fine.” He tried to smile, feeling his lips tremble.

 

“Did he hit you?” she asked, her voice gentle but her eyes hard.

 

“No, he...not exactly,” he answered, squirming under that gaze.

 

“What exactly did he do?” she asked. Her grip on him tightened.

 

Instinctively, he jerked back, eyes wide. That hold felt too much like Garak's. “I..it's nothing, OK? I really shouldn't have come!”

 

“Julian, listen to me. You have nothing to be ashamed of. Do you understand me? This isn't your fault. Whatever you did or said, he had no right to harm you. Are you all right? Have you gotten checked out at the infirmary?”

 

He nodded and mumbled, “It was just some bruising.”

 

She guided him to sit on her sofa and replicated him some tea, putting the mug into his hands. Sitting close beside him on the couch, she said, “Has he ever done anything like this to you before?”

 

“No,” he said, not lifting his gaze from the reflective surface of his tea. The night they got back together was different, wasn't it? It had to be. He had enjoyed it. Only because you wanted him so badly you'd have accepted almost anything if it meant having him inside you. He closed his eyes.

 

She rubbed soothingly over his back. “I'm glad you're all right physically,” she said. “You can't...tolerate this, you know?” she asked carefully. “I'm not telling you how to live your life, but things like this...they have a way of becoming a pattern if you're not very careful. Garak can be forceful, even by Cardassian standards. If he's suffering from some sort of imbalance after his ordeal, he could be extremely dangerous. I'm worried about your safety.”

 

“He took me to the infirmary,” he said. “He felt terrible about what happened. I...I pushed him, Dax. You know how I can be.” He hazarded a glance at her.

 

She took the tea out of his hands and leaned forward to set it on her coffee table. Straightening, she took both of his hands between hers. “I know that no matter how much you've ever managed to annoy me, I have never once thought about hitting you or harming you for it. The only justification he could ever have for hurting you physically is if you attacked him first. I know you well enough to know you didn't do something like that.”

 

“Sometimes I wonder what I'm doing with him,” he whispered miserably. “I...keep trying to tell myself that we can make this work and find a way to be happy, but something always happens to get in the way. This loss of his, whatever happened on the raid, has him torn apart. All I want is to be there for him, but he has this stiff Cardassian pride that just... It's as though everything that feels normal, right, and rational to me is anathema to him. I don't know how to handle that. I feel useless, and I wonder if being with me makes him happy at all, or if it's just that he can't stand to be alone.”

 

She shook her head. “I don't know the answer to that. I do know that you can't stay with someone who abuses you. It's possible this was a one time thing. I'm not suggesting that you ought to pull up stakes and leave him right away, but Julian, if it happens again, even if he just makes you think it's about to happen, you need to get out of there. People get killed by people who supposedly love them all the time.”

 

“I know,” he said heavily. “As a doctor, it's not as though I've never seen things like this before. I just never thought anything like it would happen to me.”

 

She squeezed his hand. “Do you want to stay with me a while? I'll be happy to let you, or if you want to talk to Odo...”

 

“No,” he said. “I'm not...I'm not quite ready to take that step. If I press charges, there's no going back from that. I don't believe this is the real him. I think he's in so much pain and under so much stress that he briefly snapped. I just happened to be a convenient target. You're entirely too kind to offer to let me bunk with you, but you know it would lead to far too many questions,” he said, finally able to offer her a small, genuine smile. “I swear to you I have no intention of letting him abuse me. I'm going to have a long, hard talk with him, and if anything like this does happen again, I'm through with him.” He sounded more certain of that than he felt, but he could only take things one step at a time, he thought.

 

“I'm really honored you came to me with something so difficult,” she said, leaning in and kissing his cheek. “I promise that nobody is going to hear about this from me. I know I have a reputation as the station gossip, but I can keep my mouth shut when it's important. If you need to talk or you need a safe place to stay, my door is open to you any time.”

 

“Thank you, Dax,” he said, drawing her into a tight embrace. “You're a good friend. I don't know what I'd do without you.”

 

“Oh, you'd manage,” she said casually, pulling back to smile at him, “but you wouldn't have nearly as much fun.”

 

Garak

Garak's Clothiers

 

He wasn't surprised that Julian didn't come by that morning. If anything, he'd be surprised if he ever had anything to do with him again after the terrible things he had said and done to him the night before. It was as though the old Elim, the one Tain took so much pride in, resurfaced for one final hurrah before lying down and staying buried. Shame didn't begin to cover what he felt for what he had done.

 

The shop was finally starting to look like it might be usable again. He had managed to clean away the soot and debris. He wouldn't be able to replace the glass himself, and he had more clothing racks on order. He was about to go through the bolts in the back to see if anything was salvageable when Lieutenant Dax strode through the open doors. “Lieutenant,” he started to say, only to find himself backed straight into his broken counter and bent back forcefully, a hard forearm tight against his throat.

 

“Garak,” Dax said, her voice thrumming with fury, “I'm very sorry for your losses. By the way, if you ever lay so much as a finger on Julian with the intent to hurt him again, you'll be wishing that Odo had gotten to you first, because I'll shove you straight out an airlock, and I won't particularly care if you're still breathing right before it happens or not.”

 

He lay very still beneath the press, even though he could have thrown her off of him had he chosen. It hurt him to think of Julian having to go to the Trill because he was too frightened and confused to come to him. However, he was grateful he had such a good friend to comfort him and come to his defense. “I assure you, Lieutenant, I will never harm him again.”

 

“You'd better not,” she said through gritted teeth, drawing back and pulling him straight with her fists balled in his tunic. She smoothed it back down and eyed him speculatively. “Are you getting help?” she asked.

 

“Help?” he asked, confused.

 

“Yes, help,” she said as though he were a particularly stupid child. “For your grief. Clearly, you aren't doing a good job managing it on your own. I suggest you find somebody to talk to professionally. If you can't bring yourself to do that, then open up to Julian. The only reason I didn't march straight into Odo's office to have you hauled in the moment Julian left my quarters this morning is because I know you've been through hell, and I want to give you the benefit of the doubt for Julian's sake.”

 

He dropped his gaze to the floor and nodded. She was right. He had lost control precisely because he was trying too hard to hold onto himself alone. If he didn't start doing something constructive to relieve that pressure, he'd explode again despite the best of intentions.

 

“You're nodding. Does that mean you intend to do what I said?” she asked.

 

“Yes,” he clarified. “I'll do as you've asked, assuming Julian ever wants to speak to me again.”

 

She frowned. “I have to admit there's a part of me that wants to let you wonder that,” she said. “You deserve it, but it won't help anything. He loves you, and he still wants to be with you. I'm more than a little terrified that he'd let you do something like whatever you did to him again and still stay with you.”

 

“He...didn't tell you specifically?” That surprised him.

 

“No,” she said, her eyes narrowed. “If you're smart, you won't tell me, either. I'm too angry with you right now to be sure I'd control myself.”

 

He nodded. “I appreciate your candor and your self-control. I'm...sorry.”

 

“I'm not the one you need to say that to,” she said, turning then and leaving him.

 

He rubbed absently at his throat, wishing half-heartedly that she had taken it further. It was the least of what he deserved. He knew that he'd have to be the one to go to Julian. It wasn't fair to expect him to come to him. He determined that as soon as the doctor got off work and got settled in his quarters, he'd do just that.

 

When the time came, it wasn't so easy to follow through. He paced his own quarters nervously, wondering if he should take some sort of gift and then rejecting the idea as seeming superficial. I'm sorry I almost killed you. Have some flowers. He grunted in self disgust. Palandine's husband had been a selfish brute. On more than one occasion he saw telltale bruises on the woman he had never imagined would tolerate such treatment from anyone. He recalled how helpless and furious he felt when she made excuses. Had Julian made excuses for him to Dax? What right did he have to beg forgiveness?

 

“Stop being a coward,” he growled and stalked from his quarters. He had no right to expect anything at all from the doctor. He did, however, owe him a sincere apology. Whatever happened as a result of it was entirely up to Julian. He'd abide by any decision he made.

 

His hand trembled slightly when he lifted it to ring the chime. The, “Enter,” that greeted him sounded tense. He stepped into the quarters and found Julian seated at his dining table in such a way that the width of the table buffered him from anyone at the door. He was still in uniform and had his hands clasped loosely together on the table top. The grip tightened when he looked at Garak. “Sit down,” he told the tailor, nodding at the seat opposite him.

 

Garak did so, his mouth feeling dry. “How did work go today?” he asked tentatively.

 

“No,” the doctor said. “We're not going to do that. We're not going to sit here and make small talk until we can work up to what we need to talk about. What you did to me is completely unacceptable.”

 

“I know,” he breathed. “And I...”

 

“You'll get to say whatever you want to say when I'm done,” Julian pressed on with a brittle tone to his voice. “You claimed that you've made all manner of compromises in this relationship to shelter me from the reality that's you. Well, I'm asking you right here and now to tell me the truth. Is the reality that you're someone who is going to physically assault me whenever I say or do something you find unacceptable?”

 

“No,” Garak said, having to fight to keep his voice steady.

 

“You didn't just assault me. You stripped me. If we're both being honest, we know it's not the first time you intended to take rage out on me sexually. Am I going to have to guard against that one day, being raped by someone I'd normally give myself to willingly? Is that normal, accepted Cardassian behavior, to take advantage of a physically weaker mate and use them any way you see fit?”

 

“No,” Garak breathed, his gaze settling on the white knuckled grip of the man's hands, clenched together like a snared bird's feet.

 

“To which question?” Julian snapped.

 

“To both,” he said. “It's reprehensible.”

 

The slender man pushed back from the table and stood, turning his side to Garak and staring off toward the back of his quarters. “I'm not interested in your lip service to values you don't share.”

 

“I don't understand what you mean,” he said, for the first time having some appreciation for how some of his interrogation subjects must have felt in his presence. This was a side of Julian he had never seen, and he was positively terrified that he had already lost him for good.

 

“Please,” the doctor scoffed, shooting him a skeptical side glance. “If you believed what you were saying, that treating me that way is reprehensible, you wouldn't have done it, either time it has happened.”

 

“You said you were OK with that night,” he pointed out, feeling a small surge of resentment.

 

“That was my mistake,” Julian retorted, nodding. “And I'll accept that much responsibility for what happened last night. I gave you the impression that I'm willing to tolerate abuse just for the privilege of being your lover and that I'll crawl back begging for more.” He suddenly wheeled on him, fury and pain flaring in his eyes. “I'm not! I have tried my best to tread on eggshells when it comes to matters of your pride and privacy, and no, you never asked me to. You never had to! I was willing to do it because I love you and want to make you happy. I'm not willing to be your...your punching bag! And I'm not willing to let you shove me away whenever you feel like it just because letting me be there hurts your pride.

 

“You're physically stronger than I am. You're a better hand to hand fighter than I am. There's a definite inequity there, but if you think for one instant that makes us anything less than equal in this relationship, then you had best think again! If you ever lay a hand on me in anger again, even once,” he said, visibly shaking, “we're through, and I will...by God, I will have you arrested, no matter how embarrassing or mortifying it is for me!”

 

“As you should,” Garak said, exhaling heavily. He quieted to be sure that Julian didn't have more to say. When he was fairly sure that he was done, he said, “I know that 'I'm sorry' rings hollow in the face of the sort of betrayal I dealt you last night. I could try to explain my state of mind; however, even that sounds more like making excuses, as it's no justification.

 

“I am sorry. I'm willing to do what it takes to work to earn back the trust I've destroyed. You have my word that I will never attack you again. I won't hold it against you if you greet that announcement with skepticism. Just tell me what you need, and I'll do it.”

 

“Right now I need space,” he said, folding his arms tightly over his chest. “I thought I'd be OK being alone with you, but the truth is that I'm not. I know things are bad for you right now. I want you to get some help for that. I'm not calling things off or leaving you. I'd tell you if I were.”

 

“I understand,” he said, nodding. He wanted to tell him that he loved him but held his tongue, afraid that it would sound manipulative under the circumstances. “I'll let you be the one to decide when and how we see each other until you tell me you're ready for me to start asserting my preferences again, as long as you understand that you're not hearing from me not because I'm shutting you out, but because you've asked me to do this.”

 

Julian nodded. “Thank you, Elim,” he said. “Unless you have anything else you'd like to say, I'd appreciate it if you'd leave. We can have lunch together tomorrow at the Replimat.”

 

“I'd like that,” Garak said, standing. He hated that Julian took a step back just from such an innocuous move. For all that he had cautioned the doctor against trusting him through the years, he had never meant to imply that he should expect random attacks. His self-loathing dug in deeper. Not even someone like Dukat was such a graceless thug. He paused at the door. “I wouldn't blame you if you did leave me,” he said.

 

“I have no intention of making it that easy for you,” the doctor replied, the expression in his eyes ambivalent.

 

Unsure of exactly how to take that, he let himself out. It was ironic that now that he had what he thought he wanted, to be left alone in his grief and confusion, he didn't want it at all. They told him to get help. Who did they think could help him? No one on the station understood Cardassian psychology. He couldn't very well place a call back to Prime and make a long distance appointment to talk about the destruction of the entire Obsidian Order and the death of a man no one but he and Mila knew was his father. What was he to do?

 

He couldn't face his quarters with the sting of Julian's hard words still in his ears. He had already cleaned blood from the bulkhead. He shuddered from the memory of it and the emotion that had driven him to such violence to begin with. Ask anyone in the quadrant what word came to mind at the mention of Cardassians, and most would say 'cruel' he knew. It wasn't an undeserved reputation. The meekest and kindest of his race could turn vicious when cornered. No one would ever describe him as meek or kind in the first place.

 

He had learned all he ever needed to know of violence, implacability, tenacity, and yes, cruelty at the knee of a man who rarely deigned to acknowledge him unless he displayed the worst of his tendencies with enthusiasm. Cardassian society didn't reward emotional displays, sentiment, or weakness. Cardassia Prime itself was a harsh planet that demanded resourcefulness and boldness of its sentient population if they wanted to survive. Survival was something at which he excelled, living, not so much.

 

He let himself into his shop and retreated to his stock room. A few bolts of cloth had survived the explosion unscorched and didn't reek of smoke. He drew one down, a dark green fabric, and laid it out on his cutting table. He lifted a pair of scissors, stretched out a flat length of fabric and began to cut. The scissors slid smoothly, making a sound he found pleasing. Clean lines, uncomplicated patterns, these things made sense to his incredibly structured brain. Strip after strip furrowed and fell unheeded to the floor.

 

He didn't know how much time had passed when a hand on his shoulder brought him back to himself. He turned to see Odo then looked down at the appallingly large pile of useless fabric strips. “Branching into Dabo girl costumes?” the changeling asked dryly.

 

He snorted very softly. “I believe these would be more revealing than even they would care to try,” he said.

 

“I saw your light,” Odo explained. “It's very late.”

 

Garak nodded, setting the scissors aside. “I didn't realize.”

 

“Will you be going home soon?” he asked abruptly.

 

Garak shook his head and bent to gather the scraps to throw them into the recycler. “No, Constable. There were few things on Cardassia more dangerous than incurring Tain's ire. I wasn't the only one held in check by that fact.” As he dumped the strips he added lightly, “I don't belong there anymore, anyway.”

 

“Not even as a civilian tailor?” Odo asked.

 

Garak laughed bitterly. “Especially not as that.”

 

The changeling studied him thoughtfully. “I know you tried to protect me,” he said. “At first I thought that you wanted to go home so badly that you were blinded by Tain, but the more that I've considered it, the more I believe you were trying to protect him, too. Cardassia could use more people like you, not fewer.”

 

“I'm sure you meant that as a compliment. You'll have to forgive me if I can't take it as such,” Garak said, frowning. “This place is poisonous.” He gestured to include the entire station. “It has you feeling that you don't belong with your people, and it has made it to where I truly don't belong with mine, yet neither of us belong here. You've never given them a reason not to trust you, but most of them don't. I've never given them much reason to trust me, but even if I did, they wouldn't.”

 

“If they did, would you be able to handle it?” he asked.

 

“You're all kinds of amusing tonight, Constable,” he said.

 

“I don't know what to do for you,” Odo said bluntly.

 

“You're so certain something is necessary?” he asked, tilting his head and offering him one of his blandest smiles.

 

“More certain with each passing moment,” the changeling said.

 

“If I knew, I'd tell you.” He dropped the pretense. He didn't have the energy for it, and he wasn't in any mood to play games. “The Starfleeters seem to think if I sit down and tell a stranger about where it hurts, I'll be fine.”

 

“Hmph,” Odo said, seeming to find that as ridiculous as Garak did. “They really can be blind at times. Can't you talk to the doctor?”

 

He shook his head. “No.”

 

“You'll forgive me for saying it, but I don't understand relationships,” Odo said.

 

Garak laughed, genuinely amused. “I don't either. As it turns out, I'm not very good at them. I was better at being alone.”

 

“Why not go back to it?” he asked.

 

“Relationships have a tendency to spoil the joys of solitude. I don't pretend to understand how that works.”

 

“Why stay with someone you can't even talk to?” Odo persisted. “If he's not willing to be supportive...”

 

Garak held up a hand. “This isn't his fault. It's entirely mine. I don't want to go into it, but I don't want you thinking ill of the doctor. No, he's very supportive. It's...difficult for me to accept that.”

 

Odo nodded slowly. “I understand that,” he said. “It's not easy for me to accept help, either. I'm coming to understand that sometimes you have to let them be supportive even when you don't want it. It makes them feel better, and it's not...unpleasant...to know that someone is there for you, whether you actually need it or not.”

 

“It sounds as though you understand more than you let on,” Garak said, surprised.

 

“I am observant,” the changeling said with what may have been a humorous undertone.

 

“You'll get no arguments from me,” he said. “You know, talking to a stranger wouldn't help at all, but speaking with you has. Thank you, Constable.” He inclined his head.

 

Looking slightly surprised, Odo returned the gesture. He glanced around the stock room and over his shoulder. “You've cleaned this place up nicely. Does that mean you'll be reopening?”

 

He nodded. “Yes, I will be. You've seen the Bajorans. They need me, now more than ever with that Kai of theirs and her atrocious hats.”

 

Odo chuckled in a rare display of genuine amusement. “Perhaps one day I'll sample what it feels like actually to wear something.”

 

“Any time,” Garak said, smiling. “I'm at your disposal.”

 

“We'll see,” he said. “I should get back to patrol, and you should at least try to get some rest. Things...sometimes look better when you're not tired.”

 

“Very true,” Garak agreed. “I'll walk you out.”

 

Julian

The Infirmary

 

Four days. It had only been four days since he laid down his boundaries, and already he missed the tailor's company at night. For his part, Garak couldn't have been more cooperative and pleasant. It bothered him to think of how much the man was hiding from him for his sake, to honor his request. He couldn't hide away from Garak forever. He had to either make the decision to trust him when he said he'd never hurt him again or decide that he could never trust that and move on. It wasn't fair to either of them to hover at a distance and wait for things to feel perfect.

 

The flu outbreak was on a natural decline, and activity in the infirmary had dropped back to normal levels. He felt confident that if he left a half hour early for lunch, it wouldn't put undue stress on the staff. He walked down the short distance to Garak's shop only to find him setting up new racks. They looked strangely sculptural with nothing displayed upon them, like a modern gallery exhibit.

 

“Hello, Doctor,” Garak greeted him amiably. “You're early.”

 

“I know,” Julian said, closing the distance between them. “I miss you.”

 

Garak anchored one of the protruding “arms” in the central post of the rack and straightened, eying Julian cautiously. “I miss you, too,” he said. “Are you sure you want...”

 

He nodded, taking both of his hands in a warm press. “I am. It's probably a form of insanity, but I am.”

 

“Then I have something to tell you,” the tailor said.

 

Something about the look in his eyes when he said it stilled Julian outwardly but made his heart start to race. “What is it?” he asked, his turn for caution.

 

“I love you.”

 

He inhaled sharply, blinking rapidly. “Just...just like that? No qualifiers, no buts...”

 

“Just like that,” Garak said.

 

“Elim,” he said softly, “take me home. Right now.” And he did, just like that.

 

The End

Author Notes: This story takes place during and after the episode Distant Voices. It closely follows “Eye of the Needle” in continuity and probably won't make too much sense as a stand alone.

Summary: Doctor Bashir suffers a psychic attack from a mysterious alien, leaving him incapacitated and with the Bajorans in full control of the infirmary. Garak quickly discovers just how little influence he has without Julian's advocacy, and tension mounts high. Can Odo find a way to interrupt the growing cycle of enmity between the tailor and Nurse Decla before it turns deadly?

Author: Dark Sinestra

Date Written: December, 2009

Category: Slash

Rating: PG for mild adult language and themes.

Disclaimer: I own no dashing doctors, tempting tailors, or staunch security chiefs, but I take all the blame for the nasty nurse.

Word Count: 11,641

 

Garak

Garak's Clothiers

 

Garak hummed to himself as he tidied up for the end of the day. In a good mood, he was looking forward to Julian's upcoming birthday party, even if Julian himself was feeling extraordinarily grumpy about turning thirty. Thirty, ha! He thought to himself. If he was so bent out of shape about thirty, he wondered how he'd feel about fifty. He was rather enjoying the other side of that landmark, even if it did mean that he put on weight more easily than he once had. Humans were so backwards about so many things that the age issue should have come as no surprise.

 

“G—Garak!” Rom's voice startled him out of his thoughts, the Ferengi waiter hurrying toward him quickly.

 

“What is it?” he asked, concerned. He had rarely seen the man so anxious.

 

“You have to come,” Rom told him, seizing him by the elbow and drawing him toward the door. “I just heard from Morn that something has happened to Doctor Bashir!”

 

“Where is he?” Garak asked tightly, no longer needing Rom's prompting to hurry.

 

“In the infirmary,” he answered.

 

“What happened?” he asked, trying to stay calm. With such little information to go on, panic was premature.

 

“We're not sure. Odo is keeping it to himself, but it has something to do with that Lethean that was being so pushy with Quark earlier today. I saw him being dragged into the security office.”

 

The Lethean. Garak felt himself go cold. From the moment Quark brought the hideous alien to their table, Garak had a bad feeling about him. He hadn't liked the way he stared at his doctor after Julian flatly refused to sell him contraband. I should have followed him, he berated himself silently. A more insidious thought followed closely after. I should have killed him.

 

As they reached the infirmary, both men tried to hurry inside. They found themselves stopped cold by two burly male Bajoran nurses. “Sorry,” the darker haired of the two said, looking straight at Garak. “We're under strict orders not to let you in.”

 

“Orders? Whose orders?” Garak demanded.

 

“My orders,” a familiar voice said from behind the second nurse. Nurse Decla stepped into view. “You're a security risk. With the doctor unable to fulfill his duties, I'm in charge of this infirmary.” She glanced at Rom. “You can come in, but you can't see the patient.”

 

Rom shot a darting glance from her to Garak. “Wh—Why would I want to come in if I can't see Doctor Bashir?”

 

“That's a good question,” she said, one corner of her mouth curving up in a condescending half smile. “Perhaps you should stay out of our way if you can't find an adequate answer.”

 

Garak shot her and the Bajorans blocking his way a look that could freeze lava. Perhaps sensing trouble, Rom plucked at his elbow insistently. “Come on,” he said urgently. “Garak? You need to come with me.”

 

In his mind's eye, he had already felled all three of them with a complex move he learned long ago, his training so thorough that his hands and feet could move completely independently of one another in lethal maneuvers that were difficult for most other races to adapt to. He took one step forward, only to find Rom squarely in his path, his toothy mouth agape in dismay. “Garak!” he said in a tone of voice the Cardassian had never heard from him before. It got his attention. His gaze slid to meet deep-set blue eyes, rounded with fear, not of him, he realized, but for him. The Ferengi shook his head very slightly, and his concern reached something in Garak that anger and fear could not.

 

The crisis passed, for the moment. He felt his lethal intent give way, although he knew it hadn't gone far. It was waiting for him to call it back at any time. He allowed Rom to take him by the shoulders and turn him away, completely pliant to his direction until they were far enough from the infirmary not to be watched or overheard. “Let go of my arm,” he said, dead calm.

 

The man did so immediately, but he said in a low, intent voice, “Whatever you're thinking, don't. They're not worth the trouble you'll get into. Look at me, Garak. Promise me,” he said.

 

Garak's smile didn't reach his eyes. “Haven't you heard? I can't be trusted.” He walked for the turbo lift, grateful that the Ferengi had stopped following him. He knew he meant well, but in his current state of mind, he feared he would say or do something to him that he wouldn't easily be able to take back. Once in the lift, he directed it to Ops.

 

As he stepped off the lift, he noticed Dax, Kira, and O'Brien all glance at one another. By some unspoken agreement, Dax moved to intercept. “Garak,” she said, striding over to him and addressing him in a low voice, “you can't be here. You know that.”

 

“No, apparently the only time I can be here is when the station is about to be flooded with deadly gas thanks to inept Starfleet poking around, and the rest of you don't know what to do with yourselves,” he said acidly. “Then, of course, I'm a welcome sight.”

 

She winced slightly. “I'm sorry,” she said in such a way that he believed she meant it. Not that it mattered. “I'm going to have to ask you to leave.”

 

“I need to speak to Commander Sisko,” he said, setting his feet the moment she tried to get him to move.

 

She glanced over at Kira who gave a subtle nod. “All right,” she said, turning and falling into step with him as he crossed the work area.

 

What do they think I'm going to do? He wondered contemptuously. Look at the control panels? They're already Cardassian technology, outdated Cardassian technology at that.

 

He climbed the steps to the office and paused when she touched his shoulder lightly. “Let me let him know you're coming,” she said, hurrying ahead into the office. He waited in stony silence for longer than he felt was appropriate under the circumstances. When she came out again, she said, “Go on in.” She shot him a look that he supposed was meant to be supportive. He was too angry for gratitude.

 

The doors parted to admit him. “Commander,” he began immediately, “this is an utter outrage.” His voice thrummed with suppressed emotion. While he was not shouting, the words had no less impact for lack of volume.

 

Sisko, already standing, circled his desk to Garak's side of it to face him. “Slow down, Mr. Garak,” he said, his baritone pitched to calm him. “Tell me what's going on.”

 

“Oh, Commander, really!” he said, his eyes narrowing. “Don't try to play games with me, now of all times. A security risk? You're going to toss that flimsy excuse to keep me away from my l...from Doctor Bashir's side when something has happened to him?”

 

Sisko reacted with what seemed like genuine surprise. He hadn't known, or he was a much better actor than Garak had given him credit for up until now. “A security risk? I know you find it difficult to trust me, but you have to believe me when I tell you I don't know what you're talking about.”

 

“That Bajoran harpy, Decla,” he spat, “refusing me entrance to the infirmary.” So great was his outrage, that for a few moments, he couldn't even speak. Too many words vied for expression all at once. “She said that with the doctor no longer in charge, she has final say as to who is admitted and who is not.”

 

The Commander frowned deeply, folding his arms and lifting a hand to rub at his chin. “Unfortunately,” he said heavily, “she's telling the truth about that. She does have that authority.”

 

“But it's a flimsy excuse to promulgate a personal vendetta against me!” Garak said, no longer able to contain his volume. “How can I be any more of a security risk in the infirmary than anywhere else on this station? If Doctor Bashir's condition is too fragile for visitors, that's one thing. Of course I'd respect that, but this? This is something else entirely, and it cannot be tolerated!”

 

“Please, calm down,” Sisko said, gesturing with both hands flat, palms down. “I sympathize with your position. I truly do. I'll be willing to talk to Nurse Decla, but I can't make any promises. I don't have the authority to override her judgment in this matter.”

 

“How convenient!” Garak spat. “It seems Starfleet exerts plenty of authority whenever it wishes, only to retreat behind protocol and platitudes the moment it's faced with a situation with which it would just as soon not get involved.”

 

“Mr. Garak,” Sisko said sharply, “I said I'd do what I can. I'm sorry I can't do what I know you want me to do, march in there and order Decla and the other Bajorans to stand down. I share your outrage at the possible reasoning behind the decision, but even as Commander of this station, my hands are tied!”

 

He stared hard into the dark eyes and felt himself deflate slightly. It was true. No matter what he wanted them to do, they weren't going to do any more than their toothless protocol allowed. “It won't make a difference,” he said stiffly, clinging to the only thing he had left to him at that moment, his pride.

 

Sisko seemed to deflate a bit at this as well. “You're probably right,” he conceded. “I'll still try.”

 

“Thank you, Commander,” Garak said, inclining his head formally. “Can you at least tell me how he is?”

 

“He's unconscious,” the man replied. “At the moment, I don't know any more than that. I'll head over there now,” he offered, gesturing Garak out ahead of him.

 

The Cardassian paused. “Commander, if I may, I'd like to speak to Major Kira.”

 

Sisko considered a moment and nodded. “Wait here. I'll send her in to you.”

 

He did so, lacing his hands tightly behind his back, fingers clasped together. He had to keep them contained, or he'd do something rash. He could see Kira ascending the steps and braced himself for further confrontation.

 

“Garak,” she said the moment she had passed the threshold, “I know what you're going to ask me, and I can't do it.”

 

“Can't,” he said frostily, “or won't?”

 

She narrowed her black eyes. “Look!” she said sharply. “You and I have had our differences. Still do, but it's not fair for you to stand there and accuse me of standing by and letting this happen when you have no idea of the politics of the situation or the shitstorm it would cause if I were to try to override this woman. This goes way beyond one petty bitch, you, and Julian. I'm sorry, but it does.”

 

He understood difficult politics better than most. He reflected that the night Decla had boasted to him of her connections, it was no idle claim. “I'm sorry, Major,” he said, much subdued. “I shouldn't have lashed out at you like that.”

 

Turbulent emotion roiled very close to the surface in her expressive eyes. “I wish I could help,” she said, her hands clenching into fists at her sides. “I know how hard this is for you. I went through something similar with Winn pushing Antos.”

 

“I know you do, and did,” he said, his mind already moving forward to his next option. “Maybe there is something you can do, after all. How does your Provisional Government feel about Odo?”

 

“They trust him,” she said. “He has been invaluable to us since the Cardassians...since the end of the occupation.”

 

“So if Odo were in the presence of someone declared a security risk...”

 

Kira smiled tightly. “No one could reasonably object without throwing his entire career into question, something not even Decla could do without costing herself some support.”

 

Garak nodded, moving for the doors. “Will you please inform the Constable that I'm on my way to see him?”

 

“I will,” she said. She stopped him briefly with a light hand to his forearm. “Don't do anything stupid, OK? If anything happens to Decla, you'll be the first person they look at after this.”

 

“Don't worry, Major,” Garak said tightly. “I wish that one a very long, very miserable life. Your concern is appreciated.” He strode from Ops with his head up, his bearing regal. He wouldn't allow any of them to see the gnawing, clawing desperation mounting with every road block thrown in his way to seeing with his own two eyes what had happened to his lover. If Odo also told him no, he'd be back to option one without a friend there to stop him.

 

The shape shifter was waiting for him in Security. “Major Kira apprised me of the situation,” he said. “Unless Decla manages to come up with a better reason, I'm not going to allow her to do this to you.”

 

The stolid offer of support came close to undoing his control. As he fell into step beside the security chief, he wondered how it was that kindness could be so much more emotionally devastating than cruelty. He inclined his head deeply, in that moment not at all willing to trust his voice. The two walked nearly shoulder to shoulder, arriving at the infirmary only to see the same nurses guarding the front. When the two saw Odo, they glanced at one another uncertainly.

 

“I understand there's some concern about a security risk,” Odo said in saccharine tones. “As you can see, I'm here to ensure nothing untoward happens while Mr. Garak visits the infirmary. I suggest you stand aside.”

 

“We're under strict orders,” one of them said tentatively. The other shook his head and stepped out of the way, seeming to know when to quit. Garak ignored both men as though they weren't even there. If he allowed himself to meet either of them eye to eye, he didn't trust what he'd do.

 

Decla spotted the two of them from the hallway leading to the surgery room. She strode forward quickly. “Constable Odo,” she said, “this is highly irregular.”

 

“Indeed it is, Madame,” Odo said, his steely look matching his tone. “Is Doctor Bashir's condition so critical that he can't be allowed any visitors?”

 

“I'm not at liberty to reveal details of a patient's condition,” she said smoothly.

 

“Then we'll have a look for ourselves,” Odo said, brushing past her and pulling Garak in his wake with a solid grip to his upper arm.

 

She took a few trotting steps and positioned herself in front of both of them again. “Not while I'm here you won't,” she said firmly. “You may have authority out there,” she gestured toward the Promenade, “but this is my domain. If you have a problem with how I'm handling a critical case, feel free to contact the Bajoran Medical Board and file a formal complaint. I'm told they've been working on their backlog. Your petition has a good chance of being heard by the end of the year.”

 

“You can be sure that is exactly what I intend to do,” Odo said, turning around and pulling Garak with him. The Cardassian tried to resist, but he could tell by the tightness of the grip that if Odo felt that he needed to drag him physically from the facility, that was exactly what was about to happen. He yielded, only to prevent giving Decla the satisfaction of seeing him manhandled.

 

Once they were back out on the Promenade, he shook himself free. “So that's it?” he demanded, his voice more shrill than he intended for it to be. “She says go, and you walk out?”

 

The changeling dropped his voice and leaned closer. “You heard her. While she's there. She can't stay there indefinitely. She has to leave at some point, get some sleep. We'll try again with whoever she leaves in charge.”

 

“It won't matter,” Garak said, ready to tear his own hair out from frustration. “They all hate me, every last one of those Bajoran staff members. They resent our relationship. They think he's too good for me. They've been waiting for the chance to do something to put me in my place. Now that they have it, there's no way they're going to relinquish their advantage.”

 

“I'm not giving up,” Odo said staunchly. “Neither should you.”

 

Commander Sisko emerged from the infirmary and walked over to the two of them. Garak could tell by his expression what he was going to say before he said it. “I'm not going to ask what you did to garner such animosity,” he told Garak, “but that woman is bound and determined that you not be given access to the doctor. Unfortunately, without good cause, I can't override her, can't have her removed, and can't go over her head with the Bajorans.”

 

“Even if you did, they wouldn't listen,” Garak said. “They'll never side with a Cardassian over one of their own, no matter how wrong she is. I'm their token, a convenient target for all of their resentment over the wrongs they suffered during the occupation.”

 

Sisko frowned deeply. “I doubt that every Bajoran feels that way. Not all of them will be willing to forget that you were at Vedek Bareil's funeral or how much you risked to be there.”

 

“Please, Commander,” Garak said tiredly, reaching up to rub at his temples. A headache was coming on. “Good news and goodwill both die quick deaths. We both know that.”

 

“I'll talk to Major Kira,” Sisko said.

 

“No,” Garak shook his head. “She told me there's nothing she can do.”

 

“Perhaps she'll see things a little differently if I ask,” he suggested.

 

“No,” Garak said more sharply. “I don't want her to feel pressured to do something that will put her in an awkward position.” At Odo's look of surprise, he continued. “Who knows when she may need her political capital, or for what? No, as much as the situation pains me, I can't ask the Major to sacrifice any advantage she may have over my personal concern. There's nothing of value that I could give her in return.”

 

“You saved her life already,” Odo said simply.

 

“Please, Constable,” Garak snorted softly. “You and I both know that was no noble act.”

 

The changeling tightened his lipless mouth to a thinner line than normal. Glancing from Garak to the Commander, he said, “I'll talk to Major Kira. Perhaps between the two of us, we can come up with something. In the mean time,” he pinned Garak with a very keen gaze, “don't do anything rash. While you have my every sympathy for the unfairness of this situation, I will not tolerate your breaking the law or harming Nurse Decla or any of her staff members. Don't make me have to lock you up.”

 

Garak nodded, not willing to verbalize any sort of agreement to that effect. Odo would hear it for the lie it was as soon as it left his lips. While he wasn't yet back to the point of doing anything that drastic, he knew it wouldn't take much to get him there. Shaking his head as though he knew he had wasted his breath, Odo strode quickly away, leaving Garak alone with Commander Sisko.

 

“I was able to see him,” Sisko said more gently than he had ever spoken to Garak before. The Cardassian stiffened, detesting so much as a whiff of pity sent his way. “He's not visibly injured. As of yet, we're not one hundred percent sure of what has been done to him, although we have our suspicions.”

 

Garak knew. It was a psychic attack. Letheans were notorious for them. He felt his hands clenching spasmodically and had to fight to relax them again. He wanted nothing more than his fingers around that ugly throat to squeeze until it was pulp. It wouldn't help. If anything, it would make things much worse. If the alien died while part of his consciousness was delving into Julian's mind, the psychic backlash would quickly kill Julian as well. No, that wasn't the answer, although if Julian did die, it just might be the last thing Garak ever did. He could give his lover no comfort and support, but he could give him revenge.

 

“Garak?” Sisko said, clearly not liking the look in his eyes.

 

“I'm sorry, Commander,” he said mildly. “I'm developing a migraine. I should probably rest for a while. I trust that if the Constable and Major Kira work something out, I'll be contacted?”

 

“Immediately,” Sisko said. “You have my word on that.”

 

“Thank you, Commander,” he said, inclining his head and watching the man head toward the turbo lift. It was strange to him, knowing that he could take at face value something a human authority figure said to him. Were he dealing with a Legate or even a Gul, he knew he could have no such assurances. Strange creatures, humans.

 

He waited until the man was out of sight and turned toward Quark's Bar. At the last moment, he decided on a different ingress, taking the stairs two at a time to the second level of the Promenade and ducking in through one of the smaller side doors. His eyes adapted very quickly to the lower light level. He saw Nog stationed near the front door, looking expectantly outward. So the uncle was expecting this visit. It didn't matter. Nothing short of Odo and a full contingent of Bajoran security guards was going to stop him from this.

 

He wove between tables as silently and sinuously as a cobra that some Terrans claimed Cardassians resembled with their scales and flared necks. Scanning the bar from his shadowed vantage of the balcony, he saw Quark at the very far end of it, nervously drying a glass and looking toward Nog. Good, he thought, keep looking for just a moment longer.

 

He was down the stairs, over the bar, and on the hapless Ferengi before anyone even knew he was there except Morn, who was too startled to say a word. He bunched both fists into Quark's jacket and yanked him clean off his feet. “You!” he growled in a voice he barely recognized as his own. “You brought that piece of filth to our table knowing fully well that the doctor wouldn't do what he asked!”

 

“Garak!” Quark squeaked. “P—please! You have to believe me! I had no idea what he intended to do!”

 

“He's a Lethean! What did you think he would do?” Garak bellowed, shaking him so hard he could hear the man's sharp teeth clacking together.

 

“Uncle!” Nog shouted from somewhere off to his left, “do you want me to call Security?”

 

At Garak's look of potentially lethal intent, Quark quickly shook his head. “N—no, Nog! Be a good boy, and watch the bar.” He licked his teeth nervously. “Garak, please, you're scaring my customers. C—can we take this to the back?”

 

Garak flung him back so forcefully he stumbled and sent an entire row of glass shelving crashing to the floor in a spill of alien alcohol of various lurid colors. He cowered to shield himself from the breaking glass and scuttled into the back room, the tailor hot on his heels and feeling dangerously close to murderous. “If he dies, in addition to that Lethean,” he hissed the alien word, “I'm holding you personally responsible.”

 

“He threatened me,” Quark gibbered. “What was I supposed to do? How could I know he'd be crazy enough to attack a Starfleet officer? Garak! You know I like Doctor Bashir. Whatever you think of me, and whatever I might be, I'm not a murderer! Please!” He placed his wrists together in that odd Ferengi begging gesture that resembled a man in cuffs. “I'll do anything I can to help you, just don't kill me!”

 

“That insane bitch won't even let me see him,” Garak rasped. His head felt as though it would explode, and Quark's unrestrained desperation threatened to unleash his own.

 

The Ferengi looked confused. “Wait,” he said, “Decla? Rom told me about that.” He slowly lowered his hands, eying Garak as though he had a bomb strapped to him that could go off at any moment, or perhaps as though he were the explosive device. “M—Major Kira! I bet she could help you.”

 

“I've already talked to her,” the tailor snarled. “I didn't come here for any of your schemes. I've done everything I can short of killing the lot of them in that blasted infirmary.”

 

Quark blinked at him, calming further and looking grave. “Listen to me, Garak. I know Rom has already told you this, but you can't do something like that. It won't help the doctor, and it'll get you put away for life. What good will that do?”

 

“What good is this doing?” he asked through gritted teeth, gesturing sharply.

 

“Not being in a prison colony has all sorts of advantages,” Quark said evenly. “I know you say you don't want my ideas, but I think I have something you haven't thought of. There is more than one way into that infirmary, and I don't mean any of the doors.”

 

Garak stilled, fixing the man with a burning stare. “I'm listening,” he said tersely.

 

Odo

Kira's Private Quarters

 

After leaving Garak, Odo stopped first in the security office and downloaded a small file onto a data rod. He was hoping he wouldn't have to use it; however, he was a careful man, and he planned for as many contingencies as he could. He knew that it wouldn't be long before Nerys' shift ended. He decided the best course of action would be to wait for her outside her quarters rather than trying to intercept her from Ops. His wait hadn't been a long one. She came home straight from work and allowed him to come in with her.

 

“We have to talk,” he said.

 

Turning abruptly to face him, she raised a hand impatiently. “Look, Odo, if this is about Garak, there's nothing to say. You know as well as I do what the situation is like down on Bajor right now. Any influence I had is pretty much gone thanks to Winn and all the people wanting to kiss up to her. I'd actually like to still have a career by this time next year.”

 

“This isn't right,” he said pointedly, “and you know it.”

 

She unfastened her uniform jacket and tossed it over a chair. “You're right. It's awful. Decla is being a royal bitch, but honestly, Odo, what's at stake? She and the rest of the staff are caring for Julian as well as they can. Garak's being there, or not, isn't going to make a difference, not if what you said about Letheans is true.”

 

“Any more of a difference than your presence with Bareil made at the end,” he said ruthlessly. Her gut punched look hurt him, and knowing he put it there hurt worse. Nonetheless, he held his ground.

 

She sucked in a swift hiss of air through her teeth. “How can you say that to me?” she asked.

 

“How can you know what that man is going through and not even try?” he retorted.

 

She shook her head and turned away from him. “He's a Cardassian,” she said flatly. “Do you have any idea what he has put Julian through in that relationship? He told him...he told him outright he doesn't love him. You'll have to forgive me if I find this sudden show of his just a little suspect in light of that,” she snapped. “If anything, it seems more like...like a territory dispute!”

 

She could be so stubborn, so blinded by her prejudices. It angered him when she got this way, and it disappointed him, too. She was better than that. Sometimes, it took a lot of pushing to get her to remember it. “Naturally, you find it easier to believe that he's lying now, rather than in telling the doctor he doesn't love him,” he said querulously.

 

“Frankly? Yes!” she said. “Look. I appreciate what he did about the funeral. I do. I even think that maybe in some way, it's the most selfless thing he has ever done, but...”

 

“It's not,” he cut her off abruptly.

 

She shook her head. “Oh, don't start! Don't even try to talk about that trip to Cardassia. You and I both know that Commander Sisko threatened him with deportation to get him to agree. Even so, I half expected that he would have just as soon shot me and Tekeny instead of Entek, if he thought it would get him something.”

 

Sighing to himself, he produced the data rod, offering it to her silently, his look a challenging one.

 

“What's this?” she asked, taking it from him and turning it over in her hand.

 

“It's a copy of the transmission Garak received regarding your abduction,” he replied. “It took me a long time to find it, even longer to decode it, but I know it's authentic. He doesn't know that I have it, and I'd like for it to stay that way.”

 

She frowned deeply. “What does this prove?” she asked, her voice taut with suspicion.

 

“What are you so worried about?” he asked, a mocking tone rising in his voice. “You're so certain you're right. This should mean nothing, right?”

 

With a stubborn set to her jaw, she crossed to her terminal and shoved the rod into its slot. He watched her body language closely as she read the short line of text. She caught her breath, then sagged, her head dropping slightly forward. “I don't understand,” she said softly.

 

“What's not to understand,” Odo demanded, “if you accept that Garak actually loves the doctor a great deal more than he knows how to handle or can even admit to himself? The only way his actions in light of that transmission don't make sense is if we accept your version of what he's like.”

 

She scrubbed a hand back through her hair. “I always assumed he was ordered to do it, some game within a game they're all so fond of. I...” she trailed off and sighed. “Fine,” she said, resigned. “I'll do what I can. I just don't know if it'll be enough. The only person I can think of who might have even close to enough influence to pull strings like this is Shakaar, and I don't think he'll be thrilled with the idea of doing something like this for a Cardassian.”

 

“He won't be doing it for a Cardassian,” he said reasonably. “He'll be doing it for you.”

 

“What are you going to do?” she asked.

 

He, too, felt resigned for a different reason. “I'm going to contact Doctor Mora,” he said. “He has some pull with the Bajoran Medical Board. None of them may be fond of Cardassians, but I believe that all of them are professional enough to know that visitation protocol should never be shaped by the personal feelings of the attending medical personnel in charge of the facility. I'm also going to dig deeper into this Decla's background. There may be something there we can use.”

 

“Odo,” she said hesitantly, “we don't have any evidence that this is personal, just Garak's word against Decla's.”

 

“I'm sure Doctor Bashir could enlighten us further,” he said.

 

“If he wakes up, yes,” she said, nodding. “If he doesn't...”

 

“Nerys, if he doesn't, I'll accept whatever fallout occurs because of our actions. We're doing the right thing. That's all that matters.”

 

“Easy for you to say,” she muttered darkly, turning to make the call to Shakaar.

Author notes: This story spans the Deep Space 9 episodes The Abandoned through Life Support. I used a few lines directly from the script of Civil Defense, namely the computer notifications and one brief exchange between Bashir and Garak in Ops. Although I didn't modify the basic plots of any of the shows I included, I did give a pretty different take on Fascination. They played it for comic effect, but at its core, the situations set up in that show were pretty disturbing and would be scary for those involved. Plus, it made no sense to me only principal cast members were affected when Lwaxana was all over the Promenade. This story could still qualify as a stand-alone, but with the weight of back story building up, it makes more sense at least in the context of “The Servant of Your Heart”.
Summary: Julian Bashir and Elim Garak walk the edges of the line in the sand that Garak drew, each believing himself to be right. In a world of ever shifting alliances and increasingly complicated politics, the two discover that a balance of power is almost impossible to maintain.
Author: Dark Sinestra Date Written: December, 2009
Category: Slash
Rating: NC-17 for explicit violent sex, mild adult language, intense adult themes, and character death.
Disclaimer: I don't own any of the people, places, things, or events from Star Trek Deep Space 9. All remain the property of Paramount, and I receive nothing but gratification in the knowledge that I would've enjoyed my TV show more.
Word Count: 16,519
 

Julian
The Infirmary

The doctor frowned and flinched away as Dax tried to hold him firmly by the chin and take a closer look at his face. “Will you stop squirming, Julian?” she said in frustration. “I'm trying to see if that Jem'Hadar boy cracked your temporal fossa or your zygomatic process when he hit you.” She took a scanner from a nearby nurse and ran it close to his cheek and the side of his eye.
 

“I'm fine,” he said yet again. “And he's not really a boy anymore, is he?”
 

“Not so much, no,” she said grimly. She turned off the scanner and handed it back to the nurse. “Thank you,” she said to her and turned her attention back to him. “You got off lucky, no fractures. You ought to let them treat you for the contusion, though.”
 

It was on the tip of his tongue to protest, but he knew that level look. It would be more trouble than it was worth. “Fine,” he said, beckoning the nurse over to help him. “What I really need is to be able to examine him further and see if I can synthesize that missing enzyme. I'm certain it's contributing to his erratic behavior.”
 

“Probably so. I'm sure Benjamin will want to see us in the wardroom soon. Do you want me to wait for you?”
 

“No,” he said. “You go ahead. I'll catch up.” He didn't know how to tell her that her solicitousness since Garak abruptly broke things off with him wasn't always welcome. He wasn't sure she would listen to him anyway. As things were, the only solitude he managed to carve out for himself was during work, when he could legitimately claim that he didn't need the distractions of others, and late at night, when he desperately did but couldn't bring himself to disrupt his friend's sleep. He sat still while the nurse ran the tissue regenerator over his swollen cheek, feeling the throbbing pain ease.
 

Under normal circumstances, he'd view the chance to observe a growing Jem'Hadar up close as an exciting, once in a lifetime opportunity. To be sure, he was taking copious notes and paying close attention. However, it didn't thrill him. Nothing did. He felt as though he was just going through the motions, and the pain never went far. All he had to do was to look down the Promenade and see Garak's shop or catch a glimpse of him going about his routine, and he was right back to that feeling that he couldn't get enough air and that too much of the light had gone out of his world.
 

He thanked the nurse and followed in the earlier footsteps of Dax toward the wardroom. The meeting went about as he expected it to go. Of course brass wasn't going to want to pass up the opportunity to study one of the enemy's shock troops up close. Kira's overly enthusiastic support of the idea of turning the young being into a lab experiment irked him. He was pleased to have the opportunity to throw in his support with Odo. He remembered very well how it felt to be a laboratory subject, the pain of all the changes he went through during his illegal gene therapy treatments. He wasn't certain if he had his complete memories from that time, but he had enough. As he listened to the Constable's impassioned plea on the young warrior's behalf, he wished that he could let the changeling know just how much they had in common. It would be a relief to be able to talk to someone who understood.
 

Commander Sisko asked to speak to Odo in private, and Julian decided to go check on the boy. It was hard to stop thinking of him in that way, even harder to believe that he had just recently held him in his arms as an infant. When he reached the security office, he found the powerful alien flinging himself against the holding cell shielding, and no amount of explaining on his part would calm him. Only the presence of Odo managed that, so it was fortunate that he joined them shortly and talked him down.
 

It made the doctor burn with anger to think of a race of beings so carefully bred and manipulated. They were nothing more than genetic slaves to the Founders. If he could help this one, he fully intended to. He also knew how it felt to be designed and engineered, to wonder what parts of oneself were genuine and what parts were put there at the request of others. He wondered if he would every truly and fully be able to forgive his parents for that. He didn't think of it often. In facing the Jem'Hadar, he found the issue brought front and center in a way it hadn't been in years.
 

Having such a challenging task set before him as synthesizing the complex enzyme missing from the boy's system kept him blessedly distracted for hours. He was disappointed that Miles and Odo managed to find a hidden cache of it before he succeeded. As it was more important that the boy be given some relief, he discovered that the best way to pass it quickly into his body was through the carotid artery. He kept samples aside for study and research and gave the rest to Odo for safe keeping. The two left the infirmary together.
 

A few hours after that, he heard a hail on the infirmary comm and turned to accept it personally. He had made progress on his analysis of the enzyme and hadn't noticed how much time had passed. He recognized the doctor on the screen as an expert in xenoimmunology whose papers were almost always cropping up in most of the medical journals he kept up with, someone stationed on Starbase 201. He schooled his features to politeness, but he was angry. Starfleet was obviously not willing to let this go. “I see I didn't awaken you, Doctor Bashir,” the older man said. “Good. I wanted to extend the professional courtesy of requesting all of your notes and the results of any experiments you've run on that Jem'Hadar of yours personally. You've been making quite a name for yourself lately.”
 

“Thank you, Doctor Ramirez,” he said, distantly polite. “I've read many of your papers. Your work on the polymerase chain reaction of the J8B5 virus for safer vaccines along the Tzenkethi Border is particularly brilliant. You've likely saved hundreds of lives.”
 

“That's why we do it, isn't it?” he said, obviously flattered. “Having the chance to study this specimen may save hundreds, if not thousands, more. I must say I envy your position there, right at the cusp of the passage to the Gamma Quadrant.”
 

“It's rarely dull,” he replied, impatient with the jocular small talk when a sentient being's life hung in the balance. “I trust you'll treat him well?” he said.
 

The man blinked. “Who? Oh, you mean the specimen? Well, of course, we'll treat it as well as we can, but as you know, we can't always be as non-invasive as we like.”
 

“Of course,” he said, his voice hardening. “Doctor, my apologies, but it's very late here. It will take me some time to collate the data for transmission, as I wasn't expecting to have the situation taken out of my hands this quickly. We told the boy he would be staying here for now.”
 

“Of course,” the man said, completely ignoring the not so subtle rebuke. “I eagerly await your findings, Doctor. Ramirez out.”
 

The transmission ended, and Julian slammed the flat of his hand down on the table beside it. “Damn!” he said.
 

A late shift nurse stuck his head around the corner. “Is everything all right, Doctor?”
 

“No, but we have work to do. Help me get this data sorted,” he said, making room for the nurse. “We'll be sending it off to Starbase 201 in short order.”
 

He left the infirmary very late, affording himself less than four hours of sleep before it was time to get back to work. It wasn't the first and wouldn't be the last time he stretched himself thin. It came with the territory for medical staff. His mood improved somewhat when he heard the next day that the Jem'Hadar had managed to commandeer a runabout and escape and that no one got hurt in the process. Good for you, he thought. Don't ever turn back. You're probably better off with your Founders.

He didn't like feeling this way, disgusted with his superiors and his government, first over the treatment of Garak, now this. It made him wonder if he hadn't made a mistake in joining Starfleet. He could have made a decent career for himself as a civilian doctor and never faced so many ethical challenges. He could have stayed in Paris and never had his heart crushed. In leaving, had he not done the same to his fiancée? He had justified himself by saying that they were too young to have gotten engaged and that he hadn't thought hard enough about how he had his whole life ahead of him. In hindsight, in light of his broken heart, he realized that his decision was selfish, childish, and cruel. How many women had he dallied with, nearly all of them more serious about him than he was them? How many hearts had he broken? Maybe in some way, he deserved to feel the way he did.

He grumbled at himself for entertaining such bleak thoughts. Connecting what Garak had done to anything in his past was illogical. There wasn't some giant scale in the sky, keeping track of words and deeds and bringing down a hammer to equal the balance. The only relevant part of what he had been thinking was that it was irresponsible to make commitments he didn't know if he could keep at the time he made them. If getting hurt this badly prevented him from breaking other hearts in the future, then something positive came of it. It's a pity I'm just not that good at lying to myself, he thought. I don't feel any better at all.

Garak
Garak's Clothiers

On early mornings, the Promenade was now deserted. Garak toyed with the idea of opening his shop later, not that it would matter much. Early, late, he had few customers. He counted himself lucky that even when things were going well financially, he had lived frugally and modestly. He was in no danger of losing his roof over his head or his basic necessities. He knew the Ferengi across the way were much more worried and had far more to lose than he.
 

With Julian out of the picture as his steady lunch companion, he had taken to lunching at times with Rom. It wasn't the same, of course. Rom wasn't much of a reader and knew very little of any alien literature. He did, however, speak at length about his son Nog, his brother, their family life, and the situation at the bar. Garak took a vicarious sort of pleasure in this talk of family. He'd never tell Rom, but there were times he envied him his freedom in having a child and raising him openly. It was a luxury he would never be able to afford, no matter how much money or resources he might accrue.
 

He thought as little of Julian as he could, something he knew that most of the doctor's friends would judge as typical and misconstrue as a lack of care. They were so closed minded. Any Cardassian would understand his reasoning easily. Closed doors wouldn't stay that way if one were constantly opening them and peering at the contents they were meant to shut away. He had good, sound reasons for cutting things off when he did. It was unfortunate that in the process both of them were hurt. They would have been hurt much worse if things continued to progress along the course he saw, and it could have cost the young officer his entire promising career. No matter what the doctor thought in his love blindness, Garak knew that a relationship with him wasn't worth that price. He had nothing that valuable to give to the dear man in return, not even the ability to say, I love you, and mean it without ambivalence.
 

He bustled about and tidied the already immaculate place as he did every morning, lifting his head and straightening when Lieutenant Dax strode through his doors looking like a woman on a mission. He had been expecting this, either from her or one of the others. “Good morning,” he said pleasantly. “Have you been enjoying your new dress?”
 

“I haven't had the chance to wear it yet,” she confessed. “I haven't been able to do much socializing lately. Have you?”
 

He arched an eye ridge. “My dear Lieutenant, if you look around you, you may notice that we have a...lack...of civilians of late. Alas, I have more than enough time on my hands but few potential companions to choose from.”
 

“I wanted to know if you'd like to have lunch with me today,” she offered.
 

It wasn't exactly what he had been expecting. Now he simply expected that conversation to occur at a later date. “I regret that I have a lunch date already.”
 

She looked surprised. To her credit, she hid it quickly. “Well, how about dinner, then?”
 

“Do we have enough to discuss for a dinner?” he asked her, favoring her with a somewhat pointed look.
 

“We don't have to talk about Julian at all,” she said. “I'm sorry if I gave you that impression. So, are you interested?”
 

“My dear, I'm positively intrigued,” he replied. Perhaps they wouldn't have that expected conversation at all, if she was to be believed.
 

“I'll come by after work to pick you up, then,” she said. “I'd wear the dress, but I don't want to give anyone the wrong impression.”
 

He smiled, delighted at how deftly she made it clear that she had no interest in him without ever really saying such a thing at all. It was unnecessary, the lack of interest mutual; however, he knew that she received more than her fair share of romantic offers. Rebuffing them before they came was probably second nature by now. “No,” he agreed. “We can't have that. I shall see you then?”
 

“Yes,” she said, nodding and leaving for Ops.
 

He worked through the morning, enjoyed his lunch with Rom, and caught up with some reading on a seat behind his counter during the afternoon. As evening approached, he began to think of the coming dinner plans and wonder what Dax might want with him, if not to discuss Julian. The computer's voice coming from his counter console had his head jerking up in surprise, keen gaze flashing to focus on the terminal. “Warning...worker revolt in progress in Ore Processing Unit Five...security countermeasures initiated.”
 

“No,” he said, jumping up from his seat. “What have those fools gotten into now?” Before he could key in a query, Gul Dukat's face popped up on screen to relate a pre-recorded message that he recognized all too well. He sighed deeply and pressed his lips together in irritation. The beginnings of a headache announced themselves behind his eye ridges and along the top of his skull. He had much bigger things to worry about than a migraine, such as the fact that he seemed to have now been shut out of his own computer terminal. “Oh, you pompous windbag,” he growled under his breath. “You think you're so clever!”
 

He immediately left the shop, locking it down and heading toward Security. He reached the office only to find Odo and Quark inside. “Excuse me, Constable,” he said, “but I seem to have been locked out of my computer. I was wondering if perhaps I could use yours?”
 

Odo glanced up at him impatiently. “Not now, Garak,” he grated. “I can't even use it. I don't have high enough clearance.”
 

“I've been telling him I can give him Level Seven,” Quark said, rolling his eyes, “but does he listen to me?”
 

“Be quiet, Quark,” Odo and Garak said at the same time.
 

They glanced sharply at one another. Before Garak could ask for access a second time, the computer's voice said, “Warning. Workers have escaped from Ore Processing Unit Five. Initiating station-wide counterinsurgency program.”
 

“Oh, damn,” Garak said mildly, turning and rushing down the Promenade just in time to avoid the forcefield that sprang to life, sealing Odo and Quark inside. He didn't have time to argue anymore. Perhaps they'd listen to him in Ops. He hoped they would, or things were about to get much more dead than they had been of late. He had a moment of anxiety when he hit the first forcefield in front of the turbolift, but his access code worked. He hurried as fast as he possibly could, having to stop again and again to deactivate more fields. He noticed they sprang back to life as soon as he passed. Dukat's ostentatious voice droned on and on. “He always did love the sound of his own words,” he muttered.
 

When he reached one of the hallway terminals, he tried to shut down the program with his access codes. Nothing happened. He then tried to quick and dirty a few subroutines to no avail. “Of course, it's not going to be that easy,” he said in frustration.
 

By the time he reached Ops, he had heard the threat about the habitat rings being flooded with neurocine gas. Well, Elim, he thought dryly, you always worried you'd die on this station. It may happen much sooner than you anticipated. He saw Major Kira, Dax, Julian, and some personnel he didn't know in Ops behind the forcefield. At least they had managed to pry open the door. They seemed more than a little surprised to see him. No one will ever believe I'm just a tailor now, he thought. Oh, well, better to have the chance to worry about how to get out of that later than die for the perfection of a lie.

Julian
Ops

As ridiculous as it made him feel on one level, Julian was extremely glad to see Garak just then. It didn't make their situation any less grim, and he wasn't certain they'd manage to get out of the trouble they were in alive, but at least if he did die, it would be with someone he loved. He shouldn't have been surprised that the canny Cardassian had a plan. It didn't work out the way any of them expected, instead triggering yet another level of the counterinsurgency measures. Despite the setback, Garak forged ahead with another plan, one endorsed and improved upon by Dax. When he was sure that Dax's burned hands were as all right as they could be under the circumstances, he stood off to the side and watched the tailor trying to forge Gul Dukat's codes in order to shut down the system. He couldn't help but to smile and tease him. It might be the last chance he ever got to do it. He had never been more proud of him than in that moment.
 

Garak inadvertently tripped a failsafe before Dax had a chance with Kira's help to disable internal sensors. The wall replicator sprang to life, and in the flash of an eye, a man was dead. Shocked, the doctor dove for cover and watched the rest of them do the same as energy beams blasted from the now deadly machine. Every move they tried to make earned them more blasts. He narrowly avoided losing an arm trying to reach Major Kira's phaser. He could just see Garak under Dax's console as they all shouted back and forth to one another, doing their best to formulate a plan under fire.

 

My poor Elim, he thought sadly. Every time you try to do the right thing by any of us, things just get worse for you. He knew the tailor wouldn't be in any danger at all had Commander Sisko, Miles, and Jake not been poking around in the deserted guts of the ore refinery. He wished that he could apologize to him on Starfleet's behalf, but now wasn't the time or place for that.

Gul Dukat's sudden appearance, for real this time, in Ops cut off all further thought in that direction. He watched him very closely, not nearly as intimidated in his presence as he had been three years before. He waited for an opening as the Gul spoke to them, and when the arrogant Gul disabled the blaster in the replicator to make himself some tea, he almost had it. Surging to his feet, he had no choice but to dive right back down again, the diabolical lens reappearing as soon as Dukat stepped out of the way. That was too close, he thought.

Dukat approached Garak, and he tensed again. He wouldn't let him hurt him, no matter the cost. He felt his fists ball as the man taunted the tailor. To his horror, Garak seemed to be rising to the bait, swiftly standing from his cover. He couldn't stop himself from crying out, “Garak!”

“Easy, Doctor... it would seem that the computer is only targeting non-Cardassians after all,” Garak said with his eyes locked to Dukat's.
 

He felt his limbs flooded with the weakness of relief. Thank God, he thought. He listened in uneasy fascination to the calmly delivered but hostile exchange between the two. Old friends indeed, he thought dryly, recalling what Dukat had said of Garak the first time he had ever spoken to him. His dislike of the Gul intensified to something more visceral as he openly threatened Garak. He was glad that the tailor refused him the satisfaction of getting a rise, for he knew his ex had a temper underneath his blasé facade.

He slowly stood after Dukat deactivated the blaster and retreated with Major Kira into Commander Sisko's office. “What do you think he wants?” he asked the others in a low voice.

“He obviously wants the station,” Dax said grimly, glancing at Garak. “Do you think this will fly with your government?”

Julian watched Garak's face as he considered his answer. “If he has enough support in the military, it might,” he said. “I wish I could tell you for certain, Lieutenant, but I'm no longer familiar enough with the political climate on Cardassia to provide an educated opinion.”

He wanted so badly to have a moment alone with the tailor. Their eyes met briefly, and it hurt him to see cool assessment instead of any warmth. It was Elim in the infirmary all over again, vulnerable and yet stubbornly refusing to yield a centimeter. He was angry with himself for expecting anything different and dropped the eye contact first.

“Garak,” Dax said, “since it's looking like we might not have that dinner date after all, I want to tell you the main thrust of what I had to say to you. I'm only sorry I'll have to be much briefer than I intended.”

Julian looked between the two of them, irrational hurt flaring and then subsiding again. Of course it wasn't a date date. Dax would never do that to him. If she had, she certainly wouldn't be bringing it up in front of him now. “I can't give you any real privacy, but if I step to the far wall and you speak quietly, I won't hear you,” he offered.

“No, Julian, it's all right,” she said. “I don't mind if you hear this.” She shot a questioning look at Garak to see if he did.

“I'm fine with that, Lieutenant,” he said.

“Good. I wanted to thank you for helping us save Nerys,” she said.

“It's not as though I had a choice,” Garak responded, a touch of steel beneath his polite tone.

“I meant before that,” she said, unphased. “When you did.”

The doctor felt a surge of gratitude for the Trill that he tried to convey with his eyes alone. He didn't want to butt in, and he wanted Garak to have a chance to respond. It meant more to him that she would make that gesture than he could express. The fact that she had intended to do it in private made it mean that much more, for he knew that it truly was for Garak and not for him that she said it.

Garak waited a few beats to respond. “My only regret is that I won't have the chance to see how you intended to stretch that out for the length of an entire meal,” he said with an incline of his head.

Both doctor and science officer chuckled, their levity fading quickly when yet another announcement came from the computer regarding Dukat's cowardly attempt to escape the station and his failure to maintain order. As the self destruct sequence was announced, only Garak laughed. It had a very dry, ironic sound to Julian's ears.

“I don't see what's so funny,” Dax murmured.

Garak simply indicated Kira and Dukat coming out of the Commander's office with a tip of his chin. Dukat's expression was thunderous. Despite the desperation of the situation, Julian felt tempted to laugh as well. There was nothing quite so gratifying as seeing a blow hard hoisted upon his own petard.

They all gathered around Dukat at the central table and watched him try to disable the security measures. Garak laughed again at the man's failure, and Julian found himself privately grateful that their breakup hadn't been acrimonious. He had no doubt that otherwise, he might have found himself on the receiving end of the tailor's extraordinarily pointed barbs. It seemed that for those who earned his true dislike, his malice knew no limits. As entertaining as it was to see Dukat repeatedly put in his place, particularly when it came to his misguided hitting on Major Kira, it wasn't helping matters. He finally spoke up and told Garak such, hoping that he'd direct his attention back to finding a way out of the deadly situation.

In the end, it was Dax and Dukat who came up with their best chance for success. Unfortunately, it relied on the Commander and Miles being able to reach a critical area of the station and disable the laser fusion initiator to prevent an overload of the main reactor core. They all waited together in tense silence with less than ten minutes left to discover their fates, life, or a quick, fiery death that would leave them nothing more than vaporized particles adrift in space.

Julian positioned himself in front of Garak and drew in a breath, determined to tell him how much he meant to him and that he didn't hold it against him for the decision he made. The tailor cut him a very sharp warning look and flicked his glance quickly to the side to indicate Dukat not so very far away. It was too late. Dukat had already noticed that he was about to speak to Garak, and his pale blue eyes were focused on Julian with intense interest. “It may be bad timing,” the doctor said, “but I was just wondering if you ever managed to hem those pants I brought to you last week.”

“I can't believe you,” Kira said. “We could be space dust any minute, and you're worried about a pair of pants?”

“They're very nice pants, Major,” Garak said mildly. “As a matter of fact, they're ready to be picked up. I intended to tell you this evening, Doctor, but I got a little distracted.”

Dukat looked away from all of them in disgust, and Julian took the opportunity to offer Garak a very small smile. Affection surged in his breast as he realized that even now, Garak was behaving and thinking as though they would survive the situation. For as much as the Cardassian liked to claim that he was a cynic and a pessimist, he kept Julian from revealing a potential weakness in front of a dangerous enemy in case they all lived to face another day. Garak didn't return the smile, but Julian noticed a slight softening of his gaze. It was enough.

“Let's get people moving,” Dax said. “We might have time to get at least some of the people off the station before it blows.”

There was no more time for good-byes. They all got to work, doing what they could. After a few minutes more, it became clear that the crisis had been averted. Dukat beamed away before any of them could stop him. They had worse problems to deal with, such as the fact that life support had been destroyed, and they had but twelve hours to get it back online and operational. Julian retreated to the infirmary, expecting and receiving several cases of people who had been overwhelmed with panic. There were even a few heart attacks during and after the crisis. He had no idea where Garak went or what he had done after they parted company in Ops, but he knew he'd see him again. Perhaps he'd be willing to talk then without Dukat in the way.

Garak
Private Quarters

He hated those pills Julian gave him for his migraines, as they affected him strangely and usually made him have nightmares. The pain was too great this time to combat with kanar alone. The strain of the past several hours combined with having to endure Dukat's company in close quarters insured a headache to rival all headaches. As soon as he had managed to reach his quarters, no easy task without the turbolifts functioning, he took a handful of the wretched things, killed the lights, and lay down on his couch with a cool, wet cloth draped over his forehead and eyes.
 

He was starting to drift into nightmare, the faces of many of his former victims floating into his view like dead, bloated things on the surface of dark water, when his door chime dragged him back to the waking world. He sat up, disoriented and still in pain. The almost dry cloth fluttered from his face and startled him when it landed on his hands. “Computer,” he said thickly, “lights, ten percent, and who is at the blasted door?”
 

“Rephrase the question,” the computer said as dim light flooded his sitting room.
 

They could program it to do so many things, and yet recognizing slang seemed beyond it. “Who is at my door?” he asked, exasperated.
 

“Major Kira Nerys.”
 

He quirked an eye ridge and immediately regretted it. Steeling himself for whatever was about to happen, he wished his phaser wasn't all the way in his bedroom. “Enter,” he said quietly.
 

The door slid open, and Kira stood beyond the threshold. She seemed reluctant to step into the dim room, her fists clenching and unclenching at her sides. Tucking her head down slightly, she pressed her lips thin and stepped across the threshold. Her shoulders twitched when the door shut behind her. “Why is it so dark in here?” she demanded.
 

“Major,” Garak said, wincing, “please, keep your voice down. I...have a headache.” He didn't like to admit even that much weakness to her. If he didn't, he knew that she would continue barking things at him, and her voice would pierce straight to the center of his brain.
 

“Oh,” she said, blessedly more quietly. “I'm...sorry to bother you.” She stood just before his door, looking awkward and uncertain.
 

He wondered if he should wait her out or just ask what she wanted. She was so volatile, it was hard to judge moment to moment the best way to handle her. Pain was very much a factor in his asking, “Is there something I can do for you, Major? You'll have to forgive me for my limited hospitality at the moment. I was asleep.”
 

“Maybe I should come back another time,” she said, sounding relieved.
 

That relief changed things. His eyes narrowed very slightly. “No, not at all,” he said more brightly, forcing himself to sit up straighter. He gestured her over to the chair opposite his sofa. “You came all this way with the turbolifts offline. It must be important.”
 

“I prefer to stand,” she said. She made some concession to him, however, by stepping closer so that she could speak more quietly. “I...wanted to...thank you,” she said, speaking with difficulty, “for getting Dukat to back off. I...you know, I wasn't even aware that he was...” she paused and shuddered, “that he was hitting on me until you said something and he reacted the way he did.”
 

Garak inclined his head, surprised that she was thanking him, but even more surprised that she hadn't been aware of what was so blatant that it was offensive to him. “You were a bit distracted,” he said.
 

She snorted softly. “Still...was he really? Isn't it just as likely he was trying to goad me? He's such a complete ass, it wouldn't surprise me.”
 

“With all due respect, Major, perhaps you don't read Cardassians as well as you think you do,” he said. “I can assure you that he was very aggressively trying to impress you to a degree that I felt was unhealthy, particularly in light of his family situation.”
 

She scowled. “That's so disgusting. Why? Why me of all people?”
 

He had several theories, none of which he was inclined to share with her. No matter how much he hated Dukat, he was not going to give a Bajoran insight into the Cardassian psyche willingly. “That's something I'm afraid I can't answer,” he said. “You'd have to ask Dukat, not that I recommend it.”
 

“I think I'll pass on that,” she agreed. “Why did you tell Julian about my abduction?” she asked abruptly.
 

He graced her with an ironic half smile. “Are you going to believe anything I say in answer to that?”
 

She pressed her lips together again. “Probably not,” she replied.
 

“Then I'll just let you draw your own conclusions,” he said tiredly. “It takes less energy, and it's what you'll do anyway.”
 

She regarded him in silence, her black eyes reflecting the low light in twin gleams like the surface of a mirror. “I am grateful,” she said at last, “but it doesn't change anything. I think you're a snake who'd sell all of us out the first chance you got.”
 

“It's always good to know where one stands,” he answered, not that he needed her to tell him any of that. He knew it all too well.
 

She folded her arms. “Do you know how many Bajorans died during the occupation, Garak?”
 

“If you want to know the truth of it, I never gave it much thought,” he said in an offhand way. He wanted her to leave now, and he knew that goading her would be the quickest way to get his way.
 

“Why does that not surprise me?” she asked. “Ten million. Ten million men, women, and children who never did anything to your people to deserve what you did to them, to us. I don't know what your role was in the occupation, but I promise you if I ever find out that you were responsible for even one of those ten million, I'll do everything in my power to see that you pay for it.”
 

He didn't want to think about it, and his mind rejected the figure outright. What did she expect him to do about it? What did she expect any Cardassian who had a hand in that to do? Did she honestly think the state had any more compassion for disobedient servants than it did for those it occupied? He knew from first hand experience, being one of the tools for discovering dissidents, that it did not, and she should have known after seeing the recording by Kell regarding Dukat's supposed cowardice in trying to abandon the station during the “revolt”. He felt a flare of anger for this woman whose life he had saved at great personal risk having the temerity to come into his quarters and harangue him about something over which he had no control. “If you ever do find such a thing,” he said lightly, “I'll be happy to indulge you then. Until then, as far as I'm concerned, the subject is closed.”
 

“You're as arrogant as Dukat,” she spat, clenching her fists.
 

“No, dear Major,” he said. “Dukat merely thinks he is the best at what he does. I know I am. That's not arrogance. It's confidence. Was there anything else you needed? Your uniform let out a bit, perhaps?” The glare she shot him was hot enough to melt latinum. Without another word, she whirled on her heel and stalked from his room. All in all, he had handled that somewhat more ham fisted than was his wont, but she did catch him at a bad time. The things that came out of his mouth during his migraines sometimes surprised even him.
 

After re-wetting his cloth, he resettled on his couch, the bedroom too daunting a trek in his state. “Computer,” he said, “lights out, and disable door chime. I don't want to be disturbed again tonight unless the station is in danger.” The nightmares returned in force, but he slept so deeply that by the time he awoke close to lunchtime, he remembered nothing more than vague, disturbing impressions that seemed connected to things that Major Kira had said. Why had he ever let her in his quarters to begin with? He knew it could only end badly. Live and learn, Elim, he thought dryly. Live and learn.

Author notes: This story spans the Deep Space 9 episodes The Search, Part I through Second Skin. I made some slight changes to the opening scene of Equilibrium to include our favorite tailor in the continuity, but for the most part, as before, I wrote around the episodes to avoid redundancy. The story works as a standalone, but it's also a continuation of what started in “Slow Burn” and continued in “He's No Romeo”.
Summary: As the threat of the Dominion looms large over the station, Doctor Julian Bashir and tailor and spy Elim Garak must make some tough decisions regarding love, loyalty, and the meaning of duty. Each will be forced to sacrifice, but in the end, is the price too high?
Author: Dark Sinestra
Date Written: December, 2009
Category: Slash
Rating: R for some implied scenes of sex, mild adult language and intense adult themes.
Disclaimer: I don't own any of these lovely characters, episode plots, or settings from Star Trek Deep Space 9. All remain the property of Paramount, and I receive nothing but satisfaction in playing God.
Word Count: 12,238

Garak
Julian's Private Quarters
2371

The heap of blankets covering Julian's bed stirred slightly. Garak was now awake, that transitional moment for him always nearly instantaneous. His Cardassian eyes had no trouble penetrating the deep gloom. With minimal shifting, he managed to encourage his still slumbering lover into his embrace, Julian's head in the hollow of shoulder and chest, a bare arm and leg snaking over Garak's torso and thighs. Stroking his fingertips delicately over Julian's shoulder and down the length of his exposed back, he coaxed the man to wakefulness. He still marveled at how the doctor awoke in increments, as though parts of his brain came to awareness more quickly than other parts, one of their many differences that secretly delighted him. He looked down into upturned brown eyes, aware that to Julian's perception, his face was currently little more than shadow.

“Mnh,” the doctor protested, his arm tightening in its hold. “Is it really morning already?”

“I'm afraid so,” Garak said, tipping his chin until the man's wavy hair tickled his lips. “What time are they expecting you to report to the docking ring?” he asked.

“0700 sharp,” came the glum reply. “I wish they'd allow you to come along.”

Garak allowed himself a small smile and pressed it to the top of Julian's head. “I'm just as glad they haven't considered it. They'd simply try to put me to work, and before long I'd feel in over my head and completely useless. What place does a tailor have aboard a warship?”

Julian's snorted laughter tickled his scales and pectoral ridge. “You never tire of that game, do you?” he asked, lifting his head and inadvertently letting cold air under their warm cocoon of blankets.

Making a soft sound of protest, the tailor reached up and sealed the breach. “No more than you,” he said. “I'd love to be able to tell you that I awoke in time for us to have a more proper send off for you, but I'm afraid I didn't. If you want to be on time, you're going to have to hurry.”

“Well, then,” the doctor said, bending to nibble along the ridge conveniently in reach, “you will simply have to use some of the down time you'll have while I'm away concocting a plan to make it up to me.”

“After last night, I'm surprised you can say that to me with a straight face,” he replied drolly.

“After last night, I'll be surprised if I can do anything straight for some time,” Julian said smartly. “Nonetheless, I expect you won't disappoint.” He leaned up and kissed Garak soundly then slid from the bed, disturbing the blankets as little as possible.

Garak appreciated the consideration, even more when Julian called the lights up at just fifteen percent. It was still bright to his dark adjusted eyes, but at least it didn't stab into his skull like the tip of a dirk. He watched with unabashed enjoyment while the well built, slender man moved naked about the room, gathering all of his fallen clothing and passing it to him under the blankets. “You really expect me to dress without showering?” he asked.

Julian's lips pursed with amusement. “You're such a bundle of contradictions. You clearly have no issue with getting messy, and you don't insist on jumping right into the shower after even our most strenuous exertions, but you won't put your clothes on without a shower?”

Reluctantly, Garak sat up to face the chill of the room. “If you spent as much time making your clothing as I've spent on mine, it would make perfect sense to you, Doctor,” he said primly. “Besides, I was thinking we could shower together.”

“Since you put it that way...”

They spent the rest of their brief time left together performing what Garak privately thought of as the dance of polite lies, with Julian assuring him that he had no reason to worry for his safety and Garak in turn giving assurances that worry was the farthest thing from his mind. He had a backlog of work to keep him busy, and he knew that they wouldn't be gone overly long. He had every confidence that they would succeed in whatever it was they were endeavoring to do. Julian, of course, regretted that he couldn't just come out and tell Garak what that was, but it was a matter of Starfleet security. Surely he understood. Of course he did, and he'd never put Julian in such an awkward position as to ask!

He had learned over time that the best way to handle any sort of leave taking with the younger human was to keep it simple and light, the proverbial difference between the cut of a scalpel and that of a saw. As soon as he left his lover's quarters, he dropped all pretense of levity. The truth was that the growing threat of invasion had him deeply concerned, and much of that concern centered around his own safety. The others, if necessary, could flee Deep Space Nine and be reasonably assured that at least for some time, they would be safe again. Garak had no such assurances. If he went anywhere but exactly where he was supposed to be, an entire fleet of Federation warships wouldn't prevent the lone assassin in the dark that he knew would find him.

The Promenade was more deserted than he had seen it since the end of the occupation. While he did have a backlog of some work, he wondered if the customers would even be around to pick up their finished products when all was said and done. He couldn't blame any of them, not the Bajorans retreating back to Bajor, nor the other aliens who were booking passage away on any available transports that they could. He would have already done the same if the option were available to him with the promise to write Julian when he was settled. He was not one for heroics and last stands. While they might make entertaining reading for some whose lives lacked sufficient stimulation and excitement, for him heroics was just a synonym for stupidity, and last stands were for those who lacked the wit to escape a situation before they found their backs to the wall.

He worked on his backlog for most of the day. Only when he was sure that the Defiant had departed the station for the Gamma Quadrant with most of the senior Starfleet staff and some of the Bajoran staff aboard did he risk sending a coded transmission to his clandestine contact on Cardassia. He never received anything more than an acknowledgment of his transmissions for his trouble, and sometimes he didn't even receive that. Still, it made him feel useful in a small way to know that despite his exile, he did his part in service to the state. Who better to know the developing situation with the mysterious Dominion than someone close to the front lines?

If his dear Julian knew just how much he gleaned from their seemingly innocent conversations, he would probably never speak to Garak again out of fear of revealing more. Garak didn't have to ask questions or hear anything specific to read between the lines. He sighed softly, reflecting that in his life he had experienced few things worse than the knowledge that he was a well made, finely honed tool crafted for a purpose he was now denied. Tain and the others were being short sighted not using a resource they had cultivated so carefully and for so long, and Cardassia could well suffer for it. You can keep me from my contacts and resources, but you'll never keep me from doing what I know I do best, he thought.

Feeling bolstered after sending his report on the status of Starfleet's intentions with the Dominion, he closed up shop for the day and decided to take a brief detour into Quark's. To his understanding, Quark was included on the Defiant's journey because of Ferengi business dealings. In a small way, it rankled the professional in him. Of course, he had worked hard to cultivate the image that he was nothing more than a tailor. He knew they didn't believe him, but he also knew they had no idea just how useful he could be and that they saw any potential benefit in trying to find out far outweighed by the detriment of his loyalties.

It took him a second or two to realize what felt out of place in the bar. Morn was nowhere to be seen. For that matter, aside from a smattering of tense looking employees, neither was anyone else. He strolled to the bar and took a seat opposite a very disconsolate looking Rom. “Hi, Garak,” Rom said. “Wh-what can I get for you?”

“I'll have a glass of kanar,” he said. “I see my business isn't the only one with a dearth of customers today.”

“Today, tomorrow, probably forever,” the Ferengi said glumly. He set Garak's glass before him and glanced around the empty space behind him. “It's not fair.”

Garak pulled his glass closer and lifted it for a sip. “Fair?” he asked.

Rom nodded, his mouth setting in a bitter line. “All this time I've waited and worked in my brother's bar, hoping that some day it would be mine. Now, even if it happens, it'll just be a place run over by the Dominion!”

“Maybe it's time to come up with a new plan,” Garak said mildly. He genuinely liked Rom. The Ferengi had always been kind to him and deserved better than Quark for a brother and ambitions so curtailed by a lack of confidence.

“Like what?” he asked skeptically.

Garak peered at him a moment before answering, “I have every confidence that you'll figure it out,” and downing the rest of his kanar in a swallow. He set payment to the bar top.

“Y-you do?” Rom asked, eying him mistrustfully, as though he expected a hidden barb.

“I do,” he said, nodding and not elaborating. No amount of unsolicited advice was going to drag the man out of his self-imposed holding pattern. It was quite possible that this Dominion threat could be one of the best things that ever happened to Rom, he believed. As he had personally experienced, there was nothing like the prospect of losing one's entire accustomed way of life to inspire creative thinking.

Rom smiled hesitantly. “Thank you, Garak,” he said.

He inclined his head graciously and returned the smile. “I should be on my way. If things get too quiet tomorrow, come by the shop for a bit. My replicator is on its last legs, but I believe it can manage some tea.”

“I'll do that,” Rom said eagerly. “Maybe I can do something about the replicator, too.”

“That would be very kind of you,” he replied, having his doubts. “Good evening.”

Rom came by early the next day, bearing a small toolkit and asking Garak to direct him to the replicator. He guided him into his stock room and showed him the ailing device. “I've had a request in for some time now for someone to come have a look at it,” he said, “but I'm not high on the priority list, I'm afraid.” Quite the opposite he knew, if Chief O'Brien still felt the same level of hostility toward him as he had displayed in their last encounter.

“We have the same problem at the bar,” Rom told him, kneeling down and removing the panel covering all of the device's inner workings. “My brother says it's because Odo doesn't like him. I think it's Starfleet. They're just like that, thinking they're better than everybody else when they're just the same. Worse, even, because they try to pretend they're not.” He disconnected the power source and got to work.

As Garak watched the work in progress, he found himself startled by two things, the first being that Rom actually seemed to know what he was doing with that toolkit of his and the second that while he was working, he lost his tendency to stammer and hesitate. Not only that, his observation about Starfleet was pointedly accurate. “I try to tell the doctor the same thing all the time,” he said.

“He's nicer than most of them,” Rom said, digging in further and twisting his head to have a look at some of the wiring, “but he's still one of them.”

“That he is,” the Cardassian agreed. “Tell me, does Quark know you're this talented with machinery?”

“No,” the Ferengi replied. “He doesn't have any idea how often things break down in the bar. I just fix them when he's not there.”

“Why don't you tell him?” Garak asked, intrigued at this glimpse into a family dynamic he had never understood very well.

“Because then he'd expect it of me,” he answered, pulling out some wires with degraded insulation. “You're lucky I found these,” he said, reaching up to hand them to Garak. “With all this cloth back here, you could've had a bad fire.”

Garak dutifully took the wiring and gave it his attention. “Yes, it is fortunate you found that,” he agreed, but he was determined not to be deterred from his original line of questioning. With everyone of interest to him on the other side of the wormhole, he craved distraction. “Would it be so bad if he had higher expectations of you?” he asked.

Rom shot him an incredulous look. “He already expects too much, and there's barely enough time in the day to do what he asks. If he expected me to fix everything, too, I'd never have any time to myself.”

“But you fix everything anyway,” he pointed out.

“On my schedule, not Quark's.” He stood then and brushed at his hands. “You've got some burnt out components in there. I have a collection of spare parts at the bar. I'm going to go see if I have what you need. I'll be right back.”

Garak watched him hurry away with that odd, crabbed gait of his, bemused. There was much more to the Ferengi than met the eye. It was a shame he was wasting himself in that bar. It was also a shame he had never bothered before now to talk in depth to the man. He decided that he would carve out a little more time in his schedule for such socializing. Who knew what sorts of things he could learn from unguarded moments?

Rom returned with a tray loaded with various parts. Garak raised an eye ridge. “That much needs replacing?” he asked.

Rom shook his head. “No, but I don't know how many of these are in working order. I scavenge stuff the engineers throw out before it gets taken off for incineration. They're really wasteful sometimes. Just because one component doesn't work, they chuck it out when they could rebuild it instead.” He knelt back in place and began testing the parts.

Garak found himself smiling slightly. He could respect the ethic of frugality. How often had he made it out of a situation simply because he wasn't quick to part with his resources? He knew enough about what Rom was doing to realize that not only was he competent, he was good, really good. He worked with a surety of purpose that no mere tinkerer would possess. After less time than it would have taken Garak working on the same problem with limited resources, Rom had the replicator turning out a decent spice pudding in addition to red leaf tea. “Is that better than it was?” he asked Garak.

“Far better,” Garak replied. “I feel as though I should pay you for this.”

“I did it as a favor,” the Ferengi said, looking somewhat put out at the offer.

Truly, he was full of surprises. Garak inclined his head respectfully. “Then you have my thanks. At least stay for tea and pudding.” Rom beamed and nodded, and the two of them managed to make a pleasant time of it together.

Isolation and idleness had always been challenges for the tailor. He spent much of his time writing in his journal when he wasn't working and staring out his star port when he wasn't writing. Being the one left behind was always more difficult than being the one in the thick of things, he thought. He had new appreciation for all of the patient Cardassian wives whose husbands were married more to their careers than their spouses and thought it a shame that most of those career military men had such little respect or even understanding of just what price their families paid. Were the results worth it? He found himself wondering. Come back safely to me, became a familiar refrain for his solitude.

Julian
USS Defiant
Gamma Quadrant, heading Alpha Quadrant

After the third hail to his cramped quarters, Julian relented. “Enter,” he said.

Dax stepped through the door and waited for it to slide shut behind her. She graced him with an understanding look. “I thought you might want to talk,” she offered.

He nodded, and she took the seat opposite him. It took him some time to formulate what was running through his mind into coherence. The knowledge that his experience of watching Garak shot to death by a Jem'Hadar right before his eyes was just a simulation wasn't much comfort at all. He feared that he would discover that something terrible had happened for real when they got back. If it hadn't, there were still some extremely disturbing implications to the scenario that filled him with nothing less than cold dread. “I know I didn't act like it,” he said, “but the moment Garak went down, I was lost.” He couldn't meet her gaze.

“I'm sure you were,” she said, leaning forward and covering his hand with hers. “But you stayed focused, and you did what you had to do. He'd expect nothing less of you.”

“I know,” he said, nodding and glad of the touch. He was shaken to his core. “The thing that really disturbs me is that most of us in that scenario were hooked in somehow. That Vorta had us linked so that our respective actions were what we'd really do in that situation.” He lifted his gaze to hers and held it. “The real Garak wasn't there, and yet I couldn't tell the difference.”

“You can't blame yourself for that,” she said. “Things were so tense...”

“No, Jadzia, you don't understand,” he interrupted her. “That's just it. There was no way for me to tell, which means that someone has been watching Garak very closely long enough to peg his mannerisms to a 't'. Not just to have his mannerisms down, but to extrapolate his most likely course of action. The Dominion is not only aware of Garak, it clearly views him as a threat.”

She inhaled slowly and sat back, now looking as concerned as he felt. “I see your point,” she said. “Garak isn't the only one they were able to simulate well enough to fool us. Benjamin found the Admiral quite believable, even if he was frustrated with her decisions. And I was completely taken in by their version of Eddington.”

“I'm frustrated. According to Starfleet protocol, I can't tell Garak anything about what we experienced here. I can't warn him of the danger he's in,” he said, feeling the unusual urge to hit something.

Dax smiled slightly. “I truly don't think you have to worry about that as much as you think you do. Garak is one of the wariest, most mistrustful people I've ever seen, not just in this lifetime, but in all my lifetimes. He may not be specifically aware that he's in the Dominion's sights, but you can believe he's not going to be taken by surprise. I think the rest of us are in worse danger than he is.”

“You're so comforting,” he said dryly.

“I have my moments,” she said with an impish quirk of her lips. “You really love him, don't you?”

“Beyond reason,” he said with a sigh.

“Why?” she asked, tipping her head. He started to bristle, but she held up her hands. “I'm not asking that to slight him. I just want to understand.”

“Sorry for being defensive,” he murmured, “but I hear enough versions of 'he's evil and can't be trusted' from Miles and even Major Kira. I know he can't be trusted in the way that most of us consider decent or right, but if you know him well enough, you can have a pretty good idea of what he will and won't do. He wasn't raised with Starfleet ethics, and it's not fair to expect him to have them.”

“I don't disagree with you,” she said reasonably. “I feel the same way about the Klingons, but that's not what I asked you.”

“Why does anyone fall in love, Dax? What is it that connects heart to heart? If I had the answer to that, I could retire from Starfleet a wealthy and famous man and solve a lot of problems before they ever even started. He...tries my patience to within a centimeter of my self-control. Half the time, no, over half the time he argues just for the sake of arguing, has exacting expectations, can be insufferably arrogant and condescending, moody, and downright curmudgeonly. He's cynical, sarcastic, and the most stubborn man I've ever met in my life.”

Dax laughed and fanned herself. “Be still my heart. With a list like that, who could possibly resist him?”

He snorted a soft laugh. “I know. To hear me talk, he's awful, but it's what's beneath all of that that takes my breath away. Just when I think he won't understand something that's really important to me, he grasps it better than people who have known me far longer. While he chides me for not being careful enough and criticizes me for being too trusting, when I do get hurt, his patience and compassion are bottomless. He has seen me at my worst and never flinched away, and he has cared for me as conscientiously as I would a fragile patient. He...doesn't let me get away with not expecting the most from myself, and he keeps my ego in check better than anyone I've ever known. What's not to love about that?”

Her smile softened. “Thank you, Julian,” she said.

“For what?” he asked, confused.

“Helping me to understand. Garak isn't the only one who worries about you, you know. I think after this conversation, at least where you and he are concerned, I'll worry a lot less. Do you want me to stay a while?”

“No, that's all right,” he said, standing and offering her a hand up. “If you really want to stop worrying, get to know him. I think you might be pleasantly surprised.”

She walked with him the short distance to the door and paused. “We'll see,” she said. “He makes me uncomfortable. I do believe he cares for you in his own way. He doesn't have that same sentiment when it comes to the rest of us.”

“He never will if you don't give him a chance,” he countered.

She smiled faintly and leaned in to kiss his cheek. “I will consider it,” she said, “but I can't make any promises. Good night, Julian. Try to get some sleep.”

He tried to follow her advice to no avail. As the Defiant continued on its homeward course for the wormhole and Deep Space Nine, he realized he wouldn't truly be able to relax until he saw Garak with his own two eyes, assuming he wasn't still involved in some sort of mind game simulation. And I accuse Garak of paranoia, he thought ironically.

Garak
Garak's Clothiers

Garak was putting the finishing touches on a new rack display when he heard rushed footsteps closing behind him. Whirling to face whoever it was, he barely had time to say, “Ah, my dear, you're back,” before being clenched in an embrace that would've been uncomfortable to anyone with less solid bone structure. He returned the embrace with a bit more care, somewhat taken aback at how fervent the doctor was in his affections. “It has hardly been that long,” he said, amused and trying to pull back. Julian wouldn't allow it. His amusement faded. “Tell me,” he said. “What is it?”

“I can't tell you,” the man replied, his voice muffled against Garak's shoulder. “I just...I need you. Right now.”

“But the shop,” Garak protested.

“Has no customers,” Julian said gruffly.

Baffled, Garak nonetheless obliged. “Computer, close and lock doors,” he said. “At least let me take you to the back. I don't think the few people on the Promenade would appreciate a floor show.”

The doctor released him only to seize his hand and tug him toward the stock room. He was too confused by the uncharacteristic behavior to feel aroused. More than anything, he was worried. He followed in his wake and just for good measure closed the door to the stock room, too. “I'd be much more cooperative if I knew what this was about,” he said.

“It's about this,” Julian replied, kissing him crushingly. “And this,” he murmured against Garak's mouth, reaching down between them to stroke the tailor through his trousers. Garak realized he'd get no real answers as long as his lover was in the throes of whatever strong drive pushed him to such reckless abandon. His body responded well before his mind decided to back its decision wholeheartedly. The doctor took him quickly and roughly in a storm of passion that ended for both of them in record time.

As Garak lay panting on the floor and staring up at the artificial light strip, again he wondered what that had been about. “You do realize you're going to have to tell me something,” he said a bit crossly, turning his head to look at the man sprawled partially naked at his side.

“I don't ever want to lose you,” the doctor replied cryptically and laced his fingers in his to squeeze.

He didn't know what to say to that, but it filled him with trepidation. Whatever had happened on that mission to the Gamma Quadrant, it couldn't have been good. “How very morbid of you,” he said, sitting up and reaching for his undershirt and tunic, both crumpled together on the floor nearby. It was too cold for him to want to lie about for long in a state of partial undress. As much as he hated putting clean clothing over a soiled body, he hated the thought of traipsing half naked back to his quarters far worse.

“I wish I could tell you,” he said earnestly, also sitting up and starting to comport his uniform.

Garak watched his face as he spoke. He saw the minute pinching together of the brows, the drawing in of the lower lip. Whatever had happened pained the doctor much more than his regret at not being able to share it. He couldn't tell how it had anything to do with him, but perhaps he'd understand more in time. “We've been through that before,” he said gently. “You know I don't expect you to compromise your job on my behalf. Surely you can understand, however, how barging into the shop and ravaging me to within an inch of my life during work hours is troubling?”

“Ingrate,” the doctor said, his lips curving into a sly smile that Garak could tell was mostly feigned.

“No, my dear,” he said, leaning to kiss him lightly before climbing to his feet. “Never that. Everyone else made it back in one piece?” he asked carefully.

“Yes,” he answered and stood up beside Garak. “We're all unharmed. I appreciate that you asked.”

“I know they're important to you,” he said. “In that context, how could I not care? As much as I missed you, I really don't want to set a precedent of closing the shop at odd hours of the day. With business as sparse as it is, I need all the hours here I can manage. Can we continue this conversation when I get off work?”

For some reason, that seemed to amuse the doctor. He gave Garak a final tight squeeze, a very naughty grope, and kissed him with such tender emotion that it stole his breath all over again. “Yes,” he said. “We certainly can. For what it's worth, I missed you, too.”

“It's worth quite a bit,” Garak assured him, opening the stock room door and allowing him to precede him out.

Over the next few days, he believed that he was able to piece together at least part of the puzzle. A conversation with Quark helped a little bit. He was disappointed to discover that the Ferengi had not been present with the rest of them for some of the trip. It didn't stop the bar owner from having his own theories. In particular, what he said of Odo's behavior on the return trip was of keen interest to Garak. It felt strange to be taken deeper into Quark's confidences and to share at least a bit of information with him in return. Common enemies make strange bedfellows, he thought.

Strangest of all so far was Julian's sudden announcement one evening that he and Garak had been invited to dinner by Commander Sisko. Garak took one look at his excited expression and knew that no amount of squirming and begging off would spare him from attending. Resigned, he told the doctor to accept for them and braced himself for an evening of supreme discomfort. Hearing who else would be there just made it worse.

He took off a bit early the afternoon of the engagement to give himself plenty of time to prepare, physically and mentally. It was important to him to look his best, as a good suit went a long way toward making him feel more confident. He also drank a single glass of kanar to take the edge off. It truly didn't matter to him what any of the people attending thought of him. It was what his presence could do to Julian that worried him. He believed that their relationship was a detriment to his long term career prospects by virtue of his very existence and race. The least he could do was to make certain that he said and did nothing to give the Commander or the others reason to believe that he was just using the doctor and that the doctor was too naïve to see it.

Despite expecting the door chime, it still startled him when it sounded. “Enter,” he said. He took one look at what his beautiful doctor was wearing and groaned. “You're actually wearing that?” he complained.

“You're such a flatterer,” Julian said dryly. “I feel so much better now.”

Garak sighed and shook his head. “Honestly, I had hoped that by now at least some of my taste would have rubbed off on you. How many times have I said this cut is all wrong for you? Don't even get me started on the hideous color combination.”

Seemingly exasperated and amused in equal measure, the doctor said, “Just hand me my spare uniform from the closet and give me five minutes to change.”

He tsked primly. “That's an improvement, I suppose, but only just. Hurry up and don't muss your hair, or we'll be late.”

Julian

For all of Garak's fussing, they were nowhere close to late, quite the opposite. They were the first to arrive. Jake greeted them at the door. “Hey, Doctor Bashir...Mr. Garak,” he said. “Come on in. Dad and I are still cooking.”

“Hello, Jake,” Julian said cheerfully. Garak inclined his head in that way he had come to associate with Cardassians in general, and the two of them stepped into the quarters. Delicious smells filled the air, and he was very surprised to see Commander Sisko actually cooking on hot plates.

“Welcome, Doctor, Mister Garak,” Sisko said with a smile. “Make yourselves comfortable. There's wine on the sideboard and a few hors d'oeuvres scattered about.”

“Thank you, Commander,” Julian said, returning the smile and moving to pour himself and Garak a glass of white wine. “Everything already smells amazing.”

“Indeed,” Garak added. “It was gracious of you to invite us.”

“It's my pleasure,” the man replied. Jake rejoined him, and the two continued the meal preparation.

Garak took a seat, looking rather formal and stiff while he waited for Julian. The doctor brought him his glass and sat beside him. “So,” he said just a little too brightly, “when you invited us, I didn't realize you meant that you would actually be cooking.”

“Dad loves to cook,” Jake said. “He's really good at it, too.”

“Thank you, son,” Sisko said, beaming. “It's a weakness of mine, a real home cooked meal.” He turned his attention to Garak. “Tell me, Mister Garak, have you ever had Cajun food?”

“I haven't,” the Cardassian answered between sips of wine. “Judging from the smell, I believe I should be sorry to have to say that. I'm looking forward to trying it. Now, is that a reference to some sort of regional cuisine, or a specific style of cooking?”

The doctor felt a small thrill. He hadn't known what to expect from Garak in this sort of situation, as he had never had the chance to see him in a purely social context with his co-workers. So far he seemed to be maybe not exactly enjoying himself but on his best behavior. He knew that he was scoring at least a few points with the Commander by showing an interest in something that obviously interested him.

“A little bit of both, actually,” Sisko answered. He quickly warmed to the subject, all too happily indulging Garak's curiosity. Julian was content to listen. He didn't want to interrupt the moment, so he sipped his wine and tried some of the cheese ball on the low table in front of him on a cracker.

The door chimed, and Jake moved to answer it. “Hi, Major Kira,” he said. “Come on in.”

The doctor stiffened slightly, glancing out of the corners of his eyes at Garak. The Bajoran woman followed Jake inside and visibly paused when she spotted the tailor seated beside the doctor. Perhaps he should have given her advance warning that Garak would be there, but he had been afraid that if he did, she might not come at all. The look she shot Julian could have bored a hole in the station hull. “I'm glad to see I'm not late,” she managed, bee lining for the wine.

“Not at all, Major,” Sisko said. “Will Odo still be joining us?”

“The last I spoke to him he said he intended to,” she replied. She turned with a full glass and eyed each seat, settling on the one furthest away from the Cardassian. She perched on the edge. “He probably got tied up in Security at the last minute.”

“I was under the impression that things were rather quiet of late,” Garak said mildly.

She glanced sharply at him, again cut a look at Julian, and said, “I really wouldn't know. Things come up.”

“That they do,” Julian cut in. “Just this morning, I wound up with three cases of Bolian rhino virus in the infirmary, even though the last Bolian left the station several days ago. Incubation periods, you know.”

“Fascinating,” Garak said in a way that made him want to elbow him. Had they not been in polite company, he would've. “The Commander was just explaining Cajun cuisine to me, Major,” he said pleasantly. “It has quite the intriguing history, a people forced to leave their ancestral home, settling anew, and being forced to move again. They trek across an entire continent, settle in a region most consider uninhabitable due to all manner of dangerous wildlife, and turn it into food. I do hope I got that right?” he asked, glancing at Sisko.

The Commander looked highly amused. “You did, Mister Garak; I believe in the most succinct way I have ever heard you speak.”

“Brevity is the soul of wit,” he quipped.

“That would explain a lot,” Kira said a bit flatly.

“As you see,” the tailor gestured to the Major with a broad smile.

“What is this wine?” Julian cut in desperately. “It's really very good.” At the rate those two were going, he could tell he'd be drinking a lot of it that night.

“Oh, it's just a nice table brand of Pinot Grigio,” Sisko answered. “I'll make sure you leave with a label if you really like it. I order it on a fairly regular basis. I can always include an order for you with mine.”

“I'd like that,” Julian said. He didn't like the way Garak and Kira were eying one another at all, but he wasn't sure what he could do about it without making things worse. Kira's attitude was to be expected, he supposed. It was Garak's that worried him. He knew that look. It meant trouble, mischief, and provocation. It meant that if Garak wasn't careful, he might get himself slapped. “Here,” he said, standing and plucking Garak's mostly empty glass from his hand. “Let me get you a refill.” He used the moment he had his back to the Major to glare daggers at his lover and mouth, Behave!

“Thank you, my dear,” Garak said. The doctor couldn't tell if he intended to follow his order or not. Nothing had changed in his demeanor. “May I pass you anything, Major?” he asked, waiting until Julian was too far away to intervene. “You're seated quite the distance from the food.”

“No,” she said sharply, adding with some difficulty, “thank you. I'm fine.”

“Don't eat too much,” Jake said gamely. “You'll want to save room for the main course.”

“I wouldn't dream of spoiling my appetite,” Garak assured him.

Kira's mood improved visibly with the arrival of Odo. The changeling took an interest in the food preparation, heading over to watch Sisko and Jake up close. With Kira's attention now on the trio, Julian leaned close to Garak and murmured, “I don't know if it's that you can't help yourself or you won't, but please at least try not to provoke her and make things awkward.”

“My dear Doctor, I have no idea what you're talking about,” he said innocently, sipping his wine.

They turned their attention toward Odo, who was getting an impromptu lesson in souffle making. Everything seemed as though it would work out well after all, until Julian discovered that part of the meal included sauteed beets. “Beets?” he asked without enthusiasm. He should have known better, for the conversation went exactly as it did any time one expressed a dislike for a particular type of food. He was quickly informed that he simply hadn't had them prepared properly.

Dax's arrival gave Garak an opening. He murmured close to the doctor's ear, “Don't be difficult about the food. It's quite rude!”

He couldn't tell if he was serious or just taking the opportunity to goad him. Knowing Garak, the chance of either was around fifty/fifty. The pre-dinner banter continued until Dax discovered Jake's keyboard on the table and began playing around with it. At first, it didn't sound like much, but suddenly, she played a very lyrical refrain.

“That was lovely,” Julian said, surprised since she had expressed her belief that she had a complete lack of musical ability.

“Quiet!” she snapped, trying again unsuccessfully.

Taken aback, he blinked in surprise and stilled. No one said anything for a few uncomfortable moments. When she couldn't reproduce the piece again, she finally gave up, but he could tell she didn't want to. Jake broke the awkwardness with the welcome announcement that dinner was ready.

The food was every bit as delicious as the smells had promised. He did not like the beets, but he ate a few anyway, as much to satisfy Garak as Commander Sisko. He didn't have the heart to tell the man that to him, they just tasted like dirt, sweet dirt, but still dirt. Dax seemed a bit subdued and preoccupied for the rest of dinner, not at all like her. He determined that he would ask her later if something was wrong or if he had offended her in some way. He hoped that her attitude wasn't because of Garak's presence there. It didn't seem too likely. She was as friendly to the tailor as she was to any of them that night.

He was grateful that whatever mercurial mood had seized his lover early in the evening eased with the enjoyment of the meal. Garak made no further effort to provoke Major Kira in any way, and he contributed pleasantly to the dinner conversation without dominating it or becoming overbearing. It was as close to a normal social outing as Julian could have hoped for. They chose to leave at the same time as Dax, earlier than Major Kira and Odo so that they wouldn't be those people, the sort who were first arrivals and the last to depart and always so taxing to a host.

As they strolled back toward Julian's quarters, the closer of the two, they walked arm in arm. “I want to thank you,” Julian said, “for letting me have a pleasant evening out with you and coming along. I know you didn't want to.”

“I'm glad that I did,” Garak replied lightly. “It was most informative.”

Julian arched a brow. “Do you really expect me to believe you found the history of the Acadians and Cajun cuisine that intriguing?”

Garak sighed. “Every time I think you're making real progress, you say something like that and dash my hopes to pieces. It's very cruel of you, you know.”

He rolled his eyes and stopped before his door to key his entry code. Garak gestured for him to precede him inside. He did so, turning toward Garak once the door closed. “I can't imagine what else you may have learned. No one said anything earth shatteringly interesting, and aside from Dax's somewhat odd behavior, nothing of any real note happened.”

The Cardassian's lips quirked into the smile that Julian found his most maddening. It managed to imply that Garak knew something he didn't, felt that he ought to know it, and found it amusing and disappointing that he didn't all at once; not to mention it was mocking. He knew from over three years of association that nothing he said or did would pry the information out of the man once he got that smile. “Be that way, then,” he said in exasperation, heading to his bedroom to change out of his uniform.

He returned to find Garak gazing out the star port. For a few minutes, he stood quietly in his bedroom doorway and simply watched. At times the man held such profound stillness, usually in moments when he wasn't aware anyone was looking. It was hard to catch him like that. When Julian did, he felt as though he bore witness to a gulf of sadness and isolation that he was helpless to combat. No matter what he touched in Garak, he knew on an instinctive level that he never touched that. He doubted that there was a person alive who could, and he wondered if it would disappear were Garak able to return to his beloved Cardassia or if it was an indelible part of his character, forged long before his exile.

To his surprise, he found that while he lost himself in thought, he had become the observed. “Such a look,” Garak said softly.

“I could say the same thing,” he replied, his false cheer ringing flat in his ears. He closed the distance between them and stood behind the man, slipping his arms about his waist and resting his chin on one of his shoulders. “What are you looking at out there?”

“I'm not,” the tailor said cryptically. He covered Julian's hands with both of his and didn't elaborate.

“Something...in here, then?” the doctor asked hesitantly, twisting his neck to press a kiss to Garak's temple so that he'd know what he meant.

Garak turned in his arms and smiled an odd smile. “You are learning after all,” he said. “Aren't you going to ask me what it is?”

Julian nuzzled him nose to nose. “No,” he said. “You'll tell me when you're ready, or you won't. I'm not going to ask.”

The Cardassian's smile deepened, his blue eyes shining. “Oh, my dear, we truly have made some progress. Now, let's go get sweaty so we have an excuse for pillow talk.”

He laughed, startled right out of his contemplative mood. As they headed for the bedroom, he wondered if that hadn't been exactly Garak's intention. Some of his manipulations were so much more subtle than others that it was always safest just to assume intent.

Author Notes: The time frame of this story encompasses the DS9 episodes Crossover and Tribunal. If you haven't seen the show and you want to know more about what is referenced regarding the episodes, good summaries can be found at the website Memory Alpha. I made the decision not to include much of the actual episodes within the story for the sake of not being redundant for those who are familiar with the show. The story begins right where my story “Slow Burn” left off but makes sense as a stand-alone.
Summary: Doctor Julian Bashir quickly comes to realize that catching a Cardassian's romantic interest is much easier than learning to live with one, particularly one as complex and secretive as Elim Garak, and that a relationship between members of political rivalries is not for the faint of heart.
Author: Dark Sinestra
Date Written: December, 2009
Category: Slash
Rating: NC-17 for some scenes of explicit sex and mild adult language and situations.
Disclaimer: I don't own these wonderful characters, story lines, or settings from Star Trek Deep Space 9. They all belong to Paramount, and the only rewards I reap in writing them are personal satisfaction and fun.
Word Count: 13,899

Garak
Garak's Quarters
2370

Garak listened to the deep, even breathing of his new lover at his side, as astounded by the heat of the man as he was by how quickly Julian managed to fall asleep. He carefully rolled from his back to his side, lifting to an elbow and propping his cheek in his palm. How innocent the doctor looked in his unguarded moment, his strangely smooth face so child-like. Garak had given up on getting any sleep that night despite being tired. Every subtle shift and vocalization of the man at his side jolted him from his few light dozes. He wondered if he would ever become accustomed to having another in his bed or even if he should.

The troubling specter of Tain returned to him now in the quiet darkness, appropriate timing given the nature of the man. He wanted Garak to suffer, and he had gone to great lengths to insure that the torture continued unabated. The possibility that he might try to take Julian away from Garak was very real and even somewhat likely. Garak gently traced the curve of Julian's brow. The man didn't even flinch or stir. He frowned. Was it fair of him to drag such an innocent into his dangerous world where the stakes were always high, and everyone played for keeps? Like it or not, if Julian became closely involved with him, he would be exposed to everything Garak risked. Indeed, he would be a target of the Cardassian's many determined enemies. Little wonder Tain had always warned him of emotional attachments and family ties. Had his father felt this conflicted about Mila? It was difficult to imagine, but given his own very existence, he knew it must be so.

It was hard enough looking out for himself and keeping his own skin intact, even with the benefit of all of his training and honed instincts. Julian was the proverbial babe in the badlands, and the badlands were full of far worse hunters than honges. He sighed softly. He had to believe that the doctor was up to the task of learning all that he needed to teach him. He would simply have to accelerate the program. He turned over and settled his back against his companion, tensing at first when Julian's arm snaked about his waist and eventually relaxing. Yes, sleeping with someone was going to take a lot of work to get used to.

Julian

Julian awoke from a deeper sleep than he had experienced in a long time. Muttering softly, he slid his hand over the empty pillow beside him. His eyes opened fully with the sudden realization that he was not in his quarters followed swiftly by the awareness that he was alone in Garak's bed. He sat up in the dimly lit bedroom, the covers slipping from his chest and settling in a rumpled heap over his lap. “Computer,” he said, “what time is it?”

“06:32,” came the response.

At least he wasn't running late. He swung his legs over the side of the bed and went to relieve himself then wandered naked into the sitting room only to find Garak fully clothed, sipping from a mug, and reading a PADD. Julian's clothes lay neatly folded on one of the dining chairs. Garak glanced up at him. “Good morning, Doctor,” he said pleasantly. “Did you sleep well?”

“Very well,” he answered. He wanted to close the distance between them and kiss Garak good morning, but for some reason the impeccable outfit reminded him of armor, the PADD a shield. “You?”

“Yes. Thank you for asking,” he said, setting the PADD aside and standing. “I was waiting on breakfast until you were awake. What would you like?” He set his mug aside on the small dining table.

“Toast and eggs would be nice,” Julian answered. He felt awkward naked with Garak clothed, so he approached to at least put on his pants. As he neared the table, a terrible stench had him pulling a face. “Good lord, Garak, what is that you're drinking?”

“Hmm?” the tailor glanced at him over his shoulder. “Oh, that's rokassa juice. I like it warm in the mornings. It's much better than fish juice, if you ask me.”

Fish juice? Julian mouthed to himself and shuddered. “What is 'rokassa', dare I ask?” he said, peering into the depths of the mug at the murky orange-ish liquid. It looked about as appetizing as it smelled in his opinion. He slid his pants upward and fastened them then went ahead and pulled his tunic over his head. It didn't seem likely Garak intended to be affectionate that morning. Maybe he's not a morning person, he thought, although he doubted that was the issue. If not, what was?

“It's a type of fruit that grows on Cardassia,” he answered. “Very calming for the nerves. How do you want your eggs?”

“Are you nervous about something?” Julian asked in a lighter tone than he felt. “Oh, over easy, please.”

Garak gave the order and turned to hand him the plate. “Should I be?” he asked, lifting an eye ridge archly.

“Of course not,” he said, rolling a shoulder and accepting the plate. “At least not that I know of.” He sat at the table and waited for Garak to replicate his breakfast. One thing he hadn't given much thought to was how strong most Cardassian food smelled, not at all in a pleasant way. It was going to take some getting used to, sitting across from that and eating his own breakfast with any degree of appetite. He picked at his toast as Garak took his seat. “Is...something wrong, Garak?” he asked, hazarding a glance upward.

“No, my dear,” he answered, meeting Julian's gaze squarely. “Why? Am I giving that impression?”

“Not exactly,” he said, unsure of what he wanted to say or even why he felt uneasy.

“Inexactly?” Garak asked, tilting his head.

“No,” he said, snorting a soft laugh. “It's probably nothing. I suppose, well...I guess I thought things would be a little more...intimate this morning after the night we had,” he said. “I didn't expect to awaken alone in the bed, and when I came out here, you were already dressed and looked as though I was holding you up from starting your day.”

“Ah, I see,” Garak said. He took a bite of his food and a thoughtful sip of his juice. “I'm a creature of habit in many ways,” he said carefully. “You may have already noticed this, but demonstrativeness does not come easily or naturally to me.”

“I've noticed,” Julian said, smiling slightly. He felt himself easing a little at Garak's explanation. It made perfect sense. It was foolish of him to expect that the tailor would change his mannerisms overnight just because their relationship had deepened past friendship. He would have to make some allowances for Garak's reservations, just as he hoped that Garak would make some allowances for his own tendency to be very affectionate with his partners. “I just wanted to be sure you weren't having regrets.” Or changing your mind, he thought worriedly. He tried to read the look in the bright blue eyes, but as was so often the case, the Cardassian was a complete cypher.

“Are you?” he asked lightly.

“Having regrets? No,” Julian said. “I'm having a hard time believing last night even happened, but I don't regret it. I'm wondering how the others will react, though.”

“Others?” Garak asked, setting his mug down and directing more of his attention directly at the doctor.

“Yes,” he answered. “You know, Dax, the Chief, Major Kira.” He paused, not at all liking that look. “What?” he asked.

To his surprise, Garak stood up and circled the table to stand behind him. He looked up and over his shoulder, only to feel the hands that had given him such pleasure the night before settling to his shoulders and kneading with an intimate, familiar touch. Try as he might, he couldn't help but to relax into it and close his eyes. “I'll give you all week to stop that,” he murmured.

“Julian,” Garak said, his tone as caressing and intimate as his hands, “it has been a very long time since I've had anything good to myself. Do you understand what I'm saying?”

“You want me to keep what we've done quiet,” he said, his brows knitting slightly.

“For now,” Garak replied, kissing his ear lightly and making him shiver. “Besides, don't you think it will be fun sharing this? Our secret? You're always saying I'm hiding things. This time, you're the only other one in the know,” he whispered, his breath warm and destroying Julian's ability to concentrate.

He wasn't unobservant enough not to know that he was being manipulated, skillfully at that. However, what Garak said had appeal to him on several levels. What harm could it do to keep things discreet? It would make the times they did come together that much more exciting, particularly trying to escape the notice of people like Odo and Quark, the first uncannily observant, the latter unabashedly nosy.

He smiled and lifted his hands to cover Garak's, pulling the man down for a languid, lingering kiss. “All right, Garak,” he said. “We'll play it your way, for now.” You're not the only one with secrets, he thought, feeling his heart skip a beat with more than desire. He hadn't even considered how difficult it would be to keep his own secret past from the tailor now that they were intimate. He kissed him again, much harder and hungrier. Two could play the distraction game. His was so involved it made both of them late for work.

Garak was right. Sharing such a delicious secret with him was indeed fun. It charged their public lunches with subtext, each subtly attempting to provoke the other without calling attention to themselves. He had to admit that Garak was light years ahead of him when it came to the art of wicked innuendo wrapped in innocent commentary. He was determined to improve and perhaps one day catch the man flat footed, however unlikely that seemed.

He did his best to give the Cardassian plenty of space and privacy, as hard as it was to stay away. He didn't believe he'd get very far if he started pushing too hard, and in truth, he wasn't sure he was ready to open further. For every sporadic act of intimacy, he came to realize he paid a price in being pushed back the next day. If Garak was having that much trouble trusting him, how could he really trust Garak? Besides, if he let him too close, he'd have the urge to tell him everything. If he couldn't resist that urge, who knew what damage his secret could do not only to their relationship but to his entire life as he knew it? Their odd holding pattern was better than nothing and not without its significant pleasures and rewards. Why rock that boat prematurely?

One pleasant side effect of trying to give Garak space involved his deepening friendship with Miles. Beneath the gruff, no-nonsense exterior, he found someone with a sense of fun and adventure similar to his own. Best of all, the man played a mean game of darts. Julian didn't have to hold back much of his skill in order to make their games challenging.

“One more,” the Chief said, losing his third game out of five to the doctor.

Julian laughed. “I'm afraid I've had my fill. Let's have another drink, instead.”

Nodding, O'Brien gestured him ahead of him to the bar. The two of them sat in the midst of the crowd and ordered a couple of pints. “You've finally given up on Dax, then?” O'Brien asked in an offhanded way.

“Pardon?” Julian asked innocently.

“Come off it,” the Chief snorted. “You can't fool me. You know exactly what I'm talking about.” He paused for a sip of his stout. “You haven't mentioned her except in passing for weeks now, and I haven't seen you hit on her in Ops in forever and a day. You have your eye on somebody else, or did you just finally come to your senses?”

He hadn't realized that he had been acting any differently, and it was troubling to think that it was obvious enough that even Miles had noticed it. He wondered who else might be wondering the same thing. “I suppose I just came to my senses,” he said with a self-deprecating chuckle.

“Hnh,” O'Brien muttered and took a deeper swig.

“What's that supposed to mean?” the doctor asked, lifting a brow.

“Oh, nothing,” the bluff man said, waving it away.

“Hardly,” Julian pressed, turning in his bar chair to face him.

“There,” the Irishman jabbed a thick finger in his direction. “You don't give up. It's not like you.”

Damn, he's more observant than I realized, Julian thought in consternation. “All right,” he muttered, his mind racing. What could he say to throw him off the trail? How would Garak handle this? A lot more smoothly than you are, he thought ruefully. “Maybe I do have my eyes on someone else,” he said, looking off into the crowd and taking a slow swallow of his synth ale.

“Thought so,” O'Brien said with satisfaction. “Who is she?”

A sudden thought struck Julian, and he almost laughed aloud. It was plausible enough. The woman was very attractive. The only problem was she was likely to take his head off if this got back to her. He leaned in very close to Miles and whispered.

The man's eyes flew wide. “What? Are you off your nut?”

“What can I say?” Julian shrugged and smirked. “She has a cute nose.”

“It's your funeral,” O'Brien said, shaking his head and punctuating his point with a swig from his pint glass.

Garak
Garak's Clothiers

It was official. Julian and Major Kira were very late in returning from their mission to the Gamma Quadrant. Although the doctor had been coy with Garak about the nature of the mission, he had been quite clear about when they were expected to return. Garak tried not to worry as he finished up his business for the day and closed shop. It was possible they had actually already returned and that Julian had his own business to attend in the infirmary. His schedule kept him far busier than Garak, and the tailor knew better than to try to demand more time with him, particularly when it came to his duties as an officer.

After locking up for the night, he strolled down to the infirmary and ducked his head inside. He recognized the nurse on duty as someone who was aware that he and the doctor often met for lunch and occasionally dinner. “Sorry to bother you,” he said, “but has Doctor Bashir returned, by any chance?”

She glanced up at him, startled from studying a chart. “I...” she said, blinking rapidly. “I'm sorry, Sir, but I don't think I'm allowed to tell you anything.”

That would be a “no”, Garak thought darkly. He smiled and inclined his head. “That's quite all right. Thank you for your time.” He stood just outside the doorway and considered his options. He could always try to hack into the computer system, but was such a drastic step really warranted yet? They were several hours late, not days, and if he did get caught, it would be very difficult if not impossible to talk his way out of it. Asking any of the Starfleet officers was out of the question. They wouldn't tell him anything, and they'd wonder why he asked to begin with. He knew they didn't approve of his association with the doctor. He didn't want to make Julian's job any more difficult than it already was.

In the end, he settled on trying Quark. The Ferengi kept his fingers in several pies around the station. If Garak played it carefully, he might learn something. If Quark didn't know, he wouldn't be out anything for the asking. He settled his features to mild annoyance and hurried down the Promenade to the bar. As he stepped through the wide entrance, he glanced about swiftly. Sighing, he wove through the early dinner crowd and took a seat at the bar, still looking around from that vantage.

“Garak, always a pleasure. What can I get you this evening?” Quark asked, approaching as he polished a glass.

Garak gave a final look before giving a small start and turning his attention to Quark. “Hm?” he asked, raising his brow ridges.

Quark leaned an elbow on the bar top and set the glass aside. “Looking for someone?”

“Oh, no,” Garak said, waving him off. “I'll have a glass of kanar, please.” He smiled pleasantly. As soon as Quark turned his back, he started craning his head once more.

He smiled inwardly as Quark's voice dropped to a more secretive tone. “If you are looking for someone, I might be able to help you, unless it's something I shouldn't know about?”

Garak turned back to him, glanced about to make sure no one was standing too close to them, and said, “Well, I really shouldn't say anything. It would just be embarrassing to the doctor.” He took the kanar glass and slid a bar of latinum across the bar top.

“Ah, you're looking for Doctor Bashir,” Quark said, taking the money. “I haven't seen him in a couple of days. It has something to do with starting a hospital on the new colony in the Gamma Quadrant. I didn't pay that much attention. You know how he goes on.”

“Yes,” Garak said, sipping his kanar. A dangerous glitter came to his eyes. “He's very tiresome at times.” He no longer had to feign irritation. Julian told Quark more about his mission than he did Garak, so obviously it wasn't some sort of Federation secret. Just as quickly, he let the irritation go. Wasn't he always chiding the man for being too trusting? He should consider the fact that he hadn't been told an improvement, not a slap in the face. He smiled faintly and took another sip. There was hope for the man after all, assuming of course that he was all right.

“You said it would be embarrassing?” Quark prodded him, curiosity plain in the curve of his toothy smile.

“My dear man, I said no such thing,” Garak said firmly with the sort of smile he found few dared to question. It worked like a charm. The Ferengi bartender quickly backed down and moved on to another customer. Garak finished his kanar and left the bar for his quarters.

When several more hours passed with still no word from the doctor and no answer to his communication hails to his quarters, he decided that now he had good reason to be worried. Being unable to ask anyone was positively maddening. In the end, he decided to take a peek in the computer system after all. He felt fairly confident that he wouldn't be caught. He wasn't happy with what he discovered, that the Rio Grande's warp signature had been found along with the trace of a plasma leak, but that there was no sign of the ship or debris in the Gamma Quadrant or the wormhole. “Where are you?” he murmured, his stomach feeling leaden.

Julian
USS Rio Grande

Doctor Bashir almost couldn't believe that he and Major Kira had made it back from that bleak parallel dimension in one piece. He yawned and rubbed tiredly at his filthy face before turning his attention back to the controls and helping the Bajoran officer pilot the runabout back to the docking ring. Neither of them had said much on the return trip, both wrapped in their thoughts of what they had experienced and the implications of it all. Although at the beginning of their return trip, before everything had gone so terribly wrong, he had decided to further the ruse that he was now interested in Kira instead of Dax, he felt no desire to continue it. What he wanted more than anything in that moment was to see Garak, his Garak, so that he could exorcise the memory of that other brutish Garak, a thug who possessed just enough of his lover's cunning to resemble him in a twisted, frightening way on more than a physical level.

“Hey,” Kira said more gently than was usually her wont, “are you OK?”

Glancing at her, he nodded tightly. He was far from it, but she wasn't the one he wanted to confide in, the one he needed. “Are you?” he asked.

She nodded, and he could tell that she was being as dishonest with him as he with her. They docked the damaged craft and stepped back into the comforting embrace of Deep Space Nine. He hadn't realized just how much he had come to view the place as home before encountering the dark, oppressive Terok Nor. He glanced at Kira as they walked together toward debriefing. What was it like for her, he wondered, to have memories of this place as an ore processing center under the brutal boot heel of the Cardassian Union and to live here now as it was? He decided he might ask her one day, but not today.

When they reached the central core, Commander Sisko took one look at the doctor and said, “Go get cleaned up and rest. This can wait until morning.” He turned his attention to Kira. “Major, do you need some time?”

She glanced at Julian and shook her head, looking odd and out of place in a purple evening gown. “No, Commander,” she said. “Let's go ahead and get this over with.”

Julian gratefully left them, hurrying into the turbo lift and heading for the habitat ring. He wondered if Garak had been worried about him. Even though he intended to go to his quarters to get cleaned up first, instead it seemed his feet had a mind of their own. Within a few minutes, he was outside Garak's quarters, filthy, aching, exhausted, and dehydrated. He triggered the hail without hesitation.

The door opened almost instantly, revealing, despite the late hour, a fully dressed and very concerned looking Cardassian. That concern deepened as soon as his eyes lit upon Julian. “Oh, my dear,” he said, seizing him by the elbow and guiding him into the low lit sitting room. “Sit down right here,” he directed, taking him to the sofa.

Julian half sat, half collapsed, wondering how he had managed to stay on his feet for as long as he had. He hardly heard Garak at the replicator. A moment later, he had a glass in his hand and was being helped to drink. The taste was unusual but not unpleasant. “What is this?” he asked.

“It's something to help hydrate you faster,” Garak replied, “an electrolyte solution we give to our soldiers in the field.” He was a solid, comforting presence seated right next to Julian, and his hand on the glass remained steady even when the doctor's faltered. “Don't gulp it down. I know you want to. If you drink it too fast, it will just come right back up and make you worse.”

He was grateful for the low lighting as he felt like one raw nerve. He nodded and allowed Garak to pace him with the drink, accepting a second once he had finished the first. He did feel a little better, finding he had the strength to sit up a little straighter and hold the glass by himself. “I'm sorry,” he said. “I'm getting your couch all filthy, and I know how you can't abide dirt in your quarters.”

“Nonsense,” Garak tsked and shook his head. “You stay right there as long as you need to.” He squeezed his knee gently and left his hand there.

“Aren't you going to ask me what happened?” he asked after a few moments.

“You'll tell me when you're ready,” Garak replied. “I'm much more interested in the fact that you're here now in one piece than in taxing you by asking you to relive something that was plainly difficult.”

Unbidden tears stung Julian's eyes but refused to fall. In all of his imagining, he hadn't expected the tailor to be nearly this kind or understanding. It went a long way toward driving the memory of that other Garak out of the fore of his thoughts. He looked deep into the shadowed blue eyes that had never left him since they sat together and set his glass on the floor beside his feet. “I'd...like to be held,” he said hesitantly, “for just a while, if you don't mind. You probably want me to bathe first, though. I know I smell awful.”

He could've sworn reproach flashed briefly in Garak's eyes just before he took him into his arms and cradled him just as he was, dirt, stink and all. He didn't intend to fall asleep, and yet he must have, for the next he was aware he was cleaner and dressed in clothing that didn't fit properly at all, too loose in the waist and neck and too long in the sleeves. He lay on the sofa with a pillow under his head and a soft blanket draped over his shoulders and tucked beneath his sock clad feet. Lifting his head, he saw Garak seated close by, alert and attentive. “What time is it?” Julian asked thickly, trying to shake the cobwebs of exhaustion from his mind.

“Don't worry,” the tailor replied. “I won't allow you to oversleep. You have some time yet to rest.”

He wanted to protest. His body would have none of it. Resting his head back on the pillow, he closed his eyes. The next time he opened them, it was to the sensation of his hair being stroked back from his forehead. Garak knelt beside him, close enough that his clean, pleasingly exotic scent lingered in and tickled his nose. “I'm sorry to have to awaken you, dear,” he said, “but if you're expected to report to duty today, you're going to need to get up now. I took the liberty of cleaning your uniform. I didn't have time to mend it, though.”

He felt the sting of those tears again, his emotions all over the place as a result of his ordeal. How had he ever doubted that this man cared for him? Just because Garak wasn't prone to sweet whispers and public displays of affection, it didn't mean he didn't feel. He vowed that he'd remember this, particularly in the times that his lover seemed distant. “You didn't have to do that,” he said, his voice a bit thick.

“I know,” Garak said, giving his hair a final stroke and standing. “Why don't you go take a shower? I couldn't clean you up as much as you need without awakening you. When you get out, I'll have you some breakfast ready.”

He nodded and did as he was asked. He stayed in the shower much longer than usual and wondered how long it would take before he felt truly clean or like himself again. As he stepped out, he noticed several bruises in the mirror along his torso, arms, and yes, his back, too. He thought of all the slaves they had been forced to leave behind and frowned deeply. Had they managed to do any good, or had they just made things worse? He wasn't eager to return to try to find out. He dressed in his shabby uniform, marveling at how clean it was. With a stab of guilt, he realized that Garak must not have gotten any sleep at all.

The smell of eggs, toast, and sausage greeted him upon his return to the sitting room. There was no trace of Cardassian food on Garak's table and only one plate. “Aren't you eating?” he asked.

Garak shook his head. “I'll eat once you've left,” he said. “I know my food doesn't exactly agree with you, and it's important that you get something in you. I do hope they won't be expecting you to put in a full day's work,” he said critically. “You need time to rest and recover.”

“I don't think they will,” he reassured him. “Commander Sisko just wants me to come in for a debriefing. Unless there's a severe medical emergency, I plan to take the rest of the day off.”

“Good,” he said, puttering about while Julian sat down to eat. “You know how to find me if you need anything.”

He tried not to wolf down the food, but it wasn't easy to control himself. His body had been deprived of nutrients and overworked for far longer in that mirror universe than he had been missing in this one. “I'll probably sleep all day,” he said between bites. “I would like company after you get off work, though. There are some things about what happened that I need to talk about. I'm not sure you're going to like them.”

“I don't like sending you away perfectly healthy and seeing you come back looking like a prisoner of war,” Garak said a bit tartly. “If those new colonists did this to you—oh, don't look so startled. Quark told me about it when I was looking for you. If they did, I might have something to say about it.”

“You were looking for me?” he asked, wanting to hide his smile and unable to prevent it.

The look Garak shot him was priceless. “Eat your breakfast, Doctor,” he said dryly. “Hunger has obviously disarrayed your mind.”

Julian finished up, gave him a quick kiss, and returned to his quarters in time to don his spare uniform. As he suspected he would, the Commander relieved him of duty for the day after the thorough debriefing. He had never been so happy to be in his pajamas and in his own bed than when he was allowed to return to his quarters. He was asleep almost as soon as his head hit the pillow and didn't awaken again until his door chime dragged him out of troubled dreams. It took him a bit to remember that he had told Garak to come by after work. Had he truly slept all day? “Enter,” he said, rubbing his eyes and slowly sitting up. “I'm back here in the bedroom,” he called.

Garak appeared in the doorway, holding a flat box wrapped with a festive ribbon and looking at him very crossly. “Did you even know who was at your door?” he asked.

“I knew you'd be coming by after work,” Julian answered a little defensively.

“Did you also know what time it is?” Garak demanded.

The doctor sighed. “Garak, could you please give it a rest right now? I'm still very tired.”

“Exactly the moment an enemy would choose to strike you,” the tailor said pointedly. “Honestly, Doctor, I could've been anyone. Would it hurt you to be a little more careful? It could hurt you if you aren't.”

“Your concern is touching,” he said a little flatly, annoyed. “What's in the box?”

“Open it and find out,” he said, closing the distance to the bed and offering it.

He took it and eyed Garak askance. Was this another one of his tests? Obligingly, he shook the box first and tapped the lid. Garak rolled his eyes and looked away. “How melodramatic,” he said, sounding very put upon. “Hardly the way to treat a present.”

Julian's lips twitched with reluctant amusement. He pulled the ribbon off the box and opened it, only to find a lovely pair of new pajamas folded neatly inside. “You made these?” he asked as he pulled them out. The fabric was very soft and light, some sort of silk, he figured, but he didn't know such things nearly as well as the tailor. They were deep forest green with subtle threading of gold, just enough to make them shimmer when the light hit them but not enough to be gaudy.

“Do you really think I'd give you something ready made?” the tailor huffed. “Of course I did. I wasn't going to give them to you yet, but after seeing some of those bruises, I decided you'd appreciate something gentle on your skin.”

“What am I going to do with you?” Julian asked, touched more than he could say.

“Don't expect that I'll let you do much while you're in that state,” Garak replied breezily, a teasing twinkle in his eyes.

“Very funny,” he snorted and climbed out of the bed. “I want to put these on, and then we need to talk.” He felt a little self-conscious about his battered body, so he stepped into the bathroom to change. If Garak thought anything of it, he didn't give any indication of such, a fact for which the doctor was grateful. The pajamas were hands down the most comfortable clothing he had ever owned. He marveled at the perfect fit, just enough flow for comfort, not so much that they would twist on him in his sleep. They were also flattering. Leave it to his lover and his impeccable taste to be able to create flattering pajamas! “What do you think?” he asked as he stepped out and turned all the way around.

“I think I may have to rethink my notion of keeping you from getting too active,” Garak said, his smile completely wicked.

Julian laughed, startled by the sudden tease. He had to hand it to Garak. He kept him on his toes, always. He climbed back into his bed and patted the thin mattress to encourage the tailor to come sit with him. The man did so, facing him and sitting cross legged at the foot of the bed. “What happened to me and Major Kira didn't happen on New Bajor,” he began. “In fact, it didn't happen in this universe at all.”

He related the entire account from start to finish, holding nothing back, how they encountered mirror versions of many people they knew, how Kira was fortunately given more freedom, how he was worked as a slave. It was harder for him to talk about that universe's Garak, but with his Garak's gentle encouragement, he managed to get it all out. It was so strange to him how Garak could be so completely closed off and hard to read most of the time and yet so incredibly easy to talk to. He felt better when he was finished, for although he had been thorough during his debriefing, he had shared nothing about how he had felt, how frightening it had been, the threat of hopelessness, the horror of killing that universe's Odo, the overriding fear that they might never return to their own world, that they would never get home. He suddenly realized that in some ways, what he had experienced was what Garak faced every single day. He stopped talking and searched the other man's gaze, reaching across the short expanse of the bed and lightly stroking a hand down his cheek.

“What was that for?” Garak asked, tipping his head.

“For you,” he said with a soft smile and a shrug. He knew that if he said more, Garak would take it as pity and close off immediately. He didn't want that. What he did want scared him a little. He didn't think before his ordeal that he'd get to such a place emotionally so quickly. “How determined are you not to tax me?” he asked, his voice dipping into an intimate register without his even trying.

“Quite,” Garak answered firmly. “Even more so after hearing what it is you went through. What you need is plenty of rest, plenty of fluids, and time to recuperate your energy.”

Julian knew that look. He knew he had best be damned persuasive, or he'd get nowhere. “Yes,” he said quietly, “physically, that is what I need, and as a doctor, believe it or not, I do know how to take care of myself.” He made sure to smile so that Garak would know he wasn't chiding him. “There's something else I need more, though,” he said, leaning forward to take both gray hands in his and squeeze. He stroked his thumbs lightly over the backs of the hands, never anything less than fascinated with how much the texture changed depending upon the direction of the stroke. “I need you. I want you...in...in me.” His eyes shifted focus with Garak's, eye to eye, left to right, as he willed the Cardassian to understand what he meant.

“Julian,” Garak breathed his name on the barest exhale. “It can be painful, particularly the first time when you've never done such a thing before. After all you've already been through and with all those bruises on your back...”

He squeezed his hands tighter to shush him. “I know what I'm asking,” he said. “Please, Elim, don't make me beg.”

Garak made a small sound in his throat, leaning forward and drawing Julian into his arms. He kissed his face, small, light kisses all over, cheeks, lips, chin, and eyelids as he said, “Never, my dear. I'd never be so cruel. If you're sure, we'll do this, but I fully expect that if I hurt you too much, you will stop me.” He pulled back to fix him with a stern gaze.

“I promise,” he said, and he meant it.

“Wait here,” the older man told him, rising from his place and retreating into the sitting room beyond. When he returned, he held a small tub of something in his hand. He set it on the night stand beside the bed and sat on the edge of the bed next to Julian.

“What is that?” the doctor asked.

“Something we'll need later,” he said a bit cryptically. “I had to tweak the replicator a little bit. I'll make sure it's set properly again before I leave.” He lifted Julian's hand closest to him and stroked his fingers over the back and the palm, spreading the long tan fingers and massaging the webbing between each one.

Julian watched the slow, gentle motions, mesmerized as much by the sight as the sensation. He had long known that Garak had dexterous hands, even before he began experiencing the pleasure of them first hand. This took things to a whole new level. “Are you trying to put me to sleep?” he asked playfully. It was unbelievably relaxing, erotic, too, but in his current state, he could just as easily lie back and slumber as follow through with his own request.

Garak answered his question by pressing a kiss to his palm, lifting liquid blue eyes to meet his gaze as he did so. He shivered lightly and shivered again when those lips moved to his wrist and he felt a gentle graze of teeth across the thin skin there. He ran a cool hand slowly upward, pushing back the loose pajama sleeve and exposing his sensitive inner arm. His lips followed in the wake of his hand, tongue tip darting out to taste and tease.

“All right,” Julian moaned. “I'm in no danger of falling asleep now.” For all of Garak's many protestations that he was unfamiliar with human anatomy, he seemed to know exactly what he was doing, finding spots that Julian never would have believed could be erogenous and proving him wrong beyond any shadow of doubt. He was already panting, and Garak hadn't even removed his pajama top.

When he did, he took it a button at a time, using his teeth and tongue. Julian took the opportunity to delve his fingers deep into the man's thick hair, something he loved to do and didn't get to indulge nearly often enough. He tipped his head back, giving access to the hollow of his throat. Garak swept it with his tongue and pressed lush, full kisses upward toward his ear, suckling his earlobe and tracing all along the outer shell. His breath was warm and heavy, breaking Julian out in goose flesh. He had to have that mouth on his, to taste the very slightly raspy tongue, to feel himself penetrated in one way since Garak was being so damned casual about taking his time. He took the Cardassian's face in both hands and kissed him greedily, drawing his lower lip outward and raking it with his teeth.

Although Garak answered his passion in kind, it didn't make him rush. He broke the kiss, only to push the doctor back firmly onto the bed, the pajama top gaping open and exposing his chest and stomach. The bottoms were prominently tented and already showing wet from Julian's exponentially increasing state of arousal. The Cardassian leaned over him, kissing and biting a line down the center of his chest, seizing a nipple between his sharp teeth, and flicking with his tongue until the younger man was writhing and squirming. “Please,” Julian panted. “Please, Elim...soon. You said you wouldn't make me beg.”

Garak lifted his gaze, his chin resting on Julian's chest. The gleam in his eyes was wicked. “I'm doing what you asked,” he said, his voice rich in his desire. “I never said I'd hurry.”

He groaned, lowering his hands to either side and twisting them in the under sheet of his bed. “You're killing me,” he protested, half meaning it. The tailor had never taken him like this, never made him wait so long. He ground the back of his head into his pillow when Garak reached his belly button, circling it with his tongue until Julian thought he'd explode and then delving inward. He cried out shamelessly, aching for him in a way he wouldn't have believed possible before then.

He almost sobbed his relief when he felt the man's fingers in his elastic waistband, carefully lifting the bottoms over his throbbing manhood and whisking the pants off of him. He should have known better. The wicked man assiduously avoided the obvious, instead spreading his legs and giving tender ministrations to his inner thighs and then the backs of his knees. Is it possible to squirm out of one's own skin? He wondered dizzily.

When Garak worked his way back upward, he settled his hands to the back of each knee, carefully spreading Julian wider and exposing him fully. He knelt lower on the bed, and Julian looked up at him, stilling from the weight of his gaze. There was want, yes, burning desire, but in that moment, he saw more. He caught a glimpse, only a glimpse, of his dear Elim unmasked. In later years, when he thought of need, of heat, of love, he would think of the color blue, not red, and of that one searing glimpse into a magnificent heart of flame.

Garak's mouth on his most hidden, tender parts drove all cogent thought from his mind. By the time he saw him strip himself and reach for the mysterious tub on the bedside, he was little more than a quivering mass of need and appetite. He felt something cool and slightly numbing being rubbed on and into him. Once more, the tailor took his time being thorough, starting with one finger and easing up to two. Julian's eyes rolled back in his head. He hardly recognized his voice as his own. He started to protest when he felt the fingers withdraw, stopped when he felt something much hotter and slick in their place.

It was hard to focus, but he had to see his lover's face. The scales were darker, particularly along his neck, and his eyes were black rimmed with coldfire blue. “Tell me when to stop,” he said thickly, pressing his hips forward. In a matter of moments, the doctor understood the benefit of the numbing cream. Even with it, he was quickly stretched to discomfort and then pain. He gasped and tensed. Garak froze, giving him time to adjust. “Breathe with me, dear,” he said softly. “Slow inhales and exhales.”

He rode the smooth voice and found himself relaxing. The pain eased, and he nodded, his hair drenched with sweat and clinging to his pillow. “I'm all right now,” he breathed. “More, please.”

The tailor gave him what he asked for, tenderly, carefully. After another pause for him to regain his composure, he heard him say, “I'm in all the way.”

“Come to me,” he said, beckoning. “Cover me. I want to kiss you again.”

Garak shifted his weight as he leaned forward, using his powerful arms to either side of Julian to position himself so that there would be no sudden jolts. With his weight pressing downward like that, it was almost too much. Instead of kissing him, Julian sank his teeth into the flared ridge beneath his ear to avoid crying out. The effect was instantaneous and remarkable, the Cardassian's entire body wracked by a heavy spasm. “Julian,” he said, sounding choked, “if you keep doing that, I don't think I'll be able to control myself for long. I don't want to hurt you.”

He eased the pressure of his teeth and licked teasingly over the spot he had bitten. “Sorry,” he said, not feeling it in the slightest.

“You'll have to forgive me if I doubt your sincerity,” Garak said, turning his head to capture his lips in a heated kiss. When he seemed certain that he wasn't hurting his partner, he rocked his hips in slow, even strokes. His belly scales raked Julian's stone hard sex, the build of heat and friction too much for the doctor. He came in wracking spasms, adding to the slippery mix of sweat and the Cardassian's copious moisture. Much to his surprise, he never went soft, his pleasure instead immediately starting to build again. Garak had to know that would happen. It must have been why he keyed him up to such fever pitch in the first place.

He tangled both hands in the hair at the back of Garak's head, the two holding one another's gaze. He realized with a shiver that there was only one other person he had ever actually made love to. He had thought that when it happened again, if it happened again, it would be another remarkable woman, not a man, not like this. Against all better judgment and sense, against his lover's frequent advice, he found himself opening wide, yearning toward him. He felt he could drown in those eyes, lose himself and never fully return. What did secrets matter, his or Garak's, when they could touch like this? I love you, he thought fiercely, only holding his tongue because he knew the man wouldn't be able to accept it yet. It was just one more secret, one he could express in every touch if he chose, and he knew that he would, every chance he got. If Garak were even half as perceptive as he seemed, perhaps on some level, he would understand.

Garak's eyes slid shut. A moment later, Julian felt him pulsing hot and wet deep within him, the man's groan vibrating him bone deep. The doctor continued to squirm and thrust until he finished himself a second time, only then stilling and holding the tailor's lax weight atop him with a wrap of arms and legs. He nuzzled him cheek to cheek and ear to ear, murmuring softly, “I don't want to wake up alone in bed in the morning. I want you to stay.”

“I will,” Garak said, turning to press a soft kiss.

Hoping he stayed in a pliant mood, he added, “I want something else that I know you aren't going to like. I'm tired of keeping this a secret.”

He quickly gave up trying to hold Garak atop him. It was no use. He was stronger and determined. The Cardassian rolled to the side and sat up, planting his feet on the floor. “Julian,” he said, sounding exasperated.

“What?” he asked, rolling to his side to face him. “What's so wrong with wanting to be able to talk about us to my friends? Why are you so against it? Are you ashamed of us?”

Garak jerked his head back, giving him a regal profile. “Do you really think that?” he demanded reproachfully.

He sighed, wondering how they could go from such an intimate moment to being at loggerheads within the blink of an eye. “If you'd give me a reason, I wouldn't have to come up with my own,” he said, pushing up to an elbow.

“Yours are so creative,” he said spitefully. “I'd hate to deprive myself of the inner working of your insecurities. The answer is right in front of your face. It's not my fault you'd rather indulge yourself instead of see it.”

He had learned enough about Garak to know that when he started such deliberate provocation he was usually hurt or trying to distract him from something. Instead of taking the bait, he gave it hard thought. What logical reason could Garak have for not wanting him to talk about them? Cardassians were insular, some of them even xenophobic. That couldn't be true of Garak, or he wouldn't be in his bedroom right now. Other Cardassians? But there were no other Cardassians on the station. And yet Tain knew a great deal about me, down to my tea preference. Of course! Tain! He sat up, wonderfully sore but no longer focused on his body. “You're worried that Tain will find out,” he said. “That's it, isn't it?”

“You don't know him,” Garak said softly. “You don't know how spiteful, how dangerous he can be. If he decides to go for you, I won't be able to protect you, not for long.”

“I don't want you to protect me,” he said, caressing Garak's shoulder. “This is my decision to make, my risk to take if I choose. I'm...beyond flattered...that you're this concerned, but I have a say in this, too.”

“You and your Federation ideals of democracy,” Garak snorted without real heat. He did look exasperated, however.

He smiled and leaned to press a kiss to the back of his neck. “I want to be able to share this with my friends. Not...details. I'd never violate your privacy like that, but you're important to me. This is important to me, and it's marvelous, not some dirty little secret. If I want to hold your hand in public, I should be able to. No more hiding. Not this, not us. All right? You let me and Starfleet worry about my safety.”

“Starfleet,” Garak said derisively. “You have to promise me you'll start being more careful,” he added earnestly. “Find out who's at your door before you open it. Pay attention to who's around you on the Promenade and in Quark's. Occasionally look behind you when you walk. In particular, be wary of other Cardassians. Promise me!”

“I promise,” he said. “I'll take your hints and tips to heart. I know you're worried, but that level of paranoia isn't healthy.”

“That level of paranoia is the only thing that has kept me breathing all these years,” Garak countered. “I'd like it if you continued breathing, too. In fact, I'll take it very personally if you stop.”

“How personally?” he asked coyly. The tailor grunted in response and stood. “I was teasing,” Julian said quickly.

“I know. I need to relieve myself, if that's all right with you in our little democracy of two?” he asked archly.

“I'll be waiting for you,” he said, lying back again and pulling the covers aside to make room for him. Garak didn't make him wait long. With both of them exhausted, they fell asleep easily and slept straight through until morning.