Chapter Text
Day Twelve: S’sukvhet (again)
The sarnak were dying.
He crouched to examine the patient, running a finger along the darkening blade of a leaf. Its waxy shine had dulled, vine grown limp. Scattered about the bed, segments had fallen away, shriveled from orange to black in accusation. He gave it a few pours from the spout, though he wasn’t sure why. It didn’t take a doctor’s instinct to know: this was a terminal case.
Sarnak are little better than weeds, Elim had insisted. The challenge was to keep them from overtaking everything else. They’ll choke the pelat, if you’re not careful. They had to be trimmed back. Controlled.
Well, they certainly wouldn’t to be overtaking anything anytime soon, least of all the pelat, which he’d lost to laceflies last cycle. How was he to know laceflies laid their eggs in pelat? Elim hadn’t mentioned it. Had he thought it too obvious?
With a sigh, he let the vine slump back into its bed. At this rate, within the cycle, it might all be gone.
All but the kis’sa. Against the odds, the kis’sa held on, and he gave them what he hoped wasn’t too generous a drink, as if imploring. Under the weight of water and sun, the blooms nodded.
Once, just once, it would have been nice to send Elim good news. To begin a comm with something other than that same sad sentiment reframed: I’m sorry to tell you. I hate to say. I wish I had better tidings.
But the last few cycles had been all dead pelat and unrest and—
He paused. Though he didn’t look up, he felt it behind—the red veil of mourning across the door. Through a cake of dust, it was the same listless orange as the sarnak.
Alon.
Three octals had passed since the assassination, and the name was a fresh wound—difficult to staunch if he worried at it. He dug fingers back into the dirt, trying not to remember.
At least they’d managed an octal without riots. Councilors Mhesk and Garan’s plea for calm seemed to have stopped the bleeding for the moment, at least in Cardassi’or. But as he’d passed the sector’s Federation Aid Center on his walk home the night before, he’d found gates heavily bolted, floodlights stark. A sign in matter-of-fact Kardasi merely proclaimed it “closed until further notice.”
And it was difficult to forget the octals of rioting and protests they’d endured. The acrid stink of violence still hung on the air. Alongside the dust, it had spread into every corner of the morning, refusing to settle.
Everything was going to seed. Fading at the edges.
“Kelas Parmak, I am never letting you touch my garden again.”
Though Kelas might have been loath to admit it, he’d heard that voice almost every day for the last year. It offered opinions as he examined his outfit in the mirror. It scoffed at the imbecilic statements of fellow council members. It lamented the short-sightedness of policies limiting educational resources. It quipped.
It wasn’t real, of course. It was the seed Kelas kept inside. The two of them couldn’t justify the resource allocation for vid-comms, but that didn’t mean Kelas hadn’t heard that voice each time he’d read a letter. He knew the tune even if the instrument was far away.
But this…this was really Elim.
Of course it was, slipping in stage left, unannounced and unheard. Why would he expect otherwise?
It was Elim and yet…
He wore a traditional mijast, though the material was something unfamiliar, dark blue and vaguely luminous. His hair had gone greyer at the temples, and his waist filled in, no doubt from the steady availability of replicated food. More than anything else, however, Kelas noticed his bearing: an expression softer and more measured, shoulders held not with tilt and insinuation but in the gentle square of exchange. Oh, the usual coyness remained, playing behind the eyes, but it was framed by a man now versed in diplomacy. In compromise and humility.
Elim had changed.
It suited him.
Elim opened his mouth to speak—some explanation about why he’d come or how he’d gotten there—but Kelas heard none of it, swallowing the words up in a kiss. Hands found hands, and then bodies, lost. As Kelas pressed him against the outside of the house, Elim hissed his name, coarse and hot as the sweltering morning air.
Kelas hissed back. “Elim Garak, if you leave me again, you’ll have more than your garden to worry about.”
Somehow they made it into the house. Somehow they made it to the bed. Beyond a few panted words of encouragement, neither said anything more until they’d found their pleasure.
Good news. Finally good news.
Even after, words kept a respectful distance, and they drifted, the squeeze of thighs speaking enough. A hot breeze bellowed through the open window, spraying dust to already sticky scales. The air smelled of bodies and dawn. Eventually indistinct sounds intruded. The voice of neighbors. The buzz of skimmers. Elim made as if to rise and close them out, but Kelas stopped him, locking arms. They weren’t leaving the bed yet. Even the idea of leaving had no place.
So Elim subsided, settling back into the embrace. “You’ve hung curtains.”
Kelas made a noncommittal noise. He’d managed to get his hands on the fabric two cycles ago. It helped with sun in the afternoons.
“I don’t think I like them.”
They fluttered as if in protest.
“I knew you wouldn’t.”
He could hear Elim’s smile as a hand played at his hair, gentle. “I was worried, p’rimit. The news service on Earth was reporting unrest, but I couldn’t get much more than glossy half-truths from those vornek left in Central Council…”
Kelas didn’t want to discuss it. They’d cordoned-off a patch of happiness here in this bed. Too much reality would breach it. “I have trouble imagining a situation in which you can’t lay hands on any information you like through some means or other.”
“You know I don’t do that sort of thing anymore,” Elim said virtuously. “At least…not much.”
“Never managed to figure out those Federation security protocols, hmmm?”
Elim’s finger had been tracing a circle on his upper thigh. At this, it gave a little pinch. “Security was much tighter on Earth than Terok Nor. Especially in my office suite, if you can imagine.” A faux-wounded tone.
Kelas forced his eyes open. The light stung.
Elim really did look different. He was still circling the scales on Kelas’s leg teasingly, but his eyes betrayed something more. There was genuine worry there, and, to his own surprise, Kelas suddenly wasn’t sure Elim was lying. Perhaps he truly hadn’t known. Perhaps he hadn’t used whatever means necessary to find out.
Perhaps time on Earth had changed more than his figure.
“Yes, things have been unpleasant since…” Kelas tried but failed. The name stuck.
Elim hadn’t said much about it yet. Elim wasn’t the type to not say much.
So he left it, settling closer still. There would be time to mourn Alon. Time to discuss, to remember. But not now. “I was worried about you, too, mata. With all this anti-Federation sentiment…”
Elim frowned. “It’s one of the most absurd twists of fate that I should become emblematic of the Federation.”
An absurd twist of fate—it wasn’t the only one, certainly. Lying in bed beside one another had to rank as well.
“Are you going back?”
The softness of Elim’s reply told Kelas he hadn’t hidden the fear well. “There’s no government to represent at the moment, and I got a distinctly Don’t come back until your house is in order reaction from the Federation Council.”
Kelas knew he shouldn’t feel joy at this. Cardassia’s relationship with the Federation was tenuous at best, and just an octal before, a Starfleet warehouse in Munda’ar had been bombed. No one had been killed, but it was only a matter of time. If the Federation pulled aid entirely… “But once there’s an interim…”
Elim’s hand was at his jaw, following the line of aural ridge. Kelas stopped himself.
He wanted to ask. He wanted to know. Would Elim return once an interim government gained traction? Would the Federation need him on Earth to negotiate? Would he be asked leave again?
But he knew the answer.
Focus on the kis’sa, Kelas.
“You met Ekar Mhesk, didn’t you? In State Authority?”
Elim hummed an assent into his hair.
“He’s taken on a sort of interim role, along with Councilor Garan. So far, he’s sent the—”
Elim’s lips were on his again, and the thought evaporated, so much steam between the hot press of bodies. “I’m not interested in Ekar Mhesk at the moment, my dear.” Elim’s hand traveled down, taking hold of his waist.
As they rolled close once more, Kelas found blue eyes fully. His eyes.
In them, he saw nothing more than the slide of the morning sun.
Fate did enjoy its little twists.
“Are you saying, Ambassador Garak, that there’s something more important than the political state of the Union?”
Elim smirked, hand sliding lower.
Kelas gasped.
“Perhaps, just this once, Cardassia can wait.”
************************
There was no one in bed beside him when he woke. Though sun painted the window’s glass in full white, raindrops murmured against the pane.
For a sickening moment, he feared it had been a dream. Elim hadn’t returned, and he was alone, waking to a red veil and riots in Torr and—
“Doctor Parmak?”
The voice was far from familiar, yet he knew it with certainty. He blinked. “Doctor Bashir.”
The human smiled broadly, and Kelas almost laughed. It was the first time he’d seen Bashir truly smile, and it lit the room every bit as much as the seeping sunlight. Beautiful. Terribly beautiful.
Bashir took a seat beside him on the bed and set long fingers to his temple. The touch was exceptionally warm, and Kelas fought the urge to both pull away from and lean into such concentrated heat. He hoped his pulse hadn’t sped too obviously.
“Your heartrate is good. How are you feeling?”
Still trying to focus, Kelas took stock. He was in bedclothes, and, so far, at least, he felt fine. Thirsty, maybe, and heavy-limbed. His joints ached slightly, but not more than usual after a long sleep. He was having a bit of trouble concentrating, and there were pins and needles at his fingertips. But mostly, at the moment, confusion was his greatest affliction. “I—I’m fine, but what am I doing in our b—mine and Elim’s bed?”
Bashir was gracious enough to ignore the amended phrasing. “You’ve been in a coma for five days.”
“A coma? How…?”
“What…do you remember?”
Bashir’s tone was careful, and he turned inward with some trepidation, sifting through dream images and memories in an attempt to patch together something of the real. “We were on the patio. It was raining, and Larria had gone to get a rainshade… Dhessek?”
“S’sava!” Larria was on him in an instant, embrace so fierce that joints creaked and her weight near smothered. “Thank the State and the sky! After the third day, they were afraid…”
He did his best to accept the whirlwind of affection, patting the young woman on the back and whispering reassurances. Her face was rigid with a sorrow he didn’t understand and hadn’t seen there since the Fire.
“S’sava, I’m sorry. Please forgive me. I shouldn’t have left. I should have—”
“Larria,” Bashir interrupted, guiding her aside with a deft hand. “Could you go and see that Garak knows Doctor Parmak has regained consciousness?”
Larria looked back at Kelas doubtfully.
“The castellan will want to know, ana. And I’ll be the only one with him, I promise.” The look Bashir gave her radiated kindness. “Please.”
Kelas knew that some part of Bashir must have felt them, those friendly words and hopeful musings and cycles of care Larria had given him. There was such tenderness in the human’s expression that, for a moment, Kelas forgot where and why they were here and felt only keen gratitude that they had arrived.
As soon as she’d left, Bashir retook his seat with a sigh. “It’s good to see her smile. She’s been quiet the last few days. Feels responsible, I think, for that security officer. For leaving us with him. For not realizing. I try to remind her she’s the one who kept him off me in the end, but...”
As the memory filled in bit by jagged bit, Kelas knew Dhessek must be gone. Must be gone and, what was more, must never have been who he seemed. If anyone should feel guilty, it’s me. For pushing them together. For putting her and Bashir in the same danger.
“I wanted to cheer her up—she did so much for me. But I think seeing you awake was the only thing for it.”
Kelas had sat across from Bashir for a full octal and wondered, in the back of his mind, what this moment would be. How it might feel to sit side by side and talk. How the human’s voice might sound. What sort of man he would be. Would they find that, apart from medicine and Elim, they had little between?
Kindess finds kindness as the river meets the sea, his mother had always said, and as he listened to Bashir fret over Larria, he felt that very estuary. It was a familiarity of soul, and he knew there would be more than enough. They shared more. “She likes to play khel.”
“Pardon?”
“Larria. She likes to play khel. She brought the chits to your room several times. Would play both hands. Do you… remember?”
He strained, lines in his brow. “The pieces were…round. Silver?”
Interesting. He truly had taken in more than Kelas might have thought possible. Perhaps it was something about the augmented mind. An interesting point of discussion for another day, perhaps. “Yes. You should ask her to play a game. I can’t think of anything that would please her more.”
They traded smiles, warm but stretched over whatever unpleasant truth must be yet to come.
Trying to prepare himself, Kelas pushed up to sitting, back objecting only briefly. The room had the stuffy air of housing too many for too concentrated a time, round table at the center a mess of padds and cups and a mostly-empty bottle of kanar. Beside the window, a tussled cot lay bleached in the sun, and, on the opposite side of the room, a neatly-made pallet on the floor. He knew instantly that one was Bashir’s and one Elim’s.
Five days. He couldn’t help but imagine what Bashir and Elim had found to discuss for the five days he’d lain insensate between.
He distracted himself from such useless thoughts by cataloguing the equipment nearby. Many were the same monitors that had sat by Bashir’s side so recently. On an end table, a number of empty hypo inserts made a hollow line. He leaned forward to read the labels.
“They used a barbiturate of some type,” Bashir said, guessing his aim. “Well, a mix of a barbiturate and a paralytic. I’ve sent some of the blood cultures with your hematologists to see if they can fully identify it, but I suspect it will be something they’ve never seen. Thirty-One had quite the stable of chemists.”
He’d known that’s what he’d hear, but he hadn’t been ready just the same.
“Luckily I guessed the right protocol for whatever mix they selected. That and they planned on dosing me: Cardassians must be made of tougher stuff.” Bashir sighed and, lurchingly, slid across to a chair beside the bed.
Only now did Kelas notice the motor relay devices at the human’s knees and hips. He’d been so caught up in his own recovery, he’d forgotten Bashir’s entirely. “You…haven’t regained control of your legs?”
Bashir looked down at his knees ruefully, making a few jerky movements. The devices whirred. “Not yet. The neurologist said the MRDs might help, but I’m going to get some sent from friends in the Federation. The doctors from CCH did a lovely job retrofitting the Cardassian ones, but…” He shrugged.
“We’ll contact Doctor Kharn at Culat Central. She’s a genius when it comes to paralysis and motor retraining. I saw her work miracles after the Fire.”
There was a silent space that felt, for the first time, awkward.
“That is…assuming you’ll be staying with us for awhile.” Oh, even worse. “On Cardassia, I mean.”
Bashir hadn’t decided: the struggle was written in every line of his face.
Well, it had probably been too much to hope things would resolve themselves while he was blissfully unaware.
“I don’t know if you’ll want me to stick around,” Bashir said, shaking his head. “I don’t doubt 31 will try again., I’m a bit of a liability at the moment.”
“Ahh, we specialize in those here.”
This earned him a smile, and white hells, it was a lovely thing. Kelas smoothed at the bedsheets as if trying to smooth away the unease. “Do you, hmm, think I might have a cup of tea as well?”
“Oh, oh of course! Where are my manners?” Bashir, seeming grateful for the task, poured a steaming cup from the pot nearby. The smell was immediate and familiar and hit memory like an arrow to a target.
That tiny tin of tea Elim had kept just after the Fire. I brought a bit back from Deep Space Nine. I…developed a fondness for it there.
“Tarkalean tea?”
Bashir looked up from the cup. “Yes. It’s…my favorite. But if you prefer something else—”
“No, no. It’s my favorite as well.” The cup was almost as warm as Bashir’s touch. “Thank you. Truly. For everything.”
“I don’t know if you should be thanking me. If anyone’s responsible for what happened to you, it’s me. I’m the one 31 was after: you just got in the way.”
“I don’t claim to know the details, but it was my understanding that Section 31 had been exposed...?”
For the first time, Bashir’s expression turned ugly. Kelas wished for the smile back. “Apparently the Federation wasn’t quite thorough enough. No doubt some few survived and are rather nervous with the idea of me still knocking about. I know plenty: some things, I’m guessing, that haven’t come to light yet. As long as I was catatonic, it made sense not to draw attention by killing me, but…”
“But I ruined that.” Kelas sighed. Elim had been right. Guls and gettle, he would never hear the end of it.
“Ruined in the best possible way,” Bashir stressed with his eyes. “Dhessek must have been placed to ensure that, if I did recover, I could be removed immediately. And, as Garak was keen to remind me, good spies never let something as insignificant as the dismantling of their organization change the plan.”
Kelas tensed. It was a grim thought—not only the prospect of Section 31 still clinging to life, but the thought of Elim getting drawn into that fray. With Kelas lying near death, what might Elim have planned? What subtle wheels had he turned, what old tricks had he conjured to find some hint of Dhessek? To exact revenge? This—these spy games—were dangerous, and he feared, suddenly, that they might cost them dear. “Where is Elim?”
“He’s going to be cross with me,” Bashir lamented, leaning back with a fondness Kelas couldn’t miss. “He hasn’t left the room until this morning, when I finally convinced him to go to whatever briefing it was they’d been shouting about for the last five mornings.” Fondness warmed. “But you should know he hasn’t left. From the moment he made it here, he hasn’t left your side. It’s…it’s odd for me to see him so…devoted. Odd but…touching.”
Kelas was surprised to find it still there, beneath the weight of the five days. A stir of nerves. A question that was working its way toward an answer. “Not so odd. He spent quite a lot of time at your side as well.”
Bashir hid his obvious discomfort in a sip of tea. “I remember some of it. Kukulaka. And…and I think there was a book. With a meadow or…or maybe a forest on the cover.”
“Oh you could stand to forget that.”
That smile again. One wondered how it all fit on his face. “So his taste in literature hasn’t improved I take it?”
Kelas scoffed. “I’m no miracle worker.”
“I disagree.” Bashir’s eyes struck deep and held tight.
Raindrops dot-dot-dotted, loud but gentle. A flare of sun, as a cloud gave way.
They tipped smiles into teacups and let the quiet stretch as easily as they could.
It was good to see Bashir like this. Bright and alive and smiling that incandescent smile. No matter what it meant, no matter how the story might unfold, this was the ending they’d needed, this quiet peace over tea. This was as it should be.
“Kelas, I…I hope you don’t mind if I speak frankly.”
He couldn’t deny the sharp prick of fear that traveled, as insidious as some wicked barbiturate, down his spine. Perhaps I shouldn’t decide we’ve reached the ending just yet…
“I know you and Garak are…involved. Have been for some time.”
He barely managed the nod.
“And I know you…at least I think I can assume Garak has told you that he…”
“That he what, Doctor?”
Bashir looked as if he might jump out of his skin, eyes suddenly as wide as the saucer beneath his cup.
Truth be told, Kelas hadn’t heard Elim enter either, but he’d learned long ago not to startle. It only encouraged him. “Elim Garak, must you always make an entrance?”
“What good are all those years of intelligence training if one doesn’t make use of them?” A smug smile. “And is that any way to greet me after having the audacity to almost get yourself killed?”
Kelas studied that face. It was a lovely face, his favorite, and, after so many years, he often found its best parts by reflex. The upturned ridge at the chin. The playful set of lips. The sharp point of blue. This time, however, he searched for something else—something uglier and older. Something of before. He prayed not to find it, and yet, there was heaviness behind those eyes and those light words.
“Elim?”
That was the comfort of the years between them. Elim knew the question, though it hadn’t been asked.
What have you done?
Elim sat, pressing their palms and working his way to Kelas’s eyes with a gaze steady though pained. “I’ve done nothing, Kelas. I wanted to. Guls know I wanted to.” A stroke along the side of his thumb. “But I didn’t.”
Relief and love mixed, rapturous, in his chest. ‘Didn’t’—especially for Elim—truly did count for more than most realized.
He wrapped their hands fully, knowing it didn’t need to be said.
“Larria sent some lunch, if you’ll have it. Taspar broth, easy on the stomach.” He could see the same relief reflected in Elim’s face, though his tone stayed even.
“That would be wonderful.”
“And that would that be safe for him…?” Elim asked Bashir, glancing away for only a second.
“He should take it slowly, but I think he’ll be fine.”
Elim’s smile was the opposite of Bashir’s: cool and wide and subtle. And every bit as beautiful. “I’m glad to hear it,” he said as he leaned forward and pressed their chufas together. And then their lips. “Kelas, p’rimit…thank you. Thank you.” He kissed him again.
Kelas wasn’t precisely sure what Elim was thanking him for. If it was for Bashir’s recovery. Or his own. Or any of the hundred other little things that had passed between them in the last thirteen years. It didn’t matter. He merely kissed back, accepting.
Somewhere in the background, there was a mechanical whir. The pad of feet. Breaking the kiss, he glanced over Elim’s shoulder.
Carefully and as quietly as he could, Bashir was making his way out of the room. He had turned a rather charming shade of red.
“Julian?”
Hazel eyes turned back.
Kelas felt something bloom in that moment, as both Bashir and Elim watched him in open question. It was a new peace. A new certainty.
He gave Elim’s hand a squeeze. “Perhaps you might…join us for lunch?”
With a smile that barely surfaced, Elim squeezed back. He understood. “If, that is, Doctor, you can stomach a little debate with your broth. I have a few choice words for Kelas about his suggested reading material for my recent trip.”
Kelas perked up. Well that was a surprise. “You finally read the Kijal?”
“I did, and I half-suspected this coma of yours was some ploy to avoid having to defend such ridiculous drivel.”
“Ahh, I see. If there aren’t convoluted sentence structures or plodding political ideologies then it’s ‘ridiculous drivel.’”
Bashir beamed, turning back toward the table. “You know, he said the same thing about Dickenson--a human poet. One of my favorites.”
“I’m not surprised. Elim has terrible taste in poetry.”
Elim’s expression grew wary. “I’m beginning to fear this may not be a fair fight.”
“Since when have you been bothered about the fairness of a fight, Garak?” Bashir said through a laugh.
“I think you’ll find quite a lot has changed, Doctor. I am a man of fairness and virtue now.”
It was Kelas’s turn to laugh. “Let’s not get carried away in hyperbole, Elim, dear.”
Elim shrugged, but his eyes shone with a happiness Kelas hadn’t seen there in years, every hint of that heaviness gone. “A debate for another day, perhaps.”
As Elim helped him to the round table where Julian set out the broth and tea, Kelas knew this wasn’t vridan, not yet. Not a farewell, but a hello, and while Kardasi had two goodbyes, there was no word for this. For a hello that began not a few minutes or hours or days but something longer. And deeper. And more precious.
Lacking a word, Kelas merely leaned back and sipped his tea.
“So, who is this Kijal?” Bashir asked innocently, taking a slurp of broth.
Elim grinned.
Outside, through sunlight, rain fell, and the garden grew.