Chapter Text
Set before A Gentleman and a Scholar
Garak sunk deep into his favorite chair, wrapped in a Patarian woolen robe with caramel cashmere accents. He looked blearily at the glass in his hand and wondered how it had become so empty.
He flipped through fashion vids from Kegfit VI, the flashy silhouettes and fabrics boring him tonight, then the Cardassian propaganda channel, and finally settled in for the intergalactic news.
Depressing enough.
“To you, Tain,” he said, toasting the nothing around him in his little apartment above his shop, the only thing he could publicly call his own, and downed another couple of fingers of kanar. Two years after his untimely, but welcome, death, Garak hadn’t quite figured out the best way to mourn him, but the vintage was serviceable and the evening was his own. “May you rot where the Stars never shine.”
With that benediction, he stared at the screen, eventually truly paying attention when it turned to a story about a father. One Richard Bashir, father to a disgraced Starfleet Medical student, charged with first-degree genetic engineering, along with his wife.
“Fathers,” he said sadly. “Always a disappointment.” Something about the story struck him as incredibly unjust. His own father had engineered Garak’s life, and look at him now: middle-aged, alone, and not much to show for it.
“We don’t deserve it. Damn shame,” he muttered. “Circumstances of our birth. And our fathers.”
He thought about pouring himself another glass, but something niggled him. He brought up the entire article about the Bashir family and wondered if he needed another project more than he needed another glass of kanar.
--
Garak had developed a nine-point plan that he was quite proud of. Steps one through six took less than three days: he had arranged for an encrypted and untraceable comm link and directed all inquiries and information that would then be routed to him, in order to communicate with a Julian S. Bashir of Earth. Upon viewing his impressive college records and personnel file, all it took was several bribes and some strategically misplaced paperwork, Mister Bashir was free to leave the Federation and relocate.
Step seven was surprisingly simple to convince the young man to leave everything he knew and come to Cardassia, by way of an anonymous benefactor offering a scholarship for "Intraquadrant Cooperation." Garak arranged for the tuition and student visa.
Step eight, arrange for automated deposits into the account for Mister Bashir's room and board and incidentals. No need to have the man bothering him monthly with requests.
Step nine, after graduation, he'd check up on Mister Bashir, see what he'd make of himself. Perhaps he'd go into podiatry. He thought Mila had a distant cousin who did that.
Congratulating himself on time and money well spent, he treated himself to another cup of tea at lunch. All in all, he'd hardly made a dent in his inheritance, and in three short years, he'd add a doctor to his menagerie of unusual pet projects.