InsaneJournal

Black Bottle: Chapter 1: The gift Part 2
Header info for this story can be found at the beginning.

    He can't see disposing of the bottle. It is empty but for the memory of a failing friendship and an extinct species, both nothing more than footnoted victims of another war. Beautiful still. He puts it in his office in the infirmary, in plain sight and he doesn't care what people think when they see it, if they think anything at all.

    Though something in him clenches and worries a little at the thought of Garak walking in and seeing it displayed so.  He is not yet sure if the feeling comes from regret or hope.  Not much chance of it happening anyway.  It might be his imagination, but it seems they both have the same idea, avoidance.  Julian has stayed sequestered here and Garak, presumably, at his shop.  Though he's taken the scenic route to and from his quarters to avoid passing the storefront and the replimat, so he doesn't even know that for sure.

    Julian has been staring at it for two days.  It is a pocket of darkness in his brightly-lit space, it catches his eye countless times.  Even when he spends hours in the infirmary proper, a closed door between him and the bottle, it never leaves his mind completely.

Julian looks into the screen in front of him, his sight never quite reaching the text, but finding his own shadowed reflection on the smooth surface.  He puts two fingertips to the side of his face where Elim had touched him and watches it happen in the screen until his eyes slide closed.

    He would do anything to feel that again. Not the touch, just- the abandon. It was only a taste, the smallest sample of what it could be like, like that little bottle of wine, a fractal example of perfect freedom. It's just to the left of his screen.  He can see it even now without looking, feel it as well.  He opens his eyes, picks up the little glass remembrance and uncorks it, presses the neck to his lips. Cool and smooth, and fragrant with the dregs.  Everything is a stochastic tendril of Elim.

    “I can not ask it of anyone. Certainly not you. "

    That, Julian realizes, now that the fog of alcohol is gone and his mind is clear of the raw rejection of two days ago, was an admission. That was more truth than Elim had ever voluntarily spilled before. In the past, Julian could expect about half of what Elim said to turn out to have a grain of truth to it, and the other half to be completely unaccountable. No witnesses of course.

    “Of all the stories you've told me, which ones were true?”

    “My dear doctor, all of them were true.”

    “What about the lies?”

    “Especially the lies.”

    And it always amazes Julian, the way Garak is able to invent grey areas between the stark monochrome of truth and untruth. Julian, as a scientist, has always placed his faith on the strength of that definition. At any moment in time, something is either true or it is not.  And he and Garak, they are speaking the same language.  That is undeniable now.  So a truth should follow naturally.  This push and pull doesn't make any sense.

    “You do seem to enjoy the pursuit even if you're just chasing your tail.”

    A chilly finger of fear scratches up the back of his neck as he considers the probability that the reason it doesn't make sense is that it isn't true.  Because it is all another act and he has bared his heart to a cruel madman.

    “It is not my name.”

    And yet.  Julian can see the want in those grey eyes.  Sees the affection behind them and feels warmed by that cold Cardassian gaze.  Simply by that.  Maybe it's all part of his own perspective, but it doesn't feel like it.  It feels like an incomplete truth.  Something hanging in limbo and not yet decided.

    “No. More. Room.”

    He shakes his head and hopes that all the pieces inside will rearrange themselves to a complete picture when they settle.  It doesn't work.  How do you wrap your mind around a thing as complex and bifurcated as Elim Garak?

    “Julian? Oh, there you are.” O'Brian peeks around the corner of Julian's office and then steps inside.  A reflex from somewhere wants to grab the bottle off the desk and shove it in a drawer, but he stifles it. “Do you have that hypo for Yoshi?”  The Chief's gruff and accented burr is always a small comfort.  A little reminder of home way out here on their metal island.  It breaks the dreary spell Julian has been under, at least for the moment.

    “Sure.” Julian swivels in his chair, picks up the vial in question from a little shelf next to him and swivels back to hand it over to the chief. “You don't want me to administer it?”

    “Nah. Keiko wants to do it. Ever since she took the kids to see that farm on Bajor, Yoshi's scared of ya.”

    Julian raises an eyebrow. “Why?”

    “He thinks you're a scarecrow.”

    Julian's face wrinkles up a little on one side with a tired smile and he leans back in his chair.  Then his face falls.  He didn't see how it got there, but now Miles has the empty wine bottle between his hands, twirling it with vague and casual interest, the way one would handle a cheap souvenir on a shelf in a shuttleport store.

    “Hey what's eating you?”

Julian flinches a little, he's perched to take it from him but the knowledge that that would bring undue attention to it keeps him in his seat.  A lie, a half truth is on his lips but it tastes like bile. Tastes like something Garak would say to brush him off and he swallows it rather than feed it to Miles. “Just a puzzle I can't seem to find the answer to.”  Vague is ok. Utter fallacy is not.

    The chief chuffs with a funny little smile in his small mouth. “No really. What's the trouble.”

    He can't laugh at himself today.  Not at anything.  He hates them, Miles.  Julian loves one and Miles hates them all with perhaps only a measure of extreme distaste reserved for Garak.   “I really...I'm just stuck. It appears to be a perfect knot," he grumbles.

    “Julian. The problem has yet to be invented that you can't figure out. What is it anyway?” he asks and puts the bottle back on Julian's desk.

    He thinks about how much he wants to tell his friend about this. Miles can be amazingly perceptive at times, though he doesn't think that even if he spilled the whole thing, he'd be able to just write up a solution on the spot.  In fact, he could see him having Julian committed at the mere mention of it.  “I guess it's sort of a philosophical problem," he begins.  "If you take what you need to survive it's not immoral, but if you take what you need to be happy it is.  But what good is it to simply survive if you can not be happy?  And is deceiving yourself, telling yourself you don't need to be happy, don't deserve to be happy, for whatever reason, is that the same as taking what you need to survive from someone else who would need you to be happy?"

    Miles makes a face. “Julian, I'm an engineer, not a philosopher.  Honestly, that sounds more like the kind of thing you should talk to Garak about.  He at least seems to think he has all the answers, and he's never shy about sharing them and showing you how you're completely wrong, unless you're Cardassian. Of course you only get that far if you can get him to stop lying for a minute.  But I think you have more luck at that than most of us.”  Perceptive.  Julian purses his lips against the wry smile that threatens there.  Miles points at Julian.   “Maybe you should interrogate him," the chief says as an afterthought, "Give him some of his own medicine.” Miles smirks mischievously and Julian is helpless not to return the grin.

~*~

    Garak steps into the sultry refuge of his quarters. He doesn't bother with the lights. He just wants a drink and then he's going to bed.

    Kanar in hand, he slumps into the round, padded chair in the shadowed corner of his living room. He takes a sip and lets it leech between his teeth before swallowing, leaving behind a comforting, if shallow warmth. His eyes slide closed and his head, with little voluntary action on his part, dips back and rests on the soft tall back of the chair in an unusual gesture of trust, or maybe just resignation, toward the darkness. His throat exposed, he swallows again.

    “Computer, initiate force field.”

    Garak's eyes and head snap open and up. Nothing else moves because nothing else can. His arms and legs are held fast to the chair. The familiarity of the voice was the only reason he didn't pop out of the seat at the first intonation of the first word of that sentence, but now he regrets allowing Julian to finish his command before reacting.

    Julian emerges from the black of Garak's bedroom doorway and approaches the trapped tailor in his seat. Garak looks up at him through his brow and schools his face unreadable, the small measure of resignation of a moment ago gone. “My dear doctor, I assume that there is some grave, urgent, medical reason for this...unexpected visit.” A knot of anger twists in his gut, and he wants to call this an intrusion, blatant abuse, but he is the one stuck to his seat like a rat in glue, and he doesn't have the heart to raise his voice to Julian again.

    Julian crosses the small room. He takes the short glass of kanar from the tailor's trapped hand and places it on the small table nearby. He turns back to Elim and places his own hands on the arms of the chair behind Garak's elbows and leans in closely. Julian can feel Garak's accelerated breath on his face.  He looks into his eyes, now more fiery blue than grey, and says lowly, “Yes. There is.”

    Julian leans forward the rest of the way and as the centimeters between them disappear, Garak's mind shuts down and fails completely to think of a way to stop it from happening. Garak stiffens throughout his whole body and blinks over and over again as Julian's solid pressure forces him to press back or allow his head to be toppled to the back of the chair. A few seconds that blink by slow and fast at the same time, and Julian backs away.  The sound the kiss makes as it breaks is foreign and shocking.  Elim blinks some more and presses his lips together, not entirely sure they are still there. It was a dry kiss, humble. A familial exchange; perhaps even an apology.  Only as his mouth cools does he realize how warm Julian's lips were.

    Garak stares straight ahead at the flat seam between the black below and the shadowed cyan above it on Julian's uniform. In the foggy daze of overload, it looks like pre-dawn over a black sea, and his pulse in his ears laps like waves.

    “Look at me,” Julian whispers, and focus returns.

    Blue eyes rise from neutral to meet his, and Julian has never before seen Elim Garak look so guileless. His thumb goes without thought to the outer edge of a crescent ridge, hard as bone but smooth as silk. Garak's lips part and his pupils widen subtly. “Now,” says Julian, his heart hammering so hard he thinks Garak must be able to see it, “Are you going to listen to me?”

    Garak clears his throat and swallows. “You have my undivided attention,” he says, only managing to get it above a whisper.

    Julian seems bolstered, but his voice wavers as he speaks again. “Good,” he nods, a little knot forming between his brows before he leans in and kisses him again. Julian's knees snug between Garak's hips and the soft chair arms, and his hands bracket Garak's face, so warm, so soft. Garak's mouth falls open and he accepts it plainly, unhindered by a thing. Lips and tongue and panted breaths and then he pulls away again, wide eyed and breathing fast.  He shivers a little even as his eyes are hard and steady on Garak's.

    “I love Elim Garak,” he says. Another soft short kiss on the lips and a few more white hot pecks down his chin. Garak can't really think. “Say it.”

    Garak's breath is shaky at best. He's forgotten how to do it automatically. “I,” he says, dizzy and helpless, “I...love Julian Bashir,” he just barely gets it out his own surprised lips.

    Julian half grins and tuts out the smallest pebble of laughter. “No,” he purrs. “I. Love. Elim. Garak. Say it.”

    Well well. Is that fear coiling around your rib cage Mr. Garak? Garak's eyes widen. He knows this game, he's just never been on this side of the playing field. “I...I...” he stumbles on it over and over, and Julian, brave now, runs the tip of his nose down Garak's neck.  The human's touch is downy fire.

    “Say it,” Julian whispers at his pulse.

    “I...love...Elim Garak.” Julian's smile moves up and he kisses him again. His eyes slide shut as he takes Garak's mouth and slips his tongue inside, warm and luxurious. Garak can't even begin.

    Julian tastes Garak's lips as if they were his own, laves his mouth and his breath, leaving Garak warm all over.  He leaves his mouth after a moment and Elim licks the taste of him off his lips, wanting to capture it and frame it in case it never happens again, like a snapshot of a blazing meteor.

    “Say it again,” Julian's voice is hoarse and low.

    Garak is compelled to obey, and that feels like breathing water, but he does it. “I love... Elim Garak.”

    Julian kisses him again. Escalating each time by a small step, climbing a short flight toward a blissful peak, each kiss seems to push the edges and now with the addition of gently dragging teeth, Garak is surrounded and bathed with a heat that this cold rock in space has never before granted him.  And Garak can't move a muscle, nor can he remember the last time he has been so completely removed from his thoughts, so completely taken and helpless. Julian has punctured him with those teeth raked across a shell he had not known was so thin.  Bitten a hole in his side with the most rudimentary weapons, and he's going to bleed, he can feel it.

    “Say it again,” he says, his kiss-swollen lips a centimeter away.

    “I love Elim Garak," he says between heavy breaths.

    “Again,” Julian whispers.

    Garak's voice drops off as well, “I love Elim Garak.”

    “Again.”

    “I love-” Julian doesn't quite wait for him to finish. He's standing up tall on his knees, devouring Garak's mouth from high above, his hands threading hard into Garak's hair to rub solidly at his scalp and tug at the roots in a way that turns his spine to ice water.  It seems anything Julian does now is perfect, every movement of his body against Garak's is artful and every plaintive nonsense syllable that escapes the lips pressed against his sets Garak's nerves alight.  He feels as though he's arching up to the sky to taste the rain or reach the last bubble of air in a drowning cage it is that vital that he stretch as far as his invisible bonds will allow toward that face. He could be a seedling in the sun. Julian supports the back of his head as he stretches up, and the rest of his body might as well not be there as it is pinned down to the chair on every surface and just tingling.  He can't remember the last time he breathed.

    Julian sinks back down, slowly, taking Garak with him, and sits part of his weight on Garak's knees. The kiss breaks slowly, rolling away and peeling like rosy wet citrus, and Julian's eyes reopen and focus on Garak's from too few inches away to really see. Their noses brush and breath battles between their lips.

    Garak pants shallowly for a moment and then says in an unsteady voice, “I thought you were going to tell me something.”

    “I am telling you,” Julian says, sounding equally winded despite the fact they are both seated in the same comfortable chair. Then he's kissing him again. Short gentle kisses over and over because neither of them can really stand much more of the kind that bruise. Or perhaps this is just a breather.

    “When do I get to rebut?” Garak says between a few of them, faintly surprised that his capacity for such talk is not removed by this point.

    “Shut up,” Julian says with a sigh.

    Elim barely gets “Ok,” out of his mouth before it is swallowed again by a ravenous human doctor with the softest, sweetest lips Garak has ever had the fortune to have forced upon him. The shape of them against his own is maddening; feeling the definition of their outline slip between his lips as he captures them in a playful mockery of his own predicament, and then releases them to taste their marriage with his tongue.  It's a cruel tease, self-torture, as he participates at once eagerly and helplessly.  He wants and he wants, and he tries, even as he is kissed into obliviousness, to take it all in, to feel everything there is to feel, breathe in his scent and absorb his taste, and to just resist the desire to let his eyes fall closed because even with his limited vantage point, there is so much he wants to catch.  Even in the unlit room he can see Julian is flushed pink all over, and Garak wonders if he can feel that or if it is purely for the enjoyment of the observer.  He is no longer concerned that he will wake from this and find it was another daydream or that it will end as abruptly as it began and all he will have to cherish is the memory of a few moments.  No, this is not something transient that is building and budding here.  He hangs on to every second tenaciously now the way one clings to a life preserver, or to a person long and severely missed, drowned and saved.  He is memorizing this because it is a gift.

    By the time the heady barrage begins to slow, Garak becomes aware that he has no idea how much time has gone by while they sat there.

    Julian sits and strokes every small ridge and outlines every scale and strange marking on Elim's face and neck. He is hesitant to break the spell they are under, but Elim looks so tired, so spent and drained, even if he doesn't say so, even if he doesn't say a word, Julian can tell.

    “Computer. Force field down.”

    He is free but he doesn't move. Julian runs his hands down the large neck ridges and massages Elim's shoulders and chest through his clothes. His eyes shut for a while, then blink open over and over. Julian can't tell if it happens because he is sleepy but is trying to stay awake, or because he is relaxed and blissed out and just trying to remain alert. Either way it isn't really necessary. Garak hasn't moved his hands from the spot where the force field had them pinned. That isn't necessary either but he doesn't expect it to change right away.

    Time passes again in random pieces and at strange speeds totally removed from normal experience, but eventually Julian shifts and stands, removing that secure anchoring weight from Garak's lap. Garak follows him with his gaze but still doesn't move. Julian takes his hand and pulls him up gently. His knees crack and he almost smiles as he faces Julian again.

    Julian brushes his hair back into an approximation of that slick perfect arrangement Garak usually has, kisses him, and takes him by the hand to lead him toward his bedroom.

    In the few steps it takes to get to Garak's bed side, his face has changed and he's breathing noticeably faster, if still quiet as a mouse. The silence is precious though, he knows, and does not break it. In the dark, Julian sits Garak down, removes his shoes and jacket, and lays him down on his bed with gently guiding hands. Elim swallows hard as Julian walks around the bed to the other side, silhouetted by Bajor, half lit in perpetual dusk on this side, and climbs in with him.

    Julian draws the covers over both of them, thick, supple, blue sheets Garak made himself. Arms wrap around him then turn him to face the human and he realizes he's trembling, his hands are cold but everywhere else he's hot. And one part of him is extremely interested in everything that has happened tonight, but the rest of him is suddenly and absolutely terrified.

    Bashir's sad eyes are looking into his as he continuously strokes his hair and face. “Julian,” he whispers, on the verge of something, at the corner of a precipice. The first thing he has said in perhaps hours. Julian scoots closer and slides and arm under his neck and the other around his back and he holds on, lips pressed to Elim's ear.

Julian pulls back to look at him again, and then moves in, and presses a soft kiss to the smooth round depression on Garak's forehead.

    Garak is undone. He wonders only for a moment if Julian knows how intimate a gesture that is, but after everything that's happened in the past few days, he doesn't doubt that he knows. He's known all along.  Despite Garak, he knew.  So brilliant, and so beautiful looking at him from across the pale pillow.  Garak bows his head and sinks into the deep blue beneath the sheet and in the circle of Julian's arms. His large hands reach out and find the slim waist in front of him, and gently grip his ribs. As he sinks, the pressure builds around him slowly and it feels like his whole body is being purged, wrung out. It is a long way to the bottom, where the soft sand will greet him, but even just this small rend bleeds out relief so sweet, he's struggling not to weep into Julian's tunic.

    “It's ok,” Julian says, and pulls him closer.

~*~

    Elim looks the picture of peace. Julian, his head propped up on the triangle of his bent arm, faintly strokes a shred of black hair above his ear. Every little ridge and embellishment on a Cardassian's body is an erogenous zone if touched the right way, by the right hand. Julian avoids them now in favor of more innocuous places, hoping to let Garak sleep as long as possible even if he lay awake until morning. He is content to just look and let his mind wander.

    The desire for more, for everything, was unmistakably there and real, and now in the vanguard whereas it had been smoldering background noise for so long. But now was not the time for it. Some precious bottles should be preserved, saved for a time when it will sweeten happiness rather than simply dull despondency. Kept regardless of the chaotic destruction all around, the potential for loss. What good is a beautiful thing not fully appreciated? For them it will feel like a gain if it is not snatched from their grasp. And if unrealized catastrophe is gain then unrealized love is just as good as a loss undone. And Julian knows that in that they can lose themselves drunk and freed for many nights to come.

Chapter 2: The Debt