Archive of Our Own ^beta

Nerys was settled in for the evening with a nice cup of tea and an audio-romance that Jadzia had recommended when her terminal chimed with a call. Sighing, she got up to answer it, only to have her heart start racing when she saw the infirmary was calling. She lunged to answer. “Major Kira here.”

“Major,” it was Nurse Jabara calling, and she sounded calm. Nerys took a breath. “I wanted to alert you that Doctor Bashir may be on his way to see you.”

“That’s if he decides to consult an officer at all before leaving the station!” a voice called from the background, and after a moment, Nerys recognized Garak’s sarcastic pitch. 

“Nurse,” she said, forcing herself to seem calm, “what does Mr. Garak mean?”

Jabara grimaced. “I can’t reveal the details of Mr. Garak’s condition, but we’ve discovered that, functionally, we don’t have enough information on Cardassian physiology to save his life. And you know how Doctor Bashir feels about his patients dying. He intends to go into Cardassian space to retrieve the information.”

Nerys knew her face matched Jabara’s. “Computer, locate Julian Bashir.”

“Julian Bashir is in Habitat level 4, section C.” On his way to her, then.

“He’s on his way,” she told Jabara, who visibly slumped with relief. “Is there anything else, Nurse?”

Jaraba hesitated, and Nerys raised an eyebrow questioningly. “It may be more dangerous than simply going into Cardassian space,” Jabara answered after a moment.

“I’ll say!” called Garak in the background, “He’s going to the Arawath colony, Major, to find the former head of the Obsidian Order. Or he will, if you don’t stop him. ” In that moment, as she knew Julian must be drawing close to her quarters, Nerys realized three things about Garak that he would never have wanted her to know: one, Garak cared about Julian Bashir, two, Garak definitely was a spy, and three, Garak was completely incapacitated in the infirmary right now.

“I’ll take care of it,” she said abruptly, and terminated the connection. Part of her mind spun with the information she could get from Garak with this knowledge, right now before he got away. The other part listed reasons she couldn’t get it: Julian would never let anyone interrogate his patients if he thought it would hurt them more, for one. Of course, Julian was leaving—but that in itself was another reason. Nerys was about to have her hands full saving Julian’s life. Besides, he had clearly left Jabara in charge in the infirmary in his stead, and Jabara’s commitment to medical ethics—or else her respect for Julian, or both—was just as formidable an obstacle. Anyone trying to interrogate Garak would have to go through Jabara first, and it might become a physical altercation. 

The door chimed. “Enter,” she called.

Julian stepped in. “Major.”

“No.”

This stopped him in his tracks. “I beg your pardon?”

“Your request is denied, doctor.” It was worth a try.

“You don’t even know what I’m asking for!”

“It’s not a runabout to take to the Arawath colony to look for the former head of the Obsidian Order?”

“How did you know—Jabara.” He sighed. 

Nerys felt her mouth twitch in a smile. “I like her. She’s sensible. She wants to keep you alive.” Julian looked at her pleadingly, just waiting, and her shoulders slumped. “Sit down, Julian. Tell me about it.”

An hour later, Nerys found herself meeting Julian in the runabout bay, a bag slung over her shoulder. She had left a message for Sisko on his terminal—he would wake up to two of his officers gone, after all. 

Her stomach roiled with fear. No part of her had ever been interested in going into Cardassian space—she would much rather never have to speak to a Cardassian again. But there was no way she was letting Julian go by himself. He would die, and the whole station would have to get used to a new doctor. Nerys was not losing another friend to Cardassian violence.

As they got settled in the runabout, Julian said, not for the first time, “Are you sure about this, Kira? You don’t have to come.”
“Julian, do you remember when we took a runabout back into the Delta Quadrant to deliver relief kits to a planet of feuding unkillable murderers?”

“I do.”

“Well, I owed you one for that. Can this cover it?”

He seemed surprised. “More than! You didn’t owe me anything for that. I wanted to do it.”

“And I want to keep you from getting killed, if I can. So you’ll just have to accept that you’re not going alone.”

_______________________________

Julian was agitated. As they travelled into the Demilitarized Zone, he fidgeted, wiggled, and tapped, but didn’t speak. This was unusual, for Julian, and annoying, for Nerys. Much as Julian’s chatter could be tiring, Julian without it was worse.

“Julian,” she said, after the first hour past the border, “what is it?”

He looked over at her abruptly. “What? Nothing, besides the obvious. I’m just... thinking. Making sure I know what to do.” His eyes were just a bit too wide to be honest.

She waited. 

Finally, he sighed. “Jadzia said that Garak and I aren’t real friends.”

Nerys felt her heart pick up speed at the clear frustration in his voice. He wanted them to be friends. This was what she had been worried about, last year when Julian first met Garak, that Julian would be enticed, and let down his guard, give Garak something to sink his very literal claws and teeth into. “ Are you real friends?” she asked, trying her best to keep the panic out of her voice.

He clearly heard it anyways, if the way his eyes searched hers for a moment was any indication. Then he shrugged, flopping back in his seat. “I don’t know. I mean, over the course of this whole affair he’s told me about three versions of the story about why he was exiled, and I don’t believe any of them, not fully. On principle, I try to remember the stories he’s told me about his own life, but I don’t necessarily believe any of them. I don’t know if he actually gives me his true opinion on the books we read together, or if the person I eat lunch with is entirely a fabricated character he puts on for me. If anything about that character is honest, then I know that, despite the exile, he would sell me out if he thought it would benefit Cardassia. Those aren’t very good foundations for friendship.”

This was truer, Nerys thought, which was good at least. “But?” she offered, anticipating.

“But I care about him.” Julian sounded defeated by it. “He’s interesting. I feel like I’m always learning when we talk, but also like I have something valuable to contribute. When we went to Bajor, to the orphanage, and he saw the kids left behind, who would never be able to have a place on Cardassia... he seemed sad. Genuinely. Like he knew that he and those kids had one thing in common and it was never being able to go anywhere they would be loved again.”

 This was not helping Nerys calm down. “This is what I was worried about,” she said, bluntly.

He gave her his wry smile. “I know it is.”

“You stopped reporting back to me when I realized that all you were going to talk about was Cardassian and Human art. But I shouldn’t have left you to do this by yourself.”

“I’m not doing anything. That’s the problem. We don’t talk about present-day politics unless we have to—like with Rugal. We’re just talking, like people do.”

“It makes you vulnerable,” Nerys pointed out, trying to be gentle. Julian seemed miserable. “It makes you friendly, and then, when he really wants something, you’re more inclined to give it. This, for instance. Is it possible that it’s all a trap?” It had only occurred to her once they had left the station, to be fair to Julian. But a good way to get both of them to walk into it would be to tell her that Julian was going to do something dangerous alone.

Julian shook his head firmly. “He really is dying. I’m not sure how good I am at being a spy, but I’m a good doctor.”

“Then... for what it’s worth, Julian, if Garak really is dying, I think he really does care about you. I don’t know if that helps.” He simply stared at her, confused, so she recounted what he had told her when Jabara had called. “Just that much information gave away a lot. Garak spends a lot of time denying that he’s a spy. I wouldn’t be surprised if he had wanted to take it to his grave, perhaps with the exception of someone he liked. But I’m a terrible person to give that information to—I’m not ever going to leave Garak alone, now. But he as much as told me he was an Obsidian Order agent, just to give me an accurate warning about where you were going, because he was worried you would get yourself killed, knowing that I would also know just how helpless he is right now, all from that information. That’s a big risk.”

Julian took a very deep breath, seeming lost for words. Nerys let him process. Eventually, he said, “We are friends. Friends with other loyalties, but friends. Garak likes me.” He laughed then, a hint of bitterness. “I thought so, no matter what he said.”

“What did he say?” asked Nerys, suspicious.

“Oh, just that he hated me, and that he thought it was pathetic of him to look forward to our lunches. I thought he might just be trying to cover up the fact that he said he looked forward to our lunches.” He laughed again. “Garak likes getting lunch with me. I’m going to save his life, the bastard.”

Nerys stared at him as he chuckled to himself. He really was strange. “Don’t let this information make you less careful around him,” she advised. “He’s still definitely a spy, and dangerous.”

Julian gave her a smile that was sharper than anything she had ever seen on his face, just for a moment, before it softened to his usual ruefulness. “Oh,” he said, “definitely not.”

________________________

Julian materialized on the transporter pad just as Nerys was making her two-hundredth turn to cross the small space of the bridge. He was frowning. 

“Did it work?” She demanded, crossing to him to look more closely, make sure he wasn’t injured. 

He tilted his head to the side. “Tain said he would send the information to the infirmary on DS9. So I guess we’ll find out.” He collapsed into one of the chairs. “He knew I was coming, Kira, he knew how I take my tea. ” 

A chill flooded down her spine, and she collapsed next to him. “How? From Garak?”

“I don’t think so. I don’t think there’s any love lost between them. Whoever Garak might be reporting back to, I don’t think it’s Tain anymore. I think—” and then he stopped talking, looked at her with something she couldn’t identify in his face. After a moment, without speaking, he turned to the runabout’s computer.

“Julian?” she asked. 

“Let’s go home, Kira,” he suggested, voice light, entirely belied by his serious face. “I’m being paranoid. It must have been Garak. How could he have got the information otherwise?” 

She was still feeling frozen by fear, but she decided, in that moment, to trust Julian, even in this. She followed his lead. “Alright. Set a course for DS9, then, Doctor.”

“Absolutely. Why don’t you take a bit of a nap? We both need to sleep before we get back to the station, and I’m feeling too wired. I’ll take my turn at the helm first.”

Nerys acquiesced, even though she didn’t think she would be able to sleep well either. She went to the small room at the back of the runabout, where there was a pallet, and lay down, watching through slitted eyes as Julian did whatever he had in mind.

But it was boring. He was clearly working on something on the computer, but she couldn’t tell what. There was nothing to watch, and eventually, she couldn’t sustain the mindless tension. She was too used to sleeping in any spare moment. She let her eyes close, and, after a moment, dropped off to sleep.

She woke up to the feeling of the pallet being dragged along the floor. Her eyes flew open, and she surged upright before noticing that it was Julian at the foot of the pallet. He put a finger to his lips, and her angry protests died in her throat.

She watched as he methodically unscrewed the floor and wall panels that she had been resting against, peered over every inch of them, and then investigated the wiring beneath. Once the panels were replaced, he sat back and sighed, deeply. “I think we’re safe.”

“What did you find?” she asked, shaking off the last remnants of sleep.

“It wasn’t Garak. It was the computers. There’s a virus that’s amalgamating information, buried very, very deep. I cut it out of this runabout’s systems, and set up safeguards so that the station can’t re-infect it when they reconnect. But the entire station will need to be checked.”

“How did it get in there?” Her mind started to race.

He shrugged. “It might have been Garak; he’s good with computers. But I don’t think he’s this good, and technology isn’t usually a masculine skill on Cardassia. It’s possible it’s a leftover from the Occupation, or it might be a different infiltrator.”

“We have to get news to the Commander and to Chief O’Brien. We need to take care of this as soon as possible.”

“We can’t. It would involve sending the message by computer.”

Nerys felt trapped, skittish. She tried to think of a new plan, but technology wasn’t her strength, either. She was good at hitting people and blowing things up, and taking hits, and piloting. This kind of fight wasn’t for her, and she didn’t know what to do. Her chest felt tight. She didn’t know what to do, and the head of the Obsidian Order knew everything that was happening on the station, and she couldn’t stop it. She couldn’t breathe.

“-rys, please,” Julian’s voice filtered in, and then she felt his heart under her palm, his fingers gentle around her wrist. “Breathe with me,” he encouraged, and she did, trying to match her breaths to the rise and fall of his chest until her body came back under her control. When she could, she looked up at his face. It was neutral, but his eyes were soft. “I should have said that I have a plan. It will take some time, but it’s doable. First, when we get back, once Garak is out of my infirmary, I’m going to get the Chief’s entire crew through the infirmary. That way I’ll be able to check and see if any of them are Cardassians under surgical alteration. It’s easy to get the surface right, but underneath, it’s always the same. I’ll clear my quarters first, and quarantine my computer against the virus. Then I can bring the Chief to my quarters, and tell him about it. Once we know the workforce is trustworthy, the Chief can put together a discreet task force to eliminate the virus station-wide. He’ll be able to put in safeguards against any future infections by visiting ships, and we’ll know what to look for in the future.”

Slowly, Nerys nodded. “That seems reasonable,” she said, hating how her voice came out wobbly. 

Julian smiled like the sun. “I thought so,” he said, cheerily. “Old Enabran Tain isn’t going to know what hit him. And then I can move on to thwarting his other plans.”

Still unsure of her voice, Nerys just raised an eyebrow at him.

“He said he wants Garak to live because that’s a worse fate than dying,” he explained. “He said he wants him to live out a long life in exile, surrounded by people who hate him.” His grin grew with his clear self-satisfaction and delight. “But Kira, I don’t hate him.”