Received: from [66.218.66.27] by n13.grp.scd.yahoo.com with NNFMP; 10 May 2004 03:52:50 -0000 X-Sender: campbratcher@psci.net X-Apparently-To: ASCEM-S@yahoogroups.com Received: (qmail 10379 invoked from network); 10 May 2004 03:52:50 -0000 Received: from unknown (66.218.66.218) by m21.grp.scd.yahoo.com with QMQP; 10 May 2004 03:52:50 -0000 Received: from unknown (HELO mailstore.psci.net) (63.65.184.2) by mta3.grp.scd.yahoo.com with SMTP; 10 May 2004 03:52:49 -0000 Received: from max (as1-d25-rp-psci.psci.net [63.69.225.25]) by mailstore.psci.net (8.12.2/8.12.2) with SMTP id i4A3qRfP032018 for ; Sun, 9 May 2004 22:52:27 -0500 Message-ID: <003d01c43642$4561df40$87c5fea9@max> To: "ASCEM-S" Organization: ConGlomeration X-Priority: 3 X-MSMail-Priority: Normal X-Mailer: Microsoft Outlook Express 6.00.2800.1158 X-MIMEOLE: Produced By Microsoft MimeOLE V6.00.2800.1165 X-eGroups-Remote-IP: 63.65.184.2 From: "Keith & Jessica Bratcher" X-Yahoo-Profile: sileya MIME-Version: 1.0 Mailing-List: list ASCEM-S@yahoogroups.com; contact ASCEM-S-owner@yahoogroups.com Delivered-To: mailing list ASCEM-S@yahoogroups.com Precedence: bulk List-Unsubscribe: Date: Sun, 9 May 2004 22:52:52 -0500 Subject: [ASCEM-S] NEW DS9 "Nineteen Shades" 6/12 (G/B) [NC-17] Reply-To: "Keith & Jessica Bratcher" Content-Type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Please see part 1 for codes, disclaimers, and notes. ------------------------------------------- Nineteen Shades, by Penumbra (part 6/12) ------------------------------------------- Garak pulled the belt of his robe tighter and exhaled slowly. In the one-quarter light of his quarters, Serka's scales glowed with cool, silver light where the shadows didn't touch the parts of his skin that had darkened because of his arousal during their Parting. Seeing his former lover naked and in the familiar kneeling position of a supplicant was harder on his soul than Garak had thought possible. "What was that quaint human saying I heard Captain Sisko use a few days ago -- absence makes the heart grow fonder?" Serka smiled as he tilted his head up to look him in the eye. "I've missed you, too, Elim," he said in his calm, clear tenor. His emerging erection, glistening and dark against his abdomen, seemed to agree. Garak crouched in front of his former lover and slid his fingertips along the length of Delemek's hardness. It was scalding hot and slick to the touch and the shiver of delight that ran through Delemek at the touch was very gratifying. Bringing his fingers to his face, Garak inhaled the scent of the pheromone secretion that clung to his fingers. It was a heady cocktail on his senses, the musky smell reminding him of days past, their long nights of both fevered, furious fucking and slow lovemaking of whispered words and touches. A stab of desperate need shot straight into his groin, but Garak ignored it. He had other interests now. Other interests. Garak almost laughed out loud at the thought. His desire for Julian was so much more than mere interest: it was the only thing he still considered good and pure in himself. "There's someone else for you now, isn't there?" Serka, clever as ever, had obviously not forgotten how to read him. "Yes. Perhaps," Garak murmured, his hand coming to rest on Serka's thigh. It never did him any good to lie to this man who, at one point in his long life, had known him better than he himself. "Alas, you're luckier than I am in that regard. You have what you desire in your bed." "Thuli is good for me. I can't care about his history when he loves me," Serka said, and there was a defensive note in his tone. "Love is all that matters," he added. Grasping Serka's hand in his, Garak touched the neat suture scars where the three first fingers of his hand were missing. In a flash of remembrance, he remembered how sharp his knife had been and how sticky Delemek's blood had been, thicker than his scream of pain. "I taught you better than that, Dele," he said, gently chiding. "Love can heal and make you younger, but it can't erase circumstances." Serka lowered his head and satisfaction blossomed warmly in Garak's chest. His message was going to be ignored but at least he'd delivered it. The circumstances that had led to their love growing sour all those years ago were different from what both of them faced now -- Delemek with his illegitimate choice for a *ha'kem*, he himself with his unrequited desire for Julian -- yet as condemning. Back then, many things had been against them, so many that Garak had trouble remembering them all: Enabran and his misguided care for him, his violent machinations as the Obsidian Order prodigy, Delemek's precarious position in the Central Command and subsequent short-sighted misuse of their affair for political gain...too many to count, indeed. "Circumstances are in our power to change." "Only up to a point," Garak said, letting go of Serka's hand. "You are a hunted dissident, I'm an exile. Life has not been kind to either of us, my friend." Serka straightened his back and clasped his hands behind his back. He showed no sign of how uncomfortable his kneeling position was, and pride swelled in Garak's chest. Delemek was once his beautiful man, still beautiful in his well-maintained body and in his complicated mind. That mind was now obviously at an interesting crossroads, torn between the wants of the body and the restrictions his better self placed on him. Garak knew Serka wanted him, so much was evident, but the Parting was what it was and it wouldn't do to ruin it with a moment of nostalgia sex. So he had kept his robe on even when Serka had not, had resisted the temptation to take advantage of the desirable body offered to him. "I'm sorry about my outburst yesterday," Serka said, sincerity colouring both his voice and his gaze. "It was unbecoming of me. I forgot my place." Garak touched his chest where Serka had thrown the *Sher'ahm* before attacking him in the wardroom. The gesture had been expected, the rage had not. "You surprised me." A smug grin flashed on Serka's lips, disappearing as quickly as it had appeared. "I always did manage to do that to you, didn't I?" "One of your more admirable qualities -- not many people could do that. Great irony, then, that it was also part of your undoing," Garak said and touched Serka's temple, tracing the forehead ridge down. It was a shape so very familiar to him and he held back a wistful sigh when his former lover leaned into the gentle touch. "That's why the Order had the control implant installed when it was time for me to question you." "I was surprised you still remembered the control words, after all these years," Serka said, his eyes closing as he rubbed his cheek against Garak's palm. "Although I guess I shouldn't have. In reliability, your memory was rivalled only by your loyalty to the Order." Garak smiled and pulled back his hand with not a small amount of regret. Although the love had grown old, part of his visceral memory still remembered the man kneeling before him, recalled the pleasures they'd shared. "And therein lies the greatest of ironies. My loyalty." The irony was, of course, that he had killed that to which he had sworn his undying loyalty: Enabran Tain. It had been Enabran who'd ordered him to install the control implant to his lover's brain, and fool that he had been, he'd followed those orders. He'd followed the other orders, too: he had questioned Delemek on trivial things, taken the whip to his back when he had not replied, installed the control chip when he had rebelled. Tain had ordered him to sever all ties to Serka and so he had, cutting off his fingers and toes to mark him as a traitor, and then kicked him into the streets as if he was a filthy Sixth. Garak smiled sadly as he stood, his eyes never leaving the strong, graceful curve of Serka's shoulders and the dark eyes that watched him with warmth and love he didn't deserve. Enabran Tain had paid for what he'd have his son and protege do, of course: Garak had killed him, not once or twice but three times. First, by betraying him and the Obsidian Order; the second time by leaving him to die with his fleet in the Gamma Quadrant; the third time at the Dominion prison asteroid by turning up without the army Tain had hoped for. All those times, Tain had died a duped man, alone and miserable, and Garak hoped that regardless of when his time would come, he would not face it as a man as lonely as his father had been. Alas, as if there was a curse on the son of Tain, he seemed destined to follow his father's footsteps into that misery. The door chime interrupted his sombre thoughts. * * * * * * * * * * Bashir fidgeted and pressed the chime again. "Come," Garak's voice said through the door in reply to his second chime and the door opened. With a deep, fortifying breath, Bashir obeyed the curt word. When he stepped in, sweat sprang up on his forehead immediately. It was dark and hot inside Garak's quarters, and Bashir recognised the settings as the Cardassian standard: one-quarter lights, temperature at 48 degrees Centigrade. In the penumbra, he could see Garak's dark form silhouetted against the starfield visible through the porthole behind him, the cold light catching the pale, silver glow of his skin and the gleam of the long, dark Bolian silk robe he was wearing. He was standing in front of a naked, kneeling figure whose back was facing Bashir, but it was easy to tell he was a Cardassian; the echo of silver skin and the sharp, raised ridges that shone in the darkness were clues enough. The Cardassian had his head bowed down and he'd clasped his hands behind him and so Bashir could tell he was missing three fingers from one hand, along with the three toes missing from his bare left foot. Delemek Serka, his brain supplied. In shock, Bashir froze and took in the whole arrangement: the kneeling, deferent figure of Delemek Serka and Garak's shadowed, broad form towering above him in a balanced arrangement of power and submission. The scents of incense and something extrinsic wafted in the too-hot air to tickle his nose and the darkness lit only by scattered candles and the light of the stars was almost too opaque for him to see in. All this put together presented a tableau that was intimate yet oddly alien, as if he'd interrupted a deeply private ritual whose significance he couldn't even begin to fathom. "I, uh, I didn't mean to bother you," Bashir stammered, taking a step backwards towards the door. "I'm sorry," he added, and was stopped by Garak's words. "Oh, no bother at all, doctor. Please stay. Delemek and I were merely catching up," Garak said and reached to touch Serka's cheek as he looked down at him, his eyes glittering in the semi-darkness brighter than the stars behind him. For once, the expression on Garak's face was not careful control; no, it was ethereal calm. "Catching up?" Bashir asked, his voice wavering a bit. "Reminiscing about old times," Garak explained softly, and his mien of tender affection was mirrored on Serka's profile when he turned his head up and to the side to look at Garak. It was a look that spoke of love and loss; of battles long gone that had left behind lingering bitterness; of emotions that Bashir had never seen on Garak's face, for they were vulnerabilities. Suddenly, facts clicked into order in Bashir's mind. "You! It's you. You're that woman, aren't you?" Looking up and smiling with his full set of very white teeth, for a long moment Garak stroked his chin ridge as if thinking. "Alas, had I ever been female, I would've been a singularly ugly one," he finally said, amusement in his voice. "No, you thick-headed Cardassian -- in that story you told me." Garak's smile did not waver an inch. "Which story would that be?" Bashir stepped further into the room, waving his arms in a manner he recognised as agitated, but was unable to help himself. "The officer! The woman! The love that was forbidden!" he exclaimed on each step, his gestures encompassing Serka, Garak, and the entire universe. "Ah. That story." "Yes! You're the woman whose organisation frowned on the romance and so you were forced to end it. He's the young officer, in love but bound by duty that--" Bashir said, stopping mid-sentence as he came closer to Serka and saw the roadmap of scars that was his back. "What the hell?" Garak sighed, still standing very still in front of the kneeling Serka. "And you were doing so well, doctor." Glancing at Garak distractedly, Bashir crouched down behind Serka and squinted in the low light. The Cardassian's skin was indeed a field of mangled flesh: scars raised into miniature ridges criss-crossed the breadth of his muscular, well-shaped back, breaking the graceful pattern of his scales with their ugly trails. Bashir touched one of the scars and when the man drew in a sharp, shuddering breath, retracted his hand as if the scar tissue had burned him. "Garak," Bashir said, his voice faint even to his own ears. "What happened?" To the doctor's surprise it was Serka who spoke, in a low, calm voice. "He only did what was right, Dr. Bashir. I've had my mark on him now and what you see is the past. Don't concern yourself with it." "The Obsidian Order didn't just disapprove of your relationship, did they?" Bashir asked, his question more rhetorical than anything else as he pieced the puzzle together in his head. "You did this to him, didn't you, Garak? They forced you to..." He couldn't put it into words, for the lump in his throat blocked all attempts to do so. "Was this why you were exiled? Because you wouldn't kill him?" "No, it wasn't. The Order couldn't risk killing him while he was under their care," Garak replied, his voice thicker and warmer than usual. "But Delemek here can be viewed as the start of my journey down the path that would eventually lead to my expulsion." Bashir sighed. The picture was finally clearer to him. "Enabran didn't approve." "Enabran considered love to be a liability," Garak said, and there was such bone-deep weariness hidden in his voice that it made Bashir look up from the map of scars. "And because Enabran Tain told you to do this, to torture and mutilate your...lover," Bashir said, his breath catching over the last word as he stood, "you went right ahead and did it. Just like that," he added, snapping his fingers as he stepped closer to Garak. It was not quite anger he was feeling, more a mix of confusion and fear than anything else. Garak cocked his head, his hands still clasped behind his back as if this was the most normal thing for him to discuss. "I am not a nice man, doctor." "Nor am I," Delemek Serka said as he suddenly spoke with the firm tone of conviction in his voice, craning his neck up towards the standing Garak. "Please, Dr. Bashir. Understand that I am as much to fault as Elim is. I loved him," he said, glancing over his shoulder at Bashir, "and I still love him, yet what he did to me then was only right." He shrugged, his knotted muscles shifting under his skin. "I used him, and then he used me." Bashir shook his head. He was certain he'd never fully understand Cardassian motivations, but right then, the tally of violence didn't matter to him that much. It was too much too quickly -- pieces of Garak's history he'd never even imagined, the sound of old desire and regret in his friend's voice, and the scent and heat of a naked Cardassian so close to him. Stepping back, Bashir inhaled and caught Serka's unfamiliar scent that seemed an exotic mix of burnt sandalwood and cinnamon and an autumn forest. It was the smell of Cardassian arousal, and what it implied stung Bashir: that passion was for Garak. Had he, Julian Bashir of genetically enhanced cognitive powers, misunderstood all the years of acerbic flirting he and Garak had shared? Misinterpreted all those lingering gazes or the way Garak always invaded his space? Did his friend merely want his old lover back; regain what fate had taken away from him and Serka? "And now," Bashir said, catching Garak's eye, "you're putting past behind you and starting anew, just like that?" "Perhaps." Bashir's heart skipped a beat. Was he too late? Had he allowed his cowardice to rule him too long? "But why? Why now?" "Because I've grown tired of waiting, my friend." "For what?" Bashir asked, breathless as he met Garak's unblinking gaze that spoke volumes. He dared not hope, yet maybe it was finally the time for truths for both of them. "For me?" Automatically, Bashir waited for an evasion, or perhaps an outright denial to such a preposterous claim; after all, that was Garak's modus operandi. Maybe another story, a change in topics, a sudden turn of discourse from emoting to Tholian fabrics or cyclical literature. So when Garak smiled in a way he had never seen him smile and replied, Bashir simply forgot to breathe through his shock. "Yes. For you." The silence that descended in the room was so thick one could've cut it with knife. For that long moment, Bashir stood frozen, watching the play of light and emotion in his friend's eyes. The subtle shift of the pale blue into indigo, the loneliness and the pride -- it was all there, as he'd seen it through the years but not understood before now. "Oh, Garak. I've been an idiot," Bashir finally said, quietly, regretting the fears that had kept him from listening to his heart. He had not misunderstood Garak through these years; he'd merely avoided the issue altogether, taken the low route. "Such a short-sighted fool. An idiot." "On that, we can agree," Garak said, a contemplative note in his smooth voice. "You could've just said something, Garak," Bashir said, aware that he was waving his arms in a most undignified manner but not caring. "Anything," he finished lamely, smiling through his heartache. They'd danced around one another for so long, not knowing, not understanding. "Ah. Therein lies the problem, doctor," Garak said and casually rested his hand on Delemek's naked shoulder. "In Cardassian society, these things are organised so well and with the least amount of fuss. Here, however," he continued, indicating the station around them with his other hand, "things are not nearly as clear-cut -- no *vakha'kem* to help me, no social structure to guide me. And then there's you." Bashir blinked, feeling the perspiration beading on his back run down his spine. "Me?" Garak smiled again, one of his warmer not-smiles that made Bashir shiver in anticipation, and when he spoke, his voice was velvet on steel. "You. Desperation can be so very unattractive, you see. I do not plead, and I do not ask for things. Things come to me, as Delemek here once did...and as you have now done, Julian." The sound of his given name, indolent as if Garak was taste-testing the unfamiliar syllables in his mouth, made something warm flare to life in the pit of Bashir's abdomen. Hypnotised, he watched Garak's fingers trace Serka's shoulder ridge with a carefully measured caress. The scales on Serka's shoulders and back bristled in waves of delight and the man hissed, writhing in his uncomfortable-looking kneeling pose. "I think we're done," Garak continued, looking down at Serka with gentle regret, "and it's time for you to leave. Go back to your *ha'kem*, Dele. I forgive you for him." Serka sighed deeply, making the skin on his shoulders flush for a moment before he stood up and made a curt bow to Garak. "I understand," he said with a rasp in his throat. "*Meketjakl'o*, Elim. Thank you." When Serka turned to go, Bashir couldn't help noticing his obvious signs of arousal, from the expanses of skin gone musky grey to the glistening length of his erection where it emerged from its protective pod. Forcing his eyes to remain on the window behind Garak and to watch the starfield with unseeing eyes, Bashir listened to Serka's receding footsteps behind him that paused as Garak spoke. "Dele, my friend. We're not at the public baths of Koromat," Garak said, a faint smile playing on his lips and his eyes focused on something behind Bashir. "So unless you wish to scandalise a number of Bajorans and see the inside of one of Constable Odo's rather drab holding cells..." "Ah, yes. I sometimes forget myself." His words were followed by a moment of quiet rustling of clothing and the swish of the door opening. "You always did have that effect on me, Elim. You made me forget myself," Serka said, quiet wistfulness in his voice. With that and the sound of the closing door, he was gone. ------------------------------- End of part 6/12. [Non-text portions of this message have been removed] ------------------------ Yahoo! Groups Sponsor ---------------------~--> Yahoo! Domains - Claim yours for only $14.70 http://us.click.yahoo.com/Z1wmxD/DREIAA/yQLSAA/5x3olB/TM ---------------------------------------------------------------------~-> Yahoo! Groups Links <*> To visit your group on the web, go to: http://groups.yahoo.com/group/ASCEM-S/ <*> To unsubscribe from this group, send an email to: ASCEM-S-unsubscribe@yahoogroups.com <*> Your use of Yahoo! Groups is subject to: http://docs.yahoo.com/info/terms/ From ???@??? Sun May 09 23:56:34 2004 X-Persona: Status: U Return-Path: Received: from n5.grp.scd.yahoo.com ([66.218.66.89]) by quail.mail.pas.earthlink.net (EarthLink SMTP Server) with SMTP id 1bn1Rs6tk3NZFkZ2 for ; Sun, 9 May 2004 20:53:50 -0700 (PDT) X-eGroups-Return: sentto-1978024-8070-1084161180-stephenbratliff=earthlink.net@returns.groups.yahoo.com