Chapter Text
They were just coming back from lunch when Julian Bashir noticed that something was subtly but definitely wrong.
Normally his friend Garak — Elim Garak, if Enabran Tain was to be believed — moved with easy economical grace, casual yet elegant, and always perfectly balanced. But as Bashir walked him back to his shop he noticed that the Cardassian’s stride was strangely off-rhythm. It was the kind of impairment he’d usually associate with a very mild level of alcoholic intoxication, but Garak hadn’t seemed at all affected by it when he’d approached their usual table in the Replimat an hour earlier and he’d had nothing to drink with his lunch but rokassa juice.
Garak noticed his sidelong look and paused as they reached the door to his tailoring business, turning to face his Human companion. “Is something wrong, Doctor? Do I have a loose thread somewhere?”
His voice was affected too, its usually smooth and precise modulation slightly out of tune. Bashir looked him over more closely. “Garak, have you had...?”
The question died on his lips. Garak was looking at him expectantly with blue eyes a little darker than usual: his pupils were rapidly dilating. And there was something caught on the thick fabric at the neck of his tunic, just where the trapezial scales disappeared under the black brocade. Bashir reached out and almost touched the small pointed object — not a loose thread, but a tiny dart only a centimeter from a spot of dried blood on the Cardassian’s twilight grey skin.
“You’ve been shot,” Bashir said, just before Garak, still smiling, sank to his knees and would have collapsed sideways onto the floor of the Promenade if Bashir’s quick reflexes hadn’t caught him. He carefully but quickly laid Garak down on his back, noting the sudden loss of both muscle tone and the ability to speak: Garak’s lips were moving but no articulate words were coming out, only a kind of hissing gasp.
Ignoring the curious stares of nearby pedestrians, Bashir tapped his combadge. “Bashir to Ops. Medical emergency. Two to beam to the Infirmary.” As their bodies dissolved into a stream of flowing energy he reflected that it was the second time he’d had cause to issue that particular request in less than two months as far as Garak was concerned. What now? he wondered as the Infirmary’s walls appeared around him and Nurse Jabara immediately moved to assist him. He already knew the answer: Another mystery to solve, that’s what...
******************************
Less than thirty minutes later he was explaining things to Odo. Or trying to.
“The dart was tipped with a ketamisine compound,” Bashir said, indicating a micromolecular scan rotating on the Infirmary’s main screen. “It’s unlike anything we have in our database, but evidently it’s highly effective on Cardassian neurochemistry.” He glanced across the room toward Garak, who was lying on a biobed with monitors attached to his ridged forehead, unmoving. “It’s attached itself to his large-cell ganglia and is shutting them down. His central nervous system is slowly being deactivated.”
Odo folded his arms and contemplated the image. “Huh. Ketamisine is often employed by Nimidian assassins, and they seem to take great pleasure in devising new permutations on the same old theme. I’m not surprised it’s not in your database, considering that it was probably created this week.”
“It’s killing him,” Bashir said flatly. “He has less than twelve hours before he suffers irreversible organ failure.”
“If that dart had fully embedded you’d be speaking in the past tense. He only received a fraction of the intended dose.”
“Do you know of any antidote?”
“I take it you don’t.”
“Ketamisine is highly toxic, and once it takes root in the CNS it replicates itself, almost like a virus. Conventional antitoxins are practically useless.”
“Unfortunately I have no idea. All I know is that Nimidian assassins have a very high kill rate.” His eyes slid sidelong to consider the inert Cardassian. “It looks like one of his hypothetical enemies has finally caught up with him.”
“Have any Nimidians been on the station today?”
“I don’t know yet. But I’m going to find out. If there have been, it won’t be hard to hold them on a charge of attempted murder that’s going to be upgraded in less than a day.” He offered a curt nod. “Keep me posted, Doctor.”
“I will.” Bashir watched Odo leave, no doubt headed for the Security office to start searching arrival and departure records, then turned his attention back to his patient. Garak’s eyes were closed — Bashir had closed them himself — but neural scans clearly indicated that he was still conscious. He’d lost control of his non-autonomic functions but his mind was still awake and aware... and now he’d heard the prognosis. A death sentence, really, from his friend’s own lips.
Bashir rose and crossed to him, looking down at him and laying a hand on his shoulder. “Listen to me, Garak. I’m going to start looking for an antidote immediately, and I’m not going to give up until I find one.” He applied gentle reassuring pressure to the base of the trapezial ridge. “Try to stay calm, and don’t give up, because I’m not. I’ll be here with you, no matter what happens. You won’t be alone.”
Garak’s eyelids flickered. That was all the response he was capable of. Wishing that he could do more, but not sure what that ‘more’ might be, Bashir removed his hand and went back to the main console. Taking a seat in front of it, he studied the molecular scan one more time and leaned back, rotating it in his mind. “Computer, what is the prognosis for patient Elim Garak?”
“Patient Elim Garak is undergoing progressive central nervous system failure due to ketamisine compound poisoning. The patient will experience irreversible organ damage in eleven hours, twenty-seven minutes.”
No change, then. “Computer, append neuropeptide sequence A-12 from the Cardassian database to the offside terminal of the ketamisine sample molecule and execute test sequence one.”
“Please specify goal of test sequence.”
“To neutralize the neurotoxin and decompile its molecular structure while leaving Cardassian central nervous system structures intact.”
“Acknowledged.” A pause, followed by a flat beep. “Toxin unaffected.”
Bashir drew a deep breath. He hadn’t expected the first attempt to succeed. “Computer, append neuropeptide sequence A-12 to the nearside terminal of the sample and execute test sequence two.”
A pause. Another beep. “Toxin unaffected.”
Bashir cast his mind through the peptide database, looking for one that would fit the pattern on the screen before him, like a key in a lock. “Computer, append neuropeptide sequence A-37 to the offside terminal of...”
It was going to be a very long afternoon.
******************************
He had reached test sequence fifty-eight and Garak had seven hours and twenty-three minutes left to live when a dry little voice from behind him called his name.
“Doctor Julian Bashir?”
“Computer, pause sequence.” He swivelled his chair to see a small neat figure standing by the door, regarding him through wrap-around dark lenses that protected her sensitive eyes from the station’s lighting. Bekarans were noted for their intelligence and meticulous attention to detail, and in consequence many of them gravitated to law as a profession, which was the function that this woman served on DS9. Bashir tried to remember her name but came up blank; her office was in a shop on the opposite side of the Promenade and he’d never had occasion to use her services. “Can I help you, Ms...?”
She inclined her chin in a stiff little bow. “N’noal Tessar, at your service. Or rather, at Mr. Garak’s service.” In her narrow hands she held a small box of dark metal, perhaps fifteen centimeters by fifteen centimeters by six centimeters. “I understand he’s not expected to recover?”
Bashir’s eyebrows rose. “News travels fast.”
“On this station, especially so — and I was warned to listen for this particular piece of intelligence.” She indicated Garak’s still body with another nod of her chin. “He is still alive?”
“Yes, he is.”
“But not expected to recover?”
“He’s been poisoned. The prognosis is not good.”
“Then this,” she said, approaching him and holding out the box, “is for you.”
He frowned at the box, then up at her. “I don’t understand, and I really don’t have time for —”
Tessar cocked her head. “Doctor Bashir, a month and a half ago Mr. Garak had a will drawn up in accordance with Bajoran laws. It specifies you as heir to all his property, including the contents of this box. I was instructed to deliver it to you immediately should this sort of situation arise.”
She held out the box again. This time Bashir rose to his feet and took it. “Thank you, Ms. Tessar. But we’re hard at work searching for an antidote. There’s a chance that he may yet recover.”
Tessar waved a bird-boned hand. “I can only proceed according to the instructions presented to me, Doctor Bashir. And now I have fulfilled them.” Another little bow. “Shall I expect you at my office once your... business here has been concluded? We have much to discuss concerning the disposition of Mr. Garak’s property.”
“I —” Bashir swallowed, suddenly running up hard against the fact that Garak would probably not survive the night. “I’ll be sure to let you know.”
“Then good day to you.” She bobbed her head in an alien gesture of parting and walked back out onto the Promenade, leaving Bashir staring at the box in his hands. His gaze quickly shifted to the Cardassian in question, mute and unable to tell him just what the hell this was all about.
Since he couldn’t question the source of this new development, Bashir did the next best thing: he sat back down at the console, set the box in his lap, and opened it.