Sunday, August 19, 2007

ST:DS9 G/B Black Bottle Chapter 7: A New Day

Title: Black Bottle Chapter 7: A New Day

Fandom: ST:DS9

Pairing: Garak/BAshir

Rating: Extremely adult

Warnigns: BDSM, still light for now, but not for long.

Summ: Just to recap, Something happened to the boys a few weeks ago and it sparked off their relationship, finally, now that they've been tiptoeing around it for 6 bloody years. Waiting until the moment was right has been important, especially to Garak because of some unique things that happen to a Cardassian in love, and because Julian is completely inexperienced in the type of relationship they are entering. While trying to juggle hormones and lust and a stubborn Cardassian and meddling friends, Julian is also hounded by Jadzia, who just wants a few minutes of his time, but succeeds only in making Julian doubt himself and the path he is choosing. This chapter will see their waiting and caution pay off finally. Don't get too comfortable though. The angst starts again in Chapter 8.



The computer chimes and Elim turns and looks groggily to the clock on the nightstand. He can't read it. Whatever it says it is clearly an ungodly hour to be woken by an unfeeling computer. Though he can't be disgruntled for long. The warm lump that has moved from his hip to slung halfway across his chest is enough to make him smile and grumble a little purr as his sleepy fingers travel over it, uncoordinated but appreciative of the stroke of smooth skin beneath them. Julian stirs when the computer chimes again. He doesn't so much stir really as squirm in a syrupy way over him which Elim is also not going to complain about. That squirm grinds warm hairy legs against his and soft hairless groin against his hip. A moment in drowsy darkness and the computer chimes once more. Elim groans lightly. "Are you really getting up this early?" Julian tries to nod but more just sort of rubs his face on Elim's chest in affirmation. "You said you had today off too."

"I do," he says and his jaw has to open upwards because the lower half has come to rest on Garak's immovable sternum. "But I have the medical staff meeting this morning. And then the senior staff meeting."

"And then will you be finished?"

"Yes. Until the ceremony this afternoon."

Elim glowers internally but lets it go. "What ceremony?"

"Sisko. Getting the Christopher Pike medal," he mumbles.

Garak yawns. He can't recall Sisko doing anything particularly fantastic lately, nothing Starfleet should appreciate anyway. "Really? What for?"

"Bravery, valor, some other stuff," Julian slurs, eyes still closed and face lax. Garak chuckles and the computer chimes at them again, this time with a little more insistence in its bleat. So Garak lifts himself up and scoops Julian under his knees and arms. Julian groans at being disturbed so forcefully and bodily, a little petulant but too tired to do anything about it. "What are you doing?" he grumbles sloppily and his eyes finally crack open.

"Come along. Time for you to get up."

"I know. I'm up."

Garak takes the slightly limp man into the bathroom, turns them both carefully to point Julian's feet into the shower, and uses the doctor's conveniently aligned big toe to touch the button. The water starts and Garak plants him in front of it. He makes a noise of disgruntled protest again and immediately fumbles with the temperature controls. The default setting is a mere 13 degrees.

Garak takes a towel from the rack and wipes down his wet arms and says, "Time for you to get up and for me to go back to bed." He smiles at Julian huddled under the spray. Julian looks back at him with a disbelieving frown.

"You wouldn't."

Garak slides the shower door shut.



......



Julian showers quickly, feeling a momentary return of the rush of excitement he has been riding for days, then emerges fresh and steamy to the bedroom where Garak has switched off the automatic daylights and is buried beneath the covers. Julian has only his clothes from two days ago to wear; the trousers and the loose white shirt Garak let him borrow, though they aught to be clean. Not like he spent much of the past two days wearing them. At any rate he'll have to go back to his quarters to get a uniform before the senior staff meeting, but Friday's clothes would be fine for now.

So the only real obstacle to getting him out the door and on his way to the infirmary is the magnetic power of a warm, half-occupied bed on his sleepy body. As he pulls Garak's white shirt on, a drowsy blue eye peeks from a crack in the bedclothes. Elim doesn't say anything, he doesn't have to do anything more than look at him. Julian's feet, still bare and free, sunken in the thick carpet, are not aware there is business to be done, work to be pursued, they are still naked like Elim, and they carry Julian to the bed again. His eyelids droop as he slithers beneath the covers and Elim accepts him into heavy arms.

Into his moist cocoon Julian snuggles, kissed and held, and Elim licks sweet dew from beneath his jaw from his recent shower. Julian feels himself fading, so quickly, so easily though his mind nags that he needs to be leaving, that he cannot fall asleep now, that he cannot afford to lie here because he will fall asleep, and at the same time his heart is yammering happiness and a gripping need to be here and nowhere else.

He is almost gone - it only takes a moment, and Garak smiles. Poor thing. "Come on," he mutters, then lifts his feet and starts pushing with them against Julian's hip, sliding him across the sheets. "I have things to do today that I don't want to as well." Julian groans pathetically and starts to slide out of bed under his own power. "The sooner we do our jobs the sooner we can take a nap."

Julian snuffles a laugh and sits on the bed feeling about as active and capable as a case of dead gagh. His shoes go on with difficulty, but that done, he is ready to go, and does, giving Elim's knee a squeeze as he gets up. He knows if he had put his head down low enough to kiss him he would be in the bed again, though that doesn't stop the pull on his heart and body as he tears himself away.

On his slow meandering walk through the corridors, empty, dim, and echoless this early in the morning, he yawns and tries to come up with a way to get a rachtajino without going to his quarters which are not on the way, and without going to the replimat, which is on the way, except that the rachtajino program in that replicator is corrupt and it always tastes a bit too much like clams.

It's really quite odd, though, he thinks, that he is going to the weekly meeting like he has done week after week for many many many weeks now, six years worth, looking for coffee and rubbing his eyes, after just spending the last day and a half in Elim Garak's bed. Julian stops in his tracks and a wave of heat washes over him. How life can just go on after something this big happens, he doesn't know. It's supposed to change everything isn't it? That may have been what he was expecting though he never put it into such stark words. You look forward to something so strongly, and it becomes a pivot point for your whole life for a time, as if it should all be down hill from here. He knows that isn't true. Your life, your emotions don't rest on a single plane teetering on a crux like in a novel. Still, somehow it's surprising that nothing has changed this morning. Julian sees his reflection in a shiny black console on the wall of the corridor. Well. He is definitely different. Strange civilian clothing, rumpled hair, puffy eyes, goofy smile. He looks like a hungover pirate.

Julian continues on.

Also surprising, he muses, is how differently he feels today from last night. He recalls last night being not the best of his life. He was so utterly disappointed, so embarrassed at his own naïveté. He isn't sure how Elim did it, but he feels absolved this morning. That doesn't usually happen with Julian's guilt. It tends to linger regardless of how much forgiveness others apply like a bruise treated with honey. Maybe it was stupid to have felt guilty in the first place. He blamed himself for everything that wasn't perfect about last night. Elim never did. He said he didn't have any expectations, and in one sense that was true, but really he must have. He expected Julian to have trouble and he did, because everyone does. You know better than that, Dummy. This decidedly falls under the category of things that must be learned, and not things that he should have an innate ability to do simply because he is an augment. It was not reasonable to think he'd be able to just do it. And why did he assume Elim would think that he should? Elim said he had no expectations to free him of that fear, not make it more important or more challenging for Julian to wow him. Maybe he already knew this by the time he woke up and that is why he feels better now. Wouldn't be the first time he solved a problem with sleep and dreaming.

He is pretty sure he dreamed about Elim's mouth on him last night.

Julian grins as he walks though there is no one but his reflection in the black consoles to see it, overcome with it again, just the realization that this is happening is astounding, exhilarating.

He spent the last day and a half in Garak's bed - and he's going to go straight back there as soon as all of this other stuff is done.

He strolls smiling into the infirmary a good five minutes late with a slightly less clammy than usual rachtajino in hand, and plants himself in his chair with a sigh. The rest of the staff stand in a rough circle around the room, around him, leaning against consoles and tables with their own sleepy eyes and coffee cups in hand, the same scene Julian has witnessed at every weekly meeting before this. The only difference is in the expressions on their faces, just a little altered, though maybe it is his imagination.

"Well," he says. "I am, completely, unprepared for this meeting. I usually work up a plan on Friday evening from the logs of the week before, but I never got around to it. I've got nothing. So. Let's just skip the part where I ramble on for an hour and go straight to you people. What would you like to discuss? I'm all ears."

Julian smiles at them and sips his coffee and no one says anything. He looks at Marcia expectantly. She always has something to say. When he looks at her though, he thinks that maybe he wasn't imagining the change on their faces, because she is giving him the eyebrow. Julian's smile skitters away and he self-consciously runs a hand through his hair to hopefully straighten it out a bit and pulls his shirt down to disguise the wrinkles. The eyebrow fades away and she swallows and just looks a little sea sick. Finally, Doctor Girani clears her throat and speaks.

"Well...ah...I have a concern that I wanted to bring up. Our female Vulcan patients, few though they are, have been asking for a particular type of treatment for skin abnormalities that we have not been able to provide. I wanted to get your input, Doctor, and see if we can't speak with someone on Vulcan about acquiring the technology."

The whole world didn't change over night, but maybe the shock wave did spill over the rim of Julian's cup just a little.





~*~



Garak begins tossing pink and fuscia and turquoise into crates without even the slightest regard for wrinkles or delicate sequins. The gratitude festival is in full swing outside. No matter that it's not technically over. Everyone who was going to buy something to wear to it has done so. He just wants them gone. He had nearly every last strip of taffeta packed away when his comm chimed and he had to groan as he rose from his knees to go to his computer.

"Ah! Garak, I was hoping you'd be in."

Alarms go off in Garak's head, his senses string tight and his nerves buzz suddenly and fiercely. This scaled face is not one he likes to see.

"I have some information for you."

Garak scowls and glances around him, waiting, expecting something, because this isn't quite right. It isn't that he dislikes the face. Any Cardassian face is a breath of beauty here when they are so seldom seen. But he never sees this face, only hears the words over encrypted messages or reads them written in code. He doesn't even know the face well, but the lazy nasal voice is unmistakable.

"Oh relax Garak. It isn't important enough to warrant using our formal channels."

Indeed. Garak can see Cardassia Prime behind Visid Omar in the screen. Just blurry background shapes of a window, a framed living cityscape, and the comforts of a Cardassian home. He feels a sort of rage he hasn't in a long time. This worm of man who enjoys the planet Garak has fought for his whole life has not even the decency to acknowledge Garak's vulnerability out here. If the information he wishes to give Garak is so devalued, why does he bother to transmit it? And why would he assume it would be acceptable to contact Garak in any other manner, much less speak of the fact that they have formal channels? Garak grits his teeth and still says nothing.

"I've heard from reliable sources that a certain someone was seen in the vicinity of Cardassia Prime recently," he says with jovial obliviousness.

Garak frowns hard. Visid doesn't continue, however. "Who," he says sharply.

"Who do you think?"

"Dukat."

Visid smiles a gaunt smile and nods once, respectfully.

"I've also heard he has gone stark raving mad."

"That isn't news."

"No, but there is nothing worse than having a crazed Cardassian drunk with power and bloodlust aiming a very large weapon in your direction is there?"

"A weapon?"

"Metaphorically speaking."

Garak glares. "What is your point Omar?"

"You might want to let your adoptive parents know that the neighbor's son has been giving you dirty looks. Sisko in particular, but who knows, he could just try getting you all in one shot. You're no favorite of his either."

Indeed.

"So you see, common knowledge, not guarded, but proprietary nonetheless."

"Yes. I do."

"Well I can see you're busy with your dresses, Garak. I'll leave you to it. It was nice seeing you again, my friend."

Visid is replaced by a black screen and Garak frowns at it. Hints and nothing more. Nothing he could even bring to Sisko. If Dukat really is back on Cardassia, it is doubtful he would have any influence left there, though privilege perhaps. Without the backing of the Cardassian military he could still be a nuisance, but a threat to the station? Not likely. Just the same, Garak makes a mental note to keep his nose to the wind. If that inglorious snake comes near he will know of it.

At some point today he must find time to 'make the rounds' among his last few remaining allies. If Dukat does reach the station bent on revenge, and if the rumours that trickle into the pint glasses at Quark's regarding the direction of the war have any truth to them either, a deadly concoction could be brewing here, and Garak has more than just himself to think about now.

Julian is uniformed and awake and grinning as he pads into the shop. The door opens letting in music and voices from outside, smells of food and Bajorans, and then slides closed again leaving only Julian. Hands behind his back, he strolls in looking mischievous at the very least, conspiratorial and cute. Garak finds himself disarmed, suddenly, in awe. Suddenly not even a taunting Cardassian pawn can keep him angry. Julian stops short of where Garak is standing, looks around a bit, just enough to be sure they are alone, and then advances, takes Garak's hands and gently guides him backwards around his crates of dresses and past the curtain into one of the tiny changing rooms. Garak chuckles as his knees hit the seat and he is forced down onto a small pile of forgotten clothing.

Julian scrabbles at the curtain behind him, closing it more or less and diving for Elim's face at the same time. He takes Elim's lips, smiling, licks them, bites them gently, tastes inside for his tongue and bites that too. Feels like it's been ages not hours since he last touched him. He's hard and heavy and he pulls Elim up to stand again, launches him against the wall this time so he can press against him, let him feel it. Garak insibilates when he does, sizzles and grips him by his shoulder and hip and presses him harder to his groin. He delves deeply into his mouth, then nibblesucks down his jaw and neck. Julian has to stifle a moan inside a quivering jaw, still aware of where they are, but barely caring.
This is, at the very best, extremely risky. No lock on the door, no door on the room, no room for misinterpretation, but, oh, the risks he would take for this. It seems Garak's is not the only appetite that has been whetted. Amazing what a little time and patience can produce, amazing the rewards. Elim smiles and tastes his warm-blooded lips, feeling the heat move down his front like warm honey dripping from their mouths and pooling in his belly. Julian is writhing against him absolutely without inhibition, kissing, licking at his neck ridges and between the scales, since he learned that trick, and that thing he keeps pressing into his hip - Garak wants that. He wants it a lot. Wants to kiss it. Wants to suck it. Then he laughs because in sixty seconds Julian has turned him from a man ready to erupt to a man incapable of thinking thoughts more complex than kiss, lick, suck, fuck. Such a beautiful man.

"Julian?"

Everything stops and Julian's ears ring bright and loud. He peels his lips soundlessly and painfully away from Elim's, sucks them into his own mouth and stares left as if there was something he could see beyond the curtain.

"Julian?" comes the voice again. "I know you're in here," Jadzia chuckles, "I saw you walk through the door."

Julian looks wide-eyed at Garak who can only return the expression. Garak honestly can't remember the last time he felt this cornered; and for what? He isn't stealing information or arranging the untimely demise of some foreign dignitary - no, he is necking in a greenroom with a young man, about to be discovered by the woman with the biggest mouth on the station.

They can hear Jadzia's footsteps as she walks the perimeter of the room, looking for his hiding place. Julian leans back against the wall opposite Garak and peeks through a break in the curtain. The light from the shop cuts a slice down Julian's face setting that one eye to glowing gold and the corner of his mouth rich pink.

"I'm going to find you," she sing-songs, and Julian swallows hard. "Why are you avoiding me, hm? What happened to us having that little conversation this weekend?" She approaches closely, and Julian thinks he should say something, opens his mouth to do so, nervously, but then Elim is shooing at him and shaking his head violently. Another step closer and she stops. She wouldn't look in the changing rooms.

But then she does. She swings open the curtain of the first of the two tiny changing rooms with a quick swipe and Julian jumps a little. That woman has no boundaries, no bloody respect.

"Well then. Only one place you could be-"

Julian pops out around the curtain thrashing it closed behind him and making Jadzia jump a little too. She laughs and smiles brightly. She has a white flower in her hair with a small curl of ribbon the same rose red as the festival hangings on the promenade.

"What are you doing in there?"

He stammers. Of course he does. "In here? Well. Changing."

"Where's Garak?"

"Oh...he...popped out for a minute."

"I didn't see him leave."

"Oh I know. He popped out a while ago. But just for a minute."

"I see."

"He doesn't mind me being here when he's not here. You know." Julian picks a short lime-green taffeta dress from a half-deconstructed display and swings it around. "To try things on or what have you. He actually asked me to just keep an eye on the place, but I thought, while I'm here..."

"You'd try on a lime-green party dress?" Jadzia follows the flashy garment with her eyes as he gestures with it erratically.

"Yeah. No." He laughs out loud. "No, not this. This is. This is for you! I saw this and thought you'd like it."

Jadzia clearly isn't buying it, but neither does she seem to care what his reason is for being in the tailor's shop. Julian is flustered, obviously, but frustrated too, Garak can tell. The man knows how to lie and how to deceive, but it gives him grief to use that on some people. Jadzia takes the dress from Julian's hands as Garak watches from the crack in the curtain, tosses it over the rack again and stares Julian down. "Julian. I really need to talk to you."

"Uhm. Okay."

"It's about me and Worf."

"Uhm. Shouldn't we be heading to the senior staff meeting?"

"What? I thought we were going to talk."

"Well can we do it on the way?" Julian is edging toward the door.

"No! This is going to take longer than the thirty seconds it takes to get to Ops, Julian. Do you really not have more time than that to spare for me?"

"Oh. Uhm. Well. Not at the moment. I really need to be at this meeting, and-"

"What about Garak?" she accuses.

Garak watches as Julian freezes in the doorway. Jadzia isn't chasing him because she's a smart girl. She stands planted, hands on hips right where Julian left her. Julian is too nervous to pick her meaning from her words. He's thinking about getting out of there without the two of them being discovered, and he's thinking about getting her out of there before she tells him something that Garak isn't meant to hear. That's the kind of thing that would eat him alive, even if it were something small. Guilt and Julian do not mix well.

"I thought you were watching his store for him."

"Oh! Yes. Well, he'll be back any second now. We really should be going." Julian waits for her just outside the door.

Garak thinks that where she is standing, he could probably reach one arm out of the changing room and knock her out. Then they could make a quick escape before she woke up again. Granted there would be explanations later, but at least they would have time to invent them while she regained consciousness.

She relieves him of the obligation, though, and sighs and follows him out the door. Garak relaxes a little and listens, hears her complain, "You had time to watch Garak's store but you don't have time to talk to me."

Julian replies defensively, "We have the meeting to go to."

Garak creeps from the changing room to the door to listen as they walk away, make sure they are quite gone before he emerges.

"Sometimes I think the two of you should just get connected at the hip and be done with it," Jadzia says.

Garak chuckles to himself and hears Julian echo it. They are of one mind on that topic. "Nah. The Chief would get jealous," Julian retorts as they make their way around the bend.

..............................

Julian and Jadzia arrive at the meeting, rather early, although that is the norm for most of the senior staff anyway, and he watches as Jadzia seems to switch on like a light when she enters the room and locks eyes with Worf. He smiles to himself and makes a mental note to try not to do that in public himself when he sees Elim, and then thinks, ironically, that he probably has that look about him right now, just trying to stop himself from looking like that. Worf too appears extraordinarily calm and good-humoured. And why shouldn't he? Chances are good he will be going off to battle in the very near future, unless the Dominion just decides to give up tomorrow, (unlikely), and he's married to a beautiful woman who (very likely) showed him over lunch how much she loves him, if the mutual glowing going on is any indication.

He is still a Klingon, though. Still a beast of a man even shagged out, and he still has the power to make Julian nervous with no trouble at all just by being there when he isn't expecting it. Like a big hairy spider under a flower pot. And that is what happens in that moment. Miles is joking around with Julian as they find their seats, distracting him with commonplace banter, and then suddenly Worf is nearer to Julian than he thought, right behind him, and he stiffens when Worf's face comes even nearer and audibly sniffs the air above Julian's shoulder. Electricity runs up the back of his skull, making the hair stand on end, and heat rushes to his cheeks. Miles is still talking but he can't hear him, and all he can think is that Klingon's have very good olfactory senses. It is possible that he smells quite strongly of Cardassian as he was so recently pressed nose to toe against one, and like arousal and sweat. He isn't ready to deal with that.

Worf cocks his head toward Julian's face, over his shoulder and rumbles privately, "Do I smell chocolate?"

An airy laugh escapes Julian's mouth like a bubble of anxiety burst in his throat. Julian inhales deeply in response. "All I smell is lilac," he replies with a grin and Worf mock-frowns, leers, and then goes about his business. If the glowing wasn't enough evidence, the rare appearance of Mr. Worf's sense of humour is definitely indicative of recent deeds, and he flashes Jadzia a wry smile.

It proves to be the longest senior staff meeting Julian has ever attended. It might have actually been the shortest. With the festival still going on outside, Sisko didn't want to keep his officers too long, but it felt like forever. In his seat between Miles and Kira, Julian wonders how sex so quickly becomes an all encompassing thought process that he can't walk away for even a fraction of a day without thinking about it. Though, he supposes, if you spend enough time at it, it's like anything else, your body and brain just get used to it. Like the way your feet and balance get so used to hoverskates that after a few hours you forget how to walk without them. Julian smirks stupidly. They spent so much of the past two days naked and twisted in the sheets he practically forgot how to not have an erection. The thought makes him uncomfortable and hot and he thinks he's forgetting again. He also thinks it's pretty remarkable how easy it is to forget how much it hurt. He could swear it hurt a lot. Could swear. And yet he can't wait to go right back there. He knows that is what is waiting for him, that's the crazy thing. He knows it's going to happen again tonight and he can't look to it with anything other than avid anticipation.

The meeting, though, is a veritable roller coaster of anticipation and worry and exultation for Julian. While his attention wanders away from the conversation at once to a landscape of soft grey scales and sparkling blue eyes contained within his own head, it is snapped back to now over and over when the word Cardassian escapes the mouth of one of his coworkers as they refer to the Dominion, the enemy's fleet, the casualty reports. He is torn between the two factions of his mind. On one hand he has this amazing new thing budding and springing to life within him, and on the other, he has these triggers sparking fear hot and cold within him and setting him to compulsively recalculate the likelihood of total loss. When the meeting breaks up finally it feels like a cool breeze wafting over Julian's sweat-prickled body at the peak of an enormous hill on that roller coaster. They crest the hill together, standing at the table, and trace it's path with their eyes winding through the station. They file out of the ward room single file, down that hill, down the stairs into ops, down faster still into the racket of the promenade with smiles and rushing excitement before spilling out there at the bottom in front of Quark's. Julian meanders on a bewildered path through the booths and entertainers and celebrants along a familiar strip of floor. The lights, sounds, banners, everything is different and astonishing to see as if the station had been replaced by a spring carnival completely. Children run in figure eights around him, laughing, groups of people sway to the motion of music filling the air. Julian samples the Bajoran foods, admires the performers. He watches his friends do the same as they each wander away in their own bubbles of sensory overload. By and by each one is obfuscated by the crowd, and Julian walks on automatic pilot toward the infirmary, his center, even as all this goes on around him, transitioning from participant, a being captivated and linked to this gathering by the shining smiles of Jadzia and Miles and Kira, to merely a contemplative observer.

The last time the promenade was decorated and filled so with people, Julian spent his evening chasing Garak in circles around the place. He smiles privately to himself as he approaches the entrance to the infirmary, wondering where he is right now, if they will reenact it, playing hide and seek in a thicket of Bajorans like the children. That could be fun. Could also be a bit of a challenge, spies not being the easiest people to detect.

The infirmary draws him in like it does every day of his life regardless of what else he has on his plate or on his mind, because it's there. No one else is, however. Two nurses stand at the doorway and smile at him as he walks in, but the place is empty inside. Julian is disappointed, somehow. He has no idea where Garak is. Wouldn't know where to start looking in this crowd. Garak, on the other hand knows where to find him all the time, so he just has to wait for that to happen, and in the mean time, he has to find some way to occupy himself.

Time slides by in measured moments to the rhythm of the band outside. They're lively and enjoyable even from across the promenade and half inside the infirmary. It's winding down though. Afternoon wanes and the band announces their last number, people start to gather their children and beg off from their friends. Julian is about to give in to the temptation to people watch in the doorway with the two nurses when his hand is lightly captured from behind him. He jumps, but remains silent as he turns to find Garak crouched behind a corner console with a finger to his smiling lips. He stands and pulls Julian like a parade float into his office without a single soul noticing their disappearance. The door slides shut behind them and closes out all but a muffled hum from the noise outside and Julian smiles broadly, fully and with his whole face, slinks heavy arms over Elim's shoulders, accepts strong hands beneath each shoulder blade with relish, and presses his lips to Elim's. The kiss breaks wetly but quietly and Julian turns and touches the lock on the door.

That is better. Better than just a thin curtain between them and the rest of the world. Now it is Garak's turn to be ravenous.

Julian grins at him. "How did you get in here?"

Elim doesn't answer except to kiss him again, so Julian takes that to mean he isn't going to get an answer to that one. He resigns himself to enjoying that warm uninhibited smile, something rarely seen on Elim's face, or any Cardassian's face for that matter, interrupted by soft kisses to his lips, and a weak stretch in his chest as Elim takes Julian's hands out away from his body and then folds them behind Julian's own back. "You know I have to leave again for the ceremony in a few minutes." Elim doesn't respond to that either, but Julian didn't really expect him to, didn't really want him to.
Then he is backing him up slowly to the desk, lets go of his hands, and grabs him under the thighs and hoists him up to the desk top. Julian laughs into his mouth because it's a silly thing to do. He and Elim are almost the same height, he's actually just a little taller than Elim, and putting him up on the desk does nothing to even out their heights or make them more accessible to each other. You do this with a woman, with someone shorter than you to put her face at your level. That apparently wasn't his motivation, though, since once there propped on the desk, Elim bends forward with his mouth still against Julian's, pressing him back into the wall until his spine forms against it and Elim's weight presses him down to the desk top. Rather, his motivation seems to be Julian's awkward and giggling discomfort and his goal to pin him like an entomological specimen to the wall. Elim's left knee comes up to the desktop and his hands seal Julian's to the smooth surface too. Julian feels sagged and glued to the spot and he can't stop smiling as his mouth is licked and nibbled away. Then he has to sigh contentment when Elim kisses his way over to his neck, stretches his body up, lifting himself up on strong arms with his hands on top of Julian's hands, pressurizing them and forcing Julian into that state where he was two nights ago, pliant and accepting, because all that weight on the back of his hands, even with the padding of Elim's soft palms between, would hurt if he were not relaxed. Elim laps at his neck and it's like he hits some kind of invisible winch below his ear. With every lick, Julian finds his back arching, and rather than being slumped in on himself he is gasping for air and his chest comes out in defense against the maddening wet stroke of his tongue, lifting Elim with strength he doesn't possess when not chased by a devil. His spine feels like a taut archer's bow.

Elim stops his licking and sucking at his pulse, and hums, growls lowly in his ear just audible over Julian's panting. "Do you have any idea what I am going to do to you tonight?"

A little noise escapes Julian's open mouth, and he is suddenly able to jerk his sweaty palms out from under Elim's, causing him to falter and his chin to come down onto Julian's chest. Julian grabs his head and suffocates him with his own mouth. A couple of padds hit the floor and Julian couldn't care less. He is bucking under Elim and pulling his body to him, trying to get to him, get as close as possible, closer, inside of him, crawl into his skin right through his clothes. Elim is still off balance from this attack and slides down a bit toward the floor; Julian hangs on, and when they land on their feet, Garak on his, Julian on Garak's, Julian launches forward and crumples him to the ground.

It is Garak's turn to laugh now too. Julian is pulling at his shirt even as he is laying on it on a stunned backside. He lets his head clunk to the ground and laughs while Julian tries to eat him alive and peel back his clothing at the same time. Eventually he finds the strength to push him back a little, hold him tightly to himself with one hand at the small of his back (and Julian grinds into him when he does - and doesn't that feel amazing) and hold his upper body away for just a moment, long enough to look him in the eye. "My dear, what do you think we're going to do in the five minutes before you have to leave?"

Julian seems to acknowledge hearing the question as he pauses, but then chooses to ignore it (Garak ignored his questions after all) and dives for Garak's neck again. He shuts his eyes tight and stifles his laughter best he can, struggles with the young, warm man plastered to him like velcro, and finally rolls them over to pin him to the floor instead, panting. He looks wild-eyed and hungry, and Garak can not fucking wait to wipe that look off his face - but he will have to. He studies his needful expression with a sanguine smile and rocks his hips slowly against Julian's, rubbing with his pelvic bone up Julian's shaft through their clothes. Julian whines a little.

"I'm sorry, my love," he whispers. "I only came here to steal a kiss and remind you of our date tonight. I didn't mean to tease you. Much."

He whines again, just a speck. "Do you really expect me to be able to walk out that door without waddling right now?"

Garak smiles and pecks him quickly on the lips. "You have a couple of minutes yet to collect yourself." Julian is still giving him that look. "I also came to ask you if you would meet me for dinner."

Julian tries not to look panicky but thinks he probably failed for a split second, long enough for Elim to catch it. He really didn't want there to be any further delay after the ceremony.

Elim chuckles again. "We haven't shared a meal in a few days without being naked while doing so."

"I liked that."

"As did I," he responds and makes no further argument because he knows he doesn't' need to.

"Alright," Julian says with a bashful smile that warms quickly. They would have to eat at some point. Might as well do that first so there won't be any interruptions later.

Elim crawls off of him and gets to his feet, offers Julian his hand. Julian takes it and uses his momentum to crash gently into Elim as soon as he is standing, wraps his arms around him again and takes his mouth. Kissing, kissing, kissing, warmth and wet inside and that want keeps on rising instead of abating. If he had any sense at all in his head he would see the connection inherent there and stop kissing him, but that seems like a ridiculous idea, really. He takes a few deep breaths through his nose and then has to chuckle again. "Is it my imagination or is this the longest day in history?"

Elim bites his tongue. He is so turned on there is the potential for so much to come spilling out of his mouth right now. He wants to describe to him in exotic detail exactly how long he can make time stretch out with the simplest tools; a cane, some rope. They will get there. For now he says nothing on it but to smile and kiss his temple. "I will be waiting for you at Quark's."



~*~



"Done already?" Elim sits at a quiet table with two glasses of water and a tiny pink vase holding a spray of artificial flowers. Quark has terrible taste.
He shrugs. "It was very short and to the point."
"I thought the Christopher Pike Medal was a big deal."
"It is. But it looked like the admiral had other business to get to."
"Perhaps he was jealous?"
"I didn't think of that." Julian puzzles a moment. "Don't know that I would have noticed if he gave that away. I was so preoccupied, I'm not sure I was even there,"
"Preoccupied?" he asks with innocence.
Julian doesn't reply. He's still a bit out of his head even now, even faced with the bright hungry eyes across the table from him. He can't wait to get back to Elim's quarters, but at the same time, the immanency of it is stating to bring the fear back home, and his mind is racing for solutions to a problem that doesn't exist. He feels suddenly that today he may have slightly miscalculated his bravery. It was all very easy to be bold in public when he knew it would never amount to anything.
They eat quickly. Garak can feel Julian's leg jittering under the table and see it as the flowers on the table dance in place. Julian doesn't seem to notice the effect his nervousness is having on the decoration, or on Elim for that matter. He decides while watching him silently wrestle with anxiety and anticipation across the table, that this was a mistake. He should not have given him the opportunity to agonize. Dinner one way or the other wouldn't have made a difference actually, that isn't the problem. He has had hours of meetings all day to stew and worry and there is nothing else for him to do in public right now. Idle conversation is stilted when there are more important matters at hand; sex, privacy, pain and fulfillment, but they cannot talk about those matters without the potential of being discovered or at least looking very suspicious to others. All he has is his thoughts, which have apparently turned dark. Julian eats some but at a point stops and starts twisting his napkin instead.
Garak wishes they could have had some more time alone before this. He thinks had he been able to keep Julian tied up in his quarters for a good solid week before letting him back to his regular life, take it one step at a time without that urgency built up by too many hours apart, some of this stress could have been avoided. Though if he had done that someone would have come banging his door down looking for him within a day or two anyway. Sometimes he wishes Julian was a directionless Boslic vagabond rather than a brilliant doctor with responsibilities and duties. It would clear up his schedule at least.
Garak watches him a moment and then puts down his fork and wipes his mouth. "Love," he says no louder than a pin drop, and Julian looks up at him. Garak motions with his head toward the door.

~*~

Elim's cock is heavy and wet, his hips powerful as they rut against him. The cock slides up his backside and is sidetracked one direction or the other by the root of Julian's. Elim thrusts up against him over his entrance a few times, then slides a wet finger into him. He's been doing this maddening combination for a long time now, and Julian thrums with tension all over his body. Elim kisses and licks and sucks at his skin; his neck, his face, his lips and chest, with the rest of his body surrounding, compacting, and holding him securely to the bed. He takes out his finger and lets his cock slide through the warm wetness there again for a while, nudging at his entrance now and then. Julian only jumped the first time.
"You feel so good," Garak whispers hotly in Julian's ear and is rewarded with the tightening of Julian's arms around him. They breathe deeply in unison and Julian's random vocalizations are soft, high, and needy. Elim is ready, more than ready, and he thinks Julian is too. He stops his ministrations with his mouth and simply bites a small mouthful of flesh on his shoulder near but not on top of a dozen other faint bite marks he has left him already tonight. Then he takes his cock in hand and rubs the head against him, feels for that spot and starts to gently push. Julian flinches and then starts sucking in quick panicky breaths.
"I...I thought of something!" he says with that same edge of panic. He is shivering violently beneath him. Garak stops, throws the breaks on and is nearly shaking trying to keep them on. "During the ceremony today," he continues, huffing. Garak wonders if Julian can not sense how painful this is for him or if he is doing it to be cruel.
Garak swallows and pants in his ear. "And you...want to share this with me...now."
"Well I had an idea," he says apologetically, then actually squirms away from Garak and sits up. Garak tries not to look wildly out of control or ravenous. "I...really want to do this."
"As do I," Elim interjects quickly and pointedly. A little smile tugs at the corner of Julian's mouth. So yes, he gets it, mostly, but this is more important. Ok, Julian, ok.
"I want to do this, but I'm afraid I'm not going to be able to, based on what happened last night," he puts a hand up before Garak can interrupt. "I just want to try something, try it a different way."
Garak absorbs this, considers the options, then agrees. "Alright."
Julian feels gangly and awkward but after warring with that, he more or less coaxes Elim into a kneeling position facing the headboard, feet curled beneath him, and then feels doubly odd turning his back to him.
This may be a new one on Garak, a strange position that doesn't seem like much fun, but if it will alleviate his worries, then. Julian wants to feel in control of this, and Garak can understand that. He may be disappointed with how much he succeeds in controlling it, but the allowance given by Garak will help. He puts hands to Julian's hips to follow him because he is struggling to understand this still, the kinetics of playing a different position in a familiar game, and just because he doesn't want to give up contact for a second or let him feel alone. Elim places his lips to the back of his neck and kisses, assures, then guides him, feels his breath stutter as he lines them up, then lets him go, lets him decide how far and how fast, and tries to just sit and leave his body behind for a moment so he won't interfere.
Julian breathes and lets himself down little by little, then jerks back up with a sharp hiss. That little near-breach hurts, just that, and he starts worrying again. Elim strokes fingers down his back, and Julian can feel his breath come slow and steady behind him. Elim is anxious too, but showing patience above and beyond Julian's hopes still. He lets Elim's breathing set the rhythm of his own, and then comes down again, breathing, halting, breathing, breathing, his concentration loosely set there in his lungs and in the controlled burn in his thigh muscles. Everything else must stay relaxed, and with that combination, he succeeds. The touch of Elim's thighs to his own is almost enough to shift him off of this tiny point of mental and physical symmetry, but he takes a quick deep breath and wills his body open and lax still, to stay that way.
Elim's fingers dust over his shoulders and his lips follow. Julian can feel his kiss melt into a smile. "How about that," he says softly. Julian just breathes a moment more before coming to the conclusion that he hasn't won yet. Still needs to figure out how to move like this. Bravery in place, though, he flexes his legs and moves up. There is a little tightness as his body attempts to exert it's own reflexive will, but Julian breathes through his open mouth and imagines himself hollowed from head to end. Then it is time to repeat, it happens without thought, and a smile peeks from the corner of his mouth because he feels it this time, the things he is supposed to feel that were blocked by the pain before. An electric shiver comes over his body like a first kiss, a rush of blood to his head. His whole body seems to ripple happily around Elim's cock, and he sighs, sitting down fully on him. Elim fills in him a void he hadn't known existed until this moment. That's where that first kiss feeling comes from. When your lips long for a caress they've never known before and cannot know the beauty of, and then finally do, it's the same feeling, but the anticipation of it was missing because he had no idea that he should miss this deep feeling.
Julian smiles to himself, a gentle grin under closed eyes. "See," he breathes. "I know what I'm talking about sometimes." He moves up and down on him, experimentally, shallowly, and Elim completes each trip with a kiss to his back. Julian closes his eyes then, breathes in and out through his mouth and focuses on what his body is telling him. The tightness in his thighs, the stretch over Elim's, the unaccustomed intrusion into him, and his body's resignation to that presence. It tingles all around. It's like his body forgot that this part of him was capable of feeling good things, but now Elim has reminded him, and he feels it, feels the slide into him with just enough friction that all those neglected nerves are singing. Feels the fullness that is at once familiar and odd. The withdrawal is beautiful, the return exhilarating. Julian's mouth waters a little.
It's difficult though. He is lifting himself up and down with thigh muscles alone. Elim has taken his hands at his sides, he had no place to put them anyway, and while he is fairly strong, the action gets difficult quickly. Elim is making little wanting noises behind him as well. He has heard himself make that noise before. He cannot recall the exact context now, but the sound calls to mind dying of thirst, sweating his life out of his pores. He gets the impression anyway that Elim needs more as well, and isn't terribly surprised when he drops his hands, and his arms snake around his waist and lift him off his lap.
"Do you mind if I lead?" he says with disguised need.
Julian exhales on a quiver, still feeling open and strange down below, but turns a brave smile to Garak. "Ok."
"Do you like this? With me behind you?" Elim asks quietly with a knowing look.
Julian blushes on top of his already arousal and heat-pinked cheeks and nods.
Elim guides him to hands and knees, then wordlessly urges him to put his head to the pillow, fold his arms. There is a moment's trepidation as he lines up again, and it happens faster than Julian was expecting, no slow ease like before, just in, though shallowly, and it blossoms like before, a surprising inclusion in him but his body remembers, and grudgingly allows it. Julian just tries to breathe and concentrate on breathing.
But then he can't really, suddenly. He is there on his knees, feeling the air cool on his lips going in and damp going out, and staring at the wrinkles on the pillow with Elim's cock inside of him, just a bit, and Elim shifts. He feels Elim's cock go left and then right with his shifting weight and the mattress dips behind his knees, and then suddenly regular breathing isn't enough. Elim goes in. Julian can feel his hips against his rear end and his mouth opens wide for more air because he is so deep inside of him, and it happened so fast, like the difference between penetrated and penetrated completely is both dramatic and easy to achieve. Elim groans behind him, pushes a little, and then retreats. Julian gasps again in time for him to connect again, and it sets up a quick pattern that makes Julian lightheaded in a moment. Julian swallows and makes an inarticulate noise as Elim pumps into him rapidly. He hears Elim respond with a grateful moan and feels a caress to his flank that he barely registers. He is so deep inside of him, Julian can't feel or imagine much else.
"Ohhhhh, Julian," Garak sighs long and happily, stretching his name out until the last syllable dies softly on his lips. He just needed a taste. Needed to get inside of him and let go for a moment. So much relief, so much more complete than before. To have Julian open and pliant beneath him, surrounding him, he feels at peace. He knows Julian isn't feeling quite the same way right now, anal sex being what it is the first time, but he sounds like he is enjoying it as much as he can beyond the overload. Garak strokes deeply into him, then stops, indulges in a few rapid thrusts that coax noises from Julian's lungs, then goes slow to feel that sweet sharp drag all around his cock and the warmth (he is hot as the Cardassian sun!) envelope him tip to hilt. His finer scales are wet and shiny when he looks down, and he rocks his hips to rub them against Julian's skin.
Julian is aware, now that the brief assault has slowed, why this feels so different. He's helpless. He has never before associated this kind of arousal with helplessness, but there it is. That's the difference. He's always been the one in control before, and now, same as it was yesterday really. Though yesterday he was on his back, and far more vulnerable. The soft undersides of his knees, his belly, his genitals, all lined up and exposed. As silly as it seems, the physical distance between his front and his back makes all the difference between being in control and not, and the difference between total vulnerability and semi-protection makes the distance seem less vast when you're not in control. You have no eyes or hands in the back of you. If someone attacks you from behind you have little you can do but run away, and Julian has no where to run. He is not being attacked, but he understands the underlying sense of it now. Garak reaches inside of him and holds him here, and that act is both his pleasure and his means of keeping it, because Julian could not escape if he wanted to. It feels so different. That was perhaps the most frightening thing, but Elim's hand sliding slowly up his back reassuring him that he is still here, he hasn't left Julian alone with his unsupervised envy, and the pain of inexperience abated, he's is free to appreciate the more subtle facets of this new thing; at least until Elim decides to lay into him hard again. There is nothing subtle about that.
Garak stops a moment, waits, and lets him acclimate. His breathing is level and deep, and Elim thinks he is learning. He is always learning, Julian. He is absorbing and memorizing the poise of his muscles, the weight of Garak's penetration into him. Garak wants to show him everything. Can't wait to teach him everything he knows, just to see what an amazing mind like Julian's might do with that knowledge. Elim wants to wrap around him the way Julian's body swallows his cock so beautifully. He wants to make Julian feel that way all over. So he pushes down. He urges Julian's knees under him, folding him up, and sliding forward on top of him with his cock still just there, buried to the head and no further. He moves foreword on top of him and folds his arms over his back to complete the pose. He settles his weight there and listens as Julian's breath begins to leave him. There is a momentary surge beneath him as Julian realizes he cannot breathe but shallowly now. Gravity now working in Garak's favor, he slides deeply into Julian and lets the weight of his whole body press him down and the strong muscles of his abdomen power his smooth thrust in. Julian whimpers almost inaudibly beneath him and Garak's cock throbs with his rapid pulse inside. Garak kisses his back a few times and whispers to him in Kardassi below the register of the translator that his body feels like nothing he has ever loved before, like heaven to behold, and like hell to resist. Then he lifts himself up again and watches as Julian tries to recapture his lost breath but not stir even remotely from the posture Elim gave to him.
Garak lifts Julian's hips back up, places a wet kiss to the dip of his tail bone and breathes in the perfume of his skin. Then he resumes with a more gentle rhythm with hands over the rounds of Julian's soft backside. He slides his right hand down around his hip over the cooler skin there where he is mostly bone, and then into the tighter space between belly and thigh where it gets warmer by a leap, into the achingly soft crux of his groin, and then leans forward to scoop his balls in hand. Julian barely seems to notice as Garak tests their weight in his hand and marvels at their vulnerability, so far away from protective muscle and bone. Even the skin is thin and fragile feeling, velvety. He lets them drop again, and they move gently with Garak's every thrust into Julian and he just keeps his hand there to feel their motion. He can't imagine having to contend with such an uncontrollable body part. Julian's cock, too, is a mystery, though not right now. Garak is well acquainted with the dark heavy feeling he has there now, familiar with that weight Garak can feel with his knuckles. Julian is hard as stone as he brushes them up the side. It is warm with the skin pulled tight, the curve of it parallel with his taught belly. Garak takes it at the base with thumb down and fingers above, twists gently and slicks his hand down to the head. Julian tightens around him in response and Garak sees stars for a second, has to breathe a few deep breaths consciously to keep himself cool. He scoots closer to him, knees Julian' legs a little farther apart and watches his back tighten to two thick ropes around his spine to hold him up, feels Julian's inner thighs do the same against his own. Garak reaches behind himself with his right hand and collects some of the juice he has been spilling for hours now, dripping down his legs reminding him of overripe fruit weighty in his hand and sticky sweet. He takes Julian's cock in hand again. He starts a slow beat inside of him, and with each stroke in, his hand comes toward him with fingers and palm griping tightly and rubbing sharp friction over the underside of Julian's cock.
Julian is keening in only a moment and Garak smiles to himself. He is so easy. That tender flesh is so easily manipulated and teased, and yet not so fragile he must worry. So simple to drive him wherever Garak wants him to go. He stops then and fells Julian to his side with just a tiny tap to his hip. He scoops him around to lay him on his back once more, covering him completely, grabbing him with his torso like the palm of a giant hand, each limb a gripping finger over this tiny doll. Julian moans, whines at the loss of his hand on his cock and reaches down for it himself even as Garak slides a hand beneath his head and captures his mouth, seeks out his tongue with punishing, brutally hungry teeth. Garak confounds and frustrates his attempt to satisfy himself with elbows first and finally removing his lips regrettably from Julian's and verbally warning him.
"Ah-ah," he rumbles and Julian looks up needfully at him, completely open as if he were in real pain already. Garak takes one hand, then the other, and gently steers them up above Julian's head. Julian licks his dry lips and pants, squirms just slightly beneath him.
Elim is just holding onto him again, immobilizing him and making him wait. He was close a moment ago, very, very close. Now his body rocks without his understanding, his hips canting down and back straining for contact. Elim scoops his own hips down and under and his cock sinks into Julian again without the aid of his hands. Julian huffs surprise and heat rushes to his head, blood to his cock. He hears himself moan but doesn't believe it's really him. Only a moment later, Elim withdraws from him again with a grunt, and it kisses, makes a wet, licentious sound Julian also can't believe has come from his own body. Just once in and he's gone again and Julian misses it. He wants him back there inside of him. This internal want feels like the opposite of the pressure in his swollen cock, like if he could release one into the other he would be balanced except that isn't even what he wants. He wants to be unbalanced, he wants to swing the other way completely, go from a sex overburdened with blood and energy to straining and vacated, wants someone to suck it out of him, and at the same time his insides want to be pressurized and overfilled and stirred up, and he wants Elim to do it.
Garak looks down at him. His gaze darts from one of Julian's dark and liquid eyes to the other, traces his sharp jaw and softly trembling mouth. "Are you ready to begin?" he asks then, head tilting to one side.
Julian blinks. "Begin?" Garak smiles and leans down again to kiss kiss kiss his way from jaw to nipple, then brings his teeth gently around the nub. Julian grunts once, shivers a little.
"Come," Elim says then, and urges him to sit up again, then back to hands and knees. Elim takes his hands and places them at the top of the headboard, smooths his fingers down over the cold black bar set just in front of it following its curve. It registers faintly in Julian 's mind that he does not have such a thing on his bed. That this, like other aspects of Garak's quarters, and similarly, like Garak himself, is different than the norm for the rest of the station, though you wouldn't notice unless you were looking for it, or Elim was fucking you up against it.
He is like a workbench in front of Garak, then. He kneels at his side at first, holding much the same position as Julian, one hand just resting on top of Julian's, not holding them there, but reminding them of their place. He turns Julian's head to him and takes a glorious kiss that wounds him it's so beautiful. Julian is just so good right now, primed to take and absorb him. Lined up perfectly and responding like he was born for this. He never moves his hands from where Garak placed them, but stretches up as Garak's own insistent hands pull and twist his neck and back tugging at his hair to make his front accessible to him. Small avaricious nips turn to hard bites down his neck from there, each one eliciting an open-mouthed moan from Julian and making him flinch and squirm. Garak moves down with his hand still up against Julian's jaw, keeping his head up, neck stretched, probably uncomfortably, and ducks under his arm to bite his chest, the round of skin he can grasp to the outside of his nipple, squeezes, pinches with his teeth and grinds his jaw. Julian cries out and Garak feels the reverberation in his palm against his throat and listens to Julian's hands squeak and wrench with sweaty palms around the bar, feels the tremor in his whole body. Elim releases him at length and licks at the spot. Julian sighs and whimpers as he relaxes back to kneeling on the bed. Garak's hand on his chest, he can feel Julian's heart racing beneath. "Good boy," he murmurs to him. "You have nothing to worry about, my dear."
Garak runs his hands down Julian's flank and follows his hands with slow scraping bites at him, eyes open wide and watching him carefully. Julian's stomach muscles flinch and stutter as he tries to keep himself under control, and with the release of Garak's jaw, Julian releases his breath and his voice too and then sucks in a new breath to hold it in preparation for the next chain-linked bite down his side. "Breathe, Julian," he has to stop and coo to him. Julian does, then Garak is back on him with a kiss and another bite. He sucks at the skin by his lowest rib after the bite, signaling a pause, and then sits up straighter with his chest against Julian's side. He wraps a gentle hand around the back of Julian's neck and rubs a little while. He feels his back rise and fall as he catches his breath with his head resting on his knuckles. That neck and the small ear nearby are tempting and Garak leans in and breathes over it, knowing it must tickle, seeing the shiver run up his back. "Inside, Julian," he says behind his ear and can nearly feel him vibrating. "Do you like to feel me inside?"
Julian's eyes slip closed and he nods ever so slightly. He feels dulled and stupid, like Elim's voice turns to woodsmoke as it passes his lips and lulls him, but it isn't a bad feeling at all. Feels like release, relinquishment of some higher consciousness to nature in exchange for instinct. Elim's breath trails down his back followed by light skipping fingertips over his sweat-sticky skin, and a wave of anticipation seems to preempt it. His muscles all twitch around that tickling air, but it really doesn't tickle. His rear end tingles for a second before Elim's mouth contacts it, closes around a hunk of it, tries to tear it from his frame. Julian's voice comes from his shocked lungs until he is certain he should have run out of air ages ago. He sounds ridiculous to his own ears but doesn't care. Half of his body taken in a random sampling of anterior and posterior muscles is betraying him, trying to scramble away, and the other half hangs on desperately. Elim's teeth grind deeper into the meat of his backside and Julian ends up pressed up against the wall above the bed, head crooked and smashed under the console, arms fighting the bar. He is glad it is there though. While he evidences in his body his desire to flee, he really doesn't want to. He is glad of the physical barrier to help keep him there.
Garak lets him go abruptly and leaves a lot of glistening saliva behind around the large red mark. Julian's profile is contorted against the wall, brows high and pinched. His jaw is slack but his mouth tells more of his internal struggle as it twitches over his teeth and around his breath. Garak finds a new spot and bites him again. Julian's cry is unrestrained and the sound envelopes Garak, makes him throb inside where the hot weight of his cock lay in wait. He wants to hear more of that sound, but thinks in this moment to err on the side of caution, and after scraping his teeth across his wet skin, steps regretfully away from the beauty on his bed and fetches a few things from his closet. Would have had to get them at some point anyway, even if Julian knew how to keep his voice down. As he steps away, though, he can see that Julian isn't even looking. He's there with his eyes shut and panting against the wall which now also bares a smear of his sweat. A smile plays across Garak's face. He'll watch next time. He won't take his eyes off him next time.
Elim returns to his side and Julian feels him and sees him there all at once. He has a small red pillow in his hand, something like a throw cushion. Elim takes his head in one large hand and adjusts the tilt to bring their lips together. Julian kisses him back with all the reverence he feels, but probably very little of the sophistication he hopes to convey, and then continues his panting when Elim is done and smiling faintly at him. "This is new," Elim says, and Julian takes the square pillow with one numb hand. "So we don't wake the neighbors."
It isn't late enough yet to be waking anyone, but Garak also doesn't want security interrupting them to enforce a noise ordinance.
Julian looks half drunk. He holds the pillow up atop the headboard and lays his arms across it, leans his forehead against the wall and seems to relax into the posture again. Either Julian didn't really understand what Garak meant by the remark, it just didn't sink in, or he doesn't think he'll need it right this second, apparently. Garak is not in his direct line of sight still, mostly behind his gently swaying form, and he lets a wry grin spread across his face for a moment before stamping it down and weighing, for a moment, his options.
Garak nods to himself a half second later. "On second thought, come here a moment will you, Love?"
Julian perks up and turns blearily toward him. Garak takes him around one shoulder gently, with encouragement and a smile on his face, brushes the backs of his knuckles of his right hand down his spine gently and then cups his other hand quickly and with no fanfare over Julian's mouth and hits him hard across the backs of his thighs with the switch in his right hand. All the force of Julian's yelp is absorbed and deflected by Garak's hand, the air squeezing out all over and whiffling through a single stray lock of hair across his forehead. His eyes go wide and his hands come up to grip Garak's shoulder and try to prise his hand away so he can more effectively gasp for breath. Garak lets his face go with a caress to his cheek.
"Would you like the pillow now?" Julian looks at him with unconcealed shock, but obeys, takes the small pillow from where he dropped it on the mattress and places it back upon the headboard edge with a glance behind him to look at the thin switch now unconcealed in Garak's hand. It's quite nondescript, nothing more than a thin flexible rod with a handle on one end and a leather loop on the other. Garak has many implements that are far more interesting at least to the eye, but interesting isn't what he is going for tonight. Just simple, just effective.
Julian's heart is beating erratically against the fast and steady heaving of his lungs. His hands shakily squeeze the pillow. There is a hot stripe across the backs of his thighs right now, like he's leaning back against a metal bar in the sun. Elim moves, shifts as he knee-walks closer to him and Julian's back muscles spasm all over in anticipation. He doesn't strike him though, not yet. The next thing he feels is the cool smooth touch of the crop to the cleft of his ass. He vaguely fears it coming down in that spot next, but at the same token has no idea what to expect if that were to happen, what it would feel like, so the fear is unsubstantial. It doesn't strike still, just lays there a few seconds, then spins in Elim's hand, a funny tickle there as it turns, and then slides up, then down the cleft, and the loop brushes his entrance. Julian feels his body cringe involuntarily at that and he hears a small amused hum from Elim.
Then he hits him. Julian thinks he hears it after he feels it, though that thought flees far faster than anything else. His face goes instinctively to the pillow and he yells into it. A shiver and a need for oxygen take him over immediately. Strange his reaction to what would in any other situation be a shocking but mild pain, but considerations like that don't stay in his head either. His quick breathing goes back down, eventually, and it's only a few seconds later that Elim hits him again a little higher, where his gluts meet his hams, there in the tender fold, and Julian yells compulsively again. He wraps the pillow around his face and tries to breath through it. The crop is cold again as it touches the searing hot lines on his skin, runs gently over his backside before zipping through the air again and snapping at his flesh.
In a few moments and a few more strikes, Julian's back becomes fully arched up, his ass is tight and pulled in close, and his thighs have turned in, ankles crossing behind him in some sort of primal defense posture designed to keep his testicles out of harms way. Garak is no where near them, and certainly wouldn't try, but the quivering of his muscles and the cowedness of his posture is adorable and irresistible, and his cries feel like lightning shooting through Garak's middle. Garak has laid about twenty overlapping red welts across each leg before he pauses. He scoots up close behind him, runs a hand down his back and gently over the bright red area, leans down to take a closer look at it and then around to study his face. The pillow is blotched with saliva, and Julian's face is red, what he can see of it, almost as red as his thighs, but he breathes steadily.
Elim 's hands are a welcome, pleasurable reprieve for the few seconds he uses them. He turns the crop vertical only a moment later and gives him two quick licks down each buttock and Julian hears a strangling noise escape his throat before he gasps into the wet pillow again. After filling his lungs completely with air again it all comes tumbling out once more as the next sound he makes sounds suspiciously like laughter, but he isn't sure how that's possible.
Then Elim is chuckling behind him too. They're laughing together, and the hands come back to his rear end. They feel cold now, and good. Elim kisses the new marks on him, all over, and a few places he hasn't touched with the crop yet he kisses as well, letting the chuckle die out as he does.
"If I hit you with my hands," he says lowly against Julian's spine, "would you be afraid of me in the morning?"
Julian thinks a moment, or tries to through the haze, tries to imagine what Elim means by 'hit', exactly. In the end, and the end was only a few seconds from the beginning, he deigns the disambiguation pointless because even if he was afraid Elim might really hit him, he is going to answer the same way.
"I'm always afraid of you."
Garak pauses on that, feels his brow knit and places a gentle hand on Julian's back, strokes his soft skin compulsively. "Why?"
Julian just breathes for a while, then seems to take one deep slow breath before pushing his answer from his lungs. "It's...fucking scary, the way you make me feel."
Garak smiles, runs his hand down Julian's flank, over his exposed behind, kisses it once more. "If it pleases you, I will continue to scare you as long as you like."
Julian doesn't answer, just closes his eyes and relinquishes himself to that trembling feeling, the way his presence just seems to flood him with life. Elim smacks him hard with his hand coming down and plastering to his skin as if the heat from that impact would weld them together. Julian expels it all into the damp pillow he has clutched tightly to his face and doesn't move at all except with the force of Elim's strikes. He slaps and then grinds, digs his fingertips into him and squeezes, then brings his hand down again. One side, then the other, then back again, and again.
His ass is shining and red and has become firm and slippery with the swelling skin. His fingers knead into it and Julian moans continuously, his voice growing hoarse. Julian's right leg is angled in a bit more to keep him balanced while Garak worked that side of him and when Garak reaches between his legs to give his cock a gentle caress he finds it has been leaking steadily down that leg for some time, a wet trail in evidence. Garak murmurs a wordless sound of pleasure and pulls Julian's cock down between his legs, holds it there cupped in his hand and pets it with the other hand. Then hand over hand he strokes it, pulls it down, enjoying the odd roll of his foreskin, and then crouches to take it in this mouth from behind Julian. It throbs between his lips and he sucks it lovingly, laps up the underside, over his sac, all the way up to his tailbone, then again.
"You are absolutely beautiful, Julian." He means it when he says it. He cannot say he has ever seen anything more gratifying, more erotic and alluring than what is laid out before him. He lays his vibrating hands on his back, slides them up to his shoulders bringing his hips in alignment with Julian's and lays his cheek on his flattened shoulder blade just to feel the heat radiating off of him. He scoops his arms around his torso and runs his hands down his chest, into the well of his hips and down his thighs. Everything just feels so perfect. Garak reaches back up over his shoulders and gently pulls the pillow away from his face. He gives it up easily once Garak's tug on it's corner seems earnest enough. He glances back at the Cardassian once and let's him take it. Garak tosses it to the side and pulls Julian up next, by his shoulder, wraps his arms around him as he does, unsheathes his cock into the space between Julian's legs and turns Julian's head to kiss him over his shoulder. They're lips reach for each other over and over, tongues craving the warm refuge of each other's mouths. Garak supports them both with quivering back muscles, Julian leaning nearly his full weight on him, but even so, with one hand he pulls Julian's face ever closer to his, just a little closer, he knows if they try they can be a little closer, and with the other, guides his cock with gently curled fingers to Julian's entrance.
Garak has to gasp and then sigh as he sinks into him. His mouth waters a little, and then he smiles faintly when he feels Julian take his finger into his mouth. It was right there, his right palm under his jaw and not doing anything in particular. Julian didn't even make a sound as he passed into him this time, like it was old hat or something and that makes Garak smile more. He relaxes down a moment, comes down from that strained reaching that so necessarily accompanies such sweet penetration and completion, but then he resumes, undulating with his whole body, because it is necessary as breathing right now to show him he is putting everything into this. You are the be all end all for me, Boy. You are the epitome of my desire. Julian moans and moves with him, pressing himself down hard onto Garak's cock, and pulling his abs and buttocks in tight as he pulls away. Garak nearly loses his head a few times from that maneuver. Garak breathes as heavily as Julian is now. So good, so sweet. But he can't help but feel like maybe this isn't as new as it seems, maybe Julian is right. Maybe they've been doing this for the past six years. Like every conversation, every heated look shared across the promenade was just a more distant form of this intimacy, and that the actual fucking, last night, the introduction, was just a formality, and now it's just business as usual; hot, frantic, mind-blowing business, as usual, with the man he's been making love to in his mind for the past six years.
Julian takes his own cock in hand and gives it gentle strokes in time with Elim's. The slippery feeling of his love inside of him makes him toss his head back and forth on Elim's shoulder, and the way his prick, so hard now, so incredibly hard and unyielding hits that spot deep within him, he can't keep his eyes open, can't think at all. Elim's cock erases his mind and it feels so good. Elim's hand, he blearily notices, joins his own around his cock, and each stroke is so sharp, so present and tight despite their gentle pace and grip, it's only a few seconds more sucking in hugelungfuls of warm moist air before Julian spasms throughout his body, makes a strangled, cut off noise near Elim's ear, tenses all through his back and comes. It rips through him, splits him in two, and his come jumps up and lands back on him, all over him. Disoriented and high, Elim continues to pump his cock and he feels like he is dying, sounds like it too. He can see the last few drops of come squeeze to the tip of his cock when his eyes crack open, and then Elim moves inside of him again, and if fucking hurts.
Julian's brow knits and he gasps for air, digs his fingers into Elim behind him and then lets out a reverberating mewl of pain.
Garak feels ever so slightly guilty drinking in that sound, but he does it anyway. "Shh," he says in his ear, "Just another moment, Love." He wants to come inside of him. Needs to. Needs to because in six years he hasn't once. He vaguely wonders if he shouldn't spare him that tonight, the first night, really, but he knows he doesn't need to, knows he isn't going to, that nothing save instantaneous death could make him stop right now. Julian falls forward and Garak somehow, by God he does somehow stay with him. Julian is so tight so so so tight around him and it has to hurt. It makes Garak hurt thinking about it, and ache somewhere deep inside listening to him whimper into the pillow and then cough as he gasps for more air. "Almost, Baby, almost," he mutters, and then there is this ear-ringing silence for a bare second, the rushing of his blood blotting out the rest of existence, and finally he is coming. He screws his eyes shut and growls through his teeth, the whole world streaked with black and pleasure dripping off his bones and teeth.
They collapse in slow motion, robots with dying power cells laying down one servo at a time until they clunk heads on the pillow and lay there recapturing long lost air for some unknown and uncared-for chunk of time. When conscious thought does finally start to trickle back, Garak levers himself around, turns over one part of him at a time to drape a weak limb over Julian's ribs. "I'm sorry, Love."
Julian laughs. He makes a sound like he was going to retort but then just laughs some more.
Garak smiles faintly. He understands, but he wanted to apologize anyway, for the lie.
"Elim," he says with a sleepy grin and shakes his head. He rolls over with difficulty, getting winded with just that much movement, and scoots in as close as he can to him until their arms and legs interfere and get squashed between them. Now that he's here and has his attention he doesn't quite know what to say, though.
"You felt so good. I couldn't let you go."
"I didn't want you to let me go," Julian says just above a whisper. Elim seems to study his face for just a moment more then leans in and puts his lips to Julian's with a thumb to his cheek. His eyelashes brush the bridge of his nose once, and it tells Julian that his eyes have slipped closed. He kisses him back tenderly, wrapping a hand around under his shoulder to stroke down his scales. The kiss breaks at length, but it proves to be only one of perhaps hundreds to be exchanged that night while they lay there in silence in the comfort of Elim's rooms, discovering each other anew.




4 comments:

Anonymous said...

You have a special way with words. Wonderful! It was tender and hot at the same time. I'm looking forward to the next part!

Penny O said...

As the anonymous has already said, you have a wonderful way with words. I just stumbled upon this, and it's lovely. I love the relationship that's forming between Garak and Julian, and the way Julian was so methodically researching everything he could, in previous chapters - it fit him so well, I could just see him doing that sort of thing. I also love that while you're exploring the nuances of their relationship and while Julian is the submissive partner, he's not made any less Julian for it. A lot of the time fic tends to emasculate the submissive, and you haven't done that at all, for which I applaud you.

I also like what you've done with Cardassian biology. If they're a reptilian species then the retractable sexual organs makes sense, just like if there was an avian species you wouldn't expect the males to have their cocks on display whilst naked and unaroused. I can understand how it might be jarring to some, but I really do think it works, and it's obvious that you put a lot of thought into the mechanics of it all.

And this comment is really getting long enough, so I'll just finish by saying it's good to see this up and going again; I understand burn-out and stalling, and it seems like you're starting to get past that, which is wonderful. I'm looking forward to more. :)

Anonymous said...

I love this so much. Brilliant wording, dialogue, everything. I don't have a way with words as you do, so this review will not do your epic justice. Just know how much I love it and appreciate it and am praying you will continue past Chapter 7. Is there a Chapter 8 I might be missing? Thanks.

Å said...

Yes there is a chapter 8, and 9, now posted. Chapter 10 is still in the works...