Chapter Text
Weyoun follows Damar to sickbay and stands watching as the medic gives him a hypo. Then he follows Damar to the armory, where Damar straps himself into fresh armor, and then into the turbolift. “Habitat ring,” Damar says, because he doesn’t want Weyoun to follow him to Engineering.
“What is wrong with you?” Weyoun looks sad and a little frightened, a terrifying expression on his face.
“If you—” Damar starts, and has to swallow hard. “You have to know—if you’re trying to manipulate me, telling me you feel—this way—you don’t have to try. I’m—it’s too late for me. I believe it whether or not it’s true.” It feels like there are razor blades in his throat.
Weyoun frowns at him. “Do you?” He steps closer and begins to reach out to touch Damar, but drops his hand before he reaches him. “Believe it?”
Damar closes his eyes. “Weyoun Five—he would have told me anything to get me to do what I was supposed to. You’re different, you told me.”
“He wouldn’t have, actually,” Weyoun says. “If it helps. He was—attached to you, but he didn’t lie to you.”
That tears a harsh laugh out of Damar’s ragged throat. “No, I suppose he didn’t. He told me he was going to kill me. You know it’ll kill me if you’re lying to me.”
“I’ll make sure you don’t die, however this goes,” Weyoun promises.
Damar laughs again. “That’s not what I mean.”
“Oh.” Weyoun lowers his voice. “Is that why you left?”
How to articulate why he left? “You’ve ruined me,” he says. How long has it been since he said that to Weyoun Five? He closes his eyes. “They’ll say I betrayed Cardassia.”
“Who?”
“Dukat,” he says, and he knows it’s true. “Dukat will say I’m a traitor.”
Weyoun’s hand settles very softly at the back of his neck. “Yes.” The finality in his voice hurts.
“I have to persuade the other Cardassians on the station. I’m the only one who can do it.”
“Yes.” Weyoun’s hand tightens a little, and Damar lets himself lean back into it.
“I need to get to Engineering.”
“Yes,” Weyoun says one more time. He looks very sad, and Damar won’t kiss him with the taste that’s in his mouth, but he brushes his fingers against Weyoun’s cheek before Weyoun leaves the turbolift.
“Engineering,” Damar says, and watches Weyoun until he’s out of sight.
It’s intimidating to begin the process of recruiting the other Cardassians back to Cardassia, especially with Dukat in charge. Dukat is charismatic, persuasive. Damar is—not. Damar is blunt, with even less credibility than he used to have. Still, as he stands in Engineering and looks at the diagrams of the antigraviton beam, he says aloud, “Nice to not have so many Jem’Hadar underfoot anymore.”
Glinn Rusot, his subordinate who’s nominally the chief engineer, darts a glance at him. “We heard about the—incident in Quark’s. Looks like you came out the winner.”
“Don’t flatter me, Rusot.” He smiles a little. “It’d be nice if they were gone entirely.”
Rusot laughs a little. “If only. Too bad we’re about to have millions more flooding into the quadrant.”
“It is too bad,” Damar says, and lets the words hang there.
Rusot freezes for an instant and then laughs again, a little more forced this time. “Well, we are allied with the Dominion. I suppose it’s inevitable.”
“We’re practically occupied by the Dominion.” He’s not being subtle, he knows. But with five—no, now four—days left, there isn’t time for subtlety. “Soon there will be no Cardassia left.”
“Sir,” Rusot says. “I’m not sure—”
Damar takes a deep breath and turns to face Rusot. “Or Cardassia could free herself.”
“I…don’t see how.” Rusot’s voice is light. He’s better at this than Damar.
“The Jem’Hadar presence on the station is—diminishing. It could continue to diminish. In fact, by the time we’re ready to disable the minefield, there could be none of them left here.”
Rusot passes him a coil spanner, which neither of them needs, and puts his head closer to Damar’s. “I can’t imagine the Vorta here would allow—” He sees Damar’s face. “Oh. Are you—sure of him?” Rusot is aware of Damar’s preferences.
“I am,” Damar says.
“The minefield?”
“There’s no guarantee that an antigraviton beam would succeed on this scale.” Damar swallows hard. This is the part that will anger Rusot. “And it’s possible that—someone on the station is already planning to—interfere with its operation.”
Rusot recoils slightly. “The Federation?”
“War makes for strange bedfellows.” Damar immediately regrets the phrasing. “We’re massively outgunned, Rusot. You and me and Weyoun—that’s not enough people to save Cardassia. For now, we need someone to put between us and the Dominion, and the Federation will be happy to accept whatever we will give them.”
“And the—Bajorans?” Rusot curls his lip as he says it. Rusot has always hated the Bajorans.
Damar forces a smile. “If they want to die for a free Cardassia, who are we to stop them?” He takes a deep breath. “We’ve served together for many years, Rusot. You know this is what’s right. I need to know if I can count on you.”
Rusot stares hard at him. “I suppose you’d like me to go around spreading this message to the rest of the Cardassian presence on this station?”
“Discreetly.” Damar meets his gaze. “It pains me to admit it, but you’re the better—politician.”
“Yes, and I have no trouble admitting that you’re the better engineer.” That’s not quite an insult, but it’s not a compliment. “All right, Damar.” Rusot hesitates. “And—Gul Dukat?”
“I’m sure Dukat will be pleased when Cardassia is free,” Damar says. He passes Rusot an unnecessary optronic coupler. “Until then, he has enough to trouble him.” Rusot knows what this means, whatever else they want to call it: treason.
Rusot inhales tightly. “If it weren’t for all our years—”
He and Rusot served together on the Federation border while Dukat was away lording it over Bajor. “I trust you,” Damar says. Among Cardassians, such an open declaration means a great deal.
Rusot shakes his head, but Damar knows that he has Rusot on his side. And with Rusot will come much of the garrison here. The others will fall in line when they see what’s happening—most of them, anyway. “In exchange, do me a favor, Damar,” Rusot says.
“What do you want?”
Rusot claps him on the back. “Stop drinking so damn much. No one wants to follow a man who always smells like kanar and vomit.”
Damar forces a laugh. He doesn’t know how anyone can stand to walk around, knowing everything that’s about to happen, without the aid of something, but everyone seems to expect him to. “Of course.”
They spend hours in Engineering, carefully progressing on the project and undoing half their work at the same time. The danger, Damar knows, is that the Dominion might send another Vorta, or even a Founder, to oversee this work. If that happens, they have to be appeased so that nothing happens before the Federation gets here. Eventually, Rusot says, “You should go—see your Vorta. He can’t be allowed to change his mind.”
“Right.” Damar shouldn’t be nervous about this. But it frightens him, how he feels the pull to go to Weyoun’s quarters, to touch him and try to make him smile and sleep in the bed the entire night this time. He will be destroyed if Weyoun betrays him.
Weyoun isn’t in his quarters when Damar arrives, but the doors open for him. Damar hopes that’s intentional, rather than a sign of Weyoun’s lack of concern for his own safety. He takes his armor off again, takes the time to set it down neatly on a chair, and then consciously avoids going to the replicator for kanar. It would be better if Weyoun came home—returned to his quarters—soon, before Damar decides that a glass or two will smooth him out.
Instead, he goes to the sonic shower. Weyoun’s is larger and fancier, with heating options. Damar cleans his teeth and mouth thoroughly—the taste of old kanar in the back of his cheeks is only making things worse—and then drops his clothes in a heap and steps into the shower.
He doesn’t realize someone else is there until Weyoun says, “I’m glad you came home.” Damar doesn’t flinch or try to cover himself, but he has to fight the impulse to do both. He turns and sees Weyoun leaning against the doorframe, his head tilted the slightest bit as he watches Damar.
“I—wanted to come here,” he says, and it hurts to admit even though his throat isn’t raw anymore.
Weyoun shuts off the sonic shower and walks closer. “I’m glad,” he repeats, and his violet eyes are fixed on Damar’s face. He lays a hand on Damar’s shoulder and Damar hisses in a breath. “Did that—hurt?”
“It was strange. The sonic shower always makes my skin sensitive,” Damar says. He smiles a little. “I imagine it’s what your skin feels like all the time.”
Weyoun laughs. “I think you overestimate how fragile we are.” He ghosts his hand across the ridge that frames Damar’s collarbone. “How’s that?”
Damar isn’t cold, but he shivers all the same. “All right.” He grips Weyoun’s shoulder and pulls him closer, into a kiss. Weyoun’s clothes are soft against his skin, and Weyoun leans into the kiss. Damar drags his fingers through Weyoun’s hair, pulls just a little, then slides his thumb down the edge of Weyoun’s ear very gently. Weyoun makes a kind of desperate noise against his mouth and presses his hand hard against Damar’s skin. It’s overwhelming. Damar remembers that first night with Weyoun, when he spent what felt like hours sucking and biting at the ridges of his skin—“Is this obscene, in Vorta society?” He strokes Weyoun’s ear again, this time along the notches. “Would they be offended to see it? You respond to it very strongly.”
The blush is very visible on Weyoun’s skin even as he leans into Damar’s hand. Damar never saw Weyoun Five blush like that. “There isn’t—ah!—Vorta society,” he says, and Damar plays his fingers along Weyoun’s other ear too. He can see the tremors beginning as Weyoun’s breathing speeds up. “We don’t—spend a lot of—ah—time together. We’re—not made for—ourselves.”
Something about that is desperately sad to Damar. He can’t imagine his youth without his siblings, his classmates, his adulthood without his comrades. “Cardassians are almost never alone,” he says into Weyoun’s ear, and presses his body against Weyoun to feel the shivers that result. “We like to be with others.”
“I’ve—n-noticed.” Weyoun is grasping almost frantically at the shape of Damar’s ribcage, his fingernails skidding across Damar’s skin. It’s painful, but Damar would endure much worse to feel the way that Weyoun is falling apart from these little touches.
“You’re—incredible.” He can’t stop himself from saying it, pushing Weyoun back against the doorframe with his body as he touches him. Weyoun’s eyelids had been fluttering closed, but when Damar speaks, he inhales sharply and stares up at Damar. The violet irises of his eyes are very bright, catching the light, and his face is almost painfully open as Damar touches him.
“I’m—you have to believe me,” Weyoun gasps, and his voice is heavy. “I’m here for—whatever you want. I don’t have some—some secret plan—” He almost chokes on the words as Damar presses his hips against Weyoun’s and licks from the base of his neck up to the tip of his ear. He follows the same path with little biting kisses and feels Weyoun tense, shudder, and then almost melt against him.
“I believe you,” Damar says. He lo—there’s something wonderful about Weyoun like this, when he’s incapable of doing much beyond mouthing back when Damar kisses him. He steps back from Weyoun ruefully, and Weyoun stumbles a little before righting himself. “Glinn Rusot is with us.”
“Glinn—?”
“Rusot,” Damar repeats. He sprawls on Weyoun’s couch and pulls Weyoun down against him, back resting on his chest. “My second, in Engineering. He’s better at this kind of thing than I am. He’ll recruit for us.”
“If you say so.” Weyoun’s head lolls back a little on Damar’s shoulder. At some point, Damar would like to either come or put clothes on (or both, as long as it’s in that order), but for now there’s something comfortable about the weight of Weyoun on his chest.
“When are you going to send the rest of the Jem’Hadar away?”
Weyoun hesitates. “It would be better if we had Jem’Hadar ships to use,” he says. “Without Jem’Hadar.”
Damar inhales slowly against Weyoun’s warmth. “You want to kill them.”
“That’s—what my predecessor would have done,” Weyoun says slowly. He doesn’t continue.
“Millions of them are going to die in the fighting over this place.”
“Yes,” Weyoun says. “I’m not concerned with their lives, or the lives of the Jem’Hadar still on the station. But I care about your life. It seems—inconsistent.”
Damar tightens his arm around Weyoun’s chest. “What will you do?”
“The obvious option is to poison the white. It would be the fastest way.” Weyoun sounds very distant. “Is it wrong not to care about killing them?”
How different he is from Weyoun Five, that he’s concerned about this moral inconsistency. “We both know that either we kill them now by poisoning the white, or we shoot them in the fighting over control of Terok Nor. Does it make a difference to you?” He’s genuinely curious.
“I don’t think it does.” Weyoun sounds concerned. “Is that bad?”
“You’re asking the wrong person,” Damar says. “If there’s one thing that all the Cardassians on the station can agree on, it’s that we hate the Jem’Hadar.”
Weyoun is silent for a long time, his heart beating steadily. Damar can feel the tension in his body again. “The next distribution of the white is tomorrow. Noon.”
“As good a time as any.” Damar lifts his head a little to kiss the juncture of Weyoun’s neck and shoulder. “Dukat will notice.”
Weyoun shrugs. Damar wishes he could see Weyoun’s face. “It’ll be a tragedy, it happens sometimes. I’ll assure him that I’ve called for more Jem’Hadar and remind him that he claims his Cardassian soldiers are adequate. The Bajorans?”
“Kira used to be a terrorist. She will know it was necessary. No one likes the Jem’Hadar,” and isn’t there something a little sad about that? No one will mourn their deaths. The Founders might find it an annoyance, the minor irritation of losing a few kotra pawns. No one else will even notice.
Weyoun shifts a little atop him. “You can’t be comfortable like this.”
“I can think of more comfortable things,” Damar says. Weyoun rolls his hips experimentally and Damar draws in a quick breath. “You’re easily distracted.”
“I suppose so.” Weyoun does it again, and Damar reaches down between his legs to discover that Weyoun is wet, rubbing up against Damar’s fingers. Desire shoots through Damar and he’s hardening against Weyoun. Weyoun rolls over so that he’s facing Damar, wriggling out of his pants and then straddling him. Weyoun is so wet that the head of Damar’s cock is already slipping into him, and Damar tries not to just thrust all the way inside of him. Weyoun sinks down on him slowly, and when Damar reaches for his hips, Weyoun grabs Damar’s wrists and pushes them up against the arm of the couch. Damar could break his grasp but he doesn’t want to, wants Weyoun to hold him there and ride his cock. He presses his wrists back against the arm even harder and tilts his head back to expose his neck. Weyoun puts one hand at the top of his throat, not even enough to cut off his airway, but it makes Damar gasp and buck up hard into Weyoun.
He's on the verge of coming when he says, “Wait, wait.”
Weyoun halts abruptly, but his body still grips Damar tightly. “What’s wrong?”
“Can you,” Damar gasps, and he can’t believe he’s asking this. “Would you—change and fuck me?” Weyoun lifts up a little and then slides back down, and Damar almost comes just from that. “You don’t—only if you want. I’m happy to—come like this.”
“Intriguing,” Weyoun says. “I’ve never changed in the middle of intercourse. What an interesting experiment.” Those aren’t the words Damar would have chosen. Weyoun doesn’t lift away, but Damar can feel him changing around Damar, tightening further until his body forces Damar’s cock out and his own cock appears, slick and hard. Damar shivers all over, rolls over between Weyoun’s legs and rises up onto his hands and knees. “The replicator—lubricant—”
“Don’t,” Damar says, “just—” He looks behind him and sees Weyoun stroking his own cock a few times, getting his fingers wet, and then he’s pushing those two fingers into Damar. It’s—too fast, too much, but Damar can’t imagine waiting any longer. “Just—” he repeats.
“If you’re sure.” Weyoun sounds a little uncertain, but he withdraws his fingers and slides his cock into Damar’s ass very gradually. “Damar—I can barely—”
There are sparks behind Damar’s eyelids from the heat of Weyoun’s cock inside him with the almost-painful stretch of it. “You’re,” Damar says, and he can’t form words, can only fuck back against Weyoun’s cock as it opens him further. He was so close to coming before and somehow this is only heightening it. When Weyoun is fully inside, Damar starts moving, fucking himself on Weyoun’s cock. Weyoun digs his fingers into Damar’s hips and starts to move with him. Damar could die like this, happily—Weyoun inside him when he’s still a little too tight, working him open a little more with every thrust—and he doesn’t let himself touch his own cock even though he’s achingly hard. “Come inside me,” he manages to say. He doesn’t hear whatever Weyoun says, only feels him speed up until he’s thrusting frantically. As Weyoun starts to lose coordination, Damar does grasp his own cock, and he doesn’t know which of them comes first because his mind empties, all thought reduced down to twin points of sensation.