Fandom: Star trek - Deep Space Nine

Title: Doppelganger

Timeline: 2376 during the events depicted in the Re-launch Novel "This Gray Spirit"

Spoilers: Could be anything in the series plus events in the re-launch novels

Pairings: Series Canon, Re-launch Canon, Eventual Kira/Macet

Chapter Warnings: Not Beta'd

Whole Fic Warnings: Potential moderate bad language, violence and sexual content, therefore:

Rating: M

Disclaimer: I own none of these characters or their setting, this is for entertainment only and no money will be made by me.

Chapter 1 - The Devil you don't know

"Colonel!"

Kira Nerys closed her eyes for a moment fighting down a wave of... what? It wasn't revulsion, or hatred, it was more like... confusion, like a Bajoran Timpani band crashing about in her head with emotions for instruments.

She squared her shoulders and turned, there it was, the face that went with that voice, uncannily like Gul Dukat, yet with disconcerting differences; looking at him felt like re-visiting a place you once knew well and finding new trees had grown and new houses had been built. It was horribly uncomfortable.

She drew a deep breath. "What can I do for you Gul Macet?"

Equally disconcerting as his appearance was his manner, a slight hesitancy whenever he was in her presence that was so alien to a façade she associated with endless arrogance and a constant invasion of both her physical and mental personal space.

"I apologise for accosting you," he said, his voice even, almost indifferent, "I have a message from Ambassador Lang, she wonders if you would join her for dinner this evening in her quarters at 20:00 hours?"

Kira raked a hand through her hair, trying to form a diplomatic reply, as far as it went she quite liked the Ambassador, admired her even, but everything was complicated by First Minister Shakaar and his blocking of peace talks with the Cardasians. However much Kira disapproved she needed to consider carefully any social engagement that might give her old lover an excuse to question her impartiality when she tackled him on the subject, but... a little ball of anger and anxiety started to roll in her belly when she thought about what Second Minister Asarem Wadeen had told her about Shakaar's manipulation of the peace talks; should she worry about the opinion of a man who was betraying Bajor's best interest to suit some convoluted plan of revenge? Especially when he'd left her to the wolves when she was attainted by the Vedek Assembly?

Sadly, she realised that she had more faith in a Cardassian she'd met only a few times then she did in her own planet's leader and worse, her ex lover.

With a start she realised she'd been staring silently over Macet's shoulder, probably with her emotions playing out across her face if his polite but faintly bemused expression was anything to go by. Again she had that warped sense of seeing two people at once, Gul Dukat would be smirking at her distraction, stepping into her space, his breath on her cheek, his proximity crawling up and down her skin and in through her eyes and mouth to churn through her veins, making her so, so angry.

Macet shifted his weight and coughed, snapping Kira back to herself again; she found her hands had balled into fists and felt a blush creep up her neck under her uniform, if the Gul noticed he gave no sign and ridiculously that made her crosser still. However, her new role came with new responsibilities and new expectations, including that she would not punch diplomats even when she couldn't control her feelings around them. She forced her hands to relax and nodded stiffly, "Please tell the Ambassador I'd be delighted."

He looked at her silently for a long moment, then nodded courteously and turned away. She watched him go, crossing the bridge above the promenade, looking about him with interest. It was another difference between the cousins; Dukat had rarely looked at his surroundings, probably from sheer self-absorption.

However much their surface was alike, somehow she was going to have to accept that under the skin, Skrain Dukat and Akellen Macet were very different men.

Either that or the later was a very good actor.

...

Kira had carefully considered what to wear for her dinner with Ambassador Lang, she wanted to show the woman the respect she deserved, which normally meant dress uniform, but at the same time she did not want this meal to be viewed as a diplomatic meeting, essentially she wanted to send a clear message that this was a social visit.

Accordingly she choose an outfit from her limited supply of formal off duty wear, a loose pair of trousers of a silky fabric and a fitted, crossover top in a rougher texture and a darker, woody purple shade that Jadzia had once said contrasted nicely with her hair. Rummaging in a cupboard she found a bottle of aged spring wine that someone had given her at the last gratitude festival to take as an offering and taking a deep breath, set off for Ambassador Lang's quarters.

The downside of her casual dress was that it caught the attention of everyone she passed; Colonel Kira out of uniform was a rare sight and people tended to double take and notice the bottle in her hand. Finally, when she reached the door of the Ambassador's quarters and pressed the chime she was in clear view of two Bajoran security men, a Bajoran woman she recognised from one of the shops on the promenade and of course the Cardassian guard standing outside the door.

Word would certainly get around.

"Enter."

Kira nodded out of politeness to the Cardassian guard who ignored her and stepped through the opening door. Only as the door shushed shut behind her did she realise that the voice had not been the musical cadence of Ambassador Lang, but the far more masculine and familiar tones of Gul Macet.

She froze just inside the door; the Gul was sitting in the window, his impassive gaze upon her, apparently just disturbed from a little star gazing. Kira looked around searching for any sigh of Natima but unless she was hiding in the bedroom waiting to jump out and shout "surprise" she was not there. She shot a look of enquiry at Macet, pushing down the automatic adrenaline rush that came from being enclosed with a Cardassian in uniform, never mind one who looked like him, until she heard what he had to say.

He stood up slowly, almost carefully, making no move to close the distance between them. "Ambassador Lang sends her apologies; she has just received several communications from our government and has had to go to our ship to decode them. She will join us as soon as she can and has asked me to entertain you in the meantime." He gestured to a table set to one side with places for three, on the sideboard a variety of dishes and drinks, mostly Cardassian and Bajoran were waiting.

Kira's natural instinct was to turn on her heel and walk out, but she stopped herself; this was notDukat, this man had never commanded an internment camp, or a mining station, this man had spent every year of every military campaign he had been involved in on his ship, obeying the commands of people like Dukat; he had killed Bajoran's ship against ship, soldier against soldier, but never preaching that subjugation was for their own good; hating him for his war record would be preposterously hypocritical.

This man had joined Damar's rebellion; this man had worked for peace with Captain Picard.

This man had spoken up against his own government when that was a dangerous thing to do and somehow survived it.

She knew all this because she'd read every scrap of information the Bajoran militia and the Federation had on him. It behoved her to treat him with some respect, and caution of course. She tilted the bottle in her hand to show him the label. "Where shall I put this?"

...

The food was very good, Macet managed to be courteous without fussing, he didn't pull out her seat or insist in fetching her food but he did wait until she had served herself before filling his own plate and when he realised that she hadn't sat down he politely indicated that she should choose her own seat.

"Does Ambassador Lang have anything specific she wishes to talk to me about?" asked Kira before taking a bite of Mapa bread spread with a delicate fish pate.

Macet paused and seemed to consider the question, "I don't think so. I think she just wanted a change of company."

Kira cocked her head on one side, "What about you, how do you find the company aboard the station?"

"I find very little company at all, as I'm sure you have noticed I try and stay out of sight except for when it's strictly necessary." The Gul compressed his lips, "As we have discussed, my face hardly evokes pleasant memories for the inhabitants of this station."

Kira nodded. "How do you feel about that?" she asked bluntly, wanting to see his reaction.

Macet lowered his forkful of Veklava on to his plate. "I feel it is understandable, I feel it is kinder to stay out of the way when I am not needed but I feel no compunction in being visible when itis needed. For example I am aware that I make you uncomfortable but I feel no need to do anything about it. I am not Dukat." For the first time she heard irritation in his voice, well controlled, but there nevertheless.

She raised her eyes from her plate and met his steady, cool blue ones, so unusual in a Cardassian. Ironically his emotion reassured her more that his careful impassivity had. She felt herself flush, "I'm sorry," she said, with her sometimes devastating candour. "I wish I could separate your face from, from him."

The Gul took a sip of red leaf tea, "I am open to suggestions Colonel."

Kira thought for a moment, "Tell me about your family?"

"My Father came from Lakat, he met my mother at the University of Culat where he was studying military science and she was studying medicine, as the sixth of eight children and the third of three daughters she had such a small dowry that she wasn't expected to marry so she used it to study for a career. My father," Macet smiled into his cup, "defied his own parents who were determined that he would make a good match and married her as soon as they had both graduated and three days before he was due to ship out on a three month mission," Macet raised unguarded eyes to look at Kira, she could see his pride in his parentsshining from him. "I was born ten months later, my father left the military and became a professor of tactics at a provincial university where farmer's sons went in the hope of entering the military and escaping the plough and my mother became a surgeon at the local hospital. I have one sister." He cocked his head on one side, as if inviting her to comment.

"That's a small family for a Cardassian couple," observed Kira.

Macet nodded, "Intentionally so, my parents disagreed with the Cardassian tradition of large families, they considered it incompatible with our planets lack of resources, that it fostered an overly militaristic agenda."

Kira pushed some Rigellian paka beans around her plate, thinking about what he was telling her, it was all consistent with what she had read in his file. "What about you, are you married? Any children?" Again she asked a question that she essentially knew the answer to.

"Yes, I am married, we have no children."

"I'm sorry," said Kira, earnestly.

Macet raised a brow ridge. "Sorry? Why?"

Kira gave him a startled look, "I thought all Cardassian's were desperate to have children?"

He smiled grimly, "My wife does not want children, at first because she wanted to wait until my career was established and later... let us just say we grew apart."

"I'm sorr-," Kira broke off realising that she was repeating herself, "I see."

"No need to be sorry Colonel," responded Macet cheerfully, "she is happy pursing her artistic interests, I believe her current lover is a member of the Cardassian arts council and considering what little art is left intact on Cardassia I should imagine he has a lot of time for her," he gave the Colonel a tight, dry little smile, "more time than I ever did. I, until the beginning of Damar's rebellion had had a long term relationship with my ship's science officer."

Kira tried to hide her surprise, "What happened?"

"She didn't want to join the rebellion and left my ship," his expression became a little sad, "I have not been able to find her since. Though I have no interest in resuming our relationship I would like to know if she survived."

Kira topped up her wine glass. "War hardly promotes a stable love life." Her mind drifted to Odo and resolutely turned away.

"No Colonel, it does not." He sipped his tea again. "May I ask you a question?"

"Of course," she shrugged; he had probably read her file too.

"Were you and my cousin ever in a romantic relationship?"

Kira choked on her spring wine. "No!" she finally managed to splutter after Macet had slapped her on the back, immediately withdrawing to a polite distance when it was obvious she wasn't in any danger. "Why would you... Who said we were..." her face twisted in distaste, "romantic?" she spat the word like a curse.

"I apologise Colonel, I met my cousin from time to time and on the last few occasions," he thought for a moment, "over the last four or five years I think, more in the early part of that period he...spoke of you. Though he never actually said you were intimate it was clear that he was interested in that outcome and your discomfort around me... I wasn't sure whether that was causing it," he shrugged.

"He might have been interested, but..." Kira paused and took a deep breath through her nose. "He made... overtures, I suppose, I never seriously thought that he really expected me...I always assumed it was to throw me off balance, to put me on the back foot." She huffed irritably, "Did you know that my mother was one of his women? I only found out a couple of years ago and it wasn't like he had a chance before but..." she pulled a face as her stomach churned at the thought.

Macet's expression mirrored hers, "No. However it does not surprise me. I doubt if it would be any comfort to you but for a time my wife was also one of his women."

Kira flumped back into her chair, her mouth hanging open, the situation was just so ridiculous; here she was having dinner with the image of Gul Dukat, discussing Gul Dukat's love life. She snorted and then, inappropriately started to giggle, her host raised his brow ridges but let her laugh without interruption, which emphasised just how unlike Dukat he was, Dukat's pride would have been lacerated, Macet seemed at most, faintly irritated. Finally a soft chirrup made her jump and hiccup into silence. Macet stood up and crossed to the other side of the room where a Cardassian pad lay on a table. He grunted in surprise, "A message from Natima, the communications are taking more time than she envisioned and she will be staying aboard our ship all night, she apologises for being such a poor host and hopes I am looking after you adequately. His eyes strayed to the table where both their plates were relatively untouched. "I'm not sure I can reassure her on that point."

Kira looked up at him and held out her glass. "Give me some more wine and I'll see if I can do some justice to this meal."

He gave her the suggestion of a smile, the first one she recalled seeing on his face. "Very well Colonel."

"Call me Nerys, your cousin used to do it without my permission. Think how annoyed he'd be that I've invited you to."

His mouth twitched, "And I am Akellan," he said gravely, topping up her glass.

...

Akellan Macet turned out to be good and surprisingly easy company, by mutual, if unspoken agreement they moved away from personal topics and discussed some issues of command, this led Macet to tell an amusing story about reversing a Galor Class spaceship into a Napean space station and causing a serious diplomatic incident; Kira caped this by telling him about the time she accidentally dropped a delicate bomb into the sewage system of a small Cardassian Military base, causing every toilet in the building to explode simultaneously and catching the base Commander at a most inconvenient moment, Macet roared at that and she couldn't help laughing with him.

He stopped laughing first, fixing his disconcerting, light eyes on her face and his intentness stilled and quieted her, suddenly she was wary, there was a tension about him that she wasn't used to. "What?"

He didn't answer her immediately, but sat there turning a Moba fruit over and over in his hands, his eyes fixed on her face, "Why did take so much responsibility for Ziyall?"

Kira shook her head, not because she didn't understand the question, but because she didn't understand why he was asking it. "Because she was innocent, she didn't deserve to be scorned by Cardassians or Bajorans because of the accident of her birth."

"But it connected you to Dukat," he said reasonably, "that must have been very difficult when you hated him so much."

Kira shook her head again, "You don't understand, I hated what he did, there were times when I could, would have killed him to stop it and he made me so angry, no-one has ever made me angrier. Not just because of what he did, but because of the tiny moments when you could see what he could be. He gave up everything for Ziyall, he put her first, he actually cared about her mother, however appalling the relationship was when it started, however he might have deluded himself when he said she loved him I believe he loved her, as much as he was able. I think that when he said he wanted the best for the Bajoran people he actually believed it.

"He was deluded and arrogant and self absorbed. In those rare moments when he was at his best he thought he was at his worst, but he wasn't true evil, not until the end, not until after Ziyall died, I believe that, I really do." She realised that she was standing, that she was breathless and that she'd been punctuating her words with her hands. Her hands dropped and she swayed a little, lost in confusion and for a fleeting second she wondered just how much wine she had drunk, but pushed the thought away. She took an unsteady step around the table, choosing to enter Macet's space, something he had never done to her; he had always maintained a wary distance, always moving away rather than towards her whenever he had the choice.

"Why aren't you like him?" She asked, like a child asking why the sky isn't green.

He didn't answer, just stood up and looked down at her, his usually flat blue eyes tumultuous, "Because I am not him." He stepped backwards, putting distance between them again. "I must go Colonel. It's getting late, I'm sure the Ambassador will not mind if you show yourself out." Without a backward glance he turned and left.

Kira watched him go, jaw hanging; she took a few, hasty steps as if to follow him, span back and kicked over her chair. She huffed out a breath and glared at her tipped seat, what the hell was going on? What had she been doing?

...