An Emotional State

Star Trek DS9 Fanfiction
Title:	An Emotional State
Author(s):	Kathryn Ramage
Date(s):	June–September 1997
Length:
Genre:	slash
Fandom:	Star Trek: Deep Space Nine
External Links:	An Emotional State on Trekiverse
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An Emotional State is a Garak/Bashir story by Kathryn Ramage.

Series

• The Claiming
• For You
• An Emotional State

Reactions and Reviews

An Emotional State is the third part of The Claiming trilogy and is an excellent exploration of both Garak's overwhelming desire to return home (especially prior to The Die is Cast) and the struggles that have given Bashir an added maturity.

Bashir breaks up with Garak between the second and third parts. After Garak gets a mysterious message from Tain, Bashir, Odo, and Garak journey to Tain's residence. Tain offers Garak the chance to return home, but Bashir's exprience in The Claiming lead him to suspect that something is not quite right.

An Emotional State examines a possible turning point for the good doctor as the doctor receives his first experience of intense hatred. There is the expression that you don't know how to laugh until you cry and the intense anger Bashir feels allows him to feel just as intense love for the tailor. In the first two parts, Garak tried to make Bashir feel as safe as possible and Bashir saw Garak as a symbol of the safety he craved after his torture at the hands of Entek. It is only in the last part that Garak realizes that by trying to make sure that Bashir always felt safe, he failed to excite the doctor.

Like all lessons, Bashir's lesson comes at a high price. While his experience deepens his love for Garak it also costs him much of his innocence which can never be reclaimed. Like most people Bashir does not mature because he wants to, he matures because he is forces to mature.

The Claiming includes sex, but nothing that should disturb an adult slash fan. (And if you are not an adult slash fan, what are you doing here?)