This is my first time doing a Julian Bashir and Jadzia Dax story, so bear with me when I say she does NOT get involved with Worf in here. It was said by Ezri herself if Worf never came to DS9, then Dax and the good doctor would have been together. It's a bit of a challenge even though I am understanding the two and their cherished friendship - as well as how he had his crush on her when they first met but she didn't want to ruin their friendship, so he stopped pursuing her.

Now it begs the question: what would have happened if the two had realized the depths of their feelings sooner at some point? Imagine if nothing happened to the Enterprise the way it did so that Worf NEVER came to Deep Space 9. This is not set after one specific point before season 4 where Bashir and Dax realized their feelings - well, Jadzia, especially - and got together; I usually know where to start to make the story work, so this time I will let my readers decide WHEN the couple fell in love for real. :D After that, the main plot of the story will do it justice.

As everyone knows, Jadzia is seen as a role model to shy young girls who want to own themselves no matter anyone else trying to stop them. She's vibrant and passionate, intelligent, and everything that I myself feel. That kind of dedication I put into what I call my life's work. :)

Disclaimer: I own nothing of Star Trek or the characters.

Chapter One

Opportunity

When they first met, they started out as best friends, but he seemed to see more in her than just a friend. She'd been well aware but had not wanted to go as far as to change the nature of their friendship. A wiser person would always say that once things got out of hand, you would never go back to being comfortable around each other, lose what meant most to you.

She hadn't wanted to lose that, so that was why she did not want Julian Bashir that way in the beginning.

And after awhile, he stopped chasing her altogether and agreed to remain friends.

Young Jadzia had been shy and quiet, growing up on Trill with her parents and sister, determined her entire life to be joined and having finally become an initiate and placed under the apprenticeship of the great Curzon Dax - a charming, powerful but difficult man who had secured peace between the Federation and the Klingons. To her, it sounded like a great honor, until upon learning he was known to reject initiates for whatever reasons. It had been no surprise but still hurt when she had her turn; she eventually found it in her to wise up and toughen enough to reenter and get everything she ever dreamed of.

Curzon died, and the symbiont was hers. Upon joining, Jadzia Dax felt like she was a new person altogether, and nothing different about her except the sensation of the memories of the ones before her, even the man who mentored and rejected her. She did not lose sight of who she was, but what she was now was an even more intelligent being with seven generations of experience to guide her through her destiny.

One main goal was to never return back to Trill. It was because of the haunting of Curzon's elimination. However, the reason she put up with his memories was because of Benjamin Sisko, his pupil who saw him as another father figure. A part of Jadzia had felt jealous as she was supposed to have looked up to Curzon that way if he hadn't been the kind of man he was. But what had been done had been done. Curzon did not stop her anymore from changing from the timid but dedicated girl she had been to a vibrant, confident young woman passionate for life.

"In order to know who you are, it's important to know who you have been." Her words to live by, which made it all the more easy.

And then a certain handsome young doctor, new to the field, had walked into her life. He was charming and eager for adventure as she was, but the moment he revealed the depth of his...infatuation, it was like Jadzia could hardly breathe. He was coming too fast that the only easy solution was to remain just friends. Several times he wanted to take her to dinner, but even though she wanted to, she declined. The hurt in his eyes was evident despite his understanding smile.

However, Jadzia also found she enjoyed him hunting her. It was like a challenge to her, and she enjoyed it very much. A wild deer chased by the hunter for food, lean and graceful with great speed only to miss the arrows. That deer wanted to be chased only to see how far her pursuer would try and give up.

And gave up was exactly what Julian Bashir did. But as it turned out, she missed it. It felt like a part of her was alone internally, missing a great opportunity.

She was currently in her quarters, staring at her reflection and her hair loose from its ponytail, contemplating it all, after recent events. Dax, the symbiont, had been very ill recently that the memory was overbearing enough she could never stop thinking about what transpired...Jadzia's memories. Not Jadzia Dax, but Jadzia herself as a person. Opened her eyes to something she had been missing out on all this time.

~o~

"How long have you had these cramps for?" Julian asked her as he looked over the results on his PADD, his brow creased with utter concern. "It also shows shortage of breath and vomiting."

"Two weeks," she answered, laying back against the bio-bed. "I'm sorry I didn't go to you sooner, Julian. I thought it had to do with menstruation or something. But it's been longer than a week..." She stopped there because she had no idea if she was simply rambling. Dax never rambled, except for Torias. She inhaled as another onslaught of enclosed breath filled her lungs. The panic attack she had in Ops was the last resort to finally see the doctor and find out what was wrong with her if not Trill menstrual period which lasted a week, longer than human females.

"Jadzia, I don't think menstruation has anything to do with this. I'm getting a destabilization in the symbiont with these symptoms." His face was grim and...frightened. "Dax is ill."

This was what she had been dreading most. If Dax was sick, then she might be in danger yet again of rejecting the symbiont. This time she might not be so lucky. She closed her eyes and inhaled through her nose. To think that, at thirty years old and having the symbiont for three years, she was losing her life so Dax could go to another new host...

"I won't let anything happen to either of you." Julian's hand had come to rest on top of hers, generating the comforting warmth she really needed. "If the symbiont is sick, then so are you. But if I'm going to save the both of you, then I have to...remove it from your body, Jadzia, and perform the procedure."

"Oh, God." The very mention brought back that one time the symbiont had been removed and placed into another host which was never meant to be. She could never forget Verad's fear and loneliness, the confusion...it made her feel like the small girl she used to be and hated it. She had almost forgotten what it felt like to be just Jadzia again, but now she was getting a third chance. It scared her now and seemed to scare Julian as well.

After a symbiont was removed, the host had hours to live, and the symbiont itself never lived long without its host especially after being joined for the first time. This meant extreme measures and extreme caution, but she was putting her fate into Julian's hands.

"I'm sorry to tell you this," he tried to apologize.

"Don't; just get right to it. Do what you have to."

"I will," he promised, "but before I do, I need to know something just in case -"

Jadzia wanted nothing more than to tell him to just put her under and begin the operation, but her abdomen clenched again that she tried not to whimper. "What...is it?"

"I stopped chasing you because you're a friend, and I did not want to lose a friend, but after everything we have been through, my feelings for you have not changed."

He did not need to talk any further; she knew what he was trying to tell her, and now was not the time to be afraid. She was having enough trouble breathing as it was that he no longer had that effect on her. "Julian, just kiss me and put me under."

Her eyes had closed for him to obey, and the last thing she felt was his lips before her senses fogged over.

~o~

As a doctor, his life was dedicated to saving others', but when he was young, before he was even at the first decade, he wasn't the most bright amongst the rest of the children in his classes. He had always thought he disappointed those around him, even his own parents, simply because as a little one, you were bound to make mistakes and in the event of time, learn from them. That hadn't been the case with young Julian Bashir, then known as "Jules" to Mother and Father, who altered his life forever just as he turned seven.

That one trip to Adigeon Prime changed the course of his life forever.

After two months of the treatments, it was as though the intelligence that burst from his mind was like a flower bud blooming last and becoming the most beautiful out of all the ones that surpassed it. His IQ was no longer below standard. His physical build and stamina naturally enhanced, but unlike most genetically enhanced beings, he appeared out of the ordinary and was otherwise gifted. Mum and Dad were proud of him for that, but as he grew into a man and became the star student in school, their relationship was never the closest of families.

His first experience with medicine when he was at the ripe age of ten involved a sick girl on Invernia II, during an ionic storm with his father present. The memory of the failure to save her became the pivotal moment in his decision to be the one to never feel that helpless again and save the life no matter the cost. Why didn't those idiots around her know that a local herb could have saved that child? She had been too young, had been kind enough to shelter him and Richard Bashir from the depths of her heart.

Just because he ultimately decided to become a doctor later in his life did not mean that he was not afraid of them when he was young. They seemed to read right through you, know your every secret, and would make you sick all because you didn't listen to them. But his fears were unfounded as he learned about medicine, how to use it and control it, and eventually became who he was now.

Though, back then as a maturing adolescent, he thought he became a physician only to please his parents if not as a professional tennis player as sports were also his forte.

He could not say he was ever lucky in the love department.

His first love was a ballet dancer whose father offered him a position in Paris, of chief of surgery under five years, but that meant no career in Starfleet for Julian, and chief of surgery in a regular life would not have gotten him very far. He had been forced to give her up even though she was everything he ever wanted. Melora had been short-time while he oversaw the care of walking on her legs again, before she left Deep Space 9 to return home.

And now Jadzia Dax.

He remembered being captivated on sight the first time he saw her, thinking a goddess had walked into his presence. He had almost missed the spots which set her apart from a human female, taking in the leopard-print pattern running from both sides of her face, starting at the hairline and going downwards and disappearing beneath her uniform - and the unexpected thought entered his mind: how far along down did those spots go?

He could have sworn he was getting too far ahead of himself when he found himself fixated on the Trill, learning her name eventually as Lieutenant Jadzia Dax, and he couldn't help himself. She was so...beautiful. Gentle and commanding at the same time, standing tall with her hands clasped behind her back as she strode, always smiling easily and never stiff.

Julian Bashir might have found the newest girl of his dreams.

She easily accepted him as a friend, which grew as they worked together at Deep Space 9, but not as a girlfriend. He wasn't ashamed or afraid to ask her out, but he didn't want to be just friends with her. Of course he did, but could he help if she was always on his mind? Always in his dreams? Always treating him like a person?

He'd thought he was going to lose her a few times, losing a new opportunity that might be his last. First to a trial involving the mislead conviction of the late Curzon Dax, then removing the symbiont to a "cheated" host only to give Dax back to her - and now the symbiont suffered that he thought third time would be the charm. To lose Dax meant losing Jadzia, the host dying hours after the symbiont was removed.

By removing Dax meant getting to know the unjoined side of Jadzia.

~o~

"Julian?"

She had awakened after the symbiont was removed; the sedative wore off that it might be fate giving him the chance to get to know the woman without the worm in her abdomen. He was so far stabilizing the symbiont beside her, so Jadzia got to see him take care of the one thing that changed her life. "How is it?" she whispered.

"Stabilized for now," he answered calmly. The worm's tail twitched faintly, pale gray and shining with bodily fluids, but responding to his careful hands and the medicines. He hesitated to ask her. "How about you?" If it was the same as it was when the symbiont was first taken from her for Verad...

She wrapped her arms around herself and held the gray sheet close to her body, her shoulders bare and showing more of the double-sided pattern of spots, stopping - the sheet was blocking it - above the curves of her bared breasts. The sight was delightful, but the look on her incredible face was anything but the word itself. "Empty, like the last time," she whispered, on the verge of crying. "I feel so lonely...again."

He smiled reassuringly. "It won't last."

"Tell that to my hormones."

She meant to make it a joke, and her jokes were always his highlight, but this time she didn't want to, and he wasn't sure he wanted to, either. "I don't seem to remember asking you, but...have you always been so emotional, not confident in yourself, before you were joined?" In all their talks together, he actually did not remember her once mentioning the complete tale of her childhood - and he never once told her about his own life, either. Not even his secret genetic enhancement that would condemn not only his Starfleet career, but also his parents. That meant losing all he had, including her.

Jadzia smiled weakly. "Always have been. But I worked hard to prove myself, and in the end, it was Curzon who destroyed it all when I was nearing completion of the initiation. I wanted so much to be joined that I knew then and there I didn't need anyone to help me, that I could do this alone. I was the first Trill to ever reapply. I despised it all on Trill, the entrapment while I was fighting to get away from it, just to get joined...I thought my whole life would have been all but a waste." Her eyes squeezed tight.

This Jadzia was softer, more vulnerable without the symbiont, like she had been in younger years. Like Julian had been unintelligent as a child before his parents took him away to have everything about him enhanced. She hated being home as he hated being around his own parents, except she might miss her family unlike he. He had never known this about her, and it made him a little jealous to know she had a loving family to support her. "Was anyone in your family ever joined?" he asked.

"Not once." She shook her head, some strands of raven hair falling over her shoulder. "And they're content without it, but they're proud of me. I still talk to them sometimes, but I don't see them much anymore."

Julian nodded, looking back down at the worm on the table before him. The pain waves were subsiding, and seeing it made him partly wish that things were different with Trill physiology, that the Dax symbiont could be saved but given to another host so he could continue to get to know this unjoined Jadzia that made him love her more because she was fragile. "I have not seen my parents ever since I left home to become a doctor. We're not close. It's been a...long time since I actually had someone who...loved me."

"I don't think I ever had a love of my life, as simply Jadzia. Six lifetimes before me have, but not me myself."

He almost lost his concentration and cursed for it, to himself. He felt like something inside himself was melting more than he had all this time. The Jadzia Dax he first met and worked alongside with all this time had been so much work and expecting so much, testing him but also treating him well - he found he loved this one better, but by denying her the one thing that she fought for her whole life meant losing her. He'd be denying himself the one person he wanted all this time, too. By putting Dax back in after it was well, this Jadzia would be gone. They would be back to square three, having gone halfway around the cube already.

"Jadzia, everything I am learning about you - not the Dax I have grown to know," he added softly as the symbiont began to wriggle and show him that it was feeling a little better, "I'm going to lose this one I have gotten to know so well. I've fallen in love with this one who has so much more in common with me than I thought before."

He was looking back at her when he said this, and her face was twisting as though trying not to cry. "Julian, I love you, too. I felt like I was suffocating when you kept coming at me, but I think I was...scared at the time. But what scares me most of all is if I don't have Dax back, I'm going to lose you."

~o~

She'd said that she'd be more scared of losing him if he did not put Dax back into her upon curing it. Dying scared her in that moment he had poured his feelings for her. Julian had the heart of a warrior despite his boyish charm, the courage to save a life. Curzon enjoyed his life amongst Klingons, the challenge and history in Jadzia's blood inherited from him, but she wasn't Curzon anymore.

Days before, Julian Bashir saved her and the symbiont, but nothing much changed after she told him she needed time to think about what he told her, that she needed space. Space to think, to breathe and relax, take it like a woman. Vulnerable, unjoined Jadzia remembered melting and weeping like when she was a child who needed her parents during a storm, when Curzon humiliated her and dampened her spirits, when Verad's emotions were passed onto her, when she shoved down Joran to the recesses of her subconscious but otherwise accepted he was a part of her...

Why was she denying this part for herself? She'd gotten everything she ever dreamed of: friends, a career...adventure. And a friend and colleague was interested in her, respected her, but he also might be the first one she could ever get a shot at for true happiness. Now that Jadzia thought of it, she was missing an important part of life. She was thirty years old; how much longer would she have to find someone to share her life with?

It was late, but here she was, in her sleepwear and before Julian's quarters. She had nothing to be scared of, but what if Julian was already asleep and might get grouchy? Her hand moved alone and buzzed the door. Moments later, they opened for her to step in. There stood Julian in his sleepwear himself, the shirt drawn open to show muscled golden skin, his dark hair all over the place.

"Jadzia, this is a surprise," he said with a slight smile which faded quickly as he hurried over to her. "Is something wrong?"

"Kind of." She clasped her hands in front of her instead of behind like she would on duty. "Julian, I've been thinking about what you said that day...about us..."

His face lit up. "Jadzia -"

She held up her finger to his lips, silencing him. "You don't have to say anything. I think we both know what's going to happen next."

She moved up and pressed her lips against his, kissing him and pushing her body up against his. The impulse stemmed from Curzon, but it was also all her. Curzon had a new woman every week, the feeling the same, but it was all her. Perhaps the desire was all she could thank him for. Running away and unable to breathe made her burn in every part of her body that she was tired of trying to escape. Her hands cupped Julian's face before tracing the outlines of his ear and going up to caress his soft black hair. He felt so soft beneath her fingers that touching him made her heart pound faster than before. Her skin burned when his hands began to move, too, caressing her body and exploring her for the first time. Jadzia moaned against his mouth and swayed her hips back and forth as she pressed deeper into him.

His hands had been pausing on her hips, and now she felt her skin chill when the fabric of the bottom of her nightshirt lifted up until her entire back was bared for more of his touch. Her mouth removed itself from his as she sighed when his touch sizzled her skin. Julian's hands moved around and rubbed her firm stomach, and she jumped when she felt his fingers trace the spots on her sides. They were sensitive as the peaks of her breasts and the little flesh between her thighs which sensitized with more of her moist heat coming to the surface. She wanted Julian's fingers there, but there were more parts of her body she wanted him to touch, and she wanted to explore his, too.

"Your spots are sensitive," he said, amazed. "How far down do they go?"

She grinned and answered by pulling off her shirt. "See for yourself."

His eyes had a glaze to them that might as well match his watering mouth. Her breasts were full and pert, the dark pink tips already hard, and the spots downwards on the outside curves, continuing down south and disappearing beneath her pants, which she shoved down and answered his question. "All the way. Would it take forever to count how many exactly you have?"

Laughing, Jadzia put her hands on both hips and said, "Are you going to spend all night teasing me?"

"Me, teasing you? I think right now is the other way around!"

She motioned him over with one hand. "Then you have your turn, Doctor. Wouldn't want to keep your patient waiting, do you?"

Moments later, he was naked as she was. He had a wonderful musculature, his hips defined, and he was hard between the equally strong legs. "Mmm, Julian," she purred, walking up and running her hands over his chest, the skin smooth and moist. "So strong."

He chuckled deep and leaned down to kiss her again. "How would you like this to go?"

"You're the doctor; you know a lot about biology. You should know how to do this."

His hands were caressing her sides and their spots again, sensitizing her again before cupping her breasts and massaging them. She closed her eyes and relished it; the firm strokes and squeezes were delicious and shooting down between her throbbing thighs. She pulled him close to her again, feeling his thick length nestle against her and exciting her. Her hands caressed his strong back and firm rear end, which he was very sensitive about; she had only done that to tease him, nothing more.

"Maybe enough teasing and heading straight for the bed."

She loved his masculine talk and let him lay down first, but as it turned out, he let her take the lead only to flip her over so she was on her back and he assumed control. That was exactly what she expected: him letting her guard down and gaining the upper hand. This had now become a fun and exciting new challenge for the both of them in their newfound relationship.

Early on, I researched, the crew had the concept of a love story between Jadzia and Julian; it was simple love and at that, in which the symbiont became sick and therefore its host did as well, and Dr. Bashir had to separate them to treat the Dax symbiont. It was supposed to be then that we learn who Jadzia is as a person instead of combined with Dax, in which Julian falls in love with THAT person instead of the joined Dax he knew. But knowing how important it is in life to be joined with the symbiont, Bashir knows that by saving the symbiont and placing it back into Jadzia, he loses the one he falls in love with. It was a very touching concept, and I think it's a bummer that they never got together. I ship her and Worf, but I'm taking the departure to make sure it's her and Julian Bashir. :)

The story is also named after a composition piece of by Adrian Von Ziegler, "A Red Sun Sets".

Read and review. :D