As soon as they entered their quarters, the pair separated, with Kathryn heading for the replicator and Beverly for her bedroom.
Stepping into her closet, Beverly reached up to the unlabelled box that lay on the highest shelf, carefully lifting it down and placing it on her bed. Opening it up, Beverly gently pulled out the brown leather photo album that lay within.
Returning to the living area, Beverly watched Kathryn placing steaming bowls of pasta onto the table for a moment before smiling and heading over.
"Looks delicious, though considering some of the food you've tried to feed me in the past perhaps I should grab my tricorder first." Beverly teased lightly, beaming at the smile that her gentle taunt evoked from her daughter.
"Hey you can't talk, I still remember those home-made cookies you brought over the first week you were visiting after I came home. I've never seen Mom throw food away so quickly before. Phoebe said that she thought she was even going to declare it a bio-hazard."
"Don't get too cheeky with me young lady, don't forget I still owe you one, are you really wanting to increase that to two?" Beverly asked, quirking an eyebrow challengingly.
"Ok, Ok I give, I give. We both suck at cooking, how's that?"
"Not exactly what I was going for but I'll let it go for now."
"So what's that?" Kathryn asked, gesturing with her fork towards the book that Beverly was carrying.
"This is our family photo album. I was thinking that once we've finished eating we can look at some of the photos and I can share some of our stories."
"I'd like that."
An hour later the pair were sat on the sofa looking through the photos together.
"So this is your first official photo." Beverly explained, gesturing towards a 3-D sonogram picture that held pride of place on the first page of the album. "I was about three months gone when I actually realised I was pregnant," Beverly shrugged at Kathryn's look of amazement, "I know I know, you'd think a Doctor would know better, my only excuse was that I was rather stressed and distracted at the time."
For a while, the pair continued to look through the pictures, the occasional laugh or question arising as the pictures showed Beverly's bump continuing to grow. At one picture, Kathryn actually laughed out loud and Beverly turned to glare at her unrepentant child.
'I'll have you know that being pregnant brings with it some interesting cravings, where do you think your love of coffee comes from?" Beverly defended, the page open to a photo of Beverly feasting on coffee ice cream, chocolate expresso beans and expresso syrup. "Just be glad I was responsible enough to avoid drinking the coffee liqueur." She joked, before turning to the next page. "Oh now here we go. These were taken on the day that you were born. Little scamp that you were, you had me in slow labour for two and a half days and then when you finally deigned to come out, you were back to back. The Doctors were slightly mystified considering you had been in a perfect position up until then. You must have turned around the time that I went into labour and since once I got going there were no real issues, we didn't know until it was too late. Lucky for us though, you were a dinky little thing and so I could push you out without any major problems." Beverly smiled and then pointed at the next image. "So this picture is our first group shot, just you and me. Nana took it, she said even if I felt like a mess, I'd regret not having that picture in the long term." Beverly ran her finger over the delicate features of the baby in the photo and then lifted her eyes to look at her now grown up child. "She was right, I would have."
Turning back to the photos, Beverly sighed,
"You were so quiet, just staring at me as though you were trying to figure me out. I remember wondering about how such a calm and contented baby could have come from me. Ooh but then, then you screamed and I realised that as calm as you might seem on the surface, below that was a temper just like mine. To be brutally honest it reassured me, to know that there was something of me in you, because up until that moment all I had seen was your father."
Kathryn smiled at that, for even she had noticed that the resemblance to Picard was uncanny when she was first born.
As the pair continued to look through the photos, Kathryn began to quieten until the questions and comments ceased completely causing Beverly to turn to her in concern.
"Are you alright?"
"Yeah, I just…" Kathryn hesitated, swallowing as she fought back tears, "I guess as much as you've helped me recently, I still thought that you'd maybe not wanted me, that perhaps I was simply a mistake."
Hearing Kathryn's devastating confession, Beverly instantly put the book aside and pulled her into a warm hug,
"Oh no, my little one, never ever think that you weren't wanted. I admit that I was little scared when I first found out, but that was more about what kind of parent I would be, not the fact that I was having a child. I was worried about being a good mom, and things like that but I was so excited to meet you and when you got here, it was amazing. You were so perfect, a delicate little faerie with the temper of a raging bull," Beverly briefly squeezed her tighter, "You were and are my everything. My new beginning, my yellow rose." Beverly pulled back and gently pushed back a lock of Kathryn's hair, smiling lovingly at her. "The reasons I had for giving you up were never about me not wanting you. If I could have kept you with me, believe me when I say, I would have in a heartbeat. We were a team, you and I, us against the world, I used to say."
"Then why?" Kathryn pleaded.
"To protect you." Beverly stated simply.
"Protect me? Protect me from what?"
"Not from what but from whom," Beverly corrected.
"Not…" Kathryn stumbled, suddenly wondering if there was more to her parents' separation than she had first believed. Beverly quickly pulled her daughter close again, and Kathryn snuggled into her mother's embrace seeking out the comfort that was being offered.
"No, of course not. Your father is a peaceful man, and he never knew about you, and even if he had, he would never have been angry, not at me, and certainly not at you. No the threat came from another man."
Nearly twenty-one years earlier…
"Ok this is getting ridiculous, seriously little one you need to stop using my bladder as a soccer ball." Beverly groused, glaring down at her eight month pregnant belly. However rather than a cessation of movement, her voice instead seemed to incite a round of even more energetic movement, leading Beverly to groan again. "Right that's it, let's go take a walk, maybe that will calm you down," and with that Beverly stood up and started moving towards the cafe entrance. As she moved closer, she accidentally bumped into a man with her belly, and keeping her head down in embarrassment at her clumsiness, Beverly apologised, before quickly exiting, never noticing the angry expression that flashed across the face of the man, who had turned to watch her leave.
Present time.
"His name was Jack Crusher and at the time I didn't even recognise him. We were never more than passing acquaintances although it was through him that I met your father. He'd been pestering me for a date and I had been considering accepting, if only to stop him asking, but when I met your father, well, Jack never stood a chance after that, as soon as I saw him, I knew he was the one."
"Jeese, enough with the mushy stuff, Mama," Kathryn murmured from the depths of Beverly's lap, where she had laid down during the story, although from her teasing tone, Beverly could tell that in reality she was probably relieved to hear how her mother, at least had felt about their relationship.
"Anyway, like I said, at the time I didn't recognise him, which made sense since it had been over two years since I'd last seen him last and obviously we hadn't been that close. What I didn't realise was the extent of the issues that Jack had with Jean-Luc, the anger and absolute hatred that he held against him and by extension, me." Beverly paused and took a deep breath. The emotions linked to the next portion of the story threatening to overwhelm her.
"I didn't see Jack again until over a month and a half later."
Starfleet Academy, Twenty-years ago…
"So that's Picard's bastard is it?" A scornful voice asked from behind Beverly, who had been stood showing Kathryn the yellow roses that were once again in bloom and held such meaning for her. Instinctively pulling her baby closer, Beverly turned slowly to face the source of the aggressive voice.
"Hello Beverly," the man greeted tauntingly. "How have you been?" Beverly stared at the man, confused by his familiarity with both her and Jean-Luc, even as he remained a stranger to her. Eventually after examining his features for several moments, Beverly suddenly placed him.
"Jack Crusher?" She asked in surprise.
"Oh now she remembers me. Didn't seem to even notice me the last time we bumped into each other."
"Bumped into each other? I haven't seen you in over two years." Beverly responded, stepping back and away from the man.
"I guess old Johnny boy has rubbed off on you more than I expected," Jack snapped, "He was always such an arrogant self absorbed bastard, walking around with his nose in the air, convinced that he knew what was best for everyone. Never expected that you would end up being the same, but I guess having his child has made you feel like you're better than the rest of us mere mortals. You certainly seemed to think that when I bumped into you at that cafe."
"Cafe?" Beverly murmured, trying to remember the encounter.
"Yeah, there you were, fat as a whale, talking to yourself and then you wouldn't even look at me when you bumped into me. That hurt, Beverly, that really hurt."
"Well I'm very sorry for upsetting you, however if you will excuse me, we have to go. We can only stay outside for so long." Beverly explained, gesturing in the direction of her apartment with the hand that had been cradling Kathryn's head against her, before taking another step away from Jack.
"Now, now, don't be rushing off. We were just having a friendly conversation after all, no need to get all funny and talk about leaving." Jack placated, although his expression was twisted into a cruel sneer. "You know I expected better of you, Beverly. It was bad enough when you went off with Picard, although I guess I could understand that really. I mean Picard had a higher rank than me and sleeping with him would definitely help your career, but to have his kid, what is up with that?"
"I'm not going to even dignify such a statement with a response, you sick bastard." Beverly snapped angrily. "I think its best if you just leave, Jack, now."
"Oh come on, Bevs, ditch the kid and I'll show you what a real man is like. Picard's gone, he'll never know." Beverly stared at the man stood before her in disgust, but before she had the chance to comment, or do something drastic, another voice interrupted.
"I believe the lady said no." Boothby rasped, as he walked through his rose bushes and came to stand beside her.
"This ain't none of your business, old man. Me and the lady were just chatting and so I suggest you get lost." Jack threatened, moving towards the pair.
"I don't think so." Boothby countered and then without a second thought, he tapped his combadge, calling for security, at which point, Jack took one last look at Beverly and quickly bolted.
Present time.
"I thanked Boothby, and took you straight home. I don't think I put you down that entire evening. I just needed to hold you, to know that we were safe."
"That wasn't the end of it though, was it?" Kathryn guessed, instinctively knowing that such a small scare would not have been enough to convince her mother to give her up.
"No, no it wasn't. Over the next month, I kept getting messages from Jack. They ranged from simply asking me to date him, to horrible messages about Jean-Luc, me, and even you." Beverly shivered as she remembered the fear that would fill her every time she received a new message. "After a month though, the messages suddenly stopped. Stupidly I thought that it was over. I'd informed Starfleet after the first few messages and so I hoped that the messages stopping was a sign that maybe they had found him. I was wrong."
Twenty-years ago…
"Now you're sure that you don't mind watching her?" Beverly asked again, still cradling Kathryn close rather than handing her to Mia, her words and action causing Mia to roll her eyes in affectionate amusement.
"Actually you're right, in the last thirty seconds since you last asked I have changed my mind and refuse to watch your daughter. After all if she's anything like her mother, how will I get any peace tonight?" Mia teased. "Seriously Beverly, go have a nice meal with your Nana, we'll be right here when you get back, won't we little munchkin? Who's looking forward to having a quiet evening in with her auntie Mia hey?" She cooed at the quiet baby lying in her mother's arms.
Beverly rolled her eyes at her friend's antics, before reluctantly handing the baby over.
"Ok fine, but if you need me I'm only a com badge call away. Nana and I are just going to that little Italian place down the road."
"I know, I know, you've only told me like six times, written it down and added it to the calendar on our computers, trust me I know where you're going to be. Now get going or you're going to miss your reservation." Mia stated shoeing her friend one-handed out the door.
"Ok, I'm going, I'm going. Bye my little love. Mommy will be back soon." And pressing a gentle kiss to Kathryn's forehead, Beverly turned and left the apartment.
"Mia to Beverly.. Beverly… help…" The communication shut off abruptly and Beverly stared at her grandmother in horror before leaping to her feet and sprinting for the door. Felissa followed only a moment later, having paused to ask a passing waitress to call for security to meet them at Beverly's apartment.
Beverly, meanwhile, was already halfway to her apartment, her mind focussed on one thing, getting back to her baby. Forgoing the lift, Beverly ran for the stairs and sprinted up them as fast as she could.
She stumbled to a halt, as she entered her floor and saw her door standing open. Debris was clearly visible, spilling out into the corridor from Beverly's apartment and her heart stopped at the sight, terror filling her at the thought of what that might mean.
"Mia, Mia?" She screamed as she raced into her home, searching everywhere for her friend. Not finding her in the living, she sprinted for the nursery, praying desperately that she would find her friend and daughter inside.
Upon entering the room, however, her worst fears were confirmed as she saw her friend's body lying crumpled on the floor and her baby's crib overturned next to her.
"No… please no." Frantically she began searching the room for her child, although in her heart she knew the truth, her daughter was gone and as the reality of the situation hit her, Beverly collapsed to the floor.
By the time that Felissa arrived at the apartment, Starfleet Security officers were already inside. Quickly flashing her own identity card and confirming that it was her granddaughter's home, Felissa entered the destroyed space, her heart skipping a beat at the violence which had to have occurred to have caused such damage.
Choosing to ignore the devastation for now, Felissa continued on through to the Nursery nervously wondering what she would find there. As she entered the room though, she faltered. The destruction of the rest of the apartment seemed minimal in comparison to the damage done to this room, and in the centre of it sat her granddaughter, her arms wrapped around her legs and her eyes staring vacantly ahead.
"Oh Beverly." Felissa gasped, knowing that only one thing could have caused such a reaction in her granddaughter, Kathryn was gone.
Felissa Howard was known for being a kind and loving person but right now as she stared at the empty shell that was her granddaughter, Felissa could have happily killed the person who stole her great-granddaughter. In the four days that had passed since the home invasion and subsequent kidnapping, there had been no sign of the baby and she knew that Starfleet Security were starting to wonder whether it was even possible that Kathryn was still alive. Felissa resisted the urge to scream as she considered the injustice of the situation, the sadistic cruelty of the person who had done this and the pain that was filling her as she watched her granddaughter slowly kill herself. Beverly had barely eaten in the days that had followed the kidnapping and Felissa knew that if hadn't been for the sedatives that the medical personnel had slipped her the previous day, then she wouldn't have slept either.
Felissa gazed into the nursery where Beverly sat clutching a small stuffed panda to her chest, staring at the empty crib which should have held her baby.
It had been that stuffed panda that had finally broken Beverly. As the officers had combed through the room for clues, they had unearthed the toy from what had been the changing table. As soon as she seen it, Beverly had snatched it from the officer and started rambling.
"She hasn't got Jeffrey, they took her, but left behind Jeffrey. How will she sleep without him? He's her favourite toy, she needs him. She's with some stranger and she doesn't even have Jeffrey to comfort her."
Even remembering the words made Felissa's eyes start to well up. She had never felt so useless before, unable to help or even soothe her granddaughter's pain. Instead she had been forced to watch as her granddaughter slipped away, hiding behind a mask, locked away in her own pain.
Briefly, Felissa had wondered whether she should contact Kathryn's father, if only to provide Beverly with someone who might better understand her grief. However when she began investigating his whereabouts she discovered that he was on a deep space assignment, and Felissa had come to the conclusion that trying to contact him may lead to more problems than solutions. In addition to the distance, whatever support he might have been able to provide Beverly, may have been lost in his own anger or terror regarding the child he knew nothing about, who was now missing.
Leaving her grand-daughter alone, Felissa returned to the living room, idly picking up the PADD that had been delivered a few hours earlier, once again paging through the updated report on the search for Kathryn.
So far every lead that they had followed had lead to a dead end. Mia's attacker had struck from behind, having bypassed security protocols and gaining entry to the apartment, without anyone being alerted to their presence. From there, they were then able to steal the child and get away before Beverly made it home. There had been no traceable evidence left behind and beyond the messages that Beverly had been receiving prior to the incident, there was no hint of who the attacker might be. Beverly had remained convinced that Jack Crusher was the kidnapper but an alibi placed him on the other side of San Francisco at the time of the attack, and so although Starfleet Security had remained suspicious, they had to start considering other options.
Sitting down at the dining room table, Felissa dropped her head into her hands, allowing some of her pent up tears to fall as she wondered whether there was any chance that she might see her great-granddaughter again.
Present time.
"Late on the afternoon of the fourth day after you had been taken, a woman walked into a nearby hospital with a baby that she claimed was hers. The baby was quite ill and the doctors were instantly on alert, especially once they started asking her specific questions about the child and she failed to answer any of them."
"So she was the one who took me?" Kathryn asked, her brow scrunched up in confusion.
"No, she was just a devastated woman who found a baby and tried to take care of it. Turns out she had lost her own baby a few months before and when she found you lying in a ditch, she thought it was a second chance. But when she took you home, you were already so ill that you couldn't take any of the bottles that she tried to give you and eventually, terrified that she was losing another child, she took you to a hospital. She was a woman lost in her own grief but she tried to look after you."
"So who?"
"A few days after you were found, a single black rose was delivered to the apartment. It had no signature but the message attached to it was enough. I knew who had come after us."
"So was that when you decided to give me away?"
"No. Whilst you were still in the hospital recovering, Starfleet Security came to see me. Since the threat against us was still real, they offered to put us into protective custody, and give us a new life, and initially I accepted. A few days later, however, our apartment was broken into again and another message was left in your crib and I realised that as long as you were with me, even if we were given a new life, you would never be safe as long as he was free. He would keep hunting us, and he knew that you were more important to me than anything else, so you would always be a target, so I changed the plan."
Beverly wiped away the tears that were now streaming down her cheeks and taking a deep breath she began the final part of her story.
"I informed Starfleet that whilst I would take the offer of protective custody another option had to be found for you. We eventually decided that the safest thing was for Kathryn Howard to disappear. So over the next couple of weeks, we allowed certain details to leak out. It was easy really, the press had been following the story since the moment you were taken and even after I got you back, they still wanted updates. These leaks suggested that you were succumbing to your injuries, when in reality you were once again proving what a strong little girl you were by recovering quickly. Finally a report was released that you had… that you had…" Beverly stumbled over those final terrible words and broke down into painful sobs, the memories of those days and weeks overwhelming her completely.
Kathryn quickly sat up and wrapped her arms around her mother.
"Thank you for telling me." She murmured into her ear and then tightening her grip, she whispered. "I love you, Mama."
"I love you too, so much." Beverly whimpered, holding her daughter tighter, relishing in the knowledge that whatever else might happen in the days ahead her daughter was safe and back in her life.
So a nice long chapter for you all. We're now heading into areas where I have been doing the most editing and shifting of the story so from this point on I'm never going to promise to post by a deadline, not that I seem to have met them so far, sorry about that. I will still try and post at least once a week but can't guarantee the day. Thanks for all of you who have read and stuck with me so far, we're heading into the good stuff now. Toodles A xxxxx