Begin!
~Beatrice's POV
When the Queequeg arrived at Briny Beach, Bertie and I made sure to thank our friends for helping us out. Sammie insisted that the first chance I get I arrange for a check-up to make sure my baby is healthy. Something I wasn't planning to argue with; she knew better than I would. John said he sent a message to Jacques to meet us on the shore for a ride. I said goodbye to Fernald and Fiona, and Sammie agreed to help me out of the ship.
"Next time you visit, make sure it's after you have the baby. It'll make it easier to climb the ladder."
"I can see that, Sammie," I replied dryly.
Once we were out of the submarine at last Sammie followed us onto shore. I saw Bertie gazing thoughtfully at the water for a minute.
"What's wrong, honey?"
"I was just wondering where our boat might have ended up," He said sheepishly.
"Oh don't worry about that," Sammie answered, "The tides will carry it to shore somewhere. Though you'll probably never see it again." I suppose she was right.
"Thank you for everything."
"You're welcome, Bea. And make sure to let me know in advance when your due date is, because I don't want to miss meeting your kid."
I sighed, "Sammie before we go, please tell us what we're having? I know that you know!"
Sammie smiled. "I don't want to ruin it for you."
Bertie groaned. "Sammie!"
"I'm serious, don't you want it to be a surprise?"
"Well for a while we did, but now that we have the ability to know I'd appreciate it if you told us…" I replied.
Sammie continued smiling and shook her head. She wasn't going to tell us. Well… it was worth one last try.
"Ah, your ride's here," She noted looking past us at the taxi that just pulled up.
Bertie and I gave Sammie goodbye hugs and walked off to meet Jacques while she climbed back into her submarine.
"Bea, Bertrand, I'm so happy to see you're back!" Jacques greeted us with a smile. He blinked in surprise at my maternal state. "And you have some interesting news for everyone when you get home, I see."
We got into the taxi with him and started the long ride back to headquarters.
"How are Kit and Lemony," Bertie asked.
"Kit is still going strong with Dewey; I'm glad to see he makes her happy. And Lemony recently got married. He married his old flame Moxie in Stain'd By The Sea. I was his best man; I'm sorry you couldn't have been there. He had planned to have you meet some of his old friends from his apprenticeship days."
"I'm sure it was a lovely ceremony, and I can always meet them another time" I replied, "I'm glad that Moxie makes him happy. Speaking of which, you should think about settling down sometime. I can think of more than a few female volunteers who'd like to have a chance with V.F.D.'s current most eligible bachelor."
Jacques chuckled. "You sound like my sister."
That wasn't an entirely inaccurate description. Jacques has always been like an older brother to me, even before I dated Lemony.
"So you two got married then?"
One reason why I couldn't wait for the baby to get here was so we could get married. That question was embarrassing. We lived in a different time, that's all I'll say. If my mother were alive, she'd have similar notions about our situation. It was uncommon to say the least. I could only hope that Ike and Hector wouldn't have similar opinions.
"We're engaged but, um, the baby... came first…"
I saw Jacques nod understandingly in the rear view mirror. "It happens sometimes. Though I'm sure Lemony will take the news well. After all, he's been understanding through everything else that's happened."
I smiled, "I hope so…"
One long car ride later and we were dropped off at the headquarters, using the underground garage entrance. It was a strange feeling being back in the headquarters after so long. And the curious stares I got from some of the people around the area were already getting to me a little.
Of course the first thing we did was try to go check in with the Duchess to let her know we were back, albeit if one of us is "unfit for duty." Turns out she wasn't here today due to a meeting, and had left Jacqueline temporarily in charge. (To which she was happy to see us.) She assured us that her mother would be informed of our arrival. And Jacqueline was nice enough not to say much about my pregnancy. She was a bit too busy to pay it any mind at the moment, but she did mention she was happy for us.
Once that was done we made our way to the headquarters flats. Bertie and I had a toss up about who to visit first, my family or our friends. Regrettably, Bertie was also an orphan like many in our organization and he had no siblings so we had no one to visit on his side. That was one reason why he and Quinten were so close; the Quagmire family had treated him like one of their own when he had nothing else.
Ultimately, we decided that seeing Ike was a better option first.
Once we reached his flat number, I turned to Bertie with a smile. "Are you ready?"
"As I'll ever be," He replied nervously. "I mean he likes me fine, but… this is a different situation entirely…"
And so I knocked on the door. Within moments, we were greeted by my sister-in-law Josephine.
"Bea!" She shouted, grabbing me in a tight hug. "I was wondering when we'd see you again!"
"It's nice to see you Josie," I said after catching my breath.
She gave Bertrand an equally enthusiastic hug and then ushered us inside. "We got your telegram and since you didn't say when you'd be back, we were worried when you'd actually be here. Ike! Ike, Bea's back!"
I heard some scrambling from the other room and Ike came rushing in. He grinned widely at me and quickly enveloped me in a hug.
"I missed you, sis," He said, quickly wiping his eyes.
"I missed you too, big brother," I smiled slyly, "Notice anything different about me…?"
Ike and Josie took a second glance at my appearance and I watched their eyes go wide.
"You're… You…" Ike stammered.
Josie squealed. "I'm gonna be an aunt!"
I saw Ike's gaze drift behind me to Bertrand. Bertie smiled sheepishly, remembering why he was nervous about being around when we told my family. I saw a hell-fire start up in my brother's eyes. I quickly stepped between him and Bertie to avoid the inevitable yelling.
"Now Ike please, I love Bertrand very much and yes we are having a baby. We're even engaged! I'd appreciate it if you'd be a little more supportive!"
"Oh Ike, baby, you need to calm down! I thought you'd be happy to be an uncle," Josie said.
"Well I- I mean I am but…"
"It's not grammatically correct to end a sentence with 'but.' So you're happy, then be happy!"
This seemed to calm him down. Josephine had a weird obsession with grammar, specifically proper grammar. It was the other thing that she and Ike had in common besides being dare-devils.
"So… what is it," Ike asked, "And what's the due date?"
"We don't know the answer to either of those exactly yet, but it happened sometime in July so I'm going to guess my due date is in April. As for the gender, we don't know."
We had more pressing matters to discuss though. The four of us sat down and Bertie and I explained where we had been all this time. I had to apologize profusely for us crashing Ike's boat, and for not letting him know where I was immediately. He didn't care, he could always get another boat. They explained that they knew we were alive because Karrie told them. (I'll have to thank her for that too.) We then told them that the apples were ready for distribution. Ike was particularly happy to hear this news.
"Do you have the formula with you," Ike asked.
"No, I left it on the island with someone I trust. It was too dangerous to keep."
"That's good; we need all the discretion we can get. In a volatile situation like this everything could blow up if those plans fell into the wrong hands."
I agreed wholeheartedly. We spent the rest of the visit talking about our personal future plans. They mentioned that they were planning on building their own house out on Lake Lachrymose, one of their favorite places. I made a mental note to not let them babysit after Josie said the spot they chose for their "dream home" was situated on the edge of a 300 foot cliff. Not to mention I never liked going to Lake Lachrymose myself, it was invested with man-eating leeches. My brother and his wife only found these concerns more exciting so to each their own.
"Oh come now, Bea, we're not brain-dead! We'd never let anything dangerous happen to our little nibling," Josie said smiling.
"Nibling," Bertie said quizzically.
"That's a gender neutral term for niece or nephew," She explained. "Not too many people use it, but since we don't know what you're having it's the most appropriate description."
Of course a grammar freak like Josie would know words that we don't.
"Ike, we should set up a time to go visit Hector soon. I want him to see the good news," I said.
"We can do that; it'll be hard though. That village he and his mom live in recently passed a new law about mechanical devices, so we can't call him."
"...Why," Bertie asked.
"I haven't the faintest idea."
Upon finishing our visit with Ike and Josie we said our goodbyes, and went to find Quinten's flat; he used to share it with Bertie as his roommate before we left. It wasn't a hard guess to say that Karrie would most likely be with him, and had possibly started living there already. Once we found their door I knocked in a very specific way to show who I was, something that we used to do as children together.
The door opened almost instantly and I was greeted by my best friend in the whole world.
"BEA!"
"Karrie, you would not believe how much we have to tell you."
~End of Chapter!
