Chapter 12

"Deanna! What the hell was that?!" Beverly was still staring dumbfounded at Troi long after the captain had escaped into the turbolift. She wasn't sure if she was mad, surprised, amused, or impressed… Maybe all of the above.

"That was the ship's counselor getting the ship's captain to go to sickbay without a fight," Troi said matter of factly.

"Well yes, but…" Crusher was still at a loss for words, mouth agape and eyebrows up in utter disbelief.

"And it was me saying something that has needed to be said for about twenty years."

"What?"

"Oh, come on, Beverly. It's not like it's a secret. Nearly everyone on this ship knows you two have a special relationship."

"Well yes, but…!"

"And I think his feelings for you have something to do with his irrational behavior. You can be angry if you want, but I think I just confirmed my suspicions on the root of all this."

"And put me in an awkward situation!" Crusher finally managed to choke out.

"And for that, I apologize. But you have to admit, it defused the situation and quite possibly has the captain understanding what is happening to him."

Crusher was still blinking in surprise. Sure, she and Picard had feelings for each other. They had been attracted to each other from the first day they met, but they had come to a nonverbal understanding that their relationship was to remain totally on a friendship basis. There were times when both of them wished there could be more, but neither spoke of it. Maybe it was fear that speaking of the desire would ruin the comfortable friendship they had. Maybe it was cowardice. Maybe they were just used to the status quo. Again, it was probably a combination of all of those. But now that Troi had broken the taboo, something would happen. Exactly what, Crusher didn't know.

"Well, if he really went to sickbay, I should be there," said Crusher distractedly and headed towards the turbolift. "You coming?" she turned to ask Troi as an afterthought.

"No, I want to see if he'll talk to you. Now that he's thinking about his feelings for you, he may be more willing to tell you what's going on. I'll be a distraction."

"You're a distraction all right," Crusher said as she entered the turbolift. When she turned to face the closing door, Troi saw a small grin on her face.

The captain had indeed gone to sickbay where he sat morosely on a biobed looking at the floor and cradling his right hand. When Crusher entered sickbay, Nurse Ogawa met her at the door.

"The captain's here waiting on you, Doctor," she said in a private voice. She glanced back at the brooding patient. "He wouldn't say much other than that you were expecting him and he'd wait on you."

"Thanks, Alyssa," said Crusher. "I'll call you if I need you."

"Yes, Doctor." Ogawa made a discrete exit, thankful Crusher was there to handle the moody captain. The other nurses who had been working in the room also cleared out quietly. They knew something was up.

Crusher took a deep breath and walked over to the biobed. Picard didn't look up until she touched him on the shoulder. "Jean Luc?"

He didn't jump at her touch but instead just took a deep breath and sighed it out slowly. When he finally looked up at her, she realized that he had been looking at the floor to hide the fact that he had been crying. His normally clear hazel eyes were bloodshot and tired, but his gaze was almost serene. He didn't say anything, but his look spoke volumes. Something had changed.

"Jean Luc, I'm concerned about you."

"I know." He grinned a sad half-grin and let his gaze fall. "So am I."

"Can you tell me what happened to you in the holodeck?" Her voice was soothing with no judgment in it.

He looked at the floor for a moment more and lifted his gaze to meet hers. "I broke my hand."

Crusher finally noticed his swollen and bruised right hand and the gentle way he was supporting it on his lap. "Let me see." She tenderly took his hand in hers and scanned it with her medical scanner. "You sure did," she said shaking her head. "Three fractured proximal phalanges… You've got to stop hitting things."

He managed a small smile. "I know."

"Wait here." She walked to a cabinet and retrieved a bone regenerator and hypospray. Picard remained sitting sedately on the biobed, looking at the floor.

"How did you break your hand?" she asked when she returned.

"By being a foolish man."

"What exactly does that mean?"

"It means that I thought that hitting a hologram of a Cardassian would help me…"

"The safety protocols should have kept you from breaking your hand," she said confused.

"I disengaged them."

"You what?"

"I disengaged the protocols."

"And What did you hope to accomplish by doing that?" she asked incredulously.

"I guess I hoped it would help me overcome the intense anger I've been feeling…but all it accomplished was breaking my hand…and showing me…" He trailed off, his facial muscles betraying his fight for emotional control.

"Showing you what?" She used the hypospray to inject him with an analgesic and then began to heal Picard's broken bones. She was careful to avoid holding his wrist.

His brows furrowed in determination. "…Showing me that I've become the very thing I despise."

Crusher looked up from her work. She could see fresh tears in his eyes threatening to spill onto his cheeks. It broke her heart. She could see from the strain around his eyes that he was choked with his emotions, so she focused intently on his hand, giving him and herself time to loosen the knots in their throats. After a few more moments, she said, "OK, this should do it. Your hand will be stiff for a few days, but there won't be any lasting effects." She stowed her medical tools to their proper locations and returned to stand in front of her patient. He opened and closed his hand a few times and then returned it to his lap.

"Thank you," he said quietly, looking at his healed hand.

"You're welcome."

Finally, Picard lifted his eyes to hers. "Beverly, we need to talk."

"Yes, we do." At last, he was allowing a crack of light through the wall he had built around himself. Beverly didn't dare push him for fear he would once again retreat into himself…into whatever hell he was reliving in his mind.

"There are a great many things I need to tell you…some that I fear will… alter our friendship forever." This was difficult for him. He took a deep breath. "…some things about which I feel a great deal of shame…"

Beverly put her hand on his uninjured one and squeezed reassuringly. "Jean Luc, I've always been here for you, and I always will."

He nodded but hesitated. "But this is not the proper place. Will you come to my quarters?"

Crusher assessed him for a moment. He seemed clear-headed, almost the man she knew before the incident with the Cardassians…but she couldn't ignore the fact that he had been nearly out of his mind less than an hour before. It was her duty to determine if his behavior was the result of more than emotional trauma. But she also couldn't ignore his willingness to truly talk to her. It was time to compromise. "And after we talk… then you'll come back to sickbay for a full diagnostic? No argument?"

"I'll come back to sickbay with no argument." He was totally compliant, a polar opposite change from how he had been only half an hour before.

"All right," Crusher said.

Picard produced another half grin and slid onto his feet off the biobed. "Thank you." He put his hand on the small of her back to guide her towards the door. He rarely did that unless he was completely at ease. Beverly went along with it, still bemused at the change in the man.

He didn't say anything as they strolled to his quarters. Crusher could tell that he was lost in thought, but he seemed almost at peace with whatever had happened to him.

When they reached his quarters, he entered his access code and the doors slid open. "Please," he said offering for Crusher to enter first. The first thing she noticed when she entered his quarters was that things were a mess. She had never seen his quarters in anything other than pristine shape, clean and orderly, but there was work piled on his desk, dirty clothing on the floor, and empty tea cups scattered around the room. "Pardon the mess," he said apologetically. "I haven't really been myself."

"It's OK," Crusher said and sat down on the couch.

"Would you like something?" he asked her as he went to the replicator.

"Water would be fine, thank you."

He turned to the replicator. "Water, cold….Tea, Earl Grey hot." Both beverages materialized, and took them off of the replicator pad. Carrying them over to the couch, he handed Crusher her water and then sat down next to her on the couch. He gently placed his cup of tea on the coffee table and stared into the steam rising from the hot liquid.

Crusher took a sip of the water, letting Picard gather his thoughts. The fact that he had sat next to her instead of across from her was telling in his desire to unload whatever was haunting him. She didn't have to be an empath to feel the waves of emotions roiling off of him and filling the room with a loaded silence.

After another moment, Picard let out a resolute sigh and turned to face Crusher. "Beverly, I really don't know where to begin."

"Take your time," she soothed.

He nodded slightly, pursing his lips in thought. "There are things that I didn't tell you about my experience with the Cardassians," he said. "…Things about which I am deeply ashamed."

"Tell me what happened."

He furrowed his brow and swallowed. "I told you that they convinced me that they had killed Worf and captured you…"

Crusher nodded, "Yes."

"What I didn't tell you… was that there was one time when Madred had finally let me sleep. I don't know how long it had been since I had last slept…it seemed like days. I was so tired..." He trailed off in thought. "And I had this dream. It was as vivid and real as this is right now. I dreamed that I got up off the floor of the room where they were keeping me and walked through a large wooden door into my boyhood home in Labarre." He grinned at the warm memory. "Everyone was there…my family, my Enterprise family…." He put his hand on hers and squeezed, looking at her with affection. "We were having this feast. It smelled so good. I was so hungry…" Looking into her eyes, he continued, "And you were there sitting beside me. You were happy and safe, and it felt so natural to have you there." He smiled, remembering the joy he felt. "I didn't want it to end…but of course it did…and I was back on the cold floor, hurting."

Beverly listened feeling the knot forming in her throat again and tears welling in her eyes.

"When he woke me up, he told me that I could go; that they didn't need me anymore. I didn't believe him, but I also wanted desperately to escape…so I got up and had just about made it to the door when he told me that he was going to start torturing you for information now that I was leaving." At that point, Picard's voice cracked and he cleared his throat. "I couldn't let that happen so I chose to stay with him. I thought that if I could hold on until the Enterprise found us, you would be spared."

Beverly couldn't say anything as her throat constricted with emotion. A single tear rolled down her cheek and she wiped it away. She was honored by his bravery, stunned, heart-broken… "Oh my God, Jean Luc."

He shook his head emphatically, seeing that she was about to thank him. "I'm not telling you this for you to thank me. No, it just makes what happened next even more shameful." His jaw was set as he prepared himself. He looked at the floor again, his face contorting as he fought to stay in control.

"Jean Luc, what happened?"

He looked up at her with tears in his eyes. His voice strained against his grief. "I chose to protect you… and then at the end, I chose to give you up. He kept asking me how many lights I saw. I knew there were four...there had always been four..., but I could see five. And if I told him there were five, then the torture would stop. And I was going to tell him." His words were tumbling out of him now as if the dam had broken. "I was going to tell him anything to make it stop." The tears fell one after another onto his cheeks. "If his superior hadn't come in when he did...the second that he did… I would have said it." Anguish filled his eyes as he looked at her, confessing his despicable sin.

"Jean Luc…"

He wasn't finished. "What Deanna said was the truth. I do love you. I always have. And it kills my soul to think that I would have given you up to that monster. How can I live with myself? How can I look at you now and not think that I would have given you to them just to save myself?"

"Jean Luc, it's not your fault. You were starving and drugged and…"

He cut her off, shaking his head, "No. Let me finish. There's more you should know. You asked me what happened on the holodeck…" He took a deep breath and let it out slowly, composing himself. "I went to the holodeck with murder on my mind. I wanted to kill that man with my bare hands. But I also wouldn't have minded if he had killed me either. That's why I disengaged the safety protocols."

"What stopped you?" she asked quietly.

"Something totally unexpected happened. I told the computer to pick any Cardassian soldier it had on file as a template for the soldier I wanted to kill." He almost chuckled to himself at the irony. "And it picked a descent man." He shook his head. "I asked the computer who LaVek was after I left you and Deanna..., and he was one of the founders of the Cardassian/Federation Peace Treaty; a man not very different than how I used to be." Picard paused, letting the cruel irony sink in. "I have generated so much hate and rage at what those few Cardassians did to me that I began to hate all Cardassians. And I thought that I could get my revenge on those few men by killing another of their race." He looked at her with profound sadness. "I have become the very person who perpetuates racial hatred and bigotry. I am that person I have fought to overcome most of my life. I am no better than any of the racist humans throughout history…and I would give up the woman I love just to save myself..." He let the statement hang in the air before he could no longer bear to look at her and returned his gaze to the floor.

Crusher finally understood the depth of his grief. The Cardassians had shattered the foundation upon which he governed his very life. They had used her to break him whether she was their captive or not… whether he was still in their custody or not. He had lived his life with integrity, dignity, selflessness, and respect only to have all of it turned on its head in one fell swoop. The magnitude of the injury was devastating. There was only one thing she could do.

Beverly reached up and gently used her hand to turn his face towards hers. Bringing her other hand up to cup his face, she pulled him towards her and kissed him gently on the lips. He resisted the kiss and pulled away, but she continued to cup his face in her hands. "Beverly, don't."

"Jean Luc, I can feel how ashamed you are of yourself, but you shouldn't be."

"No, don't"

"Listen to me. You went through something that no person should ever have to endure. I honestly don't know how you survived it. I know that I couldn't have. And I am honored that you protected me."

"I didn't."

"You did. And even though you think you somehow betrayed me, you didn't. You are the bravest, most noble man I have ever known, and nothing will ever change that." She could feel more tears welling in her eyes as her heart swelled in her chest. She had never loved him more than at that moment. She smiled at the silliness of not saying it… "I love you too."

Relief and love washed over him when she said it. He couldn't help but smile between her hands. And when she pulled him close to kiss him again, he didn't resist. He returned the kiss, bringing his hands up to her hair. They parted and gazed at each other. "I don't know what to say," he said smiling. He had expected her to react to his behavior with the same revulsion that he did. But it had the total opposite effect.

"Jean Luc Picard, you are a good man who went through a very bad experience. I trust you and know that you would give your life for anyone under your command without a second thought. You didn't break."

"I was going to."

"But you didn't." She looked at him squarely in the eye. "You didn't."

She leaned forward again and kissed him. He responded intensely, pulling her close and deepening the kiss.

Captain's Personal Log Stardate 46389.2. It has been nearly three months since my return to the Enterprise. While my recovery is taking longer than I would like, I have to admit that I am coming to terms with what has happened. Beverly pulled me back from the brink. I will forever be indebted to her...And also for Counselor Troi's boldness after the holodeck incident. On a more somber note...my understanding of some of the darkest and most violent conflicts in human history have become comprehensible to me where once they were mere abstractions. How easily we learn to hate one another. How easily we resort to violence. It is a sobering consequence of suffering.

The End

So, do Crusher and Picard finally get together? I'll let your imaginations run with it and leave it open for a sequel. Thanks to all who have read my first story. It was joy to write and to know that others were enjoying it as well. I have more JLP stories coming!