"I want a divorce"

Posted on Wed Oct 19th, 2022 @ 7:05am by Consul Josephine Carlyle-Cragen & Kyle Cragen [Reece]

Mission: Season 5: Time Warp
Location: Starfleet Maximum Security Prison, New Zealand
Timeline: 22/08/2397
2141 words - 4.3 OF Standard Post Measure

It had to be done. She could not put it off any longer. Josephine Carlyle walked behind the two security guards who were leading her into a conference room deep in the heart of the Maximum Security Prison wing of the New Zealand Prison.

She was dressed in her starfleet uniform, the holographic disguise cloaking her pregnancy easily. She had been released from Bishop a couple of days prior and while she was still under medical and counseling watch, this was something she needed to do.

She entered the room and found it empty. Calmly she sat down facing the door, her hands folded on the PADD she had carried with her. The two guards took up position behind her. Now she had to wait for the others to bring in Kyle Cragen. A man she had not seen in months. A man she knew from years before. Centuries.

A few moments later, the opposite door opened and a quartet of beefy guards escorted a cuffed and shackled Kyle Cragen into the room. His sour expression brightened when he saw the love of his long life. As he looked over her, a slightly confused look crossed his features, but he said nothing.

After the guards secured him to both the chair and table, they moved off to the sides of the room, standing at the ready, in case Kyle tried anything.

"'Ello, my love. You are looking well, though..." His eyes moved down to her belly, then back up to her eyes. "Not sure why you're hiding our child. I can feel her presence, you know."

Josephine chose not to respond to that comment, instead she slid the PADD forward. "This is your notification of my intent to proceed with the legal dissolution of our marriage."

Kragen was silent for a few beats. His emotional state was that of a stone. He was completely unreadable.

Finally, he slowly nodded. "I see," he said softly. "So, my Sephine is gone then." A single tear started to fall from the corner of his left eye. "I supposed you'll just tell our child that I'm dead." He shrugged slightly. "Probably for the best. She shouldn't know anything about who I am."

He reached up, causing the guards to tense visibly. He paused briefly, his gaze never leaving her eyes. "I swore to you that you and our child will always be safe. If this is what is required for that to happen, so be it." He pressed his right thumb to the PADD screen, signifying his agreement to her divorce request.

"I suppose this will be the last time we ever see each other again." He shook his head slowly. "I never should have left you to go on that damnable mission for the King. Perhaps then, you would have chosen to stay with me."

"She will know of you. She will know both sides. The side you showed Sephine and the side you show the world." Josie said softly. "I am not going to hide that from our child. Part of me, the part that is Sephine will always love you, Kyle. But the rest of me, loves someone else. Maybe had I lived and died in the 1600s with you, it would have been different. But that life is gone for both of us." She reached out and pulled the PADD back towards her. "When our child is born, I will send you a holo."

He nodded slowly. "If it means anything, if you can believe any part of my word...I'm sorry for the pain I caused you and Arrianna." He shook his head slightly, finally lowering his eyes from hers. "I know I can never atone for what I've done, nor will I ever see the love for me in your eyes again, however, I do regret that I allowed my grief over losing you to push me to where I am now." He got quiet, honest regret on his face. "I pray that you and our child remain safe, every day."

"I remember the Kyle I met, I remember wanting it to go further than it did. I knew that it could not. I knew too much, but I wanted it then, for me. To forget the world I left but then I came back and months passed and I had a chance at another life. I am sorry that hurts you." She paused. "I will tell her of that Kyle as well."

He looked over at her, shaking his head sadly. "It's a shame. Back then, we were both following our own peoples version of the Prime Directive." He snorted softly. "Who knows, if I had told you who I really was, you might've stayed? I almost told you, that night up on my roof garden. After seeing the way your eyes glowed seeing that book." The left side of his mouth twitched upwards slightly.

"Or maybe you could have come with us." She said softly. Josephine stood. "Take care Kyle "

"Wait...please?" He asked. "Would you pull up a blank form on your PADD?"

Josie nodded, sat back down and did so and pushed it across to him.

He tried to lift his hand to enter some text, but, the restraints were making it near impossible. Looking over at the supervisor of his guard detail, he spoke softly, "Sir, would you loosen the restraint on my right hand? I need to write something very important."

The Andorian frowned slightly for a moment, then he said, "Stand ready."

The other guards in the room all drew their phasers and pointed them at Cragen.

The supervisor moved over and, after placing his fists on the table top, spoke aloud and clearly, so there would be no misunderstanding. "Prisoner, if you so much as raise your hand to scratch your ear, my men will stun you into the next century. Am I clear?"

Kyle nodded, "Crystal, Sir."

The supervisor wasn't so sure. However, he couldn't see any downside that might come of it. Moving back to his spot by the wall, he used a control device to release Cragen's right hand.

"Thank you, Sir," Cragen responded without even stretching his fingers. He looked at the PADD and started to type out what seemed like a letter. As he did so, he responded to Josephine. "Had I not been sent on that mission for the King, I probably would have. However, in the end, it's good that I didn't. After I was captured, I met my granddaughter, several generations descended, but still. My blood flows through her veins. She is a remarkable young woman, Kara is her name. You'd like her. Anyway, while she and I spoke, I finally started to see just how mad I had become. Seven hundred years searching for someone who vanished without a trace will do that to you."

"She, Kara that is, showed me the first real tenderness that I have felt in well over five hundred years. I swore to her, on my word as an El Aurian, that she and her fellow crewmembers' would never be harmed by me or mine. It was the same oath I gave you...or...Sephine. I only wanted you back. Then, while we were together, you actually started to change me as well. I started to feel remorse for taking you and Arrianna. Unfortunately, Fate caught up to me before I could change my ways and try to make amends." He finished writing and slid the PADD back over. "While it won't fix anything," he nodded down at the PADD, indicating she should read it.

Josie picked it up and began to read. Her jaw clenched and she blinked as she read it.

To Whom it may Concern;

Welcome. This letter, written by my hand on 11 March, 2397, while I am an inmate at Starfleet Maximum Security Prison, New Zealand, Earth, is to be considered my last will and testament. While I know that I am serving a life sentence for my crimes, I willingly rescind the requirement that my death be necessary for my will to be carried out.

In the matter of all my worldly goods here on Earth, I bequeath them all to Lieutenant Josephine Catherine Carlyle, and she is to hold such items, that she does not wish to possess, in a trust for our daughter, Liberty [Middle name to be added] Carlye- Cragen, who will take possession of the remaining items when she turns twenty-five years old, by the Earth calendar.

I also hereby release Lieutenant Josephine Catherine Carlyle, from granting me any parental rights to said daughter, Liberty Gretta Carlyle-Cragen I have already caused too much pain to the both of them. I do not wish to cause any more.

Signed, by my thumbprint,

Lord Kyle Cragen
Defender of the Realm
British Empire (under King Charles II)

Commander Kyle Cragen
Starfleet (dishonorably discharged)

Finishing reading it, she looked up. "Kyle.." she said softly. "I am going to name her Liberty... do you have a preference for a middle name?"

Cragen smiled warmly. "That's a beautiful name." His eyes started to fill with tears, then he cleared his throat. "Gretta? It was my mother's name."

Josephine nodded and quickly added the details. "I will tell her that."

Cragen nodded silently, then placed his right hand back were it could be restrained, which the guard supervisor did, fully securing the prisoner again. Cragen did not make any move to complain. "Sir," he did ask though, "Would you please sign off on the form I just wrote, as a witness that it was not written under any duress or coercion?" Cragen's tone remained quiet and respectful.

The supervisor considered it, then nodded, moving over to the table and added his thumbprint as a witness. "Your time's almost up, prisoner," he stated gruffly, then moved back to his position.

Cragen nodded. "Yes, Sir." He looked over at Josephine. "I'll contact my estate lawyer tonight, let her know to reach out to you. Where can you be reached?"

"Starfleet Medical for a few more days, then the USS Elysium" Josephine replied as she watched the interactions between him and the guards. To be expected. Part of her wondered if Bishop would try to break Kyle out.

Cragen nodded again. "Jo," he started, then stopped himself. Shaking his head slowly and deflating somewhat.

"Yes?" She asked. "Say it now Kyle."

He looked up at her, his eyes filling with tears again. "I'm sorry," he said, emotion choking his words slightly. Though, it was true emotion. "I know it won't change anything. I know that after you leave here, I'll probably never see you again. I've earned that punishment. That, and so much more. But please know, I have sat and considered my actions quite deeply and thoroughly. I am sorry for the pain and torment that I caused you and Arrianna. Neither of you deserved any of it." He hung his head in honest shame.

"No we didn't and you are paying for it as are we." She replied softly. "Our child is one thing I do not regret Kyle. Maybe one day I will be able to forgive you, but I won't forget. I will remember the man I met in England fondly though." She stood as the buzzer went. "Goodbye Kyle."

He looked back up at her and replied. "Goodby, Lady Josephine Humphreys. May the rest of your days be brighter than the past. Know that wherever you go, my heart will always go with you."

"Sir Kyle" she replied and then she was escorted out.

After she left, Cragen's security detail got him up on his feet and back out to the cell block.

As they moved through the general population wing, several inmates hooted and cat-called Cragen. He knew many of the prisoners incarcerated here. Some he had even put in here, back when he was Starfleet.

Now, he was just another prisoner, like them, destined to live the rest of his natural life inside these walls. And, as an El Aurian, who was barely into middle age...that would be a very long time indeed.

The detail moved him back out of the general population wing, and into the special prisoners wing. Here, the worst of the worst were locked up, kept in isolation from others, except for various legal meetings and to be granted the one hour a day of exercise, out in the special wing's small fresh air enclosure.

Cragen entered his cell as instructed, waiting for the restraints to be removed. Finally, they were and his cell door was slammed shut, sealing him inside. As he moved to sit, he noticed a note was on his pillow.

He sat down and picked up the note. It said a single line of text.

Be ready. Soon. SFI