Memorial Day

Posted on May 26, 2014 @ 9:57pm by Ambassador Xana Bonviva
Edited on on Jun 05, 2014 @ 8:52am

Mission: The Tangled Webs We Weave
Location: Earth
Tags: Xana, Jake, Family

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Memorial Day



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Location: EARTH

Scene: Venice, Italy - Bonviva Villa

Benito William Bonviva-Crichton stood in the doorway of his mother’s room. With time and maturity, perhaps he’d notice the dark circles under her eyes or the way she curled up in bed holding onto a pillow in a futile attempt to replace someone. He came in here every morning, so he could have told anyone about sometimes she spoke in her sleep; dreamy words in Italian or Bolian about a life that was long gone in a place in the Gamma Quadrant. He heard her words of love murmured as she tossed and turned fitfully. In truth, if anyone was able to speak about a unprotected Xana Bonviva, it was her only son.

But he was 4, so he was blissfully unaware of these things.

Instead, with the exuberance of youth, the little blue boy with dark hair that was in desperate need of a haircut went running into the large bedroom and tackled his mother, flying up from the floor and crash landing half on his mother and half on the bed.

“Buon giorno,” he mother yawned as she snaked an arm out to catch her son. She peeked open an eye, saw he was unhurt as he lay next to her in his shark pajamas. Seeing he was fine, she closed her eyes again. Sleep was not coming again but she refused to surrender to another day before she had to.

Benito sat up on his knees and gleefully shook his mother. “Wake up! It’s a stay home day,” he announced, using his favorite phrase to indicate a day when they didn’t have to go to the office or school.

Before Xana could correct him her daughter came running in. Dahlia used to be the one who woke up her mother but she ceded that to her younger brother when he became old enough to climb out of his bed to do the honors. “Mom! I got a message from Jake,” Dahlia yelled. With a flop on Xana’s bed, the Bajoran/Bolian/Human girl began to retell the entire message.

“Why didn’t I get a message?” Benito asked.

“Cause I sent him a message and you didn’t,” Dahlia pointed out. “Mom, are we going to the DISCOVERY today?”

Yawning Xana sat up and said, “No, today we’re going to San Francisco. All of us.”

=/\=

Scene: San Francisco, USA - SFA Memorial Gardens

Dahlia wore a red and white polka dot sleeveless dress with matching sandals; then she had her mother pull her long blonde wavy hair braid it so that it hung neatly down her back. Benito fought the attempts to dress up but he too cleaned up and wore khakis with a white polo shirt, but he refused to comb his brown hair so it was messy and not just because of the breeze that blew. Both children sat on a chairs off to the side with dignitaries and officers surrounding them.

“I’m bored,” Benito sighed.

“Look Mom speaks next and then we’re done,” Dahlia pointed out showing Ben the PADD with the program.

“Can we eat next?” the boy asked.

Well aware that her children were counting down the time until they could leave the dais but unable to to do anything about it, Xana Bonviva went to the podium. Every year she had to give one of these speeches, and every year she worried about it. Looking out onto the crowd she saw the mixture of young cadets, newly minted officers and enlisted, men and women of the Fleet in various capacities, and on today, she saw the ones left behind. So the azure woman did something that made her staff crazy -- she put aside her carefully prepared and vetted notes to speak from the heart.

“Good Morning. I’d like to thank Admiral Lang and Secretary Young for having me,” she said referring to the head of SFA and the Secretary of Veterans Affairs respectively. “It’s an honor to be here as we remember those from Starfleet who’ve left us.”

Looking over at her children for a moment, Xana’s face softened before turning back to the crowd. “Just before any veteran centered holiday, there’s a swell of patriotism as suddenly people start asking, ‘How can we honor our veterans?’.” It’s an important question, it’s one we should ask. We just shouldn’t ask it a few times a year and then tuck it away like we do with our holiday paraphernalia.

“Words like ‘heroism’ and ‘sacrifice’ are talked about as we try to figure what that means to each of us; if you read history it’s hard not to be overcome with emotion. Perhaps some of you in the crowd joined because you read about those who went before you and somewhere deep you aspired to be like that. Starfleet was designed to space exploration, but somewhere along the way in our history we became - we had to become - more than that. As the liberties of the Federation were threatened, we had to respond. Skirmishes, conflicts, and wars were all fought because we had to respond.

“Wars are not without their glory,” Pausing for a moment Xana spoke plainly from the heart, “But it brings such a wretched loss of loved ones.”

Pausing for a moment she cleared her throat, “Throughout all Federation worlds and colonies, you will find cemeteries. We have so many, so many cemeteries filled for those who died and we can name, and unfortunately those that died who we cannot name because their names are lost to the stars. There are stones, markers, and ribbons all marking our dead. We sing songs about them, we tell stories and remember them in so many ways, privately and publicly.

“We sing the songs of what these heroes accomplished. We cannot sing though of what they could have done, because we’ll never know. We will never know what was lost, and that is the burden we the living have to bear. The uniqueness of these individuals is gone for eternity; forever lost to us under the freedom we still have.”

“Today is not the beginning of summer, it is a memorial. We mourn the recently deceased as well as our ancestors. We will recount their stories, remember what made them real to us. For these men and women who died in the name of the Federation were very real - they were our sons and daughters; our mothers and fathers; our sisters and brothers; our husbands and wives.

“Today is a day of remembrance of those we loved and who will be gone forever. We live on, and live on in the best way we can. Nothing we can do will bring them back. So we tell our stories, sing our songs, and erect memorials all to show that no matter how much longer we live, no matter what turns our life may take without them, forever they are in our hearts.”

=/\=

Long after the ceremony ended, Xana took a walk with her children. Dahlia stopped suddenly and turned to her mother. “Mom, I want to go over there,” she said nodding her head off to the side.

“Benito and I will sit here,” Xana said.

“But I wanna-”

“Benito and I will sit here,” Xana repeated with a glare to her son.

Dahlia nodded and walked off while her son sighed a great sigh before sitting next to his mother on a stone bench. “Mom, look, Dahlia is over by some dahlias!” Benito exclaimed.

Xana looked over at the distinctive white and deep purple flowers that were by one particular stone in the ground. “I know,” she murmured.

“Why?” he asked. When his mother looked at him, Benito tried again, “Why is Dahlia by the dahlias?”

“She’s by the stone that remembers her father,” she explained. When Benito looked confused Xana tried to explain, “Dahlia’s daddy died long ago. Long before you were born. And that’s the stone that remembers him here on EARTH.”

Benito frowned at that. He knew, kind of, that he and his sister had different fathers. His sister had a different nose than him; they had slightly different last names; and of course she called Dad “Jake” rather than Dad. In the day to day scheme of things he never thought about it. “Why?” When his mother gave him a puzzled look he asked, “Why do we have different daddies?”

“Oh,” Xana exhaled. Stumped momentarily she thought about how to explain this to a 4 year old. “I used to be married to Dahlia’s daddy, and we had Dahlia. Then he died. Sometime after that your daddy and I got married, and then you were born,” she said in what was the grossest under-explanation of her life during the Second Dominion War.

“Why are there dahlias here?” Benito asked.

“Cause her daddy liked dahlias,” Xana explained softly, remembering how Gene would bring her dahlias when he’d come in from the EIDOLON.

“Benito isn’t a flower,” her son pointed out.

“You were named for a poet. Your daddy gave me a book of poetry by a 22nd century poet named Benito,” Xana explained with a smile, remembering the unexpected gift from Jake when they went on their honeymoon.

“Ohhh,” Benito said nodding his head. Looking over at Dahlia he asked, “So when my daddy is dead you’ll put poetry by his stone?”

Xana said nothing to that, instead watching Dahlia making her way back. “Go get your sister,” she said, changing the subject.

“Otay,” her son replied jumping off the bench as he went running to his sister.

**So when my daddy is dead you’ll put poetry by his stone?** the words repeated in her head. She wanted to lie and tell her son that she hadn’t planned it out, what she’d do if Jake died. No, she knew what she’d do if Jake died; she wouldn’t tell anyone about that, how late at night when she worried she planned out the memorial in a macabre way of preparing herself. She laid out the steps as if to reassure herself that she did this once so she could do it again; bury a spouse who died too soon.

But even in those moments Xana knew it was all a lie. Cause when you were told that your loved one died, even for something as true as the Federation, it always surprised you.

=/\=

Scene: Venice, Italy - Bonviva Villa

“Mom! I’m going to send a message to Jake,” her daughter announced after dinner as she went running up the stairs.

Xana smiled at that; Jake’s message had perked up the 9 year old girl. “Benito, what are you doing?”

“Building a submarine,” her son announced as he played with blocks. “Then I’m going to go underwater.”

“Bring me back something,” Xana teased. Getting up she walked into the office she had at home. She made a mental note to tell Secretary Young, the Secretary of Veterans Affairs, that she liked his speech; he spoke quite eloquently about the need for remembering the living, about remembering veterans.

But first she had a personal message to send. “Computer, send a message to Commander Jacob Crichton, USS DISCOVERY.”

The computer beeped several times before the light blinked at her. “Hello, Jake. I just wanted to thank you for Dahlia’s message, she’s ecstatic. And I…” biting her lip she wondered what to say. She hadn’t realized until she saw his message last night, how happy he’d be at the thought of the kids going to stay with him. He even seemed happy at the idea of seeing her, which had her all happy and confused at the same time.

“Mom? What are you doing?”

Xana turned to her son who was standing in the doorway of the room. “I was sending a message to your father.” When Benito looked hesitant she offered, “You want to join me?”

“No,” Benito replied vehemently shaking his head.

All Xana could think about was how happy Jake had seemed at seeing the kids again, that she became desperate to give him a little more. “Ok, I’ll tell your father you like vanilla ice cream.”

“NO!” Benito yelled. Stomping over to his mother, the 4 year old wagged his finger in a move reminiscent of his mother and said, “NO VANILLA!”

Pretending to be surprised Xana asked, “No vanilla?”

“NO! I like…chocolate chocolate chip,” Benito announced. Seeing he was in front of the screen he started to move away, until his mother tugged him.

“Tell him,” she whispered nodding to the screen.

“I don’t see him,” the 4 year old pointed out.

Xana rolled her violet eyes. “It’s like when we send a message to Grandma and Grandpa,” she offered referring to Jake’s parents who loved to receive message from the kids.

“Oh,” Benito replied. Looking into the black screen, so that his eyes, violet like his mother’s, shined back he said, “I like chocolate chocolate chip ice cream.”

“I thought you liked peanut butter ice cream,” Xana offered.

“Oh yeah that too,” Benito replied. Looking up at his mother he said, “Don’t forget about the orange one.”

“Orange sherbert,” Xana replied.

The little boy nodded until he said, “Do they have whipped cream on the ship?”

“I’m sure they do,” Xana smiled.

“I want that too,” Benito announced. When his mother whispered something in his ear, he sighed and said, “Please.” Then he wiggled until he was off her lap and went into another room to play.

“Well...you have your orders,” Xana teased the screen with a bright smile. Pausing for a moment she said, “I was thinking of you today…”

**So when my daddy is dead you’ll put poetry by his stone?**

“And I just wanted you to know that...I know it hasn’t been easy for you to be married to me...but I love you and--”

“SPRINKLES!”

“--and sprinkles. What?” Xana replied shaking her head. Looking over at her son who was standing in the doorway she asked again, “What?”

“I want sprinkles. Rainbow ones,” Benito clarified.

Rolling her eyes at her son, Xana turned back to the screen. “We love you and we want sprinkles.”

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Sarah Albertini-Bond

Secretary Xana Bonviva

Secretary to Starfleet