Time passed. The Andromeda crew faced many challenges. They rose to meet them all. Beka's Flash addiction, Harper's infestation, the Worldship and rebuilding the Commonwealth all took their toll. There were setbacks, of course but in all challenges they showed what they were made of and ultimately triumphed. Which was a cause for celebration. The best kind of celebration for any of them was of course, shore leave. Not all at once, obviously. Harper and Beka were currently on shore leave. "Hmm."

"What, Harper?"

"I was just thinking."

"You thinking? How frightening?"

"Hardy-har-har. Anyway, you know the latest planet to join the Commonwealth."

"Which one? Ever since we defeated the Worldship we have to beat them off with sticks." Beka grinned.

"Balasamo. The music lover's planet."

"Oh, yeah. How could I forget? They have the best archives of all the musical history of any planet. They cover just about anything. What about them?"

"I just thought we could stop by and see if we could find out anything on the Pussycats."

She looked at him. "Harper, I'm sorry to have to tell you this but Earth was a pretty obscure planet until recently. Even if it is free now. What makes you think its musical records would be considered important enough for anyone to preserve?"

"It's worth a shot." That's all he said.

She sighed. "Yeah, it is. Let's go." They headed there.

Once there they were recognized and given the red carpet treatment. They checked out the musical archives. "Oh, by the Divine! Harper, you were right. Look here."

Harper hurried over to where Beka was. She had found files on the Pussycats. All the albums they had ever done were present and preserved on the computer files. There were more than Beka had expected. Apparently the Pussycats had had a very long and successful career.

A clerk came over. "May I help you?"

Beka nodded. Can we have copies of all this music to take with us?"

The clerk nodded and smiled. "Certainly."

Then she had another thought. "Can you cross reference the individual members of this group and get any and all solo work they might have done?"

"Yes. I will do that too." He hurried off.

Harper grinned. "Oh ye of little faith. Now let's go to the personal archives."

"What for?"

"To see if there is anything about dear old Grandma Melody of course."

"Harper, get serious. I loved that ditz as much as anybody but she and her group are hardly the most important musicians ever. Not even of Earth. There won't be anything on them."

"You also said we wouldn't find any of their music."

Point taken. O.K." Beka let Harper drag her to the personal archives. These were archives where all the personal information on the lives of every planet's musicians was preserved. Well, what had been available. So they started looking through the archives. There was more information on some musicians than others. It looked like there was nothing on Melody to find.

Until Harper found it. "Look, Beka. I found something. It's something about them."

Beka took the holo-vid. "Let's take it over to the player and watch it." They did.

It was, of course, ancient footage but whoever had restored it had done an excellent job. A news announcer came into view. "In entertainment news today, Melody Valentine of the pop group Josie and the Pussycats recently gave birth to a son. The father is still a mystery but she was interviewed as she was leaving the hospital with her band mates, Valerie Brown and Josie McCoy who is engaged to Alan Mayberry."

The scene switched to the front of a hospital. Harper and Beka recognized the Pussycats. They were a little older but they hadn't changed much. They were still recognizable.

"Melody, Melody. Who's the father?"

The screen Melody just smiled. "No one important. He said he loved me but he didn't."

"Show us the baby."

"Gladly. I've got a beautiful baby boy. See." She raised the bundle in her arms so the camera could see the face of an adorable baby boy.

'What's his name?"

"Joseph Robert Valentine. After Josie. I wanted to name him Joseph Valerie Valentine after my two best friends."

Here Valerie interrupted. "I convinced her that it would be a bad idea. Valentine is close enough to Valerie. And now we have to go."

"Bye." Melody called as she was steered away.

Back to the announcer. "And that's all for today." The vid ended.

Harper turned to Beka. "Kid had a narrow escape."

"Yep. Thankfully smarter heads prevailed. I kind of suspected that something like that had happened ever since I found out that I was a direct descendant of hers. After all, children don't generally get their mother's last name unless…."

Harper nodded. "Yeah. Someone took advantage of her all right. But it didn't break her. She still stayed the same it looks like. That's the Melody we met, always happy. Nothing gets her down."

Beka smiled. "Nope. Nothing does. And if it does, it doesn't keep her down for long. It really was cool having them aboard.

Harper had to agree. Although it had started off as not so great, it really had ended well. It was an honor and a privilege to be descended from her. And her son of course. It looked like young Joseph Valentine would pass on his good looks through his line for a long time.

As the two of them left the archives with their files Harper remarked. 'I wonder if bringing Bleep home spurred on the space exploration program."

"I wouldn't be surprised, Harper. Not surprised at all."

The End.