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she had made such an impression on the crew she had recently been
promoted to interim-CEO during the Commander’s recovery. Following his recent
death it seemed this temporary arrangement was likely to become permanent, as
the only other candidate, Paul Harrington, had made it perfectly clear he had
no desire for the job.
    It was in no small part due to the recent death of Jon that
Miranda found herself fleeing the station at high speed. During her short stay
she had found herself developing strong feelings for the young, enigmatic
Commander. Since his death it had seemed every room on the station, every
corridor held painful memories of their short, but poignant, time together.
Hence, desperate for some solitude, she had taken her ship for a brief flight.
However, even then she could not entirely escape, for this beautiful ship — a now long since decommissioned Imperial heavy attack fighter,
a Wraith —had been a parting gift from the Commander. In memory of Jon
she had named the ship The Last Praetorian . A fitting tribute,
she felt, to the person who had bestowed this expensive gift upon her. Even now
she could picture the last few moments of the Commander’s life, as his personal
shuttle, the Eternal Light, barrelled into the massive star carrier.
Both disappearing in a blinding flash of light only moments later.
    Turning her thoughts away from such painful memories, she
once again focused on piloting her ship. Prior to this Miranda had never
actually owned anything of her own, hence found herself cherishing the
ship even more. With a deft touch of the flight controls, the ship danced
around a particularly large piece of space debris. This corner of the system
was now littered with detritus from the recent battle. The Confederation Navy
had issued a cover story about a fatal ship accident to account for the large
amount of debris and higher than ordinary background radiation from the nuclear
explosion. Only a few people in the Confederation, the crew of the Terra
Nova included, knew what events had actually transpired here.
    A battle that had probably determined the very future of the
young Confederation.
    Turning her attention back to the area of space around her
fighter, she set the ship darting to the right, then the left, evading
particularly large pieces. It seemed that the debris field was particularly
dense in this area of space. It mattered little, as it was only when she
glanced down at the navigation computer that she realised just how far away
from Terra Nova she had travelled. Lost in her thoughts, she had flown
far farther than she had originally intended. Taking one last look outside the
cockpit windows, she prepared to swing the large fighter around and reverse
course back to Terra Nova . As CEO she now had responsibilities and could
not afford to just disappear for significant periods of time.
    As her fingers were about to dance across the fight controls
to alter course, she saw a flash of light from the periphery of her vision.
Assuming that it was just some starlight reflecting off another piece of space debris,
she ignored it and had once again reached for the flight controls when she saw
it again. It was too regular a flash to be just a mere reflection of light.
Something was broadcasting that signal. Miranda finally did alter the course of
her ship, not towards Terra Nova but in the opposite direction, towards
the beacon of light, curious about what the source could be.
    The closer she approached the source of the light, the
thicker the debris became, causing her to have to focus more on her piloting
abilities. She eventually realised she must be flying through what remained of
the Imperial Star , the flagship of the old Imperial Navy, destroyed by
Jon with the warhead secreted on his personal shuttle. Only that massive
warship could have produced debris of this size and density. Finally arriving
at the source of the light Miranda was disappointed to see it was just a
navigation beacon from the