The Last Praetorian

Terra Nova, Zeta Aquilae System

Staring at his face in the mirror Jon was surprised to see a bruise starting to form on his forehead. Rubbing it painfully, Jon looked around, astonished to see his small quarters on the Imperial Star.

“How did I get here?” he asked. The last he could remember was being on the station, with alarms sounding… A chime from the door interrupted his thoughts.

“Come!” he called out. As the door opened a figure glided into the room. The visitor was shorter than Jon and wearing a white cloak that masked his or her features. With a strange sense of déjà vu, Jon watched as Sofia pushed the hood away from her face.

Jon could only gape at her, not having aged a day, as she glided towards him. “What are you doing here? I thought that you were on Eden Prime?”

“Do you always greet your guests shirtless?” Sofia replied with a laugh, running her hand across his bare chest. As she leaned forward to kiss him she whispered. “I fully approve.”

The next moment they were twirling, intertwined on the open-air patio, alone, with the band inside playing a slow song, the stars shining brightly down on the young couple.

“Getting the hang of things, Jon?” she asked as she executed a stunning twirl.

“Where are we?” he replied confused. “Is this a dream?”

She laughed with genuine delight. “You don’t miss a thing,” she responded, reeling and darting around Jon with the grace of a summer breeze, chuckling good-naturedly at his obvious and total confusion.

Reaching out, he snaked an arm out to halt her, pulling her to him until her body was flush against his. Spinning Sofia in a gradually tighter circle, pulling her closer with every turn, until the two of them stood utterly still at the center of the dance floor.

And then, as if a parched man, having been offered a drink after going for days without, his lips descended upon hers in a desperate, demanding kiss. This time there was nobody to interrupt them, and the kiss seemed to go on and on, Jon becoming lost in the feel of her. Finally he pulled his head back from hers and opened his eyes, terrified to think she might no longer be there, only to find her gazing sadly back at him. She dropped her hands to his shoulders, retreated one step, and another before moving her body in time to the music once again.

“Please don’t leave me,” Jon cried desperately. “I have been so alone without you.” Admitting it to himself at the same time as saying the words aloud.

Twirling back, closer, Sofia touched her hand delicately to his chest, in the same fashion she did on the Imperial Star, she explained in a soft voice. “You have never been alone, Jon. I have always been with you, in here,” she said laying her hand over his heart.

With that she once again twirled away, fading from sight, as the music softened, leaving Jon standing alone on the open-air patio.

“I’m sorry,” Jon said aloud. “I never wanted to hurt you, I love you…” Admitting it to himself, for the first time.

“Son of a bitch, that hurts!” Jon panted out aloud, his ashen face covered in a thick sheen of sweat. He had regained consciousness a few days before, but it was going to take his body much longer before it recovered. His breathing was still laboured, the scar tissue causing his lungs to expand and contract painfully. Sleeping was the worst, as he frequently awoke during the night, breathless and in pain.

Better the pain from the lungs than the pain from the broken heart.

He was still deeply shaken by the dream he’d had whilst unconscious in medical. What was worst is he could rarely remember his dreams, but this one seemed imprinted on his consciousness, every look and every touch crystal clear. Jon lost count of the times he woke, crying out for her. He frequently found himself opening a channel to Sofia, only to angrily snatch his hand away. Even if he managed to talk to her, what was he going to say? It had been almost five years.

Hi, how are you? I know we haven’t spoken for years and I am sorry I hurt you. How about picking up where we left off?

It sounded pathetic, even to him! For all he knew she had long since moved on, found somebody else, somebody to share her life, her bed. The thoughts made Jon’s heart freeze and his blood run cold.

Looking at the chronometer in his bedroom—he had finally been kicked out of medical after his complaining reached unbearable levels, even for his medical staff—Jon noticed it was just after five in the morning.

Rise and shine, he thought sourly to himself.

It was barely an hour later when Jon shuffled painfully into his office, unannounced. “What the hell are you doing here so early?” Jon demanded foul tempered, partly from the pain and lack of sleep and partly because he was hoping to beat the current occupant to his chair but had failed miserably.

“Well good morning to you, feel free to just stroll in,” Miranda replied waspishly.

“It’s my office.”

“Not until the Doctor clears you back for duty, and for god’s sake sit down before you collapse.”

Jon distinctly disliked following other’s orders, although he had no problem issuing them, but deciding to overlook the point, this once, and slid gratefully into his chair. “What’s the latest?” Jon asked, trying to peer over the rim of the datapad Miranda was reading.

Miranda only angled the datapad further away from his eyesight. “None of your concern,” she replied abruptly. On her first day she had discovered the department heads were producing daily reports, in hard copy! A young ensign then collated these before they were delivered to the Commanding Officer for review. Miranda could not believe it. She had immediately ordered that henceforth all department heads would file daily status reports electronically.

Jon meanwhile was bored and looking around his office for something to amuse himself. Noticing the desk had been moved to the other side of the office, away from the energy field encasing the window, he commented. “So I see you had the energy grid repaired, I’m surprised you did not have the window altered to remove the need.”

“I thought about it, but I guessed you would just have it modified back again when you returned to duty. I felt sorry for the poor engineering team wasting their effort.” Miranda went back to reading her report, ignoring Jon, much to his chagrin.

“It got nippy in here without it.”

“So Paul informed me.”

Jon waited expectantly for the obvious question, but was disappointed when it was not forthcoming. “Pretty difficult to breath in a vacuum,” he prodded.

“Hmm…”

Jon fell silent, fairly deflated Miranda was ignoring him, unused to this restless inactivity. “Don’t suppose I could interest you in a short trip? I need to make a cargo pickup.”

“There is nothing on the shipping manifest.”

“It’s personal.”

“I didn’t think the Doctor has reinstated your flight status.”

“He hasn’t, hence I need a pilot.”

“Well I am busy, lot of others to choose from on the station.”

“Sure, I guess,” Jon replied dejectedly. “Never mind, I’ll go and find somebody else to fly the ’Light…”

“What?” Miranda squeaked. She actually squeaked.

Jon had to try hard to suppress a grin at his victory. “Well I did not want to drag you away, you’re obviously very busy,” he hedged.

“No, no, no,” Miranda stammered quickly. “I’ve just finished here.”

“You’re sure?” Jon inquired doubtfully.

“Sure!” Miranda stated glibly, tossing away the datapad she had been so engrossed in only moments before. Skipping around the desk, actually skipping, she pulled Jon out of his seat towards the door.

“Well…if you’re really sure,” Jon deadpanned.

The Eternal Light tore away from the station at full thrust, before nose-diving into an uncontrollable flat spin, coming back to level flight—inverted, if it was possible to be inverted in space, where the absence of gravity made concepts of up and down, relative.

Miranda was just laughing with delight, hair flying in all directions as the ship’s internal stabilisers tried to compensate for the wild manoeuvres, with only limited success. Miranda had never flown a ship, beyond her old hawk fighter, that was so responsive. The ship seemed to respond instantly to each of her light touches, gliding and soaring through the intervening space.

“Hey take it easy will you,” Jon groused. “The ’Light is an old girl now, show her some respect will you? Remember this ship is only on loan to me from the Emperor, he might want it back one day and in good condition too!”

“I forgot you once told me this ship belonged to the Emperor, wow he had a good taste in ships,” she gushed, motioning towards the rich internal decorating, with the Aurelius family seal prominently displayed. “Anyway seeing that he no longer needs it,” she added tactlessly. “I guess it’s yours now.”

“Actually this now belongs to the Imperial Princess Aurelius,” Jon corrected her. “After the Emperor’s death she inherited all the families’ assets, companies, properties and ships.”

“Wow, stunningly beautiful and totally loaded, you completely blew it with her!” Miranda replied with another giggle, barrel rolling the shuttle. Much to Jon’s dislike as his lung was screaming in protest and the painkillers he had taken before the flight were making him nauseous.

“She was better off without me,” Jon replied morosely. “But at least she let me keep the ship.” Jon remembered their parting words painfully.

Recognising that she had spoiled the mood with her flippant comments, and worried at Jon’s pale face and glassy expression Miranda finally levelled off the ship, reducing power to the engines.

“So where is this cargo that you need to pick up?” she asked curiously.

“The Ceres asteroid belt, you will find it in the navigational computer. It should only be a few hours flight time at sub-light.”

“What sort of cargo are you planning on picking up?” Miranda asked curiously. “Some rock to throw at your department heads when they next don’t deliver your reports on time?”

“I was thinking something a bit bigger…”

A few hours later, Miranda was rousing Jon awake after he had fallen asleep on the way due to lack of rest the night before.

“Okay we’re here, so where to now?” she asked, her curiosity peaked by his earlier comments.

Rubbing the sleep from his eyes, Jon brought up the ships sensor report and highlighted one of the largest asteroids, almost two-and-a-half kilometres in length, and almost as long in diameter, at the centre of the field. “This one, Erebus, and try and not hit anything else on the way.”

“Gee Jon,” Miranda replied, expertly plotting a course to weave through the field. “Couldn’t you have chosen one on the edge of the field?”

“And deprive you of the opportunity to show off your superior piloting skills? No,” Jon replied, keeping one eye on the sensors to make sure Miranda did not drift too close to one of the spinning rocks. However, he needn’t have worried as Miranda expertly threaded the Eternal Light between them, slowly moving towards the centre of the field, and the largest asteroid.

The Eternal Light was still almost five kilometres from the centre of the belt, when suddenly on the emergency channel a broadcast started to announce. “Unidentified ship, you have entered restricted space. Vacate this area immediately or lethal force will be authorised. Unidentified ship, you have entered restricted space…” the message continued to repeat itself.

“Whoa, easy,” Jon murmured. Touching the back of Miranda’s hand reassuringly, he fired the port control thruster to move them away from one particular rock that had encroached within a few meters of the ship.

“Sorry,” Miranda replied embarrassed. “I was surprised by the message and lost concentration.” She glanced over at Jon’s hand, still resting on top of hers, noting he had not withdrawn it after she had corrected their course. Finally she decided if Jon had not noticed, she would not bring the issue up, anyway his hand was warm, and it was kind of reassuring.

“That’s okay, I forgot about the message. Anyway I better send the confirmation code before the automated defence systems blow us up,” Jon replied, with a grin.

“What automated defence systems?” Miranda inquired, shooting Jon a disturbed look. “You did not mention any automated defence systems.”

“Sorry must have slipped my mind. Anyway, nothing special, a couple of rail guns, probably a few missile emplacements, might be a particle weapon or two. It’s been a while,” he replied. His attention was focused on his console, as he seemed to be busy entering a thirty-two digit confirmation code. The flashing red light, with the words declaring “Access Denied” did not particularly reassure Miranda.

“Strange, I was sure it was that code,” Jon muttered. Scratching his two-day-old stubble uncomfortably, he redoubled his efforts.

“Jon!” Miranda urgently encouraged him, as the tactical display lit-up like the night sky reporting multiple weapon systems targeting then.

“One minute, one minute,” Jon muttered. “I’m sure that I’ve got it this time.”

Miranda was only two seconds away from throwing full power to the engines and making a mad dash for the edge of the belt, when finally the console glowed green, along with the words “Access Granted.”

“Next time I agree to accompany you for a cargo pickup, how about you mention the automated defence systems and the possibility of imminent death, before I agree to accompany you!”

“Where would the fun be in that?” Jon replied, giving Miranda a wide grin.

Miranda had to catch her breath at the sight of him, because he was really…very…quite…well…breath taking. The smile made Jon appear years younger, more carefree and she could picture him years before, as a young boy wearing such a smile, having been caught getting up to some mischief. His dark hair was tousled all over his head, because he hadn’t bothered to comb it since rising. Even tousled, Jon was way to handsome. Worse, he had on a flight-suit almost the same colour as his eyes, one that did absolutely nothing to hide what she knew was a phenomenal chest and spectacular shoulders. The faded flight-suit was worn and snug in all the right places. Miranda had always thought Jon handsome, but way out of her league. Jon was major league, and her barely peewee, but that didn’t mean she couldn’t dream, noticing his warm hand still resting on hers.

Tearing her gaze away from Jon’s handsome profile, Miranda was shocked to see they were now approaching the largest asteroid, far too quickly to be able to stop safely in time. Frantically reaching for the flight controls to reverse thrust and alter course she was astonished to feel Jon’s hand tighten over hers, interrupting her. Glancing frantically at Jon she insisted, “Jon we need to alter course, otherwise we are going to collide.”

Continuing to gaze directly into her eyes, Jon replied. “No. We. Won’t. Miranda do you trust me? Really trust me?”

Miranda’s thoughts whirled back to the conversation that she had with Paul, days before, while Jon was still in a coma in Medical. Then she had accused Jon of leading them into oblivion, wanting to fulfil his own death wish, and now only a few days later, here they were, heading to certain destruction into an asteroid. But Paul had insisted that none of the crew, her included, had anything to fear from Jon, and Miranda had believed him. Looking into Jon’s warm, understanding gaze she found herself still believing him.

The ships collision alert warning started to sound, warning them that they were barely seconds away from the impending impact, but still Jon continued to hold her hand reassuringly. “Trust me,” he whispered to her, barely seconds before the Eternal Light collided with the Erebus asteroid…

…passing straight through its surface. Jon immediately killed the engines and the ship came to a halt within a large cavernous hangar.

The asteroid was hollow.

Miranda looked around in astonishment, noticing curved rock walls and a solid, flat landing bay. “But how?” she demanded in astonishment.

“Quite simple really,” Jon explained with a pleased grin. It was a certain rite-of-passage. Docking at the Erebus depot for the first time even veteran pilots sometimes panicked, but Miranda had passed with flying colours, although Jon could certainly forgive her for shutting her eyes just before the moment of impact. “The asteroid is hollow, mined from the inside out around the same time that Terra Nova was constructed. The docking port is covered with a simple holoprojector to hide the entrance,” Jon explained as he brought the ship into dock, ensuring there was a hard-seal and the atmosphere in the depot was still good. It had been many years since anybody had been here last.

Opening the airlock into the depot, Jon motioned Miranda ahead of him exclaiming, “Open Sesame! I give you the cave full of hidden treasure.”

Miranda stopped just inside the airlock, her mouth agape in disbelief. Facing her was another massive cavern; it must have been hundreds of meters in length, as she could not see the far end in the dim light. However, it was not the size that astonished her but the contents, for it was full of crates, some small, barely a few meters in length, others massive, running into tens of meters square. The cave was full of them, ascending up into the dark roof. Curious to know the contents of the crates, she cautiously approached the nearest one. With a glance towards Jon, who nodded in agreement, she prised the lid off, astonished at the contents. Pulse rifles, dozens of them, neatly lined up. Taking one out, she was astonished to see it was immaculate, as if it had just rolled off the production line. The next crate held the same. The one after that, energy pistols. After that grenades, missiles and so it went on.

“It’s an arms depot,” Miranda exhaled in understanding, her mind boggling at the size of it. You could equip an army from this one store. No, scratch that, a dozen armies.

“One of a dozen, at least that I know of,” Jon explained, looking around the room. “Top secret Imperial Navy arms dumps. Known only to the Emperor and his most trusted adjutants. A last resort. A worst-case scenario. Only to be used if the very existence of the Empire was threatened. Of course nobody saw that the biggest threat to the empire came from within. So they lie abandoned, forgotten, disused, until now,” Jon said firmly.

“But I don’t understand,” Miranda said confused. “These must be worth millions, tens of millions of credits, more profit than Vanguard would make in a life-time. So why not just sell them?”

“Well, putting aside the question of who I would sell them to, as the only customers in the market are thieves, pirates, mercenaries, slavers... exactly the last sort of people I would want possessing this” Jon uttered with disgust. “What would I do with the money?”

“What would you do with the money?” Miranda asked in astonishment. “Spend it, give it away, and live like a king, like an emperor…” Suddenly Miranda realised what she had just uttered aloud. Who Jon was, who he had been. “The Emperor, Marcus Aurelius, told you about this, didn’t he?” But the question was rhetorical, for how else could Jon have known about this, and what other secrets had the Emperor divulged to him?

“You don’t need to sell this, because you don’t need the credits,” realisation dawned on Miranda as she followed the thought through. “Because you already have more money than you could spend, more money than an Emperor could spend in a lifetime, because he told you where it was hidden.”

The Aurelius family had run the Empire for over five centuries. Miranda could not picture, could not imagine, the wealth that they must have accumulated, now all gone. But not all. Some of it would have been hidden away, just like this arms depot, hidden away, a last resort, a worst-case scenario.

“Not all of it,” Jon replied embarrassed, but pleased she had worked it out. “After Marcus’s death all the family wealth was inherited by Sofia. However, there were other accounts, anonymous accounts, shell companies, assets, and investments all carefully hidden away. Not even I knew about them all. Marcus still had secrets, things that he did not divulge even to me.”

“Then why the big charade, Vanguard, Terra Nova, all the contracts, all the effort, for what?” Miranda demanded, remembering all her hard work and effort to make Vanguard a success and for what?

“People need a purpose, a reason, a goal in life, Miranda,” Jon explained patiently. “I should know this better than most. When the Confederation disbanded the Imperial Navy, many people, good people, honest, honourable and hardworking had their life taken away from them. They were lost like me. Do you think people like Paul, David, Gunny, and Jason would have just accepted a few million credits each if I had offered it? They would have been horrified, it would have besmirched their personal honour, they would have thrown the money back in my face.”

“So you gave them a purpose,” Miranda exhaled in sudden comprehension. “You created Vanguard not as a company intent on profit, but as a purpose for them.”

“Vanguard generates a profit,” Jon replied defensively.

“But if we are not here for cargo to transport, why are we here?”

“There are some supplies that I want to pick up and one other little thing,” Jon replied with a hard, flint-eyed expression.

The some supplies, turned out to be a dozen of the larger crates, which of course happened to be at the far end of the depot. Too heavy to carry by hand Jon and Miranda had to utilise the automated cargo handlers to help load the crates aboard the Eternal Light, even with the automated cargo handlers it was long, hard, sweaty work, but finally several hours later the crates were aboard the Eternal Light, and Jon and Miranda stood alone, facing a massive internal blast door.

“This is your one more little thing?” Miranda inquired looking at the massive door apprehensively. Whatever required such a massive barrier, in a hollow asteroid that was already brimming with weapons and high explosives did not even bear contemplating.

“Behind this door is the reason why you will not find this depot on any Imperial Navy report, or manifest or star-chart,” Jon explained cryptically. “This is why it was only known to the Emperor and a few of his closest advisors.” Approaching a console set into the frame of the door, Jon once again typed in a code, which to the best of his knowledge he was the last alive to know. This time there was no hesitation, no mistake.

“Authorisation Code—accepted,” the console flashed. “Voice print authorisation required.”

“Jonathan Radec, Commander, Praetorian Guards, 58th Squadron,” Jon tonelessly announced to the door.

“Voice Print—accepted,” the console once again reported. However, this time there was no other prompts and the massive door, slowly, ponderously started to open.

“Open Sesame,” Jon announced to the door.

Miranda was astonished that, as the door slowly opened, she could see it must have been close to thirty centimetres thick, What horror could possibly be behind such a door? However, Miranda was disappointed to find that the room behind the door was barely twenty meters by ten meters in size, a cubbyhole compared to the rest of the massive depot. Lying in the middle of the room, like a tomb of old, rested a single solitary box. Approximately six meters in length, half again in width, and half again in height, Miranda did for a moment think that it was a coffin.

That was until she saw the markings on the crate, and took several steps back in terror. “Is… Is it safe?” she stuttered.

Approaching the crate cautiously to check its contents, Jon replied, “It’s been sitting here for almost a decade, surrounded by lethal weapons and high explosives, in an unstable asteroid belt. I think if it was going to go off, it would have done so by now.”

Satisfied what he was looking for was present and everything checked out, he turned back to Miranda and asked. “Give me a hand with this can you? Probably best we don’t drop it.”