There he was, floating through the everlasting darkness and airless, starless, void of space.
All those long hours in the simulator would finally pay off. Zero-gravity training, although tiring, would finally save his life today. He touched the helmet which had saved his life, but had taken another.
He had escaped death today, only to face it again.
Tomorrow his sentencing would occur. His punishment would follow.
His failure was a fact, but mercy wasn't.
There was a time when his life and career were never certain. Every failure and victory was brushed aside, rewarded or condemned on a whim. It all depended on the captain's mood.
Captain Crais had been a horrible man. A good captain, but a horrible man.
And it only got worse as his obsession for that strange man grew and grew.
Crichton.
The planet beneath his dangling feet was still spinning around. Bracca's eye was twitching.
A dreadful silence was everywhere. He could only hear the sound of his own breathing. And in that moment, nobody but him could. The debris from the freighter's destruction were still floating around, and he was lucky enough not to get hit by any, as he kept on floating through outer space.
Luck.
The beacon implanted into the structure of the helmet was already transmitting a distress-call to the Command Carrier which was silently waiting for instructions in orbit around the Royal Planet.
There was no luck in this, only careful planning and strict regulations.
Not luck or fate.
The man did not believe in a God, or a multitude of Gods for that matter, and nor was he ever taught how.
But what he did know was that his fate, his life, was no longer in his own hands.
He checked the pressure gauge and the amount of oxygen he had still left.
There was more than enough left.
Bracca knew that a Marauder would be dispatched soon to extract him from the debris.
He was floating through vessels and floating turrets which were programmed to target anything which would power up its weapons.
This Bracca learned from his mad encounter with the human.
It was the insane human who ruined everything.
And still Bracca couldn't determine whether he was a madman, or a genius.
Crichton successfully eluded capture, but without a spacesuit like his, he would surely die in outer space. His body would be able to cope with the difference in pressure and his head would explode.
Scorpius's precious obsession to capture Crichton would come to an end, and so would Bracca's ambitions to ever become captain.
He knew he would probably be mocked by the other Peacekeepers. He knew that they could possibly well be stretching out this glorious moment of his extraction only to mock him. To laugh at him, like only they could, with their vicious, loud laughs and spiteful, jealous snickering.
Oh, yes, Bracca knew how they talked about him in the corridors, but he used to turn his head and pretend not to hear it.
Oh, how they would pay, Bracca always told himself. When he would become captain, he would have the last laugh. All those years kissing up to superior officers would come to a rewarding climax, and he would make them pay for laughing at him.
They would have to salute him. They would have to kiss up to him.
And he would make them pay.
That's what he had been telling himself for all those years, but now they seemed such hollow words.
Would they be his final words, he wondered. Would he look up to his executioner and say, "All I ever wanted was respect, and a place of power, where I could look upon myself in a mirror and say: I did the right thing."
As the Marauder flew past, Bracca could only think of how he let Scorpius down.
He could not stop imagining his future punishment: demotion, banishment, transfer, or death. For all he knew he could be mopping up the floors of the Carrier's corridors this time tomorrow.
Bracca knew nothing. It drove him mad, but he never said a word.
He had killed John Crichton. He had let him go, and he left him aboard that burning freighter to die.
Now he was going to pay the price. And Bracca, bravely, accepted this fact.
As the Marauder pulled him aboard, and the soldiers on board gazed at him with curious, taunting eyes, Bracca looked away.
He took a deep breath, raised his chin, and ignored their words and questions as he waited until the Marauder docked inside the Command Carrier.
There he was put into a decompression chamber for a couple of arns. It was a chamber in which he could finally take off his uncomfortable spacesuit and acclimatise to the Carrier's air and pressure.
Even those he thought kindly of he ignored as he walked towards the Command Carrier's bridge.
He intended to apologize personally to Scorpius. He intended for him to be the first to accept his full report on what happened aboard that freighter.
Scorpius would be the first to know of how John Crichton died.
Bracca believed that to be the right thing to do.
He changed into his regular uniform and entered the elevator, alone, folding his arms behind his back as he looked up at the lights in the ceiling.
He did not practice his words, nor did he try to picture how the moment would unfold, when he would speak directly to Scorpius and come clean about his failure.
He approached the door to Scorpius's private quarters, only to be halted by two armed men who guarded the door.
Bracca could feel the glares of the officers in his back. They all knew of his little space-walk and soon this rumour would circulate all the way to the officer's lounge.
Bracca didn't care.
His eyes were aimed at the door to Scorpius's quarters. He had just arrived from the planet and he awaited Bracca's report.
'Lieutenant Bracca.' Scorpius said, acknowledging Bracca's presence in his quarters, letting him know that his arrival did not go unnoticed.
Bracca did not look Scorpius in the eyes as he positioned himself in the centre of the room and assumed a official military stance as regulations insisted.
'I have come here to apologise, sir.' Bracca spoke. 'I have failed my mission to capture John Crichton, and I must regretfully report that the human was killed during the mission.'
Bracca saw how Scorpius's coolant rod was replaced by this strange, alien woman, yet he pretended not to. He had always felt uncomfortable whenever Scorpius had to undergo this procedure. Sticking a rod into someone's head just wasn't natural.
The woman, Scorpius's personal assistant, now revealed a new coolant rod from her purse and placed it in Scorpius's rotating spire, which, only moments later, returned in its right place.
Scorpius took a deep breath and then continued with the conversation, as the woman backed away into the shadows.
'I'm sure you expect some kind of punishment, lieutenant,' Scorpius said.
He slowly climbed down the small steps towards Bracca. 'But here I must disappoint you, for John Crichton is not dead.'
'Not dead, sir?' Bracca asked surprised.
'He is alive and well,' Scorpius said smiling, raising his hands halfway into the air, as if he planned to hug Bracca, but then he lowered his hands again. He let them slide slowly against his sides. 'Aboard his Leviathan, somewhere in the Uncharted Territories, but no doubt we haven't seen the last of him yet. I will make sure of that.'
He looked deeply into Bracca's eyes, before continued. He was friendly, almost open and cheerful to Bracca, as if he was not his failing inferior, yet a victorious comrade in a secret war.
'But sir,' Bracca said. 'I don't understand…'
Captain Crais would have never reacted like this. He would've died before he ever got friendly with one of his lieutenants.
'We were lucky today, Bracca.' Scorpius said. 'Extremely lucky. The Scarrans…don't know what valuable and dangerous secrets Crichton has locked inside his mind. At least, they don't know yet. That is why we must act quickly, while we still have the upper hand.'
'Sir, if I may ask,' Bracca said. 'You said Crichton was still alive…'
'Yes, I saw him on the Royal Planet.' Scorpius answered.
'But how? He was stranded on an exploding freighter without a spacesuit! He should've died, sir. How could he have survived?'
Scorpius smiled.
'Suffice to say, lieutenant, that Crichton survived….well, because of me.'
Bracca didn't understand.
'During his captivity on the Gammak Base, I placed a neural chip inside his mind. Quite ingenious, actually. The chip was designed to search for the wormhole-knowledge inside his mind and gradually merge with his system. Crichton survived the deadly encounter with you, because the chip wouldn't let him die, and nor did he succeed in killing me on the Royal Planet below. These were basic rules I implanted into the chip, and therefore also…into Crichton's mind.'
'Very ingenious, sir, if I may say so, sir.' Bracca said.
'You may.' Scorpius spoke.
Scorpius resumed his walk up the small steps, and Bracca didn't understand why.
Did they not still have urgent business to discuss?
'Sir?' Bracca said. 'What about my punishment? I failed you. I failed to carry out a direct order from you. Shouldn't you at least take away some personal rights or rank?'
Scorpius turned around, standing halfway on the small steps in a graceful, frozen pose.
'So you want to be punished?' he asked.
'Well, if you want me to be honest…' Bracca said, hesitating to answer. 'Yes.'
Scorpius smiled.
'You are quite a surprise, lieutenant Bracca.' he spoke, as he slowly stepped down.
'They used to say that you could tell a man's worth by how he wins his battles, but I disagree.'
Bracca only listened to Scorpius's words, never daring to interrupt, for it would be improper.
'I say that you can tell a man's worth, by how he handles himself when he loses. And you, lieutenant, you have exceeded beyond all my expectations, for you handled yourself more than fine today.'
'Thank you, sir.' Bracca said.
'But still, do not forget, there are many lessons still to be learned today.' Scorpius added.
'I know, sir.'
'Never…underestimate…Crichton…again.' Scorpius said.
Bracca left Scorpius's quarters with high spirits and a rekindled determination and goal.
Those who had laughed at him before now wouldn't even dare to smile in front of Lieutenant Meeklo Bracca.
He would never doubt Scorpius ever again.
And he knew that from this day forward, he would never again underestimate that insane human called John Crichton, and when that day would come when they would face each other again, Bracca knew that Crichton wouldn't escape his grasp a second time.
He would make sure of it.