I have a theory that this chapter was hard to write because it involves something terribly sad happening...

Dean watched as Beka's rusty, old tin-can of a ship flew clumsily towards his hangar bay. The inertia gently carried the ship ever closer and Dean could feel his heart begin to pound in his chest.

Check one last time. Just one last time.

"Finster. Scan the ship for any extra life forms apart from Beka's." Dean ordered, talking to a man whose name he knew for certain, was not actually Finster. "Please."

Dean got the answer he wanted: there was one life sign. Just one. One little lost girl coming home. Beka had seen the error of her ways; she had apologise for shooting him in the stomach and like all those who had seen the edge of the shiny commonwealth, now wanted more than her fair share. Dean even let himself imagine a future where they raised their race together.

Screw Drago Museveni, he, Dean Hatu would be the one to go down in history. Tales would be told, legends spread, myths created, all about one man and his mission to make those populating the universe stronger.

Not only that, but Beka was going to be his in five seconds. Four seconds. Three seconds. Two seconds. One second...

"And the Maru had landed."

Dean chuckled to himself. It's always easy.

Dean waited for Beka's face to appear on the overhead screen, for her to ask to be let through the doors that connected her ship to his. He waited and waited, then eventually, her face did appear.

"Goodbye Dean." She said, simply. Then the transmission cut out.

Dean felt his stomach plummet to the floor. A though briefly flitted across his mind. Trap? No. She was not that smart. No one could beat him. Never. He was invincible.

Invincible.

"Dammit. Finster, eject that god damn ship. Now!" Dean panicked, his voice stuck in his throat. He was one perceptive man. How had he not seen this?

Beka would not have said goodbye if she meant to come aboard. Something was wrong and it was all on that decaying ship that he had blindly let travel into the heart of his empire. Then the men around him exploded into action, trying to save the ship. But it was too late.

I am invincible, I cannot die. I shall watch this all burn and I shall be left, to continue with my mission. Dean truly believed he would survive. The little voices in his brain were telling him with complete certainty that he would be all right. Nothing could kill him.

Then the invincible boy was lost, his body separated, his limbs torn apart in the great explosion that wracked through the whole ship. An explosion that echoed out from the Eureka Maru, reverberating through the ship, destroying everything in it's path.

Then there was silence in the space where he had once been and all that remained was the debris of a once incredible dream.

"It's over." Rommie announced to the group. "Dean's ship had successfully been destroyed."

"Well done people." Dylan said, letting out a sigh of relief. It was over but still not one of them felt lighter, freer or that they had done anything good today. Dean was dead but so was the Maru.

"It doesn't really feel like a victory does it?" Harper said quietly.

"No."

Beka walked out of command, the image of her ship flying into Dean's lair still etched onto her brain. She just wanted to sleep. Curl uptightly, entangle herself up in the sheets of her bed onboard the Maru... But that was gone, never to be replaced by anything as warm and as comforting again.

Never before had she felt so truly alone.

The Maru's been blown up! Whoops...