Jaya had often thought about how she would run her own ship as Captain.

The only real issue she had found, now being the acting Captain of the Craton, was that Ian Brooks had already run a good ship.

There were few changes she could make. She did implement a few alterations to schedules and operations, making a mark so to speak. They were not huge, and despite some initial discomfort from a handful of officers, it had gone smoothly.

Their discomfort had been good, in a way. The hard work was being done on the surface, and it would be weeks more yet before the Craton was actively called upon to be taking in teams and groups of !Xomyi refugees. The ship was acting only in a support role, and that could breed complacency.

Shaking things up had been a way to keep everyone alert and active.

Drills were another, and right now she watched in interest - and no small enjoyment - as the bridge crew ran through one.

In this scenario, she was out of action. How didn't matter, nor did it matter if she was dead or alive; all that mattered was that junior officers were in control of the ship.

The idea was that the moon had begun breaking up sooner than expected, and the crew were scrambling to keep the ship both safe and to evacuate as many teams from the surface as possible.

"We need to move the ship closer so we can pick up those shuttles that have breached atmo," Navigation called.

"No," Operations disagreed. "We're already too close to significant chunks of the moon that threaten the ship - we don't have the ability to deflect objects that size."

Comms chimed in. "We have two more teams launching from the surface, but they're experiencing heavy bombardment of small debris, I don't think-" he suddenly went silent.

"We lost them," he said, his voice heavy.

Response stepped up. Its commander was, in this scenario, Lt. Commander Pirra. "Our duty is to our mission. Navigation, have you plotted us the safest path you can?"

"Aye!"

"Then take us down. Ops, get the weapons going, try to give at least a missile bump to anything big that threatens us, and use the point-defense guns for smaller objects. Orient the frontal cone to catch anything they miss. Tell all the shuttles our path and get them to move to meet us."

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"But the pieces we can't deflect-" Ops began.

"Are we going to be hit by them, Nav?" Pirra asked.

"I don't think so. The odds are small - this is our best shot."

"Get us moving. Ops, get to your task."

The Operations officer looked to Jaya, mouth agape.

"Don't look to me," Jaya said. "I am dead."

Pirra was not a bridge officer, but in this scenario, there was little for Response Team One to do except be on the ship. Though they should have been down running their own companion scenario about fighting fires on the ship, Pirra had delegated that role.

"The bridge needs a Response officer," she had said when she had arrived.

Jaya had found herself quite amused by this call.

"I'll allow it," she had said.

"We're moving in," Navigation now called. "We've got large pieces of the moon - Dark, they're bigger than us - just forty clicks at heading . . ." She read off the numbers.

"That is too close," Ops said. "We can't even hope to budge a piece that big. If it breaks up further-"

"If," Pirra said. "Keep our heading, monitor the piece. Warm up the zerodrives - if need be maybe we can nudge any pieces with a partial field."

Nav nodded nervously.

It was, Jaya thought, the kind of crazy thing Brooks would try. Zerodrives were not toys, and using them in the way he often did was widely considered foolhardy.

"We have shuttles approaching," Flight called. "Their path is rocky, though."

"Get what point-defense guns we can on it," Pirra called to Ops.

"The moon piece is starting to break up!" Navigation called. "It's calving - a piece is on a course that will hit us in thirty seconds!"

"Get that drive going, alter its trajectory!" Pirra called.

"It's too big!"

"Nudge it, buy us a few more seconds. Get us a course that will avoid it if you can."

"There's no safe path we can register-"

"Dive into the planetary well," Pirra ordered, looking at the charts, herself.

"We can't escape a planetary gravity well like that easily-"

"We'll make a jump at the last minute - we've got the drive up, yes?"

Science called out. "We cannot make a jump in a planetary atmosphere, the repercussions-"

"Will not be worse than what's already happening," Pirra replied.

"We've got three shuttles docked," Flight called. "Those are the only ones in range . . ."

"Give them our best calculations for a safe path out, tell them to burn until they're clear and we'll get them as soon as we can," Pirra called. "Prepare for zerojump in-"

The emergency lights on the bridge suddenly went back to normal.

Everyone froze in surprise, as the emergency suddenly became the normal.

"Very good work," Jaya said. "Lt. Commander Pirra, your bravery in action would have netted you a medal, or perhaps killed everyone."

Pirra looked suddenly somewhat chagrined. "I stand by my actions, Captain."

Jaya nodded sharply. "Good, I am glad you are not second-guessing yourself."

"May I ask, Captain - why did you stop the scenario before we finished?"

"We have a signal coming in, Captain," the comms officer suddenly called. "It's Research-Major Nkosi."

"That is why," Jaya said. "Bring the call through."

Nkosi appeared.

"Hello, Captain, I am sorry if I am interrupting your war game."

"It is only a practice for a rescue operation," she said, feeling for a moment like he'd been making some kind of soft rebuke.

"My mistake," he replied, and she genuinely could not tell if there was more to it. "I wanted to speak to you about your latest scans you sent over."

Jaya checked the logs; they had been sent over just ten minutes ago. "Is there some problem with our work, Research-Major?"

"No, not at all. But there was something unexpected. In this location . . ." A map appeared, highlighting a part in the middle of the main continent. "Your scans observed the remains of a camp." His face went troubled. "I can tell you with certainty, Captain, that it is not one of ours. We have never had people within a hundred kilometers of this area, let alone a field camp."

Jaya took a moment to process that. Bringing up their detailed images, she could make out the camp. All that could be seen were the tops of tents, some of them quite large.

They did not match any Union-issued tents, however. They were not just camouflaged visually, but contained electronic baffles that made them hard to pick up. The Craton's powerful scanners had seen through that, but . . . even if Nkosi was mistaken, his people wouldn't have had any reason to use such things.

"Thank you for bringing this to my attention," she told him.

"I find it troubling, Captain," Nkosi said. "My guess is that it has been occupied for some time, longer than we have even been here. Who else has come to this world, and why? Why are they hiding?"

"There is only one way we will find out," Jaya said, looking to Pirra.

The Lt. Commander saluted her. "I will prepare Response Team One for orbital insertion."