Here and Now and Then

by Mike Chen

Two images of Miranda greeted him; the left frame holding her high school portrait, the Miranda that he’d left; and in the right frame was an old woman, life aged into her wrinkles and smile, the image captured off the holo she’d made during her final days. In between the two sat a weathered old coin.

There was an original epilogue with Miranda on her deathbed when a mysterious courier shows up with a card that simply has a drawing of a TARDIS on it. She sees it and then passes, knowing that her dad made it safely home. The idea was that Markus did this because giving her this information 60 seconds before her death would not affect the timeline in any way. I actually opened with this scene to create a closed loop with the book but it was deemed too obtuse and more of an easter egg than anything else, so we cut it. I should post it in my newsletter someday.