A Dark, Distorted Mirror. Volume 4. A Future, Born in Pain addm-4

by Gareth D. Williams

  She could feel the power in this place. It was a holy place, not just to the Tak'cha but to her people as well, a place where the ancestors had walked, where legends had stood. She could hear their words, feel their inner strength, witness their ancient struggles.

  It had been she who had noticed that Kozorr had wandered off, and also she who had worked out where he would have gone. Gripped by a strange, dark feeling she could not explain, she had gathered Rastenn and the others and gone to find him, moving quickly.

  They had found family and friends, kith and kin, wearing bands that proclaimed their allegiance, and standing guard with pikes raised. There had been a moment's hesitation, and then battle had been joined, Minbari against Minbari, warrior against warrior, all set upon strength and skill and prowess and will.

  As it had been in the old days.

  Tirivail had caught a brief glimpse of Kozorr inside the room, and had seized an opportunity to dart into the chamber. A figure was standing over him, pike raised. For a moment time shifted slightly, and she was sure she saw a tall warrior, bearing the mark of a clan long dead. Without thought, she struck, and as her pike connected, she saw who it was.

  "You should be more careful," she said to Kozorr, a faint smile on her face. "But then...." She turned to look at Kats. The strike had not been a harsh one, not a killing blow. "So should she."

  "No," Kozorr whispered, trying to rise, but his crippled body would not permit him. It was a tragedy, such a vibrant will imprisoned by a weakened and injured body. She did not love him any the less for his deformity, but he could not believe that, of course.

  "Come," she said, bending over to take his hand. "There is battle outside. You will be needed."

  "No," said another voice, a surprisingly forceful one. Tirivail turned to see the little worker rising to her feet. She still held Kozorr's pike. "We should not be fighting each other," she said, holding the weapon inexpertly.

  "Silence, traitor. Lord Sonovar should have killed you when he was able."

  "I am no traitor, not to the Minbari, not to the Grey Council, not to anyone." Tirivail saw Kozorr flinch. "But this is not the way. We should not be fighting each other."

  "We did for thousands of years before Valen came. We will do so again."

  "And where will that take us? Our world is dead, our people scattered to the three winds, our cities rubble and our shrines empty ruins. We should be working together to rebuild, not merely creating more dead bodies."

  "Spoken like a true worker. Go back to your little den and build walls and bridges. Let us rule, as we were always meant to."

  "Always? You do not see, do you? We have been three working as one. You fight, we build, they pray. And together, our people are strengthened. Apart, we wither and die." Kats paused. "Ask Kozorr."

  "He is a warrior! He knows the way the galaxy is."

  Kats turned instinctively to look at Kozorr. Tirivail could see him out of the corner of her eye. His head was bowed, his body shaken by racking coughs. His weak leg was twisted.

  Tirivail's heart wept to see him like this, but she was a warrior, and she knew the value of action over sentimentality.

  She darted forward, aiming for a paralysing blow rather than a killing one. Her last strike had been weakened due to her mis–perception of what she was striking. This one would not be. She was a trained warrior, Kats just a worker holding a pike even a master could not wield well.

  Kozorr's pike seemed to move in Kats' hands. There was a flick of her wrist, and the pike knocked aside Tirivail's thrust. The warrior stepped back, eyes darkening.

  "I am only a mere worker," Kats said softly, "but a warrior I knew once, and loved always, told me that it has been said that weapons can.... over time.... become moulded by their owners, guided by the spirits of those who bore the pike in times past." She smiled sadly. "A silly superstition, is it not?"

  Tirivail paled. She was a warrior. A thousand years had passed since the great days of the warriors, the days of duels and glorious deaths and immortalisation in poetry. A thousand years of peace were shouting at her.... but she still believed. The old ways spoke to her, and in the depths of her heart she truly believed that her ancestors watched her always, that ghosts protected holy places.... and that weapons could be guided by the spirits of their former owners.

  But Kozorr had wielded that pike less than two years. She had never heard, even in the darkest legends, of any pike becoming a spirit blade in such a short time.

  She launched forward in another attack. Kats parried it. Tirivail spun on the balls of her feet and darted past Kats' guard, dancing effortlessly in a pattern of attack her clan's Sechs had developed. Kats moved slowly to match her.

  Tirivail rained blows down on Kats, and each one was blocked, although with difficulty. There were.... weaknesses in Kats' defence. Tirivail could not explain this, any more than she could explain how Kats could wield the weapon at all. The guidance of Kozorr's spirit was the only possibility.

  But that meant....

  It meant that Kozorr did truly love this worker after all. It meant that the bravest, strongest, most noble warrior Tirivail had ever known loved a worker rather than her.

  Screaming with fury, she continued to attack. Time and space continued to shift, and she was on Minbar once again, on her family's training ground, practising with the denn'bok while her father watched.

  Lanniel was defending, crafting an effortless wall of movement and parry, draining every attack. Every advance broke on her wall, and finally Tirivail slumped to the ground, defeated.

  No! Not this time!

  Her attack smashed Kozorr's pike from Kats' hands and the force of the impact drove the worker to the floor. Eyes blind with rage, not knowing where or when she was, Tirivail lunged in for the kill.

  There was a distant cry from someone she ought to know, but did not, and a blur of motion. In one terrible instant she realised what was happening and tried to reverse her attack, but instinct was too finely ingrained. Generation after generation of warrior training in her blood worked against her.

  Kozorr's crippled body could move at last. He formed another shield, one Tirivail could destroy all too easily. The edge of her pike tore into his body.

  There was a rush of blood, an anguished cry, and then.... silence.

  She dropped her pike and sank to her knees, head bowed. She knew Kats was saying something, but she did not hear it. The words were not meant for her, after all, but for the one they both loved, the one she had just killed.

  "Is he dead?" she whispered at last. It was a killing blow, she knew that. He might still live, if his will held. It might not be fatal.... yet. But she knew with a sick certainty that it would kill him eventually.

  "No," came the soft reply.

  "You were right. We should not be fighting each other."

  There was noise and movement from the other side of the room. "Tirivail!" came a cry. It was Rastenn, the euphoria of victory in his voice. "We have prisoners, two of them."

  "Let them go," she said hollowly.

  "What?"

  "Let them go!"

  "Sinoval is waiting for you," said Kats softly. "He is in the Grey Council Hall. He is alone."

  "I know where that is." Tirivail rose to her feet and picked up her pike. "We will end this, and when it is.... done.... I will come back. Kozorr, can you.... hear me?"

  "I think he can."

  "You.... were right. Take your pretty little worker, be with her." Her eyes shifted to meet Kats'. "I...." She tried to say something, but no words would come.

  "I know," Kats whispered, tears in her eyes.

  Tirivail could not hold that gaze for long. She broke away and turned to Rastenn. He had seen Kozorr's body, and his face paled. He had idolised Kozorr, dreamed of modelling himself in his pattern.

  "We will find Sinoval," she said to him, and he looked at her. "We will end this."

  "Yes," said Rastenn, a dark hatred in his voice. "We will end this."

  * *
*

  There was a lesson Corwin remembered the Captain teaching him once. It was about fear, and something he claimed to have picked up from one of his earliest commanding officers.

  Fear has no place during a battle. Before, yes. And after sometimes. But never during. There are two types of soldiers: the one who wants to win, and the one who is afraid to lose. Both can be good. Damned good. But in a match between the two, there's no doubt who'll win.

  Don't be afraid during a battle. Think about what is. Think about what you have to return to, not about what you might lose.

  The Captain had taught him a great many things, and most of them he had learned to heed. Not this one. He was afraid, but not of dying. He was afraid of living. Afraid of what was going to come out of all this.

  It was not just him. There was a palpable sense of fear over the whole bridge. He could see some of the crew shaking. It wasn't just fear of battle. These were experienced soldiers, who'd been fighting almost constantly as far back as they could remember. There was something.... expectant in the air, a feeling that something very, very bad was going to happen.

  Even the ship seemed to feel it. From time to time while he had been on the Agamemnon he had felt something that seemed like a heartbeat, thudding through the armrest of his chair. It could be just his imagination, but it seemed to be beating faster now.

  "Are you there?" he thought to himself. "Is anyone there, or am I really losing my mind?" He had felt so many strange things about this ship, and he was not the only one. Neeoma flat out refused to come on board any more, and several members of other crews had resigned, or moved to the normal support ships. There had even been a handful of suicides.

  What had those Vorlons done here? What were they willing to do for all this?

  In fact, the only person who seemed unaffected by these Dark Stars was the Captain himself, but then he had changed so much in recent months anyway.

  Are you there? Corwin thought to himself again as the gap in space opened and the Agamemnon swept into normal space with the rest of the fleet.

  Help me!

  He started, sitting forward. Had someone said something? He looked around, but none of the bridge crew was looking at him. He was sure he had heard something, but it wasn't a voice he recognised.

  He shook his head, trembling. There were a million explanations. Radio interference, perhaps. Strange things happened in hyperspace. Or maybe simple stress.

  Whatever it was, rational thought fled as he found himself staring at the fleet ready to oppose him. Human ships, crewed by his contemporaries, people he knew, people he had met, liked, befriended.

  And next to them, the Shadow ships.

  Destroy them! cried a voice, one he could not identify, and just beneath that, a soft echo came. Help me.

  There were no words that needed to be spoken, no orders that needed to be given. It was as if the ships knew what they were doing and the crews were merely along for the ride.

  The Dark Stars swept forward, and battle was joined.

  * * *

  He watched and listened as she talked, happy to let her do so. He knew something of the trauma she had recently been through. The doctors here might not be well provisioned or well paid or well supplied, but they were thorough and they knew their job. For most of them it was a calling.

  She showed little sign of her grief. Although her words lacked the conviction of their previous conversation, her genuine sincerity remained.

  Dexter Smith was still unable to explain, even to himself, why he was risking so much to help Delenn. A little voice in his mind, Talia's voice, said he owed Delenn nothing. She was the enemy. They had undertaken a mission to rescue her, and they had been paid for it, and that was that. Mission accomplished, job done, go home.

  But another part of him pointed out that Delenn was not the enemy. She was someone who had been terribly, terribly hurt, and needed help, needed company, needed someone.

  "We have talked before," she said hesitantly, after a while. "I know you...."

  "Dexter Smith. Formerly Captain in Earthforce. I arrested you on Babylon Four."

  She smiled in recognition. "Yes, I remember now. What happened? Why are you not with your army any more?"

  "Ah.... I was asked to explain some.... things about that whole incident I really couldn't explain. I resigned to avoid a scandal, with an honourable discharge due to 'ill health'. To be honest, I just couldn't do it any more. When I joined Earthforce it was to get away from here. Then later it was a simple matter of good and evil. We were good, you were evil, and that was that.

  "I saw just a bit too much and...." He sighed. "I didn't know where I was going, what I was doing.... what. So I decided to wind down a notch, come back here and try to work things out."

  "Ah," she said, nodding. "A soul quest, yes. Some of our people have been known to do similar things, when they realise they are known only by their positions, by what they are, rather than who they are.

  "Tell me, Captain Smith, do you know who you are now?"

  "I'm getting there," he admitted. "And it's plain old Mr. Smith these days. Or Dexter even. Just not Dex."

  "I apologise," she said. She made to smile, but then a look of pain crossed her face, and she began to cough. Flecks of blood stained her mouth.

  "Are you all right?" said Smith, starting. "Let me get a doctor."

  "No," she whispered weakly. "It is.... only to be expected.... after what has happened. I can...." She closed her eyes. "I can still hear his heart beating...." She began coughing again.

  "I'm going to get a doctor," he said again, rising from his chair by her side. She tried to say something, but clearly could not. He moved quickly from her room to the adjacent corridor. To his surprise there was no one there. He took a glance in the nearest room. It was empty. And then the next one.

  That was empty too.

  In fact, there was no one around.

  He might have retired from Earthforce but he had been a soldier for a long time, and some instincts remained. They were all screaming at him. There was the sound of movement outside, and he began to panic. Racing back to Delenn's room, he scooped up the PPG he had laid next to the chair.

  "What is it?" Delenn whispered.

  "Trouble," he replied softly. "Can you walk?"

  "If I must."

  "Trust me, you must. I think someone's discovered you're here. Come on." He reached for her and gently helped her out of the bed. She swayed against him and almost fell. "Just move as quickly as you can," he said. "We've got to get out of here."

  "Where?"

  "I don't know." Slowly, he began to guide her towards the back door. "I would have said Bo's, but I went to him before. Maybe he...." He shook his head. "No, I can't believe Bo would do that. But.... Damn, we've been much too careless. Doctors, helpers, anyone could have found out you're here."

  "We don't know.... they.... know...."

  A window exploded as a rock came flying through it. Smith started as it landed at his feet. There was the sound of angry voices outside. He could not identify words, and he did not want to.

  "Oh, they know all right. There must be another way out of here."

  "Why...?" She coughed again. "Why are you helping me?"

  "Someone has to."

  "No," she said seriously. "No one has to. I would not blame you if you chose to leave me here. I have done much to deserve that."

  "Well, what can I say? I always wanted to be a hero. Look, someone has to be the good guy, and it might as well be me. In the grand scale of things my life doesn't mean much. Yours does. Now come on, we have to get out the back."

  "Thank you," she whispered. "Thank you."

  "Hey, don't thank me until we're out of this."

  Slowly, they moved on. More windows broke, but they were all front–facing ones. Maybe they had not got round the back. Smith was thinking of places to go, places to hide. There was an alley not far away that led out to another abandoned building. They could hide there for a while
. It would be hard to conceal Delenn, of course. Even apart from her headbone she was pretty conspicuous in her white hospital gown.

  Still, all they had to do was get away from here. They could try to get in touch with Welles. He would be able to do something.

  Smith pushed open the back door, and swore loudly.

  There was a crowd waiting for them. Several people were carrying weapons, and dark glares were burning in their eyes. There were angry cries.

  And standing in the front row, a look of triumph on his face, arms folded across his chest, was Trace.

  He was smiling.

  * * *

  Klaxons continued to blare across Proxima. Wherever they were heard they aroused panic and terror. People had long memories. Some scrambled into underground blast shelters, families huddled together, reliving days they had thought were long gone. Others stumbled outside, looking up into the sky, waiting for the first sight of the alien ships descending on their world.

  If anyone in the business sector had done that they would indeed have seen an alien ship descending on their world, but this was not a Minbari warship, not a Dark Star, or a Narn cruiser, or a Drazi Sunhawk, or any other Alliance ship.

  It was a Shadow vessel. A ship belonging to humanity's allies, their saviours, their guardians against all the things that threatened the human race.

  The dome shattered as it crashed through the glittering surface, shards raining down upon the buildings and people below. It turned and bore down on the Edgars Building, the headquarters of Interplanetary Expeditions.

  It fired. Windows shattered. Walls exploded. The building began to collapse.

  Somewhere beneath the building, in a hidden, reinforced underground complex, two men stood before another one. The room was shaking around them.

  "How strong is this place?" asked the younger. "Can that thing blow us up?"

  "Eventually, yes. There were limits to just how strong we could make this complex without alerting the Enemy. It will however take time.... and that is on our side."

  "Is it ready?"

  A thin smile stretched across his features. "Yes, the network is ready. The Dark Stars are here, and unknowingly they bring our salvation with them. All we have to do is open this link."