She was not a wife, she was not a mother, she was not a leader.
She was a healer.
There were few, precious few who could help her, but the Alliance had been born from only a few, and perhaps it could be re–born. Lethke would have needed a great deal more stealth to have hidden his meeting from her eyes, although she had not discovered his plan until after she had returned from the garden, limping and hobbling.
These were good people, people who desired peace and tranquillity, and if they worked together....
The smell of the room hit her while she was still in the corridor. At first she hoped it was just an illusion, or a memory, but as she came closer she realised that it was real. She kept hoping, daring to believe it might be something else, right until the moment she reached the still–open door.
These were not bodies, at least not the ones she could see. They were lumps of flesh, ruptured and torn and mutilated. One piece of flesh bore a fragment of Durano's red coat. The blackened Drazi corpse could only be Taan Churok. She wept at the sight of Lethke's body.
Her heart almost stopped when she saw the all–but–headless body of a Narn, but as she looked at it closely, with the cold, dispassionate glance that can only arise from the purest fear, she saw that it was not G'Kar. The clothing and build were different, and this had to be G'Kael.
She could not see G'Kar at all, and there was only one Narn body. Perhaps he had never arrived. Perhaps he still lived. Perhaps....
"G'Kar," she whispered, holding on to that one thought. She did not know how these people had been killed, although she could suspect, but if G'Kar still lived, then maybe their lives' works would still endure.
"He.... lives," rasped a broken voice, and she turned. There was a movement behind a table which had clearly been hurled into the wall with tremendous force. It took Delenn a long moment to recognise the voice.
She moved forward cautiously, lifting the hem of her skirt and picking a slow trail across the mass of flesh. As she got close enough to look behind the table, she saw Kulomani, blood sprayed across his chest and still dripping from numerous wounds.
"At least.... I think so," he said, gasping for breath. Horrible sounds came from his chest, the grinding of countless broken bones, a grisly rasp against the faint drumbeat of his heart. "Heard voices.... from the.... other side of the.... world."
"What happened?" she asked, leaning over to touch him. He shook at the lightest caress on his chest.
"Vorlon," he said, his eyelids fluttering. "Treason.... it said." He sighed. "Can't.... feel my legs." He looked up at her, his eyes filled with sincerity and conviction. "Kill me."
"No," she said firmly, tracing the outline of the table. It was hard to tell where it ended and Kulomani began, but she managed it eventually. Both his legs were broken, probably completely shattered.
"Dying anyway."
"No," she said again, biting her lip and trying to think of some way to move the table gently. Then she looked at the mangled ruin of his lower body, and reached out to touch his upper thigh. "Can you feel that?"
"Feel.... what? You.... have to...."
"No," she said again, her decision made. It might be that he would die anyway, but she would not let him die, and she would not kill him here. "We have seen too many die," she said angrily, her hands exploring the table for a hold. "This Alliance was built after far too many deaths, and it was built to celebrate life. We have all forgotten that, myself included, but it is time to remember. I will not let you die." She found a grip and dug her fingers in sharply.
"I am a healer, you see."
She forced the table up with all her strength. Kulomani let out a loud cry and his head flopped backwards, but she managed to get the table clear, pushing it away to one side.
His legs looked even more ruined from here, but as she looked closer she saw it might not be as bad as she had initially feared. The bones were smashed, but no limb was severed, and she knew Brakiri bones to be very supple. With time and rest they would probably knit. He might even walk again - or he might not.
"Commander Kulomani," she said, looking down at him. He did not reply, and she wondered if the blood loss or shock had finally killed him, but his eyelids fluttered. "Commander Kulomani."
"Empty," he whispered. "You.... are empty."
She took his hand and pulled him up so that he swayed against her, barely upright.
"I am filled with my purpose," she said firmly. "What else do I need?"
His head bobbed, and he seemed to be nodding. "What.... else.... indeed?"
* * *
You will obey us
* * *
She took a deep breath. She should be angry. No one could fault her for being angry. In fact, no one could fault her for being absolutely bloody furious. And she was.
But she was also ready. Unlike last time, she understood the need for this. Sinoval could not be everywhere, and his mystique drew on his personal power and force of will as much on legend. He had to be seen. Besides, he obviously had things to do which were more important than leading his bloody fleet.
She knew the objectives, and the reasoning behind it. Babylon 5 was the centre of the Alliance, an important symbol. It was also the current location of a lot of important people who would have to be rescued.
Susan had a very uncomfortable feeling she would have to destroy the station in order to save it.
She looked out at her fleet, trying to breathe slowly. Sinoval thought her capable of this. He must have done, or he would not have gone on ahead. He certainly wouldn't have jeopardised everything just for a single blaze–of–glory mission, would he?
She gritted her teeth, and began to speak.
"Is everyone ready?"
Her voice would go out across her fleet. All of them could hear her, and she could hear all of them.
"We are ready," replied the cold, dead, emotionless voice of Marrago, leader of the ragtag army formed from the remains of the Brotherhood Without Banners.
"To war we go, with no fear or doubt," said another. "May our ancestors watch over us." Susan had no doubt that Marrain and the Tak'cha were ready and fearless.
"Yes," came a simple reply, spoken no doubt through teeth as gritted as her own. Vizhak had watched his homeworld fall under the grip of the Vorlons, only barely managing to escape himself. He had been another of Sinoval's private projects, but he had worked to gather as many of his people as he could. Hungry and angry and filled with desire for revenge.
The Soul Hunters did not reply, but Susan could feel their acceptance vibrating through the Well. They would go through anything for their Primarch.
What a mess this was. In one way or another the three commanders of the fleet were all dead men, trapped and lost in grief. They were the renegades and the monsters and the bandits and the dispossessed.
They were an army of freaks.
Susan touched the pattern of scars on her face and felt the whisper of her mother's touch in the back of her mind.
She was a freak as well.
"You all know the plans," she said. "Hold the Vorlons back from the station, assemble a boarding party. If we can drive the whole fleet away, so much the better, but that's secondary. There's a list of people we have to get off the station before the really heavy fighting begins."
She paused.
"And if a single one of you puts revenge above the overall plan, I'll personally skin him alive.
"Let's go."
* * *
You will obey us
* * *
Sinoval lifted his head and opened his eyes. Around him he could hear the screams, the waiting, anticipating
things
from elsewhere, from behind the barriers of hyperspace. The
things
the Vorlons had brought through.
The human was standing there, still, not breathing, a faint, satisfied smile on his face.
"You would be Sebastian," Sinoval whispered.
The journey through
hyperspace had never felt like that before. The Aliens were nearer than he had suspected. He had seen their city in the dreamscape where Sheridan and he had been imprisoned, but that had not been entirely real, just the reflection of the night sky in a lake filled with the black blood of the dying.
The things that had reached out to him in hyperspace were real, terrifyingly real, and close to breaking through.
"I am. Inquisitor Sebastian of the Order of Seekers for Truth and Penitence, to allow myself my full title."
"Of course." Sinoval coughed, trying to remember how to breathe, trying to remember how to force his heart to keep beating. "Formality." He sat back on his heels. "Sinoval, once of the Wind Swords, Primarch Majestus et Conclavus, Lord of Cathedral."
"Formality indeed," Sebastian intoned. "It is always good to meet with politeness, with someone who recognises that manners are inherently necessary in a diplomatic meeting such as this. In the interests of formality, may I inform you that the Lights Cardinal of the Vorlon High Command have ordered you placed under arrest for various and sundry crimes against the natural order of the galaxy. You are to be transported to Their August Presence, alive if possible, but should you resist I am to take you to them dead. Do you understand me?"
"Perfectly," he breathed. His breath was coming more strongly now, and his body was beginning to feel more normal. His muscles were tense, ready for the explosion of motion that would begin this. His fingers slowly curled around Stormbringer's hilt.
"Those who have aided or assisted you in your crimes are also to be placed under arrest," Sebastian added. "I have already begun this process."
He stepped to one side, a single tap of his cane on the floor punctuating the motion.
Kats was there, lying still and unconscious on the floor.
She was not dead. Even weakened and confused, Sinoval could see that, but she was hurt. The sight of her fragile, gentle beauty touched him in a way he could not have anticipated. It had been two years or more since he had last seen her, before Golgotha, before Sheridan, before the black heart of night beating in the necropolis crafted by dreams.
It had been easy to push her out of his mind, but now she was here before him, vulnerable and wounded, and he had not been expecting her.
The Well tried to cry out a warning to him, but the voice was distant and he did not react as quickly as he should have done. He tried to move forward, but Sebastian was ready for him. The cane swung in a smooth, graceful semi–circle and smashed into the side of his head. He fell, reeling, stunned by the electricity crackling from the length of the cane.
"I am authorised, and indeed requested," Sebastian said, "to use whatever force I deem necessary in the pursuit of my duty."
He struck Sinoval again.
* * *
You will obey us
* * *
For Senator Dexter Smith, sleep was not something to be welcomed. Not now. It was not that he suffered from insomnia, in fact that would have been preferable. It was that when he slept he dreamed of the grave, of worms eating his flesh, of cold damp soil filling his mouth and his eyes, of skin cracking and rotting and becoming dust.
He had to will himself to wake, and then there was nothing to do but stare up at the ceiling, careful not to wake Talia. She was sleeping well, and he supposed he should envy her that, but he could not. He doubted he could envy anyone anything.
He could hardly bring himself to touch her. Her skin was cold and clammy, her hair smelled of mist in a graveyard, her heartbeat was the slow, dying thud of a drum whose drummer is losing strength.
Sometimes she felt warm, and at those times he let her stay with him and sleep beside him. They did nothing else. He could hardly bring himself to touch her, or anyone else. He could not bring himself to kiss her. It was only the gentle touch of her mind that made her presence bearable.
It was not that he had stopped feeling for her. He doubted he would ever do that, but he could see no point in anything. He could see only death in everything and everyone. Even in her.
Little things provoked strange memories within him. He thought about kissing her, and he remembered the first girl he had ever kissed, only now she was not full of life, with a shy glint in her eyes and shaking almost as hard as himself. Now she was a hollow skeleton, her lips blue with cold and skin that broke at his touch, revealing emptiness beneath.
Every other memory he had was the same. Everyone he remembered was dead, a skeleton, a revenant.
Was that what death was like, he wondered frequently, the slow and gradual corruption of all the good memories, until all that remained were the bad, and there was no reason to carry on?
Fortunately he had a reason. Those creatures, the things from elsewhere, had to be stopped. He had to stop them, because he had seen one, and without the training and discipline of the telepaths who had shared the experience, he had seen and experienced more. It had been driven back, back into the Apocalypse Box from which it had emerged, but it was still there, and he could feel it every time he looked at a living - or dying - being.
That was his goal, but there were things he had to do first.
"You're crazy," Talia said to him one day when he told her of his plan. They had spoken such words before, about one insane plan after another. The breaking into the hospital to rescue Delenn was yet another memory that had turned to ashes, for they had got there to find Delenn already dead and yet they had brought her out anyway, but this time the words were spoken without jest. No joking. No banter.
He supposed he was. No one could look upon that thing and remain sane. No one could look unprotected upon the infinity that was another universe and not see things differently.
He was a human being, and he was still alive. That was what he told himself when he doubted, as he did so very often.
"I have to do this," he had replied simply.
"At least take me with you."
"No."
"We should leave soon," said the Vindrizi. Dexter did not like to look at him. The body was human, but the force animating it was something entirely different. The human body was fallible and weak, and he could see the flaws running through it, tiny fault lines far beneath the surface. But that did not matter to the Vindrizi itself, a being with an existence of hundreds of millennia. It could wait and live on. It didn't matter to Dexter either. It didn't matter how long any lifespan was - all things died, and one day the Vindrizi would die too. And it would cease to exist with an even greater fear than that experienced by humans.
"I must do this," he had said again.
Neither of them understood. Or perhaps they had understood and he had not noticed. Regardless, he was convinced it was right that he do this. He was human, not a machine, not a walking corpse. He was human, and he would repay his debts.
That was why he found himself looking up at the impressively tall Edgars Building, home of Interplanetary Expeditions, looking at the cracks in the plexiglass and plasteel. That was why he found himself waiting outside the office of its secretive controller and conspirator, Mr. William Edgars.
He had wondered if an old man would be more obviously dying than the younger people he had seen. To his slight surprise, that was not the case. Everything was dying equally.
Death begins with life, after all.
* * *
You will obey us
* * *
And so the ships came through, bringing war to the place built to symbolise peace.
The Drazi, a race punished and sanctioned and enslaved.
The Tak'cha, a race of exiles, without home, without understanding, without atonement.
The Brotherhood Without Banners, raiders and outlaws and murderers and monsters.
The Soul Hunters.
The Vorlons were waiting for them, of course.
* * *
You will obey us
* * *
.... never need to change again.
The Vorlon's voice was seductive and soft, the voice of a kindly uncle comforting a y
oung child who does not understand the way the world works. It was the voice of wisdom, of the understanding of a teacher or a friend.
General John Sheridan did not need a lesson in how the world worked. He was not a young child, and he did not need wisdom.
What he needed, what he understood he needed, beneath the raging anger and the howling emptiness, behind the legion of ghosts staring at him with blank, unforgiving eyes....
What he needed was answers.
General John Sheridan looked up at the Vorlon, past the patterns swirling and writhing on its bone–white suit, past the fluttering of distant wings, into the pale glow of its eye stalk.
"What do I say?" he asked.
A Dark, Distorted Mirror. Volume 5 : Among the Stars, like Giants. Part 5 : The Three–Edged Sword addm-5 Page 10