Voices

by John Vornholt

  Or was she alone? What had Kosh meant by Invisible Isabel? That had been a game, right? A practical joke. There were no invisible people, really. Although who knew what there was in the Vorlons’ advanced culture? She knew she had picked up the trace of a voice on Red-3, after she had eliminated all the visible people in the cafe. Whatever it was, it had been real to Kosh, too.

  There were only twenty minutes left, she remembered, before Kosh was going to make his move. But what was his move? What was her part in it? How could she get off the station, even with the Vorlon’s help? She had to calm down, Talia told herself, and stop asking questions for which there were no answers. If indeed Kosh had agreed to help her escape in twenty minutes, then he would. If she had misinterpreted his signals and he didn’t help her, she was no worse off. One way she was a fugitive, but in the other way she was a prisoner with a celebrated murder trial ahead of her.

  She half-expected some calm voice of reason and responsibility to take her aside and tell her that escape from Babylon 5 was crazy. Not only that, but it would make her look guilty. Even the people who defended her now would stop defending her, and probably chase her. But for some unfathomable reason, Talia knew that she could get off B5, and that she had to get off, if she wanted to stay alive. Moreover, she bad to go to Earth if she wanted to clear her name. It was mad, but she had to do it.

  In the clear light of madness, Talia stopped to think about Emily Crane. What did she really know about the small woman who stuttered? She was a licensed telepath specializing in the ad business, but maybe she had deep roots to Mars and the separatist movement. Maybe, in fact, the dark-skinned woman had actually tried to kill her, plus Bester, Malten, and the ones she had succeeded in killing.

  What was that old expression, “the banality of evil.” Ms. Crane was a banal person, a cipher among the rampant egotism of Psi Corps. Maybe that was just the sort of person a terrorist agency depended upon to infiltrate and do its dirtiest work.

  Talia rubbed her eyes and plucked at the white jumpsuit and white gloves she was wearing. It had seemed a logical choice in clothing when she had put it on in her quarters - something comfortable for lounging about the cell - but now it seemed too flimsy and insignificant to get her all the way to Earth. What had she been thinking?

  Without really knowing the time, Talia looked up, knowing that something was about to happen. If, she asked herself, there was an invisible being name Isabel in this detention center, what should Isabel be doing? That was easy - she should be unlocking the cell door.

  The lock was on a box about two meters beyond the door, and it was operated by an electronic cardkey. In addition to the electronics, a mechanical bolt held the door shut. Talia concentrated on the bolt. Although she wasn’t a locksmith, part of her espionage training at Psi Corps had involved the picking of locks and a few other counter-intelligence measures. She knew how a lock ought to work and how it ought to look inside. She couldn’t get her hands inside the lock - but that was okay, she had Invisible Isabel. She was beginning to suspect that Isabel was tied to the telekinetic powers given her by Ironheart.

  Concentrating very hard, Talia thought about being an invisible person who could slip into a small place and turn the tumblers. She could see her tiny hands running over the miniature components, bypassing the electronics to go directly to the mechanism. When the tumblers tripped, the bolt would spring back. Move the tumblers, pull the bolt, she told herself, just the way you move your lucky penny. She ignored the sweat running down her face, slicking strands of blond hair to her pale cheeks. Talia thought only about Invisible Isabel and her tiny fingers. She was real, the telepath told herself; she was real, and she could move those small tumblers. She could, she could …

  When the click sounded, it was like waking up from a dream. Talia heard her cell door creak open before she could even focus her eyes on it. She stood and pushed it wide open. There was no overwhelming sense of freedom as Talia stepped out of her cell, only terrible fear of what she was about to become. All her life, she had toed the line, done the right thing - a good daughter, a good student, a willing recruit to Psi Corps, and a hard worker ever since. There had been one or two romantic lapses, but youth had to be served. Since then, she had trod the straight and narrow.

  She told herself that she was already considered a terrorist, a murderer, and a traitor, and she was about to add fugitive to the list. And rogue telepath. Of all the terrible labels, that one frightened her the most. Maybe she could clear herself of the other charges, but once a rogue telepath

  Talia had wandered to the front of the outer door, wondering if she was supposed to open it the same way. There was a small window in the door, and one of the guards jumped up and looked at her in amazement. She didn’t hide from his startled gaze. What was the point?

  The guard ran to his desk and started to pick up his PPG pistol and a cardkey, but he suddenly did a very strange thing. He started to move like a man who thought he was weightless, like a man who couldn’t decide how to put his feet down. A second later he staggered and collapsed to the floor.

  Talia pressed her face against the small window and could see two more guards lying unconscious on the anteroom floor. She looked instinctively at the air vents - if there was a gas, it was invisible. Just like her friend.

  The seconds seemed to drag on, and there was nothing to do but stand there and wait for the next act of this surreal drama. In a few moments, the door on the other side of the anteroom - the one to freedom - opened, and Ambassador Kosh glided in. If the Vorlon was surprised by the sight of three guards lying unconscious on the floor, it didn’t show in his movements. He went straightaway to the desk. When he stopped, a small mechanical claw issued from his ornate robe and picked up the cardkey. Then it extended over a meter to insert the card into the slot, and the door opened.

  Talia walked into the anteroom. When she didn’t faint, she knew the gas had dispersed even if its effects remained in force. She looked at Kosh, wondering what he would do next. The Vorlon’s robe opened, and a little shelf slid out.

  Upon the shelf was a Minbari robe and hood. She took the hood and put it over her head. It not only hid her face, but it hid the fact that her head didn’t look like the hairless, crested dome of a Minbari.

  “I’ll be tall for a Minbari,” said Talia with a humorless smile.

  Mr. Bester was sitting up in his bed. He still looked terrible, thought Mr. Gray, and his mood was even worse. Gray almost felt sorry for the man who stood in front of him, getting a dressing-down.

  “Captain Sheridan,” growled Bester, “how dare you defy me! You cannot delay justice forever. I will get that woman in my custody - it is inevitable. If you persist in blocking me, it will mean the end of your career! After that pathetic show of security, I wouldn’t be surprised if the Senate was already picking your replacement. And if you defy me, and the will of the Senate, by letting Talia Winters elude justice - nobody in the Earth Alliance will be able to save you!”

  Sheridan’s lips thinned. “Are you done?”

  “No!” shrieked Bester. “I’m just beginning. By tomorrow morning, my people will have talked to the senators on the judicial committee. We will have a reversal of your foolish policy so fast that you won’t know what hit you!”

  “As a matter of fact,” said Sheridan, “I’ve already heard from several Senators. They are putting the pressure on me, and so is Earthforce. But I told them exactly the same thing I’m telling you - this crime was committed on Babylon 5, and that’s where we’ll try it. We won’t rush to trial either. Our investigation isn’t complete, and Ms. Winters deserves the best legal counsel we can find, It may take weeks, or months.”

  Bester twisted in anger and followed it up with a grimace and a howl of pain. Dr. Franklin, who had been hovering nearby, stepped between them.

  “Captain Sheridan,” said the doctor, “this man is due to receive artificial skin grafts in one hour. If you can’t talk to him without aggravating him, I’m going to have
to ask you to leave.”

  “But he summoned me!” protested Sheridan.

  “That doesn’t matter,” said the doctor. “He’s the one who’s lying in bed, wounded.”

  Bester croaked, “It’s okay, it’s okay. I’m calm. Sheridan is fighting a losing battle here, and he knows it. If he wants to go down fighting, that’s his business. I’ll be happy to take him down.”

  There was some commotion in another part of the medlab, and Gray looked up to see Garibaldi and another security guard rush into the room. Garibaldi had been looking terrible for days, thought Gray, and now he looked worse than Mr. Bester.

  “Captain,” said the security chief, “we have a major breach in security.”

  Sheridan visibly blanched. “What’s happened now?”

  Garibaldi sighed and looked at Bester. “I guess we can’t keep it a secret.” He turned to the security guard who accompanied him. “Tell them what happened, Rupel.”

  The guard shook his head, as if he still wasn’t sure. “It was peaceful at the brig, nothing was going on. And I looked up and saw Ms. Winters standing on the other side of the door, out of her cell!”

  “What did you do?” asked Sheridan.

  The man shook his head. “I started to go for my weapon and the cardkey and … that’s all I remember. The next thing I know, I wake up on the floor, and the other two guards are out cold, too. She got clean away.”

  With horror, Gray glanced down to see if Mr. Bester had been seized by fits of anger, but the Psi Cop was unaccountably smiling. In fact, he looked pleased with the shocked expressions all around him.

  “Thank you so much, Mr. Garibaldi,” said Bester. “Your incompetence has just ended a lot of pointless debate. A telepath who is fleeing prosecution is automatically classified as rogue.”

  Bester smiled with the delicious irony of it. “Now that Talia Winters is a rogue telepath, we don’t need anybody’s permission to go after her. Mr. Gray, call my subordinates in. We’re going to bring down a rogue.”

  CHAPTER 12

  “Sir,” said Garibaldi desperately, “let me go after her.”

  Captain Sheridan and the security chief regarded each other with a mixture of confidence and uncertainty. They hadn’t worked together very long, but they had been forced into a level of faith reserved for old comrades. Despite the way things had gone so far, thought Garibaldi, there had to be a way to pull this out of the fire. The captain had to trust him.

  “How do you know she’s left the station?” asked the captain.

  “We’re looking for her,” explained Garibaldi. “My people are all over the docks, but we’ve been so backed up with the conference - and the mass exodus after the bombing - that we’ve got transports taking off every five minutes! We’re eyeballing everything that goes out, but we could be missing something. In fact, we may already be too late.”

  Garibaldi rubbed his jaw. “To escape like this, she must’ve had help. I have a hunch about who helped her, and I have a hunch about where she went. There’s a lead that only she and I know about - she might try to follow it up.”

  From his hospital bed, Bester was leaning forward with interest. “I’m a great believer in hunches, Mr. Garibaldi. Tell me, where is she going?” He cocked his head, as if listening, then he smiled. “You don’t have to tell me. It’s Earth.”

  The chief looked at the Psi Cop with disgust. “Your people are the ones who spooked her. They’re the ones who made her run.”

  “I don’t agree with that,” said Bester. “I think fear made her run. But I agree that she had help. She’s had help from the beginning, and just like you, I want to find out who’s bankrolling this. So let’s make a deal.”

  Bester grimaced as he shifted around to get a bit more height in his bed. “I will hold back my Psi Cops for a few days. Instead, let’s send Mr. Garibaldi and Mr. Gray to Earth to find her. And her accomplices.”

  Garibaldi turned his attention to the pasty-faced Gray. “I don’t want him coming with me.”

  “Okay, Mr. Gray,” said Bester. “Let’s alert my people on Earth - they can bring her down as soon as she steps off the transport.”

  “Wait,” said Sheridan, holding up a weathered hand. “Mr. Bester is right about one thing - as soon as he calls the Psi Cops on her, it becomes an assassination. The local police will be after her, too. If we’re going to find out anything, we want her investigated. We want all the leads followed up. Garibaldi, if you think you know where she’s going, go there. And take Mr. Gray with you.”

  Garibaldi shook his head, as if he couldn’t believe what he was hearing. “I work better alone.”

  Bester smiled. “I think you will find Mr. Gray is very little trouble. And he’s not a Psi Cop - he’s not authorized to take her out. He’s just an investigator, like yourself.”

  Garibaldi looked at Mr. Gray, who gave him an encouraging but nervous smile. He doesn’t really want to go, thought Garibaldi; he just wants to get away from Bester, and I can’t blame him for that. The security chief decided he would agree for the time being to take the telepath, and ditch him as soon as possible.

  He scowled at Gray. “All right. The last transport for Earth is leaving in an hour, docking bay five. Let’s be on it.”

  “Absolutely,” agreed Gray. “I have some theories of my own about this matter.”

  Garibaldi started to tell him where to put his theories, but he decided to tell him after they were safely away.

  Captain Sheridan took a deep breath and turned toward Dr. Franklin. “Why don’t you sedate your patient and get started.”

  “Not a bad idea,” said Franklin. “Nurse, hypo!”

  “Wait a minute,” protested Bester, thrashing around in his bed. “I need to report in! I need to call the president …”

  Franklin administered the hypo.

  Still scowling, Bester lay back in his bed. “Do a good job, you two,” he murmured. “You don’t want me to have to get out of this bed and come after you.

  …” His voice trailed off as he fell asleep.

  “Mr. Garibaldi,” said the doctor, “before you leave, we could use some extra security on the door.”

  “All right,” scowled the security chief, “but having extra people hasn’t solved any problems so far.”

  “We need to think like these terrorists,” suggested Harriman Gray. “I have a lead of my own to follow up. I’ll tell you about it on the flight. See you later, Mr. Garibaldi.”

  The slim telepath dashed off to follow his lead, and Garibaldi rolled his eyes at Captain Sheridan. “Sorry, sir, but why are you making me bring him?”

  “Just like you said,” answered Sheridan, “by ourselves, we haven’t done much good so far. Maybe if we join forces with them - I don’t know, it’s worth a try. And I want to say, I know how you feel about Ms. Winters, but she’s a fugitive. Bring her in, if you get the chance.”

  “I will,” agreed Garibaldi. He lowered his voice. “I think it was Ambassador Kosh who helped her. I haven’t got any proof, but he went to visit her half an hour before she escaped. Rupel, who’s a linguist, listened to their conversation and couldn’t understand a word of it.”

  “All right,” said Sheridan grimly, “leave Kosh to me.”

  Talia sat in total darkness, wondering if she was going to her death, to her freedom, or just going mad. Under Kosh’s orders, and against her screaming better judgment, she had ditched her Minbari outfit and crawled into a reinforced cargo box. And that’s where she had remained for the better part of an hour now. There had been no instructions from Kosh, except to show her how the pins could be removed from the inside to let the straps work themselves free. Not even a proper good-bye from Kosh or anyone else, and she had been sealed up in this box. Even though Talia knew she could get out by pulling the pins, she had no idea where she would find herself.

  She presumed she was on a vessel and that her rescuers had left Babylon 5, because she had been knocked around by some pretty good g-forces. Or maybe somebody
had simply tossed the crate down a stairwell - it was impossible to tell! In the absence of instructions or guidance, what was she supposed to do, stay in the box forever? Or until customs sold it for unclaimed surplus?

  Worse yet, she had started to hear scuffling sounds outside in the - wherever she was. The sound was too heavy and massive to be rats, she hoped, but that didn’t explain what it was. Could it be somebody moving the crates around? Or a heavy person just passing through? She had heard no voices, which for some reason made her think that it wasn’t the crew. And if it wasn’t the crew, who was it?

  She had reached the level of endurance for breathing foul air and listening to strange noises in the darkness, while hunched in a terrible position. She had to find out where she was, or go crazy. So Talia reached for the pins that held the straps closed from inside. She already knew they would slide out easily, because she had been toying with them in the dark for the better part of an hour.

  She felt the smooth sticks come out in her hands, and she knew the straps were now just lying across the top of the crate. All she would need was a swift push to be out of that stifling darkness. But once out, the secret of the box would be revealed. As with many boxes, there would be no putting back the surprise after it popped out. Whoever was shuffling around out there might view her as a stowaway and kill her. Or they might know Mr. Bester, who had to be looking for her by now.

  It was the unknown either way, decided Talia, and she would rather die with light in her eyes, fresh air in her lungs, and her back straight. She pushed open the top and stretched.

  A creature in rags gasped with flight and fell over a similar crate. Talia jumped out of her own crate and scrambled behind it. They peered at each other with fear and curiosity.

  He had long, scraggly hair and a grubby beard, but he was at least human. She was about to welcome him with a big smile, when she saw his hand ease out from behind the box, and it was holding a PPG pistol.