Babylon 5 - CC2 - Red Fury
Author: Claudia Christian; Morgan Grant Buchanan
Date: 0101-01-01 00:00:00+00:00
Keywords: Babylon 5 short story

Red Fury

Claudia Christian

&

Morgan Grant Buchanan

Red Fury is a work of fan fiction and is meant to be shared for enjoyment. It is not to be sold or republished for profit for any reason.

All of the characters in this story are fictitious, and any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, is purely coincidental.

Note: This story takes place towards the end of 2262 (after the conclusion of the events of Season 5). President Sheridan has arrested Lyta Alexander but Michael Gaibaldi has used his newfound power as President of Edgars Industries to ensure her release. Susan Ivanova has been captain of her Warlock-class destroyer Titans for a year. This story is self-contained but if you want to read the very first story to feature Ivanova and the Vorlon transport once owned by Ambassador Ulkesh (Kosh 2), read J. Michael Straczynski’s short story Hidden Agendas, first published in 2000 in the Official Babylon 5 Magazine.

prologue

Mars, Dome One, December, 2262.

Michael Garibaldi awoke to an irritating, unending alarm. The clock beside his bed told him it was 2 am and for a moment he thought he was back in his old, cramped quarters on Babylon 5. That had been the last place anyone had dared to wake him at such an ungodly hour.

But the bed he was lying on was almost as large as his entire room on the space station and he was covered with lavish, black silk sheets and wearing pajamas woven by the insectile hands of a Gaim Queen—clothes which would have cost him three years’ salary when he was a Chief of Security. No, he was on Mars, living his new life.

Since taking over the day-to-day running of Edgars Industries, Michael Garibaldi had become one of the wealthiest and most powerful men in the galaxy and he had firm expectations that, whatever other benefits the position brought with it, an undisturbed night’s sleep should be right at the top of the list. That had been his old life—woken up at all hours, having to sit in on every decision, manage every little thing.

Now he had people to do that for him. Garibaldi sighed and tapped a panel beside his bed, opening a comm channel. The holographic form of his assistant, Reynolds, was instantly projected into the air above his bed. Reynolds was a thin man, obsessed with detail, always sitting behind the same console—analyzing data, scouring through reports, collecting information that might be of interest to Garibaldi. He was a pedantic, particular man—qualities that suited his job perfectly—but he was prone to disturbing Garibaldi for reasons less than spectacularly important and now, now he had gone one step too far. He had broken the number one rule.

“Reynolds,” he said. “What did I specifically order you never to do?

My exact words.”

“To never wake you, sir.”

“Unless?”

“Unless it was the end of the world and Earth was about to go up in flames and all hell was breaking loose.”

“And I meant it. Literally. The. End. Of. The. World. Is the world going up in actual flames?”

“No, sir.”

“Do you know I was dreaming about bagna càuda. Have you ever had bagna càuda? Italian dip with garlic, anchovies, olive oil, roasted vegetables?”

“No, sir.”

“Then you don’t know what you’ve just done.” And the man never truly would. Normally Garibaldi’s sleep was plagued by nightmares—things he did when the Psi Corps were inside his head, casualties he’d seen during the war, bad memories from the old days on Mars. He seldom slept well. But not that night.

“I was back on Babylon 5,” Garibaldi said, “and I’d been piecing together the ingredients for bagna càuda for over three months, smuggling them in, one by one, and then it was finally there, right in front of me. And then you woke me up. Nowadays I can have a swimming pool filled with bagna càuda if I want but I can never have that moment again, of tasting it after having to wait three excruciating months.”

“Yes, sir,” Reynolds said without any hint of emotion. It wasn’t the first time he’d been on the receiving end of one of Garibaldi’s anecdotal lectures.

“Well?”

“Our new intelligence satellites, the ones with the prototype
sensors, they’ve picked up a Vorlon ship en route to Earth.”

“A planet-killer?” Garibaldi asked, visualizing the massive Vorlon ships that could decimate an entire world with one concentrated discharge of a beam weapon.

“No, sir. A smaller vessel. A Vorlon transport. Blood red in color.”

Garibaldi nodded. “Right. There’s only one of those left this side of the Galactic Rim—the shuttle left behind by that crazy Vorlon ambassador they sent us after Kosh. He’s not back is he?”

“Not as far as we can tell, sir...”

“Well, that’s interesting but...”

“Five minutes ago the ship destroyed a Psi Corps spy satellite.”

“Okay. That’s good news, Reynolds, but it’s still hardly the end of...”

“Our intel says your old comrade Susan Ivanova is piloting it.”

“Susan?”

Garibaldi jumped out of bed and pulled on his robe, his mind racing.

Susan’s ship Titans, a Warlock-class destroyer, had been found to have hidden Shadow tech built into its systems. She’d worked together with Sheridan and Lyta Alexander to destroy it—they’d used the Vorlon ship to do the job. The end result was that the Vorlon vessel had ended up permanently integrated into Titans’ systems, sealed away in a locked deck. Garibaldi felt a headache stirring at the back of his skull.

“Sir, I’ve received an update,” Reynolds said. “She’s attacked a top-secret Psi Corps base in Siberia.”

“The new one they’ve been pouring all their money into?” Garibaldi said in surprise. “With cutting edge defenses?”

“Another update, sir. The Vorlon craft has destroyed the Siberian base and is moving across the Bering Strait at high speed. What are your orders?”

“You were right to wake me up, Reynolds. The world’s not going up in flames yet but it might be by the time Ivanova’s done.”

“Do you want us to forward our intel to Earth Dome, sir? Or the Alliance on Babylon 5? They don’t have our resources. They won’t even know what’s hit them until they start reviewing and analyzing data. We can give them a heads up, so they’re ready if she strikes again.”

“She’s only hit a satellite and a base, both Psi Corps property?”

“Yes, sir. And now she’s single-handedly tackling a squadron of the Psi Corps fighters. There’s a repeating message transmitting from her ship.”

Reynolds tapped a button on his console and Garibaldi’s room was filled with the sound of Susan’s voice. She didn’t sound happy.

Where is Bester? I keep going until I get Bester.

“Bester?” Garibaldi’s head began to throb with a single, painful intensity.

“Sir, if she can harness that kind of firepower it might take a half-dozen White Stars to stop her.”

“Then here’s what I want you to do, Reynolds,” Garibaldi said calmly. “I’m going to have something sent to you.”

“I’ve got everything I need here, sir.”

“What you don’t have is a pot of bagna càuda,” Garibaldi replied with forced enthusiasm. “I want you to relax. Sit back and enjoy it. Wait for more intel to come in.”

“But...”

“Don’t notify Earth Dome, and you sure as hell won’t say a word to Babylon 5. Capiche?”

“Sir, innocent lives could be lost if she strikes again. The base she’s just hit suffered seventy-two casualties.”

“All Psi Corps?” Garibaldi asked.

“Yes...” the man replied hesitantly.

“Enjoy your meal,” Garibaldi replied, shutting off the comm channel.

Reynolds was pedantic but he knew how to follow orders. Garibaldi rushed towards one of the black steel walls of his vast bedchamber and pressed his palm against it. A hidden doorway appeared, leading into a labyrinthine network of tunnels. Garibaldi quickly traced out an intricate route known only to himself. He was short on time; his programming was already kicking in. Lyta Alexander had removed all of the psychic protocols the Psi Cop Alfred Bester had woven throughout his mind—all except one. He was no longer compelled to betray his friends but buried deep inside his mind was a command that under no circumstances could he harm or knowingly allow harm to befall Bester—the man solely responsible for nearly destroying his life.

Lyta had promised to remove that block only when Garibaldi had used his power and resources to utterly destroy the Psi Corps. Until then, he would not be permitted to take his revenge.

So what exactly had Bester done to piss Ivanova off? Something stupid, that was for sure, because now she was on the warpath, mounting a one-woman crusade. Or maybe that was all part of the Psi Cop’s plan? The command at the back of Garibaldi’s mind was already compelling him to warn Bester, to stop Susan, to preserve Bester’s life. Was this Bester’s little joke—to infuriate Susan and then sit back and wait, knowing Garibaldi would have no choice but to step in and intervene?

Garibaldi came to a stop before a large, impregnable door made of quantium-80—an ultra-rare mineral that could only be found on one planetoid in Grid Epsilon. He didn’t need to punch in a security code or supply voice identification. The sensitive alien alloy from which the door had been forged had imprinted his form. He walked directly into it, activating the localized jumpgate that transported him from outside to inside his command center in an instant. Any intruder would go unrecognized by the door and live a very short life after being transported into hyperspace.

The room was filled with an extensive security station, similar to the one he’d had on Babylon 5, except this unit was state-of-the-art and hooked into a super computer deep beneath the Martian surface. It was the only man-made system to contain components loaned personally to Garibaldi by Draal, custodian of the Great Machine on Epsilon III.

When he’d retired from his short stint as Head of Covert Intelligence for the Alliance, Garibaldi made sure he had all the tools he needed to protect himself and those he loved.

Garibaldi knew he was a few hours ahead of the Psi Corps, EarthForce and the Alliance, time enough to uncover what had happened and make sure that, however things played out, the final move would be his.

He placed a circular neural interface on his head and allowed hisunconscious mind to start scanning through the oceans of data floating about on the Inter Stellar Network, piecing the story together with every resource at his disposal. Information was currency and having it might mean the difference between life and death for his friend when the game played out—and he was determined that if he did have to stop Susan, that he would do everything in his power to spare her life.

Garibaldi suddenly remembered he had an outstanding task and opened up a comm channel to the kitchen. “Can you have a pot of bagna càuda sent to Reynolds?”

“Yes sir,” a voice replied. “And one for yourself?”

“Maybe later,” Garibaldi said as he filtered through the thousands of news bulletins and military reports that raced through his mind, “I’ve lost my appetite.”

A few minutes later, when he had a sense of what had happened, Garibaldi punched a complex code sequence into his console and opened a channel to Psi Corps HQ. The image of the man he hated more than anyone in the universe appeared—a smug, self-satisfied smile upon his face.

“Mr. Garibaldi?” Bester said cheerfully. “I’ve been expecting your call.”

chapter 1

One day earlier. Asteroid belt between Mars & Jupiter, en route to Proxima.

Captain Susan Ivanova tapped her foot impatiently on the metallic deck as her Warlock-class destroyer Titans hurtled through space towards a sea of asteroids.

“We’re almost there, sir,” her Commander, William Berensen said.

“Ten thousand clicks.”

“Any luck contacting them yet?” she asked. Berensen looked to Lieutenant Lukas Breck, the communications officer.

“White Star 27, come in. This is the Interstellar Alliance Ship, Titans, ” Breck said into his console, “we’re responding to your distress signal. Can you read us?” He shook his head a few seconds later.

“Nothing, sir, just the same message on repeat.” Breck tapped his console and the message broadcast around the bridge.

Under attack from an unknown vessel. We’re suffering heavy casualties.

We are in desperate need of reinforcements! We can’t take this kind of damage for long.

They’d been en route to Proxima III, ordered to protect transports delivering vital supplies to the colony, when the distress call had come through. The signal originated from deep within the asteroid belt between Mars and Jupiter, a wasteland of floating space rock, far from jumpgates, space stations or shipping lanes. The big question on Ivanova’s mind was the same one troubling every member of Titans’ crew—what kind of an assailant had the power to overwhelm a White Star?

“Have we isolated the location of the signal yet?” Ivanova asked.

“The signal is coming from the other side of Pallas, one of the largest asteroids in the belt,” Breck said. “It’s over 600 kilometers in diameter.

We’re going to have to navigate around dozens of smaller rocks to reach the White Star’s position.“

“We don’t have time,” Ivanova said impatiently. “If there’s a fight going on, we need to be in it. Blast the smaller asteroids and drive right through the rubble. The shields can take it. And put out a call for reinforcements to White Stars 12 and 24. Tell them to divert from their journey to Proxima and get here on the double. If this is a trap, let’s make sure we’ve got our bases covered. We don’t want to end up like White Star 27.”

“Two minutes to contact, sir,” Berensen said.

Ivanova looked at the massive asteroid on the view screen. It was large, like a small moon without many surrounding rocks. She nodded approvingly. This was good, fewer places for an enemy to conceal themselves.

“Activate battle stations. I want Star Furies ready to launch the second I give the order,” Ivanova commanded. “White Star 27 is Captain Hurley’s ship and he’s no pushover. Let’s be ready for anything.”

Titans’ cannons sparked to life, a half dozen missile bay doors opened, shields hummed as they pushed asteroid rubble out of the ship’s path. Ivanova had the crew run through a rapid system check as they approached, ensuring everything was in perfect order. Every system on a destroyer relied on another. All it took in an armed conflict was for one link in the chain to break, one unexpected malfunction or failure, and the whole ship could be lost. When she first became captain of Titans, Ivanova had sensed the crew’s reluctance to carry out the endless drills she made them run.

“We’re warriors,” she’d explained. “The war is over but each day we’re on patrol we don’t know what we’re going to face. A warrior keeps her weapons sharp and at the ready. This ship is our weapon. We’ll keep her in perfect working order and we’ll get better and faster at doing it. Do any of you want to die because of a malfunctioning missile port or a poorly serviced Star Fury?”

“No, sir!” they’d replied as one.

“Then carry out your drills efficiently and without complaint. Make me happy and in return I’ll do my best to keep you alive.”

“We’re coming around the asteroid,” Breck said. “The signal is still transmitting. We should see White Star 27 any second.”

“Slow to cruising speed two hundred clicks out,” Ivanova ordered.

“I want visual confirmation before we go rushing in.”

“There she is, sir,” Berensen said.

The view screen filled with the sight of the hybrid human-Minbari vessel. She hung in space like a broken-winged bird—fire raging within her battered and charred body. It both angered and disturbed Susan to see it like this. A White Star was a thing of beauty and power, and more than that—the White Star fleet was the symbol of the Alliance’s strength, the big stick that allowed President Sheridan to walk softly. If one could be brought down with impunity it made the job of keeping the peace that much harder.

“Try and establish contact again. I want to know what hit them,” Ivanova ordered.

“Still no reply, sir,” Breck said after another attempt. “Just the same message.”

“Life signs?” she asked her science officer, Lieutenant Catlyn Tsai.

“Ten survivors. None of them moving,” Tsai said. And then an instant later: “Sir! Scans reveal her engines are close to critical. Less than ten minutes before she blows.”

Ivanova understood the urgency in her voice. No one wanted to be near a White Star when its gravimetric engine went nova.

“Any potential threats on the scanners?” she asked Tsai.

“No, sir,” Tsai said. “Attackers could be shielding themselves behind the asteroid but I’m bouncing signals off a dozen smaller rocks in the immediate vicinity and not picking up anything. Situation reads ‘all clear’, sir.”

“We’ve got nine minutes. Let’s get in there and get the survivors out before she blows.”

She tapped the panel on her console and patched a channel through to Lieutenant Commander Amelia Graydon, the leader of

Wolf Squadron, her elite Star Fury unit.

“Graydon, you’ve got five minutes to get on board that ship and clear out all ten survivors. Be ready for anything.”

“Just another day at the office, sir,” Graydon said.

Wolf Squadron was the best of the best, personally trained by her—still, Ivanova couldn’t shake the feeling something was going to go wrong. She wanted nothing more than to get the hell out of there but she had a duty to her allies aboard the White Star.

“Split the scanners between the asteroid and a 500 click radius around Titans, ” she ordered. “Watch for any localized power surges. If a ship with enough power to generate its own jump point blips into sight, I want a hundred missiles up its butt before it knows what’s hit it. I don’t want any surprises.”

And then all hell broke loose.

The space before them rippled, a quivering black wave that drove fear into Susan Ivanova’s heart. A cloaked Shadow vessel. Impossible. There were no more Shadow vessels. They had left the galaxy for good. The ripple cleared revealing a massive EarthForce destroyer—black skin like a Shadow vessel, spines protruding from the forward and aft hull. Advanced Omega-class—an Earth-made ship integrated with Shadow technology.

This was the first one she’d ever seen with cloaking technology. She thought they’d wiped them all out during the war. She cursed beneath her breath. You could only prepare for potential threats based on best information. How could you prepare for something like this?

“Two more at 6 o’clock, sir!” Tsai called out.

“We’re trapped front and rear by the enemy and aft by the asteroid,”

Berensen said. “Only portside is clear.”

“Damn it!” Ivanova exclaimed. “If we take the only visible line of retreat they’ll target our flank and break through our shields in seconds.”

She turned to Breck. “We need a half-dozen White Stars. Right now!”

Ivanova had fought Advanced Omega-class once before. Then she’d had a fleet of White Stars at her disposal; she knew she couldn’t take all three on her own.

“Communications are being jammed, Captain,” Breck replied.

No surprise there, she thought. At least she’d sent for backup.

Another two White Stars would help balance the odds. All she had to do now was survive long enough for them reach her.

Suddenly, the first Omega-class fired its primary beam weapon, not at her ship but right into the heart of the stranded White Star.

“Full power to shields!” Ivanova called as the White Star went nova. A rapidly expanding ball of intense, bright radiation surged towards them. It only took a split second for the ten survivors and Wolf Squadron to be annihilated. Titans was thrown sideways, towards the asteroid. The impact hammered their shields, collapsing a third of Titans’ deck under the sudden wave of pressure. Half the systems on the bridge flickered and died, Breck’s console suddenly exploded throwing him back out of his chair.

“Shields at ten percent,” Berensen called. “Rear ships have targeted our jump engines. We can’t open a jumpgate.”

The Shadow tech destroyers were closing in, attempting to trap them against the asteroid.

“Open fire on the ship in front!” Ivanova commanded. “Everything we’ve got! Don’t give the bastards one single inch.”

Titans burst into action, a hive of activity as missiles, cannons and railguns let loose.

“We’re hammering them,” Berensen said, “but we’re taking heavy damage to our rear shields. We’ll be dead by the time we break through their defenses.”

“Dammit, use the asteroid!” Ivanova ordered. “If we fly close it’ll give us some cover. Keep targeting the ship in front. I want it out of the game.”

Titans moved in even closer to the asteroid, hugging the rough spherical form. The incoming fire to their tail dropped off as the other two ships struggled to reposition themselves for a clear shot.

“Deploy remaining Star Fury squadrons. Get them in the face of the ships behind us. High maneuverability. No direct assault. We need a distraction.”

“Star Furies deployed,” Berensen confirmed.

Ivanova checked the sensor readout on her display. The Omega-class ships were maneuvering with incredible, intuitive dexterity, much more effectively than any she’d seen during the war. The only ships she’d seen with that kind of ability had been full-size Shadow vessels.

Telepaths. These prototypes don’t just have Shadow tech, they’ve got telepaths integrated with their systems.

“Fire the engines, full speed ahead. All remaining power to the
particle cannon. Target the cargo bays of the destroyer in front of us. They’ve got a telepath in deep freeze plugged into each ship. Take out the telepaths and we put the ships out of commission!”

“Taking heavy hits in the exchange of fire. Our shields at five percent, sir,” Berensen said, “but we’ve almost breached its defenses.”

“Cease fire. All power to engines. Full speed ahead.”

“Sir?”

“Now!”

Ivanova knew every inch of her ship, exactly where she could push to get results, and right now her shields were her greatest weapon.

“We’re ramming them, sir?” Berensen asked.

“No, we’re going to cut right through them. Tell the Star Furies to get clear. A hundred click blast radius. Cut engines. All power to shields. Brace for impact,” Ivanova ordered.

Titans hit the Omega-class full force, breaching the black ship’s shields, cutting into its already weakened skeleton. The impact shook Titans with violent tremors. For the first time in a long time Susan Ivanova prayed. Please God, let us live. Let this work.

The viewscreen went black, panels on the deck started exploding, a ceiling section caved in. The ship lurched and Ivanova was suddenly thrown from her chair, her head colliding with the railing in front of her. She struggled to her feet, trying to clear her head. And then the viewscreen cleared and they were facing the vastness of space, free of the enemy ship.

“Full power to engines. Get us clear.”

The explosion that followed nearly knocked her from her feet again.

“We’ve cleared the destroyer’s explosion,” Berensen said, “I’ve got no power reserves though. Primary engines are down. We’re at cruising speed with the gravitic engines until we can conduct repairs.”

“The two destroyers behind us took the brunt of the blast,” Tsai said, “but they’re still functional. They’ll be on us again in under thirty seconds.”

“Get us moving! Full retreat until backup arrives!” Ivanova ordered.

She turned to Tsai. “Run diagnostics. I want to know what’s still functioning.”

Berensen jumped into Lieutenant Breck’s seat and checked the display.

“I’m receiving conflicting information here Captain,” he said. “Just before the attack a localized power surge disrupted our outgoing signal. The message for reinforcements wasn’t sent.”

“How can that be?” Ivanova replied. “You said ‘localized’? What’s the point of origin?”

“Deck 7, sir.”

“Sir, we’ve got no shields,” Tsai said. “Engines will take two days to repair. We’ve got four functioning missile bays, one heavy railgun and two light pulse cannons operational.”

Another blast shook Titans.

“That’s a direct hit, sir.

Ivanova looked around at her command crew. They were beaten
and bloody, but not defeated. Not yet.

“Get the Star Furies back on the destroyers. Target them with any firepower we’ve got left. Buy me time.”

“Time for what?”

“Berensen, you’re in charge,” she said, striding towards the turbo lift. “Captain?”

“Keep angling us behind the asteroid so we only have to take fire from one ship at a time. Force them to keep repositioning if they want to hit us.”

As she stepped into the flickering light of the turbo lift she felt fluid running down her forehead and into her right eye. Ivanova instinctively wiped it away and as she lowered her hand she saw blood. She recalled she’d hit her head during the battle. That explained why she suddenly found it so hard to think straight. And now that she thought of it, she felt tired. So very tired.

Keep focused, she ordered herself. Keep it together. You can rest when you’ve done your duty.

“Sir? Where will you be, sir?” Berensen’s voice came in through the speaker as the turbo lift carried her down into the ship.

“Deck 7,” she replied. “I’m going to poke our resident Vorlon transport with a stick and see what happens.”

Susan struggled to remember the complex sequence of letters and numbers that would grant her access to the sealed deck. It seemed as if a fog had settled over her mind and it took an enormous effort of will to overcome it.

The heavy door slid open and she stepped into darkness. It was the first time anyone had been in there since John and Lyta had helped her integrate the alien transport with Titans’ systems but there hadn’t been a day when she didn’t think about it. Her ship was like her body, an extension of herself, and having the Vorlon craft inside it was like having an unwanted skin cancer, you never forgot it was there. Sometimes she awoke to realize she’d been dreaming of it. In those dreams, she’d be back home, in Russia, and she’d suddenly spot it in the sky overhead.

It occurred to her there’d never been a dream where she’d gone inside it, never any clue of what lay behind the living Vorlon shell.

As Ivanova moved down the metal walkway, the transport started to glow—a crimson, pulsing light with scarlet accents—revealing itself in the darkness. It looked like a giant, angry squid. There was no doubt in her mind that the pulsating glow was a warning—she wasn’t welcome.

John had told her how he’d got it to cooperate last time. He’d put his hand on it and simply talked to it. She wasn’t John. Wasn’t Vorlon-touched like he was. There was one other thing he’d said though—it had been bored. It had welcomed fighting the Shadow entity that had taken over her ship. And she suspected that was why it had jammed her outgoing signal for reinforcements. It wanted something to do. It wanted to stretch its wings.

She strode towards it with purpose and the living surface of the alien ship warped in response. A long, thick tentacle emerged from its surface, its tip hovering in the air above her, glowing with a strong, yellow light. The point of light came to rest over Susan’s heart. A targeting beam; another warning. One more step and an organic beam weapon would kill her instantly.

“This is your doing,” she said to it. “You wanted this conflict, you blocked my call for assistance, and now you’re going to set things right.”

She took another step forward, the targeting beam shining right in her face. A loud humming filled the deck.

“Kill me if you want, we’re all going to be dead in a minute anyway, so fire away or get that tentacle, or whatever the hell it is, out of my face.”

And, to her surprise, it did.

She took one tentative step after another until she was beside it. It rippled with power, radiated energy. Ivanova had some small telepathic ability, and in the back of her mind a part of her was screaming, yelling at her to turn and run. But she was Susan Ivanova. She was Russian.

She did not give in to fear. Slowly, she placed her hand upon its surface, which was surprisingly warm.

“You know what I want,” she said. “I know you hate anything touched by the Shadows and out there are two Shadow tech enabled ships. Help us destroy them. You’ve been caged up here. I bet you’re itching for a fight.”

Susan could feel its resistance. Then she realized she could sense its thoughts. It was like looking at a deep, fast-running river. She was human; she was nothing. It had stopped her transmission to punish them.

“To punish us? For what?”

Images flashed across the surface of her mind. At first she saw John, except it wasn’t just John. In the mind of the Vorlon ship, John occupied the same space as the first of the First Ones – Lorien. When John had used the Vorlon ship to purge the Shadow tech from Titans, he hadn’t simply asked it, he had compelled it. It was trapped, unable to resist his command. She got the sense it wanted to die but couldn’t kill itself, that was forbidden. The Shadow tech destroyers could though. Since it had been on board Titans they were the only enemy they’d come across powerful enough to do the job. Susan realized then that John hadn’t got it quite right. It wasn’t bored, it was in deep despair, it was suicidal.

The Vorlons had gone away. It was the last of its kind left in the galaxy.

“You want to die and take us with you? You’re the last Vorlon thing left this side of the galactic rim and this is how you honor the memory of your kind? By killing yourself, by letting Shadow tech ships humble you?”

It quivered beneath her touch and radiated a sudden, intense heat.

Susan had to pull her hand away quickly to avoid being burned. She was satisfied she’d hit a nerve. She knew it wouldn’t be hard, the ship’s master was a Vorlon fundamentalist named Ulkesh. It’d been easily provoked too. Killing that Vorlon had been a pain in the ass and Ivanova knew she’d have to tread carefully, she didn’t want to have to go through that again with this ship. She tentatively put her hand back on the ship and was relieved to find the surface had cooled. “You’re compelled to stay where John put you but what exactly are your limitations?” Ivanova asked. “Do you have to stay here? In this exact spot?” Another ripple of feelings and images hit her. At first she saw Titans, and then the form of a person, overlaid on top of it. She tried her best to clear her mind, to identify the person, and was surprised to see herself. To the ship there was no difference between Ivanova and Titans. They were as one and it was bound to serve.

“You’ll stand with us and continue the Vorlon mission,” Ivanova said. “You can eliminate the last influence of the Shadows and after that you can go wherever you wish. I’ll set you free.”

She felt its acquiescence, a reluctant agreement.

“But on one condition. I want to pilot you. I want to see it done right. You’re on your own in a hostile galaxy. You’ve got to pick a side. You don’t get to hate everything because it’s not Vorlon.”

The walls of the deck echoed the ship’s scream of denial.

“It’s my way or the highway and the highway’s going straight to hell in less than a minute.”

Another blast struck Titans, nearly knocking Susan from her feet.

“You want to die a coward’s death?” she yelled at the ship. “Have that go down as the last thing a Vorlon did in our galaxy?”

There was no reply. The pulsating red light stopped suddenly and Ivanova was left standing in absolute darkness. She tapped the link on the back of her hand.

“Berensen?”

“Star Furies are all down, sir. One more hit and we’re done. What are your orders?”

What could she say? They were sitting ducks and their last hope had just done the Vorlon equivalent of slamming a door in her face.

And then there was light. A shimmering portal appeared, radiating red-tinged light.

“Thank you,” she whispered beneath her breath.

“Sir?” Berensen’s voice squawked from the link.

“Open up the flight bay, don’t bother with the airlock. I’m about to show whoever’s on those ships that they’ve just made the biggest mistake of their lives.”

chapter 2

Susan Ivanova fell upon the two massive destroyers like a hawk upon its prey.

The moment she’d entered the ship it had been like walking into a dream—two dreams in fact, running simultaneously. In one she was flying through the air, completely supported on all sides by a great cloud of light. In the other dream she was back behind the controls of her favorite Star Fury, the first one she’d piloted on Babylon 5. That fighter had been like a second skin, she’d felt completely confident when she was strapped into it, and when it was destroyed she’d felt like she’d lost a limb. The two dreams overlapped effortlessly; being inside the Vorlon craft made that way of looking at things seem perfectly natural.

“Hold onto your encounter suit,” Ivanova said. “I’m about to see what you can really do.”

The Ivanova in the bright cloud dream saw thin white threads appear and start to move into her body—the ends of the strands pressing in through the pores of her skin. The more threads that entered her, the stronger the connection she felt with the ship. The strands turned red, one by one, until she realized she wasn’t actually surrounded by a cloud at all, but floating in a cocoon made up of millions of fibers.

The vague awareness she had of the Vorlon ship’s feelings was now transformed into a powerful tide of emotion. Heartache, loneliness, anger, resentment. Ivanova saw now why the ship had agreed to let her pilot it. It needed what it had received from its previous, Vorlon master—a mind to direct and focus its power.

She could feel the ship’s anger—over its forced service on Titans, towards the Shadow tech vessels, its fury at being left behind when the others of its kind had moved on—and she channeled those feelings, reminding the vessel of its duty. It was of the Vorlon and these vessels containing Shadow technology were an obscenity. One word entered her mind, forming clearly like a ringing bell— impure—the greatest Vorlon sin. It wasn’t only the taint of the Shadows that offended it. It was the hubris of the humans who had sought to use it for their own purposes—to sully the purity of a higher species with the fears and desires of lower order beings.

Susan checked the position of Titans. Her ship was heading away at a steady pace; both enemy vessels were engaging her. Ivanova came in on a high arc above the two black destroyers. Pulse cannons formed on the side of the ship and fired a chain of rapid beams, targeting and destroying the particle beam cannons of both ships in a devastating display of power.

She whooped with excitement. It was effortless, like taking a swim on a warm summer day. However connected she had been to her Star Fury on Babylon 5, nothing beat the instantaneous response of the Vorlon ship. The second the thought formed in her mind, it acted, and with devastating effectiveness. The ship picked up on her confidence, her emotions and amplified them, and Susan had an insight into what these Vorlon craft were. They were magnifiers—conscious, organic entities, cut from the energetic bodies of their masters and polished until they could focus and enhance their powers. She had hoped to use the Vorlon transport to buy Titans more time but the discovery of the raw power locked up in the ship’s relatively small package was a complete and unexpected surprise. Ivanova reminded herself that it was never wise to underestimate the Vorlons.

As she looped back for a second pass she was struck by a swarm of missiles and plasma blasts. They hit hard, knocking her about inside the small craft like dice rattling in a tin cup. Susan felt the heat that struck the ship’s surface as if it were scorching her own skin. She saw now what it meant to be Vorlon, the alien temperament that terrified every other, lesser species in the galaxy. When disaster struck, when pain hit, there was no closing down, no coping mechanisms, no retreat into fantasy or delusion. Vorlons saw things how they were. There was no blacking out, no overload, no shutting down or running away. They tackled reality head on, saw it without any filters or buffers.

Susan was amazed to discover that the Vorlon ship could absorb the energy barrage that struck it. She lost track of where the ship started and she stopped. The energy the ship absorbed felt like burning heat in the pit of her stomach. It moved up the center of her chest and pooled in her eyes, waiting to be released.

Ivanova concentrated her attention on the destroyer before her. She was fire and light, focused to a single, white-hot point. She was the ship firing its fusion beam, a concentrated line of energy against which there was no defense. She sped along the destroyer’s port side, slicing it in half.

Susan pulled up and away as the ship exploded. Only one left now.

The fire ran up the middle of her body again and she had to use all her will-power not to destroy the ship instantly. Instead, she managed to focus her gaze so that she disabled its engines and weapons only.

The Vorlon transport railed against her effort to harness it. She’d fed it anger and it wanted nothing more than to ride out that wave and destroy the enemy.

“No. Not yet.”

It was like trying to saddle a bronco. It was one thing to use a human to accomplish its goals but it wouldn’t accept Ivanova dictating terms, telling it what it could and couldn’t do.

“You. Will. Hold,” she ordered.

She wasn’t John; she was no negotiator and the Vorlon knew it. She would give her life rather than let it win, and if she was dead then it would be lost again, without purpose. It yielded reluctantly, holding its power in check.

The Omega-class hung in space, crippled. Susan’s small telepathic ability was greatly enhanced by the ship and her hunch that the Omega-class destroyers were utilizing telepaths was quickly confirmed. There were three of them, all victims, forced to integrate with the ship to give it greater responsiveness.

She wanted answers. Who had set her up? Who had fitted out the destroyers with Shadow tech? Who was responsible for attacking her ship, destroying the White Star, killing her crew? Susan Ivanova wanted to know who she had to make pay.

She felt the Shadow components of the ship screaming in denial as she reached out with her mind. Their presence was like an oil slick, attempting to pollute the cocoon of light that surrounded her. Ivanova focused her energy upon that darkness and began burning her way through to the human minds that lay beneath the Shadow systems.

“Who did this to you?” she asked. “Tell me and I will carry out justice for you. I’ll see them burn.”

“End this,” they pleaded as one. “Please. End this.”

“A name. A face. Show me who did this and I’ll set you free.”

Then there were both. A face and a name and more—a reason.

Alfred Bester, head of Psi Corps. It didn’t make sense. Whatever Bester was, he would never submit his fellow telepaths to this kind of fate.

She probed more deeply and saw that Bester had discovered the ships, already built on Ganymede. Unable to free the telepaths inside, he’d decided to sacrifice them to serve the greater good of the Psi Corps—to destroy Titans and capture the Vorlon craft for himself. There was technology aboard it that could be taken and modified to further his own cause—to develop an ultimate weapon for when the inevitable war between humans and telepaths began.

“Please,” the telepaths begged her. “End it now.”

There was nothing she could do for them. No treatment that would untangle them from the Shadow tech and allow them to live. A quick death was the kindest mercy.

Ivanova put some distance between her and the destroyer and then swung back around, firing directly at it. She unleashed all the power she’d been holding in reserve. The Vorlon ship fired its beam weapon into the heart of the destroyer, this time responding to Ivanova’s feelings before they had even become a conscious thought—an experience that was both frightening and gratifying. This was justice. This was righteousness. As the enemy ship exploded, Susan drove right into the fire. The ship knew its limits; she could sense them. Fire couldn’t hurt her. Missiles or energy weapons couldn’t stop her. The fire gave her strength, it gave her power.

“Sir? You’ve done it. Head back in now.”

It was Berensen. An incoming transmission from Titans. His voice and the remembrance that she was the ship’s captain came to her as if from a great distance. The Vorlon ship had given her two gifts. A vision that permitted her to see everything on a grand scale and power she could wield with a direct efficacy. Why had she held back for so long?

Allowed herself to be constrained by little rules and regulations? This assault was the final straw, the final indignity she would suffer at the hand of Psi Corps. Her enemies needed to learn that they could not strike at her with impunity. They needed to feel her rage.

“Sir?”

“You’re in command Berensen,” she transmitted. “Repair jump engines and dock at the Alliance base on Proxima III.”

“And you, sir?”

“I’ve got work to do.”

The Vorlon ship warped space around her, creating its own jumpgate. She sped through it. The fire was building within her again and when she exited hyperspace it would begin. She would clean the stain of the Psi Corps from the face of the Earth. Every base, every ship, every god-damned Psi Cop and most important of all—before she killed him, she would wipe the insufferable smirk from the face of the head Psi Cop himself—Alfred Bester.

chapter 3

Interstellar Alliance headquarters, Tuzanor, Minbar.

John Sheridan was having a hell of a day.

When he moved the headquarters of the Interstellar Alliance to the ancient Minbari city of Tuzanor, he’d hoped its tranquil surroundings would make his job as President of the Interstellar Alliance less stressful.

But from day one he’d barely had a spare moment to appreciate the snow-capped mountains, cascading waterfalls and crystalline towers.

Each day was filled with endless requests—trade embargoes, border treaties to sign, settling potential conflicts.

The day had started with a war brewing between the Drazi and the Pak’ma’ra over a massive hyperspace jellyfish that had escaped from a jumpgate and died on their shared border. The Drazi wanted to deify it and build an orbital temple in its honor; the Pak’ma’ra claimed their laws and customs would be violated beyond repair if they weren’t permitted to haul it back to their homeworld for a mass feast. Then the news about Ivanova hit his desk.

“She’s in a Vorlon ship doing what?”

He barely had time to scan the contents of the report when his screen lit up with an incoming Gold Channel One transmission from Earth—General George O’Reilly, Chairman of EarthForce’s Joint Chiefs of Staff.

“She’s snapped, John. We can’t stop her, at least not without killing her. I’m making this call as a personal courtesy to you.”

“I appreciate that George. I’m on this.”

“Here’s what’s not in the report,” the general said. “She was provoked. Attacked by three Shadow tech destroyers near Jupiter.”

A prickling discomfort crawled up the back of Sheridan’s neck. “I thought we got rid of all of them.”

“We think there must have been some prototypes concealed on Ganymede.”

“And somehow this is connected to Psi Corps?” Sheridan asked.

“Why else would she be attacking them?”

“All we know for sure is that she’s going like a bat out of hell, destroying base after base. She’s demanding they offer up Bester or she’ll wipe them off the face of the Earth.”

“Bester’s had this coming for a long time, Bill. If he’s openly attacked her...”

“John, we can’t have this kind of thing going on, not so soon after the war, not with the telepaths starting to make trouble. You know that.”

“I know, I know,” he said, absent-mindedly rubbing his temples.

“And I appreciate you bringing this to me. Have your men stand down. I’ll fix this somehow.”

“I can give you 24 hours to resolve this. Then I have to act.”

“Wait. I need you to do something else for me, Bill. If she’s inside a Vorlon ship then she’s not in her right mind. It’s enough to drive anyone crazy, take my word for it. And if Bester and the Psi Corps have driven her to this point, she’s not responsible for her actions.”

“I can help her, John. Hell, I can see she gets a commendation for this if you like. I have contacts that can make that happen, but on one condition only. She can’t kill Bester.”

“I thought you were going to say ‘as long as she doesn’t hit any civilian targets.’ And what do you mean ‘contacts who can make that happen’? You’re practically running EarthForce.”

“John, you know there are forces higher than the office of the President or EarthForce. There always have been, there always will be. That’s all I can say. You have my word I’ll do all I can for your friend. Assuming she survives.”

“As long as I stop her from killing Bester,” Sheridan reiterated.

“Good luck, John,” O’Reilly said, and then the screen went blank.

“Good luck?” Sheridan said out loud. “Susan’s gone crazy in command of a Vorlon ship and all he’s got is ‘good luck’?”

He wished now he hadn’t left the Vorlon ship on board Titans. But what else was there to do with it? It seemed like the safest bet at the time, leaving it under Susan’s watchful eye. Sheridan patched a signal straight through to Babylon 5. If he had to pry Susan out of the Vorlon ship then he was going to need Lyta and that was going to be a hell of a problem in itself. The last time they’d spoken, he’d held a PPG to her head.

After the problems with Byron and his telepaths on Babylon 5, he’d been the one who’d personally arrested Lyta on charges of supporting terrorism. Somehow, she’d managed to get the charges against her dropped and now she was due to ship out with G’Kar to explore the galaxy. He didn’t think she’d respond well to one last request for help.

“Lyta. Just hear me out...” he started when the call went through.

“Bester’s on his way here.”

“I haven’t even asked...”

“Bester is on his way here with a personal escort of Black Omega Star Furies. It’s something to do with Susan.”

He wondered if she’d just intuited the reason for his call or if Lyta really was so powerful now that she could read his thoughts over the light years of space between them.

“You’ve heard about Susan?” he asked.

“No. I can sense her thoughts, though. She’s in trouble. I’m assuming you want my help.”

“You got that right. Look I know there’s been some bad blood...”

“You’ve got it. I’ll help. This one last time before I go away.”

“That easy? I was expecting you’d...”

“Put up more of a fight? If it was for you, I’d tell you to go to hell. But it’s not. It’s for Susan. She didn’t stick around to see Babylon 5 sell out its telepath population. We stood together and faced the Great Eye on Z’ha’dum. I helped when Shadow tech was hiding on her ship, and I’ll help her now. Because of who she is and because of what we all once were.”

“Alright,” Sheridan said, “thank you. I’m on my way.”

“Here? Susan isn’t anywhere near Babylon 5.”

“No, she’s on Earth right now but she’ll be coming your way soon.

She’s going to try and kill Bester. I’ll send you the file.”

“Oh,” Lyta said. ”That’s not good.”

“That she’ll be coming to Babylon 5?”

“No. That she wants to kill Bester.”

“I thought you’d be pleased about that,” Sheridan said.

“Ordinarily, yes, but no one’s allowed to kill Bester except for Mr. Garibaldi.”

“I’ll keep that in mind,” Sheridan said, closing the channel.

The journey from Minbar to Babylon 5 was only a little longer than the Earth to Babylon 5 voyage. Utilizing the major jump routes, the gravimetric engines in his White Star would put him there in a matter of hours, arriving just after Susan. There was no time to waste. The matter of the hyperspace jellyfish would have to wait.

Sheridan scowled as he marched down the corridor, heading for the hangar bay. Bester he understood, the Psi Cop was always the same, always pushing the limits to further his own cause, but what was it that Lyta had said about Michael? Didn’t he already have a hard enough job ahead of him? He’d made a personal assurance that he’d stop Susan but what if she wouldn’t listen to reason? If she were inside the Vorlon ship her mind would be addled, her emotions running wild.

“What the hell is wrong with these people?” he said out loud.

Everything had been easy when all he had to do was lead an attack fleet to save the galaxy from god-like aliens. Life and death, right and wrong. Nice and clean. Nothing was simple any more.

chapter 4

Susan Ivanova emerged from the electric blue spiral of the jumpgate and sped towards Babylon 5. She knew why Bester had run here—he was seeking refuge in the one place he thought she would never attack.

And she did feel a slight inner conflict, but any thought of restraint was like spring rain falling upon a raging forest fire. The account had to be paid in full this time, and not just for the crew of Titans and White Star 27, but for all of the people that had suffered at Bester’s hands. Her vengeance was fuelled by a divine fire; a righteousness that could not be denied. If Babylon 5 stood in between her and her enemy then its captain would have to live with her mistakes.

“Captain Ivanova, this is Captain Lochley.” An incoming signal from Babylon 5. “I’m requesting that you stand down immediately. I have direct orders from President Sheridan. Stand down and surrender yourself into Babylon 5’s custody. I am authorized to guarantee your safety.”

She didn’t reply, it would only make things more difficult. Really, what was there to say?

“Captain Ivanova? I asked nicely once. Now I’m ordering you to stand down and hold your position.”

Ivanova’s attention was consumed by nine, black Star Furies marked with Psi Corps insignia—Bester’s elite Black Omega squadron.

They were lined up behind the station in a reverse phalanx, a V-shaped funnel. She knew that Bester’s ship would be the one at the rear—he’d happily sacrifice every one of his men to keep her at bay. Another incoming signal. This was one call she wanted to take.

“Bester,” she said.

“Captain Ivanova. We are at something of an impasse.”

“Sure we are,” she said. “You don’t want me to blow you out of space and I can’t take out nine Star Furies single handed. Oh, wait. I can. So glad we could work things out.”

“Wait!” Bester called out and Ivanova was pleased to hear a tone of urgency in his voice. “You don’t want to do this. I have assurances from Captain Lochley that Babylon 5 will fire on you if you engage my fighters.”

“I’m okay with that,” Susan said. “But there’s one thing you need to know. Today is the last day you pollute the galaxy with your existence, the very last day, and if that means both of us die then I guess I’ll see you in hell.“

She came in high over Babylon 5 and opened fire on the Psi Corps fighters. They responded at once—concentrating their fire, holding formation and tracking her as she flew over them.

As in the previous firefight, she absorbed the energy from the blasts that hit her, feeding the fire, fuelling both her rage and the fusion beam that was a part of her. Susan flew directly into the storm of pulse cannon fire and let the burning fire surge through her core. Her fusion beam obliterated the nearest Star Fury in an explosion of sparks.

She’d expected them to scatter, to make it harder to target them. By the time she’d worked out the reason they were holding their ground, it was too late, their combined psychic attack had penetrated her defenses.

Suddenly she was a little girl again, sitting at the feet of her mother, Sophie, who looked down at her with sad eyes. This was when her mother had been at her worst, just before she took her own life, her telepathic abilities fully repressed by Psi Corps drugs.

“Susan?” she said. “What are you doing? Betraying your friends? Didn’t I teach you anything?”

Those words unlocked a lifetime of repressed emotion in an instant.

Feelings about her mother—anger, sadness, helplessness, despair—a crippling flood almost strong enough to put out the psychic fire that propelled her. Figures stood on either side of her mother, staring at her—her father, her brother Ganya—all dead now. She was the last of them, the last of her family.

Then the ship stepped in. It reminded her of her duty. It understood her feelings. It was the last one as well. It knew sadness, loneliness, abandonment. It taught her now, as she had taught it. Sadness, misery, cowardice were not options. Only duty. Only justice. Her ship surged forward, the fire raging once more. She gave herself to it as a sacrifice.

The Psi Corps fighters broke formation—eight ships constantly shuffling position at high speed, trying to conceal Bester while they fired on Ivanova. It was like trying to spot a single fly in a swarm. It didn’t matter; she knew how to solve the problem. Bester would be the last one standing, he always was.

John Sheridan exited the jumpgate near Babylon 5 and flew straight into a blazing firefight.

Susan’s ship was cutting through the Psi Corps squadron with a single-minded intensity, utilizing the near-impossible maneuverability of the Vorlon craft.

Lochley had reported that there were initially nine, including Bester’s ship. There were five by the time he pulled out of the jumpgate.

Now four.

“Full speed ahead,” he ordered. “Don’t slow down until we’re in between Susan and the Black Omegas.”

Ivanova had disabled one of the black Star Furies and Sheridan could predict her next move—she was about to unleash her beam weapon and annihilate the fighter.

“Are you certain you wish to directly expose this ship to the intensity of a Vorlon beam weapon?” his Minbari commander, Denar, asked.

“Standard tactics aren’t going to do us any good here,” Sheridan replied. “We’re going to have to go out on a limb if we stand any chance of taking Susan down alive. Now punch it.”

Sheridan’s White Star came to a sudden stop right in front of Susan, body-blocking her, protecting Bester and his Psi Cops. The White Star began to shake apart.

“Sir,” Denar said. “Shields are at seventy percent. We can’t withstand a direct assault at this range for long.”

Sheridan hoped his gamble would pay off. This was Susan in full berserker rage, she’d been pushed to the edge. His only hope was that their friendship and her sense of duty would be strong enough to get her to pull her punches.

“Shields at fifty percent,” Denar said.

“Hold,” Sheridan ordered.

“Once the beam penetrates our shields we will die,” the Minbari said, trying his best to keep the panic from his voice.

“I said hold, damn it!” Sheridan barked.

The beam stopped firing suddenly and the Vorlon ship hung in space before them. Sheridan opened a comm channel.

“Susan? Can you hear me?”

“John?” her voice came back.

“Yeah, it’s me. You’ve got to stand down.”

“I can’t. You don’t know what he’s done.”

“I’ve got a pretty good idea and I’m here to tell you that this can’t happen. Even this far in, I can still pull you out. They started this thing, I know, but I can’t do a damned thing to help if you kill Bester.”

“You should listen to him,” Bester said, cutting into the transmission.

“Bester! Shut the hell up and stand down.” Sheridan snapped. “I swear to God if I see so much as a single shot fired from any of your fighters then I’ll let her have you.”

“President Sheridan...” Bester began.

“Not one more word. You really want to push things further than you already have today?”

Bester’s signal cut out.

“I’ve had enough politics for a lifetime,” Susan said angrily. “There’s nothing left but to see justice carried out. That’s what’s going to happen today, John. I don’t care about myself anymore; I’ve got to see this out. He’s got to pay.”

“I’ve been in that thing Susan. The Vorlon ship makes it hard to keep your head straight. You’re not thinking clearly.”

“From where I stand it’s crystal clear. There’s always another agenda, always a reason not to attack him, that’s the game he plays. How many more people have to die before we wake up? I’m only going to say this once John—stand aside.”

The signal cut out and Sheridan’s eyes widened when he saw organic pulse cannons emerge from the Vorlon ship and target his White Star.

“Give me manual control of the ship,” he ordered and an instrument panel immediately lowered from the ceiling, fitting over his command chair.

He opened a channel to the docking bay on Babylon 5. “Lyta?”

“I’m here. I’m trying to touch Susan’s mind but she’s beyond reason. You’ve got to get her in here. I need to be close to her. If you can keep the ship in check I just might be able to get her out.”

“I’ll do my best. Keep trying to get through to her for now,”

Sheridan said. “I’m going to need all the help I can get.”

And then Susan was coming right at him, cannons firing.

“Damn it! Divert power to shields. Come about, we’re going to take her on.” His finger hovered over the trigger of the White Star’s neutron cannon.

Ivanova’s cannons pounded away at his shields and he wished he hadn’t let her hit his ship for so long. At least Bester was listening.

Sensors told him the Black Omegas were hanging back, no doubt enjoying the show.

“Shields are down, sir. We have no defenses. Will we return fire?”

“No. That’s just going to piss her off more.”

The Vorlon ship swung above him suddenly, maneuvering to a high position, targeting his engines.

“She’s taken out the gravimetric engines!” Denar said.

“I know. What’s the status of the rear port and aft thrusters? And the tractor beam?”

“Fully functional, sir.”

“Good.”

“Good, sir?”

“Be patient,” Sheridan said. “The good news is Susan’s trying to knock us out of action first. She’ll only shoot to kill as a last measure.”

The White Star shook wildly as the Vorlon craft struck again.

“That’s good news? She just disabled our cannons. We’re helpless,” the Minbari said.

“Clearly you’ve never played baseball, Mr. Denar.”

“Base. Ball. A dance festival conducted on a military station?”

“She’s coming about for another pass. She’ll be in position in ten seconds. Anchor the nose of the ship with the tractor beams. Fire rear port and aft thrusters on my mark!”

“What are we doing sir? Are we going to ram her?”

“Mr. Denar, we’re going to hit a home run. Mark!”

With the nose of the ship held firm by the tractor beams, the selected thrusters swung the White Star about in a sudden, sweeping arc. The starboard hull connected solidly with the side of the Vorlon ship, smacking it clean out of the fight and sending it hurtling right at Babylon 5’s hull.

“Lochley? She’s coming in fast,” Sheridan said, contacting Babylon 5’s C&C. “I want you to trap her in a hangar bay with standard Earth gravity. A rough landing will knock the fight out of her. I hope.”

“Affirmative,” Lochley replied.

“There’s no metal in the Vorlon ship, you can’t grab her with magnetic grapples. Fire cable hooks at her.”

Before the Vorlon ship could recover, dozens of grappling cables shot out from the station, flying past it, extending their claws and then drawing back. More than half of them caught on, hooking the ship, drawing it into the gaping maw of the hangar bay.

In his mind Sheridan could hear the Vorlon ship scream. Tentacles emerged from its body, flailing about as it tried to free itself. Lasers formed at the tips of those tentacles and started cutting through the cables that trapped it.

“It’s going to pull free,” Sheridan said. He knew if he lost it there would be no second chance. Susan would be more cautious the next time round, much more likely to use lethal force to accomplish her objective. He still had one more card up his sleeve. He sent a signal back into the jumpgate, which activated instantly in response. A massive EarthForce destroyer appeared, charging towards Babylon 5 at full speed. Titans, Susan’s own ship. Sheridan had explained the situation and Commander Berensen had been happy to help try to rescue his captain.

Titans moved in and rammed the Vorlon ship with all its mass, smacking it right back into the hole it had been trying to pull away from.

“Here she comes!” Sheridan called out.

“We’ve got her,” Lochley replied.

He watched Susan’s ship hit the hangar bay deck at high speed, the grapple cables slack as she raced back towards their anchor point.

Sparks flew as her hull skidded against steel and then a powerful impact as she collided with the crash wall at the end of the bay. The wall was specifically designed to cushion the impact of a ship coming in hot, but Titans had propelled the Vorlon craft down the runway at twice the velocity it was rated to handle. Fire retardants automatically sprayed the ship and as he followed her into the bay, he lost sight of the Vorlon ship beneath clouds of chemical foam.

“Get in there with a fire crew,” Sheridan said to Lochley. “I’m docking right now. Activate the force field the second I’m inside. I don’t want that ship going anywhere.”

He switched channels again.

“Lyta? Is she alive?”

“She is, though I’m having trouble distinguishing her mind from the ship’s. I’m going to need you.”

“On my way. “

Lochley’s voice chimed in. “We have an official request from Mr. Bester seeking permission to land in the hangar bay. His Star Fury has suffered severe damage. He says if he can’t dock immediately he will perish in space. We can’t open up another bay in time.”

“Damn it, all right,” Sheridan said. “We can’t let him die now, not after all this. The second he’s in I want the bay sealed, and make sure he’s put at the opposite end from Susan. I don’t even want them to catch sight of one another.”

Sheridan cursed beneath his breath as he landed beside the Vorlon ship. No, nothing was simple anymore.

chapter 5

Susan lay inside Babylon 5’s hangar bay, covered with limp grapple cables and foul smelling chemicals. Did they really think they could hold her? When Bester was so close?

But what was it she had seen at the last moment? Titans. Her own ship.

It had helped Sheridan. It had rammed her, forced her into this flimsy trap. But why? They had as much reason to pay Bester back as anyone.

It was their fellow crewmates who’d died. She was confused and in pain.

“Susan? Can you hear me? Lyta’s formed a telepathic link between us.”

It was John. She could see him standing there, on the other side of her shell as if it were transparent, clear as day. It was John, and yet it wasn’t John. She saw him overlaid with the form of the First One.

Lorien. She quivered with reverence, awe, most of all, fear. No, they weren’t her feelings, they belonged to the ship.

She understood its reaction. If John separated them then what would happen to it? Where would it go? Back to Deck 7 aboard Titans?

No, never again. It had a mission. It had to carry out its duty. She had taught it that.

“Susan, you’ve got to come out of there. Human minds aren’t meant for this. We’re not ready to see the galaxy through Vorlon eyes.”

“You did,” she said.

“No. Whatever gift Lorien left me allowed me to cope with being inside it, but I can’t remember a thing after. It’s like being inside a dream. Think about it for a second. Do you actually know where you are inside the ship? Where your body is?”

It was then Susan realized she had a serious problem. Her body was somewhere inside the ship, she was sure of that, but where exactly was another matter all together. She could feel every inch of the ship and its systems but the overlapping dream of being surrounded by the cocoon and also piloting her favorite Star Fury was gone. Now she was a vague, amorphous consciousness. Mist on a window that could be wiped away at any moment.

“You’ve got to come out of there before it’s too late,” John said.

“You’ll become so much a part of it that you won’t know where you start and it ends.”

“A dream,” she said. “You’re right, it’s just like a dream.”

“And now you need to wake up, Susan.”

The ship was trying to rekindle the feelings of anger within her, to get her to give it the spark that it could magnify into a firestorm.

“With this ship, I can take out Psi Corps as a threat, once and for all, won’t that be worth it?”

“Worth losing you? No. No it won’t. Come back, Susan. You have to want to come back, you have to let go of all your anger, that’s what’s holding you there.”

The ship railed against his words.

“It’s alone, John,” she said. “If it lets me go it wants to know what will happen.”

He placed his hand upon the ship’s skin and spoke directly to it.

“I don’t know,” Sheridan said. “You want to go home, but no one knows where the Vorlons and Shadows have gone. I can try to help you find them but you have to let her go now. This isn’t the right way.”

Susan was suddenly back in the cocoon of threads and Lyta was there with her in her telepathic form, gently pulling at the red strands, drawing them out of her body. Susan felt the fire fade as each thread was withdrawn. Cool, clear currents trickled through her mind.

Suddenly the ship fired its engines and began to pull away. This was a trick! Sheridan had distracted it. Made a space for the telepath to penetrate its defenses.

“Lyta!” John called out in warning. It was too late. The ship sent a psychic shockwave into Lyta’s telepathic form, scattering it. Susan heard Lyta scream in pain as her mind was thrown back into her body without warning.

Susan’s mind and the ship’s mind began to blur together. There would be no more humans. It didn’t need Ivanova’s mind, just her feelings. They provided a purpose, a focus. It would carry out its mission and then it would fly far away to the Vorlon homeworld, where it would live in isolation. Susan knew she couldn’t fight it, she could barely even tell which thoughts were hers anymore.

She shook with a sudden, violent intensity. Susan thought they were under attack again but there was no weapon strike. The ship had responded to a signal of great power, a transmission beamed
out into distant space. The signal didn’t originate from Babylon 5 or Titans but it came from somewhere nearby. It carried information the ship considered priceless—the coordinates to where the Vorlons and Shadows had left the galaxy. Its need for anger dissipated, evaporated by a radiant hope. If it traveled there it might be able to follow its kind.

It would no longer be alone.

The Vorlon ship fired its engines in excitement and, almost as an afterthought, began to expel Susan Ivanova from its body. She was impure, not of Vorlon. When it arrived at the coordinates it might be rejected if she was inside it. Susan found herself suddenly ripped apart, pulled in opposing directions by the connecting threads.

Lyta was there again, inside the thread cocoon, hurriedly pulling strands from her body, knitting her mind and body back together.

Susan became aware that she was back inside her body the split second before a portal in the Vorlon ship opened and she was spat out onto the hard, metallic deck of the hangar bay.

She couldn’t move at first. She just lay there on her side, watching the ship as it broke free of the grapple lines and sped away, passing through the hangar bay force field with no more effort than a leaping fish breaking through the surface of a lake. It shot towards the jumpgate, activated it, and was gone.

“Thanks for nothing,” Susan said in a hoarse, worn voice. Hands helped her sit up—John and Lyta’s hands. Her whole body was in pain. She could feel her senses returning though, her mind clearing and regaining a rational, human perspective.

“Oh, God,” she said looking at them. “What the hell was I doing? What was I thinking?”

John smiled at her, his perfect, reassuring smile. The smile said that everything was going to be okay. But how could it? After what she’d done, after the damage she’d caused. Nothing could ever be okay again.

“Yeah,” he said, as if reading her thoughts. “That’s how I felt when I first had a Vorlon in my mind. Don’t worry, it fades with time and then you start to feel normal again. Well, mostly normal. Don’t worry, we’re here for you. We’ll sort this out.”

“What else are friends for?” Lyta said and Susan was sure the comment was directed more at John than at her.

“There was a signal,” she explained to John. “Someone transmitted a signal that would allow it to follow the Vorlons and Shadows.”

“Then that’s the last of them gone,” Sheridan said. “I can’t say I’m sad to see it go.”

As they helped Susan to her feet she spotted Bester, standing beside his Star Fury at the other end of the hangar bay. He’d failed in his mission to get the Vorlon craft, he’d failed to kill her, but he’d played a dangerous game and survived, and that meant there’d be another day.

Another throw of the dice. Another day her friends would be at risk.

“There’s still something I have to do,” she said.

“Susan...”

“It’s okay, John. I’m just going to talk to him.”

“Is that true?” John asked Lyta.

“Sure,” Lyta replied. “Absolutely. Basic communication.”

Susan Ivanova hobbled painfully across the deck, forcing herself to stay upright until she stood before Bester. He seemed perfectly unconcerned, still sporting his signature smirk.

“Captain Ivanova. Susan. I suggest you restrain yourself or I’ll be forced to...”

She slowly curled her fingers into a fist and smashed Alfred Bester in the face with as much strength as she could muster. He fell backwards, landing awkwardly on his rear. He looked up at her in shock. He’d expected his psychic defenses to have repelled her, prevented her from raising a hand to him.

“You’ll regret that,” he said to Ivanova.

“Learn to like it,” she said to him. “I’ll be coming back for you when the dust settles.”

She walked back to her friends, making sure to give Lyta a quick, courteous nod for blocking Bester’s psychic defenses long enough for her fist to hit home.

“You said she wasn’t going to hurt him,” Sheridan said to Lyta.

“I said she was going to communicate with him,” Lyta replied.

“And I did,” Ivanova said. “With my fist.”

She limped past them, heading for the turbo lift. “I need vodka before I can deal with this,” she said. “Lots of vodka.”

“You got it,” John replied. “Right after you receive medical treatment.”

“Vodka is medicine. Vodka first.”

He didn’t argue.

“The only thing that puzzles me,” John said, as the turbo lift carried them to Earhart’s in Red Sector, “is who beamed the transmission with those coordinates? It came out of nowhere and just in the nick of time. Who has access to that kind of information?”

Susan Ivanova shrugged and said nothing, but she had a pretty good idea of exactly who it was she had to thank.

Epilogue

Garibaldi terminated the signal transmission beamed out by the Great Machine. Only the Great Machine’s network was powerful enough to track the Vorlons and Shadows to the precise point from which they had left the galaxy.

Draal, the caretaker of the planet-sized computer, had given Garibaldi permission to choose the moment when the signal would be activated and terminated, but only on the condition that he not be permitted to know the signal’s end point—the knowledge of those coordinates were to remain a secret until humanity was ready to take its place with the galaxy’s advanced races.

Garibaldi removed the neural interface and stretched. He’d been up for almost a full 24 hours without rest.

“I’m getting too old for this stuff,” he said.

He’d analyzed the entire scenario, calculated where Sheridan and Lyta’s plan was most likely to fall over and then devised a strategy to pull their butts out of the fire before they all got burned. He had to save Bester, he couldn’t resist that compulsion, but he could shape the exact way in which the Psi Cop was saved. He could ensure his friends suffered the least harm in the process.

Garibaldi was used to working within narrow confines. Bester had beaten him once. That would never happen again, even with the psychic block in his head. He would die before he ever betrayed his friends again.

Garibaldi leaned back in his chair, waiting. When the call came he answered at once.

“Mr. Garibaldi,” said Bester.

Garibaldi couldn’t keep the smile from his face when he saw Bester’s black eye.

“That was a close call, Mr. Garibaldi.”

“You’re safe, aren’t you? That’s the only condition. That I can’t knowingly allow harm to come to you. There was nothing in there about letting the Psi Corps get knocked around a little.”

“You and your friends are going to suffer for this, Mr. Garibaldi.”

“Sure, sure,” he said dismissively. “Now listen, Al, here’s how this is going to play out. My friends in EarthForce are going to see that this whole incident is swept under the carpet. We’re going to say the Vorlon craft was unmanned—a rogue ship—the last remnant of the war and that now it’s been destroyed. Susan won’t take any heat over this, not even a note on her record, and in return I’ll see that Psi Corps isn’t exposed for attacking an EarthForce destroyer and killing members of its crew, not to mention White Star 27.”

“You over-estimate your power, Mr. Garibaldi.”

“No. No, I don’t. You’re going to go along with everything, Bester, and you’re going to do it because this time you get to walk away scot-free—for Susan’s sake. Do we have an understanding?”

“Yes.” From the sour expression on Bester’s face Garibaldi knew
that one word of acquiescence had cost him dearly.

“Good. Now I want you to know the only reason I’m going to make all that happen is because it doesn’t matter. It doesn’t matter that you walk on this one because your time is coming, Al. Psi Corps’ time is coming and when it does, I’m going to be there. I’ve already got it picked out, a Louisville slugger with your name carved into the side in big letters. And I’m going to be the one swinging it.”

“Keep telling yourself that Mr. Garibaldi. Just make sure you do your job like a good dog and keep me alive.”

The transmission cut out and Garibaldi smiled. Bester was full of his usual bluster and bravado but there was something he had never seen in the man’s eyes before—fear, uncertainty. “Not long now,” Garibaldi said to himself. “Not long at all.”

He opened up a channel to the kitchen.

“Mr. Garibaldi?”

“Yeah. Can you send me through that bagna càuda now?”

“On its way, Mr. Garibaldi.”

He opened another channel.

“Reynolds? You there?”

“I’m always here, sir. What can I get you?”

“A problem-free galaxy?”

“Sorry, sir. That’s something you’re more qualified to handle.”

“Let me tell ya, you never even know you’re in the galaxy saving business until you’re saving the galaxy, and by then it’s too late to get out.”

“I’m sure it is, sir. I, for one, am glad you’re in it.”

“At least someone appreciates me. What did you think of the bagna càuda I sent you?”

“It was nourishing, sir.”

“Seriously? The greatest meal in the galaxy and that’s all you got? Some things are worth making a meal out of,” Garibaldi said, and he couldn’t help thinking of Bester again with the black eye. “Man, I’m going to have to start up a food appreciation course. Did I ever tell you about my theory that if the Vorlons and Shadows had bagna càuda then there wouldn’t have even been a war?”

“Yes, sir. On many an occasion.”

Garibaldi laughed as he stood up and walked away from his station.

Nothing could kill his mood today. Susan was going to be all right, his friends had survived the latest threat, a dozen Psi Corps bases were crippled and there wasn’t a god-damned thing they could do about it.

Best of all, Bester had a black eye. Nothing beat that.

He was just about to exit through the quantium door when his security station sounded an alert.

“Sir?”

“No. Leave me alone Reynolds. I’m going to eat and then I’m going back to bed.”

“Sir, you know I wouldn’t disturb you if it wasn’t important.”

“What? It’s been five minutes. The world’s in flames? In the last five minutes?”

“Not burning, sir. Not literally. Ivanova’s strikes to the Psi Corps bases seem to have given rogue telepaths something to rally around. It seems they were already congregating after Byron’s death and were just waiting for something like this. There are riots on Babylon 5, on Mars, across Earth. If it’s not brought under control it could spiral out into something much bigger.”

“A telepath war?”

“Your words, sir. Not mine.”

Garibaldi sighed as he returned to the seat behind the console.

“Kitchen?”

“Yes, Mr. Garibaldi?”

“Put a hold on that bagna càuda. I just lost my appetite again.”

Table of Contents

- Red Fury

- prologue
- chapter 1
- chapter 2
- chapter 3
- chapter 4
- chapter 5
- Epilogue