"There is also the Great Machine, which is more than capable of defending the station. You remember the first time we saw it?" He nodded. "Still, this might be a cause for concern. Perhaps we should try to find G'Kar."
He nodded again. "Now?"
"No time like the present." Smiling, he took her arm and they left her quarters, his long stride consciously slowed to match her shorter one.
As they began to walk down the corridor however, they encountered two figures coming the other way. Sheridan started and stiffened, and he knew Delenn had noticed the tension in his arm.
He looked at the two men closely. Captain Ari Ben Zayn and his telepath, Harriman Gray. Bester's men through and through. Both men had noticed them and while Gray looked uneasy, Ben Zayn consciously straightened his bearing and stopped, waiting for Sheridan and Delenn to approach him.
"I thought I'd find you with her," Ben Zayn said, addressing Sheridan directly without a glance at Delenn. "Didn't you receive your orders, then?"
"I received them," came the careful reply. Sheridan was looking directly at Gray, who seemed…. fascinated by his gaze. That was still better than looking at Ben Zayn. The man was a career soldier, with years more experience than Sheridan himself. His scar seemed to bleed as Sheridan looked at it. "I was just looking for G'Kar to…."
"And have you started working for G'Kar now, Captain?" he snapped. "You work for Bester. The Parmenion is his ship, its crew are his men and you are his soldier. Have you forgotten that?"
"No, Captain, I haven't. But Bester did post me here to safeguard this project of G'Kar's, as well as to maintain general order in the League and Alliance worlds, as per G'Kar's wishes. My exact post was, if I remember the term correctly, Bester's liaison with G'Kar."
"Yes, I am completely aware of that, but now Bester has requested your presence on Sanctuary. This supersedes your posting here. You are to come along…. now, or your ship and your crew will have to go without you."
"You know as well as I do that at least half of that crew is mine."
"And they will obey the orders of Major Krantz just as well as they would yours. If they do not do so, then they can easily be replaced. You have your orders, Captain. So, unless your recent freedom has affected your ability to obey them, I expect to see the Parmenion leaving here within the hour. Do you understand me?"
"I understand you perfectly well! But I have my responsibilities here, to G'Kar, to this station, to…." He stopped as he felt Delenn tapping his arm gently.
"Go, John," she said. "We will be fine here." He started to speak, to protest, but his words were stifled by her kiss. "I love you," she said softly, so softly it was hardly audible. "Go."
She stepped back and, with a twirl, turned and went back towards her quarters. Sheridan focussed his gaze on Ben Zayn. "We will be gone within the hour," he snapped. "And if this is no emergency, we will be back here equally quickly. Good day, Captain."
He stormed down the corridor without saying another word.
* * *
Lord Jarno stood at his window looking out at the streets of his city, and shivered. It was night-time and yet the city was lit as if it were day. Not just by lights, but by the fires.
They had been burning for days, it seemed — in the warehouse sector, the peasant villages, the fields, even in the streets themselves. Where each inferno blazed, someone stood in the centre of it, screaming that the Shadow was coming.
Jarno did not need to be told about the Shadow, he saw it every night in his dreams. The sky was blacked out by the appearance of countless billions of ships, each one screaming inside his mind.
Shadow Criers they called themselves. Madness, but an enlightened madness. They preached that everything would burn, all would be destroyed when the Darkness came.
"Still looking outside? Why bother? The City Guard will put out the fires eventually, that's what they're there for, after all. And then they'll find out who did it and execute them. Come back to bed."
He did not turn from the window at the sound of her voice. Many times over the last year he had begun to wonder why he had ever listened to it in the first place. He had always been ambitious…. before, but for the greater glory of the Republic, not for his own advancement.
But then he had begun to listen to her and old dreams had begun to surface. At first they had sounded so reasonable. Of course the Republic needed strength, now more than ever. Good people had been ignored by the Court for too long and if it took something a little…. extreme to force them to recognise that, then so be it.
Somewhere along the way, however, it had all gone wrong. He didn't know where. From the moment she had first manoeuvred him into her bed, making a mockery of his marriage vows? From the death of Emperor Refa perhaps? Maybe from the emergence of the first Shadow Crier. Maybe it had always been wrong and he had simply never noticed until now.
"Jarno dear," continued the petulant voice, and he sighed. "Stop looking outside. You know it only upsets you. There's something much more interesting for you to look at over here…."
He sighed again and silently cursed his own weaknesses. Perhaps they were why he had never risen as far as he felt he should have risen.
"The city is burning," he muttered softly. "The city…. is burning."
"Only the parts of it that don't matter. The Guard will never let the fires get anywhere near the Noble Quarter."
"People are dying."
"People who don't matter. The peasants. There will always be more of them around."
He sighed again and nodded. He was considering returning to bed when his commscreen beeped. Turning towards it, he suppressed a surge of fear. Who could possibly be contacting him at this time of night? This could be nothing good.
"I'm sorry, my lord," spoke the voice of his aide over the commchannel. "I will tell the Lord Kiro that you are unable to take his call at the moment…."
Lord Kiro? Jarno swallowed harshly. "No. I'll take it now." He moved over to the screen, watching as his companion awkwardly pulled the sheets up to cover herself.
The image came into view on the screen, and Jarno looked at his fellow noble. Once, many years before, the two had been friends, fostered together at his uncle's estate. A million years ago now. Both of them had changed too much, and neither made any mention of that time in their childhood.
"What is the meaning of this, Jarno?" Kiro asked. He looked positively apoplectic.
"The meaning of what, Kiro? Do you know what time it is?"
"Of course I know the time, and you know full well what I am referring to! I have been at my estates all week, and when I return, not half an hour ago, I find guardsmen all around my house here. My servants tell me that no one has been allowed to enter or leave since they arrived, and the guards tell me they were ordered there by you! What is the meaning of this, Jarno?"
Jarno straightened automatically at Kiro's tone, even though he could not dispute the rightfulness of his anger. Jarno knew nothing of any such guardsmen, but he still maintained his composure. "It behoves us all to act as nobles, Kiro. Perhaps you have forgotten that."
"Forgotten! Jarno, I will ask you one last time. What is the meaning of this outrage? If I do not receive an answer then I will have to take this matter to the Centarum, and have you arrested."
"Your tone does not befit you, Lord Kiro. This conversation is at an end. I trust we will be able to speak later, when you are suitably calmed." Kiro made to reply, but Jarno cut the transmission. He then turned to his companion.
"Very masterful," she said, discarding the covers and rising from the bed. "I did not know you had it in you." She smiled. "I was very impressed."
"You did that, didn't you?"
"I took a few…. little liberties with your personal seal and your personal guards."
"Not to mention my person. The Emperor's Name, why?"
She began dressing herself, not in one of her usual fine gowns, but in the more utilitarian costume she wore when she was doing something surreptitious. Close, tight-fitting hunting clothes. "Officially…. reasons of security of course. In Lord Kiro's absence his house was vulnerable to attack from those insane Shadow Criers. Someone had to protect him."
Jarno folded his arms high on his chest. "And unofficially?"
"He has his own ambitions for the throne, of course."
"Well of course he does. So does half of the Court. And the other half, come to that."
"Yes, but Kiro is just open enough to make an attempt, and he has the lineage to succeed as well. Don't forget that his House once held the throne."
"I haven't forgotten, and nor have I forgotten how they lost it."
"In any case, Kiro has been away gathering support in his southern estates. He may even be contemplating an alliance with dear old Londo, anything that would further his chances of the throne. We have to deal with him before that can happen."
"That's what this is about, isn't it? Kiro was in talks with your husband."
"My ex-husband. Don't forget he is legally dead. And yes, there is that, but more importantly, you are going to take over Kiro's House and estates, which will be a great step towards the throne. And you are going to do it tonight."
"Tonight?"
"Yes. A little premature I'll admit, but my sources said that Kiro wasn't due to return for another few days. I'll have to have some of them shot." Mariel smiled and moved closer to Jarno, reaching up to touch his face. "Come on, dear. We have work to do."
"Work? Attacking another Lord's house? Such a thing has not been done for centuries."
"Great men are not bound by normal rules, Jarno. The first Emperor said that, remember. And behind every great man, there is a great woman showing him how to do it right. Get dressed, quickly. We had better get my dear sister-wife as well. We may need her testimony that we were provoked if matters do not go well."
"I can't do this. I…." He looked at her, and he could feel all his old weaknesses rising to the fore. She was right of course. Great men were not bound by normal rules. But was he a great man?
Would he ever be?
Pitifully, pathetically, hopelessly, he nodded, and went to get dressed.
* * *
There was power, but not as she had expected; knowledge, but not as she had anticipated; wisdom, but not as she had wished.
And there was something else, a nagging, burning sensation that the Machine was doing…. something. She did not know what, and she could not find out.
Furious, Donne shifted her consciousness to her holographic form and let it step out into view. As she looked at her companions she was struck by their weakness. The two mundanes were the worst. Number One and Number Two were seated in the far corner of the cavern, ostensibly on watch, but actually talking about their concerns in hushed voices they presumably believed she could not hear.
Ivanova was still comatose, curled up like a tiny baby. From time to time pathetic whimpers escaped from her mouth.
And Tu'Pari…. he was sitting cross-legged next to the equally comatose G'Kar. The Narn assassin was sharpening his long, wicked knife with a methodical air, gazing distantly at the walls.
