PREVIOUSLY, IN STAR AND CIRCLE I: "THE SEEKER'S FIRE"...
Having fallen through a gate between realities on the world named Amaranth, Anla'shok Val'na Julia Tikopai, the young and sometimes impetuous commander of the ISA battlecruiser SHARD OF NIGHT, suddenly finds herself in a shared body with her doppelganger, a woman who serves an Empire of Minbari, Drakh and Humans -- an Empire built by the Drakh for their Masters, the Shadows, and opposed by an Interstellar Alliance consisting of most of the other Younger Races.
Under the command of this reality's John Sheridan, Julia's opposite has committed herself to an attack on the Alliance flagship (another EXCALIBUR), and while the 'Other' has been warned that Julia would arrive through the gate between worlds by a mysterious 'Shadowman', she will allow no interference in Imperial plans...and for a little while at least, trapped in a prison of her opposite's devising, Julia finds herself unable to act. Meanwhile, on the other side of the fence, the Alliance forces, nowhere near as unawares of the forthcoming attack as the Imperials would like to believe, are preparing an intricate trap for their enemies.
At the same time this is going on, Klairika, Sheynell and the rest of the crew of the regular SHARD OF NIGHT are doing their best to try and figure out what has happened to their captain, when their investigations are disturbed by the arrival of several unexpected allies -- the first, a pair of Soul Hunters, and then, the Technomage Galen. Each have come to help the Rangers for their own reasons, but all agree that Julia must be saved... and soon enough, Galen and the Soul Hunters devise a means to locate the Observer's missing soul, and Klairika and Sheynell are summoned into action to help search for their Captain.
Back in the other reality, battle is soon joined between the forces of Alliance and Empire, and Sha'var Alyt Sheridan eventually orders the EXCALIBUR to be destroyed. This action is thwarted, however, by an unexpected energy burst from the EXCALIBUR that disables the SHARD, the arrival of a second fleet of Alliance warships lead by Shai Alyt Sinoval himself...and finally, by a direct intervention from Julia that causes the Other to collapse.
In short order, the SHARD, now cut off from the rest of the Imperial forces, is boarded, and Julia, now in control of the body she shares with her opposite, is captured by a force of Minbari and taken onboard the EXCALIBUR. A number of revelations soon follow, chief among them being the fact that the 'Admiral' in command of the Alliance is none other then Jeffrey Sinclair. Sinclair, aided by Zathras and at least three Technomages, has been expecting Julia's arrival -- Zathras in particular tells her that she is 'to teach' her opposite how to bring Sheridan out of the darkness and into the light -- and she soon discovers that the price of failure may be very great indeed.
And is failure inevitable? For in the aftermath of the disastrous attack on the EXCALIBUR, Sheridan's wife and fellow officer Elizabeth Lochley has ordered the arrest of her husband, so that he may be returned to Minbar to pay the price of their defeat at the hands of the Alliance forces.
* * *
AND NOW, THE CONCLUSION...
* * *
My name's Garibaldi. Michael Garibaldi. And for the last ten years or so, I've served as Armsmaster to one of the senior Earth-sect houses in the Empire. Those years have consisted of good days, bad days...and days when it's almost been safer not to get out of bed, if you know what I'm saying. And just in case you have a hard time making guesses, yesterday was definitely one of those days.
The day started when Sha'var Alyt John Sheridan, he of the mad power trips, gave the order to destroy the latest Interstellar Alliance flagship, a newtech destroyer named EXCALIBUR. And you know what?... to start with, things looked good. It looked like our Sha'var Alyt was actually going to have a numerical advantage in ships for a change, and that the jump-out and attack was going to be a serious shock for the bad guys. Hell, to start with, it looked like I might actually get to board something, and capture some people.
In other words, it looked too good to be true, and soon enough, the tables were turned. First, one of our Warlocks, the BASILISK, gets taken out by the EXCALIBUR's main gun... then, our secret weapon, a ship named SHARD OF NIGHT, is disabled by a new Alliance defensive gizmo of some sort, and finally, just to throw salt on the wounds, Shai Alyt Sinoval *himself* rides in with the cavalry.
Needless to say, SHE wasn't very happy about all this, and everyone in the Imperial military knows how things work when the generals lose too many battles -- it's 'off with their heads', as the old saying goes. During the night after the battle, she wouldn't see him, wouldn't even speak to him, and finally, this morning, she ordered me to arrest the man she'd been married to for twenty-five years, and get him ready to go back to Minbar to face the music in front of the Council of Ascension.
Sounded like a great plan, as plans go -- I never really did like the guy in any case. It's always the same with his type, give 'em too much power and it always goes to their heads. And the order was simple enough to execute -- go to Sheridan's quarters, break the door down and throw him in the brig.
Only... you see, there was this *small* problem. While I was on the way to said quarters, Sheridan's sanctum, along with a six-hundred or so foot long section of the ENCHANTRESS's hull, detached and decided to go its seperate way, luckily before I tried to open the door. That sneaky bastard, I told myself at the time, he ran *before* we could arrest him, not exactly the most Imperial thing to do, but not terribly surprising, either. As a result, SHE is now furious, and the Drakh aren't much happier. While every ship under HER command is now chasing this little black organic splinter-ship with a Sheridan inside it.
And I thought yesterday was bad. So far, today's shaping up to be much, *much* worse.
* * *
Interstellar Alliance flagship EXCALIBUR -- enroute from Zander Prime to Transfer Beacon 1175-A. 11:35 hrs, EST, March 10th, 2267.
Julia sat in front of the Technomage's Mirror, now dressed in the familiar black-and-grey uniform of her craft, and tried not to shiver. The last time she had been placed in this position, her opposite had abruptly and very ruthlessly taken command of their shared body and forced her into a prison she had escaped from mostly due to sheer luck. For now, the Other was silent and sullen, still in shock from the revelations of the last few hours. For now, she had the upper hand.
For now. How long this would last depended entirely on how the upcoming conversation went -- and also, of course, on her not letting her concentration lapse even for a moment. Entil'zha Sinclair, before he and the others had retired from her side, had warned her not to lose that control even for a moment... until they had 'shown the truth to your apprentice' as he had put it. Although what the truth consisted of was yet to be revealed.
"You will have to hold very still while we finish making the adjustments." the Technomage named Jaenisara warned her. "The Gatekeeper has told us that the instruments of Contact are very easy to destroy, and none of what we are attempting here will be possible unless you and the woman we know as 'the Darkness Born' can talk to one another *face to face*." Julia was finding it especially difficult to talk to the Technomage, and merely nodded in return -- in her reality, this woman was Jennifer Westcastle, her teacher, friend and confidante, while here, she was an unknown quantity; a person with a different name, history and identity...
"You have a question?"
Julia jumped, before raising her eyes to meet Jaenisara's. "Am I that easy to read?"
"In some respects, you are veiled to us... but in others, it is as if a brilliant light is shining upon your soul. You are multi-faceted, Anla'shok Tikopai -- in short, a very dangerous woman for your age. The question you wish to ask me is an important one to you, however; ask it."
"Were you... ever known by another name?"
Jaenisara sighed. "I thought it might be that. The answer to your question is yes, child; I *was* known by another name... before I was reborn, that is."
"Reborn?"
"Yes. My father's trading fleet was destroyed by an Imperial Wolfpack squadron over fifteen years before the start of the Shadow War, and I was the only survivor of that attack. I was thrown into an escape pod before the end, and drifted for days all alone, with very little in the way of supplies or air. I nearly starved to death before I was rescued..."
"Who was it that resuced you?"
Jaenisara smiled, then -- a smile of wistfulness, and memory. "Alwyn was the one who rescued me, Isabelle at his side even then... and in the years that followed, the skeletal wraith that a Technomage and his pupil rescued from certain death blossomed into his latest protege. Together we are very powerful, as the Empire has discovered already -- and with the addition of other allies you have yet to meet, we can be formidable."
"Then the purpose of this mission..."
"Has yet to be achieved." Jaenisara freely admitted. "Your capture and the encounter with the forces loyal to Sheridan was only the first move in a much bigger pattern, and success is far from certain..."
"And what of my return through the gate?" she suddenly exclaimed. "How long am I to be trapped in this shadowy reflection of the worlds and peoples I know and care about?"
"You will know when you are no longer needed." the technomage assured her. "The Gatekeeper will relax his hold on you, and those who seek you out will be able to find you at last. But be warned -- it may take longer then any of us wish for that moment to come. As such, the time for talking is finished; the time for you to confront your opposite has come. Behold."
The mirror shimmered then, and Julia gazed into the Looking Glass and shivered anew, as a reflection came into being, a reflection of the Darkness in her own soul that she had only touched briefly during the Thirdspace Crisis, almost six years before -- a reflection whose hateful gaze seemed to burn with its intensity.
And then, as Jaenisara made another adjustment, a whisper of that hate emerged from the mirror, a voice brittle with venom and fury. "Usurper, I name you." the Other began. "And betrayer of all I hold dear!"
"If that is your wish," Julia coldly replied. "My lady Darkness Born. But I have promised the Entil'zha I will do what he wants me to do, and unless I succeed, you will never know peace. You will never be alone in this body ever again... is that what you want?"
"I will see your spirit torn to shreds and scattered to the winds before I give in to your ENTIL'ZHA, Usurper. I am what I am, a soldier of the Empire, an agent of chaos. I am, and always shall be, your enemy -- you cannot change that. You *cannot* change me... I will not allow it."
So be it; if that was the way she wanted it, that was the way it had to be. "That is your line to hold if you wish, of course... a line in the sand -- an enviable line, I will admit. But I have sworn to break that line, in Valen's name, and I shall."
The Other was about to reply, when a sudden, sardonic chuckle filled the room, and Julia whirled away from the mirror to see a figure in the doorway of Jaenisara's sanctum: a man she hadn't expected to meet for some time to come, if ever. But here he was, all the same.
"And so the two unmovable mountains collide." Matthew Gideon drawled, as he and Jaenisara locked gazes, and appraisingly nodded at one another. "Now which of the two will be first to splinter, do you think?"
* * *
Elsewhere on the EXCALIBUR, a figure gazed out upon the ruthless red light of hyperspace, and the various destroyers, cruisers and fighter groups accompanying the Alliance flagship on its run to the nearby transfer point. A sigh emerged from the figure, then -- where he was at the moment was a very VERY long way from his home, from his friends, his teachers, and most especially, his brothers. He missed his brothers, and although he had been warned by the Guardian of the Machine that the path he would shortly be following would take him even farther away from those he cared for, the pain of seperation could not be ignored.
And yet, there *was* the mission to occupy his thoughts, the task that had occupied most every waking moment of his life for almost as long as he could remember. The ONE had been preparing him for this task for a very long time, of course, and the moment would soon be coming when all would come down to success...
Or to ultimate failure.
Just for a moment, his hand strayed down towards the fold in his loose overcoat that contained a small box. A small, VERY important box -- a box that would change the future, and create the past that had been. If all went well, that was.
And then, behind him, the door opened, and the brilliant light beyond spilled into the chamber. He turned, then, to see the figure of the human who was his friend, the human he had followed for many years, now.
The human who was the ONE.
"Zathras," Jeffrey Sinclair began, "We need to talk."
* * *
Imperial Warlock Class Destroyer ENCHANTRESS. 11:47 hrs, EST.
"What do you mean," Sha'var Alyt Elizabeth Lochley, formerly Sheridan, snarled, as her first officer visibly winced, "You've lost his trail?"
"Splintership trails have always been notoriously difficult to follow, Sha'var Alyt," Warren Keffer carefully replied. "For starters, we didn't know that he'd had one built into the hull of the ENCHANTRESS until it was too late. Empire splinterships are based directly on the Dark One's technology -- one group of Drakh servants have been using them for thousands of years..."
"Pa'trakar Keffer," she ground out, each word pronounciated slowly and with deadly emphasis, "Let me make something absolutely clear to you. Sooner or later, the Council of Ascension and our superior officers are going to realize that we've lost him. At that point, they will be looking for someone to execute. I assure you, Pa'trakar, I do not intend to shoulder the blame for this travesty of a mission. In fact, I give you one guess as who I will blame for the loss of Sha'var Alyt Sheridan."
Pa'trakar Keffer got the point very quickly. "I understand, Sha'var Alyt. We'll find him."
"You'd better."
It was, of course, at that point that an alarm rang out on her bridge... and Lochley slowly clenched her left hand into a fist. That particular signal meant one thing and one thing only -- a squadron of small warships had just leapt into existence on the ENCHANTRESS's scanners, and besides the still damaged and only-just-reclaimed SHARD OF NIGHT, there was only one squadron in the Fleet that had that capability. And that meant that the Council of Ascension already knew a great deal too much about the current situation for her own peace of mind.
"We are being hailed, Sha'var Alyt." Keffer informed her, his face now a frozen mask. "Do you wish to accept the hail?"
A dozen responses whirled through her mind at that point, but finally, she nodded; was there really any other choice? "On screen."
The woman that appeared there was someone that many in the Fleet feared, for she was the only squadron leader in the entire EMPIRE that answered directly to the Tyrant himself. Again and again, she and her Wolfpack had proven their worth in the wars of the past ten years, and their victories were widespread and numerous. The gold-and-gray uniform she wore was a symbol all its own, unique and one of a kind. And even she shivered, then, as that woman smiled a smile of bitter purpose, a smile that almost always meant death was waiting just around the corner for someone.
Somewhere.
"Alyt Tha'ssele Sheridan, how good of you to be so predictable." The smile widened, then, however. "Oh, my mistake... it would be Sha'var Alyt Sheridan now, wouldn't it?"
"LOCHLEY." she icily corrected.
"Hmm. An understandable response on your part, Sha'var Alyt, but not entirely unsurprising, either... although it will, of course, make my job a whole lot easier."
"Do you mean to say that..."
La'sekvah Susan Ivanova nodded mirthlessly in reply, the smile now gone. "I do not believe I have to remind you, Sha'var Alyt, that I am the Huntmaster of the Empire. And this, I *assure* you, will be a Hunt I will enjoy.
Please DO stand by. I'm coming aboard."
* * *
Elsewhere...
Below her, a dizzying galaxy of light whirled, and all around was darkness. Klairika extended her arms, almost terrified by the perspective, as she slowly spun over what appeared to be ten thousand light years of emptiness. The perspective was almost enough to make her ill...
<Don't be foolish, Brakiri.> Galen coldly informed her through the link with Sheynell... and how *that* was possible was something she didn't even want to touch at the moment. <What you are seeing is a virtual projection of the gateway. Below you are the myriad lights of this domain, beyond, the darkness of the Gap Between one world and the next.>
<But... it's so dark!>
<There is no need for you to fear -- the Soul Hunters and I have already located that which you seek. Open your eyes, and see for the first time what is around you.>
Gritting her (virtual?) teeth, Klairika forced herself to turn away from the light below her, and towards the darkness above. Slowly, very slowly, her eyes adapted, and tiny gray patches slowly began to appear against the black night of the Gap Between.
<What... what are those?>
<Other worlds.> the Technomage noted. <You see what might have been, Klairika Alidiae, possibilities we chose to ignore. Now!... between here and the possibility we seek, you will see a path to follow, a path that will lead you to that which we seek.>
Almost she protested, then, that she could see nothing at all... and then, that all changed, as a faint, gossamer thread of light slowly appeared, a thread that ran off towards one of those faint gray galaxies of light, off in the distance. <Is that...>
<The link between her body and her soul, yes.> Galen replied. <The Gate allowed her to make the trip almost instantly. You do not have that luxury, I'm afraid.>
<How long will it take to reach her?>
<We do not know the answer to that question. We only know that time is running out.>
<And if we can't rescue her before the Gate closes?>
<She will be trapped in the other reality, I'm afraid.> Galen informed her. <And if we are not careful, so may you.>
* * *
[Cue Dramatic Music]
KLAIRIKA ALIDIAE
We are the Watchers...
[Klairika standing on the bridge of the SHARD OF NIGHT, an image of the EXCALIBUR hanging in the air in front of her.]
SHEYNELL KEYNES
We are the Warriors.
[Images: Sheynell at the tactical station, the battlecruiser firing its main gun and destroying a Drakh capital ship]
LARIEKEN
We are the Guardians...
[Image: Larieken defending his Captain against Z'shailyl attackers, warrior pike in hand]
VEYSHAHK
We are the Healers.
[Image: Veyshahk at his desk in MedSection, an image of the Drakh virus on his computer screen.]
DASOURI and NICHOLAS DAWSON
We are the exiles...
[Image: Nicholas in Engineering, Dasouri at the helm of the SHARD]
JULIA TIKOPAI
And I am the Seeker.
[Image: Julia's face, lit by candles, the stars of the Galaxy beyond]
KLAIRIKA ALIDIAE
We are the Rangers of the SHARD OF NIGHT, in this, the Earth Year 2267.
[Image: The SHARD OF NIGHT enters, from the left...]
JULIA TIKOPAI
This is our story.
[... before engaging darklight mode, and going into hyperspace.]
S T A R A N D C I R C L E
"T H E S E E K E R' S F I R E"
* * *
STAR AND CIRCLE created by
David Goldingay <dgolding@connect.ab.ca>
* * *
Legal Disclaimer:
* * *
BABYLON 5, CRUSADE and all characters and situations thereof are the creations and copyrighted property of J. Michael Straczynski and Babylonian Productions. This series is a non-profit creation for the purposes of private entertainment only. Original characters and situations are copyright of the author, 1997-99.
Coming soon: Act I of Episode V: "Their Proper Time and Place"
* * *
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