Very few people aboard the Babylon knew of each other’s pasts. Some, like the Captain, had been in Earthforce before and during the war. Some, like Lieutenants Franklin and Connally had had other plans and dreams – he to be a doctor, she to be the hope of the downtrodden worker – torn from them. Some, like Corwin, had no past, or none that they would admit to, and none that mattered any more. The past was dead, and there was only the future.

But still, he had a long memory, and even having Satai Delenn on this ship grated at him. Having her in the Captain’s ready room seemed almost sacrilegious. But if the Captain wanted her here…

“Yes,” Corwin said. “And so do you.” He caught the flicker in her eyes as he said that, and he knew his guess had proved accurate. Quite a few aboard the Babylon knew of the Babylon 4 mission – they had been so instrumental in its planning that the station had been named after the ship itself, but how Satai Delenn could know about this would be fascinating to hear. Especially in light of the… ah, unusual circumstances here.

“It’s called Babylon Four,” Sheridan said, raising his head. “It was the fourth in a series of secret missions and agendas called the Babylon Project – named after this ship, of course.

“Babylon Four was to be a secret base. Proxima Three was just a little too open. We wanted somewhere quieter and out of the way, somewhere for the Resistance Government to hide, somewhere a little more easily defended than Proxima Three. A space station, packed to the core with the best weaponry systems we could muster. A place of defence, and later, offence. Plans were drawn up, we did extensive scouting missions to find a suitable place, and we found here. Above a deserted planet. Perfect.”

Corwin could see Delenn alternating her gaze between him and the Captain. He met her eyes with a steely determination and he was quite surprised to see sadness in hers when she recognised this.

“But?” she said.

“But it was never damn well built!”

Corwin could see her staring at Sheridan, perhaps surprised by the bitterness in his voice, and why not? Although he doubted the wisdom of telling all this to a Minbari Satai, he decided to continue.

“We were all ready to go when we lost Orion Four and Seven and most of the Belt Alliance. Over half our financial and mineral resources gone in a matter of weeks.”

He could see the emotion in the Captain’s eyes. Sheridan had lost more at Orion than just some money or minerals. He had lost his daughter – buried beneath a collapsed building. With Elizabeth, he had also lost his wife. While Anna was still alive in a physical sense, emotionally, she was quite dead.

“All our remaining resources had to go on feeding the refugees we managed to get away from Orion,” Corwin continued, never taking his eyes off Delenn. “It wasn’t enough. Twenty thousand starved that year.”

“But we can’t dwell on the past now, Mr. Corwin,” the Captain suddenly spoke up. “Any word on anyone on the station?”

“Just this.” Corwin went over to a control panel and activated the communications system.

– eridan and Zha’valen Delenn to come over and meet with us. They must come alone. We repeat. We would like Captain Sheridan and Zha’valen Delenn to come over and meet with us. They must come alone. We repeat –

“Just that. Over and over again. It’s got all the right Earthforce identification codes, but I would be interested to know how they knew the two of you would be here.”

“Mr. Corwin. A space station that hasn’t been built appears from over above a planet that’s supposed to be deserted but contains awesomely powerful technological resources, and you’re worried about how they knew I’d be here? The codes are genuine?”

“One hundred percent. What do you think? Some kind of Black Ops mission? A secret project? Some sort of cloaking device, perhaps?”

“Secret enough for me not to know about it?”

“Point, but it’s a fair bet that someone knows something about it.” Corwin looked at Delenn. “Don’t you?”

“I… yes,” she breathed, looking directly at the Captain. “We must go, Captain. It is very important that we do so.”

“It could be a trap,” Corwin said flatly. “I’d advise taking a Security team along.”

“It said we should go alone, Mr. Corwin.”

“What was that title the message gave you?” Corwin asked Delenn. “Zha’valen? Some kind of Minbari rank?”

“It… it is nothing. I possess no such title. Please, Captain, we must go. I cannot tell you why, but we must.”

Corwin caught the Captain’s gaze. She was lying – at least partially – and all three of them knew it. There was an old saying humans had picked up from the Centauri.

’Minbari never tell anyone the whole truth.’

“She’s right, David. Whatever this is, I have to know. Launch two Starfury squadrons and keep them on constant flyby. We’ll take a shuttle over. At the first sign of trouble, blast that thing, and don’t worry about me.”

“Captain, I…” Corwin flicked another glance at Delenn. “I don’t trust her. I think you should take a Security team along. I can contact Mr. Allan, we can…”

“It said to go alone, David.”

Corwin sighed. “Fine, fine, but… be careful, sir.”

The Captain seemed to consider this advice for a moment and then he chuckled. “That’d be far too easy, Mr. Corwin. Far too easy.”

She’d made it aboard after all. She and her allies could have easily wiped out their opponents, but that wouldn’t have brought them victory if they hadn’t stopped this station. Dying was just what her opponents wanted.

Dying in their holy cause. How noble of them!

No, death was preferable to the pain of living, but she knew enough to be aware of her responsibility – to the ones who had saved her, and to the one who had loved her.

A few of her opponents had survived and managed to escape. A few more had been captured. The others had been killed. She wondered if they had died happy, suspecting their deaths were buying them victory.

They had been wrong. There was no victory for the Army of Light today, and there would not even be the memory of one. They would have had no victories for the past thousand years.

For she would stop them.

Susan Ivanova and her Shadow companions were hitching a lift aboard Babylon 4 to the past. All they had to do was kill the man called Jeffrey Sinclair.

And then the war would be over a thousand years before it had ever begun.

“So?”

“I am sorry?” Delenn looked at Sheridan carefully. He more than any other human she found difficult to understand, although she had admittedly had little contact with other humans to use as reference.

Welles was the result of the worst of the war: a man with great gifts who had become so hard and cold that he could only use those gifts to give pain in the name of duty and anguish in the name of service.

Miss Alexander seemed almost subdued, living her life by rote because she lacked the will to do anything else.

Commander Corwin and the security guards she had met – including the two who had beaten her – were either suspicious of her or plain hated her, still fighting a war in which she was the enemy, not knowing or not caring just who they were selling themselves to in the name of victory.

And Captain Sheridan? He combined all these traits and many more. He possessed great gifts, and used them to kill. She knew the rage he could manifest, having seen it at horrifying first hand, but she also remembered the act of mercy he had shown her – the only mercy she had ever been shown by a human being. She had even let him watch her as she slept, reminded almost absurdly of both her father, and of the ancient ritual of sleep watching between two who were intended. It felt both absurd and strangely right to her. She wondered how it had felt to him. She was nowhere near an answer, but she suspected that neither was he.