Gareth Williams - A Dark, Distorted Mirror. Volume 5 - Among the Stars, like Giants. Part 3 - On the Edges of Perception

"I am going to tell you a story, G'Kael. Stop me if I am wrong in any part.

"The Centauri have been suffering a great deal since the war ended. One of their highly-placed military figures made a deal with the Shadows out of desperation and fear, the result of a war we could have ended a long time ago, but chose to allow to continue.

"This has been turned into a huge, people-wide acceptance of the Shadows. The Centauri are hated and castigated by the Alliance as a whole, punished beyond proportion for the crimes they have committed. Their Emperor, my oldest friend, is forced to accede to a humiliating treaty which does all but blame him personally. His representative has to come begging for aid to this Council.

"The Centauri people suffer from famines and inquisition and raids by hostile forces they cannot stop because the Alliance has commandeered their fleet out of paranoia and a desire for 'cohesion'. When they grovel to us for aid, our ships are sent to help defend their worlds. Our soldiers enforce martial law on their planets, under the guise of 'peacekeeping'. The Centauri are humiliated and broken, unable even to eat or drink without our permission, and we, the Narn Regime, only too happy to overlook past wrongs and injustices in this new age of co-operation, control a good number of their worlds and a large proportion of their economy.

"Who had the most influence in the drafting of the treaty allowing them entry into the Alliance? We did, as the party wronged by them on so many occasions. Who orchestrated the aid shipments and the military peacekeeping contingent to enforce them? We did.

"How many of these disasters have been our work? All of them? None?"

"A few," G'Kael replied after a long pause. "An intervention here and there. I do not truly know exactly where we are involved. I spy for the Kha'Ri, not on them."

"There is one thing I wish to know from you, and one thing only. This displays a degree of patience and forward thinking and innovation I doubt any in our current Kha'Ri are capable of. Who is behind this? Who created this idea?"

"You do not want the answer to that question, Ha'Cormar'ah."

"I would not have asked if I did not," G'Kar hissed. "Tell me!"

"As you wish. My.... sources tell me that you are right. There is one mind behind this scheme, although several of the Kha'Ri quite happily follow her lead and have added innovations of their own."

"Her?"

"I believe you know her quite well, Ha'Cormar'ah. Or used to, anyway.

"Her name is Da'Kal."

Less than an hour later, they were both drunk. An hour after that they were giggling at silly jokes. An hour after that they were kissing as if for the first time in their lives. A couple of hours after that, they were fighting for those selfsame lives.

Rewind a little.

Dexter had just finished telling a long and rambling story about one of his fellow Senators.

"I'm telling you, he's there, on the floor of the House, trying very hard to come up with an answer that will make any sense at all, to anyone. He's getting more and more flustered, and the Speaker is asking him to speak a little louder, and to answer the question, and he's sweating, and panicking, and oh God, are we heckling him?"

"Come on," Talia replied, interrupting him for the seventh time during this story. She was lying alongside him, her feet up on his lap, her arm pillowing his head. "It's not easy coming up with an explanation for that sort of thing, not even for a trained politician."

"I could come up with an explanation."

"You aren't a trained politician, dear."

"Oh, thank you."

"It was a compliment." She kissed his cheek. "Carry on, I'm listening."

"No, no, you're too busy interrupting, and insulting my political skills. I'm not finishing it now."

"I'm sorry. I won't interrupt again, I promise."

"You sure?"

"Absolutely."

"I'll go on if you kiss me again."

She did. He finished the story. They both laughed.

Vejar the technomage, the forgotten and abandoned, sat before his mirror, keeping his reflection clear and uppermost in his mind, and cast his soul upwards and outwards through the Neuadd.

He had named it that, in the days when the building had still meant something. When Kazomi 7 had still meant something. When the Alliance had existed to protect and shelter and unify.

He had given up his companions and his friends and all those who would understand him to remain here, to help and guide and protect, and now he was forgotten and abandoned.

Kazomi 7 was quiet these days. All the administration of the Alliance had been moved to Babylon 5. The Ambassadors and their staff had left. Most of the Governments kept a skeleton office here, with third- or fourth-rate diplomats who did little more than eat large dinners and try to stay out of trouble. The Shrine to the Unknown Warrior that Delenn had created to honour those who had died was now untended and unguarded.

And there, as always, at the summit of the tower that was the Neuadd, was the globe of light that formed the Vorlon's quarters. Ambassador Ulkesh was in. Alone of the ambassadors he had remained behind, a new Vorlon ambassador having been appointed to Babylon 5. Vejar did not know why he was here, and he did not want to know. He had tried, once, penetrating the globe that surrounded Ulkesh's quarters, and had been repelled in agony. Never again. Not for people who no longer cared if he even existed.

It was galling. He had been so much in demand before. Checking people for Keepers, providing wards and shields and holo-demons. With the war over and the Vorlons secure in their power base once again, there was no more need for him.

None whatsoever.

"Such is the gratitude of princes," said a voice.

Vejar returned slowly to his body, and stared deeply into the mirror. There was nothing behind him, exactly as he had expected. He raised one hand, and a ball of light formed inside his fist. Opening his fingers one at a time, he released the ball and it rose into the air.

The light shattered and became a mass of butterflies, a million different colours. Vejar caught one easily and lowered his hand.

In his fist was a feather.

"Hello, Galen," he sighed.

"Hello, Vejar," came the cheery reply. "I suppose you're wondering what I'm doing here."

"Who is Da'Kal?

"That is a question I find my heart is too heavy to answer, but answer it I must. What I do, I do alone. As mine was the omission, so is mine the responsibility to make restitution. But I know that I may fall, and someone else will have to take up my path, and to do that, you will need to know what I know.

"Da'Kal is a noblewoman of my people. Her father G'Nattach was a priest of G'Quan, a particularly wise and enlightened man. I learned a great deal from his teachings, and it grieves me more than I can say that I am acknowledged as a great messiah while men such as he are forgotten. He did what he could to help our people during the Centauri Occupation. He helped refugees flee beyond Centauri-controlled lands. He hid outlaws. He provided medicine and healing and holy words.

"I first met him the night after my father died. I had fled from the household where my family had been kept as servants, and I had killed one Centauri, the son of the noble family who owned us. I still remember his wide, terrified eyes as he died. One more sin to add to so many others. I believe this more as I grow older: we are all born pure, but with each passing day the weight of our actions burdens us more and more and stains us with their filth.

"Lost and confused and angry and afraid, I stumbled on G'Nattach's chapel and collapsed in the doorway. Da'Kal found me and took me in. She nursed me back to health. I still do not know why.