Peter David - Out of the Darkness

David Sheridan squirmed as his mother planted a kiss on his cheek. He wiped it off as quickly as possible, then howled in anguished laughter as Michael Garibaldi kissed him just as aggressively on the other cheek. “Uncle Mikey!” he managed to get out as he quickly wiped the drool from his face. “Oh, yuck!”

“‘Oh, yuck’? Is that all you have to say?” Garibaldi asked him in mock offense. “And after the terrific present I’ve gotten you?

They were gathered in Sheridan’s den, a more private room for study and contemplation. It boasted an assortment of mementos from earlier in the careers of both Delenn and Sheridan, and the room overall had more of an “Earth” feel to it. At least, that’s what David was told. Having never actually been to Earth, he could only take his father’s word for it. “Present? Is it the trip? Finally?” Davidasked. Delenn rolled her eyes, as if this were a subject that had been broached a hundred times before… and indeed, perhaps it had. “David, we said eighteen…”

“What is the big deal about eighteen?” he demanded. Knowing that his mother was a dead end, he turned to his father. “Dad, I’m sixteen now. Would you please tell Mom that she’s being paranoid.”

“You’re being paranoid,” Sheridan told her promptly. “So you’re saying I can go.”

“No, you can’t go. But it’s your birthday, so I figured I’d humor you.”

David sighed in exasperation. He turned to Garibaldi, his court of last resort. “Can you believe this? They won’t put me on a shuttle by myself to go visit you on Mars. To go anywhere! What the hell is going on?”

“Language,” Delenn said primly.

“Sorry. What the bloody hell is going on?”

“Attaboy,” Garibaldi said.

“A reminder here, David,” Sheridan said. “You’re ‘sixteen’ on a technicality. Minbari years are shorter than Earth years. By Earth standards, you’ve still got a ways to go.”

“Okay, fine. But I’ve also got some Minbari blood in me, so that should count for something.”

“Yeah. Don’t get too attached to your hair, for one thing,” Garibaldi cracked. Delenn, who was busy slicing the white—and—chocolate cake that had been brought in minutes earlier, shook her head. “You, Michael, are precisely no help whatsoever.”

“Thank you.”

“You’re welcome. Here,” and she shoved a piece of cake at him.

“Look, I gotta tell you, the kid’s got a point, that’s…. Garibaldi said. He took a bite of the cake, then said, “Who baked this?”

“I did,” Sheridan said. “I figured it’s never too late to try something new.”

“Well, guess what. You were wrong.” He put the cake aside Sheridan scowled. “It’s just that… well, the kid’s sixteen years old and he’s never so much as flown on a shuttle by himself? Aside from a trip or two to Babylon 5 , he’s spent practically his whole life on Minbar. He should get out, have a chance to see the galaxy. My God, when I think what I was up to when I was sixteen…”

“The imagination fairly reels,” Delenn said.

“It’s a different situation, Michael, and you know it.”

Sheridan lowered his voice and glanced at David, as he said to Garibaldi, “And I don’t know if now is the best time to—”

“Discuss it,” David interrupted. He had finished his piece of cake, his teenaged taste buds apparently not the least put off. “God, I can’t think of the number of times I’ve heard that. When is it going to be safe to discuss things in front of me, huh? How sheltered am I going to have to be?”

Sheridan looked to Delenn, but she shrugged slightly in a “What—else—can—we—say?” manner. “It’s just… different,” he said. “How?” The question came from both Garibaldi and David. “Because,” Sheridan said patiently, “I’m the president of the Interstellar Alliance. And the fact is that there are people out there—some of them outside the Alliance, some of them, I hate to say, part of it—who might well desire to put pressure on me any way they can. To say nothing of the numerous people I’ve piled up over the years who have individual grudges with me. And my son would be a terrific prize to acquire in that regard.”

“Wow, you really are paranoid,” Garibaldi said.

“And so are you. Don’t you remember? It’s one of the things I’ve always liked about you.”

“And paranoia has its time and place,” Garibaldi admitted. “That being all the time and every place,” Sheridan replied. “True enough. But don’t you think there should be some balance? Like I said, when I was sixteen—”

“You were already bumming around the galaxy, I know. Snagging rides wherever you could, exploring colonies, getting into trouble. And it made you the man you are today.”

“God help us all,” Garibaldi said cheerfully, “The point is,” Sheridan continued, “David isn’t you. You could do whatever you wanted, get into whatever trouble you wished, with relative anonymity. David had the bad luck to be my son.”

“I don’t think of it as bad luck, Dad.” David sighed. “I wish you wouldn’t put words in my mouth.”

“Sorry.”

“He’s got so many of his own they just kind of spill out all over the place into other people’s mouths.”

“Don’t helpme, Michael,” Sheridan told him. “The thing is, you’re right about one thing,” David said. “One thing.” Delenn laughed. “My, my. That’s an improvement of one hundred percent over most discussions you two have, John. You should be proud.” I “Don’t help me, Mom,” David deadpanned. He turned back to his father. “The thing is… you’re the president of the Interstellar Alliance. To all intents and purposes, you’re the most powerful man in known space.”

“A bit of a high—flown description, but I’ll accept that Sheridan said.

“But why is it, then… that the most powerful man in know space… has the most powerless son?”

Sheridan looked down a moment and sighed. “David… I wish the situation were different. I wish we lived in other circumstances.”

“We live in the circumstances that we make, Dad. You can’t create a certain set of circumstances, and then moan about it and chalk it off to the doings of fate.”

“He has a point, John.”

“ Et tu , Delenn?”

“I’m not saying that your concerns aren’t valid. Just that his are equally valid. There is no easy answer,” she replied.

“When is there ever?” He thought about it a moment, and then said, “Maybe when you’re seventeen…”

“Forget it, Dad,” David said impatiently. “Just forget it. I’ll lock myself in my room and come out when I’m fifty, and maybe that will be safe enough.” Before Sheridan could respond, David turned to Garibaldi. “Okay, so what is your present, then?”

“David, you raised the subject; we can’t just let it drop,” Sheridan said. “You know what, Dad? It’s my birthday. If I want to drop a subject, then I think it should get dropped.” Sheridan put up his hands in an attitude of submission, where—‘ upon David looked back at Garibaldi. “So? My present?”

Garibaldi reached into his jacket and pulled out a PPG. He handed it to David, and said proudly, “Here you go.”

David took it and turned it over reverently, feeling its heft “Wow,” he whispered.

Sheridan’s face was so dark that it looked as if thunderheads were rolling in. “Michael,” he said stiffly. “May we speak privately a—”

“Oh, calm down, John. David, pull the trigger.”

“David, you will do no such thing!” Delenn snapped. “Will you guys trust me? After twenty—plus years, you’d think I’d’ve earned that. David, point it over in that direction and pull the trigger.”