ooOoo
You Must Remember This
ooOoo
If anyone had thought that floating around the cosmos was a peaceful, tranquil sort of gig to land in then anyone would have been wrong. That glorified tin can that they called Babylon 5 saw as much action as a bookie's at Belmont Park during a meet. This was something that I learnt both from my own observations and from what I'd been told by Susan as we strutted through the joint.
And I had also decided that there was nothing about that girl that I didn't like. Commander Susan Ivanova of EarthForce - I had her name and rank; I would have asked for her serial number but you can't expect a girl to go too far on a first date - was a class act. I liked her hair, her liked her eyes, I liked the sound of her sighs... Yeah, yeah, okay - I'll leave the poetry stuff to Della's sister, Maya. But you get the picture. I even liked her in her uniform. I would have liked her even more out of her uniform, but a guy has to take what he can get and be glad of it.
'So, what goes on with this shebang anyhow?' I had asked. And she had told me. It was a diplomatic station, a port and now a base of operations for a war (because you can never have enough of those) and over all of that, it was the sort of place that pretty much everybody ended up washing up at, at some time or another. It made it sound like Rick's Café. Any minute everyone was going to stand up and start a chorus of the Marseillaise.
'So,' I said in my best friendly manner, 'sounds like you've got your hands full around here.'
Susan kept staring straight ahead. 'That's an understatement.'
'Uh-huh.' I shoved my hands in my pockets and moseyed along beside her. I was cutting quite a dash that day: I'd had my shoes shined in the morning, my suit had not long been sponged and pressed and my best hat had been brushed by my own two hands only that afternoon while we'd been sitting in the office waiting for the phone to ring. Any girl would have been happy to have her head turned by me but I'm not the kind of guy who can have his head turned by just any girl. 'I guess us showing up like this isn't helping.'
She didn't break stride but her eyes darted sideways at me, looking at me from under her lashes. 'No, it's fine. We've grown used to dealing with ... unusual ... situations.'
I took hold of her arm, bringing her to a stop. 'Hey - y'know if you get wound any tighter you're gonna break yourself in half.'
Her mouth opened slightly; she looked like she was trying to decide whether or not to toss me through a wall but what came out was a little breath of laughter. 'Excuse me?'
I held out my free hand, palm up. 'I don't mean nothing by it. All I'm saying is that if you were a camel and we were a straw we'd probably have heard your spine crack - and there ain't nothing wrong with saying it. It doesn't do you any good keeping it all in - your insides get all mushed up. Throw something, yell, do a soft-shoe shuffle if that's your poison; you'll feel better in the long run.'
'I don't see you following your own advice.' She had arched one shapely eyebrow an eighth of an inch. I arched mine right back.
'Are you kidding? I'm considering throwing my head back and howling, except that I don't look too good that way and I'm trying to make a good impression, see?'
She did that almost-but-not-quite laugh thing again and her eyes slid past me for a second; when they fixed on me again I nearly did throw back my head and howl but for very different reasons. I realised that I still had hold of her arm so I gave it a friendly squeeze and grinned at her.
'Stick with me, precious, and you'll be fine.'
'Mr Garibaldi-'
'Mike,' I said.
She paused. 'Mike. We're doing everything we can to get you home; we're hoping that it won't take too long.'
I shrugged. 'Hey, there's no rush. I always said that I wanted to travel but you know how it goes - you put it off, you say maybe next year, and the next thing you know the furthest you've managed to get is the end of the block and back. So I've travelled a bit further than I was bargaining on - so what? It'll be a great story to tell the kids.'
Susan was looking at me, thoughtful.
'Okay, one kid. Or no kids, if you prefer. Me, I'm easy. I got nothing against kids but it's great if you can just hand 'em back over at the end of the day.'
'Are you always like this?'
'Only in the mating season.'
She shook her head and we started moving again. Susan didn't say much for a couple of minutes and I figured that maybe she was figuring how flat, empty and meaningless her life would be without me in it. I thought I should offer her a ray of hope.
'Hey, look, maybe your boy Draal won't be able to fix it to send us back - that's jake. Like I said, we're good people; we work for a living - well, some of us work for a living - we could fit right in with the rest of the stiffs.'
This idea seemed to amuse her. 'Work? Just what would you do around here?'
I thought about it for a moment. 'Well... I can recite the alphabet backwards, John can waggle his ears, and Della can cross her eyes; so between us we've got the makings of a very, very small and actually quite boring circus act.'
There was a choking sound in the back of her throat that turned into a giggle. That was a nice sound - like one of those tinkling brooks that poetry guys are always banging on about. Susan stopped walking, leant against the wall and put a hand over her mouth like that would help keep the giggles in. It didn't. They turned into full-blow peals of laughter and she was one of the few dolls I'd ever seen who actually looked good with her head thrown back laughing like that. She put her hands over her face, muffling herself until she calmed down; when she emerged again her face was flushed and her eyes were blue as sapphires and soft as a powder-puff.
'See, I told you not to keep it all in,' I said. 'You should keep me around just for the catharsis.' I slipped that word in like a pro and she didn't turn a hair; we were getting along just fine.
'Yeah,' she wiped her eyes, 'maybe.'
A delegation of little grey characters with big black eyes sauntered past us and we let them by before we took up our own sauntering again. Susan's shoulders were less stiff and every now and then her lips would twitch again. I kept myself entertained by imagining what she'd look like in nylons and a slinky number in a nice shade of red - or shade of anything she liked.
'So, you really are a private detective?' she asked after we'd gone some way.
'That's what it says on my licence.'
'Do you enjoy it?'
I shrugged. 'It's a living. It wasn't my idea anyway.'
Her eyebrows went up again. 'Oh? Whose was it?'
'John's. I used to be a cop, see? Then there was some stuff - long story, boring story. Okay, not a boring story but it is long and I don't feel like getting into that. Maybe if you're really good you can have it as a bedtime treat; the cadences of my manly voice will lull you into sweet slumbers. Anyhow, I used to be a cop, then I wasn't, and John decided we should be detectives so I said okay 'cos he's not safe to be let out on his own. It was my good deed for the decade.'
'I see. How long have you been working together?'
'Uh, three years.' I let out a whistle. 'Man, that's a long time. And, brother, does it feel like it.'
'I don't believe it.' Her smile was directed inwards and I thought it was unfair of her not to share it around.
'It's true. Three whole, long years-'
'I mean I don't believe that it's the way you make out; I think you really enjoy what you do.' Susan looked at me like she could see right through me.
'That so, huh?'
'Yes.'
'What about you - don't you enjoy what you do?'
'I...' Susan gave it some thought. 'It's what I wanted; and it has its moments. Things have been pretty tough for us lately and I don't think they're going to be getting any easier anytime soon but, well, that's just part of the job. I do enjoy what I do. It's what I am.'
I didn't doubt it - that girl had steel in her spine and held it so straight you could have used her as a flagpole. 'Anybody keeping the homefires burning?' I had to ask; I think she'd given up being offended by my line of questioning and as she was giving as good as she got it wasn't like she wasn't getting anything out of it.
'No; no, not now. How about you? Is there a Mrs Garibaldi back in nineteen-forty-nine?'
I thought about a girl I'd thought about asking; I thought about her golden hair and her gardenia perfume that had stayed on my pillow for weeks afterwards. 'Nah. Original lone-wolf, see?'
'I see.'
We turned a corner and I could hear music coming from one of the corridors leading off from the corridor we were walking down. It still looked like every other corridor we had walked down and if I had had a suspicious mind (which I do) I would have thought that Susan was just walking me in a circle. Not that I minded; she could take me for a walk anytime. 'What's down there?' I asked.
'That-'
I didn't give the chance to tell me, just hoofed it down to find out for myself. I think I smelt it before anything else - that sort of hot, clammy smell that you get when a lot of people are squashed into one space that isn't big enough to hold them. The lights were dimmer in the corridor than back where we'd come from, which seemed to suit the patrons just fine - they all looked like they had plenty to hide and the shadows were just the place to do it in. The air was soaked with alcohol and sin. I could almost feel right at home. Susan came up behind me; I glanced at her and her mouth had set into a hard line.
'This is Downbelow; it's the undeveloped part of the station.'
'Huh.' Two chippies with heads as bare and shiny as cue-balls inched past, both dressed in the sort of non-clothing you'd expect to see in a joy-house. 'It looks plenty developed to me,' I said. If the worst came to it and we were stuck, I guessed that me and John could just set up shop right here. And Della could...
I glanced at the little bare-headed dolls and the one with almond-shaped eyes dipped her head and gave me a coy little smile.
Nah; Della would never go for that.
I started forward and felt a hand on my arm.
'No.'
'No?' I was hurt. 'But you're showing me the sights - and it looks to me like there's some sights in this joint I'd like to see.'
Susan let out a breath. 'Look, Downbelow isn't... I thought you didn't want to make my life any more difficult than it is already.'
'I don't.'
'Then we're not going in there.'
'Uh-huh. Oh, I see; I get it. Y'know, you dames are all the same - you promise a guy the world and then you make him feel like a heel when he expects you to deliver it.'
She leant a little closer to me and I noticed for the first time that she was wearing perfume - you just had to be standing real close to get a whiff of it. It wasn't the sort of scent that pins you to the wall and slaps you around the face, more the kind that sidles up to you and gets itself attached without you having any say in the matter. Then I thought that maybe it wasn't her perfume, maybe she just smelt that way. I swallowed, hard. One corner of her mouth lifted a sixteenth of an inch. 'I didn't promise you anything.'
I folded my arms, leaned back against a big metal strut and practiced looking unconcerned. 'You're a lowdown dirty fighter.'
She put her eyebrows up. I grinned at her.
'Don't get me wrong, that wasn't a complaint; I like it.'
Susan let out another breath of laughter. 'Come on.' She started off and I followed her; actually, I had intended to stay making nice with my pillar for a while, just to teach her a lesson but my feet had other ideas and had started walking all on their own. Nuts. I remembered telling John that he'd been in deep trouble about five minutes after he first met Della Ramir, so I was glad that he wasn't around to see my current performance and start making wise-cracks of his own.
We hadn't made it that far back into the respectable side of town when a character walking down another corridor crossed our path. He looked at us and affected an air of pleased surprise. I affected one of just downright surprise.
'Ah, Commander; and Mr Garibaldi.' He smiled at us and I didn't buy it for a second - his eyes still looked cold and hard; he had an awful lot of very pointy teeth. He looked like just the kind of guy that John hated on sight - the kind that dyes his hair. The face was right but the accent was way off and he'd pinned some diapers on that made him look like he was angling to play Napoleon. The black arrangement on top of his head stood up like a fan and I decided that I'd been right all along - if Lon Mollari grew out his hair, you really could use him as a chimney brush.
Susan had gone rigid again, shoulders all braced and square. 'Londo.' She nodded curtly.
Londo? Great. Londo. The bird turned his eyes on me.
'Hey,' I said and tried not to sound too strangled.
He tilted his head and his hair quivered. 'Mr Garibaldi, are you all right? You do not seem ... what is it you say? You do not seem to be quite yourself.'
'I'm not,' I told him, 'I'm somebody else.'
Londo looked at me, bushy eyebrows coming together like two caterpillars in a mating dance and then I got another look at his pointy pearlies. 'Ah, this is a joke, yes?'
'Yeah. A joke.'
'Your Earth humour is most peculiar.'
Susan decided to step in and show off her commanding rank. 'I'm sorry, Ambassador, but we ... have a meeting to get to.'
He shrugged, shoulders moving up and down a fraction. 'Of course. Everyone is busy these days, yes?'
She nodded. 'Yes.'
He bowed to us and wandered off, hands behind his back. I slumped against a wall. 'Precious, this is one hell of a place you got here, you know that?'
'Don't I ever.'
There was something else I'd noticed on our way through the set-up: if I thought that people treated a guy named Michael A. Garibaldi with respect, it was nothing on what Susan got. They snapped to when they saw her coming as if their lives depended on it. 'You must get a kick being in charge around here.'
She gave me one of her looks. 'I'm not in charge - the captain is the C.O.'
I shrugged. 'Isn't he all tied up in the war?'
'We all are.' She said it real quiet, real level.
'Okay, I'm not taking anything away from that. I'm not taking anything away from your captain, I guess he's a stand-up guy - I should know, I've had my own copy to handle for the past few years and that ain't no picnic, believe you me. But I've seen the way people look at you around here; he might be the head honcho and he's probably damn good at it but while he's busy thinking up ten ways to save the world before breakfast, you run this place, don't you? All kidding aside, that's amazing. You're amazing.'
Susan's eyes were on me; two spots of colour appeared, one in each cheek, and she glance down for a moment. 'That... I think that's probably the nicest thing anyone's ever said to me.'
So I wasn't a poet and I didn't have John's fancy turn of phrase but I had sincerity. And now that I'd gone and laid it out there I felt like an idiot. I felt a little less like an idiot when I saw the way she was looking at me and it was enough to make me roll on my back at her feet right there. I cleared my throat.
'The nicest thing, huh? What, are all the guys around here brain dead?'
She laughed a little. 'I think they must be.' She took in a breath and I could see the hollow of her throat vibrating against the collar of her jacket; she let the breath out again. 'We should probably get a move on if we want to make it to that fake meeting – Londo is many things but he isn't stupid.'
The Lon I knew was a lot of things, too, so I could well imagine what the bird in the velvet jacket could be like. I pushed myself away from the wall and Susan fell in next to me. It felt nice, having her walk alongside.
'I'm sorry,' she said suddenly.
I squinted at her. 'What for?'
'For bringing you here. I... It wasn't supposed to be like this; I was supposed to be finding allies, and I got distracted. I don't know how you ended up here but I think that if I hadn't found you, however it was that I did find you, you'd still be where you're supposed to be.'
I shrugged. 'Aw, skip it. Think I'd miss this?' I was starting to think that maybe I'd just tear up a return ticket if I got offered one. The only person who really relied on me was my landlord and even that wasn't exactly an essential relationship as far as he was concerned; he'd always find some poor shlub willing to hand over his hard earned jack in return for a roof over his head.
I was working my way up to a new speech that would dazzle her with my wit and wisdom when I saw three Sheridans come sailing over the horizon. Della was clamped onto John's arm like he was afraid she'd stray if he took his eye off her for two seconds – at least, that what I thought at first. When they got closer I saw that she looked paler than usual and John's face was strained; he looked like he'd been roughed up some. I took a chance and looked at the captain but he had no battle scars showing.
'Are you two okay?' I asked. 'You look like you've gone a few rounds.'
'It was nothing,' John said, 'just a little breather.'
'What happened?' Susan asked.
'Kosh happened,' Sheridan told her and he looked grim. He wasn't the kind of guy you wanted to get in the way of when he looked at that. Actually, he wasn't the kind of guy you wanted to get in the way of, period.
'Kosh?' John repeated. 'That's its name? Kosh?'
'Yes.'
'Sounds like a sneeze.'
Susan blanched. (That's an actual verb – I checked with Della.)
She shook it off. 'Are you both all right?'
'We're fine,' Della said firmly. 'I'm glad we ran into you, Commander – you are coming with us tonight, aren't you?'
'Uh...' Susan looked at her, taken aback. 'Coming with you where?'
'Delenn and I have arranged a little get together – it's a female only forum.' She turned her eyes on the two males of genus Sheridan and they both had the sense to keep their yaps shut. 'It will be fun.'
It was John's turn to blanch. (Verb, see?)
'I...' Her eyes slipped sideways to me and I all but puffed out my chest. Of course, I would have puffed it out more if I'd had the sense to ask her out before this and I couldn't very well do it now. 'Delenn agreed to this?'
'Oh yes, she was all for it; you simply must come – the more is most definitely the merrier where these things are concerned, don't you think?'
'Well...' I got more eye slippage and for a moment I thought maybe she'd turn Della down; Susan lifted her head. 'Yes, all right. It might even be ... fun.'
Nuts. Still, maybe I could slip Della five bucks to talk me up some.
'Hey, if the girls are headed out, how about poker night?' I said.
'Now there's an idea,' John said.
'I'm full of them.'
'You're full of something.'
'Can it.'
Sheridan had watched us without saying much but he looked like he was enjoying himself somewhat, which made a change from earlier. Whatever a Kosh was it was obviously something in the field of a miracle worker. 'I'll let Michael – our Michael – know.'
'See, and you were worried this was a bad idea,' Della said to John.
'You can drop the past tense, plaything, we're still in the present.'
'Oh, shush. Eight o'clock, Commander – or may I call you Susan?'
'Susan. Susan is fine.'
Della smiled but it wasn't the full wattage; she looked a little unsteady and John didn't loosen his hold on her.
'We're on our way to check out the digs,' he said, 'you coming?'
'I'm still playing at tourist,' I said, 'I'll catch you up.'
They sailed past, Sheridan steering them through. I looked at Susan and grinned at her.
'Precious, I hope you know what you're letting yourself in for.'
She looked uncertain. 'What do you mean?'
'Well, Della isn't exactly wild – she's a nice, respectable kinda gal. Or she was, but then John got his hands on her. It's not that they go looking for stuff to happen, it just seems to happen to them. I'm just giving you a head's up.'
Susan considered this. 'Yes... That sounds a lot like some people I know.' I couldn't tell if she thought that was a good thing or not but I guessed it was probably the one that wasn't good. She started to ease down the hall again and I took the opportunity to get me another whiff of the scent in the air around her.
'By the way, that's a nice perfume you got there.'
She frowned. 'I'm not wearing any.'
I swallowed again. Brother, was I in deep.
ooOoo
'It's probably not quite what you're used to,' Sheridan said, ushering them through the door, 'but it's clean.'
'At the moment an old cardboard box would be welcome,' Della said, 'this is heavenly.' She set Archie down, took of his leash; the dog sniffed the air and took off, making a circuit of the room, jumping on every piece of furniture, then tore into the bedroom, laying claim to the bed. He crossed his paws, chin resting on them.
'Looks like we'll be sleeping on the floor,' John remarked.
His wife glanced at him, the grey of her eyes softening; a look passed between them of shared memory. John cleared his throat.
'This will suit us just fine,' he said. 'Thanks. I, uh, I'm not sure how we can pay for it, though-'
Sheridan held up a hand. 'Don't worry about it; I've become very good at juggling budgets.'
'That's very kind of you,' Della added. She crossed the room, turned in the doorway of the bedroom, grasping the handles of the doors. 'If you gentlemen will excuse me...' She slid them home firmly.
John's eyes remained on that spot for a moment, as though he could still see her through the closed doors; he turned to Sheridan, sank into a chair and jerked his head in the direction of the now unseen Della. 'It's probably a good thing that she's only got the clothes she's standing up in or we wouldn't see her again 'til gone midnight.'
Sheridan smiled lightly. He watched the other man for a while and wondered what sort of prize idiot he had been from the first; he had never been a particularly jealous or possessive man - so he liked to think. Sheridan ran a hand through his hair and sat opposite John.
'Look, about earlier... I just wanted to say-'
John held up his hands, shook his head. 'Skip it. Look, I don't know much about women; if you ask Mike he'll tell you that I don't know anything about women. That isn't true - I know one thing, and that's one more thing than he knows. That isn't the point. What I'm saying is this: women make you crazy.' He spread his hands.
Sheridan blew out a breath. 'I hear that.'
John's features softened some; he patted his pockets, found his cigarettes and tapped one out. Stretching across he held the pack out to Sheridan. The captain hesitated; it was meant as a friendly gesture and after his less than stellar behaviour until this point it seemed churlish to refuse. He took one, holding it uncertainly between his fingers feeling more than a little awkward. It seemed simple enough; he followed John's lead, taking a pull on one end as the flame ignited the other. He choked back the cough as the smoke hit his throat; his chest felt scalded. No filter on the thing; it was certainly a lot less healthy than the versions that circulated now - not that that was saying much.
John sat back, took a deep drag and blew out the smoke lazily; through the closed doors came the sound of running water and the rise and fall of his wife's voice, interspersed with the occasional yap as she and Archie exchanged confidences.
Sheridan tried to find a way of holding the cigarette that didn't make him look like an awkward teenager engaging in a little low-key rebellion. It hadn't been jealousy over John and Delenn, he rationalised; it had been over John and Della. Not because of Della - lovely though she was - but because of what they had. They made it look so easy, now that he actually allowed himself to see it. So different from himself and Delenn... That was his fault. He knew that. They had inched closer, slowly stripping away the barriers, the differences, the knowledge of what they were exposing themselves to until they had reached the point where he felt as close to her as he ever had to anyone in his whole life. He was in love with her; he'd been in love with her for a long time, long before he had even admitted it to himself. And she loved him.
And then.
A cell on Centauri Prime. He could still feel her in his arms, still taste her - the fierce passion of her kiss. A kiss that for her had obviously been only one of many. And the dreams that he had allowed himself were a reality; they were together, she was his, and they had a son. The knowledge of that had brought intense pleasure; his first impulse had been to go to her, to tell her... He had held back. Stubbornness, contrariness, perhaps; denying himself the future that he wanted simply because it had been confirmed to him. Partly, perhaps, but that wasn't it. Londo - Emperor Mollari, as he would be then - had seemed far more interested in him than in Delenn. Was it because of him that she would end up there? Imprisoned, possibly tortured. He might lead her to that and God knows what else beside. Once, early on, when he had started to realise that his feelings for that extraordinary woman were something more profound than he had expected, he had thought that he might be able to talk himself out of her. Not that he had ever really tried; not that he had really wanted to. Maybe she would have been better off if he had. And so here they were - too late to go back and stopped from moving forward - locked into this holding pattern of frustration and desire. And he wanted her so badly.
When the war was over, perhaps; when they had more time.
Sheridan took another pull on the cigarette and coughed helplessly; it was making him light-headed. 'You know,' he managed, 'these things'll kill you.'
John raised one eyebrow. 'Buddy, I'm married to Della. There's every possibility that she'll finish me off before anything else does.'
'I get the feeling that you wouldn't have it any other way.'
John grinned at him. 'Well, I don't have to tell you how that goes.'
Sheridan was still. 'Oh?'
The other man glanced towards the closed doors again. 'They're not exactly unalike, as I'm sure you will have noticed. You have both my congratulations and my sympathies.'
It was like having the little voice in the back of his mind sitting in front of him. Smoking. And he certainly had plenty to say for himself, this smooth-tongued counterpart - to everyone.
'You know, I, uh, I sort of envy you - you're not exactly lost for words.'
John frowned for a moment - it was followed by understanding and incredulity. 'What - you mean the drivel that comes out of my mouth whenever I'm within twenty yards of that woman? Let me tell you something - that's pure survival. If it wasn't for that I'd still be standing in my office with my jaw on the floor staring at her.'
Sheridan raised his eyebrows. 'I find that hard to believe.'
'Well, that just shows how much you know. First time I took her out? I rang her house, I got her on the phone; I fell all over myself for ten minutes. In the end, she asked me out. Smooth, huh?'
Sheridan laughed. 'They really are two headstrong women, aren't they?'
John shook out another cigarette, put it to his lips without touching it with his fingers. 'Oh yes.'
ooOoo
'Hey, how ya' doing?'
Susan started, the familiar voice bringing a wholly unfamiliar confusion. Not Mike, she told herself, relaxing. It was the other one. She turned from the observation window; it seemed to be a popular place lately.
'About time.' She faced him, met Michael's appraising eyes. 'You guys all set for the big game?'
'Sure, I guess.' He shoved his hands into his pockets. 'I haven't played in a while, but I'm sure it'll come back to me. How hard can it be?'
That didn't sound promising, Susan thought. 'Just promise me you won't play for money. And watch the captain. He hates to lose … at anything.'
One corner of his mouth twitched. 'You know, I would never have guessed that about him.'
Susan allowed herself a smile.
Michael looked over his shoulder and saw his twin wandering along the curve of the observation point, staring in undisguised astonishment at assorted alien life. 'How'd he like the grand tour? All this must be pretty strange for them, and that's putting it mildly.'
'They seem to be coping.' And there appeared to have been a cessation of hostilities, judging from when she had last seen the Sheridan trio. 'I took him to C&C, then the gardens, then here. He saw the Zocalo when he met the captain, and I didn't think he'd care for the StarFury bays or the fusion reactor.'
'Who knows what he'd like? It's all new to him.' Michael looked at Susan's face; she was shuttered, more than usual and he proceeded cautiously. 'You okay?'
Susan stiffened. 'Why do you ask?'
'Well, from what I heard you took quite a jolt from that damn machine and all this is what you might call pretty stressful…' His voice petered out. Jerking his head towards Mike, he added, 'He seems a little, you know, interested.'
She had been rigid, now she became glacial. Her words, when they came, were evenly weighed, carefully spaced, and chilling in their execution. 'I do not know what you mean.'
Michael bulled on. 'You know, interested. In you. Personally. As a person of the female type. It was weird to watch myself put the moves on you.' He saw the colour start to rise in her cheeks. 'Not that I would. I mean, I wouldn't. Not that you wouldn't be worth putting the moves on…There's no good way out of this, is there?'
She shook her head. 'No, there's not.' Giving herself a little shake, she laughed slightly. 'You know, what? It's okay. Really. Gather him up and get to the game.'
'Yes, ma'am.' He paused, frowning. 'What brought that on, anyway?'
'It was his idea.' She nodded towards Mike. 'Della has apparently already made other plans - I'm told I get to go out with the girls.'
'The … girls? You and Della?' His eyes took on a strangely glassy look. 'That would be something to see.'
'And Delenn - she was Della's first victim. The poor woman has no idea what she's in for.'
Michael grinned. 'Which one? I, uh, I don't suppose you'd be willing to record that, would you?' he added wistfully. The colour rose in her cheeks again, eyes starting to snap. 'No, I guess not.' He pulled his hands from his pockets, gave her a sketchy salute. 'Good luck. I have a feeling you'll need it.'
'You too.' She turned back to look out the window. It was always a spectacular view. So peaceful; so quiet... She heard Michael greet Mike and exchange a few lines. Their footsteps approached; she didn't say a word to either man as they passed behind her on their way out of the room.
TBC
