Out Of The Darkness Chapter 2: , a babylon 5 fanfic

[AC][AL]

Disclaimers: All B5 characters and settings belong to JMS and Warner Brothers and anybody else with legitimate legal claim. Don't want them, not claiming them, just borrowing them. Only one character's mine, but if the Great Maker needs her, or someone similar to her, she's his.

Spoiler warning: *Definitely* contains spoilers up to the current U.S. episodes of Season 5 (as much as I can actually use within the context of this story), as well as Book #9. *Could definitely* contain spoilers through the end of Season 5.

This is my first foray into the mystery genre, so please forgive any really glaring errors.

Big boxes of virtual Godivas to all who helped in the birth of this baby! You guys are the best!

Enough of my stalling. After some brief spoiler space for those who may not be up-to-date with the U.S.. . .

Perpetual dedication:
Dedicated to those of us who think there had to be a better way for Ivanova to realize it.

**********

I couldn't believe what I was about to do. My hand was shaking like a leaf when I reached for the doorbell. No matter what lie I told myself, nothing convinced me that this was going to be easy.
"You okay?"
The sound of Stephen Franklin's voice normally wouldn't have caused me to leap out of my skin. But then, these were hardly normal conditions. I looked down at the case in his hand. Such a small piece of equipment for the bombshell that I was sure it was about to drop.
"Yeah, Stephen. Fine."
The door to John Sheridan's quarters finally opened, and when I saw what was on the other side I had to laugh. The entire room looked like a toy factory had exploded. Between the empty boxes were more toys than I had ever seen, anywhere. What had to be the funniest sight, though, was the President of the Interstellar Alliance himself trying to get away from a teddy bear that was half his height. Knowing John, the next thing he would be looking for would be an airlock big enough for that bear.
"Don't ask," John said.
I waded through the chaos until I managed to find the sofa. Only a few inches of cushion weren't covered in toys. I grabbed a small stuffed polar bear as I sat down in the middle of that mess.
"Is Delenn here?" I asked.
"No. She had Minbari business that couldn't wait."
"Then I'll let you decide what to tell her."
John glanced over at Stephen, who just shrugged. "Don't look at me. She wouldn't tell me what any of this was about, either."
I took a deep breath. "Well, I am now, and I want this kept quiet. No official record of this *anywhere*. This can't even get within *earshot* of Earthforce. The only reason I'm telling the two of you is because I don't really have a choice. If you want to tell *anyone* else, ask me first." I pushed myself on, carefully picking every word. "John, do you remember why I told you I couldn't go through a telepathic scan?"
"Well, yes. You're-" I felt him putting the pieces together. "Susan, you mean-?"
"It's not a latency anymore." Just saying the words felt like the weight of the station had been lifted from my shoulders.
"How strong are you?" John asked.
"Your guess is as good as mine. That's why I asked you to bring the neural scanner, Stephen."
Stephen looked lost. "Wait a second here. What latency?"
And here I thought John had told him already. "Telepathy."
"You're a telepath?"
"Yes."
"And how long have you been keeping this from your doctor?"
I let out a groan. I had expected Stephen to be difficult about this, but not *this* difficult. "It all started just after I shipped out of here. I got lucky, I suppose. The mindquakes were minor. First one knocked me down a flight of stairs. Cracked a couple of vertebrae and generally wrenched the hell out of my back. Got to spend my first two weeks on the Valkyrie confined to bedrest in my quarters. Made one hell of a first impression on the crew."
"Didn't anyone pick up on the mindquakes?" Stephen asked.
"They went away right before I got returned to duty. My CMO just thought I'd hit my head too hard in the fall."
"And you didn't tell your CMO about the mindquakes?"
I gave him a glare. "I'm still here, aren't I?"
John took a deep breath and tried to get us to be quiet. "It doesn't matter what she told her CMO, Stephen. What matters is what she's telling us right now. First things first. Susan, I know you're worried about the Corps. I promise you, we'll do everything in our power to take care of you. Part of the job of Alliance Fleet Commander is to be Delenn's second-in-command for the Rangers. They'll protect you. What I'm worried about is getting you trained."
He was worried about me? I was flattered. "I've been working on a few things I picked up from my mother, but I haven't been able to do any more than that. I could probably manage a surface scan if I had to, but that's about it. I was planning on talking to Lyta about training me when she got back."
John nodded. "Do it. If Lyta can't, or for some reason won't, help you, I'll see if Delenn can find a Minbari telepath willing to train you."
"Thanks, John. I will." I looked around the room at all of the toys, until I finally got to the scanner at Stephen's feet. "Well, I suppose now's as good a time as any. Hook me up, Doc."
Stephen was hesitant. "This scanner can't give us an exact level of your abilities. I can give you a good idea, but Lyta might be the only one who could tell you for sure."
"Ballpark figure's better than nothing. What do I do?" I asked.
The latches on the scanner's case opened with a pop. "Just try to relax. This is a new model, so I only have to put a couple of monitors on your skin."
For once I decided to play the good little patient. It only took him a couple of seconds to place the monitors on my temples.
"Ready?" he asked.
"Ready as I'll every be."
"Okay," he said. "Here goes. You shouldn't feel a thing."
He was right. I could barely feel the monitors. I had to force myself to relax, to try not to think of how much things would change as a result of this one test. The seconds felt like hours before Stephen finally spoke up.
"Time's up. They're running through the filter now."
The machine beeped. Stephen studied the readouts. I tried to keep out of his thoughts, even though his disbelief was obvious to anyone.
"Well, isn't this interesting." He put the machine down and reached for the electrodes, looking me straight in the eyes. "My dear Captain, I can say with a great deal of certainty that you are at least a P7, maybe even a P8."
My jaw dropped. "P8?" Stunned wasn't quite the word for it. I felt like I'd been run through the proverbial ringer. First Marcus and now this. Reality certainly did seem to have it in for me.
John whistled. "You think you can keep it under control until Lyta and Zack get back from Mars? They'll be back in three weeks."
I shrugged, still trying to sort it all out. "I made it the year on the Valkyrie, didn't I? Three weeks should be a piece of cake."

**********

I couldn't believe where I was. I'd only been back a day. Where in the hell did I get the idea that I could do this?
The door closed behind me, and I stood there, completely unable to move. Even facing the entire Earth fleet in the civil war, I hadn't been this afraid. The planet killers in the Shadow war hadn't unnerved me this much.
This was different.
This was personal.
I managed to look over at the observation window. Stephen was standing there, waiting for a signal from me. I nodded slowly, and Stephen flipped a switch on the wall. The privacy switch, he'd called it. One switch that cut off any audio, video, or even securecam data coming out of the isolab. With all of the requests for privacy made by friends who had visited Marcus in the last few days, Stephen had thought it would be more efficient to just wire it all to one switch. Maintenance had hated the job.
I, on the other hand, couldn't have been more thankful. Just being in the room was hard enough.
Stephen walked away from the window. I was alone, but not completely. He may have been comatose, but I could still sense him just on the fringes of my awareness. It was weak, not nearly enough for me to have opened a connection, but it was enough to make me believe that there was somebody home.
It took a few seconds of mustering my nerve, but I finally managed to walk over to the bed. There was a weight in my chest that just wouldn't go away. Somewhere in my mind I was trying to convince myself that this was really happening.
He looked so calm, almost as if he were enjoying a deep sleep. No, I'd seen him asleep once, a lifetime ago. Now he looked even more peaceful.
I reached out and touched his hand. As I did, I felt a stillness in my mind, a clarity of thought that I hadn't known for over a year. It was as if I'd been listening to white noise for the last year and someone had finally turned off the source. Something was going on telepathically and I had no idea what it was. I tried to reach out, to contact him, but I was met by silence.
He was there, I just wasn't going to be able to reach him without words. The words wouldn't come.
The time for expressing my gratitude would come later, after he awoke. I could almost hear Delenn's voice telling me to have patience with the universe, that Marcus would wake up when the time was right.
The real question was could I wait that long?
For that matter, did either one of us have that much time?
I remembered the night they had told me he was gone. Tears that wouldn't stop flowing. Anger at myself for how I'd treated him. Anger at him for not saying anything. Hating the universe for letting something so completely wrong to happen.
Only I could manage both anger and hatred over something that had been done out of love.
Then the dreams had started, dreams that had been as vivid as memories. A place I had come to know as well as I knew Babylon Five because of nothing more than dreams. A place that had been destroyed before I had ever heard its name.
Arisia Colony, the place he had called home.
I felt a tear run down my cheek. My past was nothing more than one regret stacked upon another. To be honest, I had never seriously considered my future. It had never occurred to me that I would survive the Shadow War, let alone the civil war with Earth. I still hadn't given the future serious thought. It was as if I'd spent the last year in purgatory, as if my personal version of hell was living only in the past.
But that changed. Now, all I had was the future. It was time to figure out what I wanted from it, and acknowledging the truth seemed to be the best place to start.
I brushed a stray black hair off of his forehead. His mind was in there, held captive by his recovering body. I had never realized just how much I missed that mind, the quick wit, the slightly warped way he looked at the universe.
I admit, I had always been convinced that all of his charm had been nothing more than a camouflage for a death wish. Hell, if it hadn't been for my career, I probably would have been the same way. Neither one of us had any family left, and Babylon Five was the only place we could call home.
We had far too many things in common.
I couldn't go back to Earth anymore. The last time I'd tried, the media had followed me like Pak'ma'ra let loose in a morgue. The only place I had been able to escape them was on the Valkyrie.
Delenn was right. Marcus could wake up at any moment, or never. What did he have to wake up for? For all he knew, I was dead. I didn't doubt Delenn's confidence that he knew it had worked.
I doubted my own.
There had to be a way to reach him through this coma.
I smiled as the answer came to me, effectively killing two birds with one stone. Bracing myself against the bedside, I leaned forward and kissed him on the cheek. Maybe, just maybe, he would recognize my voice. I whispered four words into his ear before leaving.
"I love you, too."

**********

"Captain, may I come in?"
I looked up from my desk to find Alina Minette standing in my office doorway. "Of course. Is there something I can do for you, Miss Minette?" I gestured for her to take the one empty chair in the room.
Alina walked over and sat down, lifting the long cowl she wore just enough to avoid brushing the stacks of flimsies that I'd been working on refiling. "Well, actually, no. I just thought I'd pop by and see how you were settling in. I'm sorry if I'm disturbing you."
I set the file I'd been working on aside. "Not at all. I was just trying to figure out these files. I never thought I'd see the day that running the Rangers would require this much paperwork."
"Yes, it is a daunting task, isn't it? If you ever require assistance, please don't hesitate to ask me, Captain."
"Did it take *you* this long to figure out the filing system?" I asked, picking up another folder.
"Between us, I never really did understand it. I'm fluent in Minbari, especially the religious caste dialect, so I know it isn't a language barrier."
"Where you the one who translated all of this into English?"
She nodded, giving me a pained smile. "It only took six months."
"I'll put you in for a commendation," I said, trying not to laugh.
After a couple of awkward seconds, Alina reached into one of her pockets. "Actually, Captain, I came to bring you a couple of items for your office. You might say they've become icons to the Rangers in the last month or so."
"Icons?"
"Yes. To anyone else, they simply are what they are. To those of us who know, however, they remind us of what we are truly capable of becoming. They have been in Delenn's care until now. She thought that you might appreciate having them by your side."
Icons to the Rangers? Now I was really curious. She pulled two things from her pockets and sat them on my desk. One was a very familiar pin, while the other was something I didn't recall seeing before. Beside the pin worn by every member of the Rangers sat a small black cylinder that was about as long as my hand. I found myself staring at both items for a long time before I figured out why they might have been so revered. The only thing that could have separated these things from their owner for such a long time could have been death.
"Alina, whose were these?"
"You don't know?"
My hand went on its own to the black cylinder. I'd heard some of the Rangers carried fighting pikes, even seen them used on more than a couple of occasions, but I'd never actually held one before. "This is Marcus's pike, isn't it?"
Alina nodded.
"How do you open it?"
She reached forward, relocating my fingers to a small groove on the cylinder's face. I was all too familiar with the sound that the pike made when it flashed into existence.
"To retract it, you just-"
I managed to find the finger motion that retracted the pike before Alina could finish her instruction. "Delenn really doesn't mind if I keep these?" I asked.
"She wouldn't have it any other way."
I got a laugh out of that. "And if Delenn got her way, Marcus would wake up tomorrow."
"She can be a bit of an idealist."
"Be careful, Alina. That idealist changed the galaxy."
"Oh, I know. I was there, too, Captain. Now, if you will excuse me, Delenn has quite a list of duties for me today." She stood up slowly, again lifting her cowl the few inches it took to clear the piles.
"Alina?"
She turned around gingerly. "Yes?"
I picked up the pin, staring at it as it sat in the palm of my hand. I wanted to thank her, but other words were there. "I seem to have a habit of making bad first impressions. I'm sorry if we got off on the wrong foot."
"Given all that you've been through, it's perfectly understandable. "
There was a strange tone to her voice. I had to pull my eyes away from the pin, but when I looked up she was gone. I couldn't recall actually hearing her parting words, but somehow I knew she had said them.
"You're welcome, Captain."

**********

When I opened my eyes, all I could see was red. No details, no doors, no windows, just this blood red light wrapped around me like a blanket.
I waited long enough to let my eyes adjust to the light before I tried to figure out what was going on. I couldn't see anything more than the faint outlines around a few doorways. The only thing I could tell for certain was that this was not a place on the station. At least, it wasn't any place I'd ever seen.
"Hello?" My voice came back to me as a metallic echo. I decided to stay where I was, see if anyone answered.
My patience paid off in the sound of footsteps somewhere in another corridor.
I tried to follow the sound, going through one empty corridor after another. Corridors began to steer me into hallways, then into meeting areas. All of them were empty, but still covered by shadows.
The footsteps seemed to be getting louder by the second. I was getting closer.
Across the room from me was an archway -- a very large archway that I couldn't remember seeing in all of the years I'd been on the station. A shadow fell onto the floor on the other side of that archway. Its source looked human.
"Hello?" I yelled. "Who's there?"
The person turned their head slightly, looking as if they'd heard me. A thought nagged at my mind, the realization that there was something incredibly familiar about that shadow, something I couldn't quite place. I was about to let it bother me, until the shadow began to move away.
I ran across the room, getting through the archway just in time to catch a glimpse of someone slipping around the next corner.
The footsteps stopped.
I rounded the next corner and found the mysterious person standing just a few feet away. He was draped in darkness, but I managed to figure out that he was about my height, maybe a little taller. The silhouette made me think of a person that it would be easy, but dangerous, to underestimate.
I knew that fact better than I ever would have admitted.
Any doubts I might have had were immediately dismissed when a painfully familiar voice reached my ears.
"Hello, Susan."
The next thing I knew I was sitting bolt upright in my bed. I was breathing hard, and frightened out of my wits. "Just a dream," I whispered, "it's just another damned dream."
Was it? Every night for almost fourteen months I'd been having unusual dreams, but they'd all been about Arisia. Not once in that whole time had I had a single dream about anything else, let alone Babylon Five.
The only problem was, this didn't feel like a dream. What it felt like was something telepathic.
But how could something like that happen? He was supposedly in a coma. I'd only heard of one time that a telepath had managed to form a connection with a person in a coma, and it had taken Lyta Alexander to do that. Lyta, who was quite possibly the strongest telepath in human history. The coma patients she had contacted were also strong telepaths. For all I knew, Marcus wasn't a telepath.
I couldn't believe this was happening. I might have been rated around a P8, but I had no illusions about my abilities when put up against Lyta's. It was like comparing apples and oranges.
I curled up with the blankets, fighting desperately to get back to sleep. My mind, however, had a different agenda. There were so many possibilities. Could my telepathic abilities have been what kept him alive? Could that have hooked up some kind of connection between us? Could something like that even happen to a normal? Why hadn't I experienced anything like this before?
I stared at the ceiling, trying to answer the endless string of questions for myself. By the time I finally fell back to sleep, all of those questions had given me one hell of a headache.

**********

"Damn it, Susan! I thought you understood this. We have to wait him out. I can't just look at a readout and say when it's going to happen. I can't even tell you if it ever will."
Stephen Franklin was not a happy man. Then again, when I considered how much I had been badgering him that morning, I couldn't really blame him. "I do understand, Stephen. It's just, you know . . . I'm not good at patience."
If anything, my lack of patience had become even worse in the last year, but there was no way I was telling Stephen that.
I looked down at Marcus, sleeping peacefully on the bed. A part of me wished that damned machine had done its job and killed him, freed us both from the living hell of the last year. No one had a clue why he was still alive, not even Stephen. At least he was asleep, if a coma could be considered anywhere near sleep. Time was not passing for him.
I felt like I'd aged ten years just in the few days since they'd told me he was alive. After last night, I was willing to make it twelve years.
"He's not exactly the most patient person either, Susan, believe me," Stephen said, curbing his temper. "If anyone's going crazier than you about this, it's him."
He was doing it again, talking to me like I was some kind of grieving widow. What annoyed me was that he wasn't the only one. So many people had begun walking on eggshells around me since I'd come back to the station, and it seemed like more people were doing it every day. I wasn't going to go off into a fit of hysterics at the slightest mention of his name. Couldn't they see that? I mean, sure, I was hardly the same person that left here a year ago. But I wasn't that different, was I?
I looked up to find Stephen giving me his patented 'compassionate doctor' look. "Do you think he can hear us?" I asked.
"Possibly. It's been known to happen."
The dream nagged at the back of my mind. "Stephen, could he be having dreams?"
"Well, there are reports going back for centuries of coma patients having bizarre dreams while they were under."
"Bizarre? How?"
A warning cloud settled over Stephen's face. "Surreal. The longer the coma, the further away from reality the patient gets. The dreams get more surreal."
In Delenn's efforts to revive him, could she have inadvertently trapped him inside his own mind? I knew his past wasn't pleasant, and now the memories had become his only companions. The memories, and the dreams. Did I get a look at how surreal those dreams had become last night?
"Were there any unusual readings on him last night?" I asked.
"Nothing unusual for him," Stephen said after checking a few displays. "It looks like his neurotransmitter levels got up pretty high, but they've been fluctuating ever since we brought him back."
"Wait a second. His neurotransmitter levels? I thought that was a telepathic signature?"
"In your case, yes."
"And him?" I asked.
"Well, he doesn't carry the genetic marker, but we don't have any records of the machine draining a person that far without killing them. Having it hooked up to a telepath could create side effects all by itself. Why?"
Why? Because I'd just had the most bizarre dream of my life? Because I was sure he'd spoken to me? Because I might have finally lost my mind?
"Just checking," I said. "I take it you're keeping an eye on it?"
The glare on Stephen's face said I shouldn't question his medical skills in the future.
"Sorry. Could he be receiving a telepathic signal? Maybe be in contact with someone?"
He checked a few readouts. "It's possible. What bugs me is that I know he's not a telepath, but those neurotransmitter levels never sink lower than what I'd expect in a P1 or a P2. Last night they got up as high as a P4. I can't figure it out."
"What about Lyta?"
"She might be able to make contact. I was planning to have her take a look at him when she gets back."
My link chirped before I could say anything else.
"Ivanova, go."
"You might want to meet me down in Brown 12."
In all of the years I'd known Michael Garibaldi, I had never heard him so unsettled. "What is it, Garibaldi?"
"Something you should see."
I almost, for a split second, thought I heard an edge of fear in Michael's voice. Nothing that struck fear into Michael Alfredo Garibaldi was allowed to happen in the same sector as Babylon Five. "I'm on my way. Ivanova out."
I put a hand on Stephen's shoulder. "Call Lyta in on this. Something's going on, and I want to know what it is. If there's a telepath on this station that's keeping him under, tell Lyta I'll personally pay her triple to tell me who's doing it."

**********

I got to Brown 12 just in time to watch Garibaldi bark orders.
"All right, I want everyone to block off this corridor. Cut off access to the lift. Callahan, I want you and Thomas to stay with the body until Medlab gets someone down here. Have the cameras on every angle. Nobody gets within ten feet without clearance from me, Captain Lochley or Captain Ivanova, got it?"
A petite blonde woman nodded, "Yes, sir."
I let the security team disperse before I let Garibaldi know I was there. "What's this about a body?"
Michael was jumpy, too jumpy. I must have caught him off-guard. "Captain, hi. We had a report of a dead Minbari down here. When Morishi sent Callahan and Thomas down here, this came back."
He held out his hand to me. In it was a small object that was so coated in coagulating reddish blood that I wasn't able identify it on sight. When I touched it, though, I found a familiar shape underneath that blood. I couldn't help but look down at the pin that I'd added to my uniform just a few hours before. It was about the same size as the object in my hand. My suspicions were confirmed when I managed to rub some of the bloody coating off of the smooth center, uncovering the swirling blue crystal.
"Damn. Someone killed a Ranger down here? How?"
"We haven't been able to find a murder weapon yet, but it looks like a knife across the throat. My guess is the killer got the drop on him."
That was when I felt it. I couldn't quite figure out what it was, but something was brushing against the edges of my telepathic barriers. Gentle. Soft. Unobtrusive. I had to shake my head hard to get myself back on track. "Garibaldi, have you been able to figure out who the victim was?" Even I could hear the distance in my voice.
"Identicard says his name's Rashann. Just came onto the station yesterday."
"Any indication of where he came from?"
Garibaldi shook his head. "I've got a trace on it right now."
"Witnesses?"
"Not a one. Morishi's pulling the securecam inputs right now."
"As soon as you get anything-"
"I'll find you. Don't worry."
"Told Lochley yet?"
He shook his head. "Rangers are our territory first."
I turned back toward the lift, bothered by the fact that the telepathic presence didn't seem to want to go away. Garibaldi stopped me before I'd gone too far.
"Ivanova, I've got a bad feeling we may be in for more."
He was worried. "How do you figure that?"
"Something jumped out at me when I started that trace. Before he joined the Rangers, Rashann was Religious Caste."
"Religious Caste?" Delenn was going to have a fit when she heard about this.
"Yes. And this looks almost like he was trying to execute the poor guy. The civil war ended almost two years ago. What could a Religious Caste Minbari have done to merit execution?"
I was starting to see his point. "So you think we may have someone with a grudge against the Rangers?"
"I'm not ruling it out."
No one executed anyone, let alone a Ranger, on my station and got away with it. Okay, so I was feeling a little possessive. "You sealed off the station?"
"Morishi did it as soon as the pin came back."
I couldn't help but notice Callahan and Thomas standing by something covered in a white sheet. Judging by the dark red stains, I could imagine the gruesome sight that sheet hid from public view. If the killer could do that to a Minbari, a race that was so much stronger than most of the other races, I didn't even want to think about what they could to a human.
"I want to see that file as soon as you're done briefing Lochley, Michael. Tell Stephen to hold the autopsy until we hear from his clan."
Garibaldi took a deep breath. "Got it. After all they've done, who would want to kill a Ranger?"
I walked away, back toward the lift. The presence was gone. Great. Not only did I have a murderer on my hands, but now something bizarre was happening to my telepathic senses. What was going on?
"That's a very good question, Michael. A very good question."

**********

The doorbell at Delenn's door had never seemed so loud. It was Minette's voice that came through the speaker. "Yes?"
"It's Captain Ivanova. I need to speak with Ambassador Delenn."
I was through the door before it had finished opening. Alina stood by the dining table, sorting through more stacks of flimsies.
"The ambassador is not available at the moment, Captain. Is this something I can help you with?"
"I don't think so. When can I talk to her?"
"Right now, Captain," Delenn said, sliding the bedroom door aside. She pulled the belt on her black robe around her midsection as tightly as she could before grabbing a hairbrush and almost attacking her wet hair. "My apologies for not answering right away. What is it you require?"
"When did you get a shower put in here?"
"Right after John and I were married."
My smile slowly faded as I tried to figure out how to tell her my news. "I really don't know how to say this, Delenn, but I've got bad news. A Minbari Ranger named Rashann has been killed."
The brushing stopped as Delenn's green eyes darkened. "Killed? How?"
"Someone slit his throat," I said. "He was found in Brown Sector. We're not sure yet if he was dumped there or if that's where it happened."
Delenn seemed unable to decide between anger and sadness at the news. "I will seek out his clan leader and inform them immediately."
"Do you want me to tell them?"
"No. The Rangers are my responsibility, Susan, second only to the Minbari. I will speak to Rashann's clan. Do you have any indication who might have done this?"
"Garibaldi's doing everything in his power and then some to find out. Do you think an autopsy would offend his clan?"
Delenn thought about this for a moment. "I am not certain. However, if the information will benefit your investigation, I believe it will be possible to convince the clan to accept this. Tell Doctor Franklin to proceed."
"You're sure?"
Delenn's expression was almost gloomy. "No, but I believe it is necessary. You need all of the information you can gather, correct?"
"We don't even know if there's anything there that could help."
"As long as you and Mister Garibaldi are investigating, Susan, you will find this person. I have faith."
I finally tackled our only clue. "What worries me is that right now the only thing we've got to go on is the fact that he was a Ranger."
Delenn's bright eyes widened in horror. "Surely he was not killed simply because he was with the Rangers?"
"That's what we're going on right now. The station's locked down and I've alerted all the Rangers on board to be on their guard. If you give the word, I'll ship them out of here."
"I do not believe that will be necessary at the moment, but I will keep it in mind."
"Thank you. I'll let you know whatever we find."
Delenn turned to Alina, who handed her a stack of flimsies. "When Doctor Franklin is finished with the autopsy, I will escort Rashann's body back to Minbar myself. Now, if you will excuse me, I must contact the clans and begin the preparations. As you say, good luck!"

*****

"Cause of death is obvious," Stephen said as he opened a file folder and placed it on Captain Lochley's desk. "I'm listing the mechanism of death as suffocation."
Garibaldi perused his own copy of the file. "Suffocation? Where do you get that? Looked to me like he bled to death."
"Michael, you still haven't told me where you got that medical degree. Minbari can handle losing a lot of blood. If this injury had been anywhere else, he might have had a chance. The problem is where the blood went."
Lochley scanned the file in her hands. "Down his throat. Looks like Rashann was suffocated by his own blood."
"Precisely."
"Any defensive wounds?" I asked. "Signs he might have fought back?"
Stephen simply shook his head.
As I scanned the report, one detail leapt out at me. "Wait a minute. You found metallic fibers in the vertebrae?"
"Lodged there. I'm running every test I know of on them as we speak."
"Got anything you can tell us yet?" Lochley asked.
"Right now," Stephen said, "all I know is that the preliminary tests say it's a metal indigenous to Minbar."
"All roads lead to Minbar," Garibaldi muttered.
I knew that tone all too well. "What have you got, Michael?"
He shifted in his chair. "Well, I got the results back from the trace on Rashann's identicard. His last stop before coming here was Proxima 3. Before that, Minbar."
"How long was he on Proxima?"
"Eight standard days."
"Long enough to make enemies," I mused, staring at the wall over Garibaldi's shoulder. "How many came in from there with him?"
"That's the problem. That transport originated on Proxima 3. There were about two hundred people on board."
Two hundred? This was getting worse by the minute. "Any of them trace back to Minbar?" I asked.
Garibaldi shook his head.
"Two hundred people," Lochley muttered. "We're going to need one hell of a big lineup room."
"We're working on that, Captain. Just the strength the guy would have needed should knock a few people off the list."
I flipped my file closed. "How about securecam? Anything there?"
"Nothing conclusive. I've got people interviewing everyone in the footage, though."
The station was locked down, sealed up like a tin can. Nobody could hide out for very long. "Stephen, any more clues on who could have done this?"
The doctor paced the room slowly. "Well, judging by the angle of the incision, our killer is taller than Rashann was. I'd say he's about two to three meters tall, maybe more. Strength is definitely an issue. A person would have to be pretty strong to knife a Minbari in the throat, cut back as far as he did, and still be able to suppress a struggle."
"I'd think it was a rogue Minbari," I thought aloud, "except Marcus told me Minbari just don't kill other Minbari."
"I'm not ruling it out," Garibaldi said. "With all due respect, I've heard that, too. I'm *still* trying to figure out how they're going to explain that civil war."
"A Minbari could probably do it," Stephen volunteered, "but it wouldn't be easy. Like a human doing that to another human. I don't know of too many races here with that kind of strength outside of the alien sector."
"Oh, I just had a very bad idea," I groaned. "We've been assuming the killer got the drop on Rashann. What if he didn't? There weren't any defensive wounds. No sign of a struggle."
I could tell from the change in Garibaldi's expression that he was beginning to understand. "What if he knew the guy?"
"Or at least trusted him." Stephen Franklin's eyes widened at the idea. "What evidence I've seen would corroborate that."
Lochley winced. "We've also been assuming this guy has a grudge against the Rangers. What if he's posing as one of them?"
"Don't say that," Garibaldi said. "I don't want to think about that. Do you realize how many Rangers are still on this station?"
"And have been told to be on their guard?"
We simply sat and stared for a moment, the full weight of Lochley's idea sinking into all of our minds.
"Yep," I said, "we're going to need one hell of a big lineup room."

**********

I opened my eyes to empty Zocalo storefronts staring at me from the shadows. The halogen glare of the emergency lights only made me more uneasy.
"Hello? Marcus? Are you here?"
Silence was the only answer I received. Curious, I slowly walked around the familiar territory. Nothing out of the ordinary leapt into view, until I rounded the corner near where the Babylon Emporium had once operated.
There I was greeted with a sight that threatened to turn my stomach. I stood at the feet of the murdered Ranger, displayed for all the world in the gruesome detail I had only imagined.
"I was wondering when you would get around to coming back."
I looked into the deep shadows and came up empty. "Why?"
"Answers."
"To what?"
"The murders."
"There's only been one."
"There will be more."
"How do you know?"
Footsteps answered, until a very familiar figure finally stepped out of the shadows. "I know."
"Marcus?"
He walked toward me, every movement more fluid than I ever thought possible. It was the Marcus Cole I remembered, but somehow not. He wasn't wearing his Ranger's uniform, just a pair of black pants and a plain white dress shirt that looked Earthforce-issue. His black hair brushed his shoulders. "Susan, you have to find whoever did this."
"That's what I'm trying to do."
I managed to catch his eyes as he brought them away from the corpse. In them I saw two things I had never seen before -- a combination of helplessness and absolute loathing that I hadn't though possible. "More of us will die before this is over," he whispered.
"You know that?"
"I'm certain of it," he said. "Mister Garibaldi was right. Why would anyone want to murder a Religious Caste Minbari? It was because he was a Ranger, Susan."
"That's right, he was -- wait a minute, how do you know about that?"
He looked at me thoughtfully for a moment. "No, you're not dreaming this."
"You're starting to sound like a Vorlon, Marcus," I whispered, taking a tentative step back. "What are you talking about?"
A tender smile curved his lips. "How did I know what you were thinking?"
"Wait a minute, are we connected?"
"Yes."
"Telepathically?"
"Probably, yes."
I wasn't sure I liked the sound of that. "I want you out of my head."
"Sorry, but I'm afraid that's impossible."
"Why?"
"Because I don't have any real control over it."
"Sounds like-"
"Hardwired. That's a good way of putting it."
"Would you stop that!" I yelled. "You're going to drive me-"
"Crazy?"
"Marcus," I warned, backing it with a glare.
His smug grin was back. "Sorry, couldn't resist."
"Well, you're going to have to. It's bad enough as it is without this on top of it."
He reached a hand toward me, brushing his fingers against my cheek. That slight touch brought with it more emotions than I'd ever felt from anyone. "I'll do my best," he said as he turned his attentions back to the murder victim at our feet. "Right now, this is more important. Every Ranger in the vicinity of Babylon Five is depending on you."
"Marcus?"
"They're calling you. I'll try to contact you again when it becomes necessary."
I could hear the sound of my link chirping back in the real world, but I wasn't ready to move. "Not until I get a better explanation."
A suggestion of annoyance hovered in those bright blue eyes. "Susan, how am I supposed to explain it to you when I'm not sure exactly what's going on myself?"
Crossing my arms over my chest, I took a single step forward. "If this really is a telepathic connection, then you know I'm more than strong enough to keep you here."
"Not that I'd mind."
"If I keep you here, I won't be able to track this killer."
We stared at each other across the silence for what seemed like an eternity, until he finally gave up. "I promise you a better explanation next time."
"What if there isn't a next time?"
"There will be."
He was giving me that look again, the one that said I needed to listen to him. I'd almost forgotten how unbelievably annoying it was. It was a slow realization, but I wasn't going to be able to argue with him, at least not here. "All right, but next time I won't be so easy to get rid of."
"Susan," he teased, "when has anything with you ever been easy?"
Slowly, Marcus faded into the darkness. My link chirped again, louder than the last time. I was wide awake and back in the real world before I even realized it was happening. Reaching back, I recovered my link from the shelf behind my bed.
"Ivanova, go."
"Sorry to wake you," Garibaldi's voice said. "We've got another one."

[End Part 2 of 6]