The Lady of Downbelow
Babylon 5: Season 1 begins in March 2258
+++++PART+08+++++
March 2258
"Lady! Lady!" Danny's panic came through loud and clear, grabbing Nova's attention immediately, jerking her head up and letting her eyes zero in on him, "What's wrong?"
"There's a Soul Hunter on Babylon 5!" he said 'Soul Hunter' with extra emphasis. Based on the reactions of those around her, it meant more to them than to her…and they were frightened. Many spoke over each other in their panic.
"Soul Hunter?"
"Soul Hunter, here?"
"Child, are you sure?" one of her Abbai regulars asked with obvious fear.
Danny nodded furiously. "I heard the Minbari lady say it! She saw the Soul Hunter with her own eyes in the MedLab! She even tried to kill it, but the doctor stopped her." The way he said the last was tinged with astonishment as if he couldn't believe that anyone would stop another from killing a Soul Hunter.
"What would a Soul Hunter be doing on Babylon 5?" asked a quiet grandmother.
Brown-12 almost froze in its contemplation of that. Many looked at Nova with a quiet significance. Several faces hardened in resolve. Nova noticed that the ones who were more prone to violence had an air of understanding and determination. Fearing that one of them would do something rash, she tried to redirect the conversation.
"What or who is a Soul Hunter?" Nova asked.
The group blinked at her, amazed that she didn't know this basic thing they all dreaded. Harn was the one to answer her, "A Soul Hunter believes that when one dies, their existence ends as there is no afterlife. Thus, they capture the soul at the moment of death to prevent that person's knowledge and abilities from disappearing."
Another chimed in, "I heard they can sense when death is near and go hunting."
Nova frowned. "But people die every day, every minute. They can't possibly be everywhere at once."
"They only catch the souls of great leaders," the same grandmother added, "poets, scholars…healers." Several spines stiffened. More significant looks in Nova's direction. "Only the best of the best souls do they prevent from joining the ancestors."
Nova blinked. So, it was about a difference in beliefs? Afterlife versus no afterlife? Just that these Soul Hunters claimed to have figured out how to capture a soul. Which did make sense if they truly believed that there was no afterlife. To preserve the greatest among themselves, they saved what would otherwise be lost. It did make sense.
"We'll need to protect the Lady," Harn said grimly.
"What? Me? Why me?" Nova was baffled. The Doctor was the significant one, not her!
A couple gave huffing laughs, a few rolled their eyes. They knew their lady well. "Everyone be on the lookout for strangers, particularly those with odd equipment." Nods. "Don't let any unknowns get past you." Murmurs of consent.
While she didn't believe that a soul could be captured, it was obvious they believed and were taking measures to ensure her safety. Nova was caught between exasperation and gratitude. "Don't forget to watch out for each other," she instructed. "There's no guarantee that this Hunter is after me. There's lots of important people on B5."
A couple of snorts of disagreement made her heart warm that little bit more.
"We won't let 'im get you, Lady!" another verbally opposed.
There was a loud cheer to concur.
+++B5+++
"Lady! Lady!" Nova turned at the cry. She was beginning to think this was a theme with Danny. "I saw him, Lady! I saw the Soul Hunter!"
That got her attention. "Are you sure?"
Danny nodded vigorously. "He's in Brown-21 and he's got the Minbari lady all tied up and tubes and things all over! He's stealing her soul! I SAW him!"
"What?" Nova was already in motion before he finished speaking. She grabbed her now-characteristic blue cloth sack of supplies and half-ran for the lift. No, she didn't believe that a soul could be captured or contained, but someone 'all tied up with tubes and things' could NOT be good. And with everyone so afraid of this Soul Hunter, they wouldn't move to stop him.
"Where are you going, Lady? You can't go! He'll get YOU!" Danny wailed, running after her.
Nova looked at the boy, touched and annoyed at his concern for her instead of for the potential murder victim. "Danny, go find a security guard and tell them. Then find the others and stay in Grey-17 until I get back." If the 'Minbari lady' -also known as the Minbari ambassador- was the one captured, then the commander and security were already looking for her. Any member of security had a communication link and could inform the rest.
"But LADY—" he screamed.
"Do as I tell you," she instructed sternly. "Now, Danny. Go!"
It was obvious he was doing so under protest and great objection, but he still obeyed. Running at his fullest speed down the corridor, intent on getting to the first security officer he saw as fast as possible. Then he could go back and help the Lady!
+++B5+++
Brown-21 was even more dusty and dirty than Brown-12 had been before she'd appropriated the level. More pipes and crates than Grey-17 too. It was probably only used for maintenance. The only pathways she saw looked as if they were designed for strictly that.
Nova took a couple of seconds, closing her eyes to heighten her senses. Particularly her hearing. She listened, hoping to catch even a quiet swish of cloth or some other minute sound that would tell her a direction. A low hum, a bare whispering murmur.
Nova took off left, doing her best to find a balance between speed and noise. As she got closer, Nova heard a lower male bass speaking, though she wasn't close enough to hear precise words. However, she knew that tone.
"…the transference," it was said with a kind of greedy reassurance that made a chill go down her spine. "Close now. Enough for a glimpse into your soul."
Finally, Nova was near enough that she had to slow to a ducking crawl, but only a few more moments until she could see the setup of the space. A Minbari woman was lying prone, tied to a floor grate. Some sort of apparatus held her ankles as well, tubes of red liquid going to a large single-neck round-bottom flask. Considering the setup, either the flask was vacuum-sealed, drawing the liquid inside itself, or the tubes were coming from a pressurized source. Nova hoped it was the first, since disconnecting a catheter was much easier than clotting an arterial line.
Either way however, the Minbari was dying from exsanguination right before her eyes. She needed to move, there wasn't much time. But where was the Soul Hunter?
A figure, clad in brownish-red leather with a wool undercoat was peering intently at a sphere sitting inside a weird mechanism. To her eyes, it looked like a cross between an old-fashioned Terran generator and an electric can opener.
"You have planned such a thing?" The Soul Hunter was stunned, though Nova couldn't tell from what. "You would DO such a thing?"
The woman was barely moving anymore. Nova had to move…NOW!
Nova darted forward from the right and caught the Hunter in the side of the head with the hand that held something heavy. The Soul Hunter cried out in pain and went down.
Nova pointed her sonic at the mechanical whosie-whatsit and thought Off! But when she activated it, there was a brief spark and it didn't chirp. "Stardust!" she hissed to herself, "Next time, don't hit the bad guy with the sonic!"
"How dare you?" the Soul Hunter cried.
Nova squeaked, then yelled in pain as he returned her gesture. She collapsed half on top of the Minbari, who gave a low groan but otherwise showed no signs of consciousness. As she was trying to bring her thoughts back to a reasonable understanding, she felt huge hands on her shoulders, shoving her to the right.
"You will not stop me," the Hunter grimly intoned.
"Delenn!" another male called out.
"No. Not again!" the Hunter denied, then moved out of Nova's now limited perception. "Not again!"
Oh good, the bad guy was occupied. Someone was coming to the rescue! Nova shook her head once in an attempt to clear her vision, then instantly regretted it. She moaned in pain but kept her hands moving. Fumbling though they were, they were better than just sitting there while someone died!
She felt an ankle. Felt the metal thingie holding it—what were those thingies called again? She knew that she knew the word… "Come on, come on," she whispered to her screwdriver. "Help me out." A buzz. A chirp. Then the cuff—that was the word!—clicked open. "One more time please," she pleaded. Buzz. Buzz. Chirp. Click. "Yes! Thanks!"
Her vision was firming as well. At least there were now only two feet in front of her instead of four. Yay! Improvement! She fiddled with the settings, trying to remember what setting was for blood coagulation, but for the life of her, she couldn't remember. Not yay…
Nova decided that if she couldn't remember her fancy sonic setting, she'd just go old school. So there! A quick clip, pull, and press; to remove the catheter and then put pressure on the wound site. Her other hand went to the bottom of her shirt, pulled it up to her teeth, and yanked. A loud tear and she had a strip of cloth. Another few yanks and she had four strips! Two as compresses and two as ties. That should do. Yay! Again!
"No! Leave us alone!" The would-be murderer was far outside of her line of sight, but she could still hear the insane ramblings. "Why do you fight for her? Don't you understand? She is Satai! I have seen her soul! They're using you!"
A thud to her left drew her attention and she saw Commander Sinclair by a fabric bag, laying as if he'd been thrown into his position. He lifted his head, seemed to analyze the surrounding situation(s?) quickly, and then looked back towards the direction in which he'd been flung. Bad guy coming their way then.
"No! What are you doing? You…" the Soul Hunter muttered.
Nova turned to look at him, to see if she was the one he was focused on, and saw seven glowing red spheres hovering around the bad guy. Then an eighth, just coming from the bag that apparently Sinclair had opened.
"You don't know what you're doing. My children!" he almost sounded pleading. "I never…never meant any harm…"
"Any harm?" she asked. Nova knew her voice couldn't be as firm and uncompromising as she intended, but at least she didn't fall over. She counted that as a win. "Any harm? You're trying to murder her! How is that not meaning any harm?"
"I was saving her soul!"
As if on cue, the machine powered up fully and a red beam of light shot out, centering itself on the Minbari's chest.
Nova didn't think, didn't consider, only reacted. She darted to the right, putting herself between the beam and the unconscious woman.
"No!" the Soul Hunter yelled. "Let me save her!"
She halfway thought she heard him move forward as if to stop her or something, but Nova herself had a different problem. It was as if she suddenly had no control over her body, frozen in place on her side. She cried out, screaming in agony. It felt as if a knife were trying to carve out her main heart! A golden glow began to eke slowly out of her skin, but she couldn't move to get away. It just carved a little deeper with every microsecond.
Suddenly the knife was gone and she crumpled fully down, panting.
Long seconds must have passed by her unnoticed because the next she knew there were hands on her shoulders, but these were smaller and much more gentle than the bad guy's had been. "Are you alright?" Oh, that was Sinclair. Good guy. Rescued the damsels.
"You should have shiny armor," Nova muttered without opening her eyes.
Sinclair gave a short reluctant laugh, "I left it in my closet."
"Bad guy gone?"
"Yes, he's gone."
"Minbari lady?"
"I think you got to Delenn in time."
"Yay."
"I've called for medical. You'll both b…" his voice trailed off. Or perhaps she was the one that trailed off since the world went dark at the same time.
+++B5+++
"How is Delenn?" Sinclair asked.
"Better," Dr. Steven Franklin answered easily. "She has a strong constitution. Amazingly strong, really. Losing that much blood would've killed most. Explains why they fought so well during the war. They just kept going no matter how great the injury or loss of blood." He paused and turned. "Any more and she would have died. The other saved her life."
"And how is Nova?"
Dr. Franklin gave a baffled shrug. "I have no idea. She's not human, I can tell you that definitively. She is not any species in the database. In fact, the computer keeps saying there's an error, but I've checked it three times. No mistake with the machine or the blood draw.
"I CAN tell you that she has golden blood," he offered as if a consolation prize.
"Golden blood? What does that mean?"
"It means she has no blood type and no Rh antigens, or at least none that the computer can recognize. This does happen in humans, but it's very rare. In the last 250 years, since its discovery, there's been only 157 cases of golden blood, total." He shook his head. "If she were human, I'd suggest she have a regular blood draw to have on ice in case she needs a transfusion because there's nothing here that I can give her." He paused, considered. "I'll recommend that anyway."
"Will she be alright?"
"That's what I'm trying to tell you, Jeff. I just don't know. She has two hearts like a Centauri, but none of their other characteristics. Her EKG is within human and Centauri normal parameters, but her blood oxygen is low. Her EEG is off the charts. Her temperature is so low that I'd think she was dead yet is exhibiting none of the symptoms of hypothermia. Honestly, I'm afraid to touch her because I can't tell what her system would do with anything I could give her."
Sinclair was frowning hard by the end of the xenobiologist's recitation. Then he moved to one of the wall terminals. "Request?" the computer asked.
"Call for Boe Harker. Encoded Gold-2."
"Processing… connected."
The face was just as it had been the last time Sinclair had seen him several months prior. "What's wrong?" Harker asked shortly.
"Nova's unconscious."
Harker's face darkened considerably. "Tell me everything."
Sinclair did a quick rundown of events as he knew them. Then he called over Franklin to go over Morganson's test results. Throughout, Harker said nothing. When they were both done with their recitations, Harker sat back slightly, thinking. "Blood ox should be around 155-170. Average heart rate is about the same. Temp should be somewhere between 14 and 17 degrees Celsius. High brain wave activity is par for the course. If the EEG falls into human levels, then you worry."
The doctor was taking notes. "Then she has a low blood oxygen level." He snapped his fingers and an attendant hurried to affix an oxygen mask to the patient.
Harker nodded approval. "Were you able to do an in-depth resonance scan?"
"Yes. No obvious injuries or foreign bodies. There are multiples of structures in her internal anatomy—the least of which is a couple extra ribs. Her nervous system…I have no words for it, and I have no way to know if they are unusual for her species."
"Ask her to come in when she's healthy for a baseline scan. She won't mind if you swear to doctor-patient confidentiality. She might make you sign a non-disclosure agreement too." Harker said absently. He tapped his chin. "Biology isn't my area of expertise by a long shot. I only know the basics for them…" A thought struck him. "Do you have any chocolate you can give her?"
"Chocolate?" Steven asked in disbelief.
"Gallifreyans are highly allergic to aspirin, but chocolate is almost miraculous in its restorative capacity," Harker explained. "The darker, the better. Take a small bit and put it on her tongue and let it dissolve. See if that works."
He nodded. "And if it doesn't?"
"You call me back, and I bring the cavalry." He winced. "Let's HOPE we don't have to call him." The screen went blank.
Sinclair looked at Franklin. "Do you have chocolate stashed somewhere?"
"No…" he held up a finger as he remembered, "but I know Ivanova does." He hit his comm. link. Less than an hour later, the xenobiologist blinked in amazement as a single small square of Hershey's made the Lady of Downbelow begin to stir.
+++B5+++
"Please, enter," Delenn smiled at her gratefully and gestured. "I am so glad you accepted my offer." An arrangement of tea for two was set out.
Nova was already shaking her head. It wasn't that she didn't like tea, but she didn't want to impose. Instead, she held out a brown cloth sack, "I just wanted to give you these. They're all tagged as Minbari, so I thought you should have them."
Delenn took them reverently, cradling the sack as if it were a small child. She looked up and the honest intense gratitude was obvious. "You have done a great service, not just to myself, but to all Minbari."
Nova grimaced, uncomfortable with the praise. "I just… wanted you to know…" she hesitated.
Delenn had set the soul bag down gently, then looked up at her in curiosity, "Yes?"
"…I didn't know if you would want to know…"
The Minbari had been a member of the religious caste for a human lifetime. She understood, at least partially, what the other was preluding to. As a Satai, Delenn was more than familiar with the reluctance to convey such information. "Please. Let us have tea and you may tell me. I have learned that tea softens uncomfortable information."
Nova gave a small snort of reluctant laughter and obediently sat across from the woman. When the tea was poured and a dutiful sip had been taken, she tried again. "The orbs," she gestured with her chin, "they… they're not souls."
Delenn froze momentarily, set her cup down, and solemnly regarded her. "Explain."
Nova sighed, "I know his beliefs and yours were diametrically opposed. He thought he was saving people because he didn't believe there was any hereafter. You thought he was stealing people so that they couldn't join the rest of your people waiting to be reborn." She paused. "Is that all correct?"
"In essence, yes."
Nova nodded. "Well, once I was back on my feet, I went back and found that machine of his." Delenn sucked in a sharp breath. Nova forestalled her with a finger. "It's destroyed now, but I needed to know what it had been designed to do. Because what it did to me shouldn't have been possible."
Delenn picked up her cup. "And what did you find?"
"That, once charged, it copies and stores a person's mental pathways. Basically, it's a fancy recording system. The downside to using it is that it uses the person's own energy to form the template, thus, in essence, killing the individual in the process." Nova peered at her intently, trying to convey her seriousness. "But it's a copy. In human terminology, it's a first-generation transcendence, or mind uploading, if you understand those comparisons. A really bad version, since those aren't supposed to destroy the original. Though the original architect could have been trying to ensure that the copy never deviated from the original, seeing it as a desired feature instead of a flaw. Or maybe it was only ever supposed to be used afterward, I don't know for sure.
"I DO know that while those are copies of Minbari minds, they aren't their souls," Nova finally picked up her tea again, finished with her explanation.
The religious Satai pondered the information for long quiet minutes before she finally replied. When she did, it was without rancor or recrimination. Instead only simple statements. "Any being is the accumulation of their life experiences, beliefs, and decisions, all of which are etched into mental pathways and stored in memory. Their mind… is their soul."
There really wasn't anything to say to that, so Nova didn't try and simply finished her tea. When she got up to leave, Delenn spoke again, "You are not angry with the Soul Hunter."
It was an observation, not a question, but Nova felt compelled to answer anyway. She turned to look at the priest, wondering how to phrase it so that the woman wouldn't get angry herself. Finally, she settled for, "I pity him."
Delenn tilted her head slightly, her face a mask of flat calm. "Why?"
Nova huffed a soft breath. "Two reasons mainly. One, I, as well as his own people, thought him insane. Even as a criminal, it's against most civilizations to condemn those truly mentally ill. They are locked up and we try to help them, but we don't kill them. We don't see their actions as their choice or their fault."
"Hmm… and the other?"
Nova's shoulders slumped as if by an unseen weight. "Insane or not, based on what he believed, he thought he was doing the right thing. Even when all around him people told him otherwise, he carried right on doing what he thought was just and good to save others. And he kept doing it even to his own death.
"He did what he thought was right, despite everyone telling him it was foolish, it didn't dissuade him. That kind of mental fortitude and determination is admirable. Some of the best leaders, both military and civilian, have had that trait. George Washington and Jean d'Arc immediately jump to mind."
Delenn blinked, not having seen it this way. She pondered what she knew and understood about human history as well as how it might pertain to the current situation...and something occurred to her. "Yet…" she paused to make sure she had the other's attention, "...a Soul Hunter is not a soldier. There may be an inherent difference between a soldier and a hunter."
Nova contemplated that for a couple seconds. Then she gave a tired sigh, a sad shrug. "You may have a point. I don't know enough to say. Guess I'd have to talk to a soldier and get their opinion." She didn't wait for a response – she either didn't expect one or she didn't want one – she continued, "I pity him, because then I can forgive him… Then, maybe, I can forgive myself…"
Delenn gave the Gallifreyan a bow of respect and saw her out of her quarters. But after Nova left, the Minbari Religious Satai couldn't help but contemplate what such words said about her character. To bring oneself to empathize with another was easy. To empathize with an enemy was much harder, sometimes impossible, or took many years. Even as the Gallifreyan claimed it was with selfish intent, to do so in only a couple of days was remarkable.
A small part of the Minbari wondered what might be said if she described these events to one of the warrior caste. Perhaps she would ask the next one that came to Babylon 5.
09.27.2021/10.01.2021
+++++B5+DW+B5+++++
***Golden Blood is a real thing, and I'm really sorry to anyone who has it. Google it and you'll see what I mean. *****Most of what I got of the details for TL physiology came from the TARDIS Wiki. Several are just things I made up or are so common in fanon that they might as well be canon.
Thanks go to denise3 and BarbedCaress for their awesome betaing!
This is my first Babylon5 fic, please be kind as I know it's not perfect.
Reviews are love and help keep me motivated to write more!