Everyone had slowly filtered back to their duties.

'It went well.'

'Yes.' Sheridan had been staring somewhere in the middle-distance; he shook himself, turned to her. 'Thank you. Again.'

A fleeting smile warmed her face. 'You seem to have offered us more hope than there has been for a long time, Captain. It is you who should be thanked.'

'Yeah, well, let's just see if it works, huh?'

Their voices were low, all but lost against the background hum of machinery and the constant verbal flow of information between the staff. A private conversation necessitated close proximity. Her eyes looked bruised with lack of sleep; the skin over her cheekbones was taut, stretched.

He wanted to touch her face, to smooth some of the cares he saw away but he didn't dare. As much as he didn't want to, he cared for her. But he couldn't allow himself to care too much. If events in this universe played out as they had in his this was only one step. And a small one at that. There would have to be another and he was already preparing himself mentally for it. 'I owe you an apology.'

A frown of confusion appeared. 'Apology? Why?'

'For last night. I-' He blew out a breath. 'When you- When my Delenn told me about her family it was the first time that she had ever talked to me about them. It was hard for her to explain, difficult for her to talk about certain things, especially to someone who isn't Minbari. I had no right to use that to ... blackmail you, emotionally, into- I shouldn't have done it.'

'You found the most logical method to get what you needed.' Her voice was cool; her head tilted. 'I do not mean that as a criticism. You required my help; you did what you had to in order to get it. I do not believe that you intended to hurt me.'

His face hardened. 'But I did. Hurt you, I mean, didn't I?'

Delenn considered this. 'Hurt... No, not hurt. I was surprised. They are not things that someone who is not close to me would know.' But just how close was something that still puzzled her. He knew things that she had spoken of to few even of her own race: Mayan, her most cherished friend; Dukhat and Draal, both of whom had known her father so well. And this man, John Sheridan, was so dear to her that she would allow him close to her heart. 'You were right to think that they would help to make me believe you.'

'But you might have done that anyway.'

She watched him and again was struck by the strange contradictions that defined Humans. An impetuous race. He would have done almost anything to convince her of his sincerity, his sanity. Now he regretted the very words that had achieved his aim.

'Perhaps. But, as you have said, we have very little time. It was worth the risk. I do not blame you for what you did.'

He searched her face, smiled slightly and blew out a breath. 'Thank you. But I still do.'

Her expression was appraising, as though he were tool whose usefulness she was attempting to judge. 'Do you always do that?'

'Do what?'

'Blame yourself for things when no-one else does?'

'I don't-' Sheridan stopped and then smiled. 'Maybe. Sometimes. I'm a soldier. It comes with the territory.'

'It is a habit you should try to break.'

His smile broadened into a grin. 'As should you.'

Her eyes smiled in the same way: grey suddenly softening, gleaming in the depths.

'Perhaps we should both, as your people say, work on it.'

Garibaldi watched the pair across the room. There was intensity there and yet distance, too. Not quite strangers, not quite friends.

'What do you think?'

Garibaldi turned slightly towards Sinclair, angling himself so they were still in his sight-line. They were both oblivious to everything else, lost in their exchange.

'I don't know whether to kiss them or slap them. Maybe I'll compromise: slap him and kiss her.'

Sinclair managed a sound like a laugh. 'You didn't believe him either.'

Garibaldi blew out a breath. 'I can't think of a single damn reason why John wouldn't be telling us the truth. I can't even think of a reason why his story shouldn't be the truth, but... But I don't know.'

'And Satai Delenn backed him up.'

She was smiling up at him. He couldn't see Sheridan's face but there was an expression like tenderness in hers. Just for a few seconds and then it was gone. Garibaldi's gaze settled on Sinclair. 'Yeah. And Minbari don't lie.'

Sinclair's face rarely gave anything away. A slight twitch of the jaw, a tightening around his eyes. It made him a bastard to play poker with. There was a slight twitch of his jaw. 'She's a double-negative. She didn't confirm anything he said, she just failed to not confirm it. It could be that she's not backing him up, he's backing her.'

'Or covering for her. Look, there's something between those two. Maybe they have met before; maybe they're a one-night stand that went wrong, or maybe they were more than one night a while back and never got over it, who knows. Maybe he did hear some rumour he didn't think worth mentioning; maybe she confided in him and for one of those reasons that a simple Earther like me doesn't get she convinces him that the source of all this information is best not revealed. He comes up with some story to keep us happy and she keeps her mouth shut so she won't have to lie about it.' Garibaldi ran a hand over his head and scratched the back of his neck ferociously. 'It makes a lot more sense than the other theories I've had. You really don't want to hear those.

Sinclair leaned against a console. There were too many questions, too many things still unclear. But they had a chance; that was the only thing that really mattered now. 'Can't be any worse than mine. I think when all of this is over we need to have a long talk with John Sheridan.'

'You bet your ass we do.'

Too busy worrying at their local enigma, neither had noticed Stephen Franklin join them. Garibaldi jerked his chin at him by way of greeting. 'So what's our answer to Monty, Ike and Patton done to you?'

The doctor looked mildly quizzical. 'Sheridan? He hasn't done anything, I just need to talk to him.'

'Oh?'

There it was, Garibaldi thought, the tightening around Sinclair's eyes.

Franklin looked between them. 'Doesn't doctor-patient confidentiality mean anything to you people?' He saw the exchanged glance, knew that they weren't about to let it go. 'Fine. It's probably nothing, okay? It's definitely nothing serious and its absolutely none of your business.'

'Yeah, okay, Doc, I'll let you off. What's your take on the genius idea?'

His face brightened, losing the haggard weariness that had become ingrained. 'Military strategy is not my field but anything that reduces the number of bodies on gurneys coming through MedLab is fine with me.'

Franklin left them and at MedLab looked over the test results once again. They were the routine swabs and samples that he always took after every injury. Like everyone else there, Sheridan's file was full of them. It was entirely possible that there had been a glitch in the equipment, even possible that the sample had been contaminated. That had happened before. But in all his years of biology and xenobiology, Franklin had never seen anything like this: micro-organisms in the blood, unidentifiable.

It was probably nothing, just a mistake. But he wanted to run the tests again. Just to make sure. He'd need another sample.

He pinched the bridge of his nose. The fleet would be moving out in the next few hours. It would have to wait until the offensive was over.

Vadiri faced Delenn, his bulk blocking her exit from the corner of the docking bay. His voice was low but the sibilance still echoed against the rock. He had come to recognise the signs of stubborness in her – the lifting of her chin, the tightening of her mouth.

'My place is with you, Anla'Shok Na.'

'Your place, Alyt, is where you can best serve your people. You are needed to command one of the squadrons of White Stars and that is where you will be.' Delenn sighed heavily. 'You are one of our most experienced fighters, Vadiri, and the coming battle will not be an easy one. At moments such as these we must rely on those who are most suited to lead. You are such a one.'

His head tilted back; he regarded her impassively. 'Do you think that I am so foolish or so uncertain of myself that I require flattery?'

The cares of the warrior-leader that had never been her birthright were clearly written in her face; they made her look older than her years. But when she smiled, even a little, she had the look of an acolyte in her first year of service. She smiled now. 'No, I do not have so low an opinion of you. But my words have been the truth – we need your experience in battle to direct the squadron.'

'If you insist on entering the fight you should at least board one of our cruisers.'

'I have hidden from the fight for too long, my friend; I cannot ask people to risk their lives when I am not willing to do the same.'

On the periphery of his vision there was movement; a glance to the side brought the figure into focus. The Human, Sheridan. The impatience was clear in his face. Delenn had also glanced in his direction but her gaze, Vadiri noted, lasted slightly longer than was necessary.

But that was no concern of his and not something of which he wanted knowledge.

'I can take it that this conversation is ended, Alyt?'

He inclined his head, his fist slamming into his open palm. 'Yes, Satai.'

She joined Sheridan and he watched them make their way to the shuttles. The Human's attitude towards the Satai was not something that Vadiri could quite understand. His respect for her was obvious, but there was a familiarity in the way he spoke to her that seemed out of keeping with an association that could be numbered in hours rather than cycles.

Again, something that was none of his concern.

But Delenn's safety was his concern. Degeba was supposed to have been the safer option and here they were in the middle of a battle. And one that could prove definitive in terms of the overall campaign against their ancient enemy. Shortly after her investiture as Ranger One, Vadiri had been summoned by both Draal and Dukhat himself. Delenn's stance against the renegades of the Warrior Caste had earned her enemies and while she had the courage to confront them, the Rangers, and all they represented, could not afford the loss of another of their leaders.

And neither Draal nor Dukhat could countenance the loss of the vibrant woman they had known since she was a child.

Vadiri's instructions had been very clear and very direct. Get her on the first transport leaving Minbar and keep her out of danger until the situation on their homeworld had reached some kind of equilibrium. They had spent some time at the training base on Proxima and when news had come that the White Star fleet had been completed it had seemed a good opportunity to both meet other leaders of the resistance and move Delenn to a place that was reasonably safe from both Minbari assassins and the Shadows.

And all that could possibly be undone by the presence of one John Sheridan.

They had reached the shuttle that would take them to the White Star that had been placed under the captain's command. He helped Delenn up the ramp, his gestures automatic, almost protective. It could almost reconcile Vadiri to the fact that the safety of Anla'Shok Na was now in the hands of another.

It was strange that her life seemed to be so important to this Human. Almost as strange as the fact that Satai Delenn seemed to trust him so completely.

Vadiri turned away, summoned his second-in-command and started towards his own shuttle. It was just one more thing that he was studiously not concerning himself with.

Her hands moved with their customary fluid grace. The table was littered with the accoutrements demanded by the ritual. She knelt opposite him, mixing something in a pot, her words soft, hypnotic. It was almost like a song. He couldn't stop watching her hands. She poured some of it into a cup, held it out to him. Her smile was inviting. The air was heavy with incense. It smelt like her hair. Soft, dark hair falling to her shoulders. He drank and she watched his face. She was too far away, on the other side of that small, low table. He'd break the damn thing to get to her. To have her. Prayers, meditation. They would do this her way because it was important to her and he would do anything she wanted. He would do anything for her. He had loved before, but not like this. This had started like a breeze and turned into a hurricane. It was the thing he had lived for and it was terrifying. He couldn't stop watching her hands. They moved to the front of her robe, undoing the clasp that held it in place. Dark silk against her skin. Pooling on the floor. Her skin was pale and bare and it was against his. Her kiss was electrifying. A hurricane. A firestorm. He could see the universe in her eyes. She was the universe. She was everything. And she was his. He held her close in his arms but she was slipping away – he tried to reach for her but they were already too far apart and he could feel himself falling. Falling, and there was no end, and she wasn't there.

'Delenn!'

'Yes, Captain?' A voice, steady and resonant. Her voice.

He really was falling and only just managed to stop himself from sliding all the way down the slanted bed. A Minbari woman was standing over him and he instinctively looked around for Delenn. And then remembered what had happened. And at that moment of memory he knew despair worse than the death he had already lived.

'Nothing. I- It was just a dream.' Sheridan passed both hands over his face, scrubbed at his eyes. When he stood his limbs still felt cramped and stiff from too much tension and not enough sleep.

Delenn watched his every movement with curiosity. She had met many Humans over the course of many cycles: they were a highly contradictory and unpredictable species, but she felt a deep affection for them. Something she had shared with her father. They were a good people; they had potential for greatness, nobility. She had befriended many of them but there were still barriers; they were two very different cultures that did not always understand one another easily.

She wondered about her other self. Half-Human. It was a condition she attempted to picture and in which she failed. There had to be physical differences, that much she knew; but what would be the others? Would she think and feel differently? Was that the explanation for her mirror's closeness to John Sheridan? It did not explain her own emotions.

Where had it come from, this trust she placed in this stranger? Desperation was not the basis for a good decision, she had been that taught long ago - one of those portentous statements that Draal was so fond of declaiming; although, they always held a solid truth. It was not desperation, she was certain, even though their situation was desperate. She believed what he had told her, not just because she wanted to believe that he offered her hope. Offered hope to them all, however transitory.

His appeal to her had been a personal one. However, her own motives for responding were not entirely clear, even to herself. He had asked for her support, her complicity in his plan and in his secret but she had found an unexpected need to give him more than that. A need to console the aching wound that was so clearly visible when he looked at her. To give solace was dictated by her faith, demanded by her conscience, yet even without these she would have given it anyway. Perhaps because she was - in some odd way, she was sure of it - the cause.

And it was the reasons for this that she could not quite understand. Or would not understand.

There had been passion when he said her name in his sleep. She might be validating Sheridan's prediction but it was true - for her, it made no difference. Whatever her condition in that place, it was not here and was of no real importance. But for some undefined reason he was important. Uppermost in her thoughts at the moment was the way he called to her - not his voice specifically, but the timbre behind it when his mask slipped and he was unaware. Minbari Religious were trained to hear the music behind the words and his melody spoke volumes that his words would not reveal; and what surprised her most was that, though she was still unsure if he were completely sane, she did not feel so alone when he was near. She studied him again, analysing what she found.

He was a warrior there was no doubt of that. It was there, in every gesture, every word, in the way he held himself. But there was something else – a gentleness in him. Kindness, decency. His eyes were that curious shade she had only ever seen in Humans: hazel, they called it. It seemed to shift and change with the light, with his mood. He was beautiful, she thought. The admission, even if only to herself, shocked her. Even more shocking was that she had imagined, just for a second, his embrace around her.

Delenn realised, tardily and with a feeling like remorse, that she had never given any thought to the man whose place he had taken. Was he somewhere experiencing equal confusion? Was the Delenn he spoke of attempting to reconcile herself to a friend who did not know her?

Friend. Friendship was a beautiful thing, a precious thing, but it seemed an inadequate term for whatever it was that he had with the woman whose name she shared.

Sheridan turned to her, words fading as he saw her strange, disconnected expression. He touched her lightly on the arm; she started, flinching, and his hand dropped to his side.

'Sorry.'

'No, you didn't-' She shook her head. Words rose to her lips and she could not stop them. 'Tell me, Captain, the person you know as Delenn...'

Sheridan's face was guarded. 'Yes?'

'She- You told me that she is part Human.'

'That's right.'

Her hands moved together, fingers interlacing, dropping to her sides again. 'Does she look very different?'

The answer did not come immediately. 'No. I mean...' He sighed. 'At first glance, probably yes, you do look very different, but that's more ... an overall impression. Your faces are practically the same. She has hair, dark hair.' Delenn's hands moved to her head, touching lightly the edges of the bone. 'Most of that's gone, she has a small piece left. The top part, from her temples.'

'Temples.' She repeated the word, puzzled.

'Yes, it's...' He raised his hands to his face; her movements mirrored his. To an observer it must look like they were involved in some strange game, Sheridan thought.

Her attempt at a smile was forced. 'She must be very clumsy.' His look was questioning. 'I mean that she must have trouble maintaining her balance. The fluids that help us to do so are located in the lower part of the crest.'

Sheridan's face cleared. 'Ah, I see. Ours are in our inner ears. I'll have to ask her about that when-' The smile faded. 'When I see her again.'

"When" seemed an optimistic word to choose but he could not bring himself to say "if."

In that moment he looked as though he could break and Delenn felt the discomfort of witnessing something so intensely private being so publicly visible. And yet curiosity still drove her. 'Did you know her before? When she was still Minbari?'

Delenn, he thought, would insist that she still was Minbari despite the changes she had undergone. He couldn't argue with her there. 'No, no I hadn't met her then. I've seen pictures, but- No, we only met each other after her transformation.'

'I understand.' He was, perhaps, appalled by her. The physical reality of her. That was why he found it so difficult to look at her. The woman he knew, his friend, was more like one of his own race and now what he saw was someone so different, so – alien. Revulsion, she had to admit, would be an expected reaction from one of her own people under similar circumstances. Yet, he did not seem to be that sort of man. And he was looking at her now and what she saw in his face was not disgust.

Sheridan watched her helplessly. She was distressed; he recognised the signs. His instinct was to reach for her but he knew it would not be welcome.

'We should go up to the bridge,' he said. Now that, he thought, was a sentence loaded with comfort and sympathy. Her eyes were raised to his momentarily and then dropped.

'I hope that you were able to sleep without too much discomfort.' It was all that she was able to think of saying. His gaze could be disconcerting. As though he knew what she was thinking, what she would say, how she would be feeling. It was an unfair advantage.

His smile was rueful, amusement in his eyes.

'I've learnt a few things over the last forty-eight hours, and one of them is that no matter what universe you are in, some things will always just be,' he paused and looked at the beds, 'tilted.'

Delenn nodded. Her expression was controlled again, remote. It had been a long time since he had seen Delenn close herself off from him. He had forgotten what it was like.

It hurt. Both at home and here.

'We have received word from the reconnaissance ships.'

Sheridan nodded. 'They're coming.'

'Yes. They passed through the seam we left in our defences; but where they are now is something we can only surmise.'

He could see the tension in her shoulders. 'That's what we wanted.'

'I know. But we have so many ships, so may people's lives... I do not mind risking my own life: that is my choice. It is within my control. But risking the lives of others is not something I have ever enjoyed.'

'Sending young people out to die. Neither have I.' He remembered the first time they had had a conversation such as this. She had gone to him then, comfort that had come from the most unexpected quarter and had succeeded where no-one else that day had been able. They had walked through the garden together, the first of so many times. And now, in this distant place, this Delenn had come to him, her need for his comforting presence warring with her desire to remain aloof. Comfort had won out and for that he was grateful. 'We will get through this.'

'I am not afraid to die.'

Sheridan considered her for a long moment. He'd heard that phrase on so many lips so many times before. People who uttered such sentiments usually were afraid despite their words, and with good reason. Delenn, the one who was now so far away, was sometimes afraid. But being afraid was a far cry from being a coward; fear was something she could control - she had never allowed it to control her. And the woman facing him now had the same quality. 'Mm. It's not that bad.' It was an attempt to lighten her mood. 'It's not something I would recommend, but it's not that bad.'

Of all the things that he had told her and she had chosen to believe, this was the most difficult to accept. Perhaps because it seemed so unlikely that anyone who seemed so alive, more alive than any being she had ever known, could have been touched by death.

'It's not something I plan on doing again anytime soon. We're not going to die today.' It was a thought he needed to believe as well. He smiled at her again. 'Are you ready?'

She let out a long breath, steadied herself. 'Your people have a disturbing tendency of using that phrase just before they do something massively unwise.'

Around the bridge, there were a few snickers. Sheridan grinned. 'Okay. I'll assume that was a "Yes." '

TBC