The Time Lord Empire.

The War with the Khanate.


Delenn sighed as she read and reread the reports that had been mounting for the last month before she turned to look out of the viewing port, which was showing the escort fleet for the Valen'tha, the Shargoti class Minbari war cruiser assigned to carry the Grey council above the Minbari people, not that they would do much good in protecting the council if the new human threat attacked them. Delenn walked over to the port, and leant against it and closed her eyes, wondering if the spirit of humanity was trying to demand revenge on her and her decision to go to war with them. It certainly seemed like it to her, but she couldn't say she blamed them for that. The Minbari had, afterall, hunted humanity to the brink of extinction, and the other races that were being attacked had certainly contributed to the new war with the humans, humans that were unusual.

In the 15 years since the destruction of the human homeworld, there had been scattered reports of surviving humans, and Delenn had been the driving force to find out if they could be reached, if a settlement between then could be made, desperate to make amends and to make a sort of peace. But the reports had been unconfirmed since they were too few for the Council to be interested, and many on the Council, complacent and foolish as they were, declared they could not waste valuable resources on human lives even if they had a Minbari soul. The anger she had felt, the painful knowledge they had been destroyed their own souls through the destruction of the humans who had taken their own lives rather than be destroyed. And now, there was indeed confirmation humans had survived, but these humans were different, they were stronger, faster and smarter physically than they had been before, and their technology was more advanced than it had been before.

Delenn remembered that moment, she still suffered from nightmares of the moment when Valen's human form had looked at her with such hatred, such unrelenting grief and rage, and how she had tried to plead with him to stay alive, only to see him and the others help each other shake off the drugs the Minbari warriors had carelessly given them, forced them to undergo the Triluminary ritual to determine their soul status, but treated them little better than animals. Delenn grimaced; she knew that the Minbari people on the whole considered humans to be primitives with nothing to show for their culture. The Minbari preached to the galaxy, no better than the other races come to that, that they were the most advanced race in existence, in culture and in technology. Then again so did other races, but some more than others. The Centauri postured and procastrinated about their republic, dressed in fine clothes, dined on fine foods and drank expensive wines and other beverages, but their republic had decayed, become stagnant, and they had given up much of their territories. It was a sad fact, but Delenn couldn't say she didn't think the Centauri deserved it.

Thinking of the Centauri made her think of the Shadows, who had obviously appeared to the republic, and now the Centauri seemed to gain more and more military advances and victories over the Narns, and the Minbari had called the humans barbarians. Only barbarians would let something as petty as breaking away and gaining freedom from a hundred years of pain and slavery get in the way of the future, and some Centauri were like that. Delenn, and the Anla'shok were convinced that the Centauri were the thraws of the Shadows, the only proof they had was the sudden number of victories and the daring the Centauri were now getting. Where had it come from when all the daring had left them as soon as they started giving up more of their worlds and protectorates? The Centauri's sudden return to the galactic stage had also brought in two groups of humans, one of them were certainly more like the humans Delenn had known from her observations of the numerous battles they lost during the old war but there seemed to be few of them. Their technology had become more advanced, but slightly to make a fairer fight with a Minbari starship. The others...she shuddered as she recalled the damage inflicted on the Minbari people by them.

Delenn thought about the human carrying Valen's soul, something she found herself doing on many an occasion these past 15 years of pain and grief, she wondered what the soul of Valen had seen as a human. Did he have a family before Earth was destroyed, a wife and children? Was he happy in the human afterlife? Delenn knew humans had different beliefs than the Minbari, and that wasn't their fault, but the rest of her people did.

The Minbari had been fighting against the strange humans for the last 2 months, and so far the Minbari were taking heavy losses with ships boarded and the kills crewed, their throats slit or torn to pieces, blood painting the walls. Delenn shuddered as she remembered the number of times she and the rest of the council watched the recordings of the humans in their primary coloured battle armour slaughter the Minbari. They took trophies, too; heads, head bone, Den boks, guns, knives, even pieces of the ships themselves.

The Grey Council had ordered there to be massive retaliation, the warriors, more than aware that the souls of Minbari circulating into human bodies, understood that humans should not be killed, but the attacks on Minbari colonies and vessels were becoming too serious, and the warrior caste was desperate for retaliation, forcing the Council to declare war.


Torture came naturally to the augments, and Khan was no different. Suspended from the ceiling, were two Minbari warriors, one a female and the other a male, and in the candlelit room, both of their shadows seemed distorted in their present posture. It amused Khan no end to compare the Minbari, his prisoners, to Satan's image of being bound. Both of them had their tunics off, and only the male had been bruised and battered. The female was untouched, something that obviously surprised them and both must knew, or guessed that they were saving the female for some reason, but Khan intended to see to it they got what they expected.

Khan glanced in the background behind him to glance at the augments behind him. There were two Supremes as well as three Warriors, and it was the faces of the Supremes that caught his attention.

The Supremes Khan had brought with him were both tall men, with one of them shorter than the other, but one had a fairly roguish appearance, with a long scar down his face, and had reddish hair. The other kept his long brown hair in a tight queue, and his eyes hooded were blue, but Khan wasn't blind enough to see he wasn't ambitious. Superior ability did breed superior ambition.

The red head Supreme was known as Caesar, and the brown haired one was known as Malick. Both Supremes had served on the frontlines; Malick had a Minbari PPG, and a fighting pike holstered in his utility belt, along with his regulation battle gear and short sword. In contract to the others, Caesar wore a bandoleer with a Narn skin sash, and Narn skin gloves with a Narn sword, not unlike a Japanese katana which he wore on his back. Khan had heard rumours that Caesar had personally skinned the Narns he found himself, and collected their skeletons, keeping them in a trophy room onboard his warship.

Khan had nothing against the trophies themselves, but he believed that the skinning of intelligent beings was simply too far, but he didn't say a word; Caesar was a noted leader and Supreme of the Augments, he was entitled to his kills and trophies the same way Khan himself was. For the last 2 months, Khan had alternated between maintaining his power base on the homeworld, and leading his people to victory. The alliance with the Shadows had become known only to the Supreme Council, only when Khan had spent a month informing them of the changes. Now their technology was advanced enough to wage war, they had organic computers, and and weapons that were more powerful than those of the Minbari and the Centauri.

They had already used the new mind analysis machine on both of the Minbari prisoners, and after waiting several days for them to recover, Khan had decided to have some fun with them.

And to watch out for Malik and Caesar.

Khan wasn't stupid; he knew that many in the Supreme Council were plotting against him. He remembered only too well how competive he and his brethren, some of them were now either Strategists or Supremes, had been when they were growing up under the the yoke of the Earth alliance, something the Basics had encouraged, at first, before they realised that the supermen were becoming more and more out of control. Khan wasn't sure what the outcome would've been if the Minbari had not have destroyed the colony.

Malik and Caesar were the most powerful of his competitors, and the most dangerous. The Supreme Council granted all members battlefleets with resources, and some members of the council possessed the most powerful fleets in the Armada, and every time a Supreme won a major battle, or a string of victories, they were granted more power in the Council, something Khan wished didn't happen.

Malik, Caesar, Austin, Isis, Persis, Roman, Joaquin, and Ethan, were the most powerful of all the Supremes, and each one of them could be a threat to Khan's own power base. Augments recognised and admired superior strength.

Khan snapped out of his thoughts when the Minbari spat blood at him. " I will tell you nothing, human." He sneered, the word human sounded like a curse.

Angry that he'd been spat on, Khan's right gloved fist with reinforced metal knuckle dusters impacted on the Minbari's rib cage, making the foul inferior subhuman creature fold and sag against his bonds, the Minbari warrior coughing up more blood and spluttering.

" What makes you think we want information?" Khan asked, genuinely curious as to why the Minbari thought that was the only reason for he and his fellow being here, surely the creature knew that as prisoners they had the right to torture and to maim their victims? The Minbari had certainly done this to humans they'd caught because of their Basic cousins weaknesses.

Confusion entered the Minbari's gaze, Khan put it down to pain, yes that was probably why the stupid creature believed they were safe. " That's what you want, isn't it?" The prisoner asked.

Khan glanced in the direction of his fellow Supremes, and with a slow smile drew his dagger, and the three superhumans walked over to the female Minbari, who struggled to get loose.

" Stop!" The male warrior shouted; he'd seen the horrors these barbarians had wrought on female Minbari, Centauri, and Narn females they'd caught. Even though they were granted death there was nothing honorable in them. " I'll tell you whatever you wish to know! I swear it!"

Khan didn't even glance back. " The mind analysis machine has already downloaded your knowledge into our databanks, you are useless to us. Your...lovely friend here is fair game."

On the other side of the door, the two Warriors standing guard smiled as they heard the near musical scream of the Minbari female, hearing it rise and then shriek, the male begging for mercy, only to choke with his own blood...music to their ears.

Covered in blood, Malik and Caesar followed their equally blood soaked leader through the palace to their respective suites. Khan had desired all the Supremes to live under one roof, as Sun Tzu said, keep your friends close and your enemies closer. Khan admired Sun Tzu as the ancient Basic's military mind formed the plans of many of Khans' philosophies. Another quote sprang to mind, one that Khan belived applied to the Supremes he knew plotted against him, be extremely subtle, even to the point of formlessness. Be extremely mysterious, even to the point of soundlessness. Thereby you can be the director of an opponent's fate.

Khan watched all of the Supremes, knowing they had their own ambitions, but he did so with great subtlety. He was watchful with them and his followers, just like he was watchful with the inferior species outside.


Malik entered his room, and when he entered the ornately designed bathroom, and methodically stripped off his ornately cut Supreme uniform, taking off his trophies and utility belt, and placing the majority of his weapons on his bedside table as he carefully removed his uniform, placing the White uniform into the laundry box for it to be taken away by the slave droids in the morning.

Khan suspected something being planned, Malik could see it, hear it in his carefully worded sentences, see it in his eyes. Oh, Khan was being subtle, there was no doubt about that, but he needn't worry. Malik had no intention of taking control of the Empire, he merely wished to take a group and establish his own empire, far away from Khan.

Many in the Supremes felt Khans' alliance with the Shadows was a mistake, that they should wait and grow before they spread out and conquered. The Basic ancestors had made the mistake of moving much to quickly before, and look where it had gotten them. As he stood in the shower stall, Malik calmly and carefully cleaned himself of the blood from the now dead Minbari female.


Carefully placing his Narn skin trophies on their stand, waiting for their owner to drape them on the next uniform, Caesar methodically cleaned his hair, cleaning and washing out the blood from his victim.

When he got out, he placed the uniform into the box, and pressed the control that would tell the slave droids to pick it up in the morning. Instead of going to bed, Caesar walked over to the window of his suite, and sat down on the leather armchair and gazed at the stars, pouring himself a drink in the process, but since he was shipping out in the morning, it was non alcholic. Caesar had always loved astronomy, and he kept his old telescope in a box, only taking it out when he needed too. The instrument was from his childhood, but he took it with him everywhere.

Khan suspected something, he knew it, and so did Malik. Caesar had known both augments since boyhood and were almost friendly with each other, but as the years passed and their ambitions grew, so did the divides between them.

Caesar could see from the look in Maliks own eyes that the other augment had his own ambitions, but Maliks ambitions were radically different from Caesars', it was more than likely Malik intended to found his own empire, away from Khan. Caesar didn't, he wanted the empire already present to be his. He had to admit that Khan had already provided them with a great and growing empire, but he had done it too quickly. A true empire needed time and strength, not the help of an alien power. The augment scientists would have eventually been able to develop warships and weapons from the scavenged vessels already taken.

Khan took shortcuts, Caesar didn't, and the warlord suspected him already. He would need to move carefully if he was to survive in an already suspicious world.


The attack came suddenly, and Delenn jerked out of her meditation in her quarters. What in Valen's name was that? She thought, though she guessed she already knew the answer. Striding over to the viewport, she looked out into space, and staggered back at the flash that signaled the destruction of one of the escort ships gravimetric fins. One of the enemy ships appeared, and she winced as she saw the sleek predatory monster of the second human group, the ones who boarded and stormed Minbari ships leaving only bloody messes for others to find.

Not bothering to put her hood up, Delenn ran out of the room, ignoring the milling of Minbari workers and warriors, all of them getting out of her way when they saw her grey robes, as she rushed in the direction of the tactical centre.

When she got there she found the other members of the Council watching grim faced the skirmish that was taking place outside. The Valen'tha had been escorted by a squadron of 12 Whitestars, 7 Sharlins, 3 Tinashis, but now since the attack two Whitestars had been clearly destroyed, and a Sharlin was being torn to pieces by the warships of the humans.

Delenn stepped closer to Coplann. The warrior turned to face her with some surprise. " I thought you wouldn't come," he said.

" I wanted to see for myself," she sighed, watching as the humans threw themselves against their Minbari counterparts. " How many human ships are there?" She asked him.

Coplann shrugged, " There hasn't been an exact count. They appeared out of nowhere, and their ships are shielded with stealth fields."

Delenn smirked mentally, remembering that tactic, but stopped it from appearing on her face, she could hear the anger radiating from Coplann and the Council's other warrior members. The Minbari warrior caste had always enjoyed destroying ships as they tried valiantly to defend themselves from her peoples neutron and fusion beam cannons, but the Warriors preferred minimal damage, so they generated fields that reflected sensor beams away. The tactic had been popular for generations, and they had been used successfully and efficiently on the humans.

There was a definite irony, Delenn saw, in what the humans were doing.

Then the cruiser shook as the humans launched another assault on a nearby Whitestar, and Delenn flinched as the ship exploded, three bursts of light hiting the ship directly in the gravimetric fins and 3 on the cockpit section before it exploded.

Before the ships could fire anymore, there was a flash of light, and space seemed to splinter and crack as bright light flooded the room, forcing the council to cover their eyes.

What in Valen's name?

Delenn focused on the light, and watched as it seemed to attract the other Minbari ships and the Valen'tha, pulling the ships down into...a vortex, a tunnel through space.

She was dimly aware of Coplann ( or was it Morann? ) shout to the bridge, ordering the ship to breakaway from the anomaly, but the pull was too strong...

The trip through the vortex was like falling down a waterfall.

The Valen'tha buffeted from side to side, and the Council fell about all over themselves as they tried to maintain their stability on the bucking Shagoti. Delenn stayed on the floor, sliding in one direction to another, until one of the other members grabbed her and heaved her up on her feet.

Delenn turned and found herself looking at Morann, and she nodded, " Thank you."

Morann kept his hold on her, wrapping his arms around her as he fought to maintain their stability together. Delenn watched as with a flash of light the tunnel ended and they were back in normal space.

Delenn and Morann, and Coplann looked around, and went to help the ones of the council who'd fallen around the room. Delenn's ears were filling with questions from the others. What was that? Where are we? Where are the humans? She noticed with some relief the humans had gone, though whether they had died inside the vortex or they had simply not fallen into it was another matter, and Delenn could not bring herself to care about it.

Kozorr, the captain of the Valen'tha, had been honoured when he had been commissioned to be the commander of the cruiser of the Grey council, now he was facing the dubious honour of trying to find out what had happened.

He helped a member of the crew get up to her controls, giving her an order as he did. " Go into the astrometic database, find our position."

The girl nodded, and went to work.

Kozorr barked out orders to other members of the crew, " Contact engineering, what's the status of the reactors and the jump engines. Contact the other ships, find out who's here and who isn't."

The Grey Council walked onto the bridge, making all the crew turn and bow reverently, but Satai Delenn held up her hand, forestalling any more bows. " Where are we?"

Kozorr glanced at the girl of the warrior caste whom he'd given the order to find out that very information, and he went towards her. " Well?" He asked, leaning over her shoulder. The girl, a mere child, worked ferverishly setting and programming the computer to match the nearest star and constellation. It was slow work, then the computer found a match, and when the girl and the captain saw it with wide eyes they gasped.

One member of the council Kozorr did not know grew impatient, " What is it?"

The girl and Kozorr looked at one another, and Kozorr grew himself up stiffly. " Satai's," he began respectfully. " We have travelled 2.5 million light years from where we were. We're in the next galaxy."