Tag: Babylon 5

Susan Ivanova:

We’re ready to go, Captain. Any last minute instructions?

John Sheridan:

Beside from an old Egyptian blessing, I can’t think of a thing.

Susan Ivanova:

Then we’ll see you…when we see you.

Marcus Cole:

An old Egyptian blessing?

Susan Ivanova:

“May God stand between you and harm in all the empty places where you must walk.”

— “Shadow Dancing” – Babylon 5, Season 3 (1996)

G’Kar:

…This time it is possible he could be wrong.

Michael Garibaldi:

Yeah, it’s possible. But you don’t follow an order because you know for sure it’s gonna work out. You do what you’re told! Because your C.O. has the moral authority that says, “You may not come back, but the cause is just and fair and necessary!”

— “Walkabout” – Babylon 5, Season 3 (1996)

Vir Cotto, in a dream:

Prophecy is a guess that comes true. When it doesn’t, it’s a metaphor.

— “The Very Long Night of Londo Mollari” – Babylon 5, Season 5 (1998)

Galen:

…No, not a dream, a nightmare. And if sometimes dreams come true, then what of our nightmares?

— “Babylon 5: A Call To Arms” (1999)

A portal opened…. The apprentices moved toward it, falling into a line. Once through the portal, Galen found himself on a path lined on both sides by mages. The path led to a tent standing separate from the others, a tent he hadn’t seen before. That was where his transformation would take place.

The interior was dark, and as Galen entered, he found himself somehow alone. No one seemed to be in front of him or behind him. A globe of light appeared farther inside the tent. It hovered over a table of dark crystal.

In the faint light, Galen noticed that to the side of the entryway were several stacks of canisters. The canisters were smaller than the ones that held the chrysalises, about two feet high and one foot across, and they were covered in an opaque outer layer that was ornate, carved with runes. This must be how the Circle stored the implants, once they made them. Galen marveled that something so intricate and so powerful could be so small.

Galen approached the table and rested a hand on it. The cold surface stung his raw skin. Obviously he was meant to lie on it. He eased himself down onto the crystal table. As soon as he was supine, a great force—like an invisible hand—slammed down on him. He was pinned flat against the cold surface. His breath came in short gasps. He couldn’t move. His lungs couldn’t fully inflate against the pressure.

The light above him went out. All was silent except for the panting of his breath. A line of fire cut through the darkness above him, curled itself into the rune for solidarity. The rune descended until it hovered just above him, the same size as his body. The heat of it awakened more pain in his skin. He tried to turn his head to the side to escape from it, but he could not move.

Then the rune began to unravel. The line of fire whipped out and down, driving into the flesh of his shoulder. Galen screamed.

Fire burned like a micro thin wire shot down his arm. It split into three parts as it reached his hand, running down his thumb, index, and middle fingers and exiting out the tips. The three lines of fire rose and turned back toward him, plunged into the fingertips of his other hand and blazed up his arm, joining and popping our at the shoulder.

Galen’s breathing grew harder, faster. The fire ran up into the darkness and vanished. He lay in blackness, the line of fire an afterimage above him, anticipating the appearance of the next rune. He didn’t know if he could stand six more of them.

He remembered Fed joking nervously, If it were painless, then everyone would want to do it, right? Fed was going through the same thing.

If Fed could do it, then he could do it.

As he lay in the dark, though, something glided over his raw shoulder, faint as a shoulder. He started, but the jerk of his muscles had no effect against the force holding him clown. Something thin and cold and wet pushed into the tiny hole burned by the fire. It worried inside him, deeper and deeper, generating a dull tingling hat spread like goose bumps down his arm. On his shoulder, the length of its body followed into the hole, contracting and relaxing, contracting and relaxing. Its head passed his biceps and continued toward his elbow, drawing a line of coldness with it.

At the other shoulder a second invader stirred, wriggling its way inside. This was not the way it had felt when he’d entered chrysalis stage. One implant had been inserted at the base of his skull. He’d been asleep during the procedure, and he’d awoken only with a vague headache. He’d never had the feeling of something inside him, something other.

These new implants would connect to that original one, accessing all the information that had been gathered and stored while he trained with the chrysalis. Yet they felt different. These things moving inside him that were not him were wrong. They did not belong.

At last, as they each split into three and pushed into his fingertips, the movement slowed, stopped. His hands and arms tingled, infused with the cold. The tech was inside him now, waiting. Above him, a line of fire appeared and twisted into the rune for secrecy.

The pressure holding him down suddenly vanished. Galen’s gasp turned into a huge ragged inhalation. The desire to run was nearly overwhelming, though he felt too weak to move. Were they giving him a chance to leave? Was this another test?

The rune descended and unraveled, the end of the line of fire raised, poised to strike. Galen realized what was wanted of him. With numb fingers he turned himself onto his stomach. The pressure returned, and with it, the fire.

The pattern was repeated for each of the seven runes of the Code as Galen watched the lines of fire reflected in the table and panted against its surface. Twin tunnels were burned across the back of his shoulders, one down each side of his spine, and four from the base of his skull up into his brain.

Each time the formation of the tunnel was followed by the insinuation of the tech, cold, thin, and wet, contracting and relaxing, pushing inside him, stretching the skin of his back, sending prickles like tiny needles down his spine, driving the cold in intricate coils through his brain and settling there, making his body its home.

He sensed something then, like an echo of an echo of an echo, the faintest hint of what he had felt with the chrysalis. The echo carried his revulsion back to him.

The pressure lifted, and Galen’s head fell to the side in relief. Numbness spread through his body. He was not who he had been.

He was not himself anymore. He was something that was part himself and part other.

He was a techno-mage.

— Casting Shadows, chapter 6

— “The Memory of War” – Crusade (1999)

John Matheson:

I know you said it wasn’t a problem getting me here, and I hate to contradict a superior officer, but I suspect my status as a telepath did…come up.

Matthew Gideon:

John, you know what causes most problems? Ambiguity. Not knowing which decision is the right one. You’re the best First Officer I’ve ever served with, and I consider you a friend.

So there was no ambiguity, and no problem.

— “War Zone” – Crusade (1999)

Refa:

Londo, you are a fool! You walk away from the greatest power I have even seen, and now you expect me to do the same? They are the key to my eventual rise to the throne! Why would I abandon them?

Londo:

Because I have asked you. And because your loyalty to our people should be greater than your ambition.

…And because I have poisoned your drink.

[Refa stares at Londo in shock.]

Yes, and it is very interesting poison. It comes in two parts. Both are harmless on their own; but when combined, quite lethal. The first settles into the bloodstream and the intestinal walls. It stays there for years: silent, dormant, waiting. When the other half of the poison enters the body, the two meet [and] have a little party in your cardiovascular system. And suddenly: You. Are. Quite. Dead.

Your drink contained the first half of the poison.

Refa:

Why? Why did you do this?

Londo:

To guarantee your co-operation. And because sooner or later you would do it to me. Yes, we are returning to the old ways, Refa. And poison was always the instrument of choice in the Old Republic.

Being something of a sentimentalist, I got here first.

Refa:

[cowed by fear]

What do you want me to do?

Londo:

You have encouraged that fool [Emperor] Cartagia to attack worlds that have no value to us. You will now encourage him otherwise. You will bolster our lines of defense around Centauri Prime. And you have nothing more to do with Mr. Morden. If you do not comply, one of my agents in the royal palace will introduce you to the second half of the poison.

[lifts his glass]

To your health, Lord Refa.

— "Ceremonies of Light and Dark" – Babylon 5, Season 3 (1996)

Thomas:

How did you get into this in the first place?

Aldous:

[Who has dedicated his life to the search for the Holy Grail.]

I kept the accounts for one of the major Earth corporations. I lived in a world of numbers: clean, smooth, logical, precise. We took a vacation to visit the Mars Colony; the first time we had been. We were in a crawler halfway across the Amazonis Planitia when suddenly the ground gave way beneath us. I woke up in a hospital, a few bumps and bruises. But Sarah and the children: gone.

Thomas:

I’m sorry.

Aldous:

I grieved for a long time. A very long time. But eventually I went back to work. But…the numbers didn’t add up anymore; nothing made sense any more. So, finally, one day I just left. Believing there had to be something—some reason why I had been spared.

Then I met a man who said he was the last of his kind. He told me I was a man of infinite promise..and goodness. And when he was dying, he gave me this: his staff. And now I’m the last. But the numbers add up again, Thomas.

The. Numbers. Do. Add. Up.

— "Grail" – Babylon 5, Season 1 (1994)

— “War Zone” – Crusade (1999)

This excerpt needs to be video as the best parts are the character’s expression and tone.

— “Racing the Night” – Crusade (1999)

G’Kar:

It was the end of the Earth year 2260, and the war had paused—suddenly and unexpectedly. All around us, it was as if the universe were holding its breath, waiting.

All of life can be broken down into moments of transition or moments of revelation. This had the feeling of both. G’Quon wrote:

There is a greater darkness than the one we fight. It is the darkness of the soul that has lost its way. The war we fight is not against powers and principalities. It is against chaos and despair.

Greater than the death of flesh is the death of hope, the death of dreams. Against this peril we can never surrender.

The future is all around us waiting in moments of transition to be born in moments of revelation. No one knows the shape of that future, or where it will take us. We know only that it is always born in pain.

— “Z’ha’dum” – Babylon 5, Season 3 (1996)

Marcus Cole:

You know, I used to think it was awful that life was so unfair. Then I thought, “wouldn’t it be much worse if life were fair, and all the terrible things that happen to us come because we actually deserve them?“

So, now I take great comfort in the general hostility and unfairness of the universe.

— “Point of No Return” – Babylon 5, Season 3 (1996)

Lorien:

You can’t turn away from death simply because you’re afraid of what might happen without you. That’s not enough! You’re not embracing life; you’re fleeing death! And so you’re caught in between, unable to go forward or backward.

Your friends need what you can be when you are no longer afraid. When you know who you are, and why you are, and what you want. When you are no longer looking for reasons to live but can simply be.

…Surrender yourself to death. The death of flesh. The death of fear. Step into the abyss, and let go….

— “Whatever Happened to Mr. Garibaldi?” – Babylon 5, Season 4 (1997)

Delenn:

It should never have been allowed to happen. Not for my sake.

Lenier:

If not for yours, then who else?

Delenn:

He could have been killed.

Lenier:

Delenn, all we know is that we will die. It is only a matter of how, when, and whether or not it is with honor. He did what any of us would have done.

Respectfully, Delenn, I think this is the one thing about your position you do not yet understand. You cherish life. Life is your goal. But for the greater part to live, some must die or be harmed in its defense—and yours. There is no other way.

— “Grey-17 Is Missing” – Babylon 5, Season 3 (1996)

Londo Mollari:

Now, if I may ask: does this torment end when you leave, or am I going to have to spend the rest of my life paying for one little mistake?

Elric the Techno-mage:

Oh, I’m afraid you have to spend the rest of your life paying for your mistakes. Not this one, of course; it’s trivial. I have withdrawn the spell, but there will be others.

Londo Mollari:

What are you talking about?

Elric the Techno-mage:

You are touched by darkness, Ambassador. I see it as a blemish that will grow with time.

I could warn you, of course, but you would not listen.

I could kill you, but someone would take your place.

So I do the only thing I can: I go.

[Starts to turn away then turns back.]

Oh, I believe it was an endorsement you wanted. A word or two, a picture, to send to the folks back home confirming that you have a destiny before you.

Londo Mollari:

Yes, it was just a thought, nothing more.

Elric the Techno-mage:

Well, take this for what little it will profit you:

As I look at you, Ambassador Mollari, I see a great hand reaching out of the stars. The hand is your hand. And I hear sounds—the sounds of billions of people calling your name.

Londo Mollari:

[Brightens.]

My followers?

Elric the Techno-mage:

[Scowls.]

Your victims.

[Turns and walks away.]

— “The Geometry of Shadows” – Babylon 5, Season 2 (1995)

Jenson:

I’m told it’s old. Real old. Older than Mankind, even…. It’s an Apocalypse Box. You ever heard of an Apocalyse Box?

[Matthew Gideon shakes his head. Jenson leans in and lowers his voice.]

It gives you an edge. It knows things no one else knows….

[Possession of the box passes to Gideon. Jenson laughs then gives a sober warning.]

It lies. You, you know that? You have to be very careful, because…it lies. Not all the time. Just enough….

— “The Path of Sorrows” – Crusade (1999)

Marcus Cole:

The Minbari say the only way to understand the battle is to understand the language. War is as much concept as execution.

Dr. Stephen Franklin:

What else did they teach you?

Marcus Cole:

Delight. Respect. Compassion. That for your actions to be pure they must proceed from direction, determination, patience, and strength. I’m afraid I’m still working on patience. They taught me how to live, how to breathe, how to fight and how to die.

And they taught me terror. How to use it. And how to face it.

Dr. Stephen Franklin:

I think I’d like to hear more about that.

Marcus Cole:

No, you wouldn’t.

— “A Late Delivery from Avalon” – Babylon 5, Season 3 (1996)

Each [spaceship], as it approached the landing site, was disguised in a different, beautiful illusion. A silver fish wound among the evening stars, singing a haunting aria. A golden dragon breathed bouquets of flowers. A sailing ship rode the air currents. A giant model of an atom made a stately descent. A pinwheel of fire spiraled through the night. They were dreamers and shapers, singers and makers.

Once they had been greater in number. Yet in the past, more had been drawn to them for power than for understanding. Now they were five hundred, dedicated to learning, sharing the beauty of magic, doing good. For once no mage was in serious violation of the Code, and no feuds between mages seemed likely to erupt into violence. They were far from perfect, to be sure—eccentric, opinionated, intense, quick to anger—but Elric had never been more proud of them.

When he had been elected to the Circle nine years earlier, his feelings toward the mages had subtly changed. Before that, they had been his colleagues, his order, his clan, his family. Now they were also his responsibility. Joining the Circle had been a great honor, yet it was also a great burden, in ways he could never have anticipated. The mages’ past, and their future, lay in his trust. It was his charge to keep them safe and whole and focused on the Code. He felt that responsibility keenly now.

The convocations were critical times of bonding and affirmation, and this one perhaps more than any other. The signs were uncertain, yet he felt a growing sense that things were changing, quietly but irrevocably, not only here on Soom but everywhere. A darkness was growing. The mages had to be unified in purpose and spirit, prepared for any danger that might threaten….

— Casting Shadows, chapter 2

Susan Ivanova:

Babylon 5 was last of the Babylon stations. There would never be another. It changed the future and it changed us.

It taught us that we have to create the future…or others will do it for us. It taught us that we have to care for one another; because if we don’t, who will? And that true strength sometimes comes from the most unlikely of places.

Mostly, though, I think it gave us hope that there can always be new beginnings. Even for people like us.

— “Sleeping In Light” – Babylon 5, Season 5 (1998)