[Ivanova hands Sheridan a teddy bear from the new gift shop.]
Ba-Bear-lon 5? Oh, he's a cute one. [Notices the initials on the shirt.] J.S.?
Oh, this is supposed to be me? [Suddenly turns grim.] I want it off my station. I want 'em all off my station. I want the whole place yanked out, boxed up, and shipped out by 0800 tomorrow. Is that clear?
Oh, and...[Takes the bear.]
...
[Warren Keffer responds to a report of a UFO outside the station.]
CCC&C
Babylon Control to Zeta-One. Any trace of that unidentified object?
WKWarren Keffer
Negative, Babylon Control. I don't see a...
[Said teddy bear hits his Starfury's viewport for a moment before drifting away again.]
CCC&C
Zeta-One, have you encountered unidentified object? Can you describe it?
KKeffer
Negative, Babylon Control. I don't think so. Not on a bet. Heading back to the barn.
You know, what the folks back home don't understand--the ones who've never left Earth--is just how dangerous space can be. Aside from incidents like this, just the everyday reality of living your days and nights in a big tin can surrounded by a vacuum. I remember my first time on a transport on the Moon-Mars run. I was just a kid, maybe 17. A buddy of mine was messing around and zipping through the halls. And he hid in one of the airlocks. I don't know, I guess he was going to try to scare us or something. I don't know. But just as I got close, he must have hit the wrong button, because the air doors slammed shut, the space doors, opened, and he just flew out into space. And the one thing they never tell you is that you don't die instantly in vacuum. He just hung there, against the black, like a puppet with his strings all tangled up--or like one of those old cartoons where you run off the edge of a cliff and your legs keep going. You could see that he was trying to breathe, but there was nothing! And one thing I remember when they pulled in his body--his eyes were frozen. [long pause] A lot of people make jokes about spacing somebody, about shoving somebody out an airlock. I don't think it's funny. Never will.
[ISN reporter Cynthia Torqueman interviews G'Kar about the old Narn-Centauri war.]
My family lived in G'Kamazad, one of the larger cities on Narn. My father..."served" in a Centauri household during the last years of the rebellion. I was barely a pouchling at the time. My mother was ill, unable to escape through the underground, so we all stayed. It was a difficult time. We were striking deep into Centauri resources. Things were tense. One day my father spilled a cup of hot jala on the mistress of the house and...and she had him killed. They took him out, tied his hands together, and hung him from a jalwah tree for three days. I came to him the last night, against my mother's orders, and he looked down at me. He said he was proud, and to go and fight, and be all the things he never was. Then he died. The next morning I ran away and killed my first Centauri.
CTCynthia Torqueman
Why do you think they invaded back then?
Why does any advanced civilization seek to destroy a less-advanced one? Because the land is strategically valuable, because there are resources that can be cultivated and exploited, but most of all...simply because they can. You have experienced much the same on your own world. There are humans for whom the words "never again" carry special meaning. As they do for us.
[various answers to Torqueman's final question: "Given the danger, at the end of the day...is it worth it?"]
Absolutely. Sure, when things get tense out here, we have to be careful. Our search of the Centauri vessels we captured proved that they were bringing in weapons of mass destruction, offloading them outside the station, and sending them on to the front lines. Now that we know that, we can make sure it doesn't happen any more. We learn. It's what humans do.
Misunderstandings aside, yes! I definitely think it's worth it. We must simply work harder to make sure we communicate with one another to prevent this sort of tragic situation from ever happening again! A violent attack by Narn forces is an unacceptable response to a peaceful protest by my government. And with the intervention of Earth, perhaps we can keep them from making a similar mistake in the future.
I don't know any more. I used to think so, but now...
Of course it is. For the simple reason that no one else would ever build a place like this. Humans share one unique quality: They build communities. If the Narns or Centauri or any other race built a station like this, it would be used only by their own people. But everywhere humans go, they create communities out of diverse and sometimes hostile populations. It is a great gift, and a terrible responsibility--one that cannot be abandoned.
SQSenator Quantrell
Well...I guess we'll just have to see...won't we?
All right, Med 2--go, go! Look, if we weren't here right now, half the people in this room would be dead! Now that should be a good enough answer for anyone.
EDEduardo Delvientos
Sure! What, are you kidding? I have a retirement pension to make, you know?
Yes. But not for any of the reasons that you've probably been told. The job of Babylon 5 is not to enforce the peace. It's to create the peace. And this place was built on the assumption that we could work out our problems and build a better future. And that, to me, is the key issue. See, in the last few years, we've stumbled. We stumbled at the death of the President, the war, and on and on. And when you stumble a lot, you...you start looking at your feet. Well, we have to make people...lift their eyes back to the horizon, and see the line of ancestors behind us, saying, "Make my life have meaning." And to our inheritors before us, saying, "Create the world we will live in." I mean, w-we're not just...holding jobs and having dinner. We are in the process of building the future. That's what Babylon 5 is all about.
If restoring the Centauri Republic means nothing to you, what does? What do you want?
I'd like to live just long enough to be there when they cut off your head and stick it on a pike as a warning to the next ten generations that some favors come with too high a price. I would look up at your lifeless eyes and wave like this.
[He gives Morden a mockingly cheerful finger waggle.]
Can you and your associates arrange this for me, Mr. Morden?
[Franklin tells Ivanova what he sees when a patient dies.]
And then, just at the last, it's as if they look past you at something else, and the look on their face, it's like nothing you can describe. And then, just as they look past you--the moment that they look past you--you can't help but meet their gaze and just for an instant, you see God reflected in their eyes. [pauses] I've seen a lot of reflected gods today, Susan. And I'm wondering how we can keep believing in them, when they've stopped believing in us.
You ever studied ancient history? 20th century, World War II?
Well...not really. [grins] I always used to fall asleep in history class.
The Germans had a secret code they used for all their important messages. It was called "Enigma". What they didn't know was that the British had cracked the code. One day, Churchill's people intercepted a message authorizing the bombing of a city named Coventry. Now, if they evacuated Coventry, the Germans would know their code had been broken, and switch to another system. If that happened, it could cost the Allies the entire war. If they didn't evacuate the city, hundreds of innocent men, women, and children would die. [N]
They kept the secret. There was no evacuation. And on November 14, 1940, Coventry was destroyed. The dead were... piled up like cordwood! I--I've seen newsreels of Churchill visiting the ruins a few days later. And you can just see it in his eyes, the knowledge of what he'd done. Dark, haunted. All these years I've never been able to get that image out of my head.
Well, I'm glad it's a decision I don't have to make. I don't think I could live with myself. How many lives is a secret worth?
[Londo tells Vir about his friendship with Urza Jaddo.]
In dueling societies, it is customary for each member to be given a fighting name by his comrades! They said I fought like a crazed leati, and so they called me Paso Leati! Urza was known as Skal Tura--the silent beast! Those were great times, Vir! We were young, proud, fierce, bursting to prove ourselves to each other and to the world. Our starships ruled the spaceways, and our power was rivaled by that of the gods only! Ah, Great Maker, it was good to be a Centauri then!
Every generation of Centauri mourns for the golden days when their power was like unto the gods! It--it's counterproductive! I mean, why make history if you fail to learn by it?
You know, Vir, you have what the Earthers call a negative personality.
They are in pain. Frightened. Dying. Minbari are taught that, at such a times, the afflicted should be ministered to, comforted.
They're not your own people, Delenn!
I didn't know that similarity was required for the exercise of compassion.
[Delenn is in Sheridan's quartiers to ask permission for her and Lennier to enter the quarantine zone.]
All life is transitory. A dream. We all come together in the same place at the end of time. If I don't see you again here, I will see you in a little while, in the place where no shadows fall.
W--Delenn! [She stops and looks back.] When I do see you again...call me John?
