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								<p>

								An elderly Minbari male arrives on the station and asks to be shown to

								Ambassador Delenn.

								<p>

								<img align=middle src="/lurk/gif/018/draal.gif"> Asking for directions.

								<p>

								Epsilon 3, the planet B5 is orbiting, is experiencing large earthquakes.

								Ivanova and Sinclair clear Dr. Tasaki, a geologist, to take a shuttle

								closer to the planet and collect data.

								<p>

								On his way to a negotiation session, Sinclair runs into Talia Winters

								waiting for the transport tube.  She comments that Garibaldi is always

								in the tube waiting for her, and sure enough, he's there when the door

								opens.  She opts to take the stairs.

								<p>

								As Dr. Tasaki's shuttle nears the surface of the planet, a powerful

								energy beam suddenly fires into space from below ground, knocking the

								shuttle out of control.  Ivanova orders two Starfuries to tow the

								shuttle back to base.  When he returns, Tasaki is eager to go down again

								the next day

								with more equipment, to try to figure out what's causing the beam.

								<p>

								Sinclair is presiding over a negotiation between Delenn and Londo about

								trade routes.  The negotiation proceeds smoothly, which Londo attributes

								to G'Kar's absence.  Delenn assures him that G'Kar's anger will fade

								with time, but Londo insists that the Narn hatred of the Centauri is

								intense enough to reduce Centauri Prime to ash if it could be made physical --

								and the Centauri react to that hatred by hating the Narn all the more.

								After Londo leaves, Delenn comments to Sinclair that if Londo is right,

								if future generations won't be born into a brighter world, "then life is

								pointless, and evolution vastly overrated."

								<p>

								<img align=middle src="/lurk/gif/018/negotiation.gif"> Londo describes the

								Narns' hatred.

								<p>

								Later, Ivanova tells Sinclair that the beam is a signal, perhaps a beacon,

								though nobody has been able to decipher it.  She remarks that the day's

								Earth Force status report didn't say anything about the Mars colony, very

								unusual as it's mentioned every day.

								<p>

								Delenn is returning to her quarters when she's met by the Minbari male

								who boarded the station earlier.  His name is Draal, and he's an old

								teacher of hers.

								<p>

								Sinclair is preparing for bed, watching the news on TV.  The anchor is

								interrupted by a special report from the Mars colony: an armed revolt has

								begun, and heavy fighting is reported.  The news show is able to broadcast

								a few moments of a field report before the reporter is cut off.  Sinclair

								shuts off the television, disturbed.

								<p>

								Before he can contemplate further, a flickering image appears in midair

								across the room, an alien man who pleads for Sinclair's help before vanishing

								abruptly.

								<p>

								<img align=middle src="/lurk/gif/018/varn.gif"> Pleading for help.

								<p>

								The next morning, Sinclair and Ivanova talk about the situation on Mars

								over breakfast.  Sinclair, of course, was born there, and it's his home

								that's being blasted apart; but neither of them has friends or family

								there any more.  Garibaldi, according to Ivanova, is taking the news badly.

								<p>

								Draal joins Delenn in her quarters.  After thanking her for arranging for

								his quarters, he says that he left Minbar because it's changing for the

								worse, the people growing dissatisfied, self-involved to the exclusion of

								others; they've lost their sense of purpose.  He says that he's "going to

								the sea" -- journeying out into the sea of stars in the hopes of finding

								a place where he's needed.  Delenn is shocked.

								<p>

								Garibaldi tries to get a comm channel to Mars, but the government has imposed

								a communications blackout and he's not highly-placed enough to get through

								despite the blackout.

								<p>

								Ivanova briefs Dr. Tasaki and his crew, reminding them that the Starfuries

								escorting them are only designed for spaceflight and won't be able to help

								if the shuttle goes into the planet's atmosphere.  Tasaki agrees not to do

								that, and the shuttle and escort are launched.

								<p>

								<img align=middle src="/lurk/gif/018/brief.gif"> Ivanova briefs the shuttle

								crew.

								<p>

								Garibaldi goes to Talia and explains that when he was working security on

								Mars, he met and got involved with a woman named Lise Hampton.  It was serious,

								but when he accepted Sinclair's offer to come to Babylon 5, he and Lise broke

								up angry with each other.  They haven't spoken since, but now he's worried

								sick about her.  He asks Talia to try to get him a comm channel via the

								secret Psi Corps training facility on Mars -- a facility, Talia notes with

								surprise, that he's not supposed to know about.

								<p>

								<img align=middle src="/lurk/gif/018/garibaldi.gif"> Garibaldi talks

								about Lise.

								<p>

								Ignoring Ivanova's order, Tasaki takes the shuttle into the upper part of

								the atmosphere to get more detailed sensor readings.  Suddenly, a barrage

								of missiles is launched from the surface.  One of them strikes the shuttle,

								but after Ivanova has the Starfuries disorient the missiles from orbit,

								Tasaki and his crew manage to escape safely.

								<p>

								Back on the station, Tasaki shows Sinclair and Ivanova a high-resolution

								image he captured just after the missiles were launched.  It shows them

								coming from deep inside a fissure in the surface, five kilometers below

								the surface.  Sinclair easily convinces Ivanova that the two of them

								should take a shuttle down to take a closer look, justifying his presence

								because it might be a first contact.

								<p>

								<img align=middle src="/lurk/gif/018/tasaki.gif"> Tasaki describes the

								image.

								<p>

								Garibaldi is in the zocalo, looking miserable.  Londo cheers him up by

								telling him a story.  Londo was sitting in a club one day, looking miserable,

								when one of the dancers kissed him and told him it couldn't be that bad.

								He married her, regretted it the next morning, and has regretted it ever since.

								<p>

								On his way back to his quarters, Londo sees the same alien Sinclair saw

								earlier.  Once again, it asks for help, then vanishes.

								<p>

								With orbiting Starfuries disorienting the missiles, Sinclair and Ivanova

								take a shuttle into the fissure, where they discover an artificial tunnel

								in the rock face.  They land on a platform inside and put on breathers to

								go have a look around.

								<p>

								<img align=middle src="/lurk/gif/018/furyfire.gif"> Distracting the

								planetary defenses.

								<p>

								Talia speaks with a member of the Psi-Corps, someone at the Mars facility.

								The woman refuses to let Garibaldi have a link -- doing so would confirm the

								existence of the facility, and he might be asking for a channel just to

								find out if the place really exists -- but she offers to look Lise Hampton's

								name up in the files and see if she's all right.  Fighting is occuring

								less than a quarter-mile away from the facility, it seems; the Free Mars

								movement was much better armed and organized than anyone suspected.

								<p>

								Sinclair and Ivanova explore some smaller side tunnels on foot.  They

								pass a dead alien, then nearly stumble into a high-tech deathtrap, but

								Sinclair sees it in time and the two of them make it through uninjured.

								They find themselves on a bridge spanning what looks like the hollow core of

								a gargantuan machine, miles tall with huge parts moving up and down the

								walls.

								<p>

								<img align=middle src="/lurk/gif/018/bridge.gif"> Sinclair and Ivanova cross

								the bridge.

								<p>

								Delenn and Draal visit Londo, who complains that he's unable to comprehend

								Earth people.  As an example, he quotes a song he's been studying for a week.

								"It doesn't mean <em>anything</em>," he complains.

								<p>

								Talia visits Garibaldi in the command center and tells him Lise Hampton

								isn't on the survivor list.  Garibaldi refuses to believe that something

								has happened to her, but seems somewhat numb.

								<p>

								An earthquake cuts off the tunnel behind Sinclair and Ivanova.  Continuing

								forward, they see another projection of the alien Sinclair saw on the station.

								This time, though, the real alien is just around the corner, strapped into

								the center of a huge machine on the wall.  "Help me," he says, "or your

								people, <em>all</em> your people, will die."

								<p>

								They help him out of the machine and take him back to the shuttle.  With

								fighter cover, they head full-speed back toward the station.  Sinclair orders

								Garibaldi to have a medical team standing by.

								<p>

								Garibaldi is relieved to hear that they're returning, but his relief is cut

								short when a tech announces that a ship, a <em>big</em> ship, is coming through

								the jump gate.  He looks down at his computer display.  "What the hell?"

								<p>

								<strong>To be continued...</strong>

								<p>

								<h3>Synopsis by <a href="http://www.midwinter.com/~koreth/">Steven Grimm</a></h3>