Babylon 5 Baptism of Fire Claudia Christian (epub)

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.BAPTISM OF FIREPROLOGUECaptain Susan Ivanova felt the vibration shudder through the deckplates of the Titans.The screen ahead of her displayed the green and red symbols that differentiated friendly ships from foes.A mass of red swarmed around the large green circle that represented her ship, like ants flowing out of a colony that had been unwittingly disturbed.Red lights blinked out as enemy vessels were torn from stem to stern by the Titans’ Heavy Particle Beam Cannons, or blown apart by the continued salvos from the missile batteries.On the array of monitors the emptiness of space was a barely visible backdrop to the fiery criss-crossing of plasma weapon burst.Even with the tiny green specks that denoted the Starfury squadrons, the numbers still did not add up and it was obvious that they were outnumbered.She grabbed the armrests of her chair as the ship was buffeted again.“Direct hit amidships,” Commander William Berensen announced calmly as sparks showered down across his console.An acrid smell drifted across the bridge and the exchange of small arms fire that echoed down the corridor and into the bridge seemed to be getting louder.Relay systems in the walls ruptured behind her and Ivanova turned to see her navigator, Lieutenant John Maddison, throw his hands up in front of his face as his console overloaded.“Damage to the navigational system, unable to take evasive action!” Maddison called out as he managed to avoid the full brunt of the explosion.He tilted his head back, keeping his left eye shut as blood ran down the side of his temple, pooled around the eye socket and continued down his cheek.It was impossible now to make a tactical withdrawal, Ivanova realised.All they could do was stand their ground and fight.“Full power to the forward batteries.Punch a hole through their hearts!” Ivanova ordered.“Particle beams, retargeting,” Berensen said.“Firing!”The monitor flared white as the full force of the particle beams ripped through the enemy ship.“Narn heavy cruiser disabled,” Lieutenant Commander Amelia Graydon announced, grabbing on to the railing in front of her station as the ship was rocked again by incoming fire.“Jump points opening!” she called out.“Where?” Ivanova asked, unable to see anything on the monitors.“Directly behind them,” Graydon said, her voice wavering.“It looks like reinforcements.”BABYLON 5ONEShe stretched out almost the full length of the station.Babylon 5.The last of the Babylon stations.Home to a quarter of a million humans and aliens wrapped in its two million, five hundred thousand tons of spinning metal.For once there was so sense of urgency.She could drift at her leisure.The waves of her long brown hair spread out around her as she curled herself around the warm glow of the fusion reactors.She felt the comforting pulse of its power spark through her like a heartbeat as her fingers traced lines through the miles of conduits that zig-zagged around the station bringing light and warmth and energy.She wrapped herself around the central core, turning gently with the station, as she floated down through Brown Sector, Green Sector, Red Sector and Blue Sector.She entered the lives of the Lurkers who had coming chasing a dream that had failed to materialise, the Dockers unloading the precious cargos from the multitude of transports filling the docking bays, and the alien ambassadors debating in the council chamber.On and on she moved, through businessmen hammering out deals and traders selling their wares in the Zocalo.They drank in the bars and ate in the restaurants.When the hustle and bustle got too much, they stood in quiet contemplation in the Zen Garden.She saw all this as she spiralled around toward Command and Control at the very front of the station.Few believed Babylon 5would succeed.It had united league nations and, at a cost, brought peace.For a while she had been part of it, but not any more.She wasn’t needed here.She wasn’t needed now.Just then, in that final instant, as it was time to turn her back after the final goodbyes, her diaphragm went into spasm as it inflated her lungs.As her back arched and the air was expelled in a rush, she felt not the station spread out around her but the soft cushion of the MedLab bed she was laid out on.She felt the tingle of her nerve endings, the rhythmic thump of her heart and the deep roaring in her ears as blood rushed to her brain.The muffled shouts that had been nothing more than distant echoes rose suddenly into an urgent din of voices.A blur of colour swum in front of her as she opened her eyes.She blinked, focused, and as the colours separated and shapes took form, her eyes jerked in their sockets she jumped from one orderly to the next as they swarmed around the bed, registering their looks of astonishment and fear.She tried to turn her head but it was locked, rigid in a metal brace that encompassed her.Her right arm felt numb and too heavy to move, but she found her left arm was free and, raising it, she clawed to freeherself while nurses endeavoured to hold her down.Only then did she notice the body slumped on the mattress.It lay face down but she recognized the black hair and the dark robes of the Anla’shok.As the nurses lifted the prone figure up, and she recognised the bearded face that lolled back in their arms, Susan Ivanova screamed and screamed until her lungs burned and her throat felt raw.Susan Ivanova sat on the corner of the sofa with her knees pulled up to her chest.Her robe hung loosely over the medical gown and her hair was a mass of tangles.The lighting in her quarters was dimmed, except above the small, circular table where Doctor Stephen Franklin sat with her medical file spread out in front of him.He had brought her something to eat but the meal remained untouched on the low table beside her as Ivanova stared blankly into the darkness.Rather than force her to have something, Franklin had left it until she was ready, and stayed to review the results of the recent tests he had performed on her.Leafing through the pages, he stopped and rubbed the bridge of his nose.He felt tired after the long journey from Mars to Babylon 5.Worse was the feeling of guilt from having failed to get back before it was too late.When he finally arrived, Franklin had found the medical staff congregated in the corridor outside the MedLab, fearful of going back inside.The facility looked like it had been turned over.He had found Ivanova curled up on the floor, wracked with guilt, broken by the pain.“What was that, the machine he used?” Ivanova asked, her voice little more than a whisper.When she had come round, Ivanova had found a bracelet strapped around her wrist that was attached to a similar bracelet strapped to Marcus.She had reached out for him, grabbed his hand in hers and was shocked to feel the coldness in his dry skin.As Ivanova looked over to Franklin for an answer she absently rubbed her wrist where she had been connected to the alien device.They had talked about it already in MedLab, but Franklin had noticed the circular nature of her conversation and was happy to accommodate her.“Remember that free clinic I set up in DownBelow for people who either didn’t have the credits for medication or just didn’t want to visit MedLab for treatment?” Franklin explained.“Well, one day the patients started to dry up.I discovered that instead of coming to me they were going to this woman, Laura Rosen.“I assumed she was just some quack faith healer.But she actually was treating them.Not with any more of medication but with this machine she had bought from an alien trader.Obviously it didn’t come with a handbook of any kind but she had got it to work nevertheless.Except, it did so by transferring the life energy from one person to another [ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]

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