Babylon 5 1. Chrysalis

Chrysalis

Inside the Chrysalis, Delenn dreamed.

Dreams of youth. Her first year as an acolyte, finding herself lost in the corridors, finally running, frantic, only to come to closed door after closed door. Realizing only on the day of the closing examinations that she ought to have been studying the Centauri language this entire cycle, but had attended not a single day's instruction, and now she found herself staring at a screen covered with indecipherable symbols, the dread weight of despair settling all around.

Dreams of Babylon 5. Something dark and ancient was chasing her, always just out of sight. Her robes too thick, her strides too short. She always ended up in Brown Sector, pushing her way through moldy refuse, the sound of the creature's breathing becoming louder and louder. Delenn tried to cry out for help, but there was no one else there, no one at all, the whole station empty, and even if it were not, she hadn't breath enough to call out.

Dreams that were memories. Dukhat dying in her arms. Returning to Minbar only to learn that her father has passed beyond the Veil, his last message to her ringing endlessly in her ears, and she should have known, she had seen his eyes were dead even then. A human, in an Earthforce uniform, standing down at the end of a hallway, shouting out "_Isil'zha! Isil'zha!_"

Dreams of the future. Walking through the gardens with Jeffrey Sinclair, the warm pressure of his hand around hers. But in this dream she hadn't changed - he had. Her eyes traced the edges of his bone crest, solid and smooth as befitted a member of the religious caste. His skull free of rough human hair. The bridge of his nose wide and solid, shielding his eyes somewhat, making him look even more wise. Walking with this Sinclair, Delenn felt wholly at ease, as though some horrible wrong had been righted. She felt herself suffused not with love, but with a respect so deep that it bordered on awe. Here was her place in the universe, and some part of her she didn't even know was missing was restored. She was complete.

xxx

Delenn was swimming towards the surface, thick and oily liquid around her, seeming to grab with devious hands at her feet. Her lungs burned, and she kicked hard, but seemed to come no closer to the light she could see above her, cool and blue, whispering a promise of sweet air and comfort. Delenn caught on fire, the liquid around her not a liquid at all but flames, harsh, guttering flames, coal black. Her skin cracked, and the flames sank into her with relentless pressure. Horrible twisting and churning in her abdomen, her head surrounded and filled with a nameless agony.

Suddenly she was falling, bound with countless strands of rope. Delenn landed on a hard floor, tried to free herself, but her movements only tangled her more. Finally she was able to pull away the wispy strands, and she rolled onto her back, and breathed. The air had never smelled sweeter, and she drew in breath after breath, filling her lungs with it, remembering the tea they had drunk as acolytes so they might have visions of their true paths, wondering if good, clean air could have the same effect.

Delenn opened her eyes. She was in her quarters. She was awake.

She tried to sit up, but her muscles were weak and didn't answer as they should. She reached out a hand to grab the edge of the table beside her, and then she saw herself. The skin of her hand and arm was dark and thick, cracked like the floor of the river basin outside Tuzanor after a drought, looking not even like skin but instead the rough scales of some reptilian beast.

"In Valen's name," Delenn heard. The voice that said the words was awful, choked and guttural, and Delenn realized with a shuddery gasp of fear that the voice belonged to her, just as the dark, cracked skin belonged to her. She had thought the swim through fire to be a dream, the last of the dreams of the Chrysalis, but this was no dream. Something had gone wrong. Something had gone terribly wrong.

What had she become?

xxx

Delenn finally made her way to her bedroom, the long struggle to stand and walk finally abandoned, and she crawled to the closet and dragged down a robe. There was no pain, but she felt that if she moved too fast then her skin would finish cracking and fall off, exposing the flesh underneath. It was as though she had been carefully wrapped in broken glass, and the sensation was so unnerving that it took all the will-power she had to not start screaming. She was afraid that if she started, she would never stop. So Delenn pushed everything out of her mind except each task, one after another. Sit back on your ankles. Pull the robe around your back. One arm through the sleeve - gently, gently, don't catch the fabric on your skin. The other arm. Draw the robe around you. Tie it.

She needed to meditate. The candles were on the table, so she crawled back that way, one movement after another, slow, steady. Every sound so loud in her ears - the rasp of her breath, the thundering of her pulse, the hiss of her robe dragging on the floor. She carefully lit a candle, doing her best to ignore the way her heart hammered even faster at the sight of the tiny flame. She was tired, she was so tired, so instead of sitting before the candle she crawled to the corner, rested against the wall.

Delenn watched the flame, tried to slow her pulse, let herself enter the meditative state as familiar to her as breathing, the warm comfort like strong wings enfolding her, the tranquility like a soothing balm. But it wasn't working. The feeling of her skin, so alien, could not be banished from her mind. The thickness of it gave her a curiously hollow feeling, as though the essential part of her had been scooped out and this shriveled husk was all that was left behind.

The flame mocked her. It twinkled so gaily, with such an innocuous charm, but it was a lie. She couldn't look away. Delenn became sure that she had not actually lit the candle. She couldn't remember doing it, and she stared at the flame, at the lazy trail of smoke above it, and a deep certainty filled her - the evil that had chased her through the station, that dark and noisome thing borne out of some diseased womb, was here with her, in her quarters. It had lit the candle, to remind her of what it had done to her after it had caught her, the way it had set her on fire - for that was what had happened, wasn't it? Was there any other explanation for the state she was in, the visions of black fire eating away at her until she was nothing, just a shell?

It was with her, right now, watching her. Delenn looked around her quarters, frantic, but minutes (hours? days?) of staring at the flame had blinded her to the darkness, and everywhere she looked she saw only the afterimage of the bright light, always hiding the creature, it was always just behind it, and the fear grew and grew and the scream was right there, just behind her lips, when she saw him.

Sinclair, his kind eyes looking down at her, his hand tight around hers. His face, still his own and yet not, the face he should have had, the face of his soul, she thought, smiling down. Delenn tucked the image away, closed her eyes. One breath. Two. Three. The sensation of a presence melted away. Delenn opened her eyes, and the candle flame was just a flame, no dark harbinger of something evil just a few paces away. Still, it gave her no comfort, so she reached out a shaking hand to extinguish it.

Sinclair. She would have to see him soon, now that the Chrysalis was over. How could she bear to have him look at her? He would be repulsed, and all of this would be for naught. She was supposed to have made herself more like him, so that they could be together, not just as friends and allies, but as lovers, to be a bridge between Human and Minbari. Delenn looked down at her hands, her ugliness, and choked back a sob. She was supposed to carry his child! That had been her plan, hidden from the Council who would never have allowed it, who had only grudgingly gone along with only the idea of exploring the Chrysalis, who had authorized nothing. She had gone her own way, accelerated her plan, sure that when she emerged Sinclair would find her beautiful. And all the hurt and pain from the war, still carried by all of them ten years later, would be smoothed away. What a gesture it would have been! Satai Delenn of the Grey Council, the one truly responsible for the war (although the humans would never know that, could never know that), and Commander Jeffrey Sinclair, a survivor of The Line, side by side, bound by a force more strong than anything in the universe. And their child, a mingling of the bloods of Earth and Minbar, a symbol made flesh that no differences could stand between their peoples. He would have been the future.

All for nothing. Distantly Delenn thought she should be feeling something - anger, disappointment, despair - but she felt numb, nothing more. And it was with only half an ear that she heard her door slide open and shut, and saw Lennier enter and stare at the broken remains of the Chrysalis.


	2. Sheridan

Sheridan

Lennier helped her into the small ablution room off her bedroom, then stood somewhat nervously, apparently unsure of what she wanted of him next. Delenn clutched her robe tightly around her, the hood so low that she could see only the floor, and her feet, just as ugly as her hands. Dr. Franklin remained in the front section of her quarters; the last she had seen of him, he was perched awkwardly on the edge of a chair, medkit at his feet, muttering something into the link on his hand.

Lennier had called the doctor down immediately upon finding Delenn, and she had been too tired to care. Franklin had wanted to take her up to Medlab right away, begin a full examination, but she wouldn't allow it. Not yet, not until she could look at herself first.

"Thank you, Lennier." The voice was still more a croak than a voice; she hadn't spoken in over two weeks. She looked at her feet, and didn't see the plaintive look on Lennier's face as he backed out of the room, sliding the door shut as he went.

Delenn untied the robe, let it drop from her shoulders, but at the last second turned away from the mirror, unable to confront her reflection. Franklin had done something to her forearm; she had felt a peculiar pressure and then a cool, damp feeling - he had asked her if it was supposed to do that, and she'd had no idea what he'd meant. She was afraid to look at her arm, afraid that she was injured, afraid that she now looked even worse. She kept her eyes trained on the wall, stepped into the bathing stall. She had told Lennier and Franklin that she only wanted a moment to herself, a moment to see what she had become before she left the relative safety and security of her quarters. She guessed that Franklin would not want her to wash herself, that the Minbari chemicals might be terribly harmful to her new skin, and that if he knew her intentions he would have taken her to Medlab against her wishes, by force if need be. But Delenn felt dirty, fouled in some way she could not yet articulate to herself. She opened the valve to let the cleanser drip down over her, and at first thought the mechanism was blocked in some way, because she didn't feel the first steady drips on the top of her head. She reached up and touched the dispenser, and her fingers came away wet. She rubbed her thumb across the tips of her fingers, and saw the dark scales move.

Delenn's breath caught, and she pushed one of the scales aside, too astonished to be horrified. Instead of exposed flesh or pulsing blood, she saw only pink, healthy skin.

_Pink_ skin, not the cool, creamy white skin of the Minbari. She grappled with that thought only a heartbeat before she realized that the cleanser had begun to cover her, dripping down her arms and legs. She slid her hands over herself, and the scales fell away, and she stared amazed at the sudden beauty of her slender body, the skin so perfect and smooth, brand new. She opened the second valve, to rinse herself in cool water, and again the troubling sensation. Or lack of sensation, to be more accurate. She could not feel the water on the top of her head, not as she should; it was as though the feeling had been muffled somehow.

Delenn stepped out of the stall, a towel to dry off the remaining beads of water, and then she caught sight of herself in the mirror. There was a feeling in her stomach, the feeling she always had just before entering a jump gate, a feeling of there-but-not-there, and as she slowly brought up her hand to feel the dark brown hair falling around her face, she felt the feeling move up to her heart, her throat.

The hair was curiously soft. She had never touched human hair before, and had expected it to feel more like the bristles of an animal, sharp and prickly, but this was like silk against her sensitive fingertips. Delenn ran her fingers through it again and again, the feeling of the individual hairs tugging against the remnants of her bone crest so completely and totally foreign to her that for the first time the reality of her transformation came home to her.

"Delenn? Are you all right?" Lennier's voice through the door, but Delenn didn't hear it. She stared at herself, the crest encircling her head like a crown, the thick hair above and below it. The door opened, and Delenn might have laughed at Lennier's face, his eyes comically large as he took in the sight of her naked body, the frantic way he dove for her robe and hurriedly wrapped it around her, his sputtering apologies, but she didn't see him. She didn't see Franklin as he came up behind them both, didn't see him drop the device in his hand, didn't hear his almost reverent "My God" as he stared at her reflection.

A moment of shared wonder, then they left her again. She opened her robe to look at herself more fully, but her body looked essentially unchanged, as far as she could tell. No hair anywhere but the top of her head, and she let out a breath she didn't know she had been holding. She tied the robe, then leaned forward to study her face more clearly. At first she had thought the smaller bone crest and the hair were the only changes, but now she could see subtle differences here and there - her brow ridge was smoother, less defined. And the bridge of her nose was narrower, almost slim. Delenn didn't like it; now her nose looked unanchored somehow, as though it might just fall off. At least she didn't have eyebrows, those silly little patches of hair that served no purpose that she could discern. But she leaned closer, something about her eyes…

Hairs. Growing just above and below her eyes, so close that at first Delenn thought they actually were growing out of her eyes. She drew back, disgusted, and fled away from the mirror.

Lennier and Franklin stood in the threshold of her bedroom, and Lennier stepped up as soon as she left the ablution room. Hovered around her, and she knew he only wanted to help her in any way he could, but Delenn was suddenly seized by a wave of irritation so strong she feared she might lash out. She swallowed the emotion instead, disconcerted that she had felt something like that about Lennier in the first place.

"I would like to dress, please." She opened her closet, filled with thick padded robes, pulled out the first set she saw. Saw that Lennier had pulled her frosted doors closed, that she had privacy enough. She pulled the robes on, each layer another barrier between her and the world, and as she pinned on her brooch, she felt more like herself, centered, the universe around her shifting back to its rightful place. From the back of her closet Delenn pulled out a thin, white silk robe, one she hadn't worn in at least ten cycles, since she had last attended the Ritual of Planetary Renewal. She couldn't remember now why she had bothered to bring it with her to Babylon 5, considering how little space she had in her quarters, but it was perfect for her purpose now.

Delenn snapped the robe shut and pulled the hood over her head as she walked back into the main room. She pulled her hair to one side - again that strange sensation as it pulled against her bone crest, an almost pleasant sensation that sent a vague tingle along the back of her head and down her neck. Franklin still stared at her, a slight smile on his lips, very different from the look on Lennier's face - she could tell he was doing his best to appear supportive, positive, but she could tell that it was just a mask, that underneath he was worried, even dismayed.

"Ambassador, I've already arranged to have a private room for you up in Medlab," Franklin said, moving toward the door. "I'd like to keep you overnight - I don't expect there to be anything serious, but, well, you certainly present a unique case. We have no frame of reference." Delenn turned a brittle smile his way. "I appreciate your enthusiasm, Dr. Franklin, but I have more urgent matters to which I must attend." She turned to her aide. "Lennier, please arrange for a meeting with Commander Sinclair. As soon as his schedule permits."

She watched an ominous look pass between the two men, and then there was a long beat of awkward silence that continued to draw out long past when she would have expected an answer. "Lennier, what is it?" He turned to her, and she could tell that he did not want to speak, and a cold frisson of fear sparked through her stomach.

"Sinclair is no longer posted to Babylon 5."

At first Delenn literally could not understand his words. Every now and then she would find herself at a loss with the English language, but it usually happened when humans used their strange idioms and metaphors, or when the command staff fell into jargon and acronyms. At times like that, she would find herself hearing only the individual sounds of each syllable, and would sometimes lose the thread of the conversation as she tried to parse the meaning from what she'd heard. She ran Lennier's words through her mind again, and could not make herself face what she already knew was the truth.

"He is not on the station now? When will he return?" The looks on both their faces angered her, the syrupy pity she saw there, the condescension. "Lennier. Answer me."

"Sinclair has been named the first human Ambassador to Minbar. He departed several days after you entered the Chrysalis. Captain John Sheridan is the new military governor of Babylon 5."

Delenn closed her eyes. Her hands came up to her brooch, and she tried to reclaim that centered feeling she'd had only minutes ago, what now felt like days and days ago. But everything was wrong, all of her plans laid to waste, the most important plan of all now fouled nearly beyond hope of completion. And she could not go back.

She was tired, oh, so tired. She had emerged from the Chrysalis spent, her energy and reserves devoted to her change, and the hours since had seen her swing from one emotional extreme to another. She would give anything to just lock her door, set the Babcom to record, and sleep, sleep until she no longer remembered her plans, which now seemed so absurd, so steeped in pride.

"Then please arrange a meeting with this Captain Sheridan, Lennier."

Franklin took a step forward. "Ambassador, I still think-"

"I promise to submit to your examination and your tests, Doctor, but not tonight."

xxx

Delenn kept her hand securely on Lennier's elbow, allowing herself to be led, keeping her eyes on the floor beneath her feet. The hood of her robe was pulled so far down that she could see only a few inches at a time, but she didn't want anyone to see her en route to the Council Chambers. She didn't think there would be, what did the humans say? a scene, but she didn't want the distraction. Her control over the situation felt tenuous enough already.

Lennier stopped. "I will go in first, Delenn, and let the Captain know that you are here, and would like to speak with him." She nodded, and felt rather than saw him walk away and into the Chambers. Delenn reached out her hand, placed it against the wall. Took centering breaths. Lennier was back, nodding at her; she entered the room. Utter silence surrounded her, and she carefully made her way to the front of the table.

Delenn lifted her hood, and found herself face to face with a human in an Earthforce uniform, presumably the Captain Sheridan now running the station. He looked familiar, but she couldn't immediately place him. She dipped her head slightly, then launched into her little speech, the words memorized by rote even before she had entered the Chrysalis. She had meant to address the entire Council, but instead found herself speaking only to Sheridan, who was staring at her with the same dazed look that Franklin had worn, a half-smile on his lips. She wondered if this look meant that the humans were trying hard to not laugh at her, if her appearance was now nonsensically absurd in the way that they seemed to highly value in their form of humor.

But Delenn had been in politics for a long time, as a diplomat, as a member of the Grey Council, and she kept her worry off her face. She bowed again, and waited through another round of silence. Sheridan still didn't seem to know what to say; she watched his mouth open and close twice. Distantly, perhaps from the other end of the station, Londo said something about hoping that Delenn wouldn't start acting as irrationally as the other humans now that she had become their distant cousin. Delenn made her way to her usual seat, glancing back at Sheridan only to see his steady gaze following her. She sat, and discreetly grabbed onto the edge of the table to keep from spinning.


	3. Adjustments

Adjustments

The dream of flames. Every night since her change, Delenn had suffered through that particular agony again and again - the choked darkness around her, the surface always just tantalizingly out of reach, the black fire swirling and consuming. Tonight was different, though. The flames did not surround her but were inside of her, deep in her bones, and with each pulse of her heart they swept through her body, even down to her fingertips.

Delenn awoke, soaking wet. Her first thought was that Lennier must have seen her on fire and thrown water on her to put her out. As she became aware of her surroundings, of the glad fact of her wakefulness, Delenn pulled at her thick sleeping garments, dismayed by how they clung to her sticky body. She hadn't been able to have a full night's sleep since her change (and how she was coming to hate that phrase, springing up with sickening regularity; nothing tasted right _since her change_, strange moods and emotions swept through her _since her change_, she could no longer walk unnoticed through the station _since her change_), waking up sometimes two or three times like this, hot and wet and more uncomfortable than she'd ever been in her life.

She stripped off the sleeping garments, tossed them in the thermal unit, then stepped into her bathing stall. No need to use the cleanser; she let the water drip down over her, moving her hair aside to wet the back of her neck. Delenn stepped out, didn't bother with a towel, and stood underneath the main air recycling vent in her bedroom, the cool air making the water on her skin evaporate, sending a welcome shiver down her spine. A few curious bumps arose on her arms, her upper chest. Tomorrow (or today, she supposed) was her delayed appointment with Franklin. She could add the strange tiny bumps to her ever-growing list of oddities that had arisen since her change.

Dry and cool, Delenn idly thought about climbing back onto her bed just as she was, but since Lennier had a propensity of simply entering her quarters in the morning with notes and agendas and messages already prepared, and she didn't want to shock him any more than she already had, she pulled on a clean set of sleeping garments, her skin already protesting the lack of fresh air. The sheets on her bed were damp, and with a groan Delenn stripped them off, laid a fresh one on top and fervently hoped she would be able to get at least an hour or two of sleep before she had to begin yet another day.

xxx

"Now breathe deep. Good. Again." Franklin took his reading, then moved to another piece of equipment, scanning numbers and symbols. Delenn liked to see him work; she appreciated the seemingly effortless, quiet competency of any professional in his element, and seeing Franklin move about Medlab, running this diagnostic, that test, entering data into the computer, was almost like watching the careful steps of a ritual. It added a comforting note to this experience.

"I'm glad we did that physical so recently - gives me a good baseline to work from. Have you felt more warm than usual lately, as though you were running a fever?" Franklin asked, smiling as Delenn gasped.

"Yes! All of the time, especially when I try to sleep. How did you know?"

"Your body temperature is a full eight degrees higher than it used to be. I want you to breathe into this as hard as you can, for as long as you can." Delenn took the proffered tube and complied, finding that she ran out of air far earlier than she would have expected. Franklin continued, "You're only a degree or so cooler than the standard human body temperature now. I'd like to take your temperature on a regular basis, maybe once a week for the next few weeks, establish what exactly your standard is now. We're going to have to make quite a few unique standards for you, I think. Your lung capacity is diminished; did it feel that way to you?" Delenn nodded.

"Doctor, I have made a list of questions that have arisen the last several days. Could you take a look, please?" Delenn handed Franklin the notes she had written down this morning, and he read the sheet of paper, that same smile on his face, the one he'd had the entire time she'd been in this room, the smile that said _this is the most fun I've had doing this job in a long time_.

"Goosebumps."

Delenn was positive she hadn't heard him correctly. "A goose is a type of bird, yes? That some humans eat during their celebratory rituals?" Franklin laughed, not at her (she had heard some laughter directed at her in the last few days, and knew the difference), but in the way a parent might laugh when his child asks a particularly naïve question.

"The bumps you felt along your arms, I assume when you weren't wrapped up in all your heavy robes? We call those goosebumps. When humans used to have much thicker body hair, when they were cold or threatened, the follicles would stiffen, raising the hairs and trapping air against the skin. It made the body warmer, or appear bigger. Even though we've lost most of our body hair over the millennia, we still break out in goosebumps as our body tries to fluff up what hair it still has; one of those evolutionary quirks, I guess."

"I don't have hair on my arms, or anywhere but on my head and…my eyes." Franklin leaned close, and grinned. Delenn started to feel like some new exotic creature that had been discovered, and here was the first naturalist to catalogue her.

"You sure do. Eyelashes." Delenn leaned forward, gazed at his eyes just as he was gazing at hers. If anyone had happened to walk by and see them, they might have wondered at the Chief Doctor and the Minbari Ambassador staring at each other with great intensity, only inches apart.

"You have these eyelashes, as well. I have never looked close enough at a human to see them before. Do they also serve an outdated purpose?" Franklin leaned back, smiled that smile again.

"They protect your eyes, from particulates, sweat, insects." Delenn made a face, tried hard not to picture the great Deth'Na beetle trundling towards her eye, and failed, in the way one always fails to _not_ think about something. Franklin clapped a companionable hand on her shoulder as she shuddered. He looked back down at her list. "We covered why you're hot. I would imagine that food doesn't taste right because your taste buds have changed, but it may be a difference in your sinuses; in humans, sense of smell is an integral part of the sense of taste. You'll probably just have to experiment with seasonings, different foods." Delenn nodded, wishing she'd had the nerve to write about those bursts of emotional intensity, because she couldn't bring herself to ask out loud. It was simply too undignified.

"Well, that's it for today," Franklin said, gathering up his tools and putting them away. "I noticed a few changes in the arrangement of your internal organs, but I'll need to do a more thorough scan before I know more. Nothing pressing; why don't we schedule that for the day after tomorrow?"

"That should be fine; I'll have to check with Lennier," Delenn answered, a bit troubled at the idea that her organs were no longer where they ought to be. She hadn't expected for there to be as many changes as there were, but she chided herself at the thought; she hadn't done this for a purely aesthetic transformation, of course, and should bear the inconveniences of her new body with more dignity and calm than she had thus far. "Thank you, Doctor."

"Of course." His answer was perfunctory, rote. How could she impress upon him what a difference it made to know that her symptoms weren't unique only to her, or even worse, figments of her imagination? The little bumps signified nothing other than that she was cold; all humans had them. What a relief. How many times would Franklin be able to give her the same comfort in the future, to let her know she wasn't alone in some new, potentially frightening, experience? Delenn couldn't think of any way to say what she wanted to say, not without revealing how scared she was all the time, how worried she was that something would still end up being horribly wrong with her, so she only gently placed her hand on Franklin's arm and smiled at him, hoping he would see the extent of her gratitude in her eyes. As she left Medlab, she thought he had.

xxx

The three Workers chattered to themselves in Lenn'a, a language Delenn always found comforting to listen to; strong, concrete words, everything expressed in clear terms, no ambiguity or confusion - sometimes she thought about how simple her life would be if she had been called to the worker caste as opposed to the religious caste. She wouldn't have to always think of ways to answer questions without actually answering them, explain a situation while still leaving out the most pertinent details, all of the various half-truths and obfuscation that had become second nature to her now.

The workers finished their measurements, taken quickly and efficiently, and two left to attend to other customers. The third, her eyes suitably downcast, waited for Delenn to pull her outer robes back on. "Would you like to choose fabrics, Ambassador?"

"No, I have a Council meeting I must attend. I trust your judgment as far as colors and patterns go. Please just make the robes as light as possible, the thinnest material you have. Make them as though I would always be wearing them during the high summer in Yedor." Delenn finished dressing, already feeling too warm again. "When should I expect them to be finished?"

"Three standard days, I think, Ambassador." Delenn bowed her head slightly in thanks, left the shop. She was afraid she might be running late; she had spent more time in Medlab than Lennier's schedule had set aside. She pushed her way through the Zocolo, more crowded than usual - she was usually either in her quarters or in meetings at this time of day. Two Minbari passed her, and she granted them a slight smile, but they only turned away from her, whispering to each other. Delenn quickened her pace, head down, but she couldn't navigate that way and bumped into a Drazi. She remembered the brief moment, just after she had emerged from the Chrysalis, examining her scale-covered hands and arms, when she had been sure that something had gone wrong, and she had become a Minbari-Drazi hybrid. Remembered that moment of panic, which swiftly vanished only to be replaced by another, and another.

"Excuse me, my apologies," she stammered, but the Drazi was already gone, deep in the crowd, and Delenn pushed her way to the nearest shop, just for a chance to breathe.

There were tiny things hanging from the walls. Scraps of fabric and lace; black, white, some in bright colors, some nearly transparent. She would have thought them to be cleaning rags, were it not for the prices.

"Something I can help you with?" Delenn turned to see the shopkeeper, a pretty, young human girl, smiling at Delenn without artifice. How nice; she had not seen many welcoming smiles the last few days. She looked at the human's hair, the way it was braided and coiled on top of her head; she found herself noticing that kind of thing more and more often, but her bone crest limited what she could do with her own hair, and so she had just left it hanging down. She thought she might like to try doing something different with it, but not today.

"What are these, may I ask?"

"Nighties. I didn't think Minbari-"

"One wears these at night?" The shopkeeper nodded, that parent-with-a-silly-child smile on her face. Delenn took a closer look at the frilly and lacy and stringy things. They looked…cool. She imagined sleeping in one; skin exposed to the open air, what was covered only done so by the thinnest layer of fabric. But these were a little…too little. She did not think she would be able to wear them even in complete privacy without feeling ridiculous, immodest. "Do you have any that are not quite so…" She couldn't think of the right word, but the shopkeeper seemed to know what she was asking, and led Delenn to the back of the shop. There the nighties (what a silly word; but that seemed true of so many human words) had the same thin straps and low-cut necklines, but they were longer, would cover her legs.

"I'll take three of these," Delenn said, pulling out her credit chit. The shopkeeper scanned it. "Please have them sent to my quarters." She glanced at the timekeeper on the wall; the meeting would start in five minutes. She was always on time, usually early, but her schedule had changed so much since her change, everything taking longer than she was used to, and despite Lennier's best efforts she found herself running late all the time. Delenn took back her chit, smiled quickly at the shopkeeper, and left, not running, which would be completely inappropriate, but walking at a rather quick pace.

xxx

Too quick a pace, as it turned out. By the time Delenn reached the Council Chambers, she was hot and sticky with sweat. Minbari did not perspire, something she had always been glad of after she had learned how many other races did, especially the Centauri - the number of times she had been too close to Londo during meetings with the Council, as he harangued and paced and gesticulated, unable to look away as the sweat dripped down his face and even sometimes onto the table, Delenn could not count. Yet here she was, sweating herself, and it was awful, awful. She stood outside the Chambers, hoping to cool down a little bit before entering, wiping off her face, feeling obscurely like she was late to an instructional session and would soon face a scolding.

"If some of the representatives find themselves too frightened to vote for this measure, too cowed, perhaps we might ask ourselves why? It wouldn't have anything to do with Narn influence on their homeworlds, would it? Tell me, G'Kar, how many private meetings have you arranged recently?"

Delenn stepped in to see Londo strutting in the space between the main table and the risers of the non-aligned worlds. G'Kar flung himself out of his seat at the question, and Delenn was able to slip into her seat with little fanfare as everyone else watched the two men closely. Everyone except Captain Sheridan, that is, who dipped his head her way, a warm smile on his face. Delenn found herself helpless not to smile back, both wishing that he hadn't noticed her and pleased that he had.

"The Narn are not in the habit of coercing other races - I might think that you were the one visiting certain representatives, making certain…statements," G'Kar replied, the furious anger that always seemed to surround him making his voice tight. Londo laughed, too loudly, too exuberantly, as always.

"This is my proposal that we're discussing! Why would I threaten anyone? As though I am even capable of making threats. You're not making sense, not that that's anything new."

"Enough!" Sheridan said, his voice cutting through the din as the other representatives all tried to throw their comments in at the same time. "Every representative here is free to vote however he or she wishes without those motives being examined. This isn't a courtroom, Ambassador Mollari; your proposal has been voted down. Next order of business." Delenn smiled to herself as Londo sat down, grumbling, but neatly taken care of nonetheless. She looked through her agenda, impressed by how quickly the Captain had been able to establish himself in the Council. After Sinclair's calm, careful leadership, she had been worried that his replacement would fail to command the same respect from the diverse races all gathered here, many of whom seemed to look forward to opportunities for conflict more than they ever tried to accomplish anything of substance. But Sheridan-

The Brakiri ambassador was addressing the Council now. Delenn forced herself to focus.

xxx

"Ambassador? Could I walk you to your quarters?" Delenn looked up from her papers to see Captain Sheridan in front of her, that same steady smile on his face. Every now and then the representatives would be in a talkative mood after a Council meeting was over, but most times there was a great scramble for the exits, and Delenn usually busied herself with something until the Chambers cleared out. Aside from the Drazi and Markab ambassadors still arguing about something in the corner, Delenn and Sheridan were alone. She was glad; she had wanted to speak with him, get to know a little bit more about him, but hadn't had the time for a personal meeting yet.

"Of course, Captain. Thank you," she replied, and they walked out into the corridor side by side.

"I'm sorry I haven't had the chance to really talk with you since…since we met," he said. "I was worried when you weren't at the meeting at first. I was afraid I'd offended you."

"How could you have offended me?" Delenn watched as the Captain paused, seeming to pick his next words carefully. This was not how she expected this conversation to begin.

"I know the Minbari weren't pleased that I was assigned to Babylon 5." She shook her head. What was he talking about?

"I haven't had the opportunity to talk with my government since my change. I was unaware there was any concern over your appointment." Now he was looking at her with confusion. They reached the tube, and entered, and now that they were no longer walking and had no excuse to do otherwise, Delenn found herself looking straight at him.

And then she knew why he had seemed so familiar that first time she looked at him. Why his name seemed to be one she'd heard before. She had been so concerned with herself, with utterly mundane things like sweat and goosebumps, she hadn't even bothered to look up the most cursory information about the new Captain. "You're Starkiller." Sheridan nodded, looked both uncomfortable and worried and yet still proud. Delenn wanted to tell him that she was not angry with him, could not begrudge the humans their one paltry victory, and for a brief moment the thought _I was nearly Earthkiller, so don't feel guilty_ sprang unbidden to the forefront of her mind; she didn't know what to say, though, so she just smiled at him, shaking her head, wondering why the tube wasn't moving, noticing that the air was getting quite close.

"I'm not offended, not at all," she finally said, and the relief on his face was immediate. "I imagine you've been fairly busy. How have you settled in?" Sheridan looked around at the tube himself, the corners of his mouth turned down, and she heard the tiniest sound, a deep, gruff "Hmm" that for some reason she found captivating.

"Where are we going?" he asked, and she realized that the tube was still waiting for a command.

"Oh. Green Four." There, they were moving. She looked at him, and he looked at her, and even though their interaction thus far had been fairly awkward, Delenn was struck by how much she already liked him. He had a likeable face, one that was handsome for a human. She had already noticed his smile, and the dimples that framed it. His eyes were light; not blue, perhaps hazel. She was still looking at him. Who had spoken last? Had he asked her a question, and was he waiting for an answer?

"No, still settling in. Going well, it's going well. With a station this size, it's going to take a while to learn the ropes." She was glad that she had learned that particular phrase from Mr. Garibaldi and did not have to ask to what ropes he was referring. The tube stopped, the doors opened, and Sheridan held out an arm to indicate that she should leave first. As she did, she felt only the very slightest brush against her back, and realized he must have brought his hand up, only to take it immediately away. Perhaps she had not been moving quickly enough. Perhaps he was in a hurry. Delenn started walking at her usual pace, not at the more leisurely one she would have used while engaged in conversation. Of course he would be quite busy, and probably had only asked to accompany her to make sure the Minbari ambassador was not angry with him.

"I've been thinking about what you said, about why you did what you did. About being a bridge between our peoples, so we wouldn't have another war," Sheridan said as they arrived at her quarters. "And I was thinking that that's really the whole point of this station, that's why we're here. We're all bridges. And after that Council meeting, and refereeing between Londo and G'Kar, and some of the other crises that have already popped up, well, it's just a big relief to know how committed you are to peace. To know that you're going to be sitting at that table with me." He wasn't the best speaker in the world, but the sentiment itself…Delenn felt a prickle of tears at the back of her eyes, and swallowed hard. There had been laughter and derision and condescension and dismay, but this was the first time she had felt understanding and respect from someone else regarding her transformation. She looked up into Sheridan's face, his clear, open face, free of pretense, and was so happy that she was afraid she would just throw her arms around him. So she opened her door, and ducked inside, and took the opportunity to compose herself.

"Thank you, Captain. I have no doubts that we will work very well together, and I hope that we are able to guide the Council toward making wise decisions." She lowered her head, watched him return the gesture, and then he walked away. Her door closed, but Delenn just stood there, lost in thought.

Why had Earthgov sent Starkiller to run Babylon 5? Was it to send a message? But he had been perfectly polite to her, even cordial. She did not look like a Minbari anymore, though, or at least not like any Minbari anyone had ever seen; perhaps that made the difference. It would do no good to fret over it now; she would see what happened, although this felt like an auspicious start to their professional relationship.

There was a package on her counter, and Delenn looked at the slip of paper pinned to the top. _Thank you for your recent order - please let me know if there's anything I can help you with in the future! -Sherri. _Delenn opened the bag and pulled out her new night clothes. So light, so airy, and she found herself looking forward to sleeping tonight. There was something else at the bottom - a robe, with long sleeves and a single tie around the middle, but of a material only slightly thicker than the other garments. This would be perfect to pull on those mornings when Lennier arrived earlier than expected. Delenn made a mental note to send Sherri a thank-you message, perhaps a small gift.

xxx

The restaurant was the only one on the station with decent flarn, so Delenn found herself eating there on a regular basis. She wasn't much of a cook herself, and hated to ask Lennier, who was often busier than even she was. After lunch she had her scheduled scan with Franklin in Medlab, which she was not looking forward to, so she found herself without much of an appetite. There was a table of three Minbari warriors against the wall, halfway across the restaurant, and Delenn found that during a lull in the overall level of chatter that she could hear their conversation.

It was surprising. She would have thought them too far away to hear, especially since their voices weren't raised in the slightest. But she supposed that her new human ears, which had always struck her as absurdly large, did have a reason for their size after all. She kept her eyes on her plate, pushed the flarn around, and listened.

They were talking about her.

"I cannot believe the Council has allowed this to happen. It would be bad enough were any ordinary Minbari to go through such a transformation, but for the Federation's representative to Babylon 5? It's disgraceful."

"She looks like a freak. Like she was too close to the fusion reactor after an accident."

"You two can talk all you like, but I plan to do something. I've already submitted my request to speak with my clan's elders, and the warrior leadership here on the station. I will ask them to do what they can to remove her. She no longer represents our people, our voice."

Delenn gripped the edge of the table with her free hand, took deep breaths. She had expected this. These were only the instinctual reactions of warriors, who rarely approached a new situation with consideration or forethought. To remove her from the station would be an admission of weakness, would reflect poorly on the Grey Council. She had nothing to fear, and their opinions were meaningless.

"Why do you think she did it?"

"The religious caste were the ones who pushed for the surrender to the humans. Soft, spineless, the lot of them. She's probably a human fetishist, obsessed with the animals. I wouldn't be surprised to find out she's taken a human lover. It's bestiality, really."

She could take no more, and stood abruptly, her chair scraping loudly over the tiles. She knew that the warriors would notice her leaving, would put two and two together, but she didn't care. She left, head held high, but her cheeks were burning.

xxx

Delenn had redressed, and now waited patiently for Franklin to return. After he had performed the more thorough scan of her abdomen, he had left, saying something about analyzing the results immediately and saving her some time, and Dr. Hobbs had come in to give Delenn an internal examination. Delenn thought that Franklin both didn't feel entirely comfortable doing the exam himself, and that she would prefer a female physician. Humans could be quaint sometimes, the way they worried about gender, how often they let those concerns dictate decisions in their day-to-day lives. But Delenn didn't mind, if it meant that Franklin would be more at ease with her.

"Everything's just fine," Franklin said, entering the room. He sat across from Delenn, radiating ease, and she felt herself grow calm. She didn't want to admit it, but she had been a bit worried about what the results might have been. "Your uterus has increased in size by about thirty percent; human fetuses gestate longer, are larger at birth. Your other organs had to shift around a bit to make room."

"So my reproductive system will function correctly?" she asked. Then Franklin opened the folder he was carrying, shuffled through the papers, and she realized he was buying some time.

"The results on your blood tests have come back. I was curious to see if there had been any changes to your DNA, if your metamorphosis extended clear down to the genetic level. Now, this is just a preliminary diagnosis, I'd like to send off some of the blood work to the labs on Earth, maybe get a second or third opinion from some of my colleagues, but it does appear that there are sizeable differences, places in your genome that are more human than Minbari."

"What does that mean? That I am genetically compatible with humans?" Again the paper shuffling.

"It depends on what you mean by that," he answered, his eyes on hers, his voice measured, direct. "You and I are definitely more closely related than we were before. I could probably give you human blood if you needed a transfusion, maybe even human tissues should circumstances require it, although let's hope they never do. As far as reproduction goes, I think that if we were to use in vitro fertilization, you wouldn't have much trouble carrying a child to term. Overall you're still more Minbari than human, at least on a genetic level."

"I would not have trouble having a child with another Minbari, you mean," she said, aware of an ache just below her breast bone. Her fingers trembled, and she clasped her hands tightly in her lap.

"That's right. I doubt very much you could reproduce with a human. That's not something you were concerned about, were you?"

She heard herself answer as though she stood outside the room, felt a tight smile stretch across her face. "No, of course not. Thank you, Doctor." She stood to leave, and concentrated on moving one foot in front of the other, in keeping her face smooth and still.

"Ambassador? There are some other…symptoms you might experience as a result of the change in your reproductive system," Franklin said, standing himself. "We should probably go over them, just in case." Delenn had to get out, had to get back to her quarters, she didn't have much time left, she knew it, she knew that her hold over herself was tenuous at best.

"I'm very busy, Doctor. Perhaps some other time." Then she was out, knowing that she must appear very rude, knowing that Franklin had followed her a few steps. She heard him say, "Ambassador," again, but ignored him.

Out of Medlab, down the corridors, to the tube, through Green Sector. The whole time, faces turned her way; inquisitive, amused, angry, surprised. Delenn repeated a mantra in her head, timed it to her steps. _Everything is fine. You are fine. Everything will work out. This is where the universe wants you to be. There is a reason for this. You will be fine._

By the time she reached her quarters, she was shaking so badly she could hardly open her door. She set it to open by her voice command only, extinguished all the lights, closed the frosted doors to her bedroom and then locked the door to her ablution room, sat down inside the bathing stall, held her knees tight to her chest, and cried.


	4. A Change of Plans

A Change of Plans

The brush that Lennier had purchased for her in the Zocolo was clearly defective. Delenn had just washed her hair, and knew there was no dirt or oil or any other particles in it, knew that it was perfectly clean, and therefore the brush should be able to move through the individual strands quite easily. But it insisted on snagging toward the bottom, tugging the hairs hard, causing discomfort, even pain. She ended up having to spend more time getting ready than she usually did, and by the time she emerged into the front room of her quarters, Lennier was already waiting for her, the look on his face perfectly placid as always and yet she knew that he could not understand why she could not be ready exactly at the time he arrived so that they might begin work immediately. Lennier was many things to her - a diligent aide, a confidante, even a friend - but she did not think she could explain certain things to him. Not yet.

"Pardon my tardiness, Lennier," Delenn said, joining him at the table. He handed her the day's agenda, filled to the brim as always. A meeting with a Minbari merchant ship's captain at 0800, a request to attend the adoption ceremony of the son of a low-born but very wealthy family to an aristocratic but quite poor member of the Centaurum at 1000, a dispute between a worker and a warrior needed resolving and could she arbitrate at 1100, a meeting with a member of the Minbari warrior leadership here on the station at 1300, and so on, and so on. She begrudged having to spend her time on things like the adoption ceremony, where she knew she was invited only to function as a kind of living ornament, something to make the proceedings seem more important; but her attendance could end up being helpful in some unknown way later on, and besides, she hated the likelihood of Londo confronting her at some point over her absence. "All of this looks fine. Thank you, Lennier."

"Delenn, we've had more reports come in of problems in Sector 19. That is an area primarily under Minbari protection. Shall I forward the messages to the nearest Alyt?" He handed her the stack of reports. Raiders, sneak attacks, cargoes lost, a few casualties. Nothing new.

"No, I will convene a meeting of the Council in the next few days. That area might be primarily under our protection, but it also abuts Drazi space. And several races have met with violence. There is no reason why they could not send at least one ship."

Lennier nodded his head, understanding her perfectly. "You think this to be a good opportunity for the non-aligned worlds to practice working together."

"Indeed. Why don't you draft a letter to the local Alyt in the meantime? It does no good to be overly optimistic, and we may end up needing to take care of the problem ourselves. Is there anything else?"

"No, Delenn." Lennier gathered his papers together, made sure she had her agenda. "I'm sorry, there is something else. Dr. Franklin sent a request late last night; he wanted to know if you could make an appointment for your next 'check-up,' which I am assuming is a standard examination. Did you not already have two examinations in Medlab?"

Delenn did not want to talk about it, but also did not want Lennier worrying about her health. "The doctor only wishes to be thorough. You know that he is very interested in xenobiology; I think that he is simply enthusiastic about the opportunity to study me and my new physiology. It is not as though the universe abounds in hybrids."

"Of course. Shall I make the appointment for you? You have an opening in the afternoon the day after tomorrow."

"No. I am understanding of the doctor's desires, but have no desire of my own to be a test subject. Until I have an actual medical need, he shall have to resign himself to studying the data he already has on file. Thank you, Lennier."

Lennier's promptness in all matters was one of his best qualities to Delenn; after she dismissed him he wasted no time in leaving her, and she leaned back in her chair, feeling a few vertebrae shift and pop. She had indeed slept much easier since switching to human night clothes, and today she was wearing her new robes for the first time. The thinner material made an enormous difference, and she already felt she had more energy than she had since her change. The robes did hug her figure more, which was acceptable if out of the ordinary for a female Minbari. But the warm colors were becoming against her dark hair, and highlighted the blush in her cheeks, and it was with a feeling that perhaps she wasn't a freak, was maybe even a little bit attractive, albeit in a strange, exotic way, that Delenn left her quarters.

xxx

On a good day, it took thirty minutes to walk from her quarters to the Captain's office. Through corridors, up the tube, through more corridors, and everywhere people, people, people. They were accustomed to her new appearance now, or so she had thought, as yesterday she had drawn so few curious stares that she had been able to forget for a few moments that she was unique amongst all quarter-million souls aboard, unique in all the universe. But today there were glances, different from the stares and hard looks of the last two weeks; quick glances and lingering glances and embarrassed glances and appreciative glances. Most were from human men - a security officer, a pilot, a maintenance employee, several civilians - but she also caught a few human women looking her way, two Minbari workers, and one Narn.

Delenn found that the glances made her self-conscious. She missed the days she could traverse the station in relative anonymity. Her own people had recognized her, of course, and a handful of humans, the other ambassadors, but most of the time she could conduct her business in a quiet little undisturbed bubble. But the glances also made her feel good, even though she had done her best to remind herself that her value as a sentient being, as one tiny spark in the consciousness of the universe, was totally independent from her physical body. Still, enough people had looked at her with surprise and even disgust in the last two weeks to make her sometimes look at her own reflection in the same way, so she allowed herself a moment walking the last stretch of corridor to luxuriate in the sensation. She didn't even mind that her journey had taken her an extra ten minutes, and she was likely to be late to her first meeting.

Delenn entered the Captain's office, a twitch in her stomach as she turned the corner to approach his desk. She had not seen him since he had walked her back to her quarters after the last Council meeting, and found herself wondering if she would draw a glance from him as well, and if so, what kind of glance it might be.

His office was empty.

Delenn found herself at a loss. She stood in the middle of the empty room for one moment, then another. Should she sit and wait? Should she leave a note? How would she leave a note? She stepped forward and peered down at his desk, seeing handwriting that might have been his own, turning her head to get a better look. Footsteps just outside. Delenn jumped back, then tried to stand nonchalantly, one hand up in her hair, a new nervous tic that she couldn't seem to banish.

Ivanova entered, brisk and professional as always; she pulled up when she saw Delenn. "Ambassador? Something I can help you with?" She had one expressive eyebrow raised (perhaps that was their purpose?), as though expecting some other surprise. A nasty surprise, if the look on her face was any indication.

"I was hoping to speak with the Captain." Delenn was painfully aware of how odd she must look, just standing by herself in the empty office. Ivanova tossed a folder onto the desk, turned to leave, and called over her shoulder, "He's probably still down in the docking bay."

Delenn hurried to follow, wanting to ask what the Captain was doing in the docking bay, but lost Ivanova around a corner. It wouldn't be as long a walk down there, but she would be unable to make it to her meeting with the Minbari merchant without being so late as to give unavoidable offense. She ought to just send Sheridan a message, which would be simple enough; if she convened a meeting of the Council, would he be able to attend? She needn't have walked all the way up here to begin with, considering how busy her day was. If the Captain was in the docking bay then he was no doubt busy himself, probably overseeing some Starfury exercise or meeting an important dignitary. A message was the prudent, sensible thing to do. The Minbari thing to do.

Delenn walked back to Sheridan's office, turned on his Babcom system. Her finger hovered for a moment over the screen. She made a call.

Lennier's face, ready for whatever she had to say, as though he had been waiting in stasis in front of his screen for this specific moment.

"Lennier, please cancel my first meeting. Something has come up." She had just enough time to hear Lennier's assent, and then Delenn was making her way down to the docking bay.

xxx

Perhaps there had been some emergency, some vast, galactic crisis that necessitated that all two hundred and fifty thousand people aboard this station make their way directly between her and the docking bay. Delenn was tall for a Minbari female but still shorter than many of the members of the other races, and she pushed her way into the tube, unable to see anything but the chests and backs of the people surrounding her, and for one heart-shattering instant she was back inside the Chrysalis, her arms held tightly to her chest, the air thick and close. Panic swelled in her stomach, and she closed her eyes, tried to find that piece of still, quiet calm that always existed inside her heart, tried to keep her breathing steady, tried to keep sweat from beading up on her forehead. And just as she began to realize that she was going to fail, the tube doors opened and the occupants poured out.

Delenn leaned against the wall next to the tube for a moment, smoothing her hands over her robes, concentrating on the feel of the fabric under her fingers. She had ridden in crowded tubes before and never had such a reaction. She thought for an instant about asking Franklin about it, but it was too soon; she wasn't ready to face him yet. Then she thought about retreating to her quarters, pulling the walls around her and huddling in the cool, quiet darkness, telling Lennier to cancel everything, and she had almost made up her mind to get back in the tube and leave when she saw him.

Sheridan, accompanying another Earthforce officer, walking away from the docking bay in her direction. They were talking, laughing, and at the sight of her quarry Delenn thought she would feel relief, but instead her heart kept hammering away, faster than ever, and her palms felt damp and clammy.

"Valen, stand beside me," she whispered, and headed toward him. He saw her, their eyes locked, and then there was a flood of something inside her, something warm and good, and she could not keep the smile off her face, or out of her voice. "There you are." Sheridan's smile was brief, and he made the introductions to the human beside him, a pleasant-enough looking man who at first had The Look on his face, then The Glance. _You should not feel pleased at humans looking at you in that way, Delenn_, a voice in her head said, the little voice that was always there with a warning or a rebuke or some pertinent detail she'd allowed herself to forget; once that voice had been Dukhat's, but more and more often she imagined a tiny Lennier inside her mind, always ready to tell her something she didn't want to hear.

"Captain, I was hoping to convene a meeting of the Council later this week to discuss the problems in Sector 19." If she had not said _there you are_ upon seeing him, had not looked like the silly fog-headed acolyte she knew she had, he might think she had just run into him while about on her own business and remembered to bring up the meeting. Instead he would have to wonder why it was so important that she speak to him about something so trivial. She wondered the same herself. He was answering, his manner easy, telling her to let him know the time of the meeting, that he would be there, and she was grateful for this Maynard's presence, because now she could make her exit quickly, professionally, with more grace than she'd managed before. She walked past the two men, toward the docking bay, as though she had business to attend there.

Delenn sat down, next to families waiting to be reunited, and bored businesspeople, and disaffected souls lucky enough to be able to afford a ticket back home, and she waited until she didn't feel like she was going to break apart into a million pieces.

xxx

Delenn sat at the table in her quarters, waiting for her next appointment. The arbitration between the worker and the warrior had not gone well; she had been short, fractious, out of sorts. Neither had been happy with her decision, although both grudgingly agreed to go along with her terms. Now she was hungry, but nothing sounded good, and she didn't have time to eat anyway. Her body felt sore and tender, and she was tired, but her mind was racing, running over her brief encounter with Sheridan again and again.

What exactly had the look on his face meant? She knew that she had interrupted the conversation he was having with Maynard, someone he evidently knew well. On top of that, he was probably embarrassed at having to introduce her, having to field the inevitable questions about why she looked the way she did, what she had done, and why. It was the last thing he would want to talk about, she was sure.

She looked at her hands. Her knuckles were a little redder than usual, and the skin on the back of her hands was dry, rough. The same was true of her heels, her elbows, her knees. She could hear Franklin's voice. _Humans naturally have rougher skin, from when we used to be hairy, savage primates - the same gene pool you've willingly entered. Rough skin, useless bumps, ugly noses, hairy eyes and heads, nonfunctioning taste buds, all part of the human condition. There are probably some aspects of our race that are pleasant, even attractive, but you didn't seem to pick any of those up. Let me run another test…_

Her door chimed. She let in Teronn, a member of the warrior leadership on Babylon 5, an unusually quiet man for a warrior. Delenn had only met him a few times since the station had begun operating, but she liked him, respected him. They made their greetings - polite, the words the same as they always were, but she could sense something ugly going on. It was there in his eyes, in the clipped words, in the closed-off body language. As they finished the ritual pleasantries, Delenn found herself growing defensive, anger and frustration already boiling up inside her.

A long beat of silence. Teronn only looked at her, and she realized that he had kept himself several paces away, did not want to be too close to her, was at this very moment looking at her with distaste.

"I'm not sure I understand the intent of this meeting, Teronn," she said, facing away from him, unable to tolerate that look a second longer. She knew she was being rude, that her demeanor would only make the meeting more uncomfortable, but did not care.

"I have been delegated by others who…" He trailed off, and in that one moment between heartbeats, Delenn knew what was coming. Remembered that conversation she'd overheard at lunch, the warriors who didn't know she could hear (or maybe they did know, maybe they were glad she could hear, she had not even thought of that, not until this moment), and the one who had vowed to do what he could to remove her. Teronn continued, "Delenn, there is concern among our people here on Babylon 5. Meaning no disrespect, they worry that you are no longer one of us." How could he mean no disrespect, and say something like that to her?

"I am more one of us at this moment than I have ever been. More than you will ever know." And as she said the words, she realized they were true. Throughout the last two weeks, every day bringing with it some new challenge, some new change, she had never stopped thinking of herself as Minbari, never questioned her identity, not in the way it mattered most. No longer Minbari? He might as well say she was no longer alive. And she no longer feared the look on Teronn's face, no longer cared what he might think about her. She knew who she was. Turning to face him, she said, "I appreciate your concern, but there is nothing I can tell you at this time. Later."

"This cannot wait. We need to understand what is happening," Teronn immediately replied, not even listening to her. And suddenly her anger and frustration, her fatigue, the embarrassment over her meeting with Sheridan, even her dry skin and tangled hair, all of it merged to form a towering pillar of pride, and she rode it toward him, feeling the power in her limbs, an elemental power that made everything sharp and clear.

"Understanding is not required, only obedience."

He bowed, and she thought he sensed that power, but raising his head he said, "To our own kind, yes, but that is the question. Are you any longer our own kind? We have a right to know." Just as suddenly as it had arrived, that pride and power disappeared, like mist in a ray of sunlight, and she felt the doubts and worries flood back. "If you cannot give us what we need, we will ask permission to send a representative to speak directly with the Grey Council. Unless you object."

He had skated close to the line of outright disrespect and disobedience in the way he had spoken to her, but had not crossed it. But this…asking her permission was an obvious ploy. If Delenn did indeed object, she would only further damage her reputation on the station. Those who were suspicious of her would become only more so. Those who had been willing to wait, the few who had even accepted her, would wonder what she was hiding.

"No. No, I have no objections. Is there anything else?"

He had wanted her to object, she could see that, the disappointment on his face. But she would not make it that easy for them. Teronn left, and Delenn took a deep breath, thinking about the difficulties that lay ahead. A representative would be sent to the Grey Council, and she would be summoned, she knew that. Out of simple curiosity, if nothing else. What would the Council say? She had avoided thinking about the more far-reaching consequences of her change, of the fact that she had entered the Chrysalis without the Council's authorization. She thought again of that pride she had just felt, the pride that had given her power, that had made her feel herself again for just a brief moment. The pride she always used to feel, that had made her think she was fulfilling prophecy, that she alone knew what was necessary.

She had been proud, yes, too proud. And now there would be a reckoning.

xxx

Delenn and Lennier walked through Green Sector, and he was telling her something, some incident between a Gaim and a pak'ma'ra, and she nodded and smiled at the right times, but was not listening. One last meeting and then her day would be over. Lennier would probably want to go over his notes - he always worried that he might have missed transcribing each and every word perfectly, and that if he did there would be great chaos - but she was sure she could get rid of him quickly. Delenn knew that once she was alone the doubts and concerns would start gnawing at her mind again, that she would pace and worry, that she would sit down to work to try and distract herself but be unable to focus, that she would wish for Lennier's presence, but right now she just wanted to be alone.

Lennier had stopped, and she walked another few paces before she realized it. She turned, and he was looking at her, a question in his eyes. The lights dimmed, and her head seemed filled with fog, and she groped at the wall as she felt her knees buckle. The corridor twisted and turned around her, and Lennier's hands on her arms were solid and good, and she grabbed onto him.

"Delenn, what is it?" There was real fear in his voice, and she made herself stand up straight, even though the world was still spinning around her.

"Just a little dizziness. I am fine. I should have eaten earlier, but did not have time."

"I will make certain to schedule you more time between meetings at midday. This is my mistake." She tried to object, but he continued on; there was no stopping Lennier when he felt it was his duty to look after her. "I will cancel this meeting, and accompany you to Medlab."

"No, no. Lennier, that is not necessary."

"Then allow me to make an appointment with Dr. Franklin for tomorrow." She could not tell him no, so she nodded, and he led her back to the door he had stopped in front of, that she had passed while lost in her own thoughts. He pressed a button to announce their presence, and Delenn slipped her hand down to squeeze his, in thanks.

xxx

For the first time since her change, Delenn was ready in the morning before Lennier arrived. She thought about eating some breakfast, but had awakened with a vague nausea and decided to stick with water. She could probably have used these unexpected few minutes free to prepare for upcoming meetings, go over the reports from Sector 19, do something useful, but instead just brushed her hair. She had felt like a conquering hero this morning after finally loosening all the tangles, and now the brush running through the strands was relaxing, calming. She wished she could brush straight down from the crown of her head, but that was of course impossible with her bone crest in the way. She twirled the ends of her hair around her fingers, making little curls, liking the way they looked against the shoulders of her robes.

The door opened, and Lennier entered, clearly in a hurry. "Good morning, Delenn. How was your night?" Code for _did you nearly fall down in a faint again?_ She set her brush aside, made herself look bright-eyed and alert.

"I slept quite well, thank you, Lennier. You are busy this morning?"

"Yes. If you do not mind, I will give you your agenda and leave to attend to some personal business. It is nothing you need concern yourself about. I can of course rearrange it should you require my presence this morning." He stood in front of her, waiting, and Delenn was struck by how proud she was of him. How noble he looked, and smart, and kind. She sent up a silent thanks to the universe for the day he came to her.

"No, Lennier, have the day to yourself." He bowed and left, and Delenn picked up her agenda. Then she brought her fingers to her mouth, caught between smiling and biting her lips, momentarily overwhelmed. Her morning had only three meetings, with plenty of time between each; the last item on the agenda was her appointment with Franklin at 1300 hours. The rest of her afternoon and evening was free.

Lennier had obviously taken as many of her duties on himself as he could, given her as much freedom today as was possible. He did not wait in her quarters until she realized it, did not want any gratitude or praise; he did it because he knew she needed it, and because he wanted to. Delenn wiped away a tear, swallowed the rest, and ventured out of her quarters to greet the day.

xxx

The instant Delenn stepped into Medlab, she found herself in a near panic. That same feeling from the tube, on her way down to the docking bay, overcame her again. It was the smell of these rooms, the frequency of the lights humming, the temperature of the air. She made herself walk to her assigned room, where Franklin was already waiting.

"I'm glad you could make it, Ambassador. Please, have a seat." He gestured to the table, grabbed his preliminary diagnostic tool. She removed her outer robe, laid it beside her, and sat. The strongest urge to run, to flee, filled her completely. She bit the inside of her cheek, forced the urge away, looked straight ahead. "I'm sorry about what happened at the last exam," he said. "I didn't mean to make you uncomfortable."

"I am fine."

He started waving the wand over her, and she could see that he was taken aback by her abruptness. "Lennier tells me that you nearly fainted last night?"

"No."

Franklin waited, but she stared resolutely at the wall in front of her. There was a placard asking patients to inform their doctor if they experienced any of the following symptoms - coughs, chills, rashes. Some kind of infectious disease, she guessed. She wished there were a placard up there with her symptoms - panic, despair, fear, rage, worry. She would tell Franklin all about it, and he would say, _of course, we see that all the time - here, take these pills_, and that would be that.

"Ambassador, is there something wrong?"

"I do not understand the necessity of these frequent examinations, Doctor. I am fine." Delenn did not want him to speak to her. She did not want to make human small talk. She wanted this over and done with so she could get out of this place.

"Ambassador, you've been through quite a change. Even if I weren't curious from a scientific point of view, I'm still a doctor and you're my patient. I have to make sure you're not suffering any side effects from your…transition." Side effects? Her life was nothing but one large side effect, all the time. And he already knew about her increased body temperature, the change in her sensation of taste, probably knew that the changes in her reproductive system had upset her a great deal, so he was now just hoping to learn more than she had already told him. Likely he would not be satisfied with hearing that everything was fine, she was fine, nothing was wrong. Nothing was wrong at all. "So?" he asked, stopping and looking at her.

"Nothing of consequence. Momentary dizziness, fatigue, that's all."

"Nothing else is bothering you?" Delenn took a deep breath, knowing that if he pressed much more it would all come out, and it felt like a dam inside her was about to break. Then Franklin went on. "How are the other Minbari reacting to your situation?" And that reminded her of the meeting with Teronn, and she grabbed onto that anger, and used it to make the dam strong again.

"Fine." If she would not discuss the reaction of the other Minbari with Lennier, then she certainly would not discuss it with Franklin. She found his asking such a question presumptuous, as though that had anything to do with her health.

"They accept this without question?" This. Everything she was going through, reduced to _this. _She would not let him see her, would not let him see that the exact opposite was true, that as far as she could tell the only Minbari who accepted her (no, _this_) were a few workers and Lennier.

"Of course." Delenn smiled then, ready to finish the conversation for good, remind the doctor who exactly was in control of this situation. "So, when does the new delegation arrive?"

"What new delegation?" Ah, she had him.

"I don't know, I only heard Mr. Garibaldi mention to someone that he was awaiting their arrival. I believe they're called Bagna Cauda?" At this Franklin turned and sighed. The someone to whom Mr. Garibaldi had mentioned the bagna cauda had been Delenn herself, when they found themselves taking the tube down to Green Sector together. Two minutes of Garibaldi ranting about his new diet, then describing to Delenn in detail exactly what each individual bite tasted like, the texture, the butter melting and dripping, and Delenn, feeling more than vaguely nauseated, finally blocked him out entirely by slipping into a deep meditative state, which would be unacceptably rude with most people, but Garibaldi didn't seem to notice her absence at all.

Franklin was putting his tools away, muttering under his breath about calories and cholesterol, so Delenn slipped her outer robe back on, thanked him quietly, and made her exit.

xxx

Seven hours before she could even begin to think about going to bed, and Delenn didn't know what to do with herself. She tried to remember the last time she'd had a break more than fifteen or thirty minutes long, the last time she'd had the freedom to explore the station, shop in the Zocolo, eat a leisurely meal. She couldn't.

Unfortunately, she didn't feel like doing any of those things. Exploring the station would just lead to nasty looks from her own people; shopping would just remind her of all of the things she'd had to purchase recently to accommodate her new life; and even though she could feel hunger gnawing away just under her ribs, she had no appetite. She walked to a Babcom system, looked up this evening's scheduled entertainment. A 22nd century Earth vid, some kind of Brakiri sporting event, a Centauri opera.

No. Delenn didn't want to attend any of those things, because she knew that even sitting amongst dozens or even hundreds of others, she would be alone. If she explored the station or shopped or ate she would be alone. If she returned to her quarters she would be alone.

She would give anything to talk to Sinclair right now. He would understand, and without saying a word he would make her feel better, just by being there. It struck her all at once how acutely lonely she was on this station, how her days passed in an endless stream of work that she could either do in her sleep or taxed her to her limits, how the only person she could talk to she found herself unable to burden any more than she already had.

Delenn found herself walking to the Zen garden, which often happened when she lost herself in her own head. If she was going to be alone, she might as well be so in a place that she found peaceful, restorative. She turned to enter and stopped - a man was standing in the entrance, facing away from her. She could see just enough of his profile to recognize the Captain. Delenn paused a moment, unsure if she should disturb him, but she remembered conversations with Sinclair in this same garden and wanted desperately to have even a fraction of the same comfort.

"Captain," she said, and he turned to her. That jolt of nervousness to her core. "I can come back if you wish to be alone."

He immediately stopped her. "No, no, no. Please." She entered, thinking that maybe it was worth the turmoil to have just a second of the relief she felt at him inviting her into his presence. Maybe that was the price the universe demanded for happiness.

"I heard the news. I'm sorry for your loss." She didn't know how close Sheridan had been to the pilots, but knew that those in the military keenly felt the deaths of their comrades - especially an officer for those under his command - no matter how often it occurred.

A beat. She regretted bringing it up, then he said, "That's the hard part, isn't it? Sending young people out to die." He looked as lost as she felt. It hurt to look at.

"But they saved others. At the right moment, they were at the right place." Trying to comfort him, trying to say the right words to make him feel better. It was suddenly very important that she make him feel better. "They knew what to do. As you did."

"What makes you think this is the right place for me?" he asked, and she wondered that he could feel that way. How could he not know?

"The universe puts us in places where we can learn. They're never easy places, but they are right." And the universe was doing it to her, right now, making her say these words, feeling the truth of them in her bones. "Wherever we are is the right place, at the right time. The pain that sometimes comes is part of the process of constantly being born." He walked beside her into the garden, and she could no longer remember feeling anything other than what she felt at this moment, the rightness of her place in the universe.

"You sound like you've been doing some thinking about this on your own," he said, his voice soft. Was she that easy to read?

"Perhaps." She turned to him, and he was standing closer than she'd thought, and his eyes were on hers. He made that noise again, that "Hmm" sound, but more open than before, encouraging her to go on. "We are both, I suppose, going through…transitions." His gaze was too strong, and she had to turn away again. There was something happening to her, and her next words were to herself. "But the universe knows what it's doing."

Sheridan continued following her, and part of her wanted to run away. She was on the verge of something, some great discovery, and she felt herself standing on the edge of the abyss, not knowing what was ahead of her, wanting it and fearing it and needing it. It would be easier, safer to go back the way she'd come, but she wanted to jump, wanted to see what was out there. "I wish I had your faith in the universe," he said. "I just don't see it sometimes."

"Then I will tell you a great secret, Captain." Delenn turned back to him. "Perhaps the greatest of all time. The molecules of your body are the same molecules that make up this station, and the nebula outside, that burn inside the stars themselves. We are star stuff. We are the universe, made manifest, trying to figure itself out." He was looking at her, and she could feel it, whatever it was out there, rushing through her blood. "As we have both learned, sometimes the universe requires a change of perspective."

Sheridan smiled at her, nodded. They turned to walk back the other way, and his hand came up again, to guide her forward, and he wasn't trying to force her to move faster or anything like that, not at all. He was just being…she knew the word, she had to think, but then he was speaking again. "So is that what you tell yourself, those times when it all seems too much? That the universe is asking you to change your perspective?"

"Sometimes. Knowing something to be true and feeling it are two different things." He made that low sound again, and Delenn felt an electric current shoot down low through her abdomen. "I have had difficulty lately, remembering that I am but one part of the puzzle, that there is a reason behind every circumstance."

"So you don't feel you have control over your life? If we're all just where the universe wants us to be, then how does anyone have free will, have the ability to make their own decisions?"

"But we are the universe," she told him, and he laughed, shaking his head. "I have spoken with Mr. Garibaldi about this, although perhaps not in these terms. He says that some humans have a way of saying the same thing. That it is 'God's plan.'"

"I suppose that is the same thing," Sheridan said, thoughtful. "Maybe it all boils down to taking what comes at you with an open mind, and making the best of it." They were walking down the corridor now, back toward the front of the station. "Where are you headed?"

Delenn found herself strangely embarrassed. What would he think of her work ethic? "I have the evening free," she finally said, and was surprised when his face lit up.

"Me, too. I was going to catch the vid the Classic Film Society was showing tonight. Did you want to join me?" She thought again of what she had said to him, what she had really said to herself, and she nodded, not trusting herself to speak.

xxx

Sheridan walked her back to her quarters, and they chatted lightly about the vid, something about star-crossed lovers whose families fought against their being together. Delenn hadn't really paid too much attention to it, more interested in Sheridan sitting next to her, his quiet laughter, the way the flickering light from the screen played over his face. Humans tended to be taller and broader than Minbari, and Sheridan was tall even for a human, so she found herself very aware of his physical presence. She felt her awareness was not a bad thing. In fact, she had felt a very pleasant warmth all evening, nothing like the horrible heat she'd suffered those first few days after her change; a warmth that filled her, made her feel buoyant.

Sheridan had purchased the same popped corn that Garibaldi had once shared with her, when he had showed her his favorite entertainment, a duck who was constantly injuring himself. She had gingerly eaten some then and hadn't liked it, so when Sheridan casually offered her some just before the vid was about to start, she was afraid to offend him by refusing, but worried about eating something she knew she did not like, especially considering how much difficulty she had faced recently when it came to food.

But the popped corn was delicious, and she found herself making an involuntary sound of pleasure at the way it melted against her tongue, the saltiness so perfect, and she ate another piece, and another, her eyes closed. Her fingertips were greasy, and she licked them clean, and even that was bliss. It occurred to her that she ought to thank him, so she opened her eyes and looked his way. Sheridan was staring at her, his mouth slightly open. Delenn felt her cheeks grow hot; she had managed to embarrass herself in front of him again. "I'm sorry, I have not eaten yet today. I haven't eaten much recently, to be honest."

"Why not?" His voice was low, pitched only for her ear, and he had shifted in his seat to face her more fully. She stared at her hands in her lap, and found she could not lie to him.

"Nothing tastes good, and I have not felt well." He didn't answer, but she could feel him looking at her. Then the lights dimmed and the vid started up, and she drew in a shaky breath. They were having a nice time, and she had to ruin it. Then she saw he held the popped corn in front of her again, and he dipped his head low, next to hers. She could feel his breath against her hair, and shivered.

"It seems this tasted pretty good." She glanced his way, and there was that smile. Maybe the night wasn't ruined after all. She took another piece, feeling shy and brazen all at the same time.

Now they stood in front of her quarters. "You said you haven't felt well," he said, one arm braced against the wall above the door, leaning slightly forward. "Is that connected to your transformation?"

"Yes," she admitted. Sheridan shook his head slightly, looking down at her in a way she could not decipher.

"Did you know, before you began the process, what was going to happen?"

"Not exactly. I had an idea, but some of what I thought I knew turned out to be wrong." He started to say something, then changed his mind. He was looking at the floor, thinking, and she was about to thank him for a lovely evening when he swiftly looked up at her.

"I cannot imagine being that brave. Doing what you did. I don't know of anyone who would be able to change their very identity, let alone for such selfless reasons." And suddenly Delenn knew why she had felt such torment, why the despair and anger and hopelessness had built and built - she hadn't had selfless reasons. She had told herself they were, smug in her prophetic rightness, but they were selfish. All her grand plans, her visions of the future, they were about her, about her greatness, about her place in the universe.

Tears stung her eyes, and she tried to blink them away, but there was an ache in her throat that threatened to choke her. Delenn realized she was going to break down in front of him, and tried to cover her face.

"I'm sorry, I didn't mean…" he said, and his hands were hovering in the air on either side of her body.

"I'm sorry," she said, voice thick.

"No, I'm sorry," Sheridan retorted, and she looked up at him, surprised. There was a gleam in his eye, and she couldn't help but laugh even through a sob. She wanted to step forward and bury her face in his chest, wanted his arms around her, wanted it so much it hurt. And she thought maybe he wanted the same thing, but then the link on his hand beeped. It was Garibaldi, his tinny voice cutting through the air between them, and Delenn took the opportunity to breathe, dry her face, get herself under control. After Sheridan had assured the Chief he was on his way, he looked at her. Why couldn't she tell what he was thinking?

"Thank you for the evening, Captain. And do not apologize. What you said…means a lot to me." He nodded, the slightest movement of his head, his eyes never leaving hers. Then he put one hand on her upper arm, the barest pressure, a hint of a smile, and he walked away, down the corridor.

Delenn watched him until she could no longer see him, and stood in front of her door even longer, until finally someone else came her way. She let herself in.

xxx

It was late, but Delenn couldn't sleep. She laid on her back, hands clasped under her breasts, eyes pointed at the ceiling but seeing the stars above her head. She felt so at peace she simply could not give the feeling up, not for the sleep she needed, not for anything. The right person, at the right time. When she had emerged, it was not Sinclair here but Sheridan. Her body had changed, but not enough to allow her to bear a child to a human. She was where the universe wanted her.

Something dark was coming. Delenn knew that Babylon 5 would be at the crux of what was to come, that Sheridan would have an important part to play. He would need her, as an ally, as a friend. Whatever would happen, they would face it together - she vowed that now, in the dark.

She stood at the edge of the abyss. Something great and mysterious before her.

Delenn jumped.


	5. Girl Talk

Girl Talk

When the Minbari Advisory Board for the Babylon Project was first formed, Delenn was the first member chosen. Her early work took place on the _Valen'tha_, which of course used the Minbar calendar; early on in the Project, though, Delenn found herself having to use the Earth calendar more and more often. At first she could not keep track of the names of the days and months, the durations of time, and she was constantly thinking a particular meeting was two months away when it was in fact two weeks. But by the time she had arrived on Babylon 5, she rarely had to consult the conversion file on her computer (whereas she was constantly referring to her language translator, sometimes it felt like every day). And after two years, she had begun thinking in the Earth calendar first, measuring time in her head as minutes and hours, keeping track with weeks and months.

Until her change. Then everything became clearly delineated into two distinct periods of time - before her change, and after her change. Three days after her change she bought new clothes. Five days after her change she learned she would never carry a child. Nine days after her change she was accused of no longer being a Minbari. Two weeks after her change she dressed in the morning and didn't start at her reflection in the mirror for the first time.

Two weeks and three days after her change, she watched a vid with Sheridan. And she found herself keeping track of time from that day. It was three days after she watched the vid that she saw him next, on the other side of the Zocolo, and when their eyes met through the crowd his face lit up with a wide, tooth-filled smile. Delenn started to move his way but Garibaldi got to him first, and after only a few seconds of conversation the two immediately took off in the opposite direction. A brief pang of disappointment, then Delenn spent the rest of the day conjuring up the image of his smile.

Five days after she watched the vid with him, she was eating some taalor for her evening meal, trying to read some reports from home. Even though she knew it was fresh, it tasted like it had spoiled. There was nothing else to eat in her quarters, but she was too tired to brave going to a restaurant or even one of the food stalls. Delenn read through the list of restaurants who offered delivery for an extra exorbitant price, and the word _pizza_ caught her eye. It was a word Garibaldi had taught her on a day he had regaled her with stories of his favorite foods, which were all fried in oil and covered in cheese (or fried in cheese and covered in oil? she couldn't remember); at that instant something greasy and disgusting sounded like the most perfect thing in the world. Delenn ordered the pizza, at a loss when the young man taking her order asked what toppings she wanted, and said _yes _to the first thing he suggested.

She went back to her reports, and read the same note three times without having an idea what it actually said. The pizza arrived, and Delenn's first bite was the most wonderful thing she had ever eaten, making the popped corn she had eaten with Sheridan a distant memory. She felt, at that moment, that her soul and Garibaldi's soul were one. She ate first one piece, then another, and in seemingly no time the pizza was half-gone, and she finally made herself put it away before she made herself sick.

Six days after she watched the vid with Sheridan, Delenn awakened and instantly knew something was wrong. She was cold, terribly cold. She pulled on one of her old sets of robes, met with Lennier, and by the time he left she could feel sweat over every inch of her body, was so hot that she could hardly think. She climbed into her bathing stall, scrubbed herself with the chemical cleanser, feeling unreasonably filthy. By the time she dried off, she was cold again, and cramps had seized her. She had felt cramps in muscles needing oxygen after exerting herself, and occasionally cramps after eating food more rich than she was used to, but nothing like this. It felt as though great hands inside her abdomen had seized her organs and tissues and squeezed and wrenched and pulled. At first Delenn laid back down on her bed, but she finally curled up in a ball beside it on the floor.

The cramps passed long enough for her to brew an analgesic tea, and she sipped the hot liquid while pacing back and forth. It was twelve paces from her door to the far wall, but she turned one pace short to make counting easier. Eighteen circuits of her quarters later, she barely made it into her ablution room in time to vomit, the first time she had done so in nearly twenty cycles. After an eternity, Delenn found herself sitting on the floor, resting her forehead against the cool metal of the sink, shaking. She wanted to blame the pizza, but the cramps weren't in her stomach. They were lower, and as another cramp took hold, she knew there was something wrong with her reproductive system.

She knew she ought to call Dr. Franklin, or at least call Lennier, but she could not bear the idea. More tests, more examinations. Franklin looking over her like she was some lab specimen, something to be poked and prodded. Finally she dragged herself into her bathing stall, clothes and all, and turned the water on as hot as it would go, and after half an hour the cramps seemed to lessen, and then they were gone.

She stripped her sodden robes off and left them right on the floor. Delenn climbed onto her bed, not bothering with brushing out her hair or pulling on dry clothes. She felt weaker than she had after she had just emerged from the Chrysalis. It wasn't until afternoon slipped into evening that Delenn remembered that there had been a Council meeting that morning, that she had missed it entirely. She had been so looking forward to it, although she would not admit to herself why, even though she knew perfectly well. She laughed darkly at that; Minbari never tell the whole truth, even to themselves. She had been looking forward to seeing Sheridan again, had imagined talking to him after the meeting was over, had wondered if he would walk her back to her quarters. Would he have even noticed her absence? Feeling miserable and wretched, she was sure he did not.

Eight days after she watched the vid with Sheridan, her hands cracked and bled. She examined the skin on her elbows, and when she saw how much it looked like the scales from the Chrysalis, she calmly turned her mirror over to face the wall.

Ten days after she watched the vid with Sheridan, her brush failed entirely. No matter how carefully she tried to smooth the tangles out, they just grew worse and worse. She could feel the hairs snapping off, pulling out of her head painfully. The ones that pulled out of her bone crest hurt so much that she had to put her head down on the counter, bite her lips to keep from crying out. At one point, the brush got tangled up itself, and no matter how she turned it she could not pull it out. She started to panic, tugging it this way and that, and when she felt like finding a knife and cutting all of the hair off, Delenn called the one person she knew who she thought could help her.

xxx

Delenn had changed into what her father called home clothes, a loose tunic and trousers. She was already going to be acutely embarrassed, so why not be comfortable? Ivanova had expressed dismay that she used the traditional Minbari chemicals to clean herself, and Delenn found herself rambling about how Minbari did not perspire and had even brought up their night secretions when thankfully Ivanova cut her off. Of course, Delenn did perspire now, and her body no longer prepared the next layer of epidermis for exposure to the air while she slept, so she wondered why she had persisted using the same bathing techniques for as long as she did; it had not occurred to her to do anything else.

Now Ivanova stood behind her, carefully trying to untangle her hair. It was painful, no matter how slowly she worked, and Delenn could not keep a small cry from escaping her lips.

"I'm sorry. Your hair is just…destroyed," Ivanova said. She set the brush down, just touched the dry and brittle locks with her fingers, gently trying to separate the strands.

"Can it be saved?" Delenn asked, for a brief moment imagined all of it gone. She was surprised when her first thought was that she would no longer be pretty. When had she started to think of herself as pretty?

"Oh, sure. The first time I left home, I went to a summer camp outside Prague, and I had access to a swimming pool for the first time in my life."

"Swimming pool?"

"An artificial body of water, just to swim in. For recreation. Anyway," Ivanova went on, "you have to put certain chemicals in pools, to keep bacteria and algae from growing, and those chemicals can be pretty harsh. I was very young, I didn't realize you had to wash those chemicals off after you swim - I was a kid, and hey, I was getting wet, right? After, oh, six or seven days, you could have used my hair to feed a horse. One of the older girls sat me down, gave me a talk about hygiene among other things, straightened the whole thing out."

"What did she do?" Delenn imagined some complicated ritual, with many steps and the careful application of unguents. Ivanova came around and looked at her, then held up a finger.

"Stay right here. I'll be back. I have to get some stuff."

"What kind of stuff?"

"Just…stay."

xxx

Ivanova returned almost an hour later, carrying two huge bags.

"Commander, I am keeping you from your duties."

"You're not, and call me Susan. Doing your hair does not require me to be addressed by rank," Ivanova said, pulling items out of the bags and stacking them on the table beside Delenn's chair. This was clearly a more in-depth ritual than she had anticipated. Ivanova went on. "For the foreseeable future, I have taken off my Earthforce uniform and put on my spa…uniform."

Delenn looked her up and down. "You are still wearing your Earthforce uniform."

"It's a figure of speech." Delenn smiled at her then, and was gratified to see the surprise on Ivanova's face. "How often do you pretend you don't understand some English word or phrase?"

"Not often. Perhaps with Mr. Garibaldi - he delights in explaining things to me."

"Has he taught you any dirty jokes?"

"Many." Ivanova finished unpacking her purchases, then took off her jacket and surveyed Delenn's head.

"First things first, here's what you're going to use from now on. Shampoo for your hair. Lather up and rinse it out. And if your chemicals fried your hair like that, I imagine they dried out your skin, too." Delenn nodded, wondering why she had waited so long to call Ivanova, who was attacking this problem like it was a new alien threat to the station. "Human soap."

"It does not strip the top layer of the epidermis?" Ivanova shook her head, and Delenn felt unreasonably sad.

"It's important to you? This idea of rebirth?"

"Yes. So many things have changed," Delenn sighed, "but it was comforting, that this aspect of my life did not."

Ivanova looked at her for a moment with compassion, and then it was gone as if it had never been there. She rolled up the sleeves of her white shirt. "All right. Let's get started."

xxx

Ivanova had spread some kind of hot oil throughout her hair, then wrapped her whole head in a warm, damp towel. They talked for half an hour about Delenn's new appearance, and Ivanova laughed at Delenn's story of discovering goosebumps for the first time, and Delenn squirmed at the thought of using metal clamps to curl her eyelashes.

Delenn was in her bathing stall, rinsing the oil out of her hair. She thought about opening up to Ivanova, telling her about some of the other things that had happened recently. But as she toweled herself dry and put her home clothes back on, she felt she could not put any more of her own burdens on Ivanova's shoulders, not when the Commander was sacrificing her own time to do Delenn a favor.

"Have a seat," Ivanova ordered when Delenn came back into the main room. Ivanova combed the wet hair, which parted as easily as it had the first day Delenn had done so herself. She sighed in pleasure. "How do you usually dry your hair?"

"I rub it with a towel," Delenn said, wondering how else one would do it. "Some mornings I am in a hurry, so I must rub the hair quite violently."

"Yeah, that'll break it all off. Here, use this." Ivanova handed Delenn an instrument shaped like the human letter V. Delenn held it gingerly, looking it over. Ivanova took it back, placed it around the top of one lock of hair, closed the ends and drew them down. Delenn reached up - the hair was dry.

"How does this work?"

"A current or something, I have no idea." Ivanova dried the rest of her hair, then began winding it around metal cylinders. Delenn found her eyes growing heavy, found herself slipping toward sleep.

"Why does it feel better, when someone else touches your hair?"

"One of life's great mysteries," Ivanova said, fastening the last cylinder. "Franklin would probably go on about monkeys grooming each other, positive reinforcement for altruism, blah blah blah. I asked my mother once, probably when she was doing something just like this, and she told me that God found many ways to remind us that we needed other people, that some things are best if they aren't done alone."

Delenn smiled, then put a hand to her head, felt the cylinders stacked around it. "What do I look like?"

"A woman who is enjoying some well-deserved pampering."

xxx

Londo's celebration of the thirtieth anniversary of his Ascension was turning out to be a surprisingly nice occasion. Delenn had not realized how much she had been avoiding so many activities outside her necessary functions as Minbari Ambassador on the station until her third conversation with someone she used to see on a regular basis but hadn't seen since her change. Everyone was in such good spirits that she found it easy to blend in, and the mood seemed to be infectious.

Ivanova had helped her arrange her hair, and if Delenn was not mistaken, the Commander's expression in the mirror betrayed that she was quite proud of her achievement. Before Delenn could thank her properly, though, Ivanova excused herself quite neatly. Delenn thought she did not want to hear more thanks, would be embarrassed by too much gratitude. She owed Ivanova a favor, though, and did not know how she would ever repay her.

Delenn walked away from Mr. Garibaldi to find herself something to drink; mingling in a crowded room was thirsty work. Garibaldi had complimented her appearance, and by his quiet tone she thought the compliment was genuine. He had looked upset, had spoken of a woman he had taken to immediately - Ms. Winters, of course - and a man who had hurt her. She was not used to seeing Garibaldi at a loss, and the sight was unsettling somehow.

"We Minbari believe, as do some humans, that souls travel together. Some groups of souls are drawn one to the other in life, to relive good relationships from the past, and if possible, to make right the bad ones."

The words didn't seem to mean much to Garibaldi. For humans whose religious traditions did not include the concept of rebirth, the idea probably would not give much comfort or make much sense. But Delenn found herself thinking of her words again as Sheridan walked her way. She took a quick drink of cold water, remembering that the last time he had seen her, twelve days ago, she had been a weeping mess. But his smile was as wide as always, those dimples flashing, and he swept his eyes up and down her form.

"You look lovely, Ambassador." The same words as Mr. Garibaldi, but said in such a different tone. She felt blood rush to her cheeks, and in dipping her head in acknowledgement found herself looking at the Captain's bare feet. They were so incongruous under his dress uniform that she couldn't help the smile that overtook her.

"How are you enjoying the celebration?"

"It's a good party. And it's nice to a have a break," he said, selecting a drink of his own. "Although I got here a little late. I was halfway down and felt like I'd forgotten something, walked all the way back to my quarters, and just stood there. Finally realized it was my damn shoes."

Delenn laughed, but before she could respond she heard Londo's voice ring out. "Presents! I will be opening presents now! G'Kar, you did not bring me a present? I am hurt, truly."

Sheridan leaned close, whispered loudly. "I think he's going to start opening presents." They walked over to the crowd forming around the Centauri. Yes, she had known his soul before. Thinking back, she wondered if she had realized that the first moment she had seen him. She couldn't honestly remember much from the first few days after the Chrysalis - so much was a blur - but she liked to think so.

xxx

Walking with Ivanova toward the tube a few days later, she felt she had to thank her, one last time. If Londo's celebration had taken place while she had still been fighting with her hair, if she'd had to find a way to make herself presentable in such a state…Delenn did not think that Ivanova quite understood just what her help meant to her.

"Well, if you have any other problems, any other questions, just ask," Ivanova said. Delenn knew that Ivanova was just being polite, but she had to take advantage of the opportunity. If Ivanova told her that the cramps signaled a serious problem with her reproductive system, then she would go see Franklin. She couldn't imagine that there was any other explanation, but thought that perhaps Ivanova, after hearing of what had happened, would order Delenn to report to Medlab. And if Delenn refused, she would perhaps inform Captain Sheridan. That she could not let happen. She would have to see Franklin, to make sure Sheridan did not learn of her situation. So, having engineered a foolproof way to make herself see her own doctor, Delenn asked.

"Well, now that you mention it, do you have any idea why I suddenly started getting these odd cramps?"

Ivanova looked at her with a mixture of that same compassion from before, and something that told her that she was not going to like what she heard next.

"Blue Two," Ivanova commanded the tube, then shook her head. "Cramps. And you've never had them before?"

"No."

"Cramps…down low?" Ivanova gestured over her own abdomen, and Delenn nodded. "Franklin didn't talk to you about this?"

"Dr. Franklin told me that my reproductive system more closely resembled that of a human female."

"But he didn't go into…the rest…?"

The tube stopped, and the doors opened. Ivanova took Delenn's elbow, led her down the corridor, other crew members coming and going. Delenn felt every eye on her.

"Commander, there is a word I cannot remember, and I have not been able to find the right search parameters for my translation program. One uses the word to describe a human male, who is very kind to a female, courteous."

Ivanova gave her a look as they entered the Commander's quarters. "Do you mean 'gentleman?'"

"Yes, that is the word." Delenn stood just inside the door while Ivanova put a kettle on to boil. She waited for Ivanova to ask her why the question had occurred to her, or perhaps who had acted as a gentleman toward her, but her diversion didn't last long.

"So Franklin told you that your reproductive system was human, and that was it?"

The brief respite from the pertinent topic at hand had made Delenn reluctant to discuss it anymore. While Ivanova's back was turned, Delenn said quietly, "I did not wish to hear any more after he told me that I could not…" But she couldn't say the words, and stared at the floor.

"After he told you that you couldn't have children." Delenn nodded, and felt rather than saw Ivanova come to stand beside her. "Let's sit down," Ivanova said, and they went to the couch. Delenn clasped her fingers together tightly, concentrated on staying calm. She had resigned herself to this, it should no longer cause her pain. But there was an ache, not gone but just dormant for a while, and now it shuddered inside her again.

"Well," Ivanova said, slapping her hands against her knees, "we'll talk about cramps first. Sadly, this is one of those things that a lot of human women just have to deal with."

"They are not cause for alarm?"

"Of course they are, but what're you gonna do? Were they just irritating, or were they difficult to deal with?"

"It was the most horrible pain, Susan. I have never felt anything like it."

"Yep, had those before. Did you get hot and cold, throw up?"

"Throw what up?"

"Vomit."

"Yes. It was most upsetting. You have gone through such an experience?"

"I don't usually get them that bad, but a couple times, yeah. You can try to take something for the pain, but unless you get them every single month without fail, in which case you should see a doctor, go on something, it's best to try and weather the storm."

"Every month? What happens every month?"

The kettle began to whistle, and as the noise grew and grew, Delenn watched in growing horror as Ivanova turned pitying eyes her way.

xxx

Fifteen days after she watched the vid with Sheridan, Delenn awoke in the middle of the night, aware of a sticky wetness between her legs. She turned on the lights and examined the blood on her sheets, on her nightgown. Perhaps this was the reason she'd experienced the cramps; if she hadn't, she never would have spoken to Ivanova, would never have learned what the cramps signified, and would not have been prepared for this sight. She might have thought herself injured, even dying. As it was, she calmly threw everything into the thermal unit and pulled the small box of supplies Ivanova had given her from the back of the closet, where she had been reasonably sure Lennier would not find it and ask any questions she did not want to hear.

Ivanova had told her of human menstruation as though there was nothing worse to endure, but Delenn found herself smiling as she washed herself clean, arranged the absorbent cloth. Franklin had told her that conceiving would be difficult with a Minbari, nearly impossible with a human, that the changes in her genetic code made him think that any chance of offspring was slim. But her body had not listened. It had prepared to nurture a life anyway.

Maybe Franklin was right. Maybe he wasn't.


	6. Getting to Know You

Getting to Know You

Delenn awakened one morning, and, without knowing it, she was happy. Two weeks before, everything had started to work out. Ivanova had done so much more than just show her how to wash her hair; she had shown her that it was all right to let go of some of those artifacts from her old life that simply no longer applied. She had shown her that behind every uncomfortable aspect of her new existence, every trial and tribulation, there was a purpose.

Delenn had finally resolved how to repay Susan for all that she had done. Taking her lead from Lennier's example, she was not going to do anything that would only draw attention to herself, that would make the gesture about her and not about acknowledging her gratitude. She drew an adequate salary, on top of what was already paid to rent her quarters. Some necessarily went to her few material needs; some she used to assist Minbari on the station who were having trouble making ends meet; some she spent on financing certain trade missions, as an investment; some she donated to a fund to provide meals to those in Down Below; some she set aside. Delenn took half the credits from her savings and sent it home to Minbar, to the Sisters of Valeria; they would light a candle in Susan's name every day for the next two years, and in the light of that flame recite their morning devotionals.

Delenn hoped that her mother would light the first candle.

On that morning, the first morning since the Chrysalis that she had awakened without a cloud around her heart, Delenn used her new human shower for the first time. She had put in a request for maintenance to install it, and backed up as ever, they had only arrived to do so two days earlier. She bathed, and dressed, and prepared her hair, and it was so easy and trouble-free that by the time she was done it was already routine, and she could set her mind free, let it roam about and think and prepare and decide.

On that morning, she made breakfast for herself and Lennier, and the simple look of surprise and pleasure on his face was worth every minute of agony she'd endured. They had spent an entire day the week before working out which spices and Minbari ingredients no longer agreed with her new palate, a meticulous system of trial and error that Lennier seemed to relish. They finally discovered that it was the jenn that tasted rotten to her, and the hylax that tasted too sour; after expunging those two staples from her pantry, and sending out a memorandum to the restaurants on the station which prepared Minbari food explaining the importance of keeping them far away from anything the Ambassador ordered, Lennier was satisfied he had solved the problem.

On that morning, she left her quarters and, for the first time since the Chrysalis, was not on guard. She didn't check for exits, or keep track of the faces around her, or worry about every sound she heard. She was vaguely aware of a strange feeling, and once stopped, wondering what it was, but could not place it. It was the absence of fear.

On that morning, Delenn was heading down a corridor toward her first meeting when she saw the command staff came out of the mess, laughing boisterously, the sound like clear bells echoing between the bulkheads. She was thirty or so meters away, and they turned the opposite direction; just before they turned the corner, she saw Sheridan toss his head back, laughing, and slap Garibaldi hard on the shoulder. They were close, the four of them. A good team.

She needed to be a part of that team.

xxx

"Will he be ready?"

Delenn had been making her way through Green Sector when suddenly Kosh was there, his encounter suit looming ahead of her as though he had already been there, waiting, though she was sure she had not seen him.

"To whom are you referring?" She knew already, of course.

No answer. Kosh slid silently away, not waiting for her response. She knew her response had to be _yes_, but did not know if it was true.

Was Sheridan ready? The Shadows had returned, and Valen had foretold that the Minbari would join with the missing halves of their souls to fight against the darkness. There would be no alliance with Earth itself - Delenn had pinned her hopes to Babylon 5 long before Sheridan's arrival and the assassination of President Santiago, even before Kosh confirmed that the ancient enemy was stirring from its fastness on Z'ha'dum.

She didn't doubt Sheridan's military strengths, his strategic insights, his ability to command. He was Starkiller, after all. But would he be _ready_? Great sacrifices would be required, and no one is willing to sacrifice himself without knowing for what purpose. When the time came for Delenn to reveal to Sheridan the existence of the Shadows, their unfathomable strength, their insidious designs, he would have to trust her. That was imperative. She had vowed that night, in the dark, on the edge of the abyss, that she would be his greatest ally, that she would stand by his side during the coming storm, but that couldn't happen if he didn't trust her. Delenn felt that he respected her, perhaps even liked her, but did he trust her?

She didn't know.

xxx

Delenn needed someone to whom she could freely talk. Someone kind, someone who would listen with an open heart. She needed to speak with a female. A human female. She wished she could ask Ivanova, but the Commander would ask too many questions. Delenn didn't want any questions; she just wanted some answers.

She made her way through the Zocolo, ignoring the calls of the merchants from their booths, and entered the shop from which she had purchased her nightgowns. There, in the back, the human shopkeeper, with her pretty braids of hair. She was wrapping up an order, and thankfully the shop was empty.

"Might I trouble you for a moment?" Delenn asked, brushing past the lacy wisps of cloth. The shopkeeper - Sherri, that was her name - raised her head and beamed.

"Ambassador! I'm so glad to see you. I can't thank you enough for your gift - you really didn't have to do that. I haven't been able to afford real flowers since I've been on the station - I still have them in my room, although they're pretty dried out now."

"Of course I had to," Delenn said. "Mere credits were not adequate to express my thanks."

"Can I help you find something?"

"Actually," and she had planned this ahead of time, but found herself strangely embarrassed, as though the shopkeeper would instantly know about which man Delenn spoke, "I was hoping to ask for your help in a more personal matter."

"No problem," Sherri said, and she gestured to a small sofa at the back of the store. "Have a seat. Can I get you something to drink?"

"No, thank you. I have a meeting in thirty minutes. I will need to leave soon." Delenn stared at her hands, aware of Sherri's warm, pleasant face turned her way, and tried to think of where to begin. "When a Minbari female wishes to…learn more about a Minbari male, there is a specific way to do so. A clear path. One follows a series of rituals, designed to take the couple from mere acquaintance to an eternal bond, should they walk the path to its end. There is no ambiguity. As each ritual is completed, the couple decides if they wish to continue; to do so means they are pleased with what they have learned so far, about the other, and about themselves."

"That sounds…really nice. Seriously. I think my entire dating life could be summed up with the word 'ambiguity.'"

"It is a good system. But the male whom I wish to learn more about is not Minbari. He is…human."

"Ahh." Delenn finally turned to Sherri, who had the oddest look on her face, almost as if Delenn's admission had brought her great joy.

"If he were Minbari, I would know what to do next," Delenn said, finding it easier to breathe now that the hard part was over. "But I am not sure what the human rituals entail."

"I see. Well," Sherri said thoughtfully, her eyes looking around at the flimsy underclothes hanging all around, "I'd want to know how well you know this guy. Are you friends?"

Delenn looked around at the nighties herself. Was Sherri about to suggest…? "I would say that our interactions have been friendly. Our relationship is professional."

"And you'd like it to be more?"

"More what? I would like to know more about him."

"Would you like your relationship to be more…romantic?" That was a good question. Delenn's first thought wasn't a thought at all, but was instead the memory of his presence beside her when they watched the vid, that feeling of warmth. No, she did not want their relationship to become romantic. That wasn't the plan. She needed to learn more about him, and for him to learn more about her, so they might begin building a foundation of trust. That's all she wanted.

"I get it," Sherri said, and she put her hand over Delenn's. "You have to work with this guy, so even if you wanted to take it to the next step, you're afraid that it might make things messy. You don't want to ruin your professional relationship if things don't work out." Delenn stared at her, amazed. Was she an unlicensed telepath? The look on Delenn's face must have been humorous, because Sherri laughed. "You probably came here because I'm the only human girl you know, right? But I don't believe in coincidences. My mom was a matchmaker. I picked up a few tricks, watching her as a kid. You were definitely meant to come talk to me about this."

"I can see that now. The universe puts us in places where we can learn."

"You can ask him out to dinner. You want to get to know him more? That's how humans do it. While you eat, you can talk - about anything other than business. You probably talk enough business as it is. And if it goes well, you'll have dinner again in the future. At least, that's the way it usually works."

"If I ask him to dinner, will that signal to him that I am desirous of a more romantic relationship? Because I do not want him to think that."

Sherri stood, shaking her head, and started moving things around, wiping a cloth in her hand over the surfaces, even though the shop looked clean enough to Delenn already. "Oh, no. For humans, a dinner date is just a way to get to know each other, outside of whatever environment you usually interact in. It's just friendly. You said you were friendly?"

"Yes, quite friendly." Delenn stood, feeling much better now that she had a plan. "I shall ask him to dinner. Thank you again, Sherri." The shopkeeper turned, her smile infectious.

"You'll have to let me know how it goes."

"Of course."

xxx

Delenn was pleased with her plan. It was straightforward. She would find Captain Sheridan and ask him to join her for dinner. They would talk. She would learn more about him - she knew what kind of soldier he was, now she had to know what kind of person he was. He would begin to see her as more than just one of the ambassadors on the station. She would become his friend.

Simple.

Except that she could not find Captain Sheridan. After she left Sherri's shop, she was busy in meetings the rest of the day. Delenn had thought it would be easy enough to find the Captain and invite him to dinner the next day. True to his word, Lennier had scheduled her plenty of time between her meetings at midday; eating some kind of filled pastry while she walked, Delenn made her way to the Captain's office. It was empty.

It was empty the day after that, as well.

On the third day, Delenn recorded a message before she left her quarters in the morning, asking the Captain if she could arrange a time to speak with him. She stopped at every Babcom unit she passed as she made her way throughout the station on her way to and from meetings, ceremonies, a ritual meal, more meetings - no messages from Sheridan. She found herself growing anxious. The last time they had spoken had been at Londo's ascension anniversary. She had thought their conversation to be amicable, pleasant. She had not offended him, had she?

After she entered her quarters at the end of the day, the first thing she did was check the Babcom. No messages. Delenn ate a meal she didn't taste, wrote a report for the Council that no one would read, changed for bed. Lying there, looking at the ceiling, she found herself wondering if perhaps this wasn't the right time. Kosh had said the Shadows had returned, but it might be years before they began venturing forth in earnest. She was trying to accelerate her relationship with Sheridan, push it closer than it was at a faster pace than it would evolve at naturally. Perhaps that was not the right plan.

A beep from the other room. Captain Sheridan was on the line.

Did she have enough time to change? No, she didn't want to keep him waiting. She grabbed her light robe from beside her bed, tied it securely. As she walked to the Babcom, Delenn found herself smoothing her hair down, arranging it over her shoulders. She made herself lower her hands, clasp them in front. She stood ramrod straight.

"Accept call."

She could tell the moment his face appeared on the screen that Sheridan was tired. He had removed his jacket and unbuttoned his collar, and she could see his desk behind him, covered in papers. Clearly he was quite busy, overworked. His eyes swept her up and down, as though he didn't recognize her at first. Overworked, and she was adding to his burden.

"Ambassador, did I wake you?"

"No, I was not yet asleep."

"I'm sorry I didn't get back to you earlier. It's been one of those days. Your message said you wanted to speak with me?" What she wanted to do was go to his office, gather up all his papers and set them aside, and walk him to his quarters; she wanted to prepare some tea, watch him drink it, watch him relax; she wanted to see that careworn look leave his face; she wanted something else without even knowing what it was.

"It's not important," she said, unable to ask anything of him. "It's late, and you look tired. You should rest."

Delenn could see that he wanted to protest, but was too tired to do even that.

"You're sure it's not important?"

"It can wait. Good night, Captain."

"Good night, Ambassador." Then her screen went dark, and she felt a brief sting when his face was no longer before her. She continued to stand for a moment, thinking but not in words, feeling the quiet stillness of her quarters around her. She untied her robe and returned to her bed.

xxx

It was six days after meeting with Sherri before Delenn finally had the chance to speak with Sheridan. The fourth day she was too busy to even attempt to find him, and hoped during thirty seconds of quiet while in a tube that she might run into him by chance, or that he might even try to find her, but then she was out of the tube and thought about it no more.

The fifth day she went to his office at midday only to find Ivanova there, reading through an enormous binder overstuffed with papers.

"Commander, it is good to see you."

"How much are you charged for your quarters?" Ivanova demanded, not looking up.

"I'm not sure. The rent is paid by the Federation directly." Ivanova flipped through the binder, her face a storm cloud. "Commander, I was hoping to speak with the Captain."

"Is there a problem?"

"No, no problem," Delenn said, wishing she'd invented a problem before arriving. "I just had a question for him."

"I can take a message."

"That won't be necessary, Commander. Thank you." Delenn turned at the door and looked back at Ivanova, who had seemingly already forgotten that anyone had just spoken to her. She muttered darkly under her breath, and Delenn worried that she would rip the pages if she turned them any more roughly.

On the sixth day, Delenn had resigned herself to never seeing Sheridan again as long as she lived. The station was too big and filled with too many people, and even if she did nothing but walk the corridors all day she would never run into him. The next scheduled Council meeting wasn't for another three days; perhaps she would speak to him then. More likely, he would have to cancel or she would have to cancel or the Council would rip itself apart in the meantime or the station would implode. Maybe Epsilon Three's sun would go nova.

She was on her way to observe trade negotiations between the Gaim and a minor race whose name she couldn't even remember, thinking up other reasons why the Council meeting would not take place as scheduled (they could be drawn into an alternate universe where humans didn't even exist; then she certainly wouldn't be able to see Sheridan), and then there he was, right in front of her, walking with Franklin.

She was too relieved and surprised to even think about making herself look calm, even indifferent, and made straight for him. "Captain, there you are. I was looking for you." Delenn was aware of Franklin standing just behind Sheridan, listening intently. "May I speak to you for a moment…privately?"

Sheridan sent Franklin on his way, and as he turned back to her, it seemed that he was expecting her to drop another crisis in his lap; he looked guarded, tired. And Delenn realized that she had been so concerned with simply finding him in the first place that she had given no thought as to how she was going to ask him to dinner. She couldn't very well tell him the truth. _Captain, the day is coming when you and I will need to be very close allies, to lead the battle against the most fearsome enemy the galaxy has ever known. I need to get to know you, make sure you're the right person for the job._

"I was wondering if you could help me. This is difficult." What was the best way to ask him? What would he believe, that would seem on the surface to be the only reason yet still allow her to put her plan into motion? "If you could help me better understand what it is to be human."

She looked up at him, and he seemed taken aback. He barely said something, wanting her to go on. She remembered him telling her that she was brave, remembered him asking about her transformation; he was curious, but not unduly or for ignoble reasons. This would work. At least she hoped so; the look on his face wasn't particularly encouraging.

"Though I now look more like you, I am not one of you. And if I am to be a bridge of understanding between humans and Minbari, it would help if I knew more about your people."

"I see. Um, so, what would you suggest?"

"Dinner."

"Dinner?" He sounded surprised by that. She stopped and turned, and was not prepared to see the expression in his eyes. He looked confused, and she wondered if maybe he had not had a friendly dinner in quite some time, being as busy as he was.

"Dinner. In all my time here, I have rarely sat and just talked. With you, or with any other human. And I think that I would like to." There, she had put it so that it would seen she was not necessarily interested only in him, but in learning more about humans in general. She did not want him to get the wrong idea.

He stammered, "Talk about what?" And there it was, that smile.

"Anything. Everything. Except business and negotiations and whose trade agreement is being most unfair to the others." He made that sound she loved, and this time when the happiness bubbled up inside her, she knew what it was. "Just talk."

"All right," he said, "I'll set it up and get back to you. This evening okay?" She had thought that if he agreed, it would be some days before they would sit down together to eat. She had envisioned a day or two at least to prepare. But she didn't mind; now she wouldn't have time to fret and worry.

"Perfect. Until then, Captain."

"Ambassador," he said, the word translated through his smile and the low tone of his voice into something else. She headed back the way she'd come, then turned to see him leave. Sheridan was still watching her, something in his eyes, and Delenn quickly turned and made her way down the corridor, unsure of why he was still standing there, why he was watching her walk away. She had surprised him, that much was obvious. But she thought from his smile, from the way his eyes had remained on her, that it was a good surprise.

xxx

The trade negotiation had not gone well. The Cora'dai began the talks already assuming the Gaim were looking to cheat them, and the Gaim immediately went on the offensive. Within minutes the two sides were screaming at each other, translators unable to work out what must have been some truly colorful curses, filling the air with squawks and beeps and static. Delenn simply walked out of the room. She had been asked to provide advice, counsel, but there was nothing she could say until everyone calmed down. She decided to walk through the station while waiting for her next meeting, the last of the day. She felt on edge, anxious, and didn't know why.

She was on her way to the final meeting when Lennier found her. He bowed, face impassive as ever, but she could tell that he had been looking for her for some time.

"What is it, Lennier?"

"I have a message for you, from the Captain." He handed the note over. It read simply _Fresh Air restaurant 1930 hours._ "As that is only thirty minutes after the conclusion of your meeting with the Drazi ambassador, I hope you don't mind that I took the liberty of rescheduling."

"Not at all, Lennier. Thank you." He bowed again and left her. She remembered the days she had done the same tasks for Dukhat; she had felt she was always running from one dreadfully important job to another, never able to stay ahead of the endless stream of duties. The duties that, because they were Dukhat's, were also her own. She would have to schedule Lennier a brief respite from his work. Perhaps a week on Minbar; she was afraid that if he remained on the station he would find other ways of assisting her, which would involve more work, which was certainly not the point.

Back in her quarters, Delenn changed into her nicest set of robes. She looked at herself in the mirror and wondered what else she should do. She had seen human women with pigments applied to their faces, but owned none, and would not have known how to use them even if she did. She gathered her hair and pulled it up against the nape of her neck, and liked the way that looked, but had nothing with which to secure it.

She found herself pacing her quarters, a tight knot in her stomach. She had nearly two hours still to wait before meeting the Captain, and felt that was far too long and not nearly enough. She wasn't afraid that she would learn something about him that would throw her plans into question; already the business of making sure he was the right person seemed like a formality. What was she worried about, then?

xxx

Sherri was helping a customer when Delenn entered the shop. She took the opportunity to study the twists and coils of hair piled atop the human's head. It evinced a skill that reminded Delenn of fishing nets she had seen in Tadenn of Char's gallery - beautiful artistry and intricate work, and yet still completely functional. She wondered if the shopkeeper would mind teaching her; she did not want to overburden the young woman, who, judging from the hours she kept at the shop, was quite busy as it was.

Delenn looked through the tiny things hanging from the walls, wondering what possible purpose they might serve. There simply wasn't enough fabric to cover much of anything; certainly not enough to provide any warmth. She could see her fingers through this one, holding it up to the light. One might as well not wear anything at all.

"Thinking of trying one out?" Delenn turned to see Sherri just behind her, the customer gone.

"No. I was just thinking that…" But she didn't want to offend the shopkeeper.

"What? Go ahead."

"They just seem rather silly."

"Oh, they are. So, Ambassador, how was your dinner?"

"It is tonight. In about ninety minutes, actually." Delenn found it quite amusing, how happy the young woman seemed about all of this. She supposed the Minbari ambassador asking her for help in studying a human male would be a novelty, though. "I do not wish to bother you, but I was hoping you could help me with my hair. You have such lovely hair."

Delenn knew few people who were immune to praise. Sherri smiled very sweetly as she walked around Delenn, looking her over. "Is this what you're wearing?"

"Yes. It is not appropriate?"

"It's very pretty. I actually think your hair looks just right the way it is. It reminds me of old paintings. So, where are you eating?"

"The Fresh Air. I have never been. I do not believe they offer much Minbari food, and I am told it is rather expensive."

Sherri had an odd look on her face, and she looked Delenn up and down again, more seriously now.

"You made a reservation at the Fresh Air?"

"No, the Ca…my…my friend did." Sherri had one hand at her chin, appearing deep in study. Something seemed wrong. Perhaps the Fresh Air was not well-suited for conversation; some of the venues on the station were quite loud.

"You know, since you want to learn more about human rituals for this kind of thing, maybe you could wear the type of dress a human would wear if she were going out to dinner? It's just a thought."

"You do not think I would look strange?"

"No, not at all. Come on." And Sherri hurried to the back, flipped off the lights, then ushered Delenn out of the shop. She pulled the doors closed, locked down metal grating. Grabbed Delenn's hand and pulled her into the Zocolo.

xxx

Delenn didn't like the idea of a 'dressing room.' It seemed indecent to change out of her clothes while not in her quarters. But she supposed things could not get any worse. She had already had to change into human undergarments when her shift had been visible through the hole in this dress. She wasn't sure she was comfortable with this hole. The rest of the dress was very nice, covering her shoulders and arms and legs as it ought, even if it did cling rather tightly to her body. But the hole exposed her chest, the tops of her breasts, and all the rest of the dress did little to make her feel she wasn't going to walk out of this small room naked.

"Ambassador? Is everything okay?"

"I will need your help again with this metal locking mechanism." Delenn turned her back to the curtain, and felt Sherri come up behind her, pull up the tab that secured the dress around her. It was a poorly designed garment if it required assistance to put on. But Delenn did not wish to appear ungrateful, so she said nothing.

"All right, let's see it."

Delenn stepped out, and was gratified at the expression on Sherri's face. The human made a twirling gesture with a finger, and Delenn submitted, moving slowly around in a circle. "It looks all right?"

"This is definitely the dress. You look amazing with a capital amazing."

"I do not know about this." Delenn gestured to the hole in the dress, but Sherri only nodded her head emphatically.

"That's what makes it. Mitzi? I'm gonna do her hair in the back, okay?" The owner of the shop, an older woman whose eyes had not left the mini-vid player in her hands, nodded and muttered something. Sherri led Delenn into a storage room in the back of the shop, hands on her shoulders to push her down into a chair. Delenn was not used to so much physical contact; it seemed the human girl was always grabbing her hands or touching her back. But she found she didn't mind. And what she had said to Sheridan wasn't a complete ruse; she did want to learn more about humans, understand them. Humans were more physically demonstrative than Minbari; that was good to know.

Sherri had begun to work with Delenn's hair, and she felt herself relax. It was an immensely pleasurable feeling.

"How did you learn to arrange your hair that way?"

"It's the style on Orion Seven. That's where I'm from. Our dresses are actually a lot more like your robes than what you're wearing now - big drapey sleeves and all. Girls do each other's hair, learn how to do all the different kinds of braids. There are books, and instructional vids. 'A woman's hair is her crowning glory' - that's what my dad always said. I bought new clothes when I came to Babylon 5, but I couldn't imagine doing my hair any other way."

Sherri used some kind of metal rod on a few pieces of hair. Delenn could feel heat against her neck.

"Humans believe a female's hair to be important?"

"Some do. Women can do more with their hair than men, since men usually keep their hair short. It's a way to make yourself look unique, I guess. And a lot of men find hair attractive."

"Hair? What is attractive about hair?" Sherri laughed at that, her fingers gently touching the pins securing Delenn's hair, making sure everything was in place.

"I don't know. It's just pretty, I guess. You don't think your hair is pretty?" Delenn did, in fact, but it was more about the darkness around her face, the contrast with her eyes. And she liked the feel of it between her fingers, often found herself twirling a lock of it while deep in thought.

"I suppose. I am still adjusting to it."

Sherri came around front, looked Delenn over. "Okay. Looks good. We'll do just a little lipstick, mascara, maybe some light eyeshadow. You're so pretty, you don't need much."

"You think I am pretty?"

"Minbari have mirrors, right?" Delenn couldn't help but smile at that, and closed her eyes as Sherri prepared her pigments.

Feeling completely unlike herself, aware of the heaviness of her eyelashes and the slick balm on her lips, Delenn followed Sherri to the counter, where Mitzi continued to watch her vid. The shopkeeper scanned Delenn's credit chit without ever looking away from her screen.

"I'll drop your clothes off at your quarters," Sherri said, fixing a tiny piece of Delenn's hair.

"You are too kind. I cannot thank you enough."

"Shh. I'm having fun. Mitzi, look at the Ambassador. Doesn't she look great?"

The shopkeeper glanced up, grunted. "She'll definitely turn heads." Back to her vid.

"All right. You've got about fifteen minutes, and the Fresh Air's a bit of a walk. You better go. And I want to be debriefed at some point."

"I will make sure to." Suddenly Sherri was putting her arms around her, an easily and spontaneously given hug. Delenn found herself returning it.

"Good luck," the girl whispered, and Delenn smiled, left.

xxx

The walk from the dress shop to the restaurant had been a daunting one. People stopped what they were doing, conversations came to a halt, one man even followed her a few steps. Delenn began to worry that Sherri had been wrong, that wearing a human dress was a horrible breach of protocol, was offensive. But then Sheridan had given her the same open-mouthed, wide-eyed look when he saw her, and he had told her that she looked very attractive. Many Minbari facial expressions were similar in meaning to human ones, but she didn't think she would ever get used to how many human expressions had multiple interpretations. She had thought that look to be one of confusion, even shock, but apparently it also conveyed appreciation.

They were waiting for their appetizer, something stuffed with something else; many of the words on the menu were unfamiliar to her, so she had told Sheridan to pick out his favorite. While he had read the list, she had thought about the feeling that had sparked through her when he leaned over the back of her chair, the territorial quality he had possessed. What she had mostly thought about was how much she had liked it.

"I just think it's a load of bull. Just one more way they can demonstrate who really holds the reins." They had agreed not to talk business, but Sheridan had seemed to find himself unable to refrain from complaining about a rent increase on his quarters.

"I would not think sixty credits a week enough to make much difference in a budget the size of EarthForce's."

"Exactly! It's just a slap in the face, nothing more."

"What will happen if you do not comply?"

"Oh, who knows." Sheridan was looking out over the restaurant, jaw tight, thinking, and Delenn took the opportunity to study his profile. She hadn't seen him out of uniform before. He looked quite different, and yet not at all at the same time. It was very curious. "I'm sure they'll come up with something."

"You could afford to pay the thirty credits, could you not?"

"Sure. But that's not the point."

"So it is a matter of principle." He nodded, looked very serious. Intense. "You think EarthForce will come back with some other demand, or consequence for your inaction. Then you will continue to refuse, as a matter of principle. How far would you be willing to take this? What is it worth to you?" What would Sheridan do, what decision would he make, when he found himself between an irresistible force and an immovable object? She could not have asked for a better case study.

"I don't know. I do know that I do not want to back down, not if I can help it. Then the next time, when it's something that does matter, they might think they can push me into a corner again, expect me to just buckle, cave in, right like that. I'm the one who should be in control of this station, not just be a puppet, with EarthForce always pulling the strings."

"Is that not part of your military culture, though? To take orders."

"Every soldier has to ask himself, or herself, if those orders are just," Sheridan said, leaning over the table, pinning her with his eyes. "That's as much a part of wearing the uniform as anything else. Now, I'm not saying paying a few extra credits in rent is some huge moral dilemma. But at this point in my career, I think I've earned the right to not be treated like some common grunt."

Then the waiter arrived with their appetizer, and they were quiet for a moment, eating their first bites. Whatever it was, it was delicious, reminding Delenn a bit of foods flavored with jenn, at least the way they had tasted before her change.

"You like it?" Sheridan asked, smiling.

"Yes. I have had many interesting experiences with food recently."

"I bet. And you're feeling better?"

Delenn nodded, wishing she hadn't confided in him that night, feeling exposed. Although perhaps it was a good thing, to be a little vulnerable around him. Humans seemed to appreciate weaknesses in each other, provided they were minor. "It seems I have finally completed my period of…transition." His eyes were on hers, steady, not flitting up to her bone crest like so many other people's. She found she could not meet his gaze for long, and dropped her eyes back to her food, helpless to keep a smile from tugging at her lips.

xxx

They were waiting for their dessert. Delenn found herself almost uncomfortably full, but was loathe for the evening to end, so when the waiter suggested another course she agreed wholeheartedly. She had let Sheridan order for her again, and he had done so with an intriguing mix of enthusiasm and deference. She was reminded again of the word Susan had told her. Gentleman. She had looked it up in her computer, and felt that it could have no better definition than the man sitting in front of her.

She leaned forward, chin in hand, and studied his face. Sheridan withstood her scrutiny for only a moment. "What?"

"Every time I look at a human face, there is a moment when I am made aware of our difference. When I look and see…an alien. Someone who is not myself. And it is not the hair, or the lack of bone crest, or the nose. It is the eyebrows."

He leaned forward himself, smiling. "Really?"

"What I have found most peculiar is that I do not have this feeling when I look at you. I do not think, he is not my kind. There is no little jolt. And I have finally figured out why that is." She let the pause draw out, until he looked as though he might burst. "You do not have any eyebrows."

Sheridan sat back, the most delightful look on his face. He slapped the table top. "I do, too."

"No. I have looked. No eyebrows."

He laughed, then leaned forward again. Very close. "Then you didn't look close enough. I definitely have eyebrows." She leaned nearer herself. She knew he did have them; very light, both in color and thickness, but obviously there. But Delenn took the opportunity to get a clear look at his eyes. Hazel, as she'd thought; a lovely golden brown with flecks of green. She sat back, adjusted her napkin, enjoying herself.

"No eyebrows," she declared. He was laughing again, and the couple at the table next to them glanced their way.

"Delenn…"

"Do not be upset! This is a good thing. Eyebrows are ridiculous."

"Is that so?"

"They serve no purpose. They simply hang there, hairy and distressing. Often I have the hardest time paying attention when I speak with Mr. Garibaldi. I believe his eyebrows, what is the word? Hypnotize me." Sheridan was laughing hard now, his mirth contagious, but she made herself stay serious. "They are always moving, up and down." She used her hands to demonstrate. "And sometimes at angles. I find it particularly disturbing when they move independently of one another, the one up and the other down. And then when they draw together, and there is simply one long eyebrow stretching across the whole face?" She gave a shudder, and he actually put his head down on the table, he was laughing so hard. The entire back of the restaurant was looking their way, a few people chuckling themselves. The communal quality of humor was one of her favorite things about humans.

Sheridan's laughter lessened, and he held a hand over his stomach. "I have eyebrows," he said weakly, and wiped at his eyes.

"So you say." Now she watched him lean forward, chin in hand, mimicking her earlier pose. "What?"

"I'm trying to imagine what you would look like with eyebrows."

"Please don't. What an awful thought."

He reached out and took one of her loose tendrils of hair between his fingers, held it up until the end laid on her face where an eyebrow would be. He tilted his head, looking at her. She took a piece of hair from the other side of her head and held it up herself. Then she waggled it up and down, and couldn't help smiling at the little laugh he couldn't hold in.

"Do I look more like a human this way?" He released the hair and she did the same. He continued to look at her, and his gaze became more serious, felt more heavy upon her.

"I like the way you look, just like this." Delenn was aware her heart was beating harder, wondered if Sheridan could tell. She didn't know what to say, felt pinned by his gaze. Each second drew out, longer than the one before, and she felt she would be caught in this place forever, lost in his eyes.

The waiter seemed to appear from nowhere, setting their desserts before them, asking in sharp, loud tones about coffee or tea, and Delenn was able to tear her eyes away, center herself again. She had told Sheridan that she had finished her period of transition, and maybe that was true. But she felt that maybe she was entering a new time of change, that her transformation was not limited by only her physical differences from her old life. That the Chrysalis had done something not just to her body, but to her soul. Glancing up at him again, his eyes already on her, she was sure of it.

xxx

"Sir? I'm sorry, sir, but we have to close up." Their waiter, looking as though he'd rather go into battle with a Drazi armed with only his eye teeth. He couldn't quite manage to meet Sheridan's eye. Delenn looked around the restaurant; they were the only guests still there. The other tables were empty, the chairs stacked on top. She saw a lonely figure mopping the floor near the front.

"Oh," Sheridan said, aware of the same sight. "Of course. I hope we didn't inconvenience you."

"No, sir. Of course not, sir." Sheridan stood, took a few credit disks from his pocket and handed them to the young man as he shook his hand. "Thank you, sir." The waiter stepped back, and Sheridan held out his hand. Delenn looked at it a moment, not sure what he intended.

"They're kicking us out." She snapped out of her reverie, took his hand, and he helped her stand. They walked toward the front, and he released her hand. She felt a pang, but then felt his hand on her back, leading her forward. Delenn had not really thought much before the last few weeks how rarely she had any physical contact with another, and found herself soaking up the sensation like a sponge.

"Can I walk you to your quarters?" he asked as they exited the restaurant. The station was never empty, but there were far fewer people out and about than there usually were.

"I would like that." They turned down the next corridor and it was completely empty, no one in sight. She felt they were in their own private little world.

"So? How did you like the food?"

"It was delicious," she said, which was the truth. She had actually been surprised by how good everything had tasted. She generally thought of food as fuel, nothing more, and had rarely given it much thought until her change had thrown her usual habits into disarray. "Although I do not think I shall need to eat much tomorrow."

That little grunt of his. "No, I'm pretty well fortified myself, too." They walked in companionable silence for a while. She found herself remembering his remark that he did not think of Minbari as laughing. Delenn quite enjoyed laughing herself, and was surprised that he thought of her as humorless, as she did not think of herself that way. Surprised, and still a little stung. Which was ridiculous - he could not have had much personal contact with Minbari, and when he had, it was not likely anyone was laughing.

"Do you like jokes?" she asked.

"Yes. Do Minbari tell jokes?"

"No, but Mr. Garibaldi has been teaching me. Humans seem to appreciate surprise, a defying of expectations, the suffering of others, word play - which often escapes me - and self-deprecation."

"That's not what Minbari find funny?"

"We generally find humor in the failure to reach spiritual enlightenment." He grunted, seemed to think. "Of course, we have our own forms of word play, as when a single word means different things in the different Minbari languages. I would imagine they translate as poorly as some of your…what are they called?"

"Puns?"

"Yes, puns. These are the types of things one is not taught when learning a language. One must learn through immersion."

"Well, I'm not much for puns, but I am world-class at knock-knock jokes."

"Knock-knock?"

He demonstrated by knocking his fist against the wall. "So if someone knocked on your door, you would ask…?"

"Who is there?"

"Right. And then I answer, and you repeat it and add 'who' at the end. And then the punch line."

"This is the part of the joke that provokes laughter, yes?"

He nodded. "Okay. Knock knock." He was already smiling.

"Who is there?"

"Kosh."

"Kosh who?"

"Gesundheit!" And he chuckled, seeming very pleased with himself. Delenn smiled herself, but did not understand. "'Gesundheit' is German for 'bless you.'"

"I have heard humans say this after another sneezes."

"Right. Kosh-hoo!"

"Ah. I see it now." They were nearing her quarters. She could only walk so slow.

"You didn't think it was funny?"

"Be quiet. I am trying to think of a joke." She thought self-deprecation to be the best choice. Dukhat had always told her that a man who could not laugh at himself could not laugh. "Londo also likes human jokes, did you know that? He told me a joke once about a light bulb. I heard Mr. Garibaldi tell a joke about a light bulb as well, but the people involved and the 'punch line' were different."

"Just like a knock-knock joke," he said. "The possibilities are endless."

"Here is one, then. How many Minbari does it take to…now I don't remember."

"Screw in?"

"Yes, screw in a light bulb. What is a light bulb? The lights on this station are cylindrical." He was already lightly laughing, shaking his head, and she decided to go on. "How many Minbari does it take to screw in a light bulb?"

"I don't know. How many?"

"No one knows. They surrender before finishing the job, and never tell anyone why." Sheridan stopped dead in his tracks. Delenn turned, and the look of surprise on his face upset her. What had she done wrong? Then the surprise melted into laughter, as loud as it had been in the restaurant. She laughed herself, feeling effervescent, as light as air. He started walking again, his hand again on her back, and they turned the corner and there were her quarters.

They stopped in front of her door. He was very close. She would only have to raise her hand to touch him, and she grabbed onto her dress so that she wouldn't.

"Would you like to come in for some tea?" He looked down at her for a long beat, and it seemed his gaze dipped down once, to her lips.

"I would love to," Sheridan said, and she knew the rest of the sentence was coming before he said it, "but I have to make an early start in the morning." She nodded, anticipating his answer not making her disappointment any less. "I had a lovely evening. A great evening. The best evening I've had since I've been on the station."

She knew she was smiling too widely. "Me, too."

"The next time we both have an evening free, the same evening, we should do this again."

"I'd like that." Then he was looking at her again, as if he wanted to say something else. She wanted to say something but didn't know what. He finally started walking away. Delenn stood there, watching him leave as he had done the last time he had walked her to her quarters, but this time, halfway down the corridor, he turned to look at her again.

"Good night," he said. She felt that if she gave the slightest indication she wished him to do so, he would come back.

"Good night."

xxx

Delenn sat in the dark. Three days before, when he had called her late at night, she had looked at him on the screen and not known exactly what it was she wanted. Now she knew.

She wanted him.


	7. Never the Whole Truth

Never the Whole Truth

Delenn had never thought that she would tell him like this. And watching him pace around her quarters, she realized that they had waited too long. They should have confided in him months ago. She could have set aside an evening and calmly and carefully explained everything to him; his questions would have been about the threat they all faced, how best to prepare for the long war ahead. Now, however, his mind was clearly filled with turmoil. He wasn't listening to everything she said, he was cutting her off, interrupting her answers, and his thoughts were focused on one thing: his wife. Delenn struggled to keep herself calm even as a dull pain settled behind her eyes.

Kosh closed his iris, releasing John from the memory download. John staggered, and without thinking Delenn reached out and grabbed his arm. He pulled out of her grasp, insistent even as he struggled to regain control over himself. "Anna. The _Icarus_. They found something. They woke something up."

"Yes. Once awakened, the Shadows could not allow them to leave in case they would warn others," she explained. He had to know that there was no hope for rescue; he had to stay here. She didn't want to continue, but she knew she must. "Those who would not serve...were killed." His face at that tore at her, and she realized just how insidious the things Morden had said to him must have been. Then immediately hope reformed itself in his eyes.

"But were they all killed? Delenn, maybe some of them were kept alive as prisoners. Anna might still be alive. Morden-"

"Must be released." She knew she was evading his question, his real question, the only question he wanted answered. But she could not give him the answer. She could not tell him the truth. Yes, his wife might still be alive. Kosh even believed it likely.

John could not know.

"After what you just showed me, how can you ask me to let him go?"

"Because right now they do not know how much we know. The last time the Shadows lost because they moved too quickly. Now they are being careful, gathering their forces slowly. If you push Morden, sooner or later he will tell you what happened. Then he will be killed. You will be killed. The Shadows will move now, before we're ready for them."

"How are they going to know?" he asked, disdainful.

"Because Morden is never alone. Listen to me. Aside from the Vorlons, we do not have the First Ones to help us this time. We are on our own. We will have only one chance to stop them, and if we fail, billions will die." Now he was listening. "There comes a moment when each of us must pledge himself to something greater than himself. You told G'Kar he had to decide between revenge and the good of his own people. Now you must make the same decision, Captain. It will be the most important decision of your life." She didn't know what else she could say, and watching John, she wasn't sure what he would do.

Damn Morden! She had known what he was almost immediately, when he'd visited her a year ago. If she could have done so without raising any suspicion, she wished that she had killed him then herself.

John turned away from her, lost in thought. Kosh moved her way, his iris opening slightly. He said nothing; he did not have to. The Vorlon slid silently out of her quarters. Delenn waited, watching John closely. His thoughts were often obscured from her, mostly because she still could not always accurately parse the many different interpretations any single human expression might contain. But now she felt even more lost than usual. It did not help that she was afraid: afraid that the Shadows would learn they were being watched, afraid that Morden would reveal what he knew, afraid of what John might do to him. She was mostly afraid that John was lost to her.

Now he turned back to face her, and there was something in his eyes that she had never seen before. Something hard, and mocking. "Tell me, Delenn. Tell me the truth. Because Minbari don't lie, right?" Her stomach sank. Now he would ask her about Anna, and she did not think that she would be able to lie right to his face, and she would not be able to evade his question again. "Asking me to dinner, spending time with me - that had nothing to do with me, or even getting to know humans any better, did it? It was about this, about the Shadows. It was some kind of extended job interview, wasn't it?" She'd been so ready for him to ask about his wife that she was entirely unprepared for this. It did not help that he was painfully close to the truth - she had in fact asked him to dinner to determine whether or not he was the right person to lead the fight against the Shadows. He shook his head at the surprise on her face. "I thought so. What, you had to make sure you could trust me? Afraid I'd run out and blab about the Shadows first thing?"

Three days ago had been a perfect day. She had thought that they had begun to be more than colleagues, perhaps even more than friends. Delenn could still remember his face just before he had left her quarters that night, his face when she thought that he might kiss her. She could not reconcile it with the face before her now, the one staring at her with hurt and anger. Feeling as though she'd been slapped, Delenn spoke without thinking, and regretted the words almost as soon as they left her mouth. "You were Starkiller. Why should I have trusted you with this knowledge without even knowing you?"

A long beat of silence. He nodded, slowly, a smile on his face that made tears prick at the backs of her eyes. "Right. You know, I was beginning to think..." He let out a sharp, bitter laugh, and Delenn dug her fingernails into her palms. She would not cry in front of him. She would not let him see her weak. "It doesn't matter what I thought," he said, voice flat. "You don't have to worry, though. I won't leak your little secret." He pushed past her and out the door.

Delenn stumbled over and sat down. She wanted to run after him, tell him that she had known she could trust him from the moment she first saw him. That she had absolute faith in him. That she never felt safer than when she was in his presence. That she wanted to spend time with him not because she wanted to learn about Humans or to evaluate him but because he made her happy.

That she would gladly lie to him about his wife if it meant that she could keep him all to herself.

Feeling sick, Delenn went to her knees and lit a candle. She would meditate, and pray, though she knew that neither would bring her any peace.

xxx

_Three days earlier..._

The ebb and flow of events on the station always fascinated Delenn. For several weeks, it would seem that everything was happening all at once; crises, mysterious occurrences, fights, battles, wars. She would be so busy she wouldn't even have the time to be aware of how busy she was. After her dinner with Sheridan, one of these whirlwind periods descended on all of them. Working from the moment she woke till the moment she climbed into bed. Dreaming of her work while she slept. She saw the Captain, worked with him, spoke with him, but found herself thinking of him only as the Captain and nothing else; those nascent feelings that she'd only just begun to acknowledge were easily sublimated.

As quickly as it had appeared, the latest busy period slipped away, and Delenn found herself contemplating several hours free as soon as this Council meeting ended. At first she had thought to speak with Sheridan afterwards, see if he also had the evening free. He had said that the next time they had the same evening off, they should spend time together again; she might suggest another dinner, more casual this time. Or perhaps they could walk through the station. But before she spent too much time considering her options, she came to realize that Sheridan was not in a good mood. The Council meeting was routine; haggling over trade agreements and some complaints about the allocation of space in Green Sector. Nothing out of the ordinary. Sheridan was short, though, biting off his curt answers, his jaw clenched. Delenn didn't think she had ever seen him quite like this.

Then the meeting was over, everyone packing up and leaving. Sheridan grabbed his folder and seemed to storm off, not even glancing her way. Delenn swallowed her disappointment; he likely did not have the evening free, was probably very busy, and besides, she could not expect him to always take the time to greet her. Now she had to resign herself to spending the evening alone, and could not think of anything she wished to do.

The last of the others had left, and she finally made her own way out of the Council Chambers. She hoped for and expected an empty hallway and empty tube, not wanting to make small talk. Delenn turned the corner and was surprised to see Sheridan pacing in front of the tube, speaking into his link.

"Just nod and smile, but don't agree to anything. If they want to press you, just tell them that everything has to be submitted in writing." He clicked off, looking down at her with dark eyes, something in his face she couldn't interpret. "Are you busy tonight?"

"No, I have no other duties."

"Do you want to do something?" A flutter under her ribs at that, and Delenn gave herself a mental shake. Why he made her feel like a nervous acolyte again, she did not know. For some reason, she didn't want him to know he had that kind of power over her.

"You do not have more work to do?"

"Nah, I just made Ivanova do it." She smiled then, hoping he had done so to be able to spend time with her, and not because he did not wish to perform whatever duty he had passed down to his second. She walked to the tube, feeling his eyes on her, and she was doing it again, putting her hand up in her hair, unable to keep the smile off her face. "I was afraid I'd missed you," he said, and they stepped into the transport. "I figured you would come this way, but you didn't come and didn't come, and I decided you must have gone the other direction."

"I prefer to wait until everyone else leaves. The other diplomats like to continue to complain if they can corner me in the corridor or in a tube." He grunted at that, looking down at her, and Delenn wondered how she ever managed to get through the last two months without spending time with him like this - just the two of them, no work.

"So what do you want to do? Are you hungry? Did you have something in mind?"

"You choose." He cocked his head at that, and Delenn felt another surge of that feeling she'd had after he'd left her at her quarters after their date. She wanted him, without even knowing exactly what that entailed. He was still looking at her. "You choose. Whatever you wish to do, that is what I wish to do."

"Okay." A slow smile spread over his face. "Green Two," he told the tube, and with a half second of weightlessness in her stomach - _an entirely appropriate sensation_, she thought - they were on their way.

xxx

"I thought a dog was a domesticated animal. A pet."

"It is. It's just what we call these."

"Why?"

"That's a good question. There's a type of dog, a dachshund, that has a long skinny body. I think that's where it comes from."

"So this is not dog meat?"

"No! No, we don't eat our pets."

Delenn looked down at the food in her hand - a _hot dog_, he called it - with distrust. It simply did not look appetizing. Sheridan was holding his own, covered with a bright yellow substance and some kind of chunky green concoction, and was grinning down at her in such contrast to his earlier mood that he barely seemed the same person.

"I don't know," she said, hoping he would understand and take her to a different booth.

"Here, try it with mustard and relish." He waved at the booth's proprietor, a man with deeply etched lines in his face, and whose clothes spoke to a distressing lack of hygiene that Delenn did not appreciate in those who prepared her food. The man slopped the same colorful condiments on her hot dog, and then Sheridan looked at her expectantly.

Delenn took the smallest bite she could. Chewed. She tried to concentrate on the taste of the bread, which was acceptable, and even the meat, which was too salty but not otherwise objectionable, but the other flavors were too overwhelming. Sharp and bitter and acidic; she did not want to spit out a mouthful of food right in front of him, but she couldn't seem to finish chewing the bite in her mouth. She shook her head, and Sheridan laughed, took the hot dog out of her hands.

"No," she said, after finally being able to swallow. Sheridan took an enormous bite out of what had been her hot dog - it was a good thing he was so attractive to her, or his eating habits would further turn her stomach.

"Make her another one," he told the proprietor, still chewing his food while he spoke. He took another bite before he finished swallowing the first one; she wondered when he had last eaten, that he was apparently starving.

"No, I am fine, really."

"Put just a tiny bit of ketchup on the end. One bite's worth." Another bun and tube of meat was handed to her, this one with a single blob of some bright red substance on the end.

"Food should not be this color."

"Just try it!" Now he had moved on to his own hot dog, hers dispatched after only his third bite. Delenn gingerly took another bite, and while this one was not as bad as the first, she still did not enjoy it.

"I'm sorry. I will just eat it like this, I think." She tore off the part that still had the red on it - _catch something _- and threw it in the bin. Sheridan made a face at that, and she wondered just how much room his stomach took up in his abdomen. Delenn took a bite of just the bread and meat, and while it would never be one of her favorite foods, it would suffice for today.

"A plain hot dog?" She nodded, and he made another face at that. For a moment, she could see the person he had once been, twenty or more years ago, a boy on the cusp of manhood. No worries, no duties, no obligations. She would have liked to have known him then.

"Five more credits," the proprietor said, emotionless, and Sheridan handed him the necessary disc. Then they were walking down a corridor she had never before visited, and Delenn found herself becoming excited, wondering where he was taking her next. She hoped it wasn't to try more Earth food.

They entered a large space, and for a moment she thought it was one of the agricultural rooms, but the green plant covering most of the ground was far too short to be a crop. There were places to sit on two of the four sides, and she decided it must be some type of exhibition hall. Sheridan finished off his hot dog, took off his jacket and draped it over a low wall, and unbuttoned his collar.

"Have you ever seen a baseball field before?" She shook her head, and he started walking down the right side of the square. She walked alongside him, enjoying the wide-open space - such a dramatic difference from the rest of her life on the station, cooped up in cramped quarters.

"It is a human athletic event?"

"Mmhmm. And when you go to a baseball game, you always have a hot dog."

"This is a ritual?"

"More like a tradition. I remember the first time my dad took me to a baseball game. I was, oh, eight years old, I think. And Dad was never big on eating out, or spending money he didn't have to, but that day we had hot dogs and peanuts and cotton candy and big frozen lemonades. By the time I got home I was so sick I ended up just lying on the floor next to my bed. It was the best day." That didn't make any sense to her, but he looked so happy right now that she couldn't help but feel happy herself. He turned to look down at her, and she could see that there was some of that yellow substance on the corner of his mouth.

"You have...I don't know what it's called. Here." She gestured to her own mouth. He swiped at his cheek with his hand, missing the yellow entirely. "It is still there." Now he poked his tongue out, and Delenn had to look away, could feel her cheeks go hot.

"Did I get it?" She looked back up, and couldn't help the undignified laugh she let out. His face, looking so innocent, eyebrows raised, a big dab of yellow something still on the corner of his mouth.

"No. You would probably not have had this problem had you not eaten as though you had not seen food in a standard week."

"I haven't had a hot dog in a long time. I forgot how good they tasted." Now she made a face of her own at him, and he laughed, that loud laugh she remembered from their dinner. He rubbed at his cheek again with the heel of his hand as they turned to follow the wall around the field.

"Stop. Come here." He obligingly leaned down, and she wiped at the corner of his mouth with her index finger, painfully aware of how close he was, his mouth only inches from her own. It would be so easy to just lean up...

Delenn made herself take a step back, looking at the yellow on her finger. Now what was she going to do with it? "You didn't think that through," Sheridan said, sounding far too amused. "Just lick it off." She glared at him then, and actually drew in a breath to say _you lick it off_ before she realized what exactly that would mean. She wouldn't let herself think about that, and finally wiped her finger clean on the remaining half of her hot dog, now cold and utterly unappetizing. She put it on the wall, ignoring Sheridan's grin.

"Not a hot dog fan, then?"

"I'm sorry. I hope I do not offend you by disliking your ceremonial athletic food." He chuckled, and she wondered if it was an accident when his arm brushed against her own. They walked for awhile, then made another turn. The last turn - they were headed back toward the entrance. Would he then walk her back to her quarters? Would that be the end of their evening together? "Tell me, Captain, how does one play this base game?"

"Baseball. It's pretty straight forward. You have two teams. One plays out here in the field. A pitcher throws balls toward home plate, down there. The other team takes turns batting, trying to hit the ball. If you do, you run around the bases. If you make it all the way around, that's one point. The team in the field tries to throw the ball to a player waiting at one of the bases, and if the ball gets there before the runner does, he's out. Three outs and the teams switch sides. They go back and forth nine times." That was straight forward?

Sheridan retrieved a long skinny something, came back to where she was standing. "Step back a little bit," he ordered her, and then he stood beside a flat white square in the dirt. "Computer: activate batting practice. Saved settings for Sheridan." He held the wooden club up, knees slightly bent. Delenn saw only a white blur pass in front of him, and he swung his weapon swiftly. Nothing happened that she could see.

"Strike one," the computer voice intoned. Another blur, and this time there was a crack as Sheridan swung. Delenn could see the white object - a ball - fly up and behind them. "Foul ball. Strike two." Sheridan rotated the top of the club in the air a few times, digging one of his shoes into the dirt. Another ball came flying his way, and again, he swung and made no contact. "Strike three. Batter out."

"Damn it!" he said, hitting the club down on the white square.

"You are not very good at this game?" He glared up at her, then pointed the club in her direction.

"I'll have you know I played varsity in high school." Delenn reached out and grabbed the end of the club, pulled it out of his grasp. "You ready to go?" he asked.

"Show me how to use this club." A wonderful look on his face then - surprise and delight. He gestured her over.

"It's a bat. Here, stand right here." She took his place next to the white square. His hands gently touched her here and there - her shoulders, her wrist. "Keep your elbow up. Here, practice a nice easy swing. You're dipping it down a little bit in the middle; keep it level." Delenn felt ridiculous, swinging the wooden bat back and forth, but every time he reached out and brushed his fingers against her elbow or her back, she found that she didn't mind feeling a little ridiculous. "Ready for some balls?" She nodded.

"Computer: activate batting practice. Beginner settings, softball. Okay, just keep your eye on the ball, nice, easy, level swing." She could see the ball coming her way, not in a straight line but in an arc. Even though he had just told her to keep the eye on the ball, Delenn ended up looking at the bat, and swung before the ball even reached her.

"Strike one."

"That was good, that was a good swing. Keep your eye on the ball." His hand on her shoulder, moving her forward just a little bit. The second ball came her way, and she kept her eye on it. She was expecting to hear the same crack she'd heard before, but there was nothing.

"Strike two."

"How did I miss?"

"You dropped your shoulder; dipped the bat right under it. Gotta keep it level." There were too many things to try and keep in mind. She changed her grip on the bat, pretended it was half a denn'bok. And as the third ball came her way, she let herself fall into those familiar rhythms; more than fifteen cycles since she had last done any pike training, but the body remembered what the mind did not. _Crack!_ The ball flew away from her, back the way it came.

"Double," the computer announced.

Sheridan laughed, coming around to look her in the face. "What did you do?" Delenn just handed him the bat, well aware of the smug look on her face. She walked over to retrieve his jacket, and it was immensely gratifying to see the surprise and humor still written so plainly all over his face when she turned back to him. "I'm serious. You just...changed. Everything about you - your posture, the way you held the bat, the look on your face. What did you do?"

"Captain, did you really think religious caste Minbari did nothing but pray and meditate all day?" She handed him his jacket, brushing her hair over her shoulder as she did so, and walked to the exit. Even though she knew he would do nothing else, it still felt wonderful to hear him following along.

xxx

They walked in silence back to her quarters, Delenn aware of his eyes on her, clearly wanting to ask her more questions. It was not yet that late; perhaps this time he would stay. They could sit, and talk. In private.

She opened her door. "So what did you do?" Sheridan blurted out as she stepped inside.

"Come in and I'll show you." He followed her in. _You should not be alone with this man in your quarters, Delenn._ That voice in her head, Lennier's voice; she pushed it aside. _Where was it?_ Delenn could not remember seeing it since she'd been on the station, but it was here, somewhere. She stood for a moment, letting the world drift _behind_ her, casting her mind out into the seas of memory. When had it last been in her hand? Packing on Minbar, all her possessions into boxes; how little she actually owned.

"Can you not tell me? Is it a secret?" She remembered Sheridan then, standing and watching her. She must have looked an odd sight, slipping into the lightest stage of meditation right in front of him. But she knew where it was now, and walked over to her closet, moved a box aside to reveal another, and pulled it out. Brought it out to him. He turned it over and over in his hands. Had he really never seen one before? "What is this?"

"It is a denn'bok. A fighting pike." He held it up between his thumb and forefinger, looked through the circle right at her.

"How do you fight with this?" She put a hand on his arm, guided him another step into the room. Looked to the left and right - yes, the way was clear. She took a step back.

"Hold it like this. Out in front of you. Now, rotate your wrist forward just like this..." The denn'bok extended in a flash - she was expecting it, but Sheridan was not. He jumped, staring up and down its length for a moment, and then laughed, a deep laugh that she hadn't heard before. He gave the denn'bok a few experimental twirls, then looked up at her with such unblemished joy in his eyes that she felt pierced through with happiness. She had put that look on his face.

"You know how to fight with this?" She nodded. "You're going to have to show me how," he said, holding the pike completely wrong. He whipped it back and forth through the air, and he was going to break something in a minute.

"I will, but not in my quarters. We will find you some actual targets, and not my possessions."

"We could go back to the baseball diamond. Or is there another place you go to practice?"

"I have not practiced in many years. There is a room I had in mind, though." A space she had set aside nearly two years ago, primarily for the use of Minbari on the station, though it was open to all. A simple room, with only thin mats on the floor; intended for meditation. A small, private room. Delenn took the denn'bok from him, condensed it back into the sleeve. Sheridan held his hand back out for it, and she shook her head at him. "Not until I am assured you will not stab yourself through."

"I won't play with it. I just want to hold it." She drew in a breath, thinking perhaps to tell him she was unaware that EarthForce posted children to such important assignments, when his link beeped. For a moment Delenn thought he would ignore it, but he grudgingly lifted it to his mouth. "Sheridan, go."

"Captain, this is C and C. We've got a bit of an emergency here. A collision inside the docking bay."

"Any casualties?"

"No, and no serious injuries, either. But we've got a lot of debris to clean up, and the ships are piling up outside. A lot of pissed-off aliens are wanting to speak with you, sir."

Sheridan paused, and Delenn couldn't help but stare at him; how fascinating, to be able to see someone else thinking. It rarely felt like anyone she had to deal with actually thought. "Where's Ivanova?" he asked.

"I called the Commander first, sir, but she..."

"She what?"

"She said she was busy nodding and smiling and that you could, um..."

"I can imagine the rest. I'll be right up. Sheridan out." He sighed, turned to look at her with a half-smile. "It never ends."

"It is unfortunate you do not have more subordinates to whom you could give your duties."

"Is that sarcasm, Ambassador?" _I love the way the corners of his eyes crinkle up when he smiles at me_, she thought, and wondered if there were anything about her that made him feel the same way.

"I am never sarcastic."

"Well, you're right. It is unfortunate." The words came out in a far more serious tone than the words warranted, the pitch of his voice a little lower than usual. He looked at her for a long beat, but she couldn't think of anything to say; her heart beating too fast, her mind a racing blank. "You promise that you'll show me how to use that thing sometime?"

"I promise." His eyes on hers, the barest nod of his head, a hint of a smile. He turned to go, and Delenn took a step forward, spoke without thinking. "Captain. I was wondering if perhaps you would like to have dinner again some night." She had expected his broad smile, not the level look he was giving her. "I have learned so much about Humans from you, in such a short period of time. I would like to return the favor, if you are interested."

"Of course. I'd like that." Something in his eyes then, and Delenn thought, _this is it._ He would close the gap between them, a hand resting against her cheek, his face lowering to hers; his lips would press against her own, and it had been such a long time since she'd last been kissed she scarcely remembered what it felt like. But he only let out a breath - not quite a sigh - and walked out the door.

Delenn stood right where she was for a long moment, bringing a hand up and resting it just under her sternum. What had she been thinking, expecting him to kiss her? He was the commanding officer of the station, she was Minbar's representative; they both sat on the governing Council. More importantly, the battle with the Shadows was coming, and they both had parts to play. She was being silly, and selfish; what she had seen in his eyes just before he left was probably nothing more than the recognition of those facts.

Still, she locked the door and dimmed the lights, and lay back against her bed. Oh, how she wanted him. After her change, she had done a lot of research into humans, far more than she'd ever done before. She had read about human sexual practices, but that reading had been clinical, dry; it was quite different contemplating a specific practice, with a specific human. There was already a deep ache between her legs, and she closed her eyes and let herself imagine Sheridan coming back into her quarters, walking slowly and steadily toward her. Lowering himself on top of her, knees and elbows on either side of her body, pinning her down. She imagined his kiss, long and deep. She imagined their clothes falling away, his skin against hers, his hand behind her knee drawing her leg up to his side.

She unhooked the bottom of her robe, slid her hand inside.

xxx

Delenn walked down the corridor in Blue Sector that would lead her to the Captain's quarters. What she was planning was in complete defiance of everything Kosh wished from her, but she found herself not caring in the slightest. Besides the simple pique at the thought that Kosh always made her feel even less than an acolyte, a child hiding behind her father's robes, she knew that Kosh did not always understand how Humans worked. Not that she was any expert herself, but she knew that Humans in general, and John in particular, would not appreciate being lied to, no matter the intentions.

And not telling him was a lie, no matter how she tried to equivocate. They could not expect him to be a leader in the coming war and treat him like an irresponsible child at the same time. What he would do with the information would be his choice; she could advise him, hope that he would decide to follow a specific path, but she could not make that choice for him.

There was his door. Delenn stood in front of it, and she wanted to turn back and leave. Knots in her stomach; it was hard to breathe. She did not fear his reaction, since she already knew what it would be - frustration, anger, betrayal. What she did fear was the choice he would make, and that she also thought she knew. If there were even the slightest chance that his wife were alive, would he not go after her? Even if she told him that Anna would no longer be Anna - which was not something she knew for certain, though she could imagine no reason why the Shadows would have let her live unmolested - would he still not attempt to rescue her? He would leave, as soon as possible, and travel to Z'ha'dum. No matter if he went with a single ship or a thousand, he wouldn't have the slightest chance.

He would die.

Minutes had passed, and still Delenn waited outside his door. This was her choice. Tell him the truth, and sentence him to almost certain death. Hide the truth, and keep him alive, but at the cost of his trust, should he ever learn of her deception. She did not even consider the war with the Shadows, the role John would play; she only thought of him leaving the station and never returning. She only thought of never seeing him again. Returning to the life she had lived before he had arrived, before the Chrysalis - she had thought herself happy at the time, but remembering it now, it seemed bleak, joyless. How could she go about her day without the promise of seeing him, of speaking with him?

_Stop it, Delenn!_ She had already made up her mind. That was why she had walked here. He deserved the truth. She rang for entrance, then waited, feeling nauseated, terrified. No answer. It would be easy to assume that he were somewhere else in the station - in his office, in C & C, anywhere at all - and leave. But somehow she knew that he was inside, just a few paces away, the wall between them.

She pressed the call button. "Captain? It is Delenn. May I speak with you?" Again she waited, and again she was met with nothing but silence. He did not wish to speak with her. This was not surprising, but it still hurt, a sharp pain lancing through her worse than any physical pain she had ever felt.

Delenn turned to go, and his door slid open. She hesitated a moment, then entered his quarters.

They were dark, almost entirely. There was a light coming from a lamp in his bedroom that filtered through the glass partition, and she waited a moment for her eyes to adjust. There he was, sitting on the couch to her right. He did not look her way, only stared forward at nothing. She could not make out much of his face in the low light, but what little she was able to see chilled her.

Now was the time to tell him. What would she say? _Captain, I would not answer you earlier, though I led you to believe that there was no hope. We assume that your wife is dead, but we do not know for sure. She may still be alive. She may be a prisoner on Z'ha'dum, subjected to torture, deprivation. She may be in terrible pain. She may have been changed, like Morden. She may have been used in some horrible experiment, turned into something no longer even recognizable as Human. She may be waiting for you even now, hoping for you to rescue her. She may be dead, long dead, her body used for who knows what dark and evil rites. We simply do not know._

John finally turned his head and looked at her, his eyes filled with anguish. "I finally said goodbye to her. I finally let her go. Now this." His voice broke. "Are you sure she's dead? Are you sure?"

She could see it in his eyes: he wanted her to say 'yes.'

Delenn nodded, not trusting her voice. John leaned his head back, his eyes screwed tightly shut. He put a hand over his face. She had not just lied by omission; she had lied straight away, right to his face. She had never done such a thing before. Delenn expected to be filled with shame, but there was none. She only felt pain, his pain, as though it were her own; all she wanted to do was comfort him. But she had no comfort to give. She turned to leave.

"Please don't go," he said, voice hoarse. She looked back at him, but he hadn't moved, still had his hand over his eyes. She paused, uncertain what he wanted from her. He dropped his hand, and the naked pleading in his eyes was enough to undo her. She slowly sat down beside him, leaving space between them. Her movements careful, as though he were a wild animal she had charmed, and he might spook and take flight at any moment. She waited, but he did not speak, just let out a sigh that seemed to issue from his bones.

She wanted him to look her way, to say her name, to take her hand; he did not.

She wanted to rest her head on his shoulder, to loop her arms around his waist, to whisper that she loved him; she did not.

They sat in silence, in the dark.


	8. Lacunae

**Chapter Eight: Lacunae**

_She would never forget the day she had been made Satai. Minbari had ceremonies for everything, yet this ceremony was simple, barely deserving the name. Dukhat stood before her, gazing down at her with such pride. The others stood in a circle, surrounding them. The lights were turned low, and Delenn shivered despite herself._

_Dukhat stepped even closer, so close that for a moment, her breath caught. Perhaps he noticed, for the corner of his mouth quirked. He reached behind her, taking hold of the caul of her grey robe. As he drew it over her head, the edge of his thumb brushed against her cheek._

_Dukhat held onto the fabric a fraction of a second too long, his eyes never leaving hers. Delenn felt the will of the universe enter her heart, and she knew that the path that stretched before her was just, was right._

"I am Grey. I stand between the candle and the star," she said in no more than a whisper, but the words rang in the quiet chamber nonetheless.

xxx

The day was not yet halfway gone, and she was already so tired she did not think she would make it till evening. The pictures she had viewed last night would not leave her mind. No matter what she did, she kept seeing those bright smiles, those laughing eyes. But most of all, she kept seeing Sheridan's face, the love written on his features. So she didn't see Morden heading her way at first, strolling with an arrogant roll to his hips, jacket slung over his shoulder, as though he didn't have a care in the world. He saw her, though, and the smile he aimed her way would have been infectious coming from nearly anyone else. From Morden, it was a grin carved into a rotting gourd, something filled with dark horrors. Goosebumps rose suddenly all over Delenn's body, even her face, and her fingers itched for the feel of a denn'bok.

"Ambassador," Morden said, dipping his head her way. The Captain had clearly ordered his release, and yet to see him loose in the corridor, without even a single guard, made Delenn absolutely furious, though it had been exactly what she'd argued for the day before. In the few seconds it took for her to pass him, her eyes never leaving his, aware of her heart pounding away in her chest and a hot flush across her cheeks, a hundred thoughts seemed to rip through her mind. _Alone, just the two of us. No one else to see what would happen. I could kill him now, in this instant, and no one would ever know._

Except it wasn't true. They weren't alone. Whether his Shadow handlers were only watching her through Morden's eyes as psychic hitchhikers, or whether they were with them in the corridor even now, invisible to her senses, they would know anything Delenn did, and the repercussions were likely to be terrible beyond her imagining.

Now Morden was behind her, and it was like passing out from under the shadow of a bird of prey, circling overhead. Delenn released a breath she had not known she was holding, though she didn't feel entirely safe until she had turned the corner. Then she stopped and leaned against the wall, not needing its support so much as its comforting solidity under her hand.

It was necessary for Morden to be released, for all the reasons she had given to Sheridan and more besides, but still, she could not help but think, _what have I done?_

xxx

"_We are Grey. We stand between the darkness and the light."_

xxx

Delenn had sat with Sheridan for hours the night before. In silence for a long time. She had not known what he needed from her – the comfort of her presence, someone in whom he could confide his fears, or perhaps just another warm body in the darkness. At some point, her eyes scratchy and raw, her body growing stiff and uncomfortable, Delenn shifted, ready to stand and leave. Sheridan finally seemed to remember she was there. He turned slightly, enough to look at her. Though her eyes had adjusted some, it was still difficult to make out much of his expression in the dark. He was normally so spirited, so vivacious; it was odd to have no idea what he was thinking or how he felt.

"I'm sorry," he said hoarsely. He didn't elaborate. Delenn didn't want him to. She didn't want any clarification, because she still felt acutely aware of her lie to him, the lie that she knew for certain that Anna was dead. The lie that seemed to pulse beneath the surface of her skin, just waiting for her to open her mouth so that it might spring forth. So instead she just nodded, raised her hand and rested it gently on his shoulder. "Me, too," she whispered. Sheridan shook his head – was he rejecting her apology? He stood, paced away into the darkness, and Delenn's hand fell limply to the sofa.

"You have nothing to apologize for," he said gruffly, his back to her. She longed to join him, to rest her head between his shoulder blades and wrap her arms around his waist. She wanted to hold him so badly that the desire threatened to choke her.

His accusation earlier still rang in her ears, and the words to answer him were right there. _Yes, I wanted to know if you were trustworthy. Yes, I wanted to know more about you. But that isn't why I asked you to dinner, Captain, and that isn't why I have wished to see you every day since. I think I'm beginning to love you._ But Delenn could not say those words. They would put motive to the lie, and even worse, they might not be accepted. She did not believe her feelings were reciprocated, and that was a rejection she could not stand. So she just sat silently, watching Sheridan slowly walk into his kitchen, set out two glasses, and pour them full of cool water. He brought the glasses back to the sofa, handing her one wordlessly.

Delenn sipped, the water welcome indeed. Suddenly she had a desire to swim, to immerse her entire body in a pool of liquid this cool. She would sink to the bottom, her weight seeming to disappear, currents rushing past her skin and through her hair. She hadn't swam in many cycles, probably since before she'd been an acolyte. Nothing sounded better.

Why wouldn't Sheridan speak? Surely his mind was racing the same as hers, and surely he still had questions for her, but he remained mute. After he drained his glass in one long swallow, he sighed, a sound that seemed to issue from his very soul. Delenn realized she could not stay here for another moment. She would do or say something she would regret, and she felt their blossoming friendship was on the verge of irrevocable ruin. She took one last polite sip and set her glass aside.

"Please don't go," he said, and his hand groped out for hers, but Delenn stood before he could grasp it. She knotted her fingers together behind her back and kept her eyes on the floor.

"It's late. You should get some sleep." She certainly wouldn't be able to sleep tonight, so it was ludicrous to think that Sheridan would be able to sleep, yet what else could she say?

"Delenn..." His voice was pleading, broken. It sank claws into her heart, and Delenn knew that if she stayed she would be lost. So she moved to the door, forcing herself to take each individual step.

"Good night, Captain," she said, and she stepped through the door before he had the chance to reply. A few paces and she stopped, resting her back against the wall. Blue Sector very quiet this time of night. She could hear no one else nearby – those not asleep in their beds would be in C and C. So she let herself stay right where she was, just outside the Captain's quarters, and if anyone saw her, she didn't have the energy to care about any suspicions they might have. In truth, a part of her was hoping that Sheridan would come to the door, that he would see her still here, and that he would draw her back into his quarters. If he did, she would go with him. And if he invited her back to his bed, she would go there, too. It would be a terrible mistake, but a part of her didn't care, and so she lingered, hoping that perhaps he would take the decision out of her hands.

But he did not come to the door. Delenn walked back to her quarters, back to her narrow bed. She did not sleep.

xxx

_The Grey Council had summoned her. The summons had been brief, even curt. As Delenn sat in the flyer, en route to the Valen'tha, she tried to keep her thoughts centered. Positive. Optimistic. But she knew, she knew. _

_She was supposed to wait. She was supposed to bide her time and ignore the signs, and wait for the Council to give her their permission. And she had not waited, she had done what had needed to be done, she had entered the Chrysalis on her own. Now was the hour of reckoning._

_Delenn closed her eyes, trying to ignore the hyperspace hum, that slight vibration she never noticed at first, but that after an hour began to intrude upon her consciousness, seeming to make her very bones shudder and sing. She could not push the sensation away, and as it deepened and deepened, setting her teeth on edge, Delenn could no longer lie to herself. _

_She would not be returning to Babylon 5._

xxx

She had seen Morden the next day, but not Sheridan. She had hoped he would call her, or come to see her, but he did neither. As the day progressed, Delenn became more and more worried that all her counsel from the day before had been thrown aside. He had decided he could not abandon his wife, even to near-certain death. He would go after her, go to Z'ha'dum, and Delenn would never see him again. Hadn't she seen the way he looked at her, seen the evidence in the picture she had found? Just when the worry became a certainty, Delenn passed Commander Ivanova in the corridor. Even though Susan was clearly in a hurry, Delenn put a hand on her arm, drawing her aside for a moment.

"Commander-"

"I'm sorry, Ambassador, but I've got a fire to put out, and by that I mean I have a literal fire to put out." Susan was already walking away. Delenn was quite unused to being dismissed so quickly and summarily, and felt a sudden rush of pique despite herself.

"I just wanted to know if you'd seen the Captain today." Delenn made herself stand still as a statue, kept her eyes on the Commander's, kept a bland, vaguely amiable expression on her face. Inside, a storm. The storm only grew as Susan stopped. A strange look came over her face, something almost suspicious. In the space between two heartbeats, Delenn became absolutely sure that Sheridan had left. He was en route at this moment, hurtling toward his doom.

And he had not said goodbye.

But no sooner than it had appeared, the odd look on Susan's face vanished, replaced by one of concern, perhaps even compassion. "Yeah, I saw him for a couple minutes. He's been locked up in his office, but he came into C and C at one point. Did you need anything, Delenn?"

Locked up in his office and making a quick journey to Command and Control could still mean he was planning to fly to Z'ha'dum, but for no reason she could articulate, Delenn did not think that was the case. Relief filled her, and she had to struggle to keep from smiling broadly at Susan, who would probably take the gesture as a sign that Delenn was mentally ill. "I don't need anything, Commander. I'm sorry to have bothered you." Before Susan could say anything else, Delenn nodded curtly and hurried away. She had relied on work to keep her mind off her worries, but the thought of another meeting was enough to turn her stomach, so she stopped at the next Babcom she passed and canceled the rest of her evening. She'd had no appetite for days, and the strangled knots in her stomach had not yet relented, but Delenn knew she had to eat something, so she picked up a salad and some soup. She almost doubled her order – maybe Sheridan would stop by and see her this evening, and undoubtedly he would not have eaten, either – but a superstitious twinge made her change her mind. If he did not stop by she would have leftover food, prepared for a purpose and then not eaten, a bad omen.

Sheridan did not come, and Delenn ate her food alone, mechanically, not tasting a bite.

xxx

"_Ambassador," a voice called out, and Delenn turned, trying to spot Captain Sheridan in the crowd. Red Sector was always crowded, but today, and at this hour, it seemed every single person aboard the station was packed inside the plazas and corridors, jostling to buy trinkets and gadgets that none of them needed. Finally she saw Sheridan waving, tall enough that his head poked above most of the crowd. They both made their way to the wall through unspoken agreement, finding a narrow space between two booths. There was a bruise over one of his eyes, a scrape on his cheek, but he smiled at her just as brightly as ever._

"_I see the Strieb did not do too much damage," she said, trying to keep her tone light. That he was on his feet looking as hale as ever led her to believe he had not been tortured, or wounded too greatly, but it was still hard to be certain. But Sheridan just smiled even wider, if such a thing were possible, and inclined his head close to hers._

"_Thanks to you." His smile faded, and his face grew very serious. His eyes seemed to pierce straight through her. Delenn felt a warmth in her cheeks and knew she was blushing, cursed the infernal Human parts of her that led to such a betrayal of her emotions, yet she could do nothing about it. Sheridan's eyes drifted over her face, and she thought he was looking at that silly pink flush, but his gaze dropped to her mouth. Delenn moistened her lips with her tongue, out of nervousness, not even thinking. Sheridan quickly looked away, back out over the crowd. "If you hadn't been out there just then..." he murmured, voice quiet, barely able to be heard. Then he looked back at her, straightening up, the distance between them increasing._

"_So what were you doing in a flyer out there?" he asked, head cocked to one side. Delenn smiled a smile that she knew was tight, probably unattractive. She had been returning from the Valen'tha in disgrace, of course, stripped of her title and privileges. She had been forced to witness the ascension of Neroon, listen to his invective, watch as he threatened to tear apart the Council and all it stood for asunder, with absolutely no power to do anything to the contrary. She had been sitting in the flier, her blood boiling, filled with thoughts of vengeance. Then she would come back to herself, filled instead with thoughts of self-loathing. Vacillating between the two extremes left her feeling nauseated. _

_Then a signal from the station – the Captain had been kidnapped._

_As Delenn looked up at Sheridan's warm, affable face, patiently waiting for her answer, she felt a weight lift off her shoulders. So she was no longer Satai – what difference did that make? She was still the same person she had always been, even now, even after all the changes she had gone through. She just shrugged, leaning against the wall, and he adopted her casual pose. "I had been...running an errand. Something unpleasant but of no importance._

"_I was just on my way back home."_

xxx

She did not see Sheridan the next day, or the next. Three days after her revelations, after their argument, after the long night in his quarters, there was a meeting of the League of Non-Aligned Worlds. Delenn walked to the chambers with a churning stomach, a clammy sweat on her palms. She knew for a fact that the Captain was still on the station, and if he had ever harbored plans to depart for Z'ha'dum, he surely would have left by now, so that was not the cause of her worry. And she knew that he had forgiven her, that he bore her no ill will. Yet her anxiety persisted, reminding her of the nearly-omnipresent anxiety she had experienced the first week after her change. The walls seemed too close, the eyes of those she passed too curious, the crowds too loud. She wished for nothing more than to remain in her quarters, spending the day in solitude. Before, she had often longed to see Sheridan, hoped to run into him unexpectedly, and sometimes she even devised schemes that would give her the opportunity to bump into him, apparently by accident, schemes later discarded as being foolish, childish. Now, knowing that she would see him at the meeting, Delenn found herself dreading it.

By the time she reached the Council chambers, she was a few minutes tardy, something apparently so unexpected and bizarre that even Londo gazed at her with frank surprise. Delenn took her seat, face hot, her eyes on the table before her. Yet though she did not even really look at him, she knew that Sheridan didn't even glance her way.

Like all the Council meetings in recent weeks, nothing was accomplished. The ambassadors were a cantankerous, fractious bunch. As the Markab ambassador shouted invective at the representatives of a dozen other worlds, so furious that spittle flew from her mouth, Delenn found herself gripped suddenly by a wave of hatred, an emotion so potent, and one she was so unused to, she didn't recognize it for what it was at first. When she realized she would happily throw the lot of them out of an airlock and not miss a moment of sleep over it, it was all she could do to keep from running out of the chambers right then and there. Instead, she just clasped her hands tightly in her lap, stared at the table, and counted in her head, letting the monotonous stream of numbers block out the incessant bickering, the unending strife.

After an eternity, the meeting ended. The ambassadors departed, some still spewing filth, others having forgotten the recent curses already and marching out together for entertainment and frivolity. A dreadful headache had set up camp, and Delenn waited for the chambers to clear out before she attempted her own escape. Soon only a handful of bodies remained, Sheridan among them. Delenn finally dared to look at him.

How handsome he was! He had shaved since the ordeal with Morden, and she thought his hair had been trimmed as well. His uniform was impeccably crisp. There was an aura of strength and authority surrounding him, something almost tangible, and it reminded her so much of Dukhat that for a moment she was millions of light years away, on a different ship altogether, in a place where she always felt safe and loved. The memory was enough to make her smile, and her heart felt light.

"Captain," she said, waiting for him to look up from the papers he was gathering. She would invite him to dinner. They would put the past few days behind them. Maybe they wouldn't return immediately to the place they'd been the day he showed her how to play baseball, the day she thought he would kiss her, but it wouldn't take long, she didn't think.

"Ambassador," he replied curtly, never lifting his eyes. Folder under his arm, he turned on his heel and left.

After a few minutes, the rest of the remaining ambassadors were gone as well, and Delenn was alone. The chambers sat silent, like a hollow shell. Delenn remained unmoving in her seat, staring sightlessly ahead of her, waiting for the ache in her stomach to go away. But it never did, so she finally stood and returned to her quarters. By the time she walked through the door, she had made up her mind.

xxx

_I answer to other Minbari. Not freaks._

_Even now the words rang in her ears. Ashan's words, spoken with such flat impudence, such absolute conviction. Nothing she ever said or did would ever change his mind – how many others were like him? How many fellow Minbari, men and women who were her blood, would no sooner look at her as destroy their own honor?_

_Sheridan was telling her a story, of being stranded in his craft, perhaps during the war; she had been hearing Ashan in her mind, had missed the beginning of the story. "I never thought there could be anything worse than being all alone in the night," he said. Even though she knew exactly what conclusion he would draw, Delenn could not help but respond._

"_There is. Being all alone in a crowd." His face grew very serious, and she knew that in some way, her words hurt him, as they must hurt any caring, compassionate soul. But she kept speaking. "You feel cut off from your people, from your government. You even begin to doubt yourself. I understand it so well that it cuts to my heart." _

_Maybe it was this admission that brought him to her door that night, wearing the same jacket he had worn when they'd dined at the Fresh Air. When she answered the door, he stared at her for a long moment. "I'm sorry," he finally said. "It's late. Did I wake you?"_

_Delenn was confused. "No, I was reading. Why?"_

_He made gestures indicating her clothing. Enlightenment did not follow. "You're in your...night...clothes?" he finally said, brow furrowed. Why she found his absolute and utter confusion with anything to do with Minbari so adorable, Delenn did not know._

"_This is what I was wearing all day. I just took off the outer robe." She shook her head at him as he grinned broadly, and then his eyes swept her form from top to bottom and back to her face, much as they had the night at the Fresh Air, though this time his gaze did not linger on her legs. _

"_Did you want to go grab something to eat?" he asked. Delenn hated that particular euphemism. It made it sound as though they were going to hunt for live game with their bare hands. But she nodded, and before she knew it they found themselves at a corner table, the seats built into the walls, in some little restaurant tucked away in a part of the station she'd never visited before. It was dimly lit, the atmosphere hushed, and Delenn was very aware of her knees brushing against Sheridan's legs._

"_I haven't been able to stop thinking about what you said, in the rock garden," he said, playing with his fork while they waited for their meals to arrive. It was not a conversation she wanted to have again, but she could think of nothing to say. She kept her eyes on the flickering candle flame. "Is it really that bad?" he asked. There was something in his voice that said he wanted her to answer in the negative, to assure him she had only been exaggerating, that everything was, as the Humans put it, as right as water. But she could not do the Human thing and tell the little lie to make things simpler. She could not say anything at all. She just looked at the flame, willing her tear ducts to remain dry, doing her best to keep her face still._

"_Ah, Delenn," he said, tossing the fork aside. He scooted closer, his hand coming up to her back, but then the server arrived, putting plates in front of them, making idle small talk, and by the time he left, the moment had passed._

xxx

The door securely locked, her Babcom set to record all incoming messages, the lights turned off, Delenn lit a candle. She kicked off her shoes and sat cross-legged in front of the flame. For hours she stared, clearing her mind, clearing her heart. At first she spoke to herself in words. _You know what Sheridan must be – a leader in the coming war. A general. That is more important than any fleeting fancy that may have captivated you in the dark, late at night. That is more important than any hope to reconcile your peoples, if such a thing is even possible. Forget your silly dreams. Forget any hopes of love, of romance, of an ending such as they tell in legends. Hopes are for those fortunate enough to live beyond responsibility._

As evening stretched into night, as her muscles cramped and stiffened, Delenn moved beyond the need for words. The meditative state pulled her under, a dark tide that rolled over all obstacles in its path. She felt herself suffused by those qualities that had always been her touchstones: duty, honor, selflessness. What was coming was too huge to contemplate, too large for a single mind to envision. To worry about silly trifles like dinners and kisses was to diminish herself, and she needed to do the opposite. So Delenn let it all go. The tide kept rising.

By morning, the candle flame sputtered out in a pool of wax. Delenn rose, body stiff, but she did not feel it. She ate...something, though she didn't remember what it was ten minutes later. She met with Lennier, who seemed happy to see her, quite unlike his rather stoic demeanor the last few weeks, but it didn't occur to Delenn to inquire as to the cause. She went to meetings, she answered queries, she read reports, she criss-crossed the station until she had to stop and look at a map to remember where she was.

The Captain crossed her path, but Delenn had no business with him at the moment, so she only nodded and continued on her way. If he seemed taken aback, if he even seemed hurt, if his eyes followed her down the corridor until she was out of sight, then Delenn did not see it.

xxx

_Had she ever been this exhausted? After the Chrysalis, she knew, she had often been weary, and certainly there had been days on end during the war with the Humans where she had worked without sleep, without even a moment's rest. But for some reason, the last thirty-six hours had been especially trying. Watching the Centauri and Narn throw themselves into war out of ignorance and spite, because they were obstinate and wanted to see blood more than they wanted anything else, and being unable to do anything to stop it – it was enough to exhaust anyone. They would need the resources of every race for the upcoming war, the real war. The war with the Shadows._

_Delenn needed to eat, and she needed to shower, and she most certainly needed to sleep, but she couldn't seem to rouse herself from the sofa. When the door chime sounded, she had half a mind to ignore it. Let Lennier think she had gone to bed. But then the Captain's voice filled her quarters, and Delenn could not refuse him._

_He didn't seem to mind that she didn't stand as he entered, and joined her on the sofa. Months ago he had sat with a respectable distance between them; now he was only a few scant inches away, close enough that she could feel the heat from his body. "God, this day," he said, and sighed. It was a sigh she wished she could mimic, as it seemed to let him release some built-up tension; a sigh would not suffice for her. She needed something much more than a sigh; once she figured out what that was, of course..._

"_It was a long day," she agreed, and he grunted, that sound that always seemed to lodge right in her bones. _

"_A long, awful, fragging long day." _

"_You said long twice." She turned, resting her head against the back of the sofa. He grinned at her, turning himself. _

"_Long long long."_

"_Long long long long," she responded, and he laughed. The urge to lean forward and kiss him struck her so strongly that for a moment she could think of nothing else. Would he see it in her face? But he was still laughing._

"_Long to the fifth." He made a face at her, waggling his eyebrows. Challenging her._

"_Long mora'zha," she shot back. The look on his face could only be surprise, maybe even shock._

"_Is that a curse? Is that a Minbari curse?"_

"_It means 'dreadfully,' but in such a way as to imply that its state cannot be changed."_

"_Do Minbari curse? Will you teach me?" Delenn laughed herself. She had been thinking of the reporter, the Earth reporter, who had visited the station while all the nonsense with the Centauri ship had been going on. The reporter who had asked her questions, asked whether she worried about the Humans who would hate her because of her new appearance. Delenn had found herself crying in front of the woman, utterly humiliated. If she were to confide in anyone, it would not have been Lennier, or even Susan – it would have been Sheridan. But now the reporter's pointed questions seemed meaningless, completely unimportant. Delenn leaned forward and put her mouth close to Sheridan's ear. He was laughing even before she whispered the filthiest curse she had ever learned._

"_What does it mean?"_

"_You must promise never to use it," she said, and she narrowed her eyes at him to make sure that he knew she meant it. He nodded, mimed some kind of gesture in front of his lips. Delenn whispered the translation, feeling heat in her face using the English words. Sheridan hooted out laughter, clapped his hands, slapped his knee. He laughed and laughed so long she was afraid he might injure himself._

"_Can I say it to Garibaldi? Please? He'll never know what it means."_

"_Captain, you promised." She looked at him very sternly, and he nodded, but there was a mischievous glint in his eye she did not trust._

_They talked for hours, even though they were both completely worn out. Finally he tried to stand, and he nearly lost his balance. "Just stay where you are," she said, laughing again, she had been laughing so much her stomach hurt, even her face hurt, it was ridiculous. Sheridan collapsed back onto the sofa, stretching out. His legs stuck out over the end. Delenn found a spare blanket in the chest at the foot of her bed and spread it over him. "Do you need an extra pillow?" she asked. He didn't answer, just stared up at her with wide, guileless eyes. It was on the tip of her tongue to invite him to join her in her own bed – chastely and platonically, of course. Of course. But then he just shook his head slowly, and his eyes drooped closed._

"_Thank you," he whispered. Delenn stood there, watching him for a moment. His face fell slack, and the years seemed to disappear. A lock of hair had tumbled over his forehead, and she wanted to smooth it back. She thought about remaining where she was, watching him sleep, but she could not. Not yet. She retreated back to her bedroom, thinking she would never fall asleep, not now. But she was asleep in seconds._

xxx

Weeks after resolving to do her duty and forget about any thoughts of transient romance, Delenn awakened one morning from a short yet adequate night's sleep. The alarm set to chime each morning had not yet sounded, and the lights had only just begun to brighten – it was before dawn, the hour of dreams, a time that had once been Delenn's very favorite. As a child, she used to slip out of bed at this time, tiptoe through the house, the stone and tile cold against her bare feet. Father would still be asleep, and it was nearly impossible to awaken him. Once she had received a terrible fright from a dark dream, and had crept into his bedroom. She wanted only for him to reassure her, to tell her that everything would be all right; years later, she realized this must have happened not long after Mother had left. She had been afraid that Father would leave, too, and she would be all alone. Delenn had stood over him, had placed a hand on his shoulder, had shook his arm, and raised her voice; it wasn't until she climbed up in his bed and hopped up and down on her knees that he finally stirred. By then, the fear had vanished, and she had only been able to giggle when he sleepily asked her what was wrong. So there was no need for her to tiptoe, yet she had to be silent, had to sneak and sidle. She didn't even want the shadows to know she was awake, that she wasn't cowed by the darkness, that she wasn't hiding away in her bed.

Once through the house, she would slip out into the garden behind their house. The garden was small, and mostly made of rocks, but it was her favorite garden out of any she had ever seen, because it was hers. She would watch the sky turn from black to blue to violet and pink; she would listen to the birds sing; she would keep an eye on the delicate frost covering everything, try to capture the moment when it melted away into nothingness, and yet it always seemed she missed that ephemeral transition, something solid and crystalline one moment, a few drops of cold water the next. But mostly, she would think, and she would feel. Imagine she could sense the universe around her, inside her. If she were still enough, if she were quiet enough, the universe would speak to her, makes its intentions and hopes and dreams known. Then she would become an instrument of the universe, at once part of its infinite clockwork and a conscious operator within. Some mornings, as the rest of the city slept, Delenn felt she sensed something lurking behind the mundane, tangible world in front of her, something dense and eternal. A thrill would go through her, and in meditation, she always tried to recapture that feeling, and was rarely able to do so.

This morning, laying in bed, watching the lights in her quarters brighten by imperceptible degrees, Delenn tried to remember the last time she had felt that sense of being connected to something greater than herself. Inside the Chrysalis? That had been part of the reason she had entered into it, why she had changed herself so much, but had she really felt it then? Or had she simply told herself that she knew what the universe wanted? Another lie. She was becoming quite adept at lying, most of all to herself.

Delenn would have given anything, in that moment, to return to the little garden behind her father's house. It had been many cycles since she'd been there last; since before the war with the Humans. When her father had passed, she had not been able to bring herself to return, and relatives had cleared away what few material possessions remained. Now that she thought about it, she could not actually remember the last time she had been home. Some time when she had been an acolyte. Ever since then, home had become an abstract concept, as she had begun to lead an existence where any bed and four walls would do.

Without thinking any further, without checking her agenda or messages, without pausing a single moment more, Delenn dressed. As she pulled on her shoes, she thought of Lennier, and scrawled a quick note for him that she left on her table; perhaps he would see it, perhaps he would not. Again that tiny thrill, entirely inappropriate for one her age, and she left her quarters and hurried out of Green Sector, headed wherever the corridors led her.

It was perhaps ten or fifteen minutes later when Delenn found herself at the athletic field. It was presently configured for baseball, and as she entered she could hear the wooden stick, the name of which she had forgotten, cracking as it was swung at flying balls. Humans, and their ridiculous sports. Delenn had hoped for solitude, but she knew how unlikely solitude was on the station at any time, and at any location. She would slip in, make her way up to one of the observation stands, and watch quietly. The athlete would probably not notice her at all, and she would still find some comfort in the wide open space.

She had one foot on the step taking her to the left-hand stand when she happened to glance over her shoulder. The athlete standing there staring at her, wooden stick resting on his shoulder, eyes wide with what looked like disbelief, was Sheridan. Delenn froze, and her breath lodged in her throat. She had come here hoping the universe would speak to her, hoping for some small, quiet push against her soul. Instead, she had found Sheridan.

Delenn opened her mouth to speak. She still had no breath, and besides, she didn't know what she would say.

Sheridan lowered the wooden stick and walked towards her. Distantly, Delenn heard the computerized voice announce that the next ball was being held. She didn't think Sheridan heard the announcement at all. His eyes were fixed on hers, and she could not remember him ever looking at her so directly, so intensely. He was wearing casual clothing, the fabric stained dark at his chest. Sleeves pushed up, buttons at the throat undone; Delenn was unused to seeing his bare skin, even so little as this; the token greeting she had managed to come up with disappeared, and she was reduced to smiling at him weakly.

Sheridan walked still closer. He was peering up at her almost as though he didn't know who she was. It had only been a few weeks since that day, that horrible, strange day, but it seemed like so much longer. _Forget your silly dreams. Forget any hopes of love, of romance, of an ending such as they tell in legends._ Her own words rose up in her mind, seeming to mock her. In that instant, Delenn cared nothing for her former resolve, her good intentions. She only wanted this man before her, wanted him with an intensity so keen, she was having a hard time not throwing herself at him now.

"Captain," she finally managed, the word breathy and quiet, scarcely audible to her own ears. Sheridan walked closer, just a few steps away now, close enough for Delenn to see perspiration dotting his brow, close enough to see the bewilderment in his eyes.

The haze that had surrounded her dissipated. Sheridan was looking at her as though he didn't know who she was because he clearly _didn't_ know who she was. Something was wrong with him, and a stab of fear drove through her.

"I should know you," he murmured. He shook his head slowly, his eyes never leaving her face. "I know I should. But I don't, not at all. I've never seen you before. But I have, haven't I?"

One of her hands crept up to clutch at her pin, the edges biting into her fingertips. Delenn found herself nodding, and though she hoped that this was one of those silly Human rituals, a _prank_, as Mr. Garibaldi called it, she could tell that it was not. "Yes. We are acquainted," she finally managed. "Do you know who you are?" She gripped the crystal pin more tightly, needing that pain to center her. Sheridan's brow furrowed.

"Of course I know who I am," he answered, and Delenn let out her held breath in a shaky exhale. "I know who I am," he repeated, "and I know..." Sheridan shook his head, looking out over the athletic field. Delenn stared at his profile, not knowing what to do. Had he injured his head? Sometimes Minbari with such an injury might forget occurrences in their recent memory; perhaps it was the same with Humans. Delenn stepped down onto the grass, carefully, tentatively. She did not want to frighten him if she raised such a possibility. But he took a step back from her, looking at her face again, that same odd, searching glint in his eyes.

"Who are you?" he asked. The tone of his voice was something Delenn had heard before. It was the tone Lennier had used when he had seen her just as she emerged from the Chrysalis, when she had still been covered in thick, rough scales. It was the tone Teronn had used when he had questioned her in her quarters, wondering aloud whether she was still Minbari at all. It was the tone the Grey Council had used when they had dismissed her. It was the tone Ashan had used. _I answer to other Minbari. Not to freaks._

It was a tone that did not ask _who are you?_ but instead _what are you?_ Hearing it come from Sheridan's lips, seeing it reflected in the curious and maybe even hostile shine in his eyes, it left her breathless and exposed. A sharp wind would be enough to cut right through her, blow her into dust.

"I am Delenn," she said. What else could she say? Sheridan shook his head again, his eyes drifting up to her bone crest, down her hair, back to her eyes, to the ridge just above. Marking everything that made her not Minbari, not Human, not anything but herself. Then without saying another word, he turned away from her, walking past the white square set in the dirt and to a small door in the wall behind, disappearing from her view.

Delenn had no memory of sitting right where she was, on the lowest step leading up to the observation stand. She would later not be able to remember how long she sat there. Her fingers were numb, and they lay like white worms in her lap. Her heart thudded so hard it hurt, she could feel it knocking in her throat, like something trying to get out. Some time later, another athlete entered, and she stared at Delenn with wide blue eyes until Delenn came back to herself. "Are you all right?" the woman asked, a stocky Human woman with thin, tight braids and bulging muscles, and she put out a hand, meaning to touch Delenn. She nodded, attempted a smile, and fled, not trusting herself to speak. Down the corridor, and there was someone at the first Babcom she came to, so she kept walking. There was a crowd loitering a few meters from the next Babcom, and they stared at her as she passed, stared with eyes asking _what are you? what are you? what are you?_ She made it back to her quarters.

As the door cycled open, she became suddenly sure Lennier would be there. She did not wish to see him. He would ask questions, he would fawn over her obsequiously, and the thought was enough to send a jolt of adrenaline through her system. She would have to order him to leave, she knew, and he would not want to. But her quarters were empty. Delenn sagged onto her sofa. There was no reason for her to feel this way. Obviously Sheridan was injured in some way. That was all. It had been incredibly irresponsible for her to let him leave like that, to not stay with him, immediately call for medical assistance. And yet the incident still left her feeling raw, as though she had been flayed. She allowed herself only a few moments rest, and then she stood and went to her own Babcom, putting through a call to Medlab.

"I need to speak with Dr. Franklin," she said, in what she hoped was an even, calm tone. The nurse on the other side didn't seem to notice anything was wrong – he at least didn't stare at her with wide eyes like the Human athlete with the huge muscles – so perhaps she had managed to get herself back under control.

"Dr. Franklin's with a patient."

"It's an emergency," she responded, and if she put an imperious edge to her words, then so be it. The nurse nodded slowly, eyes appraising, and a hold screen flashed up. Delenn waited. Would it be faster to simply go to Medlab herself? But then the hold screen vanished, and Stephen stood before her, his eyes a little weary (as usual), his face tired (as usual), his smile warm (thankfully, as usual).

"Ambassador?"

"It's about Captain Sheridan," she started, and then stopped as Stephen nodded. He already knew.

"I've got the Captain in a room right now, running some more tests. He just came up, told me what happened. It's...there's been..." Stephen stopped, and frowned, as much as he ever frowned.

"You cannot tell me. I understand. A physician's oath of confidentiality."

"Well, that," he allowed, "and we don't actually know what exactly is going on just yet." That was not what Delenn wanted to hear. Worry slid a cold hand around her throat, and she swallowed hard. "Look, Ambassador, I need to get back. Maybe he'll tell you about it later himself."

Delenn nodded, and said something incidental and meaningless – she didn't think Stephen even heard. The screen went blank. Something was wrong with Sheridan, something even Dr. Franklin didn't understand, and she had to remain in the dark.

She glanced over, and saw that her note to Lennier was gone. A data crystal sat in its place. After a beat, Delenn took it up and loaded it. Lennier's face appeared on her screen, so familiar, like a clan member she had known her whole life. How could she have ever planned to send him away, to order him away? It had been some time since she had hated her odd Human emotional shifts, but she hated them now, hated herself, that she could have ever thought something so...disloyal.

"Delenn," Lennier said, "I hope you will not take this as an imposition, but I have made some adjustments in your agenda for the next few days. I have sensed that something...has changed lately in the way in which you view the world. Your demeanor. This necessarily requires a period of adjustment. I have scheduled a meeting with the Laks'an this evening. She is visiting the Brekana Colony at the moment, so there will be a delay of two minutes each way. I felt you needed to speak with her." Lennier clasped his hands and bowed. The recording ended.

She was glad that he had made a recording, rather than telling her in person. Scheduling her a meeting with the Laks'an was an imposition, he was correct, and if he were standing here in front of her, she would tell him as much. Since he was not here, Delenn could take a few deep breaths and be rational. Lennier was right. She was in need of spiritual guidance. She had thought about scheduling a meeting herself months ago, just after the Chrysalis, but had realized then that she needed to reach an even keel herself before hand; to do otherwise would only waste the Laks'an's time.

There were a few hours before the scheduled appointment. Delenn made herself eat a small meal first, just bread and fruit. Then she bathed, taking care to make sure she was especially clean. She dressed in a simple blue shift, pulling her thin, white robe over it. She carefully plaited her hair in a single braid, unsure what the Laks'an would think of her having hair at all. And then she lit a fresh candle and waited.

A chime sounded, telling her it was time for the meeting. Delenn felt a thin coil of nervousness snake its way through her stomach. She had only spoken to the Laks'an once before, and that had been in her previous incarnation, twenty some cycles earlier. It was amazing that Lennier had been able to secure her an audience so quickly, but perhaps even as former Satai she still was important enough to warrant such consideration. Perhaps the Laks'an was curious herself. It was hard to say. How would she greet Delenn? With courtesy? With warmth? Or would she look at Delenn as so many others of her people did, with distaste, with revulsion? Would she look at Delenn and only see a freak?

The screen brightened, and Delenn found herself looking at smooth, polished crystal facets. They glowed slightly, blues and greens. Comforting, serene. Distantly, bells were ringing. And then the Laks'an entered the frame, pausing for a moment with her head bowed, her eyes closed. Tears sprang unbidden to Delenn's eyes. Even with light years between them, meeting through viewscreens, she felt an immense feeling of gratitude, and awe. The Laks'an opened her eyes, raised them to Delenn's, and she smiled broadly. Two teeth were missing. Delenn bowed her head, and then could not help but smile in return.

The Laks'an was the holder of the Minbari cultural heritage, each vessel born when the previous one passed beyond the Veil. Whereas other Minbari knew that they had lived before, time and time again, though they did not possess any specific memories of those previous lives, the Laks'an was different. The Laks'an remembered all. She remembered the cycles still in living memory; she remembered the Time of Growth; she remembered the Dark Days; she remembered the last Shadow War. She remembered Valen. She remembered the birth of the Minbari as a species, maybe even was the very first Minbari. That, she could not remember.

This incarnation of the Laks'an was still a child, not yet ten cycles old. But her voice was deep, melodious, not child-like in the slightest. "Delenn of Mir. How good it is to see you! You are quite changed from our previous meeting. But still a child of Minbar."

Delenn couldn't breathe. She gasped, trying to draw air into her lungs. Tears clouded her vision. _Still a child of Minbar._ The Laks'an said it was so, and who was any other Minbari to argue with her? Laughter broke through her tears, and Delenn knew that from this day forward, everything would be all right.

xxx

"_Please don't go," he had said. And then he'd reached for her, saying her name, when had he began using her name so familiarly? Delenn couldn't remember. She tossed and turned on the hard mattress, unable to find a comfortable position. She knew that sleep was lost to her, that she should rise and make productive use of this time, but she could be as stubborn as any Minbari, even now._

_She should have stayed. That was the thought she wrestled with, what kept her awake. Her rational mind continued to provide the reasons why staying would have been the worst mistake, but she didn't want to listen. She just wanted him. And she wanted to make sure he didn't leave._

_Thoughts of his wife tormented her. Anna Sheridan, a woman she had never met. The woman he had loved. Still loved. Delenn realized that if Sheridan wasn't sleeping, it was not thoughts of her that kept him awake, but thoughts of Anna. He would miss Anna, remember Anna, desire Anna. Not her._

_Now Delenn pushed herself up from the bed. Hadn't she always known that to be the truth? Sheridan was an outgoing, friendly man, and he had never been anything other than friendly with her. No doubt he behaved the same way with many other people. And she had been so starry-eyed around him – what was the word? Susan had said it once. A smash? She had a smash on him? That didn't sound right. _

_She went to her computer, jabbed her fingers at the screen, going from menu to menu. A mistake, she thought, this is a mistake, but she didn't stop. Finally she found herself looking at a picture of Anna Sheridan, standing in front of a standard exploration ship, smiling brightly. Reddish-brown hair, sparkling eyes. Round, pink cheeks and full lips. She wore a shirt with no sleeves, just a strip of fabric at the top of each shoulder, and she wore shorts that ended closer to her waist than her knees. Wide expanses of bronzed skin. _

_This was what Sheridan found attractive. A woman who could not look more different than Delenn, with her strange dark hair, her cool eyes, her pale skin. _

_Delenn kept searching. Pictures of Anna Sheridan at digs, pictures of her at university, pictures of her with colleagues. Big toothy smiles, her energy seemed to leap from the screen. You could almost hear her laughter. It would have been bright and effervescent, the kind of laugh that made you laugh yourself, even if you didn't know what she was laughing about._

_Pictures of Anna with her husband. Delenn's fingers fell to the screen, accidentally zoomed in on the image. Anna was looking down, her lashes dark fans against her cheeks, watching as Sheridan slipped a ring on her finger. But his eyes were on her face, and the love there was so strong that there could be no denying it._

_No one had ever looked at Delenn like that. They looked at her with raised eyebrows, with wide eyes, with questioning glances to their neighbors. They shook their heads at her, they pointed, they laughed. They called her names._

_Delenn closed the picture, closed all of them, but they were already burned into her brain. A despair took hold of her that was as chill as a winter rain. _

_What a fool she was._

xxx

It was late when Sheridan came to her quarters. So late, she had indeed changed into her night clothes, and as she struggled into one of her robes, she couldn't manage to find the ties. They were trapped somewhere in the folds of the fabric. Delenn didn't want him to leave, so she let him in anyway, just grabbing the sides of the robe and clutching them together at her waist.

He stood there just inside the doorway, only the half of his face near the kitchen lit. This stare was nothing like the one at the athletic field, when he had been so confused, so disarmed.

"Hi," he said, and he smiled. "Delenn."

She wanted to hug him. Instead she just smiled back. "Hello."

"I'm sorry..."

"You didn't wake me," she interrupted. "I just cannot find the..." She fluttered her hands, trying to indicate the strip of fabric that would secure the robe, _ties_ didn't seem like the right word. Of course, that meant the robe gaped open, and Sheridan's eyes dropped immediately. Did he have no courtesy at all? (_Of course he doesn't, he's a Human_, some antiquated part of her psyche answered, something that had lain dormant since the early years of the war.) She grabbed at the robe again, feeling that she might as well be naked in front of him, though the nightgown was no more revealing that the black dress had been at their first shared dinner together. She was still very aware of how thin the fabric was, of the way it outlined her breasts.

Sheridan just stepped forward until he was right in front of her. He moved his hands slowly, as though he was afraid she would strike him, and reached around her body. He found the strip of fabric, and drew it around her waist. He tied it, and when he cinched it tight, there was something in his eyes, which never left hers, that made her feel weak. His hands stayed where they were, and Delenn waited for them to begin to slide over her body. "You look as though you feel better," she said, though it was nearly a question. Sheridan nodded. He was too close, far too close, but Delenn could not make herself step back. "Tell me what happened," she said instead. She needed to know how he could have forgotten her so completely, and be sure that it would never happen again.

Sheridan nodded, stepped back. The composition of the air in her quarters didn't change, but Delenn felt as though she could breathe again. She joined him on the sofa, making sure to put a discreet distance between them. She kept a hand on the collar of her robe.

He told her about the Markab who had killed himself, bashing his own head in against a pipe. About the being that had jumped from the Markab corpse to Sheridan himself. About the hallucinations, the strange emotions. "This thing, it made me feel these things, trying to send me a message about its own situation. Fear, homesickness." Sheridan paused, his eyes finding hers. "Loss. The loss of the things that...mean the most to me."

Delenn swallowed hard and dropped her eyes to her lap. That feeling of being on the precipice, of something vast and unknown just before her, made itself known again. There were a thousand questions she wanted to ask him, and suddenly she couldn't remember a single word of English.

"I've missed you," he said quietly. "Missed seeing you. Missed having you at my side helping me to deal with all of this. Missed talking to you. It all went wrong, after Morden."

"That is his nature." Delenn reeled, his words completely unexpected. She dared to look at him again, and it was clear his gaze had never left her face. He shook his head, just once, the gesture calm.

"He didn't help, but I think...I think we've both been damaged lately. And sometimes it's difficult to let other people in, even though it would make things so much better." Sheridan reached out with two fingers and very delicately slid a lock of her hair back behind her ear. Delenn could not have hid her shiver even if she had wanted to.

"You don't seem damaged to me," she said, which was only the truth. Now Sheridan looked away from her, and it was though a connection between them had been severed.

"Part of me died two years ago," he murmured, his voice low, almost hoarse. "It happened, and for a long time I couldn't believe it. And then it was easier to just keep not believing it, to not think about it, to just...go on. It was easier to cut out everything around where that part had been and fill up the empty space with work. It was so much easier that a lot of the time, it was almost as if I was glad that a part of me was dead. But whenever I realized that, when my sister called on what had been our wedding anniversary, when I found something of her's in a drawer, when I heard a funny joke and made a mental note to tell her later, whenever that happened? I have never hated myself so much in my entire life. And then, of course, the best and easiest way to get past _that_ was to pretend it had never happened, either. I made myself not think about it, about any of it. Made myself not deal with it.

"So when Morden showed up, when all of that happened, I _had_ to deal with it. I had to acknowledge it. And it hurt. I've never been good with mental pain, I like being happy so I just make myself be happy, as much as I can. But that pain, it wasn't the worst. The worst was the guilt."

"You aren't responsible for what happened to her," Delenn said. She tried to sound as logical as possible, so she would convince him. "It wasn't your fault."

There was a long pause while he studied his hands. Then he looked back at her. "That's not what I feel guilty about." It took a moment before the meaning of his words reached her.

"Oh," she said quietly, more an exhalation than a word.

"Yeah." All night he had been looking at her in some way she didn't recognize, didn't know how to categorize. Now she knew. It was the look she had seen in the picture, as he slid the ring on Anna's finger.

"I don't mean to make you feel guilty," she said. She didn't like how defensive she sounded.

"That night, that night you sat with me, I wondered what my life would be like if Anna hadn't died. If she were still here. Would she have come to the station with me? Would she have been with me as I got to know you? Would that have changed anything between you and me?" He paused, and Delenn felt every emotion she had ever felt, all mixed up and jumbled together. "I felt guilty because I realized that it wouldn't have made any difference," Sheridan finally said. His face blurred in front of her, and Delenn dragged her hand across her eyes, not wanting him to see her tears.

They sat in silence. Delenn felt that every muscle in her body was locked stiff. She concentrated on breathing evenly, of letting the tightness in her throat melt away in slow, unnoticeable increments.

"Delenn. Say something."

More silence. If she tried to speak now, only a croak would issue from her throat. The pause lengthened and lengthened, but Sheridan didn't move, didn't say a word.

"I don't know what to say." The barest whisper, she couldn't even hear it herself, but she thought he did.

"Do you not feel the same way?"

She shook her head, a tear spilled down her cheek. "I do," she said, and she bit her lip hard enough to draw blood. "I do." Sheridan got up suddenly, and she was certain she had somehow managed to anger him, but he only retrieved a tissue and brought it back to her. She wiped her eyes and under her nose, and he rested his hand between her shoulder blades. She laughed a little, the sound dry and bitter. "And I have felt guilty because I should be worrying about the Narn and Centauri, and about the Earth government, and about the Shadows. And instead, all I seem to worry about...is you." What a relief to admit to that! It wasn't until she said it that she realized he might misinterpret her words. But he only rubbed his hand up and down a little. His touch was so comforting she felt she might weep.

"Maybe mutual guilt isn't the best place to start a relationship," he said lightly, with a short laugh of his own. "Can we just be friends?" he asked. "Let's just be friends for now. Okay? The way things were before."

"Yes," she agreed. "I'd like that."

After that, it seemed that all the tension between them vanished. They made plans to meet for dinner some time in the indeterminate future; their schedules were both so full, it was hard to plan for much of anything. Sheridan talked more about flying out into space to take the unknown entity home – how sure he'd been, how once he had climbed into his ship, he hadn't felt a moment of fear.

Once he yawned, though, Delenn stood and went to the door, which forced him to follow. She did not want him to fall asleep on her couch again. It would not be a good idea to test their vow to remain friends and nothing more so soon, not when she still felt so labile. Before she could react, Sheridan put his arms around her, drawing her close. His scent was warm and full, and she breathed it in.

"That part of me, that died?" His breath puffed against her ear. "I felt it again, that first time I saw you. I'm glad." Delenn just closed her eyes, concentrated on nothing besides the feel of his body, his arms tight around her.

It was a long time before he let go.

xxx

_Dukhat walked her back to her chamber, their pace unhurried. At some point her hand had found his. At her door, he surprised her with an embrace, pulling her tight against him. _

"_Master," she said, and he released her, his smile bright._

"_I am not your Master any more. You are Satai, and we are equals." Delenn knew there was something in his eyes, something that had never been there before, but now was not the time to explore it. She only inclined her head to him, courteous yet shallow, signifying acceptance of his words, not deference. _

"_And perhaps you will regret nominating me in the first place," she said lightly. Dukhat laughed._

"_What do you have up your sleeve, Delenn?" She didn't answer him, only smiled and entered her chamber._

_Once inside, she found the book of prophecy she had carried with her for the last eight cycles. Dukhat had thought her to be joking, perhaps, but she had not been. She had many plans, many plans indeed. The grey robe hung carefully in the closet, Delenn lay on her bed, reading Valen's words once more._


End file.
