Babylon 5 s05e04 Episode Script

Lochley.
Go.
We've got something on the long-range hyperspace probes, captain.
- Is it them? - It could be.
They destroyed the probe before we could get much information.
On my way.
- Anything else on the scanners? - Not yet.
They're at maximum range as it is.
Keep scanning.
All right, people, we don't have confirmation yet but it may be the scout fleet the Gaim warned us about.
They're the advanced wing of a hostile alien force that's scouting out this sector for likely worlds to invade.
For "likely" read "soft and vulnerable.
" Our task is to make sure they either don't leave here or they leave convinced that we are neither soft nor vulnerable and way too much trouble to invade.
We win this battle, they go away we save ourselves a great deal of trouble in the future.
We lose, this will get a hell of a lot worse.
Let's get ready.
I want all civilian traffic moved out of the area.
- President Sheridan been notified yet? - As soon as we got the signal.
I want a life pod for him and Delenn in case things get out of control.
- He won't leave.
Neither will Delenn.
- Leave that to me.
I'll talk to them.
If I have to knock them out and stick them in a pod, I'll do it.
- Just get it ready.
- Aye, captain.
Captain Lochley to Cobra Bays.
Launch defensive wing number one.
I confirm we are on standby for red alert.
Repeat, we are now on standby for red alert.
Come on, let's go! Let's go! Pick it up! Move it! This is not a drill.
All station commanders report to C & C.
- Looks like another red alert.
- Yeah.
Third one this month.
Seems like every week something goes wrong here.
And we have to clean it up.
- Never think about that part, now, do they? - Probably never even crosses their minds.
You got that right.
Wonder what this one's about.
Don't know.
I guess we'll find out in a little bit.
And so it begins.
- There is a hole in your mind.
- What do you want? No one here is exactly what he appears.
Nothing's the same anymore.
Commander Sinclair is being reassigned.
Why don't you eliminate the entire Narn Homeworld? I see a great hand reaching out of the stars.
President Clark signed a decree declaring martial law.
These orders have forced us to declare independence.
Unless your people get off their encounter-suited butts and do something - You are The One who was.
- lf you go to Z'Ha'Dum, you will die.
Why are you here? Do you have anything worth living for? I think of my beautiful city in flames.
Get out of our galaxy! We are here to place President Clark under arrest.
- Mr.
President, I insist - You can insist till your heart's content.
- I am not leaving.
Neither is Delenn.
- We don't know what we're getting into.
We have no information on the disposition of the enemy forces their weapons, strength, and all the White Stars are out.
- They won't get back - I understand.
No, sir, I don't think you do.
Now, my job is to protect you and this station, not necessarily in that order.
- That part I understand.
- I can't do my job protecting the station if I have to worry about you.
Just give me a little peace of mind on the one front, sir.
That'll give me the freedom to take care of all the rest.
If our positions were reversed what would you do? The same.
So you'll link to the life pod, and we'll know your whereabouts? - I'll do what I can.
- Mr.
President, it's vital - You hear that, Bo? - Yeah.
That's why I like Sheridan.
Always have.
A lot of these bigwigs, they're only worried about protecting their own skin.
Sheridan, he's down in the trenches with everybody else.
He is that.
One day, I was working Grey Sector and he came running after a guy who stabbed Delenn.
You could see it in his eyes.
He was ready to kill this guy.
Anybody else would have let Security take care of it.
But Sheridan chased him down and put him down so hard the guy didn't get up for three days.
You've seen him and Delenn together, right? Now, that's true love, my friend.
- You don't see that very often.
- Very true.
He's a good man.
Yeah, a good man.
I heard he was dead once.
Yeah, well, nobody's perfect, Bo.
- Hey, Mack, can I ask you a question? - Shoot.
- What the hell are these things for? - What do you mean? - I mean, what do they do? - What do you mean, "What do they do?" You run them along the floor like this.
Okay, so what does it do? It's not any cleaner.
I don't know.
Maybe it looks for cracks, or it does something to the metal.
- Makes it stronger.
I don't know.
- So you don't know what it does? No.
Well I guess it's time for lunch.
- Yep.
- What you got there? - Hard salami.
Hard salami? How the hell did you get hard salami up here? - I know a guy.
- Yeah, well, introduce me sometime, okay? I'm a little tired of the same old, same old.
I'm a little desperate here.
I can tell.
What is that stuff? Well, it's this spoo everybody's talking about.
The Centauri love it.
Ten credits an ounce, if you can believe that.
What's it taste like? It's hard to say, Bo.
Kind of spoo-ish, I guess.
No, you're supposed to say chicken.
Whenever you eat something strange and someone asks, "What's it taste like?" You're supposed to say "chicken.
" It doesn't taste like chicken.
Okay.
- Okay, never mind.
- Want half? - Trade you for the hard salami.
- I don't know.
Come on, Bo, be a guy.
Oh, man this stuff is awful.
Ten credits an ounce, if you can believe that.
- The Centauri love it? - They go nuts for it.
No wonder their hair stands straight up.
All sectors, enemy scout ship is on vector to jumpgate.
Now entering full red alert.
Maintenance, we need someone in Medlab and Observation Dome ASAP.
- How's the salami? - It tastes like chicken.
All right, listen up, I want everyone that can be moved cleared out of Medlabs 2 and 3.
We're going to need the space.
I want a prep for radiation burns exposure to space, trauma, lacerations and We got problems with the Isolab.
It's only giving us standard atmosphere options.
- We need to customize on the fly.
- System's probably locked up.
- Give me two minutes, and I'll get it online.
- Thanks.
All right, listen up, check the protoblood stores.
See what we have on hand.
I want all synthetics on standby ready to adapt to whatever comes in.
All right, let's go to work.
I just wish I knew what kind of life forms we're in for.
- Makes it kind of hard to prepare.
- Why? - Why what? - Nothing.
I didn't mean No, go ahead.
What were you saying? It's just that, why bother? Whoever they are, whatever they are, they're coming here to kill us.
If I see one of them flopping on the deck, gasping for air, I'm gonna let him buy it.
Well, that's your choice.
I don't agree.
Why not? Why not? You know, some days, I wonder the same thing, all right? Sometimes it's like no one else is playing by the rules, so why should we? It does take it out of you after a while, believe me.
Even so Now, see, the thing is, I wasn't always going to be a doctor.
My father is career military, just like his dad and his dad before him.
So it was just understood that I would go the same way.
I even bought into it myself.
And then one day, l - You remember what happened to the lares? - Yeah.
Yeah, that was right before the Dilgar War.
We got caught in the middle of a civil war between two midrange colonies.
Lares was shot down and captured by enemy forces.
My father was first officer on the lares.
When that ship went down, there wasn't much chance anybody would survive or that any survivors would be allowed to live by the enemy.
It took almost two months for our forces to retake that base.
I remember watching ISN when they opened up the enemy base and three injured soldiers came out.
One of them was my father.
The base doctor kept him alive over the objections of the CO because he believed that life was sacred and had to be preserved.
When I saw him walk out, supported by the doctor I knew right then that's what I wanted to do with my life.
Of course, my father, he wasn't too happy about it, but he always said we had to go our own way.
So I did.
So when this is all over, I'll be out there looking for anybody I can save on our side or theirs, because that's what I do.
That's what I would want them to do for me or for you.
So I need those atmospherics back online.
- You'll have it.
- All right.
- Hey, doc.
- Yeah? So, what happened to the doctor that helped your dad? Shot and killed by his own men.
They said he was a traitor.
- What's the problem? - I don't know.
It was working fine a moment ago and then the wiring shorted out.
Let me take a look.
- Status? - Working on secondary targeting console.
Primaries are online.
We read three scout vessels ahead of the main assault group.
We can't let any of them get back to the main group.
Make sure Here they come.
I can't get a lock.
They're coming around.
Delta Wing moving to intercept.
- Defense grid, prepare to fire.
- Defense grid, aye.
Primaries locking on.
Fire.
- Splash bogey one.
- Target lock on bogey two.
Direct hit on bogey two.
They're trying to access our defense information.
- Scramble the codes.
- Lf we scramble it, we can't use the system.
If they download our codes, the main fleet can shut us down.
Scramble it.
- Aye, captain.
- There's your problem.
- She's making a run for it.
- All fighters, I want that ship.
She's outrunning them.
Out of range of the primary weapons system.
- There you go! - Secondaries back online.
Fire.
Yeah, that's your problem.
Had a bunch of these come in on a food transport about a year ago.
Always getting in the wiring.
- Lieutenant, status? - Defense grid fully operational, captain.
Good, because that was only a taste of what's coming just enough to soften us up and scout out the area.
The rest of them won't be far behind.
We're in serious guano here, lieutenant.
Better alert the ambassadors and go through emergency evac procedures.
Understood.
While you do that, I'm gonna go have a little talk with Mr.
Garibaldi.
- Hey, how'd it go? - Another B1-5.
In C & C? Man, we're gonna catch hell for that one.
Damned crawlers are all over the place.
Can you hand me that R-12? Yeah.
So you get a chance to see the new captain? - Yeah.
- What do you think? - Tastes like - Don't go there.
Okay.
Hey, one thing's for sure if I needed somebody to watch my back in a fight, I'd pick her.
She's tough.
She's smart.
I'm just glad she's on my side.
- Yeah, maybe.
- What do you mean? - Nothing.
- No, no.
Come on, you said it.
- You must have meant something.
- You just hear things.
Rumors.
Like what? Well, back when we were fighting Earth, trying to get rid of President Clark scuttlebutt is, she was on the wrong side.
So were a lot of people.
A lot of them followed orders because they had to.
And some of them followed them because they wanted to.
- So, what are you saying? - I'm not saying anything.
You asked me what the rumor was, and I told you.
You shouldn't listen to rumors, Bo.
This place is full of them.
When lvanova left, everywhere I turned, somebody had an opinion on that one.
One guy said that she left because she was heartbroken over that guy - Marcus.
- Marcus, right.
Then somebody else said that she wanted a promotion.
Quit because she wasn't getting paid enough money.
So which is it? What difference does it make? That's the military life.
People come, people go.
It's nobody else's business.
If I shouldn't listen to rumors then why did you ask me to tell you what they were? I just like to stay informed, that's all.
Brown 9.
- Oh, man, we got Brown Sector again? - I know, I know.
I thought Del Rey was working Brown Sector.
Del Rey's down sick.
He - Oh, damn it, captain.
- Blue 7.
I need all the information.
How am I to know they could download our tactical system? You're supposed to be head of Covert Intelligence.
Right now I'm not seeing a lot of intelligence: Covert, overt or otherwise.
The Gaim didn't say anything about that.
When his people got hit - Did you ask him? - No, I didn't ask him if they could scan us.
I also didn't ask them if they could wax the hull.
Some of the questions I think about, and some I don't.
You can't think of everything.
That's the nature of your job, Mr.
Garibaldi.
If you can't handle it, I'll tell President Sheridan to find someone who can.
Meanwhile, I suggest you go back to the Gaim and think up all those questions you didn't think up before because we have an assault fleet on the way and I'd like to have at least a fighting chance of surviving the next 12 hours.
Well, trust me, the odds on that are pretty damn small right about now.
- Pizza sounds good.
- No, can't get good pizza up here.
- I know a guy.
- Oh, here we go again.
I really hate it down here, Bo.
- The crawlers? - Yeah, they've been in here too but that ain't the problem.
It looks like we've had seepage from the water reprocessing system again.
They keep tapping the pipes for fresh, and they never close them up right again.
- Hand me those pliers.
- Sure.
You know, I was wondering why don't they shut down the jumpgate when this sort of thing happens? - When what happens? - Well, the captain was saying something about an alien fleet.
Here you go.
They can't just shut down the gate.
The thing takes four, five days to heat up and two days just to shut down.
Any faster and boom.
There's a lot of power in those things, Mack, an awful lot.
And besides, if things get hot you don't want to close off your only route of escape out of here.
- This is Mack.
- You guys take care of that M- 17? - Just finished, boss.
- Okay, get down to the sanctuary.
They need the place prepped for some religious ceremony.
Heading out.
- They never give us a break around here.
- Amen.
We are strongly urging all residents to stay in your quarters until the current crisis has passed.
The first wing of the attack is coming through.
I repeat, the first wing is coming through.
Maintenance, this is Mackie, we're finished in here.
Going on break for a bit unless you need us.
Negative.
You're clear for now.
Almost pretty, isn't it? Yeah, I suppose it is.
Sometimes it's easy to forget those are our guys fighting out there.
All you see is the light, the color.
When you see red that's one of ours going up.
- The green, that's the other guys.
- How can you tell? You can't have an explosion unless you have an atmosphere in the ship.
Our guys use oxygen.
So when the fuel core blows, it lights up red.
Those other guys use some other atmosphere.
I don't know, carbon monoxide, something.
So when the thing blows it's different.
Green.
You figure this out all by yourself, did you? I asked one of the pilots the other day.
He told me all about it.
- Most of them act like we don't exist.
- Yeah, hotshots.
Yeah, but this one was okay.
Probably out there right now.
Hey, that was a red one.
- When did you get religious? - I'm not.
It's just respect, that's all.
Every time we get a little red star born out there, somebody's life ends.
All they ever were gonna be, all they were all the people they knew, all the people they loved it's all gone.
They're fighting for us, Mack.
Don't ever forget that.
Take a look.
Yeah! Yeah.
One of the White Stars.
Captain said they wouldn't be back for a while.
This baby was closer to home than the others.
- It sure looks pretty.
- You think? Hell, yeah.
What do you think? I always thought they looked like plucked chickens.
- What? - Look, it's not my fault they were designed that way.
Look, that's a breaching pod.
It looks like we're gonna have us some guests.
Attention, all residents.
You are advised to move to the shelters at once.
We are being boarded.
I repeat, all personnel to the shelters.
You heard the man.
Computer, Blue 3.
- Come on, Blue 3.
- The system's shorted out.
- Oh, great.
- Let's just hope we're not between levels.
Manual override.
Get down! Get down! - Close it up! - I can't! Get out! Holy Cover me! Cover me! Zack, we need a medic here! Watch your back! Watch your back! Cover me! What the hell are you guys doing here?! Get out of here! We'll cover you! Go on! Cover! - Hey, Bo! - Yeah? - Next time, we walk, man! - I'm with you.
You're safe.
I suggest you remain here until the fighting stops.
- Yeah, but the fighting's right outside.
- Nonetheless, it is safe.
A fellow of infinite jest.
I knew him, Horatio.
It's Mack, actually.
This is Bo.
- You knew this guy? - After the fact.
He was killed just outside that door.
His helmet rolled in here and stopped just where you're sitting.
At the moment of death, there is a passing of energy an explosion of consciousness.
It permeates everything in close proximity: Your clothes, jewelry, anything.
We can still feel him.
What he was, what he did his hopes and fears and expectations.
It's still there for a few minutes.
Then it will disappear joining him in silence.
Telepaths.
The telepaths we heard about, the ones that Sheridan let live down here.
Well, we don't get assigned to Brown Sector much anymore.
It's mainly the new guys who get stuck with it.
I didn't mean anything by that.
It's just that we didn't Shouldn't you folks be in a shelter? It's a lot less dangerous.
Though cruel and capricious, bringing us into a world that fears us and hates us nature did not leave us entirely without protection.
Yeah.
- Yeah, maybe so.
We should go.
- Yeah, we should go.
Oh, man, this close to the hull I mean, you really feel it when we take a hit.
You know, this thing goes on much longer, and we're gonna have a breach.
It's okay.
Our guys will handle them.
- Do you think so? - They're the best pilots in this sector.
I just wish I was out there with them.
- Do you? - Yeah.
- Sincerely? - Bo.
Yeah, I sincerely do.
- Tell me that it matters to you.
- Bo, I don't Yes, it matters to me.
Why? What the hell? Bo.
Bo, you okay? It's quiet outside.
The fighting seems to have moved down the hall.
- I think we should be going, while we can.
- Yeah.
Goodbye.
My life here absolutely intolerable, completely inexcusable.
You would think we would be beyond this sort of thing by now, wouldn't you? And whose idea was it to send the White Stars away at a time like this? They are still returning from guarding the Enfili Homeworld, as you well know.
I wasn't talking to you.
I was talking to the universe.
The universe The universe hates me, you know.
I don't know why.
I have never done anything to the universe to Well, all right, a few things but after a while, you would think it would be enough.
"Yes, we have had our little fun with Londo Mollari for now.
Perhaps it is time to move on and find someone else to play with.
" You seem rather calm about all of this.
When I was a child, your people decided that the rebellion by my people needed to be discouraged.
So your people bombed seven of our major cities for six straight days, 31 hours a day.
You thought you could bomb us into submission.
It didn't work then, and it didn't work later.
We spent our days in shelters we made ourselves.
We sang songs.
We prayed.
We ate.
We slept.
I spent my life in one such shelter or another.
I will tell you the truth, Mollari.
This is probably the closest thing I have to a home.
Yes, well, don't start singing.
You'll frighten the children.
We have enough misery to deal with as it is.
We don't need to add more.
And where did you grow up, Mollari? - What? - It was a simple enough question.
While I was sitting in a bomb shelter learning to hate your people where did you spend your time as a child? Playing in the imperial gardens? Learning Centauri table manners? I was never a child.
I had responsibilities.
I've had responsibilities for as long as I can remember: Duty, honor, family.
- That explains a great deal.
- Really? And what exactly does it explain, G'Kar? I spent my years in one shelter after another, but sooner or later I was able to leave the shelter and walk out into the daylight.
You do not have that luxury.
You carry your shelter with you every day.
You did not grow up.
You grew old.
I think I will see how things are going out there.
I'll go too.
Good idea.
What, are you afraid I won't come back, G'Kar? No, I'm afraid you will.
So how long you figure they've been married? Attention personnel, a second wave is coming through the gate.
Repeat, a second wave is coming through.
- Yeah? - All hands are needed on Red 1.
We have fires on the deck burning in from the hull.
On our way.
Let's go.
Yeah, all right.
All right.
Where's that support? Get it up here now! - Delenn, listen to me.
- No.
- You have to get on the life pod.
- I refuse to leave.
That's what I said to Lochley, and I was wrong.
Now, this isn't going well.
I need to know that you are safe.
- John, l - You two.
- Do you know where the life pods are? - Yes, sir.
- Escort Ambassador Delenn there at once.
- But, sir, we were told Doesn't matter.
I need everyone in Security on the firing line.
That leaves you.
See to it she gets there safely and gets on the first available pod.
- Yes, sir.
- Now, go on.
With luck, the rest of the White Stars will get here on time and we won't even need the pods.
- What if we do? What if the station falls? Then as you said to me once: "I'll see you again in the place where no shadows fall.
" Go on.
Ma'am? Ambassador.
The pods are this way.
- What is your name? - Ma'am? That was not a difficult question.
No, it's just Well, folks at your level I mean, we don't get asked that a lot, ma'am.
We just get orders.
My name is Mack, and this is Bo.
We're kind of a team.
Floaters, I guess you could say.
Guys in Maintenance have their own beat.
We get assigned to whatever needs doing.
We keep the place running while the big boys are fighting or making all the big decisions.
- Worker Caste.
- Yeah, I guess you could say that.
We're just about as Worker Caste as you're ever gonna find up here.
If you don't mind, the launch bays are this way.
- I was going to ask you a question.
- Ma'am? If I'm launched in a life pod, and let us say, shortly after the launch the equipment is accidentally smashed from the inside what would happen to the pod? - It'd crash into Epsilon 3.
- Or explode.
It could explode.
Possible.
It wouldn't be good either way, ma'am.
I see.
Understand, that while I'm not a prophet, I can tell you that if I were going to be sent away in a life pod and forced to watch everything I love and have fought for die before my eyes without even a chance to keep it together the life pod would suffer just such a terrible accident.
Now, time being circular, if we know that this will happen then we may as well assume that it has happened already and that the life pod is not safe for me to enter.
The president is right, ma'am.
It's not safe here for either one of you.
I know, but it's home for both of us.
Ma'am.
You two really do love each other, don't you? Hey, did you see that smile? I mean, it was like the sun coming out from behind a cloud.
I did indeed.
Suddenly, I think I understand Sheridan a lot better.
- How so? - Dead or alive, I'd claw my way out of hell and straight through 10 miles of solid rock to see that smile again.
- Yeah.
What the hell was that, a hit? - No, it didn't sound like one.
- Oh, yeah! All right! - What? What is it? The cavalry is here! Yeah! Is that amazing or what? I mean, they look like angels swooping in out of the sky.
- You said they looked like plucked chickens.
- Not right now, they don't.
Hey, do you ever wish you could be out there? You know, riding fire with the rest of them? Sometimes, yeah.
Sometimes no, and sometimes I wonder what the hell I'm doing here.
All of this is bigger than you.
It's bigger than me.
It's bigger than anyone should ever have to deal with.
- Yeah, I know what you mean.
- Then I take a look at the rest of them: Londo, G'Kar, Sheridan, Delenn.
And I think, "If they can handle it, then I can handle it.
" My mother used to tell me: "God knows the age of every tree and the color of every flower.
And he knows just how wide your shoulders are.
And he'll never give you anything to carry that's bigger than you can handle.
" Then maybe that's what this whole place is about.
That's what you have to do to get by in a place like this.
- And what's that? - Grow bigger shoulders.
- It looks like the fighting's stopped.
- Yeah.
- We best get back to work.
- I guess so.
- What a mess.
- I hear you.
It's like this all over the place.
Hull needs work, we got air locks shot out all over Brown Level and you don't want to know what the HAZMAT boys have waiting for them outside.
All that stuff: Body parts, ship parts, fuel cores.
All of it has to be picked up and taken away or it'll float around until it messes something up.
Yeah, typical.
They call all the shots, they get all the glory we clean up all the mess.
Well maybe not all the mess.
Cleanup detail is still working on Bays 3 and 7.
They figure they'll have the work done by 0900 hours.
Negative.
We have a transport due in at 8.
- They'll be done by then.
- Yes, captain.
So anything new from the hyperspace probes? Nothing.
It looks like we got them all.
Not even one of them made it out to report back on our weaknesses or situation.
Good, mission accomplished.
They'll move on to the next target.
Just hope it doesn't have anything to do with us or anybody else in this sector.
Roger that.
Ma'am? Captain? Captain Lochley! Yes? Well, captain I know you're new here and all, and I just wanted to say you're okay in my book, ma'am.
- Thank you.
- Yeah.
Medlab 4 reports a power loss.
Get a tech team on it.
Hello, Mack, Bo.
- Bo? - Yeah? - She remembered my name.
- Our names.
- I think I'm in love.
- She's married.
We could work something out.
- Will you come on? - Yeah.
- So lunch? - Sure, I'll treat.
How about some spoo? At 15 credits an ounce? You're out of your