Темное, кривое зеркало. Том 3 : След на песке

Elrisia was still screaming.

* * *

She knew where she had to go, where there was one person who could help her. She had passed up on his love once before, but it was different now. It was the past now. He was different.

She could still change things. Not for humanity perhaps, but for her. She could…. be…. happy….

The rift was tearing her apart, but the space suit would protect her. They had been modified slightly to provide protection against the rift. She knew that. The voice that had once spoken to her had said that machinery had been added for protection when last-minute work had been needed on the station before entering the rift. It would protect her as well.

And as the winds of time buffeted her this way and that way, as she screamed in pain both physical and remembered, Susan Ivanova made her way slowly to the Babylon.

'I don't like this mission,' David was saying. 'It sounds…. dangerous.'

'Don't try to protect me,' she replied, a little more harshly than she had intended. 'I know what I'm doing. I…. I have to get away from Proxima for a while, that's all, and besides…. this is important. You know that. We need all the advantages we can get in this war, and there might just be some out on the Rim.'

'That's not it, Susan.' God, he looked so young. He was, really, but still…. So many years ago. Before she had left for the Rim. In a very real sense she had never returned from it. 'You're running from something. What is it? Why won't you tell me?'

'You're imagining things.' A lie. It had been a lie then, and he had known it. She had accidentally run into a Psi Cop a few days before volunteering for the mission. The teep — Donne, her name had been — had looked at her slowly and curiously, before walking on. Had she suspected anything? They were getting closer to her now. Soon, they would find out.

'It's an important mission, and I have to do this. David, I don't try to dissuade you from risking your life next to Captain Sheridan all the time, do I?'

'Susan, that's…. that's different, and you know it.'

'No, it isn't. I've got to go. I'll see you…. when I get back, David. It'll only be a couple of months.'

And then she had left, and never returned.

Until now.

Her eyes opened, and she could see him again. She was feeling…. so weak, but…. ready. There he was. David. A good few years older than in her vision from the past, but…. still young, still innocent. She almost sobbed.

There were others beside him, and one of them barked something. She couldn't understand the words, and she tried to move forward. They were all drawing weapons. She recognised one of them. Not his name, but he had…. done something…. He had helped her, helped them, once…. He had let her try to kill Delenn.

No. Prevent that betrayal, do something to change the present, perhaps save them all.

She moved, and tried to touch them. There was a brilliant flare of light before her eyes, and she screamed. The other man had fallen, but everything inside her was churning. She felt sick. She tried to reach David. He was so close to her now…. almost…. there….

With a soft wrench, she was pulled back into the timestream.

'Why are you doing this?' someone was asking her. 'Why are you…?'

'I must have been dropped on my head when I was a baby,' she replied, with trademark cynicism. 'I don't need a reason.'

'I will not forget this.'

'I doubt you'll live long enough to.'

With a shock, she realised she was holding a weapon. She raised it up. A darkness fell over them both, and something in the other person's eyes glinted, and Susan realised at last who it was.

The timestream threw her out again, her head reeling. She was in the same place she had been in before, the docking bay of the Babylon. David was there again, but alone. It was the same time as before.

He began to speak, and unlike the last time, she could understand his words. 'It's you, isn't it?' he said. 'I thought it was before, but now…. it is you.'

She tried to move forward, to reach him, to touch him, but she could not, and she fell. He rushed to her side, but then stopped suddenly. 'You need my help,' he said, not a question, but a statement. He knew her better than she knew herself these days.

She nodded weakly.

'So then, what can I do for you?' Slowly, desperately, knowing that it might be a mistake but willing to chance it anyway, she removed her helmet, so much wanting to see him directly instead of through a visor.

'I….' She tried to think of what to say, but the words would not come out. So much had not happened yet, there was so much she had not yet done that she would regret. Marcus was…. still alive.

'I'm sorry, David,' she whispered, tears running down her face. 'When I…. left you, we argued. I'm sorry for what I said.'

'Ah…. that's all right,' he said, bemused. 'Susan, you look…. different. This has to do with Babylon Four, doesn't it? What's happening?'

'It's…. I can't explain. Think of me as…. as….' A brief memory of Marcus came to her mind, a book he had been reading while he was assigned to look after her — or to spy on her, depending on your point of view. But David was hardly a greedy miser, and she was no spirit, benevolent or otherwise, and she could not change him. What had been…. was, and she could not alter it.

'I'm a ghost,' she said, trying to beat back tears. 'I'm just a ghost passing through. Forget I was ever here.'

'I'll never forget you, Susan,' he said, and he was so sincere, so genuine….

She blinked away her tears, and knew what she had to do. He had shown her the way, although he would probably never know how. To be truthful, she probably never would either. 'I need to get back to Babylon Four,' she said. 'There's…. something I have to do.'

'Can I help?'

She shook her head sadly. 'You already have. More than you can know.'

He nodded. 'I'll…. always be around to help you, no matter what's been going on lately. I have hope for the future, Susan. Everything will turn out for the best, I'm sure of that.'

'Keep believing that…. and maybe…. may…. be….'

She fell silent, and did not speak again until she arrived back on Babylon 4, almost exactly at the spot where she had ambushed and captured Sheridan. The Narn was waiting there for her, as were Valen and Zathras.

'I surrender,' she said quietly. 'I'm turning myself over to you.'

'Told you,' said Zathras happily. 'Zathras knows best. Oh yes. People should listen to Zathras more. Zathras knows what Zathras is saying.'

* * *

A ruined ship was floating aimlessly, just one pile of debris among so many, just one more mark of the lost and the damned in this battle. In the remains of what had once been the bridge of the EAS Parmenion there was a body, the body of one who had once been the greatest hope of his people.

Captain John Sheridan was trapped between life and death. He was not breathing.

There was a sudden and brilliant flare of light, the very last act of a dying angel.

And then there was silence once more.

* * *

'He is not dead,' she said softly. 'I can feel it. I know. He is not dead.'

Commander David Corwin nodded once, briefly. He wanted to believe her, even if he was not sure he could. No one could have survived that, could they? If anyone could, it would be the Captain.

'He…. is not dead.'