To Dream in the City of Sorrows (35 page)

Sinclair was already giving his order. “Computer. Emergency procedures. Engines in reverse. Back away from the rift. Full priority. Fighter Two, Fighter Three–“

“Engines in reverse,” Marcus and Sakai said almost simultaneously.

Sinclair’s fighter shuddered as his reverse engines kicked in, full power. His forward motion began to slow, then stopped. The ship groaned and shuddered again, then slowly, very slowly began backing away from the rift, inch by inch.

“It’s working,” Marcus said.

“Yeah, but how long can these ships keep this up?” Sakai asked. “We’re pouring everything we got into this. The engines can’t tolerate this kind of strain forever. “

“They shouldn’t have to for long,” Sinclair said, trying to sound more hopeful than he felt. “Draal should be working right now to close that portal down.”

But Sinclair wondered if the explosion had put the rift out of Draal’s control somehow. There were just too many unknown factors at work, and Sinclair didn’t like it at all. That explosion, for instance, was nothing like he’d been told to expect. Perhaps the Vorlons knew less about Shadow technology than they thought. Or was it that the Vorlons knew less about this rift than they pretended to know?

“Fighter Two, Fighter Three. How’s your progress?”

“Slow but steady,” Sakai answered. “I’m picking up just a little bit of speed,” Marcus said.

Sinclair checked his console again. Nothing, then yes – he was beginning to pick up just a little speed.

“I’m reading it, too,” said Sakai. “A small increase in speed. Looks like we’re doing it.”

“Roger that, Fighter Two,” Sinclair said. “Perhaps–“

Suddenly weapons fire slammed into Sakai’s starboard engine nacelle from above, shearing it off completely from Sakai’s fighter, and sending her ship spinning to the right. Then it began tumbling rapidly toward the time rift.

A Shadow fighter swooped down into view, and came straight at Sinclair. Their sensors hadn’t detected its presence. It had come over the top of the rim, just as they had, hiding in the distortion the rift created, undetectable until it was too late.

“Marcus, keep going! Get out of here!” Sinclair yelled. Sinclair fired a split second before the alien ship pulled up to go over Sinclair’s ship. The burst hit and took off two of the spiked projections and a good chunk of the lower back portion of the hull, but did not destroy the enemy ship. Like Sakai’s fighter, it veered suddenly and uncontrollably toward the rift.

“Computer. Cut reverse engines! Full power ahead! Take us into the rift!”

He was thrown backward into his seat as his fighter jumped forward and hurtled toward the spinning star field ahead.

“Entil’Zha–“ Sinclair heard Marcus say before everything on the com was lost to static.

“Catherine! Do you read me!” He tried but couldn’t get through the interference. He couldn’t talk to her, but he could see her ship up ahead, past the tumbling alien ship. They were all on the same trajectory toward what? Sinclair didn’t know. But he was certain that Catherine could have survived – must have survived – the attack. These prototype fighters could lose an engine nacelle without damage being done to the cockpit or life-support systems. In fact, because of the Vorlon technology, the ship had the capability of repairing some of the damage automatically. She still had one good engine nacelle with which she could maneuver. He just had to get to her.

Light flooded the cockpit as the star field disappeared and a flowing river of light and energy rushed past his ship. He strained to see ahead, to see past the alien ship, itself almost completely obscured by the moving currents of multicolored light, to find Catherine’s ship. He just caught a glimpse of it before it was covered in the fog of light and color.

There was no way to increase his speed; he was already at full power. They were still in the middle of the rift, still had time to go back the way they came, if she could reassert control of her ship and reverse her course ...

He suddenly realized he had been so focused on going forward to get to her, he didn’t even know if it was possible to reverse course inside the rift. Well, if not, he would just keep his course straight ahead and hope he would emerge from the rift at the same place and time that she did. Together, they could figure out what to do next.

The atmosphere around his ship grew less murky. He could see the alien ship clearly now, and just ahead Sakai’s ship came back into view.

Then he saw the darkness ahead of them. It looked like a wall of solid obsidian surrounded by blue fire.

“Catherine,” he tried again. “If you can hear me, I’m coming through after you. Just hang on. Catherine! Can you hear me? I’ll be there. I promise!”

He saw her ship hit the wall of darkness and go through, disappearing section by section until it was gone. The alien ship was next.

The atmosphere began to change once again. Flashes like sheet lightning flared suddenly, increasing rapidly in number and intensity all around him. The alien ship hit the wall, and began to disappear through it, the nose, the middle ... and stopped, halfway in, with Sinclair’s ship headed straight at it on a collision course.

Sinclair tried to pull the nose of his fighter up, tried to veer left or right, but as before, he was frozen into his trajectory and could not alter its course.

“Computer. Collision avoidance. Engines in reverse. Full stop.”

His ship began to slow down, but Sinclair realized grimly it wasn’t going to be enough. The only question now was would his ship slow down enough to make it possible for him to survive the impact? He braced himself, and concentrated on willing himself to survive, to make it through somehow ...

He was still a couple of hundred yards out when the alien ship burst apart, as if the wall had closed in on it and crushed it, spewing shrapnel that clanged and clattered off his ship’s hull and hard crystalline cockpit canopy like a hailstorm. One piece damaged the port engine intake cone, another larger piece sheared off a sensor array beneath the cockpit, and one small pellet punctured the cockpit canopy, punctured Sinclair’s helmet faceplate, snapping his head back and tearing through his left cheek to lodge under his cheekbone.

In front of him, the wall of darkness shattered into a million pieces, revealing an intense, blinding light that swallowed Sinclair and his ship as he clenched his eyes shut and put his arms over his face in a futile attempt to block the painful light. Then darkness.

“Fighter One! Are you all right?”

It was a moment more before Sinclair’s eyes could focus, but then he saw the stars through the canopy, and straight ahead he saw a barely visible circle of translucent energy glowing dimly, slightly distorting the light of the stars behind it, but with no opening to the revolving star field of some other century. The rift was closed.

He heard another voice: his computer was giving a damage report. He must have asked for one, his training having taken over automatically, but he didn’t remember doing so.

“Sensor array three completely disabled. Engine two at three-quarters power. Damage to cockpit canopy automatically repaired, life-support systems at nominal.”

A part of his mind marveled at how the Vorlon-Minbari-made cockpit windshield had instantly and seamlessly repaired itself, covering the hole caused by the shrapnel, almost like a living creature growing new skin over a wound. The same could not be said for his more conventionally manufactured suit helmet, which was cracked and punctured.

Sinclair pulled the now useless helmet off and hooked it to his chair. He felt a searing pain through the entire left side of his head, felt blood trickling down his cheek, but beyond that – nothing. He was numb, as if his entire being, his body, his mind, his heart, were encased in ice.

“Fighter One! Are you okay? Entil’Zha!”

From a long distance away, he heard himself answer Marcus. “I’m here. Fighter Two is gone.”

C
HAPTER 30

IT took the damaged fighters five hours to limp back to Epsilon 3. As the freighter made way immediately for the jump gate, Rathenn met Sinclair and Marcus in the docking bay, expressing his regret and sorrow. Sinclair was rushed to the freighter’s small infirmary. Along the way, Marcus gave Rathenn a quick report, but the Minbari already seemed to know much of it, apparently having received some word from Draal.

After treating Sinclair for shock and removing the piece of shrapnel from his face, the Minbari doctor told Sinclair he would be fine, but that he would need further treatment on Minbar to completely heal the wound on his face and remove the scar.

Sinclair shook his head, saying nothing. He got up in spite of the doctor’s protest that he needed rest. “I’ll rest in my quarters,” he said and left. Leaving Rathenn behind to confer with the doctor, a concerned Marcus went with Sinclair. They walked silently through corridors of the old freighter. Sinclair had said little during the flight back from the rift, and Marcus, then, as now, had not wanted to intrude, trying to help just by his presence. Marcus understood what it meant to lose someone so close, knew what feelings were overwhelming Sinclair. There were no words that could help right now.

When they got to the bunk area, Sinclair paused at the door to his small cabin.

“Thank you, Marcus,” he said without looking at him, then disappeared behind the door.

The cramped narrow room seemed like a coffin. He stood just inside the door, unable to move. He had been somehow going through the motions now for seven hours, and it seemed as if he had watched someone else being stitched up by the doctor, someone else being spoken to in sad, hushed tones.

He found he was shaking, realized he could no longer stand, but couldn’t bring himself to go over to the bed. His knees buckled and he let himself slide to the floor. He sat in front of the door for what seemed like a long time. Gradually he noticed he was staring at Catherine’s duffel bag, leaned up against his own.

“God damn it!” he said, pounding the hard metal floor with his fist. He wanted to cry, but couldn’t and that made him angrier.

So much time wasted. So much time they had spent apart over the years, far too often for stupid, avoidable reasons, for stubbornness and for hurt pride and for pointless arguments and for conflicting demands of work ... and for what? And now when they had finally put all the pieces together, saw that they fit and were always meant to fit together, she was taken away from him again.

And this time it was his fault. He should have refused to let her go on the mission. He should have found a way to reach her ship before it went through the barrier and made the jump into the past. He should have done something that he didn’t do, something that would have saved her. Something.

He had no idea how long he had been sitting there, staring, unmoving, before he heard a knock on his door. “Are you all right, Entil’Zha?” It was Marcus, concern evident in his voice.

He almost laughed at the question. No, he wanted to shout. I’m not all right. What the hell do you think! Go away and leave me alone. But all he could say was “Yes.”

The rest of the trip back to Minbar passed in a fog of pain and anger. He did not eat, did not lie down on the bed or truly sleep, and spoke only a few words to Marcus. Still he could not cry.

Instead he thought about the rift. And that Catherine’s fighter had been intact when it made the time jump.

Upon arriving back at the Ranger compound, the doctors insisted Sinclair stay overnight in the Ranger medical facility for observation. He agreed without protest, and slept for the first time in four days. The next morning he demanded an immediate meeting with Rathenn and Ulkesh. He continued to resist any effort to further treat the sutured wound on his face.

This seemed to be a matter of great concern to Rathenn, as Sinclair met with the Grey Council member and the Vorlon in one of the small conference rooms.

“Entil’Zha, the doctors say if you do not let them treat the injury, it will result in a permanent scar that will be much more difficult to remove later.”

“The wound will heal on its own,” Sinclair said. “We have more important things to discuss.”

“But Entil’Zha,” Rathenn persisted, “it is not considered befitting for a leader of your rank to have such a visible physical flaw, not when it can be treated as easily as this one. You are a symbol of–“

“Things change,” Sinclair snapped. “I don’t wish to discuss it further, and I would appreciate it if you’d also tell the doctors as much.”

Rathenn started to protest further, but on seeing Sinclair’s expression, thought better of it.

“I want a full report on what happened to the time rift,” Sinclair said.

“The explosion did much more damage to the rift than had been anticipated,” Rathenn said. “And the backlash of energy caused some small injury to Draal as well, through his connection to the Great Machine.”

“When will the rift be open again?”

Rathenn glanced over at the silent Ulkesh. “It will take several months at least for Draal to repair the damage.”

“As soon as it’s repaired, I’m going after Catherine–“

“No,” Ulkesh said.

“–there’s a good chance,” Sinclair said over his protest, “that she survived both the attack and her passage through the rift.”

“She is gone,” Ulkesh said. “And can never return.”

“You don’t know that!” Sinclair said. “I’m sure she was alive when she went through the barrier–“

“Entil’Zha,” Rathenn said. “It cannot be done.”

“I don’t accept that.”

“I am told it is almost certain she could not have survived the time jump. You underestimate the difficulties and dangers of traveling through the rift. I am told that it requires far more than just the time stabilizers. No trip through the rift is without considerable risk, even with careful preparation, which she did not have. But even if she had survived, where would you look for her?” Rathenn asked quietly. “The rift was not under Draal’s control when she passed through it. Even he cannot say where in the past she went. How would you find her among the millions upon millions of years past?”