“If they can’t get off their asses to fight the Centauri, they’re sure as hell going to lose it,” Sheridan said flatly. He leaned against his desk and shook his head, looking more discouraged and frustrated than Delenn could recall seeing him in years. “They keep being ‘encouraged’ to look the other way. They believe that if they simply let Centauri Prime take this world or that world, that it will be enough to placate them. They think things are going to settle down. They don’t understand that it isn’t going to happen unless we make things settle down… and that won’t happen for as long as the Centauri think that they can walk all over us!”
Six more years. And this sort of irritation was all he had to look forward to, day in, day out? Delenn could not recall a time when she more despised Londo Mollari.
“I’ve spoken to the Brakiri. The Dubai. The Gaim. And on and on, a list almost as long as the list of worlds that have fallen to the Centauri,” Sheridan continued. “No one wants to get involved. They come up with reason after reason why it’s not a good idea, and you’re right, Delenn, it all boils down to the same thing: It’s not their problem.” He shook his head. “If we had simply waited around until the Shadows were ready to attack Babylon 5, it would be a seriously different galaxy out there. These damned pacifists…”
“Since when is peace bad?”
The youthful voice startled Sheridan out of his frustrated diatribe. They all turned toward the speaker, even though they all already knew who it was.
David Sheridan stood there, leaning against the door frame and smiling in that infinitely self—possessed manner that only adolescents could summon with facility.
“And here he comes… the great agitator,” Garibaldi said with the air of someone who had been down the same road any number of times.
“Hey, Uncle Mikey.”
Garibaldi emitted a pained howl, as if he’d just been stabbed through the heart. He staggered across the room, then suddenly lunged and snagged an arm around the back of David’s neck. David let out a howl of anything other than anguish, as Garibaldi yanked on his long hair and snarled, “No ‘Uncle Mikey’! I hate ‘Uncle Mikey’! You know I hate ‘Uncle Mikey’!”
“I’m sorry, Uncle Mikey!” David howled, choking on his own laughter.
“Punk kid. Get a haircut.” Garibaldi shoved him free, turned to John Sheridan, and chucked a thumb at the teen. “You got a punk kid there with no respect for his elders, including his beloved godfather.”
“Tell me about it,” Sheridan commiserated.
“David, I thought you were at your lessons with Master Vultan,” Delenn said.
“I was. Vultan decided it was time to take a break.”
“Meaning that he took his eyes off you for half a second and you were gone.”
David shrugged noncommittally.
Delenn let out a sigh that was a familiar combination of love and exasperation. “He’s your son,” she said to Sheridan.
“How reassuring,” G’Kar remarked. “There were those rumors…”
“Your sense of humor, as always, is not appreciated, G’Kar,” Sheridan said with mock severity.
“True comic visionaries rarely are during their lifetime.”
“A few more remarks like that, and I’ll solve the ‘lifetime’ problem for you,” Sheridan warned with that same feigned gravity.
“Sounds like you folks are all having a good time kidding around with each other,” David observed wryly. “Kind of interesting, considering that when I came in everything sounded pretty damned grave.”
“Language,” Delenn said reflexively.
“Sorry. Pretty goddamned grave.”
She looked heavenward for strength.
“You wouldn’t, by some chance, be trying to change the mood in here simply because I’m around?” inquired David.
The adults looked uncomfortably at each other.
“It’s all right,” he continued, clearly not interested in waiting for an answer. “I was actually standing outside the last few minutes.”
Garibaldi pointed at David and said to Sheridan, “That boy has a future in surveillance. Let me take him back to Mars and train him for a few years. You won’t recognize him.”
“If his hair gets much longer, I won’t recognize him in any event,” Sheridan commented.
“You didn’t answer my question, Dad,” David said, clearly not about to let his father off the hook. “You’re angry with the pacifist factions who don’t want to get into a full-blown war with the Centauri. What’s wrong with pacifism? I mean, look at the Earth-Minbari war. Thanks to the aggressiveness of the Humans who fired on the Minbari, killing Dukhat, and the Minbari responding with pure rage, there was a needless interstellar war that cost millions of lives.”
Delenn flinched inwardly. David would have had to bring that up. The fact was that it was Delenn herself who had made the fateful decision to attack the Humans, even as she had cradled the still—warm corpse of Dukhat. They ‘re animals! The words, screamed in an agonized voice barely recognizable as her own, still rang in her head. But David had never learned that. It was a secret that she kept buried deep in her, a moment that she could never forget, no matter how much she wanted to.
“And then,” continued David, unaware of his mother’s inner turmoil, “the entire Human Homeworld would have been wiped out if the Minbari hadn’t suddenly surrendered. The reasons were complicated, but the result was the same: a peace movement. So obviously, those who seek peace are right some of the time. When do you decide it’s the right time for peace… and when it is time to go to war?”
“It’s not an easy question,” Sheridan admitted.
“Well, actually, it is an easy question. The answer’s the tough part.”
Sheridan glanced at Garibaldi, who had just spoken, and responded wryly, “Thank you, Michael, for that reassuring clarification.”
“No problem.”
Delenn stepped forward, and resting a hand on her son’s shoulder, said, “It depends whether one is in a situation where a movement of peace is viewed as a benefit for all concerned… or merely a sign of weakness.”
Sheridan nodded in confirmation. “There are some who use peace, not as a tool, but as a weapon. Something to distract or forestall opponents while they move forward with their plans for conquest.”
“And how do you know when that’s the case?”
“You have to look at the whole picture,” Sheridan said. “You don’t examine one action, or even a couple of actions. You look at everything they’ve done throughout their history, and get a clear idea of where they’ve been. Based on that, you can determine where they’re most likely to go.”
“In the case of Londo and the Centauri,” Garibaldi said grimly, “where they’re going to go is anyplace they want to. Right now they’re the six—hundred—pound gorilla.”
“The what?” David looked at him blankly.
“The gorilla. It’s an old joke. Where does a six-hundred-pound gorilla sit? Answer is, anywhere he wants. Get it?”
“Kind of.” David hesitated, then asked, “What’s a gorilla?”
Garibaldi opened his mouth to respond, then closed it and sighed. “Never mind.”
Easily turning his attention away from the joke that had left him puzzled, David said, “Londo… the emperor… you think that’s what he wants to do? Go everywhere… anywhere… he wants?”