FOR THE LOVE OF THE SHI ALYT - PART 6 By Sunraven The hours ticked by, with Garibaldi getting more and more desperate. He even took Neroon to the PakMaRa's quarters and forced them all to get their stomachs pumped. Terra spent her time alternating between Neroon, trying to keep him calm, and doing the same with Jeffrey. During those hours, she used every ounce of mediator skill she had, along with a good portion of her empathic abilities. It was now well into the night shift, and she was following Jeffrey to his quarters to give him a replay of the memory suppression that she'd done the night before. His face had such a hag-ridden look, it made her heart go out to him. He opened the security lock and went in, with her starting to follow, when the spoo really started hitting the fan! He pushed her hard back out of the door, knocking her to the floor in the corridor, because an intruder was waiting inside in the darkness, who then attacked him. The two fought in almost silence for a few minutes until the Commander managed to drop his opponent. He called for the lights, but Terra already knew who it was. She had sensed Neroon as soon as the door had opened, but his attack had come so quickly that she hadn't had time to warn Jeffrey. She decided prudently to stay out of the fray, and after a minute Garibaldi walked past her into the room, followed by a teenaged girl with a strong wild psi talent. Terra followed them in to hear an exhausted Jeffrey say, "Escort Alyt Neroon back to his quarters. We'll continue the search without his help." Neroon had already stormed out the door. Terra took off after him and Garibaldi followed her. She turned to him and said, "Michael, let me escort him to his quarters. I'll keep him out of Jeffrey's hair." Michael looked at her with his shrewd eyes. "Okay, Doc. He's yours. You seem to be the only one who can do anything with him anyway. I don't think I've ever met a more testy Minbari before, and remember, most of the ones I had met were during the war, and they were trying real hard to kill me. At least he hasn't gotten to that with us yet." "You've been real good with him, considering. Thank you Michael." "Hey, just doing my job." But he did look pleased at the compliment. He headed back to Jeffrey's quarters, and Terra went back to Neroon's. He was working on some written messages when she was let in. He pretended to ignore her for a few minutes, annoyance and, was it hurt feelings?, coming from him. Finally it got on her nerves, and she reached to the hand that was writing with the light pen and stopped it for a second. The pen dropped, and he looked up at her in anger. "What are you doing? Stop that at once." "Not until you explain to me why in the hell did you break into Sinclair's quarters? Did you really think he would hide a dead body there? What was he doing, sleeping with it? And then you attack him when we discovered you in there? Has an Alyt of the Warrior Caste stooped to breaking and entering because he can't control his frustration?" He shot out of the chair with blinding speed and grabbed her, picking her off her feet and bringing them face to face. "You go too far!" He snarled. God she hated being picked up and shaken and all that! What did these damn men think she was, a Barbie doll, or something? She used her empathy to reach for the nerve bundles that controlled his arms and touched them such. His suddenly paralyzed arms and hands dropped her back down on her feet, and she released the mental pressure. She glared up at him. "Gone too far? No, Neroon, I haven't even begun yet, and violence will not shut me up!" He shouted back at her in fury, "You speak of me, but what of you? Why do you even ask me what or who the Commander is sleeping with? Aren't you the one with that knowledge? Is that why you were following the Commander to his quarters? Is he your +++++++?" The word for lover he used was not very nice. Damn it if he wasn't jealous, she thought. "If he was, it would be none of your business, Neroon. You've caused enough stress in that poor man's life to take months to get rid of. Now I want your apology at using that awful word in regards to me. Will you give it to me, or will you have that as the last word spoken between us for the rest of our lives? I mean it, Neroon. You choose." She crossed her arms over her chest and glared at him. Her eyes, green in anger, stared into his brown ones. Finally he was the first to look away. "Perhaps it was an exaggeration. I should not have said it." "That's probably as close to an apology as you can get, I guess. Okay then, I will still continue to talk to you, until the next insult." Right then the com vid went off. Delenn got on and told Neroon that she wished to speak to him. She didn't sound pleased. While Neroon headed out to see Delenn, Terra decided to go to her quarters and hide, uh, meditate. She was really stressed. Once she got there, she noticed she had a message from Jeffrey. When she played it, she almost had a heart attack when he told her that it had been Delenn who had taken the body, cremated it, and was going to send it back on the Ingati. He also asked her to call him when she got in. When she tried to return the call, she got the do not disturb signal, so she left him a message. Then she went to lie down for awhile, suddenly very tired and disgusted with all Minbari. She had only been lying down for a few minutes when her visitors chime buzzed. "Come." It was Neroon, and she had no idea how he had found her quarters. His face looked pale with anger and shock, and the effort involved with keeping himself from striking out at something. She came to him at once, sat him down on the couch, and prepared him some tea. He looked at her, his eyes tortured. "Did you know?" When she nodded, he continued. "Did you know it was her this entire time?" "No. I just found out from Sinclair. I'm sorry, Neroon. I really had no idea. She's been avoiding me during all of this, I think, to stop me from sensing her and finding out. I would not have gone along with it, if I'd known, and she knows me well enough to know that. You deserved to be told the truth. What did she say to you?" "She told me if I didn't support her story that the body has been transformed, that she would destroy the Star Riders, dishonor my clan, because I ignored Branmer's wishes for a quiet burial. She spoke for the entire Gray Council. How can I perpetuate such a farce? I would dishonor his memory if I do!" "Neroon, look at it from the Gray Council's perspective. Your caste has resented the Religious Caste since they gave the surrender order during the war. But the resentments go much deeper than that. Valen began the Gray Council in order to control those resentments, but the Council can't make them disappear. What do you think would happen if you lead the Star Riders to protest Delenn's taking of the body?" He looked down for a moment, thinking, then looked back at her, appalled horror on his face. "It would mean Civil War between the castes." "Yes, it would. And Minbari would start killing Minbari again for the first time in a thousand years. Would you wish to have that you were the one who started that on your conscious?" "No. I...I must support her story. I see no honorable alternative." "And think of it this way. Is the story so preposterous? Branmer's ashes will be scattered in space around Minbar. He will be, in a sense, looking over your people until the end of your world. His spirit will be with the Gods. And it will have been done the way he wished, and your honor will not bear the stain of disobeying his wishes. In fact, Delenn has saved your honor as well, though perhaps it would have been nice if she had told you about it before she did it." She said wryly. "Most of your caste would not have listened to her if she had tried to explain. But you're different, and she doesn't yet realize that, I think. You would listen, and take her words to your heart. You may not agree with her, but you would listen. She, and I think you as well, don't realize yet that you're more than just Warrior Caste, just as she's more than just Religious Caste. I expect that she will notice a difference, someday. Probably not until you become a fellow member of the Gray Council though, when she'll have to notice it. We all have our prejudices, after all." He smiled at her. "Me, a member of the Gray Council, to float among the stars governing our people? I don't think so. I may become Shi Alyt some day, but Satai? You have a vivid imagination, Terra." He said gently. She moved into his arms, which he closed around her as though he wouldn't ever let go again. "It isn't imagination, dear one. Remember when I said that I had already seen your true face? I have. You will lead your people some day, Neroon, and lead them with courage and wisdom. And you will bring your caste and Delenn's caste closer together as well. Branmer trained you well. He was a priest, before he became a war leader. When he taught you the arts of war, he was also teaching you the arts of the soul as well, only he didn't tell you he was doing it." She smiled. "I expect it was less painful for both of you that way. Why do you think he didn't really protest much when, in our youthful explorings, we became lovers? He knew that you would need to regard Humans differently in the future, and he probably saw that as just another lesson, one that was more pleasurable than most. " "It was very pleasant, wasn't it?" His eyes gentled with remembrance as he stroked her hair in his old favorite gesture. "Yes, and it deepened our friendship, for which I will be forever grateful." She pulled away to look at him. "Did you know that Branmer even came to my wedding ritual, dressed as a priest, of course. You had heard that I married?" He looked at her, surprised. "The Shi Alyt came to your wedding? I did hear about your adoption and marriage, but not from the Shi Alyt. My clan elders told me about it." The twinkle came back to his eyes for the first time since he had been on Babylon 5. "The Star Riders were quite scandalized when it happened. They said it was typical of the Religious Caste to do something so disgusting as wanting to mate with a Human. Sometimes I wonder how they would have reacted had they known about my actions and feelings for you at the peace talks, or if it had been me who had had the audacity to marry you. It took great courage on Ledann's part to marry you at the risk of being cast out from his clan and our people." "It wouldn't have been such a supreme sacrifice for him as it would be for, say, someone like you, Neroon. Ledann was a scientist first and foremost. He loved his family, and Minbar, but as long as he had his work, and later me, he would have probably shrugged off being made outcaste. He was most unusual for a Minbari." "Yes, he was, it seems. You know, Branmer probably kept the announcement about your wedding from me to save my feelings." "Would you have minded so much?" Her eyes searched his face. "Minded? When I heard of it, I almost came to Halanthe to kill him!" Sensing that he wasn't too serious, she laughed. "You did not! You're teasing me, now." "Yes, I am. I didn't like it, I admit, and I was envious, but the deed had already been done, and there was no way for it to be undone. I did wish you both well. Someone who loves life so much as you deserves happiness, Terra." He appeared uncomfortable, suddenly. "I also heard about Ledann's death. I was very sorry for your loss. If his clan hadn't taken revenge on the murderers who killed him, I would have come to Halanthe and revenged him myself. I wanted to go to you then, but the Shi Alyt advised me not to. I expect he might have been afraid that my feelings for you would be revived if I saw you then. And I think that he was right about that." The sadness that was a recurring companion engulfed her suddenly. "I didn't want to live after he died, Neroon. We were attacked by about twenty Earth Firsters, a Human hate group. One of them hit me with something, so I was concussed and almost blacking out. Then they started beating him, oh, Neroon, it was so cold, so methodical. They beat him until he was barely conscious, then they turned to me." She shivered in remembered fear. "I was the one they really hated. After all, I had had the temerity to marry a male not of my own species. One of them, the leader, I think, tore open my clothes. I think they were going to gang rape me, do you know what that term means?" He nodded, and the horror and outrage in his eyes gave off a heat of its own. "I couldn't use my gift, because I was barely conscious from my head injury and from Ledann's pain overwhelming me. Ledann must have seen what they were doing, even as hurt as he was, and he purposely pushed himself into a berzerker fury. He killed six of them and injured two more before they broke and ran. He was such a gentle man who valued life so much. He might not have died if he hadn't berzerked. The stress on his system was too much, and he never came out of his coma. He died two days later, in my arms. I didn't even get to say goodbye." The tears were falling down her face in profusion now. Neroon held her even closer, and said in a gentle voice, "He died with great honor while defending the woman he loved, Terra. Even my caste, while we still didn't approve of his taste in females," the twinkle came back to his eyes, "when we heard about it, we did honor the courage he showed. He was a good man, and a brave one. Did you know that I actually had met Ledann before? He is the cousin of a Religious Caste friend that I went to the Warrior Caste academy with. They are very much alike physically." "That would be Fleet Captain Lenann?" "Yes." "I met him at the wedding, and again at the funeral. They do, I mean did, look a lot alike." She wiped her tears on the back of her hand and gave him a close look. "We should get back to what we were talking about, you know. You are going to support Delenn in this, aren't you?" "Yes. I don't really have much choice, and it is the correct thing to do. A civil war among my people would be unacceptable." She felt very proud of him at that moment. "To make this decision, and your mourning process, a little bit easier, I have something I would like to give you." He looked at her quizzically. She went to a dresser, opened a drawer, and took out a Minbari scroll. She brought it back, and handed it to him. "Branmer gave this to Ledann and I for a marriage gift. It is a group of tay-lok he wrote while he was still a priest. This was the only copy. I would like you to have it so that you can see all that he was, not just the Star Rider War Leader part." "This is so precious, and it was not meant for me." He didn't, quite, refuse it, which for a Minbari would have been a grave insult. "I've taken his poems and have written music to accompany them, and had them recorded on a crystal. I thought I would give the music to Delenn, who also loved Branmer dearly. But I want you to have the original work, so that you never forget what he taught you." "I will treasure this always. Thank you." And the look he gave her went far toward easing the pang she felt in giving up one more connection to her marriage. She smiled, reaching up to stroke the skin near his headbone lightly. "You are most certainly welcome, my friend." The end