Темное, кривое зеркало. Том 5 : Средь звезд, подобно гигантам.
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"David, there's something I need you to...."
"No! I don't like what the Alliance has become, John. It's a dark, cold place where everything seems to be about numbers and pieces and pawns and nothing actually matters apart from winning. Towards the end of the war, I was looking around and I gradually realised there was nothing there I wanted to be fighting for.
"It's got worse since then, hasn't it? I've heard what's been happening. The Drazi, the Centauri. I found out recently that one of those Inquisitors visited Kats. Inquisitors? Think about that for a minute. We have Inquisitors and secret police and ...." He came to a halt. "Everything just feels wrong. For God's sake, is this what we were fighting for all those years?"
"No. It isn't. David, I've been asleep for a very long time. I didn't see all those things you've just described. All I could think about was.... getting through the day. And then the next day, and the next. But I've opened my eyes now.... or rather, had them opened for me.
"You're right. This isn't what we were fighting for. I'm not quite sure what all that struggle was for, but it wasn't this.
"But it was worth fighting for once. Surely it is again! I can't do this alone, David. I need your help. I've always needed your help."
David looked at him, at his outstretched hand, and the absolute sincerity and passion in his eyes. For a moment he looked ten years younger, as he had looked when they first met, determined to create a better world and to defend it against anyone or anything who tried to stop him.
He reached out and took his Captain's hand.
"I'm here," he said.
John laughed, and they hugged, as friends and brothers and warriors who have just regained their purpose.
"So," David said when they separated. "Where do we start?"
"There's something I need you to do for me. No one else can do it. It's probably the most important thing I've ever asked anyone to do."
"What?"
"I need you to be my best man.
"I'm going to ask Delenn to marry me."
G'Kar awakened instantly, passing from dissonance to clarity in a second. He remembered killing Da'Kal, fulfilling a decades-old promise to end her life if ever she asked him to. He remembered the soldiers attacking him, hitting him and kicking him.
And then he realised he was awake and in a cargo hold filled with his own people. It was dark and dirty, and it was moving. He sensed the familiarity of spaceflight.
"Oh, Da'Kal," he whispered, trying to stand. He couldn't, of course. Everyone was strapped in tightly. The cargo hold was hardly designed to carry people, but such was necessity.
"Oh, Da'Kal." He tried to blink through his single eye and shed a tear for her, but he could not. He knew she had arranged this. There was no other way he could have been convinced to leave the planet, unless he was removed by force.
"Is something wrong?" asked a solicitous voice from beside him.
He turned, somewhat awkwardly given the pain in his neck and back. It was a comfortable pain, a pain that reminded him he was still alive, but it was limiting nonetheless. A young girl was sitting there, strapped in as awkwardly and uncomfortably as he was.
"You look hurt," she said.
"I am fine," he replied. "I am not hurt."
"What happened to your eye?"
He reached out to touch the ruin at the side of his head. "Nothing. I can see more clearly now than I could before, when I had both."
"I know you," she said. "You're G'Kar, the Prophet."
"I am. I think you have the advantage of me. Who are you?"
"I.... I was called Na'Lar, but it's almost time for me to choose my new name. I don't know what to pick, but.... Do you know a man named Londo Mollari? I have a message to give to him. A strange man called Lennier asked me to. He helped me."
"Londo?" G'Kar tried to follow the unconscious stream of rambling from the girl. Her innocent chatter was welcome, but trying to follow her.... "Lennier! Have you seen him?" He had entirely forgotten about the Minbari. He had assumed Lennier and Ta'Lon would have left the planet when they overheard his conversation with Da'Kal. "Is Lennier on this ship?"
"No," she said, sadly. "He couldn't come on. He helped me. He carried me here. He was a good man."
G'Kar closed his eyes. "Yes. Yes, he was."
"Do you know this Londo Mollari?"
"Yes, I do. I will take you to him if you like. If I can."
"I'd like that. I've got something to tell him."
"What?"
"I can't tell you. I can only tell him. Who is he?"
"A friend. A friend of mine. And Lennier's. Another good man. There are.... not enough good men in this galaxy."
"Are you a priest?"
"A priest? Yes, I suppose so. I believe, if that means anything."
"My mother said I had to go to a priest when I'd chosen my new name, when I chose which religion I wanted to follow. She wanted me to call myself Na'Hiri and adopt her religion, but none of them.... made any sense to me. I wasn't sure what name I wanted. Can I....
"Can I call myself L'Neer?"
He looked at her. Lennier had bought her life at the cost of his own. He must have seen something within her, something special, and for a moment G'Kar thought he could see it as well.
"Little one," he said, smiling. "You can call yourself whatever you wish."
Lennier had left the city far behind him, walking out into the countryside. High grey mountains loomed on either side, every stone and plant and breath of air filled with blood. This world had been a battleground for so long that in the end no one had known what else to do with it.
The sad thing was that Lennier had no better idea that the Narns did.
"Hey, Minbari!"