Londo is not happy about the presence of a Narn heavy cruiser, the G’Tok, insisting that per the treaty all Narn warships are to be turned over to the Centauri, but, as Garibaldi points out, Babylon 5 is no longer bound by that treaty and since they need all the ships they can get, they’ll take whoever is willing. Londo asks what guarantees he has it won’t open fire on any Centauri ships?
- Garibaldi: It’s the same guarantee I gave that none of the Narns would break into your quarters in the middle of the night and slit your throat.
Londo: Mr. Garibaldi, you have never given me that promise!
Garibaldi: You’re right. Sleep tight.
Lyta shows up in Medlab looking for Dr. Franklin, but Dr. Hobbs is filling in right now. Lyta is looking for any information on Kosh’s death, but no one else was there and so no one can tell her anything.
Speaking of the Vorlons, the replacement ambassador arrives, just as Garibaldi brings Ivanova news that the captain wants to convene a meeting of the War Council. Sheridan himself needed to get some space, literally, so he went for a walk on the cargo prongs. While he’s there the Vorlon ship goes up to his and gives him a message on its side.
G’Kar is meeting with Na’Kal, the G’Tok’s commander, and giving him a freshly made dinner, which he greatly appreciates. Na’Kal gives him a rundown of what forces they have left.
In the docking area, Sheridan and Ivanova are waiting for the new ambassador, but Garibaldi has gone to find Stephen. He hasn’t been in his quarters for a while and no one knows where he is. Sheridan regrets not being able to help him.
The Vorlon ambassador comes in, clad in a sleek purple encounter suit and regards the two of them without a word. Sheridan introduces himself and Ivanova and gives a quick briefing. To keep Kosh’s death a secret, they will address him as Kosh, but when Sheridan asks him for his real name, the Vorlon simply replies “Kosh.” When pressed further, he says, “We are all Kosh,” then glides away.
- Sheridan: Well, he’s a Vorlon alright.
Ivanova: Yep.
Garibaldi finds Stephen somewhere in a Downbelow market, where he’s on what’s known as a “Walkabout”. It’s part of his faith, an old Australian custom they adopted for those times when they lose themselves amidst all the turmoil of life. The idea is to leave everything and start walking until you find yourself and then sit down and have a long talk with yourself.
In Kosh’s quarters, the new ambassador, Ulkeshnote , is examining the walls and sees the imprint of two Shadows, and a human. Shortly after, he finds Lyta and demands to know where. Lyta insists she didn’t have a piece of Kosh when he died, and she doesn’t know of anyone else who does. Ulkesh is not happy and tells her she failed.
Later she meets with Sheridan to give him a rundown. While she listens to him, she suddenly hears Kosh’s voice, but it was actually Sheridan. Startled, she asks if there’s anything else, and Sheridan does have something he wants to ask her.
Stephen wanders into some night club where a singer is up on stage singing, and sits down to listen.
In the War Room, Sheridan briefs the League on what Garibaldi found, and wants to test the Shadow’s weakness to telepaths. Shortly he will be taking Lyta and seeing if she can jam one long enough to destroy it, and asks for as many ships as they are willing to provide. Delenn is willing, G’Kar will have to talk to Na’Kal before committing the G’Tok, but the rest stand in uncomfortable silence until Sheridan dismisses them. Delenn suggests bringing along additional telepaths, and Sheridan disagrees but the War Council rules against him.
Back in the club, Stephen is sitting by himself when the singer comes up. She introduces herself as Cailyn, and they start talking, as she picks up a glass and starts looking at him through it.
Na’Kal come to meet with G’Kar, but he’s not willing to go on what he regards as a fool’s mission. G’Kar pleads with him to change his mind, but Na’Kal is not moved.
In Hyperspace, The White Star moves to where there’s a high likelihood of an attack.
In Cailyn’s quarters, she keeps holding up glasses, and explains that she has a theory that if she gets the angle just right, she can see his soul. Hasn’t worked so far. When she asks what Franklin’s doing there, he admits he doesn’t really know, but she doesn’t like that answer. “You’re supposed to say that you’re here to spend the night with a beautiful woman.” Franklin gets the not-so-subtle hint.
G’Kar is asleep when Garibaldi comes in, shoves the Book of G’Quon back at him and demands to know why the G’Tok is still there. He then rakes G’Kar over the coals for pretty much abdicating his responsibility as the Narns’ leader, before storming out.
Franklin and Cailyn are in bed talking. He says she can be doing so much better and offers his help. She doesn’t need anything, except metazine. It’s a narcotic, only for prescription, and he refuses.
As they wait for word of a Shadow attack, Lyta asks Sheridan how he knew Kosh had died. He tell her about the dream he had, and when he woke up he just knew. Lennier picks up word of a Shadow attack and they jump into action. As they close on one, Lyta begins focusing on it, but collapses in a panic. As the Shadow ship closes, Sheridan grabs Lyta’s hand and she sees a vision of Kosh’s last few moments. This angers her enough to get up and stop the enemy ship dead in its tracks. The White Star fires its main beam weapon at full power, then with power from the jump engines until it finally kills the thing. But now they can’t jump for twenty minutes.
As Stephen sleeps, Cailyn wakes up and sneaks off with his credit chit.
Lyta warns Sheridan that the Shadow ship got a signal off before it was destroyed and shortly after, four more jump in. The Minbar ship they brought for support jumps in with three telepaths but that leaves one ship still loose, and Lyta is still recovering from the last one.
Suddenly the G’Tok jumps in and fires on it, and the White Star turns to help destroy it. G’Kar makes contact and announces he brought some friends and more League ships jump in. Faced with superior numbers and the telepaths, the remaining Shadows bug out.
On the White Star, Lyta again hears Kosh’s voice, “And so it begins.”
Franklin awakes to a crash and finds Cailyn collapsed on the floor, with a vial of Metazine. He gets her to Medlab where Dr. Hobbs informs him that she has a condition called neuroparalysis, terminal, and that she will probably live another six or seven months. She didn’t go home because she didn’t see a reason, so decided to stay on the station and sing for as long as she was able.
Stephen orders the staff to give her whatever she needs for as long as she needs before heading off.
As they come back, Lyta goes to Ulkesh, telling him she thinks there might be a piece of Kosh somewhere after all.
Stephen is back at the club to listen to Cailyn singing once again... but his walkabout still beckons, and so he moves on.
This episode contains examples of:
- All There in the Manual: The novel To Dream in the City of Sorrows reveals that the name of Kosh's replacement is Ulkesh.
- Back from the Brink: This episode reveals more than just the G'Tok survived of the Narn fleet. Sadly it's only about ten ships but the Centauri were in such a hurry to assault Narn they left many more disabled but not destroyed. Now the Narns are fixing those ships as fast as possible in hope of being able to strike back.
- Bad Boss: Ulkesh is already shaping up to be one.
- Big Damn Heroes: G'Kar is able to convince the Commander of the Narn cruiser (along with most of the League of Non-Aligned Worlds) to lend assistance just in the nick of time.
- Bizarre Instrument: The musical instruments used by Cailyn's band look like future-y versions of current musical instruments.
- Call-Back:
- The G'Tok sought sanctuary right after the Narn surrendered to the Centauri.
- We've seen Lyta carrying pieces of Kosh before.
- Lyta sees the last moments of Kosh's life from Sheridan's memory.
- Na'Kal doesn't want to go with Sheridan because last time Narn ships faced the Shadows they were wiped out.
- The Cavalry: After being chewed out by Garibaldi, G'kar not only convinces Na'Kal but the league ambassadors to aid Sheridan. Their arrival frightens the Shadows for the very first time in the series and their ships escape.
- Continuity Nod:
- When Garibaldi does his What the Hell, Hero? speech to G'Kar, he thumps the book of G'Quan at least a couple times, previously shown to be a Fee Fi Faux Pas. After Garibaldi storms out, G'Kar delicately touches the book as if trying to soothe it from being thumped.
- Metazine, the painkiller Cailyn used, was also used on Sinclair to keep him unconscious when he was abducted.
- Ivanova mentions that the few times they have faced off against a Shadow vessel, they got lucky.
- The reddish-brown ship that Ulkesh arrives in was previously seen fighting the Shadows as part of the Vorlon fleet.
- Darker and Edgier: Ulkesh's ship and encounter suit are darker than Kosh's. Even his "eye" is red, contrast to Kosh's green. Kosh's "speech" (the music/sound that plays before we hear a male voice translating the sound into English) has always sounded like a musical hum or chant. But with Ulkesh, the sound is eerie, ominous, almost unsettling. Kosh's translated voice is deep and somewhat authoritative, Ulkesh's sounds snide and dismissive. There is definitely an air of menace about him.
- Does This Remind You of Anything?:
- After her first encounter with Ulkesh, Lyta is talking to Sheridan, who knows something is wrong and that it has to do with the Vorlon, only for her to first brush it off and then start making excuses for Ulkesh, and the Vorlons in general .
- Lyta Alexander hears what sounds like Kosh saying "and so it begins...". As well as reinforcing the idea that a part of Kosh literally lives on in Sheridan (Kosh wasn't being metaphorical when he said that as he died), this references the Minbari rebirth ceremony...which, viewers may remember, also serves as a marriage ceremony. That the phrase is said just as the Shadow ship has fled before a combined force of humans, Minbari, Narn and various League races, an attentive viewer might decide that a collection of Younger Races just exchanged vows...whether they realize it yet or not.
- The Chains of Commanding: Garibaldi talks about this regarding Sheridan and G'Kar.
- Eye Scream: Lyta bleeds from the eye under the strain of fighting a Shadow vessel.
- Establishing Character Moment: Ulkesh just seems as enigmatic as Kosh when he first comes on, but we see what he's really like when he meets Lyta, belittling and nearly strangling her.
- Foreshadowing:
- Franklin is on a Walkabout trying to find himself. He assures Garibaldi that he doesn't literally mean another Franklin. Many visuals in this episode present images of multiple Franklins, via the use of prisms.
- Lyta hears Kosh's voice twice while around Sheridan.
- If the new Vorlon encounter suit seems darker and more foreboding, there's good reason for that.
- Hilarious Outtakes: When the White Star is about to be attacked by Shadow reinforcements:
- Sheridan/Bruce Boxleitner: Then we have a problem.Lennier/Bill Mumy: Yeah, no shit, Sherlock.Sheridan/Boxleitner: (looks directly at the camera) RUN FOR IT!!!(Sheridan/Boxleitner and Lennier/Mumy abruptly flee the set, followed by the rest of the cast. The film crew tries to take over the empty consoles on the bridge before running away as well.)
- Gunship Rescue: The G'Tok and a small fleet of League ships, showing up just in time to save the White Star and a Minbari cruiser.
- Go Mad from the Revelation: G'Kar calls the fact that each race seems to have some version of Swedish meatballs one of those mysteries that will either never be explained or would drive you mad if you knew.
- Journey to Find Oneself: The basic premise of the Walkabout.
- Mistaken for Junkie: Franklin at first thinks that Caitlyn is a victim of a metazine overdose. It turns out the metazine that she'd misappropriated hadn't even been opened, and that the reason she wanted it was to ease the symptoms of a terminal condition. Once this comes to light, Franklin relents. (Being a recovering addict himself, he probably wanted to try rescuing someone else from the same fate, but once again it's Not Quite the Right Thing.)
- Musical Episode: Downplayed, as it's just Cailyn, but she does get two full songs while the story stops to let her finish.
- Offscreen Moment of Awesome: After getting chewed out by Garibaldi for not pushing harder, G'Kar convinces not only Na'Kal but what looks like the entire league to get off their asses and help.
- Planet of Steves: As said by the replacement Vorlon ambassador, "We are all Kosh."
- Psychic Strangle: Ulkesh does this to Lyta on their first meeting.
- Rule of Symbolism:
- Just like his encounter suit, Ulkesh's ship is darker than Kosh's.
- Cailyn tries to see into people's souls by looking at them through a patterned glass. The final shot of the episode shows Franklin seen leaving Cailyn's lounge—as viewed through a similar glass pattern.
- Screw This, I'm Outta Here: The Shadows flee battle for the first time in the series after the Army of Light manages to destroy two of their vessels.
- Secretly Dying: Cailyn appears to be perfectly fine other than asking for metazine. Stephen doesn't get the full story until she's on a bed in Medlab.
- Sex for Solace: Basically Stephen and Cailyn's relationship. He's a recovering addict trying to sort himself out and she's dying, and trying to live as much as she can in the meantime.
- Slain in Their Sleep: Alluded to in Garibaldi's promise to Londo that none of the Narns would slit his throat in the middle of the night. Oh wait, he never made that promise!
- Toplessness from the Back: Right before she sneaks off with his credit chit, we see Cailyn's bare back as she puts a shirt on.
- What the Hell, Hero?: Garibaldi practically throws G'Kar's book back at him, rakes him across the coals for being hesitant, and tells him to order the Narn cruiser into action.
- Woken Up at an Ungodly Hour: Garibaldi comes to G'Kar's quarters at a late hour to return the Book of G'Quan to him, or rather shove it at him and give him a What the Hell, Hero? for having the G'Tok at Babylon 5 instead of out in the fight before storming out.
