Recap / Babylon Five S 02 E 11 All Alone In The Night

Season 2, Episode 11:

All Alone in the Night

"You have always been here."

Sheridan: Why are you here?
Kosh: We were never away. For the first time you mind is quiet enough to hear me.
Sheridan: Why am I here?
Kosh: You have always been here.

---

Delenn is in her quarters looking distraught. She has been called before the Grey Council to answer for her actions in undergoing her transformation. She is worried that they will not only remove her from the council, but from Babylon 5 as well. She gives Lennier some instructions in case she doesn't come back.

In C&C Sheridan and Ivanova are discussing a series of strange sightings and the disappearance of one ship in a nearby sector. She is about to deploy a fighter wing to investigate, but Sheridan decides he'll lead the fighters himself. He wants to feel space again... and he wants to keep his flight pay. Meanwhile in the target sector, a Narn fighter is destroyed by an unknown attacker.

Delenn and Lennier set out to rendezvous with the Grey Council and Sheridan is informed that General Hague will be arriving shortly. He and the fighters set out while Delenn boards the Council's cruiser and goes to face them.

The flight seems pretty routine until a strangely designed ship jumps out of hyperspace and attacks. Sheridan's fighter is destroyed, but he manages to eject, only to be reeled in by the alien ship. The other fighters are quickly eliminated, except one. The pilot, Ramirez can only watch as the aliens escape with the captain. With his Starfury damaged, the core leaking radiation that has already built to lethal levels, Ramirez sets out to return to Babylon 5.

Back on station, General Hague arrives and asks where the captain is. He is currently strapped to a table aboard the ship where a device with drills, needles, and what appear to be saws appears out of the ceiling and descends toward him.

In the Grey Council's chamber, Delenn gives the traditional greeting but is answered only by Hedronn who tells her the others will not come. She has not been called back to serve but to be judged. They have voted to remove her from the Council. She asks about her position as ambassador and is told it is still under consideration. She requests and is granted the right to plead her case in that regard.

As Ramirez arrives back at Babylon 5, Sheridan, with blood dripping down his face, watches the device retract. A pole drops down next to the table and his restraints are released. Moments later a Drazi wielding another pole and with a strange device on his head attacks him. Sheridan tries to talk him down, but each time the Drazi hesitates the device forces him to attack until he is impaled on his own pole. Sheridan has no time to relax as a Narn appears with a sword. He attacks Sheridan as well, but also pleads with Sheridan to kill him. Sheridan eventually knocks him out.

On Babylon 5, Ramirez dies of radiation poisoning, but they were able to get images of the ship from his gun camera.

Before the full Council, Delenn makes her case to remain as ambassador. A new voice, her replacement, says he is more than happy to let her go back. He pulls his hood off to reveal himself as Neroon. Delenn is shocked; he is Warrior caste, her replacement ought to be Religious caste. His justification is that if there is indeed a great war coming, the warriors should have a greater say since it is them who will be bearing the brunt of it. As for her position, he allows her to keep it, insists on it even.

Neroon: Return to Babylon 5, and stay there!

Sheridan is sitting beside the Narn; since they fought, he's managed to remove the device on the Narn's head. The Narn starts to wake up. He can't move too much since he's injured. Sheridan says their first priority is to escape, but the Narn says there is no escape then loses consciousness again.

Ivanova reports to General Hague that the alien ship has been sighted a couple more times. Again it attacks and collects specimens, which Hague thinks is good news; it'll slow them down. The jumpgate opens and the destroyer Agamemnon comes through. Hague called them in for some extra fire power, now they need a target.

The target is still in hyperspace, and while Sheridan waits for the Narn to wake up again, he dozes off and starts to dream.

First he sees Ivanova with a raven on her shoulder asking, "Do you know who I am?"

He then sees Garibaldi standing on a catwalk with a white dove on his shoulder, who tells him, "The man in between is searching for you."

Sheridan turns and finds himself wearing a Psi Corps uniform. Now he sees Ivanova again wearing a black dress with a veil. She tells him, "You are the hand."

He turns again and finds himself facing Kosh.

Sheridan: Why are you here?

Kosh: We were never away. For the first time, your mind is quiet enough to hear me.

Sheridan: Why am I here?

Kosh: You have always been here.

Sheridan wakes up and notices something. The wall is not flush with the floor. He begins trying to pry it up.

As Delenn returns to Babylon 5 she is told of the missing captain and asks to see the images of the ship. She recognizes it as being from a species called Streibs. They intruded on Minbari space once, who then followed them back to their homeworld. She sends the coordinates to them.

As Sheridan works, the Narn wakes and tries to help. As they do the ship trembles a couple of times, the first jumping out of hyperspace, the second was something else. The Agamemnon has jumped into the area and begins firing at the ship. Sheridan manages to pry the wall up and they are able to escape into a corridor, overpower one of the crew and get to an escape pod.

Meanwhile the Streibs open their prison holds, sucking their captives out the airlocks. Furious, Ivanova orders them destroyed, which the Agamemnon accomplishes in a few seconds. Amid the explosion they pick up a signal from an escape pod—an SOS—which Ivanova realizes is Sheridan trying to contact them.

Safely back on Babylon 5, Sheridan looks in on the Narn in Medlab. He is relieved the Narn will recover, but saddened to hear Ramirez didn't make it. He walks out to find Kosh waiting outside Medlab. "You have always been here," the Vorlon says before gliding away.

In his quarters, Sheridan meets with Hague. The general activates a device which will scramble any listening devices. Sheridan tells him that Ivanova, Garibaldi, and Franklin are good, loyal officers and that he hates having to spy on them. He is told that he was President Santiago's choice to run Babylon 5 if anything happened to him because Sheridan's record looks like one of a hard-nosed jarhead, the kind Clark would appoint. Since Clark thinks Sheridan is one of them, he leaves him alone. He then begins explaining how there are elements on Earth who don't buy the "it was an accident" line about Santiago's death, and that it's up to them to do something about it. He asks Sheridan to bring the others into it, knowing he'll be jeopardizing them as much as himself. Hague intends to start the operation as soon as he returns to Earth.

Later, Ivanova comes to Sheridan's quarters. Inside Franklin and Garibaldi are already waiting with him. After activating the jammer again, he gives them the rundown:

Ever since the death of president Santiago, something unpleasant's been going on back home. You know it, and I know it. We've stood by too long. That's going to change. Quietly, discreetly, an inch at a time—for now, strictly within the rules. We have to do something, or risk losing everything we hold dear. Now, we'll get some help from inside Earth Dome, but the bottom line: if anything goes wrong, we're on our own.

The others look at each other before Ivanova says, "We're with you captain. Wherever this goes, however it ends, we're with you."

This episode contains examples of:

• Abandon Ship: Sheridan is forced to bail out of his crippled Starfury. The entire cockpit is ejected as an Escape Pod.
• Alien Abduction: On a show that's already in space.
• Ascended Extra: Neroon was created by D.C. Fontana in her script for "Legacies," with no plans to use him further. JMS was then so impressed with John Vickery's performance that he was made part of the Myth Arc.
• Call-Back:
  • Several, mostly to Sheridan's arrival on the station and Delenn's transformation, but also a return appearance of Neroon.
  • Delenn recalls that when Lennier first arrived, she had to order him to look her in the eye.
• The Cavalry: General Hague calls in the Agamemnon to hunt down the Streib ship.
• Continuity Nod: At the Grey Council, Delenn repeats the lines she said the last time she was there, but it's considerably more hesitant this time, as the circumstances are very different.
• Creepy Crows: When Ivanova first appears in Sheridan's dream she has a raven on her shoulder.
• Dream Sequence: A Kosh-inspired one.
• Escape Pod:
  • Once again, we see the Starfuries' escape mechanism: The entire cockpit is blown free of the rest of the ship.
  • Sheridan later commandeers one from the Streibs to escape their ship right before it's destroyed.
• Everyone Knows Morse: Well, they know the old SOS signal, anyway.
• Exact Words: Ivanova demands that the Streibs release their prisoners. They do... into space. Ivanova does not take it well.
• Face Death with Dignity: Ramirez is told by the computer he is already dealing with terminal radiation levels. What does he do? He charges back to Babylon 5 to try and save his Captain.
• Foreshadowing: So much.
  • Sheridan's Dream Sequence is nothing but, and more is revealed about Valen's prophecies to the Minbari.
  • Ta'Lon will become more important in subsequent seasons.
  • Hague warns Sheridan that following this course could cost him his career.
  • Finally, there's the rest of the command crew joining Sheridan's little conspiracy.
• The Grays: Babylon 5 likes this one. The Streib are the second of three "Gray"-inspired aliens to show up. We've already met the Vree, and the "Shadow Surgeons" will be introduced in later seasons.
• Heroic Sacrifice: Ramirez. In a less literal way, Lennier too.
• I Cannot Self-Terminate: Why Ta'Lon begs Sheridan to kill him at first...
• I Will Only Slow You Down: ...and he's not done being noble in their big escape, either.
• The Last Dance: Ramirez is informed by his fighter's computer that he's already received a lethal radiation dose. He still finds it in himself to get his fighter (and its recorded footage) back to Babylon 5 — even if Ramirez can't be saved, maybe the captain can.
• The Mole: A rare positive example in Sheridan.
• Mugging the Monster:
  • The Streib seek out new life to experiment on and try to avoid doing this. Then they attack an Earthforce unit. Delenn reveals that they'd also done this in the past with the Minbari, with what are hinted to be even worse consequences for the Streibs.
  • The Streib do not appear again. Although they are noted a few times in the canonical Passing of the Techno-mages novels to be present among crowds of those races who work for the Shadows (and are mentioned separately from the "Shadow Surgeons", whom they resemble).
• No One Gets Left Behind: After Sheridan is forced to eject, and his wingman is killed, Ramirez and his own wingman try to attack the Streib ship to rescue him rather than escape.
• O.O.C. Is Serious Business: Hague knows something is very wrong when Sheridan is late in returning to his meeting with him.
• Playing with Syringes
• Say My Name: Ramirez calls out with a "Captain!" when Sheridan is abducted.
• Serious Business: Lots of trash talk about Baseball.
• Shout-Out: The Streibs are named for Whitley Streiber, and their appearance is inspired by the aliens in his Communion.
• Tempting Fate: When Ivanova objects to Sheridan leading the fighters, he asks, "What could go wrong?"
• Thrown Out the Airlock: After Ivanova demands the Streibs release their prisoners, they vent their holding cells to space, which puts them straight into Too Dumb to Live territory as they are IMMEDIATELY destroyed - what did they THINK was going to happen?
• Title Drop: This episode's title was a part of the opening narrations of Seasons One and Two.
• Too Dumb to Live: As noted above the Streib, utterly outgunned and with no means of escape, eject all their prisoners into space, leaving the Earthforce ships with no reason to not blow them into dust while also deeply angering them. What exactly they were hoping to achieve with this is unclear but the result is entirely predictable.
• Unhand Them, Villain!: When Earthforce confronts the Streib ship, demanding the release of their captives, the Streib comply — by ejecting the test subjects into space. Needless to say, that was the wrong move.
• Wham Line: "It's about time someone showed up to debrief me." The first time we learn that Sheridan's appointment to Babylon 5 has a deeper purpose: he's part of a conspiracy against President Clark.
• You Are Already Dead: Ramirez is coldly notified by his Starfury's computer that he's already taken a lethal dose of radiation.