"Into the Sands of Blood comes Walker Smith of Earth, the bravest of his race. And now comes the Sho-Rin. Master of the Mutai. Bravest of the brave." - The Muta-Do.

This episode, in terms of the writing, is just plain weird. It has two very different plot strands, neither of which interact in any way or move along the main story. Despite being thematically linked (both are about not letting go) they're a chalk and cheese pairing (or as Eddie Izzard puts it, they go together like a toboggan and broccoli). It's like two B plots got together and failed to have a baby.

Plot 1 is about Ivanova. Her rabbi turns up on her doorstep, bearing the family samovar and wondering why she missed her father's funeral. She blames work: she was too busy to travel to Earth and too busy to sit shiva. Rabbi Koslov responds by going to see Commander Sinclair, to ask for time off on her behalf. Remember how Ivanova didn't ask permission to use the gold communications channel to speak to her dying father? She didn't mention his death to Sinclair, either. It becomes clear, through Sinclair's conversations with Koslov and Ivanova, that if she had he'd have packed her off home for the funeral - and that's the last thing Ivanova wants.

Plot 2, nominally the A plot, is about Garibaldi's friend Walker Smith, a boxer from Earth, arriving on the station to fight in the Mutai, an alien fighting arena. Robbed of his chance to compete on Earth by a conspiracy to frame him for doping, he wants to use a win here to boost his profile back home. The problem is, humans don't fight in the Mutai.

It's fair to say I don't like this plotline at all, and the reason is that it's all too easy. Smith turns up full of pride and swagger, expecting to just be let in. He turns up at the Mutai training gym, calls the first alien he sees ET, and when rebuffed grabs the alien's shoulder demanding to see the Muta-Do. "ET", predictably, turns out to be the Muta-Do himself and knocks him on his ass. Later, Smith is approached by the oddly-named Caliban who tells him there's another way into the Mutai, one that must be done in the proper way, that requires respect and courage.

It really doesn't. Smith gets tickets to that evening's Mutai. When the reigning champion wins his bout and the Muta-Do asks if there are any challengers, Smith steps up. Literally the only thing he has to do is position himself as "the bravest of his race" to have his challenge accepted. The problem is, he doesn't work for his shot - it's handed to him by Caliban. It would have been more narratively satisfying to see Smith work it out for himself: turn up at the Mutai and realise he can challenge, challenge and be rejected because he gets the form wrong, work out what he needs to do and challenge again at the risk of humiliation.

The Mutai itself is also disappointing. Garibaldi describes it as a meatgrinder, "no rounds, rules, or gloves", and the name itself means Trial by Blood. In reality it turns out to be little more than bareknuckle fighting in a ropeless neon boxing ring. Smith and his opponent thump each other until they fall over and the Muta-Do declares it a draw. There's never any real sense Smith can lose anything but his pride. The most danger he faces is from a spectator with a weapon, upset a human's in the ring, who's taken out by Garibaldi.

While there aren't any try-fail cycles in the Walker Smith plotline, there are several in Ivanova's. Koslov tries and fails to convince her to sit shiva, tries again at dinner which fails spectacularly when she finds out he's spoken to Sinclair, who speaks to Ivanova himself and also fails to talk her round. Koslov tries one more time before he leaves. She rebuffs every attempt until finally, as Koslov's leaving, she changes her mind.

There isn't an articulated moment of change in either plotline, although change has clearly happened. This is another failing in the Mutai story. I think we're supposed to accept Smith's changed because he accepts a draw rather than a win at any cost, and because at the end he respects and has earned the respect of the aliens in the Mutai. But he doesn't earn it so it feels flat. The switch in Ivanova's attitude is handled better and shown in how she interacts with Koslov. When he first arrives she greets him formally as Rabbi Koslov, and he asks what happened to the informal nickname, Uncle Yossel, she called him as a child. As he prepares to leave, she remembers her father's final wish for her to forgive him, calls out "Uncle Yossel" in a slightly panicky little girl voice. and asks him to stay and sit shiva with her.

Overall this episode is a disappointment, both in the plot and the writing. It doesn't offer anything to move the main story forward, or offer much insight into character. We hear about Garibaldi's drinking from Smith, but already know about it from earlier in the series. While it throws a little more insight into Ivanova's background, that she's a Russian Jew and estranged from her father isn't new information. At the end of the episode, very little has changed. It could be removed entirely and not leave a hole, and in that respect it's a failure.

The only thing it does offer is that Walker Smith, the only friend Garibaldi appears to have apart from Sinclair, feels the need to tell him to watch his back not once but twice. Not heeding the warning is something Garibaldi will come to regret later.

"You really want to know what I want? You really want to know the truth? I want my people to reclaim their rightful place in the galaxy. I want to see the Centauri stretch their hand and command the stars. I want a rebirth of glory, a renaissance of power. I want to stop running like a man late for an appointment afraid to look back, or to look forward. I want us to be what we used to be. I want I want it all back the way that it was." - Londo Mollari

And now, thirteen episodes in, the main plot gets rolling. Commander Sinclair tells Garibaldi about the things he remembered during And the Sky Full of Stars, about being abducted by the Minbari, and asks him to look into it.

On the surface, the A plot is the recovery of the Eye, the oldest symbol of Centauri nobility that's been lost for 100 years. Ambassador Mollari collects it from the shady Mr Reno and the Centauri government, having paid "enough to buy a small planet", send Lord Kiro and his aunt Lady Ladira to collect it.

Of course things are never that simple. On arriving at Babylon 5 Ladira, a seer, has a vision of the station being destroyed. Kiro shrugs off her concern - she once declared he'd be killed by "shadows" and he's still around, after all. He visits Mollari to view the Eye, aggrieved at being the messenger when the Eye rightfully belongs to his family. Things are changing at home, the emperor hasn't been seen in public for a while and the people are restless. He could take the Eye for himself and claim the throne. Mollari points out that doing so would invariably be fatal without support: "these are no longer the good old days".

The B plot involves an increase in attacks by raiders on ships visiting the station. Sinclair is doing his best to combat them, but they disappear too fast. Small ships rely on jump gates to travel long distances, but the raiders disappear faster than Babylon 5's fighters can get to them making it hard to track them down. When Babylon 5 receives a mayday from the nearby transport Achilles, they send out Starfuries to deal with it. It's only on reviewing the transport's cargo manifest that Sinclair realises it's a trap, to divert fighters away from the station.

The C plot is not so much a plot as a cryptic diversion at this point, in much the same way as the one with Talia, Kosh, and Abbut in Deathwalker. A man called Morden arrives on the station. The officer who checks him in comments his ID hasn't been updated in a while, and Morden tells him he's been exploring. His mission is to visit each of the ambassadors in turn and ask them one very specific question: "What do you want?" It will turn out to be an important one.

Ambassador G'Kar is irritated by Morden's vagueness and tells him he wants to be left alone in peace and quiet, but as Morden makes to leave he amends it to the destruction of the Centauri: "To tear down their cities blacken their sky, sow their ground with salt. To completely, utterly erase them." Beyond that he has no ambition, as long as his people are safe. Ambassador Mollari's reaction is initially much the same: irritation, followed by the desire to be left alone. Like G'Kar he amends his wish as Morden leaves. He wants the good old days back and the Centauri to have an empire again. Ambassador Delenn asks Morden what the point of the question is, and if he's asking each of the ambassadors. Then she's overcome by a momentary pain. She sees him surrounded by shadows, a triangle appears on her forehead which she covers, and she tells Morden to leave. When he's gone she comments to herself "They're here" in horror.

Morden is not, in fact, visiting all of the ambassadors. When he sees Kosh coming, he hides.

The plot threads link together when the raiders take Mollari, Kiro, and Ladira hostage as they attempt to quietly get the Eye off the station. When Sinclair intercepts them, having figured out Kiro's ship could be a target, they take Kiro and the Eye onto the ship and leave the station. Sinclair locks them out of the jump gate, but a larger ship appears through its own gate - the reason the raiders always managed to escape. The diverted Starfuries make it back in time to defend against the raider fighters, but Kiro's ship is swallowed by the larger ship and disappears into a new jump point. During the battle, Mr Morden encounters Kosh again, and this time doesn't back down. Afterwards we hear the Vorlon's encounter suit was damaged.

Back on the raider ship, Kiro congratulates the raiders on a successful heist, only to find they've betrayed him. Instead of returning him as head of the Centauri government, they're returning both him and the Eye in return for a substantial ransom. Before they get far a black ship shimmers into view and destroys them.

Later, Ambassador Mollari is visited by Mr Morden, who gives him a gift from "friends you don't know you have". It's the Eye, and the promise they will find him again.

Wrapping up the episode, Garibaldi tells Sinclair he hasn't found out much about Sinclair's missing day, but what he has found out is that Sinclair was pretty far down the list of potential commanders for Babylon 5. Every name above his was rejected by the Minbari government, who had approval over who would run Babylon 5 in return for their involvement. He wasn't able to find out why. Lady Ladira also sees Sinclair on her departure from the station. She shares with him her vision of fire and death, which hasn't changed despite averting the raider attack. It's a possible future, and one that may be avoided.

As with The War Prayer, the episode manages to link together its seemingly unrelated plot strands, apart from the business of Garibaldi's investigation which largely serves as bookends. It seems out of place, until later when it becomes apparent that it's actually very relevant indeed. The Shadows are introduced for the first time, although not named as such by anyone other than Ladira who doesn't know what they are. It's clear Delenn does know, and has been warned, and equally obvious the other ambassadors don't - apart from Kosh. During his encounter with Mr Morden he says to leave the station, "they are not for you", and it's clear he's addressing the creatures Delenn saw surrounding Morden rather than Morden himself.

The episode asks more questions than it answers, but it does so with a promise that loose ends have been left for a reason, and answers will come with time.

"Never hand someone a gun unless you're sure where they'll point it." - Commander Jeffrey Sinclair

As promised last week, this episode sees Commander Sinclair once again creatively interpreting rules and regulations to get the outcome he wants - in not one but both of the plot strands.

The plots are linked in that the same disaster causes both, that disaster happening only because of the plots' background happening in the same place at the same time in the first place. Confused yet? Fortunately it's pretty simple after it all kicks off. Faulty equipment leads to an accident in the docking bay which kills two dock workers, and a Narn ship is destroyed in the accident because the captain panics. Plot A is the dock workers going on strike because of the poor conditions that caused the accident, and the Narn ship is only there to deliver a sacred plant to Ambassador G'Kar for Plot B. Remove the poor working conditions or the Narn ship and there's no inciting incident. It's a clever piece of writing, that makes the threads feel unified even though they each go their separate ways from here.

Under the terms of their contract striking is illegal, and Sinclair tries to talk the dockers out of it before word can get back to Earth. However the government's new budget for Babylon 5 is leaked - and the dockers get nothing. They go on unofficial strike, all calling in sick, and Earth sends their best negotiator Orin Zento to step in. Sentator Hidoshi tells Sinclair "He has stopped this kind of thing before in other stations", succinctly letting the audience know that this is a widespread problem.

Unfortunately, Zento's skill as a negotiator appears to have nothing to do with negotiating and everything to do with talking loudly at people and threatening to invoke the Rush Act and have them arrested. Sinclair tries to persuade him to take a softer approach but then, not convinced they'll get the people and funding they need, the workers make the strike official. Zento invokes the Rush Act which has lead to arrests, rioting, and deaths on Europa and Matewan. As Garibaldi takes his security forces in, Sinclair tries and fails to get the senate to revoke their order. As a last resort he pulls a copy of the full text to find out exactly what it empowers him to do.

While this is going on, G'Kar's dealing with the repercussions of the destruction of the Narn ship, which was carrying a sacred G'Quan Eth plant which he needs for a religious observance. The only other plant on the ship is owned by Ambassador Mollari. Knowing full well Mollari won't give him the plant G'Kar breaks into his quarters and, knowing full well G'Kar will break in, Londo's hidden the plant elsewhere. He offers to sell it for an extortionate price although he'll be sad to lose it. In a nice touch of background (and putting a gun firmly in a drawer for later use) he states: "When you drop the seeds into a proper mixture of alcohol whole new universes open up. It's a shame you Narns waste them, burning them as incense!"

Of course when the time comes, having humiliated G'Kar, he refuses to sell.

Although he hates to do it G'Kar takes his grievance to Commander Sinclair, who's somewhat distracted by the strike and says he can't do anything as Mollari owns the plant. It's only at this point G'Kar dispatches Na'Toth to steal a statue of a Centauri deity (it's not specified which one) from the Centauri Cultural Centre. It's an interesting insight into his moral character that despite hating the Centauri an affront to their religious beliefs is his weapon of last resort and that, proud as he is, he's willing to humble himself by asking for help first. This episode, and the events of Mind War, show him to be much more spiritual than he generally lets on, and lays the groundwork for things that happen much, much later.

Things have got violent between Garibaldi's men and the dockers, and Sinclair withdraws the security forces to meet the dockers face to face, with Orin Zento at his side. He asks Zento for confirmation that the Rush Act means he's empowered to end the strike by any means necessary, which Zento confirms. But the thing is, while those means are generally interpreted to mean military action and arrests, that's not what it actually says. Sinclair can do what he likes, so what he does is reallocate some of the increased military budget to repair the equipment and hire new workers. Zento isn't happy with it, but the dockers are and the strike ends.

Next stop is to see Ambassadors Mollari and G'Kar, who are about ready to kill each other. Once again using rules and regulations to solve his troubles, he tells Mollari that he's discovered the G'Quan Eth is a controlled substance which can only be owned for medical or religious purposes. This may or may not be true, since Mollari protests it's no worse than whiskey and Sinclair tells him to file a protest, but it allows him to confiscate the plant and give it to G'Kar on the condition the Centauri statue is returned.

The only problem is, it's too late to perform the ceremony. It must be carried out in the first rays of the sun to shine past the Q'Guan mountain on a particular day, those not on Narn must do it at the same time which has already passed. Sinclair has an answer for this too: "The sunlight that touched the mountain 10 years ago will reach this station in 12 hours. It's been on a long journey, but it's still the same sunlight". G'Kar agrees that this is enough, "You are a far more spiritual man than I gave you credit for", and the episode ends with him performing the ritual for a group of his people.

The docker plot doesn't end quite so peacefully. Senator Hidoshi calls Sinclair with a warning: his creative interpretation of the Rush Act has made him new enemies. His response? "So, what else is new?" He's already made an enemy of Bester in Mind War, within the senate in Deathwalker, and there's also the shadowy group behind the events of And the Sky Full of Stars. He does what he does to protect the station and its people, and in that respect his politicking is no different that ramming a Minbari cruiser. Garibaldi complains in Infection that Sinclair's always putting himself "on the line". He's just not always doing it by chasing monsters with a gun.

"We are alike, you and I. We are both, as you say the odd man out. I have been in your place. I can feel how you are pinned. And it would give me some small pleasure to know that things can work out, even for us." - Londo Mollari

This episode brings us back round to Earth politics, and we get Garibaldi's backstory, both neatly tied up in a bow. It's fairly straightforward with an episode's worth of A plot and no B plot, and most of what it achieves is setting up groundwork for the season finale.

The fraught nature of things back on Earth is mentioned in the opening shots of a news channel reporting on President Santiago's upcoming  visit to the station, which many people think are to build support for trade and immigration agreements with the alien races. He's bringing with him an escort of Cobra fighters that will be permanently based on Babylon 5, and while inspecting the bay they'll be housed in Garibaldi and Ivanova narrowly miss being caught in an explosion that kills a man and injures another.

The chief of presidential security, Major Lianna Kemmer, takes over the investigation. Unfortunately she has a personal issue with Garibaldi, and after she sidelines him and takes over the investigation Garibaldi loses his temper at a petty thief he catches for the third time that month. Sinclair takes him aside and demands an explanation. "I need a drink," Garibaldi replies, and orders water, making it pretty obvious the way his explanation is going to head. Given their long history, it hard to believe Sinclair doesn't already know himself.

Seventeen years previously, Garibaldi had been the only clean cop in the Europa ice-mining operation. The stress of trying to uphold the law when no one else cared made him hit the bottle pretty hard. His only other comfort was the time spent with the family of his friend Frank Kemmer - the Major's father - and they kept him "sane and sober". Then Garibaldi's work started to pay off, and in retaliation his enemies rigged a shuttle pad to explode as Frank ended his run. Garibaldi was framed for negligence, blackballed, and hit the bottle again.

Kemmer decides to interrogate Nolan, the survivor of the accident, even though doing so will kill him. When his response is "bomb" and Garibaldi's name she's more than happy to assume Garibaldi is guilty of sabotage. She has his quarters searched and her second in command Cutter finds Centauri ducats and schematics of the Cobra bay, clear proof of Garibaldi's guilt. She's not prepared to look any deeper, especially with traces of explosives found in the bay. Sinclair accuses her of a personal vendetta, and Garibaldi goes on the run.

Sinclair tries to buy time to find Garibaldi first by cancelling Kemmer's station-wide alert, knowing it will take time for her to contact Earth to have him overruled. Ivanova assists by ordering maintenance on the communications channels that will tie them up for several hours. Kemmer gets round it by using the comms channel on her ship, but it's enough to give Garibaldi a headstart.

He goes to see Ambassador Mollari, a sensible place to start given the Centauri ducats but Londo knows nothing about the plot. He suggests the Narn are responsible, having extorted ducats from the Cetauri in exchange for the scientific data they took during the occupation of Ragesh 3 in the first episode. Londo loans Garibaldi some money to get him by, stating he feels some measure of sympathy - but if Garibaldi's caught, he'll deny speaking to him. The next stop is Ambassador G'Kar, who denies his people are involved and invites Garibaldi to defect.  Both of these encounters serve mainly to add characterisation to the parties involved. Londo is, as always, a hopeless romantic in rooting for the underdog, G'Kar is sneakily political and pragmatic, and Garibaldi himself states he'd rather die than take up G'Kar's offer.

Garibaldi's next stop is to try the station's criminal underworld, where he's refused service and then attacked. Sinclair tracks him down and saves him from a beating, once again proving to be a hands-on sort of commander, and tries to persuade him to come in. Garibaldi refuses and escapes while Sinclair's distracted. He insists on finding out who framed him, but instead ends up in a bar at the bottom of a bottle.

Sinclair takes a call from General Netter ordering him to give Kemmer his full co-operation. He obeys, but accuses her again of having a personal vendetta. At this point they find out Garibaldi's been spending Londo's Centauri ducats, which only serves to make him look more guilty. Shortly after this he's brought in, drunk. Kemmer takes him to her command centre, while Cutter checks the bays again ahead of the president's arrival.

By this point in the season it's clear that Sinclair will try to get what he needs within the limitations set by his rank and the diplomatic demands of his position. In this case he gets Welch, Garibaldi's second, to search the quarters of Nolan. He finds detonators and pamphlets linked to right-wing group Home Guard who were behind the events of The War Prayer. Nolan's bomb had detonated early by accident.

It's a pretty straight run to the finish from there. They realise Home Guard are behind the plot, and that Cutter planted the evidence in Garibaldi's quarters while searching them. He also rigged the doors of the fighter bays to explode on opening, which is aborted with the time-honoured one second to spare. The episode ends with Garibaldi and Kemmer reconciling. They promise to keep in touch, but like so many incidental characters we never hear from her again and it's likely she doesn't make it past the end of the season.

This isn't the last time we'll see personal vendettas running the plot - or even the last time this season. It's also not the first or last time Sinclair uses his interpretation of the rules and regulations to protect the station and its people. He's going to do it again in the very next episode, in fact.

"Understanding is a three-edged sword." - Ambassador Kosh.

This episode manages to be a standalone monster of the week episode, while simultaneously digging deep into themes that play into the wider arc. There's also a completely baffling encounter, that only makes sense if you look at this episode in terms of the overarching plot and the show's need to be flexible about external factors.

We open with Ambassador Kosh contracting telepath Talia Winters for a job, and Ambassador G'Kar's aide Na'Toth trying to kill a visitor to the station with her bare hands.

The visitor is a trader going by the name of Gyla Lobos, travelling with Minbari ID, clothes, and ship, although she's not Minbari. According to Na'Toth the visitor is Deathwalker, a Dilgar war criminal notorious for her experiments on prisoners - including Na'Toth's grandfather. The problem is, the Dilgar have been extinct for thirty years and Deathwalker herself should be much older.

G'Kar persuades Sinclair to release Na'Toth into house arrest in his custody, where she tells him she's sworn a blood oath to kill Deathwalker. She's not pleased when he tells her to put it aside for the good of their people - the Narn government is trying to make a deal with Deathwalker for a discovery that will give them an advantage over their enemies. Na'Toth agrees to postpone her claim and G'Kar promises to help her fulfill the blood oath once they have what they want. However Deathwalker's price is Na'Toth's execution and G'Kar refuses, despite his previous words to Na'Toth about the need to sacrifice for the greater good. It's a lovely piece of characterisation that even G'Kar, previously depicted as ruthless, has a line he won't cross.

The Narn aren't the only ones interested in Deathwalker's secrets. Sinclair receives a call from Senator Hidoshi back on Earth instructing him to send Deathwalker once she's recovered, and Ambassador Mollari stops Sinclair in the corridor to ask if the rumour of Deathwalker being in custody is true. The rumours spread even further once G'Kar warns the other ambassadors Deathwalker is on the station, to prevent her from leaving.

Deathwalker reveals to Sinclair that she is who Na'Toth claims. The reason she looks young age is an anti-aging and disease serum she's developed, which she intends to share with the whole galaxy - immortality for all. She claims to have been sheltered by a Minbari faction called the Wind Swords, and comments they're right to fear Sinclair. This, of course, is a nod to the previous episode and the revelation that during the Earth-Minbari War he was captured and interrogated by the Minbari shortly before they surrendered, before being released with no memory of the encounter. It's also interesting that literally the only interaction Sinclair and Deathwalker have had at this point is Sinclair walking into Medlab, introducing himself, and asking Doctor Franklin to give them a moment. "You know the way of command" she tells him approvingly, but it's honestly difficult to imagine her phrasing her orders as questions. Her impression appears to be based on the fact Sinclair does exactly that, with the expectation of being obeyed, and Franklin does as he's told. There's very little of Franklin in this episode, but there's a lovely piece of characterisation here even though he doesn't say a word. When Sinclair arrives, Franklin is between Deathwalker and the door, clearly unhappy about being near her and just as clearly positioned to stop her leaving even though they both know he couldn't actually stop her.

As Sinclair prepares to ship Deathwalker off to Earth, the Ambassadors gang up on him and force a council meeting to decide what will be done with her - the League of Non-Aligned Worlds wants her to stand trial on Babylon 5. The problem is, they only get one vote between them. Sinclair votes with them (almost certainly not what Senator Hidoshi had in mind). The Vorlons, as always, abstain. The Centauri vote no and the Narn, after the trial being on Narn is refused, also vote no. Sinclair's plan hinged on the Minbari voting yes, but they don't. It's another nice characterisation note that it's Lennier who casts the vote as Delenn is away. He's obviously unhappy about doing it, but does as he's told and apologies to Sinclair after. He's also the one who admits the Wind Swords did harbour Deathwalker, and used her to create weapons to fight Earth with during the war, which the Minbari are now too ashamed to admit. It's almost certain Delenn would not have told Sinclair this, but Lennier doesn't appear to think twice and I'm not sure if this says more about him or his perception of Sinclair.

Vote defeated, they stick Deathwalker on a ship. This time a whole fleet of ships from the various League worlds arrives and threatens to attack the station. After a brief standoff, Sinclair tells the League ambassadors about the serum and proposes they send scientists to Earth to help with its development . When it's finished, they can have Deathwalker for trial - a more civilised version of what G'Kar promised Na'Toth. Deathwalker is scornful of the idea, saying the Earth Alliance won't let it stand. Her parting blow is to tell Sinclair that the key ingredient in her serum can't be made, it has to be harvested from other living beings. Watching the other races tear each other apart will be her legacy.

Then her ship leaves and the Vorlons blow it up.

Ambassador Kosh tells the rest they aren't ready for immortality, and glides away. While all this is going on Talia's having a very odd encounter, and really the only thing that connects the two storylines is that Kosh is in both.

It's established earlier in the season that Talia's job as a commercial telepath is to scan both parties during negotiations to ensure everyone's on the same page. Which is exactly what she does here, except that Kosh's associate Abbut has a completely blank mind, and the pair of them talk rubbish. Talia's confused and upset, since the constant scans are tiring and end in her having unpleasant flashbacks. The nonsense talk is amusing and adds some levity, but the whole thing would probably be a lot more interesting if it weren't for all the Deathwalker business going on. However, since the whole point is to put a gun in a drawer that's never used (more on that later), burying it in a plot that's more interesting was probably the best thing they could have done with it.

At the end of the negotiations, Abbut removes his hat to reveal a cybernetic brain and removes a data crystal which he hands to Kosh. When asked, Kosh tells Talia it contains "Reflection, surprise, terror. For the future." Talia takes her concerns to Sinclair and Garibaldi, and the latter tells her Abbut is a Vicker (VCR, an excellent pun that only works if you believe people will still know what that is in the 23rd century), part organic and part machine, used by aliens to record things. They can only guess why Kosh wanted to record Talia, but their guess is that it's because Vorlons don't trust telepaths. What might be the real reason becomes apparent later.

Despite not actually moving on the main arc, the episode manages to touch on the themes of immortality, whole races going extinct, the need to sacrifice for the greater good, and Sinclair's backstory with the Minbari. Because of this, unlike other less successful monster of the week episodes, it's difficult to see how this one could be removed and not leave a gaping hole

"Everyone lies, Michael. The innocent lie because they don't want to be blamed. The guilty lie because they don't have a choice. Find out why he's lying, the rest will take care of itself." - Jeffrey Sinclair

This is the first episode that deals heavily with Sinclair's backstory and, it will later turn out, the main plot, and it's a weird one.

It all starts out fairly straightforward, with Sinclair and Garibaldi questioning one of the security personnel, Bensen, about his gambling habits. They believe he's been placing bets over the limits imposed on station staff and, although Bensen denies it, they're right. In order to settle his debts he supplies a power cell to a couple of shady characters.

In the meantime, Doctor Franklin is examining Ambassador Delenn to gather data on healthy Minbari. Since he usually sees them when they're sick, it will provide him with a baseline to work from. They chat about his past hitchhiking on starships and working for his passage, and that during the Earth-Minbari war he destroyed his xenobiology notes rather than have them used for biological warfare. Delenn is surprised and grateful, and dodges his question as to what she did during the war.

That night, Sinclair wakes up after a nightmare of the Battle of the Line. He finds his comms not working, and in one of the series more unsettling scenes he makes his way to C&C to find it - and the whole station - deserted. All except for one other person. His unnamed captor tells him they're inside Sinclair's mind, in a virtual reality constructed to get to the bottom of what exactly happened during Sinclair's missing 24 hours during the battle - at the end of which the Minbari surrendered. Sinclair's report stated his ship was damaged, he tried to ram a Minbari cruiser and blacked out, but there are a number of people back home who don't believe him. They think he betrayed Earth, agreed to be a spy for the Minbari, and that the increasing alien presence and influence back on Earth is evidence of this.

The interloper tries a number of tricks to get Sinclair to cooperate. He summons and kills an image of Garibaldi, inflicts pain on Sinclair, and conjures shades of a dead comrade who accuses him of betrayal. Sinclair, realising that time is limited and people will be looking for him, fights back and hurts his captor, forcing him out of the simulation.

While all this could be happening at the speed of thought, it actually takes long enough that Chief Garibaldi reports Sinclair missing - he's an hour late for a meeting and no one's seen him since the previous evening. He starts a full scale search of the station, even outside in case they're looking for a body. The body they find is Bensen, who interrupted the interrogation of Sinclair and is killed for it. The search's proximity to where Sinclair's being held makes his kidnappers panic and they ramp up the psychotropic drugs in the hope it will make him snap.

It does, but not in the way they expect.

Sinclair remembers the Minbari assassin in the pilot telling him "there's a hole in your mind". He remembers ramming the cruiser, being taken on board and inspected by the Grey Council who wave a glowing device at him. He remembers seeing Delenn there. The shock of it ejects him from the virtual reality where, believing himself in hostile territory, he smashes the simulator. He then tries to kill Garibaldi, who's just found him. Hallucinating and frightened, he goes on on the run.

What follows is a three way chase with the second captor chasing Sinclair, Garibaldi's forces chasing them both, and Sinclair unable to tell friend from foe. He's stopped by Delenn, who puts herself in the line of fire to talk him down. He comes out of it enough to shoot the second captor before collapsing and being taken to medlab.

The plot here is a fairly simple one, the main story being Sinclair's experiences and the B plot the search for him. But the episode overall does some pretty hard work in terms of characterisation and story arc. As well as finding out more about Doctor Franklin, it also reveals more about Sinclair. The mental construct is of Babylon 5, and that's where he comes back to when resisting his captor, who accuses him of hiding behind duty and responsibility. We see a triluminary for the first time, although we're not told what it is or what the Grey Council are using it for. It's also revealed that the growing xenophobia back on Earth is deeply rooted, possibly even within the government.

At the end of the episode, Sinclair goes to see Delenn to thank her for her help. He tells her "strange that seeing you snapped me out of it" and it's a nice touch that it's not clear which time he means. She asks if he remembers anything of his experience - another ambiguous phrasing, since it's not clear here either which encounter she's referring to. Sinclair lies and tells her no, although it's suggested Delenn suspects he's lying simply in the way she reacts. After he's gone another member of the Grey Council warns her that should he remember, Sinclair must be killed. In his quarters, Sinclair admits in his log he remembers. His goal now is to find out what the Minbari wanted with him ten years ago.

"Something my father said. He was…old, very old at the time. I went into his room, and he was sitting, alone in the dark, crying. So I asked him what was wrong, and he said, "My shoes are too tight. But it doesn't matter, because I have forgotten how to dance." I never understood what that meant until now. My shoes are too tight, and I have forgotten how to dance." - Londo Mollari

This is one of my favourite episodes in terms of the writing, because the three plots are linked and work well together (unlike the disaster to come that is TKO).

A close friend of Ambassador Delenn's, Minbari poet Shaal Mayan, is visiting the station. On her way back from Delenn's quarters she's attacked by an Earth-First hate group, who leave her stabbed and branded. This isn't the first attack, and although Commander Sinclair puts security chief Garibaldi on it, it's not enough for Ambassador G'Kar who starts agitating the alien population to fight back. This always strikes me as out of character for G'Kar, making a public spectacle being more Ambassador Mollari's sort of thing. While the show hasn't yet revealed anything about his past as a freedom fighter, he's been shown to be a private person who deals with problems behind the scenes - as he did when there was a price on his head. Inciting to riot doesn't seem like his style.

In the meantime, a pair of Centauri runaways arrive on the station, Kiron and Aria, who've been betrothed to other people but want to marry each other. They end up in Mollari's custody, in part because Kiron is his aide Vir's cousin. Mollari is less than sympathetic - marrying for love is just not done in Centauri society. He himself has three wives, who he refers to as pestilence, famine, and death (fittingly placing himself as war) although none of them are on the station with him. He books Kiron and Aria passage home and washes his hands of the matter.

Ivanova also receives a visitor, an old boyfriend Malcolm Biggs. For a while it looks like he wants to rekindle their relationship, but it soon turns out he has other motives. When Kiron and Aria are hospitalised by the same group that attacked Mayan, there are retaliatory attacks on humans - one a known xenophobe who was questioned about the previous attack. Biggs is caught on camera trying to recruit him into the Home Guard, an Earth-first terrorist faction.

Sinclair engages in skullduggery. He recruits Ivanova to plant some seeds about how he's unhappy with aliens on Earth himself, and introduce them. Sinclair's rude to the ambassadors at a reception, and in short order is telling Biggs how he "really" feels. Biggs takes the bait and is arrested along with his accomplices who attacked Maya, Kiron, and Aria.

Not only do the plots tie together well, but there's some nice characterisation. We hear from Biggs how Ivanova always put her career and duty before her personal life, and then we see it in action - firstly when she cuts her conversations with him short because of problems on the station, and later when she agrees to help Sinclair take him down. There's more of the Minbari as a deeply spiritual people, shown in Delenn's relationship with Mayan and Mayan's reaction to being attacked, and this in turn influences how Mollari decides to deal with his young runaways.

Mayan tells him he should allow Aria to sit in Medlab with Kiron while he's unconscious, because love is a potent healing force. Mollari, with his three unloved and unloving wives, is initially scathing - young people should learn to live without love. "As you did?" she asks him. It's only been a few episodes since Mollari was revealed to be a romantic himself, and a large chunk of future plot hinges on his inability to live without the one he loves. In the end, he arranges for Kiron and Aria to be fostered by his second cousin, which will bring honour to their own families, and when they're old enough will be allowed to choose for themselves who to marry.

There's also a tiny bit of the main story arc, with just enough Ambassador Kosh to be funny without his deliberate vagueness becoming annoying. Garibaldi and Sinclair muse about the nature of Vorlons, and remind the audience of the events of the pilot- of how Kosh was poisoned despite being in his encounter suit, and how the doctor and telepath who were the only people to respectively see and scan a Vorlon were shipped back home shortly after. This is the only part of the episode out of place, since it doesn't tie into the episode other then Sinclair using the attacks as an excuse to talk to Kosh. It's more moving pieces into place than movement, but those pieces will be important later.

Let me pass on to you the one thing I've learned about this place. No one here is exactly what he appears. Not Mollari, not Delenn, not Sinclair…and not me." - G'Kar
 
This is where Psi Corp start playing a role in things, and we get to see if Ivanova's negative feelings towards them are warranted. Spoiler: they are. The episode also puts some guns in drawers for later use, even if it doesn't seem to do much at first glance.
 
Psi Cops Bester and Kelsey turn up to investigate a rogue telepath Jason Ironheart, who they believe is hiding on the station. They're first seen going through customs, with Bester talking telepathically to a security officer who answers out loud and doesn't appear to notice. Then they arrive at Commander Sinclair's office. He does notice and isn't happy about it - such psychic intrusion is against the rules.
 
Bester is unapologetic. Special circumstances warrant special measures, or at least that's his excuse. He has Sinclair call in the station's resident telepath Talia Winters, who is a former student and lover of Ironheart's, so they can scan her. As they carry out what's obviously a painful and deeply unpleasant procedure on her it becomes clear Bester enjoys the power he has over others.
 
There's some nice characterisation here of Sinclair. He clearly dislikes Bester and what he represents, but he's sympathetic to Talia and tries to shield her, and she's surprised by his compassion. Ivanova features briefly, and in hindsight must have a mind of steel - at this point the audience knows she hates Psi Corps, but not that she herself is an unregistered telepath. While Bester's not permitted to scan the command staff, he'd have no problem picking up their surface thoughts which he's almost certainly monitoring.
 
It's only after the scan that Ironheart makes himself known. He tells Talia he's been subject to Psi Corp experiments to ramp up psychic abilities and as a result he's become a telekinetic. They want to use his powers for assassination. Not only does he not want this, but the powers are growing too fast for him to control. As they speak he has a "mindquake" and tells Talia to run.
 
Sinclair and Talia concoct a plan to get Ironheart off the station safely, although why they thought it could remain a secret is beyond me. Bester sees Sinclair's clearing a route to the docking bay for what it is. There's no attempt at misdirection, although to be fair there isn't a lot of time. After a confrontation in which Kelsey dies, Ironheart escapes and turns into a being of pure energy. He gives Talia a gift before he departs, later revealed to be minor telekinetic powers and an ability to block telepathic scans.
 
While this is going on, Catherine Sakai is hired to conduct a survey of Sigma 957. She's warned off by G'Kar - she needs the permission of the Narn government to proceed - but threatens to go over his head. When she leaves to do the survey he's seen calling the Narn Homeworld for a fighter to go to Sigma 957, apparently making good on his promise that she won't return. However, as he tells her, "no one here is exactly what he appears". When her ship has a brush with an unknown entity and goes into a decaying orbit, it's G'Kar's fighter that rescues her.
 
While this encounter is set up as an unsolved mystery, it's actually doing double duty in introducing elements that will be important later. G'Kar's observations about the nature of the beings at Sigma 957 reveal not only a hidden spiritual side but also set up the idea of the First Ones, and this particular race will be contacted again in season 3. That's some pretty heavy lifting for a B plot.

"My orders are quite specific. You are to know pain. You are to know fear. And then you are to die at the required hour." - Tu'Pari

This episode deals with some heavy themes - death and religion - but it does it with a light touch, which is a refreshing change after the lack of subtlety in Infection. It also introduces Commander Sinclair's on-again-off-again girlfriend Catherine Sakai, and new aides Na'Toth and Lennier for G'Kar and Delenn.

This episode is a great example of how the show was set up so no one was irreplaceable. G'Kar's aide Ko'Dath has died between episodes in an unfortunately-timed airlock accident, and he's immediately suspicious that Na'Toth arrives not long after he receives a message saying there's an assassin after him. In reality, Ko'Dath actress Mary Woronov had to drop out because she couldn't tolerate the Narn make-up, and her departure is worked into the story in a way that works with the plot. Likewise Blaire Baron, who played Sinclair's girlfriend Carolyn in the pilot, didn't want to return for the main series. During a conversation between Sinclair and Sakai it's revealed that Carolyn left not long after the events of the pilot, and that the off-again-on-again relationship with Sakai predates her - they don't pick up where they left off if either of them is seeing someone else.

The specifics of the contract are that G'Kar should live in fear of the assassin, then be tortured, before being killed 48 hours after watching the message. He does know both fear and pain before being rescued by Na'Toth. G'Kar is proud, and one thing that's slipped in here is his refusal to give the assassin the satisfaction of hearing him scream, a facet of his character that will be important in season four.

While G'Kar's waiting for an assassin, the station is hosting a week-long festival for all the different species to show off their religions. The Centauri contribution is an over-indulgent feast, in which a drunken Ambassador Mollari crawls on the table and kisses the bottom of the goddess of love. It's a tradition dating back to a conflict with the Xon, who once shared their homeworld, and is a celebration of survival. The Xon were presumably a sapient race, as Mollari describes them as a "dominant species" and tells a poor taste joke ("Do you know what the last Xon said just before he died? Aaarrrgghh!"), which positions the Centauri as aggressors even before their subjugation of the Narn. It may even be the reason they're conquerors by nature.

The Minbari perform a rebirth ceremony, in which Sinclair participates to Delenn's obvious delight. Sakai ribs him afterwards that it also doubles as a marriage ceremony, and this throwaway comment takes on a greater significance in hindsight, perhaps being a declaration of intent on Delenn's part. The introduction of Lennier also gives an insight into wider Minbari culture and the larger plot. He won't look at Delenn at first, because her position as a member of the ruling council forbids it. She gently persuades him to look up, then pulls rank and forbids him to speak of her true identity as the Minbari are hiding it from the others. When asked if he understands he replies "No, but understanding is not required, only obedience."

The religions of the other races, including the Narn, are mostly absent apart from a Drazi pilgrim trying to bring a ceremonial blade aboard the station. Since Narn religion features quite heavily in an upcoming episode this is likely a deliberate choice in the writing. Their lack of participation isn't remarked on, so it can be assumed by the viewer that they participate or not - and its certainly easy to imagine they'd refuse to "put on a show" for any audience that included the Centauri.

At the end of the episode, Sinclair introduces the ambassadors to a long line of people from various Earth faiths. It's meant to show of how all religions are equally important, but it feels like a crammed in way of dealing with how you include Earth in the festival without upsetting any viewers. The festival is meant to showcase the dominant religion, and dominant and important are not the same thing. I'm not sure there was a more graceful way out of it, however, and the long line of people to meet suggests faith is still important in the twenty-third century - important in a show that puts it in the centre of the main story