Hand in Glove 1/4
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She shivered as she slipped into the gloves. So 
much of her life had been spent with her hands 
sheathed in leather, but so rarely had it been to 
protect against a physical cold. The mark of a 
telepath, the ever-present gloves did nothing to 
temper the iciness with which mundanes received 
her.

Cold seeped through the insulated parka, 
slithering between the layers of clothing Lyta 
Alexander wore. The network of tunnels that 
cobwebbed the Martian underground had a 
breathable atmosphere, but little else to make it 
hospitable. She would make the trip back to 
Babylon 5 alone. Sheridan’s forces had gone on to 
Earth, Garibaldi and Halloran had turned back to 
their own lives on Mars, and Franklin had raced 
to intercept a Ranger on a lover’s quest.

She made her way through the tunnels to the 
docking bays. Left to find her own transportation 
when little was moving, she had booked passage on 
a cargo ship bound for the outer colonies with a 
stop at Babylon 5. Three days later, she was off-
loaded, after the food supplies but before the 
machine parts.

The bulky clothing was an annoyance now: 
unnecessary in the controlled climate of Babylon 
5, unwieldy to carry. She kept the parka on as 
she passed through customs, though sweat soaked 
the clothing beneath. Finally at the front of the 
line, she offered her identicard to the agent. 
The thickness of her gloves muffled sensation and 
muffed the hand-off. The card tumbled to the deck 
plate, bouncing once with a rather 
inconsequential click, she thought, for something 
that held her whole life. She dropped to her 
knees to retrieve it, sliding off a glove as she 
did. Even without that padding around her 
fingers, she still struggled to coax the thin 
plastic badge from its resting-place on the 
floor, snapping a fingernail as she pried it up.

Still on her knees, she extended the card to the 
security agent, watched him place his fingers 
carefully on the far edge of the card from hers. 
She had not been listening to the psychic noise 
of the place; blocking such background noise was 
habit. She heard it now, however: the annoyance 
and restlessness of those behind her in the line, 
and the apprehension of this young man, who 
recognized her as a telepath, and feared to touch 
her. For a moment, she considered saying 
something, something to let them know she could 
hear them, something to prove they had no secrets 
from her. Something stopped her, though she could 
not be sure if it was her ethics or her fear of 
their reaction. Silently, she rose, swallowed her 
anger, accepted her identicard, and moved on.

She caught glimpses of the ISN reports as she 
passed through the Zocalo: the battles between 
the Army of Light and Earthforce, Clark’s 
suicide, Earth’s rescue by Sheridan’s forces. 
Nowhere, of course, was there any mention of the 
telepaths. Few, even in high places, would know 
about them; none would admit it. There was talk 
of the new government, of amnesty for Sheridan’s 
officers, and of the Interstellar Alliance. 
Sheridan, Delenn, G’Kar, even Londo, all gave 
bold speeches. They spoke of peace and of 
protection, of rights and of respect.

Her quarters seemed colder and darker than she 
remembered them, and suddenly her winter attire 
felt more welcome. She dropped her little bag 
just inside the door and called for lights, 
waited for them to flicker to life, and assessed 
her surroundings. A memory shivered down her 
spine, a room bare save for a mattress, and 
though the space still seemed spare and 
inelegant, it was better now. Perhaps she would 
fix it up a bit, when she found work. If she 
found work.

She had moved on to wondering if she should stay 
on Babylon 5 at all when the door chime sounded. 
A quick glance at the viewer showed Zack Allan on 
the other side of the door, fidgeting just a bit. 
She called the open command and realized, with 
the recognition of regret that he had not brought 
a pizza, that she was hungry.

The door slid back. Zack’s gaze shifted from his 
own feet to woman before him, and he started to 
stammer. "Oh…uh…hi…I… I can…"

"Hi, Zack."

"I’m sorry. Were you on your way out? I can come 
back."

Only then did Lyta realize she still wore her 
full arctic gear. Her cheeks warmed further as 
she fumbled with the fastenings on the jacket.

"No, Zack, actually I just got in. Come in, 
please," she said as the parka slipped from her 
shoulders onto the chair behind her. "What can I 
do for you?" She winced as she heard herself, 
automatically, use the language of a servant.

Zack’s grin peeked out on one side of his face, 
and he shifted his weight as though the balancing 
the new expression he carried. "I just heard 
you’d come aboard, and I thought I’d come by and 
say hi."

She wondered, cynically, if the Chief of 
Security was notified of all arrivals, or only 
those of telepaths, but even as the thought 
prickled at her brain, she motioned him in. His 
first footfall kicked her abandoned bag, throwing 
him off balance, making him lurch forward 
awkwardly. She jumped forward to steady him, her 
gloved hands like paws on his arms. She fell back 
as he caught his balance, stooping to move the 
offending luggage out of the way, shedding the 
gloves and tossing them atop the bag.

"So, how did everything go on Mars?" Zack was 
asking.

She was unsure how to respond. Zack clearly knew 
the outcome of the mission. How privy he was to 
the details, she could not say.

"Well, from what I’ve seen on ISN, it went 
well." Perhaps he was just making small talk.

"Yeah, well, it was pretty scary there for a 
while. EarthForce gave us a harder time than we 
expected," he said.

She felt the clawing in her solar plexus climb 
her spine. Spinning toward the kitchen, she let a 
question float in the air. "Would you like some 
tea?" She did not look back to see if he heard 
her irritation.

"Yeah, sure, thanks," Zack mumbled, following 
her to the nook. "What happened with the 
telepaths anyway?" he pressed. "Did you get ‘em 
on the EarthForce ships or not?"

The kettle clattered onto a burner no hotter 
than her temper. "Yes." Her tone was almost even 
when she turned back to him. "One cryotube was 
smuggled onto each EarthForce destroyer."

Allan cantilevered his long frame to rest his 
forearms on the counter. "So what happened? 
Didn’t it work? Why’d they give us so much 
trouble?"

The water had not yet begun to bubble, but her 
temper boiled over.

"Do you have any idea how much ‘trouble’ 
Sheridan and his people would have had if those 
telepaths had not been on the EarthForce ships? 
They crippled all the EarthForce ships near Mars. 
Sheridan’s offensive would have been over before 
it started without them. And I’ll thank you not 
to talk about three dozen of my people like they 
were some kind of collective parlor trick. 
Telepaths died in that offensive, and not by 
their own choice. "

"Hey, now, just a minute! We weren’t the ones 
who wired up those telepaths and put them in the 
deep freeze. The doc did everything he could to 
try to bring them out but there was no way around 
the Shadow tech. Those teeps were as good as dead 
when we found ‘em."

"They were used as weapons – cannon fodder. 
That’s all we’ve ever been to you, isn’t it?"

"What? Now that’s not fair. And what’s with this 
‘we’ business? Or are you back in the Corps?"

"Oh, excuse me! ‘We’ can be Sheridan’s people, 
but ‘we’ can’t be telepaths? Sorry, I forgot! 
We’re only supposed to remember we’re telepaths 
when it’s useful to you!"

"Yeah, well I thought ‘we’ were Sheridan’s 
people. I thought you were with us, part of the 
stand we took. But I guess maybe I was wrong. I 
thought I was coming here to welcome home a 
friend, but I guess maybe I was wrong about that 
too. "

The kettle broke into an insistent whistle, and 
Lyta spun abruptly to silence it.

"Maybe we should forget the tea. I have to get 
back to work," Allan said.

On the edges of her mind, Lyta could feel a 
sadness in him, even more powerful than his 
anger. She did not turn when the door opened.

"See ya, Lyta."