Invoking Darkness

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Book: Read Invoking Darkness for Free Online
Authors: Babylon 5
Tags: SciFi
in the Centauri government, both respected and feared. Some even believed he might one day become emperor. Although Londo had broken his alliance with the Shadows after winning the war against the Narn, Morden had cleverly drawn him back into the fold by having Londo's love, Adira, killed, and leading Londo to believe the Centauri lord Refa responsible. Londo turned to Morden for aid in killing the influential Refa; the plan Londo had devised would soon come to fruition. He was a harder, more ruthless person than he had been. He had little time for drinking or gambling anymore; right now, revenge was foremost in his thoughts.
    A condition with which Galen was familiar.
    He selected another probe, the one he had long ago affixed to G'Leel's shoulder. Alwyn had surely detected it but he allowed it to remain, perhaps hoping the mages would see what he saw, and decide to leave the hiding place.
    G'Leel sat in the lush office of a well-dressed Drazi, while Alwyn – in the guise of "Thomas Alecto," one of his many false identities – paced back and forth, delivering an impassioned speech to convince the Drazi to donate relief supplies for the Narn. Thomas Alecto was the director of the "Citizens of Light Disaster Relief Society," one of Alwyn's seemingly endless supply of fictitious companies. He and G'Leel, a "consultant" for the society, organized desperate relief missions to the ruins of Narn. The two of them flew in the supplies, evading the Centauri defenses.
    When they had first decided to work together to fight the Shadows, they had hoped to stop the great war before it began in earnest. They had interfered in several of the smaller wars, providing unexpected resistance, and even, in one case, negotiating a surprise peace agreement.
    Yet they were limited in what they could accomplish. At the beginning of the Narn-Centauri war, they tried to convince the Narn leaders in the Kha'Ri that their true enemies were not the Centauri, but the Shadows. The Narns' hatred for their former slave-masters, though, was too strong. They would not believe.
    The decimation of the Narn home-world was a horrible blow to both G'Leel and Alwyn. Alwyn released his frustration in brutal bar fights and other undisciplined outbursts. The death of Carvin still hung heavily on him, and this new tragedy sucked away any forward momentum he had maintained.
    Although he ranted about fighting the Shadows, he could no longer gather himself sufficiently to organize any action.
    But G'Leel was determined to strike back at the Shadows directly. She gathered a few allies from the Narn underground, and together they devised a suicidal plan: bomb the Shadows' home of Z'ha'dum. In three ships they set out for Alpha Omega 3. Within moments of dropping out of hyperspace into the system, though, they were targeted by Z'ha'dum's planetary defense net. Weapons platforms took aim, fired. Two ships were instantly destroyed.
    G'Leel and the others aboard the third ship barely escaped into hyperspace. Disheartened, G'Leel had returned to Alwyn, and his attempt to raise her spirits had at last propelled Alwyn out of the worst of his depression.
    They had begun to organize relief missions and gather information for the Narn resistance. In Galen's mind's eye, the Drazi refused for the third time to provide any supplies. Alwyn's voice rose, and he rounded the desk toward the Drazi, his hand closing into a fist. G'Leel jumped up, came between them. Galen flipped through more probes.
    Alwyn and G'Leel did what they could, but they would not stop the Shadows. Any major opposition would have to involve several different races acting in concert, and it would have to arise from Babylon 5. John Sheridan, the station's captain, had been organizing a secret alliance over the last months, attempting to build an Army of Light, a force of sufficient strength to oppose the Shadows.
    Galen selected the probe on John's neck. He stood now in his office, talking to a group of nine, attempting

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