Second Shadow War
From The Babylon Project
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The second and final Shadow War occurred in 2260, in which the Shadows battled the combined forces of the Babylon 5, Minbari Federation, Narn Regime, the League of Non-Aligned Worlds, and the Vorlon Empire. While not technically the second Shadow War, this was the second war that the younger races participated in. The war came to end in 2261 with the final departure of the First Ones from the galaxy.
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[edit] Prologue to the War
- "And so it begins..."
- – Kosh
The Shadows returned to Z'ha'dum sometime before the year 2258 as was their custom to honor Lorien, though according to the First One they had lost sight of the deeper reasons behind their actions. None the less, from their Homeworld they began preparations for the coming war, recovering the war fleet they had dispersed across the Galaxy as a precaution to keep it intact while they 'slept'. At least two of these ships were hidden inside the Sol System, and one of these (buried on Mars) was uncovered by a 'Black Operation' involving IPX and the Psi Corps, who knew little of the ship except that it was extraordinarily advanced...and that it had started to transmit a homing signal once exposed. Quickly, the Earth teams were pulled back from the ship and several days later, another identical shadow ship arrived, 'digging' the first ship out of the ground and activating it, the two then returning to Z'ha'dum. The Earth Alliance had however implanted a tracking device into the dormant Shadow ship before it awoke, and in the year 2256, IPX under contract from Earthforce New Technologies Division sent a ship, the 'Icarus', to follow it and investigate, arriving on Z'ha'dum in 2257.
The Shadows however had started to 'awaken' by this time and they captured the crew shortly after they landed, offering them a chance to serve them. Most of the crew -including Anna Sheridan - refused to serve the Shadows and so were turned into 'CPUs' for the Shadow ships. Some small part of the crew did agree to serve the Shadows, including 'Mr. Morden'. At the same time as the Shadows started to 'awaken', the Vorlons begun to prepare for the coming war as well. Secretly, they made contact with the leader of the Minbari Grey Council, Dukhat, knowing that the humans were 'the key' to this cycle of the great conflict with their nemesis. While it is possible (or even probable) that their interactions led to the Earth-Minbari War, it also indirectly led to the construction of both Babylon stations Four and Five, critical for the previous the coming wars. The Minbari Anla'Shok frowned upon as something of a joke by the Minbari Warrior Caste, continued to hold their faith that the Shadows would soon return as the hour drew close, starting their own preparations.
[edit] Initial Maneuvering
- "What do you want?"
- – Mr Morden
The first known direct act by the Shadows (or their agents) came in 2254, when a series of Shadow Fighters attempted to plant a large fusion bomb on Babylon 4 in an attempt to destroy it, setting up an alternate timeline where without Valen and the station, the Shadows would come out of the last war far stronger losers, able to move much faster and harder, resulting in the destruction of Babylon 5 at the end of 2260. This attempt was foiled by the White Star, which came back in time from 2260, completing the 'time loop' that sent both Babylon 4 and Valen back in time to win the last Shadow War.
In 2258, the Shadows made their first indirect moves at interacting with the major Galactic powers, with Mr. Morden arriving on the Station as an 'ambassador' to the Shadows, though he took great pains to only ever introduce himself as representing 'my associates', leaving the identity of his backers a mystery. To this end, Morden visited the various Ambassadors and asked them the Shadows infamous question; "What do you want?" Delenn, sensing the presence of the Shadows around him sends Morden away abruptly, taking his presence as a sign to begin her own preparations for the coming war, regardless of what the Grey Council thinks. G'Kar, lacking a vision beyond simple revenge upon the Centauri does not impress Morden's 'associates'. Londo however, who dreams of the Centauri becoming strong once again, regaining their power and place across the Galaxy, does. Morden and his Shadow minders are also briefly confronted by Kosh on this first visit to Babylon 5, but given the 'rules' between the Vorlons and the Shadows, it would appear that there are few real consequences to a short standoff between them, during which the Vorlon warns the Shadows that "they are not for you".
The Shadows however do not back off, instead forging a strong alliance of convenience with Londo, doing him 'favors' for no apparent price that causes his stature to rise dramatically back home. At the same time -probably from their interactions with Morden and the Icarus crew- the Shadows take a great deal of interest in humanity, having Morden establish a far more open dialog with certain factions in Earth including Morgan Clark and part of the Psi Corps, leading to the assassination of President Santiago and ascension of Clark to the Presidency of the Earth Alliance.
At some point, the Rangers also begin to prepare in earnest for the Shadow War with the help of the Vorlons, including the commissioning of a line of new White Star class Warships, without the knowledge of the entire Grey Council. Humans also are allowed to join the Rangers as equals, welcomed freely by the Minbari members of the order, though the idea is not enthusiastically supported by the Minbari warrior cast. Jeffrey Sinclair is recalled from Babylon 5 to take up a post as the Earth Alliance ambassador to Minbar, but without the knowledge of the Alliance, he joins and soon rises to leadership of the Rangers.
[edit] The Shadows Move
- "August 3, 2260. Personal diary. Ten days ago, for the first time, the Shadows began attacking openly"
- – Susan Ivanova
The Shadows early on appear content to provide a 'supporting' role behind the scenes, helping their 'friends' such as Londo without him realizing just who they had allied themselves with. None the less, their machinations soon result or accelerate events such as the Earth Alliance turning into a totalitarian state, the Narn declaring war against the Centauri, the Centauri expanding and fighting many other League races, the League then turning on each other at the Shadows encouragement; all of this dedicated to their goal of encouraging Strength through Chaos. Occasionally their forces would make direct appearances, such as their destruction of the Narn Fleet in the Battle of Gorash 7, but mostly the Shadows worked from behind the scenes.
At the same time, the 'Army of Light' was taking its first steps. Draal custodian of the Great Machine on Epsilon 3 put his resources at the disposal of Sheridan and Delenn, who also started to use the Rangers to investigate the actions and influence of the Shadows, while buying time to gather strength and prepare for the war. The Shadows, seeing the Rangers as a direct threat attempted to take direct action against them on at least one occasion, but failed. Shortly after the breakaway of Babylon 5 from the Earth Alliance, the Shadows started to move openly, flaunting their ships and power as they struck almost randomly at the League, bringing chaos to their already depleted forces in their goal to let the worthy survive and the weak perish. Efforts by Babylon 5 and the Ranger/Minbari backbone against the Shadows to unite the League against the Shadows were unsuccessful until the Vorlons directly intervened and attacked a Shadow fleet, destroying it. This apparent violation of the 'rules' between the Shadows and Vorlons led to swift retaliation with the assassination of Kosh by Morden's Shadow associates, the end result of which appeared to be a return to the 'status quo' between the two sides. Yet Kosh's death was not in vain, in seeing that -apparently- Babylon 5 had allies just as strong as the Shadows, the League rallied into the Army of Light, allying together to face the Darkness.
At this time, the 'causality loop' of Babylon 4 returning to the past was completed by the Babylon-5 crew, who jumped back in time 6 years to make the events happen 'as they were supposed to happen'. Jeffrey Sinclair, the Entil'Zha of the Rangers taking Babylon 4 back 1000 years, using the same process Delenn took to become half human, to become a full Minbari named 'Valen', the legendary leader who defeated the Shadows 1000 years ago. With his 'demise', Delenn becomes Entil'Zha of the Anla'Shok and alongside Sheridan, one of the two major figures to lead the Army of Light against the Shadows. This Army of Light, after discovering the weakness of Shadow ships to telepathic jamming, launches a major fleet action against the Shadows, combining large elements of the various allied fleets, telepathic attacks and well developed intelligence to successfully defeat a major Shadow force in a direct engagement. While the Army of Light looses ships at a ratio of 2-1 to achieve this victory, a victory it is none the less, forcing the Shadows to retreat and delivering the First Ones a message that their attempt to spread disorder and chaos appears to have failed. To this end, the Shadows send John Sheridan's Wife, Anna, who had been enslaved and brainwashed by the Shadows after refusing the serve them, to invite him to Z'ha'dum to hear 'their side of the story' of the conflict between them and the Vorlons, in the hope of convincing him of the rightness of their side. Knowing it was certainly a trap, but afraid from a vision of the future that not going to Z'ha'dum would cause even more problems, John and Anna left alone on the White Star Prime. After meeting the Shadow's representatives, Sheridan rejects their position and fights his way clear. Hopelessly cut off on the Shadow's Homeworld, he chooses to take his life by detonating two 500 Megaton fusion bombs on the unmanned White Star, destroying a major Shadow city while leaping to his apparent death, opening a door for the war to enter a new and unexpected direction.
[edit] Enter the Vorlons
Sheridan's actions on Z'ha'dum delivered a stunning blow to the Shadows, but they came close to being in vain as in the aftermath of his 'death', the Army of Light started to fracture. Encouraged by the lack of any Shadow reprisals in the aftermath of Z'ha'dum, some races in the Army of Light concluded that the war had ended. Despite the belief of key figures such as Delenn that the war was far from over, certain members of the League -such as the Drazi- started to push for a breakup of the Army of Light, under the assumption that keeping it in force would only incite the Shadows to strike back.
Delenn however was undeterred by their push and started to gather the still loyal forces of the Army of Light for a final strike before their strength was too diluted to have even a slim hope against their enemy. Alarmed by actions they believed would only 'restart' the war, those opposed attempted to publicly depose her...only to be dramatically put down by the return of a very much alive John Sheridan, who finally understood the reasoning behind the war. He quickly sought to gather an alliance never before seen of the Younger Races to end the cycle once and for all. At the same time however, Sheridan's attack on Z'ha'dum opened a new phase of the war that no one expected. In the aftermath of his attack, the Shadows had taken the precaution of dispersing their fleets to numerous staging points across the Galaxy, to prevent any other such 'sneak attacks' from causing major damage to their forces as they licked their wounds. In some cases -such as Centauri Prime- the Shadows were welcomed openly by the Government, others -such as Coriana 6- without the means to fight back simply accepted their presence in the knowledge they could not do anything about it. Unfortunately for those planets, being so openly touched by the Shadows, at least in the minds of the Vorlons, meant they had become irreparably tainted by 'the darkness', regardless of if the worlds could have possible refused the 'request' of a fleet of Shadow vessels. To this end, the Vorlon fleet swung into action in this war on a scale not seen for a thousand years. Their first target was a Shadow base on the planet Arcata VII...and they attacked with a Vorlon planetkiller, which was soon used on Ventari, then Tazino Prime and several other planets. In response to this dramatic escalation, the Shadows swiftly deployed their own Planet Killer, destroying a colony on the edge of Vorlon space, restarting the war at a terrifying new level as the two First Ones worked to exterminate any species who supported their other side.
[edit] Conclusion
The war came to an end at Coriana VI. There John Sheridan, speaking on behalf on the Younger Races, convened with two representatives of the Shadows and Vorlons aboard the commanding White Star. Sheridan declared, in sight of the Army of Light, that the Younger Races no longer required the assistance of the First Ones in shaping their destiny, in effect rendering the ideological war between the Shadows and Vorlons obsolete. At Lorien's urging, the Shadows, Vorlons and other remaining First Ones agreed to follow him beyond the Rim.
[edit] References
| Wars and Conflicts | ||
| Shadow Wars: | First Shadow War • Second Shadow War | |
| Earth Conflicts: | World War III • War of the Shining Star • Dilgar War • Earth-Minbari War • Earth Alliance Civil War • Telepath War • Drakh War • Second Earth Alliance Civil War | |
| Other Conflicts: | War of 20 Million Deaths • First Centauri Occupation of Narn • Narn-Centauri War • Second Centauri Occupation of Narn • Centauri Wars of Aggression • Minbari Civil War | |
| Limited Skirmishes: | Battle of the Scoria Plains • Battle of Nu'Shok • Invasion of Ragesh III • Operation Sudden Death | |
