"Goodbye," said Sheridan.

Ivanova felt an odd apprehension as she went through the pre-launch checklist. "Goodbye" was such a simple word; yet depending on how it was said, it could mean the cheerful parting of a few minutes or the anguished parting of forever. There was something ominous in the way G'Kar and Sheridan had exchanged those simple words. She glanced at Captain Sheridan, who was trying so hard to understand the alien ambassadors and, at the same time, keep his distance from them. Sheridan had yet to learn how futile it was to try to think like them, or how difficult it was to keep from being drawn into their intrigues.

She wanted to tell G'Kar good luck, but all she said was, "Narn transport, you are cleared for departure."

As the small cigar-shaped vessel disengaged from the dock and glided into the starscape, Captain Sheridan shook his head. "Was he in any kind of trouble with his government?"

"I don't know," Ivanova said with a shrug. "Contrary to popular belief, I don't know everything that goes on here."

"Thirty seconds until jump," said a tech.

Captain Sheridan was just turning to leave when it happened. The instruments tracking G'Kar's one-man ship shot off their scales.

"Reactor breach! Narn transport!" shouted a tech.

A colleague added, "Radiation increase of four hundred percent!"

Ivanova pounded her communications panel. "Narn transport, come in! G'Kar!"

The small ship continued to drift for a second until it exploded into a searing cloud of subatomic particles. The explosion blossomed outward through space, until it vanished like a rainbow chased by the sun. In less than two seconds, there was nothing left of G'Kar's personal transport but ever-expanding space dust.

"Oh, my God!" said a tech behind Ivanova.

Captain Sheridan leaned on a panel, gaping with amazement at the glimmering starscape, where there had been a ship a few seconds earlier. He swallowed hard and yelled, "Scramble a Starfury. And a rescue team!"