409: Atonement

Dr Franklin provides G'Kar with a prosthetic eye which can, if still activated, see when it is out of his body.  Zack Allen is promoted to Chief of Security, while Sheridan plans to send Marcus and Franklin to Mars to contact the underground resistance in mounting their war against President Clark.

Delenn is recalled to Minbar to face "the Dreaming", a process that will decide whether her true motives, especially regarding her relationship to Sheridan, are correct and approved by others.  Lennier accompanies her into the chamber, which allows them to witness Delenn's time as aide to Minbari leader Dukhat, her appointment to the Grey Council, and the outbreak of the Earth-Minbari War.  When the humans fired first upon their ship, Dukhat was killed.  Delenn is enraged at the death of her mentor - and as hers is the deciding vote over whether or not to take retribution upon the humans, she screams for revenge, to pursue the humans to their homeworld and annihilate them with no mercy.

Delenn realizes that the moment the Dreaming intended her to see was Dukhat's last words to her: "you are a child of Valen".  She is descended from Valen, and as a result carries human DNA passed down from Sinclair.  To prevent this fact from becoming known to all Minbari, Delenn is allowed to return to Babylon 5, her pairing with Sheridan intended as a "peace offering" following the war.

Notes: Delenn's shame about her actions in the Earth-Minbari War were first hinted at in And the Sky Full of Stars, And Now For a Word and Ceremonies of Light and Dark.  Delenn spends her third night to watch Sheridan sleeping to complete a Minbari custom, the first two occasions being Messages From Earth and Shadow Dancing.  Jeffrey Sinclair's transformation into Valen was seen in War Without End, Part II.  If Delenn is a descendant of Valen, given the events in the novel To Dream in the City of Sorrows, is it possible that she is also descended from Catherine Sakai?

Footage from this episode was re-used for In the Beginning.

Guest Cast: Reiner Shone appears as Dukhat, and reprises this role for In the Beginning.  One of the Minbari is played by Robin Atkin Downes, who plays Byron the telepath in Season Five; he reprises this role for the telemovie In the Beginning, where he is given the name Morann.