There really aren't a lot of specifics available. Here's the gist of it, derived from two of the unproduced scripts and some JMS postings.
<font class="small">Spoiler:</font>
<table bgcolor="#000000" cellspacing="2" cellpadding="2" border="0"><tr bgcolor="#000000"><td bgcolor="#000000" id="spoiler"><font color="#000000">Near the end of S1 Gideon has another encounter with the mystery ship that destroyed the
Cerberus and killed every crew member except for him. Among other things he discovers that the effect of its main weapon is virtually identical to that of the
Excalibur's main gun. While the mystery ship escapes,
Excalibur's crew discovers a unique energy signature that would make it possible for them to locate and follow the ship in the future.
In the S1 cliff-hanger they would find the ship again, this time following it to a secret base. Gideon and Galen infiltrate the facility. Gideon is captured and brought to the base commander - an
EarthForce officer in charge of a covert project intended to adapt and exploit Shadow technology. The ship that destroyed
Cerberus was an early experiment that "escaped" The Human CPU went mad, hence the attack. Meanwhile Galen makes his way deeper into the site and discovers its ulitmate secret - an area where Humans are being used as "hosts" to grow Technomage-like implants. Galen destroys the area, killing the doomed "hosts" in the process.
After the pair escape they have a major falling out. Gideon is shocked to discover that Galen's Tech was provided by the Shadows, and is angry at how much possibly vital information Galen has withheld from him to protect that secret. Galen leaves
Excalibur.
Gideon organizes a meeting of those working on the cure, to be held on Mars. At the meeting he intends to present evidence of what he found at the secret base. He intends to go alone, so that he's the only one who can be accused of treason for revealing the secret, but Matherson, Dureena and Max all join him. (Chambers may be there, too, and perhaps one or two others from the crew.)
As Gideon approaches the building where the meeting is to take place we become aware that Galen is also on Mars, watching from a distance - and that he has discovered that an assassin is lying in wait for Gideon. Before Galen can sound a warning the assassin fires and we see Gideon fall to the ground - fade out.
JMS has indicated that the cure would have been discovered in S2. At some point the
Excalibur crew would realize that the cure was not exactly what it appeared. No one in EarthGov would believe them, however. Gideon and company would "steal" their ship and "go renegade", hunted by both EarthGov and other forces, in an attempt to find out what is really going on. That was pretty much as far as he went in describing the future of the show. What follows is speculation, and very limited speculation, at that.
We know the plague comes originally from the Shadows. We know that a similar plague was created by a technomage using nano-tech, and that the Drakh plague seems to use some of the same techniques. We also know that both EarthGov and the Technomages have some knowledge of Shadow-based nano-tech. Finally we know (from the Technomage novels) that
all Shadow-tech has the quality of predisposing the user towards chaos. If the "cure" is an application of Shadow-derived nano-tech, there is a good chance that it will retain this quality - creating almost as many problems as the original plague would have. Since this is only a possibility, however, and since there would be unimaginable ethical and political pressure to use any cure as soon as it was discovered, it is entirely plausible that EarthGov would ignore Gideon's warnings and use the cure. The argument against using it would come from a maverick captain who had at least tried to reveal top-secret information, and a technomage who was inherently suspect.
It is interesting to note that
B5 really got the Shadow arc rolling only in S2. Prior to that much of the emphasis had been on Sinclair's missing 24 hours and the Minbari surrender, although the mysterious Shadow ships and the notion of an ancient enemy were introduced starting around mid-season. The original outline for
B5 had called for these threads to be resolved by the fourth of fifth episode of S2, with the Shadow War then dominating until early S4. Similarly
Crusade S1 would have been about finding a cure for the Drakh plague, although the Shadow-tech thread would also have been introduced. Early in S2 the plague story would probably have been ended, and the new thread begun. (The plague story was never sustainable over five years, anyway. We all knew the plague
was cured.)
I'm not sure where the story would have gone after that. But I can make a couple of guesses on specific points: 1) The IA, especially John Sheridan, would have been more open to Gideon's ideas than EarthGov, and would likely have provided some covert assistance to
Excalibur. 2) Elizabeth Lochley, who was spared the hard choice of acting against her government and orders because she was never told to bomb civilians or commit any other obviously criminal act, would now have to make that choice after all. I suspect that she would throw her lot in with Gideon.
Excalibur couldn't have docked at B5 without instantly being seized, but I'm willing to be Gideon and others could have come aboard on shuttles and used the place for meetings and to pick up supplies.
Anyway, that's what little I know, and what little I can guess about the future direction of the series.</font></td></tr></table>
Regards,
Joe
