Cure for the Plague, (I think this would do it)

[bakana]

If there were only a few hundred Telepaths left in a population numbering in the Millions, it is quite possible that their descendants don't meet very often.

<BLOCKQUOTE><font size="1" face="Verdana, arial">quote:</font><HR>
"But as far as I know, there are no Narn telepaths. You may not even carry the gene."

"There are no Narn telepaths now. But once, long ago, there were."

"Yeah? What happened to them?"

"They and their families were exterminated. The telepath gene has never been strong enough in the survivors to breed a natural telepath."

Lindstrom and G'Kar in Babylon 5:"Dust to Dust" <HR></BLOCKQUOTE>

Saying that they would re-emerge in a few generation assumes that the various pieces of the gene complex are present in a large percentage of the population.

If they are only present in a small percentage, it could take Several thousand years before they began to manifest often enough for anyone to notice.

An isolated telepath would be very smart to keep a low profile. Considering the reaction most people would have to the idea of someone reading his/her mind, telepaths who brag about their ability would have very short lifespans.

There could be a fair number of Narn Telepaths running around, but scattered through the population so that the odds of two Meeting would be slim.

We have no idea how Long it took the Vorlons to scatter the gene complex on the various worlds.
They most likely planted the gene complexes in some of the babies we saw being gestated on the Vorlon Homeworld (in Lyta's memories), took them to the various planets and left them to be adopted.

A baby here, a baby there, after a while, you've got telepath genes scattered all over the place.

Then, you wait for the genes to spread through the population until a "critical mass" is reached and Telepaths start popping up all over the place.
How Strong a telepath depends on just how many of the various pieces that particular individual gets. Or which pieces.
The existence of the Telekinetics implies that the Telepath gene is only Part of the overall complex.

I believe it was Lyta who said something once about telepathy in her family going back Further than even PsyCorps realises.
I.e. her family hid the talent for several generations.



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Do not ascribe your own motivations to others:
At best, it will break your heart.
At worst, it will get you dead."

 

[Galahad]

Someone mentioned earlier that the control centre for the plague might be hidden on Earth. How about this for an ironic twist. The control mechanism was integrated into the Victory and the Excalibur's computer matrix.

We know that the main designer of the VCD was in cahoots with the Drakh. What a sick twist it would make if the supposed instrument of Earth's salvation, and it's symbol of hope was actually a poisoned chalice.

The only way of discovering if this were true, would be to analyse how the virus adapted in relation to the Excalibur's missions. For example, to remain undetected, commands for adaptation may only be transmitted when Excalibur itself transmits a purposeful message to Earth. The further Excalibur is away in terms of communication, the longer the gaps between adaptation signals.

This of course may be overly ironiv and way out there, but I think it'd be a great twist.

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Back when I was a kid in Sunday School, Father Minkowski once said: "Given the crucifixion was a terrible thing for anyone to endure, if you could go back in time 2200 years, would you prevent the crucifixion of Christ?" Well after a heated debate, we all agreed the answer was no. The crucifixion was necessary to redeem the world. - Lt. John Matheson "The Needs of Earth"

"We live for the One. We die for the One!"

 

[dimon37]

Ok, Let me tell you what my fiancee told while and after reading the telepath trilogy. She is doing PhD in genetics, neurogenetics in particular, so her opinion cna be trusted.
1) What PsiCorps is doing is a load bull. According to the books, only mother's genome(metachondrial) is responsible for telepathic abilities -> to get better telepaths you have female telepaths marry PHYSICALY strong and capable males(not necesserily telepaths)
2)Technically, the Drakh(Shadow) plague is not a virus. a nanovirus(whatever that means), but not a virus in the medical sense of the word.

Now, this is from me personally(source: third book on telepath series)

<table bgcolor=black><tr><td bgcolor=black><font size=1 color=white>Spoiler:</font></td></tr><tr><td><font size=2 color=black>
The cure was discovered and it was discovered by the crew of the Excalibur. Nothing is said about the cure itself. </font></td></tr></table>



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[**DONOTDELETE**]

Since the plague is Shadow (nano)Tech, might the cure be found in Vorlon (nano)Tech?
This is an idea I have for a Crusade/DS9 relaunch crossover fanfic. I don't expect to get to it anytime soon, but am willing to try if I can find a collaborator.
Anyone interested can contact me at: darkwing76@hotmail.com or ewing.william@fallon.navy.mil
Back to the topic, my thought is that eventually, Excalibur would/ve found a working model of the virus and Galen would've worked out the commands to shut it down.

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Darkwing
Let's..get..dangerous

 

[**DONOTDELETE**]

<BLOCKQUOTE><font size="1" face="Verdana, arial">quote:</font><HR> Ok, Let me tell you what my fiancee told while and after reading the telepath trilogy. She is doing PhD in genetics, neurogenetics in particular, so her opinion cna be trusted.
<HR></BLOCKQUOTE>

Dimon37 ask your fiancé to read the first Psi Corps book again. A lot of telepaths do not have the mitochondria sequence. This is how Kevin Vacit was able to operate without being detected. The real telepath genes are in the nucleus and can be inherited from both parents. The mitochondria genes appear to be some form of booster.


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Andrew Swallow

 

[bakana]

The whole Telepath Arc makes it very clear that there is no Single "Telepath Gene".

It's a complex combination of genes that PsyCorps is still trying to unravel.
They know Some of the markers, but have not identified them all.

If they Had identified all the relevant genes, they wouldn't be wasting time with experimental breeding programs.
They'd be creating Gene-Spliced babies by the dozen as fast and often as they could get female "blips" pregnant.
And probably some Non Blip females, too.
Bester, for one, would not hesitate for a second to kidnap runaways and plant PsyCorps babies in them.
And, we have seen that there were people in PsyCorps who had even Less morals than Bester.


Best guess is that the Vorlons designed the gene complexes to be Dominant so they'd almost always get inherited, then scattered the various pieces and parts of the gene complexes throughout the population by arranging for babies created on the Vorlon homeworld to be adopted all over the world.

Then, they sat back and waited for enough of these genes to accumulate in various families to create Telepaths.

The probability is that, by the time of Babylon 5, almost Every Human has at least a small Part of the Telepath gene complex.

Eventually (a couple thousand years or so) everyone would be a telepath, no matter what.

Unless, like Narn, some critical part of the complex got wiped out too early, before it had a chance to spread throughout the population.



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Do not ascribe your own motivations to others:
At best, it will break your heart.
At worst, it will get you dead."

 

[Galahad]

Also, we know how very clever the Shadows were when using deception and failsafes in their tech, as Dureena noted. Maybe it has an anti tamper device, if you fiddle with it, it triggers the plagues infection rate, speeding up the process or even making it's final effect instantaneous.

So if it's on Earth, where would they hide it?

Lourdes? The most obvious inobvious place, and hideously ironic. People go to the place for healing and get closer to the instrument of their destruction.

That wasn't too serious by the way!

The key to the whole series is probably Mankind's greed! Look at it, from Gideon and his box to Earthforce and their Shadowtech, it seems to be a running theme. Maybe the Covert developers at Earthforce were deceived and given a gift of some tech that contained the computer core for the plague. Maybe it's like the Rings... Shadowtech was given to Earth to study, and was used by the black ops people. However, the tech interacts with the "One Ring" or in this case plague computer core.

Just a few random thoughts early in the UK morning!

------------------
Back when I was a kid in Sunday School, Father Minkowski once said: "Given the crucifixion was a terrible thing for anyone to endure, if you could go back in time 2200 years, would you prevent the crucifixion of Christ?" Well after a heated debate, we all agreed the answer was no. The crucifixion was necessary to redeem the world. - Lt. John Matheson "The Needs of Earth"

"We live for the One. We die for the One!"

 

[Talathanar]

My .02 after wading through posts. Great points on a lot of them. I've not read the book and I apologize for repeating if it happens.

1. I agree that the Drakh plague computer core is probably on Earth. (logically) We saw in one of the eps with whats'is'nuts talking about 'his associates' on earth with a Psi Corps person in the room. Besides what would be a better place to put the best way to stop something rather than where no one can reach it due to the effects. You try to stop big nasty plague, you catch it too. Sounds very Shadow-like to me.

2. In one of the more recent eps of B5 (recent rerun I should say) Edgars is in a room with infects teeps, he touches one..Seems he's pretty confident that the virus will work only on telepaths.

It seems to me that destroying the thing that gives it directions would be a very baaad idea. While reciving instructions atleast it has a particular direction to go. IIRC The Drakh don't understand *exactly* what they have or humanity would have been wiped out since the Drakh would have been able to change it. This can also mean that it is recieving instructions to not kill humanity before adapting to do it pardon the expression, cleanly.

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[eirik]

In the Centauri book trilogy, we learned that:


<table bgcolor=black><tr><td bgcolor=black><font size=1 color=white>Spoiler:</font></td></tr><tr><td><font size=2 color=black> the plague was meant for Minbar. The Drakh only had enough material for one planet, according to Gwynn or Finian in the Centauri trilogy. </font></td></tr></table>

So, this suggests that if there is a computer on earth controlling the plague, then the Drakh had more than one.

I don't think this is unlikely, BTW. Afterall, they surely didn't anticipate Lyta triggering the Z'Hadum self-destruction device when she did and so had to grab what they could with the limited time they had. That was probably a very chaotic process. Undoubtedly, they grabbed several things that may be of absolutely no use to them because one component may require another component to be useful, etc.

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It never ends; it only changes!

 

[bakana]

Wherever the central plague controller is, The Drakh are the ones who placed it there.

Personally, I'd vote for somewhere on the Moon. This isn't something that needs real time communication.
Remember, It's a 5 year project, preplanned and running mostly on autopilot.

Plus, there are indications that the Drakh aren't really planning to let the plague run it's full course.
There are hints that they'd be happy to negotiate a surrender that made all humanity their Slaves.
They'd wait until everyone had given up on finding a Cure, of course.

That may even be part of what JMS was planning. The "false cure" that was hinted at in the revelations about where the first two seasons were headed.



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Do not ascribe your own motivations to others:
At best, it will break your heart.
At worst, it will get you dead."

 

[**DONOTDELETE**]

Since the Drakh were not planning on using the plague on Earth they may not have had time to plant a control computer. The plague could simply be running on automatic.

Spoiler for Magazine Stories.

<table bgcolor=black><tr><td bgcolor=black><font size=1 color=white>Spoiler:</font></td></tr><tr><td><font size=2 color=black>
In the magazine story "Hidden Agendas" the Warlock class of ships contained Shadowtech computers. One of these may be able to take control of the virus and order it to self-destruct.
</font></td></tr></table>

Andrew Swallow

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Andrew Swallow

 

[PsiProne]

Not sure what could be a spoiler so its all boxed! Possible spoilers for S4-5, Drakh War and Crusade.




<table bgcolor=black><tr><td bgcolor=black><font size=1 color=white>Spoiler:</font></td></tr><tr><td><font size=2 color=black>
I find it interesting that the Drahk Plague may not have been intended for Earth. It does makes sense because they brought their shadow-planetkiller to destroy Earth IMHO. But who ever the intended target was, ie Minbar, I don't think the Drakh meant to wipe them out with the plague. It was mentioned in a Crusade episode, that humans were killed during the initial infection. If the plague was intended for annihilation why would it not learn from the deaths it caused during the initial infection, but instead back-off and do some more 'research.'

I think the plague was never intended to destroy. I think it was a way for ultimate control of a species. It studies every kind of weakness present in its victim, that way the Drakh can tell an entire population en masse, SERVE us or DIE! Why?

Remember, the Drakh lost their masters, the Shadows. The Shadows were 'vanquished' by people like Sheridan and Delenn.
Remember in season 4, when Delenn first encounters them? We find out the Shadows left their servants behind, servants who are now looking to be masters themselves. Also in season 4 and 5 we find out the Drakh are controlling The Regent. That was for Londo betrayal of Morden and his 'associates'.

Now what better revenge then to annihialte the humans and subdue the Minbari with the Plague. The very people responsible for vanquishing their beloved masters, the Shadows. I think that may have been the original plan.</font></td></tr></table>

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"You cannot stop someone who's been touched by Vorlons!"
"I tried so hard and got so far, in the end it doesn't even matter."

[This message has been edited by PsiProne (edited January 24, 2002).]

 

[Cern]

I like that idea Psion10.

<table bgcolor=black><tr><td bgcolor=black><font size=1 color=white>Spoiler:</font></td></tr><tr><td><font size=2 color=black>maybe if Earth comes under Drakh control, that would be why the Excalibur "goes Renegade", tring to find a way to free Earth </font></td></tr></table>



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So come on rally round this brave and valiant cause with tradition, pride, and honor at its core. With swords drawn to defend stood these noble-hearted men. Faugh-an-ballagh, clear the way, me boys!!
-Dropkick Murphys: Heroes From Our Past

 

[Hesperous]

Wow, good thought,

<table bgcolor=black><tr><td bgcolor=black><font size=1 color=white>Spoiler:</font></td></tr><tr><td><font size=2 color=black> The cure is given in exchange for EA's loyalty, (odds are, we would surrender to them). We would be forced to break with the ISA, and follow the orders of new masters. The new Tech, (gravitation fields, shadow tech integration, et.) makes the EA a tough customer, and with the Drakh agenda, the perfect weapon. Gidion knows he, (and Excalibur,) could be the only solution.</font></td></tr></table>

TO JMS: PLEASE BRING CRUSADE BACK?!?!?!



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[Cern]

Supposedly, the Cure would be Worse than the Disease.

<table bgcolor=black><tr><td bgcolor=black><font size=1 color=white>Spoiler:</font></td></tr><tr><td><font size=2 color=black> Earth being enslaved would certainly qualify </font></td></tr></table>



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So come on rally round this brave and valiant cause with tradition, pride, and honor at its core. With swords drawn to defend stood these noble-hearted men. Faugh-an-ballagh, clear the way, me boys!!
-Dropkick Murphys: Heroes From Our Past