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Where did the shadows go ?

DaRkEnEdStAr

Regular
I was watching in the begining and dukat was saying
"the allies of the shadows are gathering at z`ha`dum , their masters can`t be far behind them" or something to that effect , and it lead me to an interesting question ...... All throughout b5 it mentioned that the shadows were driven away off z`ha`dum by the forces of light , But when anna comes back she said that they awoke the aliens from their Hibernation . eh?? so was they driven off ? or does the word "driven off Z`Ha Dum" mean something different ? and if they were droven off where did they go ?
 
Hmm. That's a good question. I don't know. It does sound like a contradiction, doesn't it? /forums/images/graemlins/confused.gif

Perhaps a few shadows were left there as a kind of early-warning system in case someone tried to land on Zahadum. And the rest were somewhere else. /forums/images/graemlins/confused.gif
 
/forums/images/graemlins/laugh.gif /forums/images/graemlins/laugh.gif /forums/images/graemlins/laugh.gif /forums/images/graemlins/laugh.gif /forums/images/graemlins/laugh.gifYes where is he when there is a tough question.
 
My Guess:
They went to an unexplored area of our, Milky Way Galaxy, probably through a hidden jumpgate and null space like Xha'dam (The Centauri Prime Trilogy: Legions of Fire - Book II - Armies of Light and Dark: "Xha'dam" starting on page 39, ~middle of page).
 
The Shadows almost literally went to ground. Their ships were scattered across the galaxy, buried on dead worlds to hide them from Valen's coalition. But I think some things were left on Z'ha'dum, buried as well. The crew of the Icarus may think that they woke something up, but that's not really accurate. The Shadows were already awake; someone flew the ship out to Mars to collect the buried one. The Icarus simply followed.

So perhaps the best reconciliation of the two apparently conflicting terms is that both happened: the Shadow military fled Z'ha'dum and hid itself, scattered all over the place. Something was left on Z'ha'dum as a sentinel. What happened to the rest of the Shadows, those not flying the ships or standing guard, I don't know. Going by Lorien's comments, which I would trust the most, the majority of the Shadows were elsewhere for the thousand years since Valen, but not all had left. Also I think that the Shadows did go into hibernation, just in their place(s) of exile, and either returned and were woken up or woke up and returned.

As to where they were (because it wasn't Mars or Ganymede, those were just empty ships) -- I haven't the foggiest idea. Perhaps a pocket in hyperspace like the Vorlons used to hide their planet killer.

Truth be told, we just don't know enough. Which is probably what JMS intended. The more mysterious, the more terrifying, as we all know...
 
I agree with KoshFan. After the defeat from Valen and Co. the shadows probably dispersed across the galaxy, in all the dark places where no-one would walk. Some probably hid in hyperpace, like the Vorlons had done, since they have a very advanced and seemingly effortless way of moving in and out of hyperspace, and were older than the Vorlons and thus probably capable of achieving such hiding places.

I would assume that some would remain at Za'Ha'Dum since it was their *supposed* home world (Read: Loriens comment about showing respect), and distibuted certain forces in places like Ganymede and Mars, where they would be recovered at a later date.

For the shadows to come back in greater numbers, they would need to manufacture/create additional ships and technology, so there must have been somewhere where such activities took place, and a base of operations needed to collaborate their efforts. Just a Babylon 5 was a center of operations on the side of light, Za'Ha'Dum would be the place of operations for the side of dark. Babylon 5 could not run on it's own without a crew, and likewise at Za'Ha'Dum.

Perhaps hyperspace, the drakh homeworld and the homeworld of the other dark races (it was implied that there were more than one dark servant race, although not mentioned by name). It was also suggested that the shadows in the Valen era were resident on the Narn homeworld, discovered by Ja'Quan and subsequently driven away. The Narns are one of the younger races, so it is entirely possible that the shadows took residency in other worlds without full knowledge of their existence. Who knows, they could have hid themselves at the bottom of the abyssals in our own oceans around 1200 A.D.

Furthermore, the shadows were all about caos, not obedience. The Vorlons would therefore have a clearly defined homeworld and sector in space easily recognisable to others. The shadows would operate a more caotic structure, where their forces were distributed across many worlds, nebula, rifts in space-time, and hyperspace, using natural hiding places or deliberate cloaking. The shadows themselves are not visible to most humanoids, with exception to Telepaths, and could be sleeping in peoples abodes without them realising it.

Telepaths were forcibly introduced into Human genes only 100 years prior to the events of B5, therefore they could feasibly go undetected on earth until this time. Perhaps this is one reason why the Vorlons engineered humans to have telepathic abilities. Maybe the plague was engineered by the shadows to see what would happen. Maybe Jack the Ripper was actually working on behalf of the shadows before being requisitioned by the Vorlons.

Sleep well tonight.
 
When asked
"You just lost an intergallactic war.....what are you gonna do now?"

The Shadows replied...."We''re going beyond the Disney-Rim World!!!""
 

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