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Talia Winters

Talia Winters is a character appearing on the science fiction television show Babylon 5. Winters was portrayed by actress Andrea Thompson. Winters is a commercial telepath from Earth, and a member of the Psi Corps organization. Like all Psi Corps members, Winters' telepathic ability is numbered according to ability; Winters is a P5, the level of most commercial telepaths. Typically, commercial telepaths are assigned to help two or more business parties broker deals, by monitoring their honesty during business negotiations.


After arriving on the station in 2258, Winters developed friendships with several of the staff members aboard the Babylon 5 station, particularly Michael Garibaldi, who harbored a not-so secret crush on Winters, and Susan Ivanova, the station's second-in-command. The relationship between Ivanova and Winters was particularly complicated; initially, Ivanova was hostile to Winters' arrival, refusing to acknowledge the presence of a Psi Corps telepath aboard Babylon 5. Winters quickly discovered that Ivanova's mother was a telepath who committed suicide, and that Ivanova blamed Psi Corps for her mother's death. Despite the initial tension between the two women, they developed a mutual respect which later blossomed into friendship.

In 2259, the command staff of Babylon 5 discovered that Winters had been modified by Psi Corps to carry a hidden personality. (A vague picture in one of the Babylon 5 comic books alludes to this manipulation, apparently taking place at Psi Corps headquarters on Mars.) This personality was hidden so deeply that Winters herself was unaware of its existence. The Psi Corps used this "sleeper" personality to spy on the Babylon 5 staff. When dissident telepath and Mars rebel Lyta Alexander learned of the sleeper program, she traveled to Babylon 5 with the news. Alexander told the staff that she had the password to the second personality. Once it was sent via telepathic link into the person harboring the sleeper personality, the original personality would be destroyed, and the second personality would take total control. Alexander sent the password into each member of the command staff, but none of them were harboring the personality. When Winters arrived, Alexander sent the password into her mind, revealing Winters as the unwitting spy harboring the hidden personality. Winters' original personality was destroyed, with the hidden personality apparently taking full control of her psyche.

After the hidden personality took over, Talia Winters was sent back to Earth. Her ultimate fate has not been revealed, but the Psi-Cop Al Bester hinted that she was dissected after arriving back on Earth. It's not known for sure how truthful that statement was, as it may had been an attempt to generate strong emotion among Winters' friends, and use that to get into the minds of the command staff.

Last updated: 09-12-2005 02:39:13