The monitoring station blinked through a sequence of readouts, and all three of them maneuvered into position to see the screen. Melora and Reg hung back in order to let the senior engineer reach the actual controls.

The readouts were going by too fast for Barclay to gather much from them, but he could see that Zuka Juno was keeping up with the scrolling code. The senior engineer kept a placid expression on his face, but Reg could see his eyes dashing back and forth, up and down across the screens. Those pale, wise eyes couldn't hide his immense disbelief and fear.

"Stop it for a second," ordered Pazlar.

The old engineer's hands hovered over the instruments, but they halted and began to tremble. With alarm, Melora reached over his shoulder and began pounding on the board, but her actions had no effect whatsoever. Screens full of obtuse computer code kept scrolling past, with no way to stop it, no way to end it.

"It's frozen, isn't it?" demanded Melora.

The elder Elaysian was certainly frozen, floating in front of the screen, staring at it as if it were his tombstone. Angrily, Melora grabbed him by his billowing white robes, spun him around, and shook his body. In her grasp, the once arrogant engineer now seemed as frail and helpless as the oldest spires on Gemworld.

"You can't stop it, can you?" shouted Melora, tears welling in her intense blue eyes.

He gulped and finally seemed to hear her. "Uh, no," he answered in a cracked voice. "It's encrypted ... in an endless loop."

"Can you break the encryption?"

"No." He shook his head, then buried his face in the billowy sails under his arm.

Seeing this reaction, Reg twisted his hands nervously. He wanted to pace, but his feet dangled in midair; so he kept clapping his hands as he spoke. "It's just as we suspected ... only worse. Somebody sabotaged the sh.e.l.l, then they encrypted it so n.o.body can fix it. This may look bad, but I'm sure Data or Geordi can break the-"

"No one can break it," answered Zuka Juno, snapping out of his stupor. "Only those who put it on-maybe not even them."

"And who put it on?" asked Melora.

He turned away evasively. "That's hard to say."

"No, it's not," she insisted. "Only six beings had access to this level of programming-the six senior engineers. Isn't that right?"

"You've got to give me time to think about all of this. The repercussions-" Juno couldn't finish the sentence, and his face reverted to a stunned mask of fear.

"The repercussions are that everybody on this planet is going to die! Everybody on the Enterprise is going to die!" Melora laughed derisively and tossed her silky blond hair. "I apologize, Reg. I told you it couldn't be possible that someone from Gemworld could destroy their own planet, but that's apparently what happened."

Barclay cleared his throat, trying to find something to say in response to this devastating news. "Well, my people almost destroyed their own planet. We survived because we're like you. We just kept trying to hold things together. Of course, Earth is younger, not quite as fragile as Gemworld is."

"Yes," grumbled Pazlar. "One tiny bit of corrupted code, and billions of years of history and survival are about to vanish. What are we going to do about this, Engineer Juno?"

The old Elaysian shook his head slowly, eyes wide, as if he had just seen his own mortality. "It's not just the fractal program," he murmured hoa.r.s.ely. "There's also the rift out there."

"But if you stop collecting dark matter," said Reg, "you have a chance to stop it before it destroys everything."

No sooner had he said those words than he remembered Data's report to Captain Picard. The sh.e.l.l was designed like a human being, not a machine. It was not a collection of subsystems that could be turned on and off as needed; it was a single ent.i.ty, designed to compensate for changing conditions but never to stop working. At the moment, it was compensating for a fractal growth program run amuck by sucking all the dark matter from another dimension. One of the keepers of the secrets had betrayed them.

Zuka Juno looked at Reg with a mixture of shock and horror. "I have to convene the Exalted Ones and ask for their opinion."

"There's no time for that!" snapped Pazlar. "We've got to get the other senior engineers back here!"

"Uh ... one of them is a ma.s.s murderer," Reg reminded her. "Did all six of them have access to this room?"

"Yes," answered Zuka Juno, "except for the Gendlii, of course, who must send a proxy. The Lipul engineer has access via the crystal stream behind these panels."

"Okay, the Gendlii is out," said Reg, making a mental note. He wasn't sure what a Gendlii was, but he was glad to hear that at least one of the six engineers could be eliminated from suspicion. "Who is his proxy?"

"Tangre Bertoran. Perhaps you know him."

"Oh, we know him," Reg a.s.sured the engineer. "I think it's time to contact the Enterprise and tell them the bad news." He lifted his hand to strike his combadge, but Juno reached out and grabbed his wrist. The old engineer's grip was surprisingly strong.

"Please, think about what you're doing," begged the elder Elaysian. "There will be panic ... a complete loss of faith. We must keep this a secret for now, until I can inform the Exalted Ones. We must prepare our people first."

"I think they're mature enough to know the truth," said Melora. "Go ahead and contact the Enterprise, Reg."

"I want to find the one who did this," insisted the aged Elaysian, his hand and his voice shaking with anger. "If we act too quickly and bring in your crew, he might be driven away. Give us a moment to handle this internally-a small delay won't affect anything. Please."

He seemed so sincere that Reg was forced to glance at Pazlar. She seemed torn by indecision, and Barclay could understand how they might want a short period to digest this news before outsiders got involved. "All right," he said, "but we'll go with you."

Juno gave them a weak smile and pointed to the blinking monitor station. "Perhaps I should stay here and do what I can-maybe there's something I've overlooked. You go, my son, to the Exalted Ones and speak to them in my place."

"Do you think they'll believe me?" asked Reg. "n.o.body has so far."

"They will if you carry this." The senior engineer pushed off from the monitoring station and floated to the small red panel above them. He extracted the violet shard and handed it to Reg, brown lanyard and all.

The crystal twinkled for a moment when Reg held it, and he flinched. But it didn't burn or hurt him; in fact, it felt strangely cool and energizing. It was like holding an icicle with his bare hands. The shard was about the same size as an icicle, and Barclay was reminded of winters back in the midwest, when he used to throw s...o...b..a.l.l.s at the icicles hanging from the rain gutters.

Melora proudly put the fiber lanyard around his neck and tightened it like a noose. "You're a proxy for a senior engineer," she said. "That's a great responsibility."

"Are you ... are you sure you want to do this?" asked Reg doubtfully. "I don't have much experience being a dignitary."

"You are the one, my son," insisted the elder engineer. "You diligently tried to warn us about this when no one was listening; now you must continue this thankless task. With that gem, they will know you have my blessing. Hurry."

"Come on, Reg," said Melora, taking his hand.

The lanky engineer grasped the violet shard with his other hand, certain that someone had made a mistake. It felt as if they had given him the key to the city, but for all the wrong reasons. Although Reg was honored, he didn't want to be the voice of doom for all of Gemworld.

Lying on metal girders were seven corpses in black body bags bearing Starfleet insignia. The funeral took place in a cavernous s.p.a.ce in the Enterprise that was occasionally used for sporting events, such as soccer. Three of the deceased were members of a field hockey team which had reigned as champions of the Enterprise for two years. It made sense to hold the service here, thought Picard, since it was going to be a bit different, anyway.

Because they couldn't use the transporter or torpedoes to dispose of the bodies in s.p.a.ce, as was traditional, they had fallen back on a little-used but acceptable alternative method. Captain Picard was a traditionalist when it came to funeral services-and he had performed a great many during the war-so he was uneasy about these changes.

The crowd was large, consisting of almost everyone who wasn't on active duty. They stood in a semicircle around the six small pyres. There was an air of quiet, except for a few sniffles. Will Riker was speaking, reading the name of each fallen crewmember and listing his or her accomplishments. Picard recalled faces, especially Yontel's, and snippets of conversation in pa.s.sing. Now those youthful personalities were gone, and the ent.i.ty that was the Enterprise was diminished.

Commander Riker finished reading the biographic part of the program, and he nodded to the captain. Picard cleared his throat and lifted his chin, all the better to project his stentorian voice.

"Around the turn of the last millennium," he began, "a fleet of one hundred thirty-one sailing ships had a race on one of Earth's oceans-from Sidney, Australia, to Hobart, Tasmania. As the race progressed, a storm blew in, but there are often storms in those waters. Most of the yachts plowed ahead, hoping to win the race. But the storm quickly turned into a rare hurricane, such as was never seen in those waters before. Scores of ships were disabled or capsized.

"For two days, primitive aircraft performed hundreds of daring rescues. When it was over, six sailors from three different vessels had perished. Two of their bodies were never recovered."

The captain scanned the array of faces, skin colors, and species, marveling at the incredible variety of his crew. Despite their many differences, they were closer now to each other than they were to their own families, and each death affected every one of them. Picard noted the absence of Counselor Troi, who would normally be moving among them, giving comfort and consolation where needed. By now, all of them knew of her distress, and it had to be one more worry they shared.

The captain continued, "When we entered this solar system, we lost seven brave shipmates in an unforeseen tragedy. Like those sailors of centuries past, we fly into danger, never knowing exactly what we will face. For all of us who travel in s.p.a.ce, or upon the untamed sea, or in any hostile environment-we know that we are tempting the fates. There are places where nature and physics don't want us to be, but we persist in going there, anyway. Because challenge and exploration are in our nature."

He hardly needed to add that Gemworld also fit that description-a hostile environment that harbored life despite its true nature. "In s.p.a.ce, we know we will meet threats that we would never meet if we remained safely in our armchairs, but that has never deterred us. Exploration of the unknown can be both thrilling and tragic, but none of us would live our lives any differently.

"At that long-ago memorial service for those six sailors, Hugo van Kretschmar, the commodore of the local yacht club, had these words to say. I think these sentiments hold just as true for our fallen comrades now as they did then, for those lost sailors: " 'We will miss you always,' " intoned the captain, quoting a man who died three centuries ago. " 'We will remember you always; we will learn from the tragic cirumstances of your pa.s.sing. May the everlasting voyage you have now embarked on be blessed with calm seas and gentle breezes. May you never have to reef or change a headsail in the night. May your bunk always be warm and dry.' "

He nodded to Commander Riker, who barked, "Present arms!"

Six crewmembers with phaser rifles stepped forward, holding their rifles in a shouldered position. "Take aim!" ordered Riker, and the squad lifted their weapons and drew a bead on the six body bags resting on pedestals. "Fire!"

With their rifles, they blasted the bags with gleaming beams until they vaporized, leaving nothing but a slight trail of steam. There was silence at this somber, unexpected sight, and the captain wished he had something uplifting to say to his crew. But he didn't. Vaporizing the bodies might have been efficient, but it only served to remind everyone what dire straits they were in.

Silently the crowd began to file out the doors at either end of the cavernous room. Riker thanked the six members of the firing squad, who themselves looked shaken from dispatching their comrades in such a fashion. The captain lowered his head, knowing the service had ended on a disturbing note.

The other thing that had ended was his patience. He lifted his chin and tapped his combadge. "Picard to bridge."

"Data here."

"I want to find out what we're up against," declared the captain. "Prepare the probe."

Chapter Eleven.

DEANNA TROI LAY UNCONSCIOUS in a private room in sickbay while Dr. Beverly Crasher stood at the foot of her bed checking her vital signs on the overhead screen. Except for her brain waves, which were slightly more active than usual, Troi's vital signs were all within normal ranges. She appeared to be sleeping peacefully, almost angelically, with her raven hair streaming outward across the pillow from her radiant face.

That would last only about another fifteen minutes, thought Crusher, until the sedatives began to wear off. At that time, there was no telling which Deanna Troi would return to them-the trusted counselor or the delusional patient.

As a friend, Crasher hated what she had to do next; as a doctor, she had no choice. She bent down and made sure that the heavy-duty restraints on her comrade's arms and legs were tight, but not tight enough to cut off circulation. Deanna hadn't appeared to be a danger to others, but she could easily injure herself if she became destructive again. It was better to be overly cautious than sorry. The restraints were the main reason the doctor hadn't wanted Will and Jean-Luc to see her patient. They might get the wrong idea.

Or perhaps they might realize how serious it was.

With a troubled frown, Crusher gazed at her colleague, shipmate, and friend, thinking how painful life would be on the Enterprise if she didn't recover. She could mend the burns, broken bones, and diseases she saw every day, but a damaged psyche was beyond her bag of tricks. Deanna should be at a starbase, under the supervision of a team of counselors, but knowing that didn't do either one of them any good. They were trapped here, far removed from help for her condition. It wasn't in Beverly's nature to be pessimistic about a patient's chances, but she didn't think the terror she had seen in Troi's eyes would leave easily.

Her combadge beeped, snapping Beverly out of her oppressive thoughts. "Crusher here," she answered.

"Doctor, this is Nurse Ogawa. Commander Riker is in the receiving room."

Crusher nodded to herself, knowing that she couldn't hold him off forever. "Tell him I'll be right there. And, Ogawa, let's have somebody standing by with Counselor Troi-she could wake up any time."

"Don't worry, we won't leave her alone," promised the senior nurse.

When Crusher entered main sickbay, she found Will Riker pacing. The big man whirled around and stared expectantly at her, his clean-shaven face making him look more boyish than he had in years. "Any change?"

"No," she answered softly, "but the sedative will be wearing off in fifteen or twenty minutes. The next time she wakes up should tell us a lot about her condition."

"Can I see her?"

"Why don't we wait until she's awake," said Beverly pleasantly. "I'll let you buy me a cup of coffee until then."

Riker looked uncertain about leaving Deanna again-after all, it wasn't that long ago that he had rediscovered his feelings for her. But Crusher smiled and took his arm, guiding him out the door and into the corridor before he could mount a protest. With any luck, thought the doctor, the next time he saw her, she wouldn't be strapped down and unconscious.

"Enterprise to away team," said Captain Picard from the command chair in the center of the bridge. When there was no answer, he tapped the combadge on his chair again. "Picard to Barclay. Come in, away team."

"They may be out of range," suggested Data, plying the ops console. "Interference from the new crystal growth has drastically reduced our effective range. When we last got a fix on the shuttlecraft, they were at the sh.e.l.l, but our scanners indicate they have left the sh.e.l.l. They will probably go deeper into the planet."

Picard nodded, trying to temper his worry and impatience. Experience had taught him that the Elaysians, Lipuls, Alpusta, and other denizens of Gemworld were not the easiest to get along with, and he had best let the away team do their job. He had faith in both Barclay and Pazlar. Their movements clearly showed they were traveling far and wide, trying to gain access to the computer codes. Once they did, another piece of the puzzle would be uncovered.

The captain knew it was up to him to turn over a large chunk of that puzzle himself. Tangre Bertoran and the Jeptah had been right about one thing-the rift was connected, and they couldn't ignore it. They had to find out more about this invisible singularity which spewed dark matter, thoron radiation, and destruction in equal measure. If it truly was a dimensional rift, they couldn't even guess what was on the other side.

The captain had stared down a black hole before, but at least he knew what awaited him on the other side of a black hole-nothingness, nonexistence. Another dimension, one full of dark matter, could be more alien than anything ever seen in their galaxy. Despite the captain's wealth of experience, that was a sobering thought.

Picard kept recalling what Data had said about imbalance and equalization. If the rift were left open, dark matter might keep flowing between the two dimensions until they were equalized. First Gemworld would be destroyed, then the solar system, the sector, the quadrant-and both dimensions. The rift would widen until it consumed the cosmos.

"Mr. Data," said the captain, "prepare to launch the probe."

"Yes, sir." The android deftly worked his board for a few seconds. "Without accurate sensor readings, targeting is problematic. I will be forced to make an approximation of the rift's location."

Picard smiled slightly. "I trust your guess, Data."

"Course laid in," reported the android. "Probe is ready for launch."

"Fire when ready."

Data tapped his console. "Probe launched."

The captain looked up at the viewscreen to witness a scene very similar to the simulation he had viewed on the holodeck with the Jeptah protestors. The probe zoomed through an opening in the sh.e.l.l and streaked into s.p.a.ce. Scanners picked up the blip outside the sh.e.l.l as it soared toward a jagged gash in the starscape. At least that's how Picard imagined it.

"Sensors reporting in," said Data, scanning screen after screen of readouts. "Trace gases are consistent with a darkmatter nebula. Thoron radiation increasing exponentially, as are graviton readings, baryon particles, and gamma rays. Probe is now encountering unknown gas clouds; recognizable substances are ammonia, carbon dioxide, and water vapor."

Picard frowned, thinking those were the basic ingredients of amino acids, the building blocks of life. Could that thing be alive? He was about to order the probe aborted when it disappeared from the viewscreen.

"Transmission ended," said Data simply.

Deanna Troi was asleep. Oblivious, until a sharp pain punctured her stomach, and a horrible whining sounded in her mind. She howled as her abdominal muscles tightened involuntarily, and she tried to sit up to ease the pain. But her arms were strapped down! All she could do was thrash about on the bed, not knowing where she was or what was happening to her. It felt as if a knife was tearing her insides out, and her head was about to split open.

In a small cafeteria a few meters down the corridor, Beverly Crusher's combadge chirped. "Ogawa to Crusher," came a familiar voice.

"Crusher here," answered Beverly, hoping it was good news. Across the table from her, Will Riker leaned forward expectantly.

"Come quickly!" urged Ogawa. "She's delirious."

Crusher jumped to her feet and reached the doorway a split second before Riker. The two of them charged down the corridor and into sickbay, barely giving the automatic doors a chance to whoosh open. An anguished scream pierced the air, urging them past rows of occupied beds and into the private examination room where they saw Nurse Ogawa and two orderlies trying to subdue Troi, who thrashed and shrieked like a woman possessed.

"Don't you know you're killing me! Stop it! Stop it!" she cried between screams and lunges.

"Twenty cc's of lectrazine," ordered Crusher, holding out her hand for the hypospray.