"Wait a minute ... can't we talk to her first?" Riker rushed to her bedside, pushing the others out of his way. He gently touched her trembling, sweaty forearm. "Deanna, do you hear me? It's Will."

"Ah! No! Stop!" She cried like a frightened animal caught in a trap, while she struggled pathetically against her binds.

Riker gazed with anguish at the troubled woman. "Does she have to be tied up like this?"

"Look at her, Will," shouted Crusher over the din. "I'm afraid she'll hurt herself!"

Just then, Troi erupted with a scream that was primal, like a childbirth scream, and even Riker recoiled. Crusher glanced at Ogawa, caught her eye, and waited as the nurse placed a hypo in her palm.

Will inserted himself between them, shielding Deanna from the hypo. "Let me talk to her for just a second."

"She's in pain," said Crusher. "I don't know why she's like this, but the mind can do real damage to the body."

Riker desperately tried to grip Troi's hand, then he yelped in agony as she dug her fingernails into his flesh. Spittle flew from her mouth as she shouted, "Don't do that again! You stabbed me! Why? I gave to you, and you took-" Deanna grimaced and would have doubled over in pain if she weren't bound so tightly.

With considerable effort, Riker wrenched his bloodied hand away from hers and rose to his feet, a distraught look on his face. With the path clear, the doctor waded in with her hypospray.

"You wanted it!" shouted Troi, struggling against her bonds. "You wanted to know ... now you have it all! It's in you ... and me. Everyone-"

"I'm sorry," said Crusher as she administered the hypo.

"Unnh," moaned the disheveled woman, sinking back on her pillow. Within a few moments, Deanna Troi was again sleeping peacefully, her hair radiating outward from her serene face.

Riker scowled with a mixture of anger and helplessness. "What brought this on? Was it those d.a.m.n dreams? She was fine before this!"

"I don't know what happened to her." Beverly shook her head in frustration. "We may never know what started this agitation ... unless it has a physical cause I haven't found yet."

At Riker's crestfallen expression, Crusher patted the big man on the shoulder. "We'll keep looking, but the sooner we get out of here, the better ... for her. She needs the specialists at a starbase."

"There's nothing you can do for her?"

"We'll keep her comfortable, and we'll try to talk to her again," answered Crusher. "Next time, I'll bring her around more gradually. We don't have any Vulcans on board, do we?"

"No, none at the moment," muttered Riker. "During the war, most of them went to serve on Vulcan ships, and we never got them back. You can forget about a mind-meld."

"Will, I don't know what to tell you." She patted him again on the shoulder, and they both looked down at the bound figure. Beverly didn't want to give him any false hope, and she was fresh out of words of encouragement.

"I' m going to get her out of here," vowed Riker. He strode from the examination room, through main sickbay, and out the door.

Crusher sighed wearily and rubbed her eyes. She thought about going back to bed, but instead she turned to Nurse Ogawa and said, "Let's do a complete workup again, starting with a brain scan."

Reg Barclay gaped at the magnificent hall of the Exalted Ones, with its rose-hued prisms sparkling with bubbles, glints of light, and the faint silhouette of a Lipul. As if revisiting a dream, Reg glided deeper into the hollow crystal, clinging to Melora's hand. By the time his eyes adjusted to the dim, refracted light, his expression had changed from wonder to distress.

The floor of the cavernous chamber and all of its nooks and crevices were encrusted with the mutant black crystal, growing like spiny weeds. Here and there, black clouds of crushed and broken crystal floated ominously in the air, and an oppressive silence hung over the spa.r.s.e a.s.semblage. Barclay looked around the gloomy hall but could see no Alpusta or Yiltern, and only a handful of desolate Elaysians.

From the rear of the hall, a figure zoomed toward them gripping a hoverplatform, his yellow robes billowing behind him. "Tangre Bertoran," muttered Reg, pulling back from Melora's grip.

"You let me handle him," she insisted.

When the Peer of the Jeptah reached them, he swung around to a stop and hovered dangerously close to Reg's head. The lanky engineer flinched a little, but not much, and he returned the unfriendly gaze.

"He has no right to be here," declared Bertoran, pointing at the human.

"He has every right to be here." Melora pointed to the violet shard floating around Reg's neck. "He's the proxy for Zuka Juno."

The gray-haired Elaysian looked abashed for a moment at this news, but he quickly recovered both his att.i.tude and his sneer. "If that's true, then it shows that my brother Zuka has made a mockery of his esteemed office and should be replaced."

"I really d-don't want to intrude," said Barclay, gripping the shard for comfort, "but you people need to know what you're up against. Zuka Juno said you would believe me ... if I carried this jewel."

Reg held up the shard, and it glinted briefly, which caused more commotion than his entire speech. The Elaysians waved their arms and conversed in urgent whispers, and the Lipuls bobbed with agitation inside their rose-hued crystals. Melora tried to call them to order, but it was hopeless.

She gave him an encouraging smile, but all Barclay could do was gulp. In front of him, Tangre Bertoran seethed with such anger that it looked as if he would break his hoverplatform in half. Before he could denounce Reg, his const.i.tuents swooped forward, clamoring for his attention.

"You won't keep that trinket," Bertoran vowed under his breath. He gripped his disc and sped away from them.

"Now what?" asked the human worriedly.

"You're the one with the crystal," said Melora. "Use it."

Reg knew he needed help, but then he remembered that the Elaysians didn't run this show by themselves. Although few in number, the Lipuls seemed to possess considerable authority and influence. As Deanna had said, they were certainly the oldest of all the sentient races, and n.o.body wanted to upstage them.

He looked around and spotted a glimmer on the floor. By bending over and peering into the clumps of misshapen, smoky crystal, he was able to make out a small cl.u.s.ter of rainbow prisms. Reg remembered that this gemlike instrument had helped Captain Picard communicate with the Lipuls, so he gripped Melora's hand and pointed down.

She nodded and whirled around to push off the roof of the entryway. Grabbing Reg as she soared past, she dragged him into the thicket of black spires, which shattered at their touch, sending up noxious clouds of dust. Reg would have coughed himself to death, but Pazlar kept them moving briskly through the new growth. Finally they reached the rainbow cl.u.s.ter, which glittered like a treasure at the bottom of a sooty mine.

With Melora's help, Reg pulled off the lanyard and pressed the violet crystal into the center of the larger crystal, as he had seen the others do on his earlier visit. Melora pushed off the floor to elevate the two of them above the clouds of soot, and they watched while the aged cl.u.s.ter cycled through a vibrant display of colors.

After a moment, a strange, disembodied voice spoke loudly enough for all to hear: "Barclay is recognized as a proxy. Afford him all regard and esteem you would afford a senior engineer."

"Bah!" scoffed Tangre Bertoran from the back of the hall. Several other Elaysians murmured their disapproval, but no one jumped up to openly challenge him.

Melora urged Reg, "Go ahead and tell them."

Reg's mouth suddenly felt as dry as the brittle, black crystal beneath him, and he wished he had drunk more from his sip tube. He blurted out, "The fractal program on the sh.e.l.l is corrupted. It's in an endless loop, sucking dark matter from the rift. It's spewing it as fast as your collectors can grab it. We can't stop it-not even Zuka Juno-because the code has been encrypted. To be blunt, one of your senior engineers has sabotaged the sh.e.l.l."

Now the murmurs grew to shrill squawks and cries. Accusations rent the air, and the Elaysians fluttered around like a flock of starlings scattered by a loud noise. "You have to be wrong!" shouted Tangre Bertoran, shaking his fist. "Or mad!"

Melora dashed in front of Reg and shouted, "I didn't believe it either! Neither did brother Juno. But when we entered the programming room, opened the files, and saw with our own eyes, we had to admit the truth. Now you will have to open your eyes and see that one of us is a traitor. Not all of us, just one. Unless we find that being, he or she may succeed in destroying Gemworld."

From the corner of his eye, Barclay saw Tangre Bertoran descending quickly toward the glowing cl.u.s.ter on the floor. He tugged on Melora's shoulder and pointed. "He's after the crystal."

Using Reg as a springboard and pushing him ten meters higher, Melora went soaring back toward the cl.u.s.ter. Although Bertoran was moving faster than her on his hoverplatform, Melora had the shorter distance to travel, and she reached the cl.u.s.ter a second before him. Deftly the blond Elaysian s.n.a.t.c.hed the violet shard from its socket and held it up for all to see.

Then she waved the shard in Bertoran's face and crowed, "You're too late to get this one! Is that how you got to be proxy for the Gendlii?"

"Enough of these games!" shouted Tangre Bertoran. He gripped his own gleaming green crystal, which floated from a golden cord about his neck. "I will return to the sh.e.l.l, using my own proxy, and inspect the programming. If what these outsiders say is a lie-and I'm sure it is-we will charge them with blasphemy and heresy!"

That p.r.o.nouncement was met with considerable agreement, and the clamor grew deafening for a few seconds. Melora floated to Reg's side and hung the violet gem around his neck. He wasn't going to say anything else, but resentment walled up within him. We risked our own lives to save these fools!

On top of that, he was getting very queasy. All of this put Reg in a mood to speak his mind.

He shouted, "This time, you won't survive! The Ancients would be ashamed of you. No ... you can't be descended from the beings who built the sh.e.l.l!"

That insult got their attention, and several of the Elaysians stopped to glare at him.

"This is not how your ancestors survived," he told them, "by ignoring a problem. No, they ... they survived because they faced every problem that confronted them-from the receding of the oceans to the loss of their atmosphere. The inhabitants of Gemworld have gotten soft. You prefer to bicker and fix blame instead of finding a solution. I'm sorry ... that's not how the Ancients would have faced this."

When Reg caught Melora beaming at him, he knew he was on a roll. He puffed his chest out and continued, "Actually our first guess about this crisis was wrong. We thought the sh.e.l.l might have malfunctioned, but it turned out to be the oldest problem in the book. On earth we used to call it 'human error,' and you can use that term, although this act was not done in error. It was done on purpose. You'll claim that it can't happen, that I'm insane, or whatever ... I've heard that all before. The question is-will you act like your ancestors? Will you do what it takes to survive? Or would you prefer to hide in this room and bicker ... until you die?"

No one talked against him now, and no one mocked him, not even Tangre Bertoran. Melora moved to Reg's side and squeezed his arm. "What was good," she whispered. "When you invoked the Ancients, you hit them where it hurts. Now what do we do?"

Barclay's stomach churned. Without gravity to hold the bile down, he felt it coming up. "I've got a big finish," he said with a groan.

A look of realization dawned on Melora's face, and she jerked away from him just as he vomited. Retching in a weightless environment was far worse than retching in gravity, Reg decided. For one thing, there was no obvious direction.

Doubled over in pain and embarra.s.sment, he let Melora drag him backward out of the hall of the Exalted Ones.

Chapter Twelve.

"A PRIVATE WORD with you, Captain."

From the command chair, Picard looked up at Will Riker, who had just returned to the bridge. The way the big man worked his jaw, he was obviously agitated, and the captain was curious as to why he wanted privacy. It must have something to do with Counselor Troi.

The captain looked around at the bridge and decided there wasn't anything that required his immediate attention. Mostly there was nothing but ongoing repairs, diagnostics, and monitoring. Soon most of the crew wouldn't have enough to do to keep their minds off their predicament. Picard wished the probe had told them more about the dimensional rift, but all it had done was confirm some of their worst suspicions. Until they heard from Barclay and Pazlar, their next step on Gemworld's behalf was uncertain.

"You have the bridge, Data," said Picard, rising to his feet. He motioned to his first officer and led the way into his ready room. Once inside, he paused for a moment to inspect his new lion fish in its cylindrical aquarium.

"Go on, Number One."

Riker shifted on his feet, looking uncomfortable. "I've just come back from seeing Deanna-"

"I know." The captain shook his head at the tragedy which had befallen one of his most trusted officers. "The doctor told me that when she woke up, she was ... unchanged."

"That's putting it mildly," grumbled Riker. "She's delirious, completely out of it. Beverly says that we have to get her to a starbase where there are specialists."

"I understand the problem." Picard fixed his first officer with a concerned look. "But I'm not sure what you're getting at."

"I've thought about it, sir, and I believe that a shuttlecraft could escape from the rift by leaving on the far side of the planet. We'd be using the sh.e.l.l as a sort of shield, then we'd go immediately into warp. I'm sure we could-"

Picard held up his hand and smiled sympathetically. "Permission denied. We know too little about the rift, even after sending a probe into it. And the morale problem if people started deserting the ship-"

"But, Captain, we can't leave her like this," insisted the commander.

Picard's tone grew a bit steely. "We all feel strongly about Counselor Troi and want to see her full recovery, but this is a foolhardy plan. I'm not going to gamble your life on it, or hers. In our fastest shuttlecraft, you couldn't get to a starbase in less than thirty hours. How would you take care of her? Number One, accept the fact that we're here until we resolve this crisis."

"And if we can't?"

"Then she'll be the luckiest one among us," replied Picard. "She won't have to see the end."

His combadge chirped and a familiar voice said, "Bridge to Picard."

"Go ahead, Data."

"Lieutenant Pazlar has reported in. She will dock the shuttlecraft in approximately five minutes, and she has requested a medical team. Lieutenant Barclay is ill."

"How ill?" asked the captain, fearing a sickness similar to Danna Troi's.

"s.p.a.ce sickness."

He let out a relieved sigh. Although he was sure that Barclay would disagree with him, s.p.a.ce sickness wasn't deadly. "See to it. Riker and I will meet them in sickbay. Picard out."

He turned to Riker and managed a pained smile. "This gives you another excuse to visit sickbay."

"I'm with you, sir," said the first officer, lifting his chin. "Are you sure we can't destroy that rift?"

"Perhaps we can. But we don't know how, and we don't know what we'd be destroying. If we can stop the flow of dark matter, maybe it will close on its own."

"That's the plan?" asked Riker.

"Until I hear a better one."

From his bed in sickbay, Reg Barclay looked apologetically at Captain Picard. "I'm really sorry I messed up, sir. I tried to convince them."

"Don't listen to him," said Melora Pazlar, gazing proudly at the lieutenant. "He did great. I really think the Exalted Ones listened to him and will cooperate with us. He can't help it if he was in a weightless environment for too long ... and got a little sick."

"No, of course not," said Picard with an encouraging smile. "I'm sure they won't hold it against you."

Commander Riker bent over and fingered the violet crystal hanging from Reg's neck. "You seem to have picked up a souvenir."

"Yes, it's ... it's kind of a key, like a promotion." Barclay shook his head in wonderment. "Apparently I'm now the proxy for one of the senior engineers, Zuka Juno. That means we can get access to the sh.e.l.l programming whenever we want, for all the good it will do us."

"Why don't you tell us exactly what happened," said the captain.

"Yes, sir." Reg glanced uncertainly at Melora. "We actually promised to keep it a secret until they had time to deal with it, but I don't suppose it matters."

"We can't wait any longer," agreed Pazlar.

In a somewhat halting manner, with frequent side jaunts, Barclay told the captain and first officer about finding Zuka Juno and bringing him to the sh.e.l.l. When the senior engineer accessed the primary computer code, their worst fears were realized. The code had, indeed, been sabotaged and put into an encrypted loop.

It was only logical to leave the senior engineer at work on the problem, so Barclay had gone in his place to appeal to the Exalted Ones. To give his words more weight, he had became Zuka Juno's proxy.

Melora interrupted, "He really shamed them into taking some action."