ERID WAS AT home, eating dinner with his parents. They were glad and grateful to have been reunited with their younger son, though their faces still showed the pain of not knowing where he was or what had happened to him.

"It must have been terrible," said his mother.

Erid looked down at his plate of spiced tubers. "Words don't begin to do it justice," he told her.

"The fortress ..." said his father. "I can't even imagine what that was like. And that wasn't the worst of it, was it?"

Erid shook his head. "I felt like a freak. And I was always afraid of what I carried inside me."

"The power," said his mother.

"Yes. Even after I learned to control it, I was scared that it would come out when I didn't want it to and hurt someone."

"Someone innocent," his father suggested.

Erid nodded. "Someone innocent."

"And you say you looked ... different?" his mother asked. There was concern in her eyes-concern for him.

"Very different," he told her. "My hair was all gone. And my blood vessels had become big and swollen, and the flesh around them had turned purple." He managed a smile. "I can tell you, I wasn't pleasant to look at."

Both his mother and his father were silent for a moment. It couldn't have been easy for them to hear what Erid was saying. No parent wanted his or her child to experience such horror.

"But it's over now," his father said at last. "You're normal again. And you're home with us."

Erid's mother put her hand on top of his. "You don't have to worry about any of those awful things anymore."

He nodded. "I know. As time goes on, it's beginning to seem more and more like a bad dream. And-"

Suddenly, he felt a heaviness in his arms and legs-a heaviness he remembered all too well. His mouth went dry with fear.

No, he thought. This can't be happening. It's supposed to be over.

Still, the heaviness didn't go away. It got worse. And as he looked on, terrified, his veins began to grow under his skin.

"What is it?" asked his mother. "What's the matter?"

Erid got to his feet, tipping the dinner table over, smashing the dishes on the floor. His father took hold of his arm.

"What's happening?" he wanted to know.

But Erid couldn't tell him. His mouth was too full of panic to make words come out. All he could do was watch as his blood vessels became high, hard ridges and the skin turned purple around them.

Except for the vessels in his hands. Those remained strangely, hideously normal. A glow began to come from his fingers.

Erid knew what came next. "Run!" he told his parents. "Get away from me!"

"No!" his mother insisted. "You need us!"

"You can't stay with me!" he tried to explain. "Not when I'm like this! You'll die!"

Erid's father shook his head. "We're your parents! We can't just leave you like this!"

Suddenly, a brilliant beam of energy shot out from one of his fingertips and struck his mother in the shoulder. She cried out in agony and fell spinning to the floor, where her blood began to pool around her.

Erid wanted to reach out to her, to help her, but he couldn't-because more of the bright, blazing beams were springing into existence. More and more and more ...

"No!" he screamed.

... and realized he wasn't in his parents' house anymore. He was somewhere else. In a bed somewhere. And someone was embracing him, looking needfully into his eyes.

Corba, he thought. I'm with Corba. The beams ... my hurting my mother ... it was just a nightmare.

But something was wrong in the real world, too-he could see it in Corba's expression. She seemed frightened by something, and Erid knew she didn't frighten easily.

"What is it?" he asked, blinking away the last vestiges of sleep.

She pointed to the window. "Look."

Erid pulled away his covers and made his way to the window. It was still dark out, but as he got closer, he could see a flash of light. It blinded him for a moment.

When his vision cleared, he was greeted by a sight that made all his experiences to that point seem commonplace and mundane. A large vehicle of some kind was blocking half the street. Nearby, three bulky, alien figures in battle armor seemed to be standing guard while two others carried unconscious Xhaldians toward the vehicle.

Erid recognized the unconscious ones. They were two of the transformed who had escaped from the fortress with him-the woman who turned invisible and the man who could grow twelve feet tall.

He didn't understand. What was happening? Who were the aliens?

Suddenly, he heard Paldul's words in his head. They throbbed with urgency, forcing Erid to hold his head in pain.

"Someone's found us," thought the telepath. "They've broken into the first building and dragged our comrades out. The rest of us have to get away while we still can."

"Can't we fight them?" Erid wondered back, his heart beating hard against his ribs.

"You don't understand," Paldul thought, his anxiety coming through in waves. "They've got stun weapons that put to shame those we saw in the fortress. We've got no choice but to run."

Erid opened his eyes and saw that Corba had been subjected to the same painful announcement. She looked at him.

"Wehavetogo," she rasped.

"Yes," he said.

They pulled on their clothes as quickly as they could, then ran down the hallway and found the stairs. Erid's legs felt heavy, unresponsive. Corba could have sped ahead of him if she had wanted, but she lingered so she wouldn't leave him behind.

On the stair, they found two of the other transformed-Inarh and the woman who drew energy from things around her. They glanced at Erid and Corba, but they didn't say anything. They just made it down the stairs as quickly as they possibly could.

When they reached the ground floor, they crossed the common area and headed for the building's back door. Corba got to it first. She peeked through the oval window set into it, then turned to the rest of them.

"It'sclearbackhere," she said.

That was all they needed to hear. The four of them burst out of the door, followed the alley behind it to a perpendicular alley, and got as far away from the building as they could.

Erid wondered what had happened to Leyden and Denara. For all he knew, they had been among the first contacted by Paldul, since they were among Rahatan's favorites. If that were so, they were out on the streets already, concealing themselves from the aliens.

In any case, he couldn't worry about them at the moment. Not when he had his hands full worrying about himself and Corba.

Propelled by fear, Erid ran as quickly as he could on his leaden legs-and he didn't look back. Not even once.

Chapter Seventeen.

THE MOMENT SOVAR'S, shift ended, he went looking for Robinson. He felt he had to share what he had learned with someone, and the transporter operator was his closest friend on the Enterprise.

As it happened, his search took him to Holodeck Two, where Robinson had booked an hour's worth of time. When he got there, he found out her program was already in progress.

Sovar stood outside the interlocking doors for a moment, wondering whether or not to interrupt his friend. After all, it might have been a personal fantasy Robinson was pursuing in the holodeck, and he didn't want to intrude on something like that.

On the other hand, he didn't think he could wait an hour. He had to talk to someone now.

Accessing the holodeck controls, the security officer opened the jigsaw-puzzle doors. As they slid apart, he caught a glimpse of a figure standing with her back to him.

She was wrapped in a purple cloak, the hem of which moved in a gentle wind. Beyond the figure, framed by columns of shadow-blue marble, distant peaks blazed in the fierce, golden light of sunset.

A scent of flowers and honey came floating out to Sovar on the breeze. Drawn by it, he took a step forward into the holoscene and realized it wasn't just the columns ahead of him that were made of blue marble. So were the floor under his feet and the peaked ceiling above him.

The holodeck doors closed behind him, wrapping him completely in the illusion. Here, a simple, stringed instrument rested on a wooden stand. There, a silver pitcher and two silver goblets stood on a table. And in a third place, a dark velvet divan stretched like a Terran cat.

The figure in the cloak turned and reacted to his presence. It was Robinson, of course. She smiled at him, looking a little embara.s.sed.

"Marble halls," she said, as if that were explanation enough.

Suddenly, Sovar understood. His friend had created the place from the words of Banshee's song-minus the va.s.sals and the serfs, apparently. What's more, she had done a breathtaking job of it.

But he hadn't come here to admire her skill with a holodeck. He had something much more pressing on his mind.

"B.G.," he said, "I did not wish to interrupt your scenario, but something has happened on my homeworld. Something almost ..." He tried to find the right word. "... unimaginable."

Robinson's brow creased. "What is it.?"

He told her about the development of strange abilities in young people all over Xhaldia. He talked about the fear that had gripped the planet's people when they discovered superbeings in their midst. And he spoke of the reaction of their leaders.

"The government must have become frightened, too," Sovar related, "because it incarcerated these beings. They said it was for the protection of the transformed, but-"

"The transformed?" asked Robinson.

"It is what the superbeings are being called," he explained. "In any case, the government's action backfired. The transformed broke out of the fortress at Verdeen and disappeared."

"I don't blame them," said his friend.

"No," said the security officer. He took a step toward her. "You don't understand, B.G. There are thousands of people in the vicinity who are neither superbeings nor armed guardsmen, but ordinary Xhaldians-people whose lives are at risk."

Robinson nodded. "And you're afraid for them."

"Yes." He sighed. "The government has called for a.s.sistance from the Federation. Though Xhaldia is not a member planet, it has ties-"

"I know," she said gently.

Of course, he thought. He had described them to her himself.

"The Enterprise," he said, "was the vessel closest to my homeworld. We are on our way to Xhaldia now ... to see if we can accomplish what Verdeen's guardsmen cannot."

"To round up the superbeings?" Robinson asked.

"Yes. And to re-establish order."

His friend came closer and held him by the arms. "How did you find all this out, Relda?"

He sighed. "Commander Riker told me-with the captain's permission, of course. Captain Picard will inform the rest of the crew in a little while, but he wanted me to know first."

His friend nodded. "That was-"

Before she could finish her statement, there was a flash of blown diodes, and an entire section of the sunset-painted mountains behind Robinson blinked out of existence. In its place, Sovar could see a naked portion of the black and gold hologrid.

The transporter operator shook her head. "What the-?"

Suddenly, someone stepped out of the disabled grid section. Someone who, after Sovar got over his surprise, looked a lot like Shadowcat.

Looking a little puzzled, the mutant gazed at the two officers. Then she turned around and studied the place where the scenery was missing. At last, she turned back to Sovar and Robinson.

"Sorry about that," Shadowcat said. "I was on my way to Deck Eleven. Lt. Barclay was going to show me the computer core-I'm kind of interested in computers-and ..." She shrugged. "I guess I got lost and blew a few circuits. I mean, I do that when I pa.s.s through a system that uses electricity, so usually I'm really-"

Sovar held up his hand. He was filled with anger. After all, the mutant had intruded on a very personal conversation-whether by accident, as she claimed, or by design.

"We have heard your explanation," he told her. "Now leave us."

Shadowcat frowned. "Okay," she said. "Be that way about it." Without another word, she melted back through the section of exposed hologrid.

The security officer turned to his friend. "Do you think she overheard what I said about our mission?"

Robinson shook her head. "Hard to say. But I wouldn't worry about it too much. The captain's going to tell the whole crew soon, right? So it's not exactly as if she uncovered a secret."

Sovar thought about it. "I suppose you're right."