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“What happened?” asked Riker-though he already knew the answer.

“He collapsed,” said Troi, her face taut with Wesley’s pain and fear. “Not more than a few seconds ago.”

“It’s all right, sir,” said Wesley. “I think the symptoms are just beginning.” He tried to get up under his own power, failed and slumped against the deck again. “But I’m going to need a gurney to get to sickbay.”

Burtin was kneeling beside the ensign too, now. He looked up at Riker, said nothing. But his silence was thick with accusation.

With the return of full circulation to his stiff, rope-scored limbs, Picard was beginning to feel the pain he’d been spared since his failed escape attempt. It had already gotten so bad that he winced with every halting step.

“Get a move on,” called the marshal behind him. “Or I’ll give you a taste of what real agony is like.”

The courtyard echoed with his threat. Other marshals heard and turned their heads. When nothing happened, they turned away again.

Ralak’kai and Geordi walked on either side of Picard, similarly hobbled by their physical discomforts. They exchanged glances.

“A taste,” suggested Ralak’kai, “of the hospitality we have to look forward to?”

Picard grunted. “No doubt.”

The marshals might have been less testy, the human observed, if the full complement of prisoners had arrived. They had been quite vocal in their anger when they saw all the empty wagons.

Unlike that other fortress, there had been no careful guards to greet them here. Nor could Picard, now that he was inside, see more than a few casual watchers up on the walls.

Obviously, there was no fear of invasion in this place. And indeed, what need was there for guards when the fortress was crawling with sky riders-and nothing but sky riders? The only warriors he saw were those who had brought them in the wagons.

Was this some sort of headquarters for the marshals, then? A dispatch point?

And if that were the case, why had Picard and the others been transported here? Not for punishment alone, he thought. After all, that could have been meted out a while ago, and with a lot less effort.

Then why? As some sort of work force? He looked around. There didn’t seem to be a lot of work that needed doing. Or…

“Move it, I said!”

Picard felt a blow in the middle of his back, and his legs were too inflexible to absorb the impact. He pitched forward, caught himself on hands and knees as a cloud of dust rose around him.

He didn’t quite see the action that ensued, but he gathered that Geordi had come to his defense. Perhaps even shoved the marshal as the marshal had shoved Picard.

What he did see was a second sky rider striking Geordi down from behind. As the dark man fell, the metal band he wore on his face went flying.

In that moment, Picard understood that the band was not part of Geordi. And he understood more than that-for without it, the dark man seemed confused-disoriented.

The band is some sort of seeing device, he realized. Geordi is blind.

To his credit, the dark man didn’t whimper or cry out at his loss. But then, even after knowing him only this short time, Picard hadn’t expected him to.

Instead, Geordi calmly and methodically searched the ground around him with probing fingers. And when after a few seconds he hadn’t found anything, he resolutely got to his feet.

There was no point in begging, he knew. It would not get him anywhere.

Picard saw where the metal band had landed. So did Ralak’kai. But the marshals weren’t about to let them recover it for their companion.

“Come on,” said one of the sky riders. Picard felt another jolt, though this time he managed to stay on his feet. “Are you deaf or something?”

“My friend dropped something,” he said, confronting the marshal. “Let him have it back.” It grated on him to say the next word: “Please.”

The sky rider’s mouth spread slowly into a leering grin.

“What happens to him,” he said, “is no business of yours.”

He removed his blaster from his holster.

“Unless