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By Root 622 0

Immediately after they had finished watching the tricorder recording, Torres had adjusted the sensors to scan on the very narrow band that had enabled Telek to locate the Shepherds in the first place. That seemed like such a long, long time ago. Had it really been only a few days? Torres shook her head. Her concentration was being affected by the dark matter the Romulan ships had spewed into their systems. They had to get it out soon.

The scan had yielded immediate results. They were now able to control, to some extent, the amount of power in the orb. At one point, Torres thought she had come perilously close to actually shattering the "unbreakable" sphere. The purple light had grown in intensity and the timbre of the humming sound had soared upward several octaves. She'd shut things

down immediately and they'd all stared at each other, damp with sudden dewings of panicky sweat.

They had realized they would have to create another container, similar to but far larger than the sphere. And that container, too, must be unbreakable. But how to get the dark matter in it in the first place?

It was Seven who finally put them on the right track.

"The Bussard collector," she had said.

Telek's brow had furrowed in confusion. "I am not familiar-"

Of course. Smart as he was, he'd only been here for a few days, and he'd been hard at work on the dark-matter problem.

"The Bussard collector is a set of powerful electromagnetic coils located at the front of the warp engine nacelles," Torres explained. "We've used it before to gather up emergency fuel. When the ship is traveling at high speed, the coils generate an electromagnetic field that collects stray atoms of interstellar hydrogen. We can reconfigure the coils, direct them toward the spots where the dark matter is collected, beam it into the Shepherd orb, and from mere into... into whatever we come up with to contain the stuff."

Telek had frowned. "We cannot dematerialize dark matter. I explained this to you before."

"So, how else do you propose getting the dark matter into the orb?" Torres challenged. "We can't just pluck it like grapes on a stem, you know."

Telek did not answer immediately. Finally, he said, "Can the transporter be adjusted to resonate on the same frequency as the Shepherd technology?"

It was Torres's turn to hesitate. "I think so," she said. "We can try, anyway. It wouldn't be dangerous. Either the stuff will dematerialize or it won't."

It was a relief, almost a joy, to finally have part of the puzzle to work on. They notified the captain of their progress, and Janeway gave her blessing. They then sprang into activity, enlisting everyone in engineering for assistance.

It was into this bustling hive of activity that Harry Kim brought Khala.

"So, this is the warp core," Torres heard Khala saying. She glanced up from her console and nodded a cursory greeting. She expected Harry to give their unusual guest a quick tour and then get out of the way. He must realize how busy they were here. When he didn't, she stepped up to them and forced a smile.

"Khala, I'd love to give you a tour myself, but we're really very, very busy down here. Nonessential personnel should..." She faltered, realizing she couldn't think of a way to put it politely. "Should consider themselves nonessential," she finished lamely.

To her surprise, Kim and Khala exchanged grins. "I think you'll find Khala more essential than you imagine. Her people are more technologically advanced than we are, and she's a physicist on her homeworld. I've already acquainted her with the whole dark-matter problem, and she's offered to help."

Torres looked at Khala with new respect. "At this point, I'll take whatever help I can get." Quickly, she brought Khala up to speed. The pretty blue woman followed everything, nodding now and then and occasionally asking for clarification. When Torres was finished, Khala stepped up to the floating sphere.

"The dark matter, as I understand it from what Harry has told me, does not exist in