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Had she assumed a mortal form again, she would have blinked back tears from large blue eyes. But she had no form, and would not, not yet, not here. Even through the sorrow that the other incarnation had caused, the Entity knew she would not have shirked this duty had she known.

There was time to fulfill her duty without hurting them further. Or so she thought. Certainly Janeway, the Doctor, and the other humans present did not notice the Entity's presence. But even as she swept from sickbay, she saw Tuvok's head come up, saw his eyes narrow. Ah, she ought to have known. She could not hide it from him. Unable to help herself, she brushed his regulated Vulcan thoughts with sad, sweet affection, then reluctantly left for Engineering.

Tuvok blinked. He must have been in error. It could not be. But Tialin was smiling, holding his gaze with her own, and he knew he had not been mistaken.

He said softly, to himself, "Kes."

The shield was holding. Which was a good thing on many counts.

"We've got to start gathering up the dark matter stirred up from that last battle," said Torres. This was beginning to become all too familiar.

"Lieutenant," said Seven. 'The warp-bubble universe is expanding."

Torres ran to Seven's console to look. Sure enough, it was growing, right before their eyes.

"There's twice as much dark matter in there as before-no, three times-" Torres fell silent. It was as if the warp-bubble universe was a jar, and someone was filling it-right to the brim. More and more dark matter poured into the bubble, and it kept growing, changing size to accommodate the sudden inflow.

"What the hell is going on?" Torres cried.

Suddenly That Damned Ball emitted a terrible sound. It had been loud before, but now Torres thought her eardrums might burst from the dreadful screeching. Light filled Engineering, terrible, blinding light, and then it was gone.

"Lieutenant Torres," said Seven, "the orb has disappeared."

Torres blinked, frantically forcing her eyes to adjust. Seven was right.

"So has the warp-bubble universe," said Khala worriedly.

Oh God, oh God, thought Torres frantically. "Engineering to Janeway!"

"Relax, B'Elanna," came her captain's voice. "The warp-bubble universe has disappeared, but all the dark matter's safely in the orb. Tialin has come to take it back."

Janeway thought she had never seen anything as beautiful as the orb, held safely in Tialin's capable hands. Even though she knew what was at stake, and how fragile this balance between existence and nonex-istence was, Janeway felt they had a fighting chance now.

Reading her thoughts, Tialin said, "All our energy had been taken up in attempting to undo the damage that Lhiau has caused." She hesitated, then said, "Even we made mistakes, Captain Janeway. But you are right. There is still a chance."

"Mistakes?" Janeway smiled thinly. "I can't imagine you making mistakes."

All at once, Tialin looked haunted. "We are not omnipotent, as I told your Tom Paris once before. We made our mistakes. Even as we tried to undo wrongs, we caused such wrongs ourselves. You were witness, Captain, to the first time we tried to correct the imbalance by transferring matter from one universe into another."

For a moment, Janeway had no idea what Tialin was talking about Then her eyes widened with horror as she understood. Her mind's eye filled with the image of the planet on which she had first met Tialin. It had once been a Class M planet, with oceans and clouds and a population of two billion humanoids. She remembered seeing it wink first out of, then back into, existence. She remembered the volcanoes, the radiation, staring at bodies of pale purple-skinned humanoids who died in the instant from one step to another. They had called it the Ghost Planet.

Tialin nodded sadly. "We thought that if we could move the entire planet safely into another universe, it would counter the imbalance more quickly. We did