Not daring to think how close they had come to annihilation, Jindigar shut down the linkages to the merest whisper. He was afraid to attempt an adjournment when they all needed the stability of the open links.

Turning into Cyrus's embrace, Krinata buried herself as if scrabbling for protection. Cyrus pried the frantic infant from Krinata's grip, ignoring the bloody gashes it inflicted on both of them, and rose to return her to her mother's arms. The instant the baby was out of touch with the Oliat, everything shifted. Krinata, overloaded beyond tolerance, could only clutch at Cyrus and sob uncontrollably.

Torn between duty and compassion, Cyrus emitted a low groan and enfolded her in his arms, knowing he couldn't protect her from what assailed her, but unable to withhold that small comfort. He stroked her head with trembling fingers.

Jindigar, oddly bereft at Krinata's turning from him, could not blame the Outrider for being human. And somehow Cyrus's touch came to them through Krinata as balm for raw nerves, which soothed Jindigar's sense of loss. Mindful of Eithlarin's irrational sensitivity to break-ins, and feeling Darllanyu's response as he reacted to Krinata, he explained, III must recapture Krinata's attention, or we are all lost.// Even an Outrider's valid touch could be disruptive. And with his mate warm in his arms, how long could Cyrus remain only comforting?

//Go ahead,// Darllanyu told him tightly.

Jindigar widened the link to Krinata, demanding her attention, trying not to feel justified in it. //Krinata! Listen! You didn't do that. Takora did.//

//??// She turned to him, eyes widening.

Her sobs quieted, and he added the only reassurance he had.

//You haven't the skill to grab Center like that—and then do– what you did. Takora did. She was a Center. If she'd balanced with another Oliat, she wouldn't be able to do anything else but grab for Center at the first chance.//

For a moment Jindigar thought he was getting through to her, for she muttered, "//Takora... //" Then, more strongly, //What do I have to do to prove to you I was Takora!// Her eyes went out of focus, her face went slack, and an unnatural stillness settled over her.

Jindigar sat back on his heels in shock. She still believes she was Takora? But Dushau simply did not reincarnate. He and Krinata had put the Takora personality to rest a year ago. She had seemed to accept all her Dushau-like manifestations, from playing the whule to functioning in Oliat subforms, as part of the Takora memory-nexus she'd absorbed from his mind by accident. She hadn't manifested anything but the most rudimentary Outreach skills since then.

But when they'd first landed on Phanphihy, Krinata had been carrying a memory-loop seared into her mind at the insanity-crazed death of Desdinda. To Krinata it had been like being possessed by a devil bent on killing Jindigar. Desdinda had been laid to rest permanently, but Krinata didn't have the strength to face anything like that again.

And now, in a moment of paralyzing panic, Takora had taken total control of Krinata—as if she were more than just an acquired memory-nexus and would have to be excised.

Jindigar squatted down next to Krinata and touched her cheek. //It's not like Desdinda.. You only have some of my memories of Takora from when I was her Protector.// Jindigar had broken Aliom law when he had Inverted Takora's Oliat, to Dissolve it. But he'd done that because Takora was already at the verge of death and was too weak to Dissolve her own Oliat. She would have taken them all with her to Incompletion-death had Jindigar not acted. But that one act had branded him Invert for life, and many Aliom practitioners had not forgiven him, even though as Center he had kept his pledge not to Invert this Oliat. //Krinata—it's all right now,// he pleaded, hoping it was so, trying not to think of the feeling he'd had as he'd floated above his Oliat, watching her at Center with the power to send him to oblivion. But she didn't.

As Krinata stared fixedly off into space the rest of his officers began to collect themselves. Zannesu hunkered down opposite Jindigar and passed a hand in front of Krinata's eyes. The entire Oliat should have felt her avoidance reflex, but there was nothing. Zannesu met Jindigar's eyes, seeing only by Oliat awareness. //She's—not there.//

But the link was still there. //She's alive.//

Zannesu came around and pulled Jindigar to his feet. //This is just another reason we shouldn't have taken her as Outreach, Jindigar. No human—//

Darllanyu interrupted. //We can't blame her. I should have taken pensone. I told you I couldn't do without it.//

//But we've all survived, and we learned a lot about ourselves and about humans we'd never have experienced otherwise,// noted Eithlarin. //Which makes us all that much closer to Completion.//

Venlagar rose with the help of his Outrider and did what Jindigar had not dared. With both hands on Krinata's shoulders, he coaxed her away from Cyrus and brought her back into the group. //Whatever we may do next, Krinata is part of us now. I admit she gave me the horrors—but we knew she'd be our weak point. Considering that, she's done remarkably well. We're all alive, aren't we? And that's because she, as a human, was able to attune to this planet when we weren't.//

That should have been Jindigar's speech, but he was pulling himself away from another dread. Suppose I can't capture enough of her attention to Dissolve? If her mind had snapped, they could all die, sucked into her madness.

Just then, the stirring and muttering among the onlookers at the front of the cave gave way to a cry of alarm voiced by some human or Lehiroh man, and suddenly the cave was filled with the strident buzz of myriads of tiny wings.

Venlagar, Receiving, gave them the picture. High up on the plateau above them, the overmind of the hive Krinata had contacted had—in true Phanphihy fashion—adopted the pseudo-hive below and decided to feed the neighboring young. The hive workers were now transporting—bead by tiny bead– a quantity of their syrup to the stores of the pseudo-hive.

The hive consciousness was aware of huge lumbering creatures just within the cave mouth, thrashing about and flailing at the stream of laden transporters it had sent. It commanded the warriors and workers to avoid the slow creatures. Before long, the huge animals had lumbered out of the cave, fleeing as if afraid of attack. Strange.

Indeed, as had come to the hive's awareness, the food cells were empty—the young must be starving. This would be a true alliance, good for the hive, for these creatures could spread and nurture the seeds of the pollen plants.

This was an Emulation level dangerous even for a fully balanced and secure Oliat. Jindigar pulled them back from being immersed in the hive mentality of the insectoids. The committee representatives were shouting at each other as they fled.

The Oliat was isolated without an Outreach. But they had done their day's work. The Holot would be fed—if he could only find a way of telling them so.

He scooped Krinata's tiny body up in his arms and felt a moment of fear as Cyrus blocked his way, locking eyes with him, his unspoken fear for Krinata like a wall between them. But then Storm intervened, taking Cyrus by the shoulders and turning him away. "Listen to me! You can't help Krinata. She's one of them now. They don't dare let a human medic touch her. Jindigar will know what to do."

Jindigar was aware of the bunching of Cyrus's muscles against Storm's Lehiroh strength, but it was the fierce conflict of friends with a deep caring that was, in its way, so purely male, it bridged the species gap and united them. At last Cyrus yielded and turned his face away while Jindigar carried Krinata out of the cave, the other Outriders closing around the moving Oliat, ignoring the flight of insects overhead because the Oliat did.