her.
Commander! Take your hands off her!
- Mrs Troi...
- Don't "Mrs Troi" me!
Leave her alone. If it weren't
for you, she'd be married by now.
- That's enough!
- I am warning you!
Stay away from my daughter!
You're coming with me.
I don't know what got into me.
Please, tell Will how sorry I am.
You're fine.
But your psilosynine levels are low.
Psilo what?
It's a neurotransmitter
involved in telepathy.
It's been depleted by your work. You
have to avoid telepathy for a while.
- I can't.
- Why?
We only have three days left
and the Cairn have so much to learn.
Lwaxana, I'm sorry, but
you have to take some time and rest.
Maybe I can help with the Cairn.
No. You're only half Betazoid, dear.
And you have no experience
with their form of telepathy.
Then I won't use telepathy.
We'll work verbally.
I suppose we could do that.
And if they don't understand,
I'll explain telepathically.
No. You'll work verbally, too.
The point is
for you to get some rest, Mother.
It'll do them good
to figure things out with words.
I suppose you're right.
This is the ship's arboretum.
- "Arbor" means tree.
- Very good, Hedril.
People come here to relax, enjoy
themselves in a natural setting.
"Flowers of all hue,
and without thorn the rose."
It's an old Earth poem
by John Milton.
Please, what is a poem?
Poetry is an art form
that uses words
put together in new and unexpected
ways, sometimes in rhyme.
Milton was speculating that, in
heaven, roses wouldn't have thorns.
Heaven?
Heaven is...
Well, it's... How can I put it?
Yes, I see. Thank you. Heaven.
You're supposed
to be avoiding telepathy.
- I'm only trying to help, dear.
- You don't look well.
I'm just tired. Maybe I'll sit down.
Don't worry. She'll be fine.
You'll find this interesting.
It's a jewel plant from Folnar III.
The plant secretes a resin
which is collected in the blossom.
By the time the bloom fades,
the resin has hardened
into a beautiful gem.
Mother!
Troi to sickbay.
Medical emergency in the arboretum.
She's not responding
to cortical stimulation.
I'm not sure what else I can do.
I don't understand.
She was fine yesterday.
It's so strange. It's almost as if
her brain has shut down.
- Is there a physiological cause?
- I'm running a subneural scan.
I can see no tissue damage,
no neurochemical imbalance,
no infection, nothing.
Yet her neural activity
is almost non-existent.
Except in the paracortex. Activity
there is almost off the scale.
The paracortex
is the Betazoid telepathic lobe.
She communicated
with Maques just before she fell.
Might there be side effects of Cairn
telepathy we're unaware of?
It's a possibility.
I think it's time that you and I
had a talk with Maques.
I am very apologetic for what has
happened to your mother.
Is it possible that your telepathic
communications with Mrs Troi
harmed her in some way?
No. I tried to to explain before.
Bad thoughts, they hurt her.
What thoughts? Take your time.
Inside her, the dark place.
I don't understand.
She is...
What are the words?
I don't have the words.
Counsellor?
Stop it!
It's alright.
I'm fine. He was just trying to
communicate with me telepathically.
Do you understand now?
I'm not sure.
He communicated so much to me that,
at first, it was just a jumble.
- Have you sorted any of it out?
- I think so.
During telepathic contact
with my mother,
Maques sensed
what he calls "a dark place".
He tried to tell me about it before,
in my office, and I misunderstood.
I thought he was talking
about thoughts
my mother was keeping private,
but he meant something was
happening in her metaconscious mind.
- Metaconscious?
- It's part of the Betazoid psyche,
a filtering mechanism that protects
us from psychic trauma.
Is Maques suggesting your mother's
metaconscious is damaged?
He feels that whatever is wrong
with her is centred there.
If he's right,
she may have suffered a trauma
that her metaconscious
can't