Disclaimer: Don't own

Now I haven't actually seen the Borg episodes for VOY or TNG, but I have read summaries. Hence, any complaints about breaking canon will be summarily ignored due to my ignorance, though I do take a few known liberties.

This is basically what might have happened if, instead of Picard getting rescued and the Borg cube blowing up, Picard had stayed on the Borg cube and the cube had hightailed it out of there. This is from Riker's POV the day after Voyager returns from the Delta Quadrant. This is the second part technically, but I'm pretty sure you could read them in either order. The other one is under VOY fics under the same name and from Janeway's POV.

I don't like the end on this. It would work perfectly without the meeting with Janeway, but I wrote it and got attached to it. Not so obscure references to Darth Vadar will do that.

Most people I know had stayed up late that night. They had stayed up late celebrating the return of Voyager from her seven-year journey. I hadn't. I had been dead tired, just returning a few hours earlier from guarding the border. I knew that as captain of Starfleet's flagship I would be expected to attend some sort of function or ten to celebrate their return, but right then I had been more concerned with my bed and how much softer it was then the one on the Enterprise. And the morning after, I was more concerned with my real breakfast then reading the paper. Mine was a simple life of ignoring the outside world. Not for long.

I was just lifting my fork full of omelet when my doorbell rang, followed by incessant pounding on my door. "Come in!" I attempted to shout over the sound of the pounding. The door was flung open by none other than Dr. Beverly Crusher who nearly fell over in her haste to get through the door.

Her red hair was still messy from sleep and it looked suspiciously like she had thrown a coat on over her pajamas. I lazily wondered what could possibly have gotten her so riled up that she would be pounding on my door like that at 7:30 in the morning. "Have you seen the paper yet today? Have you? You won't believe what's happened! Oh my god, I can't believe this happened!"

I internally shook my head. If that was all it was… "No I haven't seen the paper yet today but it's not like I live in a black hole. I know that Voyager got back."

"Not that, not that!" She slammed a news PADD on to my table, shoving my breakfast out of the way and consequently on to the floor. She jabbed a pointed finger at it. "Look!"

I picked up the PADD and read the headline out loud. "'Voyager Returns From Seven-Year Journey.'" I glanced at the picture, showing Captain Janeway, her First Officer who looked distinctly different from the one she left with, and a blond woman with a glint of metal over her left eyebrow. I read the caption out loud too. "'Pictured from left, Commander Chakotay, a former Maquis who became Janeway's first officer after their crews joined, Captain Kathryn Janeway, captain of the USS Voyager, and Seven of Nine, formerly Annika Hansen, a liberated Borg drone.' Captain Janeway liberated a Borg drone, brownie points for her."

"She liberated three, now just read it!" Beverly insisted, pointing at a section titled 'The Borg of Voyager'.

Again, I read out loud, still not getting it. "Among Voyager's crew are three liberated Borg drones, two Humans and one of a species known as Brunali. They are known as Seven of Nine, formerly Annika Hansen, Icheb who goes by his original name, and Locutus, formerly…" I trailed off, finally getting it and completely thunderstruck.

"Captain Jean-Luc Picard." Beverly finished for me.

I continued to read that part of the article, turning to the page it indicated at the bottom. There was a picture there of the three Borg, Seven of Nine, Icheb, and… him. He looked so different. While Seven of Nine and Icheb's implants were limited to shiny bits of metal on their foreheads, it was obvious that Voyager's doctor could not go so far with him. He still had the outer implant on his forehead, and it was obvious there was more that was not visible in the headshot.

Beverly suddenly pointed out to another paragraph. "Look! They're here! He's here!"

I looked where she was pointing, and it did indeed appear that he was here in San Francisco, not far from here. "We can go make enquiries later, now I want to finish my breakfast, don't do…" Then I noticed she was already gone. "Anything rash," I finished lamely.

I grabbed my coat and flung it on over my pajamas, grabbing the PADD and reading it as I chased after Beverly. "Beverly! Wait! We should do this slowly! It says he has amnesia!"

"I don't care if he's suffering from Q-itis!" she shouted back at me. We ran through the crowded streets, me barely keeping up. Beverly was a master at ducking and weaving through crowds, and I was just too big. Finally she stopped and paused. I had nearly grabbed her arm to prevent her from going any further when she whispered out his name and ran on.

We had gotten to the edge of a crowd, and there was Voyager's crew right there. Beverly almost moved faster than the speed of light, shouting out, "Jean-Luc! Jean-Luc!" The man who had once been my captain paused as he saw her running towards him. I felt a bird of hope soar within me- had the story been wrong? I kept running after Beverly.

She finally reached him and grabbed him by his shoulders. "Jean-Luc," she whispered, just loud enough for me to hear. And then, to my surprise, the rest of the crowd's surprise, and most likely her surprise as well, she pulled him into a passionate kiss.

He broke off the kiss and looked at her, an air of superiority oozing from him. "I am not acquainted with this Jean-Luc you speak of. Others have made that mistake. I am Locutus."

An old-fashioned gunshot rang out, abruptly ending the short life of my bird of hope. Jean-Luc Picard is dead, and in his place is a mindless robot.

Later Captain Janeway requested a private meeting with me. I assumed, and correctly, that it was about Locutus. She gave me a fixed look. "I'll depend on you to tell this to your crew, though how much you say is at your discretion. Particularly one Beverly Crusher, though I doubt she needs any more reminding."

I nodded.

Janeway leaned back in her chair, watching the waves of steam float from her coffee cup. "I once hoped that he was the Captain Picard I knew as well. I tried beyond reason to get him to remember. In the end, I was the last person on Voyager to accept him for who he is now."

I interrupted. "He would hate and despise who he is now. It would have been kinder to kill that… thing."

"But that's why it wouldn't have been. Locutus is not Picard and Picard is not Locutus. Locutus is his own person. It is not his fault that he happens to inhabit the body of one dear to us all."

There was silence for a few minutes. "There was a fire at his family's vineyard after he was taken. His brother and nephew died. He was the last, and it would have hurt him to know."

Janeway's face made a weird look at this comment, but it was gone before I could identify it. "Locutus was favored by the Borg Queen. He is more machine now than man, though I wouldn't go so far as to say that he's twisted and evil. He is more… lost. In our small community on Voyager it was easier for him to try to fit in. But here it is a whole new world for him, and most of it expects him to be someone he's not. He will never thrive as long as he is stuck in Captain Picard's shadow, something he will need help to get out of. I'm not asking you to do anything other than refrain from calling him Jean-Luc Picard and placing distinct expectations on him."

I nodded. "I will pass your message on to my crew."

Reviews please! If I get enough positive feedback I might continue it.