Author's Note: I'm breaking a long-held rule of mine here, namely to never post something that isn't finished. I'm hoping that I can get myself moving on it again, though, since I know where I want to go with it, I just can't find themotivation to actually get there.
Disclaimer: Not mine, of course.
Spoilers: None to specific episodes that I can think of. Set sometime in season 1.
The computer systems lay dormant, waiting patiently – if a machine could be said to be patient – for someone to come and activate their programming. Isolated by shielding and physical space, they had no way of telling if they had been truly abandoned – or whether someone had returned.
The invading programs had long since sifted through all the information available to them. Defeated by the shields, they had returned to the micro-engineered devices that had carried them safely to their current location. The nanotechnology had fulfilled all its targeted objectives bar one; to return home with the information so painstakingly gathered. The nanites waited, needing only a means of escape from their isolation; years drifted by, unheeded, and still they waited.