Star Trek Voyager: Eternal Soul

Chapter III: Malevolence

Alpha Quadrant, Tau Ceti Star System, February 23, 2156:

Erika Hernandez's refusal to take orders from the strange entity invading her ship didn't go unnoticed. It wasn't long before her actions provoked a response. The lights around them dimmed and virtually every console on the bridge abruptly went dark. Columbia's emergency backup generators brought critical, primary systems almost immediately back on line… all of them except one.

"Life support is down," reported Lt. Andrews from tactical. "All decks, Captain."

Hernandez wasted no more time trying to negotiate. She sprinted quickly to her command seat and the control panel next to it, activating the ship's all-call. "This is the Captain speaking," she said, her voice crackling briskly from speakers on every deck. "All hands go to immediate tactical alert. Equip yourselves with phase pistols and communicators; assume everything you say and do is being monitored. We have an intruder aboard that seems to have no physical body, and its capabilities remain mostly unknown to us. Everyone fall back to 'D' deck… after which the bridge crew will reassemble and construct a temporary, auxiliary command station in the catwalk of the starboard nacelle. Everyone else… find a comfortable spot to hole up and stay safe."

She moved next to Maxwell's blackened, still smoking Communications console and verified that its control systems were completely off-line.

Commander Strong glanced at the Captain with curious interest. "The catwalk on the starboard nacelle? We'd fry in there as long as our engines are running."

Hernandez shrugged and her voice dropped to a whisper. "I did say to assume that everything we do is being monitored." She nodded with confidence. "Let it guess what we're up to. Most of our vital hardware is on 'D' deck, and the alien creature will obviously go after our warp core just like it did aboard the Hemmapek. I don't think it's any accident that a large group of the Tellarites ended up in their engine room."

Lt. Benjamin Matthews spun in his chair. "The creature has accessed helm control systems... specifically our navigation charts," he said heatedly, taking the intrusion on his personal turf somewhat personally. "It's using the system internally… bypassing the console controls and trying to set a course away from here. I'm totally locked out."

"Lt. Andrews, begin with Mr. Matthews station," Hernandez ordered. "Make the bridge completely useless to it."

Joshua pulled out his phase pistol and raised the setting to maximum. He proceeded first to navigation, then to tactical, next to communications, engineering, and finally science. At each console he opened the access panels beneath the control systems and used his phaser to sever the power supply to the hardware.

Lt. Sheila Wakefield stood near the Science station, using her handheld, portable scanner. "Can't it blow out power conduits on the bridge and kill us too?" she asked, wondering why the entity was simply sitting idle and letting him disable the bridge.

"It could if I was working near anything vital," said Andrews as he leaned inside the access hatch beneath her sensor controls. His phaser fired several times in brief spurts of orange fire… just enough to cut key power supplies. "The bridge controls are linked to engineering and the rest of the ship by a simple network that also supplies them with electricity. But…" he paused, remembering the NX-02's layout. "… the really heavy duty power relays from engineering are routed to where they're most needed – the outer hull, the nacelles, the phaser cannons..." He pointed at her console. "The bridge control systems and lights don't need warp power, just enough electricity to keep them running. Polarizing the hull plating, firing phasers, or using warp speed, on the other hand, takes a lot more juice."

"Still, if it wants us dead…"

"Then right now, it would have to kill everyone on the bridge," argued Andrews as he continued to disable the bridge stations. "It's obviously not prepared to do that yet."

"It's probably thinking about what I said," Hernandez guessed. "The more of us it kills, the less of us there are to fix things and carry out its orders. From its actions so far, I seriously doubt it plans to make Tau Ceti its home."

"No doubt it's observing us," mused Commander Strong. "It doesn't want to make the same mistake that it did with the Tellarites…

While the Commander spoke, Joshua Andrews suddenly stiffened as a soft green glow surrounded his body. He collapsed to his knees and his phase pistol fell from his grasp and clattered to the deck. As it did so a barely audible whine sounded from it, gradually building in intensity.

"It's trying to… attack me," Andrews gasped, taking a huge deep breath and then forcing himself to stand. "Interfering… with my… brain activity and nervous system…"

The glow around Andrews faded, but the electronic whine continued to grow louder. Strong leaped to Andrews' side and picked up the phase pistol, quickly snapping it open and removing its energy cartridge. "The overload setting was activated," he sighed, pocketing the power supply and hooking the now powerless weapon to his belt. "This entity – whatever it is – obviously likes to blow things up."

Hernandez tried the lift doors and found that they wouldn't open. She pulled the cover off the manual access controls in the wall next to the door and yanked out the conductive wires. The tiny, almost nonexistent electrical charge holding the doors closed failed and they slid open. The Captain glanced briefly down the lift tube, noting that the lift chamber itself was paused somewhere between 'D' and 'E' deck. She nodded and moved back to Andrews' tactical station and the one remaining console that had not yet been powered down.

"I'm restricting all further command functions to manual keyboard access only," she told them. "Life support is back on-line and will stay that way unless this thing invading our ship can find another way to turn it off again."

The Captain's next move was to shut down Columbia's main computer and then reach down and manually tear away the power lines running to the console. Again all of the bridge lighting went dark… only a few emergency lights winked back on to provide minimal illumination.

Sheila Wakefield – Columbia's Science Officer - grew concerned. "Our main computer links all key systems together and normally accepts input directly from the bridge," she pointed out. "But powering them off isn't enough… the engines, navigation, weapons… they can still be accessed wirelessly, one at a time if need be. Those systems are deliberately designed to function independently of each other in case our main computer is damaged and isn't available to coordinate shipboard functions."

"Not any longer they're not," said Hernandez confidently. "All commands to each system must now be manually keyed directly into an access terminal by a member of this crew and preceded by our prefix code. So even if the creature knows the code, it is still locked out of wireless access unless it can physically push controls on one of our consoles or force one of us to do it. And… if it could control people…" she glanced toward her tactical officer with a smile, "…it wouldn't have contented itself with simply disorienting Lt. Andrews long enough to overload his phase pistol. Instead, it would have used him to carry out its orders."

Commander Strong was still half holding Andrews by the arm but the tactical officer nodded that he was okay and smiled gratefully. "I'm okay now," he said. "All the creature managed to do was make me dizzy for a minute or so."

Hernandez glanced down the turbolift shaft again, verifying that everything was dark. "Follow me," she ordered as she entered the tube and swung her legs onto the top rung of the ladderwell leading down. "We may have to open the hatch on the top of the lift to get through to the deck below, but all systems are powered off and I don't think it's going to start up unexpectedly on us. So let's rendezvous with the rest of the crew on 'D' deck."

"We're with you Captain," said Strong, moving over to assist the rest of the bridge crew with the planned evacuation.

Hernandez dropped her voice to a whisper. "When we reach 'D' deck, go directly to Engineering Commander," she told him. "Route all primary ship functions there… have your crew set up portable terminals, and we'll make a stand there and get control of our ship back."

He nodded and they quickly began moving, one by one, down the ladder toward the lower decks.

The Vryke was furious… nothing it was trying worked. Apparently the lower biological based organisms that now inhabited the Alpha Quadrant were just as stubborn and aggressive as those that had inhabited it 300 million years earlier. As it watched system after system on the Columbia bridge go dark, its determination to succeed this time was equaled only by its boiling rage.

Like the other vessels it had encountered, most of this ship's command crew was stationed on the bridge – which was precisely why it had focused most of its attacks there so far. The few, major power conduits that it had risked rupturing had failed to electrify the insulated deck plating, and its ability to control the biologically based humans using other measures was severely limited as well. But there had to be some way, something that it could use…

It had regained its freedom, but so far that was all the Vryke had. Although it had used the wormhole to dig back through time and free itself from the Questar gravity well, it was still somewhat of a prisoner. Its ability to move about the galaxy had been restored, but at sub-light speeds only. In order to really travel a reasonable distance – particularly spanning the vast distance between stars – the Vryke required a starship. It needed an interstellar vessel equipped with a functional warp drive along with an obedient crew to pilot it.

This particular starship was much more primitive than the Enterprise had been. Its main computer was quite limited in ability – certainly not the heart and soul of vessel operations as Kirk's had been. In just a few short minutes the bridge crew had completely blocked access to the resources that the Vryke so desperately needed in order to renew its journey between worlds.

Despite the difficulties so far, it hardly considered itself beaten. The Vryke had planned out many possible options during the three hundred thousand millennia it had been a captive, so it had a pretty good idea as to its next move. Quickly following Columbia's major power conduits back toward engineering and the ship's warp core, it moved the essence of its being down into the steady power source being generated at the heart of the starship. To truly control the crew of the vessel, the Vryke needed to expand its essence – to grow from the organic equivalent of a one-celled organism into a massive creature capable of manipulating both the physical as well as the electrical world surrounding it.

Thus it settled itself gently around the pulsing energy output from Columbia's warp core and initiated its reproductive process. Slowly at first and then more confidently, it began absorbing the power needed to duplicate by mitosis. Soon there would be two of it, and then four, and then eight… As long as it had a powerful source of energy to draw upon its ability to proliferate was virtually unlimited. The new 'cells' that were created as part of its expanding body would mutate as they grew; adding new capabilities that the original, centralized 'brain' could draw upon and make us of in furthering its plans for conquest.

The crew of the Columbia only suspected that they were in great danger… the Vryke already knew what it was capable of, and it was utterly determined to dominate or destroy.

Main engineering aboard Columbia was very quickly bustling with major activity. Large, collapsible tables were hastily set up around both sides of the horizontal length of the engine. Atop these the crew activated portable computer systems that were used to tap into the bridge command functions, rerouting them to their new, temporary auxiliary control. Captain Hernandez supervised the process of setting up the backup bridge after giving Commander Strong orders to power down the warp core and place its control systems on secured standby.

The soft green glow surrounding the metallic shell around the warp core was a distinct warning sign that they were running out of time. The invading entity was busy doing something, and whatever it had chosen as its next move would not likely be good for her crew.

Dozens of blue-uniformed Starfleet crew moved back and forth, attending to their duties. Everyone comprising the eighty-plus personnel complement had reassembled on 'D' Deck. Those who weren't assisting with the creation of a temporary bridge in engineering were currently holed up in crew quarters or assisting Doctor Karyn Petroyko in hauling up portable medical equipment from Sickbay. Captain Hernandez was busy checking over the rerouted communications control system when the ship's chef tapped her on the shoulder.

"Why did you move the bridge crew down here?" the galley chief asked curiously, fidgeting a bit nervously as always. "If the entity can attack you up there, it can certainly do so down here as well." He was a young, good looking intelligent man and an excellent cook; but just this once Hernandez was glad he wasn't making tactical command decisions.

"That's a great question," the Captain replied briskly. "While aboard the Tellarite vessel, I witnessed firsthand what this creature can do. It blew a hole in the hull of the Hemmapek's bridge and killed everyone inside, venting all their atmosphere into space with one simple act of sabotage. So I'm changing tactics and regrouping down here in order to make sure that we're close to the heart of our ship… its engine. If the entity could go anywhere faster without needing our warp drive, it wouldn't have stayed trapped aboard the freighter after killing off its crew."

As she spoke, a sudden series of flares exploded along both sides of the warp engine mount, spraying sparks and bits of glowing debris all over the crew. White smoke poured out of the angry, burning remnants of the fires and the large, two-level chamber surrounding them filled rapidly with the odor of burnt electrical insulation. Strong ignored the intimidation tactics, and a few seconds later the intermix reaction within the warp chamber slowed to a crawl,and its power output dropped considerably.

"What was that?" asked the chef.

"The entity seems to be angry now that we're denying it the prize it seeks," pointed out Hernandez brusquely.

"It overloaded and blew out the cascade safeties," pointed out Strong. "The ones designed to contain a core breach. It's trying everything, short of destroying us completely, to force us to comply with its demands. The more we fight back, the more it tries to find ways to slow our progress."

"Has anybody figured out what it is yet?" asked the Captain angrily.

"I'm starting to get a pretty good idea," said Lt. Wakefield from behind her. Erika turned at the voice and stepped up next to her Science Officer.

"What have you got?" she asked intently.

"We know it has no physical body to speak of, so I've been analyzing the entire electromagnetic spectrum," Wakefield pointed out. She switched the monitor's display in front of her to an image looking out behind the starship's saucer section. It was an aft view showing the rear half of both warp nacelles, along with various sized pieces of metal debris clinging to their surface. From all sides surrounding them more pieces of metallic debris continued to float gently toward their vessel.

"Is that debris from the Hemmapek sticking to the hull…?" Hernandez guessed.

Wakefield nodded. "Yes it is. Since that thing came aboard, our hull has picked up a distinct, very powerful magnetic signature. It was fluctuating unsteadily at first, but has continued to grow rapidly stronger. I think the creature absorbs part or all of the energy around it – it collects starlight, radiation… probably absorbs a little bit of everything." She shrugged her shoulders. "So it's good that you had Commander Strong shut down the warp engines, because I'm certain that it can consume at least some of our own energy output as well."

Lt. Andrews joined them, having completed his own sensor scans. "I think it's also the source of the local electromagnetic interference that's blocking our communications. The dampening field around this region of space has grown considerably wider since we first arrived… and the exact center is Columbia."

Hernandez sighed. "Starfleet? Can we get a message of some kind out?"

Andrews shook his head. "Unless we leave this thing behind and get far enough away from it, I don't see how we can send anything to them that they would even be able to recognize as a distress call." His frown signaled just a small part of the emotions that he was feeling inside.

The Captain touched his arm briefly, reassuringly. "Take four MACOs, go down to the armory on deck 'F'," she told him, "and take the phase cannons off-line. Unhook the power supplies connected to them if you have to. With the warp drive on stand-by, the entity can't use the power output running through the shipboard conduits to attack you any longer."

"No," Andrews replied tensely. "But it can think of other things…"

"Make certain that our weapons are useless to it," said Hernandez sternly, snapping the Lieutenant back to attention. "I don't want it shooting down or attacking any ships that eventually decide to show up looking for us."

He nodded, turning to pick four marines out of the crowd. Together the small group raised their weapons and headed out of engineering, back toward the nearest ladderwell. Hernandez turned thoughtfully toward Lt. Wakefield, who was curiously studying data from the new Science station. She was comparing it to additional data that she had displayed on her handheld scanner with a definite look of suspicion.

"What? What's going on?" said Captain Hernandez.

Wakefield glanced at her with a note of concern. "The creature wiped our databanks on the bridge," she said. "All of the sensor scans that Lt. Andrews and I took while you and the boarding party were aboard the Hemmapek are gone… it erased everything." She shook her head with dismay. "Fortunately I downloaded the survey data into my scanner before we evacuated from the bridge. There's something else out there…"

"Another creature?"

"No Captain…" As she spoke a large explosion shook the entire ship, and the walls around them rumbled ominously in response. The filtered atmosphere around them swirled with a sinister hiss and began rushing back out into the corridor behind them.

"Another power conduit has ruptured in crew quarters!" someone shouted. "It's on this deck! We've got at least two more hull breaches… stand by and we'll do our best to seal the room."

Hernandez waited edgily, listening for the sound of the escaping atmosphere to decrease. Once the damage control team had sealed off the compromised room, the ship's life support system slowly began returning their air to a breathable level. "It's one damned thing after another today," said the Captain heatedly. "We've got to find a way to end this stalemate." She turned back to Wakefield. "What specifically is out there?"

The Lieutenant studied the realigned sensors, now pointed directly at the disturbance. Carefully she keyed in her command sequences, making sure to identify them first by manually typing the prefix code. The combination of the code and manually data entered commands had prevented the entity from using its ability to input its own orders wirelessly. So far.

"It looks like a sub-space rupture of some sort," said Wakefield as she analyzed the newest data. "We couldn't detect it before because of all the dust particles surrounding Tau Ceti… it was partially shielded from our scans. It's similar to the void created by a stable warp field, except that this is some sort of fold – perhaps even a permanent tear – in the fabric between normal space and subspace."

"Is it caused by a black hole, or perhaps a dwarf star of some sort?"

"Nooo…" Wakefield studied the data carefully. "Aside from all of the gravitons leaking through, I'd say it matches the textbook definition of a wormhole." Sheila used her terminal to generate a computer model of the anomaly; the non-visible portions of which were automatically identified and color coded by levels of radioactivity to reflect their danger to humanoid life.

Erika was watching the sensor readings too. "Whatever it is, there's a tremendous source of gravity near the other side," she observed. "Measurements are off the scale, in fact. Is it possible that our unwanted visitor originally came from there?"

"I'd say it's almost certainly where this entity came from," nodded Wakefield. "Without sending a probe through, it will be impossible to calculate exactly where the other end of this thing leads to. However, I'd say that the starting point originates somewhere along the outer rim of our galaxy… at the very tip of the 'Perseus External' arm."

Henry Maxwell had been treated for the burns he received when his console exploded, then released by Doctor Petroyko. So he, Commander Strong, and Lt. Matthews all gathered around Wakefield and the Captain so that they could also listen to the conversation. They stood there, studying the graphic computer representation of the wormhole curiously, watching it pulsate softly as high levels of gravity reached out of its center and tugged mightily at everything surrounding the entry point. Already a long filament of dust from Tau Ceti had begun to stretch outwards toward it, attracted by the heavy gravity field that was steadily emanating from the other side of the wormhole.

"This is a new stellar object… and wasn't here the last time one of our ships passed by, or they would have reported it to Starfleet as an environmental hazard," pointed out Maxwell. "Whatever that object is, I can assure you that it hasn't been here for more than a few weeks. I routinely get updates on the Starfleet communications channels regarding new objects… especially the ones that pose a hazard to normal traffic."

"It's a danger to most of this sector," said Wakefield unfavorably. "Or it will be before too much longer. And I find it most interesting that the entity used it to travel here… to a tactically sound position less than twelve light years from Earth. The way it can manipulate our computer and power systems… can you imagine if it got access to technology on a planetary scale…?"

The Captain flipped open her communicator. "Hernandez to Andrews."

The pause before he responded was refreshingly brief. "Andrews here…"

"Get your work done in the armory Lieutenant," she ordered. "Then stand by. It's quite possible that Columbia may be going for a bumpy ride, and if we do we're going to need your photonic torpedoes. Lt. Wakefield will contact you with specifications for yield settings."

"Acknowledged."

Strong looked at her with a concerned expression. "You're not thinking about taking Columbia inside that thing?" he said with growing anxiety, pointing at the on-screen computer simulation of the inter-spatial rupture. "Are you?"

Hernandez sighed and met his gaze steadily. "We've got a confirmed hostile entity aboard our ship, sitting virtually on Earth's doorstep. I don't like the situation any more than you do, Commander, but it seems to me that if we take our ship through that anomaly we'll leave Tau Ceti far behind and arrive at wherever this thing originally came from. According to Lt. Wakefield, that ought to be very far from here."

The Commander gestured toward the makeshift Science station. "Look at the gravity field generated from whatever is inside that anomaly. In all likelihood, that kind of vortex will tear Columbia completely apart. Our structural integrity won't hold for long in a gravity field like that… certainly not for more than a few minutes, at best."

Matthews evaluated their remaining options, struggling to come up with alternatives. "We could send a shuttle pod inside first, to map a safe course through for Columbia to use later," he suggested.

Hernandez shook her head. "We're better shielded from the background radiation right here in engineering. There is an alien entity aboard Columbia, ladies and gentlemen. So we're going to do our sworn duty and protect Starfleet. We're going to make damn certain that – whatever happens to us – this hostile creature hitching a ride with us ends up somewhere else… somewhere very far away."

"Agreed," Strong said reluctantly, after thinking the matter over for another minute. "If we angle our course safely around the outer perimeter of the gravitational field on the other side, we have a good chance of surviving the trip. And if we do keep our ship intact, we'll have plenty of time once we arrive at the exit point to figure out how to get rid of our unwanted guest."

"The larger issue is that we won't know where to steer until we first travel through it and see what's on the other side," said Hernandez with a shrug. "Normally I prefer to look before I leap." She glanced over at the Commander. "Can we survive inside that thing?"

Strong snorted with laughter. "The shorter our time inside of there, the better off I predict we will be," he replied tersely. "However, we can work out a basic orbital course in advance, and include adjustable target parameters that Lt. Matthews can adjust at the last second."

"What about the wormhole?" asked Wakefield. "If we do appear somewhere farther away and manage to force the entity to leave Columbia, we might be disabled and unable to return. It can simply leave us behind and use the sub-space rupture to come right back to Tau Ceti, then pick up business right where it left off."

"Not if we use our torpedoes to collapse the entrance to the anomaly from the other side," pointed out Captain Hernandez. "That's going to be Lt. Andrews' job."

"Will torpedoes be enough?" Strong wondered. "The entity might not need more than a pinhole."

Hernandez grinned confidently. "Lt. Wakefield is a sub-space specialist," the Captain noted. "If anyone can collapse that thing, she can."

"With photonic torpedoes, it won't be a problem," said Sheila with a nod. "At the very least, I'll be able to make this end of it spin out of control, ending up far, far away from Tau Ceti."

"And we'll be safely in the 'Perseus External' arm," added Hernandez. "That's a long trip home, but we'll be able to send a message to Starfleet to let them know what happened."

"If we can get rid of the entity first," warned Strong. "Until then, communications are down."

"One problem at a time please, Commander."

Delta Quadrant, Starship Voyager, Stardate 54942.7:

Commander Chakotay sat in Voyager's command seat, idly watching the stars stream by on the forward viewscreen. They had been following the coordinates provided to them by 'Q' for several days now without any luck. Chakotay was a rugged, dark-haired physical man who normally possessed a lot of patience, but even he found himself growing more and more restless as each moment passed and nothing unusual showed itself.

"This may be the one occasion where we discover that even 'Q' doesn't know everything," he stated bluntly. "He may claim to be omnipotent, but the universe is a pretty big place."

Lt. Tom Paris occupied his usual position at the helm, and he shrugged his shoulders as he too kept an eye on the view ahead of them. "I never have felt quite right about things when that guy shows up," he noted with a shake of his head. "Some folks are just plain trouble, that's all there is to it."

Paris ignored the 'it takes one to know one' look that he got from Ensign Kim.

"Are you certain 'Q' told the Captain that the data he gave her was a shortcut?" asked the Ensign.

"Absolutely," Chakotay confirmed. "According to the Captain, he even joked that he didn't want to do all the work for us… so I doubt we'll be seeing the Alpha Quadrant in the near future."

"How will we cope without him?" sighed Kim with a note of frustration. "Honestly, we've already moved at least ten light years off our optimal course back to the Alpha Quadrant… if this journey doesn't yield some results soon we may actually be adding time to our trip home."

"What about Starfleet… or Dr. Zimmerman at Jupiter Station?" asked Paris curiously. "Were they able to provide any details on our little detour?"

Chakotay shook his head negatively. "All they know is what they can see with their space-based observational telescopes… they've also got some data from a few long range probes that made it inside Delta Quadrant space over the years. Based on every report reviewed so far, we're headed into a largely unexplored region."

Alarms suddenly blared and the bridge lights dimmed as the ship went unexpectedly to red alert. Chakotay swung one of the portable data monitors over to hover above the right armrest on his chair and promptly began studying the sensor data that was simultaneously displaying behind him at Lt. Tuvok's tactical station. There was a brief pause as everyone on the bridge checked their work and verified battle readiness.

"Sensors have detected a debris field ahead that appears to have a Borg signature," stated Tuvok.

Chakotay tapped the internal ship Comm-link. "Captain Janeway to the bridge," he said, feeling the familiar rise of fear in his heart each time they ran into that one, relentless, automated enemy that they never quite seemed able to leave permanently behind.

Starfleet had not been the same since its first encounter with them, and – although Voyager had managed to escape from the very heart of Borg space several years ago – they were still close enough to the 'neighborhood'. It kept everyone on their toes, and over the years they had routinely changed course many times to avoid contact with Borg ships. The entire galaxy was their playground, after all, and they always seemed to be searching for something new and unique to assimilate.

"Commander Chakotay, this is Seven of Nine in the Astrometrics lab."

He tapped his Comm-badge. "Go ahead Seven."

"Commander Data and I have directed Voyager's sensors ahead… toward the debris field that was just detected. Preliminary indications are that there were at least four vessels, all of which appear to have self destructed. The fragments are largely scattered throughout this region, because the explosions occurred slightly less than one year ago."

The lift doors at the rear of the bridge snapped open and Captain Janeway emerged, her short, neatly combed red hair cascading around her shoulders as she entered. They had been in the Delta Quadrant for almost seven years, and in all that time everyone who walked onto the bridge saw the same crisp, well-trained Starfleet crew that normally inhabited the Alpha Quadrant. The only possible exception to the rule was that brief period when the Kazon had taken over, during which time efficiency on the Starship had declined noticeably.

"Report," ordered Janeway as Chakotay moved over one seat to his right, allowing her to take over the center seat.

"There is a massive debris field less than a light year from our current position," stated Lt. Tuvok. "Seven of Nine and Commander Data are providing us with additional data from the Astrometrics lab… it appears as though three cubes and a scout vessel were traveling through this area and self destructed. What caused them to make this decision is currently unknown."

"Apart from passing by several uninhabited star systems, this is the only item of interest that we've run across since we left our projected course," noted Chakotay.

"Is there normally Borg activity in this region?" wondered Janeway curiously.

"Negative." Although she was down in the Astrometrics lab, Seven seemed totally sure of her pronouncement. "All four sectors in this region have a notorious reputation for being relatively unpopulated and severely lacking in technological hardware. A few of the species that do live in this region aren't even warp capable."

Janeway mulled the information over. "Then I wonder what the Borg were doing here," she said finally, arms crossed and her expression still puzzled. A thought occurred to her. "Seven, are you certain that the ships self destructed?"

There was a pause… even though their resident Borg expert always knew her facts before she spoke up, it was quite probable that she was triple-checking her data one last time anyway. "Lt. Tuvok's scans have detected no traces of residual weapons fire on the debris fragments… no sign of tractor beam activity, directed energy discharges, or other hostile action of any kind."

Commander Data spoke up. "The Borg are always extremely hesitant to sacrifice ships and drones unless they are in danger of being captured. However, they rely heavily on the assimilation of technology from other cultures to advance their own technology and have regularly gone out of their way to deny that same advantage to their opponents. If they encountered someone or something that significantly compromised their security, that would be sufficient cause for them to initiate self destruct."

Janeway nodded in agreement. "Full long range scan Mr. Tuvok," she said. "There might still be something else out here… something that attracted their attention and lured them here."

The Vulcan tactical officer raised an eyebrow at her request. "I have already completed a detailed scan of the surrounding territory," he pointed out. "Aside from a series of star systems ahead with reasonable sized populations, there is nothing I can see that would pose any reasonable threat to an opponent like the Borg."

"The Borg did not come here planning to assimilate the populations on the planets we have detected," observed Seven. "Although many of the inhabited star systems ahead of us do have warp-capable ships at their disposal, the outward radius of their exploration indicates that they are limited to a maximum velocity of warp four. Borg drones would consider such technology to be irrelevant and unworthy of pursuit."

Chakotay's expression was grim. "In other words, they've got bigger fish to fry. They would rather focus their attention on the more advanced populations in the galaxy first."

"Precisely, Commander."

Voyager dropped out of warp, shedding its faster than light velocity to sub-light speed. The large starship continued to close in on the debris field at low impulse. Millions of large and medium-sized fragments of debris from the four vessels filled the foreground of the viewscreen. The lengthy cloud of rubble stretched far into the background of the image as far as their eyes could see. Many of the larger, more sizeable hardware fragments were scattered and tougher to find since the entire collection of debris had been slowly spreading steadily outward for almost a year.

"This entire area is still saturated with higher than normal levels of anti-matter radiation," noted Tuvok. "I am increasing power to Voyager's deflector shields."

"If the Borg were planning to send out a search party, they probably have already done so," commented Chakotay. "Still, I recommend we stay at yellow alert while Voyager remains in the area."

"There was no search party." Again, Seven sounded very certain of her stance. "If self-destruct was initiated – and I am virtually certain that this was the case – then the Borg Collective had already evaluated the situation and concluded that this convoy's security had been compromised beyond the point where it was capable of defending itself. The Queen may choose to send a scout ship through this region now and then to search for whomever or whatever caused the malfunction, but they won't risk a major presence in this area again until they can identify something to study and establish what they're up against."

"So someone socked it to the Borg and then high-tailed it out of here?" Paris looked rather pleased for a change. A few minutes earlier his cheeks had paled at the mere mention of the 'B' word, but now color was returning to them and he seemed more relaxed. "It's just too bad no one stuck around for us to thank."

As usual, Tuvok was not so quick to celebrate. "There may still be someone here Lieutenant," he pointed out. "Our sensors could simply be incapable of detecting them."

The pink drained out of Tom Paris' cheeks again and he busied himself with the helm controls, pausing the ship's forward progress briefly as it reached the outer edge of the blast radius. Janeway took only a moment on this occasion to decide their next move.

"Seven, I want you and Commander Chakotay to take the Delta Flyer into the debris field. Locate and access tactical information from any data nodes that survived the explosion. Take Commander Data with you… I'll be interested to hear his analysis as well."

"Yes Captain." From Astrometrics, Seven terminated her communications link with the bridge.

As Janeway spoke, Commander Chakotay stood up and smiled. "I doubt there's much left out there, but Seven can usually decrypt anything that hasn't been vaporized… she's even been known to recover data from severely damaged equipment that most people would normally discard."

The Captain took a deep breath, watching the debris on the viewscreen tumble randomly this way and that. "Chakotay, I would be very interested to know what drew the Borg here, and even more curious as to what possibly could have so rattled them that the Collective felt the need to kill them off."

"We'll do our best to get some answers for you Captain," promised Chakotay. He disappeared into a turbolift, on his way to the shuttle bay.

"This might have been the result of sabotage by drones we liberated during the Unimatrix Zero mission," speculated Tuvok. "Once separated from the Collective, they would try and cause exactly this type of disruption. After all, the Queen has discarded ships before in order to get rid of affected drones."

"Somehow I don't think you're right Mr. Tuvok. My gut tells me we aren't going to get that lucky this time around," mused Janeway.

"Why do you say that Captain?" Kim wondered curiously.

"Because 'Q' sent us here," she replied firmly.

Author's Notes: By the way... thanks as always go to my biggest fan Le'letha!

And for those who think you know what's going on, well you really don't!