The light streaming through the windows shifted between patterns of burnt orange and dusky yellows to darker blood reds. Clouds of dense gases and streamers of particulates intertwined in strange forms, like the building of some monstorous storm.
A storm that seemed far away, yet could break at any moment with savage fury.
None of which helped ease the tension in Voyager's conference room. The Captain,
Chakotay, Seven, Tuvok and B'elanna sat around the table, their faces grim. There was no talking.
The wall display was replaying the footage from Seven's spacesuit, just as she finished burning through the wreckage into the Engineering Node of the ancient Borg vessel.
"Our primary goal should be to collect as many segments of the Transwarp Drive Coils as we can." Her voice sounded small and far away. On the screen she played her light downward, toward where the coils were. "The processed metal..."
Her voice stopped. Directly ahead was a large, somewhat open area, battered and deformed like the rest of the wreck but still accessable. Huge, charred and broken masses of machinery protruded from walls and ceiling, overhanging a large curving arc of oddly colored metal.
The remains of a walkway ran from just below where they stood, out a distance before ending in a tangled mass of torn metal. The walkway was twisted, the struts and supports bent and snapped in disturbing ways.
A few meters away, a Borg drone stood on the walkway, next to a particurally twisted mass of supports. It's body was charred and strangely mishappen, perhaps the result of catastrophic skeletal damage.
It's mouth was distended, gaping wide. It looked like the drone had been screaming when it died.
A long, sharp fragment of a broken strut had been driven through the drones face, through it's head and out the back of it's skull. Dark Borg blood crusted the strut while bits of seared tissue and fragments of torn Borg implants formed a gruesome blossom erupting from the wound.
The drones hands were locked around the shaft of the strut in a literal deathgrip. From the way it's hands were positioned, it appeared the drone had been trying to drive the shaft deeper into it's skull as it died.
Behind and slightly above the first drone floated the remains of another one. It was missing a leg and the upper body looked like some wild animal had clawed and savaged it. It too appeared to have been screaming when it died, dark blood frozen all around the mouth. It's one remaing eye was open wider than seemed physically possible and icy tears of techno-organic blood streamed outward from it.
The Borg's hands were clenched so tightly around it's skull they had torn into flesh and metal alike. The drone held it's own head out in front of it, having somehow, impossibly ripped it off. Bits of torn flesh and twisted circuitry were all that connected the cranium to the stump of the shoulders. There were no words, in any known language, that could have accurately described the expression on the drone's ruined face.
A new sound came over the speakers, of someone gagging. As the lights played around the chamber, they revealed dozens of drones floating wieghtless or tangled in the wreckage. All had three things in common. They were dead, their heads had all been destroyed, some in ways that could not be imagined, much less described, and the worst of the damage, it appeared,
they had inflicted on themselves.
"No, no, no, no..." D'Lessa's voice, hoarse and grating, sounded over the comms, joining with Jensen's whispering plea. "Gods... Gods..."
"Computer, end playback..." Janeway's sharp command cut through the room. The computer beeped obidiently and the horror on the display faded into blackness.
For several long moments, no one spoke. Chakotay's face was ashen. Seven and B'eLanna looked like the gates of Hell itself had opened wide to provide them with a personal view of Damnation.
Tuvok, to the casual observer, appeared unaffected. Janeway was not a casual observer however and the things she saw on her old friends face spoke volumes.
"All the drones we encountered not killed by the explosions or ship damage all appear to have died of self-inflicted cranial injuries." He began slowly. Chakotay glanced over at Seven,
spoke softly, "It started on the planet's surface and spread to the Borg in orbit..."
"And the collective was forced to sever the Nueral links, to prevent it from destroying all Borg, everywhere." Seven was shaking, her voice a hollow whisper.
After a few more seconds of tense silence Tuvok continued. "Circumstances aside, the mission was at least partially a success. We were able to recover several largely intact segments of a Transwarp drive coil, along with it's relevant support machinery and technologies."
Torres shifted uncomfortably in her seat. It was a strain to find her voice. "We've secured what we salvaged on the Hanger Deck. It's going to take time to reasearch and reverse-engineer it into something we can integrate into Voyager's drives..."
She looked at the Captain, her expression more desperate than apologetic. "There's no way we'll be able to have anything ready with the current repair schedule. It's going to take a lot more time than we have..."
Janeway glanced sharply at the young officer, but said nothing. She was right. It might take months or years of study to unlock the secrets of the ancient Borg drive. Right now,
the thought of the remaining week and a half of repair work ahead of them before they could flee this cursed nebula was all but unbearable.
Again, a uncomfortable silence descended. After a few moments, Janeway nodded, as much to herself as her officers. "B'elanna, continue with the repairs. Safe to say, we need to get out of this Nebula. Commander..." She looked over to Chakotay. "Will we be ready for a safe exit when repairs are finished?"
"Yes..." Chakotay glanced over at Seven, who remained silent. "We'll have the plan on your desk for review by tomorrow but we believe it should offer us the best way to clear this sector without attracting the attention of the Borg..."
"Thank you..." The Captain said softly. She looked at all of them. "Thank you all...
Dismissed..."
Stiffly, as if under a great weight, the officers rose from the table. As they filed to the door, Janeway called out. "Tuvok, stay a moment..."
The Vulcan security officer turned back, waited for his crewmates to leave before walking back over to the Captain. Janeway stood slowly, giving her old friend a almost pleading look. "We never should have boarded that wreck..." It was a statement, not a question.
"The endeavor was not without gain. Only time and circumstance can judge the price we will have to pay because of it."
"The price..." Her tone was derisive. "We've seen the price the Borg paid..." She turned slightly, gesturing out the windows. "Ten more days. Ten more days to escape this Hell."
Tuvok's answer was straightforward. "There is no logical reason to believe we will not.
Repairs are proceeding according to schedule, the ship will be ready when the time comes. Regardless of it's other effects this place has done nothing to hinder or impare our progress toward our goal of leaving."
He paused, his brow creasing slightly. "Granted, the conditions we found aboard the wreck were troubling, but those events were ten centuries in the past. That this nebula is oppresive and detrimental to the mental well-being of the crew has proven to be fact. Given it's history as we have been told it, that is understandable for emotional beings..."
Janeway turned away from the outside view. "Emotional...? The Borg aren't emotional. They are cold, and practical and ruthlessly logical. And they are so terrified of what happened here they won't even approach. After seeing what you saw, what happened to them back then, do you really believe anything as small as logic or emotion will make any difference if whatever took them comes for us?"
Tuvok opened his mouth, then slowly closed it again. He met the Captain's gaze, his eyes grim.
"No..." She said quietly. "No. Neither do I..."
