Chapter 20 Alpha and Omega Part II
Unimatrix 001 – Borg Space
Five ships came through the gate. A Negh'Var and Warbird, accompanied by three Sovereigns. One of the Sovereigns was the U.S.S. Enterprise. As soon as the ships came out of the gate three cubes approached. The center one contained Locutus. He hailed the Enterprise.
"We are as one Picard. I knew you would follow. Humans are predictable. Your ships and crews will be assimilated into the collective, but you Picard are too great a threat to the Collective. You and the Enterprise will be destroyed." He said
Locutus' cube fell back as the other two cubes attacked. They were however quickly defeated by a combination of phaser, torpedo, Ion Cannon and Shield inversion fire.
"Sir, Borg ships closing fast." Said Data
"It's a trap! All ships retreat to the warp gate I say again retreat through the warp gate." Ordered Picard
The five ships fought an intense retreat covering each other as the ships entered the gate. The Borg with several ships kept firing at them. One of the Sovereigns was damaged but managed to get through. Then all of them were through, the Borg continued to fire and destroyed their own gate to prevent the alliance from coming back.
Unbeknownst to them however, a small group of cloaked ships hid behind a nearby nebula. Two Bird of Preys, a Shrike, two Griffins and the Avenger. Worf hailed the Enterprise.
"It appears the Borg have fallen for your plan Captain." Said Worf
"Excellent Worf, apparently Locutus does not know my thoughts as well as he claims. Now you must capture a Borg construction ship and rebuild a transwarp gate so we can return." Said Picard
"I understand Captain. Worf out." Replied Worf.
Worf ordered the small group of ships to re-cloak then looked at his sensor board. There were two options. The Borg construction ship near a mining operation or behind a cluster of nebulas. He chose the Borg ship behind a cluster of nebulas, they would offer cover from long range scanners and allow the building of a sizable base to launch their attack. The problem was that they were surrounded by cerulean nebulas. It would be nearly impossible to get into the area cloaked. The nebula would disable the cloak along with standard weapons. But sensors were unaffected. He ordered his ships into the nebula and worked to extend the sensor range. There were no Borg ships or stations in sensor range yet.
Worf ordered the small fleet out of the nebula and cloaked immediately. One of the Bird of Preys moved ahead and found a small construction ship with one hundred drones aboard. It was guarded by three interceptors and a sphere. Worf ordered the fleet into position. "We will have to hit the sphere first and all at once, before we can break and attack the interceptors. Do not fire on the assembler. Standby." Ordered Worf.
"NOW!" he said.
Immediately all six ships decloaked and opened fire. The Sphere didn't even get a shot off before it was destroyed. "All ships, remember don't fire on the assembler yet, we're trying to capture it, prepare boarding parties." Ordered Worf.
The three interceptors didn't last long either. But one of the Klingon ships was heavily damaged in the fight. Worf ordered it into the cerulean nebula to make repairs to everything except weapons. With the escorts gone the fleet surrounded the assembler. Firing careful bursts they beat down the shields and began boarding it. It went slow at first, the Borg drones adapted to the boarders weapons quickly, but the Klingons handed out Bat'leth and knives to the other parties, even the Romulans, and the process was much faster. Eventually they did capture the ship and immediately began construction on a new transwarp gate.
Three hours passed and the gate was finished.
Six more ships came out of the gate. The flagship of every race in the alliance, Martok's Negh'Var, Sela's Warbird and the U.S.S. Enterprise along with a construction ship from each race. "We must act quickly; the Borg will detect the transwarp activity soon and send ships to investigate. Begin construction and prepare to meet the attack. Once we have secured the area it is imperative we find the Omega containment facility and destroy it. When Omega destabilizes the chain reaction will destroy all of subspace in the sector and everything in it, including the Borg. We will not have much time to escape, but it is our only option." Ordered Picard.
The construction ships began building Starbases at the entrance to what would become their main base. There were few moons inside the perimeter but the alliance made do with what they had and Picard had a trick up his sleeve as well. As several turrets were built to provide extra protection, Picard ordered the Romulan and Federation to develop their technology. The Romulans were able to build everything up to and including their Phoenix Facility inside the nebular perimeter. Unfortunately the Federation had to build its Temporal research center outside the perimeter, but there were plenty of turrets to protect it and Starfleet recently armed it with a few pulse phasers.
"Captain, sensors are detecting power surges from the Borg Nexus' in this sector." Said Data
"They must be reinforcing the shields on the Omega containment facility. We will have to destroy them first. I have an idea. Number one, have the Romulans begin building a Phoenix-class ship, we can use the Transwarp gate to insert it behind enemy lines near the Nexus' and we can use the Temporal stasis field to freeze any ships nearby." Said Picard
"Captain, we don't quite have enough resources for that class of ship. The moon inside the perimeter is empty too." Reported Riker
"Not a problem Number one. Computer, open a subspace channel to the Pleiades Cluster."
"Channel open." Said the Computer
"This is Picard: Show me the money." He said
"Message acknowledged and received sir." Said Riker
"Sir the transwarp gate is activating and several ships are coming through." Reported the Helm
"Red alert!" yelled Riker
"Belay that." Picard said calmly.
As Riker turned with a stunned expression on his face, half a dozen mining ships full of dilithium came through and immediately docked with the mining station.
"Will that be enough Number one?" Picard asked
Riker looked at the resource count, coughed and said "Yes sir I think that will do."
"Then make it so. Oh and have those mining ships decommissioned when they've made their deliveries. We need all the resources we can get." Picard replied.
As the super ship was being built, the Borg made several attempts to break through and get into the base. But there were simply too many turrets and Starbases to deal with. Even sending three fully armed cubes barely put a dent in the line of turrets. After two hours of fending off attack after attack, the Phoenix-class ship was ready and standing by.
"Enterprise to Phoenix, standby to enter the transwarp gate. Manheim research facility, activate a stasis field at these coordinates, transwarp gate, activate a conduit to these coordinates."
"Manheim facility here, stasis field online and activated." Replied the facility.
"Conduit open and stable." Reported the crew aboard the gate.
"Phoenix here, is it time yet?" asked the small crew.
"Standby….Phoenix, go through the gate, once you are through, activate your spacial rift weapon immediately. Good luck."
"For the Romulan Star Empire!"
The Phoenix-class ship went through, immediately reappearing next to one of the Nexus is the sector.
"Spacial rift detected." Reported the computer.
A few tense minutes passed before Data reported "Captain, sensors are reading a 25% drop in power to the Omega Containment Facility."
"Excellent, tell the Romulans to build two more of the Phoenix-class ships. And have all personnel ready to evacuate on my order." Said Picard.
"Aye sir."
A few more hours and a couple of power transfers to the Manheim facility and the alliance was ready for its second attack. Sensors indicated the last Nexus also had the modification center and technology node required for the Borg's special weapons. Picard sent two sets of coordinates, one set went to the transwarp gate and the other went to the temporal facility.
The transwarp gate activated a conduit leading to a point between the Nexus and the Borg stations.
The Manheim facility activated a stasis field around those coordinates.
A Phoenix-class ship entered the conduit.
Another spacial rift was detected.
Another Nexus was destroyed.
"Excellent, the Omega Containment facility is now vulnerable to attack, Phoenix two, standby to-"
"Captain! I'm reading three Borg ships heading this way, one of them is Locutus'." Said Data.
Locutus' cube tried to get in the base, but it too was heavily damaged by the turrets and Starbases. Before he died Locutus hailed the Enterprise.
"My death is irrelevant, resistance is futile Picard, it is only a matter of time." He said
"Fire all weapons." Ordered Picard
But the Enterprise never got off a shot before the cube exploded. However, what Federation sensor did not detect through the debris was a Borg sphere, going through a temporal rift similar to the one the Premonition created.
For the third time, the transwarp conduit opened near the containment facility, a stasis field opened around the same coordinates, and a small Romulan ship came out of the conduit.
Once again a spacial rift was detected. But it would be a tense minute before sensors read that the containment facility had been destroyed. As the stasis field dissipated the Borg realized what happened and attempted to save the Omega particle. Structural integrity has been compromised. Particle 010 destabilizing. Reinforce containment field.
"The Omega containment facility is destabilizing, inform all ships to head for the warp gate immediately." Ordered Picard.
Luckily the Starbases and other stations had already evacuated. Several hundred shuttles packed with personnel went through the gate along with the Avenger, Enterprise, Martok's Negh'Var and Sela's Warbird. The Omega Particle, despite the efforts of the Collective exploded taking everything in the sector in it.