=/\=
"Cadet Icheb Hansen, reporting for room assignment, sir."
The "sir" in question was a second year cadet waiting for him in the vestibule of Archer Hall, the building which would serve as Icheb's residence for the remainder of this academic year. She nodded her head to acknowledge his presence in that slightly stiff way Icheb noticed was virtually universal when one was introduced to a Vulcan. "You may refer to me by my given name Verit, Cadet Hansen. You are to be one of my suitemates. Follow me."
She held out her hand and relieved Icheb of the small duffel bag containing his study PADDs and miscellaneous paraphernalia. Inside the elevator, she activated the controls to carry them up to the seventh floor of the dormitory. Upon exiting the lift, they walked down a corridor decorated in the grey color scheme so familiar to Icheb from his days on Voyager. Halfway down the hallway, she stopped in front of a doorway and pointed to a metal plate on its surface. Below the names "Sanchez, Tana, and Verit," he saw a slightly shinier piece with "Hansen" etched into it. After Icheb pressed his hand on the touchpad beneath the nameplate, the door swished open, allowing them entry into a spacious room brightly lit by the bank of floor-to-ceiling windows forming its exterior wall.
He gestured for Verit to walk through the doorway before him. He set his bags as soon as he'd stepped inside the door, and it swished closed behind him. "There is no need for a male cadet to wait for a female one to enter a room at the Academy, Cadet Hansen."
While Icheb briefly considered explaining he'd merely wanted to avoid blocking her entrance if his bags got stuck in the doorway, he thought better of it. Even though it happened to be the truth, it sounded like a feeble excuse. Wordlessly accepting her reproof, Icheb looked away from her and examined his surroundings more closely. The space was comfortably furnished by a good-sized table with six chairs, two double desks, a couple of easy chairs, and a couch which looked exactly like the ones in the lounge area of Voyager's mess hall. Standard Starfleet issue, Icheb thought with amusement. The center of each side wall was pierced by a small alcove, which was flanked on either side by square pieces of molding surrounding an empty glass pane. Icheb wondered if the occupants were allowed to post some sort of artwork inside the molding.
His companion interrupted Icheb's train of thought. "Your bed chamber is through that doorway, to the left. Cadet Austin Sanchez occupies the room to the right. As he will remind you often, he comes from the Great State of Texas, which is located along the Gulf Coast of this continent. Our other suitemate is Cadet Tana Farys. She is Bajoran. Are you familiar with the naming conventions of that world?"
"I am, Cadet Verit. I lived with Bajorans on Voyager."
"Good. She will inform you if she wishes to be addressed as Cadet Tana, or simply by her given name of Farys. And you may omit the term 'cadet' when addressing me, Cadet Hansen."
"In that case, please call me Icheb. I'm used to it. Until recently, I had no other designation."
She regarded him intently for a moment. Icheb returned her scrutiny, since he really didn't know what else to say anyway. Verit was pretty, although Icheb didn't think she was as beautiful as Asil. If she turned out to be as easy to speak with as Asil, however, Icheb thought they could become friends. Her coloring was similar to Ensign Vorik's, with very pale skin, inky black eyes, and very dark hair, cut short, with straight bangs over her eyebrows. Once their mutual inspection ended, Verit nodded coolly to Icheb and walked towards one of the desks. Taking a seat, she picked up the PADD lying there and began to read.
As Icheb dragged the bags he'd brought with him through the door she'd indicated, he decided she must know a lot more about his history than he did about hers. That wasn't surprising. A few feature stories had been published about the young Brunali male, rescued from the Borg by the crew of Voyager, who had arrived on that ship when it returned triumphantly to Earth.
When Icheb saw his bedchamber for the first time, he was strongly reminded of Voyager's crew quarters. A narrow bunk was positioned along the short side of the room. Along the far side, he saw a built-in dresser, a closet, and a small sink. Another door, to the right of the sink, led into a sanitary cubicle and the bathing room he knew he was to share with Cadet Sanchez. He noticed the twin of the molding-flanked glass panel on his left. When he played with a small knob next to it, he saw that it was, in fact, a window that opened onto the living area. The knob controlled its opacity. He was able to clear his view completely, to see Verit reading at the desk, or leave it blank, the way it was on its other side. With another setting, he could view an imitation star field, either stationary, or moving, as if he were standing inside a starship. In the corner next to the window, a small desk and matching chair were positioned, with a computer terminal on the desk's surface. A bank of shelves designed to hold small objects such as PADDs rose on the wall above the desk.
It was a small but efficient living space. He approved of its design for another reason. Anyone leaving this chamber for a first assignment on a space-going vessel such as Voyager would be accustomed to the type of quarters a junior officer was likely to be provided on their new ship.
It didn't take very long for Icheb to put everything he had away. He hadn't acquired much in the way of civilian-type clothing as of yet. In fact, he possessed far more PADDs, with research data stored inside them, than anything else. On the center of the shelf above the one holding his collection of PADDs, Icheb carefully placed the paper book Aunt Irene had just sent to him. Her daughter had told her how much Icheb had admired the original when he was given the privilege of viewing it at the Danish Royal Library. Inside the flyleaf of this reproduction of the Copenhagen Psalter, Aunt Irene had written:
Dearest Icheb. Welcome to the Hansen family! I hope you'll keep this book as a memento of your first visit to your cousins in Scandinavia. Come back to see us whenever you can.
Love always, Aunt Irene.
=/\=
If Icheb thought the rest of their suitemates would be as calm and self-contained as Verit, he quickly found he was mistaken. Cadet Tana Farys reminded him of a more self-confident Tal Celes, with a strong but bubbly personality. Verit's comment that Cadet Austin Sanchez would remind everyone that he was from the Great State of Texas "often" turned out to be very accurate. He was also extremely friendly and generous towards his suitemates, as well as just about everyone else he met. On the first night, Austin threw a "welcome, Icheb" party for what he described as his closest friends. Twenty other cadets showed up.
Before arriving on campus, Icheb decided that if asked about why he came back to live on Voyager after his brief return to Brunal, he would provide the same explanation he had given to the Antarean Ambassador O'Zaal, about having become "used to living in space." He never did get the chance to tell that story before the truth came out. While the four suitemates were having supper, before the party guests were due to arrive, Austin and Farys asked him about his experiences as a Borg. "How come you were assimilated, but you're biological parents weren't?" Austin asked.
Icheb tried to recall the details of the story Leucon had foisted upon Seven, only to discover he didn't remember enough of them for that explanation to make sense. When he mentioned being alone in a small transport vessel when he was captured, Farys said she didn't understand how he happened to be alone. "Where were you going? If your ship was so small, you couldn't have been on a trading mission, could you?"
He looked over at Verit. While she hasn't asked him any questions, her eyes were boring into his in the same way Commander Tuvok's always had whenever Icheb had flubbed a response to a question during their tutoring sessions. Farys' befuddlement and Austin's obvious disbelief were even more evident than the Vulcan cadet's silent chastisement.
Icheb gave up and told them the real story. All of it, from the beginning, when he first woke up, alone on a Borg cube with no memory of his past life, having to cope with a thousand Borg corpses by himself; to when the captain transported him back onto Voyager when the Borg were going to assimilate him for the second time.
"How could your parents do something like that to you?" Farys cried out, when Icheb paused in his recitation.
Icheb sighed before answering her. "I've turned this over and over in my mind so many times. I've talked it over with Seven, who was also rescued from the Borg and is now my mother, and with Lieutenant Paris, the chief helmsman of Voyager. My adoptive mother Seven is very bitter about what they did to me - almost as bitter as she is towards her parents for deliberately putting her in the path of the Borg. Mr. Paris has been more helpful. He's tried to provide some perspective on this. Honestly, it's hard for me to think about, but sometimes I can't stop myself. Having seen what the Borg did to my native planet, the only answer I have is that they were so desperate, they'd try anything, even sacrificing one of their children, to stop the Borg from raiding them anymore."
"But why did your parents sacrifice you in particular?" Farys asked.
"I can't answer that, Farys. When they were about to send me to the Borg for the second time, Yifay said me I was important to them, but I didn't know why. But then she injected me with a sedative and put me to sleep without telling me the reason. It's possible I wasn't the only Brunali child given this treatment. Maybe a lot of us were, but my parents were the ones brave enough to actually send me into the path of a Borg cube."
Austin snorted. "Brave? I don't think so, sending their child to be assimilated like that. If they'd made that change in their own DNA and sent themselves to the Borg to be assimilated, maybe then I'd agree with you about their bravery."
"I once asked Mr. Paris about why they simply didn't give everyone on the planet this mutation, so if any of them were assimilated, the Borg would die from it. He said if the Borg figured out the source of the pathogen, they might simply go to Brunal and blow the planet and all its inhabitants to smithereens so it couldn't happen again. That might be why."
Verit, who up to now had remained silent throughout Icheb's story, said quietly, "Sacrificing one person instead of the many is logical, but to do it secretly, without even informing the one sacrificed or allowing him or her to choose to do this - that is illogical. You do not appear to condemn your parents for doing this to you without your knowledge. Is that, in fact, true?"
Icheb smiled up at her. "It depends on the day of the week, I guess. Sometimes I'm very bitter about all of it. At other times, I'm glad Seven's parents didn't protect her, either, so she was on Voyager when my Children's Collective needed to be saved." He shook his head. "I had another story to tell you that wasn't exactly a lie, but it left out so much, it was as good as one. You can see how long it's taken me to tell you the story, and it's just about as painful for you to hear it as it is for me to tell it. I'd appreciate it if you'd just keep this between the four of us. It may all come out eventually, but it would be nice to try and forget it while I'm here with you."
They all murmured their agreement. When the crowd started arriving, Austin took on the role of host, introducing Icheb to all of his friends, keeping the party lively - and the conversation superficial. The subject of how Icheb became Borg never seemed to come up.
At the end of the evening, when the last of the boisterous guests had slipped away to go to their own rooms for the rest of the night, and after Farys and Austin had retreated to their own bedchambers, Icheb sighed in relief and sat down on the couch next to Verit. She leaned over and said softly in his ear, "It is most gratifying to find another suitemate who is as willing to listen to others as he is to express himself in a loud and raucous manner."
"Have I expressed myself in a loud and raucous manner?"
"No, you have not. It is refreshing. The suitemate you replaced was Andorian. Thirin was very intelligent and capable, but his manner of stating opinions was often - loud and raucous."
"What happened to this Thirin?"
"He decided Starfleet wasn't for him after all. He went home in the middle of the last semester. I trust you will not come to a similar conclusion."
"Verit, I lived on Voyager for a year and a half. All of my closest friends were on that ship. Once I was accepted as a cadet, I served in many capacities, almost as many as I would have if I had actually been one of its assigned crew. I learned then that a career in Starfleet was my destiny."
"Then I truly welcome you to Starfleet Academy, Cadet Icheb. As the Klingons say, may your career be glorious."
=/\=
