Chapter 52

Cries In The Darkness

As Seven and Chakotay made it to the Bridge, the ship lurched violently nearly taking them off of their feet.

"Ablative hull armor is holding, Captain." Odo reported as he typed into his console.

"Can you get a positive lock on the life signs from the alien ship?!" Ben yelled over the sound of the Borg cube firing on them. Taking his place at Ben's side, Chakotay rushed to the command center and held on, just as Seven walked over to the science station.

"We can get a lock on them but we can't beam them over because of our shielding." Odo reported. "And we can't destroy the Borg cube yet or we'll risk destroying the ship they're trying to assimilate."

"MACO team go to all essential decks." Chakotay ordered as he tapped at his combadge, already knowing what Ben had planned.

"Transporter room, when we drop the shields beam the lifeforms aboard the ship." Ben added as he tapped at his own combadge. "When they are beamed aboard, I want that cube destroyed Constable. Drop the shields on my mark... now!"

As Odo dropped the shields, the entire Bridge crew held their breath until the Transporter room reported that they beamed the aliens to Sickbay.

A second later, before Odo could raise the shields back up there it was. The one thing they wished they didn't hear. It was the sickening hum of a transport that deposited eight Borg drones on the Bridge. Sisko and Chakotay pulled their hand phasers and struck the first Borg drone together, sending it tumbling to the floor. Dax took out her own phaser and as she aimed it at a second one, she suddenly felt a harsh mechanical grip on her right shoulder. As she let out a cry of surprise, assimilation tubes were suddenly jammed into her neck. Her eyes rolling up in the back of her head and falling to the floor, the voices of millions started to fill her mind. Hearing the voice of it's newest sister in it's own mind the Borg drone turned to face whoever he could get to join them.

Seeing Ben, it started to walk towards him when suddenly Dax sat up with a scream, her face already turning a mottled gray. Hearing her scream Odo looked up from the drone he was dealing with and saw as the bottom of his girlfriend's uniform began to tear and then he saw as something began to squirm along her stomach region. It only took him a second to realize that the Dax symbiote was being rejected by what was now a unwilling and foreign host to it. Watching as the slug moved out from under her tunic, it moved a few inches, and joined Jadzia in the hive mind as Borg implants began to sprout from it too.

"No." Odo whispered hoarsely as he tried to run through the sea of drones to reach his girlfriend.

Sickbay

"Just try to remain calm." Erin said to her alien patient as she tried to hold the woman down. She had plasma burns all along her face and body and with a cry of pain the woman shot up and looked at the doctor deep in her holographic eyes.

"You... you must promise me that you will look after them." the woman wheezed out as Erin followed her line of vision and saw three small children inching closer to where they were.

"I promise." Erin said as she delicately pushed the woman back down. "Kes, get these children back." Erin then ordered as she looked the twin boys and the little girl over and saw that they didn't have any visible injuries. "And get my medical tricorder. We must prepare this woman for surgery."

"Come on children." Kes said as she shooed the children back and handed Erin her tricorder. "Here. What happened?"

"I was watching my emergency medical channel and these people were fired on by the Borg." Erin was saying even as she started to scan the alien woman. "There's something wrong with her nervous system. We've got to stabilize her synapse. Get me a choline compound."

"Which choline compound?" Kes asked as she ran to the medicine cabinet.

"It doesn't matter." Erin replied as the woman slipped into a coma. "Just make sure it's a pure base. Hurry, her heart rate is slowing down. She's on the verge of flatlining."

"Acetylcholine, twenty five microlitres." Kes said as she injected it in the woman's neck. "It's not helping. I'm reading massive synaptic failure."

"This doesn't make any sense." Erin said with a shake of her head as the power started to fluctuate in the room, the lights nearly cutting off. Without dramatic fanfare their alien patient's vitals flat-lined. "Damnit, I'll have to administer CPR." Erin said as she went to work.

"Kes to Engineering." Kes said as she tapped at her combadge. "Transfer all available power to Sickbay."

'We're a little busy down here!' B'Elanna yelled over the comline. 'I'll see what I can... ohhhh!'

As B'Elanna let loose a deafening scream over the comline, Kes' mind flashed back to a vision she had almost two years ago. It was a vision of Chakotay screaming but now she knew that it wasn't of him screaming at that time. It was now. Coming back to herself, she ran from Sickbay, while ignoring the doctor calling her name.

Seeing that what she was doing was now useless and her patient was dead, Erin looked back to the children and saw the twins crying and the little girl staring at her curiously with a blank look in her eyes. "What's your name?" Erin asked of the little girl.

"My name is Mezoti." the young girl replied.


As Kes hurried down a corridor, she heard the sounds of shouting and phaser fire. Slowly turning a corner, she saw Kira, Tuvok, Tabrin and Neelix holding off a group of Borg drones further down the hall. Feeling a foreign power rise up in her body, Kes extended her right hand and an invisible force shot down the hall and destroyed the drones on contact.

Turning around, Neelix and Tuvok looked on in surprise as they saw that the force had come from Kes who still had her hand extended out.

"Ke... Kes did you do that?" Neelix stuttered out as the group approached her.

"Tuvok... I... something feels wrong." Kes started as she began to cry. "We have to get to the Bridge before it's too late. We have to save Chakotay."

"Take her to the Bridge, Tuvok." Kira ordered, already figuring not to doubt Kes or her warnings. "The rest of you come with me. We have to get to Engineering."

"But..." Neelix started as Kira looked at him with fire in her eyes.

"Now, Neelix!" Kira snapped as she and Tabrin started to march off. Giving one last look to his ex-girlfriend, Neelix followed his commanding officer.

The Bridge

Seeing a drone sneak up behind the Captain, Odo rushed up behind it and delivered an ax handle smash to it's back, instantly crushing it's spinal column and sending it to it's knees. Desperately trying to find his girlfriend, two more drones materialized on the Bridge and he heard a clicking sound behind him. Turning sharply, he grabbed a Borg by the arm, ripped it off and used it to crack the skull of another opponent.

Going into a roll, Seven came up behind a Borg drone and took it's legs out from under it. As it went down she rolled again and wrapped her powerful legs around it's head and with a sickening twist, broke it's neck. As she got to her feet, she saw that the drones were either all dead on the ground or they dematerialized off of the ship.

"Is everybody alright?" Chakotay asked with a wince as he looked around, cradling his arm. He knew it had to be broken, because he could barely move it.

"We have to get her to Sickbay." Tom said loudly over the roaring fire, by a burning conduit. The ensign that took Dax's place was standing by the conduit when it exploded and Tom had to hold her down as she tried to claw at her burnt face.

"I think that I should get her down to..." Before Seven could get out the rest of her statement she heard the familiar sound of something being teleported. Looking to where Chakotay was she watched in horror as Dax stuck her assimilation tubes into his neck. As Chakotay passed out, Seven let out a cry as Dax looked at her and then Odo, before teleporting off of the ship.

"Can we get a lock on Commander Chakotay or Dax?" Ben asked as he was the first one to regain his bearings.

"The Borg cube just placed heavy shielding around itself." Tom said as he made it back to the conn, while a group of people came for the Ensign with the burnt face. "We managed to knock out their weapons array though."

"Seven, work with Odo to see if you can cut through the Borg's shield harmonics so we can get our people back." Ben ordered. After a moment, he saw that his daughter wasn't moving. "Seven!" he snapped making her snap out of her daze and rush over to Tactical to help Odo.

At that moment Tuvok and Kes walked onto the Bridge.

"Captain, whatever we do we have to do it quick." Tom said as he turned around and looked at him. "Long range sensors are picking up the presence of three more Borg cubes and there's more on the way. They'll intercept us in three minutes."

'I'm sorry, Seven.' Ben thought to himself. He knew that his ship could take out a few Borg cubes but he didn't know how long it would take for the Borg to assimilate information from Dax and Chakotay. He knew that it would just be a matter of time before they would adapt to the Ares' weapons and take the whole crew. He'd rather destroy the whole ship before he let that happen. "Mr. Paris set a course for... Kes what are you doing?" Sisko asked as the Ocampan woman stepped out in front of him. Raising a hand, a bright light surrounded the ship as they felt themselves being propelled.

"Captain we're entering into... I.. I don't know what we're entering into." Tom spoke up as he typed into his console.

"Kes." Ben said as he stood to his feet. "Kes!" he barked into her ear as he touched her shoulder. Her power fading, Kes dropped her hand and turned around to look at him.

"Sir we're about four light years from our last position." Tom reported. "There's no sign of the Borg following us."

"He's crying, Captain." Kes said weakly as she fell into Ben's arms, her powers drained.

"Who's crying?" Ben asked as he looked down at her.

"Chakotay." Kes replied, barely over a whisper, but Seven still heard her and it made her heart twist up in knots. "He's somewhere crying out into the darkness."

As those words left her mouth, Seven thought back to her spirit guides warning several months ago. This was what Yosef warned her about. Your love for him will bring you sorrow.

Place Unknown

"Oh, my head." Those were the first coherent words that came out of Chakotay's mouth as he became semi-conscious. He still couldn't open up his eyes, but he still felt an almost unbearable pain and coldness. 'Seven.' he immediately thought, as he thought back to the Borg attack. He was in and out of consciousness but still he saw his girlfriend keep fighting till the end.

Trying to sit up, he felt that he was strapped to a table. That realization dawning forced him to open his eyes and he saw that the table was twisting and rotating, giving him frightening glimpses of the room he was in. As it slowed down a little, a new image appeared of six Borg drones clustered together in one section of the room, each with an elaborate series of hoses and conduits connected to its face. Through the tubes he saw an exchange of fluid and energy pulsing back and forth, some sort of bizarre "feeding" or "renewal" was going on. Chancing a glance up he saw that the tubes all seemed to lead toward the ceiling.

Finally he saw that he was in a vast chamber crammed with hundreds of Borg drones standing upright in individual alcoves. They were everywhere, on the ceiling, walls, floor. This was a Borg collective, hundreds of Borg that formed a gigantic "hive" mind. The Borg were half-man/half machine. No individual personalities. No feelings. They had only one goal in life: to assimilate new races into their collective.

"Why does this place look so familiar?" he asked himself, as the table locked into position. "And why is my head hurting so bad?" as if to answer his question a Borg drone opened a panel on the side of his head, and began connecting a thick bundle of optical cabling to it. Looking down at his body he saw that he was already half machine. "What the... what the hell is going on?" he said to himself nervously.

Suddenly a woman's voice, low, seductive, almost deadly, interrupted his thoughts.

"What's going on is...you're mine." She said making him look upward toward the ceiling.

A rustle of movement somewhere in the cyber-tangle... almost like a snake slithering beneath the weeds. And for a brief instant he got a glimpse of a face unlike any Borg he'd ever seen. Or had he? It was the face of a woman. Pale- skinned... piercing eyes...raven hair or cables slicked back...a hauntingly beautiful image in a sea of nightmarish technology. And then just as suddenly as she was there she was gone.

"I know what this is." Chakotay spoke aloud, having remembered in graphic detail when his girlfriend would wake up in the middle of the night and tell him about this place. "This is..."

"Unimatrix One." the voice spoke again as out of the mist that hugged the top of the room, descended the Borg Queen.

After a few moments a huge crane arm came down and placed her torso which was suspended by a complex rig of cables and hydraulics, onto a body that stood independently by itself. Her face and upper-torso were much more humanoid, with the pasty-pale white of Borg flesh. Her eyes had a silvery glint to them and her demeanor was seductive and sensual in contrast to the harsh, mechanical surroundings. He didn't want to admit it, but her features were almost angelic, but the silvery glint in her eyes betrayed an inner-darkness.

"Right now you're wondering why I haven't fully assimilated you." she stated as she got close to his, before waving off her drones.

"The thought.. the thought had crossed my mind." he replied with a wince.

"To be honest Chakotay, I need you." she replied, delicately touching his face with her thumb.

"How do you know my name?" Chakotay asked as he flinched away from her touch.

"Oh, I know many things about you." she said as a single Borg drone marched down the huge hub facility. As Chakotay caught a glimpse of them passing, he held back his tears as he saw that it was Dax or what was left of her as she was covered with Borg technology. "I must admit that your friend is very interesting but you hold something very important. You hold my interest. You are the first of your Native American people that I've ever assimilated and it'll be a spiritual reawakening for me when I take away what you are. Even Still, I've decided to make you an offer that I didn't make to Locutus." she said as she walked around the other side of the table and smiled down at him. "From what I know of your people, they were horribly oppressed on Earth for centuries prompting them to leave and start anew on other planets to preserve what they were. I'm offering you something so much greater. A chance to start anew. I want you to willingly join me as my King."

"What?" he asked, shocked.

"The Borg needs something new to add to it's perfection and not just another drone." she clarified. "But I want you to give yourself to me... to the Collective, willingly. Isn't that much more tempting than merely being with Annika? If you join with me I'll let her go from the Collective... she and your shipmates will be free to do as they please."

'I...I can't do this.' Chakotay thought to himself. As much as he cared for his lover, if he were to serve as the Borg king he would do far more damage then what was already done. Besides he knew that the Queen knew of Seven being on the Ares because she had already assimilated Dax. He knew that there was no way she would let the Ares go with someone so unique like Seven being on board.

"Maybe you need time to rethink my offer." the Queen interrupted his thoughts again, misinterpreting his silence. "I might not be able to hear your thoughts just yet but I can still assimilate you."

As she said that, the Dax drone converged on him with a specialized cybernetic arm, which extruded a series of stiletto-tipped drill spikes that she used to bore into the side of his head, making him scream out in terror.

"I'll let you go for now so you will know the taste of assimilating other worlds." the Queen said as she turned around. "In a few weeks, I'll come back for you and we'll talk again. Welcome to the Collective, Cheveyo." the Queen said before walking off, Chakotay's or rather Cheveyo's screams echoing through the darkness.

A/N The name Cheveyo is of Native American Hopi origin. The meaning of Cheveyo is "spirit warrior". Also I know some people are probably wondering how Chakotay got to Unimatrix one so fast. There was a transwarp conduit not far from their location that took the cube he was on right to the Queen's hive. And yes this is the darkness Yosef warned her about, I told you guys I was going somewhere with that, lol. The scenes with Dax turning into a Borg on the Bridge and the one with Chakotay and the Queen are from an abandoned fic that I wrote back in 2003 that I never got a chance to post on here, but I did post it on some other boards. I knew those scenes would come in handy one day, lol. To my beta if you're reading this, I never got an answer to the pm I sent you about that abandoned story I wanted you to read, just let me know in a pm or a review if you want to read it.