Vader stood in the control room of the Death Star, intently watching the
Borg cube on the view screen. At least, so it seemed to the other people
in the room with him. Through the Force, Vader was trying to touch the
minds of the aliens, to predict their next move.
He left the presence of his ruined, mostly mechanical body, flowing on a tide of pure anger; the anger that fueled the Dark Side. He searched the Borg cube for one, one that seemed in command. However, there was only one individual on board, and that was clearly Tarkin. He could not sense any others, yet there must have been, since some of the aliens had used their matter transporters to take Tarkin and their own soldiers back to their ship.
Vader then decided to widen his perspective, to look beyond individuals and see if some greater, non-corporeal mind was controlling them. What he felt next was like nothing he had ever seen, heard about, or even imagined before.
The emptiness he felt was because none of those beings were truly alive. Their bodies had no midichlorians inside them. They were not of this galaxy, possibly not even of this universe. And, their "minds" were not contained within their bodies. All their consciousness was woven into one single will, a collective consciousness, as it were.
Even when individual soldiers died, their minds still existed within the collective. A consciousness consisting of millions of minds, yet controlling all of those minds as well. Vader held himself back from delving in too deep, for fear that he would lose himself in the overpowering complacency that was The Borg collective. He saw their plans, even their very thoughts. Assimilate. Grow. Learn. Control.
They had no concern for individuals. Their one goal was to absorb all knowledge and technology in existence and spread themselves until they were all that exists in the universe. All will be Borg. Resistance is futile. Resistance is futile. Resistance is futile.
Vader shook off the mind-numbing effects of the collective's monotone whisper. A weak mind would succumb easily to it, but Vader's was no weak mind. He was also assisted by the Dark Side, making him powerful enough to withstand delving fully into the collective.
One consciousness must be more powerful than all the others. That consciousness must be the embodiment of the collective, and all its actions. He plunged into the collective, searching for this mind. He flew past ship operations, assimilation objectives, individual drone commands, to the very heart of the collective. There must be a central point. Must be…
Intruder! Intruder! Alien mind attempting to enter the collective! Reject!
Vader's consciousness struck the metaphysical equivalent of a transparisteel wall. He had been carelessly shooting through the collective without watching for such traps. He was flung out of the collective so forcefully that when his consciousness arrived back at his body, he staggered backward for a second. He shook his head, ignoring the others in the command room. Those others, likewise, were trying to ignore the Dark Lord's moment of weakness, for fear that they would be strangled from a distance, or worse.
Vader reflected on what he had seen. They would not stop until they had assimilated everything. They could adapt to all physical weapons, but he knew that they could be infiltrated by the Dark Side, given the right tactics. However, they had only seen what the Death Star was capable of. They could not adapt to what they had not experienced firsthand, especially not a weapon as powerful as the Death Star's superlaser.
The superlaser would come first, and if that did not work, Vader was confident he could use the Dark Side to annihilate The Borg. He had trained under Palpatine for years. He had read Palpatine's books on the Dark Side and its potential. He was sure he could muster all his Dark Side strength to conjure up a Force storm to wipe every Borg out of existence.
He checked the tech station's chronometer. Only minutes to go before the superweapon could be fired. The end to this battle was near.
"Who are you?" Tarkin demanded. Now that he knew there was a single leader, he was not nearly as unnerved.
"I am the collective consciousness of The Borg."
"I demand you show yourself!"
The female voice laughed slightly, not mockingly, but rather patronizing in its tone. "You are not in much of a position to make demands. Others have made demands of us, but they have been assimilated. Or destroyed," she added, almost an afterthought.
Tarkin heard motion above him. He was not prepared for what he saw. A humanoid female torso, with pale skin and a silver spine extending from its bottom, was being lowered by a set of tubes. She said, "I am the beginning, the end. The one who is many. I am The Borg."
Her torso was lowered into a mechanical body standing a few mere meters from where Tarkin stood. He hadn't noticed the gleaming black form until this moment. When the torso was fully seated in the body, the body seemed to grab onto the torso, and the tubes all released and retracted. She walked toward Tarkin with a distinctly female gait, and a rather sexy stride at that.
He looked at her face. Thin and beautiful, her head was surprisingly small, as if she had been a very petite woman in a previous life. Now her skin shined like the scales of a Trandoshan, and tubes connected the back of her head to her middle back. Her eyes, large and black, were almost hypnotizing. Tarkin's heart started beating more quickly. If he had ever seen the epitome of beauty, she could have been it.
But his first duty was as an officer of the Empire, and he would not abandon his duty. He was concerned, however, with the Death Star. In mere moments, it would fire the superlaser, assuming Vader did not change the plan. Once that happened, The Borg would be destroyed. Tarkin did not intend to be on The Borg ship when that happened.
"Your attack on an Imperial space station is an act of war. An act that will bring the entire Empire upon you, and you will be destroyed. Therefore, I demand you return me to my station and surrender. If you do so, I promise your death will be quick."
Tarkin's voice wavered through part of his speech. He did not have any sort of feelings through that "Force" that Vader kept babbling about, but he could still sense the immense power emanating from this woman. So delicate, yet so strong.
"You see, Governor Wilhuff Tarkin," said the Queen, surprising Tarkin with the use of his little-known first name, "we have no intentions of surrendering. We are The Borg. We will prevail over all. But this place is new to us. We do not know how we are here, but it is definitely alien to us. We need a liaison between The Borg and the peoples of this galaxy."
Tarkin stiffened up, ready to die for refusing to help them.
The Queen continued, "We have read the records of your 'Death Star', including those of your tactical genius and your many victories over unfavorable odds. We also read your own personal files, your own feelings of how you wish to control the galaxy and your frustration at having to submit to a non-military wizard, whom you call 'Emperor Palpatine'. Such authority-based structures are obsolete. The Borg are of one mind, and I am that mind. No training of officers, no having to deal with each person's inefficiencies and mistakes. The Borg make no mistakes."
For the first time, Tarkin was truly caught off-guard. His military demeanor faltered, and his mouth dropped open. They knew. They had seen the thoughts no one else knew about. Vader and the Emperor had had their suspicions of him, but this woman had read him as easily as a datapad.
True, he was frustrated. He was the best tactician in the galaxy, better than the Emperor and Vader combined. The problem was, he was only human, not some super powerful mutant that could manipulate some "Force" to get what he wanted. He deserved to control the Empire. But he knew the chances of that were slim, unless both Vader and Palpatine were eliminated permanently.
"I…I am loyal to my Emperor," he said, not even convincing himself.
"I don't want you as another drone, Tarkin," said the queen. "You have qualities we often lack, such as analytical thinking, and tactical ability. We have been delayed by other creatures who used those skills against us. We…I…want an individual mind, an equal to myself. One that can help The Borg spread and rule. It is not a position for the weak, which is why we have chosen you. You must give yourself to us if you want this power."
Tarkin felt flashes through his mind of the power this one woman held. The Borg had infinite power, and infinite resources. He was aging rapidly, and he knew it. Nearing the end of his natural life. For all the Empire's medical technology, he would not live more than another forty years, and the last twenty would be in retirement, powerless and miserable. With The Borg, he could live forever. He would be The Borg. His power would be greater that a hundred Emperors.
Tarkin could not resist. Resistance was futile. For all his loyalty, his ultimate goal was power, and he was about to be handed it.
"Yes," said Tarkin. "I want the power. I will stand at your side, and help you bring order to the galaxy. The Empire is powerful, but that power is limited. I can see that The Borg are the true power in the galaxy now."
The Queen smiled proudly. Finally, after so many failures, she had her equal. She stroked Tarkin's bony cheek with her hand. "Then it shall be so. We will add your distinctiveness to our own."
One of the drones behind Tarkin reached out to his neck. A pair of tubes stretched from its fingers and impaled Tarkin's neck. Tarkin gasped with the quick pain, but the pain was immediately muted. The Queen, out of gratitude for Tarkin's willingness, blocked the usual pain of assimilation, and watched as the surprised look on his face melted away. The skin of his face tore in several places, and living machinery broke through and grew n the surface of his skin.
Inside, The Borg nanoprobes touched Tarkin's brain. However, instead of losing all voluntary thought to the collective, Tarkin could now begin to hear all the voices of the collective. Harmonious, unified, organized. Like a smoothly-running machine. Filling his mind with the knowledge of centuries of conquest and thousands of cultures. Suddenly, his ability to think and calculate spread a thousandfold. He was no longer limited to three dimensions; he could think across five. He hadn't even been aware of a fifth dimension before. His recall ability became perfect. Unlike in a normal human where memories had the tendency to fade, his memories all became instantly accessible. His memories flowed out of his head and became the collective's, and the collective's memories flowed into his mind, making them his own. He could remember everything he'd ever seen, ever heard, every order he'd ever given…
Suddenly, his voice shouted over the din of the collective, momentarily disrupting the Queen's train of thought.
"We have to leave here! Now!"
He left the presence of his ruined, mostly mechanical body, flowing on a tide of pure anger; the anger that fueled the Dark Side. He searched the Borg cube for one, one that seemed in command. However, there was only one individual on board, and that was clearly Tarkin. He could not sense any others, yet there must have been, since some of the aliens had used their matter transporters to take Tarkin and their own soldiers back to their ship.
Vader then decided to widen his perspective, to look beyond individuals and see if some greater, non-corporeal mind was controlling them. What he felt next was like nothing he had ever seen, heard about, or even imagined before.
The emptiness he felt was because none of those beings were truly alive. Their bodies had no midichlorians inside them. They were not of this galaxy, possibly not even of this universe. And, their "minds" were not contained within their bodies. All their consciousness was woven into one single will, a collective consciousness, as it were.
Even when individual soldiers died, their minds still existed within the collective. A consciousness consisting of millions of minds, yet controlling all of those minds as well. Vader held himself back from delving in too deep, for fear that he would lose himself in the overpowering complacency that was The Borg collective. He saw their plans, even their very thoughts. Assimilate. Grow. Learn. Control.
They had no concern for individuals. Their one goal was to absorb all knowledge and technology in existence and spread themselves until they were all that exists in the universe. All will be Borg. Resistance is futile. Resistance is futile. Resistance is futile.
Vader shook off the mind-numbing effects of the collective's monotone whisper. A weak mind would succumb easily to it, but Vader's was no weak mind. He was also assisted by the Dark Side, making him powerful enough to withstand delving fully into the collective.
One consciousness must be more powerful than all the others. That consciousness must be the embodiment of the collective, and all its actions. He plunged into the collective, searching for this mind. He flew past ship operations, assimilation objectives, individual drone commands, to the very heart of the collective. There must be a central point. Must be…
Intruder! Intruder! Alien mind attempting to enter the collective! Reject!
Vader's consciousness struck the metaphysical equivalent of a transparisteel wall. He had been carelessly shooting through the collective without watching for such traps. He was flung out of the collective so forcefully that when his consciousness arrived back at his body, he staggered backward for a second. He shook his head, ignoring the others in the command room. Those others, likewise, were trying to ignore the Dark Lord's moment of weakness, for fear that they would be strangled from a distance, or worse.
Vader reflected on what he had seen. They would not stop until they had assimilated everything. They could adapt to all physical weapons, but he knew that they could be infiltrated by the Dark Side, given the right tactics. However, they had only seen what the Death Star was capable of. They could not adapt to what they had not experienced firsthand, especially not a weapon as powerful as the Death Star's superlaser.
The superlaser would come first, and if that did not work, Vader was confident he could use the Dark Side to annihilate The Borg. He had trained under Palpatine for years. He had read Palpatine's books on the Dark Side and its potential. He was sure he could muster all his Dark Side strength to conjure up a Force storm to wipe every Borg out of existence.
He checked the tech station's chronometer. Only minutes to go before the superweapon could be fired. The end to this battle was near.
"Who are you?" Tarkin demanded. Now that he knew there was a single leader, he was not nearly as unnerved.
"I am the collective consciousness of The Borg."
"I demand you show yourself!"
The female voice laughed slightly, not mockingly, but rather patronizing in its tone. "You are not in much of a position to make demands. Others have made demands of us, but they have been assimilated. Or destroyed," she added, almost an afterthought.
Tarkin heard motion above him. He was not prepared for what he saw. A humanoid female torso, with pale skin and a silver spine extending from its bottom, was being lowered by a set of tubes. She said, "I am the beginning, the end. The one who is many. I am The Borg."
Her torso was lowered into a mechanical body standing a few mere meters from where Tarkin stood. He hadn't noticed the gleaming black form until this moment. When the torso was fully seated in the body, the body seemed to grab onto the torso, and the tubes all released and retracted. She walked toward Tarkin with a distinctly female gait, and a rather sexy stride at that.
He looked at her face. Thin and beautiful, her head was surprisingly small, as if she had been a very petite woman in a previous life. Now her skin shined like the scales of a Trandoshan, and tubes connected the back of her head to her middle back. Her eyes, large and black, were almost hypnotizing. Tarkin's heart started beating more quickly. If he had ever seen the epitome of beauty, she could have been it.
But his first duty was as an officer of the Empire, and he would not abandon his duty. He was concerned, however, with the Death Star. In mere moments, it would fire the superlaser, assuming Vader did not change the plan. Once that happened, The Borg would be destroyed. Tarkin did not intend to be on The Borg ship when that happened.
"Your attack on an Imperial space station is an act of war. An act that will bring the entire Empire upon you, and you will be destroyed. Therefore, I demand you return me to my station and surrender. If you do so, I promise your death will be quick."
Tarkin's voice wavered through part of his speech. He did not have any sort of feelings through that "Force" that Vader kept babbling about, but he could still sense the immense power emanating from this woman. So delicate, yet so strong.
"You see, Governor Wilhuff Tarkin," said the Queen, surprising Tarkin with the use of his little-known first name, "we have no intentions of surrendering. We are The Borg. We will prevail over all. But this place is new to us. We do not know how we are here, but it is definitely alien to us. We need a liaison between The Borg and the peoples of this galaxy."
Tarkin stiffened up, ready to die for refusing to help them.
The Queen continued, "We have read the records of your 'Death Star', including those of your tactical genius and your many victories over unfavorable odds. We also read your own personal files, your own feelings of how you wish to control the galaxy and your frustration at having to submit to a non-military wizard, whom you call 'Emperor Palpatine'. Such authority-based structures are obsolete. The Borg are of one mind, and I am that mind. No training of officers, no having to deal with each person's inefficiencies and mistakes. The Borg make no mistakes."
For the first time, Tarkin was truly caught off-guard. His military demeanor faltered, and his mouth dropped open. They knew. They had seen the thoughts no one else knew about. Vader and the Emperor had had their suspicions of him, but this woman had read him as easily as a datapad.
True, he was frustrated. He was the best tactician in the galaxy, better than the Emperor and Vader combined. The problem was, he was only human, not some super powerful mutant that could manipulate some "Force" to get what he wanted. He deserved to control the Empire. But he knew the chances of that were slim, unless both Vader and Palpatine were eliminated permanently.
"I…I am loyal to my Emperor," he said, not even convincing himself.
"I don't want you as another drone, Tarkin," said the queen. "You have qualities we often lack, such as analytical thinking, and tactical ability. We have been delayed by other creatures who used those skills against us. We…I…want an individual mind, an equal to myself. One that can help The Borg spread and rule. It is not a position for the weak, which is why we have chosen you. You must give yourself to us if you want this power."
Tarkin felt flashes through his mind of the power this one woman held. The Borg had infinite power, and infinite resources. He was aging rapidly, and he knew it. Nearing the end of his natural life. For all the Empire's medical technology, he would not live more than another forty years, and the last twenty would be in retirement, powerless and miserable. With The Borg, he could live forever. He would be The Borg. His power would be greater that a hundred Emperors.
Tarkin could not resist. Resistance was futile. For all his loyalty, his ultimate goal was power, and he was about to be handed it.
"Yes," said Tarkin. "I want the power. I will stand at your side, and help you bring order to the galaxy. The Empire is powerful, but that power is limited. I can see that The Borg are the true power in the galaxy now."
The Queen smiled proudly. Finally, after so many failures, she had her equal. She stroked Tarkin's bony cheek with her hand. "Then it shall be so. We will add your distinctiveness to our own."
One of the drones behind Tarkin reached out to his neck. A pair of tubes stretched from its fingers and impaled Tarkin's neck. Tarkin gasped with the quick pain, but the pain was immediately muted. The Queen, out of gratitude for Tarkin's willingness, blocked the usual pain of assimilation, and watched as the surprised look on his face melted away. The skin of his face tore in several places, and living machinery broke through and grew n the surface of his skin.
Inside, The Borg nanoprobes touched Tarkin's brain. However, instead of losing all voluntary thought to the collective, Tarkin could now begin to hear all the voices of the collective. Harmonious, unified, organized. Like a smoothly-running machine. Filling his mind with the knowledge of centuries of conquest and thousands of cultures. Suddenly, his ability to think and calculate spread a thousandfold. He was no longer limited to three dimensions; he could think across five. He hadn't even been aware of a fifth dimension before. His recall ability became perfect. Unlike in a normal human where memories had the tendency to fade, his memories all became instantly accessible. His memories flowed out of his head and became the collective's, and the collective's memories flowed into his mind, making them his own. He could remember everything he'd ever seen, ever heard, every order he'd ever given…
Suddenly, his voice shouted over the din of the collective, momentarily disrupting the Queen's train of thought.
"We have to leave here! Now!"