After a month of writing rewritng and writers block it's finally finished...this chapter is anyway.

Chapter 12

Tom sat in his quarters trying to tune out the nasty Borg noise. He looked at a picture of B'lana holding Miral when she was two weeks old. Looking at the picture made him long to see his beloved family again. But with the Borg going to assimilate them in three days it didn't look like he was going to see them again. He looked outside at the massive Exterminator-Cube. It had more cubes attatched to it now. Borg cubes came daily and hooked themselves up to the massive ship to construct it. The Borg must not have much patience. Tom shook his head. All hope had nearly vanished from the crew. No one smiled or laughed anymore. Not even Neelix who usually buzzed around the ship happy as a Klingon who had come back from battle victorious. Tom turned away from the window. He was trying to decide whether to replicate some coffee when the door chimed. "Come in." he called and Seven stepped inside. Uh-oh. "Hello lieutenant." she said calmly. "I am here to-"

"Chakotay sent you didn't he?" Tom interrupted. Seven confused asked "No. Why would he?"

"Never mind. So what is it you were going to tell me?" He said quickly hoping to avoid an argument. Seven pulled a device out of her pocket and handed it to Tom. "Here. This will allow you to talk to other people who wear this device without the Borg overhearing. You and all the other senior officers will be wearing one at the conference today." Tom took the device and looked at it. "Its a bit primitive but it was all I could do on short notice."

"How do I put it on?" Tom asked. Seven pointed to the earphone "That end goes into your ear-" she then pointed to the microphone "-and that end dangles near your mouth." Tom did as instructed and felt around for an on switch. He found something on the earpeice and flicked it. Without warning the noise quit and dead silence overcame the room. Tom looked around so did Seven. "Does this thing tune OUT sound as well?" Tom asked. Seven turned her attention back to Tom. "Yes but...you didn't turn it on. Otherwise I wouldn't of been able to hear you. For some strange reason the noise stopped." Tom pulled the device off his ear. She was right. The sound which had been broadcasting for four days straight had ceased. Then a voice came... "Hello puny biological lifeforms. I have chosen to stop transmitting and reset your communications equipment back to normal since you don't seem to appreciate it. I was so hoping you would. Especially you Seven-of-Nine. I thaught you wouldn't mind listening to your brothers and sisters again. But I geuss not. So instead of assimilating you I will instead destroy your little ship same time tomorrow." The voice cackled and then went away. Janeways voice came over the comm two seconds later "All senior officers I need you on the bridg, now!. Everyone else...prepare for battle, and pray that we get out of here."

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"We have approximately 24 hours to live unless we do something about it." That was Janeway. As she was saying this Tom and Seven walked in and immediately went to their posts."We can't outrun the Borg. We can't destroy them through any means found on Voyager alone. So instead, we'll be blowing up the nebula." Everyone looked confused.

"And how do we do that?" Asked Chakotay. Janeway whispered something to Seven, who stood up.

"Three days ago, while I was running scans on the nebula I discovered something. A new gas that, mysteriously, has never been found in any other nebula. 3 Miligrams of this gas can create an explosion equall to twenty antimatter bombs if exposed to excessive amounts of Nutrion Particles. This nebula obviously contains much more than that and poses a possibility of forming a new star while anihilating anything within a five light year range." Janeway whipped her head around towards Seven.

"You never told me that!"

"I ran some other experiments after I announced my finding to you."

"Well, either way we're going to ignite the nebula anyway." Gasps were heard from throughout the bridge. "And that means we need to create a warp core breach. Or at least find some way of creating enough Nutrion Particles equal to the amount a warp core breach would create. So I'm open to any suggestions that might be made."

"Well," Tom began "Theres a warp core inside one of our shuttles. Maybe we could use that." Janeway nodded.

"Unfortunately, a warp core that size wouldn't create the necessary amount of Nutrion Particles we need." Seven said.

"However," Tuvok said "we could modify a Photon Torpedo warhead, to hold the core as well as an additional three hundred ounds of trilithium, to increase the intensity of the explosion, which should generate more particles."

Janeway looked at Tuvok and said "Do it."

"Hold it," Tom protested "We're inside the nebula. How do we get out without getting ourselves killed?" Janeway bit her lip. She hadn't thought of that yet.

"I know what we could do." Said Harry "We could modify the deflecter dish to emit a magnetic beam. The beam could push away the gas-"

"And enable us to leave the nebula!" Janeway finished for him. "Good thinking, get started on it." Janeway relaxed a little. They had a way out. They had very little time to get out, but it was better than nothing. And for the first time in three days, unable to supress it any longer, she slept.