=/\=
Around the time that Korok the Klingon and Laura the human arrived in Unimatrix Zero, the makeup of Annika's Unimatrix 01 changed. Four of Nine's body had aged to the point that his nanoprobes could no longer keep him healthy, and he had been replaced by a younger drone who'd been assimilated the previous year.
Three of Nine's cortical node began to fail while Unimatrix 01 was flying a scout ship in a binary star system, assessing the planets for desirable resources. Nothing of value was found, and they headed back towards their cube as soon as they learned of Three of Nine's malfunctioning. Three of Nine died while they were on their way back, and Seven of Nine's attempt to resuscitate her through the modified nanoprobe technique was insufficient to revive her. The medical drones on their cube inserted a replacement cortical node, but it was too late to save her. The replacement Three of Nine proved to be one of the beings assimilated at Wolf 359. Laura knew of her, and that she had also been a Starfleet officer, but the two were not personally acquainted. Laura was able to identify the new Three of Nine's species as Bajoran, however. Since the newcomer did not possess the mutation allowing visits to Unimatrix Zero, Annika did not learn the pre-assimilation designation of the new member of her unimatrix at that time.
Whenever Axum was absent from Unimatrix Zero while Annika and Laura were together at the sanctuary, the two human women enjoyed speaking with one another. Through their conversations, Annika felt she gained valuable insight about what it was like to be a human - not that it was necessarily enough for complete understanding. In many ways, Annika wasn't sure she truly was human anymore. It had been so long since she'd been around any. Laura had become Borg when she was an adult, not a child, however. Annika hoped she could serve as her guide to becoming more human, even if that "becoming" could only take place in the virtual world of Unimatrix Zero.
=/\=
The friendship with Axum that began on Annika's first day in Unimatrix Zero continued to thrive. If anything, they'd become even closer over time. While they still had no knowledge of exactly which Borg vessels contained their physical bodies, nor where their respective vessels were positioned relative to each other's, they no longer allowed that to bother them. They enjoyed their virtual lives and shared whatever they could about what they'd learned in the "real" world of the Collective. She told him of the circumstances of her assimilation, or as much of it as she still recalled. Those early memories were fading, since she had not yet reached the age of seven years when she became Borg. Sometimes he could tell her things about that first day in Unimatrix Zero which she could no longer recall. Pennia had relayed details of what Annika and her mother had said to each other after Pennia brought Annika to Erin.
When Annika asked Axum about how he had become Borg, he recalled many more details of his last day as an individual. He'd been older, just entering adolescence when he was assimilated. He remembered his terror when the Borg forced everyone at his school into the courtyard and separated them into two groups. The younger students were sent to one end, and the teachers and older children, including Axum, were herded towards the other. Drones plunged assimilation tubules into the necks of Axum and his classmates one by one. Axum was one of the last to be attacked, and as a result, he observed the different ways the children were handled, which seemed to have been based upon their level of physical development. After the attacking drones plunged their assimilation tubes into the necks of the youngest victims, the children were hoisted over their attacker's shoulders and waves of colored light enveloped them.
"Then they disappeared. The teachers and the older students like me were held between a pair of drones. They kept us from trying to escape while the nanoprobes were injected into our necks. I saw metal things sprouting through my schoolmates' skin as it turned a spotty gray, and I remember thinking that I hoped they wouldn't do that to me. Of course they did. Then the waves of light surrounded us, too. The schoolyard disappeared and was replaced by a world of metal, lit a very strange acid green. I didn't know the metal things were implants, or that the colored light was from a transporter beam, until after my own transformation provided me with the explanation. I'd never seen a transporter in action before. I don't know if my people had ever even thought about inventing that mode of transportation. The Ioroni had attained space flight within our own star system, but we'd only just begun to experiment with something called 'warping space' propulsion. In general, our technologies couldn't have added much to the Hive mind."
"If that's so, why did the Collective see your people as worthy of assimilation?"
"I believe our physical natures were the true prize. We're strong and healthy. I know now that we're very long-lived, compared to many other species which have been assimilated by the Collective. We're a very adaptable people, too. The members of Species 6147 were assessed by the first Borg scouts to have the potential of becoming excellent drones. And our star system was exceptionally well-stocked with minerals. That must have been a primary attraction for the Borg Queen to attack us, as well."
"The younger children in your school . . . do you think they were placed into maturation chambers?"
"From what you told me about the way your 'bad giant' handled you on The Raven, I believe they were."
"Have you ever seen any of your people on your sphere? Or here in Unimatrix Zero?"
"No, Annika. I've never seen any of the Ioroni again. After my assimilation was complete, I was transferred from the cube that attacked my planet to another, and a short time later, to my sphere. It's large, but it's much smaller than any of the cubes."
"So you're alone now, like me."
"Yes, we're both alone."
"I'm glad we have each other."
The tone of his voice grew deeper, gentler, and much softer. "So am I, Annika. So am I."
=/\=
