The conference room filled quickly with Voyager's senior staff. They all wanted to see what everyone else had and hoped it somehow fit with what they had. Captain Janeway sat at the head of the table and watched as her crew took their seats. She noted that Seven wasn't there yet, and she wondered if she'd had trouble with the baby since Seven was normally one of the first to arrive.

"I take it the Doctor couldn't find anything wrong with the two of you?" Chakotay asked as he looked over at Tom and Harry.

"Nothing new anyway. Harry's still pretty wired, and I think it rubbed off on the Doc." Tom answered with a chuckle in his voice.

Harry shot Tom a look and was about to reply to his friend's jab when Seven and the Doctor finally walked in. The two latecomers quickly took their seats and apologized for their tardiness. Janeway nodded knowingly to them both and then began the meeting.

"It would appear we've found ourselves quite a puzzle whose pieces don't really seem to fit." The Captain began. "We've got the derelict alien ship, the Borg sphere, and now a new piece to add to the puzzle." She paused, taking the moment to look over at Seven, and then addressed the crew again. "It would seem that Seven and I are parents."

Seven stepped in seamlessly. "The Doctor has discovered that the child we found on the sphere is biologically our daughter."

Tom and Harry looked shocked and Tuvok's eyebrow rose. It really didn't surprise either Seven or Kathryn that B'Elanna and Chakotay didn't seem surprised, they were each in their own way their partner's best friend. Once the mumbled questions and confused congratulations had settled, Seven explained what she'd found in the computer core regarding the child. She then explained what she and B'Elanna had found out about the sphere. She told them about the sphere being used as a 'nursery', about the files they'd gotten into, and then about the potential Borg Queen threat.

"So you think that she was creating an heir?" Chakotay asked.

Seven nodded. "That is the current the hypothesis."

"What we still don't know is why she choice to create a child using me and Seven." Janeway added in.

"Captain, if I may?" Tuvok said. When he got a nod from Janeway he went on. "You have on several occasions prevailed in your conflicts with the Borg Queen. Seven has proved to be a fascination for her in that she finds Seven to be unique."

"Are you suggesting that maybe she sees me as some kind of equal?" Janeway asked her oldest friend and second officer.

The Vulcan nodded. "She has been known for searching out an equal in the past."

Janeway nodded. "Jean-Luc Picard. But why not just use him to create a child?"

"Maybe she isn't into guys." Tom blurted out. Every set of eyes in the room was suddenly on him and it made him blush a little. "What?"

Ignoring Tom's remark Tuvok went on. "The Queen that Captain Picard faced and ultimately destroyed clearly isn't the one we have been dealing with."

"Who's to say the Queen we have now isn't somehow tied to Picard." B'Elanna tossed out. "We don't know how Queens are made or chosen or whatever."

Everyone looked to Seven who simply said, "I was unaware of there being Queen until our first encounter with her. So I am unaware of the process of how secession works."

What Tuvok said made sense. She had gone toe to toe with the Queen and she'd come out on top, and she had done so with Seven's help.

"The Borg strive for perfection." Tuvok continued. "The Queen seeks perfection, she is, in her own mind, perfection. A child created from the genetic material from someone she saw as an equal, and someone she saw as being unique, with her influence…"

Tom shivered at the idea. "That's a scary thought. A Borg Queen who's part Captain Janeway, part Seven and raised by the current Queen?"

Harry nodded in agreement. "Seriously, if the Captain where the Borg Queen forget it, just assimilate me now."

Janeway couldn't help but grinned. "I think I'm flattered." After sharing a smile with the two young men Janeway got the meeting back on track. "Whatever the reasoning for her creation the baby is here and we can expect that the Queen will want her back."

"There is still no sign of Borg activity in the area." Tuvok said as he looked down at the padd in his hand. "That however can change at any moment given their ability to appear suddenly anywhere through a trans-dimensional rift."

Janeway nodded. "Lets stay at yellow alert for now and continue to run scans of the area. Now, about what killed those ships and the people and Borg aboard them."

"After speaking to the Captain in regards to the unknown toxic gas that Lieutenant Paris and Ensign Kim found on the alien ship, I began to look at the logs regarding the drones bio-status." Seven paused as she pressed a button on her padd sending a file to the screen on the wall. A line of data scrolled up the screen as she spoke. "I found an unknown toxin in the logs. It seemed to have hit every drone at once. How it did this is unknown."

"It went through the ship's collective in a matter of moments." B'Elanna added. "But the toxin isn't what shut the sphere down."

"Then what did?" Chakotay asked.

"The drones." B'Elanna answered. "It was their last dying act."

Seven elaborated. "Once they realized the toxin was moving through their systems they performed a system wide shut down to prevent the toxin from spreading throughout the Collective."

"The maturation chamber had it's own systems." Janeway noted as she looked at the screen. "A fail safe to keep the baby safe if anything were to happen to the rest of the ship."

Seven nodded. "It was a fail safe."

"I've been looking over the information that Ensign Kim was able to bring me from the alien ship." The Doctor began. "It would appear that the toxin that killed both crews was created on that ship."

"The Slayer." Tom added. "From what we were able to find out, the ship was called the Slayer and the people on it were the Gortortians."

"So not the Brunali again?" B'Elanna asked.

"There are other people out there who want the Borg dead." Tom reminded his wife. "Hell didn't the Enterprise even try cooking up a virus once?"

Janeway nodded. "They did but Picard didn't follow through based on moral issues."

"Guess the Gortortians didn't have any moral issues." Harry said. "That place was horror scene."

Tom nodded his agreement to that statement before adding, "The ship's logs state that they've spent the last ten years perfecting the gas compound and hunting down Borg to test it out on."

"So they developed a gas that could kill the Borg. They got it onto the sphere and wiped out all the drones. The baby was uninfected because the maturation chamber kept her safe. So now the question is, what happened to them?" Chakotay asked.

"Best guess," B'Elanna said as she sat forward after looking over all the notes on her padd. "Someone goofed."

Janeway picked up her padd and looked over the detailed information. "That's one hell of a goof. Doctor, is there a threat to anyone if we send another away team?"

"No," The Doctor replied. "I've examined both Lieutenant Paris, and Ensign Kim, and I checked the biofilters from the away team who went to the Borg sphere. All were clean."

"Then I want you three," Janeway began as she looked at Tom, Harry, and the Doctor, "to go back to the Slayer and find out more. Maybe if we're more careful with the gas we can use it to our advantage." The three men nodded their heads. "Seven, B'Elanna, keep working on those Borg files. Any and all information at this point, the more we know about everything and anything Borg the better. The rest of you, I want Voyager ready for any unwanted guests who might show up to the party."

B'Elanna, Seven, Tuvok, and Chakotay all nodded their heads and Janeway dismissed them. Most of them filed out of the room quickly and headed off to their perspective assignments; Seven and Janeway however lingered behind.

At first neither knew what to say but after several lingering seconds Kathryn began, "Seven, about the baby…"

"Gretchen." Seven informed her as she moved to stand in front of the older woman.

Janeway blinked and then smiled a lopsided smile. "Gretchen?"

Seven suddenly felt nervous. "The Neelix asked if she had a name and then the Doctor went into his monolog about picking the perfect name. He said it should be a strong name with a positive connection to where she comes from and where she is going. Your mother's name came to mind. I hope you're not up set with me for choosing without you."

Her response was to kiss Seven quickly but firmly. When she pulled back from her young lover she held one of Seven's hands in her own. "I think it's a wonderful name, Annika." She replied with a bright beaming smile. She was truly touched by the gesture and was finding it hard to keep tears from her eyes. "Humans often give their children middle names as well, Annika. We could name her after your mother too."

"No." Seven stated flatly. She still had mixed emotions regarding her own parents. It was because of them she'd been assimilated at six years of age. Her emotions towards her parents were one of the reasons she preferred not to use her human name. The only person who had truly connected to Seven on that deep a human level was Kathryn, which is way only Kathryn called her Annika. Well, almost the only person, her aunt called her by name as well but that's because the woman had only known her as the small six year old girl who loved strawberries so much.

Janeway licked her lips before biting her bottom one for a moment. "Ok. Then what about Irene?"

Seven blinked. She found it a little unnerving but also very comforting when Kathryn did that. She thought for a moment and nodded. From what she'd seen of her aunt through the communiqués the woman was kind and Seven was fond of her. "That is acceptable."

"Then it's settled." Janeway smiled a little. She was feeling overwhelmed again but in a good way. There was something almost thrilling in giving your child a name. It made everything seem that much more real.

"You wished to speak of Gretchen?" Seven asked as a way of reminding Kathryn of how this conversation had started.

Janeway nodded. "I wanted to see how you were doing dealing with all of this."

"I am," Seven started and then paused to think. "Overwhelmed."

"You and me both." Janeway admitted as she looked up into Seven's eyes. "I'm sorry for running out on you both earlier."

"You were feeling trapped." Seven said as she lightly squeezed Kathryn's hand since her lover was holding her meshed hand.

Kathryn shook her head. "No, Annika, not trapped, scared. I don't know how to be someone's mother, no one does at first, not really but most people get months at least to figure it out before it happens. Most people have some knowledge that it's going to happen."

"We will adapt." Seven reassured her lover. "Our daughter needs her mothers."

The smile on Kathryn's face was huge and bright. "I like the sound of that. Our daughter."

Seven returned that bright smile as she reached up with her free hand to caress Kathryn's pale faintly freckled cheek. The two women spent a few more stolen moments together before going their separate ways. Seven headed down to the cargo bay to work while the Captain returned to her place on the bridge. That brief chance to reconnect with each other helped them both to move on and prepare to face the next level of this sudden change in their lives. It would be a massive adjustment but they both felt stronger knowing the other was just as ready and willing as they other.