The panicked status reports flowing out of the comm systems were eerily reminiscent of Wolf 359, and they sent a faint chill down Admiral Picard's spine as he observed the flow of battle.
"...heavy damage to the starboard nacelle, falling back to secondary tactical position,"
"Shields at forty three percent, falling back to mobile position three, taking heavy fire...!"
"-antimatter containment is going!" Static made the last report too garbled to fully understand, "...hull breach in progress...! ...-all hands abandon ship! Repeat, all hands abandon-"
Picard stared intently at the main viewer, his face a mask of stone. Around him, the bridge of Seventh Fleet's flagship was a storm of activity, as Captain Riker fought his ship. On the main viewer, debris, jagged pieces of broken tritanium hull, and a multitude of moving and non-moving lights haloed a savagely wounded Borg cube. Its massive structure showed rents big enough to fit a Galaxy Class starship into, and its outer superstructure was a crumbling ruin, but this only served to hide the danger the ship still posed to all ships in range.
The Enterprise was currently shielding a series of desperate rescue operations spawned by the destruction of two entire Galaxy Wings. The ships of both task forces had gotten the worst of the initial back-and-forth exchange between the Borg Cube and the Federation fleet.
Starships swam through space around the Cube, speckles of fire lancing out seemingly at random. The rate of fire was low enough to indicate that the battle had been going on for some time, and ships were struggling to recharge fading phaser banks, and were hording the precious remaining torpedoes in their stocks.
A wavering green beam lashed out from some emitter deep inside the Borg ship, latching onto the small sleek form of one of the half dozen Intrepid Class light cruisers that were making close passes at the behemoth. The small ship staggered in space, firing two bright red beams up towards where the emitter was located, but the green beam continued plying at its shields. The ship was obviously doomed, unless a miracle occurred.
"Captain..." Picard touched the sleeve of his former First Officer, and the man looked over for a moment, pulled from his battle-fever by the urgency in his voice. He looked back to the viewer, seeming to divine what Picard was thinking.
"Ensign, adjust your heading thirty degrees to port, maximum impulse!"
"Aye, sir!" The young man's fingers did a feverish tap dance on his control panel, and the flagship accelerated back into the thick of the battle.
Up ahead, a blackened and scorched Prometheus Attack cruiser swooped between the Borg ship and the dying Intrepid, firing phasers from multiple emitters in short bursts, obviously playing through the frequencies hoping to get lucky. They got lucky, and one of their phaser bursts touched off an explosion which gouged another hole in the side of the massive Cube, and the green beam evaporated into space. The massive ship began to turn.
"Ensign!" Riker snapped, "Auxiliary power to the impulse engines...!"
Too late. A flurry of quantum torpedoes flew from the underside of the Prometheus, enlarging the hole in the Borg vessel, shooting yellow tendrils of secondary explosions all along that side of the Cube. That was when the Cube turned on its axis and spat several green bolts of energy back at the small attack cruiser, which was soon wreathed in secondary explosions of its own.
"There goes the Rhode Island," Riker said softly. After a moment's contemplation, he turned aside to a sensor officer. "Did Admiral Janeway make it off the ship?" The petite officer plied her controls for a moment before turning with an expression that was completely devoid of emotion save for around the eyes.
"No sir. I'm sorry."
Picard frowned subtly. They were committed, but something was off just a little, something he couldn't quite pin down. The ship shook as the wounded Borg vessel suddenly increased its attacks, and as ships died around him, Picard sat deep in concentration. Status reports continued to flow.
"...we've lost the entire Beta and Gamma wings, and Theta is down to half strength! It's getting too hot in here, we've got to pull back-" static. Sparkles on the screen, fighters dying in the night like lightning bugs winking off, though in this case never to return.
"Secondary fallback zone had been compromised! All ships scatter, repeat, all ships-"
The secondary fallback zone included the Fleet's Carriers, which were now at risk of being overrun. Picard sat up slowly, as if the weight of his dying command was literally on his shoulders. He pressed a button on the small panel on the left arm of his command chair.
"Mister Worf, what's your strength?" he asked. A short hiss of static responded, then,
"Admiral!" A gruff Klingon voice made the name sound almost like an insult, though that was undoubtedly adrenaline fueled. "Forty seven percent of my combat strength remains, nearly half of that in Peregrines! One more strike should be sufficient-"
"Yes, Mister Worf, recall the remaining fighters," Picard said firmly. "Send them all in together."
"Yes sir!" The Klingon barked, "Twelve seconds until all Carriers achieve full deck launch, then all fighters will-" Static garbled the rest of his words, and on the view screen, one of the Akiras took a series of energy blasts dead on, before swooping gracefully to the side, a third of its saucer melted away. Seconds later, fighters spilled from the damaged deck, and from the other Carriers, which were escaping on different vectors.
"Mister Worf!" Picard's tone took on an urgency for the first time. To his right, Captain Riker leaned forward, snapping orders to interpose the flagship between the Borg Cube and the wounded Akira.
"Do you copy, Mister Worf?" Riker almost yelled out. Long seconds ticked by, and the wounded ship limped away at its best speed as multiple Borg tractors tore at the Enterprise.
"Shields at forty-three percent, Captain! We're getting leak-through pretty bad, the ablative armor is taking damage-" The Ensign's report was interrupted by the crackling of static. Klingon curses rolled out over the comm systems, and despite the crashing sounds and hiss of fire extinguishing systems, Worf's voice sounded like it was coming through an amplifier.
"All Peregrines are away, but the Midway is too wounded to fight or run-"
"Just hang tight, Mister Worf," Riker said tautly, hanging on to the arms of his command chair as the Enterprise bucked wildly. "We'll get you and your ship out of here!"
"You'll be destroyed yourself if you try to shield our ship with your own. Perhaps today is a good day to die after all-!" On the screen, the damaged ship turned on its axis, leaving the shadow of the Enterprise and firing off a volley of photon torpedoes. A Borg tractor beam flitted out and tore the vessel in half. Picard sat back slowly as if the breath had been knocked out of him.
A swarm of dots converged on the damaged Cube. Closing in, sparkles of white spawned from the front of the fighters, covering the enemy ship in explosions. Too many subs-systems had already been damaged, and one of the numerous quantum torpedoes hit something critical that happened to be unshielded at that moment. A third of the Cube vaporized, and the rest began to slowly come apart, as if the ship's regenerative capabilities were working in reverse. There was no escape sphere.
The view screen went dark, the red battle lighting faded, and normal illumination came back up.
"Simulation ended," said the computer in its usual blank female voice. After a moment's rest, the Admiral lifted his head.
"All ships of the Fleet, return to normal operating status," he said, his voice tired. "All flag officers report to the Enterprise for the after-action briefing. Picard out."
The hushed reverent atmosphere that had haunted the corridors of the Enterprise since her assignment to the newly reactivated Seventh Fleet was shaken by the most recent events, as evidenced by Captain Riker and Admiral Picard as they made their way down one of them towards the briefing room. Around a bend in this particular corridor, excited voices could be heard.
"I'm telling you, it was my torpedo!" An exuberant Captain Tom Paris gesticulated wildly, narrow missing his fellow conversationalist's head as the two of them turned the corner and came into view. The Andorian moved his head slightly, antennae twitching for a moment, more from expression of denial than frustration at his colleague's antics.
"It was not, I can assure you," the blue-skinned alien replied stiffly.
"It was! You saw how perfect my pass was," he maneuvered his hand as if it were a ship, "Boom! In and out, and then it went up like a firecracker!"
The Andorian snorted and shook his head.
"You're more stubborn than many of my species, I'll give you that."
"Gentlemen, gentlemen...!" The sharp contralto female voice made Tom and the Andorian jump. "Aren't you supposed to be on your way to a briefing?" The two looked like a pair of misbehaving kids caught in the act. "You could at least do yourselves the favor of getting there before the Admiral gets there..." Riker chose this moment to inconspicuously clear his throat, and Tom suddenly snapped into an attention pose that would put most cadets straight from the Academy to shame.
"I-I'm sorry sir, I didn't recognize you... I mean-" the man floundered, "I didn't mean it like that..." The Andorian beside him might as well have been a blue statue etched into a mountain. It didn't even look like he was breathing.
"At ease, gentlemen," Picard said, hiding the humor he felt. He gave a subtle nod Riker.
"After you," Riker said, nodding and gesturing down the hall with open hand. His voice carried enough sting to make Tom sweat furiously, but still held a hint of good humor. The two walked, or marched rather, ahead, and while Picard leaned closer to Riker, fingering the short, somewhat sparse white hair covering most of his face and cheeks.
"Doesn't make me look old, does it?"
Riker put on his poker face.
"Of course not, sir."
The facial hair was very close to how he remembered himself when the temporal trickster Q had taken him to a possible future. He had never considered himself to be a beard man until the day he decided to grow it. Riker leaned in, and the change in expression told Picard that his Flag Captain had changed trains of thought. The rapport to know such things about the man he had worked with so closely for so long was what had led to him requesting the man for the position.
"Speaking of the young Captain's outburst a minute ago, that was the first sim run that ended up at least close to a win. how long are we going to be running the fleet through anti-Borg tactics?" The gleam in Riker's eyes told Picard exactly what was going through the man's mind. He got that look whenever he thought he was not being given all the information, especially when that information was probably interesting. In this case, it hit close to the mark, and touched on one of Picard's very few sensitive subjects, that of his time as Locutus of Borg. Since then, he had encountered the Borg once more, and had been instrumental in defeating them.
He had told no one, not even his former First Officer, nor had he even put in any report, that the only reason he had led the Fleet to victory at that time was because he had heard the Borg's thoughts. On some level, he still had the ability to tap into their communications, and it frightened him. Riker did not know this was going through his Admiral's mind, but he saw the hesitation, and the intense look, and knew he had touched on something sensitive.
"Sorry, Admiral," he said, returning to his professional mask, "tell me later." Picard twitched his head in a nod, inwardly grateful for the reprieve. Riker wasn't the only one asking questions about his choice of tactics. He knew he had always had enemies in Starfleet higher-ups, and something like this was just what those enemies would look for.
Even if he had heard nothing overt, that didn't mean the danger wasn't there. Then it hit him, what he had been thinking about during the simulation, and couldn't figure out. He actually paused a moment, mid-step, as the realization set in.
The simulation battles didn't take into account his strange ability to hear the Borg intra-ship communications.
"Sir?" Riker was looking at him curiously. He shook himself.
"Nothing," he said. Ahead were the briefing room doors, which slid aside at their approach. "Shall we?"
"After you, sir."
Subtle unrest niggled its way through her connection with her sometimes-helpers, sometimes-prisoners, sometimes-jailers.
"The search continues," she whispered into the void, "as it will continue, until they are all found."
The unrest disappeared abruptly. The Borg were nothing if not obedient to the one they called Queen, whether they agreed with her decisions or not.
"You chose me," Yui whispered. The Collective's surprise was as refreshing as it always was. Pity, explanation, these things were foreign to them, foreign to the other Queens who had come before. "If you want me to do what you chose me to do, then let me work." Chagrin. Not quite chagrin. The Collective did not actually have the ability to feel such a thing, or to question its own perfect choices, but after three years of closeness with their new Queen, they felt something close.
"Look," Yui cast the Collective's gaze outward, along the transwarp network that was slowly being reconstructed. "It's being completed far ahead of your schedule." Assent. There was no arguing with reality. "This human drive, this is why you chose me, and left me almost completely untouched."
She fell silent, and the Collective slowly withdrew. Small fragments of its consciousness still dissented, but they were coming around, as they always did. Even so, these little confrontations were becoming more and more frequent. She had only told a partial truth earlier. The rest of the reason they had chosen her had yet to be truly fulfilled. It was the reason for this search, alongside the rebuilding of the Borg transport network.
The two tasks intermeshed, though the results were somewhat unlike the Borg's usual modus operandi. Left to themselves, the Borg chose three courses of action when it came to a race they came across in their travels. One, it was too weak, and thus left alone. Two, it was too powerful, and thus destroyed. Three, it was neither too weak, nor too powerful, and so it was allowed to flourish. At regular intervals, such a race would be culled, it would be harvested for the technology it had come up with since the last encounter.
The Federation was one such race.
Unwitting. Naïve. So completely innocent to their true purpose to the Collective. It was only unfortunate that the previous Queen had allowed the Federation to very nearly discover their hidden purpose, by allowing Voyager to find the Transwarp conduit barely one light-year from earth.
Even if they were weak and naïve, it was only a matter of time before someone in the Federation started wondering why the Borg had such direct access to earth, and yet had never invaded it with overwhelming force. When that happened, everything would change, starting with...
Found.
Found... Found... FoundFoundFound-
A spark of joy obliterated her train of thought, and she felt the Borg withdraw, almost as if in pain, before suddenly moving in towards the strong cloying emotion. Like a moth drawn to flame, she felt them embrace her hesitantly, even knowing they were going to get burned.
A display appeared in the void, showing a planet.
Blur of motion, and distance was crossed. A Cardassian planet. Small flickers of weapons fire, of Cardassian ships dying like fireflies. Hull fragments, some on fire, some not, drifted lazily, spun about, tossed aside as the Cube drove onward towards the planet below. Sensors flickered out, searching. Finding.
A sliver of a green hazed downwards, a transporter beam, questing out for the one person on this planet that was worth saving.
Found her.
A large monitor dominated the front of the massive briefing room, and on it was a moving picture. The Borg Cube, its green tractor beams flashing out, disabling ships. A familiar scene, one which every Captain present had lived through hours earlier. One of the half-dozen Intrepids harrying the Borg was suddenly hit, and disabled. A Prometheus Attack Cruiser swooped in, destroying the emitter, and shielding the injured ship. The Borg Cube began its slow turn that would end in the Prometheus' destruction at the hands of fresh weapon emitters. The screen froze just as green sparkles lanced out from the Cube to the small ship shielding its fellow.
"Too close," Picard said, indicating the screen. "-and too stationary. Never stay in one place for so long, especially that close to a Borg ship."
"Sir," Admiral Janeway's contralto voice carried subtle reproach, mingled with surprise, "a ship under my command was disabled. Didn't you do the same for the Defiant the last time you faced the Borg?"
Picard's expression hardened for a moment, then he sighed.
"True," he replied. "By my ship was fresh. It had not been in a running battle for five hours straight. Indeed, the battle was nearly over, by the time the Enterprise arrived. Still," he raised a hand, forestalling further argument, "I understand your point. But if you look here," he manipulated the panel in front of him, moving the display diagonally towards a group of fighter craft. The two dozen small craft were elongated smudges on the screen, they had been moving so fast. "The young Captain Paris was already in position to render assistance in drawing the Borg's fire. As you can see," he touched the controls, and the display continued. Tom's fighter group swarmed over the Borg vessel, but the Cube was already focused on Janeway's ship, which it destroyed methodically, before turning on the fighters.
"Of course, Admiral," Janeway said contritely, "You're right." There was a moment of silence.
"Not completely," Picard finally said. "Had I been more astute, I would have seen your intentions, and informed you of the larger situation."
"More astute?" Janeway said, a puzzled expression on her face. Picard didn't answer, and she was about to repeat her question, when he spoke.
"I was thinking," he almost whispered, his eyes distant. He had been thinking, at that time, about his connection with the Borg, and how it changed things. Subtle murmurs broke the silence showing everyone's surprise at how Picard's mask had slipped, even if for a moment. Riker leaned over.
"Admiral?" he asked softly. Picard seemed to come to himself, and sat up a little straighter, his hands going automatically to straighten his uniform, in what had infamously become known as the Picard Maneuver. He was about to speak, when someone else spoke up for him. It was the aforementioned Captain Tom Paris.
"Admiral, if you don't mind my asking, when are we going to be allowed to use all the weapons at our disposal?" The murmurs got louder, both at the audacity of Tom's question, and because many were thinking the same thing. It was a useful question. After all, they had only won the previous scenario by assuming that Federation Peregrine TacFighters could be modified to carry Quantum Torpedoes, which was still in the experimental stages of development. Picard considered the man's question, his feelings hidden from his expression for the moment. Tom took this as license to continue. "These simulations aren't accurate if they don't take into account the main weapons and defenses that we'll be using-"
Rike half stood, and was about to silence the brash Captain when he stopped suddenly. Picard had put a light hand on his arm.
"Captain," Picard said smoothly, smiling the tight diplomatic smile Riker had so often seen before. There was no actual condescension in that smile, but it implied nearly the same thing. "I don't have to explain myself, but in this case I will. The Borg have had nearly three years to study the data they gathered from when they engaged Voyager. There are several possibilities. One, that the weapons and armor are still effective against the Borg, in which case, all of this is moot." He looked around. No one believed this possibility, even if they all hoped for it.
"Two, that the weapons are completely ineffective, in which case they won't even be used. Or three, that their effectiveness has been dropped to the level of our other weapons. Remember, however the Borg may adapt, all that means is that it will take more of the same weapon to do any appreciable damage." He glanced around again, more briefly this time.
"Will Transphasic torpedoes still kill a Borg ship with one or two shots? Did the adaptations the Borg Sphere made to Voyager's experimental Ablative armor generators spread to the rest of the Collective before it was destroyed? We simply have no way of knowing anything until we face them again." No one had anything to say, or if they did, they did not have the courage to say it. Picard stood slowly. "Very well. If there are no more concerns or issues, this briefing is dismissed-"
The doors at the far end of the briefing room whooshed open, and distant loud voices raised in volume. On one side was the firm voice of a Federation security officer.
"-I'm sorry, sir, you can't go in! A briefing is taking place-"
On the other, was Zimmerman, his voice as confident and important as the data he was carrying.
"A briefing?" he said archly. "Good. Then everyone'll be in one place, and I won't have to repeat myself."
"Sir, this is your last warning...!" The man adjusted the setting on his phaser rifle.
"Stand down, officer," Picard said, speaking up. "The good Captain... Zimmerman, isn't it?" Picard didn't wait for confirmation, "-obviously has something important to tell us." It was implied in his tone that if it wasn't important, 'Captain' Zimmerman would shortly be 'Ensign' Zimmerman. The man came up short, noting for the first time how many auspicious names and ranks were gathered around him. He came to a rare attention, and spoke up.
"Admiral, my ship encountered a Borg Cube." He didn't wait to let this sink in. "The Borg didn't stop, or engage my vessel at all. It was traveling at maximum Impulse at these coordinates, in this direction." he held up a small Padd, which apparently contained said information. The murmurs from before increased in volume.
"Clear the room," Picard murmured to Riker, who immediately stood up. Before Riker could issue even one order, the comm system trilled.
"Urgent message for Admiral Picard," The Computer said in her neutral voice. Picard turned the small viewer in front of him so he could see better.
"On my viewer," he instructed the computer. The viewer changed, showing black empty space lit with stars. Two Federation ships faced a flurry of distant green specks. A small square appeared, with the distorted view of a middle-aged male, black hair covering a slightly bored expression.
"Admiral, we were patrolling the neutral zone between Federation and Klingon space. They just came out of cloak five minutes ago, and demanded that we withdraw. They're cloaking and decloaking randomly, so I can't get a good count, but I think they want a stand-up fight."
Picard's eyes narrowed. Two Nebula-Class Cruisers versus an unknown number of Klingon ships. While it was true that tensions between the Federation and the Klingon Empire had risen slowly over the past three years, this would be the first actual confrontation that didn't involve a few ships decloaking, firing a few shots, and vanishing back into cloak. On the other hand...
"I'm sorry, Admiral," the man said, his voice suddenly tinny behind the whooping of alarms, "It looks like I'm out of time." The man's head turned to the side, he apparently now speaking to one of his bridge crew. "Lieutenant, activate the Ablative generators."
On the screen, sections of the two ships seemed to expand, starting at the front of the ships and going back. The growth moved evenly and rapidly, until every curve and arc of each ship had expanded outwards, giving both ships the appearance of being nearly twenty percent bigger. The distant shapes of enemy craft began to enlarge, and sparkles of green floated from them out towards the two Federation ships.
The classroom was the usual quiet riot of sound and activity right after the lunch bell had rung, the different groups forming, each clique with its own set of rules and members, completely on the fly. Standard politics for fourteen-year-olds.
"It was so cool! You really had to have been there, it was awesome!" Kensuke gesticulated wildly, as he, Touji, and Shinji slowly walked the halls of Tokyo-3 middle school to the lunchroom. "Shinji, I know your parents were out that night, and Touji was grounded, but the military just released the specs on the new armed VTOL! Seriously, how could you guys miss that!?"
Touji shot Shinji an 'easily' look, which Shinji agreed to with a half-grin. Kensuke continued his rapid-fire review.
"-most armament of its class anywhere in the world, as maneuverable as anything in the sky, complete aerial domination! And I was there! I practically touched it...! I'm telling you, I can take a break for a while, the pictures I took have made me rich..." which was true. The other two stooges had seen firsthand the throng of students that had come to their friend for his pictures.
"So Shinji," Touji said, desperately attempting to drag the conversation back to something interesting, "wanna shoot hoops after school?"
"Sure," Shinji answered with some relief, "but I can't stay long, my parents-" he paused for a moment, as if in thought.
"What is it?" Touji asked. Shinji looked confused, then suddenly turned. Rei chose that moment to bump into him, relieving him of the lunch he was carrying. Her lunch, that is. She turned and stuck her tongue out at him, before continuing on her way.
"Man," Touji said, "that 'twin' thing you two pull is creepy if you ask me..." the boy shivered for effect.
Shinji smiled wryly. He and Rei were fraternal twins, or so his mother had told him. Whatever the reason, he sometimes had this feeling, when she was near. Twice in his life, he had actually felt a physical pain at the exact time Rei had been injured elsewhere. Once when she broke an arm, and the other when she got a really bad headache. That time, he had come upon her sitting in a desk in an unused classroom, her head on her arms. She was in such pain she hadn't realized he had been in the room until he touched her shoulder, and when he did, the realization stunned her right out of the pain.
The three stooges continued onwards.
Lunch had just gotten underway when the door to the dining area opened. A hush fell over the room as the old professor walked through the open doorway, his weathered hand on the shoulder of a female girl wearing the outfit that was this school's uniform. Her auburn hair was adorned with two red clips, and her young face held a strange mix of fear and anger. It was etched into her features, which was odd considering the situation. The raw emotion in her eyes was enough to make one wonder if she had just come from a torture chamber, as opposed to just down the hall. Shinji happened to look up at that moment, and two tables away, he felt Rei look up as well.
"Lunch isn't over," the professor said, waving at the students to continue what they were doing. "I just wanted to introduce someone. From this day onward, this young lady will be sharing your class. Treat her well. That's all." The professor turned to go, leaving the girl standing there. Her flitting eyes lit on Shinji's, then danced over to Rei's. They moved back to Shinji's, and the boy felt as if the universe stood still for a moment. Somehow, he knew her.
.
.
.
On a monitor, somewhere else, Yui watched the odd reunion. She felt the complex emotions of her children and their liberated friend, inwardly smiling at the feeling of satisfaction she felt from the Collective.
"We will continue to search for the others," she whispered into the void, "until all are found."
With that, all disagreement had evaporated. There was nothing but unwavering agreement and devotion from the Collective, now. Just as there should be, from subjects, to their Queen.
A/N: To the reviewer... Actually that's true, Rei would make a great stereotypical ice-cold Borg Queen, that's just not what I'm going for in this one ;-p on the other hand, maybe something like that could happen, somewhere in the story. I've got the ending in mind (which I try to do these days, when I write), but getting there is open country