Of Cats and Dark Energy
Part 7: Working From the Inside
There was no need to send an Away Team to the surface of Rainbow World. The Enterprise had detected the characteristic emission trail of the Borg ship within minutes of dropping out of warp. Following the trail had revealed that the cube was proceeding in a series of short warp-speed hops, followed by longer periods travelling at impulse.
"The pattern resembles a standard survey mission." Horek had commented.
"So they're trying to figure out where they are." Riker speculated. "Or they're looking for something to assimilate, or trying to find a TransWarp corridor to get back to the Collective. Probably all three.
"They'll be slower than us if they continue their pattern. We can catch them, come out of warp beyond their sensor range and initiate stealth protocols. Then it's just a matter of sticking with them until we can come up with a plan."
"Make it so." Picard ordered.
One side-effect of 'embracing eternity' with someone was that you could make a shrewd guess as to where you might find them. Samara was on the Observation Deck – she enjoyed looking out at space. It was pure luck, however, that Miranda was also there. The two women were talking. It was clearly not a private conversation, and Picard caught the end of it as he joined them.
"I worry." Miranda was saying. "This time, Shepard might run into something even he can't handle."
"Should I ever chance to meet anything or anyone Commander Shepard can't handle," Samara replied, "I sincerely hope it will be in a friendly way!" She turned to the Captain. "Good morning, Jean-Luc. Miranda and I were just fretting over our crew-mates on the Normandy. No doubt you have similar concerns over your remarkable android."
"Data isn't my android." Picard pointed out. "I actually pleaded his case in the legal enquiry that established him as a person, not property.
"It is interesting, though, to note that it often takes the reaction of strangers, such as Miss vas Normandy and Mr Vakarian, to remind us that Data is an artificial being. When you work with him for a while, you tend to forget, and simply treat him as a person with a slightly unusual personality.
"But putting that aside for now, I am curious about these Collectors?"
Samara sighed. "The Collectors are the decayed and debased remnant of a once-great race. We have spoken of the Protheans to you?"
Picard nodded. "They were the race who dominated the Galaxy before the last Reaper attack 50 000 years ago. They died fighting the Reapers but left several legacies, including the mass-effect technology and relay network. So they were not in fact rendered extinct?"
Samara shook her head. "It is not as simple as a surviving remnant, Jean-Luc. During our recent mission, we discovered that the Collectors are the genetically-modified descendants of Protheans captured and experimented on by the Reapers. They now exist only to serve their creators."
"We think," Miranda said, "that they were originally collecting intelligence. They'd been doing that for years, centuries, maybe. They'd slip in through the Omega-4 relay and employ slavers, mercs or thieves to acquire certain items or specimens. They'd pay with advanced technology, then go back through the relay. We couldn't track them, because no ship that went through that relay ever came back.
"But then, after the Battle of the Citadel, when the Reaper called Sovereign was destroyed, they got aggressive. They started coming through in those big ships, and kidnapping entire human colonies. They were taking them back through the relay to a Reaper-built base in the Galactic Core, where they were turning them into base genetic material to create a Human-Reaper hybrid.
"But we'd obtained a Reaper IFF that got us through the relay. We boarded their base and blew it to Hell. We thought that would put a a stop to them, we didn't realise there might be other ships trapped on this side of the relay."
"If they had been attacking humans before, why the sudden change to krogan?" Picard asked. "And why bargain rather than simply take?"
"One does not 'simply take' a krogan, Jean-Luc." Samara pointed out. "The weaponry – particularly the Seeker swarms -on that ship were designed to capture humans. Krogan are much tougher, and have remarkable regenerative capabilities. It is entirely possible that the method by which the swarms paralyse humans might be less effective, or entirely ineffective, against krogan. Or perhaps they simply wished to avoid wasteful conflict.
"As to the why, I can only speculate. During our mission, individual Collectors were occasionally possessed by a more powerful, non-physical, entity that called itself the 'Harbinger'. We suspect this to be a Reaper AI or VI fragment. The destruction of their base might have severed the connection between any Collectors left here and this Harbinger. We do not know what level of individual intelligence the Collectors possess – they are an insectoid species and may have a hive-mind.
"Given what we do know, I suspect that they intended to use krogan genetic material to enhance their combat abilities, enabling them to dominate the Galaxy and prevent any resistance to the Reapers' return."
"There's another thing." Miranda added. "The Collectors were offering a cure for the genophage. If it was genuine, there'd be a population explosion among the krogan, and past experience tells us that can only lead to war. A war that would exhaust the entire Galaxy and might even do the Reapers' job for them."
"So if there are more Collector vessels out there, they constitute a clear and present danger to every species." Picard noted. "You should notify your Council to be on the alert. The Enterprise stands ready to assist, should we be forced to remain here."
"LaForge to Captain." The voice came from Picards' communicator badge. He tapped it and replied. "Picard here. What is it, Geordi?"
"We're getting a message from the Normandy, Captain." Geordi said. "They're using some kind of quantum entanglement array. The Doctor wants to speak with you. But its' a holographic array, you'll need to take it in Holodeck Two."
"On my way." Picard responded.
Kasumi Goto and Thane Krios had never chanced to work together before. She was a thief and he was an assassin, so their paths had never crossed professionally. But they were the Normandy crews' stealth specialists, which is why they were now proceeding cautiously along a corridor on the Dalek saucer.
"This ship is incredibly old." Kasumi whispered. "You can see the wear on the floor, and there's like a patina on everything."
"It has been in battle recently." Thane remarked. "I noticed the damage on the hull as we approached. It has had a severe mauling."
Their route, picked out by EDI according to the Doctors' directions, led them down a wide corridor lined with clear-fronted booths. Most of these booths were occupied by inert Daleks.
"It appears that the Doctor was correct in his assertion that the Daleks only keep the minimum crew required active, and the rest in stasis." Thane noted. "Fortunate for us."
"They give me the creeps." Kasumi admitted. "D'you think they're still, like, in those suits, or do they get out of them and sleep somewhere else?"
"I doubt it." Thane told her. "The information we've been given is that they're dependent on those suits, and virtually helpless outside them."
"Nasty!" Kasumi said. "No kinda life."
"I agree." Thane allowed. "Though a quarian might not."
"Oh, quarians get out of their suits from time to time." Kasumi grinned. "Tali does, anyway!
"Here's the Drive Chamber."
It was huge, but dominated by the vast hyperdrive engine. Neither of these two were engineers, but it was obvious that this mighty engine had been severely damaged, perhaps beyond repair. Here there were active Daleks, though only a few. They were centred around the engine, gliding along catwalks and occasionally taking flight and hovering near an inaccessible section. Clearly, repairs were still being attempted, but the Dalek engineers were so intent on their work that they were easily evaded.
Thane touched Kasumis' arm and pointed. At one end of the room, dwarfed by the main drive, were the two stolen mass-effect engines, crudely but efficiently patched in to the Dalek systems. They were currently inactive and unattended. Thane and Kasumi crept as close as they could under cover of the various other devices that filled the room.
Thane climbed to a vantage point that gave him the best all-around view of the approaches, then signalled Kasumi. The young thief activated her biotic Tactical Cloak and slipped up to the engines. She had practised under Data and Talis' watchful eyes, so it took her only moments to attach and activate the small device that the android and the quarian had designed and built. Slipping back into cover, she de-cloaked and signalled Thane to exit the Drive Chamber.
Now it was simply a matter of threading a path through the less-frequented parts of the ship to reach an airlock. There they would wait until the saucer dropped its shields to retrieve the Dalek assault squads. At that point, the shuttle from the Normandy would approach and they would make their exit. EDIs' cyber-warfare suite was, hopefully, jamming the Daleks' internal sensors so that they could pass unnoticed unless actually seen.
They were crossing a large chamber – it looked like some sort of assembly hall -when Kasumi suddenly caught Thanes' arm. She pointed to a large door, coloured bright red and surrounded with writing in an unfamiliar, angular, script.
"I'm going to take a look in there!" She told him.
"That's outside our mission parameters." He reminded her. "Are you sure it's wise?"
"Look at the damned door!" She replied excitedly. "There has to be something important behind it!
"Look, Thane, we hardly know anything about these Daleks. Data tells us what he can, which isn't much. The Doctor tells us what he wants to, which is less. We have to start finding things out for ourselves.
"Now, keep a look-out!"
She went over to the door and began working with her omni-tool. "Ha!" She crowed. "This is hardly locked at all! Not for me at any rate! Don't Daleks have thieves?"
"I doubt it." Thane told her. "And any thief from another species is unlikely to get this far into the ship in normal circumstances."
"Takes half the fun out of it!" She complained. Then the door slid open. The room beyond was almost as large as the one they had come from. Arranged along the back wall were ten large cylindrical chambers in two groups of five. In the middle of these was a plinth on which stood a singular object. The thing was about a foot high, and looked like an egg resting on a shallow bowl. There were lights arranged in lines up its sides, that flickered on and off in complex patterns.
"What is that?" Thane asked.
"Whatever it is, it's ours now!" Kasumi announced, and lifted it from the plinth.
All Hell promptly broke loose. Sirens began blaring, lights flashing and mechanical voices began shouting "A-lert! A-lert!".
They darted back into the main chamber.
"Two exits, and they're coming from both." Thane said grimly. "Kasumi, you need to cloak and wait by that door. I'll find a vantage point and keep them occupied while you get to the airlock."
"You gotta be kidding!" She said. "They'll kill you, Thane!"
"I am already dying," Thane told her, "after a long life filled with sin. My service on the Normandy has been my atonement. This will complete it.
"Go, child. You are young, and have much yet to do."
She looked into those fathomless drell eyes, and saw nothing but calm acceptance. But calm acceptance was not Kasumis' way.
"Like Hell!" She told him. "We walk out of this together, or not at all! Kolyat deserves to know his father."
He was about to ask how she knew about his son, when a dozen or so Daleks swept into the room and surrounded them, shouting "Halt! Do not move!"
Thane and Kasumi stood back to back, guns levelled. One of the Daleks glided forward.
"You can-not es-cape." It stated. "Re-turn the Pro-gen-it-or De-vice and you will be spared."
"Unlikely." Thane replied. "You will not fire on us now, for fear of damaging the device. Otherwise, we would already be dead."
"So what's going to happen," Kasumi said, "is that you're going to clear a path to the airlock, and we're going to walk out of here. Once we're safely aboard our shuttle, you can have this doohickey back."
"Your shut-tle has been des-troyed." The Dalek replied. "You re-quire food. You re-quire rest. We do not. We will wait."
Kasumi activated her comlink. "Normandy, we have a situation here."
"Your ship can-not ass-ist you." The Dalek pointed out. "It can-not app-roach with-out being des-troyed. You have no Trans-mat. You will not be res-cued."
"God, you guys are so negative!" Kasumi complained. "I bet you never get invited to parties!"
Then the sound started. A whirring, groaning sound that seemed to come from the air itself. Suddenly, both Thane and Kasumi began to see another room superimposed on the one they were in. A room that grew steadily more solid as the noise grew in volume and intensity.
If it was disconcerting for the human and the drell, it seemed to throw the Daleks into absolute panic.
"A-lert! A-lert!" They were screaming. "TAR-DIS de-tect-ted! Time-Lord in-cur-sion!"
A few seconds later, the new room was fully solid around them. Spacious and high, with ramps and stairs apparently leading off into other areas. As they looked round, they saw a hexagonal control panel in the centre of the room, with a familiar figure fussing at it.
"Doctor?" Thane said.
"Yes, hello, welcome to the TARDIS." The Doctor replied. "We'll be back on the Normandy in a second. What did you do to get them so angry so quickly?"
"Stole something, of course." Kasumi said. "I'm a thief, it's what I do. But this seemed to be very important to them."
She held up the object she had taken. The Doctor looked completely taken aback. "A Progenitor Device? You stole a Progenitor Device? No wonder they're hopping mad!"
"What does it do?" She wanted to know.
"It makes Daleks." The Doctor said. "Daleks don't bother with all that mummy Dalek and daddy Dalek stuff. That device contains the complete DNA pattern of every Kaled mutant from the ones Davros originally grew in tanks on Skaro, through every improvement, iteration and recombination they've ever created to the ones out there now. It holds the design and specification for every battlesuit from the original prototype to the Emperor and Special Weapons versions. With enough power and raw matter, that thing can churn out Daleks by the thousand in a matter of hours, programmed and battle-ready."
"So it is important, then?" Kasumi insisted.
"So important that you've either ensured the success of this plan, or got the lot of us killed!" The Doctor averred. "We've arrived. We'd better let Shepard know what's happened. He's a bit worried about you."
They left this high-tech room through a very unimpressive-looking narrow wooden door, to find themselves on the Engineering Deck of the Normandy. Engineers Donnelly and Daniels were staring at them.
"You only just left!" Donnelly said. "How did you get back with them so quick?"
"It's a time machine!" The Doctor snapped. "I could've got back before I left if I'd wanted to!"
Kasumi turned and found that she had just come out of the enigmatic blue box. She stared for a moment, then walked slowly all the way around the box, turned to the Doctor and opened her mouth.
"I know!" He cut her off testily. "It's bigger on the inside! I could hardly travel round the universe in it if it wasn't, could I?"
Their arrival in CIC was cause for a muted but sincere celebration. Then EDI announced the incoming message.
"A-li-en ship. We are the Da-leks. We wish to speak with your lea-der."
"This is commander Shepard, of the SSV Normandy. I'm listening." Shepard replied.
"Com-man-der, you are har-bour-ing a fu-gi-tive from Da-lek just-ice. The Time-Lord known as the Doc-tor is res-pon-si-ble for the mur-der of ma-ny Da-leks and sub-jects of the Da-lek Em-pire. He has sto-len a TAR-DIS and a Da-lek de-vice of great va-lue.
"We ac-cept that you may be ig-nor-ant of his crimes. He may claim to be a re-fu-gee, but that is a lie. We re-quest that you hand ov-er the Doc-tor a-long with the TAR-DIS and the sto-len de-vice as a to-ken of good-will. This will a-ssure peace be-tween your people and the Da-lek Em-pire.
"What is your an-swer?"
"You're really rather good." Shepard noted. "Except I saw what you did on that asari colony."
"That was self-de-fence." Came the answer. "We app-roached peace-ful-ly and were fired on with-out war-ning. We re-tal-i-at-ed."
"That's bull!" Shepard snarled. "I saw the security tapes. That was a cold-blooded, deliberate massacre of innocent people! If you want the Doctor, or anything else on this ship, catch us if you can!
"Joker, go!"
Everyone grabbed onto something as the Normandy executed a sharp 180-degree turn and accelerated away. The Dalek saucer, underpowered and damaged, began to lumber in pursuit.
"Set course for Sahrabarik." Shepard ordered. "And stay just far enough ahead to make sure they don't lose us." He turned to the Doctor. "Now it's up to Jean-Luc and the Enterprise to do their part!"
Will Riker was obviously a born pilot, Miranda concluded. Rather than actually flying this shuttle, he was permitting it to drift, but only in the direction he wanted. The vast Borg cube -bigger than some moons she had seen – filled the viewport.
"How come they don't see us?" She asked.
Riker shrugged. "Mostly because they don't want to." He said. "The Borg are only interested in anything advanced or unique enough to assimilate, or powerful enough to be a threat. Flying like this, with our emissions masked, we're just a piece of space junk. Even if we hit them, we wouldn't scratch the hull."
"I guess that makes sense, if you understand these Borg." Miranda allowed. "But surely they must be aware of the Enterprise?"
"Same story." Riker told her. "The ship is just at the edge of their sensor range. But we've adjusted her systems to mask life-signs and give false energy signatures. To anyone scanning her, she looks like an old-style unmanned inter-system freighter. Nothing worth Borg attention."
"I would have thought," Samara said, "that you would have more advanced stealth technology, Commander."
Riker shook his head. "We have treaties with the Romulan and Klingon empires that forbid the Federation to develop cloaking technology. Apart from that one development, the Federation has more ships and better tech than either. Their ability to cloak their ships evens the odds.
"Here we go!"
With that, and the smallest of bumps, the shuttle attached itself to the side of the cube.
"From here, we can beam aboard without being detected." Riker said. "After that, it's just being careful."
There were four in the Away Team: Riker and Miranda, who had the main task of the mission, a Security CPO named Styles and Samara, who had insisted on seeing the Borg vessel for herself. They emerged in a largish room lined with machinery but otherwise empty.
Miranda gazed around. The room was dimly-lit, the air tasted flat and sterile, like it did in a re-breather unit. The equipment was clean, but looked random and untidy. There were devices from several different kinds of technology, all clearly functional, but no attempt had been made to harmonise their design, or even to make it ergonomic. Heavy, insulated cables came in through the walls and floor and were laid to their destinations by the shortest route. No trunking or any attempt to conceal them.
"The Borg are all about efficiency." Will stated. "As long as it works, they don't care how it looks. Most of it is directly operated by the central Matrix of the cube. Anything that requires manual interface can be operated by the nearest drone, and they don't need to sit or worry about RSI.
"Let's go."
The corridors were uniform, straight and laid on a regular grid. There were relatively few side-rooms, the walls were mostly composed of more machinery. Occasionally, they encountered clusters of drones, all standing in upright units to which they seemed to be connected by tubes and wires. At the first one of these, they stopped and looked. There were several different species there. Humans, Klingons, rangy, pointed-eared ones who could have been either Vulcans or Romulans – according to Riker, it was not easy to tell them apart at a glance – and a single asari, clearly taken from Rainbow World. Samara bowed her head: "Whatever has become of your body, sister, may the Goddess protect and cherish your soul." She murmured.
As diverse as the drones were, they all had some things in common. They were hairless, grey-skinned, clad in heavy, tight black garments. All had had the left arm and hand replaced with some kind of prosthesis – though each one appeared to have a different function. All of them had the left eye either replaced or covered with some kind of lens. Riker told them that both the lenses and the prostheses were modular, able to be exchanged for others depending on the assigned task.
Later, as they were passing another drone cluster, one of them activated, the tubes and wires pulling clear of the body. She – it had been a woman – stepped out of her unit and moved off along the corridor, passing within a foot of the Away Team. Her gaze was directed straight ahead and she took no notice of any of them.
"See?" Riker said. "Until or unless we do something the system construes as a threat, they don't even see us!"
The atmosphere aboard this ship was oppressive, and Miranda was glad when, guided by Rikers' tricorder, they found their way to where the mass-effect generators had been placed. Here they found an unexpected bonus, an operational mass-effect drive.
"They didn't get this on Rainbow World." Miranda stated. "This comes from a frigate-class ship!"
"They must have run across one and assimilated it before we caught up with them." Riker said. "It's linked up to their systems, but not in use. They may be experimenting with it or using it as a back-up in case their warp drive fails.
"Does it come from a Council or Alliance ship?"
Miranda shook her head. "It's turian-built, but an obsolete model. Look at that insignia painted on it. That's the Blue Suns' badge. It was a merc ship, probably bought illegally before it could be decommissioned.
"Still, it's a stroke of luck for us. Let's get this done, I want to get out of here!"
They set to work, fitting and activating the discreet device that Data and Tali had designed and Geordi had produced.
They had just finished when a drone came out of nowhere, heading toward the engine. Reacting without thinking, Styles fired his phaser. The drone fell with a crash, just as another came round the same corner. This one clearly saw Styles and began to move toward him. This time, his phaser had no effect and the drone grabbed him. A tube extended from the back of its hand and was plunged into Styles' neck. At the same moment, Samara held up her hands, which glowed blue. An aura of the same colour surrounded the three remaining team members.
The drone released Styles, who turned to look at his comrades. Black veins were already beginning to spread from his neck across his face. Obviously aware of his impending fate, Styles nodded once, then placed his phaser under his jaw and blew his own head off.
The drone stared down at him for a moment, then looked up and began to move toward the engine again.
"Back away slowly." Samara whispered. "Stay within the aura, but do not let the drone enter it."
Whatever she was doing, Riker noted, it was working. The drone was looking straight through them. It went directly to the engines and began to work on the connections. Two more came round the corner, picked up the bodies and carried them away.
"Time to go." Riker said grimly. Outside the engine room, Samara was able to drop her biotic field.
"It was the same one I used to conceal us from the Seekers at the Collector base." She said. "They too were drones, like these Borg, and my instincts told me that it would work."
"Good instincts." Riker said. "Now, let's get out of here!"
Picard had just received Rikers' laconic report from the safely-inbound shuttle when Dr Crusher arrived on the bridge.
"Ah, Beverley," he greeted her, "is everything ready?"
She nodded. "All passengers and non-combat crew have been moved to the saucer section, Jean-Luc."
"Excellent." He nodded. "Now, you know your orders?"
"Yes." She said, then at his questioning glance, she added. "As soon as you get to the Battle Bridge, I'm to separate the saucer and proceed at best speed, avoiding contact with local traffic and settlements, to the Sahrabarik System in the Terminus sector. We will rendezvous with the main section there, if you don't come and meet us before.
"What happens, Jean-Luc, if this doesn't work? Or even if it does and the main section is destroyed and you get yourself killed?"
"Then you are in command, Beverley, and must use your own discretion." He told her firmly. "You can find a habitable world to settle, and cannibalise the saucer if you wish. Alternatively, you may wish to offer the ship to the Human Alliance or the Galactic Council. Even without the main section, it would be a considerable asset, not to mention the contents of our database.
"Whatever you decide, your priority will be to find a safe home for these people, Beverley."
"Understood." She replied. "Two things before you go, Jean-Luc. One, try to spend some time with Samara. Oh, don't give me that innocent look! I've known you too long and too well. She's special to you, and you are to her. Don't waste it!"
"And the second thing?" He asked.
"Don't die!" She commanded.
"I will make every effort not to." He promised.
She hugged him then, tightly. "Godspeed, Jean-Luc." She whispered in his ear. He nodded, then left for the Battle Bridge.
It was an hour later. The shuttle had docked and the Enterprise main section was racing toward the cube at flank speed.
"Course laid in for Sahrabarik." Riker reported from the helm.
"Very well, Number One. Go to Red Alert and commence attack run. You may fire when ready, Mr Worf."
"Aye, sir."
At maximum impulse, the Enterprise swooped past the cube and unleashed a volley of torpedoes.
"Several direct hits, minimal damage." Worf reported. "And they are pursuing us."
"Maximum warp. Engage!" Picard ordered.
A few moments later, Horek reported. "They are following us. Their speed is holding at Warp Nine-point-five. Our current velocity is Warp Nine-point-seven-five. We are outdistancing them."
"Reduce speed to Warp Nine-point-six." Picard said. "We can't get too far ahead, or this may not work."