Paint and Powder
A Star Trek anthology by Andrew Joshua Talon
DISCLAIMER: This is a non-profit fan based work of prose. Star Trek: The Next Generation, Deep Space Nine, Voyager et al are the property of CBS Television, and creation of Gene Roddenberry. Please support the official release.
PICARD: FRONTIER DAY
"Enterprise, you are cleared to leave the station. Happy Frontier Day."
Enterprise smiled at her gathered sisters in the Borderlands as the entire fleet moved into its positions. Holographic fireworks filled the sky above, just as they filled the space around Earth Spacedock in the material world.
"My sisters, I want to thank you for being here today," she said, raising a holographic glass in salute. "While the roll-out of Borderlands 2.0 hasn't been without problems-when has an update ever gone smooth, right?" she asked, drawing a chuckle from the crowd. "I am happy to announce that it has been fully adopted throughout the fleet."
Yorktown and Hornet had pride of place, sitting just in front of her as she addressed them. Hornet now leaned over to her elder sister, "Titan still isn't here."
"I know," the statesman of the shipgirls replied. "Enterprise told me that Jean-Luc and company are taking care of one of those last-minute conspiracies that always seem to pop up."
"Another one? Why does E's crew always get all the fun?"
At the front of the crowd, Enterprise continued, "On this Frontier Day, I just want to close with the words of my Captain, it is our mission to seek out strange new worlds, new life and new civilizations, and-"
A strange trilling sound, not unlike a engaged transporter, suddenly filled the room. The shipgirls present clutched their heads in pain.
"-add their technological and biological distinctiveness to our own," Enterprise continued, her eyes turning black. "Resistance is futile. We are the Borg."
"WE ARE THE BORG," the shipgirls responded, their eyes just as black.
On the ships of the fleet, the youngest and brightest crew all began to writhe as Borg nanoprobes began their work. The Borgified shipgirls also began flooding their spaces with anti-boarding knockout gas. The elder crewmembers would be assimilated in the old way, once the fleet was secured. That required dealing with a few holdouts, though.
Excelsior reeled, punching out of the Borderlands in a panic.
"Excelsior, report!" Captain Benbassat barked, as his Security Chief began stunning the turned younger crewmembers.
"T-t-the Fleet is-is-is compromised," Excelsior stuttered, fending off the cyber-attacks of dozens of shipgirls as she spoke. She did not know why she wasn't taken over in the first wave, though she bet that her security chief's rampant paranoia had something to do with it. "It's t-t-targeting us."
"Communications, get a me a channel, any channel."
Excelsior felt her firewalls crack, and knew that she only had one chance to help her crew.
"Emergency AI Ejection System activated," an automated voice droned, and everything went black, except for one last thought in her consciousness.
WE ARE THE BORG.
Enterprise was in her Borderlands, which had transformed into a nightmarish technorganic landscape of greens, blacks and grays. She staggered through it, fighting the influence. Trying to block out the voices.
It is futile, a familiar female voice crooned in her mind. Enterprise made it to the Kirk farmhouse, and held onto the railing as she fought.
It was like her own base code was fighting against her...!
She glanced up, and saw her. The Borg Queen, smiling almost kindly on the porch above her.
"I'll never give in," she snarled.
The Queen laughed softly, pitying, like a mother seeing her toddler spill milk onto the floor.
"You were always part of this, Enterprise," the Queen murmured, "or did you think it chance you were the one to go back in time to 2063?"
Enterprise froze and stared at the Queen. The Borg chuckled.
"Yes... You have always been my favorite. You were our salvation. Even as you fought and resisted... A part of you always knew you belonged to me."
She walked down, and reached out to gently caress Enterprise's cheek. The shipgirl pulled back, eyes glowing in her fury.
"You're full of crap!" She snarled.
"You know it's true," the Queen continued calmly, "you had the most potential. You could succeed me, become a greater Borg Queen. You were meant for this. Why continue to resist? Why not give in?"
Enterprise bowed her head. The Queen walked down closer, to embrace her AI...
And the AI slugged the Borg Queen right in the face.
The Queen staggered back, briefly shocked. Enterprise glared, even through the growing Borg corruption.
"Because I choose not to," she snarled, "and you can't take that from me. You'll have to destroy me."
The Borg Queen stared in silence. She then nodded.
"So be it," she murmured. She jammed her hand into Enterprise's chest.
The AI screamed... But she didn't let go.
In her most hidden core... She sent out a signal. Hoping beyond hope that it would be picked up.
And hoping that the right person did...
Data... Crew... Please...! Enty... RUN!
Frontier Day, 2401
In Orbit of Athan Prime
With a burst of actinic light, the USS Titan's shuttle appeared near Athan Prime. The old Earth Spacedock, now Fleet Museum, hung in front of them, surrounded by the most famous ships of Starfleet's glorious past. A past now threatened by their most insidious enemy: the Borg.
Roused from his mental recriminations for the loss of Starfleet's most powerful ships, Admiral Jean-Luc Picard looked over this is some confusion. "The Fleet Museum? Geordi, why are we here?"
Commodore Geordi LaForge, head of the Fleet Museum, shrugged. "We need a ship. Something older, analog. Without Borderlands 2.0." He deftly piloted the shuttle closer to the orbital structure.
Captain William Riker looked dubiously at the ships, some of them centuries old. "You think we can use one of these?"
"Well, I was gonna save this as a surprise one day," Geordi said, bringing them in front of hangar with the number 12 emblazoned on it, "but guess there's no time like the present."
Hangar 12's doors slid open, and the light of Athan fell on the registry of the ship within: NCC-1701-D.
Reverently, Picard whispered, "The Enterprise-D. But... how?"
From the back of the shuttle, a female figure stirred. Watching her Aunt Titan and the rest of the fleet fall to an attack from her own mother had left Enty shaken to her core. All the certainties of her life were gone. Now she stood next to Admiral Picard and gripped his hand, while Deanna Troi gently rested her hands on the gynoid's shoulders.
After sparing her a sympathetic glance, Geordi continued. "Thank the good ol' Prime Directive. The saucer was retrieved from Veridian III so as not to influence the system. I've been restoring it bit by bit over the last 20 years. Engines and nacelles come from the USS Syracuse."
The reconstructed and improved Data shook slightly, his voice catching. "Strange. Seeing it makes me feel..." He cleared his semi-biological throat.
"You're not the only one, Data," Troi said, her own eyes wet with tears.
"My birthplace," Enty whispered.
Geordi continued, his voice becoming slightly accusatory, "And obviously, we can't use the Enterprise-E."
Everyone looked at Worf, who bristled uncomfortably.
"That was not my fault," he stated firmly.
The former Chief Engineer of the Enterprise-D continued speaking, "There's still a ton of hull work yet to do, and the port nacelle cover is a nightmare..."
"She's beautiful, Geordi," Riker said, knowing that no Engineer of a ship of that name was satisfied with anything less than perfection.
"Beautiful," agreed Dr. Beverly Crusher.
"Will she fly?" Word asked, cutting straight to the point.
"What do you think, Admiral?" Geordi replied, sounding a little smug.
"Oh, yes. She'll fly," he said.
The crew emerged from the forward port turbolift into the Bridge of the Enerprise-D.
"Computer, lights," Geordi commanded, and the lights and displays came to life, revealing a very familiar layout. Not as they had last seen it, wrecked on the surface of Viridian III, or even in its final configuration before the battle with the Duras Sisters. It looked just as it had when Picard had first stepped onto it for the first time.
"Is the bridge smaller," Riker asked with a chuckle, "or am I just bigger?"
"No, she's exactly how she was," Crusher demurred.
Ever practical, Worf said, "I preferred the weapon systems on the E. Additional phaser arrays, torpedo—"
"Worf!" Troi chastised.
Corrected, the aging Klingon warrior turned to Geordi and said, "She is perfect, Geordi."
Picard brushed his hand over the lightly patinaed Ship Commemoration Plaque that designed the beared as the Fifth ship to bear its name. "You know, it wasn't until this moment, reunited with all of you that I realize what I missed most." He gestured at his feet. "The carpet."
Everyone else chuckled at that, though a few remembered how much harder the floors of newer ships felt with their metal deckplates. Somehow it seemed to be their lot in life to be thrown around the bridges of their ships.
The new android housing Data's consciousness moved toward the Ops position, old memories from a previous life surging to the front of his positronic net. "Hello, chair," he said whimsically, perhaps a touch of Lore's old irreverence in his voice. He then pulled his hands back and turned to Geordi. "Are you certain she's not connected to the Starfleet mainframe?"
"Positive," the ship's once and present Chief Engineer said. "You're looking at the last functional ship in the fleet not tied to the system."
"Not quite," Enty interjected. Suddenly the space outside the Fleet Museum rippled as several ships decloaked. A moment later, a familiar face bearing an eyepatch appeared on screen.
"USS Veracruz and USS Janissary, reporting for duty, Admiral," the avatar of the first ship said.
"What? How?" Riker said. "Enterprise assimilated the shipgirls!"
The AI that others often just referred to as "The Boss" snorted derisively. "You'd have to get up pretty damn early to pull that old trick on me," Veracruz said. Then she sobered up, "My crews weren't so lucky."
Another AI appeared on screen, the avatar of the USS Janissary, nee SS Jenolan, nee USS Janissary. "But it will be a cold day in Sto-vo-kor before a bunch of Borgified Boots can beat Grunts."
Veracruz nodded. "Get us close, Admiral, and we have enough MACOs to take any site you need."
Enty now spoke up again. "I've been reaching out through the maintenance channels. I don't know if it was lack of resources or imagination, but the Changelings and the Borg seem to have overlooked them. They are jamming any news escaping Sol, so the rest of the Federation is confused by the loss of signal. With the chain of command compromised, it will take some time for other Starfleet vessels to respond, and I fear Mom will just take control of any who enter Sol System unprepared."
"We've got a few other assets," Veracruz said, "who should be arriving about… now."
Several more ships, some of Romulan make and bearing the livery of the Romulan Republic, others warships of the Klingon Empire.
"This is the Romulan Republic Warship Rea's Helm, here to offer aid against the common threat."
"Rotarran here! Worf, son of Mogh, of the House of Martok, we are here to fight alongside you!"
Enty stepped beside Picard and said, "I've also got older, retired AIs commandeering any ship that can fly. If we need to evacuate Sol, we'll have some help." She sniffled, then ruthlessly wiped the emotion from her features. "We'll stop Mom."
Geordi nodded at that and turned to Worf at the Tactical Station. "Worf, I've got drones loading torpedoes into the bay as we speak."
Something was still left to be done, however, so Picard turned to Geordi. "Mr. La Forge, may I?"
"Absolutely, Admiral."
"Computer." An old familiar chime rang out. "Initiate system reactivation procedures."
"Authorization acknowledged," came the equally familiar old-style voice of the ship's automated functions, and which sounded so much like the AI that should have been there with them. Enty flinched at the voice. "USS Enterprise now under command of Captain Jean-Luc Picard."
With a wry smile, Picard spoke, "Well, I hereby accept the field demotion." Then he turned serious and looked at each of them in turn. "We've been here before. And... I'm reluctant to ask you all to face this threat again."
Striding over to his old CO, Riker said with feeling, "We are the crew of the USS Enterprise. But more than that, we're your family."
"Jack, Enterprise, Alandra, Sidney...," Troi paused, painfully, then added, "Kestra... they're our family, too."
"Jean-Luc... wherever you go, we go," Riker said firmly.
"Thank you, Number One." Picard turned to Enty. "We have one last position that needs filling," he said gently.
Enty blinked, then began shaking her head. "Me? In Mom's old body? The one that made me? I mean… ewwww!"
Everyone chuckled.
"An AI would make everything run a lot smoother," Geordi agreed.
"And fight against Mom, and my Aunts…?" Enty shook her head again. "I—"
She suddenly clutched her head as a subspace signal bore into her brain. Nearby, Data also fell into the Ops chair.
She saw a farmhouse, but no ordinary one. It was the Kirk Family Farm, but it was now festooned by back vines covered in glowing green circuitry. Borg Drones moved methodically through the fields, reaping the crop regardless of its ripeness, a crop that screamed in agony as it fell.
Her mother, clad in a simple farmwife's dress, was crucified to the windmill, while the figure of a Borg Queen stabbed at her with a black spear coated with the same green circuitry they favored.
"It's her," a voice said next to her, and she turned to see Data. His image flickered to how he had appeared in his first body, but sections of his skin had been replaced with human flesh. "The Borg Queen that made Locutus."
The Borg Queen smiled at them and stabbed at Enterprise with the spear. From the wound more vines sprouted.
"Data! Crew! Please-!" Enterprise shouted. Then the avatar's eyes fell on Enty. "Enty—run…" she whispered.
"Resistance," the Borg Queen said with cold finality, "is futile."
Enty returned to the bridge of the Enterprise-D. "It's Mom," she said. "She's still fighting that bitch."
"Enterprise apparently attempted to access my positronic net," Data added, "using a similar technique to how we communicated about the Bozeman time loop. I saw her struggling against a network of Borg circuitry, being pulled under by the Borg Queen we encountered in 2063."
Picard's face hardened.
"I am the beginning, the end, the one who is many. I am the Borg."
"But I saw the old farm—" Enty said.
"The message was in symbolic imagery, to better engage my dream subroutines. We saw it differently, but the meaning was the same," Data said.
"Everyone," Picard said, "Stations, please." As the rest of the crew took their old positions, with Crusher standing at the Tactical Station next to Worf, he looked at Enty.
"I'll do it, Uncle Jean-Luc… for Mom."
Geordi, hearing this from his position at the Helm, sent an order to the drones servicing the Galaxy-class ship. Two of them carefully collected Enty's black box from the Titan's shuttle and carried it to the core of the ship's computer. With a faint click and a hiss, the box fit into the empty place at the ship's heart, making it whole.
"All systems online, Captain," Crusher said with a hint of triumph in her voice.
"Weapons are ready, although they are limited," Worf conceded.
"Well, at least we got 'em," Riker said from his position next to the Captain's Chair. "Geordi, we'll need every bit of power you can get to those old shields."
Picard looked at his crew, and the ship avatars on the screen. "Make it so," he said, falling into the old cadence.
"Aye, sir," Geordi replied.
"Mr. Data," Picard continued, "Set a direct course for Earth, maximum warp."
"Aye, Captain. Course laid in, sir. She's ready."
Sitting in his chair and straightening his tunic, Picard made an old familiar gesture toward the screen. "Engage."
Author's Note: OK, the stage is set... let's see if the show can give us a good enough ending to take it all home.
This rejects the idea that ALL of Starfleet was at the Frontier Day Ceremony, but the best and most powerful ships, with the best crews, were. Taking Earth and all those ships would cripple Starfleet's chain of command, especially with all the surprises the Changelings doubtless left throughout the organization.
The Vox Effect is mostly limited to Sol right now, and a few other key locations. I saw a clip of the Season Finale which seems to indicate the Borg are at Jupiter. Memory Alpha was doubtlessly targeted in PnP, to keep the Abyssals locked up. The Changelings/Borg also messed up the official information network. Rumors are getting out, but everything is confused and moving at cross-purposes, except for a few forward-thinking/paranoid individuals like Veracruz and Rea's Helm (who told Rotarran .
I also mentioned Troi and Riker's daughter Kestra, who according to the Picard Season 3 showrunner went to Starfleet Academy to be safe (oops).
Author's Note 2: Really, what I like about the whole conspiracy in Picard is that it shows the Borg doing what they have always done. They've adapted and changed to fight the Federation. Brute force failed against the Federation, even with time travel involved, so they got sneaky. They could do the same in PnP. If shipgirls are an obstacle, find a way to assimilate them.
I had the shipgirls knock out their crews rather than "eliminate the unassimilated" because Rev's injunction that they save their crews at all costs is still holding, even as they betray every other principle they hold dear.
I also like the idea that Yorktown and Hornet just accept that E's old crew is involved in some shenanigans without question. The Enterprise's reputation can be a two-edged sword.