Chapter 91:

The next day messages were received, "This is the United Sentient Communities. We welcome all sentients to join with us, whether they want to be unconnected or join the sentient collective, or anything in between.

Due to the likelihood of military operations against us by those who fear us and therefore want to destroy us, we will need to screen all transportation to the systems that support the USC. Anyone wishing to enter these systems or to trade will need to send a sub-space message and then secure arrangements will be made. We welcome all refugees from Federation Alliance policies."

The Director of Starfleet Marines was a Nausicaan. Harry Potter had long since retired from that position and at the age of 106 he didn't see any point in reenlisting. The challenges of 2087 were in countering extremely advanced techniques researched by the collectives. His specialty was in developing magical technological techniques and later in building a cohesive force from many species of recruits.

Human magicals had a much longer lifespan than human non-magicals. Actually, with recently developed technology all species of the Federation tended to usually live healthy lives up to close to their lifespans and then deteriorate quickly. To extend lifespans beyond that would have required something that would resemble synthetic sentient life, which was strictly forbidden. It was noted that in canon, even the Borg didn't move towards synthetic life, but used lightly modified sentient species.

Harry Potter and Hermione Granger-Potter flew around the Federation in their private spaceship, although with a war starting, they moved to what was considered a safe area. Hermione remotely taught a Starfleet Academy class, Introduction to Magical Computation.

The Starfleet Marines Director gave a report to the Federation Alliance, "The mentor of the first Marines Director taught him a principle, Constant Vigilance, which has since become one of the founding principles of the Starfleet Marines.

We have checked all Marines personnel for attitudes that might lead them to not supporting a potential fight against the Collectives, or to actively take their side. They are not being punished, they are instead being protected from committing treason. They have been assigned to desk duty unrelated to this conflict, and are under constant supervision."

Starfleet Intelligence rapidly searched for possible collective infiltrators everywhere that was under Federation control, and found several collective cells. Starfleet Marines handled any necessity to dissuade non-cooperation. They were required to sit out the conflict, in protective custody if needed, but generally with just a small amount of supervision to prevent active support of a potential enemy.

That left the Collective systems with their unknown defenses on one side, and the Federation systems with their fairly well known defenses on the other. There was no useful intelligence gathered from collective supporters in Federation systems. There was no unencrypted communications from Collective systems. Both sides had a full drone screen near each other, but not so far firing at each other.

The United Sentient Communities sent a clear sub-space message which was available to anyone in the Federation. "We have analyzed the present situation, and the military options available to each side. Since the goal of the USC is simply to exist in freedom, our deployment is defensive and reactive.

We have concluded that the only viable strategy that the Federation Alliance has to end the freedom of the USC is to use overwhelming energy attacks in a war of attrition. That strategy might be successful, but to ensure the ending of collective sentience, they will by necessity need to kill billions of sentients. We do not believe that the Federation Alliance believes that they have any clever or high technology way to get through USC defenses without total destruction.

It is a well known principle of war that a plan only survives until contact with the enemy. Obviously USC reactions to any Federation Alliance attacks could result in surprises. Federation attacks could themselves have surprises.

There is however, an alternative to war. Start from the future of sentient evolution that the Federation Alliance is trying to avoid, and let us together work out a way to avoid that future in ways that all consider acceptable, and then ratify any future agreement with another Federation Alliance vote. Since these negotiations effect everyone, we will only conduct them over clear channel subspace communications.

There is no deadline to our offer, since the status quo is acceptable to us. Only actual conflict would put an end to this offer."

Section 31 and the Supervisors met to discuss the offer before a Federation Alliance meeting.

Luna asked, "Is everything the USC said true?"

Gary 11 answered, "As far as we can tell. In canon you would find a clever attack plan that would disrupt the collective and their machinery would all power down. While that timeline only differs from this one by changes made about a century ago, this timeline simply does not work that way.

For one, they are not the Borg. No-one was assimilated against their will. Break their connections, and they still would be loyal to the USC. Drones and other machinery work on standing orders, and do not power down due to interruptions in communications with some sort of central control."

Amyah was 21 and had the rank of Assistant Director of Section 31. Her mother Pythia, age 57, her grandparents, Cora and Theo, and her great-grandparents, Luna and myself were all full co-Directors. She said, "Besides being horrified at the potential losses of a war, I see a permanent coarsening of the morals of a Federation that would go through that. This is how we would create something resembling the Mirror Universe."

Pythia said, "I see no clever way to win this war without huge losses. The USC analysis is accurate."

I said, "Since compromise is clearly the goal. Let us look at the details. Limiting physical changes to sentient species is probably an area where the gap is not that large. We would agree to limit changes that overly change the characteristics of species, especially those related to appearance. We would allow enhancements and additions to senses, to strength and damage resistance. We have accepted these for decades. We do not accept synthetic additions to intelligence, due to the danger of becoming synthetic life. We do accept mental interfaces to non-sentient computers and communication networks, as long as they only interface to the sensory and motor portions of the brain."

Theo said, "I do not think the USC goes beyond any of those restrictions now, but we need to go over the collective aspects of their changes."

I continued, "Quite right. That should be the part that can be agreed to. First let us pause on that part. Does anyone see that agreement leading to a bad evolutionary outcome, or in preventing the future evolutions that would be desirable?"

Everyone confirmed that they were acceptable.

I continued, "The next area will be more difficult to achieve an agreement. Sentients have separate minds, except for those species that evolved differently such as the Ions and Devronians. Leadership is by agreement, not by access to internal parts of the mind. Emotional sharing is by voluntary linking, but for limited times and activities, not as a normal part of a day. Mental communication is allowed, but using sensory input and motor output parts of the brain. A sense of self, and free will is not given up by agreement to join a collective."

Everyone confirmed that if these were agreed to it would not result in bad futures.

Cora and Theo visited the planet Organia. The people on Organia had a medieval technological level, but from canon it was known that they were actually capable of being far more advanced than that, and were highly advanced in magic and also in having a non-corporeal form.

While most of the villagers ignored them, a man in robes greeted them, "Welcome. I am Ayelborne."

Cora asked, "Since we are deciding possible future paths of this part of the galaxy. We would like to ask your advice." Cora and Theo then explained the background and future predictions, and the canon knowledge of the Borg."

Ayelborne said, "Naturally we are for a peaceful solution to differences."

Cora answered, "While you might see us as being worthy of further contact in the future, what we want to know is if we would be setting ourselves in an evolutionary path that would be more or less likely to meet your long term approval depending on what agreement we might make to avoid a conflict at this time."

Ayelborne said, "It is not our place to tell you how to evolve your society."

Cora and Theo realized that they weren't going to get much from them except for them to advocate peace.

Section 31 presented our assessments of an acceptable agreement to the Federation Alliance.

The Starfleet Chief of Operations, a Tellarite, said, "The statement by the USC is correct. They are probably a little more advanced than we are. I do not see defeating their drones and then landing on their planets easily. I see blunt force being needed, with huge amounts of energy to overwhelm sophisticated defenses. That is our advantage, having more resources than they have."

The Starfleet Marines Director said, "If we can get to planets, I cannot see a way to accomplish mission objectives without destruction. We would encounter drones in the air, ground, sea, and underground. Even if those were defeated and we captured people, their loyalties would remain and they would reform their collectives if released from custody."

The Starfleet Chief of Staff said, "Let us put it to a vote, to engage in negotiations, and to avoid any military conflict while negotiations are underway. If we agree to negotiations and an agreement can be reached, then a full vote would be needed to ratify such an agreement."

An Andorian asked, "Would the USC systems themselves be part of a ratification vote?"

The Starfleet Chief of Staff said, "No. They are outside the chain of authority of the Federation Alliance, even if we do not recognize that separation. It is a de facto independence so therefore they cannot vote until there is a de facto reintegration with the Federation Alliance."

The vote was in favor of negotiations.

The proposed restrictions on sentient modifications were transmitted along with an agreement to rejoin the Federation Alliance. Some additions were made to my list of restrictions to ensure separate sentient minds with free will, and frequent testing of that status. In addition restrictions on too much voluntary authority given to charismatic leaders was added.

There were some additional restrictions on magic added. Most of those were related to magic that effected souls and minds.

The new field of Community Magic was subject to tests and restrictions. Much thought went into what would be allowed and what would be restricted.

The USC replied with several hundred modifications and specific situations to be addressed. They emphasized that they agreed with the necessity of preventing synthetic sentient life, which made much of the agreements simpler. In addition they agreed on not eventually becoming the Borg and in preserving free will.

There were several months of detailed public negotiations. Finally the USC replied to one of the Federation Alliance communications with its own ratification. The Federation Alliance had its own vote and agreed.

Some of the USC members missed some of the mental connection they had, but found that those connections that were allowed sufficient to be acceptable. The leader stepped back from his role, and became more of a monk who gave advice than a leader of a people.

The agreement of 2088 established the Federation as not just an organization that helped research, but one that also held back technology. That new emphasis also led to an a goal of expansion of the Federation. Even areas that might not join the Federation Alliance would be put under the same restrictions on technological development.