The station was in chaos. The creature had torn into the walls and ceiling, snapping ancient power cables and conduits. The lights had gone out for thirty seconds while the old backup power struggled to activate. Shouts of pure terror followed screams of surprise. The bloodcurdling shrieks were the last phase of the twisted symphony of horror. Hasara followed behind the Orion, Tougun, who had both blaster pistols out and fired at whoever he could get in his crosshairs.

The Borg creature was murdering its way from the lower level into the main hall, assimilating. The initial attack had sufficiently frightened everyone. A new wave of half-drones was rising from the floor and advancing on the feeling crowds. Hasara tapped his communication device, and within thirty seconds, Krov and Sinai were at his side, standing ready. Sinai was picking off anyone who attempted to get near them. Tougun’s entourage reached him and began to escort him back to his ship. The reverberating sounds of phasers and blasters were a mortifying rhythm punctuated by the drowning screams and shouts. The Orion looked to Hasara, “You could come with us.” Two Orion Borg drones dropped to the ground at his feet, one cut down by Sinai’s staccato firing and the other sputtering blood from the deep cut from Krov.

“We’ve secured a shuttle. You got what you wanted.” He shot two more, and the groaning drones spun like pinwheels as they slammed into the ground. “I will expect payment.” Tougun gave him a quiet nod amid the chaos and motioned his team to retreat to the ship. Hasara motioned his team, “Let’s get on our way. Montana Squadron is on its way under the guise of responding to a distress signal.”

Sinai dispatched a group of drones advancing on them, “So they’re on clean-up duty? Good for them.” As they moved back and around, Hasra spotted the young Orion woman huddling in fear near their dock. He ran to her and grabbed her hand, “Come with me.” Her eyes went wide, but she didn’t hesitate or resist. She followed him as the rest jumped into the shuttle, slamming the door closed. Hagasi didn’t hesitate – the shuttle jumped from the station and pulled away.

Hasara slipped into the ops seat, “No Borg made it out?”

The Ferengi chuckled, “The transporters on the station were easy to sabotage—a couple of small explosive charges will make it hard, even for the Borg, to repair them.” He moved them behind a moon, “All of the ships made it out clean – Tougan made his power moves to unify the others under his flag.” He lowered their power levels to avoid further detection, “Better the devil we know.”

Hasara didn’t reply as he sat in silence. Tougun wasn’t their friend. They knew more about him than they had when they started. He wasn’t sure if that made the mission a success or not. He supposed only time would tell.

In the passenger cabin, the young Orion stared at Sinai, who stared back at her, annoyed. “Why did you bring her along, Hasara?” she shouted towards the cockpit.

Hasara appeared in the arch, “Why did I bring you along back then?” She scowled at his implication. “She’s as lost as we all out here. Help her see what you were able to see.” He returned to the cockpit, leaving Sinai staring at her new charge.

She accused, “What is your name?”

The young Orion shrugged, “I don’t have a name. I was called 9932.”

Sinai understood, “Well, what do you like to do?”

A hesitant smile appeared. “I like…to draw. They never really let me…, so I had to do it in secret.”

The Romulan shouted at Hagasi in the cockpit, “Give me a famous woman artist!”

There was a growl from the Ferengi before he snarled, “Catharina.”

Sinai turned to the Orion, “That’s your name.”

Catharina’s smile broadened as she said it out loud a few times. “I like it.”

The Dragonfly thundered through space, followed closely by the Douglas and Perseverance. It had been a plan hatched in haste—the technology had to return to Starfleet’s hands. Most agreed the thing needed to be destroyed. It would eventually fall to the Daystrom Institute and others to decide the ultimate fate. Captain Alexandra Pantuso sat in the center chair, the lights a subtle ruby hue. The last report had been a station filling with Borg, including a creature of terrifying power. “Time to intercept?”

Ensign Gabriela Castillo tapped at her console, “Five minutes. Long-range sensors show no ships in the area. The station is showing plenty of Borg life signs.” Her heart rested just below her throat. She was fighting to remain calm.

Pantuso drummed her fingers on the arm of her chair. The three ships had activated their respective Hazard Teams to investigate the situation at the station. Caution had been stressed to each of them.

“Captain?” She turned at the voice of their two-month chief of science, Ensign Lita Morrison. She’d come up through the ranks quickly. Her adjustment and learning curve was a process. Pantuso left her chair and stood behind her. Lita brought up the scans she was working on, “Normally, when we quantify Borg, we can detect a signal with The Collective.” The data on the screen rotated several times, “I’m not picking up any connection. Many attempts to reach out…but nothing’s responding.”

Alexandra slid into the chair next to the science chief, “So whatever Borg drones are on the station…they’re not getting orders or updates? They’re just getting…silence?”

Morrison matched her CO’s contemplative stance as she ran through various scenarios in her head. The connection to the collective was notoriously powerful and could reach distances that beguiled Starfleet scientists. She sat forward with a start, “These aren’t Borg…at least…the Borg of the Delta Quadrant that we know. That device was an early design with the Changeling conspiracy for Frontier Day and was probably tuned specifically to the Borg Queen.” She tapped her console anew, “They’re not receiving a signal back because The Borg Queen they are tasked with connecting to is dead.”

Alex blew out a low whistle of appreciation: “So they don’t have direction or leadership telling them what to do. The initial attack and ensuing assimilation spree were instinctual. Once their version of order was restored…they’d ask for their next step, which is never going to come.”

Lita drummed her fingers on the edge of the console. “What if we could…deprogram them or something? Send a shut-down code? Then, we’d only have to worry about the creature from the Borg lagoon. Hazard team only has to worry about one versus all of them.”

Pantuso snapped her fingers, “Get to work. We’re going to have time to scan and figure out what we’re looking at when we arrive in two – work with the other two science departments…and work quickly. You might end up saving some lives by the end of this, Ensign Morrison.”

Baron Nine sat next to the empty science station on the bridge of the USS Douglas. Sadie Fowler remained in the care of the Montana Station hospital, and he had been the next best option to assist with science. He had stoutly refused to sit in her chair. The data from the Dragonfly was on the screen, and he worked at an event pace. His knowledge and experience with Borg had been a benefit for Starfleet at large. It had been over two months since he had come under the wing of the Montana Station Squadron. He had spent that time learning all he had missed and all that existed outside of where he had lived. There had been so much to learn. So much context had filled his mind, and he was still learning in his downtime.

“Baron?” He turned in the chair to face his captain, Helena Dread. She asked, “Thoughts so far?” She had accepted him early on. Not feeling judgment staring at him from across the bridge had been a welcome relief.

“The initial concept is within the limits of the technology they had used in the incident. We have the research and data from the Frontier Day experience. It is a matter of taking that and putting it to work with the scenario we face now.” He returned to the console, “Given that it was an earlier concept, it helps. Finding a way to infuse them with a new collective signal may be the more advantageous path.”

Dread appeared lost in thought for a moment. She shook her head, “You don’t seem to think we’ll be able to save anyone from their assimilated fate.” He observed a sadness in both her voice and face.

Nine agreed, “Whatever they discovered as flawed with this device and then proceeded to perfect it – the flawed nature precludes anything from surviving the mangled process it has created. The nature of the reformulated process was that with the destruction of the Queen and the signal that was exerting control over people, they returned to their normal state. I do not wish to think of what would happen if we attempted to return those on the station to their original state. The reports of Nathanial and his group are evidence enough.”

Helena felt a coldness in her chest. She had been hopeful, perhaps foolishly, that maybe they’d manage to find someone they could save. Whether they were hero, villains, or somewhere in between, they deserved to at least live according to their terms. She was frustrated with Hasara. Tougun had grown his power base with an act of mass murder. There was too much wanton death weighing the equation down to attempt to make the excuse that those who had been assimilated were terrible and evil. Her mind returned to the present, “You’re suggesting we create a pseudo-collective to accept the signal and…what? Shut them down?”

The ex-Borg put it plainly, “We would need to instruct them to deactivate permanently. The next step would be to…”

She raised her right hand, “I know what the next step is, Baron. We would need to process the bodies and ensure their complete and total destruction.”

“It is current protocol, Captain Dread.”

Helena clamped her mouth shut. He was new to this as both ex-Borg and human. Telling him off would do neither of them any good. After a minute of silence, she found her words, “Get to building it. We’ll determine the signal once the fake collective system has been built and tested.” She watched as he stood and headed for the science offices. She hoped they would find a way to save some of them.

“You sound skeptical, Park.” Captain Wren Walton sat in her ready room on the Perseverance, her XO across the desk. The plan had been agreed on—the process of building a collective with which to reply was underway.

Commander Park wasn’t sure how she felt. There were far too many variables to handle, and her science background made her equally fascinated and horrified by the possibilities ahead. “I don’t know if skeptical covers it, Wren. You read Helena’s report. She is less than thrilled.”

Walton sat back in the chair, “The problem is – she’s not wrong. If they were Federation citizens, Starfleet officers, or a race that was a member of the Federation – we wouldn’t hesitate. We’d do everything we could to save them.” She grumbled, “But any of them that we find with a remote chance of recovery will have to be routed through JAG, Starfleet Security, and everybody else. They’ll have to be secured at Montana Station until someone can make it out here to pick them up.”

Park mused, “Sounds like you just talked us into doing the right thing, Wren.”

Walton grimaced, “Sometimes I hate it when I’m right. I’ll loop in Fontana. He’s going to hate this too.”