We all worship Paramount, hollowed be they that owns Star Trek and many things Trekish. We also offer a prayer to Decker, who on the seventh day created Star Traks. Please think good thoughts of Meneks, who has decided to play in the warped universe of Star Trak.
Beware the Howling Wolf
Second walked along the tier towards his alcove. His gait was the standard shuffle of a Borg whose consciousness is more fully immersed in the digital realm than the real. Movement between nodal intersection, or anywhere on the cube for that matter, and alcove was automatic, deserving of no more attention than necessary to prevent bumping into walls or accidental careening through guardrails. Second's reaction was extreme confusion when he was forced to return to the real world, a whine alerting him to something unexpected. Turning to face his alcove, Second looked down.
The animal curled in Second's alcove was, well, a dog. To be more exact, it was a shosho, a domesticated nonsentient companion endemic to Arrival-Departure. They had been brought to the systems four thousand years earlier by a species extirpated during one of the many wars which regularly swept the region. Several races had adopted the pet, and shoshos were welcome family members throughout multitudes of ships and the homes of both stars.
This particular shosho was Labrador-sized, with floppy ears and a large nose. A thick tail beat a welcoming tempo against the deck. Eyes of dark hazel looked up at Second with adoration, emanating an unspoken trust which said "I don't know who you are, but I implicitly have faith that you will make everything better." And better it could only become, for the moderately long white hair which at one time had covered the animal had been reduced to mangy twists and fuzz. The gray pallor of underlying skin in combination with star-shaped external implants screamed as to what had occurred. Only one drone could be responsible.
"Move," ordered Second as he pointed down the walkway. "Get. Get out of my alcove."
The shosho whined pitifully, tail increasing its thumping.
"Move, you mongrel. Out. Now." Second tried to worm a foot between the shosho's body and the back of the alcove, to no avail. The leverage was not right. The animal whined again, then began to purr nervously. While it may superficially resemble a Terran dog, it did have its differences.
{Doctor, come here and remove this creature for disposal,} directed Second towards the responsible party, {before I do it for you.}
Doctor's signature disengaged from the files he had been perusing. {You found Yapyap?} asked the head of the drone maintenance hierarchy excitedly. He paused as he accessed the images swirling in the forefront of Second's mind. {No! Don't do that to Yapyap!}
Snarled Second, {Too late.}
Second bent over to grab the shosho, pulling it out of the alcove. The animal whimpered, toenails scrabbling against the floor ineffectively as it tried to resist. "Out. Out now." The expression on the animal's face was one of confusion as to why a God-Owner would do such an incomprehensible thing, but that the reason was not important and all was forgiven regardless.
Doctor materialized three alcoves distant as Second began to push the pet towards the edge of the catwalk, towards the open shaft.
"No!" yelled Doctor. "Don't hurt Yapyap! He is only a puppy!"
Second glanced towards Doctor and responded, "A 'puppy' which should not be here. How many Luplup incidents will we have to suffer before your animal fetish is abolished? How many hamster accidents?" He gave the shosho a final push to scoot it under the guardrail and into the abyss.
And found himself pulled to the deck, his chest crashing against metal plates.
The shosho had latched powerful jaws onto Second's arm at the last moment, sharp teeth punching through armor to catch flesh underneath. The move was not malicious, and even as it dangled over a long fall it whimpered with hope, with the knowledge that it would be rescued. Doctor blubbered about saving Yapyap, not that Second listened. He had greater concerns, such as the animal dangling from his arm, an animal whose presence made standing impossible.
"Shut up," said Second to Doctor, followed by, "Let go, you annoying beast. Off of me," directed at Yapyap. The shosho whined again, fixing Second in a liquid brown gaze designed to melt the heart of the most dedicated pet hater. However, Second did not despise pets; he merely concurred with the Borg position that nonsentient animals were irrelevant, served no useful purpose. After shaking his arm vigorously, to no avail, he managed to bring his other limb into play, rapping the shosho sharply on the nose.
With a yip of pain, Yapyap let go. The animal tumbled head over tail, finally impacting distant floor with an unheard thump. Second regained his feet, ignoring Doctor as the latter leaned over the guardrail, peering at the motionless canine body lying broken one hundred meters below.
Second examined his arm in disgust, "That damn animal bit right through the armor. I see holes. What did you do to that thing? Give it duralloy teeth?" He ignored the bruising and tearing of flesh under molded plating, damage already healing. "Insert me on the drone maintenance roster for armor removal and replacement. Did you hear me, Doctor? Comply."
"Huh? What? Oh, sure," said a dejected Doctor, his eyes briefly raising to look at Second before returning to the sight far below. Incisors clicked. "Poor puppy." The last statement was directed at the deceased shosho.
"I will regenerate until my surgery is scheduled," noted Second as his designation was placed on the maintenance roster. The drone turned, then stepped up and backwards into his alcove, feeling familiar clamps engage to steady his body. Before he allowed himself to slip into relaxing regeneration, he said, "The shosho is your mess, Doctor. You know the rules, and you are the only one to blame. Clean it up before you return to your normal duties." Eyes closed as the regeneration cycle began, thoughts drifting as Borg programs whispered Collective doctrine into a receptive mind, brain functioning usurped to serve as a wetware node in the sub-collective computer.
Doctor heaved a vast sigh, then peered over the edge of the walkway once more. He frowned as he searched for the doggy corpse, seeing nothing. Tentative queries of those most likely to snag a dead shosho revealed nothing; and the computer informed him that no drones had been in the immediate vicinity of Yapyap's final and abrupt resting place. With a glance at Second, Doctor buried the information about his inability to dispose of the corpse. It would surface eventually: dead things are unable to wander very far.
A transporter beam conveyed Doctor to another area within the cube, leaving behind alcove tier 7 of subsection 17, submatrix 10. Somewhere, everywhere and nowhere, a distant howl echoed, unheard, unremarked.
*****
Falling, falling, falling...he was falling. As is common in dream physics, the tumbling decent was both fast and slow without being paradoxical. Tiers flashed by; above, increasingly distant pale ovals peering downwards were blurred by dim lights, nearsightedness, and the hazing effects of sleeptime "fog."
The floor eagerly reached to accept his body. His limbs flailed even as the background conscious mind knew all was for naught. The impact was both painful and painless, shattered legs and broken back merely an indication of damage. The injuries did not matter. Concussion, dislocations, deep bruises of organ and bone, all was dismissed.
One leg, two legs, torturous crawl towards a dark corner, a black duct. Even as he struggled towards the hiding place, he could feel bones snapping into proper place, flesh knitting. The mind cries out! A soundless, piercing scream which howls a message to the dream.
And the message? An animalistic announcement, conveying no substance but emotion, a sense of "I am here! Here I am! I am alive!" No call for revenge, no triumph, nothing except I Am. Any other demand would be ridiculous, an impossible flight of fancy to fight the forces which warp dreams.
Again he howls. The consciousness watches, silent.
*****
Second awoke from regeneration, computer announcing the end to his cycle, adding he was due to Maintenance Bay #5 for reconstructive arm surgery in ten minutes. He peered at his arm in disgust, noting once more the bite marks marring the relatively thin armor. With a snort of annoyance, an acknowledgment was dispatched to drone maintenance, indicating he would be on the table promptly.
Second automatically split his awareness into multitask mode as assigned duties demanded attention. A large chunk of personal mental resources, however, turned to contemplate the odd dream which had plagued him in regeneration, a dream of half-seen shadows and animal impulses.
Regeneration was a peculiar time for Borg drones, akin to sleep, yet quite different, a time dedicated to servicing needs of both body and mind. While the physical self was refueled and accumulated metabolic poisons removed, unsubtle programs crawled through highly altered brainware, realigning any neurological pathways which had drifted from optimal compliance configuration. Big Brother was always watching. The end product was a drone dedicated to pursuit of Borg perfection, no questions asked. Assimilation imperfection did not dilute the desire for Oneness; assimilation imperfection did not increase the odds of becoming a rogue.
The oddness entered in how a drone opted to spend the hours of regeneration, either a state of active participation or zombie-like drifting. The latter was the most common condition for the great majority of the Collective, but those of Cube #347 which held command appointments, such as hierarchy heads, often spent body downtime only slightly less active on the mindscape than when physically mobile. A firm hand on reins was required to stop impulse from turning into a plunge into the nearest star to observe coronal interactions up close and personal. Drifting, however, had been the method Second had chosen for his most recent regeneration cycle, which in turn allowed the computer to use his mind as an extension of the overall processes which turned the individual selves of the sub-collective into a (somewhat) functional whole. The consequence of drifting was a consciousness which was prone to strange interpretations as the dreaming mind made an attempt to catalogue experience into understanding.
The whirling morass which was the collective consciousness of Cube #347 included many minds alien in basic thought processes. An extreme example was Sensors. Somewhere, probably several somewheres and several sometimes, Second's zombie awareness had bumped into the active minds of other drones, or orbited too close to datastreams translated into formats accessible to minds like Sensors and difficult to resolve by anyone else. The end result had been an odd dream of falling, of howling, of...of...of being.
It was probably all very metaphysical, a case psychologists pray to encounter in their lifetime for the royalties from books to be written about the poor, psychotic schmuck. However, Second had no father to hate, no mother to blame, and a cigar remained a thick roll of smoldering vegetation which contributed to bed breath, cancer, and premature death.
It was time to report to Maintenance Bay #5. Second stilled his rambling and irrelevant thoughts, collapsing the personal partition and making the decision to remain mentally active during the next several regeneration cycles.
Second materialized in the maintenance bay. The standard instruments of drone well-being were in evidence, transforming the medical ward into a garage for a rabid tool enthusiast. Two benches were already in use; and Second stepped next to the table indicated to be his. He lay upon the metal slab. Voluntary muscles below his neck were disconnected as 65 of 133 triggered the appropriate compliance pathways. He was now prepped for surgery.
Second expanded input to his visual cortex to include views from monitoring cameras scattered in the walls and ceiling of the bay, as well as that of the drone which would be working on his arm. Doctor was busy at another body, diligently tweezing small twists of metal from 159 of 480's forehead, loser of a staple gun fight. As 65 of 133 began to remove damaged arm plating, Second directed a query at Doctor.
{The animal is disposed,} stated Second. It was confirmation, not question.
Doctor paused in his work, glancing over his shoulder at Second before wedging out another of the several dozen staples residing in 159 of 480's face. {Yapyap is gone.} Was there maybe the slightest hesitation before the answer, a shuffling as information was buried?
{Gone?}
{All gone.}
{Good,} replied Second, satisfied. Doctor was likely wary because of one or more other illicit projects, but Second's immediate concern was that the shosho was removed from the cube. Several minutes passed as Second critically watched the progressing limb surgery, then primary levels of awareness slipped into the dataspaces to make the rounds of various bulletin boards. His official duties were routine, the boring dribbles not handled by Captain. Scanning for indications of imminent wish fulfillment did not require his full attention, and neither did sorting cargo bay manifests for incongruities.
Second slowly perused the board entitled "Nonsentient Sightings." It was a forum dedicated to reporting upon encounters with Doctor's pets. Lately a rash of hexapod hamster sightings had prompted a discussion as to how the things managed to survive each extermination attempt. Spontaneous generation was the favorite theory despite overwhelming scientific evidence against such a phenomenon. Near the bottom of the board was a short notice Second read in curiosity, an interest which grew as he absorbed the timestamp.
{11 of 240,} demanded Second, disturbing the named drone as she welded a broken alcove tier guardrail, {confirm this posting.}
Replied 11 of 240, {Aye, I saw a four-legged something in subsection 17, submatrix 26. Only caught a glimpse of it, though.}
{Did it resemble this animal?} Second provided 11 of 240 with an image of the (supposedly demised) shosho as it hung from his arm.
11 of 240 provided a recording of her experience, a swift sensation of motion at the edge of perception. She had not pursued the shadow, important duties elsewhere ranking a higher priority than chasing an escaped pet. {Could be,} she drawled.
Second retreated, leaving 11 of 240 to her job. He compared the pictures, suspicion growing.
{Doctor, define "gone,"} demanded Second.
Doctor increased the pace of his destapling, ignoring the complaints from 159 of 480 as needlenose pliers grabbed skin as well as metal. {Gone: past participle of go; dying or dead; ruined, lost; used up; carried away.}
{And which of those definitions is appropriate in the sentence "Yapyap is gone"?}
Doctor halted his work, shoulders slumping. He cocked his head to look at a camera lens, aware Second was utilizing the visual. Incisors clicked together once, twice amid turbulent internalized thoughts. {Lost.}
{Did you, or did you not, dispose of the animal, specifically, the shosho,} asked Second, leaving no room for wiggling around the truth. Borg could not lie to each other, but those imperfectly assimilated had discovered every exploitable loophole available to sidestep fact when self-deemed necessary.
The response was a short clip from Doctor's point of view, looking over the railing to the bottom of the shaft. No shosho corpse was in evidence. {No. There was no animal to dispose. I do not know where the corpse went.}
Thoughts of zombie vysts galloped through Second's head as the emerging vermin problem spread beyond the confines of him and Doctor. Privacy did not exist in the Collective. A wordless question was raised.
{No, no. That could not happen again!} claimed Doctor adamantly. {That was a special, special case. Luplup-girl was a true singular consciousness with each body an appendage. Disconnecting a vyst body was equivalent to losing a finger, easily reattached, good as new. Yapyap is a boy, not pregnant, and requires sexual methods to propagate his species. He is one, alone. Even if the fall was not terminal, poor Yapyap would not have been able to move, and certainly not disappear.}
Second was skeptical.
{Trust your vet! I tell the truth!}
Doctor was telling the truth, as far as he knew it. Second would have to look elsewhere. Mystery of the zombie shosho...it sounded like the title to one of Captain's coveted Jumba the Wise Lizard novels. Second held a very brief conversation with Captain, the end of which returned responsibility of tracking the animal to Second. Gee-whiz. Fun. Not. Likely the shosho, assuming it was alive and remained in that condition, would join the ranks of other assimilated creatures which lived like fugitives amid the thousands of kilometers of hiding space available on Cube #347. Hamsters, scorpion-like trinoth with joy-juice poison, bloodvine, and now shosho. The cube was a regular zoo.
{Hey!} exclaimed Second as he returned attention to his surgery, noting what had become of his arm. {That color doesn't match the rest of my armor. As unlikely as it would be for me to publicly appear in an assault, sporting a patch of screaming orange would be unBorglike considering the rest of my armor is black. Remove that offensive repair and replace it correctly.}
65 of 133 sighed with exaggerated annoyance, laying down plasma soldering iron. She would have to start all over. No one appreciated her work, her attempt of artistry on a living drone canvas.
*****
Soft light; sharp center dissolving to indistinct edges; point of view one, then three, then two. Another dream sequence, time stretched to infinity even as it rushed impatiently like a melt-swollen mountain stream.
Surreal. More than real, less than real.
Best to passively observe until reality of an awake and conscious mind reasserted dominance.
He was two and he was three and he was one. He was of four legs and he was of two legs and he was of no legs. He limped pitifully through the metallic corridors, helped by himself, knowing without knowledge the maze through which he trod. The others which did and did not look like himself needed to be avoided, at least for now.
It was all very metaphoric.
He was hungry. He knew that something small was near: this was the place he had been trying to find. He could hide here; and maybe he could even recover here, for although part of himself was sad to see that he was dying (knew that death was a fact of life even though his very presence cheated extinction), another part of himself, the howling part, struggled to live with animal vigor, animal inability to accept.
He stalked forth, he of two four no legs, to catch the small things. The small things had six legs, black eyes, and went squeak when he caught them in his jaws. The blood was sweet and was bitter. It was and wasn't what he needed, but would suit for now. It sustained life, many small things dying such that he could live...for a time.
He was not desperate yet, he of three, he of one, he of two. The time might come when he would be forced to go forth and try other methods to survive. Survival was instinct. The small things weren't quite right; food came from bags and was small abstract chunks and tasted of molpul even though he had never sampled molpul in his life. His sire's sire's sire's sire to the mists of time had never tasted molpul, yet somewhere in that line he had, yet somewhere in that line until recently he had not known such a beast as a molpul existed.
Still, he caught small things in his jaws until he was full.
And he howled of self, telling the universe of his continued being.
And then it was time to sleep.
*****
{Regeneration cycle complete,} announced the computer.
Second awoke. First thought: 'I was to spend regeneration lucid, not drifting.' Second thought: 'Whose composite datastream was my conscious entangled to account for these surreal dreams?' Third thought: 'What is that awful taste in my mouth?' Fourth thought: 'Why do I have to supervise the sorting of internal sensor logs over the past year to pinpoint all miscellaneous power fluctuations in subsection 27?'
Of the fourth thought, Second could do nothing. Delta was searching for shorts, illicit energy usage, and other drains on the power cores, both those caused by maintenance need and those due to purposeful intent. One of the primary tasks of command and control was to shuffle files, and right now the deep abysses of local archives required trolling.
The first thought upon awakening was easily explained. Although Second had set his mind state for regeneration, the need of the sub-collective always overrode personal preference. If, as in this case, a problem popped up which required additional resources, the computer would usurp brainware as drones entered regeneration, sending sense of self drifting to the dataspace dreamscape as wetware was used to crunch numbers.
As far as the cause of the surreal dreams, the culprit was impossible to trace. Similar to the previous regeneration cycle, his semi-conscious mind likely had been caught within the flow of one of the more alien mentalities of Cube #347, else swirled in the gestalt of other similarly drifting minds, each contributing to the overall morass of insensibility. Second had been a drone for over thirteen decades, and had far experienced worse than fuzzy impressions of hamsters and hallways.
Concerning the third thought, the bad taste, Second was absolutely clueless. Although he did not eat, could not eat, functional taste buds remained, a vestigial organ which neither contributed to nor detracted from his fitness as a Borg drone. Oh well, it was not relevant.
A year's worth of internal sensor logs awaited inspection.
Four hours later, the monumental task of minutely examining subsection 27 for power anomalies was only half complete. Thus far revealed were standard transient phenomenon, the phantoms which came and went, a problem seen once and never repeated. Additionally and much more important, three chronic shorts had been discovered, trivial in the greater scheme of things, but a tidbit of data to appease Delta. Of greatest significance, although not unexpected, a continuous low-level siphoning of energy from a tertiary power feed had been found. Likely the culprit of the illicit tap was a drone with a secret project. Second refused to allow deeper digging into the cause behind drain, forcing the drones slowly slogging through the mountain of data to focus on the task at hand, not skip into tangents, no matter how fascinating. Delta could investigate the tapping to her hearts content.
Second was highly bored, his job to make sure the task continued without deviations. Occasionally he would scan data summaries and review progress of individuals and subgroups. Sometimes the whip would be cracked, a reminder that the investigation did not include topics such as the kilometers of optic cable replaced in the target subsection or extraordinary number of firecracker stashes which had been found secreted within interstitial spaces. More often than not, however, Second was left to simply observe, his participation automatic and mind-numbing.
Thoughts meandered to the bulletin boards, and more specifically, the pet sighting board.
*
-Timestamp: 8241.6z / Location: subsection 17, submatrix 26
-Posted by: 114 of 230 / Subject: Howling
-I was sonic scrubbing graffiti when I heard howling. Where it came from exactly, I do not know. The corridors can carry sound funny sometimes. I suppose it could have been machinery, or another drone, but those explanations do not seem correct to me. Most odd. I thought at one point there were two distinct pitches, but analysis of captured sound file [see attachment] is inconclusive. The auditory doubling was likely due to an unusual combination of echoes and reverberations.
-Timestamp: 8310.5c / Location: subsection 17, submatrix 23
-Posted by: 26 of 42 / Subject: Hamster bodies
-Okay, who has been doing weird things to the hamsters? In the last four hours, I have found seven hamsters, or parts of hamsters. This is just gross. If you, whomever the hamster vigilante is, are going to eradicate the vermin, you could at least do so cleanly. Guess who has to mop up the mess, huh? Me!
-Timestamp: 8319.2f / Location: subsection 18, submatrix 27
-Posted by: 151 of 203 / Subject: Eggplant elephants
-i see eggPlant elePHants. they are LookinG at me like they Want to eAt me. i think doctoR should not assimilate eggplAnt elePhants anymore. anD elephants should definitely not flY.
*
Second scrolled through drone maintenance, noting 151 of 203 was listed to undergo surgery to remove a crayon currently lodged in his front temporal lobe. An eggplant crayon. The details upon why a crayon was literally pushing 151 of 203's paranoia buttons was likely fascinating in a morbid way, but Second resisted inquiring. Similarly, while slaughtered hamster was not the usual decoration for cube corridors, the posting was irrelevant concerning the shosho.
Second absently x'ed complete another day of archived sensor logs, then returned to the pet board post entitled "Howling." The attached file contained both auditory recording of a duel howl, as well as subsequent tonal analysis trying to confirm the double nature. As noted, the results were ambiguous, primarily due to poor sound quality. Naturally, no other drone had heard the suspicious duet.
Running with the hypothesis that one shosho had spontaneously become two, Second required data to prove or disprove the conjecture. Doctor's collected vet files on all nonsentient things furry, scaled, or feathered were exactly what Second needed. He raided the extensive database, copying anything shosho related. Unfortunately, unless Doctor had acquired a second mutt, the ex-vet's insistence that a single could not become a double a la Luplup was correct.
The shosho was a heterogeneous animal, following the classical mammalian template with only minor discrepancies. The male sired offspring; and while he could suckle young, he could not become pregnant. Only the female carried and bore offspring. The male had no pouches or internal structures to hide an errant pup; and he was genetically locked to his sex, unable to change gender. No clones. No budding. No fission. Unless a biblical miracle had been bestowed, or an omnipotent being was playing a joke, Yapyap, a male shosho, was the only one of his kind on Cube #347.
Second still was not convinced the fall had been survivable by a mere animal. Several days from now, he fully expected to find a decaying corpse, with a drone crewmember confessing involvement in using speakers and Weapons' holoemitters to cause hallucinations. Funny. Ha-ha. Second was not laughing.
Theory disproved. Howling duet was an anomalous occurrence.
Not so much curious as bored, Second continued to scan the shosho file. Surprisingly, the term "shosho" actually related to two species, genetic cousins unable to successfully interbreed. Physically the two races looked almost identical, difference postulated to be the result of a forgotten breeding program by the long extirpated species which had originally brought the shosho to Arrival-Departure.
The two breeds were known as alpha and beta. Beta was longer in leg, slightly shorter in hair, and sported a distinctly bulged skull indicating an expanded brain. The beta was moderately more intelligent than its alpha cousin, although the intelligence often manifested itself as obsessive-compulsive behavior if the animal was not kept sufficiently stimulated. For that reason, beta shoshos were often employed as working dogs - herding molpuls, enforcement. Alphas, on the other hand, had personalities better suited for the pet market, although betas were perfectly acceptable if an owner had the time to properly socialize the animal and strenuously exercise it. Primarily because of the ownership ease, the shosho of choice, alphas, were more widely distributed in AD in comparison to betas. Yapyap, a beta, had been the exception rather than the rule with an origination from a private residence.
{Hey! There is a definite pattern to the suspect power taps,} announced 333 of 480, spokesdrone to the partition which was examining sensor logs covering the first six hours of a ship day.
The shosho information became irrelevant as Second was confronted with potential difficulties of a significant sort. The tangential wandering of 333 of 480's partition would partially explain why the overall task was requiring greater time than originally estimated. {Irrelevant!} roared Second. {Return to work. Comply.}
333 of 480 sputtered, well aware she was not performing the task assigned what she was, {But, but, but it really interesting. You see...}
{Comply!}
{Just look at the data? Just a...}
{Irrelevant. Comply. Now. It is Delta's problem, not ours.}
{But...}
{Comply.}
{Okay. We comply,} sighed 333 of 480. {You don't know what...} she began, only to trail off when faced with the displeasure radiating from Second. {Fine. Back to sensor logs. Joy. No thinking what-so-ever.}
{We are Borg,} reminded Second, irony coloring his words, {and thinking is irrelevant. Do the task we have been assigned.}
*****
He limped forward slowly, stopping to crouch under a sheltering table. He was no longer getting better; and although he had healed much more than should have been expected considering the trauma which had shattered legs and spine, it was not enough. He was alive, but he of three, he of two, he of one knew that the state would not persist. Part of him feared death even as part of him, the part which struggled to live, could not grasp the abstract.
A pair of feet moved across the room, halting next to his muzzle. He looked up at himself, down at himself, a split vision possible only in a dream. A sigh of disappointment: no more small things could be found.
Hunger snarled his insides. Instincts warred, instinct to curl up and sleep until all was better against instinct food was required to regain health. He of two and he of three knew both instincts were futile, but he of one lunged for the nebulous goal of survival. A hand reached for the light just beyond reach, always out of reach.
The light disappeared, eclipsed by a shape familiar. He squinted at the form, but realized while the People-shaped shadow included head, torso, arms, legs, it was not truly recognizable. The face was a blur, scent unfamiliar.
He inhaled again, drawing air deep into nasal cavities. There was an underlying odor, the metallic tang of the small things, a pungency which now mingled with the scent of himself. Stomach rumbled, reminding him of his hunger.
The shape eclipsing eternity uttered a deep "wha wha wha." He watched it for several heartbeats, he of three, he of one, he of two. It was he of one, he of four legs, which came to a decision.
With a whine, with a howl, he leaped upon the haloed demon: "I will live! I will be!"
*****
Second awoke, regeneration cycle complete. The first thing he focused on was his mouth, and the horrible taste. Two cycles in a row the computer had set him drifting despite his command otherwise; and two cycles in a row he had woken to a despicable taste, as if a piece of rotten garbage had taken residence under his tongue.
Yucking, Second raised one hand, cupping it to cover chin and nose. He exhaled noisily through his mouth. He tried to sniff his breath to test if raunchy smell accompanied the ten-day old gym sock taste, but was unable to tell. However, Second's species was not known for their sense of smell.
Stepping out of his alcove, Second checked Captain's location. Unsurprisingly, the primary consensus monitor and facilitator was in his nodal intersection. Walking along the alcove tier in that direction, Second continued to hold hand before face, failing to discern mouth odor.
"Captain," said Second as he entered the nodal intersection, "I require your assistance."
Captain turned away from his viewscreen. "What? 'My Favorite Blorple' is on, and I want to catch the ending."
"Perfect. Hold still." Second stopped directly before Captain, then exhaled mightily in the latter's face. Captain scrunched his eye closed, then stepped backward while shaking his head back and forth in annoyance.
"What was that for?"
Asked Second, "Did my breath smell?"
Captain reopened his eye, fanning his unmodified hand in front of himself. The nostrils on his forehead were tightly constricted. "Repeat?"
"Did my breath smell?"
"No. It stunk. What have you been doing to yourself? Don't tell me you have been engaged in 306 of 510's garlic tasting contests?"
Second held up one palm in the universal gesture for "Just a minute." In his other hand materialized a bottle of mint mouthwash from inventory. Opening the cap, he upended the container, chugging a mouthful.
{Have you had any difficulties with your alcove lately?} Second briskly gargled, then puffed his cheeks as he swished the unnaturally green-blue liquid back and forth.
"Negative. If Delta catches you tinkering with your alcove settings," warned Captain. He did not bother to finish the sentence.
Gargle. Gargle. Second paused, cheeks distended, a line of spittle leaking from lips to dribble down his chin. Perhaps he should have thought this action all the way through. He had no place to spit; and damned if he was going to swallow it, only to heave it up five minutes later. {I have commanded lucid regeneration the last two cycles, and each time the computer has sent me to La-La-Land. Also each time I have awoken to a horrible taste to my mouth. My alcove must be malfunctioning. I have not done anything lately to warrant Delta requiring revenge.}
Second stepped outside the shelter of the intersection, peering over the alcove tier rail to the distant ground. He spat. Below, 197 of 310, efficiently mopping, was missed by the mouthful of used mouthwash by less than a meter. She shouted a few choice profanities upwards, then sullenly cleaned up the mess.
"Perhaps," noncommittally replied Captain. "I do not know about your breath, but the last several days have experienced heavy computational loads. Analysis of subspace communications to determine which groups have Artifacts, assigning probabilities to several hundred scenarios to be used in later sub-collective consensus, the list is long. We are also quizzing Depot on his knowledge of this system, but he has been, as usual, less than forthcoming."
Second smacked his lips. Captain's remarks were superfluous, already known, but the verbalization helped to align neural processes. It was the Borg equivalent to talking outloud with oneself. "Much better. That might explain my nonlucid regeneration, yes, but not my mouth. Accept input of what I can recall of some odd regeneration dreams. I would like to know who's consciousness I have been bumping..." He trailed off as an alarm rang through the dataspaces, nightmares irrelevant.
Captain mirrored Second's stance, eyes focused somewhere between infinity and nowhere as mind centered on the trouble. 59 of 152 had been attacked, and thus Cube #347 was attacked An assault on one was an assault on all. The drone was only now recovering sufficient functionality to report his condition and yell for assistance. The sub-collective moved to confront the threat.
59 of 152 was a mess, mentally and physically. On the edge of consciousness, he continued to reported "dog attack" over and over until drone maintenance suspended his higher neurological functions, spinning him into a coma. Flesh was savaged, armor torn, yet in it all, the attacker had never torn nor mangled a vital system. The drone was salvageable, barely, although only a slight worsening of prognosis would be required to tip scales to termination and recycling.
The memegram sequence downloaded from unconscious mind was blurry, confused, mirroring the trauma which had visited 59 of 152. Personal memories were usually recalled with eidetic clarity by Borg, but in this case damaged connections between biological and technological structures forced the sub-collective to recreate events from neural memory alone. The brain of most species, including that of 59 of 152, is notoriously unreliable to objectively remember incidents. Random cross-linkages, emotional state, expectations, and hormonal levels contribute to final memegram imprint, one which may or may not resemble actual events.
First person view, 59 of 152 entering Maintenance Bay #13, focused upon the task to find a Limb Calibration Device, Type 6, forgotten when the bay was last used two weeks prior. Doctor was inventorying medical equipment, sending drones of his hierarchy on an extensive scavenger hunt to find misplaced, or outright stolen, items. The job was routine, so 59 of 152 was acting autonomously, no need for the sub-collective to monitor his actions, to watch over his figurative shoulder. Thence contributed to subsequent confusion, for 59 of 152 was the only witness of events which transpired.
59 of 152 sees something, someone, but the figure is blurred. The shape could be a hatrack for all the detail which can be discerned. A question is asked, demanded - "State your identification." Perhaps the words trigger the attack, for a howling cry calls from the unspecified figure, to which 59 of 152 responds by stepping backward. Surprise is a sharp tang coloring the memory.
A moment of clarity. A dog, a shosho, an assimilated shosho hairless and gray of skin, leaps forward, bowling over 59 of 152. A table crashes, spilling maintenance instruments. 59 of 152 hits his head sharply against a work bench, the cause of his memory problems, as well as a stunning impact which disables ability to scream to the unseen collective consciousness of Cube #347 for help.
The shosho muzzle hovers over 59 of 152's face, floating unattached to body. The head morphs to that of a sad-eyed, dog-faced humanoid, snarling lips lifted to bare teeth. A heavy weight, greater than that attributable to a Labrador-sized dog, presses down upon 59 of 152s body, trapping him. The rending begins, a sensation 59 of 152 is unable to struggle against, damage from accidental cranium blow affecting motor control in a negative manner. Several minutes later, the mauling abruptly ends, although 59 of 152 is incapable of reporting his serious condition and request assistance until thirty minutes later. The memegram ends.
Seconds after normalizing contact with the sub-collective, five weapon hierarchy members arrived to find the severely mangled 59 of 152 amid blood, bits of flesh, Borg parts. The attacker was gone. Heavy drone feet ruined the site for comprehensive investigation, although two blood-outlined prints, the pad of a shosho, were discovered leaving the scene.
{It is a werewolf,} said 9 of 300 confidently.
Scoffed Second, {A werewolf? Don't be inane.}
9 of 300 insisted, {A werewolf. Look at the evidence. The shosho fell off the alcove tier, a fall which would have required days of recovery even by a drone, yet it manages to crawl away. Later it is observed several times, obviously not paralyzed. The blooded hamsters. And now, it is seen again, by 59 of 152, whom it attacks, transforming mid-leap into a humanoid.} The theory was "proved" by 59 of 152's suspect memegrams.
Captain attempted to be a voice of reason in the growing opinion storm. {The bite marks are of an animal, a shosho. However, the leap to "werewolf" on strength of a memegram is preposterous. 59 of 152 was severely damaged, thus the evidence is unreliable.}
{Werewolf,} affirmed 9 of 300. The pressure to accept the proposed conclusion was increasing, and not only among weapons hierarchy ranks. Weapons himself was providing his approval, agreeing to anything which might lead to eventual mayhem.
Resistance to the werewolf idea suddenly collapsed, or so it seemed. However, such was not the case. Captain was instead leading a strategic retreat to allow those firmly entrenched in the humanoid-canine camp to follow their belief, as long as overall cube efficiency remained uncompromised. At the very least, the activity would provide weapons hierarchy with exercise and something constructive to pursue. Second was appalled by the action of command and control, even as he shifted mental gears to follow the new program. In the background, Doctor was pleading unsuccessfully for the shosho hunt to be aborted.
{So,} asked Captain, {how does one stop a werewolf?}
Called one voice, accompanied by the appropriate pict, {Silver bullets!}
{Holy water!} crowed a second.
{Crossbow quarrels!}
{Garlic!}
{Cover its head with a blanket!}
{Dismember it and drag it to crossroads for burial!}
{Cut off the pelt and sew it back on inside-out!}
{Burn! Burn! Burn! Burn!} added resident pyromaniac 279 of 300. He was ignored, burning his answer for everything. How does one mop a floor? Burn it.
Second rumbled, {We are mixing myths.}
{Well,} began 9 of 300, the instigator, {maybe it is a zombie vampire werewolf. Can't be too careful, you know. We might wake up one day, all undead.}
{We are already undead,} commented Second. {At least by the standards of many resistant races.}
Dismissed 9 of 300, {That doesn't count. Wrong type of undead. I mean the not breathing, no pulse kind of undead.} The brainstorm continued to rage, each suggestion more outlandish than the last.
{Slap it with a ripe fish!}
{Break a mirror over its head during a lunar eclipse!}
{Recite "I'm A Little Teapot" backwards while wearing a sassy purple number and doing a country jig.}
Eventually, finally, consensus narrowed possible weapons to one. The single weapon was actually a aggregation of several. Argument over which species' myth - those that had werebeing myths - to follow constructed the ultimate (zombie vampire) werewolf instrument of destruction - a silver-tipped wooden crossbow bolt dipped in concentrated garlic essence.
{This whole endeavor is irrelevant,} complained Second. Few drones were listening, Captain among the group.
{Let weapons hierarchy have their fun,} said Captain. {They will rid the cube of the shosho, and perhaps flush out other wayward assimilated pets at the same time. Only weapons hierarchy will be involved, physically at least. Since Weapons would be playing BorgCraft "simulations" anyway, cube efficiency will not be altered. Efficiency might even increase. We are not under threat of external attack, therefore the distraction will not deter from our tactical readiness. Lastly, the vicarious amusement will entertain nonparticipants.}
Second grumbled, but acknowledged his acceptance. It was his role as secondary consensus monitor to utter objections, to voice the misgivings which were held within the sub-consciousness. Second played the role of devil or angel advocate very well. Part of Cube #347 was wary about hunting the animal, but the much greater part thought it a grand idea.
Readying his large file of "I told you so"s and sarcastic remarks, Second metaphorically leaned back to watch. Perhaps the antics by weapon hierarchy might be somewhat amusing. The bets offered regarding how long it would take to run the shosho to ground and pepper it with crossbow quarrels looked interesting, as did the odds concerning animal status as a werewolf.
*****
He trotted the endless corridors, each featureless, each alike, on a quest to find somewhere, nowhere, everywhere, infinity, eternity. He of four legs was in charge, set the pace, slow might it be, with he of two legs and he of no legs deferring judgment. He looked for small things. He looked for light to guide his way. Neither could he find.
Once in a while - A second? A minute? Longer? Shorter? Time was a flawed concept - he saw a demon. Inevitably the demon was shaped like a People; and inevitable the demon eclipsed the goal which he sought. He no longer knew what the goal was, other than survival and a cessation of pain, but he did know the demons stood in his way.
Attacking, he dipped his muzzle in their flesh, tasting bitter blood. Each instance soured the blood more, and he grew to dislike his actions. He would knock the demon down, leave his mark, then struggle onward. He helped himself ever onward.
Other demons chased behind, but they were not important. He howled his defiance to the hunters, then lost them in the hallways which all looked alike.
Time in dreams is meaningless, and forever it seemed he had been struggling onward. Forever. Onward. Onward. Onward.
*****
{It was a dog, I tell you, a dog!} called 124 of 300.
{Well, my location is one corridor hullwards, and I saw a humanoid shape cross the hallway intersection. I admit the lighting is dim and I was 30 meters away, but I think I can distinguish between a quadruped and biped. This was biped,} retorted 23 of 212.
{Dog!}
{Biped!}
{Dog!}
{Biped}
{Your eyes need to be replaced!}
{Oh yah? Well...well, your /brain/ needs to be replaced!}
{Stop it!} demanded 80 of 230. She did not mean the argument. {Who shot a bolt in my back? Who? It is lodged in my ribcage.} 80 of 230, an engineering drone, had been quietly testing circuits when rudely interrupted. Unfortunately her assignment was well within the current hunt area, and four designations were listed as being around the corner from her. Any of the four could have arrowed her. The guilty party was near, as no transporters had been activated. {I am not a werewolf!}
Second was highly amused. True, all the misgivings of having weapons hierarchy on a rampage were coming true as foretold, but Second had performed his job of cautious naysayer and could not be blamed. Since being overrode, he had spent his waking hours either watching the hunt, or contemplating what part of his alcove and associated systems was responsible for his case of morning mouth. Thus far both shosho and alcove were winning their respective contests.
The hunt showed no sign of abatement, mongrel disappearing for several hours only to reappear and be lost again. The only casualties so far were unlucky drones the victim of friendly fire. No one had come close to catching the shosho, neither as mutt nor in supposed bipedal form. During his last regeneration, Second knew from logs the sightings had increased. Several drones, usually engineering, had been slammed to wall or ground and had a bite taken out of a limb. Inevitably none of the victims could say for certain if their assaulter was indeed a werewolf; and inevitably the shosho evaded hunters who hastily beamed in.
{Eyes!}
{Brain!}
{Eyes!}
{Brain!}
*****
It was a nest of small things. The dream alternately slowed and sped as he tried to capture the little animals. However, they always seemed to slip from his grasp at the last minute, scampering away as unattainable goals are wont to do. It was very frustrating.
Finally he laid hand and maw over a prey, trapping it before it could vanish as so many of its comrades had done. He returned to the center of the small room, a nowhere place where several featureless hallways intersected, hallways, which as the rules of unreal places dictate, dissolved into impenetrable fog beyond a dozen meters. Here, at least, there were lights all around, which no number of demons could take away. He was tired. He was lethargic.
He was dying.
He of three, he of one, he of two, all accepted the simple fact, an ending no number of small things could change. He would be defiant until the end, it was his nature, but eventually darkness would overtake him, a demon he could not banish. The People-demons were not responsible, no matter how many bright goals they eclipsed. Punishing them was futile. No, he would stay here, chase the small things in the minute hope one of the creatures held a cure, and wait.
He bit into the small thing. Like the demons, it was sour. He howled disappointment.
And then, out of nowhere, he was surrounded by People! People were good! Superficially they resembled demons, but the bright lights allowed him to see the differences. People would make it all better, they always did. People were his salvation. They held something in their arms, somethings he did not recognize, but People tended to do incomprehensible things. It was the nature of People.
The air was suddenly full of flying darts, long and silver tipped, all aimed for he of one, he of two. A portion of he of three, an odd split-self possible only in dreams, was astonished, surprised. What was this? He raised to his feet, still clutching a small thing, and howled a question - "Ye look like people, but are ye actually demons in disguise?"
At the same time, he writhed on the floor, body pierced by quarrels. His blood was burning. However, the question was answered, declared he of one: they were People, and they were making it all better. He would die, but he would go on.
And he did.
*****
Second awoke to find himself not in his alcove where he belonged, but in a corridor junction somewhere in subsection 14. The horrible taste which had become a fixture over his last several regeneration cycles was stronger than ever. Beside him was a shosho corpse, more resembling hedgehog than dog. Twelve drones surrounded him, crossbows of eleven loaded and aimed at unarmored portions of his anatomy. The twelfth was rapidly fixing a broken bowstring and pleading for the others to refrain from shooting until he was ready to join.
"Explain what is going on here," demanded Second. A wetness was creeping down his chin. He wiped it away with the back of his hand, noting in a detached manner the resulting bright crimson stain. A double-take was required to register the dead hexapod hamster he clutched in the same hand. The small body was dropped from suddenly nerveless fingers.
Asked Second to the silent faces and deadly crossbows, "What has happened to me?"
Answered one, weapon never veering from Second's face, "Why don't you tell us, wolfboy?"
"It was," said Doctor, "a classic case of one of those alien-influence-your-brain thingies. You are all better now. Shoo-shoo." Doctor waved his hands in front of Second's nose.
Second levered himself to a sitting position, then stood, body paralysis bloc disengaged. "Why am I the prime candidate for alien mind influence around here?" he muttered.
Answered Doctor despite the rhetorical nature of the question, "Don't be ridiculous! 21 of 203 is infected by an alien every week, like clockwork! And it was an unusually cute alien last time."
Second stared at Doctor. "21 of 203 has a faulty cortical processor. It shorts once a week."
"Well, maybe," conceded Doctor, "but it can't be operated on without scrambling his brains."
Second's sarcastic retort went unverbalized, but that did not mean it wasn't voiced. "Scrambled brains" and "Doctor" figured prominently. With that parting comment, Second beamed himself back to his alcove.
The shosho animal, specifically the beta genotype, was a werewolf, albeit in a very nontraditional manner. There were no animal-to-humanoid transmogrification beneath the baleful eye of the full moon, but, in a sense, the potential existed. Only possible because of the fluid nature of Star Trek genetics, a universe full of hybrids between creatures evolved from different planetary lineages, the beta shosho was a lot more than it first appeared.
Among Doctor's stolen vet files of care, feeding, and breeding of shoshos were genetic sequence examples of the two types. They were in the files to demonstrate why the alpha and beta could not interbreed. The beta sequences displayed long stretches of silent DNA, genetic code which was not actively expressed; the alpha lacked the hundreds, thousands of added genes, as well as a seemingly extraneous chromosome. The Borg, however, had vast experience and knowledge of genetics, required when over ten thousand different sentient beings are cogs in the Whole. That expertise led to perceiving traits, traits which had no place in the shosho genetic code.
On Terra, chimpanzees and humans are separated from each other by less than a percentage point of genetic difference; and man and mouse, quite different in body form and brain, still share most DNA. Genetic sequences are conserved throughout evolution, no need for nature to reinvent an enzyme in the chicken when one used for similar purposes by the single-cell bacteria will suit. Within the silent shosho beta code were gene variations typical to sentience, yet the mutt demonstrated the intelligence of, well, a dog. Thence came the werewolf hypothesis.
The most likely explanation was the original shosho owner-species were not actually extirpated, had not been driven to local extinction four thousands years prior as believed by AD systems inhabitants. Somehow, someway, genetic engineers had overlapped their code with the widely accepted pet shosho, using same genes where possible and adding where not. The result was the beta variation. It was infertile with its alpha cousin, for what would be the point to survive species Armageddon, only to die a second racial death through genetic dilution?
The werewolf hypothesis further postulated a trigger to cause unexpressed segments to spontaneously activate. The trigger was unknown, unknowable, perhaps a future occurrence, perhaps passed by due to a mistake, ever condemning the forgotten race to purgatory. The Borg did not care. Supposing the trigger was activated in the future, millions of beta shosho - much less wide-spread than alphas, but still immensely popular - would painfully transform from animal to humanoid. Instant population base, instant army, but not necessarily instant intelligence.
Having the body and brain of a sentient being does not automatically bestow intelligence, only potential. Except in a few rare cases, all sentients pass through a childhood phase where knowledge is learned and social skills gained. The transformation of shosho into other would only give the proposed beings bodies with the shosho mind retained - no language beyond instinct, no technological knowledge, nothing. Instant army becomes instant influx of wards of state.
Shosho beta compared to alpha had an expanded brain, yet displayed intelligence gain was minimal. It was here hid the unknown, unnamed shosho owner-species. The original definition of a meme describes it as a unit of mental information in the same way that a gene is a unit of biological information, an idea passed from one generation to the next, evolving. The shosho species-owners went one step further, turning abstract into actual, altering the concept of idea transmission into a physical process. The resulting personality and knowledge memes observed in the background, a life-long dream as a passenger. Unable to affect the shosho host, generations of shosho owner-species sprung full-grown in the minds of pups, awaiting on perpetual hold for the release trigger. The transfer mechanism of the meme was a saliva-borne virus, created within the cells of the shosho mother shortly after giving birth. One insignificant nip, and a meme variation sped to the new host's brain to begin residence. The process was literal racial memory.
Interesting, in a purely academic sense, normally the sub-collective of Cube #347, dutiful Borg they were, would give a figurative yawn of boredom and irrelevance. In this case, however, nanite interaction with Yapyap had triggered meme virus production, meme viruses which in turn had been transferred to Second after an inadvertent bite. As the memes could not expect to survive a substantial time in Second's brain, a genetically hostile environment, one would not expect the virus to have any effect. Yapyap's survival of his fall changed this belief.
Assimilation had triggered certain gene sequences. The full "werewolf" transformation remained dormant, but many portions applicable to bone, neuron, and organ reformatting allowed for rapid, if incomplete, healing. The transplanted memes subsequently fostered a resonance between Second and shosho. Only able to activate during regeneration when Second's neurological functions were repressed, the result was sleepwalking to join Yapyap. Together the two (or three, if counting the dreaming personality lodged in shosho brain) roamed the hallways, Second aware only in a remote sense of what he was doing, Yapyap in charge.
Second eyed his alcove, then turned on heel to head towards the nodal intersection. He did not require regeneration yet, despite Doctor's insistence otherwise. The hesitation was irrelevant, an emotional construct built from half-remembered memories twisted through the mindset of an animal, but nonetheless it existed. It was past time to purge his neural pathways...in a little while.
In the nodal intersection, Captain was staring at his screen, view a stylized representation of the AD system. A Free Rock - an inhabited asteroid in a semi-stable orbit distant from the wormholes and not associated with either Arrival or Departure, a rock which would eventually be torn apart by tidal stresses in a few thousand years - was highlighted. Four green paths arced from Cube #347's position to intersect. In reality, Captain was not using the viewscreen, his mind focused on a much richer plane of multidimensional data. Second felt most of Captain's awareness disengage from the digital realm as the former's presence was registered.
"The Lock Artifact," stated Second.
Captain did not bother to reply, confirmation irrelevant. Instead, he asked, "What /did/ you say when the hunter group confronted you and the shosho? The syntax indicates true language, as opposed to animal sounds, but insufficient words were available for translation." The harsh, nasal howls Second had uttered were replayed for emphasis, echoing in the intersection.
Second slashed through the replay, halting it. "You know, everyone knows, I do not know. How many times must I repeat myself? I have suffered many crawling through my brain to answer that question. All which remains is dissection." Pause. "Not that I endorse such an extreme action. Investigations have conclusively demonstrated a head attached to living body allows for easier data retrieval than a head alone," he hastily added.
Captain looked at Second, head cocked as he "listened" to a budding conversation concerning Second and the pro and cons of beginning a new round of inquiry over the head issue.
Second winced at the discussion topic. He backed out of the nodal intersection: perhaps his alcove was a safe escape after all.
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