Top o' the heap is Paramount, owners of Star Trek. Struggling along in the middle is Star Traks, created by Decker. Squashed underneath is BorgSpace and I.

It's A Dog Eat Borg Universe Out There

Original Self Luplup idly turned the lump of fused metal over in her hands minor. Once it had been a component to a delicate quantum computer, but violent passage through the atmosphere of a terrestrial planet had reduced it to a shadow of its former complexity. Of course, damage also could have occurred prior to re-entry, during the assault on the Klingon ship in which the computer had once been housed. Actual origin did not matter since the lump was the sole remnant of the erstwhile Klingon ship; and that Klingon ship the final battlecruiser of the remnant Klingon fleet.

The significance of the abused metal was not lost on Luplup; and she was being both practical and ironic as she passed it to a worker Self for transport to the orbital den's nearest reclamation facility. Soon it, like the surviving dregs of Klingon civilization (once suitably tamed and gene altered), would be recycled into serving Luplup.

Luplup had grown big, beyond her imagination when her only desire had revolved around simple survival. Her primary "body" stretched over a third of the galactic disk, and she had claws hooked into another third. Eventually the final triad would also become Luplup, all the planets and bodies and materials a part of Self, but that time was not now. Plan for the future, look beyond the present...if the Borg, now extinct, had taught her anything, that concept was among the most important.

Taking a moment to consciously feel/reach/smell/see beyond the Original Self body she often centered her awareness upon, Luplup reveled in herSelf. Solid worker Selves mined and smelted ores...or scrubbed the interior of a recently captured starship...or (Original Self tipped a muzzle downward) oiled away the squeak of a floor ventilation fan. Nimble technicians dismantled alien hardware, analyzing it; and in the gene labs altered the genome of Luplup Selves yet to be born, as well as the genetic identities of dozens of nonSelf species deemed suitable for inclusion into the Greater Self. Robust tacticals of five distinct types performed assaults upon tens of targets, one of them planetary in scale. Integrators meshed with vinculum technology to coordinate all parts into one Self; egg queens of the various castes lived their lives producing egg after egg; and banks of dataQueens, heavily altered until they were more computer processor than organic being, performed millions of calculations a second in an effort to determine the best possible course of action for a given part of Self.

And, center of it all, a mere part, yet more, was Original Self. The body should have been discarded long ago, was not necessary, was version 1.0. Luplup had long since upgraded (and continued to do so) herSelves, generation by generation, but still felt a sense of (dictionaries from thousands of species were consulted) "nostalgia" for the old thing. Original Luplup flexed the artificial talons of her right hands major, considering: there was a new alloy she was incorporating into the claws of her tacticals...perhaps she should replace those on the Original Luplup unit.

A thread of incoming data caught a part of Luplup's attention, a sliver of awareness sliced fine. The observation algorithm with which the data was associated was disused, but memories of the long war with the Borgs and lessons learnt therein made her loath to redirect the resources to other projects. It was only a few dozen integrators and an equal number of dataQueens, a pittance. Perhaps her instinct (Luplup had retained instinct/emotions/passion: the cost was high at times, but they had also provided an edge unmatched by her greatest threat in the form of the Borg), her animal paranoia had been correct, assuming it wasn't a false alarm.

On the fractal frequencies once favored by the Borg, but now silent these last fifty years, was a lone signal asking for acknowledgement from a Collective which existed no longer.

The ships in the area of the anomaly - a bare wasteland of dying stars, relics of an interstellar war occurring ten million years ago - were few, but the very nature of the sparsely populated region meant there was little interference of artificial origin. Besides a pair space-time of distortions characteristic of Xenig zero-point array engines (Luplup had no interest in mechs - because they were not organic, she did not recognize mechs of any species as potential competition), there was one tenacious signature, one not seen outside Luplup's own captured fleets for five decades.

It was a Borg Exploratory-class cube.

And, more importantly, as discernable from the nature of the automatic request for integration, it was a /known/ cube - Cube #347.

All over Luplup, all over the galaxy wherever Selves were located, bodies paused in their activity. The stunning only lasted a few heartbeats, but in that moment thousands of Selves were inadvertently maimed or killed. In some cases it was because halting in the middle of a heavy firefight is not recommended; and other cases were attributable to simple misfortune, for example three dozen worker Selves squashed beneath a thousand metric tons of frozen methane. No matter. Luplup had long grown beyond the point where the loss of a thousand (a million) of herSelves was a set-back. An annoyance, perhaps, but not a threat to continued existence.

The ramifications of Cube #347's return were much more significant.

Original Luplup flexed the claws of hands major and hands minor; and talons on all four feet scored long tracks into the softer metal of the floor.

Cube #347 had disappeared sixty-two years prior, during the waning years of the war with the Borgs, when the latter were becoming desperate to devise a tactic to forestall Luplup's inevitable victory. Cube #347's personal history was odd, convoluted as it was bounced along the temporal axis like a tennis ball, yet at the time of its disappearance Luplup had known it to include Captain Borg Bad-Man...the same Captain Borg Bad-Man who had been present at Luplup's "birth," who had been instrumental the several times she had faced true death. In Luplup's mind, Cube #347 had always included Captain Borg Bad-Man, and there was no reason her nemesis should not be aboard now.

Sixty-two years ago, in sector 67z.99 of the Beta Quadrant, had been a large species #137 artifact. In this current era, it was still present, but as an impenetrable nebula instead of its original form of a tarnished silver sphere the size of a brown dwarf star. The Borgs had thought they had discovered the artifact's trigger, a way to alter it from sessile slumber to active weapon. Cube #347, expendable, had been dispatched to activate the artifact. Shortly thereafter, the cube was gone and a nebula was in its place. Where Cube #347 was concerned, there was no such thing as coincidence.

And what was in that nebula? None knew, not Luplup, not the extinct Borgs, not the scientific and/or military expeditions of several species. Among the many reports included whales; petunias; an entire parliament debating the legality of sliced bread (a very common manifestation); a landmass with pyramids on it outlining the word 'Atlantis'; and, most disturbing of all, a gigantic nose with ever-snuffing nostrils. In the end, all ships (and Selves) which drifted too deep into the nebula lost contact with the outside, never again to be seen or heard.

And now, Cube #347 was back...and so was Captain Borg Bad-Man. The gap-toothed maw of Original Self gaped in silent pleasure: Luplup had best welcome back the lost Borgs properly.

*****

"I said I was sorry," bellyached Iris, "what more do you want? I would have rolled earlier except /somebody/ complained it was going to faint if it didn't stuff its mouth full of munchies." The eyeball pivoted to glower upwards. Captain was in Maintenance Bay #2 having a pair of tendons in his back swapped for inorganic replacements. While he was required to lie on his stomach for the procedure, Captain nonetheless was able to use the visual datafeed of a nearby maintenance drone to track Iris when the latter wandered out of immediate view. Where the Director glared, the duralloy ceiling was bubbling as if wax set before a too-hot fire. Continued Iris, "And the only machine with the correct snack - microwavable jalapeno-flavored cheese popcorn, very disgusting - was way over in the maze which is budgeting. I could not roll before Lips returned, else be accused of cheating, not that /I/ would ever stoop to something like that, unlike /some/ entities I know."

There was a muffled "Hey! I resemble that remark!" Or, maybe there was not. It did matter, for the Director had returned to Captain's personal vision. Since Captain was currently lying on his frontside with face cradled in a hole on a table which looked like it should belong to a massage therapist, only with much less padding and much more metal, that meant Iris appeared to be wading in the floor. The Director was not bothered by this impossibility.

"We went through three conventions," steadily replied Captain. If he had been able to move his arms, he would have emphasized his point with three waving fingers. Instead, he imaged a holographic "3" glyph in front of the Director. "The last one was situated in a large metropolis. The first two were 'normal,' no assimilations by order of the local Collective for purposes of lulling the public. The final one we had to endure for twenty days, with the 'Assimilation Kit' finally beamed out on the last day. Then, following the conventions, we began filming. The script called for goo! I had to stand submerged for twenty hours in a slurry tank full of snot!"

Sniffing sounds came from Iris, the eyeball testing the air despite the fact it lacked a nose. "So that's what that scent is. I thought you'd gone in for perfume."

"Perfume is irrelevant."

{Speak for yourself,} protested 22 of 42, perfume connoisseur who, when she wasn't repairing various (usually smelly) aspects of the regeneration system, was brewing perfumes with names like "Ambivalence" and "Ode de Manly Man."

Captain ignored 22 of 42's comment. A question was directed at the Director, who was staying longer than usual following a Fall. "Where are we?"

"Not the correct reality," confidently stated Iris.

"Even /we/ can tell that," retorted Captain.

Upon completing the Fall, the first surprise was the Voice, or, rather, lack of Voice. Instead of the usual booming announcement of an incomprehensible number, there was nothing. The silence was broken after several seconds with an echoing BEEP!, followed by "We are sorry, but your bodiless Voice has taken ill at this time. If you need a replacement bodiless Voice, please contact a VoiceTemp temp agency at your convenience. Thank you and have a nice existence."

After quashing attempts to place subspace calls to temp agencies listed in the onboard yellow pages, the normal post-Fall routine was initiated. The first order of business was to reactivate Sensors so that the sub-collective could determine its location and era. This was a necessary procedure, triangulating position in relation to pulsars; and calculations based upon pulsar spin-down rate, assuming this reality wasn't too skewed from the reality the sub-collective called home, provided a rough calendar date. The surprising outcome not only placed Cube #347 in a barren galactic sector mapped in Borg astrometric charts, but also indicated the cube to have emerged in the same time period as in its origin reality.

Unfortunately, only the gross characteristics were similar.

The evidence of Borg activity was contradictory. On the one hand, fractal bands were quiet, no answer to Cube #347's reintegration request, no Collective. On the other hand, subspace ripples showed Borg transwarp and hypertranswarp to be extant, albeit at lower levels than expected; and remnant evidence pointed to a greater traffic volume approximately half a century prior. Following that line, Sensors, amid half-understood groggy complaints ({[Stereo] Sensors up. Demand immediate [landing] from her before she can stretch a [library] or [jumping jack] positioned [newspaper] prior to [black]. Allow Sensors at least five [orange stars] to retune the grid to [lavender].}), had discerned two cube signatures approaching, although they were still over an hour distant. Subsequent subspace transmissions directed at the pair had returned silence.

Well, it wasn't the first time the local Collective had not resembled that expected.

{We shall wait,} declared Captain when the consensus cascade completed.

Appended Weapons, {With full weapons ready! And then attack!}

{We will not attack. We shall wait,} firmly repeated Captain, placing pressure on Weapons to comply. However, sub-collective paranoia built from the "welcoming committees" of realities past countered, shifting consensus slightly. Captain lessened the compulsion on Weapons, adding, {Weapons will be primed, but we will only reply to aggressive overtures from the incoming ships. We will /not/ initiate hostilities.}

{Preemptive strikes are more effective,} groused Weapons, but did not overtly pursue the matter.

"Will you convey to us information about this reality?" asked Captain aloud to the Director. Unfortunately, the eyeball was gone, vanished between one millisecond and the next.

The drone performing maintenance on Captain's back intruded, directing attention to a dataspace visual file. {What model of tendon do you want installed. For your base species classification there are many choices in stock. For instance, model A2 has a lovely tritanium-reinforced polymer base, creating a flex which is a bit stiff, yet...}

*****

Two of Luplup's ships vectored in on Cube #347. The previous owner had designated them Exploratory-class Cube #1157 and Assault-class Sphere #93, but Luplup did not need names. The vessels were an extension of herSelf, as were the crews which actually pushed buttons and interfaced with on-board computers.

Luplup did not build spaceships, although she had the resources, orbital yards, and blueprints to do so. Instead, her eclectic fleet comprised of captured ships, the core of which was powerful Borg cubes and spheres, although even the lowliest of atmospheric shuttles was not dismissed. Luplup had become good at planning for specifics in the immediate future, of using long-term views to attain strategic gains, but her soul was that of a predator whose basic biology-driven mindset did not require thinking of an overall big picture which would not arrive for a decade, or a century. The galaxy was large and there was always another spacefaring civilization to prey upon.

The Luplup ships emerged from hypertranswarp, charging forward in direct assault. The first view of Cube #347 showed quiescence, waiting; and even as Luplup sprinted at full impulse, the cube of bad-mans hesitated. Finally, less than one minute to long-distance weapon envelope, the prey initiated a defensive spin.

"Be hurt!" screamed Luplup into the audio bands of the fractal subspace frequency Cube #347 continued to emit unto. "Be hurt, bad-mans! I come to kills yous all; and I will kills yous all as many times as it takes to makes yous extinct! I am strong! I am in charge!" Cube #347's repetitious request for integration to an extinct Collective was immediately discontinued.

Millions of Selves snarled rage; and on Cube #1157 and Sphere #93, those Selves not in regeneration stupor barked a hunting call as foot talons were scraped across metal decks in inharmonious counterpoint.

The first torpedoes splashed against Cube #347. The prey's shield flickered, but held; and a volley of missiles was Luplup's answer, as well as the electromagnetic screech of decoys pretending to be Cube #347. Explosions blazed as the remainder of the first torpedoes were lured to their destruction. Luplup did not care, for the second and third waves were already sent; and very quickly both of her on-hunt ships would be entering energy weapon range. There would be nothing left of the prey except chunks of metal; and, most importantly, nothing left of Captain Borg Bad-Man.

Cube #347 hesitated, then accelerated away from the torpedoes, as if trying to flee on impulse power alone. Then it zigged off its course, zagging again into a completely new direction; and, finally, turned to charge the incoming munitions. Luplup shrieked as she saw the initial flight attempt, then gurgled in astonishment at the insane turn of events. She had weapons at her disposal, those which would prevent a capturable ship from fleeing, which dampened the prey energy grid and made it unable to fight. In this case, those weapons were dismissed by Luplup, who only wanted to close with the enemy and rend it with the space navel version of tooth and claw.

Abruptly Cube #347 disappeared. "What?" squealed Luplup, those Selves directly involved literally bouncing off the bulkheads of cube and sphere. Even Original Self, in regeneration and far from battle, twitched head and claws in response. In the next half second, Luplup remembered herSelf, remembered that she could see the invisible and thus saw the ship of bad-mans had leapt to hypertranswarp. Then, in the last half of that second, Cube #347 blinked back into the fray, directly between Cube #1157 and Sphere #93.

It was an unenviable position for the Borg; and very good for Luplup. While her active torpedoes were too far to assist, only now beginning the loops which would bring them back into the fray, Luplup could slash with energy-based weapons. Luplup struck.

Both of Luplup's ship parts opened fire upon Cube #347, raking shields. Again shields flickered as they had under initial torpedo impact, momentarily allowed undiluted fury to assault hull. Luplup nodded to herSelf in satisfaction: primary and secondary shield distribution nodes were down, with only tertiary backup remaining. She recklessly slid her more maneuverable cube closer, unconcerned about the dangerous tactical folly which would have caused even the Collective to pause. Her Selves talked to the Borg computers which controlled firing solutions, designating a new target set.

Suddenly, Luplup reeled as scores, hundreds, thousands of her Selves on Cube #1157 expired. The pain was not great, the equivalent of a pin-prick, but unexpectedness magnified the loss. All across the body Luplup, Selves who could do so howled.

A pair of singularity torpedoes had smashed into the cube. Singularity torps are not recommended short-range weapons, backsplash as deadly to attacker as impact was to target. The first had collapsed the cube's shield; and the second torpedo, with precision normally lacking from Cube #347 (although Luplup did not know this), bored through the thickly armored cap to Central Shaft #3, entered the shaft itself, plowed through multiple bulkheads, and finally disgorged the singularity on the heavy casing surrounding the primary engineering core. The resulting explosion had literally ripped Cube #1157 in four ragged parts, each now undergoing their own fiery disintegrations.

Cube #347 had not escaped unscathed. The close detonation had backwashed upon the target's own shields, overloading and collapsing them. There were no more backups. The inviting hull was free for scoring, for rending. However, as if in anticipation of the event, the prey was already in motion, at first a cube length towards Sphere #93, then pivoting rapidly to move away on a new vector. Engines were cycled for hypertranswarp, idled, then spun up again.

Screaming, Luplup reached forth from her remaining ship with a transporter beam, targeting anything organic. Specifically, she focused on the subsection of vessel she remembered Captain Borg Bad-Man to regard as his personal territory, unseen and insubstantial claws fishing into the ship. Luplup confirmed 22 transporter locks. She tore away her treasure, knowing as she did so that while the chances of Captain Borg to be within clawhold to be small, she nonetheless had hurt the bad-mans.

Cube #347 jumped into hypertranswarp, leaving behind a wounded Luplup to catalogue her prizes.

*****

Cube #347 waited. Captain stood in his nodal intersection, watching a holodisplay graphic representation of the incoming vessels. Although it flickered now and again, occasionally twisting into multicolored fireworks as Sensors altered data input to the confusion of both her own hierarchy and the computer, overall it remained relatively constant: the central yellow doughnut was Cube #347, and the two red chrysanthemums riding the pointed end of long arrows were the unresponsive Borg signatures.

{Sensors says thirty [boards] to emergence,} announced Sensors, a countdown she had been maintaining for the last five minutes. A virtual digital clock ran backwards in counterpoint. {Twenty [boards]. Ten [boards]. Five [boards]. Emergence. Sensors [tastes].}

The vessel pair were definitely Borg, an Assault-class sphere and an Exploratory-class cube, both somewhat scarred and indefinably shabby. Borg ships were always kept in excellent condition, yet these two looked as if shipwide regeneration was nonfunctional, requiring physical hull maintenance. It was a subtle impression, one invisible to those not Borg. However, this was a different reality operating on different rules. Cube #347 continued its request for integration.

{Sensors [touches] impulse engines [disk] to full output, and targeting locks [pinging] us!} reported Sensors. Captain's holodisplay flickered and reset to include tactical information.

{Told you so!} crowed Weapons. {We must fight!}

Captain initiated a consensus cascade. Decision trees and abbreviated "what-if's" churned in the dataspaces, but most of the tangents reached a conclusion of "Insufficient data." The outcome:

{Decision matrix complete,} intoned Captain, {and we will maintain a defensive posture. The local Collective may yet recognize us.}

Weapons grumbled, then pushed the cube into a defensive spin.

Then, overpowering the fractal subspace frequencies Cube #347 was broadcasting upon, came an audio stream. It was not the Collective, neither familiar wordless presence of trillions nor more distant multivoice. It was a single synthesized voice, pitched in the alto, bringing to mind an image of sharp teeth and inflexible jaw not evolved for speech. It screamed, "Be hurt! Be hurt, bad-mans! I come to kills yous all; and I will kills yous all as many times as it takes to makes yous extinct! I am strong! I am in charge!"

The voice...it was recognized, especially by Captain. Those ships incoming were not a local Collective, but the property of one Luplup. The reintegration request was cut.

The holodisplay wavered, momentarily morphing into a plate of plaid worms before stabilizing in its previous configuration. The tactical update now showed two dozen torpedo traces leading the incoming enemy, all vectors intersecting upon Cube #347. Captain's glazed eye only vaguely registered the visuals, attention directed inward where streamed the same information, richer, as well as lurked an impatient Weapons.

{We attack!} urged Weapons.

{Evade, then retreat,} countered Captain. {We cannot best an Assault-class sphere. Project reason for direct assault instead of more effective approach of employing a directed dampening field to incapacitate us.}

{I don't care,} snarled Weapons even as his hierarchy responded to the need for analytical tactical information. {And we can destroy an Assault-class. Simulations show validity.}

Captain received the subsidiary data stream from Weapons, packets linked to the BorgCraft game. {Best case scenario is a casualty index of 3,725 with Cube #347 reduced to pockets of life support. Worst case - and this is most of them - is complete destruction of us. Unacceptable. We will evade, then retreat.}

Meanwhile, the tactical projection loop completed. Ventured 26 of 300, oblivious to Weapons' requests that she desist and concentrate on her targeting, {Luplup has always shown a tendency towards direct attack?} It was tentative hypothesis, not firm conclusion, and not directly pertinent to the rapidly evolving situation.

Command and control pushed at Weapons, who complied (for the nonce) and diverted power to defensive measures. It wasn't as if a target the size of Cube #347 could dodge, and it was better to allow the torpedoes to close within countermeasure range, accepting punishment from those that went through. {Countermeasure away,} sulked Weapons as a dozen special torpedoes were launched, each projecting an electromagnetic signature siren call to which to lure enemy torpedoes to their doom. Most enemy missiles seized the bait, detonating harmlessly, but a dozen of moderate isoton yield still impacted against shields.

{Primary shield distribution network has failed,} announced Delta. {Engineering hierarchy undertaking repairs at priority level. Secondary systems have compensated. Minor damage to hull surface. Auxiliary Cores #1 and #4 on-line.}

Weapons, slipping his restraints, prodded his hierarchy to respond. Half a dozen torpedoes was Cube #347's answer to the attack, flung towards the more dangerous Assault-class sphere. If Luplup was concerned, she did not display it in her tactical maneuvers. A second and third torpedo volley was already incoming, cube and sphere hard behind the screen as they pressed to close to short-range weapons range.

{We retreat,} said Captain as impulse engines control was shifted away from the weapons hierarchy. Cube #347 retreated from torpedoes and incoming sphere and cube. Weapons, on the other hand, would not accede, wrestling for the command codes.

Emphasized Weapons, {We cannot withdraw. It is not tactically sound. Luplup will follow us unless we destroy her assets here.} It was logical, Borg thinking, except that there was no bite to back Weapons' bark. The situation imbued the weapons hierarchy with higher command priority than normal, reflecting the requirement of a standard sub-collective to have tactical specialties dominate in times of strife. Unfortunately, from command and control point of view, this meant it was more difficult to rein in the weapons hierarchy when the situation called for a solution which was not best served by charging it head on with great firepower. Therefore, like two people fighting over control of a steering wheel, Cube #347 jigged back and forth as engine control passed between the two hierarchies.

{You are going to burn out the impulse engines,} complained Delta. {I already have enough to do without fixing engines.}

Weapons gained the upper hand in the fight for impulse control, completely locking out any hierarchy but his own (and, more specifically, as authorized by his signature). It was as if a door had been slammed in Captain's face. Absorbing resources belonging to Assimilation (who was performing observations upon Bulkhead Hue #14 and the length of time the paint required to dry under battle conditions), command and control assaulted the block. Cube #347 swung into the torpedo path and charged. A brassy fanfare echoed throughout the subsections.

Second, frustrated as any in command and control as the milliseconds drained away, took notice of a minor sub-subbranch of an earlier decision tree matrix, {We still have supralight engines.}

{Emergency hypertranswarp,} intoned Captain as the available avenue was exploited before Weapons' could counter. Ignoring Delta's protestations that hypertranswarp engines required charge time for sustained travel, hypertranswarp was initiated.

And hypertranswarp was lost. The engines needed a lot of energy, more than the associated capacitors could provide without the dedicated input from a power core. Less than a second in hypertranswarp, Cube #347 blinked back into the universe, directly between cube and sphere.

{Damn,} declared Captain. {Oops.}

{You messed up my battle,} declared Weapons haughtily. {My hierarchy must have complete control now. This is very similar to BorgCraft scenario #RT345.}

Command and control retreated to a support position.

Both of Luplup's ships did not hesitate given their sudden advantage. While the torpedoes were successfully evaded for the moment, both Assault-class sphere and Exploratory-class cube, despite ill-maintained appearance, had full working batteries of energy-based weaponry. Disruptors danced over Cube #347's shields, punctuated by phasers, lasers, cutting beams, and anti-matter bomblets. Shields, unable to take the abuse, overloaded.

Delta informed into the intranets: {Secondary shield distribution network off-line. Moving to compensate with tertiary backup. Auxiliary Core #1 has sustained a loss of efficiency and is replaced by Auxiliary Core #7. Heavy hull damage intruding into mid-level armor on faces #2 and #4, hull grid coordinates...} The list droned on even as Luplup paused her assault, allowing sufficient time for shields to firm.

{Sensors sees cube trying to [be a fuzzy uncle],} helpfully indicated Sensors. Luplup's cube was moving inward, closing the gap between it and Cube #347, until it was nearly shield to shield. It was not a sanctioned tactic, one which prompted Weapons to complain even as he posted dataspace reminders to himself to include the maneuver in his next BorgSpace custom scenarios.

Weapons shoved back, using two of the very limited supply of singularity torpedoes on-board. {Push off,} said Weapons, speaking to Luplup even though the vyst could not hear. {Give us room!}

As the enemy cube was the targeting equivalent of a barn side, not even Cube #347 could miss. Well, theoretically they could, but certain dyslectic drones had either visited drone maintenance for optical readjustment, or had been reassigned to tasks which did not involved active participation in aiming. The first singularity torp overloaded the shield of Luplup's Exploratory-class; and the second, of four proton pairs yield and shot directly after the first, impacted above Central Shaft #3 and burned its way inward.

The following explosion was satisfactory, even for Weapons.

Unfortunately, the tertiary shields, systems already abused from the battle, did not survive the violent backwash from singularity torp detonation and cube demise. Shield distribution nodes throughout the cube violently showered sparks on any drones who were near. One target was annihilated, but Cube #347 was wide open to the Assault-class sphere.

{Chances for survival if we remain here,} demanded Captain to Weapons.

{0.0067%,} replied Weapons, {with 0.0007% that we will be victorious! We are favored.} Weapons' view of acceptable odds, at least concerning anything remotely connected to battle, was extraordinarily skewed.

{I don't think so,} replied Second, safe in his alcove.

Captain, who had been knocked off his feet during the backwash, remained sprawled on the deck - it was the most stable venue for the moment - as he answered, {Agreed. Command path override to designated unit 45 of 300, initiate deep regeneration stasis. Remainder of weapons hierarchy temporary override hierarchy head control to 2 of 8.}

{Hey,} griped 2 of 8, {I don't have to be in charge of anything! Give it to 3 of 8!}

{Second's presence is required for other duties. Comply 2 of 8. I am consensus monitor and facilitator here, and you are not.}

{Compliance,} sighed 2 of 8.

Meanwhile, Weapons, not expecting to be sent into stasis, tried to retaliate by committing the cube towards Luplup's sphere. Then, his mental presence all but gone, was regulated to deep regeneration until such time he could be reawakened. Captain posted a note to both Doctor and Assimilation that it was time to examine the increasingly volatile Weapons to determine if there was a physically derived reason for his extreme attempt at noncompliance.

Captain directed the cube on a new impulse vector away from the sphere. This time there was only a moderate protest from the weapons hierarchy, one quickly quashed by 2 of 8 (who wanted to leave battle as soon as possible so the hierarchy could be returned to Weapons). As Cube #347 moved, hypertranswarp engines siphoned power for full, and proper, operation.

{Transporter [pen] detected,} spouted Sensors. It was not immediately clear what the insectoid meant: was Luplup trying to assault with tacticals while the shield was down? It was dangerous to attempt a transporter offensive onto a moving, uncooperative vessel as the chance to end up partially materialized within a bulkhead, or other unpleasantness, was large. However, as Captain felt a transporter try and fail to gain a lock on him, he understood: Luplup was trying to grab anything she could.

{I feel...} began Second. Then, Second's voice cut as Cube #347 committed to hypertranswarp flight, destination chosen at random. Captain blinked and cast through the dataspaces, confirming with a camera on Second's alcove that he was gone...as were six other drones, including Weapons.

*****

Luplup snorted as she watched with her long-distance technological eyes as the prey ran. While wounded hullside and lacking battle shields, the Borg cube still retained all engines. Exploratory-classes had the highest power to mass ratio relative to other Borg vessel types could thus accelerate faster and maintain a higher speed through the subspace layers. Luplup's lone Assault-class could not match the bad-mans, so she did not waste effort on the attempt. Luplup knew Borgs, and knew that the cube might run now, but it would not go far. Part of her attention was assigned to keep long-distance eyes on the target. Five hundred twenty-two functional Selves were beamed away from the singularity torp-rended wreck of a cube, the unsalvageable rest left amid the wreckage. All would be abandoned. There was always another vessel somewhere to capture, always a mine and factory to provide materials; and she could always produce more Selves.

Luplup had beamed her treasures into an empty supply closet. Like her disregard for ship names, she did not bother with subsections, submatrices, deck levels, or numerical room designations. Unfortunately, the first thing the Borgs had done following materialization was to destroy all sensors in the closet, including those whose only function was to test air quality and to automatically turn on the lights when someone entered the room. No matter. Luplup would just go herSelf and examine her prizes, as she had been planning to do anyway.

Three dozen tacticals, type I, and a dataQueen, type II, congregated outside the door to the supply closet cum impromptu brig. The tacticals were numerous and arrived within minutes. On the other hand, the dataQueen, a liaison type not required for day to day operations, had to be activated from stasis and provided sufficient time to recuperate so Luplup didn't embarrass herSelf if her dataQueen Self ran into a wall due to equilibrium difficulties. It had happened before, forcing Luplup to destroy an enemy asset she had desired to capture lest the tale of the blunder be spread among her prey of the time.

The tacticals were positioned in front of the dataQueen, Luplup shielding that Self with her other Selves. The dataQueen had been a difficult variation to genetically engineer; and even now, fifty-four years after the initial birth, the very few egg queens of the variant tended to lay viable clutches. Consequentially, the dataQueen, type II, was a very rare, very precious commodity valued higher than any other Self except Original Self.

The closet door opened and Luplup entered, tacticals raising weapons in threat. Something squeaked and went squish underfoot, but before that distraction could be quantified, a more dangerous barrage of disruptor fire erupted, hitting forward tacticals in the chest. Luplup hissed in annoyance as Selves went down, burned. She forced her downed Selves back to their feet as she advanced with her whole Selves.

"The heads," called one drone from the far side of the closet, a misnomer as it was a decently sized room equivalent to a basketball court. "If you don't destroy the heads or spinal cords, they'll just do that zombie thing."

There were only two drones who were attacking, who had offensive hardware mounted on their bodies. Neither verbally answered the four-eyed drone's advice, although the larger of the two Borg tacticals hunched his shoulders a bit. Besides the advice-giver and the enemy tacticals, four more bad-mans were present, lined against the wall and out of the way. Part of Luplup paused, and counted again, once more arriving at seven drones, not the 22 expected from the transporter lock.

One of the non-combatants near the door sidled along the wall, as if in a flanking maneuver. Luplup casually split three of her Selves from the main pack and fired weapons upon the bad-man. Each beam weapon was set at a slightly different frequency to preclude quick personal shield adaptation by the Borgs. The targeted drone fell, no longer a threat. The trio merged back into the pack, barking triumphant hunting cries.

Two tactical Selves toppled, heads crisped and no longer able to respond to the greater Luplup Self, truly dead. The bodies were trampled as Luplup advanced, uncaring for what was now cooling organic matter that required transportation to replicator reclamation for recycling. More panicking squeaks from underfoot, and a Self in the rear of the pack caught a glimpse of a six-legged something, small, naked. The sight awakened a deeper primal urge in Luplup, in that individual Self, but she repressed the feeling, shredded the spark of "I" in that single Self before it could grow.

In the end, it was the lack of cover (the three potted plants, unexpected, did not count) and the overwhelming force of Luplup which doomed the two tactical Borgs. The pair could only retreat as Luplup advanced; and while Luplup did lose three more Selves to recycling, it was not important. Disdaining weapons, Luplup closed and physically grappled with the Borgs, pulling them down, immobilizing them through numbers. During the attack, Luplup accidentally sliced the throat of the smaller of the two Borg tacticals, sharp foot talons of a Self opening arteries to a gush of blood. Unlike Luplup, the Borg individuals were fragile and could not be re-animated. With disgust, Luplup kicked the carcass away as she spread out her Selves to train weapons on the still standing bad-mans. The tactical Borg lay under ten Selves, verbalizing, as another two used rope to efficiently restrain the captive.

"Imaginative, Weapons, but I don't think words are going to help. I told you that your tactic would not work. And even if it did, then what? An Assault-class sphere normally holds 35,000 drones, and since vysts are smaller, one postulates there would be more of them. Not even you can terminate that many."

The downed Borg tactical had went verbally silent, but that did not mean there was no silent information exchange between drones in the way Borgs could do. Something must of passed, because the four-eyed drone responded, "Anatomically impossible, Weapons."

"Bes silent," commanded Luplup through her dataQueen as she sent that Self into the room.

Four-eye: "That is a new one..."

"Silence, bad-mans!" screeched Luplup. Several Selves brandished their weapons. While Luplup didn't want to kill these drones - she needed as many alive as possible for her plan - neither would she allow her dominance to be challenged. The four-eyed one quieted, went statue still.

The dataQueen was a triumph of Luplup's genetic engineering ability, a Self with the anatomical capacity to speak without use of a voder. Prey usually responded better to demands if it came directly from a single Self instead of an electric box. Luplup did not understand this tendency, but nonetheless exploited it. Unfortunately, the base Luplup genes did not include the necessary codes, and it had been many years of nonviable dataQueen mutants to create the dataQueen, type II - liaison, gene line. The four-eyed Borg had obviously not been expecting a speaking Luplup, which would make sense since Cube #347 had been lost long before Luplup had developed true speech abilities.

Luplup peered at the four-eyed one, appraising him: this one was the one in charge, likely of the Borg command and control hierarchy of which Captain Borg Bad-Man was a part. He was the dangerous one, even more so than the crazy tactical bad-man who continued to struggle despite the futility of the action.

"I am Luplup," announced Luplup. Her dataQueen looked at each drone in turn. "If yous be nice, maybe I won't terminates yous all. If yous be bads, I will tear you into pieces." The dataQueen opened her mouth to relay additional words when a tactical at the back of the pack stooped, grabbed, chewed, swallow.

It was instinct at the level of the individual Self, a process Luplup had little control over. Like breathing, like the beating of the heart, Luplup could micromanage each Self, but it was a waste of mental resources to figuratively contemplate navels on each of her billions of Selves. Therefore, Luplup did not bother; and Luplup was thus surprised at the Self's action.

Eleven hexapod hamsters of a Borgified variety scrambling for the open doorway had raised deep instincts in the individual Self, an instinct to pounce on small prey items. Luplup had been raised to sentience via artificial means, and she retained many of the instincts discarded by those species who naturally evolve to awareness. Ten hamsters now disappeared into the corridor, scattering, the eleventh crushed by the jaws of the Self prior to swallowing. Unfortunately, Luplup had no more ability to digest food than any Borg, and the hamster was swiftly thrown up.

The dataQueen glared at the Borgs, nonverbally daring them to comment upon the faux pas. No reply was forthcoming, not even from the four-eyed one. Perhaps there was an inward observance, for one of the pack-of-three drones abruptly had the stony face of nerves frozen lest an unwanted expression occur. Luplup pretended not to notice.

Luplup grumbled. Distant from the action, Original Self minutely waggled her head back and forth despite being in regeneration. Tactical Selves in the supply closet retreated outside the door, but no further, weapons trained upon the Borgs inside. Luplup would return later with the dataQueen, once the tactical bad-man had quieted, once the command and control Borg realized he was getting no help from his sub-collective.

Said Luplup through the dataQueen, "Yous will do. You are not Captain Borg Bad-Man, but yous will do." The dataQueen withdrew, leaving tacticals behind.

*****

Cube #347 circled a feeble white dwarf. The system was relatively empty, a motley collection of rocks. Close in were the dead cinders of two terrestrial worlds baked aeons ago in the outer atmosphere of a then bloated red giant; and further was a near-frozen once-giant planet, shrunk to a small percentage of its former glory as most of its gasses condensed around the core. Although the aged system was one step from the celestial grave, it nonetheless was naturally aged, unlike the odd remnant wisps of glowing gas which were neighboring stars, long ago victims of a mutually genocidal interstellar war of a scale even the Borg had never practiced. Even now, tens of millions of years later, iota radiation, very rare outside a laboratory and likely derived from ancient hellish weapons, permeated the region.

Captain monitored several primary datastreams, as well as received condensed updates upon a myriad of minor ones. 151 of 300 was now temporary head of the weapons hierarchy, much to 2 of 8's relief. Unfortunately for the latter, the respite had been fleeting, for Captain had immediately tapped her to second his position. Captain didn't need a dedicated Second, and normally, Second having been lost/misplaced several times previously, might not have bothered, except the Luplup crisis had created a series of difficulties too complex for one drone to coordinate alone.

{Yes, yes,} harped 2 of 8, {I may be in the Second function, but I will not be called so. 3 of 8 will be returned to the chore soonest. If you need me, I'll be spray painting my skull: there is a wonderful purple and lime green motif I saw in a fashion magazine that I've been meaning to try out.}

Captain acknowledged 2 of 8. The drone's actions were not unexpected, and she was quite capable of keeping up with the latest in loud color schemes while performing a secondary consensus monitor and facilitator job. There were other things to focus upon.

{Delta: summary report,} ordered Captain. In his nodal intersection, disregarding the first warning of regeneration need (he still had a good twenty hours before noticeable performance degradation), a new holoscreen brightened in preparation to receive data.

Answered Delta, {Primary shield distribution nodes still down, although secondary and tertiary are working at nominal efficiencies. Hull armor intact; and except for the deep impact craters on faces #2 and #4, damage is minor. We are beginning repair. Auxiliary Core #1 has been shut down and removed from service until such time plasma coolant can be reinjected. This task is rated low priority as our offensive, defensive, and mobility characteristics are not adversely affected by its loss.}

Accompanying Delta's spoken report, a more detailed datastream scrolled up the holodisplay. Specific repairs ongoing and planned, as well as priority of each, were highlighted, with links to designations on each work gang and their current activity level.

Concluded Delta, {Overall cube capability from norm is 89%.} She paused, then added, {We were damned lucky. Why 45 of 300 is continued to be allowed to be Weapons when he should be terminated like the insane...}

{Delta,} rebuked Captain, {keep to your own hierarchy. Now is not the time for opinions.}

{Compliance,} sullenly replied Delta.

The primary reason Weapons continued to be Weapons was his tendency to beat to a pulp any other drone who attempted to usurp the position; and as 45 of 300 (most of the time) functioned adequately as Weapons, there was no basis to effect his removal, much less terminate an otherwise functional drone. Delta knew this, as did Captain, as did all the sub-collective, but that did not forebear the former from stating her thoughts on the matter.

Captain sighed, then turned to a large partition comprised of elements of command and control and weapons, with 2 of 8 as the primary nexus. Luplup held seven drones, including Second and Weapons. Exact designations were not important, however, for all which was necessary to know was that she had drones, and core code made it an imperative for any available sub-collective (i.e., Cube #347) to retrieve them. The Collective didn't like for its units to be out of its direct control. The root level compulsion could only be altered by the Greater Consciousness; and, since such was not present, Cube #347 was thus forced to confront Luplup once more in a futile bid of Exploratory-class cube against Assault-class sphere to gain back those stolen.

{But what about my plants?} asked 58 of 203, as he had continually queried each time he received trigger notification that Captain's stream of consciousness was paying greater attention to retrieval issues.

Said Captain, {Your plants will not be returned. Desist with the topic.}

{But they were /prize/ pip-palms! They were the centerpiece of my collection!} 58 of 203 maintained a greenhouse, hot and steamy even by comparison to the tropical atmosphere which pervaded a Borg cube, in Supply Closet #29, subsection 14, submatrix 5.

{Desist,} repeated Captain. 58 of 203 backed away from the topic...for now. Captain was also sure Doctor had lost something in the transporter grab, but beyond the occasional {Poor, frightened babies} and an image of grey animals with six-legs and black eyes, there was no active solicitation from that quarter. Doctor already knew the answer to the hamster question, and thus deemed not to ask in the first place.

{Do we have options?} inquired Captain of 2 of 8.

Wordless assent was the reply.

{And they are?}

Said 2 of 8, {That orange and loam brown is not in fashion this season.} Pause, then a hurried continuation. {And that our best option would be to perform a high-speed run past the target and transport our units back to our cube. The iota radiation in the region means shields will be permeable to transporters. Luplup could repossess our units, or other ones via another blind grab, but since she only has one ship in the vicinity we should be beyond transporter range by the time she can react.}

Transporter use when one target was in a high rate of motion relative to the other was not safe. True, taking was safer than putting, since there was less chance of the transportee arriving in the middle of a bulkhead, but an unsure transporter lock could mean only transporting part of the target, leaving behind important bits such as an arm, a head, part of the torso. Captain released the option, the best of several, to the general sub-collective for consensus. The best-case plan was approved.

{We accept,} confirmed Captain. {Sensors?}

Sensors was tracking the Assault-class sphere. {Sensors sees [march] to be [black and white and red all over].}

{Coordinates, Sensors.} Captain swiveled his head slightly as he swung another holographic display into the forefront. It was a miniature 3-D astrometric map out to a distance of fifty light-years from Cube #347. The display zoomed in to a smaller volume, a single star brightening. Luplup's sphere was 5.6 light-years distant. The same information was mirrored in the dataspaces, cold numbers replacing colorful visual.

{There,} helpfully said Sensors.

Captain accepted the coordinates, feeding them into the computer. Engineering teams vacated the hull. Cube #347 leapt into hypertranswarp.

Luplup had not returned, or, rather, the speaking vyst had not. Luplup did remain present in the guise of 105 centimeter tall, slim, heavily armed and armored tacticals who warily watched the supply closet interior from their position in the hallway just outside the open doorway. They had not interfered when Second and the three remaining engineering drones had stacked the terminated bodies to the side, out of the way under the three palm trees, but had become agitated when motion had been made to untie Weapons. With barks, snarls, and raised weapons, understandable speech was not necessary to get the point across. Weapons was left in the middle of the closet, bound, frustrated.

The miniature sub-collective of five was severed from the Cube #347 community. While this was a Borg ship, the vinculum had long since been retuned to fractal frequency bands favored by Luplup; and, thus, was useless for communicating with Cube #347. Hardware neural transceivers alone did not operate at distances beyond the solar system scale without vinculum boosting. Several hours passed uneventfully, the engineering drones discussing in the near unintelligible shorthand of engineers everywhere escape possibilities using McGyver-esk contraptions made with implants scavenged from the terminated bodies. While Weapons approved of the action, contributing with blueprints from his own onboard catalogue of lethal devices, Second inserted a balance to keep the plans from drifting into too-wild possibilities.

To the outside observer, three hours had passed with the drones standing statue still, except for Weapons, who sporadically tested his bonds.

A commotion at the doorway, a shifting of vyst bodies and the tap of vyst claws against deck plating, alerted the detainees that something was changing. Eyes previously glazed as they stared at the sights of an internal reality blinked, focusing on the entrance. In walked six tacticals, surrounding the speaking vyst, the dataQueen. At the rear of the pack were a half dozen technicians of some type, the smaller animals (the Borg mindset refused to label them as sentient) clutching surgical tools and other devices in both hands major and hands minor.

The dataQueen stood a head below the tacticals, with a shorter neck and longer body. Her ribcage was expanded, providing her the deep-chest appearance of an animal evolved for long-distance running; and her cranium held a much greater volume of brain than the tacticals present. Ports and implants began at the base of her skull, following the spinal column to a point just beyond hip girdle. Thin legs and arms had the withered look of muscle atrophy, but claws still gleamed with lethal edges. Most altered from the standard vyst model was the jaw and muzzle, the front of the face squished flat as if the creature had run muzzle-first into a wall.

"I bring yous gifts. Yous wills accept," pronounced Luplup through her dataQueen.

Second inquired, "And what are these 'gifts'?"

"Good gifts. Devices to allows me to keep a transporter lock on yous at all times. Yous will accept."

"And if we don't?"

The tacticals uttered short barks; and the sound that emerged from the speaker was akin to a chuckle as practiced by one for whom the action was not natural. "Yous don't have a choice. If yous refuse, I will restrain you like yous tactical there," a hands major was waved at a glowering Weapons, "and give yous my gifts anyway. The operations is simple. Cut, insert, all-done. I thinks yous will be first." Second was the one addressed. "Yous are like Captain Borg Bad-Man; and yous are the one most dangerous to I. I should just terminate you, but then my plan may fails."

As Luplup had said, the operation was simple. Under the pointed reminder of aimed weapons, the technicians scampered forward with laser scalpels. All which was necessary was a slice into the muscle of an arm and insert a transporter tag. The tag provided Luplup with a unique signature to focus upon, allowing for easier beaming. Following the minor operation, Luplup withdrew technicians and the dataQueen, returning to the status quo of sentinel tacticals.

More hours passed. The three engineers and Weapons had devised a nuclear device, assuming they could break out of the supply closet and find a source of refined plutonium before the local population of Luplup could terminate them.

Then, all five paused in their various discussions. There was activity from outside the door, a number of tacticals equal to the living detainees entering. Internally, a tenacious connection had been re-established with Cube #347, one which grew increasingly strong as the cube neared, as the vinculum grasped their minds and rewove them into the sub-collective fabric.

Each drone received a tight vyst hug as the first tingles of a transporter beam alerted of imminent transportation with an unsure lock.

{Warning! This is a...} began Second. Too late. The transporter lock firmed, and two dead bodies, five living drones, and their hitchhikers dematerialized.

*****

Original Self, unconscious mirror to Luplup's emotional state, bobbed her head in pleasure as the Borgs took the bait. Borgs were so predictable. Luplup had only to push a button, pull a leash, and they performed the same each time, even the slightly odd group of which Captain Borg Bad-Man was a part. It only confirmed in Luplup's mind that the universe was better without Borgs, that only the strong in mind and body could dominate.

Luplup had carefully positioned her Assault-class sphere in orbit around a minor planetoid, forcing the prey to enter the system upon a preset vector for the high-speed transporter snatch. There would be lag time before the cube could go hypertranswarp again, and its most economical path was a straight line. Therefore, at the end of that projected line, Luplup hid another ship, an over-large shuttle with onboard cloaking device. All Luplup's vessels of the line, where possible, carried at least one support ship, for she had found her options to be greater when she could field a pack rather than a singleton.

As expected, Cube #347 appeared in the system, dropping out of hypertranswarp and into high impulse. The prey whipped past Luplup's sphere, its transporters plucking drones and Selves from the sphere through shields made transparent by iota radiation. Luplup resisted the impulse to fire upon the cube, to score its flanks.

Selves materialized on Cube #347 within a room of tables and lights and tools. Drones lay upon the tables while others stood over them with devices, some which blinked and some which buzzed. Luplup hissed her disappointment as she recognized a maintenance bay, for it was unlikely Captain Borg Bad-Man was present. However, there were other prey available, and in the resulting confusion Luplup leapt from her detainees, onto the tables, and thence on Borg shoulders and chests. Claws were dug in.

The cube neared Luplup's ambush site, the cloaked shuttle hiding in full view. She could see with her technological eyes the warping of space which proceeded an entrance into the subspace travel realm. Unfortunately, the shuttle did not have sufficient power to engage both cloak and shields, so Luplup was forced to expose her presence in order to recover prisoners, Selves, and new treasures.

No matter if Luplup had to beam aboard each of the target's crew one at a time, she would find Captain Borg Bad-Man. Her unconscious fixation upon the individual blamed for the ancient sin of separating her from Owner would allow no other choice.

Transporters were energized.

*****

{...trap,} concluded Second as he materialized in Maintenance Bay #6. He wobbled and fell to the floor as his hitchhiker used him as a springboard, leaping to a tabletop before peering around with an intelligence greater than the animalistic form suggested. All which was missing was...oh, wait, thought Second to himself, that makes it perfect. A conduit carrying (mostly) water from the adjacent comet processing facility to secondary destination in the form of further refinement burst, spraying liquid. Droplets clung to reptilian flanks and head; and Luplup snarled, all of her, as she considered her objectives.

Commented Second, {Very prehistoric.}

The vyst immediately above Second glanced down, as if hearing the thought, then jumped out of view. She landed on 89 of 133, bearing the maintenance drone to the deck. 89 of 133's visual datastream was a too-close one of snapping jaws and slashing hands major, not to mention the phaser rifle, held too close for even a well adapted personal shield to deflect.

On the floor, being stepped upon, Weapons yelled both verbally and in the intranet for someone to untie him. And for 151 of 300 to relinquish all command codes associated with weapons hierarchy.

Captain calmly queried Second, {Update.} The other detainees were receiving similar demands for information download, although Weapons wasn't responding.

{Trap. We have transporter tags inserted in us,} responded Second even as he felt his recent memories copied into general sub-collective circulation. {Type of trap is unknown.}

{You saw hamsters?} intruded Doctor, worry tingeing his question. {And, my, those naughty puppies, there are making a mess in Maintenance Bay #6. Giving everyone boo-boos.}

Water continued to gently rain upon the chaos. Electrical devices not hardened against liquids were throwing sparks, with a small fire merrily burning against one wall. Each vyst had claimed either a patient or maintenance unit and was standing over the unlucky drone snarling, waiting. Those who were able to move were pushing for the doorways, else transporting. Weapons called for tactical backup even as he tried to roll into action, bumping against a table. 81 of 310, paralyzed for a procedure not yet begun and already precariously balanced, fell onto Weapons' back, pinning him.

{Sensors says that wasn't there a [library] ago,} indignantly said Sensors. Second brought the exterior sensor feed to the forefront. It was a large cargo shuttle, an insystem ore and gas hauler, boxy as such things tended to be despite species of origin. Since it had no supralight engines, immediate conclusions linked it to Luplup and arriving with the sphere. Even as hypertranswarp engines committed to the next rip into subspace, a transporter lock focused upon Second and the others with tags, as well as those currently claimed by vysts.

Second had just enough time to spit out {Here we go again} before he felt the fuzzy feeling which comes with atom disassociation. Then he was staring at thirty tacticals, each sporting sufficient weaponry to terminate any drone, and contact with Cube #347 was lost once more.

*****

"Gee, this looks familiar. Potted plants, squished hamster, /upchucked/ hamster, all the comforts of a five-star resort," remarked the four-eyed command and control drone seconds after he, and the other prizes, had been transferred from shuttle hold to supply closet. Luplup had mastered irony, but she remained fuzzy on sarcasm. Sometimes she could recognize it, sometimes not. This was not one of those times, although she knew there was significance to the words beyond face-value meaning.

Luplup answered through her dataQueen, "This is the same supply closet yous were held before." The dataQueen, plus sufficient numbers of tacticals to protect her, had been positioned to wait the transference. In the hallway were technicians, ready with an adequate supply of tags for the new drones. She noted with pleasure that the Borg tactical unit remained bound, solving many problems before they began.

"Same friendly welcome, too."

Far away, Original Self paused as she walked up a hallway of the orbital den, then continued on. On Sphere #93, Luplup decided not to answer: she definitely sensed there was an insincerity to the words. Instead she contemplated her catch, as she had done on the shuttle. In addition to original five functional drones (the two terminated ones had been abandoned to Cube #347), Luplup now counted six additional prisoners. Two had been patients and the remaining four technicians in the maintenance bay. Luplup snorted, she was gaining quite a collection, but had yet to capture the bad-man she truly wanted.

Luplup set her Assault-class sphere in motion, tailing the prey cube. She knew she could not catch the faster Exploratory-class, but neither did she want to follow a cold scent. This particular trap would not work again, and it was best to abandon the ambush site. However, there were variations Luplup planned to use. She would gain her objective, then she would terminate all the other drones (especially the mad tactical which was trying to bounce its way toward her protected dataQueen), and blow up Cube #347.

"Yous new drones wills now be tagged. Yous will comply or I'll dos this." A tactical Self shot the bound drone. The weapon was set at a level to stun, to disrupt nerve-muscle communication, not kill. She kicked away the convulsing Borg, then several Selves raised their own phasers in warning as one of the maintenance technicians stepped forward to examine him. "He will live. Yous will comply with my demands."

Luplup kept her dataQueen's gaze fixed on the command and control unit. The drone did not miss the threat. His head canted slightly sideways in Borg communication, as did the others present. "We comply," replied the four-eyed drone, tone that a dull monotone, bantering character dismissed.

Original Self nodded. All was how it should be.

*****

In the radiation hell of a gas giant's van Allen belt waited Cube #347. Sensors was barely able to see the rest of the system, complaining the whole time that she felt as if she was being [burned] inside her brain. It did not matter, for Sensors, despite her different outlook upon the universe, was still a good Borg, complying as ordered. If the sensor grid had difficulty resolving what was beyond the van Allen belt, then Cube #347 was sufficiently hidden in return.

This system was one of the odd, war torn relics, feeble star a glowing ember of what it used to be. It was a brown dwarf, aged before its time, populated by the remains of a system which showed signs, even after millions of years, of past tenancy. There was a thin asteroid belt marking the grave site of a once habitable second planet; and three charred, disfigured lumps of moon, more fused glass than rock, shared Cube #347's orbit of the gas giant.

Luplup's sphere was in a higher orbit of the gas giant, focusing outward in search. Upon entering the system, she had made a perfunctory scan of the deeper atmosphere of the large planet, plainly deciding that not even a Borg cube could survive the radiation hell. In truth, the radiation was attacking systems and drones, but Cube #347 would be gone before lasting damage accrued.

Cube #347's swifter orbit allowed the cube to draw up behind and below Luplup without use of thrusters or other mechanisms which could give away presence. They were in position.

{Let's go,} said Captain. It was not the most memorable of battle charge, but it was concise. Several photon torpedoes were lobbed not at Luplup, instead detonating into the van Allen belts. Wisps of methane caught fire, burning scant oxygen, a momentary fireball to blind visual sensors. At the same time, the radiation belt pulsed with Cube #347's impulse drive, spinning wild auroras.

Rising out of radiation, atmosphere, and fire came Cube #347. Several disruptors and cutting beams lanced out from the sphere, but they impacted harmlessly on shields. Iota radiation made shields only transparent to transporters, retaining normal functionality otherwise. Several shots went wide, sphere targeting systems requiring a vital second or two for resetting due to the maelstrom erupting in the atmosphere below.

Locks were made on the eleven captives. No vyst hitchhikers were detected. Triumphant, Cube #347 sped into hypertranswarp, leaving behind burning gas giant and frustrated Luplup.

*****

No fair! thought Luplup, No fair! The universe was not fair, just uncaring. The set back of one vyst, even one as vast as Luplup, was nothing in comparison to the spatial and temporal span of the universe, whatever universe one might be inhabiting. However, for that one vyst, she in return did not care what that universe thought, instead quite vocal in her belief that life was unfair to her.

Luplup was having a temper tantrum.

Across the body vyst, things were destroyed - devices, ships, planets, peoples. In a fit of anger, Luplup released a dozen thermonuclear diggers onto an inhabited moon, diggers meant to crack the mantle of uninhabited planets so as to create a volcanic geothermal source. A dozen of the devices were too many for the moon, and it destabilized into vast chunks of lava and rock. Eventually the debris would rain down upon the mother world, destroying the very biological and technological resources Luplup had been previously trying to capture (more or less) whole. She did not care.

It was no fair!

Slowly the tantrum was controlled. Reason returned. Original Self removed claws and teeth from the body of the nonSelf she had been mauling. The nonSelves were species conquered by Luplup and found to be amiable to genetic engineering, pacifying them and allowing cloned offspring to imprint upon Luplup without worry of competing individuality. They were effectively organic robots, immensely helpful in tasks ranging from being dataQueen sub-nodes to expendable subjects in a wide range of research fields. Luplup pigeonholed the nonSelves in a similar hole with ship resources, always knowing there were more available. The loss of one (or a million) nonSelves during a blinding temper tantrum was not important.

Several workers pulled away the terminated nonSelf (Luplup could not re-animate them like she could her Selves) for recycling. She calmed herSelf, setting her Selves back to their normal routines: it was time for introspection on this problem.

Luplup set her sphere into pursuit, sniffing along the subspace wake where Cube #347 had fled. If the prey kept along its straight line of travel, as Borg were wont to do, then there were several possibilities of which Luplup could take advantage.

She would regain her prizes, and then some.

*****

{What do you mean you "can't get them out"?} asked Second irritably. {It took less than five minutes to put into my arm, and you've been hacking away at the limb, not to mention shoulder and that side of my torso, for three hours.} Under the ministering laser scalpel of Doctor lay Second, bits and pieces of armoring from his left side stacked neatly on a table, exposing flesh beneath. Undergoing a similar procedure were five other drones. Unfortunately, drone maintenance was having difficulties removing the tags Luplup had inserted.

Doctor ground his incisors together as he probed into Second's shoulder joint with a low-tech length of wire, at the same time waving a diagnostic instrument. He stopped to review the medical tricorder's readings, then substituted wire for a flexible tool which looked like a very thin straw and had an arc of blue electricity at the end. It was plunged into the hole formerly occupied by wire. There was the smell of cooked flesh and an almost subliminal buzz. Finally, tweezers forged into the hole, pulling out a hunk of metal the size and shape of a pellet rifle round.

"Naughty wittle things: the original implant has broken up and is trying to distribute itself throughout your body. Each eensy, tiny bit functions as a tag all by its lonesome. To remove all the sub-tags, you will need twenty hours of surgery, if not more." The tweezers were brandished in Second's face, too closer for comfort when one can't move, especially as the end holding the tag was nearly inserted up his nose.

The ship shook again. The tag fell to the floor, rolling away underfoot. A small bucket of similar tags, common depository of those removed from the six patients, upended from its precarious perch on the edge of a work bench. Unheard in the general ruckus was the scrabbling of tiny claws from the darker portions of the maintenance bay where the sub-tags skidded.

{Can you hold it down out there?} requested Doctor. {The vet office is busy right now.}

Luplup had entered the system where Cube #347 was currently loitering within the outskirts of an asteroid belt. The sphere had exited hypertranswarp very close to the cube, the celestial equivalent of dropping a penny from the top of a two-hundred story building and having it land, without bouncing, next to a coin on the ground at the base. Luplup had then immediately tractored several nearby rocks and flung them at the cube, disrupting any thoughts of flight...not that Weapons, now in charge of his hierarchy again, would allow such without a struggle. Hitting an opponent's shields with clouds of gravel was a simplistic, yet practical, way to ensure said opponent could not engage supralight. The larger asteroids were mere punctuation.

Luplup, however, did not seem to have total destruction on her mind. With a pair of rocks serving as pitiful secondary shields to Cube #347's return defense, the sphere made a pass at high speed. In Maintenance Bay #2, Doctor laid his ears back to his skull as all his patients disappeared, as did several of his hierarchy who had been holding tags. He had felt the momentary tingle of a transporter beam trying to make a high speed lock, but it had not set.

"Bugger," exclaimed Doctor to the universe in general, "how is a vet supposed to work when his patients keep running away?"

*****

The calculations were difficult, even for the organo-silicon computer which was Cube #347 with its living brains and manufactured hardware. There was also an element of luck, or, as the Collective disallowed the small-being belief of luck, an aspect of random chance. Luplup had managed to do it, but the question was, could the sub-collective of Cube #347 follow suit, especially when the sphere was sitting far from any star, far from any cover.

Cube #347 did it. While only twenty-eight of the thirty-two drones were retrieved, it was better than nothing.

The chase continued.

*****

"Mine!" screamed Luplup's Sphere #93 dataQueen as her Borgs materialized in the increasingly crowded supply closet made even more packed as she required sufficient tacticals to keep the bad-mans in line. As the prior several times, her initial chore was to subdue to the insane Borg tactical, bind him securely: so caught up was she in the stealing of Borgs that she never considered abandoning the troublesome one. As the task was undertaken, other Selves scanned the ranks of resigned Borg, not seeing the one face she most wanted to see.

"Yous all belong to me! My toys! Yous will not be taken from me!"

Half a dozen hamster vermin had arrived with the Borg. Whether it had been due to inadvertently swallowed tag pellets or simple bad luck, it was not important. They were underfoot and Luplup had to keep herself from eating any more of the unpalatable things. Instead she stepped on two of them, missing the other four as they ran down the hallway in a scramble to join their friends. She would deal with them later. Until then...

"I'm getting dizzy with all this transportering," mildly commented the four-eyed drone, the voice of which Luplup was coming to despise.

"Shut up! Quiet! Mine!"

*****

Back and forth, forth and back, like a twisted transporter tennis match between Cube #347 and Luplup, with 5 to 47 drones (plus miscellaneous hamsters, several hat stands, eight vysts, and additional plants) as the balls. Evolving from one-sided strafing runs at high-speed upon the target, cube and sphere were now performing double transports, even more tricky for the transportees, and more dangerous.

Cube #347 usually entered a system first, being the faster of the two ships, although the sub-collective occasionally halted it to wait in the vacuum of interstellar space. When Luplup's sphere eventually appeared, as it always did, the two would charge at each other in a match of chicken using vehicles that, if they clipped, would be certain cause much damage to both parties. At the last moment, as if a mutual decision, the pair would swerve, flashing by each other at very high relativistic velocities, transporters plunging through opponent shields to snatch all which could be grabbed. At the same time, energy weapons would shiver the shields of the other, not seriously, not causing damage, two giants (albeit one smaller than the other) engaged in a not-so-comical slap contest. Transporter lock achieved, the pair would break away and count their prizes.

Sometimes, if Cube #347 had managed to recover all its drones, the cube would choose a random course and flee. It always eventually came to ground somewhere, whereupon Luplup would begin her stalk.

Other times, Luplup would decide she wanted to change the hunting grounds and steal away with her prizes. Cube #347, complying with root level imperatives, would follow, stealth dependent upon Weapons' restraint and if he was present on board.

Most times, neither side would declare temporary victory and, like two jousters, would turn and run at each other again.

And again.

And again.

Finally, after one last attempt had netted all the sub-collective drones which belonged to Cube #347 (58 of 203 still asking after his plants and why they couldn't be included in the retrievals), the cube turned tail and ran. There was a nebula relatively nearby, and it offered several options for concealment (or ambush, as insisted Weapons) not available at present.

*****

Cube #347 slowly traveled through the nebula, quarter impulse leaving a vast wake behind. It was a trail even a half-blind navigator could follow, but the nebula was...odd, especially where concerned the exterior sensor array. It was driving Sensors buggy, no pun intended. Theoretically Luplup was out there, maybe even nearby, but it was assumed that she could no more sense the cube than the cube could sense her.

{It's the parliament again,} commented 34 of 510 of the sensory hierarchy.

Disregarding the fact that they were sitting in near vacuum and very low temperatures, surrounded by colorful nebular gasses, a full English parliament argued. The participants could be one of a dozen species - human, Cardassian, Vulcan, unidentifiable, and so on. Always they wore formal 17th century English clothing topped by a talc wig, an accessory which looked especially odd on Ferrengi. Benches, tables, and a podium accompanied the parliament on its journey, as well as scraps of papers which were never whisked away into the surrounding nebula. A large loaf of bread, neatly sliced, took center stage to the discussions, the focus of much gesturing and gavel pounding. Either the cube neared the parliament, or the parliament neared the cube, it did not matter. As the previous four times, cube loudspeakers crackled into speech.

Voice One: "I say! I say! The legality of sliced bread? Abomination! Pure abomination! All sliced bread should be burned and the bakers who conceived of this impure notion put to the gallows!" (chorus of agreement)

Voice Two: "You are a superstitious old donkey. There is nothing miraculous, or devilish, about pre-sliced bread. You take a knife to your bread everyday! Or at least your servants do. So the bakers save a few seconds for you, what of it? It is convenience of the highest order."

Voice One: "And the bakers come from your district!"

Voice Two: "So? That is not the point under discussion. They could have easily come from your district." (jeering whistles and calls of "Hear! Hear!")

Voice Three: "This is ridiculous! You are only jealous of the monetary benefits that..."

Voice Four (accompanied by gavel banging): "Order! Order! Enough accusations! I will not have this parliament turned into a zoo!" Pause. "Also, by the way, how does the Parliament feel about adjourning for a spot of tea? I put this motion on the floor. Any seconds?"

The voices faded; and the parliament whirled away in the nebula, lost to view.

{Sensors, report: where is that Assault-class sphere?} queried Captain.

The reply was the frustrated tone of one unable to do one's task, {Sensors does not know. Sensors can not [hear] nor [smell] anything. Visual, quantum [fuzzies], long-wave [dragon], [paper] frequencies, gravimetrics, everything is [scrambled eggs]. Sensors is [swordfish].}

Doctor was performing "house calls," checking on several still tagged patients who were recovering from surgery (and transporters) in their alcoves. Drone maintenance, much less Doctors of present or past, never provided such personalized service, only sending units to collect for the maintenance bay those unable to come on their own. Second was the current focus of Doctor or he would have been if the latter had been spending more time waving around a diagnostic tool and less time listening with an ear pressed against the bulkhead adjoining the alcove.

"I am over here," said Second as he watched Doctor tap a metal plate, "and there is no part of me in the bulkhead. I have two sub- tags in me, and I would like them to be removed eventually."

Doctor jerked away from the bulkhead, ears drooping slightly. He clicked his teeth together and seemed to see Second for the first time. He was also being very guarded about his thought processes. "Yes, yes, vet work. The tags will come out after you are allowed to regenerate for a tiny bit." There was a pause as first a humming device was passed over Second's body, followed by a limb with build-in diagnostic tools. Doctor seemed to be aiming more at the metal to either side of Second than Second himself. "Hm...very, very interesting."

"What?" asked Second. He shuffled through the many diagnostic streams in the dataspace, finally finding that originating from Doctor. The raw data might as well as been input from Sensors for all Second understood it, and he was not inclined to download the proper information files to teach himself medical technobabble. "What is interesting, Doctor? Me? The bulkhead?"

"Well..." began Doctor. Further understanding was not forthcoming as Cube #347's internal superstructure rang like a bell. There was a breathless wait, followed by a much stronger rattling. Outside, the space warfare equivalent of depth charges were exploding, some nearer and some further; and for a structure as large as an Exploratory-class cube to audibly resonate deeper than hull level, the isoton yield had to be immense.

A third explosion was not felt in the inhabited subsection depths, but a fourth made Doctor stumble against Second.

In the intranets, Captain called, {Report! Sensors! Weapons! In that order!}

{Sensors did not see Luplup! Sensors still can't [taste] Luplup!} protested Sensors.

Weapons growled, {Backtrack on the depth charges. Once we know where the sphere is hiding, we can charge it and remove it from relevancy.} In between those times he was spending on Luplup's vessel, he had been running BorgCraft simulations concentrating on scenarios which had one Exploratory-class cube pitted against one Assault-class sphere. Assuming a perfectly efficient cube crew and a woefully understaffed and incompetent sphere crew, Cube #347 could not lose. Under more realistic models, a 3.2% chance of victory was likely and quite sufficient for Weapons to argue for an attempt.

{What do you think Sensors is trying to do?} While Weapons would contest with command and control or engineering for engine or systems controls as appropriate, he was not so cavalier about taking over the sensor grid. {The [waters], they mask all [pens]. Maybe if Sensors alters the grid on face #3 to [spaz]...there is...no, [goblin] nose again.}

Drifting in the wisps of nebular gas was an enormous nose. It had been seen several times, each time given a wide berth. It was logical to assume the phantasms were sensor hallucinations caused by unique nebular properties, but the darkness in those nostrils was very, very foreboding.

Luplup may have been at the same disadvantage when it came to actually knowing Cube #347's position, but that did not stop her from flailing with high explosives. There was a high probability she was using the pressure waves from the explosions to create a crude three-dimensional map of the area, including where Cube #347 was located, for the depth charges were slowly moving closer in an erratic inward spiral.

It was time to move.

In his nodal intersection, Captain regarded the large nose. It was the only cover of sorts in view. Even Weapons was inclined to agree, although he had notions of using the piece of floating anatomy as an ambush point, not a place to cower behind. There was consensus, and Cube #347 moved towards the nose.

The nose took a deep snuff. Cube and sub-collective were snorted into the nostril blackness.

*****

Luplup fired another depth charge into the nebula. The modified torpedo flew outwards for five seconds, then exploded. While the intrinsic characteristics of the nebula shrouded normal ways of using her long-distance eyes, brute force echolocation was returning a very granular view of the area. Luplup, however, did not care of the method's inelegance: there was the hint of a cube shaped hole in the map, one matching the dimensions of an Exploratory-class cube.

Then the dreaded nose appeared.

Luplup hissed. She did not like venturing into the nebula to begin with, and certainly did not like doing so with her only pursuit vessel in the area. Other units were incoming, but the soonest Battle-class, diverted from stomping on a prey species homeworld, would not arrive for ten hours. She did not wish to lose this sphere asset; and the nose figured prominently in the nebula's outskirts as the last sight seen before all contact was lost to exploring Selves.

Keeping a wary long-distance eye on the Nose of Doom, Luplup launched a trio of charges, trying to explode them close to the postulated position of her prey. Maybe the target would flush...or maybe the target would choose to stand still and be destroyed. At this point the chase for Captain Borg Bad-Man was beginning to wear thin, to become boring, and Luplup did not care which outcome prevailed.

Besides, this sphere needed to be fumigated. The six-legged, inedible, hitchhiking varmints were making inconvenient nests in the walls, irritating dens of wire and other material that were causing minor, yet annoying, losses in efficiency for the sphere unit.

*****

The sub-collective was receiving contradictory input. On the one hand, engineering hierarchy via Delta reported maneuvering thrusters to be functioning within normal parameters; and on the other hand, visuals of the oddly lighted area showed Cube #347 to be stuck in snot within the inner nostril, thrusters ineffective as the ship shared tenancy with an oversized nostril hair and a 500 meter diameter booger.

{Analysis,} demanded Captain to engineering hierarchy. There was a kaboom-ba-boomboom *crash*. It was ignored.

Delta shot back, {All is nominal. Thruster workload is consistent with moving through vacuum far from a gravity well.}

{Sensors,} continued Captain as he gathered summarized reports.

Kaboom-ba-boomboom *crash*.

{Sensors says we [paper] moving...}

{Hah!} chorused the double Delta voice in the background.

{...but we are also still. Stuck. [Orange juice].}

Captain verbalized the general sub-collective assessment of the situation, {Nonsensical. Illogical.}

Kaboom-ba-boomboom *crash*.

Captain blinked as the noise echoing in his nodal intersection registered. It was the sound of a miniature drum kit, complete with cymbal. It was also an impossible sound, unheard since the First Person Plural debacle. 95 of 203's drum kit had been (1) larger, and (2) was currently nonexistent (unless the drone had illicitly re-replicated it).

Slowly pivoting in place, Captain announced into the intranets, {Whomever is playing with the sound system, now is not the time.}

Kaboom-ba-boomboom *crash*.

Ah-ha! Captain spotted movement against one wall. He raised lighting in the nodal intersection above that of the standard gloom. Revealed was a pint-sized drum kit; and blinking in the sudden brightness was...a six-legged hamster.

{Oh! There's one!} spouted Doctor. The form of Cube #347's maintenance hierarchy head materialized in Captain's nodal intersection. Despite the fact Doctor had been scant meters away paying an "alcove call" on Second, he had decided to use the transporters for this vital hamster emergency. "Wait. You are cute, but not as cute usual."

It was a hamster climbing off the drum set stool, but it wasn't the normal variety. Instead, it stood knee-tall to Captain, balanced on its two hindmost legs, leaving the other four free. The stance was not that of an animal performing a trick, but one evolved for bipedalism. The four non-walking legs were true arms, terminating in well-developed hands. Unlike the animals which infested Cube #347, this one was covered in a soft brown and white fur, obviously unBorgified. The face, however, was that of the hamster. It also wore a strategically placed kilt and had a pocketed bandolier crossing its chest.

"Hello," squeaked the hamster. "I think we need to have a little talk."

{Hamster!} shouted Weapons. {Extermination team alpha through zeta, converge upon...}

The hamster frowned a cute little frown, as if it had heard Weapons' declaration. Perhaps it had, for it responded as if such, "No, no. I don't think so. This needs to be a civil discussion. Restrain him." The "him" was clear as to meaning. "Else, you may regret it."

Bulkhead plates clattered to the deck, pushed from within the walls by small hands. The revealed hamsters were wielding phaser rifles that looked more appropriate for a child's soldier doll. These weapons, however, were not toys, and all the rifle toters wore expressions that clearly said 'Go ahead, make my day.'

Doctor boggled. "Oh, so cuuuute! You need a hug! And a hamster ball! I have some of those around." Several plastic balls of transparent pastel hues materialized in the intersection near the drum kit.

{Stand down, Weapons. You will comply,} spoke Captain. Weapons did so, reluctantly.

"Much better," said the hamster-in-charge. There was a side glance of longing at the exercise balls before full attention was returned to Captain. "As I said, we need to have a little talk. First of all, I'm not really what you see. This body is really that of a small, six-legged, wire-stripping animal, but since I needed to contact you, I required a creature that could, well, speak. The hamsters fit the bill, after I had found a reality moderately close featuring the appropriate evolutionary track. A little bit of tinkering with the geometries of the 9th through 11th dimensional matrices, and, well, here I am."

Captain and Doctor favored the hamster with blank faces, not of Borg impassivity, but of sub-collective non-comprehension.

The hamster blinked. "You are in what you would call a species #137 artifact. This nebula. I am this nebula. My name is Alteck"

"You are a hamster," stated Doctor, pointing out the obvious. "You are a hamster with delusions?"

"No, this body is an avatar from an alternate reality superimposed upon this one. His name is Squeak. Did you know all hamsters are named Squeak? Really! It is all in the enunciation as to which Squeak is which. I am controlling this Squeak like a puppet. I am the nebula, for lack of a better term. I know you have met a similar artifact...small metal sphere in charge of a large transportation system...you dribbled it around a lot...." Squeak made circular motions with all four of his arms. The hamsters with rifles did not move.

Answered Captain, "Depot."

The hamster nodded solemnly. "Very good. Nice enough fellow. My function...I'll not explain. Not only would you not understand, you collectively as in your entire Greater Consciousness would not." Pause. "Yes, I know this isn't your native reality. I exist in all realities, this nebula, I am on every page, you could say. Your astrometric charts do label me, but since I'm not active in your reality at the moment, I'm just a normal nebula...or am I a sphere?...juuuuust a sec...um, nebula, looks like. Anyway, here I am...er, what were we talking about?"

"Nebulas? In all realities?" prompted Captain.

"Yes. Mostly I watch, sometimes I act. Here, well, you don't belong, and you are within my sphere of influence - do you know the what-if's I had to jigger to make that be so? - now, so I think I will help you out. You do know that if you are completely destroyed, the game is over? No resurrection?"

Second materialized into the nodal intersection. "This was the purpose of your house call?" he asked, gesturing at the hamsters.

Captain hushed Second and Doctor before more words could be uttered from that quarter. "We were not so informed. We have been notified that drones who are terminated...." Captain trailed off as he noticed lips pursed around incisor teeth.

Said Squeak the hamster, "Omission, typical of Directors." The small rodent sighed, then deposited drum sticks onto snare drum with barely a riff. "Well, it is true. And before you ask, because I can read the meanderings of your group mind, no, I cannot haul you back to your own reality. I would like to, since, well, you could call it part of my function to make sure everyone stays on their own page in the grand Book of Reality, but, er, the infinity die kind of screws the pooch. Whomever had the bright idea to package ultimate probability into a dice and sell it to Board manufacturers, I don't know, but I'd knock them upside the head if I did and if I wasn't lenig." The threat, coming from a knee-high hamster, was ludicrous, yet at the same time quite disturbing.

Several hamster treat biscuits composed of sunflower seeds held together with molasses materialized near the speaker, as well as in the compartments with armed rodents. Some rifles were put aside in favor of attacking the grain confectionary, but sufficient force remained on alert to dissuade notions of extermination squads.

"As I said, I'll give you assistance, at least until the infinity die is rolled again and you go elsewhere, hopefully back where you belong. For now, it is that Assault-class banging around in me that seems to be your main problem. You have more problems on the way, but I think the die will be rolled by then. If not, I'll cross that bridge when it comes."

{Destroy the sphere,} advised Weapons.

Responded Squeak, or, rather Alteck the artifact before Captain could relay the succinct suggestion, "I, um, can't act directly. I'm somewhat like your ol' buddy Depot in that regards. I need specific conditions to do so, at least in this part of me. Luplup has learned not to venture too deep into me where I can take direct action. In my outer nebular layers I have to be a bit more circumstantial. However, through these avatars, since several dozen are also on your spherical problem, I can assist. Just sit back and watch: I'll give you an accurate visual on the action." The hamster paused, then looked at Doctor, "And, if you could, some more seed cakes? Perhaps a few more plastic balls? That would be great."

Doctor clapped his hands together happily and clicked his incisors. He had decided the bipedal hamsters were close enough to the Borgified ones that differences did not matter. It was not often that he had animals that could talk back and make their desires known. "More yum-yums coming."

*****

Original Self gnashed her teeth together. On Sphere #93, the dataQueen did likewise; and active Selves not set to vital tasks hissed in frustration. Cube #347 was not flushed. The latest explosion-echoes showed the cube-shaped anomaly to be gone. The only recognizable thing within the view of Luplup's numerous types of long-distance eyes was the nose and a bed of daffodils.

Wary distance was kept from the nose. The daffodils were another story as a depth charge was spat at them. Unfortunately, the explosion accomplished nothing except altering yellow daffodils to a tangled brier of deep purple roses.

The dataQueen responded to Luplup's general agitation and pent up irritation. She was currently deployed in the supply closet which was serving as Borg jail when drones were present. The room wasn't quite empty, for there were still three potted plants present, as well as an assortment of topiary, flowering bushes, and a yellow and blue vine. A hands major lashed out at a palm, severing the slender trunk. Foliage crashed to the ground, knocking over a plant sculpted in the form of a construction crane.

"That wasn't very nice," shrilled a high-pitched voice.

Startled, Luplup whirled towards the source, neck of her dataQueen lowered in threat. From the corridor rushed in a dozen tacticals, weapons raised and claws at the ready. There was no one else to make words on this sphere! Luplup certainly did not talk to herSelf - she had learnt the folly of making little voices, little parts of the greater Self - and the few nonSelves on the sphere were all locked in their alcoves.

Searching by many eyes landed upon a vermin, one of the varmints accidentally beamed aboard the sphere during the transporter duel. It stood just within the confines of the interstitial space, looking out from a space usually covered by a panel. The creature would not be safe there, no, for Luplup had specially bred technicians which were perfect fits for the cramped interstitial regions. She dispatched eight to wiggle into the bulkhead spaces, more than enough to deal with a single vermin.

"Yous speak," accused Luplup. She was backed with hissing from tacticals.

The hamster wasn't quite the same as the ones Luplup had seen before. Beyond the bipedal stance and the fur, it was wearing clothes in the form of trousers and a vest; and there was a bandana tied around its forehead, Rambo style. In one of its four hands it held a miniature pair of wire clippers, and in the other a box with several buttons.

"Yes I do," replied the hamster. "I just wanted to tell you that you are trespassing upon this nebula, and that you have five minutes to show sign that you are leaving. Forget the cube. I am currently rigging explosions to occur in some tricksy areas, so if you aren't pushing off in five minutes, this sphere will no longer exist. I give you a demonstration." An index finger stabbed at a button on the remote control. There was a frown as nothing happened. The button was punched several more times, each attempt with additional force. "Stupid, primitive equipment." Then there was a click.

Luplup reeled as the computer reported damage to Auxiliary Core #3. Damage was an understatement, for the core had exploded most spectacularly, destroying the space it was housed in as well as surrounding areas. It was not a deadly wound to the sphere, for Borg had structurally strong designs as well as with redundancy, and automatic damage control was already sealing the region. An unconscious autonomic part of Luplup set Selves into motion for repair duties. This action had not been expected; and the damage would have been much worse had Auxiliary Core #3 been actively on-line instead of idling.

The dataQueen retreated, allowing barking tacticals to stalk forward. Weapons were fired at the hamster in response to the threat. The vermin, seeing its welcome worn out, stepped sideways into the interstitial space, not a hair scorched. "Die! I do not comply!" howled the dataQueen in the background.

Five minutes later, Luplup lost her presence in the nebula artifact when her sphere blew up, the victim of catastrophic overload of primary and all auxiliary cores.

Luplup mulled her options as the first half dozen of the arriving ship-pack joined the Battle-class already patrolling just outside the nebula's wispy tendrils. The period required for interstellar travel, even at transwarp and hypertranswarp speeds, meant Luplup had time to cool her anger, to think analytically about her problem. In this case, the problem was Cube #347, which was, as far as she could tell, still inside the nebula. There were no tell-tale subspace tracks leading away to argue otherwise.

Eventually the prey had to emerge. There were no resources within the nebula, assuming the cube had not fallen into those depths Luplup knew to be fatal. Cube #347 might skulk for years on minimal power, minimal resource consumption, but be it months or centuries, it would have to come out. And Luplup would be there when it did.

And if it didn't? Luplup would assume that meant it was lost to the nebula, but it might require a long time to satisfy the probability index of an Exploratory-class cube succumbing to the death of no resources.

Luplup was content to wait.

*****

"No, no, no. Shutuck," explained Alteck through its avatar hamster Squeak. "Shoo-tuck. The rough translation is 'everyreality', sort of analogous to everywhere, but, well, every reality." The hamster waved all four of his little arms, then sighed and paced several times in silence across the table Captain had earlier transported to his nodal intersection so as to bring Squeak to a more comfortable speaking height. The hamster paused. "That's the best I can do without resorting to the high level mathematics which is the language of genius physicists. My presence is shutuck, everyreality. It is also blaateen[click], limited, since I don't have sufficient processing power to be active in all those realities all the time."

Captain was mouthpiece for a sub-collective trying to come to grips with the difficulties of syntax in temporal and reality mechanics. Most species evolved speech as a way to discuss food, warn of danger, or tell the latest dirty joke. Except for a few rare instances such as Species #6766 (whom none could claim to understand anyway), that same language eventually had to adapt to recounting what it had never been meant to describe. The Collective, rooted as it was in the languages of tens of thousands of species, was similar in that respect and had the same disadvantage, although such was rarely perceived because the Greater Consciousness had no need to attend scientific conferences and prove points in obscure branches of metaphysics. Alteck's builders, on the other hand, had existed long enough for their language to evolve words that dealt specifically with time travel and alternate realities. In the former case, there were whole verb forms to take into account, for instance, pasts that used to be, futures that could be, and presents that were all screwed up because some idiot had went and shot their own grandfather.

Silence reined as Captain tried to digest the hamster's words. That line of discussion was shelved as another thread initiated. "We want - I could care less, but there is a subset interested in this - to know more about future tenses. You said there were five. Before this discussion, however, we require an update upon Luplup."

If Alteck was nonplussed about the sudden change in topic, Squeak the hamster did not show it. Like Depot, this artifact seemed to enjoy talking, and its preferred topic was linguistics. The avatar lazily waved one hand of four at a holodisplay. A second hand stuffed a square of honey-coated seed cake into mouth.

"Luplup is setting up a perimeter outside my nebular boundaries," said Alteck through Squeak's mostly full mouth, garbling many of the words. "I think it is a stupid ploy because my surface area is too great for adequate sensor net coverage, even if Luplup's entire fleet were present. If I wanted to, I could so mess up her sensor readings that she couldn't tell if a black hole was within twenty meters of a ship hull, much less sense the track of a single Borg cube. Oh well." The matter was dismissed. "She won't come inside and I don't feel like expending the energy to do anything while she is beyond my boundary."

"What did occur to those ships that have 'disappeared'?" asked Captain, as he had been inquiring on and off for the five days since the sphere had exploded.

As those other times, the question wasn't answered. Squeak gave a lazy, four shouldered shrug as Alteck asked, "Future tenses? Yes, there are five. Sometimes six, but some academics believe that one is actually a corruption of the fassur tense, or what-if, and should not be formally included."

Captain allowed other members of the sub-collective to puppet his body, to ask questions, turning his attention to other matters more immediate and less esoteric.

In Bulk Cargo Hold #1 was Doctor, who had constructed a spa and resort, complete with exercise balls, shredded newspaper beds, and all the seed cakes a hamster could eat. Most of the cube's population of alternately evolved hamsters were there, either relaxing else guarding the room against Weapons' intrusion attempts. The armed hamsters which had originally been in Captain's nodal intersection were now in Bulk Cargo Hold #1 as security, small phasers proving to be more than adequate (and of a variety unable to be adapted) to stun those extermination squads which tried to crash the party. Weapons himself had been stunned on six different occasions.

Most of the weapons hierarchy were refusing to be on extermination squads against an opponent that could fight back so readily. The sub-collective had been assured that the hamsters would revert to their original Borgified selves upon leaving Alteck's sphere of influence. Except for Weapons, those who usually performed varmint eradication detail were willing to wait for such a time.

Meanwhile, Doctor organized a hamster volleyball tournament.

{Weapons is going to make another try,} commented Captain to Second. Weapons was swimming up from the unconsciousness created by his previous attempt, yet already his thoughts were centered around ways to create havoc amid the hamster resort. He was a conspiracy of one, however, for there were no volunteers to assist. Weapons did not care.

Second responded, {Shall we try to do something about it?}

{Like what? Stop Weapons?}

There were several beats of conversational silence between Captain and Second in the intranets, although operational data of normal sub-collective operation passed between them and other elements of command and control. Finally Second said, {Nah. He'll eventually learn, or terminate himself in the process. I bet he'll require eight more 'teachings' before he learns.}

There was a large grid drawn in the dataspaces, a virtual board with Weapons as the current primary bet of interest. Second scratched his wager upon the board. Captain had emplaced his bet earlier.

{I still say ten times total, that means four more times. Weapons isn't stupid, just persistent.}

"Hello? Are you listening to me? I need to talk to Captain," called a distant voice.

{You can have your body back,} intruded 133 of 203, linguistics scholar in another life, another reality, {but I want it back to delve further into the matter of differences between tenses of future gyritis, future kramer, and future kilner.}

Captain blinked, then focused on the hamster. "Yes?"

"Captain?"

"Speaking."

Squeak pointed at something, or someone, behind Captain. As he did so, a soap bubble floated past, bursting when it landed onto the table. "I think your ride is here," commented Alteck.

After Alteck had withdrawn its presence, after all hamster avatars had been sent back into the interstitial spaces much to Doctor's disappointment, after the table had been returned to the Maintenance Bay #2, Captain was left with one Director.

"Time to go?" inquired Captain.

Iris gazed upward, toward the ceiling, as if looking at sights far away and which only it could see. Both suppositions were likely correct. "Just about." The eyeball was, for once, not stuck in a wall or floor, not floating outrageously in the air, was just there. It did have PADD and bubble cigar in nonexistent hand, but that was nothing new. Perhaps it was a bit on the pink side outside the green iris?

"What?" asked the Director with irritation as it noticed Captain staring at it with more than normal interest. "It is a new contact lens, okay? It gives me great limited clairvoyance and 10/20 hindsight. It just makes me a little...red until the lens settles in."

"Oh."

"And green is my natural color, as much as /some people/ think it isn't."

Captain did not answer, the criticism not directed at him. Several more minutes passed. The waiting stretched. The Director fidgeted with its cigar, then activated a game on its PADD. Finally Captain, prodded by elements within the sub-collective, asked, "Is it true that if we are all terminated in any given reality that we will be forever dead? 'Game over' was the terminology."

Iris stared at Captain as only a Director can. No eyelids allows one to be a champion in the staring department. "Um, yes. So, don't try to terminate yourself, plural, okay? I'd really hate to lose you, especially with all the pain I'm going through to keep you alive. And if you aren't eventually returned to your home reality, we're going to have to dump our Board and start all over again." Under its breath the Director muttered to itself about needing to talk to certain Progenitors about certain big-mouthed lenig.

More time passed. Iris grunted as chunky space invaders overran block bunkers. The PADD was turned off and the eyeball gazed at the ceiling. Captain shifted from foot to foot. He opened his mouth.

"Yes, yes, we are going. I just had to make some final arrangements. Hang on, Fall!"

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