Andard-say isclamer-day: Ar-stay ek-tray is-ay owned-ay by-ay Aramount-pay. Ecker-day reated-cay Ar-stay aks-tray. Eneks-may ites-ray OrgSpace-bay.

Jumba the Wise Lizard and the Case of the Mad Queen, Part I

My name is Jumba, Jumba ser Alina, sometimes also known as the Wise Lizard. I am a private detective, for hire to anyone who can afford my fees. Sometimes I'll do jobs for little more than a bottle of cheap whiskey, and other times my prospective employer needs to have the better part of a fortune available to secure my hire: it all depends upon the client...and the assignment. Being a knock-out with a tail just so, scutes just a hint of blush helps as well in securing my interest. Enough of me, for in the end I'm an average Joe, nothing special.

It all started on a dark and stormy evening, one of those nights when your greatest ambition in life is to curl up before a crackling fire with book in one hand and a double malt in the other. I, however, had just taken a case, and I was in a high security facility awaiting a meeting with a Queen, an utterly mad Queen.

Jumba ser Alina was a Crouki, a species of reptiloid persuasion. He was more lizard than saurian in appearance, a 2-meter tall bipedal basilisk. Vestigial tail was about thirty centimeters in length, neither adding nor detracting balance, but was more than sufficient to dictate kilts to be the primary below-waist garment, as opposed to pants. Long toes with sharp talons, even well manicured talons, meant footwear beyond the basic flip-flop was not practical; and Crouki spacesuits were so dreaded by those whose professions demanded them that extra-vehicular robotic systems were highly developed. The torso and arms were standard as far as bipedal creatures went, with highly dexterous hands sporting four fingers and one thumb apiece: pocketed vests were the most common clothing, followed by rank tabards with hidden pouches. The neck was somewhat stocky; and on the males a small ruff was visible, able to be inflated at need or when trying to impress the ladies. As far as the head, there was no hair, no external ears, yet at the same time, the expressions produced by extremely elastic facial muscles were of greater range than should be possible by any reptiloid; and if eyes were the windows to the soul, the intelligent eyes of the Crouki spoke volumes.

In this particular case, Jumba was the standard Crouki hue of mottled brown and green. A hint of gold gilded the scales of belly, underneck, cheek, and mouth, emphasizing his masculinity, a color no female of his species sported for it was the males who had to attract the eye of the opposite sex in order to be included in the breeding unit. On this particular day his kilt was a serviceable, if dull, dark green in color, offsetting the stained brown leather of his vest. Around his waist he openly wore a holstered handgun, a high tech marvel of disruptor technology; and banded around his lower calf was a small knife. If that wasn't enough, two more knives were hidden on his person, a monster sheathed on his upper thigh, under the kilt, and the other of more normal size at the small of his back. In addition, in the slit pouch under his right armpit (slit pouches were used by the male to carry young - one per pouch - during the months following birth when the female had sunk into the post-birth stupor) held a miniature needler, darts of the projectile weapon loaded with a sleep agent.

"Are we ready yet?" called Jumba impatiently to the guard on the other side of the wire grating in a small anteroom. The guard looked somewhat bored as she consulted her display.

"Hold your ruff," spat the guard. Females of the Crouki species were conspicuously larger and stronger than the males and, thus, often given towards the more 'hands-on' jobs of society. "They're doing final prisoner prep now."

"She's in a cage," grumped Jumba, "and it isn't like she can escape. A physical cage, not a forcefield one. Absolutely primitive, if you ask me, but if that is the way it must be done, so be it."

The guard looked up from her monitor, "No one asked you, sweet-ruff. So, how'd you get permission to talk to our star guest, anyway? She doesn't get many visitors, for obvious reasons; and those that do get to see her have to go through extensive background checks, first. This is the first I've heard of you."

Jumba snorted. "You know those disappearances that have been in the news as of late?" He waited until the guard nodded her snout. "Well, the military have an idea that some of /her/ kind might be the cause of it." The guard gasped. "That's right, /her/ kind. And, as far as the military can tell, all the remaining enclaves of her kind are accounted for. I've been hired to get to the bottom of this mystery."

The console beeped, grabbing the guard's attention. She pushed a few buttons, allowing the cage door to the ultra-maximum security wing to open, to disengage the lethal weaponry which waited eagerly in alcoves. "There you go. Don't worry too much, now. She can't get out, can't touch you, and there are guards on the upper mezzanine watching her every move. She gets out of line one iota, and we can zap her back into compliance.">

"Thanks," nodded Jumba as he started through the portal. He paused, then looked sideways at the guard. "You know, afterwards, if you are free, maybe you might want to have a little drink with me, maybe some dinner? Who knows, later?" Neck ruff flickered just a bit, a suggestion of a suggestion.

The guard laughed. "You flatter a female, you old fraud. Besides, I've my breeding unit to think about, what with four males to make happy. Now, if you are ready to settle down, I think I could find room for a fifth."

Jumba heaved a long sigh. "No, no. I'm not ready for kids."

"You'll never be ready for kids," chortled the guard. "I know your type. One candle nights until the day you die." She paused, voice turning more serious. "Be careful in there, Flatterer. She might not be able to touch you, but she is still deadly to the mind." With that, the guard became all business, urging Jumba through the portal to the room beyond.

The ultra-high security wing of Jika prison facility on the asteroid Koo held precisely one prisoner. One. The wing had cost uncountable credits, but the races which had helped with the construction, either monetarily, with materials, or labor had felt that no amount of money was too much. Compared to the alternative, it was a very small price to pay. It was the Crouki who had volunteered to manage the facility, to guard the prisoner; and the other races of the Assembly whom had worked to capture the prisoner were more than happy to so allow the Crouki.

Jumba peered around with interest as he entered the giant room, more than three stories high. It was white, sterile, which only served to emphasize the clear box which took center stage, a transparent cage fifteen meters by fifteen meters. On the second story mezzanine, guards watched over the guard rail with interest, old-fashioned projectile rifles at the ready; and everywhere were cameras and sensors trained on the occupant of the box. The set-up was very impressive.

Furniture within the cage was minimal. Of table, bed, chairs, sink, or toilet, there was none, instead what appeared to be an upright coffin gracing the back of the box. The coffin was a technological marvel, alien in construction, almost organic. It connected to the outside via a relatively small cable which delivered power. If one walked to the backside of the coffin, the alcove, one would be able to see that there were a series of additional ports for a variety of other connections, but it was only a single one which was vital. Jumba, however, was not interested in the alcove, but rather the occupant inside.

"Ahem," said Jumba loudly as he cleared his throat.

In the alcove, a pair of eyes opened. A chill voice, synthetic in nature, answered, "You are heard. State your intentions. Do you come to poke me, prod me, like all the others before? Do you come to sample my blood? Examine my regenerative capabilities? Question me upon the hierarchy of the Borg?" The tone was resigned to its fate, but at the same time projected that, should the opportunity arise, escape was a valid option. Defeat was not in the vocabulary.

She was a Borg Queen, the last of her kind. As a nexus of the Collective, the Borg had once employed many of them, of different species but linked by strength of will. No longer. It had been a difficult fight for the free peoples of the galaxy, terrible in price, to defeat the Borg. However, in the end, by guile and by military might, the Greater Consciousness had been shattered. There were still a few enclaves, mini-collectives of Borg off the beaten track, but without spaceflight or a central mind to coordinate them, they were unimportant. Someday they would die off. Until then, this Queen was kept as a portal to understanding the Borg.

There remained a primal connection between the Queen and the million or so remaining scattered drones. Transfers of large amounts of data could be jammed, but it had never been pinpointed how exactly communication occurred. At best, the Queen knew where her far flung drone parts were, but nothing more extensive could be passed. Experts believed that the Borg Queen had long ago crossed the thin line to insanity, however such could be defined in the cybernetic race. She remained lucid; and the signs of madness were subtle. Sane or not, she was still very, very dangerous.

Jumba had come for a specific reason, and cared not of the Queen's mental status. A straight answer is what he desired. "Are you still linked to the other drones?" probed Jumba.

"Ah, this is going to be a discussion upon the hierarchy of the Borg. How unexciting. How predictable. Yes, I remained linked to the other drones which remain. They are scattered, without the purpose I provide. The Greater Consciousness no longer survives. The body Borg is a quadriplegic in a coma. Now, go away." Eyes closed.

After glancing up at the walkways above, Jumba nervously switched his tail back and forth, then approached the cage. No entrance, no egress was possible, yet the potential danger set his ruff to vibrating. He felt in greater peril at this juncture, at this now, than in all his previous cases. "I'm not done. I am Jumba. Perhaps you know of me? I need to talk to you. I need to know if any of your drones have escaped their enclaves."

The Queen opened her eyes again, this time actually disengaging from her alcove. In many respects she was an average humanoid, shorter than Jumba and belonging to one of the many mammalian races. She was not as heavily cybernized as some of the other Queens destroyed in the war, but she remained quite the artificial creature. She stalked within three meters, two meters, one meter of Jumba. "So, you are Jumba. Jumba the Wise Lizard. Yes, I, we, the Borg have heard of you. Surprised? No drones have escaped their enclaves; and no new 'colonies' have been formed. Automatic defenses and regular patrols ensure that." Piercing eyes locked onto Jumba.

"Then, what, is out there attacking ships? No assimilations as of yet, but the signs are all congruent with Borg technology," demanded Jumba, unconsciously leaning forward.

The Queen cocked her head slightly as if considering the question. Suddenly, abruptly, she stepped forward until only the transparent barrier separated the two. Guards reflexively raised their rifles, sighting on the aggressive Borg. Ignoring the activity above, mouth parted and whispered, "Idiots." Cipher delivered, the Queen turned her back, dismissing Jumba. "This discussion is at an end. You are the private investigator...you figure it out. If your small mind can."

Jumba sighed. Why did so many of his cases insert these little twists? Sometimes it seemed his life was a series of cheap detective novels.

After my interview with the Queen - if she was within a kilometer of the sanity border, I'll eat my kilt - I left to confer with the military brass who hired me in the first place. Ah, government work. Since this was a Borg case, I essentially had a blank expense check, and I planned to use it. While I did find out some of what had and was happening elsewhere in the sector, I can only conjecture the full details.

"A googol and six to the square root of minus three," intoned the unseen bass voice which had become familiar, followed by the body-vibrating BONG. Cube #347 materialized to a new reality.

Second called to nowhere, nothing, "Now, that is just plain silly. What sort of dice has such a number, anyway?"

"Infinity dice," jovially answered Iris as it fell through the ceiling of the nodal intersection, landing up to its non-knees in floor. It stepped upward, putting itself on a more level plane. "Any and all numbers are on the infinity dice: it is the nature of the beast. So...um...where is the captain of this joint?" The eyeball spun in a slow circle, seeing only Second in the nodal intersection whereupon it had expected to find Captain.

Second peered down at the Director. If one was going to be an omnipotent being, one would expect that one would be more imposing than a few fingers over a meter. The height difference didn't appreciably bother the entity. Other observations tumbled through the back of Second's mind, products of intranet gossip. "Regeneration. It is required, you know. You didn't appear immediately after the initial translation, so he decided to do something more pressing than wait for you."

"You are the sarcastic one, much more so when in person. Fine, fine. The briefing just goes to all of you, anyway," said Iris as it looked at its PADD. Several contemplative bubbles were blown from the cigar, each a subtly different color from the one before.

There was a tickle in the dataspaces, something which had not been present since the cube had first been wrenched onto this cosmic rollercoster ride to oblivion. The vinculum had found the whisper of active Borg fractual frequencies, very weak, but definitely present. Sensors rapidly reconfigured to try to pinpoint the origin as efforts to connect to the local Collective proved futile for unknown reasons.

Iris began to speak, "Interesting reality. Okay, rather boring Board, actually. The Collective has pretty much been wiped out in a war. There are remnants left, but nothing major; and all are kept under close military surveillance. Since nothing is currently trying to eat, destroy, or otherwise annihilate you, why don't you be a good piece and stay right here. The nearest star is over seven light years away and you are not in a populated part of the quadrant. As soon as my turn comes around again, you'll be off, hopefully back to the Board where you belong. Do you comply?"

Second narrowed his eyes as he looked down upon the Director. No response was provided except the activation of engines as the nearest Borg nexus was determined. The consensus cascade had resolved a course of action.

Iris was not amused. "Look, you have free will and all that jazz, but I strongly insist you stay right here. Those playing this Board are going to be mighty POed if you mess up plots in progress."

Cube #347 leapt into hypertranswarp.

"Fine, be that way. I'll be very disappointed if you are destroyed, not to mention the wagers I'll loose to certain people." The Director blew an extra large bubble, stepped into it, the floated away back through the ceiling. Silently Second watched the disappearance, most of his awareness within the sub-collective as he performed his normal duties.

I've heard theories that certain people - writers, musicians, artists - are somehow wired to "hear" alternate realities. There are mathematical formulas and philosophical discourses upon the biological nature of the "soul;" and, wouldn't you know it, quantum physics makes an appearance as well. These scientists and cosmologists say that there is no inspiration, that it is simply the brain receiving input from other realities where the story, the score, the sculpture already exists, sort of like having metal fillings in your teeth catching a local radio broadcast. Crack-pots, all, in my estimation.

If that were true, then I, or anyone, could potentially be the central character of some book elsewhere in the multi-verses. Ha! What a gas! I'm just a plain ol' detective for hire. Still, some of the things I learned at the end of the investigation made me rethink those theories, until I decided that perhaps it was best I forget about it all before my brain exploded.

Cube #347 glided into the system. It was silent only in that vacuum was not conducive to air-borne sounds, but in other respects the ship was not quiet. Subtlety, stealth, were not Borg strong points. Gravimetrics, vacuum energy, radio, sensor whispers in a multitude of electromagnetic frequencies, Cube #347 was a beacon.

"Warning! The second planet of this system is interdicted. Do not approach, or you will be damaged. Persist and you will be destroyed. This is your only warning!" shrilled an automated sentinel in three dozen languages. It dissolved under a hail of neuruptors into a sprinkling of debris.

The system was as tens of thousands of others in that it had a yellow dwarf primary surrounded by an adoring family of rocky planets, gas giants, and countless asteroids and ice chunks. It was a place fated to either birth a sentient race or provide a colony for spacefarers; and, in fact, there were signs here and there of exploitation of the solar system's resources. And there were also signs of war.

Following a tentative carrier wave inexorably inward, Cube #347 neared the second planet. To the fractual subspace channel were being sent standard requests for re-integration into the Whole, or simple acknowledgment of existence, but no reply was forthcoming. It was almost as if there was no vinculum, else fractual frequencies being largely jammed in a manner unknown to the sub-collective. Of Order, there was none, only the most base of signals which indicated a drone or a population of drones survived.

Ringing the second planet at the equator and set over the poles were massive platforms bristling with weapons. Humongous, they would cause multiple eclipses of the sun a daily occurrence for any on the planet's surface. The platforms, unbeknownst to Cube #347, not only served to keep the several million Borg on the planet, but to warn invaders away. More than one person over the years had devised a plan which, somewhere, required a drone. The platforms excluded such riffraff. They were also sufficient to successfully engage a fleet of a dozen Battle-class cubes intent on freeing their comrades, should such ever occur.

One Exploratory-class cube was mere annoyance.

For incoming vessels, the platforms were programmed to disable, if possible. A pair of Crouki crewed corvettes - stations of interdicted planets was generally considered boring, a not-so-subtle punishment detail - would then board the unlucky ship, question all aboard, perform any law enforcement activities necessary, and finally tow the offender to impoundment.

"Is that what I think it is?" asked a corvette's junior sensory officer to her superior, her jaw agape.

The senior, scales dulled with age, leaned over the junior's chair to peer at the screen. "What?"

"That looks like the signature of a Borg cube, Exploratory-class. It is just like on the training files. Are we having a drill, sir?"

The younger female's voice was still high pitched, yet to drop to the lower registers as was normal in Crouki late adolescence. The senior officer winced. "No, this isn't a drill; and a Borg cube is impossible. Let me see the readings." The junior vacated the chair for the senior.

As the expected few brief seconds stretched into half a long minute, the senior officer did not move, except for his ruff, which began to shake slightly in agitation. "By the Gods..." breathed the sensory officer, a veteran of the Borg Wars.

Meanwhile, the junior officer had altered an adjacent unoccupied console to echo the information of the dedicated sensory station. "The platforms are engaging, sir."

The platforms, programmed as they were, only did minor damage to the intruder. The trespasser returned fire, then, as quickly as it had appeared, the cube vanished, using a propulsion not encountered before. Computers noted certain recognizable signature components, but the overall result was definitely new, different. Disturbing.

The senior sensory officer turned to regard the third-watch primary, who had been distantly observing. "We have a problem," said the former to the latter. Understatement. "Wake the captain." A sigh escaped lips. "At least this'll get us out of this boring hellhole. However, you know, I think I'd rather have boredom than that sort of action."

'That sort of action' was a stationary shot of the Exploratory-class cube in question, looming large on the sensory console's primary screen.

Jumba the Wise Lizard regarded General Thalth as the latter levelly gazed back from her side of the heavy metal desk. The General's scales were faded with age and the slightly curled edges caused rasping with each movement, but quick black eyes held a youthful energy long forgotten by body. Thalth was one of those individuals who only seemed to grow stronger in mind as the body slid the long slide towards eventual expiration. Death for this General, however, was still many, many years distant.

"So, why'd you call me here?" asked Jumba, honestly curious. He did not bother with the male posturings he typically performed around those of the opposite sex. While he liked the act of flirting, that was all it usually was - an act. Carefully contrived and refined over the years, it served to mentally disarm those, especially females of his species, who might otherwise be tightlipped with potentially useful information. There were pluses to being perceived as a ditz male. The General, on the other hand, with her keen insight and long years experience, would see straight through the performance.

The General soundlessly turned over a single paper on her uncluttered desk and pushed it forward. "Take a look."

Jumba slid the paper toward himself, recognizing a standard-sized glossy, a low-tech still-shot photograph. On the photograph was the image of a ship. Confused, Jumba glanced into the face of Thalth. "So? It is a Borg cube. I can't tell you size without a scale. I can go into the CompNet and drag tens of thousands of like images into crystal storage in minutes. I'm a detective, not a data-psychic to tell you which news reel, archive, or other source this picture came from."

Thalth leaned back in her chair, nonplused. "What if I told you that picture was taken yesterday at about the time you were flirting with a certain jail guard?"

"I'd say you were taking drugs, beg your General's pardon," snorted Jumba, neither respectful nor apologetic. If they didn't like his attitude, the government could get another detective. However, he /was/ the best, and they knew it. "There are no more cubes."

"It was an Exploratory-class, at least according to size. It tested the defenses of the Borg Icthrius Two colony. While it was forced to retreat, the corvettes on duty recorded some discrepancies, things not seen during the Borg Wars." The General tilted herself forward, flipped over another paper, then leaned back again.

Suspicious, Jumba peered down at the new picture without actually touching it. This one was not precisely a photograph, but rather a special sheet of thin plastic able to encode and display a short video clip. Jumba gazed at a loop, one in which a grainy Borg cube approached an indistinct blob, the latter of which vanished in a short-lived blaze of glory due to cube-mounted weaponry.

General Thalth spoke, "The weapon is not familiar. True, a marker beacon doesn't have much in the way of defense beyond a light shield to ward the stray micrometeorite, but that weapon carved through it as if it wasn't there; and it later repeated the performance on one of the interdictor platforms above Icthrius Two. Only sheer firepower forced the invader to leave. The weapon appears to be neutral in charge, which means our shields cannot deflect it. In all, the techs tell me that while it may /look/ like an Exploratory-class, it could mount an offense closer to that of Battle-class." Pause. "And there was a new type of propulsion signature when the cube did leave. It was similar to transwarp, yet different. Closer analysis picked up other bothersome things, but these are the major issues."

Jumba frowned. "So is this what has been attacking ships? Did you miss an enclave somewhere, one which has picked up additional technologies? And, more importantly, do you still need to retain my services since your mystery is solved?" Jumba neglected to add that he had done, essentially, nothing, for to do so might give the government thoughts of non-payment.

Thalth snorted, inclining herself and her chair forward once more. "You are needed to get to the bottom of this mystery. By all rights that cube should not exist. The Borg Wars did not miss any enclaves, despite doomsday predictions by the tabloids for the last three years, but we are checking out all leads. I saw a tape of your session with the Queen: she seems to like you." The General smiled wickedly at the pronouncement, enjoying Jumba's almost controlled twitch. "Maybe it is your male wiles. Maybe she was in an expansive mood. Maybe she was just overly insane that day. No matter, you will go talk to her again, gain as much information as possible."

"And, meanwhile?" pressed Jumba.

"The military is overly good, so the press has pointed out in the past, at making things go boom." No more was added to the cryptic comment. Jumba's briefing with General Thalth was over.

With expressionless face, Captain watched debris in the holographic field spin. Where moments before had been an unremarkable freighter, now was a collection of carbonized hull plating, engine components, atomized electronics, and plasma. Captain's eyes automatically flickered to a particular piece of fused metal an instant before it was lanced by a neurupter, vaporizing it.

{Weapons...} began Captain, a host of unvoiced accusations in the mental tone.

{It was threatening us,} explained Weapons. Unbidden, a second holodisplay opened beside the first in Captain's nodal intersection. The replay focused upon a whole version of the reality in the real-time external view.

Captain dismissed the new visual, although he could not as easily ignore the stream in the dataspaces. It had engine troubles and was already stopped. {When we halted to inquire upon directions and a condensed history of this reality, it tried to flee using impulse. You blew it up.} It was a dysfunction typical of the Cube #347 sub-collective.

{It...} began Weapons.

{It did nothing!} declared Captain. {/Every/ vessel we have met in this reality has been destroyed! All we need is information, either an intact crew or an intact computer. Disabling would accomplish this goal. Dis-a-bel-ing.}

{But...}

{Second, explain to Weapons and the weapons hierarchy the concept of disabling. Again.}

Second, elsewhere in the cube, groused, {Futility!}

{Resistance is futile,} reminded Captain.

Second deliberately twisted the meaning. {You bet it is in this case.}

Captain heaved a sigh, the only major movement he had made in the last hour beyond slight changes in head position. Attention was shifted to another hierarchy. {Sensors, report.}

Abruptly, the debris field altered to a three-dimensional abstract of orange and fluorescent pink curly-cues whirling in a hypnotic pattern. Slowly a pea green stain infused the display volume and began to subtly pulsate. Captain tilted his head slowly one way, then the other, eye squinted, as he attempted to make sense of the computer's interpretation of raw sensor data originating from certain sensor arrays on all faces. Captain knew better than to sample the original datastream, for if it was causing such difficulties with computer algorithms, his brain had no chance.

{Present data in a format the rest of the sub-collective can understand,} demanded Captain has he felt the gray matter in his head catch fire and begin to melt.

Chirped Sensors, {Sensors thinks [blanket] clear. However, if it is insisted, it can be [slammed].}

{We insist.}

Green, pink, and orange disappeared in favor of a blue object the size of a sugar cube. As the display began to slowly rotate around the y-axis, red lines angled in from off-screen, impacting the cube. Seven of the lines were of medium thickness, and four were nearly transparent; and the final one was a bright beacon. Three of the medium lines corresponded to relative direction and distance of the three Borg presences Cube #347 had unsuccessfully attempted to contact. Three of the medium lines led to systems which would require a small armada of Collective vessels to penetrate. Presumably the other lines fingered similar situations, interdicted worlds full of Borg unwilling or unable to communicate with Cube #347.

One line, one representation of Borg concentrations the vinculum could sense was both less and more than the others. It was less in that it appeared to only be /one/ drone creating the emanation, yet it was more in that it was much stronger than the others. Still, like the others, communication was not possible no matter how many requests were sent. Once more, the most likely conclusion, the most improbable conclusion, was jamming of subspace fractual frequencies.

Captain triggered a consensus cascade, with course of action the business under debate. The answer returned, setting a vector towards the emanator of the most powerful line.

The cube leapt into hypertranswarp, leaving behind the debris field.

"What is this?" asked Jumba. He was back in the Queen's prison chamber, the disturbing object of Borgdom statue-still in her alcove. She was not regenerating, insisted a jailor-technician prior to Jumba's entrance, although she might as well be for all the attention she afforded the detective. Jumba continued to press the photo he held flat against one transparent wall. "I know you are awake. I need to know what this is and its origin."

"Little beings, always in a hurry. Scurrying around in your small lives, worrying about your small concerns. Vermin," proclaimed the Queen as she suddenly animated. "The Borg take a longer view; and even this is a mere setback in the final quest for Perfection. Someday, you small beings will make a mistake." The Queen's eyes finally opened, focusing first upon Jumba, then the picture. The rest of her prison might not have existed for all the attention she gave it.

Jumba urged, "What is this and what is its origin."

The Queen afforded Jumba a dark look, one which plainly said he was wasting her time with his irrelevant questions. She then glanced swiftly upwards, appraising the ever-present security on mezzanine before returning her gaze to the Wise Lizard. The Queen may be mad, but there was a calculated predatory quality to the insanity. The alcove was abandoned. "It is an Exploratory-class cube." Pause. "You did not come to ask me that question alone. Why do small beings inquire upon questions of which the answer is already known? Energy would be better used examining the unknown, or adapting the known to service oneself."

Jumba would not allow himself to be sidetracked: he was a detective and long the master at verbal evasion. Instead, he plowed ahead, "As I'm sure you know, all the enclaves the military monitors are intact. The cube did not come from a colony. After much internal wrangling, they have come to the painful conclusion that they must have missed a population somewhere, perhaps a small one only now strong enough to send forth a scout. I believe otherwise. I am right, aren't I?"

Gliding near, the drone stopped uncomfortably close to Jumba, invading personal space even through the thick transparent aluminum cage wall. Involuntarily, Jumba felt his ruff fluttering in agitation, a reaction he swiftly controlled. The flinch, no matter how slight, was not lost upon the Queen. She ignored the detective's question.

"You are a truth seeker. A neurotic truth seeker. Consequences and means are not important, as long as truth is revealed." The statement was delivered with the slight head cock which generally indicated Collective communication, except that the Queen was isolated except on the most basic of levels.

"Perhaps," guardedly returned Jumba. "Truth is, after all, a stronger edifice than a lie. An empire may be built on lies, but it only takes a single truth to crumble it."

"Careful," admonished the Queen as she turned away, eyes again searching, counting the tier guards, "your education is showing. That almost sounded like a profound thought, especially for a small being." Abruptly the drone whirled to face Jumba again, grace belying the cybernization which made many a drone cumbersomely awkward. "You would make a good drone. Come, expand your mind, learn of the universal truths as only the Collective can know. Used to know. Whereas a small being can never hope to understand the smallest gram of truth, the synthesis of a trillion trillion can explore the very bones of reality, searching for Perfection."

Above and behind, a nervous guard fingered her rifle, lifting it in preparation to aim. A deathly still filled the room, broken only by the faint scrape of Borg fingers on cage wall.

Jumba swallowed, but held his ground, held the picture against transparent aluminum. "No thanks. I'm all one for new experiences, but that is one I will do without. I hear the outpatient recovery period for addicts is horrible." The jaunty words were relayed gruffly, with a cultivated nonchalance he did not actually feel. Appearances and impressions were important, however, and there were more to his audience than just the Queen. The overanxious guard relaxed. "Again, this cube isn't from some missed population, is it?"

The Queen appeared to loose interest. "It is a ship of fools." The matter was dismissed, and the drone returned to her alcove. No amount of cajoling or threats could re-engage the Queen in further conversation.

Thus far in this caper, I've done as close to nothing as possible, yet the government, in its wisdom, seems to think I'm a detective whiz. I'm not about to burst their bubble, not as long as I am paid. It is a perfectly fine arrangement from my point of view.

First, I was tasked to determine what had been attacking ships, a "what" with Borg characteristics. Lo and behold! When confirmation came in the form of a direct observation, it was the Borg craft. Surprise, surprise. Somehow I got the credit for it, for all my entire contribution was a disturbing chat with Jika prison's most infamous detainee.

The Borg colonies are linked to each other and to their Queen via a subspace frequency thingy I don't pretend to understand. One of the major breaks in the Borg War was the discovery of how to jam an entire spectrum of the Collective's communication. The Borg hierarchy fell apart; and before the Collective could re-establish itself and adapt, Assembly forces attacked. However jammed the primary frequencies were, nonetheless a faint basic linkage remained, not enough to send data upon, but more of an awareness of other drones. That was an important bit of knowledge, for techs could examine the threads of awareness linking the final surviving Queen to colonies and colonies to each other, using it to determine the number of enclaves. It was talking to the techs that allowed me to learn that the colony number remained the same as before the cube attacks, a finding confirmed in a round-about way with my second Queen session, and one vastly unpopular with my employers.

The military mind had talked itself into the "only possible, logical solution," and was unwilling to explore other lines of questioning.

An equally important bit of knowledge revolved around the jammers. While most of the devices were incorporated into the orbital interdiction platforms, a much smaller one existed, installed in the Queen's head. Theoretically, as long as the platforms remained, the Queen did not require a jammer herself, but it served as a fail-safe should the Queen ever escape and infect Jika prison personnel with the "gift" of nanoprobes. New drones would remain unable to link with the Queen until the device was removed, a potential confusion which gave the military several precious hours to appraise the situation and deal with it in a most explosive manner.

The Queen's jammer would have considerable impact later, but, until that time, my employers insisted it was for me to solve the riddle of the Borg cube and its origin. I, in turn, relaxed like the Wise Lizard I have been named, allowing military number crunchers and computers do the actual work. I loved the irony of the military telling me the answer so that I could relay it back to the military.

At the back of my mind, raising my ruff, twitching my tail, however, was the surety that I would more than earn my commission before the case came to a close.

I hate those feelings.

The Jika facility was not heavily armed nor had an abundance of security, the Queen's wing notwithstanding. It did sport many layers of armor, but the purpose was to protect those within the prison from the harsh natural environment without, not from directed attack. Excepting the Borg Queen, there was no real need to prevent prisoners from escape or expect a daring prison break from outsiders. Security was there to maintain order. The Crouki had their own brand of Alcatraz, one just as forbidding and unlikely to afford escape.

Take one neutron star, its already twisted gravitational fields warped further by the extraordinarily abundant (some said unnaturally so, but had yet to prove thus) miniature black holes which swung in erratic orbits. The Jika facility itself was constructed on an asteroid which had been towed into one of only two locales of stable gravimetrics, free of dangerous singularities.

To attempt escape in one of the facility's escape pods was tantamount to suicide. The pods were more for show than functionality, and the mini black holes would punch through hull long before the gravity currents could be navigated, assuming the vessel didn't crash into the neutron star first...or simply be torn apart in the treacherous gravity tides like so much wet tissue.

The only way on or off Jika, for security and prisoners alike, came in the form of a robotic craft. Powerful unaware AIs on Jika and a large number of sensors made navigation possible, if one had the correct encryption key. The continually mutating fractual key was loaded into the computer of the courier vessel, and the ship subsequently piloted through the chaos by commands of the Jika master AI. Numerous safeguards made sure that the Jika facility's one weak point was warded; and in the multi-century lifespan of the prison, the only two breeches from the outside had ended in the spectacular explosion of the courier.

The Borg Queen was only the latest, if most potentially troublesome, of a long series of infamous guests.

{Pretty,} exclaimed Sensors as Cube #347 dropped out of hypertranswarp into the stable locale not occupied by Jika. While the gravimetric permutations of the unusual neutron star system did extend as deep into subspace as hypertranswarp, the "turbulence" was much less, allowing an exactitude of maneuvering not possible at the lower velocities of transwarp, warp, or impulse. Still, halting from insane speeds into a parking spot as small on the cosmic scale as the static point by Cube #347 was nothing less than astounding, and possible only because of the sheer computing power offered by 4000 organic-silicon brains...and a large amount of strictness on the part of command and control.

Pretty was not an accurate word for the phenomenon. It was also an irrelevant concept for Borg (except Sensors, who had a vastly different outlook upon the universe). Still, word substitutions in the form of powerful, dangerous, and perilous could not match the simple utterance by the insectoid.

The ferocious white glare of the neutron star clashed with its powerful radio emanations, sending the electromagnetic spectrum into a melodically buzzing static. Energetic radiations excited the gasses of the star's rebirth, a natural neon glow of dark reds, fiery oranges, velvet purples, and sharp yellows. The miniature black holes, themselves invisible in the visual frequencies, nonetheless were x-ray pinpoints as they raced around their primary, twisting gravity fields before and behind in to a complex mathematical equation the whole of the Borg Collective would require centuries of dedicated calculation to discern. One species, lost in the mists of time, had looked upon the system and declared it proof of a Divinity, then spent the next millennium trying to get in touch with the Grand Being by dropping subspace operators into the black holes before deciding that God's communicator set was inoperational and embarking upon a quest to build the grandest phone of all.

You know all those supernovas in that one minor globular cluster circling the galaxy....

Anyway, next to the grandeur which was the neutron star, Jika was dark, squat, and, frankly, ugly.

{Sensors,} snapped Captain as the named chattered in a poetic form of clicks and whistles in species #6766 language which the universal translator refused to attempt sense, {pay attention. Are we noticed? Is the thread emanating from the structure? Can we lock onto it?}

Sensors airily replied: {No. Yes.} The final question was answered with a dataspace pictorial, one which algorithms set in place by Captain translated into holographic visuals. In Captain's nodal intersection blossomed a system representation, unusual colors labeling various structures. Within the purple prison asteroid icon beat a yellow-green star. Sensors returned to her unintelligible poetry.

Attention was shifted to engineering. {We can acquire a lock through this mess?} The sub-collecting was querying itself, a self-diagnostic dialogue made verbal, Captain at its nexus.

Delta gave wordless assent. {Yes. Transporter lock is possible. We will have to park exactly within the static locale where that asteroid located. The gravimetric potentials will otherwise shear apart this vessel.}

{We understand,} said Captain. Command and control took the reins of the sub-collective, knowing that everything would have to be perfect to attain their goal. Well, perhaps not perfection, a feat too difficult to achieve by the imperfect drones, but something sufficiently near as to be indistinguishable by the outside observer. To do otherwise meant termination.

{We go,} stated Captain. Cube #347 vanished into hypertranswarp.

The most daring prison break in the history of the quadrant was underway.

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Here ends Part I of Jumba the Wise Lizard and the Case of the Mad Queen. Will Cube #347 be successful? Will the Queen escape? Will Jumba pick up a date for the evening? All these (well, mostly these) and more to be answered in PART II of this grand Jumba the Wise Lizard saga.

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