Where Sleeping Drones Lie

Posted on Sun Dec 28th, 2025 @ 3:51am by Captain Tyler Driskill & Ensign Valerie Sheldon & Lieutenant Nixie Wilde & Lieutenant Tyler Rehman & Lieutenant Commander Gulati

4,292 words; about a 21 minute read

Mission: Mission 3 - Discord of the Mind
Location: Borg Sphere

The shimmering glow of the Federation transporter dissipated, fading away from what began as a group of shapeless beams of light that steadily increased form and gained mass as molecules were put back together and the motionless were reanimated. There amid the darkness of an interior section of the damaged Borg vessel were several of the starship Concord’s best men and women. Lieutenant Commander Gulati, inexperienced in her new capacity as First Officer though you would not find it carved on her Benzite mug. Instead, she showed determination, a mask of confidence. It was what she knew was necessary to keep everyone alive at least the best chance of doing so. She was a mathematics person. Statistics were often her safe haven. The problem was statistics rarely lied which could be comforting and cold. She would never be able to keep the whole crew safe, not with the dangers of the Delta quadrant ahead of them or the shapeshifting menace tormenting them.

And I just left that thing on the Concord thought Lieutenant Commander Gulati. She stepped forward and turned the wrist mounted torch with its two bright beams of light. This Borg sphere was just a mangled bit of wreckage, but the readings that the Concord gathered indicated that this chunk of debris was the section with propulsion systems meaning it should have the transwarp coils that Gulati and Lieutenant Nokumara would need to work on Concord’s experimental Frankenstein drive that had brought them to this quadrant.

Speaking of which, Gulati half-turned and a beam of light shown on two Starfleet uniforms, their goldenrod tunics evident: Nokumara and Sheldon. Gulati would rely on them for harvesting the parts from this dormant hell hole. Her two beams of light spun around more. They could all take in the sights. Alcoves. As though straight out of her nightmares some of the alcoves were empty yet others were occupied by marionette with strings cut, slumped over and only held in place by metallic pieces and parts of the ship itself, beams and crossbeams that had collapsed upon them.

The fires that once engulfed this ship was long gone. Undoubtedly short lived when they were alive but that was what looked like a time far passed. Hearing the footsteps behind her and to her right, she whipped around. The light shining brightly in Rehman’s eyes. “Sorry,” Gulati apologized not intending to blind the short science officer. He and Lieutenant Nixie Wilde rounded out Gulati’s away team. Nixie there for their protection. Lieutenant Tyler Rehman there because of his brilliant mind and resourcefulness. If they could gain access to where this Borg sphere had been, it may be potentially useful to the Concord and expand upon what little Rehman had to work with for stellar cartographic maps of the quadrant. “It looks like our friends have been in the dark for a while. Emergency power either never kicked on or ran out of juice. Without the ability to regenerate…” she shown her wrist lantern towards the deck. Body upon body of motionless drone.

"Down but not out," Kai said as started walking around the area; he stopped at a console and studied the controls for a long minute before pulling out the tools of his trade. Federation consoles were constructed to accommodate the physical features of their crews while here, there were interface ports instead. He squatted and took a look underneath, no access hatches either. Luckily, he came prepared. He rose to his feet and turned on his PADD which was as far from Starfleet standard as a PADD could get. He pulled a bundle of connections out of his carry bag and started sifting through them, looking for something that would work.

"Nothing," he growled. "Stupid Borg ... wait ... Borg ..." He walked over to the alcoves, searching each of them individually, until he found what he was looking for and did a fist bump. "Yes, this should do it." It took a few minutes because he needed two things to be true. One, that the Borg didn't suddenly come to live and Borgify him and two, that he didn't damage the connection while doing the extraction. He worked quietly, unconsciously holding his breath, until the connector was free and wondered what that would do to the Borg if it ever woke up. "You just keep sleeping," he said. "No need for you to notice anything at all."

"Borg today, gone tomorrow" quipped Gulati. She did not chuckle but delivered a bit a joke nonetheless. The best she could do in a time like this was try to find humor. It was nothing short of spooky to be on a Borg vessel especially when it was dark and quiet.

He brought the connector back to the console and sat down, cross-legged, on the deck while he jury-rigged a connection between his PADD and the console. "Okay," he said to the ship's First Officer, "I think I have a way to wake up this console, gain access to some of the systems."

Gulati looked at Sheldon "Ensign, work with Lieutenant Nokamura. We will need to wake that console up... we need to power up some of this ship, but be careful. These drones may look deceased but they are likely far from it. We don't want to do anything that will make us out to be a threat."

Ensign Sheldon gave a quick nod to Lieutenant Commander Gulati and turned her attention to Kai and what he was doing. "Brilliant idea" she gestured toward the connection he was working on. "I would have never thought to take this route" she admitted and stood by until Lieutenant Nokamura gave her direction.

"Thanks for noticing," Kai said. He connected the console to his PADD and gestured for the ensign to join him. "I write holo-adventures," he said, "and some friends of mine asked me to do one on the Borg. So, I've been researching." He called up a directory on his PADD, the entries all written in Hawaiian, and found what he was looking for. "One of the things I have been developing is a rudimentary," he glanced at the ensign, a twinkle in his dark eyes, "and I do mean rudimentary Borg Queen. Oh the things I have planned for her ..."

"Anyway, this sphere and everything in it, is designed to respond to Borg commands. We, in Starfleet, would enter those commands verbally or, in older systems, through a written set of instructions. The Borg do it through their mental connections primarily. So my Queen here ... if it works, can send the simple command to power up this console." He took in a deep breath. "Fingers crossed this works."

"Fingers crossed indeed, Lieutenant" quipped Gulati. The thought of a Borg queen created or not was unnerving. "Do be careful, Lieutenant Nokamura" added the Benzite.

Sheldon literally crossed her fingers and waited to see what happened.

At first, nothing happened which had Kai swearing in fluent Hawaiian. He made a couple of modifications to his program. Nothing. He made a few more and then, the console came to life. "Now," he said, grinning at Sheldon, "let's see if we can get access to deck plans and inventory. If they even have such a thing."

“Here” Sheldon looked over at Kai “well sort of” she shrugged. “Doesn’t seem like the Borg keep much inventory of supplies laying around.”

"Parts," Kai said as hunted up the translation program on his PADD. "There will be lots of those. Sometimes things need to be replaced, sometimes things wear out. Parts are useful to have and no engineer, Borgified or otherwise, would go long without having a sizeable parts drop available. So somewhere in this program is the data we're looking for ... something that would at least give us a starting point for the search, eh?" He turned toward Sheldon, a thoughtful look on his face. "You could try scanning," he said. "Maybe the tricorder can recognize the coils. Even if its just a scan of the components, the tricorder can use that to extrapolate possible uses and from that, we would just need to take a look."

“Aye sir” Ensign Sheldon replied and took out her tricorder to start her scans. The operations officer input a command to hand the tricorder look for anything that matched the components in their experimental warp drive. She wasn’t the most informed when it came to the drive but she knew that starfleet used reversed engineered Borg transwarp drive parts to make it.

While Sheldon did that, Kai settled in to hunt through the informational network. The joy of a hive mind was that information was shared, accessible to all, and his rudimentary 'queen' could view anything that the hive had access to ... understanding it now, that was a bit more of a challenge, but still doable. Just a slow, painstaking process that was going to take time.

The Benzite placed a hand on Rehman's shoulder "We need to find our way to something that would have navigational information, a node perhaps?" she asked him. She may have been a bit of an expert on Borg technology but she knew Rehman had a better understanding of what would have equated to 'science' for the Borg.

Tyler Rehman couldn't decide what he was feeling at the moment. His blue/grey eyes shifted around the wreckage, his tricorder was already out and open, set to passive scan. He was in awe of all that he was seeing, yet part of him was afraid of what might happen. His mind was still on their predicament, lost in space, a changeling, and now the Borg. If a Romulan warbird decided to de-clock right then and there, he wouldn't be surprised. The senior science officer nodded at Gulati's request. "The nodes, as I have learned, are instrumental for the Borg to absorb the billions of teraquads of information that each ship receives. The question is, can we find the right set of nodes that we need."

Nixie glanced their way, flexing her fingers on the grip of her rifle. She hadn't lowered it since arrival. Whatever they did, she hoped they did it quickly. They still knew relatively little about the Borg. Or at least, the intricacies of how they worked. For all they knew, there could be a fail safe, or numerous ones, that could be easily flipped by too much stimulation.

"Nixie," Gulati could see the fingers gripping the phaser rifle. "Should anything so much as flinch in an unsettling way, shoot it. We'll deal with the aftermath" commented the First Officer. It was important not to be perceived as a threat once the drones became active again, but she knew that Nixie would only shoot if the experienced officer determined such was needed.

"Understood," Nixie's voice was hushed, as if they were the ones being watched...or standing in a tomb.

Gulati accompanied Rehman. "Should be that way" said Gulati gesturing facing forward. "At least from what I remember. I spent my share of time in simulations of Borg vessels, but this is a whole different experience actually being on one in person."

"Simulations are never what they seem," Rehman said. He recalibrated his tricorder to go from passive scan to something more detailed. He moved forward as if he was automatic pilot. He began his detailed scans and soon found something that looked like a node. "That way," he said, lifting his right hand to point in the direction he needed to go.

******
Kai was sitting on the deck, cross-legged, watching the data scroll, side by side with the translation. His 'queen' was programmed to alert when the right data was located (or even something in the vicinity of the right data) and, being who he was, Kai looked for something to do. The translation matrix was doing its job, or maybe he was just getting better at reading it, or a combination of the two, but he started looking at the sphere's systems because there was a question that needed answering (at least in his mind) and that was simply ... why? Why did the sphere crash?

It took a long while to figure out but then, he had time. It was a challenge and Kai, well, he loved challenges. He was speaking in his native Hawaiian now, hunkered over the screen. "He aha ka pilikia," he murmured as he searched through readings. What's the problem? At first everything seemed fine. The Borg understood routine, were disciplined in their maintenance routines, and replaced parts in danger of wearing out within a reasonable time frame. Replaced parts ....

He searched through the maintenance logs and found an entry. Alone, with no observable dangers in sight, the ... what 'ka heck' ... he searched the translation matrix, compared a few entries ... sensors ... the sensors had been taken off line to do an extensive maintenance routine. The sphere had continued, in effect blind, rather than remain in place and hit debris causing a cascading effect that took out a number of systems. And the Borg, being Borg, had recorded everything right up to the point that ship crashed.

Lieutenant Commander Gulati was with Rehman trying to make progress with accessing the Borg Sphere's records - navigational and star charts. The Borg traversed Immense swatches of space with their transwarp drives. Gaining access to that would allow the Concord more insight as to what was out there.

"Gulati to Nokamura," the Benzite First Officer said opening a comm channel to her away team. "Kai, have you made any progress?"

"Nokamura here," Kai responded. "Yes, I have. Figured out why the sphere crashed and," he turned his attention to the program his 'queen' was running and nodded, smiling. "I have the location for their parts' drop. If they have anything we can use, it would be there."

Good, that's one mystery out of the way thought Gulati. "Alright, what can you tell me Nokamura?" The Benzite waited for a rundown on the situation and what had caused the sphere to crash. She was optimistic there were items here of use to the Concord.

"Sensors were offline for maintenance but the sphere kept going. With their shields down, they hit a debris field that started a chain reaction, took out too many systems and the boom. The sphere crashed," Kai answered.

"Makes me feel a little sorry for them...almost, but not entirely. If this sphere hadn't crashed here, it would have just contributed to the assimilation of another world and species" commented Gulati.

She studied the location where the parts likely were. "Good work, Lieutenant" she added looking at Nokamura..

The Benzite opened a broad channel to the entire away team. "Tyler, stay put and download whatever astrological information you can. I may not speak Borg, but our ship's computer should be able to start deciphering when we get back."

"Yup," Rehman responded to the broad opened channel. If he was being honest himself, he wasn't going to be moving anywhere anytime soon. The node had so much information, it made his head spin. He looked at the small screen of his tricorder, his eyes bright as if he got the best gift on Christmas morning. As he watched the download, he had been thinking about all the algorithms he was going to be able to create for the information... and that made him giddy.

"Nixie, Ensign Sheldon we are going in deeper for the parts we need. Bag and tag operation, I'll transmit the internal coordinates Nokamura found to your tricorders. Meet me at the junction. We'll mark what we need and see about getting a transporter lock on it."

"Understood," Nixie replied curtly, still wary of making too much noise in this place. She flipped her tricorder open, starting towards the junction, her rifle still held ready to fire in her other hand. She was not keen on them being split...she was all too eager to bring the team back together.

Sheldon was keeping an eye on the sleeping drones, her tricorder and where they were going. "Have you ever encounter the Borg before" the Operations Officer asked her superior officer with a shaky voice.

"Yes, but this is my first time on a real borg ship. And if I've learnt anything over the years, it's that simulations can only teach you so much," Nixie replied softly, her eyes glancing between her tricorder and the gloomy green tinged corridor.

“It’s rather spooky in here” Valerie replied with a tone that made it clear that she was nervous or even scared.

Nixie glanced her way, noting the uneasiness. She couldn't blame her, not one bit, but she needed her focused. "Just focus on your training," she advised softly. "This is just another corridor, on another ship, on another away mission..."

“Yes ma’am” she shot Lieutenant Wild a half smile and then repeated softly “just another corridor on another away mission” it made Valerie slightly less nervous. They rounded a corner and the corridor was dark, the Ensign shined her flashlight so she could see but almost tripped over a dead drone.

"Easy does it," commented Guliani. "Let's get a move on though. I don't want to be on this Borg crypt any longer than we have to-" the Benzite began to add when something shifted, changed. The Borg vessel had been triggered by something, alcoves started activating with a green glow. Corridors started to become slightly more illuminated, and the sound of the mechanics of drone appendages, swiveling, swirling, and moving like automatons had taken her breath from her.

****

Lieutenant Nokamura reacted to the reanimation of the automatons with confusion. This isn't supposed to happen thought Concord's recently promoted Chief Engineer. This had been his plan, his time to shine, the idea to create a 'Queen' program had been his, but something had gone wrong. Get some of the power restored to crucial areas, sure, but raising zombie drones was not part of his coding. He tapped his communications badge quickly. "This was not me, Commander. I don't know why they are activating, but we have drones...."

Nokamura quickly grabbed a PADD he had set down. The only reason they would be activating like this from my program would be if another Borg....shit. "Commander, I....we...someone must have activated a distress signal. The Borg are coming!"

Gulati did not want that news. She immediately swapped a tricorder for her holstered phaser. "Then we are leaving. Everyone fall back to our entry point. Lieutenant Nokamura, send me the coordinates to the 'parts drop' and get back for extraction. Don't bother packing up, just get out of there."

Kai Nokamura transmitted the coordinates to Lieutenant Commander Gulati. "Coordinates sent, ma'am. I am on my- AHHH!" his scream was blood curdling. The piercing of his skin by a Borg hand tubules had felt a thousand times worse than that of a Box Jellyfish, something he had experienced more than once in his lifetime surfing. When the tubules burrowed into his flesh, it damn near buckled his knees.

He felt like he had lost a lot of blood rapidly, but that was not the case. It wasn't blood that was draining from him, it was his humanity. This was it. This was how Lieutenant Kai Nokamura was going to end his career service with Starfleet, stranded in the Delta Quadrant and turned into one of them...soulless automatons, no individuality.

Nokumura's face began to lose the sun-kissed tone, becoming pale like death. The pain was intense and he knew what was going to come next. They would take him to some sort of chamber where the assimilation process would finish. Already though, he could not resist it. In fact, he felt as though his body had been hijacked. His control was gone and his thoughts were just the dying spark of humanity that clung to a life that was already far gone.

A shot from a Federation phaser set to kill struck him right in the chest. He could not even feel his skin become scorched from the burns, but another shot arched over his shoulder and he felt the tubules rip out, detach from his neck and the thump of a Borg drone hitting the deck plating. He himself dropped as well, only to look up and see the small frame of Lieutenant Commander Gulati over him. The last act of humanity he could give was motion his mouth the best he could to express gratitude.

Lieutenant Commander Gulati opened a communications channel to Concord. "Gulati to Concord...away team to Concord. Captain, we need to get out of here. I'm ordering my team back for extraction. I don't know what's going on out there, but the Borg are coming. This ship is no longer dormant. I repeat no longer dormant."

Driskill stood from his chair “I’ve got plenty to fill you in on commander. However we are not out of the woods just yet.”

"It's nice to hear your voice. Rehman, Wilde, and Sheldon are on their way to the extraction point. Nokamura is dead, Sir. I'll be joining the others in a few minutes. Don't wait for me. If I am not there in three minutes, beam them up and leave me."

“Negative Gulati get to the extraction point with the rest of your team” the Captain said over the communication system. “Commander did you receive that order?” He wasn’t going to leave them and he would want a full debrief on the mission and the death of their officer. Sadly this is one time they might not be able to retrieve the body.

I need to get to the 'parts drop' thought Gulati. The coordinates were close...really close. The issue was with the Borg vessel coming back to life as it were, that section would have some sort of shielding up, preventing transport. She could get there, she might be able to get what they had come for, but she would not be able to get back...not to the extraction site, and with the shield generators up in that section, she'd be stuck here. "Yeah....communications interference, Captain. Be ready in a few. If you can get a lock on my signal beam me back. Gulati out."

Three minutes. She did not have much time, and she booked it down through the Borg maze to the 'parts drop' that Nokamura had provided. She opened a channel to her team. "Sheldon, Wilde, Rehman, extraction in three minutes. Get there. Ty, I'm sending you coordinates to hub on this hunk of junk. You have less than three minutes to use that beautiful brain of yours to cause a power issue in this area...my life depends on it."

Three minutes could be the longest in the history or time, or it could be the shortest. It had depended on how fast his brain could go on autopilot. "Got it," Rehman said, as his feet were already carrying him to the extraction point while manipulating his tricorder. Once he received the coordinates, he began to bring up his special algorithms he used for emergency situations like this. As his feet took him forward, his fingers moved quickly, looking at the power structures and where they led. It didn't take him but thirty seconds to trace the power sources to Gulati's coordinates. He stopped a moment, by his calculations, he still had more than a minute and a half to get to the extraction while still sending a power surge. He punched in a bunch of commands and brought up another list of algorithms and finding the one he knew would work, sent it through the network. He waited a few more seconds and then did another trace to find the work was accomplished. He had managed to send a disruption through part of the power network that would fluctuate the power in the area Gulati was working, along with the surrounding areas. The active Borg would notice and send them skittering about, ignoring the commander.

Rehman then picked up the pace; he needed to get the hell out of this carnage.

Gulati had been rummaging through Borg parts...literally parts of Borg drones, not just ship parts when the illumination around her began to flicker like a brown out. She could hear the sound of generators losing power. Brilliant she thought to herself. She was glad that she made the wise choice of bringing Rehman with them. It was a decision that had just saved her stubborn ass.

She found it - transwarp coil. She reached out to touch the piece just as she felt a tingle across her body. Federation transporter technology pulling her away. She tightened her grip on the coil. Soon, the wreckage of the Borg ship was gone. Instead, she was crouched on the transporter pad of the USS Concord, her arm reaching outward and in her hand, a damaged transwarp coil. "Got it" she muttered to herself.

Of course, when she looked up she found, arms folded at his chest, and a cross expression on his like a father catching his teenage daughter sneaking in well after curfew, Captain Tyler Driskill. He had instructed her to get back to the extraction site. Instead, the Concord had to lock onto her signature...away from the rest of the away team. "Captain..." she said slowly rising to her feet.

“Glad to have you back Commander” he watched her stand “but I do expect an explanation on the way to the bridge” he tapped his communicator “Driskill to the bridge get us the hell out of here.”

 

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