by Peter David
“Data, are you okay?” asked Geordi. “Data?”
Data was still taking a moment to collect his thoughts, and finally he turned to La Forge. “I am functioning quite well, thank you, Geordi.”
“What happened? What did you do?”
“I planted a command to continue functioning within her brain,” said Data. He stood and reached over and, before Crusher could stop him, pulled out the knife that was protruding from the Borg’s arm. She did not so much as flinch. Instead, she continued to stare straight ahead. “I overrode the Borg command to self-destruct. It was actually quite close in terms of timing. She is now functional.”
“Can I remove the Borg implants?” asked Beverly.
“I do not see why not,” said Data. He was reaching up to his head and disconnecting the complex wiring. “There should be no danger now. I have essentially defused the bomb within her.”
“Can she talk?” asked La Forge. Confident that Data had matters firmly in hand, Geordi walked around the table from his instruments and stared into the face of the Borg woman. “Can you understand me? Can you hear me? Counselor, is she in there?”
“I sense nothing,” Deanna Troi admitted. “Her mind is still clear.”
“We can reeducate her,” said Geordi excitedly. “We can—”
“It will be virtually impossible, Geordi,” Troi said. “Whoever or whatever this woman is, we are talking about something far beyond a simple erasure of memory. This woman’s entire…soul, if you will…has been expunged. Her only claim to being alive is the fact that her body is functioning. Otherwise—”
“Counselor Troi is correct,” said Data. “Recreating knowledge is well within our technology. It has been, for decades. But recreating an entire individual…”
“We’ve done it in the holodeck. I’ve done it,” said Geordi firmly.
“What is created in the holodeck is not alive,” Data said. “What you are discussing does not seem feasible.”
“But if—”
“She’s looking at you,” said Crusher. There was wonder and amazement in her voice. “She focussed. She hadn’t done that before. Geordi, she focussed on you. She’s doing it right now.”
Geordi turned and stared at the Borg woman. He couldn’t see her eyes, of course. But her head was definitely pointed in his direction, and she seemed to be concentrating on him.
Then the moment passed, and her head slumped back. She returned to staring off into space.
Geordi looked from one of his comrades to the other and then said firmly, “I don’t care if it’s feasible or not. We’re going to make it feasible.”
On board the Repulse, Mr. Seth turned in his chair and said, “Transporter room reports all planetside colonists are now aboard. Emergency evacuation is complete.”
“Just in time,” said Taggert grimly.
The planet-eater descended towards Kalish VIII, and a force beam leaped out from the maw of the machine. It sliced through the planet, bisecting it with surgical precision.
“Hailing frequencies,” bellowed Taggert in a thunderous rage, and then, without even waiting for acknowledgment, she said, “Intruder, this is Taggert of the Repulse. You are destroying the homes of the Astra colonists!”
“We are still hungry.”
“Back away. That’s an order.”
There was a dead silence, and for one brief moment Taggert deluded herself into thinking that the massive destroyer was actually going to obey.
“I am tired of you,” the ship said.
A force beam lashed out from the destroyer, carving a swathe across the primary hull of the Repulse. Some shields actually held as systems all over the ship went into overload. In engineering, power couldn’t be rerouted fast enough, and circuit boards blew out. The ship shook violently under the unexpected pounding. A radiation containment unit cracked open, and massive doors immediately slid into place to seal off the damage before the entire ship could be contaminated.
“Warp drive is out!” shouted Seth. “Deflector shields at thirty percent! Hull damage on decks 33 through 39!”
Taggert was gripping the arms of her chair as the red-alert klaxon seemed even louder. In her head she could hear the screams of her people. “What in hell did they hit us with?”
“Force beam of pure anti-proton.”
Taggert’s eyes widened momentarily, and then, with as much conviction as if she were holding the upper hand, she rapped out, “Combination array of photon torpedos and phasers. Fire!”
The full armament of the Repulse was unleashed at the planet-killer. For all the good it did, they might as well have been hurling rocks. The photon torpedos exploded prematurely against the towering spikes, and the phasers ricocheted harmlessly off the neutronium skin.
The force beam of the planet-killer struck again. This time the shields were totally unable to withstand it. They crumbled like tissue paper, and the aft hull buckled inward, stopping just short of actual breach. The entire ship shook, like a toy caught in the hand of a massive baby.
“Shields down!” shouted Seth over the din and the barrage of damage reports that were coming in from all over the ship. “Weapons systems out!”
Suddenly the ship was jolted again, but this time there was no force beam. Instead, a tractor beam had taken hold of them and was starting to drag them downward.
The Repulse hurtled downward, toward one of the looming spikes. Taggert could see that it came to a point, miles above the surface of the machine, that was almost needle-sharp. And her ship was being dragged right towards it.
“Full reverse!” snapped Taggert. She didn’t have to shout; she was always able to make herself heard at her normal tone, no matter how loud her surroundings. In happier times, she claimed it was because she came from a large family.
“Warp drive is out, switching to impulse,” called out Seth. The ship lurched slightly, and then the tractor beam reaffirmed its superiority and continued to drag them downward. The spike loomed closer and closer. Taggert could almost see a small array of lights against it, flickering on and off like a deadly Christmas tree.
The ship was about to be skewered. That was all there was to it. The spike would penetrate either the primary or secondary hull, or maybe both warp nacelles. Whatever, it didn’t matter. They were about to be gouged, ripped apart, left for dead.
“Intruder!” shouted Taggert. “There’s nothing to be gained by killing us!”
The spikes came ever closer.
“Let’s discuss this,” she continued. “You and I. Just the two of us. Let my ship go, and we can—”
And suddenly the Repulse snapped free. Taggert stumbled backwards, landing heavily in her chair. The starship spiralled away, like a stone caught in the flow of a brook. “Stabilize us!” said Taggert, somewhat unnecessarily since Seth was already doing it.
Within moments they had restored their equilibrium, but that was all. All systems were still out, and the Repulse hung there in space, helpless.
“I’m not interested in you,” came the voice of the machine with such force and unexpectedness that Taggert actually jumped slightly. “I’m not interested in your starship. All I want is the Borg. When I fired on you, I used my force beam at a fraction of its strength. If I’d used full strength, you’d be dead. Remember that. You would be dead.”
With that comment ringing in their ears, they watched impotently as the planet-destroyer swallowed the large pieces of Kalish VIII. Then, having eaten its fill, it turned without a word and headed off across the Beta Quadrant.
Unknowingly, towards the Enterprise.
But knowingly—all too knowingly—toward the heart of the unknown space wherein lived…the Borg.
Chapter Eight
Vendetta…
A dazzling array of images and voices, and then there was the maddening glimpse of something, something huge and ancient and capable of great destruction. And that word…
Vendetta, it whispered in her mind. Vendetta, it seared into her soul. And an image,
an image of a woman with hair the color of space and eyes that were ancient and suffering. Vendetta, and it was a warning, and it was a prayer, and it was....
Deanna Troi sat up in bed, her body covered in sweat, and she was gasping and disoriented.
She had that odd feeling that one gets when awakening in a strange place, except she was in her own cabin. But that was not where she had expected to be.
Her heart was pounding, her pulse racing. She fought to obtain some degree of equilibrium and, after a few minutes, did so. Her breathing returned to normal, her thoughts, to the quiet, orderly pattern that she forced them into.
An empath, surrounded by beings who had no control over their emotions mentally, never had an easy time of it. She constantly had to practice mental disciplines in order to screen out the steady cacophony of emotional baggage that every human carried. It was as if someone with very, very acute hearing had to stuff cotton balls in their ears or otherwise go deaf from the barrage of sounds that they would be subjected to.
Such shields as Deanna used were an effort, but it had become almost a casual effort. No one even knew she was doing it, for it had become second nature.
But something was trying to break through those barriers now. She had a feeling that, whatever it was, it wasn’t doing so intentionally. But somewhere, somehow, there was someone with such a forceful power of will that they were virtually leaking telepathic impressions that were being discerned by…
Guinan?
Could that have somehow been what caused her to pass out?
But what was it? What was trying to get through? What in the world was out there?
Deanna lay back in her bed, pulling the bed covers closer up so that they were just under her chin. Just the way she’d liked it when she was a little girl and her mother had tucked her in at night. Somehow the covers seemed to provide a shield against the monsters that lurked in the shadows—the monsters that defied empathic detection, but were there nevertheless, ready to consume unwary little girls.
She stared up at the ceiling, trying to figure out what was happening. But the more she thought about it, the harder it became for her to think, the more leaden her thoughts. Her eyelids seemed utterly unwilling to stay up, and the darkness became even darker.
Darker still…Darker still…and there was the darkness of space.
One by one, pinpoint lights seemed to come on—one by one, as if someone were snapping them on with a switch somewhere. And each of those lights became a glowing star.
A ship cut across her field of vision. It moved through space with eerie silence, and Deanna felt a distant tickle of confusion and fear. The ship was of a design that she had never seen before, a design that seemed ancient. It was oval, with a single, abbreviated warp nacelle extending from the top. It glided through space with a singularity of purpose…but how could she divine that from a ship? A ship couldn’t have a purpose; only the individual who was piloting it.
The events in the dream flowed forward. Troi could neither stop nor control it or do anything except hold on for the ride.
And then, suddenly, she was inside the ship. She looked around at the tall, glistening banks of controls. They were primitive-looking in comparison to the glistening, seamless padds of the Enterprise. One had a tendency to take things for granted, and certainly the modern technology of the Enterprise was one of those things.
Slowly she circled the interior of the ship, and then she realized that she had no body, that she was exploring with her mind. It was an incredible feeling of liberation, and she was almost giddy. She was undetectable, invisible. She could go anywhere, do anything....
Then she saw her.
The woman was seated in the middle of what appeared to be the main cabin. She was wearing a starkly functional jumpsuit, and she was watching the main viewing screen with an obsessive determination. She was watching for something, and Deanna had no idea what.
The entire thing had an air of total unreality about it. All of it was being played out in eerie silence, except there was some sort of music in the back of Deanna’s head, a nameless tune that wandered through her brain from time to time, vaguely classical, with lots of strings playing.
Lights were flickering across the woman’s face.
Lights.
Where were they coming from?
The lights became brighter and brighter, filling the entire ship, filling her entire being. The woman never took her eyes off the viewscreen. The woman....
She was a vision of beauty. Deanna wondered why she hadn’t noticed it before. She had very long, black hair, and a narrow face, and dark eyes set far apart…
And in those eyes…
Those eyes…
Mourning. Anger. Obsession. All of it and more overwhelmed Deanna as her mind brushed against the woman’s. And a name.
Del…something…she couldn’t quite hear.
And a word.
Vendetta.
The woman did not react outwardly, but Deanna sensed herself being pushed away somehow. She withdrew and hovered nearby, and the colors were just overwhelming…
She turned and looked at the viewscreen.
It was the barrier, the barrier at the galactic rim. It swirled and crackled in front of them, electrical displays dancing across it. An undulating miasma of pure force and power, in the olden days the barrier had been virtually uncrossable. Technology had improved, though. Shielding had been improved. So much more was possible now, and yet, no one had really explored much beyond the edge of the galaxy. There was no point. The distance to the nearest galaxy was uncrossable in anything less than centuries, and the Federation had simply shown no interest in creating and staffing the generational ship that would be required to make such a voyage. There had been talk of stocking such a ship with androids similar to Data, but the plans for duplicating the Enterprise officer had died aborning, at a hearing over Data’s humanity.
The woman was approaching the galactic barrier. There was that frightening determination in her face, the certainty that she had to get through. But what was driving her? What had possessed a lone woman to acquire a small, private vessel for the purpose of challenging the rim barrier? It didn’t seem to make any sense.
The ship hurtled toward the barrier, and then it began to shake. She handled the controls with practiced skill and determination. If Deanna had been in her situation—alone, so utterly, utterly alone and facing something of such incredible power—she wondered whether she would have been able to handle it.
She hurtled into the barrier, and the powerful forces of the barrier grabbed her ship up and began to toss it about, as if it were a stone skipping across a lake. The powerful engines of the woman’s small ship strained against the onslaught, and the display across the viewscreen was almost blinding. Deanna felt the ship throb and shake beneath her and she tried to reach out to grab something for support, but she had no hands, she had nothing, and the universe was whirling.
The woman screamed, and it was a scream of defiance and fury, a scream designed to drag up her emotions and create from them a shield against fear. She let the fury overwhelm her, and a burning desire for…vengeance.
Vengeance for what?
Vengeance for whom?
Her ship was pounded, and she kept on going.
Her mind was assailed, and she kept on going.
Incredible forces pressed against her shielding, and her head was pounding, and alternately she felt as if she were going to freeze to death or have the blood in her veins boil, but she pressed on, fighting to keep the ship on course. She was in pursuit of something, or perhaps running from something, or perhaps some of both.
The ship trembled around her, but the fury of her will was insurmountable. It seemed as if the woman were keeping the vessel moving forward by sheer determination.
The roar was deafening. It was as if the galaxy itself had literally sprung to life, to try and prevent her from attaining her goal. But nothing would stop her. Nothing could stop her.
It seemed as if days passed. Deanna lost all sense of time, all comprehension of how long she was a prisoner here.
And then the forces began to subside. The perimeter of the galaxy thinned out, the incredible powers that had been fighting her relenting and admitting that they had been met, they had been bested. Her ship shot through and out, into the void.
Deanna—a silent, invisible spectator—gasped, placing a nonexistent hand against her nonexistent chest. She stared at the woman in the command chair.
She was slumped back, exhausted. But then she pulled herself up and looked out at the void that faced her, the vast, vast nothingness that lay beyond the galaxy.
She went to her navigational instruments. She was definitely going to need them, for there were no stars to guide her. But no…she was using no coordinates, Deanna could see now. Yet she was guiding the ship, straight and true, clearly hell-bent on some destination. But Troi had no idea what it could be.
And then Deanna began to sense it. Sense them. Sense someone calling, beckoning, like the ancient sirens of myth. And with the same determination as ancient sailors had known when they devotedly smashed their ships onto the rocks in trying to get to the unreachable women, so, too, was this mystery woman now sending her ship hurtling forward toward voices that only she could hear. Except Deanna heard them too.
Help us, they whispered. Avenge us. We have been waiting such a very long time…we thought no one could hear us.
And the woman responded to the voices in Deanna’s head. “Anyone could have heard you,” she whispered, “but they had to listen. And they had to know where to look.”
Where are we going? Deanna whispered. Who are you? Why am I seeing all this? How?
Time seemed to stop, and then the woman gasped. Deanna turned and saw what was on the screen, and she couldn’t believe it.
It was huge, immense beyond all reckoning. Some sort of device, with great spikes, and a maw, and…
