Leaning against the bulkhead near the primary science station, Captain Corbin took in what Velesa and Niro were briefing him and his first officer. Sensing Nelson’s irritation at them taking the long way around in their briefing, Corbin concealed his smirk. He had to take this seriously.

“So when we double-checked the overnight long-range sensor logs, we found this little surprise,” Velesa said as she used the holographic controls to display a frequency.

Not recognising the frequency instantly, Corbin sensed that his first officer did and asked her about it. “What is it, Number One?”

Nelson didn’t automatically answer her captain. Instead, she looked at the two other senior officers. “Are you certain about it?” Her former engineering abilities were kicking in above her first officer role.

Niro nodded. His bald Deltan head shone brightly by the reflection of the lights from above him. “We are certain of it it, ma’am.”

Nelson turned to Corbin, “Sir, this needs to be raised to Starfleet Command immediately.”

“Why?” Corbin asked, lowering his voice, realising that whatever it was now made them feel worried and concerned. He could feel the chill going down Nelson’s spine.

“Sir, that’s a Borg neural interlink frequency,” Nelson answered. “And from the size of some of those curves, I would suggest that we are looking at a Cube. It’s amplifying the frequency consistent with a vessel of that size.” 

“And it’s just beyond the Federation border,” Niro added as he taped a button beside Velesa. A local star map then replaced the sensor log of the frequency, showing Federation space near the shared border with the Talarian Republic. Just beyond the unclaimed space between the Talarians and Tholian Assembly, a red dot indicated the whereabouts of this frequency. They weren’t too far from it. Their current mission was to patrol the border and fly the flag to preserve the peace with the Talarians. This discovery now changed everything. 

“Lieutenant Niro, take us to red alert and issue combat assignments,” Corbin instructed; he turned to Velesa just as Niro returned to his station and activated the ship-wide alarm, “I want further long-range scans taken; pull everything you can from the nearest telescopes, outposts and intelligence drones.”

Velesa knew what he wanted, as Corbin could hear her already working out the quickest way to get more information on the threat near their backyard. “I’ll access the  Castal Array to see if its sensors can give us a better picture, sir.”

Corbin then ordered Lieutenant Starok, at the helm, to set a course so they could position themselves relatively close to the frequency within Federation space. 

“Aye, sir,” Starok replied instantly, “Course laid in.”

“Engage at warp nine,” Corbin commanded as he moved from the science station to cross the bridge. “Number One, the bridge is yours, and Commander Alkos, open a secure priority one channel to Admiral Duncan.”

“Captain’s log stardate seven-eight-four-two-three point one-five. After discussing what we’ve found with Fleet Admiral Duncan at Fourth Fleet Operations, he has ordered the Columbia to head beyond Federation space to investigate this arrival of a Borg Cube. While discussing the matter with the admiral, the Borg interlink frequency we had detected went dead. The admiral wants us to learn what happened and why a Cube is sitting so close to our space.”

“Dropping out of warp,” Starok announced from the helm just as Captain Corbin reentered the bridge. 

Everyone was now present, his entire senior staff, as they knew that if this was the prelude to another Borg invasion, they would be the first line of defence for the Federation, and it would be their responsibility to raise the alarm. However, with the interlink frequency going dead and even the use of the Castal Array not being able to give them more data, they had to find out what was going on. 

Tugging on his jacket, he stopped in the centre of the bridge. He had noticed that everyone was now armed, and extra security personnel were assigned to the bridge. 

“Report,” He asked aloud to anyone who had something.

“I’ve got the Borg Cube,” Velesa shared, and before anyone else could react, she had already pulled the image of the menacing ship onto the viewscreen. 

Corbin must have opened his mouth to the surprise before them as he realised after a few seconds how he must have looked. He instantly closed it. Nelson had moved from her chair to stand beside him. He appreciated her being by his side as he held on to the back of Alkos’ chair.

“How’s that possible?” Nelson asked. 

Counsellor Merrindis, who sat beside the captain’s chair on the left, shared in the shock, too. “I thought it took an entire fleet to take one of them down?”

“Obviously not,” Doctor Carrillion countered from where she stood by Niro’s side. “All of those lives lost. It’s a tragedy.”

Corbin couldn’t understand his doctor’s reaction to the scene before him. The Borg Cube they had thought was there was now shattered into pieces spread across the entire system. He knew she meant all of the drones who had lost their lives. 

“Any ideas?” Corbin turned to Velesa.

Velesa was busy working at her station, trying to interpret the data coming in from the sensors. She eventually shook her head. “There’s so much to sift through here, sir; I can’t make heads or tails out of this data.”

Ortega then spoke up from the engineering consoles. “I’m detecting hundreds if not thousands of pieces of debris swept across the entire system; if we want to get some answers to what happened to this Cube, then I suggest we begin a salvage operation, sir.”

“A quick one of that, as the Borg are known to return to recover what they’ve lost themselves,” Nelson advised.

Corbin couldn’t agree anymore with his senior staff. “Okay, if we’re going to do this, where do we start?”

“Captain, it looks like there are at least four areas where a bulk of the Cube has ended up,” Velesa reported as she showed a scan of the uninhabited star system. “The arctic region of a small M-class-like moon, an asteroid field, the upper atmosphere of a class seven gas giant and the surface of a class Y planet.”

“Well, none of them sounds dangerous,” Nelson said sarcastically.

Corbin couldn’t agree more with her assessment of the situation. “Okay, if we’re going to do this quickly, we must send out multiple away teams.” He turned to Nelson, “Number One, begin organising teams; use the shuttles and runabouts if we must, but I want this operation done quickly before any other Cubes arrive.”

“Sir, some drones are alive among the debris,” Niro announced. “I suggest everyone goes in armed and ready to defend themselves.”

“Borg Drones are known to ignore anyone who isn’t a threat to them,” Merrindis advised. “If they are wounded, they will focus on repairing what they have to call for help.”

“Yes, counsellor, that’s normal Borg behaviour; however, even a wounded animal will kick back if it feels endangered,” Niro countered.

“I’ll order all away teams to give any drones they encounter a wide berth,” Nelson said.

“We could beam some of the smaller pieces to the cargo bay to run an analysis from there,” Ortega suggested.

“Make it happen,” Corbin agreed. “I want us out of here before those drones make themselves known to their big brothers.” 

In Play:

All: Captain Corbin is sending multiple away teams across the system to retrieve the Borg debris and return it to the Columbia to determine what happened to the ship and why it was so close to Federation space. The groups are being sent out via support craft or through the use of transporters. 

If you need inspiration for your storytelling, perhaps your team will be assigned to one of the following away missions/ideas:

Frozen Antics:

A small M-class-like moon, where pieces are spread across a few kilometres in the northern polar pole area. Your team must wrap up warm as they walk across the snowy conditions to find the pieces. Along the way, consider how strong and brave your characters are as they endure the deep chills of this arctic environment. Once arriving, your team must dig deep underneath the thick layers of snow before they freeze to death! 

Tug Away:

Several shuttles and runabouts must enter one of the asteroid fields to tractor some larger parts of the Borg’s hull. The shuttles must work together to prevent breaking the debris any further. However, the asteroids are not making it easy to perform this operation. There are many smaller pieces that can heavily damage your little ship and the hull fragments. Working together, can you pilot and find a solution to get yourself out of this dense area of floating rocks?

Among The Clouds:

A section of the Cube has been found within the upper atmosphere of a class 7 gas giant. There is no way this section can be retrieved. However, there is enough time to board it and recover anything significant. An away team must go over in EVA suits and find any data nodes to help explain why the ship was so close to the Federation. There’s a race against the clock before this section falls too deep into the gas giant and becomes crushed by the external pressure. Will your team get in and out in time before they squished like a tin of sardines? 

Demon Eyes:

Most of the Cube has crash-landed on a Y-class planetoid. Transporters cannot be used to beam anyone down or up. Shuttles and runabouts must be used, and EVA suits must be worn as teams are sent down to this inhospitable world to retrieve the remains of the Cube. Sensor sweeps show that some Drones may have survived and are attempting to regenerate. Away teams are ordered to avoid the drones at all costs but observe their behaviour from afar. While avoiding interacting with the drones, your ensign must locate anything valuable. This is a hide-and-seek mission with a twist – you don’t want the drones to find you!

A Needle In A Haystack:

As the debris is returned to Columbia, a team has been tasked with cataloguing the different pieces. What interesting parts and treasures does your team find? Remember, when a Borg ship is destroyed, its most critical parts self-destruct; you may not find a transwarp coil but something else of interest. What is it, and how does it work? However, as you start to get somewhere with the technology, you may find Borg fail-safe software among it that prevents you from accessing its secrets. How will you bypass this to unlock the information? How good is your ensign at cracking codes? 

Something else?

Or is there something else that is just as dangerous and is among a hazard that is worth the risk to get? What else could you find sifting through so many pieces of Borg junk? The choice is yours, but hurry up before the Borg return – the Columbia cannot get assimilated!

The trip from Earth to the USS Columbia hadn’t taken Ashton as long as he had thought it would. Along the way, there had been chatter of some new Borg activity. There had also been talk of his transport ship returning to Earth but he had argued with the Captain and had convinced them to continue on. 

Now, here he was, sitting on his bunk and listening to the red alert klaxon blaring away. The Columbia had apparently seen something on their sensors and had taken off to investigate. 

Ashton had still been in the Academy during Frontier Day so this would mark his first real interaction with anything Borg. If he said he wasn’t nervous, he’d be lying. But he was a Starfleet Officer now and this was what he had signed up for. To explore the unknown. Hopefully, he would get that opportunity here.

Nitala was lying in her bunk reading a book, after their last mission was successful there was nothing much to do at the moment. Others moved throughout the bunk hallway going to either their bunk or going to work on something or other. A few moments later she heard her PADD ding which caused her to raise her eyebrows before picking it up and reading the context.

“What?” She said aloud which was meant to be inside her head but it escaped her lips. She looked around to see if she could see Ensign Jeden nearby. When she finally spotted her she walked over to where she was. “Did you get any orders popped in?” Nitala asked looking at her.

Jeden was lost in thought as she stepped up to her bunk after finishing an hour of laps in the pool when Nitala appeared beside her causing her to jump slightly. “Nitala,” she said in surprise, hand on her chest, “you startled me.”

Taking a moment she grabbed her PADD and glanced through it. “Yeah…,” she started then stopped and let out a groan, “I hate the cold…” she said as she read through the orders before pausing, “Seriously, we need to find wreckage from a borg ship.” With a sigh, she turned to Nitala, “Those the orders you meant? Got to love the lower decks…”

She nodded not looking forward to going in the cold let alone recovering items from a Borg wreckage, not after the events of Frontier Day. At least she knew she wouldn’t be the only one who would be going. 

Tav sighed contentedly as he slid his last photo into place on the wall of his bunk. A place for everything, and everything in its place, as his mother used to say. Tav didn’t mind the limited personal space afforded to him as a fresh-faced ensign. Some of his friends from the class above him had complained about the living quarters when they got to their first billet last year, but Tav had grown up with not much more than a bunk bed and a locker, so this suited him fine.

Tav had just settled down with his PADD to start reading up on Galaxy-class specs when a priority message popped up in front of the tech manual: his first assignment! Tav sat up so fast he smacked his forehead on the bunk above him, and then tumbled out of his rack without skipping a beat. He was excited to talk about his first task on the Columbia, but Tav didn’t know anyone yet. He’d barely met his division, and remembering a dozen names upon hearing them once was not Tav’s strong suit… 

Tav scanned the faces of his fellow shipmates scattered around the bunk hallway. Holding up his PADD, he asked the room “I, uh, have a two-part question: A, is anyone else about to go trekking through the snow for Borg parts, and b, is this normal?”

Nitala looked at the young Ensign and held up her hand. “We are,” she replied. “Well, anything’s possible with Starfleet to be sent on unusual assignments.” She added with a grin though she wasn’t fond of the idea of going on a frozen planet to gather Borg parts. 

Jeden looked over at Tav and nodded, “It will be fun, though the borg has poor taste, a nice tropical beach would have been more fun.”

Talibah stepped out of the Don shower and reached for her hairbrush as she heard her PADD ping with an incoming message. She walked over to the table where she left it and ran the comb through her hair and picked it up. “Oh bloody hell. Time to find the others and see if they know anything more. “ She quickly got dressed for the start of her shift.

Tav turned to focus on Nitala and waved at her as he approached. “Yeah, I suppose that’s true, just didn’t expect to be worrying about assimilation on my very first away mission. I’m Tav, by the way! I mean, Ensign Tav Maddox. Tav is fine though. Or Maddox. Or Mads. My friends used to call me that at the academy.” Tav stuttered out in rapid fire. “On the other hand, might be pretty sweet to get my hands on some advanced tech! So far the most exotic piece of equipment I’ve been elbow-deep in was a Ferengi impulse drive. I think even the stem bolts were gold-plated.” His tone changed quickly, the hint of fear of the Borg morphed into excitement as he contemplated tinkering with some green and black gadgets!

Talibah entered the bunk hallways looking for familiar faces to check in with. Seeing a small group of ensigns and overhearing one of them mention Borg tech she made her way over to the group and cleared her throat.

“You too?” Nitala asked looking at Talibah. “This is going to be a very strange mission though I am not particularly looking forward to it.” She said with a wince and wrinkled eyebrows. They chatted amongst themselves for a few minutes about the mission. “We better get bundled up and head down to the shuttlebay,” Nitala suggested as they were due to depart shortly.

“Yeah, looks like we have just enough time to get the cold weather gear out of storage and other supplies,” Jeden said as she slipped her uniform jacket over her shirt. “Best get some phasers as well, with our luck there will be drones looking to tango.”

“Y’all ever danced on Dirigo III? The colonists there came up with this zero-g dance called ‘Flight Pursuit.’ It’s like a zero-g tango!” Tav exclaimed, probably to himself. He quickly downloaded a few engineering reports on Borg tech to his PADD, grabbed his favorite pair of working gloves out of his locker, and turned to the group. “I’m going to go grab my tool kit from engineering. Does anyone else need gear or kit that they want me to grab? If you grab me a medium jacket and a phaser, I’ll grab your tools and meet you in the shuttlebay.” 

“Sounds good,” Nitala replied as they all split to get prepared before meeting back up in the shuttlebay.

Nitala had changed into the appropriate gear, grabbed her kit, and headed out of the bunk room. Heading down the corridor she began to make her way to where the turbolift was located. Thoughts ran through her mind with the away mission she was being sent on. She didn’t quite like the idea of searching through the wreckage of a Borg ship. However, she learned that the vessel that was destroyed was scattered over different areas and only some of it landed on the ice-cold moon. She didn’t like it any less, what if they found Borg drones? She thought what if they woke up? She began to wonder again as she reached the lift and entered. “Shuttlebay one,” she ordered as the lift began to move towards its destination.

After a few moments, the lift came to a stop, she exited as the doors opened and made her way to the shuttlebay where she found the shuttle they were taking. A young Lieutenant JG was waiting, he must be there to fly the shuttle to the moon. Smiling she entered seeing she was the first one of the team to show up, so she took a seat and waited for their arrival.

Tav slung his tool kit over his shoulder. Looking around the equipment lockers for any of the names of the people he had just met 5 minutes ago, he grabbed what he found and loaded that too. Teetering precariously across the engine room deck, he made his way back to the turbolift, weighed down by more tools than anyone needed. As the lift made its way to the shuttlebay, he let his mind wander back to thoughts of the Borg. “What do I know about them?” thought Tav. Well, he remembered they ignore things they don’t consider a threat and/or useful. This holds doubly true if they are busy with some task of their own. So if their ship crashed in a frozen wasteland, Tav reasoned, maybe any surviving drones would be too busy to hunt them down and give them the dubious gift of a nanite infection.

Tav lurched out of the turbolift and into the shuttlebay. Ensign Nitala was already here, making small talk with their pilot. Tav placed the kits into a storage bin on the shuttlecraft, pulled on a jacket, and took a seat of his own. “Do you think we’ll get the opportunity to work with anything we find and bring back? It’d be a real bummer if we collect all this cool tech, only for the chief engineer to get all the fun of tinkering with it later.”

She looked at Tav, “I am not sure but it would be an interesting opportunity.” She said even though she would rather be far away from it. She wasn’t sure what to think of his bubbly personality, the always chatty type. However, she was coming around to being more open instead of being an introvert. “I am just not sure I like the idea of going on an icy moon. I not fond of the cold.” She admitted with a soft chuckle.

“Not a fan of the cold Nitala? As long as there isn’t a storm raging on the ground, the cold never really bothered me too much,” Jeden said as she stepped through the door into the shuttle bay. Dropped the large duffle she had slung over her shoulder she adjusted the heavy pair of external snow leggings she wore that came up to her mid-torso. “It’s a pity we can’t get some skiing in.” She stopped for a minute and turned to the ensign standing with Nitala and held out her hand in the customary human greeting, “I didn’t catch your name earlier, I’m Sonia Jeden.”

“Hi Sonia Jeden, it’s a pleasure to meet you! I’m Tav Maddox. Some of my friends call me Mads, but I’m fine with basically whatever!” Tav shook her hand enthusiastically. “Also who says we can’t get any skiing in? Maybe we’ll find some tech at the bottom of a slope. In the name of efficiency, I think we should probably ski down it, no? Maybe I should run over to the cargo bay replicator and grab some skis myself…” Tav suggested half-jokingly with a smile.

“But, on a more important note, should we discuss a general plan? I was looking at the long-range scans of the moon while waiting on the turbolift. We’ll get a better look when the shuttle is closer, but from what I can tell right now, there’s a large debris field here,” Tav points to a map on his PADD, “but there is also a significant amount of debris scattered across the surrounding area. The big pile might be more dangerous if any drones survived… but the equipment we find there might be more salvageable. What do y’all think?” 

“Well, if it was up to me I’d say start with the biggest pile first, if we find what we are looking for all the better. Get us off that ice-covered, freezing and did I mention cold rock. “  Talibah said as she approached the group with a rucksack over one shoulder, a PADD in one hand while attaching her tricorder and phaser to her harness with the other. “I think we can all agree the sooner we are off that moon the better for all involved.”

“Agreed,” Nitala replied with a gulp. “Well we better get going,” she added as they all seemed to take their seats, and a short time later they were cleared for departure. The shuttle lifted and began its journey out of the Columbia and began to head towards the ice-cold moon. Things seemed to have gone quiet as they made their journey towards their destination, her nerves were getting the better of her.

Staring out the window silently, Tav reflected on the cold vacuum of space as they cleared the shuttlebay. He was used to space. He didn’t grow up on a planet with an atmosphere, he grew up on a space station, with what, a few inches of duranium between him and emptiness? Tav was comfortable with it; and used to it. The thing is, space doesn’t get “comfortable” around you. It’ll still turn you into a popsicle if you go out there without a suit. Tav shuddered as he pushed away thoughts of the Borg warping in on top of their shuttle. Was that a warp flash he saw in the distance? A fleck of green? Tav zipped his fleece a little higher and checked the settings on his phaser. Again. Comfort started to return as the blackness of space gave way to a light, red glow as they entered the moon’s atmosphere.

As the pilot brought the shuttle closer to the surface, Tav thought he could start to make out signs of the crash. “Yes, that’s definitely broken hull down there,” he thought as he checked his phaser one last time. Time to earn a paycheck, as his mother used to say.

“Indeed,” Nitala replied as she could see chunks of debris in a couple of different places. 

Talibah walked forward to stand behind the helmsman, one arm on the seat and one arm on the console. “This looks like the outskirts of the debris field, what we want will be a bit further ahead. “ She tapped the pilot on the shoulder “Look for a a big piece and set us down as close as you can get us.”  She went back to her seat and started to pull her cold-weather gear from her ruck. 

Looking out the viewport on the side of the shuttlecraft Jacoby could see the fall out of Borg debris below.  It was like a giant ice cube frozen and chipped away.   As for the cold, he was used to the cold.  In Texas, one Earth the area he grew up in was not for flat land and bitter winters.  The wind would cut through every layer of clothes, and his family didn’t own any advanced warming clothing that Starfleet used. 

Nitala looked at everyone else and gave a weak smile as the shuttle began to landing procedures. A short time later they landed and the shuttle began to power down. “Well bundle up everyone,” she said with a sigh.

Shuttlecraft Engle (NCC-76991/03)

Not for the first time, Ashton found himself wondering why, exactly, was he sitting at the controls of a shuttlecraft. Sure, he had flown some in the Academy, and he even kept up his rating, but it was not his calling. There had been a reason he had chosen the security division. 

When he was little, his father would take him flying and give him the controls. That was until that time he had almost flown right into their house while trying to land. From that point on, Ashton only flew when he had to. 

Now, he wasn’t just flying; he was part of a group of three shuttles that were attempting to lock their tractor beams onto a chunk of Borg technology and bring it safely out of a debris field and get it aboard the Columbia. He secretly prayed that the other two pilots were better at this than he was.

Shuttlecraft Young (NCC-76991/01)

Boarding the Young, one of the many shuttles named for former Earth astronauts, Bollwyn had been surprised when he had been assigned to this mission. From what he could tell, almost everyone on the ship was being utilised across the entire system to deal with the remains of this Borg debris field. Entering the cockpit, Bollwyn took the helm controls of the type-fourteen shuttle and began the departure routine. 

Tapping on the intercom between him and the other two shuttles, he knew his mission brief. Commander Nelson had briefed several officers about a range of multiple away missions. His one was to tug one part of many larger sections of the Cube out of an asteroid field and bring it within transporter range of the Columbia.

“Shuttlecraft Young, ready for departure,” He announced over the intercom. “Ensigns Stark and Adler, are you ready to get underway?”

Shuttlecraft Engle (NCC-76991/03)

Ashton involuntarily jumped when Bollwyn came over the comms. He had been so focused on the controls of his shuttle that the sudden break in the silence caught him off guard. 

“Um…Shuttlecraft Engle is set and ready. Flight check complete.” he replied to the other pilot. “Ready to go when you guys are.”

Shuttlecraft Glover (NCC-76991/02)

Upon hearing Bollwyn’s voice come through the comms, Adler jumped slightly. He was so focused on finishing the flight checklist that he was shocked by the break in silence.

“Shuttlecraft Glover, all systems green. Ready to go,” he responded. 

Shuttlecraft Crippen (NCC-76991/06)

“This is shuttlecraft Crippen; I have been advised by command to assist you in this mission. My systems are green and ready to go,” Mkana’s voice came over the communication channel. 

He leaned back in his chair and saw the others getting ready for the vital mission that was ahead of them. He did have many hours in flight simulation at the holodeck while doing space work and was known to have experience with flight in space, so it played to his advantage. But now he has to show it, which does scare him slightly under working pressure. 

Shuttlecraft Engle (NCC-76991/03)

“Glad to have you with us, Crippen.” answered Ashton. “I think, as a command ensign, this is your mission to call, and everyone seems to be ready, so at your call, we’ll get underway.”

Shuttlecraft Crippen (NCC-76991/06)

That was a logical observation, and he didn’t think much about it until it was mentioned. He looked at the list of shuttles formed up: “Crippen, Engle, Glover, and Young.” Mkana took a deep breath and nodded as he pressed the communication button to resume the line.

“Acknowledge Engle; let’s move in formation outside and pick out a safe target to bring back for further investigation. Keep me up to date on which target and stay in formation.” With that said, Mkana moved the controls forward, and the shuttle slowly moved into space. 

Shuttlecraft Young (NCC-76991/01)

Tapping away at the console, Bollwyn pushed his thrusters to one quarter, and in formation, his shuttle with the others departed from the Columbia’s main shuttle bay. Once they left safely, Bollwyn spoke over the intercom. “I’m detecting a reasonable hull fragment, bearing one-six-two-mark-four-seven,” He pressed a button that would push a holographic scan of the Borg Cube they would be pulling back to each of their cockpits. “Its size and composition are large enough for our shuttles to place tractor beams on safely. However, the asteroid field in this area is dense. We must use our phasers and micro-torpedoes to vaporise some of the large rocks in our way. Thankfully, scans show they are mostly made out of ice.” He paused. “Is everyone to blow up some ice then?”

Shuttlecraft Glover (NCC-76991/02)

“Let’s make some water.” David said as he began setting coordinates for where he is going.

Nitala and the others exited the shuttle and began to walk toward where her tricorder was telling them to go. “My tricorder is picking up some pieces buried deep in that pile of snow and ice. We are going to have to dig it out,” Nitala said as she looked at the others. Though they were bundled up she could still feel the coldness, her face was slightly turning red.

“Once we free them we need to get any technology that we don’t want falling into the wrong hands and brought back to the ship.” She stated remembering what the orders had said.

Tav’s face was completely covered. Every inch of his skin was covered. He liked winter… kind of? But the cold wind was unrelenting, constantly blasting him with snow, and that was unenjoyable by anyone. Except maybe the Breen. “Now that’s a thought I don’t need to mull on,” Tav muttered. Breen AND Borg. Undesirable.

Talibah followed the rest of the team as a decision was made on where to dig. Something had her on edge, the hairs on the back of her neck were stiff. Shaking it off as just the cold and being on an unknown moon. “Any idea on what we are looking for?” as she started to dig in with her shovel working the area that the others had indicated.

 Checking his tricorder, Tav noted the estimated depth of the tech inside the snowdrift, as well as the ice composition. “Man, I’d love to skip the shovel and just use a low-power phaser blast… but since we don’t know how much tech is exposed, I don’t want to risk damaging whatever remains.” Tav unfolded his shovel, and with a heavy sigh, began to dig. 10 minutes later, the first glint of cold black metal peaked out from the snow. 

Jacoby scanned the drift with his Tricorder.  He re-ran the scan back scan.  While the storm was pretty heavy, it had been relatively calm in this area the last month.  A couple of windy days but nothing like they were experiencing now.  “This storm kicked up last night.  The snow is soft, I don’t think this has been here as long as we think, whatever it is!” Jacoby grabbed his shovel and continued to dig.

Jeden sighed loudly as she saw the first bit of hull from the cube appear, “Shoveling a walkway is one thing but this…” She let the rest of the sentence hang in the air as she moved another load of snow away from the fragment. As she did she felt the snow shift under her slightly, a second before it collapsed away from the fragment dragging her down into the darkness below and out of sight with a high-pitched shriek of surprise. A moment later the the ground settled revealing a 3-meter wide hole leading down into the darkness below.

Nitala moved closer as Jeden seemed to have fallen, “are you ok?” she said in a high-pitched voice as her heart began to pump blood through her body with adrenaline, which seemed to warm her up a bit.

Jeden blinked and pushed herself up onto all fours as the snow that partially buried her fell around her. “Think so,” she said, “Just a little dazed.”

“What do you see down there?” She asked.

“One sec,” Jeden said as she slowly stood up and looked around her, the light from her helmet illuminated her view and cast long ominous shadows all around her. Before she was a large section of the hull of the cube that had created the snow cavern she found herself in. “There is a chuck of the hull down here, the snow must have drifted to create this cavern. I don’t see any lights. This could be what we are after.”

Tav peered down into the darkness with a mixture of shock and fear. Jeden had disappeared so quickly, that Tav hadn’t even had a chance to reach out and grab her! He quickly pulled off his pack and started digging around. He didn’t have any rope, but he might have some spare electro-plasma conduit, that was flexible and strong enough to hold a human’s weight. Looking up at the others, Tav asked “Should we go down, or just bring her up?”

“Jacoby scanned, there are no life signs.  Nothing biological, and nothing powered on except what we were picking up.  I mean we did just spend all this time digging, I’m not sticking up here.” He said making his way down into the hole.  

Tav quietly repeated Jacoby’s words over and over in his head. “No life signs. No life signs. No life signs.” Swallowing in an attempt to clear the lump in his throat, Tav did his best to steel himself and looked up at Nitala. “I’m trying to think of something witty to say to make myself feel better, but I’ve got nothing. I guess there’s nothing to do but get to it, yeah?” Tav wiped the snow from his goggles and followed Jacoby into the cold, metal pit.

Talibah looked down into the hole that Jeden had just fallen into and then making up her mind she started to look for a way that she could climb down. “Jeden, I’m on my way. Just give me a second to make my way down to you.” as she looked at the rest of the team. “I’m going down.”

Jeden cast her eyes upwards to the entrance to her private little snow cavern, “Sounds good, all this borg wreckage does not make it creepy or anything.”

“I’ll remain up here if you guys want to start recovering any technology that we don’t want falling into the wrong hands to be brought onboard the shuttle.” Nitala said as she looked at both Talibah and Jeden, “Tav if you want to go down there and help them while Jacoby stays up here helping me?” 

Jeden nodded and said, “Works for me,” before turning back to the wreckage and grabbing her shoving. Surveying the site before her she absently mused to her, ‘Now, if I was some fancy borg tech, where would I be hiding?’ Without a further thought she took a few steps towards a modestly sized mound of buried in the snow, ‘Maybe here?’

Tav opened his eyes after his feet touched down next to Jeden. He hadn’t even realized he had closed them during the climb down into the pit. Tav quickly glanced at his companions to see if they had noticed, but if they did, nobody said anything. Opening his tricorder, he aimed it into the dark hull opening and waited for a readout before stepping forward. Jacoby had already reported no life signs or power, so now Tav was just trying to identify anything in the wreckage. If this were a Starfleet vessel, many components would be identifiable on sight. Heck, he could probably identify standard components from half a dozen different races’ vessels. But Borg tech? Hard to isolate one mass of black metal and tubes from another without a little electronic assistance.

Ensign James Hood, recently but not newly assigned to the USS Columbia before it’s departure on it’s current mission was jogging the halls with a Datapad in hand. He was making his way to one of the shuttlebays to coordinate and document yet another departure.

Their arrival near Talarian space and subsequent finding of the remains of a Borg cube had the crew in overdrive mode. The Captain wanted it investigated and as many parts and salvage as they could get their hands on.

While he wasn’t assigned to any away team, most likely due to being one of the most recent assigned crew, he was tasked with coordinating the efforts of the away teams and logging their departures and arrivals as well as any findings they may bring back.

After all, someone has to do the paperwork portion. And as a command division Ensign; that was his task.

The doors to the main shuttlebay slid open as James entered and looked around for the deck chief. Spotting him, he approached eagerly and announced himself, ready to get to work.

“Chief, I am here to document the away team findings. Where have you been storing them?” said ENS Hood.

The crewman in question, a Chief Petty Officer assigned as deck chief of this shuttlebay, turned and looked the young officer up and down. He propped a brow up at his question. These young Ensigns were always so…excitable. Even about paperwork.

“Over there, sir. All somewhat organized and ready for logging before being sent to the proper departments for further study and containment.” said the CPO.

“Very well, Chief. I’ll need one or two hands to assist me if you can spare them.” said ENS Hood.

“Aye, sir. I’ll send two crewmen to assist your efforts.” said the CPO.

James nodded and turned to approach the area containing the newly arrived salvage from the Borg cube. It seemed…unsettling being this close to such things. His father had served in the Dominion War era as well as his mother. He had heard stories direct from them of the Borg encounters and read up on all Starfleets information about them. He wasn’t very eager to be near their technology but it needed to be done.

As he pulled up his datapad, he began filling forms for each salvage piece and classifying it by the type, danger, and which department to send it to for further examination. Some of these would go direct to a secure cargo container if they posed too big a risk to crew or if the ship didn’t have the proper equipment to contain or study it.

Two crewmen approached him looking just as unsettled having to work near this stuff as he. Introductions aside, the three of them began the process of organizing and logging all the salvage.

It had been several days since the mission on the frozen moon had finished, and they had brought back what Borg technology they had deemed as being worthy of further research. The team had gone back to their assigned duties on the Columbia. 

After a rather uneventful shift on the bridge, Talibah makes her way to the lounge area of the lower decks, not sure what or who she is looking for. She finds the lounge rather empty for this hour and makes her way to the bar area where the holographic bartender is seen cleaning glasses as he prepares for a new day.

“Looking for anyone in particular, Ensign?”

“Not really, more like just not ready to be alone just yet.”

“Ahhhh, Well I’m here if you would like to talk, I may not be a counselor but we bartenders are known for being good listeners.”

“Just this last mission we were on is playing games with my head, being in the dark, looking for who knows what in a crashed Borg ship does things, makes you think.”

“Does it? Having troubles?”

“Nooo, not really.. Just can’t get the cold, dark unknown out of my head. What if…We found…”

“I take it you didn’t?”

“Nope, not a drone in sight. However, the questions remain the same. What would I have done? What would we have done?

“You may never know, ensign. Sometimes we can not know the answers till we face the question.”

“That’s what I’m afraid of. The unknown. Not knowing how I would have reacted.”

The holo bartender just nodded. They continued to talk for the next hour or so.

Talibah made her way to her quarters, as she pondered what was playing in her mind. Over the next few minutes, she made her way to her bed, lay down, and tried to clear her mind.

The lights of the suit glistened off of the frozen dark walls of ice-covered Borg tech as she moved past Tav. “There has to be something else here” as she continued further into the dark space. The lights glistened off of what she recognized as another regeneration alcove, empty and frozen as the other one was. The lights gleamed into the darkness, small beams of light guiding her forward.

She pulled out her tricorder and held it in front of her sweeping from side to side as he looked for anything of note. “Come on, find something.” as she looked down at the screen. The screen blipped off to the left as she made her way into a pitch-black area. The lights of the suit did not pierce the darkness of the surrounding area. “Ok…” as she quickly switched her comms over to the group channel. “Hey guys, I’ve entered some sort of large area. I’m having trouble making out anything much farther than what the lights show me.” She reaches behind her back and pulls out what looks like a dark stick that she cracks over her knee. The stick starts to glow an eerie blue light that casts a dim light around her. ”I’m placing a marker light at my current position.”

Looking around she could just now make out a wall off to her right, which she walked towards. “What have we here?” as she walked looking at the Tricorders screen in front of her. Slowly making her way towards the blip shown on the screen. 

Sheets begin to rustle as Talibah’s legs move restlessly.

As she moved forward her foot hit something hard, as she stumbled and fell forward she looked she saw something lying on the floor beside her. ”Hey guys… I think I found something.” she called out in the dark. As she slowly rose to her knees she saw before her the ice-encapsulated remains of what could only be a drone. “We have Drones…”

The legs moved around more as the covers were kicked away. 

She began to take a closer look at the entity in front of her. “I don’t think this is what they meant by finding some tech. But you have to admit it’s interesting. Who can say that they were this close to a drone.” she wondered to herself as she slowly went to one knee beside the drone. “Looks to be humanoid in nature. Normal-looking implants.” She ran the tricorder over the body. “Now why are you here?” as she looked around what she believed was a large room of some sort. Returning to her feet she looked around and found the wall that she had been following. 

She reached behind her took another stick across her knee and she placed it at the foot of the wall. Blue light started to eerily fill the room as she looked toward what she felt would be the middle of the room. Taking a deep breath she stepped over the drone laying on the floor and slowly stepped forward looking down just as much as she looked ahead. “Where there is one drone there are bound to be more,” she said to herself.

As she stepped forward the lights danced in front of her. Reaching out with the Tricorder she approached another blip on the screen as two tables came into her view the lights danced across what lay on top of them.

Talibah bolted awake, her eyes wide as she looked wildly around her quarters.

“Computer, lights.”

As the room’s lights started to glow brighter. She stood and looked around. “Damn it…” as she took a seat on the edge of her bed. She looked over and saw that the other bed in the shard quarters was now empty as her roommate was on duty. 

“It was just a nightmare Tali, just a nightmare..” She took a deep breath and slowly let it out, repeating the breathing techniques learned so long ago. 

It had been several days since the mission on the frozen moon had finished, and they had brought back what Borg technology they had deemed as being worthy of further research. But no drones had been found in that cave. Yes, she had tripped and stumbled but not over a frozen drone and she definitely did not find any tables. What she had found though was one of the Borg consoles that she proceeded to take apart and bring back to the hole where the others had been waiting. 

“Just your mind playing games with you, Tali. None of it was real. Go back to sleep.”

She laid back down, closing her eyes as sleep slowly took over.

Shuttlecraft Young (NCC-76991/01)

Though they had arrived ahead of schedule, the mammoth task of hauling the massive wreck from the Borg Cube now faced the four pilots. Sitting comfortably but hard at work, Bollwyn reviewed the incoming sensor feeds. They were far from the ship, and their return trip would be tricky, so he had to know everything before they attached their tractor beams to it.

“This large section of the Cube appears to be mostly intact, though I’m not detecting any active drones,” He shared over the intercom. “There are some active power nodes, and regenerative forcefields have sealed off a few internal areas. I suspect whatever caused the Cube to explode, that elements of it activated emergency procedures to protect as much as possible.”

Shuttlecraft Crippen (NCC-76991/06)

Looking at the information pouring in, Mkana nodded to the assessment given by Bollwyn and tapped onto the console. “Do we know what this part of the cube was part of? I mean, if it is a valuable part, it could contain more accurate information on what happened to it or better say why it happened.” 

Shuttlecraft Young (NCC-76991/01)

“Based on what we know about Borg Cube designs, this area of the ship may include the Central Plexus,” Bollwyn shared. “I’m sure the captain and the others would be interested in accessing it to see if the Cube still has any records of its last connection with the Collective.”

The young scientist tapped away at his scans before speaking further down the intercom with the others. “That said, the outer hull itself is heavily damaged. We are going to have to take it easy as we move it. There’s no active deflector field, so any rocks or ice that hit it will cause damage.”

Shuttlecraft Crippen (NCC-76991/06)

“If we stay in formation, it should be a piece of cake. We need at least one confident pilot to shoot down the rocks and ice to keep the rest safe. Any volunteers for the job?” Mkana tried to create a valid formation to keep them safe and achieve their goal of tugging this piece back. 

Shuttlecraft Glover (NCC-76991/02)

“I’ll do it,” Adler said, speaking through the comms. “I have pretty good aim. So it should be a piece of cake.” He said confidently. He was one of the best pilots in his class. He was sure he could hit the rocks and ice without hurting his crew mates or the Cube piece they were trying to recover.

Shuttlecraft Engle (NCC-76991/03)

Ashton had been sitting there listening to the conversation. He was still a bit nervous about the mission. It wasn’t his flying. He knew he could fly almost anything when he needed to. It was the whole teamwork stuff. He’d never done anything like they were about to attempt. The others sounded extremely confident, so he was happy to sit back, listen and let them lead. He’d do what was needed of him.

Shuttlecraft Young (NCC-76991/01)

“Right, let’s get this done, then,” Bollwyn suggested over the channel. He pressed a few buttons on his shuttlecraft and then shared what he had done with the others. “I’ve selected the coordinates of the best areas for our tractors to tug from. I’m transmitting them to you now.” 

As soon as he pressed the sent button, he tapped his own tractor beam emitters to begin powering up. “By my own calculations, we will need to remain at one-half impulse to pull this giant mess without causing too much damage to us and it.”

Shuttlecraft Crippen (NCC-76991/06) 

“Received, setting course to my angle.” Following the lead of the shuttlecraft Young, Mkana manoeuvres his shuttle to the given coordinates. Hovering before the piece, Mkana made some final scans. “I am detecting a structural failure on my side. I must recalibrate the tractor beam, or I might damage it too much.” 

He started to scan the hull another time just to be sure and set up the parameters for the tractor beam. 

Shuttlecraft Engle (NCC-76991/03)

Ashton received his coordinates and moved his shuttle into place. “Shuttlecraft Engle in position and ready to lock on,” he said over the open comms. As he waited for the others to get into position, he scanned the area he was to lock onto. Everything seemed solid. Getting the damaged piece secured didn’t seem like too big of an issue. Ashton felt the whole moving it as a unit was where they would run into problems. He told himself that he was just overthinking it. Time was the only thing that would tell. He closed his eyes for a moment and said a silent prayer for him and the team.

Shuttlecraft Crippen (NCC-76991/06) 

“Begin locking” Mkana gave the command as he tapped a few times on his console as his shuttle grabbed onto the Borg piece. “Lock confirmed, holding structure in position.” He looked at the information pouring into his console. “Glover, we got some incoming debris; please take care of that.” Mkana saw the alert on his console. 

Shuttlecraft Glover (NCC-76991/02)

“I got it,” Adler said as he tapped on his console, repositioning his shuttle as he selected each of the incoming debris and opened fire. “You’re clear,” he said to them.

Shuttlecraft Engle (NCC-76991/03)

Ashton locked on to his coordinates, and a few minutes later, the shuttles were dancing across space like a well-choreographed ballet. Ashton was just thinking about how smoothly things were going when he heard Mkana contact the Glover about some debris. Adler moved in swiftly and de-escalated the situation with ease. 

With everyone’s attention drawn to the debris ahead of them, no one caught a glimpse of the one approaching the Engle from behind. The collision took Ashton by surprise. “I’m hit.” he quickly told the others as he began a diagnostic of his systems. “We’re good. We’re good. Everything seems to be running just……” There was another sudden jolt, and Ashton’s tractor beam began losing power. “Scratch that,” he added and told the others about the power loss.

Shuttlecraft Young (NCC-76991/01)

“Keep going, everyone. I’ve got you covered, Ashton,” Bollwyn stated over the intercom as he increased the power to his tractor beam, and the onboard computer confirmed full synchronisation from everyone. “Shuttlecraft Young to Columbia, we are on our way to bringing you a nice piece of treasure!”

Nitala and Jacoby were at the top watching the others below as they began to search for technology they could retrieve so they don’t fall into the wrong hands. It seemed like things were going very slowly as she pulled her mask over her face as it was getting more cold out than before. “How’s it going down there?” Nitala said through comms so they would be able to hear her.

“Well if you like being down a hole and staring into the remains of a Borg ship then everything is just fine” Talibah snidely replies. “Well since we are down here, let’s see what we can find.” as she enters the remains of what once was a Borg ship. “ Any ideas on what we should be looking for? Besides the occasional Drone piece or two?”

Tav kept glancing back and forth between his tricorder and the remains of the Borg’s vessel. “Honestly, I can’t tell what anything is. Seems like one of those times when a senior officer’s experience might be necessary, but the mission is too boring to warrant their attention, you know? I’m just going to start removing the first thing I see that looks even remotely intact.” With that, Tav plunged through the hole in the Borg hull. He didn’t have to go far before he ran into some recognizable equipment. Anyone who had seen the vids of Locutus at Wolf 359 would recognize it. Walls upon walls of drone recharging stations made up the background of that recording. Of course, this was only a single station, and it didn’t have a drone inside. But it looked relatively unscathed from the crash, so Tav started disconnecting some of the hardware.

“An alcove is an alcove, seen one seen them all, there has got to be more.” Talibah walked further into the dark hallway going past Tav. 

Talibah walked several meters farther into the cave bypassing several more alcoves. Till she came up with a small room that her tricorder had led her to. As her lights played across the icy surfaces, they finally landed on what looked like some console. “Now this is what I’m talking about,” she said as she reached for her tool bag. 

“That console could be promising,” Jeden said as she stepped up beside Talibah as she finished brushing the snow off of a black box of some sort. “I don’t see any external damage, well to the point it doesn’t appear to have exploded…”

“Well, do we try for it in one piece or should we just focus on the main processing unit?” Talibah asked as she started to work on disconnecting it from the wall.

They continued to scavenge the wreckage finding any Borg tech they felt would be bad falling into the wrong hands. They would each take breaks within the shuttle to warm up as the weather seemed to get colder as time passed on. After they got all that they needed and loaded them on the shuttle they set off for the Columbia, Nitala was glad that this away mission was over as she wasn’t sure how much more of the cold she could take. The nervousness while working on getting the Borg tech made her even more nervous as anything could have gone wrong at any moment. She watched out of the window as the shuttle began to break orbit, looking at the planet below before she looked to where the Columbia had been sitting.