“We are the Borg. You will be assimilated. Resistance is futile!”

Hearing that announcement, Commander Jaz already barked the next set of orders without thinking. “Shields to maximum, standby all weapons!”

Horatio McCallister leant forward in his chair as he considered what was taking place before them. A Borg settlement on a broken planet. “This doesn’t make sense,” He stated before turning to look over at his chief science officer. “Jonarom, analyse that hail and determine if it uses the same subspace domain linked to the Borg Collective’s hive mind.”

The young ensign nodded and went to work, while he did that Jaz turned to her captain.

“Second-guessing your brother?” She whispered. 

McCallister shook her head, “No, but from what I know about the Borg, it doesn’t make sense for them to make that threat without being able to back it up. That’s a crashed cube far from any known territory that the Collective once claimed in the Delta Quadrant. Why try to intimidate us with that?”

“Isn’t that their standard greeting?” Lieutenant Jarata asked from the helm.

“Yes, but my gut is telling me something is off here,” McCallister said as he stood up and took a stride over to the science station. “Anything, ensign?”

Jonarom nodded. “I’m using multimodal reflection sorting to scan for the subspace signals normally operated by the Borg hive mind, sir, and I’m detecting something on the lower subspace bands.”

“Why on the lower subspace bands?” McCallister asked. 

Checking the scans on the consoles before him, the young Ardanan scientist looked at what the readings were telling him. “Comparing them to what Starfleet has seen before of the hive minds signal, this is not normal, sir. It’s almost like a poor man’s attempt at a collective consciousness.”

“A mini-hive mind?” Chief Bronden suggested from the operations station just behind the captain and ensign.  

Turning to look at his chief of operations, McCallister wanted him to elaborate further. “Bronden, explain.”

“Though the Borg settlement has powerful shielding in place, the rest of it has a low-level energy output. I would summarise that what Ensign Jonarom is detecting is not the actual hive mind but a smaller one, perhaps one that is local to these Borg only.” The Zaldan man hypothesied. 

“Then why don’t we ask the fleet captain why we’re not blowing them up?” Lieutenant Commander Jirani asked aloud from the security and tactical station.

“Because that’s not how we do things, Edeena,” Jaz reminded the Bajoran woman. “This isn’t a Klingon ship where we blow things up and ask questions later.”

“That’s an incredible threat to our security and that of every other civilisation in the quadrant,” Jirani stated.

“And that’s enough,” McCallister said in a stern tone before turning to his science officer. “Jonarom, share your analysis with the Odyssey and send over our theory.”

“Aye, sir,” the ensign replied. 

McCallister walked back to the centre of the room and sat down in his chair. He knew that Jirani could come out with things sometimes, but he hated it when she made it awkward for them all. Jaz noticed his expression as he sat down and gave him a reassuring look of support before returning to look at the console that sat between them. 

“The Themis has just launched its fighters; they’re taking up a defensive formation above the squadron,” Jaz announced. 

McCallister took a breath in and wondered what his brother was preparing.