He was thirteen again, on the holodeck. He shouldn’t have been there. Shouldn’t have even had access to that program. But teenagers can find anything, especially on an old cargo freighter whose systems he’d been hacking since he was five years old, and he’d been looking for ‘adult films’ in his parent’s digital lockbox on the system. 

That’s not what he found. 

He was on the bridge of a ship, but not the Morningstar. Something newer, something with more weapons. It hadn’t mattered. Nothing had mattered as the cube had materialized out of nothingness in front of him. The ship’s weapons had fired, the bridge crew around him shouting all at once. 

The gentle rush of metallic-tainted air washed over his face, the single sign he wasn’t aboard that ship, but safe on the Morningstar. 

It didn’t matter… his senses told him he was there, watching the Cube slicing through space to birth itself. Saw the weapons fire as the ship he was on, and all the others around it, fired on the cube. 

It didn’t matter. Nothing stopped it.

Then they were all around him. Screams echoed. There was the flash of amber and green as his fists clenched at his side and his nails bit deep into his palms. 

“We are the Borg…” the voice was legion and terrible, as he stumbled backward, fleeing from a fate worse than death…

——

RJ blinked himself out of the memory—he’d gotten into so much shit with his parents for finding that holo-recording… a black market recording from one of the ships at Wolf 359, and he’d had nightmares for months afterward—and focused on the ensign in front of him. 

“Shields up, red alert,” he ordered. “And get me some long range scans. Make sure no one’s coming to answer that signal.” 

If there was a borg cube incoming, he wanted to know about it, and fast. He looked at the viewscreen and the ships in the middle of the system. 

“Send a message to command,” he added. “Relay what we know so far, and inform them of the presence of a borg signal in this system.”

The bridge crew reacted instantly, a slight hum of tension running through the air. He didn’t blame them, everyone was still on edge after Frontier Day. 

“Ensign Howell,” he said. “Get me an estimate on how many people aboard all those ships?”

The ensign shook his head. “Something’s blocking our scans, sir. I can’t get accurate readings on lifesigns.”

“Can you get anything from them?” RJ asked, on his feet now. He didn’t pace, but stood in front of the captain’s chair, feet spread for balance. It was more than a physical thing. He always thought better on his feet. “Okay, pull the manifests from their last port for the liner, the kaplans we’d be looking at an average crew of six, those cargo transporters will be running a crew of twelve max. Crunch the numbers and tell me how many.”

“Aye sir.”

RJ turned to Thane. “If there’s a Borg signal, then we might be looking at drones as well. If even one of those gets aboard then we have to be ready.” 

Thane nodded. “You really think they might try and take over the ship?”

RJ shrugged. “No idea. So far we’ve only had reports of signals and the odd drone sighting. But there have been no attacks, or aggressive actions from the drones that have been seen…. But I don’t think we should discount it as an option.”

“Agreed,” Thane’s expression tightened, a grim look in his eyes. “At least we’re looking at traditional drones, not our own crew this time.” 

“Sir, I have numbers for you,” Ensign Howell said. “The liner, the SS Lizabetta, had eighty miners on board when it left the mining colony on Tervas-four. With all the other ships, we’re looking at maximum numbers of around a hundred and fifty.”

He nodded. That was more than he’d hoped for, but not as many as he’d feared. 

“That’s on the ships all clustered together sir. There should be two more on the other one.”

His eyebrow winged up. “Other one?” 

“Yes sir. There’s a research vessel just out of the system. The SS Robert Walton.”

“Can you hail it?” 

“Trying now, sir… there’s no answer.”

“Okay, bring it up on the main screen,” he ordered, his frown deepening as the screen changed to show a smaller ship. It was definitely dead in space, floating aimlessly with no lights on. 

“Life signs, power core?” he asked. 

Howell shook his head. “Nothing sir. It’s dead.” 

RJ pursed his lips, making his mustache tickle the underside of his nose. Yeah, it was definitely too long. He should do something about that later. 

If the ship was dead in the water and powered down, that would be why they hadn’t noticed it on arrival into the system. “What do we know about it?” 

“It’s dead sir,” Howell asked in confusion. “With respect, why even bother with it at the moment?”

“Hmmm?” RJ looked over at him from his musings looking at the screen. “Because it’s an oddity, ensign. The rest of the ships are all tangled up, emitting a borg signal, but this one isn’t.” 

He looked at the ship on the screen again. 

“And that begs the question why. Why is this ship not with the others? What’s so special about it?”