Boarding Action [✱9]

Posted on Fri Jan 2nd, 2026 @ 3:03pm by Lieutenant Commander Alph & Doc & Ensign Mana'i & Major Victoria, Daughter of Kalath & Lieutenant Akaar Zuul & Lieutenant Valerie Gordon & Captain Three of Five & Cadet Senior Grade Camilaar 'Cam' of Rhade & Warrior Choq, Son of None & Cadet Senior Grade Iplik, Son of Raavon
Edited on on Fri Jan 2nd, 2026 @ 3:16pm

2,362 words; about a 12 minute read

Mission: UnderMind [4]
Location: IKS Praxis' Claw, Deck 3
Timeline: After [✱7]

The freshly-armed crew from the Hercules began their entry into the dimly-lit corridors of the Praxis' Claw. The ship's power grid was in a state of flux, and lights seemed to twitch and flicker according to the whims of an artificial nervous system under strain.

"We still can't make sense of this radiation that's interfering with our sensors, but at least it doesn't seem to be harmful." Gordon explained as her most recent attempt to interface with the local power grid was stymied by the mysterious radiation.

"Our first stop should be Main Engineering. Unless anyone has a better suggestion?" Kalath asked the team, watching warily as she moved.

"I agree." Choq said, just loud enough to be heard. He assumed he was the only past or present KDF member among them. "If the ship follows standard configuration we should be able to reach it quickly from here."

"I also concur." Three said after a short assessment. "If the bridge is inaccessible, drones seeking control will likely attempt to establish a foothold in main engineering."

With her Kanohi mask glowing softly as she reached out with its power, Mana'i's seemed uneasy as she walked in the middle of the group. She had her icepick already in hand, carried in both hands. "I sense overwhelming... intention." She said, softly. "It is like nothing I have ever felt before. With my Mask I can discern what each of you wants at a glance. At such times there is only one thing I must focus on. But within this vessel I sense... a sea of intention. Like a tidal wave so relentless that crashes down and subsumes completely all in its wake." This, of course, was the collective will of the Borg hive mind - whatever remained of it, at least.

"What is this Borg you speak of? Your people speak of them as if they are a great evil." She added. She hadn't yet read up on that part of the station's database.

“The Borg are a collective of interlinked cyborg entities from many different races. They share a single consciousness that lacks any sense of individuality or independence. They claim to seek ‘perfection’, but their means of attaining it are to assimilate individuals and technology they consider worthy into their collective by force. They were once the greatest threat to spacefaring civilization, numbering in the trillions, but in 2378 the majority of their forces and infrastructure were destroyed.” Alph explained.

“Only a year ago, despite having been in decay for decades, they managed to assimilate every being under the age of 25 within Starfleet’s First Fleet, which they took control of and used to besiege Earth. They were again defeated, and had been considered functionally extinct since.” Alph added, feeling the context would likely help her.

Camilaar turned to Mana'i and concern showed on his expression. "They strip away who you are when they convert your body with their technology. In that way, they are evil. If you see them, run and don't stop." He glanced a few different directions before focusing on the Toa again.

"I wouldn't immediately think they are defeated, too quickly. If nothing else, they adapt and come back in one form or another." Akaar added, his expression already full of dread as he tightened his grip on his weapon's handle.

"You must not let them touch you." Kalath cautioned. "They use tubules from their hands to insert nanoprobes that begin the assimilation process from the inside out."

The rest probably couldn't quite tell - but the very thought of these inhuman beings claiming her, swallowing her identity till none of it remained, sent a chill down Mana'i's spine. Her gauntleted hand tightened on the handle of her icepick; the familiar weight of it was a welcome, if only fleeting, balm to the sense of dread that had materialised in her gut.

"The closest thing to such a threat in my universe was the time when Makuta Teridax infected the Matoran of Voya Nui." She murmured, softly. "Minute portions of his essence, inserted into their bodies, stripped them of their free will. Only the actions of the Toa Inika saved them." Except this time there was no energized protodermis or zamor sphere launcher with which to reverse the process. There was just herself, her noticeably far less mystically inclined comrades and their collective wit. It would need to do - whether she liked it or not.

"I do hope that Brunali pathogen is adaptable, ha, use their own adaptation against them," Camilaar commented, his nose sensing similar scents to those they already found. The direction of which still eluded him.

"Starfleet doesn't use pathogens, Cadet." Kalath said sternly, evoking several of her old drill sergeants. "Hold on. Quiet." She made a fist over her shoulder, there was an intersection in the hall ahead. A pair of legs could be seen extending out of the path that branched off to the left, looking to be lying flat on their front.

"Choq, Zuul, with me." She whispered as loud as she dared. "Everyone else, stay back, but keep your eyes out for any surprises." She led with the point of her bat'leth forward.

Mana'i's gaze swept over the corridor, focusing on the pair of booted feet on the floor. What she sensed at once drove the very tip of a spear of dread into her chest.

"Major. Be careful. That thing you are approaching is... alive." She murmured, as loud as she could manage. "Inactive, but alive. I perceive the same collective will that permeates this place in it too. It is softer and more garbled, but present."

Now that Gordon knew the body was there, she was able to cut through the radiation enough to get some kind of reading. "She's right." Gordon agreed with Mana'i, "I'm detecting nanoprobe activity. But not much else." Her tricorder wasn't medical, but the nanites in the body's feet lit up like shotgun pellets on an x-ray. She didn't want to get any closer to scan the rest until someone gave the all clear. Come on, stay down. She said to herself.

Choq edged forward carefully behind Kalath, his mek'leth held ahead in backhand grip to slash through any limb that might suddenly grab for him.

Akaar kept pace with Choq, watching the other side for possible ambushes.

Three followed cautiously, she had no further insights without being able to see the being in question.

The Major took careful steps forward, her bat'leth ready to strike. As she reached a vantage where she could start to see around the corner, the tension in her declined. She could see the man was dead, the blade of a kur'leth poked up through his back from the front. Likely as not, he had fallen on it deliberately, a death on his own terms. The colour in his skin was drained and other early signs of assimilation were present. She shined her wrist-torch onto him.

"He's dead." Kalath told the group. "If the Borg have one persistent weakness, it's that the synthetic can't survive without the biological. If the body dies, the machines can't sustain themselves alone. Doesn't mean they won't try." Kalath told Mana'i specifically.

"Should we not determine how he died? It may impact us," Akaar suggested in concern. He was checking behind them and around while the others decided what to do, he failed to process the blade impaled into the dead Klingon, for his focus was divided.

"I'd assume the sword he fell on probably played a role, but let's make sure." Kalath said, turning back to the group. "Mr Iplik, deploy the lantern." She instructed the Klingon cadet, who had the medical hologram's mobile emitter among the equipment in his rather large pack over his shoulders.

"I only smell a few Klingons, I think the assimilation process actually blocks body odour," Camilaar commented, he was too keeping his attention away from the dead Klingon. He didn't want that burned in his memory. "I can't localize the scent. Apologies."

"Keep your... nose... peeled anyway cadet, we should take every advantage we can get." Kalath said, realising she was mixing her metaphors.

Cadet Camilaar nodded. "Will do ma'am."

"Yes ma'am." Cadet Iplik replied almost a full minute after he'd been asked, having only nodded wordlessly, still terrified of the corpse and working to remove the lantern device. He activated the knee-high cylinder which did vaguely resemble old fashioned oil lamps in its shape. The device hummed gently and floated so its top was around chest height.

From the device came a projection of Doc, the supplementary medical hologram. "Hello there, friends. What in Hera's glorious name is this?" Doc asked.

"We're on a Klingon ship that's been attacked by Borg. We want to know what killed this man." Iplik told the hologram.

"Let's have a look." Doc said, taking a tricorder from the lantern, out of a panel that didn't open until he reached for it.

"From the way you're all standing carefully back, I assume you know he's full of nanites. But it looks like blood loss got him. He punctured his heart and other organs with the sword. From the position, I'd say this was self-inflicted. Doesn't mean the nanites still aren't trying to fix it. There's millions of those critters still swimming around in there." Doc moved closer, crouching on the other side of the man, where his head was, scanning closely.

The body twitched slightly. Doc looked immediately back to the others, in time to see most of them somewhat startled. "You might want to take a step back." Doc advised, just as the apparently dead Klingon reached up to grab at him. The Klingon's hand passed through him, he lifted the tricorder out of the way swiftly enough to avoid it being hit.

Kalath slid back without lifting her feet, raising her bat'leth to ready stance defensively, before realising just how limited the quasi-assimilated corpse was.

Three did not react instinctively when the impaled body moved, but she tilted her head slightly to get a different position for her optical implant. She found herself almost impressed that the Klingon had been able to end his own life effectively enough to avoid assimilation.

Choq flinched every so slightly as the corpse moved. Like any Klingon who understood the process well enough, he feared assimilation. There was no death, no afterlife, only eternal slavery. This warrior knew that too, he took the last chance to regain die with honour. He regained his composure, and held his defensive stance, mek'leth ready to sever and swipe.

Doc stepped back towards the group, and the lantern kept an equal distance away from him as he came, swerving around the Hercules crew.

The impaled Klingon continued to grab blindly for a moment, before grabbing at the wall and trying to turn itself, and realising it did not have the strength to turn itself by only moving its arms. It seemed to stop again, and rest once more.

Kalath knew she could end this easily with the point of her bat'leth in the area behind his ears, but she felt that might not have been the preference of the scientists. She remained still, focused intently on twitching carcass.

"Did the Doc just praise Hera?" Akaar's tone was hard as he posed the question. "The Doc does know about the Goa'uld Hera right?"

"Correct, Lieutenant. Doc's subroutines were affected by the Goa'uld takeover virus, we were unable to remove his worship of Hera without purging his entire accumulated personality over the last seven years. He is still fully loyal and dedicated to his mission, but he seems to consider her a deity, at least in the abstract." Alph noted. "We are continuing to work on it. He can still perform his role at near 100 percent efficiency." He clarified, in the event anyone thought this was an unsatisfactory situation.

Akaar frowned. "I hadn't realised that the virus affected everything that deeply. Well, at least it doesn't affect his work ethic." He half smiled and returned to his defense vigil of their surroundings.

"Looks like the nanoprobes are trying to find an escape route. But they're not moving that body anywhere else as long as there's a blade between two severed thoracic vertebrae." Doc assessed.

Camilaar frowned. "What should we do about it?"

"I believe we should move him somewhere else for now, perhaps one of the rooms we know to be empty. We can have the Hercules send a team over to determine if beaming him back is feasible. One of the most effective ways to incapacitate nanites without an energy-based solution they may adapt to is cold. Ensign Mana'i, would it be acceptable to you to chill this man's body to allow us to preserve him until such time as we can determine what is appropriate?" Alph suggested and asked.

"Of course." Mana'i unsheathed her ice pick and tapped it to the chest of the inactive drone; immediately a layer of ice spread out from the point of contact, shackling its hands, then covering its entire body. Better safe than sorry.

"We should get moving," Akaar suggested, his body tense as they'd been here a little too long in his opinion.

"I agree. Do the needful and get him out of here." Major Kalath said, gesturing to the body.

Mana'i seemed not terribly concerned about transporting the frozen drone; she hefted the entire thing and slung it over her shoulder like it weighed nothing.

"Thank you for your assistance, Ensign." Alph placed a small transponder from his kit on the frozen surface of the drone. "Alph to beaming site, I am activating a transponder on a subject for quarantine isolation. They are presently in stasis, consult with Hercules staff for suitability to beam back."

"Aye, sir." Came the ever-so-slightly garbled transmission from their beachhead. The frozen quasi-assimilated corpse was beamed away, relieving Mana'i of its burden, however minimal it was for her. Alph was surprised by her strength.

"I believe we are less than 40 meters from one of the upper supervision points for main engineering. This way." Alph said, pointing past where the corpse had been lying.

RSS Feed