Season 15: Episode 4 - Vox Populai

[James Ramort]

[USS Discovery - Main Bridge]

The Situation went from bad to worse in mere seconds as more and more assimilated crewman and officers started to be taken up into the collective. This including the Second Officer and the Chief Science Officer was bad enough but the Captain seemed to be affected too. Something about that other young Ensign stationed at comms. When the Order came to abandon the Main Bridge, Ramort was speechless. Not so much because he would have no words to describe how he felt. More so because the situation was surreal. He retreated, covering the air with the occasional burst from his Phaser. His first day, he even got to be on the Bridge... on his first day... and then this. But his young age mattered no, he was expected to perform according to standard protocol and now really wasn't the time to suffer a severe psychological breakdown. He needed to gather his resolve, remember his drilling and do his best to survive. Maybe even contribute to freeing his taken comrades.

[Turbolift]

The Atmosphere in the Turbolift was strange. Ramort would remember it still long after. The air was filled with uneasiness. The smell of sweat and hormones. The slight salt of tears, were they only his own or had somebody cried their panic out too, he didn't know. His Vision was able to focus fully again at least. He stood cramped in here with some of the most important people of the Ship. He hadn't even had time yet to introduce himself to either the Captain or the First Officer. Now he stood basically next to them and the only thing hanging in the air was a feeling of doom creeping up on the entire Ship, no the entire Fleet.

He noticed another thing that made him uneasy. When they had entered the Turbolift the controls had still displayed a Startrek Issue LCARS Interface. This was no longer the case. Now a series of green buttons connected by green lines forming a web, labeled in Borg, was in its place. The whole display reminded him of an Octopus, using a thousand arms to gather its prize right by itself, holding it tight and never again releasing it to swim among the waves of the openness of space. No matter how much he tried to stop it, the image burned itself into his mind. He had felt it, the Kraken had stretched his arms and nearly touched him. His scales had been tainted by its ink but not managed to stick on him for some reason. He had heard the collectives' plea. It spoke of safety and ethereal eternity. It had not done so with words but from within himself. The same part of him it touched had planted this in his mind but it wasn't fully there, it wasn't quite real enough to reach out itself, to make the connection and to, yes, to kill him in all reality. He had to be thankful for that really. Then the Doors to Beta Bridge opened and he had tasks to take care of. The Trauma Spiral would have to wait for another day.

[Beta Bridge - Pre Excelsior]

As everyone took up tasks where needed, he headed for the Science Consoles. A quick tab on the main input made it obvious they had been locked out just as much as the rest of the ship. But what about lower priority systems. His fingers flying over the inputs, he queried the Computer for a plethora of Subsystems. From private communications, laboratory controls, replicators, Holodecks to library access. Some were open to access, like turbolift controls, life support, personal logs while a random selection of other subsystems were locked out. Including Holodecks, Cargo Transporters and for some strange reason lighting on deck 12. From these Systems, most didn't even require command clearance of any level to access. It seemed someone wanted to make extra sure all potentially relevant systems were covered by Fleet Formation mode. It was also clear this person was not a scientist.
He connected his Tricorder to the library subsystems, but even there it seemed that most entries in fact had been encrypted. What was still open though were the logs. What harm could logs do after all. Unless of course you began to use them. Unless you began to harness their data. Unless you knew exactly what you were looking for. He mirrored all files he might potentially need then got distracted by the Excelsior opening Comms.

[Beta Bridge - Past Excelsior]

He didn't know how many people had been part of Excelsiors crew but to think they were all gone now. He hadn't known anyone onboard but they had been Starfleet. All those Officers, maybe some even as young as himself, fresh from the Academy.
Something in his head was hanging up on that thought, something...
There was no time to grief them now. He needed to keep it together. Unless he wanted to join them as part of the Dustcloud around the Earth.
He could feel the terror creeping up on him again. He needed to keep busy. But he couldn't fight the Borg directly, he wasn't trained for that. But he could assist in other ways. He was a scientist. He needed to start with establishing the basis for what was happening here. He pulled out his medical Tricoder and began to take readings from the rest of the Crew on the Beta Bridge, including himself. The Tricoder, besides showing heightened levels of Stress Hormones there was something going on in the Brains. Ramort could see it more clearly in his own patterns, something anomalous that had been formed in the base of this Brain stem. It was something he had never seen before. In none of the required lectures on physiology the academy insisted on for all personal. The same thing was absent in most of the other people on the Bridge. Some had remnants of it nested in their Brains. Without scanning one of the assimilated ones it was impossible to verify but there was a pattern here. Something to make sense of in an ocean of chaos.
He could reconstruct a growth pattern with the different scan results and maybe even extrapolate how a fully grown version would look like. Linking the two Tricorders he ran the Model through the logs. If anywhere there had been made an observation of something like this it would show up. For now at least he could report his finding, whom to he was not sure but without a Chief Scientist he most likely had to report to either the XO or CO directly.

Speaking to none of them in particular, he spoke up:

"Sir, I might have found something. There is something in our Brains. It is not fully grown in us here. I can't say if it is present in the assimilated ones or what it does but it wasn't part of what we were taught in the academy for sure."

"Ensign Ramort, Chief Graham.  See to Lieutenant Grippen's injury.  I know you are not medics - just do the best you can."

Upon the Commander's order, he quickly grabbed a med kit from the back wall and headed to Lieutenant Grippen. First scanning him, then beginning to apply some mild localized sedatives so he could continue, then starting a basic subdermal regeneration to stop the bleeding. It was beyond his capabilities to go into any aesthetic surgery and Lt. Grippen would have a remaining hole until they got to some proper medical facility but the bleeding at least stopped.

[Lek]

NPC PO2 Helga Tragnar/Drone 356698
[USS Discovery-B - Deck 2 - Armory >> Deck 7]

There was no emotion at all from the Klingon hybrid Borg drone at watching the two security crewman eliminated.  Their individualness was noted and recognized by Drone 356698; but as mere crewmen their names weren't on the target list - at least at present.   Their elimination was reported to the Collective so that when their names/roles did appear on the list, they could immediately be struck off as having been eliminated already.

Having handed out all the weapons in the Armory to assimilated personnel, Drone 356698 received new orders to located Target 7.  Species Ferengi. Position: Chief Engineer.   Collective knowledge from the Assimilated had provided information that this drone's shell was familiar to the Ferengi and which could be provided advantage.

The sabotage reports suggested the target was using the Jeffries tubes.  A request was sent to the most senior of Borg on the ship.  Drone 356698 required transport to nearest access to the most recent sabotage site.
[USS Discovery-B Deck 7]

The accuracy of the transporter system meant that transporting into the Jeffries tube was not possible.  The nearest access was Deck 7 Corridor 7A-4.  With a drone sitting at the controls in Ops, Security and Engineering, Drone 356698 arrived to the location and found the hatchway already unlocked.  They entered and listened.  Their biological shell had an excellent olfactory sensory and was soon able to locate the missing target as being in the ladder tube just around the corner from her position.

They walked to the ladder access and looked up.

"Target located."  Drone 356698 announced then began to climb rapidly, closing the distance between them and Target 7.

[Jeffries Tube between Deck 7 and Deck 6 - USS Discovery]

Lek was huffing his way up the ladder, when he heard it, the soft thump of leather on metal, there was someone was below him.

"Dammit, so much for reaching the impulse engines."

He hissed. Lek knew he wasn't a fighter and he was only an average shot, no, he was an engineer and that was how he'd get out of this problem. When he reached the next cross tube, he got off ladder and quickly opened the nearest access panel. He pulled out several cables, leaving some dangling and reconnecting others. He heard the low whine of the cross circuiting he'd created begin to build power. He closed the panel and raced down the tube as quickly as he could because he didn't want to be anywhere near this junction when the next person entered. What he'd created was a very powerful electrical field that just needed someone to enter it to give it a path to ground that would, at the very least, deliver the same effect as a phaser set on high stun, or, if the person was unlucky, a lethal dose of electricity.

When he reached the next cross corridor, he duplicated his trap to prevent pursuit and then headed for the nearest ladder back down to deck 7. If he could reach the anti-matter storage, the interference caused by the volatile material would hide him from the ship's sensors.

[Zhukdrashar Mrekrerhas]

[NPC Doctor Meelar Phlome | Deck 5 | Alpha Hull Medical Facilities | USS Discovery NCC 78393-B]

NPC Crewman Kitaa Horg/Drone 356700
USS Discovery - Deck 5 - Alpha Hull Medical Facilities]

Assigned to keeping watch over the many various experiments that went on in the lab, was the role of the medical technician.  Kitaa's role.  A role she enjoyed, though you could never tell from her dour expression.

She had been listening to the Frontier Day celebration in a small room off of the side of the lab, as she watched the doctor work.  When it seemed that Dr. Phlome was going to depart for a bit - likely to see the fireworks and such - Kitaa gave the Denobulan woman a grunted nod, then suddenly cocked her head in surprise at the unexpectedly hijacked broadcast.   Admiral PIcard giving a warning about Changelings in cahoots with the Borg?  Sounded ominous.

Anything more to be warned about was cut up and soon after replaced by a shrill tone that caused Kitaa to go into minor convulsions as her being was taken over by the borg programming in her DNA.

Oh. Right! Phlome realized she had forgotten to report to her assigned Security detail, as she heard the grunted nod of Kitaa just when she was about to take her leave.

"Aw geez."

That was the right expression, right? Human one. Meelar was almost certain.

Whatever the case, she felt a twinge of guilt at forgetting her presence. She knew that Horg's stern and severe expression put most off, but talking to her had revealed that there was more than just a stoic face. She enjoyed talking to Kitaa. And, Meelar also appreciated her dutiful watch. Maybe inviting her to come along would be ideal? She decided to proceed, though soon stopped as she overheard some kind of... warning.

Meelar raised an eyebrow, listening to it over before advancing closer. Once again, she stopped as she overheard a shrill screech that instinctively made her shield her ears. She gritted her teeth, wondering what the heck that had been until she saw with horror that Kitaa was beginning to convulse. She gasped, quickly reaching for her Medical Tricorder and running to scan her. She set her fear aside, even though she wasn't sure what was happening. She was certain Kitaa had no history of seizures...

"Hold on Kitaa!" She exclaimed, as the scanner made its work. Her inner peace, however, was quickly disrupted as she read the analyses, horror seeping in as she gazed at her, seeing thick, dark-green veins beginning to bulge underneath her skin. She shook her head, trying to make sense of how could this be happening.

She stumbled backward onto the cold ground as Horg moved, her head moving from side to side, as if she could deny what was transpiring.

"K-Kitaa! S-Stop! It is me! Your friend, Meelar! Meelar Phlome! You don't have t-to do this!"

NPC Crewman Kitaa Horg/Drone 356700
USS Discovery - Deck 5 - Alpha Hull Medical Facilities]

Annihilate all the Non-Assimilated.   That was the directive.

Drone 356700 knew the directive.

It noted the presence of a Non-Assimilated in its vicinity and moved towards the Denobulan female.  Lacking an energy weapon, the Collective would use this drone's superior strength to crush the Non-Assimilated's head with its hands.

But her pleading fell on deaf ears as Horg kept advancing, without any hint that she could be even there any longer. Phlome's survival instinct kicked in finally just as Kitaa loomed above her, extending her hands towards her to grab either Meelar's head or neck. She decided to move before she could find out, quickly flexing her legs before kicking her square in the navel, hopefully making the Borg flinch, at least momentarily, and propelling Meelar backward half-a-foot or so.

She crawled backward some more, making sure she was away from the infected crewmember, up until she bumped her head against the wall. She groaned in pain but endured it as she attempted to call for Security, "S-Security! I-I need you at Deck 5, Alpha Hull Medical Facilities! P-Please!"

No response. She felt a hole in her stomach as she realized she was all alone. And that she had no weapons or ways to defend herself. Maybe if she could reach the medical cabinet, get a hypospray. But she was too far from it.

She fished around in her pockets, trying to find something that she could use to fight her off. She found not a weapon, but instead, a container of Dermaline Gel. Why was that even there? She decided not to question it, as she scooped out a handful, tossing it towards the feet of Horg, before she sped off deeper into the Laboratory. She hoped that the slippery substance would give her enough time to grab some equipment before the Drone could recover... of course, Kitaa was quite close to her already...

[Lorut Vila]

USS Discovery
Turbolift-Beta Bridge

What weapons did we manage to salvage?

Vila held up the phaser she'd taken off one of the Borgs, plus pulled out another contraband one from her top. One day, she'd explain to the Commander just how she hid them, but that wasn't a conversation for right now. "Here," she said, holding them out. "Hold one," she said, before bending to her boot, and pulling out a field knife. "Well armed. Don't worry," she said, with a shrug. "Put it in my file."

The Turbolift stopped. She wasn't about to get off, but she knew better than to question THIS, even if her first instinct was to go steal a shuttle and get the hell out of there. Oddly, her brain was also shouting at her to call Ben, but that would most definitely[/I] need to wait.

Oh, Prophets, no...

She sighed. "What have the Prophets ever done for us?" She said, stepping forward to help the Captain destroy the hulls in an effort to thwart the further takeover of the ship.

Lorut, Addams - I hope you are helping the Captain in his sabotage there.

"You know I am on it," she said. She was finally calm, carefully but quickly pulling yellow and red wires. "Leave the green, sir," she said. "You don't want to go down from electrocuting yourself," she said.

"Addams, get the green behind me, please," she said.

"This is futile. Can't we just take a shuttle out of here?" She voiced the thought.

"Never mind. If I survived the Cardassians, what's a few million Borg?" She said.

[Kinley Garrison]

[USS Discovery - Deck 1 - Main Bridge]
Ensign Ruth Falleq-Tekin

Drone 056239.  She was only vaguely aware of who she was.  The Ruthie inside was pacified with the euphoria of assimilation. So the Drone she had become didn't see her father or anyone else on the bridge.  She saw ourselves, and the others.  And she recieved her instructions.

Elliminate all non-assimilated.

The Collective labeled its targets.  Captain.  First Officer.  Sec- Negative.  Second Officer Assilimated.  Chief of Security, Chief Scie- Chief Science Officer Assimilated. Helm Officer...

The Borg Drone pulled out the station phaser and raised it, firing on the Captain.  Then the next target.  Then the Captain again.  As long as they were still standing they were a threat.  As long as they were alive the Collective couldn't annihilate the Federation.

Very quickly the non-assimilated retreated and escaped through the turbolift.  The Drone walked over and sat at the First Officer's chair as the former Science Chief took the Captain's chair.  They had control of Discovery.  They also had control of Enterprise.  And control of every other ship in the network.  They were connected to each other on every ship, and even ships out within the system and sector.  There was a limit, of course, but as their Collective got bigger, more ships were being sent to eliminate defenses and threats to the Collective.

"Unsanctioned movement, turbolift.  Unsanctioned movement, Deck 11."

Thats when warp drive was taken down.  Resistance.  Priority Target 7 has not been eliminated.  Target 7 hadn't even been located.  It was a threat.  It was a big threat.

"Secure vital systems. Assess and repair damage.  Restore full functionality."

The Borg were now aware of attempts to disable Discovery.  And were moving to trap the saboteur.

[Bridge]

Saboteurs. Both on the Discovery and in the rest of the Fleet. No matter. The Drones would take care of the saboteurs on the ship and annihilate the remainder. Already there were reports of the Unassimilated attempting to congregate onto the  Discovery's Beta Bridge. Squadrons of drones were en route to rectify these anomalies.

The Excelsior, on the other hand, was another problem entirely. They had lost control of the ship to the Unassimilated and attempted to turn on the Borg fleet. Unacceptable parameters.  They would rectify the situation,  Drones 365970, 093298, 218634, and 421897 were given the orders to turn their ships on the Excelsior.

"œFire."

In a matter of minutes, the Excelsior was destroyed.

[Target: Eliminated]

[Jettis Jyur]

[ As Murphy]

They made it! Murphy and Harrington took a moment to breathe in the relative safety of the turbolift, before nodding. "œY-y-y-yeah. S-so, we-we were just in 10-forward watching the parade of ships and fireworks with our buddy Vinod  here, and then the Admiral came on and said something about the Borg coming, and then, Vinnie and practically everyone in the room turned"¦ like Zombies!"   stuttered Murphy, who was shaking like an Earth Chihuahua dog from the shock of it all.  Murphy interjected," We got out when we could, but there were a few others there that got swarmed and couldn't get out. I don't think they're alive anymore. We were just looking for someone who wasn't turned too."

Murphy pondered. "œIf there's anyone left, they might be t-trying to hold the Beta bridge as long as they can. But, it's not going to be able to control anything on the ship with that Fleet mode active"¦ But I think I do know of a stash of weapons. I had an old Flight Chief who always kept a stash of guns in the floors of the shuttles when she was here. It's not really on the official registers for weapons, but they're still there, and it probably means that the Borg don't know about them, not to mention that there might be less Borg in the hangars than up here.

[ USS Discovery - Deck 10 ]

Just the word 'borg' was enough to make Jettis sick to his stomach. The recap of what had happened in such a short time made it feel all too real, all over again. Taking a few steadying breaths, Jettis tried to keep his mind off of the obvious, off of what threatened to consume his thoughts.

"Lead the way then. We need weapons, and anyone else who's still alive will need them too. Even better if they're not documented." Unfortunately, that path would likely take them away from any other non-borg, but working with what they had, it was a good plan. "We have no comms, we'll have to be fast."

Following the lead of the two officers, the next dilemma pushed its way into Jettis' mind. Killing the borg meant killing crewmates. And even so, was there any hope of escape? They couldn't exactly hail another ship, or beam to the planet. Even jettisoning the lifepods wouldn't give them a fighting chance, but maybe if they could at least reclaim their ship and find the engineers. "Is there any way we can leave instructions for any survivors? Something they wouldn't recognize?"

[M'Nia]

This was so not good. First everybody froze up then their eyes went black then they identified themselves as Borg! ' M'nia, you are n deep trouble here!' she thought to herself. She was trying not to panic but it couldn't get much worse. Then it did as they started talking about destroying the non assimilated. That meant her. She had to get away.

She took a chance that maybe Lek hadn't been assimilated. At any rate she knew he had a bolt hole or 3 ready. She knew of one such nearby. She ran for the jefferies tube and opened the hatch and practically shot in and closed the hatch behind her. she crawled up into the tube. , she stopped long enough to catch her breath and get her bearings and just gather herself so she could figure out what was going on. She had to think. If she wasn't affected then maybe others weren't as well. The question was why? and who? she wasn't sure but maybe she could find someone. She wished she knew if Lek was ok. She wasn't sure she should risk using the combadge. So much was uncertain at this time. too much was happening too fast.

[Tekin Nevir]

Commander Rayek tr'Lhoell
[USS Discovery-B - Deck Six - Beta Bridge] Stardate 78288.5  (April 16, 2401)

While the Captain explained his decision to continue on to the Beta Bridge, Rayek tapped behind his ear in an attempt to contact his wife.  But even the 'off-the-books' comms lines were locked down.  Fvadt!

Rayek completely agreed with the Security Chief's suggestion, to exit out the lift's emergency hatch but the Captain had other plans.

As the doors opened to the Beta Bridge, Rayek was ready with his phaser rifle, ready to fire - his weapon on its heaviest stun setting - at any Borg movement from within.  But the room was quiet for now.  The console displays all showed the same green symbol overtop the Fleet Formation Mode wording.

Rayek was already on path towards the weapons locker when the Captain suggested exactly that.  It took only a moment or two to empty it of the half dozen rifles, and various stun and smoke grenades that were stored there.   He also activated the mobile transporter inhibitor which was stored there for exactly this sort of hostile takeover situation.  At least the Borg weren't going to be able to transport in now.  While Rayek did that,  the Captain, began sabotaging consoles; he also explained about the opposition to this Fleet Formation mode by several other Captains.

"Lorut, Addams - I hope you are helping the Captain in his sabotage there. " He called out figuring those two would know best what circuits to pull and chips to break.

Seeing that Lachlyn was covering the entrances, Rayek continued to gather the weapons scattered about the room - collecting the hand phasers next.  They were located under each console.   No sense in leaving them behind for the Borg to use on the crew.

In the midst of Tekin's explanation, a transmission came in from Captain Benbassat , clearly hijacked from the Borg.

While others watched the video feed, Rayek continued to move about the room counting the survivors so far.  Nine, on a bridge that had a capacity for  passing out weapons and grenades to those in need, listening as the Captain of the Excelsior attempted to rally the other ships to fight back like they were.    Unfortunately, for the Excelsior the fight was short lived.  An entire ship destroyed.  Assimilated and Free-willed alike.  Dead.

There were six rifles in the locker (plus his own).. that was not even one for each of the commissioned officers present.   Similarly there were only six hand phasers (plus what weapons the others might have already with them).  It wasn't common practice for officers to just carry weapons on them.  Department Heads yes, on duty security yes.... but not the average officer.  That's what the weapon stashes were for.

Rayek tried to do a weapons count and in doing so noticed that the Flight chief didn't look so well.

"Ensign Ramort, Chief Graham.  See to Lieutenant Grippen's injury.  I know you are not medics - just do the best you can."

His finally determination had him handing out rifles and type 2 hand phasers to the Captain, Lieutenants Addams and Lachlyn (if she didn't already have either on her presently), and Ensigns T'Prith and Ramort.   For the moment, with the man's injury, Rayek withheld handing the Risan pilot a firearm.  Nor did he hand anything out to Ensign Lorut, since he already knew from her barrage of attacks on the Alpha Bridge - that the Bajoran Ops officer had 2 hand phasers already.   The last rifle (other than his own) went to Chief Petty Graham and he kept the last hand phaser in reserve to pass to Lieutenant when the man was more steady.

She wanted to facepalm but instead merely nodded while kicking herself for not remembering the change in staffing due to the celebrations. Deck Six held the forward lounge where a large group gathered to watch the celebrations. Surely they were affected as well.

Captain Benbassat??

Tanner knew him. He golfed with her Uncle. The panic in his voice was intense and when he was silenced, everyone felt the weight of what it meant.

"The whole ship...they just removed the whole ship."She shook her head, rage replacing the sorrow of the action they'd just noticed. "They may not be here yet, but they're too close for comfort. We need to seal this bridge since they know we're here." She motioned to the emergency access conduit, "We can still head out there and can use the Jeffries to reach the closest weapons cache. Just lock it behind."

"Anyone coming with me?" Tanner asked, "Whatever is going on, they're focused on control. I doubt they'd expect kick back this quickly."

USS Discovery
Turbolift-Beta Bridge

Vila held up the phaser she'd taken off one of the Borgs, plus pulled out another contraband one from her top. One day, she'd explain to the Commander just how she hid them, but that wasn't a conversation for right now. "Here," she said, holding them out. "Hold one," she said, before bending to her boot, and pulling out a field knife. "Well armed. Don't worry," she said, with a shrug. "Put it in my file."

The Turbolift stopped. She wasn't about to get off, but she knew better than to question THIS, even if her first instinct was to go steal a shuttle and get the hell out of there. Oddly, her brain was also shouting at her to call Ben, but that would most definitely[/I] need to wait.
She sighed. "What have the Prophets ever done for us?" She said, stepping forward to help the Captain destroy the hulls in an effort to thwart the further takeover of the ship.

"You know I am on it," she said. She was finally calm, carefully but quickly pulling yellow and red wires. "Leave the green, sir," she said. "You don't want to go down from electrocuting yourself," she said.

"Addams, get the green behind me, please," she said.

"This is futile. Can't we just take a shuttle out of here?" She voiced the thought.

"Never mind. If I survived the Cardassians, what's a few million Borg?" She said.

[USS Discovery - Deck 6 - Beta (Battle) Bridge]

He struggled to contain himself and started to calm down, giving a sharp exhale at Vila's answer about the Prophets.  "I'm not in the mood to have a religious debate, Ms Lorut." he said, looking down at his work.  What was he doing?  He was close to locking out weapons control, which would render Discovery useless to the Collective... but...

"We can't continue.  You all heard what happened to Ben. If we disable Discovery, the Collective will just consider her a total loss and move us out of formation.  We have to consider the whole crew, even those who are..." he struggled to finish.  "Those who are temporarily lost."

He looked over at James's report and took a look at the readings. It was... curious.  He took the tricorder and scanned himself, comparing the readings to that of James's.  "It's there for me, but much more... reduced."  Without another word he turned the scanner on Vila and compared her scan with his.  "Her's is even less.  Wait, this can't be a coincidence."

Unfortunately, he was interrupted when he heard a pounding at the doors.  "That was faster, but not unexpected.  Look, sabotage isn't going to work, neither is taking back the ship.  We saw what happened.  We need to get off Discovery.. ideally without fighting more of our crew..." he trailed off, even with the pounding outside.

"The Dominion War... millions of casualties.  Our generation was reduced, and we doubled our recruitment.  The majority of the fleet is less than 30.  Thats why they got Kinley and Dem and... well you know."

"Let's get off the ship.  We need to get to Spacedock.  Not only is it not part of the fleet system, but it also has the smallest amount of young officers.  We need to get to a shuttle." he stated, tapping his comm badge to reset the channel to the only open channel that worked. 99-Delta.

"All hands, this is the Captain.  The Discovery is under occupation." Prophets he hated that word, and his face grimaced hard. "If you can make it to a shuttle, do so.  Escape pods and transporters are out.  If you can't make it, secure your area and bunker down.  I say again, Discovery is lost.  Evacuate the ship."

He primed his phaser, and pointed to an area of the deck.  "Jefferies tube, Deck 10 has a crawlway for maintenance, and we can hit the shuttle bay to get out of here."

[Tekin Nevir]

[Bridge]

Saboteurs. Both on the Discovery and in the rest of the Fleet. No matter. The Drones would take care of the saboteurs on the ship and annihilate the remainder. Already there were reports of the Unassimilated attempting to congregate onto the  Discovery's Beta Bridge. Squadrons of drones were en route to rectify these anomalies.

The Excelsior, on the other hand, was another problem entirely. They had lost control of the ship to the Unassimilated and attempted to turn on the Borg fleet. Unacceptable parameters.  They would rectify the situation,  Drones 365970, 093298, 218634, and 421897 were given the orders to turn their ships on the Excelsior.

"œFire."

In a matter of minutes, the Excelsior was destroyed.

[Target: Eliminated]

[USS Discovery - Deck 1 - Main Bridge]

The unassimilated vessel was eliminated.

"Excelsior eliminated."

"All vessels secure."

"Fleetwide assimilation complete."

Each member of the Borg crew acted as one, continuing thoughts of each other. The Discovery started to turn in formation with the rest of the fleet as it got into an attack formation... facing Spacedock.  Weapons were being primed on orders from the Borg signal, through the Enterprise. A message called out through the rest of the fleet, either by comm, or worse, by feeling.

"A message to those who resist. Your armada has been added to our own. Your weak and willful will soon be eliminated. Your strongest have all been assimilated. We are Borg. Starfleet now is Borg."

[Lek]

"All hands, this is the Captain.  The Discovery is under occupation." Prophets he hated that word, and his face grimaced hard. "If you can make it to a shuttle, do so.  Escape pods and transporters are out.  If you can't make it, secure your area and bunker down.  I say again, Discovery is lost.  Evacuate the ship."

[Deck 7 - Antimatter Pod Storage - USS Discovery]

Lek heard the message from the Captain and while it did him good to hear he had survived, it destroyed him to know that Discovery had fallen. He didn't consider himself heroic and not really even that brave, but he was the Chief Engineer of the USS Discovery and he would not let the Borg have her.

"I'm not fool enough to try to fight the drones that have taken the ship, there are too many and I'm not a fighter, I am an engineer. No, I'm in the perfect place to stop this. If they find me, I will set my phaser to overload, that will breach the Anti-Matter Pod and that will be as good as a warp core breach. THEY WILL NOT HAVE MY SHIP!"

He snarled and hunkered down to see if he'd have to put his plan into action.

[Dem Broadshire]

Commander Rayek tr'Lhoell
[USS Discovery-B - Deck One - Bridge] Stardate 78288.5  (April 16, 2401)

For a moment, when the Risan pilot had thrown himself in a tackle towards the Borg-doctor, Rayek thought that he might reach the locker first.   It wasn't to be though, as the drone-doctor recovered faster than even Rayek anticipated.  Before the Romulan could think to alter his action, the Borg who once was Broadshire, had a phaser rifle aimed up towards him.

With only two meters between them the phaser was fired, even as Rayek threw himself down into a feet first slide across the bridge's carpeted floor so that the phaser beam passed just overhead, his momentum closing the distance.  As he slid on his back towards the drone, the Romulan kicked out at the rifle in Dem's hand sending it flying before the assimilated medic could attempt to use it again; and then kicked a second time - this time towards the Borg's head in an attempt to 'stun' the drone long enough so that Rayek could get to his feet once more.

As he kicked, Rayek heard the Captain calling for a retreat to the turbolift.  Though Rayek hated to admit defeat here, the odds were not in their favor if they stayed.  Rolling away from the Dem-drone, Rayek rose to his feet and did a quick glance about to determine his best route of escape.   He spied the dropped phaser rifle on the floor between him and the pilot, in a direct path to the turbolift.  Convenient.  Rayek snatched for the weapon in passing and used it as a bludgeon to knock away other drones attempting to block his way to Lieutenant Grippen.

"Get up, Lieutenant.  We gotta go!". Behind them, Rayek could hear the Captain's remorse at having noticed Garrison's assimilation.

Rayek crouched by the turbolift doors and used the muzzle of the rifle pressed against the doorway to keep the lift doors open while the remaining unaffected officers made their escape into the lift.   "Move it everyone! Graham! Ramort! You too Lachlyn! We can't defend here."

Eventually they were inside the turbolift and on the way to the Beta Bridge. The ensign's frustrated question, didn't have an answer.  Rayek did however attempt to respond to the Captain.   "It seems this is the Changeling threat that Picard was trying to warn us about.  Somehow they have managed to assimilate a large portion of the crew."

The Romulan paused to think a moment.  "Captain, it is likely that the Borg will seek to secure the ship by taking over all three of her bridges, as well as engineering and the armory." Those would be his first targets in a boarding action if he had to take over Discovery.  He didn't say not to go to the Beta Bridge - he just needed the Captain to be aware that they would likely encounter opposition there as well.

"What weapons did we manage to salvage?" he asked, displaying the hard-fought for phaser rifle.  He'd needed to know what they had to work with if the Captain intended for this small group to take and hold the Beta Bridge.

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NPC Crewman Kitaa Horg/Drone 356700
USS Discovery - Deck 5 - Alpha Hull Medical Facilities]

Annihilate all the Non-Assimilated.   That was the directive.

Drone 356700 knew the directive.

It noted the presence of a Non-Assimilated in its vicinity and moved towards the Denobulan female.  Lacking an energy weapon, the Collective would use this drone's superior strength to crush the Non-Assimilated's head with its hands.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

NPC Dr. Misha Sluchaynyy
USS Discovery - Deck 9 (Beta Hull) - Sickbay ]

"You have  knack forrr underrrstatement, Tanarrr,"  the elderly Russian commented to the Romulan, addressing him not by his family name was common, but rather the man's personal name.  In the short time the Romulan had been aboard, Misha had grown to consider the other doctor a close comrade.

He frowned as he looked at the momentarily stunned medics that littered the Sickbay floor.  "What is going on vith  crrrew?" he asked, then as if answering is own question he offered up a thought.  "If I had to hazarrrd  guess, I'd say zey verrre assimilated but I don't have clue how since none have been exposed to  Borrrg nanites as farrr as I kan tell."

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

NPC PO2 Helga Tragnar/Drone 356698
[USS Discovery - Deck 2 - Armory]

"We are the Borg"

Annihilate all the Non-Assimilated.

Drone 356698 - an assimilated hybrid species containing Human and Klingon genetics - surveyed the armory.  Through the hive mind, 356698 noted the presence of another drone - 356697 - Human genetics.

[Non-target]

No others were in the armory.

Armory secure Drone 356698 announced to the Collective.

A moment later, there was sound at the armory doors as they were forced open by some determined Starfleet security officers intent on gaining weapons to defend themselves against the Borg invasion.   Unfortunately for them their former crewmates within were already assimilated.

[Bridge | USS Discovery]

Communication lost with the collective

Reestablishing link

Dem's drone reactivated just in time to find Commander tr'Lhoell scrambling away from him, and after accessing memory processors, Dem found that he had been kicked three centimetres under the temporal lobe, partially fracturing the skull. This process was completed in less than a second, and Dem had already redrawn his phaser and open fired on all retreating crew, firing a critical blow Ensign Gabrial Ignace, who stopped in his tracks. All other command staff escaped.

The drone took a few moments to calculate the possible destinations of the crew, cross referencing his bodies memories and current crew movements, to surmise a most likely outcome. Dem communicated with the collective again, before moving to the turbolift along with several drones.

Drones converge on Alpha bridge, Gamma bridge, Delta bridge, Engineering, Shuttlebays.

[M'Nia]

[USS Discovery - Jeffries tube 21 engineering section

"Let's get off the ship.  We need to get to Spacedock.  Not only is it not part of the fleet system, but it also has the smallest amount of young officers.  We need to get to a shuttle." he stated, tapping his comm badge to reset the channel to the only open channel that worked. 99-Delta.

"All hands, this is the Captain.  The Discovery is under occupation." Prophets he hated that word, and his face grimaced hard. "If you can make it to a shuttle, do so.  Escape pods and transporters are out.  If you can't make it, secure your area and bunker down.  I say again, Discovery is lost.  Evacuate the ship."

He primed his phaser, and pointed to an area of the deck.  "Jefferies tube, Deck 10 has a crawlway for maintenance, and we can hit the shuttle bay to get out of here."

M'nia did not like what she heard. The discovery? Lost? It was a sad day indeed. However felt comfortable replying on that channel. "Captain, this is Lt. JG M'nia. I made it to the Jeffries tube in one piece. I can make it to  the shuttle bay from here. Any word from lt. Cmdr Lek?" she said as she started to make her way through the tube system. She had to minimize her time on the regular decks as it was too risky. Fortunately she knew enough to get from here to there. Still this was nerve wracking. Several of her friends and colleagues had been assimilated somehow. She didn't know if it was revers able of not or what was going to happen but she would do her best to get to that shuttle bay and pray to K'tal that everyone would be alright in the end.

[Malik Grippen]

Upon the Commander's order, he quickly grabbed a med kit from the back wall and headed to Lieutenant Grippen. First scanning him, then beginning to apply some mild localized sedatives so he could continue, then starting a basic subdermal regeneration to stop the bleeding. It was beyond his capabilities to go into any aesthetic surgery and Lt. Grippen would have a remaining hole until they got to some proper medical facility but the bleeding at least stopped.

[Beta Bridge]

The relief was immediate as the pain sedatives worked their magic, 25th century medicine truly was a marvel. Malik rubbed his eyes clear and straightened back his hair trying to compose himself. "Ensign Ramort, isn't it? You have my thanks. Things aren't usually this bad by the way..." alluding to their current desperate situation.

Malik stood back to his feet still covered in blood most of which was his own, he must have appeared quite the spectacle as he listened to the captain. Malik couldn't help but feel they were giving up to easily, surely they had to take the fight to the Borg in some way and abandoning ship just felt wrong. But if they needed to escape via shuttle's, then they were going to need a couple of good unassimilated-pilots.

He nodded to Alex, "If we're flying out of here, lets do it. We just need to make it to the shuttlebay in one piece and give us time to power up and pre-flight whatever shuttles are currently functional. Assuming the damn Borg haven't infected them to." Flying through an enemy armada to a besieged space dock wasn't going to be easy, but Malik felt he and Alex were up to the task.

[Tanner Lachlyn]

As the new security Chief, it didn't seem like a good idea to start her journey by arguing with the Captain, but damn it, Tanner wanted to. There were so many unknown variables and his message could be helpful or harmful, depending on the situation that the people were in.

So far he'd ignored anything she'd said. Maybe it was the fact she hadn't earned any respect yet and was too new to matter. Looking at the access panel she chewed her lip anxiously. There was no way she could leave the ship without knowing what was going on with the rest of her staff. Tanner needed to know if they were all dead, if they were still fighting or if they needed help.

Still, she couldn't go off on her own without saying anything, "Sir, permission to utilize the Jeffries to do a small deck sweep before I make my way to the shuttle bay. I can at least get a feel for whats going on out there, which will ...ease my conscience about leaving."

Not that her conscience was much to anyone.

[Kinley Garrison]

[ USS Discovery - Deck 10 ]

Just the word 'borg' was enough to make Jettis sick to his stomach. The recap of what had happened in such a short time made it feel all too real, all over again. Taking a few steadying breaths, Jettis tried to keep his mind off of the obvious, off of what threatened to consume his thoughts.

"Lead the way then. We need weapons, and anyone else who's still alive will need them too. Even better if they're not documented." Unfortunately, that path would likely take them away from any other non-borg, but working with what they had, it was a good plan. "We have no comms, we'll have to be fast."

Following the lead of the two officers, the next dilemma pushed its way into Jettis' mind. Killing the borg meant killing crewmates. And even so, was there any hope of escape? They couldn't exactly hail another ship, or beam to the planet. Even jettisoning the lifepods wouldn't give them a fighting chance, but maybe if they could at least reclaim their ship and find the engineers. "Is there any way we can leave instructions for any survivors? Something they wouldn't recognize?"

[Turbolift]

[As Murphy]

Y-y-yeah. It's a plan." said Murphy, really hoping that the hallways weren't crawling with Borg, or worse, they'd have to go into a Jeffries, or WORSE, There'd be Borg in the Jeffries! That would be some kind of sick nightmare, that would be worse than what already was happening today.

"All hands, this is the Captain.  The Discovery is under occupation." Prophets he hated that word, and his face grimaced hard. "If you can make it to a shuttle, do so.  Escape pods and transporters are out.  If you can't make it, secure your area and bunker down.  I say again, Discovery is lost.  Evacuate the ship."

So, it looked like that question was answered. At least the Captain was not Borgified, and whoever was left was also headed for the shuttles. Good, at least there were some other people out there. now, if only they could get there. That was going to be the challenge.

Harrington opened up the turbolift door just a smidge. The hallways seemed relatively clear for now. It seems like any Borg were on the far end of the corridor. "œHypothetically, we might be able to go through the science labs and find something there to make a distraction before we run all the way down. I don't think they'd find that all that interesting while they're taking over the ship, and Vin once kept mentioning that there's some potentially flammable or interesting stuff in those chem cabinets, That'll give them something to deal with."