'ROU(t) It's One of Ours.'
Space looked empty around me but I knew it wasn't. I didn't think as much firepower had ever been in the same spot before since...since possibly ever.
Not that you could tell. Not only was everyone sitting under cloak, but also to minimize the chance of detection, everyone was under minimum emission protocols. For all we knew, the Borg might be able to see straight through the cloaks so we wanted to minimize their willingness to pay attention to us.
Continue to that nicely energy-radiating shipyards by Andoria. Go on.
The Borg kept coming.
That big Cube had been visible hours ago and was slowly approaching the system. The plan was to attack when it dropped out of warp at the edge of the Andorian System. Nobody wanted to try to fight the damn thing in warp.
The Cube was big and scary, but right now I just wanted the damn thing to get here so we could kick its collective arse.
Heh! Need to remember that one!
Running a full weapon system diagnostic for the fifth time at the last minute, I idly watched the big thing approach at high warp.
Nervous or not, I just wanted it to get here. There was only so many games of poker you could play against the ship computer before you got bored out of your processor and started to count stars.
That's it, as soon as this is over, I'm flirting one of the Islands into installing a small holodeck on me. Dancing in Starlight invented one, one of those puppy decks would be perfect. Being able to use one of those on another ship in a task-force during downtime was one thing, but for stuff like this, I rather wanted my own holodeck.
Sooner or later, you simply ran out of books and TV series you wanted to watch.
Diagnostics finished.
Borg cube thirty seconds from engagement point.
I started another weapons diagnostic. Thirty seconds was bloody ages.
Honestly, checking my torpedoes was completely pointless at this point. They checked out the last hundred and five times I did it. It wouldn't be any different this time. It was just a nervous reaction.
If this ambush didn't work, I would die ramming the cube. My secondary core was ejected and well out of range with the search and rescue group already.
There was no way I wanted to keep that anywhere close to the Borg. If I went into ramming and ejected it, they might be able to snatch it before it managed to warp away.
Even if it meant these last hours of memory go lost, at least the backup of my personality is safe.
Almost there.
Come on.
I followed the Cube with passive scanners as it dropped out of warp, continuing on sublight. It was massive.
None of us have ever engaged a real Borg vessel before. Oh, I did it in the holodeck like everyone else, but seeing the real thing was a completely different thing.
Three kilometers on each side. Twenty seven cubic kilometers of hostile alien collective.
Data conclusive. Cube class vessel. Signature and size match previous encounters. Minor variations. Shields...stronger than anything I had ever seen. Then again, it was the largest mobile ship I had ever seen as well.
Compared to that thing, a Island class was tiny.
Even through my dread, I couldn't help but wonder how it would be to be that big. To have thousands of people on board. Tens of thousands.
...Nah.
Of course, having a crew would be awesome, but anything larger than a Defiant? No way. Too sluggish.
I have run exercises against Galaxies and Islands before. They could barely maneuver at all. Let's hope that applied to this thing as well.
If not, this might turn into a fair fight.
Fuck fair fights.
At current speed, two seconds until engagement position.
One second.
The Cube started to transmit on all subspace frequencies, "We are the Borg. Y..."
Dropping my cloak, I blew most of my forward hull covering off, leaving only a lattice of supports as I launched my entire complement of photon torpedo while starting evasive maneuvers...spinning and rolling as I launched everything I had in a massive alpha strike.
All two hundred and fifty of them.
I wasn't the only one.
All around the cube the trap snapped shut as hundreds of other ROUs did the exact same thing. Dropped cloak and fired everything they had at it.
Thousands of warheads, the majority photons, but hundreds of quantum warheads as well smashed into the massive enemy vessel as a wave of primordial fire.
Adapt to this, you fucker.
The Cube was big. The Cube was strong. The Cube was powerful.
But absolutely nothing could withstand the absolute antimatter fury that converged on its position. The warheads detonated and for two point three seconds, I was blind and couldn't see a thing as my sensors rebooted.
Tracking the previous courses of the other ships in range, I kept maneuvering, trying to pick the paths I would be least likely to run into any of them.
Until target is confirmed dead, don't stop moving.
When I could receive data again, there was nothing left.
Radiation, dust. Gases. Trace minerals. The largest part I could even detect was ten meters across and seemed like it had belonged to some kind of reactor casing.
Huh.
Well, that was anticlimactic. As much as I hate fair fights, I really expected more from the Borg.
ROU(t) 'Hold my Beer and Watch This' opened a wide band channel, "What was that? We are the Borg. Y... what? I didn't quite catch that."
U.S.S. 'High Resistance Zone' opened a channel as well. "Stop taunting the wreckage," she chided her.
"Why? Can it hurt me?"
"No, it's just tacky."
I just laughed at them and did a happy roll, glad to be alive and not having lost any friends.
AN// Big thanks to Rastamon for betaing this section.
