The Borg undoubtedly have a rough idea where the dead cube is and it is likely they will send a cube to reclaim the scrap at some point. Nobody has any idea on the timeline or likelihood of that, but putting some limit in place makes sense.
I can't imagine any way of estimating a timeline on that that could make 2 hours sensible. The timeline for the cube being dead has to be more than one order of magnitude longer than that (otherwise it wouldn't be cooled down, and would be inside an apocalyptic space lightning storm if the running hypothesis for why it's dead is correct). Hanging around it forever would be dumb, but fleeing in exactly 2 hours for fear of the borg without more signs than they have would be dumber.
I know borg nanotechnology is basically magic, but irl basically no nanotech more complex than carbon nanotubes would have survived the current required to fry this whole ship and everything living in it, not without being stored in some heavily shielded area at any rate
I don't remember the details of what ails the Vidiians, but I think the nanoprobes would solve the symptoms but not the cause of the disease. Having said that, from a Borg perspective the Vidiians would be a massive resource sink to keep a Vidiian drone, and so I don't think they would bother. It would count as a defective drone and the Borg could use those resources elsewhere to better effect.
The Vidiians have a couple or three advanced tech areas, at least one of which the Borg have no use for. Their "medical transporter guns" could be used by the Borg to deliver Borg nano and implants directly to potential future Borg drones without the need to get into me!ee range. If I were running the Borg I'd grab that tech, then lose all interest in them.
True. Those words tend to bite you in the face.
Seeing as the Federation etc. don't have Transporters, do the Vidiians have those guns, or are they using an alternative tech? I'm guessing the Borg don't have Transporters (I think if they did it'd have been clearer, in-story).
Oh, good point. I forgot about that bit, although frankly I would put Borg on a level approaching the anomalous powers / supertech lost civilizations and I'd expect them to have transporters even if the current mainline civilizations don't. I mean, Q doesn't take a shuttle like some sort of pleb, surely?
Actually, thing about electrical current is it's extremely easy to shield even by accident. A highly conductive path from in to out that doesn't run through your vitals basically does it so long as the conductor doesn't vaporize before the dischange ends. it's hard to imagine how an electrical discharge could have killed everyone inside the spaceship while leaving the spaceship structurally intact, TBH, unless they build these ships with non-conductive structural and hull materials.
I'd expect Borg nanoprobes to eat almost any biological attack nearly as effectively as Zephyr's immune system, but IDK what the canon on Borg vs. organic disease is.
Luckily, it wasn't an electrical surge. It was ions from a pulsar, which caused the tech to self-fry. The tech frying itself is what caused the electrical issues.
This post is the only time the word 'pulsar' appears in this entire thread, so...that's sure not a thing the story has told us.
No, it was an electrical discharge from passing through a nearby nebula, at least that's what the Voyager crew theorized.
Borg Queen: "Why did you put that cube on cement blocks?"
The thing is that the defense against high-energy electrical discharge isn't insulation, it's the opposite. You make sure that it can ground through you without hurting you.
It's space. There's nowhere to ground to. Or rather, the borg cube was the ground.
Ah, but there's your problem: you were right the first time, there's no ground. The cube isn't ground. It's microscopic compared to the discharge.
Induction heating, maybe. You might have a path for the discharge but the resulting magnetics are going to be wild.
Might be wise not to forget subspace? We don't know how massive electrical discharges might interact with that - basically a matter of author judgement?
The TK levitation ability (providing a flight assist), and the fire breath might suggest not being boring?
He is a psychic flying lizard, of the classic Star Trek "it isn't magic, it is psionics" type. Psychic gravity-manipulation abilities linked to his wings to allow flight, and psychic pyrokinesis linked to his throat and mouth to allow flames. Though he has only managed flames once, AFAIK, and doesn't know how to do it again. As per all Star Trek psychics, he doesn't really have the ability to expand his powers; he has what he has, and can learn to use it better, but won't gain new abilities. Perhaps he can warp his gravity-negating power to allow limited telekinesis by using gravity? Considering that his claws aren't dexterous enough for fine manipulation and are too strong for most lighter materials something like that would be basically required for the high-technology we have found.
Might want to re-read the camping-while-repairs episodes? Didn't he light fires with his breath weapon? I think he's got a bit of a handle on it, but...
