Through Uncharted Waters
Through Uncharted Waters
Chrysalis stood in a corridor leading off to an unknown section of the Borg ship. She walked slowly and carefully as she passed drone after drone, deep in their slumber within alcoves lined along the walls.
After fifty, she lost track of how many drones she had passed. She had seen fewer ponies at her almost wedding, than drones in that one hallway. At first she was afraid one of them might notice her sweating profusely, that is, until she realized most every drone’s skin had a slick sheen of some unknown substance stuck to them.
After twenty minutes had passed, she happened upon her first conscious Borg drone. She froze in place, completely forgetting everything that Picard had explained to her. The drone was walking in her direction and continued to do so; right passed her as though she wasn’t even there.
When the drone had moved far enough away, she breathed an audible sigh of relief. She then recalled the captain explaining how the drones would simply ignore her until she became a threat. She continued another forty meters until she came into a room with five conscious drones, hard at work.
Each drone was manipulating several green terminals. This looked like one of the rooms Picard tried to explain to her. She racked her brains trying to recall exactly what he said…
One hour and forty-five minutes before the Borg arrived at the Defensive Perimeter…
“Pay attention!” Picard said, growing impatient with the changeling.
Chrysalis was in fact paying attention, but honestly had no clue what she was paying attention to. “What am I looking at?” she asked.
“This room houses one of several Power Waveguide Conduits,” he explained. Notice the color of the node in ceiling. This color represents the conduit. The conduit controls the flow of information throughout the ship. Whenever you encounter one of these nodes, attach this device off to the side to avoid detection.”
Picard held up a tiny circular device. It was small enough to lose and difficult to see from far away. A small light was blinking in the center.
“When you’ve attached the device, push the light in the center. The light will turn off. It is now armed.”
“What does it do?” asked Chrysalis.
“This device uploads a Borg command to all drones within range of the conduit to go to sleep.” He held up another tiny circular device with a blinking light at its center. “This device, however, needs to be attached to all Power Distribution Nodes. Computer: Change to Borg Power Distribution Node room.”
At once the scene around them changed, but not by much. In fact, the only thing Chrysalis could discern was the device in the ceiling was now a different color.
“This room houses the Power Distribution Node which delivers power to all of their systems. You place this device on all of these nodes. They are micro-explosives design to disable the node. It is armed the same way. When in doubt, remember the colors of the two types of nodes.” He held up the two devices. “Put these devices on the red nodes, and these devices on the green ones. It is vital you get this right.”
…
Chrysalis looked up at the ceiling of the room. A red node stuck out from the center. Was this the Power Distribution node or the Power Wave Conduit? She couldn’t remember.
She started to panic. She was standing in the middle of the hall, in plain view of the drones operating the controls, but they seemed to remain blissfully ignorant to her presence. Even so, she still couldn’t shake the feeling they were well aware that she was an imposter.
She clumsily walked into the room, giving her best Borg impression she could manage, considering she’d only ever seen a ‘hologram’ of one before. She looked straight up at the node.
The red light glared back at her, mocking her as she tried to figure out which device was supposed to be attached to this. She reached to her sides where two secret compartments were attached. Opening one, she saw dozens of little devices with blinking lights. Opening the other, she saw dozens of different little devices with blinking lights.
She reached for one randomly and started to place it onto the node. She was about to click the light when she realized it was green. She took out the other device and noticed the light on it was red.
She blushed slightly, which was unimaginable for a Borg drone, before putting away the green-lighted one and attaching a red-lighted one to the red-lighted node instead. She pushed the light switch in, arming it. She had no idea if she had just armed a sleep spell or an explosive spell. But she at least hoped she guessed which device to use correctly.
She took another look around the room. The drones still seemed completely oblivious to her. She breathed a small sigh of relief and left for the next corridor.
“Ow!” said Rainbow Dash, rubbing her head. “That really hurts!”
The other ponies were collecting themselves in Ten Forward when the ship finally stopped shaking. Rarity had passed out cold. Rainbow was flying at the time of the first impact and slammed head-first into a wall. The other ponies were mostly okay with just small cuts and bruises.
Guinan came over from the bar to help them.
“Is everypony, all right?” she asked using the correct vernacular. She offered a bar napkin to Rainbow who reluctantly took it.
“We’re fine, but we frustrated!” Twilight said, helping Rarity back to her feet. “We came here to help the captain, not just sit in a bar.”
“Yeah!” Applejack agreed. “And for a bar, you should know, your cider has gone really rotten. I can’t even taste the apples in it!”
Guinan smiled and almost laughed. “I think I can get you something more to your liking.”
“Later,” said Twilight bitterly. “I want to see whoever’s in charge now.” Riker had just announced the captain’s incapacitation.
Guinan could see so much determination for such a young pony coming from her. She walked over to an intercom and said, “Guinan to the bridge.”
“Riker here Guinan,” came the reply. “Is there something you need?”
“Our Equestrian ambassador is requesting an audience.” She smiled at Twilight who didn’t get the joke.
“Now’s not a good time. When we have shields, weapons, and warp back, then I’ll come down.”
“I think you’ll want to hear what she has to say, Captain.”
“…Fine. Escort Twilight Sparkle to the bridge. Riker out.”
The channel closed abruptly.
“Thank you, Guinan,” said Twilight, “but how did you know how important what I had to say was?”
“In all the time I’ve spent tending to this bar, as you call it, I have encountered and listened to many different people from many different worlds. Eventually, I’ve come to learn quite a bit about them. Looking at you now, I know exactly how important your words are for both you and the acting captain.”
Five wooden mugs of steaming hot apple cider appeared in the replicator behind her.
“When did you…?” Twilight started to ask curiously.
“It’s the job of every bar tender know exactly what their patrons need most. Come, everypony. Enjoy your cider, and when you’ve finished, I will take you to the captain.”
All the ponies grabbed a steaming mug from the tray and took a sip.
“Oooo! Thank you!” cried Pinkie, throwing the piping hot cider straight down her gullet. “This is delicious!”
“Oh my!” Rarity exclaimed. “It is indeed, most delectable.”
“Well bust my hump and call me a griffin’s uncle! That is just what doctor ordered. Where’d ya get the apples to make this here recipe?”
“I may have sampled one of your apples from your bag earlier, Applejack,” said Guinan slyly. “I have to say they were one of the sweetest apples I have ever tasted.”
Applejack checked her bag and saw one apple was missing. “How did you…? When did you…? You know stealing is wrong!”
The replicator opened again with a fresh new apple. Guinan handed it to Applejack smiling. “My apologies. Please accept this new one as my gift.”
Examining it closely, Applejack could almost not tell the difference between this apple and her own. It was a bright shiny red, just soft enough for maximum ripeness and single bright green leaf attached to its end. She could sense the difference, but not enough for to complain.
“Well… I… Thank you, Guinan.”
“You’re welcome. Now enjoy your cider, and Twilight, when you’re finished, will go see Captain Riker.”
“Thank you Guinan,” said Twilight sipping the hot cider.
She had to admit, the warmth of the hot cider in her belly was precisely what she needed most at this exact moment.
Sweat dripped down from Chrysalis’s Borg forehead. She couldn’t understand how these things could possibly function in such heat. She needed to modify her appearance in some way if she was going to be able to survive in such a sweltering climate.
After she placed the fourteenth device on the fourteenth random node she happened upon, she couldn’t go on without doing something to cool herself off.
She found an area where all the alcoves were empty, and no drones were anywhere to be found. A green aura formed over her bald head. The mechanisms surrounding her body all twisted and maneuvered slightly. When they finished, everything looked nearly identical to the way it had been before, but now small air pockets were flooded throughout the suit, allowing for a constant breeze to pass through her. The air was still muggy and unbearably warm, but the breeze at least let her continue on for a little while longer.
The green aura faded. Chrysalis breathed deeply. The humid air made it so difficult to so. She crept back into the corridor and was about to press on, when she spotted no less than twelve drones blocking her path and closing in on her position.
They were still too far away to really notice her. She ducked back into the room and tried to think. The room only was composed of a bunch of empty alcoves. Chrysalis recalled from Picard’s lecture that the Borg use the alcoves in the same manner as she consumes love. With little time remaining, she hobbled over to one of the empty slots and tried to climb in.
She pressed her feet back until they locked into place. Her back arched and locked in. She closed her eyes and tilted her head back until it rested onto the plate with miniature green lightning shooting through it.
At once she felt a strange surge. Though she was merely a chameleon of a Borg drone, her copies were exact enough for the energy to flow through the suit’s mechanisms, charging them.
She hadn’t realized just how hungry she was. She was alone on a ship where love was just another of a bunch of nonexistent emotions. She hadn’t expected the energy to feed her, but was grateful when she felt the rush of energy flowing into her. She almost forgot the reason why she was standing in the charging station. Until she could hear several drones’ feet shuffling as they neared to within a meter or two away from her.
“If you should ever find yourself in a dire situation, I can give you this one chance,” Picard explained from the Holodeck.
He held up a very different device from the little circular ones he had been explaining to her earlier. This device was a square box with all different kinds of lights blinking away merrily. Chrysalis couldn’t make heads or tails of it.
“What does it do?” she asked.
“If you are in imminent danger, with no hope of escaping, activate this device. It will trigger what’s called an EMP blast. All of the devices, the Borg, their technology, everything that carries electricity readily will shut down around you.”
“That sounds like a very powerful magic,” said Chrysalis. “Why do we not simply use this ‘EMP’ across the entire Borg ship?”
“It’s complicated, I’m afraid...” Picard tried to think of a good way to explain. “If you were at war with an enemy, and that enemy begins firing arrows at your city constantly, what would you do?”
“I would use my magic to deflect them right back at the enemy, of course.”
Chrysalis could not draw any connections from this explanation to the device.
Picard had to rephrase. “What would other, non-magical, ponies do if they faced that same situation?”
Chrysalis paused to think. She shrugged. “I suppose they would construct shields to protect themselves.”
“Exactly! Now, how long would you say it would take to make enough shields for everyone?”
“Several days at least with no magic.”
“Now for you, magic speeds that time up considerably. For the Borg, technology does. Now matter what trick we come up with: arrows, cannons, phasers, EMP, etc., they always come up with shields to protect them in a very short amount of time.”
“Okay…” Chrysalis nodded, unsurely.
“The Borg have long since created shields to protect itself from EMP, so using it against the ship will not work.”
“Then how would it work for me?”
“Inside this device is a shield frequency disruptor. The device will analyze the drones’ current shield frequencies and momentarily disrupt them long enough for the EMP to work.”
Chrysalis was vaguely starting to comprehend the captain, but this was all well above of her level of understanding.
“I still don’t see why we wouldn’t just use this device against the whole ship then,” she persisted.
“An individual drone takes a certain amount of time to process the information and come up with a solution to the problem. Thousands of drones working together simultaneously across the entire ship would arrive at the solution before the weapon could even be fired. This trick will only work on a small scale, and it will only work once.”
“Only once?”
“Once this device is used against them, the other Borg will become immediately become aware of it and quickly devise a counter to it. Not to mention that the device itself would be destroyed by the EMP blast.”
“So you’re giving me a weapon that will only work once and immediately alert the entire ship to my presence?”
“Correct. But I’m afraid it’s a little worse than that.”
“How much worse could it get!?” Chrysalis shouted angrily.
“If you use this device, any remaining devices you carry, both the virus and the explosive, will become useless. So remember, this is a last minute, no way out defense. And once you use it, you will be on the run…”
Chrysalis was trying to hold her breath as they neared her. She kept one hand on the EMP device, her finger a twitch away from triggering it.
The drones were not speaking out loud, but somehow, she knew they were talking about her. She cracked her eyelid the tiniest bit. A Borg drone was staring at her. She could hear the others proceeding to their alcoves.
“How stupid could I be?” she thought. “I’m probably standing in this thing’s bed!”
Sure enough, after a moment, the Borg spoke audibly. His voice was sharp, deep, and carried the voices of more than one person. “You are not in the correct designated regeneration alcove, and your link to the hive mind has been severed. Proceed to Sector 5027 for Subspace Transceiver repair and general diagnostic.”
Chrysalis blinked her eyes open. She nearly froze, but held on as tight as she could to her focus. She stepped off the Alcove, stiffly, feeling the drain of the energy flow dissipating as she did, and proceeded back out into the corridor. She turned and saw the Borg who spoke climbing into his alcove.
Chrysalis quickly remembered her finger was a centimeter away from triggering the EMP device, and moved it away. She disarmed it and continued onward in search of the next node.
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Hmm... Quiet week... Bad chapter?
3417487
Not at all. You captured the tension and the challenges of using technology millennia beyond Chryssy's understanding quite nicely. Still, while this was a very nicely written bit of setup and transition, nothing much actually happened. There just isn't much to comment on.
That said, I'm definitely looking forward to more. Especially if/when Chrysalis runs into Celestus.
3420747
Me too!
With so many storylines slowly progressing side-by-side - it takes a long while to move a short distance. Hopefully I'm not losing people along the way, myself included. (In this chapter, I accidentally put Fluttershy in with the rest of the ponies on the enterprise before remembering there is no "Future-Fluttershy"!
)
just keep cool, Chrysalis. Oh wait
You can't. 98.7 degrees Fahrenheit, I believe it was 72% humidity...
I wonder if Chrysalis will run into Celestus? I hope not. Good thing Borg drones aren't very smart and have never encountered Changelings.
he explained. Notice the color of the node in ceiling.
1. Notice the colour of the node in the ceiling. Forgot your opening quotation mark.