"Regeneration"

Posted on Mon Mar 14th, 2011 @ 4:50pm by Lieutenant Three of Seven

Mission: Shore Leave 1: Pacifica
Location: USS Arizona
Timeline: Following "Consequences"

Other than the puzzling distraction by Captain Cowell that had necessitated the backflow and flooding of two sets of personal quarters, the drone could now gaze over a hard night's work. More than a typical nocturnal period implied, by working non-stop since the time that Cowell had approved the re-design, Three could now step back and appreciate the fruits of that labor. With bioneural circuitry now alleviating processing redundancies, the waste matter reclamation and hazardous material processing core of the starship was now operating several times above the Starfleet Corps of Engineers approved criteria for the class. When it had finished the final diagnostics to ensure full operation as intended, Three would have to submit the re-design to Starfleet. More likely however only a Borg could appreciate the efficiency of flushing a toilet with a one-point-seven-eight percent energy savings over the rest of the fleet.

And Three didn't even make use of the ship's toilets.

Well, not usually anyway. Gazing down over its well soiled form, Three could already see that this was one pair of engineering coveralls that would be getting recycled. If not incinerated. And its own physical housing would require a scrubbing in the sonic shower, another facility that Three didn't make use of as frequently as its biological counterparts.

As the last of the diagnostics came back with reports of full functionality, Three brought the improved waste processing system on-line. And perhaps not a moment too soon. With his random behavior, it wouldn't surprise Three if Cowell began recalling personnel from the surface.

With his task complete Three traveled back to the spartan personal space which it had been allotted. Barely through the doors, the drone removed its clothing and promptly had the material disintegrated before moving into the small bathroom attached to the empty abode. The sonic pulses did a quick and adequate job of scrubbing the outer coating of Three's physical body. Emerging only a minute later from the water-less shower, the drone passed in front of the bathroom mirror. It was a wall hanging the Borg passed by on a number of occasions coming and going from the sonic shower.

What was odd about this occasion was that Three paused to glance at it's reflection.

Any other time, Three was content to not give a nanosecond of thought to a physical appearance. Three was... Three. Not male. Not female. Yet Captain Cowell seemed to insist that there was something incorrect about believing that to be the total equation, that Three could not be a whole person without having an assigned gender. So perhaps Three neglected its individuality by avoiding believing itself to be a person. Yet all outward appearances would have been seemingly to the contrary.

Any such truths about its 'person' were only skin deep however. And arguably not even so in his case, being that the skin in question was actually a kind of latex polymer. The hand a duranium wire frame that supported an array of isolinear conduits and optical data fiber controlling the locomotion and gyros that provided the drone movement. Three controlled the physical unit through neurological impulses, relayed through the nanites his Borg implants produced and used to maintain the functionality of the disembodied brain. But, in the end, that was really the only part of Three that was genuinely real.

Was that enough to be deemed a 'person'?

There were seemingly only two answers to that question, though Three feared either for the same reasons. None of which were logical or orderly, which made it all the more reason why the Borg preferred to not dwell on the issue. Making its way to the make-shift alcove that Three had made for itself through the assimilation and adaption of power cells and what was normally intended as a replicator interface, the drone plugged itself into the ship for a much needed respite that would exchange the physical world for a virtual reality.

"Computer, begin regeneration cycle," the drone ordered aloud.

Darkness came.

Not the literal absence of light, but the ethereal stuff of nightmares and myth; the shadow of that place from which dreams stemmed and fears were made manifest through memory and emotion. Some not its own, but recollections only partially remembered from the many decades during which the drone had subsisted as a single drop in a larger pool of consciousness.

Voices still heard, faintly, like shadows on the wall.