Resistance - J.M. Dillard [58]
The second drone approached from the side, his limb terminating in a double-edged rotating blade. He aimed it menacingly at the center of Picard’s chest.
Instinctively, the captain flinched at first. And then he set his jaw and straightened.
“Yes,” he croaked. “Kill me. Go ahead.” Better to die than to give them access to his mind, and the location of the Enterprise, and critical data about Starfleet. Better to die than to become one of them again; he would not be the cause of another Wolf 359, would not be used against the Enterprise. Worf would see the ship safely home; humankind would rally and defeat the enemy yet a third time.
He bared his chest and moved forward, embracing the blade, wondering whether it was capable of penetrating Locutus’s molded black carapace.
It was. Its bite was stunningly painful, even to his transformed Borg body. His muscles, his internal organs spasmed intensely; his eyes widened at the accompanying fleeting flash of light. He fought to draw in air and found it tainted with his blood. Even so, he found the will and strength to press forward, to force the blade in deeper, to his heart.
Before his vision dimmed entirely, he sensed the drones moving around him, catching him as he fell. He lifted his face and saw that of the Borg queen, frowning.
He surrendered to darkness, praying the blow had been fatal.
9
PICARD WOKE LYING ON A BED. THE BORG CARAPACE covering his chest had been removed, and the chalky skin beneath it was pristine, unscarred, as if it had never been pierced and torn. There was no pain at all, not even from the broken arm.
The worst possible thing had happened. He had failed, this just as Janeway and T’Lana had predicted. Had he let his desire for revenge blind him to the inevitability of this outcome?
The fact that he had not died filled him with unspeakable frustration, unspeakable fury. He tried to rise and found himself bound by heavy restraints. Vainly, he thrashed against them, near weeping with rage and self-loathing. The one promise he had made to himself—that he would never allow himself to be used again to hurt his own kind—was about to be broken.
He took only a small degree of comfort to find that the neutralizer chip was still functioning—for the moment.
He was no longer in the birthing chamber but in an open area, next to a single white, solitary wall. Macabre surgical instruments—drills, saws, scalpels, useful for fashioning flesh as well as metal—hung ready for use. Their chilling significance was not lost on him.
And he had exchanged positions with the queen. He was now supine while she stood looking down at him. He was all too aware that the bed was in fact a diagnostic table; he glanced up and saw the monitors tracking his life functions.
The queen had assumed her body and wore it gracefully, naturally, with a dancer’s bearing. Her face and eyes—so unlike those of others of her race—were utterly alive, shining with humor, confidence, pride, rippling with subtler nuances of emotion. High-spirited, he might have called her, in another century, under different circumstances.
Her features wore a thick layer of shimmering gel, remnants of the chrysalis.
He yearned to reach out, as he had only a few years before, and with his own hands snap her lovely neck, watch as her shining eyes flickered and dimmed. He had the strength of a Borg now. He could do it so easily, if only he could lift his arms…
“So,” she said, the corners of her lips curving upward with dark amusement. Her tone was playful, her voice feminine, alluring, the whisper of thousands speaking as one. “There’s a human expression, isn’t there? The third time is the charm…?”
She reached down and laid a glistening hand upon his shoulder. Her touch was cold and moist, a toad’s; he recoiled from it. She gave a small, easy laugh.
“You’ve come back, as you were always meant to. I sensed you, you know. Even before I was born. I came to life before I was quite ready, just for you.
“Have you come willingly to me, now? It’s how I’ve always wanted you: willing,