Borg questions (Spoliers)

[Nerroth]

Hi.


I picked up another copy of The Buried Age (it sems my first copy is back in Ireland, oops) and after reading through it, have a fresh appreciation for how brilliant a piece of work it is.


However, a few of the parts I noticed this time around left a few questions open, relating to the Borg.

*When the Manraloth scout encountered the Collective, it was noted that the Borg took a stasis bubble with them through a transwarp conduit - though Giriaenn was doubtful the Collective would have much luck in prizing it open.

Does this bubble appear in any of the subsequent Borg stories - and, indeed, could it remain unactivated in the remains of what had been Collective space in the post-Destiny era?


*One point which was reinforced in my mind in The Buried Age was the longevity of the El-Aurians - many of whom were already centuries-old by the time the Borg assimilated their home system.

However, with what happens to the Borg in Destiny, would El-Auria be among the worlds liberated - and if so, would there still be a large proportion of the population who would have lived prior to their assimilation?

Further, the Borg don't seem to mind spreading their drones around - so there may be El-Aurian former-drones scattered across Collective space. Would this be a fair assessment?


*There's a note that the real Derian was lost when the homeworld fell. Is there any source to explain whether she was lost as in killed, or lost as in assimilated - and if the latter, could she be alive in the Delta Quadrant as one of the liberated former-drones?

 

[Paris]

I don't think any of these questions have been answered yet. Hopefully Christopher picks up some of those pieces in another story one day.

And I agree about The Buried Age. It's a great read

 

[Christopher]

I picked up another copy of The Buried Age (it sems my first copy is back in Ireland, oops) and after reading through it, have a fresh appreciation for how brilliant a piece of work it is.

Aw, shucks. Thanks so much.

*When the Manraloth scout encountered the Collective, it was noted that the Borg took a stasis bubble with them through a transwarp conduit - though Giriaenn was doubtful the Collective would have much luck in prizing it open.

Does this bubble appear in any of the subsequent Borg stories - and, indeed, could it remain unactivated in the remains of what had been Collective space in the post-Destiny era?

No, it hasn't been mentioned since. As I recall, the "ascended" Manraloth were working to solve the problem of freeing the occupants of the stasis bubbles. I'd think that, at the very least, they would've rescued that one from the Borg and taken it somewhere safe.

*One point which was reinforced in my mind in The Buried Age was the longevity of the El-Aurians - many of whom were already centuries-old by the time the Borg assimilated their home system.

However, with what happens to the Borg in Destiny, would El-Auria be among the worlds liberated - and if so, would there still be a large proportion of the population who would have lived prior to their assimilation?

Further, the Borg don't seem to mind spreading their drones around - so there may be El-Aurian former-drones scattered across Collective space. Would this be a fair assessment?

My understanding is that the Caeliar didn't so much restore the assimilated drones to their previous form as absorb them into the Caeliar gestalt. So I don't think there would be a bunch of El-Aurian ex-drones running around, no. They'd be Caeliar now.

 

[Nerroth]

I picked up another copy of The Buried Age (it sems my first copy is back in Ireland, oops) and after reading through it, have a fresh appreciation for how brilliant a piece of work it is.

Aw, shucks. Thanks so much.

Actually, I wonder what Sir Patrick would think of it himself, were he ever inclined to read it...

(It would work really well as an animated mini-series, in my view - or even as an audio play.)

*When the Manraloth scout encountered the Collective, it was noted that the Borg took a stasis bubble with them through a transwarp conduit - though Giriaenn was doubtful the Collective would have much luck in prizing it open.

Does this bubble appear in any of the subsequent Borg stories - and, indeed, could it remain unactivated in the remains of what had been Collective space in the post-Destiny era?

No, it hasn't been mentioned since. As I recall, the "ascended" Manraloth were working to solve the problem of freeing the occupants of the stasis bubbles. I'd think that, at the very least, they would've rescued that one from the Borg and taken it somewhere safe.

At the very least, I might imagine that they'd keep an 'eye' on it - given their access to the broader timeline, they'd be able to see if the Borg would have made their way in before the events of Destiny took place.

If they can't, maybe an effort they may choose to make to rescue their in-stasis colleagues might not occur in the physical universe until the post-Destiny era?

*One point which was reinforced in my mind in The Buried Age was the longevity of the El-Aurians - many of whom were already centuries-old by the time the Borg assimilated their home system.

However, with what happens to the Borg in Destiny, would El-Auria be among the worlds liberated - and if so, would there still be a large proportion of the population who would have lived prior to their assimilation?

Further, the Borg don't seem to mind spreading their drones around - so there may be El-Aurian former-drones scattered across Collective space. Would this be a fair assessment?

My understanding is that the Caeliar didn't so much restore the assimilated drones to their previous form as absorb them into the Caeliar gestalt. So I don't think there would be a bunch of El-Aurian ex-drones running around, no. They'd be Caeliar now.

But what would that mean for El-Auria itself, or for any of the planets in the Delta Quadrant turned into Borg worlds?

Would they now lie uninhabited, waiting for someone else to come in and claim them - or would they retain the kind of ecological alteration seen on Earth in First Contact, and thus take a lot of effort to be made viable for colonisation (by some species, at least) once more?


Essentially, if Guinan went to post-Destiny El-Auria, what would be there waiting for her?

 

[Christopher]

^Based on what we've seen, I figure a Borg-assimilated world would be rendered pretty much uninhabitable. They've wiped out everything natural and replaced it with tech; take the tech away and you've got a barren rock.

 

[Nerroth]

That's gonna leave things pretty interesting in the post-Destiny Delta Quadrant - rather than the vast Collective bearing down on the non-assimilated species' collective neck-analogues, they'd be left with immense swathes of what would amount to be dead zones.

Oh, by the way - are the transwarp conduits gone too, or did they get left behind? (If the Borg-built portals on one or both ends aren't there anymore, would they dissipate naturally, or remain the way the ones for the Vaadwaur have?)

 

[Christopher]

Well, it's unclear whether any of the transwarp network survived "Endgame." But my guess would be that the hubs were needed to keep the conduits open, so without them, the conduits fail.

As for the Vaadwaur corridors, I hinted in The Buried Age that they're a surviving remnant of the Manraloth's galactic travel network (or rather, that of the greater galactic metacivilization of which the Manraloth were a key part).

 

[foravalon]

My understanding is that the Caeliar didn't so much restore the assimilated drones to their previous form as absorb them into the Caeliar gestalt. So I don't think there would be a bunch of El-Aurian ex-drones running around, no. They'd be Caeliar now.

What's the deal with the former borg survivors that were found and killed by Nakahara of the U.S.S Hood in Singular Destiny? Soon-tek Han and the rest?

 

[LightningStorm]

My interpretation of what happened was that the Caeliar did return each drone to their former selves, but then gave them all the choice to join the gestalt or go on their own. And most of them decided to go ahead and do that since their old lives weren't likely to be still around and ready to jump back into.

 

[downinabluefunk]

My interpretation of what happened was that the Caeliar did return each drone to their former selves, but then gave them all the choice to join the gestalt or go on their own. And most of them decided to go ahead and do that since their old lives weren't likely to be still around and ready to jump back into.

I wonder what Picard would have chosen if he'd somehow remained Locutus until a time the Caeliar could have been contacted.

 

[foravalon]

My interpretation of what happened was that the Caeliar did return each drone to their former selves, but then gave them all the choice to join the gestalt or go on their own. And most of them decided to go ahead and do that since their old lives weren't likely to be still around and ready to jump back into.

Hey LightningStorm, I think your interpretation is right on the money. That being the case, it's highly possible there could be quite a number of liberated El Aurians zipping out there and myriad other species too.

 

[pookha]

i really do hope the caeliar gave the former drones a choice.
to do other wise would make them bad as the borg.
and i have hoped that there would be some former drones who did decline and are out there with interesting stories to tell.

i would be very suprised especially if some of the recently assimilated didnt opt out.

 

[chelly]

According to Seven she was given a choice, so most likely they all were given a choice.