Little is known about the Borg prior to the first
encounter in 2365 by the USS Enterprise
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| A Borg |
, (except for several colonies which were destroyed
in 2364 along the Federation / Romulan Neutral Zone, their destruction
later being attributed to the Borg). It is a fact that their home was originally
in the Delta Quadrant, but they roam the galaxy looking for new technology
to assimilate into their collective. Their ability to adapt instantly to
counter any new threat makes them probably the greatest threat to the Federation
ever. It is important to note that the Federation would not have encountered
the Borg quite so soon had the being known as 'Q' not brought both species
together by throwing the Enterprise light years off course to System
J-25. The Enterprise was only saved from destruction by the
intervention of 'Q' who sent them back to the Alpha Quadrant. At this point,
Starfleet began planning for the expected invasion of the Federation, now
that the Borg were aware of our existence.
The Borg are an immensely powerful race of enhanced
humanoids, who implant themselves with cybernetic devices which give them
great technological and combat advantages over simple 'biological' humanoids.
It is known that the Borg are born as totally biological beings, but have
their first implants inserted shortly after birth and are then 'updated'
as they grow to finally take their designated place in the Collective.
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| A Borg Shield. |
In the Collective, different Borgs are equipped
with different hardware for specific tasks, and are tied into a sophisticated
subspace network. This links each Borg with all of the other Borg, forming
in effect One mind - The Collective. Due to this combined
intelligence and adaptability, most succesfull weapons against the Borg
only work once - they quickly adapt and generate an effective counter.
This is evident with the Phaser - one Borg can be killed, but after that
all the other Borg can generate a shield to totally nullify this weapon.
The crew of the Enterprise partially got around this by designing
a chip to fit in the hand phasers which randomly changed the phaser frequency
after every shot. This stopped the Borg from being able to adapt. Larger
versions were installed in the ships phasers also.
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| New Providence |
The Borg finally invaded the Federation in 2366,
when the USS Enterprise (again) encountered a Borg ship entering
Federation space, on route to the Terran Starsystem. The Enterprise
had been investigating the disappearance of the New Providence colony on
Jouret IV.
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| Locutus of Borg. |
The Federation, true to form, was not prepared for
an invasion. The Borg captured captain Jean-Luc Picard from the Enterprise
with the intention of using a human voice to co-ordinate their assimilation
of the Federation. They then however altered Picard by inserting bio-mechanical
implants, in effect making Picard himself a Borg - Locutus of Borg. All
of Picard's Knowledge then was avaliable to the Borg, who easily defeated
any of the Enterprise plans to destroy them. Locutus then led the
Borg to destroy 39 ships of the 40 which Starfleet had emassed at Wolf
359. Eventually, the crew of the Enterprise managed rescue Picard/Locutus
from the Borg ship. Data then used the Borg susbpace link with Locutus
to implant a 'sleep' command into the Collective. This then caused the
Borg ship to self destruct, and Picard was released from the Colective.
Dr Crusher was then able to remove the Borg implants and Picard was human
again.
The next time the Federation encountered the Borg
was when a crashed Borg scoutship was
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| Hugh |
discovered on a moon in the Argolis Cluster by the
Enterprise. A single survivor, whose Borg designation was 'Third
of Five' was rescued. The Enterprise crew nursed this Borg back
to health, and gave him a name : 'Hugh'. The crew developed a 'virus' which
they could introduce into the Borg Collective Consciousness, through Hugh,
and was designed to cause a fatal overload, hence destroying all the Borg
at once. However, the crew then realised that Hugh was becoming more 'self'
aware and hence this weapon was effectively murder. Hugh was returned to
the crash site and later picked up by another Borg scout ship. Incidentally,
Picard was later given a severe reprimand by Starfleet for alowing the
Borg to leave without attempting to use it to destroy the Collective.
The decision Picard made to return Hugh to the
Collective had a profound effect on the Borg.
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| Lore and the Borg |
Hugh's new-found sense of individuality began to
be transferred throughout the ship he was on - deprived of their group
identity, individual Borg were unable to function as a unit. All were confused
and some even starved to death as a result. They were unable to navigate
or indeed perform any function properly. This was changed with the arrival
of the android Lore, brother of Starfleet android commander Data. Lore
appointed himself leader of these Borg, and promised that he would help
them towards their goal - to become totaly artificial life-forms free from
any dependance on biological or organic bodies.
In 2369 Lore led the Borg on a new offensive
against the Federation. Using Transwarp conduits they were able to travel
many times faster than the top speed of Starfleets best ships. They first
atacked a Federation outpost on Ohniaka III, killing all lifeforms present,
and then managed to enlist the help of Commander Data himself who vowed
to help his brother Lore. Lore however was controlling Data (and the Borg)
by re-transmitting some of the emotions from his emotion-chip to Data and
by-passing his programming. The Enterprise crew one again managed
to save the day by destroying the Borg ship, and enlisting the help of
Hugh and some renegade Borg to thwart Lore's plans. Data then dismantled
Lore, and took the emotion chip so that he would some day be able to use
it himself. The surviving Borg rallied under Hugh and are attempting to
make a new life, as individuals.
The Latest Borg invasion was the greatest threat
so-far. Only the intervention of the Enterprise (The newest ship
to carry that name - 'E') managed to stop the Assimilation of the entire
planet Earth. The Borg attacked the Terran Sector again, and their cube
was destroyed just short of the Earth by a combined attack by the Enterprise
and the few surviving Starfleet ships (the Defiant barely survived).
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| Borg Sphere. |
However, a Borg escape craft (spherical in design)
survived and headed to Earth, chased by the Enterprise. The Borg
vessel managed to escape back in time, at which point the entire Earth
changed and became full of Borg! Realising that the Borg had altered the
past, Picard and crew followed them back in an attempt to fix the damage.
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| The Borg Queen. |
When they arrived in the late 21st century, Picard
realised that the Borg were attempting to disrupt the attempt by Zephran
Cochrane to travel faster than light - this would mean that the Vulcans
would never contact Earth, and the Borg were free to assimilate at their
leisure. The Enterprise destroyed the Borg Sphere, but not before Borg
drones infiltrated the Enterprise, bringing with them their Queen - the
force behind the Collective. As we know, Picard and crew (the few that
survived, that is) managed to destroy all the borg, help Cochrane break
the light barrier and generally save the Universe one more time. The price
was high however - many of the crew were assimilated (and later killed
by the survivors or when Data released the Warp-coolant), the Enterprise
was almost transformed info a Borg ship, and a great many of promising
starfleet officers had their careers cut short. Starfleet had just about
come back up to strength after the massacre at Wolf 359, and now they have
to start again from scratch - but the Borg are Finished.
This time.
More current information on the Borg's activities
will be avaliable from this terminal once the data has been de-classified. |
