Chapter 7: Interlude - A Tale of Two Hives

Disclaimer: Borg and  Star Trek belong to CBS Paramount; Geth and Mass Effect belong to EA/Bioware; OFAS belongs to Hermione of Vulcan; the concept of minis belongs to Miss Cam and the PPC belongs to Jay and Acacia. Nathonea  and Luxury are part of the general PPC canon, and are not mine either.


Chapter 7: Interlude - A Tale of Two Hives (wherein Joke lives up to his name at Cyba's expense, and brings Mess along for the ride, naturally).

Cyba Zero returned to the RC with a much better opinion of psychologists than she had expected. Eagrus was out somewhere, and apparently Zouh was with him, so Cyba settled down and tried to put the advice she had been given into practice.

She, Sigma and Phi had all been thoroughly convinced, once Eagrus had managed to trick them into going through a portal to FicPsych, that they were in for a terrible ordeal of American-film-style 'circle time' and supposedly soothing voices that actually only made you drowsy. It had not exactly started well, with the three of them having been locked in a Collective-proof chamber until they had threatened to start singing because they were bored, at which point it had been decided that maybe they were free of hive influence from their previous mission after all.

Then they had been introduced to a lovely person called Nathonea Dewstan, who had managed to evaporate their triple-strength Very Sceptical Look just by coming into the room and turning out to have Borg implants just like they did. True, most of hers had been removed, but the fact that she was sort of Borg too went a good way to letting her off for being a psychologist (albeit a nurse-level one). It also meant she had a good angle on their situation, despite the fact that she had gained her implants the old fashioned way... by getting assimilated.

There had not been any psychologist-talk, either.  After verifying all the facts of the disguise generator incident and the events of the Trekverse mission (despite the influence issues after restoring the canon, the influence had only really consisted of 'get Eagrus' rather than 'how to use one's implants'); Nathonea had taught the three of them how to meditate World One style. The hope was that the technique would bring them more in tune with their new bodies, which would in turn enable them to learn how to perform the basic necessities like sleeping. Apparently it was not something that could be explained without networking.

She had also explained that, once they finally succeeded in entering regeneration, that their dreams might be affected. The machine that shielded the inhabitants of HQ from the fangirl dreams filtering through apparently did not work when Borg alcoves were involved - presumably because the latter promoted networking.

Then Cyba, Sigma and Phi had gone their separate ways, to gain different experiences. Sigma had joined DoSAT, muttering something about fixing up the space-ship they had crashed in the middle of OFAS' dinner-hall. Phi had gone off to DMSE&R with the two mini-Stus, who had suffered a similar fate to their progenitor - minus the being assassinated part. The duo had made it known - in unison - that they wished to improve their spelling, as well as changing their names to Caprt and Captin One of Five. Extensive testing later, it became apparent that the usual rule of minis applied: their networking range was only a couple of rooms (and not strong enough to cause influence problems), and their nanoprobes were not capable of assimilating much. (Okay, so the little they had managed to assimilate had been the back of Eagrus' hand, so even though he had been in disguise at the time, and his subsequent reversion to Easterling form had completely fixed it, he wanted the pair kept as far away from him as possible.) Besides, their transformation seemed to have done them the world of good: their over-active hormones were completely gone, and the whole quest for perfection had left them rather more amenable to the idea of using good English. Needless to say, Phi was training them and studying the general effect of their condition, perhaps in the hope that Borg nanoprobes with modified programming might be a way to reduce Mary Sue blood-glitter concentration.

Cyba, of course, had returned to DTE, and was now standing in her alcove, trying to meditate. Unfortunately, stray thoughts kept creeping into her head, like how Mess and Joke had been uncharacteristically well-behaved for the last few days.

It was at that point that Mess - at least, she thought it was Mess - sauntered into the room in his four-legged form... and sat watching her intently.

Cyba smiled at him, then closed the eye she could and resumed meditating. She relaxed, allowing her senses to spread, heightening her oneness with her surroundings. She could hear the soothing hum of the machinery nearly, the tap of Mess Efekt's feet as he came closer. She let her awareness extend, reaching forth to...

For a moment, there was some sort of connection, but she did not get the chance to tell what kind, because suddenly her senses turned off and reactivated.

She was lying on the floor, and while her senses were back, they felt wrong. Her body also felt different - if possible, even more solid than previously. She groaned, but the sound that came out was definitely not what she had imagined. Had she fallen out of her alcove again? She tried to get up, but it was like trying to walk on all fours, on stilts. She crashed to the floor, which at least was not that far, and looked around instead. The room seemed to be her RC, but it was a lot bigger than she remembered. Worse... she could see herself standing in her alcove, watching with a look of amusement.

Forcing her panic down, she concentrated on getting up - one leg at a time. She managed it this time, albeit remaining very wobbly. Steadying herself, she managed to get a look at part of her body, which to her horror was the blue-silver metal of...

Mess!

 She was now petty sure what had happened: Mess had swapped their bodies. That little horror of a mini had found a way to hack her networking abilities and link them up to his and Joke's, probably via her alcove.

That does it! Although... where's Joke? Maybe I can get him on my side.

She could not see him anywhere in the room, so she headed for the main RC and the console, where her minis could often be found charging. To her credit, she managed about two steps before she fell over, accompanied by Mess snickering. Focusing hard, she got back to all fours and stumbled a bit further.

If this is Mess and not Joke, maybe I can work out how to transform...

Planting her feet firmly, she concentrated with all her will and stood up on her hind legs. Plates shifted, realigning, and balancing abruptly got a whole lot easier. A quick check told her that she had been successful, so she looked pointedly at Mess-as-her, who in turn looked a bit put out and maybe a little impressed.

So there!  she tried to say; what came out was a smug-sounding bleep.

Mess-as-her stepped out of her alcove, extended her nanoprobe injectors and began inspecting them with interest.

Hoo boy. He's better at this than I am.

She turned around and resumed her search for Joke. Ignoring Mess-as-her, Cyba walked out into the RC proper and headed purposefully towards the console, where the minis could often be found charging. Sure enough, Joke was curled up in a shutdown position, charging from the open port she had left there.

"Joke? Joke?!" she called. It even came out sounding vaguely like what she was trying to say, but Joke remained asleep. She poked him, but nothing changed. When she poked harder, and the little mini toppled over, Cyba realised the real truth: Joke was not at home, he was busy co-piloting with Mess. In fact, knowing the minis, it had probably been Joke's idea. She should have known better.

Heavy footsteps and a snicker sounded behind her, as Mess-and-Joke-as-her walked past and headed out of the trapdoor.

Great. Where are Eagrus and Zouh when I need them? Regardless, I can't let those minis get up to mischief. I don't what to imagine the trouble they could cause in my form - and I'll get the blame!

She ran over to the trapdoor, but was soon faced with a new problem: the ladder was not built for minis. The rungs were too far apart for her to reach! How was she supposed to get down to give chase?

Mess-and-Joke-as-her looked up, guessed what she was thinking and shrugged, flashing her an evil grin before striding off down the corridor.

Cyba racked her brain, and mentally kicked herself for being so silly. She was in a Geth body, and in Mass Effect, Geth could drop from orbit without taking damage. One floor would hardly stop her, mini or not, so she composed herself and jumped.

She landed in a half-kneeling position with a slight thud. Mess-and-Joke-as-her looked over their shoulder and began walking faster. Cyba began running after them, bleeping furiously, but it took four of her steps to equal one of theirs and they were leaving her behind easily.

However, Geth Primes were armed - even miniature ones. It would not cause any damage, but it ought to sting a bit.

Take this, you naughty minis, thought Cyba with relish, aiming the energy cannon she was holding in one hand. Cyba knew her body still registered such things, if not in quite in the human sense, and it ought to be enough of a shock to slow them down.

Mess-and-Joke-as-her jumped as the little blast hit them squarely in the back. Cyba caught up a few steps, peppering them frantically with energy bolts. They faltered, holding up an arm to shield themselves... and then a green shield flashed into life around them.

Oh darn: adapted. I forgot about that.

However, she had closed some of the gap. There was only one thing for it: she leapt at them with all her might (well, Mess Efekt's might, anyway), bleeping a battle-cry that was the closest she could get to screaming.

Mess-and-Joke-as-her retaliated by charging up the gizmos in her body's mechanical arm.

Ah, I don't actually know what that does, thought Cyba, as the black metal realigned and suddenly emitted a beam of green light. The next moment, all forward momentum ceased and she found herself hanging in mid-air. Ooh, tractor beam. Nice! I have to find out how that... aaaaaaagh!

Mess-and-Joke-as-her had reversed the beam, sending her flying back down the corridor in the direction she had come. She was so glad Geth were resistant to falling damage... and pain. As she got to her feet to see the pair of minis wearing a rather satisfied expression on her body's face - before disappearing around a corner - she felt her resolve strengthen.

Right, that's it! This calls for backup! Eagrus and Zouh might be away, but I have other allies you don't know about, Mess and Joke. The Collective of Three protects its own. Hey! Why am I even thinking of us by that name Eagrus came up with, anyway? Aaaaagh!

Concentrating on shaking her thoughts into line, she sauntered in a random direction. She was careful not to hurry, else the Ironic Overpower would ensure it took hours to get to either of the places she wanted.

About five minutes later, she passed a door bearing an irrelevant number and a rather more relevant name: Phi Six. There were also several more notices hanging beneath the first, which read:

1. No royal purple allowed beyond this point.

2. Red is also best avoided, especially if worn on a shirt.

3. NO BUGE. ANYWHERE. AT ALL.

4. Oh, and beware of the minis.

Aiming another jump, Cyba-as-Mess swung from the handle and the door opened, swinging inwards into Phi's RC. Cyba landed and shoved the door shut, taking point. After all that, and it was empty. Phi must have taken her minis somewhere, presumably to educate them.

Oh well, I'll have to find Sigma's RC, thought Cyba.

She turned around, preparing to swing on the handle this side and leave... except there was no handle. She supposed it was to keep Phi's minis from wandering around HQ and causing trouble - after all, they had the potential to cause more trouble even than Mess and Joke. However, it did not help her in her quest to stop the trouble Mess and Joke were causing right now. Nevertheless, she had no choice but to wait until Phi and the minis got back. At least the minis were out, too...

That was, of course, when she noticed the red laser dot on her chest.

Her eyes followed the laser back to its source, and saw Caprt One of Five peering around a table leg about a metre away. She started edging into the room, giving the little cyborg-dogman a wide berth. While Phi's minis followed the rule of diminished power, she did not really want to find out whether that diminishment still worked when the target was also a mini. She was glad that her whole red problem seemed not to affect her when the red was on one of the Borg, though. Speaking of which, she could not envisage Caprt being alone - where there was one, there was the other, surely? So where exactly was Captin?

She stopped and thought about it. Where were the Borg always when you were trying to keep an eye on all of them nearby?

Oh blast. He's behind me.

She dodged sideways, and a pair of injectors missed her by millimetres.

I guess they have a certain word beginning with 'a' on the brain. Big surprise. Bet they still can't spell it, though.

She ran for it, with Caprt and Captin in hot pursuit.

How do I get Mess' voice working properly? A spelling test would probably slow them up enough to buy myself a bit of extra time. Darn it, where are you, Phi?

She dodged left, right, left again. She was faster and more agile, but there were two of them and they were taking advantage of it. She really hoped they did not have tractor beams. Even so, it was only a matter of time before they caught her. She had to get out of reach somehow... Geth thrusters?

She waited until she had gained a bit of ground over them, then stopped and aimed her single-eyed gaze at the tabletop above and in front of her.

I want to be up there. I need to be up there!

Hoping against hope, she jumped and believed she could do it.

At the height of her jump, her thrusters fired. She glided upwards, wobbled slightly, but managed to land clumsily on the table. She had probably scratched Mess' paintwork, but it served him right. He would not be able to scratch hers back, either - hers regenerated.

She lay on the table, gazing around the room for a moment. There was a lot of apparatus visible, all sorts of implements  and stationary stacked on shelves and presumably more in the cupboards standing against various walls. The table she was on was a central workbench, and she could see the entrance to a side-room that presumably housed Phi's alcove.

Standing up, Cyba-as-Mess saw Caprt and Captin's scaled-down alcoves by one wall. She suspected the minis had been trying to back her into them, too. The minis themselves were both staring up at her, but it was tough luck for them that they could not reach her.

Ha, thought Cyba, and concentrated very hard on blowing a big, fat raspberry. It was a bit tinny, but it was definitely a raspberry. The advantage of Mess' body (at least in his Prime form), was that it was quite intuitive - most of his abilities roughly corresponded to a human body. She was getting the hang of this! If only she could figure out the cloak...

Caprt and Captin's leg plates opened slightly, and Cyba was suddenly a lot less smug.

Please tell me they're not... adapting, her thoughts trailed off and she retreated just in time for Caprt and Captin to fire thrusters of their own and land on the edge of the tabletop. Rule number one of the PPC, Cyba reminded herself, the IO is out to get you!

Concentrating again, knowing it was perfect or bust, she suddenly pointed her finger at the pair and instructed: "Spell 'assimilation'!"

Both of them immediately stopped dead, suffering from a conflict of programming. Their quest for perfection demanded that they assimilate this intruder in their RC. However, their quest for perfection also demanded being able to spell.

"A-S-S," they began to recite, then paused. What was the next letter?

Ha, thought Cyba again. Got you. I bet you'll be pondering that for plenty long enough for Phi to get back.

What is the next letter? thought the One of Fives. What is the... Then their programming resolved its conflict. The intruder knows the next letter. A-S-S-what-ever-it-is it!

Both mini-Stu-drones abruptly went back into motion.

"You have the answer," they stated together.

"Oh, bleeping BLEEP!" cried Cyba, and the chase began again.

You should have expected that, she scolded herself mentally, while making the jump to the shelves. The pair jumped a moment after her, but she had already picked up a bottle of - something - and used it as a bat as the drones came in to land. The first one went flying, but the impact of the second smashed the bottle as it was deflected, spilling its contents everywhere.

Cyba tossed the broken bottle away, grabbed another, and dropped it on the heads of the mini-Stus as they made another attempt from below. Cyba moved to the next one, and continued bombing them until she ran out of bottles.

It was at this point that the drones managed to join her on the top shelf, one on each side.

Cyba squeaked, giving up the high ground in favour of not getting caught, and dropped to the next shelf down. This shelf contained apparatus, most of it glass beakers and the like, which was of little use to her. It was also covered with all manner of liquids from the broken bottles - that while apparently unreactive - had rendered the shelf very slippery.

Cyba planted her feet as firmly as was possible, and prepared to defend against the onslaught from above. The upper shelf should provide her some cover, so she only had to watch the edges.

CRUNCH!

Caprt and Captin had decided to go through the shelf to get to her. Luckily, in the final moment, Cyba had decided to duck.

Looking up, a pair of injectors had punched through just above her head. Cyba took the initiative: she grabbed hold of the stingers and bent them back on themselves... hard. Sure enough, when whichever mini they belonged to tried to retract them, he found himself well and truly stuck.

There came the sound of struggling from above, then a massive CRACK as with their combined strength, Caprt and Captin broke off part of the shelf. Caprt then proceeded to bend Captin's injectors back the right way, then the pair of them came down on Cyba-as-Mess' head.

Cyba sidestepped and lost her footing, sliding down the length of the shelf, knocking all of the glass beakers and such off ahead of her, where they then bounced off the shelf below and shattered all over the floor.

Cyba fell after them, but managed to catch the third and lowest shelf and roll under the cover of the middle one. There she found the lid of a tin of some sort, and proceeded to use it as a shield. Caprt landed on her shelf and she rammed him, knocking him off. Captin then landed, bracing himself better than his companion, and tried to reach around the shield to get her. Cyba angled it so he was unable to reach, but was pushed to her knees in the process. She swiped a pencil and prodded the drone's feet with it until he lost his footing, then turned so he rolled off. Unfortunately, the pencil caught on one of his cables, and yanked her off too.

She landed on top of him and tumbled off quickly, trying to get to her feet only to be tripped by his tail. With a lot of scrambling, she finally regained her footing. She managed to get the pencil free, too, and armed with that and the lid, she was slowly backed into a corner by the pair, feeling like a very bizarre hoplite.

Her back touched metal, and she realised they had just backed her into one of their alcoves. She raised her 'spear' and 'shield', but what she really wanted was to just disappear...

To her surprise, Mess' cloaking system came online and she did disappear. It would not last long, but it might just be enough. Caprt and Captin had been confounded, she stepped between them and...

THUNK!

She wobbled, her vision sparking, a blaring warning of system damage going off somewhere in the back of her mind. Caprt looked at her and withdrew the arm he had stuck out at head-height. Cyba felt herself falling back, right into the arms of Captin, kicking herself for forgetting that Borg were notorious for seeing right through cloaking.

Warning: system damage! Platform shutdown imminent. Repair mode activating, said her systems.

Bother and darn and blast and... Cyba's mind was saying. She knew what she would be when she recovered, and it would be properly this time. Caprt was already reaching for her. Darn and blast and...

"Hold it right there!" commanded a voice.

The mini-Stu-dogman-drones both froze, and their heads turned to face the speaker.

"Queen Phi?" they queried.

"Let him go," commanded Phi, and Caprt and Captin immediately dropped Cyba-as-Mess. Phi picked her up and laid her on the main table. "Mess Efekt? What are you doing here? Are you alright?"

Cyba felt her systems coming back online, and managed to bleep-groan: "Queen?"

Phi sighed. "I keep telling them not to call me that, but they're being most adamant. And since when could you talk, Mess?"

"I'm not Mess, I'm Cyba," said Cyba.

"Nice try Mess. Did Joke put you up to it?"

"I am Cyba, Joke put Mess up to swapping our bodies and now they've run off as me. I dread to think what mayhem they're causing..."

"More than you've caused here?" asked Phi, eyeing the complete devastation zone that had been her RC.

"They tried to assimilate me!" protested Cyba.

"Mess making a mess, why am I not surprised?" commented Phi.

"I'm not Mess!" cried Cyba. "I'll... I'll tell you something Mess and Joke don't know: I ended up in HQ after falling through a plothole while LARPing! You know that! You have my memories, for goodness' sake!"

"Cyba could have told you that since then," countered Phi.

"If you don't believe me, come and see for yourself!"  bleeped Cyba.

"Oh fine," said Phi. "It's not as though this RC isn't already a scene from a disaster movie, even if Joke is waiting to sneak in here the moment I'm gone."

With that, Phi caved in and sat Cyba-as-Mess on one shoulder, and Caprt and Captin on the other. Both parties eyed each other carefully for any sign of weakness, but Cyba doubted the One of Fives would try anything with Phi around - hopefully.

It took them about half an hour to relocate Mess-and-Joke-as-Cyba, who had ended up somewhere in the vicinity of the Department of Bad Slash, apparently having raided a store-room on the way and acquired a large number of paint-tins (at least some of them Suvian colours), as well as something that looked suspiciously like 'food' leftovers from the canteen (shudder). They were now using these objects, in conjunction with a certain inbuilt tractor-beam, to apply 'modern art' to the walls.

"I... see..." Phi managed to get out, then immediately drew a standard-issue PPC phone and called Sigma. "Sigma... this is Phi. We have a situation with Cyba, Mess and Joke in the Department of Bad Slash area, and could use reinforcements. Please come ASAP."

Sigma hung up and beheld the stylised image of a wolf with a laser eye, which she had etched onto the back wall of the bridge of her new ship, the Silver Hound, with her own eye-laser and a focusing lens. It looked quite good, in her opinion.

However, her sisters-in-arms needed her help, and she was not going to abandon them. The Collective of Three had to stick together.

Blast Eagrus for coming up with that name, she grumbled to herself mentally, and hurried off thinking very hard about everything but where she was going.

Sigma arrived to find Phi, Mess and the One of Fives stalking Cyba, who appeared to have gone completely mad and was redecorating the corridors - and any agents unfortunate enough to be walking past.

"Has she cracked?" asked Sigma, worriedly. "Are we here to hide the flamethrowers?"

"No, she's right here," said Mess, much to Sigma's surprise. "That's Mess and Joke doing that."

"What? Hold on a moment?" questioned Sigma, bemused.

"Cyba appears to be in Mess Efekt's body, while Mess and Joke are in Cyba's, causing merry mayhem," explained Phi.

"They're spilling - paint - all over my lovely black plating," spluttered Cyba-as-Mess furiously.

"Somehow, we need to get Cyba's body back to her alcove and convince Mess and Joke to transfer everybody's consciousnesses back where they should be," Phi gave Sigma the rundown.

"Preferably before Luxury... oh, too late," groaned Cyba.

Luxury had just appeared from a room to the left, presumably to investigate the commotion. She looked like she was dressed for visiting the beach, and Mess-and-Joke-as-Cyba were right in her sights.

"We need a distraction," muttered Sigma.

"Phi?" suggested Cyba, taking hold of the end of Phi's cable-hair. "Fling me will you, please?"

"We could send Caprt and Captin," Sigma offered an alternative.

"No," said Cyba. "We don't need that much of a distraction."

"Ready?" asked Phi.

"Do it," agreed Cyba.

Phi turned her head sharply, causing her 'hair' to whip around, effectively acting as a slingshot to launch  Cyba right at Luxury. Luxury noticed.

"EEEEEEEEEE!" she squealed excitedly, right as Cyba opened fire with her energy cannon. The "EEEEEE" quickly became "OWOWOWSTOPIT", much to Cyba's satisfaction as she landed on Luxury's head.

Mess and Joke readied their tractor beam, but then Sigma and Phi came around the corner. The expression on the face of the body the minis had borrowed was quite a picture; they had not expected Cyba to return with reinforcements in the form of, well, two more of her. They immediately aimed the tractor beam in Sigma and Phi's direction, giving Cyba the opportunity she needed to jump from Luxury's hair to Mess-and-Joke-as-her's cables, to which she latched herself firmly.

This in turn allowed Sigma and Phi to get close enough to grab Mess-and-Joke-as-Cyba's arms and commence the dragging of Cyba's body back to Cyba's RC, while Cyba-as-Mess provided covering fire.

"I really hope Caprt and Captin aren't getting ideas from Mess and Joke," muttered Phi as they went. "I will be taking precautions."

Eventually, they arrived back at Cyba's RC. Sigma and Phi managed to manhandle Mess-and-Joke-as-Cyba up the ladder, and forcibly shoved them back into Cyba's alcove.

"Right," said Cyba, hands on hips. "Now, Mess and Joke, you fix this immediately!"

The minis looked a bit dejected, but realised they were caught and the game was up. With a sigh, they leant back in the alcove and Cyba felt her senses switch off. When they reactivated, she was thankfully back in her own body, and Mess was back in his. A moment later, Joke wandered in.

"Thank you, Mess and Joke," she told them. "And don't you ever do that again!"

"Or you," Phi added pointedly to Caprt and Captin, who were sitting on her shoulders.

"Ah, but our plan worked!" came the response from Joke. "We left a monitoring subroutine in unit Mess' platform, and now we can speak properly."

"Why you little..." Cyba began.

"In return, we can show you how to regenerate - though you more or less had it by yourself," spoke Mess. As promised, he immediately sent the information to Cyba via her alcove. The tweaks to her method were minimal, but they made Cyba kick herself that she had missed them.

"Is that all?" gaped Cyba.

"All you have to do is open yourself to the possibilities, Cyba-Mistress. Then the method of using your implants is quite logical," they explained. "Your problem lies in your over-complication of the processes."

"Hmmm," mused Sigma and Phi thoughtfully.

"Can you show me how to use the rest?" asked Cyba hopefully.

"Yes, but it would be better practice for you if we do not," they replied.

"Oh, fine," Cyba sighed. "Thanks, though it was a shame you had to cause mayhem along the way."

Mess and Joke snickered. "Heehee, but that was half the fun!"