@marcus

Funny story, I was actually giving my story's epilogue another quick edit to explain why Ibalei wasn't changed very much after being joined when you posted here. Although, you do make an interesting point about what could happen to Bryan...Hmmm...Could make for a good side-story...

Ahh, that makes much more sense

Feel free to bash the coda I wrote to the underlying arc of my LCs

I'm not suggesting that he get busted out of his command, but maybe an enquiry as a formality as to why he chose to engage the incoming cube, rather than retreating from it might be interesting to explore... I think that was what struck me most in Q-Who... Once the tractor beam was broken, my order would have been to come about and depart at maximum warp, not sit around waiting to see what happened next (I know, that wouldn't be good drama, but not the most sound command decision Picard ever made ) I absolutely loved the look on his face after, when Guinan pointed out that the Borg would be coming for him (even though they were en-route anyway...)

sparklysoldier, gulberat: you both almost made me cry, damn you. And a great entry (also emotional, but in a different way) by ironphoenix rounds out the trio.

johnsills: the Andorian XO with whom Sinclair has a great deal of (mutual) unresolved attraction is also in a four-marriage. In their case, it does not help; if anything, it just (further) complicates things. :p

Well, then again, an Andorian four is about the same as human monogamy - when you have four genders, it's the simplest possible arrangement. Dominic Tascher, OTOH, is human, he was just born on a human-settled world (haven't decided which one yet). And the Admiral is from Earth, born in the Seattle/Olympia metroplex, in what used to be Tacoma back in the day.

I do wonder sometimes what, if any, marriage customs there might be among Diane Duane's Sulamid - who have twelve genders, all of which insist on being referred to as "she"...

Thanks for reading it! Enala may have been originally born out of an LC and only had a few days aboard the ship, but she's a vital part of the Roanoke's history now. She's a symbol of everything they're fighting against when they face the Borg, and of all the people they're fighting to save. :/

Thanks, and I'm glad they both came through so well. Azera and Corspa's argument was, in its more understated way, as hard to write as the later part of the story, and Enala came to life as the story unfolded ways I'd never anticipated when it was just a scribbled outline. This was a harrowing experience for the whole crew, more than I'd ever intended, though it also brought them to life and cemented some of their friendships in ways I hadn't expected either.

That's a funny story! Short answer: "Azera Xi" is her given name and, like the Vulcans, she doesn't really have a surname. The difference between "Azera" and "Azera Xi" is, for her, kind of like the difference between Kate and Catherine. She goes by Azera with her crew and friends, but in more formal matters and talking to her superiors, she's Azera Xi.

Explanation of that short answer: when I first made her character it was indeed first name Azeri, last name Xi, but the character maker wouldn't accept that. I worked around it by making "Azera Xi" her first name and leaving everything else blank, and after twenty levels of having the admirals calling her "Azera Xi," it actually works in my mind now as a given name.

What is it about this topic that inspired us to go overboard with the writing?

I liked it! The confrontation with the Borg cube at the start and using the asteroid to collapse the conduit was very well described, and you did a great job with using Aloysha's inhuman senses and nature to the story's advantage, showing the world from his point of view and how it gives him a unique perspective on other species. I particularly liked your description of how the universe is blue-shifted because everyone's moving through time toward him without ever catching up, and the description of the way he sees Six/Tassok's neurological activity and how unnaturally organized and precise it is. The ending was handled well and resolved naturally without wrapping things up too neatly, and it ended with a memorable closing line.

Thanks! I haven't read his books but I looked up his bibliography on Wiki and it's definitely high praise to be compared to - I'm glad you liked it! I didn't even think of "Enterprise" while writing it, but you know, I can kind of see that. The NX-01 crew's less formal with each other since they're all equally new to space exploration, and Azera's in sort of a similar position as a young, rather informal captain leading a more experienced bridge crew.

I read your story, and it was also impressive! I definitely didn't see the plot unfolding in that direction at all (especially not what happens with Lambert, nor the full nature of the Borg they found), and the reference to the Royal Protocol was a really nice touch, and the phrase "the One Who Is Many" as the Borg's own term for the Queen (since "Borg Queen" is just what the Hansens called her as an allusion to insects). The issue of trusting the new drone seemed to be resolved a little quickly, but she was already halfway an individual, and an individual with no loyalty to the Borg, so it does make sense on a second read (while making for some very vividly, appropriately icky visuals). And besides, as they say at weddings, "I'd like to think I haven't so much lost a Klingon as gained a fledgling Borg Queen!"

And as someone said earlier in the thread, "skinny Risan porn star" paints all the visual we need.

I'll have to run in a second so this next review's a little short, but the references to Romulan culture in jonsills' story are very thorough and Sills' rather eccentric interactions with his crew are a lot of fun to read. There's surprisingly little conflict given the situation, but if a Romulan turned Borg drone offers to join the crew, just say yes - and the explanation that the assimilation process got stopped halfway through and left him as not really a Borg either was nicely visualized as they described his appearance.

And nathankirts may have had the most sensible reaction to finding a drone of us all.

I had a little fun letting Alyosha remind N'Riuw that you can't always make guesses about someone based on stereotypes.

That was one of those scenes that snuck up on me while I was writing. I had no idea there'd even be such a character as N'Riuw until he showed up onscreen, and I "saw" what he looked like.

I get the feeling that, however illogical it is, N'Riuw kept his eyepiece not just because he uses its functionality, but on some irrational level he feels like it's a big middle finger to the Borg any time they are dumb enough to hail his ship.

His shapeshifting capabilities (to judge by "Time's Arrow") don't operate on the same principles as a Founder's, so I think that at least on a sensory level he is unchanged while in human form. That said, I think sometimes he restricts his visual field so as to avoid creeping people out by acting like he's got eyes in the back of his head. ("You behind me on the science station! Stop updating your Spacebook status and get back to work!")

I would figure that a being who evolved as he did would have some sense for the neural energy he is capable of feeding on. But I think that his upbringing and his beliefs give him a different sort of aesthetic appreciation than a "normal" Devidian, whose judgments would be more akin to judging the quality of wine as it goes down. Alyosha can appreciate it as it is, left alone "in nature," so to speak.

I'm not really sure whether his neuroelectric sense is a supplement to one of the five senses that we know as humans, or something else entirely, but he definitely does make aesthetic judgments about it.

I'm not sure if th'Valek really sensed Alyosha's presence or not, since I don't know whether Aenar telepathy is SO powerful that it can sense things that are in a different phase. That said, Deanna Troi seemed to be able to sense the fear from the Devidians' victims in "Time's Arrow." Whether that was due to the triolic pattern enhancers, I'm not sure.

But if any non-Devidian would have a chance, it would be th'Valek, since Alyosha and Thraz are so close that they are almost like brothers.

Sparklysoldier definitely got to me, too.

It's easy to see in your case, though, given that your character's bio lends her so naturally to it!

Thanks! Having gotten a little STF experience under my belt by now, I realized it would be pretty crazy to have an escort essentially attempting to solo a tac cube, so desperate measures were called for!

I had to stretch things a bit, since the kind of temporal phasing that's been established as canon for the Devidians is not exactly real-life science. So while I did my best, it's possible that a Real Scientist (TM) could bust me for that one.

But I figured that since the red shift seen in distant galaxies is because they are moving away from us, and any object moving towards us is blue-shifted, the comparison would be reasonable enough to get away with it. (And might well explain the blue hue you get when you're inside a triolic enhancer field.)

Presumably, though, if Alyosha were to look at his own hands, or if some object phased in with him, it would not be affected by the Doppler shift.

I'm glad you liked it. Since Alyosha must feed on artificially-generated energy, I figured that was a distinction he'd be well attuned to.

And yeah, there's not too much "neat" in what Gul Tassok and his daughter will face now.

You're very welcome, and I really enjoyed the entry As an author, Lustbader is pretty formulaic in his approach, and most, if not all, his books feature a twin timeline, shifting between the two throughout the book till they conclude at the end (the flashback timeline never meets up to the beginning of 'the present', but is always related) but he does what he does very well, and uses excellent description and very well defined characters, and it was that characteristic which I was comparing your writing to, not his formulaic approach

Thanks ^_^ I wanted to take a slightly different route than 'just another drone', remembered reading about the Royal Protocol, and thought it might be interesting to see what might happen if that process was somehow interrupted. And of course, in First Contact, she introduced herself as the One who is Many, I figure that could indeed be her designation, or at least a recognizable one ^_^

At this moment, Eleven is probably best described as an uncrowned Queen... She has not only the knowledge of the Collective, but all the capabilities of a Borg Queen, just no connection to the Collective. A potential mini-spoiler is that I am mentally debating the idea that Eleven really is One who is Many, but simply used the history of Holly Masters as a ruse to relieve suspicion (a bit like how in Master and Commander, the captain of a French vessel pretends to be the ship's doctor, and that the dead guy in front of him is the captain, so he can escape) after all, she would have the knowledge of millions of officers at her disposal, so would be able to concoct such a story at a moment's notice, and simply relied on Amanda's willingness to want to give the benefit of the doubt... Of course, that's just an idea, I'm really not sure how and where to go with Eleven from here, that is just one option I'm mulling over, she may indeed remain true to her story of being an assimilated officer... I may have her promoted to replace Lambert, I may have her brought to Starfleet Command for debriefing and then left in their hands, I really haven't decided how things will go there yet, I think that's why I felt the need to write a coda to the arc...

I know what you mean there, and very much so The line about not drinking was fantastically done, in that while Alyosha literally does not consume liquids, he could simply have been speaking from the perspective of a Tee Total Human who refused to drink alcohol

Equally, that very much makes sense ^_^

Oh absolutely, it would make perfect sense that he would behave in as Human a manner as possible, so as to blend in and not cause distress, it was just interesting to see the world through his eyes ^_^

Given the radical differences between Devidian and Human physiology, it would be logical for their senses to be as different, and differently focused One comparison, might be to the way in which Magneto is not only able to manipulate magnetic fields, but is actually aware of metals in their own right, rather than simply focusing a magnetic field in a set area, and manipulating whatever is in that region... Equally, it made me wonder how he would have perceived Marcus' bioelectrical energy, because as an immortal, his quickening would have been not only constantly regenerating his physical cellular structure, but also recharging itself as well, so to Alyosha, I can only imagine that would have appeared very different to most other beings...

From what I understand, Andorian antennae are sensitive to electrical fields and shifts in pressure, so what I was wondering, was if he had been aware of Alyosha by some kind of physical detection of his presence, rather than being telepathically aware of Alyosha's consciousness, even if only on a subconscious level. A bit like how people on paranormal investigations can claim to smell a scent, such as pipe tobacco or a particular aftershave. Sometimes not even aware of the connection it has to a loved one, but simply aware that they can smell something...

@ everyone,

Ty for the kind words and friendly advice regarding my entry folks. Makes me really glad I decided to start doing these a few months ago. Haven't really had much time to read others until today so:

@sparklysoldier

Great work on yours! Shame about Enala, but I guess that's better than being a Borg drone

@marcus

As usual, excellent work Are you a published author? because if you're not, you really should be.

@cmdrscarlet

Very good work! My guess would be that being one of the slavers that captured Kathryn when she was young would be very...unhealthy

@squatsauce

Very great entry! It can be difficult to have comedy when involving the Borg, but you pulled it off in spades. Tarayl was especially comical, given that she's a far cry form most other Trill we encounter in Trek.

@josills

Interesting use of an assimilated (or at least partially so) Romulan. I'd be willing to bet that he'll have quite an interesting reaction to seeing Mol'Rihan.

@ambassaormolari

Only real issue I saw was a partial BB code for italics that was missing its endpoint Otherwise, great entry.