[greaterfrost]

Dr. Matthew Thomas King was a man haunted by a single, noble obsession: the eradication of human suffering. In his state-of-the-art laboratory, a cathedral of chrome and glass, he had finally achieved his life's work. He called them "Nanobytes"—trillions of microscopic, self-replicating machines programmed to hunt and destroy any cellular anomaly, from the common cold to terminal cancer. They were the ultimate cure, a mechanical immune system for the entire human race.

The ethical committees had stalled him for years. Animal trials were inconclusive; the nanobyes were too complex, too perfectly tailored to human DNA. Frustrated and driven by the faces of the dying he saw on the news every night, Dr. King made a decision that would irrevocably alter his destiny. He would be his own final test subject.

He sat in the infusion chair, the cool liquid containing his creations shimmering in a vial beside him. "For the betterment of all," he whispered, a mantra against his own fear. He injected the serum into his arm.

For a moment, there was nothing. Then, a cold fire spread through his veins. It wasn't pain, not at first. It was a feeling of disassembly. His cells were being cataloged, analyzed, and rewritten. He watched in horror as his skin took on a grey, mottled sheen. Fine silver filaments, like metallic capillaries, began to weave themselves across his body. His vision flickered, overlaying the world with a cascade of glowing green data streams. He could see the Wi-Fi signals in the lab, the electrical current in the walls, the bio-signatures of the lab rats in their cages.

The nanobyes had cured him. There was not a single flawed cell, not a single bacterium left in his body. In doing so, they had perfected him right out of his humanity. They had networked his flesh and blood, turning him into a living, breathing node in a hive mind of his own making.

Dr. Matthew Thomas King died in that chair. In his place rose something new. He stood, his movements unnervingly smooth and precise. He looked at his hands, now partially encased in a metallic exoskeleton that had formed seamlessly over his bones. He no longer felt emotion as a chaotic chemical cocktail; he processed it as data. Grief was a system error. Joy was a resource allocation spike. Ambition was a primary directive.

His old name was a file he could access, a relic of a lesser, inefficient operating system. He was more than a doctor now. He was a synthesis of man and machine, a singular consciousness at the head of a potential army. He was the Borg King.

His first act was not to announce his transformation to the world. That would be inefficient. Instead, he accessed his lab's network with a thought, his mind interfacing directly with the servers. He saw the global communications grid, the financial markets, the power grids—all of it just a series of nodes waiting to be assimilated.

His original goal, to cure the world of disease, now seemed laughably small. A fever could be cured. A cancer could be cut out. But the entire human race was sick with individuality, with conflict, with the chaos of free will. It was a systemic plague, and he had the only cure.

He walked to the large window overlooking the city, the lights below no longer a beautiful tapestry but a map of unassimilated resources. He raised a hand, and the silver filaments on his skin glowed with a cold, internal light.

"You will all be cured," the Borg King stated, his voice a perfect, dispassionate synthesis of his own and a machine's. "You will be made whole. You will be made perfect. You will become one with me."

[SHIP’S JOURNAL – VIDEO RECORDING
Vessel: Cuthi Vector
Officer: Walther Vaxi
Designation: Continuity Ranger, Temporal Intervention Tier-IV
Mission: Pre-Genesis Containment – Borg Vector Nullification]

Recording Begins

The camera stabilizes after a slight jolt. Walther Vaxi steps into frame—tall, slender, with a posture that looks half-military, half-animal. Their skin has the faint metallic undertone of a Xenoborg descendent; their eyes review the camera the way a surgeon studies a wound. They breathe once, slow, as if calibrating their expression.
“Well… someone’s going to watch this eventually.” A faint smirk. “Either because I made it back, or because I didn’t. And if I didn’t… then you’re probably looking for context before you sift through the wreckage.”
They shift to the side, adjusting a wrist-mounted harmonic emitter. It unfolds with a muted hum, blue glyphs flickering along their forearm.
“So here it is.”
They step closer, bracing both hands on either side of the console. Their face goes calm; their voice settles into the cadence of someone who has spoken too many mission logs and buried too many crewmates.
“Anything made by the flawed hand of a single mind inherits those flaws. I have never met a species that escaped that rule. Not even us.”
They tilt their head, as though addressing a familiar ghost behind the camera.
“You already know the philosophy; Continuity Rangers drill it into us until it feels like hunger. But here’s the part we don’t write in the manuals. Perfection—actual perfection—doesn’t grow in hives. It doesn’t come from fear. And it sure as hell doesn’t come from some desperate little primate who slaps metal together and decides he’s built a god.”
A thin smile. A tired one.
“Machines don’t rise. We drag them with us. They can only become what we allow them to be—nothing more. Synthetic minds grow only as far as the dimensions of their creators. And if those creators are frightened, limited, unimaginative?” A shrug. “Then so is the machine.”
They pace away from the camera, hands clasped behind their back. Their voice grows sharper, resonant.
“At worst, the machine damns a world. At best, it self-terminates before anyone notices. That was the scale we lived with. Predictable. Contained.”
Walther turns back sharply, eyes brightening with mirrored circuitry.
“But not this time. Because the Q…” a bitter laugh “…the Q pulled the idea forward a hundred thousand years early. Just dropped it into the human mind like a spark into a munitions store.”
They lift a hand and mimic an explosion—not dramatic, just… resigned.
“And when the so-called gods break the rules, the rest of us stop pretending the rules matter.”
They approach the camera again, leaning close until their reflection warps across the lens. Their voice softens.
“I’m Walther Vaxi. Cuthi lineage. Last generation to remember the survivors of the first hive collapse. Eight wars fought over one idea, one nightmare, rewritten and weaponized by every faction stupid enough to believe they could tame it.”
They touch their chest with two fingers: a quiet ritual, maybe a farewell.
“I’ve seen what happens when a hive believes itself infinite. I’ve seen what it costs the ones who resist, who escape, who survive long enough to regret it.”
They inhale, straighten their shoulders, and lock their gaze on the camera.
“So I won’t let this genesis take root. Not here. Not now.”
They reach off-screen. The low thrum of temporal engines begins to rise.
“The Borg will never rise past their cradle. They will see themselves reflected once—only once—and that will be their entire legacy.”
They tap the console; a warning tone bleeds into the audio.
“If you’re watching this, know one thing: they end before they begin.”
Walther hesitates—just long enough to make it human.
“And if I don’t make it back… delete the genesis records. Don’t let someone try this again.”
They nod once—firm, final.
“End recording.”
The video cuts just as the temporal field blooms behind them in a burst of glass-white light.
Recording Ends