Zedd nodded "I would, once we're secure up to there, I'll watch this jext.corner too." He looked up above them and then his eyes made their way back down the wall, still taking notes of conduits and anything else that looked odd.

“Zedd, it’s Avery. What do you see? Describe what Ragnar’s talking about. Could be a redundant power shunt, or maybe some version of energy converters. Converters can be valuable, Captain. We can recycle or sell them.”

"From what I gather it looks to be some sort of hub. Something that looks to be a primary conduits or bus line and then several more smaller lines coming back off. But I dont see any borg around it at the moment."

“I’m pretty sure that structure is part of their multiple redundancy system. Those conduits work in part with the regeneration protocols. The fact that you’re not seeing any drones could mean that either they’re regenerating or the cube is more damaged than we realize.”

Ragnar left Zedd and Avery to the conversation which he wasn't really following anyway, his attention already moving further down the corridor. He moved slowly, phaser rifle still lowered but ready in his hands, checking every opening before he passed it and taking another look at the distribution nodes above them now that Avery had pointed them out. Okay, so ten seconds for transport sounded reassuring from the bridge...but in here, Ragnar knew ten seconds could be a very long time. He kept track of the others behind him without needing to look every few steps, listening to their movement while his eyes worked over the dark ahead, the walls, the ceiling and anything that looked even slightly different from what they had already passed. The deeper into the cube they moved, the more aware he became of the route behind them as well as the one ahead, mentally holding onto each turn and the fallback point they had already chosen.

Zedd and Mei-Lin both kept up with Ragnar. Mei-Lin covered back the farthest, while Zedd had made his way up to be about two thirds of the way between them, closer to Ragnar. All was still quiet as he entered the open area in front of them as Ragnar cleared it, making sure to not go in too far.

A moment later, Mei-Lin piped up "Chief, I'm running a passive scan on the hub now, maybe there's an interlink the Captain can hook up to?" She watched as numbers ran across the inside of her visor, transmitting what she was pickup up back to the Dutchman.

“Messing with interlink frequencies in such close vicinity to the Collective is a tall order, Mei-Lin. It could overload Zedd’s dataport. Let me see what I can do on my end, alright? Stand by, guys.”

"Acknowledged" she replied. It may or may not be the best time for an interlink, but it also could save them time of moving forward inside and risking direct detction.

“Morgan to Zedd and Mei-Lin. I’ve got something. I found a frequency to eavesdrop without being detected. Set your tricorders and dataport to 54.6 megahertz. This should enable us to monitor Borg communications without the Collective knowing it.
Zedd, you might feel a bit lightheaded when you make the adjustment. It should dissipate in a few minutes.”

"Understood Avery, I'll look at making a connection here." Zedd looked around for a moment and considered if he should stop there or if they need to move in more. He piped up "What do you think Ragnar, should we go in further or hold here and see what else we can scan?"

Ragnar glanced at him before he tilted his head. "If you're going to insert, this is the best spot...we can fall back easily," he said before he looked ahead again, frowning. "Unless you're desperate to find out what is ahead, Captain. We can scout ahead for a few minutes, get more readings, then fall back here."

While the idea of scouting ahead sounded better than plugging himself into the collective, he knew it carried it's own danger to continue. He also trusted Avery and Mei-Lin more than risking running across a borg drone looking for trouble. "I'll connect in. Please go ahead and take up watch."

Zedd brought the dataport online and let the wireless link reach for the Borg interlink.

The response came almost immediately.

For a fraction of a second there was only carrier noise and machine traffic, then the channel opened wider and the Collective crashed into him.

Not one voice. Thousands.

Fragments of thought overlapped one another without pause or order, some clear enough to make out, others little more than impressions pushed through the link. Coordinates. Status reports. Damage assessments. Drone designations. Requests for repair. Tactical data. Internal commands. Half-finished directives from systems that were no longer answering. Some of the voices were sharp and immediate while others were distant, broken, or repeating the same sequence over and over as damaged portions of the cube continued trying to speak to a Collective that was no longer listening.

For a moment, there was no Zedd and no room around him, only the sheer weight of a machine civilization talking to itself. He forced his attention past it.

The cube was damaged. Large sections were inactive, and that was the only reason this was possible at all. He didn't need the Collective. He needed the ship.

Zedd began narrowing the connection, filtering out the voices and pushing deeper into the local systems until the flood became something closer to usable data. He searched for infrastructure records first: deck layouts, power distribution, fabrication systems, environmental controls, structural integrity reports, maintenance logs, anything that could tell them what portions of the cube were still intact.

Then he started looking for components.

Functional power-transfer assemblies. Regenerative systems. Sensor hardware. Processing nodes. Distribution conduits. Anything still attached to a section of the cube that was dead enough to salvage but intact enough to be worth taking.

The Collective continued whispering beneath it all, thousands of voices reduced now to a low, constant pressure at the edge of his awareness.

Zedd ignored them and kept digging.

"How are things looking Avery, Ragnar? Anything indicating concern or them noticing our presence?"

“Avery here…I should ask you the same question. How are you doing, Zedd? Are you handling the input? I’m sure it’s overwhelming. T’Vara’s got lock on your vitals. So far, so good, Captain.”

Ragnar didn't answer immediately, too focused on the rest of their sector. There was something different...small, not the sort of big change you'd expect if someone plugged themselves into a Borg cube. No...this was more subtle. A green light coming to life farther down the corridor where there had been nothing before, followed by another closer to them. His attention moved upwards as one of the distribution nodes gave a faint pulse, then towards an opening across the chamber when he heard the unmistakable mechanical sound of something moving beyond it. His grip tightened around the phaser rifle without raising it as adrenaline pushed through him. He took a slow breath, calming the spike down. A few seconds later another light came on inside what looked like a regeneration alcove farther along the wall, illuminating the shape of a drone standing motionless within it. Ragnar watched it carefully. The drone's head moved slightly, but it made no attempt to leave the alcove. Then it went still again. "They're noticing something alright," he said quietly. His eyes stayed on the drone before moving back towards the corridor and the other openings around them. "Nothing coming for us yet, but the cube knows we're here."

“I see it, too, Ragnar. Regeneration doesn’t necessarily mean trouble. The longer they stay dormant, the better, but some of the damaged systems might be online in a matter of hours. Zedd, do you get a sense of what systems are giving off power signatures?”, Avery said.

The truth was, Zedd was spinning trying to keep all the voices from drowning him out. He was more focused on accessing anything readily available instead of trying to break through any firewalls or focus on what commands or larger consensus in thought was being communicated. He stopped for a moment and did his best to focus.

They certainly had been heavily focusing on repair, for quite some time it seemed. He couldn't tell how long but they were focusing on one area at a time.

"It sounds like they're focusing has been repairs, collectove processing to augment damaged systems and the like. A number of drones were dedicated to help woth it, likely why it's been so quiet. I can't tell how much longer it'll be until they have this area repaired but we should go over the schematics you're seeing and decide what area's to salvage, especially if this doesn't become an option to return to."

He noticed some low level feedback a moment later. Enough to be annoying but nothing that would incapacitate him. It certainly made it more difficult to focus along with all the voices.

Ragnar looked towards Zedd, then back to the drone. "Then we take what we can and leave before they finish fixing the place." His rifle stayed low, but ready. "I'd rather not be here when they decide we're part of the problem."

Zedd winced at pain as the feedback increased. He wasn't sure if it was and actual defense from the Borg systems or just other systems coming back online. He terminated the connection and then placed a hand on the wall for a moment to keep his balance as he gathered himself.

"Did we get enough Avery? I think we should put a plan together and get back as soon as possible and follow Ragnar's direction."

“Should be good to go. There should be a power waveguide about 15 meters east of your position. We can definitely use that. See if you can scrounge and titanium or duranium. Larger components I can transport, the smaller stuff might be easier to just carry back to the shuttle.”

"In that case, Raganr finish up whatever you need and let's fall back so we can return as soon as possible and begin stripping this thing. The less time we give the Borg, the better." He began walking back towards Mei-Lin who had been reviewing the data he pulled and also running additional scans in case anyone else decided they wanted to join the party.

"Everything looks good here Captain. Ready to go when Ragnar is."

Ragnar gave the drone one last look before turning his attention back towards the way they had come. "Nothing worth staying for." He shifted his rifle in his hands and nodded towards Mei-Lin. "Let's fall back. I'll bring up the rear." The rifle remained lowered, but there was no relaxing now. Not until there was an airlock between them and the Borg, and maybe even a few lightyears.

Mei-Lin gave a nod and Zedd took point for the way back to the runabout. It was much quicker than it seemed like and once the trio got on board, Zedd tapped the console to signal they were good to leave. The rear hatch sealed shut and they could hear the maglock disengage. Soon enough they'd be back and soon enough, they'd be making real money...