The Darkness in Picard S3...

 ....That Nobody Is Talking About

The Borg have been defeated for once and for all ! Yay ! Long live the Federation. But....at what price did this victory come ? Yes, the Borg Collective is evil. Yes, they were planning to wipe out Earth and needed to be stopped. And the queen was an insane (insert whatever curse you think is best here). Picard and crew did what needed to be done. It's not them I'm doubting, but I think the situation is nowhere as black-and-white as it appears at first glance. 

Let's talk about a man called Fred....Fred is just a random guy living on random planet in the Delta Quadrant. Then one day the Borg roll up to ruin everybody's day by assimilating them. Including Fred. He loses his family, he loses his friends, he his loses his mind. And then the neurolytic pathogen ruins the collective. Let us look at the possibilities for Fred.

1. If he's really unlucky, he dies a horrible death and then gets eaten by Queen. Only to be briefly revived as a mindless cyber zombie when Picard and co visit. He is then put out of his misery when the Borg ship explodes.
2. The Pathogen simply kills him.
   
3. He gets stuck in regeneration mode, like the Cube seen in Let Sleeping Borg Lie. And then...
1. Because of people's fear of the Collective, nobody rescues him...ever.
2. Somebody comes across his Cube and he is given the 'Icheb Treatment / aka dissected alive for his implants".
3. Even if he get rescued by somebody who doesn't Icheb him, where's he going to go ? As I said above...friends, family, gone. And what about his homeworld ? Even if the Collective didn't total it, who knows how long Fred has been in the Hive Mind. Is his world still there ? Has it been taken over by somebody else ?....

Which takes us away from Fred and back to the bigger picture. As established by Voyager, Borg Space is big. And like any other nation, the Borg have neighbors. Neighbors who are going to figure out that the Collective is falling apart. And try to conquer their space, either by colonization or warfare. 

A situation that is going to lead to the death of innocents drones like Fred. Bloody wars between these states. Yes, the Federation has won, but the Delta Quadrant is burning. And let's not forget there is also the fact that everybody who was taken over, now probably has PTSD. Not mention the elephant in the room...

Where did this pathogen come from ? Neurolytic Pathogens don't exactly grow on trees. And even if it could be made in the Sickbay of the USS Voyager, I doubt The Doctor would allow it. Yes, he was part of the developing of the nanite weapon they used against Species 8472. But that was with the galaxy at stake. And Voyager's goal was not genocide. In fact, this was a major source of tension between Janeway and the Borg.

The only other option is that Admiral Janeway brought it with her from 2404 to 2378. But it doesn't answer the question of how she got it. Replicators don't make lifeforms. Somebody had to grow it. Somebody rather ruthless. Somebody know for attempting genocide by virus....

Basically, the whole thing screams Section 31. And where they failed when they tried to wipe out the Founders, this time they succeeded.

That's all I....No wait, it was.   But after sleeping on it for a night, it's not anymore. (Short) RANT ALARM !! 

What about the Borg splinter states ? The Borg Cooperative from the Voyager episode Unity and the Unimatrix Zero, whose former members were liberated. Are they gone as well ? Will Section 31 use the pathogen to wipe the Cooperative out to prevent the rise of new Collective !? Will Starfleet just stand for that ?

Moving on.....I know that some people consider Prodigy and Lower Decks non-canon. But based on the upcoming SNW / Lower Deck crossover, the folks running the show(s) think differently. Which brings us to "Let Sleeping Borg Lie". 

The USS Protostar crew managed to get out. But they had the luck of having a Medusan along for the ride. So how many of these dormant Borg ships are out there, waiting to ruin somebody's day ? These ships are basically landmines, ready to restart the Collective if whoever boards them messes up. 

In short, it's a huge frakking, bloody mess. And it's the Federation's fault. They needed to get back to the Delta Quadrant and get to cleaning it up. Or as Commander Adama would put it...

"You cannot play God, then wash you hands of the things you've created. Sooner or later, you can't hide from the things you've done anymore."

Regards,

Ruben A. Hilbers (Commander Nash)