The Borg

The Borg are an immensely powerful race of cybernetically enhanced humanoids. Believed to have originated in the Delta Quadrant, the Borg have spread throughout the Galaxy in their quest to assimilate all races into the Borg collective.

The Borg operate around a principle known as the collective, a term used to describe the group consciousness of the Borg civilisation, and is itself composed of a number of life forms from around the galaxy. The Borg travel the galaxy assimilating entire cultures into their collective. When the Borg attack, they use an unique strategy for dealing with prisoners; they turn them into Borg. Within only a few minutes of capture the prisoners become allies to the Borg, ready to help in the assault on their former colleagues.

Assimilation is achieved by an existing Borg penetrating the victim's skin via two tubules which extend from the Borg's hand. Once under the victim's skin, several nanoprobes are injected which attack the body on the cellular level taking control of cells and body functions. From here, the victim begins to turn into a Borg, their bodies riddled with Borg technology and renders them passive, ready for further assimilation via the grafting of cybernetic components onto the subject's body. This transformation robs the victim of independent control and eventually links them into the Borg collective.

The group consciousness that the Borg maintains means that no one Borg has a sense of individuality or separate autonomous thought or action apart from that of the hive mentality. All Borg are initially born humanoid although are implanted immediately after birth or capture and fitted with various cybernetic devices which integrate them into the group, adapting them to their new function. Each Borg is linked to the hive via a sophisticated subspace network that ensures that each is given constant and immediate supervision by the collective.

Every Borg exhibits a high degree of intelligence and adaptability in their tactics against other life forms. The most successful Borg countermeasures are only effective once as the Borg have the ability to quickly adapt. The Borg travel the universe in ships which, due to the high degree of connectivity between single Borg, can be considered as a single entity, extremely generalised in design, with no specific bridge or engineering section.

The Borg only attack when either assimilating entire races or when they perceive a threat. The artificial and organic parts of the Borg blend together seamlessly with devices extending from their bodies rather than as separate items held by hand. They can survive in the vacuum of space indefinitely without the need for breathing apparatus and their bodies appear to have in-built shielding against directed energy fire, e.g. from a phaser, and also have the ability to transport themselves at will.

The Borg queen is the one controlling consciousness within the Borg collective and personifies herself as the Borg; the beginning and the end of the hive consciousness.