What would Borg Vau N'Akat be like? (And in general, what the heck is up with the Vau N'Akat?)
What would Borg Vau N'Akat be like? (And in general, what the heck is up with the Vau N'Akat?)
I think the Vau N'Akat seen in Prodigy have a lot of "biological and technological distinctiveness" to be added to the collective's own. My question is whether or not the Borg could take advantage of the Vau N'Akat's abilities, and whether they'd be all that helpful.
For instance, could assimilated Vau N'Akat use their heirloom powers to manipulate materials in order to pump out at least the shells of Borg Cubes like nobody's business?
I think this depends on how heirloom material actually works and is made. Its utility to the Borg probably depends on whether or not it's a limited resource or actually some sort of alloy that could be constructed anywhere in the galaxy.
In truth, we can't know that, as in the current state of canon Vau N'Akat lore, it's basically just space magic to us. If I had to take a wild guess, I have two theories:
- Maybe Vau N'Akat have detachable nanobot-esque cells that communicate with the brain over an electromagnatic signal, allowing the quick assembly of structures at a relatively precise level, especially with the one specific material. (Perhaps all that blue dust stuff that happens at death are these cells freaking out as communication ceases and, for lack of orders, devouring the body.)
- The Vau N'Akat have organs that essentially very precisely accelerate exchange particles. (This theory makes the above one seem comparatively more plausible.)
Another question is whether or not Vau N'Akat drones could use all that "your will is mine" stuff to aid the assimilation of other Vau N'Akat and/or create one super drone.
Going with theory 1, maybe the "Your will is mine" stuff is actually a weak ability to lend extra cells to the desired person that builds up when a lot of people are doing it, strengthening healing and immune responses as well as any use of that person's detached cells, thus explaining that whole scene.
If this is the mechanic by which it works (and assimilation doesn't somehow bork the mental facilities for this), this could be a very powerful ability for the Borg. It almost sounds too powerful, as those cells could be used as essentially an assimilation virus or a bioweapon, which I think would break the balance of power in the ST universe in a way that I think writers really wouldn't want to.
Overall, as I have said before, just as I find it very fun to try to theorize how the Vau N'Akat work, I also find it very difficult due to both its status as a very new species and their general uniqueness (almost un-Trekiness, not to insult them) as a species. I do think Prodigy does some good things with the Vau N'Akat, and it's nice to have a species that's a bit more than just forehead ridges and a fatal flaw (if they even bother with the forehead ridges - looking at you, Betazoids). However, similar to some of the complaints with Prodigy in general, I can't deny that the space magic aspect feels more Star Wars than I can say I like in Star Trek.
So, what are your thoughts?
I wish I had something more to add to this. I saw this when you posted and thought surely someone more creatively minded than I would chime in. Just want to say thanks for taking the time to write this up, it makes you think about how many other one off deux ex machina type races that Star Trek likes to throw out there. The Organians, Talosians, whatever they decided Trelane is, the Douwd, the list goes on and on. It's quite fortunate for the rest of civilization that these omniscient beings seem to stick to themselves.
I actually don't mind the space-magic aspects, but I'm also more of a fan of TOS, which leaned into the whole mysticism and space magic more than a lot of the later shows. Not everything has to have a scientific explanation, or at least, not one known to the Federation/viewer. We don't know how Q abilities work, for example.
Honestly, I'm not sure that the Borg would really take advantage of their abilities. For all their claims about collective technological and biological distinctiveness, we've yet to see the Borg actually make use of any of it, besides some vague lip service about suitability of purpose.
We don't see Borg drones from telepathic species use their telepathic abilities as communication, or weaponise those abilities, for example. They mostly just use their tech and brute force.
It is equally possible that there might be a metaphysical aspect to the abilities of the Vau N'Akat that the Borg are unable to tap, similar to the abilities of the travellers, which also don't have a replicable technological basis. If the Borg could do that, they would have expanded well outside of Earth in First Contact, given that Wesley once created and created access points to and from a whole universe.
That's a good point about the Borg not using telepathy, etc. Perhaps the large mass of existing Borg have a bias towards the usefulness of such abilities that the collective, when acting as one mind, is not really able to self-interrogate? If so, that could be considered one of their major weaknesses.
I've always thought about how many beings with one belief would the Borg need to assimilate to see a great effect. For instance, if the Borg assimilated trillions of Ferengi (however that happened), would the Borg start suddenly trying to seek out profit?
"We are the Borg. Your biological, technological, and financial distinctiveness will be added to our own. Resistance is not profitable!"