star trek voyager omega directive

Omega Directive

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Omega lockout screen

The Omega Directive (denoted by Ω ) was a highly classified Starfleet general order requiring the captain of a starship to notify Starfleet Command immediately upon detection of an Omega molecule .

The directive also authorized the use of any and all means to destroy an Omega molecule, superseding all other regulations including the Prime Directive . The Omega Directive was deemed necessary because of the extreme power and consequently catastrophic threat to interstellar civilizations posed by even a single molecule . Knowledge of the Omega molecule and the Omega Directive was restricted to starship captains and flag officers . Captains received subsequent training on how to deal with the issue; however specialist teams were created to deal with crisis.

• 3.1 Background information
• 3.2 Apocrypha
• 3.3 External link

History [ ]

In the mid- 23rd century , a team of 127 top- Federation scientists , led by the Starfleet physicist Ketteract , was working on a top secret experiment at a classified research station in the Lantaru sector . Research showed a single molecule of Omega contained the same power as a warp core , so theoretically a small chain could sustain a civilization indefinitely. Ketteract's goal was to create an inexhaustible power source, though Seven of Nine pointed out its potential use as a weapon . Federation cosmologists theorized that the Omega molecule once existed in nature for an infinitesimal period of time at the exact moment of the big bang ; some even claimed Omega was the primal source of energy for the Big Bang.

Outpost destroyed by Omega molecules

The scientists were able to synthesize a single Omega molecule, which only remained stable for a fraction of a second. Upon its nearly instant destabilization, the research center was destroyed, killing all 127 scientists. An unexpected secondary effect (discovered by rescue teams en route) was the rupture of subspace within a radius of several light years , causing warp travel to become a permanent impossibility within this area. Starfleet Command realized the terrible implications: a chain reaction involving a handful of Omega molecules could devastate subspace throughout an entire quadrant , effectively ending interstellar travel for spacefaring civilizations in the quadrant.

Therefore Starfleet Command suppressed all knowledge of the experiment and fabricated the story of a natural phenomenon occurring in the Lantaru sector which made warp travel impossible within the seven-light year radius of subspace devastated by the Omega explosion.

Protocol [ ]

Omega molecules being destroyed

Starfleet enacted the Omega Directive in response to the Lantaru incident, naming it after the last letter in the Greek alphabet , chosen to signify the molecule as the ultimate threat not only to the Federation, but to every spacefaring civilization in the entire galaxy . If a starship were to detect an Omega molecule, the following procedure would occur:

• The ship's computer would disengage the engines immediately and lock out all computer access, displaying the Greek letter "Omega" on every bridge console. Only the captain would be able to disable the lockout.
• In the privacy of his or her ready room or other secured area, with the doors locked, the captain would give the computer the proper high-level security authorization code to access the sensor data.
• The computer would then brief the captain regarding the detection of Omega molecules, followed by instructions to implement the Omega Directive at once – disregarding all other priorities, including the Prime Directive .
• The captain, absolutely forbidden from discussing anything about what was happening with any member of the crew, would contact Starfleet Command via an encrypted channel to inform them of the situation. Starfleet Command would then dispatch a specialized team authorized to use whatever means necessary to destroy the molecules. ( VOY : " The Omega Directive ")

The Omega Directive was executed in the Delta Quadrant on stardate 51781.2 in 2374 by Captain Kathryn Janeway of the USS Voyager . On that stardate, Voyager 's sensors encountered the shock wave from a nearby Omega explosion, revealing the presence of one or more Omega molecules in the vicinity. However, Voyager was out of contact with Starfleet when the detection occurred, with no specialist support to deal with the problem. Complicating the matter was the fact that Seven of Nine was aware of both the molecule's existence (due to the Borg 's own Omega experiments) and the Omega Directive (the Borg having assimilated Starfleet captains, thus their knowledge). After reconsidering Chakotay 's counsel, Janeway therefore modified the protocols to their unique situation by briefing her senior staff (including Seven) on the directive, effectively enlisting the crew to destroy the molecules. The Voyager crew successfully destroyed the Omega molecules, using a harmonic resonance chamber to destroy twenty-eight percent of them and a gravimetric torpedo eliminating the rest. ( VOY : " The Omega Directive ")

Appendices [ ]

Background information [ ].

The first known opportunity for the Borg to have learned of the Omega Directive was in 2362 , when they presumably assimilated Captain Blackwood along with the rest of the crew of the USS Tombaugh . ( VOY : " Infinite Regress ") If Blackwood was dead before a drone could get to him, the next and most definite opportunity was when they assimilated Captain Jean-Luc Picard of the USS Enterprise -D into Locutus of Borg in 2367 . ( TNG : " The Best of Both Worlds ")

Apocrypha [ ]

The Omega Directive is mentioned by Captain James T. Kirk in the 2006 video game Star Trek: Legacy after a devastating attack spreads thousands of Omega particles into a star system. Kirk asked Starfleet to develop the directive.

The game Star Trek: Armada depicts events of an Omega molecule. It was found by the Ferengi , who were preparing to sell it to the Cardassians , as they did not realize its power. The Romulans led by Sela captured it and hid it at a Romulan starbase where the Borg assimilated it. It was moved to Unimatrix 01 where an invasion force led by the Federation-Klingon-Romulan alliance destroyed it and the surrounding Borg sectors.

The Section 31 novel Cloak details the events that lead to the creation of the Omega Directive. In it, the USS Enterprise forces the USS Sphinx out of warp, having been sabotaged by Section 31 in order to prevent them from revealing the research station in the Lantaru sector. This leads to an investigation that reveals Ketteract's experiment to James T. Kirk and the crew of the original Enterprise . Although Kirk tries to appeal to Ketteract to stop the experiment, he is unsuccessful and the events described in " The Omega Directive " come to fruition.

In the game Star Trek Online mission "Sphere of Influence", the player character and major characters from the Federation and Klingon sides are taken by surprise when the character Commander Winters tells everyone that "all the monitors on the bridge are showing an Omega, we're locked out of the computers and the engine's off-line" after the Enterprise -F scanned what was on the other side of the Iconian gateway near Jouret IV , thus setting the stage for the Season 8 expansion.

External link [ ]

• Omega Directive at Memory Beta , the wiki for licensed Star Trek works

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http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Recap/StarTrekVoyagerS4E19TheOmegaDirective

Recap / Star Trek Voyager S 4 E 19 The Omega Directive

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The Omega particle is known to Starfleet captains and admirals, but not to any lower ranking officers or enlisted. Since Seven of Nine was in the Borg collective, which has assimilated Starfleet officers like Captain Picard, Seven knows about the Omega directive. She also knows that the Borg revere the Omega particle for its perfection.

Back in the Alpha Quadrant, Janeway would have help dealing with Omega. In the Delta Quadrant, she has her crew, but still feeling guilty about stranding them on the other side of the galaxy, decides she and Seven should go at it alone, just the two of them. But as work on the project reveals that there are many more factors of Omega particles than can be practically neutralized, Janeway decides to involve her senior staff into working on a more effective solution. Between the Borg technology that Seven has acquired, and the crew working in tandem on a containment unit, they quickly work on a better solution. But trouble still looms ahead, as the alien civilization who created Omega won't give up without a fight, and then Seven can't give up on her notion that she get Omega to stabilize in perfect harmony...

All hell breaks loose as the Voyager crew beams up Omega into the containment unit and they start the process to destabilize the molecules. The enemy ships' weapons risk destroying both Voyager and the subspace in the quadrant. As the procedure continues, Seven is shocked when she manages to witness the Omega molecules achieve harmony without any explainable reasons. Despite the achievement, Janeway orders to have the containment unit beamed into space and destroyed, as a minimum safe amount of the Omega molecules have now been safely neutralized. Voyager manages to warp away as the explosion goes off, with the aliens pre-warp vessels unable to pursue.

The episode ends with Janeway and Seven in da Vinci's workshop on the holodeck, as they ponder over the past few days of events. Seven explains that she was delighted to finally witnessing her personal goal of perfection (seeing the stable formation of Omega), but she's left with more questions now than answers. When inside the Collective, they generally decided on which ideals made the most sense, but now that she's alone she can't come to a reasonable conclusion as to what she believes now. Janeway simply reassures her by saying, "If I didn't know you better, I'd say you just had your first spiritual experience."

Contains examples of:

• Ain't Too Proud to Beg : Seven's voice cracks as she asks Chakotay to authorize her plan to stabilize the Omega molecule, adding "Please" despite showing No Social Skills throughout the episode.
• Alien Non-Interference Clause : Explicitly overruled in matters of Omega.
• Arson, Murder, and Jaywalking : Seven plans to work, eat, exercise, and read A Christmas Carol .
• Artistic License – History : Albert Einstein never worked directly in the development of atomic weapons, although his theory of mass-energy equivalence (e=mc squared) laid the groundwork for them, and he did sign a letter advising President Franklin Roosevelt that American research into the area be accelerated as World War 2 neared. His only regret in that regard was from encouraging such research, as it became clear after the war neither Germany or Japan had the resources to construct atomic bombs, and Soviet Russia only figured it out from spying on America's efforts, which led to the Cold War.
• Artistic License – Space : The alien moon is said to have an atmosphere eleven thousand kilometers thick. For context, the entire planet Earth has a diameter of 12,800 kilometers.
• The "Be Careful!" Speech : Janeway demands a hypospray of Fantastic Radiation Shielding , and curtly overrules the Doctor when he objects that it's dangerous. However the Doctor earns a Gooey Look when he gives this trope.
• Bittersweet Ending : The Omega particles, which could be used to power civilizations, had to be destroyed; but for a few precious seconds, Seven glimpsed perfection.
• Butt-Monkey : Seven engages in her usual Harry-bashing, even going so far as to "demote" him in as part of her work detail.
• Blunt "No" : Harry : Wanna know what I think? Tuvok : No.
• Tuvok is playing kal-toh with Ensign Kim, which they started doing at the end of "Alter Ego".
• Carol Marcus and her Genesis Device is mentioned.
• Cargo Cult : The Borg have one for Omega, considering it the epitome of perfection to which they strive.
• Classified Information : Everything about the Omega particle is restricted to Starfleet Captains and Flagship Officers. The crew are understandably annoyed at this , given that they're effectively told to do tasks without being able to use their Gadgeteer Genius skills. Seven is brought into Janeway's confidence, as she already knows about the Omega Directive from Starfleet captains who've been assimilated by the Borg. However these rules have been written for the Alpha Quadrant, where a Starfleet captain would call in a specialized Starfleet team to deal with the crisis. Janeway is convinced to include the senior staff when the crisis turns out to be bigger than she expected.
• Eldritch Abomination : Of a sort; Omega's true nature can't be known, and it's responsible for much destruction and loss of life, including the potential to destroy subspace - the medium of the universe which enables warp speed. Its very existence is considered the Godzilla Threshold by Starfleet. On seeing its creation, Seven even has the sense that it may be self-aware enough to study her in response.
• Expy : In-universe, Seven creates one of a Hive Mind to build and maintain the resonance chamber, even demoting Harry when he refuses to play along!
• Famous, Famous, Fictional : When discussing the potential of the Omega Particle, Janeway mentions Einstein and the atom bomb (famous), and Carol Marcus and the Genesis Device (fictional).
• For Science! : Averted; Omega is so dangerous that Starfleet wants it destroyed. Alien scientist: Small-minded creatures! You destroy whatever you don't understand!
• Starfleet procedure goes out the airlock when Omega is involved. Captain Janeway is set on destroying a dangerous phenomenon instead of investigating it, keeps the crew out of the loop, and the Prime Directive is superseded.
• Janeway eventually letting the senior crew know what's up. Seven is already aware of Omega and the Omega Directive because the Borg assimilated knowledge of it, likely from Picard and the victims of Wolf 359, and Voyager , being stranded in the Delta Quadrant, has no access to Starfleet resources, forcing Janeway to throw together an Omega Directive squadron from her own personnel.
• Just as Janeway has been authorized to destroy Omega at all costs, Seven says that Borg drones have been instructed to assimilate it at all costs.
• The species developing the Omega molecule. Their resources are drained and they don't have warp technology, so can't get outside help.
• Gone Horribly Right : Along with Marcus, Janeway thinks of Einstein and the atomic bomb when comparing peoples' reactions to the revolutionary devices which they helped create, but could be (and were) perverted into deadly weapons; Janeway can understand how they must have felt, and Ketteract must have felt the same about Omega shortly before the end of his life.
• Headbutting Heroes : Averted during the final Janeway/Seven confrontation in Cargo Bay 2. Unlike in "Prey", this time Seven does understand Janeway's perspective, and steps aside to allow the captain to destroy Omega.
• Holy Grail : Janeway calls Omega this for the Borg. Seven doesn't get the reference.
• Hyperspeed Escape : When pursued by sublight spacecraft, Voyager can't flee because of the damage from the Omega explosion . They escape the region Just in Time to detonate the Omega particles and jump to warp.
• If I Do Not Return : And for once this trope is meant to be taken seriously, as Chakotay would have only ten seconds to pull a Hyperspeed Escape before Omega created a No Warping Zone , if Janeway's shuttle mission didn't succeed. Averted in the end as she involves more of the crew and Voyager itself.
• In Harm's Way : Janeway would rather go on a Suicide Mission than put Voyager 's crew at risk. Fortunately Chakotay convinces her to at least bring the senior officers into the problem; however, this also leads to them realizing they'll need Voyager itself to pull off the mission.
• Insufferable Genius : Seven effortlessly completes the kal-toh game Harry has been working on all night, saying it's "elementary spatial harmonics". Kim asks what Seven needs the rest of the crew for, only to get a Meaningful Look from Seven. "Forget I asked." Seven of Nine: The modifications require several complex calculations. Assist me. Captain Janeway: I guess I will .
• Lock Down : The moment the sensors detect the Omega shockwave Voyager automatically drops out of warp with all sensors shut down, and the computer can only be accessed by the captain.
• Mad Lib Thriller Title : Going by the name, you'd be forgiven if you thought this was a Robert Ludlum joint.
• The Main Characters Do Everything : Janeway and her senior staff are the ones most involved in destroying Omega. This is justified for two reasons: the extreme need-to-know nature of the Omega Directive (which Janeway is already bending to a serious degree) and the fact that Voyager is the only ship around to deal with things. Janeway even explains that if this were in the Alpha Quadrant, Starfleet would be sending a specialized team to destroy Omega.
• Male Gaze : The camera drops to show Seven's ass as she's walking away from the audience while in the cargo bay.
• A Million Is a Statistic : The Borg consider 600,000 dead drones an irrelevance in their quest to stabilize the Omega particle. They also assimilated a number of primitive species just to follow the chain of evidence to Omega.
• Names to Run Away from Really Fast : Nothing good will come from something named after the last and most ominous letter in the Greek alphabet.
• No Man Should Have This Power : How Starfleet feels about Omega.
• No Social Skills : Lampshaded by the Doctor when Seven tries to barge into his Sickbay and interrogate a barely conscious patient. He promises to teach the subject on her next course.
• No Warping Zone : A single Omega particle detonation can destroy subspace across an entire sector, making warp travel impossible throughout said sector (which has already occurred in the Lantaru Sector, with Starfleet officially declaring it a natural phenomenon), and a large enough chain reaction could do the same to an entire quadrant . This is why Starfleet is freakin' scared of Omega and wants it destroyed at any cost.
• Oh, Crap! : Many times throughout the episode, especially as the molecule count goes from one to dozens to hundreds to over two hundred million.
• O.O.C. Is Serious Business : Former science officer Janeway wants Omega destroyed without bothering to study it. Seven's desire to gaze upon it is compared to religious fervor.
• Outgrown Such Silly Superstitions : Averted; Seven dismisses speculation by primitive species (including human ) about the nature of the Omega particle, yet the Borg quest also has religious overtones. She appeals to Chakotay's beliefs when begging him to let her stabilize the molecule, and at the end of the episode compares her gazing on a fully formed Omega molecule to a religious epiphany. Seven: This simulation contains many religious components. I was studying them to help me understand what I saw in Cargo Bay two. Janeway: The data isn't clear why Omega stabilized in the last few seconds. The chances are it was simply a chaotic anomaly, nothing more. Seven: For three point two seconds I saw perfection. When Omega stabilized, I felt a curious sensation. As I was watching it, it seemed to be watching me. The Borg have assimilated many species with mythologies to explain such moments of clarity. I've always dismissed them as trivial. Perhaps I was wrong. Janeway: If I didn't know you better, I'd say you just had your first spiritual experience.
• Properly Paranoid : Omega is Classified Information because of the risk that the information will be taken by force, which has already happened with the Borg.
• Rule of Funny : The work 'collective' Seven forms on Voyager . Giving everyone Borg designations would actually be less efficient, but sets up a gag involving Harry Kim getting "demoted".
• Rule of Symbolism : In-Universe when Seven studies the religious symbols in the Da Vinci holo-program, in order to come to grips with the experience of witnessing perfection.
• Schizo Tech : The species that was working on Omega have fast sublight ships with weapons that are a legitimate threat to Voyager ...and are a pre-warp civilization . Justified in that their solar system has an ample supply of the rare substance required to synthesize Omega, and their local subspace may have been damaged, producing false negatives in warp tests, well before the Voyager crew showed up.
• Screw the Rules, I'm Doing What's Right! : Convinced of the necessity, Janeway violates orders and tells only her senior staff about the Omega particle in detail.
• Janeway being so impressed with Seven's containment device that she leaves the Omega project (which is meant to destroy the particle) in her hands. Fortunately Seven proves loyal, despite admitting that she had every reason and opportunity to disobey orders.
• The species who produced the Omega molecules are doing this too, as if the Borg find any evidence whatsoever about them discovering Omega, their civilization is going to be assimilated down to the last person.
• These Are Things Man Was Not Meant to Know : Janeway: The Final Frontier has some boundaries that are not meant to be crossed.
• Title Drop : Computer: Implement the Omega Directive immediately. All other priorities rescinded.
• Ultimate Life Form : The Omega molecule is infinitely complex, yet harmonious; representing true perfection. It's speculated that a natural particle created the universe with the Big Bang , making it literally God.
• Unobtanium : Boronite ore, the material needed to synthesize the Omega molecule, is suggested to be very rare — the Borg only had enough within their vast territory to synthesize a single, ultimately unstable, molecule
• Visual Gag : Chakotay says "Try to shake them off" just before a Screen Shake .
• Weapon of Mass Destruction : The ability for the Omega molecule to become this is lampshaded, though the emphasis is on the accidental damage it might cause by destroying subspace across half the Quadrant, throwing all spacefaring civilizations into a pre-warp state. Kim and Tuvok are shown loading a gravimetric charge into a torpedo, which Kim claims is powerful enough to destroy a small planet . Sure enough a moon is being used for Omega experiments, and at one point Tuvok suggests using the torpedo to destroy the experimental chamber, which presumably would have destroyed the moon as well .
• Wham Line : Janeway and Tuvok examine the area where the Omega molecules are being contained, and they decide on a way to safely access Omega and remove it forcibly from the laboratory: Tuvok: Captain, I'd be negligent if I didn't point out that we're about to violate the Prime Directive. Janeway: For the duration of this mission, the Prime Directive has been rescinded . Let's get this over with.
• With or Without You : Janeway: I'm going to neutralize this threat, Seven, with or without your help.
• With Us or Against Us : Janeway gives Seven a choice between helping her destroy Omega or being confined to quarters. Seven is not intimidated, but cooperates because she desires to see Omega for herself.
• You Are Number 6 : When Seven of Nine is put in charge of building the containment unit for the Omega molecules, she assigns Borg-style designations to each group member to "improve efficiency". Seven of Nine : Six of Ten, this is not your assignment. Harry Kim : Please, stop calling me that. Seven of Nine : You are compromising our productivity. I am reassigning you to chamber maintenance. Your new designation is Two of Ten. Harry Kim : Wait a minute, you're demoting me? Since when did the Borg pull rank? Seven of Nine : It's Starfleet Protocol I adapted. I find it most useful.
• You Talk Too Much! : When planning her daily activities, Seven allocates 3 hours, 20 minutes for a task she's working on with Ensign Kim, plus an additional 17 minutes for his "conversational digressions". Later Captain Janeway cuts off Kim when he asks who developed the Weapon of Mass Destruction they're planting into a photon torpedo. "Mr Kim, you ask too many questions." The moment she leaves, Kim engages in rampant speculation on what the captain is up to.

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Project daedalus, su’kal.

The Omega Directive

Picking up from a previous episode in Star Trek Voyager, the crew finds themselves dealing with the Omega Directive. A highly classified protocol that requires them to locate and contain an Omega particle, an incredibly powerful and unstable molecule.

The Omega Directive is activated when a ship is within close proximity of the particle, and it falls to the crew to find and contain it before it can cause immense damage. They soon find out that the particle is traveling in a stream of energy from a nearby star system, and their only hope for containing it is to follow it and find a way to capture and contain it.

When they arrive in the star system, the crew discovers that an alien species called the Nacene have been living there for centuries. The Nacene are a mysterious and powerful race, with the ability to manipulate matter and energy, and they may hold the key to containing the Omega particle.

However, the Nacene are not willing to help the crew of Voyager, as they believe that the Omega particle is far too dangerous for humans to handle. In order to convince the Nacene to help them, the crew must prove to them that they can safely contain the particle.

Meanwhile, a powerful alien race called the Dralians are also after the Omega particle. They want to use its power to further their own agenda, and have no qualms about destroying Voyager to get what they want. The crew must outwit and outmaneuver the Dralians in order to protect the Omega particle from falling into their hands.

The crew locates the Omega particle and successfully contain it, but not before they’re forced to make a difficult decision. In order to prevent the particle from being used as a weapon, they must destroy it, thus sacrificing their only chance of containing it.

The crew is left with heavy hearts but are reassured that they did the right thing. They return to Voyager, with the knowledge that they have once again saved the galaxy from a potential disaster. The Omega Directive has been fulfilled, and the crew is now one step closer to their goal of returning home.

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Star Trek: Voyager – The Omega Directive (Review)

The Omega Directive plays like Star Trek: Voyager is trying to push itself.

It is an episode which finds Janeway acting secretively and unilaterally, casually brushing aside the Prime Directive in service of some hidden agenda. This is a very big deal. On the original Star Trek , it frequently seemed like the Prime Directive was something for Kirk to outwit. However, since Star Trek: The Next Generation , the franchise has taken the rule to have a lot more moral weight. Even more precisely, since Caretaker , Janeway has emphasised that it is not her place to intervene directly in the affairs of alien civilisations.

The be-all and end-all.

So there sound be something very shocking about Janeway keeping secrets from her crew and forsaking the moral principle that had been the cornerstone of her first few years in command. Given how conventional Voyager has been, how carefully the show has pitched itself as the most archetypal of Star Trek shows, this should be a pretty big deal. What would get Janeway to consciously (and even enthusiastically) cross those lines? How far would she go? What else is she concealing from the people around her? It should be a powerhouse episode of television.

However, The Omega Directive falls flat. Part of the problem is timing, with The Omega Directive sandwiched between Inquisition and In the Pale Moonlight in terms of the overall franchise chronology. Star Trek: Deep Space Nine had been transgressing and subverting franchise norms for years at this point. The Omega Directive feels like something relatively small-scale, juxtaposed against the activities of Section 31 or Sisko’s complicity in murder. The Omega Directive thinks that it is playing in the same league, but it is not even the same sport.

An explosive new development.

More than that, there is a clumsiness to The Omega Directive . The episode touches on a number of interesting ideas, but the story’s thematic weight is quite consciously removed from the core premise. The Omega Directive works best as a weird episode touching on Borg spirituality, and on the question of the Collective’s motivations, but the episode invests so much energy in the black-ops norm-shattering framing device that these elements do not feel like satisfying pay-off. The core themes of The Omega Directive feel like they belong in another episode.

The Omega Directive is a wasted opportunity, its underwhelming subversive trappings distracting from what might have been a compelling meditation on faith and belief.

That healthy blue glow.

A lot of the fourth season of Voyager plays like Brannon Braga setting out his stall, mapping out his vision of Voyager . Jeri Taylor would step aside as executive producer at the end of the season, and Braga would step up to fill the gap. Braga had his own distinctive vision of what he wanted Voyager to be. While Braga was never able to realise all of that vision, never able to completely reinvent Voyager in his own image, he did have a very conscious impact on how Voyager told its stories.

Braga was very interested in using Voyager to tell blockbuster stories. Braga seemed to imagine Voyager as a vehicle for sweeping adventures told on a large canvas. This vision of the show was perhaps best articulated in the two-parters co-written with Joe Menosky, episodes like Scorpion, Part I , Scorpion, Part II , Year of Hell, Part I , Year of Hell, Part II , The Killing Game, Part I and The Killing Game, Part II . Braga was fascinated with action-driven storytelling, epic tales that moved at a rapid pace; think of episodes like Deadlock or Timeless .

Fitting with Janeway’s designs.

The Omega Directive is the last Star Trek teleplay to be credited to writer Lisa Klink, but it fits consciously within Braga’s aesthetic. With the fourth season of Voyager , Braga wanted to push the show to extremes. Braga advocated for the creation of more consciously “alien” adversaries like Species 8472 or the Hirogen, aliens that were (originally) designed to move past the cliché of “foreheads of the week.” Braga also wanted to spend more time and energy with the Borg, to build them into the framework of Voyager .

Unlike Michael Piller or Jeri Taylor, Brannon Braga was never particularly interested in traditional character development or exposition. Braga had made a few awkward stabs at the stock Star Trek issue-driven episode like  The Game or Emanations , but his real strength lay in wacky high-concept-driven episodes Cause and Effect or  Frame of Mind or Projections . Braga liked to play with big ideas and was not particularly invested in the conventional Star Trek aesthetic of politics and diplomacy.

“Well, I hate to Braga about it.”

Braga was a writer unlikely to get bogged down in stories about the Maquis, as demonstrated by his bungled handling of the plot point in the early first season episode Parallax . Similarly, Braga was less likely to get tied up in any of the Kazon or Prime Directive stories that dominated the first two seasons. Braga created the Vidiians in Phage , but did very little to flesh out their culture beyond a monstrous b-movie AIDS allegory. Tellingly, Braga would employ the Vidiians as generic muscle in episodes like Deadlock or Fury .

The readiness with which The Omega Directive casts aside the Prime Directive is very much in keeping with Braga’s approach to writing for Star Trek . It is something just a little bit outside the franchise’s comfort zone, a slaughtering of a sacred cow. So much time and energy had been devoted to the Prime Directive, so many episodes agonising over what it meant and what it did, that it had become an ordering principle within the Star Trek universe. The casual suggestion that Starfleet would allow the Prime Directive to be superceded and overridden is a cheeky premise.

“More like mole-cool.”

There was some minor controversy over the episode, to the point that Brannon Braga actually posted online that the controversy was at least part of the point of the episode :

The Omega Directive fits in nicely with established Trek canon. In fact, it plays off it and uses it in a very dramatic fashion.  The Directive is meant to be controversial. Janeway knows it and the crew knows it.  That’s what makes for an exciting hour of television. Someone pointed out the parallels to a TNG show called The Pegasus, and they are right in doing so: Starfleet does not always make the right decisions for the right reasons. It’s up to our heroes to ultimately make the right moral choice.

It is worth noting that The Pegasus was a major influence on Braga as a Star Trek writer. The Omega Directive cites the episode as a source of inspiration, and Braga would return to it for These Are the Voyages…

Table that debate for later.

Indeed, it should be noted that The Omega Directive is largely notable for the attention paid to the transgression rather than the transgression itself. After all, this is not the first episode where Janeway casually dismisses the Prime Directive. After agonising over the Prime Directive in episodes like  Prime Factors or  Alliances , Janeway very easily and very casually violated it at the end of  The Killing Game, Part II . Janeway spent two years trying not to give advanced technology to the Kazon, but surrendered it to the Hirogen after only a handful of episodes.

As such, The Omega Directive hardly breaks new ground. Janeway might have been slavishly devoted to the Prime Directive in earlier seasons, but the fourth season made it clear that Janeway had changed. As such, it feels like The Omega Directive is attempting to be provocative, to draw attention to the crossing of a line that was already well in the rear view mirror. The Omega Directive is not the episode that introduces Braga’s disinterest in the Prime Directive, but it does serve as a very overt signalling of intent.

“You use this word, alcoves?” “Alcoves, yes. Sometimes.”

The Omega Directive wallows in the melodrama of the premise. The Omega Directive feels very forced and laboured in its handling of the eponymous regulation. After all, the distinctive blue “omega” insignia is hardly the most subtle of protocols. “I’ve been informed that this is a highly classified mission,” Chakotay assures Torres early in the episode. However, completely overriding ship functions and broadcasting a strange logo all over the ship seems counter-intuitive. It honestly seems like Starfleet wants the crew to know what a big deal this is.

Similarly, The Omega Directive makes a big deal of Janeway’s reluctance to bring the rest of the crew into the loop. She refuses to explain the strange happenings, although she clearly knows what is going on. She reviews the data privately, without any context. She offers instruction and direction, without any explanation. Torres mentions “rumours” circulating that “Janeway’s been locked in her ready room for the past sixteen hours.” Interestingly, Braga would return to the heightened drama of Janeway locking herself away from the crew in Night .

“Damn it, we’ve been outflanked by subversive Star Trek plotting.”

To be fair, there are interesting stories that can be told with these ideas. Deep Space Nine proves as much, with The Omega Directive sandwiched between two much stronger stories exploring similar themes. Inquisition focused on a secret organisation within Starfleet pursuing a covert agenda. Section 31 is far more unsettling than the Omega Directive could ever hope to be. In the Pale Moonlight told the story of a Starfleet captain who crosses moral lines in pursuit of the greater good. Sisko crosses more lines, and they weigh more heavily on him, than Janeway does here.

Unfortunately, it feels like The Omega Directive really has nothing interesting it wants to do with these ideas. They exist to shock the audience, to generate controversy, to heighten tension. However, there is no substance to them. Janeway never does anything particularly unforgivable while upholding the Omega Directive; there is no state-sanctioned murder, no covert sabotage, no reckless endangerment. Janeway’s behaviour is arguably perfectly reasonable in the context of nuclear proliferation.

“What are you doing here?” “It’s a secret.” “Shut up.”

Similarly, Janeway keeps her mission secret for almost half the episode, but she brings the crew up to speed quickly and with a minimum of fuss. There is never a moment where any of the characters actively challenge Janeway’s decisions, however sceptical they might be. Nobody objects to the directive, once it has been explained to them. Everybody on Voyager seems to agree that the eponymous directive is perfectly reasonable, which seems somewhat unlikely given that so many of these characters were introduced as rebels against the Federation.

There is no drama to any of this. Everything is very stale and very safe. As much as The Omega Directive teases the idea of pushing beyond the norms of the franchise, it remains firmly trapped within the Roddenberry Box. Characters seem incapable of disagreeing with one another, even civilly. This is most notable in the scene between Janeway and Chakotay in Astrometrics. Janeway and Chakotay have had trust issues in the past. Janeway lied to Chakotay about Paris in the run-up to Investigations . Chakotay betrayed Janeway in Scorpion, Part II .

Holey…

The dialogue between the characters ignores this subtext and history. At least some of that is down to Beltran’s performance, with the actor seeming to phone it all in. “That’s a reasonable argument, but you’re not always a reasonable woman,” Chakotay tells Janeway at one point. “You’re determined to protect this crew, and this time you’ve taken it too far.” This feels like it should be a bigger point, akin to Chakotay pleading with Janeway in Scorpion, Part I . Instead, it just seems cheesy. “Voyager may be alone out here, but you’re not. Let us help you.”

Given how the episode eventually plays out, with the mission to retrieve the omega molecules treated like any other mission with the crew working in harmony like a well-oiled machine, all of this early tension feels disingenuous. It feels like a distraction, clutter that exists purely so that the first few acts might have an interesting story hook. There is no sense of what the story says about Janeway or her crew, no tangible character motivation for this secrecy beyond the desire to add tension to a fairly flaccid premise.

“If you’re really into Seven, you could always try placing an ad in the classifieds?”

It is worth noting that secrets and mysteries become a recurring motif during Braga’s tenure as executive producer. Most obviously, Night has Janeway cut herself off from the crew in a self-imposed exile that plays almost as a cynical parody of Jeri Taylor’s interpretation of the character. The Voyager Conspiracy finds Seven of Nine investigating conspiracy theories that Janeway has been (and still is) lying to the crew. The Haunting of Deck 12 hinges on a secretive restricted area on the ship, one off-limit to the children on the crew without any explanation.

In some respects, this fascination with secrets for the sake of secrets reflects Voyager ‘s place in nineties popular culture. The nineties were dominated by conspiracy and speculation, in the belief that those in authority were keeping secrets from the public to further their own agenda. This is most obvious in the work of Chris Carter or Oliver Stone, but it played out across the popular culture of the decade. Braga even touched directly upon that nineties paranoia through a weird subplot featuring twentieth-century militia men in  Future’s End, Part II .

Alien concepts in a utopian future.

It is entirely possible to tell great Star Trek stories built around that paranoia. Braga arguably explored an existential strain of that paranoia in episodes like Frame of Mind or Projections . More than that, Deep Space Nine also used that framework to tell compelling and unsettling stories in episodes like Whispers or Inquisition . The problem with The Omega Directive is that Voyager tends to treat this paranoia as an aesthetic rather than a theme, a set of stylistic trappings rather than something of interest of itself.

Of course, this paranoia is not the only plot element that marks The Omega Directive as a slice of nineties pop culture. The very concepts of “the omega directive” and “the omega molecule” frame the episode in the context of nineties politics. Star Trek has always been tied to American self-image, and Voyager is very much a part of that. Voyager largely reflected how the United States saw itself at the end of the twentieth century: the single global power in a unipolar world, dealing with smaller and unstable powers rather than expansive and monolithic empires.

Science run amok.

In particular, the Delta Quadrant seems to reflect the American perception of the third world. Voyager is a clean and stylish starship flying through space dominated by tribes like the Kazon or predators like the Hirogen or exploiters like the Malon. The aesthetic of the Delta Quadrant is one of erosion and decay, as suggested by episodes like The Chute or Fair Trade . The ship encounters fallen empires in Alliances or Unity or Dragon’s Teeth , immigrants in Displaced , dispossessed refugees in Day of Honour , petty dictatorships in Resistance or Warlord .

This is reflected in The Omega Directive , which is very much an episode about the moral responsibility that Starfleet has to prevent proliferation of the omega molecule. The Second World War looms large over the Star Trek canon, and the atomic bomb is part of that. After all, the nuclear bomb symbolises both the potential and the horror of scientific progress, the massive leap forward in mankind’s understanding of the universe coupled with the capacity for horrific violence. Voyager already touched upon the bombing of Hiroshima and Nagasaki in Jetrel .

Janeway can repeat her warnings until she is blue in the face…

Janeway even makes the parallels to the atomic bomb explicit through her lock entries. “I know how Einstein must have felt about the atom bomb, or Marcus when she developed the Genesis device,” Janeway reflects at one point, acknowledging another of the franchise’s nuclear analogies. “They watched helplessly as science took a destructive course.” In some ways, that atomic fear seems baked into the Star Trek franchise, a relic of its Cold War origins and also an expression of anxiety about its technological utopia.

The Omega Directive plays very much like a justification of unilateral intervention to prevent proliferation of advanced technology to smaller powers. This was very much a preoccupation of the Clinton Administration during the nineties, dealing with the aftermath of the Cold War. The United States no longer found itself squaring of against the Soviet Union, instead acting as an enforcer of global norms regarding the proliferation of weapons of mass destruction. The New York Times would describe it as “a new cold war.”

“Looks like you’ve got some proliferated ulcers.”

In the nineties, there was a very tangible fear of these minor powers gaining access to advanced technology, whether through the black market created by the collapse of the Soviet Union or through the diplomatic back channels from countries like China . During the mid-nineties, there was considerable speculation about the development of nuclear and chemical weaponry in countries like North Korea , Libya , Iran and Iraq . In an effort to contain the threat of nuclear proliferation, Clinton would broker a peace deal with North Korea and launch strikes against Iraq .

This is very much the backdrop of The Omega Directive , an episode that seems to imagine Starfleet in the role of galactic police. The Federation takes upon itself an obligation to minimise the spread or proliferation of the omega molecule, in pursuit of the greater good. Even operating tens of thousands of light years from Earth, Janeway still takes it upon herself to intervene in the affairs of less advanced cultures and strip them of this dangerous technology. It is a pretty compelling dramatic hook.

A disarming conversation.

Indeed, the eponymous mission objective opens up all sorts of tough questions about moral authority and imperialism. What right does Janeway have to deprive an alien society of a vital energy supply? Even accepting that omega molecules could be weaponised, why is Starfleet the organisation that gets to make that decision? “My orders are to destroy the omega molecules,” seven of Nine informs Allos. “This is my life’s work, the salvation of my people!” Allos protests. “Our resources are nearly gone. The future of my people depends on this discovery.”

There is an interesting debate to be had about the moral complexity of nuclear proliferation. However, The Omega Directive neatly sidesteps a lot of the more interesting discussions by weighting the argument. Most obviously, the omega molecule is an imperfect metaphor for nuclear power. The Federation is not harnessing omega molecules, whether to build weapons of mass destruction or as a power source. As such, the analogy feels clumsy and imperfect. Would Allos have a stronger point if the Federation itself were using omega molecules?

Operating in the bubble.

Similarly, The Omega Directive opts for the most clear-cut example possible, a plot thread that unambiguously supports this heavy-handed intervention. Janeway discovers that a primitive society has been experimenting with omega molecules, leading to a disaster on a small moon. As such, intervention is both easy and justified, taking a loaded gun away from a small child. What if Starfleet detected the omega molecule in Romulan or Klingon space? What if Janeway detected it in the Borg Collective? What if there were consequences for intervention?

The Omega Directive is far too clean for this kind of story. There is none of the complexity or nuance that make Inquisition or In the Pale Moonlight so effective. There is a clear sense that Voyager has been left standing in the dirt by Deep Space Nine . This story might have been subversive or earth-shattering on The Next Generation , but the Star Trek franchise has moved beyond that point. It is no small irony that the spin-off set on a space station should go so much further than that set on a starship cast seventy thousand light years from home.

Part and particle.

Then again, The Omega Directive in some way acknowledges these limitations. Voyager was the most overtly conservative of the twenty-fourth century Star Trek shows, the least adventurous and the most reactionary. The Omega Directive is fundamentally a story that imposes limits upon knowledge and upon science, a story that draws a line in the sand. “The final frontier has some boundaries that shouldn’t be crossed, and we’re looking at one,” Janeway warns Seven of Nine. The script seems to agree with her.

This is very much in keeping with the limits that Voyager sets upon itself during its third and fourth seasons, the boundaries that it defines and the comfort zone that it marks. Voyager was the first Star Trek show that was explicitly about retreating from the unknown, about actively seeking the familiar rather than embracing the new. The Next Generation pushed outwards. Deep Space Nine sat on the frontier with a gateway to adventure. Voyager sets a course for home at maximum warp. The final frontier is not infinite. If anything, it is retreating inwards.

Piecing it all together.

Voyager is a show about a crew constantly scared and horrified by the unfamiliar. The series reflects all manner of uncomfortable and xenophobic fears. The Kazon were a nightmare, a heavily racially-coded group of freed slaves who had formed a gang culture and turned the local neighbourhood into a hellhole. The immigrants in Displaced and the refugees in Day of Honour were just waiting for an opportunity to undermine the Starfleet crew. Species 8472 were a species from another universe who introduced themselves by launching an omnicidal invasion.

For a franchise about hope and idealism in the face of the unknown, Voyager seemed wary of the alien. Voyager sought comfort and security in familiar trappings. For Janeway, it was Starfleet procedure. For the crew, it was the promise of the return to the Alpha Quadrant. For the writing staff, it was the comfort of familiar Star Trek plotting and storytelling. As such, The Omega Directive marks  another outward boundary for Voyager , another point of retreat from mystery and exploration towards safer ground.

“Here comes the science.”

Still, there are interesting ideas at work in The Omega Directive , but they are buried under the squandered premise and the pointless melodrama. As Braga confessed to Cinefantastique , the episode had a muddled and confused development cycle:

“The Omega Directive was a very troubled script. We knew we had something engaging with the idea that there was a Starfleet directive that superseded all other directives. There were some nice analogies about the Omega particle and the atom bomb. Where is the edge of the frontier in science? But it was dry and intellectual. Then we hit on the idea that the show should be about religion. We hit religion again this year. Maybe the Borg look at the Omega particle as perfection, or, in essence, it is their Holy Grail, so that we could show another side to Seven of Nine. At the same time, we could show another side to Janeway, and again get them in a more minor philosophical clash. And I think that’s what made the show.”

Braga is correct in this observation. The Omega Directive works best as a story focused on Seven of Nine and on the notion that Borg pursuit of “perfection” could be seen as religious in nature. It is a genuinely provocative plot point that fits comfortably with how Voyager sees the Borg Collective.

The god particle.

However, there is something disingenuous in this development. The Omega Directive suffers from a very basic structural problem, in that it feels like two half-episodes smooshed together to fill forty-five minutes of television. It is a story that feels like it was sutured together, with the writers having no idea what the finished episode would look like as they were going. The Omega Directive begins as an episode about a secret Starfleet objective and nuclear proliferation, but then becomes a story about Seven of Nine’s spirituality.

This is not the first time that Voyager has run into these sorts of problems with its scripts. In some respects, the writing staff on Voyager seems to suffer from a deficit of attention. There are plenty of examples;  The Q and the Grey is a sex farce that becomes a role-play adventure, Alter Ego begins as a Kim story about falling in love with a hologram and switches to a version of Fatal Attraction starring Tuvok, Worst Case Scenario is an interesting exploration of the missed opportunities of the first season that turns into a stock “holodeck gone awry” narrative.

Shining examples…

It is interesting to wonder whether this lack of focus, and lack of structure, is a direct result of Michael Piller’s departure. After all, Piller had long advocated that episodes should be consciously built around character arcs. The plot structure of The Omega Directive is so muddled that Braga had to go on line and explicitly explain what it was really about :

This is not a story, ultimately, about a substance.  It’s not about Janeway following a directive or not.  It’s not about science and the hackneyed concept of whether or not we should cross the line and explore what should not be explored.  It is about, in the end, religion.  Seven of Nine, we reveal, has an interest in Omega that borders on religious obsession.  To her, Omega represents “Perfection.”  And in this way, we explore themes of religion in an unexpected way.

The input of the author is always of interest when discussing a work of art. Understanding where a piece of work came from provides a vital sense of context and meaning. That does not excuse horrible mistakes, or insure against valid critical readings, but it does provide a sense what the author was trying to do. At the same time, a piece of work should be able to stand on its own two feet without needing that sort of explicit disclaimer.

When you gotta glow…

The Omega Directive would be a much stronger episode if it focused on Seven of Nine from the start and dropped all of those pseudo-provocative trappings involving Janeway. Seven of Nine is a character designed to explore the human condition, and playing with religious ideas is a part of that. The idea of the Borg Collective actively pursuing the omega molecule as some sort of scientific crusade is fascinating, a compelling juxtaposition of the mechanised Borg Collective with a more organic religious fervour.

This reflects the approach that the third and fourth seasons have taken to the Borg, exploring their unique status as a fusion of organic mind and technological drive. The Borg were foreshadowed in episodes like Blood Fever and Unity , but were properly introduced to Voyager in Scorpion, Part I . That episode also introduced the da Vinci holoprogram, and its gothic fusion of human imagination and mechanical innovation. Although John Rhys-Davies only appeared in two episodes of Voyager , his workshop has been a recurring fixture of the fourth season.

“Let’s not blow this out of proportion.”

Da Vinci’s workshop has been tied to the development and growth of Seven of Nine as a character. In the teaser to The Raven , da Vinci’s hanging flying machine prompted Seven to reconnect with repressed memories of her childhood assimilation. At the end of The Omega Directive , Seven retreats to the workshop in order to properly process her religious experience with the omega molecules. It is a place where Seven can hope to harmonise her Borg and human identities.

The Omega Directive marks the last appearance of the workshop, but it remains an evocative location. It taps into the idea of the Borg as something more primal than technological, tying them to the very idea of mechanised industrialisation rather than consigning them to some speculative future. This thematic connection between the Borg Collective and da Vinci’s workshop provides a rich insight into how Voyager approaches the iconic cybernetic aliens. The Borg are not a culture in the same way as the Klingons or the Romulans. They are an idea.

“Looks like these scientists had a blast.”

This connection allows for the strange religious undertones of The Omega Directive . The idea of Borg religion would seem ridiculous in the context of Q Who? or The Best of Both Worlds, Part I and The Best of Both Worlds, Part II . However, it makes a lot more sense if the Borg are presented as a force of industrialisation and the logical extension of mechanisation. Like most Star Trek aliens, the Borg work best as a mirror of humanity, but Voyager seems to suggest a rich historical context for that anxiety that stretches back to the renaissance, predating the enlightenment.

“Omega is infinitely complex, yet harmonious,” Seven of Nine explains to Janeway. “To the Borg it represents perfection. I wish to understand that perfection.” Janeway immediately understands. “The Borg’s Holy Grail.” to the Borg, it seems like the omega molecule is the ultimate “god particle.” As its name implies, it would seem to represent the end of things, the goal towards which the Borg aspire, the ideal of perfection. It does not matter whether the omega molecule can be stabilised or harnessed, merely that it can be conceived and pursued.

Keeping her doubts at Cargo Bay.

The Omega Directive seems to treat the omega molecule as an idea rather than a literal object. The Borg learned about the concept gradually, through second-hand speculation and rumour. “When did the Borg discover Omega?” Janeway asks. Seven explains that it came about through the assimilation “of thirteen different species.” It was a breadcrumb trail that began with stories of lights in the sky and developed. “We followed this trail of myth for many years until finally assimilating a species with useful scientific data. We then created the molecule ourselves.”

Janeway confesses, “Omega caused quite a stir among my own species. Federation cosmologists had a theory that the molecule once existed in nature for an infinitesimal period of time at the exact moment of the Big Bang. Some claimed Omega was the primal source of energy for the explosion that began our universe.” Seven dismisses the idea. “A creation myth like any other,” she contends, oblivious of the fact that the lights in the sky that sparked the Borg’s pursuit of the omega molecule were just as mythic and legendary.

Burning desire.

As with those mechanical arms in da Vinci’s workshop, there is a sense that the Borg are not stripmining humanity so much as augmenting it. The Borg are no longer a force aiming to destroy humanity and replace it with something better or stronger. Instead, they are just seeking a more harmonised and efficient balance. The Omega Directive makes this explicit; if the Borg idea of “perfection” is embodied by the omega molecule, then it cannot be the supplanting of organic life. The Borg are not seeking to build a race of androids or anything so generic.

This is obviously monstrous, given that the Borg assimilate alien species without their consent and destroy even the idea of individual identity. However, Voyager uses episodes like The Omega Directive to explore the purpose and motivations of the Borg Collective beyond simple unstoppable consumption. There is a sense that Voyager is trying to understand the Borg Collective beyond a set of simple impulses like  “expand” and “assimilate.” It is a conscious attempt to make the Borg seem more nuanced and developed than they would otherwise be.

“I am the Delta and the Omega, the first and the last, the beginning and the end.”

As Kevin S. Decker argues in Inhuman Nature, or What’s It Like to Be a Borg? , this is conscious effort to present the Borg as more than just a devouring plague of robot zombies:

For the Borg, perfection is to be approached by adapting the best elements of assimilated civilisations and casting away the worst elements. What little we know about the ultimate goal of this method is perhaps best stated by Seven of Nine: perfection is, like the Omega molecule, “infinitely complex, yet harmonious”, including “infinite parts functioning as one.” The implication here is that the individual contribution of each of Omega’s atomic elements creates this harmony, instead of conflict. All internal resistance is overcome. Similarly, Omega’s inherent instability comes from its interaction with things non-Omega, elements and energies alien and external to it.

The Omega Directive is a very clever way of exploring this idea, a way to tell a story about the Borg without including the Borg. It is an episode that adds nuance to the Collective, but without undercutting them.

“Oh my god…”

To be fair, there is a credible argument to be made that Voyager does not need to flesh out or develop the Borg. In their early appearances, the Borg were terrifying because they were so alien and so unknowable. The Borg were something utterly unlike any other Star Trek species, and that helped them to become the breakout alien of the Rick Berman era. The Borg were scary in large part because they existed beyond simple human conceptions and ideas. Introducing elements like religion into the Borg Collective undercuts that, making them more relatable.

Voyager diluted the threat of the Borg Collective. Part of that was through the repeated use of the Borg threat to heighten the stakes in episodes like The Gift or Drone . If Janeway and her crew could go toe-to-toe with the entire Borg Collective repeatedly and without breaking a sweat , then it was harder and harder for the audience to take the Borg seriously as a major threat. However, there was also the sense that Voyager humanised the Borg, stripping away a lot of the aspects that made the Borg unique and distinctive.

“I am become mildly irradiated.”

Although the Borg Queen was introduced in Star Trek: First Contact , she became a fixture on Voyager in stories like Dark Frontier, Part I , Dark Frontier, Part II , Unimatrix Zero, Part I , Unimatrix Zero, Part II and Endgame . With each appearance, the idea of a “leader” of the Collective became increasingly normalised. It stripped away the idea of the Borg Collective as a race without any individual identities or personalities. Even though The Omega Directive does not actually feature the Borg Collective, giving them a religion continues that trend of humanisation.

In some ways, this religion feels like an extension of the weird new age themes that run through a lot of the religious episodes on Voyager . Stories like Tattoo and Sacred Ground insist that faith and science can coexist in harmony. Seven of Nine even broaches the topic with Chakotay, the new age standard-bearer on Voyager . “Commander, you are a spiritual man,” Seven reflects. “If you had the chance to see your God, your Great Spirit, what would you do?” Chakotay answers honestly, “I’d pursue it, with all my heart.”

Seven is feeling rather blue.

In (Re)Covering Sacred Ground , Jennifer E. Porter and Darcee L. McLaren argue that Voyager uses the Borg Collective as a metaphor for new age ideas existing in harmony with scientific principles:

As a Borg character, Secen of Nine represents a fusion of humanity and technology. She experiences a mystical, noetic awareness while engaged in the practice of science. While gazing at an “Omega” molecule, understood by the Borg to symbolise ultimate complexity in ultimate harmony, Seven of Nine experiences something that transcends the bounds of her understanding. Seven of Nine’s mystical experience maintains the emphasis within Voyager on the compatibility, rather than conflict, between science and religion.

There is a very solid argument to be made that the later seasons of Voyager make a conscious effort to use the Borg to explore the new age ideas that had largely been off-loaded to Chakotay in earlier stories like The Cloud .

Renaissance drone.

The Omega Directive is perhaps the most obvious example, but the trend continues across the rest of the run. Infinite Regress uses the Borg Collective to explore Seven of Nine’s “past lives” , as she finds herself alternating between personalities assimilated by the collective. Similarly, Unimatrix Zero, Part I and Unimatrix Zero, Part II unfold within a shared dream space (or collective unconscious) that recalls the psychological landscape navigated by Chakotay and the crew in Waking Moments .

Still, The Omega Directive is interesting in how it chooses to contrast Starfleet with the Borg Collective. Earlier episodes like Q Who? made a point to present the Borg Collective as a monstrous reflection of Starfleet, a grotesque dehumanising organisation with little regard for self-determination or individuality. The Borg Collective in Q Who? was in many ways an extension of the Federation suggested in episodes like The Measure of a Man , the organisation that would ask an officer to risk their life by submitting to an experiment to create a slave race.

Borg to death.

The Omega Directive contrasts Starfleet and the Borg Collective in how they approach the omega molecule. Starfleet retreats from the very idea of the molecule, classifying all information and preventing its proliferation. Starfleet sets a rigid boundary on the final frontier, a line of scientific curiousity that it will not cross. Once again, this is very much in keeping with the tone and perspective of Voyager as a whole. Voyager is a show about retreat from anything particularly challenging or new.

However, the Borg Collective are positioned as the more principled explorers, as the entity most purely devoted to concepts of evolving and learning. There is something unsettling about a version of Star Trek where the only people who want to expand the boundaries of knowledge are the monstrous Borg Collective. The Omega Directive suggests that the Borg are reckless or dangerous for wanting to know more about this mysterious molecule. After all, an explosion of omega molecules has disastrous consequences for everybody, not just the party responsible.

Looking into it.

This is very much in keeping with how Voyager portrays the Borg Collective. On Voyager , the Borg seem to be constantly pushing outwards and onwards, they are seeking to expand their sphere of influence. Of course, the Borg are doing this to satisfy their own colonial impulses, to grow the Collective. Voyager repeatedly insists that this is a very dangerous thing to do, that the Borg are shaking the boat with their arrogance. Their attempt to expand into fluidic space in the lead-up to Scorpion, Part I arguably put the entire universe at risk from Species 8472.

The dangers that the Borg create through their flirtation with the transcendent and the unknown can be contrasted with the safety and security of Voyager. The Borg are greedy and expansionist, they do not understand that there are apparently limits on knowledge. Voyager suggests that Borg are monstrous because of their thirst for knowledge, as much as for the actual physical harm that they cause to their victims. This is a Star Trek show where the bad guys are defined as such for seeking to extend their understanding of the universe.

“The Osega Omega Drive wasn’t very big in this quadrant, was it?”

The Omega Directive plays like Voyager is trying to push itself, but only within rigidly defined boundaries.

You might be interested in our other reviews from the fourth season of Star Trek: Voyager :

• Scorpion, Part II
• Day of Honor
• Scientific Method
• Year of Hell, Part I
• Year of Hell, Part II
• Random Thoughts
• Concerning Flight
• Mortal Coil
• Waking Moments
• Message in a Bottle
• The Killing Game, Part I
• The Killing Game, Part II
• The Omega Directive
• Unforgettable
• Living Witness
• Hope and Fear

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Filed under: Voyager | Tagged: borg , borg collective , janeway , new age , omega molecule , Prime Directive , religion , seven of nine , star trek: voyager , the omega directive , voyager |

9 Responses

The concept of this episode always intrigued me, even if I felt that getting the rest of the crew to follow was lazily done and rather boring, but you bring up a lot of good points about the Borg, progress, and religion that I had never thought of. I never actually thought that the whole “research is evil” was a noticeable point, but now I can recall some similar episodes that exist in the same strain. Also, I had a chuckle when I noticed a bit of your notes on the Borg were similar to a rant I posted a while back. Granted, it’s not entirely out-of-the-box thinking there, but I still think it’s an interesting take on why the Borg have such a mythos around them in parts of the fanbase as unstoppable robot zombies. Keep up the great work!

Thanks for the kind words!

Yeah, Voyager is very much the “this far, no further!” Star Trek, which makes a nice companion to the “no, further!” Star Trek of Deep Space Nine.

One aspect I’ve always found fascinating about the Borg is their near total creative sterility. They don’t seem to actually innovate anything, all knowledge and technology is stolen via forced assimilation. Even this episode, which comes the closest we’ve been given to anything regarding some uniquely Borg cultural belief reveals how their entire pursuit of ‘perfection’ seems to have come from other people.

There is something rather sad about that even aside from the monstrous nature of the Borg, the idea of a people who can quite literally only grow externally and internally by banditry and kidnapping. In some ways it makes them seem even more pathetic than the Kazon for all their great power. What on Earth would the Borg do if they actually ‘won’ and assimilated every species worth assimilating?

Yeah, I mean, you could arguably go even further and argue that this makes them the perfect recurring antagonists for Voyager. Voyager is in many ways a show about defining the boundaries of the Star Trek franchise, of going further than anybody has gone before and retreating. The Borg perhaps reflect this, a culture that has atrophied and which is physically incapable of pushing any further on its own terms.

DS9’s sixth season is a savage evisceration of Gene Roddenberry’s utopian Star Trek universe, with Starfleet fighting the Dominion for its very survival, even if it means getting they’re hands well and truly dirty to do it, as we’ve seen in the recent likes of Inquisition and the peerless In the Pale Moonlight. With The Omega Directive, VGR’s fourth season is trying to play catch-up.

I like episodes that dissect the Star Trek universe. This is something that DS9 pulls off to absolute perfection. But VGR is much too reticent a Trek show. It’s not like the show is incapable of brilliance. It just delivers it in random spurts. Even the much better S4 fails to provide classic episodes on a weekly basis.

The Omega Directive is an attempt by the show to do what DS9 does much better, by fashioning something we never knew about Starfleet, akin to our recent discovery about Section 31. Voyager is cruising along towards the Alpha Quadrant when it suddenly drops out of warp, stopped cold, and a mysterious omega symbol starts appearing on monitors all over the ship. The only one with sufficient clearance to restore ship’s systems is Janeway and after locking herself in her Ready Room, the computer informs her to implement the Omega Directive.

This is something that immediately captures our interest. What is the Omega Directive? Whatever it is, it’s something that supersedes all other Starfleet directives. Even the Prime Directive. I quite liked the way the episode doesn’t give us all the answers right away. The crew are informed this is a highly classified Starfleet mission, but are told nothing else. The only one Janeway will confide in is Seven of Nine, who knows all about the Omega Directive from knowledge the Borg assimilated from other Starfleet captains.

The episode is careful not to give too much of its secrets away. We learn more about the present situation in gradual increments. Janeway and Seven discuss the Directive and the implications it has for the Quadrant. We don’t get any full-blown exposition until Chakotay persuades Janeway to let the senior staff in on what the Omega Directive is.

The fact that Omega turns out to be a molecule could be seen as an anticlimax. Certainly Tom doesn’t see what all the fuss is about initially, until Janeway reveals it’s the most powerful substance known to exist, capable of obliterating subspace throughout the galaxy, putting an end to warp travel forever. The Omega Directive orders all Starfleet officers to find and destroy Omega, at any cost.

I don’t think The Omega Directive succeeds as well as DS9 when it shines a light on the dark corners of the Star Trek universe. But I think it does succeed at exposing the Federation’s self-righteousness. The Omega Directive is a product of Starfleet’s desire to, as you say Darren, police the entire galaxy. Remember the arrogance of TNG’s first couple of years? The Enterprise crew truly believed they’re own rhetoric, until Q forced them into a first encounter with the Borg.

The Federation is run by “duty-crazed bureaucrats” as Chakotay points out to Janeway, and I can believe they created the Omega Directive in order to protect they’re own interests, rather than for others as Janeway claims. What right do they have to swoop in on other races and apply they’re supreme moral authority? The senior staff seem to agree with this reasoning which is frankly more than a little disturbing. Is it because they should uphold the Omega Directive, or because it would end they’re journey home forever?

The episode adds another slant by once again pitting Janeway against Seven, in this case Seven’s spiritualism vs Janeway’s pragmatism. Janeway would rather destroy Omega than run the risk of an Omega explosion decimating subspace across the quadrant. But Seven has come to regard Omega as the epitome of perfection itself, a product of her Borg upbringing, and Seven would rather harness the power of Omega, the closest thing the Borg ascribe to as a God.

The Omega Directive is a muddle of ideas no doubt. Some of them are good ones. Some of them are interesting. And some of them do expose the more unsavoury things at the heart of this franchise. In the end, it decides to come down on the side of Janeway, and destroy Omega rather than come to understand it more fully (although Seven’s view of a perfect sphere of Omega molecules is striking), but The Omega Directive is certainly one of the more thought-provoking VGR episodes. What thoughts it provokes in you will no doubt differ depending on the person. For me, that makes The Omega Directive one of this show’s most fearless experiments.

I’m a bit less keen on it. It feels very safe, like a Voyager version of those bolder Deep Space Nine episodes with the rough edges filed down.

This episode was loaded with statements contrary to established canon (within Voyager itself), bad dialogue, and going yet further with Seven’s demi-god like Mary Sue status.

She waltzes in and wins Kal’Toh in one move, a game Tuvok has explained in a previous episode to take decades to master. Harry Kim literally exclaims, “Is there anything you don’t know?” He has reverted to a teenage boy even though he has been beaten savagely by the Hirogen a mere two episodes prior. He experiences zero character growth and even whines to Tuvok about the Omega Directive being kept a secret. He is a perpetual man-child, yanked back to this status after even the most traumatic life experiences.

Seven explains her vast all-knowingness to Kim by saying “I was Borg”. Except if anything, that should make her a borderline invalid. One gets the sense in most other episodes that the borg keep most knowledge ‘in the cloud’ and drones are like puppets more than contemplative hard drives with legs. Hugh never expresses any knowledge beyond the basic technical skills required for operating mechanisms and spaceships.

Janeways exclaims, “Here’s to Borg ingenuity”, despite Voyager re-confirming that the Borg never innovate, they assimilate. Janeway even preaches on this difference in this very season.

Seven is handed massive sweeping powers over the crew, despite being sanctioned heavily several episodes earlier and threatened with the brig. Now she’s temporarily second in command, with Chakotay falling in line with his typical lack of any emotive expression.

It’s all just endless inconsistencies. The very structure of the supposed reality of the show is smashed, with core world-building and character facts altered from one episode to the next.

The writers seem to want to be working on The Twilight Zone or The Outer Limits. There is a palpable contempt for the viewer, and a pervading sense that they lack intellect, introspection, and talent.

This episode was terrible, not for its core plot, but for all the ‘small stuff’.

A very fascinating review! The paragraphs about the Borg as a force of mechanised industrialisation are particularly enlightening. I mean, the allegory was pretty obvious, the scene of Janeway marveling at the mechanical arm in Da Vinci’s workshop is an iconic precursor to her encounter with the Borg. But I had never quite reflected on how this influenced Voyager’s overall approach to Borg as a species (or as you put it, an idea rather than a species) beyond the Scorpion triology, and how this lends some credence to their anthropomorphisation which I had been very skeptical about. The reviews on this blog are usually insightful, but this one in particular took the cake for me. Thanks a lot for writing this review, and keep up the good work!

Thanks. I’m very proud of these reviews. I hope they hold up.

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The Omega Directive Stardate: 51781.2 Original Airdate: April 15, 1998

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Star Trek: Discovery 's Big Threat Has a Major Voyager Connection

The latest season of discovery has revealed one of the series' most fascinating links back to the past—drawing on a voyager plotline left untouched for years..

As Star Trek: Discovery ’s fourth season builds up to its endgame pitching the Federation into a dangerous first contact with a mysterious, extra-galactic threat, at the heart of it all has been a mysterious, planet-wrecking anomaly known as the DMA. But as we’ve learned more about the anomaly, it’s revealed a surprising connection to Star Trek: Voyager —and a threat that could have major ramifications for the Star Trek universe.

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What Is Star Trek: Discovery ’s Dark Matter Anomaly?

In the past few weeks since Discovery returned from its mid-season hiatus , we and the crew of the the titular vessel have come to learn more and more about what the “Dark Matter Anomaly” actually is. Early in the season, we discovered that the anomaly isn’t actually anomalous at all , and instead a manufactured tool being used by a mysterious species from beyond the galactic barrier, currently only known to the Federation by the designation “10-C.” It turns out that the anomaly isn’t a weapon of war, even if its appearance in the Star Trek galaxy has brought with it gravitic waves powerful enough to tear planets near to the teleporting, massive storm apart wherever it finds itself traveling. It’s actually a highly advanced mining tool, and it’s being used to harvest an incredibly rare element with a name familiar to diehard Trek fans: boronite.

What is Boronite, and Why Is It Important?

Boronite was first introduced in the 1998, season-four Star Trek: Voyager episode “The Omega Directive.” An element that only naturally formed in incredibly small quantities across the known universe, boronite was a key component in synthesizing an incredibly powerful molecule known only as the Omega molecule. Omega molecules were theorized to be capable of storing incredibly vast amounts of energy—at the time of Voyager ’s setting in the late 24th century, the Federation believed a single molecule contained the equivalent energy of a fully powered starship warp core, and even small chains of Omega could provide energy to entire civilizations for generations.

Omega’s big problem was that it was also almost impossible to keep in a stabilized state for any period of time. Experiments with Omega in secret by Federation scientists in the 23rd century were able to synthesize a single molecule that destabilized in an instant, and did so violently. Not only did the ensuing explosion destroy the research station the experiment was conducted aboard, killing hundreds of people, the real threat of Omega was revealed to have lasting implications beyond the immediate explosive aftermath of destabilization. Omega’s destruction left a tear in the fabric of subspace in its wake, a rupture that, even from the fallout of a single molecule’s destabilization, stretched lightyears from the the origin point of the explosion. The rupture in subspace prevented conventional warp travel technology—the creation of a stable bubble to allow for safe FTL travel—from being used, and with the rupture seemingly irreparable, warp travel in the aftermath of an Omega detonation became impossible seemingly forever.

In the wake of its tragic research on the molecule, the Federation immediately enacted a cover-up, classifying the subspace rupture as a natural phenomenon, and made the very existence of Omega molecules a classified secret known only to Starfleet ship captains and other high-ranking flag officers in the organization. Known as the Omega Directive, the general Starfleet order overrode even the organizations’ most vaunted rule, the Prime Directive, and tasked Starfleet captains with the authority to destroy a detected Omega molecule by any means necessary. Omega, as rare as it was, represented the greatest threat to the Federation imaginable—if even a handful of molecules were synthesized and destabilized, the damage to subspace rendering long-range communication and warp travel impossible could end spacefaring civilization as the Federation and most known species perceived it forever.

What Could Omega Molecules Mean for Star Trek ’s Future?

If Species 10-C is mining what rare natural instances of boronite are even available in the known galaxy, there’s a good chance they might have done what no civilization in the Federation, or even beyond it, has ever been able to: create a sustainable energy source from properly stabilized Omega molecules. Even in the advanced future of the 31st century that Discovery has found itself set in since the climax of season two, such a revelation would reflect one of the greatest leaps in technological capability Star Trek has seen from its usual 22nd-24th century settings in other series. Even beyond all the other technological advances we’ve seen in Discovery ’s recent seasons, it’d be one of the few reveals to really hit long time fans with a show of just how far things have come—even if that technology is still even wildly beyond the capacity of the Federation in that time.

But the inherent power of Omega molecules, if that is what 10-C are using their mined boronite for, could be implemented just as destructively, too. If the Federation’s first contact with the species goes bad—and it might, considering last week rogue scientist Ruon Tarka destroyed the first DMA with a very illegal weapon—weaponized Omega could do untold damage to the Federation and the galaxy at large. Beyond just the potency of its energy release, Omega’s ability to destabilize subspace could plunge the Federation into a dark age even worse than the effects of the Burn —which, at the very least, was an non-permanent barrier to most warp travel, and some degree of communication was still available across vast passages of space. Widespread detonation of Omega molecules could cut off the civilizations of the galaxy from each other forever, effectively bringing an end to the Federation as an entity in the process.

Whatever happens as Discovery ’s fourth season enters its endgame, drawing on a 24 year old plot thread from Voyager —and extrapolating the potential horror of its worst outcome—is one hell of a thing to hang a season on. With Seven of Nine on Picard , Kate Mulgrew’s Janeway returned in animated form on Star Trek: Prodigy , and now this, it feels like Voyager is getting a moment in the spotlight in Trek ’s current, bright future.

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Star Trek: What Is The Omega Particle?

Star Trek's Omega particle: a macabre creation haunting the series, challenging scientific comprehension, and threatening cataclysmic destruction.

Since the beginning, Star Trek has introduced audiences to mind-bending concepts that defy the known realities. Among these cosmic mysteries is the Omega particle. This strange substance haunts the series with insidious implications, testing the boundaries of scientific comprehension and plunging sci-fi fans into a maddening rabbit hole where reality unravels and chaos reigns supreme.

The Omega particle in Star Trek serves as a haunting symbol of forbidden knowledge. It is a sinister force that threatens to unleash destruction upon the galaxy. Its danger lies in its potential to rupture subspace and annihilate the fundamental structure of space-time itself. This sinister substance challenges the ordered universe with its unruly essence. It becomes a perverse temptation, akin to the forbidden fruit that whispers to curious minds daring to gaze into the abyss.

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The Origin & Nature Of The Omega Particle

Referred to by the Borg as Particle 010, the Omega particle holds the distinction of being the most formidable substance in the known universe. The Borg, relentless assimilators of knowledge , first became aware of the Omega molecule in 2145. Through the assimilation of thirteen distinct species, the Borg gradually pieced together the puzzle of this elusive substance.

Their quest began with the assimilation of Species 262, which possessed an oral history hinting at the presence of a profoundly powerful element. Intrigued, the Borg embarked on a relentless pursuit, leading them to Species 263, a comparably primitive society. Guided by whispers of myth, the Borg doggedly followed the trail for countless years until they finally encountered a species that provided them with valuable data.

Armed with this newfound knowledge, the Borg achieved the remarkable feat of synthesizing a solitary Omega molecule, capable of preserving stability for a minuscule fraction of time — one trillionth of a nanosecond. However, the path to this accomplishment was not without perils. The Borg's experimentation with Omega resulted in the destruction of twenty-nine of their vessels, and the loss of 600,000 assimilated drones. Nevertheless, the allure of Omega drove the Borg to a singular imperative: to assimilate Omega at any cost.

To advance their agenda, the Borg devised a harmonic resonance chamber intended to theoretically stabilize the Omega molecule. Despite their formidable intellect, the Borg encountered an insurmountable roadblock. They could construct the chamber, but were unable to acquire the essential boronite substance needed to synthesize additional Omega molecules, as Seven of Nine lamented in Star Trek: Voyager.

In Star Trek: Voyager Season 4, Episode 1, titled "The Omega Directive," the Omega molecule assumes center stage, showcasing its staggering potential and the Borg's unwavering pursuit of perfection.

The Threat Of The Omega Particle In Star Trek

The threat posed by the Omega molecule is best described in Captain Kathryn Janeway's words in "The Omega Directive:"

"I won't risk half the quadrant to satisfy our curiosity. It's arrogant, and it's irresponsible. The final frontier has some boundaries that shouldn't be crossed, and we're looking at one."

However, the menace posed by the Omega molecule extends beyond its potential to obliterate vast portions of the quadrant , as Janeway contends. The Federation's apprehension is primarily rooted in the far-reaching repercussions on subspace itself. Voyager elaborates on this notion, revealing that the subspace disturbances resulting from the failed 23rd-century Omega experiment persist into the 24th century, effectively impeding warp travel within the surrounding sector.

It is crucial to note that warp travel serves as the foundation of the Federation, with civilizations deemed unworthy of "first contact" until they independently develop this technology. What's more, at this point in the series, the crew of Voyager is stranded decades away from home — and that's with access to warp travel. Without it, there is no conceivable way home.

The crew is forced to envision a scenario where a colossal Omega detonation occurs, leading to the annihilation of warp travel not only within the Federation, but conceivably throughout the entire galaxy. Such an event would sever the ties of subspace communication that bind countless worlds together. Messages, traversing at the speed of light, would languish for years, if not decades, before reaching their intended recipients. Ships would regress to sublight speeds, reminiscent of a bygone era. Consequently, the Federation and other galactic powers would be torn asunder, condemned to navigate the cosmos in isolated solitude.

The Omega particle stands as a haunting symbol of forbidden knowledge in the Star Trek universe. Its potential to rupture subspace and unleash cataclysmic destruction poses a threat to vast portions of the quadrant and the fabric of space-time itself. The relentless pursuit of perfection by the Borg and the Federation's apprehension underscores the profound implications of the Omega molecule.

As Captain Janeway cautions, there are boundaries in the final frontier that should not be crossed. The Omega particle challenges the order and stability of the universe, leaving a trail of subspace disturbances that impede warp travel and disrupt communication between civilizations. It has the potential to isolate and fragment the galactic powers, plunging them into a state of isolated solitude. In the end, the Omega particle remains an enigma, a tantalizing glimpse into the realm of Star Trek . It reminds us that even in the vast expanse of space, there are mysteries that should be left untouched, lest we unleash chaos upon the galaxy.

Voyager ’s "The Omega Directive" episode is available to stream on Paramount+ and Pluto TV.

MORE: Star Trek: What Are The Origins of the Borg?

Star Trek: Voyager (TV Series)

The omega directive (1998), jeri ryan: seven of nine.

• Quotes (13)

Photos 

Quotes 

[last lines] 

Seven of Nine : For 3.2 seconds, I saw perfection. When Omega stabilized, I felt a curious sensation. As I was watching it, it seemed to be watching me. - The Borg have assimilated many species, with mythologies to explain such moments of clarity. I've always dismissed them as trivial. Perhaps I was wrong.

Captain Kathryn Janeway : If I didn't know you better... I'd say you just had your first spiritual experience.

[Seven has given each member of her work team Borg designations] 

Seven of Nine : Six of Ten, this is not your assignment.

Harry Kim : Please, stop calling me that.

Seven of Nine : You're compromising our productivity... I'm reassigning you to chamber maintenance. Your new designation is Two of Ten.

Harry Kim : [laughs]  Wait a minute. You're demoting me? Since when do the Borg pull rank?

Seven of Nine : A Starfleet protocol I adapted. I find it most useful.

Harry Kim : I'm glad you're not the Captain.

[first lines] 

Voyager Computer : 0600 hours. Regeneration cycle complete.

Seven of Nine : Daily log, Seven of Nine, Stardate 15781.2 - Today, Ensign Kim and I will conduct a comprehensive diagnostic of the aft sensor array. I have allocated three hours twenty minutes for the task, and an additional seventeen minutes for Ensign Kim's usual conversational digressions. I am scheduled to take a nutritional supplement at 1500 hours, engage in one hour of cardiovascular activity, then I intend to review a text the Doctor recommended, entitled 'A Christmas Carol.' He believes it will have educational value. End log.

Captain Kathryn Janeway : If someone out there is experimenting with Omega, I'm under orders to stop them. Otherwise this entire quadrant would be at risk.

Seven of Nine : Those orders were the result of Starfleet's ignorance and fear. I can alleviate your ignorance. As for your fear...

Captain Kathryn Janeway : Sometimes fear should be respected, Seven.

Captain Kathryn Janeway : What is it the Borg say? That Omega is perfect?

Seven of Nine : Yes.

Captain Kathryn Janeway : Is that a theory or a belief?

Seven of Nine : Your Starfleet Directive is no longer relevant. I have found a way to control Omega.

Captain Kathryn Janeway : I don't care if you can make it sing and dance. We're getting rid of it.

Captain Kathryn Janeway : I didn't realize you had such a strong scientific curiosity.

Seven of Nine : Not curiosity. Desire.

Captain Kathryn Janeway : Desire?

Seven of Nine : Omega is infinitely complex, yet harmonious. To the Borg, it represents perfection. I wish to understand that perfection.

Captain Kathryn Janeway : The Borg's Holy Grail.

Seven of Nine : Captain?

Captain Kathryn Janeway : Never mind.

Seven of Nine : Particle 010 - the Borg designation for what you call Omega. Every drone is aware of its existence. We were instructed to assimilate it at all costs. It is... perfection. The molecules exist in a flawless state. Infinite parts functioning as one.

Chakotay : Like the Borg.

Seven of Nine : Precisely. I am no longer Borg; but I still need to understand that perfection. Without it, my existence will never be complete.

Captain Kathryn Janeway : I'm curious. When did the Borg discover Omega?

Seven of Nine : 229 years ago.

Captain Kathryn Janeway : Assimilation?

Seven of Nine : Yes. Of thirteen different species.

Captain Kathryn Janeway : Thirteen?

Seven of Nine : It began with Species 262. They were primitive, but their oral history referred to a powerful substance which could burn the sky. The Borg were intrigued. Which led them to Species 263. They, too, were primitive and believed it was a drop of blood from their creator.

Captain Kathryn Janeway : Fascinating!

Seven of Nine : Yes, but irrelevant.

Harry Kim : Is there anything you don't know?

Seven of Nine : I was Borg.

Harry Kim : "I was Borg!" That's what you always say, but what does it mean? You have the knowledge of 10,000 species in your head?

Seven of Nine : Not exactly. Each drone's experiences are processed by the Collective. Only useful information is retained.

Harry Kim : Still, that probably makes you the most intelligent human being alive.

Seven of Nine : Probably.

Harry Kim : So what do you need the rest of us for?

[Seven gives him a peculiar look] 

Harry Kim : Forget I asked.

[Seven has told Janeway about the Borg's first attempt to create an Omega molecule] 

Captain Kathryn Janeway : Tell me... how many Borg were sacrificed during this experiment?

Seven of Nine : 29 vessels, 600,000 drones, but that is irrelevant.

Captain Kathryn Janeway : I wondered who was running my program. Master da Vinci doesn't like visitors after midnight.

Seven of Nine : He protested. I deactivated him.

Seven of Nine : Which of them is the senior researcher?

The Doctor : This gentleman. Why do you ask?

Seven of Nine : He has knowledge I require.

The Doctor : He also happens to be barely conscious. Come back in an hour.

Seven of Nine : Unacceptable.

The Doctor : Unavoidable. This is my sickbay. The man needs to recover.

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