Plot

The Borg travel back in time intent on preventing Earth's first contact with an alien species. Captain Picard and his crew pursue them to ensure that Zefram Cochrane makes his maiden flight reaching warp speed.

In the twenty-fourth century, the crew of the U.S.S. Enterprise NCC-1701-E has been ordered to patrol the Romulan Neutral Zone by the Federation to avoid interference with their battle against the insidious Borg. Witnessing the loss of the battle, Captain Jean-Luc Picard ignores orders and takes command of the fleet engaging the Borg. But the Borg plan to travel back into the twenty-first century through a vortex with the intention to stop Earth's first contact with an alien race (the Vulcans). Following the Borg sphere, Picard and his crew realize that they have taken over the Enterprise in order to carry out their mission. Their only chance to do away with the Borg and their seductive Queen is to make sure that Zefram Cochrane makes his famous faster-than-light travel to the stars.—Blazer346

The Borg have invaded Earth's galaxy, resulting in a battle with Star Fleet. The newly-commissioned USS Enterprise-E, commanded by Captain Jean-Luc Pickard, is ordered away from the action as Star Fleet command fear that Pickard's previous assimilation by the Borg will affect his judgement. Once it is clear that Star Fleet are losing the battle, Pickard disobeys orders and sets course for Earth, arriving in the nick of time. The Enterprise manages to save the Earth from destruction but it is soon apparent that the Borg do not intend to destroy Earth but change the course of its history.—grantss

It is the twenty-fourth century, and the Borg (cybernetic lifeforms) have spread across the galaxy with one sole purpose: to assimilate and conquer all races. Under the command of their seductive and sadistic Queen, the Borg are headed to Earth with a devious plan involving time travel to alter history. After an epic battle against the Borg, Captain Jean-Luc Picard and the U.S.S. Enterprise NCC-1701-E crew follow the Borg sphere back into the twenty-first century, and must battle the Borg Queen before she assimilates mankind. Meanwhile, Picard and his crew must make sure that Zefram Cochrane makes his famous warp flight, and makes Earth's first contact with an alien species (the Vulcans).—Robert Lynch <docrlynch@yahoo.com>

Captain Jean-Luc Picard (Patrick Stewart) suddenly awakens from a nightmare in which he relived his assimilation by the cybernetic Borg six years earlier (as shown in the two-part series episode "The Best of Both Worlds"). Starfleet informs him of a new Borg attack against Earth but orders the USS Enterprise-E to patrol the Neutral Zone in case of Romulan aggression. Starfleet is worried that Picard is too emotionally involved with the Borg as an unstable element to join the fight.

Learning that the fleet is losing the battle, the Enterprise crew disobeys orders and heads for Earth, where a single damaged Borg Cube opposes a group of Starfleet vessels. The Enterprise arrives in time to assist the crew of the USS Defiant which is commanded by Lieutenant Commander Worf (Michael Dorn). After Picard hears Borg communications in his mind, he takes command of the fleet and orders the surviving starships to concentrate their firepower on a seemingly non-vital section of the Borg Cube. The Cube is destroyed after launching a smaller spherical ship heading towards Earth.

The Enterprise pursues the Borg sphere into a temporal vortex. Picard orders the Enterprise to follow it, and as they are enveloped into the vortex, the crew briefly glimpses an Earth populated entirely by Borg. Picard realizes that the Borg have used time travel to change the past. The Enterprise arrives in the past, on April 4, 2063, the day before humanity's first encounter with alien life after the historic warp drive flight. The Borg sphere fires on the planet; realizing that the Borg are trying to prevent first contact, the Enterprise crew destroy the sphere and send an away team to the Montana site where Zefram Cochrane (James Cromwell) is building his ship, the Phoenix, to look for survivors. Picard sends Cochrane's assistant Lily Sloane (Alfre Woodard) to the Enterprise for medical attention, then returns to the ship and leaves Commander William Riker (Jonathan Frakes) on Earth to make sure the Phoenix's flight proceeds as planned. The Enterprise crew sees Cochrane as a legend, but the real man is reluctant to assume his role as the historical figure.

A group of Borg invade the Enterprise's lower decks and begin to assimilate some of its crew and modify the ship. Picard and a team attempt to reach engineering to disable the Borg with its corrosive coolant, but the android Data (Brent Spiner) is captured, and finds the Borg Queen (Alice Krige), who gains his trust by giving part of him human skin. A frightened Sloane seizes the captain, but he gains her trust, and they escape the Borg-infested area of the ship by creating a diversion in the holodeck. Picard, Worf, and the ship's navigator, Lieutenant Hawk (Neal McDonough), travel in space suits to stop the Borg from calling reinforcements with the deflector dish, but Hawk is assimilated in the process. As the Borg continue to assimilate, Worf suggests destroying the ship, but Picard angrily calls him a coward and vows to continue the fight. Lily confronts the captain and makes him realize he is acting irrationally due to his own past with the Borg and his desire for revenge. Picard apologizes to Worf and orders the activation of the ship's self-destruct and evacuation of the crew to escape pods, while he stays behind to rescue Data.

As Cochrane, Riker, and engineer Geordi La Forge (LeVar Burton) prepare to activate the warp drive on the Phoenix, Picard confronts the Borg Queen and discovers she has grafted human skin onto Data, giving him the sensation of touch he has long desired. She has presented this modification as a gift to the android, hoping to obtain his encryption codes to the Enterprise computer. Although Picard offers himself to the Borg in exchange for Data's freedom, the android refuses to leave. He deactivates the self-destruct sequence and fires torpedoes at the Phoenix, but they miss, and the Queen realizes Data has deceived her. Data ruptures a coolant tank, and the corrosive gas dissolves the biological components of the Borg as well as his new skin.

With the Borg threat neutralized, Cochrane completes his warp flight, and the next day, April 5, 2063, the crew watches as Vulcans, attracted by the Phoenix warp flight, land and greet Cochrane. Having ensured the correction of history, Picard bids Lily farewell and the Enterprise crew leave without being noticed and return to the 24th century.