Everything they tried failed. Even Locutus was a spectacular failure and the Queen had especially high hopes for that one. Now, with the utter collaps... of nearly 85% of the transwarp network and mounting resistance from the humans, the Collective had to try something more radical. The Collective had encountered many unusual technologies over the centuries. The most recent, though, was so unusual that only one species possessed it. They had been known as the Orichalco. The Orichalco had a. I parked it up front and on the side of my father's body shop, with a for sale sign on the wind shield. Nothing much happened for the first three days I'd left it there, but on the weekend, two girls drove up, parked in the street, and came over to look at my car. I let them look at it by themselves for about five minutes before cleaning my hands and walking over to see them."I just put a different engine and transmission in it, replaced the whole interior, smoothed out all the little paint. He handed it to one of the men seated at the table."I don't want to touch the cards. I don't want anybody to be able to say I manipulated them in any way. You do it. Tear off the cellophane, open the deck and count out the cards."The crowd was silent except for one, "No fucking way" at the back of the room.The crowd counted off: "thirteen; fourteen; fifteen; sixteen." The old man turned over the sixteenth card and dropped it on the pile; Jack of Hearts. The room was stunned as the old men. It had adequately helped you to navigate the main roads on your journey northward, but it failed to prepare you for the winding, branching mountain roads you're expected to travel. You're fairly sure you'd followed your directions adequately, but the branch indicated by the map should have come up a couple of miles back. You take a swig of water from your canteen, wiping the sweat from your brow. You give it a shake, feeling only a little more water in it. The crags around you shield you from.