Author note: Not mine, never will be. I'm just a geek who isn't profiting from the story below, just my thoughts on how Seven might be feeling in the sandbox that has been given to us as 'Picard'. This is a one-shot set around Picard Episode 8:"Broken Pieces".

Seven's 'Humanity'

Picard. Oh, how Seven hated him.

How she hated the people who blindly followed him, even going so far as to love him.
Picard, his Federation, and all they stood for. What did he represent? For far too many he was a hero, a symbol of hope and peace... but not to her. To Seven, he was the one who had paved her way to Hell.

He symbolised everything Seven's life had become since returning to the Alpha Quadrant on Voyager. He, who came back from assimilation to fully recover his place amongst humanity... and to be loved for it!

Picard Day... what a load of sanctimonious crap!

And yet here she was, Seven Of Nine. Annika Hansen.

No longer fully Borg, not entirely human... never being allowed a full and welcomed place in 'humanity'.
When Voyager had returned, welcome parties were there for everyone but her. Even escaped terrorists and prisoners ranked higher than a 'rescued' Borg!

Whilst many had chosen to believe she was 'reformed' (like she'd been in a damn rehabilitation program or something), the Federation had never believed that she could regain her humanity. Therefore, they reasoned, if she wasn't human she was Borg... the common enemy. If this was true... then she wasn't to be afforded any rights. Borg did not deserve any rights.

For all the work she had tirelessly carried out to get the crew of Voyager 'home', Seven wasn't even to get a dwelling that she could give such an assignation to.
Rescued by Voyager... how naive Seven had been back then.

With the emotional maturity of a small child, the 'me' that had existed prior to the Borg created 'Seven of Nine, Tertiary Adjunct of Unimatrix 01', she'd battled to fit in on Voyager, always falling far short of meeting Captain Janeway's idealistic and unrealistic expectations.

Even in those early days she should have seen how things were to be, and she had been a fool.

How could she be more human, when she had been treated like a machine?
What 'humanity' had Seven been afforded on Voyager? Treated with suspicion, treated like an outcast, treated like hardware kept in the damn Cargo Bay... only to be brought out when she was useful to the rest of the Voyager crew.

Never equal, only a tool to be used.

The passing of time has brought many experiences to Seven's door... experiences that would have broken so many of those who professed their 'humanity'. Losses and heartbreaks that would have shattered those who were weaker than she.

Seven had battled back from the brink, hell... she'd battled back from many such 'brinks'.
She'd shed blood, sweat and tears, fought for years to gain a footing as her own person and entity, even fighting against parts of herself she would never reveal beyond the bottom of a bottle... all in order to regain a part of 'humanity' that everyone else stated she should have, but judged that she was didn't deserve.

Seven would prevail. She would continue as a Fenris Ranger... working to be the strength for those who had been broken. She would be there for the outcasts, the tortured, the bereft... she would be there for those who could not speak, for those who could not fight, and for those whose voices had been silenced forever.

Seven would not forget.
She would see beyond the implants, the scars, even beyond their pain... to Seven's enhanced eyesight everyone was important, valid and deserving of kindness and life.

In this way, Seven could not sit by and watch the xB's be spaced. She felt their pain even before making the decision to be assimilated once again... something she had sworn would never happen to her again in her lifetime.

But in that moment, when Seven experienced assimilation yet again and as she took her place as Borg Queen of this micro-collective... something fell into place deep inside her.

Whilst amongst the voices, hers rang out "WE ARE THE BORG".
That was THEIR right, they WERE the Borg.

No longer drowning in her own thoughts of loss, failure and angst... Seven felt a kind of peace amongst the Borg chatter.
She could see the Borg part of herself clearly, not replacing, but enhancing who she was.

In that moment Seven could see a path ahead...
Once the threat was removed, Seven would disconnect from the Collective and return as Annika because the human part of her had work to do that she could not do in the Collective.

She needed her individuality, her hard-won scars, her heart, her righteous anger...
But she would return, her Collective would be waiting for her.