Can the Borg Queen lie?

Question

In the Dark Frontier episode of Star Trek Voyager, the Borg Queen is contacting Seven of Nine and she tells her that her deassimilation and putting her on board Voyager was intentional, and was part of the plan of having an agent among Voyager's crew.

We know very well that this is not true. Seven of Nine was severed from the Collective at the end of the Borg-Species 8472 War, purely by the actions of Voyager's crew. Her link to the Collective was disabled, the closest Borg cube was destroyed and there is absolutely no chance that the Borg Queen could plan this or even predict such a sequence of events.

Does this means that the Borg Queen is lying to Seven of Nine? Could something as perfect as the queen of all Borg lower herself to such a human tactic like lying, just to make their plans come true?

Answer 1

The Borg Queen is far from perfect; the pursuit of perfection is what drives the Borg, after all. In that same episode you cite above, the Borg Queen does lie to Seven of Nine at another time; Seven catches her in her lie, as the Borg, never needing to lie, aren't very good at it when they need to. This would indicate that the Queen is capable of lying. The producers also left that claim by the Queen deliberately vague; Seven's ability to catch the Queen in a lie may indicate that her previous statement that Seven was always meant to be an agent is true, or it may indicate that Seven was too emotional at the time to pick up on the subtle cues that the Queen was lying. It's a very good, very clever episode for that reason.

Answer 2

S05E16 Dark Frontier Voyager shuttle is trying to hide from the Queen with multiadaptive shielding that Seven of Nine's parents invented.

Queen adapts, Voyager remodulates shields and hides again. Queen lies that they have the shuttle - 3 lifeforms one hologram. Seven says that she would have felt their presence because Borg would have assimilated by now. Queen smiles. : )

Answer 3

The Borg Queen can lie. In "Unimatrix Zero" the Borg Queen tells a child that "assimilation turns us all into friends". The boy then asks if it is fun, and the Queen looks at him and blatantly says, "Yes, it's fun". This is a blatant lie as the Borg have no need or concept of fun. This is evidenced by Seven of Nine's transition from the collective. She had to develop a "fun side". The Borg also lie in "Scorpion" when they promise Janeway safe passage through their space.