This establishes a clear timeline. The time between the Cube kidnapping Picard and set a course for Earth to his was rescue somewhere between Wolf 359 and Earth was 6 days. Note that this is an opening crawl directly to the audience rather than a character's observation, and as such it should be treated as a higher level of canon than character dialogue.
The problem with your estimate is that according to Picard in FC the Federation comprised of 150 (presumably major) worlds spread across 8,000c. If we were to assume that Warp 9.9 was ~2,333c (7,000c / 3 years) and that the Borg Cube and the E-D were travelling at warp 9.9 for the entire duration, then over the course of 6 days they travelled a max distance of ~38.4c. Of course, they did not travel at warp 9.9 and they did not travel non-stop, so the distance would actually be shorter than this. Similarly, in FC the cube went from the Federation border directly to Earth in what appeared to be a matter of days. Just the distance between Earth and Wolf 359 alone is 7.8c. I find it highly unlikely that the capital of the Federation would be a mere 25-50c from the frontier.
Sorry, not sure what this is supposed to prove. The whole point of discussion between us was the availability of transwarp drive, and my stance is that just because we never see the Borg use it doesn't mean that it doesn't exist at that time. So based on those travel times we're looking at two possibilities:
1. The Borg DID employ transwarp at some point during their invasions of the Federation. We know that after Wolf 359 but before the final confrontation at Earth, a second Borg vessel with assimilated victims from Wolf 359 went back to the Delta Quadrant. That must have involved transwarp to get back in time for Voyager.
2. Chaulk it up to the fact that warp speed is inconsistent throughout the series (Klingon homeworld is in our Oort Cloud according to Star Trek : Enterprise).
Hard to say which one is more plausible. Could be both. If number 2 is correct, then while that may explain an inconsistency of a few days, it doesn't explain a few years of travel from J-25.
Actually that's besides the point. Even if Data's exact distance was off, the main point was that it would take over 2 years for the E-D to reach the nearest star base.
No that's exactly the point. It's not that Data's exact distance was off, it was WAY off. It's 2 years at maximum warp...6 - 7 under sustainable conditions.
It shouldn't come as a shocker that a vessel many times larger and more technologically advanced than the E-D could make the same trip in less than half the time via standard warp.
Right so if we're talking 2 or 3 years instead of 7, that's far more reasonable. But even a cube can't generate enough power to take a 7 year trip and squeeze it down to 1. Maximum warp for the E-D is 9.8. No ship ever seen can simply go double that.
I suppose you're right in that it could have done it in a much shorter time via transwarp coil or conduit, but as they had nothing to fear they may have been acting rather leisurely in their approach.
Well yeah I agree with you they were being leisurely however you look at it. I personally think it's impossible for a cube to use standard warp to get from J-25 to Earth in only a year, but had they wanted to, they could have taken a transwarp conduit very close to Federation space and been there maybe in weeks. Remember that the Borg already were in the AQ...they had attacked several Federation and Romulan colonies along the Neutral Zone. They could have just turned that ship around and been there in months or sent several cubes instead of just one.
