Star Trek: Starbase 777 - prison-cells-02

The second floor of the prison was cool and humid, clammy in an uncomfortable way that was difficult to wash off. The walls were all closed off, only allowing for the artificial rhythm of fluorescent lighting. Blindfolded and bound, Havra, Allan, Victoria, Tavek, Dezyim, and Edgar were dropped into a small common room, with small cots along the walls and a washroom behind a sliding door. The door was sealed off behind them, leaving them to remove their own blindfolds.

Ripping the blindfold off with absolute hatred, as if the object itself was the reason he and his colleagues were here, his eyes darted around. “Fffffffuck.” He huffed, “At least we have furniture, though.”

"Are they gone?" Victoria said, stood unmoving where she had been deposited with arms crossed. She had been that way since their captors had entered the Temhruuhi's brig to collect them, not cooperating enough to make their lives easy, but not doing anything to make it more difficult either. The way she saw it, the less they stood out, the they'd invite the Tal Shiar's wrath, and the better they would stay in one piece until Starfleet came to get them. In the same vein, she moved her head around slightly, though neglected to remove the blindfold until told they were alone.

Almost faster aster than the human eye could blink, he ripped off the blindfold, and his own eyes flicked around the room, taking in every detail. Cots, a door that probably led to the washroom, no windows. And no signs of any outlets either, he was sort of fucked. But his battery wasn’t bad, around 76% or so, thanks to the amount of time he’d spent turned off. His hands registered the room’s clamminess, but it didn’t bother him. He produced enough heat to not feel it, even if his touch receptors were on. “No outlets.. hah, I’m fucked. You all are.. still probably fucked, this humidity can’t be good for you, but less.”

Dezyim pulled off his own blindfold and made a noise halfway between a scoff and a choke. Recovering quickly, he stashed the blindfold in his pocket in case it was useful later and zipped up his jacket. “They’re gone.” He assured Victoria.

He looked towards the others, and then at the walls around him. There was no easy way out of this, not even a difficult way. This wasn’t going to be fun. “I’d say something about asserting dominance on the first day of jail, but…” He shrugged.

Victoria nodded and, finally, raised her hands to slip the blindfold up and over her head, blinking several times in quick succession to take note of where they had ended up and who she had ended up with - taking note of how many were present in the brig that hadn't ended up in this room. "Okay," she took a deep breath, raising a brow in the general direction of Edgar and Tavek, "guess I've slept a few nights in worse places. Just gotta hang tight till rescue comes."

He knocked on the wall, hearing it echo. “I wonder how soundproof these are.” He muttered, “Maybe we fulfill our plans of engineering karaoke: featuring Lieutenant Bishop.”

“I have a lot of songs saved… theoretically, I can play the instrumentals.” He shrugged, sitting down on a cot.

“Let’s put a pin in that.” He joked, “Maybe once we’re a few days in and insane enough to do it.” He paused, before correcting himself. “Sorry. Too soon. Actually— no good time for that at all.” (edited)

The cold air hit him immediately. He was used to humidity... when it was warm. But when it was cold? It felt like he was in Boston in the fall again, waiting for the train in the morning to take him to the library when it had just rained overnight. Not a great feeling. The first thing he did when he took off his blindfold, though, was to look around the room and count the people they had with them now. Note down each of their names in his head. Three of his junior officers in here, too. Fuck. Pushing the voices that crept into his head upon that realization, he tugged his socks up from his boots so that they actually covered the skin in between the boots and his shorts - something he supposed came in handy right now. "Later, maybe," he said to Ed about the karaoke, more focused on looking around the room now, really trying to analyze everything they had - or rather, didn't have - to work with here. Call it the engineer in him. "Nobody's injured or anything, right? I know we patched Havra up earlier, but I just wanna make sure.." he said as he looked from her, to everyone else in the room.

"Yeah, you know where to go if you stub your toe," Victoria raised her hand slightly, then crossed both across her torso. "Don't think we should be doing anything that annoys whoever's watching - or listening, and that includes going insane." She sighed, giving the door behind them a cursory glance before shuffling off to claim a cot of her own. "A lot of people go through a lot worse every day."

Tavek just stared at her, like he wanted to say something very nasty for a second before controlling himself. “Then you are not aware of what these people can do to you.” He said, like he knew from lived experience.

Allan nodded at Victoria. Yeah, it was good they had a medical officer in here, at least. That was nice. A medical officer, an intelligence officer (a cryptologist, maybe?), and... four engineers. While he didn't visibly look distressed, or sound it, he was at the least visibly concerned, for the people in this room but also, almost moreso, the people not in this room, the ones he had no idea where they were. He could only assume they were in similar conditions, but there was always the option of things being worse for them. "Well, nothing's being done to us like that right now, so - let's take a breather, okay? Does anyone need some water..?" They did have cups after all!

“I’m doing fine.” Dezyim had been righting himself after the transport and rather rude blindfolding, but when he saw Allan pull his socks up he looked at him with an expression that could best be ascribed to ‘pity’. “Allan,” he started. “Would you like a… blanket? Or something? For your legs, I mean.”

Allan tilted his head as Dezyim asked if he wanted a blanket, then looked down at his legs. Then back up with a shake of his head. "Um- thanks, I think I'm alright, though, I mean, it's - the socks are warm," he said, which was true - it was only like, 3 inches or so of exposed skin anyways, but the socks were in fact there for the purpose of covering up when need be. "I'll... let you know if I do later, though. It's... I mean, I'll be honest, the temperature kinda sucks, but not like we can control a thermostat in here. Like, 'hey, Computer? Turn the temperature to 69 degrees Fahrenheit,'" he said, as a joke, "I lived in Boston for a little bit when I was older. Guess I'll get used to it again."

He pursed his lips, watching the slowly blooming argument after taking a seat in one of the cots, drumming his hands against his knees.

Victoria was under her sheets the moment she sat in her cot, overall pervasive feeling of nastiness be damned! Man, she really was regretting not showing up to work in her uniform jacket that day. "I'm just saying we shouldn't be giving them any excuses to do anything to us. We got good at that back home, living right next to the Neutral Zone and all," she said flatly, then shrugged, "worked there, hoping it works here."

“I’m with you on that. Don’t give anyone a reason to hurt you. Wish I had more advice than that, but last time these guys had me, I’d done literally nothing and they still beat the shit out of me. Stay sane, don’t provoke anyone. But now, I’m going back the fuck to sleep, because it seems like these guys intend on draining my battery to zero and knocking us down a crew member.” He said, more coldly than in his usual tone.

Cool, cool, cool. Victoria raised her hands in surrender. At least Tavek seemed to agree with her on principle, the rage she could understand and, she hoped, work with. A look of concern was given to each of her roommates before she laid down and decided to simply stare at the ceiling panels for the moment.

He picked up his singular sheet on the cot he’d plopped into, wrapping it around himself to cover his short-sleeved arms. He told himself that he’d just replicate a new uniform jacket when he got back, since he had unfortunately lost it in the struggle to transport them from the brig to their respective cells.

Noticing the Ensign looking a bit cold, Tavek took off his own jacket, wordlessly tossing it to Edgar before he collapsed onto his own cot. He didn’t feel the cold anyway.

He blinked, a bit surprised, but chuckled. “—thanks.” He tilted his head slightly, “I kinda forgot you didn’t.. yeah. Thank you. I owe you one.” (edited)

Dezyim moved over to one of the cots in a far corner of the room and kicked his shoes off, placing them neatly under the cot with his glasses safely tucked next to them. He then curled up in the blanket and faced the wall quietly, unnerved to have left the feeling of being on a ship or station behind. The cell had of the background noises or subtle movements he was used to.

“I owe you all for… well, a lot of things. A jacket’s the least I can do.” He said simply before switching himself off, falling limp under the thin blanket.

He was about to reply, but watched him switch himself off and decided that saying something to deaf ears was pointless.

He watched as things settled, not saying anything for a while. In fact, he didn't say anything at all for... a long time, letting anyone who wanted to take a nap or something take one, or just spend the time to look at the ceiling, lie down... whatever. It seemed like it was Quiet Time in their prison cell and so he did just that; he stayed quiet. That was, until he got a little too restless. Looking at the ceiling and doodling various squares and cylinders and other such shapes on the same piece of paper could only last him so long. He got up off the cot and went to the bathroom, looking it all over again. Not, there wasn't really anything in here worth messing with. Not even anything that looked like it could be pried open, really... fuck. He took a cup and filled it with water. Chugged it. Another one, for safe measure. The water was at least not colder than the room itself. He went back into the main room, sitting down in the blank space in the middle of the room. Unsure of what to say, really, he started taking pieces of paper and arranging them in a grid on the floor.

Victoria wasn't asleep. She hadn't even thought to find it, truth be told. The ceiling was interesting enough as she mentally refreshed herself on no-tech emergency procedures, just in case things were to go bad. There was no Eicran, Alin, or Aria to back her up here. Only when Allan moved to the bathroom and returned did she roll onto her side to watch him walk between the row of beds, gaze wordlessly trained on him with a somber - but not entirely present - expression. Although, sitting in the middle of the room was enough of a break from their short-lived monotony to shake her from her thoughts. Victoria stretched her arms, then spun around in her cot so that she laid on her belly, face to the foot of her bed, towards where Allan had sat down. A few seconds were spent wrapping her sheet back around herself, though she left her arms free. "That some kind of escape plan?" she asked, watching him arrange the grid.

Dezyim turned over, curious about the movement, and watched Allan as he arranged the grid. Or... watched him as best as he could. With no access to any sort of gel or similar product, his hair had long since fallen out of its iconic slicked back style into more of a... depressing bob. It formed a curtain over his eyes, and after a frustrating minute of trying to peer out from under his admittedly long bangs, he gave up. He moved to go see what Allan was doing up close, crouching down beside the engineer wordlessly.

Hearing the rustling of the paper, Ed turned in his cot and cracked an eye open to see what everyone else did— his superior officer assembling drawings on the floor. He watched from where he was, rubbing the sleep out of his eyes.

Allan looked up to Victoria when she spoke, a breath of laughter escaping his lips as he shook his head. "Nah, I - I wish, no, it's just... earlier in the brig, I said if we had enough paper, we could make a little board game. I think we can, still," he said, trying to remember which squares went where as he drew some grids onto the paper as the "spaces", "if anyone'd wanna play. I think it can only be four players, but like, we could always have teams. There's not any actual uh, choice in the game, though, kinda just - I mean, you can decide which piece to move with your roll, I guess? That's about it." "You basically roll a die - or in this case, you'd spin the pen like a bottle and see what number it lands on, and then you move your piece out of the "home" if it lands on a 6. So everyone kinda just keeps spinning for a long time at the beginning, but then you start moving along, and you have to get to uh, the finish spaces first..." he moved his finger in a little spiral motion as if he had the board already set up, but since he didn't, it didn't make a whole lot of sense. "It'll, uh, make more sense once I lay it all out."

Sitting up, the ensign tuned into the conversation. “Room for another, then?” He asked, hopping off of the cot.

"No, that makes sense. I understand what you're saying." He sat down crisscross on the other side of the 'board' from Allan. "I'd love to play too. I don't think I've ever played a board game, actually. Well- unless you count Dabo." He chuckled halfheartedly as he tried to move his bangs out of his eyes. They fell right back to where they had been before.

"Sure, of course you can play. Normally, there's different colors to go by, but we don't really have that... does anyone know how to do origami? Maybe we could have like, different shapes, I know that you can make little stars with origami, because we can't do like, the big swans, it's gotta be, you know, board-game-piece sized." He smiled when Dezyim said 'Dabo', and shrugged. "I mean, I don't actually know that much about board games, but we can ask the Captain if it counts when we get back, yeah?" He kept arranging the paper into the board until he had something he seemed satisfied with. "If we can't figure out the origami, we can just draw little shapes on smaller pieces of paper, that's okay, too." He then looked back at Dezyim. "Do you - do you want me to help you with that? We could probably use the blindfold as a good headband to keep it outta your eyes, right?"

He moved to kneel beside the others, watching the papers closely as he listened to Allen.

"Better than spin the bottle, I'm in," Victoria said, first propping herself up on her elbows against the cot, then getting up to sit on the floor with the others. "I can fold a boat, I think," she said, wrapping the sheet around her shoulders as she did, and outstretching a hand for a piece of Allan's papers, "guy showed me how back in San Fran a few years ago."

"Is it, uh - gonna be small enough to fit onto the spaces..?" He asked, unsure of how small one could fold a paper boat, but handing Victoria a piece of paper nonetheless. "I mean, go ahead and make the boat anyways, it sounds cool." He still wanted to see it even if it wasn't gonna be used in the game!

Dezyim smiled at Allan’s comment on asking the captain when they got back. He probably only half-meant it; everyone was feeling grim. But it meant he was putting on a brave face for everyone else; Dezyim had lead groups before, he was familiar with that tactic. So he figured it would make Allan feel better to feel as if he were truly helping people, so he smiled. The offer to help him with his hair, however, made him turn a deep violet. He was embarrassed both to have not thought of that himself and for the fact he apparently couldn’t manage his own hair. “I don’t- I- khm… no- no thank you.” He tried and failed to recover, and instead chose to change the subject. “I think I could fold a star. One of the little ones. I learned how to in the academy and then… kept doing it when I was bored.”

"I'll... make it work," Victoria said, a hint of a smirk forming at the edge of her lips as she accepted the paper. She tucked her crossed legs further underneath herself, and tore the paper into half. Damn, was she getting good at tearing things in half. It had been a few years since she last tried it, and so she mustered every last bit of focus she could, paper strip up to eye level. Twelve odd folds or so later - she lost count at some point - and there was a boat! Not many places in their current predicament to float it in, nor did it really fit too well into the spaces provided, being about an inch and a half too large. But Victoria seemed happy about her craftsmanship, straining a smile as she passed it back to Allan. "Well, best I can do. You'll have to ask a surgeon for anything smaller."

Allan watched Victoria make the boat, glad to see Dezyim smile even if it may have been a little forced. "Okay, just - let me know, I have plenty experience doing other peoples' hair for them, even braiding it and stuff," he said, before he handed Dezyim a sheet of paper. "Go for it, I'd love to see the stars." And boy, did he mean that literally, too. He smiled when Victoria passed him the boat, setting it down to the paper and laughing at her joke. "I take it you're not a surgeon, then? But hey, I think we can make it work if we just put it sideways, right?" He asked, doing so. Man, if only they had a little boat to go to the stars with.

“Holy shit, that’s actually super impressive.” He chuckled, looking to Victoria, “You gotta teach me how to make those sometime.”

”Oh, no,” Victoria replied to Allan with faux offence taken, even with palm against her own chest to really sell it, “I work in Emergencies. Hammer a nail too much the wrong way, and maybe I’ll catch you when we get back.” Towards Edgar, she offered a nod of thanks. “It’s just a party trick, but if you want- I guess we’ve more than enough time.”

Dezyim considered the offer to braid his hair very seriously for a moment before shaking it away. He would look ridiculous. He took the paper from Allan and folded it back and forth before tearing it into one long strip. Then, he folded it over itself over and over again, going in a circle in a way that made it look like he was just balling it up. He folded it until the strip was used up and proceeded to pinch in the corners and suddenly it wasn’t a ball of paper at all, but a small star about the size of a button. He held it up in front of his face, showing his compatriotes. “And for you, sir,” he addressed Allan, “a star.” He very ceremoniously dropped the star into Allan’s hands with a smile.

He grinned at Victoria, shrugging. “Who knows? I am definitely known for getting hurt in stupid ways.” He told her, as if it was something to brag about.

"Makes sense why I haven't seen you around before, then," Allan said to Victoria, "I'm hardly ever in emergencies. Usually just come in after something but like, not on a super urgent basis. Don't plan on making things into emergencies, either. Respectfully. Though -" He nodded to Ed. "Might be smart to avoid any sharp edges or corners, then, guys, 'cause I guess - wait, no, sorry. I'm confusing... I'm confusing surgery and stitches. You can still do stitches, right..?" He was an engineer, not a doctor! When Dezyim beheld the star for everyone to look at, a grin came to his face. Actually genuine, and he chuckled when Dezyim addressed him and put it in his hands. For a moment, actually, he forgot their situation entirely, focused on this small little star as he set it down on the makeshift paper board and handed Dezyim three more sheets. "Why thank you, this is beautiful, okay, okay, so we just need... three more stars, and three more boats, and... maybe we have two of each, but we draw like, polka dots or stripes on some of them? There's gotta be 4 sets of 4 things." (edited)

Victoria watched the showmanship unfolding with her chin dipped and the side of her forehead pointed squarely towards Dezyim, until she couldn't help but squeeze her eyes closed and allow a thin-lipped grin to stop a bit of laughter from leaking out. Not the time, her subconscious had decided, suppressing it as much as it could. She came out of it shaking her head and regarding Allan's statement. "Stitches like you wouldn't believe," Victoria said, hand outstretched to take another couple of pieces of paper. Right, they hadn't met. She realised as much about the rest of the cell only after Allan had laid it out plainly for her - she'd never been the best with names, after all, it was so difficult to keep track of so many that passed through sickbay's doors that she rarely bothered outside it to begin with. "I'm Victoria, by the way," she said, to the room in general, although her gaze remained set on the papers she was collecting. With her other hand, she gestured for Edgar to scoot closer. "Think you wanna give this a go?"

He followed instructions, shifting to sit cross-legged on one side of the makeshift board. “Yeah, sure.” He shrugged, “Why not?”

"Awesome," Allan had said in response to Victoria saying she could in fact do stitches. "I could... also try making a boat if you show us how," he said, taking one of the sheets of paper, "I mean, if I also make one, that's the first set done already, right?"

“You mind if I follow along? Just to make a spare?” He asked, leaning in to look closer at the papers in front of him.

“More stars, coming up.” He tore more strips of paper and proceeded to fold them quite the same, albeit quicker and messier. He produced them so fast that Allan wouldn’t get a chance to draw them before the next one was already waiting. When Victoria shared her name, though, he paused. “Dezyim. It’s a pleasure.” He didn’t know several of his cellmate’s names either, he was realizing, and was glad she had thought of it before it became a slight on his part.

"Yeah, okay," she agreed, raising herself to shift her weight against her legs once more. "So..." The first few folds were just making the paper smaller, which was easy enough. After than, she actively had to stop herself from bringing the piece up to her eyes like she had done before, just so everyone else could watch as she created the boat's triangular center, then slowly flipped it inside out and into a diamond. Now, if they had done it right, just as Victoria hoped she herself had done, pulling apart each side of the diamond would reveal the boat structure, triangle tucked in the middle. She almost let out a sigh of relief as hers did so, instead of immediately falling right apart. Placing her second creation on the ground next to her first, she looked to Allan and Edgar to see how they were doing.

"Oh, hell yeah," Allan grinned when Dezyim started making more stars like crazy. 8 stars in total, then, and he counted them out to make sure once he was done. "You're good at that, damn. So I'm thinking I'll just like, draw little hearts on 4 of the stars to differentiate that player?" He then shifted his full attention to the boat making lesson. Making exact folds was actually pretty easy for him once given the instructions - after all, precision measuring came pretty naturally to the engineer after all his experience with it. He was, still, a little hesitant about the flipping it inside out part, but - it worked! "Whoa," he said as he looked at it, looking to theirs as well, "damn, I didn't expect it to work so well. Okay, so maybe we... draw some other shape on 4 of the boats, too? Any ideas? Oh, and I'm Allan. Even though you knew that already." And so did everyone in the room, but hey. Just participating in the introductions like everyone else.

Watching over Allan’s shoulder as he folded the boat, Ed watched him carefully, planning on attempting the folds if— or, more hopefully, when, he got home. “Should we assign a symbol to everyone?” He asked, “You’re a star, Victoria’s a triangle, Dez is a heart, et cetera?”

Havra had, after pulling off the blindfold from her face, taken a look around before picking up a thin sheet from one of the cots and heading for the washroom, where she had attempted to clean up the blood on her shoulder a little. When she returned she had been wrapped in the sorry excuse of a blanket. Since then she had been sitting on one of the cots, legs pulled against her chest, not speaking unless she was spoken to. Her eyes were almost constantly fixed to the entrance, although she did glance over to the others occasionally, curious what sort of game Allan had come up with. She did not want to play, but listening to them talk was something she could concentrate on to keep her mind distracted. Despite being exhausted she could not sleep which she was almost glad for. This was the last place she would want to fall asleep.

Numerous footsteps began to march down the hall in a perfect rhythm, coming towards the cell.

"Wait- why am I a triangle?" Victoria asked, her gaze having rested on Edgar already as he spoke, but turning more questioning as he offered that suggestion. If anything, she wanted to be a square. As the footsteps grew closer, her interest peeled off from the conversation at hand, and any remnants of cheer that had crept unto her features in the last few minutes quickly vanished, replaced with a scowl, lips slightly ajar. She picked up her boats and scooted behind the frame of her cot, silently willing the rest of her cellmates to do the same.

“I want to know why I’m heart as well.” He laughed lightly. If anything he would have expected to be a star, seeing as he was the one who had folded them. He heard the footsteps before the humans though, and all humor left his face. He stood and went back to his cot quickly, retrieving his glasses from their place. He wanted to be able to see whatever was about to happen. He then slid onto the cot and pressed himself up against the wall as if he willed himself hard enough he might just pass right through it.

"Yeah, I mean, again, only four players, but we can have like, little teams, so - I mean, I feel like Dezyim can be the star since he made 'em, but a heart's good, too," he said, giving a little smile to Havra if he happened to catch her glance while he put hearts onto four of the star pieces. "You don't have to be a triangle, just, like - any shape? Like, we'll have the regular boats, the stars, then the stars with the hearts, and boats with triangles or whatever other shape you want." Seemed simple enough! When he heard the footsteps, though, he watched everyone shy away and decided to fold the game together carefully, setting it just under his cot. "We can ah, decide what shape we want on the boats later," he said calmly, though he did pull on his socks a little more out of some sort of nervous habit. "Triangles, squares, circles - maybe even an animal? Like a fish could be fun, for a boat."

A sharp, rhythmic knock, a moment of hesitation as the door was unlocked... The door opened to a group of guards, faces obscured, all armed. "Hands where I can see them," the one in front said, her voice gruff behind the slight muffle of a mask, "To your beds, facing the wall."

Yeah, seemed like the shapes needed to come later. Upon being given the order, he did so, raising his hands up above his head and moving to the bed, facing the wall like asked. Was this just a routine check or something? Making sure they weren't building a secret bomb instead of a board game? Who knew.

Well, THAT was enough to wake Tavek up. He pulled the thin blanket off of him, looking towards the door. Guards. This could not be good. No way to fight, no way to escape right now.. So, still on his bed, brain still rebooting from the long nap, he just turned to face the wall with his hard raised, wondering what the fuck was actually going on.

Victoria, surprise surprise, was quite happy to comply, not even bothering to take off her blanket as she raised both hands and stood up, the fabric winding up draped behind her neck and off both shoulders like a scrunched up scarf. The little bit of modesty it made her feel was welcome, nonetheless. She moved slow towards the wall beside her bed, hands pressing up against the panelling, though not without attempting to sneak peeks of what was happening out of the corners of her eyes. (edited)

Putting his hands up and quickly moving to stare at the wall like it was the most interesting thing there, Ed stayed uncharacteristically silent.

Dezyim was practically there already. All he had to do was turn around, really. So he did, raising his hands. He felt them starting to shake, as they so often did, and decided to press them against the wall so at least he would look confident. That’s what he told himself at least; the truth was he did not look confident in the slightest.

The group dispersed through the room, searching pockets, taking whatever they could find — paper, pens, notepads, cutely folded or not. They ensured that the group would be left with damn near nothing. They muttered among themselves, saying something, something, "ensign," and with that, "You two." the leader of the small group gestured Dezyim and Edgar forward. "Center of the room. If anyone tries anything, I'll blow your heads off, got that?"

Ed felt his entire body seize at the mention of his name, but he forced himself into action anyway, heart slamming into his ribs like it was trying to escape. He stepped cautiously backward, until he roughly hit the centre, swallowing the lump in his throat as he put his hands down to his sides, the only defiance he could pull off without becoming a stain against the cell wall.

Dezyim took a moment to realize that he was part of ‘you two’ and, after he did, a moment still to get moving. He stood from the cot and moved towards the center of the room, feeling quite like he was in some sort of dream. He reminded himself he had the privilege of escape at any time before shaking that thought away. He couldn’t do that to his fellow officers— no, to his friends. He came to a stop in the middle of the room, hands still raised.

Oh god, they were searching her. Just like when one of their officers had tried to subdue her before, Victoria was not super enthusiastic about being touched by her captors. This time, however, given that they were no longer on home ground, she managed to convince herself to stay put. There weren't many places for her to have stashed anything - the Tal Shiar would find her folded boats in one of her front pockets, and an amalgamation of strips of fabric in the other. Victoria almost turned around to check if she was being pointed towards in the Tal Shiar's reference, though the shuffling of the ensigns stopped her from fully turning her head. She blinked, and instead leaned her forehead against the wall. Surely, this would be nothing, they hadn't misbehaved, nor given their captors any reason to want to hurt them. Maybe they were just checking for something - that made more sense to her. (edited)

Fuck, okay. They took his jacket off and immediately he shivered, the cold, humid air feeling like it his biting his skin from the suddenness of it all. He let it happen, though, biting his lip. Which was a mechanism he was only doing because he knew that if he didn't, some sort of stupid shit would come out of his mouth. It was a problem of his, and he knew it, and he was so, so tempted to scoff or something when he heard them taking everything, but no. He had to keep quiet. For his own safety, but also everyone's here. So they took everything out of his uniform jacket pockets. The little packets of wipes, the pencil, the sharpie marker, the wrench, the hairtie, a few spare bolts, the little pouch of fake blood, a pen, a little crumpled up blueprint of the fusion reactor and its glitter modifications, a little pouch of glitter, and all the little assorted candies. And when he heard the ensigns step towards the center of the room, well - it was accompanied by a deadly threat, so... he breathed in, held it for a bit, breathed out, and kept doing that, quietly. What else could he do?

Havra had to force herself not to react too strongly to being searched, well beyond how tense she was, but she couldn't imagine many prisoners were particularly relaxed while being this close to these people. Her hair ties and pins as well as three coloured pencils (yellow, black and light pink) she hadn't even been aware were in her pocket were confiscated.

Tavek’s bug drawing having been very successfully hidden inside his arm, however, was spared. Android privileges. It was about the only privilege he had, though, considering the Tal Shiar had a very, very good reason to hate him- he wondered why they hadn’t chosen him. He wanted to volunteer instead. The poor Ensigns didn’t deserve this. He wanted to be beaten and broken instead of them. He was meant to take that, they were fragile and fleshy and damage lasted forever on them. He stayed frozen where he was and said nothing. He doubted they would even let him switch places anyway.

The oddities received no reactions beyond a few raised eyebrows, but they carried on. Disruptors remained pointed at the group, but one dug theirs pointedly against Ed's back. That's what he got for making a bit of a show... The leader leant down enough to Dez to whisper; "It's been a while since we've had a Vorta to play with. I'm sure the scientists will be more than happy about this one," She straightened, nudging him forward as a pair of officers cuffed them both. "Forward, you two. Stray from the path for a second and I'll feed your friends whatever's left of your corpses." (edited)

He grimaced at the cool feeling of the weapon pressing into his back, but stayed silent, moving along as instructed.

Dezyim tried to clear his mind of emotions. He could handle the pain. He could. He’d died before, he’d die again, and he’d be in pain again. He just had to move through it. But if he said the wrong thing and it came down on somebody else? No… he just had to hold his tongue and move forward. So he did, trying to ignore any way he might feel about the situation.

The door shut tightly behind them, locked, and the group was once again alone.

Tavek gently touched the joint where the drawing was hidden, pushing it yet further into his arm. “Fuck the lot of you, fascists.” He whispered once the guards were gone, quiet enough that only he and maybe someone in the cot next to him could hear it.

Allan let go of the breath he hadn't been aware he was holding for... who knew how long. He turned around, looking at the shut door, and then looked at the group. One, two, three of them now. Yeah. Okay. He looked over at Tavek, specifically. "Um-" he started to say, and then cleared his throat, "it's uh, probably... best you save your energy, right? If they're taking people in and out of here, um. Might be... best for you to sleep. Or something. Like, y'know. Cold out. I'll wake you up if there's anything else, yeah?" A very, very strained smile followed those words.

Victoria only dared peek proper once the sound of the door shut behind them. Damn, they really did take the two ensigns. She bit her bottom lip, hoping - if she were religious she would have prayed - that nothing... too serious was being done to them. Crumpling to her cot, one knee folding before the other, she ran her hands through her hair in silent frustration. "Yeah," she said, thoroughly deflated, even a little raspy. She tried to elaborate, but could think of nothing else to say that didn't have a chance of making things worse, even as her mouth opened in an attempt to, so she could only merely repeat herself, "...yeah."

“I will. Just.. if they take me.. there’s a good chance I’m not coming back. From prior experience, my chance of survival is abysmal. And if they drag me off I’m not getting a goodbye. So.. take this as that goodbye, yea? Goodbye to all of you. It’s been a good run, 777. Hope the next roboticist’s at least half as decent as me.” He gave a hollow chuckle before laying back down.

Allan looked at the ground, taking in what Tavek said twice in his head before he spoke again. "Abysmal? You're still here. Don't say shit like that," he said, no anger present in his tone - more concern. "It's been a good run, but we're not done running." He sighed, taking in a deep breath and letting it out. "Just... sleep. Set yourself a timer for an hour, even, if you just want a nap - I just need you to be using the most minimal power right now, okay?"

“For you all? I’ll run until I break for good if it means you guys get out of this.” He said, smiling slightly before switching himself off once more.

Havra was not entirely certain if wishing someone a quick death was withing the moral framework of Starfleet, but in that moment she could not bring herself to care. There was a child that came to mind that she had cared for once they had not been afforded that mercy. The words describing their end were forever burned into Havra's mind. She was a coward now just as she had been then, selfish too. There was no escaping this and still she had not tried to help others because she feared for herself, foolishly hoping that if she stayed alive a few hours longer it would somehow matter. Somehow she had found a path to walk that made her both a bad person for not helping others when she might have been able to and disloyal for betraying her people. "If there is anything I am good at it's certainly running." The disgust in her voice made it apparent that she did not think this a good thing.

Victoria spent a few long seconds flicking her thumb against the hem of her blanket, idly running through several morbid thoughts as the conversation tapered off. To say the silence that followed was uncomfortable would easily have been an understatement. She stirred, if only to place her back against the wall as she sat up in her cot, and looked at Havra and Allan. "Look, um," her hands clattered against each other as they fell into her lap, "I'm not gonna be getting much sleep so... I might as well stay up and watch the door. You guys should try for a few hours of sleep, or rest, at least."

The moment Tavek switched himself off, he sat down on the cot and folded his knees up to his chest, hugging them tight. It helped with the cold, sure, just a little. But mostly, it was so he could put his head down on top of his knees, silent for a while. Silent while Havra said what she did, because... he didn't know what to say. He never did, did he? He shut his eyes and counted to ten, trying to take deep breaths. Trying to calm all the emotions stirring in him, and yet when he glanced up at Victoria when she spoke, his eyes were already a little wet. "We take turns, I think," he said, voice quiet - "how.. how long have you been in Starfleet?"

”How long have I been in Starfleet?” Victoria repeated the question. She wasn’t sure if she really wanted a conversation - her insides feeling like they had been tied into knots definitely wasn’t helping - but one look at Allan and she knew that she had to try, if not for herself, then at least to help calm the emotions in the room before they freewheeled out of control. “I graduated iiiiin,” she began soft and slow, thoughtful in her recollection, “twenty four oh two. So, thirteen years, more or less. Worked with Starfleet a little longer than that. Eighteen, I think. Eighteen years - fleet’s never let me down, not once, not yet.” She shook her head, needing the reminder just as much as anybody else. “What about you guys?”

"Eighteen," Allan echoed, "I graduated in, um.. 2409, so - six," less than half of Victoria's thirteen, and a whole third of the eighteen. "I, um, so you've - been here... longer, yeah." 'Duh', was what the voice in his head screamed at him. He took another deep breath, a little shakier, as he looked away from her and to the door. Where the two ensigns had left through moments before, and gone to who knows where, having who knows what happen. He didn't know, and that scared him more than anything else, for some reason. He looked from the door then back to Victoria, then back to Tavek, who... admittedly, he'd told to sleep for a reason. By the time he'd looked back at the door, the tears were already at the edges of his eyes. "Yeah. Um- sorry, I-" He didn't know what the hell to say, or do, and that was the fucking problem. He shook his head in some sort of apology before he buried it in his knees and cried, trying to keep it quiet as he could.

Havra had no intention of sleeping anytime soon, similar to the doctor she didn't think she would be able to. She did not respond immediately, still standing there almost like a statue. Eventually sat back down on 'her' cot and wrapped the 'banket' around her shoulders again. "I suppose is depends... about three years ago? Probably a little less. I don't remember what exactly they put down as the date that I stopped working with and started working for."

Oh great, crying. The thought floated up in Victoria's mind not as a result of distaste but rather for a lack of knowing what to do in these types of situations. Wounds she could mend, but sadness and grief? That was a whole nother ball game. She was going to respond to Havra, perhaps something along the lines of how glad she was that Havra was doing better. Instead, she merely glanced in the latter's direction as though asking for some sort of help. But she felt compelled to do something regardless, even if for a few moments she could only watch Allan weep in silence. "Hey," Victoria began again, meek and uncertain as she dragged herself to sit against the edge of her cot closest to Allan, boots finding the ground as she leaned forward, "do you want... like, a hug or something?"

Huh, so Havra was also a case of working with Starfleet before she worked for. That would have intrigued him and prompted him to ask more if he weren't busy in his feelings. When he heard Victoria speak and shuffle a little closer, he sniffled a bit before he looked up at her slightly. He really looked at her for a second, wet green eyes at her brown, and considered her offer. Well, the answer to her question was a resounding yes. He knew that. It may have sounded fucking ridiculous, but he was a guy who never really went, like, even a day without a hug. Of course, part of that was probably also owed to the fact that he was always sleeping with someone else every night. He couldn't even recall the last time he slept alone on the station. "Um, only if you -" his voice was still quiet, just above a whisper, "want to? I - I mean, I also might cry, there, and I don't wanna, um, get your like, shirt all gross, or anything, um-" He had to stop talking, because his voice was getting a little too shaky; it was threatening to become the type of tremble that'd break into a sob, and so he quieted himself. And then took another breath in and out, slowly. "But if you.. if you're okay with that, then, um - yes. I'd love that, really." Yay, honesty!!!

Phew, that could've been way more awkward if he said no. Victoria wasn't really someone particularly well-versed in the art of hugging things out. She smiled at Allan with as much of an upwards tick in her lips as she could will in the moment, dipping her head to look at herself when he expressed concern. In all likelihood, there was still some dried blood caked into her pants where she had kneeled on the floor of the brig earlier, but bringing that up didn't seem like it would be all that reassuring. "Oh, I don't care," Victoria said flippantly in summary, acknowledging his agreement and transferring herself to sit on the edge of Allan's cot, off to his side. "They're coming," she said, again, the most reassurance she found herself able to give. It didn't feel right to assert that their crewmates would be fine, after all. With a sigh, she opened up her arms as an invite, as un-disjointedly as she could.

Allan simply nodded to her statement. He still believed it; he believed that Starfleet was coming. What he didn't know is if they'd be too late. When Victoria opened up her arms, he counted to five in his head. Because otherwise, he would have just immediately taken the hug, and would that have seemed too desperate? But after those five seconds, he did, unfolding himself from his previous curled up position so that he was sitting normally and wrapping his arms around Victoria and holding her close. "Thanks," he whispered, putting his face on her shoulder, trying not to cry consciously for all of maybe five more seconds before he ended up doing so anyways. At least the tears were a little bit warmer than the air around them. After doing that for just a little bit, he whispered again. "I just... I don't know if I'm - if I'm doing this right, if I'm, like - I don't know, I - they - I'm not supposed to be like this, especially not when - when-" that word was a reassurance to himself, because he was talking about Ed and Dezyim, he knew they would, "when they come back. But I can't... it's just - it's so much, you know?" (edited)

Victoria readily accepted, not warmly at first but slowly softening into Allan's grasp. She wrapped her arms under his and around him, one hand slowly running up and down against his back. Allan was close enough here to feel her own, exasperated breathing, at least at first, though it soon calmed and steadied. Perhaps he wasn't the only one that needed this, just the only one brave enough to admit he did. "Look, nobody gets it right," she said, direct, "not you, not me, not anybody else. I don't even think I'm doing this right." Allan could feel one hand lift off his back then tap back down with a little bit of force as she spoke. There was a pause as she tried to think of words to keep going with. "Back when I did field work, you know, we had a saying; get it done, b-eh- moan about it after, do it again tomorrow. Nothing about doing it right, just getting it done. I guess, here, getting it done means staying alive. We just gotta keep on doing that."

Allan listened carefully to her words, trying to steady his breathing while she spoke. It was still pretty shaky, but it was slow, and that was enough for him. At least he hadn't lost it so much that he was hyperventilating. And he even let out a soft little chuckle when she corrected her wording. "You can say 'bitch', it's okay," he said, a somewhat lighter tone to his voice finally. "And.. yeah, it's -" Another deep breath followed, and he was starting to realize that he'd have to be doing that a lot here. Just... making sure that he fucking breathed. There was a little sniff that followed before he spoke again. "You're right, I... think. I just never thought I'd.. it still feels like I was an ensign, like, yesterday. And now I'm like... fuckin' - responsible for them, and I - I don't know. I feel like I failed somehow, s-somewhere, and it's... but you're right. Stay alive. That's it. That's... yeah, okay. I hope I can - we can - we can do that, yeah. We will. Yeah." A sigh. It sounded like he was trying to convince himself with his own words, but maybe it was working. That and the hug that he still wanted to be in, though he was never sure how long was too long with these things. It was kind of nice in the cold, really, so... maybe a little bit longer? "Um... thank you. Again."

"Well, I'll tell you one thing for sure's that I'm definitely gonna be bitchin'," Victoria nodded her head, her chin nudging into Allan's shoulder with each dip. See, Victoria had a policy of not swearing whilst on duty, but alongside the hall pass she'd been given, she supposed she might not have really been on duty at the moment, anyway. "And I mean I'm gonna," she stated, matter-of-fact, "no matter what they try to do. And you're all invited." She would wait for Allan to call it quits on the embrace, similarly enjoying the much-appreciated warmth she hadn't been aware she was missing until then. But, more importantly, it was the only thing she knew for sure was helping calm his nerves, it was the least she could do until he found his own two feet again, emotionally speaking, anyway.

Eventually, Edgar and Dezyim were brought back to the cell, Dezyim limp and with several bandages, Edgar sporting a bandage of his own. They were being carried and dragged along by a group of tall guards, when from the back of the group a higher voice piped up.

"Oooh, can I have the android? I want the android," a tanned, slender figure with a long, bright pink deathhawk and pale blue eyes pushed to the front, wholly unconcerned with Edgar and Dezyim's states, or that of the other people in the cell. They simply looked straight at Tavek, shoulders slumping in disappointment when they realised he was just sitting lifelessly over in a corner. "Well, that just makes him easier to restrain. Please take him for me, lovelies! I'll make sure to give him a lovely time in my little den," Vici asked the other guards, who started doing as they said. It seemed Tavek would be waking up in a different place, later.

Of course, the commotion has woken him up- enough loud noise would do that, plus the sound of someone approaching him. Menacingly. His eyes shot open, confused for a second. “Hey what- oh, great, I guess it’s my turn..” He said, but he didn’t resist. Not when it might get someone else hurt. He saw that Edgar and Dezymin were back.. but they were.. to put it bluntly, broken. And he was a roboticist, not a flesh doctor. He couldn’t fix them anyway. All he could do was be interesting enough to distract his captors from taking anyone else. He stared at Vici, olive green eyes meeting pale blue. His look, even after all this hell, was still defiantly strong. This purple-haired freak would not die quietly.

Grimacing, he carefully scooped Dezyim out of the guard’s grip, managing to get him into a cot before letting himself slump against the wall, sliding down to sit once again. He turned his eyes up towards Tavek, gaze glinting with a mix of pity and horror, but he said nothing.

"Oh, you're awake! Oh, you'll ruin the surprise, please go back to sleep for a little bit? Just a ten minute nap, I'm sure we'll be ready for you by then," Vici said, icey blue eyes boring into Tavek's soul as if seeing past the cameras for his eyes and dissecting the wires behind them. They were smiling, deeply unconcerned with the wellbeing of any one person in the room besides themself.

“How about a truce, if you don’t dissect me while I’m out, I won’t wake up mid-transit. I wouldn’t want to spoil your fun.” He said, the last part with a touch of sarcasm. It was his coping strategy. The person in front of him’s energy was horrifying, but he was diligent in not letting it show.

"Oh, dissection is incredibly last-century, I leave things like that to Commander Vrenak." Vici waved their hand as if to dismiss the accusation like dispersing smoke in the air. They grinned, then, as if to warn Tavek that more horrifying words were about to leave their mouth. "I can of course still do it, honey, if you don't listen to me. Go to sleep."

Dezyim stayed limp as he was carried over to the cot. It wasn’t clear if it was because he truly couldn’t move or if he had just given up. When he was set down, though, he curled up into something of a fetal position in the middle of the cot. He just… needed the room to stop spinning for a second.

Hesitating, he reached up and placed a hand on Dez’s arm. He could still see everything that had happened, as if it were burned into his eyes like an image into a screen. Guilt churned in his stomach, making him want to vanish into a hole. He should have done something, anything to prevent it from getting this bad. “…I’m sorry.” He mumbled, “Dez, I— I don’t know if you can hear me. Just… I’m here. And I’m sorry.” (edited)

“Well then, I like being in one piece, so it’s goodnight for now, everyone- don’t worry, I will be back with you all, you can’t get rid of me so easily.” He said, with the fakest smile and the fakest confidence that he’d ever put on in his fifteen years of existence. He wasn’t sure if he’d come back in one piece. Or come back at all. With that, he went limp against the wall- though if he was damaged enough, he’d still wake up.

Victoria had been in the bathroom when Vici returned with her missing crewmates, and she wiped her forehead with the back of her hand, sighing in relief, as she returned down the aisle between the cots. Bandages... okay, things could definitely have been worse - she would check on them herself once their captors were gone. And then they said they wanted to take Tavek. Victoria couldn't help but recall what he had said to her before. Where she had been silent the last time, that was before it became clear the Tal Shiar were out to hurt them. "He hasn't even done anything," she protested, her voice as calm and unprovocative as she could will it despite her anger, "none of us have done anything to you, we're not your enemies."

"He listens!" As Tavek turned off, Vici turned to Victoria. "Oh, my love, you misunderstand. I don't care what any of you have or haven't done. I care about what you can offer us. And this little guy here-" Vici patted Tavek's head denigratingly, as if stroking a pet, "-has a lot to offer me." And with that, he walked out of the cell, the guards following behind them, leaving the cell to their discomfort.

"We are most definitely their enemies doctor, after all we do not belong to them and even that would not necessarily mean we would be safe. Try not to draw any attention, there's rarely a good outcome to that." Havra hesitated for a moment before she slowly made her way over to the Ensigns. "Perhaps you could take a look at him, doctor. I'm uncertain how much you can do, but you are more likely to know about that than me."

Edgar hesitated, glancing from the doctor to the Lieutenant, before nodding. “Yeah… you should give him a look.” Ed muttered, “They, um…” He trailed off, pursing his lips and looking away.

"Yeah, I've tried that, look how far that's got us. Dragged and bandaged, really?" Victoria spun on her heel, once the exit shut, to face Havra's advice, gesturing assertively towards in the general direction of Edgar and Dezyim. Her hands quickly landed at her hip, and she sighed deeply, deeper than she had yet. "Sorry," she nodded with her eyes closed, "yeah, you're right." She moved towards Dezyim's cot, getting down on one knee. "I'm just gonna check your dressings, m'kay?" she asked, a hand tentatively finding an un-bandaged shoulder to rest on. Then, she turned her head across her shoulder to look at Edgar, and spoke just a little more firmly, "I need to know what they did to you both." (edited)

He wrung his hands, watching Dez for a moment, before taking as deep a breath as he could. “I… I got off easy. I’m fine.” He muttered, “With Dez, they—“ He lowered his voice, head dropping to stare at his feet. “They cut him open. It— I didn’t see a lot of it, but… they gave him a hypospray, I think it was sedation or a muscle relaxant, and they just…”

It took Dezyim a second to realize that Victoria was talking to him, but when he did he stirred. He tried to push himself to a sitting position, eventually getting himself to where he could lean against the wall his cot was up against. He screwed his eyes shut. Moving felt… well… bad. After a moment he opened them and spoke. “What he means to say is they dissected me like a rat.” His voice was different— more flat and with the slightest edge of anger. As he continued it became increasingly clear that his regular speaking voice was something learned and practiced; this was closer to his natural cadence. “They took out my termination implant. Wanted to make sure I wasn’t going anywhere.”

He stiffened, eyes frozen on the other ensign, still seated on the floor beside the cot, absolutely speechless. He knew nothing about the procedure, but that… holy fuck.

"You don't have to apologize doctor, the situation is rather terrible all around." Havra gave her a half smile that looked and felt more like a grimace. As she listened as Dezyim described what had happened she shuddered, she could not imagine how horrifying it must be to be used to a protection like that only to have it suddenly be gone.

"There's no way they did all that with only relaxant," Victoria said, not even with disbelief. In her mind, there was no way it was anything besides Edgar getting the contents of the hypospray mistaken. But one thing was for sure, if they arrived at this outcome not as a result of failing to comply, the Tal Shiar were indeed out to hurt them for, well, the fun of it. "Don't move. Just, lay back. Did they give you anything after?" she asked. With surgery like that, she'd have prescribed the strongest painkillers she could've gotten her hands on. Otherwise, well. Her hands moved quickly over the dressings, assessing them with only a light touch. "Well, the bad news is there isn't much else I can do. But I'm gonna give some of these a tighten - whoever did these obviously doesn't care if they do. You might feel a few pinches." She got to work.

“Now why would they waste their painkillers on me?” He held up a hand to keep Victoria away, phrasing it like it was a stupid question. “They stabbed Edgar. Shoulder. Work on that, medical.” He wasn’t sure why he felt so impossibly angry, but then again he didn’t really care.

Ed blinked, furrowing his brow. “I’m bandaged, I’m fine!” He scoffed, “You’re the one who got cut open.”

"You're both getting looked at," Victoria said in a tone that indicated there would be no further negotiation on the matter, "you can whine and scream and call me whatever you want, but you sit still while you do it. Unlike them, we care if you end up bleeding to death." It wouldn't take more than a few minutes for Victoria to ensure each of his bandages dressed his wounds appropriately. She wasn't quite happy about it, still, and she worried if their captors would provide replacements in the next few days, but those were considerations that didn't need to be voiced. "So, they stabbed you, huh?" she asked, turning to Edgar. "They say why?"

With his hands clasped in his lap and his head still tilted downwards, he angled his eyes up at her. “I pissed them off.” He shrugged, “I was trying to buy some time, but they… apparently hate anyone funnier than them.” He let out a chuckle, albeit one that sounded more exhausted than amused. “It’s not as bad as it looks. Barely hurts.”

“You called them ‘unprofessional assholes’ after they warned you there would be consequences for running your mouth.” It might’ve been funny in different circumstances, but it was hard to find it funny at this point. He sighed, suddenly very, very exhausted. If they ever escaped, maybe he’d see about going home and getting it replaced. He unfocused is eyes, turning that thought over in his mind. Going home.

“I was buying time. I was trying to— I don’t know, figure out a way to get us out of there.” He argued back, although there wasn’t much bite to his words.

Dezyim didn’t want to argue with Edgar. In fact, as soon as he brought up the ensign’s words he regretted it. He was surprised that Ed could even stomach to be around him after seeing him… like that. He had to be kind, a kinder person than Dezyim was, especially to try and look after him now that he had an option. He felt shame start to burn in him, so he opted to keep his mouth closed and continue to stare blankly at the wall.

He took a breath, noting the change in demeanour. “…I’m glad you’re still here with us, man.” Ed said, letting a bit of a smile creep through, “You get serious bragging rights now, you know that? You survived this much Tal Shiar bullshit, you’re a fucking superhero.”

Victoria could only shake her head as she fussed over Edgar's shoulder, leaned over him, one knee braced against the edge of his cot so she could have a view of his wound and dressing from the top down. "Well, don't do that again. Can't say you'll definitely get as lucky as this time - think they missed most of the good stuff."

He had chuckled again when Victoria mentioned bitching again - and man, did even that small bit of humor feel good. And so did the hug, really, until he finally took a reaaaally deep breath before letting go, and of course - thanking her again. After that, he washed his face with a quick glass of warm water and found his way to the cot, just... waiting. Because he knew they'd come back, right? And come back they did. In bandages. He was going to wake Tavek up the moment he heard the door open - but nope, the noise seemed to wake him. Okay. The next few moments went by awfully fast in his head. Before he knew it, Tavek was gone, and when Dezyim mentioned what had happened to him, everything else started fading in and out of his ears as if his brain was just collecting this data; nothing more. Something shut down in order to note these things, listen to the conversation, even as the tension rose between them, he was looking straight ahead. Taking it in, until his eyes went down to Edgar's cot that Victoria was sitting on. He turned to look at his own cot, at his own blanket, and thought for a minute. "...y'know..." he said, quietly, and then held the blanket down tightly on one edge and pressed his knee down just below it to tear off a small corner of it. And then he said absolutely goddamn nothing, seemingly forgetting he had said anything at all as he started folding the little piece.

Ideally, Victoria would have wanted to double check the range of motion available to Edgar's arm. But after that ordeal, and with her complete lack of supplies, she would put that idea to rest for now. Instead, she had raised herself from his side and shuffled over to her bed, sitting at the foot of it hunched over with elbows propped against the tops of her thighs, lazily watching Allan. The full extent of implications from the past few minutes had yet to hit her, stuck in work-mode ever since the doors opened, and to some level, Victoria seemed aware of that. Watching him tie... whatever it was he was making... was a good enough distraction, given their circumstances.

Allan, after ripping that very tiny corner of blanket, got a better idea. He stood up and started rolling both ends of the blanket, back to the rest of the group due to how the cots were positioned. Then he folded that in half, twisted one half, and he had something... oh, man. He'd made this for his little cousins at a hotel once, he knew it was possible... with ties. He tried folding it without them, though, managing to squeeze and fold in the middle so it looked like a little person in a hoodie, but he wondered... aw, fuck it. He ripped two very, very small and thin sheets of blanket off the edges and tied them around the top to make some ears. Once he was done, he turned around, sat down on his cot, and stood the bear up on his lap, clearing his throat before he spoke to the group. "So I - um, I made a bear." Simple and to the point, he made one of its little arms wave.

Victoria nodded sagely, as though Allan had just re-invented the wheel. In truth, she was finally getting a little too tired for her own good, that latest batch of adrenaline making its rounds through her system but just barely. "Cute, great," she started, clapping her hands softly so that no sound came through. She gestured towards the two injured engineers, supposing if anyone needed a bear in these trying times, it definitely wasn't herself.

He found himself admiring the bear, the way it had been made out of the shitty, practically useless sheets. He gingerly shifted his shoulder, testing how much he could move it before settling back where he sat. “You should name him.” He murmured, “Something dignified.”

Allan had no smile on his face, but more of a... neutral sort of look, something that said he was just going through some motions right now. Instinct, if you will. And this was his instinct. "Hm," he looked down at the bear, then back to Ed, "to be honest, I don't even know what 'dignified' means in that context. Dezyim, any ideas?"

Dezyim had been silently watching the situation unfold with his eyes but upon prompting it was clear he was not truly paying attention, just watching the movement. It took him a beat to register Allan’s question. He blinked a couple of times before speaking. “I- fuck, I don’t know…” Like he was having to do a hard reset of his brain. He squeezed his eyes shut for a moment before opening them again. “Dignified where? Dignified to who?” He tried to pull some information from his brain, but was having a hard time of it. So he tried to make it easier— the cell was majority human, so he should pick a human name. He started going through names and faces of humans he had known from the academy. “Kian… or… Sarahia. Najib maybe… Arick, Camilla, Raj.” He shook his head. That was all he had. They didn’t have to know those were just random people he’d met. “It’s… a nice bear, Allan.” He said softly.

Allan shrugged when Dezyim asked those questions. If the ensign took too long, he wqas going to say it didn't have to be dignified at all considering that again, he didn't know what it meant, but just before then Dezyim started listing some names. He nodded as the man listed them, floating them around in his head. "I like Raj," he said finally, "for a bear, I think it's nice. Simple. And ah, thanks, it's.." he held it up again, "yours, if you want it. Well - for the day, I mean. It's supposed to be a blanket at night. But I can also make you one from your blanket, too..."

Dezyim furrowed his brows and looked at it. “What… uh… what do I do with it? Forgive me, but wouldn’t it be more useful to you as a blanket?” He had never had… well… anything like this before. Comfort items weren’t particularly something he kept, so it wasn’t as if he was used to them. He at least seemed to be feeling somewhat better; he was beginning to regain some of his usual composure.

"Well, that's why ideally you'd give it back at night, or I can make it out of your own, but, um - " Hm. How did he explain what someone did with a stuffed animal? "Well, it's.. I mean, at least for a lot of species, sometimes kids will be given little stuffed animals like this, and will just, like, hug them? Kinda like a stress toy or something, if you're familiar with those. But you can do whatever with it. Sit it next to you, talk to it like a rubber duck, play it like a little puppet - you know, practice some vent trilogy... whatever it is, that skill..."

Dezyim made a soft “oh” sound, looking at the bear. Would it be more rude to reject it to let Allan keep his blanket or accept it and force him to be cold? He stared at the bear for a second, looking between it and Allan before taking it delicately and placing it on his cot. “I think… I think I’m going to sleep now.” He announced plainly. He was, all things considered, exhausted. So he curled up again, putting his back against the bear.

He watched the bear, his lips thinning into an almost-smile as he watched. At least Dez was sleeping. Although he couldn’t say the same for himself, he didn’t need it nearly as much as the other ensign did. He glanced down at the jacket over his body, how it was missing bits of the sleeve and covered in blood— he felt a bit bad, since it wasn’t exactly his, but he supposed he could grab a new one for Tavek when they got back to the station. He ran his fingers over the metal pips, before folding the unzipped collar over them, keeping them out of sight. They weren’t his rank, it didn’t feel right to wear them. (edited)

He nodded as Dezyim took the bear, smiling just slightly as he did, the first time he had since the ensigns had left. "Sounds good," he said, "I'll stay up for a bit. Probably 'til Tavek comes back." Which was what he intended, at least. It didn't feel right to him to sleep when one of them was still missing. He got up, going to the bathroom and just sliding the door open a little to get a glass of water. Just like before, a quick, warm glass just to try and not be so cold. He couldn't see it, and it was faint compared with his skintone, but his nose was just a little red right now. Once he was done, he stood by the door for a second to look over the room, then looked to Ed, who was, well, right there, and took a step or two closer before he sat down against the wall opposite him. There were a lot of things floating around in his brain right now, but he wanted to at least try and chat a little bit. "You're from California, right?" Was the first thing that left his brain and was therefore verbalized. (edited)

At some point between her sitting down and the bear being named, Victoria would have leaned back into her cot and promptly passed out, tangled up in the sorry excuse of a blanket she was using for warmth, and with a hand and half a leg extended off the edge of her bed. Sweet dreams!

He glanced over at Allan, having been broken out of his thoughts all of a sudden. “Oh— uh, yeah. I am.” He said, “My parents wanted to stay close to starfleet.”

"Ahh, so, like - San Francisco, right? Or around there?" That was where the Academy was, sure, but also Starfleet HQ. They kinda just dominated a whole part of the city at this point. They sort of had the same initials, too. San Fran, Star Fleet... something like that. He packed that ramble of a thought away. "Complete opposite ocean. I always forget what it's called. Prolific, something like that."

He chuckled tiredly, nodding. “Around San Francisco, yeah. Really close to HQ.” He nodded, “And… I think you mean the Pacific? Could be wrong, though.”

"Pacific, fuck, yeah, that's it," he nodded. "Yeah, I was - y'know, by the Atlantic. Until the Academy, right, which was ... the Pacific, yeah... I wonder if there's anything up with the -ics at the end... it's, uh.... someone who studies linguistic-" he paused before he said the "s" at the end, eyes widening a little. "Wait..."

He shrugged, tilting his head. “Yeah?” He tilted his head in curiosity, wondering why exactly was dawning on the lieutenant.

"'Linguistic'. It... also ends with -ic. I don't think there's actually a connection there, but because I don't know anything... about linguistics, I don't know, but, I mean... what are other words?" He thought for a bit, trying to think of said words. "So there's Pacific, Atlantic, linguistic, uhhh... metallic... magic? Terrific, Arabic, aesthetic, lyric, uh... okay, most of these like, describe things or people so, um.." he thought some more, something.. or someone a little more specific, "gothic, autistic, erotic, umm.. Catholic....? Angelic, uh-" he looked down at the ground, his amused look fading from his face for just a moment before he shook his head and smiled again. "Anyways, yeah. Words. Crazy. But yeah, uh. Grew up pretty much in the Atlantic." (edited)

A soft breath of laughter escaped him, and he folded his hands where he sat, picking at his fingers. “That’s really cool, actually. You have any siblings, or…?”

"The -ic is a suffix used for adjectives that indicate that the thing it is referring to is... I think it was 'relating to or resembling' the first part of the word, so say a thing is metal in the case of metallic. I'm not entirely sure if all of the words you listed fall into this category, although I think the oceans do. The names you call them are originally only the adjective, it would be the Atlantic and Pacific ocean, but since the oceans are more frequently referenced than other things with this adjective the clarification of 'ocean' rather than say some type of fish probably became irrelevant in day to day language." Havra had been sitting in her cot staring at the wall but had not been able to resist dumping information about language on her cell mates. "Sorry, that was a bit much... This really isn't the language I am best at so I might be off a little." (edited)

When Havra spoke up, Allan sat up a bit against the wall to look at her - being just past Ed's cot it wasn't hard to see her. "Whoa, yeah, I think you're right," Allan nodded, then shook his head after she'd apologized. "No, hey, don't apologize, I love listening to people talk. I know that sounds crazy considering how much I talk, but really, I love hearing people talk about stuff they know." And God, did he. "I don't have any siblings, no, but I have, like... a lot of cousins, most of them're younger than me. We had family reunions and lived close to eachother a lot, so I was around 'em a lot. But aside that, just, you know, me, my parents, and our dog. What about you guys, any siblings..?"

He raised an eyebrow at the information Havra shared, not fully understanding but grateful for the lesson anyhow. He was never the type for linguistics. “I’ve got four of ‘em.” He replied to Allan, “I’m the youngest by, like… two years.”

"Four, wow," he leaned back a bit more so that he was almost laying down against the wall, "how was it..? Like - I know some people say it's like, either super awesome or kinda sucks to be the youngest. The first thing is mostly, from what I've heard, at least, is that the parents tend to be more lenient with the younger one after learning everything through the older ones," he shrugged, "no clue if that's the case for everyone, though."

“Well, it was— fine, I guess. My parents were a foster family for a bit, that’s where my older siblings came from, and they adopted me when I was a baby, so…” He crossed his legs beneath him, pulling his feet under himself, “I’m not sure how different my own experience is, but they were pretty lenient with me.” (edited)

"Hey, that's nice," he said, "mine were pretty chill, too, though - y'know, of course they got upset when I got myself in trouble, but they never really got too upset, y'know? They were always really - and I mean, they are still really loving and supportive of me, which... y'know, I'm grateful for it. I guess the worst point was when I got myself in huge trouble in the Incident, right, they were pretty... they were worried they raised me wrong, I guess, that they might've been too supportive of me, but... it was really just me, right? Y'know, uh. Dumb teenager shit."

He nodded, his eyes flitting to the floor beneath. “…yeah. Sometimes, it’s just… you fuck up so spectacularly, that it makes people rethink some stuff.” He shrugged slightly, sighing, “Dumb teenager shit.”

Oh, yikes, those words seemed to stick in his mind rather than go and get processed and go out like the rest. Somehow, he'd turned the conversation to something and then Ed had simply followed it, so it wasn't the ensign's fault, but... his mind was trying to make him think deeper into the words than Ed had meant them. Had he fucked up spectacularly? Was that why they were here? Was he still the dumb teenager he was a decade ago? Was he worse? He looked down at the ground too, not looking back up until he decided to speak. "Yeah. You know, um, speaking of childhood stuff - you know rock paper scissors..?"

He offered a quick glance, and a slight angle of his head that could have been a nod, before his lips quirked upward. “Yeah, I do. You looking for a round or two?”

"Yeah, definitely, I'm down if you are," Allan said, and then smiled just a little as he put his hand in a fist and down in his palm. So ready for this, even though the last time he'd played this was... well, it'd been a while, to say the least. "Okay - rock, paper, scissors... shoot," he said, and then he threw... paper!!

He did as he’d been taught since his youth, the sacred ritual of rock-paper-scissors that was so special to any bored kid, or in this case, starfleet officer. One, two, three, and he held his hand flat, for paper.

"God, okay," Allan laughed as that resulted in a draw, shaking his head and he put his hand to his palm again. "Okay, okay - let's do 3 rounds, two out of three, right? Unless we keep drawing, of course," and then he counted them off again...

“Best out of three.” He agreed, doing the same three taps of his fist against his open palm before holding out two fingers for scissors.

"Rock, paper, scissors..." He was thinking about what to throw while he was saying the words... and when the count ended, he threw rock!!!

He groaned, leaning back, before angling himself towards Allan once again. “Alright. I can count us off this time.” He said, as he did so.

"Okayyyy, okay, we're onto something, we're onto something," he nodded, "go for it, yeah." He let the other count them off, doing the tap silently along with him and then throwing paper! Again! Paper two: electric boogaloo!!!

With one round left to win, he hit his fist against his palm once, twice, thrice, and pulled out paper, once again.

When that draw happened, Allan started actually laughing, a lot more than he did before - and probably... the most he had since they'd been kidnapped, actually. "Wait, okay, okay, one more, then, I'll count us off this time?"

“Alright.” He grinned, preparing for another round, cracking his knuckles.

"Bet, okay." For the hell of it, he cracked his knuckles too to copy him. Though, hopefully, he wouldn't copy him again in the game. "Rock, paper, scissors.." And he threw scissors this time!

He did the same one, two, three palm strikes, taking a deep breath, and then pulled out rock!

"Oooh, okay, you got that, one more, then," he grinned, "unless it's double paper again, of course. Rock, paper, scissors..." And this motherfucker threw paper. Again. Probably a dumb move, given the past four rounds...

This was it, the final round. He prepared himself, did the same motions thrice, and pulled… scissors!

And a dumb move it was! Still, the engineer was grinning, like - actually having a good time type of grinning, the previous horrors having left his brain momentarily. "Well done," he said, before attempting a fist bump to the ensign - hopefully Ed knew what it was, Allan had realized it really was up to the person in this wide of a galaxy if they knew things like fist bumps and high fives and whatnot. "You crushed it. I oughta fold you a crown or something."

He returned the fist bump, with a nod. “You put up a good fight, Lieutenant. We should rematch, next time we get a shot,” He chuckled, “The crown isn’t necessary, but… if you’re offering.” A lightbulb seemed to go off in his head, and he grinned. “You ever heard of the other things you can play? Not just minerals and craft supplies?”

"Hand over your blanket, I'll give it a shot," he said, having zero fucking clue how he'd do it but he was a man willing to try anything once. "A few, yeah. There's like, a nerdy one I know with actual minerals, then there's one with like, fire, air, water, and a sponge, I think? And then there's the hacker version, and the uh - there's some other, um. Versions. But yeah, what about you? Got any favorites?"

He smiled, memories of his years playing it with his siblings flooding back like a hole punched into a dam, as he handed the blanket over. “I remember Lizard, and my favourite used to be Vulcan, but we always called it Spock.” He mimed the hand symbols, and the Vulcan salute that came with the play. (edited)

Allan tilted his head as he sat up on the cot with Ed to start attempting to fold the blanket - he wasn't going to have the blanket touching the floor! "Honestly, I'm... surprised I haven't heard of that one. So what, lizard... does it eat the water or the paper? Or both? And um, the Vulcan... beats rock? And lizard? Maybe...? Go ahead, teach it to me."

He scooted over to make more room for Allan. “Lizard, from what I know, beats paper, but gets beaten by scissors and rock. Vulcan… I’m pretty sure gets beaten by lizard and paper, but beats scissors and rock.”

"Wait, yeah, water isn't - okay, yeah, it eats the paper, the scissors-" he frowned a little, but then shook his head and kept going, "and rock... okay, sure, wait, can we be a little nicer to the lizard? I mean - well, wait, wait. Why does the Vulcan get beaten by the lizard? And paper? I guess it doesn't have to make sense," he answered his own question, sort of, but he was also a bit distracted by trying to fold the blanket. He figured that making some sort of triangles would work, because crowns were a triangle, right, and there had to be some base, bottom layer, so folding the thing into a square was the first move, right... after some messing around with it, he finally got something. "Okay, hold on- I think I got.." He held it up, and it sure looked like a sort of crown. It was a circle that had two prominent pointy triangles sticking up on the sides, definitely crown-shaped, and there was a base layer inside that made it actually wearable as a hat. As he held it up though, it started to shift apart a little, and he quickly shoved one fold back into the other to tighten it. "Look, see - " he put it - very slowly - onto his head, but that was when it came apart, the now unfolded end of the blanket coming to rest in front of his face. Despite the great unsuccess, Allan laughed, and then gathered up the blanket before it could fall to the ground and set it back down carefully onto the cot. "Sorry, guess it's a bit too thin to hold the shape. Anyways, you were saying, uh, Vulcan beats scissors and rock? But not lizard and paper." (edited)

In all honesty, Ed hadn’t thought much of the logistics of the extended rock-paper-scissors universe, so he didn’t have much of an answer. Instead, he watched Allan work, offering a smile when the blanket fell back into its original shape. “Yeah.” He replied, “I… don’t think I can remember much more than that. It’s been a while.” He felt a bit silly, sitting here and playing games in a prison. Hell, he hadn’t stopped thinking about giving Tavek back his jacket, when he got back from whatever fresh horror awaited him. Ed knew the only thing he could do was wait. And games were a good way to pass the time, of course. But it made him queasy, knowing that he was here, and they were only a few doors down.

"Ahh, okay, well, I mean - I can give it a try if you want, but, man, what's another game - there's so many you need paper for, uhhh... oh, we could - oh, we can do that game where you hide the thing under the cups and then you switch the cups around?" And the cups were indeed opaque! So that'd work. "I dunno if I can switch 'em around super fast, but we can try it. Whole group can guess and whoever's right wins?"

*Before too long, actually, two entirely new guards never before seen dropped Tavek off, depositing his limp body on the ground with a little more care than the ones before had handled him with. Then, they turned to the group. The smaller one, a Reman, scanned the group with purpose, while the taller one seemed to have their eyes wander over them more before finally speaking. *

"Lieutenant Allan Allen, stand up. The Commander wants to speak to you." Their voice was soft, but they spoke clearly, their accent crisp and easily understood and translated by the UT. The bottom of their face was mostly covered, but even with only their eyes visible between a mask and a hood, their pale skin, brown eyes, and the gnarly scars covering the left side of their face were plain to see, as well as a few wisps of brown hair that peeked out from under the hood.

His eyes widened, watching Allan. His stomach dropped at the sight of a very limp Tavek, and he pulled off his jacket, balling it up and placing it beside him. “…cup game’s gonna have to wait.” He whispered, glancing towards his superior officer with a look that he hoped would mean ‘good luck’.

Victoria awoke from her shallow slumber, reflexively at the sound of the doors opening and boots hitting the floors. She rolled in an attempt to see what had come for them this time, narrowly avoiding shifting herself right off the edge of her cot, catching herself at the last moment and sitting up straight against the edge instead. Tavek caught her attention first - man, he looked horrible. It pained her that there was little she could do for him, not even to tighten up any bandages to make herself feel better. But Allan? They were all getting a turn, it seemed. She turned her gaze up to where he stood and, after searching unsuccessfully for words that might inspire any sort of confidence, raised a hand in his direction to shake.

Allan had just gathered the cups together. "Okay, we also need a thing to put under the cups - oh! My pip, let's go, let's see, uh-" he started fiddling with the pip on his jacket, thinking it was just small and moveable enough to be able to be the thing under the cup, and had just taken it off when the guards came into the room. He froze, slo-o-owly stacking the cups back together and placing them by the wall as he watched Tavek get put back against the wall. And then... oh, him this time? "Fucking fiiiinally, geez, thought you'd never get to-" he paused when he saw Victoria extend her hand to him, then smiled just a bit as he shook Victoria's hand and then held his hands up, "I'm actually Ensign Allan Allen right now, though, so I'm afraid that if that's not the guy you're looking for, you might..."

"I suggest not running your mouth in front of the Commander." The tall operative motioned for the Reman to approach, who handily cuffed Allan and nudged him towards the door. "We will be moving to another level. If you make any unfortunate moves, my associate will be forced to subdue you."

In response to their words, the Reman let out a gruff huff, pushing Allan along further.

One eye peeled open- no sense to open the other one given his position on the floor, but he made no move to get up. He saw that the jacket that he’d tossed to Edgar had been placed back beside him. “No, take it back, Edgar, you need it more than I do.” He whispered weakly, voice glitching between his own, and every other voice he’d stored in his voicebox to use for jokes and whatnot. He then looked up, as best he could, to Allan, not speaking but just looking at him, with an expression less along the lines of “good luck”, but more along the lines of “please just come back alive.” He couldn’t muster up anything else.

He leaned down to Tavek, pushing the jacket back towards him. “It’s got your pips.” He whispered, “And I run hot. Just use it as a pillow, or something.”

He would have argued further, but he didn’t have the will nor energy anymore. Edgar probably knew that too. He didn’t touch it once it was pushed back to him to, nor make a more to get to anywhere more comfortable, just switching off once more.

He sighed, pushing the balled-up garment underneath Tavek’s head, before moving to sit against the wall, watching the door and the struggle, biting his cheek.

Dezyim awoke in time to see Allan being escorted out of the prison in handcuffs. He sat up blearily, scanning the room. Seeing that Tavek was back, he stood and crossed the room. “We could… move him to his cot maybe? He doesn’t have to stay here… on the ground.” He looked to the others. He’d certainly need help lifting the android.

“If you can grab his legs, we can get him up there together.” Ed murmured, trying to shift his unconscious crew member to test how heavy he really was.

He wasn’t as horrifically heavy as some androids could get, but he was still close to 200 pounds, hard for someone to lift on their own.

"No, no!" Victoria was still in the midst of recovering to the lights in the room, besides the headache she was sporting owing to the way she slept, when she heard Edgar and Dezyim scheming. "You two aren't doing anything," she said sternly, scrambling to her feet and gesturing with one hand towards each engineer for them to stay put. Then, she regarded Tavek as he lay on the ground, defeated in the way she ran her fingers through her hair. "You can't move at all, can you?" she asked, one hand still propped against the back of her own scalp, trying to figure out what to do. (edited)

"I can always help. Since the Ensigns will not, the two of us should be able to lift him." Havra got up from her cot and subtly stretched her limbs. For all that she was exhausted she was still a vulcanoid.

He blinked, a bit offended but otherwise just confused. “It’s fine, let me get him up to the cot!” He argued, “I can lift things.”*

"Considering you have been more recently stabbed than me... how about you do not." A thought about how comically fragile humans were passed through her mind and made her shudder, she was not supposed to think those thoughts. Half of the things she had been taught as a child were cherry picked if not downright false, she knew this. The point stood however, she had not been stabbed as recently.

“Oooookay… true.” He muttered, “Let me know if I can help, though.”

"Yeah. Your shoulder rips open again, and you're gambling if these guys care enough to keep you from bleeding out," Victoria said, nodding to Havra. She wasn't happy with the idea of letting Havra strain herself, either, but at least that wound she knew had been sealed. She waved her over and flipped Tavek so he was sprawled out, positioning herself between his legs.

Dezyim took a step back at Victoria’s mandate. He didn’t want to stress the doctor too heavily. He did regret suggesting it when there wasn’t all that much he could do, though. So he moved over to Tavek’s cot and pulled the blanket back so that they could tuck him in after they moved him there.

Swallowing his pride, he picked up the jacket, the strange fixation of keeping the garment with its original owner far beyond questioning, as he watched them work on getting Tavek up onto the cot.

Havra helped Victoria pick up Tavek and brought him over to his cot, he wasn't exactly a four year old, but she also did not have to carry him for prolonged periods of time. "I am not familiar with the temperature he runs at... would the additional jacket help him retain energy? If not... Ensign, you could just take off the pips if they make you uncomfortable."

“No, it’s… it’s his jacket. I don’t want to keep it when he needs it, especially since I lost mine in a stupid way.” He placed the jacket beside Tavek on the cot.

Victoria was not a strong person. Even though Havra was objectively doing the most work by lifting from the shoulders, she was still heaving the entire time, slowly backing her way over to Tavek's cot and unceremoniously dumping him into it as quickly as she could - though not without a mouthed 'sorry'. Breathless as she was, she still stopped herself from collapsing behind Tavek. Both of her hands found the top of her head as she walked towards the toilet, though she stopped short of heading inside, instead pacing back and forth down the breadth of the room, behind the last row of beds. She couldn't remember the last time she felt as useless as she did right then.

Dezyim took a seat back on his cot, arms crossed over his stomach, watching Victoria pace. “Victoria,” he said, not unkindly. He wasn’t exactly sure where he was supposed to go next, though. He wasn’t good at helping people; he was no Allan. So he said the first thing to come to his mind. “So… what does the food taste like?” (edited)

None of the ideas that her mind was able to come up with were particularly confidence-inspiring. She knew that Starfleet was mounting a rescue, that was never in doubt, but they'd only been taken for what felt like a couple of days... if the Tal Shiar kept up at this rate, she wasn't sure if she'd even want Starfleet to find what would be left of them. She shrank after she was called to, squatting to the left of the toilet archway, with her knees to her front and elbows sat atop, propping up her cheeks. Something about tensing her muscles kept her grounded. "Taste?" she asked, following moments of awkward silence, "it doesn't. Like, I mean, there isn't any taste. Why would they even bother with taste, right?" "You know, one thing I can't get my mind off," she changed the topic, not wanting to think about their food that didn't taste like food. Though her hand remained against the side of her face, she raised a finger to point at Dezyim, "they took you for your implant, right? Terrible, but makes sense." Then she turned her gaze and finger towards Edgar. "What did they take you for?"

He hesitated, furrowing his brow in thought. Why had they taken him? He certainly had nothing to offer, nor did he pose much of a threat on his own— had he been collateral damage? Or just a warning? “…I don’t know.” He muttered, “They just did, I guess. They don’t seem to have a rhyme or reason when it comes to random kidnapping.”

"They just did," Victoria nodded, then lowered her head, buried in the crook of her arm as her fingers crawled up her already messied hair. "They just did," she repeated, more sombre than upset, significantly more muffled than before. She'd never been kidnapped, not really. Away missions weren't really her thing, either. Victoria had always been someone happy with her lot, patching up whoever was thrown her way. Yet, here she sat, amidst a perpetual damp haze, among people she cared about whom she could do nothing to fix. Her fingers clawed lightly into her scalp; once instruments to keep friends in one piece, now merely reminders that she was still alive, still helpless.

He let out a long exhale, running a hand through his hair as he ran the question through his mind again and again. “Tori— can I call you Tori?” He spoke up, seeing her distress and figuring that he could at least distract her, “You got a favourite place? Like— hometown, or somewhere you’ve only been a few times?” (edited)

Not everything needed a personal purpose, if she gambled Havra would have bet quite a bit on the fact that most of the people here were here by chance because they were in the wrong place at the wrong time. She had returned to her cot and was wrapped in the thin blanket and was lying there motionless with her eyes closed. Sleep wouldn't come however, not that she wanted it to, so she was listening to the ongoing conversation trying her best to keep her thoughts away from the numerous things that she could not allow herself to think about. Keeping up the façade of relative indifference was familiar, almost nostalgic and safe. She did not know how much longer it would last.

Tori? Had it been anywhere else, a question like that wouldn't have been entertained by anything other than a scowl. Instead, here, Victoria simply didn't address it at all. "Yeah, and yeah, I've imagined I was there instead like... a billion times by now," she said, her hands opening and clapping together gently above her head, "the air's not this sticky back home. I think we'd all rather be home, right now."

“Yeah, that’s… fair.” He admitted, “But I’m talking about your favourite place. Like— think back, what was the one place that made you the happiest?” He sighed, under his breath, “I don’t know, fuckin’ small talk. Allan’s better at it.”

"You and me both," Victoria responded, fully sitting down on the floor panels where she squatted. She crossed her arms atop her kneecaps and laid her chin on her forearm. In truth, she wanted to cry. She really, really, wanted to cry. Her cheeks were red already, ready for her tears, only nothing would come of it. Somehow, that felt worse. "In... the Kerath Canyons, there's a basin where the rockfaces form a circle, kind of. We don't know where it came from, but in the middle there's just... the biggest tree," she said, "the only tree in that whole, entire range. We'd pass it a lot, going home. It meant five more hours of sweat, and we'd always take a break. You know, the usual cheesy shit: sing songs, play games. Boss was a lot like yours, actually." "There," she said, extending her hand and pointing straight ahead into nothingness.

“Kerath Canyons… where’s that?” *He asked, shifting to sit on the floor, tucking his knees to his chest once again.

"Home," she responded, not wanting to say her homeworld aloud where the Tal Shiar could hear. Not that she thought it would keep that information from anyone who came looking, it just didn't feel right.

He nodded, clasping his hands together in the way he used to as a child when he was anxious. He was past acting mature, this place was dehumanizing enough. “That sounds… pretty amazing, actually.” He chuckled softly, “Always good to have that sense of community, and— y’know, whatnot.”

“Maybe you can visit there when we get out. I was actually thinking about going home, too.” He touched the back of his head, winced, and pulled his hand away. At least both of their punishment hadn’t been too bad... “I haven’t been back to the Gamma Quadrant since… I think since before I started studying to enter the academy.” He tried to remember. It definitely felt like a long time. “Do you both… uh… visit your homes regularly?” He really hoped Victoria wasn’t going to cry. He wasn’t sure what he was supposed to do if that happened. He crossed his legs at the ankles and tried to smile reassuringly, hoping that wasn’t too sensitive of a question.

“Somewhat.” He shrugged, “With postings and stuff, it’s tricky, but I try to say hi every now and then.”

For a moments Havra allowed herself to consider where she would go if they somehow got out of this. She refused to entertain the thought that something might have happened to Laina, so the first thing she would do was make sure she could hold the child, after that though... she didn't know. When she had been transferred to 777 she had been hesitant, it was just so close to Romulan space, but she hadn't dared to decline based on a bad feeling when she owed everything to the Federation and Starfleet in particular. The rational part of herself had known of course that they would have respected her wishes, but that just was not something you did, especially considering that her work would be more valuable on 777 than elsewhere. It was important to be valuable. Now though... If she would return she didn't know if she could bare to stay. Simultaneously she did not want to go anywhere new, moving around to much wouldn't be good for Laina's social life and Havra was sick and tired of uprooting her life over and over and over again. She felt tears gathering in her eyes and started to blink to deter them from falling. Elements, did she yearn to go home and feel safe, but for the life of her she could not think of a single place that, even if she could return to it, would make that possible. She thought of the smell of spring on Flior, or the dark green trees and small white flowers that she would sometimes tuck behind her husband's ear when she came back inside the house from the garden. There was a nursery on Rator once and maybe her childhood bedroom on Romulus. None of these places were ever without constant fear even if she had done her very best to pretend they were. The blinking failed her and so did the slow shaky breaths. It was a miracle really that she had held it together for so long, but she finally made a misstep, thought about everything just a little too much and started to sob.

Dezyim’s attention was turned by the muffled sounds of crying, quiet at first but quickly growing in volume. He turned his head, surprised to see Havra as the source. She had seemed so… stoic in all of the time they had been in the prison. Admittedly he didn’t really know her well, though. He closed his eyes in the tiniest bit of a grimace. Allan wasn’t here, and when he got back he would likely need comforting himself. Everyone else was loosing hope; there might be no one coming to help them at all, but it wouldn’t do them any good to loose any will they had left. He had to help them. A lot of these people had lives and families to go back to. They had to be alright when they got back to the station, if they ever did, and he was the only person left able to make that happen. So he stood up and made his way across the room to Havra’s cot. “Hey…” He stood next to the cot; he felt like he was looming over her but he was actually so short there was very little looming happening. “Did you… did you want to talk about it? Or do you need a hug? Or a distraction?” He trailed off.

Havra was very evidently trying to take deep breaths, but failing miserably at lastingly calming herself down. She frowned when she realized she had been approached and wiped away tears that were soon replaced with new ones. This was the last place she could afford a break down, but the more she tried to tell herself how she really needed to get her shit together, the more she though about the situation the angrier she got. Havra had been taught many times over how to keep a cool head in stressful situations. She had a solid strategy that worked well for her... usually. It was nothing short of unfair that it failed her now, just as it was unfair that she had to learn it as soon as she did to begin with. Hot shame at herself and fury at everything curled in her chest; she could feel the pressure building wanting her to lash out. Somehow she managed not to yell at Dezyim, even though for a moment she wanted nothing more than to insult him and scream about how everyone in here was an idiot for going on and on about a future that would not come and unimportant small talk that she couldn't care less about, instead she just started to cry harder again. After a few failed attempts of communicating, either because she had not managed to get a coherent sentence out or because she had realized that what she was about to say was mean, Havra rested her head against the wall and tried again. "The world is cruel. I knew already, but..." She laughed, and even though it turned into sobs again it didn't take as long before she managed quiet down again. "If you don't mind... you can sit here for a bit." She pulled her legs against her chest and nodded towards the lower half of her bed.

Victoria was too emotionally exhausted to react, admittedly, having her head down with eyes pressed against her forearms. Still, no tears came for her, even as the exchange drew her attention and she looked up to see Havra succumb. She had tried to keep morale up, before, but found it impossible within herself to even so much as part her lips to try, now. If her hands hadn't been good enough, she didn't think there was a shot in hell she could have done anything with her words. So, she merely shoved her head back down into her limbs and sighed, deeply.

A misery only perpetuated by heavy footsteps, and a knock on the door.

Before he could sit down, the knock at the door alerted him. He instead moved towards the door, as if standing there would do… anything. “Why do they even knock, anyway? It’s not as if they’re waiting for our permission to enter the cell.” He practically spat the words out. He had to give it to them, though— they had the best inconvenient timing.

Havra tensed up at the sound and wiped her face with her sleeve again. She stood up, but stayed by her cot. "I really don't know, it's not like we can't hear their footsteps either."

The knock and footsteps had managed to wake Tavek up- even at this low of battery, his brain had learned to interpret footsteps and knocks as danger signals, and if he sensed danger, he’d always wake up. He was.. in his cot. He remembered passing out on the floor. Did these guys.. his comrades, his injured friends, did they lift him up here? They didn’t have to. Fuck that pink-haired guy. No one would have done that for a tool or ornament. Convincing someone who hadn’t even experienced the synth ban that he wasn’t a person would take more than one member of an organization he detested. The physical damage still hurt like a truck had hit him, though. His vision was dimmer, having turned everything he possibly could off to save battery. He estimated about a day or so of constant activity was all he had left. His voice still glitched as he spoke. “They want us to anticipate the coming torment, I guess.”

He exhaled shakily, looking away from the door. He didn’t want to know, nor did he want to see. If he wasn’t paying attention, it’d be easier, right? “It’ll… it’s nothing,” He muttered, “they’re just antagonizing us.”

Hearing Tavek's voice was a nice reprieve, although she couldn't bring herself to look towards the cots. Besides an almost visible shiver that shot up her spine the second after the knock, she remained entirely unmoving.

Hello, cell two. The threat this time was silent — a handful of guards with disruptors, making sure the prisoners remained still while they made their way in. One of them gestured, and another spoke up; "You've got work to do, doctor." and gestured Victoria forward.

Okay, well, when the people who were hurting all your friends finally lets themselves into the room with a bunch of big, mean guns, you couldn't just keep your head buried, no matter how hard you tried. Or at least, Victoria thought so, until wishing she hadn't once her eyes refocused on an arm outstretched for her - she registered that even before the guard's words. Her first thought, forcing her to swallow in panic, was about Allan, or perhaps one of her other crewmates she hadn't seen since the brig. Had they beaten one of them up so badly that she was needed? Or was she being lured? She figured it wasn't something they would tell her, she wasn't even sure if it was something she wanted to find out. But that moment of worry had been enough for her reflexes, and even as she felt her nerves pulse down her extremities in ways she hadn't felt in years, she was on her feet before she knew enough to stop herself. Her mouth opened, but only something reminiscing a croak came out. She shed no tears, still, perhaps the sickest silver lining she could have still held onto. Could she refuse? She feared for those in the cots flanking her if she did. Okay. Fine. Her first steps dragged, and she braced herself against the edge of the closest cot - Dezyim's - until her legs felt willing enough to hold her weight.

Easy enough. No one move, no one protest, and everything will turn out juuust fine.. "Come along, then." To the corridor!

Ironically being briefly distracted by their captors had distracted Havra enough that she was calmer after they left than she had been before they had come in. Still she returned to sitting on her cot the same way she had been sitting previously. Her face was cold from the slowly evaporating moisture, she brough her hands up to warm her cheeks, but her hands were even colder. "I suppose now we at least know who is going to be next."

Dezyim sat down on the edge of the bed. Was it bad to lie to her? When she was so scared? “They said she had work to do. Allan’s already gone to be interrogated, but he’s senior staff. They only took Edgar and I to remove my implant and break our spirits. So… it’s possible they won’t take you.” He bit his lip. That line of thinking only worked if you took what they were doing to Allan and Victoria at their captor’s words and ignored the fact that they had taken Tavek. It wasn’t the best lie he’d ever told, but it was the best one he could come up with right then.

“I’m… look, I’m gonna be honest, we’ve got a lot to do when we finally get out.” He chuckled bitterly, smoothing a hand over his hair, that had begun to hang limply from his head from the constant fidgeting, “I think we’re owed some time off after this.” (edited)

“Hah… I have a lot of damage to my body I need to repair. So.. so much.. fuck, I’ll need to replace it after all this I think.” He said, pushing some hair out of his eyes.

Havra laughed, surprising herself with how genuine it was. "You're a darling, Ensign. I'm afraid you don't know half of the possible reasons they might want to 'talk' to me."

Slowly, the time crawled by, going hours upon hours without either Victoria or Allan returning. Food came and went, and still no Victoria or Allan.

Propping himself up against the cot once again, he checked his shoulder for a fleeting moment before the sight of it still made him want to gag. There were reasons why he wasn’t a doctor, for sure.

Tavek, for his part, had gone back to sleep, both to conserve battery, and to distract himself from both the lingering pain of being half-melted on the inside, and from the horror of this whole situation.

Abruptly, the door was dragged open, and an unresponsive Allan was unceremoniously dumped inside. As quick as they'd come, they were gone.

Ed froze, unsurprised but disturbed to find yet another one of the officers he’d been brought here with beaten within an inch of their life. “…fuck.” He whispered, unable to look away, “That’s… oh, fuck.”

Tavek had woken up from the commotion, taking stock of the situation. No.. this couldn’t be right. Was Allan even breathing? Was he.. no! Allan could not be dead, not him, he was the only source of light in this hell hole and if Allan went dark, they all would. He got up, walking over to kneel down next to him and try his best to feel for a pulse. Thankfully, his fingers were not completely dead, he could feel it. “He’s breathing and has a pulse at least.. but..” It was always a blessing to Tavek that he could not cry. Now, it was a curse. He wanted so badly to cry for his beaten and battered friend. “Please.. we need you Allan. Please wake up, I can’t take care of everyone, I’m close to dying myself, how will we go on? We all need to survive, that means you too.” He said, his voice little more than a glitched whisper. Was he a bit selfish? Maybe. But fuck, if Allan didn’t get up, how WOULD they go on?

“He’ll wake up.” Ed mumbled, half to himself, “It’s— it’s gonna be fine.” He chewed on his fingernails, afraid to get any closer, as if the moment he got a good look everything would take a turn for the worse. “The crew’s gonna come for us. We just need to survive until then.” He exhaled shakily, stepping forward to place a hand on Tavek’s shoulder, tentatively enough to pull away if he proved to not want the touch.

Upon Allan’s unceremonious return, Dezyim stood from the cot, his eyes widening as he put a hand to his chest. Was the lieutenant really… dead? He moved towards where his body lay as the others did, but when Tavek said he was alive he actually turned around and moved away. Retrieving the two strips of fabric that Allan had just so recently torn off of his blanket to make the bear, he took one to the sink and wet it. He returned, walking briskly, and began wiping and drying his blood covered face, careful to avoid the nose itself where it could be injured.

Havra approached also, although she remained out of the Ensign's way. Too many hands usually made rather a mess of such things, at least when they were not specifically trained for it. "Has the bleeding stopped? If it hasn't we should probably turn him on his side so he doesn't swallow or breath in the blood..."

“I think the blood’s stopped? It’s just dried.. though would it hurt if we still turned him on his side anyway? I’m not an organic people doctor, I don’t really know what to do.” He said, stepping back a bit to give Allan space if he did wake up.

"There are injuries that make moving someone dangerous, but considering how they deposited him in here I doubt we could make it much worse." Havra returned to her bed to get a few more stripes of fabric from her blanket.

Allan had thought that for sure, he was going to die. When Irok had asked him if he'd gotten it all out of his system, that he wouldn't get another chance - he thought that was the man's way of saying those were his last words - like, ever. And the last thing he'd felt was that excruciating pain to his little human skull. Which, while much less so, was still a pain he had upon waking up. His head fucking hurt, as if it was being split apart in ten different directions, and his nose hurt, and his throat, and - and for some reason, his ribs really fucking hurt, too. He had no memory of what had happened, there. And then there was the cold again, felt even through his bloodied up uniform. The next thing he felt after all that, though, was a gentle, soft wipe along his face, and the warmth that came with it. He made a soft little sound, something of a groan of pain, probably, before he started to blink open his eyes. They stung a little at the edges, a sharp pain, and the tears were already starting again, an unfortunately innate bodily reaction. But he looked at his immediate surroundings. The three engineering officers that had been in his cell with him, Dezyim being the one providing the ever-so-gentle warmth to his face, and Havra nearby, and... He tried to move, to twist his body in such a way that he would be able to look around the room, but the aching pain in his ribs protested against that. "Shit, where..." he blinked slowly, looking up at the ceiling - or Dezyim, whichever was closer - and sighed as he whispered, "where's.. Victoria?"

Dezyim sat back, jumping a little when he stirred. He’d been so focused on his task that he hadn’t been paying attention to the actual person under it, and such hadn’t noticed he was waking. “Founders! Don’t sit up so fast.” His voice was annoyed but was ultimately colored with relief. He’d been slightly worried he wouldn’t wake up. “They took her as well. Said she had work to do— whether that meant one of our crewmates is injured or if they’re making her experiment on a crewmate as punishment remains to be seen. Sit still, I’m still getting this.” He took the back of Allan’s head gingerly in his hand to brace it as he continued to wipe the blood off. His brow furrowed in concentration. It was becoming increasingly apparent that the two measly strips were not going to be enough, and Allan was just going to need to wash off in the sink himself. “This… is not working anymore.” He stated simply, letting go of Allan and moving away. He felt almost immediately embarrassed about the whole situation so tried to move on. “I… uh… hope you’re not hurt too badly.” As if he wasn’t covered in blood and had just moments before been unconscious. (edited)

Ed let out a breath, with a jumble of words that somewhat resembled ‘holyfuckIcan’tbelieveyou’realive’, leaning over to finally take in the scene.

"Here." Havra held out the stripes she had ripped from her blanket to Allan. "If you think you can walk and want to wash it off yourself, I can help you to the washroom."

Tavek had stepped back for a moment, letting the others speak for a moment. He felt bad he wasn’t doing more.. but he himself was in a bad state. He was doing his best to stop his hands from shaking on their own accord, trying to keep his face from twitching as wires sparked in ways they weren’t meant to. He knew that if he spoke, his voice would glitch. Allan was an Engineer.. he would worry. He didn’t want Allan to worry about him. Allan had enough to deal with already.

He'd laid back down when he looked at Dezyim and shut his eyes as he listened to him. This was... probably not a dream. It could've been, though. The world around him had that haziness to it that dreams had, and while in reality that was a mix of his wet, red eyes and all the pain in his head and elsewhere, his mind didn't know much better. Maybe he was dead after all. However, the way he felt Dezyim continue to hold the back of his head and wipe the blood off of his face while he spoke hinted otherwise. It was a little bit of warmth, a little bit of kindness, and a little bit of reality mixed all into eachother. He folded his hands over his chest, gently touching the area where it hurt the most, not wanting to get in the way of what Dezyim was doing. But fuck, the words were ringing in his ears. The ones from his meeting with Irok, and now these. Victoria was gone, taken for... work to do. Great. He took a deep breath when he heard that, and wasn't surprised to find the taste of blood still in his throat, and was much more surprised when the breath he took felt like it was forced to be shallow. He'd had some broken ribs before, but... combined with everything else, it felt like this was a lot worse. When Dezyim stopped holding his head - something he would never admit he missed, he opened his eyes, much to the feeling of the stinging again - mostly to make sure that Dezyim was fine, if anything. "Okay," was all he whispered, "...thanks, really." He then looked to wherever Havra's voice was coming from, and he looked up at the strips and really considered it, but given the pain that ripped through him when he tried to sit up earlier, he shook his head, slowly, from where he was. "Mm, 'sfine," he mumbled, "thanks, I, um- y'know, it, uh. Matches the hair, when you.. think about it."

He rubbed his eyes, letting out a tired, sob-like sort of laugh. He kept his gaze on the non-bloodied parts of Allan, silently cursing himself for not being able to look at the injuries while simultaneously wanting to throw up at the thought of more people being injured. “Glad to have you back, boss,” He exhaled, “How’s it hanging?”

“I’m glad have you back too, boss. Prison just isn’t the same without you.” He said weakly, trying to smile a little bit, but it ended up just looking more sad than anything. Tavek was not used to physical pain. He turned off such things for a reason. But whatever the fuck that guy had managed to do to him… damn, it hurt. It took some strength to not claw at his arms and legs to expose and rip out the offending wires. This body was toast. Literally. (edited)

Allan couldn't help but smile just a little bit when he heard Ed make that bit of a laugh. It was definitely physically strained, but it was emotionally genuine, at least. He'd intended to make someone laugh with that joke, and he'd succeeded. "Glad to... see you guys, too. How..." he chose not to answer the question before he could finish thinking about what could be the answer. He shut his eyes again, disappointed to learn that the stinging somehow persisted after he closed them, and so he was just forced to blink them repeatedly and let the tears fall out. Usually, he was a man who was totally fine with being the center of attention when it happened - it wasn't something he craved, but was comfortable with - but now, almost feeling like a first, or the first time in a long time, he was starting to feel awful being looked at like this by so many people. Since he was still lying on the ground, he moved his head to the side in order to look across the room, under the cots and away to the other wall - where there was a stack of cups, still neatly there with one of his pips underneath it. "Did you guys try the cup game, yet..?"

“We, uh, figured we’d wait,” He glanced over to the cups, offering a bit of a playful grin, despite the cracked lips and exhaustion, “Gave us time to strategize against you.” (edited)

“The what?” He’d been asleep when they’d talked about it, and had never heard of the game in the first place. He looked towards where both Ed and Allan had turned, confused. He hadn’t even noticed the stack sitting there. “You play a game… with cups? What do you do with them?” It was hard to imagine any game you could play with cups, of all things.

Like a kid on Christmas, Ed lit right back up, eyes regaining that excited glimmer. “Ooh, okay, we’ve got some explaining to do.” He turned back to Allan, “I’ll do the moving if you wanna give him the rundown.”

He looked sheepishly at the others. “I think I was also either asleep or not around.. because I have no idea what the cup game is either.”

Allan couldn't help but smile softly again when Ed joked about having time to strategize against him. Strategy? In the cup moving game? It was a ridiculous notion, but he loved Ed for trying. It was working. "You shuffle 'em," he said to Dezyim and Tavek, "put something under them, uh, shuffle the cups around, people have to guess... which cup has the thing." He then looked up at his cot- it really was convenient that it was right next to the door right now, and looked back to the group. "I think, um - if I can sit against the wall, I can use the cot as the uh, table for the cups.." he took a second to breath, still a shallow breath, which he seemed like he'd have to take a lot of breaks to do those, actually, while he talked, and he became more unsure about his ability to do so. "Probably.." he looked down at his hands, "fuck, yeah, uh. I need to. Wash off my hands before I go and... touch the cups, and," he coughed, wincing at the sharper pain that cause in his ribs, "probably some... water in one of the, um. Other cups." There were six cups: only three were needed for the game, after all.

“Take it easy.” He said quickly, “I’m not supposed to be the one giving you orders, but… maybe don’t get more hurt. Stay comfy, yeah?” He picked up the pip, examining it for a moment before carrying it and the cups over to the cot Allan had indicated.

“I can get you some water, if you want. I’ll use my cup, not like I need it for anything.” He offered, focusing hard on doing whatever tasks his body could handle at the moment. Self-repair systems were going haywire trying to bypass broken servos and melted wiring- they were finding usable pathways, but in odd places- hence, the random voicebox glitching and the dimmed vision. He had to do something. It was funny.. the horrific damage done had actually helped preserve his battery by ruining so much of him. He was forced to run at reduced capacity, but that meant he could run for longer.

Dezyim watched as the other two flitted about, fetching various cups. He turned back to Allan. “Do you want help getting over to the wall? No offense, but…” He glanced at him, the way he was breathing, wincing, curled just slightly in pain. “I don’t think you could make it there on your own. Or should, for that matter.” He glanced at the wall. It wasn’t too far away, but was it even safe to try and move him like that?

'Comfy'. Hm. He'd try best he could. "I think it's like taking a band-aid off? Like, I just.." he leaned his head back so that he could see the wall. It wasn't too far away - he'd been dumped by the door, so it was really just a few feet off from here. He was silent for a second again, considering Dezyim's offer before he nodded. "Yeah, you're - right, there's no offense there, don't worry." He took a moment to take some breaths before he answered Tavek. "Thanks, yeah, water... would be good," especially for the blood caught in his throat, still. Not a great taste. As much as he loved dressing up as a sexy vampire for Halloween, he'd probably make a pretty shit one in real life.

And with that, he was off to the bathroom. A room he actually hadn’t gone into before this, considering he had no need for it. He reached for the cup, only for his hand to shake so badly that it fell into the sink. He stared down at the offending hand, the new one that he’d JUST made and grafted to himself after the fucking Borg Cube, and now it was ruined! He clenched it into a fist, his nails digging into the fake skin, before he finally relaxed it. Soon enough, it stopped shaking, and he filled up the cup and quickly brought it out to Allan before he could spill it.

Once everyone was as settled as they could be, he held up the pip. “Okay. Whoever’s interested in an impromptu cup game… now’s your chance.” He announced, a bit quieter than usual to keep from waking those who were resting or not willing to listen to his bullshit, “I’m gonna put this bad boy under one of these, give ‘em a good spin, and you guys are going to have to try and keep up.” “Anyone with x-ray vision… no cheating.” He added, mostly joking. (edited)

“If I had that capability, I’ve long since turned it off to save battery.” He chuckled, listening intently to the instructions. In his weakened state, he reckoned he had about as good of a chance as everyone else to guess this thing right.

Placing the small metal object under one of the cups with a flourish, he began the process of moving them around, careful to put a few fake-outs in with actual movements. Seconds passed, and he stepped away, hands in the air. “Place your bets, folks.”

Dezyim sat on the floor with his legs folded under him, enraptured with Edgar’s movements. About halfway through, he realized he had zoned out and… completely lost track of where the pip was. Damn! He hadn’t even been thinking of anything. He gazed at the cups, lost, and realized he was just going to have to guess anyway so there was no point in wasting the brainpower trying to figure out where it was now. So when the cups came to a stop, he picked the one he liked best. “The… leftmost one.”

He nodded, picking up the cup with a gentle hand, before revealing the small metal dot. “Hey, nice!” He offered a congratulatory high five, reaching over to him.

Dezyim stared blankly at where the cup had been, and realized the pip was there. Huh. “I almost expected it to not be under… any of the cups. I think I’ve played too many games with Ferengi who had less than good intentions.” He chuckled, but there wasn’t much humor behind it. When Edgar raised a hand to high-five, it took him a moment to high-five him back. Frankly, it was a bad high-five— it was too awkward, and Dezyim grimaced when he pulled his hand away.

He shrugged, picking up the pip again. “More of a fist bump guy, I get it.” He said, dropping it into the cup again, “And I’m not much of a cheater, so you’re safe with me.”

Exhaustion was clawing at her mind pulling her into unconsciousness repeatedly; it barely counted as sleep considering it was only ever for a few minutes at a time. She had given up resisting it, if she could recover any energy whatsoever that was probably good. Her sleep had never been particularly heavy and caring for children certainly had not made it so either.

Allan did consider sitting up himself when he watched everyone gather around the cot, but decided against it. It was a stronger consideration once Tavek handed him the water, but he simply set it down next to him with a small thanks. And then he... just listened to them play the cup game. Which was almost... relaxing? Yeah, almost. While he could in fact see the cups move from where he was at, it still hurt a little to keep his eyes open, so he shut his eyes and listened to the shuffle of them. To the interactions between the other officers, and the little... what he could presume was a high five from Ed's comment afterwards. He focused on taking breaths in and out, at least glad that the other officers' focus seemed to be off him now. Really, it felt a bit embarrassing to be like this at the moment, despite the joke he'd attempted to make earlier. And so he kept his eyes shut, hoping to catch another radio show of the cup game round two: electric boogaloo. (edited)

Putting on his best announcer voice, he slipped the pip beneath a cup once again. “Okay, second round! Let’s do this.” He moved the cups around once again, shuffling them as carefully as he could, “Guesses, anyone?”

Honestly… Tavek did NOT catch where the cup had gone. He was sort of lost in his own thoughts, he was running at reduced capacity, and he was generally just a bit stupid. So… yeah, he was just guessing here. He made a little exaggerated “hmm” noise as he pretended to think for a moment, before speaking. “I’ll go with the middle one.*

The truth was Dezyim wasn’t much of an… anything guy. Fist-bumps and high-fives were things he had learned to tolerate, but that didn’t mean he didn’t still dislike them. He looked at Tavek from the corner of his eye. He had been eyeing the middle cup but wasn’t going to say that now; he didn’t want to look like he was copying him. “In that case, I’ll say the rightmost one.” He glanced over at Allan to see his eyes were closed. He wished there was more that they could do for him, but… there wasn’t. He wasn’t even sure what kind of injuries ha had, other than the broken nose. He turned his mind back to the cup game.

The door slid open with no warning, bringing, sadly, no Victoria, but instead unfamiliar faces. At the front, the covered face of a tall, pale-skinned operative, scanning the group. "Havra t'Mrian," they simply announced, looking right at them after a strange few seconds of searching with their eyes.

From behind them, a Reman appeared, with cuffs in his hands, clear about their intent. They didn't approach, simply waiting for Havra to stand up and approach.

Having been just about to pick up the cup, froze mid-reach. He bit his tongue, glancing towards who they requested with that same mix of pity and concern. “We’ll save a game for you when you get back.” He exhaled, furrowing his brow.

Her heartbeat skyrocketed, in part because she had very suddenly gone half asleep to bright awake, but mostly because of the situation in general. "Thank you Ensign, but you don't have to." She stood up and headed over to the individual with the cuffs, uncertain at first she eventually looked up searching their faces for anything like recognition.

Both faces were impassive as they processed Havra, binding their wrists and taking them out of the cell. Aside from calling out her name, they remained totally silent, eerie in their quiet synchronisation.

Allan listened to the second round of cups. It was so rudely interrupted by the door sliding open, and he turned his head and blinked his eyes open, squinting at the two - oh, the same officers that had taken him? At least they didn't say anything about seeing the Commander when they said her name, but that didn't really stop the worry in him. He wasn't sure if he'd actually said the words 'stay safe' or not by the time she'd left (he hadn't, it was barely a whisper). At least she was the last one? Maybe after she came back, they'd be fine to just... deal with everything, and no more? After the door shut, he sighed, reaching up and grabbing his pillow down from the cot and pressing it to his forehead. Despite it being cold, that almost seemed to help his headache just a little - or maybe that was just imagination. "Left, then," he said, just above a whisper - since he'd already made himself known again by that sudden movement, he might as well say something. "That's my guess."

He nodded, acknowledging the guesses, although the previous excitement had since been drained from his tone. “Okay. Our winner is…” He muttered, lifting each cup, “The middle one. Congrats, Tavek!”

Well.. Havra being taken really ruined the mood. He hoped she’d be alright.. this was the first Taken Incident that Tavek was fully awake and alert for. Well, as alert as you could be at 10% battery. He looked towards the door with an expression of both anger for their captors, and pity for the person they’d just taken away. “Lucky guess, I suppose.. though, I don’t know if I can do another round, I’m sorry. I need to conserve what energy I have left.” He said, his tone a little disappointed in himself.

“Yeah, no, I get that.” He sighed, stacking the cups once again, “Maybe we postpone until we get Havra back. I did promise her a game, although… whether or not she wanted to play is questionable.”

What energy he had left? Allan looked at Tavek, and realized that he didn't actually know what happened to the android. He was taken away at the same time that Tavek had returned. "And do what?" He asked quietly, followed by a little sigh and a shake of his head. "Tavek, what.. what's your battery at?" Maybe like, 60% was his guess? Damn, he should've asked Irok how long they'd been here instead of... all the bullshit he said instead.

He sighed, looking up with an exhausted, resigned expression. Like he knew he wasn’t going to get out of this. His eyes flicked between everyone left in the room before landing back on Allan. “10%. The fuckers drained my battery and fried me to boot.” He paused. A living thing would take a deep, shaky breath. But Tavek was not a living thing, so he just paused. His hands jerked for a moment as a burnt wire tried desperately to still send signals. “I don’t think I’ll make it out of this. I just wanted.. I just wanted to play one last game with you all. But.. please promise me.. if I go to zero..” He paused again. “Please don’t waste your energy dragging a 200-pound corpse out of here if you get the opportunity. Just.. I don’t care what you have to do, make sure I will never turn on again if you do get the chance and have to leave me. Make sure I’m dead forever, and I’ll be happy with that.” He made a noise akin to a sigh, standing up and getting back into his cot. “But I don’t want that to happen. So.. I’ll be off for the long haul. Please, if you need me for anything, wake me up.”

He hesitated, one hand reaching out for a moment before watching him go back to the cot. “…sweet dreams, man.” He muttered, turning his eyes back to the cups, before handing the pip back to Allan. “This belongs to you, I believe.”

10%, and fried. Damn. He let that information sink into him while Tavek paused, eyebrows furrowing with concern as he continued to hold the pillow against his forehead and look up at the android from where he laid on the floor. He only looked more concerned once Tavek started talking about... not wanting them to take his corpse out of here. Hm. He looked away from the other and shut his eyes, taking a small breath himself. "Tavek," he actually decided not to comment on the 200 pounds detail - instead he settled on, "what if I asked you the same for myself, hm?" It was a genuine question, and he wordlessly took the pip back and then... placed it back onto the cot the cups were on. Wasn't a point in putting it back onto his bloody jacket right now.

“It would be different for you… For any of you, I wouldn’t listen. If I still had the strength by then, I would carry you myself. Ah.. I’m getting away from the point here. But… what I wanted to say is, I don’t want to be the thing holding you all back if it comes to that.” He paused for a moment. “Unlike what that guy seemed to think.. I’m not an object. I’m not a tool. I’m not an ornament. I am a person, I can make choices, and I choose not to be the person that stands between you all and the rest of your lives. I don’t hate myself, I promise. I just.. I love you guys. I want you all to live your lives. If that ultimately means I can’t be there to see it, then I’m alright with that.” He smiled weakly- close-lipped.

"Yeah, but you just.. said it yourself. You wouldn't listen," Allan said, plainly, his voice - pretty much ever since he'd been deposited back into here, aside from when he cracked that joke about the blood matching his hair - being pretty uncharacteristically dry. "You can make the choices, and we can listen or not. We'll all live our lives," he said, not sure if he believed that or not, but he had to, didn't he? "We'll all live." (edited)

Ed echoed what Allan said in his head, over and over again like a mantra. He’d been saying it to himself, but it meant something else to him with a superior officer’s words instead of his own. “You’re sticking with us, man.” Ed said, after a moment of staying silent, “You’re one of us. Engineers are like, uh— bonded shelter cats. You take one, you take us all. I think that’s a saying, at least…”

“I…” A good soldier knew when he’d been beat. Tavek had been beat. He couldn’t really argue.. even if he wanted to, just so he could be sure he wouldn’t get in anyone’s way. He didn’t think he could live with himself if anyone died for him. “You’ve got me beat, I suppose. We’re the strangest bunch of shelter cats I’ve ever seen.. but the comparison’s not wrong. But.. it’s goodnight-slash-morning-slash whatever time this is, for me, for now. Stay safe, you guys.* He said, laying down, and after a few moments in case anyone else wished him a good night, he switched himself off.

Fuck. Allan recognized the comparison, he did, but now he was just thinking about his cats. Or, rather, his one cat and Mephistopheles's cats, but still. The cats that he cared for because they were roommates. He was now thinking about them and how when it was time for them to sleep, they usually curled up next to him and slept there, and that they were very warm. He wondered how they were doing. And by proxy, he started thinking about Mephistopheles. How was he doing? In all likelihood, probably better than anyone else; he was Captain for a reason - he had a way of keeping above the water during a flood. And then he started worrying about his other partners and fuck, that led his thinking back to Saren, back to all that shit Irok was saying, and - He started feeling a little lightheaded, and there was that odd feeling of a loss of sensation in his fingers as they continued to hold the pillow to his head, and there was some rapid sound in his ears, and he wasn't sure- wait, shit. He was hyperventilating. "Shit," was the curse that came out of him then, as he stopped breathing entirely and then inhaled. Hold. Exhale. It was a process, a slow one given that each breath hurt, but the rhythm steadied him, for now. He looked over to see if anyone was still nearby - wait, yeah. Ed. "...sorry." Why was he apologizing???

At the sound of the curse, he turned to Allan in worry. “You good, boss?” He furrowed his brow, trying to think fast. What did someone in distress need? Obviously emotional support, but the next best thing was probably comfort, right? He opted to go by that, as he got to his feet, “Uh… I’m gonna grab you a blanket or something. Something you can prop yourself up with?” (edited)

Allan was still manually breathing, which seemed to be the best strategy right now for himself and his lungs. He simply stared at Ed for a second, before having to look down and blink some tears out. "No," he answered flatly, to the ensign's first question, then answered the next, "if I prop myself up, might as well go the whole thing and.. stand up. I just have to, um. Be ready for that." And holy shit, did he not feel ready for that right now. (edited)

“Oh— yeah, okay—“ He stammered, palms facing outward in a placating gesture, “It— take it at your own pace, yeah.”

Allan frowned a little. No, he had to give him something to do, to help, right, was that how it worked? People liked feeling helpful. Like there was something useful about them. Something that made them worth being around. "Y'know, um, what you could do, though," he said, "do you have any.. like, jokes? If you need a topic, um.. food?"

“I mean— yeah, I have a few, they’re stupid, but…” He shrugged, figuring that giving it a shot wouldn’t be horrible. “Why are beets always victorious?”

"I'm sure they're fine," Allan reassured, and then waited until Ed asked his question, giving the classic reply: "I dunno, why?"

“They’re un-beet-able.” He said, fighting to keep the stupid grin on his face from spreading across his lips.

Knock-knock, motherfuckers.

Dezyim had been watching the interaction between Edgar and Allan silently, unsure of… everything about the conversation. He was having trouble following it, and couldn’t quite figure out when he should jump in. He wasn’t having an easy time scraping words together either, so he just… sat. Silently. But when the knock sounded on the door he turned sharply, suddenly very alert.

When Ed revealed the punchline, he gave his best attempt at a smile, careful not to laugh (because that hurt, for some stupid reason). "That's a good one, I like it," he said, and then the knock at the door was heard, and he simply turned his head to look at it, resting his cheek on the cold floor. "Uh... who's there..?"

“Ffffuck.” He muttered, “Right after the punchline. These assholes have good comedic timing.”

The door opened, and a boot peaked out at the bottom of it; Maiek - or, rather, Derain - pushed it open, plate of food in his hands and a murderous glare in his eyes. Thick eyebrow jolted up at seeing people on the floor. "Trying to dig a hole or something?" came a somewhat dismissive question. The tray was put on the closest empty bed. "Or the cots are a tad too uncomfortable for you?"

Dezyim followed Snake with his eyes as he entered the room. “Yes actually, they’re giving me back pain.” He stretched, emphasizing the point. “In all thirteen years of my life I’ve never had back pain. Do you know how terrible the mattresses have to be to make a thirteen year old spine hurt?” He stood, moving to occupy the space between his crew mates and the man. He wasn’t even sure what he was trying to do; protect his friends, maybe.

He watched carefully. Okay, so it was just... food delivery time, nobody else was being taken for the second time, that was... good. Upon being asked the question, being the guy completely on the floor, he sighed. "Digging a hole for a g-" wait, no, that was a bad joke to make right now. "I mean - honestly, I just gotta get up there. Heat rises, uh. Slightly." It was like, maybe half a degree warmer on the cot than on the cold floor, possibly.

“Is there something you want from us? You’ve already tortured the majority.” Ed watched the man closely, eyes trained on his expression.

Amber eyes looked the Vorta up and down, thoroughly unimpressed as he gestured from his head to toe: "..What's this you're doing right now? Our hospitality hasn't been enough to beat some sense into you? Need a second round, perhaps at the isolator this time? One of your scientists has had a grand fucking time in there already, care to join?" The rasp was a dangerous hiss. Pipe the fuck down and don't act up, kid. He glared at Edgar, then. "Food duty. I ain't gonna touch the bunch of you unless I have to. And while my patience doesn't run out as quickly as some, you are not encouraged to test it. Got it?"

He bit his tongue, looking away in a sort of defeated acceptance. Causing any more issues would definitely get him stabbed again, and as cool a story as it would be, he didn’t feel like risking it.

"Isolator? As in the... circuit switch?" He looked very concerned for whatever scientist was put in some sort of electrical torture nightmare from what he was envisioning. As far as he knew, there were only two scientists here, Saren and Paco..

"Solitary confinement," he explained, that unblinking stare now trained on Allan. He had to be staring down at him, even if unintentionally. "I hope I don't have to explain what that is."

"Oh," not that made it any better, or worried him less, but... it made sense. "Yeah, I - I get, um. What that is.. thanks."

Dezyim took a step closer to the man and a thought occurred to him. He wasn’t protecting his friends at all. No, he was goading the guard on for personal reasons. Selfish reasons. His voice lowered as he spoke to Maiek. “Maybe you haven’t given me enough hospitality.” He held steady eye contact, but had stopped moving towards him.

Was Dezyim stepping closer? Fuck, no, he- "Dezyim, don't-" Despite not wanting to when there was no need, he suddenly got up quickly, wincing at the intense pain in his ribs but ignoring it for the sake of going over to Dezyim and attempting to grab his arm and pull him back from the man.

“Dez, no—“ Ed lunged forwards, hoping to grab his wrist or something, but falling fairly short.

The step closer was met with a sigh that carried both the physical and mental exhaustion of a millenia before Maiek. Should've started with any other cell, truly. Instead of voicing that displeasure though, he gave the Vorta a thin-lipped smile that bordered on a snarl: "Now what the Hell is this? Sit down, child."

Dezyim held angry eye contact for a moment before letting out a frustrated breath. “Oh, you’re no fun. One of the others surely would have had a knife to my throat or a disrupter to my head by now.” His voice was full of vitriol, as if he had wanted Maiek to react. He turned, brushing past his cellmates as he went back to his cot. What was he even doing? It wasn’t worth it; he did feel pity for his cellmates, and he would have felt terribly guilty if they had had to scrape him off the floor. He gritted his teeth. He had to get ahold of himself.

... What? His eyes followed the retreating figure, expression blank... before he just bursted out laughing: "Oh. Oh! Is that what this was? You think you can use me as a convenient ticket for a way out?!" He shouldn't be affected by this. He shouldn't. He shouldn't. He-- He was. The Vorta was unceremoniously grabbed by the scruff, and forced to a halt. "Let me explain some simple concepts to you," there was a cigarette in his mouth. He didn't remember pulling it out, or putting it between his (slightly shaking) lips. "Because I don't know if this is an act of selfish misery, or a dumb fucking self-sacrificial spiel you people seem to think is noble. I could kill you. I could snuff out your short little life like a candle. But I'd do it right in front of them." He gave the ensign a shake, as if the Vorta was a misbehaving pup: "You keen on hurting the rest of these clowns like that? Make em towel what's left of you off the floor? Pull what's left of their fragile morale a level lower?" Damn it. He released Dezyim, stalking off towards the door with an impressive chain of curses: "Eat your food while it's still warm, you hopeless fucking bastards."

The door slid open only a few moments later, and Victoria was shoved inside.

At first Dezyim didn’t react to being grabbed and shaken, almost like he was used to it. But he was very quickly reminded he had something of a significant head injury, at which point he curled in on himself like a dying bug. His ears rang as he waited for Snake to stop shaking him. When he was released, he navigated his way back to his cot and sat down. Waves of icy-hot pain radiated down his body from the back of his skull. This was what he had wanted, wasn’t it? He wrapped his arms around his stomach and folded over himself. His brain did NOT like being shaken after its recent… intrusions. He had caught bits of what Snake had said; he was right, what the hell was Dezyim doing? He screwed his eyes shut and sat there, motionless.

The moment the man had left through the door, Allan had walked - slowly, though glad to realize that his legs weren't hurting in any sort of way - over to Dezyim. He almost put a hand on his shoulder, but then realized there was still some blood on them. For fucks' sake - at least now that he was up, he could go wash off after this. "Dezyim," he spoke softly, and then realized he was tasting blood. Okay, so the sudden change from lying down to standing up must've done something. Whatever. Didn't care, he just held the wrist of his sleeve up to his nose to prevent it from dripping all over the floor. And then he forgot all about what he was going to say. "Let... let me know if you need to talk, okay? I'm.. listen, I know none of us are really okay right now, but we're still here. And that means being here for you, too, okay?" He froze when the door opened again, turning to look at who it was this time- "Victoria?" he set his sleeve down, then quickly put it back up. Whoops.

Dezyim stayed curled up even as Allan spoke. It was a nice thought, but… talk about what? What was there to talk about? He was acting like a wreck but… he wouldn’t even know where to start if he wanted to. And he didn’t. It wasn’t worth wasting Allan’s time or energy. He didn’t even consider the offer. When he announced Victoria’s entrance though, Dezyim took a deep breath and concentrated on not being nauseous. The pain had shifted back to a constant dull ache which was nice. He sat up slowly. “Welcome back, Lieutenant.”

He tipped his gaze upwards to see the only medical officer who’d been put in cell two with them, and felt a wave of relief wash over him at the sight of her alive.

Several shades paler than when she had left, Victoria stumbled into the room, appearing barely awake in all ways besides the thousand yard stare with which she looked down the hall between beds. She was entirely unhurt, as far as anyone could tell, although a stray splatter of blood adorned the shoulder of her left sleeve. Victoria... registered friendlier faces welcoming her back, but did not react at all. She had wished for her guards to take her somewhere else, but it seemed luck hadn't been on her side for some time now. None of them had been spared a beating in some form, have they? Except of herself, but what was she to do about it? Staggering weakly, she walked the length of the room, never once straying her gaze until she reached the bathroom. Her cellmates heard a thud against the door seconds after it shut behind her, a result of her back slamming against it as she slid down onto the floor, head in hands.

When Dezyim said nothing, Allan didn't say anything either. He wasn't the type of guy to press someone if they didn't feel like talking, so he stepped away to where Victoria was... going right into the bathroom. Sure, maybe she just really had to go, but then the thud of the door - he wasn't sure what to think, but a possibility could've been that she'd fainted, so he slowly walked over to it. "Hey, uh.. Victoria?"

The only sounds that met Allan were laboured breaths from the other side. Unpredictable in their intervals, she heaved as she swallowed the stale air, then rasped grotesquely when she expelled it. Curled up on the floor, it was like the dam had finally broken, tears streaming from her eyes in uncontrollable waves, even as she buried her face in her arms to save herself from the embarrassment. At some point, it might've sounded like she tried to speak, or at least address Allan, but only sputters and coughs were all she found.

Okay, so... she sounded like she was maybe having a panic attack, or just crying, or also, possibly, a seizure? And that last one really worried him, so he decided to try and say something else before trying anything. "Hey, I... I know that like- like, you've probably been through a lot, like, whatever happened, but you're, like... you're breathing right..? Like, not having a seizure or, um, choking or something like that?" Of course, if she was, there wouldn't be an answer, but... he just had to hope that she would reply with even just a single word.

TW: Nausea At first, nothing changed. It was impossible to tell if Victoria had even heard Allan through her sobs. Thirty seconds would pass. Then, a whole minute. Her silent cries had reduced to quiet whimpers; she didn't feel much better, not really, merely having run out, dehydrated from hours of work without a break. She tried again to speak, perhaps to shoo Allan away. It wasn't as though she deserved his pity, not after what she had done. He could, maybe, make out the simplest attempt at an 'I' or 'Go', before she faltered again. Then, a sharp groan and some scrambling, followed by unabashed retching. When Allan found her - if he tried the door once she left it free to open - he'd find her slumped over the rim of the toilet, red-eyed and drenched in her own tears. She was still sniffling and taking laboured breaths, but was otherwise limp and motionless. (edited)

Allan had counted a full minute, really, which seemed to be coincidental. The whole time he listened catefully; at least she seemed to still be breathing. And there was, maybe, some sort of attempting to speak, which... was oddly a good sign here. Well - it didn't get better, actually. He wasn't a medical officer by any means, but when he heard the next set of noises, for some reason, his brain just added them up into one big warning sign and he sighed. "Okay, I'm - I'm gonna open the door, Victoria," he said, a last-minute warning in case she was going to speak. And if not, he slowly slid open the door, trying to with one hand but it really was a two hand task, much to his dismay as he felt the blood drip down his face again - though he was able to put his sleeve to stop it again once he'd opened it. He hesitated once he saw her there, unsure whether to touch her shoulder or just let her have her space. "Hey, I.. just was worried about you," he said softly as he took a moment to wash off his hands. And then one went back to his nose, but at least he now had one free, not-bloody hand. Slowly, he sat down, trying to keep his torso as still as possible when he did but still wincing at the sharp pains that happened regardless. "You can, um... do you need some water? If you just want me gone, I can do that, too." There was no sharpness in it, no pity either, only the quiet voice of someone trying to keep her anchored - that was by no means anchored at all himself, even. "I can also, um-" he took his clean hand and carefully took some of her hair to hold it back behind her. "Just.. let me know, okay?"

Grimacing at the sounds of very obvious vomiting and heaving, and a general bad time for the Lieutenant, Ed concerned himself with the tray left in their cell. He stood up, moving to carry it onto an empty cot and placing it there, careful not to drop or spill anything. He narrowed his eyes, looking through what exactly was involved in their mandatory but not exactly pleasant shared sustenance. (edited)

It was a tray of food plates, looking like any other previous food tray they've got, both a comforting and discouraging fact. The one notable thing would be it's positioning on the cot - specifically, the way it seemed to... hover over it, just a little bit. Something achieved by either anti-gravity... or just the plain fact of having something underneath it.

"Water," Victoria croaked, fanning herself with her hands. She leaned back and brought both palms up to her face, eventually finding support against the wall again. Only when she was certain that she wasn't about to break out into uncontrollable bawling again - even worse, not alone, this time - she inched her hands down until fingers clutched at her cheeks. What. In the fuck. Did they do to Allan? She knew she'd seen blood earlier upon her entry, but did not fully grasp the extent of his injuries until now. And here she was, completely untouched, unable to do anything to help him, yet still having the gall to take his help. No, the only thing she could do in this layer of hell was hurt. "I..." she squeezed her eyes shut and folded forwards as though suppressing another wave of discomfort, "Go- I'm okay... I'll... get up. I can- they didn't hurt me..."

He narrowed his eyes at the way the tray hovered, giving it a gentle rattle to make sure he wasn’t just in the midst of any kind of hallucination. When it continued to act as if something anti-gravity were involved, he looked up towards the others, then back towards it. He picked it back up again, scouring the bottom of the tray’s surface for whatever it was that was causing this.

"Okay," Allan said to her request for water, standing up - as carefully as he could, forgetting how much worse standing up was than sitting down. He'd mostly ignored the pain from the first time he stood up, having been too caught up in trying to keep Dezyim from too much danger, but now there was nothing immediate to be focusing on, just the act of getting up and getting water. He drew in a little hiss when he made the movement to push himself up from the floor, but otherwise kept himself silent, not wanting to worry Victoria too bad, or make her think he was doing too much out of his way for her. Sure, she could spot the visible injuries all across his face: the bruises that mostly pooled underneath his eyes, the bump on his forehead, the blood - that the top half of his uniform and even some of his shorts had all over it. But she didn't need to know his ribs were broken, too. Hell, he himself didn't even know that until he felt it when he came back to consciousness. But she didn't need to know. And what did she mean by they didn't hurt her? "Clearly, they did. I'll be right back, just gotta get a cup." When he walked out, though, just before grabbing the cup, he looked at Ed rather curiously. "Uh.." he walked a little closer to the ensign, "you got like, a secret tray game in mind, or something?"

Something very inconspicuously was taped to the bottom part of the tray. Suspiciously package-shaped.

“No, it’s, uh…” He gestured to the tray, “Floating.” He detached the package with a smaller air of caution than he would have normally, turning it over in his hand as he pulled the tape from it. It didn’t look like a bomb, and didn’t act like a bomb (and he supposed it didn’t quack like one, to quote the old saying), so he had just gone by the assumption that it indeed wasn’t a bomb.

IT'S A BOMB YOU EXPLODED. Kidding. It felt solid, but didn't rattle, nor tick.

He hesitated, before taking the colour and shape of it. It certainly wasn’t an explosive, or anything actively dangerous, but the lack of a rattle told him that it was about the same size it appeared to be, so… what in the hell was it? He searched for some kind of button, a latch, maybe a loose panel, to pry open and take a peek at.

Paper wrapped, cheaply too. Not much quickly available and easily missable material in this horrid fucking place. "For your injuries. Keep your mouths shut and eyes open" was written on the other side in neat handwriting.

He held back a bit of a smile, thinking back to the slightly younger Tal Shiar agent (compared to the fascist grandparent) who’d dropped this off. “Hey, Allan!” He called, “Come take a look!”

Allan, who had been watching Ed look at the thing ever since he asked him about it, tilted his head as he walked closer, not bending down. "Go ahead, you can open it," he said, "try and go in as straight of a line as you can, actually. Could make a boat or two outta the wrapping, ah - Victoria might like that."

He nodded, giving him an off-handed finger gun as acknowledgment, as he carefully split the paper own the middle, only making a few shaky tears (to which he promptly cursed under his breath). When he finished, he held two piles— the medical supplies, and the folded paper. “Victoria’s gonna like both of these.” He muttered, “You wanna show her?”

"Sure, what's..." he looked aside from the paper for now, they could do whatever with that later, and looked at the actual contents of the package Ed had uncovered, "I mean, what's all.." he trailed off as he started going through the contents, sorting them in piles if there were multiples of anything.

Dezyim had followed the others to their meals, watching quietly as Edgar discovered the supplies. Damn. Okay. He felt like sinking straight into the floor never to be seen again. Not only had he disgraced himself in front of everyone, but the guard had also stuck his neck out to help them. He felt cruel and selfish in ways previously unknown to him. “Allan should probably be first to get medical supplies, right?” He definitely seemed like he was in the worst shape out of all of them.

He put his hands up and stepped back, letting the Lieutenant handle the supplies. “Up to him.” He mumbled, “I vote yes, as well, though. Most of us’ll last an extra few minutes.”

In the package were some painkillers, wet disinfectant wipes, and an osteoregenerator - albeit with a "half used" indicator glued to it. Likely swiped off of a table or fished out of the trash, when no one saw it...

While tempted to say 'I'm right here' while the ensigns talked about him next to him, he set aside the items, then looked back at the other two. "Okay, we've got some painkillers, wipes, osteoregenerator - half used, so... I mean, there's enough of these for all of us, I assume your head still hurts like hell," he handed one of the painkillers over to Dezyim, and then looked at Ed, "your shoulder feeling okay after a few days, or..?" (edited)

“Holy shit.” He let out a soft, surprised chuckle, “I’m— it’s fine. Bleeding’s stopped, only sore when I move it. I’ll be good.” He looked over the items again, rethinking what he’d assumed about the almost serpentine fellow who had dropped them off. Maybe he had good intentions. Or maybe he was just the messenger.

Dezyim pushed Allan’s hand away, shaking his head. “I’m fine really. You take them.” The truth was his head did hurt, but it was nothing he couldn’t handle. Edgar was probably lying about how much his injury hurt— stab wounds were no walk in the park. And Allan just… well he seemed significantly worse off, to say the least. It was better to use them and save any extras for later. Their wounds could get worse, and they may later wish that they still had some left over were they to use them all right now. “We probably should use those disinfectant wipes.” He lightly touched Edgar’s unstabbed shoulder before something occurred to him. “We should… also probably ask Victoria for real medical help.” He glanced back towards the bathroom.

Victoria had calmed, slightly, but barely moved. Although she had stopped crying and retching, her breathing was still laboured and her legs were still sprawled limp. Her eyes were slammed shut as she recounted what had just occurred over the last few hours, although with her face shielded by her hands from the bathroom's entrance, it wasn't something her cellmates could make out. (edited)

"You're - sorry, Dezyim, I - I don't know what kind of... I don't know what you're trying to do, but I... we need you to be okay," he said, taking a quick breath, "if not for the reason that we fucking care a hell of a lot about you, the simple reason that when we get out of here, we need you in the best shape that, I mean... that you can be in, so... if your head hurts, please, just - there's plenty, at least take one?" He said, then glanced towards the bathroom as well, shook his head and set the painkiller he had offered to Dezyim down nearby. "I'll just - I'll leave it there. Sorry." He nodded to Edgar, then grabbed the packet of wipes, tucking them under his shoulder so that he could grab the cup for Victoria with his free hand. After filling the cup with water, he sat down next to Victoria again, praying and hoping and praying that he didn't spill it, since he wasn't able to brace himself against the wall as he sat down. So it was a very slow, calculated movement as he bent his knees down, and then folded his legs underneath him. All in all, a successful effort - the cup only shook a little, and he only winced, like, once. "Here," he said to Victoria as he held the water cup out to her, "water. Also, um.. we got some supplies. Some painkillers and wipes and uh, a half-charged osteoregenerator. If you need any of those, I, um- dunno what they did to you, but let me know."

He returned the nod, watching him walk off as he turned towards Dezyim. “Okay, you should definitely get one of these. I can tell you’re not doing so hot, Dez.”

Dezyim worked through the conversation backwards. When Edgar called him Dez, he leaned forward incredulously. “Dez? I-” He didn’t know how to feel about a nickname. He’d never been called a nickname before. Wait, what exactly did Edgar mean about being able to tell he wasn’t doing well? Did he look bad? He pulled back and ran a hand through his hair. He hadn’t exactly been paying much attention to how he looked recently, but did he really look that rough? “I don’t…” And then he processed what Allan had said about caring about him. He stared at the painkiller where he’d left it. They cared about him. He brought his hand down from his hair to rest gently where his heart was. “Oh.” His voice was soft. He stared at it for another beat before picking up the painkiller and dry-swallowed it.

“If you need anything else, let me know. Or— any of us, really, but still.” Ed offered a smile, giving him a nudge with his elbow.

Victoria noticed that Allan was approaching again and turned to face away, even with her hands covering herself still. But she heard the sound of water being dispensed, and some part of her deemed herself too dehydrated to protest, despite all the shame she would no doubt soon feel. She jerked her head to meet Allan's gaze, then quickly shied away her gaze to look down at the cup he held. Gasping for air, she raised her arms, first going for the cup, but then pausing and detouring to wrangle her hair behind her ears. Only then would she grasp for the cup, a vice grip squeezing around its rim as she took it from Allan and drank it all in one go, spilling some down her chin in the process. "Thank-" she coughed, "-you." With that, she placed the cup on the ground and leaned back against the wall, tired and glazed-over eyes staring up at Allan, stifling her coughing but just barely. "I don't- they didn't do anything," she said, at a level hardly above a whisper, "you should... I dunno- take the painkillers... but I.. I can't help you."

Allan smiled just slightly, though it was near impossible to see with the sleeve still held up to his face. He looked down at the cup, then back up at the sink. "You want another..?" It was a genuine question, and one that he asked without realizing that he hadn't had water himself. "It's okay if you can't help, I've, uh - worked on an osteoregenerator before, I should be able to use it, I think," key word was 'I think', because working on the technology inside it was way different than knowing how it was used. "I, um - you know, the broken nose can last, uh. A little longer, it's okay." No mention of the ribs, again. He didn't need her to know that yet. "You sure you're okay, though, like - even if it's just a bit of a headache, there's um, enough for everyone to take one, so.."

"No, no," Victoria lied, still hoarse, dabbing her face with the back of her hand and looking down at the cup again. So selfish she was that she'd chosen to put herself over Allan's bloodied self, she told herself, hugging her knees to her chest as she did. She wished her fellow medical officers were here - admittedly, she wasn't sure if she could trust herself, not after all that - it wasn't Allan's fault she was this way, all he or any of her cellmates have tried to do was help her. Moving her palms up into her own view, shaking as they were, she clenched her fists in an attempt to steady them, finding Allan again as she did so. "Fuck," she said, "what... did they do to you?" She paused to grimace. "Show me?"

Allan blinked at her, hearing her hoarse voice, and he simply raised himself just enough so his arm could reach the sink and fill up the water cup again. Too much effort to get up and sit back down all over again. Once he'd filled it, he set it down on the ground next to Victoria, silent. When she asked what 'they' did to him, and to show her, he sighed. "Um.. to be honest, I don't know all of it," he said, his own voice still hoarse as well, "I haven't, um.. thought too much about it. He uh, well, broke my nose first, and then I thought I was gonna die when he slammed my head into the door, but.." he gestured with his free hand to the bump on his head from that encounter, "I don't.. actually remember what happened after that." Why was he avoiding telling her..? He didn't want to worry her too much, he supposed. There was already.. so much going on.

The cup barely touched the ground before she scooped it up and downed it in the same, panicked fashion. She had noticed his voice, and moved to offer what remained in the cup, only to notice halfway that there was barely any water left. Ugh- couldn't even do that right. Her brows lowered, as did her jaw, when Allan explained. She should've been here, at least to help stabilise him when he returned, not... where she had ended up instead. Guilt, in its most primordial state, roiled again within her stomach. "He what-" she mouthed in silence. Then with a little bit of whatever she could summon, and with another, disgraced downwards look, she continued, "my hands won't stop shaking, Allan. I wish I could fix you up, I.. wish I could fix you all. But I don't know if I can. I don't know how much more of this we can take."

"You don't have to, it's okay," Allan blinked a few times, the tears starting to come back - he really wished he wasn't so easy to cry sometimes. It was a blessing when he needed it; a curse when he didn't. "It's okay, Victoria. Really." He wasn't sure what else to say. Was there really much more? "I mean.. well. We'll be okay. And, um.." he paused, sniffing and then coughing because oh boy, that was not a good idea, "whenever, um - whenever my nose stops fuckin' bleeding, I can give you a hug, if you... if you want one."

Striding towards the two superior officers in bathroom with the air of a child going to tell their parents they had just thrown up, Ed held one of the painkillers in his palm. He knocked on the door frame, holding out the medication. “Sorry to, uh… interrupt.” He muttered, deciding at the last minute to go for the nickname’d assigned her with little to no objections, “Tori, if you need anything, we’ve got medical shit. And… I’m— we’re glad you’re back.”

She nodded at Allan's words, and again at his offer. Would they, though? Victoria asked herself. The next time their jailers came for her and put her to work... she wouldn't be back - that she knew for certain. Perhaps she might have even told Allan that, but before she could even ponder the ramifications of that, there was a knock on the door frame. Her spine shot straight up, and her grip around her knees tightened in the several moments between the sound and realising it hadn't been the main door to their cell that had been knocked on. She closed her eyes and managed to relax, barely, then looked past Allan to see who had come for them. "Yeah- yeah, we'll be okay," Victoria said, faking enthusiasm where it had no merit. "Thanks... guys," she began, taking a moment to rub her eyes to focus on what Ed was holding out, and nudging her chin upwards towards Allan, "that the painkiller? You should take that.. you know, if you haven't.. already." Goodness, they were still in the bathroom, weren't they? Victoria sighed loudly, and braced herself to stand.

As Victoria et al. prepared to leavee the bathroom, the door to the cell opened, revealing a Havra that looked like they'd been crying, and her two silent guards, who simply unlocked her cuffs and disappeared without a word.

When Allan, instinctively, threw his head back to look up at Ed, he grimaced at the instant combination of senses that told him not to do that, dropping his chin forward again with a quick cough. A rough breath escaped him, but he looked up at Ed next without actually tilting his head up this time. "I.. should, yeah," he said, almost embarrassed at the fact that he hadn't already. He'd told Ed and Dezyim and Victoria to, but yet, he'd forgotten to himself. Woops. When the door to the cell opened, he was distracted from that again, though, looking past Ed to Havra as they were put back into the cell. "Havra, hey," he said, though his voice might have been a bit too hoarse, a bit too quiet to hear clearly, "are y- do you, um.." fuck, what was he trying to say..? "We have, um.. painkillers, and stuff, if you, um. Need it." Fuck, he really couldn't form a sentence, could he?

The one thing that seemed to genuinely cheer Victoria up was that Havra returned in one piece. That left each of her cellmates accounted for. As she placed an arm against the wall - and later, the front edge of Dezyim's cot - to brace herself for the walk back to her bed, rejecting any attempts to help her, she waved weakly at Havra with her free hand. She had tried to form words, too, of course, but nothing came of that effort. She would most definitely need a turn in the sonic shower later; but for now, Victoria threw herself, quite literally, into her cot where she curled up again, sat with back against the wall, trying her best to keep her tears from restarting.

Havra stood like a statue where they had been brought to. Allan's voice did register, but none of what he said made sense to them at first. After too long of leaving the question unanswered they sighed. "They did not hurt me, safe the medication for yourself. I can not imagine they gave you much." Their voice was quiet and monotone. Really they had not expected Allan would be given any medication, but they were to numb to be surprised. They nodded at Victoria's wave and looked at their cot, but instead of walking over they let themselves drop to the floor where they stood.

Allan blinked at her for a moment, then gave a small, tired nod. "Okay," he said, "if they didn't hurt you, that's..." he sighed, shifting a little where he sat, trying to ease whatever was going on with him. She was right; he really did need to take it himself. "That's good. I just figured, after..." He wasn't sure where he was going. Again. The words trailed off into a thin breath, and he wiped at his nose with the back of his wrist. He let out something halfway between a sigh and a cough, wincing at the taste of blood in his mouth before he spoke again. "Just... let me know if you need a hand up, okay..?" It was a tired offer that he knew he wasn't capable of, but he said it anyways, as if he was.

"Like I said I'm not hurt." Well, their knees would probably bruise, but that wouldn't stop them from getting up, if they found the will to stand up that was. For a while they stared into nothingness, before they decided to do something that they probably would regret later. "Did you know I had a son? He died 102 days before he turned three." Of course Allan did not know, it wasn't even in their file.

Allan nodded slowly when Havra said they weren't hurt again. That was good to know. He looked away when he realized they were staring straight ahead, not wanting to make them any more uncomfortable than they already seemed. For all that it was, he wanted this metal room to be the most comfortable one that they knew in this damned place. He wasn't sure how to respond when they decided to share that fact about their family. He blinked a few times, holding his head with his free hand as he tried to think of how to even respond to that. In normal situations, he felt like he was decent at listening to people, at comforting them, at hearing them out - but right now he felt like he was decent at absolute shit, including staying conscious. "I... didn't know," he said after a moment, "I... I can't imagine, um... sorry, you can... um, did you want to ... talk about it? I don't have to.. say anything, I can just, um," he shifted some so that his back was against the wall while he was sitting down, which helped... a little, "be here."

"He would have turned eleven this year." Havra laughed, not because they thought it funny but because it was absurd. They could not even begin to imagine what he might have looked like. They barely remembered what he had looked like before he had been in the hospital. There were pictures, but first they couldn't stand looking at them and then they had left them on Rator where they had never returned to again. Khaiell might have had some, but they had not asked. They had thought perhaps they had reached the point where the tears would stop, but they began to silently fall again, because the only face they remembered of the child was what he had looked like dying. "It is... I... have you ever waited for someone to die?"

Allan's mouth opened, then closed again. Had he? No, he hadn't. The death he'd experienced was of someone who was gone in the blink of an eye, as suddenly as could possibly happen. He squeezed his eyes shut, before opening them when he realized that shutting them just prompted his mind to see the colors of an explosion in the middle of dark space even moreso. So he stared at the blank wall across from him, past Havra. He tried to consider if there was anything else he could add to this, but he just had to answer simply. "No," the word came out of him eventually, and he let his hand fall from his face for a moment. He looked down, at his own hands, smudged with blood. In the back of his mind, it almost looked green. "I, um... haven't."

"It is..." They took a shaking breath. "It's a little bit like staying here... not really, but... you're helpless. There's nothing you would not do to help, but at some point you realize all you can do is wait. It's painful hoping when you know there is no hope, but you must do it all the same. Sooner or later there comes a moment when you wish for it to be over, one way or another and then you hate yourself forever for the thought." When he had died they had wondered if those thoughts had doomed him. Sometimes they had thought... They shook their head. "I'm sorry."

The words landed heavy in the fog that was Allan's brain right now. The way Havra compared it to being here, even with the added on 'not really', it... still sunk in. He was helpless. All he can do is wait. Those were truths, weren't they? He didn't want to think about it. Not in regards to their situation, not in regards to Saren, and not in regards to anybody else here right now. But they were right. Of course they were, hadn't he spent his entire life being naive..? "You don't have to be sorry, it's okay," he spoke softly, as if speaking any louder would force him to be interrupted by some sort of cough or sob. "I, um.. you shouldn't blame yourself for it. Like you said, it's... it was all you could do."

They smiled, thought once again there was no joy behind it. "Oh I know. It has been over eight years, I've been told thousands of times that it wasn't my fault. It doesn't really help." Sometimes they wondered if Khaiell still thought about it as much as they did, if he was still alive of course, which was foolish because she knew he would. "I don't think I've ever been as happy as I was when he was born. It was naive of corse, the entire situation was a mess, but I was happy pretending."

Allan listened, his brows furrowed together as he kept his gaze down on his hands. It seemed like the nosebleed had stopped for now, at least. He was quiet for a moment, because he knew there wasn’t anything he could say that would make eight years of grief lighter, and the fog in his head made the words even harder to find. "Yeah, sorry," he mumbled, voice low, and ended up coughing before he spoke again. "I um, I.. get that, actually." Yeah, no, he did get that. No matter how many people told him it wasn't his fault... it only took one person who did to make him feel it all over again. He was going to tell her that it wasn't naive, but who was he to know the definition of the word? He tried to think of anything else, any sort of thing that might keep the conversation going. They would tell him if he was being too much, right? He only hoped that was the case. "It's... still a good memory, even if it wasn't perfect," he spoke a little more loudly, just so she could hear him above his quiet mumbles, "like, um.. you were happy at the time, so it still counts, you know? Like, um.. the whole moment, I assume, like - what'd you name him..?" That was always a highlight of his own parents' story, at least. But then again, his name was... well, his name.

Havra gave him a small sad smile when he said that he understood, this time it almost seemed real. Knowing what they knew now, almost all of their once happy memories were overshadowed by something sad, the last two times their life had fallen apart they had just done their bast to make new memories, so they had assumed this time would be the same. It wasn't. Perhaps if Khaiell had died they might have been able to do that. Instead they had left everything they had every known. Romulus had been history for decades and yet betraying her people had felt like it had lost to them in its entirety once more. They shook their head. "Saren, after my mother in law's father. Mostly because I was looking for goodwill, but my husband reassured me at the time that his grandfather was not a bad man to be named after."

Allan had started to think that he was coming back to speaking normally, actually, when he had asked her that question. That he'd successfully diverted his thoughts away from his own situations, and back to theirs. But when they said their son's name, his gaze instantly flicked back down away from them again. Saren. He was suddenly more aware of the way his body was shivering and the way his heart had started to beat faster. He bit his lip, trying to reason the thoughts away. Saren was common enough of a name. He'd met Havra before, on a previous mission on Tora Lambda VI. There was no way they were some secret Tal Shiar agent trying to mess with him, right? They sounded genuine. This was a real, traumatic experience they were venting to him about, and he couldn't keep himself together for more than a few minutes of it. So much for being there for them. He pulled his knees tight to his chest, his other hand pressing against his forehead as if that would help any of the pain. "Havra, I-" he wanted to say so much to them. But he couldn't. Once he had spoken anything at all, it was over. The tears were streaming down his face already, meeting with the blood on his lips. He was barely able to manage just a few words after that. "Th-thanks, for, um.. s-shar... um... that," Thanks for sharing that, he meant. But he could feel every physical symptom of a panic attack coming into his system right now, and he had to get something out, quickly, "I'm sorry, it's - it's not, it's not you, I.." 'I'm a fucking wreck,' was probably what needed to follow after that. divider

15:57

The timing was too cruel, too much. The moment they said that name, his mind had dragged him right back to that office. Killed through his own sheer negligence, was what the man had said. It was all twisting into one unbearable thought - he's going to lose his Saren, too. But it'd actually be his fault, and there was nothing he could do. Just wait. Absolutely fucking helpless. "I'm.. sorry," he muttered in between his shaky, shallow breaths and sobs. "I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I.." He felt so dizzy, now, murmuring more apologies as his pulse was pounding in his head, shutting his eyes, and he had enough sense in him to find the floor, curling up to face the wall, ignoring the sharp pain in his ribs when he did that. His hands felt colder and more numb than they should have. He had to focus on breathing, which was hard. Unfortunately, the voices that were screaming at him in his head were far louder than his own sense of self-preservation. He couldn’t stop trembling no matter how hard he tried. He couldn't stop the way every sob tore through his ribs like glass, despite feeling the urge to flee, to escape this somehow, to go and hide himself in the bathroom. It was intensely embarrassing - sobbing like a child, a boy, curled up on the floor in front of five other people, bloody and bruised. But he felt like he was dying physically, and the emotional weight seemed to further press him to the floor. There was nothing he could do. About anything, it seemed.

It took them longer than they liked to react. What had they said that could have possibly caused this? There had to be something they were not aware of. Havra eventually got up and walked up to Allan though they kept some distance to make sure he would not feel trapped... well any more trapped than they already were in this cell. Looking around the room they tried to catch someone else's eyes to request assistance. "Hey there Lieutenant, can you try to breath slowly?" It had been some time since they had witnessed a panic attack that wasn't their own. In an attempt to demonstrate they sat down on the floor again and proceeded to take slow breaths themselves, which was a good idea anyway. After a while they spoke again. "I did not mean to... You know, sometimes hoping in situations that seem hopeless does pay off, that is why you have to keep doing it. It's painful, but refusing to play out the game because you think you will loose is not a good strategy."

Not even Tavek knew how much time has gone by. His internal clock was fried, and he hadn’t even had an accurate track on it before then. Still, enough had gone by that his body forced him awake- just to ensure that it still -could- run a full startup. It didn’t know why this had happened. For all his body knew, another pulse of electricity could run through him and kill him for good at any moment. He took the time awake to run diagnostics. 9% battery. 42% of systems nonfunctional (some intentionally turned off, so it wasn’t as bad). 42% of systems running at reduced capacity. Damage alarms blared in his head until he turned them off. He couldn’t do anything about them anyway. He didn’t speak, or anything. He just looked out at everyone. His brain fired, choosing to play back that.. that interrogation. He had chosen Starfleet, hadn’t he? He’d willingly ~~handed over his leash to them~~ chosen to play by their rules, hadn’t he? ~~Had his leash ever been in his own hands?~~ Maybe he was just a dog after all. And his teeth had been ripped out so he couldn’t even bite like one.

The door slid open, and in walked Vici, ponytail swinging behind them happily as they entered. "Hello, my favourite little doom-and-gloomers. I have some absolutely wonderful news for you all!" They clapped once to get everyone's attention. "I'm here on behalf of your beloved First Officer, Commander Tarsek V'hgai, who has personally elected to extend your stay at our lovely little inn... inn-definitely! Get it? That one should make sense in Federation Language, too." They seemed quite proud of the joke.

Ed bit his tongue, his fists squeezing into balls and loosening periodically from where he sat at the cot. He wasn’t surprised, after all, the Tal Shiar had proven themselves to be shit hosts. “Thanks.” He whispered beneath his breath, barely audible from where he sat.

Allan didn't hear Havra, at first. Everything was too loud in his own ears. The pulse, the sobbing, the breathing, the voices - it was all so, so loud, and it drowned out the intelligence officer's voice like a wave. At least, he didn't hear the first time that they spoke. The second time, he did hear just a little, something about hoping, something about doing it, something about a game... but it was all flowing together in his head. Being twisted into things they hadn't said. Going back to the thoughts that things were hopeless, he couldn't do shit, there was nothing to keep doing. There was no game to play; they were the spectators. Speaking of spectating, then. Body still facing the wall, he quickly pushed himself up to sit up and turn his shoulders towards the door when he heard it slide open, barely catching his breath when he did that. He sputtered out a cough as he listened to the words. Tarsek... personally elected to extend... his eyes squinted, red and wet as fuck, but he did, at least, want to try and understand what this meant, it seemed... important. "W.. what?" A simple question. (edited)

Speak of the absolute fucking Devil. Speak of the person who would live in Tavek’s nightmares if he actually could dream. Speak of the person who fried his insides like a very metallic piece of chicken. His eyes widened in the only sign of panic he could still show- please, not again, he could not take another round of that, he would die for certain. Then, the news. He almost didn’t want to believe it. An indefinite stay would mean a death sentence for him. If his battery didn’t die and turn him off forever, going long enough without repairs would kill him anyway. And anyway.. it would mean even more torture. But what else could he expect? It was the Tal Shiar. But.. he had to admit.. he’d liked Tarsek. In his mind, he didn’t want to think that Tarsek would sentence them all to death. Did their lives mean less than whatever Tarsek had sacrificed them for? He stared down into his lap, defeated. He didn’t want to die at 15. “What a lovely bit of news.” He muttered.

Victoria had been watching the scenes unfold before her with a certain helplessness rooted in her mind, not even having taken the liberty to wrap herself in her blanket over the last few minutes. The shivering? Be it from the cold, or remnants of her very own breakdown, or a little bit of either, she couldn't quite tell, not that it mattered anyway. She didn't even turn her head when the doors opened, and the pink-haired weirdo, who had come for Tavek days ago, entered. The joy in which they spoke scared her, admittedly, in a way even the scientists hadn't. Yet, she could only sigh and shoo Vici away with her hand. "As if they were gonna let us go, anyway," Victoria scoffed weakly at the idea.

Dezyim turned, still standing at Allan’s cot where the supplies had been handed out. He made no move to hide them; most of them had been dispersed anyway, and errent movement would attract too much attention. So he stood motionless, listening to Vici talk. He was not for a second convinced Tarsek had truly said that. No, it was more likely they were lying or twisting his words or taking them out of context. Regardless, they never would have been let go even if Tarsek had said that. Victoria voiced his thoughts almost as soon as they crossed his mind, so his mouth just tightened into a hard line as he watched them speak. (edited)

"Well, you didn't hear this from me, but the Commander was looking into making the arrangements, if the intel provided were to be accurate, of course. However, no intel, no freedom! That's the trade, and he chose not to take it. Vulcans, am I right? That lack of self-preservation... I don't know how they've survived so long." Beyond Vici's words, there was no way to verify the statements of course, so they'd have to make the choice of whether to believe him or not. However... "You'd know about that trade, wouldn't you, mister assistant chief engineer? Although, you got on his nerves well before you got the chance to actually finish trading, so I guess you'll never know what would have happened."

"Yeah, yeah, leave him alone. Save it, pinky, we all believe you," Victoria said, nothing if not patronising and annoyed, with very apparent exhaustion over their entire spiel, waving them off again with slightly more enthusiasm behind her hand.

Tavek’s head snapped over to Allan next. He couldn’t have. Allan was his friend, right? He wouldn’t have sold them all out knowing they’d all die, right? Allan wouldn’t have done this to him, to all of them. But… Allan -was- senior staff. Allan knew things they didn’t. Intel they didn’t have. He didn’t know if Allan could be trusted anymore. He didn’t know if anyone could be trusted anymore. In the end, that person was right. The Federation had killed his kind before. They could do it again. “Allan.. you didn’t do anything, right? You wouldn’t have done that, please tell me you didn’t do that.”

Shit, that couldn’t be right. Ed turned towards Tavek, brow pinched in a combination of confusion and utter horror. That couldn’t have been true, it was the Tal Shiar pulling their usual bullshit. Is that what had gone on while Allan was away? Would Allan have sold them out, given the chance?

"You don't have to believe me, but I always tell the truth. Ask Tavek, he knows alllllll about it." Vici sank back through the doorway, waving as the door started closing. "I just came to share the good news! Byebye!"

“Hey! You told me you’d kill me if I said it, no fair!” He called back as Vici sank through the doorway, caught off guard by the mention of that conversation. Like come on, he couldn’t spill any tea if he’d be immediately killed for it, no fair. His eyes settled back on Allan after Vici left, more hopeless-looking than anything.

Dezyim looked up, processing what Tavek had said. He turned around to make direct eye contact with him. As soon as he heard the door close, he spoke. “All of this and you still don’t trust Allan? And you’d raise paranoia in everyone else? We’re all you have right now.” His voice was authoritative, more than it had seemed like he could muster. In fact, it didn’t seem like he was thinking of Tavek as ranking higher than him at all— more like he was seconds away from telling him to shut up.

“I’m the only one guaranteed to die no matter what anyone does to us here if I stay more than a couple more days! I am broken and falling apart and there is no way to fix me, forgive me if I’m not exactly in my right mind here!” He said, almost every other word glitched to the point of being hard to understand, both from emotion and from general system failures. He sunk against the wall, bringing up his knees close to his chest in a kind of ball, more a defensive pose than anything.

Feeling like his tongue would break clean off if he bit it any longer, he let out a sharp exhale, eyes darting around. “What the fuck is going on?!” He blurted out, “We’re stuck here longer, what the fuck happened?” He took a second after the outburst to collect himself, and sat back down, folding his arms in his lap like he hadn’t just yelled. He didn’t expect a response, but if he kept that in much longer he was sure he’d hit someone.

Allan bit his lip, slowly turning around completely so that he wasn't twisting his torso in a way that was so, so bad for him. He stared straight ahead at Vici as they spoke to him, not sure what to say. Fuck. And just when he'd been losing it about that whole interaction, it was coming back. But the others in the cell were now all looking at him, and Victoria, Victoria... ugh, he didn't feel like he deserved what she said, but somewhere in his brain, he appreciated it. When Tavek asked him if he did anything was when he realized he was biting his lip so hard it was bleeding. God, he hoped he wasn't losing too much blood. It seemed like a lot, it seemed like a lot, this whole situation was... a lot. Would he have done it? He was so scared, and he wasn't sure... if... "Um-" He looked guilty. It was just a small noise that got out of him, and he wiped off his mouth with his bloody sleeve as he looked at Dezyim when he spoke. Oh. He wasn't sure how to process that. He wasn't sure how to go through any of this, to be honest. And then Ed spoke again, and, and... "I - listen, I.. okay, um, I.." There was no way he could finish a sentence right now. He was an engineer who couldn't get words out of his mouth without stumbling, after all. That's what Irok had said, right..?

"All of you stop this right now, this is exactly what they want. The Ensign is right, giving away intel in exchange for our freedom is a bad deal... I for one would rather my life did not depend on the sense of honour of these people. What exactly is stopping them from killing us if they have what they want? As long as they think we have something worth keeping us alive they are less likely to kill us." Well not Havra, they said the had everything they wanted from them, but the others did not need to know that. "Plus you never know what intel was requested. If any of you would like to doom someone else to torture or death, let me know now so I can report and avoid you in the future."

Dezyim turned to Edgar, looking at him blankly. “Did you really believe they were going to let us out of here? If they got information out of any one of us,they then would have slaughtered us where we stood. They can’t take the risk of us going free. We were dead as soon as they captured us. The only thing that could have changed was if we gave information and how long they kept us alive.” Dezyim spoke as if they were already dead. Maybe they were in his head. “I would rather be dead and silent than dead and a traitor.” Maybe that was not entirely true— he had regretted joining the Federation more than a few times since their capture. But he was spiteful, and was certainly not going to give the Tal Shiar what they wanted. Not that he knew anything, anyway.

“No— I know, but—“ He stammered, shrinking back slightly. He knew Dez had a point, but he wanted to cling to the stubbornness he was used to, even for a short while, “Look, I was holding onto some kind of hope that they’d let us out of here. Sue me.” (edited)

"What she said," Victoria agreed, with a nod to Havra. Then, she turned to Tavek. "Look, I'm not gonna sit here and tell you you're wrong," she said, sniffling, similarly curled up. At some point, she'd found the wherewithal to actually pull her blanket over her shoulders again. That, plus the metaphorically rising temperature in the room, seemed to give her just the slightest bit of a second wind. "No-one's asking you to be okay with... you know. But like it or not, we all joined up to do the job for a reason. This is the job. Try to remember your reason, and hold onto it." She parted her lips as she regarded the mayhem occurring in the rest of the room, sympathetic, red, and tired eyes meeting every face around her. "Whatever we're keeping from them, I'm sure it's saving real lives out there," she said, "saving lives is what I joined up for... it's what I hoped I'd die doing. Not like this, but... heh." She allowed a macabre chuckle. "Us. Here. Now," she paused to search for words, "it doesn't really feel like it... but this is what the Fleet's about, isn't it? Even if Allan, or the Commander gave them what they wanted, what's the point of going home? I wouldn't be able to look myself in the mirror- would you?" It was only when she finished that she realised that was probably her reality now, regardless.

Everyone was saying more words now. More words were harder to understand. But he got most of it, he thought. Havra and Dezyim were right, probably. If he had given up the information to Irok, there were no guarantees. Even if there were... "Yeah, um.. that." Not that he had any room to speak. Not that he had anything to say at all, unless asked. If he was asked, he'd answer, but he couldn't say much more now. Even as he listened to Victoria, he just nodded. He leaned his back against the wall again, taking slow, shallow breaths. Fuck, he needed to get up and get that painkiller. Or the osteoregenerator. Or hell, some fucking water. Only took standing up physically or standing up emotionally and asking someone for help.

He didn’t respond. His brain kept calling up memories unbidden, as if his pitiful fifteen years of life were flashing before his eyes. His poor cat would miss him, and did his remaining friends even want that responsibility of caring for Azuki long-term anyway? Fuck, even his creator would probably miss him, even if he didn’t exactly like the man. The only reason he’d come to Starfleet was because he’d felt lost and wanted to feel useful for something. Now he was going to die just as lost and useless as the day he’d joined. In the end, even in a room full of people, he was going to die alone now. Surely these people didn’t like him much now after he’d said the things he’d just said. “I’m sorry.” He said before his voice broke off, not knowing what else to say.

"If we are getting out of here it will be because someone comes for us, I can not claim that I think it is likely... but I think directing your hopes towards that is more realistic." Havra was not entirely certain they themselves had much trust in this, but it was the most likely way to keep the people here from an all out fight, something they did not care for in the slightest. "Let's focus on the moment? We have hurt people. You said there was medical supply?" They still did not understand why they had been given that, but if it was here not using it would be foolish.

He heard his brother’s words in his mind, feeling his face warm with embarrassment. He had much better impulse control than he used to, and he remembered how Kore used to say ‘Edgar, it’s time to shut up.’ Whenever he neared the point of truly getting himself punched in the face. He missed his brother, despite everything. Maybe he’d call him after all this was over. He nodded, pointing towards the sorted piles that he had been semi-guarding. “We’ve got enough painkillers for everyone, an osteo-thingy, wet wipes, stuff like that,” He stepped back to allow Havra a good view. (edited)

"That's..." Havra blinked repeatedly. Those, if they were genuine, were surprisingly decent medical supplies. Furrowing their brows they made their way over to the supplies to inspect them. "And these are real? That's... odd.... Right, who is physically injured? Any broken bones besides the Lieutenant?" They took one of the painkillers and brought it to Allan.

Victoria had tried her best for her friends. She still held onto hope that the fleet was coming for them, but even if not, she hadn’t wanted to go out with everyone having hands around one another’s throats. So, she was glad, at least, that that heat had simmered away for the moment. Medical supplies. Right. She swung her body, slowly, until her foot felt the floor panels. Naturally, she’d test the strength in both legs for a few seconds before finally rising and going to inspect what they had. She had let her friends, bruised, battered, and stabbed, wait for her bout of self-deprecation to cease for long enough. And yeah, she did want to die saving people, so as unsure as she was about whether or not she still could, she still had to try and keep going. “Okay,” she took the osteoregenerator in hand and sat on the edge of her bed between it and Allan’s, swinging her head around to see if anyone else responded to Havra, the instrument being nervously toyed with between her fingers. “Allan,” she addressed with a sigh, “what did he break?”

Allan was avoiding at looking at anybody now. It felt like the past.. well, it hadn't been long since he got pulled into the Commander's office, had that whole interaction, then been deposited off here, and had Victoria come back, talk to her, then Havra came back, and he lost his stupid fucking mind, if he even had one to begin with, and then the pink-haired ensign had come in, to tell them .. well, and now they were here. Still, when Havra came over to him and brought him the painkiller, he took it almost immediately. "Thanks," he gave them his best attempt at a small smile. That painkiller would hopefully help, at the very least, his headache, if not a lot of his other pains right now. He looked across the room at Victoria when she asked him that question, realizing that he had to answer it. But he wasn't going to shout across the room, so he hoped she could just hear him when he spoke at the quiet voice that his lungs allowed at the moment. "Like I said before, I... don't exactly remember what happened after I was out, but.. I mean, I think it's got to be, at least, like.." Why did he feel so embarrassed to talk about his injuries? About all of this? "Like, I mean, I think at least a few of my ribs are broken, all kind of.. in the same area?"

Once Allan had taken the painkiller Havra sat down on the floor again. "I don't understand... they have ways to gather information that does not require you to be forthcoming or honest... why would they pretend they would exchange our freedom for information when they could have just read your mind? Perhaps their Commander does not trust his subordinates with the intel he was asking for... or they do not care about it as much as they would have us think... I do not think you should talk about what he wanted here either by the way." They were confused and worried about their own questioning, angry too because none of the others had their mind invaded the way they had, but mostly concerned. Whether or not they cared for Khaiell should have been entirely irrelevant, they could have asked them so much more, about their current work, about... well what they suspected Allan had been asked. There had to be something they were missing. The uncertainty was infuriating and they were certain they had known it would be, so really maybe they shouldn't waste thoughts on it, but they could not help their mind running away with the wildest scenarios. They let their head fall back against the wall and sighed. "I don't know enough to make sense of anything." (edited)

She nodded and slowly made her way to where Allan sat, supporting herself on the way there against the cots and, at one point, a hand briefly on the top of Havra's head, just so she could make sure she didn't trip as she passed by where Havra sat. She dropped herself down behind and slightly off to Allan's side, clicking the regenerator on. "Ugh," her arms were still shaking slightly, "this won't be the best job you've ever seen, but- better than nothing? Don't move." With that, she shut up, needing entirely too much focus to feel normal about what really was a procedure she'd done hundreds if not thousands of times prior, and got to work.

"Better than I could do, I'm sure," Allan said, not sure how much work the device itself did, but sure that a medical professional knew how to use it better than he did. "Just, um... it's only half-charged, so maybe... just my ribs..? If that's not too much, I think - I mean, that's the most important thing. It'll have me, um.." almost as if in demonstration, he took a slow, but shallow breath, "breathing a lot better." And then he stayed still, letting her do her thing.

"Only if you're sure," Victoria said, pausing her work to do so, "but if nobody else has broken bones-" She glanced up to look around the room, her words addressed to everyone. "-no point being a hero. Let me know." Resuming her work in silence, Allan's ribs would soon be back to more or less where they were before.

And with Allan's ribs finally in better shape, the time could pass a little more comfortably, until finally, unbeknownst to everyone there, the dawn of the final day broke.

The first thing Allan had done once Victoria healed his ribs was taking one big, deep breath, as if he'd forgotten what that was like. It was refreshing, really, being able to breath in and out like this (through his mouth, but still) without it hurting like hell, and it was also nice to just - stand up. He felt a little dizzy when he did, supposing that was due to the concussion, but there was no intense pain anymore, thanks to the healed ribs and painkillers. He got up, got some water, and then probably laid down in his cot and eventually, fell asleep. And so yeah, the time passed more comfortably, physically. Right now, though, he'd been sitting up on his cot, back against the wall as he thought about what Havra had said a while back. He got up then, going to .. wherever she was, to talk with her. "Hey, um - when you said they.. had ways of getting information out of you, like - you said mind reading or something..?"

After some time Havra too had returned to her cot, where she was also sitting now. With the slightly ripped up banket wrapped around her shoulders she was sitting cross-legged at the upper end of the cot. She had attempted to sleep and failed miserably, too many thoughts running through her head that she could not bring herself to ignore. When Allan approached her she was in the process of slowly absentmindedly detangling her hair with her fingers while staring into nothingness somewhere close to the entrance to their cell. She looked up when he addressed her, a slight frown on her face before she remembered that she might have said something about that earlier. "They have at least one Reman, who as I am sure you know is capable of telepathy, he was there when they brought you to the Commander? I was wondering why they did not just read your mind for the information they were looking for. They didn't did they? Otherwise they would not be making so much of a fuss that you did not tell them, unless that's part of their plan... but surely at some point a plan's complexity outweighs its effectiveness?" (edited)

When Havra shared the details, he nodded. "Yeah, I... I'm not sure. I mean, I'm sure that - pretty sure, at least, that there wasn't anyone else in the room with me besides the Commander. Not sure why they wouldn't just have read it, yeah.. same with Tarsek," he said, drawing the blanket a little more around his shoulders - he'd thankfully been able to wash his uniform and the blanket as well - the uniform still smelled like blood, unfortunately, but at least it didn't look it. But still, he was pretty cold, so he was sort of wearing it like a poncho. "I guess I'm, um..." he tried finding nicer words, because sure, he could call himself not smart enough to understand, but that would mean the same about Havra, wouldn't it? And he certainly didn't think they weren't smart by any means. "It's hard to understand, yeah."

Seated on his cot with the blanket rolled up in his arms to mimic a pillow to hold onto, Ed watched and listened, although his attention was somewhat divided between the cell’s happenings and the affairs in his own mind. How many hours had it been? How many days? Were they being searched for? He chewed on his bottom lip, trying to find something to idly do while eavesdropping. Was it even eavesdropping if they were all stuck in the same room? Fuck, he needed to touch some grass. He decided there and then that the first thing he’d do when he was back on 777 was to fall face-first in the grass inside the environmental ring.

"They must want something from us or with us I suppose... we would not be alive otherwise, but if it is that intel I'm not sure why they don't already have it and if it's something else I'm uncertain whether that is better or worse." She supposed keeping those they wanted to experiment on alive was reasonable enough, but she did not think Allan would be alive if that was all there was to it. After brief consideration she patted the cot next to her in an offer for him to sit down. "I don't understand what they wanted from me... the first few questions were... expected, but unless they were just messing with me... there is a lot of things they did not asked me that I would have asked myself in a similar situation."

Dezyim was curled up on his cot, head pulled under the blanket. He was not really asleep, as he passively listened to Havra and Allan’s conversation. But he wasn’t quite awake, either; he didn’t dream, but as he turned over old memories in his mind he thought that that had to be what dreaming was like. He always tried to avoid thinking about dying, but when he was half asleep it got difficult. He sat up suddenly, clawing desperately at his neck and gasping for air before he realized there was… nothing there. He looked around, realizing he was still in the prison. He shook for a second, breathing quickly, every muscle in his body tensed before he forced himself to relax again.

Hearing the sound of gasping, Ed’s gaze shot towards the source, the struggling Vorta, watching as he shot up. “Shit—“ He muttered, getting to his feet and approaching with an air of caution, “Dez, you, uh— you good?”

He blinked hard for a second. For a moment he wasn’t sure who was approaching him. But when Edgar spoke, he immediately recognized him. “Edgar. I’m…” he moved his hand away from his throat. There were faint purple marks from his fingernails, and his voice was a little hoarse. He cleared his throat before continuing. “I’m okay. Thank you. Just a… bad dream. You know how it is.” He offered him a smile, but his eyes weren’t really in it.

“I get that.” He nodded, offering a smile, stepping forward and gesturing towards the cot, “Could I sit with you?”

"Something, yeah... I'm not sure," Allan said to Havra, sitting down next to them when they offered. "No clue what they want from a lot of people here, honestly. It seems kind of random, for a lot of them." He was silent for a bit, but then he got up, took the paper wrapping from the medical supplies, and sat back down. "I don't think you were watching when Victoria taught us how to do this," he said as he carefully folded the paper and tore two pieces off, each the perfect size to make a little paper boat, "I could teach you, if you want."

Dezyim let out an affirmative noise as he made space on the cot for Edgar, scooting over and straightening the blankets. “By all means.” He didn’t look at Ed as he sat down, instead opting to look straight ahead. He shouldn’t tell him about the memory, he decided. It was too grim, too frightening. Nobody needed to hear about it. He sat in silence, waiting for the ensign to speak.

"Hm... I suppose why not?" Havra reached for one of the paper pieces, if nothing else it might help her prevent overthinking for a while. "Perhaps we should just be happy that they have not killed anyone... here at least, if nothing else it does give up more time in which someone might come for us."

Allan had handed her the paper piece, making the first fold in his own to demonstrate, but then paused. 'Here, at least.' Fuck. He didn't hear what she had said after that. "Yeah," he said, as if he had heard. Okay, Allan. Mind back on track. You can do this. "So, um... the first fold is this, right, and then the second.." and he proceeded to show her how to fold it, as slowly as she needed.

“So— I realize I don’t actually know that much about you.” He mentioned, pulling his hair out of his face as it fell into his eyes, “How long’ve you been in starfleet?”

“Oh, not long at all.” He waved a hand as he spoke, relaxing somewhat. “I only just graduated from the academy this last year. I was stationed on 777 for my cadet cruise though and got bluechipped. You’re relatively new to the station too, aren’t you?” He hoped he was remembering that correctly. Usually he liked to review his fellow engineer’s information to make conversing go smoother, but he had been falling behind on it in recent times and… well now he was in prison.

Tavek had woken up a minute ago- but it wasn’t really obvious that he had. He’d just laid still where he was, listening to everything going on. It seemed like a nice conversation.. nothing horrible was happening in the moment. So, finally, he decided to sit up, once again ignoring pain signals and damage warnings. Self-diagnostics revealed much the same as the last time he’d been awake.

“I am, yeah. Second posting ever, the first one was an older ship. It never stopped falling apart, really.” He laughed softly to himself, remembering the rushed repairs that were barely up to code, but were deemed “good enough” by his superiors, “You liking it on 777?” (edited)

It didn't take too long until Havra figured the boat folding out, mostly because it reminded her of a little bird creature that Laina had made dozens of and spread through their quarters a few weeks back. Once her boat was done she unfolded the piece of paper again and slid it into one of her pockets, before nodding at Allan. "Thank you."

He smiled at Edgar. Serving on an older ship always sounded so comforting to him. Something about knowing you were needed, maybe. “I was liking it, yeah. I was,” he repeated, softer than the first time. It was hard to say he was still enjoying it in their current situation. It was better than how his predecessor had been living before, certainly, but… did he like it? He wasn’t entirely sure. He certainly didn’t sound sure. “I should really be asking you that, though.”

“I think I make my opinions pretty clear.” He grinned, crossing his legs below him where he sat, “But it’s been pretty cool, meeting lots of folks. Everything’s super high tech— even the people.”

Allan smiled when they had finished their boat, and rather than unfolding his, he sat it on his lap for a moment, then looked over at Victoria, then back at the boat. "Yeah, it's no problem, I feel like we can have a whole origami class when we're back on the station. Might be kinda fun," he said, and then stood up. "I'm gonna, ah... ship this off." He smiled just a little, then made a swimming motion with the boat, despite that ... not being what boats do - but he had to display that it was in water somehow. After that, he walked over to Victoria, still making the swimming motion of the boat the whole time he did, then... got on one knee, holding the boat up in his hands as if he was presenting a royal a sword. "For you, Lieutenant," he said, that small smile still on his face as he looked up at her.

Tavek had to chuckle at the joke, plus the way Allan actually presented the boat to Victoria. He still wasn’t sure if he’d make it out of this.. but fuck it. Maybe his last moments wouldn’t be shitty. He might as well enjoy them as much as he could while being in prison. “I know how to do cranes, and.. do paper airplanes count? But that’s all I can do with paper.” He said, wanting to at least contribute something to the conversation.

Dezyim let out a short but genuine laugh, thinking of all the androids and various others that he had seen go through engineering. “High tech people is certainly true. I’ve seen the androids around to prove it.” He smiled, glancing at Tavek. The smile faded from his face slightly. Hopefully their captors wouldn’t just leave him to rot.

He spied the slight fall of the Vorta’s face, and scrambled to find something else to mention. Anything to keep their minds off of it. “What year did you start the academy?” He asked, “I think our years might’ve overlapped. Maybe we’ve had the same classes?”

Victoria had, at some point, awoken and flipped over in place to stare up into the ceiling, her hands resting atop one another on her stomach. She might have stopped shaking - hell, she'd even went through and sorted Allan's ribs well enough - but she still felt like a far cry from her usual self. Zoned out, she barely even registered tha boats were being made. With just enough wherewithal to notice Allan's head approaching her side, she rolled her head to the side against the cot to see what he was up to, unable to stifle an amused exhale and half a weak smile in response to being handed the origami. "You still shouldn't be moving," she reprimanded, although she would take the boat with both hands regardless, "but, thanks."

Tavek glanced back at Dezyim, smiling for a split second before also turning his thoughts to what Dezyim was probably thinking. He was high tech for sure… but that was a curse here, rather than a blessing. It meant he had less time than everyone else. “Ah, the Academy.. brings me back to the good old days. Did you guys have that one electrical engineering professor that gave insane amounts of homework and always went overtime on lectures, or was I just incredibly unlucky?” He said, waxing on a bit as if he had been there thirty years ago instead of two years ago, just to inject some tiny bit of humor into the situation.

“Wait— I might have, what was their name?” He snickered, turning to look towards Tavek, secretly thankful that he was awake and doing relatively alright.

“Ahh.. fuck me, memory banks aren’t doing so hot, low battery makes me stupid.. Professor Sh'sheliss, I think that’s her name. Andorian, really short, her tests were legitimately brutal and I have a whole computer for a brain.” It took him a bit to find the answer to the question, but he still could. At least he had that going for him still. He wasn’t out of this forever just yet.

“I remember her! She’s— ancient, now, oh my god.” He laughed, recalling the late-night cramming and lectures nearing psychological torture, “I think she hated my class enough to retire, I heard she stopped teaching a year or two ago.”

Allan smiled a little more when Victoria gave him her own smile, no matter how weak. He sat with his legs crossed on the floor next to her cot after she took the boat, shrugging. "I shouldn't..?" The question was followed with a tilt of his head and a genuine confused look. "My ribs are like, totally good now, though, right? I mean - they don't really hurt anymore, so... and from what I know, my legs are pretty alright, it's just, like - I mean, I think the painkillers might be wearing off a liiiittle on the whole concussion side of things, but it's not so bad? And I'm not sure if moving or not fixes that, but, well. You're the doctor," he admitted. He touched his cheeks under his eyes, where the bruising was still... very bad, and winced just a little. "And this, I guess, but like... only when I touch it, so. I just... don't do that, right?"

“2411 to… well, this year, I suppose. You?” They had probably had some of the same classes, but at the same time seemed unlikely. It was nice to talk about, though. A good distraction. Being at the academy had been nice, and it always seemed like other officers had good memories of it. “I remember Sh’sheliss, although I didn’t find her to be that bad. We’d chat after classes sometimes. Interesting woman.”

“Huh! I was 2410-14.” He remarked, “Although I got held back a bit beforehand. Either way— we just didn’t run into each other, then. Bad luck, I suppose, since I feel like we would’ve gotten along.”

"Definitely don't do that," Victoria chuckled, shaking her head and propping her head up a little so she could see what the others were doing. It felt good that Allan was feeling better, she had to admit to herself, and she was glad to see Tavek speaking with the others as well.

“Ahh. That’s not bad luck. I wasn’t terrible social when I was at the academy, to be honest. Even I had known you I probably would have never talked to you. Too much for me to do, not any time for socialization.” He rubbed his ear as he thought about it. He didn’t really have any friends from the academy, now that he thought about it. He was always too busy to be socializing. Always too much work to do.

“That’s… fair, yeah. I was kinda awkward in the academy as well.” He admitted, remembering his process of learning to make friends as quickly as he could now. It involved a large amount of saying stupid shit, which he regretted, but he’d lived and he’d learned, he supposed.

“Were we all just awkward as anything in the Academy, because that was me too! For the life of me I could not figure out how to function in life, at least when it comes to talking to people. Still not too good with that nowadays though, if I’m being honest.” He shrugged. Though.. it wasn’t as if he had no friends now, right? In the Academy, he hadn’t had any, and people on his last posting weren’t the greatest to him.. but here? On 777? People had been kinder to him here than anyone anywhere else in the Federation had been. He wondered now how much of that kindness was them all hoping he wouldn’t snap. After all.. as much as he hated the guy, Vici had kind of been right, many people -would- be scared of him, especially if they knew everything about him, it was why he had always kept everything hidden. Made himself palatable. Looking back on it, he’d made himself pathetic. And being pathetic hadn’t saved Silver, who deserved to die far less than him, so why would it save him? Being in the Federation was like dancing on a knife’s edge at times, relying on others not to try and kill him, but there was also nowhere else to go. He always tried to be kind. He wasn’t ever good enough at it.

“You’re doing just fine now, don’t worry too much about that.” Ed nodded, “And… yeah. Academy days were no one’s proudest moments. They definitely weren’t mine.” God, what he would give to get those Velocity-based fights wiped from his file, and to forget all of the terrible attempts at being as charismatic as he’d always wanted to be.

Allan nodded when Victoria said definitely not to do that. "Of course, sir," was that a genuinely silly smile on his face just now? Might've been. Hard to tell, because it was gone when he turned to look at everyone else chatting. It wasn't that he was suddenly frowning or anything, just... focusing. They were talking about the Academy, something that was... shit, six whole years behind him, now. And a couple of months, of course, but still. More than half a decade. He thought for a moment, and then cleared his throat. "Havvvve you guys, um... you ever played duck, duck, goose? Victoria gave me the idea." That sure was a way to say that.

“The game where you chase each other around the circle?” Ed asked, hoping that his memory was serving him right, “I think I know that one.”

"Yeah! We just all sit down in a circle, and it's a basic game of 'tag', really, like - whoever's..." he stood up, drawing a little circle in the air above the ground with his finger, "'it' at the time is gonna say 'duck' everytime they tap someone's head that they don't pick, and they say 'goose' when they're picking someone - and then that someone has to chase them and tag them before they get back to where that someone was sitting and sit down. Does that make sense?"

He nodded, the rules coming back to him like they had been programmed into him. He was convinced almost every kid who grew up on earth knew it, the game was pure tradition! “Yeah, I got you.” He nodded, hopping off of Dezyim’s cot, “So we circle up, first.”

"Wait, I gave you the idea?" Victoria asked, sitting up when her name was said, blanket slipping off of her, which prompted her to drape it around her shoulders again. Regardless, she moved off her bed to join the others where they sat. "Sorry-" she raised a palm and paused, "how?"

"Yeah, when you tapped Havra's head a while ago, idea popped into my head. Forgot about it until now. Whaddya mean by 'how'? Like, uh, which part are you not getting?" He asked, ready to explain again if he needed to. (edited)

"When I what?" Victoria asked back, not remembering having done anything like that at all. "Nevermind," she waved away all need for explanation with her hands, crossing her legs, "you sure you're okay enough to be running around?"

"Mmm.." Allan thought about it, he did. Granted, he hadn't done a lot of physical activity since his ribs were healed - some standing up and sitting down and walking as he talked to people, but... nothing too quick or strenuous. "Mayyyybe? I mean, we can always start with you or Ed or someone. I can be the duck first." He sat down in the circle with a smile.

Donning his most serious expression (which… had the air of a cartoon mascot frowning, in all honesty), Ed stood up straighter, dusting himself off. “I accept this responsibility. I will do you all proud.” He mimicked the serious captain voice he’d learned from his father, “Circle time.”

"Sorry," Victoria reached a hand to tap against the back of Edgar's arm, "running around's probably gonna end up in your boss here not having such a great time. We can do duck duck goose later." She leaned back, resting against the leg of her cot. "How do you even come up with these ideas?"

Oh, shit, he’d forgotten about that. “Good point. I secede my goose powers temporarily.” He put up his palms, nodding his head deep enough to almost be a bow, before going back to his usual demeanour. “Yeah, actually, I have the same question.”

"Thank you," Allan bowed his head when Ed said he accepted the responsibility, then looked up at Victoria when she called them off. "Ahh, guess that's fair," he sighed dramatically, "I ... I mean, I've just played a lot of games in my life, I guess? Especially as a kid. Especially in school, at family reunions.. I mean, when I have family reunions even now, I have like, a looooot of little cousins who need to stay entertained, but... we usually have, like, toys and stuff."

“That’s a sign of a good life lived, yeah? Playing lots of games and stuff. Having time to do fun shit.” Ed remarked, his usual smile beginning to quirk his lips upwards. “I always heard that a life that you can have fun in is a successful one. I don’t know if it’s true, but..:”

Dezyim had been watching the interaction with vague interest. He’d never seen duck duck goose, but the idea of running around in a circle with his head still injured sounded like a great way to get nauseous. He wasn’t the most athletic at the best of times either, and so decided to just sit out. Secretly he was slightly relieved when Victoria stopped them; he appreciated it when the games were ones he could play. “Your cousins, what are they like?” he asked Allan. The idea of a family had always seemed nice to Dezyim, so he appreciated hearing others talk about theirs.

"It is, which is why we've got to play something," Allan responded to Ed, standing up and looking around the room as he tried to think. They had cups, pips, blankets, a little bit of paper left... hm. He looked to Dezyim, then, and took in a breath. "Ummmm... well, I've - got a lot of them," he chuckled, "they're sort of... I mean, it depends a lot on which family they're from and the... everything about them individually, right? But um, I was on a call, with, um, one of them the other day, she was visiting my parents' house because she really likes my dog, um.. Nessa, she's only four," he held up four fingers on one hand for some reason, then laughed, "she uh, always does that when she tells me how old she is. Oh-" his eyes lit up a little, "we could do charades? Anyone know charades?"

Now that sounded good. He wasn’t… particularly great at it, but it was a fun game nonetheless, and one that had caused countless disputes back home. It was nostalgic, yes, but also a challenge. “Hell yeah. That’ll be easy enough on your head, right?” (edited)

“I think I know what that is, I can play that.” He replied, referring to the charades thing. He was pretty sure he’d seen someone play it before.. oh, how he dearly missed being able to look things up in his head. He missed being connected to the Internet, being cut off from information made him extremely antsy even when he wasn’t imprisoned by people who still had good reasons to further torture him. At this point, if one of them tried anything again, he had half a mind to do what was forbidden and actually fight back, if he was going to die either way, he wasn’t going to die a coward, and the only thing stopping him from fully considering the idea was his fear that his living comrades might be punished for it. He just hoped rescue was still going to come.

"Yeah! The both of us, I think, it'd be fine -" He meant Dezyim, who yeah, also had a brain injury and one a lot worse he could assume, "I mean, it's something you can do sitting down, even, but like - not a lot of movement required, yeah," he shrugged. "You could always start us off, Ed..?"

“Alright.” He nodded, tapping his hands against his sides as he stepped towards what he considered the middle of the room, “Are we doing a theme? Or just… anything?”

"I'd say go with your heart, man," Allan said, watching Ed go to the center of the room, and he sat down a little further away so he could watch better. "Whatever you wanna do."

Furrowing his brow in thought, he fell silent for a moment, before blinking, seeming to come back to reality as he nodded. “Okay. I think I’ve got it. We ready?”

“Yeah, I think so, I’m ready.” He had absolutely no clue what he himself would pretend to be, his knowledge of games like this was weak at best, but he was willing to give it all a shot. And he was of course willing to at least try and guess what everyone else was.

Allan nodded quickly. "Fuck yeah, hit me with it," he hoped Ed knew that phrase. He did not mean to literally hit him. By any means.

He chuckled, cracking his knuckles before miming two open hands, palms facing each other. When the heels of his hands touched, he snapped his fingers and palms together and apart in a sort of hinge-like motion.

Tavek.. did not know what the fuck that was. Like, at all. For a second, he thought it was like, maybe a laptop shutting, or a door? The hinge motion was weird.. maybe his brain really was just fried, but the snap kind of reminded him of when you shut like a really heavy book and it made an audible -thunk-.. maybe that was what it was? Why not guess, no harm in getting it wrong, he supposed. “Is it a book?” He guessed.

Allan tilted his head, then looked up at the ceiling as he tried to think of what the fuck Ed was meaning. "Uh... Pac-Man..?"

He shook his head, although he pointed towards Allan when Pac-Man was said. On the right track! He moved his hands, still together, to the top of his head, making a point above his forehead.

Dezyim’s eyebrows shot up and he sat up straighter, very excited to have figured it out. “That… that Earth fish! The big ones, I saw them one time… what was it they were called?” He paused, searching for the word. “Shark! Is it shark?”

“Yes! Fuck yeah!” He exclaimed, grinning ear to ear, as one of his hands shot from his head to point at the other ensign excitedly, “You got it.”

Allan, despite very much knowing what the Earth fish was the moment Dezyim said 'Earth fish', waited completely for the ensign to remember. When he did, Allan smiled when he saw Ed's grin - it was a bit contagious, wasn't it? "Shaaark, yeah, that makes sense," he nodded, "I think that means you go next..? Something like that?"

He gave a joking bow, miming taking a crown off of his head and placing it upon Dezyim’s. “It is your turn, my liege. You have the floor.” He bowed with a chuckle, moving to hop onto one of the cots.

“Your liege? I… My turn?” He laughed and shook his head. “I am not an imaginative man, to say the least. I think Tavek should go next.”

Damn, putting him on the spot when he had absolutely no clue what to do, even when Dezyim was the one who one. No fair, man, no fair. He pretended to buffer for a few seconds while he actually thought of something. Think, think about what he knew that other people might also know.. oh, he knew what could maybe work. He stood up, arms at his sides, folded up so his hands were limp and extended outwards by his shoulders, before he started to flap them up and down, hoping that this was a good way to visually explain what he was trying to do, but fuck, he was bad at charades.

“…bird?” Ed raised an eyebrow, wringing his hands as he shifted to sit cross-legged, “Like— uh—“

Bird was a good guess, and when that was guessed, Allan was left to come up with something else. Something else that flapped little wings, like a ... "Butterfly..?" He asked, and something in him started to freeze up a little. Just slightly.

Oh, fuck, it wasn’t making sense.. why was THIS of all things making him panic, this was like torture round two for him honestly, being put on the spot like this. Being at 8% battery was not a recipe for being smart and he knew it. Basing this whole thing off of that one drawing was NOT a good idea, they’d probably all forgotten about it, but how could he when that drawing was still inside his own arm? It was the only thing he could think of, he’d had to use it after he was put on the spot. So he shook his head at the bird thing. Obviously more was required. But then, Allan spoke, and he’d guessed it right! Of course Allan would remember it too. So, he pointed at Allan. “Yes, that’s it!”

Allan nodded, but the smile on his face was just a little forced. "Oh, awesome, yeah, I, uh- you know, didn't want to guess.. bird, so, um, it's another thing that... flies, and uh, flaps, 'cause um, ships, don't... flap wings, um.." he looked back to Dezyim, and then the group at large, "who's uh... next?"

“You’re gonna be next, right? Since you got it right.” Ed suggested, “You don’t have to be, but I figured that’s the way we’d been going.”

"I... I think it goes back to Dezyim, actually, since he passed it off to Tavek even though he won, so.. it goes back to him, I think? And then it's back to normal..? Yeah?" Yeah, he was partly trying to make an excuse.

He sat back down, smiling, not exactly knowing why Allan’s smile looked off. Maybe if he was fully charged, and his eyes were not so broken, he could possibly tell, but for now, he didn’t know what he’d done wrong. He kept up his own smile, hoping that maybe his eyes were just failing and that smile of Allan’s was fine after all. He didn’t want to think he’d done something wrong. “It’s only fair if Dezyim’s next, he put me on the spot!” He said, laughing good-naturedly.

Dezyim looked from Allan to Edgar to Tavek and realized there was no way he was getting out of it. He sighed playfully and stood up. He held out his hand as if he were holding something and looked down and it, moving his arm in a sweeping motion, keeping his eyes glued to whatever he was pretending to hold.

Allan put a hand on his chin as he tried to lock in. He tried to really think about this, but then he kind of just said the first thing that came to mind. "Are you uh... showing people a really cool rock..? Like, one of those ones that changes how it looks at different angles or something?"

“Is it, uh— tricorder? Or a flashlight?” Ed chimed in, watching the movement and trying to chisel some recognition out of his own brain.

“Are you like.. presenting something?” Yeah, Tavek was absolutely stumped. He’d probably be stumped even at 100% battery too.

“Tricorder! Yes, it was a tricorder.” He nodded, glad Edgar had gotten it. Really the only things he could think of were work or engineering related. “That means it’s your turn again I believe.”

He got to his feet, taking his stage in the middle of the room as he scoured the room around him for something to act out, before settling on something. “Okay— uh—“ He muttered, beginning to make a circle with both of his hands. He then formed a smaller circle with one hand, slowly moving it in front of the other.

Dezyim snapped his fingers and pointed at Edgar soon after he started the movement. “Eclipse. Is it eclipse?”

Allan nodded to what Dezyim said, truly stumped on anything else it could be. "Mhm, it's - it's gotta be that, I think." Right? What else...

“How the fuck did you get it that fast?” He laughed, “That’s my go-to when trying to stump people. Kudos to you, man!”

“Really? It seems pretty clear to me. You have one object overlapping and obscuring the other. What else could it be?” He stood up, clearing his throat. “I think this one is a little more complicated.” He held his hand in a c-shape as if he were holding something again, but this time he brought it up to his lips and tilted his head back. Then, he suddenly opened the hand that was the c-shape and put it over his chest, his face full of mock horror. He fell to the ground gently but dramatically and laid there, crumpled.

He was following the steps carefully. Clearly the first was drinking something, right? And then... oh. "Being poisoned?" He guessed, leaning over just to make sure Dezyim was actually just fine. Never knew in this place.

“Like— maybe a dagger or something? Anything stabby?” He asked, leaning in a bit to get a closer look.

He sat up, perfectly fine. “It was being poisoned. Your turn…” he tilted his head, eyeing Allan’s pips. Or, rather, pip. “…ensign.” He grinned somewhat mischievously before returning to his spot and gesturing for Allan to go.

Allan laughed a little when he called him ensign, looking down at his collar - yeah, he really did still have the one on there. He'd have to remember the other later. "Ooookay, sir, I'll go," he said as he slowly got up and moved so he was in front of them all and thought for a moment. He held one hand in front of him in an upright fist. He made the same motion with his other hand, then drew his hands apart parallel to eachother to either side, staring intently at the space now between them. He nodded, then took one hand to point a few times within that empty space, and looked back at his side to nod as if he was nodding at somebody next to him. Then he looked back to the space.

Victoria sat with arms crossed, not having moved from before, watching Allan cook... whatever it was he was cooking. Charades wasn't really in her wheelhouse, aside from when she had to guess what her patients were renacting when she asked them what they had done to get themselves into trouble. "Supervising," she offered, less a question and more a statement, a hand going up in a 'i dunno' gesture.

“Oh… or… is that one of those… old paper blueprints?” He furrowed his eyebrows, watching Allan complete the movement as he tried to match it up with something he had seen before.

Allan looked from Victoria to Dezyim as they both answered. "Well, um... I'm not sure how to... I mean!" He smiled upon realizing it. "Technically, you're both right, actually, because I meant blueprint, yes, but then I also was, technically, supervising with the blueprint, so ... congrats to the both of you?"

"Cool," Victoria nodded once in acknowledgement, her outstretched arm moving towards Dezyim, and she'd lean into it, for a high-five.

Dezyim cringed internally a little and returned the high-five. He didn’t understand everyone’s love for them, but it wasn’t as bad as the one he had given Edgar so… he was getting better? “You can go, Victoria. I’ve gone enough for right now I think.” He really and truly was out of ideas this time.

“Hell yeah! Let’s get her into this.” Ed grinned, egging her on with a stupid expression on his face. “Do it, do it, do it…”

"Me?" Victoria said, surprisedly pointing back at herself. Nevertheless, she propped herself up and stretched. "What am I even supposed to-" she began, placing hands on hips and staring at the ceiling for a second, "-okay. Here." Laying her left hand flat, palm up, she moved her right on top of it, mimicking holding a pen. She did a little bit of a scribble, not really anything too legible, then made a show of rolling her eyes. To top it off, she swung her left hand across her torso, as though throwing something across the room.

Tavek, who had actually been quietly buffering for a minute or so (low battery did weird things to him, especially given he was in quite dire straits regarding it at the moment), finally came back to awareness.. to see.. what the actual fuck was Victoria doing?? Tavek thought he was doing okay at charades, but this was just.. what? “Uh… you misspelled something?” And this was it, folks, Tavek’s entered true stupidity territory.

Okay, clearly she was manually writing something, but for what? Well, she was a doctor, so maybe.. "Are you... writing prescriptions or something?"

“Notes? Or, uh— a notepad??” Ed suggested, although the usage of paper in the federation was slim enough that he knew he was wrong as soon as he said it.

"Paperwork. I hate paperwork," Victoria said, matter-of-fact, shrugging. She leaned back to her previous, resting position. Yeah, party games were definitely not her forte. Stick to your day-job, Vic. "I guess you're all close enough," she said, gesturing for someone else to go.

"Well, you've - I mean, you've got to pick whoever was closest," *Allan said, looking between the group," *unless we played, like, rock paper scissors for it or something, but... seems easier to just pick someone?"

Victoria chuckled, then pointed at Tavek. "I misspell things when doing this stuff wayyyy too often," she said, "I mean, I don't think that's something I'm supposed to just tell you guys, but-" She shrugged.

“I get that.” Ed shrugged, before cheering, “Go, Tavek! Act that shit out, dude!”

“Wait, I’m the closest? I have no ideas, please!” He laughed, all the while deleting more and more error messages and warnings. Fuck, he thought, just let him live a little longer please, just for a few more rounds of charades before he kicked it. “Oh alright, I guess I’ll go.” He said, standing up with a fake sigh of exasperation. Quickly, think of something.. oh, of course THAT memory had to come back, his first attempt at that one club in the Academy and he’d done horribly at it, why did his brain have to show him that?? Well, he supposed the others might know what it was, so he might as well try. He closed his left hand into a fist, willing it not to seize as the wiring protested- by fuck, he was going to do this, broken body or not. He held his left arm straight out in front of him, twisted so the fist pointed upwards like he was holding something out in front of him. He also closed his right hand into a fist and extended it out, though he held it closer to his body before drawing it back, and then opening the fist like he’d let something go. Hopefully that was enough.

"Mm.. are you like, shooting a bow..?" He asked, kind of thinking of some old movies where they did that a lot. He sure as hell hadn't seen anyone do that in real life.

“Yeah, you got it! Uhh.. hand placement might be off, my fingers are doing weird shit right now and it’s been a while since I’ve done any archery… I joined a club for it in the Academy my first year, turned out almost everyone in it had already done it for a while, and I failed so miserably I just left and never came back. I somehow got an arrow in a tree instead of the target.” He said a little sheepishly before sitting back down.

When Tavek said that, he did actually remember something back from his time at the Academy as well. "Ohhh, yeah, it - there was this cadet back when I was in the Academy too, literally just came up to me and was like, flirting with me and then asked if they could try and shoot an apple on my head? And gave me like, some goggles, and I was like.. fuck it, sure," he laughed a little, "but, ah, they did it! It worked."

“Sounds like a good way to get brain damage.” Ed blinked, “Glad you only have the normal amount of holes in your head now, though, boss.”

Dezyim blanched, listening to Allan’s story. “You let them… use a weapon… to shoot something off your head?” His voice was full of incredulousness. He couldn’t decide if it was brave or stupid. Had it been Dezyim, he certainly wouldn’t have gone through with it.

”Tame by ED standards,” Victoria made a so-so movement with one of her hands. “I hope you’ve grown out of that, though. Difference between a cadet and chief engineer’s a bit big on the ‘we need your brain in one piece’ scale.”

“Uh… I can’t tell if that’s brave, stupid, or both! Congrats on surviving though!” He said, having no clue what one was supposed to say when someone brought up willingly allowing someone to shoot a weapon in their direction. Tavek was notoriously hard to kill and even he wouldn’t let anyone try that. No thank you, no pointy objects near his head please.

"Well, it was one of those like, practice ones..? But yeah, uh, I was kinda a dumb teen, y'know, so.." He laughed nervously. He only hoped he was less dumb now, but... nope. Nope, he wasn't thinking about that. "Um- does this mean I'm still next, though..?"

He snickered, tucking his knees to his chest where he sat. “It’s.. so weird that we’re doing this here. In jail.”

"Yep! Pretty weird, huh. Sooo, um..." He went ahead and stood up, grinning and then putting his lips together as he thought about what he'd do. He had to think quicker about it, too, so.. "Okay, I uh - I got one.." It was easy, but he just went with it anyways. He spread his feet a bit, one turning slightly as he brought his hands together in a fist near his shoulder. After a tense pause, he twisted his body and swept his arms through the air in a quick, practiced motion, then looked up in the air for a moment.

He furrowed his brow, before guessing the first thing that popped into his head. “Uh— baseball? Something with a bat.”

Allan pointed and smiled at Ed, nodding. "Yep! That's it. You ever played? I've actually never played, I've just, like, done the swinging a bat part. Done it a few times in the holodeck smashing glass, pretty fun and, well, you know - safe when you do it that way."

“A little bit! Played it in… what, fifth grade?” He remarked, “I ended up getting kicked out, though. I was a super sore loser, and we weren’t that good.”

"Kicked -" Allan laughed a little, surprised. Then again, from what little he knew about Ed, it didn't seem too shocking. "Kicked out, really? I mean - you were in fifth grade, so... that's what, 10 years old..? 11, maybe..?"

“Yyyyyeah.” He cringed, chuckling to himself a bit more self-deprecatingly than he would have preferred, “I liked sports, not the sportsmanship. Nowadays, I like to think I’m better, though.”

"Yeah? You got any sports you play now, or like.. wanna play?" Allan asked, trying to think of his own answer to that question as he asked it, just in case it was reflected back to him.

“Well, I was a Velocity player in the academy. And I’ve been playing Springball on and off for a few years.” He said, thinking back to his last match, “How about you? Any sports?”

"Oh, I have never played Velocity, is it hard? I've always thought it'd be pretty difficult, but everyone sort of makes it look easy, so it's sort of hard to judge," that was maybe due to his very much 'adequate' aim with a phaser - not fantastic, but not bad either - enough for a trained officer to comfortably be at, really. "I do like Springball, though. Kinda crazy, but that's what I like about it. I guess the only sport I technically do is surfing? I've never done a competition or anything though, I just do it with my friends for fun. Sort of grew up with it."

“It’s… tricky, I guess. Not really hard, when you get used to it.” He shrugged, “Surfing’s fucking awesome, though, that’s awesome.”

"Yeaaah. We gotta go on a beach sometime, it... you ever built sandcastles? I mean, I know my engineers would probably love a good sandcastle building contest, buuuut.." he gestured to the other engineers, still standing up, palm up and arm outstretched... and it made something click in his head. He looked at his hand for a second, then back at everyone. "Okay, so something everyone can do at a beach, actually - you guys know the Macarena, by chance? You know, like.." he put his other arm out like the first, then put his hands to his shoulders, crossing his arms across his chest like that. But then he waited to see if anyone else knew what he was talking about.

"I'm not doing the Macarena, Allan," Victoria said. head tilting to the side as though studying the man's endless energy. "On an actual beach, maybe. It might actually be pretty nice to spend more than an hour on one." That was the sort of thing only prison could make the likes of Victoria say.

She had been sitting on their cot listening to and occasionally watching the others as they played. It was a strange feeling, being surrounded by other people without knowing how to relate to them and although she had told herself over and over again after fleeing to federation space that it would get better with time it hit her in full force yet again. The various sports and games and elements know what else were about as lost on her as the talk about the academy had been. None of the others were likely to know the things she had enjoyed in her childhood even if she had been in the right mood for any of them. Somehow she managed not to snap at them to shut up, it wasn't their fault and she should be happy that they were keeping it together, wallowing in their misery would help no one. She needed to get away, so since that was the only option she got up and hid in the washroom.

"Victoriaaaa," he said her name with the most puppy dog look he could muster, face still quite bruised and eyes still a little red, it may have not been his best look. "For me..? Could be our last chance to dance, you know. Not to be like, grim, but.. c'mon," he moved his hands to his head then in the next step of the dance. "It's sooo easy, you know?"

“If I can do a dance in front of the cameras in a Tal Shiar brig, you can do the Macarena in a private setting.” Ed deadpanned, folding his arms over his legs, before joining Allan in the puppy dog look when he saw it.

"You can do it sitting down, too! You don't gotta stand up or nothing if you're not feeling it," he looked at Ed, as he did the next move of his hands to his waist, waiting for the other to catch up.

With an exhausted yet absolutely giddy expression, Ed joined in, staring at Victoria with wide eyes.

“What if I play the song, will you Macarena with us then?” He said, standing up- this was one dance he actually knew, and he had the song saved. Yeah, should he be doing it? Maybe not. Would he be doing it anyway? Absolutely. Tavek lived for the bit.

"Get me out of here and on a beach, and then we'll talk," Victoria said, quite serious about the whole thing. And probably only after a truckload of therapy, too, if they managed to get to that. She waved with her hands, trying not to be impolite, but she stood and made her way after Havra towards the bathroom. Apparently, they had both had similar ideas. Ah well. After a moment of contemplation, she decided to risk looking silly for checking on someone purely going to the bathroom, and knocked gently on the door. "Hey, you okay in there?"

Allan stared at Tavek. "You can... do that..?" He genuinely had no idea that was a possibility. "Maybe slow it down a liiiittle bit, I can't move tooo fast, definitely not spinning around." He nodded to Victoria when she said she'd do it but like, on a beach. That tracked.

“Macaremix.” Ed mumbled under his breath, watching the others, “You should absolutely do it, Tavek.”

“I have been waiting for this moment for a very long time.” He said, smiling, before the Macarena (slowed down a bit) started to emanate from him. He was playing it via his voicebox, so he couldn’t really speak- but it was playing, and he knew the dance, so he also started to dance to it. This was his -true- purpose at the moment, he decided.

At first there wasn't any indication that Havra had heard Victoria. There was a pause that was almost uncomfortably long. "Yes.. if you need privacy I can leave."

"No, I'm, you know, just making sure," Victoria said, arms crossed awkwardly and talking to the door, "I just thought you left a little suddenly, and, well, I know what it feels like to wanna lock yourself away for a bit. I can ask them to stop, if you want, they'd get it," she turned back to watch the ruckus for a moment, "or- if you wanna talk about it, I'm here, m'kay?"

So there were just three engineers casually doing the macarena in a fucking prison cell. However, when Allan heard the noise of footsteps, he stopped, hands moving down from his head back to his sides before he looked right at Tavek. "T-Tavek, hey, um-" he made a little zipping motion across his lips to tell him to like, not play the Macarena song anymore.

And, the Macarena was over! Instead, his eyes widened, and he stepped back. Fuck.. please, don’t be that guy, don’t be that pink-haired guy again- or, maybe they’d get lucky and the door wouldn’t open, they’d be spared any more torture. He looked over to Allan, willing himself to stop shaking. He was so tired now, and scared. He just didn’t want to be hurt any more.

Allan breathed in. Yeah, Macarena over. Back to consider that he was, you know... here. And that the past was... no, he would still avoid thinking about the past. For now. As long as he could, at least. He made a small motion with his hand to signal to Tavek to sit down, before saying as much. "You should sit," he said, slowly moving to his own cot right by the door to do the same. Just sit there. That's what they should be doing, right..?

He froze, eyes shooting towards the door. What shit were the Tal Shiar pulling now? Hadn’t they tortured them all already? What was left to be done to them?

He did, wordlessly going back to his own cot and sitting down, taking the time to run self-checks again. 5% battery, 46% of systems nonfunctional, 38% of systems running at reduced capacity. No damage alarms blared in his head anymore. He’d turned them all off. If he turned off again, he didn’t want to think about the fact that there was a chance he’d never turn on again without some serious repairs. Being tortured meant nothing to Tavek now. There was nothing left to be done to him but bash his head in until nothing was left. The only thing worse they could do to him was kill him. He knew androids who’d lived shorter lives than him. 15 years was a luxury many would have given everything for. Maybe he should just be grateful for the time he’d gotten to live. Not like he could do anything about it anyway.

This time Havra had opened the door to respond to Victoria, just in time to hear the footsteps approaching the cell. She tensed up for a moment and then sighed, before stepping out of the bathroom. "It's alright, thank you for the offer." She didn't care for returning to the cot so she simply remained standing next to the washroom door, eyes fixed on the door.

Victoria nodded and, similarly, turned to affix her gaze on the door, pressing her back against the wall harder than when she merely leaned on it before, as though she could melt into it if she tried hard enough.

Dezyim tensed, turning to the door. The Macarena had lulled him into a false sense of security, one that he was now realizing was truly stupid. They were in prison! How in the world could they sit there and play games? Dread grew in him, and he stilled, waiting for the return of their captors.

There was a knock first, which then was followed by the door's opening. A now familiar face walked in, eyeing the group with a half-lidded gaze. "I won't waste time convincing you all, so I'll just be frank. The cameras are currently looping the footage of you all sitting around here doing jack shit. Your people have arrived here to get you out of here. Don't take long, we have some people in pretty bad shapes in the other two cells." He ignited the cigarette - couldn't help himself - and gestured the rest to start coming in: "One by one, don't overwhelm the bunch. I don't know what Starfleet secret code bullshit you need to do to verify your identities to them, but if there is one, go for it I guess."

He blinked, brain unable to process what was happening. Had he hit his head? Was this even real? Surely he’d laughed himself into some kind of delirium by now. There was no way. Absolutely no way whatsoever. But it was real. “…holy fuck.” He whispered, “This— you—“

Allan stood up when he saw which agent this was, mostly worried about the interaction from before with Dezyim, where this guy had called them "hopeless fucking bastards" - and then... he said that their people were getting them out of here. People were in pretty bad shapes in the other two... he had to shove that one back to his mind. Right now, the people in here were his responsibility, weren't they..? "Okay," he said slowly after a breath he wasn't aware he'd been holding, waiting for when the others would come in.

"What, not even a disbelieving shout or an accusation of me being a lying fucking reptile?" he couldn't help it, okay?..

Vara'l poked his head in then and idly proceeded to say. "Jolan tru." As he entered the room with a warm smile. Looked to Allan then. "Hello Lieutenant." The smile one that coloured with deep concern and worry as he looked about the room, attempted to identify any injuries he could have spotted. He complied with the direction to come in one at a time. Moved in to make room for others.

Enter Silver! Who.. was horrified by what she was witnessing, thank you very much. Thankfully, she had a bit of a trick up her sleeve once she entered the cell. She took the contacts out of her eyes- brown removed to reveal bright yellow, with diamond-shaped pupils that at least one person in the cell would recognize. That was Tavek, though Edgar and Allan might too, she wasn’t sure. “We’re here to help- I had to cut my hair and everything, but I’m Silver.” She said, her voice as characteristic as ever to anyone that knew her.

Said lying fucking reptile stepped to the side, letting the Starfleet officers do their thing.

Looking to Silver, Ed blinked, raising his eyebrows. “I’ve seen some shit these past two weeks— this is the most surprising. Nice to see you.” He joked, letting out a relieved chuckle.

Allan looked right at Vara'l, really took a moment to process his voice, then turned back to Snake. "Nope - thank you, actually. For this and ah, the stuff from earlier. Really helped," Was his face still all bruised and stuff? Yeah, he was able to breathe!! Super helpful! Then he turned back to Vara'l. "Didn't know I'd have such a handsome knight in shining armor, honestly, but let's go, yeah..? What's the plan from here?" Just like him to try and crack a joke, even still, though he said it quietly so hopefffully only Vara'l heard it. (edited)

"... Damn," Victoria said, letting out the biggest breath she didn't even notice she was holding. She placed a hand on the back of Havra's shoulder, gesturing for her to step forwards first. Then, stopped for a moment of double-think. "You guys are real, right?"

Tavek had looked up, unsure what to make of everything.. until.. no way. No fucking way. That was NOT Silver in a shitty bob cut and black hair, what the hell was she doing here, did she have a death wish?? But honestly, he didn’t expect anything else from Silver, she was more loyal than he was, and she had even less of a self-preservation instinct. He stood up, slowly approaching before she closed the gap and hugged him. He returned it. He didn’t say anything. He doubted he could say anything at the moment.

Havra did not like this, yes there was at least one person here that she recognized from the station's files, but the station had been infiltrated. How were they supposed to know this wasn't some sick play on their end to get them to lower their guards. "What exactly is your idea of what happens now?"

Vesta entered and immediately lifted the romulan uniform up to reveal a small pack she had consealed under it. From it she revoved quite a few candy bar type nutrition bars. They weren't the best starfleet had to offer nutritionally, but they had essesial viatmins and more importatly, tasted really good and could raise moral. She offered them to the prisoners silently, as her hands were full and she didn't speak.

“It’s nice to see you too, you won’t have to see any more shit because you’re coming home with us. I have more insects to talk to you about.” She said to Ed, referring the convo in the butterfly garden (the one that was definitely finished before this all started)- her finally swearing was definitely a change, one she didn’t know if it was good or bad. “I’ve missed you, Tavek.” She said quietly before pulling away.

Vara'l's smile happened to grow further then, even if the handsome compliment was something he reckoned he did not deserve. He noted a bit of heat in his face but assumed it was something else and just continued to smile as he stated. "We'll be extracting you all from the prison and enacting a escape plan, do you have anybody who'll need assistance in moving?" He glanced to the medical lieutenant then. "We are real, lieutenant."

THE Silver swore now? God, not being in prison truly changed people. He let out a deep mix of a sigh and a laugh, relief flooding his body and making him feel like he would melt. He hadn’t realized how tense he had been these past two weeks, how his heart had been racing for days straight, until it finally slowed, and he felt like a new man.

Dezyim worked his jaw as he listened to the man talk. And then… officers followed him. Officers he knew. They were getting out of there. They weren’t going to die in the cell. He… honestly didn’t feel anything. No relief, no thankfulness. Nothing. He stood and crossed the room, coming to a stop next to Snake. “So,” he started, keeping his eyes focused on the commotion. “You wouldn’t happen to have any more cigarettes on you, would you? One you’d be willing to part with, I mean.”

"Don't think so, I think... I think I'm the one of us that was the most injured? I can't really move like, that fast without wanting to like, die, but- other than that, pretty good, I think, and, I mean- if needed, then..." He realized he was rambling off, and smiled apologetically at the CTO, "sorry. Yeah, I don't think anyone here needs assistance moving, unless I'm mistaken. Much as I'd love to ask you to carry me. Um- joking. That's a joke. What's the escape plan?"

She looked around in confusion, still not moving from next to the washroom door. How could any of the others simply accept this? "How do we know you were not among the people infiltrating 777? You could be in disguise... If you think I'm going along with a relocation without any proper proof of who any of you are... at least fucking stun me."

Victoria jerked her head to Havra as she spoke, resting a hand against her shoulder again in support. She supposed those words did make sense, as much as she wanted to cling onto the belief that Starfleet had, indeed, finally come for them.

Okay that heat thing had started to perplex him slightly. Not that he commented on it, that'd be unprofessional. He'd need to get his implants checked when he got back or something. "Exfil to ship." He proceeded to pull a transporter tag from a pouch then and showed it to the Lieutenant. "One for you, we've enough for everyone in here." He looked to Havra then. "What proof would you prefer, Lieutenant." Wondered then if he'd seen them before. Wondered about that as he watched and noted the medical officer also.

"Does anyone here need urgent medical care?" gods help him with these people... "The medical wing of the getaway vessel is already prepared for others." His eyes then flickered to Dezyim. Ah, great... "What, not gonna provoke this time?.."

Silver, meanwhile, pulled out two transporter tags from her own pouch, handing one to Tavek, and the other to Ed, as she was closest to them. Tavek took his with a small nod of thanks. He didn’t have the energy for much else. Silver gave a small smile to them both. “Ready for a prison break?” She said to them.

He grinned ear to ear, as this was the best news he’d heard in a long time. “Let’s get the fuck out of here.” He nodded, before adding for good measure, “—please.”

"Um, sorry, I just confirmed with him-" Allan nodded to Vara'l as he looked at Snake to answer the medical question, "answer's no, nothing urgent here by any means." Which was, to his knowledge, true. He then looked back to Vara'l, looking at the transporter tag, then back up to him. "I mean, I can just ask you - or, wait-" he looked at the other officers, narrowing his eyes slightly at Silver. "What... you look familiar. Name?" (edited)

“Ensign SILV3-R. Silver. Just in a really awful hair cut and color. I was afraid that long hair might be suspicious.” She said, turning back to Allan- her slightly glowing yellow eyes definitely gave her away, no Romulan could have them naturally unless they literally carved their own eyes out to replace with synthetic ones. Plus she hadn’t blinked this entire time.

"Okay, and - earlier this month. How'd we meet earlier this month, and... do you remember what you ended up doing, as a um, favor..?" He asked her, hoping she'd remember. Sucking ghosts into a vacuum was a 'favor', sure. But it was an easy way to confirm her identity, to him at least.

“Mm. I don’t feel like it right now.” He replied tiredly. After a beat he turned to face Snake as he spoke again. “Sorry about… I’m sorry. I didn’t realize that… yeah. Thank you.” He felt a pang of guilt, but mostly he just felt… exhausted. He didn’t know if they really could trust these officers, but he frankly didn’t care all that much anymore. “So… why did you help us? And where will you go now?”

“Oh, the ghost competition! I got that one ghost off you before the second one went for me. If that counts as a favor, I mean, you don’t owe me a favor back for that by the way.” She said with a smile, remembering the whole debacle much more fondly than Allan probably did. She had won and gotten a pet out of it, after all.

"Thanks. Okay, yeah-" he looked at Havra and Victoria and nodded, "that's a real answer, and a correct one - I think that verifies who she is pretty well, at least."

Candy bars had been given whether or not the prisoners wanted them, and Vesta returned to the sidelines, satified that everyone in this cell was stable and in surpisingly good spirits. In someways she was glad that she didn't know anyone very well, but in others she wished that somebody had been happy to see her, and not just some nebulous rescuer.

She fond herself at a loss of words, half tempted to request his weapon and try to shoot them in the face, but in reality that would be a catastrophic idea nor did she trust her aim enough to pull that off. Questions were no good, they could have hidden their loyalties on 777. She pulled Victoria behind her back. "I don't know."

The glare Allan received was sharp and pointed. The one directed at Dezyim - a bit less so. "If you didn't, it means I did a good job," came the curt reply. "And helping people who were hurt by Tal Shiar is my job. It's the least I can do after I've been pulled out of it's vice grip. Because while my life individually doesn't mean much and ultimately I will die and be judged for my deeds, I can do something about it while I'm still here." Begrudgingly, he took out another cigarette and offered it to the Vorta: "That last part is confidential, though. Take this candy and bugger off."

Well, all that was good enough for her. Her legs were beginning to lose feeling again, though this time, she suspected for a reasons better than worse. She gave Havra an understanding nod, however, even if she was convinced, accepting her current place over her want to take a seat again. "I get it," she said, softly. From where she stood, now she could put both hands on Havra's shoulders, one on each, which she would, "but even if it is a trick... we can't just stay here."

Allan looked back to Vara'l, curiously taking one of the tags as they were handed out, before he added a question: "Do you know, um ... the other cells, the other 12 of us - there's - is.." he took a deep breath, he could talk, he knew how to talk, fuck.. "everyone alive?"

"No fatalities have been reported." The Romulan reported to them then as he watched the other. "..Everyone's alive." Vara'l elected to not elaborate on conditions though.

“That’s the same reason I joined Starfleet. To do something actually good with my life.” He said it bitterly, as if he no longer quite believed that. He took the cigarette gingerly, but continued to hold it away from himself. “Now, and I hate to ask more of you…” he didn’t seem to hate it terribly. In fact, he seemed to find it a little bit funny; the ghost of a smile on his face. “…but could you spare a light, too?”

She didn't dare to turn around to look at Victoria, memories of how she had been transported into the first place they had been held at flashing before her eyes. There had been enough people she did not care to have there standing behind her back for a lifetime. "If this is urgent, you might as will stun me before transport."

Allan looked at Vara'l, and while the emotion in his slightly red eyes had been rather playful before, just trying to focus on the happy emotion that was hopefully getting out of here, it was clearly one of concern now - and just the slightest shake, too. "Vara'l," he said softly, "that's... good to hear." He considered his next words carefully. "But you're hesitating, Vara'l, I - you wouldn't lie to me about this.. right?" (edited)

"Is that what you want?" Victoria asked, quiet enough that she wouldn't be readily heard over the other conversations going on in the room. She didn't sound quick to judge, merely interested in ascertaining that Havra really would have preferred to be sedated. "We're all going with you, you know, you're not doing this alone."

Grey eyes fixed upon Allan then. "I wouldn't." He then paused and admitted softly. "..Not everyone's gotten off intact as I'm sure you're aware in here." He paused then and added slowly then. "I've another friend here, Allan." A very quietly admitted fact.

"Of course not." She snapped, immediately regretting it as soon as she realized. "I do not want to be transported to elements know where at all."

Allan swallowed, nodding slowly as Vara'l spoke to him. "I know," he said, "and I - Vara'l, the... I... what the hell do you mean by that, as intact, are there people not intact, Vara'l- I mean, like - I mean, I mean.." oh, no, no, no, he was not going to lose it now, but.. "can you tell me if like... I mean, is everybody going to - they're alive right now, are they going to be alive, are they so..." he wasn't even sure where he was going anymore. He rambled too much, and he knew it.

Victoria sighed, but did not seem to take offense. "I think they're Starfleet," she confessed, "I wanna go, and I think we all want you to come with us. We're not gonna let you stick around here to die."

He puffed out the smoke through his nose, the impression of an angry dragon on point, but offered a lighter nonetheless. Instead of replying to Dezyim, however, his attention was once again turned towards the engineer. "Electrocution burns on one of the third cell dweller's hands, two other were dragged off to the labs," he wasn't one to mince around the bush. The guy was asking for details on his colleagues, and the grim realities of their situation had to be delivered to these people at some point. "First level - fucked up android, cut UT, and a stabbing victim. That's why the med on your getaway vessel is warmed up already."

"Nobody is going to die." The Romulan responded then as he reached out to them, offered them a hand if they needed one. "We're getting them to medical." He stated then. "As our associate here said, med is warmed up and ready."

Stabbing victim. That phrase shouldn't have alarmed him as much as it did. That could be anyone. After all, Ed was a stabbing victim too, right? And Ed was fine! There was no certainty that the stabbing victim was Saren, or that it was something worse than Ed's injury, and yet, his mind didn't provide him with that kind of logic. Without thinking about it, he'd grabbed onto Vara'l's hand when he offered it, just to steady himself, really - the CTO might have noticed that he was slightly shaking. "Okay, t.. thanks," he barely managed to get the words out to the man who'd answered his question. "And they're... going to be okay. In the medbay. Which they'll be in, like, any second now, which we'll - we'll be going up to the same, getaway.. vessel, soon, too, once we get all these tags, on, right.. right. Okay. Okay, yeah."

Havra did not want to die, despite the fact that she had asked to be shot multiple times in the last few minutes. Looking around the cell was surreal. They did not act like they were Tal Shiar, but that was by no means actual prove, which she was painfully aware of. It was down to hoping then. "If you insist... I suppose you are right, there is no real benefit to staying behind."

Out of all the horrors listed, it was the “fucked up android” that really got to him. Maybe it was because he was a roboticist, it was his responsibility to help- he remembered, her name was Aria, she was so gentle and she was completely undeserving of any harm at all.. and he himself was too fucked up to help her even when they all got beamed back up. He instead was forced to just sit with that knowledge knowing that not only would he have to let someone else crack him open and start ripping out (more gently than that) all the melted wiring and shit (when he detested anyone else touching him on a good day, after all this shit he was positively petrified of it), he now knew that he could not perform the one task he was good for- being a roboticist and helping his fellow androids. He wondered if she now somewhat distrusted organic people too, after all this. He couldn’t say that his own trust in them was intact now. Maybe Vici had gotten to him in that regard.

"Okay, good," Victoria said, tentatively stepping out from behind Havra. "We're going home, okay? We're going home," she reassured, encouraging Havra to step forwards from the back wall and towards the beds.

All of the prisoners were now tagged. A brief shimmer filled the room... and just like that, they were gone to the getaway vessel. (edited)