Star Trek: Starbase 777

After paying their way into the colosseum with their stolen goods (and a bribery to be let inside even though they were late for the event), @Away Team Two were inside the building, which was sort of like a Klingons' take on the Roman colosseum of old. It was open-roofed, and had a large circle of seats around the central stage, and everything in the building was either red, grey or black, like if shadow the hedgehog or one of those people who design gamer chairs designed a building. It would be hard to hear one another above the cheering for the person in the centre - a very tall, very buff woman, decked out in Klingon warrior garb, all furs and spikes. Somehow, though, the way she walked around the stage, flexing for the audience, was very reminiscent of WWE fights. She even had a special name: PANTHER THE POUNDER! It was originally something else similarly alliterative, but she was advised by her 'publicity agents' to change it to be less risqué. Before her, a pummelled opponent lay on the floor, looking like a cross between a crumpled tissue and a bruised potato. "ANOTHER OPPONENT DEFEATED BY I, THE PANTHER! Who else dares challenge me?" (edited)

Senang looked between her teammates, unsure of who should go. Realistically, either she or Yoro'clis or Aoife had the most combat experience, and would be the best picks. And considering he was naturally far stronger than humans, and she couldn't accurately parse Yoro'clis' abilities, perhaps it was wise if she did end up being the one to challenge them. She'd ask the rest what they thought, though. "Does anyone else want to go? Otherwise I will volunteer." If there was someone who felt like getting pummelled into the ground, he wouldn't argue. Well, no, he would, a little bit. But if they felt strongly about it, he wasn't one to judge.

"Why don't we all just go?" Aoife mused, clearly not fond of the idea of anyone having a 1v1 with an undine. "Or we could wait for someone else to volunteer and we observe to get an idea of how she fights, that way we'll know any weaknesses to exploit."

“I say we wait, who knows what our odds are.” She said in a hushed tone, the hybrid having returned to her dutch-ish accent. She stood behind Aoife, trying to catch a glimpse or two once in a while, but overall she was rather uninterested in the match. Being surrounded by Klingons, real or not, didn’t help. “I don’t think we should risk it.”

"I am volunteering. I am fairly certain I will be able to win a fight, and I get the feeling we need to do so to progress." He wasn't a martial artist for nothing, and he'd done his research on Undine after last time. They shifted using DNA imitation, which made them essentially indistinguishable from the species they were imitating. That included the physical limitations of those species. He was a Vulcan in peak physical condition, with decades of martial arts training under his belt. There wouldn't be very many people that would defeat him in a fair fight, and he wasn't planning on fighting fair. He had a phaser and a phaser rifle with him for a reason.

Seeing the show, Saren couldn't help but wonder: were the Undines just that willing to roleplay out all of other species culture aspects, including entertainment, or was this, at least in some part... genuine? "I'm afraid we don't have that much time to wait," he shook his head, looking at his teammates. "If things get bad, Lieutenant, I will jump in to help. But also, uh-- we have a secret weapon, right?" Calling a weird fucking cat that was weird, but this whole away mission was anything but.

"I can take the secret weapon with me. Perhaps she will be less inclined to attack me if I have it with me." It truly wasn't a hardship to carry the cat with them. Senang was possibly more skilled with one hand than most people were with two, and they'd do a lot to keep the cat safe. Even if it was a hologram. He pushed towards the front of the crowd, cat in hand, clearing his throat as he went. He wasn't a shouter, so he had to prepare himself for challenging this opponent. "I will challenge you," he said firmly, voice barely raised to a yell. Mission failed on that front... But as he climbed towards the stage, he still seemed to catch the Panther's attention, given that he was the only person who wanted to try his luck.

He did indeed! The crowd cheered and so did she, eager to lay into another victim - er, defeat another opponent. "A CHALLENGER APPROACHES!" She yelled, as soon as Senang made it down to the central stage. "What's your warrior name, enemy mine?"

Senang looked visibly confused. A warrior name... did he need one? He frowned for a second, before opening his mouth again. "You may call me... the Victor?" It probably would have sounded a lot cooler if he sounded a little more certain.

"Nice to meet you, Victor!" It was hard to tell if she was deliberately misinterpreting that or not. "Everyone, can we get some WAR CRIES for them?" The crowd cheered 'Victor, Victor, Victor!' "WOOO! And let me hear a HISS for the PANTHER!" A strange hissing sound came from the crowd. It was hard to tell if that was an Undine vocalisation or if she thought that was the noise panthers made. "Tell the crowd, then - what do you want for your prize? It can be ANYTHING! I have the clout to get you whatever you want."

Well, Senang was at least sensible enough not to just blurt out what they needed. "Can I decide later?" she asked, hoping to look genuine, "I just came for the fight." That at least looked very real, her suit and weapons looking the part, even if the cat fit the picture a little less. It was good to know that the Panther could get them where they needed to go. She just hoped she was a good enough liar to not arouse suspicion while they were at it.

"Of course, worthy opponent! Our battle will be legendary!" The audience cheered, and she moved the mic away. "...Can you put the cat down, though? I don't want to accidentally hit it."

"But then wouldn't it be smart to keep him with me? That way you have to put more of an effort in." Senang was a tactical officer. He did tactics and stuff. Or something. He stanced up, his feet shoulder width apart, his hands in front of him, one of them still holding the kitten gently. If it was at genuine risk of being hurt, he'd probably drop it instinctively, but the Panther didn't need to know that.

"Eh... I suppose it isn't a real cat and you're only preventing yourself from using one hand, so it's fine." She wasn't super happy about it, but she wanted to move things on for the audience. "Get yourself a Bat'leth and stand on that marker there, then." She pointed toward where a blue marker was on the stage, then walked over to stand on her own red marker. "Alright, panther pals! The rules are the same: first to leave the ring, surrender or die loses!" Die? Uh-oh. What was Senang getting into? "Chant with me! Three! Two! ONE! LET'S GOOOOO!" She charged across the stage!

It had been a while since Senang had fought with a bat'leth, but he did have some practice with the weapon. He wasn't a particularly Klingon fighter, far more comfortable combining the weapon with different styles of martial arts, but he could. As soon as he was in position, the fight started, and the Panther was rapidly approaching. There wasn't a lot Senang could do about that, but.... he had a kitten in his hand.... Senang, no... Senang yes. She threw the kitten right at the Panther's face, taking a few steps to the side to avoid her approach, swiping at them forcefully with the sharp side of the bat'leth in order to do some early damage.

Well, THAT hadn't been what she'd expected at all, and she was completely thrown! The cat landed on her face and screeched, clawing at her head and getting her in an eye as it tried to cling to anything it could hold to. Poor distressed cat. She actually dropped the Bat'leth just so she was able to grab it off her face. Oh boy, this wasn't good for publicity, and OW her eye and sides where Senang had managed to get a few hits in. "What the fuck? You dirty little cat exploiter!" She dropped it and then aimed a swift and foreceful uppercut toward Senang's chin. (edited)

Fighting without bat'leths was preferable to fighting with bat'leths. The issue about them both having weapons is that while he had a weapon, his opponent did too, and there was a far bigger chance to get hurt if there were weapons involved. As soon as he'd tanked the hit to the face, managing to turn his head just enough to not be forced to bite his own tongue off but still taking a lot of force to his jaw and cheek, he dropped his own bat'leth, and rushed in to try to land a powerful blow to the sternum. The closer they were together, the more damage Senang could do. "I am sorry about that. A tactical mind finds weaknesses to exploit, and exploits them. It was only logical to attempt to distract you." Keeping an enemy talking would distract them as well, and though Senang couldn't afford to lose their own focus, it was worth trying to keep up a conversation if it would give them the upper hand.

"HROW!" Was her grunt of pain as she got hit in the sternum. Her face red, she growled out wheezily, "Yeah, but did you have to do it by throwing a cat at me? I look so uncool!" What if she was deemed not badass enough for the gladiator role? She might get stuck managing a cat cafe! She loved cats, but she also loved killing things. "HRAH!" He battle cry as she socked Senang right in the nose! They would definitely bleed, and it would probably be broken. It was a good thing they were fighting so up close, though, because with one eye out of commission her depth perception wasn't as good as it could be. "This flesh vessel is feeble. Be glad I can't show you my TRUE strength."

"This flesh vessel is not." Senang spat out some green blood as it seeped into his mouth, and launched into an uppercut that would hit the Panther in the throat. He wasn't very tall, so wouldn't be able to reach vital areas on her face very comfortably, but the throat he could do. It was a good way to wind the Panther too, who probably wasn't too used to her "flesh vessel" relying on the manual intake of air. "You are a strong fighter regardless."

It was true - most of her opponents so far had been other Undine still getting used to their meat puppets. Going up against someone who was actually used to operating theirs was actually a pretty big disadvantage. She took the punch to the throat and had to back away just so she could cough for a bit. "Ugh, I'm bruising like a peach! How do the outsiders live like this?" To be fair, before advanced medical science, not very well. "Thanks, though. HOO-RRAAGH!" One big KICK aimed at Senang's knee!

Senang definitely couldn't take a hit to the knee and risk getting put out of commission, so they had to dodge back to avoid it. Luckily if you paid attention to your opponents, kicks were usually easy to see coming. The dodge put distance between them though, and that wasn't what Senang wanted. Although... they weren't above fighting dirty.... In a single move, they drew their phaser, and shot the Panther, the weapon still set to stun. Time to end this fight, in their opinion. They had things to do.

She took a phaser shot straight to the face - but didn't go down. "Seriously? Just shooting me with a phaser? What a terribly boring, terrible Federation way to win. How did you even get ahold of a real phaser?" Strange that she could tell. Had she been shot with one before? She was struggling to stay upright, though, and she had worse aim even before her balance was thrown off. She decided to try one last trick - straight outta the Klingon handbook. She ran straight towards Senang like a charging rhinoceros and then SLAMMED her ridged forehead down toward Senang's forehead. They better dodge - that might be a little too skull-splitting to survive. (edited)

And dodge Senang did, taking advantage of how uncoordinated the Panther was currently. He scrambled to the side, half diving and half falling, pivoting on his foot in a way that probably looked about as painful as it was. "Logic dictates that one never reveals their secrets," he pointed out, aiming and shooting once more. "I am supposed to be a Vulcan, after all." If that second shot didnt take her down, it would probably at least slow her down enough to easily be able to grapple her.

Aaand she's down. There's only so much you can resist a phaser, no matter how powerful you were, especially in a skinsuit you weren't used to. She wasn't unconscious, which was an accomplishment in itself, but she was getting too sluggish to move, and she knew she was beat. "Right, the logic stuff. I'm really glad I didn't get saddled with that role. Even though I lost, this is way more fun." She stood up sluggishly, grabbed the mic from where she'd dropped it earlier, stumbled over to Senang, then grabbed his arm and held it up high. "WE HAVE A WINNER! Ironically, it seemed THE PANTHER'S only weakness is... CATS! Any final words for our audience, Victor?" She pointed the mic toward him. "Do me a favour and say something cool enough to have been worth me getting my ass kicked." (edited)

Senang was glad for the end of the fight. He could have won the battle more fairly, probably, but he didn't have the patience or the time. He let the Panther raise his arm, before bending down to speak into the mic. "It is only logical to live up to one's name," he said, not really sure if that was cool, but figuring it was in character enough to work. He motioned at the rest of the team to come down, taking stock of himself. His ankle twinged and his nose and face hurt as well, but he wasn't too battered. He was perfectly fine to continue to work, though he'd like to have his nose set back in place and healed up, if possible. Having to re-break it so it could heal correctly would be a pain.

Good enough for the crowd! They cheered, entertained by the good show, though there were a few boos in there too - either toward Senang's victory or at the Panther for disappointing them. The Panther announced that the event was over, and everyone started shuffling out. "So what was the prize you wanted?" She asked them.

"I'm actually here with a team to fix something with the generators that keep the projectors for this place running. They're supposed to be around here somewhere, but we were essentially told to "figure it out", so perhaps you could point us in the right direction? We just need access to the consoles." That was close enough to the truth that it wasn't hard to bend it out of shape just a little bit. As their team started arriving, Senang pointed them out, so the Panther would know who they were talking about.

Saren let out a breath of relief as soon as the fight ended in victory of the... Victor, and as soon as they were given the signal to come, he followed the team into the arena, feeling mighty uncomfortable being gazed upon what felt like thousand upon thousand of pairs of eyes, but kept his face carefully neutral. "The "team" would be us, yes," he nodded along, supporting Senang's claims, meanwhile giving her nose a squinted look. As soon as they were left alone, they should get that checked out.

"Oh, that? Yeah, there's one right below the colosseum, actually. This place uses a lot of power because of all the audience members we have to generate besides other Undine. This is sort of a commercial district, too, so it's always busy spawning new people and items. It's right next to the gladiator room, where we prepare for battle." That meant they showered, changed clothes, sharpened weapons, etcetera. That also meant the generator was right near a bunch of very threatening Undine, so don't get caught! "Follow me!" She made her way to a seemingly empty spot in the centre, pressed a button on the ground with her foot, and one of those cool hidden spiral staircases appeared. (edited)

Senang followed after the Panther quite readily, leading the charge so the people behind him would be protected in case the gladiator decided to turn around and attack someone.

Yoro’clis followed continuing to hold his phaser as if he was going into battle. He was suspicious of the entire simulated world and concerned about any sort of ambushes. For now things seemed to be going well though so he just walked ready for whatever was next. It seemed like Senang had the situation under control for now.

She wasn't really in a position to attack anyone. In fact, she was so unsteady on her feet, she stumbled and fell down the stairs. They could hear various smacks, thuds, and 'oof, ouch, aagh, ouch' noises as she tumbled down, then a short moment of silence, then a distant, "I'm okay!"

Well... this is the closest they have been to the generator, it would be foolish to stop now. In Saren went.

"Be careful," Senang said out loud as he descended far more calmly than the Panther had. "You know how hard your flesh vessel is to take care of."

When they all came down, they were met with a large room full of weapons, with a few gladiators chilling out, some in armour, others in bath towels after having a wash in the nearby communal shower. One was tending to Panther with a dermal regenerator. The Panther, no longer bothered to get her ass up off the floor, just pointed in the direction of the room the generator is in. "You should just be able to use your maintenance staff authorisation code or biometrics to get in." (edited)

Yoro’clis scanned the room and saw that the crowd appeared to all be fighters. He figured it was likely a bad idea to try and stun everyone in the room. Instead stealth was needed. That was one of the things that he struggled with. The Honored Elder thought that he would be more useful as a diversion than as a spy. He walked over to the rack of weapons and drew what appeared to be a crude copy of a kar’takin. Yoro’clis began to do a few tricks and show off for all of the nearby gladiators, trying to gather a crowd.

Aoife followed the group into the room. Bringing up the rear of the away team. She stayed toward the back, blocking the exit in case they needed to subdue the undine without them getting away.

Oh, fuck. Well, of course it would not get easier for them. Though, the mention of biometrics, did make an idea pop in his head... Spotting where Panther was sitting, Saren came closer to her, bowing his head at the most unnecessarily deep angle of Respect and Admiration: "Thank you so much, Panther, this was a great one despite the loss. Let your next arena battles be as grand as this one..." he then reached out and put his hand on her yet unhealed patch of skin, holding it there for a good moment like some baseball dad, reassuring his kid that they did just great. Then, after muttering out a quick "oh, um, apologies...", as if realizing his dumb fleshbag faux pas, he stepped away from her, face pulled in an embarrassed grimace, and tried his best to disappear in the crowd with quite literally blood on his hands - hopefully enough to fool the security? He was just about to check...

The gladiators were successfully enamoured with Yoro'clis' display! One of them even grabbed a Bat'leth and started doing his own tricks, trying to show him up. It seemed everything was a competition with these guys. While the gladdy lads (gender neutral) had their fun with their tricks, Panther was busy being baffled at whatever the hell Saren was doing. She looked very confused, but didn't question it, assuming this was some Romulan ritual she hadn't learned about. Like an unprosecuted murderer, Saren got away scot-free with blood on his hands. Now all he needed to do was slyly use it to get through biometrics, but that shouldn't be too hard considering everyone was distracted by Yoro'clis' sick tricks.

He realized that he needed to keep the act up but could not act too skilled with the sword. That would likely raise too many questions. To deal with this Yoro’clis decided to shroud for the crowd. It has been a while since he had needed to use that ability but the veteran was more than capable of still cloaking himself. He began to boast about his skills. “This meat suit has all sorts of fun tricks!” The Honored Elder then began to shimmer before disappearing, seemingly having teleported away somehow.

While the gladiators were busy being enamored with Yoro'clis' out of this world kar'takin skills (something Saren himself would gladly check out, but couldn't right now), he made his way further into the underground corridor, soon arriving at the generator room's door. Positioning himself so that it would be all too hard to see his actions if someone stood behind his back (and perhaps having one of his teammates flank his side for further security), he pressed his palm against the sensor, smearing it with Undine blood.

Aoife didn't miss a beat and followed Saren down the corridor to help shield him from prying eyes. She stood behind him acting as casually as possible hoping no one would notice what was going on.

Holy shit! Where'd he go! The gladiators were amazed, looking around for where Yoro went - though he should probably come back soon, because them scrutinising their surroundings wasn't good for the rest of the group trying to be stealthy. The sensor got a little confused about registering both Saren's DNA and the blood, but eventually prioritised the blood, maybe it was from someone with higher clearance, or they just got lucky. Probably a good thing, because it might have some way to notice if the biometrics of a person were disguised Undine meatsuit biometrics or actual genuine not-fluidic lifeforms. The door beeped and could easily be pushed open. Inside was a large generator with a panel below it, with all sorts of switches and buttons. Most significantly, there were three numbered buttons; number one was red, number two was yellow, and number three was blue.

Yoro’clis rushed towards a nearby wall and then tried to lean back as casually as he could. It was difficult to poorly act as a Jem’Hadar. For now he did his best to dazzle the large audience and be bad at being himself. That was all that he could do as the rest of the group did the actual work. After a second or two Yoro’clis unshrouded, attracting the attention of some. He was getting old and could not stay hidden for long. The Honored Elder then spun the polearm as he spoke loudly. “Not bad, eh?”

As the door beeped, Saren pressed his (un-bloodied, non-murderer looking) palm against it to push it open. The sight of the generator made him heave a tremendous sigh of relief, "Okay, let's get this thing into perfect working condition, yes?" After making sure that he would not be seen by the gladiators outside of the room, the Romulan pulled out the isolinear chip that was given to the teams. He eyed the buttons with furrowed brows, and then decided to check if there was anything on the screen itself...

The gladiators clapped. "Oh, I gotta get my meatsuit changed to do that! What species are you even supposed to be, actually? Some kind of Gorn?" Uh-oh. Let's not let the Undine get their hands on the DNA of any Jem'hadar. They're bad enough to deal with without being able to turn invisible. The screen said nothing except 'input password', but someine had set the background to be an image of Picard, Spock, O'brien and Sisko all hanging out together. A strange arrangement, considering none were known to hang out with one another except maybe Sisko and O'brien for work reasons.

Aoife walked into the generator room and looked around unsure what exactly to do. "Is there a specific sequence to repair them?" She asked Saren while looking around, not speaking directly about disabling the generators in case someone was listening. "Or should we just take a direct approach with our 'repairs'." She gestured to her phaser rifle when she asked about a direct approach.

Yoro’clis quickly realized how bad it would be if he was copied. He was resistant to many weapons, stronger than almost all species, and could turn invisible. Some sort of lie was going to be needed to prevent a legion of Jem’Hadar Undines to be around. Luckily these ones did not seem to be very smart. “I think they are called Vorta, this one is also an Honest Elder or something. The issue is that they are all made in machines and we can’t copy the copies. Need to get them fresh.”

That was sure an... interesting desktop picture choice, thought it felt like it had some very specific purpose. And, looking at the tricolor buttons (a very familiar tricolor, he might add), then back at the screen, Saren felt like he might've know what that purpose was... "Your first assumption would be correct, in my opinion," he replied. Picard, Spock, O'Brien, Sisko. Red, blue, yellow, red uniform... He was about to do the most mundane act of turning on the damn thing, or blow tae fuck up. Saren put in the following sequence of numbers: 1-3-2-1.

Congrats, Saren, you solved the puzzle! With a very satisfying 'ping', Saren was accepted into the next stage of security, but it was just biometrics again, so he got through to the generator menu. Whoever set that picture as a reminder for themself to remember the password wasn't as subtle as they thought, it seemed. From here, Saren could nose around the system and fuck it up as much as he wanted, though he might need someone with more technical aptitude to do the latter.

Plunging the isolinear chip into the system and borrowing all of that juicy, juicy Undine information, was somehow even more satisfying. The rest of the magic, though, had to be done by the team's engineer, Yaveru, who Saren gently called out for, not raising his voice too much because risking getting caught right now, would be the worst.

Yoro'clis realized that he needed to have another trick or the gladiators would go back to walking around the room. He was not fit for talent shows but for now he would at least need to act the part. The first thing that he could think of was something he had seen in the station's sports hall. "Everyone I learned a human game called arm wrestling at the cafe, who wants to play?" The Honored Elder walked over to a nearby table and set up for his first challenger.

Presumably, Yaveru, the team engineer, answered the call, and probably fucked up the generator by typing the equivalent of 'delete system 32' in the console commands. They were done. What an incredibly smooth operation! A fight won, gladiators impressed, puzzle solved, information acquired, and a generator destroyed. It was going well. SO well. So, of course, things had to go terribly wrong all of a sudden - when sections of the floor started disappearing. Jagged square holes appeared around them, and they could hear yells from the other room as several gladiators, including one who'd sat at the opposite end of the table to arm wrestle Yoro, plummeted into the void below. They'd have to parkour their way out, avoiding all the holes along the way, lest they want to embrace the void too! (edited)

Aoife jumped onto a solid-looking section of floor once she realised what was going on. "Time to go Lieutenant!" She exclaimed, taken somewhat by surprise by how violently the simulation had begun to deteriorate.

All of the joy quickly disappeared from Yoro'clis' face as he watched everyone around him fall to their deaths. Those who had seen the Jem'Hadar in battle before would recognize the cold stare. It appeared that he now had to leave the colosseum or die. With the kar'takin still in hand Yoro'clis began to jump over the holes and tried to make it out of the area as quickly as possible. He did not know if more floor would disappear soon and could not afford to risk that.

Senang followed after Aoife. His played had totally been active the whole time and wasn't just returning now to make sure he didn't die randomly. His nose still hadn't been set, but he had other worries at the moment.

"Move!" was the immediate reaction, as Saren just watched a chunk of a floor disappear before him into nothingness, something he may had only seen in glitchy first test holodeck simulations before. He had no wish to try and see where these rabbitholes would lead, so off he went hopping over them all the way back to the (hopefully still existing) surface!..

As they all hopped, skipped and jumped along, they passed Panther, who, with her half-healed injuries and still recovering from two stuns, was struggling to maintain enough balance to hop over the holes safely. She lost her balance and started to tumble into the void below, but they were near enough that one of them might be able to dart over and catch her if they wanted to, though it would mean remaining in the rapidly swiss-cheesing room for a bit longer. Question was: would one of them risk their life for a powerful enemy combatant, or was it better to let her (possibly) die?

Well, shit. Senang did feel a certain obligation to Panther. He'd blatantly used them for their clout, after all, and he felt like he owed her. So, with a little effort, he grabbed at her, using his vulcanoid strength to pull her back to the edge. "Watch out, Panther," he told her gruffly, as he made sure she was standing upright before following after the others again.

Yoro'clis continued to jump towards the exit, completely ignoring Panther. From an observers view it was possible that he had not even seen her. After spending years on the battlefield and becoming desensitized to death the Honored Elder had no mercy for a falling enemy. There was no reason to risk his life for the enemy.

Aoife did consider leaving panther to die, but decided to help so Senang would have some backup. Plus Panther could probably be a good source of intel if they could capture them. "On your six!" Aoife announced as she hopped onto a bit of floor behind Senang to help.

"Whoa! Thanks, you two." Considering they went into the generator room to 'repair' it and everything in the simulation immediately went to shit, plus Senang having an actual real phaser earlier, she was getting a little suspicious... But in return for them potentially saving her life, she chose not to say anything. She simply went along with the rest of them, maneuvering through the room and up the stairs as best she could, until they were all out on the stage again. Everything was still covered in holes, spreading out from approximately where the generator was underground, though they seemed to be appearing and disappearing in enough of a pattern they were able to navigate through them and leave the colosseum and get to where there were less holes. (edited)

Yoro'clis looked around and saw the entire world collapsing around him. The mission was now on a clock ticking towards everyone's death. Speed was needed and the group needed to do whatever they could to make it happen. Yoro'clis decided to resort to lies and technobabble. It was not his preference to act like this but there was no other option. He turned to Panther. "It looks like we were too late. We are going to need to do redirects to the other generators to stop this. Do you know where the closest one is?"

Thank fuck for his agility and dexterity, Saren was nearing the less hazardous zone of the colosseum with two objectives in his rushing mind - checking if everyone got out, and checking what he downloaded. After turning and seeing and making sure of the first, he then turned his attention to the tricorder...

What Saren had downloaded was an Internal crew list. As he read it, their environment stopped glitching, and perhaps as some kind of backup in case things went completely wrong, or perhaps this was just a side effect of everything going wrong, the environment completely changed to a rainforest. To be continued in #inner-rainforest ...