Star Trek: Starbase 777

[D] Ava had bid her goodbye to James and Lilian when she’d heard the starbase wide message. She’d decided to change into her uniform and head to the labs, see where she could help. She was now going down the hallways with quick steps.

15:20

She found the door to the bioscience labs and went in.

The mercs were moving throughout the rooms on this deck taking everything of value.

He followed them through the hallways still under shroud, waiting for them to come out of the next room.

They finally made it through and moved to the officers corridor tried breaking into Aleto’s room at the end of the hallway.

Chance! He moved up behind them under shroud, grabbed their heads and clonked them together.

The both of them collapsed on the ground. Their heads both bleeding from the force of the hit though the Romulan seemed like his head had a a little more damage than the Klingon.

He knelt down and began seerching them for communicators, tools or othrr items of note.

There were communicators and each had one. They had different weapons and armor though. Seems they didn’t bother to have uniforms.

He barely cared for the latter two things. For now these two needed to be put somewhere relatively safe, and so he dragged both men to a nearby storage closet, did his best to patch their head wounds and bound their hands with rope, then left for the jeffries tubes.

Just then he heard a Communication from the Gorn earlier it seemed like he wanted to beam these two goons aboard. “Uj'oz Rorstirgh come in. We got to make our escape before the charges go off and destroy the the Starbase.”

Well, obviously he couldn't let this opportunity slide. He snatched up the communicator and, in his best impression of the Klingon's (they were about as deep as each other anyway) said: "Speaking. We are ready to return."

He was covered in a brilliant gold light as he was transported aboard the Runabout the mercs had taken.

[D]Ava had grabbed a phaser and fled the labs when the power failed and the base was put to red alert. Apparently, the mercs had made it to the command ring. Fighting wasn’t exactly Ava’s thing, but if she could help in some way, she would. On her way, she passed dead bodies. In the beginning, it almost made her throw up with shock, but she pulled herself together. All of her senses were sharpened, she was on the edge of her seat, strained and ready. Her eyes darted around as she held the phaser. She just had to get to the lifts. Hopefully they would work if she put them on auxiliary power.

09:33

She had to take out one merc which she managed and then she stepped into the lift.

Streelan surged down the hallway after her and skidded into the lift just before the doors closed.

As she headed for the labs, she wondered whether Stree would be there as well. She never really could remember the times of his shifts… Too bad. She entered the chemical science lab.

She hurried to the lifts.

She exited the #natural-sciences-lab-02 and walks over to the lift.

Ava went down the familiar corridor and entered the chemistry lab.

She stepped out of the lift, thinking. She really needed that animal, guinea pig or whatever she could find. She needed the practice and a holoprogram just wouldn't work. And a person... actually, didn't what was her name? Ma Ching-ling, didn't she offer? It was for emotional support yes but...maybe she would agree to telepathy as well. She'd try to convince her anyway. She entered the #natural-sciences-lab-02.

She left her lab and walked through the hallway over to the turbolift.

She waited for Jasmine with a smile. The girl had already captured her heart. She was intelligent and fun, just like her mother.

And she was following along, a smile on her face. She herself was growing quite fond of the Vulcan lady. She was smart, fun and quite a fun person to be around! "So, what's your current project? Anything special?" She asked curiously. "You seem like a busy person after all."

Ava laughed as they went down the corridor. “Yeah, my work does keep me on my toes. However, at the time being, things are getting more relaxed. During our last mission, we encountered a Reman who was able to mind control others.” She shuddered at the thought. “I guess investigating this is a project, but Laara is doing most of that, so I focus on analyzing samples which different research vessels bring to the base. Today, I’ll synthesize some ammonia. That’s for the environmental ring, they need more fertilizer.” She opened the door to the labs. “Et voila,” she said with a smile, “Welcome to my realm.” (edited)

"Have you tried pulling DNA out of the samples and then letting the computer make a projection of the brain of said reman? Telepathy in most species is neuron based, such as with myself! So maybe that's something you can try?" She suggested, shrugging a little. When the doors opened she grinned brightly and looked around. "Before I go inside, what am I and am I not allowed to mess with? I don't want to ruin anything you guys did."

Ava chuckled. “I’ll show you what you can touch. As for your idea, it’s smart, and I’m pretty sure Laara has already tried that out. She’s the brain expert. I’m more into chemistry and marine biology.” Then, she entered the labs together with Jasmine.

Styre walked down the corridor quickly, turning right into the bioscience lab; the one with the necessary equipment that he needed.

She made her was to the bioscience lab.

Styre walked back into the hall, heading towards the turbolift.

Austin waited outside the research corridor. He wanted to stay professional and knew the presence of anouther security officer would help.

After a little bit of waiting Austin decided to go in on his own. He put on his best professional smile and entered the bioscience lab.

Ava was still incredibly happy that Austin and Jasmine were with her. It was truly amazing to have such great company!

As they walked through the corridor Austin stayed next to Ava. This time he was the one who was closer then he needed to be.

Ava worried a little about the fact that Jasmine was most likely very aware of how fuzzy Austin made her feel. Well, it wasn’t like she could hide it from a literal empath. “So, Jasmine, how exactly is it with your telepathic abilities? You said they’re increasing and developing. What’s that like?” She had that tone of scientific curiosity.

She trotted along with Ava and Austin, walking next to Ava with a smile. She was enjoying this quite a bit. Hearing the question made her think for a moment before answering. "Alright, picture it like this: you're in a room, completely empty. Now, slowly but surely this room is going to fill with voices and feelings that get louder and louder. It can get overwhelming- like you saw a few hours back, but most of the time it's manageable. Right now I'm trying to learn how to project my thoughts, because I have the recieving pretty much figured out."

Ava nodded along. “Yeah, I can imagine. Funnily enough, my telepathic abilities have recently been increasing as well, so I kind of know what you mean to an extent.” She looked at her curiously. “So, if you’ve got the receiving figured out; what you’re saying is you could read my thoughts?”

Austin stayed quiet.

"If I focus on you specifically, yes. The empathy part is just active all the time. Can't exactly turn that off." She chuckled a little and shrugged.

“What am I thinking right now?” Ava thought of a couple of things she wanted to do later. Talk to Georgia, eat lunch, respond to Styre’s message, meditate.

She looked at her and raised an eyebrow. "I don't know, I'm not allowed to read your mind without permission. So unless you give me direct permission to read your mind, I'm not doing anything." She said with a smile.

“That’s very commendable of you.” Ava smirked. “You know what, let’s try this later. I’m sure Laara would like to talk to you about this!” Maybe it was indeed best if Jasmine wasn’t reading Ava’s thoughts as long as Austin was nearby. She went into the lifts.

She left the lift and walked through the corridor until she reached the #natural-sciences-lab-02 and entered, first walking into the doorframe and wincing from the bump forming on her forehead. She should have watched where she was going instead of continually looking over her notes and adding new ones to her padd but who was going to stop her? She entered through the door this time.

Ava went into the bioscience labs once again. There was also some chemistry things she needed to take care of, but first biology!

He walked down the hallway extremely excited.

In the corridor, Ava took her PADD from Jasmine again. “So, let’s see what you’ve got in mind, shall we?”

She followed them.

On the PADD was a list. A few tools, paint of some sort and hairdye. Also attached was a file, a design for a pattern on her cybernetic arm. "Hope you like it!"

“Oh, this looks amazing! I’ll definitely help you with that.” Ava nodded and got Jasmine a glance as they approached the lift. “You want to dye your hair?”

He went down the corridor.

Down the hall to the turbolift.

To the bioscience labs.

Ava ran down the corridor to the lifts.

Tammy slowly made her way down the corridor with a hum, pushing her hovercart with her, until eventually coming to a stop outside of the Bioscience Labs for her first drop off of the day. She picked out a specific item from her hovercart, before heading into the labs.

Tammy exited the labs and carried on her route, humming Jingle Bells as she did.

TO THE BIOSCIENCE LAB.

Ava ruffled through her hair for a second before she simply let them fall down onto her shoulders. A little messy still, but good enough. “Hey, Austin, what would you say to Hawaii?” Her tone was casual, but secretly she was grinning with joy and excitement.

As he walked with her he grew an excited smile. "Sounds amazing. Its been forever since I was able to chill out on a warm beach. Why do you ask?"

“Because of my Secret Santa.” Without any further explanation, she pulled out the vacation booking and handed it to him while heading for the lift.

He began reading through it as they stepped into the lift there was a growing look of intrigue on his face.

I'zaak had some spare time on his last day of shore leave before starting his new assignment. He hadn't come remotely close to navigating the base and felt that would be time well spent, especially since he was now at least comfortable with the hospital ring. Now he found himself looking around the research ring. At present time he had no studies or even a clear focus of medical research, but perhaps something he saw today would inspire him. Dressed in his duty uniform he moved down the hall inspecting each door slowly.

She stepped out of the bioscience lab finally after...well, she couldn't exactly remember the last time she left the labs. Ava would usually eventually poke her out but since her transfer, Laara had focused hard on her work and rarely came out. As she walked out she noticed the trill in the hallway. "Morning Lieutenant." She literally had no idea what time it was, was it morning?

I'zaak pulled himself away from the door of the geology lab when he heard someone call out. He paused for a moment to see if he recognized the woman. Once it was clear she was being polite he smiled and walked over. "Good afternoon . . ." He emphasized. "Lieutenant. . . long morning in the labs?" He quirked his brow and looked to the biolab door.

"...Something like that." She said sheepishly, she normally wouldn't have spent so long in the lab but...no one was there to tell her she shouldn't. Her mind was slightly blurry from working through the week and she bore a slight headache. She focused back on the Lieutenant. "Junior Lieutenant Melaara Zeatraan by the way, you are? I'm afraid I don't know too many people here, I've only been here about a month and don't spend much time outside the labs."

He nodded to the woman with a polite smile. "I remember nights like that. You get so invested in making progress or some new breakthrough that you don't even remember to drink your coffee." He gestured to himself. "I'm Dr. I'zaak, I've just been reassigned to the base, I haven't quite started yet."

She smiled weakly, tired from the late nights and early mornings when she thought she found something new. "Nice to meet you Doctor, I'm fairly new too but this is a nice station from what I've seen. Have you liked it so far?"

"Well it's only been a day or so and so far while the station is beautiful the size is giving me pause. I feel like I'm constantly lost and zooming around everywhere except for where I need to get. But It's part of the fun I imagine. Never know who you'll run into next." He looked back to the lab doors. "I hope I'm not distracting you or anything. Or stopping you from getting some rest?"

"No, I'm not...I could use a break." She sighed and rubbed the bridge of her nose. "I think I'm going to head to a bar or the mess or something." Working for almost a week straight definitely wasn't healthy and she now knew not to do it again... although she probably would after she got excited about something again.

The doctor looked over Melaara quickly. She did seem to have classic signs of sleep deprivation, not unheard of among passionate researchers. "I haven't seen the mess before or else I'd offer to help you get there. Are you sure you're alright otherwise?"

"I'm sure I'm fine." A cup of water should erase the panging in her head. She blinked and rubbed her tired eyes. "I can make it." She started walking down the hallway and took a few steps before she realized she was going the wrong way. She sighed and turned around. "See you around Doctor."

He stood still for a moment and nodded as she assured him she was good to make her way to the mess. He remained silent as she slowly turned around and began walking in the opposite direction. He managed to stifle a small chuckle before responding to her. "Lieutenant."

She gave a nod before walking into the wall surrounding the turbolift. "Ack." She stumbled back before entering the blurry turbolift.

I'zaak's eyes widened somewhat as he saw the Lieutenant bump into the wall. He began to hope he didn't just meet his first patient.

He continued to move on examining the research labs.

Maggie walked forward with a smile on her face, her first day on the job! She headed into the physics lab.

She walked to the office.

She walked along the corridor and tried to memorize what was were, then she stopped in front of the office.

She made her way back to the lift.

Lilian made her way to the computer science labs. It would probably be the best place to set up an impromptu command post.

She scrambled out of her office and rushed over to the computer science lab to get some scans.

She had finally managed to make use of the turbolift. As soon as the door opened she ran down the hall. Luckily her memory was good enough to remember where the computer science lab was from earlier that day.

Dagis exited the turbolift, carrying her crate as she did, and scurried down the corridor towards the Computer Sciences Lab. (edited)

The Ferengi exited the lab a short while later and headed back down the corridor to the turbolifts.

With a quick glance behind her she checked if the others were following her, before she headed to the chemical science lab.

She followed down to the chemistry labs.

Ahh, a new, hopefully peaceful day at work! What else could a shy, unassuming (ha, nah, he wasn't really any of those things anymore) ask for? Streelan certainly didn't need more than that especially given the previous few days. He strode out of the turbolift and down the hallway, eager to start off his day...

Ellanor had been cooped up in her room most of the day doing research up in her room. She was typing some information into her PADD as she stepped off the lift and down the hallway. She was so absorbed into her PADD that she didn't notice the tall figure before her. She bumped into him and her PADD clattered to the floor. "Oh my gosh, I am so so sorry!"

The young Kelpien merely smiled serenely and bent down, picking up the PADD and holding it out to her with both hands. "No need to apologise, friend. It happens rather often."

She smiled up at the Lieutenant and took her PADD from him. She then perfected her posture, and spoke more professional. "Please forgive me, sir. I wasn't watching where I was going. I was inputting some data in my notes."

"Call me Streelan. Sir in... a pinch." He made a little pinching motion with his fingers, head cocked to the side. "Hmmph. A pinch. What an odd expression. Just be more careful next time, hm?"

"Of course, si-Streelan. My apologies again. And yes I do agree, that saying is a little odd. But, many earth ones are, if you ask me." She held her hand out to the Kelpien. "My name is Ellanor, by the way. Ellanor Misthair."

"Streelan." The offered hand was shaken. What a difference between them in terms of height, he thought, he must've been an actual giant to her. "Where were you headed?"

"Well, to be honest, I was heading to the bioscience lab to confirm some findings. But now I can't remember what I was going to confirm." She smiled and laughed slightly. She kept her gaze up at him. He was pretty tall. Easily towered over her. "What about you? If I may ask, of course."

"The astrometrics lab. I have a few things to look over before I'm done for the day." He replied while trotting down the hallway.

She attempted to keep up with him, her legs a decent bit shorter than his. "Would you mind if I tagged along? I'm sure my objective will come to me in time."

Stree smirked and glanced backwards at her. "Oh, I'd appreciate the company. The lab gets horribly boring all alone at times..."

Ellanor smiled and followed behind him. "I can agree. Sometimes it's a bit lonely as well. But I just surround myself with plants and that usually makes it less lonely and boring for me."

"I take it botany is a passion of yours." He smiled back at her, a little less mischievously than before. He really was mostly glad to have a little companionship, though. "Isn't it?"

"Oh, absolutely. I'm a sucker for plants, what can I say? I actually have a Dionaea muscipula in my room at this very moment." Her posture relaxed a little as they walked. Talking about plants was always a fun thing for her to do.

"Aren't those rare?" He raised an eyebrow. "Interesting. I've always thought they were the loveliest shade of green."

"Yeah, they are pretty rare. I rescued this one from freezing in the snow one winter a few years back. I talk to him like he's my best friend." She instantly flushed with embarrassment. "I'm sorry, that's a little embarrassing for me to say. I'm just really passionate about plants, I suppose."

"Passion for something you enjoy is sexy." He quipped, absolutely offhand. Trust Streelan to say things like that, it seems, with all his newfound post-vahar'ai confidence. "I'd hardly call it embarrassing."

Ellanor couldn't help but ponder his statement for a moment. Was he complimenting her? Most likely not. She smiled at him and continued their conversation. "What are you passionate about, Streelan?"

"Well, it isn't quite work related..." He chuckled. "I love reading. And books. And simply relaxing with a good poem in hand... oh, I have far too many books in my head."

"Reading? I absolutely love to read. I have a whole separate PADD just for books." Her excitement growing again, as she loved books.

"As do I!" Streelan grinned as he stepped through the door to the astrometrics lab. "Oh, you simply must share some of your collection with me. I promise to do the same."

"Oh, of course. You may borrow my reading PADD at any time, Streelan." She smiled back at him and followed him inside.

She stepped out of the lab and into the hallway, her gaze locked on her padd looking through the research and data just collected.

Ken made his way down the hallway, seeming to be in quite a deep train of thought. What stood out about him however was the fact he didn't look at anyone or say anything, he just walked to the labs with his mind elsewhere.

She started walking, her eyes still glued to the screen when she ran into the doctor. She stumbled back and almost dropped the padd before scrambling to catch it again. "I am so sorry!" She rushed to say. "I should have looked where I was going." She admitted.

He looked at the lieutenant, raising his eyebrow ever so slightly before speaking up. "No worries." He said plainly before patting down his coat and letting out a slight sigh.

"I really am sorry, are you okay? I'm Lieutenant Torvek by the way." She stuck out her hand for a handshake while she introduced herself. "The new assistant chief science officer at this station."

"I am fine." He said in response before shaking her hand firmly. "Doctor Richards. Astrophysicist and chemist." He gave a nod before letting go of her hand, looking at the person in front of him. "A... Pleasure to meet you, Lieutenant."

"A pleasure to meet you too Doctor." She smiled friendly. "Astrophysicist and chemist? That's cool, so are you going to the physics lab or the chemistry lab?" She asked curiously.

"Physics." He said in response before speaking up again. "That lab is more useful seeing the current subject of my research." He put his arms behind his back as he looked passed the woman for a moment before looking back at her. He didn't seem all that easy to talk to.

"What's the current subject of your research?" She asked curiously, he did seem very unforthcoming and not very social at all.

"Slow spinning singularities and neutron stars. A very unusual yet interesting subject." He said calmly, looking at the woman again. "Now, if you would excuse me. I have a experiment to conduct."

"Would you mind if I joined? Spinning singularities have always interested me as well." She asked curiously. "What do you plan to do for your experiment?"

"Fine." He said with a slight grunt as he walked towards the labs. "I'm trying to figure out if the magnetic fields that the stars create are of any influence to their slow spinning nature."

She nodded curiously and trodded after him, bringing along her padd and quickly looking at something before putting it away.

He made his way down to the lift, looking behind him occasionally to see if Ellanor was following or not.

She indeed was, very eagerly

2

She walked out of the lift and into the hallway. She turned around to wait on him.

And out of the lift came Ken, walking in a steady pace as always. "I'll be heading to the chemical labs. Perhaps you can do the same to add the chemical side to the response of your plant."

"Perhaps I could, if you wouldn't mind the company, of course."

"I would not." He gave a nod as they walked down the corridor. "Perhaps I could help you with your research if you don't understand a specific thing."

She smiled at him and nodded. "Yes sir, I would appreciate that very much should the need arise.*

"Very well. Just send a message when you need my aid." He said with yet another nod before walking towards the doors of the labs.

She smiled herself, then headed off in her own direction to work on an experiment with a certain plant.

They quickly made their way to the bioscience, Nately even had a bit of a skip in his step.

Ellanor followed, just about running herself.

He quickly carried her down the hallway laughing as he did. She was just so precious to him.

Ellanor laughed along with him. She felt like they were kids running away.

She walked down the hall to her office and entered.

He quickly ran into the Bio lab.

As soon as the turbolift doors opened, Cecil darted towards the bioscience lab.

After work Cecil stepped into the research corridor and headed to the turbolift.

Doors sliding open, Lihne stepped out and moved briskly down the hall.

Rubbing her shoulders, She soon reached the turbolifts and waited for the doors to open and let her in.

.Maggie rushed down to the lab.

Cecil bolted for the lab

Evoras was quickly walking down the corridor towards the labs.

Cecil walked brisky down the corridor and to the turbolift.

She walked to the turbolift.

It didn’t take him long to find the computer science lab.

11:59

Like a man with a stick up his butt, he went to the lift.

2

3

A PADD in hand she walked to her office.

Cecil got off the lift a few minutes after Evoras. He tossed the empty hypo cartridge into the bio waste and walked down to the CSO's office. He took a deep breath as he reached into his bag to squeeze Baby Nalas. He could do this. He was not going to make a fool of himself. He had the report done, his findings were good and his numbers checked multiple times. He could do this.

"Top of your class? My baby Nalas is so smart! Come here, Marnah will give you a hug! I'm so proud of you!"

No need to worry... he can do this.

2

Remun strode to the computer science labs, his brows slightly furrowed.

He went to the lifts, rather quickly. Not exactly hurried. He wouldn’t want to appear hurried. But his steps were quicker than usual.

He stepped off the lift into the research corridor.

Torvek led the hybrid down the hall two doors to the chemistry lab. "Ah, I see. So how'd you get into Starfleet then?" She asked curiously as they arrived at the chemistry labs door.

Renakir walked into the lab and saw the empty spaces. "Here?" He said as he began typing some coordinates on his PADD. "On Rator III we had a few visiting Starfleet officers, one of them saw potential in a little cave gremlin and I got a recommendation. I assume your story is similar," He turned his head to look at her. "Unless your family chose to reunify with the Vulcans?"His voice was monotone and without judgement, but seeing how she was Romulan she may have easily picked up his judgement by his phrasing.

Aside from the desk issue, Renakir had a few other matters to attend to that day. He helped transport some samples to the bioscience lab. It was a pretty uneventful day after his talk with the Romulan scientist. She was fascinating. His first encounter with one of his kind went well, he thought. Once his shift was over he headed to the turbolift.

Just like the day before, he went to the computer science labs.

Back to the lift he went, like a man on a mission. On a mission to judge everyone in his sight and look damn good while doing so.

After getting back into her uniform. She decided to get back to work. She wanted to continue to test some theories that she had in her mind. She looked on her PADD.

Ready for his duties, Renakir stepped off the lift and in his rush to get to work nearly crashed into the woman walking in the corridor! "Excuse me, sorry,"Renakir said as he adjusted his sunglasses that almost fell off when trying to swerve out of her way.

T'Zan blushed when she saw another attractive alien coming her way. And a Romulan no less. He also seems to be just as clumsy as her. "It's ok. I bump into a lot of people accidentally too."

When Renakir got close to her, he noticed her ears and semi distinctive Romulan features. Maybe she's mixed? "That's alright," Renakir replied in Rihannsu, wondering if his instinct was correct. On second thought if this woman was mixed maybe she spoke Vulcan instead.

She blushed a shade of green when he got close. She recognized the Romulan language. She understood both Vulcan and Romulan, since she's a hybrid, she wanted to understand both sides of herself. "I'm a clumsy gal..." She replied back in Rihannsu.

"It's much alright," Hmm she was blushing? Well so was he, in fact Renakir had been blushing bright green all day. It was so damn hot, he couldn't help it that M-Class environment meant 20C all the time. "My name is Renakir Solait Torre'vnau, Lieutenant junior grade. I'm the new transporter operator," Renakir introduced himself with his full name. She was Romulan, clearly, but perhaps she would have noticed his first name was in fact not Romulan.

She noticed his professional stature. He must be something more than a Romulan, he looks...exotic. She straightened out her uniform skirt and spoke. "I'm T'Zan, I'm also Lieutenant Junior Grade. I'm one of the new scientists in the science division."

"Oh, science? What do you study?" Renakir remembered the day before when he met another Romulan scientist. Lieutenant Torvek was her name? There sure were a lot of Romulans in science. Well, two now. It still seemed like a lot. Renakir was carefully studying her body language behind his dark sunglasses. They were both hybrids it seemed.

T'Zan blushed a deeper green, she can definitely notice when someone is studying her. She has been through it enough times throughout her life. "Physics. My interest is subspace and temporal anomalies. How is it working the transporter?"

Renakir quickly picked up on her blushing more. Hmm was she hot too? No, maybe she was just shy? "Temporal anomalies. Sounds fascinating,"Renakir had never had a brain for science. Complex abstract problems, too much work with not much visible progress in his mind. He much preferred transporters. You always knew when they were working and there was a lot less debate. It's either functional or not. "It's busy. You may have noticed you have a new desk in the chemical science lab, I am the one who arranged it. I also fix turbolifts. You haven't had any issues with them lately, have you?"

"I haven't had any problems so far, but thank you for asking." She looks at her PADD and checks her info. She needed to break the suspensions between them now. "When you spoke to me in Rihannsu, did you assume I'm a Vulcan?"

03:04

"Because it seemed like you were trying to see if I was a Romulan or not."

Good, turbolifts had been fine. Renakir really was debating opening up a problems/concerns box for turbolift operations. It seemed like no one kept detailed logs around here. Or maybe they did and he just never found them. "I do not see many Romulans, aside from the other science officer," He said honestly. "I take it you are mixed? I am aware of the decision some Romulans made to reunify with the Vulcans," Was that what she wanted to know? Renakir was having trouble reading her.

"The other science officer? Oh, you must mean T'Rell I met her too, she's cool." She smiled, when she heard the part about being mixed, she nodded. "Yes, I'm a Hybrid, My father is Vulcan and my mother is Romulan, people often assume I'm either or."

"Yes, I met her," So they have met, it makes sense they are in the same departmemt. "I can see why they would think that," Renakir thought her use of the word 'hybrid' was interesting. Most people of mixed heritage disliked the word, but it was all down to personal preference. "Where did you grow up? Vulcan?" He assumed she was probably one of the reunification children who were raised the Vulcan way. Not what he would personally choose for his future family (if he chose to have one), but it was a lifestyle choice he respected.

"I was born on Vulcan yes, I have never even been to Romulus. My mother had a fling with my dad, but they decided to get married when Romulus was destroyed. My father supports Reunification."

Of course her father supports reunification, he thought. For someone born on Vulcan she was not stoic like the others. How strange, his roommate, an Orion, was more Vulcan than this hybrid born on Vulcan. This station was full of surprises. "I see. I was born on Remus. In a mining camp," Renakir said, assuming that she could probably deduce his story from that bit of information. "However i was raised on Rator III, my Romulan father did not wish to reunify, he thought peace should start at home with the Remans," Renakir looked down at his PADD to check the time. There was nothing pressing to get to so he could still chat a bit more.

"Vulcan wasn't really the best place to grow up, I was forced into Surak's teachings and I tried to run away, so my parents gave me a deal, I can live on Earth, but I can never come back to Vulcan." She sighs sadly and puts her head down. "I haven't seen them since."

A very interesting story. From what Renakir deduced, most Romulans had similar feelings. The other science officer found the teachings of Surak to be very limiting. Romulans were passionate people after all, it makes sense that many of the children of reunification struggled to fit in. "I am sorry to say Rator III was not much better," Renakir paused for a moment. "The Romulan Free State was, unlike the name, not very free. It was backed by the Tal Shiar, Remans were still oppressed under the new regime," He explained that life was equally difficult for Romulans who decided to stay together. "But the Romulan Republic is much better, the government is made up of Romulan and Reman senators," Perhaps by now she probably would have known he was in fact half Reman. He didn't think it was hard to tell, grey skin, black fingernails, sharp teeth... The sunglasses. But if she grew up on Vulcan, perhaps she never learned about the Remans, it was something the Romulans, especially reunification-minded ones, wanted to forget.

T'Zan felt bad about Renakir's home to. She placed a comforting hand on his shoulder. She then noticed something, he had greyer skin than a Romulan. He must also be a hybrid! Maybe that's why he noticed her heritage right away. "Are you a hybrid too?"

'Don't try and give my sympathy, don't give me sympathy', Renakir said over and over in his mind. He was hoping she knew very little about the Remans but-- "I am of mixed race, Reman and Romulan," Renakir was trying his best not to freak out about her touching him. Surely she knew Vulcans and Romulans did not initiate physical contact. Not outside of intimate situations with chosen partners or in combat. It was their first meeting and he didn't want to make a bad first impression, but man he wanted to tell her to take a step back.

She pulled away her hand, everyone reacts alot whenever she shows her emotions. It's nothing that she hasn't handled before. "I guess that's how you were able to notice that I'm a hybrid too. I have never heard of a Reman before."

"... Many Romulans who chose to reunify like to hide that part of Romulan history," Renakir said, his town flat and emotionless. "Remans were enslaved by the Romulans until we were granted citizenship after a series of peace talks with Ambassador Spock," Maybe mentioning a famous name would help to describe the situation. "I lived most of my life as any Romulan child though. Aptitude tests, fights to the death to prove my existence contributed to the state, secrets," He said casually as if he had a normal childhood. It was to him. Aside from being plagued by constant headaches, his childhood was no different from other Romulan children.

T'Zan felt even worst for him. But she noticed that he isn't used to someone caring about him. She wasn't used to anyone caring about her either. It was always about hiding how she felt, she felt worst when she did that. But when she left. She felt free for the first time in her life. "I grew up different, my emotions showed more than I can handle. So I gave up trying to hide them."

"I am not surprised, Romulans are passionate people," Renakir was glad that even though she was a product of reunification, she preferred to live her life with emotions. "I agree, I have always embraced my emotions. I would never want to live a life where I cannot be open about how I feel,"Despite his words he was a very calm and collected individual. He lacked the arrogance of most Romulans and he was also very forward with his words. No deception in his voice, he was not one to try and misrepresent himself. "So, where did you attend the academy? I went to the Marseilles campus in France. It was much nicer than California. Darker, cooler, more mild. Plus, French food is delicious."

T'Zan smiled at Renakir, she found someone she can relate to. She thought about her Academy days for a moment. "I went classic, San Francisco. Though, I attended a high school in Atlanta, Georgia before applying to the academy. Have you tried Coca-Cola? It's delicious!"

Interesting choice. It seemed like a lot of people chose San Francisco. Honestly. Renakir never understood why. Maybe California had he nice beaches and pop culture, but France had baguettes, good wine, and amazing opera. In his mind it was superior to any other campus, but he was definitely biased. "Atlanta Georgia, the south," Renakir briefly remembered his American geography. "I have had Coca-Cola, although I prefer French wine," Renakir said, not a big fan on carbonated beverages. Perhaps it was because he was half Reman, but the fizzy drinks just never felt right in his mouth. It all tasted like... Spicy water to him. "Have you ever been to France?"

T'Zan sat down and started to remember her first moments in earth. "Before I settled down in Atlanta, I explored earth to see what it was like. I've been to Greece, Russia, Canada, and yes- she giggled "-even France."

Renakir leaned against the wall, he did have duties to attend to soon, he couldn't get too comfortable. "And what did you think during your travels? France has some lovely cafes, the area is surprisingly diverse," Renakir took note of her giggling. They were on duty, were they not? Was..... Was she interested in him? The blushing the giggling, it was all... This would be the second person who had shown interest in him. This station was truly full of strange happenings.

"I liked the food, it was amazing. It had beautiful sights to see as well. It's such a beautiful country. I see why you like it so much."

"I am glad you enjoyed it," Renakir took a few moments to carefully analyse her body language. He was intrigued, but also suspicious. He was always wary of people's ulterior motives. There was always a catch, there had to be something. Or maybe this woman was like Eshen, no motives, just wanting to be friends. "Have you ever considered visiting New Romulus? I think you would fit in, they are also very forthcoming with emotions."

She never thought about New Romulus. She can't go back to Vulcan, but New Romulus, maybe they can accept her emotions unlike her previous planet. "I haven't, but thanks to your suggestion, I can definitely make time for a visit soon." She smiled. She sat upright and relaxed, she felt more at ease with herself.

"Perhaps if you plan to take shore leave in a few months I can go with you. My father is Senator Torre'vnau and I would be glad to tour you around," Renakir offered, thinking it was the least he could do to help this seemingly lost hybrid woman, "I need to get back to my duties now. #deleted-channel seems to have malfunctioned again and I need to run additional diagnostics."

"Great! It's a date!" She blushed green again after proclaiming that. "I need to get back to my duties as well, I'm trying to find a plant that causes temporal anomalies."

A date? Hmm. "It is certainly a promise. I wish you well in your research Lieutenant," Renakir bowed his head before continuing down the corridor to check in with the chemical science lab. He had to make sure they hadn't destroyed the new desk he just gave them.

She noticed how polite he was when he bowed his head. His hybrid needed to learn to trust people, but at least he wasn't as agressive as the other Romulans. "Good luck with your transporter!" She continued with her work.

She walked towards the turbolift.

As always, he went to the labs.

He headed to the labs!

Cecil walked down the corridor!

He scurried down the corridor.

He walked down the corridor, actually on time for work for once.

Guess who was walking down the corridor! It was Maggie! With her notes in hand, she took a breath and headed into the lab.

2

After his shift was done, he headed down the corridor to the lift.

Cecil walked down the corridor!

Cecil hurried down the corridor.

Styre's tall and slender frame walked down the corridor towards the physics lab. It was a lab he is seldom seen within; that is only because he lacks the complex rationale behind much of the basis of physics. But today was different, with the chemical science lab being occupied for more pertinent experiments, Styre felt that the physics lab would be a suitable substitute.

After his shift was over Cecil walked down the corridor.

After surviving another day at work. Mr. Sissil Za'ari aka Cecil aka Ratman Nalas walked down the corridor.

3

Oh boy, he's here. And he's ready to go to Work™!....not really but he's supposed to.

2

Off he goes, singing a few old songs to himself by the illustrious singer and classical composer 'Rihanna'.

Down the corridor!

Stumbling down the corridor like a zombie without a leg... Weeee

Walking out into the corridors, he looked around for a nearby hatch and finally found it a while later. So in he goes!

He walked down the corridor, PADD in hand.

He made his way down to the turbolift. He would return to his empty quarters. That thought made him wonder briefly how Renakir was doing on that away mission. What? No, he wasn’t thinking about Renakir. He was thinking about the away mission in itself. After all, it was important he kept on top of things happening on and around the station! He went into the lift.

2

He walked down the corridor.

He walked down the hallway.

After work he darted down the hallway. He heard the announcement that the Eventide was back! Excited!

She was totally coming from her quarters and didn't materialize out of thin air. But that's besides the point really, the important part was that she had sorted her thoughts out and once again was relative control over her mind and also that she was currently walking down the research corridor, checking the different labs for, well anything that should have been reported but hadn't been really.

He made his way down the corridor towards the computer science labs.

After his longer-than-usual update, Alizati headed down the corridor.

After attempting (who knows if it actually worked) to get rid of all traces of her calculations, she walked towards the turbolifts.

"It is rather pleasant, calm at times. Though some officers seem to prefer causing trouble over doing their actual jobs, which results in... Problems." He explained calmly as he walked down the hallway, smiling a bit as they waddled down to the lift.

“Oh? And what kinds of problems would those be?”, she asked with interest, entering into #turbolift.

He walked down the corridor as soon as the doors opened.

Shuffling down the corridor, look at this little boy go.

After his shift he headed down the corridor, time to eat some snacks.

He walked out of the lift, in one piece thankfully. And headed to the CSO's office. (edited)

After snuggling with the epohhs, Renakir decided he was going to do it. He was going to see his uncle. He realised he only had two options; sit in his quarters paranoid or go to Surak Snacks and ask the man himself what was up.

After more than a day of administrative work she had almost jumped out of her chair when the yellow alarm hit. Anything that gave her a reason to forgo yet another reply to an inconsequential request was welcome at this point. Not that she was happy about the potential crisis... but well she was happy about the potential crisis. Fast but not quite in a hurry she headed down the corridor towards the computer science lab. Being prepared to do scans on the station definitely wouldn't hurt.

When she got the comm she turned around and went to the physics lab.

[Comms] "All available @SCI personnel to the #social-sciences-lab-01, we have been tasked with building a device to stop the storm."

Ava hurried to the physics lab, even though she was just a chemist, she might still be able to help if it was about biochemical reactions or bio-electricity or something along the lines.

The epohh followed the woman out into the corridor, more interested in eating berries than causing havoc it seemed.

“Aren’t you a little cutie pie, huh? Yes, you are. What the hell were you doing in the labs, you little rascal?” She dropped a few berried on the ground to distract the epohh while she shrugged out of her uniform jacket. She had a similar burrito-inspired idea as Eshen had, but of course she didn’t know Eshen and she would never know that their minds were like this . All she knew was that this epohh was really fucking cute.

1

The epohh squeaked when the science officer spoke. It didn't understand a word because it had the brain the size of a pea (still larger than Nalas' tho). It shuffled over to the pile of berries and began stuffing its face. Pieces of blueberry were now stuck in the tuffs of red fur of the epohh as it ate happily.

3

Adorable, thought Ava. And then she had to do something rude. She quickly leant down and picked up the little creature, snuggling it into her uniform jacket. “Stay calm and you’ll get more berries,” she said.

The epohh did not stay quiet, in fact it let out a blood curdling scream and began to thrash violently inside the jacket, trying to be #FreeEpohh!

1

“Hey, shush!” And with that, she pulled the jacket over the epohh’s many eyes. Usually, plunging an animal into darkness often made them calm down. Like, it worked with birds for example. Maybe it would work with epohhs too? (edited)

That certainly did not calm down the epohh, it only made it angrier! The smol little red epohh struggled more and began to try and rip the jacket with its teeth. It was disoriented and scared, poor thing.

“Shhh, shhh, okay I’m sorry for the jacket,” said Ava trying to sound soothing. She knelt down so that the epohh could feel the ground underneath its hooves, but she still held on to it. She also let the epohh get to the small hill of blueberries on the ground again.

The epohh let out a soft 'yip' when its hoofs touched the ground and it sniffed the blueberries. Sadly it still didn't understand the words being spoken, but it was clear that it was starting to run out of energy.

“More berries?”, asked Ava softly, still holding on to the small animal. She wouldn’t let go but she’d give it the option to eat a little and she gave it a small pat on the back.

The epohh happily ate the berries, wiggling about and making soft munching noises. Its sharp teeth grinded the berries, but it was also making quite the mess. Blueberry juice covered the floor and the jacket the epohh was wrapped in,

“I gotta clean this later,” muttered Ava more to herself than to the animal — which couldn’t understand her in the first place. “Now, what to do with you, huh?” She kept caressing the small animal. Perhaps it would be best to bing it to her quarters or the brig, but she wouldn’t want to use the lift unnecessarily. There were some researched aquariums and cages, empty in the bioscience lab. Come to think of it, perhaps that was whether the little rascal had come from?

The epohh began to purr, still wiggling in the jacket but it seemed a lot more friendly. The little fluff ball clicked its hoofs together and squeaked.

“Aw, you cute little creature…” She took the bag of berries in her left hand and the animal underneath her right arm, then she stood up, careful not to stress the epohh out. “Come I’ll bring you to a nice place,” she said and went towards the #natural-sciences-lab-02.

"Fucking hell," he breathed, cursing the striped epohh, the lock, himself, and the universe. But mostly himself. This is when he heard the news about Green - and breathed a sigh of relief. One more... Quickly he went into the #natural-sciences-lab-02, hoping that maybe Blue was still there or she left some evidence behind of where the epohh could've gone.

Eshen, carrying Green, also known as Anklebiter Burrito, also went to the #natural-sciences-lab-02.

Eshen exited the bioscience labs, Greenless.

4

She quickly walked down the corridor on towards the turbolifts.

After stepping out of the turbolift, she made her way down the corridor, looking into all of the labs as she passed by to make sure nothing was too out of ordinary (for the current situation at least). Once she'd done that she entered her office.

Here his steps faltered for a bit, as the Romulan tried to map out his path to the Eventide. Saren went to the #turbolift.

She was just checking over all of the labs again when she opened the door to the geology lab.

He went to the lifts.

To the labs!

He walked right by her side. "So what brought you to the station in the first place, it seems like a big shakeup from being in a underwater lab."

“Yeah, it is,” said Ava, “But the underwater lab was two postings ago. My last posting was a starship, the Tyrga. I wanted some more stability, hoping that a base would provide that,” though she kind of had her doubts with all the stuff that Austin had told her about. Speaking of Austin; “also several friends of mine work here.”

"Well that's good." He smiled at her and then loosely frowned. "I haven't actually met many people around here yet, those who I have though my... may have been a little dismayed by some of... my quirks." He wasn't really exactly sure how to describe Kitsap going crazy on someone who he had just befriended.

“Oh? And what would those be?”, she asked as they went towards the lifts.

"You'll kinda have to see them with your own eyes but some of my past personalities are... interesting to say the least." He seemed slightly unnerved as he thought mostly about Kitsap.

“I guess I’ll get to meet them sometime,” said Ava with a shrug and stepped into the turbolift. “So, where do we wanna go first?”

He laughed slightly as he entered the lift. "I had presumed you would know where we were going."

"Either you knock me out or i knock myself out." He angrily exclaimed, about to bite Saren given the slightest chance. "And I wasn't overworking myself to death!! If it had happened I'd be 6 feet underground already." He angy.

"Oh I'm so sorry, next time I'll set up a clock to see when exactly your reckless habits will fucking kill you so you can stop just before the last second. Because that's exactly how it works!" he shot back in a mocking tone, because holy hell this man was ridiculous.* "And knocking you out? Really? Maybe we should just tranquilize you while we're at it?" *Saren looked as annoyed as he did back in the geology lab. But fuck was he worried, both at Bright and at his unhinged emotions. It was happening yet again!

With that, Bright finally snapped. "I need my work because- Because- IT'S ALL I GOT!! I'm.... I have nothing else. I'm incredibly lost and I don't know what to do but work." He finally opened up, lowering his head and sighing heavily. ".... I'm all alone. My brothers can't see me, my parents want me dead, and the one who raised me passed away. Saren, i have nobody else... So I fill my time with work, doing the things I love."

2

That... made him stop. "Bright..." Suddenly his reckless, uncaring behavior made sense. And that was the scariest part, wasn't it? That it made sense, that Saren has seen it before - in adults back in his colony, who, grief-ridden and not knowing what to do after they lost their homes, were purposefuly overworking themselves; how people in the academy did the same. "...I offer to properly talk about it in the quarters. For now I have a question for you: why do you think I'm doing this? Dragging you away from your work and all that." He stepped into the #turbolift , still carrying Bright - kinda scared that if he put the human on the ground, Jack would... crumble.

Done with duties at last! The Cardassian scampered out the door of the bioscience lab and began making her way to the lift with her PADD in front of her. A new research paper had just come out and she'd be damned if she didn't read it...

Maggie gasped out as she was bumped into, lightly grabbing at her skirt as she fell to the ground like a total nerd. “Ah! Sorry sorry!” She said as she stood up. “Aaaa, my bad.”

Niatha blinked and giggled awkwardly after taking a step back. "Oh. Oh god. I am so sorry-" She turned around and began to walk the other way in embarrassment.

Maggie blinked as she looked towards the woman. “Oh no no! It’s fine, don’t worry! Just caught me off guard is all! Never been better!”

"Really?" Nia glanced back at her blinking emerald green eyes. "Well... alright then! I'm sorry to have bumped into you like that, I'll be on my way..."

Maggie shook her hands. “I’m Maggie Roode, what’s your name?” She said, wanting a new friend.

"Nia. Niatha Chet. Hi." The Cardassian smiled and shook the offered hand.

Maggie smiled as she took the hand. “Nice to meet you! I’m Maggie Roode, wait I already said that uhm…” She said with nervous chuckle. “What do you do?”

"I'm a botanist. I basically study and tend the plants on station." Niatha smiled. "And you, silver-haired cutie?"

Well being called a cutie practically turned Maggie into a loony tune. Steam releasing from her ears (not actually but it felt like it) as a deep blush fell over her face. “Oh uhm thank you! Thank you uhm! I am a physicist! You are uh uh uh uh uh…..cute too I suppose! Scientifically you are hot!” She said with a deep blush.

"'Scientifically'?" Niatha blinked, giggling at the much taller woman's reaction. "Really?"

Maggie blinked slightly as she looked at the woman in front of her. “Aaaa, yes! Yes you are, and that makes sense!”

"Define 'scientifically'?" She grinned and stepped closer to the much taller woman with her arms crossed. "Because I really am very curious as to what you mean..."

Maggie’s face was as red as a sword covered in blood stabbing through a strawberry. “Uhmmmmm, you have uhm….a good…..body? Uhm…” She was grasping for straws here, she didn’t think about this often. “And you uh….seem nice?”

"Aww. You're welcome." She said with a grin. "Well, I gotta go - see you around? Mags~?"

Maggie nodded with a small blush as she too began to leave. “Yep yep yep yep yep! See you around!” She left in a hurry.

He walked to the bioscience labs with a wide smile across his face.

“You swim often?”, she asked as they made their way towards the lift.

"Well yeah, remember how we used to always swim together out on the beach?" Austin remembered how they used to play games and splash around on the shores, the pool wasnt a beach but atleast it was a nice place to swim. He entered the lift with her.

“‘Course I do. You always had more stamina than me. But I could hold my breath for longer,” she said with a smirk. “I bet I still can!” And with that she entered #turbolift with him.

“Well, this is the research ring. We’ve go labs for geology, astronetrics, physics, chemical science and computer science. Anything you want to see first?”

Having survived that interaction with his desk neighbour, Nalas carefully walked down the corridor.

Down the corridor he goes, and into the turbolift.

And down the corridor he walked with a bag over his shoulder, making sure not to hit anything as asked. "What brings you to 777, miss Katjiary?" He eventually asked as he made his way down the corridor.

“Well I got assigned here, so it's really more of a chance than anything that brought me here. It’s sort of my first…. Well it’s my second assignment out of the academy, except I went back to the academy in between the last one and now and also the first one lasted for a handful of days and ended with me on sick leave, so I would like to do well now.” Clearly slightly annoyed about how her first assignment went she huffed and hugged the bag she was carrying with one arm, as she followed him back to where she had come from. Or at least she thought she’d come from that direction?

"If I may, how did you end up on sick leave after a few days on a mission? Something significant must have taken place in order for that to have happened." He asked as he turned his head slightly to look at the woman, switching shoulders with the bag in order to not exhaust himself.

“I was in the wrong place at the wrong time, as it usually is. Some part of the starship’s heating blew up and landed in my eye.” She shrugged, at least with the one shoulder that didn’t have the heavy bag on it. All things considered she seemed really unbothered, almost bored by the story. “It’s not a particularly impressive story.”

"To me it is. Getting something in your eye through an explosion and then survive is quite impressive. Personally I do not have such a story though. I am but a simple man." He said as he looked at her once again before stopping at a lift and calling it down.

She shrugged again. “I’m sure you have plenty of stories that are worth listening to.” Actually, Mirrim was absolutely convinced that every single story was worth listening to, no matter how boring the person telling it thought it was. If you worded it like that though it made people feel less special, which really was neither her intention nor the truth. The turbolift arrived and she stepped into it.

And Ken followed her in moments after, not saying a word as he did so.

She quickly made her way down the corridor, reaching #natural-sciences-lab-02 without much trouble. She had memorized a map of this area before she came here.

"...yep! Seeya tomorrow!" A short, pretty Cardassian woman emerged from a side door, presumably a botany lab, judging by the potted baby tree she clutched in her hands as she pottered down the corridor, bound for the turbolift.

“Hello! Who are you?” She asked, looking at the woman holding the baby tree.

"Hm?" Niatha swung round to look at the Vulcanoid woman, the tree swaying precariously in her arms. Evidently it wasn't as light as she made it seem. "Oh! I was talking to crewman Styx in the botany lab - but hi! I'm Niatha. Botanist, as you can tell..."

“I’m Lorin. I’m new here, and I’m an Exobiologist. It seems that the biology lab is occupied, so I am deciding where I should go now. I was hoping to familiarize myself with this area, as I will no doubt be spending much of my time here.” She replied, pulling her hair back into a bun.

"Oh! I can bring you around." Niatha offered. "Though you'll have to let me transport this tree to the botanical gardens first - unless you wanna come along?"

“I’ll come with you.” She said, trying to think of something to say.

"Wonderful." She smiled warmly and pottered on down the hallway. "Well, Lorin. How long have you been on board exactly, and have you visited the utility deck yet?"

“I’ve been onboard about a day, and I did visit the utility deck.” She replied, thinking back to the shopping trip with Two.

"Good, then you've been broken in properly. You'll be spending a lot of time there..." Niatha smiled slyly as she put the tree down (which made a pretty dull thunk as it hit the floor) and hit the turbolift controls.

“Why would I spend more time doing recreational activities then actually doing my job?” She asked, wondering whether people disliked their jobs that much.

"I didn't mean it that way. I meant that you'll be going there once you're done with your job to relax." She clarified with a giggle.

“Thank you for the clarification. I have not met many people here. In fact, I have only met one person here. Hopefully I will meet more.” She said, thinking about Two.

"You will. C'mon, I'll show you one of my favorite places." She led her into #turbolift.

Renakir walked down the corridor.

Renakir had to stop himself from covering his hears when the sound of Maggie's booming voice carried through the corridor and also leaked into the lab room. Oh to be a human without sensitive Vulcanoid hearing, he thought. Once the people had scurried away, Renakir pushed the trolly down the corridor ever so slowly. He kept looking around just to make sure there weren't any people in his way. "You really know how to scatter a crowd," Renakir said in a half joking manner, chuckling and shaking his head. He could sense some of the people who had cleared the way were staring at them, after all it was two people with a mystery box on a trolly, they looked like those retro terran 'aliens' in their silly PPE gear too. "We can take a turbolift, but make sure it's clear, we can't risk this bumping a wall or anything," Renakir told Maggie. There would be enough room and the box was sealed pretty good, but they still needed to be mindful of the space.

Maggie nodded as she marched through the hallways with a pep in her step as she summoned the lift. “Picked up from my aunt, she yelled at this guy named Mikey Myers all the time when I was in her office! I’m real good at it.” She said as she swiftly opened the door up to the lift and looked inside. “Clear! Come on in it’s fun inside! It’s the Maggie Mouse Funhouse!” She said as she walked inside and held the door open for him, squeezing against the wall to make more room.

1

As the doors of the turbolift opened, Paco stepped out after Commander Zellina to the research corridor with feelings of both fear and pride inside him as he walked a respectable distance behind the Commander to make room for anyone else passing by. Any person walking into their first day in what could be a big career would reasonably have this sentiment. He had spent some years of his life preparing for a moment like this, and now it has culminated to the internal brainwave of 'Holy shit, I actually work here now?' which ran around his mind. The anthropologist contemplated on how his work life is going to be, quietly looking around the facilities around him and trying to keep it all together and professional-like. "I'm guessing I have a lot of work ahead of me now, huh?" he joked while also looking for subtle, yet visually obvious, places to drop off snacks for people later on.

She watched the Ensign look around his surroundings. It took her back to her earlier days in Starfleet, her first assignment. The first time she worked on the bridge crew. And she's now watching another crewman starting a new chapter as well. "I would recommend taking the first few days to adjust to your new environment, I found it to help me in the past for new postings." Zellina said with a calm and sincere tone.

"That I can do! I-It's a lot to take in honestly." He replied in a tone of both amazement and disbelief as he looked all around what could potentially be-- No! what is DEFINITELY a new chapter in his life, and he took it all with a very light pride. "I think my grandma would be proud to see me here... she convinced me to join Starfleet." Paco chuckled lightly to himself, quietly reminiscing to all those stories long ago in mangos past.

She couldn't help but feel joy for him. "I'm sure she would. Well if there's ever anything you need, you can contact me on the PADD. I should let you be on your way." The Aurelian was still planning to find the crewman that reacted oddly.

He nodded, looking to up to her with a light smile as he glanced over to what seemed to be the anthropology wing of the corridor before deciding to be an absolute nerd in doing what he thought would be a stroke of genius before going in "Thank you, Commander... Live long and prosper." He did the Vulcan salute as he said this as well

1

Somehow the turbolift got him to where he wanted to go and Nalas headed towards the labs!

[D] The Romulan scientist walked alone, humming something softly and quietly under his breath. Today was going to be a busy day - not only did he just end his shift, but he also planned to start a little self-indulgent, kinda-scientific-but-not-really project - that may or may not had to do with cooking, something Saren hadn't done in quite a while now. Hmm... His steps slowed down as Saren pulled out his PADD, already thinking up a message for Renakir that asked him about his favourite fruits or berries, yet was discreet enough that the half-Reman didn't grow suspicious. Slowly yet surely, he made his way to the turbolift...

Most of the officers had split off into groups and headed to the turbolifts to go straight to the shuttlebay. Radin had told them to blend in, and sure, they might not have been wearing horrible prison jumpsuits any more -- but did a group of brutish looking agents and scientists all marching in tandem to storm the shuttlebay not look suspicious? It was only a matter of time before they were hunted down by Security, and Kaegaakur was smart enough to realise this. Instead of heading off with the others he had decided to take a leisurely stroll instead, having donned a blue-striped Starfleet uniform and the rank pips of some generic non-commissioned officer. It was while stifling a yawn that he wandered down the corridor that supposedly belonged to the science section of this station. From one of the labs there was the distinct sound of yelling. Yeesh, he'd never have been able to work in those sorts of conditions, Starfleet needed to quieten down...

Paco ran out of the door once the lift arrived to this stop "TANGINA!! (Son of a BITCH!)" He screamed, adding on to the yelling along with a slurry of Filipino curse words and prayers as he fixed his uniform up and prepped to be in his station. He looked through his PADD to see what the absolute heck was going on. One minute, he was having a panic attack in the evil turbolift, the next, he was chilling in the holodeck researching on the potential of Starfleet Booty Shorts vs the destruction of the Prime Directive (for science!), and now the entire station is in both a metaphorical, and potentially literal, fire! He was unprepped for this situation, obviously, his hands were sticky from melted mango ice candy and some stains of it were on his uniform, and the combination of weak sleeping gas and not getting enough sleep for the past few nights didn't help him at all... but he was still going to do the fuck he was meant to do!

The Rigellian had frozen in place upon the announcement over the tannoy being put out. Ah, fantastic, so now everyone knew that they had escaped. He had been right in that it wouldn't be long before Starfleet's security officers were after them all. But that being said... What was the deal with the sleeping gas? If other agents had arrived to break out Radin's lot, then surely they'd have known that the sleeping gas wouldn't just hit the Starfleet officers here -- it would hit the Section 31 officers instead. There was no getting to an extraction point (which, by the way, hadn't been confirmed yet) if they were all knocked out. All of this sounded very strange to him, so what was he supposed to do? Hand himself in? Walk back to the brig? That'd probably give him a lighter sentence in a court trial... He was considering it when he heard the shout from behind him. He turned, looking at the Starfleet officer who was booking it down the corridor. Oh well, too late - it looked like he was just going to have to go along with the disguise for now! "Hey, uh, Sir-" oh god, he was just a scientist, not one of their undercover agents who knew Starfleet ranks, "what's going on? I'm new here, sorry - where do I go to help?"

"Well, for starters... The station has gone mad, sleeping gas has been pouring in through the vents, and there are prisoners running amok around the station!" Paco explained in a very tense tone, very close to the point of scolding at the 'non-commission officer' for not figuring out the obvious from the captain's announcement. It made sense knowing the high-stress nature of the situation, but still. "I'm heading over to the Computer Science Lab to see if I can isolate the source of the gas itself and reroute it somewhere else...or something! You can help me with that at least instead of standing around!" Paco then gestured the Rigellian to follow him, observing him closely since he was of lower rank, looking through the chatroom to check for any updates on the situation. The possibility that the prisoners would do something tricky as well passed his mind, looking around carefully for anything suspicious going on around them before looking back to the Rigellian. "What is your name and rank? (edited)

Fucking yeesh, this dude was harsh. He would have gotten along with Radin, seeing as how she acted in exactly the same bitchy way whenever something went wrong. It took him all of his restraint to not snap back in return. He inhaled slowly to stop himself from going off – which was a bad idea, the drowsiness hitting him from that fucking sleeping gas – and then shook his head to try to clear his thoughts. It was while falling in line with the Ensign and matching his stride that he spoke. “My apologies, sir, whatever they’re using is clearly going to my head. It’s-“ three stripes on a rank badge, what the fuck did that mean? The name he went with would have to be close to his own to make sure that he responded too, but didn’t immediately get caught if Security asked for it. “It’s Chief Petty Officer Kaeviechiiv, sir.” (edited)

Lorin walked into the corridor. She wasn’t sure what was going on, but she was here in case things go wrong.

In any other 'normal situation' (whatever that would mean in Starfleet), Paco would generally be very nice and offer Kae a mango candy as a gesture of good will and welcoming him to the Starbase, but he was very much willing to beat the living shit out of people anyone with a fucking flip flop in a heart beat due to the amount of stress he was being put under and also a slight Napoleon complex due to his height. Compared to Kae, he was a bit more worse for wear, slapping himself a couple of times just to keep his head straight as they headed to the Comp Labs before looking back to the chief when he introduced himself. "Acknowledged, Chief. I'm Ensign Umali. Once we get to the computer labs, I want you to call engineering to see if they can cut off the gas in our vents. Should buy us some time while I run though whatever the hell is going on right now." He explained his plan, clearly going off with whatever he could think off the top of his head. When seeing Lorin walk into the corridor, he waved over to her to follow them, 'cause Strength in numbers. (edited)

Lorin followed them. Strength in numbers indeed. Lorin was more soft than muscle, but she could still defend herself pretty well. “Maybe I should go with this guy to call Engineering, in case something happens.”

Technically speaking, him going along with this Starfleet officer wasn’t a bad thing. He wasn’t thrilled by the prospect of getting KO’d by some sleeping gas either, and he was still perplexed at why it was being used in the first place. He didn’t particularly care about the other agents and scientists getting out – he had never liked half of them, anyway – but just in case Section 31 had shown up to rescue them, then maybe he ought to put in a bit of effort and make himself look better to the higher ups. “That might be a good idea, thank you, sir,” he stated when this other Ensign also showed up – green hair to go with his purple hair, wow, they would make a neat duo. “I think my commbadge works fine, but I don’t know if I have LCARS access because I only came aboard just recently. I haven’t tried using one of the consoles yet.” What a lie, and lying suited him!

“Say, sir, you look a bit familiar. But I don’t remember where I’ve seen you before.” She lied. She could recognize him from the biology lab at Section 31, though Kae might not because of her new hair.

1

Something about that statement didnt sit right with Paco. He had only been here a few weeks, and yet when he stepped into Starbase 777, he was able to quickly access his quarters and all other facilities with no hassle. If Kae were not able to gain any access up to this point, assuming the 'Chief' was assigned to be in this base in advance by order of someone else, there is clearly something wrong... and like any good Scientist, Paco was willing to test this hypothesis. "You were Assigned to be in this base, is that correct Chief?" Paco asked as they stood in the doors of the Computer Science Labs, using his own access as a Ensign to keep that door fucking shut for now "At this point I have been here a few weeks, and I never encountered that problem at all when I first arrived." He had that mad/dissapointed Asian Dad tone his voice, gesturing Lorin to be ready and keep eyes on him subtly by tapping on her arm before walking over to pretty much try and block escape.

Lorin flinched when she was touched. Still, she gave Paco a look of acknowledgment, but it also sort of said “Don’t touch me”. She went up real close to Paco, enough that Kae couldn’t hear what she was about to whisper. “That man does not work here, he is Section 31” She whispered almost inaudibly.

The disappointed dad voice didn’t work on Kaegaakur, considering how he was about eleven-odd years Paco’s senior, but what did work was the suspicious talk. Already? Really? It had taken him a grand total of only a few sentences to sound suspicious. Radin was going to find this fucking hilarious whenever they wound up back in the brig together. “Maybe we served on the same ship before,” he offered politely to Lorin, hoping that being a little more polite and a little more suave might work. He had lost all of his charisma skills when Section 31 had dragged him into their ranks and let him work on his own. His people skills used to be for trying to talk people into somewhat controversial experiments, but that charisma had fallen by the wayside. “And as I mentioned, sir, I’m not sure if I have access. I haven’t needed onto a console for anything yet. But if it was quick for them to add you, then hopefully it’ll be the same for me…”

“Why sir, I haven’t ever served in a ship. And nobody like you served or survived on my outpost. You, sir, aren’t who you say you are, I suppose.” She said, her voice sickly sweet. She stayed close to Paco, ready to fuck shit up.

"I was added in advance because I was assigned to this base. And LCARS doesn't simply just refer to the console, but to most systems of a ship and starbase as well, including certain doorways depending on access permissions. As a Science Officer, I expected you to know that." Paco still went on with the suspicious Asian dad talk. Now this is where his experiment begins. Due to the nature of how sensitive Starfleet scientific computer systems and the information held within them are , it would be logical to assume that only fully validated crewmembers of Starfleet would have access to this door, no guest would be able to open it unless they have the permissions to do so, and no prisoner... because why would that ever be the case. If he is what he says he is, then that door would open no problem, if not... Paco was ready to go on full Manny Pacquiao on the Chief. "Anyways, its really simple to know if you have LCARS access, Just open that door for us, Chief." (edited)

Lorin readied herself for a neck pinch, as soon as that man failed to open the door, she’d do it. She looked over to Paco, to let him know she had a plan. She stood close by the door. Hopefully she acted so she wouldn’t look like she knew how to do a neck pinch. But she did know, with devastating precision and speed. She would get him just like she did his comrades in the Section 31 base.

”I’m a geneticist,” he stated, taking a purposeful step away from the door instead of towards it, knowing that it wouldn’t open. He shrugged and offered a shap-toothed grin, holding up both hands. “Not a computer programmer. Alright, alright, you got me. Damn, I thought I’d last longer at the whole lying thing than this, I mean- this is embarrassing.” He shook his head, giving an amused chuckle as if this was all just some sort of game. “I don’t even know what rank badge this is, Chief Petty Officer was a straight up guess. The agents are better at this sort of thing.”

“Don’t try anything. I expect you to do what we order you to, and to not cause any issue. We’re fixing this gas problem now.” Lorin glared at Kae. The neck pinch option wasn’t off the table if he tried to go after them, and Lorin wasn’t quick to trust an enemy. Section 31 was evil. She didn’t trust anyone who did such horrible things. (edited)

"Thank you for your cooperation." Paco smiled at the peaceful resolution of this entire course of events, knowing that there would be other times when punching would be more appropriate before stepping towards the door and opening it, like an actual authentic Starfleet Officer would. He was totally going to rub this in to Kaegaakur and all his lil prisoner buddies in the brig sooner or later. "I'm calling security first." He tapped on his comm badge requested for security, very much tired and tense, but happy he caught someone red handed in a lie (edited)

”Oh please, I don’t have any reason to stop you fixing this problem of yours! I don’t want to be nothing more than a sleeping heap on the floor, and if all of my colleagues are knocked out then it’s not as if they can get away. By fixing this, you’re actually doing them a favour.” At the end of his statement he paused, initially crossing his arms but then unfolding one to raise a hand to his face, chewing on the end of a long, sharp nail. It was only for a moment before he paused, looked back to Lorin, and offered her a sickly grin, absolutely delighting in the response he had gotten from her. “I don’t mind going back to your brig either. I adore how you treat your prisoners with such respect – I never thought brig food would be so good. I’d ask for your recipe – or your replicator codes…”

“You should be glad I’m not going to knock you out and get it over with. But I care about my job, so I won’t. But rest assured, you won’t be treated so nicely now after escaping. I don’t tolerate bullshit from people like you.” She didn’t tolerate anyone’s bullshit. She wasn’t going to be nice about it either. Vulcans didn’t tolerate bullshit, but they did it nicely. She didn’t do it nicely.

"Okay, I think that's enough for now. We have other business to handle" Paco glared back to Kaegaakur, he also didn't tolerate bullshit, but he isn't going to tolerate nonsense bickering either. Keeping a close eye on him, he gestured for all three of them to enter into the computer lab, mostly nudging Kae. It would make things easier considering there wasn't really much room to escape when the doors shut closed the minute they stepped inside. "Just in case, we are keeping you under our watch before security arrives while we fix the the gas problem..." He said tiredly, again slapping himself a few more times to keep himself awake before turning over to Lorin. "Let's get started, Ensign" He said with a light smile before approaching one of the computer consoles, trying to access information in regards to what they can currently do with the vents from where they are. (edited)

“Call me Lorin. Not you, Section 31, you don’t get to do that.” She went with Paco to the computer consoles.

[D]Not long after, a woman dressed in a black top and a civilian lab coat came running around the corner. She was looking behind her, and startled herself when she turned around. "Fuck! You jumpscared me!" She looked behind the officers and spied Kaegaakur in the back. "You guys have been the only people I've seen since this whole thing started, could I tag along until we're safe?"

“Yes, come in with us. Be careful of the guy behind us, he’s Section 31 and an escaped prisoner at that.” She said as she walked into the computer lab.

Quickly, Lorin locked the computer lab doors so Kae couldn’t escape, and continued running after Chloe. Lorin was pretty fast, and she tried to catch up to the Section 31 agent and hopefully neck pinch her more accurately this time.

[D] In of the corridors, he sprinted across it as quickly as he could, heading straight to the physics lab.

[D]The announcement came when Rudy got to the research corridor, his heart somewhat skipped a beat when the chemical lab was mentioned. He had been working on a anti-gas agent whilst being accompanied by a bomb the whole time? What kind of a sick dating partner was that? But alas, he wanted to go back there, he was an officer, a senior officer, he wanted to help if someone was there to begin with no that the announcement was out.

Right in front of Rudy a maintenance hatch opened and a very long and gangly Romulan-Reman boy hopped out. He had thick dark green hair that looked like seaweed that covered his face and the brightest blue eyes. His skin was grey and he had very sharp teeth. Dressed in rather nice civilian clothes, the man looked like he could use a shower or at least a nice comb for his hair. OH! Umm.. HI!" He waved to the stranger, silly expression on his face.

He stopped, he looked at the curious figure that had just gotten out of the maintenance hatch. He was surprised on how tall the person was, more than two metres, that was absolutely huge compere Rudy's 180-ish cm. In an emergency like this, three things could come out of the maintenance hatch, one was an engineer, second was someone from operations and third was someone who made the emergency. He figured it would be the last case, he wasn't wearing a Starfleet uniform nor any insignia. "I don't think you're supposed to come out of that hatch," Rudy exclaimed with an equally silly expression on his face. He was trying to probe the figure.

Kianarix frowned and clasped his hands together, bowing his head. He felt bad for scaring the random Starfleet officer, but he didn't know the layout of the tubes! Plus they were so cramped, he had to play body origami every time he crawled in them since they were clearly not made with Vulcanoids in mind. "S-sorry... I was trying to run away from the bomb stuff. There was umm.. Someone with lots of fur who looked like," Kianarix beared his sharp teeth and made an angry face paired with a growl, "Rawr!" He lifted his hands to his face to simulate claws. "And then there was another person who was like," Kianarix put his hands on his head and extended his index and middle fingers upwards to look like antennae. "Oooga booga!" He didn't know what noise Nora made, he literally made it up on the spot. "And then there was a bomb but they disabled it. But it was like," He made a rectangle shape with his thumb and index fingers. "Yeah, boom. And I just wanna go hommeee!! Or find my fiance! or his brother or my dad!!!" His expression quickly changed to that of sadness and worry.

Preplexed, he was quite preplexed, he could not really tell whether he was someone who was part of the cause of this whole mess or a geniune civilian that was caught in the fray. Rudy used to live on a ship with mere hundreds of lives with little margin of civilian lives on board, and not only that he knew almost all of them, most of them only by faces not names though. But now, he couldn't lower his guard but he shouldn't jump into conclusions either, he could be wrong and got himself injured because of it though. He approached the person, as calm as he could be as well as asking, "I want you calm down first, what is your name and how did you find yourself in the 'bomb stuff'?" By the way the person was behaving it was hard to believe that he was part of the cause, but then again Rudy, being oblivous to whodunnit, had to be vigilant, especially with escaped convicts going about.

Kianarix sighed and put his hands behind his back. A very menacing pose for a Romulan, but clearly from Kianarix's demeanour and attitude he was not a typical Romulan. He was very young, not a day over 26! And he was just a normal civilian, he had nothing to hide, besides he would be a terrible secret keeper. "Umm..." Kianarix took a small step away from the officer, a little hesitent to get close to strangers especially after that one lady touched his arm in the tubes. That was weird! He didn't mind hugging or platonic affection, but consent first would be nice! Not that this officer would grab him or anything. "I'm Kianarix ir-Levitasz tr'Rylov. I'm engaged to Lieutenant Renakir of the house of Torre'vnau, he's the turbolift operator! But I am just a visiting civilian. I was scared when everyone started falling asleep s-so I crawled through the tubes. There's a crazy murderer guy on the loose, but I don't care I just wanna go home!"

"Oh," a slight oh escaped his mouth, Rudy thought there was no way he could make soemthing like that up without considering the obvious way to disprove that. And so, he chose to share his name, who he was, after seeing the Romulan was slightly distrusting of him made apparent by the body expressions. "I'm Lieutenant Hartley, science officer, I'll try to connect to your fiance, but I need you to stay with me. alright?" Without waiting for him to reply, he tapped his commbadge,

"Oh, Renakir? Is he busy? I don't want to burden him," Kianarix waved his hands around and shook his head. He did want to find Renakir, but on second thought there were Starfleet officers everywhere doing official things and he didn't want to interrupt the man. "T-Thank you Lieutenant, that is very nice but please I don't want to bother him. I'm scared he'll be mad," Kianarix frowned. Renakir was not that type of guy, but Kianarix's boyfriend was and he was always afraid of being a burden on others. The poor Romulan-Reman hybrid was terrible at keeping jobs, had no real marketable skill except he was good at crafting. Not that his crafts were very popular, he mostly made things for his family members.

"He is on his way here, there is a problem in the next room that only your fiance could handle, you don't have to worry about burdening his work, Sir." Once out of his communications with the lieutenant he said that to the civilian. He emphised on saying 'only your fiance' was a white lie but not so far from the truth. Rudy could probably think a way to defuse the bomb on his own, altough the risk would be higher since he would be using chemical to basically destory chemical inside of the bomb to defuse it. "Stay close to me and do not wander down that way," He pointed at the direction behind the romulan, where it lead to the lab. Rudy made his way to place himself in between the romulan and the direction of the lab. If something was to go wrong, the one who would get hit first would be him, and it could act as a shield for the civilian.

"O-Oh okay," Kianarix said softly still very confused what exactly was going on but he was going to stay put just like the nice lieutenant told him to! Plus he was excited to see Renakir even if it was only going to be for a few seconds.

And look who came walking down the corridor! The station's resident Gangly Bitch™️ and twerker MC Mr. Sunshine! Renakir was not as tall as Kianarix, no way, only 6'5 a little over 195cm, average height for a Vulcanoid if not on the shorter side. He wore his pretty yellow banded Starfleet uniform with a nice pair of dark sunglasses to hide his sensitive eyes from the bright lights of the station. "Are you Lieutenant Hartley?" He asked as he approached the man who was near Kianarix. It was nice to see that his fiance was unharmed, although he was a bit concerned that Kianarix had been running around the station. Seriously, he was only supposed to be visiting for a couple weeks, but it had literally been months. "I want to say thank you and I apologise for this, Kianarix is just a civilian, he's ummm.. Helping out my dad at a restaurant he works at," Renakir thought he should provide some explanation as to why there was a tall and clumsy Romulan-Reman civilian wandering around 777.

Down the corridor he saw a man, dressed in a similar yet different uniform to Rudy's own. The one that made the different was the golden-ish colour strip across his chest, showing that he was either from engineering or operations. But when the rank pips were similiar to that of Rudy's he knew he was the person the two of them was waiting for. When he spoke, he asked whether he was speaking to the right person, which Rudy replied, "Yes, but do call me Rudy, Lieutenant Renakir." In his mind and behind that slight smile of greetings, he said to himself 'I know vulcanoids can be tall be, goodness, they're tall, I hope my neck is alright..' "Do not worry, it is not any of our fault, he was just in the wrong place at the wrong time," Rudy replied nonchalantly, "What of the #natural-sciences-lab-03?" Rudy gestured the room further down the hallway with his left hand, the hand where his uniform was ripped clean off.

"Okay Rudy," Renakir didn't mind calling him by his first name, after all that was the proper way to address Remans. Renakir always liked being called by his first name as opposed to his family name. It made more sense now too with his cousin, also a Torre'vnau, working on the station. They were different rank but 'Lieutenant Torre'vnau' could mean either of them. "It's nice to meet you, sorry it had to be like this," He let out a light chuckle as he began walking towards the chemical science lab. Now on second thought he didn't want Kianarix to be so close to the bomb just in case. "Anyway, have you seen any escaped prisoners? I sent a comms to the chemical science lab but I got no reply," Renakir said, a little concerned but also he didn't want them to have to fight off baddies when trying to disarm a whole bomb.

Kianarix shook his head, happily skipping to Renakir's side. Rudy was nice, but Renakir was family! Almost family. Kianarix towered over Renakir but he towered over mostly everyone, it was that Vulcanoid height. Remans were pretty tall and Romulans were pretty tall. Although unlike Renakir, Kianarix didn't need sunglasses.

"I don't think I have," Rudy replied, "I was working on the solution for the gas problem we had earlier in chemical science lab about a good while ago now. The lab was empty when I left for the physics lab after the officers there needed help." Rudy explained the summary of what happened earlier, before continuing while walking beside the tall Renakir. "I made sure those officers in physics lab were treated in sickbay, before leaving to go back this level and here we are now."

"Oh that's good," Renakir said as he leisurely strolled down the corridor. The science deck was quiet large, even at Threshold™️ speeds it wouldn't be quick to get all the way down to the chem science lab. He walked a comfortable Romulan distance away from Rudy, which meant out of stabbing range. A bit too far for humans, but it was just a habit he picked up and plus, Vulcanoid hearing made it easy to hear the other person no matter the distance. It was right when Rudy mentioned the solution to the gas problem that Renakir stopped in his tracks and turned to the Lieutenant. "Wait WHAT? Youfixed the gas problem? Rudy, that's so damn cool! Tell me you're gonna be putting that in your report or I will personally go to Commander Lhai'lvek and tell her about your heroic deed myself!*

Kianarix walked behind the two of them, keeping quiet for fear of interfering with the two officers. He stopped when Renakir did, nearly crashing into him. Kianarix's hair flopped around as he walked, like a man with seaweed on his head.

T'was true, the plot required the corridor to be big, it was essential for the situation on hand. But, all jokes aside, the labs were quite far in between, they were in a Starbase not a starship after all. It was only natural for the two to be walking with out-of-hand-reach distance apart, he could see why it was the case so he didn't really mind it, why would he? "Hm?" Rudy hummed, curious as to why Renakir wanted the party to stop moving. Renakir sudden change in intonation took Rudy by surprise, he never thought of what he did in anything close to what the Ops officer thought of it. When he was explaining the summary of what happened, he never put any emphasis on it, he mentioned it like it was just part of the narrative, and it was for him, nothing special at all. "Oh no no, Renakir, it was no heroic act, it was just something I had to do, there's no need of an exaggeration. Heck, I could say the same for you, I figured you solved the problem in the turbolift, right, that's more heroic than what I did!" he smiled wryly trying to brush it off as a an ordinary thing and emphasised on his deed with the bomb, "and yes, it should be in my report, it's good information for future gas attacks, it'll have the formula for the serum that I made earlier as it should." Once again he wryly told Renakir.

Rudy was too humble, but it was to be expected of a fine Starfleet officer! When they stopped he noticed Kianarix bouncing a little as he attempted not to hit him. It was cute to be followed by a very long tree-shaped man, like they were some video game travelling party. Kianarix the tank, Rudy the mage, Renakir the melee. They just needed a healer and they had a perfect set up! "It was definitely a heroic act! And no, I was just doing my job. Jamie actually disabled the bomb, I only cut it out of its position, I can't take all the credit for that," Renakir said with a light blush and a small shake of the head. "So tell me, how did you do it? I can't promise I'll understand all the science mumbo jumbo, but I am curious how you were able to disperse the serum through the vents so fast."

"I guess..." Rudy shook his head in defeat, the man was not going to let Rudy slide his deed down under the shrug, who could blame him for doing that. So it was wise if Rudy just admit defeat so that he could redirect the topic away from him doing a heroic thing or whatever. Fortunately enough, Renakir did it for Rudy by asking him how the whole thing was. Back in his previous posting, he had to explain unknown or dangerous elements to his away team as part of his duty as their designated chemist and environmentalist. As time went on, he got good at breaking it down to a level where someone who had no background in science could understand. With that, he started explaining how it was, "It was quite simple, imagine a sailing ship. The crew of that ship is in a form of bacteria, tiny little creatures that you can only see under a microscope; its job was simple, to eat the harmful gas away. Now those bacteria can't move on its own, a crew needs a ship, so I used another gas called perfluoromethylhexane, the name's quite a mouthful, it's basically odourless and harmless gas that you can use for testing gas movements. That gas is their ship. A ship needs an ocean to float on, so I used protamines, a protein, for their ocean to make sure they are prosperous and can replicate." "That is the basis of how I did it, now to answer how it could spread so quickly: I used something that we're currently inhaling, Oxygen. The station has oxygen distributed all across the decks, it's everywhere, my serum needs to be everywhere, see the correlation right? Now I made oxygen as the wind that would blow the ship forward to make sure it reaches its destination. That's basically how it was. Although I couldn't do all of this if not for the help of Petty Officer Stevenson, one of your own department crewmen." He did not forget to mention the man that helped his as much as he did for the station. "So yeah, I hope it isn't that confusing to you. A gas that eats away gas."

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2

Renakir listened closely to what the scientist was saying. He appreciated Rudy breaking things down in simpler terms, it helped. He was pretty good when it came to algorithms and cracking engineering mysteries, but science was way out of his field of expertise. The ship analogy was quite good, he felt like he could understand how the scientist was able to disperse the serum throughout the whole ship. A smile crossed Renakir's face as he imagined... Tiny little people on a ship just floating through the air. "Woah, I love that analogy," He said, eyes wide, although Rudy could not see his eyes but he definitely saw how the ridges of Renakir's forehead lifted when he spoke. He looked over at Kianarix who was just swaying happily as he listened. "And a gas that eats gas, now that's something-- wait is that why it was damn wet in the tubes? I thought it was just condensation or something, sometimes it can get super humid there if a lot of people are working in the same area," Renakir asked, curious if it was due to the serum or maybe he was just in a wet area of the tubes. He was hoping it was the serum, unexpected wetness was never welcome.

And happily the tall ass Romulan-Reman man swayed. He may not have understood any of the science stuff, but the story was cute! "The sleepy gas didn't make me so sleepy, but maybe because I'm so tall? Also are you guys gonna bring me home? I wanna go home this isn't the way home," Kianarix remembered hearing they were heading to the chemical science lab? Or something like that, either way it was not the turbolifts down to the civilian quarters.

Wetness, it was indeed something he did not think would happen, it could be the effects of the the carbonic acid he added, or maybe he just added in too much of in the relation to the margin for the carbonic acid and the protein. He was playing it safe when he was adding the carbonic mixture, he didn't want his gas to devour oxygen, after all. "That could be because of it, yeah... the carbonic acid prevented the ship from being greedy for more wind by sinking the ship. That means, it's liquidated into water when mixed with hydrogen that's in the air." He said part of his thought away without missing the part that he had to make them understand what he was saying. His expressions were somewhat serious when he shared but then Rudy continued, his expressions changed to a seemingly cheery one. "But hey, I never tested it, there were no trials and error for that serum, I'm just glad it worked the first try, discounting a hiccup with the distribution. I'd say it's not bad of a work for someone who's in his first day of work shift." He chuckled, mentioning the fact that he had only been there in uniform for that day. Only just arrived at the station two or three days ago.

"Ah that sounds like it," Renakir actually understood that bit of it. He nodded in agreement and continued walking towards the #natural-sciences-lab-03. "Wait, you're telling me this is only your first day? Rudy, man, you're a fucking legend!" Renakir said, spitting out some good Terran slang he had learned from his friends Allan and Eshen. Seriously, those guys really knew cool phrases. Renakir, of course, delivered the phrase in Standard with this incredibly French accent. The Romulan-Reman officer was quite a mix of cultures. He looked around the corridor to see if there were any more baddies, but the coast seemed clear. "Kianarix, I will need you to stay.... Actually, you can come inside, I think it's safer anyway," Renakir was worried about Kianarix's safety, but he also knew if any escaped prisoner were to attack Kianarix in the corridor, he would have no chance of defending himself. Not to be mean, but the tall Romulan-Reman man probably couldn't fight his way out of a paper bag, even with his Vulcanoid strength.

"Je ne sais pas, man, I don't know about that," Rudy said in a very americanised accent when he was talking with the almost defunct language. He picked up a bit of it after one of his mates from his last posting, nothing too much, he never really took interest in languages, he only picked up words and phrases. He followed Renakir, since he was there to support him he could be of assistance to probably keep the civilian safe from harm's way if it came to that. He hoped it wouldn't, he hadn't done any combat since the academy and a few sparring sessions in the holodeck back on his previous ship.

2

After he walked around this giant station, he finaly stumpled upon the facilities. He tried to hide the wrinkles in his uniform, when he slowly walked past every door, and tried to find the facility he would fit into. "....bio...computer...chem...geo....uh...physics...?"

He scratched his head, looking around, a bit helpless. He took out his tablet, and made sure he is were he had to be. Unsure what to do, he then tried to hear whats going on in those labs, hoping he would find out where he belongs too

15:30

While doing this, he suddenly realized that this might have made him look like a spy, so he jumped back from the door he was listening at, and noticed, it was "Computer-Science". Since that was the closest he could imagine being his workplace, he entered the lab "Well...here we go..."

He entered the corridor after being in the lab for some time. He looked around, hoping to find someone.

He went back to the lab, preparing his stuff

He left the Elevator, and walked to the Computer Lab. "Those Holodecks are AWESOME!..."

Back in the corridor, he walked down the hallway, till he arrived the Turbolifts. He entered one.

He left #deleted-channel , and entered the Corridor.

*He heared his stomach growl, and decided to pay the messhall a visit. He steped into #deleted-channel *

She walked to the CSO’s office. Before doing anything, she took a moment to mentally assure herself that everything would be fine. She took a deep breath, and pressed the buzzer by the door.

After obtaining his wood, Nalas headed out of the bio science lab with his pizzas. Since they were the things that were going to go bad first, he was going to bring them to his friend! Hopefully she was around and ready to eat some pizzas. Nalas was dressed for work as always, holding two pizza boxes in his hands as he slowly began making his way down the hall.

[D] Once he had finished heading to sickbay for his little cycling incident earlier today, Paco headed straight for the research corridor to begin a new shift, albeit around half an hour or so late. Rushing towards his post, Paco read through his PADD as he quickly made his way, looking over the list of tasks that needed to be done and also checking in on some surveys he had previously sent out for a science project. "Good Morning, Sir." Paco greeted with a smile when he saw Nalas, stopping to step aside to not accidentally bump into him, and the pizza boxes. "Is there a special occasion today?"

Nalas didn't even see Paco and nearly ran into his fellow scientist! The silly Bajoran boy quickly swerved and hit the wall with a loud 'thud!'. His hands gripped the sides of the bottom pizza box as he tried not to lose his balance, but the cardboard the slipping from his pretty fingers. "Ahhhh, good-- morning!" Nalas squeaked out as he bent his knees so he could gently sink to the ground. Like falling in slow motion, oh what a way to go, but at least the pizzas were safe. "N-Not really, I promised another officer pizza! Umm," Nalas was now sitting on the floor, trying to lift the pizzas up again. "Sorry, can you help me with these? I can carry them myself, but I need someone to hold them while I get up," He let out an embarrassed chuckle, removing his hands from the two boxes.

"Uhh- Yeah of course!" Paco readily said after briefly processing what had happened, putting his PADD away safely in his pocket as he bent down to stack the two pizza boxes again and pick them up as he waited for the silly Bajoran boy to gather himself and get up. He felt a little bit bad for the silly Bajoran, feeling partially responsible for it, but at the same time, it was a bit comforting to him to see that not everyone is exactly in 'Peak Starfleet Fashion', whatever that would mean. Paco himself still looked disheveled, but much less so now compared to when he first boarded here. "You doing alright?"

Nalas pulled himself to his feet and took a few seconds to catch his breath. Despite working with his boyfriend to do stretches and stuff he was still unbelievably unfit. He was trying to work on his flexibility at least. "Y-Yeah, uh, it's my one lung," Nalas turned his head away so he could cough. "Alright, ready for the pizzas, lay 'em on me!" Nalas reached his hands out, ready to take the pizza boxes back from his colleague. "By the way thanks so much for the help. I'm Nalas, resident Cardassian exobiologist," Nalas gave the orher a cheeky grin, his French accent was as strong as ever when he spoke too. "And you, kind sir?"

"Ah, I see... Sorry to hear about that." Paco said apologetically, readying himself to help if Nalas needed anything else just like he would do for most of his family, some who faced respiratory problems. "Alright, but you know... you can tie both boxes together with a cord, that way you only need to use one hand to carry them." Paco suggested as he handed the pizza boxen over to Nalas, giving a smile as the Cardassian introduced himself. "I'm Paco, the resident Human Anthropologist" he replied, his own native Filipino accent just as thick. Noticing his accent though, Paco was very much impressed with how diverse Starfleet actually was than he expected.

"I was born like this, I will survive," Nalas said with a light chuckle as he readjusted his grip on the boxes. His breathing was more or less back to normal, but there was visible sweat drops along his hair line and neck. This boy was clearly exerting himself more than usual. "R-Really? I never knew that!" Nalas' eyes widened at the idea as if a lightbulb went off in his mind. "Hey Paco! Human anthropologist? Woah cool! Where are you from? I'm from Cardassia Prime, I know it doesn't look like it but I'm wholly Cardassian," Nalas had his hands full with the boxes so he simply wiggled his head back and forth so his earring on his right ear jingled.

"If you say so then..." Although Nalas was his superior in rank, Paco couldn't help but be concerned for the boy's health as he observed Nalas' breathing and sweating, part of him instinctually wanted to take care of this poor boy, or at least make sure is is mostly alright after bringing the pizza's over to whoever he was supposed to deliver them to, so that he could call sickbay. He smiled seeing the lightbulb went off expression on him, looking back when he took care of his younger cousins. "I'm from Earth, where most humans are from I guess," he answered, awkwardly chuckling since he was not used to being around someone with so much energy. Another reason to help protect this silly boy yesyes.

1

They may have been different ranks, but Nalas was a certified lower decker™️ for life. He could handle a couple pizzas. It was worth it for his friends after all! "Ah yeah, the human homeworld. Weird it's not called.. Humus or something, but earth. Like Cardassians from Cardassia, Bajorans from Bajora, Humans from earth?" Nalas noticed, also curiously he referred to Bajor by its Bajoran name, not the name in Standard. He was slowly learning Bajoran! "Hey you busy? Uhh I am gonna take these to uhh... Events hall! For the science fair!"

Mallory ran down the hall after the epohhs, reaching up to rub at her eyes behind her glasses as she did so. She wanted more than anything to scream and cry and pitch a fit like a child, but letting the epohhs get hurt somewhere because she was feeling bad was unacceptable. So, she focused on putting one foot in front of the other as she tried to catch up to them.

Chopin, the red gal, was faster than the rest, charging at full speed. Miss green was slower but still quite fast and Amelie was the slowest. Halfway down the corridor Amelie ended up stopping and just laying down in the ground, all worn out.

Renakir came dashing down the corridor, staggering as he was attempting to find his way without his sunglasses which were now left in the turbo. "Bring her to the bio sci lab, there's an enclosure there labelled Saren tr'Lareth-Morvar," Renakir told Mallory, the name of his dinam felt odd on his lips now. His dinam, the murderer.

She scooped up Amelie as soon as she got the chance and held her tight so that she couldn't wriggle free again. "Got it," she responded, starting to move once again.

Here he is once again... the station in heightened alert. Such is life as a Starfleet Officer. As Paco stumbled out of the turbolift, he took deep breaths as he walked towards his station, hoping that the captain and the admiral are doing alright. (edited)

7

Where do you go after a murder happens? You sneak out to the science corridor with your coffee cup and quickly place your Very Roode Cage in protective holding, Maggie took a breath. “Oh Jesus…”

Renakir walked down the opposite direction of the corridor to Paco and Maggie, carrying his disruptor. The halls were ominously empty. Apart from some guy. And some girl. And Mallory behind him. Well, he supposed he should have expected to encounter some scientists in the labs, but hopefully they were all nerds and wouldn't be too much trouble for him.

6

Maggie turned to look towards Rennie with a smile, unaware they had been taken over by a evil force in two senses of the word. “Heya LT! Uhm….nice weather we’re having? Can I stay with you guys?”

7

Who the FUCK are you calling a nerd?! As Paco saw Renakir walk out of the Biosci lab, he let out a sigh of relief, quietly walking towards him with a soft smile on his lip seeing the friend he made during his panic attack in the cursed turbolift, oblivious to whatever the hell is going on.

6

5

Mallory had been so sure she was being stealthy, but clearly that was not the case. These two clearly had no idea that the situation had changed, and drastically. Well, truly desperate times called for truly desperate measures. Taking a deep breath, she reached out to both Paco and Maggie with her telepathy. 'Keep acting natural, but get out of his line of fire. He's behaving the same way Saren did before he attacked.' she silently warned. She clenched her jaw to keep it from trembling.

Renakir stopped, looking stiff and uncomfortable as people approached him. "No, I'm going to go ahead on my own, but you guys can stick together and hide in the labs if you want. I hear there's a really..." He rubbed one of his eyes. The lights here were already too bright, but his half-Reman vision was making everything so much brighter, and it was getting unbearable. "There's a dangerous guy out there, you know." He pushed past them all and walked into #deleted-channel .

4

If Maggie had any brain power in terms of danger, if she was a tactical officer she might have acted better, but to her she saw the man as a killer and a danger and tossed her ceramic coffee cup at his head. “Ah! Get away from me!”

8

Rennie clutched his head, a green bruise forming on his forehead where Maggie's coffee cup hit it. "FUCK! Pain again?" He pointed the disruptor at her. "I'm just trying to get to the turbolift, fuck off." He then called her several rude words in Rihannsu.

6

7

6

7

Maggie screamed out in fear. “I’m sorrrrrry! Don’t shoot me please!” She yelled out as she covered her head. “Please don’t shoot me! I’ll do whatever you want!”

Hearing this information, Paco's eyes widened. He couldn't believe it himself, but when the coffee cup was thrown and the disruptor was revealed. Yep, he evil. "Hate this!" Paco yelled as he attempted to grab Renakir by his disruptor wrist, hoping to slam it against the wall to make him drop it... or at least make him miss Maggie. (edited)

As soon as Maggie blew what little cover they had, Mallory knew they were fucked. Terror coursed through her, and she couldn't bring herself to follow any more. Instead, she took a step backwards. And then another. And then she was sprinting back into the lab she'd just exited, shutting and locking the door behind her. She was no hero.

Rennie looked slightly amused below his wincing at Maggie and Mallory's actions, aiming his gun at Paco, the only person who hadn't pissed themself yet. "Aren't you Starfleet? This is pathetic. You're exactly the kinds of cowards who retreated during Hobus." Then Paco tried to grab him by his disruptor arm, but he didn't succeed. Renakir was a Vulcanoid, a species that could crush metal with their bare hands, and this one clearly worked out. Biceps of steel. He yelled as he shoved Paco away from him, aimed the disruptor at his chest, pulled the trigger, and then... ...A spurt of water came out the nozzle, splashing gently onto Paco's chest. He stared despondently at the slightly moist area over Paco's heart, looking like a broken man.

2

3

Maggie blinked, saw Paco fighting and then saw his gun not work. “Huh…” She said, then looked to the broken shard of cup on the ground and picked it up. Before racing forward to try and stab into his back with the shard. “I’m sorry!”

"...ohh... right we're scientists..." Paco said out loud as he looked to the 'wound' in his chest, realizing that for the most part, only Security had access to the beefy weapons in the station. "Computer! Raise the lights in the Research Corridor to Maximum brightness!" Paco yelled out, wanting to see if it would work before he stood up and tried to get some distance away from him to try another attempt at tackling. Renakir wore sunglasses inside for a reason, right?

4

1

Renakir was so distracted by the embarrassment of whatever the fuck that was he didn't even notice Maggie charging up behind him and stabbing with the shard, and he let out a strangled yelp as it pierced skin. He backhanded her away and then touched the wound on his back, staring at the smear of green blood on his hands like he'd never bled before. "Pain..." His eyes were brimming with tears from both the pain and the light, and as they fell onto his bloody hands he wondered if this was even a fraction of what Jean and Mo had felt. Then Paco raised the light levels and the noise he made of pain and frustration was indescribable. Eyes squeezed shut, he tried to run blindly towards #turbolift , smacking into the wall and then hitting the button to open the doors after a few tries with his blurry vision, banking on them maybe not wanting to hurt Renakir any more than they already had.

6

Maggie was a human, and a rather weak human really. So she was sent flying into a wall with a small gasp, holding her head as she crashed into the ground and held her head with her hands. Not nothing the green blood on her hands and in her hair now, the first she had felt so closely…

As Renakir blindly ran towards the turbolift, Paco followed in pursuit. "Call security!" He yelled out leaping at him in an attempt to tackle him down to the ground. At this point, he was just desperate to keep him in one place and restrained. If all goes well, a good scan was in order.

Maggie was too concussed to make any sort of call, she laid in a heap on the floor.

The doors opened and Paco only succeeded in tackling Renakir into #turbolift itself...

As the turbolift doors swooshed open, Paco, still weaing Renakir's awesome looking sunglasses, saw that the research corridor was dark as shit for some reason. "Hey, who the killed the lights?!" Paco yelled out as he tried to step out of the lift, accidentally slamming against a wall inside the lift itself, which made him take the damn things off, tossing them back inside for them to vibe. Once his vision is back to normal, he quickly went on to check in on Maggie if she is still knocked out or not before calling sickbay to beam her there if she wasn't consious. (edited)

7

6

7

"Computer, what is the procedure for Chroniton Particle Contamination?" Paco asked out of curiosity, wanting to be sure of something before trying any new ideas.

The computer chimed. "Antichroniton particles can combat chroniton particles."

Assuming that the plan had worked, Paco made his way to a replicator, finally given the peaceful opportunity to make himself some FUCKING FOOD. His brain was too tired from all of the stuff that just happened, and so he went to the replicator in the nearest lab and made his request. "5 large slices of Bajoran Hawaiian Pizza, hot. 1 Can of Coca-Cola, cold" and then he sat outside in the corridor again and ate, trying to mentally process and cope with all the things that happened in this event.

6

7

6

After hanging with Mallory, Renakir was holding his daughter and heading down the corridor. When packing her toys for the others he had completely forgotten her leash so he was stuck holding his fluffy daughter as they made their way past all of the other people that day. It was surprisingly busy, although it was alpha shift, but it seems that detail had slipped Renakir's mind. When he didn't have work for long stretches of time, the nights seemed to all blend together. It also didn't help they were in space so there wasn't much visual cue as to what was 'day' and what was 'night'. Even though he was off duty, he still wore his uniform. He didn't have the energy to pick out anything else, and it always felt awkward walking around in civilian clothes. Anyway, he had a green canvas tote bag swung over his shoulder that read 'DELTA DELIGHTS' with a hand drawn image of some liberated borg and a Tak-tak on it. Inside were all of Kali-fals toys and snacks.

Another day has begun in Starfleet. This may actually be one of the few times Paco actually had a full nights sleep, waking up to find himself in better spirits, at least relatively to how he was feeling the night before. He looked cleaner and more put together as he made his way from his quarters to his station in the research facilities. Although he was not much of a morning person, he was content being in Alpha Shift, not really knowing what much to do with his own free time other than working on personal projects or fooling around in the Holodeck. Both probably good ideas, but he wanted to do something structured before faffing about aimlessly throughout the Station like a professional. As he stepped out of the turbolift, Paco pulled out his PADD and scrolled through whatever tasks he had due for the day. It was not necessarily too busy, but enough to make for a good productive day to keep his head straight. As he was walking, he saw the familiar sight of his friend Renakir and the adorable little epohh in his arms and smiled. "Good Morning, Sir."

"Morning," Renakir said nonchalantly as he passed Paco in the corridor. It was only then a few seconds later that he realised-- that was Paco! The station's biggest Hawaiin pizza fanboy! Renakir doubled back, tunirng sharply on his heels which made Kali-fal squeak, and walking back towards the scientist. "Paco, it's-- you're back at work? So soon?" He could only assume as Paco was dressed in his uniform. Or maybe he wasn't working? Renakir was also dressed in his uniform yet off duty so he could only hope the scientist was in the same boat. He sure hoped Paco wasn't working so soon after the Incident.

Paco didn't think too much of it when Renakir passed by him, glad to see that he was doing fine and on duty as well, or he assumed so since they were both in uniform. Honestly, Paco occasionally also uses his uniform despite being off duty, mainly because he is too lazy to pick anything else out. But this wasn't one of those ocassions. Paco stopped on his step when he heard Kali-fal squeak, adorable as it was, he was more surprised seeing Renakir walk back towards him. "Uhm.. Yes, Sir. I'm on shift today... Aren't you?" He answered, taking a little bit of an awkward pause to process the question before he spoke. He was just as tense as when the two first met, albeit a bit less so now than the first time, though still shaken by everything that happened to him the day before.

"You're working?" If only Paco could see Renakir's beady little silver eyes widened when he heard that. He shookd his had, absolutely flabbergasted that the scientist was here to work. Seeing Paco's tensed posture brought back the feeling he had when he was, or really when Nirral, was threatening the other's life. Although things were peaceful between them now, Renakir could still see the look of horror on Paco's face when he had raised his disruptor. Even though no one was physically harmed at his hands that day, he knew he terrorised people and that pain would probably never truly disappear. It made him realise how terrifying he could be, a Romulan and a Reman were terrifying on their own but he, a hybrid of those two species was capable of so much. Kali-fal, could sense the distress in her father and in an attempt to cheer him up, he bowed her head so her antennae would brush against his face. Then she turned to Paco and gave the scientist a silly smile, sticking her tongue out at him. "I am just surprised you're back to work so soon. I... I want to apologise," Renakir could see on his daughter's face that she wanted pets from Paco, but he didn't want to alarm the anthropologist by stepping too close. "I'm off duty for... Probably some time," Renakir looked away, unable to look the man in hs eyes for any longer than a couple seconds. He let out a sigh and held his daughter tighter. "How are you doing?"

Paco simply nodded when Renakir asked again if he was working already the day straight after the events that have occured and stood in silence. He thought back to what might have been his final moments, slowly taking in a deep breath at the memory of the disruptor raised against him. He never really thought of the person holding it, just to where it was pointed. To some extent, Paco felt the distress Renakir is experiencing through observing Kali-fal's behavior. He cannot imagine how it felt to hold that much of an emotional burden in his shoulders. When the epohh turned to smile at him, Paco's expression softened, returning the smile. "It's... it's fine... It wasn't your fault... uhm.. May I?" He took a few steps forward to get closer to him so that he could give his little daughter a few well deserved pets. He never really had the chance to interact this closely with an epohh before besides watching them during the science fair, but they both knew what had happened. "I have learned long ago that it's unwise to fear someone based on race... besides, you're my friend." The anthropologist looked up to him sympathetically, keeping as much of an open mind as he could. He nodded when Renakir mentioned he was going to be off duty for the time being, time off would probably be best knowing the intensity of what had happened, especially on Renakir. "I'm doing...alright...I'm still alive afterall, aren't I?" Probably the worst attempt at a bad joke he could make, but he hoped it would lighten the mood, chuckling a little bit. "I feel that working would help distract me a bit... or at least make me feel better before I wander around the station for the rest of the day.... How about you?" (edited)

Renakir was visibly saddened when the scientist nodded to confirm that he was working. He shook his head in an attempt to get Kali-fal's antennae out of his face, nearly shaking his sunglasses off. After regaining his composure, his found it in himself to look at Paco again. "Oh, um, sure," Renakir froze in place, allowing Paco to approach him so he could pat Kali-fal on the head. The epohh responded with a soft squeak and a biiig lick of Paco's hand. Her rough cat-like tongue was incredibly long and she looked quite proud after the action. "Friend," Renakir repeated the word, his eyes moving to some random spot on the wall as he contemplated the meaning of the word. He and Paco were friends, but he didn't feel like he should have been allowed to embrace such a word. Not after what he had done-- or really what Nirral had done. "Thank you, Paco," Renakir clenched his teeth together, trying to regain his focus. "Y-Yeah, I am glad you're alright. The disruptor was actually mine.. If you remember from the Raid, I stole it from a guard and gutted it to make a toy for Kali-fal," Renakir realised he didn't speak to Paco much after that event, but he was sure their experiences were more or less similar. "You don't have to go to work so soon, but... I am glad it's a good distraction," Renakir shrugged, voice still low and soft, barely more than a whisper. "I'm doing better than I thought I would be," He said, purposefully being very vague with his answer. "I was just picking up Kali-fal and we were going to relax at home," Renakir replied, looking down at his epohh and suddenly realising Paco was way closer than he rememberd him a second ago. He didn't chuckle with Paco but he appreciated the scientist's attempt to lighten the mood. "Oh umm.. I was meaning to ask you, if you saw my old sunglasses? Thankfully I'm wearing my extras, but the glasses are custom made for me and I was thinking of bringing my old pair to my father to repair."

Paco was visibly enjoying Kali-fal's company, smiling as he gave the good little epohh the pats and gentle scritches. Paco also thought of giving her a slice of dried mango as a little treat, but he figured he could ask a little bit later for permission. When Renakir brought up how he got the disruptor water gun and mentioned the raid, he looked past him slightly and stared at the door of the Computer Science Lab. "T-that's... interesting..." For a few moments it somewhat appeared Renakir had kind of lost him for a quick minute as he remembered what he went through during the Raid behind the doors of the other lab, only shaking himself out of it before returning his focus back to Renakir when he asked about his other pair of sunglasses. "Ah! Yeah! I have them with me actually. I nabbed them from you while you were under the influence of 'The Ghost'. Y'know, to blind you as you were heading to the brig... s-sorry for hitting you in the head a bunch of times though. I'll make it up to you at some point." He used that term to refer to whatever entity got into Renakir and Saren during the incident since he didn't know exactly what or who it was, but either way Paco felt really sorry for them and was glad to be at least partially responsible for its demise. He reached into his pocket and fished out Rennie's original glasses, which have clearly seen much better days... especially before Paco had his own fun with them as the cracks in the lenses would show as he handed them over back to their original owner. "Very sorry for your glasses by the way..."

4

Kali-fal enjoyed the attention, she was an energetic girl! It was good that Renakir had such an outgoing pet, it helped him interact with others a little easier and he was slowly getting used to touch. He wasn't about to hold hands with anyone, but seeing what a positive effect things like hugs were made him more willing to try (with select friends). Renakir's shoulders tensed up when he noticed Paco's attention wavering and he wasn't sure if it was about the Raid or the disruptor. Or maybe both. He grimaced and hid his face in Kali-fal's lucious mane so Paco couldn't see. "His name was Nirral," Renakir lifted his head, speaking with a little bit of sharpness to his voice before he caught what he was doing and prompty shut up. A dark green blush crossed his face as he bit down on his tongue. Even if the possession only lasted a short time, Renakir still felt some connection with the dead man. "I'm sorry. I mean, thank you for picking up my glasses," Renakir had a lot he wanted to say about the whole possession and his actions towards Paco and the rest of his colleagues, but maybe not in the corridor. He took his glasses from Paco and carefully put them in his tote bag, attempting not to drop Kali-fal in the process. "... Just out of curiosity, but did you try to wear my glasses?"

"No, no.. I'm sorry, I didn't know..." Paco was shocked when he saw Renakir's sharp reaction, but very much understood the nature of the response since he might have struck a nerve on that one. "Do you... wanna talk about it when I'm off duty?" Seeing how busy the corridor was at this time, it was already best not to discuss things of this nature, and also he didn't really have much planned after finishing his shift anyway. He too wanted to talk about the events that happened during the science fair. When Renakir asked him about his sunglasses, Paco looked at him straight in the eye whilst giving Kali-fal a few more gentle pats since she clearly deserved the attention for being so cute."Yes, Sir. I did." He answered, probably too bluntly, but he was talking to his superior officer. Best to be thorough. "It felt very cool at first, but it made me blind and I ran into a wall a few times when I got back here after you went to the Constabulary Deck... I have no regrets, I had a couple of badass moments in them."

Renakir felt bad for shocking the ensign with his response, but was thankful that the other didn't seem too upset by it. Then came the invitation to talk about things that made the Romulan-Reman pause. Talk. That was something he was still trying to get a hang of. He was never a good verbal communicator, they didn't really do that in Romulan society. Most of the communication was done with sideways looks, innuendo, subterfuge, well planned stabbings. His expression was thoughtful and then he opened his mouth to speak. "Thank you for the offer, but.. I am not really sure what there is to talk about," His eyebrows pulled together as he gave Paco a nervous smile. It wasn't that he didn't trust Paco or that he didn't want to chat with him, he just... Wasn't sure how to open up just yet. All this time, Kali-fal was mewing and leaned her head closer to Paco so he could give her more pets. For some reason the way Paco delivered his answer to his question about the sunglasses made him laugh out loud. So loud that Kali-fal hiccupped at the sudden vibrations as Renakir's deep voice echoed throughout the corridor. "Badass moments? Sounds about right, yeah I feel super cool too," Renakir told Paco with a nod, loosening up just a little. "The world is much different in the dark," He tilted his head with Kali-fal mirroring his action. "And you don't have to call me sir, just Renakir... Or Rennie as some people call me," They were off duty and Renakir wanted to cultivate friendship with the kind anthropologist. "Would you want your own pair? My dad makes them, don't worry, he can make them in accordance to human physiology, they won't be ask dark as the ones I have."

Paco nodded to Rekanir's gentle rejection to his offer of... having talks. As an introvert, the anthropologist can reasonably understand Rennie's sentiments, being on a similar boat in that regard as well. He also assumed, like most Vulcans, Romulans and Remans would also largely introverted to some degree. In further thought, that sounds like a good potential side project he could dedicate another 12+ hours of his time diving into at some point, but not now. Paco returned the smile Rennie gave with an equally awkward and nervous smile, which showed the moderately light, yet ironic, level of social ineptness the 'Social' Scientist posses. Paco chuckled along with Rennie as he laughed, though not as loud, at the way he delivered his answer to the question of the latter's sunglasses, glad it gave the opportunity for the both of them to loosen up at least a little bit. "Yeah, I had a... very empowering moment in the turbolift during the chaos." referring to his little 'Science Time' one-liner. He would've also worn them during a part of his little luncheon in here during the aftermath of the whole incident. A good amount of Coca-Cola was spilled over in his uniform over the chest part where he, or rather Nirral, shot him in the chest with the water pistol. He currently worn a spare uniform he had to this shift since it was more appropriate. Upon the offer of his own pair of sunglasses, Paco seemed perk up, smiling excitedly *"Yeah! I would love to have my own pair! Thanks Ren!" *It was customary for Filipinos to give their friends and relatives new nicknames, mostly at the spur of the moment, based on their own name, a trait, or even things, In this case, it was just easier for Paco to say Ren than Rennie or Renakir. * "Also.. Can I hold her? Maybe give her dried fruit as a treat?" *Paco asked, giving Kali-fal more of the gentle pets she wanted

Renakir was happy that the scientist didn't seem offended when he gave his rejection. He did catch Paco's awkward smile, Kali-fal did too as the epohh extended her tongue again to try and lick the poor mango fanboy. "Empowering moment?" Renakir repeated the word in his French accent. He then nodded his head and brought Kali-fal closer to Paco so he could hold her. "Sure and oh of course! She loved the dried mangoes you gave me earlier. I... Am Vulcanoid so I couldn't eat them myself but she could and she loved them," As he spoke his posture gradually relaxed. He was still a bit jumpy but when it was clear the Filipino anthropologist didn't have any hard feelings about the events from the other day he felt a little more at ease. "Oh and I'm happy that you enjoyed my sunglasses. I'll tell my dad to make you a pair. He works at Surak Snacks so you can pick them up there or I can bring them to you in the lab," Renakir was always eager to promote his dad's workplace because the owner was nice and of course he wanted his dad to meet more of his friends. "Ren? Now that's a new one, most people call me Rennie or Soleil for a nickname," He commented on the cute nickname. He was at first hesitant about nicknames because he liked his full name, but he had come to understand it was a sign of friendship. "Is your name also a nickname? Paco?"

"Yeah it was awesome!" Paco was very excited to tell this story, since it was the most he was able to contribute in a crisis so far. Also he had Kali-fal in his arms, hugging her gently close to him with one arm whilst he carefully reached into his pocket to pull out another pack of dried mango slices he seems to always have present in his person. He was all smiles. * "After you left the lift to do... whatever it was Nirral wanted you to do in the Constabulary Deck, I stayed in the turbolift because I essentially gave up trying to be Security... It was already a workout trying to get to your face, Ren! I was just glad the computer was working and Nirral didn't make you fight me back because it was real close quarters combat," *He loosened up enough at this point to casually tell the story, having Kali-fal melted most of the tense feeling he had. Now its just being careful with what he was saying, and not dropping the precious little epohh as he tried to feed her a slice of mango, which was already a cute sight to him. "I scanned your sunglasses and found noting, but there was chroniton field residue around the lift, which meant that something was out of phase, but still able to interact with you and Lieutenant tr'Lareth-Morvar somehow," In true science officer fashion, he was very much enjoying retelling this bit as he prepared to recreate the actions he did in the lift... albeit with a cute epohh in his arms. "Thats when I took your sunglasses, stood up, put them on, and then went: 'Science Time'.... It's dumb, but I felt really cool and badass." he chuckled a little bit before he continued to spoil Kali-Fal a little bit more with cuddles and praise before feeding a 2nd mango slice once a bit passed when she finished the first. He nodded when he was told he could pick up the pair from Surak Snacks, now with a plan for where to eat later...or at some point. "Yeah, Paco is both my name and nickname. but I was also called Pac's in the Academy"

Kali-fal wiggled in Paco's arms, snuggling close to him. She seemed very happy to be held by someone new and showed such excitement with her wobbly antennae. All six beady black eyes looked at the scientist as the blue epohh opened her mouth wide for the mango slice. Renakir watched the scene unfold, smiling as Kali-fal ate the slice. It was nice to see his daughter so happy and even nicer to see Paco was enjoying himself too! They were becoming quick friends, not just Renakir and Paco, but Kali-fal too. Soon the epohh was going to become a stationwide sensation. "Ah, yeah, I remember, Renakir chuckled nervously when Paco mentioned the constabulary deck. Although he didn't actually hurt anyone, he did terrorise people which was just as bad as any physical altercation. If anything it was worse. Wounds could be healed, but mental trauma wasn't exactly something a dermal regenerator could fix. "Wow you got all that from my sunglasses? That's some good thinking," Renakir listened to Paco tell his story, feeling a little better when he heard it had a happy ending. "Science time? I like that and I wanna see you in shades once my dad makes them for you. You know.. I think you have what it takes to be Reman! Actually I know you do. I hereby decalre you, Paco, Reman!" Renakir said as he tilted his head up to keep his glasses from falling off. As he was doing this action he noticed Kali-fal eating the second mango slice, her long tongue wrapping around the slice (and Paco's fingers) before eating it quickly. One would think Renakir never fed her with how quickly she ate, but no, she actually just ate. "That is actually genuis! Good job Paco! Also yes, I love the nickname, Pac's! How many mango slices do you have? I don't want Kali-fal to eat all of them!"

Hearing that he was officially a Reman now, at least to Rennie's eyes, brightened up Paco a little bit more, though he was still greatly distracted by Kali-Fal's cuteness. He was weirded out for a brief moment by the sensation of the epohh's tongue wrapping around his fingers before eating the second slice of dried mango, but the wholesome moment made it not matter as much. By the time he was asked in regards to the quantity of dried mango slices he had on his person, the anthropologist froze. He was silent in those moments, trying to carefully think over how much dried mango he actually had on him. It felt like an interrogation for drug smuggling. To which, there were days where he actually had a very subtle Mango-like aroma around him. They were very sweet, so obviously bad for one's health if over consumed despite being organic and premium grade... Also it was his preferred comfort snack aside from Bajoran Pizza and replicator Diet Coca-Cola. "...around 3 packs worth at the moment, but I left the rest in my quarters." He said with a light chuckle, always with a pack ready if ever needed, or if he wanted to give a person one. (edited)

Renakir noticed the way Paco's expression brightened when he declard him Reman. Actually, Renakir was meaning to declare all of his friends Reman. He laughed as he watched Kali-fal's long tongue snake around Paco's fingers as she ate the mango slice. No matter what, his daughter would always find joy in snacks. "Wow, you really are mangoboi," Renakir laughed and gave his epohh a little pat on the head. Kali-fal made a soft squeaking noise and wiggled her body as she attempted to turn to face her father again. She was starting to get restless. She liked being held but she also liked walking around the base and exploring on her own. "Kali-fal had a lot of snacks today, I think it's time we get back home," Renakir said as he held out his hand for Kali-fal to boop with her noise. "Thanks for the mangos and the sunglasses. I'll let you know when my dad hsa finished your pair," Renakir held out his arms for Paco to drop his daughter in. He looked at Paco with a much more relaxed look now, still smiling and even if his eyes weren't visible, his expression of joy was easy to read.

"Yeah, I think should get started with my shift soon as well." After giving Kali-fal a third, and hopefully final, slice of dried mango, he placed Rennie's daughter in his arms. He was happy his day got this much of a good start, and he hadn't even read any of his emails yet! Paco looked at the two with a soft smile before he took a mental note when Rennie said he would update him in regards to the sunglasses. "Alrighty! Guess I'll see you at Surak Snacks! Thanks Ren!" He said with a smile and a nod, knowing this might also be a good opportunity to eat real food not from a replicator... and get out of the workplace. After the exchange of goodbyes, and a few more pets to Kali-fal, Paco waved before stepping off to his station, knowing he could be more casual around Rennie off duty now.

2

[D] While the tribbles were causing havoc everywhere, our local resident Romulan scientist decided to join in on the game against time and the multiplying, cooing mass of fur that threatened to overwhelm the station in about... the nearest hour. Perhaps two. He didn't have much time to ponder upon that, instead determined to do some scanning - which, despite the terrific amount of tribbles around him, was still a bit of a tricky task, if he didn't want to get buried under them (or getting their smell on himself, with Eshen in mind). Extending his hand closer to the fluffy menaces, he performed the scan... Huh. Comparing to the regular readings, probably available in the Starfleet's database, these tribbles appeared to be a bit different. Which the ACSO was quick to report via the quick press of his commbadge...

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[COMM] "Lieutenant Commander Rakim to Lieutenant Tr'Lareth-Morvar, wanted to pass some data on if you've not already encountered it, computer scan of the tribbles in the Senior crew corridors turned up that the tribbles reproduction rate there is ten times higher than the average."

After relying his message, he made his way to the bioscience lab, prepared to... well. Do some science. Just as he was going, though, he received a comm from his fellow officer: [COMM] "Understood, I will take that into consideration. I have no proof yet, but I feel safe in assuming that the dust may have something to do with that. Thank you, Lieutenant Commander," he nodded, an instinct despite him knowing that Rakim would not see it, and walked inside the lab.

He came out of #natural-sciences-lab-02, and walked to #computer-core, where he went though the Door.

Maggie sipped her coffee as she walked along the hallway, she didn’t love being someone with a big important rank! She was so used to being a low rank that having people nod to her and treat her like a big deal….oh boy oh boy did she need a whole lotta coffee to deal with the stress. Maggie sighed as the lights started to flicker. “Oh it’s okay….I’m sure it is…”

Kaylee ran out of the computer sciences lab and down the corridor, before debating if the turbo lift would work. She almost didn't see Maggie there and managed out a 'hello ma'am!' As she ran past.

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Well... this day was sure something. Hearing his overly complicated House name being called over the announcement, Saren left his station and made his swift way through the corridor, to the turbolifts, intending to go to the airlocks as quickly as it was possible, ready to provide any scientific assistance he could.

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