Star Trek: Starbase 777 - turbolift-two

Styre walked into the turbolift, calling for the lower habitat ring.

She entered the turbolift. "Utility Ring." She left.

“Utility ring,” she said and then she looked up at Styre. “What’s your clothing size? Other than tall as heck?”

”I do not know, I simply inform the replicator to replicate me my clothes.”

Ava snorted. “Okay, how tall are you exactly? 6’8’’?” she guessed.

“Approximately, yes.” He replied concisely.

The lift stopped and the doors opened. As she walked out, Ava said, “Hey, about recently in the lab… you forgive me, right? I was at fault. Which isn’t saying you weren’t nitpicking, but it is saying you were right and I’m sorry.” She walked into the utility ring corridor.

Styre had completely forgotten about then. He nodded. “You need not to apologize, Lieutenant. All is well.”

She stepped onto the lift. "Lower Habitats."

"Utility ring, please!"

"Upper habitats please."

”Operations”

“Lower habitats,” she said.

Austin stepped onto the lifts with everyone. "I taught him everything he knows. He was fresh out of the academy when he got assigned to me."

Ava chuckled. “Wow, my boyfriend is so impressive,” she said with a sarcastic edge to it. She just wanted to tease him a little.

He laughed with her a little bit.

"you two really do seen great together I don't think I've ever seen Austin this happy before."

He blushed a little bit.

Ava smiled at Clyde. “Really?” Then, she noticed nobody had ordered the lift and said, “Utility ring.”

He decided to tease Austin for old time sake. "Oh yeah. You must really mean a lot to him for him to be blushing like that."

Ava laughed. “You know, Clyde, I’m looking forwards to getting you to spill some tea about Austin.” She was cheerful and even though she was teasing Austin, she was also still holding on to his arm. She wondered how long it would take for Clyde to ask why she was so emotional as a Vulcan. Usually it didn’t take people all too long.

As they arrived at the utility ring Clyde would step out. "You ought to be the most interesting Vulcan I've ever seen. How about a one on one lunch sometime?"

Ava snorted as she and Austin followed out of the lift. “Austin, your mentee is trying to steal your girlfriend,” she teased.

"Down to the utility ring please."

Tammy entered the turbolift and went to the Upper Habitat Ring.

"Engineering ring, please."

"Utility Ring."

"Utility ring please."

Stepping into the lift she again called out her destination. "Lower Habitats Please."

00:23

She stopped and reconsidered... she was actually rather hungry. "Cancel, new command... utility ring."

Thank God he'd checked out a map first; his first little while aboard Dorsetshire had him visit half a dozen decks before finding the one he wanted. "Constabulatory ring."

The announcement made the Polish petty officer pause and reconsider. "Hold on that. Promenade, please.*

"Constabulatory ring."

"Constabulary Ring."

"Environmental ring, please." He quickly ordered to the turbolift. As they waited He decided to talk some more. "So, what inspired you to join starfleet?"

"Well the sciences for one thing, and to kind of just get away from my family really. Pretty stifling back there but once I enlisted it became more of a personal thing I suppose, I really like this job." She recalled contemplatingly. "What about you Austin? What made you join Starfleet?"

He shrugged. "I've just kind of always wanted to be in starfleet. I am a true believer in the morals and good within starfleet. I see the good we do every day and I'm extremely proud of it."

"That's a good reason." She nodded. "Good morals in Starfleet is what I see too, and it's like people like you that keep it that way." She said thoughtfully.

"Starfleet would be nothing without its scientists though. You all are the ones who are always discovering things that make out society so great." The elevator arrived at its destination.

"Thanks." The door slid open and she stepped out.

"Constabulary Ring."

Dagis entered and called for the Utility Ring, exiting as soon as the turbolift arrived.

"Constabulary Ring!" She said after running into the small moving room.

People had started to try to pile into the turbolifts in order to get to the likes of the shuttlebay where they could escape. Some were by themselves, others had attempted to scoop up their wares and haul them along too. It was to the extent that the turbolift doors wouldn't close with the number of people trying to pile in.

The turbolift began to ferry anouther loud of people including the Ferengi down to the engineering deck. The occupants of the lift tried their best to ignore the hostile ferengi. The elevator was filled to the brim exceeding its own intended compacity.

Panic ensued within the lift as the civilians began to panic. They trampled ontop of eachother as they all scrambled to find a way out of the small space. One person found himself injured severally as his body was jammed against a wall.

After assembling a team, Kassell and the officers made their way to the turbolift. People trying to cram into the lift prevented it from closing. However, it wouldn't work due to Lieutenant Ughaz'adun's orders that halted it from working. They kept a respectful distance "Citizens, evacuate the turbolift immediately! There are armed men in there. Please make your way to the other turbolifts." he said, turning his head to the teams. "Watch for the Ferengi and his bodyguards. They are using live civilians as shields. If they're still in the turbolift when all of the citizens are cleared out, we must proceed with caution. This is a delicate matter." Thus, the team and Kassell began directing civilians away from the turbolift, but being cautious of the Ferengi and his men.

She jogged over to the Cardassian Glen. "Kassel, right? Lieutenant Ughaz'udan sent me over to help." She said once she drew close enough. "What do you need Glen?"

One of the bodyguard pulled a phaser from his holster and layed aim at a civilian. The phaser was set to kill, the man would die instantly. He announced to the officers who amassed by the lift. "No one moves or more civilians get killed." The ferengi shushed the bodyguard and then spoke himself. "What my associate is saying is... you have basically one economical option. You let me get to my shuttle, hell I'll even evacuate some of these civilians with me or... we could fill up the morgue even more for you." The ferengi had a look of confidence on his face.

Kassell finally spotted the Ferengi in the crowd, especially after one of his bodyguards shot a civilian. "Everybody halt!" he shouted. Everyone stopped and remained in their position. The Glen listened to the Ferengi speak, laying out the option he believed was the only way for no more deaths. He looked at the Emin. "To remain still, Ensign." he said, looking back to the Ferengi. "On the contrary, Ferengi. I have trained officers surrounding the turbolift. Your bodyguards would drop dead if they tried to fire at a civilian again. So I suggest your drop your weapons, and surrender with your lobes in tact."

The Ferengi shrugged, looking around at the several unmoving civilians still surrounding him, he wasn't going to let a single one of them move less they get shot. "How many of these civilians do you think we could kill before you manage that? In a situation of two evils you should go with the lesser one, prevent any loss of life. You could even save a few lives by just simply letting me go." The ferengi kept a Supreme confidence, not letting the situation get into his head.

She nodded and stayed still silently, her attention on the Ferengi once she had taken in what was happening. Her hands in position to grab her phaser and her body in a position where she could hit the targets without putting anyone in danger, being at an angle that she could hit an of the body guards or the Ferengi if needed. She had complete confidence in her abilities to shoot and act quickly just in case anything were to happen.

Kassell remained silent, thinking out his options. The Ferengi had a point. More civilians would die if he ordered the officers to fire. Even though they were trained, they wouldn't be able to shoot that quick given the circumstances. He swallowed the saliva that built up in his mouth from the adrenaline. However, one thing that stuck out was the fact that the culprit wouldn't be able to make it to the shuttle bay with all these people still cramped in the turbolift. "Then we're at a stalemate. However, if you want to get to the shuttle bay, you will have to let some of these people go. Or else the turbolift will never shut and never take you to your destination. So I suggest you let..." he glanced around at the civilians. "Ten citizens go." it would at least save ten more lives.

The Ferengi grew a small smile across his face, he remembered the rules of acquisition quite well and thus he never took the first offer. He also recognized if he gave ten people away he'd be screwed. After a short count he realized he only had 12 hostages. "I'll give you 4, including any children. The rest will get a safe evacuation from the station in my personal shuttlecraft, that is a promise."

Four. Six less than what he hoped for. At least the Ferengi would allow the children to leave too. He didn't break the eye contact between him and this murderer. However, he wasn't going to settle on four. It was too low. "Six, including any children. That halves the amount of innocent lives here and still gives you assurance." he said, hoping the Ferengi would take the counteroffer.

She tensed as she watched the Orion bodyguards and the Ferengi. Her hands still ready to grab her phaser at any moment and fire to the highest threat. Her phaser was on stun of course, high stun. The faster she shot the less time they'd have to wound anyone. She studied the three numskulls before glancing back at the Cardassian Glen. Hopefully they could get through this with the least amount of causalities.

The ferengi rolled his eyes in contemplation but eventually relented. "Fine, six hostages but that's all you are going to be getting." He nodded to the bodyguards and each pushed away 2 people towards the Glen, including a child. The group began to carefully make their way out of the lift.

Jes stared after the offenders as they made their way out. The remaining hostages going with them. This...this didn't feel right. The Ferengi and his body guards got to go free after not only taking hostages but looting around while everyone had struggled to get to safety. And what of the hostages? Sure, the Ferengi had said they would take them to safety but where was safety for the Ferengi? Some random M-class planet? Or maybe a random cargo ship. Her gaze shifted over to the new Cardassian Lieutenant. Was he really just going to let them go? Or perhaps he had a plan of some sort. Or maybe...maybe not, maybe he thought that was the best they could do. They saved six hostages, the rest were going to safety. No, that couldn't be right could it? Cardassians were ruthless, focused and determined. For better or for worse. She was certain that the Cardassian in charge knew what he was doing.

Kassell motioned for an officer to guide the agreed hostages to safety, more specifically another turbolift. Meanwhile, all of the other officers eyed down the Ferengi and Orions, but still had their guns ready. To make him feel more at ease, the Glen spoke up. "Lower your weapons." he said. While lowering their phasers, they exchanged complexed looks between each other. Kassell waited for the Ferengi to walk a good distance away. He turned and tapped on his wrist comm. [Comms] "Glen Kassell to transport operator. Are you able to lock onto the lifesigns of one Ferengi and three Orions? They should be on the utility ring."

[Comms] "Transporter ato Kassell please standby, locking on." The operator paused for a couple moments as he set his controls up to lock on. "I'm locked on to three Orions and a Ferengi, ready to transport on your command."

Ah, there it was. She thought as she lowered her phaser, his plan. As soon as the Ferengi and Orion guards were isolated from the rest of the people, save the last few hostages which shouldn't be a problem considering they weren't Orions or Ferengi, beam them away. Most probably to the brig. Hostages safe, the Ferengi and his guards in the brig... everything was going to be just fine. Well other than the fact the station just blew up.

Kassell grinned a little before giving the order. "Transport them to a holding cell in the brig." he said, awaiting confirmation that they were locked up and behind a forcefield.

[Comms] "Affirmitive, transporting them to a holding cell now." In a sudden show each one of the hostage takers began to beam out. One of the orions attempted to fire his weapon but it was far too late by then. Shock resounded throughout the small crowd of former hostages but after only a moment their survival instincts kicked back in as they began seaking a way off the station once again.

"Good work. Kassell out." He tapped his wrist comm again before turning to Ensign Emin. "Now, Lieutenant Ughaz'udan sent you to assist, and you will." he turned towards the team who were relieved that the matter was resolved. "There are still many civilians evacuating in the shuttle bay. We also need to evacuate other decks on the utility ring like the Commodore ordered. The three of you head to the shuttle bay, and direct the former hostages to the turbolift." he pointed at three members of the team. "The rest of you are with me." he said, motioning his hand for them to follow.

She nodded. "Understood, Sir." Revitalized by the Cardassians success, she had just been there for backup pretty much. Still, it felt nice to have a victory, no matter how small or how big her part was. Especially with how chaotic everything had been.

Before they left, Kassell made sure that the wounded man in the turbolift got medical attention.

"Constabulary Ring."

Kassell was present in the turbolift as well.

"Environmental ring" She called as she looked around the turbolift

"Operations, please."

He walked into the lift and stood near the left wall, looking at Ellanor for a moment. "Research ring." He stated before looking back at the Ensign. "I do not think I ever caught your name, Ensign."

"Oh, yes. I'm sorry sir. It's Ellanor Misthair. Or just Ell for short if you'd prefer."

"Ellanor." He repeated for himself. "An interesting name, I have not heard it before. Then again, there aren't any peculiar names in Denmark."

"Not where I'm from, either. I have no clue where my parents got it from, but here I am with it." She laughed a little.

"So it would seem." He said with a nod, looking forward for a while. He really had no idea why he asked her to join him, but alas, here they were. The mysteries of life.

As she quietly waited, she pulled her PADD out and read over some of her notes she had made. After a small edit, she put it away and resumed to look at the doors.

"What are you researching currently?" He asked as he saw her take a note on he PADD, his curiosity growing.

"I rescued a Venus Flytrap, and I'm doing research over how this one acts compared to one's I have observed in the wild. I may say, I didn't think there would be this many differences in just a plant."

"You rescued a plant? Most peculiar. What makes it so different? And what made it to need rescuing?" He said as he looked at the ensign, raising his eyebrow slightly.

"Well, sir, the color of the plant has changed slightly. But nothing to signify that it is suffering or in pain. My guess would be the occasional artificial lighting. And..well, it has a more domesticated nature to it, almost like the common house cat, if you will. I rescued it a few years or so ago. There was a terrible winter coming while I was in the area doing a independent study, and it was the only one of its kind in the area, so I put it into a empty pot I had with me, and I've had it ever since." Her gaze went to him and she smiled after her explanation.

"Interesting. I'll be interested in your report when it does get released." He said with a nod.

Ellanor was slightly taken aback at the interest of him in her work, but she kept her composure. She simply nodded to the Lieutenant. "Absolutely, sir. My research should be completed here before too long. It's pretty long so prepare yourself for a read."

"I have done nothing but read for the past two years, Ensign. I can handle a report." He said with a very faint shrug. Coincidentally, that same period of time he spent reading, was the same amount of time he had disappeared. How odd.

"Challenge accepted, sir. I would also like your feedback on it as well, if you wouldn't mind, that is."

"Very well. Do note that I am directer than most and will not hold back any critiques. It may be... Confronting."

"Noted, sir. And I would prefer that exact approach, nothing more." She smiled at him once again, then her eyes went back to the door.

"Very well." He said with a nod. "Just send the report over when you are done and I will take a look at it, agreed?"

She kept her eyes on the door and smiled. "Agreed, sir. You'll be the first to know once it's released."

"Thank you." He gave a nod towards her. Then the doors of the turbolift opened and Ken gestured to the hallway. "After you."

She nodded again to him. "Thank you, sir." She then stepped into the hall.

And so he followed her to outside the lift.

“Utility Ring.”

She walked in and leaned against the wall, raising her eyebrow at her sister with a smile. "A backflip? Can you even do that?"

She smiled at her sister. "Nope, but I'm sure I can attempt one if I need to." She laughed as she spoke.

"That'll be very interesting to see, dear sister of mine." She laughed softly, shaking her head lightly.

"I can't guarantee anything anything but I'll do my best." She laughed along with her sister.

"I'll prepare the popcorn." She chuckled softly and pressed the button for the deck her quarters were at.

"You're going to need a lot, it may take time." She laughed.

"Deal!" She laughed softly and walked out of the lift when the doors opened.

Ellanor smiled at her sister and followed her out.

Her first stop would be a plasma junction in the hallway up in the upper habitat ring. "Ooo! Where all the station bigwigs live!" She said with a smile, "Maybe I'll stop by Cdr. Z's and see how she's doing. I haven't talked to her in a while!"

She walked into the lift with Kh'reyah and smiled up at her. "You're cute from this angle, y'know?" She chuckled softly.

"I know. Lower habitat ring." She said with a toothy smile.

"Good to know you agree with me." She smiled warmly and wrapped her arms around Kh'reyah's waist, pulling her in closer. "I want to make sure that when you walk around the station you'll always know someone finds you cute. And that someone is me." She said with a smirk on her face, looking up at Kh'reyah.

"I already know that my students find me cute, Samantha, but I will accept it." She laughed heartily and stepped out the door.

She laughed softly and walked out of the lift, going after Kh'reyah.

They stepped into the turbolift, holding the door for Wheatley.

"Thank you!" He nodded his head in respect and got in, crossing his arms behind himself.

“Of course!” They grinned up at their new friend.

"Upper habitat ring," They called, stepping inside.

"The utility deck. Now."

"Utility deck."

Sauk stepped into the life. "Same!" He grinned.

"Utility ring please." He shouted ecstaticly as the lift began to move.

Stepping into the lift she waited for the doors to shut and made her request. “Utility Ring.” As the lift came to its stop she spoke once more to the computer. “Danke.”

“Engineering Please.”

"Lower habitat ring and Glory to the Founders."

They entered the lift. "Yeah man, I'm happy to stay with you all long as you want me to." He paused to address the lift. "Middle habitats please." Once the lift started going Jack moved to hold Sauk's hand some more.

Sauk blushed again, clearing his throat. "Hey Jack?" He began cautiously.

Jack picked up the caution in his voice which caught him off guard. "Yeah Sawk? What is it?"

"Um...do you know what a Vulcan kiss is?" He asked, figuring that was the best place to start.

Jack shook his head with a bit of embarrassment. "No, I probably should've spent a bit more time studying Vulcan and Bajoran dating rituals."

"Um. So..." Sauk slowly took his hand out of Jack's. "Hold out your pointer and middle finger," He requested.

Jack raised an eyebrow as he slowly followed what Sauk asked of him. His hand trembling slightly as he lifted his fingers.

Sauk did the same, touching his finger's to Jack's. "That's a Vulcan kiss. It's called ozh'esta," He explained.

Jack had a smile on his face, he felt the odd surge of emotion he had felt several times before but this time it was much stronger. He tried to place his affection towards the top of his mind but he also came off as nervous. "Wait... have we been... vulcan kissing when I hold your hand?"

"Yeah...kinda," Sauk grinned sheepishly. "Sorry for not telling you." He smiled as he felt Jack's affection for him.

Jack for some reason he couldn't explain suddenly felt a little embarrassed but he couldn't understand why. "No I'm the one who's sorry, that must've been weird for you."

"No! No, it was...kinda cute," He admitted, lowering his hand. "You're cute,"

He felt one final sudden wave of affection settle over him as their hands disconnected. "You are... pretty cute aswell. Meeting you was one of the best things to ever happen to me." Suddenly the elevator dinged as it reached its destination.

"Utility ring, if you please."

The doors to the turbolift opened once again and Cecil stepped inside. "Utility ring." For some reason Cecil's heart was still racing from earlier. It was just a one off thing, glitches happen, he kept telling himself. Thankfully the turbolift moved without stopping this time.

"Airlocks please."

"Hello again computer, it's your girl. Aella 5. Utility Ring. May the Founders give their blessings to you."

"Computer. Utility ring."

Adill stood with his back straight. He took a glance at the station plan before saying, “Environmental ring.”

"Hospital ring"

"Constabulary ring."

Cecil got inside the turbolift, but kept the doors open. He had to mentally prepare himself for what was to come. "Computer, Middle habitat ring," He said as he let go of the button to let the doors close. Cecil closed his eyes once again and tried to focus on the sound of his own breathing. That's what he was taught as a kid. "I'm good, i am strong, I will not let my fear control me. I did nothing wrong, I am a survivor," Cecil muttered under his breath as the lift carried him to the middle habitat ring. Time could not have passed slower, it felt like he was underwater, the air was getting thinner---

Casper entered the turbolift, taking a moment to remember how the areas were designated on this station. "Middle Habitat Ring."

"Upper habitat ring."

[D] He was going to be late to work again if he didn't hurry up. Cecil left his quarters on time, but psyching himself up to get on the turbolift took longer than expected. "Longer than expected" try 30 minutes of pacing around the middle habitat corridor trying to think "happy thoughts". "Research ring." Cecil said as the turbolift doors closed. He could do this. It was a short ride to the research ring. Nothing was going to happen. Cecil closed his eyes and tried to pretend he was somewhere else. Anywhere else.

"Sissil, you're back late again. You know the punishment for that. You have 4 hours. I will let you out when dinner is ready and you will sit with us."

The air was getting thinner, he was having a hard time breathing. Cecil opened his eyes and looked around frantically. The turbolift never looked so... White. Everything was white it was all-- Black."

When Adill stepped into the turbolift, he found another unexpected thing. A feminine looking boy was passed out on the floor. How come people kept passing out on this starbase?! Anyways, Adill knelt down next to the person. “Hello? Hello, you hear me? Ensign.” It was the first thing to address the person. While he did so, Adill took the person’s shoulders and rolled him into his back. He checked for breathing and pulse.

1

Cecil was out cold, he didn't respond. He was in a cold sweat, still breathing, but he couldn't hear anything. Everything was black.

Adill took note of the breathing. The pulse was heightened; the skin sweaty. Adill opened the Ensign’s uniform around his neck to make breathing easier for him. He also opened the belt around the jumpsuit. “Hospital ring,” he called out, “Emergency override.” The lift started moving and Adill put up the Ensign’s legs into his lap to aid with blood flow.

Somewhere in the darkness, Cecil heard a voice, 'Hospital ring' ? Where was he? Cecil tried to move but the world was spinning. Which way was up which way was down?

Adill noticed that the person seemed to be gaining some consciousness. “At ease, Ensign. I’m taking you to the hospital ring. You are going to be alright,” he repeated the lines as he carefully picked up the figure. He was small and light in his Klingon arms. Finally, the lift opened and he stepped out into the corridor, carrying the Ensign.

"Environmental ring."

"Middle habitat ring."

“Utility ring.” His voice was calm and sharp.

"Upper habitat ring."

She stepped aboard. "Utility Ring."

"Constable ring!"

"Middle habitat ring, please."

"Utility Ring!"

“Engineering,” he said, his voice smooth and cold.

1

“Middle habitat ring.”

“Command deck.”

Dagis entered and went to Starbase Operations. On the journey she pulled her PADD out to carry on working. Profit knows she couldn’t afford to not with her lack of staff. (edited)

"Upper habitat ring!"

Right as he was about to enter the lift he heard a rattling behind one of the panels. Was there someone in the jefferies tubes? He heard heavy breathing and sounds of someone crying. Sounds like a personal problem, he thought, He stepped onto the lift. "Middle habitat ring."

2

"Middle habitat ring," T'Lenar requested.

“Environmental ring,” he grunted.

“Research ring,” he said calmly, his hands behind his back.

"Middle habitat." Calmly, of course, he observed the lift around him, and heard the most annoying jangle of musical arrangements possible. Why was it so slow? Still, the Gorn kept his composure, and waited for but a moment's notice.

Now for Cecil's greatest enemy. The turbolift. He took out the last hypo and pressed it onto his neck. This was his big day, he was going to present his findings to THE CSO™️. He could not fuck this up. "Research ring. Glory to Cardassia."

“Middle habitat ring, please and thank you!”

2

Thunk! This time, finally, he made it to the location he wanted to go to, and with that, rushed as fast as he could to the painfully-slow turbolifts. "Utility ring, try not to get me stuck again." He snarled, as the doors shut, and the annoying jangle played once more...

“Middle habitat ring.” He mentally added ‘hurry up’, but that was altogether illogical, since the lift would not react to that; so he kept his mouth shut as his stomach grumbled silently.

"Middle Habitat ring, section 21 alpha."

She stood silently while the lift moved.

“Operations,” he said.

Remun stepped into the lift and turned, facing the doors. He folded his arms behind his back and was about to order the lift to the environmental ring.

Eshen entered the turbolift smoothly as though he hadn't thought of turning around and looking for a different one as soon as he saw Remun was in there. "Environmental ring."

@Deleted User

Remun let the other person stand beside him. For a brief moment the light brown eyes in his stoic face went to study the Ensign — tall, muscular, pointed ears, forehead ridges; so many hybrids on this station! There was a bit of a sharp edge to the look in his eyes, as though he was judging the Ensign’s eyeliner — which he probably was — but other than that, he looked perfectly logical and stoic and Vulcan™️ in every regard except for his skin color and ears. He said nothing at first, since he wanted to get to the environmental ring as well. There wasn’t even a nod as a greeting.

As the doors closed and the turbolift started, Eshen glanced at the Vulcan in disguise and said a similar load of nothing. Remun had no objection to his destination, Eshen noticed. In his leggings and tight gym shirt, hair tied up, Eshen had been on his way to get some exercise in, so he hoped Remun wasn't heading the same way.

Remun’s uniform didn’t betray his destination, but he wore a pair of leggings and a t-shirt underneath. Poor Eshen. Remun wasn’t intending un making conversation, but then something happened. He was just thinking about how much he hated Renakir, when— Creeeeek! With an unhealthy noise, the turbolift came to an uneasy halt. A slight vibration shook through it, causing Remun to strain so he wouldn’t fall, and then everything stopped moving. He looked at the ground and the walls and then finally, at Eshen. (edited)

Eshen looked back. What, did Remun think he did this somehow? He's not the turbolift wizard or whoever fixes these things. He tapped his comm badge. "Malfunction in turbolift 2."

Remun did not sigh, even though he wanted to. He merely said stoically, “It appears we will be stuck for a while, Ensign. My roommate has reflected the malfunction in this lift in his work log.” He didn’t pry into Renakir’s stuff, but he had really good ears and had heard him record it.

Oh, for Surak's sake. The only guy on the station he'd actively been making an attempt to avoid and he gets stuck with him. Why couldn't he be trapped in here with someone tall and pretty, like in his daydreams? Well, Remun was pretty, but in the same way that molten lava was in that it it looks beautiful and vaguely edible (what? Was Remun a salad now?) but it's still a phenomenonally stupid idea to go near it, touch it, or get stuck in a turbolift with it. Remun's attitude was too cold for that metaphor, though. Maybe ice. He'll have plenty of time work on it, unfortunately. "Ah. Damn. I'll be late for my reps and miles." (edited)

1

“I, too, will have to postpone my work out,” said the lava, his tone as vacant as can be. For a moment, he added nothing, but then he found that it would be logical to introduce himself, seeing as he would likely have to spend a considerable amount of time with the Ensign. “I am Lt. JG. Remun T’Lauk.” No ‘nice to meet you’ or anything. “What is your name?”

"Ensign Eshen K'Tann, but you may call me Eshen, and he and him." He was not going to offer a gloved hand like he usually did. Not to a green Vulcan. Instead, he just did a quick Vulcan salute. "Do we follow the same schedule? I haven't seen you around the gyms and such around this time." He must have been avoiding him so well he'd started doing it subconsciously.

He returned the Vulcan salute and said plainly, “I follow this schedule. However, I have only recently arrived on the station. This might explain how we have not met.” He narrowed his eyes slightly. “Albeit I recall seeing you on the bridge of the U.S.S. Eventide. I do not believe that I am mistaken.”

Shit. They had the same exercise schedule? But Eshen didn't want to change his routine. Unfair. Why was he haunted by this stoic green phantom? "Yes. That was... Quite the series of events." Eshen frowned. "But it was a learning experience, at least. I admired Captain Mona's quick thinking." (edited)

“She seems competent,” said Remun merely. His eyes flickered from Eshen’s outfit to his ears. “You are half-Vulcan, are you not?” His tone was almost bored, betraying none of his genuine confusion.

Eshen tilted his head. "I'm a Vulcan-Klingon who was raised on Earth. And you're an Orion-Vulcan, in a manner of speaking, yes?"

“Biologically, I am fully Orion,” he replied, “But I was adopted by a Vulcan couple when I was an infant and have grown up on Vulcan.” He looked Eshen up and down. “You do not follow the teachings of Surak.” It wasn’t a question, not really. More like a deduction.

Eshen shook his head. "Incorrect. I follow them differently, but I do follow them."

Remun raised an eyebrow. Full on Vulcan Judgement™️. He was really good at that. “You follow them differently? How?” His tone was still as unreadable as before, though he disliked being incorrect and it may have shown in his eyes.

Ah. 'Twas what he feared. The Eyebrow Raise. He didn't let his fear show, though, no matter how much 'trapped in an elevator with a judgmental Vulcan' resembled one of his very specific nightmare scenarios. "In many different ways. One is that I focus more on emotional regulation than suppression. It lets me stay calm in times of crisis and avoid the impact of negative emotions while still allowing the benefits of positive ones, though they too are controlled." (edited)

Remun’s eyebrow went back down, but his eyes remained narrowed. Like a lizard on the prowl. Wait. Can lizards narrow their eyes? No, I don’t think so. NEVERMIND! With a cool tone of voice, he said, “I see.” He then turned his eyes away from Eshen and looked at the elevator door. For a moment, he said nothing.

Well, that's worse than the Eyebrow Raise. He had no idea if that was a good or bad reaction. Remun couldn't deny he'd done a good job regulating his emotions during the Borg crisis, though, at least. He'd probably been the least scared person on that ship - perhaps even less so than Remun himself. The walls were really starting to close in. Nalas was right; turbolifts are terrifying. He sighed, leaned on the wall behind him, then slid down onto the floor.

Remun turned his head at the sound of Eshen’s butt hitting the floor. He looked at the Ensign. “Are you not feeling well, Ensign?”, he questioned, though his voice didn’t carry any real concern.

Eshen leaned his elbows on his knees. "I'm fine. I just want to save my energy for the workout, instead of standing until my legs get stiff. If I was in here on my own, I might have gotten my stretches in." (edited)

“I understand.” Remun hesitated, but finally, he decided to sit down as well. He did not slide down at the wall like Eshen, instead he gracefully folded his legs underneath him and sat cross legged on the floor. His back was straight, his posture suspiciously perfect. “Do you meditate?”, he asked, because he was still wary about someone practicing the teachings of Surak “differently”.

Eshen started a tricep stretch as he talked to Remun. Might as well get something in. "Yes. Every morning and night, at very specific times, along with the Plea For The Dead at midday. It gives life a sort of rhythm, don't you think? It's like the moments of stillness between breaths, or the silence between beats."

Remun blinked. “Very poetic,” he commented and his voice lacked any appreciation for the word. “However, I do agree with the fact that Surak’s teaching install order and structure in life.” He watched Eshen stretch briefly. Was he judging or simply acknowledging? You never know. “I am sure my roommate would approve of your poetic phrasing.” According to the tone of his voice, that was not a compliment.

"Hmmm. Not a fan of poetry, then? It is an exercise in structure and form and a healthy, safe way to express yourself. Also, who's your roommate?"

Remun did not comment on the poetry part. He was not about to start a discussion, not with this guy who was half-illogical and a total enigma to him. However, he did answer stoically, “Lieutenant Junior Grade Torre’vnau. Perhaps you have met him.” His voice did not give away his dislike for the person. He was way too logical for that.

"Mon ami Français? Oh, I met him officially yesterday, but we'd bumped into one another on and off before that. Hot guy, good taste, mysterious and a little tragic."

1

It clicked in Remun’s brain. “Ah, yes. You were the one who intoxicated him.” Way to describe the situation yesterday. I mean it had been fucking wild, but to blame it on Eshen? Was it a bit rude? Maybe. Did Remun care? Absolutely not, he was still a little green shit.

Eshen moved onto shoulder stretches. "Oh, I can be quite intoxicating, but no - it was more of a mutual smashing. Why, did he say anything interesting?"

Remun’s eyebrows furrowed for the break of a second at the ‘mutual smashing’, but then they smoothed out again. “I suppose he did not behave any more illogical than what is his nature. However…” He thought back to last night. “He did call me takov. While he used to try to elicit an emotional response from me via the usage of insults, he now seems to have found a new highly illogical fascination with complimenting me.” He shook his head very slightly. “I have other things to do than to try to decipher his nonsensical behavior.”

19:45

All the while, his tone remained cool an emotionless.

Takov? Interesting. One of the reasons Eshen had been so calm with the Borg was that they were an enigma, and his curiosity overrode his fear. Similarly, his apprehension about Remun quickly became a desire to get to the bottom of whatever this is. "Illogical? Nonsensical? What, nobody's ever called you handsome before, pretty boy? It's perfectly clear - he's attracted to you."

Remun strained slightly. Of course people had called him handsome before, they just usually stopped putting in the effort in trying to get to know him as soon as they noticed how unsociable and uninterested he was. Renakir, however… “I do not care for it. And I do not wish to discuss it, Ensign,” he said, and just in case pulling rank wasn’t enough he also shot Eshen a cold look.

Nope. Eshen was reasonably sure this guy had some vulnerability, some crack in the facade somewhere now. The cold look of a green Vulcan was no longer enough to scare him. Eshen shrugged. "Alright, then. Your loss. I suppose you won't mind if I pursue him in the meantime, then."

1

Remun was almost amused. What was Eshen insinuating? That he had some kind of interest in Renakir? Pffft! As if he’d ever lower himself to such illogical things. “I have no objection,” he said plainly, “However, do try not to let him intoxicate himself again next time. He becomes increasingly difficult to understand when he is speaking with a slur and mixing his already less-than-passable Vulcan with Rihannsu.” At this point, he really hoped that the lift would just go on again soon.

Eshen's mental profile of this guy was getting interesting: an over-achieving perfectionist, pre-burnout; raised by Vulcans but not one - possibly over-compensating for that with his rigid dedication to Surak; some possibly mutual tension going on with Renakir; finally, he reminded Eshen of himself, before the Academy. It would be an endearing amalgamation of traits were Remun not also a prick. Still, some part of him felt... Compelled to help him, somehow, if he could, but he didn't have any idea where to start. Certainly not in here. "Renakir is an adult. He can handle himself." Eshen looked around the lift and sighed, still on his shoulder stretches. (edited)

“Indeed,” said Remun. It was impossible to know whether he actually agreed with Eshen or whether he was just saying it but didn’t believe in it — since Renakir did behave like a child sometimes, at least in Remun’s eyes. Anyways, he wanted to change the subject. It was logical to make conversation, right? To pass the time. “You are a diplomat, are you not? Is this your first posting, Ensign?” Might as well gather some information on this guy while they were here. For document 4.

2

Eshen smiled slightly and nodded. "Yes, this is my first posting. I assume you've had a bunch, right, Lieutenant? Any interesting stories?"

“I was stationed on Starbase 13 in the Trill sector prior to my transfer.” He looked at the wall of the turbolift and added, “I would not know which stories you might find interesting, Ensign. Nor am I here to entertain you.” He tapped his commbadge. “T’Lauk to Engineering,” he said, his voice smooth, “Malfunction in turbolift 2. When can we expect a change of the current situation?”

"Nobody is put in this world to entertain anybody, my dear, but it does substantially enrich conversations, especially in a turbolift." Clearly, nobody taught this guy The Rules.

[COMMS] A friendly voice crackled over the communicator: “Hey there! I promise we’re working on it! Shouldn’t be taking too long now. Maybe ten minutes. Sit tight! Elms out.”

Remun was relieved to know that he would not need to “entertain” Eshen for very much longer. He as already feeling way too much like he was being questioned. Nonetheless, he looked at Eshen and said, “I presume there is a story I can tell you. The story of how I have earned my promotion.”

21:13

Sir Boast-a-lot at it again. Boasting was illogical maybe, but trust Remun to be illogically proud of all of his achievements.

As a proficient boaster himself, Eshen was no stranger to it, or to nodding along to self-important people describing their magnificent deeds. That was in his job description. He was actually interested in this, though. He leaned back against the wall casually and nodded. "Go on?"

“A fleet of ships was making its way to starbase 13 and encountered a meteor field within an ion cloud. They were able to pick up communications with us, but their scanners were disrupted. We had to manually guide them through the meteor field. Lieutenant Skarch, a coworker of mine, made a mistake in his calculations. I found it in time to correct him.” He paused. “Had I not, parts of the fleet would likely have been damaged by a meteor, or lost in the field.” He didn’t care whether that made him sound overly important or full of himself; or whether or not it was entertaining enough for Eshen’s liking.

"So your attention to detail saved the day, then? I'd say you deserved that promotion." Eshen probably could've told that story better, he thinks. "I can see why you're in ops."

“I used to be in Engineering,” replied Remun. Man, he was unusually chatty today. Must be the annoyance about the elevator getting to him. Or Renakir. Not that he was thinking about him. “Computer Engineering. I transferred to Operations and it was by no means an unfortunate decision.” He paused. Was it really necessary to keep this conversation alive? Maybe, he decided. Damn, Renakir was already wearing off on him. “It is your turn to entertain, I believe. Albeit I do not care much for entertainment.”

"Oh, I don't think I have any stories that'd interest you." Maybe literally anyone else but this guy. "My work is all anti-climactic conflict de-escalation, or weeks upon weeks of discussion regarding the minutae of some kind of law or deal, or attempting to bridge the divide between members of alien races with a thousand years of bad blood. There's a lot of... Subtlety to it - believe it or not, I'm capable of that during work hours - but it doesn't make for good storytelling."

“I see.” Was he relieved that he wouldn’t have to engage in even more social interaction? Yes. Yes, absolutely he was. He kept his quiet and looked at the lift wall.

[COMMS] “Elms to turbolift 2, you should have power again now.” Just as the voice came over the comms, the lift sprang to life again and started moving.

"Thank Kah'less." Eshen would've Rule 4'd this conversation two awkward silences ago if he'd been able to, but since they were stuck in the lift, he couldn't. Never underestimate the importance of Rule 4. If 'make a good first impression' wasn't already too fitting to not be Rule 1, he would've put it at the top of the list. He's not sure he did well at Rule 1 this time around, though. He could've tried harder, kept up the Vulcan act up a little longer... Eshen was already making notes in his head for how to deal with people like Remun in the future. In fact, after he stood up and stretched his whole body like a cat, he started making notes in bullet points on his PADD, one of which was 'come up with interesting work stories'.

Remun stood up as well, grateful that the lift had started moving again. Finally, they reached their destination. Remun didn’t find it pertinent to say anything else, like a goodbye to the Ensign. He just left the lift.

After a long day at work Renakir headed to the lift. "Middle habitat ring."

Once they got to the lift Cecil paused and looked at his mother. He couldn't let her know about his fear. He didn't want her pity and he definitely didn't want to show any sign of weakness. He took a deep breath and stepped onto the lift in silence.

Cecil stood outside the turbolift, trying his best to hide his fear. He couldn't let anyone know, especially not his mother. He took a deep breath and stepped inside. "Middle habitat ring." The lift hummed as it began to move. Cecil closed his eyes and tried not to think about it.

"Nalas, are you alright?" Ellara was very concerned for her son. She knew he had claustrophobia. In fact if it wasn't for her, he would have never been properly diagnosed when he was in the academy. She wanted to hug Cecil, but she knew that would definitely make things worse. She just stood in silence, watching her son suffer with no way to help him. It was times like this that she couldn't help but blame herself for how things turned out. What if she did assimilate just like he did? Gave up her Bajoran culture and faith, maybe then her son wouldn't be so embarrassed to be seen with her. If only she had known, maybe she would have stayed on Cardassia Prime.

2

Cecil didn't answer her, he just kept his eyes shut, hoping to the Prophets-- to Cardassia, that he could stay strong during the ride. Wait, wasn't there a broken lift? Turbolift 2-- shit that was the lift they were on! Maybe it was fixed, maybe. He prayed to the Prophets, please let this ride be smooth.

After his shift was over he headed to the turbolift to head back to his quarters. He was mentally preparing himself for the wave of heat he would feel once he got to his quarters. Yeah, that green asshole definitely changed the temperature again, he thought. Renakir looked down at his PADD and began to review his work log for the day.

T'Zan, walked into the lift looking down at her PADD, she was reviewing her temporal anomalies again, she bumped into a familiar hybrid. "Oh sorry!"

He quickly stepped to the side to avoid accidentally hitting the familiar science officer and simply nodded his head. "Jolan tru," He greeted her, trying to be polite. "Where are you heading?" He asked, curious if she was also ending her shift.

"Well I've been thinking about what you said about New Romulus, so I've decided to try something I never tried before. Romulan ale." She straightened out her skirt after bumping into Renakir.

"Oh interesting," She hadn't had Romulan ale before? Curious. Renakir looked back down at his PADD, making sure to stand on the opposite side of the lift from her. "So what is your destination? I don't mind having the lift stop at the place you want to go to first, I was just heading back to my quarters."

"I wanted to stop by my quarters to drop off my information, then I'm going to the eplison club and bar and try out that Romulan ale."

"Alright then. Computer, Middle habitat ring," Renakir commanded and the lift began to hum. "They have quite a nice selection of vintage ales there. It is very strong, I take it you enjoy alcohol?"

She blushed a shade of green, memories flowed through her mind, last time she tried some earth alcohol, she managed to steal a bunch of cows from a farm and spray painted a Mcdonalds window. If she drinks too much, she not only acts more crazy, but she becomes more...flirtatious...she snapped back to reality. "I enjoy it...very much..." She says her reply very wistful and carefully.

He raised an eyebrow when he saw T'zan blushing again. Interesting. He was about to respond when suddenly the lift came to a halt. "... It appears the lift has stopped. Do not worry, I can fix it," Renakir said as he knelt down and pulled off the small panel on the side of the lift. This was the second time he was stuck in the lift with someone and also the second time turbolift-2 had broken down. Maybe he should have told maintenance to put this lift out of service for a day so they could properly fix it. "Are you alright, Lieutenant?"

"I am ok, thanks for asking." T'Zan watched as Renakir got to work. "How long will it take before the turbolift works again?"

[COMMS] Over the speakers of the lift, there came a message: “Elms to lift 2, there’s been a reported turbolift malfunction again. Are you all okay?” The voice was friendly.

"It will only take a few moments," Renakir said as he began to fidget with some of the wires. In typical Renakir fashion he ended up cutting the lights and the whole lift went black. [COMM] "Lieutenant Torre'vnau to Elms, everything is alright. I am in the lift with Lieutenant T'Zan heading to the middle habitat ring. It will only take me a few minutes to fix the issue."

[COMMS] “Alrighty then! I’ll leave you to it. Comm me if you need backup! Elms out.”

T'Zan sat down in the turbolift and watched as Renakir continued to work. He was very talented when it came to wires. She decided to pass the time by asking some questions. "I did some research on Renmans, after our last conversation."

"Hmm? Have you now?" Renakir said as he worked, his voice was flat and emotionless as was normal when he was focused. "What did you find out?"

"You're sensitive to light and heat. That's why you're wearing sunglasses. You also have very sharp teeth." She looked at his mouth. "There was more, but I had to get back to work."

"That is true," Renakir said as he lowered his sunglasses so he could get a better view of the wires. His silver eyes reflecting the small amount of light illuminating the lift. He was moving wires around and disconnecting things, seemingly at random. Maybe it was a little random, but he had an idea of what was wrong. "I am only half Reman, but sometimes it feels like I have more Reman genes than Romulan." Why did this girl look up the Remans? Was she curious about his origins because she was also plotting against him? Maybe she was working with his roommate-- No, Remun is too stuck up to have an accomplice. He worked alone, but that didn't make Renakir any less suspicious of T'Zan.

T'Zan started to twist her hair, a habit when she gets bored. "It is kind of the same as me, but I don't really feel more or less Romulan or Vulcan, I just feel like me." She suddenly thought of something. "Canada!"

1

Renakir turned to look at T'zan when she spoke. "Hmm what?" He was very confused, very very confused. Was this how Remun felt when dealing with him? T'Zan was highly illogical and that was coming from Renakir who himself was the epitome of illogical. "Is something wrong?"

She went over and sat down next to him and smiled. "Canada, it's an earth country. Whenever summer vacation happened at the academy, I always go there. It's super cold, the perfect place for you. I thought about what you said about showing me around New Romulus, and I wanted to return the favor."

"Canada.. Interesting," Renakir had never considered taking shore leave on earth again, well not unless it was Norway or something. He was not particularly fond of earth weather. He resumed his work on the lift. "Perhaps if I decide to go to earth we can arrange to meet up," Renakir moved over so he wouldn't be as close to her. It was making him very uncomfortable. It was already getting warm in the turbolift, he didn't need to accidentally brush arms with this lieutenant. After a couple more minutes of fiddling with circuits, the lift began to move again. "We are resuming course, I am attempting to bring back the lights," Renakir said, pushing his sunglasses back up on his face.

"Nice skills. I can't wait to finally taste Romulan ale. I hear it tastes amazing." She stood up and straightened out her skirt. She noticed that Renakir is very... uncomfortable. Maybe it was the heat. Or her. She doesn't know for sure. It seemed like Renakir really had something on his mind about her. But what is it? "Is your quarters the right temperature?"

1

Renakir flipped a switch and the lights in the turbolift came back on. He replaced the panel back on the wall and stood up. "My quarters... That is a whole story," He took a deep breath. "For now let's say, yes. It's dark and negative 10 degrees Celsius," His private quarters that is. Not the common area. The common area was the temperature of the sun beacuse his roommate was a selfish and arrogant prick. MAN he fucking hated that guy. The lift finally reached the middle habitat ring and Renakir waited for T'zan to step off first. "After you. Apologies for the delay, Lieutenant."

She bowed "Thank you, I'll see you later." She said in the Romulan language before leaving the turbolift.

"Jolan tru," He bowed his head before stepping off the lift.

"Environmental ring, fast!"

"I HAVE POINTY EARS!!!" She shouted as she entered the turbolift. She held onto Nia's arm close.

"Yes, you do. Hospital ring." She said. "Nice pointy ears I'd add."

"Thank you! -HIC- I like how short you are! You're cuddly!" T'Zan hugged her tightly.

"Yes, I am! I'm glad you like it. Come on." Patting her shoulder she exited onto the #corridor-04.

"Upper habitat ring!" They purred

3

"Utility ring!" Cecil said, clicking his little watch device once.

1

"Utility ring."

Dagis stepped into the turbolift and headed to Starbase Operations, staring at her PADD the entire journey.

"Operation please."

"Operations ring, make it snappy and don't stop for anyone else."

"Utility ring.."

"Middle habitat ring, please and thank you!"

1

"Hospital ring!"

The engineer entered the turbolift, holding her hands behind he back and looking directly ahead. She was about to order a location when another person stepped in.

That person happened to be the resident Cardassian botanist, who smiled and turned around asking for the utility ring. She was dressed stylishly tonight, as she was whenever she wasn't on duty. Blame her English teenhood for teaching her to dress stylishly in all black complete with makeup...

T’Lenar raised an eyebrow at the way the woman was dressed. As it happened, she was headed to the Utility ring. She wore plain Vulcan robes, the color of the edges of a nebula. “Ensign,” She nodded.

"T'Lenar. So good to meet you." She smiled back, glancing backward at the Vulcan with her arms crossed. "You headed my way?"

“I am,” She nodded. “I have elected to spend some of my off time exploring the promenade,” She informed the Cardassian.

"Interesting." The young Cardassian hummed. A companion would certainly not be out of place, even if the other was as flat as T'Lenar (or frankly most other Vulcans for that matter). "I'll be walking the promenade for something new to wear - you?"

“I would not be opposed to shopping for apparel. My wardrobe is rather…plain,” T’Lenar nodded, considering. “If you do not mind me accompanying you, of course,”

"I don't say no to company." She quipped. "Especially from cute Vulcans I still have yet to get to know..."

A light dusting of green marched steadily across her cheeks. “I see. Very well, then, I will accompany you,”

"You're blushing." Niatha smirked to herself. To force an emotion out of a Vulcan was an achievement - to get one to blush was among the highest, surely. She stepped out of the turbolift in silence, onto #deleted-channel.

“Hospital ring,”

He entered the same quiet turbolift that had always been there, one that had seen its share of death during the hostage situation following the PACT Gallactica bombings. He couldn't get it out of his mind yet he firmly asked. "Hospital ring please."

At first Austin was about to sternly ask to go down to the "Constabulary..." *Suddenly a though entered his mind and he blurted out. "Airlocks... please."

Cecil got into the turbolift alone and clicked his watch 4 times. He closed his eyes as the lift took him to the airlock.

after about a minute of silence, he asked, somewhat quietly “Um… Are the doctors nice…? The one back on the O’Leary wasn’t… But surely there are better ones… Right?”

3

"They're very nice, we have a fantastic medical staff," Renakir reassured the borg as he stepped into the turbolift. "Hospital ring" He said and the lift began to move to #corridor-04

"Listen, turbolift-2, mate. I've heard'a your antics. I'll make you a deal. You get me where I gotta go without breakin', Torre'vnau gives you a little extra TLC next checkup." He sounded slightly insane, but luckily nobody was here to judge him. "Utility ring. Prove your worth."

14:31

The turbolift obediently trundled along, and when it arrived at its destination, Mo tapped the the walls of the lift like one would affectionately pat the flank of a horse, muttered 'good job', then stepped into the #deleted-channel once the doors opened.

4

"Middle habitat," Sauk bit out.

“Engineering ring,”

Dagis entered and went to the Engineering Ring, hoping no one else entered the lift while she was in it. Thankfully they didn't, which gave her chance to breathe for a moment. Once the lift arrived she stepped out, her face now buried in her PADD once more.

"Starbase operations."

Cecil wasn't sure when that lanky vampire was working so he decided to take a different lift this time. "Research ring."

"Upper habitat," Was barely a whisper, squeezed out through rapidly closing vocal cords as their higher functions shut down and the tears began to fall.

"Upper habitat," Mo said, with none of the usual affection he had for the turbolifts in his voice.

“Middle habitat ring."

"Hospital ring."

"Middle habitat ring, my dear Dos."

"Command Deck."

"Engineering ring,"

"Utility ring."

"Middle habitats please." He announced.

"Lower habitat ring!"

“Lovely turbolift two, please deposit me on the middle habitat ring,” They said in a cheerful voice.

"Middle habit ring."

She stepped on the turblift so fast, she didn't even realise there was someone else on it. "Middle habitat ring," She commanded, as if she knew where she was doing.

He blinked a few times when he noticed just who got onto the turbolift with him, however he stayed silent the whole ride. Once the lift stopped and opened at the middle habitat ring, Renakir whispered into Valleka's ear. "I believe you are looking for the Lower Habitat Ring, Nirrasek," His voice low and calm as he walked past her to get off the lift and down to the middle habitat corridor.

1

"Utility ring!"

To avoid any angry German men coming after her, Valleka continued on her way to the turbolift. She took a moment to straight out her skirt and shirt that had gotten wrinkled in her mad dash down the corridor.

Doors opened, Saren lifted his gaze up, expecting a fellow officer, and-- "..." he blinked his green eyes at Valleka, the incessant chatter of his chaotic thoughts that followed him from the environmental ring suddenly halting, his mind eerily silent, "...Jolan tru." Was he cursed? Were the turbolifts cursed? Was there something in them that attracted Romulans, like moths to the lights? Should he believe that this was a simple coincidence, or give into the instinct to suspect foul play? He shuffled slightly, making space for Valleka. This was going to be a lovely ride.

She stepped to the side as soon as the doors opened, a wide grin creeping across her face. Her eyes narrowed when she realised who had just stepped into the lift with her. The gears in her mind began to turn and she straightened her posture. Long limbs, slim figure, and a youthful face made Valleka stand out amongst her countrymen. She had no doubts this boy was Romulan, and he probably recognised her Republic uniform immediately too. "Jolan tru," Her voice was low and her tone smooth like honey. Valleka was a senator, well versed in the art of deception and of course Romulan 3D chess. "Another Romulan, it must be my lucky day," He was only her second-- third Romulan encounter, but she made it sound like he was her thirtieth. Just trying to get the paranoia going, it was as if someone had turned on a humidifier but instead of water it pumped out liquid subterfuge.

Mo stepped into turbolift 2. "Station Airlocks. By the way, even though y'break down a lot, you're my favourite turbolift. Don't tell the others."

3

Maybe it was Renakir's fault. Could the tall man somehow wire the turbolifts so they specifically targeted him? Maybe he didn't forgive him for his lack of knowledge about the Remans after all! Poor ensign wanted to laugh, hearing Valleka's words - who he now suspected to be not just from the Republic, but also of great importance there. Indeed, this place was overrun by Romulans. What the hell... "It's not luck, believe me," he bit, voice even, "There's just a lot of us. Even the non-Romulans are now suspecting a soon-to-happen-assassination or something like that." The discomfort that some people on the base felt was palpable and often obvious. If Saren was younger, he would be concerned and a bit ~~(lot)~~ upset about that. Now he just expected it, from everyone he met. The Romulans were easier, in some sense - their reactions were natural to him. "I am not as interested in scheming, though. I have things to do," he touched his uniform, tracing the blue stripe with his fingertips. Then he looked up at Valleka: "Ensign Saren Morvar, science division. Or you would prefer my full name... Senator?" He lifted his eyebrow, confident in his guess. She felt like one, the voice and the posture and the stare and the goddamn smile. He won't let her win this game easily, though.

She never thought she'd be so happy to meet another Romulan from Romulus, or well, she assumed he was at least raised around Romulans. After chatting with that Earth-raised Romulan she missed the anxiety filled conversations she often enjoyed with her countrymen. "Of course it isn't luck, I'm no senator, I'm a Tal Shiar agent who has come to investigate you," The senator gave the other a serious look, her gaze wavering as she stared into his eyes. After a few second she chuckled and shook her head. He guessed right, she was a Senator but she wasn't going to say it outright. He was Romulan, he definitely could figure it out she thought. "Kidding, ensign." "Ensign Saren Morvar, science? Sounds like a very Romulan profession," Valleka crossed her arms and looked away, her body relaxed. Unlike Renakir she reveled in a game of Romulan 3d chess. She looked completely relaxed and in her element, perhaps one would even say she looked carefree despite having just made such a serious joke at the poor ensign. * "Oh I am surprised you didn't give me your full name from the start, or has Starfleet made you forget you were Romulan? Tsk tsk," *She was patronising him, shaking her head. "The Federation naming format is horribly flawed. Do you have to go by Saren Morvar everywhere?" (edited)

1

He knew it was a joke. It was similar to one he said to Nalas in the lab, a snap reaction to his colleagues' unease, fueled by bitter annoyance; it was a joke, a jab at him, a bit mean spirited (in best Romulan fashion), but ultimately harmless. That was his rational part speaking. He couldn't hear it, though, over the sheer terror that stabbed through him, making him freeze. "I sure hope so," Saren stubbornly stared back at Valleka, jaw set and eyes bright. "That would be a really awkward ride on the lift." But what if she was tied to them? If he gave her his full name now, would she research him?.. It wouldn't be easy. She would have to know what to look for... He rolled his shoulder. "I guess it is. Most of us are there," he focused on her words, "I know some Romulans are in Operations. Haven't chatted with all of them yet, I've been too busy." Busy exploring and adapting still, but she didn't have to know about that. His project was a work in progress that he didn't want to rush. Valleka's comment at the name format does make him smirk a bit, "Force of habit, but that's how it works in Starfleet, long names or not. Humans simply don't have such naming traditions as we do." He pointedly looked at her. She hasn't introduced herself.

She kept her gaze fixed on him, as if they were locked in a staring contest. Only she seemed carefree, truly enjoying the moment, whilst the ensign was tensed up. Valleka's smile never wavered nor did her piercing gaze, she was truly in her element. Did that joke get him thinking? What if it was true? Judging from his reaction he didn't think too well of the now defunct Romulan secret police. Most Romulans shared his views, although there were still some supporters around the galaxy. She looked away when he rolled his shoulder and leaned up against the wall and twirled the ends of her hair around her fingers. "I think I know those Romulans in OPS, interesting bunch of guys," She turned her head to look at Saren again. "Human naming traditions are very confusing, and they think we have crazy names. Anyway, Saren Morvar, I asked you for your full name. Don't worry, I'm not a Tal Shiar agent. Senator Valleka i-Ch'eren T'Rylov," She turned to face him again, giving him a flirty smile, obviously out to confuse and intimidate him.

"They are, yeah. Well, I only met one of them," he briefly looked up, remembering the meeting, "Also in a turbolift." Renakir was probably sneezing like crazy, wherever he was. The Romulan lady was relaxed, which Saren slightly envied; clearly, she was someone who reveled in the Romulan way of living. Which made sense, considering that she was a senator - the fact that he managed to deduce her correctly did bring him just the smallest twinge of satisfaction. He himself was standing still, arms behind his back, eyebrows knit together. Complete opposite of her. He looked at her again, silent for a moment, as if reconsidering his options. "Humans choose the names for their children, either depending on the meaning, after their relatives, or just because they like the name," he informed her with a curt nod. Then: "Saren ir-Llaiir tr'Morvar. Pleasure to meet you."

"Also in a turbolift?" Valleka put one hand on her hip and turned her attention back to the blank walls of the turbolift. What a coincidence indeed. She was not sure what that meant, if anything at all, but she had a feeling it was driving this ensign crazy. Actually, she wouldn't be surprised if this boy was having an internal crisis at that very moment. His stiff posture was all she needed to tell her that he was not here to play around with her. What a pity, she almost felt sorry for this ensign who was clearly missing out on all the fun on Mol'Rihan. Hearing his full name confirmed he was not from Mol'Rihan or Romulus at all, a place called Llaiir? Valleka raised an eyebrow and took a step closer to the man. Her confident stance and cool gaze were well practiced, she was a senator after all. "Well then, Saren ir-Llaiir tr'Morvar, I'm curious what other Romulan you met in the turbolift and about where Llaiir--" Valleka began speaking before the turbolift came to a freezing halt, causing the senator to lose her balance, falling forwards towards Saren!

"Also in a turbolift," he parroted with a lazy blink, watching her as she came closer, "Funny enough, he's an ope--" That sentence was never finished - as if mentioning the place's name three times put an unbearable curse on it, the turbolift stopped, dead. Saren widened his stance and hunched down slightly, saving himself from the fall; his companion was less fortunate. He saw her stumble, and his hands moved up, catching the falling body on his forearms and chest before it hit the floor. "F-f-f-f-fun," he wheezed out, mix of irritation, embarrassment and alertness coiling up in his abdomen, "It seems that we're... stuck here... Why do these things break down so often?!" So, he was standing in a defunct lift, a Romulan senator hanging off of him. Oh Elements, the senator-- "Are you all right..?" he asked, gently pushing his hands up so Valleka could stand. He would never think that it was possible to die of embarrassment, but in that moment he was pretty close. He pulled out his PADD, "I will call maintenance, hold on..."

She stumbled right into Saren's arms. There was a brief moment of panic when she realised they were touching! A million things rushed through her mind accompanied by a very distressed look of panic before she regained her footing and scurried back to her side of the lift. "I'm fine, just fine," Her voice was hurried as she blurted out the words in a strange mix of low and high Rihan, quite unusual for a senator who was supposed to be from the top of Romulan society. He's scared, he thinks I want to kill him, he's embarrassed? A dark green blush crossed the senator's face as she turned away from Saren. Turning your back on another Romulan? One of the biggest faux pas anyone could do, but Valleka was now also overcome with embarrassment. Romulans were touch empaths and some still have telepathy, right? That's what this was? Or maybe she felt this way because she spent so much time with Remans, their presence awakened her telepathy, that was definitely it! When she finally regained her composure she turned back to Saren and put on her best poker face. She was definitely not having a mental crisis. "Maintenance. Yes, good idea Ensign. I hope they will get here soon. Tell them I'm stuck in here too, maybe that will make them hurry," She commanded in a much harsher tone than she intended. Unbeknownst to her, the maintenance officer was none other than her betrothed, the station's favourite half-Reman half Romulan hybrid.

Rarely he felt the warmth and weight of another person this close to himself - he was a Romulan, after all, an unapproachable, private species for many of whom this kind of contact was almost a taboo. And while Saren didn't share the idea that many of his brethren had about the touch telepathy - or, more accurately, was skeptical of it - he could feel his ears turning slightly green, as he willed himself into keeping a stoic facial expression, trying not to think too hard about the semihug that they just had. Two Romulans, standing in the broken turbolift, five feet apart and blushing 'cause they just touched... * *She hurried away from him, even turning her back - which very surprised Saren. But it was understandable. The ensign pointedly looked away, giving Valleka time to regain her composure. The message to Renakir was sent, and Saren hoped that the tall man would arrive as soon as possible. Soon he got a response, just as the senator turned back to him, collected yet intense. "... Yeah, good idea," he replied, already typing away his second SOS to the Romulan-Reman officer. "And now we wait..." What now? Do they just sit in silence, waiting for their savior? Do they talk? He pressed his back against the wall with a sigh. "This is probably not how you imagined your day going, huh," he said in an attempt to break the silence.

3

The way he said and now we wait was making her nervous. How long were they waiting? What was he going to do? What were they going to do? If the turbolift hadn't stopped she would have been just fine teasing him, but now that they touched things had changed. The tables had turned and now she could barely look at the other without risking him seeing how flustered she was. The next words out his mouth surprised her, she didn't expect him to initiate anymore conversation. She was hoping this was going to be a silent ride, but it seemed like he wanted to chat. Not only chat, but she got the feeling that he was probably thinking the same thing she was-- No, she knew exactly what he was thinking. Romulan touch telepathy/empathy was real, she knew all his thoughts. This was a planned event, he wanted to get stuck in the turbolift with her and catch her. He was from a Romulan colony, one that hated the Tal Shiar and the Republic. If he caught her, she would get flustered-- then feel indebted to him for saving her from falling. One thing would lead to another and before she knew it he would be gunning for her seat on the senate and fight to oppress the Reman population once again. She had to defend her honour. "No, not really," She said, keeping as calm a composure as she could. "Did you have any Remans on Llaiir, just a question," It sounded like a question from left field, but if he possessed touch telepathy too then he must have seen it coming. Oh, the paranoia was running deep.

2

He got another message from Renakir - he read it. Then did a doubletake. Then another one. So not only this lade was a senator, she also just so happened to be mister sunshine's fiancée? Fantastic. Saren typed out a profanity, then deleted it and sent Renakir a more muted reaction to the news. "Don't interact with her", easier said than done! Thanks, Lieutenant! He looked at Valleka, who herself seemed to be... pondering. Her confident and flirty demeanor was suddenly gone, replaced by a quiet, but no less intense persona. Don't interact with her. How well did his fellow Starfleet officer know this woman? Or that was his paranoia speaking? Who exactly was Renakir protecting, if any?.. Left shoulder rolls, again. Saren locked his long fingers together, deep in thoughts himself. But he didn't have time to think much - Valleka answered him. Saren tilted his head, puzzled. What a weird question. Why Remans? Because of Renakir? "No, not one," he answered slowly, "only Romulans. Hundred or so. Why?"

2

She may have been having an internal paranoia-filled crisis, but her Romulan senses were as sharp as ever. She caught the ensign typing on his PADD. Was he talking to maintenance again? What was he telling them? Two Romulans stuck in the turbo? Or maybe he was talking to a hitman. Inviting a Romulan senator to the base, showing her around, even introducing her to suspiciously friendly tour guides (Satok and Comet), it was all a plan to lower her defenses. And now this was her final stand. This guy, Morvar, he was going to end her. Her worries were calmed when she saw the other roll his shoulder-- this was the second time he did it, or was it his third? She had lost count, but she knew a nervous habit when she saw one. In fact she didn't even notice she was doing one herself; rubbing the tips of her ears. Despite never having met, her and Renakir shared that habit. It was purely coincidence though. "Who are you talking to? Is maintenance coming?" Valleka completely ignored the other's counter-question, her paranoia was showing horribly. Her breathing was steady and her poker face was sound, but her words were slurring together, a weird mix of high and low Rihannsu again. She looked at Saren, but couldn't retain eye contact for more than a few seconds. They touched, how could she look at him the same way after that? How could he look at her after that?

If only he knew what was going on inside of her head - what she imagined him to be. But Saren didn't have that insight. Instead he saw fear and paranoia, oozing from the person in front of him. She tried to hide it, yet there were signs. His professional training stirred, alarmed. Was she about to have a panic attack?.. But maybe, just maybe, it was a simulation, his mind supplied. She was a Romulan, after all, in a high position nonetheless. What if she was tricking you, Renakir did call her dangerous, did he not? What if-- "Valleka, breathe. Deeply. In... Out," he said, after giving his paranoia a metaphorical kick in its ass. The Starfleet officer slowly slid down, eventually ending up in a sitting position on the floor. His facial expression relaxed slightly as he still watched Valleka - now less out of caution, more in a lookout for alarming signs. "Yes, he said he should arrive soon," he slowly nodded, answering the woman's question. "Unfortunately we can't do much here, just wait. But I will reach out to him again, if he fails to appear. Now... why were you so interested in the Llaiir and Remans?"

She caught him staring, but she didn't stare back. All her senses were telling her to stare back at him double the force he was staring at her-- but she couldn't bring herself to do that. She took her hands off her ears when the other spoke again, his voice soft, almost comforting? For a split second she forgot she was stuck in a turbolift with a Romulan. "I'm fine," She took a deep breath as she watched the other slide to the floor. She took a more graceful approach and sat down gently. Her legs bent out in front of her and now she was resting her head on her knees. *He, who is he? Valleka's mind was immediately going to bad places again, an assassin? Tal Shiar operative? Reman anarchist? Hmmm.* "I can wait. It's fine," Valleka's calm composure had returned, but it was clear from the tone in her voie that she was anything but fine. "Just a passing thought. There were no Remans on Rator III where I grew up, I was just curious if you had ever met one." It was a terrible excuse she thought, but she delivered her lines smoothly just as a senator would.

He doubted that it was fine, it didn't really feel that way, but decided against commenting on that. She breathed, deep, and also sat down, Saren's keen eyes never leaving her. That was enough for the time being. So she was from Rator III, where Renakir also lived, if he recalled their conversation correctly. Interesting… "...Understood. I've only met one recently, when I got here..." that "one" also just so happened to be her betrothed, but oh well, it was no big deal, right? Stupid coincidences. "I managed to offend the guy, by being a bit stupid and saying stupid things. I kinda hope he isn't… that he doesn't hold it against me," he murmured, thoughtful, not really talking with Valleka, just providing background noise, "I have a shitty personality, but I don't like being shitty to people, weirdly enough."

He was staring again-- of course he was staring. They were both Romulan, it would be a death wish if they were to take their eyes off each other. She couldn't keep focused though, she looked at the wall in front of her and then at her feet. Why was she suddenly so jittery? She had been in many situations like this, some even worse. "We have a few Reman senators on Mol'Rihan, but outside of there I've never met one," Valleka said, not being completely honest. She had briefly met Renakir, but they didn't even exchange glances. She took a deep breath and found the strength to continue their little Romulan staring contest. "Shitty personality? Hardly, you're very charming, Saren," She said as her lips curled into a soft smile. She was starting to get her groove back. A little.

[COMMS] "Ensign Saren, are you there? I am directly above you. Is everything alright?"

She never met Renakir?.. If so... this was going to be a very interesting first meeting. It was in this moment he realized that soon there would be three Romulans in the lift, two of which had... some sort of relationship thing going on. Lovely. "Mol'Rihan is growing and evolving, then. Glad to hear that," he replied easily, because well... it was true. Here he had nothing to hide, that's why he replied with confidence. But her next words did make him stumble. "Charm- huh, hm. You're flattering me, senator," did his ears just become greenish in color, again?.. If he were not so flustered in that moment, Valleka would hear a more coherent objection. He looked away, just in time for his comm badge to suddenly sputter to live. Saren quickly tapped it: [COMM] "Oh. Hello there, sir. We're fine, will be even better when we can exit the lift. Want to chat with us while you work?" He can't help but tease slightly, squinting his eyes at the ceiling. It was a nice distraction from some... not so nice thoughts coming into his head ~~(they didn't understand, didn't know)~~, and the situation as a whole. "I hope you didn't grow a liking to this lovely box, because soon we will be exiting it," he said to Valleka, still sitting down, a corner of his mouth turned up in a crooked sort of grin.

It seemed like things were back to normal. Hearing the other's confident tone when commenting on Mol'Rihan put her mind at ease. She rubbed the tips of her ears as she stared at Saren. Was he blushing? She was about to say something about it when she heard a familiar voice on the comms. Her heels made a loud clicking noise against the floor as she switched to sit on her knees, looking up at the ceiling as if Renakir was literally there. "Bless Tenakruvek, I am really looking forward to getting out of here," She groaned and stretched her neck back. The lift had become suffocating and awkward. If it was just subterfuge, she'd enjoy it, but it was a mess of awkward ever since they touched. Valleka felt like she now knew the other's deepest darkest thoughts, every emotion. She didn't say it but she was sure they made a telepathic connection and that was the most unsettling thing of all.

[COMMS] "I am glad to hear your voice, Saren. No one's ever been stuck in a room with Valleka and lived to tell the tale," A soft chuckle could be heard through the comms. "Chat away ensign, I am almost done."

He was glad to hear him, what? Saren blinked as his hand hovered over the badge, a slight crease appearing between his brows. Better move away from that... [COMM] "I am full of surprises, sir. Let me think for a second... hm. You know about the vivver cats, right? The carnivorous felines of New Romulus." Ah yes, his go to theme - science and biology. Professionalism casually slipped into his voice, chasing away the anxiety. Anxiety... more like slight paranoia. His mind reminded him about the collision with Valleka, about the touch; and while he didn't particularly support the touch-telepathy theory, he couldn't help but worry. What if, what if... She would've killed you without hesitation if she really knew, he reminded himself, a weirdly calming thought. She would question you right now if there really was a connection. So pipe down, stupid. He pressed his badge again. [COMM] "Scientists have found their very old claw marks in the forests. It's interesting because these marks suggest that at some point the cats were much smaller in size and much more agile, at least according to the researchers. There is a speculation going on that at some point there was an apex predator running around the planet and terrorizing everyone. However, it seems that it... disappeared."

She let the two chat over the comms, staying silent. It was strange to hear Renakir speak with Saren, he almost sounded friendly? Valleka didn't even know her fiance was capable of being anything but dismissive and cold. Not to throw out stereotypes, but he certainly acted more Reman than Romulan. Cold, enigmatic, jaded, all of the things one would expect from a slave species on a cold mood. Her eyes fixated on Saren as he spoke, as if she were a lion looking at her pray. Secretly, she was still nervous and breaking down inside, but on the outside her defenses were raised again. She got back on her feet, sharp heels clacking aginst the sides of the lift.

[COMMS] "Vivver cats, fascinating. Maybe the apex predatot was actually just Tal Shiar agents," A few beeps could be heard as Renakir continued to work in the tubes. The lights in the turbolift began to flicker a few times before completely shutting off. Now the only thing illuminating the space were the emergency floor lights. Dim, but at least it allowed the two Romulans to see the floor and the other's silhouette.

He let out a dry laugh at Renakir's words. [COMM] "That would be quite an interesting plot twist sir, you may be onto something. Ever thought of transferring into science?" "People really like to joke about them, huh," he exhaled, just as the lights went out. He lifted his gaze up at Valleka, who was now standing above him, unnervingly quiet. Watching him in the dark. He pressed the badge again. [COMM] "Agents or not, the apex seems to be gone, which allowed vivvers to increase in size. They hunt at night, looking out for their prey with their six red eyes. Sounds like quite an intimidating creature, don't you agree?" He was looking at the senator, as if expecting her input, too. What was she up to...

[COMMS] "A plot twist or the truth," Renakir knew very well that Valleka was listening and was purposefully hamming up the delivery of his words to spook her. He continued to listen to Saren's words, enjoying hearing the man talk. It was oddly comforting, in a way it was easing the tension he felt as he was trying to get the turbolify functioning.

No doubt Saren caught her staring. Valleka continued on with her piercing gaze, observing how passionate the science officer was when talking about Vivvers. She flipped her hair over her shoulder and crossed her arms, judging him. "You should really listen to him," Valleka was unsure if Saren knew about her connection with Renakir, but she was going to play as if he didn't. He hadn't told anyone else about their connection so why would he mention it to this random science officer? "He's also working with the Tal Shiar, this was all planned," She said with a cheeky smirk on her face. She was looking forward to seeing how Saren would react or even if he would believe her. Even if he didn't believe a word she said, paranoia was a way of life. She wanted him to think about this meeting for a long time. In her mind she was just doing him a favour; keeping him on his feet.

The turbolift began to whirl and hum, but the lights remained off. As the turbolift began to move the humming got louder.

[COMMS] "The truth, huh. Humans assign their Earth species all sorts of scientific names for classification purposes, which I find convenient. I would then suggest Romulus terribilis for the agents." Valleka's words made him freeze for a second. "Is he now? Never heard of half-Remans joining the service that considered them as nothing worth more than dirt under their boots. But if so, he's either the best one out there or really shitty at his job," he hissed, eyes narrowed. Saren got up, arms linked behind his back, "Frankly, senator, I feel like you're lying to me about my fellow officer, for some odd reason." He felt... weirdly offended on Renakir's part. He still remembered what that man told him, and he still chose to believe his words. Her implications felt almost blasphemous. He opened his mouth to say something more, but then the lift came back to life... sort of. Saren wasn't a turbolift expert, but this was... not normal, in his opinion. The humming noise especially. [COMM] "Sir, is the turbolift supposed to, uh. Act like this?.."

1

2

[COMMS] "That does sound fitting," Renakir replied back over the comms. There was a couple of clanks that echoed down the shaft as he continued his repair work. When Saren began to talk to Valleka, the comms went silent on Renakir's side, he was a man on a mission. Once he heard Saren's voice again, the clanging noises stopped. [COMMS] "Yeah, is everything okay in there? I am transferring you two to the #deleted-channel"

She scoffted and turned her nose up at him the mere mention of her lying. "Why would a Romulan lie to another? Hmm?" Valleka was really in this for the long haul. She kept up the attitude for a few more seconds before laughing and shaking her head. "Oh, you should have seen your face, Ensign," She took a step closer to Saren, no longer stabbing distance apart. She was very close by Romulan standards. "I am just keeping you alert. You never know though, Solait is a sneaky one," Despite playing like she didn't know Renakir, she was not infallable. Using his Romulan name made it obvious they were at least acquainted with one another.

The turbolift lights turned back on and the humming got softer. It was as if the whole ordeal had never happened and the lift was back to normal.

"Because we are the most cuddly and trustworthy species in the whole quadrant and beyond," he replied, still squinting at her. She was laughing, probably finding this whole exchange very amusing. This was her element, and he preferred to see this particular Romulan like that; the brooding silence was unnerving, to say the least. He himself didn't laugh. Instead he pressed the badge, hopefully for the last time for today. [COMM] "That will be fine, we're ready to exit. Thank you." She moved closer. Saren didn't step away, his hand cradling his badge. He bent towards her, just enough for it to be noticeable, gaze focused on her face. "Thank you for looking out for me, senator Valleka, but I do know how to deal with such dangers," he answered sweetly. "like I said to your betrothed, I am full of surprises." He flashed her a toothy grin and then backed away, just in time to exit the lift. Back straight, he stepped into the #deleted-channel.

3

1

Renakir was waiting for the two of them when they exited, looking directly at Saren. He did not look concerned, although he did shoot the other a slightly worried eyebrow raise. He let Saren pass, choosing not to say a word to him, not in front of Valleka. Once he was sure that Saren was out of hearing range, he stepped into the lift and the doors closed. "Nirrasek. I do not appreciate you harassing my friends," He had his eyes fixed on Valleka's, glaring just as hard back at her as she was at him. Valleka was still shook from Saren's words from earlier and it was clear her mind was elsewhere.

"I meant no disrespect," Valleka smiled innocently and played with her hair, an attempt to cover up the nervousness she was feeling. So Saren did tell Renakir about their relationship. Well, it didn't foil her plans, she still managed to instill a new sense of paranoia in the poor science officer. "Are we going to have that dinner like you promised, s'Jaeih Tao?" And just quick as he got into the lift, Renakir turned around and exited without another word. The doors closed and Valleka was left alone. "Utility Ring!" Well she was in the lift, she had to state a location. Might as well go explore as she had nothing better to do.

2

"Starbase Operations."

Seven stepped inside the turbolift, remembering what Hsarr had said about the computer pretty much running the place. "Uh..." he paused, trying to remember what he was told. "Environmental ring..?"

Seven stumbled into the turbolift, pretty much face planting into the floor. Whatever noise he made must have sounded like "utility ring", because that's where he ended up.

3

Being alone with A’Ruk in the turbolift was a bit different than being alone with him in the airlocks, in public, where others could see them… Adill tried not to think of it as he said, “Would be a dishonor to leave you with the impression that Starfleet is ‘lacking’ nowadays in terms of hospitality. So, which part of the station would you like to see first?”

A’Ruk stood next to Adill and didn’t have to consider his answer for a second. “Wherever it is that we can spar.”

“I should have known,” muttered Adill. “Computer, environmental ring!” And the turbolift started moving.

He stood in silence next to Adill as the lift moved. It seemed like they were on some kind of sinus wavelength. One moment they were easily bantering and the next they were plunging head first into awkward silences. He’d been right. This wouldn’t be simple.

Eventually the lift stopped and Adill gestured for A’Ruk to follow him. “This way!”

"Hospital ring."

"Research Ring."

“Utility ring,” he ordered.

A’Ruk stood next to him, eyeing his profile. “You wouldn’t really fight HoD Kuchak over my wellbeing, would you?”

Adill was taken aback by the question, but his eyes were stoic and determined when he turned to look at A’Ruk. “Of course I would, maqoch, and I would win.” His tone was serious.

A’Ruk didn’t know how to react. Finally, he nodded in response. “Yes, I believe you would, my friend.” And that was that.

Adill got off the lift with him.

"Um, how do these things work again?" Kiarah frowned thoughtfully. "Oh, right. Middle Habitat Ring if you please!"

"Research ring."

Having requested the utility ring upon entering, as he waited for the turbolift to arrive he confirmed with Computer exactly where Ensign Del was. The location was somewhere named 'Gliqqigug's,' apparently. Considering how he wouldn't have known where to go otherwise, he was thankful that Del had gotten there first.

"Constabulary Ring, please," he requested upon entering the turbolift, having let the handful of other people in the lift request their own destinations first.

“Environmental ring,” stated the Orion blankly as he stood with his arms crossed behind his back.

[D] Sometime after their conversation with Maggie, Hsarr entered the turbolift. According to the computer, Wheatley had been working for far too long. “Engineering ring,”

“Utility,” he said, looking to spend some time on the promenade.

"Engineering ring."

As they entered into the turbolift, Dion's words gave him yet another excuse to look the other over again, which he certainly didn't mind. "Just slightly longer legs, yeah," he observed. "Not that I know of!" Allan answered confidently with a smile. "And that's good enough for me."

Dion caught Allan's eye and winked quickly; blink and he'd miss it. "Nice. I like to make people food sometimes, so it's good to know in advance. Utility ring -" Dion paused. "Wait, I left my actual trousers in there." The black jeans with the slightly ripped knees. He was so focused on the shorts he legit forgot there was a third pair of pants in the equation. The elevator doors shut, as if to forbid him from retrieving them. (edited)

Lucky for himself, Allan didn't blink and miss that, so he winked back; probably equally as quick. "That's -" he started to say something about food, before Dion realized that fact about the pants. "That's okay, we have to eventually go back anyways, right?" He tilted his head as if he somehow didn't know.

"For one reason or another." He let that hang in the air while the turbolift moved up to #deleted-channel, then stepped out.

3

Zi stepped into the turbolift with Ash and Comet in two. Ash, being a good boy, automatically sat next to Zi once he entered. "Environmental Ring." They called out.

Comet noticed Ash’s good boy-ness and patted him on the head, then waited for the trio to arrive at their destination.

Ash appreciated the pats. Once the turbolift arrived the trio stepped out into #corridor-14.

“Utility,” she said out loud to the turbolift and it started moving.

Getting into the turbolift, Sauk answered Eshen’s question. “Yeah, he did! It’s super cool, I have it on a shelf over my desk,”

"I know! He's so creative. You know, both of you never value your talents and interests enough." Is is a Bajoran thing or something, he wondered? "But that's okay, I'll just do it for you." The turbolift vroomed upwards.

She wanted to get to the Eventide, but she remembered that there was something off with the plant she’d bought yesterday, and she wanted to check in with Hannah Richards to see whether she was doing anything wrong in terms of tending to the plant. So, she said, “Environmental.” And to that ring the lift took her, now because the role player said the wrong ring earlier because they are not that awake yet.

“Middle habitat ring,” he said, and was grateful that he was the only person in the lift because he was feeling especially unsociable right now.

“Utility ring.”

"Hospital ring."

“Engineering ring, if you will,”

“Utility,” said Adill.

“Where are we meeting that friend of yours?”

“Rana’s bar. You won’t like the bloodwine there, but try the tea.”

A’Ruk scoffed. “Tea?”, he said, sounding like he didn’t find tea to be a warrior’s drink.

“I know you like tea, A’Ruk,” replied Adill. Then they stepped onto the #deleted-channel.

Adill was right, but A’Ruk wasn’t going to say it. He followed Adill.

"Middle habitat ring."

Allan followed into #turbolift-two right after the other, smiling. "And we appreciate it!" he said, like a true businessman. He then looked up at the turbolift as he did so many times, trying so hard to remember what he was going to do about it. What in the world was it?

“Where too, ensign? This is your machine. I would also like to see if I can get in touch with Risren,” Branch turned to the man beside him.

"Hm," Allan pondered for a second, half at the turbolift mystery and half at the question Branch had asked him. "Maybe the.. utility ring?" He said, "Holodeck takes great photos, really." It might have also just been the only ring he was really familiar with still.

“Whatever works,” Branch nodded, folding his hands behind his back and waiting for the turbolift to work it’s magic.

Hearing a location in Allan’s words, the turbolift had already begun to take them there.

2

Allan was just trying so hard to remember whatever he was trying to remember about the turbolifts. Would he ever figure it out? Or would he forever be stressed out just slightly when he entered a turbolift for the rest of his life? Only time would tell, really, but eventually the turbolift got to #deleted-channel and that was all. Until next time, he would have to simply wonder. And until then, there were booty shorts pics to take.

"We meet again, old friend." Ah, yes. Definitely no turbolift favouritism here. "Utility Ring."

3

“Engineering ring!”

"Utility ring."

[D] Nalas stepped onto the turbolift and made a brief stop at the lower habitat ring before returning back, but now he was carrying a small basket with flowers. "Utility ring!"

"Upper habitat ring."

"Upper habitat ring?" He was pretty sure of that at least.

Time for the thoughest battle of the day. Nalas took a deep breath and stepped into the turbolift. With his eyes squeezed shut he spoke a little prayer to the Prophets, hoping to be guided through this trying time. Poor boy. He was still in his fit from Surak Snacks, cute black skirt with a loose 3/4 sleeves shirt. With his soft feminine features he looked like a girl with short hair.

[D] Trevor stepped into the turbolift, a large box in his arms. If you looked closer, you might see tiny holes poked in the top of the box. He glanced nervously at the person beside him. It had been a while since he had interacted with people who he didn't already know. But at least he was wearing clean clothes, for once! Granted, it was still a hoodie and sweatpants, but they were both new.

With his eyes shut he didn't see the other person step into the lift at all. He stood with his head tiled up towards the ceiling, completely unaware of his surroundings. "Middle habitat ring, Pokor malin çad (You do a service)," He spoke softly before taking another deep breath and lowering his head so he was facing forward once again. After a few more seconds of trying to get his zen back, he opened his eyes only to see-- "AHH, ON LEGATE DAMAR'S GRAVE, WHO ARE YOU!?" He shouted, nearly falling backwards from the shock he got. He had never seen this person nor was he prepared to talk to any Bajorans today.

Trevor's eyes widened when the boy raised his voice. A noise could be heard from his box. The sudden shouting made his heart beat faster than he'd ever run in his life. "Uh- Trevor. I'm Trevor," He replied in a subdued voice, self consciously touching his riged nose when he saw the boy's earring. He himself wasn't wearing one, because in his opinion, the Prophets were bullshit. "Can you please not be so...shouty?" Not only did loud noises scare Trevor, they scared the not-a-creature he was carrying in a box. "I'm sorry if I...startled...you..." His words came slow. He wasn't used to verbally expressing himself.

He sighed and shook his head, feeling bad for his outburst. Of all the places to run into someone it was the damn turbolift. As if he needed another reason to hate these damn closed spaces. A noise from within the box the other was holding mixed with his nervous expression was all Nalas needed to tell him this stranger didn't want to be in this situation anymore than he did. "It's alright," He turned his head and coughed, trying to catch his breath again. Honestly, the one lung was not usually an issue, but the air always felt thinner in turbolifts for some reason. "I'm Nalas Za'ari, exobiologist," He introduced himself. This time he actually was going to use some braincells and just rely on the UT instead of the trainwreck which was his Bajoran speaking skills. "Did you just transfer here?" He asked, assuming this boy was in Starfleet. After all Nalas was also in civilian attire, maybe Trevor was also off-duty? Although Nalas didn't notice any new Bajorans on the roster.

"I- I'm not crew. I'm...visiting my sibling," Trevor corrected. He was definitely not crew, and definitely not Bajoran. "I'm...unemployed, I guess," He added sadly. This person seemed almost as jumpy as Trevor felt on the inside; on the outside he looked...dull, washed out, used. And he was. He had been used, so many times. He set the box in his arms on the floor. "Do these..lift thingies...usually take this long?" He asked nervously. It felt like it had been a while since they'd both entered...what was wrong?

Nalas nodded as he listeend to the other boy speak. Just his luck, to be stuck in the lift with a civilian family member. Well, if anything it was good that he didn't need to worry about looking stupid because this person was just a visitor. He leaned against the wall and crossed his arms. "Ahh ok, yeah who are ya visiting? Also the lifts are usually fast, but uhhh guess this one is taking it slow, you going to the middle habitat ring too?"

"Uh-- yeah, I am. I'm visiting...Comet Eco," Trevor said, using the standard ordering of names. He and Comet were human. Just human. Nothing else. "They're my sibling. Older. We don't really look alike," He shrugged, shuffling his feet awkwardly. He didn't look much like any of his family, kids had often made fun of him, saying he was adopted, ect. It really wasn't fun. At all.

Comet comet-- Wait he knew that name! Yes the frizzy haired Bajoran. They looked nothing alike, he thought. For a moment he wondered if they were half siblings. Nalas had a half sibling, well, he didn't know who that half sibling was but he knew they existed somewhere in the galaxy. "Yeaahhh I know Comet. They are nice, kinda silly, but nice," He said as he recalled details of their meeting and Comet's profile from the roster. "So Trevor, what's in the box?" He asked, pointing to the box on the ground.

"Uh- Well- I'm...not quite sure if it's...allowed on this station," He admitted. "I don't wanna tell you and then you get in trouble," He rubbed the back of his neck. Was Nalas going to tell him off if he found out? Was he going to have to leave? Comet had told him he could stay, he needed to stay, they were going to help him!

Oh this guy was unemployed, but he had the attitude of a lower decker. Nalas let out a soft chuckle and shook his head. "Nah man, you're cool. I'm just an ensign, I'm not gonna spoil your fun," He said in a reassuring tone. Nalas was still breathing faster than usual, the air was thin and he was a bit of an anxiety ball standing in the lift that seemed to very much not be moving.

"Oh. Well. Uh..." He bent down, opened the top of the box...and out popped the head of a small dog that looked to be a tiny version of a husky. "This is Chief. She's...my best friend," He said. And from within the box...tiny whining noises could be heard, not coming from Chief at all, but from...puppies, that looked to be about 6 months old. Trevor was carrying a whole ass dog family back from a walk in the park.

2

Nalas walked over to the box and leaned down to get a look at what was inside. Oh a dog!! AND puppies! This was definitely making his turbolift ride more enjoyable and it was evident from the way his face lit up. "Wow you were really carrying a whole dog family?" He looked at Trevor and laughed. "Yeah yeah, I won't tell, but I don't think you'd get in trouble for this at all. If anything, I think more people on this station need to pet a dog."

"I'm...looking for good homes for the puppies, if you know anyone who might be interested. I can't take care of them myself, but I am going to keep one, just so Chief doesn't get too sad," Trevor told Nalas. He wanted to make sure the people who ended up with Chief's puppies were trustworthy and kind. "I carried them...we were playing in the park, but the puppies got tired," He explained, gesturing at the five little mini-husky pups. "I haven't named them yet, either. I'm kinda stuck with names,"

This boy was giving away PUPPIES? Nalas wanted one, but he also knew with his less than perfect record it would be hard to get permission. It wasn't that he seemed irresponsible, it was just that he had multiple discipline marks on his record and without a medical need he doubted OPS would grant him the privilege. Nalas' expresison became thoughful for a moment, tapping a finger against his chin. "I don't know anyone off the top of my head but-- Well my boyfriend Eshen likes animals, I think. Maybe I can ask him, he's also my roommate," Eshen had a pretty clean record, surely OPS would approve if Eshen asked. "Also you know you can put up adoption adverts, right?"

2

"I...didn't know if I was allowed to. Can I PADD Eshen later, to ask him? I would love to...uh...find good families for these little guys. I hope I'm able to find them. I would...feel better if they found homes...where Comet lives. Then they can...check on them for me...right?" Trevor said, walking Nalas through his logic. Maybe, when he got back to Comet's quarters, where he'd been sleeping on the floor in their bedroom, he could send an announcment about the puppies. It would also be a good chance for him to practice his social skills after they were so underused for such a long time.

"Yeah sure, Eshen K'Tann if you can get Comet to check his comms code," Nalas said, excited for the prospect of having a pet. He knew Sauk had a pet, although she was an emotional support animal, but there were times where Nalas really wanted to pet something fluffy. The turbolift hummed once again, it seemed to be moving in the right direction. Nalas was not quite sure what was holding it up, maybe everyone was on the lifts today? Traffic jam? "Where were you heading again? I think this lift is gonna go to the middle habitat ring."

"I'm going there too. That's where Comet sleeps, and I've been staying with them," Trevor replied, closing the lid to the box despite Chief's protests and picking it back up. "I'll be sure to contact him about," He added. As the lift began moving again, Trevor sighed in relief. Socializing was still very much not his strong suit, and being forced to do it was an awkward and uncomfortable position to be placed in. He wasn't trying to be rude, but he would probably not have approached Nalas on his own without the turbolift prompting him.

"Yep no problem," Nalas said in a friendly tone as the doors to the lift opened. Fucking finally! He thought. "See ya around Trevor. You can also PADD me any time, uhh I'm usually free," And off he went down the corridor!

“Utility ring,” she said, and soon stepped out of the lift into #deleted-channel.

"Con..constabulary ring?" What a big word. Sheesh.

Allan definitely isn't suffering from turbolift favoritism. "Utility ring?"

"Utility ring! Pokor malin çad (You do a service)! For Cardassia hehe."

"Lower habitat ring, dear turbolift dos!"

“Middle habitat,” she said, because it was pretty late and she needed to get some sleep in. At least she needed to try. Also, she was a bit sore from all that biking and she wanted to rest.

Looked like Mo’s turbolift favouritism had worn off on her, because again she was in turbolift 2. “Airlock!”

"Airlock."

“Utility,” she said, wanting to grab a coffee or something.

"Engineering ring."

“Engineering ring,” he stated and promptly got off the lift as it arrived there.

As soon as Remun stepped off, the turbolift shut down, dead in the shaft.

7

The Romulan-Reman boy stepped onto the lift and immediately got down on his hands and knees to pull off the side panel. With a repair kit in hand he began to examine the wires.

Poor Renakir working alone was a terrible idea because the turbolift doors suddenly locked behind him and the lights turned up, full brightness.

As if things couldn't get worse. Renakir tapped his comm badge, hoping someone would answer.

After that crazy episode in the turbolift, Renakir stepped out at last and headed towards rhe #corridor-16.

Free of marshalling civilians at last. Ughaz'udan stepped into the turbolift and barked an order for it to take him to the security deck. At least there he could monitor their situation from a better vantage point - so to speak.

@Riov Rai tr'Torre'vnau

Right before the doors closed, Aella leapt inside and was met by--a familiar face. "Ughaz'udan!!! My favourite Jem'hadar ehehe well, I don't know many others. Fancy seeing you here! Where are ya off to?"

Now there was an unexpected sight - and a rather worrying one at that. "Aella. Why are you not in your quarters?' He demanded.

Aella stood beside him, her shoes soaking wet as well as the ends of her now incredibly long hair that was tied up in a ponytail. She chose today of all days to wear a long chiffon skirt that was also soaked. "Because it's wet and I slipped and fell, I'm going to medical, where are you going?"

Where the hell had she managed to find water to slip and fall in, he wondered. Was somewhere on the starbase dripping water onto the floor? Ugh, whatever. Sanitation would take care of it at the end of this mess. "The constabulary ring." He replied. "Why are you bound for Medical? Are you injured?"

"Yes i am! Look," Aella took off her glasses and showed them to ughaz'udan, one lens had been cracked and one arm was crooked. "This is very important!"

Without any orders the turbolift was stationary.

"Hospital ring. Now." He barked to the turbolift. Sure, he may have been on the way back to work, but this decidedly took precedence. "I will accompany you there." He stated, "Then I will find my way to the constabulary ring."

The lift took them to the #corridor-16.

"Oh really? thank you so much Ughaz'udan! It feels just like the vanguard fleet now, being escorted by a Jem'hadar. It would be better if Waiyau was here, I hope he's ok in the command deck," Aella sighed and leaned up against the wall of the lift, not knowing they were indeed not heading to the hospital ring.

"If... who?" Ughaz'udan took a step forward through the door as soon as he felt the car grind to a halt - and immediately started, blinking in shock before retreating back into the turbolift. "Computer, hospital ring. This is the engineering ring."

"Eshen K'Tann! He's Waiyau, my most trusted mate. We even touched fingers," Aella said with a cute giggle as she gently pushed her wet bangs from her face. She looked straight ahead when the lift stopped, confused what had just happened. Why were they on the engineering ring?

1

Poor Renakir was just finishing up diagnostics in the engineering corridor when the lift arrived again and the doos opened. The Romulan-Reman man blinked when he saw the Jem'hadar step out and then back into the lift. "Lieutenant? Is something wrong?" He asked, very baffled why a tactical officer was on the engineering ring.

Ah, yes. Something was quite seriously wrong - and no, it wasn't the fact that she'd given K'tann the equivalent of a Vulcan kiss. "I ordered the turbolift to the hospital ring." He stated. "But this was our final destination. Is the ion storm surrounding the station possibly the cause of this error?"

"Yes, the turbolifts seem to be acting strange. In fact I was just trapped in that one not ten minutes ago. I am going to run another scan, repeat the destination it should work," Renakir advised, expertly hiding his shock at seeing the tactical officer. He had never seen a Jem'hadar in person. This was definitely something new.

"Hospital ring! For the Founders!" Aella ordered the turbolift. Perhaps scaring it into thinking this was official Dominion business would get it to go to the right destination.

Unfortunately the lift was not a Dominion sympathiser and did not recognise the command from the Vorta.

2

"Please proceed. Aella here is injured and requires medical attention." He stated, leaning against the far wall with his arms folded, phaser rifle slung behind his back. Yes, phaser rifle - he'd still not had time to put that down since drawing it from the armory, such was the action so far...

She put her hands on her hips, a tactic she learned from one of the shopkeepers on the utility ring and looked at Ughaz'udan with a disappointed face. "Tell the lift to move! It's not moving," She whined, as bratty as ever. It was clear her patience was wearing down and she had no time to try and be polite. Plus, she did miss bossing around giant war lizards.

Unfortunately, as bratty and whiny and impatient as she could be with uncooperative machinery her voice carried no power (literally or otherwise) - this he knew, and as such the tiniest smirk flashed across his lips. "Unfortunately malfunctioning machinery bows to no one until it is repaired. Therefore my word is as good as yours as far as commanding this turbolift is concerned." He deadpanned. "We shall have to wait."

Aella sighed and looked up at the ceiling, unsure of what to do. "Hospital ring, please!" She whined as she stood in the lift, still wet. Not soaking wet, but her clothes and hair were damn and she was very uncomfortable.

The turbolift hummed and began to move very slowly towards the hospital ring.

"Remind me to thank that Reman lieutenant later." He deadpanned. "Enlighten me, Aella - how and where did you get yourself soaked to such an extent? Is water leaking onto parts of the station?"

"He's a funny one, sunglasses are cute," Aella said, totally not hitting on Renakir or anything, but she had a thing for tall muscly men. "My replicator was leaking and it soaked my whole floor. I tried to ask Waiyau for help but he's busy doing importnt things," Aella sighed, looking away from Ughaz'udan as she twirled her long hair around her hand.

The lift finally arrived at the #corridor-04.

'Important things.' A member of the diplomatic corps had 'important things' to do during an ion storm, where diplomacy was the least of his worries? Ughaz'udan found that odd - but perhaps there was something he wasn't seeing, he thought to himself. He pushed away from the far wall. "You can ask Engineering - surely they would be pleased to help you." He said, before exiting the turbolift.

"I don't like those guys," Aella frowned as she stepped into the #corridor-04.

“Upper habitat ring, please,” They said wearily.

"Upper habitat ring..." He tiredly spoke up, yawning.

3

In the turbolift, he tried to remember again what he always tried to remember when he was in the turbolift but instead nearly fell asleep as he leaned against it. Maybe he did fall asleep.

2

[D] After the shenanigans of the day, Eshen was on his way back to his quarters to meet Aella again, entering the lift to - was that Allan? All tuckered out on the floor? Cute. Eshen didn't both waking him up - this would either do it or it wouldn't - before he picked him up bridal-style. "Middle habitat ring."

2

When the lift arrived, Eshen stepped into #deleted-channel.

"Turbolift two, to the hospital ring. 'Ey, been a while, ain't it?"

10:08

When it arrived, Mo stepped out of The Best Turbolift into #corridor-04.

2

"Utility ring."

"Lower habitat ring."

“Middle habitat ring, section one,” he said.

Allan took a good look at the turbolift, completely aware the last time he was in here, he was asleep. Good thing he was wide awake now. Or bad thing? Regardless. "Upper habitat ring," he said.

"Turbolift two, to Airlocks."

Classic turbolift two, Allan didn't even know if he'd been in any other at this point. "Utility ring? Wait, no, uh- environmental ring."

Turbolift two yet again. "Engineering ring." (edited)

Maggie smiled as she pressed a kiss to Dion’s arms. “Only if you have cute workout gear.”

Dion felt the Presence of Allan in this turbolift, somehow. "You know I do, dear, but same goes for you. You need a good fit to get fit! Are you in section one or two, by the way?"

3

“Hmmm, I just have basic ass sports bras and work out shorts. Sounds like a job for my fashion coach.” She said with a wink. “Two!”

"Middle Habitat, Section Two, please." The lift whooshed them up to #deleted-channel. "You know, it's amazing how quickly and quietly they did all that reconstruction work dividing the middle habitat in two and adding the extra mess hall."

3

Talai ventured right after Renakir, just a half-step behind so he could look around, left and right and up, looking a tiny bit like a tourist exploring the station. He behaved... awfully comfortable, walking besides a fellow Romulan in an unfamiliar, tiny environment, alone. Was this obliviousness? Maybe confidence? Or something else entirely?.. He turned, facing the lift doors, head slightly tilted forward and turned towards the officer. Talai was listening to him with clear interest on his face, soaking up the information given to him like a sponge would soak up water - an instinct that was as natural as breathing. "Ah, you keep the inner life of this station moving," he nodded, flicking away some invisible speckle of dust off of his travel bag. "You have quite a vital and important job here, Solait." There was a slight frown after Renakir mentioned the Supernova. "You survived on Rator III, of all the places? Boy, my respect for you is growing," his tone was light-hearted, yet sincere. Talai knew what a rathole - pun intended - that homeworld could be for those who didn't support or were not well liked by the state, "I assume Saren told you a bit of his own history, then?" Not all of it. Talai was sure about that - unfortunately. "Hm, I can see that. Similar people do tend to stick together," Talai looked up, squinting at the bright light. "My faelirh got his own myriad of reasons for his career choice. What made you come to Starfleet?"

As they stepped onto the turbolift, a familiar sense of paranoia washed over him. This time he did not Surak such a feeling away, he decided to embrace it and use it to look at the man with a critical eye. "Utility Ring," He commanded to the turbolift as soon as the two of them were inside. Unsurprisingly the older man seemed much too pre-occupied with looking around. The Federation architecture was-- That's right. He was an architect. It was in this very lift that he remembered speaking with Saren. He remembered that Saren said that Talai would be interested in learning about his family's house on Mol'Rihan. Was that some house, he thought. "Yes, quite literally," Renakir folded his arms behind his back and looked forward as the lift began to move. He caught the other's expression change at the mention of the Supernova. Of course, Saren did not live through it but Talai did. "Yes, and-- thank you?" He said, raising his voice at the second part of his statement. "I didn't exactly have a choice, I was 5," He stated, unsure how old the man thought he was. Perhaps to others it was impressive that a Reman survived life on Rator III, but to Renakir it was a bittersweet victory on his part. He got to live, but he was the sole son of the Torre'vnau house. Well, the only Romulan son. He had some cousins but they were Reman who had... A bit less legitimacy to the Torre'vnau name. "Yes I know briefly about your history," Renakir told the man, nodding slowly. "At the time of my enlistment, I was still living on Rator III. As you can imagine, there were not many opportunities for someone who looks like me," He gestured to his sunglasses and held out his hands to show the man his black nails. "I met a few Starfleet officers who saw potential in me so as soon as I was old enough, I asked for a sponsor and I left. I am the first and only one of my family to join Starfleet. I understand you are an architect on Mol'Rihan?"

He chuckled, a soft, almost melodic sound: "I forget you're not familiar with my manner of speech, forgive me. What I meant by survival... you grew up and became something of your own, despite all the odds. A good man, nonetheless. Believe me or not, Solait, it's not that easy to accomplish." He hummed, thinking of a response to Renakir's words. Ah, so Saren didn't tell him. His dearest, most foolish boy, stubborn as ever. Talai knew what was hiding under that tough coat. "Saren met two in the Flotilla. They liked him, but it was Saren who pestered them about joining, having to convince them. And then convince us," he looked at Renakir again, eyebrow quirked up. "I will admit, I knew little of humans then. Still don't. I was terrified of letting him go to Starfleet, after all the history between us. But looks like it's working out, eh?" Talai smiled at the mention of his work: "Yes indeed! Mol'Rihan needs a lot of work, considering there were no structures there. Well, that's unfair - there are the ruins, but those are not very, hm, habitable."

The chuckle did nothing to put him at ease, in fact he was incredibly suspicious of this man's friendliness. ”Thank you for your compliment," Was all Renakir could say in response to Talai's words. He was not in the best headspace right now and was hoping they could meet Saren and he could be on his way. The humming was making him nervous too. Why was everything this man doing setting off alarms? Truly an enigmatic Romulan, just like Saren. Renakir was over here trying to play Romulan 3D chess but it seemed like this dad-shaped Romulan had no intention of even picking up a piece. "Interesting. Saren is very motivated, once he sets his mind to something, he does it. I have never had any doubts about his abilities," Renakir said, voice stable and calm despite the anxiety surging through his body. "Saren mentioned you would be interested in my house. The House of Torre'vnau is mixed, we live in a 4 building complex, two Remand and two Romulan. Half the estate is in darkness the other in light," He explained as the lift began to slow. Were they at the utility ring or was there just traffic? Oh Renakir was beating himself up mentally for not instating the 'no more than one Romulan in a lift at a time' rule.

"He really is, isn't he?" Talai nodded, proud. "I am glad that he could find a place for himself..." He trailed off, looking at the lift doors with that calm yet focused gaze of his. Then... "Relax, boy. I have zero intentions of hurting you, and I believe the same applies to you. Doesn't it?" If the Romulan chess were a physical game... there would be Renakir, waiting for his opponent to make the first move with his pawn, and then there would be Talai, ignoring the game completely and building a pyramid out of his chess pieces instead. Talai made a blatant assumption about him. He didn't know the officer personally, but he knew Romulans. The older man shot Renakir a warm, though somewhat a bit smug, smile. "Oh, how interesting! Does it use natural light sources or is there some engineering magic involved?" he inquired, curious, his little moment of Romulan subterfuge and cunning all but passed. (edited)

1

"I am glad we both coincidentally got stationed on this starbase that is coincidentally located right next to Mol'Rihan," Renakir said, not trying to hide his suspicion that his and Saren's assignment was random. He sighed when the other acknowledged his paranoia. Talai was not only Romulan, but also a father, a father who had lived through the Supernova. Renakir shouldn't have been surprised when the older man caught on to how he was acting. "Yes, of course," He said with full honesty. The lift slowed and the doors opened to the #deleted-channel. In true Romulan fashion, he stayed in the lift, allowing the older man to step off first. "Since it is a 4 building complex, we just have lights for two buildings and the other two utilise natural light. However as you know, Remans are nocturnal so there is usually no problem with either side of my family trying to get around when they are awake," Renakir explained as he looked out into the corridor.

"Utility Ring."

“Middle habitat, section one,” she said.

"If it kept trying to go into said restaurant and making noises and movements indicating that it wanted to go in there? Yes, I would ideally want to explain that to it somehow." He said, also stepping into the turbolift, thank god it was two, remembering how Bir, Ikki, and Yuch had clearly expressed those things to him. They had also thanked him for picking them up, which indicated they had wish for communication of their own, perhaps. "Yeah, I picked up a lot. Actually took classes in it for a while to prepare for meeting her parents," he laughed some at that, those classes were awful to sit through, but did teach him well. "I'm glad you'll consider it."

"I believe you are viewing them through the lens of a sentient being, which they are still far from," Alizati stepped into the turbolift and stood on the opposite side from Allan. ”Upper habitat ring, He said before turning to the ensign once more. He did not make eye contact with the furby, it's actions were illogical and Alizati made a mental note to check its logs to see if it was attempting to learn sentience. Perhaps it was because it had interacted with so many organic life forms, it was trying to learn. "Vulcan is very difficult to learn, many sounds are impossible for a non-Vulcanoid tongue. Perhaps if you study hard enough, you may be able to read some of my notes," Alizati was not hopeful, but the ensign was capable of surprises so it wasn't an impossible goal.

"Right, I know, but they're acting as sentient as a cat, so it's only fair to treat them as such," he explained as they rode the turbolift. "I'd love to learn more, honestly. Language has always never been my strongest subject, though, to learn a language I have to use it practically pretty often, that's why it worked back then. It's sort of why programming languages are so easy for me to grasp, you can use them pretty much all the time whenever you'd like and see if you're correct, without waiting on another person's input."

He did not make any comment about his furby acting like a sentient cat. If anything, the furby was merely doing what it was programmed to do; learn from experience. He continued to listen to what the other had to say about language learning. It was something as an android he did not have the experience of doing. He could simply download whatever language he wanted and speak it perfectly without practice. "Perhaps you could answer a language question for me. I seem to have a minor language malfunction in my memory, i have an update soon and would appreciate it if such error was corrected," He said before stepping into the #deleted-channel.

"Operations ring, please, and thank you,"

She took turbolift two, maybe Mo’s favouritism was rubbing off on her. “Environmental ring,” she said and soon stepped out into the corridor.

"Utility ring."

Into his favorite turbolift Allan went, he realllly had to meet with Eshen soon to tell him about his totally great idea that he kept remembering whenever he went into the turbolift.

1

As soon as the doors closed they opened again and-- the three-headed furby came slithering inside, chriping and making overall very distressing noises. Bir extended his head towards Allan and blinked in rapid succession, the other two heads stayed on the ground to allow Bir to move freely.

Allan looked down at the furby creature, kneeling down to look at Bir carefully as he heard the distressing noises. "You okay?" he asked softly, in Vulcan, because he that was one of the phrases he did know how to say. Still, he offered his arm for the creature to climb up and waited for any answer the creature might give him. If not, he'd probably have to find Alizati.

The three headed furby quickly slithered up onto Allan's arm and then wrapped itself around his neck like a scarf. Yuch, the shortest of the three, nuzzled Allan's cheek, clearly a friendly head. "Â̶͋l̵̓͝i̷͋̓z̷̑͆a̴͑͒t̷͐̓i̴̅̿?" The sound was coming from Ikki, the second head. It seemed the Furby was capable of some language even if was just a few words.

The engineer laughed a little as the furby wrapped itself around his neck like a scarf, it tickled juuust a bit. He pet Yuch's head in return, smiling. "Alizati? We can find out where he is for sure," he said, giving Ikki a little pap on the head before messaging Alizati over the comms system. [Comms] "Hey, uh, boss, Bir Ikki and Yuch are here for ya, where ya at?"

[Comms] "I am on my way to my quarters. You may come to the #deleted-channel."

[Comms] "Roger that, boss." He spoke to the turbolift next. "Upper habitat ring, please," and then he just sort of held the furberous as he was transported to #deleted-channel .

"Constabulary ring, please!"

"Environmental ring."

"Utility ring, dear friend!"

"Environmental ring."

“Hospital ring,” said Mika with little to no gusto.

"Upper habitat ring."

And into his favorite turbolift. "...starbase operations," he said for the first time.

Allan wheeled his little glowy wheels suitcase into the turbolift. "Airlocks," he said, finally ready to just get the hell off of this base. Not that it wasn't great and all, but he really wanted to be on a beach right now. And to see his friends! He leaned against the wall of the turbolift as it traveled, propping one leg up against the wall to stabilize himself.

[D] It was only a moment of time before the turbolift slowed to a stop to let more passengers on. As the doors opened the only person stood waiting to board was awfully familiar looking. Zi stepped into the turbolift when the doors opened, almost entirely unaware of who else was even in there. They were on autopilot and had full intentions of minding their own business, to the extent that they had no clue Allan was the other person in here. "Environmental Ring, please."

Allan watched as Zi walked in, giving them a small wave. "Whatchya headed there for? More lawnmower bot business? Or?" He asked, still in his mesh tank top and starfleet shorts, but honestly, Zi had seen him in more revealing clothes before so that was okay.

It was only as Allan spoke that Zi properly looked up and at him, a blush immediately appearing in their cheeks upon realising 1, who they were in the lift with, and 2, what Allan was wearing. "Oh, uhh, h-hi Allan." They greeted sheepishly, offering a small wave in return. "I was actually just going to uhh, to go and do some weeding, actually." They said, honestly struggling to not stare at what the man was wearing, trying their best to keep eye contact despite their blushing.

"Weeding? I thought that was only on Starbase 420, not here, but hey. What do I know," He stopped leaning against the wall and took a step closer to the other, "How've you been, anyways? It's been a while, and I would love to hear about anything other than what the Admiral just talked to me about, to be honest."

3

Weeding on 420...? Oh... Oh that kind! "Oh, uhh, I've been fine, thanks! Just sort of been doing the same old stuff. Plant maintenance, really." They responded with a smile. "What about you? Going somewhere nice for shore leave?"

"Yeah, actually! Going to some friends' vacation home on Mol'Rihan actually, got the suitcase all packed and everything." He smiled back, looking down at the other. "Plant maintenance... oh, I've been meaning to ask - what's your favorite plant?"

"That sounds nice!" Zi replied, smiling as they did. As they were asked about their favourite plant they had to think for a good moment before responding. "Umm, well, honestly I don't think I have one favourite. I think it's kind of impossible to pick just one. I love succulents and cacti, though!" They responded cheerfully.

"Oo, good choice," Allan said, "Succulents and cacti are really nice. Don't require a lot of attention so it's easy to just sort of have them around," he smiled, "not that plants that are more needy of attention aren't just as great. Ever been around azaleas?"

"Are you kidding? I love azaleas!" Zi responded with a grin, their mind now completely taken off of Allan's very distracting outfit.

"Shit, really?" Allan laughed, "They're amazing. My favorites are the orange ones," he said, his mom would often have them on the porch. "You know, I heard there's a flower shop on the utility ring, would you want to go sometime when I come back?"

Zi's blush only increased at this point, but for completely different reasons. "I'd love to! We could pick some up for our quarters!" They said excitedly.

"Absofuckinlutely, I've been meaning to get some plants for my quarters for the longest time, especially after going to Eshen's quarters the other day, that man's got plants for days up in there." He couldn't help but smile still at the other's excitement. "I was thinking I could find some red plumerias if I'm lucky."

1

"Oh I like them too!" Zi responded cheerfully. A plant-buying date! Well, not a date, but it's a thing! More plants! "I already have a lot of plants in my quarters, but the more the merrier as far as I'm concerned!"

"Really? Most people I know don't know what they are when I talk about them, but I guess you know so much about plants, it makes sense you would know," he said, "Well, I've got absolutely none, so I think it would be a great start. So I'd say we could arrange that little date for ah... evening, sometime after shore leave, maybe a day or two after I come back? I could PADD you," he said, he was never too great at planning things for exact times. More of a go-with-the-flow kinda guy.

Date? Did he say date? Oh stars. Somehow yet more blushing “O-oh, y-yes! You can PADD me! I’d really like that.” Zi replied quietly with a sheepish, yet also genuine smile. “I’ll be fairly free whenever, honestly. I don’t really have any shore leave plans myself, other than maybe going to see my family.”

"Of course! I'll PADD you around then, or maybe before then just for fun. We'll see," he shrugged, smiling as he watched the turbolift approach his stop, so to say. "Well, that's my cue to go, but -" He blew a cheesy little kiss to them as he stepped outside of the turbolift, making sure to bring his bag with him, "You have fun out there!"

Zi watched with a smile as Allan left, admittedly feeling a little disappointed he had to go so soon, only for that disappointment to entirely disappear the instant he blew them a kiss, their heart rate increasing, but managing to give him a little wave in return. As the turbolift doors closed again everything slowly started going all over the place in their brain. “Am I going on a date? Is that a date? Did he just blow me a kiss? He blew me a kiss! Why did he blow me a kiss? I’ve never gone on a date before!” Zi practically paced back and fourth in the lift as they spoke, their blush entirely stuck to their face as the lift took them to their destination. They had no idea how to process any of this right now, but at the same time they didn’t hate any of it.

4

2

"Oh yeah, tucked 'em right in." Well, sort of. "Fed my isopods and changed into a clean shirt, too. Not that you can tell, really. I haven't worn anything but my work uniform for... A while. 'Cept that jacket, of course." He let her tell the computer where to go, since now they were going to her quarters. He wondered what it would be like in there.

Yeah she had noticed his boring wardrobe and she was going to change it in a bit. But more about that in a later rp post. Mika addressed the lift, “Middle habitat ring, section one.” She looked over at Mo, tugging on the jacket that she’d hung over her shoulder. “You’ll have to get it back sometime. What did we say? Monopoly?”, she said as the lift started moving.

"Yeah, monopoly. The simple human version of a much better game." Ferengi Monopoly needed a business degree to understand, but you could also learn about business by playing it if you had just the right amount of knowledge to start with. Rico would probably be really good at it, he thought. The turboloft hummes all the way up to #deleted-channel.

“I’m assuming Ferengi monopoly doesn’t use paper money,” said Mika, “Did you know monopoly was originally invented by Elizabeth Magie and it was designed to demonstrate the evils of capitalism? It was meant to be anti-capitalist. Magie would send herself straight to the brig if she found out how many people have taken a liking to the game.” Mo might be able to drop fun facts, but he wasn’t the only one. The lift doors opened and she stepped out into #deleted-channel.

1

Mo entered turbolift two. "Upper habitat ring," He said, less affectionate than usual since now was probably not the time for his quirky lift anthropomorphism. He looked over to Dagis who, presumably, entered with him. It was isolated in here; she could probably cry a bit if she wanted to. Then again, doing that in front of the Station Commander might be a bit uncomfortable, even though he'd pretty much been trying to make himself as nonthreatening as possible so she wouldn't feel like she had to worry about that, which was quite different to how he'd acted when they first met.

Dagis had entered the lift, seemingly struggling more and more to hold herself together the longer she didn't let her emotions out. It was as the doors closed and the lift started moving that, as the Ferengi stood there with her head down, everything finally broke. Tears started running down her cheeks and dripping onto the floor as she started audibly sobbing, her PADD gripped to her chest like she was hugging it and her bag arm also coming up to do the same, as her body started shaking with every sob. She didn't care who she was around, she couldn't hold this in any more. She felt sick, both because of what happened, and because her fears had come true.

5

Oh shit, she really was crying. There was something sadly poetic about her hugging the PADD with Vince's case on it, too. He couldn't believe Samantha had acted so... Callously as she had about the situation Dagis had been in, as though she wasn't wholly and entirely blackmailed into this. She'd escaped and they'd literally kidnapped her friend and then mailed him back to them. Those were the kinds of extremes Sec 31 was willing to go to if you didn't do what they demanded. Samantha would have done the same thing in her shoes. Most people would have. But what could he do? What could he say? ...Fuck it. He stood in front of Dagis and put a hand on her shoulder. "Hey.... we'll deal with this, okay? We'll make a plan. We're not helpless. You aren't in the same situation you were in before and by the Lord I won't let you be in it again." His voice was gentle, but determined.

5

Mo putting his hand on Dagis' shoulder felt strangely comforting, and as she listened to what he said she desperately tried to focus on his words. 'We'll make a plan', 'we're not helpless', 'I won't let you be in it again'. It was after a few more seconds that that the Ferengi looked up at the Captain, tears still dripping down her cheeks, but her sobbing calmed and her body shaking less. "Th-thank y-you..." She all but mumbled, sounding completely grateful for what he said, as well as the fact he wasn't judging her, but instead wanting to help and protect her, all while still sounding very upset. "W-we have to f-find a way to s-stop them..." She said with a sniffle, still hugging her PADD and herself as she spoke quietly.

4

"We will." He didn't have a single fucking clue how, but he somehow managed to sound very assured of himself. The turbolift came to a stop and the doors opened, but there was nobody in the corridor. Not unusual, considering there were much less senior staff than other crew. "But in the meantime, uh... You can just cry it out, and let me know if you need anything, like to talk it through with someone, or pet a cat, or, like, a hug or somethin', if that's not weird. Actually, maybe it is, but I'm weird. So." He cleared his throat, gave her one last pat on the shoulder and then turned towards the door.

4

The Ferengi nodded silently in response, feeling more than entirely grateful for Mo being so nice to her. She would've laughed at his comment about being weird, but she just couldn't get herself to do that right now. Once the turbolift doors opened and she realised there was basically no one out here to see her in her sad state Dagis felt almost entirely relieved about any potentially awkward social situations. She glanced at Mo, before stepping out into the corridor.

As the entered the lift, Aella stood close to the wall, making sure to be a comfortable distance apart. Eshen may have enjoyed closeness, but he was far from a 'typical' Vulcan. Aella, with her hands still clasped behind her back, kept her chin up and eyes forward as she waited for the other to step into the lift. "Do you need a map of the station?" Aella asked, thinking it would probably be helpful. "I can send one via PADD message if you give me your COMMs code," She told her. It was logical to ask for COMMs code to send a station layout, right? Certainly not for casual conversation or anything, strictly to help this newcomer get acquainted with the various parts of the station.

T’Rama was both surprised and grateful to find that this stranger was being so helpful. She nodded as she stood next to Aella in the lift, a reasonable distance apart. Not far enough for it to be weird, not close enough for it to be inappropriate. She looked over at the Vorta and said, “I believe that is a good idea. Since I may be staying on the station for a few nights, it will be practical to have a map.” So, logically, the next step was to exchange COMMs codes. T’Rama pulled out her PADD in order to do exactly that.

Aella did not smile, but being a Vorta her emotions were clear in her eyes. She tapped a few buttons on her PADD to send ther map to T'Rama. After the map was successfully sent she stuffed her PADD back in her tiny bag. "You should have the map now. And you are free to message me if you need anything, I have been here for almost half a year now and I can say I am well acquainted with this station," She said, trying not to sound too proud, but she did considered herself a bit of a veteran on the station. Even if they didn't like her, most Starfleet personnel were aware there was a Vorta on board. Aella glanced at T'Rama again, but only for a split second. She was admiring the other's robes and long hair, a woman of good taste. Not that Aella was a good judge of appearances, but she was a fan of comfy and flowy outfits as evident from her own outfit choice. "T'Lauk lives in the middle habitat ring, section two," Aella told the Vulcan before commanding the lift to go to said ring.

T’Rama gave an appreciative nod, displaying that (1) the map had arrived on her PADD and (2) she was grateful for this woman’s helpfulness. “Thank you. I will make sure to contact you should I require your help again,” she said, her tone still neutral. She memorized what the Vorta had said about Remun’s quarters. The lift started moving. It wasn’t a long trip from the lower habitat ring to the middle habitat ring. “I believe I will find my way from here,” said the Vulcan when the doors opened into the #deleted-channel. She didn’t want to keep Aella from other things that the Vorta might have been doing before she agreed to help T’Rama.

Aella was happy to help a newcomer find her way around the station and T'Rama seemed charming enough. She stayed still as the lift moved, the only noise aside from the low mechanical hum being the soft rustling of Aella's bag against her side. "Alright then, I hope you have a pleasant visit," Aella spoke in her characteristic Vorta sing-song tone. For someone who claimed to be tone deaf and unable to carry a tune, her voice had quite a melodic quality to it, especially when she spoke Vulcan. She gave the woman a polite nod, no smile, but the warmth was evident in the way she looked at T'Rama's dark eyes.

T’Rama held the eye contact only for a brief second before she looked away again. She doubted highly that she would have a pleasant visit, but she appreciated the sentiment - as illogical as it was. “Perhaps we will meet again,” said T’Rama, sounding quiet and indifferent. “Goodbye, Aella.” And then she stepped out into the corridor on her own.

2

And here he was, in his totally-not-favorite-at-all turbolift. "Engineering ring," he said, one hand on the shoulder strap of his bag and the other in the pocket of his long pants - it was, after all, interesting how much longer these pockets could be than the shorts version, at least. (edited)

Why did everyone liked turbolift 2? No idea. "Environmental ring."

With his rocks now in hand, he got into the lift. "Utility ring."

Nalas stepped into the lift, with his lil fidget toy as always. "Starbase.. Operations.. ring?" Nalas said, not entirely sure what to call it. Thank Damar the turbolifts apparently spoke French.

"Utility ring."

Favourite number two today it seeemd. "Middle habitat ring."

Zi entered along with Ash and headed to the Operations Ring.

Anthony walked into the turbo lift, and held the door for Max. "You modified it to become a light freighter? That's quite the engineering feat. What kind of modifications did you have to accomplish in order to do that?" he asked, as the door closed. "Utility ring." he called to the computer.

"I installed a larger warp core, larger cargo bay and passenger capacity, larger impulse engines, among various other things that I scavenged and traded. My ship is built to be more maneuverable and faster than any others of its class by sacrificing life support and gravity systems, since I do not need them."

Anthony laughed as he thought about it. "well, I suppose that is a mass saver, but I guess you'd regain some of that mass in reinforcing the hull and frame for the more powerful propulsion and warp systems. Heck, it wouldn't surprise me if you had to remove the life support for those kinds of modifications. I'd love to take a look at it sometime."

"Observe" Max reached into her jacket and pulled our her personal PADD, showing the current diagram of her ship and the status of its repairs. In addition to all Max said about the ship, it also featured a phaser array, and hardpoints for potential externally mounted units. "My ships cargo bay is being totally replaced, currently. I plan to further modify my vessel during the repairs in order to correct some flaws with the power flow and weapons systems. Perhaps you can help me later with that, so I can install life support systems for passenger transport?"

Anthony leaned in, to observe the vessel. Scratching his chin as he looked over the diagrams. "In the academy, I took courses on subwarp aerospace propulsion systems. It's not my specialty, but if we put together a team of engineers, we could definitely refit your vessel not just to be better, but push it to its limits in whatever way you want" the turbo lift came to a calm and gentle stop, opening the doors, Anthony stepped out with Max onto the utility corridor.

"Engineering ring."

Alizati stepped into the lift and right when the doors closed he looked at Men. "Upper habitat ring," He said and the lift began to move. His mind was telling him do not think any illogical thoughts, do not do any illogical things. However illogical things was all he could think about.

And evidently, all Men could do was illogical things. As soon as Alizati finished telling the lift where to go, he pushed him against the wall and kissed him until the lift reached its destination. One would think him struck by Pon Farr all of a sudden, but no; he simply had the boldness to do the things he always wanted to do with no shame holding him back. The doors slid open and he removed himself from Alizati, leading him into the #deleted-channel.

2

Allan leaned against the walls of the turbolift, somehow this turbolift felt a little fruity. He didn't know why, it was just some sort of weird sense. Whatever, though. "Constabulary ring," he said, and soon enough he was taken to the #corridor-15 .

3

With no fear, he stepped into the turbolift. "Hospital ring."

The Ferengi entered the turbolift and went to Middle Habitat Ring Section One.

[D] After he finished working in the lab, Saren was on his way to the middle habitat ring - after all, there was one very important person he had a gift to give to. With a parcel in his hands and with hope that no turbolift adventures awaited him, he stepped in...

As soon as the doors to the lift opened, a familiar seaweed haired boy was standing there. Greasy kelp green hair along with a very nice suit and tie, the whole ensemble, but with luxury thongs (Romulan Gucci brand). The Romulan-Reman man not only had on a nice suit, but in his arms was a bucket of-- rocks, labelled 'SURAK SNACKS'. "mmmm! Hi," The man said with one hand around the bucket and the other inside to grab a handful of rocks. He smiled a toothy grin, sharp teeth and light blue eyes shining under the bright turbolift lights. He was clearly part Reman, but he didn't wear sunglasses, interesting.

...damn it. Green eyes narrowed, looking up and down at the unfamiliar man. The suit, the.... rock bucket, the sharp teeth - all painted a confusing yet clear picture. "Jolan tru," he replied, standing still in front of Kianarix, back straight, Resting Bitch Face mode on. This one was clearly half-Reman, yet that didn't mean anything. Yet, at least. "I assume you're a visitor here?" A discreet way of asking "what the fuck are you doing in the lift?". Was this guy also going to the middle habitat? If so, what's his business? Saren... really should stop being so suspicious of people.

"Jolan tru," Kianarix said with a nervous smile as he took a step away from Saren. He stood with his back against the wall with both arms wrapped around his bucket of rocks now. "Y-Yea visiting," Kianarix frowned and looked down at the ground. He could feel the Romulan paranoia filling the air, which seemed to make him sad by the way he lowered his gaze. Despite the very nice clothes he was wearing, his hair was untidy and his hands were covered in gravel from eating the rocks. "I came here with my e'lev, but he said he went to buy some ale," The space version of 'he left for a pack of cigarettes'. "He's an interceptor, half Vulcan half Romulan, ummm... Lun Tr'Kota," Even though Kianarix was half Romulan he was clearly raised by Remans. He didn't care for 3d chess or hiding information. Always forward and honest, Kianarix was night and day to a certain other Romulan-Reman aboard the station.

Ah, Kota. Saren's carefully crafted expression of neutrality and indifference remained, though the urge to facepalm and groan in the most tired, exasperated way imaginable, was very strong. He remembered Alizati vaguely mentioning someone similar - perhaps the same guy? "Tell him that a Lareth had said hello", he wanted to say, but that would be... mean. Undignified. A rather ill joke. "I've had heard if him," he said instead, voice calm, head tilting juuuust slightly to the left. "Talked to his... relative. You are also engaged to someone, correct?" Little did he know... "Ah. I apologize. My name's Saren..." there was a pause, the man clearly considering if he should introduce himself the Romulan way, "Saren ir-Llaiir tr'Morvar."

"You really know him?" Kianarix's face lit up when the other said that. There were so many Romulans on the station, who would have guessed the one who got into the turbolift with him knew exactly who he was talking about. The green haired boy hugged his bucket of rocks a little tighter, getting a weird vibe from this man all of a sudden. "Hi Mr. Saren," He waved a hand at him, remembering it was improper to offer a hug or to rub his head. Reman greetings were strange. He was a bit confused why Saren didn't give his full name at first, but he assumed it was some weird Romulan 3d chess thing. Unlike others around him, Kianarix was raised Reman and so had little to no experience with the language of subterfuge. He was just happy to meet someone who spoke his language!"I am engaged to umm... Mr. Renakir of the Torre'vnau house," He told Saren with a bit of hesitation as if he was unhappy with the arrangement. On the contrary, he was happy to get out of his living situation, but the thought of marrying his arranged partner before his romantic one was very upsetting to him. (edited)

3

"Not in person, no. But I have met Lalisa," Saren shook his head, a wavy strand of hair falling into his eye. He dismissively combed it back, "And please. Here, just Saren is fine." This one was a bit weird. Very un-Romulan and absolutely unlike one other half-Reman he had met. But, ultimately, harmless. Saren just started relaxing, shoulders slightly going down and head turning away, when this stranger mentioned his dinam by name and house, and-- "You what?" If looks... didn't necessarily kill, but burn a hole through one's skull, this would be it. Because what the fuck, what are the chances of Saren meeting Renakir's fiancee again, in the same damn turbolift?! Also, why didn't his dinam tell him about this? He's not obligated, Saren reminded himself, it's his private business. Or maybe he just doesn't trust you? Can't blame the guy, after you wept your eyes out on his shoulder, telling him just how pathetic and fucked up you are-- Okay, no, no. Stop. This isn't about you. Saren blinked, refocusing on Kianarix. Noticing the sadness. "You're talking about my brother. Interesting. Are you here to visit him, or..?" Fuck. Maybe he shouldn't intrude on... whatever the fuck was going on here? Was there something going on here? Didn't he go to Starfleet to escape the Romulan society, only to get thrown right back into it? Should he stop asking himself so many questions?

3

Lalisa? Kianarix didn't know who that was but she sounded unpleasant. The hybrid was very out of tune with family politics. The most he knew was Valleka was mean to him and Lun and now he was living at the very comfy Torre'vnau estate. The way this Romulan officer reacted made Kianarix press against the wall and slowly sink down. Did he say something bad? Was he mad? His light blue eyes looked over at a random point on the wall as if not looking at Saren would somehow de-escalate the situation. He could feel the other man's gaze on him. The turbolift was small, way too small for two Romulans he thought. Unlike Renakir, Kianarix was terrible at controlling his emotions and he looked like he was about to cry. "B-Brother? You're Renakir's Dinam?" He squeaked out, voice strained as it felt like the air was suddenly getting thinner. "J-Just to visit. I... I'm Kianarix Tr'Rylov, umm... Valleka's brother i-if you know her. I... umm umm," Tears began to form in the corners of his eyes. He was terrible at 3d chess and he didn't know what to do. He brushed some loose strands of oily hair from his face. "I... Valleka is mean to me s-so Mr. Cerrub helped me... I don't really know Mr. Renakir. He sounds... Cool," Was he giving away too much information? He was hoping that giving away so much would disperse any further doubts or suspicion from the other.

2

As soon as the first tears sprung up, Saren's expression shifted - the hard, aloof mask slipped away, giving space to what clearly was concern-guilt. Good job, asshole. You made this Reman stranger cry, scared him into backing away into the wall. Would other people feel disappointment in him, were they to witness this? Renakir, Captain? He knew he would be. "I am, you're correct," he replied, voice going softer, an apologetic note in his tone. "I'm sure you'll be okay. He's kind." Unlike me, Saren wanted to add, but bit his tongue. Instead he turned his hesd away, looking pointedly at the ground: "I apologize for scaring you. It was... not my intention, believe it or not." Or maybe it was? Was this his subconscious acting up? Irok would be proud of this, a bitter thought that seemingly haunted him too often now. "I can take a different lift. If you wish."

Kianarix calmed down a little when he heard Saren's change in tone. He was still nervous, but the other did not seem to be mad or have any malicious intent. He held his hands behind his back and looked down at his feet, shuffling a little in place. "I-It's okay," He sighed and shook his head, his eyes not meeting the other's. It was clear he did not have much experience talking with people as evident from his stuttering and slightly slurred Rihannsu. Not very Romulan, but also too nervous to be Reman, Kianarix was his own flavour of hybrid. "C-Can... Can you tell the lift to go to where Mr. Renakir's quarters are? You don't have to walk me there, just... The ring," He finally lifted his head and looked at Saren, light blue eyes blinking slowly obscured by loose strands of seaweed-coloured hair.

"...Sure," came a short, curt reply. He lifted his head up: "Middle habitat ring." New plan - get Kianarix to the correct ring, then go to his quarters. Renakir... he clutched the parcel tighter. Saren could come to him later. Yes, that's what he'll do. No need to intrude on some family, Reman, stuff. Still, the Romulan couldn't help but wonder - would this guy tell his friend about the unpleasant encounter he just had? Saren hoped that the Romulan-Reman officer won't be... too disappointed in him. It would hurt, even if Saren prepared himself to expect the worst. Because expecting the worst was somehow easier than hoping for the better. "Just follow the doors down the corridor. You will eventually find his quarters. The names are written on the door," he stated the obvious to fill in the silence that fell upon the too small room of the turbolift. Just ride this through, Morvar. Just ride this through...

"I understand," Kianarix leaned up against the wall when Saren gave the command. He didn't realised the turbolift moved just with a request! How cool! But he didn't speak Standard or anything but Rihannsu or Havrannsu so would it still work? The young Reman boy pulled his long fringe back in an attempt to get a better look at Saren now that he was calming down. The man looked really similar to Renakir, but the skin tone was more green than grey. He had the same narrow eyes, hair colour. He didn't even realise he was staring, watching the other man clutch some mysterious box. "... Hey, Mr. Saren, are you Reman?" He asked seemingly out of the blue. Now with his hair pulled away from his face it was obvious to see his forehead and brow ridges that framed his deep set eyes. Aside from his eye colour and lack of sunglasses it would be easy to mistake him as fully Reman. (edited)

Kianarix's question was met by a raised eyebrow: "No?" he replied, naturally assuming that the inquiry was about his bloodline. Then, Saren actually understood the question: "Oh. I got... called one, once, by Renakir." He went back to eyeing the lift's floor, mentally coaxing it to go faster. Interacting with strangers, especially Remans, was still a bit too hard for him, even after he told his dinam about his troubles and talked with Alizati and Tiravurik. That was... frustrating. That it didn't help, not even a little bit. "And, again, just Saren is fine. I am not used to honorifics that are directed towards me."

Kianarix was specifically talking about Saren's bloodline so the initial response made sense. He certainly looked Reman, but looks can be deceiving as Kianarix was a very Reman looking Romulan hybrid! He tapped his toes on the floor as he waited for the lift to reach its destination. Was it just slow that day? Did lifts always take this long? The seconds went by, then minutes, then he heard the other speak up again. "Oh that kind of Reman. You must be pretty cool too if you were declared Reman," He looked at Saren with a soft smile when he realised how confusing his question must have been to someone with knowledge of Reman culture. Honestly, he had been living around Romulans so long even he forgot being Reman was not just something determined by blood but also by bonds of trust. "What are you doing with that box Mr-- I mean Saren? Can I see?" The young Reman man walked towards the middle of the lift, still clutching his bucket of rocks in his arms.

"I must, huh?" he could help but bite, a slightly self-deprecating chuckle escaping his lips. "I'm not so sure about that, I'm afraid. For... multiple reasons." Reasons that he really refused to expand upon, even if this stranger was now part of the Torrevnau house. It was... for the lack of the better word, off-putting, to see such a curious, open Reman. Romulan-Reman, Saren reminded himself. His posture stiffened, straightened out, as he warily watched Kianarix's approach - and yet, Saren didn't step away. "It's a gift, for Renakir," he explained, thumb running carefully over the moss green wrapping paper. "Going to gift it to him-- later." He totally wasn't planning to do that now. Nope.

Kianarix wasn't sure why Saren was reluctant to take the compliment. Renakir was similar when they met. Their meeting was brief but he remembered complimenting his fiance on his handsome looks only be deflected. Maybe they really were meant to be dinams, they had a similar demeanour and look. As much as Kianarix wanted to push more compliments on the other, if he was so similar to Renakir maybe it wasn't a good idea. Compliments and friendliness was the Reman way! But Saren was only Reman by fraternity, not blood. "Later? Why not now? Were you--" Kianarix's eyes widened when he realised he may have been intruding on some good dinam-to-dinam time! He immediately backed up against the wall and looked at the ceiling. "Sir Turbolift, utility ring please!" He shouted and the lift stopped and then changed directions. "I'm gonna go visit my new dad then. Umm.. He's a waiter at Surak Snacks," Even though Kianarix had clearly already been to the Vulcan establishment from the bucket he was holding, he hadn't actually spoken to anyone.

Stuck between feeling embarrassed for his change of plans being discovered, and feeling amused at the Kianarix's nickname for the lift, Saren blurted out a sound most closely described as a startled "bw-huh?", as the lift stoped and went the opposite direction. He eyed the rock bucket (rocket?) suspiciously, naturally assuming that the seaweed man got it from the aforementioned Snacks. And yet, there was a thankful spark in his soul, which Saren quickly labeled as selfish and tried to ignore it's warmth. "I also know him," he let his shoulders fall, a half-laugh, half-huff escaping his lips. It wasn't hard to deduce who Kianarix was talking about, "Funny how many mutual connections we have..." Saren then lifted his gaze up, giving the Romulan-Reman one more unblinking look. Yet it was noticeably more... friendly? Huh. This one was nothing like Valleka. Saren deemed it a good thing. "You probably know that Renakir was engaged before. After that broke off I, mind you, impulsively, but also very seriously, promised him to keep an eye out if he ever gets engaged again, for, hm, safety." Green eyes blinked, and Saren allowed himself a smile - one that clearly belonged to a man who didn't smile often, but did so genuinely. "But, at least as far as it goes, I'm relieved to see that there probably won't be a need for that."

1

Kianarix's eyes widenend when Saren said he knew Tiravurik! He didn't think it was so strange that they had so many mutuals, after all this Romulan man was Renakir's dinam. His posture stiffened when the other looked at him, but unlike before he seemed less... Intimidating. "Y-Yeah, I mean... Valleka is my sister, I know she's mean. I think Mr. Renakir is too cool for me, but I will do my best when... We get married," The man with the seaweed said as he looked down into the empty rock bucket. It was clear from his body language he was not fond of Renakir's former fiance. "You are a good dinam... Do you know Rai? He is also Renakir's dinam," Kianarix lifted his head to look at Saren, but now his hair was all in his face so he looked more like a swamp monster than any Romulan or Reman.

"Is she mean to you..?" he asked, brows furrowing, the unsaid "as well?" lingering in the air. The petty part of his mind added this new tidbit of information into the list of reasons he should revisit his idea of having a civilized discussion with Valleka behind the Surak Snacks. Maybe because this man was now a Torre'vnau, maybe because he was half-Reman, or maybe for the simple reason that Saren didn't like people acting like assholes to their own family members. It was an unthinkable thing to do. The Romulan hummed, but couldn't remember Renakir mentioning anyone by the name Rai. So he shook his head: "No. I'll probably meet him, at some point. I tend to run into people that are somehow related to my family or to my friends. It's a newly discovered talent of mine." Or maybe he was just a trouble magnet. Hopefully that doesn't come back to bite him in the ass, some time. Anyways... "Do you want to do this?" Saren asked suddenly, fingers drumming some unfamiliar tune on the gift he was holding, "The whole marriage thing, I mean. It's probably... complicated. For you."

3

"She's mean to everyone," Kianarix replied with a soft sigh as his arms gripped the empty bucket tighter. He was clearly trying to avoid talking specifics when it came to Valleka. He had very mixed feelings about being part of the Rylov family. On one hand it was great for him as a Reman with no other opportunities, but on the other, living his life on edge knowing that he was just a political pawn hurt. He pretended it didn't bother him, but Kianarix wasn't as stupid as people thought. With another deep breath he stared at the closed turbolift doors in front of him. The air had settled and it was more relaxed, but there was something about two Romulans in a turbolift that made it impossible to truly be at ease. "Oh umm do I want--?" The question made Kianarix turn his head and stare at Saren with a very confused expression. "... No one has ever asked me what I want before," He looked as if Saren had just offered him a million bars of gold pressed latinum. "I just want to leave the Rylov house, marriage is the only way, right?" He was very confused about the question, what did it matter what he wanted?

Saren's frown deepened. Ravana, his little sister, sometimes was also mean - but in a way that a young teenager sometimes could be, an emotional response to the world around her. She bit and sneered and showed her teeth with gleeful ease, her ferocity often reminding Saren of a wolf cub, but she never tried to deliberately hurt anyone. Especially not her own brothers. And now here was Kianarix, eyes wide, genuinely shocked that his wants may actually be more significant than he ever thought before. A man who probably didn't have any say in the arrangements, but still went along with them just to leave his sister, his family, his House behind. And fuck if that didn't make Saren's soul ache with sympathy. "It's not the only way. Independence is as scary as it is valuable," Saren sighed. "I'm sorry that your family is so shitty you're willing to marry a stranger. But maybe now you will have the chance to explore freedom?"

If only Saren (and Kianarix) knew how deep it really was. He saw the frown on the other's face deepen, but he didn't know why. Fortunately or unfortunately, Kianarix had lived the majority of his quarter of a century life around Remans who loved anyone and everyone who was willing to join them. Kianarix still wondered about his parents though, hell, he didn't even know which genes he got from which parent. And back to the topic at hand, Saren seemed thoughtful for a moment and the Romulan-Reman boy wasn't sure what it was. He nodded slowly at the other's words, still unsure what he had done to earn the other's sympathy. He didn't hold any prejudices, but he knew Romulans did and it was very confusing to piece together any plausible reason for the other's demeanour towards him. Was it because he was Renakir's fiance? Was Saren just being polite? Or was he really one of those rare Romulans that actually cared? "Mr. Cerrub let me live at the estate, it's very nice. There's a pool and the Remans are nice to me. Not the Romulans, except Rai," He said, for some reason he didn't address Rai with honourifics, were they friends? Lovers? Something else? Well find out on the next episode of-- The turbolift then came to a halt and the doors opened. "Thanks for chatting Saren," Kianarix smiled and waved a grey hand to the Romulan man. "Yolan zhu!"

1

Two followed Lorin, badly humming some sort of tune. Hi humming sounded kind of like a microwave.

She started humming an ancient Earth tune (caramelldansen).

00:57

“Well, let’s hope this turbo-lift will be big enough for the both of us.. I haven’t been in one many times.” She said, opening the door.

”Its big enough to fit a couple of people, don’t worry.” Two said, and manually instructed the turbolift to go to the environmental ring. He wasn’t a huge fan of voice activated devices…

“Honestly, I love how big this place is. I’ve never had so much room to mess around in, my dorm in the Academy was tiny.” She commented, remembering the massive utility area.

”I don’t think I’d be here if it wasn’t so big, small enclosed spaces are just… Ew” It kinda made sense that Two hated small spaces, having spent most of his time before on a Borg hypercube.

The doors open, and they step out into #corridor-14

The lift arrived to the utility ring. Saren moved so Kianarix could leave: "Jolan tru, Kianarix. Middle habitat, please." The lift closed, speeding off to it's next destination. The Romulan leaned against the wall, sighing. At least this meeting with a member of a Rylov family went much better, and they didn't get stuck. And he didn't get recognized. A pleasant little bonus. Still, unease lingered on - the little bits and pieces of information he got from Kianarix didn't paint a pretty background picture. But, if Saren had learnt anything, it was that many things were more than often not as simple as they appeared. Still. He should keep an eye out for any visiting Romulans.

2

1

Reaching the turbolift, she started making her way to #corridor-05.

00:46

The doors opened, and she stepped out into the corridor.

Turbolift two, seemed to be everyone's favourite. "Environmental ring."

“Middle habitat, section two.” She said.

Not this shit again. Nope it's just turbolift 2. "Upper habitat ring."

She got into the turbolift.. “Utility Ring.”

“Middle habitat, section two.” She said, folding her hands behind her back.

"Airlocks."

01:35

With dog in toe, Renakir stepped into the lift. "Middle habitat ring."

"Utility ring."

“Utility ring.”

“Middle habitat, section 1!”

"Middle habitat ring."

“Environmental ring!”

She got into the turbolift.

"Did your aunt inspire you to go into the medical field? Utility ring!" She called out as she entered beside her.

“Yep, she did. It was always a good day when she’d tell me stories from work when she thought I was old enough to handle them. Though my parents inspired me to go into Starfleet.” She said.

"That's good. That was me, too. My parents inspired me to go into Starfleet, along with a teacher I had in high school."

“My parents were chemists, so I picked up some knowledge from them, too. I’ve got two younger brothers and one of them joined Starfleet like I did. My parents were proud of us all.” She said. She hadn’t seen her parents or her brothers in a long time. She missed them a lot.

"My parents were proud of me, too. We went to Risa to celebrate the day I graduated in fact." She laughed and stepped out of the turbolift, onto the #deleted-channel.

"Environmental ring."

[D] "Upper habitat ring," Allan said in his favorite little turbolift that he really still couldn't remember whatever that thing was. Whatever, he was about to revolutionize Starfleet fashion on an official scale. Probably. Maybe.

"Utility ring."

She got in and waited for Niatha.

She stepped in besides her and smiled while wrapping an arm around her midsection.

“Middle section one!”

"I'm on section two if you ever wanna visit. Bulkhead 5A." She smiled up at her while rubbing her shoulder. "I promise my quarters are pretty nice to visit - if you like flowers that is..."

“I love flowers.” She replied.

"Then you'll love my quarters." The turbolift stopped then, and opened to let them out. Nia smiled and took one of her hands.

"Middle habitat ring."

Alizati stepped onto the lift with Elwyn's hand in his own. It felt strange to be holding someone's hand while walking, but when he looked at the younger's face he could see how much it meant to her. Once the doors closed, Alizati waited a couple seconds before calling out the command, "Middle Habitat Ring." The words came out on his typical Vulcan monotone, a stark contrast to the softness he used to speak to Elwyn. The lift hummed as it began to move, everything seemed to be working in order. Alizati was thankful engineering and ops were able to perfect the latest sensors. He stood in the lift in silence, squeezing Elwyn's hand gently to comfort her. He took in the sights and sounds, the way the light danced on the coloured strands of Elwyn's hair, the solemn expression that covered her face. Oh how he wished he had some Android telepathy right now, as if that would allow him to jump into Elwyn's mind and battle all the negativity that dared to plague her mind.

As the turbolift took them to their destination Elwyn simply and quietly stood next to Alizati, him squeezing her hand feeling reassuring and warm despite his hand not creating that much heat. As she stood there his words and the mean man's words fought back and fourth in her head, competing for which should be payed attention to. It was after a moment of silence that she spoke quietly. "Alizati, how do you stop the negative thoughts taking over the positive ones?" The young android asked as she looked up at her mentor.

The low hum of the turbolift filled the otherwise silent room as they made their way towards their destination. His gaze was forward, focusing on keeping his senses alert in case any malfunctions or if the lift made any stops. But the lift continued to move, it was the light ring of the younger android's voice that interrupted the silence. "Vulcans would say logic, reflecting in on oneself and understanding that illogical words said by an illogical man does not say anything about your skills as an officer or your worth as a sentient being," Emotions, that was something he knew surprisingly little about. He was only starting to understand his own emotions himself, but he would give what he knew if it could help Elwyn. "You have risen through the trials of Starfleet Academy, the synth ban, and your daily work here on this station. You have been an outstanding officer and I believe I am not the only one to hold this opinion," Alizati could think of a couple people who would have acted similarly to him if they had been on the promenade. "I assure you I will make note of this incident in my report and inform the station commander. That man was wrong and I will do everything I can to make sure he gets his rightful punishment for his actions," He wasn't sure what that would be, but he hoped it would be at least being kicked off the station for good. "You shine brighter than any darkness that may befall you. And when you need help, I will only be a comm badge touch away. You do not have to fight alone," His face may have stayed neutral, but his sincerity was written clearly in his dark eyes that were still shaking. His vision was a little blurry, but he kept his gaze on Elwyn.

Elwyn quietly listened to what Alizati said, nodding a little in response here and there. 'Illogical words said by an illogical man'. That was what she started focusing on as she listened. A small smile crept onto her face as he said she was an outstanding officer, and once again as he said she shone brighter than any darkness that befell her. It was when her mentor said she didn't have to fight alone that she hugged him again, all while still managing to hold his hand. She let go a moment later and return to her position next to him. "Thank you, Alizati. That means a lot to me." She replied quietly, her small smile still on her face as she looked up at him.

The tiny smile followed by the second hug was all Alizati needed to understand his words were helping. He gladly hugged Elwyn back, his strong arms wrapping around her once again. Time stood still once again as his focus stayed on Elwyn, hugging in the turbolift. How he wished his words could magically make the bad experience disappear, but even for an android, life needed balance. One needed to see darkness so that they can understand light. "I am honoured to be able to support you, Elwyn," He looked down at her, their eyes meeting once again. It was at that moment the lift arrived at the middle habitat ring and the doors opened.

"And I'm honoured to have you as my friend and mentor." Came Elwyn's reply, the smallest of sparkles in her eyes as her small smile remained. As the turbolift doors opened she glanced at them, and then Alizati again, before heading out into the corridor, all while still holding his hand.

3

Renakir stepped back onto the turbolift with the box and his pet. "Middle habitat ring."

From the corridors, he steps in. "Airlocks." Once the turbolift reached the destination, he stepped out.

Elwyn entered the turbolift and called for the airlocks, practically buzzing with excitement as the lift took her to her destination. When it arrived she stepped out. (edited)

Allan entered the turbolift, the only one he'd ever been in really, and let the lift do what it typically did after he called for the airlocks. He's actually only been there once, for summer shore leave so- yeah!

He called for the turbolift to take him to the airlocks, calmly wondering what exactly was in store for him on this mission. Hopefully it wouldn't involve getting trapped on a ship for an extended amount of time or he was going to join Nalas in his claustrophobia. When the door opened, he exited.

"Hospital ring!"

"Middle Habitat, please."

"Utility ring."

“Utility ring.”

“Environmental Ring.”

Holding a PADD, Hal stepped into the turbolift. “Middle Habitat- Section Two”

"Starbase Operations."

The two soon made it to the turbolifts and Alizati moved so Jamie could step in first. He held his hand out to keep the doors from closing prematurely so the Trill would be able to take her time getting inside. Now would be the worse time for the lifts to break, but surely the new sensors were just redundant, right? He kept a stoic expression the whole time, fully focused on the task at hand.

The trill did indeed enter, and soon she was inside the lift with the Commander. She was still silent thought, and didn’t say much.

(maybe we should make the lifts break >:)

1

The doors closed right as Alizati stepped in. The humming of the vents beginning to circulate air filled the room as the two engineers stood safely inside. "Hospital ring," The android called out and very soon the lift began to move. He stuck close to Jamie in case she needed to lean on him. He hoped that the lifts would be fine without the redundant sensors. They were redundant, right? Now he was second guessing himself all whilst keeping a watchful eye on his fellow officer. Alizati wasn't touching Jamie, but he had his arms out ready to catch her should she need him.

She noticed the gesture and looked up for a moment. Besides her current actions, she did look up to the man as a leader, even as someone “cool”. She didn’t want to disappoint him, though she felt as though she had.

1

"It will be alright, ensign," Alizati may not have been telepathic nor empathic, but the look in Jamie's eyes told him all he needed to know. He remembered the tired look in her eyes when she insisted that she keep working and then the weary look when she had fallen asleep in the main OPS room. "How do you feel now?" He inquired, voice monotone, but there was warmth to his eyes. Like he was a father trying to care for his sick daughter. It was no secret that Alizati cared a lot for his fellow crew members. Organic life was a lot more delicate than artificial so he never wanted his officers to overwork themselves.

“Better, just a little dizzy.” she sighed, but smiled a little. The commander, despite his up-tightness as a Vulcan, seemed somewhat nice. Indeed, she found working with him rather calm and enjoyable, perhaps another reason why, in her eyes, she shouldn’t have failed him. He deserved to have a reliable staff, and like a determined daughter, wanted to make him proud of her work.

After walking for a little bit now, Alizati was glad that Jamie was getting her bearings back. He looked forward at the turbolift doors, his sensitive ears listening to the sounds as the lift moved, always vigilant for any irregularities. There was a part of him that still was not convinced the new sensors were just redundant. Even with the display broken, from the schematics left by the OPS officer they checked functions that the current sensors skipped over. He turned his head back to Jamie, paying close attention to her facial expression and stance for any signs that she may collapse again. "How much have you slept in the past 24 hours, ensign?"

“I- I don’t remember sir.” she said, sheepishly. “I usually sleep around 9pm and wake up at 5am.” The trill was clearly unsure of her own sleep schedule, and her body language reflected it, having not anticipated the question. “Is there a problem..?”

The other's answer did not help much, but Alizati was aware that sleep deprivation did affect memory. Given that response though, he thought it may not be wise to expect accurate information from her in regards to her own health. Although there were still some questions he could ask like, "How has your mental health been lately? I will not repeat what you say to me here. If you are overworked I will not be offended," Because Alizati was the one who assigned the tasks and balanced workload. As an android and a Vulcan one at that, it was easy to overestimate the amount of work that was manageable for organic beings. He felt like his understanding was pretty good, but each individual had their own pace and it was his job to be considerate of that. (edited)

“I’m- fine. A few restless nights but nothing particularly major.” Offended? oh no. She had visibly shifted slightly at the sound of it, clouding the legitimacy of her statement, almost like she didn’t want to be “caught”, so to speak.

Alizati's eyes narrowed as he watched the ensign closely. He was not the best at reading people, but he could detect patterns and compare experiences. The shift in posture mixed with the hesitation in her voice. Alizati took a step closer, towering over the woman with gaze cold as ice. "Ensign, might I remind you that my questions are to understand your condition better so that I can communicate with medical staff should you be unable to do so. I am not here to judge you, I am only concerned for your wellbeing as an officer in my department and a trusted colleague," He said, stressing the word 'trusted', a very serious term for a Romulan-- or Vulcan, but Romulans do not just trust anyone. Up until now Alizati did not seem disappointed at all, but upon hearing the other seemingly attempt to brush off his question did cause deep concern.

“Um-“ The trill backed up a bit, as if caught in a lie. She hesitated for a while, contemplating her options here. “I’ll- talk to medical about it. I promise.” she stuttered, as the quick reply came out.

Alizati held his gaze on Jamie for a couple more seconds before looking away and clasping his hands behind his back. If she didn't want to tell him there was no way to make her, but he was unsure how best to proceed going forward if she wasn't open with him. On one hand if she didn't say anything, he had no reason to adjust her task load, but on the other he had a feeling she had too many things to worry about lately. Perhaps he could assign her to to work with others for a bit so she wouldn't feel burdened to finish all her tasks alone. The lift still had yet to reach its destination, which was mildly concerning. The turbolifts were pretty reliable, but it would be a big slap in the face if this one broke down after he had taken out all the new sensors. Alizati looked around, seeing Jamie and then the doors. He did not offer her any verbal response, just a very clear Vulcan eyebrow raise of judgment and a nod.

She felt the icy air in the lift, and she couldn’t help but try and clarify. “Sir- It’s not that I don’t trust you, I do! It’s just- I’m not used to speaking about myself in.. that way. Sorry.” she sank a little, a tense expression sat on her face.

Alizati looked towards Jamie when she spoke up, his gaze unchanged by her words. He did not quite understand what was saying but clearly staring at her would only make her more tense so he looked away and spoke," *What way do you mean? I do not understand." *He spoke plainly without any emotion as always he was so typically Vulcan. Regardless of his mixed heritage, he was raised Vulcan and that was never going to change no matter what was in his DNA profile. He stood with perfect posture, hands by his sides, not too close to Jamie but they were both pretty close.

“I- I was just saying I don’t really talk about it with a lot of people and I just wanted that me not uh- saying that was nothing um, personal against you?” she quietly perked the end of the sentence, part of her scared but another part worried. Suddenly, a sudden metallic sound echoed in the lift, diverting her attention.

"My initial question was about your mental health and if you feel overworked you may tell me," Alizati stated, his ears twitching ever so slightly when he heard the noise. At first he thought it was nothing, they were on a space station filled with many other people so it was not uncommon to hear noises from maintenance or repair crews. "I am not asking for specifics. For my first question you may answer honestly, are you stressed? Are you dealing with personal issues outside of work? Overall mental health. As for the second question, a simple yes or no will suffice as I need to plan the duty roster for next week," Alizati stated, looking at the Trill very curiously now. The turbolift then came to a halt but the doors did not open. Alizati took his attention away from Jamie and immediately crouched down to take the bottom panel off the wall and began to inspect it. "You may think about your answers whilst I tend to this, I do not require assistance at this time," As if Jamie needed something else stressful to weigh on her mind.

Time to think, was that really what she needed? She took it anyways, it was more time to ignore the lingering question. She leaned against the turbolift wall, wonder exactly how she would explain this in the least confusing manner.

Alizati got to work messing with the wires. Maybe the sensors were needed he thought. They had not exceeded the weight limit or max amount of occupants, but it seems the signal was interrupted halfway through the trip. The sensors checked network stability before the lift began to move, but without it well, it seemed like there was just a lag in the network. The lifts weren't malfunctioning they were just lagging-- or so it seemed. Alizati decided to do the trusty unplug and then plug it back in trick and the humming of the lift changed pitched. F#4, the perfect pitch. Anyway he closed up the panel and stood up again. "The lift should resume course now."

Right. She stayed silent for a few more moments, letting the hum of the room fill her thoughts, before sighing. “I’m- somewhat stressed, and uh- yes. I am dealing with… a few things.” she felt a certain coldness enter her chest, as she blinked irregularly and rapidly.

Alizati blinked a couple times, not in reaction to what Jamie had said, but his eyes were feeling a little sore. Maybe it was from staring at the white walls of the lift for so long, his optical sensors must have been lagging or something. He listened closely to the sounds of the lift with his hands folded in front of him. There seemed to be no irregularities, that was a good sign. "I see. I am thinking I could assign you tasks with a partner, that way you would not feel as much pressure to handle things all on your own. I can also lessen the amount of tasks as well, would that be alright?" Alizati was relieved to hear that he wasn't overworking Jamie and that a lot of her stress seemed to be unrelated to work. Still not great, but he did not want to hear that he was contributing to her stress by overworking her.

“A partner…?” she thought about it for a moment. She did like working with people, and that would be easier. “I’m okay with that idea.” she smiled a little, feeling somewhat resolved.

Alizati nodded when he got her confirmation. He was already thinking about which officers to pair her with. Jamie was a competent engineer who had good problem solving skills, perhaps she could help out that one long engineer-- Wheatley was his name? He looked away from Jamie and took a step forward towards the door since the lift was about to reach its destination. "I will make the new duty roster later. Depending on if I get a message from medical about your condition, the schedule will remain the same for the rest of this week," Alizati told Jamie, turning his body ever so slightly towards her. The turbolift soon stopped and the familiar 'whoosh' of the doors could be heard being followed by the soft chattering of people in the #corridor-04 .

”Understood, sir.” She nodded in response, offering the commander to proceed first. Truth be told, she was looking forward to working with someone, maybe that would make things a little less boring. Though she couldn’t hell but wonder who it might be.

... and into one. "Mi-- no, sorry. Upper, habitat ring."

2

"Environmental ring, please!"

“Utility ring.”

"Delta section, food court."

Quinn entered the turbolift at a jogging pace and waited for Vialara, adjusting the medical kit hung over their shoulder.

The woman stepped into the turbolift beside the Leiutenant, before calling out to the turbolift. "Computer, Habitat Quarters, Senior Deck. Enable medical override."

As the turbolift took the two doctors to their destination Quinn's leg started idly bouncing as they thought through what they were about to witness and what treatment the patient might need. They had treated people before, but this was their first emergency on 777. It felt different despite the fact it shouldn't. The medical override was quite handy, though. Once the turbolift arrived they briefly glanced at the CMO before jogging out, narrowly avoiding hitting someone waiting to get into the lift with their medical kit.

“Deck A, Starbase Command.”

"Computer, Starbase Command, please..." Jack called out to the turbolift, almost feeling his heart being on the verge of palpitations as he clutched his chest. (edited)

“Delta deck, food court.” She said.

Lucky number two, Renakir stepped into the lift and waited for the doors to close. Today, just as always he was dressed in his uniform complete with his dark sunglasses. His uniform shirt had some blue hairs stuck in it from his fluffy daughter Kali-fal. She had taken quite a liking to not sleeping in her bed and instead on the small pile of clean clothes. Renakir was mostly leg, long limbs with broad shoulders. He liked working out and it definitely showed. Long grey fingers tapped around on his PADD, black fingernails too! He seemed deep in thought as he scrolled through his tasks for the day. Silly floppy ears twitched as they picked up on some ambient noise from the lift.

Paco looked through his PADD in one hand to briefly review some research articles and some of his tasks for the day while also holding a hefty stack of books in the other by his side as he made his way to the lift. His uniform was slightly messy from having a long night of working on his shift and some personal science projects, like what most other Science officers probably do, but planned to straighten it out later. "Wait! Hold the door please!" He called out as he approached closer to the lift as its doors began to close, picking up the pace a little bit to catch up.

Renakir's sensitive Vulcanoid hearing picked up on the voice and without even lifting his head, he stuck his hand out to block the lift doors from opening. His motion was swift, not even breaking a sweat. Once he heard the footsteps against the hard floor of the lift he raised his gaze to see who would be joining him. 'Don't be Romulan', he thought subconsciously, remembering his past run-ins with his fellow countrymen in this same lift nearly a half year ago. Spooky shit. The Romulan-Reman officer was relieved to see an alien face looking back at him. Human? Round ears, smooth forehead, not that only humans had those features, but he had a hunch. Thank Tenakruvek, he wasn't sure if he was up for a game of 3D chess, not now when he was still trying to make up a mental time table of all the tasks he had that day. From the looks of the stranger who just stepped into the lift with him, the person was coming back from work. Wrinkled uniform, PADD in hand, stack of books. Science. Yep, those guys really loved 'burning the midnight oil'. "Jolan tru, ensign. Where to?" He gave the person a polite nod, not smiling, but his tone was warm. Assuming the stranger was human he spoke Standard, French accent strong with his words aside from the Romulan greeting in the begining of his sentence.

Paco was indeed human, just somewhat shorter than most other humans he ran into himself in over the past few days or weeks after arriving here. Anyway, he let out a light sigh of relief as he saw the hand block the closing doors last minute as he stepped in once the doors opened once more "Thank you, Sir..." He politely said as he catched his breath whilst he briefly collected himself, He is lean but not as atheltic as the Romulan-Reman currently accompanying him. He pushed his wire-framed glasses back up his nose bridge before they could slip off, finally taking an actual good look at Renakir as he greeted him. '[He]'sus ko!' (My God!) rang in his mind. Pointy ears, arched eyebrows, grey skin, a Vulcanoid, and somewhat knowing the greeting from anthropological experience, a Romulan from his best guesses. But it was the fact that Renakir was a superior officer that got to him most, knowing the messy state he was in... as nearly every person in science would eventually be. "Good Day 'po' (Sir/Ma'am), Lieutenant, Sir." He greeted back politely as he returned a nod, his Filipino accent showed strong since Standard was kind of a second language to him as a traditional honorific slipped his tongue. Nonetheless, his tone was very much warm with a light hint of tired "I am planning to head into the Holodecks... How about you, Sir?" (edited)

Renakir nodded at the other officer's thank you, pulling his hand away once the stranger was safely inside. The doors closed with a gentle whoosh and with that Renakir lowered his PADD. He did not think anything of the other's appearance aside from the junior officer probably needed to get some sleep. Clearly they weren't as they went on to state their destination was the holodecks. Unlike his genetic cousins, the Vulcans, Renakir was not about judging others' choices, but he didn't like seeing so many young officers neglecting their physical health just for work. "Good day.. Po," Renakir raised an eyebrow, only half visible poking up from his dark sunglasses. He knew this language, somewhere in his mind.... It wasn't any of the languages he spoke fluently, mandarin, French, Standard, it was definitely a terran language though. "It seems you have quite a lot of stuff," Renakir stated as he looked the stranger up and down once more. Yep, this guy definitely needed some shut eye. He stood in the lift with one hand by his side and the other holding his PADD. "I am headed to work. Computer, Recreational deck," Renakir called to the lift, thinking it was best to drop his new acquaintance off first. "My name is Renakir by the way, and you? Also I do not believe I have seen you around. I have heard your accent before but I cannot place it. It's not the Bahasa Malay from earth, is it? It's very beautiful."

'...Ano sinabi niya?? (What did he say??)' was the only thing that was in mind as he heard when Renakir uttered 'Po' as it echoed infinitely. The Filipino instinct to swamp him with rudimentary lessons on basic Filipino phrases, like what most foreign tourists/relatives were traditionally subjected to, was strong, but he had to resist out of respect to a superior officer... and to not be that kind of dickhead tour guide that tricks non-native speakers to unknowingly say insults and dumb things. "Uhh yes, Sir. It's just for a personal project." He answered back for his first statement, knowing the toil that many junior officers undergo very well in his first weeks alone, the holodeck was just a perfect choice to essentially 'kill to birds with one stone' when all is done. "I am Paco, Sir. I just transferred here a few weeks ago. A Fresh Academy graduate, I guess" He answered back with a light smile, it was understandable since he was a newbie, and also mostly stuck around either the research labs or his quarters for a majority of his time here. When Renakir asked about his accent though it piqued his interest, surprised he was familiar with terran linguistics, no less the general area of his native language tree. As an anthropologist himself, he was amazed. "Thank you for the compliment, Sir, but you're close. I speak Wikang Filipino, a distant linguistic cousin to Bahasa Malay." (edited)

Personal project, hm, Renakir hoped the poor officer wasn't overworking himself. He, too, was a lower decker not too long ago. He gave the other a nod, eyes drifting back to the man's stack of books as he attempted to figure out what his specialty was. Fresh out of the academy with the name Paco and he spoke a terran language so Renakir's hunch that the other was human was correct! Paco seemed friendly, although a little tense, maybe it was because Renakir was a superior officer? He was lieutenant now, but he still felt like an ensign. There were so many things he had yet to learn. "Wikang Filipino? Yes, in southeast Asia. I had a couple of friends who spoke.. Hmm, it was Hiligaynon I believe? I apologise, I am not too versed in terran linguistics aside from French and Mandarin. I wish I had more time to explore Earth," Renakir said, a little ashamed he didn't explore Asia more during his time on the blue planet. There were so many beautiful places but with only four years and limited transporter credits he had to budget his time. And that's when the lift lights began to dim and the soft hum suddenly stopped. The doors did not open, the room fell dead silent.

Paco smiled and nodded as Renakir spoke, the conversation so far helped him ease up a little bit as he appreciated listening to someones interest in Terran linguistics and culture. The fact Renakir was familiar with Mandarin and French actually caught him off guard, having a look of surprise hearing the revelation. At last, another candidate to send mango snacks and sweets to every now and then! If he would permit it. "It's alright, Sir! In all honesty, I never really travelled much either--" His response was immedietly cut off when the lift stopped, the sudden force causing him to drop his PADD and books which mostly consisted of anthropology titles on fashion history, Starfleet uniform design, and the cultural impacts of Starfleet on other worlds. The shattering of his PADD broke the silence for a brief moment before it returned. Paco was a little tense before, the usual anxiety of being around someone of higher rank and not being in proper shape, but now it dawned on him a more as he stood in the tight confines of the lift, subtly taking in deep breaths in an attempt to calm himself down while assesing the situation "A-are you okay, Sir?"

Renakir lurched forward when the lift stopped, the clack of the ensign's PADD against the hard floor felt like needles digging into his skin. The OPS officer held on one hand to brace himself against the side of the lift and then he raised his gaze, eyes focused on Paco. Being stuck in a lift again? And in turbolift two? Maybe the superstitions were true and this lift was cursed, he thought. Remaining calm on the surface, Renakir tucked his PADD in his pocket so he could bend down. He grabbed the ensign's fallen PADD and held it out for him. The lights were dim, but there was some visibility still. "I am alright," Renakir replied, voice steady and calm. "And you?" He asked the question back at Paco. "I am a turbolift officer, of all the people you could have been stuck with I believe I am the best one," Well there were other turbolift officers, but Renakir liked to think if anyone performed well under low light in small spaces it was the former Reman miner! He removed his sunglasses in preparation for some wire tinkering. His light silver eyes seemed to glow under the dim light.

He had overheard other people mention that this particular lift was known for breaking down and acting strange, it was almost like a Starfleet Halloween tale. It was at a point where he tried to avoid this lift altogether. And now here he is... the rumors were true... the damned lift was cursed! "I-I-I am fine, Sir...N-nothing to worry about at all!" Paco shakily replied, pressing himself against a corner in the lift give himself a bit more space as he held on or dear life on whatever handle-like object was attached to either wall. His eyes glanced quickly all around the lift until he saw Renakir held out his PADD, grabbing it before checking if it is still working to no avail. "I'll try to help where I can, Sir... but does this happen often??" He asked whilst trembling a little bit. In any other situation, he would quickly become an emotional mess after a few more minutes alone, but hearing Renakir mention he is a turbolift officer reassured him. (edited)

Renakir had no problem remaining calm through the ordeal, his eyes looking over Paco once before turning around so he could pull off the small panel on the wall. He repositioned himself so he was sitting lotus position, surprisingly very comfortable. He was a flexible man too. Anyway, he thought not staring at the spooked ensign would ease the tension. "It will be alright, it appears there is a bit of a traffic jam with a couple of other lifts," There was a loud thud as renakir dropped the side panel cover down a little too recklessly. Nothing broken, but boy did the sound echo in the small space of the lift. He caught onto the other's shaky breath and stuttered speech, but hoped his calm and warm tone would put the junior officer at ease. "We are not on duty so you may just call me Renakir," He said, attempting to engage in friendly chat as he began to tug at the wires. Whoever installed the sensors did a terrible job at it-- wait he installed the sensors. The Romulan-Reman officer was mentally kicking himself for his own carelessness. "This should only take a few more minutes. In the meantime, tell me about this personal project of yours. I hope you are still remembering to get enough sleep."

Paco still held to whatever grips or support he could get his hands on, tightening his grip as the ordeal went on. The loud metallic thud made by Renakir dropping the panel surely didn't help him much either, feeling a very brief moment of freefall as his hesrt dropped whilst he felt the walls closed in on him as the noise echoed through the small chamber. The sleeplessness did not help much either in this endevor. Despite of it all, hearind the calm, warm and collected tone of the Lieutenant was helpful in getting Paco to keep holding on to his mental marbles. "I-If you say so...Renakir..." He stammered slowly, giving him his full trust as he slumped down his little corner to sit down, holding his knees together as he continued to take in some deep breaths to aid in calming himself down. The thought of his little science project distracted him from the seemingly tightening space around him. "W-well... in re-regards to my project, Renakir... essentially it circles around the evolution of certain fashion trends that draw inspiration from Starfleet. We in Starfleet, or at least the people in charge of First Contact, are cultural catalysts in most worlds. In time, if all is well, our presence would be slowly integrated as part of their culture. Our Uniforms are a strong symbol of Starfleet and have impacts on a culture and thus people see it as representing certain values or things... for example, in Earth, a Firemans uniform represents courage and duty, but there are some people who associate the uniform with... uhmmm... seduction... 'cause they are 'Hot'..." Paco explained, slowly getting into the rythem of his own mind, happy to finally showcase his science project that probably took too much of his sleep time for no reason. The fireman tidbit felt awkward to him, but was the best example he could think of. (edited)

1

Renakir was typically pretty fast as fixing turbolifts, it was a plus that his fingers were thin. Maybe it wasn't too bad being a 'gangly bitch' if it enabled him to squeeze his hands into the narrow gaps between circuit boards. His previous 'stuck in a tubolift' mates had all been rather calm during the ordeal, making Paco the first time he had someone who was visibly panicking. He had seen this before though, Renakir thought as he turned his head briefly to get a glimpse of the ensign sitting with his knees hugged against his chest. Wasn't there a Bajoran boy who was afraid of turbolifts too? It must have sucked to be claustrophobic and in Starfleet, there was no shortage of tight and narrow spaces. How did either of them survive jefferies tube crawling? Well, Renakir was going to try his hardest to make this experience more bareable for the nervous ensign. Now as a full lieutenant he felt more responsibility to look out for those around him. "Fashion? That sounds pretty interesting. To be honest, when I think of scientist I always assume dangerous chemicals or staring at stuff under a microscope. You're talking about-- hm," Renakir paused as he tried to find the right word in Standard. It was his second most used language, but for some reason he still had gaps. "Anthropology? I have always been interested in linguistics, I suppose that would also fall under anthropology," Renakir was here, a whole ass polyglot, but for some reason was still a novice at communicating with others. "Seduction? Because they are... OH! I get it, don't tell me some alien race has a sexy Starfleet uniform too?" Renakir let out a soft chuckle before grasping at a couple wires and pulling on them. The lift was still at a dead stop, but at least they still had life support and fresh air coming through the vents. "It kinda reminds me of... Ancient earth history, the Viertnamese Ao Dai was heavily influenced by European trends since they were a colony of France."

It indeed sucked so much to be claustrophobic in Starfleet, which was partly why he opted to avoid Engineering and Ops as options for himself while in the Academy. As he listened to Renakir speak, he hugged his knees closer to him. It was getting a bit harder to breathe for a bit. He began remembering the first few times where claustrophobia struck him... lone shuttle simulations, emergency jefferies tube drills, and especially the psychological part of the Academy entrance exam... He would rather be ejected into space with just a spacesuit than be shot out of a escape pod. Tight and narrow spaces were just a part of Starfleet life, he thought to himself, but it would all pay off in the end even if he never got over it. Paco was just glad to have another person accompany him. "In all fairness, a lot of Anthropology and Sociology is just mostly testing social chemistry and staring at people through binoculars... who knows, I might break the Prime Directive one day!" He joked, chuckling softly. There was still a hint of stammering and fear in his voice, but he is calming down for the most part. "Yes, Linguistics is under anthropology, and I was extremely surpised when you asked about my accent. Caught me off guard for a second honestly... never expected to meet a Romulan or Reman so interested in Mandarin" Paco was also around in a similar boat to Renakir, a Social Scientist who couldn't really socialize that well which was obvious from how nervously tense he was earlier. Once fresh air came in through the vents he began some breathing excerises, still holding himself tight, feeling much better. "Unfortunately, no on aliens with Sexy Starfleet Uniforms... yet at least... but it could happen. It's exactly like the Ao Dai! Imagine that, after seeing us walk around in uniform, someone somewhere would start a boom of Fashion trends incorporating both their native culture and Starfleet."

1

Renakir had his head in the side wall panel, grabbing at some more wires before pulling away and looking at his work. He had to disable his new sensor, but it seemed that at the very least the lift was going to continue onwards to its destination. Maybe he had to go back to the drawing board with the sensors, they seemed to be causing more headache than they were worth. He held the tiny sensor in his hands and placed it on the ground behind him. When he did that he noticed the ensign was hugging his knees tighter and showing signs of further distress. As someone who was also prone to panic attacks and anxiety, he had an idea of what was going down. "Oh, I hope you don't do that," Renakir continued speaking in lighthearted manner. "I love accents. I learned Mandarin because I liked terran martial arts, very cool. Hmm.. I know one phrase in Filipino I think, what was it, wala na ko akong tanong (I don't have any questions)?" He asid, clumy with his pronunciation. "I grew up monolingual, but learning other languages opens up so much more media and entertainment, it's cool," He knew how sheltered he was a chlild and was impressed by the diversity of other planets. "And aw no sexy Starfleet uniforms-- hey I mean we have unofficial Starfleet shorts, the engineer Allan Allen makes them if you're ever interested in picking up a pair. May be some good research," Renakir grabbed the side panel and clicked it back on, making another (but quieter) thud noise as it was attached. "I'd like to see what variations other cultures take on our uniforms!"

2

"... you mean 'Wala na ako mga tanong'? (same thing, but gramatically correct) You were really close though." He corrected with a light chuckle. He very much appreciated the attempt, and also the chance to listen to him talk about his experience with Terran culture... it was things like this, the opportunity for exchanging stories and cultures, that got him really into his field and Starfleet. Besides that, once he gathered a rhythm in his breathing from the fresh air flowing from the vents, he slowly began to loosen up a little bit more. The conversation helped the most as a distraction in the process. The moment he mentionned the fact that Starfleet Shorts exist... even if it was unoffical... his face lit up with excitement since he was that that it would eventually happen at some point. "That's an actual thing!? I would love to talk to him! That would be great for my research!" Paco beamed, once he gets his PADD fixed he would definitely put this in his personal log. The possibilities were endless! It was still a step in the best direction possible in the name of Science! Whatever movement there is present surrounding Starfleet shorts, that movement definitely found another member/advocate. "So.. uhmm... hows the fix going?" He asked out of curiosity, calmer now than he was before, allowing himself to let go stretch his legs slightly.

3

"Yes! That was it!" Renakir laughed at his own mistake. He was learning! Even if it was slow. With so many people from Earth, one would think there would be a lot of chances to pick up different languages, but most people spoke Standard daily. Renakir had only one (1) encounter with someone who spoke Mandarin. At least the station had on shortage of French speakers. "Wala na ako mga tanong! So many sounds," Renakir repeated the words back to the scientist, his pronunciation wasn't bad, but the cadence was certainly off. Somehow he still managed to sound incredibly French. Renakir stood up and put his sunglasses back on right before the lights of the lift turned back on. He learned his lesson last time he fixed a lift. As much as he wanted to believe his light sensitivity was somehow not as bad (like how he insisted he was 'still growing' despite being 30 years old), there was no fighting his species genetics. Light was bad for his eyes and it gave him headaches. "Yeah, just send a message to Allan Allen from engineering, he's usually free to make some shorts," Their shorts army was growing!! Renakir's tone was light as he spoke of Allan. "Also the lift should be moving soon, it's all fine," Renakir was happy to see Paco had started to calm down. The steadier breathing, the lack of stammering in his speech. The lift began to hum as it resumed course to its destination. Renakir held the poor sensor in his hands, still frustrated at himself for his own carelessness. "Are you going to be alright? I'm sorry for the scare."

2

Paco simply smiled and enjoyed himself while he listened to Renakir explored his native tongue, chuckling at how the words came out in tone due to the accent. To him, and most Filipinos, it was classic entertainment. Besides, any chance to showcase his own culture to others is always well appreciated. As the lights came back on, he let out a very shakey sigh of relief as he started to stand up, loosing his balance briefly the moment the lift began moving again but gripped on the sides of the lifts walls to catch himself. Paco was still very much shaken still from the whole ordeal, but is handling it much better now compared to his past experiences. "I-I should be fine, Renakir... Don't beat yourself up over it..." he said as he stood up and stretched, holding on to a handle afterwards to help him keep upright since he was still trembling a little bit. "I have a lot planned for the Holodeck, even a nap which would honestly be wonderful" he said, chuckling softly before taking in a deep breath. Paco was fully relieved all of it was over. Now he can soon examine everything he had found so far for his research, and give himself a good break afterwards

Renakir watched as the scientist who was definitely shaken, not stirred, gripped the handle on the side of the lift when it moved. Of all the people to get stuck in the lift, it was the claustrophobic scientist. Renakir still felt bad that his own mistake caused this to happen, he hated the idea of being the reason one of his fellow officers was distressed. "You be careful, Paco," Renakir straightened his posture, holding the sensor in his hands as he faced forward. "I think a nap would be good, I know humans need to get a lot of sleep. It's not something to take lightly, "Renakir said as if he himself wasn't the insomnia king. Well, only beaten by his own brother who slept less than him if that was even possible. The Romulan-Reman officer straightened his shirt, tugging on the hem and then took a deep breath as the lift slowly came to a stop. "And maybe you should think about going to sickbay about the claustrophobia thing? I hope we are never in a situation that calls for it, but we may have to crawl through tubes or well-- hopefully the lifts don't stop again, but I don't want you to be in such a situation like this again," Renakir spoke with a concerned tone. Paco was so nice, he didn't want to see this man stressed. "Have a nice time in the holodeck," Renakir bowed his head as the doors to the lift opened up to the recreational corridor.

After a little while longer of deep breathing and mental prayers, Paco had calmed down enough to function alright enough to walk to where he needed to go. Paco held his books close to him as he listened to Renakir's concerns, glad to know he was understanding of his struggles. "I'll think about it... Thank you for helping me calm down earlier... It meant a lot." he said softly with a smile, turning towards the doors as they opened to the Recreation Deck. "I'll see you after work, Renakir. Also have this." Before stepping off turbolift-two... which he definitely would note as being one of most cursed things he had ever encountered... he reached over to his pocket and gave the lieutenant a pack of dried sliced mangos, a sweet traditional snack he usually gives out to new friends.

2

"Beta deck, senior crew quarters."

"Gamma section, environmental ring."

Mo entered with Logan. "Mhm. You've been workin' for Starfleet for a while, then. You have any ambitions for climbing the ranks? Become an admiral? Or are you happy where you are now?" Mo asked. "I ain't sure myself, t'be honest. I'm sure they're doing good work, but the higher ranks seem a bit... Distant sometimes. Too much to do, too much to see." But perhaps it was worth it go try and rise up to see what it was like in the big leagues. After all, you'll never know if you don't go; you'll never shine if you don't glow. "Environmental ring."

"Alpha deck, command."

"Yeah, I get that. Most Admiralty positions are desk jobs, I'm a bit like you in the fact I couldn't stay on Earth for more than a month tops; I'd be looking up too much." He laughed as the turbolift rose. "Don't get me wrong, the Admirals are some of the nicest people I've met, it's just the job is a bit too sedentary for me." 'And for a lot of Captains in the fleet', Logan thought to himself. He leaned against the wall of the lift as it stopped, signalling that they had arrived.

"Medical Bay" Their voice was almost panicked, as they stopped short in the lift in question. Panting, they waited for the lift to get to their destination before they would run off again.

It was a little difficult to get the bike turned around in the turbolift, seeing as how it was a stupidly long bike and not very bendy at all, but they managed it. Derek sat there as they waited for the turbolift to move, spinning the bike pedals backwards for something to do. "I know that I'm also a Section 31 people, but I'm a cool not any more Section 31 people. ...My high school English teacher would go crazy if you used grammar like that. Anyway, don't run me over, but run any others over. Mow them down! Hit and run!"

3

"I understand the pain of your high school English teacher because using grammar like that made me cringe a little, but I did it for the bit," Eshen said. "Also, legally we cannot run anyone over because that would be potentially lethal, but I like your spirit!" It was very... Bright-core.

2

3

"Nahh, fuck grammar," Allan said with a silly little grin, honestly though, he had a very complicated relationship with grammar even despite the 25th century school systems being accepting of different dialects and whatnot... language and grammar evolved so quickly, from place to place, what was 'proper' was ... highly subjective, and he kinda hated it. But alas, they had important shit to do. "Spirit's always good! Speaking of which," he felt the turbolift start to slow and set his feet on the pedals, "Just go straight ahead and then we'll make a sort of sharp turn to the left, okay? Ready... set... go!" And then, almost as if he knew this turbolift so well or something, the turbolift doors opened and hopefully they all pedaled very very fast into the #corridor-16 !

Valak got into the turbolift, hoping he was going to escape the Caitian who was talking to him. Oh he really hoped they weren't going to make it onto the lift, Valak thought he had ran pretty fast! "ENGINEERING SECTION!" He said quickly, praying the doors shut fast.

C’Sara attempted to dive into the turbolift with him. “What the fuck are you doing!”

"AHHH!!! DON'T HURT ME!" Valak screamed at the top of his lungs. He flattened his back against the side of the turbolift and clutched the support bar for dear life. The lift was on its way to its destination already.

The lift soon stopped at engineering, and once they got there, Valak bolted down #corridor-16!!

C’Sara got back in the turbolift. “Engineering!”

Jayrehi rushed into the Turbolift, only to be jumpscared by the bomb i side. She stumbled back, before regaining composure.

The turbolift doors closed and awaited a destination to take her.

Now’s the time to think, she thought, as she pulled out her tools again. Now she was wondering why Starfleet didn’t issue engineering belt, or did they? She shook her head, making sure to focus on the task at hand.

The bomb in this lift was located inside of the maintenance hatch near the floor of the lift. It was actually right where Renakir's sensor once sat before he ripped it out a few days ago.

She began checking the bomb with her tricorder, and it’s make up was largely similar to the bomb previously. She slowly started to disable the parts like she did last time, only difference was her growing confidence.

The bomb was disabled successfully, but it was still wedged deep into the turbolfit control panel. It would need to be cut out or removed somehow and one wrong move could activate it again.

The doors to the lift opened as two people were walking in.

Hal got into the turbolift. Once Renakir was in, she said, “Medical deck!”

Renakir walked in and saw Jamie, giving her a wave. "Oh hey Jamie!" Renakir was surprised to see his friend there, working on something-- Oh that's right, the bombs! "Oh Hal, ops and engineering gotta disable some bombs, how about you go to medical and I can stay with Jamie?"

“Sure thing!” Hal said, walking out of the turbolift when it reached Medical.

Once Hal exited the lift, Renakir turned to Jamie. "Hey, Jamie, there's a bomb in the senior staff corridor, if the bomb here is done, could you go get that one?" Renakir asked Jamie, hoping she was done disabling this bomb. He could deal with the removal if she was going to go get the last bomb.

“Yeah! I can go get that one!” she said with a slight nervous stutter.

"Alright, senior officer quarters!" Renakir told the lift and it began to move. Once the doors opened, Renakir waved goodbye to his friend before getting down to try and pry the disabled bomb from the wiring inside the lift. Jamie did the hard part, all he hard to do was get the bomb out.

[Comms]"Lieutenant Hartley to Lieutenant Renakir, there seems to be your fiance on #corridor-05 , he now is with me, it would be wise if you could assure him by being present here. We are near.... the red zone, if you catch my meaning." by red zone he meant the bombsite, he did not want the civilian to freak out because he said they were near a bombsite.

When Renakir got the comms he sighed. Kianarix? How did he get to the research corridor? Renakir was not looking to babysit his fiance and honestly he needed to focus on trying to careful extract the bomb from the turbolift. "Hey Lieutenant. I'm a bit busy right now, how are things by you? There are still some prisoners loose so it may be safest to keep Kianarix up there. The prisoners are all over the recreational decks and civilian quarters," Renakir replied. He didn't like leaving Kianarix with a stranger, but he also needed to get the bomb out before leaving the lift.

[Comms]"Well, there is the problem in #chemical-science-lab, I do not know how to exercise the removal of such problem and it might be dangerous for Kianarix, I was heading to see the problem myself, would it not be wise if you help with the solution?" Once again, he refused to use apparent words like bombs and defuse, in relation to what he had thought earlier

Ah that was right, the chemical science lab. Well then Renakir would have to head up there. He pondered what to do for a moment, not wanting to put Kianarix in danger, but he also couldn't just leave him to wander alone. Not to mention Renakir still didn't know where his daughter was. "Alright, I'll be there in a few," Renakir was going to help the chemical science lab with their bomb and then take Kianarix home.

He entered the lift from the research facility. He took a look at the panel, and said. "Entertaiment Complex!"

Enters the Lift. "Research Facility!"

"His office isn't prone to getting trashed, either..." Saren offered with a slight smile, his words less of a rebuttal, more of a half-hearted joke. Eshen's efforts were already working, it seemed. As soon as they stepped inside, he looked up, a habit at this point: "Oh, um. Senior crew quarters, please." The buzzing in his brain eventually subsided, leaving in his mind clarity and a hint of the command officer standing in front of him. Green eyes looked down, down, fixating on their linked hands. A thought? Concern? A Feeling arises, and he can't help but vocalize it: "Eshen..." damn the uncertainty in his voice. Saren cleared his throat before continuing: "Is this... okay, for you?" Which, in hindsight, is a hilarious question to ask to someone who he has shared a literal and metaphysical space with. But that was an emergency, he tried to reason with himself, did this also count as an one? Oh, fuck, was he making a fool of himself right now? "I-it's not that I mind, quite the opposite--" ah, if he didn't before, he sure as hell did just now! "--but, your glove is off, and..." He breathed out a miserable sound, the projected calmness quelling down the irritation Saren would feel at himself. "How do I properly put my feelings into words? Damn it, you're... you're so good for me, and... I am not sure what I can give you in return."

4

1

Eshen gave Saren a smile that was equal parts gentle and amused. "I've not asked for anything in return, have I? I enjoy helping you out with things. And I don't mind doing this with you if it might help you calm down. You and Allan are..." He paused. "Well, you're the only two people I've indulged in this sort of... Intimacy with..." (He should ask Nalas if he wanted to meld sometime. Aella it wouldn't be possible with, but Nalas it would.) He sighed and ran his other hand through his hair, which almost touched his shoulders now. Why was it so hard to talk about mind melds without it sounding like some sort of innuendo? Then, as the turbolift hummed its way up the shaft, he turned to face Saren, still holding his hand but placing the other upon his shoulder. "I'm familiar enough with both of you to do this, I mean. Besides, if I can use my abilities as a Vulcan, even 'half' of one, in times of crisis, I'm inclined to do so." He smirked. "I mean, have you ever read about Spock? Not to shame him, but he'd mind meld with anything if it was remotely practical to do so. Not that this is on par with a mind meld, but - telepathy is very useful and so I intend to use it."

5

3

He slowly laid his own palm on top of Eshen's, mimicking what he did during their meld. The Romulan then leaned in, just enough so that he was on the same eye level with Eshen, green staring into golden with unblinking certainty. "What if I want to give you something in return?.." Saren offered quietly, his voice barely above a whisper, clearly thinking and overthinking each and every syllable he said. "And maybe this want isn't born out of some sense of duty, but... uh..." He then wavered, blinked, his spell of confidence suddenly gone. Saren's gaze lingered on Eshen's face for a bit, before dropping to the ground between them. "I'm... not sure, actually," or, rather, he was scared to let this chain of thoughts unfurl itself further. "Sorry, for... being so intense." His head turned towards the lift's doors. "Shall we go?.." he offered almost meekly, am attempt to distract himself and Eshen from their comversation. Hmm.

6

5

Double hand touching, double the scandal, at least by Vulcan standards; it made even Eshen blush. "Hmmm," he said, tilting his head slightly, cheeks dusted with green. He didn't want to assume anything, but... He let go of Saren's hand only so he could gently brush it against Saren's cheek. "No need to apologise; I quite enjoyed that brief spell of intensity. And, you know, whatever you might wish to give me... I'm sure I'd be quite happy to receive." Then he held Saren's hand again and looked towards the turbolift doors. Frankly, he hadn't even realised they'd arrived, so absorbed in Saren's Intensity. "Mhm. We should go." He didn't want to leave the little bubble of the turbolift, but he did have things he needed to do. Sighing, he led Saren by the hand into #deleted-channel .

6

5

“Research Facilities.”

S'Teo was walking inside the turbolift and put his belongings on the ground As he waited for Alizati to get inside. Instead of staring into nothingness or at each other, S'Teo would begin with the smalltalk inside the turbolift. "So.. what is your exact profession in the area of engineering?" Since he never met an android before he would like to get to know him at least a bit, even though S'Teo would probably do that with most of the crew. Due to his now more than confident posture he seems to be trusting Alizanti. At least enough to go into a turbolift with him.

Alizati stepped into the turbolift, not even noticing that yet again two Romulans were in the lift together. "Beta module, senior staff quarters," Alizati said to the lift as the doors closed. He looked over at S'Teo and kept his posture perfectly straight as always. Alizati had no 'real' muscles to relax so he always had an intense look about him, however he was perfectly relaxed in this situation. "My specialty is in artificial intelligence and machine learning," He replied, knowing very well it was pretty on-the-nose given his species. Technically any time he learned anything it counted as 'machine learning'. Anyway. "And your specialty is melee combat? What inspired you to go into that?" Alizati did not give an explanation why he chose artificial intelligence as his specialty as he assumed that would be rather obvious. He was an engineer who was himself also engineered.

Artifical intelligence learning and studying about artificial intelligence. How ironic. Yes there were two romulans in the lift but do you count a romulan android as a romulan? This is a question yet be answered. "My father had also served in the imperial fleet, which is why he used his political connections to put me somewhere, where i would get the same treatment as he did. We left Romulus just two years before.. well.. you know what im talking of. Back then kids were monitored over a lifespan of 15 years until they finished training and schooling at the age of 20. I would say i chose for myself because my father wanted to keep going with the family tradition. Fighting in the name of the empire for its expansionist politics. So i didnt choose but after i graduated, i accepted that this is something i have to do. Also it seemed that the authorities thought i would be a good warrior for their wars that were to come. Sadly for them i joined the unificationists after having served for more than 5 years." He pauses there for a second to breathe and to not go off topic. "In this time i had already gathered a lot of experience because i was involved in a lot of raids and battles for the empire. In the end i could at least help romulans to get a new home.. which i havent even seen yet. Somewhen i hope i will." After this long and a bit personal explanation he turned his head towards Alizati. "It wasnt easy as kid but here im standing having achieved what i think is right. Romulans need to work together with the federation.. and.." again he pauses for a much longer time. "..the klingons."

Alizati stood on the opposite side of S'Teo in the lift. Not blinking, breathing, or moving at all. He was Alizati.jpg mode. He listened to S'Teo's tale, how he joined the military, fought for the Romulan people. Truth be told, Alizati may have possessed Romulan DNA (he did, in fact!), but he knew little about his people beyond the Federation database and his experiences on Mol'Rihan. It was something he was trying to expand his knowledge on, but with so many other tasks to worry about as senior staff it left him with little time to actually explore such topics. "You fought for the Empire? Hm, I suppose we have a couple other officers who have similar experiences," Alizati was trying to remember the names of the Romulan officers onboard who had the Empire's Navy on their file. Not many, but there were a couple-- Merikh? Hm. *"You have not seen Mol'Rihan yet? It is a beautiful planet. My family live in the capital. To be honest I wished I could have spent more time there when I visited," *Alizati's eyes were staring straight at S'Teo again. His unblinking gaze, emotionless eyes. "Our crew on 777 is very diverse, we have officers from all over the galaxy. We are also a hub for alliance cultural exchange so if there is ever a place in the galaxy to experience diversity, it is here. Why did you choose to become an exchange officer?"

he noticed the android's behaviors such as the missing need to breathe or blink but overall he thought that this would be needed to accept Alizati's presence. Alizati then mentioned other romulans who have fought for the empire and then mentioned the new homeworld of all romulans. For a second it remembered S'Teo of Romulus when Alizati talked of Mol'Rihan. "I have lived in the Captial too until we moved to the outpost. I wish i could give you something from my-" he paused due to thinking about Alizati. "-our real homeworld. Sadly there's nothing left i could give you. Maybe there will be something in the future i could give you." Starbase 777 will be challenge for S'Teo as it seems but there's nothing that could stop him of fulfilling his duty. "I think it was a good idea to learn about other species. Ecspecially now since the romulan republic is part of the Khitomer alliance. This seemed to be the perfect idea since it serves the interests of the federation as well as the ones of the republic."

Alizati raised an eyebrow when the other corrected himself-- 'our' real homeworld. Despite never seeing Romulus (his predecessor did not see the planet either), he appreciated being included. Did this mean that S'Teo was validating his experience as a Romulan as if he were organic? He hoped so, Alizati had a unique experience as an android, but it was still a Vulcanoid experience. "I do not need anything," He said, unsure what S'Teo was on about, but he was just a normal officer doing his daily routine. "This is certainly a good posting to learn about other species. We are also very close to Romulan space so you do not have to worry about being far from home," It was strange to think only a few months ago Alizati felt slightly apprehensive about being so close to Romulan space for fear of being dragged into whatever political turmoil were to unfold with his genetic cousins, but now... It was a blessing that he could live close to his family, even if his Romulan family was not the greatest. He looked forward at the blank wall in front of them, waiting for the doors to finally open to the #deleted-channel . He looked towards S'Teo and then to the hallway in front of them. "We have our annual winter ball coming up, we will have quite a lot of visitors I predict. May I ask if you have any family living on Mol'Rihan or around Romulan space?"

Alizanti doesnt need anything? Well, S'Teo was pretty sure about that. Mabye just if they get to know each other more. Surely starbase 777 was one of the best stations to be on, not just because its close to the romulan space, the station also has a huge varity of species. There are romulans as well as humans. A certain, not all too long time ago you couldnt even imagine these species working together but here they are, working side to side. "My home is whereever i live and i dont worry much about being close to romulan space." would S'Teo state before walking outside the turbolift, together with his baggage and into the #deleted-channel

Renakir got into turbolift two with his epohh following close behind. It had been a while since shit went down in here and honestly he was just focused on getting to his quarters so he could drop Kali-fal off and meet his brother. Renakir was dressed in full uniform, with the sunglasses, whilst Kali-fal had her little collar. In his hands he held a basket with a couple snacks and toys for Kali-fal and himself. As he stepped into the lift he opened the basket to pull out a baguette, obviously he needed a snack, okay. "Mmm... Senior crew quarters," He instructed the lift before chomping away at the baguette whilst Kali-fal sat at his feet, just waiting patiently like a well trained epohh.

[D] "Incoming!" a voice suddenly rang out - it seemed to belong to a tall Romulan that appeared in front of the turbolift doors, looking slightly disheveled. He let out a quiet "whew", then lifting his head up, dark eyes giving an apologetic sort of look to Renakir: "Sorry! Your turbolifts are quite busy right now with all the incoming officers, hope you don't mind?.." the stranger grinned sheepishly, his hand doing a quick motion to sweep away the rogue strands of his wavy mullet out of his face. He took in the scene - a half-Romulan(?) Lieutenant, a basket with bread, and an... "Oh! Is that an epohh?"

Renakir nearly dropped his baguette when the stranger came charging into the lift. The Romulan-Reman officer clutched his baguette to his chest as if it were a suitcase full of cash and pressed his back against the wall. His eyes were wide, but the stranger couldn't see them through his sunglasses. It only took a couple of seconds to realise two things-- first, this man was Romulan (danger), second, he had a mullet (not dangerous, but mullets were quite a choice. Kali-fal's reaction mirror her father's, all six eyes wide in surprise as the fluffy critter slowly backed away from the tall man who just entered the lift. Her mouth hung open for a couple seconds, trying to process what was happening. "Yes, this is my daughter, Kali-fal Madeleine," Renakir tried to collect himself, tossing his half eaten baguette into the basket so he could lean down and pet Kali-fal to try and calm her down. "You must be from one of the visiting ships?" Renakir asked, suspicious of his strange. Was this really a coincidence?

Ah, he seemed to be one of the more nervous type. Sy made sure to keep his distance, then - not that he personally cared, but it was to make sure that this stranger didn't freak the fuck out. Funny, it was reminiscent of his first turbolift ride with Rai. "Nice to meet you," he nodded at the epohh. "Gonna be honest, this is the first time I see an epohh with my own two eyes. Funny little critters..." Hearing Renakir's question, Sy lifted his head up, an easy smile on his face: "I am! I'm one of the helmsmen at the Rapture. I assume you're one of the ops officers here, Lieutenant..?"

Renakir was thankful that this stranger was keeping his distance. Unfortuantely with the size of the lift they would have to settle for Vulcan-safe distance apart and not the more comfortable stabbing distance apart. Luckily, Kali-fal was trained on not only how to throw off and distract an enemy, but also how to make a lot of noise to alert others nearby. "O-Oh, yeah, they're really cute," Renakir stood up again, still clutching his basket of snacks, but his knees were bent as if he was ready to charge at the stranger at any sign of hostility. "O-ohh-- Wait Rapture?!" Renakir straightened his posture and breathed a sigh of relief. Oh was he thankful that this dude was from his brother's ship. He felt less nervous now because of anything did happen, he was sure Rai would waste no time to suplex this guy. "And y-yeah I'm the turbolift officer, ironically," He chuckled lightly as he leaned his back up against the wall. Kali-fal slowly made her way to Syrax, sniffing his feet before looking up at her. "W-What a coincidence, I got family on that ship," He said, unsure how much information he should give this stranger. He could have easily been lying, you know-- name drop a random ship that was docked there, say whatever. "It's nice to see another Romulan in Starfleet," Renakir said as if he literally hadn't been panicking being in a lift with this dude two seconds ago. "What's your name?"

"Fam-- wait," Renakir could almost see the cogs in his head turning, no doubt running over the mental list of all the Romulans stationed on Rapture. Syrax hummed, then let out an excited "oh!", quickly snapping his fingers as he then pointed at Renakir: "You're Rai's brother! Yeah, I can see the resemblance now! Didn't think I would meet you so soon, heh. He did tell me about his family, just a bit. The parts that he deemed shareable to a Romulan, anyways." No wonder this interaction had reminded him of the Rapture's tactical officer! The eyes would've also been a dead giveaway, if Sy could see them - but now the sunglasses also made sense. The guy was half-Reman, and Sy, with his limited knowledge (the parts that he deemed usable, anyways, considering that it was his racist ass not-quite-grandfather who introduced little Sy to their cousin species), did know about their issues with bright lights. "Off topic question, is she okay with being petted?" he nodded at Kali-fal, the irony of her being named after a blue alcoholic drink not lost on him. He then smirked at Renakir, a knowing glint in his eyes: "I know, I act real weird for a Romulan. But I was raised on Vulcan! Which is also weird, 'cause I don't act like a Vulcan also. It's a long, boring story." Now that was a half-lie, but Renakir didn't have to know about that. Anyways, "As for the name, Syrax tr'Morvar is my name on the roster. But you can call me Sy! I prefer the shortened version, anyways."

Renaki could feel his whole body tense up when Syrax spoke again and snapped his fingers. Oh fucking Tenakruvek, he thought. This guy... He wasn't sure what to be more nervous about, the fact that this guy knew of him or the fact that he clearly knew Rai. 'Oh please, Rai, tell me you haven't introduced yourself to every Romulan on your ship', Renakir thought in his mimd. Unfortunately he was not telepathy and even if he was, him and Rai were probably too far apart to relay messages between each other. "Y-Yes, I am Rai's brother," He wasn't sure if that was a good or bad thing to this curious Romulan sporting a mullet. "Oh yes, she loves pets. She's very friendly," Alright, now if this guy knew Rai then surely he wouldn't pose any threat? Because if he did well, he'd have a seven foot tall beefy Romulan to answer to. He nodded as the man continued to talk-- raised on Vulcan? Ah, so the child of a reunificationist or something like that. He didn't mind, it wasn't in line with his personal beliefs, but it's not like this guy or any of the other Vulcan-raised Romulans could really change their upbringing. 'Movar'-- wait Morvar!? "Sy--Syrax Morvar? Umm... We're.... Dinams....... Kinda. Your uhh.. brother? cousin? Your relative..." Renakir's mind was running a million kilometres as second trying to process all of the thoughts that the words that came out of his mouth were jumbled together. "Kali-fal! He's your other godfather!" Was what the sounds that came out of his mouth formed. "This is weird but... Yeah, your relative, Saren tr'Lareth-Morvar, he and I are... Dinams. Kali-fal was a gift from him to me for my birthday," He said before he realised he had said Saren's new name. Oh.... Fuck. (chuckles, I'm in danger meme).gif.

Oop, yep, clearly this guy was also not a fan of his annoying tick. Syrax quickly lowered his hands, as if afraid that he would receive a slap on his wrists. Instead he squatted, ready to give some attention to the little creature staring up at him. The mane of fur was surprisingly soft, as Sy gently ran two of his fingers through the blue fluff. He ought to visit Mol'Rihan someday - both to see more of epohhs, but also to come back to his roots, so to say. The Romulan froze up, though, as soon as he heard Renakir's excited stuttering. What?* *Syrax stood up, movement soundless, giving the man in front of him a long, piercing stare, friendly demeanor all but gone away, replaced by apprehension and wariness. What the fuck was this guy talking about, now? Morvar? Lareth? A memory of his aunt resurfaced, feeling as painful as being shot with a phaser, and Syrax winced, scoffing. "That's a sick thing to joke about, you know that?" his expression hardened as he looked down at Renakir, something heavy settling in his chest, his voice quieting down into a rasp. "That side of my family was murdered. Never had a chance to meet my cousin before he was stabbed to death. So you better take that back, yeah?.." Did Rai tell him about this? If so...

Kali-fal rolled onto her back as soon as the man began to pet her. She loved the attention, the exact opposite of her father. In fact, she embodied everything that her dad was no; loved physical contact, loved being praised, and more than anything loved to be sassy and make a fool out of Renakir whenever they were in public. That was probably her favourite thing. Renakir took a deep breath and clasped his hands together, fingers laced, very similar to a certain tactical officer. The other's reaction was-- shocking. What? The Romulan-Reman officer tensed up again, flinching at the sudden change in demeanour. "... N-No? Saren is... Umm...." Suddenly Renakir wanted to grab Kali-fal and bolt out the door, but the lift was still moving. Fuck. "I think you are mistaken... Um... I don't know what you heard but... Saren is alive. He's a Starfleet officer, xenobiologist, a man I am proud to call my dinam. I... I think you should talk to him about this though," Renakir quickly pulled out his PADD from his pocket and began typing out a message.

His expression somewhat eased - now betraying his confusion and disbelief. Because surely, Renakir was lying - he had to, for some weird, inexplicable, stupid reason. Irok told him so himself, even forced him to hold onto the knife - this had to be a trick or something. Anything. Because miracles didn't happen. And yet Syrax couldn't help but hope, like the stupid fucking fool that he was. "Is.. is aunt Arinn-- his mother, is his mother also alive?.." he asked, voice tight, watching the officer in front of him pull out his PADD and start typing a message - to his cousin, Sy assumed. Fuck. His cousin. "Where can I, um, find him?.." What rank is he? What is he like? Does he also like old, shitty casette tapes Syrax has grown so fond of? Does he collect things? So many questions, they were overwhelming him. Syrax hooked both of his hands on his nape, squeezing it - his own attempt at quelling his nervousness.

2

"Hold," Renakir ordered the lift before it came to a sudden halt, the vibrations suddenly causing Kali-Fal to wobble before rolling onto her back. Renakir knelt down and took out his half eaten baguette from his basket and placed it in front of Kali-fal to nibble. The epohh rolled over and began to take small bites out of the long bread. "Yes, she is. And he's Lieutenant Junior Grade, his quarters are near mine. I was actually on my way to drop Kali-fal off at home and then get ready for the ball. I can take you there?" Renakir offered, trying to tell himself there was no reason to be nervous anymore. Syrax was his.. Dinam in law? Well him and Saren weren't dating but it kinda felt like that. He observed Sy's expression and wondered if he was doing the right thing. He had spoken to Saren about his family a little bit but he was in no position to make such a big revelation. He just hoped this first meeting would go well for them.... Would it?

"Yes, she is." Syrax felt like he would cry. The dangerous demeanor completely dissipated as his shoulders sagged, maybe out of relief or under the heaviness of his emotions or both. He took a deep, long sigh, pinching the bridge of his nose and squeezing his eyes shut, that he opened only after hearing Renakir's question. "I..." he blinked, unsure. Sy wanted to see him - desperately so, but he was also deathly afraid of this confrontation. What if this blood-related stranger also would grow a dislike for him? Hell, he fucked up his relationships with both of his parents, it would be twice as easy to do with Saren, there was no doubt of that. Sy had a natural talent for doing just that. "I mean, it's unavoidable at this point, isn't it?" he chuckled, not even an ounce of humor in that sound. Syrax nodded then, restless hands finding refuge in giving his upper arms an almost painful squeeze: "Y-yeah. Yeah, that would be nice. Um... you don't have to be there, though-- not that I'm shooing you away or something, it's just... I can only imagine how fucking awkward this interaction will be for you, no matter how... good or bad it is. So it's up to you..? You still haven't introduced yourself to me, heh." Dark brown eyes focused on the epohh on the turbolift's ground. So this was his cousin's gift to this officer? Ah, he did mention him being a xenobiologist - it made sense. He wondered what else the scientist was up to here - and the realization that he may be able to ask that question himself was anything but dreadful.

3

Renakir was not telepathic, but he could sense Syrax's hesitancy. He knew this was a lot to take in an oh was he regretting being the one to break the news. 'Turbolift two, you have clowned me once again', he thought. Renakir noticed the small little cues in Sy's posture, the way his shoulders dropped, the pained chuckle. Even though the other claimed to have not follow any Vulcan teachings... Renakir could tell he was raised on Vulcan, even if he wasn't walking around with zero emotions. Sy was holding back, but at the same time, he made it look easy. Hell, he was even able to chuckle at a time like this. "I can walk you to his quarters and then let you guys have your moment. I do not want to impose anymore than I already have," Renakir said to Sy before his eyes went back to his epohh who was happily munching the baguette. She was definitely Renakir's daughter with how she was absolutely devouring the French bread. "Oh, sorry, I am..." He paused, wondering what name to give Sy. Well, if Sy knew his brother then it was probably his Romulan name? "My name is Renakir Solait ir-Biscae tr'Torre'vnau, but I think if you know Rai he would probably have told you my name is Solait? Most people call me Renakir though, I.. Kinda prefer my Reman name," He said shyly, still feeling awkward about being Reman in the presence of Romulans. "Resume, course, senior crew quarters," Renakir instructed the lift, almost forgetting where they were heading.

"Yeah, sounds good to me..." the Romulan nodded, tilting his head as soon as he heard the officer's name. Huh. Wonder who that could remind Renakir of. "Renakir it is, then. Nice to meet'cha. Sorry for uh, getting a bit intense on you back then, I just... it's not everyday some random dude in a lift tells you that your missing and presumed dead relatives are actually fine and dandy." Around that moment, Renakir could hear his PADD ping a message, a reply from Saren:

"?????????????????????????????????????????????????????????"

Then, a couple of moments later, Renakir received a second reply, a much more... sophisticated, one:

"Can both of you come to my quarters, please?"

"Is that him?" Sy asked, tall enough to just lean in and take a peek himself, but too nervous and polite (sometimes) to do that. "What's he sayin'? He isn't busy or, uh, something, because-- I certainly don't want to intrude whatever scientific thingamajinga he could be doing." Oof, nervous, are we?

Renakir almost had to do a double take with Syrax's odd mannerism of tilting his head. Like a crow. It was incredible how much the Morvar broth-- cousins, were alike despite not knowing the other existed. It got Renakir thinking if he shared at mannerisms with Rai. Did he? "It's alright, uh I know it sounds like something out of a drama," Renakir chuckled as his eyes stared down at his PADD awaiting a response from his dinam. Once he got the reply the only response he could give was a laugh. This situation was terrible and incredibly tense, so much so all he could do was laugh. Meanwhile his daughter was munching away at her baguette. "Yeah, umm.. He wants us both to come to his quarters," Renakir said right before the turbolift stopped and the doors opened. Oh this was gonna be awkward, real awkward. Kali-fal had finished eating the entire half of baguette and was ready to go, rolling back onto her feet and standing beside Renakir. Even with the doors open, the air was still thick with tension, anxiety, a bit of fear too? He couldn't tell if it was Sy's vibes or his own, but he was not prepared for whatever was about to unfold. "Umm.. Shall we?" He typed a quick reply to Saren,

[Comms] "Yeah, you got it"

And then grabbed his basket. He nodded to Syrax as a way to tell him to step out first.

Zero entered the lift, smiling at Rai's blushing face.

Zadki entered the lift, frowning at nothing in particular.

"So have you ever been to an event like this before?" Zero asked as the turbolift door closed and the lift started moving.

"Umm... Well kinda," Rai said as he tried not to move around too much in the lift. He was still trying to get over the very embarrassing thing he had done in the lakes and ponds area. Oh he hoped no one who saw him there was going to be at the ball even though he knew that was pretty unlikely. "My father's wedding, but... Umm... I don't want to sound weird about it, but that's where he murdered my biological father. It wasn't sad at all, my biological father had it coming, I would have-- I mean... No violence, I am calm," Rai was not very subtle about his hatred for Sirrai or the majority of his Romulan family. He liked the Remans and especially his little brother, everyone else (besides Cerrub) could get fucked. "And... Wait before we go to the ball, there's something... I need to come clean about. It's a little embarrassing, nothing violent I swear but.... I did something and we may get stares...."

3

Zero seemed nonplussed by Rai casually mentioning there was a murder at his wedding. They'd been alive long enough now that not all that much surprised them, especially when regarding the ruthless drama of Romulan politics. Romulans be like that. "Wow! Sounds like a wild story; you'll have to tell me sometime."

"Patricide? Wow. Relatable."

"Um, what? Aren't you the one saying I'm not your dad?"

"I was trying dark humour. Was it funny?"

"It was mostly dark, not humour."

"Noted."

Then they heard what Rai said and their brow furrowed, though their chipper smile didn't waver. "What did you do, Rai? I'm sure it wasn't that bad."

Rai was glad Zero wasn't judging him for randomly talking about murder. Zero was pretty old and they had certainly seen their fair share of murders it seemed. When Zadki said 'relatable' Rai tilted his head, unaware of the story that was under the young child's words. He liked the exchanges between Zero and Zadki,very amusing. However when Zero asked him about the embarrassing thing he remembered oh that's right he was going to tell him. "Umm..... So in the lakes and ponds area. There is a skating area, it's really nice and there's a ice sculpture in the middle of the lake and.... On Remus, we often lick rocks to understand the make up of them and know our surroundings since all caves look the same. You find your way around by taste," He began to explain, realising with his arm link with Zero he couldn't do his nervous motion of rubbing the backs of his hands. Oh no. "So the ice sculpture, I want to know it so....... Yes, I licked it," Rai looked away from Zero and Zadki, his face bright green. "And I got my tongue stuck. It was thanks to my friend that I got unstuck when she poured hot tea between me and the statue. There's a brown spot on the statue now and-- Ahh everyone was staring and asking why there was a Romulan stuck to the statue. I feel so bad!"

1

...Yeah, honestly, that sounded like something Rai would do. "You sure get into a lot of shenanigans! I really don't think that's the kind of thing people will care about for more than two seconds, though; people's memories are fairly ephemeral. Most people have probably forgotten it by now. Either way, I'm not going to be... Ashamed to be seen with you or something just because of all that, don't worry."

2

Zadki smirked. "Yeah, they'll just move onto the next cringe thing someone does."

"Zadki, it was not 'cringe'."

"Anything that involves either or both of you guys is cringe."

1

"Cringe is ephemeral. What matters is our cumulative actions over time."

"Okay, then your cumulative actions over time are also cringe."

3

"Oh umm, thank you. Yes I did not expect my tongue to get stuck to it. I have learned my lesson and I will be licking anymore forbidden popsicles. Although it did look tasty," Rai said, hinting at the idea that he would probably continue to lick cold things. Maybe not statues in the middle of a Federation starbase though. He listened to Zero and Zadki's exchange about 'cringe'. What was cringe? He had no idea, but soon enough the lift stopped at the #corridor-01. He almost forgot he had linked arms with Zero and took a step a little too big but quickly pulled back when he realised what he was doing. Now he was standing incredibly close to Zero, they were practically hugging. How scandalous! ".. I wonder if my brother will be here. He is an officer on this station and is... Much cooler than me. I think you would like him."

"Airlock!" he announced, giving the lift a quick pat on it's iron wall. Why? Well, why not. It brought him to his cousin! It automatically made this lift the best one on this station.

5

Nora stepped into the turbolift, holding her burnt hand in front of her. "To Sickbay, please," she commanded once Jayrehi had boarded the turbolift as well. "Wow, amazing how precise laser welders are. It's really a very narrow burn."

“Huh, I suppose so.” she muttered, looking at her thumb.

Nora's antennae perked up, and she took a big breath as she smiled."So this holoprogram right, it's a concert, you know that. But it's not really based on any specific concert. It's set in a generic parking lot and i have various genre playlists loaded into it with their own band arrangements and crowd npc's and everything. It's so realistic too, i basically spent four years worth of savings on this thing but it was worth it cause it's my happy place." She paused in her ramble, bouncing up and down and giving Jayri an opportunity to respond.

Her eyes seemed to glitter slightly, as a look of wonder crossed her face. “Woah, I- that’s really cool! I’ve always wanted to have experienced something like that.” she giggled slightly, her face slightly flustered.

"Yeah, any of my friends are welcome. But first we should get this checked out," Nora said, holding the burnt thumb between them. In the lights of the turbolift, it was now easy to see the angry red line down most of the length of the digit. Just then, the turbolift opened its door to the #corridor-04. "Ah, perfect timing!" Nora exclaimed, thankful that turbolifts always seemed to move at the speed of plot no matter where one was going. "After you," she offered to her newest friend. (edited)

“Ah, right!” she said, looking at the door. “Uh, you can go first.”

"Alrighty then," Nora said, bowing her head and stepping out.

She followed along, exiting the lift.

"Recreational Deck. Food Court please" She spoke in an easy tone once she had entered the lift.

"Command Deck." Her voice was even as she waited for the lift to start, folding her hands in front of her.

"Research Corridor!" Paco ordered, holding on tightly to whatever handles the turbolift had on its sides (edited)

Wheatley burst in and spoke to the computer, "Uh- Engineering Deck, please! God i hope nothing's gone wrong..."

"Medical deck" They spoke, voice softer than usual.

"Food court, recreation deck."

"Starbase Command." Aoife stated clearly when she entered the turbolift. A knot had begun to form in her stomach.

Without even thinking twice, Renakir stepped into turbolift two with Kianarix. "Senior crew quarters," He commanded to the lift.

As soon as they stepped into the lift and Renakir gave the command, the door shut. Kianarix looked around, once at Renakir and once at the sterile white walls of the lift, he then proceeded to burst into tears. "I MISS LUN!" Kianarix shouted, causing Renakir to cover his ears at the sudden noise. It was a good thing the turbolifts were soundproof, he could only imagine what someone would think hearing this poor Reman kid wailing.

"It's alright, Kianarix. I think things will be better this way, you can spend time on your hobbies!" Renakir walked closer to Kianarix and offered him his hands to hold, grey fingers intertwined with each other as he let Kianarix cry out all his feelings. He told the turbolift to hold for a bit for fear of them getting to their destination before Kianarix was finished crying. "And you'll be fine living with Tiravurik, he has a lot of books and I already arranged for all your favourite rocks to be set up in your quarters," Renakir said as he tightened his grip on Kianarix's hands.

1

After a few minutes of some intense crying, Kianarix calmed down enough to speak again. "I-I know I just... Really miss Lun. He combed my hair and would always say silly things like 'Kianarix don't eat rocks past 8pm' or something. I'll miss his grumpy Vulcan face or when he would tell me I'm cooking kreyla bread wrong," He said with a deep frown on his face and a sad storm in his heart.

"Kianarix... I know it's hard but.. I don't think Lun ever really loved you," Renakir said, patting Kianarix on the back now. He felt bad that this poor boy had spent the majority of his life being used by other people, whether it was to make the Rylov family look more charitable or for whatever ulterior motives Lun had, Kianarix hadn't really had a chance to live for himself.

"... W-What about Eshen?" Kianarix asked, looking at Renakir still with tears in his eyes. He was thankful his fiance was nice, but he also wasn't sure who he could trust aside from Renakir and the Reman Torre'vnaus.

1

"I think Eshen likes you, genuinely. He isn't the type to manipulate others just for fun," Renakir reassured Kianarix. They may not have been engaged for love nor was Renakir even planning to pursue a romantic relationship with the other Romulan-Reman, but he was serious about wanting to form a strong friendship to show Kianarix what healthy relationships should look like. That also included introducing him to his friends whom he had a lot of trust in. Eshen, Allan, even Saren, they all were good people who Renakir knew would never take advantage of Kianarix's good nature.

1

"Oh o-okay, I believe you," Kianarix felt bad for relying so much on Renakir when he knew his fiance had a job and friends of his own. He just didn't have many skills to live independently, not when he had been taken care of his whole life. Whether it was his Reman family as refugees or in the Rylov house. He had always been told what to do and when to do it that now with his freedom of choice he was at a loss. "Will Kali-fal Madeleine be at home?"

"Resume course," Renakir instructed the lift, not taking his eyes off of Kianarix once."She should be. I told one of my colleagues to bring her back before we arrived so she could greet us," He told Kianarix, hoping that the thought of his fluffy daughter waiting for them at home would put Kianarix at ease. The lift soon stopped and the doors opened. Renakir separated from Kianarix and the two headed out towards the corridor.

As he walked into the turbolift, he figured he'd finally ask -someone- about something nearly a year after he'd thought about it. "Drydock," he'd said, turning to Five as he leaned against the wall of the turbolift, "do you ever think these things could use some sort of... soft background music?"

Their anxiety spiked along with the steady rising of the turbolift... "Definitely," they agreed, folding their arms behind their back. "It could help with tension, or make foe comedic timing." Haha. Comedy.

2

The lift went up, up up... only for it to suddenly stop and open it's doors, revealing Saren - who blinked, not expecting the amount of people inside, his gaze briefly lingering over Allan. "... I hope you don't mind," he said quietly. "I need to head to the drydocks."

3

"We do as well." Five nodded, woefully oblivious. "I don't mind at all."

"Totally," he agreed completely with Five. And then Saren walked in! Wow! "Absolutely not!" Allan said with a grin, scooting over a little to the side to make room for the other. "Whaddya think? Background music in the lifts?"

"Is this a poll now..?" Or the beginnings of a petition? Five tipped their head a little.

3

The turbolift nyoomed to the next person who'd called it opened, and there he was! The Captain himself! Crammed like a sardine between a bunch of tall people. "...Oh boy."

7

4

!!!!! SHIT AUTHORITY. DON'T PANIC. "Captain," Five greeted politely, keeping their gaze down.

4

5

Following the captain was the ACTO! Adding to the sardine tin! "Oh well, good thing I'm not claustrophobic."

4

Allan shrugged. "If you want it to be. More just trying to generate some conver-" and then the Captain'd walked in. Shit, this was a lot of people in one turbolift. He did the little head tip he picked up from Five earlier in his direction and scooted over, yet again... because surely there'd be more people to come. "Captain," he echoed. "Definitely a lot of room in this..." And then Aoife. "Okay, yeah, this is getting a bit- yeah."

2

Five is claustrophobic. Help. "Do you all think we should have background music in the turbolift?" They inquired curiously. Head tip ^2.

4

Oh fuck no. He pressed himself in the corner, wishing he could somehow seep through it out of the crowded space. Too soon--

6

7

“Oh! Hello everyone!” Jamis exclaimed with the Captain and the other Lieutenant. “Saren! I know you! How goes it? This is exciting!”

Yes, exciting. They are definitely not full of dread at the moment. Not at all.

Five keeping their gaze down wouldn't help when Mo was 5'2. He was actually liked closed spaces, though. "To the #drydock we go, then." And so the elevator nyoomed there before anyone else could have a chance to get in.

6

The captain is much smaller than both Five and the roleplayer expected. But here we go!

Hearing himself be addressed, his gaze shifted to the newcomer: "... Where from?.." Actually, bad question. Most people who he had not interacted with before had a rather poor pool of choices, on of them including his infamous almost-murder. Yep, this was terrible, and it wasn't even his instinctive paranoia - though that, too, was fucking him up right now, and somehow the presence of people he actually knew was making it worse.

Allan's gaze followed across the lift from Five to ... Saren, and he gave a small head tilt to see if he could get the other's attention, while sort of giving Five's shoulder a light squeeze. "I personally think it would be neat, Five, but - you'd have to tailor it pretty specifically. Different hearing preferences and all that."

Yeah, he got the whole 'I thought you'd be taller in person' thing a lot. He exited into #drydock . As should all of you. Everyone get out.

4

Eeegh physical interaction. They sank down a little. "True," they agreed, before sneaking out of Allan's hold and into #drydock.

Fresh air, thank the Hell-- Saren was quick to follow Mo into the #drydock, like a long but equally pointy shadow of his. He did want to acknowledge some people here and at least do a little bit of talking, but the 4/10 turbolift drive did throw him off. Maybe later...

Right. They could maybe make a petition later, he actually knew how to write those now thanks to a certain boyfriend of his. Out the turbolift he went, following along behind everyone else into the #drydock .

Finally Aoife left and headed to #drydock

Varal and his son entered the turbolift in what initially was silence, silence broken as the duo turned to face the doors and the man turned. "Want me to say it or would you like to?" He'd asked.

Despite his having, by this point found that something had transported butterflies into his stomach, his response arrived promptly. Promptly enough it it all honesty surprised him a bit, hadn't some mystical force glued his mouth shut earlier when the butterflies came? "Entertainment complex!" He'd responded after a quick glance at his pad as he checked to see where lessons were today. Once the turbolift arrived there he hugged his adoptive father and dashed out with a quick goodbye before his feet could glue themselves to the floor.

With the hug returned with a smile and after he'd wished his adoptive son a good day at school, Vara'l briefly considered his options before he requested "Environmental ring please." And eventually stepped out.

Having returned to the same turbolift, the Romulan asked. "Constabulary deck" And eventually stepped out upon his arrival there. He'd then headed out into the corridor and from there to the CTO's office where he'd then proceeded to have his 'meeting with the boss'.

Vara'l entered the turbolift calmly and proceeded to request "Environmental Ring."

"Entertainment complex please."

“Well, it’s good you ended up selling sausages instead of doing war crimes. Less war crimes in the galaxy is always good.” Ace said, still wearing his characteristic smile. As for meeting Lhi, it really was a happy coincidence. They just ran into each other at the mess hall. “Oh, we just met each other at the mess hall. Plus, we were at the final party of sorts in the events hall. We sat under the table and ate crackers. Good times.”

"Less war crimes in the galaxy does sound good! Someone shoulda told that to the Tal Shiar before the whole shabang!" Vrilh said, making a little 'explosion' gesture with his hands. Upon doing so he noticed the very uncomfortable look he got from his son as they were stepping into the turbolift and quickly retracted his hands and slumped his shoulders. "Ehh," He shot Lhi and apologetic smile and a little wave, but it didn't seem to really do much to calm the liberated Borg. As the doors closed, Vrilh instinctually reached to pull his son closer into the lift so he wouldn't get caught between the doors. "Oh sounds great! Under a table? Like a little club, I like that!" Vrilh said with a smile as he glanced at Ace and then his son who was eerily quiet. He couldn't have that! So he continued to babble. "You're......... Not Romulan," Vrilh looked at Ace, stating a very obvious fact as he seemed to be pondering over the other's species. "Ace..... Ace... That sounds... Oh, don't tell me-- CARDASSIAN! Wait no those guys have like.. Scales. Elements, uh, Bajoran! Vidiian? Chelon Rigelian? Deltan?" Vrilh was clearly just spitting out some random species.

Lhi entered the turbolift with his roommate and father. He was caught off guard when his father suddenly grabbed his arm and pulled him further into the lift. The sudden physical contact along with the very unsavoury Supernova mention caused visible discomfort on his face, but he didn't say anything for fear of causing a bad impression or distressing Ace who was so nicely accompanying them to their quarters.

Welp, maybe that wasn’t the best joke for Vrilh to say, gauging Lhi’s reaction. Supernova jokes were sensitive after all. As they should be, whole planets got blown up and many people died. But it wasn’t really Ace’s place to decide, he was a human after all. He noticed that Lhi was quiet. But Lhi definitely wasn’t as outgoing as him. “Yeah, like a little fort. But yep, I’m not Romulan. Or Cardassian, or any of the others that you just said. I’m a human.” Ace thought having two spines would be cool, but he wasn’t a Rigelian. Also finding chairs was hard with two spines. “So, Lhi, do you wanna go to any of the restaurants here with me?”

"Human! Oh, I love humans! I've always wanted to go to Earth! I heard about some of your wonderful inventions. Deletham, did you know humans invented canned bread! Absolutely amazing invention!!" Vrilh exclaimed, speaking way too loudly for the space they were in. Although there was no issue fitting all three of them in the lift, a calm voice would have sufficed to be properly heard. The lift was also not moving so there wasn't like they had to talk above any ambient noise. Vrilh let go of Lhi at this point, seeing how his son didn't seem to like the physical contact even if it was just touching his arm.

"I know of canned bread," Lhi replied to his father, giving him a nod before his focus shifted to Ace. "A restaurant... That would be good," Lhi was expecting to go back to his quarters but maybe a restaurant was a good idea. He fiddled his his braid and looked down at the floor, clearly not doing it too well with the social interaction at the moment. He was always shy like this, but something about having his dad around made him feel more overwhelmed. "What sort of restaurants are there? Maybe... somewhere quiet?" He asked, thinking if they went to a more mellow place that would also be a hint to his father to take his excitement down a notch.

“Canned bread? I’ve never heard of that. I like normal bread though. Especially toast with a little garlic butter, it’s delicious. But I’d have to say my favorite food is pork tacos, for sure. Or barbecue ribs. It’s hard to pick!” Ace would eat anything if he was hungry enough though. And right now, Ace was pretty hungry. He thought of what quiet restaurants there were. But he remembered T’Asha’s excited rant about some restaurant on 777, that it was quiet. “Hm, quiet. I think there’s only one quiet restaurant, it’s a Vulcan restaurant called Surak Snacks I think. My friend said it was good.”

"I have NO idea what any of those things are, but they do sound good!" Vrilh said with a loud laugh, earning him yet another perturbed look from his son. He took a deep breath and leaned against the wall, gripping the support railing with both hands. Vrilh wasn't trying to annoy his son, he was just very excited to to see him again and to meet his friend!

"We can go there. Um food court deck," Lhi gave the order to the lift that soon began to move. He stood a little closer to Ace as the lift made its way to their destination. Light green eyes shifted towards the closed doors and then to his dad who looked very chill just hanging out with them. Briefly the thought crossed his mind if they were overloading the lift, three people seemed like a lot. "I like Vulcan food, we had a lot of it in the Republic. Have you had it, Ace?" Lhi asked, still fiddling with his braid a little. His right hand moved nimbly whilst his left hand only made slower movements, showing the vast difference in dexterity between them. It was because his assimilation tubules-- or well the implant that once housed them was on his left hand. It was also why he couldn't close his hand all the way.

“Uh, toast is bread but you cook it a second time so it’s crunchy. And barbecue ribs are like.. the ribs of a pig, cooked with heat and smoke in a smoker, and covered in this sort of sweet sauce, they’re really good.” And messy, of course. Ace could devour a rack of ribs right about now. And some corn on the cob. And an iced coffee. Damn, he was hungry. He didn’t even want to drop his bags off, he just wanted food. Plus, he could drag his stuff around for a bit. He wasn’t THAT weak. He notice the difference between Lhi’s left hand and right hand. Ace’s hands were both very nimble and delicate. They were meant for typing at light speed. “I’ve never had it. I know a lot of Terran food though. Oh, and I know some Romulan foods too. Like Hlai’vnau wings.” He didn’t butcher the pronunciation, he actually said it quite well. He didn’t know many words in Rihannsu though.

"No idea what a pig is, but the ribs sound good!" Vrilh replied with a smile. The food sounded good, he would have to try it out sometime-- maybe in his travels! Without know what 'pig' was, he couldn't really imagine what the taste would be like, but they certainly had ribs on Mol'Rihan-- and other parts of Romulan space. * "Eyy, Hlai'vnau wings? I love those! Ever try them with extra spice? SUPAH-NOVA SPICY!" *Vrilh said, not realising he was being extra loud when he said that. Thankfully, or maybe not thankfully, the doors to the lfit opened up as soon as he said that. 'Supernova' was definitely not a word anyone should shout on a Starbase so close to Romulan space.

Lhi quickly shuffled out of the lift and towards #corridor-08. He was pretending his father did not just say that in public on his new starbase. Well, thankfully he didn't look anything like Vrilh so maybe people wouldn't realise they were related. ”Where is Surak Snacks? Maybe you should lead the way, Ace," Lhi said as he took a step behind Ace to let his friend be their guide.

"Entertainment section." Shane said as he stepped into the lift.

"Entertainment Section please..." He mumbled once he stepped inside.

Vara'l entered the Turbolift with a small person carried upon his shoulders enjoying the snack he'd stolen. The Romulan all smiles as he glanced up at the younger Tr'Hara and pulled a exaggerated 'sad face' as Telim sometimes called it. "And you call me the meanie, when I nick one of your snacks." He chuckled.

"Thats cause I'm a growing person and you're not!" The kid declared at that with a grin before he proceeded to say. "Civilian quarters please!"

He stepped on the lift and quickly gave his destination, ready for what was to come. “Transporter room!” (edited)

Vara'l stepped into the turbolift and after he cleared his throat to try and get rid of 'the frog in it', requested. "Transporter room."

As soon as he reached the lift, he turned around to make sure that Lokka was close behind. He had no doubt they had followed him, but there were a substantial amount of people out and about that day. Although it was the end of his shift, it was the beginning of the next one, meaning traffic around the shuttlebay was higher than usual.

Fortunately, they were tall enough to follow Alizati with their eyes from over most people's heads. They found the lift with ease, almost as if they already knew where it was. Really, they were just following the signs in the halls after they knew where the two were headed. But.... they're not exactly sure what's supposedly so dangerous about this lift, and why Vulcans in particular....

"Junior crew quarters," Alizati said his command to the lift as he stood close to one side, allowing Lokka to occupy the other. He seemed as calm as ever, eyes forward, not breathing or blinking as he always neglected to do. Most members of his department were already fully aware of their boss' quirks so he didn't see it as odd. He found comfort that even if he was some hideous robotic monster, his department would probably still gladly call him 'boss', Allan especially. "What made you choose engineering?" Alizati asked, wanting to know a little more about his new colleague. He read their file, but here was something that a text document on a PADD screen simply could not convey. He also cared a lot about making connections and building rapport with his division.

They gave the other engineer plenty of space. They actually haven't used many turbolifts before, Valencrao Beta only had one level on the largest of buildings, and Starfleet was their first exposure to the technology. They'll get used to it quickly, though. "I was a shuttle mechanic on Valencrao Beta. I am only continuing my duty in a more favorable environment."

"That is logical," Alizati stated, slightly wishing he got a more personal answer, but technically the engineer did reply appropriately to his question. He turned his head slightly so he could look at them as he spoke. "What was Valencrao Beta like? I am unfamiliar with it," He decided to ask, his voice steady and words slow. Alizati stood in the lift with his hands clasped behind his back, standing with perfect posture too. The sounds of the lift were no more than a soft hum, it seemed like everything was working property. He was still going to ask a couple engineers to check the sensors though, one could never be too sure.

"It was a research colony, deep in uncharted Alpha Quadrant space." A slight pause. It's a difficult subject for Lokka to talk about, like taking a pickaxe to a cracked reservoir. "It was established to study ancient temporal anomalies and evidence of civilization we found on the planet's surface. Valencrao Beta is a class-M planet, habitable by human standards. We found only a trace of long-gone civilization."

"I see," Was what Alizati offered as a repsonse intially. He sensed slight discomfort when the other spoke about it as indicated by the pause. Or perhaps they were unsure how to go about describing the place? Either way, Alizati got the feeling they were not too interested in speaking in depth about the place and he was going to respect that. "It sounds like you were doing good work there nonetheless. Temporal anomalies sounds dangerous," Alizati stated, not looking at Lokka straight on, but still facing them. "I understand you are a shuttlecraft engineer, but is there any particular job or project you would like to try whilst on this station? I want to make sure all of my fellow officers feel challenged and confident in their work," Alizati was planning on holding an engineering department meeting soon so hearing what his colleagues wanted to work on would make task assignment a lot easier.

1

"Temporal anomalies are dangerous. They were highly dangerous to us at the outpost, especially..." They were suddenly hit by that guilt again... they had only survived the incident that wiped that whole colony because they selfishly chose to take one of the shuttles alone for flight testing, just when the researchers needed them the most. Had they only returned an hour sooner, not as many would've died that day. Maybe there would be others to talk about Valencrao Beta and their findings.... "My main efforts in the outpost involved keeping our aging tech relevant and operational. Valencrao Beta was clearly not one of our supply chain's priorities." They kept trying to distract themself off the subject. It's not working. Their mood has visibly and audibly shifted, something more solemn and cold.

Alizati raised an eyebrow when the other Vulcan began to speak more about the outpost. Although the other didn't vocalise it, Alizati got a sense for what sort of danger Lokka spoke of. He read about it in the other's file, although there was not that much information aside from it was part of their early life. "If it is retro tech you are knowledgable in, we have a lot of likeminded officers, including myself," Did this mean they would be open to seeing the Furberus? That would be a conversation for another time, but he hoped they would be. "Do you know about terran retro tech?" He asked, thinking it would probably be best to get off of the subject of the colony as he sensed it was... Discomforting.

Probably would be interested in the ship. They're always interested in stuff like that. Fascinated, if you must. "How retro? Are you familiar with the 20th century?" There, keep away from bursting that dam. Quaint curiosities were a much better subject for Lokka.

"Yes, I know quite a bit about the tech from that era, although my knowledge is mainly focused in Vulcan, Romulan, and terran tech. I would not be opposed to learning about tech from other cultures though," Alizati stated, curious what it was about the 20th century that interested Lokka as well. He also wondered if, being Vulcan, Lokka's 20th century knowledge was in Vulcan tech because if so, them and Alizati would have quite a bit to talk about. He remembered searching through numerous childrens toys designs when he was constructing the Furberus, only to settle on the terran 'Furby' toy. "And one of our colleagues I know also enjoys 20th century tech, of the terran variety though. I heard he recently created what was called a 'boom box'," Alizati said, briefly hearing about Allan's latest creation. It was actually a replica of a music box, but Kianarix did not exactly have the clearest of memories.

"The process by which humans developed their warp technology around that era is most fascinating. The desire to break yet another so-called "impossible" speed barrier appears to have hit many cultures at once, inlcuding ours." It seems, at least for now, they are wholly unaware of this development known as the Furberus. Perhaps a direct mention of the ship would catch the engineer's interest?

The lift soon stopped at #deleted-channel and Alizati looked towards Lokka and gestured for them to go first. "This is very true. There are some cultures who had achieved faster than light travel before warp drives like the Bajorans. I have always been in awe of their engineering capabilities, one of the finest in the galaxy for their time," Alizati stated, always interested in primitive tech. "Perhaps if there is time later I could introduce you to a few others who also like retro tech, there are quite a few of us, including the station commander himself. He is quite adept at engineering," Alizati briefly remembered when the Captain had saved his 'life' (more like his consciousness). He still needed to think of some way to repay him. "Your quarters should be down the corridor. You go by a mononym, just Lokka, is that correct?"

"It appears the preservation of dated equipment is rather important around here. I believe the expression you could relate to is "I look forward to doing the same" They turned back one last time before disappearing into their room. "I hope you understand that my other names would be quite difficult for most here to pronounce."

He watched as Lhi seemed to ‘buffer’ for a moment, most likely trying to parse out his dialect, which as far as he knew was definitely one of the more…unique amongst the already quite diverse array dialects within Rihannsu. “Weird! I’ll let someun’ know that tha’ turbolift is glitchin’ out, wouldn’t want anyun’ tuh’ get hurt cuz’ of it!” He said, stepping into the lift, slightly wary of the fact he was in such close proximity to another Romulan he had just met, but did it anyway, his want to socialize overriding his cooked-in paranoia. He chuckled, nodding along as Lhi spoke about history. “Well same here, but I reckon’ tha’ next best thing is studyin’ it…that and tha’ holodeck acourse’!” He appreciated the calm, relaxed presence of the other Romulan and hoped that future interactions with other members of the crew would be as pleasant as this one.

Lhi stepped into the lift and stood on the opposite side as Jaroth. Not because he was paranoid, but so he could hold onto one of the support railings. "Maybe we can ask OPS! They do turbolifts," Lhi said, using all his strength to raise his voice at the end of his phrases. He brought his other hand up to fiddle with the ends of his braid, gently pulling at the loose strands. Lhi's hair was all over the place, messy as usual, but silky smooth! Under the messy strands of purple his features were soft, with some scarring around his optical implants and along his jawline. "That's true! I don't really do many programmes besides the foraging ones though. I get sidetracked when I try to do historical stories," Lhi said, remembering that one time he had attempted to play a story based on the life and times of Chinese Empress Wu Zetian and he ended up not playing through the story, but trying to woo one of the handsome men in her court. "What made you wanna study history?"

“OPS? Gotcha! I’ll put in a ticket when a’ get to ma’ quarters!” He said with a resolute nod, making a mental note to familiarize himself with the inter-station communications and how to reach the various departments. He tried to be polite and not stare, but he couldn’t help but be fascinated with the purple hue to the other Romulan’s hair, which in a totally aesthetic appreciation way, but also really wanting to dye his own hair that color way as well. “Might a’ ask whur’ ya’ got that fancy dye job on ur’ hair? Whoever did it was purty’ much a master at doin’ it it seems!” He asked, now caught with the sudden urge to dye his hair again. He chuckled, nodding as Lhi spoke. “Oh I hear that! Sometimes I get real caught up like in tha’ historical figures, even knowin’ they might not be as accurate as they’d be portrayed in historical texts!” He thought back to a recent program he had ran where he had gotten to interact with Captain Archer and had ended up asking the holographic recreation of the famous former Captain and Federation President tonnes of inane questions rather than progressing the program to the end. “Well, a’ pose’ its cuz’ I was given lotsa’ free reign as a kid, and a’ spent alotta’ time in tha’ library, always caught up in some story of battles long past n’ tha’ like, and I like knowing how we got tuh’ where we are now. What made ya’ wanna be a cartographer?”

Lhi nodded when Jaroth said he would put in a ticket with OPS. He was glad the other was going to do it because Lhi was always unsure what to write on there besides 'it's broken'. He had gotten a few stern messages from OPS not to be so vague with his requests, but he really couldn't help it! "My.... Dye?" Lhi turned his head to stare at Jaroth for a few seconds as his mind was trying to process what the other meant. After nearly a minute if Lhi.exe 'buffering' he responded with, ”I did it myself! It's very therapeutic!" He told the other, his voice raising slightly at the end of his sentence. "You just take a hair dye machine and pull your hair through it! It's very simple!" Lhi liked the process of dying hair as well becaues it helped him with his dexterity. "That is true, I don't know much about historical figures outside of Romulan history," Lhi's only school experience was on Romulus under the Star Empire and the history education was unfortunately not very diverse. He knew of some alien cultures, but never in depth, and even if it had come up, young Lhi (Deletham) was not exactly very open minded. He liked hearing about how Jaroth was inspired to go into history, what a cool field! "We don't really remember," Lhi admitted as he leaned against the wall so he could use both hands to fiddle with his braid and the cable that hung from his implant. "Our parents said it was our dream since childhood and when we tried it again, we found it really fun!" It was a good thing he didn't remember the original reason as his views on the galaxy as a child were actually rather problematic. "Do you only study Federation history? Or Romulan? Because I know some stuff about Romulan history."

Jaroth couldn't hide the soft grin that made its way to his usually placid countenance, watching Lhi buffer was something that even the most cold-hearted would find pleasantly amusing. "Oh, you use a machine for tha' dyein'? Interestin'! I've always gone with tha' herbal route that ma' Mother used back home, maybe I'll give this fancy dyer-majig a try!" He said, eyebrows raising with excitement, and thought at what color he would go for next...maybe good ol' fashioned Romulan green... "Y'know, I've heard that from alotta' people who grew up in tha' Empire, I reckon' they weren't to liable tuh' teach bout' all tha' diversity and wonder tha' rest of tha' galaxy had tuh' offer...buncha' veruuls tha' lot of em'!" He said, shaking his head in frustration for the less than stellar historical education standards that particular regime had. "Well ain't that neater n' a rorse's tookus! I imagine chartin' stuff could be so neat. History n' stellar cartography ain't so different really, we both explore tha' universe, just in different ways!" He said excitedly, nodding as he spoke, glad to be able to 'talk shop' so soon after arriving. "All history is ma' domain! A' course Romulan and Federation history is ma' areas of more knowledge, cuz' thats what I grew up with, but I also find Klingon, Kzinti and Breen history quite somethin' too!"

Lhi had to pause yet again to process the other's accent. The lights on his implants beeped and there was a very soft hum coming from all of the mechanical bits on him. "My dexterity is very low so I need the machine if I am to do it properly," Lhi explained, not too versed in the 'natural' method of dying hair, but a lot of traditional methods of doing things were not suited for him. He didn't like relying on technology so much, but seeing his father-- who was never Borg, openly embrace assistive tech, as well as many others using proesthetics and VISORS and such, he felt less embarrassed by it. "We couldn't really do much about it," Lhi responded to the comment about growing up in the Empire. Although he understood that it was very problematic and not a happy environment, he still missed it and hearing this guy call them 'veruuls' honestly made him a little sad. "And that's the only education I had..." Lhi added with a very subtle drop in tone. He was going to give Jaroth the benefit of the doubt, he was probably young and just never experienced the Empire first hand. He quickly tried to shift his focus to the other topic. "We are, I like exploring a lot. My dad just started a new umm.. Job? As a treasure hunter," Lhi wondered how Vrilh was doing, his very eccentric father who was setting on quite the mission. "Oh you grew up on... A Federation allied colony?"

Jaroth realized that he had fully as the Humans said ‘put his foot in it’, at seeing the sad look on Lhi’s face after the slightly insensitive remarks he made regarding the Empire, realizing that his critique of the government of his people’s past might not be the same view that all Romulans held. Perhaps it was being raised by such staunchly anti-imperial parents that made him think that way, or, more troublingly, it was his entrenched way of thinking that was the culprit. With a slight bow of his neck, he turned toward the elder. “I ‘pologize, ma’ words were…insensitive, I’ll work tuh’ recognize ma’ bias more, I know that for some tha’ Empire was all you knew and all you had.” He said solemnly, before exhaling and replacing his expression with a more neutral one, embarrassed. “Treasure hunter? Wow! Ain’t that neat! He found anything cool?” He asked, curious as to if there were any historical relics, and intrigued by what sounded to be a very interesting job. “Yeah, Sadall is way out in tha’ sticks, an’ after tha’…y’know, it grew pretty close ties to tha’ Federation, even hosts a Federation diplomatic outpost an’ a Starfleet recruiting station!”

Lhi nodded at Jaroth's apology, happy that the other realised there are other experiences in the Empire besides the obvious negative ones. The government was corrupt for sure, but that didn't mean everyone in the society agreed with it. There was very little a normal citizen could do, especially when any deviation from what the government propaganda machine told people to think would send the secret police knocking at your door. "It's okay, umm... A lot of people don't know what it was really like," Lhi said, assuming that Jaroth probably just had very rebellious parents, something Lhi certainly could not relate to. All three of his parents were very proud citizens of the Empire who had only realised the error in their thinking when they were reunited with Lhi and saw how the 'Empire' treated their son. "I don't think so, he would have said something. He's trying to find... The razor of S'Task, it apparently gives a very clean shave," Lhi repeated his father's words, staring straight ahead now as he was attempting to collect his thoughts. He did this from time to time, just spent way too long 'buffering'. "Oh... Close to the Federation. It sounds nice. I'm from... We're from Devoras colony, it was deep within Romulan space. We had a lot of freedom there though, I... was only on Romulus for a few years unm.... Before I left," Lhi said, not entirely sure how to go about explaining why he just suddenly 'left' Romulan space without mentioning the Borg. "Why did you choose Starfleet?" Lhi asked. always interested in hearing why other Romulans chose to serve another faction and not their own.

He nodded, once again deferentially bowing his head in respect to Lhi's lived experience "I reckon' younger people jus' aren't educated enough 'bout tha' realities of life in tha' Empire, both bad an' good." Despite his open views, he did wish his parents might have taught him a little less biased and a little more thoroughly, even with their strong opinions. "A clean shave?" He asked, deadpan for a moment before chuckling. He shook his head, collecting himself once again. "Ain't that somethin' though! I bet he has a whole bucket a' fun!" "I ain't ever heard a' Devoras, must be a long ol' way from ma' colony. We should compare notes on colony livin' sometime for sure." He said, realzing that they hadn't been moving the whole time. With a press of the control, the lift started to whisk them off toward the junior crew quarters corridor. "Well, a' chose Starfleet cuz' a' spent alotta' time 'round Starfleet officers growin' up, and I figured it was a good way tuh' put ma' skills n' interests tuh' use. Whattabout' you?" (edited)

"Not a lot of people are alive to talk about it," Lhi commented with a slightly sad look as he thought about all the people who never made it off of Romulus. He hated himself for not being around to experience the tragedy, not that he wanted to live through it, but he felt... Empty, to not have that shared experience. "He has some buckets I think," Lhi was not entirely sure what Jaroth was talking about so he just assumed the other was saying his dad was fun, which he was! When he wasn't accidentally being insensitive. "We are a long way from Devoras," Lhi said with a nod and a soft sigh. "But the colony isn't really habitable anymore umm..... Yeah," Lhi's voice trailed off as he was unsure how to properly phrase what he wanted to say. He looked left and right when he heard the sound of the lift begin to hum-- that's right, neither of them gave a location for the lift to travel. Well, it seemed Jaroth took care of that. "That makes sense! I chose Starfleet because I want to see more things. I... Was in the Republic for a little bit but... To be honest a feel a little uncomfortable around them," As Lhi said that he shifted about, his posture was straight, but his head was angled downwards and he looked a bit unsettled. "I miss home sometimes.... My.. Fiance and my father are on Mol'Rihan. Do you have family living there or is everyone still on your colony?" Lhi asked, tilting his head to look at Jaroth. "And we don't know if we have much to say about colony life because we... Don't have many memories of Devoras."

Deciding to let the subject of the Empire drop, sensing that it was most likely a very difficult topic, he plastered on a soft smile, nodding along as Lhi spoke. “Ah, well…” He trailed off, mindlessly running a hand through the long curly hair on his neck, thinking more about dyeing it, and possibly getting it cut into a different style, who knows, he might try for the traditional hairstyle that so many other Romulans seemed to like sporting. “Oh! Similar reasons tuh’ me then! I had also though bout’ joinin’ tha’ Republic Navy, but that quickly passed ma’ mind, seein’ that ma’ world is so close tuh’ tha’ Federation. I’ve even heard rumors that tha’ governing council might petition tha’ Federation for membership!” He said happily, thinking about what it would be like for his homeworld to be an official member of the Federation, how it might change the day-to-day lives of his people. “Oh! I’ve heard Mol’Rihan is gettin’ tuh be quite tha’ place! How do both of em’ like it? Also, congrats on your plans tuh’ be wed!” He said happily, clapping slightly in cheers as he spoke, having a momentary bout of loneliness…maybe he’d make a spacetinder account while he was posted here. “All of my immediate and extended family lives on Sadall, and has since tha’ colony was founded in tha’ early 21st century, though, it would be nice to spend some time ‘round some of our people from tha’ homeworld, I’d love tuh’ hear firsthand accounts of what it was like!”

Lhi was absentmindedly swaying back and forth, now with both hands gripping the side bar for support as he did this action. He was listening to Jaroth, but his eyes seemingly wandered around the corners of the lift. He didn't make any comment about the way the other started saying something but his voice trailed off. He assumed Jaroth was just going to change the subject from the Empire which was fair. Lhi always felt awkward talking to younger folks about it, even if he felt like he was a young folk himself. ”Are you? But you're Romulan..." Lhi said, expressing his honest opinion with a brief expression of surprise. "I guess it's what you want to do..." Lhi wasn't going to make any further comment on what a colony wanted to do, however he wasn't a fan of colonies that had been historically Romulan, suddenly switching factions. He understood there was a lot of Federation people there too but... If the colony joined, that would expand the Federation's boarders and, ah, there was a lot of issues he had with that. He liked being allies, but... Hearing what Jaroth said just didn't feel right to him, but he wasn't sure why. "Umm... My dad is going on a road trip and my fiance umm.. He hasn't been able to see a lot of stuff," Lhi thought that would be the best way to explain the fact that Miral was in prison. "A really old colony, I see," Lhi wondered what that meant when it came to conflicts with the Federation. Surely Sadall was on the front lines there, it sounded scary. Lhi was glad his family lived on Devoras for most of their existence, a few members served in the Navy and he briefly remembered his dad saying they had a member in a very high government position, one who sat right beside the Praetor. Not sure about that though, Lhi learned to take everything his father said with a big grain of salt. * "It's not scary living so close to the border? But we have had a lot of conflicts..." *Lhi mentioned, looking at Jaroth for a moment. (edited)

And just like that, the turbolift stopped but the doors didn't open. The curse of turbolift two returns.

4

Jaroth chuckled awkwardly, once again running a hand along the back of his neck as his eyes roved around the turbolift, anything to keep his mind occupied. "Yeah, this is generally why a' don't really talk politics much, ma' world is a bit...fringe with its political beliefs compared tuh' most of our people." The more he talked to Lhi, the more he started to realize just how far from the norm his colony was, and while one could look at the historical realities from a distance, able to see how there were others that had such beliefs, they were sparse, and rare amongst the countless others that fit into the proverbial 'box' much better. He would never know what it was to be raised in a traditional Romulan style, with traditional Romulan values and beliefs, possibly one of the reasons he wasn't really able to connect with Lhi on many things. His colony was old, weird, and on the border with what used to be a bitter enemy, no wonder his compatriots, and himself were in fact, the way they were. "I'm glad thur' both able tuh' explore an' see mor' a' tha' world! I reckon they're gonna come across some amazing sights an' important places! Hopefully they send ya' lotsa' pictures!" He said, happy to shift towards a lighter subject for a moment, to brighten the atmosphere, even for a moment. x_divider

02:09

"Fortunately, by tha' time I came 'round, things were relatively calm, an' mosta' tha' people from ma' world find bein' so close to tha' Federation a comfort, much as some of the older generations find that distasteful." When the turbolift lurched to a stop, but the doors didn't open, Jaroth grimaced slightly, unbeliving of his back luck at things already starting to go wrong 15 minutes into his time aboard. Slightly impatiently, he pressed the control to open the door with a bit more force, and the doors did open...but only by a centimeter at most. With a great exhale, he turned to Lhi, a look of resignation, mixed with humor at the sheer ridiculousness of the situation. "Do yuh' have any ideas on how tuh' get these open?"

"I really like our society how it is now, people are nicer and more open," Was Lhi's last comment to that, still not sure why any colony would want to switch factions. The fact that Jaroth's colony had lots of Federation people or at least was very friendly with them so much that they would want to switch... He pushed the thoughts away, not wanting to think of the political rammifications of such a move, it was something for senators to think about. "Yeah, they will, I think, my fiance especially likes sending me photos," Lhi said, realising he had not checked his comms inbox since shore leave. He was terrible at remembering to check his messages, absolutely terrible. He felt bad about it, especially knowing it gave his father anxiety waiting for his reply. "Oh I see, I don't think I would feel comfortable being close to the border but umm.. I think I just have bad experiences with it," Lhi fidgeted a little more as he spoke about it, specifically talking about his assimilation which happened on the outer fringes of Romulan space. When the turbolift stopped, Lhi didn't react at first until he saw Jaroth trying to pry the doors open. Lhi walked over to the doors, standing beside the taller man now. Lhi was shorter than Jaroth, not by a lot, but enough that he had to tilt his head upwards when they spoke. "Umm... We should call OPS," Lhi said as he tapped his comm badge. "Hi, OPS, Lieutenant Lhi erh'fvi," Lhi's tone changed suddenly when he spoke, sounding much more confident and less shaky than he usually sounded. "Turbolift two has stopped, can you help us?"

[COMMS] "Lieutenant Renakir tr'Torre'vnau, yeah hey can you describe your situation? Do not touch the doors or give any commands."

2

With a started look, Jaroth turned to Lhi after hearing not to touch anything, surprised at the fact that his first day on the station and things were already going wrong and breaking. "Uh...does this kinda' thang' happen alot 'round here?" He was not necessarily concerned about the lift being stuck, more about being stuck in a confined space with another Romulan that he had political disagreements with. If he wasn't so confident that neither of them were armed, he perhaps would be getting a little nervous at the moment...good old Romulan paranoia.

"This is the first time it's happened to me," Lhi replied as he looked left and right, trying to figure out what could be the problem. That's when he heard the reply of the OPS officer on duty and to his surprise, he was speaking Rihannsu! How lovely, they had another Romulan speaking with them. "Umm..... I don't know how to describe it.." Lhi replied to the stranger's voice over the comms channel.

[COMMS] "Can you tell me which turbolift you're in and I hear someone else in there. Could you tell me the names of everyone in the lift with you as well? Also your destination and any weird sounds or things you noticed or are seeing currently?"

At the OPS officers questions, Jaroth spoke up, head angled to the ceiling as he always felt compelled to do with the disembodied voices over comms. "Howdy! We're in turbolift two! Ma' name is Ensign Jaroth tr'Vandu'kolav, a' jus' got here!" He said, trying to keep the chuckle out of his voice, finding the whole situation quite funny, despite the breakdown of the lift. "Well, we're actually at our destination, tha' junior crew quarters corridor, but tha' doors are stuck, they won't open a lick more! I ain't hear no funky noises though!"

Right as he spoke, the lift doors let out an ear-peircing screech, and slammed shut.

[COMMS] "Yeah, don't touch the doors-- alright well, Jaroth and Lhi, I'm going to try the trusty turn it off and turn it back on again. The lights are going to shut off for a moment but don't panic. After they turn on, you should be able to leave, but let me know if it's still stuck."

Lhi tilted his head as he listened to Jaroth explain the problem, thankful that he was the one who spoke up. He still struggled with the accent though so he wasn't entirely sure what Jaroth was actually saying. The OPS officer helping them seemed nice though, everyone on the station was incredibly nice and it put him at ease. "I can see in the dark, it's okay," Lhi said, prepared for the dimming of the lights.

And with that , the lights of the turbolift shut off for a few seconds before turning back on and the doors opening!

Before the lights shut off, he made sure to grab one of the handholds that ringed the lift car, grateful for them at the feeling of slight disorientation he felt when the lights blinked off, and then back on again. When the doors finally opened, he relased the breath he hadn't realized he'd been holding and turned to Lhi, leveling the other Romulan with a broad grin, hositing his duffle and saddle back onto his shoudlers. "Well, it was good meetin' ya' Sir! Hope next time we encounter one another, its not 'compnied by a breakdown!" He said with a soft chuckle, exiting the lift and stepping into the corridor. "Til' then!" He said, bowing his head from the neck and turning to make his way down the corrior, ready for a nap after all that they had gone through.

1

"Okay, thank you and see you around!" Lhi said with a wave to the younger man as he watched him walk out of the turbolift. Once he had left, the doors closed again and this time Lhi was going to get to his destination! "Senior crew quarters!" He said he command to the lift and it moved smoothly to its destination this time.

[COMMS] "I can see the lift is working alright now. I am not entirely sure what was wrong so I'm going to run some diagnostics after you reach your destination, thanks for your help Lieutenant."

1

"Engineering!"

Stepping into turbolift three, they stood to one side to let Ressa in as well. "Two minor injuries in a corridor with no further information. I wouldn't be surprised if a replicator or console malfunctioned." They speculated plainly.

Ressa also stepped into the turbolift. This was the cursed one, they thought. This lift was bad luck. But hey, whatever. They’d probably get through okay. She stared straight at the doors, not really letting anyone know what she was thinking. She nodded at their statement, not really wanting to talk. She still thought she was a bit of an idiot and didn’t want to say anything more that might make people think she hadn’t been working her ass off on the Rapture to learn to act like a real doctor.

Once their colleague was in the turbolift Quinn called for the appropriate deck code associated with the exact Engineering corridor they were headed to, before waiting for the lift to arrive at their destination. Once the doors opened, they stepped out.

Stepping into the tubolift, Alanna turned to one of the screens on the wall and manually set it to go to the engineering section. I mean she had tried to say it like everyone but her trauma didn't like that, so this was the next best thing.

He stepped into the turbolift, his expression unchanged. However the tips of his antennae did tremble slightly. "Engineering." Voris tapped his cane slightly while he waited. The doctor hurried out when the turbolift arrived to the destination.

[D} Comprello and the randy fellow had been walking for a while, from the junior crew corridor into the turbo lift entrance. Comprello was happy to be talking to somebody but at the same time hed did tall a lot. Comprello could hear his stomach rumbling it was very unsettling, but as the approached the turbo lift he felt glad that he can finally eat and randy stomach would stop rumbling. Comprello pressed the small control panel on the turbo lift as they waited for the lift.

He followed the other Ensign into the lift, feeling it jolt slightly as it started it's ascent. Unused to this particular turbolift's quirks just yet, Randy became uncharactristically quiet, mildly unnerved. Instead of making conversation, of which he could tell his fellow lift occupant quite disliked, he instead stood silently as they made their way to the food court promenade.

The lift jolted to a stop, the computer panel beeping twice, before it suddenly changed directions, heading laterally instead of vertically. It continued its course for only a few moments before it repeated the process and went back on its original course.

"What in tarnation?" He asked, mostly to himself, and stepped forward to get a close look at the display showing destination. Seeing that they were back heading to their original destination, he shrugged, thinking nothing more of it.

1

[D] The two went their separate ways after reaching the destination, shaken by the lift being creepy.

1

As he stepped into turblift two he made sure to stand to the side so the others could fit their trollys into the lift. It was a tight fit, but all three trollys fit somehow. "So... Tribble furs. What are these farms like? I would assume they have some selective breeding?"

"No selective breeding. They do it all natural, however most farms keep a supply of cannibal tribbles to keep the population down," Rurak said as he gave the top of the crate a good pat and that's when a loud hissing noise could be heard. "One, two-- wait we have a fourth crate!" Rurak exclaimed, realising that their most exotic products were not in the first three crates.

Renakir was going to make a comment about breeding tribbles without any sort of birth control, but he was interrupted by the second officer's brief panic. "No worries, the lift is full anyway, we can grab the fourth one on a second trip," Renakir reassured the man with a kind smile. "Commercial promenade," He said the command to the lift and it began to move.

"Oh good, thank you. The last crate is from a newer farm. They have developed a way to reverse neuter a tribble! Imagine that! Never thought you could undo it," Rurak laughed loudly and slapped the top of the crate. "I hear tribbles are illegal in the Federation so I think our products will be quite the hot commodity!"

"If not we can always give them to my friend Ik'ala, he deals with stuff like this!" Orlo chimed in as he lifted up one of the crate tops to see all of the furs packed neatly inside. He then let go of the top just as the doors to the lift were opening. "Oh, we're here!"

"Tribbles are actually legal, they just need to be neutered," Renakir told Rurak, suddenly very concerned about whatever method was used to 'unneuter' the tribbles who's fur they had packed in the crates.

"Are they? Well I think we should still get some buyers. I hear the cannibal tribble furs are rare here, I know those are certainly illegal in the Federation, at least as pets," Rurak was a little disappointed to hear that the tribble furs weren't going to be seen as exotic as he had hoped for, but he hoped the colourful patterns and diverse textures would still sell. When the doors opened he wheeled his crate off of the lift and into the promenade corridor.

Having finished letting off steam from a good work out session, a very welcomed break away from her typical work regimen, Jenaha stretched as she casually waltzed into the turbolift before wiping the sweat from her brow. "Senior Staff Quarters." She ordered as she quickly let out a deep breath, just a quick shower and a change of clothes, and she would be ready to get right back to work and continue the rest of the day.

The turbolift hummed but then all lights turned off, there was a soft voice from behind Jenaha.

"Are you here to play in the dark too?" The voice asked, it was-- Kianarix! He really blended in with the darkness of the night, dressed in what could only be described as a vantage point black body suit and a mask covering his face with only his light blue eyes visible.

She always had a sneaking suspicion of this turbolift in particular, knowing the number of instances it malfunctioned, the thought of putting it out of order for a proper repair has crossed her mind, but it was hard to tell whether the lift's behavior was due to an actual technical problem, or just plain superstition. The accounts of one of the ASCO's didn't do much to help clear anything up for her either. The lights cutting out all of a sudden very much surprised her, glad to have her ocular implant assist her in seeing through the darkness as she approached the turbolifts controls in an attempt to figure out what had happened. She was caught off guard for a quick moment when Kianarix's voice chimed in the silence of the room, stopping what she was doing to quickly turn towards his direction, fisticuffs raised defensively at first, but lowered not so soon after. "Not at the moment, I guess... maybe later-- what's with the stealthy get up?" She asked out of curiosity, her empathic abilities giving her a sense of relief of no threat.

"It's my halloween costume! I'm an Enderman!" Kianarix's arms extended up and he did a full body wave. He wasn't sure if this Starfleet officer could see in the dark, but he certainly could and he wiggled and wobbled, his ass hitting the bulkheads with a soft thud which stopped his movements. "Yeah!!! I love Halloween! This is so fun!" He said, blissfully unaware that this was not a planned incident.

2

3

"Ah mate, that's kinda cool! I love your costume!" Jena said with a smile and a chuckle as she gave herself a good look of the enderman costume, which actually made her think of what her own costume should be for halloween.That little trail of thought was interrupted when the captain's announcement was sounded, her positronic eye glowed a bright yellow in response to it. "We're now on yellow alert. You have to get to your quarters..." Jena said calmly as she approached the control panel in an attempt to bring power back online and get some sort of diagnostic as to what happened.

"Thanks! I love minecraft, it's a retro earth game!" In fact, Kianarix and Renakir played together when their schedules aligned. The seaweed haired Reman-Romulan was born post-Supernova so he didn't really have the experiences of being an actual miner. All he knew was the fun game where you could build houses and slap sheep. "O-Ohh-" Kianarix put his hands back by his sides when he heard the announcement as well. "Is yellow alert bad? Yellow is such a fun colour," He assumed it was something serious if he had to go to his quarters, but at the moment the lift was stuck so how was he to do that? That's when he noticed Jenaha fiddling with the control panel. "Oh! What are you gonna do to make the lift go?" He asked, not an engineer at all. He had seen his betrothed do some turbolift stuff, but it wasn't like he was paying attention and watching someone work did not qualify him to do said work.

1

"It is a very fun color, I love yellow. However in this case, it's a very concerning color and we should be more alert if something bad happens, but I feel it's going to be fine." Jena answered as she continued to make her work on the control panel, not sure what was going on outside, but getting Kianarix out safely was the priority for now. "I'm going to see if anything got damaged. It most likely might be something wrong with a power relay or a surge protector if it just stopped like this." Jena said as she attempted to diagnose the technical issue, hopefully enough to move the lift to the civilian quarters where Kianarix could be dropped off and she could switch to another lift. "When this is over, I'm going to report this to OPS, maybe they could do a better job at this than I could... do you have any family in the station?" she asked out of curiosity, something to pass the time.

"Oh, concerning colour. Like green?" Kianarix was familiar with how things happened on Romulan or Reman ships, but was pretty oblivious to Starfleet protocols. He watched as Jenaha worked, seemingly very intrigued by how she was working to fix the lift. "Ohh... the forbidden spaghetti," Kianarix said as his blue eyes peered over Janaha's shoulders to try and get a glimpse at the wires. "--Yeah! I do! He's the turbolift engineer in OPS! My fiance, Renakir! He's so cool, I am a little jealous he gets to play with the forbidden spaghetti all day," Kianarix wished he was more gifted in literally any other field. This boy was sadly only barely literate and didn't really have many skills outside one or two things "What's your job officer.... What is your name? I'm Kianarix ir-Levitasz tr'Rylov the Enderman!" He wiggled his body again, really getting into character.

1

"Eventide" Sadhbh stated clearly for the computer

"Airlock," Allan said after he'd entered the turbolift, and assuming no turbolift shenanigans occurred, he was rightfully brought to said airlock.

“Command quarters, now.”

"Nahhh, fuck that, didn't you literally eat like, four? I know I can't count that well, bro, but like, I know you also had baked beans, we were literally eating the same thing, dude," he shook his head as he entered the turbolift. "...quarters?" He asked it, and hoped it would just recognize his voice and assume which quarters deck he would be on. "Plus, bro, if I go first then like, it's done and over with and you won't have to deal with it at a more inconvenient time like right after you replicate a really good bologna and you realize you kind of just want to eat all of it in one go and then you kinda question it for a bit before you realize that yeah that might be a bad idea but bro it's such a good idea, actually."

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“Five actually!” He said with a grin, looking very proud of himself for having won the impromptu bean-off they’d had, not realizing the both of them would suffer for it later on…thankfully they didn’t have any roommates, that would be quite the introduction to them. Forrest stood there with a blank look on his face as his slow pea-brain tried to compute all Ceedar was saying. Not bothering to try and understand, he just smiled and nodded, watching the pretty lights of the lift as it whooshed towards their destination. “Yeah go for it bro! I wanna put up my sick posters anyway! I’m hoping the beds aren’t lumpy like on the Sunderbans, that one was like, totally bad for my delts!” He said, remembering just how unpleasant his bed was, that was until he swapped Ceedar’s for his about a month before they transferred to 777.

2

"Yeah... five..." he said, also not having a clue what that meant actually in the grand scope of the discussion and he just sort of looked at his brother looking at the lights and then also looked at the lights too, they sure seemed to be doing... something. Hopefully assisting in bringing them to their destination, but he didn't know how turbolifts worked. He just knew that they worked, except when they didn't. "Bro, that one fucking suuucked ass man, like, I get it, you gotta like, conserve space and all, but like c'mon, bro, you gotta like, at least invest some sort of comfortable mattress, right? Everyone knows that not sleeping comfy destroys your sleep bro, and then you get like, less uh, assistant? Effiffin? You like, don't work as well, man." He said as somehow, the turbolift brought them to the #senior-staff-corridor .

2

Vara'l stepped in and proceeded to say. "Eventide." Before he then settled in to wait. Once the turbolift then arrived, he stepped out again.

Vara'l entered the turbolift with the members of the team who'd joined him and once they'd all entered, proceeded to say. "Engineering section now, please." Once they then arrived, Vara'l stepped out with the team.

Allan walked into the turbolift, the second one, and, given that it was running, the only one as far as he was concerned. Leaning against the wall, he waited for like, the 30 seconds that the turbolift doors usually held themselves open for anyone else to come in before giving it the command, "command deck, please?"

Mephis slid in before the doors closed. Aha, look who is was! His favourite person and his favourite turbolift. "Funny, I'm going the same way - must be fate bringing us together." Romantic. He switched to professional mode and said, "How's the mission going, Lieutenant?"

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A soft smile came to his face as he saw the Captain walk into the turbolift, chuckling at what he proceeded to say. "Such a coincidence," he whispered, before sighing and crossing his arms as he felt the turbolift go upwards, "going as fine as it can with a hostage situation, I guess? Finding a bunch of parts that don't match up to our lists of stolen ones. Means there's there's a good amount of craft out there without inertia dampeners, warp core emergency shutoffs, and the like - you know, things that without them you can just immediately die or explode or both, you know, um," he took a deep breath and then looked down at Mo again with a smile, although it was less genuine and more to convince himself to look on a brighter side here. "It's good you're coming along, I'm sure an air traffic notice from a Captain sounds a lot more legit than from a Lieutenant, at least."

"That it will do," he said, the low hum of his voice almost matching the low hum of the turbolift. "Can't have all the shuttles out there with half their bits missing. This all reminds me of what I used to do, though, back in the day, before the Fed. We were salvagers - used to take apart dead ships like fish in the deep take apart whale corpses." Of course, sometimes they may or may not have killed the whale first. "Sold 'em on black markets. Or regular markets. Depended on whether the owners of the ship would want their bits back. I enjoyed it - taking apart such big machinery." If he hadn't joined the Federation, he could see himself ending up on the other side of all this, illegally chopping up shuttles to sell their parts. Luckily, he wasn't on that path, but it was strange to think about.

"Mm, they do that?" He asked, he never really thought much about fish. They were there in the ocean and he saw them a lot but never went much further with it. "Makes sense, 'cause they usually float if they're dead, but um, whales, they're... heavier, so.." he made a little sinking motion with his hand that had already just been up while he talked as usual, and as he did that, the doors opened to lead them into the #corridor-01 .

"Mhm, it's part of the whole ecosystem of the ocean and shit," He said, as he walked into the #corridor-01. He was more of a cats, reptiles and bugs type of guy himself. For more in-depth ocean knowledge, see your local Thalass for an ocean ecology TED talk at any time. (edited)

5

Here Sakchai was, just carrying boxs of Bajoran shrimp and veggie dogs. It was gifts from his ex's family to apologise for their coldness towards him years ago. Although Sakchai wasn't at all offended that a traditional Bajoran family was not fond of their daughter dating a Cardassian, he appreciated the gesture. He thought they were just going to send him some flowers and an apology card, but what they ended up sending him was tons of shrimp and veggie dogs. In most cases he would have requested OPS to beam the crate to his quarters, but this food was delicate and was strictly not to be beamed. Sakchai was a strong man, but the sheer number of boxes with the heavy weight was barely doable. It also didn't help that he had seven fingers and so he couldn't really grip the bottom of the box with his two-fingered hand. Today, Sakchai was not working and thus was dressed in just civilian clothes. A standard dusty brown short with tight fitted trousers. As a proud Cardassian and Romulan, he made sure to wear only the most hideous and mismatched patterns imaginable. Leopard print on his trousers mixed with a hexagonal pattern for this top. Also with random belts, there was always random belts involved. He had two holding up his trousers because you never knew what could happen, one across his chest, and one just randomly on his thigh not serving any purpose.

Xiisou was turning over her lesson plans over and over in her mind, trying to think of some sort of craft, some sort of hands on activity to keep the class engaged. Keeping the attention of a large group of small children was rather difficult, as she'd learned over the past twenty-ish years. Even her experience didn't help. She was going to move to her quarters to finalize a few things when she saw -- and smelled -- someone carrying a rather large stack of boxes, seemingly struggling quite a bit to do so... Being quite tall herself, and strong to boot, Xiisou tentatively wandered over, no matter how the smell of seafood made her nose wrinkle. Xiisou had always done her best to teach her students to be kind and help others, who was she if she didn't try? She fixed her glasses before calling out, "Excuse me! Do you need a hand with those?" Her social anxiety kicked her for speaking out, as expected. It was a flutter in her stomach, a little bite at her insides, but there nonetheless. She found it easier to speak up when she wasn't the one struggling for some reason.

"Oh!" Sakchai nearly dropped his box of shrimp, but quickly readjusted his grip with his five-fingered hand and leaned the boxes to the right side to try and get a better hold on the stack. It wasn't every day he met someone taller than him! This kind stranger wasn't that much taller than him, only a few centimeters, but he was bending his knees and this seemed shorter than he actually was. "Uh, I'm sorry," Sakchai suddenly crouched down and set all the boxes on the ground on the lift. He straightened his back and shook his hands out. This action revealed his two asymmetrical hands, right one with the normal five fingers and the left with only two. "I was not expecting them to be so heavy, and I'm sorry for the smell," Even in air tight containers, there was no mistaken the Bajoran shrimp. "I wouldn't mind the extra pair of hands," Sakchai held up his two hands and wiggled his fingers. "Where are you headed? I don't want you to have to go too far out of your way to help me," He wasn't sure if this person was a civilian or officer, but either way, the shrimp was heavy and he'd never force someone to haul it down the long OPS quarters corridor for him unless they were really down with it.

Xiisou went in after him, stretching her arms up in preparation. He looked to be quite tired already. She wouldn't want him to pull a muscle or anything trying to lift these heavy boxes all by himself... "I was just going back to my quarters, I don't have anything else to do, really," she promised with an easy, reassuring smile. "My name is Xiisou, Xiisou Varez. I'm a newer teacher for the younger children on the station, but I'm used to lugging around heavy things... I don't mind helping at all, really!" It'd only take maybe half an hour at most, her lesson plans could certainly wait that long. This situation was giving her an idea, funnily enough.... "That's quite a lot of.." her nose twitched a little as she sniffed the air, "shrimp? Can I ask the occasion? Are you having a party?" Xiisou didn't mean to be intrusive, she was just morbidly curious. It was....quite a bit of shrimp, and something else, a smell she didn't quite recognize. A shrimp party -- what a funny little idea! She was envisioning a room full of people dressed up like different species of shrimp and tried not to laugh out loud. Her students would love that, maybe little shrimp paper crafts... Ah! Noticing her train of thought had trailed off, she pushed her glasses up a little. "I hope that's not too nosy to ask. I'm just curious, you don't have to answer."

Sakchai gave Xiisou a little nod to signal to acknowledge her presence. "Thanks for the offer, when we get to my stop you can help me lift the boxes again. It's nice to meet you Xiisou," Sakchai was surprised to hear this tall individual was a teacher to young children. School teacher is not what he expected, but then again no one expected some Cardassian-Romulan guy to be STC. "I'm Sakchai uh, tr'Valdore," Sakchai gave his name since Xiisou gave her name. He never knew if people cared about his surname, but considering Xiisou gave hers, he gave his. Sakchai was ambivalent about being a Valdore, although his Cardassian pride was pleased that there was a starship class named after his ancestors. "Yeah, Bajoran shrimp," Sakchai rolled his shoulders back to give himself a break before he'd have to pick them back up again. "Operations crew quarters," Sakchai gave his command to the lift and it began to move. "Ehh... Not exactly. So... I dated a Bajoran woman years ago, her family were kinda jerks to me. I didn't feel insulted or anything, I get it, I'm Cardassian and Romulan. Anyway, we didn't work out because of that. Her family now feels bad for driving me away and sent me this," He gestured to the boxes with both hands. "As an apology. They're fisherman," As if that wasn't obvious by the strong smell of the shrimp that was now permeating throughout the entire lift. "I have veggie dogs in another box. Do you like shirmp, Xiisou? Wait, I should ask where you're from and can you have shrimp?"

Xiisou felt the hum of the turbolift as it went to the desired location. Operations, huh? So Sakchai was an officer? The children in her class definitely were impacted by their time spent on the Starbase, or on starships, excited to talk about their parents' jobs or any officers they'd seen on duty. It was sweet, it felt like watching your heroes in action. She didn't ask anything, though, just smiled in response to his introduction. "It's nice to meet you too! Your name is very pretty." Look at her go, actually putting herself out there for once. She hadn't actually really met anyone on the Starbase since arriving... Oh. Her expression fell just a little, and she lowered her gaze. "Ah, I'm sorry to hear that.. I'm sorry, maybe I shouldn't have asked, I don't mean to tread on your personal life," she said, raising her shoulders a little, hand on the back of her neck. "It's -- um, I was born and raised on Rigel VII, and I don't have anything religious, or allergies or anything of that sort. My sister has a shellfish allergy, actually, and-- oh, I'm rambling. Sorry." She blinked a few times and shook her head, standing up straight. "I like shrimp, my father used to make a special sauce for it before he passed. I can't remember the recipe now, though.... Do you know what you're going to do with all of it? It seems quite a lot of food for just one person, do you have a family or a roommate or anything?"

"Oh, thank you. I chose it because uh, my real name was really close to my brother's, it made it easier for the teachers," Sakchai explained with a chuckle, thinking Xiisou would probably understand getting kids mixed up. He liked his chosen name, it was unique and had a similar vibe to his real name. "Oh no, I'm not offended at all. I still talk to my ex and she's fantastic, I was the one who accepted the gift," Sakchai had so many bizarre adventures he wasn't upset in the slightest. Maybe other Cardassians or Romulans may be secretive, but not Sakchai. He was the exact opposite, there was not much he wasn't willing to share. Well, as long as it wasn't his second wife, he was still not in the best place to speak about her since it was still too soon for him. "Rigel VII? Never been, but I have heard some stories about the Rigel system from people, I heard you guys have two spines? Damn, cool," The first thing that came to mind when he thought about the Rigel system was the two spines. It actually made sense considering Sakchai had met a number of Rigelians over the comms who were trading within Cardassian space. A lot of them would often complain that there weren't enough double-spine ergonomic seating options on whatever station they were heading to. "Not at all, I like to hear stories! And uh, not really. The thing is, this food is delicate so I can't exactly transport it easily. I have family, but they all live on Cardassia Prime or Mol'Rihan and I don't think they'd be down to just eat some shrimp," Sakchai said with a laugh as he leaned up against the side of the lift. "What do you think I should do with it? I'd like to hear your recipes too, I... am not good at cooking at all."

"Oh, yes, we do! Well, I do, anyway. There are different traits assigned to different Rigelians, but I won't bore you with the explanation. It's quite a lovely place to grow up." Her mother had a dash of two of the subspecies, meaning Xiisou got Vulcanoid height, though not much else. She was happy, though! And glad to hear she hadn't pushed Sakchai too much into talking about his personal life. At least his ex sounded nice. Xiisou considered for a long moment, scratching the side of her chin with her cheeks puffed out a little. She couldn't remember the exact things her father used to do with shrimp, though she could definitely reach out and ask for some recipes... "I don't have any on hand right now, though I'll be happy to ask my mother if she has anything and send it to you. Worst comes to worst, it can be frozen and saved for later, or you can host a...." She trailed off, knowing how ridiculous it sounded, though unable to stop herself; "Shrimp party...? For your fellow officers, or something of the like? With all of this shrimp, you may be eating it and veggie dogs for a few months," Xiisou joked, with a small amused smile at the thought. Piles and piles of shrimp and veggie dogs... Her poor sister's worst nightmares.

So Xiisou and Sakchai were both Vulcanoid, probably, that was cool! He wanted to ask about their spines, but maybe that was too personal of a question? He wanted to compliment Xiisou on how cute she looked with her cheeks puffed out, but maybe that would also be a little too much for a first meeting? "Host a shrimp off--," Sakchai attempted to finish Xiisou's sentence before she finished it herself and said 'party'. Two types of people. Truly. "O-Ohh yeah, a party, a shrimp party," Sakchai said as if that was exactly what he meant in the first place. "And thank you, no pressure if your mother doesn't have any good recipes for the shrimp," Sakchai said, appreciating the offer. As he was about to mention how strong the smell was, the turbolift suddenly stopped and the light dimmed. "Looks like there's some turbolift traffic or something," This was not too unusal, especially if a lot of people were using the lifts... Right? "Since you're a teacher your kids wouldn't happen to be up for some veggie dogs for lunches, would they? I think I could do stuff with the shrimp but veggie dogs, that's a lot of dogs."

"I like your idea better," Xiisou giggled at the prospect of a shrimp-off. That sounded fun, possibly more fun than a shrimp party. A bunch of people cooking shrimp in different creative ways... She would love to attend an event like that, possibly with the help of her dad's recipe... It'd be just like being home again. Her eyes flickered up as the turbolift's lights flickered, pushing her glasses a little bit up the bridge of her nose. "I see... It's alright, I'm quite used to it as well, if I'm telling the truth." How many times had she been made late by lift traffic? Too many. She shook her head a little. At the same time, the idea of being trapped in a turbolift that reeked of shrimp made her a little nervous.. and a little queasy. She loved seafood, but too much was too much. "Ah- that's a very kind offer, Sakchai, but unfortunately we keep a pretty tight ship when it comes to school lunches. We have to consider allergies, the possibility of cross contamination..." She ticked the reasons off on her fingers. "I'm not quite sure what else you could do with the veggie dogs. Maybe get a permit and start selling them out of the market," she joked, crossing her ankles and shoving her hands in the pockets of her overalls, leaning back against the wall. "Or maybe ship it off as a surprise gift for some friends?"

"Maybe I will have the shrimp off! Maybe I'll bring them to my family on Mol'Rihan, it may be a good bonding experience," It was times like these that Sakchai remembered that he was his family's head of house. He tried not to think about it too much because that was exactly the thing that landed him into the bizarre adventure which was Sakchai on Mol'Rihan. Well, maybe hosting a shrimp-off would allow them bond over something positive for once, "Yeah, sorry about the shrimp," Sakchai wished the boxes were more insolated so the smell of Bajoran seafood wasn't filling the tiny lift, but there was nothing he could do now. The shrimpening was upon them. "And I understand about the food. I can ask my family if they'd take those too. I am a big guy so maybe I could eat some myself," Not as tall as Xiisou, but tall nonethe less. Sakchai was also very wide and lorge, he needed all the food he could get to fuel his muscles in preparation for... just sitting in the command deck telling pilots what to do. "What kind of stuff do you teach? I have never gone to school within the Federation so I don't know much about the education system."

She hummed idly, thumbs hooked into the pockets of her overalls. "It's no problem. Spending twenty-ish years a class full of small children, I've smelled worse than shrimp," she promised with a gentle smile to reassure Sakchai - the kind that brought the markings and Trill spots along her cheeks and eyes up just a little. "It's not an unpleasant thing, just... overwhelming, I suppose." The shrimpening was far from the worst thing that could've happened. Xiisou perked up at the mention of her career. Clearly she was passionate about it, judging by just how excited she got. "Well, I've taught just about everything under the sun.. Mostly, my position is under sciences," she said. "Right now, we're learning about biology, and life cycles of different animals and creatures. Tomorrow they'll be making their own creatures to make life cycles for!" She had so many ideas bouncing around her head about what creative things her darling students could come up with. "And yourself? Um-- well, not teaching, obviously. But what do you... you're an officer, right? Operations," she fumbled for words just a little, tapping her fingers in a rhythmic pattern against her thigh. This turbolift stalling so long, it was starting to make her anxious... What if something was really wrong?

Sakchai smiled right back at Xiisou, thankful the teacher was so understanding. It's not like he could somehow make the smell of shrimp disappear. The lift was still dark, which was slightly concerning, but maybe there was just a lot of traffic. Even under the slightly dim lights he could make out the other's striking features, the hair, dark screla, little spots. He was just thankful not to be alone in all of this. "Oh that sounds so fun! I loved science in school. I wasn't very good, but I liked all the experiments," Sakchai told her with an excited look on his face. Hearing about Xiisou's classes made him excited to be a father some day. It wouldn't be soon, but he was looking forward to hearing about the fun activities his kid-- or kids would be doing. "Yep, space traffic controller, but I have experiences in other OPS fields. I've been an administrative officer, a logistics officer," Sakchai explained, trying to remember all the jobs he had done. "I know it's gonna sound really Cardassian of me, but I like jobs where I can manage things. STC is really important, without us no one could dock or fly anywhere around the station. It's a big responsibility but that's what I like," Sakchai said with a smile on his face. "Are most of your kids children of officers or civilians? I would think a lot are civilians given how that's the majority of the station's population?"

Xiisou nodded along, listening politely. She knew bits and pieces of the different jobs with different officers, most of her last jobs had them sprinkled around, though she knew she'd never be able to name everything. There was a pretty XO on that starship that was the mother of a pair of twins in the class she taught... She was nice, and really funny, and that was enough for her to fall head over heels and proceed to never make a move before moving to her next spot. "Ah, yes, mostly civilians. I can name...two children of officers off the top of my head, but almost all of them are very excited about you all and what you do for the station. Look up to you quite a bit, actually..." She made a little bit of a face, shaking her head. "Sorry. The smell is starting to get... a little bit overwhelming. In any case, officers as a whole have always been interesting, but I never could see myself in that place. I freeze up, I can't make decisions on the fly... Besides, I'm very happy where I'm at. It's something I've always wanted to do, and something I wouldn't trade for the world. I think I've got at least another few decades in me before retirement," Xiisou said, smiling timidly. "Ah, sorry, I rambled on, didn't I...? I apologize for that."

Sakchai was filled with pride when Xiisou said that her children looked up to the officers on the base. Sakchai had only just got there so he doubted anyone really knew his face, but it was nice that his new colleagues were people that children looked up to. "That's great to hear. If you ever want someone to come in as a.. Guest speaker? I love children and I hope to have one or two of my own someday," Sakchai was still trying to think about how he would go about having said children. The original plan was for him and his second wife to adopt, but that was obviously not happening and Sakchai knew he couldn't manage both his job and raising a child. "No need to apologise, and yeah I understand. It is a pretty stressful job and not for everyone. You are still doing good work as a teacher. No one would be able to be officers if it wasn't for people like you," Sakchai said with a nod and a smile. When the other mentioned the smell was getting to her, Sakchai decided it was probably best to use his OPS skills to try and see if he could get the lift moving. He sat down on the floor in front of a removeable panel and pulled it off. "I'm gonna see if I can bypass the breaks. I can't guarantee we'll be on our desired deck, but at least then we can always just get on another lift," He informed Xiisou as he began to pull at the wires to see if he could find the right one. "Are you doing anything else today? I'm sorry you have to be stuck here with the shrimp."

1

After a quick bypass the waiting time on the lift, Sakchai manage to bump them to the front of the queue and soon they were moving once again! It was only a couple seconds to the appropriate floor and once there, Sakchai led Xiisou to his quarters to drop off the shrimp and veggie dogs! A successful mission!

2

1

Rakim, after he'd rushed out of the holodeck, rushed into the turbolift and once the doors closed grabbed onto the wall with hands that shivered and shook. "Crew Quarters!" He requested, his voice shaky. Once the turbolift arrived, Rakim strided toward the door as he started back toward his quarters. As he did, he attempted to focus. Attempted to clear his mind of the memories that now hounded it. TW: Traumatic memory. "We've been hit by something, down to half impulse and dropping, hold on wait-get away from that conso-" With a effort of will, Rakim forced his mind to clear as he stepped through the turbolift doors into the corridor and they closed.

1

Vara'l headed out of the capture the flag holodeck and beelined directly to the turbolift. Once he'd arrived there he stepped inside and requested. "Senior staff quarters please." He then once the lift arrived, stepped out and stepped into the corridor.

1