Ax had escaped the Controllers on board. Brainy had not been so lucky. Neither had Sam and Tim. And who knew how many others on board had Yeerks wrapped around their brains, controlling their every movement, pretending that everything was normal until the time came to strike.

Who do you trust, podlings?

"Listen up! Everyone gather in close. There's something we need to discuss."

She turns to Jaime and the telepaths. "Ready?"

There's a vorp and all of a sudden, everyone on Obs deck is surrounded by a blue shield, protecting them from the watching eyes of Stacy's (functioning sensors). The telepaths are standing by to make sure Stacy doesn't try to read their minds and to block her if necessary (although at the last meeting, she didn't try it).

"Do not be alarmed by the blue shield. That is one of the ways we're currently being shielded from Stacy so we can talk without being overheard."

( Let the meeting get underway... )

By hook or by crook or by avoiding hook and crook, the crew assembled from the previous podpops eventually made it up to the Living Area to greet their new crew mates. The creepy sculpture was also there, though less to greet them than it was always there.

The strange, fleshy seating had multiplied. You really, really don't want to know how.

Javert had quite effectively ignored any suggestions of buddy systems, and was striding through the inner city alone. He recognized Notre Dame, and the Tower, odd amongst the alien city. But it was still a city, a structure he was most comfortable in. If he closed is eyes - which he wouldn' t- he might have imagined himself back in Paris. But it was quiet, too quiet, and none of the buildings or streets were the same.

He kept a sharp eye out, his guard up as usual, waiting for someone- or something- to jump out at him.

He stopped suddenly in front of a building. It was dirty, and older, and it managed to loom in the alien streets. An official-looking sign proclaimed it Le Prefecture de Police. He stared hard at it before opening the doors, and stepping inside. He walked through the halls and sat at his desk, exactly as he'd left it. He ran his hands over it, thoughtfully.

He spent about an hour there, sitting and soaking it in, remembering who sat where, and when. Eventually, he stood up. He went out to lean on the wall, as though he was waiting for someone, though even he wasn't sure who. He'd likely accept whoever wandered by as a substitute.

Things can happen without Stacy knowing, that much is apparent now. The damage to her sensors is significant. But the fighting clued her in.

After it's all over, after those captured have been rescued, after the injured have been tended to, only the nest is left, and Stacy takes care of it.

||Infestation of Cluster 42, Level 4, Sector 7, Sublevel 12, Zone 37 has been detected. Triggering internal defenses. Decontamination commencing.||

There is a pause.

||Decontamination complete.||

Simple as that, once she knows the problem was there. Her internal sensors are damaged, especially in the city, and so are some of the systems monitoring them. You have to know what's broken to know to fix it.

Such a simple thing and it only took one man dying to make it happen. (His body is gone, by the way, ripped to shreds and eaten. There's not even a spot of blood on the floor. That's the bugs' doing. The bugs' bodies are gone too--that's Stacy's doing).

||Any injured personnel that still have not received medical attention, report to the nearest lift, and you will be transported to the MedBay. Any uninjured personnel, report to the Living Area, to the restroom facilities to undergo decontamination of xenobiological material. Then report to the Obs Deck to meet your new crew-mates.||

Said crew-mates--and the Doctor, who'd skipped out and miraculously ducked and weaved his way to the lift when he'd realized the Master was there--are there and waiting, and just a tad confused.

[ooc: read this first]

While chaos was going on in the city, a level below the Living Areas, the rest of the ship was functioning normally. Stacy, apparently oblivious to goings on in the city, likely do to her malfunctioning sensors there, carried on with ship business.

||Pod Release Protocols Initating,|| Stacy's familiar voice sounded out to the upper levels, though no one was there to hear her. They were all downstairs, fighting for their lives against giant cockroaches.

In the Pod Caverns, there were the sounds of: Pop. Pop pop pop. Poppuhpoppoppop. KASCHUNKhiiiiiiiissssss.

The usual condensation and mist sprayed out from cracks in the pods, they ripped open and the people inside slid out onto the floors, covered in slime. One of them, due to his mechanical nature, slid out covered in a sort of oil mixture, in a smaller body than he'd once had.

Pop. Poppop. KASCHUNKhiiiiiissss.

There was no one already freed from the ship to greet them, only Stacy herself, and the empty silence of a ship caught in the middle of a crisis.