Saren was still shaking his head slightly, clearly unhappy with the situation as they were taking their positions in the arena. "You angry?" Shepard asked.

"I'd be more angry if any of this had come as a surprise. It was inevitable you'd do that, eventually. I hadn't counted on you making it a formal challenge, but then again I should have known that, too. You don't do anything half-way, especially if you're getting yourself into trouble." If anything, he sounded a bit resigned.

She hadn't noticed anything about a formal challenge. "So what difference does that make?"

Saren looked far too calm. "It can't be refused."

"So they couldn't back out. So what; it was what Nysana was trying to needle me into all the time anyway."

"I wasn't talking about them." Saren's voice was cold. "I was talking about myself." He shook his head, irritated. "Never mind. All you have to know is that this game has no rules, beside winning, and things are going to get rough."

"Oh, good."

He was already scanning their surroundings for any sign of movement. On finding none, he gave her a hard look. "I usually avoid these challenges. There is no gain in it, and I see no need to prove anything to any of our fellow Spectres." He paused for a second, then continued, his tone harder. "I also have no desire at all to lose against them because of you. Which is a very realistic outcome, given the circumstances."
Shepard drew breath to protest, but he ignored her. "So. Let's try to do this as a team, for once. They'll see you as the weaker opponent and will try to take you out first, so they can then both go for me. Whatever else you do, ignore Nysana. I'll take care of her. Don't get distracted. Go for Nihlus. Try to take him down, don't worry about anything else. If you can't, keep him busy and stay alive until I join you again. Can you do that?"

She snorted. "Of course."

"Somehow I sincerely doubt that."
Shepard refused to be insulted. "Let's play."

Saren didn't reply, and when she turned her head at him he was already gone.

She was used to that, though. With a grin, she started forward. Since she and Saren started out from the central position in the area, the traditional approach would have been to set some traps and go into defence mode, but that tactic didn't appeal to either of them.
She had always preferred a direct, more active approach if at all possible.

Her combat scanner only showed one target, which either meant they were too close to each other so the scanner read them as one individual, or that one of them was cloaking. The latter explanation made more sense. It was something she could see Nysana doing. She mentally shrugged and went for the target she could at least see.

Finding Nihlus was easy enough, and she evaded one of his explosive traps without any difficulties. Sneaking up on the likes of him was not easy, since he had excellent senses, so she didn't even try.
He apparently hadn't expected a direct attack, and she at least got a few good hits on his shields until he figured out the problem and went into cover. From then on it was proper hide-and-seek.
She finally cornered him in a dead end, and he turned on her immediately. To her extreme displeasure she still wasn't fast enough to get him with the assault rifle, and he swatted the weapon aside, breaking her grip on it. She let go rather than risk having her wrist broken and stepped aside, evading his blow and getting a good kick at the side of his knee joints in.
The armour took most of it, of course, but he felt that, and was off-balance long enough for a jab of her armoured elbow to side of his waist where his armour was by necessity thinner and more flexible.
He snarled, the tone alone promising a painful death, and she hurried to get out of immediate reach.
Going hand-to-hand with a highly trained turian in heavy armour wasn't the smartest thing to do, certainly, but she'd have to lie if she had to say it wasn't fun. Just the fun she needed.

Nihlus snarled again, a flash of white teeth behind black mandibles, and from his expression she could assume he thought something along the same lines.

Somewhere else was the sound of gunfire, rather close by, proving that somewhere Saren and Nysana were still playing tag with each other.

Shepard didn't try to gain some distance and bring fire weapons into play again, and neither did Nihlus. Close up and personal it was, then.
They traded blows for a short while, testing each other's defences. She jumped back again, narrowly avoiding a swipe of his hand that would have meant trouble if it had connected. Nihlus didn't close in after her immediately, which was a bad sign, and there was something moving behind her, to her left.

The damned turian had lured her in for his partner. Incidentally, that would be the same partner that Saren was supposed to handle.
Hell with it.

Shepard grimaced, but didn't even think about it as she lunged at Nihlus.
The other Spectre had been distracted by something behind her, and his eyes widened as he realised that she wasn't distracted as well. Now there were snarls of rage in two different voices and yelps somewhere behind her, but she ignored it with her own target in front of her. She took a glancing blow to the face, but there wasn't much force behind it.
Shepard blocked his automatic defence move with her shoulder and cracked her elbow into his face hard, hitting the rectangular scale between his eyes with admirable precision.
He snarled and somehow remained standing, but it was clear he was dazed.
She jumped clear again, because some instinct warned her, and suddenly there was a rather battered-looking Nysana between her and Nihlus, taking a swipe at her with clawed gauntlets.
Shepard registered distantly that Nihlus suddenly snarled, more surprised than angry, then fell silent.

"You're dead, Shepard." Nysana snapped.

"No, she's not. But you are, Nysana."
Saren appeared right behind her, casually tapping her shoulder. Nysana's reflexes were excellent, but even so she only managed to half-turn before the other turian had grabbed her by the back of her neck and hauled her backwards, well clear of Shepard. The turian woman was swearing creatively and profoundly, still struggling in Saren's grip and snarling with rage.

Shepard looked past Nysana at Nihlus, who was still shaking his head to clear it. He gave her a grin. "You are a fierce thing, for a human." he said.

She snorted, then returned his grin. "And you are a good sport, for a turian."

He tossed his head, and she grinned again. No hard feelings here.

Nysana was still snarling, but it sounded only insulted by now. "Oh, let me go, Saren, you made your point." Saren snorted and did just that.
The turian woman shook herself, then gave Shepard a slightly rueful grin, and addressed Saren again. "And that was downright sneaky of you. I thought you were out for the count."

Saren didn't seem to take that amiss and just shrugged. "Spectre, remember? And you started it with the tactical cloak. I just did the same."

Shepard threw him a quick look, then stared. He had claw marks over his face, and for once it was easy to see which parts of his face were cybernetic and which were not. The organic ones were leaking blue, of course. Saren hadn't been exaggerating, Nysana really was fond of using her claws.
"Damn, you look like you cuddled with a varren." she said, before she could think better about it.

Saren ignored her, turned away from her and regarded Nysana calmly. "Well fought. You've gotten even faster." he said. "Next time, though, make sure your target is actually down and not following you around under cloak." He turned to Nihlus. "As for you, you're fast and accurate as ever, and you know it, but you should consider dropping your tendency to toy with what you consider a weaker opponent. Shepard's got a blade strapped to her arm, and she has at least some vague idea what to do with it. If this was serious, you'd be down with your throat cut open. Try to avoid that next time."
He didn't even look at Shepard as he turned around and marched from the arena.

"Uh-oh. If I was you, Shepard, I'd stay out of his way for a while until he's wound down again." Nysana shook her head, then gave Nihlus a quick look. "Sorry. That was my fault. I really thought I had him down."

The other turian clapped her upper arm in a gesture that was probably meant to be comforting but made her wince. "Don't worry about it. He used to play those kind of tricks on me too, back then. I suppose there's a reason he's not only still alive but the Spectre with the longest service record to date. Now, how are you?"

She grimaced. "Don't ask." Then that grin was back on her face. "Then again, I got trashed by Saren. You got your arse handed to you by a squishy, soft-skinned little human. Putting it into perspective like that helps." She ignored his groan. "Good match, though." She looked at Shepard. "And you're a joy to watch in a fight." Her look turned considering. "After this, we're headed out at the Traverse for some target practice. The pirates there have gotten a bit too numerous, and we thought to cull them some. If you want to, you could come along with us." Nihlus didn't seem the least surprised at Nysana's words and gave Shepard a quick nod to show that he was in agreement.

Shepard blinked. That offer came unexpected. But yes, she could see where that would be fun.

"Think about it." Nysana said. "And maybe we'll see you later at the Rift. Right now, I may need a bit of rest, though. See you, Shepard."

She watched them walk away, Nysana almost successfully concealing a limp and leaning on her partner, and considered.
Then she made back to her own quarters.