An enormous ship approaches the shuttle, puts it in a dampening field, and beams a device on board. The device explodes in a white flash.

Seven awakens in a room while someone -- Penk, a humanoid alien with a sleazy demeanor -- examines her with a tricorder.

Penk "welcomes" her as a contestant in the sport of Tsunkatse. Tuvok is lying nearby, injured. Seven agrees to fight, rather than allow Penk and cohorts to throw Tuvok into the sporting pit without medical attention.

Fortunately, Penk is willing to start Seven off with a "blue" match, not a "red" one that goes to the death.

Neelix joins them, since his lotion has given him an allergy that limits him to indoor activities. The Doctor makes the valid point that "Talaxian homeopathy is no substitute for medical science."

The arena. A chanting crowd. A female fighter in the pit dispatches her opponent. Chakotay explains to Neelix that the fighters wear polaron disrupters on hands and feet and aim blows at sensors on their opponents' chests.

In the next fight, a hulking man (The Rock) enters the ring and gazes arrogantly at the audience. Cheers and boos. Then his opponent enters. It's Seven. Watching from the crowd, the Voyager crew members are shocked by her presence.

Chakotay contacts Voyager and asks B'Elanna (who's required to stay on the bridge in his absence) to beam Seven out of the arena. But they can't get a transporter lock on her.

Seven and the hulking wrestler fight. There is some taunting interchange as they punch and kick each other. She loses, perhaps because of a moment of hesitation at the end.

Chakotay and the others watch this, anguished, then beam up. They contact Janeway, who cuts short her vacation and turns back toward Voyager.

An alien treats Seven's bruises with a thermal regenerator. Viewers may notice he's a Hirogen, member of the formidable species that lives for the hunt. Why is he here?

Penk comes by to congratulate Seven for driving up ratings. The Borg are much-loathed, he explains, so people like seeing her receive punishment. Anyway, her next bout will be a "red" one -- to the death.

The Hirogen offers to train Seven. She is reluctant but a look back to the injured Tuvok forces her to agree.

The training begins. The Hirogen explains that an aggressive approach is necessary, giving her a sucker punch to make his point.

He also explains he was captured by these fight promoters 19 years ago, during his son's first hunt. Sadly, Penk would only tell him his son wasn't big enough for fighting, and so the pair were separated.

Meanwhile, the Voyager crew determines the fighters are never even in the arena -- their images are transmitted from an enormous ship, one that's out of Voyager's "weight class."

Neelix tries diplomacy to get Seven and Tuvok back, but it turns out the local authorities turn a blind eye to the sport's recruitment methods. Tsunkatse, after all, is a lucrative business.

The Hirogen completes Seven's training. She's improved, even saying she'll hunt and kill her "prey." But in a private aside to Tuvok, she confesses some doubts about whether she can kill for an audience's entertainment. The Vulcan notes it's better than dying for same, so "do whatever it takes to survive."

Seven enters the pit, and her opponent emerges. It's the Hirogen.

"You knew," she grimaces, accusing him of deceptive practices. But he counters that after 19 years of this ordeal, all he wants is a death he can be proud of. If she won't kill him, he'll have to kill her.

Voyager approaches the big vessel, raises shields and charges weapons. Chakotay's in command.

They get Penk on screen, but no satisfaction. The battle begins even as…

Seven and the Hirogen fight. She doesn't want to, but he says "there is no other way."

Voyager manages to weaken the big ship's shield generator just enough to beam Tuvok out. But force fields prevent such a ploy against the decks where the fight is taking place.

The Hirogen is winning, and regretting he wasted his time on this lackluster trainee. "You're imperfect," he snorts. But that provokes her, makes her fight harder. She knocks him down. The audience is crazed.

Voyager tries to target the big ship's signal generator -- cutting off transmission would mean disastrous financial loss -- but the Federation starship is damaged in the attempt.

Then another vessel swoops in fast. It's the Delta Flyer, Janeway at the helm. She fires, again and again.

She too targets the signal generator. This forces the revenue-conscious aliens to reroute power from the shields.

And that enables Voyager to get a lock on the fighters' intertwined figures. Officers raise phasers in the transporter room as the two are beamed aboard. Seven looks like she's about to kill the Hirogen.

But the fight's now over. She helps her onetime mentor to his feet.

Voyager arranges to rendezvous with a Hirogen hunting party, letting this man return to his people. He is grateful, and converses privately with Seven. He says he'll try to find his son, rather than go hunting.