Awakening Orders — Personal and Tactical Pressure Mount
Plot Beats
The narrative micro-steps within this event
Data's voice cuts in from the bridge with a contact at extreme range; Picard snaps orders for an intercept and Yellow Alert as the officers surge out to move.
Who Was There
Characters present in this moment
Frustrated and determined, masking anxiety about civilian risk with sharp pragmatism and personal provocation toward Worf.
K'Ehleyr drives the tactical analysis at the library terminal, frames worst-case scenarios, taunts Worf's honor and insists there are no peaceful options if the crew has awakened.
- • Convince command that there may be no peaceful alternative if the T'Ong's crew is awake.
- • Push the Enterprise to take preemptive, decisive action to protect Federation colonies.
- • Klingons in that situation will behave as hostile warriors.
- • Delay or half-measures will cost lives; direct action is the only reliable safeguard.
Resolute and morally engaged; privately tense about risking lives but unwilling to accept preemptive destruction without attempts at communication.
Picard listens to counsel, rejects a fatalistic option, argues for negotiation and restraint, then converts to command action when Data reports a contact, ordering an intercept and Yellow Alert.
- • Avoid unnecessary bloodshed by finding a way to make Klingons listen.
- • Protect Federation colonies while upholding Starfleet's ethical standards.
- • Diplomacy and moral restraint should guide Starfleet action when possible.
- • Command must act decisively when objective sensor data escalates the threat.
Clinically detached outwardly; internally mildly perplexed by the human/Klingon emotional exchange.
Data assists the tactical analysis, sits beside K'Ehleyr, translates technical possibilities into probabilities, and then interrupts the debate with a sensor report detecting a distant Klingon contact.
- • Provide accurate sensor data and clear tactical options to command.
- • Move the discussion from hypothetical to actionable by supplying objective information.
- • Objective sensor readings are the proper basis for command decisions.
- • Human emotional variables complicate but do not change the factual tactical picture.
Stoic on the surface but privately uneasy; his rigidity covers unresolved feelings stirred by K'Ehleyr's taunts.
Worf enters the tactical room, sits between K'Ehleyr and Data, refuses to soften on Klingon doctrine, and responds to tactical suggestions by invoking cultural absolutes about honor and surrender.
- • Protect Klingon cultural norms and honor in the discussion.
- • Assert a position that prevents Starfleet from making moral compromises that dishonor Klingon tradition.
- • Klingon honor obligations are non-negotiable and will determine the T'Ong crew's behavior.
- • Any attempt to disable rather than destroy risks dishonor and further conflict.
Cautiously pragmatic; ready to execute orders while weighing operational risks and uncertainties.
Riker participates in the observation-lounge debate with pragmatic input, endorses containment options, listens to technical advice and supports tactical planning consistent with command priorities.
- • Provide viable tactical alternatives that minimize loss of life.
- • Support Picard's decision-making with grounded, operational counsel.
- • Unknown variables make aggressive action risky; containment is preferable if feasible.
- • Technical solutions (e.g., override cryo) are preferable to destruction if they protect civilians.
Concerned and thoughtful; attempting to reduce escalation by broadening possibilities about the Klingons' intent.
Troi offers psychological perspectives about the T'Ong's possible non-warlike mission, questions assumptions about Klingon behavior, and moderates the room's fear with alternate hypotheses.
- • Prevent premature escalation by suggesting non-hostile explanations.
- • Protect both Federation and Klingon lives by advocating caution and empathy.
- • Not all Klingons will necessarily act on presumed wartime instincts; context matters.
- • Emotional framing in the room influences tactical decisions and should be managed.
Confident and focused; pragmatic about technical fixes and eager to translate plans into operational steps.
Geordi explains practical engineering options (beaming an away team, overriding cryogenic controls, knocking out warp engines), then moves to implement tasks by exiting toward engineering.
- • Offer technically feasible non-lethal solutions to neutralize the T'Ong.
- • Mobilize engineering resources quickly to support the selected tactical approach.
- • Engineering solutions can avoid escalation and preserve lives.
- • Rapid technical action is necessary once a tactical decision is made.
Objects Involved
Significant items in this scene
The Enterprise main bridge library terminal serves as the analytic hub where K'Ehleyr runs simulations, Data and Worf consult readouts, and tactical options (awakening point, cryogenic override) are generated and argued from its displays.
The Klingon ship P'rang exists as a proposed strategic variable—K'Ehleyr suggests using its arrival to surround the T'Ong's crew, making it a potential non-Federation instrument of containment rather than direct Starfleet force.
The Klingon battlecruiser T'Ong is the unseen antagonist around which debate circulates—its potential awakening, likely commander K'Temoc, and the crew's possible actions drive every tactical proposal and moral argument.
The Enterprise warp engines are discussed as both a propulsion capability for intercept and a tactical lever (Geordi references knocking out enemy warp engines) — they are part of the technical options for disabling or reaching the T'Ong.
Location Details
Places and their significance in this event
The Main Bridge is the operational locus that provides the sensor contact Data reports from; its distant announcement converts the lounge's debate into immediate command action and raises the ship's tactical alert level.
The Observation Lounge functions as the senior staff's strategy chamber where Picard, Riker, Troi and Geordi receive K'Ehleyr's briefing, debate ethics vs. expediency, and where Picard articulates a principled refusal to accept fatalism prior to Data's sensor alert.
Narrative Connections
How this event relates to others in the story
"After asserting 'Klingons don't yield,' Worf compels K'Temoc to yield—an ironic reversal enabled by Klingon codes of honor."
"After asserting 'Klingons don't yield,' Worf compels K'Temoc to yield—an ironic reversal enabled by Klingon codes of honor."
"After asserting 'Klingons don't yield,' Worf compels K'Temoc to yield—an ironic reversal enabled by Klingon codes of honor."
"Data's contact at extreme range triggers the officers' rush to battle stations."
"Data's contact at extreme range triggers the officers' rush to battle stations."
"Worf initially hides behind 'Honor' as a shield; in the end he drops the shield and names his feelings explicitly."
"Worf initially hides behind 'Honor' as a shield; in the end he drops the shield and names his feelings explicitly."
"K'Ehleyr tests whether Worf would take a lifelong oath; moments later he demands exactly that commitment."
"K'Ehleyr tests whether Worf would take a lifelong oath; moments later he demands exactly that commitment."
Themes This Exemplifies
Thematic resonance and meaning
Key Dialogue
"K'EHLEYR: You would have gone through with the oath, wouldn't you? Regardless of the consequences to our careers -- to our lives?"
"WORF: Honor demanded no less."
"DATA'S COM VOICE: Captain, we have detected a ship, bearing three-one-six mark forty-two, extreme sensor range."