Endorphin Leverage
Plot Beats
The narrative micro-steps within this event
Riker locks up under mounting stress while the wall panel shows no retreat; Pulaski confirms the organism has only slowed and warns his vital signs are deteriorating.
Troi targets survival-driven feelings as the effective stimulation zones, and Pulaski deduces those emotions produce endorphins toxic to the organisms.
Who Was There
Characters present in this moment
Determined and strained; outwardly commandlike but inwardly urgent and desperate, balancing clinical curiosity with the human cost of her intervention.
Examines monitors and the wall panel, interprets diagnostic data, and physically prepares the neural stimulation apparatus while making a grim calculus: increase the stimulus despite clear risk to Riker's already-erratic vitals.
- • Reduce or neutralize the vine-borne organism before the half-hour deadline
- • Calibrate stimulation to maximize endorphin response while attempting to minimize immediate physiological collapse
- • Aggressive medical intervention is justified when the alternative is death
- • Objective diagnostic data (monitors/panels) should guide risky decisions
Physical agony and vulnerability; any agency he has is suppressed by pain and near-collapse, leaving him a passive victim of others' decisions.
Lying on the biobed under severe physiological stress: muscles tensed, sweating, breathing weak and erratic while Pulaski and Troi manipulate stimulation and monitors; a passive, endangered presence whose body chemistry becomes the battleground for treatment.
- • Survive the infection long enough for medical intervention
- • Maintain consciousness and bodily functions despite stimulation
- • Trust in Starfleet medical personnel to act in his best interest
- • His duty/role doesn't protect him from mortality; he must accept help
Concerned and complicit: emotionally engaged with Riker's suffering, willing to endorse severe methods because the ethical alternative is passive acceptance of his death.
Reads Riker's emotional responses and pinpoints 'primal' survival feelings as the therapeutic target; advises Pulaski on intensifying stimulation and provides the empathic translation of clinical observation into treatment strategy.
- • Identify and communicate which memories/emotions will produce protective endorphin responses
- • Support Pulaski's clinical decisions with empathic and ethical framing
- • Emotional states can be harnessed as physiological tools for treatment
- • Allowing a patient to die without trying extreme measures would be a moral failure
Objects Involved
Significant items in this scene
The contagious microorganism (the bug) is the unseen enemy modeled by clinicians; referenced as the transmissible pathogen that complicates containment and justifies treatment urgency and extreme measures within Sickbay.
The vine-borne parasitic organism is the immediate antagonist infesting Riker; clinical dialogue establishes that its growth responds to host neurochemistry and that provoking primal survival memories slows it, making it the direct target of Pulaski's risky therapy.
The wall-mounted diagnostic display continuously visualizes the vine-like growth and neural tracings, providing the crucial diagnostic evidence that growth has slowed but remains active; it functions as the visual proof that endorphin-linked stimulation is the organism's weakness.
The bedside vital signs monitor array provides real-time HR, respiration, and EEG-like traces; its deteriorating readouts constrain Pulaski's choices, showing that while stimulation slows the organism, it also drives Riker's vitals toward collapse.
Location Details
Places and their significance in this event
Enterprise Sickbay is the clinical arena where data, empathy, and authority collide: monitors and wall panels shape decisions, Pulaski executes risky procedures, and Troi supplies emotional calibration. The room concentrates medical urgency into a moral crucible where professional duty forces traumatic choices.
Narrative Connections
How this event relates to others in the story
"Despite slowing the infection, Riker’s deteriorating vitals force Troi and Pulaski to escalate the treatment."
"Despite slowing the infection, Riker’s deteriorating vitals force Troi and Pulaski to escalate the treatment."
Key Dialogue
"Pulaski: "We've reduced the growth rate even further... but not enough.""
"Troi: "But we've isolated the specific areas to stimulate. The feelings were very primal... survival emotions.""
"Pulaski: "No. If we don't neutralize the infection within half an hour, he'll be dead.""