Troi Overwhelmed — P2's Fear of Exile Revealed
Plot Beats
The narrative micro-steps within this event
Troi moves closer to Picard Two, reaching into his fractured psyche — and in a single seismic moment, his terror explodes outward, seizing her, collapsing her into agony as his soul screams without sound.
Troi gasps her revelation — Picard Two doesn't fear death, but exile — his desperate, silent plea to leave the ship shatters any remaining illusion that this is merely a medical anomaly.
Who Was There
Characters present in this moment
Focused and professional with an undercurrent of concern; curiosity about the medical anomaly is tempered by responsibility for crew welfare.
Conducts further medical tests on Picard Two, articulates a clinical hypothesis about desynchronized internal clocks realigning to explain potential temporary coexistence, then immediately responds to Troi's scream by rushing to assist and attempting to stabilize Troi medically.
- • Diagnose the physiological cause of P2's condition and anticipate future changes.
- • Protect and treat any injured or overwhelmed crew members, particularly Troi and P2.
- • The body's internal rhythms can be disrupted by temporal displacement and can realign.
- • Medical containment and controlled evaluation are essential before any non-medical actions are taken.
Overwrought terror combined with a single-minded need to escape; not merely fear of death but a guttural longing for exile or disappearance.
Dazed and physically unstable on the biobed, P2 flinches and jerks as Troi approaches, reaches out and grips her, throws his head back in voiceless agony and radiates an intense, desperate urge — manifesting panic and a physical plea to be removed from the ship.
- • To remove himself from the presence and context of the Enterprise.
- • To avoid coexistence with the original Picard or the paradox it represents.
- • Being on the ship or coexisting would be intolerable or dangerous.
- • Escape or removal is the only avenue to resolve his distress.
Overloaded and deeply shaken; her professional empathic receptivity is breached by a raw, intolerable panic that incapacitates her.
Moves close to Picard Two, shuts her eyes to focus empathically, is violently overwhelmed by his emotional state — screams in agony, collapses when Pulaski touches her, and later reports her core impression that P2 wants desperately to leave the ship.
- • Accurately perceive and translate Picard Two's emotional state for command and medical teams.
- • Provide support and, if possible, soothe or contain P2's distress.
- • Her empathic impressions are a reliable source of information about a person's core motive.
- • Emotional truth can change command decisions as much as clinical data.
Objects Involved
Significant items in this scene
Pulaski references the 'internal body clocks' as the explanatory mechanism for Picard Two's condition: desynchronized cellular rhythms caused by temporal displacement that are now realigning and could briefly allow two functional copies. The concept functions as both a diagnostic tool and a dramatic engine that reframes the ethical stakes.
Location Details
Places and their significance in this event
Sickbay serves as the clinical crucible where medical theory and empathic truth collide: it houses Picard Two, the diagnostic equipment and Pulaski's tests, and becomes the private arena for Troi's empathic contact and collapse, converting a sterile medical moment into an ethical crossroads for command.
Narrative Connections
How this event relates to others in the story
"The shuttle’s visual log showing the Enterprise’s destruction is the visual and auditory anchor for Troi’s later revelation that P2’s terror is not of death but of exile — his desperate need to leave the ship. This confirms the future vision is not just recorded history but an emotional echo haunting P2 — a direct resonance between the recorded fate and lived trauma."
"The shuttle’s visual log showing the Enterprise’s destruction is the visual and auditory anchor for Troi’s later revelation that P2’s terror is not of death but of exile — his desperate need to leave the ship. This confirms the future vision is not just recorded history but an emotional echo haunting P2 — a direct resonance between the recorded fate and lived trauma."
Key Dialogue
"PULASKI: I am beginning to realize just how much of the body is held together by its own internal clock. You -- he was thrown out of time, which caused the body systems to change their rhythms. Slowly, as we move closer to the time he left, the internal body clocks are realigning."
"PICARD: I don't believe that is possible."
"TROI: Only that he wants desperately to leave this ship."