Quite Impossible
Plot Beats
The narrative micro-steps within this event
Data pauses—not in hesitation, but in the brutal calculus of existence—asking if leaving Sarjenka here is possible, revealing that his question is no longer theoretical, but existential.
Sarjenka erupts in a terrified whisper—'Don't leave me here. Please don't leave me.'—her voice tearing through the sterile air, transforming Data’s abstract dilemma into a living, breathing cry for survival.
Data’s response—'Quite impossible.'—is not comfort, not reassurance, but a final verdict: he has chosen not as a Starfleet officer, but as a being who now feels, and thus cannot unsee, unhear, unendure her terror.
Data and Sarjenka exit the transporter room, her hand locked in his—a silent, unbreakable bond forged in ash and lightning—leaving O’Brien frozen in bewildered silence at the precipice of Starfleet’s moral collapse.
Who Was There
Characters present in this moment
Shock morphing quickly into alarm and professional indignation; worried about rule breaches and the fallout.
O'Brien watches the materialization in stunned silence, voices an under‑breath warning about consequences, answers Data's procedural question, then reacts with incredulous protest as Data departs with the alien child.
- • Preserve transporter protocol and procedural integrity
- • Signal the severity of the unauthorized action and its likely repercussions
- • Unauthorized transportations will provoke disciplinary or operational consequences
- • Starfleet rules and standard operating procedure must be defended for the ship’s safety
Panicked and frantic on the surface, seeking safety and human (alien) contact; instinctually attaches to Data as protector.
Sarjenka materializes terrified, edges toward Data, slides her hand into his and then seizes his arm while whispering a desperate plea not to be left behind; she clings to him as her only immediate refuge.
- • Avoid being abandoned on an unfamiliar, dangerous ship
- • Secure immediate comfort and protection from a trusted figure (Data)
- • Adults/strangers may abandon or harm her unless she clings to someone familiar
- • Data (or the entity who responded before) is a safe guardian she can trust
Measured outward calm with an emergent empathic resolve; a logical determination colored by nascent compassion.
Data materializes with Sarjenka, assesses command structure, calmly engages O'Brien with procedural questions, then decisively takes the child's hand and escorts her off the transporter platform toward the bridge.
- • Protect and not abandon the frightened child
- • Deliver Sarjenka to bridge command where she can be cared for and decisions can be made
- • The child's immediate safety supersedes passive adherence to non‑interference in an imminent crisis
- • Command (Riker/Picard) should be informed by presence and facts rather than abstract reports
Objects Involved
Significant items in this scene
Sarjenka's small hand functions as the event's emotional tether: she places it in Data's, then locks onto his arm in desperation. The grip embodies trust and forces Data's moral choice into a physical act of guardianship.
The transporter platform is the physical locus of the event: Data and Sarjenka dematerialize onto it, providing incontrovertible proof of an arrival and serving as the dramatic staging that precipitates the confrontation. It functions as the forensic anchor O'Brien cites and as the literal threshold between away world and command decision.
Location Details
Places and their significance in this event
The bridge exists offstage as the destination and symbolic seat of command; Data's decision to take Sarjenka there reframes the transporter's incident as a command issue, transferring a private act into institutional jurisdiction and forcing leadership to confront ethical consequences.
Narrative Connections
How this event relates to others in the story
"Data's rescue of Sarjenka on Drema Four is the direct cause of her unauthorized arrival on the transporter pad. This act—carrying out his moral belief in person—is the single event that forces Starfleet to confront the concrete human cost of the Prime Directive."
"Data's rescue of Sarjenka on Drema Four is the direct cause of her unauthorized arrival on the transporter pad. This act—carrying out his moral belief in person—is the single event that forces Starfleet to confront the concrete human cost of the Prime Directive."
"Data's rescue of Sarjenka on Drema Four is the direct cause of her unauthorized arrival on the transporter pad. This act—carrying out his moral belief in person—is the single event that forces Starfleet to confront the concrete human cost of the Prime Directive."
"The arrival of Sarjenka on the transporter pad immediately triggers Picard’s demand to know Data’s whereabouts. The breach becomes visible, public, and inescapable—escalating the implicit moral crisis (in Picard’s ready room) into an overt, undeniable catastrophe on the bridge."
"The arrival of Sarjenka on the transporter pad immediately triggers Picard’s demand to know Data’s whereabouts. The breach becomes visible, public, and inescapable—escalating the implicit moral crisis (in Picard’s ready room) into an overt, undeniable catastrophe on the bridge."
Key Dialogue
"O'BRIEN: "You're going to take that?""
"SARJENKA: "Don't leave me here. Please don't leave me.""
"DATA: "Quite impossible.""