Volunteering Geordi: Duty Over Caution
Plot Beats
The narrative micro-steps within this event
Data validates the distress with hard numbers—total guidance failure and shrinking power reserves—and Riker summons La Forge to the bridge.
Geordi arrives with a wry jab, and Riker cuts through the fog by committing to beam the chief engineer aboard the Pakled vessel.
Worf challenges the plan, pushing for remote assistance; Riker cites duty, doubts the Pakleds' ability to parse specs, and orders Geordi to the Transporter Room with gear.
Worf presses for more intel; Data tags the Pakleds as benign with limited armaments, and Riker relaxes into confidence, convinced the Enterprise outmans and outguns them.
Who Was There
Characters present in this moment
Clinically neutral and steady; his objectivity functions as a ballast to Riker's moral reasoning and Worf's caution.
Operates his console, provides sensor reads and technical assessments (ship design, guidance failure, reserve power estimate), and frames the Pakleds as low-threat through unemotional analysis that reassures command.
- • Deliver accurate sensor diagnostics to inform tactical decision-making
- • Minimize uncertainty by translating data into clear risk assessments
- • Support bridge command with unemotional technical counsel
- • Sensors and data provide reliable grounds for action
- • Limited armaments and guidance failure reduce immediate threat
- • Language deficiencies can be mistaken for intellectual inferiority
- • Objective information should guide command choices
Apprehensive and vigilant; his concern for crew safety is palpable and he reads ambiguity as potential danger.
Manning tactical, immediately recommends shields and urges caution about beaming the chief engineer aboard; presses for more information and argues for safer alternatives such as remote assistance or data transfer.
- • Prevent unnecessary risk to Enterprise personnel, especially senior specialists
- • Ensure adequate tactical precautions (shields, information) before committing an away team
- • Obtain more intelligence on the Mondor before authorizing boarding
- • Unknown equals potential threat—caution is prudent
- • Physical protection (shields, armaments) should be prioritized when in doubt
- • Starfleet procedure allows for remote assistance instead of endangering crew
- • Command must weigh tactical risk before humanitarian impulse
Confident and dutiful on the surface; mildly impatient and morally compelled—prefers action and the Starfleet ethic of rendering aid over protracted caution.
Commands from the bridge: inspects the viewscreen, questions the Pakleds, adjudicates between Worf's security caution and Data's diagnostics, and decisively orders Chief Engineer La Forge to beam aboard despite reservations.
- • Fulfill Starfleet obligation to render aid to a distressed vessel
- • Resolve the sector distress quickly to keep mission on schedule
- • Protect the Enterprise by making a pragmatic risk assessment
- • Maintain command authority and crew morale by acting decisively
- • Starfleet has a duty to aid vessels in distress
- • The Pakleds, though awkward, pose minimal tactical threat
- • Sending a skilled engineer is the fastest way to fix the problem
- • Open, immediate action projects moral authority and prevents escalation
Mildly amused and surprised, but ultimately dutiful; a professional resignation underlies his compliance with the order.
Enters from the turbolift, observes the Pakleds with a wry grin, reacts with surprise when Riker names him to go aboard, and accepts the order while preparing to report to the Transporter Room with required gear.
- • Comply with command orders and assist the stranded vessel
- • Protect himself and the ship by taking necessary precautions while aboard
- • Diagnose and repair engineering faults on the Mondor if possible
- • He possesses the technical skills to help stranded ships
- • Riker expects senior officers to lead by example
- • The mission of the Enterprise includes providing technical aid
- • The Pakleds' visible incompetence may hide unknown risks
Objects Involved
Significant items in this scene
The aft turbolift doors open as Geordi arrives on the bridge, marking the transition from briefing to action. The doors punctuate the moment Riker assigns the engineer to beam aboard, making Geordi's physical presence immediate and visible.
Mentioned indirectly when Worf urges deploying shields; Riker's command to 'hold fast' leaves the shields in their pre-event state, making the shields a tactical lever debated but not deployed during this exchange.
Seen on the Mondor viewscreen in the background, these worn engineering panels visually support Grebnedlog's claim of a broken ship — their ragged appearance strengthens the plea for help and masks the Pakleds' manipulation.
Referenced by Data's diagnostics as the source of the Mondor's propulsion failure; the guidance system's total failure is the proximate technical cause for the distress call and the justification for beaming an engineer aboard.
Location Details
Places and their significance in this event
The Enterprise main bridge is the decision arena where sensory information, moral duty, and tactical caution collide. It hosts the viewscreen exchange, the Data diagnostics, Worf's objections, Riker's command, and Geordi's arrival—functioning as both nerve center and moral stage.
Transporter Room Three is named as the staging area for the ordered boarding; it is where Geordi will assemble necessary gear and beamed to the Mondor, converting the bridge decision into immediate action.
The Mondor appears on the viewscreen as the physical object of rescue: a primitive, powerless Pakled ship whose inert state and background crew activity create the narrative plausibility for a rescue and the trap that follows.
Rhomboid Dronegar Sector 006 situates the encounter in remote space, heightening obligation and complicating tactical options—distance makes immediate assistance morally pressing but logistically riskier.
Narrative Connections
How this event relates to others in the story
"Riker sends Geordi aboard the Mondor; this directly leads to the Pakleds stunning and capturing him."
"Riker sends Geordi aboard the Mondor; this directly leads to the Pakleds stunning and capturing him."
"The Pakled mantra ‘We look for things’ hints at their acquisitive deception, later proven by Data’s analysis."
"The Pakled mantra ‘We look for things’ hints at their acquisitive deception, later proven by Data’s analysis."
Key Dialogue
"GREBNEDLOG: We look for things."
"WORF: Do we truly need to send our chief engineer over to them?"
"RIKER: Our chief engineer will beam aboard to help you-- Out."