Entertainment
 

Lifesigns (episode)

From Memory Alpha, the free Star Trek reference

Real World article
(written from a Production point of view)
"Lifesigns"
VOY, Episode 2x19
Production number: 136
First aired: 26 February 1996
← 35th of 168 produced in VOY →
← 34th of 168 released in VOY →
  {{{nNthReleasedInSeries_Remastered}}}th of 168 released in VOY Remastered  
← 406th of 727 released in all →
Written By
Kenneth Biller

Directed By
Cliff Bole
49504.3 (2372)
← Arc: Seska (4 of 9) →
  Arc: {{{wsArc1Desc}}} ({{{nArc1PartNumber}}} of {{{nArc1PartCount}}})  
  Arc: {{{wsArc2Desc}}} ({{{nArc2PartNumber}}} of {{{nArc2PartCount}}})  
  Arc: {{{wsArc3Desc}}} ({{{nArc3PartNumber}}} of {{{nArc3PartCount}}})  
  Arc: {{{wsArc4Desc}}} ({{{nArc4PartNumber}}} of {{{nArc4PartCount}}})  

The Doctor falls in love with a Vidiian patient whose life he saved.

Contents

[edit] Summary

[edit] Teaser

Tom Paris arrives late to his duty shift on the bridge and provides several obviously false excuses Commander Chakotay is irritated by Paris' tardiness and doesn't believe any of it, informally reprimanding him for being late the third time in a week. Before anything more can happen, Tuvok announces that USS Voyager has received a subspace distress call from a small, unarmed spacecraft. The weak lifesigns aboard the vessel indicate a Vidiian female. Captain Janeway orders Ensign Kim to respond to the hail, but the distressed ship does not respond. Because there are no other Vidiian ships in the sector, Janeway overrules Paris' suggestion that they may be falling into a trap and decides to have the woman beamed directly into sickbay.

In sickbay, Kes and The Doctor find an extremely complex bioneural implant in her parietal lobe. The Doctor's scans find that the device is storing her synaptic patterns and processing her neuroelectric impulses: essentially, she has a cortical stimulator built in to her body. While the device appears to be functioning normally, the nerve cells to which it connects are dying, severely reducing its function. To avoid losing their patient, The Doctor decides to transfer the synaptic patterns stored in the device into the holo-buffer. He then creates, piece by piece, a holographic body for her.

[edit] Act One

Chakotay reports that the ship's navigational logs indicate that the patient was en route to a remote Vidiian colony about ten light years from Voyager's present location. He then turns the conversation to the behavior of Tom Paris. Although crew discipline is his responsibility as first officer, he wishes to discuss the problem with Janeway before taking action. While she shares his concerns, Janeway leaves Chakotay in charge of handling Tom Paris.

As the patient's synaptic patterns stabilize, The Doctor prepares to transfer her mind into the holographic body he has created for her while her physical body is in stasis. When she wakes up, The Doctor explains the procedure and gives her a mirror so she can see her healthy-looking self. The patient starts crying for joy, overwhelmed at the idea of seeing herself healthy once more. She reveals that she was first diagnosed with the Phage at seven years old, and started receiving replacement tissue and organs shortly afterward. She is also fascinated by the fact that The Doctor is a hologram himself. She introduces herself as Denara Pel, a hematologist who had been helping treat an outbreak of the Phage on Fina Prime and on the way back to her home colony when her disease worsened. They get started working to heal Pel's body, as her mind cannot survive in the computer for more than a week. Pel sees her physical body on the biobed and becomes briefly distracted before getting to work.

[edit] Act Two

The Doctor discusses with B'Elanna Torres his plans to extract a segment of her parietal lobe to transplant into Pel. Because her Klingon DNA is resistant to the Phage and compatible with Vidiian DNA, she is a perfect donor. However, Torres has reservations about the procedure, after what the Vidiians have done to her previously. He begs her to reconsider and while they are arguing, Pel enters, expressing her sympathy for Torres and what she went through. She asks for Torres' understanding, explaining that her species has been dying of the Phage for centuries and that in their quest to find a cure, their scientists and politicians have forgotten to have compassion for the people they seek help from. However, she is willing to accept her fate should Torres choose not to undergo the procedure. Taken aback, Torres chooses to help Pel.

After they perform the surgery, The Doctor realizes that now all they have to do is wait a few days to see whether the procedure was successful or not. He suggests shutting Pel's program down temporarily, as that would slow the degradation of her neural pathways in Voyager's computer. Pel, however, is too energetic to want to be shut down: she wants to tour the ship. Since that is not an option, The Doctor takes her to Chez Sandrine on the holodeck instead. There, they engage in conversation, and at some point, The Doctor manages to make her laugh. Pel tells him how much she appreciates his sense of humor, especially because she hasn't had anything to laugh about in a very long time. She then chooses to name The Doctor "Shmullus" after her uncle, who also used to make her laugh.

The pair return to sickbay and experience a few awkward moments of silence, before The Doctor wishes her good night and reluctantly deactivates her program.

[edit] Act Three

In the mess hall, Chakotay approaches Paris and asks if anything is bothering him, pointing out his tardiness and general lack of enthusiasm on the job lately. Paris laughs mockingly at Chakotay's sudden concern for his feelings, saying that his problem is in fact Chakotay himself. He expresses his frustration over Chakotay's unwillingness to let him take initiative and be creative once in a while. He states that as a matter of fact he is not the only one who has a problem with how Chakotay runs things, and sardonically asks to be excused. As he leaves, everyone in the mess hall – including Michael Jonas – watches him.

Lorrum, Jonas' Kazon-Nistrim contact on Culluh's ship, is very interested to hear of the unrest among the Voyager crew. He praises Jonas and then orders him to sabotage Voyager's warp coils. However, Jonas refuses to damage Voyager in anyway and tells Lorrum that Seska would need to contact him if Culluh has a problem with that.

In sickbay, The Doctor is busy running a level 2 self-diagnostic to assess his situation since Pel came aboard. While he thinks there is a malfunction in his tactile acuity subroutine, Kes suggests that perhaps he might be attracted to Pel and that he in fact should not try to fix anything. The Doctor thinks this is impossible, as he isn't programmed to handle romance, but Kes points out that since his programming is adaptive, everything - including romantic feelings - are possible. Nervous about what is happening to him, The Doctor describes what he feels and experiences around Pel and says that he doesn't want his program to adapt in that manner right now. He finds his thoughts consumed by her in her absence and unsettled in her presence: quite disconcerting feelings for one so used to being in total control. After a few moments of deliberation, he asks Kes how to go about exploring a romantic relationship. Kes recommends forthrightness and simply telling Pel how he feels.

While performing maintenance surgery on Pel's body, The Doctor decides to take Kes' advice to heart and blurts out to Pel, quite as-a-matter-of-factly, of his attraction to her and his desire to enter a romantic relationship. Pel and Kes are both dumbstruck at The Doctor's approach. Pel is speechless and tells him that she'd prefer to keep their relationship professional.

In Sandrine's, a much depressed Doctor runs into Tom Paris and decides to ask him for advice on how to recover from romantic rejection, citing doctor-patient confidentiality when Paris pries for details. Paris recalls a particularly bad breakup he endured in his first year at Starfleet Academy - which almost cost him his grade in Stellar cartography. But, he reassures The Doctor that while the first love is always the hardest to get over, things tend to get better over time. However, much to The Doctor's horror, Paris reveals that you actually never completely get over someone you loved and that even years later the most trivial things can remind you of that person and make you feel just as bad and torn up inside as the day they said they never wanted to see you again. Noticing the distressed look on The Doctor's face, Paris finally realizes that The Doctor is speaking about himself and decides to give him concrete advice. After finding out a little more about the situation, Paris tells The Doctor that his approach probably scared Pel off altogether and suggests that he take her someplace special. The Doctor expresses reservations about what to do, but Paris has an idea.

Meanwhile, in sickbay, Pel is sitting on a biobed nervously waiting for The Doctor. While waiting, she speaks with Kes about her feelings for The Doctor and reveals that the awkwardness and bluntness with which The Doctor confessed his feelings for her was the reason she did not admit to her feelings for him.

[edit] Act Four

The Doctor waits for Pel in a holographic 1957 Chevrolet convertible on an equally holographic Mars. After a few awkward moments and explanations, he gives her a bouquet of red roses, a box of chocolates, and a teddy bear and turns on the car's radio. He offers to try dancing, as he's just downloaded the subroutine that would allow him to do so, but she prefers just sitting for a while and stargazing. The Doctor points out Earth and several other astronomical highlights in the sky. They kiss and embrace facing the stars.

On the bridge, Paris is late again. Chakotay says it's all right, as they don't need him. He tells him that Grimes will take Paris' place at conn for the shift, and every shift until Paris starts taking his job more seriously. Captain Janeway supports the decision all the way, but stays quiet. As Chakotay starts guiding him off the bridge, Paris shoves him roughly to the floor and Janeway has Tuvok escort Paris to the brig.

Seska contacts Jonas in his quarters to give him advice on how to implement his sabotage of the warp coils. Because she doesn't want to raise her child with the Kazon, she fully intends to take Voyager, and that means having Jonas sabotage it. She begins to detail the plan, saying that they will meet Voyager at a planet called Hemikek IV.

Meanwhile, The Doctor is feeling much more comfortable around Pel, and hopes their relationship will continue after they perform the synaptic transfer. However, before the procedure begins, they discover that Pel's brain is rejecting the tissue graft and that they cannot continue the transfer.

[edit] Act Five

The Doctor finds elevated levels of nytoxinol in Pel's body. When he finds the hypospray with which Pel was injected to contain cervaline as it was supposed to, he concludes that somebody must have deliberately poisoned Pel. Before he can call for Tuvok, however, Pel reveals that she herself administered the nytoxinol, knowing it would be fatal.

She states that she does not wish to be in that body again. She says that she would prefer to live a few healthy days with The Doctor, knowing they would be her last, than to spend the rest of her natural life in her Phage-infected body. She is sick of prolonging people's suffering, which is all she can do, and all she feels The Doctor is doing for her by making her go through with the transfer. She says in her adult life before Voyager, she was "just a disease," but has become more than that thanks to him. She fears that he will stop loving her when she is sick again. But The Doctor argues that he would love her, no matter what her condition was. Pel seems convinced and at peace and they meet in Sandrine's. As she emerges from the shadows, she reveals herself back in her real, non-holographic body, and she and the doctor embrace for a final waltz before she leaves for her home.

[edit] Log Entries

  • Chief Medical Officer's log, supplemental. Test results indicate that the holographic body is functioning normally. The patient's synaptic patterns appear to be stable, so I'm now ready to begin transferring her cognitive and motor processes.
  • Doctor's personal log, stardate 49504.3. Inaugural entry. Kes and Mister Paris have conspired to get Denara and me alone together in a place Paris considers romantic. I've never felt more... uneasy.
  • Doctor's personal log, stardate 49507.2.The more time I spend with Denara, the more my programming continues to adapt. I look forward to perfecting my romantic skills once we've completed the synaptic transfer.

[edit] Memorable Quotes

"I never thought I'd see myself again."

- Denara Pel


"You're a computer simulation?"
"An extremely sophisticated computer simulation."

- Denara Pel and The Doctor


"Sometimes I think my people are so focused on trying to save lives, we don't know how to live anymore."

- Denara Pel


"Romance is not a malfunction."

- Kes


"Where are we exactly?"
"On a planet called Mars inside a primitive, land-based vehicle. It's called a '57 Chevy. Mr. Paris is quite an automobile aficionado; this is his program."
"What is it that we're supposed to be doing?"
"I believe it's called... parking."

- Denara Pel and Dr. "Shmullus"


"By the way, Denara, I've been meaning to tell you..."
"Yes?"
"I'm romantically attracted to you and wanted to know if you felt the same way."

- The Doctor and Denara Pel


"This exact procedure was developed by Dr. Leonard McCoy in the year 2253. I'm equipped with the collective medical knowledge of more than 3000 cultures."

- The Doctor to Denara Pel


"If you've got a problem, I'd like to know what it is."
"Yeah, I've got a problem, my problem is you."

- Chakotay and Tom Paris


"Mr. Paris, I assume you've had a great deal of experience being rejected by women."
"Thanks a lot, Doc."

- The Doctor and Tom Paris


"Get your hands off me!"

- Tom Paris, to Chakotay


"I have no intention of raising my child on a Kazon ship! One way or another, I am going to take Voyager, so you can either help me or suffer along with Janeway and the others!"

- Seska


"Denara, please... don't die."

- The Doctor

[edit] Background Information

  • This is the first and only episode in which we see what a healthy Vidiian looks like.
  • Tom Paris continues his indiscipline that first started in "Meld". This culminated with Paris having a scuffle with Chakotay on the bridge as Paris is 10 minutes late for his shift. Tuvok then escorts Paris to the brig.
  • The Doctor mentions a procedure by Leonard McCoy as he is discussing the neural implant on Pel's body with Pel.
  • When making an excuse for being late to his shift, Paris jokes that he thinks he may have missed his calling in medicine. This foreshadows his later duty as assistant to The Doctor.
  • In the original broadcast of this episode, the song playing on the radio while The Doctor and Pel are in the holographic simulation of Mars is "I Only Have Eyes for You". Although originally written in 1934 by Harry Warren and Al Dubin, the version used is the 1959 recording by The Flamingos. On the DVDs, the song "My Prayer" is used instead. It was originally Copyrighted in 1939, written by George Boulanger and Jimmy Kennedy.
  • Susan Diol's costume from this episode was sold off on the It's A Wrap! sale and auction on eBay and re-used by actress Lise Simms in the episode "Year of Hell, Part II". [1]
  • The title is apparently a double-entendre, referencing both the medical procedure used on Pel, and the fact that the Doctor finally recognizes his own life.

[edit] Video and DVD releases

[edit] Links and References

[edit] Main Cast

[edit] Guest Stars

[edit] Co-Star

[edit] Uncredited Co-Stars

[edit] References

1957; 2253; appendectomy; automobile; axonal pathway; basal ganglia; bio-neural circuitry; brain; cardiovascular system; cerebellum; cerebral cortex; cervaline; Chevy; constellation; compound fracture; Crabtree, Susie; Culluh; Cygnus; delta band frequency; DNA; Doctor Alpha; Earth; EMH; emission nebula; endocrinology; Fina Prime; Foster; gigaquad; Greek; Greek mythology; hematology (hematologist); Hemikek IV; Hercules; Hercules (constellation); hiccup; Hippocrates; hives; holoemitter; hologram; humor; inaprovaline; Klingon; lectrazine; level 2 self diagnostic; Kazon-Nistrim; magnetic constrictor; Maje; Mala; Mars; Martian colonies; McCoy, Leonard; medicine; medical practitioner; My Prayer; nanofiber; neural tissue; neuralyte probe; neuro-cortical stimulator; nytoxinol; parietal lobe; phage; Platters, The; Pleiades Cluster; rose; Shmullus; Starfleet Academy; Stellar Cartography; suicide; synaptic pattern; submicron suture; tactile acuity subroutine; teddy bear; terahertz; tetrahertz; Utopia Planitia; verterium cortenide; Vidiian; Vidiian program Alpha; waltz; warp coil; Wildman, Samantha; Zimmerman, Lewis


Previous episode:
"Death Wish" 		Star Trek: Voyager
Season 2 		Next episode:
"Investigations"
Retrieved from "http://memory-alpha.org/en/wiki/Lifesigns_(episode)"