"Tricobalt can't melt parsteel beams!"
Seven Of Nine starts developing conflicting conspiracy theories about Voyager when she starts downloading important ship information while she is regenerating.
This episode provides examples of:
- An Aesop: Seven realises that quality matters as much as quantity. And having fun too.
- Amusing Alien: The alien working on the graviton catapult has the expected eccentricities of a self-motivated inventor.
- Apophenia Plot: Seven of Nine modifies her alcove to download information directly into her brain — which proves to be more than her brain can handle, and she starts forming it into patterns to try and make sense of it all. While the first scenario she constructs turns out to be correct (the ship is infested with fleas), she then veers into paranoid conspiracy theories strung together out of various events in the show's history. First she thinks Voyager is conspiring with the Cardassians to conquer the Delta Quadrant, then that the Maquis are plotting to use the quadrant as a base to attack Cardassia and the Federation, then finally that Voyager was sent to capture her so they could dissect her for tactical information on the Borg.
- Bold Explorer: Chakotay reminds Janeway of an unusual nebula they can explore.
- Bookends: Both a Seven/Naomi scene and a Janeway/Chakotay scene.
- Call-Back:
- Too numerous to list, courtesy of Seven's rapidly evolving conspiracy theories. Janeway then offers a few to help her get her head on straight again.
- When discussing how quickly rumors spread, Chakotay quips, "Warp 10".
- Captain Morgan Pose: Janeway does one on the bridge while holding a huge mug of coffee.
- Clip Show: A borderline example, as some of the references to previous episodes include clips from said episodes.
- Conflict Ball: Janeway and Chakotay even momentarily buying into Seven's loony theories after six years together seems far-fetched. On the other hand, they've both seen enough trickery and subterfuge that it's hard for either of them to absolutely dismiss Seven's claims, particularly when she delivers them with certainty and apparent backing of evidence.
- Conspiracy Theorist: Deconstructed by Seven of Nine in the episode. Without the calming influence of the Collective, her brain struggles to find order in random events, leading her to leap to wild conclusions each time she looks at the ship's data. This quickly balloons into a theory that the Federation orchestrated her assimilation as a stepping stone to invading the Delta Quadrant, leading Seven to try destroying the ship and herself. Unfortunately this type of social commentary is just as relevant as it was in The '90s. (Her paranoid rants are so persuasive that she almost convinces Chakotay for a second!)
- Continuity Cavalcade: Seven refers to many past episodes as evidence to support her theories.
- Do You Trust Me?: Fortunately Seven decides that she does trust her captain.
- Dramatic Irony: Seven's initial conspiracy theory, that the Cardassians and the Federation are allied in a plot to occupy the Delta Quandrant is both partly true and majorly false for reasons Seven is entirely unaware of: by this point in the timeline, the Cardassians have been devastated by the Dominion War and are in no state to be occupying anything, though they did ally with the Federation at the eleventh hour, and were expected to get Federation assistance in rebuilding; the Federation and the Cardassians are working more closely than they once did, but they are neither willing nor able to do anything like what Seven's suggesting.
- Facial Dialogue: Naomi wants to watch Seven trying out her download. Seven just raises an eyebrow in a silent negative.
- Failure Is the Only Option: Averted; despite various hold-ups the catapult is used successfully to send Voyager on its way, cutting three years off their journey.
- Faster-Than-Light Travel: An alien they come across in their travels is working on a graviton catapult which can catapult a vessel across space in the time it takes to say "catapult a vessel across space." The crew of Voyager are naturally willing to help any way they can.
- Feminine Women Can Cook: Averted; Janeway has her usual replicator issues trying to make a home-cooked meal for Chakotay.
- Foreshadowing:
- The below-mentioned Gossip Evolution foretells the rabbit hole of conspiracy theories that Seven's modified alcove will send her down.
- When first told of her plan, Tom says, "Learn while you sleep? I tried that once, gave me a headache."
- Good Old Ways: At the end of the episode, Naomi brings in a
stack of PADDs that she assimilated the old-fashioned way. By reading. - Gossip Evolution: The Doctor's generational projections end up with Neelix asking if he should build a nursery. Doesn't he know there's only one Official Couple allowed on the ship?
- Insane Troll Logic: Seven's futile attempts to rationalize the deluge of data she's been pouring into her brain quickly devolves from sensible deductions to radical theorizing to outright insanity as her conclusions become increasingly reliant on complete coincidences (such as Kes leaving Voyager or Seven herself being chosen as the Borg Collective's representative) until she starts suspecting Naomi Wildman, who hadn't even been born when Voyager entered the Delta Quadrant, of conspiring against her.
- It's All About Me: After sprouting a number of conspiracy theories, Seven finally works out what Janeway's secret agenda is. Herself.
- Let Us Never Speak of This Again: Once Janeway and Chakotay figure out what's going on, she jokes that they should keep the whole thing out of the official log.
- The Mutiny: Fortunately more in rumor than fact.
- Mundane Utility: Seven's technique is an initial success when she identifies a fault in the sensor grid caused by those pesky photonic fleas burning out a power conduit.
- My Skull Runneth Over: Seven's attempt at a more efficient way of absorbing information has the end result of pumping more data into her head than she can handle; trying in vain to make sense of it all, she ends up neck-deep in increasingly implausible and paranoid conspiracy theories before Janeway finally talks her down.
- O.O.C. Is Serious Business: Apart from Seven, there's a scene where Janeway and Chakotay eye each other suspiciously in Cargo Bay 2, phasers conspicuously attached to their hips.
- Only Sane Man: B'Elanna, of all people, is the one who suggests the simple solution of just talking to the captain rather than buying into Seven's "ridiculous" theories. Chakotay practically dismisses her out of hand.
- Planning with Props: For delivering exposition on the graviton catapult.
- The Power of Friendship:
- Janeway talking down Seven at the end.
- Played with between Janeway and Chakotay, who do actually seem to suspect one another for about a minute, but then acknowledge that they've been through too much to not trust one another.
- Sanity Slippage: As Seven's cortical node degrades, she slips further into her delusions that everything around her is part of a giant conspiracy.
- Series Continuity Error: Seven refers to "Commander" Seska, even though Seska was an ensign. Not that it really affects the plot.
- Sleep Learning: Seven of Nine modified a device called a cortical subunit allowing her to download ship's status reports while she was regenerating. When she mentioned this to Captain Janeway, Tom Paris commented "Learn while you sleep? I tried that once, gave me a headache." The ultimate effect of Seven of Nine's experiment was that the new information wasn't absorbed properly and she became paranoid, convinced that both Captain Janeway and Commander Chakotay were plotting against Voyager.
- Tagalong Kid: Seven finds Naomi Wildman pretending to regenerate in her alcove.
- Tampering with Food and Drink: Jokingly Discussed after getting the conspiracy mess all straightened out.Chakotay: You didn't poison the coffee, did you?
Janeway: Not any more than I usually do.. - Tastes Like Friendship: J/C reconcile over dinner again.
- Third-Person Person: As she lays out her final conspiracy theory to Captain Janeway, Seven, in a sign of Sanity Slippage, soon starts referring to both Janeway and herself in the third person. Janeway uses the same style of speech to remind Seven of the bonds of trust and friendship between them.
- What Happened to the Mouse?:
- We don't find out where Voyager took the photonic fleas they found.
- There is never any resolution to the legitimate questions of why Voyager had tricobalt warheads, or whether Seven actually saw a tractor beam on screen, or just an image artifact.
- When She Smiles: Seven to Naomi when arranging a kadis-kot game.
