#phlox’s menagerie

[phloxsmenagerie]

Moopsy!

[1trilliongrams]

^ link back to the original

[weerd1]

ENT Rewatch Starlog, 11 February, 2024: Episode 3.10 “Similitude”

We open with what appears to be the funeral of Commander Tucker before flashing back to two weeks prior. Trip and T’Pol are engaging in a neuropressure session while Trip discusses what he thinks can be a way to get Enterprise to maintain high warp factors longer. They put the plan to the test, but it results in Trip in a coma from the explosion and the NX-01 stranded in a cloud of magnetic dust that is slowly coating the ship and will eventually damage her beyond repair.

Phlox reveals he has an animal in his menagerie that he usually just takes enzymes from, but if injected with DNA, could result in a rapidly aging clone. Phlox proposes using this method to crate a copy of Trip, which in a few days would mature to the point of being able to harvest brain matter to repair the original. The clone meanwhile would age out comfortably in about two weeks.

Archer is reluctant but agrees as the Enterprise’s situation becomes more dire. Soon Phlox is raising an infant mimetic simbiot, which he dubs “Sim.” As the child rapidly grows, it becomes clear that he has Tucker’s memories, requiring Archer to explain to the pre-adolescent version who he really is and his purpose.

As they crew races to figure out how to free Enterprise, Sim joins in. He also reveals to T’Pol that he has feelings for her, but he is unsure if they are his own or belong to Trip.

He does devise a way to tow Enterprise out of the cloud. Phlox meanwhile discovers that Sim will NOT survive the procedure to save Tucker. Sim begins to suggest there may be research that would prevent his rapid aging, and that perhaps it would be worth trying to save his life as he is good NOW, and would simply continue on AS Commander Tucker. Phlox argues that there is very little chance it would work, and Archer makes it clear he will do anything to save Trip. Sim seems to acquiesce, but then tries to steal a shuttle. He stops before taking off though telling Archer he really has no where to go, and knows he will be gone soon either way. At least if he helps Trip something good can come from it all. 

As he prepared to report to sickbay, T’Pol stops him, kissing him tenderly.  He then goes to his fate. We return to the funeral to see Sim in the coffin, and Trip present at the funeral. Archer notes how Sim’s sacrifice may indeed help save everyone on Earth before committing Sim’s body to space.

Holy Shades of Tuvix, Batman. Rewatching this episode made me deeply uncomfortable, though the performances here are top notch. I admit I have a hard time buying that Phlox’s ethics would allow him to even suggest this course of action. Also, it seems a bit of a story stretch to say it would somehow be easier to make a WHOLE OTHER TUCKER than just clone some brain matter in some way, but I will give them credit that they wave the technobabble wand at the problem, and Phlox does legitimately believe Sim will live out his own complete, albeit short, lifespan regardless of the procedure. Why the doctor thinks borrowing enough brain to fix damage that made Trip comatose wouldn’t have an affect on Sim is also something it’s hard to suspend disbelief on for me, but here we are. 

The developments for the T’Pol/Trip relationship are interesting here, and will certainly be referenced in future episodes.  Morally though, I’m not sure where this episode leaves me with Phlox and Archer, and that certainly calls back to the moral conundrum Janeway faces in “Tuvix.” In that situation though, it is an accident that presents the situation; here these two CHOOSE to go forward with making an entire lifeform that will be sacrificed to save a crew member. I’m not sure that’s the choice I would go with. 

Next Voyage: The turn of the 20th to 21st Century proves to again be pivotal to history as the crew ends up in 2004 on “Carpenter Street.”

(Images taken from the main website for @trekcore; I am happy to remove the images if asked.)

[whirligig-girl]

Star Trek: War of the Worlds

I’m listening to the excellent Jeff Wayne’s Musical Version of War of the Worlds and remembering an idea I had last time I listened to the album. From a friend group DM:

you ever think about how there's probably a bunch of martians who are just... people. maybe they're complicit in the attempted colonization of Earth, maybe they themselves are victims of the colonialism perpetrated by the spacefaring geoengineering martian powers-that-be, maybe both at the same time.

like, WotW was intended as a commentary on how fucked up it'd be if the british got fucked up the same way the british fucked up its colonies. Are there martian authors writing stories about how fucked up it'd be if an interstellar ship visited and colonized Mars? I don't mean that literally necessarily, I just mean, we see Martians as nothing more than monsters, right? As far as the victims of colonialism are concerned, that may as well be all the british were. terrifying soldiers with more advanced technology.

(note: running against my own limited understanding of the history and context of what colonization actually looks like in practice)

ok my brain is being really autistic about this... Star Trek au where the War of the Worlds happened in its 19th century history in addition to all the other fucked up wars of the 20th and 21st century.

Wolf-Rayet: Martian members of the Federation

Yeah. I have shared that Enterprise rewrite with the colonialist Vulcans, right?

https://forums.sufficientvelocity.com/threads/i-can-reach-any-star.106958/ (written by @open-sketchbook​ )

(reading that made Enterprise's first two seasons so much more interesting to watch while keeping this in mind, and made its final season kinda worse)

anyway it gets a bit messy when you picture Earth as having had two attempts at alien colonization, one where the tech level is rockets (well, lasers[note 1]) vs steam engines, and the other is where it's warp drive vs warp drives on rockets.

Vulcans would have colonized Mars too

and probably facilitated medical aid to provide vaccinations and soforth for the martians so they could live on Earth, this time as humanity's peers. The solidarity would likely be lost on the two groups, however--at least at first.

...

NX-01 Enterprise leaves spacedock with "heat-rays" provided by the martians, who unlike the vulcans, have no qualms at this point with sharing technology.

i think it's a very star trek thing for the martians to be eventually redeemable.

after all, there's no crimes the Martians did on Earth that humans weren't doing to each other right up until Cochrane's warp flight.

...

alien in Phlox's sickbay, wandering around. "You have quite the eh, menagerie, Doctor," he says, and he pokes a brain-like organism sitting on the counter.

"Ahp ahp ahp! That's Ensign, ah-hem, OOOOOLAAAAAA, from engineering, he's waiting for his physical!"

 "UUUUULLLLAAAAAAAAHHHHHH!!!!!"

 "I told you you didn't have to get out of your uniform until I finished these results."

 "ULLAHHH!"

"Yes I know Earth fabrics give you a rash, you mentioned that before your appointment." 

[note1: earlier in this conversation I had mentioned that the green flashes from Mars were green lasers being used for laser sail propulsion as opposed to rockets. The description of heat rays also match infrared lasers)

(also i only ever listened to the musical version of the war of the worlds, sorry for not being able to get through a 19th century novel when i could listen to a 2 hour banger of a musical instead. :P i’m told it’s a fairly accurate adaptation though, compared to the radio drama and two movies.)

[blue-mint-winter]

Star Trek Enterprise s2e18 The Crossing

Enterprise is immobilized and swallowed up by gargantuan alien ship with no one aboard, but the atmosphere changes into a breathable for humans. This reminds me of the sinister repair station.

Through the episode we learn about the aliens who are incorporeal wisps of light and can take over human bodies and sent their real owners to subspace where they have sweet dreams.

T'Pol argues they might be just curious explorers, but Archer isn't convinced. This time his judgment was spot on. I simply wondered - if they are incorporeal and live in subspace, why do they need a big spaceship? That is already suspicious.

Basically the aliens are creeps - they don't ask for consent, they just force themselves on their victims. It's illustrated very pointedly by possessed Reed committing sexual harrassment on a female crewman and T'Pol.

Thankfully, Phlox is immune to the possession and T'Pol can fight it off thanks to her Vulcan abilities. She learns that the aliens will die in space and their ship is broken, so they plan to take over the whole crew.

I wonder if the aliens could take over animal bodies like Porthos or Phlox's menagerie. Maybe they aren't compatible.

Travis contributes by finding out that the aliens can't enter the catwalk. He also gets beaten by possessed Trip and can't stop him from interfering.

Archer and T'Pol decide to gas the possessed crew until the aliens leave their bodies under threat of dying. Then they commit a possible genocide by blowing up the alien ship. The morality of this ending is questionable. Did the aliens deserve it? They didn't aim to kill the crew. Trip insisted that he was having a good time in the other plane. Archer didn't even try to negotiate with these aliens.

Interesting and spooky idea in this episode. I just feel the moral implications should have been considered in the ending.

[reedalerts]

TAG DROP --- Character tags

[el-im]

Can you recommend any YouTube shows or podcasts that talk about Trek? Like, the big themes or character moments and canon stuff?

Star Wars has dozens of shows like that but I can't seem to find one for Trek

oh boy. well! honestly, i don't really engage in a lot of fan theory/analysis outside of what i run across doing my own research for my stupid little posts + seeing things by chance on tumblr, i really only know of/am familiar with two podcasts, which are both run by previous cast members.

connor trinneer and dom keating run the shuttlepod show on youtube + talk a lot about the behind the scenes work/implication of the stories they played in enterprise. i've had a ball watching their show, and have picked up a lot of trivia that i don't think i'd have gotten otherwise (the scar on trip's face from 'in a mirror darkly' was the same prop they used for captain pike in tos' "the menagerie", john billingsley dressing up in leather bondage with his phlox makeup still on is the reason paramount now bans halloween celebrations on studio sets, gary graham approached his role as ambassador soval entirely through the lens of being a vulcan who has "been on earth too long" + is becoming progressively more volatile because of it)

in my opinion, not all eps are created equally, and if you're at all interested, i'd watch you've got a silik mind and what the phlox first !

other than that, as far as i know, the delta flyers is a show on spotify/patreon about voyager run by rdm and garrett wang, where (i believe) they review an episode each week (though i'd kindly steer ya toward @cptproton​--my database for all things voyager + his hal listens to the delta flyers tag. hal certainly has his ducks more in a row than i do + can give you a better rundown about the show if you're interested!)

if you’re looking for in-depth doylist/watsonian analyses, i'd also take a look at @rattlegore, who pried ds9 open w a crowbar for me--my view of the show would be fundamentally different had i not read their examinations, which i think are absolutely the best articulated/most fitting views of the show that stay true to ds9's themes/reception/meaning that i’ve ever run across (some of my favorite posts they've written are here, here...)

* edit: OH and the DS9 documentary if you haven’t seen it and are interested in DS9! talks about the social impact/the significance of the stories w cast interviews!

[prider-parker-imaginations]

Imagine being a trans member of the Enterprise crew and reporting to Phlox for the first time.

You paused for a moment at the entrance to Sickbay, running a hand over your hair to smooth it into place before passing through the threshold. Almost immediately a wave of new smells washed over you, an odd mix of antiseptic, chemical smells you would usually associate with a medical area and a series of other scents you could only really describe as something reminiscent of a pet store. You could see several cages and hear the faint chirps of animals within, though only a few were currently visible. You tilted your head to one side as you approached a small aquarium containing a creature that resembled a starfish.

"Can I do something for you, ensign?"

You looked up as the ship's doctor poked his head out from around a console to address you. You hadn't met many Denobulans before but he sounded friendly and cheerful enough. He stepped around to address you more properly, bright blue eyes crinkling at the edges as he smiled, "Ah, I see you've met my osmotic eel. Fascinating creatures, aren't they?"

You folded your hands loosely behind your back, offering the appearance of attention even as your eyes continued to stray around to the different cages and enclosures, "I've never met a doctor with their own menagerie before."

"You'd be surprised at how helpful creatures can be. Though I assume you came down to Sickbay for a reason other than to sate your curiosity?"

You shifted your weight from one foot to the other momentarily, "Yes, my doctor back home told me I should report to you before we left drydock to make sure all my medical needs were in order. Doctor Franklin?"

Phlox's eyes lit with recognition, "Ah, yes, you must be Ensign [l/n]!" You nodded in confirmation and he continued, "There was a note in your file. Everything should be in proper order. You'll need to drop by Sickbay every two weeks so I can give you your hormone treatment and monitor your dosage and ensure there are no ill side effects. If you experience difficulties fitting appointments into your work schedule I can ask the Captain to help plan around them."

"Thank you, sir, but that shouldn't be necessary."

"There's no need for that kind of talk in here, Ensign, please just call me Phlox," the Denobulan admonished cheerfully.

"If you don't mind my asking, doctor, have you treated any trans patients before?" you ventured. You didn't know much about Denobulans beyond some cursory knowledge of the complicated nature of their family and marriage relationships. For all you knew, their experience of gender could differ entirely from your own.

Phlox's expression softened, "If you're concerned about my qualifications, I can assure you I will do whatever is necessary to provide you and any other crew in your situation with the utmost care and respect. Though you will be my first human transgender patient, I have read extensively regarding human medical care practices as well as having performed similar procedures on Denobula. I assure you, you are in good hands."

"You won't have any problems synthesizing hormones in deep space?" 

"Not at all. I'm sure you'll find I'm quite resourceful, Ensign."

You allowed yourself a small grin, already feeling more at ease for having made sure to reach out to your new doctor. From what you'd been told, your mission should prove an eventful one and it felt good to have gotten a potentially uncomfortable introduction out of the way. "That's good to hear, doctor. If that's all, I should be getting back to my post. Prepping to leave drydock ahead of schedule means all hands on deck."

"Of course, Ensign, it was a pleasure meeting you."

You couldn't help but return his almost unnervingly broad smile, "Likewise, doctor."

[unicorn-and-bluebells]

Ok the Ferengi bloke screeching in fright at one of Dr. Phlox's animals was kinda funny. That's what you get for messing with a menagerie

[bad-startrek-aus]

An Alternate Universe where Dr. Phlox’s medical creature menagerie becomes official Starfleet Medical practice aboard all future ships and stations. That is Hugh Culber and the Disco Doctors have a special lab for them, McCoy has a creature med zoo that Chapel sings to, Dr. Beverly Crusher practically has a personal cargo bay full of them, Julian has his as an attraction set up on the Promenade with a small selection crammed on the Defiant, and The Doctor just picks up new creatures there in the Delta Quadrant.

[phloxsmenagerie]

Mods are asleep. Post horny Garak.

[existence-overwhelming]

Fake Things

Characters - Marion Bronte Faus Deirdre, Ceyn Alden

Word Count - 1,634

Description - In an attempt to grasp the concept of sleep, a certain automaton finds them self in the company of one sleeping man and her own thoughts.

@synthcalibur

When the luminous light of day fades into a muddled red and orange and yellow display, night begins its reign. This menagerie of hues fought the encroaching darkness gallantly, but it was a losing battle. They waned and shades of purple, violet, and grey rolled across the boundless horizon. Cottony islands of milky-white darkened and twisted into inky black stains upon a seamless dark tapestry. Then the world’s night light crept up above the jagged city skyline, its pale light streaking down and guiding wayward nighttime denizens. And yet, not all diurnal entities took the advent of the moon as a cue to nod off.  With eyes wide open, Marion laid atop the sheets of Ceyn’s bed. Her legs, too long, hung over the foot of the bed like the lower section of bamboo stalks, knees bent over the rail and feet resting against the fuzzy bristles of the floor. One arm dangled off the side, the back of her hand pressed against the carpet with fingers partially curled around an empty thin black glove. The other arm was stretched out above her, bare hand splayed out. Each fingertip marked a point of interest on the ceiling, of which the automaton’s eyes examined all of them.  Her ocular optics flicked from one tip to another, the distinct pink glow of her pupils acts as the sole light source. She could make out shapes and faces out of the random patterns formed by the bumpy texture of the plastered ceiling. Of which the most intriguing being the one her palm covered.  The formation in question reminded Marion of a constellation--one Ceyn pointed out. It was something akin to an animal, a lion Ceyn called Leo, and yet looked too malformed to accurately depict the prideful feline. But that’s why she liked this pattern the most. Due to its lack of certainty and its uncanny semblance to big cat, the unusually large blotch was just like any other constellation to her.  According to Ceyn, a constellation was this group of things in the sky someone found one day and somehow saw something else from it. They used their imagination to see something out of nothing, to correlate random things into something else entirely--something with purpose. And people were expected to see what they saw, even treat this fake thing as real. More outlandish than that, people did! Because of one silly individual, people treated a series of unrelated things, made into a fake thing with fabricated definition, as something it wasn’t. Something it could not, should not, would not be--real. Thus because she was the only one to see this little odd Leo, in the sky of Ceyn’s room no less, she got the privilege of naming it. She would name it Asli, such an ironic joke.

People were always fabricating imitations of things.  Marion’s wonder-struck eyes trailed from Asli to the first knuckle of her ring finger. The elated, beaming countenance of her face faltered and turned somber. While more convincing than her counterparts--it was still fake. If you scrutinized the joint long enough, a nigh imperceptible seam between the tip and the rest of the finger evinced itself. Then the same discrepancy in her flawless skin became overt for the other two knuckles, as well as the rest of her hand’s joints. Below the alabaster skin: wires, resilient metallic bones, strips of bolted metal, nuts and bolts, servos, soldered joints and intersections, and all but organic things.  Nothing but random things.  She turned her hand palm down and clenched her digits. While nto stiff or mechanically awkward, a lack of profuse creases and wrinkles marred her pristine canvas skin like they did a human hand. Uncurling her fingers, she then flexed the five digits, extending and stretching them so the seams of each joint expanded in girth. Little black rings, thin bands, were exposed--each appended to their respective joint to provide additional protection. Then she let the mitt fall limp against her bosom, fingers lax, before breathing out a sigh. And for an ephemeral moment, she could not stand to look upon Asli any longer. It was too ugly of a mirror.  In this spontaneous lapse of repulsion, Marion turned on her side and faced Ceyn. The soft glow her eyes exuded chased away the darkness shrouding his peacefully slumbering visage. The brazen complexion she’d come to associate with happiness; the cuts and scrapes which faintly marred his features with their scar tissue; his dark strands of hair, cropped short of his neck; the unique way his nostrils flared in sync with the steady rise and fall of his chest; and the contours of his face that gave him an air of fierce cunning--everything developed over time. She smiled, memorizing every inch of his countenance for the umpteenth time. it all naturally defined his physicality, all stemming from either a choice of his own or of nature’s. When he acted or spoke, he did so with the character he himself defined all by his lonesome. Nothing told him who he should be or how he would look. It didn’t take the will of another to make him who was, nor did he look as he did because of another’s efforts.  Unlike Asli, no random things were needed to fabricate something real in Ceyn.

Marion scrutinized Ceyn’s sleeping mien a moment longer before letting her gaze descend and inch its way onto the man’s sole exposed hand. It seemed so petite, at least compared to her own. He had stout fingers and palms crisscrossed with scratches and faint, waning white streaks. Trace amounts of dirt and grime darkened the undersides of his stubby nails nigh imperceptibly. And patches of stubborn callouses, hardening the pads of his hands and fingers, lingered on his skin. His were the hands of a laborer.  For something so real, to rest his head so near, to something so fake--it seemed downright deplorable.  The automaton simply stared, nerve slipping away more and more with every second that passed as she worried at her lower lip. Bit by bit, she reached out towards the man’s hand. It was slow going and rife with hesitance, countless thoughts and emotions rising and falling out of her mind. A desire she could not put a name to drove her actions, one which stemmed from the subconscious yearnings few could ever acknowledge. But then, she stopped. Was it right to think these thoughts, to yearn for such things? Vincenza always chastised her whenever these things popped up. Words like “defective” and “retarded” often came up in her scoldings. And, more than usually, Marion would shove the whole thing far, far away so it withered away and retreated back into the confines of her subconsciousness--in no way did the automaton find the prospect of not being in Vincenza’s relatively good graces. But no one had reprimanded her this time, yet.  Would Ceyn rebuke her for wanting this?  Her eyes flicked from his hand to her own, then back again. When had she begun to tremble like a leaf? The woman curled her fingers, digits fidgeting and twitching, before promptly retracting her hand. She shook her head and beat the same mitt against her forehead in admonishment. It was stupid, utterly stupid of her to think--to try. A frown contorted her expression, lips quivering. Phlox droplets pricked the corners of her eyes, after a moment. But then, as tears threatened to spill down her cheeks, something beyond her conscious apprehension begot a surge in conviction. The woman’s hand reluctantly crawled across the linen sheets, fingers working meticulously to inch forward like a spider’s legs when treading its own web, and reached out anew. A moment of intensified dubiety ground her progression to a nigh standstill for all but a moment before she forced herself to forge on. Eventually, Marion’s pinkie finger tapped against the tip of Ceyn’s own pinkie.  The difference in length was comically noticeable.  Blinking, she glanced up to the man’s lax face. It seemed her chilly touch, albeit faint, had gone unnoticed. Even when asleep--Ceyn seemed to stand upon some unreachable level, something she could only dream of achieving. She squeezed her eyes shut, then, and reached out to take his hand into her own, however, whatever confidence driving her actions fizzled out. Rather than pull back, though, Marion intertwined her pinkie with his.  Temperature did not register for her like it did for humans. She did not feel heat, not in the normal sense. When she, for example, places her bare hand under a running faucet of scalding water, she won’t immediately recoil in pain. Rather, the plethora of subdermal sensors of her body acknowledges the sudden spike in ambient temperature, measures it and relays this reading to the mind, and then begins to advises cautionary exposure based upon the measurement.  As such, holding his pinkie simply begot a measurement of his skin’s temperature and the acknowledgement that she was, in fact, touching something.  After a moment of bated worry, Marion cracked her eyes open by an inch to gauge Ceyn’s reaction. To her surprise--he had hardly stirred at all. But even more surprising was the fact that his digit had curled around her own in response. There was no rebuke or chastisement for her actions, yet, and it seemed as if she had done anything but disturb him. While she could not be certain as to how he might react once morning came, the present outcome left a small grin on her lips. The automaton then curled up, drawing her other arm and either leg up to her chest, and nestled into the sheets whilst she continued to hold his finger.  For now, as her eye lights began to dim and eye lids became lax, she was content with being a fake thing.

[jazzypizzaz]

*yes* main plot points in “A Night in Sickbay” are infuriatingly stupid (Archer being petulant and stubborn over his bad decision to bring his dog along on a sensitive diplomatic meeting… his sexual tension thing with T'Pol ugh…)

but it’s otherwise such a charming episode! 

okay… BUT I admit I love this episode purely for Phlox: all the weird shit he gets up to at night while everyone else is asleep – clipping his gnarly inch long toenails, chasing escaped bats with origami on a stick, feeding his menagerie, etc – and the insights into Denobulan polygymous practices. 

*shrugs* dumb premise, but it has good rewatch value.

[thedenobulandoctor-archive-blog]

*tries to slip back into medical later that evening after hiding*

Phlox has gotten around to feeding most of his menagerie, but looks up when they start chirping and making various noises.  “Hello?”

[the-denobulan-doctor]

Who's your buddy? -coos at snake-

“He’s an Etarian pit viper.”  Phlox explains, gently stroking the snake’s head.  “One of the newer members of my menagerie.  Their venom has many medicinal qualities- but be careful their bite is paralytic.  Would you like to hold him?”  

[phloxsmenagerie]

I can sure try…