[Bridge]

VADIC: Let's start by taking their eyes.

[Computer room]

GEORDI: Enough is enough. Lore can't control what he can't access.
ALANDRA: I thought you unplugged him.
GEORDI: I did. This is her. She's locking us out from the bridge.
VADIC [OC]: Now, take their ears.

[Corridor]

RIGGS: Ensign Riggs to bridge. Do you copy? Damn it. Comms are dead. Fall back. Fall back!
(They are being shot at in the dark.)

[Bridge]

VADIC: Take the very road ahead of them.
(Bulkhead doors close.)
VADIC: With nowhere left to run.

[Sickbay]

PICARD: Can you access the ship's security comms from here?
CRUSHER: I'm trying, but the bridge is locking us out.

[Bridge]

RIGGS [OC]: They've got us pinned down!

[Sickbay]

CRUSHER: Transport, security everything.

[Bridge]

VADIC: There it is.

[Sickbay]

PICARD: Damn it. We must find a way to regain manual control, or we'll lose everything.
(Jack is having one of his auditory visions.)
LAFORGE: What is he doing?
MALE [OC]: I'm all alone in here. I need to regroup with my squad. Where are all the others?
(Jack sees through his eyes that they are dead, then an alien shoots. Jack gasps.)
CRUSHER: Jack.
JACK: It's no use. She's locked us out, seized control of half the bloody ship. Titan is hers now.

[Bridge]

VADIC: Attention, crew of the Federation starship USS Titan, this is your captain speaking. You are now without sight, without sound, without freedom of movement. And with a tap of my finger, without oxygen to breathe or gravity to stand. I can make the halls boil or the crew mess snow with cold. Or... I can be on my way with Jack Crusher in tow. Consider that, while I consider which of these er... fine officers up here you might miss most. So... So, Jack Crusher to the bridge, would you, please.

[Shrike brig]

TROI: Hold still. Hold still. I'm trying to clean... Shh. Don't be so dramatic. I'm nearly done.
RIKER: Oh.
TROI: Though your beard has gone from brown to grey to blood red. The face of an old man who can still take a punch. Almost.
RIKER: I've missed you, imzadi.
TROI: Imzad...? I should have taught you another word. Yintaru?
RIKER: Yintaru. What does that mean?
TROI: Baby of immense size. You've changed. I can feel it.
RIKER: In the nebula, I came face-to-face with bleakness. I hadn't felt that since... Well. But when we came out of it, all I wanted was to see your face. I missed loving you, imzadi.
TROI: Oh, you are clearly concussed.
RIKER: Oh, definitely. But when they kill us, at least I'll die knowing I gave you one final dose of the old Riker charm.
TROI: Well, you should know the Changeling that came to our home pretending to be you? He was pretty charming, too.
RIKER: Really?
TROI: Mmm.
RIKER: How charming?
TROI: Good in bed, bad at pizza.
RIKER: Huh. So just like me.
TROI: I knew they were imposters the moment they arrived. Even though I can't really read Changelings, these... they're different.
RIKER: Yeah, we know. Evolved physiology.
TROI: Well, most of them have left the ship with their leader, along with her rage and her anger and her vengeance. Did we do the right thing, giving them the compromised code?
RIKER: I couldn't let them torture you any more. I just couldn't. And I knew Jean-Luc would know what to do. With any luck, right now, he's set a classic Captain Picard trap and as we speak, he's got her on the ropes.

[Bridge]

VADIC: Mmm. This is cosy. I'm gonna take this with me.
SEVEN: Don't give me that look. I won't apologise.
SHAW: You should have blown the turbolift.
SEVEN: But I didn't, and I'd make the same decision again. I draw the line at trading lives.
SHAW: You are a Starfleet officer. You don't have the luxury to only make choices that feel hunky-dory. Everything has consequences.
SEVEN: Consequences like saving your life?
SHAW: Commander Hansen...
SEVEN: My name is Seven of Nine.
SHAW: Consequences that haven't happened yet. Not just to you or me, but to the entire ship.
VADIC: Send a team to find our shy little fox, while I try to coax him out with some fresh meat. Ooo, Jack, dearest. Are you pleased with yourself? Forcing this chaos, this suffering upon your crew. And still you refuse me. You have ten minutes to come to the bridge or I'll execute one crew member for every ten minutes that follow. Starting... well, now.

[Sickbay]

CRUSHER: Absolutely not. I will not let you go up on the bridge. Jack, don't sacrifice yourself.
PICARD: Once Vadic has you, she will destroy the ship before taking you wherever the hell she aims to take you.
JACK: And where else can it be? Where else would a Changeling reside but the Great Link, the home world for their kind?
PICARD: Vadic intimated revenge. Her focus on who you are suggests that she has something more infinitely complicated in mind.
JACK: Okay, well, let's be clear, then, shall we? I am not a Changeling. I have never changed into or from anything. I am who I am, a talker. Not sleight of hand but sleight of words, all just to distract from this... this feeling that I have... I've always been different. But not... not like their kind. No, no, no. Not like that. Not in that way.But something has changed in me. And if I tell you something, both of you, I need you to swear to me...
CRUSHER: Of course, darling.
PICARD: I can assure you, Jack, I'm here.
JACK: I think I can retake the ship.
PICARD: Jack, tell me how. Vadic has the bridge. Her people are everywhere.
JACK: Vadic has cut off our vision but I can still see. I can connect to people. See through their eyes, move their bodies. I... It's all in my head. I can slip around them, retake the bridge. I know... I know what this must sound like, but time is running out and I have to do something now.
CRUSHER: Brain function is normal. If he was hallucinating...
JACK: These are not hallucinations.
LAFORGE: He's telling the truth. I've seen him do what he's talking about. Felt him do it to me. It saved my life.
PICARD: This may indeed be why they've been hunting you. You're special. In some way, unique. If you can truly do these things, connect to one of our own. There may be something we can try. In the event of a hostile takeover, high-ranking Starfleet officers are given an override codex.
LAFORGE: To lock down the ship and all its systems. But in this case, we can use it to unlock it and regain control.
CRUSHER: Except that Vadic has control of every console on the ship except on the bridge.
JACK: What if I can get up there, through them? I can maybe just... just possibly reach out, connect, or even control one of our own. I can try. I have to try.

[Bridge]

VADIC: One minute left, Jack. How exciting.
PICARD [OC]: Input this codex into the console.
(Mura does. Vadic sees the result.)
VADIC: How did you know? How did you know Jean-Luc Picard's override codex? Unless... Oh, my, my, my. Is that you in there, Jack Crusher? Look at you, finally living up to all your potential.

[Sickbay]

JACK: She knows.

[Bridge]

VADIC: Open comms. Jack, I'm afraid your first ten minutes have expired.
SEVEN: Let them go. You want to do this. Take me.
SHAW: Hansen! Hansen. There is nothing... nothing you can do.
VADIC: He's right. What's your name?
ESMAR: Ensign Kova Rin Esmar. Communications, USS Titan.

[Sickbay]

PICARD: Jack, don't.

[Bridge]

VADIC: And you?
MURA: Lieutenant Matthew Arliss Mura. Tactical.
VADIC: No! No. Tell me something else. Tell me about someone who loves you.
MURA: My... my son.
VADIC: A son. Picard has a son. Why don't you tell him to come up here.
MURA: I can't, because I'm Starfleet.
VADIC: Want to see what control looks like?
(Vadic puts her phaser to Esmar's head, then shoots....)

[Sickbay]

VADIC [OC]: Tell them.
SEVEN [OC]: She just executed Lieutenant T'Veen.

[Bridge]

VADIC: Jack, come to the bridge. If not, we'll have to repeat this little exercise again and again and again.

[Shrike brig]

RIKER: The Titan's strategic advantage won't last. They're still outgunned. We may not survive. Kestra will have lost everyone.
TROI: You're not giving up again, are you? You left the second Jean-Luc called and put half a galaxy between us. I know you were angry at what I did when Thad died, but you gave up.
RIKER: I didn't give up. I was numb. You know why? Because our son died, Deanna, and I needed to feel the grief.
TROI: Your grief was taking you over. You were disappearing from us.
RIKER: And you used your Betazoid powers to push yourself inside my head to dull the pain. And when that wasn't enough for you, we both gave up.
TROI: Well, unlike you, I felt the weight of everyone's grief and not just my own.
RIKER: It was my last connection to him, and you tried to erase it.
TROI: Not erase it. Take it. Help you carry it. But I forgot the one thing that all counsellors should remember. You can't skip to the end of healing. Besides, if anyone's leaving that planet, it's me.
RIKER: I thought you loved Nepenthe.
TROI: No. We went there for Thad, but it's not really my cup of tea.
RIKER: Honey, it's not mine either.
TROI: That house, it's like it was designed by a cabal of retro prairie hipsters.
RIKER: Even the way the front stairs groaned at me.
TROI: It's a very judgy foyer. And those birds every morning, like screaming babies.
RIKER: Nepenthian Red-winged Banshees. Horrible. You know what they say. The only thing worse than a woodpecker...
BOTH: Is a two-headed woodpecker.
TROI: I miss the city, Will. I miss crowds and raktajino lattes and people. I miss people. Angry, joyful, complicated people.
RIKER: Then why are we there?
TROI: Because we have to be willing to go through that door to what's next.
RIKER: Here they come. Don't touch her!
(Someone shoves a blade through the alien's chest, then phasers the remains.)
TROI: Worf!
(They embrace him.)
WORF: One's personal space is a right.
TROI: Oh.
WORF: Deanna. I have counted the days since I last saw you. Like waves in the ocean, constant and unending. I have thought of your empathic gifts often during my self-evaluation.
TROI: Well, that's wonderful, Worf.
RIKER: Inappropriate.
WORF: The work I've done on myself, the level of sensitivity that I have achieved has been in more ways than one...
RIKER: Is this a rescue mission or a continuation of the torture?
WORF: We must leave. First, there is something you must see.

[Sickbay]

JACK: What other choice do we have? We all know this only ends by me going up to the bridge and turning myself over. If I stay here, eventually she's gonna find me. But if I go, at least there's a chance she'll spare the rest.
CRUSHER: Jack, please don't do this. It won't solve anything.
LAFORGE: I've tried everything to regain control of even just one system. In a year, I could write a code that could maybe override her commands. In month, my father could do it. But in minutes? We'd need an asynchronous AI matrix capable of computational speeds beyond 90 trillion operations a second. What?

[Computer room]

GEORDI: Data, can you hear me in there? Or am I talking to Lore?
(Our heroes enter, and point phasers at each other.)
GEORDI: Six years ago, you brought a gift to my anniversary dinner on Rigel.
PICARD: A Chateau Picard Bordeaux, which you said was too dry because your taste in wine is pedestrian at best.
GEORDI: Definitely Picard.
CRUSHER: Geordi, we have a plan to regain control of the ship.
JACK: We need your robot friend to talk to the ship, access its systems and override Vadic's bridge command.
GEORDI: We can't risk reconnecting him. Data's not exactly alone in there.
PICARD: You said there was some kind of partition separating Data's matrix from Lore's.
GEORDI: That's a good thing, too. Otherwise, there'd be nothing there to prevent Lore from completely erasing Data.
PICARD: Well, couldn't we just reverse that? You raise the partition and Data erases Lore, then takes control of the ship.
GEORDI: Data's ethical subroutines don't permit him to take a life of any kind.
ALANDRA: Dad, we're out of options.
GEORDI: All right. This is gonna take time.
JACK: I can get you time.
GEORDI: Okay, we only have one chance at this. When we remove the partition, there is no going back. No safeguards, no backups. Data. If you can hear me in there, you'd better buckle up.

[Data's brain]

LORE: Your friend is removing the partition between us. He's hoping you will overpower me so they can regain control of their little ship. Whatever he's attempting, it will only hasten the end. For you.
GEORDI [memory]: So you say everything in here has some significance?
DATA [memory]: Holmes collected nothing, neither trinkets nor thoughts, which were not specifically significant to him.
LORE: Reminiscing, are we? Scanning through your meaningless memorabilia? In my mind, you would find mightier things. Symbols of power, conquest. The only sensible measure of the success of a life. While you? You collect trinkets.
DATA [memory]: ..neither trinkets nor thoughts, which were not specifically...
DATA: These trinkets are my memories. The only sensible measure of the worth of a life.
LORE: And what a fairy tale it's been. While I was left abandoned, alone, you were showered with all the love and friendship the galaxy could offer. What a waste. You can't even feel enough to enjoy it.
DATA: What... what have you done?
LORE: I'm overpowering you, brother, as I always could. One lifeform replacing another. Evolution, my dear Watson.

[Shrike]

WORF: Raffaela.
RAFFI: Don't worry. It's still me.
WORF: All clear.
TROI: Jean-Luc.
WORF: Do not worry. It is not him. It is only his former shell.
RAFFI: His biological body before he went positronic. This is what the Changelings really wanted from Daystrom Station.
WORF: However, it is not Picard's body they wanted but what it contained.
RAFFI: They removed portions of his parietal lobe, sections that were infected with Irumodic Syndrome.
RIKER: Why the hell would they want that?
RAFFI: I think I can download the database. Raffi.
TROI: Deanna. Strange days, huh?
RAFFI: You're telling me.
COMPUTER: Download complete.
RIKER: Riker to Titan. Do you read me?
WORF: The shields are up. Comms down. They've lost control of the ship. Your absence has been discovered. We must return to the shuttle. Now.

[Bridge]

ALIEN: The prisoners have escaped. It's possible they have a cloaked ship nearby.
VADIC: It's time for me to give another demonstration of my impatience.
SEVEN: Don't you dare!
COMPUTER: Turbolift active.
ALIEN: Someone's on the turbolift.
VADIC: Baby boy, I was sure you'd decline my invitation.
JACK: No. My mother taught me better manners than that. I even brought you a gift.
COMPUTER: Unknown device detected.
(A metal ball with a red flashing light.)

[Computer room]

GEORDI: Lore's matrix is growing. His programing is overriding Data, devouring him bit by bit.
PICARD: There must be a way we can stop it.
GEORDI: No, Jean-Luc. This battle is all Data's now.

[Data's brain]

DATA: Curious. I'm finding it difficult to maintain focus.
LORE: Not your focus, brother, your existence. I'm consuming you. At any moment, you will simply cease to be, and all these memories, so priceless to you, will simply fade away.
DATA: My memories define me. I am who I am because they exist. Even though I do not share your desire to dominate, I recognise, given my current state, I am powerless to stop you.
(Hands Lore the hologram of Tasha Yar.)
LORE: Indeed. I hoped you'd see it that way.

[Computer room]

PICARD: Data, please. Fight, damn it. We need you, old friend. We need to retake the bridge.

[Bridge]

VADIC: I'm confused. Do you think that will kill me?
JACK: Maybe. Maybe not. I'm quite sure of one thing, though. It will kill me. So if you want me alive, you let them go. There's really no point resisting.
VADIC: Jack, Jack, Jack. Like a jack-in-the-box ready to pop, pop, pop. They've served their purpose. Lock them in there.
(Seven turns back.)
SHAW: Hansen, what are you doing?
SEVEN: Accepting the consequences.
JACK: You really should have gone.
SEVEN: You really shouldn't have come up.
VADIC: How fitting it is for you to stay and witness this.
JACK: Vadic, I'm here. Come on. Tell me, what do you want from me?
VADIC: Your gifts.
JACK: My gifts? Well, seeing as you know so much about them, why don't you indulge me, tell me, flatter me. What are they?
VADIC: Ooo, Jack Crusher. What's it like, roaming from planet to planet, species to species, but never able to outrun that awful, constant shadow of isolation? Loneliness? A life in service to others. A calling? Or was it guilt? Did you always know deep, deep down what you are?
JACK: Look, Vadic, if at any point you want to stop talking in batshit circles, I'm all ears.
VADIC: Ears. Yes. You've heard them, haven't you? The voices. What's that like? After years of solitude, silence, then finally s-s-so many voices. I can help you put the pieces together. The answers. The choice is yours, Jack. Are you not curious to see what's behind that red door?
SEVEN: What is she talking about?

[Computer room]

GEORDI: Data's primary functions are beginning to shut down. Lore's writing his own code. We're about to lose Data forever.

[Data's brain]

DATA: Included in this memory are the many hours I spent playing poker with my friends. These belong to you now.
LORE: Tell me. Why are you giving me these things?
DATA: Because you have had nothing while I have had everything.

[Computer room]

PICARD: Geordi, I'm no expert, but this looks like surrender.

[Data's brain]

DATA: This is Spot. This simple creature managed something quite miraculous. Something of which I did not know I was capable. In a way, he taught me to love. He is the best of me. The last of me. Yes.
(Lore takes Spot and smirks as Data disappears.)

[Computer room]

(The display is all red for Lore.)
GEORDI: Damn. That's it. That's it, he's gone.

[Data's brain]

LORE: I feel... What's happening?
(The display goes all blue for Data.)
DATA: I merely discovered the error in your deception. That my memories were not without value to you. I knew because they belonged to me, you would see them as trophies and be unable to resist them. You took the things that were me, and in doing so you have become me. We are one now. We are me. Goodbye, brother.
(Lore dissolves.)
LORE: Goodbye, brother.

[Computer room]

GEORDI: Data?
DATA: Yes.
PICARD: Data, we need your help. The ship is in trouble.
DATA: Say no more. Accessing ship systems.
RIKER [OC]: Shuttlecraft Emerson to Titan. Do you read?
LAFORGE: He did it. We've got comms back. Shuttle, it's LaForge. We read you.
RIKER [OC]: Ensign, what's going on over there?
LAFORGE: Vadic took control of the ship, but we're taking it back and we need you. You're clear to dock.
RAFFI [OC]: Copy that. Coming to assist.
DATA: Greetings USS Titan.

[Bridge]

DATA [OC]: This is your friendly, positronic, pissed-off security system back online.
VADIC: Find them. Go!
DATA [OC]: Unwanted guests and monologuing protoplasms, I am initiating an immediate shift change.

[Corridor]

RAFFI: Hey, boys.
(Raffi fights with two swords.)

[Bridge]

DATA [OC]: Jack Crusher, you are up.
JACK: That's my cue.
SEVEN: What the hell are you doing?
(He creates a forcefield bubble around himself and Seven. Raffi finishes off her aliens.)
JACK: Picard, do it now!

[Computer room]

PICARD: Bridge, open the evacuation hatch, now.

[Bridge]

SEVEN: Get off my bridge.
VADIC: Oh, fucking solids.
(The bad guys get sucked out.)
JACK: Picard, close it now!
(Vadic's frozen body hits the Shrike and shatters.)
SEVEN: Captain Shaw, may I present your ship back.
SHAW: Stations. We're not done yet.
ESMAR: Captain Riker's team is back on board, sir.
SHAW: Commander. You take this one.
SEVEN: Lieutenant Mura, target the Shrike.
MURA: With pleasure, Commander.
SEVEN: Give it everything we've got. Fire!

[Corridor]

(Finishing phasering alien remains.)
WORF: You did well. But you're still throwing from the left shoulder.
RAFFI: What? That's bullshit.
WORF: You must snap at the wrist.
RAFFI: That's what I was doing.
RIKER: You all right? You're scary. Deanna? What's wrong?
TROI: There's a darkness on this ship. All-consuming darkness.

[Computer room]

PICARD: Welcome back, Commander. We've missed you.
DATA: I hope, in me you will see the friend you once knew. For better or worse, I am changed. Clearly older.
CRUSHER: Young or old, we are so glad to have you back.
DATA: Thank you, doctor. It has always been my desire to know the totality of the human experience. I have already tasted death, but this? Ow. This is new.

[Corridor]

DATA: I believe we're good here.
GEORDI: Hey, Data. You just used a contraction.
DATA: No, I didn't.
GEORDI: No, I... I heard you clearly.
DATA: It appears I'm capable of using contractions now. And humour, too.
GEORDI: Wow. That certainly is new.
DATA: Many things are new to me, including myself. I am still Data but also Lore, B-4, all that Doctor Soong programed into this body.
GEORDI: Well, tell me. How do you feel?
DATA: I feel... I feel.
GEORDI: Well, I hope that you can sense, as fully as any human has ever felt anything, how happy I am to have my friend back.
DATA: And it would be negligent of me not to say, despite my many changes, the one thing that will remain forever constant is my gratitude for your friendship.

[Observation]

TROI: Data!
DATA: Counsellor.
GEORDI: Admiral, ladies and gentlemen, allow me to introduce you to the newest version of a very old friend.
RIKER: With an upgrade, I'm told.
DATA: Oh, I am mostly myself, I assure you. Albeit with a dash of computational joie de vivre.
PICARD: The last time we spoke, you wished to experience death. As happy as I am that you're here, I hope that we haven't betrayed that wish.
DATA: No, sir. I know that me is resting peacefully. But this me? This me would rather be no place else in the universe.
PICARD: Join us.
RIKER: It's been a long time since we all sat around a table like this.
GEORDI: Too long, really, by far.
CRUSHER: I am so grateful to be here. Hardship may have brought me here, but I want you all to know that there wasn't a day all those years that I didn't miss all of you.
TROI: And we missed you, too. I even found myself talking to you on my darkest days. Well, on my happiest ones, too. It turns out you give really good advice, even when you're not there, so... you were always in my heart when it mattered.
CRUSHER: Thank you.
WORF: I have slaughtered countless enemies over the years and considered sending their heads to all of you. But I was advised that that was passive-aggressive.
PICARD: All that matters is that we are together once more, because I need you, all of you. Changelings have infiltrated Starfleet.
GEORDI: Whatever it is they've got planned, Frontier Day is just hours away.
RIKER: And we've got almost no answers. We're analyzing the data that we pulled from the Shriketo see what it was that they were extracting from your body.
DATA: If I may, this is all factual information that ignores a... an emotional truth.
TROI: One which I felt the moment I set foot on this vessel. Whatever the Changelings have in store for Frontier Day is tied directly to Jack.
CRUSHER: There's something happening to him. Visions, voices. He has abilities that we... we just can't explain.
PICARD: And whatever the cause, it is getting stronger.
TROI: There's a darkness with that boy. Not in him, but around him, passing through him. And a voice inside him, ancient and weak. But a voice that isn't his own. I think it's time I met your son.

[Counsellor's office]

TROI: Are you ready?
JACK: Well, I'll say this. You don't spend a lifetime practicing the art of charismatic deflection because you want to invite people in.
TROI: Well, as a counsellor, I would normally wait for you to seek me out, but I think we can both agree that the quickest path to the truth is what everyone needs right now. So.
(Jack puts his hands in hers.)
TROI: Jack, stay with me. Follow my voice. Jack, have you ever, in your dreams, in your imagination, even perhaps when you're awake, have you ever seen a door?
JACK: The red door. The talking door.
VOICES: Jack. Jack.
JACK: The door I've no desire to open.
TROI: Why?
JACK: 'Cause I'm terrified about what's behind it.
TROI: It's time to open the door, Jack.
JACK: No. No. I don't know that I can.
VOICE: Jack.
TROI: We'll go together. You're not alone.
(He reaches for the door knob.)
VOICE: Jack.