History Recap / StarTrekPicardS3E03SeventeenSeconds

In a {{flashback}}, Picard toasts the birth of Thaddeus Riker. Will is alternately excited and scared, claiming that the turbolift ride from the ''Titan''[='s=] bridge to sickbay were the longest [[TitleDrop seventeen seconds]] of his life. However, he's rousted from her celebration by an exhausted Deanna Troi: "I haven't brushed my hair in 72 hours and your son just vomited all over Engineering. Projectile vomit! Four feet in the air! They should study him for science." Will returns to fatherhood, after wishing Picard -- who, remember, is the LastOfHisKind, has no LoveInterest and no living blood relations -- an InnocentlyInsensitive thing: "I hope one day you get to have this feeling too."

* BadassBeard: Worf still has his, but interestingly it's also changed in the interim since ''Nemesis'' (and not just the hair color). It's now gone from the traditional Klingon-style beard Worf sported during TNG and [=DS9=] to a more human-style goatee. Given Worf's post-''Nemesis'' CharacterDevelopement has seen him finally embrace and balance his human heritage, his new beard style ''could'' arguably be a symbol of that self-improvement.

* LegendaryInTheSequel: Worf, thanks to his exploits during TNG and the Dominion War. Raffi even cites it in-universe.

Worf and Raffaela (he only uses her full name) succeed in apprehending Rikka and drag him back to ''La Sirena'' for a dose of the ol' GoodCopBadCop. Rikka seems in a foul temper, and Musiker (the angry bad cop) dangles the lure of drugs in front of him so he can avoid withdrawal symptoms. However, Worf (the calmer good cop) sees his face rippling, and has only one question: "How long have you been away from the Great Link?" His cover blown, Rikka morphs and tries to escape, but Worf and his phaser put a stop to it. He then reveals what he has alreeady learned from his source in the Great Link: a RenegadeSplinterFaction of Founders, in defiance of the primary consensus, are attempting to restart the Dominion War. (Starfleet cannot acknowledge this publicly without doing the same.) Likewise, up on the ''Titan'', Jack identifies his assailant as a Changeling. (Of course, he's dragged in unconscious, forcing Picard to take a seventeen-second turbolift ride, the longest of his life, to his bedside.) Raffi hypothesizes that the Changelings who stole the Portal Phlebotinum did it to hide the theft of something bigger and scarier at the same place, and she and Worf point their BuddyCopShow towards the Daystrom Institute to find out what it was.

Raffi awakens on the ''La Sirena'', not certain how she got there. The only other occupant is her handler: Worf, Son of Mogh, who has made chamomile tea. He agrees with her that the attack on the Starfleet recruitment building is merely a herald of a greater attack. She confronts him for hamstringing her investigation, especially since she was right... but Worf points out that he was scared she would simply get herself killed, and ''he'' was right as well. That said, he has determined that a human named Titus Rikka paid Sneed to finger T'Luco, and the two join forces to apprehend him.

Worf and Raffaela (he only uses her full name) succeed in apprehending Rikka and drag him back to the ''La Sirena'' for a dose of the ol' GoodCopBadCop. Rikka seems in a foul temper, and Musiker dangles the lure of drugs in front of him so he can avoid withdrawal symptoms. However, Worf sees his face rippling, and has only one question: "How long have you been away from the Great Link?" He has learned that a RenegadeSplinterFaction of Founders, in defiance of the primary consensus, are attempting to restart the Dominion War. (Starfleet cannot acknowledge this publicly without doing the same.) Likewise, up on the ''Titan'', Jack identifies his assailant as a Changeling. (Of course, he's dragged in unconscious, forcing Picard to take a seventeen-second turbolift ride, the longest of his life, to his bedside.) Raffi hypothesizes that the Changelings who stole the Portal Phlebotinum did it to hide the theft of something bigger and scarier at the same place, and she and Worf point their BuddyCopShow towards the Daystrom Institute to find out what it was.

Shaw orders the ''Titan''-A deeper into the nebula; Vadic orders the pursuit with glacial calm. The nebula, in the grand tradition of ''Star Trek'' nebulae, dampens sensors, and the ''Titan'' is mostly able to find safety... but the ''Shrike'' seems to have some other way of finding her quarry. Shaw is injured and officially puts Riker in command. As Beverly and Dr. Ohk try to slow the internal bleeding, he grabs Jack Crusher and wonders, audibly and angrily, how the ''Shrike'' keeps tracking them. Meanwhile, Riker orders the ship out of the nebula, only to find the ''Shrike'' waiting for them... And, even worse, it has the Portal Phlebotinum that has driven the season, powered up to the point that ships can move through it. ''Titan''[='s=] attempts to escape simply result in her coming out where she started. Riker, frustrated, orders the ship ''back into'' the nebula, despite Science Officer T'Veen's warning of some sort of gravimetric object at its center. Additionally, the nebula is sending out consistent pulses of energy, which (T'Veen notes) have a bioelectric signature. [[ChekhovsGun This will be important later]].

* IAmXSonOfY: ''Of course'' Worf introduces himself as "I am Worf, son of Mogh". This time however, he includes "son of Sergey, House of Rozhenko" paying tribute to his human parents as well.

* EurekaMoment: When an injured Shaw wonders aloud how the ''Shrike'' can keep finding the ''Titan'' in the nebula, Jack sees the trail of blood in Sickbay and realizes that the ''Titan'' is leaking particles that the ''Shrike'' can follow.

-->"[[IAmXSonOfY I am Worf, son of Mogh,]] House of Martok; son of Sergey, House of Rozhenko; bane of the Duras family; slayer of Gowron. [[MoodWhiplash I have made some chamomile tea. Do you take sugar?]]"

* AvengingTheVillain: Implied, or at least a possible example when Beverly mentionsa pair of Reman Assassins who tried to kill Picard during the Donatra Sector incident. [[Film/StarTrekNemesis Shinzon]] isn't outright mentioned, but given the timing of when this occurred, it's not hard to imagine they were gunning after the man who got their liberator killed and doomed the Remans to eternal Romulan slavery (or alternately, they were trying to sabotage the Supernova Evacuation).

-->"[[IAmXSonOfY I am Worf, son of Mogh,]] House of Martok; son of Sergey, House of Rozhenko; bane of the Duras family; slayer of Gowron. [[MoodWhiplash I have made chamomile tea. Do you take sugar?]]"

-->"[[IAmXSonOfY I am Worf, son of Mogh,]] House of Martok; son of Sergey, House of Rozhenko; bane of the Duras family; slayer of Gowron. I have made chamomile tea. Do you take sugar?"

* ExplosiveInstrumentation: The old ''Trek'' "tradition" is alive and well aboard the ''Titan''-A during battle with the ''Shrike''.

In the present day, Picard confronts Crusher, demanding to know what happened to their RelationshipRevolvingDoor. Beverly admits that, the exact day she dumped him for the fifth time, she got pregnant. ...And when she tried to reach out to him, he was the victim of an assassination attempt. After the third such attempt, she gave up. "All I knew is that if you're the son of Jean-Luc Picard, there's a target on your back. ... As a mother, your whole being is about [[MamaBear protecting your child]]. I thought I could protect mine. I didn't know if I could protect ''yours''." She also admits that she told Jack who his father was and encouraged him to reach out: he refused.3

* WholePlotReference: To ''Star Trek II'' and the Battle of the Mutara Nebula, with the ''Titan''-A and ''Shrike'' taking the places of Kirk's ''Enterprise'' and Khan's ''Reliant''. Played with in that this time around, the ''Shrike'' is the tactically superior vessel and Vadic is much more experienced at space combat than Khan was, while the ''Titan''-A and protagonists are aiming for subterfuge to help them escape.

* BackInTheSaddle: Riker retakes command of ''Titan'' after Shaw is injured.

* TraumaCongaLine:L This is one factor that motivated Beverly's decision not to tell Picard about their son. After losing her parents, Jack Sr. aboard the ''Stargazer'', and Wesley to the Travelers, Beverly couldn't bear the possibility of losing one more member of her family to danger.

* NeverMyFault: Riker angrily blames Picard for the failed counterattack against the ''Shrike'' that cripples the ''Titan''-A and leaves them plummeting into the Nebula. Yet, it was Riker's hesitation that gave Vadic the crucial seconds she needed to deploy the Quantum Tunneling technology.

-->"[[IAmXSonOfY I am Worf, son of Mogh,]] House of Martok; son of Sergey, House of Rozhenko; bane of the Duras family; slayer of Gowron. I have made chamomile tea. Do you take sugar?"

* FantasticRacism: The rogue Changelings' hatred for the 'Solids' is still as strong as it was during ''Deep Space Nine''