Episode Report Card Keckler: B | Grade It Now! YOU GRADE IT Mucus of Borg
By Keckler | Season 1 | Episode 22 | Aired on 04.30.2002
Captain's Private Dining Room. Quantum and Trip watch a water polo game…match…thing. Quantum explains the "finer points of the game" to Trip as they eat beer and pretzels. All that's missing is some belching and a sport where you don't wear those weird leotards. "Think of it as one part basketball, one part swimming, and one part wrasslin'!" Quantum tells Trip, as two players try to strangle each other. "Huh, and I thought it was jest a bunch of guys screwing around in a pool," Trip says. I can't believe I'm going to say this, but I…agree with Trip! I think I better get a glass of Pimm's to make sure Hell's not experiencing an early frost.
Red Stripe Guy goes into Cargo Hold Two, discovers that the bulkhead has a runny nose, and tries to comm Red Stripe Gal just as something phlegms around his leg. Red Stripe Gal gets the comm but hears nothing. "Michael, is that you?" she says playfully. Radio silence. "Hello?" she asks.
More scenes of men screwing around in the water. Trip shows an affinity for the game as Quantum does some embarrassingly dorkish celebration twists when a goal is scored. "I told you, best sport in the world!" Quantum announces. Trip says he'd still take "a great off-tackle run out of the backfield," but he can see how this might be exciting too. Trip, Trip, Trip, to have come so far and yet…sigh. They clink glasses, and Quantum thanks his little buddy for "thinking of it." Trip don't-mention-its and tells Quantum to sit back and watch "while Texas trounces your sorry California butts." Quantum pauses, mid-swig, and asks Trip, "You haven't watched the end of this, have you?" Trip says, "Of course not!" but Quantum looks unconvinced. Isn't Trip from Florida? Why does he care about Texas? Just because they're southern doesn't mean he has to find affinity with them.
Cargo Hold Two. Red Shirt Gal waves a flashlight around and calls out, "Hello?"
Trip and Quantum argue about a foul call, and Quantum wonders how practical it would be to put a pool on the ship. Just who would you play against, Quantum? You'd be in there bouncing your ball and treading water alone. Trip says he wouldn't want to be taking a swim when the "gravity plating went off-line." Quantum thinks about that for a bit and says, "No!" and they laugh companionably. Yeah, and judging by Quantum's gratuitous shower scene in "Unexpected," the only thing that would transpire is lots of bubbles. Scary. Someone frantically comms in: "Kelly to the Captain!" Quantum tells her to go ahead, and Kelly (the crewman formerly known as Red Stripe Gal) tells him that there's some sort of life-form in the cargo hold. "Life-form?" Quantum repeats. Kelly explains that the life-form snagged Rostov: "He's still conscious, but he can't --" There's some squealchy noises and then radio silence. Quantum and Trip rush out.