Mess hall. Phlox enters and spies Quantum togged out in a white Hanes Beefy Tee. Boy, he’s really giving us the sartorial works this episode. "Trouble sleeping, Captain?" Phlox asks. Quantum comments he's not the only one, to which the good doctor replies, "Actually, Denobulans require very little rest unless you count our annual hibernation cycle." "Am I going to be without my doctor this winter?" Quantum asks. "Only for six days," Phlox tells him. Cool. I really hope they do an episode surrounding that period. It could be very interesting and ORIGINAL. Quantum chuckles that he might have to join him, and you want to know something weird? I'm not hating Bakula in this scene yet. Usually, he opens his mouth and I reach for a Post Road life-preserver, but he's actually being genuine and less of a pompous chucklehead than usual. Phlox grabs a plate of something from the refrigerated section, and Quantum asks, "Any progress?" Phlox pauses and looks very disturbed. "The research has been challenging, to say the least," he says. "A cure, Doctor, have you found a cure?" Quantum asks, and I'm back to hating him again. Phlox says, carefully, "Even if I could find one, I'm not sure it would be ethical." "Ethical?" Quantum queries, clearly needing a Merriam-Webster for that concept. Phlox states they'd be messing around with a process of evolution that has been taking place for thousands of years. Quantum slaps his thigh and gets up, saying, "Every time you treat an illness, you're interfering. That's what doctors do." It's only Episode Thirteen and they're already resorting to a tight-white-t-shirt-wearing macho-ism that Kirk didn't need until Star Trek V (and that Picard didn't ever need -- the nakedness in "Chain of Command" notwithstanding). "At least it's not a wife-beater," Mathra comments. And granted, Bakula looks to be in much better shape than Shatner ever was -- even in TOS's earliest days.

Phlox tells His Studliness that he's forgetting about the Menk. "What about the Menk?" Quantum asks, as he saunters to refill his glass of iced tea. You know, his poses are almost identical to Blalock's, and it's making me think this scene is all about showing off Bakula's body. Tight pants, tight white t-shirt, poses being struck…well, at the very least, we can say they're egalitarian in their exploitation. "I've been studying their genome as well and I've seen evidence of increasing intelligence -- motor skills, linguistic abilities -- unlike the Valakians, they seem to be in the process of an evolutionary awakening.