True Q

About True Q

"True Q" is a 6th season episode of Star Trek: The Next Generation.

The Enterprise has received an intern from Starfleet Academy, Amanda Rogers, to study biological sciences under Dr. Crusher, but soon strange things start to happen. In a cargo bay, Commander Riker is nearly hit by a falling cargo crate, which mysteriously swerves to avoid hitting him mid-flight, astonishing the onlookers including Amanda. Later, when Amanda is in main Engineering, the warpcore suffers a catastrophic meltdown and explodes at the point of the intermix chamber. Amanda is able to repel the plasma/energy wave with nothing more than her hands and reverse the damage to the core. A bemused La Forge remarks that for a second "the laws of Physics went out the window". Suddenly Q materializes and remarks that why shouldn't the laws change, because "they're so inconvenient".

Captain Picard gets Q to admit he is behind the recent Enterprise incidents. He is testing Amanda, who is not human, but actually a Q, meaning that she inherited the powers of Q. This means she must decide whether to join the continuum or not. Not convinced, but keen to allow Amanda a chance to make the right decision, Picard allows Q to teach Amanda how to use her powers. Amanda is particularly keen to learn about her biological parents, who were members of the continuum - they sired Amanda while in human form, but were killed by a tornado in Topeka, Kansas when she was very young. Q shows her how to see an image of her parents and she begins to trust him. They play a game of Q-style Hide and seek, eventually ending outside the ship on the hull between the warp nacelles (pictured).