pictures are from [#97 Extreme Risk] unless otherwise stated

ORBITAL SKYDIVING HOLOPROGRAM
including orbital skydiving suit
PAGE 1

 

CONTENTS
This Page	Torres goes orbital skydiving on the holodeck. Why Torres created the holoprogram.
Page 2	The orbital skydiving suit. Behind-the-scenes.

 

TORRES GOES ORBITAL SKYDIVING ON THE HOLODECK

Torres is on the Holodeck, in a shuttlecraft, kitted out in an orbital skydiving suit. Torres: "Higher." Holo-pilot: "Lieutenant, we're already at 200,000 metres. You could thermalise at this altitude." Torres: "I said higher." The holo-pilot obeys and reports: "We're at 300,000 metres."

Torres: "Level us off. Computer, disengage safety protocols." Computer: "Warning. Disengaging safety protocols presents extreme risk of injury."

Torres: "Override." She starts to put her helmet on. Computer: "Acknowledged. Safety protocols have been disengaged."

Torres: "Drop the forcefield on my mark." Holo-pilot: "Aye."

Torres: "Mark." The forcefield is dropped

She jumps out and starts to freefall.

The com. signal sounds. Chakotay, via comms: "Bridge to Torres." Torres, annoyed, to herself: "I don't believe it." Chakotay, via comms: "Report to Engineering on the double."

Torres: "Computer, end program." The holoprogram ends as she positions herself into a standing position.

She is standing in the empty Holodeck.

She unclips the visor and heads for the exit.

WHY TORRES CREATED THE HOLOPROGRAM

When, in late 2374, in [#83 Hunters], USS Voyager receives personal letters from home via Starfleet via the Hirogen relay network, Chakotay receives and passed on to Torres news that shocks her, that virtually all of her friends from the Maquis have been massacred by Cardassian forces who have a new ally from the Gamma Quadrant (not named, but this would be the Dominion, which is named [#82 Message In A Bottle]). Torres subsequently goes into a period of severe depression, during which she sometimes runs hazardous holodeck programs. One of these is orbital skydiving with the safety protocols disengaged; holodeck safety protocols are computer subroutines that prevent the holographic projection system from generating harmful objects, substances or situations which may cause a user's injury or even death.

Orbital skydiving is a sporting activity in which an individual, wearing a special protective suit, leaps from a spacecraft at orbital altitudes. The individual plunges hundreds of kilometres, soaring through atmospheric entry, before landing safely on the planet's surface. Torres does simulated orbital skydiving on Voyager's holodeck and orders the computer to disengage the safety protocols in order to make it as real as possible, with the danger lying in the fact that she ascends to a dangerous altitude before jumping out of the drop ship (a Starfleet shuttlecraft).

Chakotay investigates the reason for Torres' behaviour (full dialogue in Episode Guide, plus screenshots):

Chakotay: "You created a Holodeck program to watch all our Maquis friends get slaughtered! What I want to know is, Why?!"
Torres: "I thought we came down here to talk about safety protocols. This has nothing to do with that."
Chakotay: "I'm not so sure. The logs show you ran this program for only 47 seconds, the day after I gave you the news about the massacre, then you shut it down and started running the most dangerous programs you could find with the safeties off. WHY?! B'Elanna, why are you intentionally trying to hurt yourself?"
Torres: "I don't know."
Chakotay: "Are you trying to commit suicide?"
Torres, surprised at the thought: "No."
Chakotay: "Then why?"
Torres: "Because, because if I sprain my ankle at least I feel something. I'm not trying to kill myself. I'm trying to see if I'm still alive! It's not just the pain. I don't feel anything, not about my dead friends, not about Tom, you, my job."
Chakotay: "Maybe you're afraid if you let yourself start to feel something, you might not be able to stop. You can't just shut off your emotions, B'Elanna. Sooner or later you're going to have to let yourself grieve."

Torres: "Why? Just so I can go through it all over again? When I was six my father walked out on me. When I was nineteen I got kicked out of Starfleet. A few years later I got separated from the Maquis. And just when I start to feel safe you tell me that all of our old friends have been slaughtered. The way I figure it, I've lost the only family I ever had."
Chakotay: "B'Elanna, you have a new family now, here on Voyager. You're not going to lose us. You're stuck with us."
Torres: "You can't promise me that."
Chakotay: "No, I suppose I can't. Losing people's inevitable, and sometimes it happens sooner than we expect, but I can promise you that the people on this ship aren't about to let you stop living your life or break your neck on the Holodeck. You're going to have to find another way to deal with this."
Torres: "I don't know how."
Chakotay: "We'll figure it out, together."