Star Trek: The Next Generation 4.16

Galaxy's Child

Doctor Leah Brahms visits the Enterprise, the ship whose engines she helped to develop. Lieutenant Commander La Forge worked with a Holodeck recreation of Doctor Brahms once in the past, see 3.06 (Booby Trap). He knows quite a bit about her and assumes based on his working relationship with the holographic version of Doctor Brahms that they will get along.

Things don't work out between La Forge and Doctor Brahms quite as he hoped they would. She doesn't care for the modifications he has made to the Enterprise's engines or for his explanations as to why the modifications were made. She shuts him down when he tries to extend the hand of friendship by pointing out that she is married, something that he didn't know.

Things are in the process of getting better between Geordi and Leah when she discovers the Holodeck program that included a holographic version of herself. She goes off on him because of what she suspects he might have done with the holographic version of herself. He reciprocates by giving her a hard time for arriving with a chip on her shoulder and being so precious about the Enterprise.

The disagreements between Geordi and Leah are forgotten when they realize that the Enterprise has a crisis that needs their attention. A large space creature has attached itself to the Enterprise. Working together they figure out how to get it to detach from the Enterprise and stop draining power from the ship.

The episode ends with Doctor Brahms and Lieutenant Commander La Forge sharing a drink and a laugh about everything that has happened before she has to leave to take a call from her husband.

Thoughts

I wasn't sure exactly how things would play out or exactly how Doctor Brahms would find out about the holographic recreation of herself but I knew it was coming. That softened the blow and killed some of the suspense in this episode.

Geordi assumed he knew considerably more than he did about her based on his experience with the holographic version of her. Doctor Brahms reaction to the holographic version of herself was perfectly understandable. 

The part of the story that dealt with the space creature played a bigger part in the episode than my summary implies. I was more interested in the thread that dealt with Geordi and Leah so that's where my focus lay. It wasn't until half or two-third of the way through the episode that the two plot threads intersected. Up until that point it seemed like they were taking place at two different points in time.

This episode was good but not great. I like it well enough.