Synopsis: Ensign Kim seizes an opportunity to take command of a mission with unanticipated results.
This episode can be seen as an illustration of how much the Logos-driven rational conscious ego wants to be in charge of the Eros-driven irrational unconscious, but how impossible that really is.
In “Nightingale” Voyager is set down on a planet for needed repairs. Meanwhile Ensign Harry Kim, Seven of Nine, and Mr. Neelix are in the Delta Flyer looking for dilithium. The Flyer is fired upon and then receives a distress message, and although Kim tells the others that they cannot get involved in an alien conflict, he targets the weapons on the aggressing Annari ship. Then Kim and Neelix beam aboard the Kraylor ship that issued the distress message and try to help. Kim is told that the ship is on a medical mission and that no one left alive on the vessel can fly it. Kim agrees to pilot it as far as Voyager’s location. Seven asks Kim about the Prime Directive, but Kim has made up his mind to assist the Kraylor individuals led by Loken. Meanwhile, on the planet Captain Kathryn Janeway has made friends with the Annari. Kim still wants to help the Kraylor on their medical mission and also sees an opportunity to be in command. He takes Seven with him on the Kraylor vessel, but things are not as they seem. Kim learns that the ship’s mission is not medical in nature at all, but military, when it is fired upon by six Annari vessels. Kim tells Loken that he would never have helped if he knew this was the nature of his mission. Kim is relieved of command, yet after speaking with Seven, he retakes command and leads the ship to safety.
In this episode, Kim foolhardily taking command of an alien vessel without knowing its mission can be compared to the conscious ego believing it can control bits of material from the unconscious, but not knowing what is beyond its ability to perceive. To further the analogy, Seven can be seen as being in the role that in depth psychology would be held by an analyst, a trusted individual who can guide one back when one has gone too far deep into the unknown of the unconscious to come back without assistance. Or at least guidance from outside one’s own psyche.
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