Clues

*** (3 stars out of 5)

Finished early at Harrakis (Gurney Halleck places emphasis on the 'H' so I guess it's not the place with the sand worms), Enterprise engages in some leisure time.

Guinan as Gloria From Cleveland joins Picard in his latest Dixon Hill holo adventure. The fun of gun play and murder MIGHT be a little lost on her, as is the function of stocking clips.

While trying to take a gander at a class-M planet in the Ngame Nebula, everybody but Data is stunned by a wormhole. They awaken 30 seconds later and a day away. Playing it safe, the probe Data sends back to look at the planet shows it wasn't class-M after all. Problem solved forever, nothing to see here.

Except minor mysteries start to crop up.

Like Egon Spengler, Beverly Crusher grows molds, spores, and fungus. Weirdly, her experiments are a day old instead of 30 seconds. Almost as weird as having that hobby at all.

La Forge discovers the ship's chronometer has been reset: and only he or Data could have done it.

Worf and O'Brien are nursing healing injuries, and Troi's wigging out with deja vu.

And why is Nurse Ogawa's PVR full of shows that won't air till tomorrow?

Through it all, Data cannot offer answers, even though he is caught lying and laying a false trail in sensor information. It all leads them back to a confrontation with the xenophobic Paxans, and the discovery of what happened in the day no one remembers.

"Clues" is a good mystery, well-executed. Not for the last time, however, Red Dwarf beat them to the concept. And then they did a jigsaw...