Scorpius' Reasoning *Spoilers DMD*

[Kiarou]

I have heard that there is much debate as to the reasons why Scorpius appeared to kill the Diagnosan in Die Me Dichotomy. Mostly this is touted as proof of is villianly, the one act that doesn't appear to do anything but propagate evil. Most if not all of his previous acts against John can be rationalized by his need to protect the Sebaecen race and wormhole tech etc. However there could be another reason why Scorpius killed the Diagnosan, lets review what Scorpius knew at that point.

1. His Command Carrier will arrive within an arn or two(doesn't know its six arns delayed).
2. The Diagnosan can heal John.
3. John still retains his full knowledge of wormholes, the neural chip only downloaded but not erased the knowledge.
4. John has caused him much suffereing, by blowing up his Gammak base and destroying the Shadow Depository and leaving him to die.

From this we can see that the killing of the Diagnosan was evil but nessesary. Scorpius needs John to die, so he won't propagate wormhole tech. Also he wants revenge, although not in the same magnitude as against the Scarrens. Finally he thinks that his Command Carrier will arrive shortly and capture/destroy/drive off Moya and Talyn. So if everything had went Scorpius' way then the events would have followed...

The Diagnosan dead John would be straped to a table with his brain hangin' out and the sterilization light off, so fungus and other critters could breed in his brain. This would kill John in the most a few days, the least a few arns, no one knows how long it would take you to die with your brain hanging out for infection. This takes care of the need for revenge and elimination of John, if the Diagnosan was around then she could put his brain back together in short order. At this point he has no reason to think that anyone from Moya or Talyn will come down, as his Command Carrier should arrive before anyone gets suspicous. He would then leave with his technology and leave behind a dying John and a dead or captured Moya and Talyn.

[Moks]

Sound logic. I concur.

[AmanoJyaku]

Scorpius needs John to die

But if Scorpius needs John to die, why not just kill him on the operating table? He's not exactly in a position to defend himself. One theory that I came up with was that Scorpius wanted to keep John alive as a backup copy of the wormhole data. Remember that Scorpius said: "I only hope... the wormhole technology I've waited so patiently for makes more sense." The way he phrased this suggests he either isn't certain of the integrity of the data, or of his ability to interpret it.

Of course, this explanation begs the question of why Grunschlk tried to kill Crichton in "Season of Death" if he was under Scorpius' control and Scorpius needed John alive as a backup copy. One possibility that occurs to me is that Grunschlk wasn't being controlled by Scorpius at that moment. It does appear that Scorpius needs to be concentrating for the device that controls Grunschlk to work. Perhaps Grunschlk reasoned that since Scorpius went to all that trouble to go after Crichton and didn't kill him, then Scorpius must have wanted John alive still for some reason he wasn't aware of, so killing John would give Grunschlk an opportunity to take revenge on Scorpius.

[Reefrunner]

Actually, Scorpius told John he sentenced him to live without the ability to ever communicate with anyone again, so his thirst for unrequited revenge would eat at him for the rest of his life. (Well, maybe not in those words, but that was the gist.)

Once Scorpius realized through the link he had with Grundschlk that John was stuck with the neural clone in his head, he did try to kill John by encouraging Zhaan to poison him, but Zhaan was stopped before she could do it. Grundschlk might have been valuable enough as a tool to Scorpy not to risk having the others kill him if he tried to have him kill John personally. (I thought it was cool that when Grundschlk relays the diagnosan's explaination about the neural clone, immediately afterward he says "Interesting", and it's in a different voice, as if it's Scorpius' remark that he's making.)

Scorpius is all about revenge. There were probably a few reasons for him to kill the diagnosan. One is that there could be compatible donors in storage who could be used to repair the damage to Crichton's brain, and he didn't want that. The thought that John would want revenge and would never be able to get it seemed to amuse him. Second, the diagnosan designed and installed Scorpius' cooling system. He would know its weaknesses, and might be induced to pass that information along, making him a dangerous liability to Scorpius. From previous episodes, it seems plain that Scorpius doesn't leave dangerous liabilities at his back.

Edited because I got the timing wrong on something.

[AmanoJyaku]

Actually, Scorpius told John he sentenced him to live without the ability to ever communicate with anyone again, so his thirst for unrequited revenge would eat at him for the rest of his life.

Yes, but in evaluating that scene, I think you should consider this scene from the Liars, Guns and Money trilogy:

NATIRA: Mmm. Not enough to prevent this 'Crichton' from almost killing you. Why do you want him so badly?
SCORPIUS: He destroyed my Gammak base.
NATIRA: Revenge? He's not a Scarran. You wouldn't waste your hatred on anything else.
SCORPIUS: This is why I can't have you around. You know me too well.

If he "wouldn't waste [his] hatred on anything else", then why bother ensuring that John's thirst for unrequited revenge would consume him? Here's more evidence that revenge is not a motivation that Scorpius values (from "Bad Timing"):
Scorpius: "Your infantile obsession with betrayal is misplaced, John."

The aforementioned exchange with Natira suggests another motive for killing the Diagnosian: he knew too much about Scorpius, specifically how his cooling system worked. Recall this scene from the Look At the Princess trilogy:

CARGN: Too hot in here Scorpius?
D'ARGO: What's the matter?
CARGN: When he becomes incapacitated, I shall turn my full attention on you.
SCORPIUS: ( growling ) Nothing-- it's nothing. Don't listen to him!
CARGN: Because, if you do, you'd know this mutant's weakness... that his Scarran half loves the heat... thrives in heat... craves heat.... But, his Peacekeeper half is destroyed by that same warmth.
D'ARGO: Is this true?!
CARGN: Thermal regulator suit... cooling rods inserted directly into your brain... tell me the rumors are true. Please tell me your search for thermic constancy is tormentful.

The "don't listen to him" line seems to indicate that Scorpius wants to keep his cooling system a secret.

(I thought it was cool that when Grundschlk relays the diagnosan's explaination about the neural clone, immediately afterward he says "Interesting", and it's in a different voice, as if it's Scorpius' remark that he's making.)

This is something I had not considered before, and I think you're right about the change in voice probably indicating that Scorpius is definitely in control by that point if he wasn't before. Perhaps he was content to let John live as a backup copy of the wormhole data when he was unable to communicate and seemed unlikely to recover, but once he discovered that the Diagnosian recovered and could fix him, he was unwilling to let a fully-functional adversary live.

[MrX]

I think that part of it is the victory going to Scorpy's head. He's on top, he's won, and he might as well enjoy it by making one of the greatest thorns in his side miserable. I think that it was pretty much all about getting pleasure out of Crichton's misery.

[Kaiwaz]

I think everyone is right to an extent here. Scorpy kills the Diagnosan to keep his secrets, he lets John live because of the secrets he still "knows" (after all, he couldn't even check the data till he got back to the carrier), and yes... that's definitely Scorpy in control of Grunshleck (however you spell it). Which means that in Promises in S4, when Crichton claims there is no Neural Clone that's why Scorpy already knows he's there.

Strange stuff

[Reefrunner]

Please forgive the incoherence of this post. It made more sense when I tried to reply last night, but my half-hour of work disappeared when I totally lost the connection with FMD.

I want to make it plain before I start that I am not a Scorpius-hater. Nor am I willing to gloss over things he's done. I suspect there are some points that we will never agree on, but that's perfectly all right. Farscape is open to any number of different interpretations.

There are some things I would like to offer as alternate ways of viewing what happened, though.

From WGFA--

John--You put something in my head.

Scorpius--A very sophisticated neuro-chip. It contains...well, it contains, me. Or a mental clone of my personality.

Perhaps "Scorpius is all about revenge" was ill-chosen. However, revenge has been a driving force for Scorpius for many cycles. It's so strong in him that it was no secret at all to Natira that one of his motivations in seeking to destroy the Scarrans was revenge. Harvey, who is a copy of Scorpius' personality, sheds some insight on the subject of Scorpius and revenge.

In RA, Harvey drives John to use revenge as a reason to stay alive. Why? Because he knows it's kept Scorpius alive. It is inconceivable to him that anything else would be as powerful a motivation to fight death. He is totally flabbergasted when John gives in and tries revenge as his motivation, and it fails.

I suspect that once Scorpius achieves revenge against the Scarrans, he will feel a bit like that character from Princess Bride who kills his father's murderer and suddenly doesn't know what to do with himself.

At first, Scorpius would have had no reason to seek revenge against John. Why would he have? It was a simple matter of keeping John locked in the cell on the Gammak base until the chip had done its work and then harvesting the chip. John escapes. It becomes a simple matter of tracking him down and retrieving him. Only it's not so simple, and John fights him every step of the way. Before long, this becomes a personal battle, a pitting of wills and intellects. In LGM1, John fought off both the neural clone and Scorpius' commands and crawled away, leaving Scorpius to die. By the time we reach the end of DMD, Scorpius has worked hard trying to catch and hang on to John.

From DMD--

SCORPIUS: Well, Crichton... So much to say--

[More angry gibberish.]

SCORPIUS: --and yet, so little capacity.

[Walks up to worktable above John's head. John is seething, only able to say nonsense.]

SCORPIUS: [holding up container with neurochip inside] I only hope the wormhole technology I've waited so patiently for makes more sense.
[John responds with especially irate gibberish.]

SCORPIUS: Don't need a translator microbe for that one, do we?

[Scorpius stands over John's head, addressing him.]

SCORPIUS: You've cost me much. And I do not suffer disappointment well. I condemn you, John Crichton...

[Places container between John's eyes.]

SCORPIUS: ... to live! So that your thirst for unfulfilled revenge... will consume you.

What sweeter revenge could there be than to let your enemy live with the knowledge that you defeated him and that there's nothing he can do about it?

I don't believe Scorpius ever intended to keep John alive as a 'backup copy' of the wormhole data, and I'll explain why.

From LGM3--

Scorpius--When we reach my ship, and I remove my neural clone, your death will be painless.

***

Natira--Blue eyes, look at that. That is the last sight your eyes will ever see.

John--You are a sick puppy. Scorpius has to kill me and you're still getting your jollies.

Natira--Oh, he doesn't have to kill you, blue eyes.

John--Wh-what? He...he can get the chip out without hurting me?

Natira--Oh, yes.

Scorpius had every intention of killing him getting the chip out. I would guess there was never a question in his mind that the chip might fail. If the chip was something he'd designed and built himself, he could easily be that confident about it. (We don't know he did design and build it himself, but the fact that his neural clone was imprinted on it, and the fact that it easily clipped into his headgear in Incubator, sort of points in that direction.)

Additionally, if he'd wanted John as a backup copy, he could have switched off the surgical equipment and had his soldiers take John prisoner. It wouldn't have been difficult to hide and either wait for the others to leave, or pick them off one by one, or do what he did, send the Marauder out as a decoy to make the others think Talyn and Crais had destroyed him. This is another reason why I tend to believe Scorpius was enjoying a victory over John in that scene. To him, John has essentially be rendered harmless. He can't communicate. He can't tell anyone else about the wormhole tech. He can't organize his shipmates to go after Scorpius out of revenge. He's helpless to stop what's happening. Scorpius believes the diagnosan is dead and the damage to John's brain is irreparable. His body language, tone of voice, and word choices all point toward this being an enjoyable little piece of revenge. He had the opportunity and he took it.

From SOD---

SCORPIUS
Yours is an interesting species Grunchlk. Simple mind. Simple brain.
(beat)
Easily dominated.
(beat)
And easily controlled.
Grunchlk ceases his gasping and struggling and begins to move like Scorpius, a puppet.

If Scorpius was able to get Grunschlk to bite off his own finger and shoot himself in the arm (the arm thing was pretty early on, too), he was not having appreciable difficulty controlling him. More than likely he was in control any time Grunschlk was in contact with any of the others. Otherwise, Grunschlk would have had no compunction about warning them Scorpius was still there, especially after what Scorpius had done to him. It's possible Scorpius didn't know there were compatible donors that could be used to repair John's brain until that moment in the surgical suite, when he was viewing things through Grunschlk's eyes. Once he realized that John could become a functional enemy again, he encouraged Zhaan to kill John, taking advantage of her desire to ease his pain and put him out of his misery. Later, he has Grunschlk send the Scarran after John, which doesn't make sense in any other way but that he assumed the Scarran would kill him, either right away or through torturing him to death trying to find out why Scorpius wanted him. Scorpius knows the wormhole data is not accessible through ordinary means. (Don't confuse this with his concern later on about the Scarrans not getting John because of the wormhole data. Later on, John had figured out enough of the wormhole data that he would have been able to tell them far too much.)

I submit that it's also possible that, like Harvey, Scorpius could not conceive of John not wanting to seek revenge against him. It wouldn't have occurred to him that John might simply want to be left alone, and that John might be much more concerned about whether or not Scorpy might decide some day to come after him again rather than with hunting Scorpy down and getting revenge on him.

From LGM---

NATIRA: Revenge? He's not a Scarran. You wouldn't waste your hatred on anything else.

SCORPIUS: This is why I can't have you around. You know me too well.

There are several ways of interpreting this. One is to make the assumption that Scorpius is acknowledging that revenge really has nothing to do with what's going on. At this point, Scorpius may honestly believe that himself. A second way of interpreting that is that Scorpius said what he did because he knows Natira. She's an opportunist. She has suddenly come to the conclusion that in Scorpius' mind, John is on the same level as the Scarrans. It's extremely important to Scorpius that he capture John. She doesn't know why this is, but if she can find some way to use it against him for her own profit, she will. He tries to deflect her with his reply. But it could also mean that he is totally aware of how duplicitous she is, and that he meant for her to believe that his motivations for catching John were not as powerful as his desire for revenge against the Scarrans. (His motivations from the beginning were tied in with his revenge against the Scarrans, which was why catching John took on such importance to him. The info John carries in his head is vital to carrying out that revenge. This does not mean that getting revenge on John for making him work so hard to get it doesn't enter his mind at all. By that time, depriving him of his life while removing the chip could easily be seen as a form of revenge.)

I don't think this remark on her part is the impetus for the decision to kill her. I think he decided that a long time ago, but hasn't acted on it yet. As evidence, I offer the exchange between the clone and Natira.

From LGM3--

Natira--Crichton's right. Scorpius is going to kill me.

Clone--Oh my lovely. How fortunate you are. Your death will be painless.

John invited Natira into his head to speak with the clone because the clone had already told him Scorpius was planning to kill Natira. Her attempt to kill Scorpius with the metal-eating critters would have precipitated the action a lot sooner than it might have come otherwise, but John was not privy to the conversation between Scorpius and Natira about the metalites. The clone is a copy of Scorpius' personality, and has been in John's head for a cycle. Unless there was an exchange going on that we didn't see, the clone wouldn't have known about Natira's treachery either. Scorpius had already marked Natira as someone who would one day betray him and had planned to eventually kill her anyway.


I have a hard time proofing my stuff in this small reply box, so I am going to post this and then proof it. Any corrections or points I'd intended to put in will be added after that.

[La Bomba]

Is it possible that Scorpy knew that his breathing on the Diagnosan wouldn't be enough to kill it, that it would disable it and give him time to make his escape?

[Reefrunner]

Grunschlk explained in DMD that the diagnosan would die if it took in bacteria, etc, through both nose and mouth. If Scorpius pulled the mask off and breathed in its face as he did, it implies that he was aware of that. Likely he thought the diagnosan would die much more quickly than it did, or that the others wouldn't arrive as quickly as they did and save it.

[Darth Buddha]

Isn't it funny how folks have trouble when they LIKE a villain?

Best represented by the whitewashes presented by ||Scorpius||. I enjoyed his stuff as devils advocate... but he wasn't discussing after a certain point, just spinning. We've had some WONDERFUL threads about Scorpy in the past.. might be worthwhile to search for them.

If nobody else does, maybe I'll start (another) one.

[zap]

does ||Scorpius|| still post here?

[La Bomba]

Grunschlk explained in DMD that the diagnosan would die if it took in bacteria, etc, through both nose and mouth. If Scorpius pulled the mask off and breathed in its face as he did, it implies that he was aware of that. Likely he thought the diagnosan would die much more quickly than it did, or that the others wouldn't arrive as quickly as they did and save it.
Yes, I remember that. I just blurted out the first altenative explanation that came into my head. I'm trying to reconcile in my head all the facts stated above.
Clearly, he didn't intend for John to die, or as stated above, he could have simply killed him on the table.
I also think it's correct to assume that he wouldn't have done what he did simply for revenge's sake. He always has a clear motive for what he does, even if the viewer doesn't see it until much later.
Unless, and I can't think of any argument for or against this, the no killing thing works both ways. John has been stripped of his ability to kill Scorpius by the implant. Could this somehow work both ways, that Scorpius can't kill John directly?

[Reefrunner]

I think he could kill him if he wanted. And it's entirely possible that he left him on the table as he did because he knew John's brain would get infected and he would die. But if that is the case, he wanted him to die with the full knowledge that he'd failed to stop Scorpius, which is where the revenge bit comes in.

Alternately, the surgical field that kills bacteria would have been switched on by the first person who found John like that, and it would have killed any infections that were getting started. Switching it on saved the diagnosan from the infection started by Scorpius breathing in his face. Scorpius would have known that John's friends were eventually going to come look for him. Assuming that John would die of a brain infection before then is too risky. If he'd wanted him dead at that point, he would simply have killed him.

[Reefrunner]

||Scorpius||'s profile says he hasn't been active here since 10-20-2003.

[La Bomba]

Your alternate explanation make more sense to me. I suppose because of my perception of Scorpius. I just don't see him as being that reckless, ever, as he would be with the first explanation.
I think he took a calculated risk that someone would find John and the diagnosan in time to save them both, and made sure that everyone would be concentrating on that instead of him. He was just buying time. I think his taunting of John before he leaves serves two purposes:
It assures him that John will come looking for him, so he doesn't have to find John. Second, It keeps John thinking that revenge is his motive, and therefore clouds John's mind to his true intentions.

[AmanoJyaku]

I don't believe Scorpius ever intended to keep John alive as a 'backup copy' of the wormhole data, and I'll explain why.

From LGM3--

Scorpius--When we reach my ship, and I remove my neural clone, your death will be painless.

***

Natira--Blue eyes, look at that. That is the last sight your eyes will ever see.

John--You are a sick puppy. Scorpius has to kill me and you're still getting your jollies.

Natira--Oh, he doesn't have to kill you, blue eyes.

John--Wh-what? He...he can get the chip out without hurting me?

Natira--Oh, yes.

Scorpius had every intention of killing him getting the chip out. I would guess there was never a question in his mind that the chip might fail. If the chip was something he'd designed and built himself, he could easily be that confident about it. (We don't know he did design and build it himself, but the fact that his neural clone was imprinted on it, and the fact that it easily clipped into his headgear in Incubator, sort of points in that direction.)

But would Scorpius have actually killed John on the command carrier before he was certain that the data on the neurochip was usable to create wormholes? Here's another possibility: As long as John believes there's no hope of living through the process, he acquiesces to it. But as soon as he knows he get the chip out without harm, he fights the process, which is what happens when Natira tells him this:

NATIRA: Why do you want to escape now, human?
CRICHTON: You just told me that I could get the chip out of my head without dying! When you get me out of here, I'll give you the damn chip! Hell, you can have the wormhole technology! As a bonus, you can have one of my eyes!

He's actually willing to give up one of his eyes to escape; that shows pretty strong motivation. Remember what Scorpius said in Nerve:
SCORPIUS: Therein lies the stalemate I must break. You know this human better than anyone. What would persuade him to stop resisting the chair?
In that scene, he was looking for the right thing to say to Crichton to get him to "Stop resisting the Aurora Chair. Allow us to probe freely...for any information we wish." He used a lie to manipulate Crichton into surrender then, so why not on the Shadow Depository as well? (It's kind of similar to how the Pathfinders needed the crew of Moya to believe that Moya was hopeless so they wouldn't rally to her aid.)

I would guess there was never a question in his mind that the chip might fail. If the chip was something he'd designed and built himself, he could easily be that confident about it.

But if this were true, then why did he say: "I only hope... the wormhole technology I've waited so patiently for makes more sense." Why not something along the lines of: "I'm sure the wormhole technology I've waited so patiently for will make more sense"? The latter indicates certainty, while the former doesn't.

[Reefrunner]

The confidence was in his own technology. He had no doubt that it had retrieved the information--he'd already spoken to the neural clone, who had told him as much. There was the possibility that the wormhole technology wouldn't make sense, or would be in a format Scorpius couldn't use. He was taking that into account. But really, John would have been no use to him in that event. John couldn't access the information at all. Even if Scorpy had given him access to the computers and scientists in the wormhole project Scorpy intended to set up with that data (in this case, data in a format that wasn't usable), it would have been quite a while before any of it would have been useful to him. It's taken a tremendous amount of time and work for John to reach the point he's at by the end of season 4. (And if you'll recall, Scorpy told John in WSS:LB that John was taking too long with the wormhole knowledge.)

At the point where Scorpius tells John, "Your death will be painless," John had already given up. He already knew he was going to die and was resigned to it. In John's mind, Scorpius had a spike in the back of his neck that was keeping him paralyzed. Without the wild card of Natira finding out Scorpy planned to kill her, John would not have escaped, because he needed someone to fix what Scorpy had done to paralyze him. There was no reason why Scorpy would lie to him about what was coming, because there was absolutely nothing John could do to stop him.

As to whether or not John was truly paralyzed at that point--Absolutely. There's no way on Earth he'd be able to lie there and watch Natira coming after one of his eyes if he'd been able to move his head away.

[MrX]

Your alternate explanation make more sense to me. I suppose because of my perception of Scorpius. I just don't see him as being that reckless, ever, as he would be with the first explanation.
I think he took a calculated risk that someone would find John and the diagnosan in time to save them both, and made sure that everyone would be concentrating on that instead of him. He was just buying time. I think his taunting of John before he leaves serves two purposes:
It assures him that John will come looking for him, so he doesn't have to find John. Second, It keeps John thinking that revenge is his motive, and therefore clouds John's mind to his true intentions.

I agree. I don't think he left Crichton on the table to die. He tried to kill the Diagnosan, but I think he believed that one of the Moya crew would find Crichton before any infection got too bad. So Crichton would still be alive, but unable to speak, and getting revenge is made that much harder.

[Delrothj]

I believe Scorpius Killed Diagnosian because she knew too much and by killing her Scorpius was convinced that Crichton would die as well. Reason he wanted Crichton dead is logistic but the way he tryed to make it happen was because of revenge for all the trouble John caused.

ep:309 Losing time ~00:29:40
"Scorpius: Would it suprise you to learn that the Scarrens are planning a massive assault against us but they havent´t because.. Because they wear our hidden wormhole weapons. We have no hidden weapons, we lied and I think the Scarrens are begin to suspect that."

As Scarrens are aware that Scorpius is searching Crichton, they are trying to find out why. If Scarrens would capture John and find out that Scorpy is after the Wormhole technology they would realise Peacekeepers have no hidden wormhole weapons and they would start their massive assault. Thats enough reasoning to get rid of John Crichton and Diagnosian who might know too much.

[Darth Buddha]

In which case, Scorpius is a fool.

He failed to kill either... all so he could DO what needed to be DONE in a dastardly fashion that causes suffering. Had he been, to quote the Gorn, "merciful and quick", the Diagnosan would not have survived to finish John's treatment, and John would not have persisted to continue to cause him grief.

Scorpy allowed being villainous to FAIL.

If that isn't an indictment for being villainous, I know not what is!

[Ouroboros]

I've been thinking about this some myself and I've come to the conclusion that there is no rational explanation for it.

It simply wasn't a rational act. Scorpius didn't think about this he just did it.

For this I place the blame on his Scarran half. We've seen him have "outbursts" before and for me this was one of the more obvious ones. We also know that Scarrans in general seem quick to anger and prone to physical violence. whether this is cultural or genetic is another thread all together.

The way I see it in regard to Scorpy it's these sorts of outburts against civillized being that help drive his hate for the Scarrans. An interpretation that would then require that the Scarran agression be a genetic factor. He does these things, looks back on them days later after he's "cooled off" and probably realizes they were cruel and unnesesary. He then assigns the blame for them on his Scarran half. It's likely in my view that he attributes many if not all of what he sees as bad about himself to his Scarran half in this fashion.

Of course if the Scarran behavior is not genetic but cultural/learned that would make him something of a schizophrenic now wouldn't it.

Can't say I'd necessarily find a problem in that either given the way he was brought up.