To Boldly Go... (a Starfleet quest)

A nice lady does nice things

"Special Documentation File, Day 2597, Miran U, Tadamat II Ore Processing Facility. Nothing new to report." Ulani Miran sighed inwardly. Really, that's all that needed to be said - that ever needed to be said here - but you couldn't send a report that short, so. "Observation of subjects Orbek and Maret continues, but they exhibit no signs of outright dissidence, simply continued dissatisfaction with their situation." They're not alone in that feeling. "For instance..." As she continued her report on the facility's director and the safety officer, her mind wandered.

Today marked the seventh anniversary of her exile. Just over seven years ago, her cousin had attempted to defect, getting herself killed for her trouble. For that, and for Ulani's earlier failure to prevent the loss of Lorgot, she had wound up here, in a cold facility accessible only by transporter, two deca below the surface of a barren world, among eighty miners who despised her, with only a sidearm and an air of authority to protect her, with no prospects and no hope.

Not that the State made mistakes. Not that she questioned the Order for assigning her to Tadamat. But...

But she could do more important work than this.

Not that she'd find out any time soon. At first, she'd tried to simply bear her hardship for the good of the State. But within months, she'd begun drafting her first transfer request; within a year, she'd submitted it. This having failed, repeatedly, she'd decided that she needed to demonstrate some success in her work at Tadamat, and in her third year, she'd ginned up a 'conspiracy' of dissidents from a few disaffected miners. This 'uncovered', she'd hoped her next transfer request would come through; instead, she'd been ordered to get to the bottom of this conspiracy before it could curdle into something serious.

"...Correspondence digest will be attached. Close file." Ulani closed her recorder and lay back against the bed rack, giving herself a moment to rest before she got to work on that digest. Somehow, it still bothered her that she only had a bed rack. It hadn't on the Lorgot, and one didn't exactly join the Order for its comforts, but for the two years she had been working at the Regularization Desk in the capital, her quarters had had an actual mattress, a window, natural light, a regular affair with someone from Tracking...

Strange how she'd once thought that was internal exile. Regularization had been important work. Mundane, sure, repetitive, sure, but important. This? Monitoring an insignificant mining facility deep within Cardassian territory? Even the correspondence was unexciting.

Ulani sighed and opened her terminal, loaded the appropriate file, then began summarizing the correspondence received and sent out that day. (Insipid) love note, (well-deserved) rejection letter, (kinda-ugly) baby announcement, letter from a friend on Bajor (if only she were there instead of here), another love letter (this one regularized into meaninglessness by some prudish censor), correspondence-kotra move (based on the week's moves, Orbek was going to lose)...

On it went, letter after boring letter. Somehow this one tiny colony sent out dozens of letters a day, and most even got replies. Well, not like there was much else for anyone to do.

One more duty remained before bed. She sighed, checked her disruptor - still at full charge - then holstered it, grabbed a datapad, and headed off.

***

Tekeny Orbek was awake this time. Meant she didn't have to wake him just to personally deliver his orders... but also that he wasn't too tired to question them. Not even too tired to not insist on taking a walk while she passed on the bad news. It was already a waste of time when a simple email would have worked, and now it'd be even worse.

"Well, that could have been worse. At least we're not losing any more people," he mused after hearing his orders, keeping up his brisk pace as he strode into the greenhouse. "You're certain that the quota has been raised that much?"

She waved her datapad in his face. "Your orders are clear, Director."

"They do realize there's little slack here, right? We're still down one from last year, two if Broca doesn't recover soon," Tekeny stopped at one of the first plants, examining its flowers. "Well, at least Alon here is growing in nicely, don't you think?"

She sighed inwardly. Tekeny had named the plants in the greenhouse after old comrades of his from his days in the CDF. He'd been a sniper then, back in the Konen wars ... but one who had far too much trouble bringing himself to kill, according to reports. Thus his exile. Naming the plants was harmless enough, she supposed, save that he seemed to think she should be as interested in the plants as he. "Yes, they are aware."

"Alright, so how do they expect us to nearly double our output?" He moved on to another plant, three rows down. "Hmm. Zania here seems to be growing slowly for a Lakarian lily, wouldn't you agree? You did see those before back home, right, Ms. Miran?"

He was still trying to draw her into his inane gardening talk. State's sake, he probably was pronouncing her name with a long A intentionally, just to needle her. Okay, probably not - that was in keeping with a Culati accent. Still.

Best to just ignore it all, though. "Presumably, they expect you to increase production through the relaxed safety standards they're allowing you to implement."

"Serves me right for trying to introduce a little color in your life," Tekeny muttered.

"Any further questions?"

"Sure. How many lives is the Ministry willing to spend for their extra ore? Do they realize that my men and women have families, that their lives are -"

"Eight, maybe ten at most; more, and you'd start looking downright inept." It was just a guess, but it seemed about right. "Oh, sorry, did you mean for that to be a rhetorical question?"

"How do you do that - talk so casually of ending people's lives?" He strode into the corridor to the rec room as he spoke. "I doubt you have killed someone - personally, I mean. Maybe if you had, you'd understand how grave this is."

"For a veteran, you're rather unsoldierly," she fired back. "That's why you're here, then?"

"I'm here to help my miners, to do right by them." He sighed, then continued, "Look, I know you don't want to be here. Nobody does. But it's our duty, so we must make the most of it. And I don't think you are."

Ulani laughed. "Oh, this is going to be rich. Explain, please, if you would."

He stopped walking, stared into her eyes. "Simply put, you're not personable enough. I have never seen you at any of our dances. I hardly see you outside your quarters at all, in fact. Your predecessor, well, we knew him. He was a... Well, not a friend exactly, but someone you could talk to. He helped solve problems, made himself useful. You don't. Well, not to us, anyway. Though probably not even to your people. You know how much information you're probably missing out on?"

"Don't question my methods." She glared back at him, daring him to fire back.

"Alright, I won't," he said. And then he slammed her into the wall.

Operating on instinct, she tried to grab her disruptor, but he was too quick, pinning her arm with one hand while grabbing the weapon himself with the other.

Really? This is what gets me killed? Ulani thought. Then he shot her, and her world went black.

***

When she came to, Ulani Miran found herself lying on a bed rack, her hands bound, looking up into the concerned face of Tekeny Orbek. She spat.

He wiped away the spit. "That was uncalled for, ma'am. I don't want to hurt you; in fact, I'm glad you're awake. I just want to talk," he said.

"What."

"I'll lay my cards out. I know you're responsible for the three miners who 'disappeared' four years ago. I should kill you for that. They were good people - hardworking, dedicated. And loyal, in spite of whatever you ginned up against them. They deserved a better fate than whatever your people gave them.

"A better fate than you deserve. You stole three lives - not for anything they did, but for what, a transfer order? What makes your life more important than theirs?

"But, luckily for you, I am better than you. See, I care. Even about you. You work here, you're one of my people. That applies to even you, Miran." (Long A, once again, Ulani noticed, even as she mostly tuned out his rant). "And I want to do right by my people. I want to find a way for you to be forgiven. To truly be a part of this community here.

"Because that's what we are here. A community. I didn't want this post, any more than you did. But I want to make the most of things. That's what I've been trying to do here.

"You know we don't get enough supplies. What you don't know is that without me, we'd have even less. I've failed to report our dead here, so that we still get their pay, their food, their medicine, their supplies. It's not like we'd be a high priority for getting replacements anyway. I've been splitting the extra with the rest of the people here, especially those too sick or injured to work.

"I'm telling you this not as a confession, but an invitation to work with me. To realize that you're part of Tadamat, that you should be helping us here.

"Can you promise that?"

Oh. He stopped talking. Well, play along, I guess? "Yes."

"Can you apologize for the lives you stole?" he asked.

"Yes. I'm sorry. I thought only of myself; you're right about that."

"And can you sit down to breakfast with me, talk in a civilized manner about how you're going to do right by your people?"

"Yes."

"Good." He untied her hands, and they walked to his little dining table. He'd clearly laid out breakfast beforehand, a plate of fruits from the greenhouse. Fresh larishes, sliced kelom, a small bowl of mulliberries - a welcome change from the oatmeal both usually had for breakfast.

Orbek smiled at her, genuine warmth, right before she grabbed a fork and stabbed him in the throat.

He croaked out something that sounded like, "Why?"

"I'm doing right by my people." She found her pistol, switched it back to kill, and shot him. Then she took a seat and started on the mulliberries.

Three days later, Ulani Miran at last received transfer orders, sending her to Bajor.

author's note said:

Wow, it's been forever since I've done an omake of my own. Anyways...
This occurred about a year ago, in-game. We'll be getting the bonus Bajor intel report soon, so I figured I'd show y'all one of the Cardassians involved in the occupation.

Click to expand...

Click to shrink...

TOS Season 2 Review Summary:

In this season we find out that To Boldly Go has been way underselling how dangerous outer space is. It's possibility Lovecraftian, with multiple layers of ancient eldritch beings present every time you peel back a surface layer. Frequently at the end of the story the Enterprise knows something happened, but they'll never really know the full story behind what was going on. It's lost in time and horror.

And I wasn't kidding about lethality. In this season alone, two major worlds with billions of people are killed and that doesn't count the worlds the planet-eater destroyed. You think the Federation Council freaked out about a few attacks on mining stations, imagine being told that a space amoeba that appeared from nowhere ate a major world, but don't worry the Enterprise stopped it. Or a random planet-destroying war machine from beyond the galaxy at a major world, but don't worry the Enterprise stopped it. Or a random space probe sterilizing entire worlds, but don't worry... What the hell do you do when you get a report like that? What do you tell the public?

Also, glowing energy clouds may want to date you or may want to kill you, Leslie technically dies at least twice, the the entire Andromeda galaxy is going to evacuate over the next thousand years or so.

===

Season 2.1: Catspaw
http://memory-alpha.wikia.com/wiki/Catspaw_(episode)
Planet of Hats

Summary: It's the Star Trek Halloween episode (seriously). Eldritch beings not natural to our space screw with the Enterprise crew using human horror tropes until Kirk breaks their magic wand (seriously), revealing their true alien forms and killed them.

TBG Discussion: No issues. Interestingly, these are more advanced aliens but not so advanced they aren't dependent on their technology.

===

Season 2.2: Metamorphosis
http://memory-alpha.wikia.com/wiki/Metamorphosis_(episode)
Planet of Hats

Summary: The Enterprise discovers Zefram Cochrane, human inventor of the warp drive. He's been rejuvenated and kept alive by an energy being called the Companion who loves him. The Companion merges with a dying human woman (whom the Companion trapping them has prevented from getting medical treatment...) and 'becomes mortal' so she be with Cochrane romantically in a way he can accept. But she still can't leave the planet, so they decide to live out their lives there together.

TBG Discussion: No issues as such, though the Companions' story seems awfully fishy to me. If she's totally human now then why does she still need energies of the planet, and if she's not totally human did she really lose her powers? Would be interested to see a To Boldly Go Captain's Log following this up. Also, more precedent for dating energy beings.

===

Season 2.3: Friday's Child
http://memory-alpha.wikia.com/wiki/Friday's_Child_(episode)
Planet of Hats

Summary: The Enterprise competes with the Klingons to negotiate with a pre-warp (pre bow and arrow!) tribal society for the right to mine minerals on their world of Capella IV. Prime Directive, what's that? After a convoluted series of events, they succeed in installing a ruler friendly to Federation interests in place.

TBD Discussion: I assume that with the Klingons backing off and political changes in the Federation strengthening resolve not to interfere with pre-warp cultures, the mine was eventually discontinued and the Capellans have been marked for non-interferance under the Prime Directive.

===

Season 2.4: Who Mourns for Adonais?
http://memory-alpha.wikia.com/wiki/Who_Mourns_for_Adonais?_(episode)
Planet of Hats

Summary: A giant green hand grabs the Enterprise. It's an alien named Apollo who claims to have visited Earth 5,000 years ago along with others of his kind. They were worshipped and inspired the legends of the Greek gods. He screws with the crew, but eventually the Enterprise pulls a T'Lorel maneuver on his power source and Apollo discorporates.

TBG Discussion: Neither Kirk nor the viewer ever fully understands what was going on here. Apollo seems like a standard humanoid with an extra organ and he has some variety of power source outside his body, but he doesn't seem like some random alien prankster merely using advanced technology to imitate a god either. He claims that belief itself sustains him and certainly seems to be making a serious play for worship. Also, Apollo claims the gods can't really die, but rather spread out to nothingness and that certainly seems to be what happened to him. Is it possible he and his brethren could still be around in some form able to interact with the Federation. It would certainly be interesting to see this followed up in some TBG captain's log and even if it's not, isn't it wild that the greek gods are officially aliens?

===

Season 2.5: Amok Time
http://memory-alpha.wikia.com/wiki/Amok_Time_(episode)
Planet of Hats

Summary: Spock must mate or die! But when he goes home, his intended wife has a plan to reject him by pitting him in a life-or-death battle against Kirk.

TBG Discussion: No conflicts as such, but maybe it's worth remembering this episode when romanticizing Federation ideals. Even the pacifistic, logical Vulcans have barbaric death rituals as "part of their culture" because they're literally rather die than have mature and emotionally honest conversations about sex. Ideals are ideals, not fact, and even core Federation worlds sometimes fail to match them.

===

Season 2.6: The Doomsday Machine
http://memory-alpha.wikia.com/wiki/The_Doomsday_Machine_(episode)
Planet of Hats

Summary: The crew encounters a planet-eating Doomsday machine from outside the galaxy, but the real danger may be Commodore Decker's obsessive desire for revenge on the killer of his crew. (Actually, it's both!)

TBG Discussion: No conflicts, but this is yet another example of terrible, civilization-threatening, danger arriving suddenly from the edge of space. Space is really, really dangerous.

===

Season 2.7: Wolf in the Fold
http://memory-alpha.wikia.com/wiki/Wolf_in_the_Fold_(episode)
Planet of Hats

Summary: Scott is accused of killing women on the peaceful, hedonistic world of Argelius II. The actual culprit turns out to be a murderous immortal spirit subsisting on fear. They drug the entire crew so no one is afraid, then use a transporter to disperse its atoms into space. Which definitely, for sure, kills it, even though they have no way to verify that.

TBG Discussion: We'll just quietly ignore Spock's sexist comments about how "women are more deeply and easily terrified" shall we? So other than than terrifying fact that an incorporeal body-hopping murder spirit is 'just a thing that happens', the most interesting thing to consider is the Argellians. Are they still around? Well... a pacifistic society of people who look just like humans and have psychic powers? Sound familiar? Yes, Argelius II is most likely a minor Betazoid colony in the TBG universe, probably settled hundreds of years ago by dissident faction that was even more into pacifism than regular Betazoids. (Lack of immigration since would explain how they've diverged somewhat.)

===

Season 2.8: The Changeling
http://memory-alpha.wikia.com/wiki/The_Changeling_(episode)
Planet of Hats

Summary: An ancient interstellar probe from earth has merged with an alien device meant to steralize soil samples. It killed 4 billion people in the Malurian star system, and now it has turned its attention to the Enterprise. Kirk talks it to death.

TBG Discussion: So why haven't we heard from the Malurians? Because Nomad killed them all! And let that sink in, that there exists a tomb world where 4 billion lives were obliterated less than 70 years ago. Maybe somewhere a handful of Malurians survive. Maybe. Would be interesting to see a CL that voyages to the haunted dead star system of Maluria....

===

Season 2.9: The Apple
http://memory-alpha.wikia.com/wiki/The_Apple_(episode)
Planet of Hats

Summary: It's a Garden of Eden analogy, but God is a computer. Kirk kills God, like he always does. But seriously, Gamma Trianguli VI is a death-world with exploding rocks, murderous plants, and killer lightning from the clear blue sky. Four security officers die!

TBG Discussion: There's a lot of musing about the Prime Directive, but actually Kirk destroys Vaal in order to preserve the Enterprise in a clear case of self-defense, which is probably why he suffers no charges from Starfleet. It's also clear that the crew of the Enterprise has no clue what was really going on here or how this all got set up. Did the people of Vaal create the computer before losing their technology, or did some other race set them up as a nature preserve? Who knows!

===

Season 2.10: Mirror, Mirror
http://memory-alpha.wikia.com/wiki/Mirror,_Mirror_(episode)
Planet of Hats

Summary: After fruitlessly negotiating with the pacifist Halkans for dilithium rights, Kirk, McCoy, Scotty, and Uhura are transported to the mirror universe where they are fruitlessly threatening the Halkans for dilithium rights.

TBG Discussion: This is To Boldly Go canon, as we had our own trip to the mirror universe. Presumably the Halkans are still out there on their homeworld, being stubbornly pacifistic and not having anything to do with the wider galaxy. Maybe we should vote for a Halkan diplomatic push next snakepit! ;-)

===

Season 2.11: The Deadly Years
http://memory-alpha.wikia.com/wiki/The_Deadly_Years_(episode)
Planet of Hats

Summary: At an experimental colony at Gamma Hydra, low level radiation from a passing comet is causing rapid aging. It affects the senior officers, and desk jockey Commodore Stocker takes command and sends the Enterprise directly through the Neutral Zone to be attacked by Romulans. Kirk recovers just in time to save the ship.

TBG Discussion: How the heck do we let an officer reach the rank of Commodore with no field experience? Tsk. Tsk. Other than that, no issues.

===

Season 2.12: I, Mudd
http://memory-alpha.wikia.com/wiki/I,_Mudd_(episode)
Planet of Hats

Summary: The Enterprise is hijacked by an android working for Harry Mudd, who has become 'king' of a world of alien androids whose Makers died out. However the androids prove to have plans to control humanity for its own well being. The crew + Harry use illogic to paralyze the coordinator android, Norman. Then they leave, with Harry Mudd left on the planet to be tormented by android copies of his ex-wife?

TBG Discussion: Definitely an ending played for comedy rather than because it made much sense. Interestingly, the android Makers were originally from the Andromeda galaxy, whence so much crazy space stuff originates. Strong parallels with the season one episode, "What are little girls made of?", but what was drama the first time around is repeated as comedy. Still, that was probably another base of the mysterious Makers. Shows there's room for more ancient ruins populated by android-makers to turn up in To Boldly Go.

===

Season 2.13: The Trouble with Tribbles
http://memory-alpha.wikia.com/wiki/The_Trouble_with_Tribbles_(episode)
Planet of Hats

Summary: Since the Organians stopped them from settling their differences through war, the Federation and the Klingons are competing on which one can develop Sherman's Planet better. (Presumably the Klingons call it something else.) An infestation of tribbles luckily reveals both a Klingon attempt to poison the grain and the presence of a Klingon infiltrator.

TBG Discussion: Poor Scott just wants to be left alone to read his precious technical journals. Anyway, no major impacts for To Boldly Go.

===

Season 2.14: Bread and Circuses
http://memory-alpha.wikia.com/wiki/Bread_and_Circuses_(episode)
Planet of Hats

Summary: The Enterprise encounters a world ruled by an inexplicably close copy of the Roman Empire with 20th century technology. The bridge crew is captured by the 'Romans' and a renegade Federation cargo ship captain who has gone native. After they escape, Uhura informs them that the renegade 'sun cult' is actually made up of monotheists.

TBG Discussion: Ummm. I guess we can assume that planet 893-IV got a big "do not contact due to Prime Directive" sticker on it and is being left alone until the Romans work out warp travel. Otherwise not much here relevant to TBG.

===

Season 2.15: Journey to Babel
http://memory-alpha.wikia.com/wiki/Journey_to_Babel_(episode)
Planet of Hats

Summary: Spock's father is accused of murder while the Enterprise transports a 114 diplomatic personnel to a conference on Babel to discuss the admission Coridan to the Federation. While Spock donates blood to save his father's life, the guilty parties are revealed to be the Orions.

TBG Discussion: Here we see that trying to mess up entrances to the Federation is not a new idea for the Orions. In TBG, Coridan can safely be assumed to be someone's non-Federation minor colony attempting to join rather than an entirely new species. Though I see that the Enterprise series did a whole arc about it.

===

Season 2.16: A Private Little War
http://memory-alpha.wikia.com/wiki/A_Private_Little_War_(episode)
Planet of Hats

Summary: While observing a pre-First Contact people, Kirk learns that the Klingons have been supplying a tribe with firearms in hopes they will conquer the others. Several medical crises and dead indigenous people later, and Kirk reluctantly provides another tribe firearms of their own in an effort to balance the scales.

TBG Discussion: No big implications, a lot of nonsense about Vulcan healing. It's not really clear to me what the Klingons thought they were going to accomplish here. A tribal people aren't going to conquer and hold a planet because you gave them firearms.

===

Season 2.17: The Gamesters of Triskelion
http://memory-alpha.wikia.com/wiki/The_Gamesters_of_Triskelion_(episode)
Planet of Hats

Summary: (I advise reading the planet of hats cartoon summary for this one.) Kirk, Uhura, and Chekov are kidnapped by aliens and forced to fight other aliens so that a mentally superior race can gamble on the winner. In the end, Kirk bets the servitude of everyone on the Enterprise (in fairness, the brains were going to destroy the ship) on his ability to win a fight. He does, and the three brains promise to free the thralls and put them on a path to self-governance.

TBG: You have to wonder what these guys are up to decades later! Far be it from me to call three naked brains that enslave other races and make them fight to death for amusement liars, but I sure wouldn't trust them too far. Still, they didn't look very mobile, so presumably they're still out there somewhere not too far from Federation space.

===

Season 2.18: Obsession
http://memory-alpha.wikia.com/wiki/Obsession_(episode)
Planet of Hats

Summary: The Enterprise encounters a blood-draining cloud that once killed a lot of crew on a ship Kirk served on as a Lt. Kirk is obsessed with destroying it, to the point of ignoring an urgent mission to deliver medical supplies and getting more of his crew killed trying to poke the thing. His obsession is justified(?) when further encounters suggest the monster is intelligent and preparing to reproduce, so they blow up a planet with antimatter to kill it.

TBG: So yes, an intelligent blood-draining cloud that is immune to phasers and can travel at warp speed and is ready to undergo massive reproduction is just a thing you can encounter. I sometime think TBG actually undersells how dangerous space is in Star Trek! Also a note of interest from Memory Alpha:
"The episode featured the death of Eddie Paskey's character, Leslie, who was killed by the cloud creature, but reappears in several subsequent scenes throughout the rest of the series very much alive. According to Paskey, a scene in the script in which Leslie is revived by a miracle potion was never filmed."

===

Season 2.19: The Immunity Syndrome
http://memory-alpha.wikia.com/wiki/The_Immunity_Syndrome_(episode)
Planet of Hats

Summary: The Vulcan-manned ship the Intrepid, plus billions of people in the solar system Gamma A, are eaten by a giant space amoeba. (Or rather killed by an energy-draining field it projects.) And by giant we're talking 11,000 miles long! (For comparison the Earth's diameter is a little under 8,000 miles.) The Enterprise blows it up with an antimatter bomb before it can reproduce into enough amoebas to eat the entire galaxy.

TBG Discussion: So this is the second time this season a world of billions of people was killed by a monster out of space. Everyone always remembers the Intrepid, but forgets the billions of people. Kirk's time must have been a terrifying time to be alive. You have major worlds getting destroyed by monsters at random. This probably qualifies as one of the times the Enterprise saved the galaxy.

===

Season 2.20: A Piece of the Action
http://memory-alpha.wikia.com/wiki/A_Piece_of_the_Action_(episode)
Planet of Hats

Summary: The Enterprise visits the planet Sigma Iotia II, last visited by the Earth ship Horizon 100 years before (it's report having only just been received). Due to a single book left behind, the Iotians have transformed their entire culture into an imitation of early 20th century Chicago gangsters. After a series of misadventures, Kirk announces the Federation will be taking charge of the planet and take 40% of its annual production as tribute. While headed away McCoy realizes he left a communicator behind, and Kirk laughs it off.

TBG Discussion. Well, it's been a good run. We got ¾ of the way through Season 2 before we finally came to an episode that's just too silly for me to consider canon. Come one. Come on. I'm chalking this one up to one of the tall tales told about the Enterprise to credulous Academy cadets.

===

Season 2.21: By Any Other Name
http://memory-alpha.wikia.com/wiki/By_Any_Other_Name_(episode)
Planet of Hats

Summary: The Enterprise is hijacked by aliens from the Kelvan Empire in the Andromeda Galaxy. They intend to take the ship home and report on the possibilities for conquest/a new home (as the Andromeda Galaxy is becoming uninhabitable due to radiation levels). The aliens look human, but have actually just taken humanoid form to better scout the area. The modify the Enterprise so it will "only" take 300 years to fly back to Andromeda. After experiencing human emotions, they agree to give back the Enterprise and send a robot probe to Andromeda with an offer from the Federation to freely provide a world for settlement.

TBG Discussion: So heads up, but the entire Andromeda Galaxy is becoming uninhabitable and we're going to see a massive refugee wave of trillions and trillions of sapients (not just the Kelvan Empire, but every species in that galaxy) heading in all directions... including at least some to the Milky Way. Mind you all of this is happening over a timespan of many hundreds of years, so it's perfectly possible there will be no effect over timespan of our game... or a fleet containing a hundred billion refugees could show up tomorrow. Makes you think, eh?

===

Season 2.22: Return to Tomorrow
http://memory-alpha.wikia.com/wiki/Return_to_Tomorrow_(episode)
Planet of Hats

Summary: Three bodiless aliens wraiths force/request several crew members to loan their bodies so they can build android shells. (They were from a race that virtually ruled the galaxy 600,000 years ago and then fought a deadly war that destroyed themselves 500,000 years ago... by their own account at least.) However they fight among themselves, and ultimately all three are consigned to oblivion.

TBG Discussion: We had the "possession by bodyless wraiths" adventure in an early Courageous log, though those aliens seemed even less friendly. The details of the alien backstories do provide a little more information about the galaxy's deep history, though.

===

Season 2.23: Patterns of Force
http://memory-alpha.wikia.com/wiki/Patterns_of_Force_(episode)
Planet of Hats

Summary: Federation cultural observer John Gill turns the planet Ekos into Nazi world. When they finally find him, Gill says he thought he could bring the "benefits" (uhhhh...) of National Socialism to Ekos without the bad parts, but it didn't work out so well. Also they're persecuting inhabitants of the neighboring planet "Zeon" (get it? GET IT?). Gill gives a speech telling everyone not to be such jerks anymore before being shot by his evil subordinate, who is assassinated in turn. The Enterprise leaves because everything will probably be fine now.

TBG Discussion: …. (sucks in breath) I... (tosses episode in same bin as "A Piece of the Action")

===

Season 2.24: The Ultimate Computer
http://memory-alpha.wikia.com/wiki/The_Ultimate_Computer_(episode)
Planet of Hats

Summary: Dr. Richard Daystrom runs an experiment to see if the Enterprise can be fully controlled by a single artificial intelligence, the M-5. It goes rogue and hundreds of people die, but Kirk talks the computer to death. Daystrom has a nervous breakdown and is sent for rehabilitation.

TBG Discussion: This incident has been referenced in game before as one of the reasons the Federation is reluctant to experiment too much with artificial intelligences. And note that the M-5 wasn't even supposed to be a conscious AI... more like an incredibly sophisticated autopilot.

===

Season 2.25: The Omega Glory
http://memory-alpha.wikia.com/wiki/The_Omega_Glory_(episode)
Planet of Hats

Summary: The Enterprise finds its sister ship the Exeter adrift, its crew victim of a plague that reduced them to crystals. The boarding party beams to the planet below, as the log left by Captain Tracey tells them it's the only way to survive. On planet Tracey has gone crazy and is leading descendents-of-communists against descendents-of-Americans who remain after a devastating biological war because he believes they hold the key to immortality. Eventually McCoy determines the planet's ecosystem has rendered them immune to the plague, and Kirk reads the Yankees the United States Constitution before leaving.

TBG Discussion: Uh, yeah, I don't know what to make of "literally the American flag" and "literally the United States Constitution" here. That goes beyond mere coincidence. Was it a parallel earth that briefly fell into Kirk's universe or something? If you look past that, there is something interesting about the idea of Tracey as a respected starship captain driven to criminal by the promise of immortality. And note he's not killed at the end; he actually gets arrested. Considering we actually put a rebuilt Constitution-class Exeter back into service in our game, you have to wonder about the ghosts that haunt it... that's a hell of a legacy for the game. Oh, and of interest:

"Despite having been killed in the earlier episode Obsession, Eddie Paskey's Leslie appears here, beaming down with Sulu and arresting Captain Tracey at the end of the episode. According to Paskey, a scene in the Obsession script in which Leslie is revived by a miracle potion was never filmed."

Perhaps not the weirdest day of Leslie's life... but you have to wonder if arresting a man who betrayed Starfleet like Tracey did was the most unpleasant.

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Season 2.26: Assignment: Earth
http://memory-alpha.wikia.com/wiki/Assignment:_Earth_(episode)
Planet of Hats

Summary: The Enterprise travels back in time for historical research using the slingshot technique that Spock invented. There they intercept an an agent of a vastly advanced alien power (who are much more advanced than Kirk's Federation in their ability to use transporter beams across 1000 light years) who has been assigned to safeguard the Earth. The agent, Gary Seven, refuses to give any details about the aliens he's working for and even his own claim to be human is somewhat in question. Later it's shown Gary is taking over for agents previously assigned to Earth who were killed in a car accident. (In this scene he claims that they are all descendants of humans taken from Earth 6000 years ago by their mysterious alien masters.) Eventually Kirk allows Gary Seven to go through with his mission, which proves to be as benevolent as he claimed.

TBG Discussion: Okay, yes this was a backdoor pilot for a television series never produced. That said, isn't it interesting? Yet another indication that there is a state-of-play for civilizations at a higher level than the Federation without quite being the Q. Are there still Gary Seven-style agents roaming around the Federation in the To Boldly Go era? Is Linderly tracking them? How many levels of behind-the-scenes manipulation are going on in the galaxy anyway?

As for the time travel, I guess Temporal Warp had to be tested under controlled conditions at least once before it was locked away forever, and who better than the ship that invented it?