SOMETHING CRASHES INTO THE ENTERPRISE

 

Name: Star Trek: The New Voyages – Story 2 “Intersection Point”

Author: Juanita Coulson, with an introduction by James Doohan

Publication Date: 3/1976

Publisher: Bantam Books

Page Number: 20

Historian’s Note: Sometime after The Counter-Clock Incident and before The Motion Picture.   

Cast of Characters:  Captain James T. Kirk         Commander Spock              Dr. Leonard H. McCoy AKA “Bones”              Lieutenant Commander Montgomery Scott AKA “Scotty”        Lieutenant  Hikaru Sulu              Lieutenant Nyota Uhura          Lieutenant Jerry Dubois        Lieutenant Leslie         Nurse Christine Chapel          Ensign Pavel Chekov      Crewman Lissa Hart        

Starships: USS Enterprise NCC-1701

Planets: none

My Spoiler filled summary and review: The Enterprise is investigating a phenomenon in space that seems to be a great sphere of energy.  Suddenly that energy surges and the Enterprise tries to pull away. While pulling aways they appear to have suddenly collided with another ship.  The strange thing is the ship’s deflector shields should have protected them from such an occurrence, but according to their sensors there is nothing out there for them to run into.  As they continue to scan, they find some debris but what they find wasn’t what hit them but the remains of another Starfleet vessel, the USS Halcyon, that disappeared over a month ago.

The Enterprise

                The damage to the secondary hull is particularly bad because of where and what it hit.  The area damaged is causing interference with their ability to reroute energy to other areas of the ship.  Unless they fix it getting the Enterprise out of danger may not be possible.    It turns out that a particular power coupling is missing that is causing the power distribution problem.  It is located in a damaged area of the ship however.  In that area there seems to be some of the strange green energy has moved in and taken the form of a mist.  The strange mist has however allowed for an atmosphere that is actually breathable.  They need to get the power coupling and Lt. Dubois volunteers to go get it.

He kind of reminds me of the character who gets his mind wiped.

                The build a safety harness for the Lieutenant so they can pull him back when needed. However, as Lt. Uhura monitors his progress she screams and is unable to continue.  They pull Dubois back only to discover that he is alive but his mind has been destroyed and he is now a vegetable.  Spock notices the area of Dubois brain that was attacked functions differently for Vulcans. It is reasoned that Spock will have a better chance of success.  He attempts and succeeds.  Spock’s mental damage is small and quickly reversible as Kirk has him focus on the value of Pi.  According to Spock, there are intelligent creatures that lived in the space mist and it was those very creatures that found the power coupling and placed it in his hands.  As the damage their presence was doing was unintentional and they themselves were being threatened, they wanted to Spock to succeed for everyone’s sake.  

Spock a little damaged but not too much!

  

Additional thoughts: This was a nice little story.  Of course, with James Doohan writing the introduction I would have thought the story might have something to do with Scotty.  His introduction certainly made me think it would.  Scotty however has a very minor role in all of this.  His main purpose was to introduce two people from his department particularly the young hotshot Lt. Dubois. I was kind of wondering why the author just didn’t use DeSalle considering he is the assistant chief engineer.  However, considering the author was going to destroy the character’s mind maybe she felt she should do that with her own character not someone else’s.

Good news DeSalle you are not getting your brains fried.

Speaking of poor Dubois, maybe they should have Nurse Chapel see if she can help him.  She was able to work wonders with Lt. Uhura after her mind was wiped back during “The Changeling”, maybe she can do the same for him.  Lt. Uhura can also come down for some moral support and see if they can get Dubois back on his feet and mentally straight again.

If Uhura can do it, then maybe Dubois can too!

One of the things I really liked about this story is it pulls the classic Star Trek trick of “maybe the big scary thing that you think is a monster isn’t really a monster but rather another lifeform just trying to survive.”  The first real example of this came from the episode “Devil in the Dark.” In this episode, the Horta killed people, we later learned that was in self-defense as they were killing her children. The mist that the Enterprise collided into had intelligent life in it.  What happened to Dubois was unfortunate but not intentional and when given the opportunity they helped the Enterprise escape saving all involved.

Looks like a threat but maybe not!

             I did like the inclusion of other crew members besides the main cast.  After all, when some is the CHIEF engineer or the CHIEF Medical Officer there should be people seen who also work in that department.  I also give the author big credit for including dear Mr. Leslie.  A character with more appearances than Chekov deserves to be some books.

Good to see you Mr. Leslie

Should it be canon: Yes, like the last story in this volume I really liked it. I think this story would fits well with established Star Trek lore; this very easily could be an episode of the original series.  Its inclusion would enhance canon.

Cover Art: What I said last time. 

“The cover is beautiful.  You have the Enterprise flying in all its glory in the bottom center of the image.  Behind it looks like a space station built on an asteroid.  Flying above in the opposite direction is an unknown starship whose design I don’t recognize.”

  

Final Grade: Final Grade 3 of 5