RECAP | Star Trek: Strange New Worlds 306 - 'The Sehlat Who Ate Its Tail'

In the of , Nurse Chapel and Dr. Korby's quest to uncover the next step in human evolution leads the Enterprise to that holds the oldest, ultimate form of evil parasitic hitchhikers. Unfortunately for the crew, this results in the loss of Ensign Gamble and awakens something angry and savage within Captain Batel.

Now, in Episode 6, "," Lieutenant Commander James Kirk's first day in the captain's chair of the U.S.S. Farragut takes a disastrous turn when the Enterprise is captured by a deadly Scavenger Ship, but the alien menace is not exactly what it seems.

As the U.S.S. Farragut prepares to conduct a planetary survey of Helicon Gamma, Lt. Commander James T. Kirk details his belief that Captain V'Rel has an aversion to risk* in his first officer’s personal log. On the Bridge, V’Rel denies Kirk's request to send an away team to the planet. Suddenly, an unknown force creates a seismic disturbance that tears through Helicon Gamma and throws debris at the Farragut, damaging the ship and severely wounding V'Rel.

Kirk takes command and sends a distress call that brings the U.S.S. Enterprise to the scene. An away team beams over to assist the Farragut. As Nurse Christine Chapel heads to Sickbay and finds V'Rel being treated for a cerebral contusion, Lt. Spock leads Ensign Nyota Uhura and Lt. La’An Noonien-Singh to rendezvous with Kirk on the Bridge. Uhura overcomes a communications jam by achieving line-of-sight comms with Enterprise, allowing Kirk to contact Captain Christopher Pike and explain that a massive starship had targeted the planet with a focused gravitational beam.

Shortly after Pike orders a full evacuation of the Farragut, his signal is cut off by the return of the mystery vessel. The Enterprise engages with phasers, but the unknown foe latches on and pulls the Federation flagship into its sizable interior. Kirk and those aboard the Farragut watch as the vessel goes to warp. With Captain V'Rel aboard the Enterprise for treatment, Kirk is now captain of the Farragut.

Trapped within the enemy starship, Pike and Lt. Commander Una Chin-Riley assess Enterprise's status from the Bridge. Main power is offline, and the captain assumes they have been boarded. La'An and Number One reference stories about a "destroyer of worlds" — also known as Asaasllich and Astrovore — an ancient scavenger ship that consumes resources from remote planets and vessels. Lt. Erica Ortegas notes that the Klingons call it Chach-Ka — "the Annihilator," while Lt. Jenna Mitchell recalls Admiral Sawyer mentioning it in his stellar cartography class. Pike enlists Noonien-Singh to accompany him to Engineering in order to stop the power drain.

In the adrift Farragut's Ready Room, Kirk convenes with the Enterprise away team and expresses his desire to follow the scavenger ship. Lt. Montgomery "Scotty" Scott identifies a D7-class Klingon Battle Cruiser among the scans taken of their opponent's vessel, pointing out that their foe could have easily destroyed or captured the Farragut. Kirk orders Scotty to perform some miracles,** requiring the restoration of engines and weapons to pursue the scavengers.

In an Enterprise corridor, Pike and Noonien-Singh progress toward Engineering and encounter Commander Pelia, who informs them that an umbilical has tunneled through the hull, flooded certain areas with toxic gas, and tapped into the starship's power systems. Removing the umbilical is essential to restoring auxiliary power for the Enterprise's escape, so La'An gathers breathers that will allow Pike's team to traverse the contaminated areas and reach the intrusive technology.

Back on the Farragut, Scotty struggles through repairs in a . Kirk advises the engineer that the scavengers had been harvesting the mineral Aldentium from Helicon Gamma. Sullivan's Planet, a world inhabited by over 100 million people, also has significant deposits and is likely their enemy's next target. Kirk wishes to overtake the scavengers and arrive there before them, but Scotty warns that pushing the damaged starship to those extremes could be dangerous. Kirk acknowledges the risk, but orders Scotty to prepare for maximum warp.

On the Enterprise Bridge, Ortegas tells Number One that the maneuvering thrusters can be fired manually, but without comms they can not coordinate their movements. Ready to solve the communications issue, Pelia states that this may be the first time she has been glad to have lived through the 1980s. Elsewhere on the Enterprise, Pike and Noonien-Singh arrive at the umbilical, but severing it with phasers would destroy half the ship. Two space-suited scavengers emerge, and after a quick firefight, the Starfleet officers retreat with a wounded security crew member.

With the Farragut now at high warp, Spock reports from the Bridge's science station and tells Kirk that the ship has overtaken the scavenger vessel. Kirk is pleased that his gamble paid off, finally opting to take a seat in the captain's chair. Unfortunately, the plasma manifolds blow out and strand the Farragut in their enemy's path. A furious Scotty reveals that they pushed the ship too hard and the warp engines are now "giant paperweights."

Faced with two terrible options — hoping the scavengers ignore the Farragut or escaping in a shuttle while the scavengers ravage Sullivan's Planet — Kirk refuses to accept either outcome. Silencing dissent, Kirk heads to the Ready Room to clear his head. Since this is Kirk's first time as acting captain, Chapel believes he is showing signs of strain under duress. The Enterprise officers discuss the idea of taking steps to remove Kirk from command, but Uhura suggests they help him find his command style.

On the Enterprise, Pike and La'An take refuge in the Port Gallery, but Ensign Maurer has already bled out. The scavengers' iron particles are primitive-like bullets, yet their suits are advanced and capable of absorbing phaser fire. The captain orders La'An to set phasers to kill as the scavengers burst in, and the Chief of Security detonates a bottle of alcohol as a diversion that allows them to evade the so-called "monsters."

In Pelia's eclectic quarters, the engineer retrieves 20th Century landline phones and gaming joysticks. Since the signals are transmitted cable to cable, the phones can not be jammed. Pelia plans to strip the ship for copper cables and wire the Enterprise.

On the Farragut, Spock finds Kirk reassembling a three-dimensional chess game he had been playing with Captain V'Rel.*** Despite his desire to be the person giving the orders, Kirk reflects on the deaths that would have occurred if V'Rel had agreed to his initial wish to send a landing party to Helicon Gamma. Recognizing he ignored Scotty's advice about the engines, Kirk acknowledges that he's been flying by the seat of his pants and hoping he'd luck into the right call.

Spock understands Kirk's crisis of confidence, listening as the acting captain refers to himself as "the dog who caught the car" and didn't know what to do with it. Spock references a similar Vulcan expression — "the sehlat who ate its tail"**** — and posits that Kirk should continue to follow his human intuition, as it has gotten them this far. Emboldened, Kirk heads to the Bridge and informs the crew that he has no intentions of giving up on rescuing the Enterprise.

Insisting the scavenger ship must have a weakness, Kirk solicits observations. Uhura and Scotty explain that their opponent devours resources, becoming larger and needing to consume even more. Kirk asks Scotty to make it appear as if the plasma manifold is overflowing with Aldentium by flooding the intermix chamber with antiprotons. They will lure their opponents in and spring a trap. Kirk feels odd when Spock refers to him as the captain, so the Vulcan promises to demote him at the earliest opportunity.

Meanwhile, in a corridor aboard the Enterprise, Pike and Noonien-Singh pounce on the two scavengers that are searching for them. One intruder is vaporized, while the other is injured when it hesitates to kill Pike upon seeing his face. La'An and the captain return to the umbilical, deciding ruin the fuel with a taste of undesirable baryon particles.***** At the same time, the rest of the crew wires the ship for phone service, something Pelia hadn't done since she was a roadie for the Grateful Dead.

The scavenger ship drops out of warp to raid the Farragut, which targets its opponent's hull by detaching its nacelles. With the scavenger vessel temporarily disabled, Pike destabilizes the umbilical's deuterium stream with baryon particles, prompting the scavengers to retract it. With Dr. Joseph M'Benga and Number One coordinating port and starboard thrusters, Ortegas pilots the Enterprise free.

The scavenger ship begins to recover, so the Farragut destroys it by firing photon torpedoes at the wreckage within its maw. Spock detects 7,000 lifesigns — all human — among the debris, and the flag of the United States is emblazoned on its hull. Sadly, they are unable to beam the survivors aboard. In Enterprise's Ready Room, Uhura shares details about a group of mid-21st Century scientists who ventured to the stars before first contact. Pelia recalls that the explorers were the "best of us," recruited from around the world in the aftermath of World War III. The 7,000 lost in the recent engagement were the descendants of the scientists and their families.

Pike visits Kirk in the Farragut's Ready Room, insisting that the first officer made the right call during the battle. Pike emphasizes that captains must live with their decisions. Kirk is dismayed that he didn't have empathy for the scavengers until he discovered they were human. Pike decides that "empathy isn’t conditional" is the lesson which Kirk can take from the incident. Kirk wonders if Starleet would have become monsters had they experienced what the scavengers had gone through. Pike supposes that, if Captain Kirk remembers we are not that different from our enemies going forward, they can avoid such a fate.

* "Return to Tomorrow" — Demonstrating his long-held worldview and frustration with risk-averse individuals, Captain Kirk famously declared "Risk is our business" in this Star Trek: The Original Series episode.

** Star Trek III: The Search for Spock and Star Trek IV: The Voyage Home — This moment hints at the future where Scotty refers to himself as a "miracle worker" in the crew's third theatrical outing, while Dr. McCoy refers to him as one later on.

*** "Where No Man Has Gone Before" and "Charlie X" — Three-dimensional chess will be a common occurrence for Captain Kirk and Spock aboard the U.S.S. Enterprise.

**** "Journey to Babel" — Spock's pet sehlat was first mentioned by his mother Amanda Grayson, and then later seen in Star Trek: The Animated Series' "Yesteryear."

***** "Galaxy's Child" — Geordi La Forge and Leah Brahms used a similar strategy to get a space-borne lifeform off the ship when they "soured the milk" by contaminating the energy it fed on.