- While investigating the disappearance of Federation members, Kirk and his landing party find themselves placed in an alien zoo.
- Kirk takes the Enterprise to Lactra VII to investigate the disappearance of a Federation science team. While on Lactra, large slug-like aliens add them to their zoo (uniting them with members of the missing science team). Communication proves difficult, even for Mr. Spock, as the telepathic alien minds process information faster than humanly possible. An escape attempt goes south, riling two parents over the sudden disappearance of their child.—statmanjeff
- Kirk takes the Enterprise to Lactra VII to investigate the disappearance of a Federation science team (with 6 crew members) 6 weeks ago. Kirk hooks into the computer of their deserted ship (to study their logs and computers to find any information). He finds that 3 members of the science team went missing and then the captain ordered the remaining crew members, including himself, to go on a rescue mission. Kirk launches a landing party with himself, Spock and McCoy to the location where the captain and his crew beamed to, on the surface of the planet.
They find quick changes in ecology in short distances, ranging from a boiling spring to a desert (1.1 kms wide) to a rain forest. They are also attacked by all manner of beasts which they reckon they had seen on other worlds in the galaxy. The beasts are only kept at bay by the phasers of the landing party, which manage to knock them out after prolonged exposure to the phaser beams.
Spock gets a signal on his communicator while trying to contact the missing science team on the surface, and they head in that direction. Spock says that the entire ecology of the planet is manufactured (the water in the rain-forest was too pure, and thus too good to be true). Scott guides the landing party to a large gathering of life forms (like a city), roughly 98 kms north west of their current position. This is direction from which they got their communicator signal.
While on Lactra, large slug-like aliens capture the landing party and take them to their city. They add them to their zoo (uniting them with members of the missing science team). The city itself is 5 kms across and a technological marvel. The slugs take their phasers, communicators and other equipment. Communication proves difficult, even for Mr. Spock, as the telepathic alien minds process information faster than humanly possible. The alien slugs have not harmed the science team and provide them with every comfort. Spock theorizes that the aliens have the ability to read minds and have created an hospital environment, based on their understanding of what humans need One of the scientists gets a fever from an insect bite. Spock and McCoy concentrate on thinking about McCoy's medical kit and the slugs hand it over to them.
Kirk devices a plan. He would appear to be ill and the others will concentrate on a communicator. Once the slug hands over the communicator, Kirk will ask Scotty to beam them up. But the thoughts of the group are read by a baby slug, who hands the communicator to Kirk. As Kirk orders Scotty, the baby slug takes the communicator back and gets beamed up instead.
The parent slugs are now worried about their child. They start focusing on Kirk, who starts to go mad with the thought of "what happened to the baby".. Just then Scott arrives with the baby slug. Scotty reveals that the baby slug is only 6 yrs old, but with an IQ in the thousands. The baby slug had read through all of the ship's computers and told the parents about the Federation and the races it encompassed. They conclude that humans are in the process of evolving into an higher order race like themselves.
The slugs determine that the humans don't belong in the zoo and allow them to leave.
Contribute to this page
Suggest an edit or add missing content