- Enterprise seeks repairs from their encounters with the Romulans, where they stop at a desolate but idyllic repair station. But all is not what it seems when Mayweather is suddenly found dead.
- After the encounter with the Romulan minefield, Enterprise is severely damaged. Engineer Trip fears the worst. With the ship only capable of warp 2.5, traveling back to Jupiter Station will take practically forever and he doesn't have the necessary components to make the repairs himself. Captain Archer decides to send out a distress call and it isn't long before he gets a response from the Tellarites. They give the coordinates of a strange repair station. Upon approaching Enterprise is scanned. The atmosphere and the docking port are automatically changed to Enterprise' specs. The station is able to repair Enterprise in only 36 hours. The price, only 200 liters of plasma, seems rather low for all the work. Too low?—Arnoud Tiele (imdb@tiele.nl)
- Four days after the events of the previous episode, Minefield, Captain Archer and Commander Tucker inspect the damage to the ship with an inspection pod. Given the amount of damage (months of repairs, requiring Tritanium alloy), and the travel time to Jupiter Station (about a decade, since the ship can only manage warp 2 with this extensive damage), Archer decides that it is time for someone to help them out for once, and orders Ensign Sato to send a general distress call. A passing Tellarite freighter soon responds, and sends a barely understandable message but it contains clear co-ordinates directing them to an automated repair facility, three days away at Warp 2.
Upon arriving at the facility, the ship is scanned and the station re-configures itself to suit the crew's needs. The docking bay expands to fit the saucer section and the atmosphere inside the station changes from liquid helium to Oxygen Nitrogen. Enterprise then docks and the station completes a diagnostic and finds every system, every hull plating that requires repair. The station sets the full repair price at 200 liters of warp plasma. By using its advanced replication technology, the station can complete all repairs in just 34.2 hours (the same job at Jupiter would have taken 3 months at least). Archer, left without any other option, agrees, although later he has a gut feeling that not everything is as it appears. The station has scanned the Enterprise database without asking any permission. It has a recreation area with a protein re-sequencer which can replicate almost anything that the crew can wish for. On board, intrigued by the station's technology (The station even recognizes Reed's injured leg and sends a machine to regenerate his cells at an exponential rate), Tucker convinces Reed to visit the station's computer (saying that with technology like this Starfleet could start building ships that repair themselves), but their attempt to do so is detected, and they are beamed back to the Enterprise's bridge.
Meanwhile, a false comm message, ostensibly from Archer, directs Ensign Mayweather to an area currently being repaired. His body is found soon after, an apparent victim of an electrical shock. When Doctor Phlox discovers that the dead Mayweather is a well-replicated duplicate (Phlox had inoculated the entire crew against Rigelian fever a few weeks ago, but all microbes from that inoculation are dead inside the replicated body. Electric shock would have multiplied them instead of killing them), Archer resolves to search the station for him. Tucker then 'distracts' the computer, and Reed again trips the alarm, giving Sub-Commander T'Pol and Archer time to enter a computer room filled with bodies - among which are a Klingon, a Vulcan, and a Cardassian - apparently the station's method of augmenting its own processing power by augmenting its processing capacity and knowledge with their brain power.. Mayweather is rescued just as the station starts attacking Enterprise in retaliation. Archer then detonates the warp-plasma payment to blow up the station and escape. As the ship warps away the few active components of the station begin repairing the damage.
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