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Excitement is brewing onboard
Enterprise as the starship enters orbit of a Minshara-class
planet with 500 million lifeforms. Visual and acoustic scans
reveal a pre-industrial society called the Akaali. Over T'Pol's
protestations of protocol, Captain Archer decides the crew
should explore the civilization first-hand, rather than use
probes. But the mission becomes more critical when neutrino
emissions are detected on the surface, indicating an antimatter
reactor on a world that doesn't even have indoor plumbing. So
Archer sends himself, Ensign Sato, Commander Tucker and T'Pol
down to the planet disguised as Akaali to investigate.
Split into two groups, the
landing team follows their scanners through the night toward the
telltale emissions. T'Pol and Sato are disturbed to see that
many of the people on the streets of the city are afflicted with
lesions. Archer and Tucker determine the antimatter reactor is
located underneath a small curio shop, and upon breaking into
the shop they find that the entrance to the reactor is protected
by an energy barrier. Suddenly a crossbow is trained at them by
a striking Akaali woman who accuses them of causing a local
plague with their "evening deliveries."
T'Pol arrives and stuns the woman with her phase pistol. With
dawn arriving, Archer sends the others back to the shuttle while
he stays behind with the woman, whom he learns is an apothecary
named Riann. When she wakes up, Archer tells her he's an
investigator from another city who is as curious as she is about
the strange goings-on at the curio shop and how they're related
to the epidemic. When the shop opens, Archer and Tucker confront
the owner, Garos, mutually realizing each are not of this world.
Garos, a Malurian, claims to be an explorer like them who grew
fond of the Akaali and chose to stay, and the antimatter reactor
is nothing more than a fabrication device for food and clothing.
He further claims the plague is caused by an indigenous virus,
and Riann's accusations toward him are baseless. Archer is
skeptical, so he visits Riaan in her lab with T'Pol. While T'Pol
surreptitiously gathers data, Archer learns from Riaan that her
brother was one of the first victims of the epidemic, which
started shortly after Garos arrived. And suspicious deliveries
are taking place at night from Garos' shop to different places
outside the city. Later, Dr. Phlox determines from T'Pol's
readings that the city's groundwater is contaminated with
tetracyanate 622, a toxic compound primarily used as an
industrial lubricant, which appears to be responsible for the
plague.
That night Archer and Riaan watch the curio shop, waiting for
one of those deliveries. Their stakeout turns awkwardly romantic
when Archer's translator malfunctions and he has no choice but
to kiss Riaan to cover while fixing it. But then they see a man
hauling crates out of Garos' shop, and they follow him to a
forest clearing. They watch as an alien shuttlecraft procures
the crates with a tractor beam. Riaan is shaken by these sights,
and Archer is about to confess his true identity when they come
under attack by the delivery man. Archer fights with the
attacker and succeeds in stunning him, in the process undoing
his prosthetic disguise to reveal his scaly-gray alien skin.
Archer pockets the alien's weapon, shop key and a remote control
unit, then explains everything to Riaan as they return to the
city. The enter the curio shop, use the remote to disable the
energy barrier, and take a stairwell to find a massive
underground drilling operation operated by scaly-gray aliens.
Archer determines they're mining a veridium isotope, which is
used to manufacture explosives, and their drill bits are
saturated with tetracyanate. Determined to shut down the
operation, Archer tells Tucker to use the transporter to beam
out the reactor, once he can disengage the dampening field that
envelopes the entire mine. But he and Riaan misread the alien
controls and set off an alarm.
While a Malurian ship approaches Enterprise and opens fire,
Garos confronts Archer in the mine and warns him to leave and
never return. As Enterprise evades its assailant, Archer manages
to disable the dampening field and escape with Riaan into the
city where they get into a phase-pistol fight with the aliens in
front of the shocked locals. Meanwhile Tucker tries to get a
transporter lock on the reactor while Enterprise fails to fend
off the Malurian ship. He gets the idea to beam the reactor into
space and fire a spatial torpedo at it, creating an antimatter
explosion that disables the attacking ship. On the ground, Riaan
uses her scientific prowess and instructs Archer to shoot his
phase-pistol into an oil lamp on the street above Garos and his
henchmen, exploding it and thus giving Archer the upper hand.
Defeated on each front, Garos and his men leave the planet. The
Enterprise crew removes all the mining equipment and provides an
antidote for the plague, all without the Akaali knowing what's
really going on, with one exception: Riaan, who doubts anyone
would believe her anyway. Archer shares one last kiss with her
before trekking back into the unknown.
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