- Responding to a distress signal, Kirk finds Captain Tracey of the U.S.S. Exeter violating the prime directive and interfering with a war between the Yangs and the Kohms to find the secret of their longevity.
- As the Enterprise approaches planet Omega IV, they find another starship, the U.S.S. Exeter, in orbit. Kirk, Spock and McCoy beam aboard to find the ship abandoned but strewn with uniforms and crystals. The last log entry from the ship's surgeon tells them they have been infected with a deadly virus brought aboard from a returning landing party. Kirk's party beams down to the planet's surface and finds there is one Exeter survivor: Captain Ron Tracey. He has apparently ignored the Prime Directive and has taken sides in a local dispute supporting the Kohms against their arch-rivals, the Yangs. As McCoy tries to find a cure for the virus, Spock and Kirk try to make sense of the situation. They eventually realize there is an odd parallel with Earth's own history.—garykmcd
- Arriving at Omega IV, the Enterprise comes upon the U.S.S. Exeter in unmanned, automated orbit. Beaming aboard with McCoy, Spock and Lt. Galloway, Kirk discovers the entire crew reduced to their constituent, waterless chemical compounds from a disease brought back from the planet below. To survive, they must immediately beam down to the planet for its immunizing effect. There they discover Capt. Tracey, the lone survivor of the Exeter tragedy, but he's been breaking the Prime Directive with the long-lived and long-warring inhabitants (Kohms and Yangs), helping one side against the other while trying to isolate the planet's immunizing quality, believing it a virtual and marketable fountain of youth. While McCoy works to isolate the raging microbes that infect them all, duty requires Kirk to put Capt. Tracey under arrest - despite the fact that Tracey's in charge and that none of them may ever leave the planet, and that hordes of relentless savages are gathering for an all-out attack.—statmanjeff
- The Enterpise finds the U.S.S. Exeter in a fixed orbit, its crew members physically reduced to crystals. An officer left a recording, a warning for everyone that came across them to leave as quick as possible, but Kirk, Spock, McCoy and a security guard beam down to the planet, where they find a Turkic-looking Kohm people about to chop the head off a prisoner of the so-called Yangs - which the Exeters captain Tracey declares impossible savages; he states that he is the only survivor from his crew because of his immune system. There is an unidentified natural immunizing factor on the planet raised against a fatal affection which dates from a biological war centuries ago, so they seem stranded there forever. The immunization also allows the Kohms to live for many centuries. The Yangs attack, without fear of death, numerous and almost unstoppable. When Spock points out to Kirk Tracey must be charged for violation of the primary directive by arming the Kohms with phasers, he has the Kohms imprison them, because Kirk won't drop the charges in view of the imminent Yang attack - Kirk is put in a cell with a couple, which attack him and escape. McCoy finds there is no serum, just natural selection - everyone can leave, yet Tracey refuses and tries to force Kirk to have phasers beamed down. After the escapee leads the Yang hordes to the Kohm village, everyone is captured, but remarkable cultural parallels with earth open possibilities.—KGF Vissers
- Suppose that you found the Fountain of Youth, and thought that you could live hundreds of years, if only you could learn its secrets. Well, Captain Tracey (Morgan Woodward) of the star-ship Exeter believes he has found this "Fountain of Youth" on the planet where he is now stranded (he was sent to explore the sector 6 months ago). The remainder of his small crew complement is dead (Crystallized to be precise (with all the water taken out of it), and very suddenly, as if they didn't know what hit them), and Tracey has sent a distress call which the USS Enterprise has intercepted. The last log entry indicates that stepping inside the ship means death and the only means of survival is down on the planet.
The Enterprise establishes an orbit around the planet and Kirk and Spock transport down, where they are greeted by Captain Tracey. The Captain is unharmed, and living among a humanoid species, the Kohms, who resemble Earth Asians, and are clad in animal skins to protect themselves against the harsh and frigid climate. Did Tracey send the distress call in order to be rescued, or does he really want something else? His unsettling manner, and the story he relates, leave some doubt. Tracey claims that an infection from the planet wiped out his entire crew in orbit. He is infected, but stayed alive as he is on the planet. When the Exeter established orbit around this planet years before, and made "first contact", Tracey and his crew encountered two humanoid species, who were participating in an ongoing brutal conflict. The first race, the Kohms, are a seemingly gentle and contemplative species, and not aggressive, despite the nature of their current conflict. The second race, the Yangs, resemble Northern European Caucasians. The Yangs also dress in animal skins, both males and females, but unlike the peaceful Kohms, they are warlike and brutal, at least according to Tracey's description of them.
These two peoples have been trying to exterminate each other for quite a long time. Once Tracey had beamed down he figured out that the Kohms have very long lives. Kirk knows Tracey has violated the prime directive and wants to place him under arrest, but Tracey moves first and uses the Kohms to arrest Kirk and his landing party. As a direct result of Tracey's decision to remain, his crew perished in orbit, one by one, until only Tracey remained, obstinately persisting in his obsession to discover the secret of the Kohms' longevity. He had discovered that the Kohms' lifespans extended to several hundreds of years. Tracey had summoned the Enterprise, not because of actual distress, but to access the Enterprise's firepower, in order to resolve the conflict between the planet's two races in favor of the Kohms, thus enabling Tracey to locate the source of the Kohms' secret. Tracey believes that the importance of such a discovery far outweighs the violation of the Prime Directive. Kirk senses immediately that Tracey has lost touch with the fundamental purpose of the Federation, which is exploration and discovery, but always with the governing principle of non-interference. Tracey imprisons Kirk with one of the captured Yangs, while he tasks McCoy to isolate the "Fountain of Youth". The Yang attacks Kirk, but later responds to the word "Freedom". Kirk and him form a truce and try to escape from captivity. But the Yang betrays Kirk and knocks him out before escaping. Now Kirk works with Spock to escape and frees McCoy too. McCoy says that his research indicates that once there was a huge biological war on the planet. The nature counterbalanced and produced immunizing agents in soil, air and water. When humans land, they are infected, but if they stay long enough, they are immunized. Which means they can leave anytime they want. But McCoy says that the long life of the Kohms is not because of the immunizing agents, its because on the planet the weaker strains got wiped out during the war and only the best genetic stock was able to breed.
Meanwhile the escaped Yang mounted a counterattack and imprisons Kirk, Spock, McCoy and Tracey. Now Tracey, Kirk and Spock are bound by ropes and held under guard inside a large tent, which serves as a gathering hall for the Yangs. The leader of the Yangs is a man named Cloud William (Roy Jenson). One of the Yangs is an old man who serves as an advisor to Cloud William. Kirk and Spock, upon overhearing the Yangs' discussions, begin to realize that these Yangs are not as primitive as Tracey made them out to be. Kirk is trying to comprehend Cloud William's unusual manner of speaking and the symbolic elements of his culture, at least those that Kirk can see or hear from his confined position, under guard. Unfortunately, the Yang language is cluttered with words and references that Kirk simply does not understand. Cloud William continues to refer to some sort of fundamental doctrine, something called the "E Plebnista" which guides the Yangs' decisions regarding the dispensation of justice, and how they should deal with outside threats to their culture.
In response to William's interrogation, Kirk has described his and Spock's presence, and motives, truthfully (within the couched terms necessitated by the Prime Directive). Tracey, on the other hand, has presented a different version (completely untrue and self-serving, of course). William determines that the only just resolution is to kill all three. During the Yangs' heated deliberations, Kirk notices a book, prominently displayed, which Kirk theorizes might contain the tribe's "basic doctrine." Suddenly, from the recesses of the tent, one of the Yangs emerges holding a United States flag with fifty stars on a field of blue and the traditional red and white stripes. Though tattered and ragged, it is unmistakably the Stars and Stripes.
Kirk and Spock whisper to each other. How is this possible? This planet is light years from Earth. And they had never been exposed to earth culture prior to Tracey's arrival on the Exeter. So how could they possibly possess an American flag and what appears to be a Christian bible? Spock suggests to Kirk that this could be an example of Hodgkins' Theory of Parrallel Planets. Hodgkins' theory proposed that common cultures and symbols could arise on different planets in the galaxy, even though far-removed from each other, and having had no contact. Hodgkins said this was due to the nature of duality.
Kirk interpolates Spock's suggestion with Cloud William's confusing references and American earth culture. William's mate and others are frightened. Just as Kirk is talking reasonably to William, the fighting outside the tent has ceased, the Yangs have defeated the Kohms. Suddenly it dawns on Kirk. Earth. of course. Yangs means Yankees, or Americans. Spock then suggests that Kohms may stand for Communists.
Kirk shouts "Wait" to Cloud William. "Does not your "book" say that Good triumphs over evil?" The councilor confirms this. "Let us fight" says Kirk. "Tracey and I. Surely good will prevail." Cloud William consents, and the Yangs form a circle around the two. Spock says "Captain, I've discovered that Evil usually wins, unless good is very very clever." It is a tough fight, and very vicious, but Kirk is the winner. Cloud William humbles himself before Kirk, and says "I doubted you because you did not know the words of the E Plebnista." Kirk says "I did not know them because you said them so badly." Then Kirk picks up the "holy" scroll that William had been handling the entire time and begins to read it aloud. "Not E Plebnista!!" says Kirk. "Listen." Then he reads the words. " We the people, in order to form a more perfect union, establish justice, ensure domestic tranquility, provide for the common defense, promote the general welfare and, insure the blessings of liberty, to each man and his posterity, do ordain and establish this Constitution of the United States of America. Tracey is arrested and taken back to the ship.
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