Plot

After finding traces of Acamarian blood at a looted Federation outpost, the Enterprise goes to Acamar III. There they learn of a group of Acamarian nomadic pirates known as the Gatherers — descendants of people who had separated themselves from Acamarian society a century before, during a time of rampant clan warfare.

The Acamarian leader, Sovereign Marouk, initially tries to gain the cooperation of the Enterprise in launching a military strike at the Gatherers but, after Picard refuses, agrees to try to negotiate an end to the Gatherers' self-imposed exile and to invite them to return to their home world. Marouk comes aboard the Enterprise, along with her personal servant, a beautiful and charming young woman named Yuta and the Enterprise goes in search of the Gatherers. When contact is made with one band of the Gatherers, they are initially hostile and then skeptical, but they finally agree to listen to Marouk's proposal. After some discussion, the leader of the Gatherer band, Brull, agrees to recommend the proposal to Chorgan, the leader of all the Gatherers.

During the negotiations between Marouk and Brull, Yuta privately confronts an elderly Gatherer and touches him on the cheek — whereupon the man promptly has a massive heart attack

Myocardial infarction

Myocardial infarction or acute myocardial infarction , commonly known as a heart attack, results from the interruption of blood supply to a part of the heart, causing heart cells to die...

. As he draws his last breath, Yuta tells him that although she is the last of her line, her clan (Tralesta) will outlive the dying man's clan (Lornack). No one else is aware of any of this, and when the man is later found, everyone assumes that his death was natural.

Aboard the Enterprise, Riker is strongly attracted to Yuta. She tries to return his affection but finds herself unable to open up to him (either physically or emotionally).

In Sick Bay, Dr. Crusher has been examining the body of the Gatherer and discovers that his heart attack was caused by a fast-acting "micro-virus

Virus

A virus is a small infectious agent that can replicate only inside the living cells of organisms. Viruses infect all types of organisms, from animals and plants to bacteria and archaea...

" that would attack only Acamarians with a very specific DNA

DNA

Deoxyribonucleic acid is a nucleic acid that contains the genetic instructions used in the development and functioning of all known living organisms . The DNA segments that carry this genetic information are called genes, but other DNA sequences have structural purposes, or are involved in...

 profile. Other Acamarians, with different DNA profiles, could come into contact with this virus — or even be carriers — without suffering any ill effects. Such an organism couldn't possibly have evolved naturally, Crusher insists; it must have been genetically engineered, which means the man was murdered.

As the Enterprise meets the starship of Chorgan, the Gatherer Leader, a large download of information from the Acamarian planetary database arrives via subspace radio

Ansible

An ansible is a hypothetical machine capable of instantaneous or superluminal communication. Ansibles occur as plot devices in science fiction literature.- Origin :The word ansible was coined by Ursula K. Le Guin in her 1966 novel, Rocannon's World...

. Commander Data studies this material and finds a record of a similar mysterious death — another Gatherer named Penthar Mul from the Lornack clan who had a massive heart attack during his trial, 53 years ago. A photograph of the man, being led from a session of his trial, is found in the database, and in the background of the old photo is a young woman who appears identical to Yuta.

Riker beams

Transporter (Star Trek)

A transporter is a fictional teleportation machine used in the Star Trek universe. Transporters convert a person or object into an energy pattern , then "beam" it to a target, where it is reconverted into matter...

 over to the Gatherer ship and interrupts the negotiations just as Yuta is about to take a cup of brandy to Chorgan (who is also of the Lornack clan). Confronted by the new revelations about her past, Yuta admits that she is the last of five survivors of an attack on the Tralesta clan by the neighboring Lornack clan. Although that attack happened 80 years ago, Yuta hasn't aged a day since then because she was genetically altered to enable her to seek out the remaining Lornacks and kill them all, one by one, with the specially engineered virus she carries.

Riker tries to appeal to Yuta's kinder nature and begs her to abandon her quest of vengeance, but the woman is unable to shake off a century of single-minded determination. Even stun blasts from Riker's phaser fail to stop her, and in the end, he has no choice but to vaporize Yuta with his weapon's highest setting in order to stop her from lunging at Chorgan. The peace talks are saved, and the greatly relieved Gatherer official offers Riker his deepest thanks for saving his life, but the Enterprise's second-in-command is clearly too depressed by what he was forced to do to respond to the man's gratitude.

In the epilogue, Riker is seen drinking in the ship's bar. Picard approaches him to indicate that their next mission involves a trip through a sector now under the very truce that they have achieved. In a disguised moment of tenderness, he gently hints to Riker that it will be a routine mission, and and that he will offer shore leave to any crew member who might be interested. Riker stares back at the captain glassily, and then says that he will let the crew know of Picard's offer.

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