The Survivor

TAS Season 1 Episode 6
Air Date: October 13th, 1974

Plot

The Enterprise finds a one man vessel near the Romulan neutral zone that was damaged by a meteor shower. They rescue the captain Carter Winston which the crew all knows of well though everyone didn't know he was still alive. Oddly enough, his fiancee is aboard the Enterprise as a security officer.

When Winston sees his fiancee, he tells her that he had crashed on Vendor and had severe plastic surgery and that things happened and he can't merry her anymore. He goes to see Kirk about his ship to see if it can be repaired. When Kirk said it can't, Winston turned into an alien and then knocks out Kirk, then turns into Kirk.

Winston orders the Enterprise to cut through Romulan space to get to Ratar III and that the population is in immanent danger. Later Kirk wakes up and heads to bridge and notices that the course changed and Spock told him that he gave the order. He shows a recording to prove it. Kirk tells Spock he never gave that order and he should go to sick bay.

Before Kirk can get there, Winston pulls the same move on McCoy and tells Kirk that he is busy and to come back later. Spock notices that McCoy's responses were atypical. They go back and find McCoy asleep. Kirk realizes that there are three beds in the sick bay when there are only supposed to be two. He convinces Winston to revert to his true form, but Winston overpowers them and escapes into the ship.

While the search for the intruder is happening, two Romulans show up and demand that the Enterprise be given to the Romulan empire. Kirk realizes that Winston was a Romulan spy used to lure the Enterprise into Romulan space.

Winston sabotages the Enterprises deflector shields then bumps into his fiancee and she pulls a phaser on him. Winston says that the real Winston died with him, and he did get to know him before he passed. The alien starts talking about Winston's love and that he too loves her. He shows her his real form, that of a Vandorian. She lowers his phaser but Kirk shows up and attacks Wintson but he can't fire in time as the Romulan fires on the Enterprise and Winston gets away.

The Enterprise returns fire targeting propulsion systems disabling one of the two ships and the second escapes. Kirk thanks Scotty for fixing the shields but Scotty says he hasn't. They realize that Winston turned himself into a deflector shield and saved them. Winston then shows up on the bridge and says that Anne changed him.

Commentary

They use the Romulans are using Klingon Battlecruisers in this episode too, though there are Romulan markings on it.

Quotes

"Anne, this is what I am. Can you love this? You see why I told you it would be best to forget me?" - Winston

"You caught him." - McCoy

"Acute observation, Doctor." - Spock

"I'm glad to see him under guard, Jim. If he'd turned into a second Spock, it would've been too much to take." - McCoy

"Perhaps. But then two Doctor McCoys just might bring the level of medical efficiency on this ship up to acceptable levels." - Spock