| Sent
by Admiral Forrest to respond to an automated distress call, Enterprise
intercepts the Earth cargo freighter Fortunate and finds it badly damaged
and not responding to hails. Captain Archer leads an away team to board
the vessel, and they are greeted by the freighter's acting commander, first
officer Matthew Ryan. Ryan informs Archer that the Fortunate was attacked
by Nausicaan pirates, who have been harassing freighters in the sector for
years, including the one Ensign Mayweather grew up on. Claiming the distress
call was a mistake, Ryan resists Archer's overtures of help, but Dr. Phlox
insists on tending to the injured captain. Once Phlox determines that Captain
Keene will need two or three days of treatment, Archer talks Ryan into letting
Enterprise engineers come aboard the Fortunate to upgrade its defenses.
This forces Ryan and another crewman named Shaw to take special precautions
to hide their secret: they have a Nausicaan prisoner on board whom they
are torturing for information. Later, a proud Mayweather gives Ryan a tour
of the impressive new Enterprise. They bond as fellow "boomers" who both
grew up on freighters, but Ryan proves to be disdainful toward Mayweather
for having left his parents' cargo ship to join Starfleet. Meanwhile on
the Fortunate, suspicious activity leads T'Pol to run scans and detect the
bio-signs of an injured Nausicaan. Informed of this discovery, Archer confronts
Ryan, who confesses they indeed are keeping a prisoner and argues they have
every right to. Archer concurs, but counters that he also has a right to
remove the improvements made on the freighter. Ryan appears to relent and
let Archer and his team see the prisoner, but as he leads them into a cargo
module, it proves to be double-cross Ryan and Shaw trap them in the compartment
with a breach in its hull, and detach it from the freighter. The Fortunate
then fires upon Enterprise and jumps to warp, escaping while Enterprise
rescues the trapped crewmen. Commander Tucker sets out to the repair the
damaged long-range sensors so Enterprise can track the renegade freighter,
which they figure is after revenge against the Nausicaans. Mayweather approaches
Archer and asks him to consider that maybe they should stay out of Ryan's
way. But Archer argues that human beings have a code of behavior whether
they're Starfleet officers or "space boomers," and Mayweather agrees. On
the Fortunate, Ryan succeeds in beating the information he wants out of
his prisoner, namely the shield frequency codes for the Nausicaan raider
ships. They find the ship that attacked them and chase it to an asteroid
where two other Nausicaan vessels are off-loading cargo to a docking station.
Ryan orders an apprehensive Shaw to fire weapons, but their plasma bursts
fail to penetrate the Nausicaan shields. A counterattack disables their
engines and ability to escape, so the crew prepares to fight the Nausicaans
face-to-face as they board the freighter to retrieve the captive. Meanwhile
Enterprise has detected the Fortunate's weapons fire and sets course to
intercept. As an intense firefight ensues on the Fortunate, Archer hails
one of the Nausicaan captains to negotiate a peaceful solution, letting
the freighter go in exchange for the hostage. Faced with the superior firepower
of the NX-Class Enterprise, the Nausicaan captain agrees to let Archer deliver
the prisoner, but he must be quick or he'll "take his chances" with an assault
on both ships. Archer contacts Ryan and implores him to listen to reason.
Ryan stubbornly refuses to give up his hostage, but then Mayweather speaks
up and chastises Ryan for putting all freighter crews at risk to satisfy
his thirst for revenge. When the Nausicaan ships start firing, Ryan finally
gives in and releases the hostage to the boarding party, and the Nausicaan
ships retreat. Ryan is later stripped of his rank by Captain Keene, and
Keene confesses to Archer that it'll be hard for freighter crews to get
used to seeing the space they've been traveling for three generations get
a lot more crowded. |
