Star Trek: The Original Series
Season 4 Episode 1
Disclaimer: I do not own Star Trek.
Voiceover: Space, the final frontier. These are the voyages of the Starship Enterprise, and its five year mission, to explore strange new worlds, to seek out new life and new civilizations, to boldly go where no man has gone before.
Captain Kirk sat in his usual chair in the middle of the bridge, wearing his yellow and black Starfleet Captain's uniform. Sulu and Chekhov were navigating, Uhura was at communications, and Spock in his blue science officer's uniform was at his station.
The Enterprise crew were approaching an unknown planet at Warp 6. Although ordinarily, both Kirk and Spock would have beamed down, it was decided that Spock should stay on the ship in case of some emergency. Scotty was not sufficiently trained to manage the ship if there was a crisis situation. Thus the landing party that beamed down consisted of Captain Kirk, Sulu, Chekhov, Uhura and Yeoman Barrows.
The unknown planet was beautiful, yet seemed to be made up only of forest, grass, animals, birds and insects. Some of the animals and birds were sleeping. Others wandered around or flew about or ate leaves and grass. The fruits on the trees were most unusual, unlike any the landing party had encountered on Earth. Captain Kirk sent Sulu and Chekhov in one direction while he stayed with the women. Neither landing party met anyone.
Chekhov eyed the fruit. He pulled down a white one, washed it in a nearby stream and bit into it. It was delicious. He threw the stone away. Sulu hesitated, and then devoured a violet fruit. He also discarded the stone. Sulu and Chekhov filled their pockets with the fruit. Uhura meanwhile asked the Captain's permission to take some of the fruit to the Enterprise. Kirk gave his consent but cautioned her against eating it until Dr McCoy had checked the fruit was safe.
The landing party beamed up to the ship and were checked over by Dr McCoy who could find nothing wrong either with them or the fruit. However an odd thing happened after the landing party had resumed their stations. Chekhov began falling asleep on duty. No matter how hard he tried to stay awake, he couldn't. Kirk eventually sent him to his quarters to have a rest. Chekhov staggered to his bed, and fell asleep immediately. Everyone else seemed fine.
Sulu then discovered something odd, no matter how much he tried to go to sleep, he couldn't. His eyes simply refused to close. Worried, he visited Dr McCoy in his cabin, complaining of insomnia. Dr McCoy took Sulu to sickbay and initially tried to give him sleeping pills but they didn't work. A frustrated Sulu got up and paced up and down. He could still sit and lie down in bed but he just wasn't falling asleep. He counted 1 to 100 forwards and then backwards but felt nothing other than boredom. Finally, the doctor left Sulu lying awake in sickbay and returned to his cabin. Not wanting to wake the Captain, he decided to tell him about Sulu in the morning.
Dr McCoy looked in on Chekhov on the way to his cabin but he was fast asleep. The doctor turned in himself. A sleep deprived doctor would be of no use to the crew in the morning. The following day, Dr McCoy told Jim of Sulu' s sleep deprivation and Jim immediately declared Sulu off duty and confined to sickbay until further notice. Jim himself had slept well to his knowledge as had everyone else. Jim had two of the planet's fruits during the day but suffered neither sleepiness nor sleep deprivation. Chekhov was also off duty due to his sleepiness the day before. However, when the doctor checked on him to find him still in a deep sleep, he immediately rushed Chekhov to sickbay.
Dr McCoy suspected the fruit was to blame but couldn't find anything wrong with it and was puzzled that the fruit had no effect on Captain Kirk. The Captain had the ship hovering above the planet anyway for two reasons. First both Sulu and Chekhov were confined to sickbay and second, if whatever was wrong with them involved beaming down to the planet once more he needed to keep that possibility open. He alerted Starfleet who immediately agreed with his decision.
Chekhov seemed fine other than his prolonged sleep but Dr McCoy was forced to nourish him through medical tubes for fear he would starve or dehydrate if not. Sulu was also a cause for concern as prolonged insomnia could cause all manner of medical issues but nobody could think of a way to help him other than give him all the books and audio tapes from the library to keep him entertained in sickbay. Spock consulted the ship's computer and discovered that the planet they were currently orbiting was called Somnum which was Latin for sleep. He deduced correctly that the fruit had side effects connected to sleep but though he considered the logical possibility that some humans like the captain could be immune to its effects, he nevertheless asked the captain's permission to spend a night in his quarters and observe him as he slept just to make sure.
Kirk willingly agreed to this. The following morning, Spock reported that he had observed Kirk sleepwalking round the deck but had seen no other side effects. Kirk was surprised yet grateful that he had to endure nothing worse. The Captain and the Vulcan reported this to Dr McCoy who groaned in frustration. Kirk had kept the fruit locked up and nobody else had dared eat it but the sample sent to the labs had not turned up anything new at all. Spock suggested that since the humans could make no sense of it the logical solution was to have the ship's computer run a scan on the fruit. Kirk and McCoy agreed. The ship's computer ran a scan on the fruit, providing the doctor with useful information.
Dr McCoy then scanned the brains of Sulu, Chekhov and Jim to find heightened activity in the sleep centres. McCoy painstakingly worked on an antidote. While Sulu and Chekhov were confined to sickbay,the captain was allowed to perform his usual duties on condition that he had a crew member stay in his quarters at night to make sure he did not come to harm while sleepwalking. Eventually the antidote was perfected. Chekhov immediately awakened. He had a headache from prolonged sleep but Dr McCoy's medication helped to ease it. His sleeping pills also helped Sulu get some sleep. Dr McCoy however did warn the captain that he was now susceptible to sleepwalking and thus it could recur at any point in his life and must be handled in the usual way the same as with any other sleepwalker. Spock beamed down to the planet briefly to return all the fruit to the planet though he successfully resisted the temptation to eat any, using his usual Vulcan technique. Upon Spock's return the Captain ordered full warp ahead.
The End.