Stardate 1943.7: The Enterprise is in the non-aligned Majalan system when the ship receives a distress call from a shuttle that is being attacked by a cruiser. After the Enterprise has returned fire with minimum power, the cruiser is badly damaged and crashes on a moon. Three Majalan people are rescued from the shuttle: Alora, whom Pike already met when he visited the system ten years ago, a boy called the First Servant and his father Gamal. Pike agrees to ferry them to safety to their planet where the First Servant's ascension to the throne is to take place. Alora says that the attackers were aliens from a nearby colony. In sickbay, it turns out that the boy has a quantum bio implant that tremendously enhances his brain functions. The Majalans generally have very advanced medical technology and have eradicated any form of disease. Dr. M'Benga asks whether they would be able to cure a "hypothetical" patient with mast cell cygnokemia, by which he refers to his daughter. They could, but would only help her if she was one of them. Spock retrieves a device from the crashed and abandoned attacker ship that he suspects is a neural dampener, but Gamal doesn't want to confirm it. The landing party also recovers a coin that Alora identifies as an oath coin of the First Servant's guards. She suspects that one of them is a traitor. Pike accompanies Alora to Majalis, which consists of islands floating in the sky above a surface of lava. When she notices that one of the guards, Kier, repaired his coin, he attacks her and runs away. Alora, Pike and the other guards finally surround him. Alora asks him why he betrayed his people, but he grabs and attempts to kill her, upon which she stabs him with a knife. On the Enterprise, Uhura decodes data carriers that La'an took from the crashed ship and finds out that the alien attackers are descendants of the Majalans and for some reason left their planet to settle on a barren world. Gamal and the First Servant suddenly decide to leave and demand to be beamed down to Majalis. But someone else transports them away, apparently to another alien cruiser. Gamal is beamed back briefly after, and the ship prepares to go to warp. Pike orders the tractor beam to be engaged but the ship attempts to go to warp anyway. The strain on its hull being too strong, the cruiser finally breaks apart, apparently killing the boy too. But Spock, who previously talked with the boy about his scientific endeavors, receives a signal on a subspace frequency that they talked about. He was not actually beamed over to the other ship but hides in a cargo crate. Uhura investigates how someone could lock a transporter on someone on the Enterprise and discovers that Gamal recorded the First Servant's and his own biopatterns, which would facilitate just this. His plan was to save his son from a life that consists of being hooked up to a computer without ever growing up, which is the actual duty and fate of the First Servant. For some reason, the ancestors of the Majalans came up with this way to control their world. Pike has already beamed down again to attend the ceremony, unaware of what would happen to the boy. When he tries to intervene, the guards knock him down. He wakes up in Alora's apartment and it is too late to still help the boy. Although she hopes he may want to stay and learn to understand the Majalan ways, Pike leaves immediately. On the Enterprise, Gamal gives M'Benga advice on how he can treat his "hypothetical" patient.

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