The Augments

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Star Trek: Enterprise episode
"The Augments"
Soong finds himself siding with Archer against the Augments.
Episode no.	82
Prod. code	406
Airdate	November 12, 2004
Writer(s)	Michael Sussman
Director	LeVar Burton
Guest star(s)	Brent Spiner Alec Newman Abby Brammell Richard Riehle Mark Rolston
Year	May 27, 2154
Episode chronology
Previous	"Cold Station 12"
Next	"The Forge"

"The Augments" is the name of the 82nd episode from the television series Star Trek: Enterprise. It is the sixth episode from the fourth season of the series. "The Augments" initially aired on November 12, 2004, on the American television network UPN.

"The Augments" is the third part of a three episode story arc involving the return of Brent Spiner (Data from Star Trek: The Next Generation) as the criminal mastermind Dr. Arik Soong, an ancestor of Noonien Soong, the scientist who created Data.

[edit] Plot summary

Note: This episode is part of a three episode arc involving the "Augments". To follow the full plot, see the other two episodes of the arc, "Borderland" and "Cold Station 12".

Dr Soong talks of taking the Augments to an area flooded with radiation from supernova remnants, he refers to it as the "Briar Patch", possibly the same "Briar Patch" in the movie Star Trek: Insurrection. Dr Soong doesn't seem to know the special properties, just that there are several habitable planets and it would be difficult to find them within the clouds of radiation. This would run the risk of making the Augments even faster, more intelligent, and ageless.

After the Augments turn on Soong, Soong escapes to help the Enterprise crew with the help of Persis. The Enterprise crew tries to stop the Augments and T'Pol confronts Trip. Malik stabs Persis for helping Soong escape and continues with his plan to attack a Klingon colony planet. Malik's scans of the colony reveal three population centers which he plans to attack with a torpedo armed with bio-weapons stolen from Cold Station 12.

Enterprise manages to destroy the torpedo seconds after it was launched and proceeds to disable the Klingon bird of prey after Soong tells Archer where the stolen bird of prey is most vulnerable. Malik prefers to die rather than be captured and proceeds to overload the dilithium matrix and the bird of prey explodes. Malik however manages to transport himself onto the Enterprise unnoticed and attacks Archer and a guard in an attempt to kill Soong for betraying the Augments but Archer manages to kill Malik. Soong is taken to the brig and told that none of his work during his time in prison has been destroyed and is stored in a secure location for potential future use. Soong doubts that will ever happen.

Soong begins to ponder artificial lifeforms given that he now believes humanity cannot be perfected, as he told Archer, and begins work on what presumably becomes Data in Star Trek series further in the future.

[edit] Trivia

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The article could be improved by integrating relevant items and removing inappropriate ones.

References are made to the Botany Bay and Khan Noonien Singh, which, in the timeline of the Star Trek universe, would later be encountered by Captain Kirk and the crew of the USS Enterprise NCC-1701 in the Star Trek episode, Space Seed.
Possibly as a nod to the events in the earlier film, the final moments of the stolen Klingon Bird of Prey mirror those of the USS Reliant in Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan, although, unlike Khan, Malik would escape the destruction of his stolen vessel (presumeably via transporter).