Star Trek: Discovery (2017) s01e02 Episode Script

Battle at the Binary Stars

1 - This is mutiny.
- Move, Saru.
We're locked on.
Fire! GEORGIOU: Belay that order! Captain, please.
I'm trying to save you.
I'm trying to save all of you.
Stand down.
Captain! Incoming! Warp signatures detected.
GEORGIOU: Ambassador Sarek, it's good to see you again.
Thank you for receiving us, Captain Georgiou.
The pleasure is ours.
As discussed, this is my ward, - Michael Burnham.
- Hello, Michael.
Welcome to the USS Shenzhou.
And congratulations on your recent commencement.
Respect is earned, as is friendliness.
Yet diplomatic niceties must be observed.
This is hardly a negotiation.
First contact, then.
The only human to attend the Vulcan Learning Center and Science Academy rejoins her own kind.
You can see my analogy, more or less.
Less.
I will leave you now.
Live long and prosper.
Behave.
Energizing.
On Vulcan, lateral vector transporter technology has been discarded due to the massive amount of power it requires.
Starfleet has phased out that design as well.
Shenzhou is old, but she gets us where we need to go.
MAN (OVER P.
A.
): Attention, all personnel, stand by Is this vessel not up to your standards? I have no standards when it comes to this ship.
It was always my intention to join the Vulcan Expeditionary Group.
Sometimes the universe allows for the making of unexpected memories.
Emotional platitudes are not what I was hoping for.
Well, you've really been away from humans for a long time.
WOMAN (OVER P.
A.
): Dr.
Nambue.
I'd say you're too confident for your own good, but I've seen your record.
As I have seen yours.
And your confidence is justified.
As is yours.
Ready to see your new home? (DIGITAL BEEPING, INDISTINCT CONVERSATIONS) MAN: Captain on the bridge.
Not too shabby, huh? It appears to be functional.
GEORGIOU: I understand your hesitation, Michael.
It's hard leaving Vulcan and everything you've known behind.
But I assure you, this can be your new home, if you want it to be.
Thank you Captain.
(ALERT SOUNDING) How many Klingon vessels have entered the system? Tracking.
24, Captain.
The Klingon High Council consists of 24 houses.
That can't be a coincidence.
The number of ships it suggests that someone is attempting to unify the Empire again.
Against us.
Commander Burnham, you have endangered your vessel and your shipmates.
You have attacked a superior officer.
You violated the chain of command.
You are relieved of duty.
Security, remand her to the brig.
MAN: Yes, Captain.
(ORIGINAL STAR TREK THEME PLAYS) (MALE SPEAKING KLINGON) (KLINGON CHILDREN CHANTING) (KLINGON CHILDREN CHANTING) (GRUNTING) CONNOR: Starships Clarke, Shran, T'Plana Hath, Kerala, Sue, Ride, Earhart, Dana, Edison, and Yeager have dropped out of warp.
Where is the admiral? The Europa is still 800 AUs out.
Captain, the Klingons are no longer jamming ship communications.
Januzzi, open a channel.
Aye, Captain.
Unidentified Klingon vessel, this is Captain Philippa Georgiou of the USS Shenzhou.
We are on the outermost borders of Federation space, but make no mistake you and your artifact are in our territory.
We regret the situation has resulted in the death of your warrior.
We offer you two choices.
Leave immediately or open a dialogue with us.
Hopefully, it is the latter, so that we can reengage with the Klingon Empire and prove to you that now, as always we come in peace.
we come in peace.
Battle stations.
(SCREAMING) OPS, damage report.
(SCREAMING) Ensign Connor? WEETON: Transferring ops to this station, Captain.
Direct hit.
Hull breaches, decks 13 through 15.
Emergency force fields in place, bulkheads holding.
Get her to sickbay.
- Secondary tactical off-line.
- Shields.
At maximum, Captain, and holding for now.
Helm, evasive maneuver seven-alpha.
Connor, can you make it to sickbay? Yes, Captain.
The USS T'Plana Hath is under heavy attack from three Klingon vessels.
Detmer, make your heading 219 mark 6.
Aye, Captain.
- Mr.
Gant? - Phasers armed and ready, Captain.
- Locking on target.
- Fire.
Computer, how badly have we been hit? You have been confined to the brig.
- Query denied.
- (DOOR WHOOSHES OPEN) Who's there? Where are the medical officers? Connor.
What happened? The bridge was hit.
Who else was hurt? Is-is the captain all right? She told me to go to sickbay.
B-But this isn't sickbay.
We're at war.
You should be on the bridge.
I can't help.
I'm locked up for mutiny.
Why are we fighting? We're Starfleet.
We're explorers, not soldiers.
Connor, you took a blow to the head.
Activate that comm panel and call Dr.
Nambue.
Yes, I I need help.
(SCREAMS) (SCREAMING IN DISTANCE) SAREK: Michael Michael.
Michael.
My mind to your mind.
My thoughts to your thoughts.
Come back to me.
(GASPS) COMPUTER: Major hull breach.
Major hull breach.
Deck one, deck three, deck six, deck seven, deck eight, deck nine.
Status.
Additional hull breaches, decks one, three, and six through nine.
The brig.
COMPUTER: Shield at 15%.
Diverting main power from compromised decks to the bridge.
Containment field failure is imminent.
All repair personnel evacuate immediately.
Sarek? How is it possible? A mind-meld across a thousand light-years? More than a mind-meld.
Ever since you were a child, ever since the bombing at the Learning Center that act of terror that forever changed your destiny part of me, my katra, has been with you.
It also allows us this unique form of connection.
I see by your imprisonment that my counsel concerning the Klingons did not yield the results you hoped for.
I couldn't convince Captain Georgiou to strike the Klingons first, so I took matters into my own hands.
You're disappointed.
As you should be.
I did not come here to judge your actions.
I came because I sensed your your despair.
What's wrong? Communicating with you in this manner, the physical cost is significant.
Then leave me.
Please.
Do you think I came here just to say farewell? I would not put my well-being at risk for such sentimentality.
The death and destruction raining down on Starfleet, that was to be expected.
What I cannot abide is a waste of resources.
You're gifted.
You are brave.
You must do better.
Because I know you can.
You were never one to bolster my self-esteem.
Perhaps that is where I failed you.
No matter your shame, gather your strength.
Find a way to help those who need you.
Live long and prosper.
Incoming warship on attack vector.
They've locked on to us.
Divert all power from nonessential systems to aft shields.
(INDISTINCT CHATTER) (ALARM BLARING) OPS.
Yes, Captain.
Emergency force field is holding.
But shields and impulse engines are off-line.
We are completely disabled.
They're still coming.
Right behind us.
Weapons hot.
The Klingon warship peeled off.
Why didn't they finish us? SARU: They don't need to.
- Captain - (ALARM TRILLING) We're being sucked into the binary stars' debris ring.
This gravitational field is pulling us in.
Fire reverse thrusters.
They're not responding, Captain! SARU: Shields are still offline.
We are bracing for impact.
All hands, this is the captain.
Prepare to evacuate.
(LOUD CRASH) SARU: Incoming transmission from the Europa.
JANUZZI: Systems are getting back on line.
GEORGI Thank you for the assist with that tractor beam, Admiral.
What the hell happened, Philippa? We hailed.
They fired.
The Shenzhou, Clarke, and Yeager are down on our side.
We've sustained heavy casualties.
From the looks of it, so have they.
Maybe they're ready to come to the table.
Open a channel to the Klingon flagship.
Attention, Klingon leader.
I am Admiral Brett Anderson.
I speak with the authority of the entire Federation when I propose a cease-fire so that we might resolve this conflict with no further bloodshed.
T'KUVMA: Admiral, I am T'Kuvma.
I am pleased you are here.
We have been waiting for someone worthy of our attention.
Your offer of a cease-fire is accepted.
Good.
Because, if we're fighting, we're not talking.
Prepare to receive my envoy.
We'll get ready for your arrival.
Let's end this so we can get (STATIC CRACKLING) (DISTORTED): What was that? - The Europa has disengaged.
- What's going on? I can't explain it, Captain.
There's an unknown energy source disrupting our scanners.
Get me visuals.
(INDISTINCT CHATTER OVER COMMS) SARU: Captain, - I'm detecting a voluntary antimatter containment breach on the Europa.
They're going to self-destruct.
SARU: Shields up to 47%.
(T'KUVMA IN KLINGON) Captain, the Klingon vessels are warping out of the system.
All but one.
- (BEEPING) - The Klingon flagship is hailing.
They're broadcasting on all open subspace bands.
Members of the Federation.
What you call your most remote borders, I call too close to Klingon territory.
You only live now to serve as witnesses of Klingon supremacy, to be my herald.
We do not desire to know you.
But you will know our great houses, standing as one under Kahless, reborn in me, T'Kuvma! Computer, implement steps of brig emergency evacuation protocol.
COMPUTER: Denied.
Ethical protocol state prisoner evacuation to occur in life-saving circumstances only.
This is a life-saving circumstance.
I'm going to die in here unless you let me out.
Speculation.
Request to engage ethical protocols denied.
How long before my cell's containment field fails? Approximately eight minutes.
At which point I will die.
Confirm? Confirmed.
Is the corridor outside the brig undamaged and still pressurized? Affirmative.
Then getting from my cell, through the blast door, and into the corridor ensures my survival.
Negative.
Exposure to the vacuum of space for over 15 seconds would result in respiratory distress, shock and suffocation before you are able to reach blast door.
But if you open a meter-sized hole in the containment field, the rapid depressurization will shoot me through to the blast door in less than six seconds.
Affirmative.
But you will be unable to open the door in your inhibited physical state.
Then, ethically, you should open the door for me.
Working.
Request confirmed.
Ethical protocols engaged.
Chance for survival estimated at 43%.
I'll take it.
Depressurization commencing now.
"All warfare is based on deception.
When you are able to attack, you must seem unable.
" Sun Tzu.
I recognize the quote.
But I fear we are deceiving no one.
We are most definitely unable to attack.
We have no weapons, no warp, no countermove at all.
The Klingons have us.
We have photon torpedoes.
Now, we can't fire them, but we can load the warheads onto a transport, one small enough to evade their primary sensors.
Upon impact, we can deliver a kill shot directly into their hull.
Devious, Saru.
I approve.
We'll use a worker bee to carry the torpedo.
They're small enough to be mistaken for debris.
Be ready in ten minutes.
I will also run an analysis to determine blast sites for optimum damage.
Make it hurt, Saru.
Oh, there is one problem, Captain.
Our worker bees have no autopilot.
And our transporter can't penetrate their shields.
We won't need it.
I'll be driving.
Captain, that's a suicide mission.
Your priority is getting impulse engines back online so that you can get the Shenzhou out of here before I detonate the warheads.
T'Kuvma lured Starfleet to a massacre.
It's time I repaid him.
BURNHAM: Captain, you can't do that.
T'Kuvma has anointed himself the next Klingon messiah.
If you kill him, you make him a martyr.
Someone they can fight for endlessly.
That might even be what he wants.
But if you capture him, you make him a symbol of defeat.
Of shame.
And if you take him as a prisoner of war, you give the Federation leverage to sue for peace.
How could you have done this? I believed it was the only way to avoid a full-scale war.
When you first came aboard, seven years ago, I worried your Vulcan training might some day trump your humanity.
Do you know why Sarek asked me to take you on? I was a human who had seen a life of loss but still chose hope.
What an ego I had thinking I could pick away the shell the Vulcans put around you.
I was so sure I could do it.
Even convinced that you were ready for the captain's chair.
To think I knew you so little.
You want to know how I turned on you? I believed saving you and the crew was more important than Starfleet's principles.
Was it logical? Emotional? I don't know.
Let me deliver the warheads in your place.
(WHOOSHING) BURNHAM: They're gathering their dead.
- Saru, forget the worker bee.
- SARU: Captain? Spool up the transporters now, and have engineering meet us there with a torpedo warhead.
I know how we take him.
(T'KUVMA IN KLINGON) SARU: Tactical advises that they have coordinates on a slain Klingon officer.
MAN: Sensors confirm loss of environment No weapons activity on the Klingon ship.
They're drifting.
Their shields are down.
I'll beam you to an area with minimal Klingon life signs.
Let's go get our prisoner.
Energize.
(ALARM BLARING) This is the aft section of the bridge.
T'Kuvma must be close.
(KLINGON CRYING OUT IN DISTANCE) (VOQ SHOUTS) (BOTH GRUNTING) (SCREAMS) (GRUNTING) (GRUNTING) (VOQ CRIES OUT) (T'KUVMA SHOUTS) (BOTH GRUNTING) (SCREAMS) (GASPS) (SCREAMS) (GROANING) SARU: Burnham, I've lost the captain's life sign.
Burnham? Burnham? Get us out of here now.
I can't transport her without a life sign.
(KLINGON GRUNTS) I'm not leaving without her body.
- More Klingons are coming.
- (VOICES APPROACHING) Burnham, if she's deceased and you're in danger, I have no choice.
No! (GROANING) (KLINGON CHILDREN'S VOICES ECHOING) (KLINGON CHILDREN'S VOICES ECHOING) (CHILDREN'S VOICES STOP) (CHILDREN'S VOICES STOP) MALE JUDGE: To the charge of dereliction of duty, to the charge of assaulting a fellow officer, to the charge of mutiny To all these charges, how do you plead? (SOFTLY): Guilty.
JUDGE: The accused cannot be heard.
Guilty on all counts.
Is there anything you would like to say in your defense before a sentence is rendered? From my youth on Vulcan, I was raised to believe that service was my purpose.
And I carried that conviction to Starfleet.
I dreamed of a day when I would command my own vessel and further the noble objectives of this great institution.
That dream is over the only ship I know in ruins.
My crew gone.
My captain my friend, I wanted to protect them from war, from the enemy.
And now we are at war and I am the enemy.
JUDGE: It is our ruling that the defendant, Commander Michael Burnham, be stripped of rank and hereby sentenced to imprisonment for life.

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