... And Grow And Grow

Star Trek 11-12
IDW Publishing
Mike Johnson, writer
Claudia Balboni, artist

We've talked before about how this title is presenting new movie-universe versions of familiar "Star Trek" TOS episodes and how the differences between the two timelines are growing, and these two issues offer no exception. Fan-favorite episode "The Trouble With Tribbles" gets remade here as "The Truth About Tribbles."

In the classic version, the Enterprise responds to a priority distress call, rushing quickly to Deep Space Station K-7. Once there, they are "ordered" to guard grain samples from possible Klingon saboteurs. Lt. Uhura acquires a single tribble while taking part in shore leave on the station, and the tribbles' natural tendency to reproduce at an alarming rate threatens to bring disaster to the station and the startship, but the furry little creatures also expose a Klingon spy.

In this new version of events, there is no space station. Instead, the Enterprise is ordered to explore the Iota Germinorum system, and finds a Klingon bird of prey there, well outside normal Klingon space, a treaty violation. Before warping away, the Klingons deliver a garbled message about "dire threats" and "executions." The Enterprise crew beams down to the fourth planet in the system, apparently the home planet of the tribbles, which are a new species to the Federation members. All of them anyway, except one, which offers a nice nod back to events from J.J. Abrams' 2009 Trek reboot film.

Upon beaming down to Iota Germinorum IV, the crew finds the tribbles, their natural predators and a number of Klingon bombs. Kirk assigns Scotty and Chekov to disarm the bombs when the tribbles' aforementioned rapid reproduction starts to threaten the away team. To add to the crew's troubles, they soon learn that tribbles are also threatening to overrun the population back on Earth. It quickly becomes a race against breeding to save both planets.

Fun stuff!