Admiral Reeger takes command of the Enterprise and orders a planet destroyed, forcing Kirk to stop him while uncovering the truth about George Kirk's battle.
While Pike leads an away team into a cave system to answer an SOS, Admiral Simon Reeger, a decorated Klingon War veteran played by Joe Morton, takes command of the Enterprise to hunt a cloaked ship tied to the Vardan Massacre, which killed his wife and daughters. Kirk becomes his acting first officer. When Reeger tracks the ship to Argus II, a non-Federation world of about 5,000 people, he declares them collaborators and orders the planet destroyed.
Kirk refuses and is removed from his post, then learns that Reeger was given a desk job to keep his wartime instincts away from command, and that he has a complicated history with George Kirk. To stop him, Kirk secretly doses Reeger with cordrazine, giving M'Benga grounds to declare him unfit, and M'Benga takes the blame. Uhura frees the away team from Andorian smugglers and is promoted to lieutenant junior grade, while a shaken A'Sha leaves Starfleet.