Captain Jean-Luc Picard of the USS Stargazer accepts a dangerous mission only to learn that he has been lured into a deadly trap. A young Captain Picard is secretly dispatched to an orbital city in a disputed part of space. His mission: to recover an alien turncoat who could potentially upset the balance of power in an entire sector. When an explosion wrecks Picard's plan to beam the alien aboard the Stargazer, the captain finds himself pitted against both cold-blooded Cardassians and city authorities. Embroiled in a life-or-death struggle to find his alien ward, Picard's only ally is a mysterious woman named Guinan.