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Takes place in: 2294 (Main story), five months after the start of Star Trek Generations
Takes place in: 2270 or 2271, 2278, 2282, 2285, 2286 (Past sequences)
The USS Enterprise NCC-1701-B receives a signal from a distress beacon originating from Askalon V. Upon arriving at the planet, a landing party consisting of Captain John Harriman, Ensign Demora Sulu, and several others, transported to the planet's surface. The landing party locates the distress beacon but they were neither able to determine how it got there nor gather any useful information from it. Ensign Sulu had got separated from the landing party, and then she suddenly reappears and, having gone berserk, she attacks the crew. Captain Harriman was forced to shoot Demora with his phaser, fatally wounding her.
Sulu and Chekov had taken a vacation on the desert planet of Demora. Sulu was taking a walk in the streets when an Asian woman bumped into him, having been chased by three men. The Asian woman excused herself and escapes, and Sulu fights the three men, hoping to stop them from chasing her. He gets himself knocked out and taken for questioning by the three men, led by an individual named Taine. After Sulu pisses them off, the men were about to kill Sulu when the Asian woman, refered by the men as Ling Sui, suddenly appears, frees Sulu, and escapes with him. Ling Sui explains that the men were after a device in her possession, and when she was about to trade the device to another contact, Taine and his men attack and kill her contact.
Ling Sui and Sulu escape from Taine and his men during a high speed chase with shuttles and stratopods, and they end up walking in the desert. They spend the night in an oasis, and in the morning, Sulu finds that Ling Sui had disappeared.
Back in the present (2294), Sulu, Chekov and Uhura attend Demora's funeral. Harriman offers his condolences to Sulu, but Chekov is angry at Harriman for having lost Ensign Demora, especially since Captain Kirk was also lost on his ship. Harriman then rebukes Chekov, saying that Chekov was only a commander and probably will never become a captain. This leads Chekov to punch Harriman twice, forcing the people present to separate them apart.
Harriman's father, Admiral John Harriman Sr., arrives and offers his support to his son. Sulu asks for the status into the investigation into his daughter's death, and was told that Askalon V had been placed under quarantine, and that it would probably be eight to nine months before a quarantine team could be available to arrive at Askalon V to conduct the investigation. This leads Sulu to hold off his current assignment and order the Excelsior to go to Askalon V straight away so that he could find out for himself exactly why his daughter had died.
The story now goes into a series of flashback which shows how Sulu first meet Ling Sui's daugher, Demora, and her growing up. Ling Sui, also known as Susan Ling, had died of Sakuro's disease and left instructions to hand the seven-year-old Demora over to Sulu, since she is his daughter. Sulu was about to take up the offer of First Officer aboard the USS Bozeman, but then he decides to stay on Earth to take care of Demora, so he offers his apologies to Captain Morgan Batesman of the Bozeman, and takes up a teaching position at Starfleet Academy. The rest of the flashbacks shows Demora visiting Starfleet Academy and running into trouble, her reactions when Sulu helps Kirk steal the USS Enterprise to retreive Spock from the Genesis Planet, and when the crew safely return to Earth and were exonerated for their crimes as they had saved the planet.
Chekov receives a reprimand for attacking Captain Harriman, pleading temporary insanity. Sulu sends a message to both Chekov and Uhura that he was about to violate Starfleet's orders so as to find out for himself the reasons for his daughter's death.
The Excelsior answers a distress call while on its way to Askalon V, and Starfleet warns Sulu not to approach Askalon V. Sulu ignores his orders and the Excelsior continues on its way to Askalon V. Admiral Harriman orders the Enterprise-B to pursue the Excelsior.
Arriving at Askalon V, Sulu lands on the planet in a shuttlecraft and he walks around looking for clues. Sulu falls into a cavern, and he is woken up by Taine, the very same people who attacked him on the planet Demora years ago. Sulu finds out that Demora is still alive. Taine had captured Demora and tested her on an alien cloning chamber, which they had discovered on the planet and had offered its technology to the Tholians. It was a clone of Demora which attacked Harriman and was killed, not the real Demora. Taine then says that he thinks Demora is his daughter, and had purposely drawn her to this planet.
The Enterprise-B arrives at Askalon V and orders the Excelsior to locate Sulu and retreive him. The Excelsior refuses to comply. Enterprise-B, under the orders of Admiral Harriman, fires an unarmed photon torpedo at the Excelsior. And when Admiral Harriman orders phaser fire on the Excelsior, Captain Harriman relieves Admiral Harriman of command, and offers to assist the Excelsior.
Meanwhile on the planet, Sulu creates a distraction by crashing the shuttlecraft into the cavern. He rescues Demora, and in the ensuing fight, Taine and his men were killed. The other clones of Demora, and Taine and his men emerge from the cloning chambers and savagely attack each other and they were about to attack Sulu and Demora when another shuttlecraft arrives, and Captain Harriman rescues the both of them.
Admiral Harriman threatens his son with a court-martial, before Captain Harriman counters him by suggesting that Admiral Harriman had just overseen a rescue mission, aided by Captain Sulu, and the mission not only recovered a crew woman who was previously believed to be dead, but also uncovered the illegal use of alien cloning technology which the Tholians may be planning to use. Captain Harriman continues to dare the Admiral to say that he was about to fire on another Starfleet vessel, abandon both Sulu and Demora, and possibly allow the cloning technology fall into the Tholians' hands. But the Admiral declines to do so, for the good of the fleet, and also to make his son look good.
Both Sulu and Demora come away from this incident with a greater understanding of each other.
. Ling Sui, Taine and his men were independent explorers who took what items they could find and selling them to the highest bidder. The device in possession by Ling Sui contained key information about the cloning technology, and she was trying to cut Taine out by selling it to the highest bidder. Eventually, Taine located Ling Sui again, and they worked together for a while before separating again with no hard feelings.
. According to Taine, the cloning chambers on Askalon V were created by a warlike, conquest-minded race who were an offshot from the people who had created the amusement park planet, which Kirk and Sulu had visited in TOS "Shore Leave". The cloning chambers were designed to create clones of soldiers and workers, and there is no need to wait for the clones to naturally develop into full size as the growth of the clones is greatly accelerated. However the clones were savage and had no restraint, which might have led to the downfall of the race.
. The Captain's Daughter is set in 2294. It is mentioned that Scotty was on his way to the Norpin Colony onboard the USS Jenolen, and the Jenolen was lost in 2294.
. Demora Sulu is assumed to be 22 years old at the start of Star Trek Generations (2293). This places Chekov and Sulu's visit to Demora in 2270 or 2271, and 2271 would be Demora Sulu's birth year.
. The USS Bozeman disappeared into a temporal causality loop in 2278 and was only freed by the USS Enterprise-D in 2368. Sulu was initially supposed to assume the position as First Officer of the Bozeman before he discovered he had a seven-year-old daughter, which would place the date of his posting in 2278, before the Bozemen was lost.
. Demora Sulu meets Kirk, Saavik, Peter Preston, and Boothby at Starfleet Academy.
. During the 2286 sequence, Demora Sulu's visit to Starfleet Academy was said to have happened four years ago, which places the visit in 2282.
. There is no mention of Chekov being the First Officer of the USS Excelsior, since the books (War Dragons, The Last Roundup, et al.) which make such reference were published after The Captain's Daughter.
The Ashes of Eden
The Return
Avenger
Spectre
Dark Victory
Preserver
Captain's Peril
Captain's Blood
Captain's Glory
Ex Machina
The Fearful Summons
The Last Roundup
War Dragons
The Captain's Daughter
The Sundered
Dark Mirror
Crossover
Ship of the Line
Dark Passions, Book 1
Dark Passions, Book 2
Vulcan's Soul, Book 1 - Exodus