The Child

Dr Crusher has left to head Starfleet Medical, and her replacement, Dr Katherine Pulaski, joins the Enterprise as it prepares to carry dangerous plague specimens. Meanwhile a glowing life form slips aboard and enters Troi as she sleeps. She wakes to find herself pregnant, and the pregnancy advances at incredible speed. Despite Worf's view that it should be ended, Troi resolves to have the baby, a boy she names Ian Andrew. Within days he has grown into an eight-year-old. Then the plague samples begin to multiply, threatening the whole ship, and the cause is traced to radiation coming from Ian himself. Realising he is putting everyone in danger, Ian lets himself die and returns to his original form, a being of light, explaining to his grieving mother that he only wanted to experience human life. Wesley, who had planned to join his mother, decides to stay aboard, helped by a talk with the ship's new hostess, Guinan.