In the 23rd Century…
Not every captain is James T. Kirk, and not every ship is the USS Enterprise. In this six-story mini-series, Mike Harper and the crew of the freighter the SS Clydesdale just want to move some cargo, stay on Starfleet's good side, and, if they're very lucky, not get killed in the process.
In exchange for repairs to the SS Clydesdale, Mike Harper agrees to transport a passenger, but said passenger’s choice of destination is a spatial anomaly that sane captains won’t go near. Why can’t people just pick Risa instead?
The Clydesdale needs to go to Antares, but it needs a full cargo hold to make the trip worth it. Meanwhile, Dr. Corbair finds that obtaining something as simple as a working tricorder is really difficult when you’re not in Starfleet.
Sending out an entire starship to deal with an overloaded freighter seems like overkill, but maybe there’s a bit more going on than the Starfleet equivalent of a traffic stop.
Colony supply runs are about as nice and easy as it gets…most of the time.
There are reasons why Starfleet, rather than the crew of a freighter, should be handling first contacts.
Sending a barely-armed freighter to go check in on Khan Noonian Singh and his followers probably wasn’t one of Starfleet’s best ideas, but this trip is going wrong in ways they never could have imagined.