The transporter is a piece of Star Trek technology that has it has been responsible for more than one strange incident over the course of the franchise, including on occasion the creation of new life. The ability to transport from one location to another by converting matter to energy and then back to matter is something that those in the Star Trek universe seem to take for granted as safe. However, the franchise is littered with episodes whose main storylines revolve around a transporter accident of some kind.
The transporter is like the future equivalent of driving a car in more ways than one. It is something everybody in Star Trek uses on a daily basis, but because it is so ubiquitous, people sometimes forget how dangerous it can be. There have been numerous deaths in Star Trek associated with transporter accidents, and even more incidents where a transporter malfunction caused something else to go wrong. Time travel, crossing to another universe, and even incidents of people phasing out of their usual plane of existence have all been caused by a transporter malfunction.
Perhaps the most interesting malfunctions however have occurred when the transporter is responsible for creating an entirely new being. This is usually achieved either through duplication of a character into two separate people or by splicing two characters together. While this kind of thing has happened rarely, there have been 4 significant incidents of it in Star Trek history.
The first incident happened in Star Trek: The Original Series, in the season 1 episode "The Enemy Within." In the episode, a strange ore found by the Enterprise crew on the planet Alfa 177 affects the transporter circuits and causes them to malfunction, meaning that when Captain Kirk beams back to the ship, he is inadvertently split into two different people. The split occurs in such a way that Kirk is separated into the good and the bad sides of his personality; one Kirk is reasonable and compassionate, while the other is aggressive and violent. The evil Kirk proceeds to wreak havoc, attacking crew members and attempting to impersonate the good Kirk so that he can take control of the ship. The crew must find a way to stop him and attempt to repair the transporter so that they can beam the remaining away team back to the ship.
Like many Original Series episodes, "The Enemy Within" grapples with a moral question; in this case, the dichotomy of good and evil in an individual's personality. While the good Captain Kirk is a reasonable and fair man, he struggles throughout the episode with being assertive, slowly losing grip on his concentration and his ability to command the ship. Meanwhile, the evil Kirk declines in health and sanity, allowing fear and rage to take him over. The episode makes it clear that, while Kirk is repulsed by the darker sides of himself, he ultimately cannot live without them. In the end, the two Kirks are fused back together when the transporter is repaired, although not before evil Kirk makes an impassioned plea to be allowed to live separately from his better half.
Star Trek: The Next Generation contained many episodes whose plots hinged on transporter accidents. One of the best-remembered was the season 6 episode "Second Chances," where the crew of the Enterprise-D discovered a second version of Commander William Riker on a planet where he undertook a rescue mission eight years prior. While helping to evacuate a science outpost on Nervala IV, a transporter accident caused a copy of Riker to be left on the surface, while the real Riker beamed back to his ship. Because of a distortion field around Nervala IV, the surface was only accessible every eight years for a small window of time when the planet was close enough to its sun to disrupt the field. As a result, the copy of Riker was trapped on the planet for eight years until he was discovered and rescued by the Enterprise-D.
Unlike Kirk and his counterpart, the two versions of Riker are exactly the same, both possessing the same personality and even the same memories prior to their split. Also unlike Kirk, the two are never reintegrated with each other, and the copy is allowed to continue living as his own person. He decides to take on the name Thomas Riker and continue his career in Starfleet, and while he and Commander Riker start off on rocky footing, by the end of the episode the two are beginning to develop a relationship similar to that of siblings. Thomas Riker even appears a second time in the Star Trek franchise, in an episode of Star Trek: Deep Space Nine where he attempts to steal the USS Defiant in support of the Maquis cause.
In addition to splitting people apart, another common transporter accident is the splicing of two people together to create one new being. Tuvix is one such splice, created in Star Trek: Voyager in an eponymous season 1 episode. Beaming back from an away team mission with some alien orchids, Neelix and Lieutenant Tuvok are combined with some of the orchid DNA in the transporter beam. As a result, they return to the ship as one being who has the memories and personality traits of both of them. While Voyager's crew attempts to find out what happened with the transporter, as well as a way to split Neelix and Tuvok up again, the new being begins calling himself Tuvix and tries to integrate back into the rest of the crew, a feat the proves difficult for him and those around him.
When a solution for splitting Tuvix up is found, Captain Janeway is faced with a moral dilemma when Tuvix makes it clear that he doesn't want to die. Not unlike evil Kirk in "The Enemy Within," Tuvix makes the case that as a sentient being, he should be allowed to continue living and form his own life aboard Voyager. Captain Janeway struggles with the decision of what to do, before ultimately ordering Tuvix to undergo the procedure to bring Tuvok and Neelix back. Tuvix initially refuses, but after seeing that no one else on the crew will back his continued existence he sadly acquiesces. The procedure is successful, but Captain Janeway is left with her guilt at having essentially committed murder. The moral implications of Janeway's decision are something that Star Trek: Voyager fans still enjoy debating.
The season 5 Star Trek: Voyager episode "Drone" contains another instance of splicing, although in a more unique way than "Tuvix". Because of a transporter malfunction, nanoprobes from Seven of Nine are integrated into the holographic Doctor's mobile emitter when their patterns are briefly merged during transport. The emitter subsequently begins to sprout Borg technology and assimilates DNA from another member of the crew, Ensign Mulchaey, to create an entirely new Borg drone. Captain Janway is hesitant to kill the drone, even though it is highly advanced and could be dangerous because the Doctor's mobile emitter is 29th-century technology. At Janeway's request, Seven helps the drone learn about individuality and even choose a name: One.
One is curious about the Borg, but Seven and Janeway are hesitant to provide him with information in case he decides he wants to join them, which would give the Collective a huge tactical advantage and be highly dangerous. However, when One unwittingly sends a signal to the Borg, Voyager is put in a perilous position when a Borg sphere comes to assimilate One and the entire crew. Wanting to save Voyager's crew, One destroys the sphere but is critically injured in the process. When the Doctor and Seven attempt to help him, One refuses, stating that it is better if he dies so that his presence on Voyager does not put the crew in jeopardy again. One ultimately succumbs to his injuries, leaving Seven heartbroken. His death means that out of the four new life forms created by transporter accidents, Thomas Riker is the only one to survive past the end of an episode.
While there are only four examples of a completely new life being created by a transporter accident, transporter malfunction plays a significant role in numerous episodes and there are a few where the definition of "new life" could still apply. All take place in season 6 of Star Trek: The Next Generation, beginning with the episode "Realm of Fear" in which Lieutenant Barclay faces his fear of transporters and subsequently becomes convinced he is being attacked by a being living in the transporter beam. While "Realm of Fear" is not an instance of the transporter creating life, the episode does deal with microbes that are able to live inside the matter stream and is also an instance of humans becoming trapped there and needing to be saved by Barclay and the Enterprise crew.
The episode "Relics" is also not a direct instance of the transporter creating new life, but it does give a classic Star Trek character a new lease on life. While exploring a Dyson Sphere, the Enterprise-D discovers a ship, the USS Jenolan, crash-landed on the sphere's surface, with a single surviving crew member, Captain Montgomery Scott, trapped in the transporter's pattern buffer. Scotty is a popular character from Star Trek: The Original Series, and the episode deals with him attempting to figure out where he belongs in the new future he finds himself in.
Finally, the episode "Rascals" depicts Captain Picard, Ensign Ro Laren, Guinan, and Keiko O'Brien involved in a transporter accident while returning from an away mission that turns them into twelve-year-old children. The transporter removes some key genetic sequences from the four characters, causing them to de-age. While technically the four of them are not different people, and still possess the mental faculties of their true ages, the episode forces them to confront their lives in a different light while they appear as children.
The new life forms created by transporter accidents are only the tip of the iceberg when it comes to transporter-related episodes. Over the years, the transporter has proved to be an extremely useful storytelling device for the Star Trek franchise. Whether through allowing characters to travel to parallel universes, facilitating time travel, or causing accidents that change characters' physical and mental states, most episodes involving a transporter have become immediate Star Trek classics.
