The Augments were a genetically enhanced race of superhumans in the science fiction television series Star Trek: The Original Series and Star Trek: Enterprise. The race made its debut in the episode "Space Seed" and representatives also appeared in Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan. In Enterprise, Augments were introduced in "Borderland" and were the focus of a three-episode story arc that continued in "Cold Station 12" and "The Augments".
The Augments were created by genetic engineering on Earth in the 20th century, prior to the Eugenics War, which was waged by an Augment named Khan Noonien Singh, who was later defeated and exiled in a "sleeper vessel" that would be encountered by the Starship Enterprise more than two centuries later.
Although initially friendly towards James Kirk and his crew, Singh's desire for power and conquest made him too powerful to be allowed to roam free. After a failed attempt at taking over the Enterprise, Khan was exiled to Ceti Alpha V, an uninhabited but habitable planet where he would be allowed to reign. Several months later, a nearby planet exploded, destroying Ceta Alpha V's environment. Over the next 16 years, Khan and his followers suffered on the planet, abandoned by Starfleet. Eventually, they were able to hijack a starship, and attempt to take their revenge upon Kirk.
Unknown to Khan, some eighteen hundred discarded Augment embryos from the 1990s were preserved at Starfleet Medical facility Cold Station 12 until some 150 years after the war. Dr. Arik Soong was director of the facility, and stole 19 of the embryos.
Dr. Soong secretly brought the Augments to a remote, secluded planet and raised and schooled them as his own children. The Augments were indoctrinated at an early age to the idea that they were far superior to humans both physically and mentally. When Soong was incarcerated, the Augments were left to fend for themselves for a number of years. Eventually, they escaped their planet and commandeered a Klingon Bird-of-Prey, killing the crew with their bare hands. They subsequently took hostages at CS-12 and were reunited with Soong who sought to obtain thousands more Augment embryos.
Ultimately, the Augments were destroyed by the Enterprise NX-01 in the episode "The Augments" when they refused to surrender their nearly-destroyed Klingon Bird-of-Prey, although Soong himself was recaptured.
The ability of the Augments to defeat a group of Klingons caught the interest of the Empire, which was able to obtain a few surviving embryos. These were used in genetic experiments to augment Klingon DNA. However, the experiment went wrong when the human augment DNA proved to be more dominant than the Klingon genes, and mutated into a fatal virus that quickly transformed many Klingons into human-looking creatures. (A cure for the virus was found, but not before millions of Klingons had been permanently altered.)
Star Trek: Deep Space Nine revealed late in its run that Dr. Julian Bashir was the subject of similar augmentation experiments that gave him acute mental abilities and physical abilities.
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Last updated: 08-02-2005 14:49:34
