In 2375, the Enterprise travels to the "Briar Patch" to help recover Data, who suffered a malfunction while on a mission to secretly observe the apparently technologically undeveloped Ba'ku. In diagnosing the cause of Data's malfunction, the crew uncovers a plot to forcibly relocate the Ba'ku from their planet. The crew quickly discovers that the Ba'ku world's rings contain metaphasic particles with significant healing properties; the Son'a have a device that will collect those particles but will render the planet uninhabitable.

The crew begins to benefit from the rings' metagenic properties: old injuries begin to rejuvenate and crewmembers begin to act younger and with more energy. Meanwhile, Picard confronts the Son'a leader, Ru'afo, and his chief Starfleet backer, Admiral Dougherty, about the forced relocation. Picard eventually leads several of his crew in an attempt to move the Ba'ku from their village in order to delay their relocation. Eventually captured, he reveals to Dougherty that Beverly Crusher's scans of Son'a and Ba'ku reveal them to be the same species: the Son'a were banished years ago and have returned on a mission of vengeance. Fed up with Dougherty's cowtowing to Picard, Ru'afo kills the admiral and orders the particle collector activated. Picard transports to the collector and activates its self-destruct. He is saved by a last-second beam-out by the Enterprise, but Ru'afo is killed when the collector explodes.

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