Random Happenstance

I think I bought this issue thinking it was the last issue of the series, but it's not, we saw the last ish some years back! So today we've got from 1995, Star Trek #77, "Deadlock" Written by Kevin J. Ryan, pencils by Rachel Forbes-Seese, inks by Mark Heike. And a nice cover from Peter Krause and Jerome Moore.

Set during the original five-year mission, the Enterprise is investigating attacks near the Neutral Zone and is fired upon by a Romulan ship: the Romulans at the time using the ship design normally associated with the Klingons. Both ships are disabled in the battle, and are scrambling to make enough repairs to destroy the other; until long-range sensors reveal a third-party ship was out there, and had attacked a Romulan freighter. Alone they would be sitting ducks, but together they might be able to defend themselves against the mysterious other ship...

A dense and somewhat wordy issue, but solidly plotted. There are a couple bits I especially liked: while making repairs, much of the crew appear to go with coveralls over their uniforms--with the exception of Scotty, who usually worked in his red shirt! And Scotty also suggests a trick I know I've seen in another Trek comic, Next Generation's "Worst of Both Worlds," namely loading a shuttlecraft full of explosives and launching it at somebody! Kirk and his crew would figure out the mystery in a few issues, it wasn't left hanging. I'm doing the scans for this while waiting for Star Trek: Discovery to come on; can't wait to see it!