A freak shuttlecraft incident — and suddenly Captain Kirk & most of his senior officers find themselves adrift in space, with no hope of rescue, no hope of repairing their art, or restoring communications — with nothing at all, in short, but time on the hands.

Time enough for every to tell the storyplot from the Kobayashi Maru — the Starfleet Academy check given to command word cadets. Nominally a tactical workout, the Kobayashi Maru is actually a check of character exposed in the options each cadet makes, and will not make.