Vidiians

The Vidiians appear as recurring antagonists during Star Trek: Voyager's first two seasons. The crew of the USS Voyager first encounters the alien species in the season one episode "Phage", in which the Talaxian Neelix (Ethan Phillips) has his lungs stolen by two Vidiians, Dereth (Cully Fredricksen) and Motura (Stephen Rappaport). After Captain Kathryn Janeway (Kate Mulgrew) pursues the Vidiians to recover Neelix's organs, the Vidiians explain that their entire species has been infected by a pandemic known as the Phage. They have developed advanced medical technology to remotely harvest organs directly from living humanoids in order to stop the progression of the Phage, which causes tissue to disintegrate on a cellular level. Motura informs Janeway that he has already implanted Neelix's lungs into his own body, but these cannot be removed without killing him, to which he agrees. Faced with a moral dilemma, Janeway refuses his offer and allows both Dereth and Motura to leave. She instructs them to tell the other Vidiians that any attempt to take another organ from Voyager's crew will be met with deadly force. Dereth and Motura perform an operation and adapt a lung from Kes (Jennifer Lien), an Ocampa and Neelix's romantic partner, to make for a compatible donation aligned with Neelix's physiology. They are able to successfully implant the lung into Neelix's body.[1]
In "Faces", Lieutenants Tom Paris (Robert Duncan McNeill), B'Elanna Torres (Roxann Dawson), and Peter Durst (Brian Markinson) are kidnapped by the Vidiians. Paris and Durst are forced to work in mines while waiting to have their organs harvested. Vidiian Chief Surgeon Sulan (also played by Markinson) experiments on Torres to find a cure for the Phage, since her Klingon genetic structure has an immunity to the disease. The procedure splits Torres into two bodies (a full-blooded Klingon and a full-blooded human Sulan conducts further experiments on the Klingon Torres while the Human Torres is forced to work in the mines. Sulan kills Durst and grafts his face on top of his own. Commander Chakotay (Robert Beltran), Lieutenant Commander Tuvok (Tim Russ), and Ensign Harry Kim (Garrett Wang), who had formed a search party to locate the missing crew members, but upon encountering armed guards are forced to turn back. Chakotay, however returns, now disguised as a Vidiian guard with the help of Tuvok and The Doctor (Robert Picardo), helps to rescue Torres; the Doctor combines both versions of Torres back together.[2]
During "Lifesigns", the crew responds to a distress call and attempts to help a Vidiian scientist Danara Pel (Susan Diol). The Doctor creates a holographic body for Pel in order to work with her to develop a cure for the Phage. Despite the Vidiians' mistreatment of Torres in "Faces", she eventually agrees to provide a sample of her Klingon DNA for their experiments. During their collaboration, the Doctor develops romantic feelings for Pel, and the pair go on a date in the holodeck. When Pel's condition deteriorates rapidly, she decides to stay in her new holographic body so that she can remain alive for several days with the Doctor, rather than return to her own Phage-ravaged body. The Doctor convinces Pel to transfer her consciousness back into her body and the couple dance before Pel departs Voyager.[3]
Vidiians make minor appearances in "Deadlock" and "Resolutions".[4][5] In "Deadlock", Janeway orders Tom Paris to direct Voyager into a nebula to prevent detection from two nearby Vidiian planets. The starship and its crew are duplicated due to a space-time rift. Several Vidiians attack one of the copies of Voyager and harvest vital organs from members of its crew. The Janeway captaining the invaded ship stops the invasion by self-destructing the Voyager in question. This kills the Vidiians and the crew of that Voyager, excepting Harry Kim and the newborn Naomi Wildman; their counterparts having died, they change ships before the self-destruct completes.[4] Pel returns in "Resolutions" to provide a cure for Janeway and Chakotay, who are infected with a terminal illness. Other Vidiians launch an ambush attack during the exchange, but Voyager manages to escape with the serum for Janeway and Chakotay.[5]
The Vidiians are referenced and seen in several subsequent episodes. In "Coda", Janeway finds herself caught in a time loop after a group of Vidiians kill her during an away mission. All of Janeway's experiences in the time loop, as well as her death, are explained to be the result of hallucinations caused by an alien disguised as the spirit of her dead father, Admiral Janeway (Len Cariou).[6] In "Think Tank", Janeway learns that a cure for the Phage has been developed by a committee of alien intellectuals.[7] The Vidiians make their final appearance during an alternative timeline in "Fury". During this episode, Kes returns to Voyager (she had left at the beginning of the fourth season when the development of her psionic powers threatened the starship and its crew). Kes has forgotten the reason for her earlier departure, blaming the crew for abandoning her. After traveling to the past, she contacts the Vidiians and tells them that she will help them commandeer Voyager if they escort her past self back to her home planet. The future version of Kes is killed by Janeway during the Vidiians' attack, and her past version makes a holographic message to prevent the events from occurring.[8] The final mention of the Vidiians occurs in the season six episode "Good Shepherd" as one of the various alien species that have threatened Voyager in the past.[9]

Other appearances

The Vidiians have appeared in original fiction based on the Star Trek franchise. For example, in Shadow of Heaven, Danara Pel is captured by an alien species, who desire vengeance against the Vidiians for their past organ-harvesting operations. Kes rescues Pel by using her psionic powers.[10] In the alternative universe presented in the short story "Places of Exile", the Doctor and Pel are the ones who have created the cure for the Phage. In this interpretation, the Vidiians form a more diplomatic bond with Voyager's crew and promise to help expedite their return to the Alpha Quadrant.[11]
Several pieces of merchandise related to the Vidiians were also released following their debut. In 1996, an action figure of a Vidiian was released as part of a second wave of Playmates Toys' Star Trek merchandise.[12][13] A figure of a Vidiian starship was also released by WizKids.[14] The Vidiians have not been featured in Star Trek Online, a massively multiplayer online role-playing game (MMORPG), but a writer from Cryptic Studios presented in a 2013 article that they may be one potential alien species to be included in future updates.[15]

History and culture

In the Star Trek universe, roughly 2,000 years prior to the arrival of Voyager in the Delta Quadrant, the Vidiian Soladity was a culture driven by "educators, artists, and explorers".[16] The book Star Trek: Star Charts identifies the Vidiians' homeworld as Vidiia Prime, the central planet of the Vidiia system and a Class M planet.[17] The spread of the Phage, resulting in thousands of Vidiians dying every day, pushed the alien race to harvest organs and tissue from corpses as well as living beings.[16]
The Vidiians developed advanced medical technology to counteract the spread and progression of the disease, such as their use of a "combined weapon, medical scanner, and surgical instrument" and knowledge of immunogenicity.[16][18][19] They also experimented on other alien species in an attempt to find a cure for the Phage.[2] The Vidiians developed methods for interspecies organ transplants.[16] Despite their technological advancements, this alien species is shown to be unfamiliar with holographic technology and engines powered by dilithium.[18]
The Vidiians' culture also shifts as a result of the Phage. In Vidiian society, an individual would hire a specialist, or a honatta, to find the required organs or tissues.[18] Extended periods of contact or group meetings are strongly discouraged to prevent the further spread of the Phage, and those infected are shunned by healthy Vidiians out of fear of contamination.[3] The Vidiians also capture other species to work for them as slaves doing manual tasks, such as mining.[18] In the years following Voyager's encounters with the Vidiians but prior to their return to Earth, a committee of alien intellectuals known as the Think Tank claimed to have cured the Phage