- For the mirror universe counterpart, see Marla McGivers (mirror).
Marla Madlyn McGivers Singh (2242-2274) was a human female who lived during the 23rd century. A member of the United Federation of Planets Starfleet, she held the rank of lieutenant in 2267.
Biography[]
Born in the Martian colonies in 2242, she found herself keenly interested in mythology, Earth history, and painting. (ST video game: Starship Creator)
McGivers' parents died in a transporter accident, leaving her to be raised by her aunt and uncle, her historical interests clashing with their more scientific mindsets. She eventually enrolled in Starfleet Academy but never shook the feeling of being an outsider. (TOS novel: To Reign in Hell: The Exile of Khan Noonien Singh)
She specialized in sociology, anthropology, and comparative history at the Academy, particularly focusing on male historical figures. In 2263, she served her cadet cruise aboard the USS Nautilus. In 2264, she taught history as a student instructor, but was reprimanded for having a relationship with Professor Ben Miller. Graduating in the 95th percentile in 2264, McGivers was assigned to the USS Avenger's security division. She served with distinction during a first contact mission on Berengaria VI in 2265, salvaging a disastrous cultural mistake made by another member of the landing party. In 2266, she was promoted to lieutenant junior grade and transferred to the USS Enterprise as ship's historian. (ST video game: Starship Creator)
In late 2266, McGivers spoke with Janice Rand shortly before the yeoman departed the Enterprise. McGivers thought Rand and Kirk might get together, but Rand told her that Kirk never reciprocated her feelings. (TOS - New Visions comic: "Sweet Sorrow")
In 2267, McGivers was serving as historian on board the Enterprise. She was acquainted with a number of other officers on the ship, including Pavel Chekov. (TOS movie, novelization & comic adaptation: Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan, TOS novel: To Reign in Hell: The Exile of Khan Noonien Singh)
Captain James T. Kirk and Doctor Leonard McCoy passed McGivers in a corridor one evening. She asked Kirk if he'd read her industrialization report yet on Nestor III. He hadn't, nor could he remember her name. (TOS - New Visions comic: "Mister Chekov")
During the Enterprise's visit to Beta Omicron Delta III, McGivers engaged in a fantasy where she was "Crown Princess of the Universe". When the ship was thrown back to Earth in the year 1969, McGivers designed the disguises for the landing party but, to her disappointment, did not join them in venturing to the surface. (TOS novel: To Reign in Hell: The Exile of Khan Noonien Singh)
When Enterprise encountered the SS Botany Bay adrift in interstellar space, Kirk, McCoy, Lieutenant Commander Montgomery Scott and McGivers boarded the ship. The landing party discovered augmented humans encased in stasis chambers, and upon discovering Khan Noonien Singh in stasis, McGivers was immediately drawn to Khan.
After Khan was revived, McGivers attempted to debrief him and asked him about his past. She was quickly drawn to his passionate and powerful nature. Indeed, she was so taken with him that she painted his portrait. When Khan announced his intentions to take the Enterprise, she agreed to help him rather than face losing him. When she realized the enormity of what she had done, McGivers turned against Khan and his followers long enough to help Captain Kirk and the Enterprise and retake the ship.
Feeling that it would be a waste to commit Khan and his followers to a rehabilitation colony and perhaps realizing that Khan was too powerful to be entrusted to usual punishment methods, Kirk dropped all the charges against Khan and his followers, and allowed the augments to settle Ceti Alpha V. Kirk then told McGivers that she could either face a court martial, or could accompany Khan in his exile. She agreed to go with Khan, who accepted her as a superior woman. (TOS episode & Star Trek 2 novelization: Space Seed)
During the voyage to Ceti Alpha V, McGivers visited Khan in the brig and recorded memoirs of his time on Earth. Kirk wouldn't allow them privacy, as it was too risky to leave Khan unwatched. When Joaquin Weiss took Leonard McCoy hostage, she and Kirk successfully appealed to Khan to order his release. (TOS - Star Trek: Explorer short story: "The Way to Exile")
Six months after her exile to Ceti Alpha V, Khan and McGivers, along with many of the other colonists, were married. When Ceti Alpha VI exploded, the orbit of Ceti Alpha V was altered, creating a blighted and inhospitable world, made worse by pieces of Ceti Alpha VI striking the fifth planet. As conditions on the colony worsened, McGivers was targeted by dissenters and had a larval Ceti eel placed in her ear, directed to kill Khan.
By one account, she had been submitted to this by Harulf Ericsson. McGivers went back to the quarters that she and Khan shared and she pulled out a knife, about to kill Khan, but resisted at the last moment and stabbed herself in the chest, giving herself a mortal wound. When Khan asked why she did what she did, she barely managed to utter that Ericsson had planted an eel in her ear and that she had no regrets going with Khan. (TOS novel: To Reign in Hell: The Exile of Khan Noonien Singh) By another account, she had been targeted by Tamas, approaching Khan with a knife when he and Joachim discussed how to cure the Ceti eel sickness only for him to see the attack at the last second. Revealing that she was forced to do this, she died hours later in Khan's arms, her assassination attempt having been nothing more than a distraction to allow Tamas' force to steal the nuclear power generator. (TOS comic: "Khan: Ruling in Hell")
Whatever account was correct, McGivers' death was the driving reason he sought revenge on James T. Kirk, holding the captain's negligence in monitoring the colony as the cause of his wife's demise. (TOS movie, novelization & comic adaptation: Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan)
Years after Khan's death, Captain Kirk, Captain Spock, Doctor McCoy and Commander Hikaru Sulu returned to Ceti Alpha V in attempt to learn more about Khan's exile. In their search, they accidentally stumbled upon a sarcophagus for Marla that was built by Khan with Marla's mummified remains within. In another sarcophagus, likely meant for Khan, Spock found data tapes and records and Khan's personal journal. Before they left, the landing party was accosted by Ericsson's daughter and a few other surviving supermen and women who were exiled from the colony and demanded to know Khan's whereabouts, not knowing that he had left the planet and subsequently died. The young Ericsson also destroyed Marla's remains with a phaser she took from the landing party. Kirk managed to convince the young Ericsson that Khan was indeed dead and their fight was over. Kirk then instructed Sulu to go back to the Mutara Sector to beam her ashes into the debris field created when the Genesis Planet exploded, so that that she and Khan could at least be together. Kirk also hoped that (as husband and wife, they were reunited somewhere, somehow), Marla McGivers and Khan Noonien Singh had both finally found peace. (TOS novel: To Reign in Hell: The Exile of Khan Noonien Singh)
Appendices[]
Appearances[]
- TOS episode & Star Trek 2 novelization: Space Seed
- TOS novel: To Reign in Hell: The Exile of Khan Noonien Singh
- TOS - New Visions comic: "Sweet Sorrow"
- TOS - New Visions comic: "Mister Chekov"
- TOS comic: "Khan: Ruling in Hell"
- TOS - Star Trek: Explorer short story: "The Way to Exile"
References[]
- TOS novel: Across the Universe
- TOS movie, novelization & comic adaptation: Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan
- TOS movie, novelization & comic adaptation: Star Trek III: The Search for Spock
- ST video game: Starship Creator
Connections[]
External link[]
- Marla McGivers article at Memory Alpha, the wiki for canon Star Trek.