Star Trek #22 from Gold Key Comics could be found on comic spinners for January 1974. It featured Gerry Boudreau as the writer, while Alberto Giolitti continued serving as artist, and George Wilson rendered another cover painting.

The opening splash page promised a mission that would see the stalwart crew of the Enterprise dealing with the most dangerous war machine ever. And it looks like a cyborg Ent.

The Enterprise is headed to Draconis, which has asked for entry into th Federation. The crew’s mission is to see if Draconis is ready and to measure their current socio-political environment. But the Enterprise has had to temporarily stop for minor repairs.

A nearby black hole is overloading the ship’s sensors with its quantum energy. Unbelievably, Kirk doesn’t know what a black hole is. I get that it’s done for the reader’s sake, but honestly, I don’t think you could be a Starfleet captain without knowing what a black hole was.

And five years before the Palomino crew went in, through and beyond, the Enterprise gets pulled into the black hole! And survives! They enter a void of subspace, or superspace in this case, and find themselves in high orbit over a planet

Kirk, McCoy and a white Lt. Uhura (come on guys! Get this stuff sorted!) beam down and find remains of a civilization and a person being pursued by a strange, automated, tree-like thing that is firing at her. The crew are able to take it down with prolonged phaser fire, and the woman identifies herself as Rhuna.

She and her people live in a city below the surface. They were forced there after their planet came under attack and their planet’s defence systems began firing on everything!

After a nuclear disaster, the controlling module genetically modified the planet’s vegetation into weapon systems. And seemed to tumble out of history after that. Or did it?

Rhuna’s people occasionally send missions to the surface to see if it is habitable and if the machines can be brought under control. So far none of that has happened.

Meanwhile, in orbit, Spock and Scotty effect repairs on the Enterprise while puzzling on how to escape this superspace void. With repairs accomplished, the Enterprise stands by for their landing party.

Kirk’s party reaches the underground city, but they find themselves under attack by the plant creatures. And the city has no weapons with which to defend itself. Our Starfleet trio fight to survive. Kirk and Rhuna are able to recover a hidden arsenal, even as Kirk begins to realize that the bracelet Rhuna is wearing a bracelet which controls the lost control module.

Kirk destroys the bracelet, stopping the creatures, and they take the energy enhanced module with them as they return to the Enterprise. Spock has discovered that a nearby star is about to go nova, and the mind module’s energy can augment the nova.

They are able to return to normal space, and continue on their way. Boldly going into the next fray, Child’s Play.