When NBC cancelled Star Trek in 1969 after its third season, Captain Kirks five-year mission was cut short. But now, more than thirty years later, a group of fans are determined to see the missing two years explored : without any of the original actors.

Star Trek: New Voyages, the fan-funded and fan-produced series, has just completed work on its third episode of season four. To Serve All My Days will be released in spring 2006 and, like the previous fan episode, will be downloadable from www.newvoyages.com. Bonus features, outtakes and commentaries will also be available for fan enjoyment.

Director and co-creator Jack Marshall, who specializes in science fiction reclamation projects, insists that the ambitious project isnt about satirizing the series, but is instead an attempt to resurrect it. The series was co-created with the aid of James Cawley, a prop collector who also plays Kirk in the series.

Each episode of the New Voyages series is produced with the help of a growing network of Star Trek professionals. The makeup supervisor for the third episode is Oscar-winner Kevin Haney, who worked on the television spin-off shows. Story editor from the original series and author of several Trek books D.C. Fontana is also involved with the series.

Following on from the involvement of the professionals within the franchise, the series has also been given a nod of approval from Paramount Pictures when the series received a few nods on Enterprise (including a reference to Cawleys hometown) and Cawley himself was contacted in order for the series to borrow a Trek prop.

Even Manny Coto, the former executive producer of Enterprise, has become a fan of the fan-series. "I'll be downloading it," he said.

For the third episode, the New Voyages staff has worked hard to improve the series, endeavoring to make it as professional as possible. Walter Koenig, the actor who played Chekov in the original series, is reprising his character in New Voyages, showing that he could have been more than a supporting actor.

"To Serve All My Days," centers on Chekov, after a radiation burst causes him to age rapidly -- a plot device that allows for the reintroduction of Koenig, now 69, into the role -- and he must wrestle with his own mortality.

"I don't mean to be morbid, but I did have a quadruple bypass 13 years ago," Koenig says. "This might be a really good wrap for my career."

Unlike the original series however, the third episode of New Voyages will take a very dramatic and momentous twist which will outrage Trek fans all over the Internet.

Script writer Fontana however is not concerned with the reaction. "We don't have to pay attention to what came after," she said. "We say, forget that. This is the canon."