- The Enterprise has mere minutes to hit warp speed, or the Genesis device will kill them all.
- Spock, bright fellow that he is, figures out that someone needs to be exposed to toxic levels of radiation in order to restore the engines and let the ship get away…and that he's the only one with both the physical strength and technical know-how to do the job.
- He excuses himself and moseys on down to the engine room, where McCoy tells him he can't go into the core. Silly McCoy.
- One Vulcan nerve pinch later (plus a freaky fingers-to-the-cheek- thing that gives the filmmakers some wiggle room in the event they want to bring him back), Spock enters the engine core to fix the damage components.
- Khan quotes Captain Ahab.
- Kirk bites his nails.
- Spock really seriously takes a hit for the team. And, just when all hope seems lost, he restores warp power.
- Kirk orders the ship to warp speed and they rocket away just as the Genesis Device explodes, destroying the Nebula, the Reliant and Regula One as the planet Regula is bathed in its mojo.
- Kirk, all cocky and relieved, calls down to the engine room to give Scotty a long-distance fist bump.
- Instead, he gets McCoy, who sounds broken up and urges Kirk to get the heck down there before his first officer shuffles off this mortal coil.
- He arrives to see Spock slumped over and dying in the engine core.
- Spock delivers his final report to his commanding officer, admonishing him not to grieve before succumbing to his injuries and leaving both Kirk and the audience a sobbing wreck.