Zeperez was a Vezda who possessed the body of Ensign Dana Gamble on Vadia IX. (SNW: "Through the Lens of Time", "New Life and New Civilizations")

One of thousands of their species that a highly advanced spacefaring civilization had trapped within orbs inside a layered dimensional prison on Vadia IX, the item containing Zeperez was retrieved by grave robbers who had infiltrated the site. However, they were unable to find a way out and died of starvation. Centuries later in 2261, their remains were discovered by a USS Enterprise away team assigned to investigate the structure. Ensign Dana Gamble unwittingly picked up Zeperez' orb, whereupon Zeperez broke out and possessed his body. Unaware that Gamble had died upon being possessed, the away team brought Zeperez to the Enterprise, where it masqueraded as Gamble but gradually began evincing its true personality.

When Zeperez encountered Captain Marie Batel, who had been previously hybridized with Gorn DNA and gained the Gorn's genetic memory of the Vezda as a result, the two immediately attacked each other. Zeperez fled and, still masquerading as Gamble, agreed to confinement in the brig. It later escaped and demanded command codes from Pelia at gunpoint, so as to seize control of the Enterprise and free its brethren. When Doctor Joseph M'Benga distracted Zeperez, Pelia shot Gamble in the back, forcing Zeperez to emerge. Lieutenant jg Montgomery Scott then recaptured it inside its damaged orb and dematerialized both with the transporter. In the absence of a ready dimensional prison, it was decided to keep Zeperez suspended in the transport buffer. However, unnoticed by the crew, it began corrupting the Enterprise's computer system. (SNW: "Through the Lens of Time")

Zeperez was eventually able to escape, rebuilding Gamble's body to serve as its physical form and escaping to Skygowan. Zeperez sought to use a portal on the planet to return to Vadia IX and release its kind, luring the Enterprise to Skygowan as it needed M'Benga to access the portal. At the same time, it was discovered that the biosignature of Batel matched that of the Beholder statue on Vadia IX. Batel theorized that because she was hybridized with the Gorn, the chimera blossom and Una Chin-Riley's Illyrian blood, she had taken on all of the adaptive characteristics of the races that had faced evil such as the Gorn, Humans and Illyrians. If the Vezda were the evil that predated all known races, it was possible that all races held a genetic memory of how to combat them. Batel had all the parts of every race that knew how to fight the Vezda. By all of that coming together into one body, Batel was transforming into the Beholder, a being powerful enough to lock the Vezda away. Because they were dealing with interdimensional space, cause and effect could be reversed, meaning that the Vezda could be locked away by Batel in the present day and as the Beholder she could stand sentry over them for eons past. Batel believed that everything that had happened to her was always so that she could become the Beholder protecting life from the Vezda.

After the Enterprise and the USS Farragut opened the portal, Pike and Batel passed through to confront Zeperez in the prison on Vadia IX. Zeperez was able to harm Batel by blasting the Beholder statue and trapped the two in a vision where Pike and Batel got married, had a family and lived a life together with Pike never suffering the accident that trapped him in a wheelchair. Before dying of old age in the vision, Batel told Pike that once she was gone, all that he had to do was look up at the stars and he would know that she was waiting for him there. Outside the window, a streak of light passed through the sky, which Batel commented was "a little early." Batel explained that living their lives like this was a gift and it gave her everything that she needed and could've hoped for. Batel needed to have it before she did what she had to do as it would allow Batel to say goodbye and still remember them and what they had always been fighting for.

When Pike finally answered a knock at the door that he had kept hearing throughout the vision, he was transported back to Vadia IX as Zeperez destroyed the Beholder statue and released its kind. However, having attained her full power as the Beholder, Batel banished the Vezda back into their prison, declaring that she was both the Beholder and Marie Batel whose love was brighter than the Vezda's darkness. After trapping all of the Vezda, Batel transformed into the Beholder statue who would stand guard over the Vezda prison forever. (SNW: "New Life and New Civilizations")