A super late reply, but I only saw this couple of days ago. I wouldn't bother to post this late otherwise, but I want to say that I really, really hope that they return to this story later. As it is now, it feels woefully incomplete.
I had waited this story since the Saru Short Trek Episode, and whilst this was good, I still was a bit disappointed. The beginning was great. I loved the Kelpien drama on the planet, and Culber and Stamets bits were great, and good way to show that the death still mattered, it was not just a magical resurrection and all is forgotten. But the resolution of the story felt unsatisfactory. Dear Captain Pike, I think the spirit of the Prime Directive is to prevent this sort of colossal meddling, instead of prevent telling a bunch of abducted humans that the Earth made it. Whilst sure, the situation totally sucked, and Kirk would have done something too, Pike's attitude her really didn't jive with his stance on the New Eden. Also, how did they din't see the Ba'ul's reaction coming? The instant they started to talk forcibly pokemón evolving the Kelpiens I said, 'and the the Ba'ul will nuke them all.' If there hadn't been a literal deus ex machina, almost all Kelpiens would have been killed. And certainly they will still be, once the Discovery had departed. I would have expected some self reflection on a colossal fuck up of that magnitude.
Now, similar stories have happened is Star Trek before (though I can't remember one where genocide would be so imminent) and they were never addressed later, but this show is different. This is exactly the sort of situation they should use serialisation for; I liked the start of this story, but this was not a proper ending, I want a sequel, dammit!
(Also, I bet that somehow Burnamn is the Red Angel. I don't know how, but that was my intuition when I saw the Angel up close.)