1.2 That Which Is Unknown (mission)

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## Mission

Starfleet assigns the *Tempest* to witness the demonstration of a new torpedo technology by an Angosian scientist as part of his planet's attempt to join the United Federation of Planets.

## Summary

### Cold Open

A man sneaks into the cargo bay of a Romulan space station, creeping up to a torpedo casing as quietly as he can. He attaches some equipment to the torpedo and both it and he disappear in the shimmer of a transporter beam. As the beam fades away, alarms activate and two Romulan guards rush into the cargo bay to discover the missing weapon. In shock, they turn and take off running to inform their commanders.

### Part 1

The *Tempest* arrives at the planet Angosia and meets the scientist who designed the torpedo they will be testing today, Dr. Ganar Toran. Toran is anxious to get the demonstration over and done with. He asks the crew for the *Tempest's* shield frequency, claiming that having them will enable him to increase the safety margin for the *Tempest* during the test. However, the crew is suspicious of the request and choose not to give him the information. The crew proceeds to run a simulation of the detonation, which produces results consistent with Ganar's claims.

Maddox requests a meeting with Toran between the two of them and Dr. Teal, creating the opportunity for Dr. Teal to use her telepathy to probe Toran's mind. Both she and Maddox sense that Toran is hiding something, though what specifically they cannot tell. Though cautious, the crew agrees to proceed with the test but without giving Toran the shield frequency data. Goodspeed flies the torpedo prototype to the derelict test ship and returns without incident.

Shortly before commencing the test, Maddox decides to give Toran the shield frequency after all, at which point three Klingon birds of prey decloak. One bird of prey maneuvers to steal the torpedo prototype while the other two attack the *Tempest*. The Klingons' initial attack bypasses the *Tempest's* shields completely, confirming the crew's suspicions about Toran's ulterior motives. Angered by the deception, Goodspeed punches Dr. Toran in the face.

The crew remodulates the *Tempest's* shields to return them to effectiveness, while Maddox dramatically leaps over a console to detonate the torpedo before the Klingons can steal it. The torpedo detonates, disabling one of the birds of prey near it, though the *Tempest* is still under attack from the third. In a brief trading of weapons fire, the Tempest inflicts major damage to the attacking bird of prey before taking a much smaller amount of damage itself. The attacking bird of prey breaks off and the two still functional birds of prey attempt to steal the torpedo remains, but fail in the attempt.

### Part 2

The *Tempest* continues its combat with the two remaining birds of prey, disabling a second one. As the *Tempest* begins to gain the upper hand against the Klingon ships, two Romulan warbirds decloak and retrieve the prototype torpedo remains, succeeding where the Klingons had failed. The *Tempest* flees to regroup and receives further orders to track down the Romulans and retrieve the prototype before they can cross back into their own space. However, Starfleet also reminds the crew of the importance of avoiding inflaming tensions any further with either the Klingons or the Romulans.

The *Tempest* starts to give chase to the two warbirds, during which Holden and Dr. Teal interrogate Doctor Toran. Toran admits he stole the torpedo from the Romulans and passed it off as his own creation to the Angosian government. He offers to help the crew track the torpedo signature in exchange for help avoiding a lengthy prison sentence when he returns to Angosia. Maddox agrees and with Toran's assistance, the *Tempest* is able to catch up to the two warbirds near the Paulson Nebula. One of the warbirds is dead in space with radiation readings similar to the torpedo prototype, while the other is nowhere to be found. An away team of Maddox, Goodspeed, Holden, and Teal fly over to the ship in a shuttlecraft to retrieve the prototype. Once aboard, Goodspeed and Holden are able to vent the radiation, allowing the away team to secure the prototype and return with it to the *Tempest*.

With the away team returned, the other warbird decloaks and demands the *Tempest* return the prototype, claiming it as stolen Romulan property. Maddox agrees to return it and has it loaded onto the shuttlecraft *Cristoferetti* but then has the shuttle destroyed before it can reach the warbird. Foiled, the warbird commander destroys the disabled warbird, cloaks, and flees back to Romulan space.

## Elements

* Characters
	+ NPCs
		- Dr. Ganar Toran
		- Warbird Commander
	+ Supporting Characters
		- Lt. Rij'hard Douh
		- Lt. JG Eele Notus
* Ships
	+ Klingon bird of Prey 1
	+ Klingon bird of Prey 2
	+ Klingon bird of Prey 3
	+ IRW Kimara (destroyed)
	+ IRW Keras
* Items
	+ Experimental Torpedo
* Locations
	+ Angosia
	+ Paulson Nebula

## Background

"That Which Is Unknown" is a pre-built mission from Modiphius' These Are the Voyages... mission compendium book. The original mission features Takara/Takarans in place of Angosia/Angosians, which Brian swapped out in order to better fit the geography using the campaign map derived from the fan site startrekmap.com, itself derived from the Star Charts book by Larry Nemecek.
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