The Mugato and the Bunnicorn (USS Thor)

USS Thor
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	First Season, Episode 5: Stardate 239804.14 - Present

Teaser

While en route to explore a mysterious stellar event, the USS Thor receives a distress signal from the USS Excalibur, which was officially lost during the Federation-Klingon War in 2256. Intrigued by the mysterious signal from the past, the crew will find themselves in the middle of a mythical and epic conflict they never anticipated. ....

Mission Summary

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Prologue

In late 2256 the USS Excalibur was assigned to Starbase 91 as part of a quick reaction fleet in the sector. A surprise attack launched by the Klingons overwhelmed the small fleet's defenses and the assigned ships fell one by one to the onslaught. Heavily damaged and unable to fight any longer, the Excalibur set course directly away from the Klingon attack and fled to seek refuge in unexplored space. The Klingon's were not eager to let such prey escape however and pursued the ship. The Excalibur exited Starfleet sensor range with Klingon ships in pursuit and the ship was believed to be lost with all hands. Despite being officially reported lost the still heavily damaged and pursued Excalibur was able to escape to an uncharted nebula with a solar system and several planets.

During early 2398 the kingdom of Calabrum was threatened. Tremors and earthquakes shook the land, rivers briefly reversed their course, and acrid fumes belched forth from nearby mountains. The people of the kingdom were panicked and camps had formed along the outer walls where the terrified huddled under the stone easements, desperate for a protection that did not exist. Queen du Pendragon has dispatched her finest knights from the Crimson Order and had consulted with the Azure order of wizards but no solution had been found for the realm's troubles. All that was known was the sky had darkened, and the quakes had grown stronger, and the fumes were poisoning the land.

The Queen's last resort was to consult with Velik, the High Wizard of the realm, and an ancient hermit who had witnessed generations come and go. Velik acknowledged the danger but informed the queen he no longer possessed the magic to quell the looming disaster. Instead, Velik urged the queen to complete the ancient ritual of her station. A ritual passed down from generation to generation of rulers. Skeptical but desperate, Queen du Pendragon agreed and shortly thereafter departed to the sacred place in the mountains. Untouched since the first queen over 150 years prior, she made her way into the cold gray place. Along the way du Pendragon followed the ritual perfectly, touching each glyph and uttering each phrase as she was taught until she finally reached the throne room of the ancient place. Blood stains were still visible from the sacrifice of the first queen. Taking a seat in the sacred throne, Queen du Pendragon uttered the final words of the ritual: "Excalibur. I need you."

On stardate 239804.10 the distress signal of the USS Excalibur was activated and detected by the USS Thor. The distress call contained no voice information and simply consisted of a homing signal and the Excalibur's signature. The signal emanated from a nebula at the edges of modern-day Federation space and significant interference prevented the Thor from identifying a precise location. With the ship being thought lost over 150 years prior, the USS Thor changed course to investigate the mystery.

Act One

The USS Thor wrapped up her shore leave period and departed Vulcan to investigate a possible sighting of the spacebourne being Gomtuu. En route to the suspected coordinates however the ship identified a distress signal bearing the signature of the USS Excalibur, a ship lost during the Federation-Klingon war of the mid 2200s. The signal had a significant amount of interference and a precise location could not be identified, however the signal appeared to emanate from an unexplored nebula. With the ship's course set to the nebula, Fleet Captain Kells assembled several teams to begin unraveling the mystery.

Team 1, led by Lieutenant Alieth, consisted of Ensign Anton Richards, Lieutenant JG Dime De Scheppes, and Lieutenant Quen Deena. This team was tasked with examining evidence of indigenous life forms in the region and determining if there had been contact between Federation technology and their natural development. Beamed well away from the intended area, the team found themselves in a thick forest. They were no near their destination when the tremors that shook the planet forced them to take shelter in a nearby cave. What appeared to be a temporary refuge became a must when the entry to the cave collapsed, leaving them trapped. In their search for a way out, the team discovered several things: first, that the tunnel had a source of radiation. Secondly, it had been carved out of the mountain by something or someone decades ago, rather than being a natural one. Finally, deep into the cave, Ensign Richards found a mark reminiscent of a Starfleet badge, embedded in a sort of pennant, along with an arrow and a word: Calabrum. The group followed the directions further and further into the mountain, until they reached the other side. There they came upon a sight they had not expected, the white walls of Calabrum, a medieval city built around a castle with strangely familiar shapes. Still camouflaged as natives, the away team joined one of the refugee convoys heading for the city and entered the town undercover.

Team 2, led by Captain (SFMC) Wes Greaves, consisted of Lieutenant Sirok, Lieutenant JG Sasha Johnson, and Petty Officer Gra'vel. This team was tasked with working through the signal interference to identify the location of the USS Excalibur. Once identified the team would then determine what happened to the ship. Captain Greaves assembled his team in one of the ship's engineering labs and began work to identify the final location of the Excalibur. Working through the interference of the nebula proved difficult, but as the Thor got closer the interference was able to be compensated for. LT Johnson was able to refine their sensors to finally find the Excalibur. The ship had crashed in the mountains of a planet but was almost entirely intact. With the ship's location disseminated to the rest of the crew, the team assembled in the transporter room to beam down to the wreckage for further investigation. The plan was to beam directly to the Excalibur's bridge with spare batteries, download the computer logs, and return to the Thor. Unfortunately natural geological interference with the transporters resulted in the team materializing four decks below the bridge. LT Sirok's knee was injured during the beam in and the spare battery was damaged. Initially the team attempted to identify where on the ship they were and then proceed to sickbay to treat Sirok's knee. Petty Officer Gra'vel carried the wounded Sirok until they reach Deck 5, however a large hull breach blocked their path. Capt Greaves decided to send LT Sirok and PO Gra'vel to the bridge while he and LTJG Johnson went to engineering. LT Sirok was able to fashion a splint for his leg and both teams arrived at their destinations. It was discovered that the bridge had power from a makeshift power pack, however it would not last long enough to download all of the ship's logs. LT Siork and PO Gra'vel established communications with the Thor but geological interference disrupted the communications. Capt Greaves and LTJG Johnson discovered a way to restore minimal auxiliary power in engineering which boosted the transmitter output and cut through all interference. Meanwhile LT Sirok and PO Gra'vel were able to repair their battery and connect it to the makeshift power source to ensure the Excalibur's logs would be downloaded.

Team 3, led by Commander Geoffrey Teller, consisted of Lieutenant Commander Alexander Brodie, Ensign Dar Elandra, and Ensign Katsim Peri. This team was tasked to examine the environment around the ship's final location and determine a way to extract the Starfleet technology. The group was transported to an apparently volcanic area, where they began to analyse the terrain for foreign elements. Midway through the survey, the group was struck by an earthquake. Shortly after it, while still recovering from the shock, they detected a group approaching the situation. Unwilling to risk discovery, they hid in the area until whoever was approaching was revealed and they could identify whether it was friend, foe, native, local life or other. What they didn't expect was that what appeared in the area was a Klingon party, armed in what looked like medieval armour and mounting what were clearly the largest war-targ any of them had ever seen. The situation was complicated when Katsim Peri was discovered and, despite the best efforts of the entire party to avoid a hostile situation, they were soon surrounded and a scuffle broke out. As the fight swung against the Starfleeters, they were suddenly rescued by an unexpected appearance: Queen Arta du Pendragon & The Crimson Knights. Once the battle was over and the enemies defeated, the monarch offered the away team refuge in her kingdom, unaware of their true nature.

Team 4, led by Commander Lia Rouiancet, consisted of Lieutenant JG Jehe Saja, Second Lieutenant Ishani Singh and Second Lieutenant Josh Henderson. This team was tasked with conducting a survey of the system once the Thor arrived to determine if there were additional indigenous races in the area. The Thor would remain at the location of the Excalibur so the team would condut the survey aboard the Valkyrie Fighter detachment. Upon arrival at the Excalibur's crash site the team departed aboard Valkyrie 1 with Valkyrie 2, 3, and 4 in formation. The team made an initial survey plan to spread the squadron out throughout the system and conduct a thorough search. During the execution of the survey, Valkyrie 3's sensors detected a strange power source but did not realize it at the time. LTJG Jehe discovered the sensor readings and Valkryie 1 set course to investigate. The nebula interfered with sensors so the fighter had to close to within close range to scan the anomoly. The power source was identified orbiting a small planetoid but as the fighter approached it split into six different small contacts. As soon as the fighter was within scanning range the mystery objects powered disruptors and attacked the fighter. It was discovered that the objects were small orbital defense platforms. CDR Rouiancet attempted to make contact with the attackers, but an automated Klingon response was the only reply. While 2ndLt Singh attempted to dodge the weapons fire, the rest of the team determined that the satelites were very old and likely were a trap left by Klingons for the Excalibur. 2ndLt Henderson discovered the satelites had unreliable power sources and the disrupter output was exceptionally low. Combined with the shield advancedments of the last 150 years, the Valkyrie was easily able to absorbe the weapons fire. All satelites were destroyed with one being disabled and towed back to the USS Thor for further analysis.

Act Two

With an initial investigation of the planet complete, the crew of the USS Thor dove deeper into the mystery surrounding the lost ship Excalibur and began to explore the city of Calabrum to discover what had become of the crash survivors. The crew split into multiple teams again to gather as much data as possible.

Team 1 was led by Commander Rouiancet and consisted of Captain Greaves, Lieutenant Sirok, and Lieutenant Junior Grade Jehe. The four beamed down to just outside of the Excalibur crash site with the task of determining what had happened to the ship. After a brief discussion the group decided to split into two sections. LT Sirok and LTJG Jehe would try and recover the ship's logs while CDR Rouiancet and Capt Greaves would conduct forensic analysis of Deck 1 to determine who had activated the distress call. By the conclusion of the investigation it was clear that there had been significant loss of life aboard the Excalibur before the crash with evidence of Klingon boarders. The Captain's logs recovered reinforced this discovery. The logs also told a story of the Excalibur's crew. The survivors spent a year surviving out of their ship and established a small settlement they named Calabrum. After a year it was clear that rescue was not coming so in an effort to prevent cultural contamination of the planet's inhabitants, the Excalibur crash site was sealed off except for one entrance.

Team 2 was led by Commander Teller and consisted of Lieutenant Commander Brodie, Lieutenant Quen, and Ensign Dar. After the encounter with the Klingons and their subsequent rescue by the knights of Calabrum, the group was brought back to the city and made an audience with Queen Arta du Pendragon. During the audience the team learned that the city was under constant threat from Klingon raiding parties. Additionally there recently had been constant earthquakes, crops had been failing, and in many places the drinking water had turned poisonous. Refugees from across the land had flocked to Calabrum's gates in search of safety. The team decided to see this all first hand and split into two groups. The first group of CDR Teller and ENS Dar went to see the knights training area. Upon arrival in the training grounds the pair watched several of the realm's most esteemed knights train until one of them challenged CDR Teller to a friendly training bout. The CDR accepted and suited up in training equipment and was subsequently bashed about the head and limbs in the sparring match, landing only a handful of successful blows himself.

The second group of LTCDR Brodie and LT Quen accompanied Queen Pendragon to the outskirts of the city to see the refugees. Here they saw the refugee camps which were almost entirely indigenous people. The lack of food and poor living conditions the refugees were suffering in were noticeable and LT Quen determined that the nearby volcano was the source of water contamination. While touring the refugee camp, a lone rider approached the Queen and reported a giant army of slave soldiers and Klingons marching toward Calabrum, only days away. The Queen sent the rider to report to the keep and the group returned to the castle to prepare.

Team 3 was led by Lieutenant Alieth and consisted of Lieutenant Junior Grade de Sheppes, Ensign Richards, and Ensign Katsim. The team was tasked with exploring the city of Calabrum and understanding the depth of cultural contamination from the Excalibur survivors. The team began by exploring some of the streets, but decided to try and locate the ruins of burned down library that may hold historical records. The team was separated in the crowds of the streets however and LTJG de Sheppes and ENS Katsim were cut off from the others. While trying to rejoin the group ENS Katsim came across several children intently watching a basket of multicolored eggs. One by one the eggs hatched and a lizard like creature with a slender neck and wings emerged. This creature matched the exotic coloring of the eggs it hatched from and the children would offer the creature a bit of meat. When the creature chose a piece of meat the child who was selected would then pick up the creature and carry it off. This process repeated one by one until there was only one egg left. When this final egg hatched the creature ignored the children and scrambled up to ENS Katsim. It was explained by the eldest child present that the creature had bonded with ENS Katsim and to abandon it would result in it's death. Not willing to doom the creature, ENS Katsim and LTJG de Sheppes decided to take it with them.

Meanwhile LT Alieth and ENS Richards discovered the burned library which was under guard. Through clever use of a nearby child, ENS Richards created a distraction which allowed them to sneak in. LT Alieth found a written log of some interactions with the locals from the founding of Calabrum. The indigigneous population was little more than subsistence farmers when the Excalibur crashed and they were drawn to the Calabrum settlement by the sight of camp fires. To adhere to the prime directive the survivors said they were travelers from a distant area and had just settled at Calabrum. One surviving crew member told stories of Arthurian tales to explain away the presence of the more alien looking crew members. After gathering more books, the two left the library to find the rest of the team.

Team 4 was led by Fleet Captain Aron Kells and consisted of Lieutenant Sasha Johnson and Second Lieutenant Henderson. The team assembled in the shuttlebay where a recovered klingon drone had been towed to. Fleet Captain Kells wanted to gather as much information about the klingons in the area as possible. LT Johnson led the efforts in disassembling the drone to try and recover any data it had. With effort, the team found an anti-tampering device in the drone and swiftly disarmed it. Once the danger had passed, they cross referenced the computer data banks with manufacturing data found on the drone to determine it's age. The device dated back to the Federation-Klingon war from the USS Excalibur's era as suspected. More importantly it was discovered that the drone had a means to indirectly locate it's host ship. The team successfully interfaced the Thor's computers to the device and were able to determine that the Klingon's which had pursued the Excalibur had crashed a bird of prey on the planet as well.

Act Three

With the pieces of the puzzle coming together, the crew of the USS Thor determined that a massive volcanic explosion was imminent in the area. The resulting ash and lava would kill every living person within hundreds of miles of the site, and with it, the wreckage of the Excalibur. Fleet Captain Kells decided to meet with Queen du Pendragon personally and reveal who they really were. Queen du Pendragon, although surprised, took the news in stride and asked for assistance. With the prime directive already broken, Fleet Captain Kells decided to work to remove as much cultural contamination as possible while preserving the future development of the planet. The Thor would beam out every descendant of the Excalibur's survivors and let the volcano destroy the evidence, including the indigenous people who'd met the survivors. The interference already caused by the volcano meant that a massive safe area would have to be established to facilitate the beam-out. This required hundreds of transport pattern enhancers to be set-up. With the Klingons and the volcano threats looming there wasn't enough time to make it all happen so the crew of the Thor once again broke into teams to achieve their aims.

Officers

• Commanding Officer, Fleet Captain Aron Kells
• Executive Officer, Commander Geoffrey Teller
• Chief Counselor, Lt. Commander Alexander Brodie
• Strategic Operations Officer, Lt. Commander Lia Rouiancet
• Chief Medical Officer, Lieutenant Alieth
• Medical Officer, Lieutenant Quen Deena
• Chief Engineer, Lieutenant Sirok
• Marine Detachment Cdr, Captain (SFMC) Wes Greaves
• Security Officer, Ensign Dar Elandra
• Intelligence Officer, Lieutenant JG Jehe Saja
• Security Officer, Ensign Anton Richards
• Science Officer, Ensign Peri Katsim
• Engineering Officer, Lieutenant Sasha Johnson

MSNPCs

• Captain Yareli de la Lago
• Arta du Pendragon, Heart of Gold, first of her name, Queen of Calabrum
• Velik, Reluctant High Wizard and General Recluse in Calabrum