Adventure Source: Homebrew by Brent

Meetup Link: https://www.meetup.com/Star-Trek-Gaming/events/266187461/

Game Date: March 8 2020

Session Post: https://www.ob1knorrb.com/sta-episode-6-big-balls-of-borg/

Teaser: A Borg Sphere has been detected in the Shackleton Expanse. However, it seems to be inactive. The Kimura is sent to investigate. Why are the Borg inactive? What are they waiting for? Will they stay that way?

• Cmd. O’Nnyah (Raven)
• Ensign Wolfgang Ratzel (Terry) (Away Team)
• Lt. Cmd. Rowan Tonelli (Jaime) (Away Team)
• Lt. Cmd. Tu’Pari (Nick) (Away Team)
• Lt. Asha (Jaime)
• Lt. Kirkuurzhaav th’Zoarhi (Trevor)
• Lt. Cmd. Sivath (Garrett)
• Captain T’Kor (Terry)
• Lt. Oqwadel (Raven) (Away Team)
• Cmd. Xedrik (Trevor) (Away Team)
• Lt Cmd. Taemin Rahn (Garrett) (Away Team)

Important NPCs:

• None

Notable Information: The defense system on the planet, which wiped out all life forms on Borg cube is similar in technology to what was found on Orgun III. A Romulan Warbird was also hit by the defense system and drifted out of the system. It was not one of the Romulan ships encountered and it’s fate remains unknown. A Romulan Tug was captured by the crew of the Kimura.

Mission Recap: This adventure picked up from the end of “Convoy SE-119“. The Kimura finished escorting the convoy back to Narendra Station, stopping at Epsilon 19 to collect the Captain and the rest of the crew.

After a short briefing, they were ordered to go investigate the Borg Sphere that they had picked up on sensors on the return trip to the station. The Akira Class ship, U.S.S. Galvarino was a day and a half away, and the Galaxy Class U.S.S. Venture was almost two days away. Both were being recalled but Admiral Hebert didn’t want to wait until they arrived to begin investigating the Sphere.

The Kimura dropped out of warp and approached the system from quite far out, using their advanced sensors to do a scan of the planet and then the Sphere from the edge of sensor range, hoping that this would prevent the Sphere from detecting them.

The planet was a Class M planet but with no signs of intelligent life or advanced technology, there didn’t seem to be anything about it that would cause the Borg Sphere to remain in the system.

The Sphere itself seemed to be in some sort of standby mode. It seemed to have a full complement of Borg, but the vast majority were not moving around and were in their regeneration pods.

After much discussion, it was decided that an Away Team would be sent over to investigate the Sphere. The Away Team consisted of Lt. Cmd. Taemin Rahn, Cmd. Xedrik, Lt. Cmd. Rowan Tonelli, Lt. Oqwadel, Ensign Wolfang Ratxel and Lt. Cmd. Tu’Pari.

The first things they noticed when they beamed over was that the temperature was lower than expected, around 16 degrees Celsius. The air smelled like a strange combination of machine oil and perspiration, and there was an overall feeling of hopelessness and unnaturalness.

They carefully made their way to an unoccupied terminal to try and get some information on what had happened with the Sphere. As a couple members of the team worked at the terminal, Rowan suddenly felt the cold hand of a Borg on their shoulder. Rowan had a brief moment of panic, but the Borg simply moved them aside, stepped out of it’s pod and wandered down the corridor.

They did manage to find out where there was a hub with a communications node and other nodes. It wasn’t too far from where they were, but they determined that it was in a warmer area with several more active Borg in the vicinity.

Ensign Ratzel and Lt. Oqwadel made their way up one level and Ratzel rigged the sensors above the node to give off a reading of a dangerous gas leak. This was successful in causing the Borg in the node to leave, and gave the Away Team a bit of time to gain as much information as possible before the repair drones were activated and sent into the area. One person operated each of the stations and tried to get as much information as possible. The four stations were Sensors, Communications, Engineering and Navigation.

They were able to retrieve a great deal of information.

The Borg Sphere had received a message from it’s home Cube telling the Sphere to cease it’s current mission, and then the message stopped. It was obvious that there was supposed to be more to the message. They managed to find the coordinates that the message was sent from. The Sphere had been sitting in this system for slightly over a month waiting for more information from the Cube. It looked like it would automatically return to the Cube’s coordinates in three more days.

They retrieved the recent navigation data as well, confirming that the Sphere was on a scouting mission and had been preparing to move on to a new system when it received the partial message from the Cube.

They also got enough information that they felt they might be able to send a fake message to the Sphere if they could send it from the coordinates that the Cube had sent the message from, although it would be difficult and would have to be a fairly simple message.

A little more digging unearthed some visual information that had been sent as part of a standard backup procedure from the Cube which showed what happened in the time shortly before and up to the time the message had been sent. The first segment showed an external view of the Cube pursuing a Romulan Warbird. The Warbird moves through a star system, passing by a planet that has four similar looking moons orbiting it. As the Warbird is passing between one of the moons and the planet, a beam from the moon hits the Warbird. It starts to tumble and drift away from the system.

The Borg Cube stops pursuing the Warbird and moves towards the planet and the moons. It starts to send the message to the Sphere as it passes inside the orbits of the moons and it is hit with beams from the other three moons.

Additionally, the Away team recovers a portion of a video feed from the interior of the Cube at the moment that the beams hit. They see the organic portions of the Borg suddenly vaporize as the beams pass through the Cube, leaving a pile of parts behind.

At this point the repair drones are getting close, the Away Team decides they have the information they need and they beam back to the Kimura and set course for the coordinates they retrieved from the Cube.

They again take a cautious approach to the system, scanning from the edge of their sensor range, and it turns out to be a good thing as they not only detect the Cube, but three Romulan Warbirds and a heavy duty Romulan Tug. All of the Romulan ships are being careful to stay outside of the orbit of the moons.

After some careful scanning of the moons furthest away from the Romulans and the Cube they determine that the moons are all artificial and the technology for the beam weapons seems to match the technology that was found on Orgun III.

The also detect the debris of another Warbird, completely destroyed. They determine that it was destroyed because it was heading directly towards the planet and if all the lifeforms on board were killed, the ship would then have hit the planet.

The planet itself is a Class M planet, with signs of intelligent life at a medieval level of technology, but with indications that they once had a much higher level of technology, probably including space flight.

They also determine, primarily through passive observation, that the Romulan Tug is being stripped of weapons and of crew, and is set to be flown remotely. It appears as though the Romulans are going to attempt to tractor the Cube out past the orbit of the moons.

After much discussion, they decided to send a fake message to the Borg Sphere, recalling it to the Cube. It will take about six hours for it to arrive. They also rig a couple of their probes to emit signals that could be mistaken for additional Spheres.

At around the two hour mark, the Romulans finish their work on the Tug and carefully send it towards the Cube, being careful to come in at an angle away from the planet. The PC’s do some quick calculations and determine that the Tug won’t pull the Cube past the orbit of the moons before the Sphere arrives. They decide to take the chance that if the Sphere manages to redock with the Cube that they will return to Borg space rather than going towards a populated system to assimilate a replacement crew. The number of Borg on the Sphere will not be enough to effectively run the Cube, but could likely get it moving towards home.

The Romulans do engage the Sphere when it shows up, but when the Kimura launched it’s bogus Sphere probes, the Romulans retreat, leaving their tug behind. A later review of the sensor data would reveal that one of the Warbirds was the I.R.W. T’Varen, Commander Mheven’s D’Deridex Class Warbird last encountered in the “Border Dispute” adventure where she retrieved an undercover agent from the Kimira’s sister ship, the Nightingale.

The Sphere locks its tractor beam onto the Cube and starts pulling it the rest of the way out from the planet. It’s much stronger beam means it can do so from a safe distance.

The crew of the Kimura is able to take remote control of the Romulan Tug before it gets crushed to the side of the Cube. They monitor from a safe distance, watching as the Cube gets tractored to safety, the Sphere docks with it, then a short time later the Cube goes to warp, heading towards Borg space. A large sign of relief is let out by the whole crew.