Imperial Historian Klingon Academy Storyline Synopsis

Klingon Academy is a prequel to Star Trek VI: The Undiscovered Country, and is strictly portrayed from the Klingon perspective. The story’s viewpoint character is Torlek (player/character), a young Klingon warrior inducted into the Klingon Defense Forces’s Elite Command Academy, the most prestigious learning institution in the whole of the Klingon Empire. It is here that Torlek meets General Chang, who, at this time in Klingon history, is the greatest living warrior in the Empire and commandant of the Academy. In human terms, Chang is the Klingon equivalent of General Patton; a living legend and brilliant warrior within a society that esteems warriors above all other vocations. As an Academy student, Torlek is instructed by General Chang in the esoteric code of the warrior, as well as in battle tactics and the rigors of warship command.

The story begins 2 ½ years prior to the events occurring in Star Trek VI. Above the skies of the Klingon homeworld, warships loyal to Chancellor Lorak, leader of the Klingon High Council and imperial government, fight a desperate battle against Kalnor, head of the powerful House of G’Iogh and the next would-be Chancellor. Despite his superior numbers and the element of surprise in his favor, Kalnor is ultimately thwarted by General Chang. In a ritualistic duel, the General manages to kill Kalnor before he can realize his ambitions of power, and with the death of their leader, the House of G’Iogh withdraws the attempted coup and sinks into a subdued, if restless, repose.

On the heels of this victory, General Chang returns to the Academy’s halls to begin the latest term as the school’s Commandant. As with every previous term, the General takes his students through a full-scale, simulated war with the United Federation of Planets. This simulated war functions as the foundation for a curriculum espousing the virtues and codes of conduct for every honorable warrior—and it also serves as the basis for another, equally important purpose.

General Chang believes that a total war between the Klingon Empire and the United Federation of Planets is an inevitable conclusion to nearly a century of cold war maneuvering and posturing between the two interstellar superpowers. It is a future conflict that must be fought to the death, with no quarter asked, and none given. It is his intention, and his obsession, to train every single one of his students in the most effective means of defeating an enemy that—in Chang’s view—poses the greatest threat the Klingon people have ever faced.

To this end, Torlek (player/character) is put through battle after grueling battle against Starfleet’s warships in a grand, simulated battlefield in which no expense has been spared to attain complete accuracy. The battles in these simulated trials are epic in proportion, featuring the large-scale engagements of numerous Klingon and Federation fleets, and the destruction of entire planets.

And upon the successful completion of the Academy’s term, Torlek (player/character) is personally recruited by General Chang to take part in a greater conflict set in the real world. That is where Torlek is forced to put everything he has learned at the Academy to the ultimate test, and that is where the stage is set for the tragic events that transpire in Star Trek VI, The Undiscovered Country…

Klingon Academy Press.
Copyright © 1998 Interplay Productions. All rights reserved.
Revised: March 17, 1998.