Breen (planet)
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Breen is the homeworld of the enigmatic and dangerous race of the same name. It is a world intensely hostile to life forms used to Class M environments, cold enough to support oceans of liquid methane. Conversely, the Breen physiology is so uniquely adapted to their native environment that they cannot survive on Class M worlds without sophisticated pressure suits.
The Breen, ever an enigmatic race, had already mastered space travel by the 22nd century — indeed, it’s possible that they developed warp travel before the Federation was born. Thanks to their own insular nature, though, their technological development remained sluggish. The Breen remained on their homeworld with very few colonies. By the 23rd century, the Breen were rumored to be in Federation space, but contact remains fleeting. The Breen actually had a conflict with the Romulans, and managed to emulate or steal cloaking technology, while the Romulans never managed to decisively reach the Breen homeworld. It’s not until the 24th century and the Dominion War — with the Breen emergence on the Dominion side — that other Alpha and Beta Quadrant powers take notice of this race and find the Breen homeworld in Sector 97.
The Breen homeworld is the seventh planet of the Beta Epsilon-Venturi binary system, which is located near the border of the Alpha and Beta Quadrants, in between Ferenginar and the Romulan Star Empire.
Climate
Breen is remote from both of the stars in its system, and it is unspeakably frigid. Temperatures never exceed –70 degrees Celsius, and liquid hydrocarbons frequently fall from the sky as rain. It is absolutely impossible that any life form accustomed to Class M worlds could survive here without advanced life support.
Geography
Breen has no hydrosphere as such, but it does have oceans of liquid methane that cover about half of the planet’s surface. Breen’s landmass is concentrated into two large rocky continents.
Civilization
Although the Federation has known of the Breen since 2275, they remain an enigma. Their political aims, their ways of thinking, even their anatomy remain more or less opaque. Only the Cardassians, the Romulans and the Founders have maintained anything like normalized diplomatic relations with them, and even so they all feel that the Breen prefer to keep them at arms’ length. Be that as it may, some general assertions about them and their civilization may be made with reasonable certainty.
The Breen act ruthlessly in their self-interest and care little for other races. They keep their motives secret and never tip their hand as to what they will do next. Their decision to ally with the Dominion late in the Dominion War serves as a perfect example of this, in that it took everyone in the Federation Alliance by surprise, and the Breen never bothered to justify or explain their action afterward. The Romulans have their own summary judgement: “Never turn your back on a Breen.”
The exact nature of the Breen government remains somewhat enigmatic, as well. Diplomatic observers on Breen report that they always deal with an ever changing cast of low-level functionaries who are reluctant to reveal their identities. As far as anyone can tell, Breen military officials make all high-level decisions, and indeed, it appears that they have no civilian government at all.
No Federation scientists have ever made a detailed study of Breen anatomy, but it is known that they have no blood and no circulatory system as such; instead they seem to absorb nutrients through a combination of eating and osmotic action. In order to function on Class M planets, they must wear heavy pressurized suits filled with refrigerated air treated to reflect the composition of their native atmosphere.
Breen are also resistant to telepathic intrusion. They possess resistance to psionic activities similar to the Ferengi, which has led to speculation that their brains are multi-lobed.
History
The Federation made first contact with the Breen in 2275 when the Eagle, the famous Andorian-crewed Starfleet vessel, encountered one of their ships while on routine patrol. This initial encounter went smoothly enough, so that Captain Igrilan Kor reported that the Breen were peaceful, if somewhat withdrawn. His superiors at Starfleet noted an unusual tone of uncertainty in his report, however, and subsequently neither the Federation nor the Breen made diplomatic overtures to each other.
Over the next century, contact between the Breen and the Federation was fitful and unofficial. Small groups of Breen operated in both Alpha and Beta Quadrants as mercenaries, pirates and freebooters of various stripes. Their cloaking technology and sophisticated weapons made them valuable as hired help and fearsome as brigands. Breen pirates devastated the Bajoran colony of Free Haven in 2372. Contact with individual Breen mixing and mingling in Federation space, while rare, was not unknown. In 2370, a Breen pilot participated in the palio on the Deep Space 3 station.
The Breen also carried out small-scale acts of aggression against races both great and small, calculating that carefully executed pinprick attacks would grant them some tactical benefits without provoking full-scale war. Their seizure of the Cardassian ship Ravinok in 2366, in which the Breen dragooned the crew into working the dilithium mines on Dozaria, was such an incident. Unwilling to open another front while at war with the Federation and distracted by continuing resistance on Bajor, the Cardassian Central Command registered a diplomatic protest with the Breen, then let the matter go when the Breen ignored it.
In other words, the Breen deliberately limited their contact with the other major races, but their isolationism seemed to make them more dangerous, not less. Their unwillingness to ally with anyone placed them beyond persuasion, and meant that they could unleash their considerable military power at any time, for any reason. This anxiety was borne out (from the Federation point of view, anyway) in 2375 when the Breen suddenly allied themselves with the Dominion in their war against the Alliance. That same year, the Breen proved their worth by launching an audacious strike against the heart of the Federation, destroying much of the Terran city of San Francisco and severely damaging Starfleet Headquarters.
After the Alliance turned the tables on the Dominion and forced them to sue for peace, the Breen simply retreated into inscrutable isolation. They did not send a representative to negotiate the terms of surrender, nor did they give any official explanation for why they had joined forces with the Dominion in the first place. Federation political analysts speculate that they simply felt that they could gain some tactical diplomatic advantage by allying with the Dominion, and when it didn’t work out, they shrugged it off as a matter of no importance. Under pressure from the Cardassians, the Alliance successfully pressed for war reparations from the Breen, although they settled for rather less than the Cardassians had wanted. The payments are handled quietly, through the Cardassian representative on Breen.
Places of Interest
The Breen do not reveal the name of their capital city to outsiders. Foreigners are confined to the Diplomatic Quarter, the euphemistic name for a large biodome with an environment calibrated to reproduce that of a typical Class M world. All contact between Breen and foreigners takes place here, with the Breen donning their distinctive refrigerated pressure suits before they enter. It is difficult to see through the dome walls, since they are often splattered with liquid methane rain, and the walls are made of semi-opaque material, at any rate. Needless to say, a diplomatic posting to Breen is not a plum assignment.
Although the Breen homeworld remains largely an enigma, it’s known that they have extensive shipyard facilities in orbit, as well as cities of their own design in a multitude of areas. The Federation didn’t have the assets to fight the Breen directly during the Dominion War, because of the attention on the wormhole and Deep Space 9, but in any extended conflict, the Breen shipyards would be a likely target.
Reference(s)
- Burns, Eric, Kenneth A. Hite & Doug Sun. Star Trek Roleplaying Game Book 7: Worlds, Decipher, 2005. ISBN: 1582369097.