Tolian Soran

Character History:
Tolian Soren was a gifted scientist from the Planet Aurelia, who specialized in Transphasic technology and portals to other worlds, dimensions, and times. His chief partner was Professor Tanan Zager. When the Borg came to destroy Aurelia and assimilate the El-Aurian race, Soren and Tanan altered their device's programming, so that the gateway became an energy ribbon, which orbited the known Milky Way Galaxy at Warp Speeds; the energy ribbon orbited at a rate of every 39.1 years. Once the gateway was created, it was impossible for anyone else--including the Borg--to follow them into their refuge. When the gateway to the Dimensional Nexus formed, over 1,200 El-Aurians escaped, including Soren, Tanan, Tanan's young son Jaryd, Tanan's elder brother Boothby, Guinan, Martus Mazur, and many others.

Around the year 2140, Q stumbled upon the Nexus, and offered Tanan a choice: whether to remain safely inside the Nexus forever, or to leave for Earth, and protect that world and many others from a Borg invasion. When Tanan hesitated, Q forced all of the El-Aurians out of the Dimensional Nexus to Earth. Many became obsessed with returning, which was of course impossible. Nonetheless, several hundred El-Aurians tried; they chartered two civilian starships, in an attempt to rendezvous with the energy ribbon and reenter the Nexus. The attempt failed, and only a handful of them survived.

By the year 2371, Soran had developed a plan whereby he would destroy two stars, thereby altering the gravitational forces near the energy ribbon, altering its course and bringing it to the planet Veridian III, where Soran would be waiting for it. To accomplish his goal, Soran entered into an alliance with the Duras sisters, who agreed to secure trilithium, a nuclear inhibitor with which Soran would destroy the stars, in exchange for research allowing the sisters to develop a trilithium-based weapon. As Soran prepared to fire a solar probe equipped with trilithium into the Amargosa star from the Amargosa observatory, the outpost came under attack by Romulans who were attempting to retrieve the trilithium, which the Duras sisters had stolen from them. Soran was rescued by the crew of the USS Enterprise-D, and was later able to return to the observatory and launch the probe, destroying the star. As the Enterprise crew attempted to rescue an away team from the observatory before the resultant shock wave arrived, Soran was retrieved by the Duras sisters and subsequently traveled to the Veridian system, where he intended to destroy the Veridian star.

The Enterprise crew ultimately uncovered Soran's plot, realizing that Soran intended to destroy the Veridian star despite the fact that it would destroy all planets in the system, including Veridian IV, which supported a humanoid society of 230 million individuals. The Enterprise arrived at Veridian III, where Captain Picard beamed to the surface in an attempt to reason with Soran. Picard was ultimately unsuccessful, however, failing both to appeal to Soran's reasoning – Soran grimly stating that everyone was fated to die and that he was no longer concerned about preserving life – and in his subsequent attempt to penetrate the force field around Soran's equipment and stop him from launching the probe into the star. As the star was destroyed, the energy ribbon was diverted to the surface, where it transported both Soran and Picard into the Nexus, immediately before the destruction of all of the planets in the system and the Enterprise itself.

Inside the Nexus, however, Picard was able to make contact with James T. Kirk, who had been pulled in during the Enterprise-B's encounter with the ribbon. Picard managed to convince Kirk to leave the Nexus with him, traveling back in time to a point before Soran had launched the probe.

Soran is killed in the launcher's explosion

As Picard attempted to sabotage Soran's launcher, Kirk fought Soran, a confrontation which ultimately led to Kirk's death, when he fell off the scaffolding holding Soran's equipment while trying to recover the remote control for the launcher. Kirk's sacrifice, however, allowed Picard to successfully disable Soran's launcher. As Soran returned to the probe, he found that Picard had engaged the locking clamps, destroying the launcher and killing Soran in a massive explosion. In the aftermath, Picard reflected that he disagreed with Soran's perception of time as a predator, preferring to see it as a teacher that encouraged him to treasure every moment as it would never come again. (Star Trek Generations)