The 3191 race between the USS Discovery, the couriers Moll and L'ak and the Breen for ancient Progenitor technology able to create life.
In 3191 Kovich gave Captain Michael Burnham a top-secret red directive mission. Discovery was to recover the journal of a team of 24th-century scientists who had found the technology the Progenitors used to seed the galaxy with life. Fearing its power, the scientists had hidden it and scattered the clues to its location.
The couriers Moll and L'ak got to the journal first. L'ak was secretly an heir of the Breen Imperium, and his people's forces, including Primarch Ruhn, hunted him. Burnham's crew followed the trail across many worlds, gathering pieces of a map, while L'ak died in Federation custody and a grieving Moll allied with the Breen.
The hunt ended at a portal hidden between black holes. Burnham reached the Progenitors' technology and spoke with one of them. Deciding that no one should control such power, she sent the portal into a black hole, while Discovery's spore drive sent a Breen dreadnought to the edge of the galaxy.